Updated eA/rAmod Battlegrounds Battlegrounds
⚠ WARNING: WALL OF TEXT 🍎 🥛
> RATIONALE
The idea is for it to be a side-activity for players (especially a specific type of players) to enjoy whenever they feel like, and at least some sort of action for players that enjoyed PvP in this game when it still existed, since PvP (arenas, old style) itself will never again exist in MMO, especially in this game. Battlegrounds though are proven to be a success, likely because of its inclusive nature that all classes and builds are welcome to play and help in some way, unlike regular old-style PvP where only a few classes and builds dominated the whole thing, sometimes even promoting toxic gameplay.
Reminder that Battlegrounds is NOT PvP, WoE or GvG. Battlegrounds is entirely its own thing. It attracts and creates its own community of enthusiastics, most of which does not take part in regular PvP Arenas (if they were alive at all) and even WoE.
> INCENTIVE
The most effective way to incentivize Battlegrounds is by making it free-to-play (aside from having your own geared character), providing a limited-amount of supplies suited for your class (plus some exceptions, such as Seeker Card/Yellow Gemstone in the future) + not accepting ANY external consumables, so everyone is balanced supplies-wise.
Having the freedom to fully play and test your class/build whenever you want, no commitments, not having to wait for weekends to play for only 1 or 2h is a big incentive and reason why BG is popular in any game these days. Not everyone wants, has the time or patience (due to expectations that usually comes with it) to join a guild. Some people are just loners that wants to be able to enjoy other types of activities. Currently in the server, there are very few engaging things you can do in the game, the most common ones being farming, leveling and MVPing. Having Battlegrounds as a side-activity to do would keep players engaged and probably even bring more players to the server, as I have many friends that loves the server but they're mostly BG players and finds the game to be too slow/dead since there's nothing else to do other than grinding, leveling or MVPing.
BALANCED, INCLUSIVE GAMEPLAY
A big incentive in BG is that everyone is more or less equal, or at least substantially more than in WoE. All classes and builds has space and chances of winning. All classes and builds can play to its fullest potential to contribute to their team's success. And due to Battlegrounds providing almost everything you need (you only have to bring your character and gears) while also negating anything external, that means it can be easily balanced to help the struggling archetype that is Melee to make it viable and even meta. Small changes such as providing the players Green Potion (instead of Panacea), which doesn't cure Curse, already helps Melee classes immensely, and forces everyone to play smarter in order to avoid this crippling status effect. The previous server I played Battleground on did something similar and this was a huge success. You could see Melee builds everywhere, almost as popular as Ranged ones.
> REWARDS
No rewards. Or perhaps master/account-bound costumes that would require A LOT of games to get? I think anything that doesn't affect gameplay in any way (aka not limited-time cosmetics) would be fine.
I know many people ask or expect for Battlegrounds to provide WoE (and some even for PvP) consumables, but you have to remember that Origins is an old and stable server with probably the most stable economy in any server, and this is due to the fact that there are no custom or activity-locked consumables (except in Battlegrounds itself, of course) provided by the game in any way. WoE scene is much cleaner, organic and competitive when there are no free supplies involved within it.
One thing we could call a Reward, is to be able to fully play and enjoy your class/build without worrying about costs.
Rant
Fuck BG gears. Fuck BG accessories. Fuck BG weapons. These were a among the biggest mistakes in RO's history and should never ever even be considered.POSSIBLE FUTURE REWARDS?
Maybe trade coins for a small amount of experience (while at maximum efficiency of +75% rewards, the Exp/H rate close to be what a Magma party would give you) if supported by the community? Many other games provides this and I think this is not a big problem. Not a fan of this personally, but if there are support, I'm not against it.
??? Not good at thinking of rewards, because I think being able to fully play your class or anything you like, even off-meta builds, is already the best of all rewards.
> MODES
- [ Capture the Flag ] on Flavius map.
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OBJECTIVE:
Captures the enemy team's Crystal and brings it to your own Crystal.MECHANICS:
Steal the enemy's Crystal by having the player walk close/over it. The player carrying the Crystal automatically spams /hlp emote, has 25% movement speed penalty, is unable to use items, skills or command homunculuses, and loses 10% HP every 5 seconds, until you're left with 1 HP. When someone carrying the Crystal dies, the Crystal is dropped, which, if a player from the team the Crystal was stolen walks over it, the Crystal will be immedietaly sent back to base; or if a player from the enemy team walks over it, this player will now starts to carry the Crystal. You can only capture the Crystal while having your own Crystal in your base.
