Guild based vs faction based

[Slamz]

Guild based:
EVE

Faction based:
WOW (Horde vs Alliance)
WAR (Order vs Destruction)
Planetside (Vanu vs TR vs NC)


Advantages of faction based PvP:
You will automatically be on a team with a lot of teammates. Very easy to get into as a new player.

Advantages of guild based PvP:
Players are free to create their own independent "teams" that consists only of people they approve of.



I'm not sure which I like more. I like the concept of guild based gameplay but I would obviously want to create a game which I would play, and I really wouldn't want to run a 1500 person guild simply because that's what a guild based wargame would eventually mandate. You would survive only at the mercy of the bigger guilds. Maybe that's not such a bad thing, if the game could be designed such that smaller guild could contribute to a larger "nation" while still maintaining independence, like city-states... But typically, I think, guild based gameplay puts a lot of hurt on small guilds and solo players.

Team based gameplay solves a lot of those issues, at the expense of teaming you up with insufferable jerks and morons. Something like Planetside or DAOC with 3 teams seems pretty ideal, although I could also see having a game with, say, 10 teams. 12 teams. Like imagine City of Heroes/Villains if you could join NPC gangs and fight for territory. It would be similar to a guild based game but, like WOW and WAR, you would always be able to get into one of the teams. You wouldn't be a new player left out in the cold trying to apply to a big guild so that you could enjoy the game.

[Hoofhurr]

You have to have an odd number of teams at the small integer end. This let's the players compensate for imbalances in population that are unpredictable at the design stage or that shift through the life of the game.

[Slamz]

You have to have an odd number of teams at the small integer end. This let's the players compensate for imbalances in population that are unpredictable at the design stage or that shift through the life of the game.

I was thinking that if you had a larger number of teams (say, 12), then faction politics would become a much bigger factor.

That is, with 3 teams, faction politics only extend as far as temporarily ganging up on the more powerful team.

With 12 teams, there's a lot more room for backroom deals, alliances and backstabbing. You could also think about giving players more direct control over the team (almost as if they were guilds, perhaps with an elected leadership). I don't think you'd want players leading fixed teams if you only had 3 teams, but it might be more acceptable if there are 12 teams (and some feasible method of switching teams).

[Jakensama]

Hard for noobs though, remember walking outside of town in UO your first time

Actually, you could kill guildies in that, couldn't you?

[Thudz]

Guild+Faction>Guild>Faction

Have factions and have guilds and let guilds war with eachother.

[Slamz]

Yeah, I've thought about that too.

Maybe there are a certain number of "hard coded" factions, but players don't have to join them and can go off and make their own faction if they want to.


Like in WOW, you would choose to be Horde or Alliance to start with, but if you really want to you can leave the faction and go solo or start your own faction, which would have the ability to take over towns, etc, and participate in the war as a new team.

[1000xZero]

Guild+Faction>Guild>Faction

Have factions and have guilds and let guilds war with eachother.

I agree with this. It is the one feature that is missing from many games now that EQ1 did right.

Faction is a bitch but it adds a great spectrum to the game.

[Slamz]

To tie this into the "living world" discussion, I picture it as something like EQ....


There are a number of factions out there and you can go work on raising your faction with any of them and this will bring you certain benefits.

But The Purge, say, can go wipe out an orc camp completely on our own, plant our flag on it, populate it with some NPC drones and it's basically "The Purge" faction. The NPCs will then behave just like they would for any other faction -- growing the town, defending the town, working to conquer other towns, but in this case the mayor is us and we have far more direct control over what the NPCs do.

In an orc town, you can give suggestions to the NPCs and so forth, basically as if you were trying to convince the "orc boss" on a course of action. For a player faction, this still works, but the suggestions simply come up to the guild as a list of player inputs which you can read or ignore at will.



That's my vision of a fusion of "faction based" and "guild based" gameplay.


Incidentally, I would make PvP "always on". There is no case where a player cannot attack another player.


In fact, different factions may handle this sort of thing differently.

