Castle sieges

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Alpha-1 castle siege gameplay.[1]

Throughout Ashes of Creation, the player has an opportunity to participate in massively multiplayer siege warfare. Since castles are likely the world’s most limited resource, it will be a task to secure and hold them. Involving hundreds of players on a single battlefield, our sieges will employ many moving parts and intricate design features. Because of the difficult nature of taking and keeping a castle there are great rewards available to the players for their efforts. Castles will allow players to exert control over nearby lands and allow for the development of unique buildings in the nearby towns.[2]

Guilds participate in Castle sieges in an effort to capture and occupy one of the five guild castles in Ashes of Creation.[3]

  • The minimum goal is for 250x250 players to be on a single battlefield. It is hoped that this can be increased to 500x500 over time.[7][8][9][10]
  • There will be systems that mimic some of the mechanics of sieges, but there won't be practice sieges.[11]
  • There may be instanced locations within otherwise open-world castle and node sieges, where specific groups can participate in small, short duration objective-based battles that will affect the overall outcome of the siege.[12]
I love castle-based gameplay. I love trophies. I like rewarding risk a lot; and for me it's very difficult to imagine a MMO that I would want to play where there is not competition of strategic prowess that determines the outcome of these types of events and there is not a meaningful reward both mechanically and from just a bragging rights perspective that players can aim for and try to achieve. I think that it brings a lot to the game when it comes to motivations, to excel, to level, to gain power, to engage those different progression loops when there is an ultimate goal or trophy that is not static and doesn't exist forever once you achieve it, but that you must constantly perform in order to maintain; and that's really the purpose of these castles.[17]Steven Sharif

A guild that captures a castle will own that castle for a month before it is sieged again.[18][19]

Each week leading up to the siege week... is a week that's dedicated to one of the three castle dedicated nodes. So around the castle there are three nodes. They represent week, one, two, and three; and then the fourth week is the siege against the castle. Those can only be elevated up to stage three. We've discussed this in the past and there's definitely information out there on the community ran wiki.[18]Steven Sharif
  • In the first three weeks that a guild occupies a castle they will need to level up each of their castle nodes to Village stage through questing.[18][19]
    • Each of the three castle nodes have a siege against it at the end of each of these three weeks.[19][20]
  • The fourth week is declaration week, where other guilds have the opportunity to lay down their declaration flag or to sign up as a defender of the castle.[18][19]
  • Depending on how well the guild defends their castle nodes results in better defenses for the castle.[19][20]
  • Different siege weaponry will grant the attackers the ability to destroy walls, doors and sections of the castle in order to gain access to the inner keep area.[21]
  • When castles change hands (following a siege), some taxes stay with the castle and some stay with the guild.[22]
There will be benefits to attracting people... even if they're not in your guild or alliance – a feudal like system, where you can attract other players who are just independent of this whole politic. They will have things to do there - benefits to receive - and there will be a reciprocal relationship between who you can attract, what they do for you; and how that benefits you and them.[19]Steven Sharif

Guild castles

Guild castle Alpha-1 early preview.[23]

With five Castles in the world, and each having been owned by different civilizations from the far-flung past of Verra, you can expect that each Castle has its own character. Different terrains and different layouts will result in each Castle having its own advantages and disadvantages. Just because you have managed to take one Castle will not mean that your strategies will pan out in the next. Commanders will have to take into consideration the lay of the land, time of day, weather, and even seasons into account when forming their battle plans.[24]

Sword 01 - with logos.png

Five guild castles exist in Ashes of Creation.[25][24][3]

While the hard structural environment is static and not able to be- you're not building a castle if you own a castle, you're inheriting a historic ruined castle that is representative of the past because it has some tie-in to specific types of powers that we haven't gotten into from a lore perspective yet but we haven't expressed to the community. That's something that we're going to leave for the community to find out when they play. But when you place mercenaries and you place those blockades and you place those traps, that affects the level design of the castle according to the strategy you might use to defend it.[25]Steven Sharif
These Castles are occupied when players arrive on Verra, and their current inhabitants will have to be removed before any player can claim them. Castles will be dangerous and high-level raid zones until they can be cleared, and the first group of players to do so will gain the Castle as their reward.[24]

Castle nodes

One of the 5 guild castles is located on an island, depicted with its 3 adjacent castle nodes.[29][30]

