Melee Battlegrounds - New Gameplay concept!

[Nessaj]

Dave, RE! Now l2read all info before commenting, don't be lazy

All I can say is that you're thinking in completely generalized terms, e.g. Rust/DayZ gameplay or any sort of regular gameplay you've experienced in mods/MMOs these last years. Many projects had initial success but couldn't sustain it long term. It would be concerning if we were going in that sort of direction of course

This is not a survival game, it is not a death match open world, it won't be either. It's something else you haven't seen before, just like everyone doubted everything about how cRPG/Strat would work in the beginning

There's battles of various types you can play in at any time (like instant battle via joining/queue), e.g. "cRPG" as we've stressed (a lot). Then there's also the world, where you don't need to participate if you don't want to. There will be consequence-free combat whenever you want, at any point of the day, even at 4 AM in the night.

We're talking layers combined into a nice middle-ground, without being too broad, without being too specific. No doubt very different from other games. The idea and concept of this is not new within the team, it has been around from before MBG/Asinus was even known, and it is by far what attracted me personally to this project more than anything else.

Combat will still be key, it will be a focus, there will be plenty of battles and fights to participate in, and we'll do everything we can to make the combat amazing because without that the game doesn't work, combat needs to be top notch.

[Micah]

Yeah, I didn't misunderstand it. chadz said that he wants a unimap for everything (225 sq km) means that there will be an open world for everyone to play there. So if there is a battle and you want to fight there - you'll be moved or will have to move there somehow. But I'm speaking about the stuff behind it. The daily small fights look more promising to me, like defending a caravan against the ambush or attacking it, punishing trolling kids (there is no way any game can avoid it), fighting people beyond official battles. Permadeath is too harsh (don't tell me that I didn't understand it, I foresee people claiming it, just reread what I say) and having no penalty makes no sense either.

I'm all against making things difficult like that. If you don't know how things will work - don't do it. Make simple things work well first.

I think, the best approach to balance the occurance of aggressive/any type of encounters (as : how often they occure, what kind of conflicts are the majority) always by balancing the profit for it ... not only material gain, but also , how much can you boost your reputation with your act, either as bad-boy or cyber police man. The hope should be to model an environment where against all "evil" gameplay (like robbing, murdering, and even trolling) the "counter" gameplay is evenly strong ... to hold everything in balance. You can motivate people to do anything in a game by injecting some sort of virtual currency .. be it in-game-gold or reputation.
Indeed, the goal should not be to forbid any kind of gameplay ... but to try to balance it into the space of possible gameplay imo.

edit: not sure if this was really a response to the quote or to anything .. but well .. 

[Gnjus]

Nessaj is a fan of it, though, so you might see something like that

Hopefully he will also implement inbreeding (historically accurate), for those families that are......how should I put it........overly fond of themselves........I would like to see the Abay family tree with realistic pictures of its members........Greys as well, with all of their 50+ shades............ 

[chadz]

What will happen to abandoned settlements or property of inactive accounts?

If someone builds a huge complex but goes afk how long before it can be removed / taken over?

It won't go away until someone takes it over. Which should be rather easy if it's not defended.

[chadz]

I sure hope there is some mechanic that allows you to kill in self defense while avoiding the penalties of being a murderer, you know, 'murican style. If a known PKer walks up to me, blade drawn, I sure as hell ain't gonna just let him have his way with me. I hope you can kill any PKer on sight without consequence, and if anything you get a reward if they have a bounty on their head. If so, I will be rolling a hired assassin/manhunter, for justice.

In general, just because you knock someone out, doesn't mean he's dead. If you beat someone, he is unconscious or similar. Then you actively have to decide if you want to end his life OR take his stuff (it might be mutually exclusive, realism aside)

Also, murders will depend a lot on where they happen. Killings in a city can be pardoned by the city, so it is possible to kill people if you are in power of the location.

