Caravans

Alpha-2 caravan being escorted to the Miraleth node.

The Caravan System is a major aspect of the economy in Ashes of Creation. While the rewards can be great for moving massive amounts of Commodities and other materials across the world of Verra, players can choose to be Caravan attackers or defenders, making these hotspots for PvP battles.

Caravan PvP in Alpha-2.

Caravans are vehicles that facilitate the transfer of cargo across Verra.

Caravans are the induction of emergent gameplay, which means you cannot predict the situation you're going to be in when you use a caravan. That's part of the risk: The risk is the unknown. If you could predict it then your ability to mitigate that risk would unfortunately remove that dynamic- that ratio of risk versus reward. – Steven Sharif

• Personal caravans are used to transport cargo for one or more players.

• Mayoral caravans are used by Mayors to transfer cargo between nodes with established trade agreements or alliances.

• Caravans are initiated from and arrive at caravansary node buildings within Village (stage 3) nodes and above.

• Caravans create an objective-based PvP event in the open-world that players can choose to attack, defend, or opt-out of.

• PvE caravan events can cause roadways to be blocked off or hostile mobs to spawn to attack the caravan.

• It is possible to launch decoy caravans and merchant ships, but there are visual hints of what is contained in a caravan. Decoy crates may be available via social organization progression.

Initiating a caravan

Initiating a caravan from one node to another will create an objective that players will need to defend while it moves along its chosen route to the selected destination.

• Caravans are initiated by players with a diverse choice of routes and launch windows, making them difficult to "zerg".

Carrying capacity

Alpha-2 materials inventory user interface.

Inventory for A2 will exist in two categories, spatial and non-spatial. The spatial inventory system will only exist for materials and gatherables. The non-spatial system will be the normal single slot inventory that is used for all completed items IE gear, consumables etc.. The spatial system is intended to provide limitation and progression when everything in the open world is gatherable, requiring players to strategize which things they choose to gather or not. These spatial inventories will be shaped in various ways that make the bag types more conducive for certain types of gatherables allowing players to specialize their capacity. Auto sort is a feature – Steven Sharif

Inventory capacity has quantity (stacking) limits based on the type of item. Backpacks offer varying stack sizes and/or spatial inventory shapes that are optimized for carrying different items.

• A player's inventory has sections for different types of items. Quest items for example will not fill a player's regular inventory capacity.
  • Materials and resource bags have spatial ("Tetris" style) slots for items with different shapes and sizes.
  • The spatial inventory system is intended to mitigate the potential for players to diminish land management scores by stripping resources from particular zones as well as provide a challenging gameplay layer for players.

Inventory is split into two separate management systems. The first is your non-material, non-gatherable slots. Those are your standard single slot, not-space-constrained system that's a standard inventory: you just have a single slot, and you can pull completed items and/or consumables and quest items or whatever into that slot. And then, when you're talking about materials, specifically processed goods and gatherables: those exist within the Tetris type uh inventory system. – Steven Sharif

• Items are placed into the most suitable inventory slots by default.

All those materials actually sorted nicely in the appropriate bags based on your stack sizes. – Alex Khudoliy

• There will be a healthy number of slots for gear in a player's inventory.
  • Completed item inventory slots are not space constrained (by the tetris system).
  • Completed items, such as gear are also not subject to weight limits.
  • Gear loadouts can be swapped using a hotkey when out of combat.

• Inventory capacity will be relatively limited for new characters. Additional capacity may be increased by obtaining higher quality backpacks from crafters.

We want to have very unique progression when it comes to the construction of resource bags; and those resource bags will have certain benefits, like increasing stack size count of particular types of resources; or of having a additional delay time necessary to interface with with your corpse, should a player try to take the resources you might have dropped in PvP; or having passive benefits and unique structures of spacing that makes it more a better bag for wood gathering because woods are three-by-one; or a better bag for mining because mining is always two-by-two. The idea is to make your intent as a gatherer when you go out into the wild specific right not just that you're going out into the wild and gathering everything you can because it's there; and that's what we don't have like a labor system that limits it. We have a space constraint system so when you leave your node and you go out into the wild you need to be conscientious of what you're choosing to interact with and take resources for, because you have a limited space constraint to that degree. – Steven Sharif

• Inventory capacity is subject to quantity rather than weight limits.

In my opinion, and this is of course subjective, but weight management is not a compelling mechanic for players to have to deal with in an MMO setting. – Steven Sharif

• Players will have the ability to search for items they have stored in various locations (such as personal storage and node warehouses).

We want you to know where the things are; and then the meaningful aspect of that thing is traveling to those locations to access some of those things, particularly as it relates to materials and raw gatherables. – Steven Sharif

• Inventories will be able to be sorted.

Q: Why did you go for a spatial inventory system for resources?

A: There's a number of different methods that we can use in an effort to mitigate, or again throttle, the amount of success that players can have in any one trip out in the world. Now, we're using a combination of three things: We are using progression gating through your profession level; so you need to have a certain level to access certain resources. We are utilizing the spatial inventory space as a limitation on how much things you can gather before you need to go back to town. And then lastly we have a tool predicate where you need to have a tool that is relevant for the resource you're gathering; and those tools have a decay value after each use. Weight is obviously an approach that we could take if we wanted to limit. However, the spatial system works in concert with a number of other types of systems. For example, we want to have itemization drop on death specifically as it relates to material items; and we want there to be an additional layer above just weight that introduces complexity; and where there is complexity there is choice and there is strategy and there is planning required on behalf of the player in order to set themselves up for the best possible success in certain situations. – Steven Sharif

Some of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.

