Shattered Kingdoms

Im going to preface this by saying Im not overly interested in PvP or tribunal warfare myself I do it when RP demands. The system concept is designed to be acceptable firstly to PvPers then secondly look at encouraging others to join the conflicts. The design ideals Im trying to follow are; No end game of the warfare (SK should never have on nation take over the world because thats the end of S(hattered)K). Encourage people to participate with out forcing. To try to make it low maintenance for Imms to make and maintain. Try to stick to the original fame work of Sk conflict.

How it works. Tribunal A goes to an NPC to start event attacking tribunal B. Tribunal A and B get a TB telling them the event has started and where it is taking place and when it will end. Tribunal A attacks tribunal B defends 30 min later rewards tokens are handed out to people in the location of victory. They then take these tokens and turn them in for actual rewards.

The Imm work. Adding a NPC's to every tribunal in a common location (near the judge probably). This NPC would have a quest like command list that would be used to start the event. The script would only be usable by someone in a tribunal. The script would then check to see the defender has a tribunal member active. Once attackers and defenders are "available" the script is fired to send both tribunals a Tell something along the lines of "(Tribunal A) is attacking (City Y) can (Tribunal B) hold them off before <X time/date>." Then a gate/or rift depending on which is more suitable (a 30 min rift might be more suitable) opens to their defending tribunals stones. A wiz invis (lets call him the adjudicator) NPC spawns (it can not move and cant attack just to cover something funny happens with fireballs or such) in the target city at the location Im thinking the Inn but it could just as easy be the judge (this would trigger the jail break code so Im not sure its a good idea) either way it should be known to both sides. The adjudicator NPC has a 30 timer set in them. At the end of 30 min they fire off and script that rewards attacking tribunals with a reward flag, if no attacking tribunal members are present then it rewards defending members present, then they despawn (to try to limit stupid stuff like getting the plague etc.) This reward is either a token that can be reclaimed at a shop that lets you use a script once like a repeatable quest. A "shop" is then added, there could be one in each tribunal area or just one in Teron. This shop would contain the rewards.

Coding problems. Need to have NPCs spawn in different areas. Have to have a way to stop multi invasions happening at the same time. Wiz invis NPC needs to not attack people using AoE or die from similar. Shop scripting so it only works once per time but resets next attack or defend.

The rewards. The rewards should likely be one shot items of significant power or something that can be obtained another way. Depending on decisions of Imms rewards could be potions scrolls one charge wands and staves (no recharge to 2). These could range from standard buffs to true sight, resurrection an item to reduce fatigue or spirit disorientation if thats possible with existing code. Another choice for a reward could be a bump to your mentoring for your mentor insight stat point. Or a one shot scripted item of scrying.

Expansion options; Include other cities other than the capitals. Imm sponsored event times and place could include altering rooms however this would be rare and be preplanned by both sides of the event so everyone knew what was at stake. Code to be added to tweak bounty NPCs spawn strength and or rate for unbalanced challenges similar to CRS. Include allies in the rewards more directly. Assassination similar event only with a named defender to be killed as the reward condition. There are other expansion options but KISS is a good principle to start with.

Goal analysis. The warfare can be triggered any time there are attackers and defenders online. There is no a end to the fight but not an end to the war. Losing once has no real difference to current PK. It creates a situation with planned PK where both sides get some notice before the attack starts. They also have 30 min to get a group formation organised and attack. If you feel you have no chance of winning a conflict you can flee although this may have RP consequences most people will accept a discussion on the situation. The original design scope is relatively small it could even be reduced to include only Taslamar/Empire conflict and expanded on to reduce the build size. The conflict is player started player, player fought. It formalizes conflicts and "events" and offers intensives to use the designed system while not stopping the old way of just PVPing. Non tribunal members are left out of the reward side of thing but they can still be a part of the events PvP. You could even have a third party betrayal over the token items, or just to make it so no one wins. I could be wrong but I would like to think that this could be coded in a few hours (as there is a lot of copy pasta coding) by a current Imm so long as they where given permissions to do what was required where required not counting checks and balances on the code work. I can be implemented with out changing the "play" of SK significantly, although the 30 min timer could make for some clutch victory defense timing plays.

Foreseeable problems/short falls; Ninja ganks right before starting the event. People under equipped recovering when an event starts. People being knee deep in PvE content at a non gate able location when the event starts. I dont think these are any great problems but the rewards should probably start off smaller and be rampped up to see how significant they are. Over use of the system creating too many rewards. The system is not a true monitor of who is winning or losing any given conflict and will likely lead to overpowered attacks however that is not different to the current system and it can be adjusted later if required. Limits on how often the system can be made active may need to be added to stop too much loot entering the game world.

An interesting concept. I feel like this has a lot of potential for 4v1 scenarios. Perhaps the goal could be to kill the judge and warparty. First ten minutes, you can't start the warparty portion, giving the opposing team time to form a defense. Either way, the idea has potential. Wondering about risk/reward. Is a one time use item reward enough incentive to defend?
Scenario:
Jomino and I are logged in.
Byron, Rall, Pongsom, and some healer keeper is logged.
They initiate the challenge.
Do we really fight for control of our Inn, knowing that we'll lose?
Is it worth it for a true sight potion?

Each player can make that call themselves of if it is worth it. Its up to Imms is such valuable loot is available, the rewards I used are an example. Keep in mind you just have to make sure they are not in the inn room at exactly 30 min meaning a tactical strike is a viable tactic for defense and offense attacking is a lot harder because you dont know how many bounty NPCs will spwan hence why I think the rewards should also be significant. Also there are tweaks built into the system that if this kind of thing becomes the norm, adjustments can be made. Bounty NPCs spawn rate npc defender groups similar to judge defense or cabal defense are an example of these however there are other ones that could be considered, rewards adjusted. Its not like you loose your cabal powers on a success/loss. However it might drive RP towards a conclusion of a war if you keep losing and have no success yourself. So hopefully RP drives the desire to defend more than the loot. There is also the option I didnt discuss to give different value rewards to attackers vs defenders victory conditions. Use tokens as a PvP currency so that you need several victories to afford pie in the sky items. Keep it simple stupid (KISS method) to start with. However the base idea and design has lots of wiggle room to make it more balanced in the risk reward of the conflict.

There is nothing stopping 4v1 situations but this system encourages at least a 4v1 where the 1 knows its coming. Ive personally won 1v3 fights while defending a tribunal on a rogue. Its hard as crap and you need a little luck but its not impossible. If you know where they will be and when they will be there is a huge advantage on top of the defending area to start with. The reward is to encourage using a system that warns your victims rather than a surprise gank. If its not big enough people wont use it, if its too big a winning side will end up over powered.

Oh I did forget to mention a really powerful part of this idea. It could actually be implemented for a RP weekend with set times with out any building as a test to see if it works using an Imm run event to replace all the building work in the test.