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Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Wondering about a slight change to the flagging system
Alacrite
Member, Alpha Two
This is the current, official diagram for the flagging system:
Been thinking a lot about what the experience would be like as a PvE'er because plenty of the people I play games with are not into PvP in MMO's. I know that this the devs' intend on making this game a welcoming space for all types of players as well. So following this notion,
Would the flagging system be improved if when:
Purple ---Kills---> Green ---Becomes---> Red
changed to
Purple ---AttacksHarasses *---> Green ---Becomes---> Red
Let me know what you fellas think. I see this as mostly a good thing that prevents griefing. I can also see it being a problem with accidental flagging. I believe in the current system, purples would stay flagged for only 90 seconds, which i think would kinda fit in since it would be like a minor inconvenience. But honestly, for the current flagging system, 90 seconds is, imo, too little of a punishment.
*Changed after a discussion with a few people. Clarifies the goal and condition
Been thinking a lot about what the experience would be like as a PvE'er because plenty of the people I play games with are not into PvP in MMO's. I know that this the devs' intend on making this game a welcoming space for all types of players as well. So following this notion,
Would the flagging system be improved if when:
Purple ---Kills---> Green ---Becomes---> Red
changed to
Purple ---AttacksHarasses *---> Green ---Becomes---> Red
Let me know what you fellas think. I see this as mostly a good thing that prevents griefing. I can also see it being a problem with accidental flagging. I believe in the current system, purples would stay flagged for only 90 seconds, which i think would kinda fit in since it would be like a minor inconvenience. But honestly, for the current flagging system, 90 seconds is, imo, too little of a punishment.
*Changed after a discussion with a few people. Clarifies the goal and condition
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Comments
edit: not sure why I said that. It applies
I don't see how that would be the case. Purples would still fight each other freely. A green could still kill another green for any reason. The main discouragement for PvP i think that this would create is that Purples have a disadvantage because Greens can hit them first.
I guess in the changed system, green stays green unless green hits purple first. green would then become purple in this case. not red!
Another note though on this topic I'm not crazy about is the forced attack method. The idea of hitting Ctrl F before attacking feels really clunky, and holding alt instead just removes alt as a potential keybind modifier when it's a popular one already. I would prefer having a button I press (and I can keybind it to whatever I like or move it to my skillbar) that would apply a forced attack buff for a very short period of time, allowing me to then attack that way. That feels more smooth.
I do have a concern about the other end of this, though. When the green player gets attacked they're put in a lose-lose situation that's not fair to them. If they don't attack back they stay green and don't have to flag, which at first for the PvE player seems good, but now they're going to die which is bad enough, have to run back which is worse, and suffer the larger death penalty. However if they flag purple they don't have to suffer the more severe death penalty, but they already didn't want to fight to begin with so you're forcing players to flag purple who are likely still not fighting back after that anyway. They're just going to flag to avoid a worse penalty and it won't encourage PvE players to fight when they don't want to. It'll just make them resent the system and annoyed they're in that situation to begin with.
They really need to come up with a system that doesn't punish PvE players for not flagging and not participating in PvP. I do appreciate the need to offer positive incentives for players to PvP, but it shouldn't then have a negative effect on those who don't. I'm fine with green players suffering normal green death penalties for PvE deaths, but they should not suffer those penalties for a PvP death. PvE deaths you're choosing to engage in an activity and choosing to accept the associated risks - when dying as a green in PvP, you are not choosing to participate in that and thus not choosing to accept those penalties (and the opponent turning red upon your death is the appropriate punishment for them going through with the kill instead of leaving you alone after seeing you not fight back). Flagging purple would be accepting the penalty and participating.
So with my changes, it would essentially act as a dueling system. When you flag as purple, you've only damaged the targeted green. If the green wants to fight back for any reason, he then gets the first hit and it's an all fair Purple v Purple battle. If Purple is really insistent on fighting, and green really doesn't care but to PvE, Purple needs to stop attacking before they turn Red, and then Green can defend themself without worrying about consequences. Not only that, but the entire player environment becomes free to attack the Red player.
