Map and Server direction discussion

[Bane]

While taking a look at the recent poll for whether or not we should return to Onderon, I was heavily surprised that people did not realize that Anaxes V3, Onderon, and Corellia all suffer from the same core issue. As someone who's been around long enough to have experienced all three, I distinctly remember the waves of disappointment, boredom, and discontentment with our maps as they finally settled in on the player base. Now don't get me wrong, they each have their unique charms and downsides. In essence though, they all suffer from two major design flaws. 1. They are not built for purpose or the direction the server is inching towards, 2. They certainly aren't built around "Nodes". 

1. Built for purpose

This server is essentially "Occupation RP Lite". We have civilians, an occupying military force, but that's it. The villages we've had so far have been outright terrible, with Corellia genuinely being the worst for missing the mark so hard. Civilian is constantly in this cycle of life and death because there's nothing to do as a civilian, outside of antagonize the republic. The Republic genuinely has no utility for hunters as it stands, and Hunters make up the majority of civilians. This all starts with the core issue of the village. There are no true defining landmarks or important buildings in the village. If we want people to roleplay as genuine civilians we need to put the structures in place to at least give them the space to do so. A functioning village needs some sort of Governmental building, A bar or gathering place, Shops, a bank even, and places for people to live. 

More to this point, the base is too far away from the village. On every iteration of the Map the base has been this distant and antagonistic place, too far to really get RP going. While this is fine, any village going forward needs a small outpost battalions can be stationed at to encourage RP, cooperation, and conflict. 

The whole point of that rant is to show that our maps genuinely fail at encouraging any sort of genuine or deeper RP between civilians and clones. We're too deeply stuck between "Clone wars RP" and "Clone wars occupation RP", and it really shows in our map design. The locations on the map are not meant for genuine use, rather they're pit stops for the clones on the way to kill shit. 

2. Built around "Nodes"

In the designing of any map for any game "Nodes" are used as the places of genuine activity. These are your places of interest, things you're willing to spend your time traveling to. Our points of interest are genuinely dogwater. Corellia improves on this MASSIVELY. The slaver camp was a fantastic addition to the map because it serves as a semi-fortified neutral point for both clone and criminal RP, and the Temple/Crystal caves are genuinely just fantastic. Still, where it matters the map falls short. I think people would care a lot less about how pretty the map is if there were tons of shit to do in each location for each faction. The Village, Temple, and Base need to all be equally as important, where secondary locations needn't be. In terms of secondary locations, they need to be interesting/fortified enough to make them somewhat of a challenge to attack. This can be a run down and abandoned outpost, an illicit criminal compound, a small fortified camp set up in an area of natural beauty, caves used by smugglers and terrorists, etc. They don't need to be intensive, but for the love of god they need to be interesting. We need to be building the map around our three major points of interest.

3. Direction of the server

This is more a list of general bullet points of things I think would benefit the server 

1. Bring back friendly/hostile models for bh

2. Expand the number of civilian jobs and reduce the number of guild jobs

3. Expand the types of civilian jobs and give them systems to support them, (Consumables vender, Gun salesman, Smuggler, Drug maker, etc)

4. Move away from the Galactic senate and lean more heavily into local government

5. Replace Senate Guard with local PDF troops

6. More minigames for in base depending on role. (Fixing comms, engine room, etc)

7. Create a fourth and directly hostile faction. They should be like insurgents, terrorists/bandits and such. Give them a base under village. 

[Rohan]

41 minutes ago, Bane said:

3. Direction of the server

This is more a list of general bullet points of things I think would benefit the server 

1. Bring back friendly/hostile models for bh

2. Expand the number of civilian jobs and reduce the number of guild jobs

3. Expand the types of civilian jobs and give them systems to support them, (Consumables vender, Gun salesman, Smuggler, Drug maker, etc)

4. Move away from the Galactic senate and lean more heavily into local government

5. Replace Senate Guard with local PDF troops

6. More minigames for in base depending on role. (Fixing comms, engine room, etc)

7. Create a fourth and directly hostile faction. They should be like insurgents, terrorists/bandits and such. Give them a base under village. 

Most of these can be handled here: https://synergyroleplay.com/forums/forum/13-cw-server-suggestions/

I do have a few questions for you tho, just want some clarification.

