Development Cycle Archive
Thread: In-Concept Open Discussion (Week Ending 4-12-04)
Starphire wrote:
I have a concept. I have played the game sence week two and I still love it.
After the SE, spend 6 months doing nothing but fixing bugs. We still have many. The game is playable yes, but some of these have been around so long its just sad.
By SE, I'm assumming you're referring to the Space Expansion...I think the Dev's will be fixing bugs for 6 months to a year ironing out issues with the SE...much less the existing game. Our best hope is for them to fix as many bugs as possible before the SE.
This is a post I made on Tarquinas, regarding suggestions to improve Guild wars, and the overall "funness" factor
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As a participant in this weekend’s TR vs. SKULL war, I had a really enjoyable time. After reading the thread about the war, I can see many issues that need to be resolved, namely the point of having a guild war in the first place. There needs to be a way to determine who wins and who loses, so there can be a clear definition. After all, what is it that we want to achieve in a guild war? We want to win!!! And with that, deny it if you want, bragging rights are fruits of the victory.
In the current game mechanics, there is no possible way to win, unless one side concedes to a loss publicly. Although this could conceivable happen, most of the time, human nature takes over, and the result is a bunch of threads with accusations, finger pointing, flaming, cries of unfairness, and just overall bitterness in some participants. Drawing on the backyard battlefields of my younger years and some of the old school RTS games, I make these suggestions for improvement.
In order for a guild to declare war against another guild, they must choose which type of war they want to declare, “Capture the flag/king of the hill”, or “kill em by the numbers approach”.
King of the hill/capture the flag approach
For a guild to declare war, they must first build a command center. This is a non-faction structure, and cannot be purchased with any faction points. It should be expensive, and take a lot of resources. Perhaps 2-3 times that of a PA hall. If you make it valuable, you will want to make damn sure it doesn’t get blown up. By making it hard to build, you deter guilds of 10 people declaring war against a guild of 200. (This situation would be better suited for next option). This command structure, in order to keep it out of the hands of your enemy has a self destruct ability (this is where the fun comes in). Perhaps it can even be armed with defensive weapons. This structure can be built on anywhere that is not on a no-build zone. You would most likely want to put it in your city though I would imagine.
Now, if the war declarers chose this method, in order for the other guild to accept the war, they too must build a command center. War can only be declared/undeclared at a terminal in the command center.
In order for one side to win against the other, they must capture the enemy’s command center, and initiate the self destruct sequence. Then they must hold and defend the captured structure for a certain time period, say 10 mins. During this time, the owners of the captured command center, must retake their command center, and disarm the self destruct sequence before their command center blows up.
If a command center is blown up, the war immediately ends, and there is a clear cut winner and all is notified via a system message. The winners command center is then redeedable. This scenario can be mutually ended, by the guild leader of one side offering a truce at the command center, and the other guild leader accepting. If this happens, both command structures are redeeded. There is then no argument of who won the war, either one side gets their HQ destroyed, or there is a mutually accepted truce.
Think of the strategy involved in this. Part of the fun, is finding your enemy’s command structure. If you put it on a remote planet at the edge of the map, you make hard to find, but also hard to defend, as cloning centers/shuttles may or may not be nearby. Then there is the question, how many do you need to defend your base, vs. how many should be on the strike team? I think all these factors make for a very exciting battle.
“kill ‘em by the numbers approach”
Although I like the previous methodology much better, this one has its highlights. This approach is a sheer numbers game, and could lead to a long, drawn out war, especially with larger guilds. When two guilds declare/accept war with each other in the current fashion, each member of the guild is given a “death counter,” Say 10. When ever a guild member is killed by an enemy guild member, they lose a death. When they get killed 10 times, they go blue, and can no longer participate in the war; they are effectively KIA. They cannot openly attack or be attacked. Dueling of course still applies. This would effectively keep uber players from constantly returning to continue the butt kicking. If you can kill them 10 times, they are out of the picture. This can cause major turnings of the tides during the course of the battle. Rezing a corpse does not save a death BTW.
This count would extend to all guild members, so like it currently is if you are in the warring guild, you can be attacked by any member of the opposing guild. To avoid this, you must temporarily remove yourself from the guild. PVE or PVP against others not aligned with your enemy does not count towards this “death meter.” The only way to win this scenario is for one side to kill every member of the opposite guild the required number of times. Once this is done, the war is instantly over, and a system message is generated stating who the winner is.
