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GAMEPLAY CONCEPT: POLITICAL ASSASSINATION/SABOTAGE
Lunsford
Member
Good evening all,
First, I must say this game looks absolutely incredible and I can't wait for release. I am seriously considering buying the $375 pre-order option.
Secondly, my friends and I came up with an idea while learning about the way node levels are increased. This would be in reference to the "The Node System" time stamp in the following linked video (
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWuJvyBs4wQ&t=0s&ab_channel=TheLazyPeon).
If a Mayor is responsible for the development of the node, and another node needs to siege it to upgrade, then wouldn't it be in their best interest to remove that Mayor from office? Attacking another node without an established leader would be more advantageous, but it seems the only way a Mayor can be removed is through reelection or a Monster Coin Event. Considering reelection doesn't leave the office vacant, and the random nature of the Monster Coin Events, it seems competing nodes don't have an efficient way to partake in political sabotage or assassination.
That's where we came up with this concept: Political Assassination/Sabotage via Player-Node Bounties/Contracts. If nodes have the ability to declare war and siege, it seems sabotage and assassination would be key features of battle. If a node was able to hire an assassin to attack the nodes defenses/political leadership, it should give them an advantage during the attempted takeover. Things like sabotaging the city's defenses, poisoning the food and water supply, even embedding a double agent would introduce a whole new way of warfare and peacetime interaction between cities.
So, that's the idea, a den/guild of assassins who can take on bounties posted by node mayors and turn them into contracts with the nodes themselves. A simple backstory could be something like "An ancient guild of ruthless assassins that once dominated the criminal underworld, fallen into ruin for reasons still unknown to this day. The spirit of it's founder haunts the world now, leading the bloodthirsty to continue the work of sowing chaos where needed."
There are many questions that come up with this idea, so I'd like to expand on a couple answers I think we found.
QUESTION 1: Who would populate the guild and how would it be run?
I think the concept of a "loosely governed band of cutthroats" concept is the main theme here, so we don't want it to be too structured. However, we still want a clear chain of command, so I think a concept like the military nodes tournament is the way to go here. The strongest rule here, so a last man standing tournament is the way to go. Now, these wouldn't be AI's that make up the guild, but the players. In order for a player to be eligible for the guild, they have to have been a "red player" status for a certain amount of time. This will give you the option to join the guild, but be forever known as an assassin for hire, not to be trusted. However, because the red player status comes at a high risk of losing your gear, mayors would have to post a reward that is equivalent for a player in value to their gear, or another item on the same level. This incentivizes the players in the guild to take on the bounty despite the risk, and makes the node have to commit valuable time and resources to be able to acquire such a service.
Question 2: How would this concept be introduced to the game and how would the first leaders of the guild be decided if they are no current guild leaders?
To introduce the player to the guild, the spirit of the guild's founder can approach them after the player has been "red" for a period of time. He can present the opportunity to join only 3 times, never approaching again if denied all 3. Each server can have it's own guild, and in the beginning stages, the first person to join the guild of that server would obviously be the leader of that guild (first come first serve). If, for example, the guild reaches 10 members, then at a certain time ingame a free for all tournament that the assassins can partake in, and the victor claims leadership of the guild.
We discussed so much more and went in-depth for hours on this, but I don't want to write a small novel.
This was just an idea we had while researching the game and would love to see what you all think about it. Let me know if you'd like me to articulate this more.
Thank you!
First, I must say this game looks absolutely incredible and I can't wait for release. I am seriously considering buying the $375 pre-order option.
Secondly, my friends and I came up with an idea while learning about the way node levels are increased. This would be in reference to the "The Node System" time stamp in the following linked video (
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWuJvyBs4wQ&t=0s&ab_channel=TheLazyPeon).If a Mayor is responsible for the development of the node, and another node needs to siege it to upgrade, then wouldn't it be in their best interest to remove that Mayor from office? Attacking another node without an established leader would be more advantageous, but it seems the only way a Mayor can be removed is through reelection or a Monster Coin Event. Considering reelection doesn't leave the office vacant, and the random nature of the Monster Coin Events, it seems competing nodes don't have an efficient way to partake in political sabotage or assassination.