• Mules can carry roughly 10 times more than backpacks. Caravans can carry roughly 10 times more than mules.

• Inventory expansion and weight management training certificates are available in the Galleria at City stage economic nodes.

Caravan PvP

Caravan PvP in Alpha-2.

One of the most important aspects of caravans is that there is no reward without significant risk in Ashes of Creation; and the caravan system is of particular risk, because it is how materials and commodities are transited within the world of Verra; and it's difficult to navigate the world of Verra: It's a large world and the terrain is not always kind, especially to large vehicles like a caravan. – Steven Sharif

Caravan PvP party icons

	Friendly defender
	Friendly attacker
	Enemy defender
	Enemy attacker

UI message when opting in to join the defenders of a caravan PvP event.

Caravans create an objective-based PvP event in the open-world that players can choose to attack, defend, or ignore via a UI window.

• Only the caravan owner and those in the caravan's raid group will be able to see it on the world map.

You will only be able to see the caravan if you are a member of the caravan's raid or if you are the owner of the caravan on the map. If you are not one of those, then you will not see it on the map. If you come within proximity of the caravan you'll be prompted through an event UI to participate if you wish as a defender or an attacker. – Steven Sharif

• Players that choose to attack or defend the caravan will be flagged as combatants.
  • The UI notification will include the caravan owner's name and guild.
  • The proximity that the UI window appears is determined by the player's performance as either a defender or an attacker in previous raids.
  • Once registered as a defender, a player can't switch to attack the caravan.
  • The proximity radius for notification of nearby caravan events can be increased or decreased based on the caravan's components or a player's progression in the highwayman system.

At a certain proximity to the caravan, any player will receive the event notification to participate either as an attacker or as a defender. That proximity radius can be augmented either through players advancement within the Highwaymen system, which is for defenders or attackers you can increase the radius, but also the components can increase and or decrease the radius of that event notification as well. – Steven Sharif

• There will be visual hints relating to the cargo being transported on caravans, but players will not be able to see the exact contents of the caravan. Cargo is represented in this way even if a cosmetic caravan skin has been applied to the caravan.

• Players can be registered participants in a caravan event involving multiple caravans. It is not possible for a player to participate in more than one caravan event at a time.

As a player you can participate in events that have as many caravans collocated as you want. So if you have 20 Caravans that you're trying to move all in a single caravan raid with all of your players you can join all 20 of those caravans into the same caravan defense group; and that is that is the intent of the system. The same is true for the attackers. The attackers can join against all of those caravans. – Steven Sharif

• Caravan components can be individually destroyed by directional attacks against the caravan. All components are destroyed if the caravan is destroyed.

• Some defensive abilities may be effective against blocking projectiles from hitting caravans.

• Basic attacks will not slow caravans, but certain slowing abilities may be able to do so.

• Players or mounts trying to block caravans will be pushed out of the way.

As it stands currently it would be difficult for players to be able to block the caravan. Now that's not to say that certain types of effects cannot be applied to the caravan through ability use, such as slowing effects, or pause effects, stun effects, against the caravan itself, not the rider. But right now we do have a collision priority system which means that vehicles move players and mounts. Mounts and players cannot stop vehicles from moving the vehicle. Its collision has priority; and then ships have the ultimate priority. Nothing can move ships or block ships. – Steven Sharif

• If a caravan's driver is killed or otherwise removed from the caravan then any player will be able to drive the caravan for a period of 15 to 20 minutes before the caravan despawns and becomes a wreckage. A caravan will persist in the world for a period of 5 to 10 minutes from the time its owner logs out or is disconnected from the server.

• There is no limit to the number of times caravans can be commandeered or the number of times caravans get destroyed and replaced.

Q: Will there be a limit on the number of times a caravan can change hands if successfully taken over during a journey from one node to another?

A: No. There is no limit a caravan can be destroyed. That caravan can be destroyed. The Caravan thereafter could be destroyed. The driver of the Caravan can be killed and commandeered; and done as many times as is permitted through the situation. That is player driven. – Steven Sharif

Some of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.

• A group will be required to successfully attack a caravan.

Naval caravans

Alpha-2 raft caravan in the Riverlands biome.

Caravans are capable of transitioning from land to raft caravans. So if you start out as a land-based Caravan and you move to the coast and you want to move into the water there's gonna be a little transition period there; it's gonna be a little construction site: You're not gonna have to do anything it's just gonna be a timer right so that you can't quickly move between land and water. It's gonna be probably in the matter of a minute to two minutes. There's a little bit of vulnerability in that regard. – Steven Sharif

Raft caravans (also referred to as Naval caravans) allow the transportation of cargo over the water.

• Unlike merchant ships, raft caravans are capable of transitioning to and from land caravans at the point of intersection of land and water.
  • Raft caravans may only be used in rivers.
• Currently the stats of the raft are informed by the components of the caravan. This may be changed based on testing.
• By default, raft caravans have a racial appearance. Players will be able to apply caravan skins to change this appearance.

See also

• World PvP
• Economy
• Nodes