If this game doesn't let me use my ancient joystick to fly those planes around I'll be sad.
Yeah. I have an aviator joystick so I'd really like for it's use to be supported for piloting aircraft and for my previous experience with combat flight sims to be of at least some use in that way. While I don't expect flight to be modeled as well as a dedicated flight sim,
Also it would better enable the devs to add conventional landing and takeoff airplanes at some point. You can fly them without a joystick using the number keys being 10% throttle adjustment each but it's very jerky as the arrow keys and right/left rudder are either all or nothing presses or press once to change to 1/4 on one direction until another button counters it. The first is better but both are much less elegant than using joysticks. Flying by mouse requires you to use the keyboard in addition to the mouse for either rudder function or ailerons function as you can only move the mouse in 4 directions (for rudder right/left and elevator up/down), while you can twist an aviator joystick for the complete 6 movements for an airplane (right/left rudder [twist joystick], right/left aileron [stick right/left], up/down elevator [stick forward/back]) as well as having a throttle slider for controlling forward propulsion. Most joysticks have additional buttons not intended for firing weapons that could be used to assign a potential strafe function for VTOL craft so they can fly sideways and keep their forwards guns on target while remaining moving. For example mine has switches at the bottom that function as buttons when not in the neutral position, so I can hold the switch up to strafe and release it to neutral to stop, and then hold it down to strafe the opposite way.
It would be sweet to have the VTOL craft to be for local deployment for various infantry support roles. If it was my choice conventional aircraft would be for use on long range strikes far from the airbase or for bombing raids on resource industry (especially if they can do really high altitude flight) and patrolling for and interception and defense of such raids. It would be difficult but possible for enemy ground forces to penetrate to and capture the airbase(s) but it would have to be a bad day for the defenders. If the attackers hold it maybe they could utilize it to land troops or heavy armor in transporters or something into the airbase that gives some advantage over air drops so it's utilized.
The way to do that would be to have VTOL be designed to be parked in rear areas near to the fighting but out of range of artillery. That way they on average will have a quicker response time than the conventional engine planes that depending on coordination with ground troops could be patrolling nearby awaiting a call for support in expectation of an offensive or could be rearming at their more distant rear base near the production center after bombing a supply convoy or production center. Perhaps the interceptors/escorts could also be possible of strafing light ground forces and optionally carry bombs to expend before intercepting incoming aircraft so they have something to do if the enemy bombers are grounded. I'd suggest that compared to VTOL they could be designed for hit and run with high speed for the fighters and a large amount of expendable ordinance for the slower bombers. I think VTOLs should be able to shoot them down and be shot down in turn but I think VTOL could specialize in multi-directional maneuverability by utilizing their engine design while the conventional planes would be able to zoom past them with high speed passes. I'd give anti air specialized VTOL craft missiles to compensate for conventional fighter's high speed, and conventional fighters would have guns for anti-aircraft and strafing as well as guided missiles for anti-air or dumbfire high-explosive rockets for anti-ground. I'd give bombers a good sized crew for various defensive and offensive armaments and a decent speed so that they are tough to hit without specialized high altitude reaching weaponry like flak or guided missiles, though a simple machine gun should be able to hit and damage them if they fly into the stream of bullets. Flak could be assisted by both zoom and by aim boxes to assist with leading the target properly with anti-air weapons or be semi-guided over a long trajectory. Missile or rocket launchers would be cool in addition to bombs for ground attack for both fighters and bombers and make for interesting crew positions. I'd make fighters single seaters with a more dedicated ground attack fighter carrying two with one player controlling rear facing weaponry and one piloting with weapons to the front. I'd have VTOL be easy to modify prior to takeoff while conventional would be more difficult to modify after the initial production. Also I'm interested in whether the aircraft will have their forward guns fixed or whether the crosshairs follow the mouse and the gun is in a gimbal turrent mount of some kind like in X3 for example. I'd say that conventional fighter guns firing forward under the pilot's control might be best as fixed as otherwise they would be quite strong depending on how slow the planes are capable of maintaining lift at in ground attack. If they are fixed the plane has to aim directly at what it wants to shoot which would enable ground forces to shoot back in the same limited timeframe before the conventional plane zooms past. In addition it would be a nice balancing effect for VTOLs to be capable of moving it's forward firing weapon's crosshair like the weapon' mount is traversing separate of the aircraft, as otherwise the high speed of conventional craft would be hard to counter.
I never tried Planetside 1 so I don't know if I should expect things like Everquest zones and continents where high altitude bombers might be useful as everything could be 'produced' in a rear area before traversing to combat zones and thus a sort of supply line would be formed; or if it's more like a series of small first person shooter maps that you can zone into from your side's safe hub likely into a safe base and not have to travel far before reaching the action and with the equipment spawned in the safe base or otherwise locally. I'd much rather the first way as it would open up guerrilla warfare and bombers requiring escort fighters to disrupt the flow of for example armor to the fighting. Also that way VTOL craft, mobile anti aircraft vehicles, and artillery using coordinates or spotters could be used as well as player made bases and supply dumps or fortifications.
Air dropped armored vehicles with a large vulnerable conventional supply plane would be cool, as well as supply drops. Is there food in Planetside? It would be cool to drop food, reinforcements and ammo to a surrounded army. Speaking of ammo I hope it's not too easy to resupply and that players will be the ones doing it; such as driving a truck with sufficient ammunition for various types of weaponry from the production center to a forward base. If you only have to reach a resupply console or something near the fighting I'll be disappointed; unless that console is supplied through players making resupply runs for ammo or material or whatever.
Anyways those are my suggestions for the air and supply war in Planetside.
EDIT: I'm watching the 1hr+ video from the 31st and it looked at the map. Looks pretty sweet to me. Also I don't know enough about previous vehicles and such to be making suggestions it appears.
It appears grenades and some other expendables will cost resources; but I hope those resources have to be transported somehow to the base from the base or whatever they are from.
EDIT2: The video says the flight ceiling is 1000meters. I'd recommend at least 5x that and if possible maybe 10x or 20x. With those heights it would allow you to use radar to intercept and give a reason to have a really fast interceptor to reach extremely high altitude bombers bombarding the ground troops with various types of weaponry from those heights. Surface to air missiles would be cooler then, or semi-guided flak for high altitudes, as machine guns probably won't be effective at those heights.
Also it would help do what they said happened in the first game where a dropship would fly over the empty ocean to get to a rear area. Instead of going over ocean you could fly really high instead and hope no one is flying around as an interceptor looking at their radar or is controlling a surface to air missile setup that can spot, notify the user about and lock-on to high altitude planes.
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Topic: Planetside 2: Free-to-Play MMOFPS. 2000 players/server. (Read 1089967 times)