New ideas for Order Wars

Jensen

So before I start my point I'd like to preface this thread with one request. Could everyone be respectful, stay on point, and try to be constructive? It seems almost universally agreed upon that Order wars are trolly and not enjoyable if your order is less than active. With that in mind, lets see what people think could fix or replace them!

My Idea:
Order war is initiated. Both Divines or Order Heads agree on a date within X time frame. If no date is agreed upon it defaults to the last howling within that time frame. When the war begins all order members are teleported to a "capture the flag" type area. Congregation members do not count toward membership. In this area each order has a master shrine that needs to be assaulted/defended. Death of an order member will hurt this shrine, as will certain order priv abilities. Players will reset to random locations across this area on death and be out of play for some period of time. Order champions will be able to ascend into the avatar of their God by using some of their shrines power, they will receive buffs and abilities unique and themed to their God. This will last until death and their death will also use more of the shrines energy. This goes until one order destroys the other orders shrine. Upon win/loss one order receives x essence and one order loses x essence.

Thoughts?

Lim

In any mini-game, consider what kind of participants it's for. Is it for PvPers? For non-combatants? For both?

I think the ylem mechanic is decent basic mini-game because it caters both to PvPers (lessers, fracture), and non-combatants (minors). Since Orders are not only filled with PvPers, I think your idea needs a little more dash of a means by which the non-coms can contribute. Maybe bashing/hunting to procure that shrine energy you were talking about? Or searching for special shrine energy shards that are hidden across the land? Or hunting special mobs (theme customised to the God) that wander/hide around the world.

Is this going to be a one-off event? If so, then an issue might be that only a certain number of people will be involved, while others who are unable to make it will be left out. Timing is an issue, and will become more of an issue, the more people are involved. It is more difficult to get 7 people to be online at the same time than 2-3.

As a suggestion, I'd recommend making the war last a period of time. At the end of the time period, the first to destroy the shrine wins, or else whoever brings the other side's shrine lower.

Battles (where you get transported to that special battlegrounds) can be initiated from time to time with consent of each side each time. Think mini team FFAs. Hopefully, this will hopefully mitigate the general effects of bad/inconvenient timing.

Overall, I like the idea, and look forward to more conflict mechanics. Just remember to include as many people as you can!

Teani

Most things about Order wars have been angled towards combat and it would be nice if there were ways for non-coms to win a war sometimes too. PK-might shouldn't be the winning factor, as Holy war should be based around faith.

I wrote somewhere about making it possible for Order members to preach to NPCs and turn their loyalty. The difficulty would depend on previous alignment and other factors, like how long someone remains there to preach and if certain key words are used in the conversation or if someone else is present to counter or argue sentiments. It would be a lot trickier to code in, sure, but I think it would make things fun for non-coms.

This could be used as a way to expand on fractions, making a village more loyal to certain Divine, while having a black sheep somewhere in their midst worshipping a different Divine.

Just a small idea of mine.

Lim

As an aside, the need to introduce mechanics for non-combatants should apply to raids too. Say when a raid is going on, maybe random citizen mobs/off duty guards will appear around the city, and the non-combatants can help running around calling to arms a temporary militia of guards to help bolster guard numbers. I think the reason these current mechanics generate a lot of grief is that the outcomes tangibly affect non-combatants, yet leaves them helpless to respond. 

Ishin

I'm not sure how the outcomes tangibly affect non-coms? If they don't get involved with defense, they can't be killed for it, and not having guards doesn't exactly hurt a city...

Rashar

One argument to that though, Teani..

It's a holy -war-. You win the masses with faith. You might conquer the world with faith.

You win a war with ninja stars and kung fu chops.

Not to say that I don't think there should be parts in there that noncoms should be able to contribute and have a good influence on, but I think if you try to take combat out of war you're going in the wrong direction.

Teani

I did not mean that you should completely take combat out of the war. I just meant that there should be a way for non-coms to have a way to win the war as well.

If the Holy war is mostly combat-oriented, the non-coms will always feel like it's a drag. If they don't get involved in the fight, the Holywar is kind of removed from them and the characters might feel like failures for not helping defend their Divine. If they get involved, they stand little chance against those who are interested in PK. If there, however, is a way for them to get involved that holds similar weight as combat, there's an option for everyone to get involved.

Areka

And noncoms are still open PK during holywar, and with the at least current spread of PKers between specific Orders, it becomes more of a drag. Especially with how Holywar is declared/decided. However, I think some attention needs to be put into that mechanic - maybe declaring holywar should have some sort of logged reasoning function that is publicly viewable (same for surrender?).

Rashar

I don't know, Teani. I think it's pretty well known that I RP far more than I PK. I don't even know if I'm a combatant or a non combatant, or whatever falls in between. But I've never been one to hold PKers over Non-Pkers.

That being said.. you should not be able to win a war without fighting. Help maybe, sure. But non-coms can help now. I think we put them to pretty good use in the last Slyphe war, but we're just overwhelmed.

