TR MAX Lock-down, the suicide ability.

when ZOE was OP i saw 90% of the VS MAXes STANDING IN A DOORWAY MOVING NOT A SINGLE MILLIMETER WITH ZOE ACTIVATED
very funny to watch as they never died even tough they took 30% extra damage and glowed like a Christmas tree trough smoke

What if instead of an activated ability it was a buff which applied anytime the TR max stood still?

There is one place the lockdown makes my MAX obliterate anything, that's when I go AA with extended clips. If my bro and I catch a lib or a tiny plane - it's debris in no time.

However it's EXTREMELY situational with many required variants working for you:
1, Got to have your back covered, can't be exposed
2, need full lockdown unlocked and extended clips - otherwise useless
3, refill station close by, otherwise in 1 minute you're out and might not have actually killed anything.
4, support is 90% of a locked down MAX, if you're singled out, a lib or good plane pilot lol's you do death in no time.

That being said I've had few good encounters where I was able to get these variables, but the 3 I remember, it was epic!

Take a double pounder with lockdown 5 and spam a doorway.
Take Burster with lockdown 5 against aircrafts.
Take Fractures with lockdown 5 to snipe tanks from afar.

I liked the Idea of the Zoe and think they need to get rid of Faction specific traits and just give all the Maxes an overload capability.


30 Seconds of + 50% ROF and 25% movement increase available every 3 min.

At the end of your overload cycle Maxes movement speed is reduced by 50%, ROF -50%, Armor resistance to small arms reduced by -25%.
This effect lasts for 15 secs.

Basically you overheated your max and now have to cool down

I am still waiting for the general buff to TR's AI Max that Higby said would happen MONTHS ago. Worst performing Max with the worst ES ability.

I'm not going to derail this into a new ZOE thread. I'm sure some VS can put up a separate thread on that specific issue.

However, I will say that when I am in my VS MAX and see a sunderer, I flip on ZOE and the sundy is dead real fast (so am I shortly after most likely due to random infantry around the wreck), but it can still take out the sundy decently.

The TR Lockdown can do no such thing. You wander around, take a few seconds to deploy the lockdown, and then you are dead due to rockets in the face.

Furthermore, even in defensive chokepoints, the lockdown offers you rubbish benefits. Sure you shoot faster, sure you reload faster, but:

1. You are still going to eat decimators in the face
2. Most of the the time your line of fire is blocked by other MAX units (who are smart enough not to crucify themselves against the floor), or by your own infantry (mostly HA's shooting decimators around corners).
3. You don't have 360 degree firing arc, so you will be flanked or stabbed in the back (which in futuristic terms mean having your kidney blown away by 2 packs of C4).
4. When you do take fire, or you see grenades fly around corner, you take forever to UN-deploy from lockdown mode, so by time you can turn around to run you are already dead.

I'm sorry people, but I have played TR MAX for TEN years and the lockdown was, is, and most likely always will be, completely useless.

It did have a few moments in PS1 when you could lockdown on top of a railing on the 2nd floor by the entrance to a base. That is the only place I have ever seen lockdown used successfully... mostly because a) enemy rarely fired deci's up on 2nd floor when they had 50 guys immediately in their face on the 1st floor and b) noone could block your field of fire since you were on the railing.

I refuse to listen to glorified stories about how things were good in PS1 with lockdown when I know firsthand how easy it was to get killed when locked down, not to mention how easy it was to kill someone who stupidily used lockdown.

In PS1:
Lockdown at front door, inside, on 2nd level worked (and that is the ONLY place it ever worked, see above)
Lockdown at the backdoor hallway or just inside the inner door at end of the backdoor hallway = death by decimators or thumpers.
Lockdown inside towers on the stairs = death by decimators or thumpers.
Lockdown out in the open = death by tank shells, AV or air (unless you were a burster max and hanging out in the rear, ie not at the frontline).
Lockdown by the CC or Gen = death by decimators, thumpers or weaponlocked due to friendly fire from all the friendles blocking your firing lane.

Hopefully this reference to Higby saying MAX'es will be looked at and changed holds true.

Personally I have zero confidence that anything will be better for the TR MAX in terms of the empire ability. After having raised this issue off and on over the course of ten+ years in these games, and the massive disappointment of them not listening to a word from everything that was said in Planetside 1 and then implementing it in Planetside 2... well folks... If they actually manage to give the TR MAX something actually useful as an empire ability then I'll be scouting the skies in december, caues there really is a santa clause.

you take that back right now!

yes in this game it is a death wish (just too easy to kill a stationary target). i prefer upgraded charge you can get around bases pretty quick and people generally follow me outside the spawn room into trouble.

Lockdown is bad for AI.

But with AV or AA locked down MAX turns into a beast!

I think alot of players that hate LD haven't fully certed into Lock Down, Kinetic/Flak lines. If you have then you would know that this ability is probably one of the best MAX abilities in game.

If I were to suggest anything it would be an innate boost to Kinetic/Flak armor while LD is engaged. When you get those 3 lines fully certed(Flak/Kinetic/LD), you will see the true power of Lock Down.

