Ideas for the "Rich get richer" problem

[sylphaen]

Originally Posted by Malorn

Any sort of diminishing returns on resources earned does not seem like a good option to me [...]
Rewards should not be diminishing, but difficulty should definitely increase. It should be HARD to hold all of a continent, but it is hard because the mechanics work against you, not because it isn't worth doing.

While I agree that rewards should not be diminishing, I am all for them when it comes to a situation where an empire is being double teamed.

My logic on why this would be fair:
- it's not that difficult to take territory from one empire 2 empires fighting each other or when one empire is not attacking you.
- a situation terribly detrimental to one empire should not be rewarded/promoted.
- for 2 empires double teaming another empire, one empire is getting thoroughly f***ed up. Isn't that enough of a reward already ?

[EVILPIG]

The core of this balance falls on the three Empire model. The more vast their territory becomes the hard it will be to defend. The other empires will want their real estate and will go for it. Not much is needed beyond that.

One thing that I do think that will need to be changed is truncated territory receiving full benefits. If you can cut off an area of their land, they should lose their resources to and from that area.

[NewSith]

Originally Posted by Malorn

GA had different goals from Planetside and different mechanics so I'm not sure how well it will transfer.

In general I dislike anything that discourages conquest or makes land less valuable. The GA system implies there's an optimal configuration and a point at which you don't want to capture any more land.

Any sort of diminishing returns on resources earned does not seem like a good option to me for that reason.

Here are things I don't want to think in PS2:
"well, we could take that territory over there, but the net result would be nothing."

"Hey if we let the VS take that territory over there we'll increase efficiency, so tell the troops to back off and let 'em have it."

"There's nothing more to do on this continent - if we take more territory it won't be worth anything, so lets go to a continent where we can get resources"

Those are all bad and things that are a result of punishing conquest with diminishing returns on the rewards.

Rewards should not be diminishing, but difficulty should definitely increase. It should be HARD to hold all of a continent, but it is hard because the mechanics work against you, not because it isn't worth doing.

I disagree:

1. Playing fields of outfits and the zerg were always different. The zerg motivation is tacticalless fighting on a large scale and M0AR L4ND, basically rape and pillage, while outfits do smaller and more tactical ops. This is a situation where population balances the game. So let outfits play GA to control hexes and control the zerg. Suych control is next to impossible, though, so rich won't get richer.
2. On a note more related to the quote, - I offered two solutions - negative degradation, which you imply, I also reject myself. Neutral degradation, where you never get a hex that produces 0 resources is better.

More points, non-related, alternatives offered:

1. Periodical resource feeds from the empire - if you're zero-based. Basically the oppressed get a chance to successfully attack after every X minutes.
2. Foothold-connected hexes have defences and landscape setup facing the opposite of the warpgate. This way if one is taken through great effort, it already givesa a certain advantage.
3. Flying Fortresses idea
4. No adjacent hex rule, though I'm very against it, but it seems to me that that's the solution devs use currently.
5. Something like you offered alongside with absent vehicle timers, etc.

[EVILPIG]

Originally Posted by Ruwyn

You keep saying things, Malorn, that are leading me to believe that you ONLY gain the resources that your faction would be getting from the continent you are currently ON. As opposed to total from the whole World (3 continents)

If you are receiving benefits to an empire as a whole, I would hope it is only received on the continent that you are on. Resources however, are collected and stored by the outfit, so you can pick up resources on one continent and move to another.

[EVILPIG]

Originally Posted by WildVS

Well now you are talking about a "lattice" type structure again and that certainly helps against double teams if you play it right.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with double teaming, that is the purpose of the 3 empire model. It will happen to all empires and with the resources or benefits, it will be an incentive for the weakest to double team the strongest.

Similar to lattice, yes, I believe that if we are talking about benefits gained from a facility, you should have to be to draw a line through owned territories to share it with other facilities. It is currently not like this.

