Planetside 2 Catch-All

As do I. PM me and it's yours.

Amerish is cool. Spend a few hours TR, and a few hours as Vanu. Vanu fairs much better with all the weird terrain stuff. Cert gain seemed lower for me, since I play forward usually with a well placed Sundy on the front lines. Wierd night, the three factions spilt and rolled across each continent. TR had Amerish, Vanu had Indar, and NC had Esimir. I switched to Amerish when after gate capping both TR and NC. TR set at around 78% pop but we pushed and nothing can stop a Magrider with front armor so by the time I had to log out we had around 50% territory.

I've looked all over the store/cert system, how do you get the underslung stuff?

For some reason the heavy anti air homing rockets are so much fun. All your doing is sitting there and firing, but for some reason making aircraft dance feels great. Not to mention unlike tanks they tend to go down much faster.

Fun bits:

Had a Vanu tank try to run me over. It missed. It went over me, hovering ain't so great now is it. Of course seeing how there was two of them the other one just shot me...

At one point I found a secure location with ammo supplies nearby. I spent a half hour just swatting down anything that flew. Must have shot down 4-5 planes at least on one life.

Certain defense points are still a bit too tough. If you don't get absolute overwhelming force, the offense will always lose. Of course playing on defense when this happens is great. I got a couple quad kills this way. When the wipe happens the first three things I have to re get are the nade launcher, and both homing rockets for heavy. Those things are just damn mandatory. Health packs are nice, and I'll probable stop using c4. When c4 works it's great, it just rarely ever works...

Tkyl wrote:
groan wrote:

Alpha Squad Members go reserve your name now!!!
http://www.planetside2.com/reserve-name

"Under Maintenance"

Tried once this morning and again in the evening. Still 404s.

Tamren wrote:
Tkyl wrote:
groan wrote:

Alpha Squad Members go reserve your name now!!!
http://www.planetside2.com/reserve-name

"Under Maintenance"

Tried once this morning and again in the evening. Still 404s.

Wednesday 7:00am PST is the new time. So 10:00am for us East coasters.

I really like Amerish. It has a great layout and its not too packed with cap zones. There are tons of mountains which I think is pretty awesome. Very hard for tanks to get around some points though. I am enjoying every little change they are making to the game from the sound to even the typeface.

TempestBlayze wrote:

I really like Amerish. It has a great layout and its not too packed with cap zones. There are tons of mountains which I think is pretty awesome. Very hard for tanks to get around some points though. I am enjoying every little change they are making to the game from the sound to even the typeface.

I had a love/hate relationship with Amerish in Planetside. It was a lot of fun to get to the plateu/caldera atop that central mountain, and fight for those three bases that were all *just* within turret range of each other. The flight ceiling kept liberators from bombing with impunity. But when someone got a foothold up there, lookout, it was only a matter of time for them to wash over the bases. in a flood.

I'm SO glad you mentioned the sound changes. When I heard the new voice/announcements I thought I was going crazy at first. I've heard a few other minor things that add up nicely as well.

Added bonus - I've learned (when I'm the only person who remains on a point, or when fighting in a mostly abandoned base) that sound is NOT your friend. I sit there, quiet and alone, and if I'm paying attention - you really CAN hear people moving toward your location - especially if they're running.

Makes it that much harder to get surprised - which gives me the drop on people more often than not. It's great.

How is the lasher weapon now? I haven't played in awhile and I remember it was weak when it was released.

I've got a beta key if anybody wants it. PM me.

I saw a weird Vanu infantry weapon today, seemed like a beam weapon, not sure what class it was either, any ideas?

Amerish is great so far, except, I had to press E to activate a teleporter and sometimes it would send me back through once I got on the other side.

Heavy Assault Homing Rockets: hell yeah they're mandatory. And the AA one is indeed tons of fun.

RolandofGilead wrote:

I saw a weird Vanu infantry weapon today, seemed like a beam weapon, not sure what class it was either, any ideas?