For bullet point 3, are you essentially looking to make it a DarkRP type faction where they have a job and can do various activities?
For point 4 & 5, assuming they go hand in hand, what would the local government function like in your eyes with the PDF?
And finally for 7, do you think adding another group while we already have 5 playable ones is genuinely a good idea? And if so, why? (Senate, Hunters, Clone, Jedi, Naval)

[Mystic]

9 hours ago, Rohan said:

Most of these can be handled here: https://synergyroleplay.com/forums/forum/13-cw-server-suggestions/

I do have a few questions for you tho, just want some clarification.

For bullet point 3, are you essentially looking to make it a DarkRP type faction where they have a job and can do various activities?
For point 4 & 5, assuming they go hand in hand, what would the local government function like in your eyes with the PDF?
And finally for 7, do you think adding another group while we already have 5 playable ones is genuinely a good idea? And if so, why? (Senate, Hunters, Clone, Jedi, Naval)

That'd be nice if these suggestions didn't outlive the people who post them, then nobody knows what the hell to do with something they didn't request. 
 

 

10 hours ago, Bane said:

While taking a look at the recent poll for whether or not we should return to Onderon, I was heavily surprised that people did not realize that Anaxes V3, Onderon, and Corellia all suffer from the same core issue. As someone who's been around long enough to have experienced all three, I distinctly remember the waves of disappointment, boredom, and discontentment with our maps as they finally settled in on the player base. Now don't get me wrong, they each have their unique charms and downsides. In essence though, they all suffer from two major design flaws. 1. They are not built for purpose or the direction the server is inching towards, 2. They certainly aren't built around "Nodes". 

1. Built for purpose

This server is essentially "Occupation RP Lite". We have civilians, an occupying military force, but that's it. The villages we've had so far have been outright terrible, with Corellia genuinely being the worst for missing the mark so hard. Civilian is constantly in this cycle of life and death because there's nothing to do as a civilian, outside of antagonize the republic. The Republic genuinely has no utility for hunters as it stands, and Hunters make up the majority of civilians. This all starts with the core issue of the village. There are no true defining landmarks or important buildings in the village. If we want people to roleplay as genuine civilians we need to put the structures in place to at least give them the space to do so. A functioning village needs some sort of Governmental building, A bar or gathering place, Shops, a bank even, and places for people to live. 

This is real. Our best Village to date imo is Anaxes. The utilization was pretty decent and the proximity to base and the side hangar made break ins a legitimate worry and the positioning of it was perfect in that little ravine area. It was enroute to a "node" (the outpost and the crystal caves) which had quite abit more out of base interaction. Alot of this though has to do with player interaction and RP as well though. 

Overall i like the post. It's got quite a few valid things. Hopefully its taken fully into account. 

Edited May 15 by Mystic

[Marvel]

We absolutely do not need a fourth faction. We can barely support three as it is.

[Bane]

9 hours ago, Rohan said:

Most of these can be handled here: https://synergyroleplay.com/forums/forum/13-cw-server-suggestions/
 

I have suggestions up from almost a year ago that would take two hours max that haven't been approved or denied. 

9 hours ago, Rohan said:

For bullet point 3, are you essentially looking to make it a DarkRP type faction where they have a job and can do various activities?

Oh 100%. As much as DarkRP as a system sucks you need to have some sort of progression, interactivity, and interaction these roles can actually have outside of pure RP. Pretending to be a

 

9 hours ago, Rohan said:

For bullet point 3, are you essentially looking to make it a DarkRP type faction where they have a job and can do various activities?
For point 4 & 5, assuming they go hand in hand, what would the local government function like in your eyes with the PDF?
And finally for 7, do you think adding another group while we already have 5 playable ones is genuinely a good idea? And if so, why? (Senate, Hunters, Clone, Jedi, Naval)

Oh 100%. For the civilian role you need some sort of interaction, progression, etc outside of just pure RP. Pretending to bantha farmer with no tangible or interactable aspect is only fun for so long, the same with smuggling or other criminal activities.

