FOB/Rally point mechanics

[Fungwu]

Playing through the evolutions of spawn mechanics from BF2 through what we have today has been pretty interesting, and I feel that it is almost perfect, but I think there is still some room for improvement.

Here are the problems as I see them:

I think that the old system of rally points gave a squad leader a lot more tactical flexibility. Because the stealth factor of a rally point was so much greater than that of a FB, you could find a sneaky spot to put a rally and have a lot of fun with it. By comparison putting a sneaky FB is a few orders of magnitude more difficult.

However I really enjoyed when rallies were removed because they were too spammy. Having two guys sneak around, and then set a spawn where a whole squad could attack again and again no matter how many times you killed significantly subtracted from the tactical aspect of the game.

I also think there is a problem with allowing 6 FOBs and allowing the whole team to spawn on each one. The reason for this is that you can have so many FBs that a team can set one up at each flag, so the tactic that results is a team sets one up at each flag and once they take one flag, they can just spawn at the next one and so on and sweep the round without a fight.

I think this is gamey when you consider that one supply truck can set up 2 FOBs and each FOB can spawn an unlimited number of players from the whole team. So a supply truck with one driver that can realistically seat maybe 20 guys, can be used to set up two bases behind enemy lines that might end up spawning 100 guys.

It seems unfair that if you blow the truck up you get one kill, but since 100 guys can spawn from the truck, its kind of like there is 100 guys riding in the back, you should get 100 kills. In the same way it is unfair that if you let one truck driven by one guy slip through your lines, suddenly you are under attack from the rear by the whole enemy team. I also think it subtracts from the teamwork aspect of the game when one guy can change a round with a supply truck. Rewarding that behavior only encourages endless waves of misguided players wasting a teams supply trucks trying to set FOBs by themselves in enemy territory.

So in response to the above, I have come up with this idea:

Limit officer kits to squads with 4 or more men. In the same way as is now, limit officers to one rally point that needs to be rearmed. A rally can be placed anywhere with the same rules as now (disappears in 60s) However if your rally is within a certain distance from a FOB (this would need to be playtested, but lets say 150m) it will stay up with no time limit.

No one can spawn on FOBs

In addition there are a few caveats:

Having multiple enemies at a close distance, or having the FB completely destroyed will make your rally disappear within 60 seconds UNLESS:

Your rally is within 10m of:
A supply crate
Two small ammo boxes
4 Ammo bags

If you have a supply of ammo as listed above your rally will become unspawnable when there are enemies close by, instead of disappearing completely. If the FOB is destroyed, and you have ammo, your rally will stay up for a longer period of time (lets says 20min) instead of 60 seconds, but it will still go down after a while.

So I will use the dynamics I have outlined above and try and illustrate how a round of PR would play out differently, and in my opinion, for the better.

As a squad leader at the start of a round you have a few choices: You can use a vehicle, you can have a small team of specialists, like a sniper or spotter squad, or you can have a large infantry squad.

No one now can spawn directly on FOBs, and only a squad 4 or larger can set rallies so as a small team you have only main base to spawn at. This makes your job as a sniper or engineer or whatever much harder and you need to be much more careful to avoid death. Also you need to seriously consider if your small team would be better as part of a larger squad so you can benefit from a common rally point.
my hopeful result:
+ teamwork

As a vehicle squad, if your vehicle has any transport or supply ability you are now absolutely vital to your team's success. First there are vastly more passengers at main base waiting for a ride. Second every squad now needs their own base of supplies.
the result, again, I hope
++teamwork

As an infantry squad attacking or defending an objective you have a few things to consider. First off you need at least one supply crate to set a FOB. Next you need to decide how to set your rally. You can set a very fragile rally, that will expire if the enemy overruns it or destroys your FOB, but you can set it in the most tactically advantageous spot within the allowable distance of your FOB.

