The New Player experience per the Cryaotic Stream: "It's fun when you're not getting **** on."

Link: www.twitch.tv/cryaotic/b/551588262?t=55m01s


Never have I seen players try so hard to have fun just to be so incredibly defeated. I'm honestly embarrassed by how awful this game is for new people, and it is why I will NEVER recommend this game to anyone I care about.

Now, I haven't been able to go through the entire stream because twitch is being awful, but a few things I noticed:

1. Default loadouts for vehicles and maxes are awful, and it takes forever to get them to any kind of usable state.

2. Weapon's lock system exists purely to crush new players who have the audacity to not be able to properly identify the absolute mess of colors that make up PS2 factions.

3. OHKO needs to go. Whether it's from tanks, grenades, planes, whatever - it leads to the most "how did I die?" moments, which we know for a fact is one of the BIGGEST REASONS that new players drop this game like the garbage that it is.

4. On a positive note, this game is actually super pretty when you are not getting instagibbed by every vehicle in the hex. Also, infantry combat is actually fun when, again, you aren't getting wrecked by vehicles, maxes, and explosive spam. Seriously, he takes down a few BR100 players as a PDW LA, which would simply not happen in the vehicle/Max arena.

5: Resources/Timers are the worst, and the resource revamp will not be enough to fix what is the greatest barrier to new players trying to do anything other than get farmed as infantry.


Now, my suggestions to fix this would not fit in this thread, and can be summed up as "Take PS1 and remove maxes and all AOE infantry weapons," but something needs to change, or this game doesn't have a chance.

Force multipliers need a serious rework, they hamper the new player experience horribly.

I am hoping the resource revamp tweaks how many people spam vehicles or MAX's but tbh from playing on PTS a few hours the other night the tick rate of nanites coming in was to fast. There is still no reason not to spam tanks, libs, MAX's

And that's not to even mention that Spawn rooms need more exits and need to never be in line of sight of any vehicle EVER

Oh and please lock Indar from new players or something. It is the easier continent to farm spawns with vehicles. Keep them away from that **** at first

So if SOE want to do this type of thing again, what they need to do is find outfits that know what to do with large numbers of people and also have excellent gameplay knowledge, then partner the personality with the outfit. Hopefully there will be 2-3 people in each squad who know what they're doing and someone upstairs finding good fights and pulling out of farmfests.

No, SOE needs to design a game where "farmfests" don't exist.

^ Long Term Solution

Seeing as they're doing promotions NOW, they need to make the most of them by promoting good gameplay.

You know, I'm getting a little sick of this constant stream of "new playerz experience iz bad" that keeps cropping up. Let me tell you a little story. I started extremely recently comparatively (April of this year) and cut my teeth just like everyone else. And I'm still here. Because I cut my teeth. I damn near broke them off at times. I now have respectable stats and have partaken in things that make me tear up in how awe inspiring gaming has become. Because I cut my teeth.

My point here is that this game is hard. It is hard as steel. Hard as fricken diamonds. And that is why it is so endearing, the knowledge that each kill is a testament to your reflex and tactical knowledge. The knowledge that your contribution took that base. And yes, there are times when you are shoving infantry's face into their nethers with reckless abandon, we've all been there and will continue being there because of gaps in a faction strategic planning. But no one got to where they were without a little hard work and deep thought.

The way new players are viewing this game is that they'll be master of the battlefield in a month tops. The game is currently marketed wrong as a traditional FPS when it needs to be marketed more as a tactical FPS, like ARMA and it's ilk, because that is the game feel currently chosen. And so, when a new player makes a poor tactical choices, or decides to take up a lost cause, they suffer the consequences due to the unforgiving nature of tactical FPS games. And then they whine. And then forumside whines about their whining. And then I whine about said whining.

Whineception?

The point is, the game is as good as it is because it isn't catering to the run and gun, twitch masters, but rather the thinkers and planners. And that makes people frustrated when they don't get it.

Game is fine as it is. New players just need patience and the will to learn and adapt to new systems (which is fun, anyway). The challenge of PS2 is half of the fun. It's not like other FPS games.

The last thing we want is the game being dumbed down any more than it has been already.

Oh, so because you suffered, everyone else should too? Yeah, I'm sure that will lead to healthy F2P community.

