Corruption system in relation to auto-flagging in open sea

This is not a post about if auto-flagging is good or not, or about preference between the two.
It is about the corruption system and the logic inconsistency of applying this system.
(for transparency, I would prefer the complete removal of this system, but what irks me more is the logic inconsistency)

The corruption system was presented as a tool that complies with the risk-vs-reward philosophy.

E.g. an attacker risks becoming corrupted if he kills a player that doesn't fight back and the defender risks losing much more loot if he doesn't fight back.
Both sides are risking in order to get rewarded.

In the open-sea, as Steven mentioned in the stream, the rewards will be grater and the risk needs to be higher.
Is the corruption system unable to handle that?
If the reward is more valuable, wouldn't that make the attacker more willing to become corrupted and the defender more willing to fight back to minimize his loses?

Why is now the corruption system presented as an obstacle to the risk-vs-reward philosophy for open-sea content?

In the open-sea now, with the auto-flagging, what is the risk for the attackers? E.g. if let's say 3 ships that are co-operating spot 1 ship, why wouldn't they attack? Where is the risk?
How are the bounty hunters affected by this change? Would they be able to hunt corrupted players in the open-sea?
Contrary to what Steven said, this change is actually going against the risk-vs-reward philosophy. If you outnumber the enemy, there is no risk in attacking.

You cannot treat the corruption system as a helpful tool for land content and as an obstacle for open-sea content.. those things cannot be true at the same time, just because the ground changes!

When you need to add exceptions to a system, in order to make the content fun, then maybe that system is not good enough.
If it is good enough, use it everywhere.. if it is not, remove it from everywhere!

The approach Intrepid is taking makes no sense.

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Voxtrium

I changed my mind.

JustVine

BaSkA13 wrote: »

Bearheart wrote: »

How this pans out will largely depend on how its balanced from a design point of view, in addition to how the community rallies around this. So I'm looking forward to how this will look in Alpha 2 play testing.

I'm still skeptical. But there are too many variables for me to have a real opinion.

I personally don't mind the change because it won't affect my gameplay style, I used to be a resident of the Wildy in RS and Rust is currently my main game, however I'm also skeptical and cannot stay quiet when I see something that doesn't make sense to me or that feels like it contradicts what was said in the past. And I'm not sure a big change like this is simple enough to test and to just toggle on and off during Alpha 2.

If naval gameplay in Ashes works similar to Sea of Thieves', which I hope it will because that game can be quite fun, when all members of a crew die the winning crew will more often than not sunk the other ship, for any number of reasons. So unlike open world PvP in land, you probably won't be able to go back to the fight in the open sea and get revenge because you don't have a ship in your inventory and swimming/aquatic mount is probably not going to get you (and your group) back there quick enough.

For the reason above (and probably other reasons too), in my opinion, even with corruption the open sea would already be one of the most dangerous places PvP wise, which is the reason why I fail to understand their decision from a game design perspective.

This change might turn out to be extremely fun, a great addition to the game and the majority of the community might love it, but I genuinely still can't see a logical explanation to do it, especially because this change somewhat contradicts quotes like these:

Just because our flagging system gives corruption to pkers, doesn't mean PvP won't happen. There is plenty of reason for PvP to occur open-world. Scarce resources, open world hunting grounds, caravans, sieges, guild wars etc.[7] – Steven Sharif

[...] the reason for that is our current PvP systems already allow for material risk essentially that's either through the flagging system or through other event-based pvp opt-in systems as well.[11] – Steven Sharif

One of the interesting components of Ashes of Creation and our flagging system is that it presents the potential for two conflicting parties to have open conflict in the open world over pretty much anything that they may want or disagree with;... [99] – Steven Sharif

[...] Our PvP is designed to offer the players a well-balanced and fair world to shape through the pen, or sword should they choose.[100]

You're not going to see griefing in the game very often; and that's because our flagging system. The corruption mechanics are based around disincentivizing a griefer or PKer but still offering the opportunity, should the occasion arise, where the benefits outweigh the risk, you have the ability to do so. [...] It is a comfortable balance between player agency and grief and basically removing player agency for other players.[65] – Steven Sharif

Reward without risk is meaningless. Corruption is just another word for risk.[138] – Steven Sharif

TL;DR: the more I think about it, the more it feels like Intrepid is just catering to those who enjoy this style of gameplay and/or the corruption system is bad, which I don't think it is. If they want to say risk vs. reward was the reason for this change, then why aren't open world dungeons, land world bosses and other high tier/rewarding land content also free PvP/corruptionless?

