Author Topic: ABC lines / Main flags  (Read 1034 times)

Offline justasug

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ABC lines / Main flags
« on: 11-09-2016, 15:09:44 »
Two questions:

1. How do AntiBaseCamping lines work? I've been playing the game for a few years and I'm still confused about this.

Are they meant as a "do not walk into this area" marker or "do not shoot into this area" marker? I'm mainly interested in this from the mod creator's point of view, since the servers might have a different view of this.

I have to say I'm not a fan of them. They seem artificial and introduce some weird behaviour. For example on Giarabub there's a circle around the fort. You can see the enemy while standing on the fort's walls, but you're not supposed to shoot at him until he crosses an imaginary line. Sometimes the enemy is also "abusing" this by shooting from behind the line or taking cover behind it. Recently I had a British light tank shoot at my team from outside the fort. After I shot it once with an anti-tank rifle, it retreated behind the ABC line. I kept shooting and destroyed it. Fortunately the driver was a reasonable player and didn't report me. Otherwise I would have been kicked because this is officially against the rules.



2. Where did the "don't attack the main base" rule come from?

Ever since BF 1942, I've been wondering about this. I assume it's a players hive mind which emerged over time, because I can't find any rules in the BF 42 manual. It only mentions those flags being impossible to capture (you'd be wasting your time and lose the game).
I understand that it's meant to prevent "base rape". How often would the enemy come into a position where he has surrounded your main base and left you with no way to break through and capture another flag? I doubt that it would happen that often. Even if it happens, it probably means your team deserved it and the round should end as soon as possible. This also includes rules such as "don't shoot planes that are taking off", which is also weird because every airfield has anti-aircraft guns meant to protect planes that are taking off (and offering more gameplay variety and objectives).

Offline Flippy Warbear

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Re: ABC lines / Main flags
« Reply #1 on: 11-09-2016, 15:09:07 »
1) ABC's are a workaround to prevent the enemy players from entering main bases and thus camping spawns. This makes the bases that the ABC's cover a more of a safe haven so you can be relatively sure you'll be safe when you spawn there. Of course, the devs never said that firing into the base is not allowed. That is why many of the mainbases got MG's, AT-guns, artillery and anti-air guns to protect the base and repel off any attackers who might be camping at the edge of the ABC-line. Shooting into the base (according to the devs) is fine, ABC is there to prevent you from getting too close to it thought. Dont think of ABC's as NO SHOOTY SHOOTY areas but more like NO WALKY WALKY areas since that is their original intention. Wether a server has different rules for these lines, well you need to take it up to the people who runs the said server.

2) Dont attack main base rule comes from 762's rule book and not from FH2. FH2 devs never said you shouldnt or couldnt attack the mainbase, but they did want to encourage this behaviour by having the forementioned ABC lines and of course some stationary weaponry to protect the bases from being totally locked down. Idea is that if a mainbase gets camped, its not fun for anyone if those doing the camping just fish for cheap kills and those being camped cant do anything against it. But the rule forbidding attacking a main base is from 762, not from the dev team.

Offline jan_kurator

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Re: ABC lines / Main flags
« Reply #2 on: 11-09-2016, 17:09:35 »
Recently I had a British light tank shoot at my team from outside the fort. After I shot it once with an anti-tank rifle, it retreated behind the ABC line. I kept shooting and destroyed it. Fortunately the driver was a reasonable player and didn't report me. Otherwise I would have been kicked because this is officially against the rules.
Officialy, it is completely fine to kill behind ABC line, but only when somebody is abusing the rule, and shooting at you from there. You can RETURN the fire, according to server admins  ;)

Offline Oberst

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Re: ABC lines / Main flags
« Reply #3 on: 11-09-2016, 19:09:58 »
"Don't attack mainbase" rules have ever been there in the battlefield games. What they should prevent is neither firing in, nor out of mainbase, the thing what people have always complaint about is spawnrapping in mainbases. Because this is considered heavily disruptive gameplay. To prevent this, walking INTO mainbases was forbidden very early by a lot of servers. But firing into mainbases - even in the vanilla games - was often not forbidden per se, which you can see in the mainbase defenses.

Offline justasug

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Re: ABC lines / Main flags
« Reply #4 on: 13-09-2016, 13:09:01 »
That is why many of the mainbases got MG's, AT-guns, artillery and anti-air guns to protect the base and repel off any attackers who might be camping at the edge of the ABC-line.

Thanks for the clarification.
Seeing those assets being wasted is what made me curious about this. It's kind of a waste that most servers interpret that in a different way.