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I was recently at a local SWG player meeting where our group was challenged to come up with one idea that would make us play space more often. PvP boardings are what we came up with, just to be clear I'm talking about the large ships with an interior. This idea was at first just PvP but it expanded easily for PvE as well. This has also been brought up, at least in part, before on this board. I'll leave further PvE ideas open for you I think you know where to take it.

Our idea was this, after disabling an enemy multi-passenger ship (let us call them MPS from now on)
You would be able to board and fight the crew in the interior of the MPS, spawning in at the escape pod hatch.
If you were in a MPS and boarded a disabled enemy MPS both interiors should be available for combat with the link point at the escape pod hatch. The fight would be over when the last of either crew dies, with the loosing ship and possibly both ships (the winning ship may have lost it's certified pilot(s) leaving the remaining crew with no other option than podding) then going through the podding animation and appearing at a starbase. The ships should not loose "condition" themselves nor should any of their components to make it more attractive to participate in. This would also give the MPSs a larger role.

I could see issues with the spawn point being static but remember the attacker could do well by attacking ship systems to cause plasma leaks and possible crew deaths before ever boarding. I don't remember all the ship interiors but I don't believe any plasma leaks are near the escape pod hatch *wink*.

Thanks for your time,

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I need to clarify some points in this idea we had, others i honestly forgot to mention,
No MPS could ever be just blown up otherwise why fly a brick full of folks around right - this may seem off but remember that ship is going NOWHERE after it is disabled.

Here's a rundown

You disable an opposing MPS by targeting their ship engines you now have the choice to board or not
If you don't board the opposing crew now has the choice to attempt repairs or pod.
After you choose to not board the opposing crew has no choice but to get all of its systems back online or suffer death from the dangerous onboard conditions, why else would that horrid alarm be sounding. Repairing the ship has a time limit in some amount of minutes (sorry dont remember any agreement between us) or suffer death in space.

So, say you disable the ship and don't want to board (your alone in a single pilot fighter and 6 on 1 isn't for you)
Well, you will need to choose not to board and then wait. One of two things will happen either the ship explodes from the unrepaired internal damage or you will see them haul it out of there. Now, you can greatly increase you chance of such a ship exploding by targeting and destroying all the other systems first and engines last.

Ok you ate your PowerBars for lunch and feel you can take em, You choose to board. You were piloting a two seater fighter so its you and your gunner loading in at their escape pod door. Now its up to your crew to take out their crew and avoid the leaking plasma yourself. Again, you might be helping yourself out here by only taking out the engines to minimize the leaks.

This goes in line with the capitol ship from the master mission, basically you disable it and then continue to take systems offline and eventually destroy then bridge - if you take too long to do this guess what.. The crew repairs the engines and the ship leaves. Perhaps a boarding option could even be added for the master mission but after what we have seen on the regular 'vette mission I will stick to killing them from the safety of my cockpit thank-you.

Message Edited by Starode on 01-26-2005 02:13 AM

Message Edited by Starode on 01-26-2005 09:07 AM

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Starode wrote:
I was recently at a local SWG player meeting where our group was challenged to come up with one idea that would make us play space more often. PvP boardings are what we came up with, just to be clear I'm talking about the large ships with an interior. This idea was at first just PvP but it expanded easily for PvE as well. This has also been brought up, at least in part, before on this board. I'll leave further PvE ideas open for you I think you know where to take it.

Our idea was this, after disabling an enemy multi-passenger ship (let us call them MPS from now on)
You would be able to board and fight the crew in the interior of the MPS, spawning in at the escape pod hatch.
If you were in a MPS and boarded a disabled enemy MPS both interiors should be available for combat with the link point at the escape pod hatch. The fight would be over when the last of either crew dies, with the loosing ship and possibly both ships (the winning ship may have lost it's certified pilot(s) leaving the remaining crew with no other option than podding) then going through the podding animation and appearing at a starbase. The ships should not loose "condition" themselves nor should any of their components to make it more attractive to participate in. This would also give the MPSs a larger role.

I could see issues with the spawn point being static but remember the attacker could do well by attacking ship systems to cause plasma leaks and possible crew deaths before ever boarding. I don't remember all the ship interiors but I don't believe any plasma leaks are near the escape pod hatch *wink*.

Thanks for your time,

---

Awesome idea, but what's the incentive? PVP players for the most part won't really want to go through the trouble of getting into space and disabling another MPS if there's no reasonable reward for the effort. Why board at all if doesn't really effect anything? Why not just...blow it up?

I like the idea a lot, but there needs to be a reason to board for PVP fighting in the first place. It could be something like capturing components, massive FP rewards etc.

It's a little easier in a PVE situation because things can be a little more dynamic. The captured ship itself could be a dungeon if it was big enough, and there's the prospect of snazzy loot.

well think about it this way, in space you KNOW that you will be fighting an equal number of opponents at worst
*starting to sound more intrested*
Anyway, I would like to see some ideas on what you think the rewards should be... greater NPC faction presence in that sector... a nice bit of faction points... a chance to get a visit from an npc with a mission that would ultimately lead to some nice loot...

Also, keep in mind that in the future there could be ground vehicles with interiors which could use similar rules and rewards(I'm thinking ATAT, Hutt skiff, Jawa sandcrawler, Rebel troop carrier) all of which would have to be disabled before being able to board, fight in the interiors, and finally destroy (similar to poding in space)
hmm.. guess commando rockets should be good for getting the fight started.

Keep the ideas and comments coming

Naplam,

I'm not sure the comment is valid, consider the following

you are a pilot of MPS doing PvP in space - you lack fighting skills - perhaps all of your crew does as well
you are attacked by another ship and disabled
currently - the other ship would just finish you off
proposed PvP boarding - the other ship could watch you explode/repair or board you and finish you off

So, actually your "non-ground combat space PvP only pilot" would fare better not worse as you would have a chance that they wouldn't board but even if they do the outcome would still just be the same as it is currently, you get podded

If anything you bring up a good point that this would actually encourage space only folks to get ground skills
So to me its a good thing all the way around - doesnt take anything from space only folks and encourages them to do ground skills

Message Edited by Coran_Sienar on 01-26-2005 09:59 AM

This is PvP in space with ground skills to enhance the viability of large MPS
Which is just the one idea we came up with to increase JTL participation and meaning as it was felt that too few people play space.

Reward for PvE boarding I can understand - could be unique loot drops but at least the same as similar mobs on the ground

Reward for PvP is a much larger issue - say control of Deep Space as Ducimus has posted influences gcw serverwide, one part of the strategy to control deep space would be to use MPS to slow down attacking ships as they will have to stop to deal with MPS ships or face them repairing and coming at them again - so a mixed force of MPS with regular one and two pilot ships should be better than a homogenous force. Additionally, control of a given sector of space could influence gcw local to that system.

So does that help with the bigger picture

Wouldn't work because not all pilots of MP ships do combat on the ground, on of the great things about pilot is you can still do non combat on the ground, some people wouldn't like having to be a ground PVP'er for space PVP.

Would be great for just PVE but then people would still need to have a combat character on ground.

Message Edited by Naplam on 01-26-2005 08:35 AM