Travel

[Slamz]

We had talked about this some in another thread, but I thought I'd just start a separate thread for this.

Given:
* World size is massive. World War 2 Online size would be ideal. (Actually we just need to sell this idea to Cornered Rat Studios, since they have the only game engine in the world that can even handle this...)
* You are meant to spend your life working on local factional wars. Moving across the map should only happen if you don't intend to come back
* Let's just assume the game will have "magic". Sci-fi technology and magic are basically the same thing, so we're not limiting ourselves much.

What methods of travel should we support?


I'm thinking...
* You can fairly easily travel from one town to another regardless of distance if the destination and source town both employ a wizard and both wizards like you. This sort of travel is cheap if distances are short but can be very, very expensive if distances are far. So basically once you are friendly enough with 4 orc villages, the orc shaman will teleport you from one village to the next. The orc shaman in the 5th village doesn't know you well enough, though, and refuses to cooperate in such a spell, so you still have to get over there the hard way.
* Wizards may be able to teleport you away to a location of your choosing, but the further away you want to go, the more it costs and the less accurate the spell is. (e.g., if you want to teleport to that 5th village 20 miles away, the wizard will send you there, plus or minus 3 miles, and he needs 3 gold bricks to complete the ritual for that range.) This trip is one-way. He cannot call you back.
* No "WOW style" mass transit system. There simply is no easy way to travel large distances.
* NPC caravans. There would probably be caravans that you can hitch a ride on, which will travel whether you're online or not. (If the caravan gets destroyed, you would log in and find yourself in the bushes near that location.) These might take you longer distances.
* Moving large amounts of cargo would be extremely risky. YOU log out of the world but your cargo caravan doesn't.

I would probably do horses/vehicles, though, just because I think they should have a place in the game. But it would still take a damn long time to completely leave your region.


I was also thinking that a faction could, in an emergency, do a mass teleport to basically fling themselves into the wild blue yonder to start over. This could be an idea if we wanted to make sure that factions never really died. The faction decides they're losing, so they empower their best wizard to use all of the buildings in town as "fuel" for a spell which teleports all the people and possessions (including any players who logged out in the inn) 500 miles away to a fresh position where they will start to rebuild.

So from an attacker's perspective, you would be fighting this faction, taking over their towns, cruising for a victory and then their last 3 villages basically explode and everyone in them is gone -- their land is now free for the taking.

[Hoofhurr]

Travel is really a function of distance. Interesting travel is a function of density.

If you want travel to be prohibitive you increase distance and if you want travel to interesting you increase density. Nothing says, 'fuck no, I won't go there,' like putting the location really far away and putting nothing in between.

Conversely, you can encourage travel between two points by shortening the distance and putting lots of cool stuff in between.

[Slamz]

Yeah, density is a tricky one. What, exactly, do your fill your living world with? How much distance can you put between towns so that they are far enough away to not just be in a nonstop clash but are close enough to keep it interesting?

I'm thinking that the distance between, say, Freeport and Grobb, would be good. Or like Orgrimmir and Thunder Bluff. It's a solid jog but certainly doable. (And similar to WW2O/Planetside, you would need some way to set up a "mobile spawn" for any serious attacks in enemy territory, because it's just too far to run from Orgrimmir to Thunder Bluff every time you die.)



The intervening space would probably be fairly empty -- or rather, full of resources, which may include potentially dangerous but valuable wildlife, as well as factional NPCs who may be out harvesting those resources.

[Jakensama]

While I do like the idea of difficulty moving (i.e. teleporting sucked in UO because once you had your runes marked you have no reason to walk in the real world as much), I'm unsure how the semi-permanent location would appeal to people. I'd get bored of seeing the same zone and scenery all the time.

[Slamz]

Incidentally, respawning is probably a worthy offshoot discussion related to travel.

I think I would do something like this:
Every player has access to a personal extra-dimensional space, similar to a Bag of Holding. This is basically your bank, where you will store extra equipment and valuables. Only you can ever access this space.

A fairly basic magical construct is a "Spawn Stone". It's literally a stone which you place on the ground. If you die, that's where you respawn at. You may also access your holding space via this stone. Nobody else can use your stone or access your holding space but they CAN destroy your stone, to stop you from respawning there. (Incidentally, when you die I'd give you two options: spawn at stone or detonate stone. If you choose to detonate it, you'll lose your spawn but it will explode in quite a fireball. Campers will want to destroy stones, not hang around them waiting to see who shows up.)

