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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
Nodes can siege each other, but parents and vassals cannot declare wars against each other. Node Siege and Node War are two different things.
So I thought this was the case for the longest time. Obviously wars and sieging are two different things. You can wage war without there ever being a siege.
However if you continued reading the post I go on to quote Steven and show where we are all getting it wrong.
I also think vassalage/level lockouts shouldn't start at level 1. It's just a bit too restrictive because players can and will level nodes by accident as it only takes a few hours of time. I'd say start the system once a node hits level 3, and don't have any level lockouts until then, so players can actually decide which sort of node they'd like to support and migrate there.
That sounds stupidly boring, IMO. A fatal flaw in the system by being too restrictive simply because citizenship system exists. If vassal nodes have no rights to siege a parent node, then no one wants to be a part of a vassal node. There's no point since you cannot plan to destroy your parent node once you have enough resources and careful planning. There's no way for you to become the next Metropolis, just like you said.
Looks like Node Sieges isn't going to be as fun of a feature as they claimed it to be after all. At least, what I thought was that vassal nodes cannot declare sieges against their parent nodes but is allowed to participate as an attacker to their parent nodes. That's not gonna happen because citizens are automatically registered as a defender.
I think there are a few things you are missing about how the node system works here - things that make it obvious that citizens of vassal nodes shouldn't be able to participate in a siege against a parent.
You say that if you can't siege a parent node, no one will want to be a citizen of a vassal. This comment in itself is forgetting the fact that there are limits to node populations, and not everyone will be able to be citizens of metropolis nodes.
It is also forgetting that there is more to the level of a node that people care about. Many people would rather be in the highest level scientific node they can possibly be in, that is as close to their guild as is possible. Players may also place social organization or religion as their primary consideration as to which node to be a citizen of - which when you remember that each of these offer players augments for abilities, seems like a real possibility.
The idea with the node system and sieges isn't that you siege the next node over (though in the first few weeks it kind of is).
The idea is that you siege a node in the next metropolis cluster over.
Forget about the citizenship limits. That's irrelevant. This is only a matter of the citizens of a vassal node vs their parent node.
In my opinion, allowing your direct neighbours (which are also your vassals) to be able to attack you can bring more dynamics and politics into the game. It means you have to manage your relationship with your neighbours to make sure they're always happy to be under your umbrella.
Should the system allow direct neighbours to choose whether they should attack or defend their parent's node, while also preventing them from declaring the siege themselves, situation like below may occur:
Let's say there's Node A and B. Community 1 is in Node A. Group 1 wants Node A want to make Node A to be Metropolis.
Meanwhile, there's also Group 2 in Node B. Group 2 is also planning to make Node B as the Metropolis.
At this point, both are racing to get their node to Level 1 first. Time goes on and Node A gets to Level 1 first. Now, because of the parent-vassal system, Node B is now locked to one level behind Node A. However, Group 2 says, "Okay, it's alright. We'll get you next time. We'll make sure Node B will triumph and destroy you in the future." Time goes on, Node A is now a Metro and Node B is a City.
Fast foward, the world now have 4 Military Metros, including Node A and 1 Scientific Metro. Node B is an Economic City.
Here comes the fun part, Node B wants to destroy Node A because they want to enable some new economic systems in their server, which they couldn't have because there's no Economic Metro in their server. Node X, the one and only Scientific Metro decided to join with Node B to take down Node A.
Node X declares the siege to Node A. Node B's Mayor decided that their node will participate as the attacker and won't defend Node A. The other direct vassals are happy being the vassals of Node A, therefore they decided to defend Node A against the siege. The other 3 Military Metros also decided to help defend Node A because they're somehow best friends.
Now, since the other nodes who are not vassals of Node A can participate in the siege as well, they decided to join Node X+B to destroy Node A so that Node B can rise as the Economic Metro and enable some features that an Economic Metro may bring to the server.
The siege happens. Node A lost. They got destroyed. After a few days, Node B is now an Economic Metro.
What a long story. Okay, so... This can still happen with the current system since since Node B, even though registered as defender, can simply ignore the siege and not help Node A defend themselves. But that sounds so boring. Isn't it more fun to join as an attacker rather than sit there and watch the world burn, even though you really want to destroy your neighbour so bad?
The thing with the node system is that it is designed in a way where exactly which node in a cluster is the metropolis at any point in time will change quite often.
