Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
What we do know is that the PvP aspect of this game could very easily be far more complex than any other MMO on the market.
It reminds me of Mistmerrow in Archeage - a capture the flag event where capturing the flag at the wrong time will see your faction lose the match even though it is not made directly clear that your action will have that consequence.
As an example, it is entirely feasible that a node will need stone in construction of defense for the node. With the way resources fluctuate, it is entirely within the scope of probability that the nearest stone could be several nodes away. If there is a lone player hauling stone to your node and you attack him, you may well reap the benefits of that action.
However, now that player will think twice about where he will take his next caravan of stone. If he decides to take it somewhere else, your node just lost it's only source of stone - meaning your node now needs to turn from PvP jocks to quarriers and caravaners in order to build up the defense of your node.
No one is really saying a PvP player can't attack that lone player - the game allows for it so it is all good much as Mistmerrow allowed players to take over capture points at a point in time that would see their faction lose. So the question isn't a case of what "can" be done, as the answer to that is almost anything. The question that should be asked is what "should" be done. The smart player will want to know - at the very least - which other players are supplying their node (and thus, them) with resources.
Something about biting the hand that feeds you. The above post is in reply to this as well. Sure, you can attack almost anyone you want and may even gain the rewards from it, assuming you win. Thing is, would you consider it a win if you now lose access to stone to build a wall around your node? Remember, the next siege is only a few days away!
Corruption of the soul should be account wide because the same player is playing all the characters, especially if the goal is to make corruption meaningful as a mechanic/concept.
If corruption is character specific, they have to use that character to get rid of the corruption.
It's also worth pointing out that the idea of corruption isn't to stop people from killing each other. If that was the intent, Intrepid would simply make it so you can't attack other players outside of caravans, guild wars etc.
That is not what they are doing though, so clearly they still want the ability to attack other players to be in the game.
The only logical reason left to introduce corruption then, is to add weight to the decision to attack another player - if the cost of ridding yourself of the corruption you will likely gain is higher than the likely rewards, you'll think twice about attacking.
I'm actually considering making an alt for ultimate trolling - if a guild or node is known to attack players without cause, I'll spend a good amount of time on this alt there doing nothing in particular. Every time they attack I'll do nothing, die, run back and watch their corruption go up and up.
First point: As far as we know ALL caravans are flagged for pvp which means there is no corruption involved in attacking it
Second point:There would be a way of stopping people from just "logging onto another character" to get rid of the corruption of it was account wide and that is locking the "lowering of corruption" to the character that earned it. This way the entire account is corrupted until you decide to get rid of corruption with the character that built it up. If corruption worked this way I would say account wide corruption, YES PLEASE! DO IT NOW!
Thing about people that think of themselves first: If their node loses and is de-leveled, they will not care so much, they will just move to another (winning) node and become citizens there.
Since moving is in fact a possibility players can opt for. The only downside is that you might have difficulty in finding open world housing spot in another node, however instanced housing will not be limited so if you don't care about open world housing, and instanced is good enough for you, there is nothing preventing you from just moving to a better node, and focusing on your own progress over specific nodes progress.
Trust me, many players will opt for that.
Right.
Can you name one game that has applied an account wide negative effect based on legitimate in game actions? Because I can't.
It would cause a massive number of players to be pissed off, it will see people claim Intrepid have implemented it as a cash grab as more players will sub up a second account, and due to this last fact, it will be largely ineffective.
Essentially, there is no way in hell Intrepid would apply corruption account wide but restrict the player to using the character that gained the corruption to also get rid of it. I mean, how would it even work if two characters on one account both earned corruption? How would it work if the player wanted to start a new character?
While some of these things may be easily resolved (messily, but easily), it simply isn't within the realm of logical things for Intrepid to do.
Some players absolutely will. But I would suggest that we don't yet know if there are any further benefits to staying a as citizen of one node as opposed to moving around a lot. We know housing is one such benefit, as you mentioned, but we have no way at all of knowing if that is all.
Question for you: if you were a game developer, and you were creating a large open world MMO based around players joining towns and these towns expanding at the expense of nearby towns, would you put in a mechanic that gives players a reason to want to stay in the same town?
I know I would.