- [ Stone Control ] on Flavius map.
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OBJECTIVE:
Be the first team to reach 99 Points.MECHANICS:
Upon starting, the game spawns 3 Stones (Barricade sprites) on the north path and 3 Stones on the south path, which the players has to capture and carry it all the way to one of the 6 Slots in their base, which then each Stone will start to give 1 point every 10 seconds. Each team fights over the control of the Stones. Protecting the ones you have while trying to steal the enemy's. Carrying the stones applies the same mechanics of carrying the Crystal from CTF mode.
- [ Team Deathmatch ] on Krieger von Midgard (KVM) map.
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OBJECTIVE:
Eliminate the enemy points to 0.MECHANICS:
Each team starts with 99 points. Dying subtracts one point from your team.
- [ Triple Inferno ] on a small custom arena or maybe a RWC/custom RWC map.
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OBJECTIVE:
First team to reach 50 points wins.MECHANICS:
On death, players drop a skull with corresponding colors of their team. Players drops all skulls they're currently carrying on dying. Retrieving the enemy's skulls back to your base gives one point, while also deleting whatever skulls from your own team in your inventory, which is why it's important to also collect your own team's skulls.
- [ Rush ], featuring Yesnelph, Sacred Altar, Swanhild and Rothenburg on map rotations.
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OBJECTIVE:
Either capture the castle and defend it or storm a castle's defense and destroy the Emperium before time is up.MECHANICS:
The mode starts with 3 minutes for either team to capture the castle, if failed, it ends in a draw. If captured, the match duration will be extended and the castle owners will have to successfully defend it for 6 minutes. Both team starts at the entrance of the castle and has to rush an empty castle to capture it before the enemy team does. If you deals the last hit on the Emperium, your team owns the castle, you will respawn inside the castle on death and you need to prevent the enemy team from destroying your Emperium. If an enemy deals the last hit on the Emperium, your team will respawn at the castle's entrance and has to make their way to the Emperium room and break it.
- [ Bossnia ] on Tierra Gorge map.
WEEKEND-ONLY
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OBJECTIVE:
Kill the enemy team's Bosses while defending your own Bosses.MECHANICS:
The game spawns a MVP on each team's base. These MVPs are very slow, has custom attributes and doesn't use skills, although they still hit very hard. Initially, they're invulnerable, only becoming vunerable when when the Middle Flag is captured by a team, which then the opposite team's MVP will be vulnerable. The Middle Flag is plant-like and has 200 HP. Once a MVP is killed, the Flag is resetted and both teams are able to try capturing it again. Your team has to fight over the control of the Middle Flag to defend your Boss while PvPing and trying to kill the enemy's Boss. MVP order usually consisting of: [ Garm ] > [ RSX-0806 ] > [ Gloom Under Night ] (which requires your team to be able to deal with Ghost4 element, such as having Snipers, High Wizards or any other class with potential elemental damage) > [ Valkyrie Randgris ] > [ Satan Morroc ], which then the game ends if a team successfully kills Satan Morroc. This mode is interesting because it introduces monsters into PvP which then opens up unusual strategies such as Soul Linkers casting [ Eske ] on his own team's MVPs to make the MVP one-shot even the tankiest characters in the game; a Priest buffing and healing to MVP to make it stronger and keep it alive etc. By far the best and most competitive mode of all BG.
- [ Domination ] on Tierra Gorge map.
WEEKEND-ONLY
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OBJECTIVE:
Be the first team to reach 99 Points.MECHANICS:
Other than the two regular team bases, this mode has also a third base in the middle. The bases are captured by standing close to it. The closer you are, the faster you capture it. Numbers capture even faster. Each base gives 1 point every 10 seconds. This mode promotes aggressive team-play by rushing the bases with numbers, capturing faster before quickly moving to the next, instead of trying to defend.
- [ Eye of the Storm ] on Tierra Gorge map.
WEEKEND-ONLY
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OBJECTIVE:
Be the first team to reach 99 Points.MECHANICS:
Very close to Domination and Capture the Flag in fundamentals. You have two bases where you have to capture by standing close to it just like in Domination. Each base gives 1 points every 10 seconds. Same mechanics applied: the closer you are, the faster you capture, and the bigger your numbers are, even faster. Enemy team can capture your base and vice versa. A Flag spawns in the middle, which has 200 HP and player who dealt the last hit will carry it, applying the same mechanics from Capture the Flag/Stone Control (25% movement speed penalty, disabled items/skills/homunculus control, 10% HP loss every 5 seconds, /hlp emote spam). The flag gives 3 points when successfully captured and respawns after 20 seconds.
