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Throne war/faction based mmo design

Discussion in 'Game Design' started by snacktime, Nov 21, 2017.

  1. snacktime

    snacktime

    Joined:
    Apr 15, 2013
    Posts:
    3,356
    So I've been trying to think of what is a good evolution in the typical faction warfare that most pvp based mmo's use. For the most part design here has been very stale for a long time. It's either open ended like Eve, guild vs guild. Or it's set factions/servers where you just pick one to join.

    The former has only worked well in a tiny number of games. I think it's extremely difficult to design this kind of game. I'm not even sure it's what players really want (regardless of what they say they want).

    The latter is the opposite end, very structured and the metagame is usually just fluff or very minor rewards. The fun is in the combat itself, because that's all there really is to it. Which isn't necessarily bad if that's what you are going for.

    What I'm trying to solve is how can you keep the fun constant combat you see in the more structured games, while retaining the strategic and possibly political elements of the more sandboxy variety.

    There has to be a more balanced approach, one that takes the best of both and combines them maybe.

    One of the ideas I had was to have both in a game, and make them dependent. So you have guild run territories that can be conquered by other guilds. And at the same time you have a central battleground say GW2 style. And then a generic mechanic where to take full advantage of your guild territory, you have to be doing well in the battlegrounds. But more then just some small fluff bonus like you generally see.

    I haven't really made that work yet it's just an example of a direction I think that holds promise.


    Ideas?
     
  2. JoeStrout

    JoeStrout

    Joined:
    Jan 14, 2011
    Posts:
    9,859
    Years ago I played an online mech game that was supposed to be like what you describe — there was a post-apocalyptic map of North America divided into red and blue areas, with battlefields scattered around it. Players were divided permanently into red and blue factions (I believe you were given a choice upon account creation), and the map showed which areas were "controlled" by each faction.

    The final part was never implemented, but the idea was that how each team performed on the various battlefields would shift control of the map, with some in-game effects thereof. For example, if it was a battlefield in the red area, then the red team would be the "home" (defending) team on that map, with the blue team playing as the invaders. I really liked that idea.

    Of course you probably don't want to flip control of a battlefield after every battle. I would probably have some number of points for each team, shown in the choose-your-battle screen and after the battle, and let those persist between plays. Wins (and/or other things, like kills during the battle) should award points to that node, with a smaller number of points distributed to neighboring nodes. So even if your team wins, you may not add enough points to tip the balance... or if things were very even before, it might flip that node and some neighboring ones.

    I'd play that.
     
  3. Joe-Censored

    Joe-Censored

    Joined:
    Mar 26, 2013
    Posts:
    11,847
    Since you brought up Eve.... Eve Online actually implements both systems in the same game and lets the players choose to participate in either. So around 2/3 of the galaxy is player controlled space, with the guild vs guild sandbox play you mentioned. But players can also join factions in Eve and fight for their faction's control of the more central star systems in the galaxy in a more structured system.