So i question the applicability of for experience due to the very apparent different rulesets structures and scales involved and instead of explaining that it still does you run away and stoop so low as to attacking me personally by calling me a mindless fanboy with his head in the sand. Its really funny honestly when all I did was pointing out that there already is more thought involved than just 2 systems as you make it out to be.
I think everyone's forgetting one of the most major ways to limit the strengths of large guilds that the devs talked about since the beginning, and that is NO FAST TRAVEL (I think they said they might make it a special perk of one of the node types, and only fast travel within the node). IMO guilds can enforce control over their territory so effectively largely because MMORPGS give them the ability to rally instantly in large numbers onto any map in the game. In AOC, the physical distance is actually a barrier to them, and they're going to have to actually decide on a node to be centralized around or some other sort of central headquarters, which will be where they are the strongest. To truly be able to call a place their territory, the guild is actually going to need to have fighting force in or closeby to defend that area present constantly. The strongest guild on the server may very well have little influence over what happens on the opposite end of the map. I feel with that system in place and a decent MMO scale map size, the most a guild can do is controlling an entire node. The other thing is, with the design of the game, if that guild is a bunch of assholes, the casual players leaving that node will actually affect them. Remember, no fast travel and no global auction house, so the guild's resources is actually going to be tied to the prosperity of their local territory, not to mention that the nodes are need constant player activity around them to progress. So, in other words, the guilds do really need the constant economic activity of the casuals in their node to thrive. If they're gonna chase all the casuals out, not only are they getting everyone to hate them, but they're also making themselves weaker and therefore an easier target for the surrounding nodes to siege.
I really hope this game will try to limit the way huge guilds control the game. No more than 300 at max level for members. Thankfully there won't be much fast travel in the game, which will make it possible for smaller guilds to take control over areas as long as they are coordinated and well planned.
I hope that the limited ability to travel and map size will impose some restrictions as the two of you pointed out. However, here is the problem with that: there will be a limit to the number of nodes that can reach the maximum level of development. So if the limit is 3 nodes that can reach lvl 6 metro then they don't really need to control the entire map, they can simply focus on what US navy and military calls anti-access and area denial tactics. They can simply focus on denying access to key resources to prevent the other nodes from reaching a critical level of development that might lead to a siege of their own nodes.
Also, the "mega" guilds don't have to consist entirely of "assholes," cleverness and ability to expose weak points doesn't make someone an asshole. I am sure the guild leaders will ensure that their nodes grow and attract more players. Again, all of this may not be a terrible thing, I am just saying that those who do not wish to conform to the decisions made by those who control the nodes will not have any way to object. Scientific nodes will potentially have a way for the minority to voice their objections.
I am gonna take a break from posting for a while since there is not enough info out there to really continue with these discussions. And I don't want to go around in circles.
Well, if we model the game after RL, the checks and bounds that RL imposes on civilizations to prevent them from expanding would probably be logistics and communication.
Now, we can't prevent communication because of 3rd party apps. But the game can create a logistical challenge that would make it more difficult for large guilds to maintain their territory.
I'll give you an example. Resource are tied to location. Without fast travel, to maintain ownership of said resource, you would need to enforce it through power (ie, players/pvp). Just saying "this mine belongs to me" should not be enough to stop people from entering. There needs to be an investment of manpower to prevent intruders.
The larger the guild, the more territory they can hold. But the investment to move from their base of operation (the center of their territory) to the outskirts becomes increasingly difficult the larger it becomes. The amount of time and money needed to have your troops would increase several folds (because a circle increase faster in area than it does in radius), making it easier for smaller guilds in the vicinity to funnel their resource into attack and defense instead of travelling.
I could still see this as a thing though - especially at launch. When Archage came out guilds started taking control of the ocean so that you couldn't trade on the other continent. It was kinda fun at first but it got super tiresome after a while to where I just stopped crafting.
Well, if we model the game after RL, the checks and bounds that RL imposes on civilizations to prevent them from expanding would probably be logistics and communication.
Now, we can't prevent communication because of 3rd party apps. But the game can create a logistical challenge that would make it more difficult for large guilds to maintain their territory.
I'll give you an example. Resource are tied to location. Without fast travel, to maintain ownership of said resource, you would need to enforce it through power (ie, players/pvp). Just saying "this mine belongs to me" should not be enough to stop people from entering. There needs to be an investment of manpower to prevent intruders.
The larger the guild, the more territory they can hold. But the investment to move from their base of operation (the center of their territory) to the outskirts becomes increasingly difficult the larger it becomes. The amount of time and money needed to have your troops would increase several folds (because a circle increase faster in area than it does in radius), making it easier for smaller guilds in the vicinity to funnel their resource into attack and defense instead of travelling.
This is where the threat of retribution comes in.
They don't need to physically block the mine. All they need to do is send their PK squad to murder anyone they catch in the mine, or siege the node of any group they see benefiting from the mine.
It remains to be seen how much travel times will affect things, but it's safe to assume that any advantage it gives will be more efficiently exploited by the hardcore guilds than the casual guilds.
I'm afraid AoC is going to need mechanics specifically designed to hamper mega guilds from accumulating and maintaining massive levels of power.
"Needing to satisfy the "casual masses" is the linchpin of the whole node system balance."
If that's the case it's screwed from the start. Any system designed to placate the casual is either obsolete, or shoots itself in the foot. Doesn't matter what system it is. Crafting, questing, PvP, or PvE any system that says if you play 4 hours a week you can accomplish the exact same as someone who plays 4 hours a night, is broken from the word go. If 100 players individually play the game 3-5 hours a week versus 20 organized players who play 3-5 per night you think the 100 should be on equal footing?
It's that sense of entitlement that has games catering to the lowest common denominator over the past decade. Either join together and fight back or live with it, stop expecting devs to hold your hand because your feelings might get hurt. If a strong group works a well placed strategy requiring teamwork you'd rather punish that teamwork? You really want to say: "Don't reward that group that did all that work, give me and my 3 buddies the same reward because we say so!"
