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, 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.

Los Zergs están fortalecidas por el viaje rápido. Los tiempos de viajes tan signficativos evita que el juego de zerg sea una gran influencia.

Los encuentros se diseñan para tener significado en términos de jefes, habilidades y la aptitud relacionada con las composiciones, tácticas y estrategias del grupo. El Zerging no experimenta este contenido. Hay diferentes maneras de hacer que una pelea sea más difícil para que grupos más grandes, sin depender únicamente de los potenciadores de estadísticas o hacer que el jefe sea una "esponja de daño".

• Los jefes de raids y mazmorras tienen mecánicas y habilidades específicas que los jugadores deben aprender y reaccionar. Los Zergs que no sean conscientes de estas mecánicas o que no reaccionen a ellas como es debido, serán eliminados.
• Puede haber peligros ambientales y efectos de AoE que causen más daño según la cantidad de jugadores presentes.
• Hay un toma y daca para los gremios que quieren ver una mayor cantidad de miembros en lugar de un grupo más reducido y enfocado que puede ser parte de una alianza.

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. – Steven Sharif

Las mecánicas que fomentan la intriga política desempeñarán un papel en la desestabilización de los zergs.

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. – Steven Sharif

El juego basado en objetivos ayuda a equilibrar la mentalidad de zerg.

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. – Steven Sharif

Las zonas instanciadas no juegan un papel importante en la limitación de zergs, debido a que el 80% del contenido en Ashes of Creation es mundo abierto.

• Puede haber zonas instanciadas dentro de asedios a castillos y nodos donde grupos en particular pueden participar en ciertos puntos de referencia basados en objetivos.

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. – Steven Sharif

Travel times

So why is travel important? We've talked about this in the past, the reasons why. We've all existed in games where teleportation is very easy to use and sometimes that can be a detriment because you may have activities like a caravan run that's happening and one person sees you from a certain guild and they do the raid callout to their guild "everyone open your portals and come here within a split second and we're going to just mob this group". No, well instead that opportunity doesn't exist. If you want to provoke or to gank an operation of another guild, you need to have foreknowledge. You need to prepare. You need to place your forces around that area; and that is an important aspect. In addition, it makes that travel meaningful. If you are having to spend time to move to a location, you're going to think about what can I do along the way? Why am I moving to that location? How is it more beneficial for me to be in that location versus where I am now? This is also in association with the fact that you are a citizen of a particular node and that node needs your assistance within its vicinity; and if you want to move outside of that vicinity there should be a really good reason for that and there's lots of great reasons for it. – Steven Sharif

Tipo de viaje	Corriendo.	En montura.
De un extremo a otro de un nodo de Metropolis (fase 6)	2.83 minutos	1.67 minutos
Desde el centro de un nodo hasta el centro de su nodo vecino	5 minutos	3.5 minutos
De los puntos más septentrionales a los más meridionales de un continente	75 minutos	50 minutos

Fast travel

Fast travel is limited in Ashes of Creation. None of these fast travel methods allow transportation of gatherables or materials.

There is very little teleportation in the world. Some of that does get unlocked through metropolises of a certain type. Additionally there are mounts that are faster travel and there are services that are fast travel between nodes. – Steven Sharif

• Scientific metropolises offer teleportation within their vassal network, which can extend across seas, and also include islands.
• Flight paths between coastal nodes or nodes within specific regions.
• Airships between metropolises. This was previously stated to be between scientific metropolises.
• Family summoning.

Faster travel in Ashes of Creation refers to the use of player ridden mounts and flying automated creatures that connect certain nodes.

Siege balancing

There are points of balance that we want to incorporate, such as the defense mechanisms that the defenders have, the types of buffs that are acquired through completing killing the bosses, or capturing control points, the stages before a siege when it comes to those node progressions in the preceding weeks: Those are all going to be balanced considering all things being equal between the two sides. But obviously we're not going to control the state of gear acquisition that one side might have as an advantage over the other. There might be a much better geared team over there. There might be a much better coordinated team. There might be a higher number of individuals who are part of the attacking or the defense. Those are components that we aren't necessarily going to put on railroads so-to-speak. But the aspects of design that we can talk about like the hit point health of a particular wall or door, or mercenaries that can be hired; what's their cost, what's their damage output: Those are things yes we're going to balance. But obviously anything that's player dependent or that has player interaction and activity and determination you can't always balance; and you don't want to balance. Those aspects you leave those to the players. – Steven Sharif

Ver además

• Fast travel
• Gremios
• Beneficios de los nodos