Should you be deft enough to take a Castle, you’ll now be responsible for managing it. Castles will have their own Nodes associated with them, and developing and defending those Nodes will determine the state of your Castle during the next siege. If you’ve done a good job managing your kingdom, then you’ll have more and better options available for deployment during the next siege. If you let your populace fall to ruin, you may have to rely solely on your own devices.[24]

Guild castles have three adjacent castle nodes in close proximity.[3][21] The guild must develop those nodes to enhance the defenses of the castle.[3] It will be possible, but very difficult for a single guild to fully develop these nodes. They will likely need assistance from the broader community.[34]

Once the castle is owned by a guild that's when the supporting castle nodes start to come online and spawn each week prior to the fourth week castle siege. They'll have to form alliances, they'll have to get support, they'll have to get resources, they'll be able to allocate funds that have been collected through taxation in order to strengthen the defenses as well as hiring additional NPC mercenaries.[37]Steven Sharif

Castle nodes are leveled through questing by the owning guild or alliance guilds.[21]

  • Levelling castle nodes is a hastened process compared to regular nodes.[19]
  • At the end of each week leading up to a castle siege there is a period of time in the weekend where NPC generated caravans start moving toward one of the castle nodes carrying castle taxes from the nodes that fall under the castle's purview.[23][38]
    • During this time it is incumbent upon the owning guild, its allies, and citizens of the nodes to escort these caravans to the castle node.[23]
    • The enemies of the guild have incentive to attack these caravans to reap the rewards from the caravan and to sabotage the tax collection, which will reduce the defensive capability of the castle nodes and hence the castle itself.[23][21]
    • Citizens of nodes that fall under the purview of the castle are automatically registered as defenders of these caravans and may not participate in attacks against them.[23]
  • Completing these quests unlocks services and functions that are useful to the occupying guild and its allies as well as boosting the defenses the castle.[21]

If they fail to to level up those nodes or complete those quests within the three prior weeks before the declaration week, then the castle will be at a disadvantage.[21]Steven Sharif

Being a member of the occupying guild automatically makes you a garrison of the castle nodes and castle itself.[3]

  • Only members of the occupying guild are citizens of these nodes.[20]
  • This citizenship is different to normal node citizenship. Castle nodes don't operate like normal nodes.[20][35]

Declaring a castle siege

Siege preparation.[39]

Guilds are able to sign up to either siege or defend a castle over a week long declaration period.[37][21]

  • Once a guild registers for the siege a scroll creation quest is initiated that guild members may participate in, and it becomes possible to lay the declaration scroll down as soon as the quest is completed.[40]
    • Multiple guilds may register to attack and the first to complete the scroll and lay down the declaration may begin to have their members register to attack (there will be a cap).[40]
    • The siege scroll deployment is a 5 min rooted cast that alerts the region at the cast initiation and names the caster that must be the guild leader.[40][41]
    • If the guild leader is killed, the casting is interrupted.[42] The scroll will remain until it is recast. It will disappear if it is not cast within the declaration period.[43]
    • The scroll may only be placed in a ring around the castle.[44] The quality of the scroll determines the proximity to the castle.[45]
  • Players don't need to be in the guild that owns a castle in order to sign up for the defense of the castle.[21]
  • The guild leader that owns the castle is able to approve guilds that have applied to defend at the castle.[21]
  • Following declaration, the defender has a week grace period to approve defenders, hire mercenary NPCs and set up defensible positions.[37][21]

Castle siege objectives

  • Attackers capture waypoints in the castle's architecture to diminish their respawn timer and increase the respawn timer of the defenders.[46]
  • Defenders can counter-play by attacking the siege headquarters of the attackers to diminish their declaration flags and increase their respawn timers.[46]
  • Legendary NPCs will be present as commanders that act mini raid boss within the defending and attacking armies. Killing these provides added benefits, such as certain types of drops that grant battlefield benefits to either side.[46]
  • The ultimate objective for the defenders is to survive during the timed period of the siege, which is approximately 90 minutes in its first iteration.[46]
  • If the attackers reach the inner keep of the castle, a guild leader (or one other delegated officer) must cast a 3 to 5 minute cast to seal ownership of the castle.[46]
    • Casting time is diminished based on on the number of waypoints captured during the siege.[46]
    • There's an opportunity for any guild leader in the attacking alliance to capture the castle for themselves, despite what may have been agreed upon prior to the siege.[47]

There's an opportunity there for perhaps backstabbing in the throne room where one guild is like yeah you know we agreed to get to this area but we had a change of heart in the middle of the battle.[47]Steven Sharif

Siege alliances

When a siege begins, temporary alliances are formed among attackers and defenders.[48]

  • For node sieges, citizens of the node or provincial nodes being attacked are automatically registered as defenders.[49]
  • There are many reasons to participate as an ally in the attack or defence of other nodes.[50]
    • Titles.
    • Items.
    • Materials.
    • Money.
    • Social bonds.

