Ideas for a battleground / PVP content / minigames

[Zwiebelchen]

I want to expand the PvP content of this game a bit, to give players something else to do than just farming bosses.

So, give plenty suggestions!


Just as a sidenote: item rewards for true PvP are impossible, as we don't have a server-side leaderboard or anything that would prevent players from save-scumming to get items without risk. Also, the PvP in this game is not balanced enough to justify an actual ranking system.


Here are some ideas I came up with in the past to start the discussion:

1) some kind of mini-DOTA (2v2 or 3v3)
2) asymmetrical multiplayer in conquer-the-fortress style (Xv1 or Xv2)
3) a mini-tower defense/maze (could have a solo mode; possibly with item rewards)
4) capture the flag with a larger arena (2v2 or 3v3)

 

[TinyTeaser]

I feel PvP (battleground wise) will feel pointless without some sort of reward. What if you make the enemies AI?... However... that will become PvE again. I feel there needs to be a benefit from it or it will eventually just become pointless memory space in the map. Hopefully I'm wrong.

 

[BoxOfFaith]

I have to agree with Tiny.

PvP is poorly balanced with all of the CC spells combined with nukes, its nearly impossible to live anyway. Perhaps in 3v3 things are a bit more interesting, but if we have 6 equally geared players in a game, I think we'll just end up doing boss farming lol.

However creating some seperate co-operative mini games could be really neat. Like tower defences, protect the NPC, (insert random skibi TD mini-games here). I actually think farming gold through mini-game type rewards would be a really neat way to be how we obtain gold, rather than selling items (especially with the new crafting system coming).

Alternatively, you could force roles on players, so they're not using their actual character to play in the games as well. So a level 50 could play with a level 10, and the level 10 would be of equal strength within the minigame, and after the game finishes, you're rewarded with a level dependent reward.

Curiously, if you did implement co-operative minigames, is it possible to save internal "points" so you could reward mini-game completion points, and then have shops somewhere that sells certain items for these mini-game points?

 

[Zwiebelchen]

What if you make the enemies AI?...

Must. suppress. memories. of. WoW. Trials of the Crusader. Raid...


In case of a PvE minigame, I could imagine some kind of tower defense survival game mixture.
Basicly, you'd have to defend against endless spawns of enemies (possibly with randomized abilities) at progressing difficulty. You can build and upgrade towers with gold you earn from killing (the minigame gold would be tracked seperate from the hero gold, obviously). There could be towers to substitute hero abilities you don't have, like a healing tower or a tanky tower. Not sure how that could work, though.
...
On the other hand; I feel that such a minigame could be cooler as part of a boss encounter. Like the WoW chess-event in Kharazhan.

 

[erezan]

my suggest for a battleground are just like a consept in anime onepiece ""corrida colessium" which is it 3v3 in order to take an item (if impossible maybe u can give additional to gaias like Rank system es: gladiator third class, gladiator second class, and so,oon). and you can put AI monster to chase every groub just give them 1 mob each. and in the middle of the battle ground there are 1 monster whose hv throne or treasure box and our goal is to retrive it. the group who have it can become the winner. but in order to do so 3v3 thing there are a few requirement since we know all hero classes didnt well balanced

1. every group have a same lvl and classes
2. every class will chose their only 4 ability can be use and the rest will be locked while 3v3 still in progress
3. every group have one capt for leading to hmm "maybe for" drafting the abilies"
   

 

[S0ulseeker]

I feel PvP (battleground wise) will feel pointless without some sort of reward. What if you make the enemies AI?

I also agree with TinTeaser here.

In case of a PvE minigame, I could imagine some kind of tower defense survival game mixture.
Basicly, you'd have to defend against endless spawns of enemies (possibly with randomized abilities) at progressing difficulty. You can build and upgrade towers with gold you earn from killing (the minigame gold would be tracked seperate from the hero gold, obviously). There could be towers to substitute hero abilities you don't have, like a healing tower or a tanky tower. Not sure how that could work, though.
...
On the other hand; I feel that such a minigame could be cooler as part of a boss encounter. Like the WoW chess-event in Kharazhan.

A tower defense mini game might be cool but it just doesn't seem like the right kind of map for Gaias. I liked your ideas of mini areans like 2v2 capture the flag or a dota like mini game of 2v2/3v3 that could be fun.

I've pitched this idea before but this seems like an appropriate time to resurface it. I think there should be an arena where players queue up together and fight boss encounters in it (like the Orc Gladiators arena on wc3 except boss battles) You could force players to pay a high amount of either gold or mana crystals to attempt the bosses and can win "pvp gear" from special venders for beating the boss which they can then use in the other arenas. It would scale how many players queue but the fewer the players the less currency rewarded for PVP gear at the end.

I understand that this could encourage people to just reload if they fail and could potentially be exploited, but at the same time they will still lose that gold/mana crystals at least once if they beat it so the initial sink in should be substantial

 

[Jumbo]

I think for true pvp in the current arena it would be interesting if hp would be raised by 500-1000% there (and of course reset after leaving). This could be an interesting experiment to see how classes compare when you can't just 1, 2 or 3 hit the opponent.

 

[Zwiebelchen]

I've pitched this idea before but this seems like an appropriate time to resurface it. I think there should be an arena where players queue up together and fight boss encounters in it (like the Orc Gladiators arena on wc3 except boss battles) You could force players to pay a high amount of either gold or mana crystals to attempt the bosses and can win "pvp gear" from special venders for beating the boss which they can then use in the other arenas. It would scale how many players queue but the fewer the players the less currency rewarded for PVP gear at the end.

