RVR - Incremental conquest and large scale fleet battles

[Gregory Rainsborough]

One of the things that is sorely missing in Naval Action is large scale, equal BR fleet battles.

Port battles are good an' all but are usually close to land and focused around forts and capture points.

What if we created a new kind of event, call it a large scale fleet engagement. What I have in mind uses the teleport zones currently set up but could be altered however.

Let's say A wants to flip George Town. Rather than generating hostility and creating a port battle the following day you generate hostility for a "fleet engagement" which is basically a copy of the patrol zone or hell, like the port battles used to be but without towers and the BR depends upon the size of the port and or sea zone (taking teleport zones as example). If the attacker wins the engagement for the fleet engagement then a port battle is set the following day. If the defenders win, there is a cooloff as normal.

 

This does several things.

It allows for the creation of large scale fleet engagements in open sea that have a purpose beyond screening and ganking.

Creates content without doing much as the system is already in place for patrol zones.

Allows defenders the ability to stage their defence over two days. So surprise port battles won't happen and turn people off bother. This has happened numerous times since I've been on the server, team A wants to attack team B, randomly attacks port, B having no knowledge is completely unprepared and is steam rolled with no chance of getting back on their feet.

I would also suggest that ports must be taken incrementally so we don't get ports held by say, Prussia or pirates, right next to a reinforcement zone, Spain, without having some other presence in the area. This could be tied towards free ports so that they become RvR hotpoints concentrating these large scale engagements further.

The only disadvantage I can see is that it would slow down the pace of conquest, and no shows means a waste of time for the attacker. In which case, you could always automatically give the port to the attacker if the naval engagement is uncontested which would speed up and prevent people from not dropping ports and wasting the time of attackers with empty port battles.

Empty port battles are awful, as are screening if the BR is massively one sided. This would at least make screeners more effective and give them a purpose in RvR.

Edited October 7, 2018 by Gregory Rainsborough

[Gregory Rainsborough]

In addition, you could always limit this to just county capitals, which would give them some meaning and value again.

[Guest]

I like the idea, but there is a few problems.. The first ofc is - what if team B doesn't want to meet the opponent in a large OW battle? How long should team A sit in OW... 

The second part I really like in principle - incremental or battlefront conquest. The problem I see it is the timers. Already key ports are placed on timers that has little or nothing to do with defensive timers (take Santanillas and Placer in the Caymans for example), but more to do with avoiding a battle all together. This problem would exacerbate exponentially if the timers could be placed on a frontline of a few ports that are easier to maintain.

[Batman]

It took exactly 28 minutes to start a discussion about timers.

Well done, Gentlemen.

Edited October 7, 2018 by Batman

[Tom Farseer]

One could say you must have....

*puts on sunglasses*

timed it!

*CSI Miami theme starts in background...*

[Guest]

45 minutes ago, Batman said:

It took exactly 28 minutes to start a discussion about timers.

Well done, Gentlemen.

It didn't ofc take much effort, but I'd still like to give thx to our very own @Christendom, @King of Crowns and ofc @Gregory Rainsborough for making this prestigious discussion possible!

It doesn't however change the validity of my point - can you honestly say that the scenario I put forward won't be the result?

[VirtuallyIdiotic]

46 minutes ago, Tom Farseer said:

*CSI Miami theme starts in background...*

Come on you have to know the song. 

[Gregory Rainsborough]

We could bring back war supplies and they could always be used to remove timers for a day?

[Christendom]

Since I've been summoned here from the dark realm...

The more and more I think about RVR / Timers, the more I feel like having a black and white timer system is the wrong way to go.  There needs to be a third option in there somewhere where an attacking force can set a port battle without having to give up 2 nights or mornings to take the port.  The flag system was great in this regard, but it was abused.  We need something similar that can't be abused, but still allows players to set a battle the same day.  I think if players only had to dedicate 1 afternoon or night to take an off-time port, we would have less whining.    

In regards to OPs post, I like the idea....but it won't work.  It still requires players to be on 2 days in a row to take the port, which is the problem.  

[Gregory Rainsborough]

An alternative solution to Lars' point (I will point out @Lars Kjaer that no SNOW ports are behind timers though I know some GB clans value their ports more than their fights).

