The keep system here needs significant tweaking

Dear Devs,

Please take some time to reconsider how the keep system works here. The absurd difficulty of taking keeps just totally blocks out an entire section of the player base and just encourages and rewards massive zerging. One of the great things about DAoC is the keep system which makes for fun sieges and defenses and provides an extra element to the RvR game play. We tried taking a keep with red guards last night and we had 2.5groups. It takes 10+ mins to take down the keep commander. Even with enormous zergs, the keep commanders of high level keeps take 20 minutes to take down. This just destroys an entire element of the game play. Please reconsider this.

Also, keeps auto upgrading to level 10 when guilds have no skin in the game is a big problem. We took Fens last night and it was level 4 within what seemed like minutes and just kept going up from there. It's way too difficult to take keeps. I understand making them tough for 1 group but plow through but the difference between what we had in DAoC and this is just extreme.

Really hope you guys will reconsider your current stance here. For a lot of us, it's a game breaking mechanic.

Mon 28 Jan 2019 9:40 PM by Dirtyrandy

I was there on that keep they are talking about I never seen a keep so hard it was harder then relic keeps in the past as of now don’t think there will be much keep takes you need a 5 group Zerg to take down any keep above level 5 which will sooner or later lose a good amount of the everyday players hope you guys fix’s this sooner then later don’t what this to end like uthgard

Mon 28 Jan 2019 10:00 PM by defiasbandit

Make caravans easier to kill. Add better rewards to caravans. More caravans dying means lower keep levels.

Lower the points of a level 10 keep from 20 to 10. Increase the points from a caravan kill from 3 to 5.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 1:37 AM by Sleipnir

Firstly, to the GM's and Devs of this server - THANK YOU. This is quite possibly the best and most fun version of DAOC, with the best portions of the content but with quality of life changes that make it even better than it was in the original iteration. You guys have done a really cool thing, and we all appreciate it - I think the numbers speak volumes; people just want to play Phoenix! Thank you.

As for making it the best experience it can be, I too hope you will consider tweaking the keep system. Level 10 keeps *should* be tough - with that I do not disagree. However, for a guild to get a keep to level 10 should not be an automatic, easy, effortless thing with no cost, no drawback, no "skin in the game" as it were. Currently, literally any scrub who can find 3 other people to form a guild can claim a keep, and then from there it will be level 10 in a matter of hours and can remain there indefinitely. No investment. No effort. No achievement. No skin.

One of the things that some of the smaller or more casual guilds used to have the option to do was to change up the RVR content a bit - create their own content so to speak, by assaulting a keep to get another guild's attention, or taking keeps, especially unclaimed ones, to try to turn the flow of RVR a bit, open DF, create keep skirmishes, assaults and defenses. RVR IS the end game content of DAOC, and with all the keeps at level 10 with guards tougher than many dungeon boses, and Keep Commanders seemingly as tough as a raid boss, the only course is zerg warfare. I would hate to see the RVR funnelled into one playstyle like that.

Suggestions I think that could make the keep system work better and yield more variation in 'content' for RVR players :

- Make high level keeps require some skin in the game. Guild BP's were used in past server iterations and seemed to work reasonably well. It makes guilds have to at least consider and prioritize their investment, and the RP earners are the ones who will be able to maintain higher level keeps, while the scrub that just formed a throwaway guild will not - unless they get out there an earn it!

- The Caravans are a neat idea. But in order to affect a keep's level currently, a group needs to invest literally hours camping the caravans as they come through. Consider making them insta spawn when one is killed? That way if a guild doesn't pay attention to who is killing their caravan, they stand to eventually risk their keep. This can serve to generate RVR fights separate from the zerg and give an outlet for smaller groups to have an impact. Risk / reward! Content!

You have all shown a great deal of ingenuity, creativity and capability to make an awesome DAOC server. I have confidence in you all, more so than I have for any other freeshard or even Live for that matter... confidence that you can come up with ways to tweak the system to create more varied and accessible content for more varied styles of gameplay for RVR.