The PDF would act as sort of civilian defense forces not totally loyal to the GAR or the antagonistic faction. Their goal is their immediate short term gain and the prosperity of the village. The local government would very much be the same, depending on the person doing the roleplay. The major difference between the senate and the local government is lifting the restrictions placed by having them be purely lore characters. There is a level of day to day interactivity that you lose with aloof senators. You allow people to tell their own stories. Say there's a two hour shoot out in the village with insurgent or BH forces, that matters far more to the people who have to live with the dead and clean up the bodies than Galactic senators who care more so from a humanitarian removed perspective. There's more room for corruption, back room deals, and it adds an incentive for Clones, Jedi, and Naval to actually behave and use proper RP. Actions suddenly have in RP, and potentially lasting, consequences. These politicians don't have any real incentive to placate the GAR or the Senate, they could just as easily turn to the CIS for the "betterment" of their people or for personal gain. The same is just as true in reverse, depending on how the players behave. 

 

Yes, but with a caveat. It has to both be antagonistic and not closely tied to any specific groups in lore. Something like the "Insurgents of Corellia". Like the CIS of old, having an "on sight" group dedicated to chaos, combat, and furthering their faction's goals on the planet opens huge RP and PVP potential. One of the largest issues we have is that BHs are heavily restricted by their place on the server. They're technically neutral but are the only player driven source of conflict. Essentially all RP is about telling a cooperative story, when there is no clear antagonists to create conflict that story becomes much more boring. Even on the quest side of things there is so much potential to having directly opposing forces. Some of the best and most memorable character driven events were a result of BHs nutting up and being the bad guys. If we're all telling stories together we're severely hampering our ability to do so. Having an opposing force would greatly increase engagement for the GAR and give friendly hunters some actual utility

[Bane]

52 minutes ago, Marvel said:

We absolutely do not need a fourth faction. We can barely support three as it is.

Largely because there is nothing interesting to do. We have severely hampered our ability to create interesting in character interactions just from the nature of the way we have factions set up. The best player driven "events" from the past few years, in terms of RP and general server engagement, were due to the "Neutral" faction not behaving like they should and being directly antagonistic to the GAR. Having a neutral faction with no directly hostile faction makes it so conflict can only run in one direction. Engagement for the GAR is heavily hampered by having no real player driven enemy, and the utility and RP of hunters is gutted by only having one major power to play with. It's not a matter of player count, it's how we use our factions to begin with. 

[Marvel]

7 minutes ago, Bane said:

Largely because there is nothing interesting to do. We have severely hampered our ability to create interesting in character interactions just from the nature of the way we have factions set up. The best player driven "events" from the past few years, in terms of RP and general server engagement, were due to the "Neutral" faction not behaving like they should and being directly antagonistic to the GAR. Having a neutral faction with no directly hostile faction makes it so conflict can only run in one direction. Engagement for the GAR is heavily hampered by having no real player driven enemy, and the utility and RP of hunters is gutted by only having one major power to play with. It's not a matter of player count, it's how we use our factions to begin with. 

It is entirely on player count. We’re splitting our population between 9 Clone Battalions and 3 VIP Factions. In our current state we already have one battalion locked due to health and we still have multiple battalions struggling. That isn’t even getting into the nitty gritty of the factions either which arguably only one of them performs well.

I don’t disagree with your takes on the civilian faction honestly I’m not a big fan of it however adding a 4th faction will not solve any of the current issues we’re having with keeping each and every battalion and faction healthy. It will only take from them all which is a large reason I don’t open DU back up because everyone will flock towards it completely killing the battalions that are already on the brink of death and harming the larger battalions that will lose people too.

Ultimately the only thing to do if we wanted a hostile faction is to replace the Civilian faction with something fully hostile or give them jobs that are straight up hostile again.

[Bane]

1 hour ago, Marvel said:

It is entirely on player count. We’re splitting our population between 9 Clone Battalions and 3 VIP Factions. In our current state we already have one battalion locked due to health and we still have multiple battalions struggling. That isn’t even getting into the nitty gritty of the factions either which arguably only one of them performs well.

I don’t disagree with your takes on the civilian faction honestly I’m not a big fan of it however adding a 4th faction will not solve any of the current issues we’re having with keeping each and every battalion and faction healthy. It will only take from them all which is a large reason I don’t open DU back up because everyone will flock towards it completely killing the battalions that are already on the brink of death and harming the larger battalions that will lose people too.

