Corporations will probably decide that, first npc then after that player corps. As for the specifics, that's anyone's guess. Maybe it'll be a bit like Slay where you conquer a district, put defensive assets on the outer perimeter and then move on to the neighbouring district, pushing the enemy back one district at a time. So then you could only start a battle in a district directly adjecent to the ones you already own and your offencive force has to be equal or larger than the defencive force of the district you're trying to conquer.

Hmmm ... so who gets the initiative of attacking? The winner of the battle in that district?

I think that we should test this in the beta before release to make sure it works, no matter how it's implemented...

This is the gravy that I've been wanting to test. I'm hoping as well for something like Slay, but with the whole map covered already conquered by one corp, and the money goes to breaking that up for the invading force. The initial fight for the invading army will be like Ambush in that they can only field so many clones per district until they can secure a beachhead to deploy their own CRUs. Assuming the invading force can establish a beachead the planet conflict will develop more into a skirmish type battle with objectives as the MCC pushes further toward the orbital cannons protecting the planet. If the attacking force can manage to take over the orbital defenses, we get to call in the EVErs to bombard other defenses that would be too costly to take for land combat. Once they complete the bombardment we get to go through and mop up any stragglers(terrorists) that can still be on planet and fighting to take back further districts as a counter attack.

Also this is a very simplified version of it as well. Imagine more of an alliance attacking a planet with say 5 or 10 corps defending and 10 to 15 corps attacking with that amount of MCCs engaged with numerous war barges.

I'm interested in how this is going to play out for Null-sec. You'll notice that in the FanFest presentation, all they gave a detailed progression of was Faction Warfare battles. They talked about how there were established districts with slots for structures on planets that Dust players would be able to customize on behalf of their contractor when battling, but it looks like those would be roughly equivalent to the Planetary Interaction colonies EVE players have been working with since the Tyrannis expansion.

Now, take a step back and think about that one. My 6 colonies that I use for making starbase tower coolant could be maps for Dust players.

Every single PI colony made by an EVE player is effectively that EVE player having created and shaped a Dust map.

Mind = Blown

Devs have already said during the last fanfest that PI and Dust will be separate at launch. meaning your PI infrastructure will net affected at all by Dust - at least initially. perhaps in the future it will all be integrated, but not at launch.

I'm hoping it is like slay, and you can have up to six corps fight for a planet. Winning hexagons as they go, and you have to keep your hexagons connected like slay. Winner is who ever gets all the hexagons.

It will require a strategic commander, and a squad full of killers.