Spawning tanks further back.

[Extension7]

Right now I (and I hope many others feel) tanks are not done as okay as we'd hope. You can see for yourself that many servers turned tanks OFF due to various issues. I know TWI members acknowledged issues about AI tanking and such and that's sweet now we'll get that fixed ^__^

But theres another thing, it's the importance of tanks. Right now they feel like they are giant pieces of infantry, that spawn with infantry, have the same respawn timer as infantry, and such. Once you kill a tank, it'll appear in less than 1 minute or so, making you (as the defending tank or AT rifle class) feel pretty much useless to your team cause you're just buying them time from the tank for just a minute, until the tank comes back and wrecks even more of your team.

My solution to this is to move the tank spawns back further back than infantry spawn, and have tanks on their own seperate respawn time that is a tad longer than infantry respawns. I think in my opinion that it'll make tanks a bit more valuable and make it more rewarding when you destroy them, because it buys your team time to move in towards an objective and gives your team's tank more time to help clear the enemy infantry.

There's not much else to it. I made a cute colorful diagram to explain it ^__^

[defektive]

Not allowing players to exit from a vehicle has had all sorts of knock-on effects for RO2, not the least of which being a tank respawning as quickly as a dead infantryman. Another knock-on effect is the artificial super-charging of all anti-tank rifles into anti-matter railguns to help combat this rapidly respawning rolling thunder. (Such things cheapen close infantry support armour in RO2.) There are arguments for and against locking players into their vehicles and I’m not going to go into that now, but the in-game results of this design choice are undeniable. Okay, I’m going to say it: RO did it better. Ignoring whether or not being able to get out of a vehicle is directly good or bad, in RO it allowed the battlefield presence of armour to be properly balanced and measured as befitting the map in question.

Forcing slower tank respawn and/or moving the spawn point to as far back as any map will allow might help improve the combined arms feel of the game. Larger maps also help improve things and by design they are of course much better placed to make good use of rearward armour respawn points.

[MarioBava]

Originally Posted by defektive

Not allowing players to exit from a vehicle has had all sorts of knock-on effects for RO2, not the least of which being a tank respawning as quickly as a dead infantryman. Another knock-on effect is the artificial super-charging of all anti-tank rifles into anti-matter railguns to help combat this rapidly respawning rolling thunder. (Such things cheapen close infantry support armour in RO2.)

I think the power of the AT rifles has little to nothing to do with the exit or not of the tanks, given how the AT rifles were in RO1 also (tank realists always cried over too easy penetration in RO1 also).

And as far as tanks on the same infantry respawn, I agree with both of you that is a problem. I think it probably is not a necessary effect of not being able to exit a tank, however. It's just a decision that needs tweaking.

In conclusion I really don't think exiting tanks is the issue of the thread nor do I truly think it's what creates these issues, and for the OP, these are good ideas which others have also posted. Maybe TWI will take a hint about combined arms in some way, either limiting number of tanks respawns (I personally tend to prefer this solution, hypothetically), changing spawn points and/or increasing spawn times.

[Catalavos]

I'm pretty confident that the issues regarding tank spawn locations and re-spawn times will get taken care of by custom map makers. All of the settings, etc... for stuff like this can be manipulated in the SDK. I'm working on a combined-arms map now that (hopefully) will force tanks to act like tanks and not assault troops.

So far the tank spawns are about 200-300 yards behind the infantry and the cap. zones are being set-up so that tanks can't get into them. I also plan to make the tank re-spawn times so unbearable that whomever takes the tank commander role will try very hard to stay alive.

[Mekhazzio]

Originally Posted by MarioBava

I think the power of the AT rifles has little to nothing to do with the exit or not of the tanks, given how the AT rifles were in RO1 also (tank realists always cried over too easy penetration in RO1 also).

The AT rifles were much stronger in RO1. I remember a stretch of about 5 minutes in Leningrad where I took four shots and got four tank kills. While that's theoretically possible in RO2, it is vanishingly unlikely, while it was pretty easy in RO1 once you knew what to aim for. The only thing keeping it under control was the truly awful state of bipod weapon deployment in RO1.

I favor the slower and limited respawn method too. Just moving spawns back isn't a hot idea because, for one, tanks can cross terrain fast enough that it doesn't achieve much, and for another, on some maps the tank spawn point is already about as far back as it can go.

I'd move almost all of the infantry spawns on all maps back quite a bit, though.

[Bonkill]

Would it be possible for a modder to make the ability to jump in and out of tanks. i don't care if there is an animation or not but if it were possible for players to enter and exit the tank i would have absolutely no problems with this game.

[Major_Day]

Originally Posted by Catalavos

I'm pretty confident that the issues regarding tank spawn locations and re-spawn times will get taken care of by custom map makers. All of the settings, etc... for stuff like this can be manipulated in the SDK. I'm working on a combined-arms map now that (hopefully) will force tanks to act like tanks and not assault troops.

