Right now I'm a fan of an example Figment posted over on PSU - http://www.planetside-universe.com/showpost.php?p=912539&postcount=13 - that I think would do exactly what it needed two for both my issues.
That is the biggest caveat. When facing down equal numbers, the system will really shine. The problem comes when you don't have that, it becomes an absolute steamroller against the underpopulated side. With the current system, there were answers to breaking up the typical zerg with maneuver warfare. Since the lattice is by nature designed to counter this, it leaves them with little they can do. It completely removes a tactical element and replaces it with a simple numbers game. You have more people, you're probably going to win. It's exasperated further by the longer cap times, as the larger force gets to sit around and stare at a spawn room, and the smaller force can't pull any tricky maneuvers to get around the main force to cause problems without a herculean effort. People complain about zergfits now, but if this is implemented, they will only get more prevalent due to the inability of smaller outfits to really impact the battlefield.
What they need to do now is this. Sort the armor situation (paper armor is not going to be able to hold out or push against large numbers of infantry) Expand on Combat engineering. Make it less lethal but more abundant. So those underpopped defenders can at least entrench an area rather than rely on a handful of cheap kill mines. EX ( Reduce AV mines damage / Reduce AV mine cost / double to triple AV mine limit / create a minimum distance to prevent mine stacking and potentially shrink the mines back down a bit) Do that and its mostly sorted.
The game has always been a numbers game. You could split up a zerg with your small group, but a large organized force has the manpower to get more ground then you anyway. If you're complaint lies within a mindless zerg, rather than an organized one, then you should still hold the advantage. Organized zergs will always have sundies, a mindless one will bring some to the fight but with the length cap times now, you could easily get some light assaults with C4, or even just HA's with dumbfire launchers and gal drop a squad or two on top of the sunderers. A mindless zerg will lose their morale after that. There is going to be more added to lattice later on that will refine how it's done, which should add more than the simple numbers game we see on the PTS, but Planetside 2 will always to some degree be a numbers game.
This. I imagine the devs are going to address the armor situation soon, because things like this "Especially Combat Engineering" will definitely give more depth to the game than just numbers.
Well those two items in particular are what made the back and forth of PS1's combat so amazing. Large combat would be gigantic sieges where the attackers and defenders would wear each others resources out. And combat engineering was broad enough to act as a major deterrent. (rather than just a cheap kill system for 1 or 2 tanks) And the armor itself was rare but powerful enough to actually make having armor superiority a major deciding factor. Currently in PS2 a handful of HA can easily halt or slaughter armor.
I think the example Figment posted on that forum is awesome. I like the return of a more lattice type of system but due miss the look of 'owning' part of the continent.
I run with Azure Twilight. We took a bunch of outposts on the east side of the map from the TR and then also focused our attention on Zurvan to give extra feedback on that (since it is one of the "new" amp stations.) Lattice Itself: Better for directing the battle. I really like it overall compared to what is on live. Can anticipate better where the flow of battle will be. Has made for protracted fighting on a more regular basis with less ghost capping. Capture Timers Small Outposts: Can be a bit long, but not by much. They feel fairly comfortable and if they weren't changed I could make due with them. Capture Timers Large Outposts: Definitely feel too long. If you don't own absolutely all 3 capture points, they can take what feels like forever. (I think someone once said, 17 minutes if you have 2 of 3? That's nuts!) If small are 5 minutes, I wouldn't mind seeing big being 6 minutes (for all 3 points) or 10 minutes (for owning 2/3.) Capture Timers Bases: Didn't get the feeling for the main facilities, only for the satellites. Capturing Base Satellites: OMG these feel VERY LONG. I think someone else mentioned it earlier and a dev commented on it. Good good. I think maybe 2 minutes tops for one of these would be acceptable, maybe even 1 minute max. Having them act as their own territory is also kind of a negative thing in my opinion. There were several times that my squad was sent to take one of the satellites, while the rest of the platoon sat in the base. I had worries that we'd miss out on the juicy good exp for a base capture while we were at one of the outer satellites too when this happened. I honestly liked the old method where the satellites were objectives within the SOI of the big base, but not their own territory. It was also not good to be fighting at one of these new bases, yet have no clue what was going on (do we own the point back at the base?) in the main