Not only would it be extremely difficult to retrieve most of your loot on death in the ocean even before this change, but like...

Bounty hunters aren't going to just swim on up to your pirate ship and attack all your reds. In any zone with a barrier to entry like a boat or aquatic mount there is going to be less bounty hunting. The open ocean was inherently going to have pirates and it was going to be much easier for reds to live in.

On top of that, you have IS leaning more towards having mobs in the open ocean before this announcement... So a low bounty hunter zone with mobs you can use to wash your corruption off of? The old model was already going to be pretty risky. It just required that red pirates did some like, you know, work and planning to reduce their risk.

So I kind of wish Steven explained what the risk calculation he and the team was basing this on. Because even if the loot is 'too good', I'm not understanding the justification for this change and I've played the section over and over just to make sure I didn't miss something.

Why is this an unexpected move to me? There were more ways to increase risk from a PvP perspective and a PvE perspective without making this change. Mob density, encounter design, and even geographical layout (which in my opinion they absolutely just did along with this change but that's speculation.) Flagging everyone is a pretty blunt instrument. There are a couple reasons I could guess as to why they wanted to do this specific move, but I'd rather just wait for Steven to actually explain it.

Until then I'll remain surprised at 'QoL buff for red pirates' since it'd be very hard to guess that's a QoL buff Steven was willing to make up until now. I just hope Dygz isn't a sign of something deeper given Ashes is a game that needs as large of a population to work.

tautau

I had always planned on using an expendable alt for exploring particularly dangerous land areas.

Now I will use that same low level, expendable alt for my exploration of the seas and thus preserving my main.

Dygz

Voxtrium wrote: »

I think it is because open ocean will be just open ocean and not an area where there is significant content, there may be npc raiders but i dont think this is an area where you will ever go to just farm a dungeon or complete a raid. Seems like they are going for a sea of thieves vibe.

Steven says there will be unique NPCs and unique treasure-finding in the Open Seas. Greater rewards, which is why it requires greater risk. There will be raid bosses in the oceans. There are ships designed specifically for that.

Voxtrium

It has taken me awhile to form my opinion regarding this but I lean away from auto flagging for PVP.
There are a ton of risks for auto flagging in regards to abuse from other players. Right now it doesn't matter how powerful your guild is, if you constantly corrupt your players to bully a guild you are risking a lot of gear and time, however adding auto PVP flagging on the sea means that abuse of sea transportation may be the best option for any guild.

The worst part about any of this in my head is that with this system in place the most logical solution is to abuse the naval content in ashes. It does not seem like all naval content will be avoidable and there is no/less punishment if you control the waters, you remove/mitigate the risk for your guild, and while doing so open up endless opportunity that has been stated will be better than land based opportunity.

Rare resources will likely be on those islands requiring players to get there. In this current system a guild or alliance may be able to have a massive impact through naval control effectively giving them more profits than any land based operation. This could create a system where there is no real reason to farm land objectives and guilds/alliances can exist almost solely out on the sea. Also this provides a huge opportunity for guilds to gatekeep content easier than ever before.

We have been told ships will be difficult to build and upgrade and assuming that is true, the barrier to entry combined with a more skilled player already achieving the upgraded ship will provide almost no avenue for a player to stand against those that stop them from traveling across the sea/ocean.

