Can we please scrap the idea of consumable implants?

I'm really disappointed that these are temporary timer-items and not unlockable, certable items that you can switch in and out of. Sure, it depends a lot on how you resupply them. I have enough trouble keeping myself in grenades and MAXs as it is to spend infantry resources on these. I can't imagine people will want to constantly spend certs on these (thats ridiculous) so the only thing i can think of is spending resources on these, constantly.

If they are like grenades where you have to constantly re supply them, and you turn them on and off and the timer is running down, its just one more thing to be managing in the middle of a firefight. IF they last for a long time, say.. an hour or more, then its not such a big deal. But if i turn on my EOD HUD when i'm storming a base, and it only lasts a minute. Well, i'm going to be annoyed that i have to keep resupplying these and being WAY too careful about when i use them.

Implants should not be something you have to be careful about using, nor should they be things you have to KEEP supplying, for one, "implants" suggest at least a semi-permanent thing, not some sort of attachment that runs out and you have to refresh. Maybe if they worked like the heavy's shield, where they are on for awhile and their energy drains, then you have to let them recharge. but constantly having to go back to refreash my consumable items because i'm actually USING them, instead of being careful because i don't want to waste it.. thats going to get annoying.

The last thing i want is to engage the enemy, turn on my Awareness Implant and suddenly find out there was only 4 guys and now i've just wasted them. Even if they are cheap, the fact you'll have to keep going back to resupply is a huge disappointment and make the whole thing feel like a weak addon.

Implants were one thing i was really looking forward too and this doesn't make me excited at all, this feels like the grenades, mostly useless, not used very often, just a resource (or got forbid, cert-) sink that i don't really want to encourage.

I'd rather see the implants introduced as a permanent item, but each implant should offer both a benefit and a penalty.

Things moving 3% faster but have a lighter (less damage) shield
or protected against concussion/emp effect but it takes a small time longer to use the optic on your rifle.

I think that something like this would allow players a small amount of customisation that people seek and at the same time keep balance to these characters.

I also think that implants should be class specific, as some good ideas could be very powerful with a specific class.

Can you tell me what exactly is balanced about stacking Awareness with Nanoweave so that when a sniper takes a shot at your head you not only survive, but instantly and automatically spot them for you and your entire faction to see?

It does not get more gamebreaking than this, and I promise you this will be a very common combination since people despise snipers and prefer most any other form of death over being OHKed by a bolt action round to the head.

I must agree, I think SOE is in danger of stepping on a landmine with this. I was concerned about the possibility that they'd make it have a cost rather than just making it just an interesting decision. "Do I use x or y?" is enough, we really don't need "Do I want to get this for f amount of time and forgo getting that cert rank upgrade for g amount of time?" and I think you'll be hard pressed to find anyone who wants it.

As someone who has been burned in the past paying for "Free 2 Play" games such as Battlefield Play4Free, and others like Star Wars Galaxies, a game that Sony completely destroyed, I will no longer "Pay2Win". That said I really do not like the idea of my hard earned certs being forced into a consumable necessity to keep the competitive edge. All this is going to do is either force the hand of folks like me to either shell out money we do not wish to spend on the game for various reasons, or come to the realization that the game has tipped out of balance and we can no longer have and enjoyable gaming experience and we outright leave the game.

I understand it is a business and you need to make money, but when F2P games get to this point where the new implemented items are only acquired via money or a repetitive in-game currency bleed.... a TAX if you will... well, folks tend to see themselves to the door.

These implants are overpowered, and the temporary nature of the purchase is simply infuriating. I absolutely refuse to spend SC on a temporary item, and using certs is basically screwing over low-level players. I'm level 100, I can spent the certs but it's just annoying to have another bit of "make-work" to do. A lower-level player is facing an awful choice between actual investment in their character and maintaining implants to compete against me.

The implants themselves are powerful, but in really annoying ways. Like the vision one. On the one hand, it will make conc / flash grenades completely unreliable as some people will be immune and will gun you down as soon as you rush in afterwards. On the other hand, a squad with these implants can just spam conc grenades all over the place, on each other, on themselves and be immune while many of the enemies get destroyed. This is ****** game-play - the player using the grenade as intended is screwed, the MLGPROSKILLZ guys spamming them at their own feet get an advantage.

Or take the sensor one. On the one hand, the infil who is trying to hack a gen or do some assassinating now can't rely on his darts to tell him when enemies are approaching, if he keeps looking at his minimap he'll just get stabbed in the back by the guy with the implant. On the other hand, now at least the ****** tactic of parking a quad bike to get radar over a whole base won't work on him. But why must he use an implant to overcome a completely overpowered ability like 100m/200m scout radar? I don't want to have to rent items to temporarily fix broken parts of the game, just fix the game!

