A dominant guild ceases to be dominant when it fractures internally. Basically, 'when the guild chooses to no longer be dominant'.
Players outside the guild barely affect this. This is my definition of dominance. Where your actions have no real effect on a group, but they can easily affect yours.
This happens because of the Thousand Spears, relative to smaller guilds.
A dictator has an army of 1000 spearmen. 20% are loyal, the others are less so. But they all appear to be loyal, and don't communicate as much openly (this is what smaller guilds are like, almost by definition, if not, they're a Federation).
The first man to say 'down with the Emperor' finds themselves facing at least 900 spears.
Until the Emperor falls, no one says 'down with the Emperor' because it's pointless. Those who are not yet ready to say that, kill them.
Small guilds don't rise up against big guilds because they would have to successfully perfectly organize a single justified uprising, or they get stomped into nothingness by the big guild and the neutrals.
I have not seen a single game mechanic on the entire Wiki that will prevent the above. I concede that we have completely different ideas of human nature, so I welcome any discussion on the above, but if 'no, that doesn't happen', is your response to the Thousand Spears, or 'eventually there are no loyalists left', then I'll accept that we can't agree.
You should probably stop using real world examples since it's a game. Main reason that your situation works is if someone dies in real life, it's over. It's not the same in a game. Not only that, the metaphor is wrong. It would be more appropriate to have a bunch of dictators and the spearmen divided among them in random amounts. Some with more and some with less.
There aren't mechanics designed to directly fight it because the situation doesn't happen and anything you did to try to fight it would hinder cooperation.
Indirectly, the limited resources and node mechanics go against it. Not everyone can live in a metro but many will want to. If you are in a large guild, this could mean that you are stuck living outside the metro, where they tell you. It's not hard to imagine how some might not like that and consider rebelling. Even in a vacuum, a large guild would get to a state where the number of people outside of a metro outnumber the people in it, who could have the power to overwhelm the people in the metro. Remove this from the vacuum and put in a world with a variety of guilds/alliances, the group outside of the metro doesn't even need to wait for more to feel like them. They have other guilds they could join or ally with. The limited resources will cause the same situation.
I think the best example of how this has gone in other games can be seen in this video of eve's evolving politics. the blobs are alliances and the space they cover is the land they control. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wROn9oDULpE&t=1s
That video is not in any way an indication of the thing you claimed it was an indication of. I thought you had played EVE? Am I misremembering?
What do you think that is an indicator of?
It is an indicator of the fact that the largest guilds eventually 'chose to stop being dominant' (i.e. fractured).
Being dominant is not about 'preventing anyone else from doing anything', only 'being a powerful enough force that no one could reasonably oppose your goals without paying a heavy, sometimes crippling price, to their own'. If it wasn't clear that I was making the argument from this stance, I apologize.
Anyone can aim for pyrrhic victory, but most gamers won't, because they play games for fun, not 'to punish or hurt their oppressors'.
It's precisely because it's a game that I expect Thousand Spears to work more effectively, because it always has in any situation I encountered. In short, the little guy realizes that they have no power unless they go along with the big guild anyway, do nothing or help to squash anyone who does try, and wait until the big guild 'decides' not to be a superpower anymore.
EDIT: I just realized that you didn't actually clarify if you played EVE or not. A lot of the groups in that heatmap in the video are allied.
As you said, it's a game. In a pvp game, most people think it's fun to win. People don't want to win to "punish or hurt their oppressors," they want to win because people like winning. I'm not going to die fighting the oppressors or lose loved ones in the process. I'm going to have fun trying to overcome a challenge.
I don't think the Thousand Spears works because there is never one dictator. You can join another "dictator." You could even seek out one that is in conflict with the one you are being "oppressed" by. Can you tell me a game where your thousand spears scenario played out and explain what happened?
Ashes mechanics encourage you to fight. Only so many guilds can control castles and only so many people can live in metros. The best items will be from worlds bosses that only one group will be able to claim each spawn. Wither it's through caravans, wars, or sieges, you get something from it and the reward will generally be greater the stronger the opponent.
I'm honestly willing to give full examples (two, actually) but both are long, and I'd like to clear up one prerequisite first.
You say that Ashes' mechanics encourage you to fight. This is the part I'm not confident in/willing to support. I don't doubt that if Ashes has enough psychological triggers to actually encourage people to fight even when their chances of winning are less than say, 15% (arbitrary number, for some interactions it might as well be 0, but claiming that is hyperbole), then it will play out the other way.
My point is that I don't see those as existing in a way that will topple any large powerful guild, unless the benefits for being in smaller guilds will be massively more powerful than whatever benefits one obtains from Reliquaries, etc.
But I've already conceded that point to @Taiphee . So if I give an example of a game where 'the size of your large guild did not give you a relative weakness', it is useless if the perception is 'Ashes has strong bonuses for small guilds', because the scenario wouldn't match.
I'd be giving those examples as examples of 'the fact that people who are going to lose and then suffer, chose not to fight, and instead just went along with the powerful'. That's what the Thousand Spears is about, at its core.
Lots of games encourage you to fight, many of them don't even penalize you for losing, and people still get demoralized simply from 'losing too much' and quit those games (an equivalent action in Ashes could be to give up and join the winning side). As I always say, MMOs don't even get matchmaking.
So just so I don't waste your time and mine, what exactly do you think Ashes does that encourages a meaningfully disadvantaged group, to engage in a fight where they can lose something? Let's for example say that the 'Rulers' of the Metropolis respond to any aggression (in the form of sabotage or just Guild Wars with the rulers) from a Vassal node by initiating a siege to destroy that Vassal node. The Guild in the Vassal Node can lose their node, the Metropolis can't be attacked by their Vassals anyway. If this is a useless scenario to your point, feel free to ignore it.
The game isn't going to encourage you to enter an un-winnable fight and it's not supposed to.
What the game encourages you to do is win and you need to figure out how you are going to do that. Most likely, the disadvantaged group needs to talk to people and get allies. A big part of this game is supposed to be interacting with people. Yes, you can play in a small group but if you want to challenge 100+ people, you should be bringing a similar number of people.
As a side note, i get a since of urgency from your posts. They don't need to win tomorrow, it's something they can work on over time and challenge them when they are ready.
Ok thanks, I won't bother detailing all those points because they don't fit your definitions, as far as I can tell.
Sorry for dragging it out, I feel like there's a pretty good chance I understand your position now. o7
Sorry, my native language is Erlang.
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
I dunno that "known and studied" has much meaning in any game that doesn't have Ashes' Node system.
But, eventually, we will know, once we actually play.
I dunno that "known and studied" has much meaning in any game that doesn't have Ashes' Node system.
But, eventually, we will know, once we actually play.
For my education, truly, what part of the Ashes' Node system are we considering to be unique enough that this would matter? At least one of my examples would have come from a game with 'over 100 locations that are heavily influenced by, or entirely built up by, players'.
But obviously, if it was exactly Ashes, then it would be Ashes.
So I just want to know if any game design theories that show up in other games are demoted to 'not having much meaning' if the game is not extremely similar, or if games like Elite Dangerous (specifically the PowerPlay aspect, if you want to look it up) are 'allowed to be brought as evidence'.
Sorry, my native language is Erlang.
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
The game isn't going to encourage you to enter an un-winnable fight and it's not supposed to.
What the game encourages you to do is win and you need to figure out how you are going to do that. Most likely, the disadvantaged group needs to talk to people and get allies. A big part of this game is supposed to be interacting with people. Yes, you can play in a small group but if you want to challenge 100+ people, you should be bringing a similar number of people.
As a side note, i get a since of urgency from your posts. They don't need to win tomorrow, it's something they can work on over time and challenge them when they are ready.
Um. What do I lose when I defend someone's caravan?
What do I lose when I join a Siege to attack a tyrant mega-guild?
In those cases, I lose nothing for joining a supposedly un-winnable fight.
And, yes, some people enjoy supporting the underdogs.
