The Unbiased Amalgamation of Unbalanced Items

These are the things that currently need balancing, as I see it. I tried not to be biased.
- Gatekeeper. TR players will yell that it's not, or that it is but it's "their turn for an OP weapon" (which is a bunch of rubbish because balance does not work that way). But the Gatekeeper simply has too strong of a combination of range, DPS, and accuracy. This is clearly reflected by the GK's huge overperformance in the stats.
- Claymore. This AI mine is superior to the others in every way. No lights, no delay, and more damage. Nobody cares that it's directional, TR. All that means is that it can be hidden off to the side of a doorway or corner and still be effective. Again, the stats show the Claymore to be overperforming by a huge margin.
- NS Revolvers. As sidearms, these guns perform nearly as well as primaries. Combine this with the fact that they're the only pistols that can have real scopes added, and there's really no reason to use any other sidearm, ES or otherwise, over one of the Revolvers.
- C4. I think C4 is too good at too many things. It's an excellent AV explosive, an excellent anti-MAX explosive, and an excellent AI explosive. Not to mention that it can be placed or thrown, detonation can be precisely timed, and flying people can carry it. I think either its extreme AI effectiveness should be reduced, or it should have to be directly placed (can't be thrown) or it should be taken away from flying LAs. As it is now, it's just too versatile and effective.
- Flak. Flak is so useless, it's almost laughable. Flak is supposed to be a hard counter to aircraft, yet an ESF can divebomb a dual-burster MAX, tank all the flak, and kill it, no sweat. Almost all AA in the game is terrible, but flak guns are basically tickle-cannons.
- Flash weapons. I don't think an invisible 4x4 that can drive through buildings should be able to carry an M40 Fury. Is that too much to ask? You should at least have to choose between invisibility and weapons.
- AV Mana turret. Should not be a OHK versus infantry, at least with the unlimited range and pinpoint laser accuracy it has right now. Something is wrong when your AV turret is a more effective AI turret than your AI turret.

I believe fixing these things would greatly help to reduce the cheese-factor of the game.
Thoughts? Or if you can think of something to add, let me know.

While I feel this too, that C4 is too much of an answer for all situations, I don't think you could reduce it at this point. Too many people are so dependent on it, they've entirely forgotten how to play other parts of the game. Take it away and they'll all shuffle like zombies around in the spawn rooms, in a tizzy about how to handle day-to-day functions.

I 100% agree with all of these.

I agree that C4 should loose some of it's AI lethality. It shouldn't 1hko a full health non-flak infantry. The same goes for tank mines as well.

If you want to nerf C4 you're going to have to buff the HELL out of "Anti Vehicle" weapons.

I agree with your list, minus the C4. Leave that alone.

flash,
as one of those people who's poured over 5000 certs in to flash i can tell you that i can still be shot just as easily as you can,
except you can ADAD, i can't.
if you're indoor on a flash you're a free kill.
plus the angles you can shoot at are so restricted that any enemy coming from anywhere not in a 90* cone infront of you will kill you easily.

AV mana turret,
its strong for the OHK potential, but thats only on a direct hit, plus you're wrong about "unlimited range" they put a cap on it a long while ago (between 300-400m i think) also you are a sniper's favourite site, free kill!
i will agree that it is silly how the AV turret is a much better AI option for long range, but thats just down to the cone of fire on the AI turret, perhaps they should make the AI turret like Kobalt? (no cof)

I think the answer lies in the middle. Cut C4 into two pieces: an AV piece with little AOE and damage against infantry but good against tanks, and an AI version with current AOE and damage against infantry (MAX's included). That way people already have to choose what they bring rather than the "prepared for everything" package they have now.
The drawbacks should be obvious: it's got a pricetag and needs some skill to place (on vehicles mostly, being seen one moment too soon equals failure).
You can also change up the way they work. AI C4 could have a smaller AOE (or faster damage degredation) but sticky to MAX's and you can carry more. This pushes it into a less group-kill role and a more solitary role for taking out MAX's, hard targets or traps.


Edit:
Also for the flash, if you removed the 3rd person firing it would suddenly be a terrible weapon as you instantly negate the stable firing on rough terrain that 3rd person gives.

Soooo... Nothing would change?

OP's list are all valid balance issues...

however, the biggest balance issue in PS2 is unbalanced pop battles. no one has any fun in 70-30% fights or 80-20%, or 90-10%, etc.

also HA needs a major nerf to balance classes

Great list and it's spot on. I would add,

Base Turrets
They are very powerful, but most of the time they're useless, because they are SUPER EASY to destroy and are taken out before they can be used.

