Perhaps it’s time to change wars from being a 50 v 50 to 25v 25, or less? It’s easier to manage and easier for new players to get into them then. War as it is now, is a failed game mode that stopped being fun after the first month when people realised that cannons were worthless and instead it was better to use all war horns.
Personally, I think we should remove territory control completely and have wars as a cross-server, ranked game mode that can be queued any time of the day or night while using leaderboard wins to determine payouts - that being said I doubt we will see that till next year. In the meantime lowering the players needed for both sides would encourage smaller companies to participate in the game mode, increase the number of companies available to war against each other and make it a lot more accessible by most players.
I would also suggest buffing cannons and limiting the number of war horns to two.
I honestly don’t think that’s the play. There are two problems that are addressed in your post that I think can be solved in better ways.
1.) Wars being exclusive and the gap between established and developing companies is too great.
Solution: Practice Wars where companies can challenge each other to Wars on a predetermined zone of combat and time, with all the same rules and restrictions, without having to own a territory or push a territory and no territory changes ownership. Its completely simulated. Bonus would be to have free consumables. This would allow for companies to practice, improve, and engage in the large scale combat without all of the problems without having to push the strongest companies in the server.
2.) Companies that prefer to remain small have no meaningful group PvP content.
Solution: Enable Custom OPRs where one company can challenge another company to OPR matches. Each side would be able to completely control their 20 man roster, assign roles, and implement a strategy. This would allow for a similar level of skill and organizational possibilities as War but include smaller companies and even players that aren’t 100% PvPers if a company wants, since there are PvE related tasks involved.
Neither of these ideas require fundamental changes to the game. Its the same War game and the same OPR game just put in the hands of the players.
Divide the territories into the three teirs you suggested, I believe that’s by value?
A company can only attack at their teir or higher. Can not Dec down.
Once a company takes a higher teir territory, they cannot defend the lower teir territories any more. They basically give it up. Alternatively, ags could have them forfeit the lower teir territories and companies can buy them like at start of servers… this would be a huge gold sink. But would give companies with no chance in hell right a chance to own a territory. Maybe a percent of the money goes to the company vacating?
You could own all theee top teir but can no longer Dec on the lower teirs.
I know a lot of people would hate not being able to Dec or have any offensive wars if they owned all three teir s territory, but this would give companies space to grow and get better.
My only concern is this would codify the skill gaps between the teirs of companies… but think of the statement for a teir a company to break into the s teir… could be really cool.
This is so sad. I feel like there are a lot of good ideas here but the dev team is incapable of enacting a single one of them. Instead they will add another world boss ad nauseam.
Reducing the size has a lot of benefits, but comes at the cost of being massive. You are talking about reducing it by 50%, which moves it into less than opr level of battle size.
I suggested “war rolling”, a concept where companies can maintain multiple wars against people at the same time and have different reasons to war, from taking a zone, to just hunting and killing each other with an optional third “surrender” fee.
I know this is a hot take, but I think wars should be a random collection of players from each faction. It would be more inclusive and landowning companies would not have such an extreme advantage. If your faction wins, the entire faction gets rewards as long as they logged on during a certain period of time before/during the war. It would make people excited when their faction wins.
For competitive players, I would introduce cross-server company versus company wars. I’d add a ranking system and seasonal tournaments (like march madness brackets) for rewards (mostly cosmetics).
I think there should still be a massive advantage to owning territories, there should just be ways for smaller companies to compete without having to merge with other companies playing with people they normally wouldnt play with
It will always just snowball (wealth → better gear → holding zone - >more wealth). These people basically need to stop playing before someone new can take their spot.
As i said, a “Reforge” system would fix this. It would only need to meet a few key requirements.
Only cost azoth to reforge a perk on an item
Should allow full perk changes
Should probably require some profession based system of “learning” a perk to unlock it for reforging, so its not just day one everyone has the perks they want. consuming gear or the original craft mod with any perk relative would be good.
should not have any cd to reforge the perks itself.
The system should be designed in a way that allows people to freely experiment and express themselves.
The above system would correct the gear/power differential, but we still have the nasty politics behind getting on a war roster.
War needs to be redesigned from the ground up. Company control of territories is a complete failure. It needs to be readjusted to faction control not company. And two revolving hourly OPR/war style 50v50 pvp fights in randomized territories to gain influence. 200players an hour can participate with 4800 daily players can join said activity. It removes the exclusivity and tedious war rostering. Let the queue be decided by gear alone. X light builds, X medium builds, X heavy builds, X healing builds.
At the end of each week the faction with the most territory gains the control and thus the perks. The town buffs should be randomized excluding crafting buffs. Which need to be removed altogether or shifted to a PVE activity for yet another buff to get people to 590-600 craft score.
Wars involve too many people.
50 vs 50 is a game mode that is meant to make people drive away.
We are talking about that there are servers with player peaks of 400, in a war 25% of the server would be participating, it is nonsense.
1- The monetary benefit that gives ownership of the territories by companies must cease to exist. (The rewards should only be cosmetic, momentary mounts, titles…)
2- The territories must be smaller, at least they must be divided into 4 each territory.
3- Wars must be less people 25 vs 25
4- CLAN HALL must exist and that these can only be disputed by small companies.
5- The number of members of the clan must define if they can dispute a territory or a Clan hall.
6- The factions must cease to exist. And give way only to the clans.
Maybe, but you know that I also thought that in a big company it’s wrong that it’s always the same players attacking and defending.
I would add a:
7- In the same company, only 5 players from the last war can be repeated, the rest must be other members of the clan (unless it is clear that it is in defense of the conquered territory).
It wouldn’t work because what would stop the top tier companies just sending 30 players to go fight a a smaller companies in the lower tier zones?
The main issues with wars:
Mercing. The 25 mercing limit for attacks and 10 for defenders was a nice idea. It makes it far harder to defend land when the company that slots in house vs a company that slots 25 mercs. I’ve seen companies slot 25 mercs and flip a land, and then 2 days later lose it to the team they just beat because they went and slotted 25 mercs as well, and it was a common trend for a few weeks. Companies have also found a way around the merc limit with Alts.
But teams who merc out every ear vs companies that try to slot in house have a big advantage.
Alts- loads of players have multiple Alts on the same server, lots of people have different steam accounts and so they join 2 different companies. By doing this it helps companies use more mercs. It’s kinda complicated but a company is only allowed 25 on attack and 10 of defense. They have their main company and put Alts in other companies that are also competitive .These Alts allow companies slot actually slot like 30-40 mercs sometimes.
There isn’t enough good pvpers left. Most servers has a lot of good players but typically they are all grouped up into one or 2 companies that just dominate the server. And they have so much more experience and knowledge, they demolish anyone who try’s to come and challenge.
Wars are very political and drama filled and exclusive. This will always be a problem as long as players are in control.
Pushing territory is horrible. You have to push for hours for a 30 minute war. Everyone hates it. If a team gets war camped. Pushing land becomes even more demoralizing. It needs to change, and it needed to change 2 years ago.