This isn't an rts. Yes, more ships are better but if a guild doesn't have the numbers to man them, then it doesn't mean much. Just because they can't face you in a full on fight doesn't mean they are crippled.
I like how you kept questioning details so I was getting in to finer and finer points, and then eventually just decided to say that those finer points don't matter in the larger picture.
If a guild can stop them getting wood, that guild can stop them doing what ever. The smaller guild is then left with the ability to only do the things the larger guild allows them to do - or doesn't care if they do.
Sorry, i enjoy getting sucked into your scenarios and sometimes need to back out of the question to see if it makes since.
You created this scenario where you can "cripple" a guild by stopping them from making a boat (which you can't). You followed that up by saying they must submit to you because they can't make their boat (which they can).
Yes, i decided that even if they couldn't get a boat, the lack of a boat doesn't mean your guild is crippled. I also haven't come up with a replacement for the boat that would cripple a guild.
Take it right back to the start - the point of denying this guild wood is because they would otherwise challenge (or attempt to challenge) the dominant guild out at sea.
One ship isn't going to allow for this, they need many (or several, at least).
Them successfully building *a* ship isn't an issue. In fact, if they expect to build a ship every week, but their first takes them three weeks, that in itself may dissuade them from attempting that challenge at all.
If I have 10 ships and can build one a week, but it takes them three weeks to build one ship, they aren't likely to want to challenge me at sea any time soon.
Sure manpower is an issue, but if they are in any serious position to challenge the dominant guild at sea, they should have that manpower. If they don't have it, they aren't a threat.
The game isn't going to encourage you to enter an un-winnable fight and it's not supposed to.
What the game encourages you to do is win and you need to figure out how you are going to do that. Most likely, the disadvantaged group needs to talk to people and get allies. A big part of this game is supposed to be interacting with people. Yes, you can play in a small group but if you want to challenge 100+ people, you should be bringing a similar number of people.
As a side note, i get a since of urgency from your posts. They don't need to win tomorrow, it's something they can work on over time and challenge them when they are ready.
Um. What do I lose when I defend someone's caravan?
What do I lose when I join a Siege to attack a tyrant mega-guild?
In those cases, I lose nothing for joining a supposedly un-winnable fight.
And, yes, some people enjoy supporting the underdogs.
You gain that mega-tyrant guild as an enemy, if you join in opposing them often enough.
A dominant guild becomes dominant when they no longer need to fight everyone. A guild that is still fighting everyone is not dominant, it is trying to become dominant.
If this guild you are talking about truly is dominant, they will generally be leaving you alone - unless you start joining in on those fights
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mcstackersonMember, Phoenix Initiative, Royalty, Kickstarter, Alpha One
It is easier to cause large groups to fracture, or in fact, not even form, if the benefit of forming that group, e.g. access to Guild Reliquaries, stat boosts, other bonuses, are limited to a small group of people and then have to be handed out to others at the discretion of the small group.
So far, I see no signs of this in Ashes. 300 people getting a Reliquary bonus, the whole alliance having access to the same market and crafters easily, the whole node and surrounding nodes having a direct benefit from the stability of the node, with few direct limits on this...
Ok, i'm confused. Tell me if we went over this or i'm missing context.
If i get you, you are saying that you don't see how Ashes design has limited benefits for a small group when that is exactly what the node system does. I worry that you aren't seeing small as relative to server population. If i get your example, you have 300 people with benefits, 1500 on a server with 5 metros. That is 1,500 out of 15,000 - 35,000 people who have benefits. Sure, we can debate numbers but i don't think you can say that design isn't there.
The open world content also accomplishes this since only one group can farm a location at a time, limiting the resources that are generated and the people who can benefit from them.
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mcstackersonMember, Phoenix Initiative, Royalty, Kickstarter, Alpha One
This isn't an rts. Yes, more ships are better but if a guild doesn't have the numbers to man them, then it doesn't mean much. Just because they can't face you in a full on fight doesn't mean they are crippled.
I like how you kept questioning details so I was getting in to finer and finer points, and then eventually just decided to say that those finer points don't matter in the larger picture.
If a guild can stop them getting wood, that guild can stop them doing what ever. The smaller guild is then left with the ability to only do the things the larger guild allows them to do - or doesn't care if they do.
Sorry, i enjoy getting sucked into your scenarios and sometimes need to back out of the question to see if it makes since.
You created this scenario where you can "cripple" a guild by stopping them from making a boat (which you can't). You followed that up by saying they must submit to you because they can't make their boat (which they can).
Yes, i decided that even if they couldn't get a boat, the lack of a boat doesn't mean your guild is crippled. I also haven't come up with a replacement for the boat that would cripple a guild.
Take it right back to the start - the point of denying this guild wood is because they would otherwise challenge (or attempt to challenge) the dominant guild out at sea.
One ship isn't going to allow for this, they need many (or several, at least).
Them successfully building *a* ship isn't an issue. In fact, if they expect to build a ship every week, but their first takes them three weeks, that in itself may dissuade them from attempting that challenge at all.
If I have 10 ships and can build one a week, but it takes them three weeks to build one ship, they aren't likely to want to challenge me at sea any time soon.
Sure manpower is an issue, but if they are in any serious position to challenge the dominant guild at sea, they should have that manpower. If they don't have it, they aren't a threat.
As we said, even if you could slow them down as much as you said, which is currently a made up number, they could still use other avenues to get ships, like buying resources or ships from other players.
Manpower is also a limit for you since even if you are building ships faster, there is limit on how many of them you can effectively operated at one time. You will need people driving, operating potion launchers, and what ever other functions that need to be done on a ship. Depending the boarding meta, there may be other considerations that effect how many boats you can use. Point of this is it doesn't matter how fast you can make ships if they are able to get as many ships as you are able to use.
Your ships only let you "dominate" the sea. Doesn't do much for the areas inland.
Allies. They don't need to have as many ships as you if they ally themselves with one or more groups that have as many ships as you.
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
I dunno that "known and studied" has much meaning in any game that doesn't have Ashes' Node system.
But, eventually, we will know, once we actually play.
For my education, truly, what part of the Ashes' Node system are we considering to be unique enough that this would matter? At least one of my examples would have come from a game with 'over 100 locations that are heavily influenced by, or entirely built up by, players'.
But obviously, if it was exactly Ashes, then it would be Ashes.
So I just want to know if any game design theories that show up in other games are demoted to 'not having much meaning' if the game is not extremely similar, or if games like Elite Dangerous (specifically the PowerPlay aspect, if you want to look it up) are 'allowed to be brought as evidence'.
I think instead, you should share the name of the game with 'over 100 locations that are heavily influenced by, or entirely built up by, players'."
Everyone here should already know how Nodes work in Ashes. I don't think we know which game it is that is so similar that we should agree that it's been studied well enough to believe Ashes gameplay will playout similarly.
Being dominant is not about 'preventing anyone else from doing anything', only 'being a powerful enough force that no one could reasonably oppose your goals without paying a heavy, sometimes crippling price, to their own'. If it wasn't clear that I was making the argument from this stance, I apologize.
Yes. You are using a different concept of "dominant" than pretty much everyone else in this thread.
No one will care much about a mega-guild that is simply the most powerful. And no one will be trying to obstruct a guild's goals simply because it's the most powerful. If the conflict of goals is minimal, of course there will be little to no conflict of goals.
Ashes is designed to foment conflict:
Again...
"If one mega-guild dominates a server by establishing three Scientific Metros, it's very likely that the rest of the server would band together to try to take at least one of them down in order to have a Metro with a different Node type.
Most likely, the server would band together earlier to make sure the mega-guild's third Scientific City never becomes a Metro. Especially if most people on the server are anti-fast travel.
In Ashes, if people feel 'dominated', they will try to put an end to that domination.
That's what alliances are for...but they don't even have to be official alliances."
Just look at the title of this topic.
It's not simply about a guild being the most powerful, rather it's about a guild controlling their server... with the implication that others on the server perceive that control to be negative.
Ashes has several incentives to motivate people to band together against the dominators in order to reduce that control... as outlined in my example.