You can just place 1 housing type in each different node (1. freehold, 2. in city non instanced building, 3. in city instanced apartment), and you are set. So you are no longer tied to success of just one node, and you don't have to care so much if one specific node is not doing well.
At least that is how things work for now. We will see if that will change in future.
Wait, is that confirmed?
I thought you had to pick a node, but inside that nodes ZOI you could potentially have up to 3 houses.
I thought for sure you could only be citizen of one node, but I could be wrong...
In this video at 55:20 or so, they say that players can have one of each type of house, but they must all be in the same node - tying the player to the success of that node. Have they changed this since then?
You create another character. That character will automatically have access rights to your freehold and other housing, but does NOT automatically become a citizen of the node the freehold is in. That character wanders off in search of fame and fortune, finds love, and settles down 4 node clusters over, you buy an in-node house for it or instanced apartment. You can gain citizenship for that node. You will have to pay the regular upkeep and taxes to that node for the housing on that character.
They have limited freeholds to one per account. They have never come out and said that other forms of housing would be account locked to one per account, just one per character. So you could end up with one freehold, 8 in node houses, and 12 instanced apartments on a single account if say the cap on alts was 12. Paying the taxes for all that would be interesting though.
What If you build a freehold and an in-city building in same node (lets call it node A) and declare citizenship to it, then remove your freehold (will you still have your other building in that node A?) and then you move your freehold to node B. Are you citizen of node A or node B then?
- Do you automatically lose citizenship of node A when you burn down your freehold?
- does your in-city building in node A get automatically destroyed when you remove your freehold from node A?
- whats the point of having multiple housing in same node?
(I'd guess if you are locked to one city, than when you remove your freehold from it your all other housing gets destroyed from that city as well.)
- another question that pops up is what if your freehold is burned down after siege (by attackers) does that mean you automatically lose all other housing in that city as well then? Isn't that a bit over the top?
I think if you have a freehold and an in-city house in node A, destroy your freehold, and build it somewhere else it will likely automatically (or ask if you are sure) change your citizenship. If you change your citizenship you lose your in-city house (likely instantly) and can't establish as a citizen of another node for 2 weeks (as of now).
If your freehold is destroyed after a siege, that does not mean your in-city house will be. Depends on how 'destroyed' the city was, like if somehow it ended below the level your house populated. If both are destroyed you might still be a citizen until claiming citizenship elsewhere, or citizenship might be tied to a place you rest your head. I am not sure of this finer detail.
The freehold isn't the only tie to citizenship, so are in-city housing an instanced apartments. If you try to establish one somewhere else (in addition to one you already have) you will likely be prompted to change citizenship.
We all know that the general MMO playerbase (as a whole, not necessarily individuals) will do a few things. If there is chance to exploit, someone will expoit it. If there is a chance a thing could break, someone will break it. If there is a chance to be stupid, someone will be stupid.
What I mean by that is if it is implemented in a way where you can attempt to acquire land, and there is a way to click though and in the process have your other housing destroyed - people will do that without knowing what happened.
On the other hand, if it is required that you obtain citizenship of a node, and are then (and only then) able to get housing in that node, it kills off the opportunity for people to do stupid things (at least in an obvious manner).
It would mean that if you have land, and try and get a house in a different node, the game will first tell you that you need citizenship of that node. If you then attempt to get citizenship of that node, the game will tell you that you need to drop the citizenship of the node you are currently a citizen of. If you then try to drop citizenship of that node, the game will tell you that you need to relinquish your houses first.
In order, you would need to get rid of your houses, relinquish your citizenship, acquire citizenship of new node (which I hope is not necessarily a trivial matter), and then (only then) are you able to get property in your new node.
It is all obviously speculation, but it is the way I would do it.
...now Ashes will need warning labels on everything... :sigh:
I'm personally a fan of removing all the warning labels and seeing what happens, but I don't have a product marketed to millions.
Also role players are the minority of most MMO's , the casual player(the majority) will go through the entire game at his pace, but play both the PvE and PvP when the opportunity presides itself and most competent casuals wont be getting killed instantly by a PvP player because most PvP players arent the best players in the game, very small % of them actually are.
Horrible idea, and the pole choices are highly inefficient, i voted NO because its a horrible idea, not cuz it had anything to do with Role players. Also your other option of applying it to 1 alt is almost the same as your original question of applying it account wide, just wow.