Squad Deploy nerf exposes the horrible base design

Ok, before I get started, let me preface this by saying that I full acknowledge the squad deploy (especially on a dead SL) was not a good mechanic as it allowed chain dropping when combine with squad beacon that made it relatively easy to bypass enemy positions.

Okay, here's my rant that vehicle lovers probably aren't going to like. I'm of the PS1 opinion that bases are for infantry (meaning the interior from spawn to capture points) and everything else is for vehicles. Vehicles are for advancing, surrounding, and laying siege while infantry are for capturing. Currently, we have a model where you fight until you're camped by vehicles and then it's time to go elsewhere.

Squad deploy masked this to a huge extent because you usually had the option of squad deploying and using a beacon, both of which would allow you to escape the coward box (spawn room) and actually find a position you could possibly defend or do something crazy like have infantry combat. It's really weird, that combined arms thing...we need vehicles to secure the perimeter and we need infantry take the objective has turned into we need vehicles to spam (sorry "tactically suppress") everything to the point the infantry on the point shoot flare guns to watch pretty sprinkles while the enemy infantry enjoys a modest 5.2 earthquake of screen shake and explosion particles that do no harm but are beautiful in their own right.

When squad deploy was nerfed, it took away the most powerful way to get around being camped and left us with a beacon only system...which as anyone that routinely deploys beacons knows, they aren't staying up for very long. These mechanics provided the very thing that the layout SHOULD provide - infantry combat to capture points. The devs said "But hay guyz, we put up walls and stuff!" The liberators and ESF pilots would like to have a word with you. Or hills. Those damn hills that allow tanks to overlook the walls...nerf hills. "Oh but hay guys, we put tunnels that transport you to one of three places where both infantry and vehicles can camp you!" That made all kinds of sense. Rather than address the issue (camping) we added more easily camped exits (because you float up an elevator that allows 360 degrees of potential danger).

Now, what's a good rant without solutions? Gotta keep it constructive or SOE_MOD_02 might say hi.

1. Enclose all areas with capture points so that infantry dictates the outcome of a capture. Each facility should have a spawn generator that requires some level of capture time accrued before it can be overloaded. This allows attackers a viable way to overwhelm defenders while allowing defenders the ability to fight back without being unavoidably camped. There should only be one shield, which is around the spawn room and the shield should block all incoming and outgoing fire.

2. Severely nerf all infantry AV capabilities. We can't have infantry only areas while allowing infantry to be the prime threat to vehicles. If you get caught out in the open, you should most likely die to a vehicle. This also promotes combined arms as the infantry fighting inside will need the vehicles supporting their continued assault. Make them noteworthy in numbers but not necessarily scary as individuals.

3. Severely buff the rewards for vehicle kills. Reward our vehicle jockeys for doing their jobs. This should be done regardless so that fighting other vehicles is preferable to farming infantry.

4. Remove resource cost for vehicles. Go straight timer that's affected by certs, but also reduce the base time so that it doesn't require 3000 certs to get a vehicle within a reasonable amount of time. As far as I'm concerned, if you implement #1, someone full certed into acquisition timer should be able to pull whatever whenever he wants.

5. Bring in PS1s AMS cloaking ability. It's not a bad thing for attackers to have reliable spawn points that aren't easily found and targeted within minutes of deployment. Plus, it's essential to provide somewhat static spawns to attackers if you implement #1.

Look, it gives pretty much everyone everything they want. Infantry get a playground, vehicles get most of the world, beacons are useful for dropping behind enemy lines for both sides to cause chaos. Vehicle users have a role other than spa...tactical suppressing spawn rooms/control points, are rewarded for engaging in vehicle on vehicle crime, and aren't forced to play non-vehicular roles if a random rock suddenly flips their tank upside down.

Thanks for reading. Agree or disagree, I still love you and am probably watching you from outside your window.

TLDR: Nerf ZOE now.

I had to stop reading here because my brain asked me, "HUHHHHHWHHHHAAA!?!?!??"

Squad deploy now takes you to the hard spawn closest to your squad leader. How does that "get around being camped" as you stated?

If you're being camped, you're on defense. If you're on defense, you still own the spawner. Except in rare cases of course.

Not that I disagree with the subject. Well, I don't think the base designs are horrible, there's just not enough space between capture points. I've been convinced that the best solution is to remove all the cap points for bases that are not Tech Plants, Biolabs or Amp Stations. Keep the buildings there. Just make them all neutral for all intents and purposes. Then there's actually some room for vehicles to be something other than farming tools.

Love your stats sight by the by. Very nice job.

Yea you don't get it. Move along. He meant squad deploy did that before yesterday's nerf.

