A Poor Recipe: Control Points, Shardfalls, and Player Towns

Q8: Why aren't we talking about the ransom system being more dynamic based on risk?

I think we are not talking about the ransom system because its all kind of boring frankly. It needs some real zing beyond the ideas I have heard so far for it to become interesting or compelling as a game play mechanic.

 

How would you balance that so it doesn't affect those not flagged for pvp?

 

Q10: What happens when two player towns have a disagreement about trade or they just don't like each other?

Oh, oh!! How about this. If one player town doesn't like another, they have the right to declare a town war, attack the town, and ... if they win... claim the town for their own!!! Well, at least the hex scene (and force the other town to move). That would be strategic...and dramatic. Maybe not so good an idea.

 

I agree, I think that is right. It is simply the individual thrill of being able to spar. After awhile, PVE becomes predictable. PVP is always somewhat unpredictable. Therein lies the secret. To me that is what real PVP players are about. The looting thing is just a bonus feature.

 

Relating to towns as a choke point to funnel players through - for non-PVP i guess that makes sense. The balance would be in who gets those hexes on the map. They would be very valuable for traders to be in. Perhaps this is a special fund raising idea for the dev team!

 

I don't really want to debate this and I chose the words incorrectly, maybe a few times. But... I just want as much player driven story lines as possible. In my perfect game, you go to a player run festival to play games,watch jousting, and the kobolds(mob) might attack. Heck they've hit up the festival 2 of the past 5 years! The draw of all that gold in one place is just too tempting.

Anyway, we both get what we want, which is what my first post was about. And if there is a story line(I enjoyed the Utlimas), Richard Garriott and Tracy Hickman are the guys to do it. It will probably be awesome. Story line, no story line, its just a philosophical debate.

 

Ok, I'll take a stab at this...

Just nitpicking but we should distinguish between Player-Owned-Towns and Player-Towns.

Hmm, I'd say that's an assumption. There may be shardfalls that are not PvP and are PvE only. Or even a hybrid, where they are dynamic and become PvP on triggers, events or whenever the Devs feel like flipping that switch.

This is where they need to make PvP meaningful. Does it exist in this world just to satiate our blood thirst? Will performing the mere act of PvP affect our character in any other way? Will hosting a PvP-enabled POT enable certain black market NPC services in your town? We should continue to prod the devs on this area. Aside from that, enabling PvP in a POT currently only serves for play styles / RP purposes because its unclear the relation between a POT and a guild castle that can be defended via the $2M stretch goal.

The location of a POT could have an effect on the economy of the town. We know this game is all about location, location, location. There will be certain resources that grow / can only be obtained regionally. With CPs, the location of the POT has direct affect on availabilty of resources and to a certain extent, the establishment of trade routes and trade centers. Aside from that, I proposed in another thread that we allow POTs to have certain kinds of harvestable resources -- but the players need to provide that resource. But that's just wishful thinking at this point.

The ignore is most likely only going to be a chat squelch in terms of direct affect. Indirectly, it may be used in the selective multiplayer logic but that's unconfirmed. And selective multiplayer doesn't work like the "phasing" you're talking about. If there's only one instance of a scene and that scene has not yet reached its player cap, you're going to enter that instance, regardless of your selective multiplayer logic. The logic only kicks in when there are multiple instances of a scene and it needs to decide which one to place you in. So if there's only one instance of the scene, and you enter it, you're going to have that ignored player in your instance. They're likely going to be just simply squelched.

That's exactly the reason for going Open PvP though. It's what the hordes of classic UO fans want to feel and dare I say, demands everyone else to feel . I wouldn't say it's a sucker's bet. It's merely a playstyle that you've opted in to and face the consequences of going /afk in a PvP-only scene

Very likely not in terms of non-POT hexes. But potentially, you can sort of be like a CP (but not really) if they allowed two things: scene to scene travel between other POTs, and a POT can flag itself as not being accessible from the overland map. In this way, a group of POTs can be chained together to restrict the flow of travel between those POTs. The POT could become a true CP if they implemented siege mechanics (like for guild warfare) into the POT that locked down entry/exit points.

