issues of castle occupation and alliance control over regions (server dominance)

Cplusplus

hello,guys, welcome to this discussion. I have an idea: if a guild with nearly 1000 members simultaneously establishes two alliances, could it be possible to permanently occupy the best castle area and top nodes by using the other alliance's territory to simulate attacks during sieges?

Enigmatic Sage

1000 players is essentially 10% of current active server population of 10 000.

It's possible for them to hold it. The social dynamic of the game is essentially building alliances and supply chains. We haven't even seen 1000 players in the same area yet.
Hypothetically, if 1000 hold it, could need just as many to take it assuming they're all logged in and active.

Raven016

To trigger a siege will be as expensive as building the defenses.

Enigmatic Sage

Raven016 wrote: »

To trigger a siege will be as expensive as building the defenses.

I think they talking more about castle sieges than node sieges with guild occupation. But yes, declarations and preparations could be costly.

Enigmatic Sage

https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Castle_sieges

i'll just put that out there just incase.

Raven016

Ah, it's about castles.
If they are quick to fill the attacker slots, they can weaken the attacker side. Even 50% of attackers being fake can be enough.

Tyranthraxus

Cplusplus wrote: »

hello,guys, welcome to this discussion. I have an idea: if a guild with nearly 1000 members simultaneously establishes two alliances, could it be possible to permanently occupy the best castle area and top nodes by using the other alliance's territory to simulate attacks during sieges?

The bigger question that comes up as a counter-point to this recurrent conversation is this:

Why would it be BAD if the biggest guild on the server successfully held the best parts of the server, through their directed and sustained efforts?

Doesn't it establish a unifying factor against which lesser guilds can rally? Shouldn't a massive organization that manages to NOT fracture constantly per it's large size and who also manages to win the key battles to hold their territory have the right to do so? Why would it be bad, if they can manage the numbers without falling apart, all the time?

Ludullu

Tyranthraxus wrote: »

Doesn't it establish a unifying factor against which lesser guilds can rally? Shouldn't a massive organization that manages to NOT fracture constantly per it's large size and who also manages to win the key battles to hold their territory have the right to do so? Why would it be bad, if they can manage the numbers without falling apart, all the time?

Pretty much this. If 1k people on the server only stay in their single castle - that means that this 1k players can't go mess up other castles during sieges (I assume there's gonna be at least several of them happening at the same time, if not all of them).

The biggest issue/abuse I could see here is if people from that alliance can create a fully fake siege and lock everyone else out. And right now it does seem to be the case, because sieges will have limited amounts of participants.

Hell, you wouldn't even need 1k people to achieve this. So I definitely hope Intrepid come up with some preventive measures against these tactics.

Kilion

Cplusplus wrote: »

hello,guys, welcome to this discussion. I have an idea: if a guild with nearly 1000 members simultaneously establishes two alliances, could it be possible to permanently occupy the best castle area and top nodes by using the other alliance's territory to simulate attacks during sieges?

Based on the Wiki entry a "Guild size of 300 is currently the maximum cap that can be attained" so it would only be be possible to achieve the size by forming an alliance.

Going from there it would be necessary for 1 guild to take over the Castle and its 3 castle nodes, while the other 2 guilds of the alliance would have to fight their way into dominance by occupying two of the 5 possible tier 6 Nodes. [Wiki entry on Metropolis] which is quite difficult already.

So during a castle siege both sides will have 250 player at minimum facing off against each other and a maximum of 500 per side [Wiki entry on Castle Sieges] which would mean it should be possible to recrute support from the allied guilds. Such limits would only be possible by some sort of access limitation, meaning spontaneous intervention during the siege wouldn't be a thing and the alliance couldn't throw in their whole members to overpower any attackers.

Lastly, let's say there is indeed a server that is able to establish such a powerful force on one server: This alliance while probably rather stable overall has a few significant issues to solve long term:

• depending on the Node type remaining in power (occupying the mayor position) could prove quite difficult especially when we are talking Tier 6 Nodes which can have up to 3 patron guilds
• the longer the alliance lasts the longer they basically are blocking story arcs and new/other dungeons with their established Node which motivates player to sooner or later side with a faction that will bring down the "old" Nodes
• The perks of being a King/Queen or mayor of a castle or node are quite nice, especially being able to use true flight mounts, which might result in internal conflict over these perks
• An alliance like that would cover less than 50% of the world which leaves plenty of room for considerable opposition to establish itself. Furthermore these enemies would - in theory - have the opportunity to make a coordinated attack on all three heart pieces of the alliance, the castle and the two Metropoli at the same time. That would require considerable resources from the attackers to create 2 siege scrolls at the same time but it is possible and would break the support lines of the alliance because each group would be forced by the simultaneous attack to fend for themselves.

