PlanetSide 2 News

All PC servers will be offline for the following update, Feb. 02, at 6:00am PT (3:00pm CET), downtime is expected to last up to two hours.
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[h2]Oshur Launch Thoughts[/h2]
Hey there, just wanted to take a moment to remark on how amazing the reception to Oshur has been so far. It's rare to see this level of excitement and (dare I say) satisfaction with the gameplay to come out of an update. While there's still plenty of work to be done on the continent and its systems, the comments regarding how reminiscent Oshur is of PlanetSide 2's early glory, have been heartening and much appreciated.

There are certainly folks who don't have an interest in the type of gameplay being fostered on the continent, and that's totally valid. We sought to create an logistics heavy, strategy rich, and combined arms experience with Oshur, and the groundswell of support makes it seem like we landed pretty close to that mark. So thank you all for giving us (and Oshur) a chance, and we'll be keeping an eye out for more feedback as things become less new and shiny, and the meta of the continent starts to settle.

-Wrel, Lead Designer


[h2]Lunar New Year[/h2]
Happy Lunar New Year! For the Year of the Tiger, we've deployed the new Tigerstrike Decimator to the Depot, that comes bundled with a new decal and banner. These items will be available in the Depot through Feb. 28.


[h2]Oshur Changes, Fixes, and Additions[/h2]

• You can now hear footsteps on the Flotilla Bastions.
  
• War Table NPCs show as correct faction on Oshur Flotillas.
  
• Fort Arceo now has infantry terminals in the spawn room.
  
• You can now find Warpgate Terminals in the Flotillas.
  
• Fixed a "fake" cortium vein north of Dekat Interlink.
  
• Oshur's World Map thumbnail no longer says "PLACEHOLDER".
  
• The northern Flotilla can now use the air vehicle pad on the northern most Bastion.
  
• Anat Interlink now considers you in the facility area while in the spawn room.
  
• Gildad Cliffs now considers you in the facility area while in the spawn room.
  
• Wellerman Watch capture time is now equal to most Large Outposts.
  
• Seapost K12 can now be captured.
  
• Painfield at Terran Genetics should no longer kill friendlies who spawn into the spawn room.
  
• Air Terminal at Gildad Cliffs now functions.
  
• Eagle Outpost now uses the correct Tower spawnroom shields.
  
• Nascent Shipping and Storage capture timer is now on par with other single-point bases.
  
• Astira Hydroelectric now has a spawn room pain field.
  
• Pommel Gardens now has a spawn room pain field.
  
• Pommel Gardens, Astira Hydroelectric, and Mirror Bay Watchtower now all have no-construction zones.
  
• Fixed a broken Sunderer Garage shield at Mirror Bay Watchtower's eastern garage.
  
• Added Ammo Tower at Sibo Interlink.
  
• Capturing or defending Trident Relays now provide experience.
  
• Trident Relays and Interlinks won't provide the outfit resources shown in the UI in this update, but this will be 1 Polystellarite and 8 Synthium once the bug preventing delivery is resolved.
  
• Various terrain and object cleanup.
  
• A no-construction zone now prevents players from building on a campaign-related island.
  
• Seapost K10 now appears on the map and mini-map.
  
• Weapon models no longer glow on the loadout screen.
  
• Fixed an issue where firing from some of the rocks at Tannae Power wouldn't register your hits.
  
• Underwater lighting effects no longer persist when teleporting to a different continent while submerged.
  

[h2]Interlink Facilities[/h2]

• Changes have been made to the Interlink Facilities throughout the continent. The goal for the changes are mainly to give defenders more room to push out of the spawn room, and interact with more of the facility and its surroundings.
  
• A hallway shield has been added to all Interlinks, and the cover inside has been adjusted to allow for more progression pushing from the hallway.
  
• The interior space has been segmented more, closing off some longer sight lines, and making flow around the capture point a bit better.
  
• Imbanon Interlink, Dekat Interlink, and Anat Interlink all have functional teleporters that take you to safe rooms outside the main structure. Other interlinks should receive teleporters when there's time.
  
• Additional cover from aircraft has been added on the roof of the spawn room and the main structure.
  
• The spawn room now has a sniper's perch on the top floor, to make it easier to clear the rooftop approach.
  
• Bollards have been added to the four main entrances to help prevent vehicles from entering.
  

[h2]Testing Banners[/h2]

• Players who participated in the Test Build 01 and/or Test Build 02 events for Oshur, your Work in Progress banners will be making their way to your account before the week is over.
  

[h2]Misc. Changes, Fixes, and Additions[/h2]

• Reduced the global base respawn time from 15 seconds to 12 seconds.
  
• Dervish Fire Suppression now heals the described 25% health over 5 seconds. (175 health per second, instead of 150 per second.)
  
• Third person vehicle reticle shows for all vehicle passengers.
  
• Fixed an issue with aircraft thrust not decaying properly when switching seats.
  
• UBP-1 Starfish's reload animation now works correctly.
  