Obviously you want to fortify your rally with some supplies to make it more permanent. To do this you can organize your squad to haul in some ammo manually in the form of bags, or you can get an APC or transport truck to drop 2 small ammo boxes, or you can get an additional supply crate from a truck or chopper. So obviously using ammo bags you can set a very sneaky rally in a building or backwoods area, but you need to, at least temporarily, eschew heavy weapons and get the teamwork of a whole squad to haul ammo bags. Or you can set a less sneaky rally with the help of an apc or transport truck to drop small or large ammo crates.

The result I hope is that the dynamic of one guy being able to build a relatively clumsy spawn that the whole team can then spam off of is removed and replaced with the ability of a coordinated team to build a base of operations that then is actually a base of operations that allows a squad leader to develop his own spawn according to his own wishes, with taking time and the cooperation of a squad, or 2 squads greatly rewarded. A squad leader has the flexibility of having a rally point, but it is no longer a spammy rally point, because it is dependent an a larger, harder to maintain FOB. Additionally, with FOBs being so important more squads will be concentrated around them, again leading hopefully to +++teamwork.

There are a lot of branches and different directions you could take this idea, and I think some are better left to playtesting to find out, and others I think I will save for a followup post.

The main objection I think will leap into people's minds is of course, is all those rounds we've played that our team couldn't fly a chopper without crashing it, and could not set up even a FOB much less a FOB and rallies and supplies. I think the best way to test out this idea is exactly the same way we tested out the current system, by doing it as a server side beta that can be tweaked one way or another. Certainly I could see this idea as adopted by some servers that enjoy higher levels of teamwork, and others choosing to not to change as they see fit. I would like to add that if someone told me what PR would look like today vs many patches ago I would not have believed it would work, but the player bases I think has evolved well in response to the game, and these changes are designed to be difficult, but rewarding to those with a good grasp of tactics and who truly play as a team.

This is a post with a lot to think about so I would encourage anyone who replies to reread a few times and think carefully before responding.

[Fungwu]

As an addendum I will add a few things to complement the above suggestion:

Re-add the ability of engineer squad leaders to place FOBs so logistics squads can still function.

Add one "super" FOB per team placeable with some enormous amount of supplies, say 10 crates. The Super FOB is the only place other than main that can be spawned on by the whole team, as well you could contemplate what type of unique deployables could accompany this FOB such as a repair station etc.

Limit smaller FOBs that allow for permanent rally point to 2 or 3.

Allow squad leaders to place two independent rallies, one per FOB, so that a squad can have a back up spawn at a different FOB if the first is overrun.

Increase the number of transport vehicles, or allow a squad leader within 50m of the teams command post to request an appropriate squad transport like an unarmed humvee, or UAZ jeep to reduce squads stuck at main.

For insurgency you could make hideouts dependent on caches, so that you can only place a hideout within 250m (or whatever) of a cache, plus allowing squad leaders to request civ cars, or bikes at the main base.

I don't want to go into detail, or discuss in this thread any of the above, but they are just a few things to give you an idea how the changes could be balanced and fleshed out.

EDIT:

A few thoughts on gameplay flow that I would like to elaborate on:

In any game there are the main operations centered around the objectives, and auxiliary operations roughly divided into recon, ambush, and sabotage. I think the main operations would benefit because with only one or two spawn points for a squad there would be a much bigger incentive for infantry squads to cooperate and mutually support each other to prevent from being overrun and counterattacking enemies that overrun the rally of one or the other squad.

Auxiliary ops would from a standpoint be much more important, with many more supply missions and many more transport missions leaving from main base there is more opportunity to not just to run such missions, but also more targets to ambush. And of course you could run counter ops to the ambush missions so there is kind of evolving layer of gameplay centered around establishing lines of supply, ambushing the enemy's and keeping your own clear.

In the same way intelligence gathering is more important, spotting a FOB is relatively easy, but spotting where the enemy is setting his rally points is much trickier, and yet if you can communicate their location to your team you can uproot and enemy defense or attack completely.

In this way small teams can have a lot of effect, but it stays within the focus of the whole team, and without rallies for squads less than 4, a small team can have a big effect, but it is fragile and needs to be careful and circumspect, otherwise it will be killed and left at main base.

