So you’re new to PlanetSide 2 and you want to get into the action as fast as possible right? Well you came to the right place. Let’s say you want to jump straight to the front lines and start shooting things as quickly as possible. All you have to do is press the “I” button. Pressing the “I” button engages Instant Action mode. Honestly it’s as simple as that. Now you do need to be warned that getting into combat this way could prove dangerous. You don’t know what you are going to drop in on. It could be a massive tank brigade rolling through an outpost or an epic infantry war. What you can count on is an extreme firefight. Squad Deploy Are you a member of a squad? There’s a super easy way to warp across the world and join your squad mates by simply pressing another button. Hit the “Insert” key. It doesn’t matter where they are. You will be fighting right alongside them in no time at all. Using the map Let’s say you want to be a little more strategic about where you end up on the battlefield. What you want to do is bring up the world map and assess where you are needed the most. The map will be divided into 3 colors. These colors represent the 3 different factions in the game. This is a real-time look at how the war is going. You will notice glowing orange orbs, usually along the borders between factions. These indicate a massive battle taking place and that is likely where your team needs you the most. Before you jump right into the fray you do have a few options on exactly where to spawn. On the map you will see small green buttons. If you double-click them it will toss you in a drop pod and off you go. Another way to deploy is to join your squad mates already on the ground and you will see these options in green on the left hand side near the top. If your team has a Sunderer or a Galaxy vehicle you can spawn on those. If your squad leader placed a Spawn Beacon on the ground you will have the opportunity to air drop in on that exact location. So now you know the basics of how to join combat. It can be as easy as a single button press or as tactical as your heart desires. What is your favorite way to join the war? What are you waiting for soldier?!? Your team needs you. Time to lock and load.
The new instant action system is pretty great. That "l" button has saved me a lot of wasted air vehicles for transit. Though I do miss ramming things with my galaxy more than I used to.
"Instant Firing Squad mode" would be more accurate. It is virtually guaranteed to drop you in front of the largest pile of HE-shell equipped tanks on the map. Directly in front of the tanks. I have NEVER had the instant action button place me anywhere that wasn't right in the open in front of dozens of enemies without a teammate in sight. I know of no faster way of getting killed in PS2 than pressing i while in the map screen.
My advice, it is better to redeploy using "U" and check the names of the places were you can spawn. it is better to pick those that are on spawn rooms and/or buildings. They provide more cover to get ready to fight rather than dropping in a drop pod or spawning next to a sunderer.
Would of been better to have this post a tad earlier, but oh well, thanks for the update to the newer players; the more they know
Today I had it drop me into the river you can't get out of around that biolab in Amerish... fun stuff..
Instant action = instant death. Use it only if you care to die more. The smart player will actually use the map, re-deploy around till you get to the right point to spawn/pull a vehicle, and proceed from there with caution. Which brings us back to how broken and silly and restrictive the re-deploy system is, though its somewhat improved these days. A properly run squad/platoon will organize in safety somewhere, then Gal drop in into the action with support vehicles. Give us the ability to spawn anywhere we want, if you want to empower the players to make smart decisions, instead of having us limited in our spawn options.
Don't use instant action. I have gunned down too many poor newbies that thought instant action seemed like a good idea. You rarely live past 10 seconds. Most die within 3-5. I always feel guilty gunning down the BR 1 who lands near me. I send them /tell's, saying that if they need any help they should contact me, as well as how to reply to tells. Look at the map, examine where the hot zones are, and examine population. With time, you will learn to read the map and understand population movement, learn how to anticipate fights, spot incoming gal drops and so on. But just learn where to go first. Find some hot zones, spawn in them, or hop in a Galaxy at the warpgate and participate in your first air drop.
I have laughably fun times drop podding!! Killed by tanks instantly? Hardly ever. I just sprint to cover immediately after dropping then spend ages behind lines picking people off =]
You know your not the only one that wants a balanced fight right? You look at your map to find a balanced fight. You then spawn there and begin fighting right? Well so does everyone else on your faction on your continent. Now the fight isn't balanced because you unbalanced it. Just saying its not so simple uhhhh...what? We need slightly less spawn options not more. Mattherson won the server smash because it was so easy to jump around across the continent. It was a good change to add Gal spawns at more bases so you dont have to redeploy to the warpgate or techplant everytime. Now they need to fix up the spawning a bit.
So THAT'S how you get into combat. I was wondering why all of the enemies sit still and the walls of the map were all squares... NOW I know! and knowing is half the battle!
Okay look RadarX, we appreciate it, and it's a good start.... but if you want your game to succeed. You're going to need to HIRE people, who's entire job is to create a comprehensive guide for beginners which is integrated into the game. You need tooltips and help bubbles and all that crap that MMOs have to put into the first 10 levels that teach people the game well enough to give them confidence. Sure, people in the community have written guides up... but what new player goes to a forum to learn the basics of a game? Only those who are already committed to learning the game, despite SOE's asinine attempts at a tutorial. You have a game where BR100 players still don't know the truth behind game mechanics and rules. Go in the game and poll players below BR 50 and ask them basic questions: Do you know how to repair, hack a terminal/turret, change classes? Attack air craft? How do redeploy locations get chosen?" Then ask them "When does an SCU become Vulnerable? What does it do? How do you affect it? When can you cap a control point? The first series of simple questions will boggle the minds of most BR 1-30..... not the 1-30s that are reading this post. The ones who log on for an hour a day, here or there, and have NO CLUE what's going on. They just pick a class, stick with it, and try their best to figure out where the HELL the Certification tab went, and how to upgrade their armor. (Let alone have any ******* clue what the next certification levels are going to do for them). The second series of questions, I've had people up to BR 97 with NO IDEA. Sure, they may be idiots.... but if someone can play a game that long and still not really understand the game.... there is a problem.
We need more spawn options. Or atleast you need to be able to spawn in every facility that is a Biolab, Techplant or Ampstation or in in the frontlines. I'm tired to hop from place to place using redeploy.
Just hire Wrel (#mce_temp_url#), that's all SOE needs to have a perfect trainer. But, hey, look at my kill rate. I didn't know anything about the game, I even didn't play FPS since the first Doom. My kill rate in the first 6 (six!) months was below 0.2 (to be honest, it was like 0.01 in the first days), but I kept playing. I found a role besides being a sharp shooter and had lots of fun in this open world/total chaos. No missions, no scripted adventure, every day brought new challenges and still does (no, I don't mean the challenges an update grants). Yes, it takes a brain to understand the game play, and yes, it's not BF (you can kill team mates, but you shouldn't) and it's not easy. That's why I want basic trainings for newbies: their moaning might turn this in a boring arcade style shooter.
While a noble effort, this stuff really needs to be in-game somehow in the shape of either tooltips or part of the tutorial. While the tutorial currently explains the basic mechanics, it doesn't really say "why" you should do any of these things or how to make the most of them. Alternatively, there should probably always be a "Fresh Meat" platoon/outfit, that new players automatically get added to, so they at least have people they can talk to while trying to figure stuff out - and maybe even communicating should be added to the tutorial as well. Region and Yell aren't really useful for new players in any case, as those chats are laregly ignored by people in outfits/platoons or using teamspeak/voice communication. Maybe the Fresh Meat outfit could even have "temped" volunteers from established outfits embedded in it, who could both help out newbies and use the "Fresh meat" outfit as a recruiting base for their own parent outfit. I think it'd go a long way to increase the flow of information on the game (who better to ask than people who actually play it?), as well as get more people involved in the organized aspect of the game (by funneling people into outfits faster).