Also, why do you assume the opposition will be a ragtag, motley crew, rather than organized and highly adept?
As we said, even if you could slow them down as much as you said, which is currently a made up number, they could still use other avenues to get ships, like buying resources or ships from other players.
I'm not sure you are thinking things through enough, and the more you try to pull this scenario forward, the more you seem to forget about the start of it.
They can't just buy materials from other players, because those materials are in other nodes and still need to be bought to that node with the shipyard.
if need be, my guild (the dominant guild on the server, remember) can just put a block on that node completely, preventing any caravan getting through.
Sure, we may not maintain it 24/7, but how long do you think that smaller guild or node will last if the only way they can get any materials in to that node is to skip sleep for the night, or take a day off work? There is only realistically 66 hours a week that we need to prevent caravans getting in to that node for, and that is easy to accomplish.
The thing with that is those other guilds know we can and will do this, and so they straight up won't be willing to assist that guild
Even if the object guild bought completed ships, and even if we couldn't stop that happening (we could), all that would mean is that their ships cost them more than ours.
To your point on manpower. Keep in mind, the very premise of what we are talking about here is that my guild is the dominant guild on the server, and we can deny what ever we want to any other guild on the server. As such, manpower isn't an issue for US, but it will be an issue for THEM.
However, even if it were not an issue, even if all we managed to do was take half of their wood from them, that still gives us the advantage. Imagine we both go to battle with 5 ships each, because we each have 40 people. In the first few minutes, we each destroy 2 of the opponents ships. They have no more ships they can use, because they could only build 5. I still have 5 more in reserve though, because I stole all their wood.
Now sure, I may well need to go back to port to get those ships out. This may well mean that I am unable to bring them to bear in this engagement.
However, it does mean that next time, I am still able to bring 5 ships in to a fight, and they are only able to bring 3. I mean, its not like this is arena combat where we engage once, determine an outcome and then it's all done. This is open world, we engage once, determine a winner, then later on we engage again, and again, and again. If you have only prepared for that first engagement, as I said earlier, you have already lost - even if you somehow win that first engagement.
On the other hand, maybe we are repairing ships rather than having them destroyed and replaced. This is absolutely possible.
The thing with this is that in order to repair a ship, you would need wood. If I am limiting their supply of wood, I am limiting their ability to repair their ships - even if they bought them from someone else.
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The point is, without a solid supply of wood to a shipyard, a guild simply can not engage another guild in an ocean based conflict. Attack that supply line, and you cripple the front line. This is war strategy 101.
I know you well enough to know you do not disagree with the above statement.
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mcstackersonMember, Phoenix Initiative, Royalty, Kickstarter, Alpha One
As we said, even if you could slow them down as much as you said, which is currently a made up number, they could still use other avenues to get ships, like buying resources or ships from other players.
I'm not sure you are thinking things through enough, and the more you try to pull this scenario forward, the more you seem to forget about the start of it.
They can't just buy materials from other players, because those materials are in other nodes and still need to be bought to that node with the shipyard.
if need be, my guild (the dominant guild on the server, remember) can just put a block on that node completely, preventing any caravan getting through.
Sure, we may not maintain it 24/7, but how long do you think that smaller guild or node will last if the only way they can get any materials in to that node is to skip sleep for the night, or take a day off work? There is only realistically 66 hours a week that we need to prevent caravans getting in to that node for, and that is easy to accomplish.
The thing with that is those other guilds know we can and will do this, and so they straight up won't be willing to assist that guild
Even if the object guild bought completed ships, and even if we couldn't stop that happening (we could), all that would mean is that their ships cost them more than ours.
To your point on manpower. Keep in mind, the very premise of what we are talking about here is that my guild is the dominant guild on the server, and we can deny what ever we want to any other guild on the server. As such, manpower isn't an issue for US, but it will be an issue for THEM.
However, even if it were not an issue, even if all we managed to do was take half of their wood from them, that still gives us the advantage. Imagine we both go to battle with 5 ships each, because we each have 40 people. In the first few minutes, we each destroy 2 of the opponents ships. They have no more ships they can use, because they could only build 5. I still have 5 more in reserve though, because I stole all their wood.
Now sure, I may well need to go back to port to get those ships out. This may well mean that I am unable to bring them to bear in this engagement.
However, it does mean that next time, I am still able to bring 5 ships in to a fight, and they are only able to bring 3. I mean, its not like this is arena combat where we engage once, determine an outcome and then it's all done. This is open world, we engage once, determine a winner, then later on we engage again, and again, and again. If you have only prepared for that first engagement, as I said earlier, you have already lost - even if you somehow win that first engagement.
On the other hand, maybe we are repairing ships rather than having them destroyed and replaced. This is absolutely possible.
The thing with this is that in order to repair a ship, you would need wood. If I am limiting their supply of wood, I am limiting their ability to repair their ships - even if they bought them from someone else.
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The point is, without a solid supply of wood to a shipyard, a guild simply can not engage another guild in an ocean based conflict. Attack that supply line, and you cripple the front line. This is war strategy 101.
I know you well enough to know you do not disagree with the above statement.
Ok, so now we are going way back to you doing a full blockade where your members give up progressing their characters to try to stop a guild from making a boat.
How long will your guild want to do that? a week? a month?
While you are wasting your time stopping people from making a boat, they don't have to waste their time. They can either build up the mats they need for the boat or do other forms of progression.
More and more people are working from home these days. Wouldn't be hard to jump on during a break if this boat really needed to be made. Also, if you are blockading during prime time, you could go to bed early. No reason to skip sleep.
Those guilds know what you can do...They know that you will waste your members time, barricading a node so they can't make boats. The terror.
We aren't going to pull ships out if odds are stacked against us. No reason to risk the ships. If we lost any, we would build back up and bring them out the next time there is something worth using them for.
One thing you haven't explicitly talked about is shipyards in other locations. If you don't then it wouldn't be hard to get ships made and if you do, you are making an enemy of the whole server. If you do that, you aren't going to be "dominant" much longer.
Ok, so now we are going way back to you doing a full blockade where your members give up progressing their characters to try to stop a guild from making a boat.
This is the first time I have mentioned blockading a specific node.
Previously, comments in relation to things being too much work were under the false assumption that we would need to be going out looking for these caravans, forgetting the fact that we know both the origin and destination of them.
Yes, that guild could well go off and undertake other forms of progression. We are not trying to stop them doing that, we are trying to stop them building ships in order to challenge us on the water.
Also, I am not sure you understand the point of a blockade - or at least the functionality of one. The idea isn't to attack and defeat caravans as they come in to that node, the point is to stop them trying to come to that node.
Lets just recap, we have already held the guild in question off from getting wood by taking their caravans as they leave their origin node. This probably happened for 3 or 4 weeks of taking about half of their wood before they realized they need to come up with another plan, and managed to get that plan in to action. Finding a guild that is willing to go directly against the dominant guild on a server (which, if you remember, is the scenario we are talking about here) is no easy task. Realistically, the guild in question will not find a single guild both willing and capable of running wood to them.
As I said, I have been both in that dominant guild, and on servers where another guild was dominant. They don't fall due to the actions of lesser guilds, they fall due to the actions of their own leadership. Most guilds on such a server will either know this already, or very quickly come to learn it - you will not find a guild willing to assist you in fighting against a dominant guild if you are struggling to build a ship.
Even if we ignore the above and assume you find a guild that is willing - how long are they willing to wait? Do you think they are going to run a caravan to any node that has a half dozen of my guild members standing watch nearby - especially if the last time they ran a caravan in to a node that had a half dozen of my guild nearby, we attacked them with 100? If we shadow their caravan, do you not think they would get spoked and just cancel the run? I mean, if I task 100 players to guard this node, each player need only perform that task once every 1 and a half weeks or so. Most top end guilds I have been in would be able to keep that up for years, if there was a need for it (there is no need for that length here).
Again, when it comes to the guild in question, the idea is to attack and take their stuff. When it comes to others, the idea is to scare them off.
