[T:V] Vehicles

I have to disagree. A two person vehicle can be balanced under the follow circumstances:

It's movement is marginally faster than the armors.

It's health is marginally more than two and a half of the heaviest armors that can enter it.

It's weaponry is marginally more damaging than one and a half of the heaviest armors that can carry it, and is easier to use than a normal version.

Now let me validate these stipulations.

1. It's movement is marginally faster than the armors.

This of course, is how most vehicles will be balanced. They will be slightly faster or more likely slighty slower. Since this is a two person vehicle, it should go slightly faster, to make up for the use of two players.

2. It's health is marginally more than two and a half of the heaviest armors that can enter it.

This of course, is assuming it has shields. A vehicle is not as good at maneuvering than a person. Therefore, it must have more armor than a normal person, or it's protection is worthless. I actually prefer the 3-4 times the health of all occupants rule that some games use to balance vehicles. Of course, those vehicles do not have shields.

3. It's weaponry is more damaging than one and a half of the weapons of the occupants, and it's easier to use than it's normal equivalent.

Note that the damage output per a second is lower than both people alone (so that the vehicle does not dominate) and yet is easier to use than it's normal counterpart (so that it's worth using at all).

Kefka, I don't think you read/took into depth the posts which I already stated. With the low amounts of people in T:V teams, it's unlikely there will be three person or more vehicles. They just don't belong in a fast paced game. There's no reason for havocs/etc in a fast based game, loading people up and flying them across a map is not a fast nor a fluid process. You're also using base for your examples which is by far the biggest failure of all out of any version of tribes.

Vehicles need to a fluid specialized addition to the game. They should be able to easily flow and not overpower or be overpowered by armors and assist a D/O while not *making* the D/O. Large bulky multiperson vehicles really don't belong in something with a goal that's supposed to be fast fluid and fun.

I'm only going to respond briefly.

In t2 base competition the team with the stronger airforce won. I don't know how you can begin to explain that as being balanced. It wasn't.

Andy, most of your essay seems pretty obvious, but I'm not sure you fully grasp the development process that Irrational must go through. I believe the general order of development has to be: environment (map design), then physics, then armors, and only then can they begin to even consider things like vehicles. With the formula setup, they can integrate vehicles relative to the rest. Throw in weapon balancing in the end and you got yourself a game.

In my assessment, t1 and t2 vehicles can be learned from, but should not serve as a model for T:V in any capacity. Classic may have been the closest to being balanced in your assessment, but I don't believe T:V should simply pick and choose elements from t1 and t2, and wrap them up in a pretty little package. New game, new balance, new feel - and perhaps it'll keep our attention for a bit.

Shinigami said:

You didn't bother telling me I was wrong about that.

Click to expand...

i am not saying ur wrong about anything. i was just trying to show you taht there will be some that view the game as war similator & some as a sport.

personally i stradle both. when T:V roles out i will be in line to get it and will not complain regardless of the ouotcome.

In t2 base competition the team with the stronger airforce won. I don't know how you can begin to explain that as being balanced. It wasn't.

Click to expand...

I'm still competing in base, and I can vouch for this, big time. You got Shrikes that can blast things from out of missile range (if you lock on to them while they're hitting a hardpoint turret at range, they just fly straight back and avoid the misslie), Shrikes that can deliver and take home cappers faster than your LD can get to them, and Shrikes that'll ram your skiing HO into the next map.

The Havoc does have uses in base pubs, even on maps that are fairly open and with an open flag--usually it's so you can make absolutely sure you can get a pair/trio/quad of heavies into one location at the same time. My team uses 'em on several maps to create mass havoc around the flag--great way to tie up the LD and turrets for a few seconds while the capper swoops in. But the hard part is getting there--you have to hug the terrain and stay off radar to avoid Shrikers with AutoPoints.

All of this can be countered, yes, but it makes for a HUGE drain on your D, and your D has to be flexible enough to change tactics if the other team is just luring your team into the air while they switch to more ground-based tactics.

Frankly, I'm not sure how to set up vehicles for T:V. The best-balanced vehicles I can think of are from TAC2, and the main reason they have more balance are these reasons:

1) Driver cannot carry the flag... if someone gets into the driver's seat with the flag, it's instantly returned.

2) No shrike. Well, there IS a shrike-body vehicle, but it has no real weapons, only the ability to cloak and mark targets--mainly a TAC2-only thing.