So if a PvE'er wanted to just do some ore gathering, they will have one ore taken away from them. But after that, they can continue to farm uninterrupted unless the now flagged thief wants to go hardcore and risk corruption for more thievery.
By design, when a Purple attacks a Green, that gives the Green a choice to become Purple and have a fair fight, or...
Remain Green. If the Green remains Green, that gives the attacker a choice to stopp attacking or risk Corruption.
The goal is to give Greens a choice to attack back, flag as a combatant and participate in PvP.
Turning Red when attacking a Green would greatly reduce PvP opportunities - significantly more so than turning Red for killing a Green.
How would there be any Purples?
There would only be Reds and Greens. Greens don't turn Purple when they attack Reds.
That goal is still met under my conditions. And the player turning red for attacking would be met with more PvP because they can be attacked for less risk.
I see the argument for the purple state. But if this is a game that appeals to PvP'ers, then people will attack a purple player because that's what they want to do. you open yourself to the world of PvP, and anyone green around you who wants to join in, will do so.
That should be an adequate trade-off for avoiding PvP when I'm not in the mood and returning back to what I wanted to do as quickly as I would from being killed by one mob.
Half the normal death penalties is not reward enough for me to engage in PvP when I'm not in the mood for PvP
I do think that's a good deterrent, but in this situation, the Green player only loses. There's no counter play to this situation. They have to run, and stay away from the aggro player. That player can grief you for as long as they want as long as they don't kill you. They only "winning" situation is turning the aggro player red by dying to them. And that's a rough win.
And the aggressor always having the first hit on their side dissuades the green players from fighting back even more. So greens don't fight back while anyone who wants to pvp can't hit anyone beyond a single hit, otherwise they get fucked by the corruption system.
And greens know that the purples can't do anything to them beyond the first hit so they can do whatever they want. In the current system there's risk and reward. The attacker has to consider their hits because any of them could kill the target and they get quite a bit of corruption. In your suggested system there's no risk. You gonna get corruption 100% of the time if you hit anyone more than once, while your first hit doesn't risk anything, because you'd already have an advantage in the fight even if your target decides to fight back.
Your system only worsens the gameplay for both sides. The green players will still get harassed and probably with even bigger hits, because it's safer for the attacker to use their strongest ability on a green for free.
In my experience of the current system, predominant majority of people would make prodding hits when they enter a farming location that's taken by another person. That hit checks whether the target is willing to fight back. If the target doesn't fight back then the attacker weighs the pros and cons of murdering the target. Risk and reward.
But what's more often is that the target of that potential prodding hit just shoots first to show that they are in fact ready to fight and already have an advantage in that fight (usually it's a strong hit too).
In your system the prodding attack would cement the target green in not fighting back, because why would they? The attacker can't do anything else to them or they'll become red and the target can immediately kill them for absolutely free (or call friends to do that). Or the attacker will just go away because they don't want to become red before killing their biggest threat in the room. Alternatively the attacker stays in that room and starts farming the same stuff. And unless the target decides to fight back after all, the attacker can just continue farming stuff until their flag timer resets and they can just do another huge attack on the target, in hopes of mobs killing the target or just as a way to harass that person.
Except the prodding attack itself would probably be a huge hit too, just because that brings the target even closer to death, which just increases the chance of them dying to mobs asap.
And when it comes to the "first shot" of the farming person, it also accomplishes the opposite effect. Them flagging up just means that the newcomer is free to do whatever they want and now the roles in my previous example are reversed.
There's no risk involved in the decision to attack someone, because you're assured to become red or have the advantage. And there's no risk in not fighting back because if your attacker becomes red - he's a freebie for anyone around (you included), while he might even have some stat dampening if he has some PKs on him already. And most likely he would have those PKs because anyone who's ready to go red would most likely just go all the way, because the base decision to kill someone is way easier.
