[Suggestion] Reduce friendly fire damage to 75%, maintain weaponlock threshold

There's been a fair amount of complaints / discussion recently about friendly fire. A recent meta analysis of FF events has illuminated the amount of FF happening and it's pretty bad in some cases such as NC Connery. (http://www.instantactionpodcast.com/podcast/iap-055-dont-touch-my-rusty-bent-glaive-planetside-2/) FF seems to be on the brain and I have an idea.

As PS2 is more about pew pew and explosions, massive fights, etc. and nobody likes being killed due to the random player who disregards his team as he suppresses a contested area with his HE cannon, I propose that FF damage be reduced to 75% of normal. With this, however, the weapon lock penalties would be buffed to remain equal to the number of hits / weapon required to invoke a TK punishment.

The result: fewer FF casualties, fewer outraged players making retribution TKs, and the punishment system remains in place as it was. To me this would be an improvement. What say you?

P.S. Heck, I would be for a lower tolerance for FF combined with more lenient lockout times. We all know what it's like to get weaponlocked, return to normal, then bump someone else's vehicle to return to a much longer weaponlock. If that dynamic could be improved I think we're all for that also.

No we do not all know what its like being weapon locked. Been locked exactly once for intentionally killing a guy trying to blow up friendly sundys. People just need to learn how to play and ****. Its not that hard.

Sounds interesting. I would change it further such that after X amount of team damage, it is switched to reflective damage, so instead of your teammate being harmed, it's just you. Reflective is very.....effective, but for some inexplicable reason, shooter developers don't like to use it, so instead, countless millions of gamers get to endure endless griefing and sloppy playstyle.

With that method, you get both the realistic effect of actual team damage, plus the safety barrier.

Why are all these FF complaints popping up? FF is part of the game, and it works the way it is. The main reason for FF is the idiots who don't pay attention and run in front of a vehicle, the idiots who don't pay attention and run into a doorway fill with machinegun fire, and the idiots who think it's funny to teamkill.

Plus faction hoppers.

For the idiots, it might save them from dying, and save the shooter from being weaponlocked, but honestly, why? Communication and strategy should be key in this game. Not zerg rushing a door without talking.

For the TKers, it won't stop them. They will still kill you.

I like that method of dealing with the problem. I'm also an advocate for Hellbanning, but I'd troll it up a bit more and make it so that hellbanned players are able to be shot by other players, but can't see them or fight back, and for the worst offenders, spawn them in the middle of the largest fight you can find.

Sticky grenades will not kill friendlies?

Alright. I'll show you all why this is a bad idea.

Playing since beta, never been weaponlocked
If that's so common for you, then you should seriously stop and consider if you're doing anything wrong.

My opinion is many players are so focused on getting 1 more kill counter they hardly pay attention to friendly lines of fire. You can see this very well if you play the AI MANA turret often, it makes you realize how low is some players awareness. Personally I try to drop the turret where it might be useful and where I can provide suppression fire and... it's shocking to see how many noobs just sit between me and my targets desperately trying to get an extra kill.

Another proposal to make the game a bit more idiot proof? No. Bullets don't kill you a bit less because you're on the same side. And lockouts are pretty hard to get unless you are remarkably careless. I've had one in two years and I play nearly every day. If anything, I would make certain types of TK more severely punished, like explosive kills in own spawn room.

I get tired of "friendly fire" due to vehicles hitting each other, idiots running in front of vehicles, and friendly mines.
Most of the time a friendly vehicle hits mine, I get the verbal warning about FF. Dumb.
Jack-wagons running down the middle of the road on foot. Deserve it (usually). Didn't your mommy teach you to look both ways?
Parking on top of friendly mines. Asking for it.

I like that after almost four years, now apparently is the time to limit friendly fire

Ive been playing for a year now and have never had my weapoms locked. I tend to be a bit more careful around team mates (Nc) who aren't paying attention to whats around them. Ive made good practice by controlling my fire on high populated rooms.

I think a good idea would be if they could somehow implement an on screen message in big red letters that said something to the effect of:
"Warning: you have been firing on friendly forces. Continued offenses will not be tolerated."

No... just no.

i hate being tk'ed but f* it, it belongs to the game. during all the time i have been playing this game i got exactly 1 lock (some unfortunate hits on fiendlies and blowing up a turret that was being hacked by an infy behind it and changed right when i detonated the c4).

If NC does not know who to shoot at it is not the dev's Job to teach them! That would be like having the whole class learn slower because of that 1 "special" kid...

No, believe it or not but friendly fire is probably a very important mechanic. It gives players much more interaction with their allies. If you take it away or reduce it players will have far less to fear when jumping in front of friendlies, you could even see players jump in front of an ally just to steal a kill. What's more, it would mean that Zergs would get much, much better. Right now at least they have to take each other into account when opening fire on the outnumbered defenders, but when you remove or reduce the Friendly Fire this much, players will have no reason to watch out anymore and just about the only disability of having overpop is removed.

I TK a lot of griefers but haven't been weapons locked as far as I can remember.
The 1v1 FF punishment is fine, lets people defend themselves. Against multiple players it needs to be increased drastically.
There's no way anyone's TKing many players with good reason. Faction switching for sabotage is too common.
When someone goes on a grief spree, go as far as taking their certs, auto kicking, even banning.

Then just make this teamkiller weaker (for example reduce health pool by 50% for some time...) or even be more trolly, remove any penalty or griefing sound from damaging him and change his armor colours/model to that of other enemy faction(with huge azz sign in front of his display that he's penalized for griefing[like continent lock sign]), but no kill exp. He would be wrecked by ex-friendlies after respawn several times until enough time passes or set amount of deaths occur (would count for KDR ofc). It's very nasty in my opinion and would remove intentional TK'ing by great degree. I never had weapon lock form friendly killing, except for rare situations like lasher spam in underground bases like SNA on Amerish, or intentional fun between outfit members on voice comms.