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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Caravan Balancing Idea/Mechanic
deathzme
Member, Alpha Two
Core of this idea is introducing some sort of financial loss for attackers, which can also translate to a gain for defenders.
I've have several potential ways this can happen:
One idea for this a a bounty system:. Attackers needing to pay bounty for source <-> destination targets of caravans and be blacklisted there until bounties paid. Make the bounty amount based on the overall value of the caravan being attacked and put on when the attacker dies.
To add more flavor to it and actually provide some benefit of beating attackers, can make a portion of the bounty be paid off to defenders as "compensation".
Another one is durability loss which translates to gold loss: lose all durability on all their equipped gear when killed by defenders, and gold cost of repair be given to defenders as loot. No gold being dropped from the attacker directly, but ends up being the attacker loses gold to defender since they need to spend the same gold to repair their gear. This I think brings a bit of Albion flavor into the mix where attackers coming with better gear potentially will lose more "gold", but similarly provide more gold to defenders. This incentives high quality defenders beating high quality attackers. Similarly, attackers that decide to zerg with more people, worse gear, has challenges of having more people for once, and their disadvantage against smaller numbered but more powerful defenders.
Cost of forming Caravan attack party/raids:
This takes some of the social aspect out and makes it more of a hard mechanic, but it's another way attacker risk/loss can be balanced.
Have Caravan attackers needing to form a raid fund, the size of this fun corresponding directly to the value of Caravan they can attack.
Based on some of the methods of attacker loss vs defender gain I mentioned, instead of bounty and durability, gold loss can be directly from this fund for each attacker death.
In a nut shell:
-Attackers lose $$ if they die.
-Defenders get extra $$ for beating attackers.
How it can be balanced:
We can look at some of the balance here by how the value of the caravan is calculated to the attackers losses. For example, calculate it based on # of defenders:
For 10 defenders, each attacker death has a repair/bounty cost of %10 of Caravan value.
Where as for 20 defenders, it's a %5 cost.
Meaning attacking a caravan that has more defenders, hast less of a loss for attackers that die, but more if attacking caravans with less defenders.
For attackers, the less numbers they have, the higher their share will be, but based on the # of defenders, the higher or lower their cost will be. Makes a small group of strong pvpers have less loss dying to large groups of defenders, while having higher potential profit from winning, but a higher chance to lose from being out numbered.
On the flip side, attackers dealing with a smaller group of defenders have a higher chance to win, but also higher losses if they die. Making small groups of elite defenders also viable. If they're getting attacked a larger group of attackers, each of those attackers will have a very high loss at death due to low defender count.
We can further balance this by locking caravan attack and defender groups so this can't be abused.
Caravan defenders locked to "x" number of defenders when the Caravan form, who GAIN BIG BOUNTY for betraying the caravan. Implement pvp damage tracking so defenders who are throwing, are counter as having betrayed the Caravan.
Same for attackers, where their Caravan group is locked at "x" number, as in within the group/raid limits of the game, as well as the number being locked in for some maybe 15-30 minutes prior to being able to attack Caravans.
I've have several potential ways this can happen:
One idea for this a a bounty system:. Attackers needing to pay bounty for source <-> destination targets of caravans and be blacklisted there until bounties paid. Make the bounty amount based on the overall value of the caravan being attacked and put on when the attacker dies.
To add more flavor to it and actually provide some benefit of beating attackers, can make a portion of the bounty be paid off to defenders as "compensation".
Another one is durability loss which translates to gold loss: lose all durability on all their equipped gear when killed by defenders, and gold cost of repair be given to defenders as loot. No gold being dropped from the attacker directly, but ends up being the attacker loses gold to defender since they need to spend the same gold to repair their gear. This I think brings a bit of Albion flavor into the mix where attackers coming with better gear potentially will lose more "gold", but similarly provide more gold to defenders. This incentives high quality defenders beating high quality attackers. Similarly, attackers that decide to zerg with more people, worse gear, has challenges of having more people for once, and their disadvantage against smaller numbered but more powerful defenders.
Cost of forming Caravan attack party/raids:
This takes some of the social aspect out and makes it more of a hard mechanic, but it's another way attacker risk/loss can be balanced.
