Conquest Rewards and Ideas Thread

[Jipptomilly]

I have just recently returned to RIFT from a good many months away. The reason why i decided to pay money to re-sub is simple: Conquest.

I myself have only watched videos of what this "WF" is like and didn't get a chance to test it myself yet.

I have read the blog completely and read the entire 17 page "at the time" thread about conquest posted by trion.

I didnt see any other threads like this yet, and was a little surprised to say the least.

I wanted to share some ideas i have and also leave a lot of room for anyone to pitch in or criticize anything i say in this post.

1. Rewards: this is the most important factor Trion faces when attempting to make conquest "worth playing":

incremental stat increases (small increases) seems to be the only way to keep gear balanced as trion goes along implementing this patch. and i agree with that whole heartily.

1.a. New Abilities: this seems needed at this point and has been mentioned fleetingly in the blog. If new abilities were to be implemented into the game as rewards, trion may want to make them "PvP only" abilities.

"Special" abilities with longer cool downs meant to be team wide "o sheit" buttons, otherwise abilities that will not be game breaking.

I think its important to mention here that "Abilities" and the way our chars look and move when we do them are half the reason ANY of us even play games.

Why? because abilities are cool and we feel accomplished when we affect our surroundings with our own actions, this is essential to having "fun" while playing games.

Other ideas for abilities i have had include "ability levels, or upgradeable abilities". I haven't fully outlined in my own mind what exactly this would entail but i have a little idea;

-using either favor or planar points or some new form of pvp currency to "augment" certain PvP only (or not) abilities to be more effective/powerful then they were before. this gives even the most geared and seasoned PvPer the chance to feel another level of advancement and worth in their time spent PvPing.

2. A more persistent and strategy based map and "game world":

There needs to be choke points. and lots of them. i dont want to feel like im in a 50v50 riot in a cornfield. "castles" are not bad.... they create room for advanced strategies and also reduce computer performance based lag client side.

To many times have i been in port scion and open stillmoore battles that end up just feeling like a big open stand off that makes my computer lag horribly (my comp isn't that crappy).

There needs to be things like, destroyable objectives ala the generators in scion and objects in rift encounters.

A more guided and clear objective system also needs to be included:

-One capture unlocks another, that leads to the main objective, with maybe 2 or 3 "capture paths" all leading to the main capture.

-I don't know if this is at all possible with rifts engine, but possibly something along the line of "Siege weapons/Summonable Passenger Mounts":

-Imagine rolling up to the opposition on a giant "mammoth?" that can hold 10 players in it at once. Imagine how simple that might be to code and make with this engine (if at all). This idea alone might help with the overall balance and grouping issues that might currently be there.


Final thoughts:

I have returned to RIFT to see this patch through because i think i might want to stay playing RIFT for a long time if this new "Conquest WF" is done correctly, and attentively.

Trion Please listen to everything said by the community here, because to mess this up (not saying you will) would be a wasted opportunity for the community AND the dev team.

thanks for your time RIFT goers,

Unkillable | 50 Warrior - Seastone - <We Are Legend>

[Charlice]

You should put all your ideas in the PTS Conquest thread, if you haven't. I think you're pretty much guaranteed they'll be read there.

[Bionitro]

ur new abilities idea, it's not good... u need to rebalance everything again..

and it isnt balanced as it is... so dont make it worse xD

[Trisian]

Unique mounts (not reskinned you lazy gits) with super rare drop chances.

You need something to draw the PvE crowd in too.

[Testercules]

Tryin, I mean Trion, is a lot like Arenanet. They come out with an idea, let you try it, then you don't hear back for a month. I don't know about you, but I want to continue to play something that isn't ready yet just because it's still new and fun, even if you lose or suck. Back to boring dailies, fighting rogues that tank everything, and clerics that heal everything.

@OP Reading double-spaced lines for every sentence is annoying.

I never even saw any of the castles. I saw turrets that did nothing. I explored maybe 1/10th of the map before my team was over-run, because I was trying to win the game, not explore. Then, I tried to explore, and it was too late because with the game being over, the winning team still had God buffs on. Swarms of bads just ran around killing off everything that came near them. You can't out-run them or kill them. It's worse than anything currently in-game now. Even rogues and clerics. Almost.

[Grimt]

Just a couple of comments in response to the OP:

a. Welcome back. I even saw you in a few WFs from the other side (I'm Defiant) last night.

b. Regarding rewards, I'd rather that Trion focused on making PvP compelling (i.e., fun and interesting) enough that people want to play it for it's own sake. In my opinion, if a PvP instance has to grant gear improvements to entice people to join the match that means it simply isn't interesting on it's own and it becomes more like PvE. People don't play soccer or basketball to get better gear ... they play those games because it pits them against other players in a dynamic and challenging team environment. I'd like to see some form of recognition that improves upon the leaderboard system currently in place, and I'm actually not against stat rewards, but it's an indication of a failed game design if gear enhancement is the only reason people play it. The rewards (stats, gear, titles, mounts, etc) should be secondary to the fun and recognition you get from playing the match.

c. I agree that a more layered strategy is a desirable objective. The game should have more to it than simply providing players an opportunity to fight. I don't want to win a match simply because I'm more powerful than the other guy, or even just because I know my role better than the other guy knows his. If that's all I cared about I'd just do duels all the time or go play an FPS. I want to win a match because I know the battlefield better, or because I chose a better strategy, or because my group played better as a team. If Trion wants to create a PvP instance on a grand scale, it should be grand in more than just physical size or the number of people participating.

Keeping my fingers crossed ....