Now, you say that this guild could just go off and participate in other forms of progression. Indeed they could. However, since my objective was to stop them attempting to challenge us on the water, is this anything other than a complete win for me and my guild?
You don't really seem to be thinking things through, to be honest. Either that, or you are constantly forgetting that we are talking about a dominant guild - or have not experienced a dominant guild and the effect that has on other guilds on a server.
One thing you haven't explicitly talked about is shipyards in other locations. If you don't then it wouldn't be hard to get ships made and if you do, you are making an enemy of the whole server. If you do that, you aren't going to be "dominant" much longer.
I did talk about getting other guilds to build ships for the guild in question - but again, on a server with a dominant guild, very few guilds are going to be willing to risk this.
If we work on the assumption that you seem to have picked up on here in that we are generally at peace with most guilds, despite being the dominant guild, why would anyone risk that peace? I mean, if they lose one siege, they lose their shipyard.
In all honesty, a more likely scenario would be that a guild would offer to build them a ship, ask for half up front, and then offer the ship to us for the balance.
I dunno that "known and studied" has much meaning in any game that doesn't have Ashes' Node system.
But, eventually, we will know, once we actually play.
For my education, truly, what part of the Ashes' Node system are we considering to be unique enough that this would matter? At least one of my examples would have come from a game with 'over 100 locations that are heavily influenced by, or entirely built up by, players'.
But obviously, if it was exactly Ashes, then it would be Ashes.
So I just want to know if any game design theories that show up in other games are demoted to 'not having much meaning' if the game is not extremely similar, or if games like Elite Dangerous (specifically the PowerPlay aspect, if you want to look it up) are 'allowed to be brought as evidence'.
I think instead, you should share the name of the game with 'over 100 locations that are heavily influenced by, or entirely built up by, players'."
Everyone here should already know how Nodes work in Ashes. I don't think we know which game it is that is so similar that we should agree that it's been studied well enough to believe Ashes gameplay will playout similarly.
Being dominant is not about 'preventing anyone else from doing anything', only 'being a powerful enough force that no one could reasonably oppose your goals without paying a heavy, sometimes crippling price, to their own'. If it wasn't clear that I was making the argument from this stance, I apologize.
Yes. You are using a different concept of "dominant" than pretty much everyone else in this thread.
No one will care much about a mega-guild that is simply the most powerful. And no one will be trying to obstruct a guild's goals simply because it's the most powerful. If the conflict of goals is minimal, of course there will be little to no conflict of goals.
Ashes is designed to foment conflict:
Again...
"If one mega-guild dominates a server by establishing three Scientific Metros, it's very likely that the rest of the server would band together to try to take at least one of them down in order to have a Metro with a different Node type.
Most likely, the server would band together earlier to make sure the mega-guild's third Scientific City never becomes a Metro. Especially if most people on the server are anti-fast travel.
In Ashes, if people feel 'dominated', they will try to put an end to that domination.
That's what alliances are for...but they don't even have to be official alliances."
Just look at the title of this topic.
It's not simply about a guild being the most powerful, rather it's about a guild controlling their server... with the implication that others on the server perceive that control to be negative.
Ashes has several incentives to motivate people to band together against the dominators in order to reduce that control... as outlined in my example.
Also, why do you assume the opposition will be a ragtag, motley crew, rather than organized and highly adept?
Your reflection 'technique' is 'good', or at least, 'impenetrable'. But I have no interest in the Infinite Mirroring scenario of discussion.
If everyone else in the thread is using a different definition, then I have been educated sufficiently on what that definition is, and since only Noaani seems to remain with any objection to that definition, I will assume that either any other readers of this thread are satisfied with both the definition, and my education, or they will have something to say when I bow out of it.
Elite Dangerous' current iteration was released in December 2014 after a two year kickstarter, having spent a while in planning before that point.
Whether or not you consider a game with 600 Control systems (which are star systems controlled by a particular superpower which in turn influence 15-20 others, all available for player manipulation, to be chosen as a home and altered by their actions) to be similar to Ashes or not (after all, you can't destroy StarPorts, only change who controls them and thus interactions, or rather, such things as Starport Destruction only happen by Dev intervention) is up to you. There are other games with Nodes, Regions, and so on that can change in control and effect, but they obviously have less freedom than Ashes, so you could simply deny the relevance of them all, if you wished.
o7, as they say.
EDIT: As for why I'm willing to think like that, I have to. I'm usually a manager of programmers. There are entire programming frameworks that people get hired for knowing or studying that have existed for less than 10 years. So in my line of work that's the point where 'known and studied' can be used relative to methodologies, best practices, and techniques. I genuinely ask to be educated if 10 years is not enough.
Sorry, my native language is Erlang.
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mcstackersonMember, Phoenix Initiative, Royalty, Kickstarter, Alpha One
Ok, so now we are going way back to you doing a full blockade where your members give up progressing their characters to try to stop a guild from making a boat.
This is the first time I have mentioned blockading a specific node.
Previously, comments in relation to things being too much work were under the false assumption that we would need to be going out looking for these caravans, forgetting the fact that we know both the origin and destination of them.
Yes, that guild could well go off and undertake other forms of progression. We are not trying to stop them doing that, we are trying to stop them building ships in order to challenge us on the water.
Also, I am not sure you understand the point of a blockade - or at least the functionality of one. The idea isn't to attack and defeat caravans as they come in to that node, the point is to stop them trying to come to that node.
Lets just recap, we have already held the guild in question off from getting wood by taking their caravans as they leave their origin node. This probably happened for 3 or 4 weeks of taking about half of their wood before they realized they need to come up with another plan, and managed to get that plan in to action. Finding a guild that is willing to go directly against the dominant guild on a server (which, if you remember, is the scenario we are talking about here) is no easy task. Realistically, the guild in question will not find a single guild both willing and capable of running wood to them.
As I said, I have been both in that dominant guild, and on servers where another guild was dominant. They don't fall due to the actions of lesser guilds, they fall due to the actions of their own leadership. Most guilds on such a server will either know this already, or very quickly come to learn it - you will not find a guild willing to assist you in fighting against a dominant guild if you are struggling to build a ship.
Even if we ignore the above and assume you find a guild that is willing - how long are they willing to wait? Do you think they are going to run a caravan to any node that has a half dozen of my guild members standing watch nearby - especially if the last time they ran a caravan in to a node that had a half dozen of my guild nearby, we attacked them with 100? If we shadow their caravan, do you not think they would get spoked and just cancel the run? I mean, if I task 100 players to guard this node, each player need only perform that task once every 1 and a half weeks or so. Most top end guilds I have been in would be able to keep that up for years, if there was a need for it (there is no need for that length here).
Again, when it comes to the guild in question, the idea is to attack and take their stuff. When it comes to others, the idea is to scare them off.
Now, you say that this guild could just go off and participate in other forms of progression. Indeed they could. However, since my objective was to stop them attempting to challenge us on the water, is this anything other than a complete win for me and my guild?
You don't really seem to be thinking things through, to be honest. Either that, or you are constantly forgetting that we are talking about a dominant guild - or have not experienced a dominant guild and the effect that has on other guilds on a server.
One thing you haven't explicitly talked about is shipyards in other locations. If you don't then it wouldn't be hard to get ships made and if you do, you are making an enemy of the whole server. If you do that, you aren't going to be "dominant" much longer.
I did talk about getting other guilds to build ships for the guild in question - but again, on a server with a dominant guild, very few guilds are going to be willing to risk this.
If we work on the assumption that you seem to have picked up on here in that we are generally at peace with most guilds, despite being the dominant guild, why would anyone risk that peace? I mean, if they lose one siege, they lose their shipyard.
In all honesty, a more likely scenario would be that a guild would offer to build them a ship, ask for half up front, and then offer the ship to us for the balance.
Yes, internal issues are one of the reasons they fall but that isn't the only way they get contested for their position. The fact these internal issues happen is one of the reasons "dominant" guilds don't stick around.
I have also played games and i have watched guilds rise and fall. Guilds ally, guilds merge, and people move. New people come in and other people leave.
