Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
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.
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.
Comments
There will be fight for resources and taking other nodes' relics.
Not suddenly. That's the point. If you want to take down the node, the vassal node will act as a traitor for a longer time.
The parent node will be able to react and siege the vassal, a valid defense against nodes infiltrated by enemy metro nations.
Only in your dream are in competition. The ones bound to eachother will have stronger incentive to cooperate than fight.
Together will try to siege other nodes.
If one of them falls, entire branches could be removed from the metro nation and replaced with nodes from the buffer 20 outside.
That means they could lose access to metropolis benefits. What you see is your dream about a different game.
Steven's vision is to have nation like behavior between the nodes under the metropolis. He used this "nation like" expression to describe them:
"From a territory perspective it has ancillary nodes to play with and expand towards that redistricts the map, so that if a metropolis falls there's a significant difference in the layout of the world and the layout of these almost nation-like territories."
Steven will have to balance the taxes to force players out to live in smaller nodes too.
Maybe freehold and barony owners will be more interested to be citizens of smaller nodes.
"Citizenship dues and property taxes scale based on the stage of the node when a player became a citizen.[8][9][10][11][12]
The goal is to exert financial pressure on node populations by making taxes increasingly expensive as nodes advance, rather than putting in place hard population caps.[10][11]"
And we will have to see where dungeons and resources spawn. A metropolis ZoI overlaps with other nodes ZoI so it can happen that smaller nodes will be closer to these places than the metropolis itself.
You see, that's your problem. You have to play the game else you are pushing it to become the dream game you played before. You have to understand and be able to simulate in your mind the world dynamic as Steven wants it.
You cannot convince Steven to change his vision to yours just because you and a few others ask for it.
Most likely he initially started with just this idea you want and then improved it.
I was giving you 2 examples before, one where a node level 4 is unlikely to decide anything against parent node.
And one where if a siege can potentially be successful, it can become a traitor to the nation (your wish)
But that case will not be necessary if the level 5 node is so strong because it can cooperate and be the important tool to destroy nations arround.
Only is special cases player might want to promote their node to level up. But it will be risky: you destroy the metropolis and you can end up outside of the new metropolis, as part of the 20 buffer nodes.
No, the attack upwards will not be allowed because it makes no sense to weaken the nation like concept Steven wants.
The deep ocean free of corruption was a good addition to the game.
It got bigger and isolates the two continents a bit better.
It changed nothing about the nodes and it left the initial corruption mechanic unchanged.
Players might still be able to cross between continents using longer routes, from island to island.
Or will offer more protection because is bigger but also higher risk, being free of PvP.
A small crowded ocean where you immediately go from a continent to the other would have made if feel like a larger lake.
The nodes create comunities which will unite under the metropolis influence.
Solo players who insist to be "just" citizens will not be as efficient as guilds.
But participation into the castle sieges or their defense needs everyone. Even if a guild can coordinate better, it will need the support of a larger population.
Solo players who avoid guilds are typically not interested in politics either.
Your argument is weak. You just want to put sieging of parent nodes into the hand of random solo players because shaky reasons like "I am new to the game and poor but I want vertical leveling of my node even though I have weak interaction with other players... and guilds will control anyway places where money comes from."
Yes, with limitations, just as what I'm agreeing to in this current context.
And I've already said that I consider this change to be a good thing that will bring better politicking into the game and better internal drama in these "kingdoms".
Either way, it's obvious that yall want what Steven says here, while some of us want what we see as a better thing for the game. We've seen big shifts in design before, so I see no reason why this one couldn't happen.
I just hope there doesn't happen some other change that suddenly makes yall's current position moot
I mean, if they existed in Ashes, it's just another option, right?
Obviously we both know this isnt actually a valid argument. Adding the option for people to spend all day in instanced content would be detrimental to Ashes, regardless of the fact that it is "just another option". The point being,more options arent always a good thing, and sometimes there isnt an appropriate cost to balance it out.
I have no doubt that it will add more internal drama.
The question is, do you want to add internal drama at the node level in exchange for external drama?
Given the option, I'd much rather encourage node clusters fighting other node clusters, rather than fighting amongst themselves.
This seems to me to be what it comes down to. Some people want the fight to be small and local,whereas I see the entire point of the node system to be server wide conflict.
Local conflict is something that should be between smaller guilds, not nodes.
Again, to me this comes down to loot rather than the content type itself. If this instanced pve requires loot from non-instanced places - people will still have to spend a ton of time in the open world, just as is the case with pvp arena.
