I was talking to a friend regarding current GSF issues and it was suggested that I just post ideas. You can take them worth a grain of salt if you wish but the intent of this thread is to brainstorm potential solutions for tactical issues surrounding the following much complained about problems (items are listed in no particular order):

1. Power-ups in TDM, specifically damage power-ups
   
2. Non-contributing penalties
   
3. Camping regardless of location
   
4. Capital ship turrets and/or using capital ships as protection
   
5. Farming
   

I am hoping that the brainstorming produces an elegant, simple, and viable solution in some combination that can be easily implemented. I do not claim to be an expert. I have highlighted my current favorites.

Items 2 to 5 tend to involve someone staying in one place too long or not moving in some form or another, so I will list options I've read and/or brainstormed when making lists to address them as one list. Potential power-up solutions will be listed separately.

1. Power-ups

• Remove power-ups entirely
  
• Have only power-ups that recharge as opposed to enhance abilities
  Suggested power-ups would be replenishing missiles, restoring all shield or engine or weapon power to normal max of the ship, repair damage, etc.
  Power-up is not picked up if your ship does not need it.
  
• Limit enhancement of abilities only to what is achievable via component upgrades
  
• Limit the damage power-ups to use on only one or two kills
  Don't do this if you limit damage to what is achievable via upgrades
  

2-5. Staying in one place

The obvious tactical option to a spawn point being farmed is to have it protected. This can be accomplished in at least two ways. Either players decide to always protect the spawn point or turrets are turned back on. I personally do not like either of those two options assuming no other changes are made to turrets as they existed previously. Issues surrounding someone literally stopped in the field of play are really just annoyances BUT a combination of items that work logically for the main issues listed also happen to work logically for this so I included it in the list for consideration. Why exclude it when thinking about the options?

If turrets are turned back on, do one or more of the following:

• Turn down their damage
  
• Draw a big circle around them in the map to show where the edge of the turret range is
  
• Add a huge screen splash warning when you get close to their range
  
• Allow the turrets to be damaged reducing their effectiveness during the match - i.e. they don't target and hit you right away, your evasion cooldowns work against them, x% damage results in lower damage given and/or lower range, take out all turrets on a cap ship and the spawn point disappears, etc
  

If turrets are not turned back on, do one or more of the following:

(some of these may work regardless if turrets are turned back on)

• Put an invincibility timer (t) on ships being spawned that disappears when they are out of the spawn area or within some small % of the edge of their spawn area such as 10%. This allows for some maneuvering so camping is less likely. If an opposing team fires on them, there would be no debuff or damage during that time. You could color the recently spawned yellow so the opposing player doesn't waste power, ammo or abilities.
  
• Automatically pop a 90% evasion bonus on spawning that ticks down over time and disappears when you leave the spawn area entirely
  
• Auto kick recently spawned players if they don't move out of the spawn area
  
• If you just spawned, weapons do not work if you are within 100% plus a little of your spawn area AND opposing ships' weapons cannot target you when you are within 100% of your spawn area (to encourage recently spawned to leave and disallow any protection if you have already been outside the spawn area)
  
• Don't allow opposing force encroachment into the spawn area
  
• Remove cap ships entirely and allow for a larger number of spawn points that cannot be predicted well enough to be farmed
  
• Close a spawn point if enemy ships are in the area or mark it red as a hot LZ so you KNOW you're going to be landing in a hot zone
  
• Allow people to choose a cooldown to automatically pop when you are spawned, i.e. choose your ship, choose a cooldown to autopop when you are spawned, click ready...if barrel roll is chosen, choose a facing direction for your ship so everyone who barrel rolls out doesn't end up in the same spot
  

Regarding REQ's/XP and the non-contributing message and campers:

Rather than addressing this as a penalty for non-contributing at any point during the match and trying to define contribution in terms of hits whose accuracy can vary due to lag, I have the following suggestions. The first two may already work that way. I have not tested them and wanted to state them in an effort to be complete.

• If you queue and the match is initiated but it does not get enough people to spawn you get credit for completing the match in terms of the daily/weekly but it doesn't count as a defeat or in the statistics, etc.
  
• If the match starts and you never leave the spawn area or never hit the ready button, you get nothing, including no credit for the match in the daily/weekly.
  
• If you stay away from opponents and objectives more than x% of the time, you do not get credit for anything. Someone actively dog-fighting but not being successful would never be docked REQ or XP this way. Someone actively moving around a satellite would not be docked anything.
  