More than enough titles cater to the casual masses, and yet here you are looking for another to do the same.
"Needing to satisfy the "casual masses" is the linchpin of the whole node system balance."
If that's the case it's screwed from the start. Any system designed to placate the casual is either obsolete, or shoots itself in the foot. Doesn't matter what system it is. Crafting, questing, PvP, or PvE any system that says if you play 4 hours a week you can accomplish the exact same as someone who plays 4 hours a night, is broken from the word go. If 100 players individually play the game 3-5 hours a week versus 20 organized players who play 3-5 per night you think the 100 should be on equal footing?
It's that sense of entitlement that has games catering to the lowest common denominator over the past decade. Either join together and fight back or live with it, stop expecting devs to hold your hand because your feelings might get hurt. If a strong group works a well placed strategy requiring teamwork you'd rather punish that teamwork? You really want to say: "Don't reward that group that did all that work, give me and my 3 buddies the same reward because we say so!"
More than enough titles cater to the casual masses, and yet here you are looking for another to do the same.
I hope this attitude helps the folks who think hardcore players will not be a major issue wake up. There are enough no-life players with this exact point of view to completely overrun AoC.
Casual players will not be teaming up to topple the top guilds in AoC, just as they never team up to topple them in any other PvP game ever.
Intrepid will have to truly innovate the PvP mechanics to alter that fact, and nothing I've seen them suggest will come close.
I hope this attitude helps the folks who think hardcore players will not be a major issue wake up. There are enough no-life players with this exact point of view to completely overrun AoC.
Casual players will not be teaming up to topple the top guilds in AoC, just as they never team up to topple them in any other PvP game ever.
Intrepid will have to truly innovate the PvP mechanics to alter that fact, and nothing I've seen them suggest will come close.
Which part do you want people to wake up to? The part where you agree that casual players 4-5 hours a week should have everything and be completely equal to someone who plays 4-5 hours a night? Why play the game more than once a week in that case? Oh, why play it at all if it's only good one night a week and anything more than that is pointless and wasted?
Games catering to casuals are fodder for locusts. A strong initial release that stagnates and in a few months time, before the first year is out, you're left with a very small player base that can't pay the bills. So they start looking at other ways to draw in players or earn a bit of income to support it.
Forget catering to casuals, target your actual players that are going to stick around and not jump to the next new title in 3 months. Whether you like "this attitude" or not the issue isn't "hardcore" players it is entitled casuals. That has been proven time and time again by countless titles. I personally don't have the time to be a so called "hardcore" player but on the other hand I also recognize there are more people than just myself and I don't expect games to cater to me personally.
We don't need to separate this into either extreme, there is no need to make this black and white. We are not debating how hardcore the content of the game will be, but the way the game will shape how players organize. Or at least that's what my concern is haha Specifically, I am worried that organized guilds will be able to control the way decisions are made in the game: the way benefits are divvied up within a node, the way the nodes progress and so on. Players that can't take part in that decision-making process may not benefit, that's the problem. I suppose if we all join a strong guild, that won't be a problem, but some of us may not want to be part of a "mega" guild (and I also include hardcore players in this).
"Actual players," as you call them, most likely make up a small number of players playing these games (most of us do have jobs, other things to do, and such). There is a reason why Korean MMO's do so badly in American market, they DO cater to hardcore players. But gaming in South Korea is treated as a major "sport" equivalent to American football, so it's easier for them to attract revenues.
I think the games that succeed (WoW) do well because they cater to EVERYONE, there is no need to fall into either extreme...
I feel like you are thinking of guilds as a single entity and ignoring the fact the are made of players. Organized groups of players (guilds/alliances) will probably control a lot of the world and they probably should, they are a bunch of players working together. A single random player shouldn't have more weight then a group of players working together.
The beauty of the node system is, unlike other games, they aren't explicitly controlled by guilds. From what we know, the system is open. Anyone can go to a node and become a citizen. It's because of how open the system is i don't see a reason to try to hold back the more hardcore players as the casual players benefit from their efforts.
I think guilds should be allowed to use force to control land and resources. I'd hope that the cost of running a high level node would encourage guilds to work with other players but still think they should be allowed to make themselves the enemy. If they consider attacking resources with the caravan system meaningful pvp then i'd think they would also consider fighting over resources in the world meaningful.
Only thing that hasn't been made 100% clear to me is development of nodes that have fallen under the ZOI of a bigger node. Metros are awesome and all but i would be sad if that was the only place anyone lived. I believe that if players want, they should be able to move to these less popular nodes, develop, and live in them. It could be perfect for those who want to get away from all the action and form smaller communities. They wouldn't get all the bells and whistles of a metro but they would still have something. It sounds like you can do this but the details on how it all works out is not clear to me.
PS: if a guild sent a gank squad to a mine, i'm pretty sure they would be considered the laughing stocks of the community. It would be one thing if it had rare resources but wasting your members time zerging down casuals trying to get some common resources is silly.
We don't need to separate this into either extreme, there is no need to make this black and white. We are not debating how hardcore the content of the game will be, but the way the game will shape how players organize. Or at least that's what my concern is haha Specifically, I am worried that organized guilds will be able to control the way decisions are made in the game: the way benefits are divvied up within a node, the way the nodes progress and so on. Players that can't take part in that decision-making process may not benefit, that's the problem. I suppose if we all join a strong guild, that won't be a problem, but some of us may not want to be part of a "mega" guild (and I also include hardcore players in this).
"Actual players," as you call them, most likely make up a small number of players playing these games (most of us do have jobs, other things to do, and such). There is a reason why Korean MMO's do so badly in American market, they DO cater to hardcore players. But gaming in South Korea is treated as a major "sport" equivalent to American football, so it's easier for them to attract revenues.
I think the games that succeed (WoW) do well because they cater to EVERYONE, there is no need to fall into either extreme...
