DISCUSSIONS AROUND ONGOING PROJECTS

Patch - 2021-05-17

The four outposts recently established in the Nexus are activated (opened to homin attack). The characteristics of the battles to be fought for their conquest not only differ significantly from those of the "historical" outposts, but will evolve as the redesign project progresses. Below are those adopted for the first phase of testing:

• Mode: Guild vs. NPC (GvE), where only the guild having declared war can participate in the battle (no allied or enemy PCs on the battlefield).
• Duration: 55 minutes (11 rounds of 5 minutes).
• Declaration: Only one battle per week per guild and per outpost is allowed (so any guild can fight, at best, four battles per week, one on each of the four outposts).
• Schedule: a new battle can start at the beginning of each hour for each outpost. A guild wishing to attack must make its declaration within 5 minutes before the start time. For example, a guild wishing to be the attacking guild for the 9pm battle must make its declaration of war at the earliest 8:55 pm, but before 9:00 pm. If several guilds wish to register, only the first one will be retained, the others will have to try again for a next battle.
• Victory conditions: the attacking guild must pass the threshold set for it (10 at most) at the outpost it is attacking.
• Outcome: A won battle does not give the victorious guild possession of the concerned outpost (the latter is returned within the hour to the NPCs who defended it) but any battle fought closes with the granting of a reward.
• Reward: its nature and size are determined by the threshold of the attacked outpost and are displayed as soon as the war is declared. It is automatically awarded to the testing guild at the end of the battle.

  The thresholds set for a given guild at the outpost that will be the target of its next test battle and the rewards to be expected for the latter will evolve as follows:

• The initial threshold for the four outposts is set at 3.
• The higher the threshold, the higher the reward... and the reverse is true.
• After a defeat (outpost threshold not exceeded during the battle), the outpost threshold will remain the same for the guild.
• After a victory, the offered threshold of the outpost at subsequent battles of the same guild will be increased permanently by one. But if this new threshold is found too difficult to exceed by the guild, the latter can choose to set a lower threshold to the outpost for the next battle.

  Example:

  A guild attacks for the first time the outpost 250 of the Nexus (whose threshold is then for it set to 3) and wins. From then on, it can choose, for its next test battle, to attack the same outpost with threshold 3 or threshold 4. In the first case, even if the said next battle is victorious, the threshold that will be proposed it for a third battle will be 3. In the second case, the latter threshold will be preset to 5 (if victorious) or 4 (if defeated).

Ryzom Forge meeting - 2021-06-24

• Can two guilds that don't have enough people in each of them join together into one for the time of an outpost test battle in Nexus?
  Yes... For now, because it will not be possible later on, since these test battles are actually part of the development of the future outpost system.
• I find the new features tested on the Nexus outposts very refreshing, but is reducing the time of outpost battles still the objective of the refactoring?
  Yes. The only thing that remains to be determined is the strength of the defending NPCs, as the number of rounds will be reduced as a result.
• In the last few months on Atys, we have seen several battles that go well beyond 10 rounds. Hence my question: by reducing the time of outpost battles, don't we risk impoverishing the strategies?
  This debate has already taken place. Out of respect for the group that discussed and argued at length and finally reached an agreement, we will not go back on the decisions made. But there are still many points to be refined and your opinions, feedbacks and suggestions are still very welcome.

Patch 904 (2022+04-25): OP refactoring