My Suggestion for an Awesome Illum

[Darth_Philar]

Here is my vision for a multi-stage, long lasting Illum:

 

The battle area consists of an Imperial and Republic base, 2 landing zones, 6 bunkers, 2 AA emplacements, and 1 DMZ (with two small AA emplacements). Here is a rough idea of the layout:

 

Imperial Base

LZ---AA------

BK---------BK

------BK------

aa--DMZ--aa

------BK------

BK---------BK

------AA----LZ

Republic Base

 

The Default Status consists of Imperial control over all nodes on the Imperial base side and Republic Control over all nodes on the the Republic base side with neutral control over the DMZ. Killing enemy players awards "Illum Commendations" to your faction (you earn a base rate for kills in the DMZ. The rate is modified for other areas, players receive more commendations for kills closer to their own base giving the players on defense a commendation advantage to assist them in holding the line). These commendations can be spent by any player at the LZ to acquire walkers or Aircraft. Walkers are player controlled and can be killed by enemy players if not defended by ground forces; they are limited to 3 per faction. Aircraft fly on a set course and will attack enemy controlled bunkers. Aircraft will be destroyed if they fly near an enemy controlled AA emplacement and are limited to 10 per faction.

 

Stage 1 - The DMZ has 2 small AA emplacements which prevent aircraft from assaulting enemy bunkers. Enemy bunkers will one-shot all players who attempt to bypass them. Players can respawn at either their own forward bunker or at their own base. If either faction obtains control over both AA emplacements their aircraft will begin assaulting the forward enemy bunker. Alternately, walkers can be used to destroy the DMZ AA emplacements allowing aircraft from both factions to assault the forward bunkers. Once a forward bunker is destroyed the players can advance toward the second line bunkers.

 

Stage 2 - Second Line bunkers will one-shot approaching walkers and are partially defended by the main AA emplacement. Attacking players must control both bunkers to kill the force field allowing them to advance; defending players can recapture either bunker which will reengage the force field cutting off the attackers from their reinforcements. Attackers can spend commendations to acquire up to 5 battle droids per enemy second line bunker (total of 10 droids per faction) who will march from the LZ to the captured bunkers to hold them against recapture. Defenders can kill the droids en route or kill them at the bunker (they will be tougher when at the bunker). If the defenders recapture a bunker while the droids were on their way, the droids will stop wherever they are and wait for the attackers to recapture to continue marching. Players can respawn at their own base, their own forward bunker (if it still stands). Respawning at their own base allows them to take speeders to any bunker they control (including hostile bunkers that the attackers have captured).

 

Stage 3 - While the attackers control both enemy second line bunkers, they can attempt to destroy the defenders' AA gun with the use of walkers or bombs (bombs can be acquired from either the attackers own LZ or from the enemy LZ. They cannot capture the enemy LZ. Once the AA gun has been destroyed, attacker aircraft can begin bombing the shield generator. Once the shields fall, the attackers can assault the defenders' walls.

 

Stage 4 - Walkers and bombs can be used to destroy the walls of the defenders' base. The defenders can use missile turrets to target walkers or ground forces to target bomb planters. Once the walls fall, the attackers must cross a courtyard filled with cryomines to reach the Communications Array at which point they are victorious. Upon victory, both sides receive Warzone Commendations, Valor, and Credits (obviously the winners receive more). The losing faction is returned to their factions’ main Illum base (not in the warfront area) and the winners gain access to a “cleanup” period that allows them to acquire salvage nodes that can be traded for a variety of PvP related items (including commendations, mods, consumables, etc.). This cleanup period lasts for 1 hour at which point the warfront is reset.

 

To prevent farming when the enemy faction is not present, if no PvP activity is detected for a period of more than 15 minutes both sides receive a warning that they are approaching a “Cold War”. If another 10 minutes pass and no PvP is detected then the warfront will reset and no awards will be provided if the first stage is not complete. If the first stage is complete, both sides will “lose” but will receive a small amount of awards (comms and credits).

 

I should point out that both sides are strongly encouraged to engage in both offense and defense during the fight. Failure to do so will ALWAYS result in a loss.

 

Thoughts?

[LiquidKarbide]

Seems pretty thought out and very cool. Imma just go down each line of the post and say what i do and dont like lol.

First off, the set up is pretty nice and basic. No extravagant thoughts.

The ideas of commendations is awesome, especially the whole defender commendations increased. Makes the game much less of a snowball effect and allows for defense. Hopefully it won't go so much as a turtle game. but even if it does, those are fun too.