Ports could be divided into "safe", "core" ports and "secondary" ports. Safe ports are those that currently have reinforcement zones. Core ports are those that the country historically owned and secondary ports are those that are linked to safe. Free ports are considered safe ports.

Safe ports cannot be attacked and provided the first link in the chain of ports.

Core ports can have timers but timers are removed for enemy nations who have secondary ports next to it. These would form the bulk of ports I imagine.

Secondary ports cannot have timers as are considerd a border port.

The idea is to turn RvR into a tug of war rather than the current sniping of valuable ports. All ports would become valuable by doing this as it creates actually buffer zones around ports. I would also increase the desire to attack across the map to secure a small number of ports surrounded by the enemy. In other words, encourage conflict, more content.

To bring the historical accuracy back, we could grant a seasonal/annual "core" port to nations for different ports. Bridgetown for instance could be a "de jure" GB port encouraging GB to invade it and they would obtain bonuses (such as higher rate of 4/5 drops etc) for controlling that county whereas France gain one for Port-au-Prince region.

[Gregory Rainsborough]

This I suppose is actually two suggestions rather than one and might have been a mistake to put both in one thread in hindsight but they could play nicely off each other.

[Anolytic]

I too miss the good old 25v25 fights. And I like this proposal because it reminds me of parts of a proposal I myself wrote back before regions were introduced in the game.

http://forum.game-labs.net/topic/14754-proposal-for-regional-conquest-in-naval-action/

Your proposal could also be used to help address the issue of screening. We don't really see it that often now with these low player numbers, but if the game ever gets released and gets  back to old player numbers, screening is going to make RvR completely impossible against low BR ports.

[Teutonic]

I do not believe Timers are the issue, Timers being an issues is a byproduct of low population.

Eve Online has tons of timers for structures and space, but it's not an issue for a couple reasons:

1. Higher population and a more even spread of all timezones

2. There are mechanics in the game to disrupt the timers or make them a "larger" window.

3. there are a variety of ways to fight an enemy and disrupt them, in Naval Action we only have one way right now. We need more ways to disrupt and fight our enemies.

IF we could have mechanics in Naval Action to enlarge the time window for short periods of time - I am sure that would help remedy some issues.

Currently you pick a time and then the window is that +3 hours after.

currently you pick 17:00 and your timer is 17:00 - 20:00.

This creates a couple things:
The "latest" timer you can choose is 5:00 - it creates a 5:00 - 8:00 timer
The "earliest" timer you can choose is 11:00 - it creates a 11:00 - 14:00 timer

Imagine if we had a couple choices for RvR now:

- Hostility missions - Can only be done within the time Window. No limits to players inside (usual 25v25 maximum). 2 Successful Missions creates a port battle. when a hostility missions STARTS it is immediately reported in combat news that a hostility mission is being done for "Z" port. There are no NPCs to fight.

This mission would allow for a maximum of 25 people on each side (instead of only 10 we have now) and the Circle would be different from port battle circles where you gain points for every person you have in the circle up to a maximum of 5 players and you need 1,000 points to "win" and defenders win by points or if the battle goes on to the end. Each player would be 2 point per 5 seconds up to a maximum of 10 points per 5 seconds (so 5 people needed to gain max points). The circle is contested if defenders come and have players in the circle, whoever has more players/ships in the circle continues to gain 2 points per 5 seconds.
Each ship sunk gives points based on the rate of the ship:
7th-6th - 5 points
5th-4th - 10 points
3rd-1st - 20 points
Defenders cannot gain points by holding the circle, they can only gain points by sinking ships. Ships sunk giving points is just like how port battle points are given when a ship is sunk (example - 40 points given to one side, other side loses 40 points). The reason for this is to force the Defenders to engage the enemy if they want to stop the mission from succeeding, no kiting. Attackers are encouraged to finish the mission by holding the circle AND sinking the defenders if they show up.

If no Defenders show up, the mission can be finished in 8 minutes and 30 seconds with 5 players in the circle and the circle is capped.

