Planetside 2

[WayAbvPar]

Started Bat Country on Waterson for NC. Feel free to join.

Nooooo! Come join us in Evil Chickens! We have TS. And pie.

[HaemishM]

I made HaemishM on Waterson (NC).

[Kageru]

It's a game for veterans in companies to stomp noobs. The huge maps favor a tight group which can be an absolute misery for the opposition. The hopelessly weak base defences encourage aggressive play and vehicles. But it's really not that great a shooter, the lag is awful, the art style is incredibly boring as are the bases and weapons and getting stomped is no fun. I don't think this has too much chance of becoming a mainstream hit.

[Falconeer]

My impression is that they definitely didn't put in it the resources to make it a mainstream hit. From the lack of advertising to the absence of an intro movie or any tutorial, it reeks of what it is: a half-niche free-to-play product that hopes doesn't close the door to larger crowds but doesn't really believe in it, and probably doesn't need it.

I'd dare to say that it didn't cost them much (compared to AAA mmorpg), and neither it will (they don't really need to produce content, which is why they never had to shut down Planetside 1) so they can bank on the limited amount of people that will certainly stick around.
Hell, they launched in Europe with two servers. Can't remember any MMO outside of Anarchy Online (2001) to launch with such low expectations.

That said, I think it's a great game.

[Malakili]

It's a game for veterans in companies to stomp noobs.

I played quite a bit in the beta, and when I first loaded up live I chose my server and faction and then BAM I was literally drop podding into the action.  I was fine, but all I could think about was how totally hosed someone would have been if it were their very first time.  That being said, I don't think it is overall THAT noob unfriendly.  Although veterans are obviously going to stomp for a bit, there isn't a huge penalty for dying, so as long as someone likes the general idea they probably won't be scared off.

[Miasma]

Eh, forget it. I'm too awful at these games. After getting killed over a dozen times without a single kill or assist to my credit, I deleted my character and uninstalled. Back to playing against bots.

I'm by no means good anymore and in a typical fps it would make me feel bad that I was weighing my team of eight or sixteen down but you really can't go wrong in this setting since your team size isn't limited.  Even if all I do is get shot and killed that's still time the enemy had to spend on me and ammo they lost :) .

Just don't kill anyone on your own team and you're still helping.  Man a turret, drive up a sunderer with the spawn point upgrade or roll heavy assault and just hang back with an anti aircraft rocket.

[5150]

Played last night

Didnt enjoy it much, got killed loads and no idea where the hostiles were.

Performance was low

Spawned at a warpgate and took ages to drive to a battle (got killed by a friendly on the way just for shits and giggles I guess)

Didn't really know what I was doing at the base other than trying to kill people (no idea where they are because the mini map is too confusing)

Would rather play PS1 for free

[Hawkbit]

Played last night

Didnt enjoy it much, got killed loads and no idea where the hostiles were.

Performance was low

Spawned at a warpgate and took ages to drive to a battle (got killed by a friendly on the way just for shits and giggles I guess)

Didn't really know what I was doing at the base other than trying to kill people (no idea where they are because the mini map is too confusing)

Would rather play PS1 for free

This mimicked my exact experience.  I won't be playing again.  FWIW, I was invited to Dust514 recently, and had virtually the exact same experience there.

Part of the problem is that I'm not giving these games enough time and practice to get good.  Because of how the games work, it's really hard to get ramped up to not suck.  Yes, I am old and my FPS days are behind me.

[Mrbloodworth]

If you are a noob, hit me up. I'm running an outfit and we will take time to show you the ropes. At the very least I can explain concepts and such.

[Koyasha]

As far as I could tell, one of the best parts of the original Planetside is entirely absent here: the VR Training facilities.  Those were one of the things I've always praised about Planetside (and said they should be improved, but even as they were they were already decent) because it meant being able to try out weapons and vehicles before spending certs on them.