The vehicles however, walkers and aircrafts, i'm not a fan of. I don't like vehicles entering PvP and i'm sure theres some other way to get an advantage than using vehicles. Maybe be able to get buffs using the commendations to make it more interesting? The idea of destroying the bunkers however and keeping down the AA could just be a base control point.

Destroying the bunkers sounds too permanent. While on AV, you could destroy the bunkers but had graveyards placed to spawn at. At least the central DMZ should be a King of the Hill style control point that allows for spawning there, and not be destroyable. Kinda like a no-mans-land zone. Also with it, the AA placed in the central area will be taken as the controlling factions.

The second line bunkers used to take out a forcefield is really good idea, allowing the defending team to retake it and not be forever screwed. The droid idea i am really confused on. Is this just to do more damage to enemy players/ walkers? Seems really unique, but maybe a different strategy on how they actually work.

the speeder idea is nice, makes it so its not so much of a walk to each node, but still gives a little increased time for the offensive reinforcements. Maybe this could be where the droids come into play at. The runback is balanced by the droids being able to keep pressure on the front lines?

The Stage 3-AA idea seems nice as well, but instead of destroying it, maybe just taking it over (as in the DMZ AA). This allows for the defenders to be able to push back. The timing for the shield generator seems nice. But as stated before, the idea of bought aircrafts i don't like. I'd say just have the aircrafts be an auto thing that spawns when you control ALL the AA (this includes the DMZ AA). Then have the force field have a health pool that goes down when ALL AA is controlled but doesn't when its not. This way it doesnt require a full say... 3 minutes... of control at once time. but can be periodic control.

Stage 4... id say probably just keep it to the whole voidstar winning idea. just make it into the last room and tada. victory.

Idk the "cleanup" idea seems pretty cool, provides a reason for victory. Or maybe just keep it to an access of dailys/weeklys that only the winner can get. Like wintergrasp and TolBarad.

Thats all i have to say. the idea is great, but i jsut wanted to add my own little revamp.

Hopefully all that i said made sense lol

EDIT: I just realized it was planned to be an hourly or so event. This means that the whole idea of being able to come back from a push isn't as important to me. So maybe having the bunkers be destroyed and the AA be destroyed is better. However, i still say let the central assault be a nomansland that you dont destroy the AA and bunker, but just control it.

Edited April 28, 2012 by LiquidKarbide

[Darth_Philar]

Seems pretty thought out and very cool. Imma just go down each line of the post and say what i do and dont like lol.

First off, the set up is pretty nice and basic. No extravagant thoughts.

The ideas of commendations is awesome, especially the whole defender commendations increased. Makes the game much less of a snowball effect and allows for defense. Hopefully it won't go so much as a turtle game. but even if it does, those are fun too.

 

The idea behind the commendations and the defender bonus was designed to allow a smaller number of people to defend against a larger number of attackers, allowing both sides to field large attacking teams and small defending teams (since we all know that very few people actually enjoy defending). This acts as a bit of an equalizer making those few defenders just as vital to the offense as they are to the defense (by earning commendations for their team at a faster rate). This also allows turtles a chance to break in either direction as the attacking team will have the position advantage and the defending team will have the resource advantage.

 

The vehicles however, walkers and aircrafts, i'm not a fan of. I don't like vehicles entering PvP and i'm sure theres some other way to get an advantage than using vehicles. Maybe be able to get buffs using the commendations to make it more interesting? The idea of destroying the bunkers however and keeping down the AA could just be a base control point.

 

I'm not a fan of massive vehicle use either, which is why I limited the walkers to 3 per faction and made the aircraft AI controlled. The aircraft are essentially performing the same function as the turrets in Novare Coast or Alderaan Civil War (i.e. damaging the enemy emplacements) but with the added twist of your team having the ability to speed up their effectiveness by spending commendations to buy more of them. The walkers would primarily feature only in the DMZ fight as they move very slowly. In the event you had a long battle, they could feature in the final stage as well. As they would not have the ability to harm players (only certain emplacements) I don't see them being abused.

 

Destroying the bunkers sounds too permanent. While on AV, you could destroy the bunkers but had graveyards placed to spawn at. At least the central DMZ should be a King of the Hill style control point that allows for spawning there, and not be destroyable. Kinda like a no-mans-land zone. Also with it, the AA placed in the central area will be taken as the controlling factions.