[chadz]

Also I kinda wonder how the alternate character system works, if there will be one at all. It would be pretty damn fun to be able to play as both sides in the cops vs. robbers (manhunters vs. murderers?) dichotomy. However, I wouldn't want people knowing about my highwayman pastime (on my alt) when my main is rolling around as the most respected manhunter in town.

That wont work, you will most likely have a family name (=your last name), and can only change the first name. Everyone knows that you and your "brother" are in fact the same person.

[Micah]

Another question about permadeath:
What will happen if i jump down a 500 meters deep cliff in one of your beautiful nordic fjord maps or mountains ... or when i stand underwater to observe the sealife for a few days in the beautiful lakes you will design ? 

[chadz]

I feel there should be a constant legal war going on, maybe between those 2 kingdoms? And if you wanted you could gather some troops, ride over there and kill some unsuspecting players.

There will be constant fights, nonstop; some are more important, some are less important, but they happen all the time.

As for the 2nd sentence; For this game to work, there needs to be some persistancy. So usually you will never be overrun because of being unsuspecting. When you go to sleep, you will wake up next morning and know that all the stuff you had yesterday will still be there.. unless something very catastrophic happened.

So you will know when an army approaches you. Unless you fucked up your intel.

[Vibe]

So far it sounds like a cool mix of The Guild and cRPG, with a bit of Haven&Hearth mixed in. I'm sorry if I'm reposting some questions (mostly economy related):

Is there plans to have a NPC population in cities (even if merely numerical, not actually NPC characters in the city), outside of player families?
How much emphasys will be on crafting/businesses that are unrelated to combat and wars (aka not wall building, weapons, armor) but more on general medieval economy, as in ale production for taverns, paper/scriptures for the church, food production, pottery, tool making, etc etc?
How will end products of above mentioned crafts/businesses affect gameplay, will you be selling those to NPCs for profit or players for certain bonuses or whatever else they'd get out of it? Would be cool if we were selling to NPCs to see it affect the population/city itself, as in improved quality of life due to high supply of x/y, consequently increasing population (think Caesar games?).

[chadz]

Another question about permadeath:
What will happen if i jump down a 500 meters deep cliff in one of your beautiful nordic fjord maps or mountains ... or when i stand underwater to observe the sealife for a few days in the beautiful lakes you will design ? 

We'll probably have a few different states:
- Healthy (anything from 100% to 1% of HP)
- Gravely wounded (knocked out for hours, possibly days -> play a different family member)
- Conscripted (tied to an army on the move -> play a different family member)
- Dead (well... dead...  -> get a new family member )
falling off a cliff means "gravely wounded". no one likes dying to gravity

[chadz]

Is there plans to have a NPC population in cities (even if merely numerical, not actually NPC characters in the city), outside of player families?

Ideally, none: If we manage to pull it off, everything is player run. If that doesn't work out, we'll introduce NPCs, but the goal is 100% player driven.

How much emphasys will be on crafting/businesses that are unrelated to combat and wars (aka not wall building, weapons, armor) but more on general medieval economy, as in ale production for taverns, paper/scriptures for the church, food production, pottery, tool making, etc etc?

None and a lot at the same time. As we have no NPCs that you can sell to, everything that is produced must have a meaning. And ideally, everything that is produced, must be used up somewhere to keep the economy going. That's why offensive and defensive objects are just perfect for that: They will always get used up. There will always be fights, wars, and they will get rid of those items that are produced in the economy.

There will still be many intermediate objects, though; There will be food for armies, there will be ale for armies; Having versatile nutrition for your armies will allow them to move faster/further/have more HP/to be decided.

If you want to craft an advanced armor, it will probably take 10 to 20 different economical steps inbetween, and each one will require someone with the right tools, skills and resources to create the best possible outcome.

It's intentional that no one can do everything by himself, trading will be a big factor, and not just external trading, there will be a lot of trading within your own city. But all items come from (more or less infinite) resources, get manufactured by players, and then exit the cycle through wars. By wars, you can seize control of better resources. Increase manufacturing cycles. etc.

