[Suggestion] Planetside 2 Is In A Sharp Decline, It Needs New Content

we still have a server merge remaining (Emerald and Connery for America and Cobalt and Miller for europe)
that'll make a HUGE difference for server pops.

also if DBG are reading this, don't break the spawns as you plan on, that is the absolute fastest way to kill this game,
longer respawns, more restrictions, not being able to spawn at big fights, NOONE WANTS ANY OF THAT.
you would absolutely obliterate this game with such an obviously terrible idea.

I don`t want new player to be as good as a veteran. I want a reasonable amount of advantage for more skillfull player but not SO insane amount that it drows new player away from this game. New players should learn, but not to the point when he can`t do anything to veteran that abusing network advantage and current META of the game.

Did devs say that spawn time will be increased? Sounds as it is just sending infantry at nice waves every X (10-20) seconds instead of constant stream.

Reasonable advantage? This is mainly a skill based game. Short of adding homing bullets there is no way to balance skill vs lack of skill.

I didn`t say that I want full casual PS2.
In 1v1 veteran should kill new player, but tactical advantage (Positioning and weapon choice) should negate aiming skill. Otherwise it is just a game of reactions and aim and not a tactical team-based shooter that PS2 claims to be.
If PS2 will continue to punish new players it will just slowly die. Vets want the best toys on their hands and to save their favorite META playstyles that maybe fun for them but not fun for everyone else.

You mean, even if I liked the game, I can't stop playing if I wanted to stop?
How very banana terran republic.

If your team is getting beat by a single player its because you are bad at video games.

Actually a lot of people enjoy a challenge.

Imagine Super Mario Brothers, if you are old enough to remember that game, and imagine if there were no obstacles to jump over and no turtles to kill you. Imagine you just ran along flat ground from start to finish.

That would be very boring and that's what you are advocating.

They already did this with the air game. They made it so you dont have to be able to aim or really even to fly well, just get close and shoot coyotes and win.

Did this do anything positive for the air game? No. It went from a game that people really enjoyed, passionately even, to a throw away worthless endeavor.

You don't need to practice or get better, just use the right weapon and for most people thats very boring in anything but the very short term. It took away any desire to try to get good at aiming or flying.

Before coyotes and locks if you got burned down by another pilot who was using superior skill it caused a desire to practice more to get better and come back and win. Now you get burned down by some noob with coyotes and it just makes you want to log, or play infantry.

And again. I didn`t say that this game shoud be casual. I ask for one simple thing: give new player a better experience.
For whom big headshot multipler on automatic weapons is a good thing?
For A) Cheaters with aimbot
For B) Veterans that constantly sh*t on new players and wondering why playerbase is declining.
Do you want more advantage for veterans? Fine. Play in the ghost towns that PS2 servers will become if nothing will change.

Maybe "vets" should start to understand the difference between real skills and exploits/knowledge/muscle memory that also a monkey could develop.

I have the utmost respect of players who developed a keep sense of strategy/tactics and are able to position themselves in such a way to flank the enemy, understand when to attack or when to retreat and be able to remain cool and go for head-shots when entering in a room full of rabid HAs, clearing it (and maybe dying in the process) for the rest of the team to follow.

I have far less respect for players who have learned the trick to go on the roof of Biolab building without being an LA or can immediately find that invisible Sunderer because they know exactly where it is parked, or know the right spot and angle in any base from where to farm incoming enemies without risks. Sorry but there is no skill in that. Just like to handle the recoil of a weapon is not a a display of superior knowledge, but merely moving the mouse automatically like a monkey would do after a while.

Today PS2 rewards both, and I daresay it rewards more cheesy tactics and solo farming (clearly the second category of players) as opposed to players who fights for group objectives.(the first one).

Even if head-shot multiplier were removed entirely - veterans would still be better than new players.

They would likely employ better tactics
They would have a better choice of weaponry
They would have a better understanding of the game mechanics (clientside/lag)
They would have better control of recoil
They would probably have better reflexes
They would likely land more shots overall

The current headshot multiplier is IMO overkill and allows veterans (and cheaters) to take out less experienced players - even where they have been outplayed or caught by surprise.

Nothing is more frustrating that getting the drop on a HA and unloading a magazine into them - only for them to pop overshield on, turn round and plink plink you are dead.

Surely having utter dominance over other players is boring. What fun is a game whereby 95% of the engagements you undertake you know you are going to win because you can just plink them in the head.
There are plenty of other areas of the game where 'skill' can be employed

Yes, current headshot mulipler is overkill. Devs should make it so 1v1 engagements between vet and newbie (When neither of them have any tactical advandage) leave veteran with something like 30% of total HP.
Also they need to remove CoF increasment while in ADS. It is reasonable for hip-fire, but not for ADS. Bursting is just another unnecessary frustrating skill check to give already dominant veterans more power.