- [ Conquest ] , featuring all WoE:SE castles: Himinn, Andlangr, Vidblainn, Horn, Cyr, Mardol, on map rotations.
WEEKEND-ONLY
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OBJECTIVE:
Successfully defend or capture a WoE:SE castle.MECHANICS:
The mode starts with a 5 minutes duration for the attacking side to push an objective before the time is up. Destroying a Guardian Stone refreshes the duration to 4 minutes (only refreshes, doesn't add, so it's important to only destroy the first Guardian Stone when you're running out of time, instead of breaking it as soon as the match starts). Just like in WoE:SE, there are one Guardian Stone on each side of the castle and they are the key to open up the way for the first Barricades. Fully destroying a Barricade section refreshes the match duration to 4 minutes. When all 3 Barricade sections are destroyed, the duration is refreshed and you have 5 minutes to destroy the Emperium.
> MECHANICS
- [ SOLO-QUEUE ONLY ]
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For balance purposes. Similar to the last server I actively played Battlegrounds on, here there's also a big PvE-following community, meaning that BG will not be the same it is on WoE/BG-focused Mid Rate servers, consistently bringing numbers such as 30vs30 to 80vs80. It's probably gonna be close to the numbers of my last server: 10vs10 at any given time, bringing close or higher than 20vs20 during peaks/HappyHour. Initially it should be Solo, maybe allowing duo queue later on if there are enough numbers for duos to not be able to completely destroy the balance.
- [ RANDOM ASSIGNED TEAM ]
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For balance purposes. Or Solo Queue doesn't make any sense in the first place, as you could just join the team you want to be with the people you want. This is big as otherwise many players will do everything possible to only play with specific players, as this happened with me in my previous server.
- [ PSEUDO AUTO-BALANCING ]
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(i.e) a team has a Bard/Clown class, and another Bard/Clown class queues, the game will ignore the random team queue and try to send this joining Bard/Clown to the team that doesn't have one. This could be applied to only extreme disadvantages cases, such as performers, Soul Linker and Creator jobs (?). Perhaps per-mode basis? (such as Peco riders for Stone Control/Capture the Flag?). My previous server only had this balanced for performers and Soul Linkers and it worked perfectly.
- [ MINIMUM NUMBER TO START A MATCH + ONGOING JOINING ]
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Trying to respect/apply the "pseudo auto-balancing" mechanic, depending on the initial batch that started the match and subsequent players joining after. Rewarding depending on the amount of time you played that match + a small bonus if you were in the initial group that started the game. The game would only send in players in case: 1. SOMEONE IN A TEAM LEFT/GOT KICKED; in this case, the game would fill the team sending in the player with queued priority (maybe unless if it's a Bard/Clown and the team already got one?). 2. WHEN THERE ARE TWO PLAYERS IN THE QUEUE (3 FOR TRIPLE INFERNO); in this case, the game would hold the first player until second one queues and sends both in (add +1 held player for Triple Inferno mode). This it to avoid uneven matches like 4vs3, 6vs5, 3vs2vs2 etc.
- [ PENALTIES AND !VOTEKICK ]
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On players leaving/abandoning a match (10~15 minutes Battleground-Lockout), %Reward penalty on each AFK Warning + maximum amount of Warnings before the player is automatically kicked from the match. Maybe even a server rule for continuing-offenders leaving matches and issue master-account punishments accordingly. After the game Warns a player 2 times, it's possible for anyone in the team to start a!votekick Character_Name
and the rest of the team to vote with!votekick yes
or!votekick no
afterwards. At 75% or moreyes
, the player will be kicked from the match and applied a Battleground-Lockout status.
- [ DISPELL UPON ENTERING AND LEAVING A MATCH ]
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To avoid carrying in and out buffs, consumable effects and status (freeze, stone, curse, steelbody etc) . Everyone starts and leaves clean.