You drop all of your equipment if you die, but you can get extra equipment from your stone.

If you die and don't have a stone, you'll end up at the nearest factional graveyard.

If no nearby factions like you, you'll end up at the nearest neutral graveyard (or something).


However,
Players who are in good standing with a powerful enough faction will very rarely "die". Rather, they make arrangements with a local wizard and whenever they are "just about to die", the wizard intervenes and teleports you home (perhaps with some restrictions on range and expense -- e.g., maybe he needs 1 gold bar to teleport you like this, so giving him 10 gold bars means he's ready to save you 10 times). These wizards can also help you access your holding space.

When you're ready to do some serious messing around in enemy territory, you would hire a wizard like this to go out with you and park somewhere -- basically a Planetside AMS. When you "die", you teleport to the wizard. The wizard is still a wizard NPC, so he can be killed and he will also try to defend the area around him (you can't really "spawn camp" because the spawn location will throw fireballs at you and try to turn you into a newt). You could also hire guards to go with the wizard, basically creating a sort of mobile fire base / spawn location.



So you will typically take the Long Run only with the intent of setting up a spawn location of some sort for yourself. Once the enemy has wiped out your spawn location, you'll have to make the Long Run again.

[Slamz]

While I do like the idea of difficulty moving (i.e. teleporting sucked in UO because once you had your runes marked you have no reason to walk in the real world as much), I'm unsure how the semi-permanent location would appeal to people. I'd get bored of seeing the same zone and scenery all the time.

I think it should be fairly rare to find yourself in the same spot from week to week.

Eventually Orgrimmir would conquer Thunder Bluff and now you're attacking from Thunder Bluff to somewhere else.

Or Orgrimmir falls and you find yourself having to retreat to somewhere else.

I would think you'd have movement on a weekly basis. And some stuff would probably move with you. Once the Orcs conquer Thunder Bluff, the top ranking blacksmith would probably move to support the front lines, leaving an apprentice to take over the home operation.


So you're moving around the map as the war flows, but you may still see a lot of familiar faces.

[Hoofhurr]

The scenery could still change within a region as could the diversity of points of interest. Distance establishes meaningful fronts as long as there is something within each region that is uniquely worth fighting over.

[Diggles]

I dont like teleportation of any kind.
I dont like 'bind stones' of any kind. Dont you remember the bind rushers from EQ?

I think you either respawn in the temple of your faction (NAKED) or you respawn in like one of the 4 big neutral towns in the game (one in each quadarant of the game, north south east west).

I think there should be somewhat automated caravans/convoys between the 4 major neutral cities that you you can hitch rides on, but they are subject to attack...from both PC & NPC forces. IE...if noone has been hunting in a certain part of the map that the road passes thru, they will be powerful and overgrown and threaten anything coming into their territory. QUests from the neutral towns could to either escort the convoy or bounties for NPC kills along the road.

Likewise, any mounts in the game should have autopilot between friendly & neutral towns, but you are always traveling in real time and subject to attack. Perhaps if your mount skills are high enough your horse can turn away from danger or give you a small warning (neigh neigh, stamp stamp)

[Ulfen]

I dont like teleportation of any kind.
I dont like 'bind stones' of any kind. Dont you remember the bind rushers from EQ?

I think you either respawn in the temple of your faction (NAKED) or you respawn in like one of the 4 big neutral towns in the game (one in each quadarant of the game, north south east west).

I agree.

[Diggles]

Ya, I forgot that make the point that it makes death mean something.

If fights last longer, like 2-5 minutes, you dont have any solo stealth gankers. Also, you dont allow stealth, or for sure no completely invisible moving kind

[Slamz]

Bind rushing was a problem in EQ because of two problems:
* Naked wizards (bind rushing as a warrior was pointless)
* No way to destroy their bind spot

In Planetside, "bind rushing" is part of the fun. It keeps the action going and eventually one side overruns the other side's bind spot, destroys it and that's game over for that particular battle.

Without forward spawns you end up with the original WW2O or like WAR open field combat, where you die and spawn a pretty sizable distance away. The ratio of "travel to action" is too high. I want more action than travel, which requires bind spots. Mobile, destroyable bind spots have proven to be fun in Planetside and WW2O.

[Diggles]

Bind rushing was a problem in EQ because of two problems:
* Naked wizards (bind rushing as a warrior was pointless)
* No way to destroy their bind spot

In Planetside, "bind rushing" is part of the fun. It keeps the action going and eventually one side overruns the other side's bind spot, destroys it and that's game over for that particular battle.

