RvR - Bringing back a better Flag

[Teutonic]

The past month has seen a large decline in port battles and those groups who take the time and effort to create them. It seems every time I hear of someone saying "we should take X port" the immediate response is "will you grind it?" That may be acceptable and the effort required bring hostility to 100% allows both sides to engage in a fight whether that be to defend it, or the opportunity to kill players to make the PB happen faster through the hostility mechanic. I personally hear more folks dislike the current RvR mechanic and wish for change. I propose we drop Hostility missions and rework the old Flag mechanic to create something better.

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What I would keep
1. Time windows - the ability to leave it open, or to create a specific time window to defend in
2. Maintenance - I would adjust prices of maintenance, but still keep it. I would propose lowering the Time maintenance to 400k (so the maintenance is 500k and not 600k with a timer)
3. BR limits

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New Flag System:

1. Similar to the way Hostility works now, You must purchase the Flag a day before the intended port battle. You MUST purchase the flag within the port's time window as well. In order to Purchase a Flag, you must be the Leader, or Diplomat role within the clan. when the Flag is purchased, it is an item (like a book) and it is put into your personal warehouse in the port you are at, at the time of purchase. The flag can be place into the clan warehouse in order to allow Officers of the clan to gain access to it. A clan can only have ONE (can be adjusted) flag active at a time.

I believe this does a few things.
A. The moment you Purchase the flag, is the same time the Port Battle happens on the next day (24hrs from purchase)
B. the limitation of who is allowed to purchase a Flag stops abuse of random flag purchasing. The limitation of Flag's active in a clan stops abuse of a clan activating tons of flags.
C. Flag acting as an item makes it so it must be in a ships hold at the time of the port battle happening

2. The Flag itself makes the following happen:
A. The "flag holder" must create a "Battle Group" in order to enter the Port Battle.
B. The Flag is an Item that is "used" like a Book. You can ONLY use the flag after creating a Battle Group. you can ONLY use the flag on the DAY OF the Port Battle
C. Only those players in the Battle Group made by the Flag bearer are able to enter the Port Battle.
 

3. If the Flag is destroyed (the player's ship is sunk) anytime BEFORE the Port Battle, the Port Battle is immediately cancelled and Whenever the PB would have happened, the defenders gain a 24 hour rest period (as it is now when a groups fails to take a port).
3A. If the Flag has been "used" and the Flag owner had created a Battle Group. the Battle Group is considered "the flag." This means Anyone in the Battle Group can Enter the Port Battle, This also means that in order for the Defenders to stop the attackers from entering the Port Battle, they must Defeat all enemy players in the Battle Group. This stops the "kamikaze" effect of killing the flag owner before the battle and forces the Defenders to make a real attempt at denying the enemy from entering (all of them).

the defender is able to still kill the flag before the Port Battle. But the attacker can use the flag to still allow their battle group to enter.

4. Flags Cost Gold/Currency (for new patch) to create based on the Port's Battle Rating Limit.

I don't know what the basis would be for price apart from BR limit. my initial thought is the following: 1,000 gold/currency per 1 BR. So a 2,400 Deep Water BR port's flag would cost 2.4 million.

Side note - Shallow Water port flag cost would be reduced by 50% (so 500 gold/currency per 1 BR).

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A port Battle works the same way it would now, you must achieve 1,000 points to win or last throughout the whole battle time (for defenders). If the FLAG bearer dies in a screen (OW) battle that just ensures the attackers are UNABLE to enter the port battle (Although I feel we could change this to something more agreeable if folks don't like this).

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ABUSE CASES?

Groups create multiple clans to create multiple flags --- Yeah ok, I don't really care. since Clans have a limited "friendly clan list" I don't see this getting bad or negatively affecting anything. Those who try and multi-flip will always try. Those who multi-flip can't win in a contested port battle so they will lose the port eventually anyway.

Alt abuse? --- I don't see it.

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Downsides?

The one I can see is that since there are no more Hostility missions, you cannot "Stop" someone from trying to make a Port Battle happen on your port. But in the end, you can Screen the enemy out or win the Port Battle the next day anyway.

