This post is inspired and is also in part a response to the post
@Liniker made on this topic:
https://forums.ashesofcreation.com/discussion/58914/debunking-misconceptions-on-the-caravan-system-attackers-dont-need-extra-risk/p1
I appreciate his contribution to this conversation and hope this post moves the conversation forward. I've similarly been thinking about this system for years, so thought I should put my thoughts to keyboard. I would have written this during the caravan showcase 3 months ago, but I was taking a much needed break from AoC content, and am now ready to start deep diving into the game again.
I'm going to hopefully summarize the caravan system briefly, then explain why it's broken within the broader framework of the game.
Personal caravans have become fairly revolved around a resource called glint. You kill a mob and they drop some glint. You can then turn that glint into a vendor in your node for some quick gold, or you can use it to create a caravan to make significantly more gold.
How much more? That's determined primarily by the distance a caravan travels and "demand." "Demand" just means how successful caravans have been in the past week. Did a node receive 0 caravans in the past week? Then you get 20 times the amount of glint from a caravan to that node vs vendoring the glint. Did a node receive 200 caravans in the last week? Then you get 2x the amount of glint you would from vendoring. All of these are just made-up numbers, but they illustrate the point. This system is similar to how ArcheAge's trade pack values worked.
Why might a player's caravan not be successful? Because "bandits" can attack caravans and steal their glint. A portion of glint, let's say 50%, is immediately lost upon bandits successfully destroying the caravan. From there, the bandits will either have to start their own caravan to pick up the dropped loot to get the full value of the remaining glint, or they could choose to simply take the glint directly from the destroyed caravan and sell it at a lower profit on the black market. But then, they don't have to worry about anyone else taking their stolen loot from them.
There has been a lot of talk about how there isn't any balance between Caravan Originators and Bandits. Caravan Originators put in all of the hard work they did grinding mobs for glint, only to risk all of that in order to launch a caravan. Meanwhile, bandits invest nothing. In fact, they don't even suffer normal death penalties if they lose the encounter, an encounter which they have 100% power over initiating or not. Instead, they only risk potentially gaining less loot than the caravan originator, aka they're only risking the reward they may gain.
Other acclaimed risks by community members make me question how many MMO's they've played in the past. "Reputation loss" doesn't seem to be a big risk unless it was a caravan destined for your own node. If someone tells me another player is at the top of the bandit leaderboard, that isn't making me scared to cooperate with them. That's just telling me they're a great player. As for a lack of progress in the bandit progression system, we have yet to see what that looks like.
Many people are worried that this imbalance in risk will cause there to be many more bandits than caravan originators, and hence no caravans to be launched. However, Intrepid and games with similar systems merely have to raise the potential reward of a successful caravan to further incentivize them. Thinking of it in terms of Expected Value:
Expected Caravan Profit = (Gold Received * %Success Rate) - Initial Investment
As long as the Expected Caravan Profit is more than the gold gained from vendoring glint to the local merchant, everyone should try and use a caravan. To do that, all a game server needs to do is raise the amount of Gold Received from a successful caravan, no matter what the other variables in the equation look like.
So, the system is automatically balanced by the server, right? Caravans are incentivized to happen no matter how often they fail. But there are still problems.
There is still an inherent problem in there being no risk to bandits. There doesn't need to be any other consequences demonstrated during the Alpha 2 or other playtests, the fact that the system rewards bandit gameplay with no risk, whereas every other system has major risks involved, is bad in and of itself. If there was a gathering profession that could stay in-node without any risk of losing their mats, that would be poor design as well. Now imagine on top of that gathering profession not having any risk, it also potentially yielded the greatest reward out of all the gathering classes. See where some people's frustration may be coming from?
The current design is simply a lot of free gold for bandits. And what if I don't want to be a bandit? I'm able to do other tasks to gain gold, but it wouldn't be optimal gameplay. The game tells you the optimal way to play without risk, and it's by progressing in the bandit system without having to worry about losing any of your current wealth. If you see a caravan that you aren't directly allied with; attack it.
Also, just because the expected value is balanced to make it still worth running caravans rather than using a vendor, doesn't mean caravans will feel great as a player. Nobody wants to lose 9/10 times, but gain a big reward on the 10th try. I know if I was a new player and ran nine caravans and all nine failed, I'd feel hopeless with the system. People want their income to be more stable.
Lastly, some other games have been mentioned by Liniker as having succeeded with a similar system to Ashes of Creation, but they aren't similar enough. These games were Silkroad Online, ArcheAge, and Ravendawn.
In ArcheAge, there was no regionalized economic system. There was a global auction house. But in Ashes of Creation, taking some inspiration from Star Wars Galaxies and EVE Online, caravans aren't just for caravan's sake. The intention is to gather region-specific resources that have different prices in differing regions, and then make caravans to buy low in one region, transport it, and sell high in another. More importantly, the price difference in two regions represents a need for a certain resource in that region. If material resources are simply being stolen by an oversaturated amount of bandits 80% of the time globally, then that entire system collapses. It's fine if glint, which all players passively accumulate over time, is regularly lost. If forest nodes can't get specialized metal, or mountain nodes can't get specialized wood, then we have a problem.
I haven't played Ravendawn, but it seems to differ from Ashes in the same way ArcheAge does. Tradepacks aren't a way to create trade between localized economies. Not only that, they don't have specific areas you can camp to prevent an enemy node from progressing, which you can do in Ashes of Creation.
Silkroad Online lets you make 6 safe trade routes per day. That isn't the case in Ashes, and any similar system in Ashes I think would betray the risk vs reward aspect.
Solutions: Potential Ways to Create Risk for Bandits
1) A simple way to add risk would be to impose the normal death penalty on bandits if they die. I know, I know, complaints and tears aside, this would be a significant risk to individual bandits in every attack. And remember, bandits always get to decide whether to initiate the attack, so if they ever expect to lose they can simply not attack. I think giving bandits corruption would be way too far, however.
2) The Thieves Guild. If you want to be a bandit, then you need to know someone who is going to take stolen goods. And that costs a membership fee. The Thieves Guild wants their cut up front, whether you succeed or fail in your banditry. The more you fail, the more "heat" you bring to yourself and the goods you steal, and hence a higher membership price.
3) Forfeiture of local node resources to your character. Are you the guy who killed all of those players who were bringing some NPC's node some needed goods? Good for you! What's that, you want to use the crafting bench here? Hmm... no. The market stalls? Hmm... No. This wouldn't be permanent, but it adds a bit of annoyance and immersion to the game. If you're a bandit in a certain node, you're a bandit there. Cause enough havoc for a node and maybe even the local guards will start attacking you!
Last words. It seems to me that many players who love the current caravan design often claim to be big fans of full loot PvP. They also seem to claim others who are concerned with the current caravan design are carebears. But this isn't a hardcore system for a PvP gamer who loves to be on the edge of their seat as they risk all their own items like in Escape from Tarkov. This is a system that provides special protection to bandits while they run around carefree looking for more caravans to destroy at no cost to themselves.
I want PvP. I want drama to start from one node blockading another node and preventing all caravans from coming in or going out. I want node sieges to be declared because of this gameplay. I want people to hate another player so badly they do everything they can to find and destroy every single one of their caravans. Caravan destruction needs to evoke a response from players other than, "well they got you, better luck next week". And that can only happen when people go out of their way to be bandits, even though it may cost them something. Even when it's not optimal for their player progression.