Without forward spawns you end up with the original WW2O or like WAR open field combat, where you die and spawn a pretty sizable distance away. The ratio of "travel to action" is too high. I want more action than travel, which requires bind spots. Mobile, destroyable bind spots have proven to be fun in Planetside and WW2O.

well then do something like guild/faction/squad based 'siege tents/towers' or sometime, instead of personal movable spawn points

[Vllad]

I don't think their should be travel short cuts at all except in area's with in what that faction controls. Respawn should be under another catagory.

Lets use your Orgimar example and the zone in front of it. If the main faction you support controls Orgimar then as part of the cities growth is to build portaling stones/obelisk. These stones/obelisk are expensive to build but this way you can portal between Orgimar and the Troll village down by the sea. Both cities are controlled by the same faction and this creates a way for quick defenses as needed.

However I would limit the portaling to just individuals. Caravans need to run goods between Orgimar and the Troll Village.

As the Orcs expand their area they eventually take over the Barrens. As the Barrens are obsorbed into the Orc area of control they can build portals to cover those villages.

If the faction in Thunder Bluff wants to portal to the Barrens they need to go over and capture the villages and build their own Portaling stones. Part of taking over villages/cities is destroying the portaling stones. If the villages or cities can't afford to build them then they don't get any.

I would make the PC's earn certain levels of faction in order to use the portaling stones. This way if you want to trasverse the world you actually had to travel to get to places. This makes the world bigger and creates actual invasions. It also opens up new spaces for new factions. This also would make it so if PC's run to a new area they have to earn enough faction in order to start portaling around.

This creates battle fronts instead of half hazard places to fight.

On the Respawn I would add defensable AMS's in the forms of the wizards you brought up earlier. If the Orc's wanted to take Thunderbluff they would have to bring in their own spawn point. They March the NPC wizard (Plus Guards) to a close location to Thunder Bluff and all PC's helping with the invasion would then spawn at the said point. If the Cow's find it and destroy it all PC's would now have to spawn back at the Barrens if they build a Portal Stone there. I am not sure what to do with all of the NPC's invading Thunder Bluff. Do they respawn as well?

I wouldn't have a world as Dense as say the Barrens. While you do want some wandering NPC's and you want some dungeons etc in certain lands you don't want it packed to the rim like most WoW zones either. You want some space for new factions, places for Guilds to build villages or increase the sizes of those that currently exist. I would certainly fill it with things to make it interesting to hold onto a zone but as you said the front is always moving.

You want the random element of running by an area finding something that wasn't there the week before. If you pack it to tight you can't do that. I think the density of EQ is a good working spot to start with.



Vllad

[Diggles]

what if it was like terminator and only organic material and go thru the teleporters? So you came out naked and had to get gear/potions at your desination?

Banks would be broken down by faction and one for the neutral cities to share. No 'acess to items everywhere' expect cash, just like the templars did.

[Vllad]

The key is to use travel to create the Planetside lattice system. You want the spawn points to always be at the front.

You very well could make it that you can't destroy a Portaling Stone if it is still connected at two points. This makes the fronts easy to find as players log on.

This also makes players chose which factions they align themselves with more carefully.


Vllad

[Slamz]

I agree with EQ density. I think that's a good model. WAR and WOW are packed too dense. Plus, from a roleplay stance, it's just silly to look around and you see the woods PACKED with stuff wandering back and forth aimlessly.

I think you want pockets of density with lots of open space between. Like on the way from Orgrimmir to Thunder Bluff you might pass 15 orc camps. Most of these are literally "camps" with a handful of orcs. They basically process local resources and send them to Orgrimmir. Throw in some wandering deer and wolves and you've got a good, interesting setting, without having to jam it wall to wall with stuff so that you can't even run in a straight line for 30 seconds without tripping over three lions and 6 antelope.

well then do something like guild/faction/squad based 'siege tents/towers' or sometime, instead of personal movable spawn points

The "mobile wizard" idea is basically a factional spawn spot. Potentially you could employ him solo but it may be that the resource cost for using him is prohibitive unless you're pooling resources.

But I still like my "spawn stone" idea.

If you can afford the wizard, you use him because he saves your equipment.

If you can't afford the wizard, you use the personal bind stone, which does NOT save your equipment, but at least gives you an option to play in an area, until someone finds your stone and steps on it.


