New patch, Way to ruin the only Defensible base fight!!

Well I'm not an expert, but in my opinion uncoordinated defence vs. uncoordinated offence should be pretty balanced, and coordinated defence vs. coordinated offence should be pretty balanced.

Old tech plants gave a huge benefit to defence ONLY when both the defence and the offence had no strategy or organization, which is still a problem but not "OMG so impossible to take" if you have a good outfit or even just lucking into a good squad with an active leader (depending on the size of the defending force). An organized push could easily break even a much larger defence if all they did was sit in the back, but the points that were harder to attack were also harder to defend.

New tech plants shifted that way too far, giving a huge benefit to zerg-fest attack and taking away everything that made the turtle defence possible. In fact, it pushed the balance so far that right now a highly organized defence would be somewhat balanced against mindless rush (e.g. bringing in appropriate vehicles from other bases to get rid of watever is camping the spawn, and probably at least one sunderer inside the main plant at all times). It seems like an AMP station, only less defensible from the lack of walls, no anti-vehicle shields, and poorly-placed single spawn location. I wasn't fond of them before (I don't have a good outfit yet on account of my mic being beyond awful, which I plan to fix) but at least it was a little more variety and offered some tactical options.

I could not agree with you more. The amount of times I've seen my faction just sitting in the spawn room taking potshots outside is ridiculous. This is exactly how you lose a base, when you are not actively defending what it is that keeps you in control of that base.

And yet this very thread is filled with people—possibly even yourself—essentially shouting, "Defense should be EASY!!"

Tech Plant defense was about as "dumb" as anything could be in this game. You see it as dumbing things down for the offense. I see it as requiring more intelligence and strategy from the defense.

If this particular setup proves to be too easy, it can be changed.

What you call "flow" reads more like "only one viable strategy for taking any base". That's kind of boring.

I swear I noticed this in one Tech Plant before today's patch. I actually disagree with this particular change.

This. Architecture can help, sure, but there's nothing a well-coordinated swarm can't overcome (see: the comment about The Enclave's LA/MAX rush).

Tech Plants were easy-mode defense.

I see a lot of players ignoring compromised generators and those funny red dots on their minimap that appear and disappear around the same time a faction-mate dies. I don't find this too surprising; there are still a lot of newbies running around and the gameplay is not described within the game at all.

People need to figure out better AMS placement in Amp Stations. In the middle, inside the shield is a nice, safe place, but that means infantry have to run quite a distance to get to any of the shield generators or the walls/exits. You could probably fit 3 well-placed AMS's within the walls of an Amp Station for maximum coverage.

Then the faction needs to make it a good fight by defending intelligently, not by relying on the difficulty of the base design.

Fixed it for you.

sad thing is that in the overview of the game it says:

yet with this change strategic teamwork/time spent at the base is nullified and gone... taking away one of the most important game mechanics cuz ppl couldnt figure out how to tactically assault said base.. and wanted it nerfed so their zergling self can take it down.

rather then fixing a real problem that will now be in on other bases rather then just the techplant fights: CLIPPING! whats next to happen at a biolab when we experience the same thing there?

Actually I started a thread yesterday suggesting almost exactly this.
A cap point outside near the spawn, and one on the roof.

In my eyes, losing ground control of the area surrounding your base, AND losing control of the roof of your base should mean you will ultimately lose the base.

So, I'm not sure they chose the right path, but I'm positive the old path was the wrong one. I'm willing to see how things play out.

This has ever been my contention. I love a good large fight, but Tech plants were just terrible (from a server performance standpoint) If you weren't seeing this, then your server population likely sucked.

No.

Defense is about reacting to the different tactics of the Attackers.. and doing what works BEST.

IF the Attackers are morons and rush like lemmings through the backdoor, then standing there and farming them is the right defense.


You ever try defending a Tech Plant when the attackers are coming in with shield-running sunderers... large-scale MAX rushes... organized LA pushes over both shields? It's not easy to defend - at all. Hell there is barely a place you can stand inside that you weren't getting hit with Lib Flak/Rocketpod Flak/Tank Flak... etc..

No, it took two weeks for the zerg and people to start realizing how to properly take Tech plants. As soon as everybody was starting to figure it out this change came along. It was not easy defending tech plants if you had a competent force that knew how to take it. There is more going on in the background then standing at the two back doors lobbying grenades at each other.