Thanks again for listening to the players!
Praetorian

Tue 29 Jan 2019 2:43 AM by Frieza

IMO i think you need to make the rewards for keep taking/ defense much greater before you can expect anyone to actively participate. Its the funnest part of the game (keep defense) for me, but i think most people find this the most tedious part of the game.

the question then being, how do you change the rest of the game as little as possible whilst also doing this?

I think the tasks are heading in the right direction, but it encourages one big zerg to roam too much plus takes away from the pvp side, whereas a lot of people wont be bothered by the extra small amount of rps. Possibly just introducing special loot or large amounts of gold would do the trick. Maybe even creating an encounter that creates higher reward. Im not sure....

I love the relic system as well, but i just really worry its not used much after the dust settles on the first set of 50's

Tue 29 Jan 2019 5:55 AM by jhaerik

Keeps = DF access.

Stupid difficulty + shrooms = Hibs will always have DF.

How is this not a problem?

Tue 29 Jan 2019 6:13 AM by Frieza

jhaerik wrote: ↑
Tue 29 Jan 2019 5:55 AM
Keeps = DF access.

Stupid difficulty + shrooms = Hibs will always have DF.

How is this not a problem?

Im not at big boy rvr yet, so i dont know how hard a keep can be, but if ani is part of your 'problem', then i think you need an inf to poke at some. Or cabbie casting pets to get target and then macro assist till all of them are hitting them.

They are a trouble and a bother....impossible though? no. Run around to the next keep you want, (yes even if its not in task), Ani's biggest problem is setup time, take and come back....

Tue 29 Jan 2019 6:28 AM by rubaduck

The only thing I really hate about the keeps, is that the guards are so damn healthy.

I see a lot of people complain about animists and keep defense, but here's the brutal truth: they can't have more then 14 FnF pets in a 1000 range area, collectively between any animist there. They can't place them in walls, as that is a bannable offense, and if you don't report players doing that then it isn't really any help in complaining about it here. The only reason hibernia has DF all the time is because they have a LOT more active players in the RvR zones, even though the population in a total is more or less equal on each realm.

See, there are logical explanations.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 8:03 AM by faliv

Can animists even shroom in keeps? Openfield, rougly 3k locs away from an empty keep, our animist could not set a shroom with the message "to close to a keep" or something like that.

Beside that i support the idea of making keeps easier.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 8:23 AM by Ayoli

Also climb walls feels a little bit useless on enemy keeps because the Guards spot you very quick and they are unbeatable for stealthers.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 8:52 AM by Sepplord

I like the upgrade/downgrade system via caravans, but i never knew that having the keep claimed was without costs...?If that's the case, THAT surely is a problem, and probably a main reason why keeps feel to strong. Claiming a Keep to lvl10 should NOT be the normal case. It should either be the bulwark of a keep from a very strong guild that always has their keep at 10 but they also farm a lot for it, or specific strategical cases, where a guild makes the conscious decision to upgrade higher than usual.

Additionally the keeps are probably stronger because of the relic system...if that is the case, maybe scale keeps/keeplords that have a relic placed inside while keeping other keeps weaker.

A few of the most memorable evenings from back then (for me) were when we got one and a half groups of guildies, went deep into the enemy frontier, took the keep of an enemy guild and waited for them to come and take it back. Those were the moments, that broke away from the treadmill of circling emain/alternativezone. If keeps are not doable by a single fullgrp in a reasonable amount of time then (At least for me) a big part of daoc is missing

Tue 29 Jan 2019 10:18 AM by Ayoli

I suggest to make it a little bit easier to kill the caravans and make it more attractive to farm them by adding better rewards. Maybe this could help a little bit to downgrade the keeps faster.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 10:42 AM by Sepplord

Ayoli wrote: ↑
Tue 29 Jan 2019 10:18 AM
I suggest to make it a little bit easier to kill the caravans and make it more attractive to farm them by adding better rewards. Maybe this could help a little bit to downgrade the keeps faster.

The huge problem with farming caravans is that it does not build up to nice RvR-fights. If i am a smallman an i farm a caravans, then i might attract enemies, but they will also inc me while we are engaged with a caravan. MEH, not a situation i want to generate.

