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.
Expect and embrace one sided Node Wars
Xeeg
Member, Alpha Two
Let's face it, if a Node spends days farming materials and completing Mayoral quests and unlocking a Node War Scroll and then they go declare war on a Node expecting a 50/50 chance of winning, they aren't that smart.
It's an Open World PVP event, we really shouldn't expect any sense of fairness without incentives. The Node War showcase was a scripted event, with scripted teams. This ain't going to be the standard case across servers for any length of time.
In reality, we should expect that the Aggressors win MOST of the time. After all, they get to choose the time and place of the war, and they spent resources to start it. And that should be fine, as long as the rewards and punishments are reasonable. Lets say something like a 5% buff for the winning side and a -1% debuff for the losing node for 14 days.
Aggressors winning is a GOOD thing. It keeps Node War declarations happening often, because it is typically profitable. We want that incentive.
Then we can have Node Wars happening all the time and not being overly consequential, just another way to get a power increase buff, but it would be the special times when defenders get support that the Node War explodes into a really big war.
It's an Open World PVP event, we really shouldn't expect any sense of fairness without incentives. The Node War showcase was a scripted event, with scripted teams. This ain't going to be the standard case across servers for any length of time.
In reality, we should expect that the Aggressors win MOST of the time. After all, they get to choose the time and place of the war, and they spent resources to start it. And that should be fine, as long as the rewards and punishments are reasonable. Lets say something like a 5% buff for the winning side and a -1% debuff for the losing node for 14 days.
Aggressors winning is a GOOD thing. It keeps Node War declarations happening often, because it is typically profitable. We want that incentive.
Then we can have Node Wars happening all the time and not being overly consequential, just another way to get a power increase buff, but it would be the special times when defenders get support that the Node War explodes into a really big war.
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Comments
Alliances obviously gotta be somewhat costly, so everyone should be able to just ally with everyone around them.
Yeah but then who would be dumb enough to waste resources starting a Node War? They spend all the time and effort to start it and expect to be outnumbered and then also suffer a penalty for a loss? I wouldn't bother if that's the case, better to go camp a boss that night or something.
Also, even if they are allied, that doesn't mean that all those allies will immediately jump to help them. Especially if you attack the outer nodes of a vassal system, where even just coming to help that defending node would require good 20 mins of running. All the while your attacking force obviously gathered for the war beforehand.
You can have some aggressive Davids trying to take down a Goliath. David may get his clocked cleaned more times than not.
Hmm... Well a bunch of the objectives have been mentioned to unlock at specific server times, so they might still be able to prepare a very strong defense.
I still think the Aggressor should have the advantage, and then other Nodes can join with a cheaper Mayoral Commission trying to get in on the win buff.
Again, if it turns out your losing most of the Node Wars you initiate then you will just stop initiating Node Wars and do something more productive with your play time.
I am actually assuming that the Aggressor is going to choose a Node they think they can win the War on before going to war. Makes sense to me.
this makes sense to me as well, but their assumption might be wrong and they lose instead.
also, sometimes people might just want to maintain peace for whatever reason. its possible that node wars rarely if ever happen in some servers.
True, but it seems like such a waste of time and resources on the Dev team for something that rarely occurs.
I'd rather see Node Wars happening all the time but be of little consequence, than Node Wars being so impactful that people are afraid to do them because of it. Save that for the Node Sieges.
I think they will happen often since this game is aimed at people who like pvp. but I can see how some servers might be the "community chosen pve servers or rp" where the wars rarely happen (maybe until the pve toxicity starts and people decide to mruder each other and do node wars xdddd).
id like my node wars to be once every month or two. ok I just realized node wars and sieges are different things, ugh! i thought they were the same. had to check the wiki when you mentioned it.
i expect node sieges to happen once every month or 2 and wars to be more frequent, maybe once a week or very other week. the penalty for losing the war isn't as bad as the penalty for losing the siege I guess. disagree with penalties for the losers, only with rewards for the winners. penalty for the losers will surely make people stop trying and go to another node.
Exactly... I was saying something like a -1% stat dampening debuff for 14 days as some kind of very weak punishment. But yeah we don't want the Node War loss to be a quit point for players because they are punished so badly, and were likely in a 1-sided war to begin with.
Also, after a loss they shouldn't be able to get Warred on again until the debuff wears off, so 14 days Node War prevention after a loss.
I'm more in favor of completely avoiding punishment for losing a war, only reward winning one. Node wars are something that can get forced on you, so being punished for something out of your control is going to feel extra bad.
Yeah, but also there are many other activities going on in Ashes that the Node War might not be the top of your priority list. Maybe you had a boss raid planned that Friday night and some other Node declared war on yours.
Now do you cancel your raid to defend the Node War?
What if you have the boss respawn timer on lockdown?
What if another known group is itching to get that boss and you are trying to prevent them?
Node War participation shouldn't be a requirement, it should be one option among many for how you spend your time in Ashes of Creation. Sometimes it may be worth getting involved and other times you may have to sacrifice the war to achieve something even greater. And that is OK.
I just don't think we need to expect massive balanced open world PVP every time there is a Node War declaration. We will be disappointed. Better to accept that now and design the system with that in mind. Sure we can make opportunities for that to happen, but it likely won't be the norm.
Wotchu sayin?!