Caravan Hijacking, Scavenging and the Thieves Guild

In a recent video we learned that upon a successful attack, caravans will drop certificates representing the goods inside the caravan, that can be exchanged at a caravansery for raw goods.

Instead of the caravan dropping certificates I instead propose that there are two ways to "attack" a caravan: hijacking and scavenging.

I am in no way saying I know better than the devs, just wanted to share feedback like they asked. Please let me know what you think of the idea! How could it be better? What issues does this cause that I didn't think of? Please be kind and constructive, everyone wants something a little different.

Hijacking Summary
To Hijack a caravan all defenders must be removed from the caravan PvP zone (or a smaller inner zone) for a sufficient amount of time (king of the hill style). Upon successfully removing all defenders in this way the attackers would be given the option to hijack the caravan. Choosing this option cause a new destination to appear for the caravan, if the hijackers can get the caravan to that destination they capture the caravan and all of the goods inside are moved to the nearest node with a Thieves Guild presence. Attackers can then visit the Thieves Guild to collect their share (the Thieves Guild doesn't work for free) of the items from the caravan.

Scavenging Summary
Scavenging a caravan involves attacking the caravan to cause boxes of resources to drop off of the caravan. These boxes contain some of the actual goods (not certificates) from the caravan, but are light enough to be picked up by a player (or their mule). Once a player has gotten one or more boxes they can either leave and keep whatever is inside the box for themselves, or bring it to a nearby drop-point where the thieves guild will "wisk it away" to the nearest node with a Thieves Guild presence in exchange for a portion of the resources inside.

PROS

Provide more immersive experiences than dropping certificates.
Adds more player choices when attacking and defending caravans. (e.g. Should I try and recover the crates that fell or stay defending the caravan?)
Provides an "all-in" high risk for high reward option for attackers with Hijacking.
Provides a lower risk for lower reward option for attackers with Scavenging.
Defenders have a way to recover from a poor initial defense by giving them a chance to take-back their caravan or boxes.
Scavenging gives more opportunities for smaller groups to assault caravans as they could employ hit & run tactics.
Hijacking gives both attackers and defenders a chance to "switch roles" which could improve game balance. (e.g. A strong attacking force, may not be great at defending)
Increases attacker risk which improves attacker vs defender balance (e.g. Getting attacked yourself when bringing boxes to the drop-off)
Multiple "levers" for the designers to pull to improve balance. (How much the Thieves Guild charges, how far the hijacking destination is, how long it takes to hijack, how much damage it takes to drop a box, how long it takes to pick up a dropped box, etc)
Having the Thieves Guild take a portion of the stolen goods de-incentivises defenders being traitors (Because they would theoretially get more goods by defending since they won't have to pay the Thieves Guild)

CONS

Having two ways to attack a caravan could complicate the game balance.
Involving the Thieves Guild in this way may not make sense in the games lore.
A strong initial attack from the Attackers isn't as impactful which may de-incentivize Attackers from planning more. (As the defenders can "recover" from it easier theoretically)

FAQ
Q: Where would the destination for Hijackers be?
A: It would be the same distance away from the Defenders destination as the caravan was when it was Hijacked, and it would be some distance away from where the caravan was Hijacked proportional to how close the defenders where to the middle of their journey (If the defenders were really close to the end or had just started their trip, the Hijackers would have to go further).

Q: Can a hijacked caravan be recovered?
A: Yes, defenders now become attackers and new players can choose to "Help recover the stolen caravan" or "Help hijack the caravan". If the original defenders recover, they then must continue to a nearby caravansery (or their original destination) which should be the same distance away as it was when they were hijacked.

Q: How can there always be a nearby place for the Hijackers to go to?
A: The destination for the hijackers isn't any sort of structure, it is a group of Thieves Guild NPCs that act similar to the Guards for Caravans. The NPCs spawn at that destination and "take-over" once the hijackers get close enough.

Q: When are Scavengers who have taken boxes "Safe"?
A: Scavengers would be flagged as a combatant for 5 mins when picking up a box. They would also "re-flag" as normal when attacking other combatants. This gives scavengers an opportunity to run-out-the-clock if they just want to grab something and run away, and prevents Scavengers from avoiding retaliation from Defenders if they choose go to the drop-off and return to get more.

Q: Why is having both Hijacking and Scavenging better than just one of them?
A: Having both systems increases that amount of meaningful decisions that both Caravan Attackers and Defenders have to make. It also makes it harder for a single "meta" to form around attacking caravans, as the two options provide many levers between them for tuning the player experience. Having only a single option greatly reduces the amount of meaningful decisions and is more likely to result in over-optimization or "gaming" from players as there is no alternatives to incetivize or balance against.

