Sand box housing/Open world

[VegaPhone]

I made a post earlier, and decided to make a thread of its own since I doubt anyone read which I felt was something worth reading:

 

The point was about owning houses on planets, and I was expanding on that idea to include sand box mechanics, and open world pvp.

 

Please free to add more to the idea or burn the idea down.

 

There are many ways to do this and one way;

 

Have everyone be able to own titles to land, so personal housing is not an issue, however certain titles offer different perks and a person can lose their home in guild cities which offer access to special resources, and other special benefits. There can be housing in buildings, or in areas which are not of interest for guild warefare but still have open world pvp flagging, and in game events.

 

Then open world and guild cities have the housing which can be lost;

 

For example lets say the open world map had objectives, and certain objectives when captured affected on how the open world can be won by scaling NPCs with different buffs, adding more different NPCs and possibly directing NPCs on a different path (edit: also roaming armies of NPCs from objective to objective). In the open world pvp these armies will help to win against a guild city that also has direct access to rare resources, private housing with special vendors, special NPCs that add to defense and the roaming army from objective to objective, and the way they can do it is, lets say the objectives take a certain amount of time to capture them all before reaching a guild city (there can be many guild cities) and once all the points are captured before attacking the guild city, it sets a time to open attack on the castle.

 

At prime time of that day, the opposing faction can attack the guild city. However, they can have negotiations to surrender for a price to avoid being attacked.

 

Crafting;

 

There has to be a point in all these attacks, and crafting is a big motivator, but also there has to be a motivator to crafting as well. So the part of the motivation to craft is to have the siege equipment, and the many items used during the warfare only gathered through the rare resources and produced by the appropriate crafts to make them and win these wars and generate a lot of profit to spend it on other items like space ships, guild ships, a large castle in a safe planet etc

 

This is fun, and already a great aspect to the game if something like this is introduced, but there has to be more thought put into this.

 

For example what happens when all guild cities on a planet are conquered? Do people lose all thier land titles? Even the ones that are not part of the guild cities? Does it change the look of the map, and the borders change? OR does the land appear different and the oppsing faction remaining actual in game bases for questing look damaged? Does the regular resource cost more or are in less supply? Is there more violence in the npc areas, and for example a quest giver gets robbed and it changes the quest to add more quests for the same rewards, or the same quest for less rewards. etc etc

 

Is there a political system in place as well on the planets... for example Alderaan?

 

 

edit: Also BW failed to make thier MMO from the beginning since something like this to properly work needs either to be toned in the right way which means a lot more careful planning which years of development could have easily have provided and having a themepark with a seperate economy and a sandbox with a different end game, and possible droppale items economy which used a bolster system for any lvl to play in.

 

Or implemented a system that was rigorous in achievements in the few months of development that they have now, and hope that whatever population is left will make it work and attract people who are having a negative impression of the pvp, and open world of the game. However, with hype and marketing they can attract people, but it takes time to make...

 

And ideas like this have been suggested on the swtor forums from a long long time ago. The devs here dont have the resources to either make the game as a full MMO with different open world pvp ideas, or they dont want to make a game beyond the safe WoW formula.

 

edit: Also one something like this if implemented its easy to add to, and adds a lot of replay-ability to the game. There can be huge rewards which takes time to get, for example saving up for a personal castle in a safe planet. Instead of something that is a grind for hardcore players in Ops, or Warzones. Open world pvp offers a place for crafters, and the casual players to participate in large scale combat. Maybe the problem was the **** engine that they chose.

Edited May 11, 2012 by VegaPhone

[Neloth]

Yeah great ideas, I've suggested some similar ones as well earlier but unfortunately every idea involving housing, sandbox and such seems to bounce off BW as a rubber ball on concrete.

 

IMO this kind of content is a good way to reduce the effect of the content wall at 50 due to the linear theme park content today. It doesn't need expensive voicing or cinematics and can be set on land a little away from the content already in place.

Edited May 11, 2012 by Neloth

[VegaPhone]

It is unfortunate. Also the fact that they, the BW team, made UO, and have a mythic team, and SWG team working on this project would make me hope for mrore open world systems in the game than its current state.

 

They really were not planning for this, or the engine is that bad to have a lack of such systems.

[Nrock]

great ideas

[Magnusheart]

Star Wars Galaxies had some great ideas.

 

But in the end SWG failed horribly.

 

Here are the pros and cons.

We get our own little place where we have things we wants. Sandbox build our own lifestyle.

 

Problem is, this creates a void. Too much Sandbox is a poison turning it into a social 1 man RPG. More people spending time in their own "paradise" makes people less social and active on the fleets for example.

 

Less Social activity making it boring for new players and harder for others who do PvE that is not in a guild, making the game more exclusive and less active as a united community.

 

There are A LOT of things I would love to see from SWG put here, more unique color blades for sabers, 100x bigger ship variety and being able to choose your ship, etc etc.

 

But like Medicine, too much or too little can be a poison.

[VegaPhone]

Star Wars Galaxies had some great ideas.

 

But in the end SWG failed horribly.

 

Here are the pros and cons.

We get our own little place where we have things we wants. Sandbox build our own lifestyle.

 

Problem is, this creates a void. Too much Sandbox is a poison turning it into a social 1 man RPG. More people spending time in their own "paradise" makes people less social and active on the fleets for example.

 

Less Social activity making it boring for new players and harder for others who do PvE that is not in a guild, making the game more exclusive and less active as a united community.

 

There are A LOT of things I would love to see from SWG put here, more unique color blades for sabers, 100x bigger ship variety and being able to choose your ship, etc etc.

 

But like Medicine, too much or too little can be a poison.

 

Yes. That makes sense. I like what theme-parks bring to MMOs but themeparks by themselves turned into an end game without alternatives usually becomes a horrible grind. That is the point of introducing alternative content, and housing, open world pvp, multi player mini games etc will greatly increase the game value for those who don't like them-park end game grinds, or dont have the time for them.

[svartalfimposter]

/unsigned. Honestly, I don't want the devs to waste time and effort making player-housing. We have ships, those are our houses.

 

I heard rumour of motherships as guild housing. Transfer your idea into that concept and I'll reconsider.

Edited May 11, 2012 by svartalfimposter

[VegaPhone]

/unsigned. Honestly, I don't want the devs to waste time and effort making player-housing. We have ships, those are our houses.

 

I heard rumour of motherships as guild housing. Transfer your idea into that concept and I'll reconsider.

 

The problem with that is, then the ground aspect of the game is not well developed and the 3d space combat is the open sand box system people were looking for.

 

That could hurt the game, or it could make the game great. Its up to the devs really on what they can work into the game.

 

So if that's the only way to make sand box, open world pvp, with guild ships being the guild warfare (siege warfare) people are hoping for then its better than not having the alternative content. It then just becomes unfortunate that all the beautiful worlds in swtor and the many more to be added cant have such a system that encourages revisiting them either for crafting or siege warfare and player housing.