[Suggestion] Spawn Limitations

There, a good point made about why this is not a good idea. I agree with you completely. Squad play would get messed up if some of the squad had to leave to another region. But if squads also got redesigned then you could mitigate this problem.

It's a tall order but I truly believe it is worth it in the end. Right now, the squad play I think is lack luster and doesn't offer the benefits you would expect unless you are in an outfit with voice chat. But just hitting "Join Squad" doesn't change much from playing solo.

Accommodating the limited lives per region with a more comprehensive continent wide squad system that breaks up squads by region automatically would greatly mitigate this problem AND increase its efficacy from where it is now. I always thought the squads were limited by their suits base design. Just make it per region and then you have squad commands that tell the squad to go to another region. Everyone pops into that region and is automatically switched to that squad.

You've got it bass-ackwards mate. The motto is a result of the game design, and that does dictate balance.

This game is set in a planet of endless war between factions made up of literally immortal soldiers powered by space magic. Trying to enforce artificial spawn limitations in this setting and calling it a "reboot" would be like setting the remake of the Lion King in the Central Park Zoo and calling it "re-imagination".

This game isn't for everyone, people try and quit the same day, and they do it all the time. What is left of this game is a smaller community of people that genuinely enjoy it for all its faults. This community obviously invests enough back into the game not only to keep the lights on, but to continue to develop content and even to facilitate "under the hood" changes like DX11 (which ironically has a much greater chance of bringing back players than the addition of any shiny new gimmick).

If you like this game, nothing else will scratch that itch. If you don't like it, you aren't going to be swayed back by a funky spawn system. The Devs have a lot more to lose by pushing away existing players by fudging with the core mechanics than they have to gain attracting brand-new players. Especially since this game relies so heavily on word-of mouth from those existing players for advertisement.

To put it bluntly, if you are so set on making so many changes to this game to make it suit you, changes that are unlikely to even see Dev discussion, let alone player testing, you probably should look for another game.

Good points. But this game is special for sure and I like it the way it is myself. I could play this game for a long time if it wasn't for my computer limiting me and the general performance issues the game itself has.

So that all aside, it's for that very reason I make this thread and defend it. I love this game and I know that by making this change it will improve it. That's the goal. And no it is not about me at all. It is about the glory of the game.

The game right now is a kill box and farming is the only meta. Objective play suffers tremendously and are you going to deny it? Can we both agree that if you made objective play more valuable then this game would improve as it is?

So here is one measure that cuts to the heart of why this game is such a big farm box. And this measure will also benefit many other things. It's clear you haven't read the entire thread yet. I recommend sitting down a bit and going through it because there are good ideas on how this could work, for the benefit of the game itself.

As the entire experience is geared for killing.
The Entire directive tree is basically killing.

The objective-play, are the ones who would die the most, or suffer in this.

How will it benefit other things?

• For vehicles, their enemy's C-4 will be easily nullified unless perfect the first time.
• The first max on the field, will happily erase entire groups.
• The first spam of explosives, will cascade.
• Everyone will be discouraged from dying - which already means.... People will be avoiding objectives. (Spawn-Room snipers)
• Devaluing the entire use of an AMS Sunderer position, as the enemy will just use it farm lives into oblivion, if not just ignore it.
• Spawn-Rooms, are horribly designed, and will be farmed even easier, locking people out.
• Aircraft will not notice this change at all, since they can operate from the warpgate, and reach anything in a minute.
• If it affects the warpgate itself, it'll be hellish camping.
• If it doesn't affect the warpgate, there'll be no possible way to defend past sheer farm power any base close to it.
• Artillery & OSC, which one-shot, the OSC which goes through everything but a spawn-room is now cleaning lives freely from a good hex away inside a self-repairing automated defense-grid PMB with pain-fields.
• Assaulting PMB's, will be a nightmare easily, if built properly.
• Aircraft Firepower will be more hellish.
• Long-in-the-field-fights will be cut short into oblivion, rendering the base unmanned entirely on arrival.
• Push-outs from a base, turning the tide, will be less from skill & taking out spawns, to Farming-power.
• Engagements will be limited, the skill of the combatants, in smaller-fights, ensure complete domination even when out-numbered - no objective will also win the day, as you can camp one, and eliminate the entire respawn of them.
• Unless hard-farming Cert gains will be limited by Lives entirely, so risky playstyles are hard-core limited in value. Farming playstyle rewards go up, as kill-streaks become harder to remove while in a tank or ESF.
• Re-deploy Platoons profit hard, by mass-dropping via galaxy, and never staying in a fight.
• Defense Squads are hard-limited in ability, and squads scattered & splintered if holding objectives properly - as it will not be flipped, unless they fail in their jobs , which goes against objective-play.
• Zerging of vehicles, is more effective, as every enemy killed is a reduction in force - while they press forward, replenishing numbers constantly.
• Locations like Indar, which have massive distances, either benefit harshly from overlook (where your respawn limiter is turned off), allowing killing fields of limited-lives player while having unlimited respawn themselves. To long stretches of terrain between bases (Indar specific, left side of the map), where to reset that cap, is to cross miles of open terrain typically shelled from a mile or three away, or shelled literally by artillery fire, OSC's, snipers, and tanks.