[sylphaen]

You know what guys ? Sanctuary warpgates should just allow to pull out any kind of gear and vehicle.

That way, if you are double-teamed and zero-based, you do not need resources to come back in the fight.
And during regular game situations, spawning at the sanctuary warpgate would take too long to make it worthwile (along with the risk of interception).

[sylphaen]

Originally Posted by EVILPIG

There is absolutely nothing wrong with double teaming, that is the purpose of the 3 empire model. It will happen to all empires and with the resources or benefits, it will be an incentive for the weakest to double team the strongest.

There could be something very wrong with double teaming:
Imagine TR 48% / NC 48% / VS 4% and linear resource income only from territory controlled.

Congratulations, Planetside effectively became a 2 factions game where the game for the 3rd is to get back into it until the other 2 decide to stop doing a 66% vs. 33%.

Have this happen often and it could get annoying very fast.

Edit: just to be clear. I agree there is nothing wrong about double teaming except for that specific case which was the theme of this thread ("the rich getting richer").

[Grognard]

Originally Posted by Malorn

One of the Reddit questions I had asked was:

How do you plan on addressing the "rich get richer" problem where as an empire gains more territory and resources, they gain more power over the other empires?

Higby's response
...

Perhaps we, the illustrious PSU community, can assist with some ideas to help address this hard problem.

Part of the reason this is a tough problem is because solving it could render motivation to take territory useless. For example, if we had a welfare system it might not motivate people to take territory, or if we penalized large territory ownership it might motivate an empire to not take too much territory in order to optimize resource gain.

So how can we both reward players for conquest while simultaneously handicapping them so it is still possible for the conquered empires to strike back and regain territory?

What do you think could be done to help solve this problem?

No welfare, no math, no reduction in desire to take territory...

My idea is just the history of war... What do underdogs do when they are out of stuff? Steal... destroy... sacrifice... I think the mission system would be perfect for this... I'll illustrate some basic missions that would be used as a proactive way to "adjust the economy" without sacrificing the will to conquer territory...

1. Partisans...
Back hacking in the enemies rear areas allows for a resource gain for each minute the hack is in progress, regardless of success or failure. So, the needy empire always gets something for the effort. It puts a similar drain on the owning empire for each minute also, which simulates supply line interuption abstractly. Resource gain should probably tie into the hack timers to simulate the value of "fresh / untouched" areas which should be considered more productive for having seen less war ravages for longer, as an abstraction... If the hack succeeds, then this territory would produce very little if it is recaptured, due to an implied scorched earth policy of the back hackers efforts. IE... typical partisans...

2. Sabotage...
Missions in the rear of empires that attempt to destroy infrastructure. These could be hacks that are quicker, but do not allow control, just a destruction of resources. Sometimes you just want to jack them up, you may not need the territory... so the timer for the missions hack is far less to complete.

3. Raid...
These missions are similar to sabatoge missions, but if an empire needs resources more than they need to deny resources, then this is a marauder mission on "depots", abstracted... Think in terms of attacking baggage trains, depots, convoys, etc. Similar to sabotage, but there may be an element of extraction involved, much like PS1s LLUs.

4. Scorched earth...
If you presently own a territory that is in danger of being taken, there could be a mission(s) of scorched earth, where you destroy a territorys usefulness for a period of time, and this means if you keep ahold of it, you screwed yourself too... It could be as simple as multiple hacks on your own structures, each one reducing, or lengthening the resource degredation of a given territory. This one is cool, because you never know who gets hurt, or helped by this, so feints and diversions could cause the enemy to damage themselves.

All this could be done with no damage to the resource system for territory aquisition, and fleshes out the mission system even more, since it would interact with the meta economics, for more strategy. If tuned well, this could even things out meta-wise, and really FORCE empires to maintain villigance on the rest of the map or really SUFFER from complacency.