Pretty much agree Jak, but this game favors zergy outfits and zergy tactics.

Didn't you know the intended role of infantry in outdoor bases is cannon fodder for armor? You should be honored to be killed in such a way. Woo hoo blast proof walls near the spawn, uuuuhhh still have to run to the point across an open field. Herp derp.

I miss PS1 bases, especially interlinks.

The squad deploy was a drop pod, which allowed you to circumvent the camping vehicles/infantry. In a scenario (which is most fights) where you the defender are camped inside, your beacon is not an option, so you could use squad deploy to get out of there and put a beacon or mass drop quickly. This let organized groups drop on the actual point, which would distract the enemy and release the pressure on the spawn room. Effectively, it was a "get out of camped free" card that was removed. Now there is no real viable getting out of a camped situation other than an ineffectively long redeploy for one member in an ESF or the entire squad in a galaxy.

The cool thing about PS2 is the buildings available could be chained together to form complexes that don't have the PS1 base chokepoints that stalled fights. I could easily see ways that infantry fights would be epic back and forth tug of wars. But yeah, zerg rules even more now, sadly. Every "fix" they've made to prohibit camping has been a bandaid that as ineffective at best.

I do understand the point you're making here. I just totally disagree with your conclusion. There's always another way. If if said group was so well organized, they should have taken precautions to getting spawn camped.

I absolutely hate the fact that the game so often comes down to spawn camping. But when this happens it's usually (not always) a numbers thing.

I'd prefer if you keep the personal attacks to a minimum. I "get it" just fine. And the suggested solution is a borderline exploit of the mechanics that I am happy to have removed.

You don't offer any alternatives. You just say deal with it. What you expect with that kind of piss poor attitude?

You say it's the defender's fault for getting spawn camped. Why? Because they didn't bring armor to clear their armor out? How about if we don't have enough resources because the resource system blows in this game?

Seriously, in your "universe" spawn camping is a good thing and the spawn beacon nerf was the answer to all your prayers. Well the other side of the equation needs a little help if we want all things to be equal, i.e. infantry fights and armor fights balanced, not lop-sided.

I'm confused by what you mean with regards to taking precautions from getting spawn camped. It's a numbers game and regardless of how well organized you are, if they have enough vehicles, you'll eventually get camped and be ineffective *regardless of your skill level*. I know groups out there that can fight off 3-1 odds in infantry combat, but vehicles + base design trivialize infantry ability. I don't understand why we as a playerbase accept one group sitting in a spawn room staring at vehicles and vehicles shooting spawn shields is an acceptable play experience.

There's a lot of good stuff here Jak, most of it makes a lot of sense and I agree with most of it. However some of it leaves something to be desired. I liked that you used a numerical point by point format and I shall do the same in telling you what I think of your ideas.

1. This is great, tanks and others vehicles should not be able to directly spam the capture points. It's uber lame as it really is just a matter of lining the cross hairs up with the doors/windows, and promotes farming scenarios which disrupt otherwise good infantry combat from occuring. That being said since I'm in favor of the following scenario occurring in the courtyards of bases


After which infantry do all the heavy lifting by themselves inside the buildings. Tanks can help by protecting allied infantry as they try to go from Sunderer to enemy building or infantry only portion of the base, and fight other tanks trying to prevent those infantry or destroy the Sunderers spawing them.

I'm fine with the game having parts of the base that are infantry only, but it would be cool to have courtyards where tanks and infantry can fight side by side too to encourage combined arms battles.


As a good example, we have EISA Tech Plant







And not the following abomination, which is Crystal Ridge Comm Array

This outpost is a great example where a tank has basically no impact on the facility at all. You get up to a base, and then you have nothing to do. You can even protect the Sunderer well because infantry can easily C4 the Sunderer with the way the entrances are laid out. When I encounter these bases I can't contribute to my outfit much, and if you're a Tanker you're not going to just hop out of your 450 resource cost MBT unless you have significant vehicle resources coming in.


2. Totally Agree, but currently many bases are way to close together so there isn't much world for vehicles to engage in giant vehicle battles with infantry and air in the mix. Currently people can run from base to base without to much trouble. This should be changed.

3. Word...

4. Sounds like a good way to counter vehicle spam, allowing for infantry AV balancing.

5. It would be cool to have that utility returned.

PlanetSide 2 isn't a combined arms game. Vehicles and infantry should compliment each other in a "combined arms" game. Right now vehicles dictate infantry combat. There needs to be a clear divide between indoor and outdoor combat. BUT BASE CAPTURE POINTS ARE INSIDE. Yeah okay, I'll believe that when harassers can't sit on tech plant and amp station points. Great design there.