The new players will be shut out rapidly, if engaged by vehicles, maxes, aircraft, or skilled infantry.

Nothing in this game, or universe, is set-up, for limited-lives per region.
I prefer delayed respawns, as a cost, as it doesn't Completely shut-down a fight at a location.
Or force a re-deploy to get anything out of a session.
Nor does it directly & harshly reward avoiding a fight unless hard-farming.

And no, you can't actually list as many logical problems, if you talked about why Friendly-fire is 'bad'.
I've had that debate before,

• Friendly-fire prevents AOE spam among friendly forces, which eliminates any risk of throwing high-damage near-avoidable AOE that would destroy anyone that got close, or within the formation (A risky ploy to land among them, unless they can fire without a damn, in which case, it's suicide only)
• Friendly-fire, prevents just spamming the fire button, and saturating the entire field, or corridor with bullets till you hit something.
• Friendly-fire reduces the rushing without a regard for allied fire, so you can't just run through allied fire.
• Friendly-fire makes you give a **** about your aim, your allies aim, your actual position, and to not throw AOE shots around so casually.
• Without Friendly-fire, AOE spam would be god even more so, as you could rush while spamming it, cleaning entire groups rapidly without regard - right now, you'd murder half your squad if you threw grenades so casually.

So no, you can't make the same argument, about Friendly-Fire, as Spawn-locks.
One makes it so you can't respawn at all, one makes it so you can't spam explosives without killing yourself & allies.
The only related thing, is it 'worth the cost' of casually acting.
And when the game's entire base design, vehicle design, PMBs, and similar, are all designed for infinite lives, it gets a bit comic.

That's not surprising at all. It's well known that performance/graphics have gotten much worse over time. But of course we all realize there are problems. Most people only come to the forum to whine about this or that. Something else to consider is that PS2 tried to cater to everyone, which in my opinion made it somewhat bad at everything. It tries to be this massive war simulation, but at the same time it tries to keep the CoD kids happy with instant, mindless, and constant action. I'd rather see a more tactical game myself, but half the community doesn't want any interruption of spamming lives with a shotgun at a room full of bad guys. You're talking about a fundamental change 6 years down the line. That's pretty risky for the devs, and a kick in the nuts to players who invested in this game and love not having to care about lives or strategy. Just something to think about.

On another note, your quoting skills are coming along nicely.

Heheh, why thanks. And I'm always optimistic. This game just feels like it's ready for change. I know it has been 6 years in the making but I think it's time has come to shine.

No we wouldnt have a better game, wed have a different game.
How many times do i have to say this.

Planetside is planetside, it isnt COD it isnt battlefield it isnt squad or arma or any other game you can list.
Its planetside, its its own game, own type, own balance, own story.

You cant come here and play for 5 minutes and then attempt to change the game weve all been enjoying for 6 years, sorry but you just cant.
The fact that your opinion is the game isnt very good means nothing to us, sorry but thats just the case.
The game was more unforgiving for new players when we joined, did that stop us? Did we get turned away? No, we enjoyed what was on offer and played it.