[snooggums]

I think a simpler solution would be to base the number of forward bases on the map size, so on 4k maps the teams get 6, on 2k maps they get 4 on 1k maps they get 2.

[Celestial1]

Cliffnotes, anyone?

ADD won't let me read that much in one sitting.

[alberto_di_gio]

I'll write my opinion in week. After reading all of it.

[dtacs]

Ok here we go. This is the way I reply to walls of text, I suggest you reply in the same format, it is much easier to break it down into small bits. Anyone else who wants to contribute should do the same thing, or none at all really. All or nothing.

I also think there is a problem with allowing 6 FOBs and allowing the whole team to spawn on each one. The reason for this is that you can have so many FBs that a team can set one up at each flag, so the tactic that results is a team sets one up at each flag and once they take one flag, they can just spawn at the next one and so on and sweep the round without a fight.

The team is highly organized, building firebases in advance and letting the team move up quickly. Hence, by capping out and beating the other team, they are being rewarded for their organization and prowess to have them built without the enemy destroying them. I see nothing wrong with rewarding a skillful team that thinks outside the box.

I think this is gamey when you consider that one supply truck can set up 2 FOBs and each FOB can spawn an unlimited number of players from the whole team. So a supply truck with one driver that can realistically seat maybe 20 guys, can be used to set up two bases behind enemy lines that might end up spawning 100 guys.

Unlimited number of players? Incorrect and I don't need to explain why. They can keep spawning until the game is out sure, however this is not beneficial. My graph below explains this system.



At the higher end of the line, the team is sure to lose. However the team at the bottom has a higher chance of winning, not taking into account being capped out.

It seems unfair that if you blow the truck up you get one kill, but since 100 guys can spawn from the truck, its kind of like there is 100 guys riding in the back, you should get 100 kills.

This is completely illogical. There are many factors which you are not taking into consideration, such as:

• The length that it takes to build the firebase + 2 minute wait
• The truck being destroyed?
• Friendlies not using the firebase as it could be in a stupid position which happens quite often?

Saying there are '100 guys' in the back is like saying that an APC should fire as fast as a machine gun since its going to shoot those rounds anyway. It makes no sense.

In the same way it is unfair that if you let one truck driven by one guy slip through your lines, suddenly you are under attack from the rear by the whole enemy team.

You are now clearly just making things up for the sake of your argument. Never, in PR, is the whole team going to simultaneously progress from a firebase in one movement, causing the other team to lose. If that did happen, it is not unfair at all, because you can do the same thing right back to them. I

Also think it subtracts from the teamwork aspect of the game when one guy can change a round with a supply truck. Rewarding that behavior only encourages endless waves of misguided players wasting a teams supply trucks trying to set FOBs by themselves in enemy territory.

Not at all, the problem with supply trucks is that most blueys see them as a free ride that they can ditch in nowheresville. PR is not rewarding players for building firebases, it is rewarding the player for establishing a point in which squads can use to attack a location. It is impossible to not have these events happening, where one man can turn the tide of a game. Remember, there is the ability to scout parts of maps. I always love to send a rifleman out to find some cool stuff to destroy. Hes expendable, he knows what hes doing, and he knows what hes looking for. Not hard to find these niche FOBs.

So in response to the above, I have come up with this idea:

Limit officer kits to squads with 4 or more men.

Why? Destroys the concept of FAC'ing.

However if your rally is within a certain distance from a FOB (this would need to be playtested, but lets say 150m) it will stay up with no time limit.

Lol? Did you think this one over? If it stays there permanently unless destroyed manually, whats the point when you can do the same thing with a FOB?

No one can spawn on FOBs

So its just there to place a rally point? What purpose does it serve then?

Example of gameplay using this idea, in wall of text form

Majority of this is simply not needed - you are complicating the system, but to what end? It may as well go back to the old system, as this is needlessly extended teamwork, but with the same result.

Essentially I see it as this:

• Complicate the process. Have ammo boxes, supply crates, and ammo bags nessecary for the rally point and firebase building system. Have hugeamounts of teamwork involved for something that could simply be done with little increments of teamwork, as it is now.