True but there is a problem - NC has an overpop on Cobalt (generally speaking) and even more-so on Miller so the resulting population balance would be pretty horrific. I fear many NC would be sitting on an empty continent with long queues to get to any action.

We should wait until after the holiday season to see if things change but right now population imbalance seems to be a growing problem.

Sometimes NC have overpop, sometimes TR, sometimes even VS. It is a subject to change.
What worries me the most is a server perfomance and delay to the new merged server.

Can't say I understand this whole 'new player experience' balance proposition, or how it relates to attracting and retaining players.

It's an open-world sandbox game. It's not an arena shooter with an automated system giving you some hidden MMR and pairing you with/against horrible players and/or way better players to establish whether you win or lose based on your and everyone else's MMR and win rates, complete luck (AoE spam, no self or friendly fire damage), and more luck based on skill choices and team work or lack thereof.

I still play that sometimes. To me it is terrible since often, due to the arcade nature makes me feel & be completely helpless so very much of the time as I get hard countered in ways I can't always respond to. That is truly a horrible system, repetitive as hell too, but clearly many enjoy it, perhaps since 'owning' someone with a hard counter makes them feel rewarded easily.

That is the very reason I sought another alternative, and found PS2, and still love it 2074 hours in and counting, playing 2 factions, all classes, and nearly all vehicles.

*Forget attracting the masses or catering to whatever they want. It's about reaching out to players who can appreciate what PS2 is, and making sure their experience (game feedback) is as directly connected to their skill, tactics, and choice of gear as possible ('game input'). (more on this below)

The game being punishing to new players is part of game progression, and rising up to the challenge rewards you slowly over a very long time as you learn it, with no real ceiling to the amount of 'games within the game' you can play from the combination of gear, implants, squad tactics, etc. etc.

Please, if any on daybreak is reading, don't ruin this by catering to the wishes of the masses. They have plenty of other games to play. PS2 is unique and that's it's selling point and reason those of us stick around and still talk about the epic battles we're always having in the game to our online and day to day friends.

If new players have zero patience, need constant rewards, constant action, and artificial opportunities to feel good about themselves (ex. hard counters one can't respond to in any way even after the fact), who can't handle losing & dying in a million ways repeatedly to more experienced players, this may simply not be the game for them, and it is better to have them leave over destroying the game existing players enjoy.

*How to improve PS2: Work on the netcode, disable exploiters and cheats, actively seek & disable cheat sites, hardware ban cheaters, fix bugs. I'm still free2play since I had enough having to face those who essentially teleport around (ping differences/netlimiters/cheaters), who soak up more raw damage to die (hitbox registration/cheaters?), who instagib you with weapons that can't (ping/cheaters). All the skill in the world won't help anyone track someone teleporting left and right unless you're also psychic as to pre-aim their every teleportation while also accounting for the projectile travel time.

Without these major sources of frustration addressed to a more reasonable level, I doubt more content (gear, maps, vehicles, classes, events, etc. etc.) or even a planetside3 would help much.

I agree with both of you, mostly. The truth is that without a match maker PS2 is in a tough spot. There needs to be enough of a reward for getting better, while still allowing new players to have fun and contribute. Pre-CAI armor combat got this right. Nanoweave/Overshield and 2x head damage on automatics gets this wrong. Noseguns only on ESF isn't nearly as good as War Thunder does it, and I have to say isn't good at all, but Coyotes and air locks went way too far.

We need to have a high skill ceiling to keep people engaged, but we also need to somewhat limit performance differences to keep most players having a good time. It's a tricky balancing act for sure.

No more content. If they add more content it needs balanced, tweeks, people BP&M, bogs if not crashes the server after patch day... All crews should concentrate on game performance, stability, bugs, etc. And I'm not talking about just the pawns, it needs to be everyone taking action. You should take pride in your work doing what you love and are trained for. Get it running like a well oiled machine and then work on extra content slowly. Don't add great gobs of goose $#!+ and pray it works. There should be mirror servers so if a patch fails you can revert back and fix it on the "backup" servers, while the other servers remain live. But I guess its rocket science and not cost effective so wish in one hand, $#!+ in the other, see which fills up first.

New players do fine as long as they dont try to solo. Get in a squad, let the better players go in the front and stay behind a little engaging people who are already shooting someone else.

Oshur.

#micdrop

Did you see yesterday's devs stream? They are working on a new continent that has big flying fleet carriers instead of warpgates, a new server in Tokyo and tons of other stuff.