facility. Lack of information made fighting at those locations rather frustrating. With base capture timers being longer, wouldn't it be better to have a larger percent of the territory (thus also including the outposts) for alerts too? I'd think you could balance that nicely if you were careful. A small outpost could offer 5% of the territory, while a base that takes 3 times longer should offer 15%. Not real numbers there but you could see how it could balance nicely. Bypassing Bases using Satellites: Having the satellites ring the bases, and using them to bypass the main facility, so you could start off down another lattice line could make for some very interesting game-play. Personally I'd like to see that element left into the system, but return the satellites to the facility so you get more info and share in the experience for its capture. Is it possible to connect the lattice links around the edge of the base now since they are using smaller hexes? I'd really like to see how that could work and what kind of game play developed from it. Did you see many people trying to do that in the case of the alert? (I'd expect some of that, simply because alerts are all about territory % and bypassing bases could be the best use of your time for an alert.) I think if bases scaled up with the territory they offered in an alert, you wouldn't have the need to bypass them, so this idea could be thrown out. The scaling can be read int he Capturing Base Satellites section above. Zurvan's Dual Spawn: Got to see a little of this in play. It was interesting to say the least. It gave a bit more that we had to pay attention to, especially since it is so close to the SCU. I can't compare it to the other AMP stations, but I think for an organized group, having 2 spawn rooms might be really nice. Having it in the South side (opposite side of the main spawn) is good too, because it helps discourage enemy sunderers from parking inside the walls behind the buildings back there. Then again, they just parked outside the walls and used the walls themselves to camp the spawn rooms. I'd be perfect in my opinion if there was some sort of catwalk on the 2nd floor of the spawn that took you to that southern wall. Currently it is a bit easy to camp. Well that's all I can think of for now.
I really enjoyed the time on the test server. I do think that there should be a mechanism for simply cutting off the spawn tubes at some point when its clear that the base is won. SCU for medium/large facilities seems like a good idea. Sitting and shooting at the door to keep the enemies inside seems a bit pointless.
Thinking of Biolabs here. The attacker or defender would always have a teleport into the main base. In large platoon on platoon fights these are typically won by: securing the satellites .. then destroying the SCU or: bringing up the SCU and clearing the satellites. We absolutely need a way to go around the base. The long timer means they don't just flip in 30 seconds - this is wonderful! You can't afford to leave that base behind you though. Population imbalance and constant 3-way fights will be the problem with the lattice I fear.
I especially enjoy how the game flows on Test Indar. The path system helps to direct fights in different ways, as well as to create areas where players won't know what to expect. It also helps to add more flow to the battlefield, instead of the sprawling mass that we had before. Maybe its a hold-over from my PS1 days, but I feel like there should be Towers out in the Neutral areas, to act as neutral spawn / mobilization points that anyone can take over and utilize regardless of surrounding terrain ownership.
I agree with you, all that neutral territory should have some benefit to capping, or being out there every now and then. Perhaps increase resource gain from having certain outlying outposts, or something.
My complaint lies with population unbalances. With the current system, they suck, but you at least have options. With the new system, they're going to be game breaking, because there won't be one. If you have 1 platoon and the enemy has 3, with the current system, you cap around the zerg to slow them up. You can force them to split into fights you at least have a prayer at with rapid assaults. You can alamo up at a defendable location while sending a spec op team to cap their surround. You can just say **** it and go elsewhere in the continent. While frustrating for the zerg, it provides a legitimate tactic to combat superior numbers. With the new one you... get run over by superior numbers. Fall back to the next base and hope more people show up. The end. The numbers aren't inherently a problem, they just become one when a system highlights them.
And to add on, I think you just add a couple more connections and it works itself out. The current grab one territory and suddenly you can cap half the continent isn't the way to go obviously, but adding in a few more 3 pathway locations could help diffuse some of the population. You start heading south from Mao, and you know your next 3 captures won't deviate en route to Rashnu. There's no tactical decision making to be made at all there, it's just zerg your way to the facility. Throw in a Y intersection on the way and suddenly the strategic side of things opens back up a little.