• Fixed various animation issues related to underwater rifles.
  
• Moss Ravine on Amerish no longer submerges players near the magical, physics-defying streams.
  

All Access Members can enjoy a double XP weekend starting January 28th through January 20th!

Interested in being a member?
Learn more about Daybreak All Access Membership here.

Want to learn what the latest update is about? Click here to read the patch notes!

See you in game, soldier!

[h3]Welcome to the Isles of Oshur[/h3]
A new, massive-scale continent makes its way to PlanetSide 2 for the first time since 2014. The tropical isles of Oshur are reminiscent of a time before the Auraxian war, where research and exploration were the most valued pursuits, and the factions weren't fully divided.



[h3]Something for Everyone[/h3]
Oshur was designed with an emphasis on logistics and diversity of gameplay. The towering Trident Relays necessitate air support and quick responses, the lattice has deliberate and strategic cutoffs for squad and platoon leaders to pursue, the beachheads and mid-field bases carve a meaningful role for construction; the open savannahs, sandy beaches, and tropical jungles foster vehicle battles and heavy armor usage; and the hand-crafted designer-driven bases create unique and learnable gameplay spaces for hardened infantry veterans. With this new island battleground, there is something to enjoy no matter your style of gameplay.


[h3]Exodus Flotilla[/h3]
The expedition to Oshur took place aboard the new Exodus-class Fleet Carriers. Unlike traditional maps, there are no Warpgates on Oshur, and this flotilla of heavily armed fleet carriers will become your new base of operations. Enemy vehicles that stray too close will be shot out of the sky by the shipboard Particle Projection Cannon.


[h3]Water Mechanics[/h3]
As a part of a massive undertaking, we've completely changed how water works in PlanetSide 2. Every vehicle, infantry, and projectile interaction has been re-engineered to accommodate these new mechanics.

• Wheeled Vehicles putter along the surface.
  
• Hover vehicles float above the water.
  
• Air vehicles cruise beneath the waves like submarines.
  
• Infantry and treaded vehicles prowl the ocean floor.
  
• Projectiles that enter the water are hit with heavy drag.
  

Indar, Amerish, Hossin, and Esamir will all be retrofitted with these new water mechanics at a later date (so don't dip your toes into that frozen river just yet.)


[h3]Underwater Weapons[/h3]
Most traditional weapons won't fire while submerged, but special equipment has been added to ease the transition.

Three new underwater rifles and one underwater pistol are now available to access by various means.

• UBR-100 Frogman - Unlocked by completing the first tier of the Conquest Oshur directive.
  
• UBR-150 Sea Lion - Unlocked with Certs or DBC.
  
• UBR-300 Swordfish - Unlocked by completing Chapter 02 of the Distant Shores campaign.
  
• UBP-1 Starfish - Unlocked by completing the Distant Shores campaign.
  

[h3]New Facilities[/h3]
Interlink Outpost
Constructed as early communication hubs for research on the islands and out at sea, the Interlinks are single-point infantry-capture bases with a close-quarters arena and multiple entrances for attackers.

Controlling an Interlink Outpost counts toward Empire Strength on the continent.


Trident Relay
These massive spires jutting from the water's surface are only enterable from their airpads located high above. Three symmetrical entrance-ways provide an airport-style atmosphere to fight through.

Controlling a Trident Relay counts toward Empire Strength on the continent, and allows for lattice cutoffs deep into enemy territory.



[h3]Distant Shores, Chapter 02[/h3]
Nascent Expeditions has finally cleared the path toward Oshur, and the Empires are maneuvering to gain a foothold. The last chapter of the Distant Shores campaign will be made available Jan. 27.



[h3]New Directives[/h3]
Oshur Collections - A new "Collections" tab can be found in the Directives page. Our first Collections directive asks you to recover the lost dog tags of those who died during the evacuation of Oshur.


Conquest - Oshur - In the "Strategic" tab, a new directive line dedicated to the war for Oshur has been added. Unlock the new UBR-100 Frogman by completing the first tier, and the (very special) Paradise Camo at Master tier, reserved for only the most hardened veterans.



[h3]Oshur Auto-Unlock Dates[/h3]
To celebrate the launch of Oshur, we'll have certain windows where Oshur will auto-unlock itself. Outside of these days, the continent will remain in the normal rotation. We can enable or disable this functionality without downtime based on demand. The goal here is to allow everyone to experience the continent immediately while its new, while avoiding the burnout of the same map 24/7.

The current auto-unlock schedule is: Wednesday, Jan. 26 through Sunday, Jan. 30

-Wrel, Lead Designer

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For a full list of changes and fixes, head on over to our forums and read the Official Patch Notes.

Oh, hello again.

Last week we hosted the first two playtests of the new Oshur continent. Friday held just under 1,100 players (which is absolutely bonkers for the test server,) and Saturday's playtest ended up with just under 700. It was great to see how the continent functioned at different player counts, and we learned a lot in the process. There are more than a few takeaways from that last playtest, some of which I'd like to detail further below, as well as discuss how this weekend's playtests will go as we move into Test Build 02.




