Having played a metric xxxx ton of SQ, I’ve come to realise that it’s awfully repetitive and if you don’t have a worthy opponent, it’s simply boring after a while… So I’d like to offer my suggestion on what I think would be most fun for a mode that is yet to be released.
Time of battle
There are three sectors around Fort Muerte. 1600 GMT for the Euro one and -8h/+8h for the other two - can be adjusted, so that Americans would get to play too, but I think this should work, because…
Frequency
…this thing would be done weekly. Saturdays or Sundays, of course.
Duration
Long. Capped at 60 minutes.
Introduction
The thing starts with an “auction” (kind of like in the previous SQ). Six interested corps bid iridium in order to be able to participate. This would mean that you can’t just randomly queue up with a random, one day old corp, and seeing how much iridium top corporations have, this would also give the incentive to play T3/T4 SQ.
Gameplay
Each corp can start with up to two wings. With a few days heads up, pilots are asked to move to previously announced faction stations. Two corps per station. Pilots are to await in station hangars and when the match begins, the first wing of each corporation is moved outside. Both groups are set 15 kilometers away from the first warp gate of a pre-made (and highlighted on participants’ HUD) track. By following each track, you’ll have to get past 5 warp gates (so, e.g. the only way to get to Raider Range from Station Guardian-17 would be through Ontregos Pass > Felony Border > Warden Outpost Ruins > Captured Dreadnought > Scrapyard, while from Station New Eden, you’d need to go through Abandoned Beacon > Processing Rig > Poseidon Complex > Water Harvest > Smugglers’ Hideout). This means that every ship needs to be refueled at least once (either by looting enemy wrecks, or finding fuel cells in open space). During this time, you don’t need to interact with the gates - just go through to insta warp. No going back allowed. Normal spawn protection time.
Teams can attack one another as they see fit, they need to keep in mind however that every pilot has only one ship. Which is why each corp can have up to two wings. Strategies involving one wing running to dreadnoughts and one attacking the other team are expected and appreciated.
Mobs are enabled, only players of appropriate wings are allowed in open space hosted on the server (Euro for Euro SQ time, USA for USA SQ time, etc. Pilots wishing to play normal open space during this time are automatically moved to their next closest server).
I expect the race part to take a lot of time. If someone manages to come before 30 minutes have passed, they are free to try to kill the other teams or avoid combat. 30 minutes into the game, the map of the final sector that is being fought for is reloaded with dreadnoughts (I imagine dreadnoughts warping into the game would be CPU-heavy and/or difficult to squeeze in without killing everyone due to their size). Then, if a wing has 5 or more remaining pilots, the fallen ones are revived (same ships); if not, the 4 or fewer are to fight on their own (another reason why there are two wings per corp). If everyone has died, I see a few options:
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they’ve simply lost the game, and their dreadnought doesn’t even spawn;
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their dreadnought warps in without them and - while it doesn’t really stand a chance on its own - it still damages other ships and dreadnoughts;
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they get a second chance, but are warped in after 15 minutes, for the remaining 15 minutes. This option, I think, is most interesting, because it would apply to every single fallen ship, meaning that in the race part you’re essentially fighting for a better start in the actual dreadnought battle. The problem is lag. That would be 96 pilots + 6 dreadnoughts fighting. Not sure if the game can handle that. Your thoughts are most welcome. Three corps participating would work here, but I think it would be too elitist towards “less pro” corporations. If you agreed to just three corps participating, though, this could be done CtB style, with four respawns per player. Decisions, decisions…
Dreadnoughts
When the map reloads, the six dreadnoughts are formed in a circle, aiming their major caliber cannons towards the centre. Each dreadnought targets the one with the most points remaining. Whichever dreadnought is the last one standing, wins; but pilots whose dreadnoughts have been destroyed do not lose just yet. If there is time left, they are free to attempt to destroy the other capital and normal ships. If that’s the case and they succeed, the corp with the most efficiency points wins (the sum of efficiency of all the pilots of both wings). Completely annihilated wings are not accounted for (meaning that in order to have your wing’s efficiency count toward the ultimate sum, you need to have at least one pilot alive per wing).
Of course, dreadnoughts’ damage needs to be adjusted here. I don’t think it should just scale down with previous tiers - there is too much going on here to allow one-hit kills
To be able to see what’s what, each corp should have its own colour, and each wing a different shade of it. E.g. corp A’s first wing would be bright red, while their second wing would be dark red; corp B would be bright blue/dark blue, and so on.
Defence mode
There’s no defence mode. It’s supposed to be done just like that, every week.
Rewards
Because it’s a weekly thing, and because it takes so much time and cooperation (much like the weekly tournament), the rewards should be appreciable amounts of GS , however given not to everyone in the corporation, but participants only. Other corpmates could get a 10-15% cut (because they should benefit from it nonetheless).
Additionally, corporations that manage to hold their sector consecutively, should get a bonus to their location rewards: +10% for the first consecutive week, +7.5% for the next one, +5% for the third one, etc.
Also, each participant, of each corp, should get an amount of vouchers related to the sector’s faction, based on their efficiency in battle. E.g. pilot’s efficiency x15 (got 5k efficiency? Good for you, here’s your 75k vouchers, from both sub-factions).
Thoughts?