Yes, in the sense that resources are regional and there are CPs dotted throughout the map. The enterprising POT owner will know where to place his POT for that specific resource he's l0oking to "control".

The only things they've talked about are cooldowns and the inability to drop down to FPO.

Very good point and one I support. I think Open PvP incurs much more risk than simply going into PvP-only zones. The ransom mechanic can adjust for level of risk, but I haven't seen them talk about that. I'd suggest a new thread on this to get their attention.

You will only see your party members on the overland map. I don't believe they've said they'll go beyond that filter, like all guild members for example. Or even if we'll see "special" NPCs like the devs.

Good question about being stealth on the map, but I highly doubt it. The amount of interactivity or control on the overland map will be very restricted. You basically travel on it and that's it. Any interaction will need to take place in a scene. So if there are random encounters, you get pulled into a scene.

POT attack/defense scenarios have been talked about as that is kind of essential to guild warfare. It's unclear how they plan to implement the castle defense scenarios that we got from the $2M stretch goal, and it's unclear if that meant a special type of structure or special type of town that is separate from POTs.

 

I'm not going to attempt to answer all the questions, as there's just too little information we have to be able to do so fairly; but on the general issue, I would really dislike seeing any usefulness in standard game play applied to player towns at all. Why? Because whilst you can question whether the Ignore option allows people to avoid PvP mechanics by potential visitors to Player Owned Towns, the opposite is also true, but with the added negative of being based on real world personal wealth; if you can afford to own a town, you are claiming the right to be able to dictate PvM elements (fishing, resource harvesting) as well as PvP ones above and beyond the player.

Let me be personal here a second; I've donated up to Ancestor level, $275. And that puts me into a pretty small percentage of dedication amongst supporters; yet a player town is hopelessly beyond even my own commitment level. The idea that there are game play mechanics I simply can't afford is disturbing to me, so imagine what it's like for people still on the fence about buying the basic game ahead of time.

Now, declaring your home a PvP arena is the same as declaring a Town as a PvP arena it's true; whilst there will be some discomfort in the idea that you can't actually get something town sized through game mechanics, it's at least the same principle as a home, it's just a larger home. But asking for player towns to be chokepoints on the physical map, or have the right to ban people from it but at the same time gain boosted fishing or other PvP zone advantage is violating that principle. You're no longer a private home but part of the game world and have a responsibility to the wider health of the game too.

So, if you're going to declare a PvP town and expect PvP boosted resources, people have to be able to enter at least an instance of your town. Maybe not your personal one, because you have them Ignored, so you'll never see them. But they can still enter a copy of it.

Likewise, if there's to be some form of Town Vs Town mechanic, which I wouldn't be opposed too, there can be no Owner control once their town is declared part of it. Let's say Bobtown wants to fight Fredtown. Upon entering their town you see a gump pop up that says "Art thou invading or defending Fredtown?" The game tracks how many attackers and defenders are killed across both towns. But absolutely anyone should be able to come in and pick sides, whether they own a town or not. And there should be let's say a 2 week period before the Owner can remove his town from the conflict; they're basically acting as Guild leaders choosing to play in a wider system whose rules are set from above to ensure fairness. Even then you'd have advantages; the Owner knows before hand which buildings are set to Public and which Private say... assuming there isn't to be a control point in a town, in which case the owner shouldn't be able to even choose where that is: There can't be any advantages that a sufficiently organised group can't claw back; the Freddies could just hunker down in Fredtown instead and wait for you to come to them and the city they know better instead, say. Meanwhile anyone not wanting to take part, or in PvP at all whilst the fight goes on, just pass both towns without hindrance.

I don't mind seeing some small benefits to town ownership; maybe the owner can be given a Notice Board which lists to them all the people killed and who by in their city recently, and they as "mayor" can post up roleplay rewards for turning in killers (or cheering them on!)... as long as the owners of other homes at least get some form of Notice board too for general advertising of their trades etc. But what ever the systems, they have to be both optional and equal. Opt in or out should be the only choice a player owned town has, and once made it's accessible to everyone.