Speaking of playtests. Here's the current test schedule:

Test Build 02
Reward: "Work in Progress II" Profile Banner (this is one we've never given away.)
     - Friday, Jan. 21, 2pm PT / 11pm CET
     - Saturday, Jan. 22, 11am PT / 8pm CET

Banners will be delivered after Oshur goes Live, and will be granted to any account that logs on during the test period. Each test will last roughly an hour and a half after the listed start time.




So let's talk about some of the issues that popped up.

Audio Drop Out

This is the big one. There's a bug that will, after a period of play, prevent you from hearing most audio until you restart your client. This happens on Live currently, but usually takes a while to kick in based on the types of battles you're involved in. On Oshur, however, this was happening very quickly. We don't feel like this is resolved yet, but we've made some changes that should help a bit, and are still in the process of collecting data.

One thing we'd like folks to try during the playtest... if you encounter the audio bug, lower the "Maximum Audio Channels" down to 64 in your Audio settings, then restart your client. Then let us know if you run into the problem again. We'll put some entries on the feedback form to see if it helped, and we'd appreciate if you try it. This isn't a real solution, but it will give us another datapoint to go off of.


Perforrrrrmannnnce

We saw a lot of performance issues when a lot of the continent was in view, naturally this happens mainly when folks are up in the air. We've made optimizations to some of the props on the map (we had even small rocks rendering out to 2000 meters, for example,) that should improve this experience. The degree of which remains to be seen though, so please show up to the tests so we can give it a proper look!



Low Graphics

Low and medium graphical settings were originally causing certain assets not to render textures. They'd still be physical objects that'd block bullets and line of sight where applicable, they just wouldn't be visible to you. That issue has been resolved, and folks should be able to use low and medium graphical settings without issue.



Water Mechanics

When it comes to water, we noticed a number of vehicles be stuck firing ghost projectiles or lose control of your vehicle while entering the water. Some of these issues have been resolved, but we'll need to take a look under live-fire circumstances. Air vehicles will still have issues with water in the upcoming playtest, and some of the debugging that was done after the last playtest has helped unblock our path for getting these vehicles finished.



Broken Lattice and Out of Bounds

One of the main gameplay issues on Oshur was simply that a handful of the bases weren't fully implemented, or were uncapturable. The entire lattice should now be able to be maneuvered, and the Trident Relays (the tall, spire-like bases,) have been added to the mix as well. The open expanse of water exterior to the ring of islands should no longer be considered an out of bounds area.


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So what's new?

The above recaps a lot (if not all) of the issues and feedback that came up during our last playtest, so let's move on to what work has been completed over the past week-ish.



Trident online

The three spires located in open water are now available for combat. Before the war, the Trident Relay served as an transportation hub that was used for travel both throughout the continent, as well as from continent to continent by way of High-Altitude Rapid Transport (or HART) shuttles. Because of that, the design is far less military than much of the facilities you see on previous continents. On Oshur, Trident Relays are 3-point capture bases that can only realistically be assaulted by air. This destination serves as a major strategic focal point, allowing for cutoffs deep into enemy territory if the price is paid to capture one. Defenders have a spawn location located central to the facility, and traversal times are weighted toward the attacker's side to help balance out the homefield advantage.




Sunderer Shields and No-Deploys

All relevant bases should now have Sunderer No-Deploy Zones at the proper locations, and many of the bases have been fitted with Sunderer Garage Shields controlled by a terminal. Hacking the terminal will switch the shield over to your faction's, allowing vehicles to pass through. Infantry can pass through at any time, however. Adding more secure spawn locations is something we've been wanting to do for a long time, so getting this done on such a combined arms-focused continent should be a great test case for revisiting earlier maps.



Base Updates

The community has offered a bunch of useful, directed feedback on base design as it relates to Oshur. Some of the bases have seen adjustment, though there are still plenty we'd like to look at in the future. Post-launch, we'd also like to replace more of the open-field capture points with designer-driven bases.





Campaign 02 - Chapter 02

We've enabled Chapter 02 for testing this weekend. I won't spoil much here, but you'll be able to dip your toes into a bit of what was going on prior to (or maybe after?) Oshur was eventually evacuated. The playtests this weekend won't focus on running through the campaign in particular, but the second chapter will be unlocked without needing to run through the first one, and you can take it at your own pace.



In Summary...

Thank you all for participating in these tests. Oshur has a lot of moving pieces, and testing at scale is incredibly important to ensuring this update goes Live in the best shape it can. There's plenty more work still yet to be done, but based on all the feedback so far, it's incredibly heartening to see how excited and positive folks are for the release. A new place to explore, fight, and conquer... See you all this weekend.

-Wrel, Lead Designer


Download the Test Server client from this thread after reading the Test Server Policies: https://forums.daybreakgames.com/ps2/index.php?threads/read-first-test-server-policies-download-link.114038/