3) No shields. The MPB is the only vehicle that has sheilds. You can snipe people out of every vehicle but the MPB and the tank, as the tank's armor protects the driver/gunner.

4) Tank is god-awful powerful up-close, but at range it's not nearly as deadly as base. A lucky shot will nail you good, but that's hard to make due to the spread on the cannons. It DOES have controllable air-burst mortars, but these refire slowly, and due to the way the shell works, 'artillery' or 'spamming' can't be done as they can in base. Also, the tank is really slow compared to everything else, and it's strafing speed has been chopped by almost two thirds. It's only reasonably quick when moving forwards.

5) Bomber is just damn slow, period. Climbs like a brick, accelerates like a pig. However, it actually has a chaingun for protection against other vehicles... makes for a good balance.

6) Missiles--since there are missiles in TAC2, they had to be balanced. They don't do a whole lot of damage (except to the tank, since there's no real good way to get close and blast it) to air vehicles, but what they DO do is knock the vehicle around like crazy... usually through 500 degrees of rotation, usually in two axes. Nasty. However, air vehicles can take ten or more missiles to bring down, and it's a hell of a lot faster to just shoot them with the CG.

I'm not saying T:V needs to have vehicles like this, but if you're looking for a set of balanced base-style vehicles, TAC2 is where they're at. Minus the Shrike, of course.

Ambush, there's no reason to make changes to the vehicles like that. As I pointed out in my original post, what balanced the vehicles and more specifically the shrike was the addition of high armor speeds. Making non vehicle offense much more potent, and making the shrike significantly less powerful as its speed wasn't overly faster than the armors. The shrike in classic remained a good midfield weapon but you couldn't dominate an entirely offense single handedly. It became balanced within the time and effort required to get one and keep it up.

Protoss, why is everyone that disagrees with you wrong? You act like no one read your post as they obviously didn't "see the light."

I was pointing at the -bad things- in base. That's why I was using it as an example. And, even in classic. the shrike is still much better than the other vehicles.

And yes, T:V will have enough people for large vehicles. I read that T:V will be meant for 16v16 - what Tribes 2 was meant for. In a scrim, you would be able to fill up a transport with a shrike escort... in pubs, you can't. Keep the large vehicles.

Kefka said:

Protoss, why is everyone that disagrees with you wrong? You act like no one read your post as they obviously didn't "see the light."

I was pointing at the -bad things- in base. That's why I was using it as an example. And, even in classic. the shrike is still much better than the other vehicles.

And yes, T:V will have enough people for large vehicles. I read that T:V will be meant for 16v16 - what Tribes 2 was meant for. In a scrim, you would be able to fill up a transport with a shrike escort... in pubs, you can't. Keep the large vehicles.

Click to expand...

You read wrong. Competition will likely be designed sizes from 1 vs 1 (duel) to 12 vs 12. General consensus seems to desire a team size between 9 and 12.

And your claim that "anyone who disagrees with ZP is wrong to ZP" is patently false. I'm not sure why you'd choose such a blatant ad hominem attack, unless you were attempting to discredit his points without actually arguing about them.

Pub play, and comp play equal 2 totally different things.

T:V may very well have larger vehicles that might be fun, and somewhat useful in a pub, that nobody would actually use in comp play, then again it may not.

Making sure everything is balanced, mainly making sure vehicles are not overpowered, but also somewhat useful is going to be the trick.

I'd like to see them keep a one man scout/shrike type vehicle, and make sure its balanced. Also maybe a two man bombing vehicle, thats quick and balanced. These I could see being used in comp play.

But as far as heavy transports.....just because they are weak, and not viable in a comp situation, doesnt mean they arent useful, and fun to use in pubs, or for the new players.

I think the T:V devs got a good idea from what I've heard so far. They are gonna tone down the number of vehicles, and their dominance from T2 base, and make sure they are useful, but not overpowered.

Whether or not they will be as effective as a T2 classic shrike....*shrugs*. But that is a decently balanced vehicle imo, like ZP already said.

Hellboy213 said:

Also maybe a two man bombing vehicle, thats quick and balanced. These I could see being used in comp play.

But as far as heavy transports.....just because they are weak, and not viable in a comp situation, doesnt mean they arent useful, and fun to use in pubs, or for the new players.

Click to expand...