In the current system some players might attack others, but not risk the kill because they're scared of becoming red. And the harassers will just be prepared for the penalties. In your system the scared people would most likely not attack at all or do huge hits right before their target goes up to a mob. While the harassers will still just kill anyone they want because they're ready for the penalties. And now you've removed open world pvp, while haven't done anything to prevent harassment. If anything, you've increased the desire to harass pvers in the people who're on the fence about it.
Now I'm saying all of this from 12 years of personal experience of the current pvp system. It worked just fine. Lowbies weren't harassed most of the time, outside of some random PKers who'd go on genocide runs (which AoC's system prevents). And Steven has already made the penalties for PKing bigger than they were in the previous iteration of this system, so it's already more pver-friendly than the already-working system. And based on that, I see no point in making it even more anti-pvp.
When the Green player dies, they get the normal death penalty.
When the Red player dies, they get 4x the death penalty.
The Green player does not have to run and stay away from the attacker. The Green player can just let the attacker kill them and quickly return to whatever they were doing before they were attacked.
The attacker isn't griefing me if they don't kill me.
We will have to play to see if Corruption works as intended.
The corrupted player's loss doesn't necessarily mean anything to the green player.
They can grief you by following you around and attacking you. Just keeping you at low health. Possibly interrupting you from all your gathering if that's part of the system. Sure, there's risk that they might kill you because they don't know your exact hp. But that's risk on their end. You, the green player just has to deal with it.
We also don't know how quickly they can return to their activity. They might lose even 15 minutes of their time. To a person who plays 2 hours a day, that's significant and not even gameplay. They're just being dictated by other players.
- if he can likely kill the red player and
- about where the red player is
So if I am attacked by someone I can kill, I can either:
- fight back and maybe get a small amount of loot
- die, come back and kill the red and likely get some nice loot
If I don't really mind the death penalty and if the attacker has some nice gear, I might prefer to let him/her go red and then try to get the nice gear.
The degree to how much corruption is gained on a kill by kill basis and over time will be calibrated in testing.
I don't know why I would care if they are following me around.
I suppose if what I'm doing is farming dangerous mobs, I might care if they interrupted that, but I would probably just choose to go harvest nearby where mobs are scarce and wait for the attacker to get bored and leave.
I don't think an attacker can interrupt my gathering by attacking but not killing me.
I don't think respawning is going to take 15 minutes. Ashes doesn't have corpse runs.
We will have to play/test to determine whether the Corruption mechanic works satisfactorily as intended.
This is kinda hard to reply to but i'll try.
"A group of harassers would still be able to harass a player by just attacking the victim once each while they're green. Then they'll wait however long the timer is and attack again."
This happens in either system. Even more so with the current system because there's no issues with being purple so you can just keep attacking.
"greens know that the purples can't do anything to them beyond the first hit so they can do whatever they want."
All they want to do is PvE. So idk what negative affects that would have on the PvP'er.
"Your system only worsens the gameplay for both sides. The green players will still get harassed and probably with even bigger hits, because it's safer for the attacker to use their strongest ability on a green for free"
Why is that safer? It's the exact same situation. The current system doesn't actually discourage using stronger hits. And my system doesn't allow the attacker hits to be free anymore.
" the target can immediately kill them for absolutely free (or call friends to do that). Or the attacker will just go away because they don't want to become red before killing their biggest threat in the room."
The TTK doesn't allow for any immediate kills and the target will flag if they attack purple, so it wouldn't be for free. It would just start a fight. If the target actually became a threat, there's no turning red now so idk what you mean there.
"In your system the scared people would most likely not attack at all or do huge hits right before their target goes up to a mob."
That doesn't change in either system though.
Not sure if I responded to everything correctly. I feel like ur point is a bit spread out and now i'm having a headache trying to make sure i got everything covered lol
So, if players become Red by attacking a Green, Purples never exist.
The issue with being Purple is that I don't want people attacking me when I'm not in the mood for PvP.