The main objection I think will leap into people's minds is of course, is all those rounds we've played that our team couldn't fly a chopper without crashing it, and could not set up even a FOB much less a FOB and rallies and supplies.

The main objection I have is that its simply not necessary. Don't fix what isn't broken. This is just hoping on way too much.

• What if someone in the squad accidentally doesn't spawn as the 4th rifleman, and so no ammo bag, and no infinite rally?
• What if the supply truck/chopper goes down, and there is no supplies for the firebase, so a rally cannot be placed with the longer spawn time in mind, and is therefore back to square one? (as in the current state)

• With this system, could I not just get a supply truck and a squad member (with the rest in a Humvee), place a FOB, build it, go 150m out, place 4 ammo bags or whatever (or a combination of ammo bags + humvee ammo crate), then go back and destroy the evidence of the FOB being there? with a 20m rally? How is that teamwork or realism at all?

End.

[Damian(>>>PL]

I see i'm not the only one that like new system.
Old system weren't good, but I think new one isn't beter, only one change is crate and schovels to build stationar spawn(and I'm pissed of by sniperTOWs).

I hope DEVs are planing new RP, FB system.

[Fungwu]

"I think a simpler solution would be to base the number of forward bases on the map size, so on 4k maps the teams get 6, on 2k maps they get 4 on 1k maps they get 2."

I think this is definitely simpler, and a good idea, but I still think it is worth the extra effort to make a more nuanced system.

"Cliffnotes, anyone?

ADD won't let me read that much in one sitting. "

I apologize if I was too wordy, summary:

Allow rally points to be permanent if they are near a friendly FOB so that squad leaders can setup an individual spawn for their squad that is harder to for the enemy to find, but unlike old rally points is limited by logistics (IE you need at least some supplies)

"Unlimited number of players? Incorrect and I don't need to explain why."

I'll rephrase what I wrote. To set a spawn that is available for the all 32 players on a team currently requires one person. To a set a spawn for 6 players in your squad would take 2 people if you used a rally point for spawning. So to set spawns that 32 players could potentially spawn on would then take 12 people instead of 1. So the idea is that you as a squad leader are responsible for your own spawn, and to occupy a position on the map, at least you and one other squad member needs to actually go there instead of only one guy on the whole team needing to go there, and thus there is more traffic to and from the objectives and less people in effect teleporting into the objective.

"This is completely illogical. There are many factors which you are not taking into consideration, such as:

* The length that it takes to build the firebase + 2 minute wait
* The truck being destroyed?
* Friendlies not using the firebase as it could be in a stupid position which happens quite often?

Saying there are '100 guys' in the back is like saying that an APC should fire as fast as a machine gun since its going to shoot those rounds anyway. It makes no sense."

I don't think you understood what I was getting at, so I will try to say it again in a different way.

Lets say one team is defending an objective and have deployed their forces accordingly. One player on the attacking team slips by in a supply truck and sets a FOB or 2 FOBs behind the enemy. Spawning over and over again 20 or 30 or however many soldiers spawn in on those FOBs. Where did they come from? In the game obviously they just teleport in from the netherworld, but you could try and make it realistic and say they rode on the truck, but a truck cannot carry so many soldiers as that so it just becomes silly to imagine it that way.

You could imagine a real life battle where one side is defending an area. The active players on the team are like their real life counterparts, and the guys who respawn on the defensive FOBs are like reserves that would be waiting to take part in the battle if the frontline forces were killed. In that way PR mimics reality within the confines of a videogame and the battles in PR mimic in a small way real life battles and because of that there is a sense of immersion.

I personally feel that immersion is broken by having FOBs that can be setup by one guy, and that spawn so many because it really has no analogue in real life. By having individual squads set there own spawns it is more like groups of soldiers trying to infiltrate enemy lines. The squadleader and whomever he sets a rally point with are like the advance party of a larger squad or platoon, and the guys who spawn off the rally are like the rest of a small force set up in a static position and advancing on the enemy in waves of 6 or whatever. So it is not perfectly realistic or trying to be, but I think it is much closer and more immersive. Realism is not the only reason, but what I was trying to get at is more squads advancing into enemy territory where there is a chance they enemy can see them and less teleporting into it.