1. They are stationary.
2. They have low health.
3. Too many things can damage them, some at crazy rates.

The new auto-repair doesn't fix their survival issue at all.
As I have suggested in the past, I would solve this by making the turrets invincible, but reducing their fire rate as they become damaged. When fully damaged, they would overheat after each shot. I would also give them a shield that can be "angled" like deflector shields in Star Wars. Give the deflector shield 5 seconds of use with a 10 second cooldown and have it face where the cannon is facing. This way, no matter what, the base owner would actually be able to use their defenses (provided they have not been hacked).
C4
I like the idea of having purpose-driven C4, so that you have to pick the task they are good at (like proxy mines vs. tanks mines).
Claymores
I LOVE Claymores! But I have played TR as an Engineer main since beta, so... yeah, biased. The reality is that they are TOO good, simply because they can be placed behind cover where no one can see (like on the opposite side of a box) and people run into them with absolutely no way of knowing they are there. Due to the directional damage, they get the kill, where as doing the same thing with Proxy or Betty simply does not work most of the time (in my experience). May as well make them all the same, either make them all like claymores or like proxies (I would prefer if they were all like claymores ).
AV Mana Turret
I bought it years ago and it's OP as hell. As I posted years ago, I'd accept a refund if it was removed to make the game more enjoyable. Vehicle on vehicle combat often gets shut down by these, just because the Engineer wants to "farm certs" and that's not fun for the people who want to enjoy the cool vehicle game play in PS2. On the flip side, AV Mana Turrets are handy for shooting out of spawn rooms to get farming vehicles to back off...

I think you're sensationalizing a bit.

I just looked at my NC character's deathboard for the last 100 deaths and those things you listed (minus the flak) accounted for less thant 3% of deaths. That was Gatekeeper, Claymore, Revolvers, C4, Flash Weapons, and AV mana turrets combined.

I think what is really happening here is when you're killed with your guard down, and when its the most annoying to get killed, then its because of one of those weapons. But when you're alert, not sitting still, and playing normally. You're killed by a Carbine, LMG, or Assault Rifle.

Well, a lot of these weapons are compared directly to their categorical counterparts, like the Claymore, revolvers, flak, and the Gatekeeper. Regardless of whether or not you get killed "a lot" by them, they're clearly overperforming in comparison to their peers, which shows that they're not balanced.

I agree with the Revolvers, but I don't think they're OP, just undeniably better than any other secondary. There's no reason to have anything else at your hip if you've got a revolver.

As for the AV MANA Turret, it does have a strange role as highly-accurate AV denial and infantry sniper. However, you can get sniped off of it easily. I'd wait to nerf it, though. It's the last thing I need for Engineer Auraxium armor (a little under halfway done with the 'rax), and there's no way I'm going to 'rax the Spitfire or start from near-zero with sticky grenades.

So nerf things in their categories rather than buff the under performing elements in those categories?

But more importantly, why shouldn't those categories be buffed all round to make them competitive options to other general categories? I mean wouldn't 'perfect balance' mean that we'd have equal performance across the board across Primaries, Secondaries, AV weapons, AI weapons, AA weapons? Obviously Primaries are OP by that measure. Maybe the nerfs should start there?

Point I'm trying to make here is, be honest. Don't come in with an agenda against weapon systems you don't personally use. Don't come in with an agenda against things that only annoy you and aren't actually effective.

That's the biggest issue Forumside has. It has an agenda. You all need to ditch it and stop using deception, corrupted stats, and cherry picking to further your own playstyles.

All sides are guilty of it. Air, Ground, and Infantry minded players. Everyone says the other is OP.

A developer once said in another game, "when all sides are complaining, its balanced." I'm thinking DB has achieved it.

Because to not change TTK. OP weapons are too lethal. They have shorter TTK in practice than the rest. Lethality overall is meant to stay the same, not brought up.

Unbalanced pop and overpop. People fight 48v48+ most of the time. 90% of bases are meant for 24v24 or less. The biggest like amp station for 48v48. Part of that could be solved by disabling all small bases and merge big bases with their satellite baseses.

Cool your jets brahskie - show me in the OP where I said "nerf" anywhere?

And if you think this list is cherry-picked, say what, where, why, and how.

