Battlefield 3 multiplayer features 'bigger unlock tree,' vehicle customizations

More information about Battlefield 3's vehicles are revealed, and developer DICE discusses the importance of rewarding players over the long-term by planning "a bigger unlock tree."

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There are going to be quite a few ways to dish out vehicular mayhem in Battlefield 3. Players will find more than twenty class-based vehicles to drive or pilot from categories like "armored transports, infantry fighting vehicles, main battle tanks, scout helicopters, attack helicopters, fighter jets, and attack jets." Developer DICE has released some more information about these deadly war machines, and executive producer Patrick Bach recently expressed some thoughts about the importance of continuing to reward players in a long-running, competitive, multiplayer shooter.

New to the Battlefield series is a refined damage system for vehicles. "Lightly damaged vehicles recover their armor after a set amount of time (if kept away from enemy fire)," DICE's Battleblog notes. It's a design decision meant to give smart non-engineer class drivers a way to survive longer in the field, provided they're not averse to occasionally retreating and regrouping. Regenerating vehicular damage occurs on a sliding scale, however, and vehicles won't recover armor "past a certain damage threshold."

Battlefield 3's vehicle customization system is also detailed. As with customizing weapons, customizing vehicles effectively specializes them, making them more proficient in some attributes, and less in others. The most obvious example of this would be deciding whether to arm a fighter jet so that it's more effective in air-to-air combat, vs. an air-to-ground-appropriate load out.

Each of the game's drivable vehicles include three upgrade slots--one secondary weapon slot, one gadget slot, and one upgrade slot--into which can be plugged an assortment of class-based vehicle perks. More than eighty such perks exist in all, spread across the twelve classes of transportation.

Those perks will likely be unlocked over a longer period of time. Executive producer Patrick Bach recently discussed rewarding players over the long term, in an interview with RPS, Bach said that the team is anticipating "people [playing] even more than Battlefield Bad Company 2." Because of that, "we’re planning for even longer unlocks, a bigger unlock tree."

Battlefield 3 is due on PC, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3 on October 25. You can check out our hands-on multiplayer preview here.

From The Chatty
  • reply
    September 1, 2011 1:15 PM

    Jeff Mattas posted a new article, Battlefield 3 multiplayer features 'bigger unlock tree,' vehicle customizations.

    More information about Battlefield 3's vehicles are revealed, and developer DICE discusses the importance of rewarding players over the long-term by planning "a bigger unlock tree."

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      September 1, 2011 1:28 PM

      Ofc it will cost you extra dollars to access the full unlock tree xD.

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        September 1, 2011 3:15 PM

        man you are dumb

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        September 2, 2011 4:28 AM

        Absolutely, vehicle customizations will all be DLC, $15 per pack.

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      September 1, 2011 1:30 PM

      The vehicle regen doesn't sound too bad. Had to figure it wouldn't work in combat, but it's good to know you can't fully repair up by hiding behind a building or whatever without an actual repair tool / engineer helping out.

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        September 1, 2011 1:41 PM

        Unless I'm interpreting that section the wrong way. Sounds like it could just mean heavily damaged vehicles won't recover armor on their own, but if you take minor damage it will heal up just fine.

        I'd still prefer a return to the BF2 method where engineers inside vehicles can auto-repair other vehicles in close proximity slowly. It makes just as little sense as auto-regen, but it gives engineers extra utility, allows them to stay out of harm if it's really dangerous outside, avoid ff road kills, and creates another use for smaller vehicles like humvees and other fast transports.

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          September 1, 2011 5:32 PM

          Auto Repair Radius really broke down when an APC and a Tanker knew what they were doing and could virtually go the whole round without being taken down.

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            September 2, 2011 3:22 AM

            Yeah, the last thing you want is MercFox with a good engineer tagging along. If anything that's proven to me heal radius BAD

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      September 1, 2011 1:43 PM

      bonertime

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      September 1, 2011 1:43 PM

      You have to run at people unarmed to unlock your first weapon

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        September 1, 2011 1:54 PM

        this isn't really that funny, and yet I laughed anyway. too parallel to the truth, I suppose.

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        September 1, 2011 3:19 PM

        [deleted]

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        September 1, 2011 3:36 PM

        unfortunately that is not too far from reality :(

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        September 1, 2011 4:56 PM

        Kids already do that regardless of the weapons they've unlocked. It makes them feel like badass football-player-rapists. Frapists.

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        September 1, 2011 5:38 PM

        I would love this haha it would certainly make you try out all the weapons.

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        September 2, 2011 3:40 AM

        [deleted]

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      September 1, 2011 1:55 PM

      [deleted]

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      September 1, 2011 2:47 PM

      Not sure how I feel about all of these vehicle perks.

      rock paper 50 TYPES OF SCISSORS

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        September 1, 2011 5:33 PM

        It'll probably be fine. Gives more variety. I like the whole spec'n for air supremacy vs bombing.

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          September 2, 2011 3:06 AM

          I like that as well, I am just worried about how ridiculous some of the perks *might* end up being. When you have that many variables to change, the risk for exploitation goes wayyyyy up.

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      September 1, 2011 3:07 PM

      I am perfectly fine with this. Love me some unlocks.

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      September 1, 2011 3:17 PM

      Never get tired of watching that trailer

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      September 1, 2011 5:38 PM

      Instead of ~1 month to max out all the class weapons and perks, it'll be longer than that for a single class. I'm cool with this and starting as support on day 1. Me + tripod + covering a cone of fire is where I'll be rawkin.

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      September 1, 2011 6:07 PM

      I still wish they had brought the ships back. I enjoyed the island maps in BF1942 where I could hop onto the battleship with a couple of guys and bombard the ops bases. Granted they weren't implemented all that well but I think they could have come up with a way to include them, at least as an option when starting a round.

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      September 1, 2011 6:25 PM

      [deleted]

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