Brainstorm This Better Faction War System?

[Edymnion]

Yes, this is Starmade, and one of the great things about Starmade is: Configs.
There is no reason to not add anything like this if you also add it to the configs, as the configs already contain a setting for the Homebase invincibility being disabled once a faction lost all faction points and sectors. So with a config setting you could just disable it, and you could Carebear all day long, without hampering the fun for people who think differently than you.

Thats the great thing about configs.
Dont like it? Turn it off.
Dont like it and you dont have a server? Look for a server without it.

So i dont get why you are so much against this, did you not know about Starmades extensive configs?

Because its a griefer friendly default getting applied to everyone? Why not flip it around? Have a config setting that lets you turn off homebase invincibility entirely, but leave it on by default.

Anyone that wants to be on a server that has it turned off can go search for one, everyone that just wants to play the game normally has that as the default. Why must the vocal demands of the "I have the right to sit my capitol ship at spawn and shoot anybody that logs in the instant they come online" be the ones that shape the game?

Even in MMOs, the statistics show that PvP'ers are in the minority, so why do we keep bowing to their every demand?
[DOUBLEPOST=1431964070,1431963907][/DOUBLEPOST]Don't get me wrong, a more robust faction war system would be great. But things who's sole purpose is to remove the only protection in the game from people who don't want to fight in the first place is not the answer.

 

[FullMetalFox]

Because its a griefer friendly default getting applied to everyone? Why not flip it around? Have a config setting that lets you turn off homebase invincibility entirely, but leave it on by default.

Anyone that wants to be on a server that has it turned off can go search for one, everyone that just wants to play the game normally has that as the default. Why must the vocal demands of the "I have the right to sit my capitol ship at spawn and shoot anybody that logs in the instant they come online" be the ones that shape the game?

Even in MMOs, the statistics show that PvP'ers are in the minority, so why do we keep bowing to their every demand?

What "default" is, largely depends on who you ask, for you apparently its "PVE nothing else!", for others it might be "Everything", for someone else it might be "Exploring" or whatever.
In my opinion it should be a good base config that allows all gameplay styles, provides a good base for custom configs for the sake of blueprint compability, and demonstrates all of the games capabilities and function, that includes both PvE and PvP.

But honestly i mostly care about it becoming an option in the first place.

Oh well MMOs, what PvP do we have in MMOs? Honestly i gave up on all this MMO crap, because most of the time its more equipment based than anything else, very limited and mostly has not consequences outside the instance. So i rather play pure PvP based games, like Multiplayer FPS, or games that support full open world PvP with consequences.

So taking one of the types of games, that dont support good implementations of PvP, is not a good example for how many people are out there that do enjoy PvP.

Hint: Every Multiplayer FPSs population for example is PvP players, so there are a lot of them.

Don't get me wrong, a more robust faction war system would be great. But things who's sole purpose is to remove the only protection in the game from people who don't want to fight in the first place is not the answer.

Never was my intention to just remove that from players, i dont even agree with the OPs suggestion, but it should be a configurable option as a consequence for losing a war. What got me in this thread was your narrow view on PvP.

 

[Mariux]

I think I have a better idea. How about players would need to set up beacons (stations with special beacon blocks) to increase mining multiplier? The beacons would need to be spread out throughout the system and obviously, it would be difficult to protect them all. You wouldn't be able to see them on the universe map, only on nav menu and the more you destroy, the more the mining multiplier of the enemy faction decreases while the homebase remains protected. Of course, you can also add turrets to increase their defensive capabilities.

I think this is a good idea, because the more beacons there are in a system, the more likely enemy ships will find one, plus there should be a softcap to how many beacons a faction may have.

 

[Edymnion]

Hint: Every Multiplayer FPSs population for example is PvP players, so there are a lot of them.

And what does every FPS have in common? The instant the fight is over, everything goes right back to the way it was. You lose nothing by being headshot right out of the gate. And all of the players are on a level playing field, if one person wins more its because they have the skill to do so, not because they started the fight with a bigger gun and heavier armor.

Those are fair fights. That is good PvP.

Games like StarMade where losing a fight means losing months of work? Thats not fun to me, and I'm sure as hell not going to want to spend a month building the most perfect base the game has ever seen just to log off for the night, come back the next day to see that somebody parked a capitol ship over it and blew it into pieces while sending me mails of "Lulz, u mad bro?"

There is a line between PvP and griefing. PvP is between two people that want to fight each other. Griefing is when only one side agrees to it. That you apparently cannot or will not see that line speaks volumes to me.