EDIT
all Underlined areas are Edited

 

Edited June 14, 2018 by Teutonic

[Fenris]

Buy the flag only to skip hostility grinding? PB in 24 hours again? Uhm no.

Flags were in game, they were not a good feature. Flags should be used for RAIDS, although i don`t know what reward can be given, if RAID is succesful, and no AI shold be involved.

I agree in 1 point: Make them expensive.

As long ports are useless and not worth conquering, we will not have any sustainable RvR in this project. It has nothing to do with numbers on servers, the boredom in game is the reason for low numbers.

Shoot ships, craft ships is all you can do.

Boring in long terms.

[Christendom]

I like the notion of purchasing the flag beforehand and it triggering the battle time.  Then you still have to run the flag to the port to gain access to the battle, creating a need for screeners on both sides.  This eliminates the annoying hostility grind and the lack of balance those battles create and also eliminates the need for 10+ players to be up late 2 evenings in a row and will allow others to stay up past their desired time zones to take ports.  

Excellent suggestion.  @admin  I'd copy the heck out of this.

Only change I would make would be to make the flag purchasable Combat or PVP marks.  say 500 combat marks or 100 pvp marks.  

 

[Teutonic]

2 minutes ago, Banished Privateer said:

That was the old cancer of flag system, every screening fleet was going "kamikaze" or "banzai" style to focus and kill the flag, almost ignoring everything else. Planting the flag for 2 minutes and being chased around the port all the time was annoying as hell on top of it. 

I don't plan to have the flag "planted."

but I know you bring a good point which is why I said that the part about the Flag bearer sinking in a screening battle after the Port battle has started Could probably be changed to allow for adjustments.

I'd love to hear a proposal or adjustment to what I have suggested to not have the old cancer that was kamikaze against him.

[Gregory Rainsborough]

The problem isn't grinding the port, it's getting screened out. Why bother flipping a port when you know the entire server is going to be there to screen you out?

[Teutonic]

Just now, Gregory Rainsborough said:

The problem isn't grinding the port, it's getting screened out. Why bother flipping a port when you know the entire server is going to be there to screen you out?

I know the port is the objective, but a lot of players prefer a port battle as a "guaranteed" pvp fight. nothing I can say or suggest will change the fact that people get screened out. All I can suggest is a change in mechanics that would bring players back to the game to play....to allow more people - which may ultimately help the PB fleet get into a PB.

[Guest]

I think this would increase the amount of groups that try to use multi-flips. If you can all buy the flag at the same time, its just too easy. 

Suggestion: Maybe bring in a little RNG and make it so the battle time is 22-25 hours from when you click "buy". The time would randomly fall somewhere in a given range, but you couldn't precisely choose the time. I normally don't like RNG, but if it made it harder to accurately multi-flip, I think people wouldn't use the strategy. 

[Teutonic]

7 minutes ago, Banished Privateer said:

I don't like the concept of flag being an item. Best system IMHO would be flag as entire group. You pay - you can start a Port Battle Group, once group is sank, PB is cancelled. Needs also protection for group disbanding by accident or during disconnects (pass onto the next person for example).

Ok, I do like that option. I think this is a continued development for something.

What if - when Creating the battle group for the port battle with the flag you "Use the flag" like you would a book.

So then you have the Battle Group as "the flag" and anyone in the Battle Group can join the PB, no one person dying would stop the PB from happening.

EDIT - I'll adjust original post

Edited June 14, 2018 by Teutonic

[Fenris]

20 minutes ago, Christendom said:

I like the notion of purchasing the flag beforehand and it triggering the battle time.  Then you still have to run the flag to the port to gain access to the battle, creating a need for screeners on both sides.  This eliminates the annoying hostility grind and the lack of balance those battles create and also eliminates the need for 10+ players to be up late 2 evenings in a row and will allow others to stay up past their desired time zones to take ports.  

Excellent suggestion.  @admin  I'd copy the heck out of this.

Only change I would make would be to make the flag purchasable Combat or PVP marks.  say 500 combat marks or 100 pvp marks.  

 

Basically the same as it was..And PB is 24 hours later? Lol.