 

You referenced this in your edit, but I'll reiterate: the fight will last as long as it takes to finish, but after the fight is over the battle will reset in 1 hour (giving the winners a chance to reap their rewards). The reason the DMZ emplacements are all destroyable was to deincentivize zerging as a strategy. If you move forward too quickly in stage 1, the other team's offense will wipe out your first line defenses which will give the other side control of the DMZ. The idea here is to prevent the zergfest that happened in AV where both sides simply skipped the DMZ and rushed into the other team's second line from the start. If you want to advance, you need to either control the DMZ or remove it from the match by destroying the emplacements.

 

The second line bunkers used to take out a forcefield is really good idea, allowing the defending team to retake it and not be forever screwed. The droid idea i am really confused on. Is this just to do more damage to enemy players/ walkers? Seems really unique, but maybe a different strategy on how they actually work.

the speeder idea is nice, makes it so its not so much of a walk to each node, but still gives a little increased time for the offensive reinforcements. Maybe this could be where the droids come into play at. The runback is balanced by the droids being able to keep pressure on the front lines?

 

The idea of the droids was that they would act as surrogates for the attackers at the bunkers the attackers captured. That way you wouldn't need to post half of your attacking force at the bunkers in order to keep the force field open but the defenders would have to do some work to retake the bunkers. The speeder idea allows the attackers to reinforce their forward line, while still giving the defenders a chance to cut off the reinforcements. The droids would certainly help out in the event the defenders wiped out the attackers at one of the bunkers as they would need to then clear the droids in order to get the force field back online giving the attackers a chance to regroup and return. Obviously the speed of the speeders would need to be balanced to reward the defenders but not to necessarily punish the attackers.

 

The Stage 3-AA idea seems nice as well, but instead of destroying it, maybe just taking it over (as in the DMZ AA). This allows for the defenders to be able to push back. The timing for the shield generator seems nice. But as stated before, the idea of bought aircrafts i don't like. I'd say just have the aircrafts be an auto thing that spawns when you control ALL the AA (this includes the DMZ AA). Then have the force field have a health pool that goes down when ALL AA is controlled but doesn't when its not. This way it doesnt require a full say... 3 minutes... of control at once time. but can be periodic control.

 

That is pretty much how I envisioned Stage 3 going down, I could see adding in say 3 aircraft that you get for free but I still like the idea of being able to purchase more of them in order to speed up the assault. The reason the final AA gun gets destroyed instead of captured is that the attackers would have no reason to secure it since it is well behind enemy lines. If the attackers have made it this far the defenders know that they need to hold that point for as long as possible. The permanent destruction of the AA gun will fascilitate the end of stage 3.

 

Stage 4... id say probably just keep it to the whole voidstar winning idea. just make it into the last room and tada. victory.

 

I like the instant win idea, and I had a few other ones too. I just kind of felt that the instant win was a bit anticlimatic considering the massive battle that just went down lol

 

Idk the "cleanup" idea seems pretty cool, provides a reason for victory. Or maybe just keep it to an access of dailys/weeklys that only the winner can get. Like wintergrasp and TolBarad.

Thats all i have to say. the idea is great, but i jsut wanted to add my own little revamp.

Hopefully all that i said made sense lol

 

I think there should certainly be some dailies and weeklies, but having rewards that are farmable will make people want to actually participate in more than one battle per day (with TB and WG you basically only had a real fight once or twice a day since everyone did it once and got their dailies in then didn't go back).

 

EDIT: I just realized it was planned to be an hourly or so event. This means that the whole idea of being able to come back from a push isn't as important to me. So maybe having the bunkers be destroyed and the AA be destroyed is better. However, i still say let the central assault be a nomansland that you dont destroy the AA and bunker, but just control it.

 

Like I said above, the permanent destruction of your forward base should serve as a punishment for a failed zerg. The idea is to always be moving forward, but not until you have secured or eliminated the previous area. Ideally, a team that suddenly receives a large number of defensive reinforcements (i.e. new players joining the fight in progress) should be able to push the attackers back from Stage 3 back to Stage 2.

 

I also liked your idea about other things to purchase with the commendations. Buffs, Defensive Droids, Gun Turrets, etc. all come to mind as possible things you could use. One idea I had for buffs is a Defender and Attacker buff. If you buy a Defender buff and stay in your own team's territory you will gain a combat advantage, likewise, if you buy an Attacker buff and stay in enemy territory you will gain a combat advantage. I'm thinking the Defender would grant health and healing bonuses while the Attacker would grant damage.

 

One further thing I should add is a player meter. I'd like there to be a meter that you can see next to the battle map that shows your players on defense (i.e. friendly players in friendly territory) and offense (friendly players in hostile territory) and enemy players on defense (hostile players in hostile territory) and offense (hostile players in friendly territory). This meter would allow players to know if offense or defense is needed at any given time.