If everyone flags for PVP on the sea and valuable resources from npc's reside on/in the sea then a seafaring guild can farm both players and npc's for the gold/resources they need to buy the gear they need. Furthermore gatekeeping rare resources that would be exclusive to that island provides an additional revenue stream. Why would a guild not do this? You basically prove your PVP prowess, earn what on paper seems like an infinite revenue stream that is provided both by NPCs and players AND you remove the highest risk portion of the server as risk.

Example:
Alliance 1 controls most of the naval content. Alliance 2 is a patron of a metro and monarch of a castle.

Alliance 1 - They make money by raiding players, they make money by raiding NPC's, they make money by gatekeeping island ports where valuable resources are held effectively controlling the supply which == Infinite money stream

Alliance 2 - Has an infinite money sink in defending each of the 3 castle vassal nodes getting monthly sieges.
The metro will likely provide a number of benefits and be much more balanced in terms of give and take but will require significant time to gather needed resources and generate the needed gold.

Alliance 1 has 2 cost, building ships, and manning those ships, alliance 2 has to manage the castle, manage their metro, has massive resource sinks, significant political struggles. There are so many issues alliance 2 needs to deal with. But alliance 1 doesn't need a metro to reside in, only 1 they can launch from and I doubt a mayor can make hundreds of players enemy of the state and even if they can there are options for said guild.

Players will need to cross the ocean for content/raids/bosses/loot. If alliance 1 establishes control over naval content then they can easily have a rotating roster of players on ships looting npcs in there free time and PVPing players when they see them. Even if 1 ship loses to an enemy guild the travel time for ships on water will be less than on land and the likelihood that they can have a 2nd ship arrive is likely ESPECIALLY if like IS said ports are the only location you can launch a ship from.

Build a tank ship? They send a fast ship as interception and whatever the counter to the tank ship
Build a fast ship? Players are already bottlenecked to launch from node ports, where are you going to escape to?
Build a fleet and have a coordinated launch for your entire guild or alliance? Do you need to do this every time just to merely cross? Even if you win and temporarily clear the other naval guild as soon as they can they will just do everything in their power to prevent you from ever moving across the ocean again.

Even if the guild with primary naval content control occasionally gets whiped most of the time they will be abusing the average player and reaping the rewards of better than average loot, and can relaunch and patrol the naval content again.

Yes on some servers guilds will duke it out on the open seas... but as soon as there is a victor there will be too much power in the hands of that guild or alliance, the opportunity for that power doesn't lie anywhere else in the game. Its an unbalanced change.

The last problem I think of off the top of my head is the likelihood that this guild is actually a nice guild. A nice guild that ferries players across for a fee providing safe travel. Destroying those they deem as bullies, the nice guild controls the flow of resources from those islands because they control the flow of players, IE their players always get there first. They come across as the good guys helping everyone out but they make insane money by doing so, mitigate their own risk and reap more rewards, again not in like with proper risk vs reward.

"Um. I said I would not be playing.
I did not say I would not be testing."
Also @Dygz my confusion was that I considered testing the Alpha to be playing, I understand what you are saying now.

TL:DR
The potential power imbalance is the problem. I can decrease risk by controlling naval content and I can reap better than average rewards in doing so. It is not in line with Ashes goals.

SirChancelot

Sathrago wrote: »

Overthrow wrote: »

I think it's a very big decision and it's a bad one that will reduce the success of the game.

The corruption system exists to prevent Ashes from becoming a gank box. Games that are gank boxes ALWAYS fail. [and if you don't agree with that statement, then why not remove corruption entirely?]

Why then, would you turn all of the ocean content into a gank box by removing the risk of corruption? There are plenty of other opportunities for PvP that are balanced for risk v reward.

If corruption works well on land then it should also be implemented for the water content. That was the original plan. This makes it seem like ocean is supposed to be some sort of advanced content zone, like EVE null sec.

Well to be fair they are already adding similar zones to the inland as well. Maybe not as expansive as the entire sea, but its still something they have said they wanted in the game.

https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Open_world_battlegrounds

Ok
But that's certain areas, not the whole ocean.