In order for your statement of them only falling because of internal issues to be true, the strongest guild would have to be the one that showed up in the beginning and every "dominant" guild after that would have to be weaker than the previous. I could see this happening in a game where the population is in decline but even then, I wonder if you are ignoring cases where you saw a guild rise up instead of them always falling down.
Was the dominant guild you were in only dominant because the previous dominant guild fell apart?
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
edited February 2022
The definition of the original poster: "what's to prevent a 1,200 member mega-guild, or two, from completely taking over the server and ruining the game for the rest of us."
That's the context for the topic.
That's also the definition mcstackerson is using in his debate with noanni...and with you.
"Some guilds gain power and create a large footprint but i wouldn't consider it dominating."
Obviously, if no one feels the most powerful guild on the server is ruining their gameplay, it's unlikely they will band together to oppose that guild's goals.
To deny any relevance, I have to have a clear, comparable example.
Having Nodes/Regions that can change in control is not enough.
New World also has Nodes/Regions that can change control, but the ramifications of control are not necessarily enough to trigger players to care much because simply owning a large portion of the map does not significantly change the gameplay of the rest of the players. The only people who care are the people who already love PvP combat and don't need much incentive to engage in PvP combat.
So, Azherae, you should provide an example where a mega-guild in Elite Dangerous went down a path that ruined the game for the rest of the server, but no one chose to confront them. And if they chose not to because it was an unwinnable situation...what made it unwinnable?
In the example I provided, fracturing the mega-guild such that it is no longer the most powerful is not even the goal... the goal is to stop the guild from ruining gameplay for the rest of the server...specifically, the goal would be to stop the server from having too many Scientific Metros with fast travel.
Also, does Elite Dangerous provide guild structures designed specifically to reduce the impact of mega-guilds? Does Elite Dangerous offer a variety of quest and progression types that promote conflict and changing the status quo in similar fashion to the Ashes hypothetical I shared?
You simply provided a very vague Appeal To Authority and expect people to be convinced with no evidence of any kind.
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
In order for your statement of them only falling because of internal issues to be true, the strongest guild would have to be the one that showed up in the beginning and every "dominant" guild after that would have to be weaker than the previous. I could see this happening in a game where the population is in decline but even then, I wonder if you are ignoring cases where you saw a guild rise up instead of them always falling down.
Was the dominant guild you were in only dominant because the previous dominant guild fell apart?
Again, I don't understand the focus on a mega-guild vs one smaller guild trying to build a ship.
That's not an example of a mega-guild ruining the game for the rest of the server.
And... I don't see how the mega-guild will be able to make it impossible for the rest of the server to build a ship.
I'm quite sure that if a mega-guild tries to make it impossible for the rest of the server to build a ship, the rest of the server will successfully band together to build some ships... and will likely end up decimating the mega-guild's Node footprint.
The definition of the original poster: "what's to prevent a 1,200 member mega-guild, or two, from completely taking over the server and ruining the game for the rest of us."
That's the context for the topic.
That's also the definition mcstackerson is using in his debate with noanni...and with you.
"Some guilds gain power and create a large footprint but i wouldn't consider it dominating."
Obviously, if no one feels the most powerful guild on the server is ruining their gameplay, it's unlikely they will band together to oppose that guild's goals.
To deny any relevance, I have to have a clear, comparable example.
Having Nodes/Regions that can change in control is not enough.
New World also has Nodes/Regions that can change control, but the ramifications of control are not necessarily enough to trigger players to care much because simply owning a large portion of the map does not significantly change the gameplay of the rest of the players. The only people who care are the people who already love PvP combat and don't need much incentive to engage in PvP combat.
So, Azherae, you should provide an example where a mega-guild in Elite Dangerous went down a path that ruined the game for the rest of the server, but no one chose to confront them. And if they chose not to because it was an unwinnable situation...what made it unwinnable?
In the example I provided, fracturing the mega-guild such that it is no longer the most powerful is not even the goal... the goal is to stop the guild from ruining gameplay for the rest of the server...specifically, the goal would be to stop the server from having too many Scientific Metros with fast travel.
Also, does Elite Dangerous provide guild structures designed specifically to reduce the impact of mega-guilds? Does Elite Dangerous offer a variety of quest and progression types that promote conflict and changing the status quo in similar fashion to the Ashes hypothetical I shared?
You simply provided a very vague Appeal To Authority and expect people to be convinced with no evidence of any kind.
I agree completely with you, here, I simply don't like wasting time debating with someone who occasionally uses 'X is not Y' to apparently disqualify entire things.
So to be clear, I am willing to give the examples, but what I have learned to expect from you is things like 'Elite Dangerous is not a Fantasy MMO so it is not Ashes/is not relevant', and therefore it's a waste of my time. You get this reaction because I begin from the Appeal to Authority, offer indicatives or proof (which would or does take my time, so I don't always provide them), and you discard them out of hand in situations I don't see the reason for doing so in. I was specifically asking whether or not it was worth my time to go beyond the Appeal to Authority, because with you, it is often not.
Other than that, we have no disagreement. The definition of dominant, as given by the OP, does not match the one I was using, and at the moment, anything further is extrapolation or abstraction.
Your responses on the forums have not yet convinced me that you understand or are willing to accept parallels and abstractions enough to make it worth bringing them into discussion with you, so I was asking. I still don't have that answer, so I'll leave it to someone else.
For others reading:
Also, does Elite Dangerous provide guild structures designed specifically to reduce the impact of mega-guilds? Yes, more complex than those I can find on the Ashes wiki.
Does Elite Dangerous offer a variety of quest and progression types that promote conflict and changing the status quo in similar fashion to the Ashes hypothetical I shared? Yes, more complex than those I can find on the Ashes wiki, though they come close.
Further explanations may come from someone who has more time and patience than I, if they are deemed to somehow be relevant to the thread.
Sorry, my native language is Erlang.
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
edited February 2022
That's fine.
Other people can provide examples from Elite Dangerous if they care to support your claim.
(If I were going to dismiss your claim with "Elite Dangerous is not a Fantasy MMO so it is not Ashes/is not relevant", I would have done so the moment you named Elite Dangerous as your example.)
I don't think the Thousand Spears works because there is never one dictator. You can join another "dictator." You could even seek out one that is in conflict with the one you are being "oppressed" by. Can you tell me a game where your thousand spears scenario played out and explain what happened?
In my perception, my main response to the above was to offer to provide examples of the Thousand Spears specifically, contingent on clarity of understanding (which resulted in my education on the definition being used).
I'd be giving those examples as examples of 'the fact that people who are going to lose and then suffer, chose not to fight, and instead just went along with the powerful'. That's what the Thousand Spears is about, at its core.
Lots of games encourage you to fight, many of them don't even penalize you for losing, and people still get demoralized simply from 'losing too much' and quit those games (an equivalent action in Ashes could be to give up and join the winning side). As I always say, MMOs don't even get matchmaking.
At which point terminology was called out like so:
I dunno that "known and studied" has much meaning in any game that doesn't have Ashes' Node system.
But, eventually, we will know, once we actually play.
And my ask was to determine if I could use a game with a similar system in such a discussion. So where I perceive this to be now is:
"Show me an example of Thousand Spears."
"Ok but are we talking about the same thing?" (answer was no)
"I don't think you can use that Appeal to Authority for a game that doesn't use Ashes' Node system." (Valid)
"Would you even accept a game that wasn't basically the same, as having 'Ashes' Node system'? What is unique that I have to 'be able to find or prove within the game?"
"Why don't you just name the game?"
"Elite Dangerous."
So my perception is that if anyone does continue, they'll be trying to clarify 'that Elite's Background Simulation is a reasonable equivalent to Ashes' Node system', relative to the idea that the way to influence player behaviour can be referred to as 'known and studied'.
If not, then I apologize for any further misunderstanding.
Your responses on the forums have not yet convinced me that you understand or are willing to accept parallels and abstractions enough to make it worth bringing them into discussion with you, so I was asking.
