Alternative to lightning which reforms it as a sci-fi scene setter+Feedback on vehicle model revamps

The lightning as a sci-fi scene setter


The current lightning
When I first started playing, the resemblance of the lightning to a straight port of 20th century tank ruined the sci-fi setting(depressing really). It gave an impression of a game without originality, and made me question what else would be bad. Over time I got used to it/filtered it out.

Need for a scene setters
When prospective players see shots of the battle field one look at a seriously awesome vehicle will draw their eye. It will create a lasting impression on the setting and fire their imagination.

The magrider and scythe are the best scene setters in the game right now.

Lightning as a scene setter

• It's the most commonly pulled tank because it's NS and reasonably priced, and therefore the most visible
• Almost any shot of warfare outside a base will involve lightnings.

Alternative to lightning as a tank going as much sci-fi as possible

Scifi robot spider/squid, with a jet-powered hover mode for fast motion

• Examples from google: #1 , #2. The PS2 version would have wider legs and a lower profile.

• Two modes of travel
  • Slower crawl - fairly low profile with legs spread wide.
  • Fast jet powered glide - Legs trail behind and hover a foot or two off the ground like an octopus/squid. Jets are located in the main body. Can jump over obstacles which are a foot or two.
• Animation - based on squids which use water jets and tentacles to move.

• Gameplay mechanics can remain much the same.
  • Weapons can do same damage. Hitpoints/resistance can be the same.
  • Target cross sections might need to be raised, but surface areas can remain the same.
  • Terrain it can traverse can remain much the same. No one will really notice it being unable to climb much.

The new lightning model can be modified given over to the prowler. The prowler looks a bit plain because of it's boxlike shape.

Potential technical problem: animations might be a bit performance intensive.

Images of new vehicle revamps revealed at SOE live: Link.

Sunderer
Sunderer with weapons should look a bit more like a weapons platform. Examples: #1 #2. The very pronounced wedge shaped front in the examples makes it look more military and less of a civ transport. The cockpit type front in the new sunderer is cool.

Harraser
The short height of the windows and the front is a bit car-like (could be made worse by the image being stretched). Designs inspired by cars don't really invoke future sci-fi-ness for me. The car shape is very everyday and low tech.

Lightning
It's a big improvement over the current one. But there are too many tank forms in the game especially when you consider the upcoming NS Colossus.

I would like to share my Lightning revision thread as well:
http://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/index.php?threads/give-the-lightning-tank-a-real-role-by.98982/

Edit: well, looks like it got lost when they removed the suggestions section. And I can't delete this post so...

My condolences for your lost posts so many good things lost with that "useful" merge...

I agree. Planetside is very generic sci-fi at the moment, it could really use something to spice up the formula a bit.

I still believe that even though a lightning is an NS vehicle, that it should have an adapted armor pattern closely tied to the faction which spawned one.

I mean, a TR lightning would be curvier, NC look more boxy/tankier, VS more scarab/bug-like armored. But, the underlying design would still be the lightning we all know.

OR

Get in the new model. Give us the ability to buy armor co$tmetics to factionnalize them for the looks.

Step one...Stop making NC the shotgun faction and make it the railgun faction.

NO! I want a tank without legs. The Animatrix gave me nightmares, man! D:

But tanks with legs are the first step to recreating BFRs....

There's not a demand for BFR... especially if they end up being brokenly unbalanced like their predecessors.

What role would the BFR fill that no other units already fills?

And that is good because...
BFRs were a just one of the many reasons I hated PS1. And remember, ANIMATRIX!!! That still scared the hell out of me

Not really true, Honestly I would have thought that TR would have a walker tank, which would have a rotating head with turret mounted on the side and a gunner position on the top. When going into deploy mode it would lower itself and lift the main gun into an upward position. The damage profile would be similar to a tank too but it would be more elevated really.

Not too keen on the "spider" idea, but I think it'd be nice with ES Lightning variants.

The designs could be loosely based on the MBT design philosophies to integrate the general look and feel of the "armoured" core of the faction. Also, if you look at the MAX designs, they probably evoke each faction's specific "style" the best out of almost any unit in the game, with the NC looking a bit like an industrial piece of equipment, the TR a more streamlined and "produced" model and finally the VS having all those crablike griblies we all love.

Hm... Makes me want to try coming up with some design ideas for each, even though I'm terrible at drawing mechanical stuff.

Creating something completely senseless because it's "the Future" is Sci-Fi of the 80s.
I for one am fine with things that look like they are used because they worked for the past century.
I mean, there's still weapons that shoot bullets. BULLETS!

