My experiance with planetside

Cymric

I don't often write about the mmos I played, but I think planetside deserve one. Huge wall of text warning.

I first started playing planetside around 2 months ago after hearing good things about the game and that the population is up after a server merge. I did not expect to like the game, since that it is old with dated graphics and more importantly, I am bad at twitch based combat and never really like fps games. However, I am looking for a new mmo experiance and was willing to take a shot.

I am glad I did.

I log on and as expected the graphics is not too good, the controls are different from what I am use to and there are very little guidance on how things works. For some reason the tutorial never activate for me. Nevertheless I managed to figure out how the equipment terminal works, discovered the instance action option and into the battle I went.

Or so I thought. I landed at a tower, the action is actually at a base a distance away. I can't see the action and was feeling lost and not too impressed. Finally someone spawned and I follow the direction that he head off to and finally found the battle.

I am of the opinion that every mmo worth playing have a core element differentiating it from the other mmos and this core element must resonate with me before I am willing to play for the game.

For example Lotro is the beautifully crafted world, guild wars is the numerous skills and their combo, ddo is their dungeon. As I watch aircraft flew overhead and turrets shoot them down. Armor duel with each other at the edge of the base while infantry try to make their way in. At that moment I "get" planetside. Planetside is the feeling that you are really in a massive epic war and I really like that feeling.

For days I played, died a lot and was unable to get any kills. It seems that everyone playing is very skilled. I would start shooting at someone and within a few moments they would have located me, return fire and BANG! I am dead.

I keep trying with different weapons.

Infantry with heavy assault, doesn't work with my 300+ ping and bad reflex.

Infantry with thumper, cool, red numbers and they increases? Thats my score? Humm maybe I am doing something right. Oh wait maybe not...

Sniper, still no, the enemy refuse to stay still for me to hit and when I do, they hide and heal.

ATVs, grr how do you aim while moving?!

A liberator pilot pick me up as a bombardier. "Bomb the vehicle bay!" "Huh?! How do I identify it from the air?"

"The gen is down, repair the gen!!!" "Ok, I have a glue gun, but how the heck do I find the gen in this maze of a base?!"

Reaver, a 1 man aircraft that is suppose to be a solo pawn mobile, Tried to shoot a mosquito but crash into it instead and sent him crashing into the ground and exploding, no exp gained, but atleast an indirect kill.

I finally got a kill by jacking a tank when the driver dismount and man its guns. He was booted from the vehicle and did not react when I knife him to death and I was promptly mow down by another tank near by.

So I sux at planetside, very badly. My typical session yields 5-10 kills for 50+ deaths.

Instead of direct fighting, I start doing support work, fly lodestar for vehicles repair, drive ams for mobile spawns, combat engineering to fortify the base, ant runs to fill base's ntu and manning turrets. And I start getting a good amount of exp from support work and sometimes even a decent amount of kills.

"Trying to hack the tower that I am manning turrets from? Take this plasma grenade cloaker!"

"That lodestar is my exp machine and you are not gonna destroy it! Eat flak reaver!"

It is amazing what one can do with the proper motivation.

And the nicest thing is that I can really notice my skills getting better. Not my char's skills, but my own skills and thats really a different feeling from normal mmos.

After a few months of playing the flaws of planetside became very apparent however. One of course is the hackers using exploits who can really ruin a fight. A few other game play flaws that I wouldn't get into. The main problem with planetside is that the enemies are.. humans. Although you want to kill them, they do not want to die. They will struggle, fight back, run away, hide, even suicide. This enables combat to be very fun and engaging and you really get a sense of accomplishment when you get a kill. However, sometimes when I came home after a days work, I am mentally exhausted. I don't feel like putting in effort to get kills. And in planetside, if you are not putting in effort to concentrate and stay alert, you will miss opputunities to get kills and you will be killed.

Planetside still is very fun, but I do not forsee playing it as my main mmo for the long run. I will probably find a pve mmo as my main mmo and come back to planetside during week ends.

Hvezdosvit

Very well written. Thank you for reminding me that times of taking every advantage, finding promissing opportunities, stabbing from back... That's Planetside I loved, although I mainly sucked in direct fight too.

borguk1of9

Good read OP.

Lathow

Good read kind of funny too  



 Out of my experiance with planetside, The overall battlefield was a playing ground for me. You would find me often wearing light armor, with a sniper rifle, taking a number of shots, then moving to a new spot...rake up maybe 4-6 kills then maybe a cloaker or a raven would track me down. I would try to take cover from nearby teammates if they were equip for the threat facing me.



 Other times I would gather a squad up and have them follow my ams to a mildly hot spot to support some of the main force's. Most of the time we would have an impact and enough medics to keep people up and fighting. I normaly played as a support medic, tossing nades where they would be most effective...healing my teamates and keeping them alive. Tons of exp to be gained but hard as hell to stay alive myself as once they saw me healing everyone i became a huge target.