Also, being dropped into the middle of a battle as soon as I log in before even understanding what's going on, my controls, weapons, etc...it wasn't a particularly fun experience.  I'm not sure if I had more out of game guidance (website, forums, something) in the original Planetside or not, but at least I was in Sanctuary where I had time to wander around, get a feel for stuff, go into VR Training, and ask stupid questions.  Of course, I sucked at the original Planetside too, but at least I wasn't completely lost.

For an obvious example of failure to explain, at one point the battle front had moved away or I'd spawned in some distance away.  I saw someone sitting in a Galaxy alone.  I wandered up and tried to figure out how to board.  Could not figure it out.  After a minute or so, before I got around to asking how one boards a transport, he flew away.  As far as I could tell, the dropship was empty.  The dude was flying an empty dropship to the battle because apparently, no one could figure out how to board it.  Or maybe he hadn't figured out how to unlock it?  Whatever the case, there seemed to be a distinct failure for the game to communicate something, to someone.

[Threash]

You get close and "Press E to board" pops up. 

[Sky]

I sat in a sunderer for a while trying to shoot aircraft, but it was just a dude using it to drive to a base. Difficult to get a lock and he parked it in a shitty spot. I also tried a lightning which was lulz, because I had no idea where the enemy was so I just drove around a bit until I got bored. I did get into one base battle, got cornered in a building by a couple guys in multi-person tanks, tried to pop out and grenade them. Finally one of them jumped out and shot me. Pretty much any time someone got in my face it was die time. I also tried putting down a couple turrets, I miss the old engineer. The glowing shield on the turret really sucked at night, though I think I found a decent place to kind of hide it from infantry behind some bushes.

I picked VS at first before I saw f13 was rolling NC on the server. I think my VS guy was 0 kills 5 deaths, my NC guy is 0 kills 1 death, iirc.

Since it's f2p I don't have a huge problem with the learning curve part. It's the apparent lack of a useful solo role (that PS1 integrated well) and ye gods the HUD.

Is it Battlefield/TOR style cap points? I was in an NC base when I was a barney and couldn't hack a terminal thing with the NC logo and a [C] or something.

[Mrbloodworth]

You can try any item by attempting to buy, there is an option to do a trial of it. DO NOT MIX WITH BOOSTS at this time.

[Jobu]

Is it Battlefield/TOR style cap points? I was in an NC base when I was a barney and couldn't hack a terminal thing with the NC logo and a [C] or something.

It's different for each base, but basically there's a "tug of war" mechanic on all the capture points. You need to maintain a presence of players nearby, say, Point [C] for it to drain influence away from the controlling team. You don't have to "use" it or anything, just stand nearby so you see the big purple bar on your screen. Some bases have only one point, others have up to three.

Facilities have an extra quirk, where there are satellite outposts nearby that you can capture to spawn from. Except they aren't labelled as well as the A, B, C capture points so they're easy to miss. Their icon basically looks like a big downward arrow.

There's more complexity on all of the above, but every objective has that basic mechanic as it's foundation.

[Malakili]

Is it Battlefield/TOR style cap points? I was in an NC base when I was a barney and couldn't hack a terminal thing with the NC logo and a [C] or something.

I think the only thing you can hack in the game are enemy equipment terminals that you can use as if they were your own after they've been hacked.  But you don't need to hack to capture points.

[Miasma]

If you don't want to drive from the warpgate (which you shouldn't do unless you want a tank and there are no spawns closer) just bring up the map and click on one of the green dots closer to the fight.

The guy with the sunderer probably parked in what you consider a crappy location because they are mainly used as mobile spawn locations, so you want them safe and out of view of aerial units.

Just hit "E" to enter a vehicle, it won't let you if it's full.  Once in the vehicle use f1-f12 to change positions, not all of them will have turrets.

The base layout tutorial video tries to explain wtf is going on with capturing.  It looks like it will take a lot of experience to really understand though.

[Nija]

Another thing about vehicles - hit page down and it lets you set the vehicle to squad/outfit only or entirely locked. Chances are he didn't want anyone boarding. Also, locking the vehicle ejects everyone. Good for forced gal drops.