All that's going to happen is you're going to post some links, he won't read them and you'll have to slowly and painfully explain all of that information here, only for him not to accept the parallel. I'm not even convinced that if another fantasy MMO showed up with the exact same Node system and showed the exact same effects that happen due to big Squadrons in Elite Dangerous, that he'd believe it would also happen to Ashes.
Good links, tho. Hope someone else reads them.
Grilled cheese always tastes better when you eat it together!
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
In order for your statement of them only falling because of internal issues to be true, the strongest guild would have to be the one that showed up in the beginning and every "dominant" guild after that would have to be weaker than the previous.
This is not true.
In order for this to be true, you would have to assume that all guilds over all power is set to a static level. I assume you don't believe this to be true.
The dominant guild I was in became dominant through politics, mostly. Some key recruiting as well, but mostly politics. There was no previous dominant guild.
That's not an example of a mega-guild ruining the game for the rest of the server.
The example wasn't intended to be one of a dominant guild ruining the game for the rest of the server - that is why it is not an example of a dominant guild ruining the game for the rest of the server.
If you are the dominant guild on a server, and you want to remain dominant, you need to ensure that the players on that server re at least enjoying the game. If they aren't, then something will happen. It could be that people leave the server (either reroll or play something different), leaving you on a low population server with a stunted economy and no PvP to keep up with the meta and such, where you will eventually merge in to a server that has had a strong economy and is up on top of the PvP meta. When this happens, no matter how dominant you were on your old server, you don't really stand a chance on the new.
The other thing that I have seen happen if you are ruining the game enough for people on the server, is the developers will change something. It could be that they add in a new rule (if you do this thing, your account will be suspended, for example), or it could be that they make alterations to the actual game.
I have seen all three of the above happen.
I have also seen dominant guilds remain dominant on their server for years, yet maintain a healthy server population and economy on said server.
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mcstackersonMember, Phoenix Initiative, Royalty, Kickstarter, Alpha One
In order for your statement of them only falling because of internal issues to be true, the strongest guild would have to be the one that showed up in the beginning and every "dominant" guild after that would have to be weaker than the previous.
This is not true.
In order for this to be true, you would have to assume that all guilds over all power is set to a static level. I assume you don't believe this to be true.
The dominant guild I was in became dominant through politics, mostly. Some key recruiting as well, but mostly politics. There was no previous dominant guild.
I'm glad this discussion is still ongoing. I just want to point out that New World is having this very issue with mega-guilds taking over servers, albeit on a smaller scale than Ashes will, so it's an important issue to discuss and prevent here since it seems to me right now almost inevitable on certain servers.
In order for your statement of them only falling because of internal issues to be true, the strongest guild would have to be the one that showed up in the beginning and every "dominant" guild after that would have to be weaker than the previous.
This is not true.
In order for this to be true, you would have to assume that all guilds over all power is set to a static level. I assume you don't believe this to be true.
The dominant guild I was in became dominant through politics, mostly. Some key recruiting as well, but mostly politics. There was no previous dominant guild.
So there was never a guild stronger than yours?
On that server, in the time I paid attention to it, no.
That does not mean this is always the case, however. The server I was playing Archeage as a pirate always had a dominant guild or alliance, as one went down another would rise. But the power and influence of each was different - drastically so, in some cases.
Being dominant is not a one size fits all thing.
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
Why does it matter in New World?
Who controls what has no significant effect on my gameplay in NW.
Why does it matter in New World?
Who controls what has no significant effect on my gameplay in NW.
It matters because if it can happen there it will happen here and nobody is going to like it, but it'll be to late then to do much about it except reroll on another server.
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
No. I did not ask how what happens in New World affects Ashes.
I asked why does who controls the map matter in New World.
Again, when I am playing New World, who has control of the map has no significant effect on my gameplay.
Therefore, there is no compelling reason for me to try to change who controls the map.
In New World, who controls the map cannot ruin my gameplay.
In Ashes, who controls the server could impede my Racial progression and/or my Social Org progression and/or my Religion progression and/or my Node Type progression or even be counter to my goals for "Server progression", if I do or don't fast travel.
In Ashes, I will be motivated to fight to push past obstacles that are ruining my gameplay goals.
(And there are several ways to accomplish that.)
In New World, who controls the map is completely irrelevant to me because it doesn't affect any of my gameplay goals. Thus, I ignore the PvP.
So, again, I'm asking, "Why does it matter in New World?"
Hm… my experience tells me that there will be dominant guilds, but that doesn’t mean they will dominate that server. Also, the vast majority of large guilds inevitably divide into smaller guilds. Just human nature.
If a massive guild somehow beats the odds, sticks around a while, and exerts a great deal of influence over a realm. More power to them.
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Ok thanks, I won't bother detailing all those points because they don't fit your definitions, as far as I can tell.
Sorry for dragging it out, I feel like there's a pretty good chance I understand your position now. o7
But, eventually, we will know, once we actually play.
For my education, truly, what part of the Ashes' Node system are we considering to be unique enough that this would matter? At least one of my examples would have come from a game with 'over 100 locations that are heavily influenced by, or entirely built up by, players'.
But obviously, if it was exactly Ashes, then it would be Ashes.
So I just want to know if any game design theories that show up in other games are demoted to 'not having much meaning' if the game is not extremely similar, or if games like Elite Dangerous (specifically the PowerPlay aspect, if you want to look it up) are 'allowed to be brought as evidence'.
What do I lose when I join a Siege to attack a tyrant mega-guild?
In those cases, I lose nothing for joining a supposedly un-winnable fight.
And, yes, some people enjoy supporting the underdogs.
One ship isn't going to allow for this, they need many (or several, at least).
Them successfully building *a* ship isn't an issue. In fact, if they expect to build a ship every week, but their first takes them three weeks, that in itself may dissuade them from attempting that challenge at all.
If I have 10 ships and can build one a week, but it takes them three weeks to build one ship, they aren't likely to want to challenge me at sea any time soon.
Sure manpower is an issue, but if they are in any serious position to challenge the dominant guild at sea, they should have that manpower. If they don't have it, they aren't a threat.
You gain that mega-tyrant guild as an enemy, if you join in opposing them often enough.
A dominant guild becomes dominant when they no longer need to fight everyone. A guild that is still fighting everyone is not dominant, it is trying to become dominant.
If this guild you are talking about truly is dominant, they will generally be leaving you alone - unless you start joining in on those fights
Ok, i'm confused. Tell me if we went over this or i'm missing context.
If i get you, you are saying that you don't see how Ashes design has limited benefits for a small group when that is exactly what the node system does. I worry that you aren't seeing small as relative to server population. If i get your example, you have 300 people with benefits, 1500 on a server with 5 metros. That is 1,500 out of 15,000 - 35,000 people who have benefits. Sure, we can debate numbers but i don't think you can say that design isn't there.
The open world content also accomplishes this since only one group can farm a location at a time, limiting the resources that are generated and the people who can benefit from them.
As we said, even if you could slow them down as much as you said, which is currently a made up number, they could still use other avenues to get ships, like buying resources or ships from other players.
Manpower is also a limit for you since even if you are building ships faster, there is limit on how many of them you can effectively operated at one time. You will need people driving, operating potion launchers, and what ever other functions that need to be done on a ship. Depending the boarding meta, there may be other considerations that effect how many boats you can use. Point of this is it doesn't matter how fast you can make ships if they are able to get as many ships as you are able to use.
Your ships only let you "dominate" the sea. Doesn't do much for the areas inland.
Allies. They don't need to have as many ships as you if they ally themselves with one or more groups that have as many ships as you.
Everyone here should already know how Nodes work in Ashes. I don't think we know which game it is that is so similar that we should agree that it's been studied well enough to believe Ashes gameplay will playout similarly.
That being said, upon review: Yes. You are using a different concept of "dominant" than pretty much everyone else in this thread.
No one will care much about a mega-guild that is simply the most powerful. And no one will be trying to obstruct a guild's goals simply because it's the most powerful. If the conflict of goals is minimal, of course there will be little to no conflict of goals.