Gatekeeper- yes

Claymore- does have lights just dont render till your really close because when they were brighter the mine couldn't be placed anywhere without being seen do to its base profile meaning it HAS to be around corners. Current power is because the other 2 were nerfed because they were being used as assault weapons with infiltrators running into groups of enemys and frizbeeing the mines getting tons of kills(claymore couldnt do this) instead of being used in defence like they are meant to be. Unfortunately tuning them down would likely simply make them worse than their counterparts again do to only being directional and limited in places you can put it. anywhere you put a claymore you can put a BB/PM and have them go off just as much as the other, however the same cant be said about putting a claymore where you put BB/PM. (just check your corners its not hard)

NS sidearms- Everyone has access to them so its not a balance issue even if they are BS.

**** C4 but its unfortunately needed as max crashes would be impossible to deal with otherwise.

Flack- cant say never cared about it really.

flash weapons- i hate flashes but they arnt invisible just advanced stealth you can hear them coming and you can shoot them right off they are extremely irritating. But i will say that if they hit a max it should't just be roadkill they should both die i mean physics state equal and opposite reactions a max is much heavier than a flash that means the flash should die aswell in the crash but they dont even slow down.

Av mana turret- first you just wrong they have a max range i know ive sat just outside of it before obliterating armor in my tank. Secondly they are slow so 1 hitting an infantry that isnt always the easiest to hit unless they are sitting still and having to sit on the turret guiding it the entire time makes you a ****** version of a sniper that gets the trade off of killing if it hits anywhere but the drawback of no scope and long exposure time.

Lastly this does seem biased only things mentioned are Tr or nutral none of the other factions unbalanced BS is in here. Theres alot more weapons in the game that have a huge discrepancy like the difference between the Banshee and its counterparts, Battlegoose and its counterparts, Fractures and its counterparts ect.... You even forgot the other TR one of the prowler compared to its counterparts. The games balance comes from mostly every faction has BS its just different BS for different parts of the faction.

You just described the original layout of Zurvan Amp Station (and Allatum Bio Lab) back in beta. It had a single capture point in the amp station and other capture points in several smaller bases around it, A B C D E. This required players to fight over the entire canyon area rather than just around and inside the amp station walls. It was a prefect setup for the population we have now, but back in beta it didn't work out well, because player populations were low and folks generally didn't know how to play the game yet (and squad/platoon/outfit/voip wasn't finished yet or was flaky). Had SOE only kept that design and used it throughout the maps we wouldn't be seeing these game breaking 96+ overpops in bases that were, at best, designed for 24vs24.

The Lattice system is a terrible thing for the game, which I said many times before it was implemented. However, the vocal minority of PS1 players (most of whom are long gone from PS2 btw...) would not shut up about how great the lattice was and they refused to offer productive feedback to make the hex system better, when in fact the hex system was a brilliant design.

In beta they tried some good mechanics separately, but they really needed to use at the same time to achieve a hex system that would be superior to the lattice.

1. ABCDE Zurvan concept at most locations, leaving the smaller hexes as bonus locations.
2. Hex adjacency requirement and influence (to capture a hex you must own one hex connected to it and capping an enemy territory is faster when you own the bases touching it).
3. Capture points automatically tick back to the owner when there aren't any enemies standing on them.
4. The 3 types of resources and connected locations replenishing bits at time. Combine that with anything pulled from the warpgate being free and it would have solved the issue of the losing side(s) not having the resources to fight back out of their warpgate.

Doing this would have dramatically increased the strategic game play while also spreading fights out over larger areas. Fights would feel just as epic, while also not literally breaking the game by causing things like ability lag, stuttering characters, things/players/vehicles not rendering, excessive damage latency, and so on.
I really miss Higby, Smed, TRay, and the original gang who had very smart vision for what the game would be back in 2011/2012. They never intended there to be 96+ vs 96+ battles at small places like Xenotech Labs. Instead, they wanted every inch of the map to be worthwhile and fought over, in Higby's own words. Have a look at these vidoes...
"5 year player vs. 5 minute player", "sidegrades", and certs

Scale of the game, resources, offline certs, and more (world premiere in 2011)

"Every square inch"

Command Center Episode 1 (just because!)

I have been around since before "Planetside Next" was even a thing and it's depressing how shallow the game turned out to be and how little of their three year plan was accomplished. Those goals were entirely possible to achieve, with focused management and hard work. What we have now is a fun team death match game, but it could have been so much more.

You picked one thing from a handful of categories and said they were unbalanced. That's requesting a nerf.

Unless you wish to recant your entire thread and emphasize that you want things buffed. If you say something is imbalanced you either want something buffed or nerfed. Otherwise you're not making a point at all.

So which is it?