[Suggestion] How hard would it be to make a tank game deeper?

You know.. I don't see why not. They did this in MechWarrior: Living Legends with Aerospace, Tanks, as well as Mechs of course. And that was a mod, not a full game. Though the base game Crysis had vehicle sections already. But yeah it would be cool if they did this.

This would help tanks be tankier. Taking too much damage on the left side? Switch to the right. Weapons like the Basilisk would be ideal because you could concentrate fire on individual sections. And of course the idea of C4 gibbing tanks would only happen on the rear of the tank like everyone seems to want.

This might even buff the armor defensive ability. Yeah this gets my vote.

Sure, if I can get one or two of these on the Vanguard:



20-class of course.

I'd love actual module damage, for example, the possibility of destroying an engine, say, or the loading mechanism, with a penetrating shot. Heck, actual armor mechanics would be nice, with the added possibility to bounce shots, account for armor angling, etc.

Also, tanks should be given a choice of multiple guns with different stats, and the ability to switch ammo type on the fly.. With some balance adjustments, of course.

Forget this, let's just remove tank HP entirely and determine whether a tank is alive or dead (Schrödinger's magrider, anyone?) based on which components in it are still working. Though, at this junction, a big change like that is probably unlikely to happen..

I just want tank battles to feel like this:



I mean if we're playing with WWII tanks then it ought to be as exciting as WWII tanks!

It looks cool. But tactically, it's ********.

This is so incredibly complex in comparison to what we have now it isn't going to happen.

I like the damage model idea but.

None of this would make the tank gameplay any deeper.

They're not going to solve the tank's problem of having no real role in the game beyond "shooting mans".

Deepening tank gameplay means giving them more strategic mechanics, ways to interact with bases that actually matter beyond holding down LMB at crowds of infantry and occasionally shooting the odd metal box.

We're going to need bases that have more intricate capture mechanics, a real, interactive resource system that can be influenced by vehicles, meaningful logistics that make pulling vehicles a necessity rather than another farm option instead of this cancer we call redeployside.

Those are real things that can make tank gameplay deeper.

Fiddling with their armour values is not going to be one of them.


This is eerily similar to how infantry players think deeper gameplay means adding another gun to their rack.

It doesn't.
sdfsdfsdfs

Tank game-play cannot be made deeper without massive changes to the game map as well.

There are too many bases far too close together surrounded by "nutty" terrain designed to "funnel" forces here and there.

The terrain has been designed rather than created organically.

Deeper vehicle battles would require added complexity and this game can't handle any more than it already has.

PS2 was designed to be visually appealing as an exercise for the graphics engine. The game-play is incidental.

The vehicle layer was added on top of the infantry layer without much thought (originally) about their interaction. Which leaves the vehicle layer as an out of scale infantry layer since the mechanics are similar.

Tanks in PS2 are played as large suits of armor with big weapons out of all scale in a game centered around infantry combat.

Because of the strange way the game is designed, the MBT's are played often as the heaviest of infantry armor sets... with a massive shotgun or sniper rifle.

Even the air-game is affected with the ESF's and their hover mechanic. Air is played like a flying suit of armor with out of scale weaponry against lesser armored infantry units. Often one on one.

Since the resource system is hopelessly broken, it's ridiculously easy to pull a vehicle which contributes to the mess.

It's the ultimate spammy arcade style combat model.

And you know what? That's what the majority of players want. Why else wouldn't they try the MechWarrior series? I can tell you why.. its too complex, you can't pad KD, and is ultimately decided by coordination and not individual 'leet' skills.

If it had persistence, logistics and an overarching metagame, I'd be playing it in a heartbeat. It's not - it's another deathmatch shooter. I'm tired of deathmatch shooters, no matter how good they are.

Players don't know what they want. If you ask a player what he/she wants, the answer will be more of the same. Players aren't game designers. You don't know you like surströmming until you've tried surströmming.

the real problem with MechWarrior (at least MechWarrior online anyways) is its current population and multi-tier ladder system, not its complexity. unless you are already part of a lance you are ****** if you want to just play with a friend. the difference between the solo and group que is so black and white its not funny. if you play solo you hope you dont get a pants on head team. if you want to play group you need a big group, or you get dropped into a group game were one team is a full team that just been waiting on the ladder to stomp pubs, and yours is just groups of 2 or 3 getting pounded over and over again. add to that its wonky hit detection on fast mechs and it just isn't a good game to play on your own or in groups smaller then 4.

Solo queuers are separated from group queues. Besides my group of friends (enough to field a single lance) can frequently roflstomp 10 man premades (the limit in the group queue, 12s have their own).

Suffice to say.. if you're good enough, it doesn't matter how many people the other side brings. I used to do 2v6's in MW3 and MW4 quite frequently. But.. that is why people don't like it. They can't zerg it.

thats exactly what i meant. if you want to play with one other person you get thrown into the full group que and against much larger teams. its a bad system due to the current population issues.

Just put a Tanarus server back up already.

So what? Just get good. Like I said, I was able to do 2v6's in previous games. Even in the current one, my friends have been able to beat much larger groups. When I played in Beta, it wasn't uncommon for me to find person by themselves and I didn't even consider it a duel, but a free kill. Didn't matter who it was. Its a little harder to do that now because of it being 12v12. But skill > numbers in that game.

System's fine. People just need to stop whining about it and get better.

Tanks have to be tougher than Galaxies or Liberators. Maybe on paper they already are but in game play its ridiculous when you see aircraft tanking better than MBTs sometimes. Right now anti-vehicle libs just need to swoop in bam-bam-bam as fast as you can say that an MBT is shredded.