Edit: Spelling stuff

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by NewSith

I disagree:

1. Playing fields of outfits and the zerg were always different. The zerg motivation is tacticalless fighting on a large scale and M0AR L4ND, basically rape and pillage, while outfits do smaller and more tactical ops. This is a situation where population balances the game. So let outfits play GA to control hexes and control the zerg. Suych control is next to impossible, though, so rich won't get richer.
2. On a note more related to the quote, - I offered two solutions - negative degradation, which you imply, I also reject myself. Neutral degradation, where you never get a hex that produces 0 resources is better.

Something like you offered alongside with absent vehicle timers, etc.

Let me put this another way. How does diminishing returns on resources address the following issues
1) Enabling the have-not empires to wage effective war
2) Motivating the have-nots to fight
3) Maintain the intensity of the battle
4) Making it difficult to hold lots of territory

I don't see how making the resources less valuable addresses any of these issues.

It does not help the Have-nots wage war - they are still resource deprived.
It does not motivate the have-nots to fight
It does not maintain the intensity of the battle - if anything it hurts it by causing the dominant empire to give up and go somewhere else
It does not make it more difficult to hold lots of territory - all it does is make holding lots of territory less enticing.

It doesn't really solve the problem, it just reduces the motivation of empires to take lots of territory. It won't prevent it from occurring, nor does it help recover the situation in a fun way.

I like the vehicle timer reduction idea - that should go along with discounts. The idea behind discounts and vehicle timer reduction is to remove risk from the underdogs so they go out there and try to take territory. Since they have almost no costs and the dominant empire has plenty of resources to pay for vehicles they can stay competitive and have a raging battle at little to no risk of the underdog. The alternative is them taking their ball and going home.

[NewSith]

Originally Posted by Malorn

...

It doesn't really solve the problem, it just reduces the motivation of empires to take lots of territory. It won't prevent it from occurring, nor does it help recover the situation in a fun way.

Well, I can't really argue with that.

[sylphaen]

Originally Posted by Malorn

Let me put this another way. How does diminishing returns on resources address the following issues
1) Enabling the have-not empires to wage effective war
2) Motivating the have-nots to fight
3) Maintain the intensity of the battle
4) Making it difficult to hold lots of territory
[...]
It doesn't really solve the problem, it just reduces the motivation of empires to take lots of territory. It won't prevent it from occurring, nor does it help recover the situation in a fun way.

It addresses the following issue:
5) Do not reward 2 empires for raping the 3rd

It does not reduce the motivation of an empire to take lots of territory. It reduces its motivation to keep taking from the weakest.

Edit: recovery will come by offering incentives to attack the stronger empire of the other 2.
FYI, I proposed dimishing returns for situations of double-teams to not incentivize double teaming. Why ? Because double-teaming would always become an optimal strategy: one empire is out and you gain more resources from this situation. Why try anything else ?

[Duddy]

Originally Posted by Malorn

I like the vehicle timer reduction idea - that should go along with discounts. The idea behind discounts and vehicle timer reduction is to remove risk from the underdogs so they go out there and try to take territory. Since they have almost no costs and the dominant empire has plenty of resources to pay for vehicles they can stay competitive and have a raging battle at little to no risk of the underdog. The alternative is them taking their ball and going home.

Whilst I do like the idea of vehicle timer reduction, and how it pairs with discounts, I'd prefer to not see this tied to territory/resources held.

I think that is the kind of modifier that serves helping a low population better than it does one without much in the way of resources/territory, as I feel it helps replicate the effect of having more players.

While there is probably a correlation between low pop and not having territory, they are of course not one in the same. So whilst they most likely will come into effect at the same time, I believe they should remain separate.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by Ruwyn

You keep saying things, Malorn, that are leading me to believe that you ONLY gain the resources that your faction would be getting from the continent you are currently ON. As opposed to total from the whole World (3 continents)

That is correct, it is continent-based, per Higby from July

From the PS2 Public Panel Video from July:

Originally Posted by Higby

Resources are continental-based right now.

I made an entire transcript of everything related to the Territory Control system in this thread:
http://www.planetside-universe.com/s...ad.php?t=36613

For reference here's two key things from that transcript.

