As for me, the main problem of outposts today is that the biggest league win; even a better trained team, with good stuff and well tought tactics can't do it against bigger numbers. Considering how big the Kami faction is today compared to the rest of the players, that leave them little to no chance to stand out.
The main drawback of this mechanism is that as you need as many players as possible, a lot of players that are not interested into PvP are forced to come to the battles. And I often hear players from both sides, even the ones that like PvP, complaining that outpost wars are boring today.
As for me, the good way to solve this would be to limit the number of players on outposts. What I would suggest is a maximum by default of 18 players (two teams) on each side. The war interface would allow attacking and defending to propose a higher or lower number of players, by increment of 9, going as high as 72 and as low as 9. Going higher or lower than 18 would be possible only if both sides agree.
To control that, special warleague would be used. This league could be created only by superior officers and guild leaders from each attacking/defending guild. Being part of this warleague would automatically give you the corresponding "attack" or "defend" op tag.
This system would encourage players to enhance their PvP skills, stuff and tactic and to select champions to fight the war, making it both an interesting goal to reach for players and probably an interesting show to watch for non PvP players.
It would allow smaller faction to fight biggest ones on the same ground, yet still allowing the big fights with lot of players that we have today - but in a more interesting, more balanced way. It would also make guild vs guild possible, which lot of people have been asking for.
And a much bigger faction would still be able to fight on several outposts at the same time, which would grant them the almost certitude to win on one.
The main drawback is that players with lower levels would probably be excluded at some point. But if everyone change their mindset about opwar, we can definitely organize opwars where it's not all about winning but about having fun, and these players would have their role to play in this. Let's not forget that we're playing a game, not fighting for our lifes, loosing is not always fun but it doesn't kill you (thrust me, I don't win that often and I'm still in the game everyday ;).
About the proposition you made :
1. La baisse du coût des attaques et de celui des escouades (qui resteront exprimés en dappers) ;
As it has been said already by Kimmerin, this is not a good idea as op war is the only dapper sink today. Let's make dappers worth something with a lot of op wars! ;)
Today, I don't think dappers hold anyone back from declaring a war.
2. La réduction à une heure de la durée des batailles ;
Removing phase 2 is a bit scary to me, but it's probably a matter of getting used to it. Today phase 2 is making it very hard for the weaker side to win an op war, but it's also what allow them to keep their outposts by using a lot of launchers taking ammo directly from their guildhall, keeping them from having to craft during the battle.
Reducing op war time to one hour will kill the tactics that involve attacking two ops at the same time, as you don't have time in one hour to bring two op to TH6 with one group of homins. But on the other hand, it will also make it easier to plan op war on week evenings and not only on weekends like we do today.
I don't really know what to think of these changes - let's test it and see what happens!
3. Une rotation des matières premières entre les différents avant-postes, tous les soixante-douze jours IRL, couplée au retrait des matières premières d'avant-poste de qualités 50 et 100.
How will this work exactly? will Q250 ops producing Q50 mats still have Q250 guards? If that's the case, no one will be willing to fight for these. And on the other side, Q50 ops producing Q250 mats will be under constant attacks. If you want to do that, limit the way it's done - Q250 could produce Q200/Q250, Q200 could produce Q150/Q200/Q250, and the lower level aps won't be able to produce Q250.
On the other hand, I think switching mats is a very good idea. Some ops are much more difficult to attack than other for some factions because of their proximity to teleporters. Switching mats will give more chance to each faction to get their hands on everything.
4. L'attaque et la prise de la moitié des avant-postes par des PNJ ou des kitins tous les soixante-douze jours IRL.
I'm not very enthusiastic for this change because all the NPC I've seen so far on Ryzom are either cheated-strong so you need all the server to defeat them, or have weakness that make it possible for a handfull of well trained homin to defeat them.
But this will bring some interest for the non PvP oriented players in op war and will sometime take op from the hands of the strongest faction, giving a chance to other factions to have them - even if it's for a short period of time.
On the overall, I think things have been moving the right way over the past few months, the dev team has been doing a lot of work and it really shows in game. Let's be as good on op war modification, I'm sure we can make it work!
One last thing : I read a lot that op mats ar useless; indeed Greslin and Cheng have little to no use, but that's it. Op mats won't make a newbie good at PvP, but in the hands of someone that know hot to use them, they can really make the difference. For those who have the feeling that they are lying around the server in stack of 500, that not the case. Very few percents of the op production leave the Kami hands. At Les Larmes, we have way more boosted stuff (which is still op stuff... but one mat can make a lot of items) than any other kind of op stuff. And this while we're on every big op war with at least a full team - few other guilds can say the same.