 

[Mariux]

Also, in addition to my suggestion, any extra minerals earned with the multiplier would be stored in the beacons, so having too many beacons would mean that to transport all of them into one homebase would take a longer time also giving a use for transport ships. Plus, if the transporter has no jumpdrive (which is likely, since one is not neccesary for inter-system travel) enemy ships could tail them and find out the locations of the beacons.

 

[Cryptex]

Back to the original post.. -- If the biggest concern is small factions being dominated by large/pre-existing factions, or control being taken from offline players:

-Improving upon the grace period idea, why not take it a step further and say that factions of a certain size (whether determined by member count, territory control, or faction point total) are unable to be sieged. Upon approaching this limit, they are alerted. Upon passing this limit, the grace period comes into effect and they are alerted that their faction will be considered targetable.

-To eliminate long-term 'afk' factions - If the overall status of a faction does not change after a certain amount of time (meaning factions members are not online, faction points drop or don't increase, etc.), the faction will also enter the grace period, and become targetable afterwards. To prevent abuse of this by players coming in on the last day of the counter, in order to 'reset' your 'afk timer,' you need to gain a certain amount of faction points (or some other requirement, be ingame and not idle, etc - not just login and logout)

This way small factions don't have to worry about being in a one sided battle or attacked while offline. Large factions shouldn't have this problem as they are large enough that either their member count or their territory control should be large enough that it is impossible for attackers to attack without someone in that faction being online or their defenses are strong enough to withstand attacks.

Its hard to argue that this is a huge or unfair advantage for small factions either, as they don't have the advantages offered by further developing their faction. Invulnerable/Unable to be seiged as a small faction vs Advantages of a large faction. And if the argument is that there are few advantages of a large faction because of this, then more need to be added to act as a balance.

 

[FullMetalFox]

And what does every FPS have in common? The instant the fight is over, everything goes right back to the way it was. You lose nothing by being headshot right out of the gate. And all of the players are on a level playing field, if one person wins more its because they have the skill to do so, not because they started the fight with a bigger gun and heavier armor.

Those are fair fights. That is good PvP.

Not all FPS have that in common, guess why games like DayZ are so popular.
Consequences change the way PvP plays drastically. If everything resets and you just respawn with all the stuff you had before, then there is not point in being carefull, you cant develop grinding tactics as your enemy just respawns too, there is so much that gets lost due to not having to face any consequences, as you can just do whatever the fuck you want without having to worry about anything.

Games like StarMade where losing a fight means losing months of work? Thats not fun to me, and I'm sure as hell not going to want to spend a month building the most perfect base the game has ever seen just to log off for the night, come back the next day to see that somebody parked a capitol ship over it and blew it into pieces while sending me mails of "Lulz, u mad bro?"

Take a look at EVE Online, ive seen years of work being obliberated in fleet battles, i myself blew up countles ships, hostiles ones, neutral ones, my own, and i had fun. That the ships are actually gone, is a consequence that changed the whole experience, heart pounding when we got attacked on a 0sec freight transport with billions of ISK in cargo, when we grinded down our enemy by killing off small groups to reduce their total fleet size before they could face us, because otherwise we would have lost against their sheer quantity.

So guess what, apparently there are a lot of people who do enjoy that, otherwise there wouldnt be thousands or people doing that to each other daily in EVE.

There is a line between PvP and griefing. PvP is between two people that want to fight each other. Griefing is when only one side agrees to it. That you apparently cannot or will not see that line speaks volumes to me.

And you have a narrowed view apparently. Ive seen many cases in various games, that showed me that this is not as simple as you think it is.

If something is griefing or just a type of encounter PvP, largely depends on the game it takes place in and the events that lead to it.

Like say, if i see someone in EVE Online flying in low sec and i can take him down? If i do, just blow him up, salvage his ship, is that griefing for you? For you, propably, for me its was encounter PvP, allowing me to gain some loot and have some fun, and here is the thing, it was part of the dangers of going into lowsec in EVE Online, its one of the PvP types that the sandbox gameplay of that game provides. Would you still call that griefing as that person might not have wanted to fight but just cross lowsec?

If i play Minecraft, see somebody who builds a house, and i just go there, put lava on his bed and then kill him so he respawns in lava while his house burns down, thats 100% griefing.

So in my opinion, that line is not as easy as "PvP is between two people that want to fight each other. Griefing is when only one side agrees to it"...

