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.

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Suggestion: Villains which Hire Players -(Based on Node and Caravan concepts)

In line with the quest and world reactions to Nodes, I would like to suggest the idea of Villains. TLDR: read my 4 points at the bottom.

In short, a Villain would be a character or monster capable of hiring a set # of players to perform objectives which lead to a node/town's destruction. The villain would have a set maximum # of players it could hire and players which perform poorly on objectives, or perform them in an untimely manner, may get fired, allowing the villain to hire new players.

Depending on the villain, fired players may get killed, simply released, or put on a villain "Wanted" list for the rest of the hires.

A villain's offer can be refused of-course, though doing so may make it particularly dislike you (see Wanted list above). Eventually, players may learn of secretive villains only because a player refused it and told others of its whereabouts.

Objective examples:
- "Kill any players that go near the cave at the end of the river"
-"Supply my soldiers with weapons and armor" (A player both makes enemies stronger and doesn't get attacked by them)
-"Get the town to drain the lake of fish so that the monster beneath its surface attacks"
-"Find the rare plant rosebud and bring it to me!" - the hunt for the single rosebud plant begins
-"Assassinate the city's King on the night of a full moon."

I am throwing this idea out there for 4 reasons.
1) It aligns with similar ideas presented by caravans. Caravans have NPCs hire a few players to do an activity which will help a node, but other players can stop them. Villains on the other hand hire a few players to do an activity which will hurt a node, and other players can try to stop them.
2) It puts a new kind of danger to large cities, perhaps more threatening than world bosses. Perhaps, combined with a world bosses at times (Example Objective "turn on your fellow players if I am able reach the city gate")
3) This is something unique that only multiplayer games can offer; a villain which outsources objectives to players. Those defending don't just have to beat a well programmed enemy, they also need to watch out for his/her hirelings.
4) Villains can provide influential non-combat related PvP (see objective examples above)

Let me know what you think. It sounds like the foundation for such Villains is there, making it a possibility, but I understand that it would still require a decent amount of resources devoted to the task to get such a thing implemented.
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