Why not have a four man tribe player. One man can operate the weapons, the other can operate the jet pack. Someone else can operate skiing and another for the mines. 1...2.....4 Now that's team effort!

I see where you're coming from, yes. I was offering up TAC2 vehicles as a set, though I should have specified they have a good balance because they are only pitted against each other for the most part, save for flag//objective armor defenders in TAC2. (That, and armors cannot traverse terrain at all in TAC2, so speeds become irrelevant.)

Mea culpa.

I will agree that in Classic, vehicles are much better balanced against armor speed. That I can deal with.

The things that just bother me about vehicles in T2, however (and I say this as my team's dedicated bomber/havoc/tank pilot) are that they have shields and that they have no stabilization.

That is to say that ground weapons are essentially useless against vehicles due to the shields soaking up damage (hence the addition of T2's missile launcher) and that, when hit, air vehicles flop all over the place as opposed to their rock-steady movement in T1.

I would rather have no shields and a rock-steady shrike/bomber/havoc/what-have-you than one with shields that gets thrown around whenever it gets nailed. I think it would solve most of the problems with vehicles as they stand in T2--you'd be able to hurt them with armor weapons (not counting the missile launcher), and they wouldn't be sitting ducks after a single hit.

Thus, a Shrike would have an easier time hitting a target that's shooting at him and hitting him, but he'd have to watch his health bar and maneuver out of the way or attack at range or just ram the bastard. Transport crews wouldn't get flipped by a single lance (though that's a damn cool maneuver to pull off, IMO), but they'd have to work a little harder to keep it in the sky. Same for bomber crews.

However, this would neccisitate major changes in defense turrets--a shrike without shields in T2 would get ripped up by the first AA turret it wandered near. Since we don't know how hardpoint defenses will work in T:V, doing it as I've outlined above may or may not work.

The tank from TAC2, however, would work great. Its main strength as it stands now (base/classic) is its large shield reserve and its wonderfully quick responsiveness and ability to change directions on a dime. A tank without shields and with lowered strafe/reverse speed would better fit the 'assault' moniker, IMO--you'd have to get in, hit exactly what is needed for your capper to get the job done, and get out before the defense rips it apart.

All of this, however, hinges on the removal of the missile launcher from T:V, which isn't something we know about it. I'd like to see it go, myself, and that's even with my fondness for snap-shotting light armors into tiny kibbiles with it.

That's because in classic the shrike is probably the best balanced vehicle in relation to the armors. As explained over and over again. Also T:V is *not* meant for 16v16. I'm not sure where you read it but it's migrating towards smaller T1 type team sizes. Not unbelievably huge T2 sizes. Smaller teams = More teams = Indivudal talent matters more = More competition.

Kefka said:

Protoss, why is everyone that disagrees with you wrong?

I was pointing at the -bad things- in base. That's why I was using it as an example. And, even in classic. the shrike is still much better than the other vehicles.

And yes, T:V will have enough people for large vehicles. I read that T:V will be meant for 16v16 - what Tribes 2 was meant for. In a scrim, you would be able to fill up a transport with a shrike escort... in pubs, you can't. Keep the large vehicles.

Click to expand...

Ambush for starters ground weapons definetly aren't worthless vs vehicles in T2. A mine disk will either instantly kill a shrike (for example), or severely damage it. Chain will utterly destroy it as well if the person chaining it started when the shrike was a standstill.

In relation to air vehicle stability, in classic both the bomber and the shrike are very stable air wise. Not sure where you got the idea that they move around a ton when hit, but they don't. The bomber *was* slightly changed in classic so disks wouldn't cause them to move, but the shrike was always stable when hit by a disk.

Shields are needed as they serve (when implemented properly), as a means of a skill curve. Allowing skilled players to outclass the lesser players due to more precise aim, better decisions, etc. The rewards of those being able to stay up longer than a less skilled person. (As explained before).

Waited off on replying to this until I had a bit more time. I did cover T2 base, I didn't spend too much time describing it since of course as you said, whatever team had the better airforce won.

I agree 100% that T:V is a new game and anything vehicle wise has to be relative to the balance and flow of the rest of the game. While this is a massive post vehicles as you say are only a small part of the overall game.

daunt said:

I'm only going to respond briefly.

In t2 base competition the team with the stronger airforce won. I don't know how you can begin to explain that as being balanced. It wasn't.

