Inter-Continental vs Alerts

[NewSith]

Here's some food for thought and a room to be an oldfag for a bit:

The two don't really mix well. Coming from a PS1 veteran with a sad memory of Capitol Defenses happening during good fights. What do you think?

[Dougnifico]

Ya. With intercontinental lattice, the alerts need to die. They were a good stop gap, but now the real game can begin.

[bpostal]

Ya. With intercontinental lattice, the alerts need to die. They were a good stop gap, but now the real game can begin.

Yep. This should help funnel players during the off hours as well to ensure that everybody's getting a chance at a fight, so no reason for the alert system.

[Root Hade]

Yeah alerts were just a bandaid fix against all the meta-game complaints.

I think they could stay if devs remove the automation and give control over to outfits/commanders somehow. Just to direct the zerg a bit. Only really useful with way more conts though.

[Eggy]

The alerts only happen when the pop is low enough to trigger them.
They work great.
It would be sensible to just include more conditions into the triggers so that capped/locked conts, overall teritory and lock time factor into the automation trigger process.

Theres allready going to need to be some auto unlocking of conts in order to prevent people from running out of places to spawn.
Theres no reason why at "low pop time" a locked cont couldnt be auto flipped and become a cap target for an alert.

Even at high pop alerts could be used as a driving force. With a large pop disadvantge on a cont, an empire specific alert could be used to entice people to fight rather than logging off.

[Carbon Copied]

I don't see the alerts themselves going; just what the alert objective is changing. Are they needed? Not really; but if they take a more subtle integrated form then it's not going to be the biggest bugbear in the game come continental lattice time I'm sure.

[GeoGnome]

I don't see the alerts themselves going; just what the alert objective is changing. Are they needed? Not really; but if they take a more subtle integrated form then it's not going to be the biggest bugbear in the game come continental lattice time I'm sure.

I kind of go with everyone above, The alerts are obsolete the moment the continental lattice hits, because at that point you are in a 24 hour alert, and it's goal is: "World Domination"

Making the facilities be some kind of strategic objective, that also means that the alerts for facility ownership becomes useless, because it just makes sense to secure those places to help your advance.

Alerts added in, after we have some kind of clear objective, takes away from what the game should be about

[Ruffdog]

When intercontinental begins:

Out with Alerts
In with Command Rank 5 and mission system

[Rahabib]

I think most of us agree that alerts are broken,

I would like to see alerts scaled back to small objectives (like take one specific biolab for fewer xp). It should be a side objective, not THE objective.

[ringring]

They've got to go but expect lots of complaints from folk who miss the 'sugar rush' of free xp at the conclusion of one.

Maybe a bit of thought is warranted on how to mitigate that?

[GeoGnome]

They've got to go but expect lots of complaints from folk who miss the 'sugar rush' of free xp at the conclusion of one.

Maybe a bit of thought is warranted on how to mitigate that?

Well that is the mission system. Another means of doing it, is to grant XP for continent capture or mass facility capture.

So if you take all the biolabs on a continent, or all the biolabs in the world, there is a built in XP reward for your faction.

I mean, the basic IDEA of alerts, where you are paying out XP for accomplishments could be integrated back in, as built in tiered rewards that your faction unlocks... that might even help to push people down lane even more, because then there is that clear payout for taking all of X from the other 2 factions. The only thing that needs be removed (Because it just doesn't make sense anymore after the timeless 24 hour a day world wide war is factored in) is the timed portion of it. That will be taken care of with the mission system.

[Climhazzard]

Theres no reason why at "low pop time" a locked cont couldnt be auto flipped and become a cap target for an alert.

No reason... Other than it completely undermining the entire point of locking a continent.

I would like to see alerts scaled back to small objectives (like take one specific biolab for fewer xp). It should be a side objective, not THE objective.

I'm not sure how that would work, considering one faction must already own the facility.

I guess you could make it a faction-specific Alert. Say, the TR get "orders" to take a Tech Plant currently owned by the NC. But you'd have to notify the NC, too, so that they can either deny the TR any reward for capturing the target, or receive a reward for defending it.

In order to not leave out an entire faction, though, you should probably have at least one "attack" Alert going for each faction. That means each empire would have one particular facility they're charged with capturing and one that they'd need to defend. This could present problems if two factions get an Alert to take two different facilities owned by the third faction, essentially creating a double-team. To correct that, you'd have to give a faction one of these alerts for each of the other factions; that's two facilities each empire would be charged with attacking and two that they'd need to defend.