• If you leave the spawn area you get what you achieve and everything accomplished outside the spawn area counts as contributing even if all you are doing is running. Even people who run make themselves targets and there are enough obstacles with restrictions to cooldowns that they won't necessarily be successful.
  
• Put "X" on a cooldown. If you hit X and come to a stop, you will remain stopped for a max of p seconds (the time can be different for each ship since it may make more sense to do so), then when the time limit ends, the thrusters come back on at the lowest level as if S is pressed for a minimum of q number of seconds and then changes to normal thrusters as if no button is pressed for a minimum of r number of seconds. A player doing anything such as turning, firing a weapon, targeting, or using an ability during this time frame will result in normal play (S if they hit S, W if they hit W, normal thrusters, etc) but the ship must move for the total of q+r number of seconds before X can be used again.
  
  • This will prevent people from camping anywhere as well as encourage active participation.
    
  • Someone who is moving even if their intent is to run away from the battle is still a viable target. Their REQ's and XP are already limited by their active participation with gaining damage/kills/assists.
    
  • Someone who is new and still trying to figure out what to do gets some credit instead of being penalized for being new.
    
  • If this is not possible, I would want to do some form of the third option in this group as a second choice.
    

Discuss, suggest, have at it...

Here's an idea:

1. Turn capital ship turrets back on. However, also add a desertion dot to retreating players as a method of preventing the gun and run mentality plaguing a large amounts gunships.

2. The biggest problem with spawn hunting is the fact that te derpness among flyers is strong as there are way to many people who do not know you can change spawn location. The easiest method to deter spawn hunting is to determine default spawn location for pilots determined by active location of enemy ships (a la call of duty style)

Here's an idea:

 

1. Turn capital ship turrets back on. However, also add a desertion dot to retreating players as a method of preventing the gun and run mentality plaguing a large amounts gunships.

 

2. The biggest problem with spawn hunting is the fact that te derpness among flyers is strong as there are way to many people who do not know you can change spawn location. The easiest method to deter spawn hunting is to determine default spawn location for pilots determined by active location of enemy ships (a la call of duty style)

Actually, I have no problem with a Gunship going to run home to mother for protection. My beef is that they could do it a bit too easily. With Barrel Roll and relative closeness of the ships (esp in Dom) it was too easy, and they were not out of the fight long enough for it to be a significant penalty, nor where fighters able to use their mobility to actaully catch and have enough time to kill the gunships who were running. Cap ships needed to be placed another 40,000 away, and then give a speed boost to people who spawn. This way if you want to try to camp fine, but people will shoot past you and you could have a long, long way to chase them. Also, if a gunship wants to run he'll have a long, long way to go and be out of the fight for quite a while.

Here's an idea:

The easiest method to deter spawn hunting is to determine default spawn location for pilots determined by active location of enemy ships (a la call of duty style)

That's an interesting thought. I'm not sure how viable it would be. Running back to your spawn or farming at someone else's spawn would tend to turn the TDM games (even if the game can put you in an alternate spawn) into a domination game without the satellites. Be the first to get to your opponent's spawn points and stay there and you win. With the turrets turned back on, you just have to sit outside the turret range and can still farm them. Your gunship would counter theirs as far as range is concerned, etc.

For this to work, the spawn points might have to be truly random on the map, i.e. not fixed, or the number of potential spawn points would have to be so high that the opposing team could never adequately cover them all.

That's an interesting thought. I'm not sure how viable it would be. Running back to your spawn or farming at someone else's spawn would tend to turn the TDM games (even if the game can put you in an alternate spawn) into a domination game without the satellites. Be the first to get to your opponent's spawn points and stay there and you win. With the turrets turned back on, you just have to sit outside the turret range and can still farm them. Your gunship would counter theirs as far as range is concerned, etc.

 

For this to work, the spawn points might have to be truly random on the map, i.e. not fixed, or the number of potential spawn points would have to be so high that the opposing team could never adequately cover them all.

Random, multiple spawn points won't work. What kills people is being separated, and picked off in smaller numbers. Multiple spawn points promotes getting the losing side more and more spread out, which exacerbates the problem.

Actually, I have no problem with a Gunship going to run home to mother for protection. My beef is that they could do it a bit too easily. With Barrel Roll and relative closeness of the ships (esp in Dom) it was too easy, and they were not out of the fight long enough for it to be a significant penalty, nor where fighters able to use their mobility to actaully catch and have enough time to kill the gunships who were running. Cap ships needed to be placed another 40,000 away, and then give a speed boost to people who spawn. This way if you want to try to camp fine, but people will shoot past you and you could have a long, long way to chase them. Also, if a gunship wants to run he'll have a long, long way to go and be out of the fight for quite a while.