Ultimately the only thing to do if we wanted a hostile faction is to replace the Civilian faction with something fully hostile or give them jobs that are straight up hostile again.

Having a hostile portion of civilian honestly is a decent compromise 

[blazin]

2 minutes ago, Bane said:

Having a hostile portion of civilian honestly is a decent compromise 

Replace Jedi with Sith (besides lore characters)

[Jayarr]

What is an ideal village in the eyes of the community? Obviously not everyone will agree, but a general consensus wouldn’t go amiss. I thought I did right by onderons, but it seems not. The feedback would be welcome for any future projects.

[Bane]

9 minutes ago, Jayarr said:

What is an ideal village in the eyes of the community? Obviously not everyone will agree, but a general consensus wouldn’t go amiss. I thought I did right by onderons, but it seems not. The feedback would be welcome for any future projects.

I think primarily we want functional spaces that can be used

[Cucumber]

1 hour ago, blazin said:

Replace Jedi with Sith (besides lore characters)

Personally I loved Sith when it was here... but what would you do to ensure it doesn't end up like last time? As you can see it isn't a thing anymore.... so how would you ensure it's better this time around? That would be one of the biggest issues with Sith... making sure it doesn't turn into a repeat of history. 

[blazin]

Just now, Cucumber said:

Personally I loved Sith when it was here... but what would you do to ensure it doesn't end up like last time? As you can see it isn't a thing anymore.... so how would you ensure it's better this time around? That would be one of the biggest issues with Sith... making sure it doesn't turn into a repeat of history. 

not being cringe

[Brooklyn]

2 hours ago, Marvel said:

Ultimately the only thing to do if we wanted a hostile faction is to replace the Civilian faction with something fully hostile or give them jobs that are straight up hostile again.

shadow collective

[KaiserNeiner]

1 hour ago, Jayarr said:

What is an ideal village in the eyes of the community? Obviously not everyone will agree, but a general consensus wouldn’t go amiss. I thought I did right by onderons, but it seems not. The feedback would be welcome for any future projects.

I have 0 information about map creation, but if the buildings in the village were enterable, even big open rooms, I think it couldve created some opportunities to assign them titles or purpose. Opening up one of the larger buildings to be a Bank or Store or SOMETHING for rp would've been interesting. 

The ability to get up to higher spots in the village without a jetpack would have also been nice. For non jumpers, you have 3 buildings to work with. One of them was the spawn building, one was used for hostage taking or RP, the other was the bar that you could shoot through. The biggest L of village was that you could shoot through that wall(or maybe not, maybe clones would be able to shred through a building with a Z6)

[Bacta]

26 minutes ago, Brooklyn said:

shadow collective

 

Me personally I kinda want us to go back to basics on synergy when it comes to factions, having all these unique factions is cool when we are actaully back on track when it comes to RP from there we can go from what we can do with the server RP, just kinda want clone/naval/jedi.

 

For the map idk just let the guy cook and let him update the map frequently, server is always gonna change their mind on maps and whats good or not, having a consistent map creator that can update the map even a small bit every month would fix 99% of all the problems we struggle cause we sit on a map for 6 months and let all of our cringy nitpicks overwhelm it. Anaxes V3 was my favorite cause it got feedback and actaully was updated to fix issues we had with the map, whatever happens with our map i just want the map guy to be on top of things instead of us just having this hate boner for the map every 6 months.

 

Edited May 16 by Bacta

[Crimson]

Without reading that much in the post and in responses, I do think its great to discuss and all of that but I feel that a lot of folks get caught up on stuff they can't control and have it ruin their experience. That being said, change is good and I honestly wouldn't mind a overhaul of a faction. Kinda easier to say Civi but I don't have enough info to have a dog in this.

[Eclipse]

18 hours ago, Rohan said:

For bullet point 3, are you essentially looking to make it a DarkRP type faction where they have a job and can do various activities?

This was what people said bounty hunter would be like originally. It was a cool idea IMO.

 

[Bane]

7 hours ago, Cucumber said:

Personally I loved Sith when it was here... but what would you do to ensure it doesn't end up like last time? As you can see it isn't a thing anymore.... so how would you ensure it's better this time around? That would be one of the biggest issues with Sith... making sure it doesn't turn into a repeat of history. 