 

[Edymnion]

So guess what, apparently there are a lot of people who do enjoy that, otherwise there wouldnt be thousands or people doing that to each other daily in EVE.

Given that Eve Online never had a large player base to start with, and that is has been dwindling at an alarming rate to where CCP won't even release the subscription numbers anymore, that might not have been such a great comparison.

I'm not saying there aren't people that enjoy that kind of thing, but its a very small market, and the vast majority of people don't want it. I mean, I don't care if there are entire online communities out there of guys that like getting kicked in the junk, if you do it to me I'm going to have you arrested.

People need to understand that. If two people both consider free style ganking to be fun and acceptable, then by all means they should be allowed to participate in that with other like minded people. But the instant you start trying to force that way of playing on everyone regardless of their views on the subject, then you have crossed the line IMO.

 

[mrsinister]

my first thoughts....

Implement the flag system? flag yourself and you can be pvp'd or the Faction Commander can flag the whole Faction. That way those that want to pvp and wage war they can, and those that just want to play, can play..... Or as someone said near the beginning, have those that aren't going to pvp be part of a faction like the Trade Guild, not necessarily thee Trade Guild but a faction who's neutrality is similar, and when the non-pvp'ers get attacked that faction spawns in waves of enemies or selectable ships that the server admin designates.

 

[FullMetalFox]

Given that Eve Online never had a large player base to start with, and that is has been dwindling at an alarming rate to where CCP won't even release the subscription numbers anymore, that might not have been such a great comparison.

Well EVE certainly isnt dying because of a game mechanic that was there since its beginning, but rather the stagnation and bad market. But sadly, while still being popular, EVE always has been a nische product, similar to many scifi products.

I'm not saying there aren't people that enjoy that kind of thing, but its a very small market, and the vast majority of people don't want it. I mean, I don't care if there are entire online communities out there of guys that like getting kicked in the junk, if you do it to me I'm going to have you arrested.

People need to understand that. If two people both consider free style ganking to be fun and acceptable, then by all means they should be allowed to participate in that with other like minded people. But the instant you start trying to force that way of playing on everyone regardless of their views on the subject, then you have crossed the line IMO.

I wouldnt say that its very small, its small compared to the masses of PvE players who enjoy mindless grinding, but its certainly there.

Nobody is trying to force this on anybody, but trying to make it an option, and on Starmade it is certainly possible to please even the biggest carebear and even the biggest griefer, because we have extensive configs, the rest just depends on what servers get created and what players decide to do. If a player then decides to go on a server that allows this kind of game flow, nobody is crossing a line as the player knew from the beginning that this is allowed, or should have read the server info if he didnt knew.

What people also need to understand, is that mixing gameplay styles can provide an interessting game flow for various types of players, and many people seem to like that even in Starmade, otherwise rather open PvP based servers such as EE wouldnt be so popular. And this game flow is often only available in sandbox games, such as Starmade, Minecraft, EVE Online or Neocron. Fighting, or even just arguing against the implementation of an option to create this game flow, just because you personally dont like it, is something already worse than any griefing, as you are trying to prevent other people from having fun.

And even if they implement something you dont like as default config, you would still have the option to disable it with just one little file edit, so there is no need for you to fight against something like this or go bitching about "ill uninstall the minute this gets announced".

 

[lilFishy]

Ahm ^^ there is a PM for such things, as you are not helping with brainstorming this topic, dont you think?
But agreed we do need some way to motivate PvP for those who want it with some expansion/mining bonus/ constant income system.

It should not be a "remove the invounrable hm" solution, as it requires no effort and has limitless potential to be exploited by douchebags.
Make some sort of mining bonus/constant income in the claimed systems, this way the factions that want to expand and take risks can, and those that do not want to take part in this are left without the bonus/income. No risk - no prize.

 

[FullMetalFox]

Ahm ^^ there is a PM for such things, as you are not helping with brainstorming this topic, dont you think?
But agreed we do need some way to motivate PvP for those who want it with some expansion/mining bonus/ constant income system.

Partially we do, as that is a subject that quiet often pops up in PvP/Warfare related threads, for the lulz ill just call it "The Carebear Uproar!"

But yeah, if you want actual discussing of OPs suggestion, in my opinion thats the wrong way of doing it, its just a short term solution that creates even more issues in the long run. The whole faction vs faction system needs to be rewritten, there must be a reason to hold territory and a reason to wage war other than just "for the heck of it", aka give the whole thing a meaning, and in my mind that already goes as far as changing the content generation of the game, as well as the foundation of faction mechanics, so an adequate solution would need to be much more complex that OPs suggestion.

