Ikanam Biolab

That's not really a constructive way of putting it, but yes. This redesign is bad.

I would if I had more ideas - but bio labs are touchy - mess with them too much and you break them. Even these little tweaks have totally broken them. I just don't want to see those endless, cut off bio farm fights reappear on every continent on every server again.

It's funny that someone would want to remove the only semblance of satellite to large facility flow we have. Amp stations, and techplants are relatively devoid of that.

I agree right now biolabs are rat traps: fights last too long and players get often stuck in a situation where either attackers cannot get in or defenders cannot get out.

To a degree - they just need spacing out alittle more (more prevalent on the likes of Indar) and merging with the previous link outpost to boost it's size (lets be honest the small outposts are not going to support 2 faction populations condensed on 1 map). Satellite bases have their place it just needs some careful reshuffling across the board.

Fights lasting too long isn't the problem (here or anywhere) infact as long as the gameplay and mechanics making the fight interesting / exciting / enjoyable / challenging, then the length of time it takes could be non consequential. Right now the fights aren't engaging: there's no "reach arounds" and you can't employ alot of strategy outside of camping or rushing several choke points. Granted it's difficult to create a play environment where defenders don't just camp corridor x,y,z as that will be the nature of defense however creating outlets and inlets in terms of objectives and footholds that both value or impact heavily there's a reason to not just sit back and camp the corner.

Tug of war.

Maybe add a 3rd landing pad/opening so there's 1 per satellite, 2 way jump pads, each of the jump pads leads to a different part of the satellite base (2 jump pads per satellite), and keep the 3 teleport into spawns. Add a 2nd teleporter from the vehicle bay, that goes into the bio-lab proper (so people that ignore their vehicle bay opens another path into the bio-lab for attackers). Maybe extend the vehicle bay into a much bigger area (like an amp station's bay) to allow for some gate sundy busting and defenders fighting in that area.

Add an external generator for the vehicle bay's shields, not link it to the SCU anymore.

More access, not less access, should alleviate camping to some degree.

And yes the satellites are sometimes too small and spaced too closely.

Problem is although yes these are more inlets, they're also inlets to more camp spots; jump pads to the airpad, teleporter entry/exits, even confined teleporter huts etc. so it'd just create more camp/stalemate spots rather than doing anything special for the attack and defense (I know there's alot "what if's" and "maybe's" being juggled here) but it's effectively no different from what's already there. Also a third landing pad wouldn't really assist due to the lattice links, sure you can park a sundy in an enemy satellite but it's not going to last long - which means you'd still be attacking from one direction or at the most 2 if lanes have managed to be capped prior (not to mention interior asset placement with a third opening).
Also jump pads are the scourge of this game for a bigger reason: they by-pass any form of layered progression to attack/defense; there's simply no point defenders straying far from the spawn areas and going to the outer "layer" if players are flung over head and the place to stop them was back on your doorstep. I'm pretty sure jump pads are abit of a resource hog as well - seem to remember this being mentioned on a WIP episode somewhere.

Another landing pad in the current sized dome means you again run out of space quickly.

The generator option on the vehicle bay would definitely benefit being a shield overload or GSD breach however I strongly believe the method of getting from there to cap / objective point (progression) needs more substance than a quick teleport up (and into a choke point) - and yes the vehicle bay area as well as the main lab would need realistically increasing in size as it should be some form of initial foothold.

Esamir and Amerish bio labs are actually the easier of them to adjust both in dome size and better satellite layout simply because there's alot of terrain to make use of without clogging the place up. When I get chance I'll post some sketched ideas / mockups.

(P.S Sorry if it sounds like I'm merely "poo poo-ing" to your ideas - certainly not intended that way just responding with a point of view to add to the discussion.)

No worries - I'm just thinking that more ways in/out, more spots to camp, it gets to a point where there's just too many spots to camp so the fight has to flow better.

Also make the spawn teleport rooms turn color quicker - not sure what to tie them too exactly, but right now it requires capturing the satellite to get them to turn color. So people can't just sit comfortably in them for long periods.

Totally piggybacking on your ideas, but how about this as an alternative?

SCU shield gen is outside on a third landing pad with a teleporter from the spawn room to a room that's out on the pad that is unshielded.

SCU is moved to where the shield gen currently is.

Vehicle shield gen is where the current SCU is.

