Having read a few posts commenting assualting the Crown as the PS2 equivalent of Omaha beach has made me realize the one thing the Crown lacks.
There's a distinct lack of cover when rushing up these bottlenecks.
No wonder the zerg just sits down near the southern ramp. The small rocks and the bridge are about the only things keeping you alive from the hordes of MAXes, snipers, HA, LA and mana turrets! You can hug the rock wall as much as you like, but without cover, there's no way to survive the charge.
Last night, we had tanks on the southern ridge bombarding the Crown. Infantry stacked upon each other at the southern ramp. Others were keeping the NC busy at the northern hex and Zurvan. But any kind of charge we made up the hill got mowed down in the wall of bullets.
Without cover, all you really get is...
Well Sarge describes it best.The constant death made me lose interest quite fast compared to our Freyr Amp Station assault. This one assault lasted for a few hours. The NC were putting up one hell of a defence, with the TR poking their noses in (as always...) every now and then. I don't seem to get most of the criticism against the Amp Station design. Yes, it's practically an egg with a hard shell and soft core but that makes it so more interesting! You keep the enemy at bay at the walls for as long as possible. You absolutely must keep the vehicle shield generators up and running or you will get overrun by tanks and Sunderers. If they go down, it gets much harder to defend it from
inside. At this point, depending on the number of enemies that have gotten inside, you may consider sallying forth and launch a counterattack from
outside the base, from a place of strength. Get the shield generators up while cleaning up the base.
The amp stations, AFAIK, were originally civilian structures. The military facilities were built adhoc. Once the military structures are lost, you
are defending a civilian structure.
In comparison to the Crown, the large amount of cover actually makes the battles intense and keeps up your interest. We managed to take down the vehicle shield generators but they were repaired quickly so we didn't manage to send in any large number of vehicles that didn't die to mines or AV weapons. Eventually we got lucky and cracked the shell. But the NC kept on pounding until the base had switched hands and they went away to regroup.
I think the problem that is really irking people is the lack of a proper early warning system (or usual apathy). Without it, the vehicle shield generators will be down before you can mount a proper defence.
In any case, the Crown needs a small design tweak to make the battles more interesting and not just cert farms. It need to be defensible, yes, but not unconquerable. My take on the thing is to put up cover on both ramps. Move the vehicle spawn down near the base of the southern ramp. This prevents vehicle charging from playing too big of a role. Tanks and the like can sit on the southern hill to function as mobile artillery platforms as the infantry charges uphill in intense fighting while still not being pressed into a insurmountable wall of bullets. Sunderers line up the bridges with AMS ready while a few are at the back. LA and infiltrators charge up from the north, while HA and maxes charge from the south.
Defenders can still defend up on the hill but they won't be able to fully rely on walls of bullets to defend.
As a final thought experiment, what would happen if the engineer was given the ability to place down cover, practically invulnerable to small arms but weak to heavy weapons and explosives and also blocks vehicle movement? Let's also assume it's a one time thing only, costs infantry resources and can't be too close to each other for balancing. A bit like laying down barbed wire, but more practical.
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Topic: Planetside 2: Free-to-Play MMOFPS. 2000 players/server. (Read 1133520 times)