[Suggestion] Sunderer-based Artillery

Meanwhile, I'd like to see a harraser with two player slots, no weapon and "deploy" for the character loadout menu without being able to spawn people (squad beam, but still not built-in)...

OMG, we bring the Starcraf Ghost to Planetside! !!! !!!!!! Feel the hype !!!!!!!!

How to I delete my own post? I double posted by accident...

Honestly PS2 would be a much better game if it took RTS elements into consideration. That's really what PS2 is lacking at this point... strategy. And where better to get strategy than from Real Time Strategy games?

One RTS element that PS2 would benefit from is escalation. In most RTS games you start with basic buildings and units... usually infantry. And sure those infantry are fun, cheap, and spammable, but over time those early infantry quickly become obsolete and are replaced with massive machines of war. It would be nice if in PS2 fights there was this sense of escalation, starting as a minor infantry skirmish but evolving into a full-on combined arms battle as the fight drags on and gets more intense.

Another RTS element that would improve PS2 is resource and asset management. In RTS games you often build bases and gather resources, which adds in an element of economy to battle. This also affects the battle in many other ways, like access to advanced technology and units. Resources means that you can starve the enemy out, and critical assets means that you can blow stuff up to weaken the enemy. The "Resource Revamp" is supposed to add in more resources, and making many buildings destructible would greatly help the flow of battle in PS2.

Finally the last RTS element that comes to mind is issuing orders to your units. Sure squad and platoon waypoints are nice, but there should be better tools available. Synchronized and dynamic waypoints, for example, which allow for coordinated pincer movements. Or simply setting a series of sequential objectives. Or setting a priority unit target type (for example, any spotted aircraft become temporarily marked as priority targets for an A2A squadron). The PL also needs enforcement powers as well... a basic hex-sized time-limited pain field would work.

So yea... when PS2 finally decides not to cater to children it really could do better if it started incorporating some thinking elements into it.

So another bit of brainstorm...

There should most definitely be different types of artillery shells available to artillery vehicles. Of course these would be somewhat modified based on the platform (an artillery vehicle meant for AV work would never be as good as a dedicated AI artillery vehicle), but it would give a certain amount of flexibility. These would likely be unlocked in a similar fashion to how AP/HE tank cannons are unlocked.

Here's some of them... so many exciting flavors of death!

Screaming Munition
These shells or rockets add in a mechanical siren, which while reducing the overall damage and splash radius add in a terrifying psychological effect as it plummets to the ground. It works for the Phoenix and the PPA, so why not artillery?



Dud Munition
These artillery rounds are actually empty of all non-propellant explosives, only containing the siren from the "screaming" variant. Still lethal if it happens to land on someone's head, but otherwise harmless. Unlike real duds, these are engineered to be empty so don't go around playing with real unexploded duds because those may still explode. In PS2, these could be used to force enemy infantry to leave an area thinking that a bombardment is incoming, allowing friendly forces to advance without fear of friendly fire.



Smoke Munitions
Artillery shells can be modified to create smoke instead of explode. Not only are these clouds more voluminous than 40mm or handheld smoke grenades, they also tend to smoke for longer as well.



Flares
Artillery can launch IR Flares, which have two purposes. First, the flares act as great SAM and A2AM countermeasures as SAM/A2AM systems have a chance of locking onto the flares instead of friendly aircraft. Second, the flares act as a source of illumination, denying the VS hidden soldiers their nocturnal advantages.



Anti-Personnel Cluster Munitions
Each of these rounds explodes low over the battlefield, releasing a number (probably no more than 5) small proximity mines. Each mine actually does fairly little damage (probably no more than 10% health), so the purpose is more to harass and slow enemy infantry than to kill them. Area denial is the name of the game. As a safety measure the submunitions are deactivated after 1 minute.



Anti-Vehicle Cluster Munitions
Similar to the AI variant, this one drops two or less mini AT mines on the battlefield. Again, the purpose is to slow more than to destroy and the damage these mines do is not very much. Also fitted with a two-minute self-neutralizing system.