[Suggestion] Artillery!

Discussion in 'PlanetSide 2 Gameplay Discussion' started by Alexkruchev, Aug 11, 2015.

  1. Ronin Oni

    No **** sherlock, but they can't well make the game pure misery for the majority of the playerbase now can they?

    You think they're going to, after having nerfed every single vehicles in the games ability to kill infantry in swaths, introduce a new vehicle that you know would be used to bombard infantry, with the infantry unable to even shoot back at it?

    No. They will not.

    That's just the way it is. I don't expect you to like it. Done right Arty could be fun to use, but it wouldn't be good for randoms infantry play, which is the largest player base.

    Feel free to keep discussing and dreaming though, I'm just trying to caution against getting any hopes up, you should all know this is highly improbable.

    Maybe if you can get your hands on the improbability drive you could make it happen... it's about as unlikely as spontaneously turning into a chicken so it should have the capacity to cause it :p
  2. Taemien


    Mines aren't moving entities. You drop them half a meter in front of you. It impacts the ground, slides, then arms. It doesn't explode, can't explode until armed.

    I don't understand why everyone has an aversion to extending the range we can engage. I'd love to be able to shoot someone from the ranges I can hit a target IRL.
    • Up x 1
  3. CipherNine

    You are missing crucial point here.

    Infantry vs infantry combat is "fair" because you kill as often as you die. Infantry dies a lot to infantry but it also kills a lot of infantry.

    Infantry vs vehicle combat is not "fair" because infantry die much more often to vehicles than they kill them.

    This is I believe the reason why infantry players dislike fighting against vehicles. Yes, vehicles are supposed to be stronger because they cost resources but the fact remains that fighting against them is not fun for infantry.

    Well I imagined this artillery to be cheap and spamable and have good splash damage. What would make it balanced is low HP pool and low agility. It should also grant less XP upon its destruction.

    Maybe the idea wouldn't find well into the game. But point I'm trying to make is this: when discussing potential artillery vehicles you need to ask yourself how would this be fun for infantry. If infantry gameplay will suffer then such vehicle will surely never be implemented.
  4. Nogrim313

    why not just lower the projectile speed and up the anti-infantry damage on the bulldogs?
    they are already in game and look like they should be artillery they are just bad at it.

    slowing it down lets you arc them much better, then adjust its optics so the barrel is about 15-30 degrees above your sights

    this would allow sunderers to slap them on and rain AI over the walls and such. with out spotters they wouldnt be anywhere near as bad as tanks were and with the sight adjustment they would be bad at hitting infantry in close range.
  5. Demigan

    I would love that too, but the render ranges aren't there because it's fun but because it's necessary for good framerates and battles. Artillery as I see it would be best used in larger scale battles for tactical attacks, but because the render range becomes variable when there's large amount of players in the area it would invalidate the artillery.

    And yes, mines do impact then arm. However, you can make artillery fire relatively slow-moving shells, 'arm' them by making them server controlled similar to mines. All the server does is say 'is someone in the mine's range? fire'. The difference is that now the shell is moving and the range where it activates as well. The shell range can be the size of it's shell so it activates when something moves through.
    A Spitfire that is beyond your render range would be more server-intensive. That also checks if someone is in range and if something is in between, then starts dealing damage. You could also compare it to dropping mines from the flight-ceiling, but without a delay when hitting the ground. When it hits the ground (or a hitbox) it simply detonates and deals damage.
  6. ColonelChingles

    That's a very unfair point of view. What if we reversed that?

    If vehicle gameplay will suffer then such infantry weapon will surely never be implemented.

    I mean if we approached the game with that sort of balance in mind, wouldn't it be mind-boggling biased?

    Yet that's the approach that the Devs have to the game. Simply in the reverse.

    Things should be changed around where infantry and vehicles are equally valuable. Things will be implemented that favor vehicles more, just as how things are implemented that favor infantry more.
  7. CipherNine

    I imagine devs are trying to appease both infantry and vehicle players. However artillery threads are extremely biased and they do not take infantry POV into account. From what I've seen so far in this thread, artillery weapons suggested here would mostly frustrate infantry players.

