It seems like there could be some interesting lore associated with the conflict between drones, capsuleers, mercs, and NPC empires. So i'm hoping that alignment, LP, has some role to play in PvE and PvP. The 514 Chronicle suggest that perhaps slaughtering Drones may be a little inhumane to some people. Perhaps an alignment system would create some greater sense of investment and immersion for mercs if they choose to participate.

TLDR; let players subscribe to GÇÿbusiness plansGÇÖ which automatically set preferences for match types, faction contractors and faction loyalties. Each plan gives special objective, alignment and skill bonuses to reward certain gaming preferences.

Maybe players could sort of 'tailor' the way the game searches for battles for them so that they could be more likely to fight for one faction than another. The interesting thing could be that alignment or extra bonuses could come from a little bit different things depending on who's alignment you are looking for. There could be a handful of 'presets' for the way you want the game to seed you for battle (along with influencing other things). You could only change the preset or GÇÿBusiness PlanGÇÖ once per week (1st login in after downtime). Then the greater your alignment with a faction the more isk you could make. Matchmaking preferences for squads would be aggregated, but rewards bonuses would be individual. Assuming that a battle option could be cooperative pve, here is a couple of example 'Business Plans' of what I'm thinking...

....So your alignment would slowly increase for whichever factions you are working most for. With some of these plans some of your alignments would go negative with enemy factions while others would go positive. Your alignment would then correspond to your isk gain at the end of each match. A +10 alignment would be +50% more isk than normal, while a -10 would be -50% normal yield. Pairing up with a squad with likeminded GÇÿBusiness PlansGÇÖ would increase your chances of getting the same preferred matches, and therefore better ROI and faster alignment increase, which means more isk. Additionally, corporate alignment would be aggregated and correspond to payouts during faction warfare outcomes. The greater your alignment to a faction the more it would pay out if you win for it. This would make it so those corps selling out to the highest bidder wouldnGÇÖt be as well off as those who have focused on serving a particular faction.

Additionally, this could be a mechanic that rewards the DUST mercsGÇÖ loyalty to FW underdogs as their loyalty may be in high demand as their systems would be under greater threat. Therefore, you could have a corp encouraging all of its members to select GÇÿAmarr VictorGÇÖ as their business plan to increase its loyalty to a faction and get better payouts during FW.

I was under the impression that we could fight on barren, ice, storm and aquatic worlds as well.

That's fine, as long as there are plenty of pure PvP opportunities. Lot of FPS players detest PvE in all its forms, me included.

"I'm sure I need not remind you that the Empire's own Templar program was the first ever successful implementation of this technology," continued Sarum. "All the mistakes you're making, we've already made. All the lessons you're learning, we've already learned. Perhaps the most significant of these lessons is that the Sleepers do in fact pose a threat, and that threat is far greater than we had presumed."

The three men exchanged guarded glances.

"Tell me," said Sarum, looking at each of them in turn as she spoke. "Your recruits for this new breed of soldier. How have they been behaving, post-implant? Any instances of mental instability? Sudden forceful dissociative symptoms? Healthy young men speaking in tongues, thrashing their heads about hard enough to break their own necks?"

Roden and Heth were stone-faced; Shakor crossed his arms, his expression grim.

"Those implants carry the fragmented consciousness of the Sleepers within them," said Sarum. "In some of them, the Sleeper presence is so strong that it can overwhelm the implant's host."



This just screams PvE

So , We could also make FW interesting with PvE, for example fighting against Empyrean armies!
Imagine the caldari mobilizing for war, they would assemble in a matter of hours 3-4 million troops, And us mercenaries would be payed to hold the lines until Gallente forces can lay waste to the Caldari fury.
Or for example a contract by the Amarr empire to destroy a garrison full of minmatar troops, Or to explode a power generator to allow the main fighting force to take an important planet.

I love the possibilities of working together with my friends against the AI...

32 man co-op. Example: A battle ship is crashed/landed/hovering on a map and you got 5 drop ships full of mercs flying around landing on top trying to capture/destroy or protecting a Notics while it salvages it.

I'm kinda sad that CCP isn't taking priority on the drones war...
Well Let's hope they change their mind or bring the drones soon without the (tm)

Great job with bringing all these posts together. I've gone through 4 so far but plan to read them all. Would have most likely never seen them if not for this thread.

I'm really hoping that capsuleers will be able to contract out small merc squads for "dungeon crawls" in Sleeper Drone infestations. Something like four mercs with eight backup clones having to either clear out the facility of hostiles or fight their way to whatever tech macguffin and hold the position for a set amount of time. If they're successful, the contracting EVE player gets a juicy BPO or whatnot.

When is Horde Mode coming?

I had this crazy dream during the replication build when heavies were remotely durable that I was driving an lav around when suddenly a XXXL sized heavy is standing on a building, covered in dark brown armor (think sansha nation ships) that took considerable firepower to take down, including a dropship when missiles made them into gun ships.

I'd like to think of guys like this as like a npc area boss that has to be killed to progress or finish the mission. Coupled with the fact that it takes teamwork or heavy solo firepower to take down would make this a great addition to some PVE missions.

That's one awesome dream X)

Honestly I think they would be another great way to build up some teamwork away from PvP for a change. On top of that, it might also get newer players into the feel of "I need this fitting to win this mission" and start to work within the framework of a small squad "dungeoning" around together. You go out with some guys you met in corp, do some missions, get some fun new items and go play some PvP together to get enough SP to use them...already got a nice little addiction cycle ^^

And of course Sansha Horde mode...Aww man, just the ability to get Dust and Eve on the same team here is too easy to pass up...I mean, we evacuate citizens and hold off massive swarms of the zombies...if they get too crazy or overun us (or just want to see some bodies fly) we call in hell from the skies.

Hell, we could even be a precursor to boarding ships if we had to clean out infestations in space...and of course, making the Sansha Mothership a combination of Dust and Eve players boarding and disabling the ship's shields or what have you...

It would be the **** son

Repair Drones!!

I still want to have a "Dronemaster" suit like the Necromancer in Diablo 2 :D

Someone mentioned in a dream or something, but what about bosses ? How would be possible to implement them in a game such as DUST 514

~ The 3 that come to mind are:

Sansha Incursions: Sansha Invasions would probably be the zenith of Dust 514 PVE as they affect entire regions and would require lots of good fighting. Something like fighting the Borg or zombies, more intelligent and armed. Missions could be all out fighting, defensive, or even simply evacuating colonists. This would also extend to the "0.0 Colonies as well" as an invasion would also mean destruction of a lot of hard-earned work.

Rogue Drones: Much tamer, but probably initially easier to do. Could be anything from a cleanup to a horror mission where you need to fight the elements in space or on land and would be able to loot the drones. This also could work in both High-Sec and Null-Sec.

Sleepers: The ultimate exploration mission (and possible ability to work with Capsuleers in Eve), this would involve something of a space adventure through an ancient structure existing in sub-space with strange and deadly robotic creatures crawling through the ruins. I'd imagine something like a Necron (read all the lore) and even more specifically the Necron wraiths. Pretty horrific and fun :D