Outfit Rivalry Discussion

[Neurotoxin]

Greetings PSU Community!

A couple days ago, we had a great conversation going on Twitter regarding Outfit Rivalry. A lot of great ideas came out of it, and Matt Higby was jotting them down, but I feel like we can expand on the subject even further.

Outfit Rivalry is a way for outfits to declare sworn enemies and arch-rivals, and have it mean something within the context of gameplay aside from selectively targeting those rivals. There are a few different elements to it, which I think we can explore and expand upon. Rivalry Formation, Number of Rivalries, Objectives, Effects on Gameplay, and Rewards are different subjects that we can look at and explore.

Below are questions for each of the different elements of Outfit Rivalry, along with some possible solutions. Please reply with more solutions, discussions about current solutions, any any other questions that should be asked.



A) Rivalry Formation - How does the rivalry Begin?

- Outfits select other outfits and "Declare War" on them, either indefinitely or for a specified period of time.

- Outfits that constantly battle each other build up "rivalry" points. When an outfit is over 100 or 250 or 1000 Rivalry Points with another outfit, they may be chosen as a rival.

- Outfits are automatically assigned a rival based on the amount of combat and interaction they have with another outfit, or based on outfit size and activity.

- Outfits declare that they are "accepting new rivals" and will be matched against another outfit that is also declared as accepting new rivals.

- Individual members within an outfit put in bids towards rivalry with another outfit. The outfit with the most bids against it is the rival.

- Triumvirate Rivalry - One outfit from all 3 empires fight each other for a sustained hour or longer, and are declared rivals for the next 24 hours. If at least 4 hours of rival combat go on during that day, it extends to a week. If 20 hours of rival combat occur during that week, it gets extended to a month. If 100 hours of rival combat are engaged during that month, they become permanent rivalries.



B) Number of rivalries - How many is too many?

- Limit rivalries based on Outfit Level (if applicable), allowing an equal amount of rivalries from both factions.

- Limit rivalries based on Outfit Certifications (if applicable) so getting the bonus of more rivalries comes after cert points have been spent on allowing rivalries.

- Limit rivalries based on Outfit longevity. After1 month, they may have 1 rivalry per faction. After 3 months, this opens up to 2. After 6 months, they get 3 rivalries per faction. After a year, 4. Every 6 months opens up another spot on the list for rivalries.

- Limit rivalries based on in-game interaction. This could be similar to the Triumvirate Rivalry listed above, and happens automatically when outfits clash for a long time.

- Limit rivalries based on voting. Outfits may or may not have a limit, just that they need a majority vote from the members.

- No limit - have as many rivalries as you want, but it provides no bonuses and is purely a system for bragging rights.



C) Rivalry Objectives - We have rivals, and now what?

- Track and defeat the rival outfit at every opportunity.

- When the rival outfit has a mission, disrupt it, foil it however you can.

- Contest a heated area, or even a mostly-cold area, where rivals are battling.

- Specifically try to break down the opposing faction by crippling the efforts of the rival outfit.

- Outperform rivals on the battlefield, show them up in battle and on the leaderboards

- Defend your faction's gains by repelling the enemy outfit, and focus on driving the enemy out of owned hexes.

- Take over bases being held by rivals.



D) Effects on Gameplay - How does the rivalry support combat?

- Spotting priority - rivals will have a higher spotting priority than other soldiers, making their nametags the most apparent and pulling them to the front where there is overlapping.

- Rival action indicators - When a rival outfit is on the move, working on holding a specific base, etc, and friendlies detect it, a blip appears on the minimap to indicate rival presence.

- Cross-rival missions - When missions are assigned or generated, both sides of a rivalry are notified. Outfit A is set to take Tower X, and Outfit B goes to defend Tower X. Of rivalries are 3-way, Outfit C will get a mission to "Disrupt Outfits A and B at Tower X"

- Nametag indicators - Nametags will glow specially, have an outline around them, display the rival outfit's logo (or a generic "Rival Outfit" logo), or some other way to indicate rivals over regular enemies.

- Respawn Options - Spawn Near Rival Activity could be added. This would allow combatants to respawn by pod-dropping right into the action, or respawning at a nearby friendly-owned facility.



Rivalry Rewards - What are the benefits?

- Rival Kill Bonus - Defeating rivals, and / or destroying their vehicles, gets a slight bonus to experience or resources accumulated.

- Overcome / Disrupt Rival Activity - Being able to drive an outfit out of a hex or a hot battle area, or taking over a facility they hold, will give extra bonuses. As well, being entrenched in an area and resisting a rival's attempts to take over the area will give extra bonuses.

- Complete Rivalry Mission - Upon completing a Rivalry mission that was assigned or generated, winning participants get an additional bonus.

- Taunt-On-Camera - If you complete a successful taunt within the Kill Cam viewing radius of a fallen rival, it gives one "Style" point. After 100, 250, and 1000 of these, a special beret is granted to the player.

- Rivalry Store - Rivalry activity produces Rival Points. Those could be used for various things that the outfit may otherwise be able to purchase with SC or Auraxium, or give access to exclusive items that cannot be bought with SC or Auraxium. These could be special camo items, custom logo placement settings, or Rivalry-specific items (rivalry experience boosters?)



Please reply with additional questions, options, comments, concerns, feedback, etc. I'm looking forward to what we explore and come up with regarding Outfit Rivalries!