- [ LIMITED-AMOUNT FREE SUPPLIES/CONSUMABLES ]
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You gain these supplies as soon as the game sends you inside the match. They weigh 0 (zero), are untradeable and gets deleted when the match ends and you're sent back to Battleground Lobby. Numbers balanced around usefulness/strength of the supply and to promote smart play and decision makings. I.e LORD KNIGHT's [ x60 ], [ x10 ], [ x22 ] vs Creator's [ x30 ], [ x15 ], [ x13 ] vs HIGH WIZARD's [ x15 ], [ x40 ], [ x10 ] vs SNIPER's [ x25 ], [ x20 ], [ x13 ] vs CHAMPION's [ x25 ], [ x35 ], [ x15 ] (These are just examples. Full numbers to be disclosed with the Staff and decided during testing & balancing). All classes would receive every supply related to their skill catalysts and mechanics (perhaps even a system to detect and supply Card/Equipment-based skill catalysts? Such as Seeker or Stapo Card. Aiming high here. If proven to be too hard to code, this could be ignored and leave the classes with their own built-in skills). NOTE¹: up to balance to decide if the potions should be ranked or not. NOTE²: Creator needs a BG-only catalyst to cast Slim Potion Pitcher in order to avoid having more potions than it should on builds that are not for SPP (making the main healing item Mastela doesn't fix this as they would still have the CWPs to use when they run out of Mastelas). NOTE³: many server opt to make custom %Healing items without taking into account the entire game was balanced around having Fixed/Variable Number + Attribute %Bonus + Recovery Mastery (such as [ Increase HP Recovery ] for Swordman and [ Increase SP Recovery ] for Mage/Priest) to further strengthen the effect of healing items. This is a big mistake servers do that further breaks class balance. Only number that needs to be balanced is the NUMBER OF SUPPLIES RECEIVED PER CLASS.
- [ AUTOMATIC RE-SUPPLY, HEAL AND EQUIPMENT REPAIR ON DEATH ]
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Upon reviving in the respawning area, your character is healed to full HP/SP and has all their equipments repaired. You're automatically resupplied based on the amounts of supplies you currently have in your inventory (with a cooldown for some specific supplies, such as Acid Bomb catalysts and Poison Bottle, to prevent abusing of the restock mechanic and promote smart play), i.e a Lord Knight dies with [ x38 ], [ x3 ], [ x10 ], that means they're getting resupplied with [ x22 ], [ x7 ], [ x12 ]. The game will not allow for players to have more supplies than they should.
- [ WEEKEND-ONLY FOR LONGER MODES ]
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To avoid players stuck/spending too much time on a mode they don't like like during weekdays where they have a very limited amount of time to play. This was one of the biggest factors to why Battlegrounds in my previous server was so successful and active. They had all modes activated at all times at first, and whenever it rotated to Conquest or any of the Tierra modes, people would just quit and BG would die afterwards. Average match duration (for most modes) in that server was balanced to be 9 minutes. Modes that has substantially higher average duration (and some with extended-time mechanics) are enabled starting Friday 12AM until Monday 2AM server time.
- [ SEMI-RANDOM ROTATION ]
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On WEEKDAYS: [ Rush ] > [ Triple Inferno or Team Deathmatch, randomly ] > [ Stone Control or Capture the Flag, randomly ] > [ TI or TD, whichever wasn't picked last randomize ] > [ R ] > [ SC or CTF, randomly ] > [ TI or TD, randomly ] > [ SC or CTF, whichever wasn't picked last randomize ] >REPEAT
. You get it. In short, it's 1 Rush for every total 3 of Stone Control/Capture the Flag/Triple Inferno/Team Deathmatch modes, while it's not possible to repeat the same mode on the last random picking more than two times. WEEKENDS: [ Bossnia, Domination, Eye of the Storm, randomly ] > [ TI or TD, randomly ] > [ Conquest ] > [ SC or CTF ] > [ R ] > [ TI or TD, randomly ] > [ B, D, EOS, not repeating last pick ] > [ SC or CTF ] > [ C ] > [ TI or TD, randomly ] > [ R ] > [ SC or CTF ] >REPEAT, not repeating last B, D or EOS pick
. Meaning it's more packed with weekend-only modes, almost having one every other game.
- [ DELAY BETWEEN MATCHES AND !VOTESKIP ]
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After a match ends, the game would announce the next mode and give it a 1min delay before queueing is enabled starts a new match, allowing players to repair their equipments, change characters, get more gears or even breath/think a little. Players would then have the 1 minute delay to use!voteskip yes
or!voteskip no
to vote to skip the next game mode. At 75% or moreyes
, once the 1 minute delay is over, the game skips the mode and announce the next mode with another 1 minute delay for it to enable queue, not being possible for players to start skip vote a second time. Personally I'm not a fan of this!bgskip
command because it might popularize players skipping a few specific modes. Why not buff/promote those less-liked modes to be worthy playing instead? Maybe something like a Streak mechanic.