Did it look like a cyan flamethrower? That's a lasher. They are very rare because they were extremely expensive back when we paid Auraxium for stuff and even more expensive now that we use certs. Supposedly when they added it the weapon was bugged, but I can't recall if they ever fixed it.

Do the homing launchers still allow you to dumbfire the rocket? And how does the firepower compare to the regular launchers against infantry and vehicles? Logically they should be weaker to balance out the tracking capability. I know a regular rocket will take half of a liberator's health if you manage a direct hit, but if the homing AA rockets are like the AA missiles the scythe uses they would be less powerful than that.

Tamren wrote:
RolandofGilead wrote:

I saw a weird Vanu infantry weapon today, seemed like a beam weapon, not sure what class it was either, any ideas?

Did it look like a cyan flamethrower? That's a lasher.

Yes, yes it did.

Do the homing launchers still allow you to dumbfire the rocket? And how does the firepower compare to the regular launchers against infantry and vehicles? Logically they should be weaker to balance out the tracking capability. I know a regular rocket will take half of a liberator's health if you manage a direct hit, but if the homing AA rockets are like the AA missiles the scythe uses they would be less powerful than that.

Yes, and apparently they don't drop over distance if you do! Don't know. Screw that, flares recharge.
Actually it is less powerful, I was really lucky and a Mosquito flew right by me the other day and I happened to snap off a dumb fire rocket and killed it. I've always been able to destroy fighters with one dumb rocket but homing takes two last time I had one.

Hmm well if someone has the vehicle tracking launcher there are some experiments you could do.

1. Go to a tower or something away from the front line.
2. Get the homing launcher and fire it point blank into a wall. How much suit shields do you have left? A regular launcher will flatline your shields to zero because rocket self damage is reduced.
3. Find a volunteer and hit him with a homing rocket. Does it take him out in one hit? Regular rockets will insta-kill infantry of any class on a direct hit.
4. Get the volunteer to pull a MAX and repeat the test, how much damage is done? A regular rocket will take exactly 50% of a MAX's health unless he has flak armour.
5. Next spawn a tank and fire a homing rocket directly into the back armour. Get into the vehicle and note the damage done.
6. Repair the tank and try again with a regular rocket, are the damage amounts the same?

We will need to do tests like this because I don't think SOE will release hard weapon data.

This game shines so much when you are in an organized outfit. It's really a game changer. Even if you are just a peaon, it's awesome to have organization in this game. I never had so much fun than I did last night playing this. Amerish really is the best laid out map in terns of bases and terrain. There are so many great big battles happening everywhere. Caputuring and holding outpost really really matters in Amerish.

In assorted experimentation, it looks like you can only have three characters? Do we know if that's a beta limitation, a feature, or even my simple imagination?

On the one hand, that's a fair number - because it's one for each empire. On the other hand, what if I want one of each empire on "my" server, but also would like another character on the server a buddy plays on - or to join the GWJ squad wherever it lands?

TempestBlayze wrote:

This game shines so much when you are in an organized outfit. It's really a game changer. Even if you are just a peaon, it's awesome to have organization in this game. I never had so much fun than I did last night playing this. Amerish really is the best laid out map in terns of bases and terrain. There are so many great big battles happening everywhere. Caputuring and holding outpost really really matters in Amerish.

This is very true. PS2 is an entirely different game if you're rolling with a large group. The on night we rolled from one base to another with Vanguards, Skyguards, Sunderers and air cover. It was amazing!

Notes on the two homing rockets for the heavy class:

The anti vehicle homing rockets have the exact same stats as the default ones. I can say from use, they are just as strong and reload just as fast. Not only that, they shoot straighter and farther as well. Now throw homing on to it, and there is no reason ever to use the default. Oh and you can dumb fire the homing rocket. Does the same damage to infantry as well. The only thing it could be worse is splash damage, but I can't tell. Not to mention with homing you will miss way less often to begin with.