    It seems that segregation is only way to appease both infantry and tank players. Tanks mostly fight against other tanks while infantry fight other infantry within bases. Game is not fully segregated as we still have tanks killing infantry and infantry killing tanks but majority of kills are same-class kills. Infantry kills most of infantry, tanks kill most of tanks.

    I think you guys now want artillery vehicles which can interfere with infantry vs infantry combat and this clearly breaks the segregation devs have created.

    Only way I can see this work is to make such artillery vehicles infantry-like (cheap, fragile and spamable) - kill a lot, die a lot
  8. Alexkruchev


    My post is not biased against infantry at all. I also think infantry players are frustrated by just about everything that can kill them, from sniper rifles to claymores, to MBTs and ESFs.

    This thread very much takes the infantry point of view into account- it's supplied ample counters to the effectiveness of the proposed artillery, (limited precision, FLAK resistance, limited OHK potential). I primarily play infantry myself, because the MBT/LT gameplay doesn't interest me all that much because I don't have the certs to make my MBT/Lightning really viable compared to the more dedicated players- the thing I don't understand about this forum phenomenon of "Infantryside" vs "Vehicleside" is...

    I don't know hardly anyone who only does one or the other. Planetside has both- and most players routinely engage in both vehicle and infantry gameplay, often back and forth between the two.

    Most people I hear complaining about new vehicle ideas (or balance for the old ones) make it out like all tankers ever do is tank! The vast majority of players who use tanks, use them when other armor is around, and dismount when there isn't. Objectives and capture points all require dismounting to deal with them, tanks play no role outside of getting you -to- the general area alive, and defending your sunderer spawns (if attacking).

    Basically, we aren't enemies arguing for a zero-sum solution in game of "Tanks are brokenly weak" or "Tanks are brokenly overpowered".

    This vehicle would open up a brand new playstyle into the game- it would give ESFs a reason to pay attention to what is going on on the ground besides whether or not FLAK is present below them, and would encourage more communication and tactics in the game in general, as artillery would be highly dependent on ground forces to be any kind of useful, while combined arms would be easily able to deal with Artillery as it would any other vehicle based threat. It might even be easier for the aircraft, as arty might well not be sitting in the middle of a FLAK nest like most armored columns are now a days.

    Meanwhile, I also thought it would be cool to see a mortar turret for Engineers, that could drop smoke shells as well as 450 max damage splash projectiles with a similar lack of precision. - this would be an interesting addition to the game for infantryside as well. NEvermind these mortars might be able to harm vehicles as well, though I would limit it to be rather like a flash fury rather than a bulldog type weapon. (In terms of damage profile).
    • Up x 1
  9. ColonelChingles

    The Engineer AV MANA turret was supposed to be a mortar... which is why it simply looks like someone put a Bulldog on stilts!

    [IMG][IMG]

    Infantry were never supposed to have a long-range ATGM... they were obviously supposed to have a mortar to bomb the ever-loving bejeezus out of each other!

    Instead, Engineers should get one of these for actual mortar work:

    [IMG]

    And the AV MANA turret should look like these:

    [IMG]
    • Up x 1
  10. Jake the Dog

    As an artilleryman this is almost a wetdream... It would never be anything like the m777, but a guy can hope.
  11. TRSS11

    Awww, you beat me to it @Alexkruchev!
    I was going to make an artillery post today but I checked with the search function first if anybody was talking about it.

    This is a huge opportunity for the developers to bring more diversity into combat gameplay and there are plenty of ways to make it balanced. I would introduce stationary and mobile artillery where the stationary version are turrets that are located at warpgates and the mobile version is basically a truck with missile pods.

    My thoughts on balance (vehicle version):
    - High spawn cost (500 nanites?) and can only be spawned at Warpgate
    - Needs to be deployed in order to launch missiles
    - Only one seat so the driver better be an engineer
    - Make a minimum and maximum firing range like 100 to 400m
    - Make the launched missiles trackable by billows of smoke
    - Indicate the firing artillery on the minimap
    - Low accuracy, especially at high distance
    - Long reload times but you can fire a batch of missiles (four of them) in quick succession
    - Damage low enough to prevent one-shot kills for full-health infantry
    - Low ammo capacity (six times four missiles)
    - Constant damage (regardless of distance)
    - High area of effect due to explosive missiles (radius of five meters?)
    - Missiles fly high bows so you can shoot over mountains for indirect fire
    and so on