Yes
External drama won't suddenly disappear purely because there's now a possibility of internal drama, because inter-guild drama never disappeared, even though intra-guild drama always existed.
Also, a full vassal system is still 1/5 of the world. To a semi-casual player that's already more than they will most likely experience in the game (unless the story takes us across the entire map), so having theoretical conflict against someone who's within the system would be not much different from fighting those who come from the outside. And hardcore players would involve themselves in more things than just internal strife.
Be drastically reduced? probably.
Again, the best this game could possibly be is if metropolis nodes with full vassals in support go to war against other full metropolis nodes with their own vassals in support. In order for this to happen, you need to understand that there are many, many people out there that would rather tear something down to rebuild it just because it isn't exactly what they want, rather than accepting something that works for the many. Once you understand that these people exist, if your goal is still a game where metropolis nodes with full vassals in support go to war against other full metropolis nodes with their own vassals in support, then your only option is to remove that tear down option from those people.
Quite honestly, the only argument for this is "but muh node!". Since Ashes clearly can't be a game where you remain loyal to one node in perpituity, this isn't an argument at all.
Even under the current system you'll have a whole spectrum of people who stay relatively in the same area, these can be your crafters who get mats supplied through trade of guilds, your freehold owners with processing stations and whatever other stuff they get up to. And ofc the traders who supply mats to the people who don't want to get those mats themselves.
This spectrum of players would happen either way in my opinion.
Besides... If you're scared of a node perceiving you as an enemy because of what node you belong to.... "you can just drop your citizenship"
I'll tend to the flame, you can worship the ashes.
If vassals are sieging their parents too much you can:
Lower the rewards for vassal attackers.
Raise the rewards for vassal defenders.
Add additional costs for vassal attackers.
Make the ability to participate interactable by policies.
Don't throw the system out completely when you can adjust it!
The threat coming from outside exclusively is not key at all. The point of the node system as a whole is to have nodes rise and fall to keep generating content. Inward tensions produce just as much gameplay as outward tensions. Alliances will form and break in both cases.
Also, like has been said before, if the true target of IS is to make a kingom builder instead of a city state builder, the design as a whole should be reworked to better suit that. Kingdoms that are not formed out of player interactions will produce apathetic chains of people who just happen to be together.
Than you are going onto say inward generates as much tension as outward (actually no it generates more tension). Leaning more on the point about the issue and why you are saying they need all these random changes just so people aren't trying to destroy each other every second.
Nodes will change without that kind of tension this games needs some level of stability not every single node trying to go to war with each. And content being reduced because of it. There is going to be enough node changes and pvp do to other kingdoms approach and causing conflict. This game isn't trying to create a high level tension to scare off every single casual do to warring going on between 20 nodes all around them. You are not considering any design elements at all, you will have to do so many restrictions to the point people just move nodes.
People out here liking post saying its just a little change trying to rework the whole system in itself. The designs already reflect what they are trying to do as well yall just don't want to acknowledge that. Your points are full of holes and like i said before Dude bro mentality my node strong so i win (which is not how the game works).
The reason is the ability to rebel in itself.
Yes, it's that important. You already know this because you think it's going to be overused.
Yes, it's worth balancing for.
And yes it can be balanced for.
So you all can stop saying you are asking for a small change and asking for mass pvp of all node against each other and a more chaotic environment at the cost of the health and growth of the game.
First of all, sieges can't be tied to node policy at all. While we have been talking about vassal nodes vs parent nodes, it is actually citizens of vassal nodes vs parent nodes. The vassal node itself isn't a factor here, thus policies can't be a factor. If Intrepid were to implement something like this, the penalty for losing the siege would need to be the automatic destruction of this vassal node.
Second, you can't "add" an additional cost to attackers, when the only person that has a cost associated with an attacking siege is the player that obtains the scroll. You could say "just make it more expensive for a citizen to get the scroll", but then a non-citizen would get it, and that cost is very easily avoided. You could then say "make two scrolls, one that allows and one that doesn't", but now the cost of the one that allows citizens to attack needs to factor in the cost multiplied by 250 - keeping in mind that this cost per person needs to be on par with having to drop citizenship.
Rewards associated with the siege are after the fact, and are not exclusive to people that participated in the siege. It isn't an appropriate place to place a penalty, as the idea is literally that it is a free-for-all.