And there are still too many points, outposts particularly, where vehicles can just sit back and shoot at spawn shields or the obvious path you have to take to get to the cap point. GRRR I'M SUPPRESSING THE ENEMY. No you're not, you're ruining an enjoyable FPS. It boggles my mind that people think showing up with 50 MBTs is a good way to fight. Do you "win?" Yeah, probably. Is that enjoyable gameplay? Apparently, considering a vast majority of the playerbase seems to be enthralled by spawn room pinatas.

I don't know where I'm going with this, I'm kind of just rambling. This is an irritating topic. If you disagree with any of my points it's probably because you got your drool cup and your helmet mixed up this morning. I don't care.

I couldn't agree more. It's slightly less bad fighting Vanu but when fighting the TR there is normally just a ton of 1/2 deployed Prowlers chain spamming he/heat shells into every base (air tower fights being the worst current offender).

The walls on Esamir were a clumsy method of controlling this but personally I would like to see more large bases with walls or enclosed terrain. It's a shame they didn't go with a more PS1 style base design with fewer but larger bases with much more space in between them so tanks and transports had more relevance without dominating the facility battles.

Here's what the issue really comes down to in my eyes: number of vehicles.
I want a game where vehicles and infantry play complement each other. It's one of the reasons I loved PS1, and it's why I've rode out the wave on PS2 instead of playing something like CS:GO. But the number of vehicles in PS2 is absolutely overwhelming. It's always been noticeable, and with the recent release of BF4 (another game with mixed infantry/vehicle combat) it's become painfully apparent. Vehicles are strong in BF4, but they're limited. You can only have so many at one time. PS2 on the other hand, you have strong vehicles and WOOOOO HOWEVER MANY YOU WANT. Imagine a Battlefield round where your entire team can spawn MBTs, LAVs, and scout choppers at the start of the round, and you have PlanetSide. Don't get me wrong, 50 tanks facing off against each other in the open field is awesome, you don't see that anywhere else. But a platoon's worth of tanks just shelling a tower? I'll pass. Despite the redesigns that have been done, it's still too easy for vehicles to camp pretty much anything that isn't a bio lab. And as long as "pull as many tanks and liberators as we possible can" is still an effective tactic, it's going to happen, and it just keeps promoting the awful "numbers always matter" gameplay.

maybe you could get out of your tank and go inside

Okay wise guy, allow me to despawn my MBT and get 450 resources back for the tank I just spawned or allow me to cert into a timer so that if I cert into it high enough I can pull a tank whenever I want as Jak had suggested. As it stands I'm not waiting for 15-30 minutes to pull a new tank in low resource situations just to hop out of my tank and have it despawn in 5 minutes while I fight inside. When I have adequate vehicle resources coming in and when I can't be useful outside in a tank I pull a Max.

Yes in my original Ultimate Combined Arms Thread I had stated I wanted to eliminate vehicle spam and it's still an issue. Personally having many tanks fighting against eachother in an open field is one of the most fun parts of the game for me, when infantry aren't using AV turrets and AV weapons from beyond 300 meters to ruin it, and it also allows tankers to have lots of fun killing zerg infantry in tank while show them what tanking is all about.

Your issue with tanks shelling a tower is due to partially to poor terrain and base placement. For instance some of the towers are placed in positions where the hills let you shoot down directly onto the the top pads, these pads normally allow infantry to fire down upon tanks, and retreat to the middle of the pad to reload. This should be changed so infantry always have a good way to fire back without being farmed.

Sometimes when I pull a vehicle and then the situation which I needed the vehicle ends, and I think to myself "well, I could sit here in this tank doing nothing for the next 15 minutes, or I could go inside this base and shoot at people and actually have fun and by the time that's done I'll be off cooldown anyways."

Actually I just do that all the time.

No. The alternative is to have vehicle support. But you prefaced your argument by saying you didn't want to hear it. So I didn't bother.

Second, I hate spawn camping. But once it gets to that point, it's generally a numbers thing, which I have also indicated. Your "solution" is an exploit of the former mechanics. Which were removed. For good reason.

Squad deploy is a convenience feature, the purpose of which was to help squads stay organized, not a tactic to allow a squad to rotate through squad leaders and then bomb dozens of orbital strike pods at people who paid resources for their vehicles and who have constructed a proper combined arms assault on a point.

Your tactic is an obvious ploy by Team Fortress players to dumb the game down into a single mode of combat, which you favor.

But I avoided saying all that because I was trying to be nice. If you attack me personally, I won't bother trying to be nice.

No doubt you are confused or you wouldn't have opened with a personal attack. I don't have to explain what I mean to you and just because I don't doesn't mean that I don't have a point.

Are you getting me mixed up with WaaWaa? I don't believe I've attacked you...