Have Caravan attackers needing to form a raid fund, the size of this fun corresponding directly to the value of Caravan they can attack.
Based on some of the methods of attacker loss vs defender gain I mentioned, instead of bounty and durability, gold loss can be directly from this fund for each attacker death.
In a nut shell:
-Attackers lose $$ if they die.
-Defenders get extra $$ for beating attackers.
How it can be balanced:
We can look at some of the balance here by how the value of the caravan is calculated to the attackers losses. For example, calculate it based on # of defenders:
For 10 defenders, each attacker death has a repair/bounty cost of %10 of Caravan value.
Where as for 20 defenders, it's a %5 cost.
Meaning attacking a caravan that has more defenders, hast less of a loss for attackers that die, but more if attacking caravans with less defenders.
For attackers, the less numbers they have, the higher their share will be, but based on the # of defenders, the higher or lower their cost will be. Makes a small group of strong pvpers have less loss dying to large groups of defenders, while having higher potential profit from winning, but a higher chance to lose from being out numbered.
On the flip side, attackers dealing with a smaller group of defenders have a higher chance to win, but also higher losses if they die. Making small groups of elite defenders also viable. If they're getting attacked a larger group of attackers, each of those attackers will have a very high loss at death due to low defender count.
We can further balance this by locking caravan attack and defender groups so this can't be abused.
Caravan defenders locked to "x" number of defenders when the Caravan form, who GAIN BIG BOUNTY for betraying the caravan. Implement pvp damage tracking so defenders who are throwing, are counter as having betrayed the Caravan.
Same for attackers, where their Caravan group is locked at "x" number, as in within the group/raid limits of the game, as well as the number being locked in for some maybe 15-30 minutes prior to being able to attack Caravans.
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Comments
I also dont like the idea of limiting groups sizes. As a 1vX player i like that zergs are allowed to exist i just want them to be beatable. Im ok with not being rly able to 1vX in ashes but an 8vs 20 should definitly be possible if you play better.
I do like the idea of a bounty tho. I realize that the bounty systhem is originally made to hunt red players but i think it would be nice to include a way that players that got robbed can put a bounty so bountyhunters can join in and help get the caravan back.
I think the main reason for the bounty sythem is to controle griefers and bullys by allowing pvp players to deal with them themselfs but in case there are no bad guys around it could get boring and adding the caravan systhem into that would ensure you always have something to do.
They don't fight over the same loot though. Am including the Caravan owner as part of the Defenders.
Attackers have no risk of loss from attacking. Caravan owner has 100% risk of loss. Defenders' only incentive is a percentage of the Caravan if they win. With that logic everyone will want to be an attacker, Caravans movement will severely slow down to big guilds trying to progress nodes and overall severely limit economy progression. Pretty much the current argument everyone's making.
The idea of the bounty/gold loss, or whatever else it may be is to bring in financial loss to attackers, and potentially let that loss be a gain for defenders.
In terms of limiting group sizes, I meant for the attack & defender side. For example. If a raid of 20 people wants to form a caravan raid group, they need to form the raid, lock the group # in, have to wait maybe 15-30min before they can attack a Caravan.
To make it fair, same thing for defenders. When the Caravan forms they need to lock their group in as well.
This is so either side can't add numbers after the fact and exploit the system.
Could make it so attackers have to form a raid fund. If attacking a Caravan valued at 1000 gold, the raid needs to put in 1000 gold. Instead of bounties, can make it so the attackers drop a portion of that gold to defenders when they die.
Basically put in equal stakes as the defender when going into it. And manage how much of that gold is lost based on the defender/attacker counts I mentioned. Less defenders = attacker death drops more of that gold. More defenders, attacker death drops less of that gold.
At first it looked pretty interesting because I was speculating about how the caravan must make the defenders kind of a mini raid boss. But nope. It went the exact opposite of what I was expecting looking at the two teams make up. I thought the Caravan was going to be brutal for those on the attack.
I thought that was going to be the PvX representation of the “Risk” part that Steven constantly goes on about.
Was so disappointed with that showcase.