When i smallman and take a keep, i am on a platter while taking the keep, similar to being on a platter while farming the caravan. But AFTER that i am rewarded with the defensive structure within enemy territory. An attacker now has to take the disadvantage of being outside. That's the reward for the risk i (we) took

Tue 29 Jan 2019 11:56 AM by Ayoli

But not farming the caravans causes the situation we have now - full upgraded Keeps.

I agree that attacking caravans in the frontier is a risk. To minimize the risk to attack the caravans they should be easy to kill. So the attackers don't have to stay there long. Also the risk should be rewarded fair for the attacker.

As a reward to kill the caravans I am thinking about indirect rps by giving a time based small buff for gaining rps to all realm members close to a killed caravan.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 3:32 PM by Ardri

Suggestion #1: Regular Keep lvl 10 Lord WITH RELIC should be harder to kill because of bad location/regular guards/keep layout etc. It is extremely easy to get through the 2 doors and get to the lord. But having a harder keep lord will stop relics from being ninja'd in 5min. Naturally there will be many more attackers going for a relic rather than just any keep so increasing lord difficulty makes sense. Think 50-100 attackers.

Suggestion #2: Regular Keep lvl 10 Lord WITHOUT RELIC is a bit too difficult. Stakes are lower, player count is lower. Right now, they feel harder than most PvE bosses. 4 full grps of attackers (32 players) all bursting down the lord, with 0 defending, still takes 5-10 minutes. If any defenders get there in time, you're probably not taking it. A bit too difficult imo. Think 16-50 attackers.

Suggestion #3: Right now there's a sea of lvl 10 keeps at zero cost. Make keeps cost guild BPs/merit points to start running caravans.
Unclaimed keep = lvl 1, no upgrading ever.
Claimed keep (no guild points) = free upgrade to lvl 4 without caravans.
Claimed keep (spend guild points) = caravans start running to upgrade keep to lvl 10.
This would help cut down on caravans in the wild adding pvp fights, but at the same time add a cost. Also, what is the keep upgrade scale in real time? It feels a bit fast. Maybe make it 24 hours to get to lvl 10?

Suggestion #4: Keep caravan difficulty the same. Maybe increase reward as it's still not worth it 95% of the time, but people will eventually adapt if they want keeps.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 3:54 PM by Constantyne

Ayoli wrote: ↑
Tue 29 Jan 2019 11:56 AM
But not farming the caravans causes the situation we have now - full upgraded Keeps.

I agree that attacking caravans in the frontier is a risk. To minimize the risk to attack the caravans they should be easy to kill. So the attackers don't have to stay there long. Also the risk should be rewarded fair for the attacker.

As a reward to kill the caravans I am thinking about indirect rps by giving a time based small buff for gaining rps to all realm members close to a killed caravan.

We tried killing caravans. They are on about 15 minute timer after you take them and you have to take out three or four of them to even make a small dent. We did this and it wasn't really all that different. Plus it took us an hour milling around the MG to wait for caravans. The whole system has some good ideas but it is completely broken. We've tested this multiple times. Also, a keep has red guards within 30 minutes of it being taken so good luck finding a keep that isn't upgraded to the max. There's no cost for claiming so every keep is claimed and thus almost every keep is level 10 which means 4-5 groups at minimum to take the keep lord down. It's a mess!

Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:00 PM by Takii

I'm surprised to learn there's no cost to upgrading, I did not realize that. That's a huge issue since back in classic you had to be very active to keep a level 10 keep due to the cost.

As others have stated, the upgrade speed is way too fast as well. The first keep my guild claimed was level 4 within what felt like 15 minutes after claiming.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:01 PM by Constantyne

Ardri wrote: ↑
Tue 29 Jan 2019 3:32 PM
Suggestion #1: Regular Keep lvl 10 Lord WITH RELIC should be harder to kill because of bad location/regular guards/keep layout etc. It is extremely easy to get through the 2 doors and get to the lord. But having a harder keep lord will stop relics from being ninja'd in 5min. Naturally there will be many more attackers going for a relic rather than just any keep so increasing lord difficulty makes sense. Think 50-100 attackers.