Maybe the lattice on Indar isn't the best lattice, Amerish and Hossin should work out a lot better since Amerish was designed with a better "Flow of battle" in mind, and Hossin is being designed with Lattice in mind. Hopefully the options or depth you're looking for will appear there in regards to lattice as a sole mechanic. The strategy you suggested about sending one spec op to go back cap, doesn't really work. The larger force could also send a spec op and still outnumber you. The population imbalances on select servers is a different issue all together I think, you can look at lattice and the hex adjacency system, and no matter what the overpop'd faction will have the advantage. There is no strategy a small group could come up with that could beat a larger force given the same opportunities. I think the problem with populations lie more with vehicle balance. There is rock paper scissors in this game, but right now it isn't in balance specifically in ground vehicles. With proper balance of vehicles, the amount of strategies you can use effectively is increased, and in that way you could outsmart a large force. There needs to be more importance in what you bring to the battlefield, and the decisions you make with the utilities you have. The lattice on Indar PTS actually partially benefits such a mechanic, because resources are more scarce on the Lattice Indar. So, making resources more valuable has been done, now we just need to make the end result valuable too. No territory mechanic will change this game from being a numbers game to any degree, the problem doesn't lie in the territory mechanics.
A few comments: 1) Devs need to take care to engineer the fights a little bit better. We got asked for input on the AMP stations, but the only AMP station with an available fight was Zurvan; which the NC also weren't able to reach. Devs need to forcibly modify ownership of hexes to encourage this, both prior (or at start of) the scheduled event times, but also preferably even during the event times. 2) It may be worth looking into having the spawns of an outpost be disabled after it has gone 'neutral'. (Basically half-way through the cap) 3) It may be worth looking into the owner of an outpost having twice (or more) the recapture speed of attackers. Bases as well. 4) It may be worth investigating a mechanic where bases provide doubled capture speed of its neighboring outposts. 5) I stress that Test events should also occur during scheduled major patch downtimes. Its a lot easier to get people on the test server if the live servers are offline. Make sure to advertise this, in advance. Schedule the test to end when the live servers should return back up. 6) Personal non-PTR request but: Could we make the background music that plays dependent on the current Hex owner? That is, VS music plays in VS hexes, TR music in TR hexes, NC music in NC hexes. It assists in setting the mood not only for your type of situation (attack vs. defense), but also for whom you are fighting against (TR or VS for an NC).
Allow the neutralization of Bases (reverting it to un-captured with spawning by anyone there not possible) with the occupation of all three satellites. This should prevent bio-farms and the like. Keep satellite cap time at least 5 minutes.
That's the hope, but I'd rather they use the test time to make the Indar lattice better as well, in addition to taking lessons from this and applying them to the continents more suited towards a lattice system. If you can make it better now, why wouldn't you? Spec op groups may ultimately fail, but it does lead to a smaller battle in one location, and normally with a higher skill cap for both sides. They may be out numbered in both fights, but skill and tactics become bigger factors, and instead of putting all your eggs in one huge, random explosion filled basket, you have a better chance of at least fighting it out to a draw (taking one, losing one) than you do going straight up against an overwhelming force. It's not a fool proof plan, it's just another option. One that will be WAY harder to execute under the new system. Bringing it back to the server imbalances; yes, of course there are going to be advantages afforded to the larger populated factions. But my argument is that the new system accentuates them. Longer cap and destabilization times? Advantage: larger force. Fewer attack options? Advantage: larger force. Less resources? Advantage: larger force. As for smaller numbers never winning, I wholeheartedly disagree. While you may not have seen it, I can say I've seen a squad sized element hold out against a platoon and win, and in one particularly epic defense, platoons. With the shorter cap times, all you need to do is hold out long enough to get the hard spawn to kick a force out. If they're willing to be more mobile and organized than the zerg, it was highly possible in the old system. Add in all the above? Much less likely. Basically, for the people who just come in looking for a fight, then yeah, there's really no apparent downside for them other than the loooooong cap times spent just looking at/out of the spawn room. For them, the territory changes would mean nothing on a strategic level anyways, they weren't operating with that in mind to begin with. And that's perfectly fine. However, for those that do, it's going to have massive ramifications, and a complete dumbing down of that style of play. The challenge is finding a happy medium to where both can coexist, and I think this iteration went too far in favor of the former.
McFatal, you are most certainly welcome for the good back and forth at Scarred Mesa and Regent Rock! If NC hadn't been so underpopulated, I would have been fighting with you instead of against you. But alas, I felt the need to help test more than the need to crush smurfs and barnies. I do believe you shot me in the face multiple times. I do not have adequate experience to form an opinion on the overall system...yet. More testing must be done. Perhaps next week. Shameless promotion of posts on base defense incoming: http://www.planetside-universe.com/showthread.php?t=53957 Finalized idea of a new capture system: http://www.planetside-universe.com/showthread.php?t=54271&page=3