And don't tell me this game is hard. On the farmer's end, this game is not hard. It takes no thought. It takes no "tactics" beyond "pull the next force multiplier and farm the players who can't or won't do the same." All of the difficulty is frontloaded on the players least capable of dealing with it, and that's absolutely idiotic.

I agree it could be more new player friendly but I don't think the default loadouts are that bad and the new death screen pretty much sums up how and why you died. The problem lies in the learning curve. When the game came out SOE released a bunch of tutorial videos but they seem to have fallen out of sight so people need to look the videos up themselves if they want to learn.

This game is not fine as is, and I'm not concerned with "dumbing down" a perpetual farming simulator. It can't get any dumber. Pop into PS1 if you don't believe me.

That ESF at 34:00. Tell me that wasn't just like your first X months of flight.

Also, the MAX instant death at 15:00, with a 10min "haha, you died" timer.

"Beta Nights" at 41:00.

This video is actually a really good example of the NPE.

When WoW is down or you maxed out gearing (finally 550 Prideful); going back to EvE doesn't appeal right now (no stomach for the politics); BF4 (or worse CoD) is the same o' same o' - Planetside 2 has it's place.

But for broad appeal, TKs alone disqualify it (why the default server profiles for Battlefield is FF off; why WoW doesn't allow collisions as kids ruin player experience). Too much griefing, and griefing attracts the worst players, with the worse community attitudes. You don't want that when you're paying $110/mon on your server, either!

The ONE thing SOE did right in their games has been keeping community. Planetside I just can't see as an asset due to the mechanics that brings to the game the worst elements. EQ2 wouldn't tolerate those attitudes (and that's where I come from), and seeing CoD/WoW in a SOE game ... ack. It's not even like Battlefield, you can find servers that suits your play style. Here, it's take it or leave it.

And community is what makes of breaks a game. If it's not welcoming to new players, it hurts the game's growth and retention. Like I asked for a better way to group in EQ2 years ago than spamming 70_80 chat looking for a dungeon group for 3hrs -- and before Blizzard added it into WoW -- and the status quo balked at the ideas. Blizzard added it about 3 months after I started playing WoW, and come WoD, we'll see a new form of grouping for raids, too.

Its became a massive hit, that MMOs implement now.

But SOE could've been the first. I still shake my head over it all, that resistance to preserve a brand more, than adapting to the very market we're told to accept and adapt too.

Until publishers are willing to adapt their systems -- not copy -- games will be more of haves and have nots, and too cookie cutter to be much different and satisfying.

F2P games also have some weeding to do, as well. Usually I pay for games, but with PS2 (and now seeing they brought the no-no into a F2P -- buying resources itself -- which after the Asian grinder P2W experiences and the "whale" syndromes they face) SOE should've known better. I supported EQ2 having a RMT model, but not buying resources itself. A new player to ever catch up will have to be a "whale", and that is going down a dark path in gaming, too.

Idk, it's really not so bad unles you make the mistake of picking Emerald, and then picking TR on top of that.

VS have a lot of no fun allowed outfits, or at least one, and it's a fairly large zergfit, then they've also got every top competitive outfit on the server, like yours.

NC are fairly competent, but the TR is really alone, and have been the punching bag for quite some time. It's really hard to play them and have any sort of fun, especially if GOKU shows up with their platoons of dedicated PPA magriders. Your guys are frustrating as well, but that's just infantry combat, not the spawn camping type.

Because of situations like that, not a whole lot of people even play Emerald TR, most of the ones that do are low BR and prone to quit or just switch to VS. It's just not fun getting pubstomped and feeling like you didn't have a fair chance.

I think you've touched upon the answer here. Getting owned by your server's brand of try-hard infantry players is frustrating, I get that - but it's not nearly as bad as getting wrecked by legions of farm-mobiles (if only because they are only so many try-hards, yet there are nigh unlimited farm-chariots). That's one of the points I came away with from the stream. I think severely limiting the ways experienced players can absolutely destroy infantry with force multipliers is the first step, followed up with rebalancing the infantry game once it's somewhat insulated (eg, nerf the orion, HA shields, etc.).

In all honesty I think that all the problems you have mentioned with the new player experience will be mitigated with the September changes on the road map:

• Mentor system - experienced players get XP for leading new players
• Integrated tutorials

Heck even phase 2 and 3 of the mission system will help new players find what objectives are available
I don't understand your grip with being a farm... its a game with battles of 300 or more players, they have to die somehow. This isn't red rover.

EDIT: I feel a high learning curve is fit for PS. And I also think that having 100 noobs following you, with out anyone that knows the game teaching you how to play (like what they had going) is going to make it harder to learn.

And as someone else has put it: they are entertainers, they wouldn't have had as much trouble if they joined an actual outfit squad that knows what they are doing or at the very least answer any questions.

I have put some time in over the last couple of days out of fascination of how bad this title is both gameplay wise and also technically.

Mostly offpeak and it is pretty bad, but I made the mistake of playing peak last night and that was really bad, the worst I think I have ever seen in an FPS.

All it consisted of primarily was rank 100s in tanks sitting on hills as far away as they could spamming rounds into bases.

The noise was painful through headphones, the constant ceaseless hold down LMB pounding of tanks firing from both sides, with little for infantry to do as AT does absolutely nothing even if they are in range.

1HKs are pretty much all there is now, be it tank round, aircraft, shotgun, shoot you in the back invisible sniper, it is a cold war escalation of who can get total domination over an opponent so they have 0% chance of being able to fire back or kill. There is no balance, especially for the meat bags that are infantry.

I also think that the only way to explain my playing experience is that I am playing 'behind' everyone else, which would explain the superhuman aiming and firing I encounter and why it only takes 1-4 hits to kill me with firearms.

To begin I was 2/15, but whatever 'it' was 'cleared' and I managed to climb back up to 1/1. I then experienced what I was used to, being able to hit and kill over no matter what I did hitting but doing absolutely nothing and it was somewhat of a surprise.

Earlier in the day, through frustration, I managed to work out that if I used a high RPM gun I could hit and kill as using anything under 600 rpm I was hitting and they were just walking off or instakilling me. I opted for a GDF 7, not out of choice as I don't enjoy it, it was the only gun that worked along with other smgs.

In one instance I fired 90 rounds at a player on a flash, was hitting and when they got off it took 1 round to kill them

Nothing makes sense on what you are seeing/doing and combined with absolutely no gameplay and an abundance of exploiting/farming rank 100s I don't consider this title worth playing after their nearly 2 years of development, what about some poor SOB that has just installed fresh?

Best word I can think of to describe this title is 'toxic' in a way that only SMNC can begin to compare with.

Killing them is fine. Crushing their spirits and dreams into tiny helpless shards of "screw this I'll do something else" is not. Farming does the latter, and it's way too easy to farm new players in this game. I accept that there will always be some farming, but that should be the reserve of exceptionally skilled players, with all the rarity implied, not the domain of any BR70+ who pulls a PPA or a max.

But you are correct. Players have to die. I just want them to have a chance first in at least 70% of their deaths.

All I could tell you is that I agree mostly, and so do a lot of ForumSiders. PS2 is, to put it in a collective context, a mess. Here are ProL33tWSAGMGLGM420NoWeapon tips;

- Abuse all the crutches
- KD farm in any and every way possible
- Keep cheesing
- Reply to every /Tell with "QQ more", "L2P", "No English"
- Real l33t Pros fly ESF with A2G or Mag
- Real l33t Pros have MAX weapons in their top 3
- Real l33t Pros have SMGs and Shotties in their top 3
- Real l33t Pros have top Class Engie and LA because farm and C4 and Shotties
- Real l33t Pros have over 9000 PPA Kills

The problem here, at least that I'm seeing in this video, is that both the streamer and his followers are not aware of what to do and how things work. This would be a problem regardless of whether we have strong force multipliers or not. He constantly said things like "Where do we go?" and "I don't know what to do" throughout his stream. Some of his problems, at least in weapon selection, could've been solved by simply reading the text that comes with the weapon or vehicle (he was a bit lazy, I noticed ) but most of the other stuff isn't blatantly obvious to some people. Like player meta, where to go, or what to do. Seemingly simple questions with not so simple answers. Even where some vehicles fit in the grand scheme of things.

The bad part is, that SOE is taking all the wrong steps to help new players. Messing with spawns, adjusting meta, and things of that sort that completely, and by a hilarious margin, miss the problem. What needs to be done is making the newbie experience top priority by focusing on integrated tutorials and an actual tutorial that doesn't just go over the class system or how to shoot a rocket at a tank. Make an effort to help players become well informed. If they choose to ignore the tutorial, refuse to learn from experienced players in the mentor system, and click off the integrated tutorials in their game options, so be it. That's their issue then. But you have to at least make the effort.