People will care when a guild is exerting undue forcefulness and obstructing others from achieving their goals.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/dominant
1: commanding, controlling, or prevailing over all others
2: overlooking and commanding from a superior position
https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/dominating
1: offensively self-assured or given to exercising usually unwarranted power
Ashes is designed to foment conflict:
Again...
"If one mega-guild dominates a server by establishing three Scientific Metros, it's very likely that the rest of the server would band together to try to take at least one of them down in order to have a Metro with a different Node type.
Most likely, the server would band together earlier to make sure the mega-guild's third Scientific City never becomes a Metro. Especially if most people on the server are anti-fast travel.
In Ashes, if people feel 'dominated', they will try to put an end to that domination.
That's what alliances are for...but they don't even have to be official alliances."
Just look at the title of this topic.
It's not simply about a guild being the most powerful, rather it's about a guild controlling their server... with the implication that others on the server perceive that control to be negative.
Ashes has several incentives to motivate people to band together against the dominators in order to reduce that control... as outlined in my example.
Also, why do you assume the opposition will be a ragtag, motley crew, rather than organized and highly adept?
They can't just buy materials from other players, because those materials are in other nodes and still need to be bought to that node with the shipyard.
if need be, my guild (the dominant guild on the server, remember) can just put a block on that node completely, preventing any caravan getting through.
Sure, we may not maintain it 24/7, but how long do you think that smaller guild or node will last if the only way they can get any materials in to that node is to skip sleep for the night, or take a day off work? There is only realistically 66 hours a week that we need to prevent caravans getting in to that node for, and that is easy to accomplish.
The thing with that is those other guilds know we can and will do this, and so they straight up won't be willing to assist that guild
Even if the object guild bought completed ships, and even if we couldn't stop that happening (we could), all that would mean is that their ships cost them more than ours.
To your point on manpower. Keep in mind, the very premise of what we are talking about here is that my guild is the dominant guild on the server, and we can deny what ever we want to any other guild on the server. As such, manpower isn't an issue for US, but it will be an issue for THEM.
However, even if it were not an issue, even if all we managed to do was take half of their wood from them, that still gives us the advantage. Imagine we both go to battle with 5 ships each, because we each have 40 people. In the first few minutes, we each destroy 2 of the opponents ships. They have no more ships they can use, because they could only build 5. I still have 5 more in reserve though, because I stole all their wood.
Now sure, I may well need to go back to port to get those ships out. This may well mean that I am unable to bring them to bear in this engagement.
However, it does mean that next time, I am still able to bring 5 ships in to a fight, and they are only able to bring 3. I mean, its not like this is arena combat where we engage once, determine an outcome and then it's all done. This is open world, we engage once, determine a winner, then later on we engage again, and again, and again. If you have only prepared for that first engagement, as I said earlier, you have already lost - even if you somehow win that first engagement.
On the other hand, maybe we are repairing ships rather than having them destroyed and replaced. This is absolutely possible.
The thing with this is that in order to repair a ship, you would need wood. If I am limiting their supply of wood, I am limiting their ability to repair their ships - even if they bought them from someone else.
---
The point is, without a solid supply of wood to a shipyard, a guild simply can not engage another guild in an ocean based conflict. Attack that supply line, and you cripple the front line. This is war strategy 101.
I know you well enough to know you do not disagree with the above statement.
Ok, so now we are going way back to you doing a full blockade where your members give up progressing their characters to try to stop a guild from making a boat.
How long will your guild want to do that? a week? a month?
While you are wasting your time stopping people from making a boat, they don't have to waste their time. They can either build up the mats they need for the boat or do other forms of progression.
More and more people are working from home these days. Wouldn't be hard to jump on during a break if this boat really needed to be made. Also, if you are blockading during prime time, you could go to bed early. No reason to skip sleep.
Those guilds know what you can do...They know that you will waste your members time, barricading a node so they can't make boats. The terror.
We aren't going to pull ships out if odds are stacked against us. No reason to risk the ships. If we lost any, we would build back up and bring them out the next time there is something worth using them for.
One thing you haven't explicitly talked about is shipyards in other locations. If you don't then it wouldn't be hard to get ships made and if you do, you are making an enemy of the whole server. If you do that, you aren't going to be "dominant" much longer.
Previously, comments in relation to things being too much work were under the false assumption that we would need to be going out looking for these caravans, forgetting the fact that we know both the origin and destination of them.
Yes, that guild could well go off and undertake other forms of progression. We are not trying to stop them doing that, we are trying to stop them building ships in order to challenge us on the water.
Also, I am not sure you understand the point of a blockade - or at least the functionality of one. The idea isn't to attack and defeat caravans as they come in to that node, the point is to stop them trying to come to that node.
Lets just recap, we have already held the guild in question off from getting wood by taking their caravans as they leave their origin node. This probably happened for 3 or 4 weeks of taking about half of their wood before they realized they need to come up with another plan, and managed to get that plan in to action. Finding a guild that is willing to go directly against the dominant guild on a server (which, if you remember, is the scenario we are talking about here) is no easy task. Realistically, the guild in question will not find a single guild both willing and capable of running wood to them.
As I said, I have been both in that dominant guild, and on servers where another guild was dominant. They don't fall due to the actions of lesser guilds, they fall due to the actions of their own leadership. Most guilds on such a server will either know this already, or very quickly come to learn it - you will not find a guild willing to assist you in fighting against a dominant guild if you are struggling to build a ship.
Even if we ignore the above and assume you find a guild that is willing - how long are they willing to wait? Do you think they are going to run a caravan to any node that has a half dozen of my guild members standing watch nearby - especially if the last time they ran a caravan in to a node that had a half dozen of my guild nearby, we attacked them with 100? If we shadow their caravan, do you not think they would get spoked and just cancel the run? I mean, if I task 100 players to guard this node, each player need only perform that task once every 1 and a half weeks or so. Most top end guilds I have been in would be able to keep that up for years, if there was a need for it (there is no need for that length here).
Again, when it comes to the guild in question, the idea is to attack and take their stuff. When it comes to others, the idea is to scare them off.
Now, you say that this guild could just go off and participate in other forms of progression. Indeed they could. However, since my objective was to stop them attempting to challenge us on the water, is this anything other than a complete win for me and my guild?
You don't really seem to be thinking things through, to be honest. Either that, or you are constantly forgetting that we are talking about a dominant guild - or have not experienced a dominant guild and the effect that has on other guilds on a server.
I did talk about getting other guilds to build ships for the guild in question - but again, on a server with a dominant guild, very few guilds are going to be willing to risk this.
If we work on the assumption that you seem to have picked up on here in that we are generally at peace with most guilds, despite being the dominant guild, why would anyone risk that peace? I mean, if they lose one siege, they lose their shipyard.
In all honesty, a more likely scenario would be that a guild would offer to build them a ship, ask for half up front, and then offer the ship to us for the balance.
Your reflection 'technique' is 'good', or at least, 'impenetrable'. But I have no interest in the Infinite Mirroring scenario of discussion.
If everyone else in the thread is using a different definition, then I have been educated sufficiently on what that definition is, and since only Noaani seems to remain with any objection to that definition, I will assume that either any other readers of this thread are satisfied with both the definition, and my education, or they will have something to say when I bow out of it.
Elite Dangerous' current iteration was released in December 2014 after a two year kickstarter, having spent a while in planning before that point.
Whether or not you consider a game with 600 Control systems (which are star systems controlled by a particular superpower which in turn influence 15-20 others, all available for player manipulation, to be chosen as a home and altered by their actions) to be similar to Ashes or not (after all, you can't destroy StarPorts, only change who controls them and thus interactions, or rather, such things as Starport Destruction only happen by Dev intervention) is up to you. There are other games with Nodes, Regions, and so on that can change in control and effect, but they obviously have less freedom than Ashes, so you could simply deny the relevance of them all, if you wished.
o7, as they say.
EDIT: As for why I'm willing to think like that, I have to. I'm usually a manager of programmers. There are entire programming frameworks that people get hired for knowing or studying that have existed for less than 10 years. So in my line of work that's the point where 'known and studied' can be used relative to methodologies, best practices, and techniques. I genuinely ask to be educated if 10 years is not enough.