The anti air homing rockets are a bit different. They are definitely weaker then normal rockets, you can hit a soldier dead on and there is a good change they'll live. Not surprisingly they are only good against air targets. Takes about two shots to take down a light craft. Way more to take down something heavy. I'd guess 6-8. They are absolutely fantastic as a support weapon. Just look for a damaged ship that's trying to run away, instant kill. Also saving friendly ships is fun. Quite a few pilots owe me a beer.

Overall you really need to have both of these, and hey why not, they are fairly cheap.

Tamren wrote:

I'm really curious to know what the disadvantage is for homing rockets because if don't have any then you slide into pay to win territory.

I think they've designed the cert system with specialization in mind, and it doesn't seem too expensive to bother me. Honestly, I don't think I can play a game that doesn't reward me based on my investment, whether time or money, so the question to me is how much, how blatant, and how broken is any pay-to-win.

That would match the fighter AA missiles. It takes two of them to down a Mossie or Scythe, Reavers are a bit tougher and can take maybe 2.2 missiles.

I'm really curious to know what the disadvantage is for homing rockets because if they don't have any then you slide into pay to win territory.

RolandofGilead wrote:
Tamren wrote:

I'm really curious to know what the disadvantage is for homing rockets because if don't have any then you slide into pay to win territory.

I think they've designed the cert system with specialization in mind, and it doesn't seem too expensive to bother me. Honestly, I don't think I can play a game that doesn't reward me based on my investment, whether time or money, so the question to me is how much, how blatant, and how broken is any pay-to-win.

Yeah they are basically really cheap, you could easily get them after a single day. Perhaps later on the will at some upgrades to them. Say the default ones can be specced out for more raw power or splash damage. Hell just increasing the ammo count would be pretty big. Rockets are fairly useless without ammo nearby. Now with ammo, they are awesome.

Oh and I just had a blast from the past. I played wolfenstein enemy territory for a nostalgia trip, and man have I lost all skills for old school fps: Whatdya mean grenade aint the g button, and there is no melee I have to pull out my knife to stab? It's all so fast and I keep dying. Makes me feel old...

Amusingly enough I still get lag in that game while planetside is pretty much perfectly smooth...

One of the heavy assault suit upgrades allows you to carry extra rockets. I guess that makes sense, it's supposed to balance against other upgrades like extra grenades (which are very powerful) and extra armour.

Now that I think about it, I believe the reason they didn't make homing rockets any weaker is that they are hard-countered by vehicle IR smoke. Consider:

- The effective DPS of homing launchers is reduced even if the rocket does the same damage because you need to wait for the lockon to complete and the rocket flight time tends to be longer because it turns to follow targets. A vehicle with Stealth will make the lockon even slower. Plus the lockon has a finite range, vehicles show up at 1000 metres, I think they reduced lockon range to about 300m? It was in the patch notes.
- If a vehicle pops smoke you can't lock onto it for a set amount of time and it breaks existing locks. So you are reduced to dumbfire, or you automatically miss against a moving target.
- The more certs you sink into vehicle smoke the faster it recharges. At full certs you become almost but not quite immune to homing missiles. Especially combined with max Stealth.

The only reason the launcher seem like a pay to win upgrade is that there are only 3 kinds total and only 2 upgrades. Think of them like gun scopes. Any scope is a direct upgrade over iron sights. But scopes have different advantages compared to each other. Reflex sights give a clearer picture than irons, but stop you from using an infrared scope which is better at night fighting. By that logic the vehicle homing rocket is a direct upgrade from the plain launcher, but stops you from using the AA launcher and vice versa.

I suspect at some point they will add rocket launcher cert upgrades like better sights or shorter lockon times. They would have to keep them competitive with the vehicle upgrades that counter them.

Put Night Vision on your rocket pod of choice for a lot of easy certs.