Cplusplus

Kilion wrote: »

Cplusplus wrote: »

hello,guys, welcome to this discussion. I have an idea: if a guild with nearly 1000 members simultaneously establishes two alliances, could it be possible to permanently occupy the best castle area and top nodes by using the other alliance's territory to simulate attacks during sieges?

Based on the Wiki entry a "Guild size of 300 is currently the maximum cap that can be attained" so it would only be be possible to achieve the size by forming an alliance.

Going from there it would be necessary for 1 guild to take over the Castle and its 3 castle nodes, while the other 2 guilds of the alliance would have to fight their way into dominance by occupying two of the 5 possible tier 6 Nodes. [Wiki entry on Metropolis] which is quite difficult already.

So during a castle siege both sides will have 250 player at minimum facing off against each other and a maximum of 500 per side [Wiki entry on Castle Sieges] which would mean it should be possible to recrute support from the allied guilds. Such limits would only be possible by some sort of access limitation, meaning spontaneous intervention during the siege wouldn't be a thing and the alliance couldn't throw in their whole members to overpower any attackers.

Lastly, let's say there is indeed a server that is able to establish such a powerful force on one server: This alliance while probably rather stable overall has a few significant issues to solve long term:

• depending on the Node type remaining in power (occupying the mayor position) could prove quite difficult especially when we are talking Tier 6 Nodes which can have up to 3 patron guilds
• the longer the alliance lasts the longer they basically are blocking story arcs and new/other dungeons with their established Node which motivates player to sooner or later side with a faction that will bring down the "old" Nodes
• The perks of being a King/Queen or mayor of a castle or node are quite nice, especially being able to use true flight mounts, which might result in internal conflict over these perks
• An alliance like that would cover less than 50% of the world which leaves plenty of room for considerable opposition to establish itself. Furthermore these enemies would - in theory - have the opportunity to make a coordinated attack on all three heart pieces of the alliance, the castle and the two Metropoli at the same time. That would require considerable resources from the attackers to create 2 siege scrolls at the same time but it is possible and would break the support lines of the alliance because each group would be forced by the simultaneous attack to fend for themselves.

Hey, thanks for sharing your thoughts! So, I'm thinking that if people from almost two alliances team up and share the spoils, we could have one alliance backing up with a fake siege during the real one. That way, even if a big guild from the other alliance (50 people or more) jumps into a battle (node or castle), it eases up the pressure on the defending side. What do you guys think about this strategy? Just tossing it out there for discussion!

Enigmatic Sage

NiKr wrote: »

Tyranthraxus wrote: »

Doesn't it establish a unifying factor against which lesser guilds can rally? Shouldn't a massive organization that manages to NOT fracture constantly per it's large size and who also manages to win the key battles to hold their territory have the right to do so? Why would it be bad, if they can manage the numbers without falling apart, all the time?

Pretty much this. If 1k people on the server only stay in their single castle - that means that this 1k players can't go mess up other castles during sieges (I assume there's gonna be at least several of them happening at the same time, if not all of them).

The biggest issue/abuse I could see here is if people from that alliance can create a fully fake siege and lock everyone else out. And right now it does seem to be the case, because sieges will have limited amounts of participants.

Hell, you wouldn't even need 1k people to achieve this. So I definitely hope Intrepid come up with some preventive measures against these tactics.

It depends on frequency of castle siege.. if its monthly declarations they wont need to be around all the time to defend it.

then if they allow outside interference then it wont matter much either.

Kilion

Cplusplus wrote: »

Kilion wrote: »

Cplusplus wrote: »

hello,guys, welcome to this discussion. I have an idea: if a guild with nearly 1000 members simultaneously establishes two alliances, could it be possible to permanently occupy the best castle area and top nodes by using the other alliance's territory to simulate attacks during sieges?

