[Suggestion] Construction Revamp Suggestions & Ideas

Discussion in 'PlanetSide 2 Gameplay Discussion' started by Zakh, Oct 17, 2020.

  1. Zakh

    This is an ongoing complaint that a lot of us have. During platoon-sized ops I can sometimes follow armor around and find a good opportunity to drop a road block and bait out a decent fight, but because of the amount of cortium it takes, it's rare that I ever get to build anything really useful in those situations outside of the silo and a few walls.

    With the mission system now in place, specifically regarding the Elysium Drill & the Data missions, I think these could easily be incorporated with construction. The devs could do something creative like having drill derricks or towers at these locations for the missions. At the least then builders can say that their bases are fortifying the area around mission objectives.
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  2. Johannes Kaiser

    I like those ideas in general, but I think it may already be a good boost in PMBs usefulness if completed buildings get a huge increase in resistance to vehicle weapons and an increase in vulnerability to infantry-based weapons like rocket launchers, C4 and cortium bombs. Then they actually would be fought over by troops instead of being deleted by far-away tanks in 2 minutes or some enterprising ESFs in about the same time (good pilots can simply hover below the sky shield and the 1-2 AA turrets one can place with the horrid spacing simply aren't enough and quickly destroyed, making the base dead meat for the picking).
    On Wednesday for example, we had 7 people in tanks and completely demolished 2 bases in 5 minutes just because we happened to be in the vicinity. Was it fun? Well, kind of. But it was a very one-sided way of fun, because PMBs simply aren't designed to be defensible against vehicles that are not operated by braindead insects.
  3. PauPC

    Even though the whole construction system needs an overhaul and could really use the suggestions posted above. I believe it would take a great amount of time to develop, which I am uncertain if they are willing to invest that time on it.
    In my opinion, small changes are more feasible.

    The new Esamir Biolab Ruins are extremely fun to build in. However, there are still some fundamental issues that I'd like to see changed. These are listed below;

    1. Placing walls is hard: Wall placement is inconsistent, you should be able to "attach" walls next to each other and leave no gap in between. The walls themselves should also be a little bit more forgiving when it comes to terrain, sometimes you need to place one in a very concrete spot but it won't fit due to a small hill. Bunkers also need to have it's shape changed to a square (bigger pillbox?) or at least sharpen the outside.

    2. Blast/Solid Wall resistances: Even though it is understandable for rampart walls to be "weak" since players can shoot from one side but can't be shot back, blast walls and solid walls do not offer this advantage to the defender.
    So it would make sense to make these EXTREMELY hard to break (or straight up make them unbreakable). This way the builders would have to choose between protecting what's behind the wall with a solid one or allowing their allies to shoot through it with a rampart wall.

    3. Vehicle Ammo Dispensers: A simple addition, make them repair nearly vehicles like the normal base vehicle ammo dispensers. It would greatly encourage players to use them.

    4. Modules in buildings: Allow placing modules inside bunkers/pillboxes etc, this is already done by lowering them below ground level, so why not just make it easier.

    5. Increase the limit of walls: 3 walls are simply not enough to build a base by yourself. This limit should be increased to at least 6 per player.

    6. Cortium Bombs: These single-handedly ruined solo bases. An infitrator with a beacon can destroy an hour of work within minutes. Even though we can't just simply remove them, giving the Pain Spires the ability to destroy these and/or allow turret AI modules to target them would make it a challenge for that lone infiltrator to find the correct spot to place the bomb.

    7. Base Cosmetics: We have cosmetics for all the weapons and vehicles yet there is only a rampart wall camo and a faction banner to show off your base (please make the faction banner show your outfit decal too). Even though I don't play with the construction that often, I would most definitely pay for modules skins.
    Maybe camos could apply to all your buildings, because who would not want to build a giant pink base.

    8. Lowering cert cost: Unlocking all buildings costs 26,750 certs. I just reached ASP 100 on my NC account and made just over 250,000 certs total with membership. That means I have spent over 10% of my TOTAL certs in just unlocking buildings. That price is simply unreasonable for someone who has not reached ASP yet. In my opinion, construction prices should be halved and make basic buildings free (ej spawn tube).


    All of the above should not be hard to accomplish, and it would greatly improve the playability of the construction system.
    • Up x 2
  4. Demigan

    Any and all idea's that make PMB's less of a death-pit are good. Unfortunately the idea to make these items vulnerable to infantry would not make them good places to fight at. It would be difficult to balance these walls and handle a large variety of population. You don't want small groups of players to fight against the death-pits of old, and you don't want larger groups like a squad or platoon drop to just melt through the base in seconds either. You want solid, enjoyable fights.
    PMB creators need to be encouraged to create bases that are fun to fight at.
    The attackers need to be encouraged to fight in a fun way instead of using as risk-free a method as possible, like using a vehicle from range to level it all.