As it stands right now even if you do manage to take the SCU down 99% of the time there will be a defensive sundie right by the vehicle teleporter anyway, but this allows the attackers to either gate crash the shields to get rid of that sundie or they can take the vehicle shields down. Either way the attackers will have a bit of an easier time taking the base than current designs while also making gate crashing vehicles actually useful for all three major facility bases.

I don't mind your idea at all but I fear everyone's going to cry about this particular shield gen as I blast them with my various ESFs... so maybe having some structures so the shield gen is not totally exposed at least would help!

This has been on PTS for what, 3 months?
Is it ever going to go to live or did they realize 1 way jump pads onto a biolab pad was ********?

Except the biolab satellite bases were already there to be used - although ruined slightly by the hex system. They can more easily fix this by including the hex bases in the biolab hex with additional capture points that give access to particular teleporters inside the biolab itself. This would make vehicle warfare, and controlling the outer layer of the biolab important, and controlling the airpads becomes less of a one sided scenario (defenders don't care about the outside, and attackers must push into them to capture the facility).

The size of the biolab could also be increased to facilitate larger distances between spawn room and capture points, alongside making it easier to do point holds by reducing the effect of grenade spam (2-4 nades + rockets) tend to cover the entire area defenders have at their disposal for holding the point. Which is horrible for base flow given that it takes the attacker a huge investment (usually a 20-25% pop lead) just consider assaulting back into the biolab once pushed out.

Also more roof access would be good to exploit the 3 dimensional space within the biolab for classes that aren't Light assault.

These things are what I think would be a more universally accepted change.

It's been live for almost that long.

I think the big bases (and maybe all bases) need to be more elaborate. The devs have all these possibilities in front of them yet haven't used them yet. IMO the newer version of Amp Stations was a step forward for creating more elaborate large bases that were broken up into sectors that allowed the attackers to foot hold. Now don't get me wrong the new Amp Stations have some small flaws and one large one we see today.

The new Amp Station version is great for 96+ vs 96+ because it helps attackers gain a non-destroy-able foothold but in say 12 vs 12 fights its a nightmare. The points are so easy to capture and since the base is so large it takes far too long for people to react to where the enemy is. This leaves you (defender) with a 2 hour cat and mouse game of always having to capture the enemy controlled point while also hunting down every last one of them before they capture a new one.

The large bases are meant for 96 vs 96 and it shows with the newer Amp Station and the tech plant design but bio labs just become a cluster **** as their isn't enough room.

The best thing for biolabs would to either expand its main floor or add another level to it like a basement if you will. Said 'basement' could either be put directly under the main floor or even under the biolab itself as a whole (literally under ground).

Carbon Copied posted about having a larger 3 way based biolab and it actually kind of makes sense considering the way lattice turned with biolabs. Each biolab usually has 3-4 connector bases to it so why not have 3-4 air pads? I'd prefer 4 as it leaves things a little less predictable.

But anyways I suppose I should get back to the larger issue. It would seem bases are designed with a player pop number in mind. Small bases are designed to be balanced at 12 vs 12 / 24 vs 24 while towers and medium sized bases are more meant for the 48-96 crowd and the large facilities are best with 96+. Now on paper this is all fine and dandy if it went this way but there are several times due to the lattice system and pop. where you get constant 96+ on small bases (the zerg!) and 12 vs 12 on large bases. This creates really boring game play. Anyone on a receiving end of a 96+ on a small base just says "**** this i'm out" and anyone having to defend a large base with 12 just says "i'm spending 90% of my time running, I have better things to do" and just leaves. This leads us to Redeployside 2 where people move around to almost even fights and hate waiting for reinforcements.

To fix these issues large bases should be redesigned into partitions much like the Amp Station but each part should be hard to take in itself. (Biolabs already have multiple points so it shouldn't be too hard) Tiered capture objectives create better large standing fights as it gives people obvious points to focus resources on. To achieve this add better bottle necking points and counters to them. Design bottle necks around numbers of 12-24 so unless you exceed that your not getting through. Add new ways to bypass bottle necks if you have the resources (class mixture, maybe even actual resources!). Add more hackable objects maybe like DOORS!! Smartest thing to PS1. (When I say doors I mean ******* metal doors, not shields. Everyone love surprises). Maybe add destruct-able objects, you guys are developing this stuff for Everquest Next (same game engine), put it in PS2! You could make some destruct-able with rockets and others with C4 only. Add some options to bases that reflect classes you can associate. Medics and Infils should be able to "do more" (I say do more when i don't have ideas) at Biolabs, Light Assaults and MAXes at Amp stations and Heavy Assault and Engineers at tech plants. Adding more environment based options especially class specific ones will liven up gameplay by adding more niche things to classes while filling voids in base designs and class composition/representation. Go back and look at Routers from PS1! Potential infil skill.

