Gameplay: Periodic Randomization of the Uncaps

**Malorn** · 2011-07-25, 06:47 AM

Heh don't need to go overhboard here, just make it so we get to see what its like to fight / defend all sides of a continent over time, with different enemies in the other parts. Even with resources spawning and despawning if the uncaps are static then it'll still be the same faction vs faction fight over certain areas over and over again. This idea just mixes that up so we get more variety.

The mixup doesn't need to happen frequently, it just needs to happen. Some stability is good, changing day-to-day is bad. Something around once every 2 weeks to once every month. It could be weekly if they take the servers down weekly to do maintenace. That'd be a good time to do it. Though I think once a week is probably too frequent.

Coreldan · 2011-07-25, 07:22 AM

Originally Posted by Malorn

Heh don't need to go overhboard here, just make it so we get to see what its like to fight / defend all sides of a continent over time, with different enemies in the other parts. Even with resources spawning and despawning if the uncaps are static then it'll still be the same faction vs faction fight over certain areas over and over again. This idea just mixes that up so we get more variety.

The mixup doesn't need to happen frequently, it just needs to happen. Some stability is good, changing day-to-day is bad. Something around once every 2 weeks to once every month. It could be weekly if they take the servers down weekly to do maintenace. That'd be a good time to do it. Though I think once a week is probably too frequent.

Perhaps, and if it's done seldom enough, they could actually "handcraft" what actually is cappable and what not, to avoid some stupid randomizations where like one would have to travel all the way to the other end of the continent for the next cappable thing or something. Something like from Ikanam to Tumas

**Malorn** · 2011-07-25, 01:24 PM

I think the general impression so far is that the warpgates are where the uncaps are since those were invulnerable in PS1 and we've seen some concept art of stuff around the warpgate. They're also on the outskirts of the continent and make sense if a player is traveling from cont to cont they are right there at the gate.

So at the most basic level it'd basically be randomly swapping which empire is at which warpgate. The territory control system would take over from there. The new location gives you access to attack different territory and will likely re-shape the landscape on that continent, but you'd be attacking it from a different angle and opponent positions have changed so while you may end up fighting over the exact same territory, this next time you'll be on the other side of the ridge, and your opponent may be TR instead of VS. That's pretty much what I'm going for here.

Kurtz · 2011-07-25, 01:44 PM

Just to throw this out there, I haven't seen an active warpgate yet in any of the concept sketches. Feel like there is some Lore otw to explain that.

EASyEightyEight · 2011-07-28, 04:40 PM

Cool plan, one hitch: territory control.

It'd kind of suck if the TR hold the south east quadrant of a continent, and then the next morning their home base on the continent gets sent to the far end of that continent.

Might be a small gripe in the long run, but I can see some outfits getting upset over losing valuable territories with rarer minerals they could have otherwise defended if only they could deploy from the south east corner of the map!

I guess in a way that could be a stalemate ender too though. Sort of a win-lose scenario really.

I would prefer the occasional rotation/randomization though, and I'd hope there are more than just those 3 locations. Preferably there would be extra empty locations on the continent the uncaps could be harbored in, just for that added bit of randomness.

**Malorn** · 2011-08-01, 11:49 PM

Originally Posted by EASyEightyEight

Cool plan, one hitch: territory control.

It'd kind of suck if the TR hold the south east quadrant of a continent, and then the next morning their home base on the continent gets sent to the far end of that continent.

Its not really a problem for two reasons.

1) If they have any significant amount of territory they will have a facility, meaning they don't require the uncap to base out of. If they don't have a facility then it is unlikely they have much to lose, which would take us to the second reason...

2) It helps as much as it hurts. The most it would do is expose a few more hexes to invasion while simultaneously giving each empire that same amount of hexes exposure to new territory on the continent. In either case it brings new opportunity to the continent to mix it up.