Game Development: The Danger Zone

[Amanda44]

As I'm a pve player rather than a pvp player I leave these sort of debates to others more qualified to answer but, I can say, that from a defence point of view the window for destruction should not be less than 9hrs, that is just incredibly unfair on anyone who has a rl.

In all the previous worlds I have managed defence just fine (and as a hermit) unless I've made my own errors, such as mistakes in the wall and that time I left my keys in a chest overnight with an xrd leading into my village. ( - )

[strpk0]

Personal thoughts:
I personally like the idea of villages having a sort-of "weakness time" where they can be more easily raided (perhaps even through brickbashing). Not so much though, having it set to be a fixed and global "8 hour timespan" where this can take place (as some people may not be able to be online during their weakness time).

Proposal (just to try to help the idea):
Sort of building upon this idea, it would be nice if the villages in question could select when this window can take place once per week. This way they can get the real-life things sorted out and be prepared for the (possible) attacks. Any villages that don't select their window will have it take place automatically after the week's end, or something like that.
Likewise, if this were to be implemented, it would be nice to be able to track when a village's "weakness" time is, perhaps by visiting the claim and somehow grabbing an item that can inform the possible raiders when a village will be prone to attack.

Again though, these are just my ideas and thoughts. Hope they help in some manner.

[jorb]

nuff said

You bitching about a pearl necklace and me trying to work on the foundational core of the game? I couldn't agree more. Nuff said indeed.

[rye130]

One seemingly nice thing about the present ram system is that it doesn't seem to lend itself particularly well to resource spam. If you build a ram, someone -- apparently -- needs to manually watch it for 24 hours, and -- apparently -- this is enough of a chore to be a meaningful deterrent to crime and warfare. Spamming more rams doesn't help the situation, and that seems like a largely good thing.

Is there any formulation or change to the ram's mechanics that would be good, or better than what presently exists?

Say: 24 hour drying time, 12 hour window of destruction? 24/18? 48/12?

I don't think setting windows of conflict is the right way to approach siege. Forcing players to log on at a certain time just doesn't feel like it will ever not be abusable in some major way. The attacker seemingly will always be able to force the defender into a disadvantageous scenario (through spamming rams or something).

The better way to handle it, which I believe you've talked about before, is by allowing players to be able to progress the state of the raid/attack whenever they want. So if I log on and see that someone is attempting to attack me, I can work on stuff that will meaningfully delay or stop them from progressing. I'm not forced into playing during a certain window of time, but I can use my play time to do work defending.

Under a "Raid Moon" system, however, it seems likely that PvP simply becomes a question of who can leverage more combat ready characters. Is this desirable?

Please discuss.

I think the main thing should be that numbers alone don't win the game. They should help, but not completely remove the effort required to do anything. I don't want to be destined to fail just because I don't want to play with 40 other players.

[Amanda44]

One seemingly nice thing about the present ram system is that it doesn't seem to lend itself particularly well to resource spam. If you build a ram, someone -- apparently -- needs to manually watch it for 24 hours, and -- apparently -- this is enough of a chore to be a meaningful deterrent to crime and warfare. Spamming more rams doesn't help the situation, and that seems like a largely good thing.

Is there any formulation or change to the ram's mechanics that would be good, or better than what presently exists?

Say: 24 hour drying time, 12 hour window of destruction? 24/18? 48/12?

I don't think setting windows of conflict is the right way to approach siege. Forcing players to log on at a certain time just doesn't feel like it will ever not be abusable in some major way. The attacker seemingly will always be able to force the defender into a disadvantageous scenario (through spamming rams or something).

The better way to handle it, which I believe you've talked about before, is by allowing players to be able to progress the state of the raid/attack whenever they want. So if I log on and see that someone is attempting to attack me, I can work on stuff that will meaningfully delay or stop them from progressing. I'm not forced into playing during a certain window of time, but I can use my play time to do work defending.

Under a "Raid Moon" system, however, it seems likely that PvP simply becomes a question of who can leverage more combat ready characters. Is this desirable?

Please discuss.

I think the main thing should be that numbers alone don't win the game. They should help, but not completely remove the effort required to do anything. I don't want to be destined to fail just because I don't want to play with 40 other players.

Nicely said, I agree with this.

[DDDsDD999]

The perhaps best realization we've had of this thought is that of a "Raid Moon". I.e. a server global time window -- eight hours once each week, say -- during which the game takes on more the character of a free for all; raiding is significantly easier. Under such conditions it is by definition true that the state of being able to attack someone is intrinsically linked to the state of being oneself possible to attack in return.

Under a "Raid Moon" system, however, it seems likely that PvP simply becomes a question of who can leverage more combat ready characters. Is this desirable?

Please discuss.

Ah, the classic purge scenario. It actually seems rather interesting. Definitely could be considered.

[infectedking]

that time I left my keys in a chest overnight with an xrd leading into my village. ( - )

Sorry about that.

You bitching about a pearl necklace and me trying to work on the foundational core of the game? I couldn't agree more. Nuff said indeed.

More like bitching to you about things that are actually worth putting in, the holding off on siege for that long that so many of the fighting players of the game quit because you would rather put in pointless patchs for stuff when the pvp aspect basically had died off, I know for certain that a lot of the friends i've had from previous world and even this world have quit because of that, which you should care about because that means less money for you. putting indestructible objects was a really bad thing, infact you should make Dolman tables bashable because they can be used for blocking people's gates aswell.

[loftar]

I think the main thing should be that numbers alone don't win the game. They should help, but not completely remove the effort required to do anything. I don't want to be destined to fail just because I don't want to play with 40 other players.

I do think this is an interesting and possibly large question in and of itself. I mean, even if you don't play in a village with 40 other players, is it not to some extent reasonable to expect players to accumulate allies (that I could call in the event on an ongoing siege or whatever), or settle in the area of a more-or-less benevolent hegemon, or the like? Aren't those the kind of social interactions that should, at least in some theory, be desirable in an MMO? Should I, as a completely isolated and lone player, be able to match up against strong factions?

[Vert]

i dont like that someone can choose good time for they attack. The battering ram with 48 24 wiil be nice because i have 24 hours to destroy ram and its 100% chance that i will be ingame. if the time for breaking ram will be 8 hours, so raders will find time when i will be sleep ( that 8 hours and make the ram).
so we need a system when the time will be choosing by 2 sides not only one.
or we never see a battle for base in this world.

Do the history of this game have examples of successful sieges ( when the two sides engaged in the battle)

[strpk0]

I think the main thing should be that numbers alone don't win the game. They should help, but not completely remove the effort required to do anything. I don't want to be destined to fail just because I don't want to play with 40 other players.

I do think this is an interesting and possibly large question in and of itself. I mean, even if you don't play in a village with 40 other players, is it not to some extent reasonable to expect players to accumulate allies, or settle in the area of a more-or-less benevolent hegemon, or the like? Aren't those the kind of social interactions that should, at least in some theory, be desirable in an MMO? Should I, as a completely isolated and lone player, be able to match up against strong factions?

You should be able to put up a good damn fight, but ultimately the effort (keyword) and overall strength (keyword 2) of the attacking/defending force should determine the outcome of a siege.
As such, indeed it should be the case that a lone player should not be able to indefinitely defend against a strong attacking force, but perhaps given enough effort they should be able to survive for a while. Aswell, it should not be the case that any strong player/faction will automatically win a siege because they have more stats than the lone player. The effort put into making the siege or defending from it should determine the outcome aswell.
I hope what I said isn't too vague.