I don't want to ONLY support big guild/faction gameplay. I want some option for a lone thief to go out and cause trouble with acceptable personal risk without making him run for 20 minutes every time he dies.

[Jakensama]

I wouldn't have a world as Dense as say the Barrens. While you do want some wandering NPC's and you want some dungeons etc in certain lands you don't want it packed to the rim like most WoW zones either. You want some space for new factions, places for Guilds to build villages or increase the sizes of those that currently exist. I would certainly fill it with things to make it interesting to hold onto a zone but as you said the front is always moving.

I think mobs should expand to fill the space available to them, in new or undeveloped areas there are going to be more mobs, if you want to build your village there or expand it, you should have to secure some land and chase off the mobs. If enemys raze your village and don't leave anything left there, the wilderness could expand back over it.

Not sure how dynamic and roaming mobs would work out though, you would have the problem of things going extinct and eventually players just hunt the world dry so you definately have to limit the developable land (or else end up like original UO where every square foot of clear land in the world had a house built on it).

If you make it too sparse the game is boring, running around long distances with doing nothing is boring and certainly not a rewarding way to play a game for many people - you have to suspend some realism for the sake of enjoyment.

[Slamz]

Not sure how dynamic and roaming mobs would work out though, you would have the problem of things going extinct and eventually players just hunt the world dry so you definately have to limit the developable land (or else end up like original UO where every square foot of clear land in the world had a house built on it).

I would try to think up ways to implement "natural limits".

For cities, this might work something like in Civilization -- big cities take up a lot of squares of resources. Another city can form nearby but it will never be very big because the nearby big city is already taking up a large share of the nearby resources.

So like you've got Orgrimmir, which is huge, and the Barrens village, which is decent sized and in between them you've got a little place that's basically 4 tents and a watch tower. The 4 tent place can't grow to be as big as Orgrimmir because it only has access to a very limited selection of resources to consume for itself. It ends up reaching equilibrium at a population of 8 orcs because that's all the food it has access to.


Stuff like deer we may simply fudge and say "deer spawn at a given rate" and they just magically appear.

"Dwarf Fortress" actually already does exactly this. Dwarves eat food. Food spawns at a given rate. If you get too many dwarves, they'll starve themselves down to a level where the available food keeps up with them. They go out hunting, etc, and if they hunt the local wildlife to extinction, they have to wait around for the next wildlife spawn cycle.


Could probably take it a step further to make it even more realistic but that might be one step too far.

[Vllad]

I don't think it would hurt to have PC help to grown the villages. In fact I would think we would want to encourage PC help to make the Barrens village a city. This creates additional ways for the guilds/pc to grow themselves.

As long as we also encourage other NPC's and PC to tear them down we shouldn't have a UO problem. The UO Problem was nothing was rampaging through the land destroying everything.

Their is nothing that people can't build that some marauding horde of Zombies can't take care of.


Vllad

[Kakarat]

I don't think it would hurt to have PC help to grown the villages. In fact I would think we would want to encourage PC help to make the Barrens village a city. This creates additional ways for the guilds/pc to grow themselves.

As long as we also encourage other NPC's and PC to tear them down we shouldn't have a UO problem. The UO Problem was nothing was rampaging through the land destroying everything.

Their is nothing that people can't build that some marauding horde of Zombies can't take care of.


Vllad

A lot of what I have read depict Sid Meier's Civilization. Not just this thread, but a lot in this sub-forum.
It is a turn based game, therefore travel is limited per 'day/turn'. There are NPC's collecting goods for you. There are blacksmiths making weapons. There is a stable breeding horses. Those NPC's collecting goods are able to be 'captured'. Your towns that are developing are able to be taken over. A revolt may happen within this town. Sure Civilization doesn't have magic, it doesn't have character development, the point I am trying to make is that it was a successful game.
I know what I have said here has nothing to do with travel lol.

[Dophuz]

Take resources...and build roads. roads give you a speed boost. Extra costs for buidling roads over passes, rivers (bridge) etc. These would be destroyable.

Connect two villages/cities via road and you get increase atributes available at the merchants/vendors.

Pay the maint. on raods/improvements or the decay and dissolve.

Give the enemy faction a REASON to come and attack.

4am no-lifers a problem...make it so that they have to rack up some "vps" in order to come and bollix up your stuff.

Give bridges/passes ports etc..a strategic reason.