    Daybreak, pleeeeease!
  12. Demigan

    Then you either didn't read or didn't understand the idea's I put forward.
  13. Vanguard=skycancer

    Artillery in PS2 is a nice idea if done right. Have a seperate rendering mechanic, "slow" shell velocity, Really obvious shell tracers, a screaming sound and (for the poor souls being shot at) a ground marker with the words "Incoming" or "Seek shelter".
    I foresee the TR having a 6-10 round double barrel auto loader and a mediocre shell arc, the VS having something akin to the FV304 in WoT (short range, low damage, great at close range and very speedy) with the NC getting a very large, slow firing, high dmg gun with a very flat trajectory (Basically a giant railgun that fires 210-300mm HE rounds)

    To balance these arty, they would show up on the minimap and global map whenever they fire, have poor armor and have small health pools, think Glass cannon.
    The TR would have an in between kind of arty, while the NC have the overall slowest one.
    Think WoT for arty, except don't include dispersion, as the fast pace of the combat means you won't be able to hit the infantry anyways.
  14. ColonelChingles

    Artillery is necessary to PS2 because it gets rid of stale base fights and makes the area around a base critical to control.

    Say you have the capture point in the base, and that capture point is exposed to artillery. Say artillery has a 300m range.

    This means that in order to safely capture the point, you must not just control the point room, but also a 300m circle around the base. If you fail to control that outer zone, then the enemy can freely rain artillery on your head.

    What we see then is that combat shifts outward. As the outside becomes more critical to control, other non-infantry units come into play. Aircraft might hunt out in the open. Artillery counter-batteries start happening. Armour and mechanized infantry patrols are more common.

    And that's how the game should be. Instead of being packed like stupid sardines in an arbitrary room, fights would then be much more dynamic with every hill, forest, and mountain being its own tactical objective. Combined arms would be a requirement, not a catchphrase. Refusing to use vehicles to secure the perimeter would be a death sentence. A painful, highly explosive death sentence.
  15. Gundem


    Completely random, but mines can explode before they arm, just gotta be shot. Using high damage weapons, I've killed several people by popping their mines as they threw them.
  16. Reclaimer77

    Horrible idea for so many reasons.

    Just no.
  17. tanknub123

    is this some sort of joke? infantry complain enough about getting farmed and now u want a INDIRECT fire massive AOE artillery that gives the user 100% safety at a massive distance?
  18. ColonelChingles

    100% safety from the targets they're hitting, yes. After all, that's the point of artillery.

    But 100% safety from everything else? Hardly.
    Artillery are often extremely fragile, slow, and vulnerable units. See almost any RTS game ever. When they shoot, everyone in the area knows where they're shooting from. This means that units with speed (aircraft or Harassers) can easily engage and destroy artillery. Friendly artillery would have a good idea of where to aim. Tanks, although slower, could easily wipe out an entire battery given time.

    The point of artillery is to force infantry to act in concert with these faster units. To avoid a firey, burny death, infantry can:
    1) Mask their location by practicing movement and fire discipline.
    2) Form mechanized fighting patrols to secure the perimeter.
    3) Coordinate with air and ground vehicles to attack known artillery positions. Or call in counter-battery.

    Artillery isn't 100% safe, and right now would be limited to 300m against infantry. True, this means that they can fire from behind cover, but they certainly wouldn't be 100% safe from everything.
  19. tanknub123


    still i think infantry has enough things farming them. tanks libs and especially lolpodders. when i play infantry i always stay in bases so i rarely get farmed, but i can feel the rage of someone trying to kill a sundy then getting farmed. its just stupid adding things with AOE, because anything with AOE takes no skills they just invite a spam fest.
  20. Haquim

