Craban - 30.07.2009 18:50:38

Hello everyone,

As announced in the Update: PvP Changes discussion, here is the developer note about our plan to introduce a War System. Since Mirade is currently on holiday, I will host this Dev Note myself.

Link to list of replies

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Our proposal for a War System in Tibia

The Initial System is what we are working on now and want to release as soon as possible, probably in the autumn patch. We want this system to be complete, but we have many additional ideas for features and expansions that may come at a later time. For that, see below. We would however appreceate it if you could concentrate the discussion on the initial system.

Basic circumstances for a War

• The basis to wars and the opposing parties should be guilds.
  
• A war has to be mutually agreed. Noone should be forced into a war if he/she does not want to join.
  
• Wars will always start and end at the time of a server save.
  
• Killing people who are involved in the same war will always be justified.
  
• We will also have to introduce a guild bank account accessible for the leader of the guild only. When a guild is disbanded, the money from that account will of course go to the former leader of the guild.

Declaring war

• A war can be declared by the leader of one guild via an interface on the guild page of his own guild.
  
• Restrictions:
  
  • Only an active guild can declare war to an active guild. Active means that the guilds must not be in formation or have a disband warning.
    
  • One guild can have a maximum sum of running wars and open war declarations of 5 at the same time.
    
  • War can only be declared against guilds on the same game world.
    
  • The leader must be offline when declaring a war (just like with houses, because the money has to be reserved and we want to make sure it cannot be taken out of the bank account while declaring a war).
  
  
• War declaration details:
  
  • Drop down of guilds to declare war to
    
  • Duration of the war, choice between 7 and 360 days
    
  • How many war frags are needed to win the war, choice between 10 and 1000 (fraglimit)
    
  • How much money does the losing guild have to pay to the winner, coice between 0 and 2 kkk (2 billion gold); it is possible to set different amounts for each of the involved guilds.
    
  • Optional comment field where you can for example explain to the opponent leader why you want to declare war.
  
  
• Once a declaration has been successfully submitted, it will be displayed as war declaration on the guildpage of the opposing guild for the leader only.
  
• The opposing leader can then:
  
  • Reject the declaration --> no war
    
  • Accept the declaration --> war will start at next server save
    
  • Change the conditions like duration, fraglimit, money to be paid and send this back to the other leader
  
  
• The declaration can go to and fro between the two leaders until it is accepted or rejected
  
• A declaration will automatically expire when the recipient does not act within 7 days
  
• When a war and its terms are accepted:
  
  • The penalty money will be reserved on the respective guild bank account, just like we reserve money when you bid for a house.
    
  • An additional war charge of 1000 gold will be deduced from each guild bank account.
    
  • The war will be started after the next server save
    
  • Each member will be marked correspondingly. However, each member has the ability to leave the guild and thus leave the war at any time.
    
  • EDIT: I forgot to add: during a war, no guild can be disbanded by the leaders. The only way a guild could disband is if the premiumtime of the leader and the vices runs out so that it gets disbanded automatically. This however will be visible for the other side 2 weeks ahead.

Wartime and rules

• All members of war guilds will be marked with a war symbol. There will be 3 versions of the war symbol:
  
  • Version 1 shows that the character is in some war that does not concern the viewer. It is visible to everyone on the game world.
    
  • Version 2 shows that the character is in one of your wars and is on your side. It is visible only to his guildmembers. It goes together with a green skull to show that you can kill justified.
    
  • Version 3 shows that the character is in one of your wars and is your enemy. It is visible only to members of the opposing side. It goes together with a green skull to show that you can kill justified.
  
  
• The skull system
  
  • All kills amongst fighters in the same war justified kills.
    
  • The regular skull system will apply to all other attacks and kills (those that are not between two fighters in the same war).
    
  • Attacking / killing someone in a war in your own guild will be treated as in a party, so you will not get PZ-blocked at all.
    
  • Attacking / killing someone in a war in the opposing guild will always trigger a PZ-block, also if you defend yourself.
    
  • The skulls of the regular skull system (white, red, black) will overlay the green skull that the guildmembers and opponents in a war should see.
  
  
• If someone who is in one or more wars is killed, his death will be counted as war frag for each war from which at least one opponent is in the list of killers. If you have more than one war running and people from both sides kill you together, the frag will count for both wars.
  
• As soon as the frag limit is reached by one side, no more war frags will be counted and the respective side has won, but the war state (war marks and justified killings) will still go on until the next server save.
  
• Guilds can at any time during their wars recruit and dismiss members. Members can also leave the war at any time.
  
• A guild that is in a war cannot be disbanded by the leader. The leader is the only one who cannot leave the guild in war unless he passes leadership first to someone else.

How wars can end

• If one guild reaches the previously agreed frag limit --> this guild wins
  
• If the maximum duration is reached before any side reached the frag limit --> this can lead to the determination of a winner according to frag counts or to a draw.
  
• If one guild actively surrenders (there will be an option for the leader on the guild page) --> this automatically means that that guild has lost that war
  
• If one guild gets automatically disbanded during a war --> this will be treated exactly like a surrender
  
• If both guilds get disbanded at the same time --> this lead to an automatic draw.
  
• If there is a winner:
  
  • The reserved money will be transfered to the winning side.
    
  • The winning side gets war points, the opponent looses war points.
  
  
• If it is a draw:
  
  • The reserved money will not be transferred but it will not be reserved any more.
    
  • War points are not altered for either side.

Motivation to go to war: War Guild Ranking

• We will introduce a war point system for guilds and a highscore list for the war guilds.
  
• Guilds will receive points for winning wars and loose points for loosing wars.
  
• A guild will get more points if it wins against a guild with more war points and it will earn less points when winning against a lower ranked guild.
  