I understand that this could encourage people to just reload if they fail and could potentially be exploited, but at the same time they will still lose that gold/mana crystals at least once if they beat it so the initial sink in should be substantial

The thing with Arena battles is: it ultimately boils down to designing PvE bosses... which is in no way different than bosses found anywhere else in the game.
So if I add arena bosses, I could always just place them in D4 and generate some trash filler inbetween. The amount of workload would basicly be the same. As I have so much unused terrain, there is literally no point in designing any arena battles at all currently.

The idea behind minigames or PvP content is that it requires relatively little effort to create (basicly, a DotA style minigame requires some rudimentary terrain and a spawn/lose/win trigger and that's about it), but keeps the players entertained for much longer than that.

Arena battles would be the direct opposite of this: relatively high amount of work to create (mostly balancing), but low long-term entertainment value.

I think for true pvp in the current arena it would be interesting if hp would be raised by 500-1000% there (and of course reset after leaving). This could be an interesting experiment to see how classes compare when you can't just 1, 2 or 3 hit the opponent.

Damage is halved in Arena battles currently. And that already makes druids/bishops impossible to kill. ;P

 

[BoxOfFaith]

Well I think adding mini-game type options to the game would still be a neat idea. Occasionally we still get games where nobody feels like healing or something, so it could provide nice activity to do something other than boss farming for a change.

Anything directly PvP related would require too much balancing to be effective. You essentially remove half the classes from being any sort of useful in direct pvp as it is.

Perhaps some sort of "tag" game? That can be competitive without being directly PvP-combat related and could be fun.

 

[PachaXD]

Damage is halved in Arena battles currently. And that already makes druids/bishops impossible to kill. ;P

What about adding dismishing returns to heals for pvp? and maybe in top of that halving it too, maybe a 25% reduc cause of returns but could work if it´s not that complicated, no idea about that.
I think the tower defense would be really cool, a breath of fresh air for the game, would just ove to see it becoming real.

 

[Jumbo]

I disagree Zwieb. Classes like zerker and sorc are extremely op in pvp at the moment. They can one shot almost anyone and it's more of a 'Who draws first' than about any kind of tactics.

I think a combination of the hp increase with diminished healing as Pacha suggested is the way to go.

Offtopic: how's (Jon) Snow area progressing? It's more important than minigames

 

[Zwiebelchen]

I disagree Zwieb. Classes like zerker and sorc are extremely op in pvp at the moment. They can one shot almost anyone and it's more of a 'Who draws first' than about any kind of tactics.

I think a combination of the hp increase with diminished healing as Pacha suggested is the way to go.

I could implement a stat for that purpose, like resilience, that reduces exclusively PvP damage that is only on PvP-reward items.
Could be an interesting addition as then PvP would be disconnected from PvE content, which would help balancing it out a lot.

Offtopic: how's (Jon) Snow area progressing? It's more important than minigames

Finished two spells yesterday for the first boss battle. All in all, I think the bosses will be finished soon in basic implementation. Balancing and adjusting numbers is what will take the majority of the time - depending on how much you guys assist me with feedback.

 

[galactcus]

Maybe a prize for participate... like that :
you enter the arena and if you
-win the arena you receive 1 mc
-was in 2° you receive 500 gold
-was in 3° 250 gold...


there is 5 contestant (Ai like the grunt and the warlock that is in the squire quest... and maybe other's like the girl in the sewer maybe 1 thief from the thieves guild)
the balance can be done like a Media of levels...
example : arena for 45<50 RANK S
for 40~45 RANK A
for 35~40 RANK B
for 30~40 RANK C
for 25~30 RANK D

and the constestants will be balanced by the level you join... (like the pets... they will receive bonus damage and armor for each of the ranks)
PROS : lonely players can receive MC and farm gold easier...
CONS : you need conditions to make that fair...
you need to pay 250 gold to enter the chalenge, need at least level 25
and if balanced the constentats will be like mini bosses fights ^^
every player can join the arena so the max number of gladiators is 10...
(4 AI and 6 player)


the arena can start everyday at the midday... or maybe once every 2 or 3 days ^^

or maybe one day is rank S, another day is Rank A...

 

[Jumbo]

Sounds good Zwieb, but there has to be some starting minimum resilience for characters then. Otherwise no-pvp gear chars will be completely useless. Perhaps add a starter quest for pvp which only requires the player to join a team and fight one match in the arena. Losing or winning yields quest completion either way, and therefore the quest is solely based on making people discover the arena. The quest will reward a weak pvp accessory which, with its resilience, gives the player a fair start in pvp content. This 'trinket'(accessory item) can be progressively upgraded by completing real quests.
The start trinket will be white, then green, blue and perhaps even an orange one for a very challenging quest.
Even people with white trinkets will be viable, so I suppose the trinket of legendary should only be like 60% more powerful. Thus a 20%, 40%, 60% item stat increase pr item.

Another thing I would like to see in a Gladiator-mapish style with lots of creeps spawning is destructable explosive barrels, dealing huge dmg to enemies around if destroyed. Perhaps even destructible columns and pillars if the animations look good enough.

In the future I actually think it would be amazing with a pve area similar in theme to sieged Harrogath in Diablo 2. An epic siege unfolding with the outnumbered (and stat wise quite weak) defenders clashing with incoming demons/undead etc. through an endless battle where only the players will be a variable and fight their way through the battlefield to a boss or whatever else lies ahead. In this area mob types aren't restricted by the normal spawn area return rules though aggro and everything else still works as normal. At the defending area there will be stationary guards killing the mobs so that the constant onslaught is restricted to the battlefield only.