Yes, internal issues are one of the reasons they fall but that isn't the only way they get contested for their position. The fact these internal issues happen is one of the reasons "dominant" guilds don't stick around.
I have also played games and i have watched guilds rise and fall. Guilds ally, guilds merge, and people move. New people come in and other people leave.
In order for your statement of them only falling because of internal issues to be true, the strongest guild would have to be the one that showed up in the beginning and every "dominant" guild after that would have to be weaker than the previous. I could see this happening in a game where the population is in decline but even then, I wonder if you are ignoring cases where you saw a guild rise up instead of them always falling down.
Was the dominant guild you were in only dominant because the previous dominant guild fell apart?
That's the context for the topic.
That's also the definition mcstackerson is using in his debate with noanni...and with you.
"Some guilds gain power and create a large footprint but i wouldn't consider it dominating."
Obviously, if no one feels the most powerful guild on the server is ruining their gameplay, it's unlikely they will band together to oppose that guild's goals.
To deny any relevance, I have to have a clear, comparable example.
Having Nodes/Regions that can change in control is not enough.
New World also has Nodes/Regions that can change control, but the ramifications of control are not necessarily enough to trigger players to care much because simply owning a large portion of the map does not significantly change the gameplay of the rest of the players. The only people who care are the people who already love PvP combat and don't need much incentive to engage in PvP combat.
So, Azherae, you should provide an example where a mega-guild in Elite Dangerous went down a path that ruined the game for the rest of the server, but no one chose to confront them. And if they chose not to because it was an unwinnable situation...what made it unwinnable?
In the example I provided, fracturing the mega-guild such that it is no longer the most powerful is not even the goal... the goal is to stop the guild from ruining gameplay for the rest of the server...specifically, the goal would be to stop the server from having too many Scientific Metros with fast travel.
Also, does Elite Dangerous provide guild structures designed specifically to reduce the impact of mega-guilds? Does Elite Dangerous offer a variety of quest and progression types that promote conflict and changing the status quo in similar fashion to the Ashes hypothetical I shared?
You simply provided a very vague Appeal To Authority and expect people to be convinced with no evidence of any kind.
That's not an example of a mega-guild ruining the game for the rest of the server.
And... I don't see how the mega-guild will be able to make it impossible for the rest of the server to build a ship.
I'm quite sure that if a mega-guild tries to make it impossible for the rest of the server to build a ship, the rest of the server will successfully band together to build some ships... and will likely end up decimating the mega-guild's Node footprint.
I agree completely with you, here, I simply don't like wasting time debating with someone who occasionally uses 'X is not Y' to apparently disqualify entire things.
So to be clear, I am willing to give the examples, but what I have learned to expect from you is things like 'Elite Dangerous is not a Fantasy MMO so it is not Ashes/is not relevant', and therefore it's a waste of my time. You get this reaction because I begin from the Appeal to Authority, offer indicatives or proof (which would or does take my time, so I don't always provide them), and you discard them out of hand in situations I don't see the reason for doing so in. I was specifically asking whether or not it was worth my time to go beyond the Appeal to Authority, because with you, it is often not.
Other than that, we have no disagreement. The definition of dominant, as given by the OP, does not match the one I was using, and at the moment, anything further is extrapolation or abstraction.
Your responses on the forums have not yet convinced me that you understand or are willing to accept parallels and abstractions enough to make it worth bringing them into discussion with you, so I was asking. I still don't have that answer, so I'll leave it to someone else.
For others reading:
Also, does Elite Dangerous provide guild structures designed specifically to reduce the impact of mega-guilds?
Yes, more complex than those I can find on the Ashes wiki.
Does Elite Dangerous offer a variety of quest and progression types that promote conflict and changing the status quo in similar fashion to the Ashes hypothetical I shared?
Yes, more complex than those I can find on the Ashes wiki, though they come close.
Further explanations may come from someone who has more time and patience than I, if they are deemed to somehow be relevant to the thread.
Other people can provide examples from Elite Dangerous if they care to support your claim.
(If I were going to dismiss your claim with "Elite Dangerous is not a Fantasy MMO so it is not Ashes/is not relevant", I would have done so the moment you named Elite Dangerous as your example.)
In my perception, my main response to the above was to offer to provide examples of the Thousand Spears specifically, contingent on clarity of understanding (which resulted in my education on the definition being used).
At which point terminology was called out like so:
And my ask was to determine if I could use a game with a similar system in such a discussion. So where I perceive this to be now is:
"Show me an example of Thousand Spears."
"Ok but are we talking about the same thing?" (answer was no)
"I don't think you can use that Appeal to Authority for a game that doesn't use Ashes' Node system." (Valid)
"Would you even accept a game that wasn't basically the same, as having 'Ashes' Node system'? What is unique that I have to 'be able to find or prove within the game?"
"Why don't you just name the game?"
"Elite Dangerous."
So my perception is that if anyone does continue, they'll be trying to clarify 'that Elite's Background Simulation is a reasonable equivalent to Ashes' Node system', relative to the idea that the way to influence player behaviour can be referred to as 'known and studied'.
If not, then I apologize for any further misunderstanding.
And yes, explaining the Background Simulation in reasonable detail would still take longer than even these interactions.
All that's going to happen is you're going to post some links, he won't read them and you'll have to slowly and painfully explain all of that information here, only for him not to accept the parallel. I'm not even convinced that if another fantasy MMO showed up with the exact same Node system and showed the exact same effects that happen due to big Squadrons in Elite Dangerous, that he'd believe it would also happen to Ashes.
Good links, tho. Hope someone else reads them.
In order for this to be true, you would have to assume that all guilds over all power is set to a static level. I assume you don't believe this to be true.
The dominant guild I was in became dominant through politics, mostly. Some key recruiting as well, but mostly politics. There was no previous dominant guild.
If you are the dominant guild on a server, and you want to remain dominant, you need to ensure that the players on that server re at least enjoying the game. If they aren't, then something will happen. It could be that people leave the server (either reroll or play something different), leaving you on a low population server with a stunted economy and no PvP to keep up with the meta and such, where you will eventually merge in to a server that has had a strong economy and is up on top of the PvP meta. When this happens, no matter how dominant you were on your old server, you don't really stand a chance on the new.
The other thing that I have seen happen if you are ruining the game enough for people on the server, is the developers will change something. It could be that they add in a new rule (if you do this thing, your account will be suspended, for example), or it could be that they make alterations to the actual game.
I have seen all three of the above happen.
I have also seen dominant guilds remain dominant on their server for years, yet maintain a healthy server population and economy on said server.
So there was never a guild stronger than yours?
On that server, in the time I paid attention to it, no.
That does not mean this is always the case, however. The server I was playing Archeage as a pirate always had a dominant guild or alliance, as one went down another would rise. But the power and influence of each was different - drastically so, in some cases.
Being dominant is not a one size fits all thing.
Who controls what has no significant effect on my gameplay in NW.
It matters because if it can happen there it will happen here and nobody is going to like it, but it'll be to late then to do much about it except reroll on another server.
I asked why does who controls the map matter in New World.
Again, when I am playing New World, who has control of the map has no significant effect on my gameplay.
Therefore, there is no compelling reason for me to try to change who controls the map.
In New World, who controls the map cannot ruin my gameplay.
In Ashes, who controls the server could impede my Racial progression and/or my Social Org progression and/or my Religion progression and/or my Node Type progression or even be counter to my goals for "Server progression", if I do or don't fast travel.
In Ashes, I will be motivated to fight to push past obstacles that are ruining my gameplay goals.
(And there are several ways to accomplish that.)
In New World, who controls the map is completely irrelevant to me because it doesn't affect any of my gameplay goals. Thus, I ignore the PvP.
So, again, I'm asking, "Why does it matter in New World?"
If a massive guild somehow beats the odds, sticks around a while, and exerts a great deal of influence over a realm. More power to them.