"However if your rally is within a certain distance from a FOB (this would need to be playtested, but lets say 150m) it will stay up with no time limit.

Lol? Did you think this one over? If it stays there permanently unless destroyed manually, whats the point when you can do the same thing with a FOB?"

I did think this one over, and I will explain it again. A FOB is a big pile of sandbags, it is easy to see, it can only be placed in certain areas which excludes things like the inside of a building. Being able to set a permanent spawn apart from an FOB allows you to spawn in an area that the enemy has less ability to see you, and gives you more choices of what type of cover you want to spawn into. Additionally if several squads are at the same objective they can spawn at opposite ends to cover both flanks if that is what they want, rather than both spawning at the same place, or being forced to build 2 FOBs.

"No one can spawn on FOBs
So its just there to place a rally point? What purpose does it serve then?"

Building a FOB serves several purposes. First it allows you to place defenses such as the TOW missile, which happens to be quite excellent.

Secondly it is a factor to limit rally points so that they are not like the old system where they can be placed somewhere like a river bank or hard to reach roof top where they could never be found. You could still put a rally there, but if the enemy takes out the FOB the rally will disappear. So the two work interdependently to limit each other. The rally is there to be stealthier than a FOB and force each squad to actually move at least two members to an objective rather than totally teleport in, and the FOB is there to prevent the rally from being impossibly stealthy, and make it more like the fighting position of a squad with the FOB being like a platoon HQ or something that needs to be defended.

"What if someone in the squad accidentally doesn't spawn as the 4th rifleman, and so no ammo bag, and no infinite rally?"

Shoot them in the head with your pistol and tell them to try again Or increase the limit of ammo bags per player in the world to 2 or more and have one or more of your guys go find a crate to reload their ammo bag and bring some more.

"With this system, could I not just get a supply truck and a squad member (with the rest in a Humvee), place a FOB, build it, go 150m out, place 4 ammo bags or whatever (or a combination of ammo bags + humvee ammo crate), then go back and destroy the evidence of the FOB being there? with a 20m rally? How is that teamwork or realism at all?"

You could indeed, if it proved a problem you could change the timer on the rally to 10m or whatever, that is why it exists to prevent just what you are mentioning, you could just tweak it to get it right so that it would be too much a pain in the *** to destroy your own FOB.

It is more teamwork and realism because you built your FOB with 2 guys and not 1. Technically it is impossible for 1 guy alone to be a team. So requiring your spawn to be built with at least two would be teamwork, whereas with one it wouldn't. Having just your squad occupying a position that your squad advanced to and then fortified would be more realism than your squad teleporting along with other squads into a position that was advanced upon and occupied by 1 guy.

"Ok here we go. This is the way I reply to walls of text"

What is a book or newspaper? A Great Wall of Text?

[Haji with a Handgun]

Way too much F***ing text on one page.

I like the current system, but a few of these changes might be nice.

[PatrickLA_CA]

I think that current systemis allright because in realiyy the maps aren't limited on size so reinforements by air or ground can come always and I think that's why FoBs should and are presenting in game, maybe only rallys can be made to last for more time like 2-3 mins and seriously there is need of more light transpoft vehicles like humvees because they are more used in reality and something that is off-topicI think there is a need of scout or light transport helicopters on all insurgency maps,and something way too off-topic but didng want to start a new thread about a small thing like this, I think we need at least one chinook on kashan and maybe you can make a thread in suggestions for small suggestions like mine, and a thread in general disscusion about small questions because there are a lot of questions I dont want to start a new thead about.

[Fungwu]

* More limited officer kits

Not going to work. You would need to get the squad all together before you leave main, and sometimes it simply doesn't work like that.

My real intention here was just that it takes a 4 man squad to set a rally to try to encourage squads and give them a material advantage over special teams, but limiting kits or doing it any other way or not at all isn't a big deal.