There are no rewards directly associated with defending a siege. The reward is the node not being destroyed.
So, not only is the system a bad idea to have, but the levers you think Intrepid have to influence people simply do not exist. The threat coming from outside exclusively is not key at all. The point of the node system as a whole is to have nodes rise and fall to keep generating content. Inward tensions produce just as much gameplay as outward tensions. Alliances will form and break in both cases.
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It actually kind of is key.
Node clusters infighting amongst themselves is not what is going to cause content to shift and change. Node clusters forming, organizing and then looking out at other node clusters is what is going to see drastic changes in content. There is player interaction here.
You seem to only be considering the notion that everyone wants their node to be the metropolis. This is not the case at all.
All up, as I said in an above post, the only argument for allowing vassal citizens to siege their parent node is "but muh node". It is simply people wanting to stay in the same node despite that node no longer suiting the way they want to play the game.
The correct thing to do when the node you are in no longer suits the way you play, is to move on to a node that does suit the way you want to play.
The argument that no loyalty should be a thing is a non-factor in this discussion, as the side wanting vassals to siege parents is talking about destroying the node of a thousand or more players, and as such dislodging them.
Node loyalty is a mirage, a fairytale, an illusion. You will have to move nodes many times in Ashes, this is just a fact. Arguing for a change to the game to prevent this is not likely to see success.
Siege frequency has to be balanced anyway using these same levers. The changes in themselves ARE small development wise. All these systems already exist in some form.
Yes, we want a more chaotic environment for the benefit of health and growth of the game.
And if the chaos is too much, it can be adjusted down which you can't refute.
So is RL money and most of the world economy. Same goes for guild loyalty if you want to keep it in MMORPG terms. It doesn't mean that people won't care or fight for those things. Whenever you build something up and spend time and effort, you start caring. This goes as much for nodes as it does for everything else. It's basic human psychology.
I am not in the camp that want vassals to attack parent nodes, but I want Intrepid to remove the option for parent nodes to attack vassal nodes directly. If the leadership of the parent node wants a vassal node gone, they should have to do it through 3rd parties.
Its already been mentioned multiple times, what you want is NOT to the benefit and heath of the game, but just a feature you want yourself. Its already been pointed out multiple times it is a negative experience , and your argument continues to be I want my node to be a metro or I want to attack who I want to attack regardless how the game designed.
Its been pointed out your points are not strong with how you are reference levers, which is simple because again you are not considered the design of the actual game. And why you are asking for larger changes without realizing and missing a lot of details on how things work in the game. Pointed out by both noaani and I.
I feel them being able to attack is fine, and there should be a consequence if they lose the fight depending on things. And if they win it should be a consequence in itself. This can be balanced around the resources they need to sustain their area. Weakening their own kingdom will more easily open them up to being sieged. So most likely not a thing people are going to be for doing as a first choice or in general.
We need to see more so of what their goals will be for node sieges and such and effects. This is the only thing that is in more the grey area.
In a fully developed map, if a metropolis would have the interest to destroy one of his own nodes, the other metropolises will have the interest to defend it. Unless there is an agreement between them, but in that case your 3rd party solution would work better.
I would not take away this feature but I hope buffer nodes will not immediately replace the destroyed node, so that the parent node to be temporarily weakened by lack of taxes flowing in.
Anyway you cannot make all players happy in all cases. If two metropolises decide that one of the nodes must fall, chances are that it will fall.
You'd either need a string of sieges all happening at once around the same region to actually change any "kingdom" borders, or a buffer node happened to be a high enough level to absorb a tiny bit of the nodes from the "kingdom" that lost a node.
In this sense, it might be citizens of border nodes who are the only ones guaranteed to be able to actually "conquer" anything in a fully developed map, and actually able to shift the ZOI borders around... real change.
I'll tend to the flame, you can worship the ashes.
Geh, looks like you didn't read my post about policies. Let me refresh:
Both of these examples would be a way to add political elements between vassals and masters using existing systems. Policies exist, and siege registration is going to be already selective based on vassal status. Combine, and you get policies which affect siege registration.
I don't understand how vassals aren't a factor? The current system lists them as automatic defenders!
I already did suggest another type of scroll. And yes, I said it should cost more.
250 is probably not the right number, but I imagine a good value exists between 1 and infinity. The right number will be found during alpha.
To me this screams a giant "Victory!" pop-up which doles out currencies of all kinds.
