Game Development: Surveyor's Delight

[nachtmaerie]

• War and siege should be a collection of informal, localized states, rather than formal and global. Formal states create distinct interfaces between states that are prone to manipulations, workarounds and exploits. The game devolves to a game about those states, rather than a game about siege warfare.

What does this mean?

I took it to mean that Jorb would (or would have) rather see a multitude of groups within 1 realm, sort of like old relationships between rulers and their þegns, that have an mutually-beneficial alliance of sorts. Top dog village doesn't raid the smaller villages and even offers aid (through the realm boons?) and in return they will help the realm prosper/defend it. It should be informal and maintained through personal relationships, and not because we said on Discord that we would be in an alliance because you gave me 10 gold bars or something.

To tie it into the well-discussion in the other thread, which has been fun to read: putting Jorb's thoughts into that scenario actually seems to find a lot of resonance among the playerbase; players who say assets like these should be grief-proof would probably benefit from a gameworld where diplomacy and informal alliances and kinship is more prevalent -- as one user pointed out why did nobody help defend against the siege? Well nobody noticed, nobody cared until it was over, and there was not really any reason to do so anyway because why risk your (character's) life for a well that everyone uses. You die - and everyone continues to get ahead of you while you set yourself back for people that wouldn't do the same for you.

You don't need to griefproof things if you have a realm with a public well and a bunch of villages/people in that area that not only have a reason to defend that place (water) but also have kinship with the player that owns the resource/the realm (and have agreed to do so). Likewise players who are pro-random acts of violence would probably find the challenge they seem to desire (if my reading of the thread is correct at least) if you were not only sieging that specific palisade and instead have a siege that (as Jorb put it) looks more like a siege, has people actively defending it, and you have angered not just 1 small group of semi-afk players but also the surrounding area.

But I also think that what Jorb envisioned 10 years ago is not going to work anymore with the community the game has created and with the design of the game in place. I'd love to larp and swear fealty to some larper realm ruler that wants to keep out bandits and have a realm of order or whatever. Or maybe there's some realm that is just a bunch of bandits, that'd be fun too. But there's really no reason to and with the way the game works, I'd probably be better off worrying about the quality of my own trees rather than forming these alliances.

I think there is probably some nice middle ground between the hardcore PVP "everything must be destroyable" group and the people who want to play farmville with survival elements. I think it is probably even achievable if you just use the systems that currently exist, form alliances, take revenge for misdeeds, talk to people in game, whatever. That way Jorb's vision might even become reality. Or maybe I have it all wrong, it's been a long time since I last played, but I do think diplomacy was a bit more prevalent then. Granted it also seems to be that we are at the end of the world, so I am not sure what diplomacy there is left to do.

[Dawidio123]

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Small scale conflicts should happen without outside intervention because it kills the fun for the little guys. You will never get to experience siege/pvp with other equal groups because the more desperate one group gets the more ppl it can pay off/suck off (as in persuade, in minecraft) to get to help them. Siege and pvp in small scale conflicts with your neighbours should be something encouraged and it should be a hassle for outsiders to help them (which mechanically I don't think is very implementable but oh well). Like people wonder why no new people get into pvp, the moment a new person tries to get into "pvp elements" and beats the living hell out of their neighbour some bored big boy will come and fuck on them for even daring to have fun. The systems shouldn't encourage everyone to bitch up and swear fealty so they don't get obliterated, and neither should they force the big boys to interact with the hermits, have you ever interacted with hermits? it's not good. Those people play by themselves for a reason.
Kingdoms and thingwalls on the other hand should be reworked from ground up to even be a remotely decent system, right now they only serve to make a realm chat (global chat should be a thing btw, but we got discord so nbd) and as an xp battery. (Other than being an excuse for a fight same as a meteorite ig) Timers are all kinds of messed up, the whole thingwall challenge and thingwall peace are also not very well implemented, and you can still build stupid palisades around the thingwalls that makes challenging them a hell on earth.

Also, on further thought, i think you are overcomplicating what jorb said. What he wants is is what happens now is that people from different villages need to have an actual informal understanding if they want to ally or they just go to war without an official declaration/statement, instead of two villages sending each other alliance/war declarations and thus being in a formal alliance/war that affects the game mechanics wise and could be meta-gamed and exploited. Comparing to other games, what he wants is sea of thieves types of alliances instead of map game alliances.

