[Developer Blog 13.08.2019] Territorial war direction, part 2
Hello, Warlords!
My name is No. 2, the designer who is in charge of the design of territory war. Last time, I mentioned the territory reset in the future season system in the blog, and received a lot of feedback from you. Here are a few things that I would like to share with you.
A dilemma on the sand table of war
The decision to use season-play with periodic territorial resets was a long-considered and discussed design.
We love the war of power; we love every inch of the land we fought so hard to take. We have fought numerous territorial wars, from China to Europe and from Europe to Asia. We have built and destroyed nations. We’ve been partakers and union workers. We truly know that territorial warfare is not just a reward or a bonus for all the Warlords, but a real sense of conquest and glory.
But when we think about this system, we find that we have to assume two responsibilities that cannot be avoided:
First: the rules of the game need to allow as many players as possible to equally experience the charm of the territory war, whether you are core guild players, casual guild players, scattered players, or future newcomers. Many players switch between these characters for practical reasons.
Second: we want to make this system can maintain the vitality for a long term, to ensure that whether the general is fighting in the game or about to enter the world of war, can have a rhythm, constantly fresh gameplay to experience, make this world full of vitality and attraction.
What really happened
The generals also gave us a lot of ideas and suggestions, such as foreign invasion, limit the scope of influence and so on. These are all great ideas, many of them we've thought about and even tried, but very few of them actually stand the test of complex online games.
Now I want to talk to you about something that has actually happened before and is happening now as well.
In last year's CN close beta server, players completed the unification within a month. After two months, we are basically only playing friendly games, training between each other. Even when we later added the cross-land loot (the prototype of the current territorial war drill), it quickly became a way for everyone to trade profits.
It has been more than two months since the launch of European service. The borderlands has been open for competition for about two weeks. In the recent territory war, the solidification of ecology has been very evident. We also get frequent feedback from European players, who want to get rid of the friendly alliance from diplomacy system, because there is already a super alliance, which is supposed to be friendly to each other, and only a few villages and cities are fighting in the five lands.
We can reasonably speculate that Europe will soon enter the ecological curing period. As the continent enters a period of peace, the new Warlord who wants to fight for territory have no space to start a fight, and the old Warlords who have fought are retired because they have lost their opponents, and we never know how long this period of peace would last.
Use the season to create a fair fight for each player
Therefore, from six months ago, we started the design of the season system. After repeated discussion, we found that only when the territory is completely reset, can we ensure the complete restart of the ecology.
During the season, there will be clear periods of territory war, which will give everyone clear objectives to fight for, and prevent Warlords from losing the fun of fighting in the endless war of attrition. When the season resumes, it's a chance for generals who haven't reached their goals to regroup, and for generals who have already made their mark, it's a chance to re-select an opponent in the game.
A living game needs new players to join constantly, and the season system can lower the threshold for new players to enter as far as possible, and ensure that old players have fresh opponents to challenge constantly.
The season is a schedule of rich game play and rule exploration
We think that the design of territory war today is just a beginning, like the generals, our dream is to build a real world of war.
So, every season, we will update the world layout, game mechanics and some new and interesting open world systems. Maybe one season is a time of complete chaos and banditry. And another season could be a time of extreme imperial domination. Season could be a good chance to open up new lands, new combat and cosmetic themes, or even new units and player could enjoy and start over a fresh game play experience based on that.
We still have a lot of systems in development that will be introduced into the game world step by step, through the rhythm of the season.
Here, I would like to share with you one of the most important design ideas of the season: the world will remember every honor and achievement that Warlords achieved in the season. In our design, each season is a dynasty, and the history of a dynasty will be written by all the players who fought during the period, and the history of the game created by all of you is our core design concept.
Thank you for your love of territory war. We are looking forward to hear all of you.
My name is No. 2, the designer who is in charge of the design of territory war. Last time, I mentioned the territory reset in the future season system in the blog, and received a lot of feedback from you. Here are a few things that I would like to share with you.
A dilemma on the sand table of war
The decision to use season-play with periodic territorial resets was a long-considered and discussed design.
We love the war of power; we love every inch of the land we fought so hard to take. We have fought numerous territorial wars, from China to Europe and from Europe to Asia. We have built and destroyed nations. We’ve been partakers and union workers. We truly know that territorial warfare is not just a reward or a bonus for all the Warlords, but a real sense of conquest and glory.
But when we think about this system, we find that we have to assume two responsibilities that cannot be avoided:
First: the rules of the game need to allow as many players as possible to equally experience the charm of the territory war, whether you are core guild players, casual guild players, scattered players, or future newcomers. Many players switch between these characters for practical reasons.
Second: we want to make this system can maintain the vitality for a long term, to ensure that whether the general is fighting in the game or about to enter the world of war, can have a rhythm, constantly fresh gameplay to experience, make this world full of vitality and attraction.
What really happened
The generals also gave us a lot of ideas and suggestions, such as foreign invasion, limit the scope of influence and so on. These are all great ideas, many of them we've thought about and even tried, but very few of them actually stand the test of complex online games.
Now I want to talk to you about something that has actually happened before and is happening now as well.
In last year's CN close beta server, players completed the unification within a month. After two months, we are basically only playing friendly games, training between each other. Even when we later added the cross-land loot (the prototype of the current territorial war drill), it quickly became a way for everyone to trade profits.
It has been more than two months since the launch of European service. The borderlands has been open for competition for about two weeks. In the recent territory war, the solidification of ecology has been very evident. We also get frequent feedback from European players, who want to get rid of the friendly alliance from diplomacy system, because there is already a super alliance, which is supposed to be friendly to each other, and only a few villages and cities are fighting in the five lands.
We can reasonably speculate that Europe will soon enter the ecological curing period. As the continent enters a period of peace, the new Warlord who wants to fight for territory have no space to start a fight, and the old Warlords who have fought are retired because they have lost their opponents, and we never know how long this period of peace would last.
Use the season to create a fair fight for each player
Therefore, from six months ago, we started the design of the season system. After repeated discussion, we found that only when the territory is completely reset, can we ensure the complete restart of the ecology.
During the season, there will be clear periods of territory war, which will give everyone clear objectives to fight for, and prevent Warlords from losing the fun of fighting in the endless war of attrition. When the season resumes, it's a chance for generals who haven't reached their goals to regroup, and for generals who have already made their mark, it's a chance to re-select an opponent in the game.
A living game needs new players to join constantly, and the season system can lower the threshold for new players to enter as far as possible, and ensure that old players have fresh opponents to challenge constantly.
The season is a schedule of rich game play and rule exploration
We think that the design of territory war today is just a beginning, like the generals, our dream is to build a real world of war.
So, every season, we will update the world layout, game mechanics and some new and interesting open world systems. Maybe one season is a time of complete chaos and banditry. And another season could be a time of extreme imperial domination. Season could be a good chance to open up new lands, new combat and cosmetic themes, or even new units and player could enjoy and start over a fresh game play experience based on that.
We still have a lot of systems in development that will be introduced into the game world step by step, through the rhythm of the season.
Here, I would like to share with you one of the most important design ideas of the season: the world will remember every honor and achievement that Warlords achieved in the season. In our design, each season is a dynasty, and the history of a dynasty will be written by all the players who fought during the period, and the history of the game created by all of you is our core design concept.
Thank you for your love of territory war. We are looking forward to hear all of you.