 

[lilFishy]

Partially we do, as that is a subject that quiet often pops up in PvP/Warfare related threads, for the lulz ill just call it "The Carebear Uproar!"

But yeah, if you want actual discussing of OPs suggestion, in my opinion thats the wrong way of doing it, its just a short term solution that creates even more issues in the long run. The whole faction vs faction system needs to be rewritten, there must be a reason to hold territory and a reason to wage war other than just "for the heck of it", aka give the whole thing a meaning, and in my mind that already goes as far as changing the content generation of the game, as well as the foundation of faction mechanics, so an adequate solution would need to be much more complex that OPs suggestion.

So than, what is your thought of stations that generate slow but steady income or that give pasive mining bonuses? There is your motivation to hold sectors. Im thinking about them being active while there is a faction member on, or some other system that would not make this in to "claim 100+ systems and than go off for a month" . You could set them to ask reinforcements (like pirates do) if they are under attack, or some other way of protection....

 

[CaptainTaz]

So than, what is your thought of stations that generate slow but steady income or that give pasive mining bonuses? There is your motivation to hold sectors. Im thinking about them being active while there is a faction member on, or some other system that would not make this in to "claim 100+ systems and than go off for a month" . You could set them to ask reinforcements (like pirates do) if they are under attack, or some other way of protection....

That sounds more RTS style though....

 

[FullMetalFox]

So than, what is your thought of stations that generate slow but steady income or that give pasive mining bonuses? There is your motivation to hold sectors.

Nah, thats to basic, and would just work with quantity.
This would need to go much deeper like i said, involving the content generation of the game, for example the content of systems so it wont just be quantity but also location, and a bit more complex than "just destroy a station and the claim is gone".
Im writing about an idea including this, but im far from finished due to the sheer size and complexity, so i could only provide a note summary or food for thoughts right now.

 

[lilFishy]

Ok, but if something is to complex than it might not be right, simple thingsare the best, just look at VW Beatle xD
[DOUBLEPOST=1431980961,1431980783][/DOUBLEPOST]

That sounds more RTS style though....

Well IMO any serious faction vs faction war should have strategic elements, and not just "shoot, kill, war is over" there should be resources involed...

 

[Ptotheextreme]

Hey just got back to my post after a while, and to my surprise i got a tag yey

OK. First,let's not be spamming specially picked situations on this post. If you will not help on balancing this idea,then please kindly stop posting.

Like i have said before, the rates and times are not set and done yet. There is room for change and improvement.
Therefore i will take some time to get more inspiration to further improve on this concept.

Have fun

 

[FullMetalFox]

Ok, but if something is to complex than it might not be right, simple thingsare the best, just look at VW Beatle xD

To stay with the VW Beatle analogy, it might look simple from the outside, but the inner mechanics of its engine are more complex and scientific than most people would believe.

So simple things arent the best, complex things that look simple from the outside are the best.

 

[Kaamio]

Like mentioned earlier, faction war needs something to fight over such as much better than average systems that are truly rare, or some resource that isn't widely available. If there's nothing to gain, people arem't keen on risking losing a couple of days worth resources which leads easily to griefing.

Like the old EvE saying, if you find yourself in a fair fight, you didn't plan it properly. You don't go into fair fights when it practically guarantees financial loss for little to no gain.

That said, some siege mechanic might be reasonable, but also some anti-grief measures included. I think in order to siege you'd have to make your faction vulnerable to sieges with considerable duration after you stop sieging, like 2-5 days. Also the siege itself should take more than 24 hours to prevent blizing during offline hours. What I can't figure is how to determine what makes people siegeable without leaving some horrendous loopholes for griefing. All I know is that it shouldn't be possible to get sieged right away and complete immunity shouldn't be the default either.

On semi related note, I also think bases should get a serious buff due to them being completely immobile and generally AI managed... maybe like +100% shield cap, regen and turret damage?

I mean, has anyone ever had any serious trouble with a non-homebase station?

 

[Ptotheextreme]

OMG i just had an idea derived from what ive seen :p

If i want to siege a faction,it will also cost some of my own faction's points.

Effectively making me vulnerable to a counter attack.

(Maybe when my faction has more people than the one im sieging it costs a bit more)
(And if my faction has less people it costs less)
(Since Faction points could be seen as reputation points )
(You help decide)