Dying Sectors And Clan Content In General - What's The Problem?

[Megakoresh]

I had a little episode before with the rail and wrote to support about this. Support had explained a system I didn't know before, which means that the whole Rail system is even worse than I thought, which is weird in of itself considering how bad it already is.

Basically here is the reply:

Clans and Alliances that attack a rail will receive a bonus reduction in the next armistice period on that node, if the overall attack is [not] successful. Whichever Clan or Alliance is able to do the most damage during an attack will therefore be able to deploy their rail ahead of any other Clan or Alliance. If you have any other questions or concerns, please let us know.

So basically this means the snowballing is even more severe because those clans and alliances which have been fighting are going to be the only ones with enough advantage on the timer to actually attack again. If you've been out of the loop like Ghosts were, there's no way to actually try to do rails. Considering Rails are pretty bad and are dead content already it might not be a big loss, but it is also the ONLY thing that player factions can do together. Now here's what I wanted to say (yeah it's copypasted):

 

The whole system is being abandoned also because of the snowballing of the whole rail business. According to what you say, there is practically no chance for a new or returning alliance/clan to enter the game at this time, since everyone who's been fighting get a lower CD. I don't know if you plan to continue this whole Solar Rail thing or remove it completely (I don't think peopel'd mind if you removed it, its just dead content at this point), but if you plan to make any other Alliance activities, I as an Alliance general would recommend removing direct competition. It does not work in this game. 

 

Barrier to entry is too high and if one is out of the loop for a little while for one reason or another, they have no chance to get back in, despite their potential strength. The best bet would be to have stat-based competition, raids, or otherwise something that only requires a large number of people to get together, organize, show the world what they can do and have fun together with each other, no direct rival alliance intervention. We even managed to have a good amount of fun breaking the game in Dojo party a week ago. Something trivial can also be fun when done in big groups. But direct clan/alliance competition is a no-go in this game.

 

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This archwing open space missions for example could help, you can easily fit 30 people into open space and have a meaningful mission without it being too cramped.

 

Other than that there can be many ways to make it work. For example node domination - Alliance does any mission node on the map. If they win that node more times or with better overall score than other competitors, it shows as dominated by that alliance. Alliance members get increased rewards from the node and can also put battle pays for random Tenno to keep their logo on that node.

 

Clan/Alliance Invasion resolution also could work - instead of having to help corpus or grinner, an alliance may try to take the node themselves. That would require doing the invasion missions and a sizable credit/resource investment to keep node residents happy. If successful the Alliance can have control over the mission type of the Node (i.e. if it was Extermination by default, they can switch it to Deception or Spy or some such).

 

Other alliances and clans may try to dominate the node using the previously suggested system, which would give them control if they succeed. After a timer or if Clan/Alliance doesn't play/invest in an owned node, the node goes back to it's lore-defined faction and can be conquered by another clan/alliance on next invasion.

 

The point here is to have a way to make an impact through getting together and playing together the content, that Warframe does best - straight up PvE missions, without direct intervention from anyone. While it might sound cool that other Tenno can influence your play, as we have had the chance to experience ourselves - Warframe isn't built for that and it does not work. Don't believe me? Go play on a 60% Resource taxed node. Or try to take it. Tell me at which point are you having fun.

[Avyiel7]

Yours is actually a great idea. Looking forward to see where this is going, having 30 players in a single mission would be nuts!

[Megakoresh]

Our alliance after the purge consists of around 200 people and all are mostly active, so as far numbers go there can really be nothing too large. Technical limits are the issue. Thats why Im saying its not necessary to have 100 peole on same location at the same time. Something like 30 is very much enough. The point is to have missions which would be just for alliances/clans to complete and for each member to have a personal gain on, as well as the full Alliance or Clan. So not like Leaderboards, where only the top get to have gain, for more community-based activities for everyone to do and have fun together actually DOING the thing. With the public recognition being an added bonus.

 

Assuming, that is, that DE and/or players actually are interested. I would like to see some more discussion on the topic. It is largely overshadowed by other things like new weapons and stuff, but it is perhaps even more important than all of them, since these are the things which keep people playing. This is the "endgame" and without alliance and clan activities, there is little to do for veterans, if they aren't just obsessed with collecting every single thing in the game.

 

I am not a frequent poster, but this is an issue that can seriously affect not only my own, but involvement of quite a lot of people with the game. When you like the people in your alliance but there is nothing to do with those people, your only choice is to try and take those people elsewhere where you can have common activities. I'd rather it didn't have to come to that, and I imagine DE would be of the same opinion. So let's have a talk about this and see if we can turn DE's attention towards Alliances and Clans.

 

Input from one of the constant occupants of current sectors would be also very welcome. People from Invictus, Orion, Lords and Ladies of the East and such. What keeps them doing these buggy annoying and pointless conflict missions? What's the reason behind taxes that noone would ever pay (this is especially for Invictus)? Is it just because no one plays nodes anymore? Do they have 0 taxes for members and just don't want anyone else to play on their node? Other reasons?

 

Discuss.

Edited October 21, 2014 by Megakoresh

[vaugahn]

Dark Sectors are still some of the most-used nodes on the map because of their XP bonus. People will ignore the credit and resource taxes to get at that bonus XP so they can level their gear faster. The +drop chance is also good for farming rare mats, as long as there isn't a resource tax.

 

This means people will continue to play them even if there's a credit tax, which in turn means big profits for the clan holding the rail.

[Megakoresh]

Dark Sectors are still some of the most-used nodes on the map because of their XP bonus. People will ignore the credit and resource taxes to get at that bonus XP so they can level their gear faster. The +drop chance is also good for farming rare mats, as long as there isn't a resource tax.

 

This means people will continue to play them even if there's a credit tax, which in turn means big profits for the clan holding the rail.

First of all, most people I encounter know by now that Interception is by far the best place to get XP, not the rail nodes.

Second is that on about half the nodes resources are heavily taxed. For example Invictus taxes resources for 75%, which noone would of course tolerate, if they value their time. And there's nothing to spend that profit on, except building more rails. Its an enclosed cycle that really is completely meaningless as an Alliance/Clan "activity". But this we already know. The question is what would people want from alliance activities.

Edited October 21, 2014 by Megakoresh