Planetside 2 by Daybreak Games
Utility Slot: Air Drop
I had an idea that would make Galaxies infinitely more useful. What if they could pick up and drop vehicles into battle? Aren't they supposed to be dropships in the first place? Dropships lift more than soldiers.
So here's the full idea, balance and everything (mostly) accounted for: Galaxies with Air Drop equipped can lift any vehicle using the same utility slot. Vehicles dropped above a certain height will explode upon hitting the ground. Vehicles cannot be dropped into the same No-Deploy zone as Sunderers (So no tanks in Bio-Labs). Both players have to press the utility key in order for the vehicles to lock together or unlock (to prevent that one guy picking up people and dropping them). Players inside the ground vehicle will be notified when a Galaxy is in position to lock, and weapons on the ground vehicle are disabled while airborne. Lock-on launchers can lock onto the ground vehicle if specifically aimed for, or if directly underneath the Galaxy (Making Galaxies a bit more durable). Players inside the ground vehicle cannot exit the vehicle while locked with the Galaxy, but squad mates may spawn into it if it is a Sunderer.
I feel that this would encourage teamwork, and Galaxy use would skyrocket, considering the number of steep cliffs on continents such as Indar and Amerish.
Feel free to leave feedback in the comment section below, and hopefully we can eventually see this feature in-game!




It's not a bad idea per se, the problem with it - just like all other transportation in game, it's simply not needed. It's faster to pull a vehicle closer to front lines, deep insertion maneuvers are pointless since due to lattice you won't be able to capture anything anyway. It's simply too much hassle.
Here's my reasoning for this: Bases on cliffs are next to IMPOSSIBLE to take with vehicles or otherwise. This would allow people to get super close without the long drive. Plus, flight, even in a Skywhale, is faster than land travel.
This'd be great! Though I do think it should have some disadvantage like taking up all the non-gunner seats maybe?
The point of this is to get vehicles and soldiers to tough to reach spots as quickly as possible. Maybe the Galaxy could be slowed a little, to be a bit of a downside, but the biggest downside to this is the fact that you give up Fire Suppression, Gate Shield Diffuser, IR Smoke, every other utility slot simply so you can get closer to the fight faster. You trade function for mobility, and that's the catch. A Sunderer without Fire Suppression is more likely to explode than one with FS. Same with the Galaxy. If the dropship blows up, then everyone in the ground vehicle dies, too. It's a high-risk, high-reward scenario, because you can get a ton of people and heavy armor to the front lines fast, but you leave yourself vulnerable. It's a hidden downside, but it's a noteworthy one.
I think that would be bombin m8
With some tweaking I think this could be great, and it really does make sense for a drop ship. The ability to drop Sunderers might be a little OP though, I can think of many a place, especially of Amerish, that are only accessible by light assaults. Dropping a sundy in a location like that effectively blocks any class from dealing damage to the spawn point, save air units. Not to mention all the locations blocked off by buildings or barriers that were made specifically so vehicles couldn't get there.
Actually now that I think of it, that's all of Esamir. The revamp with the giant walls around every base was to keep the armor battles outside on the plains. The ability to just drop a sundy, or really any vehicle in there would be very hard to balance.
When I started writing this, I thought maybe just removing the ability to carry sunderers would be a quick fix, and we'd still get the awesome quick deploys of air dropped tanks and harassers. (which would seriously be awesome). But I think the bases were designed with the ability to stop and direct the flow of armor in mind, hence why there's all the little barriers or small yet steep hills right around a spawn room. For something like this to actually be implemented, a lot of redesigning of bases would need to be done. Essentially they need to be implementing this right now, while they're changing up the maps for the construction update.
But again, I think it's a super cool idea. And imagine if players were actually seated inside the Galaxy, so you were all lined up in seats along the walls, and you could look out a little window at the back and see a Prowler or a Magrider hanging from the back, ready to drop. Yeah, super cool
I agree, certain spots would have to be fixed to avoid issue, but I want to point out that I did mention that vehicles can't be unlocked from the Galaxy when in the same no-deploy zone for Sunderers. This means that vehicles can't be dropped on or around biolabs, inside tech-plants or amp stations, or even on top of towers. Simply putting a no-deploy zone on top of some of those ledges would prevent unfair placement of Sunderers. However, Light Assaults are more than capable of destroying such an unfair position if a coordinated effort is made, which further adds to the teamwork part of Planetside that we so sorely lack. I also had an idea for MAX's to combine to create one large robot, but I think I was hoping to go back to my days as a Transformers nerd when I came up with that. :P
I stand by my Esamir point, where practically every base on the map would need to be blocked off. And the amount of work the devs would have to go through on Amerish to determine every impossible-to-counter location among the rocky cliffs and crags would be a daunting task, and leaving the end result as a minefield of "no drop" zones consuming the map.
But on the topic of the light assaults, they were never designed to be an anti vehicle class, its even suggested at in the name. Just thinking about keeping along the lines of classes given specializations, you'd be placing a large anti armor role on the class designated for quick infantry reaction. Yes, C4 fairies are abundant, and I wont claim to be innocent of it, but that's an emergent tactic people have come to embraced.
I do agree though, that more teamwork within fights should be encouraged. Not just on a grander scale, but in the small fireteams as well. Having to use real tactics to coordinating movements and contact locations, instead of this "spawn here and flood out until we win" business
Again I think its a really cool idea, but the revamps there would need to be to implement it would be extensive at the least
Agreed, I feel though that Sony had done a really good job with map design, since most of the places that LA's can get to are too small for vehicles like Sunderers. It's almost like they were planning for something like this in the first place.
This aside, I'm going over to another post to talk about another idea I had regarding base design. You can check that out on the PS2 forums as well.
Thanks again for all the support and concerns, I really hope we can get DB to notice.