I think the system is flawed as a whole more than it is skewed to favor just PKers. I can do more damage to an Order in 24 hours with my hood and wings than I can by fighting.

Logged reasons sound really cool, but again - what point? Will they need approval? -Anything- can be justified, ICly.

Nalor

Areka said:

And noncoms are still open PK during holywar, and with the at least current spread of PKers between specific Orders, it becomes more of a drag. Especially with how Holywar is declared/decided. However, I think some attention needs to be put into that mechanic - maybe declaring holywar should have some sort of logged reasoning function that is publicly viewable (same for surrender?).

Or, Leave it to the GODS To declare war or not.. You say "OI God can we go to war with that God because He/She doesn't stand for what we believe in, blah blah blah blah" and then the God declares.. If the other god doesn't accept in 48 hours, he forefits and loses x amount of essence.

At least that'll stop people from declaring war for personal dumb reasons which has happened more then once this year...

Teani

I'm all for that, @Nalor, but what if someone actually does insult an inactive Divine? Shouldn't that Order be allowed some way to reciprocate?

Yeah, @Rashar, some amount of fighting, but if you have an Order with, say, 5 active members, of which one is somewhat able to fight, going up against an Order with 5 active members who are all good at combat, shouldn't there be some way for the even man-power to actually mean something? As it is the PK might is very scewed, as we probably all know, and it makes it less fun for those on the opposing side. Giving them a non-com option to weigh up (perhaps not all the way, but a fair bit) would perhaps at least make it more fun for everyone.

Nalor

Teani said:

I'm all for that, @Nalor, but what if someone actually does insult an inactive Divine? Shouldn't that Order be allowed some way to reciprocate?

@Teani pretty sure if a Divine is inactive, Raz or KingOleis can step in to take over the God.. I dont believe a divine is 110% inactive someone will always keep an eye on them.. no?

If not, Im sure Oleis or Raz can come up with something to cover it Considering its the GODS who make war.. so the other god can be like, "Oh noo Oleis I want to kill Dhar, Come accept this order war!..." and oleis can be dhars priests and tell the order "Guys be ready to die" / accept.. or something..

Teani

God roles are typically assigned to one person and yes, there are times when they can be inactive for long times. I do believe that Raz and Oleis might have better things to do than to pop in on one of the roles without being particularly read up on what that Order is up to to start a war, so yeah, another system for that might be better.

Nalor

Teani said:

God roles are typically assigned to one person and yes, there are times when they can be inactive for long times. I do believe that Raz and Oleis might have better things to do than to pop in on one of the roles without being particularly read up on what that Order is up to to start a war, so yeah, another system for that might be better.

If the god is inactive then he shouldn't be War with no?

Or have it so the OH can ACCEPT wars but not declare the Wars.. leave declaring wars upto the Gods. Since at end of the day its his/her Order! @‌teani

Point being if the God declares the war then its not going to be like the past few wars have been, out of rage. It's going to have some meaning behind it since its a God..

Moirean

I really fail to see what is so bad about declaring a war without huge RP reasons. Having fun is just as legitimate a reason as any other. That's the driving factor behind pretty much everything we do in Aetolia.

Nalor

Because as the whole reason behind the topic, its no fun for non coms who are in orders as it makes them ALL open pk and Non coms want some involvement in HolyWars instead of being meat shields for pk whores.

Moirean

Right, that's fine, but it's pretty unfair that people keep flipping out at people who use the wars and acting like it's breaking rules or something to declare one.

Nalor

Technically it should be if its used for ooc satisfaction or to make people feel important, but thats not what this topic is about!

The topic has and always has been about How to make holywars fair for them who dont do combat, and to find ways to get them involved without combat. Or little combat.

Exayne

Here's my opinion on Order Wars from an unbias point of view.

1. Order Wars are generally only unenjoyable and stated if they inconvenience the person with the biggest mouth to shout about it. I argee that there should be some sort of acceptace format for those who decide to randomly war again inactive Gods, but this rarely happens because Order Wars are normally the result of long standing RP or at least some warning prior to the War.

2. The way Order Wars currently work caters to both PvP and PvEers, and there is also RP throughout the whole event with the War being a conclusion or catalyst. How hard is it to run around and hunt for corpses and sit afk waiting for a shrine to be defiled or raised? If anything Order Wars are currently the most balanced form of conflict and most PvPers would leave PvEers alone unless they deliberately antagonize the person. No one forces people to interact with Order Wars, there's no law that states Order Members have to get involved and there is really nothing people or divine can do if you choose not to. If you're afraid of being hit you can A) stay in a city Go and hunt somewhere and alert people IF they attack you that you're not getting involved(Granted a few assholes may not listen) or C) Log off. No one is forcing your hand.

3. Stop having a go at people who try to bring interaction and enjoyment into Aetolia. It's tiresome and very disheartening to those who actually give a damn enough about others to put the effort in. Yes maybe Order Wars arn't you cup of tea but I bet there are some events people who do like Order Wars don't but they don't jump onto the forums and start shouting about how inconvenient and disrupting they are just because they don't like it. You can't cater to everybody's taste and the sooner people realize this the cleaner the forums will be.