[nachtmaerie]

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I think in large lines I agree. I am a ''small player'' mostly because I could not find a suitable group to join, so I was sort of forced into playing by myself -- I've interacted with plenty players and I do think it's been ''good''. But this is a game that at it's core is about paranoia - paranoia that people will steal your things, take your house, destroy your kiln, ruin your LP and maybe they'll steal your cattle too. If you're lucky they won't fuck your wife (in minecraft). Whether that is true or not is irrelevant; this is the presiding feeling that many (newer) players probably have about this game. The reason interactions with hermits are probably mostly bad is because death is punishing, engaging with systems like PvP is punishing (for reasons you explained), and people prefer to kill the cow in this game than milk it because the cow is useless, it's milk is low Q, and waiting for the Q to go up takes forever and isn't faster than just making your own milk better (well that analogy kinda sucks, but I am sure some people on this forum love milking themselves).

That said, I was merely translating what I believe Jorb was saying there, not necessarily that this would be a good idea. I think likely the game as it exists now doesn't work with the way I'd described it/how I interpreted Jorb's idea. And there is no way to enforce that a) if you're a small guy, your victim(s) will not call for help from a person that has 24h to play every day while you can maybe fit in 4-8h once you're done working and b) that conflict, realms, and politics play out organically in the game and not through discord. Personalities clash and they should, but it would be much cooler if they clashed in game rather than because you used naughty words while playing a different game on Discord.

I think also that the discussion is focused on the wrong thing -- I am a new 'returning' player from 9 years ago. It wasn't siege back then that made me stop playing/returning to play and I don't live in fear of siege now. To me siege is just the vessel for which people argue about the real issue, which is the attitude towards other people in this game. But to argue about that is a dead horse - both sides think they are playing the game the right way and in a way they are. There is a reason the argument keeps coming back to the same thing: I should be able to be completely safe vs. I should be able to siege anything and anyone. That is not about siege, that is about safety and attitude towards the game. And that is also how I interpret Jorb's ideas: it's not really about siege, his ideas were about making siege fun, aesthetically pleasing and a process, which imho makes the process of sieging more fun for both sides, not just 1 side or the other.

I actually spent some time reading the Moot about some of the sieges and I think there is a lot of storycrafting going on there that likely also fits the bill for what Jorb was describing, even if the mechanics don't support it (it taking 100+ hours to siege 1 village but in a monotone, busywork kind of way, and not a procedural kind of way, is kind of antithetical to Jorbs previous ideas and, frankly, show to me that they decided those ideas were probably not worth pursuing). Streets being blocked off/not safe, people being given passage in exchange for tribute, things like that are part of the aesthetically pleasing siege that is also fun for both sides (probably). And it's different than 10 murderhobo's breaking into your house to destroy your kiln fuck your wife mess up your life etc. So clearly it is possible.

Keyword probably is 'organic' - but HnH seems so inorganic now and predetermined that I am not sure that that is possible. Either way, still a fun game, I think.

[Crest]

Siege and pvp in small scale conflicts with your neighbours should be something encouraged and it should be a hassle for outsiders to help them (which mechanically I don't think is very implementable but oh well). Like people wonder why no new people get into pvp, the moment a new person tries to get into "pvp elements" and beats the living hell out of their neighbour some bored big boy will come and fuck on them for even daring to have fun.

Holy shit I've wanted some system that promotes this for the longest time now. So long that I basically erased the idea of it ever happening because it felt like a pipe dream.
The majority of the time that I've had engaging in conflict with neighboring villages/hermits only for them to message some of the more advanced villages on discord, paying them off to try ambush me is unreal.
I'm still skeptical that a system can be implemented that prevents this but it's neat that they're thinking about doing something about it at least. I'd love to be able to have skirmishes and a back and forth conflict between myself and others without needing to be constantly keeping the bigger more advanced villages intervening in mind just because the bitch-made neighbour messages them and begs for help like a victim (and those players they're messaging usually oblige because they're bored as shit themselves and just want to jump into any form of pvp).

I'm completely in favor of this new approach.

[animary]

"....pleasing siege that is also fun for both sides...."

