New Blog(Nodes).. Thoughts?

ArchivedUser

Personally, I thought this was a great explanation to the people that didn't get the node system to begin with, and even to the people that did get it, it cleared things up. The post was overall great, and the Node system also seems very fun! Not just because you can build your own cities, and make up lore for it and do whatever you want with it basically, but you can organize massive sieges and destroy a city that took months for someone to build... Woo! Anyways, that's what I thought, what do you guys think of it?

Cheers!

ArchivedUser

I think what will end up happening with the large city sieges is that it will most likely be a multi-siege thing for large cities or even metros.

So let's take an example of two very powerful guilds attack/siege a city. Team A is defending, and Team B is attacking. Team A manages to overall defend against the siege, but Team B manages to cause enough havoc that some buildings are either to the point of needing to be rebuilt, or the metro has gone down a node tier to city. I see this happening for anything City+ size, by that I mean only going down a tier or two based upon how badly it was damaged. It would be unlikely that a metro size's garrison gets so thoroughly destroyed that the attackers are able to lay basically the entirety of the buildings in the metro to waste resetting it completely.

Now on a town level I might see that as possible if a really large guild is just trying to blow up a nearby town so they can expand their city into a metro and need nearby available land. In this case I bet a large coordinated guild could have enough resources available to tear down the entire town within the time constraint of the siege.

Then again, it may have player population caps to prevent large zerg guilds from just swallowing up all the land.

ArchivedUser

Oh and also, we might even see Guilds commercing with the ruler(s) of a small town so they can either A. Buy the town and expand, or B. Simply destroy it if they do not abide the rules they established in while commercing.. But the system seems overall great.

ArchivedUser

You don forget aliances between cities or village to attack other place more bigger or strong....

I like this system becouse I believe that will be generate a lot of play in game.

ArchivedUser

It makes quite alot of sense that you cant have nodes of equal size next to eachother, since you need land around you to support a city. I look forward to seeing how they balance the sieges :)
Its gonna be interesting to see how you balance the destrouction needed to knock a node one level down, versus the time it takes to get the level back. Seeing as you cant develop the node next to it, and that takes time once available, its also gonna be a race to see who has the most activity and get the node level back :)

ArchivedUser

I think it's a cool system, and a great way to provide some emergent gameplay rooted in player choice!

I do wonder though, how it may be gamed.... will there be a "best" node? Will all players simply work to build it up and keep it in tact, with no real desire to destroy it since the adjacent nodes aren't as "good" anyway?

Also. if a particular node favors non-combat players such as crafters... will there be a disadvantage in keeping it, or are there ways besides combat to battle for relevance? I understand of course that this is a great player inter-dependency - the need for protection, etc. So just spitballing :)

ArchivedUser

[quote quote=1382]I think it’s a cool system, and a great way to provide some emergent gameplay rooted in player choice!

I do wonder though, how it may be gamed…. will there be a “best” node? Will all players simply work to build it up and keep it in tact, with no real desire to destroy it since the adjacent nodes aren’t as “good” anyway?

Also. if a particular node favors non-combat players such as crafters… will there be a disadvantage in keeping it, or are there ways besides combat to battle for relevance? I understand of course that this is a great player inter-dependency – the need for protection, etc. So just spitballing

[/quote]
Well since the adjacent nodes wont be as good, they may want to team up and take the big one down :) Regarding the crafting city thingy, if you have a crafting oriented city, then you presumably have some real good gear. Maybe even the best in the land, then you could simply hire some goons to keep it safe, or make truces with items as the payment etc.

Loads of ways to keep your city safe (I think :))

ArchivedUser

This reminds me of what Horizon's tried to do. WAY back.

A game with a lot of good ideas, but lacking the technology/polish to implement them. They used players to unlock different area's of the landmass and actually unlock different races for the rest of the server.

It will be really cool to have totally different areas on each server. Plus, the siege's to shake up the zones. Fantastic idea.

ArchivedUser

i loved the node video it was really informative and cleared up a few things i was unsure about,


and also loved the mage with the sword :P and the blood splatter :P

ArchivedUser

The one big take-away for me was that players will see their investment of time and money pay off. People like to own things, call something or some lace theirs even if it is a few virtual acres.

While city raiding in WoW was fun it was just that, fun. Oh, sure there was an achievement to get but there was not any downside to the faction leaders being "killed". The game is a static model that only changes when Blizzard says it changes, and barring the phasing during a few quest lines, the player has very little to any say in the matter.

In Ashes we'll see our actions, and in-actions, have consequences far beyond our gear - People will want to carve out time in order to attack a city or defend their homes and lively hoods. They'll read the comments here and elsewhere about how other players will try to game the system (like RL politicians do?) and decide for themselves how best to carve out and keep their little corner of the world safe.