Current ZOE is crap also. They should give us the Old ZOE back and give NC a shield like the vanguard but it only reduces damage by 50% for 10 seconds and it's immune to c4. They should give then TR a ability that gives them a 100% fire rate and reduces reload speed for 15 seconds with no drawbacks.

I'm starting to really hate the players of this game. SOE comes up with a new playstyle choice...playstyle choice is not that person's cup of tea...person goes and complains on forum. There's always, ALWAYS someone complaining that something in the game is not what THEY want, so it basically shouldn't even be in the game since it's not worth it for THEM. This always stems for constant comparison to the other two factions when this game should be asymmetrical in the first place. I don't play MAX much but this is pretty much the same junk that I heard for MONTHS since playing since BETA about how the T9 Carv is this or that compared to the SAW and should be nerfed to hell because your own starter weapon is not CQC focused and you don't want to try a different tactic with it. These types of topics are always going in circles. I for one like CHOICES and prefer to have LOTS of them. So I can figure out what works for me and doesn't. If it doesn't work for me, it doesn't mean everything should be changed.

This is just a general annoyance type of rant.

Even though this has nothing to do with the topic at hand, and is just an attempt to derail into a ZOE thread, it was pretty difficult to kill a ZOE MAX when you would be dead in 3-4 Bluesniper rounds to the head, and when they have one on each arm that takes less than a second to happen.

I have maxed out Flak Armor, and LD is still garbage.

Flak on MAX units doesn't defend against direct hits so you still die in a round of comets to your immobile face, a round of falcons, a pair of decimators, or a C4 brick on your back. And daring to call it the best ability in the game? You have to be trolling, because nobody is that stupid.

This is exactly why I brought this up in the refurbishment thread. The developers think they know better than the PS1 developers but they don't and need to learn from the PS1 Developers mistakes. The Max ability is a fine example of that. I'm taking a modified form of the Max part out of the refurbishment thread and posting it here.

If someone before you has gone through a mine field you should follow their path so you can hit as few mines as possible before continuing on. I feel that the Planetside 2 developers need to learn from the PS1 developers so they can spend less time worrying about issues that the PS1 developers already addressed.The biggest example where the current developers can do this is by giving the TR Max an ability that doesn’t reduce it to camping corners and hallways.

• In Planetside 1 many TR didn’t like Lock-down so eventually the developers gave it an Overdrive ability that allowed it to move while firing at a 1.5X the normal rate. The Max could not run while in overdrive and it once activated could not be turned off until the ability ran out. Currently I see the Anchor Mode as a mechanic that is purely defensive, and encourages camping which isn’t fun to do and isn't fun for the side being camped. Our current ability makes our Maxes into boring camping machines which vulnerable to C4 and Decimators.

• Personally I would either re-implement overdrive or implement a similar mobile ability that increases ROF for a limited amount of time.

Dunno how many times I can say this.

For over TEN years people on TR have complained about the lockdown ability.

There is a reason why we eventually got the overdrive ability, which arguably was the predecessor or inspiration for the VS ZOE.

I honestly don't understand why VS got the ZOE ability in the first place. Since TR is about rate of fire it would have been an obvious ability for the TR MAX if you are going to follow the empire-typical abilities.

Anyways, since VS now has improved ROF then give TR MAX's jump jets.

I would take jump jets over sprint and lockdown without even blinking.

Anyways, to drive this discussion more to the point.

The Lockdown is rubbish (and suicide to use). Pretty much anyone who used it, whether in PS1, or 2, or both, knows this and have no problems admitting as much.

The real question, or questions are:

1. What can be done to lockdown to make it a valid ability (e.g. not having your face serve as a bullseye for decimators).
2. Instead of lockdown, what other options are there for the TR MAX in terms of empire specific abilities?

The lockdown is currently AV, AA, and recently AI at choke points because of spamming pounders. If that weapon would be nerfed the LD at indoors would be too risky with too little reward. Still, it's great as AA (especially with extended magazines), and quite good as AV.

As for the empire-specific balancing of MAX abilities, the whole problem is that:

• TR were giving damage-buffing abilities
• NC were given a big shield (defense ability)
• VS were given damage-buffing abilities combined with maneuverability buff

A properly balanced empire-specific MAX pass would give:

• One offensive ability to all three empires that boosts damage (or RoF). VS might get more damage per shot, TR get higher RoF, NC get a bit of both?
• One defensive ability to all three empires that gives them short-time decrease in damage taken (shields). NC get their riot shield, VS get the glow of the ZoE, TR get some sort of short duration self-repair when under fire?

Those abilities could have empire flavor, but should all provide roughly the same amount of damage boost or defensive boost.

Based on my experience from the 10 maxes i saw on each empire it will be

NC: 5 aegis shield - 5 charge
VS:2-3 ZOE - 7-8 charge
TR:0-1 lockdown - 9-10 charge

It might be wierd but i still see more ZOE maxes than lockdown maxes,dont forget also that lockdown was like this from the very begginning

Yeah but what you said with pounders can also be done with VS and NC without even be immobile,also for it to work you need to be so far that the enemy cant hit you(you are basically a free sniper bait )

Lockdown + Bursters is pretty cool.