TheMarten

I am torn. It sound like there will be some waters near shore that can be fished and used to travel. That is good for the PVEers like me.

I recently played RUST which is an amazing sandbox game and now with some amazing graphics as well, but I have a hard time playing it when all players focus on is gunning each other down. There is SO MUCH in that game, but doing any of it is almost pointless when you are constantly getting gunned down.

From a Lore perspective, @StevenSharif tell me why corruption stops working in the deep waters vs land.

Back when I first got into MMOs I almost stopped because in Ultima Online the game turned into this: Mine/Log (lose that material and time by getting pvped), or if I made it to the point that I can get the ore to a master smith and get some armor and a sword... step out of a town and get PVPed... go mine/log (repeat)

Losing some materials is one thing... it is the time lost that is the other even greater loss. What is the "risk" of the attackers in deep water, what is their "time-sink" investment? They can only lose a ship? Being a pirate should not be easy. Real pirates had to hide and avoid "civilized" places. As it was stated in the Dev Stream, it seems that the attacker is in a win/nothing to lose situation. If that is untrue, then that needs to be better explained.

I am torn and leaning to avoiding boating if I can.

SirChancelot

Mag7spy wrote: »

Okeydoke wrote: »

Damnit watching the vod now and you spoiled this news for me Dolyem. Dygz get yur ass in the game. It's fine. I haven't seen the part of the stream yet where they talk about this, but I'd have to imagine if they're going to add a lawless zone like this, they may err on making the corruption system harsher in general.

Corruption system is already really harsh, up to extremely harsh based on how dense the server is with seeing people around. If you are red and walking by 20 people, there is a high chance they flag on you causing you to lose more progress than you gain and gear drops.

Don't be red then

Warth

@Mag7spy the 20 people dont have to flag on you. They can attack you while they are green.

Warth

SirChancelot wrote: »

Sathrago wrote: »

Overthrow wrote: »

I think it's a very big decision and it's a bad one that will reduce the success of the game.

The corruption system exists to prevent Ashes from becoming a gank box. Games that are gank boxes ALWAYS fail. [and if you don't agree with that statement, then why not remove corruption entirely?]

Why then, would you turn all of the ocean content into a gank box by removing the risk of corruption? There are plenty of other opportunities for PvP that are balanced for risk v reward.

If corruption works well on land then it should also be implemented for the water content. That was the original plan. This makes it seem like ocean is supposed to be some sort of advanced content zone, like EVE null sec.

Well to be fair they are already adding similar zones to the inland as well. Maybe not as expansive as the entire sea, but its still something they have said they wanted in the game.

https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Open_world_battlegrounds

Ok
But that's certain areas, not the whole ocean.

Well, apparently it is the whole ocean. God has spoken.

Liniker

Dygz wrote: »

And... yes. I will not play what I don't like.
That's OK.

let's be real here @Dygz you will 100% play the game so just stop saying you won't in an attempt to vocalize your discontent.

You already know that it has forced PvP and still you are here - that's not what someone that just lost interest in playing a game does. I will see you in Alpha 2 on day 1, and in Betas, and in Launch.

I'm really happy with the change, hopefully they make world bosses pvp zones as well.

Dygz

Liniker wrote: »

Dygz wrote: »

And... yes. I will not play what I don't like.
That's OK.

let's be real here @Dygz you will 100% play the game so just stop saying you won't in an attempt to vocalize your discontent. You already know that it has forced PvP and still you are here, we all know you will be there for Alpha 2 on day 1, and for Betas, and for Launch.

LMFAO
You just have to claim the opposite of anything I say.

SirChancelot

Warth wrote: »

SirChancelot wrote: »

Sathrago wrote: »

Overthrow wrote: »

I think it's a very big decision and it's a bad one that will reduce the success of the game.

The corruption system exists to prevent Ashes from becoming a gank box. Games that are gank boxes ALWAYS fail. [and if you don't agree with that statement, then why not remove corruption entirely?]