I'm excited and cautiously hopeful to see the team pull this off and allow us to make our own unique mark upon the game world.

ArchivedUser

The true test will come once the node ecosystem is mature. Will there be a most-efficient configuration that players aim for and then maintain, leading to stasis? Will metropolis sieges be so difficult that people never attempt them, again leading to stasis? Getting the right balance will be a huge accomplishment.

ArchivedUser

I have an issue with "But we feel that the effort to destroy something must be equitable with the effort to build something".
Something that provides value to others, can not have equal value between building it (not necessarily fun) and maintaining it (usually not fun) and the effort to destroy it (unfortunately for some fun).

This can't be an effort-vs-effort formula. It must be a "fun/benefit vs. fun/benefit" formula in a more utilitarian way: how much effort does it take to build and maintain plus how much non-fun does it entail plus how much benefit does it provide to how many people - vs how much fun and non-fun does it entail to destroy it. Only that makes a reasonable cost-benefit analysis and is the reason why Trammel so clearly out-competes Felluca to quote the old example. If the factors are not weighted sufficiently, you tip the game balance by design toward ganking and loss off customer base. In what I think is a misunderstanding of the dynamics, not an intent.

ArchivedUser

[quote quote=9990]The true test will come once the node ecosystem is mature. Will there be a most-efficient configuration that players aim for and then maintain, leading to stasis? Will metropolis sieges be so difficult that people never attempt them, again leading to stasis? Getting the right balance will be a huge accomplishment.

[/quote]

If it was just PvP aspects to the game then I could see the stasis being a potential problem.
BUT...the world is also alive, upgrades against you...and really doesnt want you there.
I think 'other players' ideas for you, will be the least of your worries.
:D

Intrepid are on the ball with this one I think.

ArchivedUser

I agree. Alliances are going to play a strong role between nodes, then again a economic metropolis will most likely be one that no one will want to mess with because of the AH

ArchivedUser

Damnit stop releasing these dev blogs, it makes me want to be playing this game more and more instead of watching videos about it...

ArchivedUser

Alliances will indeed have a huge role in nodes, i do hope that the longer a node survives at a certain level the bigger the reward will be if people could harvest that node. That way, it will be more balanced.

ArchivedUser

it would be awesome if there is different nodes for each area, sky, sea, dungeon, other world.

ArchivedUser

So I'm wondering what happens to what you have placed in your house (as the latest node vid suggests) should a player get a basic property when the node is young, then ends up with a mansion when it hits "metro" status, which is then battered into non-existence?

Does a player get all his stuff mailed to him/her or something else?

Hmmmmmmmm

ArchivedUser

[quote quote=11207]Does a player get all his stuff mailed to him/her or something else?[/quote]

Yes, I believe I saw that somewhere. If your home is destroyed, the stuff inside gets sent to you. If only real life insurance plans worked as well as this...

ArchivedUser

As above....you dont lose possession of all the items that were associated with your house.
They will be available when permissible.

This is actually consistent with death actually when you think about.
You still keep your personal possessions, even when you have been removed form the map.

ArchivedUser

[quote quote=1273]Oh and also, we might even see Guilds commercing with the ruler(s) of a small town so they can either A. Buy the town and expand, or B. Simply destroy it if they do not abide the rules they established in while commercing.. But the system seems overall great.

[/quote]

i fantasized about a Feudal system after the nodes part 2..

the only thing i did see is if the only way to knock down a metropolis is to either siege it or for people to become inactive there can only be 5 in the whole map... there gonna stay fairly static..

ArchivedUser

I few people seemed to be thinking what I am thinking. Sooner or later AoC will become just like it is in the real world. a few BIG nations/nodes/guilds in stagnant. There won't be any smaller nations/guilds. The bigger guild's will eventually work together to get the best gear/best of everything. Everyone want's to beat the game.

ArchivedUser

I think that a big part of the game will be the political interactions and alliances between the larger guilds and cities. Whether or not there is some kind of visible or tangible treaty system could have a big effect as well. Likely the larger cities and guilds will have relationships with eachother (both good and bad). What I would imagine would happen is that 2 or 3 of the biggest cities would house the most active and large guilds and would likely have favorable relationships between eachother. Then I could see the other 2 or 3 being destroyed on occasion and moving locations to discover new content.

One important question has yet to be answered. They have revealed the bonuses from having an economic city and that of a scientific one, but they have yet to reveal the bonuses provided to a militaristic metropolis and that of the divine. If the militaristic ones provide some sort of battle advantage, either defensive or offensive, then I would imagine that it would be beneficial for a militaristic metropolis to ally with an scientific (if the scientific's zone of influenced is affected by a treaty with the militaristic) to enable troop movement via fast travel. It would also be wise to allow an economic metropolis to remain at all times, in order to enable the wide-spread availability of items and resources to everyone.