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    Perhaps something like this is a solution: shields that block enemy fire, but allow players and vehicles to pass through. This will dictate the distance where such fights will take place. The shields can protect portions of a base, and proper placement can protect it in it's entirety. For reasons you'll read below the shield will also cause any cloaked unit to have it's cloak locked for 10 seconds, giving all defenses time to fire at it.
    We still have to deal with players making their bases a death-pit. One way that most building players will instantly hate is to disallow walls to be constructed close to each other. If there's a minimum distance where a vehicle can pass through between walls then each wall will need to be placed with more care in order to prevent enemies from getting direct hits, and enemies will have to navigate between the walls to reach the goodies within. Naturally the walls will be able to have much more health and armor than before since they don't block off access entirely.

    This is a relatively low-effort method of balancing this. It provides protection for the PMB, it allows enemies to enter the base without it needing to blow through walls or pick a single chokepoint (excepting a few mountain-bases ofcourse) and it also provides a solid method for players to use a base as a road-block: Vehicles can use the shield to pop in and out of protection. Compared to current walls this allows the vehicles much more freedom to attack enemies passing by and then get back to safety, forcing the enemy to come to the PMB and finish it off.
    It also makes the use of the Glaive more important as it could pop the shield for a moment and allow allies to momentarily attack things.

    That still leaves us with needing incentives to support PMB's. Currently we need automated defenses to protect bases as few people are willing to actually join a PMB. automated defensess should only be a stopgap until allies show up to actually defend it. Part of that is that people might not even know it's there. PMB spawnpoints need to be as accessible as Sunderers with the same short spawntime, PMB's need to be highlighted on the map-screen and PMB's need to provide something that players want to have and to protect, which means that whatever the PMB is creating for them needs to be useful enough to be regularily used.
    • Up x 1
  5. Zakh

    I like this idea.

    I wish we got more bang for our Cert buck. Halving is a good solution that would give more players incentive to unlock a few extra mods, I think. Most people just consider it a waste of certs, and it is.... lol.
    • Up x 1
  6. CruelDestiny

    I would like to add that while I do like the idea of routers they REALLY need some re-tuning. At the moment they're arguably better spawn points (outside of max spawns) and certainly better than beacons as they can spawn everyone and in many a case outright replace sunders.

    Sure its easily destroyed, but you try destroying a router that has a constant stream of bodies flowing out of it with at least 2 or 3 people guarding it and several spitfires, without needing a pocket OS (Which I really don't like the addition of).

    Literally a good fix would have each and every person that spawns from the router pulls cortium from the silo thats being used, farther distance from the silo it is the more draw there is (to a point) not only incentivizing building bases closer but keeping it filled to keep the router(s) working.

    Another fix would to have limited spawns, say a entire platoon worth, maybe two.. would still serve its purpose but require more effort to maintain a spawn literally on top of a point.

    ANYTHING, getting tired of all this nonsense where factions can ignore all other spawning mechanics and favor one that can't be easily countered.
    • Up x 1
  7. Fyrethorne


    They said in the dev stream that spawn mechanics is "Down the line" for a revision, that will probably fall under that scope. That said, it is soonTM, so no idea when that will actually take place.
    • Up x 1
  8. Johannes Kaiser

    They can also be destroyed by lucking out with a grenade in their general direction. The damage from one frag nade really is enough, you just have to get it close enough. It's by far not ideal and it'd be nice to have it redesigned, I agree, but for the moment it's cheaper and more widely available than OS.
    • Up x 1
  9. Zakh

    People kept telling me to go play Minecraft, and I needed to learn some CAD software anyway, so I took the advice to keep myself busy while watching tutorial videos and fidgeting.

    I wanted something to do while I was learning, so I started working on this silly project, which is my rather green rendition of Esamir. I have no visual arts background, and I'm definitely not much of an artist, but I still think it came out okay. If I'm going to complain about geography, I figured I might as well at least try to pull something out of my butt. I marked the shading as a reference since I wanted to try to print it out and paint it for a landscape miniature, and it will all be a solid color anyway.

    I felt like a was 10 years old again messing around with this. Still unfinished, but I think it vaguely resembles Esamir...