You're right about one thing there does not need to be an extreme. However, by saying that organized guilds or players who spend more time in game gain absolutely zero benefit from doing so you create an extreme.
A guild of 300 or and alliance of two such guilds should have more say. Some people want their guild of 5-20 to have just as much say, meaning the opinion of those 5-20 is more valuable than the consensus of 300 or 300x2.
You simply can not cater to 20 casual players by saying their opinion is more important because they are casual. It creates the extreme you want to avoid.
By NOT creating that extreme the game fosters and encourages a more robust community. If you and your 5 friends can't do it so what? Casual guilds, several large ones, will spawn and either you join them and get to know other players or you stay in your 5 person clique and get over it.
@Kraive: I did not say that organized guilds should not benefit... pay attention. I simply don't want them to TOTALLY dominate and COMPLETELY snuff out smaller guilds. Again, this has absolutely nothing to do with hardcore vs casual gamers. A 20 person hardcore guild should care about this as much as a 5 person casual guild. I think it would be nice to have a few smaller guilds pool their resources and establish a 6 tier node, for example. But they will never be able to compete with 1,000 players who are constantly pooling their resources.
@McStackerson: So the devs are designing this game to resemble RW politics. Oligarchy means that a few select individuals with the most "gold" will control the node. So if you have a few large guilds pooling their resources, they will simply have their guild leaders control the node. Military and Divine nodes will also be dominated by individuals with the most power. Some random guy won't be able to come in and topple it all. Think of Game of Thrones, did you notice a single instance where a single person controlled the outcome of what happened without relying on a massive army or some other advantage?
Camping a mine filled with common resources would be silly unless the mine contained resources vital to the node's development. But the most obvious way to dominate will be to ambush caravans.
@Memmi Any player can run a node but you are not going to be able to run a node by doing nothing. I'm sorry if i'm miss understanding you but why do you think it's fair for someone to become a leader without having to do what the previous leader had done?
What are you arguing? Do you think everyone should become a node leader? It's supposed to be cool to get but not everyone is supposed to get it and you don't need to become one to enjoy the game.
I don't get the point of your game of thrones reference. Yes, just like game of thrones, you will probably need to have a lot of people behind you or some other advantage to control land and just like game of thrones, if you piss everyone off, they are going to come for you.
@Kraive: I did not say that organized guilds should not benefit... pay attention. I simply don't want them to TOTALLY dominate and COMPLETELY snuff out smaller guilds. Again, this has absolutely nothing to do with hardcore vs casual gamers. A 20 person hardcore guild should care about this as much as a 5 person casual guild. I think it would be nice to have a few smaller guilds pool their resources and establish a 6 tier node, for example. But they will never be able to compete with 1,000 players who are constantly pooling their resources.
@McStackerson: So the devs are designing this game to resemble RW politics. Oligarchy means that a few select individuals with the most "gold" will control the node. So if you have a few large guilds pooling their resources, they will simply have their guild leaders control the node. Military and Divine nodes will also be dominated by individuals with the most power. Some random guy won't be able to come in and topple it all. Think of Game of Thrones, did you notice a single instance where a single person controlled the outcome of what happened without relying on a massive army or some other advantage?
Camping a mine filled with common resources would be silly unless the mine contained resources vital to the node's development. But the most obvious way to dominate will be to ambush caravans.
I am really just repeating myself here hah
You can't have it both ways. If "some random guy" is able to come in and topple it all then what is the point in guilds? If an organized full guild working together can't dominate over 100 individuals running amok, then what is the point in guilds?
If you play solo or with a small group of 5 why do you expect the game to hand you something? "Here, here, you be in charge despite these hundreds of other players working together."
IF a mega-guild is running a monopoly then another one will show up in opposition. If you don't want to be a part of the solution that's your choice.
Let's assume that each one of your "mega-guilds" is in game terms 3 separate fully manned guilds. 900 players, you want 20 people to outmaneuver 900? Better you want 20 people who play less often to outmaneuver and ruin what 900 working together daily aim to accomplish? So the goals of those 900 is absolutely irrelevant in your mind to your own personal goals and that of your handful of friends? Despite the fact that each one of those 900 is also a player, somehow they count for less those in your tight knit group?
If people don't band together and affect change then don't expect change to happen.
I am not saying that one guy should run things just because he wants to.... I am saying that the one guy won't have a voice in a mega guild. I also pointed out a few times that this is fine if most of us would rather have someone else make all the decisions. Personally, I want to have some role to play in deciding what happens to the node that I spend most of my time developing. I may or may not want to be controlled by the hierarchy that decides what happens to the node. Maybe I don't like their rules or their leaders, etc.
I am also not saying that some random person should become leader or that we should rotate leaders and that we should all experience what it's like to be a leader haha I am in favor of a more democratic approach, but the fear that I have is that democracy won't stand a chance in this system.
@Kraive: I did not say that organized guilds should not benefit... pay attention. I simply don't want them to TOTALLY dominate and COMPLETELY snuff out smaller guilds. Again, this has absolutely nothing to do with hardcore vs casual gamers. A 20 person hardcore guild should care about this as much as a 5 person casual guild. I think it would be nice to have a few smaller guilds pool their resources and establish a 6 tier node, for example. But they will never be able to compete with 1,000 players who are constantly pooling their resources.
@McStackerson: So the devs are designing this game to resemble RW politics. Oligarchy means that a few select individuals with the most "gold" will control the node. So if you have a few large guilds pooling their resources, they will simply have their guild leaders control the node. Military and Divine nodes will also be dominated by individuals with the most power. Some random guy won't be able to come in and topple it all. Think of Game of Thrones, did you notice a single instance where a single person controlled the outcome of what happened without relying on a massive army or some other advantage?
Camping a mine filled with common resources would be silly unless the mine contained resources vital to the node's development. But the most obvious way to dominate will be to ambush caravans.