[Kageru]

It's a game for veterans in companies to stomp noobs.

I played quite a bit in the beta, and when I first loaded up live I chose my server and faction and then BAM I was literally drop podding into the action.  I was fine, but all I could think about was how totally hosed someone would have been if it were their very first time.  That being said, I don't think it is overall THAT noob unfriendly.  Although veterans are obviously going to stomp for a bit, there isn't a huge penalty for dying, so as long as someone likes the general idea they probably won't be scared off.

It's not the initial experience so much. It's that being a pub trying to defend a monstrously huge and samey map such as biodome, against an organized group that runs as a team, uses vehicles intelligently and knows the map well, is going to get reaped. Often without really seeing the attacker (especially at night). And that's just not that fun on the receiving end. The huge maps don't allow anything resembling a "front line" that provides a structure to the battle so it just becomes a excessively large and poorly balanced death-match.

plus, omg lag. lag spikes longer than the average time to live.

On my medic I've basically given up being a medic and become an infantryman who might do some medic stuff when there's no one left to kill. The fragility of any player down to health, plus sitting their playing with a glowing shoot-me aura, is just inviting death. But looking at the NC guns they all looks pretty much identical in how they behave and the actual advantages the "advanced" ones give are opaque. I bought a 3.5 laser dot sight for the starter rifle, I'll buy the front handle and some more nanoweave when I have lots of points, is that basically enough to participate in the spawn / shoot / die infantry game or is there some massively advantageous cert I'm missing?

[Sky]

Played for a couple as a heavy. Actually had quite a blast just hanging with the zerg ungrouped. Cert gain was pretty slow. I bought a couple guns with the station cash. I think I was at 15 kills to 28 deaths or something, so that was cool enough for my newbness.

Still hate the miniscule HUD text and icons.

[tmp]

I also tried a lightning which was lulz, because I had no idea where the enemy was so I just drove around a bit until I got bored.

If you open the map, by default it makes sectors with current enemy activity flash. Makes it possible to spot bases which are early in the process of being taken, and show up there to get the action going.

Tried the game today, it's pretty entertaining (although caveat, i didn't mind much dying heaps more than getting any kills)  The highlight of the day was winding up all alone on top of enemy base with my engie, shooting the only active anti-air gun working then, and having another engie pop out of it, with followup of a knives-and-guns fight all over the room. We were both equally awful so took literally couple minutes of flailing around and failing to hit each other, until he eventually lost

[WayAbvPar]

Played for a couple as a heavy. Actually had quite a blast just hanging with the zerg ungrouped. Cert gain was pretty slow. I bought a couple guns with the station cash. I think I was at 15 kills to 28 deaths or something, so that was cool enough for my newbness.

Still hate the miniscule HUD text and icons.

Medics and engies are where it is at for cert gain. Also, take your first 50 certs you earn and buy the AMS cert for the Sunderer- turns it into a mobile spawn point. You get XP for every person that comes through, and I think you might get some from the people resupplying at it (not sure about that one). If you park it safely (so it isn't in direct fire), but near a hotspot, it is an XP fountain.

[Jobu]

Medics and engies are where it is at for cert gain. Also, take your first 50 certs you earn and buy the AMS cert for the Sunderer- turns it into a mobile spawn point. You get XP for every person that comes through, and I think you might get some from the people resupplying at it (not sure about that one). If you park it safely (so it isn't in direct fire), but near a hotspot, it is an XP fountain.

Also, get the ammo supply mod so passing tanks get replenished near your deployed Sunderer. Also a pretty hefty XP fountain.

I found running around as an engineer in a recently captured base is pretty helpful too. You get pretty good bonuses for fixing up all the turrets.

[Falconeer]

The cert gain as a medic is ridiculous. I was thinking that it should be nerfed, but then again someone else in my faction becoming stronger faster doesn't realy hurt me and eventually it's a good idea to push people to play the class and help others (revives are invaluable). So yeah, really weird. Friend got 100 certifications in an hour, where all the rest of our group was struggling at about 15.