The main drawback of this mechanism is that as you need as many players as possible, a lot of players that are not interested into PvP are forced to come to the battles. And I often hear players from both sides, even the ones that like PvP, complaining that outpost wars are boring today.
As for me, the good way to solve this would be to limit the number of players on outposts. What I would suggest is a maximum by default of 18 players (two teams) on each side. The war interface would allow attacking and defending to propose a higher or lower number of players, by increment of 9, going as high as 72 and as low as 9. Going higher or lower than 18 would be possible only if both sides agree.
To control that, special warleague would be used. This league could be created only by superior officers and guild leaders from each attacking/defending guild. Being part of this warleague would automatically give you the corresponding "attack" or "defend" op tag.
This system would encourage players to enhance their PvP skills, stuff and tactic and to select champions to fight the war, making it both an interesting goal to reach for players and probably an interesting show to watch for non PvP players.
It would allow smaller faction to fight biggest ones on the same ground, yet still allowing the big fights with lot of players that we have today - but in a more interesting, more balanced way. It would also make guild vs guild possible, which lot of people have been asking for.
And a much bigger faction would still be able to fight on several outposts at the same time, which would grant them the almost certitude to win on one.
The main drawback is that players with lower levels would probably be excluded at some point. But if everyone change their mindset about opwar, we can definitely organize opwars where it's not all about winning but about having fun, and these players would have their role to play in this. Let's not forget that we're playing a game, not fighting for our lifes, loosing is not always fun but it doesn't kill you (thrust me, I don't win that often and I'm still in the game everyday ;).
About the proposition you made :
1. La baisse du coût des attaques et de celui des escouades (qui resteront exprimés en dappers) ;
As it has been said already by Kimmerin, this is not a good idea as op war is the only dapper sink today. Let's make dappers worth something with a lot of op wars! ;)
Today, I don't think dappers hold anyone back from declaring a war.
2. La réduction à une heure de la durée des batailles ;
Removing phase 2 is a bit scary to me, but it's probably a matter of getting used to it. Today phase 2 is making it very hard for the weaker side to win an op war, but it's also what allow them to keep their outposts by using a lot of launchers taking ammo directly from their guildhall, keeping them from having to craft during the battle.
Reducing op war time to one hour will kill the tactics that involve attacking two ops at the same time, as you don't have time in one hour to bring two op to TH6 with one group of homins. But on the other hand, it will also make it easier to plan op war on week evenings and not only on weekends like we do today.
I don't really know what to think of these changes - let's test it and see what happens!
3. Une rotation des matières premières entre les différents avant-postes, tous les soixante-douze jours IRL, couplée au retrait des matières premières d'avant-poste de qualités 50 et 100.
How will this work exactly? will Q250 ops producing Q50 mats still have Q250 guards? If that's the case, no one will be willing to fight for these. And on the other side, Q50 ops producing Q250 mats will be under constant attacks. If you want to do that, limit the way it's done - Q250 could produce Q200/Q250, Q200 could produce Q150/Q200/Q250, and the lower level aps won't be able to produce Q250.
On the other hand, I think switching mats is a very good idea. Some ops are much more difficult to attack than other for some factions because of their proximity to teleporters. Switching mats will give more chance to each faction to get their hands on everything.
4. L'attaque et la prise de la moitié des avant-postes par des PNJ ou des kitins tous les soixante-douze jours IRL.
I'm not very enthusiastic for this change because all the NPC I've seen so far on Ryzom are either cheated-strong so you need all the server to defeat them, or have weakness that make it possible for a handfull of well trained homin to defeat them.
But this will bring some interest for the non PvP oriented players in op war and will sometime take op from the hands of the strongest faction, giving a chance to other factions to have them - even if it's for a short period of time.
On the overall, I think things have been moving the right way over the past few months, the dev team has been doing a lot of work and it really shows in game. Let's be as good on op war modification, I'm sure we can make it work!
One last thing : I read a lot that op mats ar useless; indeed Greslin and Cheng have little to no use, but that's it. Op mats won't make a newbie good at PvP, but in the hands of someone that know hot to use them, they can really make the difference. For those who have the feeling that they are lying around the server in stack of 500, that not the case. Very few percents of the op production leave the Kami hands. At Les Larmes, we have way more boosted stuff (which is still op stuff... but one mat can make a lot of items) than any other kind of op stuff. And this while we're on every big op war with at least a full team - few other guilds can say the same.