Suggestion #2: Regular Keep lvl 10 Lord WITHOUT RELIC is a bit too difficult. Stakes are lower, player count is lower. Right now, they feel harder than most PvE bosses. 4 full grps of attackers (32 players) all bursting down the lord, with 0 defending, still takes 5-10 minutes. If any defenders get there in time, you're probably not taking it. A bit too difficult imo. Think 16-50 attackers.

Suggestion #3: Right now there's a sea of lvl 10 keeps at zero cost. Make keeps cost guild BPs/merit points to start running caravans.
Unclaimed keep = lvl 1, no upgrading ever.
Claimed keep (no guild points) = free upgrade to lvl 4 without caravans.
Claimed keep (spend guild points) = caravans start running to upgrade keep to lvl 10.
This would help cut down on caravans in the wild adding pvp fights, but at the same time add a cost. Also, what is the keep upgrade scale in real time? It feels a bit fast. Maybe make it 24 hours to get to lvl 10?

Suggestion #4: Keep caravan difficulty the same. Maybe increase reward as it's still not worth it 95% of the time, but people will eventually adapt if they want keeps.

These are some good ideas. I think the only area where I disagree a bit is that i think keeps are way, way too hard. A solid group should be able to take a keep. It's almost always been that way. It shouldn't change now.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:04 PM by Constantyne

Takii wrote: ↑
Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:00 PM
I'm surprised to learn there's no cost to upgrading, I did not realize that. That's a huge issue since back in classic you had to be very active to keep a level 10 keep due to the cost.

As others have stated, the upgrade speed is way too fast as well. The first keep my guild claimed was level 4 within what felt like 15 minutes after claiming.

My one worry with this server is everything is too easy. I think convenient is good but easy is bad. The great part of this game is aspects of it can be challenging and require some planning/organization. The keep system is just mindless zerg with absolutely zero strategy. In fact, I would say everything with the tasks is that way. I appreciate the RvR rank bonus they have provided but overall, they are bad for the game imo.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:04 PM by chryso

Constantyne wrote: ↑
Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:01 PM
These are some good ideas. I think the only area where I disagree a bit is that i think keeps are way, way too hard. A solid group should be able to take a keep. It's almost always been that way. It shouldn't change now.

I'm not so sure about that. I think needing a couple of groups may be a good thing. We will see.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:06 PM by Constantyne

Ayoli wrote: ↑
Tue 29 Jan 2019 11:56 AM
But not farming the caravans causes the situation we have now - full upgraded Keeps.

I agree that attacking caravans in the frontier is a risk. To minimize the risk to attack the caravans they should be easy to kill. So the attackers don't have to stay there long. Also the risk should be rewarded fair for the attacker.

As a reward to kill the caravans I am thinking about indirect rps by giving a time based small buff for gaining rps to all realm members close to a killed caravan.

We spent over and hour killing caravans and the Albs took the keep (we are Mids) so we got nothing out of it, helped them and had no way of knowing they were there. Not a great way of doing things.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:08 PM by Constantyne

chryso wrote: ↑
Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:04 PM
Constantyne wrote: ↑
Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:01 PM
These are some good ideas. I think the only area where I disagree a bit is that i think keeps are way, way too hard. A solid group should be able to take a keep. It's almost always been that way. It shouldn't change now.

I'm not so sure about that. I think needing a couple of groups may be a good thing. We will see.

I could live with two groups and I wouldn't complain. But at present, that isn't viable. Put it this way, a group could be starting the lord at Bledmeer when a group leaves SF to head out there and they would most likely make it there in time to stop the group from killing the lord even on a level 5 or 6 keep.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:50 PM by Mac

Two points. DAoC is a game that easy to learn but hard to master and that's a good thing. High level keeps do have VERY strong guards and lords but... Every keep but 1 in each realm CAN become a relic keep so... The keeps need to be hard.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:56 PM by Takii

Mac wrote: ↑
Tue 29 Jan 2019 4:50 PM
Two points. DAoC is a game that easy to learn but hard to master and that's a good thing. High level keeps do have VERY strong guards and lords but... Every keep but 1 in each realm CAN become a relic keep so... The keeps need to be hard.

