Biolabs, worse than prenerf crown.

Discussion in 'PlanetSide 2 Gameplay Discussion' started by Apples, Apr 13, 2014.

  1. Apples

    Yes I said it, the current biolabs are worse than the prenerf crown, they've become pure bottlenecks for attacking forces. Some of the changes made to make them less campy are good but there are a lot of things that have been neglected or negatively impacted the biolab gameplay.

    -The biolab rock formation, users are still exploiting the keep running and jumping technique to get up onto rooftops with non LA classes, from there they camp teleport rooms with medics, engineers, and MAX units while attackers have no means to counter them effectively. This problem occurred in the past as well when people would jump across a small gap between the main spawn room and a building's roof and was fixed by adding a tall wall to stop them as they were not intended to get onto the roofs. The rock formation is due for a fix to this issue and I would recommend making the base of the formation jagged or encased in a wall tall enough to prevent non LA from jumping up.

    -Landing pad barricades, they do reduce some of the rocket spam but they narrow down the lines of approach creating bottlenecks. While this does occur the option of two landing pads to approach from does help so this isn't a big problem.

    -Reduced windows on teleport rooms, this in no way has reduced the spawn room warriors and has instead provided more camping options for defenders.

    -Removed pain fields from teleport room roofs and trees that overhang the entrances to the teleport rooms. These provide more camping spots for light assaults with minimal exposure and limited counter availability. This could easily be fixed by reinstating the pain fields and removing trees that overhang teleport rooms.

    -Barriers/walls in front of teleport room exits, these aren't bad themselves but while defenders can camp/reign fire from above with little counter, they provide more harm than good to the game, if pain fields are reinstated on rooftops and trees are cleared from overhanging the entrances then the barrier will provide both cover for attackers and defenders. However, as it stands this wall combined with the other issues involving fire from above create a harsh bottleneck.

    Sure the old crown was tough to crack with only two paths up and huge forces defending it, but it was still approachable by galaxy drop or other air, infantry could get up most sides to attack and move freely, There were no solid bottlenecks like in the current biolab. If I missed anything while typing this I am jumping into bed in one minute so I certainly didn't proof read this. :p
  2. AzureKnight

    You wanna make it better? Have two shields that block a third generator in an easily defend-able area. The two shield gens would be in various areas that were easier for defenders to access, but not impossible for attackers. Say one ground level and another in the biolab. You take down these two gens to access a third gen. When that gen goes down, the entire shield on the biolab drops allowing access from everywhere.

    Or create a very specific weapon that libs can use, has only two ammo, belly gun. Giant-*** EMP bomb that would be specifically for disabling Biolab shields. It would have the same effect of the EMP grenade on anything else. radius of 100 meters, keeps Biolab shield down for 5 minutes.
  3. JP_Russell

    Biolabs don't have nearly the black hole effect on the entirety of the controlling faction's forces that The Crown had, so I doubt many would agree with you.
    • Up x 2
  4. Llaf

    Current biolabs are nothing like the original Crown. I was there as a defender almost every day until it was nerfed. I would log in, redeploy to the Crown, and stay there all day. The only time TR ever lost the Crown was at night when they logged off, in which case VS took it. TR always took it back in the morning. Biolab battles can be won in an hour or two if the defenders are good, mere minutes if the defenders are bad or outpop'd, the original Crown battles lasted for an entire day at the least, and weeks at the most. In fact I'd say biolabs are pretty lame now compared to what they used to be. They cap too fast for me.
    • Up x 4
  5. Crayv

    I like Biolabs as they are places where vehicle zergs die. Even if they capture there is a good chance all the vehicles they pulled have despawned and they will be forced to pull more if they want to continue to the next base. They are also very defensible so people will show up to defend it, which means actual fights will occur there.

    I also find it funny how you are complaining about the attackers being camped inside their teleporter rooms. Imagine if the attackers only way in was a single large teleporter room and the defenders could shell it constantly with tanks and air. That would be a lot worse... yet it's what defenders go through at most bases in this game. So if you are trying to attack a biolab and you can't get out of the teleporter room maybe you should redeploy somewhere else.
    • Up x 1
  6. bPostal

    The only difference that I personally see between the old Crown and biolabs is that fighting at The Crown was fun.
    • Up x 7
  7. Maljas23

    DIsagree.
    • Up x 1
  8. MongooseTwoFive

    I feel the bottleneck issue is more of an issue with the hive mind of zergs more than the design. People love storming the pad instead of using the freaking teleporter room. And the people in the teleporter room stay there and shoot out instead of being aggressive. If you crash out with a squad you can bolt into a nearby building, and now they can't camp the spawn because you've created a new front.

    Today during a biolab we were being camped on the northern pad and spawn room, but somebody pulled a sunderer to the southern pad. My squad rushed the generator room and set up a defensive position. The defenders were forced to pull people away from the northern pad to try and get to the generator, allowing our guys on the northern pad to push in. Camp over. Usually if you're getting camped it's because you're willingly walking into the grinder.