If you're allied with the High Elves and you kill another player that's also allied with the High Elves, you might both lose faction regardless of who killed who or who started the fight. High Elves don't like infighting.

Whereas Orcs might actually increase your faction, because they just love a good fight (provided they liked you to begin with, anyway). They like infighting.

Could probably do a lot of interesting, but pretty simple, faction-specific rules for things like this.

[Thudz]

To tie this into the "living world" discussion, I picture it as something like EQ....


There are a number of factions out there and you can go work on raising your faction with any of them and this will bring you certain benefits.

But The Purge, say, can go wipe out an orc camp completely on our own, plant our flag on it, populate it with some NPC drones and it's basically "The Purge" faction. The NPCs will then behave just like they would for any other faction -- growing the town, defending the town, working to conquer other towns, but in this case the mayor is us and we have far more direct control over what the NPCs do.

In an orc town, you can give suggestions to the NPCs and so forth, basically as if you were trying to convince the "orc boss" on a course of action. For a player faction, this still works, but the suggestions simply come up to the guild as a list of player inputs which you can read or ignore at will.



That's my vision of a fusion of "faction based" and "guild based" gameplay.


Incidentally, I would make PvP "always on". There is no case where a player cannot attack another player.


In fact, different factions may handle this sort of thing differently.

If you're allied with the High Elves and you kill another player that's also allied with the High Elves, you might both lose faction regardless of who killed who or who started the fight. High Elves don't like infighting.

Whereas Orcs might actually increase your faction, because they just love a good fight (provided they liked you to begin with, anyway). They like infighting.

Could probably do a lot of interesting, but pretty simple, faction-specific rules for things like this.

I like where you are going with this. We need to blend more RTS in.

[Vllad]

Wasn't EQ VZ in a sense a guild based game? Their were so many x-teamers we have MoD, Iggles and one other guild that pretty much made up who we played with.

Everyone was on their own.


Vllad

[1000xZero]

Wasn't EQ VZ in a sense a guild based game? Their were so many x-teamers we have MoD, Iggles and one other guild that pretty much made up who we played with.

Everyone was on their own.


Vllad

That was only because SOE did not hard code the teams and it was exploited.

[1000xZero]

I think it would be interesting to use a Planescape:Torment type of faction system where your actions would make your alignment(for lack of a better word) and if you are in a Guild that the individual actions should make the Guild Alignment too.

[Diggles]

Guild based:
EVE

Faction based:
WOW (Horde vs Alliance)
WAR (Order vs Destruction)
Planetside (Vanu vs TR vs NC)


Advantages of faction based PvP:
You will automatically be on a team with a lot of teammates. Very easy to get into as a new player.

Advantages of guild based PvP:
Players are free to create their own independent "teams" that consists only of people they approve of.



I'm not sure which I like more. I like the concept of guild based gameplay but I would obviously want to create a game which I would play, and I really wouldn't want to run a 1500 person guild simply because that's what a guild based wargame would eventually mandate. You would survive only at the mercy of the bigger guilds. Maybe that's not such a bad thing, if the game could be designed such that smaller guild could contribute to a larger "nation" while still maintaining independence, like city-states... But typically, I think, guild based gameplay puts a lot of hurt on small guilds and solo players.

Team based gameplay solves a lot of those issues, at the expense of teaming you up with insufferable jerks and morons. Something like Planetside or DAOC with 3 teams seems pretty ideal, although I could also see having a game with, say, 10 teams. 12 teams. Like imagine City of Heroes/Villains if you could join NPC gangs and fight for territory. It would be similar to a guild based game but, like WOW and WAR, you would always be able to get into one of the teams. You wouldn't be a new player left out in the cold trying to apply to a big guild so that you could enjoy the game.

All you need is alliance (Eve, Warhammer), feudal systems (Linage 2 I think) and mercenary contracts (Eve to an extent).

