| Author |
Planetary battles |
Aeronor
Cadet
Joined: July 20, 2004
Posts: 3
|  Posted: 2004-07-28 22:55
I know this has been a hot topic lately, and Im kind of a new guy. But hey, sometimes the best ideas can come from people who aren't already emmersed in the current system, eh? =) Anyway, there's been a lot of talk about wanting to add in a FPS aspect to planetary battles, and I thought I'd throw my two cents in.
I think the first problem with FPS on planets would be that of the issue of how small scaled to get in a game. If we had FPS on planets, some people would *only* want to do that. Just like now, some people only want to fight and not build, which can sometimes screw a team over when they need planets built up quickly. Well, these people who just want to FPS would be participating in really a very small portion of the game. Face it, how much percentage of game time is spent invading planets? Sure it happens, but there's so much more going on on the bigger scale of the objectives, that often one planet isn't worth taking someone from space and sticking them to fighting there.
That brings me to my second point, which is the player amount. It seems like (especially in the MV) there are usually hardly enough people on to make any epic battles. Picture now, half those people decided to fight on a planet because it's a cool thing to do. Now you've got hardly anyone in space because everyone wants to have fun sniping each other or mowing each other down close reange with machine guns. Sound awesome? Yes. That's the problem!
The third issue I see is time. How long does it usually take to invade a planet? Maybe a couple minutes, 10 *maybe* if there's tough resistance and you have to keep sending troops to fuel the fire. Well what kind of fun would a 5 minute ground fight be? You (the programmers) would be designing an entirely new engine to run this FPS mode, just for a tiny percentage of game time. Or, to make it more enjoyable, on average planets could take 15 minutes to capture, because that'd give the guys on the ground a chance to play, much like a typical scenario in normal FPS's. But then you run into the problem that the fleet in space is now waiting for 15 minutes just so their troops can cap one stupid planet. It seems like either way someone gets annoyed. Either planets are easily capped, so an FPS mode is a waste, or you have all out planet wars, in which the people in space sit there yawning.
That brings up another point, which is: how much good will human players on the ground be able to do? When you're dropping 10 units of infantry at a time (and Im assuming one unit is basically a sqad of guys), how much good are you going to do? Sure you have intelligence and they are AI, but is it really realistic for one man and a smaller army to be able to stop a massive hoarde from taking the entire planet? He or she can't possibly be everywhere at once. So either human players are given godlike powers in infantry mode, and are able to totally kick butt on AI (which would make a horrible imbalance when someone in space is watching unit after unit get fried), or human infantry really arent that much better than AI infantry, and therefore it's pretty much a waste to even bother going on the planet because you wont make much of a difference anyway.
Rather than have all that, why not make a strategic mode you can go into for planet battles. So humans can participate in the ground battles (instead of it being so darn automated), but humans aren't actually on the ground taking up simply one pathetic infantry. Afterall, we're flying big ships in the game, which are actually controlled by hundreds of imaginary guys. It would make sense that in planet battles, we would also be in charge of hundreds of guys, instead of reduced to one little infantry.
So in this strategic mode, it could be much like any other RTS. You've got a planet surface that your guys are roaming around on, and you've got to attack the enemy camps. That way you get to control (to an extent) the outcome of ground battles with skill, without running into all the problems of adding in a FPS mode.
The way it could work, is that anyone can control the troops. However, for the attackers, the person who dropped the troops gets priority (there could be a locking system, much like with planet construction). That way it's beneficial to have 3 people drop troops, because all three of you can then controll their own units on the surface and take different objectives. On the defenders side, someone in orbit could also take command of the troops. However, to prevent ship raping while you're busy in strategy mode, perhaps the dropships land, that way they cant be pillaged in space. Likewise, the defender's ship can land (at a starport perhaps?) so the player can concentrate on fighting.
This way we'd all get to watch as infantry and tanks and things fight each other, it wouldn't have to be all automated like it is currently, and we wouldn't run into the above mentioned problems with FPS (I also think it'd be a *lot* easier to program a RTS than a FPS for this game, but I might be mistaken)
Anyway, those are my thoughts I came up with in the shower. Sorry it's so long =)
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$yTHe {C?}
Grand Admiral
Sundered Weimeriners
Joined: September 29, 2002
Posts: 1292
From: Arlington, VA
| Posted: 2004-07-28 22:58
I like this guy.....
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Aeronor
Cadet
Joined: July 20, 2004
Posts: 3
| Posted: 2004-07-28 23:04
Ah, one other thing. Planetary bombardment. How would that work? People have been talking about how much that would totally suck in FPS mode. I remember someone saying that it sucks to get sniped, picture being bombed off the face of the planet before you knew it!