Two rockets from the anti-air launcher into the rear of a Lighting will kill it. I haven't had the chance to test it on a Prowler or Magrider yet. One of the other advantages is that there's no drop on the rocket. With the anti-vehicle variant sometimes there's drop, sometimes there isn't.

Something else I've noticed, often you don't even need to fire on enemy air to get them to bug out. Just the simple "LOCK" in the middle of their screen tends to make them run in the other direction.

As a pilot I think the anti air and the rockets are right where they need to be. At one time it was almost impossible for someone from the ground to shoot me down. Now, it takes effort but it's not instant death when I get a lock or run into flak.

Missile locks don't scare me that much since I run flares. I don't think I've ever encountered another pilot using AA missiles so all missile locks come from the ground. Most of the time I just wait for solid lock (meaning a missile is in flight) and then hit flares. That breaks the lock and prevents a new lockon for a little while. In that time I can finish whatever attack/strafing run I'm in the middle of. By the time they can lock onto me again I'm either long gone, behind a hill or too far away for them to get a second shot. Even without flares you can soak up a single missile and get away.

I've gotten to the point where I can sneak up on and destroy skyguards with a little effort. Flak MAXes are a much bigger problem. If they run dual flaks they can destroy you in seconds and the annoying bastards (AND their weapon tracers!) don't show up until you get REALLY close because they count as infantry. I've gotten into the habit of making high altitude afterburner flybys to figure out where everything is and then returning really really low to the ground so they don't spot me. Thankfully MAXs are easy to pop, all it takes is 4 rockets or so if you don't miss.

If you ask me though the current metagame is balanced too much against air combat. There is no point in establishing "air superiority" over an area because you only need a little bit of flak before flying into an area becomes impossible. You very rarely get into dogfights without ground fire being a factor unless you happen to bump into another aircraft while both of you are just moving from A to B. Hopefully in the future there will be parts of the map where ground forces just can't go, and air combat can take place without interference.

For those that are interested:

There are a couple of us in an outfit called Quantum Dawn. Its on the Thebe West server. Characters are getting wiped soon for the last time so don't let your certs prevent you from coming over.

Being part of an outfit really changes the game and makes it so much more fun. This is nothing like a WoW guild where time commitment is involved. They just want you to put in an app so if hen you do mention Tkyl and I.

TempestBlayze wrote:

For those that are interested:

There are a couple of us in an outfit called Quantum Dawn. Its on the Thebe West server. Characters are getting wiped soon for the last time so don't let your certs prevent you from coming over.

Being part of an outfit really changes the game and makes it so much more fun. This is nothing like a WoW guild where time commitment is involved. They just want you to put in an app so if hen you do mention Tkyl and I.

That's tempting. I am looking for an outfit, as this game just isn't nearly as fun without joining one. Is there any noticeable lag problems using that server, Tempest? I'm east coast like you are.

Isn't GWJ going to start a Outfit with Gamers with Jobs?
or
OwGooj

Laarrs wrote:
TempestBlayze wrote:

For those that are interested:

There are a couple of us in an outfit called Quantum Dawn. Its on the Thebe West server. Characters are getting wiped soon for the last time so don't let your certs prevent you from coming over.

Being part of an outfit really changes the game and makes it so much more fun. This is nothing like a WoW guild where time commitment is involved. They just want you to put in an app so if hen you do mention Tkyl and I.

That's tempting. I am looking for an outfit, as this game just isn't nearly as fun without joining one. Is there any noticeable lag problems using that server, Tempest? I'm east coast like you are.

I've experienced a little bit of lag at peak times. However, I believe we'll be switching to an East Coast server when the game officially launches.

Laarrs wrote:

That's tempting. I am looking for an outfit, as this game just isn't nearly as fun without joining one.

Agreed. Without teamwork and coordination this game vacillates between "find the fight" and "meat grinder".

I could probably enlist with Laarrs, even though he smells and he has cooties (and his cooties have Hep C).