- Blockade missions - Blockades missions can only be done within the time window, successful Blockades makes the time window larger for X days. (if a timer was 17 - 21 from our previous example it would be 16 - 22 the next day). You can do up to 2 successful raids max (so with the previous example, the timer could go to a 15 - 23 window). After a successful blockade that timer stays at it's new time window for 48 hours, if the players do a successful blockade again within the 48 hours, they increase the time window again (to the 2 maximum). After the 2nd Raid, there is a further 48 hour window for the new timer, after the 48 hour timer, the time window reverts back. When a Missions STARTS it is immediately reported in combat news that a blockade mission is being done for "Z" port. there are no NPCs to fight.

If a port has a timer that would be widened outside the "no timer 11 - 8" window. the Timer would still widen, but no earlier than 11:00 and no later than 8:00. Due to players possibly abusing these times, the window would widen to represent the extra 2 hours for each raid. a couple examples:
Example 1 --> A 5:00-8:00 timer would become a 3:00-8:00 timer on the 1st successful raid, and a 1:00-8:00 time on the 2nd successful raid.
Example 2 --> A 18:00 - 21:00 timer would become 17:00 - 22:00 and then a 16:00 - 23:00 timer.
Example 3 --> A 0:00 - 3:00 timer would become 23:00 - 4:00 and then a 22:00 - 5:00 timer

This mission would work exactly like the above mentioned Hostility missions, but only 10 People maximum instead.

- Raiding Missions - Raiding missions can be taken and done at any time, even outside the time window that a port has on it. Raiding missions would be similar to current hostility missions (in effect the hostility missions we have now would become these raiding missions). You would do Raiding Missions until you get to 100% "Raiding hostility." Once you get to 100% Raiding Hostility the port is "Pillaged."

When a Port is Pillaged 2 things happen.

1. The player gets a portion of "loot" based on how much hostility they raised. Someone who raised more hostility gets more loot and better loot (rare woods or resources for example)/ The Loot they gain is placed in the closest outpost they own from the mission

2. A port that has been Pillaged loses their trading and labor hour bonuses for 2 days and gets a trading/labor hour malus (the effect of a pillaged port starts after downtime and lasts 2 days) and the port is given a 3 days cooldown (3 downtimes) before it can be pillaged again.

Example:
- Raiding missions taken, combat news notifies players once 25% raiding hostility is reached.
- Attackers can get to 100%, or Defenders can stop the missions just like current Hostility.
- If Raiding is successful to getting 100%, port is "Pillaged" and after downtime losses all bonuses for 48 hours. Port cannot be pillaged again for 72 hours. It would look as such for each day
------1--------------2---------------3----------------4----------------5---------
Raiding -> Pillaged -> Pillaged -> Normal -> Port can be raided again.

Edited October 7, 2018 by Teutonic

[Busterbloodvessel]

How about timers only being allowed to be set if the port contains a national presence.

For example, this could mean that the occupying clan would need to have

• a minimum number of national players who have set up the port as an outpost and/or,
• have a minimum BR of national docked vessels acting as the home fleet during hours of port closure for the timer to be effective and/or
• have a minimum number of buildings in the port.

All of the above are already limited in-game so the number of ports that could have a timer would also be limited. 

Buster (watch free)

 

 

Edited October 7, 2018 by Busterbloodvessel

[Riparian]

Those nice and big 25 vs 25 open world fleet actions would be fun to get. 

I like the basic idea that attacking nation would need to win big OW battle in order to open county for port battles. 

Also, there could and should be more "rates" of port battles: like shallow, max 4th rate, max 3rd rate and no rate limit battles depending on port.

 

[Anolytic]

14 hours ago, Busterbloodvessel said:

How about timers only being allowed to be set if the port contains a national presence.

For example, this could mean that the occupying clan would need to have

• a minimum number of national players who have set up the port as an outpost and/or,
• have a minimum BR of national docked vessels acting as the home fleet during hours of port closure for the timer to be effective and/or
• have a minimum number of buildings in the port.

All of the above are already limited in-game so the number of ports that could have a timer would also be limited. 

"There's an alt for that."

All this would do is help sell even more alts I think.

[Tom Farseer]

On 10/7/2018 at 5:01 PM, Davos Seaworth said:

Come on you have to know the song.

yeah yeah... I knew it was The Who, but didn't remeber the title off the top of my head and was too lazy to look it up.