Only faction + guild I can see is a starwars universe, empire/rebels & freelance (hutts, smugglers, pirates, etc)

Just the sheer number of ways you should be able to setup guilds could also affect alliances

dictatorship, republic, democratic, monarchy (founding clan runs all guild functions), military rank based, oligarchy, etc

[Dophuz]

It depends on what the game designer is trying to do:

In EQ and War they failed to allign the grouping/social system with the game mythos. Why bother to have "teams" or racial pairing if it's easy to mix-match from other teams. In effect they devolved the teams into class pools.

It would have been far more interesting to have bonus's and penalties for mixed races in War for warband/party maekup.

They also failed to integrate the "guilds" into the war effort. Instead they are independent operations, which while providing a recognizable struture , are a hinderence to the overall game goals. They do not add any flavor to the game. Originaly they had "regiments" that were connected and regiments gained reknown within the army structure.

Oh well...

[Zouji]

I think it would be interesting to use a Planescape:Torment type of faction system where your actions would make your alignment(for lack of a better word) and if you are in a Guild that the individual actions should make the Guild Alignment too.

I would actually like something like that. You would need to give the guilds or factions the ability to choose a method of automatically dealing with those that perform an action drastically against there alignment.

[Maren]

You could make it with 3 factions: A & B would be hard coded factions and C would be an FFA guild based faction that members from A & B can defect to.

[grizzle]

Guild+Faction>Guild>Faction

Have factions and have guilds and let guilds war with eachother.

Agree with this. Guilds proliferate the gaming world, and any game that didn't take guilds into account would, I believe, not do well. Having factions, though, helps cream a team vs team based game and allows for people not associated with each other to rally together for a common goal.

Allowing for guilds within factions helps because the stronger, more organized guilds can help prop up the faction, or push the other less motivated within the faction.

One interesting thing to consider, though, is friendly fire, similar to FPS games. If there are AE spells, or if the combat is such that it isn't auto-targeted but instead requires some sort of aiming, friendly fire might help reduce the usual blind spam and force people to play with more skill.

It might also cause all sorts of griefing, or at the least, a lot of frustration by too many accidental FF kills. I know in FPS games this can get old at times, but since I re-spawn immediately and jump back into the game I get over it quickly. But in an MMO type game where each death equates to possible loss (xp loss, gear damage, money loss, respawning miles away from battle, time loss, etc.) the level of frustration caused by FF kills could be high enough to cause people to leave. Could compensate for it by disabling those negatives if killed by FF, but then that itself presents other loophole/exploits.



I do think there should be a more robust in-game system for guilds to ally together, either for a long term basis or for the span of an evening battle. Better communication, ways to assign particular leaders, an overlay UI dedicated to this, etc.

[Diggles]

Guild+Faction>Guild>Faction

Have factions and have guilds and let guilds war with eachother.

Agree with this. Guilds proliferate the gaming world, and any game that didn't take guilds into account would, I believe, not do well. Having factions, though, helps cream a team vs team based game and allows for people not associated with each other to rally together for a common goal.

Allowing for guilds within factions helps because the stronger, more organized guilds can help prop up the faction, or push the other less motivated within the faction.

One interesting thing to consider, though, is friendly fire, similar to FPS games. If there are AE spells, or if the combat is such that it isn't auto-targeted but instead requires some sort of aiming, friendly fire might help reduce the usual blind spam and force people to play with more skill.

It might also cause all sorts of griefing, or at the least, a lot of frustration by too many accidental FF kills. I know in FPS games this can get old at times, but since I re-spawn immediately and jump back into the game I get over it quickly. But in an MMO type game where each death equates to possible loss (xp loss, gear damage, money loss, respawning miles away from battle, time loss, etc.) the level of frustration caused by FF kills could be high enough to cause people to leave. Could compensate for it by disabling those negatives if killed by FF, but then that itself presents other loophole/exploits.



I do think there should be a more robust in-game system for guilds to ally together, either for a long term basis or for the span of an evening battle. Better communication, ways to assign particular leaders, an overlay UI dedicated to this, etc.