If you're talking about attackers looting the ruins afterwards, then former vassals can be prevented from joining the looting.
So yes, attacker and defender rewards can be adjusted for vassals. An additional siege scroll cost for allowing vassals to attack can be added.
And that's with playing nice with all the existing systems.
This is just you saying "trust me bro". What's different with change caused by infighting? A node goes up up and then it goes down. As long as that is happening, the world content keeps cycling. If you think players can't figure out alliances and put together metros without the system babying them, I think you'll be in for a surprise.
I think we've said multiple multiple times that not everyone is going to be rebelling. And why are you saying this when apparently the ability to rebel would cause too much instability?
Do you think people would infight too much and there would be no stability?
Fine let's adjust that with the levers.
Or...
Do you think people would be happy to remain vassal even given the ability to rebel?
Good! Things will be probably stable!
As you said, not everyone wants their node to be a metropolis, so there will be interesting politics within nodes between people who do and who don't.
Some node communities will be actively hostile as vassals.
Some will be almost completely loyal.
Most will be somewhere in the middle, and it'll be down to politics between players to keep the kingdom growing.
I guess this is a slightly better characterization than a meme.
Maybe you're just not a community person? Maybe I need to write an example for this to make sense to you:
On server start, you go off and find a nice spot to farm for mobs and iron. A few other people come around and they help you out every now and then. Time goes on, more people keep flowing in and eventually the node has turned into a town. Iron is no longer the only thing, but rarer resources are popping up and the money is getting better. You know most of the regulars of the node, you've joined a guild in the node, you have a house and participate in the politics. You prop up a discord server for the node, and debate plans for trade alliances and facilities there. The node has long been a community in itself.
Then one day the node gets the message "you've been vassalized by Shitburg".
With the current plan, the community grinds to a halt. Once the town is maxed out, plans stagnate into just keeping the node from atrophying. Some people will be happy not doing anything and hang around as long as making some money is possible. Many people will move to a bigger node to chase advancement. But you'll find many people disappointed that they can't actively do anything about the situation. You've collectively put thousands of hours into an area and the answer is to just move.
Mind you, this sort of attachment is what will make the game politics and pvp actually matter. If people aren't invested, it all turns into a big Alterac Valley.
Yet all signs and quotes point to Ashes being the game about node loyalty. How vassal chains work is the only confusing puzzle piece.
I think I remember you mentioning how the game has many contradictions. This is one of them. And it's bad. Intrepid devs want people to be loyal to nodes and they want nodes to prevent each other from growing. But they somehow want those inherently opposed nodes to be a unified "kingdom"?
Nodes 3 better have some excellent solutions.
That whole previous post is moot. You are trying to add a whole other complexity to the system that doesn't actually add any value. You are trying to paint a scenario where a parent node can actually control other nodes in taking away free will from in game mechanics. When that is not the case.
Again here is a cost LEAVE the node, and join another node / kingdom that wants to destroy them.
Your example is missing the fact that as your node is developing, "Shitburg" is there all along, leveling up.
You are also missing the fact that while you and your community are there gathering the resources and being a community, once you become a vassal if "Shitburg", you are all still there, all still a community, still have those resources,and now happen to have access to services that you had no hand in setting up. Your small community is now a small community within a larger community.
Vassal chains are not the conflicting part of the node system. The conflict is the notion of loyalty. The rest of the games systems point to players needing to be mobile to a degree. Resources are not infinite so players need to continually relocate if they want to gather the same resource. Node infrastructure is temporary, so if you are a profession reliant on that you will need to move often. Content will change so if you want to live near content you enjoy, you will need to move often. Populations as a whole will move over time, so if your gameplay relies on large population (even running a tavern), you'll need to move often.
Everything in the games design is about players moving to new nodes somewhat frequently - the basic premise of the games design requires this (ever changing content due to node changes). The only thing that isn't in line with this principle is not actually a part of game design, it is Stevens comment about node loyalty. There is no game design element towards this as yet, just an empty statement with game design elements to the opposite effect.
You mean to receive vassals?
Steven created these buffer nodes to make the map evolution less predictable.
He also wants to create sieges and he assumes that scarcity and limited relics will drive the 5 nations to fight each-other.
When rare resources spawn somewhere, players will rush there to collect them. Caravans will start transporting them to freeholds. Those caravans will be in greater danger. Freeholds processing these resources will attract sieges too.