I would never find a siege fun, even if I'd done something to warrant it (but at least in that case I would understand it). I do not object to PvP as such, it is the core of probably 90% of online games, but I take exception to the random unprovoked violence endorsed by this game (why bother having hunting and fishing and farming, just drop everyone, naked, into the game with full combat stats, they search for armor and weapons scattered around the landscape and start attacking each other; last person standing wins).
Take your family for a day at the beach, spend hours building a beautifully detailed sandcastle; now some guy walks by, kicks it down, and walks off laughing. That is what PvP in Haven is like.
The active PvP players are so skilled and equipped it is futile for an average player to attempt to fight back. I would just sit down and "go ahead and get it over with".

And why is it a negative concept when someone getting sieged calls on more powerful players for assistance? If someone is breaking into your home you don't send your ten year old son to investigate, you call the police.


"Those people play by themselves for a reason."
A main reason being most villages are abandoned four or five months into a world (then hermits prosper by looting the remains). Several people start a village and usually specialize to divide the work - hunters, miners, farmers, etc. Then, a couple of months in, one tires of the game and quits; those remaining either look for a replacement or must pick up the slack themselves; another month and someone else quits. Eventually only a couple remain, they cannot maintain the village by themselves so quit or go to other villages. It's rare to find people who want to go the distance. Rather than continually get involved in this I prefer to play solo. But I readily admit the most fun I've had in haven was when I met someone similar and we built villages in two consecutive worlds (then they wanted to return to solo play, otherwise I'd gladly still be building villages with them).

[SnuggleSnail]

animary you don't need to worry I promise nobody is ever sieging your ass as long as your in game village doesn't get tied to your forum account

[Halbertz]

10 advices from Paladin Lothar to devs:

• Read the feedback. Don't do anything about it.
• Implement things that you like.
• Make patches fast, not slow.
• Find good life work balance.
• Avoid reading dms from whiny bitches.
• Cook everyone for 2 weeks for mentioning the words "siege" or "pvp".
• Flex that OCO is ready in 2 weeks if someone ask about it.
• Avoid passing by Husby, Tensta or Rinkeby at night
• Be citizen.
• Later.

[Dawidio123]

>The active PvP players are so skilled and equipped it is futile for an average player to attempt to fight back. I would just sit down and "go ahead and get it over with".
>And why is it a negative concept when someone getting sieged calls on more powerful players for assistance? If someone is breaking into your home you don't send your ten year old son to investigate, you call the police.

???
You just answered yourself. How is it good that if two average players go into a pissing contest the one who pays off a bigger group (usually with tokens bought directly from the store) gets to win automatically, i'd argue it's p2w if not for haven whole trade being about tokens and rmt and everything else having barely any value to the big groups. Like we aren't talking about, oh no someone breaks into my house let's call the police. We are talking about, ohno i had a fight at a bar and lost, i better pay the mob to dispose of the other guy.

If people don't get to engage with the systems because they get fucked every time they do so, they are encouraged to avoid those systems and hence never learn and get the "The active PvP players are so skilled and equipped it is futile for an average player to attempt to fight back" mentality against anyone in hussar wings. Not everyone who attacks you/sieges you is the top big boy pvper with 10k stats, sometimes it's just a snail alt standing afk next to a ram.

[joojoo1975]

On another note. Ever since the patch, I have not "caught" anything from the sea other than fish and whatnot. I used to get a lot of "trash" (seeds, gear, resources) but now I only get fish and fish related curios. Did the Patch change this?

Fishing Trash
When something is dropped in a body of water, it is added to a global pool of items that can be fished up anywhere in the world or found buried on the beach. Some people use this feature for charity by throwing their old equipment in the river. You can also drop a written parchment to send a message to a random fisherman as if it were a message in a bottle.

[The_Blode]

On another note. Ever since the patch, I have not "caught" anything from the sea other than fish and whatnot. I used to get a lot of "trash" (seeds, gear, resources) but now I only get fish and fish related curios. Did the Patch change this?

Fishing Trash
When something is dropped in a body of water, it is added to a global pool of items that can be fished up anywhere in the world or found buried on the beach. Some people use this feature for charity by throwing their old equipment in the river. You can also drop a written parchment to send a message to a random fisherman as if it were a message in a bottle.

at this stage of the world there's probably a lot more people fishing than throwing stuff into the water