I am really just repeating myself here hah
You can't have it both ways. If "some random guy" is able to come in and topple it all then what is the point in guilds? If an organized full guild working together can't dominate over 100 individuals running amok, then what is the point in guilds?
If you play solo or with a small group of 5 why do you expect the game to hand you something? "Here, here, you be in charge despite these hundreds of other players working together."
IF a mega-guild is running a monopoly then another one will show up in opposition. If you don't want to be a part of the solution that's your choice.
Let's assume that each one of your "mega-guilds" is in game terms 3 separate fully manned guilds. 900 players, you want 20 people to outmaneuver 900? Better you want 20 people who play less often to outmaneuver and ruin what 900 working together daily aim to accomplish? So the goals of those 900 is absolutely irrelevant in your mind to your own personal goals and that of your handful of friends? Despite the fact that each one of those 900 is also a player, somehow they count for less those in your tight knit group?
If people don't band together and affect change then don't expect change to happen.
I don't think anyone can logically make a claim that 900 well organized people should not be able to control a node, and maybe even control an entire server by crushing all competing nodes. That is pretty much the entire point of this type of Realm vs Realm persistent PvP game.
What I, and I think Memmi, am trying to discuss is just how completely should a mega-guild be allowed to dominate?
For example, in some (perhaps all) persistent PvP games, the alpha guild literally owns the server, and enforce that ownership by killing/wiping others. They decide if new players can play. They decide what kinds of structures can be built. They literally decide whether or not to deny the rest of the player base access to content.
Once those guilds control access to content needed to progress, they have zero competition. They are then able to grow their own power unbounded by any game mechanic, and literally become invincible. An established metro in AoC with 1000 coordinated members should have zero issue stamping out every single node that progresses to Village stage, thus solidifying their dominance of the server. Even if they have to spend 1 hour marching their army to the enemy node, who cares? They play 8-20 hours per day, so a 1 hour march will be trivial. Eventually the server rule will be "no nodes past village", enforced by every offender being wiped, and then players will stop advancing nodes past village stage.
I have a hard time seeing how anyone can defend that type of guild dominance unless they themselves are part of such a guild and are looking forward to benefiting from that scenario.
I have an equally hard time seeing how anyone can continue to think the systems presented by the devs so far will prevent that scenario in any way unless they are a blindly loyal AoC fanboi, or have never played a persistent PvP game.
Therefore, we are trying to discuss ways to curb the power of mega guilds. We are NOT trying to make them obsolete.
I am fairly certain the time to get from one end of the landmass to the other will be several hours just based off of the IGN article that came out a few weeks ago. It said that the alpha 0 is already around the size of Skyrim and that Steven was planning for the totally land of the game to be 30x as big as alpha zero. I do not know if that includes the Underrealm and the Ocean nodes, but even if it does 1000 people would have a hard time (verging on impossibility) controlling and monitoring that much area, especially since the only flying mounts will belong to the Kings/Queens and Metropolis leaders. No persistent PVP game, that I have seen or played, has been as big as Ashes plans to be or have had servers containing 8k-10k players like Ashes plans to have. A guild of 1000 will not be able to control that much land, keep all the other 7k-9k players in check, progress their characters, and maintain their own nodes. There is just not enough time in the day to do that. They would need more people on their side. A lot more people. And tyrants don't typically attract allies. In fact, they tend to sow seeds of descent within the empire they claim to control.
I am fairly certain the time to get from one end of the landmass to the other will be several hours just based off of the IGN article that came out a few weeks ago. It said that the alpha 0 is already around the size of Skyrim and that Steven was planning for the totally land of the game to be 30x as big as alpha zero. I do not know if that includes the Underrealm and the Ocean nodes, but even if it does 1000 people would have a hard time (verging on impossibility) controlling and monitoring that much area, especially since the only flying mounts will belong to the Kings/Queens and Metropolis leaders. No persistent PVP game, that I have seen or played, has been as big as Ashes plans to be or have had servers containing 8k-10k players like Ashes plans to have. A guild of 1000 will not be able to control that much land, keep all the other 7k-9k players in check, progress their characters, and maintain their own nodes. There is just not enough time in the day to do that. They would need more people on their side. A lot more people. And tyrants don't typically attract allies. In fact, they tend to sow seeds of descent within the empire they claim to control.
Sheer size may very well end up being an effective tactic to insulate the rest of the server from a mega guild.
Without any comparable game to cite, it seems it has the potential to limit, or at least curb, the influence of a single entity. However, the same large scale of the world that protects people from the mega guild will also protect the mega guild from the people. Maybe that's OK...let a crappy group of people play in their own corner of the world.
I still have a sneaking suspicion that the size of the world won't be much of a barrier to players that are online 10-20 hours per day, and sometimes play 40+ hours in a single session. Covering distance just takes time, and they have more time than everyone else...and it's not like the node they are about to siege is going anywhere.
It's probably more likely that the large world will prove to be a benefit to mega guilds. A group of 2k casual players won't be able to spend several hours traveling somewhere to siege the mega guild. The 1000 members of the mega guild will have no trouble spending several hours traveling to siege a competing node.
Simply have a few alts in the enemy nodes reporting back info, then mobilize the main force when it's time to conquer the other nodes. Pretty simple nut to crack, honestly.
I don't think anyone can logically make a claim that 900 well organized people should not be able to control a node, and maybe even control an entire server by crushing all competing nodes. That is pretty much the entire point of this type of Realm vs Realm persistent PvP game.
There. That is correct.
As for the baseless assumption, I am not in a gaming community currently. Most games I play lately I do so with a dozen or less friends. Doesn't mean I expect systems to cater to my personal play style.
