Implants on PTS!

Interesting system, I tried it a bit. Reddit exploding with the usual P2W and junk.

Check it out:

https://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/ind ... ts.184178/

http://www.reddit.com/r/Planetside/comm ... y_on_test/



All my gunners are required to use Marker, lol.

Its only small buffs, but some like reduced bobbing on explosions could be a bit tricky to balance. Maybe even the one where you can see enemy explosives. Its gonna be interesting

I'm worried about awareness. If it auto-spots for the player with the implant only... then it's fine. If it auto-spots (like a normal spot does... and I'm certain it'll be like this just from a lazy programmer standpoint) then it's going to be a problem for snipers and ranged users alike. Wouldn't be a big fan of that.

Enhanced targeting is going to be my go-to for vehicle play, and probably for normal play as well. I was a huge proponent of that implant in PS1. Always ran with it. Anything that enhances my situational awareness is huge for me. I really hated when they pulled that from us... knowing full well that they'll charge us for the old functionality later.

Sensor shield will be nice for when running stalker cloak... Hold breath for sniper build, safe landing for LA.

As for the pay-to-win griping that lots are doing... I'll leave those arguments for others. I used to care about discussing that, but i've given up on it. Don't care anymore... I'll pay when I see value in it and won't if I don't. The advantage of having a good job and kicking the ex-wife to the curb... money isn't an issue anymore.

Someone did the Math. As of 4/25/14 on the PTS here is how it would work: (Added my notes in purple)




Appears to be a common Energy pool per character. IE, each implant pulls from a single E pool, they don't have to be charged individually (that would be annoying)

So it looks like, once you get all the implants you want... and can afford to put all the T1s you gain straight into energy... that it won't be hard to keep energized, depending on how often T1s drop.

Interesting... will see how it all fleshes out.

I haven't had a chance to load up the PTS; but I have to say all this talk of 'drops' and 'construction' worries me... As does the apparent emphasis on kill-based rewards, which tends to screw over support players

Yea, there is a lot of RNG built into the system. Quite a number of people are annoyed by it. Basically, you get a random implant when you hit certain goals. I think it's going to be similar to the ribbon system.. (IE, each time you get a ribbon, you get a chance at T1 implant. Those add up and can be "converted".

I'm going to check out PTS this weekend and see how it is.

Same with combining T2's to make a T3... it's a RNG'd chance of getting the T3 you want, not a choice.

So there will be the MMO-style grind to get the gear you want, but once you have it... powering it should be a simple deconstruct the T1 implants into power implants. (That's how I understand it so far... haven't seen it for my own eyes yet)

This is all still beta anyway... so we don't know exactly how it will flesh out.

While on PTS before I posted this I did some quick math with energy drain, but only to get a feel for it. Thanks for the detailed post Cal!
Let's grind some mobs and get set with some T3 before our raids on Allatum. =)

Sweet, sounds like I can skip the Everquest Next and just stick with PS2. I usually go MMORPG, then PS, then MMORPG, then PS, then MMORPG, then PS2, etc. I've always alternated my primary focus... Muds, EQ2, SW Galaxies, WoW, SWTOR.... all split up by stints in a Planetside franchise. Gotta get my grind on.

Looking at reddit, even the current iteration of implant drops are coming in with just plain xp gain, with the current number of 4400xp for a drop being mentioned. Some are saying there are other "random" drops, but I'm sure we'll figure out, or will be told by a dev, what is giving out those extra implants/chargers.

"Drops were bugged on test for a few days, they work now. The entire system is available to evaluate on pts, minus some polish tasks still outstanding. This isn't going live tomorrow, it'll end on test for a while still so we can get real feedback. So far I've seen a few wild extrapolations based on one random drop, I'd encourage some more exploration of the system before you draw major conclusions. Fact is: the current drop tuning is designed to allow average players (by raw, non-boosted xp gain, across all characters) to be able to maintain even tier 3 implants with drops alone. Check it out for yourself. The loot system is more complex than just "kills per implant drop" or "xp per implant drop", it's weighted and favors large xp events (base captures, ribbons, alerts) for better drops. No one has scratched the surface of the drop system on pts yet."
-mh (source)

Interesting, so it sounds like an extreme menace kill might have a higher percentage drop than a spawn kill.