4. Case closed.

Ex

Ishin

I get pretty annoyed hearing about the coms vs non-coms numbers issue. Darkies have a lot of coms. We have lots of coms because we don't crap on them when they do something silly/stupid that only coms do.

Just like the other day when me and @Trager got into it. In Enorian we'd probably one or both have gotten the boot. Moi pulled us aside and tried to make us RP at each other. We had this big verbal fight there all by ourselves where we said our pieces and then I had to go pick up my gf or something like that.

Point being, if you treat your coms like shit, you'll never have many coms outside of the diehards who are just gluttons for punishment. I wish I could show you guys the difference between the two sides, attitude-wise, when it comes to stuff like that. It's enormous.

Exayne

That's because lifers don't sit in a huge web and talk oocly so nothing gets done IC

Maite

This conversation was going somewhere at the beginning. It's devolving into the same crap the rage thread did. Please don't get another topic shut down.

W

Exayne said:

Here's my opinion on Order Wars from an unbias point of view.

1. Order Wars are generally only unenjoyable and stated if they inconvenience the person with the biggest mouth to shout about it. I argee that there should be some sort of acceptace format for those who decide to randomly war again inactive Gods, but this rarely happens because Order Wars are normally the result of long standing RP or at least some warning prior to the War.

2. The way Order Wars currently work caters to both PvP and PvEers, and there is also RP throughout the whole event with the War being a conclusion or catalyst. How hard is it to run around and hunt for corpses and sit afk waiting for a shrine to be defiled or raised? If anything Order Wars are currently the most balanced form of conflict and most PvPers would leave PvEers alone unless they deliberately antagonize the person. No one forces people to interact with Order Wars, there's no law that states Order Members have to get involved and there is really nothing people or divine can do if you choose not to. If you're afraid of being hit you can A) stay in a city Go and hunt somewhere and alert people IF they attack you that you're not getting involved(Granted a few assholes may not listen) or C) Log off. No one is forcing your hand.

3. Stop having a go at people who try to bring interaction and enjoyment into Aetolia. It's tiresome and very disheartening to those who actually give a damn enough about others to put the effort in. Yes maybe Order Wars arn't you cup of tea but I bet there are some events people who do like Order Wars don't but they don't jump onto the forums and start shouting about how inconvenient and disrupting they are just because they don't like it. You can't cater to everybody's taste and the sooner people realize this the cleaner the forums will be.

4. Case closed.

Ex

Not case closed. In the previous one, I, as order head, had zero rp other that the little conversation that was done through public posts. The most frustrating thing for me is that I had zero say in the whole thing beginning in the first place.

I am going to agree that there needs to be a way of accepting a war, or declining with valid reasoning. I am not saying that the mechanic should not be used. But it has been said time and time again that it is a bad mechanic and needs fixed. So please don't defend something that very few people enjoy.

Moirean

Maite said:

So please don't defend something that very few people enjoy.

That's just simply not true. Lots of people enjoy holy wars.

Trager

Is this real life?

Rashar

Yeah. All of Iosyne's Order and Valingar.

To be fair, I like the RP (well, the one out of four times we had a war with some RP) and the fighting of Holy Wars. I just hate the hours and hours of shrine work that surrounds them. I say a very easy bandaid fix to them would be to make raising shrines instant when not in war. Why does it have to take 20 minutes?

Gwenith

Trager said:

Is this real life?

Is this fantasy?

(Had to.)

Ishin

Rashar said:

Yeah. All of Iosyne's Order and Valingar.

To be fair, I like the RP (well, the one out of four times we had a war with some RP) and the fighting of Holy Wars. I just hate the hours and hours of shrine work that surrounds them. I say a very easy bandaid fix to them would be to make raising shrines instant when not in war. Why does it have to take 20 minutes?

And me! ...I'm just not trying to force the other couple of people in my order(non-coms) into fighting. Plus my order doesn't do a lot of holy-warring either. More effecient and stuff to just surrender and rebuild shrines after. I have to admit, I see Moi doing all these holy wars and I think to myself, 'Damn I'd love to get in on that. But Sev more.'

Aarbrok

I find Order wars a really shallow pool of conflict.... either you are a person enjoying them, splashing about and beating the other person senseless with a pool noodle. Or you are the person who just realized they are sitting in chlorinated urine.

I'm the person sitting on the patio furniture drinking a pina colada smoothie, shaking my head.

Aishia

Hate Order wars, I'd probably just not log in if my order had one.

Teani

And that's what this topic was supposed to be about. How to make Order wars more enjoyable for everyone, since if one follows some kind of Divine, it's part of the character's life.

Setne

There should be tasks and stuff tailored to each Order that people can do in Order Wars, while still having pk stuff, example: I have none. One of my big issues with trying to play Aetolia is the lack of things outside of bashing to really effectively gain experience to advance in levels.