Your 'first impression' is nothing more than opinion, its your opinon that vehicles are too cheap.
Your opinion isnt fact, has never been and will never be.
The rest of your first impression is totally irrelevant to this discussion, try to stay on your own topic.

Its my opinion that the game is very enjoyable currently with the spawn mechanics as they are now, and id be fine if nothing changes.
If the developers decide after 6 years to go in another direction (new continent seems to be) and i dont like that direction ill simply stop playing, ill be disappointed, but at the end of the day its not my game, i either enjoy whats offered or i dont play it.

So you are acting like the forum police here and saying I can't come in here and offer a FRESH perspective on the game? Get out. If forum activity is invalid in your opinion then take your own advice and get off this forum.

Fresh perspective is key. I represent the most valuable asset to any game. Just because you have a stable population doesn't mean the game should never change and upset that population. It's also called a plateau. And honestly, this game gets better and better with the more people. Have you looked on this forum yet? How many threads are there that are complaining about alerts and complaining about population imbalance? Why is there going to be a 4th faction to balance the population? Because they aren't drawing any new players in to do that! They have to use their own stable population to start fixing problems that would never be there on a STATISTICAL basis if there were MUCH MORE people in the game. So don't get your skibbies in a bunch and then malign what someone is doing here on a legitimate basis. You've made no REAL point as to why specifically spawn limitations would be bad for this game and that is the purpose of this thread. So stay on topic or don't post on this thread. End of story.

Firstly i feel i should point out that the 20 or so people on this forum are not a representation of the entire games population.
Infact, as evidenced throughout history repeatedly, when people are happy they are quiet. Only when people annoyed or angry or unhappy do they kick up a fuss.
Its a vocal minority around here, some of them even admit they dont even play the game anymore.
So ill see your 'forum users' and raise you 'the rest of the game' who obviously arnt unhappy enough to whine on the forums.

Dont resort to ad-hominen, do it again and this convo is over.

Please link me your new player retention statistics, or your new accounts signup statistics.
Id be very interested to see where your drawing your conclusions from.

Again, to repeat, this is a 6 year old game, its unlikely that its going to draw massive amounts of new players.
Why should the developers chase away what loyal playerbase they do have, for the sake of perhaps maybe gaining new ones?
Its a big gamble with their income potential, would you agree?
Far better to add new content around the already existing gameplay, and to encourage old players to return.

Tbh, youve failed to convince me as to why spawn limitations would be good for this game.
Infact all youve shown is a disconnect with the way the game plays and is intended to be played.
I dont need to give a reason why its a bad idea, those have been given to you over and over in this thread already:
For example

Thats quite a big list of 'reasons', did you read his post?

Talk about the thread.

... which of these other games you speak of have the scale of planetside ?

realistic game with meaningfull death? like with batlle royal or conterstrike were once you are dead you are out of the game with this scale? how do you expect for this to even remotely work? and be fun for the casual player?

You are asking in terms of absolutes and he was speaking relatively. Why can't people differentiate this?

Making lives MORE valuable doesn't mean they are priceless per se. If you read the whole thread you will see exactly what kind of limitation could work where every player stays happy and you get all the benefits of tactical play for the objective. It would still be a limitless spawn over all. The only limitation is between base captures and base defenses. That's it.

The effect of this would be that fights would get spread out on the front line more and ghost capping would become less effective. And other things already mentioned that you can go back and read.

as has been stated numerous times not just in this thread ...
base defense is alredy impossibly hard ..
the limitation in spawns for the attacker comes in mobile spawnpoints like the sunderer or a piloted galaxy ..
destroy these and the spawnoptions are gone even if only temporary .. if a zerg comes however you may just redeploy or witness the hundred times of you dying ..

and no fights would not spread .. those who are limited in skill would just all the more try and find safety in numbers or behind armor
i who play more a supportive role sure as heck would ... meaning zergs would be even more prevalent ...

also i love how you throw this suggestion in, but are unwilling to think it through and then ask others how to have the game fixed for it to work ... the game´s mapdesign and scale is build around to throw large numbers of bodies into a fight ...
what you suggest would require a entirely new build up for "just" that idea .. in other words it would require an entirely new game ...

Again, read the thread and if you don't think otherwise then say why. You are exaggerating when you say it would take a new game because spawns already are limited. So limiting them more isn't going to break the bank. Stop being so dramatic.