Many incentives exist that can benefit your node and yourself personally by participating in the attack or defense of cities. These range from titles, to items, to materials, to money. Additionally, aiding others may help you strengthen bonds when your assets are threatened.[50]Steven Sharif

Siege mechanics

A siege occurs over several phases.[51]

  • Certain siege mechanics may be gated for specific size groups during sieges.[52]
  • There will not be a deserter debuff for leaving a siege before it is complete.[53]
  • More will be revealed in an upcoming blog entry.[51]

Siege weapons

Trebuchet siege weapon in Alpha-1 castle sieges preview.[54]

It wouldn’t be a castle siege without siege weapons. These are massive machines of war that enable attackers to bring down the walls, and defenders to keep their keep safe. Crafters can bring their own powerful schematics to the battlefield, or you can order baseline siege weapons from your friendly neighborhood siege master NPC. The Castle’s defenders will be able to deploy their own defensive weapons and turrets based on how well they maintained and defended their own Nodes. The sky will be illuminated with fire and fury.[24]

Siege weapons and siege vehicles are able to be utilized during sieges.[25]

Part of this endeavor of sieging a player-held location (or non-player-held location) is time to prepare; and that includes gathering and crafting these mega weapons or collecting the resources: Whether it be gold or specific quest items to purchase from NPCs.[32]Steven Sharif
Anything that you want to bring into existence in the world is going to be built by players: Whether that is Ships, Siege engines, Weapons, Armor, etc.[58]Jeffrey Bard

Siege PvP

Sieges don't use the PvP flagging system.[59]

Death penalties do not apply to objective-based events (such as caravans, guild wars, and node sieges).[60]

Siege NPCs

Siege NPCs, NPC guards, and mercenary NPCs serve as defense points during sieges and other events.[61][62]

  • Only combat NPCs are killable during a siege. Non-combat NPCs, such as merchants, will despawn and will respawn if the siege is unsuccessful.[61][63]
  • Mercenary NPCs can be hired in advance.[61] They are intended to be a significant presence but not the main line of defense in a siege.[64]

Dragons

info-orange.pngSome of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.

Dragons are flying mounts with strong battle abilities, such as AoE breath attacks, swooping flyby attacks, and others.[65][66]

The dragon will have a lot of capability in PvP. It's primarily its purpose, because as it relates to Castles and the sieges they're in, or Nodes and the sieges they're in. We want dragons to have large scale ramifications against player raids.[66]Steven Sharif

Siege abilities

Group summons are activated by a party leader with that ability in their class kit along with additive components from other classes that are part of the group.[68]

info-orange.pngSome of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.

Up to eight players of the same primary archetype can band together to create monumental effects during a siege.[69]

These are the types of systems that we want to put in place where groups of a single primary archetype can come together to summon these types of effects that play off of what the identity of that archetype is.[69]Steven Sharif

Summoner

Summoners can collaborate together during sieges to summon larger creatures, such as Golems.[70][71][72]

We do have the concept of siege summons being a thing with multiple summoners being required in order to create that siege summon. In those situations your character becomes the summon. So you don't have an AI that takes over your previous character but instead the recipient of those additional spell effects becomes the actual summon itself.[70]Steven Sharif
  • The target of the group summon becomes the summon itself.[70][72]
    • Previously it was stated that the party-leader becomes the summon.[71]
info-orange.pngSome of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.
  • A siege summon will have an incremental size based on the number of summoners participating in that summon activity, with a maximum of eight.[73]
  • The number of summoners participating in the summon will determine its overall size.[73]
  • All summoners must be in the same party and the party leader must be a summoner.[71]
    • The party leader initiates the summon and then takes control of it.[71]
    • Once summoned, the party leader cannot be changed.[71]
    • If the party disbands, the summon ends. There will be a grace period to handle disconnects.[71]
    • The party may also contain non-Summoners.[71]

