How long is SOE going to just ignore the VS underpopulation?

Two reasons this thread is a waste of time.

1. It's still a piece of cake to swap factions in a heart beat during Alerts.. I'm getting murdered as VS... I can swap to TR and still make bank. Maybe I don't get the big bonus at the end... but the XP/certs from kills I get joining the zerg more than makes up for it.

2. IF VS had an once of common sense...they all log out and refuse to play OR play TR... IF VS population dropped to single digits for every Alert... and TR jumped to 80-90%... even the most dense moron on the marketing team would realize their 'prized 3 way fight' promotional was essentially horse **** and they would have to something about it.

As long as VS hovers near the 20% mark in Alert fights... and #1 holds true... then nothing is going to get done.

I have a low level NC toon myself... can't quite bring myself to play fanboi TR yet... but it's growing... Every Alert... dropping VS... for another faction.

I suggest you do the same... eventually Dev will get a clue... or not...

SC arena starting up soon... kiss off PS2 as the lost cause it truly is.


PS- In addition to an XP bonus... I suggest a DPS bonus... for underpopulated factions. Call it like it is...but potentially one shot kills for the thoroughly underpopulated faction will draw folks to it...

They can't FORCE people to start playing VS, they don't want to stop everyone from playing NC or TR, and it wouldn't be fair for them to make you guys overpowered just because you have less pop.

In the end, not everyone wants to play the black spandex and lazers faction. I think VS have a visual style that just doesn't appeal to a mass amount of people, and your faction traits are pretty middle of the road, with nothing that stands out in particular.

I think the only thing they can really do to draw more people away from the other factions is to let certs carry over between characters, as I know I don't want to grind out another character again, which is most of the reason why I keep playing my TR character so much more than my alts.

First: Wow, you really stepped in it with that comment about the TR. They were struggling LONG before the nanoweave patch. If you want to compare the VS to them, you've still got about 9~12 months to wait before seeing any love.

Second: trying to balance pops with weapons buffs is a ham-fisted way to go about things. You're never going to get that "just right" because when everything is perfectly balance, then no one is happy.

Finally, the REAL solution is to build on the existing Pop Bonus system. Under popped empires (NO MATTER WHICH EMPIRE IT IS - DUH!) needs to get meaningful and automatic BUFFS - not some lame XP boost. The idea I floated a year and a half ago goes something like this:

"When an empire has a greater that 5% population margin with the highest popped empire, then each soldier in that empire receives a buff to both Armor AND Health at a rate of 5% for every 1% below the highest popped empire. So, if the NC have a pop of 40%, and the TR have a pop 35%, and the VS have a pop of 25%, then:

40 - 25 = 15
15 x 5 = 75

So the VS would get a 75% boost on both their armor and their shields. TR would get no boost, because they are at 5% and you have to be at 6% to receive the bonus.

There you go. Problem solved.

The immediate and visceral reaction from both the NC and TR players is going to be "No way! I don't want to fight against people with almost double armor and health!" Exactly. That's the whole point.

Everyone levels up at thier own pace, ive spent the better part of a year in the BR70-80 bracket now.

And I noticed after i posted the previous statement. Wasnt bothered to edit as my point still stands.

If anyones going to post anytthing, make sure its up to date.

Well aside from looking awfully gay (not that I'm against that, it's just not appealing to mediocricity of usual players) and sqeamish, VS starter weapons need a tweak. 143/30 is a bad DPM for new players to handle well. I propose 143/35 for Solstice and PulsarĄ

I switched to vs this week(permanently i am a one faction guy) from nc which i have been since launch.
Was bored of nc on my server and fancied a change.

I like the phaseshift.
Scythe though ive not put too much time into it yet is a ballerina compared to the drunk club dancer which is the Reaver, i pride my self with control over my esf and with the scythe i have already done a few amazing things the Reaver simply can not... Float like a butterfly or fall like a brick neh...

Im not into tanks much but the magrider is more interesting than the vanguard.

On ceres vs you also get revived alot more etc than nc but that is more to nc sucking so much, teamplay outside of zerging non existent for them....

Anyway im now converted and proud of it! For vanu!

Ps- one nc guy in /y did question if i were gay when they discovered i was a defector, i find it amusing that people are so narrow minded.
If anyone is thinking such thoughts of the vilolet(feminine) coloured faction and wouldn't join for that reason maybe you are not so secure with your own sexuality hmm?

Pps. Nc has a little girl commander on the voice call outs while vanu have old obi wan with robot voice synthesiser. Go figure.

Are you even reading?