* Allow perma-rallies when near ammo

Not going to happen, its a horrible idea. When you take out that FO, you expect that the enemy is going to be somehow pushed back from the area.

Not with this suggestion!
They stick around for quite a long time with this one.

My thought here was kind of the reverse situation, when your FB is taken out in the middle of a battle by one lone guy wandering around, I think you should have a chance to counterattack, whether its 10 minutes or 20 minutes or 5 minutes or whatever, I think people should have some time to react to the situation and not be forced to rush around. I didn't think it made sense for one guy to dislodge a whole platoon by knifing a radio, and instead once you take out the FOB you actually have to clear the area the old fashioned way, by clearing it house to house or whatever. Just getting close to a hidden rally would be enough to disable it, so you have some options after an enemy FOB goes down, hold your position and wait for whatever the time limit is, or get together a group of guys and actually clear the area and either find or disable any remaining enemies.

The idea of using ammo is kind of a limiting factor to help balance things. A rally represents a squad level field position of 10 or more guys, but you cannot hide 10 guys in one bush like you can a rally, so making the rallies depending in some way on ammo makes it a little harder to hide in a dumpster or rooftop or big bush, and if you do put it in such a place you have to earn it by actually taking some effort. Plus its nice to spawn and have fresh ammo

Probably a bad idea. It would end up being the first one that any SL places and in a **** place.

That idea was just something to flesh out the fact that there is no team level spawn in the field, it seemed having one company level position were anyone could spawn behind the front, but still closer the main base made sense. I suggested that a limiting factor for a super FOB would be making the players fetch a boat load of crates, 10 or however many seems right. That way you couldn't just plop one down anywhere, it had to be somewhere quite clear and secure, because it would take a lot of time to develop all those crates, so a Super FOB would only realistically go up if the team could actually hold the area long enough to get 10 crates there, so it would kind of have to be someplace secure and not a totally **** spot. I think having just one big team level FOB would be a good way to anchor and focus the team in an environment where it is difficult to keep a spawn up for long during a battle.

I also think it would be an appropriate place to try out a lot of other ideas for deployables, but I won't go into that here.

think that current systemis allright because in realiyy the maps aren't limited on size so reinforements by air or ground can come always and I think that's why FoBs should and are presenting in game

My thoughts here kind of go like this:

Imagine a map like Barracuda where you have an objective on one side of the island, and another objective on the other side of the island. The US team captures the Eastern objective after a hard battle, and two guys cap out an undefended flag on the western end and build a FOB with one crate from a Huey. Seemingly those two guys would be in a precarious position because all their team mates are engaged on the other side of the island with the Chinese army occupying a strong position in between them. However as it stands the US is under no obligation to defend the old flag and all their casualties can spawn on the newly captured one. So basically the entire team just gradually teleports around the enemy without having to dislodge them. Its kind of being outmaneuvered by magic and not by actually moving around the enemy. If the team wants to redeploy to the other side they can, but they actually have to redeploy with choppers or by walking, not by just appearing there because one helicopter with two passengers was able to land there.

[Haji with a Handgun]

I think that current systemis allright because in realiyy the maps aren't limited on size so reinforements by air or ground can come always and I think that's why FoBs should and are presenting in game, maybe only rallys can be made to last for more time like 2-3 mins and seriously there is need of more light transpoft vehicles like humvees because they are more used in reality and something that is off-topicI think there is a need of scout or light transport helicopters on all insurgency maps,and something way too off-topic but didng want to start a new thread about a small thing like this, I think we need at least one chinook on kashan and maybe you can make a thread in suggestions for small suggestions like mine, and a thread in general disscusion about small questions because there are a lot of questions I dont want to start a new thead about.

1 word. Punctuation.

