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PlanetSide's Future Plans Continued....

Folks,

A lot of you have expressed curiousity as to what the Dev Team is up to in regards to PlanetSide and its future content. Now that we've had a few weeks to shake out the launch of the game and watch how the game is running, we're ready to make some of this public.

The list below is not a complete list of all features that will be added to the game. It's just a list of what we're sure will go into the game in the near future. There are a whole host of things we're not quite ready to reveal yet, so you can expect lots more to be unveiled in the months to come.

Without further ado:

Near Future Improvements (features & tweaks)

(next two weeks)

Facility Link Benefits: Each facility gives a benefit to the owning Empire. This ability is activated whenever an Empire owns a facility of that specific type somewhere on a continent. If multiple types of facilities are owned by an Empire on a single continent, then the abilities are shared between those facilities if there are no ownership breaks between those facilities on the lattice.

For example: On Cyssor, if the TR own Pamba and Shango, then they would gain the ability for the Amp Station *and* the Bio Laboratory at both locations. However, if the TR only owned Pamba and Itan (no "friendly" connection between them), then the facilities wouldn't get to share their abilities. Instead, Pamba would have the Amp Station benefit (only) and Itan would have the Bio Laboratory benefit (only).

The facilities have the following benefits:

Bio Laboratory: Reduces all respawn penalties by 50%, at linked facilities only. (Not Towers and not AMSs.)

Technology Plant: Makes "advanced" vehicles avaialble at all vehicle pads linked to a friendly Tech Plant.

Amp Station: Allows vehicles to recharge their shield capacitors in the courtyard of any linked facilities. This shield strengthens the armor of the vehicle, but dissipates as damage hits that shield. Vehicles recharge over time when in a linked courtyard, and only dissipate energy when damaged. There is no way to recharge a shield capacitor "in the field".

Dropship Center: Allows access to Repair/Rearm Pads at linked facilities. Air vehicles can now land on the air vehicle pads and ground vehicles can pull up to a wall station in the courtyards. Once there, the vehicles can repair themselves over time, as well as access a terminal interface based on the Equipment Terminal that allows them to fill their trunk space without leaving the vehicle.

Interlink Facility: Creates an extended area that the facility can see on radar. In otherwords, it greatly enhances the coverage area of your basic radar and makes your Phalanx wall turrets much more effective. NOTE: Wall turrets are automated at all times when they are not manned by a player. They fire more slowly when automated, but are still effective. It is no longer required to own an Interlink Facility in order to activate the wall turrets. All bases have active turrets at all times unless ownership is neutral.

Advanced Hacking: Only Advanced Hacking lets you hack equipment terminals and vehicle terminals now. Basic Hacking only allows hacking of Medical Terminals, Lockers, Implant Terminals, and Certification Terminals. (Of course, all hacking abilities still continue to work for doors and control consoles.)

Liberator (bomber): The Liberator is a three-crew vehicle where all positions can shoot. The pilot has a fixed-forward machinegun, the tailgunner has an easily swiveled machinegun for air defense and ground sweeps, and the bombardier can choose between "tankbuster" shells (dropped one at a time) or "anti-personnel" shells that split in mid-air and drop a pattern of shells around the target area, designed to annihilate infantry with multiple explosions.

Skyguard (anti-aircraft buggy): The Skyguard is a two-crew vehicle where the driver sits forward and the gunner behind. The gunner has access to a flak cannon to take down air targets and a machinegun with which to defend against infantry.

Orbital Strikes: Command Rank 4 & 5 characters now have the ability to pull down powerful energy beams from the Empire's orbital platform in space. Targets are designated by dropping a waypoint somewhere in a radius around the commander and then confirming the Strike to the orbital platform. They then send a beam down that is massively destructive in its power. Orbital Strikes cost Outfit Points to use, so Commanders should keep in mind that they're spending their Outfit's collective points when using this ability. This is a timed ability, and once triggered, the timer must expire before another Orbital Strike can occur.

