(11-30-2019, 12:35 PM)Jeuge Wrote: the idea is good but impossible for some faction because their number is too small to face some faction
Its true that some factions would be not actively using the system, but I also anticipate the attention would go into where the majority of the player base is playing. Some factions would simply remain unchanged.
Also, bases that are inrp 'secret' bases would obviously not be able to be sieged. I'm all for adding a way to finally do something like that but I think there should be a few requirements that would make it very difficult, and in that case, very rare if ever a thing.
I would hope that small factions (unlawfuls) would at least though have the chance to get out and stage attacks on navy battleship bases, and chip away at them. The only real significant programming needed to perfect the system would be making repair ships work on those mortal bases, so they can be equally repaired by defenders. I did the math and pretty sure if repair ships did 10 000 RPS (repair per second instead of damage), that gives 3 600 000 repairs an hour. So a few repair ships would do pretty good in undoing the damage on random attacks on these ships, and players would need to organize their own group attacks to do significant sieges. For big sieges, I'm sure that would get quite interesting.
(11-30-2019, 12:41 PM)Silverlight Wrote: This would almost need to be a totally new game, discovery wont ever change its basics because it wont ever have the resources to do so, and there are just to many people who would rather see it dead than grow.
Well the intent would be to certainly revolutionize how we play discovery, and how our roleplay effects gameplay. Organization to the battles and therefore the corresponding RP would, I think, bring a new degree of accuracy in unfolding events, with a lot more player driven output, and that is always fun for players. Join a side, get involved. Recruit from other space game communities that we need good pilots for our own 'wars'. Wars, in this case, might be big like the Gallic war, but could also be small conflicts of unlawfu factions harassing house navies, trying to knock out one of their caps, while the house factions defend. With multiple 'mortal' targets, they could switch it up as they see fit, etc.
But its true that if one of the major things holding this back is a lack of people to facilitate it, we can fix that, but we need the staff to sign off on it first.
And just to reitereate, the basics of the system only require capital ship bases to be made mortal solars, and for devs to simply move them around at request of their owning factions, at regular intervals, so all sides are in the same boat and make moves as they go.
As to planets, I usually fall back on strategy games for examples, but in this case, they're more like cities, so the rules could simply be that the factions that can keep a battleship in orbit, claim the planet. So instead of making them attackable too, that can be axed for something simple, like most military units nearby indicates who holds the planet. It would just mean that eventually if a planet was challenged over, by enemy battleships moving into orbit, and was lost, would need an IFF change by the devs. Hopefully, as it goes, the only things devs would need to do on regular intervals is follow a list of location changes for battleships and cruiser bases, which GM's could process via the forum and send to the devs every week. I suggest a week but even 2 week intervals would still work.
All I can say at this point is, if it were decided to try this, I'm sure we could then put out word that we need people for the jobs involved. I'm under the impression though that the staff we have could handle this (maybe we need a few more GM's), its just getting into a new routine that would be the hard part.
AND, at the very least, even the staff could use this very same system on their own to make the wars happen. Where there might be a lack of players for some factions, staff could just operate them themselves. At least then it would appear that an organized 'war' was happening at the player level, and they might not even notice who's behind it. Its really so that the average player is in the middle of it, they may not even get the big picture of where battleships are, what they're doing. They may just hear that Faction A moved 3 battleships into System X, and now Faction B are also doing the same, and there will be a small war over a system, and it may jump to another after that battle is over in a few weeks. Then under that situation, at least each side's players can in real time try to take out the other's ships, rp around it all, and rp some alliances or deals to bring back up, or strike a deal with other factions to not join in, for a price, etc. The options such a system opens up is huge because it will be a new game within the game to learn the ups and downs of.
All the while I'm fine with making sure houses aren't wiped off the map. I believe this should be a relatively slowly unfolding system, and currently ZOI's limit most factions other than OC's from raiding capitals. But houses might have work to do to protect their other systems, and border systems, from unlawfuls getting too strong or brazen. And like I said, staff could divide up factions that are dead and only require 1 person making decisions at the top if players aren't there to fill the gap, and they can basically fight these wars under this system by themselves! But at least they'd follow these systems giving players an ordered structure to follow, that they can accurately anticipate and play around.
As to NPC base sieges, I'd say IF a faction eliminate its enemy's battleships in an area and it basically 'takes' a system, or half a system, the bases that fall into dispute could then be made siegeable for the purposes of IFF changes. That would also start a whole new situation because even though they may not have base ships there, players could still try to take out those attacking ships to buy time until the losing side can move more ships into that area, within a week or 2. Just make these bases very strong so they take a long time and a lot of group player effort, and we'll see some really cool situations develop here. The basica MO of the system is that you probably wouldn't want to start a base siege unless you knew your side had elminated most of the other side's caps in the area first, or it may backfire. On the other hand, they may want to try while they get a chance!
Binski Wrote:Example: Aland Shipyard
Say IMG moves 5 Sagarmanthas back into Omega-3. First of all, everyone would see them coming, they'd have to come from an IMG base, but say we allowed them a hyperspace jump, and they moved them up to the base. That would require probably 1 move from base to somewhere in Omega-3, then another a week later to approach the shipyard.
Ok, so Bretonia sees the ships when they enter the system, and they order more ships to Omega-3 to bolster its defense. (I'm also in favor of publically posting moves so people will get a fair chance to counter move, so Bret side would know the ships were moved and know to move their own at that time too if they want).
At that point, both sides would have mortal capitals around the base. Players go to work trying to eliminate the other's side. IF IMG and friends eliminated the Bretonian defending base ships (essentialy making them wrecks until removed on next patch), THEN, IMG could request to siege Aland for the purposes of recapture.
Even still, more Bretonian ships might be coming next turn or two, so they'd need to try to take it down within a week likely. All the while still Bret players would still be trying to defend the station and take out the IMG Sagarmanthas. IF by next turn, they failed to take down the base, and lose their capship bases, and Bretonia moved more in, they fail!
Under this system, a place like this may get fought over indefinitely, and would go back and forth depending on player efforts and decisions. And remember, they can't send every ship they'd have, since they still would need them to cover the rest of the House territory from other factions. Perhaps if they fail, they may only be able to retry to take the station in a few months. At least though, factions can have more real goals to work on over the long term. Meanwhile, the entire time, nothing would also stop players from building POB's or using POB's to bolster their defenses. Perhaps SUPER important bases would need to be reinforced by POB's like that to compensate for a lack of navy ships. With all of that opportunity, players should be able to find a lot to do, and have good reasons to advertise to friends about the place.