Rather than pitting neighboring nodes against each other, the system is designed where people from opposing node clusters will want to come in and siege nodes of other clusters. Rather than the citizens of a vassal node wanting to siege their parent node - they will want to siege nodes of a rival cluster along with people from the metropolis node.
Eventually, when a rival node is successful in sieging the metropolis, that vassal node is then in the positino to rush to be the metropolis in that cluster.
This is the idea behind the node system - encourage sieging more distant nodes, not those right next to you.
I really don't think that its. Even if you watch Lazypeons video that he just put how he even talks about being able to siege the node next to you that is locking you out from growing. He didn't specifically say parent node but if you are being locked out of growing its probably going to be the parent node from what we know so far.
I'll give you a run down on what your thinking.
Background: You are in a metropolis node cluster/family, you are a level 4 node being locked out of growth by a level 5 node.
1) A neighboring node cluster has a level 6 node
2) You, your buddies, and everyone else in your node cluster decide they wish to siege the neighboring node for a reason, one of which is unknown at this time(I am still in belief that land is the king item people want).
3) After careful planning and a high cost you successfully siege that node.
The End... Or not? Well you don't get any land from them unless we do what you recommend so lets see how that would play out.
I believe you are saying that the vassal node (level 4) that participated in the siege could be the next metropolis in that cluster... But that is so far from likely to happen. In order for that to work these conditions would have to be met.
1) No other nodes under the zone of influence of the former metropolis
2) If there are nodes in that cluster people are so very slow at providing XP to their node growth.
That level 4 node is going to give up everything they have and that they built to move to another cluster to start back out at the crossroads level and attempt to start over? Not going to happen on most if not all occasions.
---Edit----
Also can you explain how citizenship limit plays a role? Yes it would stop the mass rush of people living there now ungrowable level 3/4/5 node but that in my head would give people more of incentive to want their node that they live at succeed and maybe even grow to the next level. That citizenship limit makes you care even more about your node and will make you not want to live it in most situations, especially if the better nodes are full. This would have people grow bitter about the system that is chaining them down as well.
I do however think that there would be a benefit to furthering the diplomacy of nodes. I would love to see agressive diplomacy between master nodes and their vassals, though I appreciate i do not know the full scope of what is currently planned.
I think it is a worthwhile avenue to look at, but I'd hate for newcomers to come on here and see people already assuming the node system won't work with the game still pre-alpha. I did think last night that some people seemed to have made up their mind already.
Since this assumption is wrong, anything resting on it probably is too.
And youtubers are wrong all the time about this game.
That's not how that works. If land is not the king item people want that is fine. People will still want sieges regardless because it is a cool mechanic. However, even Steven said nodes (land) are the core of this game. People usually want to be enveloped in the core of the game.
Also nothing I have said about how the current mechanics are wrong according to the information we have gather on the wiki.
I am trying to have people poke holes in my understanding. You attempted with your reasoning to attack far away nodes, I countered with my explanation based on current mechanics that your node which is moving over there will not be able to get to level 6. Heck they will probably have to be lucky to make it 4.
You can't really disagree with someones opinion, assume thats what their core belief structure is based on and then dismiss their words are "meh". Now if you are bored of the discussion and no longer wish to speak about it that's another thing entirely haha.
This comment
Nodes are core to this game, but nodes do not equal land.
For the first week or two of the game, there may be sieges against neighbors - this is absolutely true. After that though, not likely.
When you get a node cluster that has a level 6 node with several level 5 nodes around it, the citizens from the level 5 nodes can't siege the level 6. Should the level 6 node be defeated in a siege by someone else, the level 5 nodes could well then attempt to siege each other, but that would be a waste. If one node sieges another, they are then taking time and resources away from the leveling process. While they may siege the node they attack successfully, there will be another level 5 node that they aren't sieging, that is then able to carry on leveling unmolested, and beat both of the other two nodes to level 6, potentially then turning those nodes in to vassals.
In this situation, it isn't a case of "you can't", but rather there are better things to spend your time on. Sure I can, if your opinion is based on an assumption that is not true (as it is here), then I can tell you that your opinion is wrong, because the assumption is wrong.
If you form an opinion based on a false assumption and then find out about that false assumption, you should then alter your opinion.
If you don't, what value is your opinion?
Nodes definitely equal land/property. Bigger node = better housing and more freeholds.