I think they just need to give ES models to all the NS vehicles. Nothing radical like a spider-tank, but just make the vehicles look more like they belong. That'd do a hell of a lot more to set the scene than a spider-tank. I mean take a look at other games with three distinct factions, let's take... starcraft as an example. When you look at that you instantly know the zerg, protoss, and terrans are different. You know they play differently. You know they FEEL different. Now look at PS2, the vanu, TR, and NC are all basically the same faction with a couple ES things tagged on and different paint schemes. There's no real faction identity. Now imagine if "NS" stuff didn't exist, if EVERYTHING was ES. Now I aint talking stats or anything, they could all perform the exact same, but their appearances are all ES. Every single NS thing would be changed to look like it belongs to the empire. Every vehicle, every gun, everything would look and sound like it belongs.

Here's what I'd do with the vehicles if it was up to me.

Flash - Current one remains NC, TR get like some fancy motorcycle thing and the VS get a hoverbike

Harasser - just use the ES buggies from PS1

Lightning - the current one would be NC while the TR version could look more like the PS1 lightning while the VS one would have the more scarab style armor and maybe more futuristic looking treads to show a progression from traditional treads to the hover technology of the magrider.

Sunderer - The current sundy could be TR while the NC gets something that's a cross between an M35 cargo truck and a garbage truck while the VS gets some weird alien looking thing

Liberator - current lib would be NC while the TR get a more sleek and stealthy looking lib and the VS get something that looks a bit more like the scythe in terms of having no real thrusters and relying on gravity n whatnot

Galaxy - current galaxy would be TR while the NC one gets a very industrial looking cargo plane (think a C-130) and the VS get something appropriate.

I'm bad with coming up with VS ideas in case you didn't notice. However I feel this would make a far larger impact than making some radical spider tank or something. I mean seriously, just sit back and imagine the game if everything was truly empire specific. If you looked up and saw a galaxy flying through the sky and you instantly knew what faction it belonged to without spamming Q. Imagine an army of MBTs, lightnings, harassers, libs, galaxies all flying and they all look like they belong to one faction. THAT is a scene maker right there. And all it'd take is some modeling and hitbox adjustments, really not a lot of work in the grand scheme of things. Far easier than making a spider tank too.

i have to disagree with turning the lightning into a spider tank i actually think it's way ahead of the current tech myself, a small profile vehicle with a fair amount of Armour and lot's of engine power to get and get out fast that sounds like a amazing weapon's platform for doing lightning fast attacks and then pulling out as quick as it comes.

then if you put it in current warfare with a 6 shot 75 mm cannon i have a feeling all the troops of that army would love the little thing myself, quickly get to a scene and as quick as it's on the scene dumping it's 6 rounds moving off to flank the enemy from another angle.

the only thing i would change about the sunderer is make it shorter

im neutral on the harasser we just need empire specific variants of it that they dev's drew up put in game even though the harasser would somewhat loose it's place in the game.

Please, be cautions with such requests.

Lightning still looks like a tank.
A redesign, with the current "toyish" trend in the art department, may not end well.

While I agree that the game's art could use some changes in places, I also feel that Sci-Fi allows for a very broad spectrum when it comes to art style and direction, and that going "as much sci-fi as possible" may not be the right way to go.

I was speaking purely aesthetically. Anything with the ability to auto-repair or be repaired by a hair dryer is light years ahead of current tech. The game is set in 3200, however.

The thing is the 3 man NS Colossus will take over as the MBT for all 3 factions. The NS Lightning is in a price/effectivenes sweet spot and will probably stay there.

What I was saying was in terms of aesthetics you don't want all NS tanks or straight forward tank forms (Prowler/Vanguard), and that something more sci-fi by another company, say Planetary Exploration(PE), would help change it up.

The NS Colossus didn't turn out too bad . I agree some of the cosmetics are cartoonish. It's still the same art team that designed the other things.

Like the weapons that all looked the same? There's no accounting for taste, I guess.
Still, lets leave aside my personal opinion that a spider tank is just this side of completely ********, and actually discuss it's implementation.
It would need drastically different physics, without skidding, and a faster acceleration. It should also be able to walk sideways and climb steep inclines even a boosting magrider will just barely best.
How would you animate it? Maybe in a millenium, engineers will have no problem creating an armoured spider just for the sake of it, but SOEs Art team might not be that far yet.
What would SOE earn from all that effort, because that's the bottom line, after all?

That aside, I don't think the Colossus will overtake anything.
It's big, it's tough, it will die to Rocket spam the moment it leaves it's warpgate.
Oh, and it doesn't fit everywhere, so less farming.
A lodestar would have a role, maybe ES-Buggies, but that thing? That'll be harder to balance than the Valkyrie.

When you look at the pre-alpha concept art - it just screams "missed opportunities".

The current models, particularly for the Lightning and Prowler, are just awful in comparison. The mosquito is probably the most accuratley rendered, but it's missing a lot of the subtle details that give it the impression of actual military hardware, vs playdoh.