The other two ways to end this type of war, is to concede defeat, and truce. To concede, one side only has to end the war like it is done now. This generates a system message to all involved of who won and lost the battle. There is no more "quitting the war" like it is done now. To truce, the guild leaders must initiate a Truce through a terminal, and the other side must accept. This way, it again, is clear cut who the winner and loser are in the battle. If there is a truce, both sides have to agree, so there is no further argument on who “won” in this case.
This scenario can lead to tons of strategy options. Do you focus on the strongest members of the guild to take them out first and get them out of the battle, or eliminate the grunts first to have less people to fight in the long run? Maybe take out their medics first, so they can’t heal the others, etc.
Although these ideas are a little rough around the edges, I think players would take guild wars a little more seriously, and as a result make them much more enjoyable for all involved. No more would it be a bunch of players killing each other endlessly until boredom sets in. Comments and/or suggestions?
You have 3 masteries. While not hunting marks, you have significant combat abilities that can allow you to hunt, and utilize your SCOUT skills (omg.. harvesting... you remember that?). A Bounty hunter still have master scout and master marksman. You can very effectively hunt and kill creatures as well as NPC's, and there is demand for meat, hide and bone. You could even take up fishing... you have plenty of options, not necessarily related to killing marks.
FalgornLightfoot wrote:
I am a Bounty Hunter on Chimeara - Europe, and in my opinion, because of my profession choice, I am getting significantly less from the game than other players.
FirstlyI do not want to drop Bounty Hunter. Its whatI got the game to play, andI know there are a great many people out there that feel the same.
As a result of my choice,I cannot remain as Master Bounty Hunter, and master any other profession at the same time. As such my game content is severely restricted in a way that no other profession must suffer.
As a result of my choice,I have virtually no defence, so to solo any medium - high level quests alone is out of the question. As such, my game content is severely restricted in a way that no other profession must suffer.
As a result of my choice, when I choose to go overt, I must fight in a very limited way to survive. The amount of skill points I spend, do not reflect my skill in combat. As such, my game content is severely restricted in a way that no other profession must suffer.
Thunderheart wrote:
ETgamer wrote:
Not sure if this is where it's supposed to be, but I'm a little worried about the coming Mandalorian armor that will be available via dungeon... chiefly, with the amount of camping we'll see with this thing, considering the overwhelming amounts of popularity that the rare armor has to back it up.
I'm not sure how this problem can be solved.
Angetenar wrote:
I was curious about something. About a month ago somebody posted an idea about a slicing kit that smugglers could sell to other players. This kit could be used to open magseal and other locked containers. The Dev response was pretty enthusiastic. Did anything else ever come of this? I think it's an excellent idea.
While your at it, why don't you all send the people who spawned the April Fools dragons down to some of the dungeons where people using loot macros on containers and have them spawn a dark jedi or two.
Fellstaff wrote:
Angetenar wrote:
I was curious about something. About a month ago somebody posted an idea about a slicing kit that smugglers could sell to other players. This kit could be used to open magseal and other locked containers. The Dev response was pretty enthusiastic. Did anything else ever come of this? I think it's an excellent idea.
While your at it, why don't you all send the people who spawned the April Fools dragons down to some of the dungeons where people using loot macros on containers and have them spawn a dark jedi or two.
I don't think this should be an option for non slicers, for ANY locked container. Thats one bonus for slicers. They can shortcut through terminals and get access to more containers in dungeons than other professions.
I'm fine with these not working on terminals. It's just that, as it stands right now, there is no reason for me to go to most of the POI's because there are no rewards, other than badges which I can care less about.
I do agree with the premise that Smugglers are lacking in content.
Please give us a reason to kill stronger things! If I'm going out to level up my skills, I can either A) Take Savage Quenker missions, it takes 10 seconds to kill each one and I get 4000 exp for it, or B) Take Graul Mauler missions, it takes 45 seconds to kill and I get 4500 exp for it. This is disapointing, there is absolutely no gain from attacking stronger monsters.
phosho delka
owerful, fast and diferent diseplines that are equal. remove sniper from this and make that a profession that requires MR and MM. rifleman should be powerfulll and the main troops. there should be 2 verieties of them.(ps:snipers use mind rifleman should use action. and hit health.) best all-round soldiers. guns have max range of 80 meters.(or 75)1 grenade sert. )