I posted those pictures as an example of how the VS USED to be overpopulated, and stated that they are CURRENTLY balanced and that I never want to deal with the populations levels like the ones in that screen shots again.

That does not solve the core problem of resources though; if one side has 50%+ of a continent losing a vehicle only means you go and pull a new one while losing one with 3 zones means you better hope you got enough saved up.

Instead I'd like to see the following:
For every percentage point below 33% on a continent the cost of ALL vehicles and timers go down by 10%. Below 30% it goes by 20% and timer is reduced by 20%. This means once a population goes to 26% (or lower) they got unlimited vehicles that can be spammed. That will help them push out and actually contest when seriously underpopped and can put a serious dent in any enemy zerg (and encourage people to use vehicles and gain some basic skill with them which will make people want to cert into them further enchanting the meta game). That also means if the underpop empire wants to stick around on Indar then they will not gain a huge boost from it.

Secondly exp gain; for every point below 30% the empire on the continent should get +10% bonus capped at +100% beyond normal bonuses. So if you're 20% or less pop you got 100% exp bonus AND unlimited vehicles; if that don't encourage you to play low pop and farm earn exp nothing will.

As for VS; the simple fact is there are no real bonuses as VS these days (no drop removed on all relevant weapons with one or two exceptions designed around it, fast reload offset by low kill power per clip, mobility nerfed to not matter etc.). Hence I'll harken back to PS1 days of the benefit of VS ammo being used for both AI and AV by simply switching fire mode. I'd like to see something similar added back to PS2 were with a switch all faction VS guns can deal AV damage (reduced AI, increased AV) vs. MAXes (+50% damage), light vehicles (Lightening, Flash, Harasser, ESF, +30% damage) and heavy (MBTs, Galaxy, Lib, Sundy, same damage an ESF takes today from normal guns) at the cost of 50% AI damage. The switch would take lets say 1s to go from one mode to the other. That would give VS a unique faction trait and fit with the outer world tech and lazors doing better damage on armor then gun powder guns (add ammo spec for TR/NC to do the same thing but it would end up being one or the other choice for them rather then switching on the fly for VS in line with the flexibility trait).

Oh and let Phaseshift deal direct health damage on top of everything else (either sniping away at people in vehicles, lets say 3 fully charged shots to kill 1 non nano weave person at 100m as max range in a vehicle (randomize hit if more then one person in vehicle) or they always deal 300hp damage due to the bullet phase shifts partly through the shield dodging it completely letting wounded people with full shield to be killed; scale for distance with 100m being 300hp and one head hit kill range) to actually make it something worth using.

VS didnt have great numbers in PS1 either from what i remember. And that went on for 10+ years, so dont get your hopes up

It's the purple, right? It's gotta be the purple. Manly men just don't want to run around wearing purple. We need a more manly color. How about neon green?

Come on man don't be dense.

mattherson vs overpop happened as a direct result of watersons TR overpop, VS left waterson in droves to avoid the massive Overpop that TB brought with him.
Populations are not balanced at all.

I love purple.
Yep.
Jet black armour would be horibly OP, (I know, I'm sorry) but it would make the Vanu art style SO much more appealing.

https://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/index.php?threads/cobalt-in-need-of-more-vs.187387/

Hmmm... an interesting theory.

Mattherson:
NC from 3/13 to 5/13. VS from 5/13 to 8/13. TR from 8/13 to 10/13. VS from 10/13 to 2/14. NC from 2/14 to current.

Waterson:
TR from 3/13 to 10/13. NC from 10/13 to current.

So if your story were true, then we should expect to see a significant drop in VS on Waterson from 3/13 to 10/13. However, the data doesn't reveal a significant drop like that. Additionally the VS overpop on Mattherson during the TR overpop on Waterson only happened for a limited time... and was in turn overpopped by the TR in August 2013. The second wave of VS overpop (the one most of us remember) was from October 2013 to February 2014. That definitely wasn't caused by TR overpop on Waterson because that's when the TR on Waterson were declining, not rising.

And?

The purple
The spandex
The lore ( Coming across as a bunch of weird Cultist's )
The default Phallic helmets

The Scythe / Mag look cool and look alien Tech ... The rest ... Just some weird homage to 80's FAME ... Surprised they haven't got leg warmers

VS players offline until some alerts, they dont play at Esamir much, while NC an TR do.

The biggest Problem VS have that we are terrible for new players.
Recoil? Accuracy? Reload? Bullet drop? doesn't matter!
A new player has terrible aim no matter what, so all that matters is DPM. He will hold don't the trigger trying to aim in the generel direction and NC and TR just have an Advantage there.

What?! I like NC looks!

What he said.