I'd like to implement more medieval stuff later (after alpha) to make the economy even more nuanced, but for now it's important to get the basic cycle of resources right.

tl;dr: no NPCs, no NPC economy, therefore, every object will have a meaning.

[Molly]

Are the current testers all committed min-maxers who are going to test all the features based on the assumption that everyone is going to try and play the game 'well' on launch, or do you have a healthy amount of troll-testers who will fuck about trying to break everything as much as possible (like you'll get in the full release)?

Krems are a valuable cRPG resource you could exploit to try and troll-proof M:BG closer to release.

I'm in.

[Sigibert]

As for the 2nd sentence; For this game to work, there needs to be some persistancy. So usually you will never be overrun because of being unsuspecting. When you go to sleep, you will wake up next morning and know that all the stuff you had yesterday will still be there.. unless something very catastrophic happened.

So you will know when an army approaches you. Unless you fucked up your intel.

Yeah, what I meant was: you and a buddy are standing on a field and all of a sudden an enemy army from the other kingdom roles over the hills and kills you if you don't escape fast enough. That's something that happens quite frequently in persistent world mod... one of the things I really like about it

I appreciate that your stuff is relatively safe when you're logged off. That's what ruined Rust for me...

[Thomek]

do you have a healthy amount of troll-testers

Implying devs are not trolls at heart. Yes?

[DaveUKR]

Dave, RE! Now l2read all info before commenting, don't be lazy

All I can say is that you're thinking in completely generalized terms, e.g. Rust/DayZ gameplay or any sort of regular gameplay you've experienced in mods/MMOs these last years. Many projects had initial success but couldn't sustain it long term. It would be concerning if we were going in that sort of direction of course

This is not a survival game, it is not a death match open world, it won't be either. It's something else you haven't seen before, just like everyone doubted everything about how cRPG/Strat would work in the beginning

There's battles of various types you can play in at any time (like instant battle via joining/queue), e.g. "cRPG" as we've stressed (a lot). Then there's also the world, where you don't need to participate if you don't want to. There will be consequence-free combat whenever you want, at any point of the day, even at 4 AM in the night.

We're talking layers combined into a nice middle-ground, without being too broad, without being too specific. No doubt very different from other games. The idea and concept of this is not new within the team, it has been around from before MBG/Asinus was even known, and it is by far what attracted me personally to this project more than anything else.

Combat will still be key, it will be a focus, there will be plenty of battles and fights to participate in, and we'll do everything we can to make the combat amazing because without that the game doesn't work, combat needs to be top notch.

Thanks for the reply. As I've stated above - I've got it all correct and I read all the stuff before commenting. There is a 225 sq km map where people do something. I agree that making everything consequence-free would make this game a survival game (because if you let someone kill someone without any consequences - people will start killing on sight, especially trollkids) but on the other hand I don't want to see a complete Minecraft sandbox. Players should not be limited in their actions like that and the price for the killed should not be that big.

In my opinion small fights look much more promising. In my opinion death in all fights should be punished somehow, whether those are fights for the castle or ambushes on the road. The only one that shouldn't - training fights (like tournaments, training camps and so on). It brings diversity to the game. I also like the family idea so even if one of the family members is getting penalized for the death (lets say each "death" makes the certain character unavailable for a growing amount of time depending on the amount of deaths and eventually at some certain death you die permanently) you can use the other one. The benefit for the killer scales well in such case. For instance - 6 hours inactivity (lets say it's his 10th "death") for the field commander might be enough for his enemies to win a couple of very important battles facing a headless army, but 6 hours for a random peasant is nothing - he will just switch to other things/characters (and he will not actually have 6 hours as he won't die, so if it's his first death - the inactivity would be i.e. 5 minutes).

But it all doesn't matter as those are things that are behind the main purpose of this game - epic fights and battles. As I've said multiple times here: small fights can be as epic as big battles if not more.