Why then, would you turn all of the ocean content into a gank box by removing the risk of corruption? There are plenty of other opportunities for PvP that are balanced for risk v reward.

If corruption works well on land then it should also be implemented for the water content. That was the original plan. This makes it seem like ocean is supposed to be some sort of advanced content zone, like EVE null sec.

Well to be fair they are already adding similar zones to the inland as well. Maybe not as expansive as the entire sea, but its still something they have said they wanted in the game.

https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Open_world_battlegrounds

Ok
But that's certain areas, not the whole ocean.

Well, apparently it is the whole ocean. God has spoken.

Did you read his comment?
I was just saying there is a difference.

Asgerr

SirChancelot wrote: »

Sathrago wrote: »

Overthrow wrote: »

I think it's a very big decision and it's a bad one that will reduce the success of the game.

The corruption system exists to prevent Ashes from becoming a gank box. Games that are gank boxes ALWAYS fail. [and if you don't agree with that statement, then why not remove corruption entirely?]

Why then, would you turn all of the ocean content into a gank box by removing the risk of corruption? There are plenty of other opportunities for PvP that are balanced for risk v reward.

If corruption works well on land then it should also be implemented for the water content. That was the original plan. This makes it seem like ocean is supposed to be some sort of advanced content zone, like EVE null sec.

Well to be fair they are already adding similar zones to the inland as well. Maybe not as expansive as the entire sea, but its still something they have said they wanted in the game.

https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Open_world_battlegrounds

Ok
But that's certain areas, not the whole ocean.

It's also not the whole ocean, just the sections that don't fall under the purview ouf a Node's zone of influence. Territorial waters so to speak.

You don't autoflag as soon as you touch water. You need to sail quite a bit further to leave the territorial waters. And then you'll be in the open PvP zone. Which, if you just keep sailing straight to your destination on the other continent, might be a total of what? 10 minutes tops?

Liniker

Dygz wrote: »

LMFAO
You just have to claim the opposite of anything I say.

Not true, sometimes you say really good stuff and give valuable feedback, just not the case in this thread - suddenly saying you won't play a game that you have been following for years for a design decision that you have not yet tested seems just like QQing. You know you will play it regardles.

SirChancelot

Asgerr wrote: »

SirChancelot wrote: »

Sathrago wrote: »

Overthrow wrote: »

I think it's a very big decision and it's a bad one that will reduce the success of the game.

The corruption system exists to prevent Ashes from becoming a gank box. Games that are gank boxes ALWAYS fail. [and if you don't agree with that statement, then why not remove corruption entirely?]

Why then, would you turn all of the ocean content into a gank box by removing the risk of corruption? There are plenty of other opportunities for PvP that are balanced for risk v reward.

If corruption works well on land then it should also be implemented for the water content. That was the original plan. This makes it seem like ocean is supposed to be some sort of advanced content zone, like EVE null sec.

Well to be fair they are already adding similar zones to the inland as well. Maybe not as expansive as the entire sea, but its still something they have said they wanted in the game.

https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Open_world_battlegrounds

Ok
But that's certain areas, not the whole ocean.

It's also not the whole ocean, just the sections that don't fall under the purview ouf a Node's zone of influence. Territorial waters so to speak.

You don't autoflag as soon as you touch water. You need to sail quite a bit further to leave the territorial waters. And then you'll be in the open PvP zone. Which, if you just keep sailing straight to your destination on the other continent, might be a total of what? 10 minutes tops?

I get that
He was talking about having autoflagging ZONES on land and I was just commenting that's not the same thing as all international waters.

Xefjord

I for one am a big fan of this change, as someone who played Archeage not even as a primarily PvPer, the amount of cross continent travel will not be nearly as high as many people think, and even then the chances of running into PvPers at sea is low enough to be rather rare, but high enough to keep the seas a little tense. I thought it was great, and this game seems to be following that example.