EMP Blasts: Imagine a Jammer grenade on steroids. A CR3-5 Commander can emit an EMP shockwave, centered on his position, that expands out, deactivating and disorienting enemy units around him. Soldiers lose their radar, all implants are reset, Spitfires and Alarm Sensors are deactivated, enemy vehicles are disabled, and mines and Boomers are detonated. All effects are temporary. Once an EMP Blast is used, the Commander must wait for a timer to expire before he's able to use it again.

See all Enemies: Command Rank 4 & 5 characters can trigger this Uplink ability and get a sense of the positions of all enemy units within a certain radius of the Commander. (CR5 Commanders have a bigger radius than CR4 Commanders.) Enemy positions are accurate, but they are only valid for the moment that the info was downloaded. The position blips darken and fade over time to show that they are "old intel" and aren't reliable any longer. This ability, once triggered, must wait for a timer to expire before it can be triggered again.

Uplink Device Interface: An interface has been developed for the Uplink Device allowing Commanders to better see the time needed before an ability is ready for use again.

Vehicle Queuing System: After watching the game develop further, it became obvious that we needed to streamline the vehicle acquisition process. Thus, the queuing system was developed. Players now transport directly to their vehicle after purchase, and auto-drive away from the pad. This minimizes the amount of time needed to get a vehicle and clear the pad for other players. Additionally, if there is a line at the terminal, there is now a queuing system that's intuitive and easy to use that lets you just hang out after making your choice until your vehicle is created. No more "double-click frenzy" as you try to beat the other players in a timing game to acquire a vehicle.

HotSpot Improvements: Hotspots are intended to tell you where the best battles are so that you can cut down your travel time and participate in the great combats around the world. Unfortunately, they don't currently refresh often enough, and they aren't always accurately portraying where groups of players are fighting. That will change soon. Hotspots will be scaled to the size of the fight occurring, and will be refreshed much more often so that the info is accurate when you arrive.

Instant Action Improvements: You can currently be redeployed to a continent where no friendly facilities are owned, thus forcing you to either try and work a facility down to zero NTU (so you can hack it) or move to another continent if you want to attack a base. This, and some fall-through conditions, will be fixed so that Instant Action is more reliable, and so that when you use it, you're pretty much guaranteed to be near a quality battle of some sort.

No "Hack Leapfrogging": You will soon be unable to hack an enemy facility if the only friendly facility linked to that enemy facility is also hacked itself. This will stabilize the "fronts" and prevent "hack leapfrogging".

Defenders can Respawn at Hacked Facilities: To aid the defense a bit, they will soon be able to respawn at hacked facilities. Of course, the respawn tubes have to be in operating condition, but if they're available, then defenders can respawn there.

Empire Incentives: The experience modifications are going away. Empire Incentives will be based on "meatier" variables now to give some bite to the Incentives. Health maximums will be affected directly so that underdog Empires get a bonus that matters.

(next month and beyond)

Again...this is not a complete list, but here goes:

Tower Silos: Yes, you requested it and we agree with you. Towers are getting Silos. They'll run off NTUs soon.

Tower Hack Times: It's likely that Towers will get a five-minute hack timer so that they can't be instantly flip-flopped.

Medic Improvements: The Medic will get great new interfaces to make Revive a more useful ability, as well as additional abilities to help out friendly units with things like stimpaks and regen patches.

Facility Gameflow: We'll be shaking up the gameplay you're used to now and making the buildings more interesting, with potential items like a force wall at the courtyard gates and possibly a blast door on the side entrance to the catacombs that would have to be hacked from within the building in order to open it to enemy attack.

Continental Lock Incentives: As your Empire gains more continental locks, your Empire also gains "bonuses" that affect all players in your Empire. These incentives start after the first couple of locks, and are additive for each successive lock thereafter. They are balanced so that it doesn't create a problem where "winners keep winning", but they are attractive bonuses just the same.

" Fame and Glory" Screens: In-game screens announcing recent best experience gainers, most kills, best outfits, territory "winners", etc. will all be available in-game so that those that it's all at-a-glance.

Outfit Point Expenditures: The Orbital Strike ability is merely the tip of the iceberg. There will be a lot of ways to spend Outfit Points in the future and those will roll out continuously over time so that Outfits have to decide where they want their points to be spent during combats in the field.

There's a lot more to come after that. Watch for more details in the weeks to come.