Like those 2 pics I posted here earlier of the lvl 5 City that fell. None of it's vassals got absorbed into the neighboring ZOIs, which means eventually they'd just collect together into the ZOI with the exact same borders as before, just with a diff node as the City. Same stuff, same people, just slightly moved around.
With a buffer node though, you'd have the opportunity of a high enough buffer node to steal one of those vassals after that City fell. Eventually maybe even that buffer node could steal enough nodes from it's neighbors that it became a Metro in it's own right.
That's all I mean when I say a buffer node can actually conquer, it has both the option to siege basically all of their neighboring nodes, AND absorb them as vassals.
I'll tend to the flame, you can worship the ashes.
Once the nodes have leveled up and have sold out all of their in-node and freehold housing (guild-only stuff), only the apartments will remain. And those go up in cost the more people have bought them, which means that moving to a new node means paying way more for new housing than what you paid for your initial place.
Majority of casuals would most likely not even be able to afford a node move. And you yourself said that sieging a parent node should have a cost equivalent to moving nodes, right? So that would imply that the cost is already fairly high.
And this doesn't even include the social aspect of leaving your community (if you've built one) or ease of content access due to knowledge of its layout and acquaintance with other people who might be farming it.
In-node/freehold owners have it slightly easier because they can sell their shit and use that money to at least get an apartment, though even then you'd be trading a super prestigious thing for a fucking instance, which I'm not sure how many people would be willing to do.
And all of this is in the context of being a citizen and having benefits from that (which are supposedly really nice), so it's not like becoming a bum after being a citizen will be all that alluring.
So I think you're wrong in saying that there're no features that promote node loyalty. If anything, I'd say that majority of node-related features do exactly that, because changing nodes is not as easy as you make it out to be.
And iirc it was you who said that a lot of people would leave the game if their node got destroyed (and their shit with it), and moving nodes would be quite close to that, especially if you have to transfer your stuff on caravans and those get raided.
I really feel like yalls acceptance of this current design comes from your belief that you'll be the ones with freeholds, in metros with strong guilds, so of course it's a good thing that the plebs down below can't rebel against you, cause how dare they rise up.
I don't think that's not quite how communities work. The point of my example was to demonstrate the organic growth of a community from people working together. If you smash a community into another community that now taxes you and prevents your growth, you get a rivalry. Sure, the pragmatic folk will see the opportunities, but your average gamer will not see this new node in a positive light.
Mobility is important yes, but those are new communities forming out of siege refugees and the opportunists. The old communities will still exist, harvesting their own areas and importing and exporting the goods they still have. Unless you have some secret information, I don't think resources will vanish to the point where nodes will completely run out everything and atrophy. So far we just know that some resources are tied to node level and some are (semi?)randomly appearing clusters. Veering too far into this realm turns into debating about hypotheticals.
Well, that's certainly a take. While this is not impossible, for me, the current pieces line up closer to a city state builder instead of a kingdom builder. Until some sort of objective reality comes crashing down, I can only work with what I believe in.
So in short,
Mr Steven pls!
The vassal system needs work.
Steven said that if a metropolis falls, a new metropolis can be created from a node in the buffer zone. Maybe he has an updated simulation and he observed a better map dynamic.
Steven also said that leveling up a node to metropolis level is relatively fast and easy but developing the metropolis, all it's buildings will require effort.
So players who move after a node was destroyed may level up a node fast.
Or even gathering rare resources at the edge of a metro nation might level up the nodes in the buffer zone.
And there is no node atrophy. Once leveled up, they do not delevel.
You are counteracting your own argument saying casuals can't afford it (I can see the pattern in these conversations where you guys don't have any ground so you are making up scenarios since you lack actual points or proof)
Back to why you are counteracting your point though is you all have been advocating the current game design won't cause enough change in the game with nodes falling (also a made up scenario ). So you saying casuals won't be able to afford it yet you are wanting more node destruction, which by your logic casuals can not afford to move (entirely made up)
The more this conversation goes on the more its clear you guys have no ground and are making crap up at this point. Again adding your own holes in the discussion, on top of saying they need to rebel, when there is no reason to rebel do to parent nodes not actually being a tyrant that can control and reduce the quality of living of vassal nodes that has been shown. Which it being the opposite being able to give some elements of benefits to them which I have a feeling will be something under their control if they want it or not (based off taxes)
Really wish I could get my hands on a node sim sometime soon, interests me way more than the Character Creator ppl begging for
I'll tend to the flame, you can worship the ashes.