This would effectively do the same thing providing invincibility to the recently spawned would do. My hesitation would be you are making the area that much larger. I don't know what system or programming limitations there might be.

Would you put obstacles such as asteroids in the additional space or keep it clear?

I would lean toward keeping it clear. Those fleeing back to the capital ships would not have the speed boost the recently spawned have making them easier targets for those chasing them. That might be enough to discourage running back home but keep it as an option for the truly desperate. The recently spawned should have a limit of some sort to use the boost so if they're choosing to get into the fight close by they can't abuse the boost to bug out to the next spawn area. If they aren't sticking around, they are using that boost to get into the action in the middle of the map.

Random, multiple spawn points won't work. What kills people is being separated, and picked off in smaller numbers. Multiple spawn points promotes getting the losing side more and more spread out, which exacerbates the problem.

You're probably right about that. This is why premades tend to own pug's.

IMO powerups are fine, its damage overcharge that needs a look. The others are a "nice bonus" not a overwhelming benefit. They should play with how much of a bonus damage overcharge adds, this could fix the whole concept of powerups (IMO). Id like to see them keep it in, but I understand if they have to remove it as well.

I'd be okay with down-tweaking DO. Assuming DO is a % increase on the damage, it could be an issue where the % increase is resulting in cases where the improved damage is so outrageous (depending on the weapon and upgrades) or the lucky critical hits push the damage way out of whack. Putting a max limit that is a regular damage + number instead of % might be viable.

It kind of depends a bit on the original intent. If the intent was to bolster the ships and even out the playing field like bolster in ground PvP, I think it's off the mark.

IMO powerups are fine, its damage overcharge that needs a look. The others are a "nice bonus" not a overwhelming benefit. They should play with how much of a bonus damage overcharge adds, this could fix the whole concept of powerups (IMO). Id like to see them keep it in, but I understand if they have to remove it as well.

I'm ok with power-ups conceptually, but in lopsided matches they just make things worse. One side is pinned down while the otherside gets to camp right near power-up spawn areas or be much closer to most of them. They can use them if they want, or simply deny them from the other side.

In well-balanced matches they make thing interesting. I just wish there were more well-balanced matches...

About the capital ship turrets,

I was thinking that perhaps they only turn on at certain times, when certain conditions are met.

Such as, if half the team is within the respawn zone or have not respawned yet. And/ Or, if too many enemy fighters (>4) are close to the spawn area. Before the turrets activate, there will be a warning to all enemy crafts that they will be pulverized if they do not back up immediately.

Of course, it would be nice if all ships within the respawn zone receives a ~% chance to evasion, and a dot that kicks them if they stay there for longer than 30 seconds in the zone per life. If this is implemented, all weapon systems such be turned off as well near the capital ships of your faction.

In well-balanced matches they make thing interesting. I just wish there were more well-balanced matches...

I completely agree with this! That's why I'm wondering if the intent was to even out the matches.

A default level ship hitting the power-up may not be even as high as the same maxed ship without a power-up. At that point, how much of a benefit is it for the default level ship? It denies the other side a power-up but he still has trouble matching. A maxed out ship hitting the power-up could be so over-powered compared to a default level ship that it's laughable in an uneven match.

About the capital ship turrets,

 

I was thinking that perhaps they only turn on at certain times, when certain conditions are met.

 

Such as, if half the team is within the respawn zone or have not respawned yet. And/ Or, if too many enemy fighters (>4) are close to the spawn area. Before the turrets activate, there will be a warning to all enemy crafts that they will be pulverized if they do not back up immediately.

 

Of course, it would be nice if all ships within the respawn zone receives a ~% chance to evasion, and a dot that kicks them if they stay there for longer than 30 seconds in the zone per life. If this is implemented, all weapon systems such be turned off as well near the capital ships of your faction.

On your first suggestion, how long would the enemy fighters have to be in the spawn area to trigger it? How long does it last? I think with everyone as a moving target there might be issues in the finer details that result from lag and the turrets need to be either on or off all the time.