That's where we came up with this concept: Political Assassination/Sabotage via Player-Node Bounties/Contracts. If nodes have the ability to declare war and siege, it seems sabotage and assassination would be key features of battle. If a node was able to hire an assassin to attack the nodes defenses/political leadership, it should give them an advantage during the attempted takeover. Things like sabotaging the city's defenses, poisoning the food and water supply, even embedding a double agent would introduce a whole new way of warfare and peacetime interaction between cities.
So, that's the idea, a den/guild of assassins who can take on bounties posted by node mayors and turn them into contracts with the nodes themselves. A simple backstory could be something like "An ancient guild of ruthless assassins that once dominated the criminal underworld, fallen into ruin for reasons still unknown to this day. The spirit of it's founder haunts the world now, leading the bloodthirsty to continue the work of sowing chaos where needed."
There are many questions that come up with this idea, so I'd like to expand on a couple answers I think we found.
QUESTION 1: Who would populate the guild and how would it be run?
I think the concept of a "loosely governed band of cutthroats" concept is the main theme here, so we don't want it to be too structured. However, we still want a clear chain of command, so I think a concept like the military nodes tournament is the way to go here. The strongest rule here, so a last man standing tournament is the way to go. Now, these wouldn't be AI's that make up the guild, but the players. In order for a player to be eligible for the guild, they have to have been a "red player" status for a certain amount of time. This will give you the option to join the guild, but be forever known as an assassin for hire, not to be trusted. However, because the red player status comes at a high risk of losing your gear, mayors would have to post a reward that is equivalent for a player in value to their gear, or another item on the same level. This incentivizes the players in the guild to take on the bounty despite the risk, and makes the node have to commit valuable time and resources to be able to acquire such a service.
Question 2: How would this concept be introduced to the game and how would the first leaders of the guild be decided if they are no current guild leaders?
To introduce the player to the guild, the spirit of the guild's founder can approach them after the player has been "red" for a period of time. He can present the opportunity to join only 3 times, never approaching again if denied all 3. Each server can have it's own guild, and in the beginning stages, the first person to join the guild of that server would obviously be the leader of that guild (first come first serve). If, for example, the guild reaches 10 members, then at a certain time ingame a free for all tournament that the assassins can partake in, and the victor claims leadership of the guild.
We discussed so much more and went in-depth for hours on this, but I don't want to write a small novel.
This was just an idea we had while researching the game and would love to see what you all think about it. Let me know if you'd like me to articulate this more.
Thank you!
0
Comments
Mayor's get 0 - 2 NPC bodyguards that they conscript from their Node's Barracks or some crap.
A profession involving Mages can automatically alert their node when a player is attacking them; if it's in-town then guards rush over and stand at entrances/roads to the Node.
A player with their head cut off can't respawn for 5 minutes and can't respawn for 8 minutes if placed on a pike --> the head lets you know where the player is if you're within a certain range (60 yards?) once you respawn though; it'll be a visual direction indicator.
How about that?
If corruption were a mental assault on everyone everywhere. . . whole world could be dark and gloomy.
Make the overworld a hellscape. Infertile grounds, blackened landscape. . . stormy clouds, swirling into the heavens at all times in the Damned Lands.
Start killing and the corruption seeps in; go too far and. . . something besides dropping your gear lmao that should just be standard for everyone.
In terms of a mechanic to enable one node to progress instead of the other, the only thing I can really see is resetting a nodes current progress towards its next level back to zero - this could well be the punishment/reward for a node war.
Basically, everything the OP is talking about I kind of expect to see in the node war system.
Founder and Guild Leader of -Providence-