Based on the Wiki entry a "Guild size of 300 is currently the maximum cap that can be attained" so it would only be be possible to achieve the size by forming an alliance.

Going from there it would be necessary for 1 guild to take over the Castle and its 3 castle nodes, while the other 2 guilds of the alliance would have to fight their way into dominance by occupying two of the 5 possible tier 6 Nodes. [Wiki entry on Metropolis] which is quite difficult already.

So during a castle siege both sides will have 250 player at minimum facing off against each other and a maximum of 500 per side [Wiki entry on Castle Sieges] which would mean it should be possible to recrute support from the allied guilds. Such limits would only be possible by some sort of access limitation, meaning spontaneous intervention during the siege wouldn't be a thing and the alliance couldn't throw in their whole members to overpower any attackers.

Lastly, let's say there is indeed a server that is able to establish such a powerful force on one server: This alliance while probably rather stable overall has a few significant issues to solve long term:

• depending on the Node type remaining in power (occupying the mayor position) could prove quite difficult especially when we are talking Tier 6 Nodes which can have up to 3 patron guilds
• the longer the alliance lasts the longer they basically are blocking story arcs and new/other dungeons with their established Node which motivates player to sooner or later side with a faction that will bring down the "old" Nodes
• The perks of being a King/Queen or mayor of a castle or node are quite nice, especially being able to use true flight mounts, which might result in internal conflict over these perks
• An alliance like that would cover less than 50% of the world which leaves plenty of room for considerable opposition to establish itself. Furthermore these enemies would - in theory - have the opportunity to make a coordinated attack on all three heart pieces of the alliance, the castle and the two Metropoli at the same time. That would require considerable resources from the attackers to create 2 siege scrolls at the same time but it is possible and would break the support lines of the alliance because each group would be forced by the simultaneous attack to fend for themselves.

Hey, thanks for sharing your thoughts! So, I'm thinking that if people from almost two alliances team up and share the spoils, we could have one alliance backing up with a fake siege during the real one. That way, even if a big guild from the other alliance (50 people or more) jumps into a battle (node or castle), it eases up the pressure on the defending side. What do you guys think about this strategy? Just tossing it out there for discussion!

I think that would be a bit difficult. As far as I am aware there can only be one siege at a time on a node / castle and they have a week of preparation time. What an allied force COULD do to sabotage the attackers is enroll on the attacker side and not participate in the siege shifting the balance in manpower in the defenders favor.

Buut honestly speaking, a server with two alliances like that sounds horrible to me. Two huge static forces like that would mean fewer shifts in the world and with that less adventures. Since I aim to play as part of small travelling mercenarry and adventuring guild I'd avoid servers where I know big groups want to establish themselves.

daveywavey

Kilion wrote: »

As far as I am aware there can only be one siege at a time on a node / castle and they have a week of preparation time. What an allied force COULD do to sabotage the attackers is enroll on the attacker side and not participate in the siege shifting the balance in manpower in the defenders favor.

"A guild that captures a castle will own that castle for a month before it is sieged again.[18][19]

Each week leading up to the siege week... is a week that's dedicated to one of the three castle dedicated nodes. So around the castle there are three nodes. They represent week, one, two, and three; and then the fourth week is the siege against the castle. Those can only be elevated up to stage three. We've discussed this in the past and there's definitely information out there on the community ran wiki.[18] – Steven Sharif
In the first three weeks that a guild occupies a castle they will need to level up each of their castle nodes to Village stage through questing.[18][19]
Each of the three castle nodes have a siege against it at the end of each of these three weeks.[19][20]
The fourth week is declaration week, where other guilds have the opportunity to lay down their declaration flag or to sign up as a defender of the castle.[18][19]"

They're going to know the siege is coming, cos it's going to happen monthly. The fourth week is where you declare your intention to attack, but if it was me, I'd be preparing in every one of the three weeks beforehand too.

Depraved

Cplusplus wrote: »

hello,guys, welcome to this discussion. I have an idea: if a guild with nearly 1000 members simultaneously establishes two alliances, could it be possible to permanently occupy the best castle area and top nodes by using the other alliance's territory to simulate attacks during sieges?

castle sieges are 250 vs 250 (and possibly expanded to 500 vs 500), so your other 750 members dont matter. you only need 250 to take a castle or defend