IF the scenario happens as you describe a few things are going to happen. Opposition will spring up, it may or may not be successful, so lets say some time later a single "Mega" controls everything with no opposing force.Some people will be okay with the status quo. Most people who aren't will move to a different server where things are more balanced. Eventually the server with the mega guild is going to be very boring for that guild, if they want opposition they have to go elsewhere to find it. So they'll also switch and attempt to sweep through another server, at which time some established and organized guilds on that server will fight back. Smaller organized guilds might even move to the server the "mega" originated from and proceed to cause havoc there. (This last bit is where I'll personally have fun) This is the bit where a small 20-30 person guild forces that larger guild to defend, usually with 150%-200% of the attacking numbers. Meaning they can't put their full weight on the offensive.
All in all the players have the tools. There is no need to break a system by trying to 'fix' it for the disenfranchised. Let the players sort it out. IF it becomes a serious game breaking issue THEN look at the data gathered and implement an educated change. No need for a knee-jerk reaction "This MIGHT happen so it has to be fixed right now!!"
Balance is a constant and on going juggle that will continue for the life of any game. It needs to be based off of factual data, not people screaming on the forums that something is broken. IF it happens then you can look at the data and say: "You know we don't need to mortar the entire system, a simple rock on the rails here will derail that train."
TL;DR: Bottom Line. You can either have a game where the players actually do make a difference, for good or bad. Or you can have another theme-park game on rigid defined rails.
So again, you don't need to control the entire map, no matter how large it is. If there is a limit of 5 nodes that can reach tier 6, that ensures that you only need to focus on 5 nodes. So maybe you have 5 guilds in control of the map, each controlling an Economic node (possibly military or divine). I wouldn't say that's ideal.
Also, just as an aside, Putin is doing quite well, his approval rating is about 80%. He also has a few allies. He is in control of a badly run economic node
So again, you don't need to control the entire map, no matter how large it is. If there is a limit of 5 nodes that can reach tier 6, that ensures that you only need to focus on 5 nodes. So maybe you have 5 guilds in control of the map, each controlling an Economic node (possibly military or divine). I wouldn't say that's ideal.
Also, just as an aside, Putin is doing quite well, his approval rating is about 80%. He also has a few allies. He is in control of a badly run economic node
Pure speculation, but I'm guessing mega guilds will strive to control as many scientific nodes as possible so they can fast travel to strategic points on the map.
They will have no problem gaming any type of node to ensure they maintain leadership. Combat, good deeds, wealth accumulation, votes...it won't matter.
I keep coming back to the fact that we just don't know how exactly this system will function. Right now, it seems that it will be easier for fewer ppl to control an economic node. I don't know what kind of checks and balances system they will have to ensure that a scientific node is "truly" democratic. So the hope is that the devs will foresee these issues and act accordingly.
So I don't see any issues with making various speculations and suggestions that might end up improving the game. It will be clearer when they release the next installment of the nodes blog.
So again, you don't need to control the entire map, no matter how large it is. If there is a limit of 5 nodes that can reach tier 6, that ensures that you only need to focus on 5 nodes. So maybe you have 5 guilds in control of the map, each controlling an Economic node (possibly military or divine). I wouldn't say that's ideal.
Also, just as an aside, Putin is doing quite well, his approval rating is about 80%. He also has a few allies. He is in control of a badly run economic node
Level 6 nodes will be the farthest away from each other because of their zones of influence. It would not be to a guild's advantage to spread their forces to the 5 corners of the world. By taking a look at history we can see that empires begin to break down once they have conquered too much land. They either are taken over from the outside because they spread their forces too thin and can't defend their land or from the inside because of unrest, selfishness, ambition, or, in the case of gamers, boredom.
Would just like to point out that if you got that statistic from the government or media of Russia then it is more than likely skewed in favor of Putin. Tyrants tend to skew "facts" to favor them. The few allies he has are from countries with similar politics as him...badly run or corrupt places that if given the choice you wouldn't want to live in.
So again, you don't need to control the entire map, no matter how large it is. If there is a limit of 5 nodes that can reach tier 6, that ensures that you only need to focus on 5 nodes. So maybe you have 5 guilds in control of the map, each controlling an Economic node (possibly military or divine). I wouldn't say that's ideal.
Also, just as an aside, Putin is doing quite well, his approval rating is about 80%. He also has a few allies. He is in control of a badly run economic node
Level 6 nodes will be the farthest away from each other because of their zones of influence. It would not be to a guild's advantage to spread their forces to the 5 corners of the world. By taking a look at history we can see that empires begin to break down once they have conquered too much land. They either are taken over from the outside because they spread their forces too thin and can't defend their land or from the inside because of unrest, selfishness, ambition, or, in the case of gamers, boredom.
Would just like to point out that if you got that statistic from the government or media of Russia then it is more than likely skewed in favor of Putin. Tyrants tend to skew "facts" to favor them. The few allies he has are from countries with similar politics as him...badly run or corrupt places that if given the choice you wouldn't want to live in.
Are you seriously contending that empires in the real world where it took literally weeks to travel from one end to the other just to communicate, are a good comparison for a video game where people can traverse the world in a few hours while sitting in a chair and talking instantaneously to all their allies?
If folks think they are safe because it will take the local mega guild 3 hours to march to their city gates...well...they will have their head pulled from the sand pretty quickly haha.
Even if a single guild won't be able to control the entire map, having 5 guilds control those nodes won't benefit anyone.
Also, empires take a while to fall. Rome lasted a few centuries hah but yeah I don't know how closely we can compare a game to real life haha btw I am not taking Russian statistics from Russian media. If you are interested, here is an interesting article: https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PE144.html Quoting page 16: "In the months following the annexation of Crimea in March 2014, President Putin’s domestic approval ratings were consistently above 80 percent. This is high even for Putin, whose approval rating has rarely dropped below 70 percent since he became president of Russia in 1999, although it fell into the 60s in 2011, staying there until the Crimea adventure began in March 2014"
The principles are still the same whether or not it is real life. 1000 people is not enough to control the world. Honestly, 1 guild being in charge of each metro isn't really bad in my opinion as long as they aren't all assholes. But, I foresee it being more likely that there will be a majority guild in each city, but isn't necessarily in control of the whole city. It is not easy to form or maintain guilds of such immensity; they are rare.