Planetside did a great job of handling this. Even though I enjoyed AoE weapons, I was constantly splashing teammates. Now with all the stats tracked and viewable on the web, the people with the most TK's or highest % of dmg done to teammates could get some sort of punishments

Either demerits, demotions, weapon strictions (they cant use aoe, or restricted to guided weapons/sidearms etc)

[Slamz]

Yeah, the Planetside system for allowing friendly fire but limiting "griefing" was very well done. If you were careful, you could afford to off the occasional jerk. If you were sloppy or were just trying to grief, it would shut you down before you could ruin the game. You can mow 1 guy down, but if you mow down 5 guys in a row you're going to get real close to a lockdown.


It could also play into the faction system.

Every point of damage done to an enemy = +1 faction
Every point of damage done to a friendly = -2 faction

So if there's 1 bad guy and 1 enemy, you don't want to fireball them both unless you're willing to take that faction hit. If there's 3 bad guys and 1 enemy, fireball away.

Additionally, anytime you make an attack which does more damage to friendlies than to enemies, your faction rating will temporarily drop to 0.


For example, Bob has 500 orc faction. Jim has 500 orc faction and 2000 dwarf faction -- he's basically a spy for the dwarfs.

When the dwarfs attack, Jim fireballs Bob. This makes Jim's orc faction temporarily drop straight to 0, because he did more "friendly" damage than "enemy" damage in that attack. Bob can now return fire without penalty (he would lose dwarf faction, but not orc).



Might have to think about this some more... could get complicated... hmmm...

Bob has 2000 orc faction and 500 dwarf faction.
Jim has 500 orc faction and 2000 dwarf faction.

Jim fireballs Bob. He loses orc and dwarf faction?

Hmmmm.

Perhaps you should have to "declare" yourself with one faction, and only one faction...

[Snowreap]

Ideally, you want everybody to be able to attack everybody. in practice, this isn't really workable because it leads to complete anarchy.

guilds and factions are a mechanism to avoid anarchy by forcing players to declare an alignment. but the problem with these is that they're very static.

what players need is a way to declare alignments that's dynamic.

start with the idea that a player has a reputation with every faction in the game. some 'default' factions would be hardcoded as part of the game, but most factions would be player organizations.

a player may also join a guild. the guild as a whole also has a reputation with every faction in the game. what happens when your reputation is different from your guild's? there are multiple possibilities. one simple one is to always use the reputation of the highest-level organization you belong to (so NPC's react to you according to your guild's reputation). another option is to use the worst reputation in the chain (so NPC's react to you according to your reputation, or your guild's, whichever is lower). a third option is to base it on how you 'flag' yourself (if you're wearing a guild tabard, or using a particular squawk code or IFF code (whatever is appropriate for the universe), NPC's react to you according to your guild's reputation, but if not they react to you according to your personal reputation).

your guild leader may also join a guild, without disbanding his own guild. and that guild may join another, and so on, to form a mega-alliance of hundreds of guilds. entire subtrees may split off from the alliance, so there's lots of room for EVE-style political intrigue.

that's all well and good for NPC interaction, but for player interaction more tools would be needed. guild leaders would probably need the ability to modify reputation levels directly (making other factions friendly, neutral or KOS as desired). guild leaders would probably also need to choose for themselves whether their selections were enforced on the members, or merely advised (the difference being, an enforced alignment prevents you from killing friendly-faction players, no matter how much of an asshat they are, while an advised alignment flags that asshat as 'green', but allows your members to kill them anyway if they really need it).

and having guilds as members of guilds means that higher-level guilds need to be able to make non-overridable alignment choices that affect everyone below (which means that joining certain alliances may mean giving up your own ability to declare war).

-ken

[grizzle]

Perhaps you should have to "declare" yourself with one faction, and only one faction...

