Is PR straying from its roots?

[MadTommy]

Tell you what!! [RIP] will run a few infantry layer maps tonight...



I also sympathise with the OP

I'll see you later

[boilerrat]

I couldn't help but think of the player limits.

With only 32 players per team, we're being stretched really far between:
-Heli transport
-Mortars
-Fob building
-Tanks
-Apcs
-CAS


So with all these different assets, the lack of infantry is easy to be understood.

[Sir.Grossi]

I'll see you later

Must have missed you

[elerik]

Infantry is most powerfull if its work. And lots of people know it. And we still have to keep in mind. If tank or APC work without infantry, it is just easy target for everybody. But to coop betwen inf and vehicles, the driver and gunner in vehicle must be experienced player. True is, that lots of people think "I am good with it" after 20 second thay are down.
Be a combat engernier to learn put mines, if you learn puting mines you can be driver This is realy true. If you are good in puting mines you are good driver becouse you understand mines
If you wanna be sqad leader you have to understand every kits. Main medic, AR, HAT, specialist.
If you wanna be transport pilot you have to understand squad function to be a good pilot.

What does it mean. Start in infantry, be patient and after that you can drive vehicle or fly.
Newbies dont understand this. Its sad.

[mat552]

tl;dr version, the mod isn't straying from its roots, the community is.

Every version gets more and more restrictive because people try dumber and dumber stuff every round.

In addition to that, the DEVs are allowing less and less leeway for people to play the mod how they want, as opposed to how the DEVs want. I'm not saying it's not their right, but I am saying it funnels all the people who PR as if it's vanilla into the servers with the rest of us (not all of them can be educated and elevated, and some unscrupulous admins and server owners will use anything to bump their player numbers), and there are less and less places to blow off steam in a wonderful sandbox. I remember the uproar over custom .5 servers, and I remember the complaints about training mode. I don't think it was worth it to remove them.

Rounds are serious business now, less than they were in .9, but still involve a lot of blood, sweat, and tears to win a round. That's fun sometimes, for some people, but not for everyone all the time. I understand the need to expand the mod as uniformly as possible, but this is one area that still isn't perfect. Vehicles cost too much and take too long to get back into the fight to be used in their intended realistic roles. APCs won't transport infantry because that means the death of them, which is a 10-15m respawn and 18-23 tickets when destroyed! (10-15 for the APC, 8 for the crew/passengers) How can you expect people to risk three to four squad's worth of tickets for a faster ride and a few seconds of fire support? An addendum to this is the flag capture mechanics, which, when coupled with other factors, value defense over offense. Why risk attacking a flag when you can make the enemy attack you, and throw their tickets into the meatgrinder while you sit back at range, calling in counter support and whatnot.

So you wind up with assets fighting each other in one corner of the map, and two teams of infantry both waiting for the other to attack. People get bored. When people get bored, people get stupid and start entertaining themselves. By glitching or exploiting the game to maintain their defensive advantage, but still be able to attack. So then the DEVs have to further slow down gameplay and add more restrictions, which people inevitably circumvent, and the cycle spirals slowly downward until a gamechanger bumps things back up, like mortars.

Why so serious? It's a "realistic" game.

[Saarna]

APCs won't transport infantry because that means the death of them, which is a 10-15m respawn and 18-23 tickets when destroyed! (10-15 for the APC, 8 for the crew/passengers)

Book of Manuel: APC 5 tickets, IFV and tanks (relevant in Merkava's case) 10 for a maximum of 13-18 tickets. Not that much of an increase over a full infantry squad wiped out on foot, which will now cost the team 12 tickets.

[mat552]

The book of manual is often wrong or outdated, my apologies.

The point still stands. A full, dead, Bradley costs a squad and a half's worth of deaths, plus your mobile antiarmor coverage.

Most players judge it to be a bad tradeoff, me included.

[Zoddom]

The book of manual is often wrong or outdated, my apologies.

The point still stands. A full, dead, Bradley costs a squad and a half's worth of deaths, plus your mobile antiarmor coverage.

Most players judge it to be a bad tradeoff, me included.

then dont use APCs as light tanks.
thats the trick...

[Cassius]

If anything its getting less run and gun with every update. I am guessing some people just like the BF2 mod on its way to becoming a reality oriented mod better, than an reality mod that almost reached its goal if that makes any sense.

[Kain888]

The book of manual is often wrong or outdated, my apologies.

Actually it is not. It's up to date and polished.

[Sidewinder Zulu]

It could easily be argued that vehicles and other heavy assets are much more important in any modern conventional war than infnatry are.
With the exception of Insurgency, these are the types of engagements PR is trying to portray.
So no, I don't think PR is going in a new direction, and even if it was, I think vehiclular combat is fine. Infantry will always have a place in Project Reality, but so will vehicles.
There are many many games that focus on just infantry and nothing else, which is why I appreciate the fact that PR has a more balanced, authentic style, where vehicles are very important, just as they are in actual warfare.

[Ford_Jam]

I dunno about straying from its roots, but a few maps that previously had no heavier assets were much better than they are now. (Those maps being Fallujah and Barracuda, even Gaza could be used in this example even though it has had tanks + bomb trucks from day 1). I enjoy asset based maps as much as the next person however I've had far more enjoyable games without them in previously removed maps and in Skirmish matches

[ComradeHX]

I couldn't help but think of the player limits.