"The Russian government has sought to shape public opinion, not respond to it. It has done so successfully by silencing political opposition and independent media". If the people never hear any other view or opinion of course they will say they favor the person who they are constantly being told is great.
It's funny that you can seamlessly upscale from "experience" in a 40 to 100 player max server to 10.000 per server game, but the moment someone brings something equally on the edge to the table, you can throw it out the window. Tell me why a gamer would travel several hours in downtime doing effectively nothing. Most wouldn't bother, especially hard core players because they know they could spend their time more favorably. Still waiting for your explanation on how your "experience" from a different rule set, scale and structure is applicable to Ashes. Persistent pvp is not enough to tie it together, otherwise the real world example that was, in fact, a persistent pvp "game" in it's essence would be just as applicable and as shown contradicts your argument.
The principles are still the same whether or not it is real life. 1000 people is not enough to control the world. Honestly, 1 guild being in charge of each metro isn't really bad in my opinion as long as they aren't all assholes. But, I foresee it being more likely that there will be a majority guild in each city, but isn't necessarily in control of the whole city. It is not easy to form or maintain guilds of such immensity; they are rare.
"The Russian government has sought to shape public opinion, not respond to it. It has done so successfully by silencing political opposition and independent media". If the people never hear any other view or opinion of course they will say they favor the person who they are constantly being told is great.
Well like I said before, they don't have to be assholes. They will control the nodes, reward their guild members, and attract others. It's hard to say exactly how it will play out, since we still don't know what the organizing structure will look like. We simply don't know exactly how the devs want to structure the city hall and so on. For example, will there be some sort of a "court" system to redress the grievances of players who may have been wronged by some action taken by the guild (maybe a reduction in tax to new guild members vs players not in the guild)? Here, we are simply going through a mental exercise of what may or may not happen. There are ways to prevent abuses and I hope that we will see some sort of system in place to at least provide some organizational framework for this political system that they want to create.
As for Russia, the economy is doing better than it did in 1990s, so part of Putin's support stems from that (maybe with the exception of an increasingly hostile middle class). High oil and gas prices have saved Putin in the past, but if the economy doesn't diversify, he and his cronies will face more troubles in the future. But yes, he also controls the media and so on. Anyway, that's kind of a tangent haha I just wanted to use Putin to say that successful dictators know how to keep power.
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Way to go tiger.
Also, the "mega" guilds don't have to consist entirely of "assholes," cleverness and ability to expose weak points doesn't make someone an asshole. I am sure the guild leaders will ensure that their nodes grow and attract more players. Again, all of this may not be a terrible thing, I am just saying that those who do not wish to conform to the decisions made by those who control the nodes will not have any way to object. Scientific nodes will potentially have a way for the minority to voice their objections.
I am gonna take a break from posting for a while since there is not enough info out there to really continue with these discussions. And I don't want to go around in circles.
Now, we can't prevent communication because of 3rd party apps. But the game can create a logistical challenge that would make it more difficult for large guilds to maintain their territory.
I'll give you an example. Resource are tied to location. Without fast travel, to maintain ownership of said resource, you would need to enforce it through power (ie, players/pvp). Just saying "this mine belongs to me" should not be enough to stop people from entering. There needs to be an investment of manpower to prevent intruders.
The larger the guild, the more territory they can hold. But the investment to move from their base of operation (the center of their territory) to the outskirts becomes increasingly difficult the larger it becomes. The amount of time and money needed to have your troops would increase several folds (because a circle increase faster in area than it does in radius), making it easier for smaller guilds in the vicinity to funnel their resource into attack and defense instead of travelling.
They don't need to physically block the mine. All they need to do is send their PK squad to murder anyone they catch in the mine, or siege the node of any group they see benefiting from the mine.
It remains to be seen how much travel times will affect things, but it's safe to assume that any advantage it gives will be more efficiently exploited by the hardcore guilds than the casual guilds.
I'm afraid AoC is going to need mechanics specifically designed to hamper mega guilds from accumulating and maintaining massive levels of power.
Any system designed to placate the casual is either obsolete, or shoots itself in the foot.
Doesn't matter what system it is. Crafting, questing, PvP, or PvE any system that says if you play 4 hours a week you can accomplish the exact same as someone who plays 4 hours a night, is broken from the word go. If 100 players individually play the game 3-5 hours a week versus 20 organized players who play 3-5 per night you think the 100 should be on equal footing?
It's that sense of entitlement that has games catering to the lowest common denominator over the past decade. Either join together and fight back or live with it, stop expecting devs to hold your hand because your feelings might get hurt. If a strong group works a well placed strategy requiring teamwork you'd rather punish that teamwork?
You really want to say: "Don't reward that group that did all that work, give me and my 3 buddies the same reward because we say so!"
More than enough titles cater to the casual masses, and yet here you are looking for another to do the same.
Casual players will not be teaming up to topple the top guilds in AoC, just as they never team up to topple them in any other PvP game ever.
Intrepid will have to truly innovate the PvP mechanics to alter that fact, and nothing I've seen them suggest will come close.
The part where you agree that casual players 4-5 hours a week should have everything and be completely equal to someone who plays 4-5 hours a night?
Why play the game more than once a week in that case? Oh, why play it at all if it's only good one night a week and anything more than that is pointless and wasted?
Games catering to casuals are fodder for locusts.
A strong initial release that stagnates and in a few months time, before the first year is out, you're left with a very small player base that can't pay the bills. So they start looking at other ways to draw in players or earn a bit of income to support it.
Forget catering to casuals, target your actual players that are going to stick around and not jump to the next new title in 3 months.
Whether you like "this attitude" or not the issue isn't "hardcore" players it is entitled casuals. That has been proven time and time again by countless titles. I personally don't have the time to be a so called "hardcore" player but on the other hand I also recognize there are more people than just myself and I don't expect games to cater to me personally.
