TL;DR: Clean up Koltyr: Smooth out the landscape, remove major bases, take away flak from center towers, limit what can be pulled based on character level in Koltyr, make inter facility missions teach about gens, SCUs, and cert spending, and limit what's available for purchase until out of Koltyr. Koltyr feels cluttered for a new player experience. There's still way too much for a new player even with tooltips. I believe it needs cleaning up to improve it: As it stands on PTS, the terrain is so rugged learning how to drive is a chore at best. I'm not asking for an open field, but remove some trees and smooth the landscape a little so that it matches up better with the rest of the continents. Remove the 3 major facilities so there's some surprise for new players, but be sure to mention in Koltyr what their importance is. You can add a blurb about what their importance is depending on what you access. That is to say, when you spawn as infantry, tell the player "When your faction owns a biolab, you get a very small health regeneration bonus over time" When you climb into a turret: "Owning an Amp station will reduce the cool down time on turrets" and when you jump in an MBT "MBTs can be pulled from large bases only when your faction owns a tech plant. they can be pulled from warpgates at all times." You could also take screenshots of said facilities and display such tips on loading screens. Have flak turrets removed from the center bases and placed on the bases where the major facilities were at as it's just too much for starting pilots. Give those center 3 bases a shield gen and SCU to teach those concepts. Limit what can be pulled in terms of vehicles based on level while in Koltyr. At a level 1-4, you can pull Lightnings, ESFs, and flashes. Level 4-7 adds MBTs, Sundies and Gals. Level 8+ allows everything else. Classes should get a similar pass as vehicles: LA and HA levels 1-2, Engis and Medic level 3-4, Infils 5-6, MAXes 8+. Sorted this way as kind of "Primary Forces", "Support Forces", "Specialized forces", and "Advanced Forces". And we need inter facility missions for sure especially for new players. As a new player, if you use ammo from your tank or plane for the first time, have a "mission" pop up that leads them to friendly ammo towers/pads. Lead them to a point that needs capping/defending, lead them to something that needs repaired or someone that needs revived provided they're playing the class that does that. And teach them to upgrade via certs with such a mission system. After getting 10 certs, have it as a mission to upgrade something on their character. Text boxes or voices or both can guide them through this process and what each slot is for. And regarding Certs, limit what's shown to them for purchase. Even as an old player, have upwards of 15 guns, or however the hell many optics there are, can be imposing. Drop it down to showing only the base gun with a couple attachments for the classes and tell them more options will be available on the real field.