So far the tank spawns are about 200-300 yards behind the infantry and the cap. zones are being set-up so that tanks can't get into them. I also plan to make the tank re-spawn times so unbearable that whomever takes the tank commander role will try very hard to stay alive.

Good luck with getting anybody to play a map like that.
Tankers are already stuck with bots that they don't want in their tanks,being unable to exit to save their lives when on fire or severely damaged,AT guns as powerfull as cruise missiles, and now you want to make a map with unbearably long spawn times,cap zones that can't be capped,and spawn points that are much further back.
If you dislike tanks so much make it an infantry only map, and let the tankers enjoy the game instead of being hamstrung by stupid ideas.

[Catalavos]

Originally Posted by Major_Day

Good luck with getting anybody to play a map like that.

I can't say that I disagree with you. A map like this, even if it works out well, could definately be considered an aquired taste. I spent several years working as a Fromager so I'm used to trying to give people something they don't really want But with many folks getting bored with the stock maps (myself not included) I think it could at least offer something slightly different. Lets call it a niche map for a niche game.

For 9 months I've read post after post from players concerning what gameplay aspect they would like to see in a map so I'm trying to include as many of these things as I can, just for the hell of it. So I'll juggle tank spawns, re-spawn times for tanks and infantry, open up the flanks, allow for long-range rifle engagements, limit SMG's, include engineer objectives, give the defenders time to dig in and get a proper defense set up, no lockdown timer, increase game time limit and whatever else I can come up with. Despite its bugs, the SDK is a lot of fun to mess with and I'm hoping TWI can get the known issues with it worked out soon so that everybody will give custom maps a chance.

[Catalavos]

Originally Posted by Major_Day

Good luck with getting anybody to play a map like that.
Tankers are already stuck with bots that they don't want in their tanks,being unable to exit to save their lives when on fire or severely damaged,AT guns as powerfull as cruise missiles, and now you want to make a map with unbearably long spawn times,cap zones that can't be capped,and spawn points that are much further back.
If you dislike tanks so much make it an infantry only map, and let the tankers enjoy the game instead of being hamstrung by stupid ideas.

OK, if you want to cop a s***tty attitude, go ahead. As an ex M1-A1 tank crewman I can assure you that I do not hate tanks. Quite the contrary as tanks are the reason I started playing RO to begin with. So before you start criticizing an *idea* before it's come to life how about leaving the defeatist BS at the door. And as far as letting tankers enjoy the game, how much fun is it, really, for a tanker to camp outside the Allies rear spawn on Pavlov's House? Speaking of bots, didn't you just make a comment on the tank tweak mutator a few hours ago? Seems to me that the bot issue is being worked on. Can't get out of a tank? BFD. I got over that the first week of the Beta. What's the alternative? Walk all the way back to spawn to get a new tank or hide in the woods waiting to shoot an AT guy with a pistol like in the original Arad map? Big fun there . And while there's no way you could know this, there are NO AT roles in my WorldInfo. Only engineers. And I'm not to blame for the AT guns, either.

I want to make a map that is fundimentally different. To take a stab at creating a slightly more 'historically accurate' version of WW2 combat in a map scenerio where the tanks and infantry have to support each other in order to advance and win. Granted, this is all up to the players in the end but I'm going to try to make it work out that way if I can. And if I fail then hey, at least I gave it a shot. Maybe I'll get it right the next time.

[Proud_God]

Originally Posted by Major_Day

Good luck with getting anybody to play a map like that.

I would definately play that map!
Longer tank respawns ftw. Ideally, we need a announcement when a new tank spawn is available, so tank crew men can play normal infantry while no tank is available.

[Catalavos]

Originally Posted by Proud_God

I would definately play that map!
Longer tank respawns ftw. Ideally, we need a announcement when a new tank spawn is available, so tank crew men can play normal infantry while no tank is available.

Just so it's clear to everyone, when I said that I want the tank re-spawn time to be "unbearable" what I was thinking was like a minute or two. As it stands on the current maps you can be back in the action in about 30 seconds.

Proud_God- I exchanged a few messages with TWSwag about this a while back. I was wondering if the tank commander could "switch roles" to rifleman when the tanks ran out. He said that it wouldn't be possible because the spawns for tank crewmen are handled with entirely different spawn volumes. Basically you would die your last death as a tank crewman and have to change roles manually.

[Proud_God]

Originally Posted by Catalavos

Basically you would die your last death as a tank crewman and have to change roles manually.

Is that so bad? Then you can select whatever (non-tank) role you want, ie. you're not restricted to rifleman.

[Catalavos]

Correct. You could even take Engineer and keep killing tanks