We don't need to separate this into either extreme, there is no need to make this black and white. We are not debating how hardcore the content of the game will be, but the way the game will shape how players organize. Or at least that's what my concern is haha Specifically, I am worried that organized guilds will be able to control the way decisions are made in the game: the way benefits are divvied up within a node, the way the nodes progress and so on. Players that can't take part in that decision-making process may not benefit, that's the problem. I suppose if we all join a strong guild, that won't be a problem, but some of us may not want to be part of a "mega" guild (and I also include hardcore players in this).
"Actual players," as you call them, most likely make up a small number of players playing these games (most of us do have jobs, other things to do, and such). There is a reason why Korean MMO's do so badly in American market, they DO cater to hardcore players. But gaming in South Korea is treated as a major "sport" equivalent to American football, so it's easier for them to attract revenues.
I think the games that succeed (WoW) do well because they cater to EVERYONE, there is no need to fall into either extreme...
The beauty of the node system is, unlike other games, they aren't explicitly controlled by guilds. From what we know, the system is open. Anyone can go to a node and become a citizen. It's because of how open the system is i don't see a reason to try to hold back the more hardcore players as the casual players benefit from their efforts.
I think guilds should be allowed to use force to control land and resources. I'd hope that the cost of running a high level node would encourage guilds to work with other players but still think they should be allowed to make themselves the enemy. If they consider attacking resources with the caravan system meaningful pvp then i'd think they would also consider fighting over resources in the world meaningful.
Only thing that hasn't been made 100% clear to me is development of nodes that have fallen under the ZOI of a bigger node. Metros are awesome and all but i would be sad if that was the only place anyone lived. I believe that if players want, they should be able to move to these less popular nodes, develop, and live in them. It could be perfect for those who want to get away from all the action and form smaller communities. They wouldn't get all the bells and whistles of a metro but they would still have something. It sounds like you can do this but the details on how it all works out is not clear to me.
PS: if a guild sent a gank squad to a mine, i'm pretty sure they would be considered the laughing stocks of the community. It would be one thing if it had rare resources but wasting your members time zerging down casuals trying to get some common resources is silly.
A guild of 300 or and alliance of two such guilds should have more say. Some people want their guild of 5-20 to have just as much say, meaning the opinion of those 5-20 is more valuable than the consensus of 300 or 300x2.
You simply can not cater to 20 casual players by saying their opinion is more important because they are casual. It creates the extreme you want to avoid.
By NOT creating that extreme the game fosters and encourages a more robust community. If you and your 5 friends can't do it so what? Casual guilds, several large ones, will spawn and either you join them and get to know other players or you stay in your 5 person clique and get over it.
@Kraive: I did not say that organized guilds should not benefit... pay attention. I simply don't want them to TOTALLY dominate and COMPLETELY snuff out smaller guilds. Again, this has absolutely nothing to do with hardcore vs casual gamers. A 20 person hardcore guild should care about this as much as a 5 person casual guild. I think it would be nice to have a few smaller guilds pool their resources and establish a 6 tier node, for example. But they will never be able to compete with 1,000 players who are constantly pooling their resources.
@McStackerson: So the devs are designing this game to resemble RW politics. Oligarchy means that a few select individuals with the most "gold" will control the node. So if you have a few large guilds pooling their resources, they will simply have their guild leaders control the node. Military and Divine nodes will also be dominated by individuals with the most power. Some random guy won't be able to come in and topple it all. Think of Game of Thrones, did you notice a single instance where a single person controlled the outcome of what happened without relying on a massive army or some other advantage?
Camping a mine filled with common resources would be silly unless the mine contained resources vital to the node's development. But the most obvious way to dominate will be to ambush caravans.
I am really just repeating myself here hah
What are you arguing? Do you think everyone should become a node leader? It's supposed to be cool to get but not everyone is supposed to get it and you don't need to become one to enjoy the game.
I don't get the point of your game of thrones reference. Yes, just like game of thrones, you will probably need to have a lot of people behind you or some other advantage to control land and just like game of thrones, if you piss everyone off, they are going to come for you.
If an organized full guild working together can't dominate over 100 individuals running amok, then what is the point in guilds?
If you play solo or with a small group of 5 why do you expect the game to hand you something? "Here, here, you be in charge despite these hundreds of other players working together."
IF a mega-guild is running a monopoly then another one will show up in opposition. If you don't want to be a part of the solution that's your choice.
Let's assume that each one of your "mega-guilds" is in game terms 3 separate fully manned guilds. 900 players, you want 20 people to outmaneuver 900? Better you want 20 people who play less often to outmaneuver and ruin what 900 working together daily aim to accomplish?
So the goals of those 900 is absolutely irrelevant in your mind to your own personal goals and that of your handful of friends? Despite the fact that each one of those 900 is also a player, somehow they count for less those in your tight knit group?
If people don't band together and affect change then don't expect change to happen.
I am also not saying that some random person should become leader or that we should rotate leaders and that we should all experience what it's like to be a leader haha I am in favor of a more democratic approach, but the fear that I have is that democracy won't stand a chance in this system.
In essence, I don't want to be one of the sheep.
What I, and I think Memmi, am trying to discuss is just how completely should a mega-guild be allowed to dominate?
For example, in some (perhaps all) persistent PvP games, the alpha guild literally owns the server, and enforce that ownership by killing/wiping others. They decide if new players can play. They decide what kinds of structures can be built. They literally decide whether or not to deny the rest of the player base access to content.
Once those guilds control access to content needed to progress, they have zero competition. They are then able to grow their own power unbounded by any game mechanic, and literally become invincible. An established metro in AoC with 1000 coordinated members should have zero issue stamping out every single node that progresses to Village stage, thus solidifying their dominance of the server. Even if they have to spend 1 hour marching their army to the enemy node, who cares? They play 8-20 hours per day, so a 1 hour march will be trivial. Eventually the server rule will be "no nodes past village", enforced by every offender being wiped, and then players will stop advancing nodes past village stage.