    The other issue is that attacking forces often have a decent amount of their guys invested in air and armor, which are close to useless in biolabs. So even in a 50/50 fight, only maybe 2/3 of the attacking force is actually in the biolab. This is one of the few places where I think the link system was detrimental. It used to be that your air/armor could contribute to taking the other satellites, creating more entry points to the biolab to prevent you from being camped. You can no longer do that unless you have a monstrous zerg capable of capturing everything surrounding the biolab.

    I really like that biolabs have that zergbuster aspect to them. It makes it so lobbing a bajillion HE shells in the enemy's general direction doesn't equal victory. However I would like to see more complexity added to the taking of a biolab. Perhaps add an additional objective on the ground that will help take the lab. An extra capture point, an extra teleporter into the lab, a generator, etc...
  9. Halon

    Biolabs need a rework.
  10. AzureKnight

    See, this is how you break out of almost any camp... You get the massive blob inside the safety net to push out all at once. have medics with rez nades and in almost every camp, you will be able to at least break the forces that siege you or impeded your target. the problem is that it doesn't happen unless it's a platoon leading it. Or as i said in another thread, one dude who pumps the group up enough to make them run into what seems like a death trap. People are too afraid of dying in this game for whatever reason. Or they'd rather just grind certs and even if they have everything they want, they'll grind out of habit...

    Personally, i think a dual shielded gen that takes down the biolab shield would be a decent aspect to biolabs. but that's me.
  11. Frank 2070

  12. Solidpew

    I played this game when the Crown had its former glory before taking a long break. The Crown is probably the strongest memory I have. I can see it now..

    Hordes of infantry struggling to climb up the rocks to reach the top of a hill covered with enemies shooting down at them from angles that made it so hard to shoot back.. Crossing over the narrow bridge from T.I. Alloys and being stopped at the base of the road leading up to the crown.. Pushing from Crossroads Watchtower, over the hill and being halted at the same bottom of the hill, then getting pushed back all the way before pushing back again.. Trying to traverse up the path from Ceres and getting rained down with explosions and bullets from the few paths that soldiers struggled so hard to grab every meter of land with..

    Ah, it's like that scene from Patton where Omar Bradley is overseeing the siege and capture of Palermo. The soldiers charge from a field towards a mountain with old fortress towers that have Axis forces shelling them from afar. A soldier asks him, "who's the bastard in charge of this operation," to which Bradley replies, "I don't know, but they otta hang him."

    No, the current biolabs aren't worse than the crown. Soldiers have the capability to get in, at the very least.

    /such memories
  13. Moz

    Nope, nope their not even close.

    They need a bit of a rework perhaps, but pre fix crown was just plain broken.
  14. Vivicector

    The problem with Biolabs is that the place is too small for the amount of people in there. I hate biolab fights for its weaponspam nature and bad FPS. There is no tactics there (aside from MAXzerg), just grind. Awful.
  15. Konfuzfanten

    The Crown was one big bottleneck. Nothing could break The Crown if you had a platoon of defenders up there. The massive crown based AA would dominate air 1000 meters from the Crown and tanks would get obliterated.

    The only thing left was a constant infantry push/meat grinder, trying to push uphill against heavy sniper fire and explosive spam.

    If you finally got up on the Crown plateau, then you had to breach the tower to get to the capture point, that being defending even more zealously by hordes of MAX's and heavies.

    And your attack would end if ONE of the defenders drop podded down with tankmines near your sundy.

    Fun times, defending...
  16. maxkeiser

    Biolabs are fine as they are. No changes are required.

    I wish people would stop opening threads asking for changes where none are needed. Just play and enjoy the game. Stop asking for every single feature and base in the game to be changed (or made easier to attack).
  17. MongooseTwoFive

    That's true, but the issue is compounded by the biolab's limited entry points. In other fights you can spawn someplace else and attack from the outside, spawn at a sunderer, squad beacon, in a gal/sunderer, etc... In a biolab you're forced to enter either via the pad or teleporter room.

    But you're right that the issue is mainly on the player side of things. Without organization, people won't leave the spawn because they know most likely nobody else will go with them. It's actually really frustrating if I'm playing with just a few friends. We're not a big enough squad to cause enough momentum to get the others to follow usually.
  18. UberBonisseur

    I can't enjoy the game because of Bioblobs


    Thread continues
  19. Wecomeinpeace

    There is a simple solution i allready posted, so i just quote myself from the biolab-roadmap thread:

    Just disregard the downvote from the guy who loves stalemate farms and do this. Easy fix imo.
    • Up x 2
  20. Apples

    So I've seen many agree and some disagree that the biolabs require work which is to be expected, however I will state that the whole reason crown was more popular and so much easier to defend was because it allowed for mutual farming which drew crowds to a point where it often could not go either way in terms of the fighting. The times it did switch hands were as some stated different populations by time of day or if a platoon or two would organize and gal drop on the crown and crash it in an instant. That's where the issues are, the biolabs are just tiny bottlenecks with one sided camping in which the defenders can block all the entrances unless they're outnumbered. In an even fight the attackers could do a max crash but there is nothing to stop the defenders from countering with a crash of their own taking everything back to square one. In fact most times I've finally seen a push out of the rooms or in from the pad it only lasts for a couple minutes before it gets pushed right back out.