MBTs need stronger armor.

MBTs are pretty strong in small situations. For example, a MBT with a HEAT cannon and a AI weapon up top... even a kobalt. Is a match for a small squad of regular infantry. This gets evened up when someone pulls a MAX... well slightly as the MAX can solo kill a tank.. the tank can obliterate the MAX quite easily if given the opportunity.

But the interesting things start happening when a force bigger than a small squad, such as a full squad or larger start rocketing and AV Mana turreting the tank in question. Maybe even the C4 comes out if the tank is close enough.

I have to ask.. one tank vs 12-24 people.. should it really win? If your answer is yes, then you're just being facetious. Balance-wise, no one should be able to take on 12-24 people, nothing in the game can or should do that. And even realistically it doesn't work like that.

And here's the flip side. What about those tank zergs of 20+ tanks that come in? Are you all suggesting that they can't deal with a 24-48 fight? You're lying if you say yes. I'm talking about this situation:



You all know what I'm talking about.

Tanks or Aircraft, or rather vehicles in general suffer from the same issues: Escalation of force.

One lone Tank or even ESF feels like a god among men at times. You can drive or fly in and rack up some kills really quick without much retaliation. Problem here is the victims are not content with being farmed, they will react. That's when the AV tools come out. See those first couple of kills would not have been easy if they already had the tools ready. But they didn't, they were fighting infantry and were playing classes dependent on that.

Now they are utterly decimating your lone or paired tanks and your reaction is well.. to do the same. Come in with more tanks and overwhelm them.

Now what are they supposed to do? Well anyone who figures out the answer win's Planetside 2. I could tell you what you're supposed to do. But you all won't listen. You have to come to realization on your own. But for those curious, its simply redeploy, and go for their base they are moving in from if they haven't taken your point yet. Rendering the tank zerg utterly useless.

Sure they can turn around and come back. But who should? It turns into an unmitigated, grabastic, uncoordinated pile of mess. Eventually they make mistakes and slowly get picked off. But like I said, you have to come to this conclusion on your own. Hearing it from me just makes most people resistant to the idea of 'going somewhere else'.

The thing with PS2 is it isn't all tactical, but part strategic as well. But that is a discussion for another day.

Now I'm not trying to say the tank vs infantry fight is fine. Its not. Its not fun for either side. No one likes getting decimated by a tank 300m away and typical defenses just don't seem to work unless you use pure numbers to rush it. On the flipside, a tanker getting rushed and gibbed by dozens of rockets, C4, and mines isn't fun either.

Increasing armor doesn't help the tanks. It just means they need to be zerged by more people. Zergs as we all know are not in short supply. They just aren't.

The fix is base design. Tanks need an objective other than shelling a spawn room. If they were concentrated on something else, infantry would be less likely to bring an explosive zerg on them. Fights need to be moved more indoors, with tanks (and other vehicles) contributing to the flow of battle that goes on inside.

Imagine this. Defenders have aboveground tunnels leading to objectives. They have easy access straight from their spawn room. These tunnels can be targeted by tanks and other vehicles for destruction. Destruction of the tunnel denies the defenders that route. Altering the battle in favor of the attackers until the tunnel is repaired. The defenders don't have to repair it to repulse the attackers. But doing so sure makes it an easier job. Just like the attackers don't have to destroy it, if they just don't have the firepower to do so. But having it, makes it easier. Repairs can't be done from safety to help balance that.

Tunnels aren't the only thing. Ceilings and walls could allow passages for attackers to run around in.

What does this all do? It gives vehicles a tool to use to affect the outcome of a base assault, without needing to shell a spawn room and piss everyone off. Thus anti-tank tools are less likely to be used, giving tanks more survivability vs infantry. The infantry will be too focused on other infantry. They're happy, as they get to fight man to man. You're happy because you're less likely to get blown up... by infantry. Can't say the same about enemy armor. But that is what you wanted to fight yes?

Just remember.. shelling a spawn room with impunity makes you a hypocrite. If you want to farm, you have to accept that you will be farmed. I'm suggesting a way to get out of that. You won't be able to farm, but you will be able to affect a battle more tactically. And of course doing so will be rewarding. I'd also give such structures hardness vs infantry based explosives. So that you don't replace tanks with C4 fairies. They're good enough at what they do. And if they really really need something.. then another explosive meant for structures could be added. Costing 300 nanites and can carry one at a time, requiring 2-3 to blow something, or more. Sure they can blow open something like that.. but it'd be more effective to bring a tank or esf.

But there's my fix to the issue. No need to buff or nerf anyone. Just change the paradigm of base assaults.

I think we are going to have a problem when the vehicles in this game have more detail than the infantry; the primary aspect of planetside 2.

As for the AP armor resistance? I have to disagree with that. Heat weapons already completely suck against tanks. There is no reason to make AP suck against them as well. AP has enough drawbacks as it is being that its effectively firing a needle at infantry and everything else.

Sounds really interesting.

Obviously we won't get the depth that tank simulators have but this seems like a good compromise and isn't as complex.

Essentially, you're just giving tanks 4 hitboxes, 4 health bars and 4 different effects (similar to being on fire). The game can afford giving every infantryman 2 hitboxes (body and head shots) and 2 health bars (health and shields); vehicles are less numerous so why are they less complex?

That said, RR, redeploy changes and missions are still far more important than armor changes.

The problem is that meaningful tank changes would need significant coding not just tweaking stats, ui or art changes. The coders have had to focus too much on bug fixes and performance ever since the game went live.