On the second one, why do a ~% chance bonus to evasion if all weapons are turned off near the spawn point or is it just your team's weapons? Are you trying to create a situation where the newly spawned near their spawn point can't fire when they have that buff but the enemy can? The change to evasion doesn't make sense unless your enemy has a chance to hit you and if your enemy can hit you, you're going to want to at least fire back in some way either via turret or your own weapons.

About the capital ship turrets,

 

I was thinking that perhaps they only turn on at certain times, when certain conditions are met.

 

Such as, if half the team is within the respawn zone or have not respawned yet. And/ Or, if too many enemy fighters (>4) are close to the spawn area. Before the turrets activate, there will be a warning to all enemy crafts that they will be pulverized if they do not back up immediately.

 

Of course, it would be nice if all ships within the respawn zone receives a ~% chance to evasion, and a dot that kicks them if they stay there for longer than 30 seconds in the zone per life. If this is implemented, all weapon systems such be turned off as well near the capital ships of your faction.

Or how about the guns don't fire if your side is ahead, but do fire if it is tied or you are losing.

That way if you're winning you can't just sit on your cap ship to win. Complaint solved.

But if you are losing you can't get so easily spawn-camped. Complaint solved.

Maybe have 10-15 sec window for the guns to start up again so that it can't be gamed to lure enemies into a trap and get a bunch of kills to take a lead.

On your first suggestion, how long would the enemy fighters have to be in the spawn area to trigger it? How long does it last? I think with everyone as a moving target there might be issues in the finer details that result from lag and the turrets need to be either on or off all the time.

 

On the second one, why do a ~% chance bonus to evasion if all weapons are turned off near the spawn point or is it just your team's weapons? Are you trying to create a situation where the newly spawned near their spawn point can't fire when they have that buff but the enemy can? The change to evasion doesn't make sense unless your enemy has a chance to hit you and if your enemy can hit you, you're going to want to at least fire back in some way either via turret or your own weapons.

I was thinking around 10 seconds each time.

For the second one, you are correct. I want your weapons to be unusable during the respawn zone, but the weapons of your enemies still functional. The evasion buff would be around 80%, making firing within the area pointless anyways. This is mostly because I was considering server latency and range. We don't want a scout or strike technically not spawn camping being blasted to bits by an immortal GS. Nor do we want a ship to abuse the time difference of the buff if both teams have their weapons disabled. I think that would create a situation were a player can abuse the downtime between when the buff goes off on his system, versus the buff showing on the player going off on the enemy's system a second later, and end up getting somewhat of an unfair advantage. We see this all the time with CCs and Shadow's resilience or PT's Hydralic overide.

Or how about the guns don't fire if your side is ahead, but do fire if it is tied or you are losing.

 

That way if you're winning you can't just sit on your cap ship to win. Complaint solved.

 

But if you are losing you can't get so easily spawn-camped. Complaint solved.

This guy pretty much fix in the last variable that determines if the turrets are on or not. Of course, I think this should be for TDM only.

Actually, I have no problem with a Gunship going to run home to mother for protection. My beef is that they could do it a bit too easily. With Barrel Roll and relative closeness of the ships (esp in Dom) it was too easy, and they were not out of the fight long enough for it to be a significant penalty, nor where fighters able to use their mobility to actaully catch and have enough time to kill the gunships who were running. Cap ships needed to be placed another 40,000 away, and then give a speed boost to people who spawn. This way if you want to try to camp fine, but people will shoot past you and you could have a long, long way to chase them. Also, if a gunship wants to run he'll have a long, long way to go and be out of the fight for quite a while.

You know, that's a very good point - Gunships should NOT be able to bug out the way they do. It'd be like giving a bomber Barrel Roll. Could you imagine?!

Take away Barrel Roll from all Gunships and turn the turrets back on. If they can outfly a scout or SF then, they've earned it.

Or how about the guns don't fire if your side is ahead, but do fire if it is tied or you are losing.

 

That way if you're winning you can't just sit on your cap ship to win. Complaint solved.

 

But if you are losing you can't get so easily spawn-camped. Complaint solved.

 

Maybe have 10-15 sec window for the guns to start up again so that it can't be gamed to lure enemies into a trap and get a bunch of kills to take a lead.

Playing devils advocate, let's go through a couple scenarios.

I'm losing or tied in a close match. This means my turrets are turned on. I get 3 guys on me and run to my capital ship. They get within range of the turrets which blow them out of the sky. Now we're winning. The opportunity to lure enemies into a trap is still there. If I time it right and they don't realize the situation, we win at the very end of the match.

