Vehicle handling: Sometimes game design is not complicated. Sometimes, you just find something that sucks and make it not suck. Vehicle handling kind of sucks on live. Sure, we've gotten used to it over the years, but that's how we know that there's room for improvement. The changes on PTS bring that improvement (along with a slight increase in tank flippage perhaps ). The flash is a joy to drive, the harasser (which I'd say is in the best state on live compared to the rest) has better traction and is far less likely to flip and has a more predictable response when you use the handbrake, tanks seem to have gotten the rival chassis's better turning speed for free (with the rival chassis now making it even better), and all tanks with tracks seem to accelerate faster and can have far more traction for going uphill. I think even sunderers received some love, though it's more difficult to tell (I don't drive them much). Rocket launchers: On live, rocket launchers take a long time to reload, take too long to resupply from ammo packs, take too long to establish a lock, have very little ammo on spawn, allow low skill OSK vs infantry, and annoy vehicles and aircraft with a long lock-on range and slow lock-fade. On PTS, these problems are either solved or their impact lessened. Tank primary weapons: On live, AP wins tank duels, and since new players only have viper and HEAT, new players lose tank duels. This is contrary to new players being able to win infantry duels if they are skilled at FPS combat. While AP being behind a 875 cert wall is not pay-to-win, it's about the closest Planetside 2 gets to it. Additionally, being forced to choose between AV and AI is disheartening, as if you choose wrong, you just wasted many nanites (as a reminder, for a non-member, a lightning would be 7 minutes worth of nanites), and part of Planetside's appeal is the variety of engagements one can take part in from minute to minute. All other ground vehicle weapons: Secondary weapons in general now better reflect their nanite cost, which is 150 for harassers and 100 more than the lightning for MBTs. This means 2/2 harassers and MBTs are less likely to instagib those they drive behind, which never promoted much in the way of skill. Secondary weapons now also better balanced with each other, leaving fewer on the never-gonna-buy-or-use-it heap. This was achieved in three major ways: reducing the AI capabilities of long range AV weapons, thus giving other AV weapons more appeal, slightly reducing the AI capabilities of short range AV weapons, and taking away some of the ES AI weapons' AI capbilities in exchange for minor AV cababilities, thus giving other AI(ish) weapons more appeal. Also the kobalt is now better against harassers than on live, so it could be said that it's AV has improved. Flak armor: It's being buffed by way of nerfing other weapons to the point that flak armor can save it's wearer's life. It rarely can do that on live, which is why it isn't used much. It still might go unused if PTS changes go live, so it is tough to say what effect it will have on the game. I simply support buffs to underused things. Vangaurd shield: I won't miss the live version. It was an "oops" button, but since the lightning has no such button, one had to (and most did) learn to play without it. Now, it's stronger when used in the right scenarios, and with the handling improvements to the vanguard, keeping one's rear hidden is now easier. Summary: All in all, vehicles will be more fun to drive, we'll have more choices of what weapons would work in a particular situation, and there will less long range BS to deal with from vehicles as well as infantry. Sorry I didn't cover everything.
Dude, you aren't alone. I love almost everything that's happening here and can't wait for it to go live.
I like that STK has been increased for AV weapons against infantry. Now the damage model goes from arbitrarily arbitrary towards consistently arbitrary.