Tank

info-orange.pngSome of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.
Pre-alpha castle siege combat featuring a Tank siege ability.[74]
If eight Tank archetypes each use one of their summon wall abilities it might construct a larger wall that can divide two raids in a moment; and would require damage and block skills and abilities for a momentary lapse of battle between those two raids.[69]Steven Sharif

Siege aftermath

Rubble will be visible for a period of time following a successful castle siege. This will likely persist until the incumbent guild develops the first defensive node.[75]

Zergs

For every play, there should be a counterplay. We often see Castle Sieges turn into zerg-fests, which really doesn’t capture the epic, back-and-forth battles we wish to see in Ashes of Creation. One of our key pillars is that Choice Matters[76], and that applies to tactics and strategy as well. A well-formulated battle plan should win out over stat sheets and bodies. Zergs will generally be difficult to pull off, and will be eminently counterable through siege weapons, traps, and other battlefield tricks.[24]

Zergs are empowered by fast-travel. Meaningful travel times are intended to prevent zerg play from being so much of an influence.[77]

Encounters are designed to have meaning in terms of how boss skills and abilities relate to group compositions, tactics and strategies. Zerging is not experiencing content.[78] There are different ways to make a fight more difficult for larger sized groups without relying solely on stat buffs or making the boss a "damage sponge".[79]

  • Raid and dungeon bosses have specific mechanics and abilities that players need to learn and react to.[79] Zergs that are not aware of these mechanics or react to them appropriately will be wiped.[78]
  • There may be environmental hazards and AoE effects that cause more damage based on the number of players present.[79]
  • There is a give-and-take for guilds that want to see a larger number of members as opposed to a more focused group that may be a part of an alliance.[80]

We're very cognizant of the fact that we don't want to see zerging be a mechanic that's utilized by guilds to accomplish content or just to steamroll over sieges... There are specific mechanics that we are working on that will be seen through the testing phases that relate to a degree of understanding of certain systems that can't just be overrun with numbers.[80]Steven Sharif

Mechanics that encourage political intrigue will play a role in destabilizing zergs.[47]

The best way that I found in games I played previously to take down a zerg is to cause drama from within... It's that conflict inside of the politicking that happens in that big organization. If we provide opportunities for division to occur then it also provides stability to keep a server healthy away from that zerg mentality also... If we approach the castle siege and we've destroyed the walls and we're in the throne room and we're about to cast on the penultimate thing and I at this time am just so excited from what's happening that I'm like "screw it I'm gonna go for it". It's gonna be mine. I'm gonna take the taxes for the next month. I'm gonna take all the gear from the castle. I'm gonna take everything... We want that political intrigue to be present in the game.[47]Steven Sharif

Objective-based game play helps to balance the zerg mentality.[81]

I always feel that if you balance based on groups that in your balance focus is to incorporate features that play well from a player versus player perspective as well as a player versus environment perspective: Having support classes, having DPS and tanks that can obstruct movement and/or create bottlenecks on the field and stuff like that. I think a well-rounded raid it will perform better against a non well-rounded raid, however then you incorporate the second aspect of numbers; and that's where again mobility, organization, leadership tactics. Having objectives in gameplay that make those important helps to balance the zerg mentality that a lot of guilds can tend to have.[81]Steven Sharif

Instancing doesn't play a major role in limiting zergs, due to 80% of content in Ashes of Creation being open-world.[12]

  • There may be instanced locations within castle and node sieges where specific groups can participate in certain objective-based waypoints.[12]

Zerging is always a problem in a lot of these MMORPGs where you really can't control the number of participants in certain open-world systems; and in that sense instancing is a great tool that designers can sometimes use to curate a particular number of participants that you want. But the predominant amount of content within Ashes of Creation, over 80% of which is is open-world content, so instancing is very limited.[12]Steven Sharif

Artwork

See also

Template:References

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  11. Twitch Bustin - Practice Sieges?
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  41. steven-castle-siege-declaration-2.png
  42. steven-castle-siege-declaration-1.png
  43. steven-castle-siege-declaration-5.png
  44. steven-castle-siege-declaration-3.png
  45. steven-castle-siege-declaration-4.png
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  48. siege alliances.png
  49. siege auto defenders.png
  50. 50.0 50.1 Official Livestream - May 4th @ 3 PM PST - Q&A
  51. 51.0 51.1 siege more info.png
  52. siege mechanics.png
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  62. siege success.png
  63. siege npcs killable.png
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  65. dragon abilities.png
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