*Note - this would have gone in the ideas section, but after the twitter / live stream discussion about rivalries, it seems like it is reasonable to expect that Outfit Rivalries won't be an "if" but instead a "when" for PS2

[Kilmoran]

Gamifying... a natural occurance based on things that occur without the aid of a system, I believe, is unnecessary.

[captainkapautz]

Originally Posted by Kilmoran

Gamifying... a natural occurance based on things that occur without the aid of a system, I believe, is unnecessary.

I agree with that.

I also think that this system could be used for the exact opposite if it gave rewards, i.e. 2 outfits each other rivals just to get the xp-bonus.

[Logri]

I'm not quite sure how I feel about this.

Doesn't this system invite the opportunity of griefing?
It's an extra factor that you have to be aware of and what about casual outfits?

/Yoda Meditate on this I must.
Very interesting idea and topic, I'm looking forward to reading the various replies.

[Senyu]

While I enjoy the idea of clan hates/rivals toward each other, I don't want it to get much as outfits sacrificing their support to the empire/mission to attack their rival outfit at a middle-of-fing-no-where base. As long as it doesn't compromise the general game flow but can add instead, I'm all for it.

In this scenario of how it could work, a base is taken with the majority or good chunk of players that belong to Outfit A. Outfit B on a different faction and within the local area are alerted that Outfit A took the base. Outfit B remembers that Outfit A is consistent in beating the tar out of them. Naturally anytime Outfit A appears as victor of an objective Outfit B gets PO'd and redoubles the effort.

Onto showing who did what, when caping a base say 3 Outfits are in participation. Outfit 1, 2, and 3 respectively. In the total force of 100 players taking the base, 60 players belong to Outfit 1, 30 players belong to Outfit 2, and 10 players belong to Outfit 3. All will recieve recognition of of taking the base. And based of each Outfits achievments they will be recognised and perhaps awarded appropietly. Perhaps the large Outfit 1 did the majority of the kills while Outfit 3 being the smallest where the ones who took all the capture points. Outfit 1 and 3 will receive the most recognition while Outfit 2 does not. Normally Outfit 2 would receive more since they have more players thus a greater chance of helping the take over but Outfit 3 was more skilled and did the objectives.

Now all 3 are recognized for helping the base take over, enemies factions can see with a quick mouseover on the base on their main map, can see the 3 logos and names of the participating outfits that took the base. The more bases have your logo and name for take over, the more bragging rights you have. This is a rough sketch of how I imagine for this to work.

[captainkapautz]

I have to say I still don't see the point.

I mean if I really don't like an outfit then I won't really need an incentive to want to fuck their shit up.

[Neurotoxin]

Originally Posted by captainkapautz

I have to say I still don't see the point.

I mean if I really don't like an outfit then I won't really need an incentive to want to fuck their shit up.

But what about a method to locate them more rapidly, in order to do this?

[captainkapautz]

Originally Posted by Neurotoxin

But what about a method to locate them more rapidly, in order to do this?

Let me just say I am not saying it can't work, I just thing it's more fun, for lack of a better word, to have this play out naturally without having the game "help" you.

I.e. "OMG LOOK ITS [LULZWEPOONNOOBZRAWR] LETS GET EM!" during a fight, than "So where is [LULZWEPOONNOOBZRAWR] at today, so we can roflstomp them." and then head to where ever the rival is at.

Edit: And I highly dislike the ability to actually track the whereabouts of enemy outfits, that just leads to easier griefing, i.e. big outfit hunting a small outfit to "extinction".
Have seen that happen before in other games.

[Logri]

Originally Posted by captainkapautz

Let me just say I am not saying it can't work, I just thing it's more fun, for lack of a better word, to have this play out naturally without having the game "help" you.

I.e. "OMG LOOK ITS [LULZWEPOONNOOBZRAWR] LETS GET EM!" during a fight, than "So where is [LULZWEPOONNOOBZRAWR] at today, so we can roflstomp them." and then head to where ever the rival is at.

I wouldn't like running into the same group of people everywhere I went, I die way too easily and would be excellent farm bait tbh.

[Dart]

Erm, giving two rival spec ops Outfits the ability to know where each other was would effectively nullify both of their playstyles!

Unnecessary and potentially damaging idea.

[Ratstomper]

Originally Posted by captainkapautz

I have to say I still don't see the point.

I mean if I really don't like an outfit then I won't really need an incentive to want to fuck their shit up.

I'm more interested in a system to better mobilize to an area where a rival outfit is, although having some slight XP bonuses for fighting rivals outfits does sound cool.

EDIT: What if instead of declaring a rival, the system automatically assigned rival outfits when two outfits fight frequently enough?

[Logri]

Would this system also somewhat limit a player in joining an outfit.
Still not sure how big of an impact a system like this would have, but some people might not be interested in having an extra bullseye on their back.

So, when joining an outfit the question: are you into rivalries, would become important.

[captainkapautz]

I mean it's not a bad idea per say, it would just need to be very, VERY carefully balanced, because otherwise it could, and probably would, go horribly wrong.

[Neurotoxin]

Well... that's why we're here. Let us discuss what we WOULD want in an Outfit Rivalry system!!

[Pella]

What a terrible idea. So much effort into something that will restrict the actual flow of game play. OP is obviously trying to reinvent the wheel here.

What next? zombie mode.....