The simple solution to this (if the concept of relics in normal keeps is even kept) is to just make relics boost the guards and lord of the keep they're in. But there's no reason to artificially boost the level of every keep and ruin a core aspect of classic keep warfare just to accommodate the custom relic mechanics.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 5:47 PM by defiasbandit

Make it easier to kill caravans. Make each caravan kill downgrade the keep more than it is. Increase the claw drops from the caravans tenfold. 10 claws insteas of 1.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 7:40 PM by defiasbandit

Require guilds to pay gold for caravans to level keeps beyond level 7. The caravans carry and drop this gold upon being killed.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 7:49 PM by jhaerik

Going to just say this now.

Why do we need so much damn PvE in our RvR?

You should haven't to famr, NPC's for hours, to go spend 15 minutes killing a raid boss to damn RvR.

Let the players be the primary defenders.

All you need to add is some sort of system that gives defenders time to DEFEND.

I'm sorry but NF just handled this soo much better, and if anything the changes have just made OF worse.

Tue 29 Jan 2019 9:09 PM by Takii

defiasbandit wrote: ↑
Tue 29 Jan 2019 7:40 PM
Require guilds to pay gold for caravans to level keeps beyond level 7. The caravans carry and drop this gold upon being killed.

At that point just remove the caravan system. The classic keep system used guild bounty points as a cost to upgrade and maintain and it worked just fine. Caravans have other annoying side effects as well such as ass jamming fights since they're on commonly traveled paths. This game does not need more NPCs interrupting fights.

If you want to keep the caravan system maybe make it only relevant for keeps that hold relics.

Wed 30 Jan 2019 3:24 PM by Roto23

I like the caravan system, but killing one should make the keep drop 2 levels, You shouldn't have to kill 4 caravans for the keep to drop 1 level.
I also want to thank you guys for all your hard work. It's amazing what you have done.

Wed 30 Jan 2019 3:35 PM by Roto23

I just read this. This is waaay too many caravans to kill to down grade a keep.... So to downgrad a keep from level 10 to level 9 we would have to kill 7 caravans. That's too much.

Sticking to this example, the 8th Caravan doesnt reach the Keep because it got killed by enemy forces. The Keep will lose 3 Caravanpoints and now only has 17 Caravanpoints left. If the next 6 Caravans also dont reach the Keep, it will downgrade to Keeplevel 9. From Keeplevel 9 to 4 the Keeplevel is the same as the Caravanpoints. So if the next 3 Caravans also dont reach that Keep, it will downgrade to Keeplevel 8 and so on. If a Caravan reaches the Keep, it will add 1 Caravanpoint to the Caravanpointpool again.

Wed 30 Jan 2019 5:16 PM by Constantyne

Roto23 wrote: ↑
Wed 30 Jan 2019 3:35 PM
I just read this. This is waaay too many caravans to kill to down grade a keep.... So to downgrad a keep from level 10 to level 9 we would have to kill 7 caravans. That's too much.

Sticking to this example, the 8th Caravan doesnt reach the Keep because it got killed by enemy forces. The Keep will lose 3 Caravanpoints and now only has 17 Caravanpoints left. If the next 6 Caravans also dont reach the Keep, it will downgrade to Keeplevel 9. From Keeplevel 9 to 4 the Keeplevel is the same as the Caravanpoints. So if the next 3 Caravans also dont reach that Keep, it will downgrade to Keeplevel 8 and so on. If a Caravan reaches the Keep, it will add 1 Caravanpoint to the Caravanpointpool again.

This is exactly what we had to deal with. And each caravan is about 10 mins apart so you can easily see how long people have to spend to take one keep. This isn't a viable system. The upgrade system isn't either with no bounty points needed to have level 10 keeps. It wouldn't take a lot to fix this but the keep commanders need a nerf of about 70% before they are realistic to deal with. Hib keeps DF in perpetuity almost. Such a great server. I can't imagine this is what the Devs want.