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  10. Zakh

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  11. Parsa


    Lol good one, but yea I think one more point you should add to your list PauPC, is to allow the player made base to spawn MBTs/Galaxies/Liberators. Even if the cortium cost would be high it would still be worth it.
  12. Zakh

    Great minds must think alike, because that was on my list of suggestions.
    I was going to suggest that the vehicle and air pads responsible for heavy air and armor be a separate Armory item specifically for those vehicles, and either cost Merit points, Auraxium, or high amounts of Cortium, like 1200 or 1500 per vehicle. Even 2000. Whatever the expense or how it's implemented, I understand why they haven't added this feature in the past, and spamming Lightnings has always been a good strat to fend off attackers in most cases, no heavy armor required. It would be a good solution to get heavy armor on the ground when there is no tech plant, but there would need to be a balance so they couldn't be spammed, else what's the point of Tech Plants anyway, right?

    The vehicle pad itself would need to be useful enough that it would be worth defending...
    There's also that pesky problem of anyone having access to the silo after 20k.
  13. Blue_Lion

    Routers are fairly easy to destroy they often fall to grenades once found.
    Part of the balance is the effort to place them. You have to start at a PMB and travel with it to where you want to place the spawn.
    There is a limit to how many you can place before you need to refill your silo. (spawning ESF to fly takes from your silo.)
    Typically this means you have some one whos only job is to fly in routers, and keep up the base.
    Base builders have to try and find places they do not get destroyed by a random harasser rolling around blowing them up.
  14. AmericanEmpire

    wont matter cortium bomb infiltrators will blow up your entire base
  15. JustGotSuspended


    I would like the NSO mbt or a sunderer ability for this. This would be extremely useful to reignite footzergs, or even just break stagnant vehicle fights.

    I am also not against giving a shield like this to bases. Basically remove all the AI things and pain spires, and revamp the skywall shield to act like a giant citadel shield, with one change: the shield blocks both inner and outer projectiles.

    As annoying as it is to be farmed/demolished from miles away, it's incredibly painful to be shot down by dudes shooting you from inside the cover of their shield.

    For this reason, the shield will be 2 sided. It also won't allow the passage of vehicles without gate shield diffuser, unlike the citadel shield. This way few vehicles will be allowed inside without infantry support, and it will require an organized push to rush a base.

    Additionally, there could be a work-around. The glaive can be reworked into a canon that targets one specific part of the shield, and breaks an opening for a small amount of time for vehicles to get through. This would likely be more difficult to implement, but would regulate the flow of vehicles inside the base like with the gsd method.
    • Up x 1
  16. Zakh

    Fixing T.I. Alloys may have been as easy as opening up the door and allowing a second opening large enough for a Flash makes clearing the vehicle backups easier, and for infantry to bum rush the spawn room rather than being stuck in a single bottleneck on the South side for the attacking force coming from the Bio Lab.

    The opening for the tunnel should probably be pulled out a bit to provide cover and an obstruction, the valley widened slightly to allow for better Sunderer access, and that would effectively give a Sunderer a safer place to park with some slight cover if it parks to the left of the tunnel entrance in the screenshot.
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    Sundy parking on the left. The tunnel entrance doesn't protrude enough to provide legitimate cover as it currently is. The no deployment zone currently obstructs this spot, which is the place Sundies really need to be to be able to access adequate cover.
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  17. Zakh

    The North side coming up the mountain from Ceres is still pretty even, but for the attackers coming from Crown, there isn't a safe place to park a Sundy.

    Modifying the rock outcrop and creating a tunnel to protect from fire at the Crown while providing a cubby against the wall below T.I. Alloys would provide 1 Sunderer cover from armor rolling in from Ceres. This is the only legitimate parking spot for attackers coming from the Crown in a 3-way fight.

    No one lives under the delusion that a Sunderer is ever going to stay hidden for more than 2 seconds.
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  18. Zakh

    Other suggestions.

    Connect the gap with a steel grate bridge and leave the current stairs in place.
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    Grav Lifts in the main room that are more or less directly in front of the upstairs doors.
    They're practical and make sense in a warehouse.
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  19. Toppestofkeks

    Not sure if this is something the playerbase would like to see but in my opinion the Flail needs some sort of rework. The reason for this, being the fact that bases don't really have any REAL value beyond just using them to spawn aircraft. Let's be real, 90% of the bases are just a spawntube + an airpad. I'd like to use the no build zones reduced in size or even go as far as to allow flails to fire anywhere within their range. This will make playerbases more relevant and formidable. You actually have a reason to pull armor and attack a playerbase in this scenario.
    • Up x 1
  20. Zakh

    I was bumping my old thread here just to keep all of my opinions in one place and to touch on Ti Alloys.

    On the Flail and construction though, I agree, and thanks for taking the time to leave your own opinions. o/