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I've been reading a number of complaints about how JTL's PvP system has been implimented and the concerns many of the X-Wing, TvX, and Aliance players over JTL's fluffy approach to space combat and wonder why the game was designed the way it was verses how it could have been designed.

Using all the current mission system, factional system, profession system, and the current economy, a far more "starwarsey" way of approaching JTL was possible.

SOE ought to have allowed pilots to be either Rebel & Privateer, Imperial & Privateer, or just Privateer. The trick is, if you're Rebel or Imperial, you're always PvP no matter what system you're in. For Privateers, they should be safe from PvP in the planetary systems (except in a circumstance I'll outline below) just as they are now.

If as a pilot you want to fly through one of the planetary system and not on business for your miltary faction (ie. Rebels or Imperials), than you should probably grab your privateer ship. This has the effect of turning you covert.

But, if you decide you want to go fly as a pilot for your side, you transport to a base for your side into the warzone -- typically in deep space or some specific system where the factional war is being fought in earnest at that particular moment in time -- where you are *given* you ship and it's armourments instead of paying for it out of your own pocket. The Light Duty Tie and Z95 wouldn't cost any faction points but the upper ships would. The moment you spawn into your factional ship, *BLING* you're an overt.


As you move up through the tiers, you get access to better ships in a tiered way just like now. As you move up in tiers, your missions would take you further and further away from the main bases that would have friendly patrols around of high tiered ships to keep out the baddies from the other side and closer to the opposing side's territory bringing you into greater probability of PvP action and further and further away from friendly MOB patrols.

Each ship (save your basic starter) costs faction points to spawn. When you spawn, it costs you faction points. When you land you get those back minus the cost of any damages and plus whatever faction points you earned by completing your assigned mission and any kills you got. The better the ship, the more faction points it costs.

If you're doing well and have lots of factional points, you can trick out your stock ship with some upgrades but those should have consequences to your ship as well. So if you want a more powerful reactor, your mass should go up degrading your turning performance. Better guns? Sure but there's less energy for charging your shields and you can't fire them as often. This will help keep the PvP part balanced even between tiers. If these factional ships are closer in performance, there's no reason why a good pilot in a TIE Interceptor can't handle a pair of mediocre pilots in B-Wings, for example, instead of now where component quality plays such a huge factor in the outcome of this fight.

Players would get missions just as you might now from a terminal at your base. You launch in and run those missions. During the course of doing those missions, you may run into other player opponents doing their missions, you may not. If you do, you're going to have to deal with PvP. If you don't, your mission would take you through a regular PvE experience much as it is now.

By basing all factional combat in deep space sectors (or several for the sake of the server architecture) there should be enough space where a large number of people, you should be able to duke it out PvP style but those who don't want to go head-to-head like that can stick to safe PvE missions closer to the main factional spawn points. Spawn camping could be reduced by by making sure spawn points and jump points are well defended by your side.

This doesn't mean that factional fighting can't go on in the Planetary Systems but you just know if you spawn in there with your faction ship and there are factional ships from the otherside, you're in for a brawl. If you want to just travel along there for the sake of just travelling, you should grab your private ship.


Cont... /

Message Edited by Onchas on 11-10-2004 04:55 PM

For variety's sake (and content), there's no reason why one of the planetary systems couldn't go under blockade periodically. If you want to travel there as a privateer, you'll have to take the risk of running the blockade (or bribing your way through). This sort of blockading opens up the possibility of some of the Master Pilots with multi-player ships acting as, that's right, you guessed it, smugglers.

If there's a great shift of, I don't know, Copper on Endor but Endor is under imperial blockade. There's no reason to close down the regular shuttle system. Just make the costs higher, maybe run every 12 instead of 10 minutes, and possibly have to go through an imperial "search" when you board for any sliced equipment and maybe duty or something on any resources you take with and some fee based on the value of the stuff you're trying to take in.

Don't want to pay the surcharge? Want to take out more resources than are allowed? Want to sneak in with your sliced, uber contraban equipment? Maybe you can hire a player manned YT1300 pilot (or Rebel Nova Courrier) to take you there...for the right price. If a player who's also a Rebel pilot in his private ship gets caught by an Imperial blockade, there should be a faction point hit for getting caught but not nearly as large as one that an Imperial pilot flying as a privateer would get trying to run an Imperial Blockade. This adds a PvP element potential for Privateers as players might be given an intercept mission or patrol mission and trip across your group.


There's also the possibilty here of adding space content for ground professions.

Maybe you want to go clean out your harvester's 20K of copper but you know you can't get it through the blockade. So you go to your harvester, clean it out, take it back to the city and give it to a smuggler and he takes it out for you, for a fee -- there could also be a drop-off and pick-up vendor/mission terminal system here as well. If the product that's gather for smuggling is placed in a lockbox that can't be freely opened, you decrease the possibility of griefing.

Smugglers could slice the boxes and hold the products ransom. But if such a thing happens, the smuggler can be flagged so the guy cheated can place a bounty on the head of the smuggler. Yummm. If the Bounty is successful, the orginal commissioner gets his stuff back.

Just by changing the approach to JTL a bit, now you've added player content for smugglers and bounty-hunters. All of this uses current game technology and systems.


I realize this post is getting quite long but I do want to comment quickly on the economic factors. Having factional ships purchased by players from shipwrights does make sure the economy is flowing. Absolutely. But there's no reason why there can't be a shipwright mission terminal. Shipwrights can take missions (maybe a commission for 12 X-Wings) and punch out those ships (or components) and sell them to the Rebels for some standard price; maybe the commission is for guns or shields or something else. The better the stats on the ships, the more money the missions pay-out to the Shipwrights and the better the ships the faction players get to fly with.

There are ways of tying in the Shipwrights to the GCW by connecting the number of ships they make and provide to the faction point cost for the pilots. The more ships rebel shipwrights make, the lower the factional points but the less the Shipwright Missions pay out for them.

So a Shipwright could chose, if he or she wanted, to make a lot of ships and help out his or her cause. Or they might decide to just sell to the highest bidder. If the Imperials need ships, he makes imperial ships.

This adds actual GCW content for crafters -- the same thing can be done for armour and guns.

The same shipwright/Privateer relationship can remain as is to keep the game consistent in terms of an open ship market. It's just that those factional ships would be comissioned by the factions through missions for use by pilots who were up to run factional missions.


I realize this is one of those, out-of-my-ass, "if I were the game designer" posts. I just feel strongly that a major opportunity was missed with JTL. The stuff I've been talking about above:

- uses all the current game systems and technologies
- adds GCW content for at least one crafter class (more if the same approach is taken to weapons and armour)
- adds content for bounty-hunters and smugglers
- can potentially be used to alter the economy and the cost of goods when the top resource shifts are on planets under blockade
- adds some degree of price stabilization
- makes PvP more user skill-based and less component quality/skill box based
- makes PvP more conscentual
- takes a bit of heat off the Jedi-BH relationship by giving BH's other player targets to go after