We're tied and I lure someone to the capital ship, before the guy on my tail gets there my side gets a kill. Now we're ahead. This means my turrets just went offline and the help I was expecting is nonexistent, I'm dead and the turrets almost immediately go online. This constant on and off might be a problem, especially when taking lag into consideration. Even if you change it to a range difference such as there has to be a 10% or more difference in the score, you could still have a constant on and off issue.

I was thinking around 10 seconds each time.

 

For the second one, you are correct. I want your weapons to be unusable during the respawn zone, but the weapons of your enemies still functional. The evasion buff would be around 80%, making firing within the area pointless anyways. This is mostly because I was considering server latency and range. We don't want a scout or strike technically not spawn camping being blasted to bits by an immortal GS. Nor do we want a ship to abuse the time difference of the buff if both teams have their weapons disabled. I think that would create a situation were a player can abuse the downtime between when the buff goes off on his system, versus the buff showing on the player going off on the enemy's system a second later, and end up getting somewhat of an unfair advantage. We see this all the time with CCs and Shadow's resilience or PT's Hydralic overide.

This could work. I'd like to see how it pans out in practice if it's doable.

You know, that's a very good point - Gunships should NOT be able to bug out the way they do. It'd be like giving a bomber Barrel Roll. Could you imagine?!

 

Take away Barrel Roll from all Gunships and turn the turrets back on. If they can outfly a scout or SF then, they've earned it.

This may no longer be an issue with the supposed changes coming to the engine abilities. It might be better to wait and see.

This may no longer be an issue with the supposed changes coming to the engine abilities. It might be better to wait and see.

Interesting. Anything I can read on the subject?

Playing devils advocate, let's go through a couple scenarios.

 

I'm losing or tied in a close match. This means my turrets are turned on. I get 3 guys on me and run to my capital ship. They get within range of the turrets which blow them out of the sky. Now we're winning. The opportunity to lure enemies into a trap is still there. If I time it right and they don't realize the situation, we win at the very end of the match.

 

We're tied and I lure someone to the capital ship, before the guy on my tail gets there my side gets a kill. Now we're ahead. This means my turrets just went offline and the help I was expecting is nonexistent, I'm dead and the turrets almost immediately go online. This constant on and off might be a problem, especially when taking lag into consideration. Even if you change it to a range difference such as there has to be a 10% or more difference in the score, you could still have a constant on and off issue.

If the score is that close though people are often going to assume that it is on because the risk is too high for the chaser, and they are more likely to break off.

In a close match I have no real problem with you running for home, not getting the support fire you expected, and dying. it's a close match after all: you don't need the extra fire from the cap ship. But once killed you would have that window of time that I mentioned before the guns flipped back on, and so the attacker could still bug out if he's alert.

And unlike some of the other suggestions, this one is pretty simple to understand and (hopefully) implement.

Interesting. Anything I can read on the subject?

There is datamined info on the 2.7 release out there. If they open up PTS for testing with 2.7 this weekend the changes might be visible there. I'd rather not post a link in this thread so it doesn't get derailed. PM me if you would like to know where.

If the score is that close though people are often going to assume that it is on because the risk is too high for the chaser, and they are more likely to break off.

 

In a close match I have no real problem with you running for home, not getting the support fire you expected, and dying. it's a close match after all: you don't need the extra fire from the cap ship. But once killed you would have that window of time that I mentioned before the guns flipped back on, and so the attacker could still bug out if he's alert.

 

And unlike some of the other suggestions, this one is pretty simple to understand and (hopefully) implement.

Fair enough.

I think the more concerning issue might be system or program limitations for something constantly going on and off. This could be mitigated by implementing a minimum time for both on and off. If the limitation is there, I'm not sure how practical it is to try it.

In another thread,http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=725454, Zharik suggested:

Spawn in an exhaustion zone. Receive 15-20 or so seconds of exhaustion zone immunity which also prevents damage from other players... The immunity goes away after time expires or you shoot a weapon.

 

I don't want NPC gunners deciding anything...

I don't want the enemy to be able to lay mines/shoot instantly any newbies zoning in at a respawn...

I don't want a gunship to be able to shoot from any sort of "safety".

This fixes all three.

This is an interesting idea.

Does anyone know if the exhaustion zone in GSF reduces health like it does in the ground game? If so, I don't see this as viable. If not, I still do not think this prevents gunships or anyone else from sitting right outside the spawn area/exhaustion zone and picking people off.

All of this would be moot if new pilots knew what was going on.

I have a solution to that. http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=725249