I see what you are saying about the level 5 and 6s. That's a great point. You are going to have to do a RA (risk analysis) on if sieging your neighbors is worth it or not. I love that part.
Further more taking someones words out of context is not the wisest of arguments. Obviously you can disagree with a opinion.
But can we clarify which assumption is wrong because you lost me there.
They haven’t made any false assumptions. Node types have significantly different features, and larger nodes DO cover more land. That’s a basic fact. An Economic metro enables rather wide reaching markets. An Scientific metro enables rather wide reaching fast travel. A Religious metro has more space for temples which are necessary for advanced enchanting.
It makes perfect sense that differing node types will want to siege their parents of a different type. Of course they would fight with and race their neighbors so their preferred node type reach metro level after a successful siege.
So maybe I am confused about this whole system like you suggest, maybe you can help me out.
I've heard multiple times from multiple people, including Steven himself, things along the lines of "A nearby node might be prohibiting your node from leveling, so you'll need to siege it down in order to keep growing."
But that clearly is not possible given the system as it currently stands.
So could you explain what's up with this inconsistency in design philosophy?
Well first, yes it is possible to siege a nearby node. Very possible. The only thing that's not possible (currently, at least), is for citizens of nodes to participate in sieges of parent nodes or affiliate nodes? Something like that. But in order to be a citizen, you need to both purchase housing within a node and also apply for citizenship in that node. Even if you own housing in a node, it doesn't automatically make you a citizen. And, you can only ever be a citizen of one node ("Only one citizenship may be declared per account, per server." However, if you declare citizenship, you will automatically be registered as a defender in any sieges of your node or your parents node (and maybe also other nodes in the zone of influence, not sure about that...).
So it very much is possible to siege adjacent nodes. In fact, if you haven't registered as a citizen, you are welcome to participate in any siege and for either side of that siege. You are only limited if you are a citizen. And given how limited player housing is actually going to be within nodes, I think that only a very small percentage of the player base are going to be citizens. That will all depend on 1) available housing, 2) citizenship tickets, 3) players actually applying for citizenship given they are eligible.
I will say that in order to even declare a siege, you have to go through a quest line to obtain a scroll to do so. And that, in itself, may present its own set of difficulties in sieging a node. Higher nodes will require more specialized scrolls that require more time and effort to acquire. I'm interested to see how all of that pans out.
If you really want to establish your node as the dominant node early on, then siege early and siege often. The longer the nodes around you have to level, the more prepared they will be for a future siege. You can't siege a node until it is at least level 3, but if you really want to dominate an area, siege any surrounding areas quickly. It will reset those nodes to 0, give you plunder to fund your node, will help ensure your node doesn't get cockblocked from leveling up further, and will make your node more appealing to players in the region.
I think it is important to point out that the basic geographic area of a node doesn't increase, but rather its zone of influence is what increases. In the Wiki for 'Zone of Influence', "Every node is given purview over a predefined geographic area called a Zone of influence (ZOI)". As I understand, when a node levels up and makes a vassal of a nearby neighboring node, then the zone of influence (ZOI) of the parent node increases by extending as far as the ZOI of the vassal(s) it has acquired. The vassals still have their own ZOI, but now their ZOI is added to the ZOI of the parent.
The vassals also have the opportunity to make further vassals of their own, and when that happens then the ZOI of the vassal is increased which also increases the ZOI of its parent node. In that way, the ZOI of the largest nodes can extend quite a measurable distance.
Thanks you for the thought out response! I completely forgot citizenship tickets weren't a concrete thing yet or if they are even going to be. I also thought they said something in one of these big AMAs about not being able to own non instanced housing in a node unless you were a citizen (reason being people could then just horde tons of property). I could be wrong on this part though and misunderstood something being said.
Regarding what you are saying with the land... A freehold is placed in nodes ZOI so a level 3 node will have less space for freeholds compared to a level 4 node in almost all cases. Don't know if you were disputing that or not. Just wanted to clarify.
ZOIs are the node’s land, is what I’m saying. Higher levels equate to more space for the node. And metros are in fact larger than villages. Even in the alpha gameplay we’ve seen, it’s pretty easy to tell the actual reach of the infrastructure is farther with each upgrade. They are geographically larger. How else would a level 4 node have more housing and more features than a level 2 node if not for more land space?
When the wiki says "Every node is given purview over a predefined geographic area called a Zone of influence (ZOI)", that simply means every node has a defined area that contributes to its growth. That initial ZOI will grow and expand with the node, if it didn’t, it would never encompass any other node, as none of the ZOIs will overlap at the start of the game.
