I had an idea rolling around in my head tonight that I thought I'd throw out there for community critique. It's meant to cater to all the different playstyles to give those groups the type of gameplay they enjoy.

The idea is a new type of RvR quest. Here's how it would work for each type of playstyle.

Solo
When you start the quest you are assigned to either protect, or capture an NPC whose job is to research a magical force that could be used to create a relic that would benefit the entire realm. When you start the quest you will be transported to a remote area of the frontiers where the NPC will spawn. If you arrive in your realm, your job is to protect the NPC, if you arrive in an enemy realm, you need to capture him. A solo member of another realm that has started the quest will be transported to the same area. Naturally, the two players will fight. The winner of that fight will then be able to interact with the NPC to teleport back and either capture or return the NPC home with his findings.

Group vs Group
Since small man groups are fairly popular as well, this could be broken down into 4v4 or 8v8 options (or whatever, haven't done any small man in quite some time, not sure what's people usually do) The quest is the same in every way as the Solo one. Capture or return NPC.

Zerg vs Zerg
This is where winning the solo and group missions come into play. When a determined number of NPCs are returned or captured by a certain realm, a relic is created. I don't know what the benefit would be exactly but it should be something tangible to all players in that realm. That relic is automatically placed in one of the winning realms inland keeps. The relic would last for a determined amount of time, like a week for example, and will be able to be captured just like the other relics in the game. That gives the zergers their preferred playstyle of keep capture/defense to control the relic. Once the determined time is up for the relic (it doesn't reset when captured, it's time is up regardless of who has it or how many times it changes hands) it disappears and the solo/group missions come back.

Now this is just a rough idea... I realize things like groups happening upon a solo fight could happen or another group AJn another groups fight. Or, a player running and hiding when they realize their group is getting beat. Realm hopping to whatever realm has the bonus until it expires.... etc. These type of issues would need to be addressed but I think this would give soloers and group players they gameplay they seek while working toward a realm wide goal to benefit everybody. Plus, it could introduce people to a different playstyle... people may try out soloing and putting together an 8 man to do the quest when their realm is falling behind on the capture/rescue count.

Thoughts?

 

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I think DAoC has a lot of unused potential in such quests/missions, but they are extremely difficult to design. Most existing quests have little to no impact on RvR. They just reward players for what they are already doing, or increase the general traffic in the frontiers by 0.00007% by sending players to random locations. I would love to see Mythic try to shape small scale RvR by creating a new cool trend based on mission objectives of some kind.

I'm not a big fan of escort missions though. They lack "flow", and it is impossible to setup somewhat even fights. Too many things can go wrong (especially if teleportation is involved).

Also, I believe it is extremely difficult to create quests/missions that are attractive to full groups or more. They need a huge reward to even bother, and it is not likely that they will encounter an enemy force of somwhat equal numbers.

To be successful, I believe that RvR quests/missions should focus primarily on the solo players (plankton theory), and therefore it is important that many individual soloers can do the quest at the same time without ruining things for each other.

My suggestion would be to let soloers gather resources (like wood and stone) from deep within enemy frontiers, thus creating a lot of traffic in designated areas. Then you could have an occasional caravan escort mission (transportation of resources), and finally you could have sawmills or other structures that can be sabotaged.

 

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wouldn't work.

people would literally start the quest, get teleported, and then stay alive while they wait for their friends to show up.

 

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I like the idea of more quest type things in the frontier to get people out there but I don't know the best way to implement it without some people figuring out how to take advantage of it.

Nice idea tho, the more idea's people throw out there the more chances mythic sees one they like.

 

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Your solo and GvG options will be abused like fook!

You're basically suggesting instanced RvR.

One of DAOC's most redeeming features is that when you venture out into the frontiers you don't know what's waiting for you.

 

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I woulnd't say its the same as instanced RvR, but I guess with teleporting it becomes pretty close.

 

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I like to see something off the wall and random.

Fer instance, when the night arrives have a number of players (or all) that were killed during the day randomly respawn during the evening hours, either in random locations or where they died and attack anything in the vicinity.

It’ll be awesome and a hell of a surprise when there is a battle in progress already, then a group of undead players respawn and attacks both groups.

Or imaging a horde of respawned players attacking a tower (they previously died trying), thus successfully killing the horde or defending the tower would automatically provide a reward without even interacting with an NPC. Or an NPC could give the quest or just information on where such an event is likely to take place

IMO, every hour, take every single person in the frontiers and place them in a completely random location. And once you die you cannot come back. It's last man/realm standing wins.

I think this would be hilarious and fun. Absolute chaos. Starts out like a FFA PvP but slowly you will build up a zerg and it'll end in an epic zerg fight. Sometimes you'll get lucky and kill a bunch of bots for free RPs, other times you get unlucky and your bot will die, or you will spawn in the lord room of an enemy keep or something

They should do this at least once.

 

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