I have a hard time seeing how anyone can defend that type of guild dominance unless they themselves are part of such a guild and are looking forward to benefiting from that scenario.
I have an equally hard time seeing how anyone can continue to think the systems presented by the devs so far will prevent that scenario in any way unless they are a blindly loyal AoC fanboi, or have never played a persistent PvP game.
Therefore, we are trying to discuss ways to curb the power of mega guilds. We are NOT trying to make them obsolete.
No persistent PVP game, that I have seen or played, has been as big as Ashes plans to be or have had servers containing 8k-10k players like Ashes plans to have. A guild of 1000 will not be able to control that much land, keep all the other 7k-9k players in check, progress their characters, and maintain their own nodes. There is just not enough time in the day to do that. They would need more people on their side. A lot more people. And tyrants don't typically attract allies. In fact, they tend to sow seeds of descent within the empire they claim to control.
Without any comparable game to cite, it seems it has the potential to limit, or at least curb, the influence of a single entity. However, the same large scale of the world that protects people from the mega guild will also protect the mega guild from the people. Maybe that's OK...let a crappy group of people play in their own corner of the world.
I still have a sneaking suspicion that the size of the world won't be much of a barrier to players that are online 10-20 hours per day, and sometimes play 40+ hours in a single session. Covering distance just takes time, and they have more time than everyone else...and it's not like the node they are about to siege is going anywhere.
It's probably more likely that the large world will prove to be a benefit to mega guilds. A group of 2k casual players won't be able to spend several hours traveling somewhere to siege the mega guild. The 1000 members of the mega guild will have no trouble spending several hours traveling to siege a competing node.
Simply have a few alts in the enemy nodes reporting back info, then mobilize the main force when it's time to conquer the other nodes. Pretty simple nut to crack, honestly.
As for the baseless assumption, I am not in a gaming community currently. Most games I play lately I do so with a dozen or less friends. Doesn't mean I expect systems to cater to my personal play style.
IF the scenario happens as you describe a few things are going to happen. Opposition will spring up, it may or may not be successful, so lets say some time later a single "Mega" controls everything with no opposing force.Some people will be okay with the status quo. Most people who aren't will move to a different server where things are more balanced. Eventually the server with the mega guild is going to be very boring for that guild, if they want opposition they have to go elsewhere to find it. So they'll also switch and attempt to sweep through another server, at which time some established and organized guilds on that server will fight back. Smaller organized guilds might even move to the server the "mega" originated from and proceed to cause havoc there. (This last bit is where I'll personally have fun) This is the bit where a small 20-30 person guild forces that larger guild to defend, usually with 150%-200% of the attacking numbers. Meaning they can't put their full weight on the offensive.
All in all the players have the tools. There is no need to break a system by trying to 'fix' it for the disenfranchised. Let the players sort it out. IF it becomes a serious game breaking issue THEN look at the data gathered and implement an educated change. No need for a knee-jerk reaction "This MIGHT happen so it has to be fixed right now!!"
Balance is a constant and on going juggle that will continue for the life of any game. It needs to be based off of factual data, not people screaming on the forums that something is broken. IF it happens then you can look at the data and say: "You know we don't need to mortar the entire system, a simple rock on the rails here will derail that train."
TL;DR:
Bottom Line. You can either have a game where the players actually do make a difference, for good or bad. Or you can have another theme-park game on rigid defined rails.
Also, just as an aside, Putin is doing quite well, his approval rating is about 80%. He also has a few allies. He is in control of a badly run economic node
They will have no problem gaming any type of node to ensure they maintain leadership. Combat, good deeds, wealth accumulation, votes...it won't matter.
So I don't see any issues with making various speculations and suggestions that might end up improving the game. It will be clearer when they release the next installment of the nodes blog.
Would just like to point out that if you got that statistic from the government or media of Russia then it is more than likely skewed in favor of Putin. Tyrants tend to skew "facts" to favor them. The few allies he has are from countries with similar politics as him...badly run or corrupt places that if given the choice you wouldn't want to live in.
If folks think they are safe because it will take the local mega guild 3 hours to march to their city gates...well...they will have their head pulled from the sand pretty quickly haha.
Also, empires take a while to fall. Rome lasted a few centuries hah but yeah I don't know how closely we can compare a game to real life haha btw I am not taking Russian statistics from Russian media. If you are interested, here is an interesting article: https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PE144.html Quoting page 16: "In the months following the annexation of Crimea in March 2014, President Putin’s domestic approval ratings were consistently above 80 percent. This is high even for Putin, whose approval rating has rarely dropped below 70 percent since he became president of Russia in 1999, although it fell into the 60s in 2011, staying there until the Crimea adventure began in March 2014"
Honestly, 1 guild being in charge of each metro isn't really bad in my opinion as long as they aren't all assholes. But, I foresee it being more likely that there will be a majority guild in each city, but isn't necessarily in control of the whole city. It is not easy to form or maintain guilds of such immensity; they are rare.
"The Russian government has sought to shape public opinion, not respond to it. It has done so successfully by silencing political opposition and independent media". If the people never hear any other view or opinion of course they will say they favor the person who they are constantly being told is great.
Tell me why a gamer would travel several hours in downtime doing effectively nothing. Most wouldn't bother, especially hard core players because they know they could spend their time more favorably.
Still waiting for your explanation on how your "experience" from a different rule set, scale and structure is applicable to Ashes. Persistent pvp is not enough to tie it together, otherwise the real world example that was, in fact, a persistent pvp "game" in it's essence would be just as applicable and as shown contradicts your argument.
As for Russia, the economy is doing better than it did in 1990s, so part of Putin's support stems from that (maybe with the exception of an increasingly hostile middle class). High oil and gas prices have saved Putin in the past, but if the economy doesn't diversify, he and his cronies will face more troubles in the future. But yes, he also controls the media and so on. Anyway, that's kind of a tangent haha I just wanted to use Putin to say that successful dictators know how to keep power.