And being flagged Purple suggests to other players that I'm in the mood for PvP, even when I'm not.
So...being Purple does have issues from a PvEer perspective.
What incentive does a Purple have to attack a Green without killing the Green?
Idk if ur being serious about "never" exist. But people simply want to PvP. So there will be purples just because of that.
In Alacrite's system the only Purple that would exist is when a Green attacks a Red. But this system just fails to grasp the inherent function of corruption (leaving lore out of the equation).
No this would not improve the system. Instead, if you went corrupt for attacking a green, you'd basically kill the flagging system. At that point, they should just turn it off.
bruh, i have zero problems with you but ur just coming in here aggressive. anyways
that's definitely not at all true though. Green attacks Green, attacker becomes purple. Green attacks purple, attack becomes purple.
The only difference this system actually creates is to not allow subsequent attacks that could be a purple griefing a green.
Which means there would be no PvP outside of Sieges and Caravans.
Which is not what Steven wants.
This made me giggle. What's the function of corruption in your system?
Lets say a purple attacks me (green). Since he is not going to kill me (as per your scenario) he has to disengage after some hits. I can heal up, jump and kill him before he has the chance to turn green with no repercussions and free loot, Yay.
Your scenario already requires a player to be dumb to enact. I wont really mind taking further advantage if this happens to me.
Jesus, you're such a loser. I guess we can just be hostile if that's how you feel.
The function of corruption is exactly the same. There's just a proportional amount of corruption for subsequent attacks on a pacifist.
If you can explain to me how that discourages green from attacking a purple in any different way than the current system, please lmk in a normal person way to respond. Otherwise, you can continue your previous engagements of insults. Only reason i'm giving you this is because you're an actual member of the gaming industry and shits embarrassing watching a dude who made a game I like act like every lame troll on the internet.
That's ALMOST EXACTLY what the current scenario is. Except, right now, you can make a barrage of attacks and the green has zero chance to heal before engaging in a fight.
In your system there's no point in a weak first attack, because the chances are - the green will not fight back, because the system completely supports them not flagging up, because you can't do shit after your first hit. You missed the "attacker would go red" part. I meant that the green player is completely safe from any more attacks. And in the case that the attacker does decide to attack more - they're immediately a red player and can be killed by anyone. And if they have a somewhat big PK count - they even have stat dampening and now their target can kill them way more easily. I gave an example why I don't believe that people will be throwing out huge attacks at random people. Now I can obviously be wrong, but that is why I explicitly stated that I'm commenting on your system from the context of 12 years of experience with the currently planned system. And in that experience, most players go for fair fights for locations because it's not only more fun this way, but it also immediately shows them if they really deserve to farm that location.
If the attacker in the current system does a huge attack first and then the target barely loses in pvp, that would mean that the target is stronger than the attacker (because attacker had an advantage). And now the initial attacker understands that their target will just come back and kick their ass because they'll be more prepared and will probably make their own first hit.
And due to this interaction, as I stated in my first comment, most of the time the initial farming person does the preemptive strike because it gives them an early advantage and immediately shows the newcomer that they're ready for pvp. But in your system the newcomer can now abuse that because they know that they won't be attacked again.
In your system, corruption system prevents people from attacking others at all. There is no reason for a green player to fight back in your system. Even the pvp players won't attack, because that's not beneficial for them. What's beneficial in your system is waiting for your attacker to make another hit and then kill a red player who drops a ton of shit and can't come back to the same place because they have a ton of xp debt.
This is why Crow said your system doesn't understand what corruption is meant for. Crow didn't insult you. Nor were they aggressive towards you. But you immediately became aggressive against Crow though.
Yikes. I think someone needs a hug.
No, it's not the same. This literally changes the current function of corruption. If all the currently defined penalties apply from corruption for just attacking a green, you will reduce open world pvp to greens attacking greens. The function of corruption in your proposal is to penalize open world pvp. At that point just play WoW?