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Thread Statistics | Show CCP posts - 7 post(s) |
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CCP Fozzie
C C P
C C P Alliance
14085
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Posted - 2016.04.04 21:42:16 -
[1] - Quote
Hello everyone! As we mentioned on last week's o7 show, we are planning a set of changes to the way capital escalations work in our Citadel expansion at the end of the month.
I want to start off with an apology for not getting this thread up a bit sooner. We've been a bit swamped here lately with prep for the expansion and early Fanfest prep, and I underestimated how long it would take to get some of this communication together.
The original sleeper capital escalation mechanic introduced way back in Apocrypha was (like many of the mechanics that ended up becoming staples of wormhole space) a bit of an accident. The escalation spawns were intended to provide extra challenge to prevent the sites from being too easy when farmed with capitals, but in practice they ended up becoming the major moneymaking source in the sites. There are several issues with the meta that emerged from the original escalation content, including the very unintuitive mechanics that encourage people to not complete the site so they can farm it repeatedly across downtimes.
With our big changes to capital ships coming in the Citadel expansion, we knew this would be a great opportunity to start building a more intentional form of capital PVE in high-class wormhole sites. We decided to create a new set of NPCs for the escalations so that we can balance and iterate on them without having to mess with the other uses of Sleepless Guardians in the basic site spawn groups. We also decided that we wanted to preserve a good chunk of the income from the sites while removing the incentive to leave sites uncompleted across downtimes. This led us in the direction of placing much of the loot that had been in the escalation spawns into a new Drifter NPC that will spawn once the site is completed.
Many of you will remember this "put the loot in something at the end of the site" concept as it's something we've been discussing with players at Fanfest roundtables for a few years now. We've also been discussing the concept with the CSM (especially Corbexx) and we're working hard to get our latest designs ready for public playtesting.
The basics of the new system are:
- The old capital escalation spawns have been replaced with smaller numbers of new NPCs that are intended to provide more engaging content for capital ships. These new escalation spawns are sleepers using the existing sleeper AI, have large signatures to ensure that they can be engaged fully by capital ships, and will perfer to shoot at capitals when available.
- These new escalation spawns come in up to three waves, one for a dread, one for a carrier and one for a force auxiliary. There are 3 NPCs in each wave in C5s and 4 per wave in C6s.
- The new escalation spawns are worth ~38m per wave in C5s and ~51m per wave in C6s.
- Most of the value of the former escalation waves is being moved to a new Drifter NPC that will spawn once the site has completed.
- The new Drifter is worth about 350m, mostly in blue loot but including salvage as well.
- This new Drifter is completely independent of the site, and will warp off if not pointed. Our current design gives it 3 points of warp core strength, but that is open to change. Once it has left the site that spawned it, the Drifter can live in the system for many days, warping between celestial locations just like a normal Drifter. It is not removed by downtimes.
- We intend the Drifter to be probable with combat scanner probes, as well as visible on d-scan. Full disclosure: we've run into some technical roadblocks with the probing and d-scan part of the feature. We are confident that we can get it working and there's a good chance that it can be ready for the initial expansion release, but it's possible that it might slip to a point release.
- This new Drifter NPC spawns at the end of the site even if no capitals have been used. It is designed to be very challenging but to be doable both with and without capitals. It will however be much easier to kill using capitals.
- Multiple Drifters can co-exist in the same wormhole system and will come to each other's aid if one gets attacked.
Both of these NPCs will "evolve" occasionally as we tune them to provide interesting and fun challenges for wormhole residents. As new functionality is added to the Drifter AI over time we plan to keep adding those features to these Drifter NPCs. The Drifters are an advanced and adaptable foe: those of you who have some experience with the early weeks and months of the original Drifters will understand what I mean.
The fact that the new mechanics encourage people to complete sites is intentional. We think this brings better gameplay than simply clearing escalation spawns and leaving the base site for days. It's important to remember that the spawn rate of new sites is connected to the completion rate of existing sites so as players in all wormhole systems start to complete their sites faster we expect new sites to repopulate faster as well.
We do hope to eventually put a smaller version of this Drifter "boss" into some lower class wormholes as well, especially C4s.
We're really interested in hearing your feedback. I'll do my best to answer questions and we'll update this thread as we get newer versions of the NPC balance onto SISI.
Game Designer | Team Five-0
https://twitter.com/CCP_Fozzie
http://www.twitch.tv/ccp_fozzie/
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CCP Fozzie
C C P
C C P Alliance
14085
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Posted - 2016.04.04 22:00:35 -
[2] - Quote
FAQ (big thanks to Corbexx for helping collect these questions from the community):
Quote:Will these drifters doomsdays people? Will it always one shot someone?
These Drifters will have their own version of the Drifter doomsday, but it will not always one-shot someone. It will however provide its own form of challenge.
Quote:Will the Drifters be able to scram people to shut off MJD.
Yes.
Quote:Will Drifters have different fits/abilities depending on type of wormhole system/effect.
Not at this time. It's definitely an interesting idea, although it would be a challenge to implement this with our current site spawning code.
Quote:Will Drifters scan people down and randomly attack them? Will they 3rd party on people fighting?
