[Suggestion] VR Room/Koltyr needs a facelift

Discussion in 'PlanetSide 2 Gameplay Discussion' started by Generic Internetter, Jun 18, 2019.

  1. Generic Internetter

    Dear Daybreak,

    The VR Room needs to have its bugs fixed, and it needs improvement.
    Doing so will enable players to better test new equipment and abilities to feel more confident in making DBC purchases with real money.

    Commonly players will like an unlock enough to get it with Certs, but not buy it outright with DBC because they haven't been able to test it thoroughly. Once they've got it with Certs then there's no incentive to buy it with DBC anymore, resulting in Daybreak missing out on potential revenue.

    If you revamp the VR room and encourage players to "try before they buy" then I am confident this will overall increase purchases of DBC. In business terms, your VR room is your showroom (akin to a car dealership) and the more confidence the customer has in the product, the more likely they are to spend money.

    As for Koltyr, I've tried it several times and I have only once seen anyone else in there. Koltyr was a cheap way of getting players to act as a VR room for each other - Nice idea in theory, but sadly nobody uses it because it's way too slow to spawn, get a sundy, then travel to meet the enemy.
    A VR-room-sized Koltyr would make Koltyr fun and useful for players looking to try before they buy. In fact, finding a way to merge the VR room and Koltyr would solve the problems with both.
    There are probably many more things that can be done to improve the VR room, but to keep development to a minimum these should suffice:
    *** Bugs to fix ***

    -- Full testing access
    Whereas any weapon can be tested, locked abilities cannot. For example, I cannot equip ambusher jumpjets in the VR room because I don't already have them unlocked (is this intended?!). All abilities and equipment should be accessible in the VR room since these are purchasable with DBC, and a player that likes an ability would likely buy it outright with DBC because abilities really shape how a class plays.

    -- Invisible walls
    The invisible walls in front of the shooting gallery and along the balcony facing outfield toward the VS and NC emit the collision "spark" whenever you shoot through them (the invisible wall at the shooting gallery is set back a couple of meters).
    These invisible walls make it extremely annoying to try out different weapons without having to jump down or spawn a sundy thus making the balcony useless. If these invisible walls are required for a technical reason, just remove the collision spark from them to make them truly invisible even when a player shoots through them.

    *** Improvements ***

    It's important to be able to test weapons against moving targets because often a weapon seems great against a static target, but when using the weapon against a moving target it doesn't perform the same, resulting in disappointment ("buyer's remorse") and therefore unwillingness to attempt subsequent purchases.
    -- Infantry
    All of the spawned infantry in the shooting gallery should be set to ADS and some of them should perform left-right sidesteps. Some of the infantry in the field should do this too. A cycle time of 1 second should work well for this.
    Also, some of the infantry in the field should sprint between two fixed points or in a loop; If they can sprint in erratic zig-zags, then even better although not entirely necessary.
    Being able to control the recoil/bloom against moving targets is absolutely central to infantry combat. If a player spends 799 DBC or 1000 Certs on a weapon that doesn't work for them once they jump into combat, it's unlikely they would take the risk again with another weapon.

    -- Vehicles
    Each faction in the field should have one harasser, one sunderer, one lightning, and one MBT, so that players can test AV weapons against all these types.
    Some vehicles should move between two fixed points or in a loop for players to get a feel for the lock-on time and/or projectile velocity of AV guns and rockets.

    -- Aircraft
    Each faction in the field should have two ESFs and a galaxy so that players can try out AA weaponry against the smallest and largest aircraft. The galaxy and one of the ESFs should just hover 50-100m above ground near their faction's infantry. The other ESF should fly between two fixed points or in a loop for players to get a feel for the lock-on time and/or projectile velocity of AA guns and rockets.


    -- Login
    In the "general" or "interface" options menu, there should be an option for the player to choose to spawn in one of four places: "any random active continent" (default), the world map, the VR room, or Koltyr.
    Or simpler: Just login players to the world map, then the player can click where they want to go.
    I mention this here because I almost always warm up in the VR room for a few minutes before jumping to a continent, meaning the game puts strain on an active continent to load me in before I just warp straight back out again.
    Some players log in then sit around AFK in the warpgate of an active continent - this hurts continent population balance. So better off defaulting to world map or giving the player the option in the general/interface menu.

    Anyway, thanks for reading.
    • Up x 2
  2. MonnyMoony

    I think you should be able to equip any weapon or equipment from any faction in VR and Koltyr - give people a chance to try out weapons from other factions and see for themselves whether a particular weapon or ability is truly OP or not.
  3. iller



    THIS

    100% this.
    • Up x 1
  4. Heini

    To be honest I like it, especially the invisible walls. They make for quite good fireworks when you shoot at them from the right angle with the Thumper.

    I don't think it's worth the time to remake it but on thing definitely needs to change:
    You should be able to test Directive as well as Alert weapons in the VR.

    And to your case of not being able to equip the Ambusher, that's a bug.
    • Up x 1
  5. FateJH

    You could just sign in with an alternate character (a throw-away, if you wish) of the other faction and do just that. There's no difference between a weapon in your hand and a weapon in their hands if it's the same pair of hands on the keyboard.
  6. TRspy007

    Actually the sad thing is no one really uses koltyr, despite it having a few interesting bases. Could we salvage them and replace some construction bases with them? Also like these ideas, gg!!
  7. Generic Internetter

    I've just logged in and noticed a lot more vehicles in the VR room, so it looks like Daybreak are starting to make incremental improvements to the VR room...?

    Thanks, Daybreak!
  8. MonnyMoony

    Well.......erm.....yes.

    The point i'm making though is that it doesn't allow direct side by side comparisons. You have to try a weapon, log out, log in as your alt, go to Koltyr, try a new weapon, then log out etc etc.

    Why not just unlock everything?