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Comments

Strevi

Tobius wrote: »

What issues does this cause that I didn't think of?
Please be kind and constructive, everyone wants something a little different.

The issue I see is about resource sink. You have taken out the resource sink from this game mechanic.
When the caravan is destroyed, it gives only part of the resources to the player who win.

If a caravan is destroyed (becomes a wreckage) it will drop a portion of the goods it was transporting.[4][62][63] The remainder of the caravan's goods are sunk (lost) when the caravan is destroyed.[64]

Same with ships:

Naval caravans can not be hijacked. The cargo on a trade ship will be similar to caravans in that the ship must be destroyed in order to capture the loot from its wreckage.[8]

with player death (also is not as clearyl stated as for caravans)

Corrupted players who die can lose gear.[9]

and with nodes

The warehouse debris will contain a portion of all Materials (crafting components) and Gatherables that were stored in the destroyed node.[158][154][159][160]

Tobius

Strevi wrote: »

The issue I see is about resource sink. You have taken out the resource sink from this game mechanic.
When the caravan is destroyed, it gives only part of the resources to the player who win.

Good point, thanks for the feedback!

Currently both Hijacking and Scavenging include a way to remove resources (through the Thieves Guild payments) but as I have it written now, players who choose to take a box and leave on their own accord wouldn't be removing resources in the same way.

One fix to that would be to make any stolen box require an exchange at the Thieves Guild to extract the resources. Then they always take either a portion of the resources or a payment as a way to re-introduce that resource sink.

Voxtrium

I actually like the idea of being able to fully scavenge a transport losing a smaller portion of resources to the npc thieves guild. Still, maybe this is an after release option, to prevent scope creep. The resource sink problem is there but you still lose some to the NPC scavenging. The larger problem is that most likely if i am raiding a caravan it will make more sense to scavenge than to destroy it. If i can destroy the caravan, it is likely i can also scavenge it. Although that would have to be tested, but that's a potential problem, That both options end up just becoming 1 option because that 1 is so much better.

Maybe remove the resource gain from a scavenged cart and instead have a gold transfer from the NPC thieves guild to the scavenging players. You get 0 of the resources but instead get 80% of the caravan value based on vendor prices at the node it was to be delivered to.

Also gate it behind requiring a player to be a high tier thieves guild member and only then does the option pop up to scavenge for the raiding party. Further reducing the likelihood that scavenging is always the chosen option.

Sunnybunny251

Hmm I like the Scavenging idea - it puts me in mind of Loot Goblins from other games.
Paying a fee to the thieves guild is also a good idea - reminds me of ESO. You have to fence the item before you can really do anything with it. And don't let the guards catch you or you loose all those hard earned "found" items .

clone63

Caravans are designed to drop certificates? That's kind of a cop out

Strevi

clone63 wrote: »

Caravans are designed to drop certificates? That's kind of a cop out

Maybe to prevent filling players' inventory?

Strevi

Tobius wrote: »

Strevi wrote: »

The issue I see is about resource sink. You have taken out the resource sink from this game mechanic.
When the caravan is destroyed, it gives only part of the resources to the player who win.

Good point, thanks for the feedback!

Currently both Hijacking and Scavenging include a way to remove resources (through the Thieves Guild payments) but as I have it written now, players who choose to take a box and leave on their own accord wouldn't be removing resources in the same way.

One fix to that would be to make any stolen box require an exchange at the Thieves Guild to extract the resources. Then they always take either a portion of the resources or a payment as a way to re-introduce that resource sink.

Will players see the percent being taken by the game? How will they feel if they see all items and then they lose 75% of them to the game item sink algorithm?

In the current way described on wiki, the game will never show to bandits that some very expensive item was removed by the game.

Tobius

Strevi wrote: »

Will players see the percent being taken by the game? How will they feel if they see all items and then they lose 75% of them to the game item sink algorithm?

In the current way described on wiki, the game will never show to bandits that some very expensive item was removed by the game.

I didn't know that was hidden from the players, very interesting! I think you could keep that system in place with this suggestion as well. No reason you'd have to inform the attackers about what is being stolen if that's the design goal the studio has.

For Scavenging, the item that drops from the Caravan would be a generic item called "Cargo". You'd have to turn that item into the Thieves Guild at which point you wouldn't know how much was taken since you could only ever see the generic "Cargo" item you picked up. If the player chose to circumvent the Thieves Guild you could still have some quantity removed off the top before the "Cargo" item is opened without the player knowing.

Likewise for Hijacking, while you're driving the stolen Caravan you still wouldn't have the ability to view its contents, and would only be able to collect the rewards from the Thieves Guild without getting any knowledge of what was actually in the Caravan.

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