Make large bases harder for small groups to take, maybe even impossible. Bring back automatic base turrets from PS1. The auto base turrets made it hard for small groups to approach unnoticed as the turrets would attack sundies(AMS) or tanks that got close. Right now base turrets are one of the most under used defense options in the game as they only get used when there is a 96+ pop and enough people around to fill them all. A 12 man defense team doesn't have time or resources to man each turret and protect every side of large bases.

Reform the lattice system as to force the zerg to break into smaller groups and follow channels that lead to the large bases and tower. Have 2-3 small base channels lead to a medium base then continue that channel to large base but do it 3-4 times over. That way the zerg gets rewarded for breaking up and tackling multiple avenues of attack getting to a large base. To prevent defenders from defending a single lattice chain with 96+ you make each tier of base more important to the teams cause since right now people only truly care about tech plants. *cough* *cough* *new resource system* *cough*






All this would only work if done at the same time.

Perhaps i said too much...

Took this during an alert today, Taking it was fun.

Then everyone just kinda sat there since there were no exiting jump pads....

Flow in works. Flow out doesn't.

If you want to do something new with biolab in terms of offense and defense do this instead:
2nd level



Something to draw imagination on :3 The top tube is a one way entrance and upon SCU detonation a unique shield generated by SCU also breaks down releasing access from top tube to lower levels for cleanup parties.
The cost will be that when SCU blows up, anyone in the room dies if blue gen is now downed by allies by the time, or by the defending forces..

i will propose to Just connect the satelites together in a triangle network. and make a entry top of the dome for gal attack !



1. No more forces block by the Bio on map
2. Good figth on feet of bio between sat

BIO will stay a objectif for health/ tank/ planes

THIS! Could be done for every named-facility (Tech, Biofarm, AmpStation). Link the 3 satellites together.

for this specific biolab, the following
"Attackers can use any teleporter now, not just the one in their Satellite." is a great idea, doing what would my above comment do, with the restriction that.. people actually have to cap the biolab to progress onto the map. While, connecting the satellites together would allow attackers to go deeper into the enemy territories.

(shrugs) they still need to go back to the drawing board on the larger bases and how they function with their satellites.

The old method (pre-lattice) was that whoever controlled the point on those outlying bases got an indestructible spawn room, which was pretty stupid from a design point. (Players despise that mechanic in Zurvan/Sungrey where attackers get spawn rooms.) Nobody who understands strategic depth wants to see the "flip a point, gain a spawn" mechanic. It's "redeployside" taken to the extreme.

#1) All of the surrounding satellites should be merged into the main facility for capture points. Each satellite should have a capture point (which puts 2-4 of the five total capture points *outside* the dome). That alone fixes the saturation issue that occurs at the landing pads of the bio-lab dome. This was originally done with Suarva, but not done well. The fights now get spread across 500-1000m of area instead of the 120m inside the dome (and the 20m at the entrances). Defenders can turtle up to slow the capture, but not forever.

#2) Vehicle and infantry terminals at the satellites should be left in place, but owned by whomever controls the bio-lab. So infiltrators can hack them, but defenders can destroy them to deny their use to the enemy, etc.

#3) Defenders should be provided spawn rooms at the satellites, but with a SCU and SCU shield generator -- both of which can be destroyed in 2.0-2.5 minutes by attackers.

#4) Jump pads and grav lifts to the landing pads should be left in place from the satellites.

#5) Teleport tubes to/from the bio-lab should simply be removed. Remove those boxes of death and stupidity and use the space to re-arrange the interior so that all bio-labs are slightly different. Move the SCU shield generator around. Yes, that means there will only be 2 ways into the bio-lab for attackers via the pads, but since the majority of the capture points are outside, it won't have an effect.

#6) Add some sort of hole in the roof at the very top of the dome to allow infiltration. LAs could use it. Or anyone with the "safe fall" implant. This would provide an interesting 3rd route into the dome for attackers.

I'll keep it simple.

It sucks.

No need to post my reasons as they've already been posted by several other players, so I'd just be repeating them.

A lot of players love biolab fights. I'm sure a lot hate them too. But it's just one type of base. So why mess with it? Why ruin them for players that like them on a chance those that don't MIGHT feel a little better about them?