Spawns aren't limited presently, in that manner at all.

We have Spawn-Beacons, Routers (new, PMB), Sunderer AMS, Squad-Spawn (That's several vehicles, like Sunderers, Valks, or Galaxies), Spawn-Tubes (PMB), Spawn-Rooms.
That's not including the new Implants designed around spawn-options.
We also have nanite-revive grenades, medics themselves for single-target, an implant that is a self-revive.

Now bases, their design is about Numbers.
12-24 Lives for the entire garrison, say a group of 6 people, now the Spawn-Room has a Massive choke-point easily held from outside, and a massive exposed door to the nearby exterior.
Does that sound like it's set-up for the defense to be limited in lives, or that sheer numbers are required, if combat happens.
Now this choke-point is reached easily from outside, and is impossible to avoid if spawning from that base.
So that choke-point is a constant, If lives were limited, Why is it designed to maximize death?

Lets' look at the basic & classic defense configurations;
We have the exposed spawn-room, open-walkways exposed to air & tanks outside, snipers, and of course the Point-rooms.
These are typically in a room big enough for a shotgun to function perfectly as a kill-zone, or in the open-air.
The entry ways into the base, comes with berths for Sunderers to deploy AMS, allowing a Spawn-point.
The Choke-points, are typically large, allowing entire squads to run down the lanes, which are multiple routes once outside the spawnroom choke-point, with numerous roads & paths along to the Capture Points.
Which are far enough away that LMGs, can be entirely nullified from point A to point B.
Tower bases, have their A-Point inside, nearest the spawn inside the tower, with balconies & more, perfect as an endless killing field inside that Tower.

The bases are typically open, with doorways large enough to fit a max or two infantry a-piece in, with large interiors, with cover galor, large enough for multiple players.

Defensive Turrets are far & in-between, and often above the allied vehicle spawn-pad is an AV turret or nearby.
This pad is entirely exposed - and vehicles have an auto-drive on spawn-in.
The terminal is also exposed entirely - which means to use it, makes you a perfectly still standing target.
With enough space around said terminal, and turrets, to house 6-12 team members if they aren't inside each other.
Rather than a cramped space.

Now onto the weaponry designed for this; Kobalt, an Dedicated AI weapon for vehicle, it shreds infantry inside a half second.
This is available on ATVs.

MAX Units
These are heavily armored suits, armed with two entire weapons for closing in, and cost an entire bloody liberator (450 nanites)
These can walk in, at any moment, and if properly used, erase entire squads.
Max crashes, are when we storm in with a damn entire squad of Maxes & Engineers. NC loves doing this more-so.
There is nothing that can be done, to avoid being mulched if one wants to kill you, past out-skilling it, or cheesing it, when not running away.

Grenades; A blast radius larger than any tank shell.
And is lethal if landed properly - which isn't hard. I typically nail spawn beacons from over an entire building, with a Frag.
We also have grenades that completely scramble controls (Concussion), and ones that blind (Flash)
On top, we have EMP grenades.

Now the classic attack on a Base, involves an exterior battle in the hex; Possibly a mile from the base itself.
Commonly dominated by armor, with a supporting wave of infantry marching in for the closing stretch.
Now with limited-lives, this exterior fight would deplete the entire base of defenders easily.
As it's an open-field battle, that has no limitations on reinforcements, air pop-ups, the mass amount of explosives we have, and sniper-fire.
We also have cloaked Battle-ants, that can ram lighting tanks to death without a scratch - while wielding Kobalts.
Infantry are expected to die a lot - let alone with the old Flash Wraiths (Cloaking ATVs, with shotguns)
With limited lives, you couldn't be in that field, at all , unless in a tank swarm.

Nothing in this game, is set-up, For the concept that Your life as a solider means jack-all.
A thousand died to take a point; Yes, that is basically the Crown.
As you couldn't stand at one-point, and farm the enemy till they dropped.
You had to actually advance & take out their spawns, if the defense.
If the attackers, You actually had to take the points, not camp their spawn to win the base.
If LOL-Pod ESFs roll up for a 2 second attack spree, the base isn't lost, unless the Attackers are able to mobilize the lull in reinforcements, and take a stronger forward position.