Facepalm.

So you need to do again PVE to "create" PVP, and there is no guarantee for PVP? Besides, you forget that soon there will be no more "Combat marks" or "PVP marks".

Once again, if there is no gain in conquest, there is no incentive to do conquest. As it is now.

Changing the hostility mechanic does not help.

Edited June 14, 2018 by Fenris

[Christendom]

I like the idea of instead of a flag, make it a special ship that has to be sailed to the port and join the battle.  Call it a troop transport.  It doesn't have BR, but has to join first for the attacking side to join.  Once it joins the battle it assumed the roll of the battle commander and they can just free cam and not have to fight.  

Also to eliminate multi flips we can just limit the amount of PBs going on against one nation at a time to be a total of 3.  You can also but an exponential growth on "flags" purchased, have a timer of the purchase window similar to how joining fleet battles works.  Every 5 or 15mins 1 flag purchase is available by that nation against another nation  (or something like that).  Purchasing flag #2 against nation X jumps in price, same for flag #3

[Christendom]

4 minutes ago, Fenris said:

Basically the same as it was..And PB is 24 hours later? Lol.

Facepalm.

So you need to do again PVE to "create" PVP, and there is no guarantee for PVP? Besides, you forget that soon there will be no more "Combat marks" or "PVP marks".

Once again, if there is no gain in conquest, there is no incentive to do conquest. As it is now.

Changing the hostility mechanic does not help.

Facepalm.  Comprehension is poor with this one.

You can get combat marks through PVP.  Or you can just use straight up PVP marks.  Or you can purchase marks from other players with gold.  

Currently PBs are at an all time low.  So clearly this system of forced PVE doesn't work.  My suggestion allows flexibility and doesn't force players to be up 2 nights (or mornings) in a row and therefore increasing the willingness to stay up for fights.

[Fenris]

4 minutes ago, Christendom said:

Currently PBs are at an all time low.  So clearly this system of forced PVE doesn't work.  My suggestion allows flexibility and doesn't force players to be up 2 nights (or mornings) in a row and therefore increasing the willingness to stay up for fights.

Try to read first what someone is writing before you get all cocky

PBs are low because players are BORED. There is nothing to conquer, there is no motivation for it. THAT is the problem of the game, not the hostility mechanic. There is nothing to do in the game.

"Your" system, which is NOT yours, was in the game already, and it was changed, i can remind you why if you want.

[Corona Lisa]

27 minutes ago, Fenris said:

Once again, if there is no gain in conquest, there is no incentive to do conquest. As it is now.

Changing the hostility mechanic does not help.

Hostility is a big part of the problem tho. Its boring as fck, takes hours and noone wants to do it.

[Fenris]

2 minutes ago, Jon Snow lets go said:

Hostility is a big part of the problem tho. Its boring as fck, takes hours and noone wants to do it.

But flags won`t help solving the bigger issue,  which is boredom in game, and conquest which has no purpose.

Bring back flags or marks or whatever it is, if there is no purpose taking a port, you will have 2 months hype about something new, and in 6 months you can watch how numbers decline.

Again.

 

 

[CeltiberoClearco]

Suppose I want to conquer port A.
I agree with clans of different nations, we buy the flags of ports A, B, C, D. All at the same time on the same day.... and we just ruined the RvR. 
This has already happened.

[z4ys]

All systems will fail.

As long side A isnt hooked (real clan base that lets you think wohhaa its mine) to its port and side B has a reason (expanding crafting buildings because of restricted slots, access to resources, etc) beside ruin dreams of side A there will be no long term conquest. There has to be losers to create meaningful stuff. But losing is nothing the community wants. We all want to be winners.

And because we all want to be winners we have carezones and shitty conquest. Because when we cant be winners we leave, become assholes, forming alliances that bash everything aka rvr gank.