With only 32 players per team, we're being stretched really far between:
-Heli transport
-Mortars
-Fob building
-Tanks
-Apcs
-CAS


So with all these different assets, the lack of infantry is easy to be understood.

Fob building is the one thing that I do not ever want to see as an independent squad.

Squads need to build fob as the need rises and build defenses if NEEDED, NOT just have one full squad 100% dedicated on digging all over the map to spam FOBs and other things...

[Imchicken1]

Fob building is the one thing that I do not ever want to see as an independent squad.

Squads need to build fob as the need rises and build defenses if NEEDED, NOT just have one full squad 100% dedicated on digging all over the map to spam FOBs and other things...

I dont think he meant all of those being completly full squads..

A 2-3 man Logi + FB squad can be soooo very useful if they know what they're doing. It allows other squads to maintain what they were previously doing, and they dont need to have one of their numbers to return to base when they need supplies (maps that dont get heli's)

[Haji with a Handgun]

I often run Logistics squads, and I gotta say, ninja FOBs can be pretty useful. If you do have a full squad for FOB building, you have to defend said FOB, not just build it and leave. Its fine if they build an FOB or 2 and then defend them, but spamming FOBs is unacceptable.

[Truism]

Let's say, hypothetically, you try to use APCs doctrinally, and do all the drills, debus and get the thing to roll with infantry conducting fire and movement.

For starters, the APC would get popped pretty much straight away since it's not moving fast and is now sitting more or less in the open.

Infantry can't fire and move like they can in real life, so you basically have a squad out on the ground waiting to get shot, unable to effectively return fire.

I'm sick of hearing people argue that APCs should be used as battle taxi's because PR has been designed, from the ground up, for this not to work properly. Without a massive overhaul using an APC as a transport is a great way to endanger a lot of lives and use a tiny amount of an asset's potential.

Just saying.


And yes, it's gone along way from its roots. Some of it has been good, some of it really hasn't. I would argue too far myself...

[dtacs]

Let's say, hypothetically, you try to use APCs doctrinally, and do all the drills, debus and get the thing to roll with infantry conducting fire and movement.

For starters, the APC would get popped pretty much straight away since it's not moving fast and is now sitting more or less in the open.

Infantry can't fire and move like they can in real life, so you basically have a squad out on the ground waiting to get shot, unable to effectively return fire.

I'm sick of hearing people argue that APCs should be used as battle taxi's because PR has been designed, from the ground up, for this not to work properly. Without a massive overhaul using an APC as a transport is a great way to endanger a lot of lives and use a tiny amount of an asset's potential.

Man I wish I could type like you can. You'll find me referencing this when the no doubt hundreds of other threads on this topic are created.

[BenHamish]

VERY well articulated 'Truism'. I think you managed very well to sum up the gut feeling of frustration we sometimes have on that issue.

[Saarna]

I'm sick of hearing people argue that APCs should be used as battle taxi's because PR has been designed, from the ground up, for this not to work properly. Without a massive overhaul using an APC as a transport is a great way to endanger a lot of lives and use a tiny amount of an asset's potential.

I'll join those people by disagreeing with you. Disclaimer, no, I don't think PR's refocus on APC's was the best move a couple years back, and I don't think so now, mainly due to the hardcoded players. However, given that on many maps there simply is not enough transportation available without the use of the battle taxis one can either sit on their hands complaining, or make the best out of what is available.

First of all, where has this idea of APC's being absolute death traps come from? I personally can't even remember the last time I've been killed with either a squad in the boot, or being hauled somewhere myself. Sure an APC's a bigger and more enticing target than trucks for example, but how easy is it to kill one steaming full speed ahead anyway? A truck's occupants may be killed with a lucky shot from any weapon, where an APC requires one or more hits from AT weapons that have to be predeployed to be even ready to fire, much less to hit the speeding target.

Secondly, this subject is far from the black and white "APC's are either light tanks or completely slaved to infantry" thinking. Realistic military doctrines completely aside, those two roles can be combined easily and effectively, on the game's terms and none other.

Actively transporting infantry doesn't mean you'll have to disengage and run back to base as soon as the previous squad's out the hatch. Barring the occasional (and usually commander ordered) mad rush from squad to squad there's plenty of time to present your firepower on the field, while still being available for transport should the need arise. Likewise supporting the infantry or the team in general doesn't come to either running amok disregarding the rest of the team or parkin your APC right next to the nearest infantry squad and waiting for the enemy to muster their AT.

APC's, and any other armored and/or armed vehicle for that matter can be effectively used as a force multiplier, either laying in ambush or loitering the area, nonetheless ready to pounce any target the infantry units are engaging. With the target's precise location known, and them probably engaged in a firefight a vehicle can just swoop in and take out the whole bunch (especially effective with the AAVP's on Muttrah) in one go before high-tailing it back to station, or where ever it might be required.

[Herbiie]

Infantry can't fire and move like they can in real life, so you basically have a squad out on the ground waiting to get shot, unable to effectively return fire..

And why not?

Simple: Because no one does it.

If you use Infantry & the APC together the APC WILL survive 9/10 times, get on mumble so you can communicate, & roll up together, if you see an RPG/LAT shout it out & everyone will open up on the target & the LAT will miss (Or in a rare case on Muttrah... shot at the wrong APC & blow it up... *facepalm*).

Now, sometimes APCs have to go out on their own, but not all the time.

Also I completely disagree with the OP - Most squads are Infantry squads, play on a half decent server.