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Thread Statistics | Show CCP posts - 6 post(s) |
Cross Atu
Conspiratus Immortalis
1689
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Posted - 2013.09.08 19:17:00 -
[1] - Quote
I've given this quite a bit of thought since this thread first went up, so here goes.
CCP FoxFour wrote:
Hey guys,
It is no secret that one of the things we would like to do is fiddle with the orbital strikes design. This includes a few small things like normalizing how we name everything (precision strike, orbital strike, orbital bombardment, other random names), making sure players know when they have an orbital strike available by always displaying something on the HUD instead of having the message show up and then disappear which often gets missed (I had 3 OBs the other night and had no idea... I am a bad squad leader...).
HUD updates are great, as is the normalizing of terms, so long as it is just the terms and does not bleed over into homogenizing game mechanics.
Quote:One of the other things we would like to do is make it so that NPC provided orbital strikes, the precision strike from the war barge, is only available in what is currently known as instant battles. That would mean that in in Factional Warfare and Planetary Conquest battles the only orbital support would be from EVE players. This is a pretty straight forward change but there is more we want to do. I'd go slow with this, try adding a time delay to the NPC strikes such that EVE support will give you faster and more powerful strikes while the NPC still provides some option.
Once at that state give it awhile to simmer while you collect data. The change to allow only EVE support as a source of OBs would actually help my alliance in PC and FW but it feels like too big a change too quickly. Being methodical > sweeping changes, pretty much every time.
Quote:We would like to also make it so that EVE orbitals are NOT earned via war points. Orbitals in instant battles would still be earned via WP... unless we come up with something else but at this time we are currently not thinking of touching it. For EVE orbitals though we are looking at making it so that the EVE pilot earns the orbital strike by capturing a beacon above the district. This would work very much the same way Factional Warfare complex beacons work. Also very similar to how it worked for the Fanfest tournament.
So how would this effect the frequency of OBs being dropped in, could only one ship capture that beacon, could only one fleet, could opposing forces both hold it if they choose not to shoot at each other in the sky? Making the EVE side of OBs more interactive is a great idea but how does this impact game flow and tactics in general? For that matter why make it exclusively one way or the other, how about a hybrid system wherein either EVE pilots or Merc squad leads could earn OBs for their team?
continued in post 2
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Cross Atu
Conspiratus Immortalis
1689
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Posted - 2013.09.08 19:36:00 -
[2] - Quote
post 2
Quote:This idea however introduces a problem. Currently because it is squads that earn orbital strikes the squad leader gets to call it in. That is very well defined. If the EVE player earns the orbital strike who gets to call the strike in? There are several options to this.
- Any squad leader fighting for the same faction as the EVE pilot gets to call it in. This however leads to all the squad leaders rushing as quickly as possible to call it in as the EVE player is probably going to fire on the first target to appear. This means that often times they may be wasted and experienced players will probably rage... a lot.
- The squad leader of the squad with the most war points gets access to the orbital strike. They are the ones with the most WP and so probably the most deserving of it... but that will probably snowball in a match and no one else would ever get it.
Again a hybrid system is better, if the SL can earn OB support s/he can call that OB as normal, meanwhile if the EVE pilot earns an OB from the beacon then that OB can be offered to the ground teams via the highest WP mechanic listed above with an additional tiered or cool down system in place so that it is more likely those EVE side earned OBs are spread around at least a little bit.
This method however is more for FW than PC, I'll get to PC in a moment.
Quote:In a Planetary Conquest match we could open it up to all squad leaders and say "hey, your match control your people" and that would be the end of it. However in a Factional Warfare match you don't control who gets in and who doesn't so it's not fair to say that and we would like to have the same system for handling this with both types of battle.
You may have to give up on that idea of one system for both battle types. At least if you're pushing for a system that is purely EVE based you are in a heavy bind. The more tactical command and control there is for a battle the more dynamic the system is required to be otherwise you're hobbling game play, the less CnC there is in a match the more you have to mechanically structure to avoid an unplayable mess, such as FF turned on in Pubs.
Unless you fundamentally alter the Dust FW mechanics such that corps and mercs have standings and have to join a militia as per EVE you're going to run into this heavy divide because often times the Mercs in FW aren't going to have "skin in the game" so to speak.
The key problem here is that any system which limits the ability of SL to call in support during coordinated PC matches is a degradation of current game play, and frankly there aren't many options when it comes to limiting player deployment of OB support that don't... well, limit player deployment of OB support. Which in turn unfairly punishes coordinated alliances that actually have a strong presence within both EVE and Dust.
Quote:We are currently favouring the idea of giving it to the squad with the most war points, but as said above nothing is final at this point. Having this be the exclusive method places an excessive burden on a single SL during all coordinated team matches. For a more 'Pub' style environment it's a fun little bonus, but for a PC battle it means that all your OB support is tied to one Merc and that is a messy tactical bottleneck which does not promote either fun or coordinated play.
Quote:The three things I am most interested in hearing about are:
- What do you think about removing war barge strikes from FW and PC?
- What do you think about EVE players earning the orbital strike?
- What do you think about who should earn calling in the orbital strike?
That of course does not mean don't discuss other things relating to orbital strikes, but I would prefer to keep that discussion focused around those 3 points. So please, let us know what you think.
- Do not remove them at this time, add a 'cooldown' or time delay on the strikes so that EVE assets are not only more powerful, as is already true, but faster as well. Assess this new method for awhile and polish as needed.
- Hybrid method over homogenized method. If you make OB earnings exclusive to EVE players and make drops exclusive to the highest WP SL not only does it snowball but it bottlenecks dynamic command and control. Further more it creates a system where tech glitches have a more negative impact on game play. If you're OB calling SL gets d/c'ed you're without OB until the game refreshes someone else into that slot. Even worse if you're EVE OB ship gets a socket error you lose all OB support/earnings until someone new is in position causing the frantic "drop it now" sloppy OBs even in full team PC matches because you never know when the OBs you've earned are going to suddenly vanish.
- Hybrid method is best, SL call in the OBs they've earned. High WP earning squad calls in the OBs earned EVE side. Some scaling work will likely need to be done for frequency of OBs and for ratio of EVE to Dust, but that's fine.
Cheers,
Cross |
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