But then these types of Alerts could be either extremely difficult or relatively easy depending on how deep in the enemy territory the facility actually is.

It also comes off as an AI-controlled mission system which may or may not go over well with the community. I don't see much love for the facility type-specific Alerts as they are now.

So if you take all the biolabs on a continent, or all the biolabs in the world, there is a built in XP reward for your faction.

That could be interesting. It could be "passive"; something that's always in effect, in a sense. Any time an empire captures all [Bio Labs|Amp Stations|Tech Plants|Interlink Facilities] on the continent, they get some extra reward (nothing huge). Capturing all of them in the world would grant a larger reward.

A reward could also be granted for breaking another faction's hold on these facilities.

I think you'd have to implement some kind of "cooldown", though, to prevent situations where, intentionally or unintentionally, two factions go back and forth (capture, break, capture, break, etc), raking in the rewards.

[KesTro]

I don't see a reason for alerts to go away entirely. But once they get the intercontinetal lattice in they definitely need to be toned down even more.

Now how to include every faction in those alerts I don't know.

[ringring]

I don't see a reason for alerts to go away entirely. But once they get the intercontinetal lattice in they definitely need to be toned down even more.

Now how to include every faction in those alerts I don't know.

Well......

based on ps1 experience, we had the inter-continental game and that's what people were concentrating on and also what motivated people. We had CR5's to discuss and decide on strategy.

Very occasionally brewko would start an event and nearly everyone hated it because it disrupted and was a distraction to the basic game. (I say everyone, obviously if you disagree I meant me and one other bloke).

So, in PS2, if after we get inter-continental gameplay the event doesn't annoy in a similar way it indicates to me that the inter-continental game isn't working right.

[Rahabib]

...
I'm not sure how that would work, considering one faction must already own the facility.

I guess you could make it a faction-specific Alert. Say, the TR get "orders" to take a Tech Plant currently owned by the NC. But you'd have to notify the NC, too, so that they can either deny the TR any reward for capturing the target, or receive a reward for defending it....
I know what you are saying, and I agree, that particular example I gave is a bad one. I think faction specific ones would be ok as long as you can see all the other factions alerts to stop them.

More appropriately, make it so that the player generated missions replace the alert system for faction specific alerts. For instance, if a biolab is needed (not sure why one territory would mean more than another, territory still wont really mean much other than just more territory), platoon leaders can use their "bounty" points to specify areas they want the zerg to go. The more platoon leaders place points on one area, the more xp for that spot. Platoon leaders are given points based on territory caps and defenses or something. I know its not a perfect system its just one that came to the top of my head.

The point is, alerts need to be smaller objectives not massive objectives that take the entire focus.

[GeoGnome]

I think you'd have to implement some kind of "cooldown", though, to prevent situations where, intentionally or unintentionally, two factions go back and forth (capture, break, capture, break, etc), raking in the rewards.

I disagree, not because I disagree with what your saying though.

Let me explain: Lets say the reward was for flipping 3 amp stations. There are 3 on indar, one in the SE quadrant of the NW quadrant, one in the NW quadrant of the SE quadrant, and one in the SE quadrant of the SW quadrant.

This kind of heavily favors the W side of indar, with the holder of the northern or SW warpgate being favored in terms of Amp station holding. The SE amp station sits at a very defensible position, and is kind of the bastion you have to go through, to gain access to the majority of the SE portion of the map.

So lets say someone has lost all 3, starting from the SW warpgate with no territory. Using base capture times of 5 minutes for small bases, 7 minutes for large bases, and 7 minutes for facilities (I think that was what they were going to change it to), assuming the caps aren't delayed it'll take 22 minutes to take Peris. Assuming there is an equally as strong push to the north starting at the same time as the Peris push, 1 hour to take Dahaka. Now the shortest route to Zurvan is from Dahaka, through the middle of the map, and it'll take an additional 34 minutes. So 1 warpgated person, from the SW warpgate will take 1 hour 34 minutes to take all 3 amp stations with no resistance slowing the advance.

Now from there lets say at that point The opposing faction immediately starts pushing them back at Zurvan, and at Dahaka. They take both of those base simultaneously and then take the quickest route (Bypassing all other facilities and only taking territory) to Peris... it'll take 1 hour.

