"Squad members can spawn on any squad member."
twitter.com/#!/L_Twin/status/103562550167355392
twitter.comPosted Aug 26, 2011, 5:21 PM UTC
4362
twitter.comIf true, I can only hope/trust they found a way to balance it well.
For example, there should be a long wait time before you can spawn on a non-squad leader IMO, if you can do it at all. Spawning on a squad leader would have a much shorter (normal respawn) wait time.
P.S. Anyone reading feel free to steal this idea and pass it on to EA if you want :D
17
I like this. Increased wait time to spawn on any squad member, but a shorter wait if you choose squad leader.
12
I just want this to be a option. Having the ability to choose if we want full squad spawn or not would be nice.
0
This isn't new, after the Alpha they said they were changing it because the attackers were at a disadvantage. It wouldn't have been that bad if the "squad leader spawn" actually worked more than 5% of the time in the Alpha.
All of this shit is really getting old. It's bad enough with all of the reposts, then we get a bunch of assumption spams confusing people.
12
It also didn't help the matter that I was never the squad leader and my squad leader didn't know they were the leader or the fact that they weren't supposed to go kamikaze every chance they got.
The two times I was able to be squad leader I would just camp as close as I could to objectives and give suppressing fire. Those two times my team actually progressed past the first couple objectives.
5
This was my tactic too, and it was reliably successful. It doesn't sound like DICE is thinking things through for some reason; do they even know about the squad spawn bugs?
2
Ahmad1Metallic:
[2011/08/16][19:40:19]
[[Translate]](http://translate.google.com/#auto|auto|@L%5FTwin Good interview. Did you say %22squad members can spawn on any squad member%22 or %22squad leader can spawn on any squad member%22 ? 'google translate this tweet'): @L_Twin Good interview. Did you say "squad members can spawn on any squad member" or "squad leader can spawn on any squad member" ?
L_Twin:
[2011/08/16][20:23:30]
[[Translate]](http://translate.google.com/#auto|auto|@Ahmad1Metallic Squad members can spawn on any squad member. 'google translate this tweet'): @Ahmad1Metallic Squad members can spawn on any squad member.
[This comment was posted by a bot][FAQ][[Did I get it wrong?]](http://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=tweet_poster&message=[Oops!](http://reddit.com/r/battlefield3/comments/jvapc\) 'report an error')
11
IIRC they said it was to help the team on the offensive because they were having a hard time.
10
Squad spawning was broken in the alpha, there was no squad leader to spawn at all most of the time due to some bug. They should have addressed that rather than jumping back onto simple-town. It seems like they just looked at the win-lose data from the alpha and said "Well, damn." But forgot to realize nobody was able to spawn on their SL's, and most of the attackers were afraid to die or something, as I would often catch myself arming MCOMMS, checking the map to see my team unable to cross an imaginary line.
12
To the haters: Do you remember how frustrating it was to be in a squad with a waterhead squad leader? Constantly dying, out on his own, flying in a single seat jet, swimming in the middle of the ocean in Oman or Wake, and generally not doing leaderly things?
If you want true leadership and military hierarchy, play PR or Arma. This is a fun game.
5
And I think it is just as frustrating to kill 3 people, including the SL, then have one go hide in a room and magically poop out 3 more. At least with a SL you know who to target to eliminate spawning.
21
agree. Kill the leader and it will slow down their assault.
4
To some, maybe so, but it motivates you to wipe the squad out quickly. There are extra points involved for doing so. Its a challenge, bro.
-6
You call it a challenge, I call it unbalanced gameplay and design.
5
Unbalanced gameplay is what happens when your squad leader has a giant star and health bar above his head. He will die every time, and when I played the alpha, not being able to spawn on your leader made the game impossible.
You really should wait to pass judgement until you play the full game. DICE are professionals, they know exactly what needs to be done to make this game a fun experience for all.
-2
No, I don't because I just switched to a new squad or made my own.
11
Thank you! Gameplay is more important that realism and this is situation is no exception.
1
Realism is a heavy feature of gameplay. This situation is debatable for both sides.
2
I hope this is just a mistake, and not true. Does anyone with a Twitter account want to confirm with him?
3
It is confusing, with the introduction of the radio beacon. It is, however, exactly like BC2.
4
Pretty sure this was posted not long after the alpha. They said they did it to make things easier on the attackers.
1
I hope there would be a feature that doesn' allow you to spawn on a squad member currently being suppressed. That would easily fix the problem that occures in Bad Company 2 because there was no such thing as "being suppressed".