So we got what we deserve. nothing 😉

Edited June 14, 2018 by z4ys

[Nelsons Barrel]

The first time I mentioned the idea of a flagsystemrevival was over a year ago and I still favor it:

On 8/2/2017 at 3:59 PM, Nelsons Barrel said:

To point 3. i would like to see for raids a revival of the flagsystem, so ports have porttimers like where you have above ~65%(numbervalues in concepts are not written in concrete) of the playerbase online so that you will not have some kind of nightraids when there is absolutely nobody to defend. That way of going with a percentage will lift the chains of localisation of the playerbase to where they live, if you have more americans online on the server, they can do it in their primetime, if its the EU playerbase, the times are open for them in their primetime. Should we ever get a healthy playernumber we could also go with a fixed number. Going with the flagsystem allows a real use of the OW because you can defend the raid already outside of the port.

 

Edited June 14, 2018 by Nelsons Barrel

[Teutonic]

33 minutes ago, CeltiberoClearco said:

Suppose I want to conquer port A.
I agree with clans of different nations, we buy the flags of ports A, B, C, D. All at the same time on the same day.... and we just ruined the RvR. 
This has already happened.

You could do that now. so RvR is already ruined on that point then?

[CeltiberoClearco]

2 minutes ago, Teutonic said:

You could do that now. so RvR is already ruined on that point then?

It's much harder now. Several clans in different ports need to be brought together, with several hostility missions per port and many players coordinated. In addition, the attacked players can now stop the hostility, delay it or at least try to do so.

Another problem would be the night-flip. You buy 4 flags and as the ports are going to be empty, with 4 players you have it done. Simple and effortless.

But I repeat that we have already had all these problems, which is why the current system.

Flags might work for a new kind of looting mission, but they don't work for the conquest of ports.

 

[Elric]

When you go back and look at all the different approaches the devs have tried for PB's, the current approach is just about the most boring of them all.  For a 'PvP' game, nearly everything in NA revolved around PvE grinding - PB's, epic events, books, upgrades...  anything that reduces this incessant PvE grind would be good.

[Guest]

im all for it, but instead of calling it flag, call it "Attack plans for Port X", or "Attack orders for Port x"

[Kawazz]

4 hours ago, Fenris said:

Buy the flag only to skip hostility grinding? PB in 24 hours again? Uhm no.

Flags were in game, they were not a good feature. Flags should be used for RAIDS, although i don`t know what reward can be given, if RAID is succesful, and no AI shold be involved.

 I agree in 1 point: Make them expensive.

As long ports are useless and not worth conquering, we will not have any sustainable RvR in this project. It has nothing to do with numbers on servers, the boredom in game is the reason for low numbers.

Shoot ships, craft ships is all you can do.

Boring in long terms.

Flags were once one of the best things in this game. Getting to the battle was incredibly fun.

Flags NEED to come back in some form even if its for raids or just races its simply awesome content. Nothing better than the race to Bermuda or carrying 5 flags and having to place them all within an hour across several ports and if we allow them to be traded relay races would be incredible.

@admin BRING BACK FLAGS!

Edited June 14, 2018 by koiz

[Guest]

6 hours ago, Intrepido said:

They are many guys sitting on 100 millions now.

Which would be a resonable price for a flag bought by a clan of several members with millions in their accounts?

victory marks could be used instead of just having them sitting captains chest collecting spiderwebs and dust. Cost of the "flag" could depend on portsize and if its shallow/deep water

[admin]

The problem with the flag is the abuse that is impossible to solve. 
You can either

• deny the port battle by purchasing the flag and keeping it if flags are exclusive
• deny the port battle by placing the flag first if flags are not exclusive
   

Long hostility is sometimes not fun especially if no-one comes to defend, but it serves the purpose: to give defender at least some chance to react. The goal is to not have more port battles but to have more full port battles.

Hostility generation will become a bit more bearable once we improve the PB rewards (already in test builds) by 1) dropping a rare item during port battles 2)giving capturable ports a better crafting bonus. 
 

[admin]

13 hours ago, Teutonic said:

 

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ABUSE CASES?

 

 

Fake flags will be a problem in your proposal. If flags are cheap you can set multiple fake port battles, if flags are expensive we will get "cant participate in a port battle" comments.

Hostility requires effort and this effort is the price that eliminates fake flags, if someone is faking a port attack he is actually THERE at sea grinding bots in a battle open forever.