Bump for Planetside 2 future's sake, we must have the Developers know that we're really concerned about this matter and that they must put "Business" aside, for which "Gameplay Quality" has to be the top Concern in this case, in respect of their player's base necessity

Don't screw on us SOE please!

They've stated they will be low cost (see the game director's letter), so I foresee little issue with accessibility for F2Pers, secondly as a Paying player I'm not going to buy these with SC anyway, if their that cheap I'll just use certs.Finally most classes start with an empty utility slot (the C4, medical doo-dad slot), this is no different

If people are genuinely concerned about the SC availability then by all means I'll sign up to that being dropped, I doubt I'll be buying them with SC like I said.

I don't have much issue at all with limited duration purchases so long as the implants remain edge benefits and are balanced as such. Consumables aren't a new concept in gaming and so long as they are readily available to all, paying or not, they won't make much difference, I look at the list and see a bunch of situational pieces of kit that wont help you in 90% on encounters but will give you that fine edge in the 10% if your smart.

Seriously actually think about how gameplay pans out in PS2 and think about the timescales involved, most of these implants won't come into play because your not going to see the circumstances they help with that often, or your going to get dropped before you can capitalise on the advantage, TTKs being what they are.

Just my 2 cents. Like I said people do seem concerned and I sort've get that, but I think there's a lot of anxiety over nothing.

SOE don't make mistakes like this. ATM PS2 have imho best f2p system for gamers and may be for devs. But you want to ruin this. I'm already Auraxium loyal and with alpha squad boost (gonna use boosts any way in the future) and now you want to introduce one more way to milk players for money? This is terrible mistake Higby&co. Don't do this.

Something else which I forgot to mention: If the "pay-to-win" aspect turns out to be a lot of fuss over nothing, I'd still prefer permanent implants because A) I'd rather not have a cert sink and B) I'd rather not have to spend time managing them.

I'm all for scrapping temporary implants.

SOE might think this move will be a nice little earner, but it's going to destroy confidence of a huge majority of current players, probably causing them to spend less in game. It will simply not be worth it, for a few thousand bucks.

I would just like to point out that in planetside1 there was no 'downside' to using implants, each fulfilled the role specified and did not detract from any other ability. However they could only be used for a short period of time as there was stamina to consider (implants drained stamina, faster the faster you moved).

How do you know that they're timed, they're consumable like those 50 SC single use camos, they weren't timed as some of my loadouts still uses those single use camos.

Implants ans consumables is literally the death of competitive play in this game. How could they have such a focus on MLG then turn around and spit in the faces of competitive players?

I sure hope there'll be the option to both buy them (say, 1500 certs / 1000 SC for a large profit) and rent them (f.Ex. 100 certs / 50 sc for 3 hours); It allows everyone to try it out, new players can get one in a double XP weekend for staying competitive, and if you save up you get a nice, if weak, bonus for all the classes you play.
Or make it cheaper, but buyable only per class/loadout.
I could afford buying them regularly with money, but I seriously got better things to do that support that. I worked with those methods, I know how it looks from the other side. *Bling*. Doesn't make you feel good, though.
Maybe the game is just not profitable enough?

So there are many complaints here that are valid but my biggest issue that hasn't been stated is the whole one implant per loadout thing. You mean to tell me you just released extra loadouts (up to 10 total) for players to be able to have different setups and actually use the guns they gave you money for. And now you basically bend em all over and say "Hey! we just put in a brand new awesome implant thing, go check it out, one caveat though, you know all those extra loadouts you bought? yeah those are worthless now, you're going to want to go back to just using one loadout and manually switching your gear so you can keep using that one ipmlant you like"

Seriously SOE wtf? you continually bend me over and yet I just keep coming back for more like the filthy ***** you've turned me into.

Eh, it's not so bad. The incredibly short duration will mean most people won't buy them unless they're in a situation where they immediately need it (I.E, buying thermal reduction to avoid that Liberator)

Personally, I think some of them should be use-consumables, i.e the auto-spot item works only so many times rather than for a few hours.

This is a valid concern, I HOPE what they mean is you can equip as per any other piece of kit but when your using a Loadout that has that implant equipped it will drain a common pool timer on the implant until depleted (So the timers on your character, not the specific loadout). That's not what the director's letter seems to indicate though, It utterly defeats the purpose of loadout slots if you have to keep shifting them around because you only have that implant on that loadout.

SOE. i have had high hopes for this game, since October of 2012 during Beta. there have been many instances where ive been angry with the Developers for rather dumb Ideas put into the game, that either No one asked for (LA jump jet sound and Infiltrators Glowing when cloaked) or that the large majority of players DID NOT WANT. such as the sunderer no deploy zones. but ive always kept up hope. untill now.

SOE, please, the player base begs of you. do not put this into the game. it is pay to win, and a few of these implants are Game breaking. you are literally killing this game which so many love, or loved, and which had so much promise

please dont make me quit the game SOE.

Please

Pay2WinSide 2
This game just can't stop disappointing