The idea of using ammo is kind of a limiting factor to help balance things. A rally represents a squad level field position of 10 or more guys, but you cannot hide 10 guys in one bush like you can a rally, so making the rallies depending in some way on ammo makes it a little harder to hide in a dumpster or rooftop or big bush, and if you do put it in such a place you have to earn it by actually taking some effort. Plus its nice to spawn and have fresh ammo

Also, using ammo is not balance. A squad that has 4 regular rifleman isn't very effective.
Against infantry maybe, but you'd have to choose between having a medic ,AR, or a Specialist. In my opinion, maybe 3 ammo bags max, even though I don't like the idea. A squad needs a medic and a rifle specialist, that only leaves 3 spots for regular rifleman. And even then, it would be a very limiting and cumbersome system. When your squad can only have 1 specialized kit (Excluding officer), it makes very annoying.

[dtacs]

CBF replying, sorry its just too long and I'd rather eat my sandwich.

tl;dr don't think its a good idea.

User received a Useless post infraction.

Dunehunter

[PatrickLA_CA]

1 word. Punctuation.

LOL I wrote it via my phone so my fingers went all crazy.

[Fungwu]

Also, using ammo is not balance. A squad that has 4 regular rifleman isn't very effective...
In my opinion, maybe 3 ammo bags max...it would be a very limiting and cumbersome system.

Well you give people three choices on how to set their squad's spawn:

1. Set a rally anywhere you like without ammo somewhere near a constructed firebase.
This is a stealthy spawn that can be in or on top of buildings, in trenches, bushes, etc. So a pretty good advantage there over spawning directly on the FOB which can't be in or on most buidings, or in a trench or bunker. However, you have an advantage from being shot while spawning, but as soon the FOB goes down your rally is done. Also your rally might be in a sneaky spot but if multiple enemies get close it will still be overrun and disappear.

2. Set a rally anywhere you can drop an ammo box or small ammo crates near a firebase.
So the limit here is you can't get a jeep or apc or truck into a lot of places, but there are still some good places, dumpsters, bushes, ditches, mountains etc. that you can. So your rally is not as stealthy or advantageous as #1, but your rally won't disappear if it is overrun, it will just go down for a few minutes. So a concerted attack will take it out, but a patrol passing by won't. Additionally, if your FOB goes down you have a few minutes to organize a counterattack and send in a few waves. But without a FOB it won't last forever so you can't just hide on the rally forever, you need to use it or lose it and make a move.


3. Set a rally anywhere you like with 4 ammo bags near a FOB
This has all the advantages of #1 but now a disadvantage. You need either 4 guys without heavy weapons or special items, or 1 or 2 guys to make multiple trips to an ammo source, and then back to the rally, which of course would take time and potentially give away its sneaky location. Of course once you throw down your ammo bags your squad can then go find an ammo crate and load up, but obviously this is adds a little time and difficulty. All the other advantages are shared with #2

So each option has a set of advantages and a set of disadvantages. So it is indeed balanced. Balanced well, is another thing. If you chose to use 4 ammo bags, it would be tough. But you wouldn't have to do it. There are conditions to consider. You could take whatever weapons you want a set a rally anywhere, and if the FOB goes down you can't spawn. That is no different from now except that you don't need to spawn on a FOB and get spawn killed, or give away your FOB by coming straight from it each time you respawn.

Or you can go through the hassle and planning to get some supplies to together and set a rally in a great place, and your rally will be tough to take out because the enemy has to actually find it.

In this game there is a big environment with many choices. Right now your choice is to spawn on a FOB, and you can only make a FOB in certain places. I think it would be better to be able to choose exactly where I spawn, but also add in a few limitations so the bad parts of rallies that were already taken out of the game are not re added.

[lucky14]

The overall idea, of rally points being permanent if within a radius of a firebase, and firebase's not spawnable, would definately increase the amount of logistics needed (since a squad couldn't just die to pop up some where on the other side of the map in enemy territory; rather, they would have to secure the territory after moving in and then place a rally in a firebase, which can then be fortified if wanted.

The ammo system would need refining, and might even be hardcoded, but IDK.

The general idea, I think, is a great idea. It limits each squad to two spawns: rally and main. And to change rally, it should require the whole squad (whether it be a squad of 2 or 6)