In theory both sides could seesaw at that point, Taking around an hour to flip all 3 bases over and over... but have you ever, seen anything go that smoothly IG? Or have you ever seen the front in the lattice advance down a central lane, in a straight line, without any of the adjacent junctions causing a tech lining, or stalling things out?

I see what your saying, as I said, but it seems unnecessary, when we're talking about such a specific series of events going off without a hitch, repeatedly. And organizing something on that scale would be next to impossible. You can barely organize 1 faction on any of the servers to resist the siren's call of a biofarm, you think you'd get through ONE iteration of the above, before 3/4 of everyone went to just go fight at Allatum?

[Climhazzard]

In theory both sides could seesaw at that point, Taking around an hour to flip all 3 bases over and over... but have you ever, seen anything go that smoothly IG? Or have you ever seen the front in the lattice advance down a central lane, in a straight line, without any of the adjacent junctions causing a tech lining, or stalling things out?

I wasn't imaging two factions trading control of all three Amp Stations. I agree that scenario would be extremely unlikely to happen, let alone in quick succession.

I was imaging a scenario where, say, the TR take all three Amp Stations on the continent (and being granted the additional reward for doing so). Then, say, the NC break that hold by taking only one of the Amp Stations (and are granted a smaller, but still additional reward for doing so).

At this point, the TR could then take that Amp Station back, which would grant them the reward for capturing all three Amp Stations again.

That single base could trade hands like this, with TR getting the greater reward each time they recapture the base, unless there's some sort of cooldown on the rewards.

I don't think even this is extremely likely to happen—at least not for a long stretches—but it'll be more likely in the future when it'll be more likely to have only two factions on a given continent.

I suppose another solution is that a faction can only be granted the reward for capturing all three Amps Stations once. That is, until another faction captures all three.

[typhaon]

Hopefully, they will be retired.

[Carbon Copied]

Taking into account the planned inter-continental links the only kind of alerts I could see working are LLU / capture the flag style scenarios where you have to retrieve "randomly generated-lore friendly component x" back to your warp gate or nearest friendly held POI. I don't see domination style mechanics working on a micro-scale of the continental lattice it's a minor thing in the global scale of things.

[ringring]

Taking into account the planned inter-continental links the only kind of alerts I could see working are LLU / capture the flag style scenarios where you have to retrieve "randomly generated-lore friendly component x" back to your warp gate or nearest friendly held POI. I don't see domination style mechanics working on a micro-scale of the continental lattice it's a minor thing in the global scale of things.

That's an accurate description of a PS1 event. They weren't liked, especially by the empire that was doing well at that time however the empire losing would probably be the most enthusiastic. Even more so if the event occurred on a continent that wasn't 'home' to them.

[Carbon Copied]

@ringring: Yeah I can see it taking away from the continental aspect in PS1 (I'm neither for nor against the CTF mechanic in alerts) - I do think WITH ps2 that there is greater scope to tailor it fairly and less intrusively to keep the objectives local to the 3 front lines. Whether that'll be the case is anyone's guess.

[hashish]

I think once they sort out and implement the new resource system, its gonna help alot more in terms of player generated mission such as capture a biolab/tech lab.. There should be more incentives..

Also i agree that Alert system serves no purpose when metagame starts to come in properly with the inter-continental warfare :) cant wait

[GeoGnome]

I wasn't imaging two factions trading control of all three Amp Stations. I agree that scenario would be extremely unlikely to happen, let alone in quick succession.

I was imaging a scenario where, say, the TR take all three Amp Stations on the continent (and being granted the additional reward for doing so). Then, say, the NC break that hold by taking only one of the Amp Stations (and are granted a smaller, but still additional reward for doing so).

At this point, the TR could then take that Amp Station back, which would grant them the reward for capturing all three Amp Stations again.

That single base could trade hands like this, with TR getting the greater reward each time they recapture the base, unless there's some sort of cooldown on the rewards.

I don't think even this is extremely likely to happen—at least not for a long stretches—but it'll be more likely in the future when it'll be more likely to have only two factions on a given continent.

I suppose another solution is that a faction can only be granted the reward for capturing all three Amps Stations once. That is, until another faction captures all three.

Ah, I see what your saying now.

With what your talking about, I agree then. Good point. :cheers: