The Latice system only makes the game more linear and stunts creative approach.

After this Indar Lettuce trial and failure imo, do you really think people will fall for that again?

This game is no longer the game I enjoyed playing, I haven't bothered logging in a week. I'll keep an eye on the forums in case they actually reverse this dumbing down of the game, but I seriously doubt that will ever happen.

So, no more money from me.

Well in this specific situation, capping was necessary because a spawn point was needed in order to bring enough firepower down on the enemy to force them to withdraw. Sure we could just send a few people up the hill to shoot at them, but it wouldn't have been nearly enough to change the dynamic of the battle. And since it was impossible to get a sundy up there, capping was the only option.

Exactly. The lattice system is by no means perfect but this is specifically what it does fix. I also think that the Lattice system is a far, far superior baseline to improve off of than the hex system going forward. I also never played PS1. This is just based off of my observations from playing over 300 hours of PS2.

This game has and always will be about large, persistent fights. Didn't you guys see the marketing material for this game? "Bigger is better?" Honestly, if that doesn't float your boat then this probably just isn't the game for you. That's what this game is designed around. The layers of strategy and tactics only serve to aid that fundamental design. That is, as far as I know, why most people wanted to play this game in the first place (aside from PS1 veterans, I suppose).

The hex system promoted the opposite of what this game is supposed to be about, and that was a problem. Now we have a system that doesn't, and SOE can move from there and build upon that.

Also to the OP, please don't act like you are some kind of strategical genius because you like RTS games and knew how to abuse the hex system (which wasn't terribly difficult). And please don't assume that simple games are meant for children. I would argue that PS2 is not a simple game, at least not to the extent you are trying to claim, but that's irrelevant to my point here. Sometimes I want to come home from a hard day at work and just decompress and shoot people. Sometimes I want a really hardcore experience that I can get super invested in, min-max to my hearts content, and bounce strategies around in my head endlessly. Fortunately, Planetside 2 has the capacity to fill both of those niches to some degree, which is probably why I've put so much time into it.

Wow, this certainly exploded, didn't it? I didn't know the Lattice system was such a controversial issue.

I guess posting this really set off an explosion. There's lots of people both for and against it it seems.


Well, at this point I'm going to let you guys duke it out. I don't have very much "debating patience" as you can see from my post before this. I just get more emotional as an argument carries on and any argument with me turns into an ugly load of crap pretty quick (so badly that I often end-up getting moderated out) so I'm going to stay out of it and let you all figure it out from here. There are people that are pro-hex system that can argue my same points but are more mature in debates and can do it better than me. I tend to just behave like a Totalitarian jackarse that wants to say "this is how I want it because f*ck you that's why". Sorry for sounding like a c*nt earlier. Again, there's better people that can argue on my behalf that can do it better than me. I'm gonna stay out of it. I'm not good at arguing, at least not in a very fair manner.

This is why I insist on making my own Outfits all the time, instead of joining existing ones. I'm not very good at listening to others and usually wanna do my own thing - and I despise any opposition to my wishes. I admit it, my maturity levels aren't great. Well, in the field of arguing anyway.



I suppose whatever has the most support will be the final product, and I guess that's the way it should be, Lattice system or not.

And I'm not really quitting PS2. Not until something I like more comes around anyway. I just said that in spite. I actually get emotional over forum arguments. I have freakin' issues.

P.S. Paisty, you can quote more than one comment in a single post. Just saiyan.


TL;DR: I'm not a very sociable person and sorry for being a bit of a jerk.


Edit: Changed my post colors because I figure the hard yellow isn't very kind on the eyes. During the day it was fine but now that I'm viewing these comments on my monitor at night the yellow hurts my eyes. Didn't realize, sorry.

It's kinda immature for me to even use custom colors. I admit - I do it to stick out more.

I was only planning on quoting the first one. Then found the others

... did you know you can edit comments?

Also, this is kind of what I think too. Except I don't think that many people are outright stupid, though I figure there must be some.

Most people don't play PS2 for seriousness. Most people have a job and play PS2 as entertainment for downtime. OR, they're just kids and aren't mature enough to care about anything but getting XP (of course large-scale battles are the best way into raking XP).

Point being though, most people don't want to take the game that seriously. They don't want to deal with thinking about too much. They came to shoot some stuff and then continue on with their lives. Anything too complicated is just a nuisance. And I can kinda understand that. I guess I'm just unable to have much fun and take sh*t way too hard.

The truth is that I don't even play for XP. I play competitively as if the war can ever end, as if I want the NC to actually win once and for all. I guess taking the game wayyyyy too seriously is ultimately my main problem.

--------------

Oh, and whoever suggested me a different game - I actually started playing Civilization recently and I'm enjoying it. I might try that game later though.

Edit: Looks like I screwed up on forgetting to edit my own comments too, Paisty.

Lattice is fine.

The lattice system has it's drawbacks. But overall it was an improvement to the game. Mainly in the form of letting you know where your faction needs to be defending. Because of that, fights tend to be much more intense.

I don't get it either. The game feels very dumbed down and simplistic now. I really feel like SOE squandered the greatness in this game with this approach. It's too hand holdy and most people who like it seem to have a very skewed perception of the game from me.

When the lattice idea first was floated, I was like, why do we need this? Fix the population imbalances and bad performance. The game still has bad pop imbalances and poor performance. Now we have a dumbed down battle flow system too. All to stop the boogieman known as "ghost cappers" (we couldn't just make it more difficult for lone players to cap whole facilities by themselves? really?).

I'm gonna quote a few passages from Sun Tzu's art of war here.

These are from chapter 6, on maneuvering. I figure this is most relevant.

"By holding out advantages to him, he can cause the enemy to approach of his own accord; or, by inflicting damage, he can make it impossible for the enemy to draw near."

You can strategize by playing mind games with the enemy and where they plan to attack. You can attempt to suck them into an area that seems easy to attack, only to crush them, or deter them from attacking where you don't want them to attack.

"By holding out advantages to him, he can cause the enemy to approach of his own accord; or, by inflicting damage, he can make it impossible for the enemy to draw near."

This one is VERY relevant to planetside. With all the boogiemen about ghost capping, here, it's a strategy to be expected. it's logical to attack where you're expected and to avoid where you're not. That's the nature of war. Now big zergs are FORCED to meet and it's not fun at all.

"An army may march great distances without distress, if it marches through country where the enemy is not."

Same thing.

"You can be sure of succeeding in your attacks if you only attack places which are undefended."

Once again, same thing.

"You can ensure the safety of your defense if you only hold positions that cannot be attacked."

And again.


This game, originally, was very much based off of Sun tzu's fighting techniques. If you watch the history channel's approach on him, you'll also see that his strategy is also relevant to a chinese strategy game, which focuses on taking as much land area as you can....and what's the objective in this game? To capture as much land area as you can.

I don't mind large battles. I really don't. But they should be natural battles. And here, they're not, they're forced. Before the lattice system even went live, there were typically no less than 4 major battles going on across the continent that each faction had access to when the server was full. We didn't need a lattice system to have such battles.

Seriously, read Sun Tzu's art of war. There's a lot of advice in there about strategy, and much of it was relevant to planetside under hex, although is pretty much irrelevant under lattice because the game feels so dumbed down. I really fail to see what was so bad with a system that allowed you to attack places that were "gasp" geographically close to the ones we already owned! Perhaps some aspects of the system needed reworking, for example, I don't think you should be able to attack after a base is cut off from the warp gate...I think that territory should be forced into a kind of siege mode or something. But other than that, hex was fine. What you call "ghost capping", a boogieman that must be destroyed (sarcasm), is actually strategy.

When lattice was added to indar, it was not added as a "test" or "trial". It was just what was going to happen, and there was no hint of testing or trailing it... Instead it was final.

I do not agree with keeping the Hex system, and I do not agree with implementing the lattice system. Instead, these two blank slate continents should have other ideas trialed... Having a number of systems in place on different continents would be nothing bad. It allows the public to see which they prefer.

The idea that there are only two options, hex and lattice, and that we have to pick one of them, is false and stupid.

Agree complately with OP. It's such a boring zerg fest.

The battle flow lines are terrible as well. So many times the battle gets stuck at Quartz ridge now, which is an AWFUL base.

Why does crossroads not connect to alloys or the crown, it just hinders the map for the sake of appeasing a few forum whiners. The middle of the map needs far more connectivity. It's supposed to be an open world war game, yet you cant go along to the next base as your forced on rails somewhere else

It was on the test server for months, posts were placed in the forums here under the test server announcement and discussed to death, where were you hiding?

LOL
Ironic.

Alright, I have to jump onto this one because it's always an eyesore.

Ironic how?

Because "ironic" is the most improperly used word I can think of and it irritates me. I'm making sure you're using it under valid context.

P.S. I'm not longer in the hex vs lattice discussion but I'm still going to respond when I'm directly quoted.

More forumside ghost capping. Making new threads after you lose every argument won't work.

On last time
This has NOTHING to do with stopping lone players. Nothing.
It's about stopping the mostly valid strategy (as you so nicely quote it below) of AVOIDING A FIGHT.

As a SL / PL, in a FPS, your duty is that your players play a proper FPS, thus fight.
But in a open Hex system, the right way to win the game is to use the proper avoidance tactics and thus being counter-productive to your players enjoyement.

The majority of time in a proper platoon is passed on regions where your platoon has the numerical advantage (see Sun Tzu below), against people that cannot and in fact, should not, defend (see Sun Tzu below), retaining said ennemies as much as possible into a fragfest.
In short, you are 2 to 5 vs 1, shooting non stop at energy fields on people going out of spawns.
I'm sorry, I (and the vast majority of Planetside 2 FPS players) did not install the game to do THAT. (and that's why a good portion of the player base fled the platoons to go on the only place they were sure to find a proper FPS, The Crown)

It please your super duper RTS mega strategical player instinct to follow Sun Tzu advice, cool. In your platoon, you are one out of what? 12 to 48 people.
If you make these 47 others turkey shoot non stop without any fight more than half their playtime, you're doing it wrong.
OTOH, if you don't assault the regions that are the best to be assaulted, you are losing, so you're doing it wrong.

===> We have a game design problem right there!

Thanks for focusing exactly on what negatively impacts the FPS aspect of this MMOFPS.

I'll quote myself, from this very thread.

Furthermore, you may be able to find posts I made while it was being tested, which imply that I viewed the lattice system with extreme caution, and had strong reservations about its implementation.

But hey...

Best part of this is the same thing that happened in PS1 is happening in PS2, tons of people can't play in the 300-400 vs 300-400 battles, the Latticer Lobby just tells them to piss off and buy a new PC, this is a realistic solution for all of these people.

History repeats it's self.

People who play on The Lattice are playing the game like Terrorists!!!

"GHOOOOST CAPPERSSSSSS"

You need people on the point to cap points.

OMFG "GHOOOOST CAPPERSSSS"

People must be within a certian distance of the capture point to cap it.

GET RID OF THE "GHOST CAPPERS"

I now say that playing the game on the Lattice is playing it like a terrorist would, and I need to make up some kind of mechanic that doesn't exist and have OCD fits about it, HMM.