• War points will also automatically expire after a certain amount of time if the guild stops fighting wars.
  
• If a guild is disbanded for whatever reason, it will loose all previously accumulated war points and start from 0 again if it is reformed.

Further details and ideas about this are still in discussion, your input will be very valued on this aspect.


Concerning server types

The war system is mainly designed for the regular PvP worlds. However, we want to introduce it to all server types, also to the current non-PvP and PvP-enforced worlds.

• Why also non-PvP?
  
  The system is based on mutual agreement and on the fact that anyone can decide to leave the war at any time. Both on non-PvP means that people get the first option to fight each other with this system, but each player can at any time withdraw from this. Therefore, we feel it will not create any problems on non-PvP but can only offer benefits.
  
  This will however mean that we will actually rename the non-PvP worlds to something more suitable.
  
  
• Why also PvP-enforced?
  
  There is no skull system nor anything like justified or unjustified kills on PvP-e, so the system does not really introduce anything totally new. However, the ranking and some organizational parts of the system will certainly also be interesting for players on PvP-e, so again, we do not see any problem but only a few additional benefits in introducing it there too.

So much about the Initial System we plan. You are most welcome to comment on these plans.

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What we may add at later stages to the War System

I will just shortly mention a few directions for addons, expansions and new features to the war system which we find interesting. Points like these will be considered later, but we will definitely not introduce these with the initial system.

• An alliance system to have groups of guilds declare wars to each other.
  
• More overviews for each game world about the current war situation.
  
• Additional rewards for the best war guilds, maybe even with some little ingame advantage.
  
• Possible additional rules concerning other players and guilds joining and leaving a war.

We will however not discuss these additional things this time around. Rest assured, you will be informed when this is atopic again.


What the war mode should achieve

• Systematic support and a set of defined rules for wars if all sides in the war have previously agreed to fight.
  
  The result will be that people who want to fight wars will not need to use unjustified kills as long as they pair up with other people who also want to fight wars. This way, unjustified kills can be used by warmongers against people who interfere even though they are not officially part of any of the war parties.
  
  
• Offer a new motivation to play for those who love PvP.
  
  We hope that the war guild ranking will help motivate people to use this feature and fight wars in order to get into this highscore list. This way, some people who perform random player killing out of pure boredom might find a new occupation.
  
  
• Additional meaning to the guild system.
  
  Through the highscoring, we expect that guilds will be kept alive longer and that the disbanding of guilds will happen a lot less since disbanding means being removed from the war guild ranking.

What the war mode is not expected to achieve

• Reduce or eliminate power abuse against neutrals.
  
  We know that this system will actually revert a little of the effect the 20 killers list has brought. Warmongers will no longer need any unjustified kills for mutually agreed wars which means they will have more to use for oppressive wars and power abuse. Since however joining and leaving a war between two guilds is very easy, they míght still need some of those unjustified kills for people like that and for other characters that are used to block and trap while not being in a war guild.
  
  
• Enable people to hunt others off a server.
  
  I will state this again: We will never support people completely forbidding other people from playing Tibia where and when they want. Do not expect us to do so, you will be disappointed.

Commenting on a few points that we expect will be brought up

• "This won't change anything because Tibian wars are not agreed between both sides"
  
  What this refers to is not war, it is slaughter. In Tibia, there is a different name for that: "power abuse". In wars, it is always possible for one side to surrender. If the other keeps bashing and killing despite the surrender, that is not a war anymore and it is certainly not the kind of behaviour we want in Tibia. Our plan for a war system is in no way intended to address this kind of behaviour.
  
  
• "The point of war is for one side to get rid of the other and keep the biggest troublemakers permanently hunted."
  
  Of course, we understand that sometimes, really bad people need to be controlled. However, this statement is too often abused by the very troublemakers themselves. They basically claim that everyone not on their side is a troublemaker. Those are the ones I address with this paragraph.
  
  People have claimed as feedback to the summer update that everyone loves PvP. If that is the case, then there is no point in getting rid of all others who also love PvP because that way, what you are doing is destroying your fun of war yourself. If this was really possible, you would end up having noone left to fight against.
  
  Additionally, we will not accept nor support in any way any sort of behaviour that has as goal to chase away our players from our game. Therefore, all those who plan to use this argument will also be ignored because it again proves that these people are the ones we need to "get rid of".
  
  
• People can abuse the easy way to leave.
  
  The argument is that people can leave and still take part in the war happenings and the battles but then counts as unjustified kill instead of a war frag.
  
  That is true, however, we thought of the other side. If for example one side has a spy in the guild and this guy then during the war starts sabotaging, attacking his own members or even just dying to increase the frag counts of the opponents, it would be fatal for this guild if they could not get rid of this guy. The other way around, we do not want a leader to be able to control the fate of his members including their ability to leave the war.
  
  The best way to have some control about people leaving is to get some money form your guildmembers before accepting a war into the guild bank account. This way, the members can decide to leave, but they have definitely paid for it.
  
  
• You should mark someone who attacks someone in a war guild for all his guild as yellow skull
  
  We have thought about this suggestion. However, if we were to automatically mark a non-war member who attacks a war member for all war partners, this could be abused even more. It would protect the skulled people in a war more than skulled people outside a war and they would certainly start to a) form guilds and declare wars just to get that ability and b) then trick innocents into making that mistake to kill them with a group. We prefer that people in war need their unjustified kills for the people attacking from outside the war rather than giving them a free ride to kill even more innocents.

I am looking forward to the discussion with you here.

Greets
Crab

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Reserved for links to replies.

Some clarifications to some questions, Part I:
Some clarifications to some questions, Part II:
Some comments on very valid points raised:
Remembering nice proposals for later and one more comment on criticism

Summary of the Feedback