3
Help! Help! I'm being suppressed!
2
Ah, when you say it that way I sort of want to take back my statement. It's just sort of unrealistic, I guess, to spawn on someone half a second before they're shot down. A feature to call your current teammates for help would be interesting, though.
1
That was known for more than two weeks now. Gamescom build had it. Why is this even news?
3
Wait, can someone explain why this is such a bad thing? I feel like I'm missing something.
2
The squad leader doesn't feel like you're squad leader anymore.
I don't want every enemy I'm shooting at die and have to deal with his teammate who spawned on him to kill me right after.
BFBC2 this happened a lot. I was shooting a enemy and their teammate spawns right behind him. I want it so if you kill the squad leader, you end it! Yes, they can revive him. But all in all I think thats way more fun.
And it takes a smart SL to stay alive for his teammate to regroup on him.
26
They changed it because the Attackers were having a tough time of it in the Alpha. That post was pre-Alpha.
0
Attackers were having a tough time in Alpha because most of the time spawning on the squad leader didn't work.
Maybe they should get spawning to actually work before worrying about making changes to it.
8
This could also work in your favor because you could get two kills instead of one.
-3
Yes, if you're lucky. Don't forget they get 1 to 2 seconds of invincibility when they spawn.
6
Woah, seriously? This would explain a few things.
1
Beeing able to spawn only on squad leader kinda forces team to stick together. There are pros and cons with spawning only on squad leader, but personally I liked the spawn system in BC2 and wouldn't be bothered if they do the same for BF3
9
What I didn't like about BC2 is I didn't even know who to spawn on when people were scattered halfway across the map. Sure, in an ideal squad, nobody does that, but when it happens it's annoying. I hope they have a special icon for the squad leader at least.
4
And there are several small points on certain maps that are vital to control (Eg. islands on A side of isla innocentes so you can AT4 the defenders choppers instantly), and having to spawn far away every time you die defending those would just suck
1
It would suck for you, not for your squad, not for your team, not for the other team. Having your chopper shot down instantly sucks way harder for the other team.
1
People liked the added layer of depth of only being able to spawn on your squad leader. It's not necessarily a bad thing imo.
4
This is utterly awful. Spawn die spawn die spawn die spawn die.
2
I feel like this could be a really positive change to the system, if they do it correctly. IMO, the worst part of BFBC2's spawn-on-squad was that you could have just emptied your gun into a guy, but while he's dead/dying, another person will spawn on him and kill you.
My idea is that if they changed it so that you couldn't spawn on a squad member who has less than 30% health or is currently firing his weapon/in a firefight, it could cut down on those unfair deaths.
1
Would be nice not spawning on someone and dying right as or immediately after they do too. Nothing like spawning directly in the line of fire or with your back turned to the person shooting...
2
as long as the leader is alive though right?
1
Thank god.
1
[deleted]
-1
That article is two months old. The game is still being tweaked.
3
[deleted]
-4
I think this is wrong. Must be typo.
-5
Cough Bad Company 3 Cough
-6
I have to agree, but to me this is even worse than taking out prone or jets. The squad system was so, so important to deep, rewarding gameplay before it was ruined in BC. I can't believe they would nerf it just because a RUSH map was imbalanced.
3
Fucking terrible. Maybe you should look at your poor map design instead of the squads.
-6
Upvoted, because even if the level design isn't poor, I agree that they could have tried a million things to balance a single map or game mode before nerfing the squad system again.
2
This.... is just awful. This severely decreases the importance of the squad leader.
But it massively balances the offense.
Squad leaders can do the same. Battlefield 2 was fine for balance.
It's for rush, not conquest.
Rush sucks for assault without squad spawning.
Then they should either enable it only for rush or change the rush mechanics. This is not the way to fix it, it also affects conquest.
Battlefield 2 played extremely differently from what we had with the Alpha. I don't think it is accurate to compare the two.
Millions of things could be changed to improve balance on a particular map or game mode, but they chose something that affects every map, every game mode. I think most people will agree that the concern is for how this will affect Conquest, not Rush. Squad member spawning made BC2 conquest a nightmare.
I agree, it worked fine in Rush, but combining this with conquest will be even worse than it was in BC2. On large maps (or any conquest map) you need to be able to destroy any enemies that get behind your lines. You cannot effectively do this if every single player is a spawn point. If just the squad leader is, that makes him important and something for the enemies to protect, but once he goes down, you don't have to worry about them spawning behind you.