I don’t really understand how you can confidently say “you can siege nearby nodes” when you are more likely than not to be in the ZoI of any nearby nodes that are a higher level than you, thus locking you out.
Or how you say “siege early and often,” then go on to describe how difficult initiating a siege can be. As soon as your neighboring node hits level 3, unless you siege them down before they hit 4 and your node follows to 3 and people start becoming citizens, you’re likely to never get the chance. And I don’t really see a siege happening like that in the first weeks of the game.
And you say “just don’t be citizens” casually, but what if the citizens of a child node don’t want to be part of their parent node? They have to sell (and subsequently lose) their housing in order to continue growing their node? What’s the point? If anything, that’s going to cause multiple accounts to be rampant in order to save houses so your main can siege unabated.
It just doesn’t really make sense. The way I see this system shaking down is child nodes making deals with foreign metros to siege their parent metro, with the offending child node promising to take as many spots in the siege defense as possible in order to potentially sabotage the siege.
While an interesting gameplay angle in its own right, I don’t really think that’s what we’re going for here.
I may be misunderstanding how ZOI's work, which is fully possible. I understand it like this:
Take a chessboard. It's an 8x8 grid with 64 spaces. A level 0 node has no infrastructure, a level 1 node would encompass a 1x1 area, a level 2 nodes infrastructure might encompass a 2x2 area, and so on. The village turns into a town, which turns into a city, which turns into a metropolis which may end up taking up 6x6 of the board with only the very outer edge of the chessboard unoccupied. The inner 6x6 area is 36 squares of the entire 64 square board, which would be a massive sprawling Metropolis taking up most of the node. It's just an analogy to explain how I view the relationship between nodes, their size, and their ZOI. The geographical region of the node never changes (it's always a 8x8 chessboard), but the city size changes as the node levels and allows for more plots of land, housing, etc.
And of course as a node levels up, it's ZOI increases by turning surrounding nodes into vassals, which helps with the economy through taxes, and helps with growing the nodes XP by getting XP from vassals, and so forth.
That's how I see it all working, but again, I'm not 100% sure that's how it is meant to function, or how it will function at all.
If you are participating in a siege against a node in the same cluster as yourself, you are sieging friends.
This will happen at times, but it will not be common. What will be more common than this is the leadership (mayors and guild leaders) in these clusters working together, rather than working against each other.
These node clusters could probably be looked at as nations in regards to the system. You aren't going to siege your capital (outside of a civil war, which Intrepid have said won't be a thing). But, if you are unruly, your capital may put their foot down (this has nothing to do with current events).
Even if you call a certain node "home", and exist within the ZOI of a larger node that is your parent, you can still participate and even initiate sieges on that parent node. As far as I can tell, the only thing stopping you is if you claim citizenship. Owning property in a node does not automatically make you a citizen, but owning property is a requirement before you can claim citizenship (at least right now it is). And if you renounce your citizenship, you don't automatically give up the rights to your property. You will still retain all of your property that you've paid for.
So I believe that yes, you absolutely can own property in your node and still participate in sieges against neighboring nodes. However, if you apply for and claim citizenship in your node, you will lock yourself out.
I did say "siege early and often", if you can manage it and if the main goal is to dominate the region. If your node is already the highest level around, sieging isn't even needed. But if you can, it would make sense to siege rival nodes in order to help guarantee your nodes dominance. Now in order to initiate a siege, there's some kind of quest that must be done/undergone first. I have no idea how difficult those quests are, but I read that the difficulty increases with the level of the node you are trying to siege. So, if you think that sieging surrounding nodes is inevitable, you might as well try and do it early so it's not as difficult or as time consuming. That's what I meant by siege early and often. Maybe not... often, so maybe just siege early
I understand that it would be unhealthy for the game if it was way too easy for nodes to be destroyed. The estimated timeline for going from level 0 to level 6 is estimated to be many weeks. In the models I've created, it takes roughly 70 days from the beginning of the game until the first Metro is created. It takes a lot of player time and investment in order to grow a node to level 6, and it would seem extremely unfair if it took considerably less effort to see it all razed to the ground. Having high level nodes so easily destroyed in the game could have drastic repercussions, so much so that it could cause players to quit.
