Dreadnought battle mode...

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1

I’ve noticed something over the last couple of games I’ve played in dreadnought battle mode. I’ve realised that there is literally nothing that can be done to “fix” the mode as it were, but there can be something done to make the function work. As you are well aware, the bug report section is filled with tons and tons and tons of bug reports on the subject, but since it’s well established to say that the system isn’t bugged, it is, in face, broken, I’d like to propose the long way around should be taken to resolve the problem.

 

Rebuild the whole thing from scratch. How did the dreadnought idea come about in the first place? Simply enough, the conquest idea came from having two wings of pilots face off against each other in a contest to take on each other for a sector, but once this function no longer became available for players to just play in a larger base on a new game mode, this meant introducing the ability to play dreadnoughts as an ungrouped player, incorporated or otherwise, became able to participate in sector conquest.

 

Now let’s take it a little step backwards (literally). When the system was working, the queue system functioned as to take on the slots between specific numbers, e.g. Corporation #1 would fill the slots between a certain value between 1 and 8, whereas Corporation 2 would fill the slots between 9 and 16; then matchmaker would provide an extra eight slots per corporation for sector defense for players to register to. Now let’s fast forward to when it broke. The server is incapable of differentiating between slots 1-8 and 9-16, so now where the registration needed for slots 9-16 should be no longer exists; what has happened is, wings now queue in order of attack status and have no differentiation from the “Sector Conquest” queue for ungrouped players.

 

Effectively, what needs to be done is, the queue system needs remodelling and reconstructing for the first stage of sector defense where the slots for attacks are filled up by the given allocated corporations upon registration, i.e. Corporation #1’s slot is allocated to 1-8, but the wing only has five players and can only fill slots 1-5, and so slots 6-8 are filled by three random players. The queue system for outstanding dreadnought attacks should be cut indefinitely from the queue if a corporation has failed to register. The queue’s system for defense can then be filled up by any players seeking to play in a dreadnought battle.

 

Please deliver your thoughts.

2

We used to have the old SQ.

I still miss it.

It was Capture the Beacon (T4/T5 Realistic mode). If you lost a ship, it was lost permanently for the whole duration of the match.

Capture Dreadnought Battle looks good in theory and it is a good eyecandy, but something is missing.

Imagine the most powerful missiles, if they would hit, they would rapture the dreadnought in half… would spice things up a bit, to keep up excitement.

Now you can sleep, while doing those missions. Rework is needed or at least implementation of the old mode in some cases.

It was already proposed.

3

Yeah, lots of changes have already been proposed for dreadnoughts. Imo, I think that 3 main things need to be changed with dreadnought battles.

 

  1. Sector Control needs a rework. The entire sector control system is very broken and has many flaws. The current major issue is fake attacks. Corps from all over are abusing this game mechanic in order to keep their precious sectors, instead of allowing other corps to play for them and defending against the attacking corps. I have been a huge supporter of implementing a combo of the old seccon map system with the new tournaments for sector control. So sectors will revert back to neutral at the end of X cycles, at which point corps could compete for control.

 

  1. Dreadnoughts needs to be reverted back to corporations only. The entire purpose of sector conquest from the very start was a place for corporations to compete with each other for sectors and in turn, rewards from those sectors. As much as I appreciate that randoms can fill an incomplete wing, it defeats the purpose of inter-corporate sector competition. Defending wings have the option of grabbing random pilots to fill their wings if they can’t fill it, and attacking wings currently can grab temp-joins to fill their wings. Personally, I am opposed to temp joins unless it is within an alliance. Which brings me to point 3.

 

  1. Alliances must be fully supported. Now, if alliances are to be implemented, restrictions need to be placed. A maximum number of corps per alliance needs to be enforced (maybe a max of 3 or 4 per alliance). With this, temp joins will no longer be necessary, and should be prevented (you can’t join a corp for X days upon leaving one, or you can’t participate in dreadnought battles for X days upon changing corps). With temp joins being prevented, alliances should be able to freely exchange players for dreadnought wings without actually leaving their current corp. Alliances should also compete for sectors as a group, not as individual corps. This will prevent one alliance from dominating the galaxy map as separate entities. But, since alliances would have more iridium at their disposal, I think that the cost of attacks should definitely be increased all around. This would make fake attacks harder as well.

 

These are my thoughts, some ideas have been suggested on other threads, so check them out too.

4

I have written most of my thoughts in [this thread](< base_url >/index.php?/topic/28102-things-bothering-me-most-about-dread-gamemode/).

 

More important than a rework, I see the fixing of these bugs or problems:

 

A) joining battles, counting battles, etc.

I think the things that have to be fixed, and maybe properly re-reported in their own threads, are the sign-up queues:

 * it seems the sign up for attack when the attacks start has also a FIFO system, like the defense; you do not sign up as your own corp, but you get assigned to the xth corp in the list where x is your place in when you pressed register to attack, instead of registering you on the proper slot. So when the actually attacking wings are determined, you end up being another corporation. This can lead to all sorts of secondary bugs.

 * instance errors of matches (server crash) lead to wrong results in the attack wing.

 * re-queueing as wing can lead to several errors.

 

B) who can announce attacks, the current rights management:

I think the problem of VP being able to announce attacks, but the role also having access to several key features in the corp needs to be reworked:

 * either make officers be able to announce attacks

 * add a new role between officer and vice-president who can announce attacks.

 

C) various thoughts for improvement

I think also the battles you send out should have more space than actual the 8 attacking corps; whether you will appear should update the queue. So registration should start right after end of announcement, with the first 8 paying full price, while the current (final) registration should take anybody who also queued an attack outside of the queue, to fill up empty slots.

 

I also think several other tries to fix it, which allows more common games, like the old SQ with a 3 hour rotation, which allows you to get attack points you can spend on locations. The battle for location should still take place like it is now as organized game however.

 

UI enhancements for wing administration, which could also be used for other wing activities, like open space, tournaments and raids, giving you access to the current fits of all wing members, their whereabouts in openspace, and also in corp menu: instead of “In hangar”, “In wing”.

5

As for alliances, I am somewhat against a rigid self-running alliance system, since it leads to power blocks. Alliances should be paid for by the allied factions if they help each other or lucrative to each other - in corp iridium. They should be permanent only, if both sides keep it alive. Once an alliance is inactive or one side fails to keep it up, it should go away.

 

The other solution is to have alliances have a maximum pilot count, similar to what Dirk said, it could also be based on total members (in quotas of 50), making smaller corps be able to build larger alliances, but making sure at least 4 (random number) corps can be full and in an alliance.

6

I’d like to draw attention back to this thread as DarthDirk and g4borg have raised some crucial points here. I wish I could expand on the posts you’ve written above, but I’m not particularly in the mood for essay-writing at the moment and I’d probably be spouting on but I think this thread should definitely be calling for at least the attention of one or two of the developers if it hasn’t already.