- [ STREAK ]
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Consecutively playing matches without leaving, getting kicked or skipping increases your rewards by 15% per Streak, for a maximum of 3 streaks or 45% more rewards.
- [ HAPPYHOUR ]
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30% bonus rewards (stacks additively with Streak for a maximum of 75% more rewards) during specific periods of the day to promote more players to join. Not a fan of this personally, but this is proven to work well in any server. 90 minutes of HappyHour at 12PM and another 90 minutes at 10PM server time? 120 minutes (starting at the same time: 12PM and 10PM) on weekends maybe.
- [ PLANT-LIKE OBJECTIVES ]
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For balance purposes, plant-like mechanics on all map/mode objectives. That way, no matter how your team composition is, there will always be a chance for you to progress and win. I.e a Conquest team with 6 High Wizards and 2 High Priest; how would they be able to destroy the Emperium? Having the a Emperium with plant-like mechanics, the HWs could spam Jupitel Thunder in it to eventually break (Note: to further balance this and avoid promoting toxic gameplay, Emperium -and only Emperium- doesn't take damage from AoE skills. Multihit skills such as [ Jupitel Thunder ], [ Trigger Happy Shot ], [ Freezing Spear ] and more, only deal a maximum of 4 hits per cast. Guardian Stone: 500 HP, BARRICADE: 250 HP, EMPERIUM: 900 HP. (All up for balances depending on the extra-time received on progressing with objectives). Another change that if possible would give Priest class another role in such modes, is making [ Sanctuary ] heal objectives for 4 HP per tick, and [ Heal ] heal for 1 (+1 per level of [ Meditatio ], to prevent Champion class to be able to heal objectives) HP per cast.
- [ BATTLEGROUND STATE SERVER BROADCAST ]
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Enabled by default, disableable by command. Broadcasts the next mode, when a match starts, if a player queues and the number of players in each team whenever the game sends in new players.
- [ QUEUE FROM ANYWHERE WHILE IN A TOWN OR A COMMAND TO TELEPORT TO BATTLEGROUND LOBBY ]
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Making it easier for players to join anytime they want, from any Town. Automatically getting removed from queue if you leave a Town map.
- [ DISABLED TAEKWON'S HIGH JUMP (EXCEPT ON RUSH MODE) AND CHAMPION'S BODY RELOCATION ]
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These skills promotes toxic gameplay in most of situations on classes that has already tons of usability in the whole Battleground. There's a big reason why these skills are disabled in Battlegrounds in pretty much any servers.
- [ ONE ACCOUNT PER IP ]
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Same from WoE settings here. The game prevents you from joining a match or even entering the queue if you're already inside a match or in the queue with another account.
- [ RESPAWN ON DEATH COOLDOWN ]
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Same mechanic applied to any Deathmatch mode in any PvP game: the more you die in a small window of time, the longer will be your respawning time. This is in order to prevent feeding/throwing/trolling, which is especially common on modes such as Team Deathmatch and Triple Inferno.
- [ BLOCK NOVICES (NOT SUPER) AND BABY CLASSES FROM JOINING ]
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Seems to be a common way to troll/piss off players since they're taking the team's spot from legit players. Joining as such classes and claim "you're helping" to avoid getting punishments applied by the staff. Nothing stopping them from leveling a Non-Trans regular class within a few hours.
- [ MECHANICALLY, EVERYONE IN A TEAM IS IN THE SAME PARTY ]
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So party-only buffs and mechanics fully apply to everyone in your team, no matter if they're in a party with you or even in another party. I.e Paladin can freely cast Devotion in anyone they want without having to invite them to a party; or Gloria works in anyone from your team as long as they're in your screen.
> CONCLUSION
Battlegrounds in certainly something hard to work on, and that's why most big servers doesn't have it. It's not easy to launch and keep a stable Battleground. But once it's done, it does creates a big following and even attracts new players only to play it. Many people doesn't enjoy WoE. Many people wants instant gratification. Many people doesn't want to commit to schedules. They just want to be able to tune in and play some sort of PvP whenever they feel like. Even if it takes half a decade (case of my previous server), it's still well worth the time.