Now this would be a really cool concept. Right now in MMOs, you have to decalre a faction at character creation. You are married to it, and nothing can get you out except to create a new toon. Allowing us to switch factions would help alleviate having to re-level 80 times jsut to reach end-game with a new toon, but it would also allow for some interesting strategies. For example, if you could permanently (can only switch once per month?) switch factions (which moves your starting point, your banks, trainers, chat channels, etc.), or you could have a spy class of sorts that allows you to temporarily switch factions so you can infultrate the enemy - you have access to their chat channels, some vendors, etc.

[Vllad]

Bob has 2000 orc faction and 500 dwarf faction.
Jim has 500 orc faction and 2000 dwarf faction.

Jim fireballs Bob. He loses orc and dwarf faction?

Hmmmm.

Don't forget, if Bob kills Jim in a dwarf camp he only loses dwarf faction. The Orcs have no idea it happened.

Don't forget your original idea. It isn't the players that matter it is the NPC's.

The NPC's carry a zone of control. That is what how the enviorment evolves.

If the dwarves control Jujuland and Bob kills Jim in Jujuland then he takes only the dwarf faction. Bob does this because he is helping the Orcs try to gain some zone of control in Jujuland.

This gives the players choices to make.

[Vllad]

This may be more harmful then helpful however:

You might also want to consider that if Bob kills Jim in an Orc zone of control since Jim is very popular with dwraves that Bob may get an increase in Orc faction because Jim is loved by dwarf's.

Basically people have to be cognisant of what their factions are. If Jim keeps working on getting his dwarf faction up he may be a welcome target in Orc lands.

Now if Jim is more populuar with the Orcs and Dwarves then Bob is when Bob killed him in Orc lands the only faction hit taken is from Bob. He lowers his Orc faction.

Again the dwarves never knew it happened.


Vllad

[Slamz]

I'm thinking more like there's an invasion of Dwarfs attacking an Orc village. Bob and Jim can be on either side, since they both have orc and dwarf faction. So if Bob attacks Jim, does that mean he's helping the orcs fight the dwarfs or helping the dwarfs fight the orcs? How do you treat this situation?

Even declaring doesn't help, unless declaring also blocks friendly fire (which I don't want to do). Jim and Bob have both declared that they are for the orcs. Jim attacks Bob right in the middle of Orctown -- what happens?



Maybe that's where "friendly fire" rules come in. Jim attacks Bob. Since this was an attack against a declared friend, this causes Jim's Orc faction to temporarily drop to 0. Bob can now fire back and any Orcs in the area will treat Jim as a hostile.

So if Jim wants to kill Bob in peace, he needs to do it where the Orcs can't see it.

[Vllad]

I think you have to keep the distinction between kill and attack. Since anyone can attack anyone so far in this game we do have to have some leeway.

Bob and Jim may be fighting on the same side but some AoE may splash or he aimed poorly need to be allowed. This has room for abuse however the Orcs only care about Bob or Jim if they kill each other. Other wise the Orcs just consider it friendly fire.

Bob may kill Jim but he only takes a faction hit. I would say the Orcs wouldn't attack him unless the faction dropped below zero. In other words Bob had some faction with Orcs so while they didn't like him killing Jim they will cut him some slack this time. If that dropped Bob to below Zero however the Orcs will attack him. EQ like.

I am not sure declarations are neccessary, only actions.

If Jim and Bob both showed up to fight where the Dwarves are attacking the Orcs they could sit and watch or help one or both sides. If they participate by healing or help killing one side or the other faction is adjusted.

However when they arrive the commanders of each side will have quest available. If Jim or Bob take any of those quest then that is a declaration of sorts to help.

Taking the quest from the Dwarf Commander could really piss off the Orc Commander where he no longer will give you his quest. Completing the quest gives you serious faction hits.

However I would still have it remain an action based mechanic. If you take the quest yet you do not start them you can still delete the quest and move over to the other Commander.

You could have multiple type quest.

Scouting
Gathering
Killing

Some quest like killing would result in severe faction hits while scouting may not. This way people could play a Neutral side and use this to balance their gains in faction increases.


Vllad