People talk about how getting autoflagged destroys the whole safety net created by the corruption system, but simply put, there isn't enough stuff IN the open sea for that argument to hold any ground. The most that it will encompass is the occasional cross continental travel and *maybe* some fishing here or there. It sounds like there will also be underwater world bosses, which would be getting tackled by large guilds and groups anyway, not everyday folks who wouldn't be able to hold their own against pirates. A solid 95% of all the games content will still very much be on land, and fishers can still fish along both the coasts, rivers, and lakes with little consequence.

Add on top of this that the game is designed that you don't really need to travel far from your home node, much less off continent. Unless you are just hyper dedicated to exploration there is no need to even cross the sea, but if you ARE hyper dedicated to exploration, it should be way more exciting to explore your continent then have to endure a (whopping what 10 minutes of?) hardship to travel to a new continent and explore there next. The open sea is going to be a lot like the wilds in Runescape, almost completely unnecessary to visit unless you are looking for PvP. Just in this case it splits two continents that probably won't be interacting heavily that much anyway. Especially not for normal players. Ironically, Sea trade may actually be more safe than land trade because both get flagged for PvP, but routes are much more set for land as opposed to Sea.

XiraelAcaron

I also do not understand why they changed this. What is the goal here? What was the problem that this change in design tries to fix? I would really like an explanation of their thought process for this.

By effectively removing the flagging system, they remove what the flagging system was desigend to do: curb the PvP excesses (i.e. griefers). At least that is what they said. So the only conclusion I can draw is that either they do not believe that the flagging system will work (i.e. there is too little PvP because of it and they want more PvP) or they want to encourage griefing. If the first is the case, then they should tell us. I hope it is not the latter.

I am looking at this purely from the PvE <-> PvP perspective:
Until now I thought the world was designed in a way to balance PvE and PvP. The PvPer had to swallow the flagging system which prevents them from doing everything they want. They run the risk of going red when (keep) attacking someone that does not fight back. The PvEers had to swallow the always on PvP without safe zones. Even in most dungeons and with world bosses. Additionally they might loose their investment in housing and nodes due to PvP. And now, they even have to contend with griefers in some areas if they want to challange all the PvE content. As someone stated before, where is the risk for the PvPers in this scenario?
If you look simply in the PvE player, the reward is the great dungeon content and the risk are the PvP griefers (not normal PvP players, because the restraints are removed and they will dominate the OpenSea as it is the only place they can do their thing).
If you look from the PvP griefer perspective, the reward is the fun (and the loot) and the risk is not existent (there my be risks due to other PvP players, but not by game design. Nor does the game design incentivises other players to threaten them; e.g. bounty hunters).

If they wanted to divide the player base along the PvP/PvE line, they certainly succeeded. You could now, of course argue, that to balace this, they introduce PvP free zones... but that would further divide the player base because the PvPer would stick to the open Sea and PvEers to the safe zones.

Steven always says the game is not for everyone. Thats nice, but at this point, I would like him to explain who the target player base is for this game actually is? Because whatever it is, it certainly just shifted.

What is also sad is that there is no good way to come back from this. If they keep the auto-flagging they will antagonize the PvE players and if they remove it they will do the same with the PvP players...additionally both will cry out that the developer bent under pressure from either the hardcore PvP crowd or from the carebears respectively.

ashesplayer123

I welcome this change a lot
Being part of a seafarer guild sounds so much fun

ashesplayer123

George_Black wrote: »

Warth wrote: »

@George_Black i cant imagine a forum without Dygz either.

I can. It will help my anger issues. I wish he finally comes to terms with the fact that AoC isn't an RP mmo like ff14. It's competitive and guild centered. You dont see me in ff14s forums asking for open world pvp, nor do you see me in bdos forums asking for no p2w servers.
Each company has their vision clearly stated. If people choose to delude themselves, I wish at least they didn't flood the forums with fluff. Anyway, as said in todays Dev Up date regarding feedback: "all feedback is welcome" but also... "we won't pursue that direction".

Dygz is the kind of guy who will never accept the fact that he might not be the target audience for this game.

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