[Zetor]

Hmm, I am somewhat intrigued by this game (never played PS1). What's the deal with the EU/US split though? I see that my station account doesn't work with the EU site (ProSiebenSatEins, really? I don't want to watch Glücksrad, thankyouverymuch  ) and I've read in some places that you need a different client as well. I briefly considered playing on the US servers to play with my guildies, but I'm worried about latency. How bad is it if you play on an east coast server? I remember Global Agenda being really fucking terrible to play on US servers.

Also, do f2p-ers basically the same power as subscribers (except for cosmetics, faster xp/cert/whatever gain, blah blah - I don't mind those)?

[Kageru]

The cert gain as a medic is ridiculous. I was thinking that it should be nerfed, but then again someone else in my faction becoming stronger faster doesn't realy hurt me and eventually it's a good idea to push people to play the class and help others (revives are invaluable). So yeah, really weird. Friend got 100 certifications in an hour, where all the rest of our group was struggling at about 15.

.... he's doing some sort of magic then. Most of my revives get me a +1 in the D part of my K/D ratio. Repairing turrets in bases was much more profitable, and it's not that fast.

The sunderer trick sounds a lot more reliable.

[Falconeer]

I wish I had tested this myself, but I never take the Medic so I can't say much about it. All I can say is that he doesn't lie, and he hit BR8 while we were all BR6 and he started playing like 5 hours after us. And his K/D sucked horribly. That's when we started seeing that something was off. He was as surprised as we are since he thought he was far behind us, especially considering that we have the Alpha Squad buff, and he doesn't. Now that I think of it, he has the Membership buff, but we got that too. Seriously, about 100 certs in an hour (that we monitored)is what he got, piles of XP, and his K/D is about 0.4, so terrible. It's all in the constant healing and revives apparently. It's all I know so far.

[Kageru]

I guess it would work if you were in an outfit that was fighting away from the respawn point and with people who will wait for you.

In public games the time between someone dying and clicking respawn is 8 seconds, and most of that time there's a pretty good reason they're dead (like being under a MBT). And then a lot of people will refuse the rez and just come back with full health shields.

[tmp]

A rez is 75xp and then you get ~50 for healing them so yeah, that's pretty fast. As comparison, ammo resupply as engie gives you 10xp or so.

Acting as a medic works when people have the common sense to back into cover when they are hit (and quite a few of them do) or otherwise die near to a rally/choke point. You can sit back in such spot and just rake in the benefits.

[Goumindong]

Medic's also get triage which is a pretty hilarious XP fountain.

Engies probably do better overall with resupply though

[Falconeer]

How many Euro players do we have? Worth writing down a list? I doubt it, but if you feel like it, drop your name and server here and I'll try to keep track of it.

- Falconeer (Falconeer), NC, Woodman Server.

[Miasma]

Still hate the miniscule HUD text and icons.

There is an oddly named option, something like centre hud display, that will give you a very large but very faint circle directly in your field of vision that gives you health/shield/ammo info etc.  It is faint enough that it doesn't get in the way but right in your face so you always know what your vitals are.  It only displays if something isn't full so don't be surprised when you turn it on and see nothing.

[01101010]

How many Euro players do we have? Worth writing down a list? I doubt it, but if you feel like it, drop your name and server here and I'll try to keep track of it.

- Falconeer (Falconeer), NC, Woodman Server.

http://forums.f13.net/index.php?topic=22775.0

[Falconeer]

Cool. I posted what I posted because I didn't see any Euro player there, and I didn't want to intrude. Sweet.

[satael]

Satael NC Woodman (just logged in on the 20th enough to reserve a name so far)

[Kageru]

Acting as a medic works when people have the common sense to back into cover when they are hit (and quite a few of them do) or otherwise die near to a rally/choke point. You can sit back in such spot and just rake in the benefits.

Hm, we're (NC on Briggs) currently getting curb-stomped by both TR and VS so most of my gaming is desperate defense of the spawn point while heavy tanks circle outside. So guess that colors things.