 My average k/d ratio was about 5/1 but i've had lots of fps experiance and most battles are only alittle organized....they need more support for squads to keep things organized and moving along with the face past battles...way to often battles would go nowhere due to zerging and no command...and those in command could'nt command anything because they had no loyalty. Game needs a lot of work for the future. but it was a decent game for a number of months

raykor

Originally posted by Cymric
The main problem with planetside is that the enemies are.. humans. Although you want to kill them, they do not want to die.

 

Nice story.  The bit above made me laugh.

Kost

Originally posted by Cymric


I don't often write about the mmos I played, but I think planetside deserve one. Huge wall of text warning.
I first started playing planetside around 2 months ago after hearing good things about the game and that the population is up after a server merge. I did not expect to like the game, since that it is old with dated graphics and more importantly, I am bad at twitch based combat and never really like fps games. However, I am looking for a new mmo experiance and was willing to take a shot.
I am glad I did.
I log on and as expected the graphics is not too good, the controls are different from what I am use to and there are very little guidance on how things works. For some reason the tutorial never activate for me. Nevertheless I managed to figure out how the equipment terminal works, discovered the instance action option and into the battle I went.
Or so I thought. I landed at a tower, the action is actually at a base a distance away. I can't see the action and was feeling lost and not too impressed. Finally someone spawned and I follow the direction that he head off to and finally found the battle.
I am of the opinion that every mmo worth playing have a core element differentiating it from the other mmos and this core element must resonate with me before I am willing to play for the game.
For example Lotro is the beautifully crafted world, guild wars is the numerous skills and their combo, ddo is their dungeon. As I watch aircraft flew overhead and turrets shoot them down. Armor duel with each other at the edge of the base while infantry try to make their way in. At that moment I "get" planetside. Planetside is the feeling that you are really in a massive epic war and I really like that feeling.
For days I played, died a lot and was unable to get any kills. It seems that everyone playing is very skilled. I would start shooting at someone and within a few moments they would have located me, return fire and BANG! I am dead.
I keep trying with different weapons.
Infantry with heavy assault, doesn't work with my 300+ ping and bad reflex.
Infantry with thumper, cool, red numbers and they increases? Thats my score? Humm maybe I am doing something right. Oh wait maybe not...
Sniper, still no, the enemy refuse to stay still for me to hit and when I do, they hide and heal.
ATVs, grr how do you aim while moving?!
A liberator pilot pick me up as a bombardier. "Bomb the vehicle bay!" "Huh?! How do I identify it from the air?"
"The gen is down, repair the gen!!!" "Ok, I have a glue gun, but how the heck do I find the gen in this maze of a base?!"
Reaver, a 1 man aircraft that is suppose to be a solo pawn mobile, Tried to shoot a mosquito but crash into it instead and sent him crashing into the ground and exploding, no exp gained, but atleast an indirect kill.
I finally got a kill by jacking a tank when the driver dismount and man its guns. He was booted from the vehicle and did not react when I knife him to death and I was promptly mow down by another tank near by.
So I sux at planetside, very badly. My typical session yields 5-10 kills for 50+ deaths.
Instead of direct fighting, I start doing support work, fly lodestar for vehicles repair, drive ams for mobile spawns, combat engineering to fortify the base, ant runs to fill base's ntu and manning turrets. And I start getting a good amount of exp from support work and sometimes even a decent amount of kills.
"Trying to hack the tower that I am manning turrets from? Take this plasma grenade cloaker!"
"That lodestar is my exp machine and you are not gonna destroy it! Eat flak reaver!"
It is amazing what one can do with the proper motivation.
And the nicest thing is that I can really notice my skills getting better. Not my char's skills, but my own skills and thats really a different feeling from normal mmos.
After a few months of playing the flaws of planetside became very apparent however. One of course is the hackers using exploits who can really ruin a fight. A few other game play flaws that I wouldn't get into. The main problem with planetside is that the enemies are.. humans. Although you want to kill them, they do not want to die. They will struggle, fight back, run away, hide, even suicide. This enables combat to be very fun and engaging and you really get a sense of accomplishment when you get a kill. However, sometimes when I came home after a days work, I am mentally exhausted. I don't feel like putting in effort to get kills. And in planetside, if you are not putting in effort to concentrate and stay alert, you will miss opputunities to get kills and you will be killed.
Planetside still is very fun, but I do not forsee playing it as my main mmo for the long run. I will probably find a pve mmo as my main mmo and come back to planetside during week ends.

 

I've never tried Planetside tbh, but after reading your story it makes me want to. I am quite intrigued to say the least.

Downloading now!

mrw0lf

Good read and well written.

PS is kinda harsh on new players simply because experience is everything, right behind not having a 300 ping. 300 ping will put you at a big disadvantage in this game (and most fps's) especially in closequarter and mediumassault fights. I'm still looking for a game to take me from PS for good, maybe PS2?

But thanks for the support play, an ams driver can have a greater effect on a massive battle than the rest of the zerg put together.