These NPCs will not scan down players, although they may unexpectedly engage players at the locations they normally warp between.
Quote:Will they be able to find wormholes?
At the moment the Drifter AI cannot find normal spawned sites like wormholes. This is a feature we would like to add to the new AI generally, and as soon as it is developed we will add it to the W-space Drifters.
Quote:Do you need a capital to spawn the drifter?
No, the Drifter will spawn once the site is completed no matter what ships are used. Capital support will greatly speed up the destruction of this NPC though.
Quote:How long after finishing the site will it spawn? How long till it will warp off?
It will spawn immediately after the site completes, and will warp off at different rates depending on what environment the AI sees.
Quote:Will data/relic sites spawn the Drifter?
The current plan is for the drifter to only spawn in the combat sites. The way that data/relic sites trigger site completion would cause some problems with the new NPC spawning. This may change however.
Quote:How long will they stay in system?
Many days. We are going to be putting a cap in place to prevent server load from getting too high if tons of them spawn over time, but we want that cap to be as high as possible. The cap will likely be adjusted both before and after release as we tune it to get as high as possible without causing issues.
Quote:Is there a max on how many there will be in a system?
Yes, but this will also be as high of a cap as we can get away with.
Quote:Can we scan them down?
Will they appear on D scan?
We absolutely intend to make them scannable and visible on d-scan, just like player ships. Full disclosure: we've run into some technical roadblocks with the probing and d-scan part of the feature. We are confident that we can get it working and there's a good chance that it can be ready for the initial expansion release, but it's possible that it might slip to a point release.
Quote:Will they attack structures?
Not right now.
Game Designer | Team Five-0
https://twitter.com/CCP_Fozzie
http://www.twitch.tv/ccp_fozzie/
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CCP Fozzie
C C P
C C P Alliance
14085
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Posted - 2016.04.04 22:00:44 -
[3] - Quote
Quote:Will FAX spawn the the new cap escalation wave?
Yes. There will be one wave for each capital type.
Quote:Will the escalation spawns have capital neuts?
They will have neuts, but they will be balanced separately from the player capital-sized neuts.
Quote:Will these have the new AI like the drifter?
No, these will use the older AI just like other Sleepers. At some point in the future we hope to move more NPC groups (like sleepers) to the newest AI, but for now it is limited to specific NPC groups like Drifters.
Quote:How many waves of these will we get? 4 like we do now?
There will be up to three waves: one for a dread, one for a carrier, one for a force auxiliary.
Quote:How much will these be worth?
~38m per wave in C5s and ~51m per wave in C6s
Quote:Will the isk/hr from these still be as good as the old ones?
That depends a bit on how you run the sites, but in most cases no. You will be able to run more sites in a day however, especially if you expand to running sites in your static.
Quote:Will the isk from drifters be mainly from blue books?
Yes. It will have a similar breakdown of value between blue loot and salvage that other high-class NPCs have.
Quote:Will these changes be on sisi before they come on tranquility for us to test?
Yes. The version that is on SISI now is spawning the right NPCs (although the drifter has the wrong character piloting it) with the right loot, but the balance of them isn't in great shape. We plan on getting that closer to a release candidate asap so you folks can give it a shot.
Game Designer | Team Five-0
https://twitter.com/CCP_Fozzie
http://www.twitch.tv/ccp_fozzie/
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CCP Fozzie
C C P
C C P Alliance
14085
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Posted - 2016.04.04 22:06:04 -
[4] - Quote
Reserved
Game Designer | Team Five-0
https://twitter.com/CCP_Fozzie
http://www.twitch.tv/ccp_fozzie/
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CCP Fozzie
C C P
C C P Alliance
14085
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Posted - 2016.04.04 22:06:15 -
[5] - Quote
Reserved
Game Designer | Team Five-0
https://twitter.com/CCP_Fozzie
http://www.twitch.tv/ccp_fozzie/
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CCP Fozzie
C C P
C C P Alliance
14125
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Posted - 2016.04.19 13:23:15 -
[6] - Quote
Thanks for your feedback so far folks!
We have adjusted the spawning of the new Drifter so that people who can't handle it (marauders for instance) can skip it completely.
Under the new system, a structure will decloak once the site is completed and you have the option of spawning the drifter by shooting that structure.
We've also done a major balance pass on the new NPCs over the weekend, upping the challenge significantly. We're very interested in hearing what you folks think about the version that is on SISI right now. As a side note, the Drifter does not doomsday in its current iteration, but the neuting power has been ramped up quite significantly to provide a significant challenge without the danger of "one shotting" people.
Game Designer | Team Five-0
https://twitter.com/CCP_Fozzie
http://www.twitch.tv/ccp_fozzie/
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CCP Fozzie
C C P
C C P Alliance
14127
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Posted - 2016.04.20 11:05:37 -
[7] - Quote
There's currently a bug that causes the Arithmos to sometimes accelerate to 200,000 m/s while fighting. We have found the cause and are getting it fixed right now.
Game Designer | Team Five-0
https://twitter.com/CCP_Fozzie
http://www.twitch.tv/ccp_fozzie/
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