Dear Daybreak, Why Still Enforce Pop 'Balance'?

Discussion in 'PlanetSide 2 Gameplay Discussion' started by Snow Sheltie, Oct 25, 2018.

  1. Snow Sheltie

    The title says it all but to break it down a little further;

    I never understood and was (and still is) firmly against attempting to force people to play one faction or another just because there are fewer people wanting to play that faction.

    For starters, it splits the community as outfit members, and friends are stuck waiting in completely unnecessary queues for continents that sometimes don't even have a platoon-worth of population on it.

    Forcing population balance like this in an asymmetrical game like Planetside does absolutely nothing to address balance issues. Trying to force players into one faction or another creates a feeling that the developers don't care for any in-game faction balancing.

    I fail to see how this is healthy for a game like this with such a precarious population level. Remove this ridiculous 'balance' feature.
    • Up x 6
  2. Silkensmooth

    I couldn't agree more. The queue system has been nothing but frustrating.

    That is the whole point of having 3 factions.

    The only time a faction balance queue should be used is when one faction has more than 50% pop.
  3. PlanetBound

    Maybe the players contributed to this by their endless complaining about population imbalance. Personally, I would prefer to join the game regardless of my faction's strength on the battlefield.
    • Up x 3
  4. SmittyJensen

    Because logging in to only find skirmishes where you are severely underpopped is rarely fun. On those nights I usually just log off and do something else. And there seems to be a larger group that play one faction in particular (at least on Emerald) as is. I cannot imagine how lopsided it would get if there weren't locks trying to control the player count.
    • Up x 8
  5. Snow Sheltie

    The thing about three factions is that it is very difficult to balance them out but in a way they self-balance when one faction is too strong and the strongest faction is sometimes stuck with fighting everyone else.

    When you're in a 3-man group? That overpop'll seem impossible. In charge of a platoon or two? Now you can get creative with creating those epic defenses that defines this game. Its those moments of stopping the zerg, of slowing down the enemy so they suffer for every inch of land gained until backup arrives that make those special moments in Planetside.
  6. PlanetBound

    I don't disagree with population complaints. There's a lot of fault with exploiting faction switching.
    • Up x 1
  7. adamts01

    The players did bring this, but only because of the years of obscenely lopsided fights and easy wins by over-pop factions. Something definitely had to be done, but keeping people from playing the game is the wrong solution.
    • Up x 3
  8. strikearrow

    I see no other solution to massive over-pop fights, except the population lock. I have basically abandoned my Connery toon because whenever I log there the VS are about 13%-25% of the pop and that equals a loss period.

    Perhaps they could create some type of duo base queue and lock those 2 bases so squads could fight over those for rewards of some type until the continent balanced. A kind-of game within a game.
  9. strikearrow

    I would say more than 40%. However, perhaps only when more than 100 total players are online should it be used at all.
  10. iller

    No I am NOT LETTING YOU GET AWAY WITH THIS LIE. ... Not on Connery good sir. This is how it looked when I quit the game originally (2015)

    [IMG]

    ...and it's how it still looks several times a week now that I've been back for 2 months

    [IMG]


    ...anyway... back on topic: Population is NEVER the problem. The problem is always who is getting 2v1'd... and for how long?? Usually that's the TR most of the time (which is why I've given up on my new TR alt and gone back to NC despite those inbred blueberries TK'ing me atleast a couple times whenever I log in). And the solution to STOP 2v1'ing is to assign a proper anti-STAT padding penalty against the Zerg in that hex anytime they are killing the Faction with the least Territory. (TL;DR version: Give the bullied-faction big HP bonus so it takes longer for the other 2 factions to Farm / KD pad off them)
    • Up x 1
  11. Jbeasty

    I don't like playing on Connery to begin with, but once in a while I try to in the mid morning if im on (when Emerald is fairly dead) and the population is so out of whack, that a monstrous or completely standstill queue is in effect, so I can't even play anyway. It usually looks like ~ 20% VS 50% TR and 30% NC. My character is TR there...

    WOULD LOVE A FRIGGIN SERVER TRANSFER PLEASE, ILL EVEN PAY!!!! My TR is being held hostage there.

    ...Or just merge Connery over to Emerald, now that the Asian server is up.
    • Up x 1
  12. iller

    Hey now there's an idea!
    • Up x 2
  13. strikearrow

    I'm BR 30 on Emerald now so haven't played Connery for months, but it was bad and constantly 13%-25% VS.
  14. adamts01

    Right now, yes, but for the past two+ years before ques VS has quite often been 50-60% + pop during alerts. That pop shifted to the greener fields of NC once the Koreans left and stopped carrying VS.
  15. Waspkiller

    Vanu is majorly underpopped most of the time but we beat them constantly. It's funny when we actually warpgate the nc and tr constantly and the tr and the nc hit on the vanu constantly because we constantly do some crazy unexpected stuff to them.
    • Up x 1
  16. Waspkiller

    I mean merging servers means that have to move data!
    I mean for real, if the game has such a low pop, merge the servers unless ya'll are going to start some ad campaign going.
    • Up x 1
  17. Waspkiller

    Generally, as i see it, if all the vet players are koreans, then what does that mean. is the vanu korea now?
  18. adamts01

    I can only speak for Connery. FPSK (the Korean outfit) dominated that server for years. They broke up, all the other VS outfits realized how **** they were, and everyone on VS for the easy ride left for NC. There are still some incredible VS players, I think more than on TR and NC for sure, but there's only so much they can do with 20% pop
  19. iller

    Whatever.... meanwhile NC / TR is a LOT more tolerable for me to play now for one reason and one reason only:

    No more FCRW
  20. Liewec123

    To sell memberships ofcourse!

    Noone wants to wait 20 mins just to play, but if you whip out your wallet then you can go straight to the front of the queue!

    Let's look at membership for veterans:
    Passive certs and xp boost? Not too useful when you have everything.
    More nanites? Nice but i'll find I don't use them that much, Default is fine.
    SKIP TO THE FRONT OF QUEUES! Sadly this is about the best thing that your £9 gets you!
    If they removed the artificial and unnecessary queues then they couldn't get you to pay to queue less.
    • Up x 2