Well, the RTS mode, as opposed to FPS mode, would be a lot more friendly to planetary bombardment. The way I see it, a circle could appear on the RTS players' screens of where the bombardment is about to occur (based on trajectory, the sensors can anticipate where the bombs wills trike). This give everyone a chance to run like mad before the bombs hit that area. There would be an inherent risk in the system, just like now of course. Currently, it's usually not smart to bomb a battle site in DS unless you know you're losing. By the same token, bombers can pick the general area of a planet they want to bomb, which would correspond to a certain "map". When you land troops on diamond on the planet, that would be the map you are at on the planet. To move to the enemy, you may have to cross several maps (diamonds from space) to get to them. Well, when the bombers pick a diamond to bomb, they are really picking a map to bomb. Inside that map, however, it is completely random where the big circle will strike. That way, if good and bad units are in the same map, you risk landing the bombs on your own team's area. The blast area circles would have to be big enough that only the fastest units could outrun, but small enough so there's definitely areas of the map that dont get hit.
As a bomber, you may get lucky and land the bombs right on the enemy, never even singing a hair on your own troops. Or, as the RTS mode player, you may be frustrated as you watch your ally bomb the heck out of your own forces on the ground.
In terms of mapping, I think RTS mode would be a lot easier, because structures like domes or hydrofarms can just be large buildings on the map, instead of *huge* structures that must be mapped so you can fight first person inside them
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Tbone
Grand Admiral
Joined: July 21, 2001
Posts: 1756
From: Vancouver
| Posted: 2004-07-29 00:00
Don't knock yourself around about it. It won't be here for a very long time, if at all.
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Creeping Shadow
Grand Admiral
Joined: January 22, 2003
Posts: 261
| Posted: 2004-07-29 00:03
been there few threaths advising it  darkspace 2 mate darkspace 2  good idea anyway
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Sc0tTn
Cadet
Joined: February 26, 2004
Posts: 206
From: Mackay Queensland
| Posted: 2004-07-29 06:35
Sounds good.
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Lawman
Fleet Admiral
Sundered Weimeriners
Joined: February 28, 2003
Posts: 276
From: New Jersey
| Posted: 2004-07-29 07:37
Wait for a UT mod or something.
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Meko
Grand Admiral
Joined: March 03, 2004
Posts: 1956
From: Vancouver
| Posted: 2004-07-29 13:42
id like people to plz cheack out www.urbanterror.net
these guys (silicon ice development) have made a game on the quake three engine (wich is weak) that had No lag.
graphics are infinitly better than CS, and the game has Way more aspects to it, with ZERO lag.
its wonderfull, if only they could make us the FPS
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Bobamelius
Grand Admiral
Galactic Navy
Joined: October 08, 2002
Posts: 2074
From: Ohio
| Posted: 2004-07-29 14:26
UT?
HELL no!
If DS gets an FPS it should require some thinking.
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AdmBito
Grand Admiral
Sundered Weimeriners
Joined: October 04, 2002
Posts: 1249
From: Its hard out here for a pimp
| Posted: 2004-07-29 14:30
Quote:
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On 2004-07-29 14:26, Bobamelius wrote:
UT?
HELL no!
If DS gets an FPS it should require some thinking.
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But shoot will still be spacebar, right?
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Bobamelius
Grand Admiral
Galactic Navy
Joined: October 08, 2002
Posts: 2074
From: Ohio
| Posted: 2004-07-29 14:43
Nah, mouse button.
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Doran
Chief Marshal
Galactic Navy
Joined: March 29, 2003
Posts: 4032
From: The Gideon Unit
| Posted: 2004-07-29 14:55
should set it up like a pinball game, you have the planet surface, def bases (flippers), planetary shields (those springy bumper things) and all the inf come spilling down
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TheTerminator970
Cadet
Joined: March 05, 2004
Posts: 40
| Posted: 2004-07-29 16:42
Just a quick suggestion here. Even though i don't play.
I would suggest that instead of doing a FPS instead you have a RTS game. I would make it similar to Close Combat series. You start with your mean and there's no resource system or what not you just fight it out. I would support a complicated battle system that let's you do a LOT of things and many different strategies. With Line of sight and what not.
Also another thing here is that there would only be 1 person facing another. Or a computer facing a person or just a comp vs comp. The computer would be pretty hard but a human would be better. I would leave it up to the devs to do this and decide how to balance and what not.
With this system i would definitely really beef up planetary defenses and make it a real problem to attack one and would require large forces to even hope of taking out a planet cluster.
Bombing would be done somewhat differently as well. The people can see large units however the player can also specify a location to be bombed. That way you can coordinate with players in space and the player controlling ground forces.
A prefect example of this would have to be ground control. Effectively that is exactly what i want but with more stuff going on. Fatigue, morale, ammo. that stuff.
A FPS would be nice to have however i don't want to pull people from the space fight. Maybe if there was a crap load more people playing then that would be cool but currently your lucky if 20 people were fightingin a system. However would you like it if 10 of them suddenly went on a planet.
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Dauphin
Grand Admiral
Galactic Navy
Joined: April 27, 2003
Posts: 349
From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
| Posted: 2004-07-30 10:03
I like the RTS idea better. Or maybe RTS and FPS could be mixed in some revolutionary new way!!
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Axalon
Vice Admiral
Joined: June 15, 2003
Posts: 442
From: East Windsor, NJ, USA
| Posted: 2004-07-31 17:55
RTS + FPS = Chaos. Ever play Goblin Commander? Don't hurt yourself Dauphin.
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[ This Message was edited by: Axalon{-BK-} on 2004-07-31 17:56 ]
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