On resource distribution:

Originally Posted by Higby

Resources are continental-based right now. I gain resources from the continent I am on.If I don't have a foothold on the continent the TR are fighting on as much - maybe the TR and Vanu are really in a stalemate on one continent and my empire doesn't really have a foothold there - I can go to a continent where we do, fight there, gather resources, my team can sort of save our resources and then we can transition to that continent and be ready to really mount an offense over there. Also the way we distribute resources will solve that problem (referring to small population vs large population). If you have less people there resources are going to be getting distributed in higher percentages to the fewer people that are there. Once we start seeing the real play patterns, the way that the game starts balancing out then we'll be making more decisions about how we keep things balanced.

There is a combination of static & dynamic spawns for resources, so that is a very simple and elegant way to solve that problem (referring to the problem of a low pop getting attacked by a high pop and not having a lot of territory for resources).

On the adjacency system:

Originally Posted by Higby

The capturing system - and this is going really deep into some of the gameplay stuff - but the way it works is based on your adjacent territory that your empire owns you get bonuses to being able to capture the territory that is connected to that. We have a system of adjacency, so the front line is constantly shifting and constantly evolving based on territory that's being captured. And you will be able to capture any piece of territory on the map but you get significant bonuses to capturing ones that are adjacent to the territory that you already control. So back-hacking is still something someone could go do. If I want to I can go to the middle of your territory and capture this piece of territory. It might take me 30 minutes to capture this one region and then when your empire goes back there and re-captures it might only take them 30 seconds. So it might not be necessarily the smartest thing for you to go do, but if you want to gain a foothold over there and you're really interested in defending that territory then it might be worth doing. For the most part the front line is going to be the place where people fight - people will be fighting on multiple fronts since we have multiple factions - but that front line is really going to determine what the most vulnerable territory to capture is.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by sylphaen

It does not reduce the motivation of an empire to take lots of territory. It reduces its motivation to keep taking from the weakest.

It reduces the motivation to keep taking. It doesn't matter who the weakest is, diminishing returns does not distinguish from territory taken from the weak or territory taken from the strong.

The 3-empire system is what prevents one empire from getting too strong.

As Evilpig said, double-teaming is the purpose of the 3-empire system to keep one empire from getting too strong, even when they have 50-60% of the global population, the other two can still team up and be competitive. The key is to make this sort of behavor natural, and not the sort of behavior where one of the weak empires piles on the other weak empire. We can influence that with incentives and missions.

The bigger issue is motivating people to fight on a lost-cause continent, and giving them the vehicles and tools they need to be successful and carve out a foothold.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by Duddy

Whilst I do like the idea of vehicle timer reduction, and how it pairs with discounts, I'd prefer to not see this tied to territory/resources held.

I think that is the kind of modifier that serves helping a low population better than it does one without much in the way of resources/territory, as I feel it helps replicate the effect of having more players.

While there is probably a correlation between low pop and not having territory, they are of course not one in the same. So whilst they most likely will come into effect at the same time, I believe they should remain separate.

I don't think the population really matters. Territory will reflect population. If it doesn't; it will converge towards it. They aren't exact, becuase an even population matching could result in one empire pushing back another, but if there is a significant mismatch in population you're going to see territory change hands to reflect that. If there isn't a significant mismatch then it isn't a problem.

Even if the underdog had a huge population but no territory and everyone got free vehicles, they'd pull what, one free vehicle each before they captured enough territory to remove the bonus? That one vehicle isn't going to make much of a difference and if anything it gave them a tiny little reward for coming to a continent they had no foothold on and capturing some territory, so I don't see any problem with it.

The only exploit to watch out for is people using a continent with no territory to get free/cheap vehicles and then taking them through the warpgate to another continent. Thats bad, but could be easily stopped by setting a flag on the vehicle making it so that vehicle either can't go through a warpgate or it is destroyed if it does.