Andy, most of your essay seems pretty obvious, but I'm not sure you fully grasp the development process that Irrational must go through. I believe the general order of development has to be: environment (map design), then physics, then armors, and only then can they begin to even consider things like vehicles. With the formula setup, they can integrate vehicles relative to the rest. Throw in weapon balancing in the end and you got yourself a game.

In my assessment, t1 and t2 vehicles can be learned from, but should not serve as a model for T:V in any capacity. Classic may have been the closest to being balanced in your assessment, but I don't believe T:V should simply pick and choose elements from t1 and t2, and wrap them up in a pretty little package. New game, new balance, new feel - and perhaps it'll keep our attention for a bit.

Click to expand...

Zoolooman said:

You read wrong. Competition will likely be designed sizes from 1 vs 1 (duel) to 12 vs 12. General consensus seems to desire a team size between 9 and 12.

And your claim that "anyone who disagrees with ZP is wrong to ZP" is patently false. I'm not sure why you'd choose such a blatant ad hominem attack, unless you were attempting to discredit his points without actually arguing about them.

Click to expand...

Maybe I should've quoted him, but he said something along the lines of "No, Kefka, all of your points are invalid." when I said two- and three-man vehicles should be marginally more powerful than a one-man vehicle and harder to take down. It's so much easier to take down a bomber or a tank than it is to take down a shrike.


And about mine-disking shrikes... what the hell? I'd love to see someone able to toss a mine onto a shrike and hit that little spot dead-on with a disk done a few times. That sounds like a fluke to me, like me being able to take down a shrike by ramming it with my wildcat.

Well I think all the bickering about how the missile launcher should be this or that clearly shows that it doesn’t need to be in the game. If you dumb it down nobody will use it and if you leave it as is its too powerful. Instead of trying to figure out how to make it work you should be looking at alternatives, something like the flak guns/mines in bf1942.

The next big problem that comes up is vehicle shields and I for one say that they don’t need them because it’s simply an eye-candy feature. They should have strong armor and that’s about it, not be 90% shields and 10% armor I mean wtf are they made out of tinfoil?

Kefka, m/ding shrikes is pretty easy specially when they are trying to ram you as they are flying straight at you. I have, and have seen my teammates, do it a ton in pubs etc.

Kefka said:

And about mine-disking shrikes... what the hell? I'd love to see someone able to toss a mine onto a shrike and hit that little spot dead-on with a disk done a few times. That sounds like a fluke to me, like me being able to take down a shrike by ramming it with my wildcat.

Click to expand...

One example from match play that i can think of. 311 vs |R| - UltraKiller, on slapdash. UK is playing LD/MF/Osniper, and about half way through the map he m/d's jaeth as he attempts to run him over on the hills midfield.

If the TWL demo library was up you could get it from there, but alas it's not.

Well, I know it's been done before, but think of these two conflicting statements:

"We need more playerbase in Tribes! The game is dying off and the old players are going elsewhere with all these changes."

"Tribes needs more skill! It sucks how I can't stop heavies dead in their tracks with one fell swoop like I used to do in Tribes 1. I wish people were as good with a disk as I would so you wouldn't NEED anything except a few mines and a disk launcher to take down vehicles. Freaking wussie newbies."

I, like a majority of online gamers, are not the hardcore types who play day in, day out. Hell, I play about five-to-ten hours a week. That's an average of an hour or two per work day. People fail to realize that being able to jump, jet, fly around, shoot other people who're flying around, and able to shoot down others in vehicles AND able to dodge the attacks of about three people who're chasing you does require a bit of skill... although, it becomes second nature after playing for five years. I'm elated when I land a MA, which I average about twice in a game... but I can't land a mine-disk shot, but I don't fret about being a newbie; I just don't have time to learn how to adjust my aim to do that sort of thing.

So keep in mind, Tribes can't cater to the small percentage of "hardcore" players out there who play at least 40 hours a week. If you want a playerbase, you're going to have to stop comparing "madskills" to the rest of the population... it's not common for the average player to be able to kill a vehicle without the aid of a missile launcher. It's very easy to avoid missiles with a trusty pack of flares, but it isn't as easy to shoot down a shrike with nothing but your spawngear (unless you're chaining the guy up close).

Vehicles in T:V ought to be fun and effective. I like vehicle inventories, though. I'm curious to see how the non-inventory vehicle era works.