Tactics rule the day, rather than sheer killing power.
Your enemy is endless, unless you take out the supply lines; So you can't just kill till they are gone.
You have... take out their spawn-points while they engage you.
That's a lot more tactical than "Sit here, in safety, killing people, until the screen says enemy depleted"
This isn't SW, we have infinite forces, Attrition only works if You make progress rather than sitting still.

This sums up half my problems with this game. It's so dumbed down. Take lockbons weapons for example. Sure, I get that there needs to be something non-MLG players can use, but they've set the bar so low that my grandma could find a place in this game. And then players complain that the grandma weapon isn't competitive.... PS2 has the scale, but it doesn't have the complexity of gameplay to accompany that scale. It's too simple. I think we'd be much better off if PS2 wasn't so accommodating to casuals, and yes, that means their 5 year old and grandma market may suffer.

I did, you took it off on a tangent with your forum police nonsense.

Look, i feel you, moving from planetside 1 to planetside 2 did feel like dumbing down, it was dumbing down.
At the time i was a bit miffed, why go backwards?
Since then ive played planetside 2 (for longer than i care to admit) learned how it plays and whats on offer, and enjoyed it for what it is.
Its like if i choose to play checkers, i dont then complain that it has no bishop, if i want a bishop i go play chess.
If i want more complicated than chess im stuck as theres nothing, but thats not chess' fault.

Yes, objective play suffers at the expense of the "Big Fight". That's because that is what most of us are here for, and it is this franchise's bread and butter. If you want smaller, more tactical objective-based gameplay there are other shooters that do it better. Improving objective play is a commendable goal, and one that I and many others who have been playing a while can get behind.

If you want to make people care about objectives, you need to make those objectives important enough that players will take the fight there themselves. Make the 'Objective' and the 'Big Fight' into the same thing. There are a plethora of ways to accomplish this without the method you are suggesting, which at best changes nothing about the way the game is played and at worst affects it negatively. The playerbase isn't an infinite resource, and if you take away their reasons for being there they will go away.

If this game had been built from the ground up with spawn restrictions per region, then what you are suggesting very well could have worked. You can 'pooh-pooh' the game's age all you want but the fact remains we are 6 years past the release date, and it is very late in the day to be talking about drastic changes to the core gameplay. Look at the reception to CAI, and the number of players that dropped after that patch. Compared to what you are suggesting those changes were minor and negatively affected a small percentage of the playerbase, yet the game still suffered a loss in players from which it has never recovered.

sure is .. the game as is is big enough the ammount of upfront information you need to learn is huge and many aspects of of the game aren´t accessible, then there is the impact of current ballance between infantry, vehicles and air ..THEN there is the need to have to invest into "basic" upgrades that you need in have whatever you play actualy be competitive ..
considering how this game is build up with certs in mind andyour idea of limiting spawns and at worst lock out players from a region can drastically impact progression of a player ... meaning you would potentionaly increase the grind

so basicaly the whole thread is you being stubborn about your idea ..

guess what .. we can be as stubborn and say ..your idea suc kz ... plain and simple ...
@krelas laid out the reasons well enough were i just would repeat them ..

you yourself say that you are new so i have to assume that you are not realising the details of this game that makes your suggestion bad .. it´s NOT an easy fix ..
you are not considering the effect of a pottentional snowball this would have overall or how much worse warpgatting a faction would have
... at best your suggestion would have no effect on the gameplay if you set a spawn limit to something of a 1000 lives and that suggestion would be just a waste of time to the devs limited resources ..

... at worst you would cause less experienced players, be they solo or in an outfit to not be able to be in the prefered action/battle .. and force them to drive around more taking more time to get to a new fight .. meaning you are not considering the individual available playtime of a player ..
... in the absolute worst case which is warpgating with the current laticesystem a low pop faction would be all the more stuck to the warpgate incapable of expanding anywhere ..
... even worse you could harm outfit/squadplay as you would seperate players and force them to regroup as a whole if they want to stick toghether ..


but come on give me that nice comeback of "dont´be dramatic, read the whole thread" again .. ..
ps: i don´t need to read the whole thread to disagree with your suggestion ...