Also, claiming citizenship has its benefits. From the Wiki:
It would seem to go against the idea of Risk vs. Reward if players could gain all the benefits of citizenship and risk absolutely nothing by participating in sieges against sister/parent nodes. And giving up your citizenship, even temporarily, would seem a small price to pay. Unless you are the mayor, in which case... that would be a heavier price.
But I just thought of something. Mayoral terms are monthly. Being mayor requires citizenship. I read in the Wiki that the only way to end a term limit early is to destroy the node. So... if you are mayor, and you renounce your citizenship, are you still mayor until the end of the month?
Yeah I think you got it. Each node has a border. at stage 3 it may only take up a small portion of its border with its ZOI. As it increase in stages its ZOI will continue growing inside that border. We both could be misunderstanding it frankly but I think thats right. We really dont have a ton to go in regards to node border vs ZOI.
Haven't we come to the conclusion that you can't do that? I might have missed something though.
I am pointing out why the system is the way it is.
However, there will be times when you will be able to do this - even if it isn't a good idea. If your metropolis is sieged, the nodes that were previously vassals of that node are now free to siege each other - however if one should do this, the chances that they will become a vassal of one of the other nodes in that cluster is very high.
Here's a GIF I've created that models the first 365 days of a node system. It's just a model, so take it with a grain of salt. I've only spent 2 days on it, but it's working so far.
1. Node 1's appear in day 1
2. Node 2's appear in day 2
3. Node 3's appear in day 3
4. Node 4's appear in day 12
5. Node 5's appear in day 34
6. Node 6's appear in day 73
The model also keeps track of zone of influence, but it doesn't show that. There is an XP system behind the scenes though, and excess XP is given to parent nodes, as the game suggests it should (although at a reduced rate).
Anyways, I like how the distribution of nodes 1-5 stays fairly even. Lots of node 0's, which would suggest plenty of places for players to go gathering resources. And in this particular model, in a year, a level 6 node is only ever destroyed twice. I put in a very small chance each day for nodes level 3 and above to "blow up", and that chance gets lower as the node grows.
I think it's also clear that as time goes on, the rate at which nodes change slows down. I think this was always expected, but it's good to actually see it. Of course, throw players into the system and all chaos may ensue.
Again, it's not perfect! Just a model! But it's fun to watch.
I think I'm going to also create another grid, but the next one will track ZOI regions for nodes. I think that would be fun to see evolve over time.
This is actually pretty dope.
I explained it already, the ZOI of any given node depends entirely on its level. A level 1 node has a significantly smaller ZOI than a metropolis.
The potential size of a node’s ZOI is static, but the actual size of its ZOI at any given time is dependent on its level. Encompassing vassals doesn’t actually increase that node’s ZOI, it will simply siphon off extra exp gathered in the ZOIs of its vassals after those vassals have maxed out on exp. Any exp accrued outside the metro’s ZOI goes to the earning node first, then onto the parent only if the vassal is maxed out.
To use your analogy, a zone’s ZOI could potentially encompass an 16x16 square mile grid, which can and will overlap with the other 16x16 grids of neighboring nodes’ potential ZOIs, but at level 1, the only exp that node will receive comes from the centermost 1x1, which makes its ZOI 1 square mile at the center where activities count toward node growth.
Once it reaches level 2, it will earn exp from the centermost 2x2, which makes its ZOI 4 square miles in which exp earned will go toward node growth. At level 3, 4x4. At level 5, 8x8. At (lvl6) metro, the full 16x16.
Of course ZOIs will also be affected by geography, but for the most part, higher level, larger geographic area covered by its ZOI.
I think the only thing I would disagree with is the first part. I believe that it is quite the opposite. I believe the potential size of a nodes ZOI is variable, where as the geographical size of a nodes base ZOI is what is static. I think a nodes ZOI doesn't necessarily grow just because the nodes level grows, but a nodes overall ZOI only grows when it makes vassals of surrounding nodes.
It's been stated that at no point will you ever be on the map and not be within some nodes ZOI. That leads me to believe that even at the very beginning, base level node ZOIs are clearly drawn out and a nodes geographical region is equal to its base ZOI. At the very beginning, no matter where you are or what you're doing, you are contributing something to a nodes development. And that is going to remain true throughout the game.
So what happens when a node levels up to level 1? Would its ZOI overlap with surrounding level 0's? Or are you suggesting that its ZOI would grow and then "push out" the level 0's, and the overall size of the ZOI of the 0's would shrink?