    Infantery getting farmed is a myth in the state the game is in now.
    If anything they let the enemy farm them.
    Libs and aircraft? Occasionally I get killed by a AH I didn't hear, or a PPA or lolpodder once in a while. When I pull my grounder the skies usually clear up in a minute or two. Unless I can't even leave the spawnroom beaucse the enemy infantery spawncamps us.
    Tanks? Yeah let me laugh harder. They can't even shoot into most bases. Yesterday I was at Indar Excavation, completely surrounded by enemy tanks. I got killed by a tank ONCE. I simply ignored them.
    And that one lightning that shelled our route to A point on Esamir? I think I watched for two minutes as our troops ran into his salvos. He didn't even have to adjust aim, just hold down the button. 1.5 minutes later he was dead, because I decided to do something about this annoyance and switched to LA.
    Harassers are annoying because you can't get rid of them easily and actually need some coordinated effort to destroy them before they get away.
    But the ONLY vehicle on the ground that I consider actually dangerous is the Sunderer. Tankier than a tank, and with dual furies or kobalts also equipped with more firepower - at half the price. Also it might possibly unload up to 11 MAX units in your face.

    Thats not going specifically against you, but everytime I read "infantery is getting farmed" I can't help but think:
    Infantery is getting farmed? I AM infantery and I know nothing about this. The only place where I ever get farmed is a biolab while trying to break through the bottlenecks - by other infantery. And frankly I think this victim complex is quite annoying.

    That aside and to the point of the thread:
    I think any artillery should be riddiculous -
    - riddiculously powerful
    - riddiculously long-ranged
    - riddiculously accurate *
    - riddiculously long reload
    - riddiculously expensive
    - riddiculously easy to destroy

    Else there is simply no reason to use them to begin with imo.

    Since the tech in the game is kinda stuck between WWI and II I also think we should have two kinds of artillery (aka BFG).
    One for direct fire designed like a anti-tank gun.
    And one for indirect fire.

    The anti-tank gun one has barely any bulletdrop and its AV damage is capable of two-shotting tanks. Its front is extremely armored(once deployed), making attacks from the front at best suicidal once it is been deployed, but flanking attacks or airstrikes will quickly dispatch of it though. Alternatively, you could just rush it, since it has a long reload.
    If it uses HE ammunition prepare for 8m explosions that are actually lethal.
    Its range is about 800 m.
    Basically, for a frontal assault this gun is Gandalf - you won't pass here. But it has to be set up beforehand.

    The indirect fire one... well, its a sundy with a big ******* gun.
    Range 1.5 km or so.
    It is rather accurate, having only 1m deviation for every 200 m distance, but since it can't see its target it always needs someone to direct it. (I said a bit to the LEFT. Your left or my left??). Maybe it could have some kind of fast reloading flare ammunition to estimate the target before opening fire for real.
    Since it doesn't need any armor at all it is more powerful than the direct fire one, causing 10m HE explosions. For AV since direct hits on vehicles are unlikely, it causes 8m explosions that work like powerful AV grenades, but deal only 600 damage to infantery even in the very center.
    Both should be able to switch the used ammo type at will.

    Both are extremely expensive, costing 750 nanites. Meaning one pull every 15 minutes. Or 10 for members. Even members with TWO resource boosts could only pull one every 6 minutes.
    Both take very long to set up, in the realm of 10-15 seconds.
    Both can easily be destroyed by a single ESF with hornets or lolpods, or even two infiltrators on fury wraiths.

    Pretty balanced, could be fun, adds a layer of strategic importance to the game and....
    will never happen.
    Aside from the technical problems that SOE back then already stated that they are incapable or unwilling to solve there are other problems
    1. Especially the indirect fire one would be a MASSIVE source of friendly fire. The "oops, I killed a whole squad" kind. Especially if your spotter is a troll.
    2. They are unusable by lone wolfs. Those things need support.
    3. They are easily destroyed by lone wolfs. It is pretty damn hard to stop a Harasser or ESF to reach a certain place without continuous and possibly extreme effort. Although that is kinda the point...
    4. They are the bane of the COD/zergling/casual crowd. Those guys don't even bother pulling a rocketlauncher when 4 ESFs shell their spawnroom, do you think they get the idea to redeploy, pull a flash and kill a strategic target like this, easy as it may be?
    and lastly
    5. Large AND coordinated outfits would become nigh-unstoppable if they are using those weapons correctly, and could only be stopped by an equally large and coordinated enemy force. This MIGHT lead to the epic battles that were promised in the PS2 trailer, but seeing as large forces have a tendency to avoid each other it will propably only make the steamrolling of lesser forces that much easier.