1.) You have engys mining up the back shield wall to prevent a breach. - Sundys with shield diffuser.
2.) More Engys mining up the side shield walls. - Sundys with Shield diffuser.
3.) Guys on the look out for LA jumping over side shield walls.
4.) Engineers keeping the turrets up on the top of the tech plant to help elevate some of the air spam so we could get some Liberators in there to bomb the attacking force allowing us to push out.
5.) Guys watching the elevators and middle section of the base.
6.) Guards at the double back doors holding off the zerg.
7.) Guards at the top of the tech plant T keeping away the random gal drops on the landing pad and the T itself.
8.) Guys watching the gen for the random Infiltrator hack. Yeah I have seen a few infiltrators good enough they where able to sneak into the gen.
9.) Engys keeping the sunders up in the middle from libs lobbing shells into the vehicle bay.

I wouldn't call that easy. I can go on if you want.

I want to go on record saying I like the Tech Plant the way it was. If they are determined to keep this change then I hope they add shields to the back doors (like the Amp Station), or the most important base will be the easiest to take. At least at the Amp Station all the doors were shielded so you could focus on generator defense.

Just saw it in action. New techplant defense strategy is pretty simple: when the zerg comes to the techplant ... pull out, wait till it's capped and the zerg moves on, then attack it with your forces. Nothing else that can be done, really.

i think thats one of the few good changed in this patch

now finally you can do more then shoot 5 hours at the frekin doorway, and spam ammo or revive

that bull had to stop !

So if I've got this straight. Attacking should take skill and organisation. Defending should take no skill or organisation, simply sitting on your **** with your gun pointed at a door. This is what you call good gameplay?

Personally, I play this game to play a massive FPS, and when I say FPS, I include all the skills normally used in such games. The PS1 base and tower assault and things like the tech plant take away most of the skills required to play and FPS and replace them with the lowest forms of gameplay. Camping and spamming. People like it because it's easy. People do it because it's easy. Ironically, COD and BF require far more skill.

If you want the old techplants back, you are a certified idiot. They were boring meatgrinders and nothing but that.

have you seen the new tp layout? I reckon two times as many defenders as attackers are necessary to even stand a chance. Also, defending involved killing yourself and spawning at the closest base with tanks + air, and then driving back to the techplant. It's really pretty horrible. I still think that a base like a techplant should be hard to take, no matter what.

You're wasting your time...
Yes, they believe a nade-spam cluster-**** is awesome, so long as they are making certs.

Rendering and a requirement for defensive strategy, in their eyes, should take a sideline to cert-gain.

Again, you have no idea what you are talking about. How does moving generators to outlying buildings create any for of defensive strategy?

I did not work at a tech plant defending it to nade spam. Making certs is part of the game and so is progression. Having a tech plant ensures Armor for your team. Defending it should be easier than assaulting it or what is the point in defending at all?

For what it's worth, most of my outfit that was online was there. 60ish of us at the time, about a platoon and a half. The initial LA rush put most of us in respawn, so when the MAX rush hit we were still respawning and running back to defensive positions. People on the ground floor were pretty safe, but it left the upstairs wide open for the MAX rush to take, and then their LAs respawned, jumped the barrier again and got our Sunderer while we were busy with the MAXs.

Like I said, excellently coordinated attack. Just a point about what a well-coordinated assault can do even against a coordinated defense. The attackers KNOW where you have to be to stop the zerg. The defenders have to scramble to respond to unexpected attack vectors, unless they outnumber the attackers so badly that it's a non-issue anyway.

All bases have silly designs because players would whine if they made them actually practical for defense. Unfortunate, but it's the way it is.

Also, to all of the forumtards talking about how tech plants were just grenade spam cert farms - you were the problem. Not the tech plant layout.

My soultion, and i know its probably not viable given the world layout.

Make two types of tech plants, make the master tech plant like the old one, built for defense and hard as hell to take.
Then makes some other tech plants around it with the new setup. Built to be flipped by anyone who passes by.

Im going to miss epic tech plant seiges, sundy shield diffuser rushes, and camping the back doors with grenade spam. That was fun, and i wanted base flipping i could go elsewhere for it, but that really was the only defense fun i could count on, other than the crown i guess.