I mean it still happens with clone battalions periodically. It's why we have HC, if someone is being cringe management and HC take care of it. I think having preventative measures, like anti-toxicity/elitism rules, is good, but ultimately they won't stop everyone who wants to be a dickhead. If we, using Brooklyn's example, had Shadow collective on the server part of their whole deal would be about being self serving, playing political games, etc. It comes with part of the territory of having "evil" factions on the server, all we can do is clearly delineate the line between RP and OOC toxicity and have punishments in place for when people cross the line

[KillJoy]

Just have props built into the map, walking around a massive map with empty buildings kills any rp as no staff wants to sit and build dupes constantly for each build. You can’t perma prop because there’s a limit (Side note tell how the hell each battalion on Endor had fully decked out bunks on a roster for a server box but we can have one per bunks now) 

 

bring back Bounty Hunter Tiers- Freelance works with Hutts, Hostile with CIs, Friendly with Republic. This way people can openly attack or have Shock try to detain the most wanted 

Edited May 16 by KillJoy

[Jayarr]

2 minutes ago, KillJoy said:

Just have props built into the map, walking around a massive map with empty buildings kills any rp as no staff wants to sit and build dupes constantly for each build. You can’t perma prop because there’s a limit (Side note tell how the hell each battalion on Endor had fully decked out bunks on a roster for a server box but we can have one per bunks now) 

I feel like a middle ground needs to met here though. Game masters were not happy with me when I put props around and cluttered areas they wanted to build in. So, perhaps some buildings should have props (cantina, guild hall, whatever else), while the other 'misc' buildings would remain empty

[Bane]

10 hours ago, Jayarr said:

What is an ideal village in the eyes of the community? Obviously not everyone will agree, but a general consensus wouldn’t go amiss. I thought I did right by onderons, but it seems not. The feedback would be welcome for any future projects.

I want to reiterate that Onderon was not a bad map, I think the issue is more about how we utilize civilian in general. The server is definitely Jedi/Clone centric, and our maps reflect that. It leads to a lot of civilian players feeling gimped because they don't also have a fully functional space or outpost to do their civilian things. I think Thesh was definitely the most disappointing part of Onderon. Having a Republic outpost, or better yet a neutral fortified outpost, with an interesting design and construction would have been far better than a SWTOR prop. When we treat Civilian, Jedi, and Republic as equal in terms of how much consideration and utility their spaces are given I think it honestly helps all three factions. If there were more enterable spaces in the Onderon village of varied design it would have made the village more fun in just day to day interactions. Whether you're a clone patrol kicking in doors for contraband or a clan of hunters smuggling goods, those varied spaces would have made things more interesting in combat and roleplay

[Bane]

9 minutes ago, Jayarr said:

I feel like a middle ground needs to met here though. Game masters were not happy with me when I put props around and cluttered areas they wanted to build in. So, perhaps some buildings should have props (cantina, guild hall, whatever else), while the other 'misc' buildings would remain empty

Agreed, some buildings, (that see heavy every day use), should be kitted out with props built into the map. Others, like villagers' homes or maybe a hidden smuggling den, should remain relatively empty. I think the core of what we want is spaces built with the consideration of the type of RP happening there

[Mystic]

On 5/15/2024 at 10:05 PM, Jayarr said:

What is an ideal village in the eyes of the community? Obviously not everyone will agree, but a general consensus wouldn’t go amiss. I thought I did right by onderons, but it seems not. The feedback would be welcome for any future projects.

A mix between Anaxes and Corellia. 

Corellia has a sweet ass design for the buildings making it seem like they have no help from the GAR. Which puts a great emphasis on the Civillian part. The Anaxes one had everything this one is missing. Space, a compact bar/village (the bar is above the village) 

Village is like 9 houses which is FINE but there is nothing else to do there. I think the Guild attempted to even RENT them out. The Cantina is the only wow factor for the village. This may largely be due to our perma prop restrictions and native lack of roleplay on the server overall. 

Civvie is also just a lowkey garbage faction. They should be EJs imo. 
The RP quality on server is not enough to make playing a Civ even worth it. It's "shoot on sight" or "do you have a basepass" RP. Not really a middle ground. They just have no purpose other than being a thorn in our side. 

Hunters are a cool concept but they are just all wannabe Mando's. There is no real bounty hunting on server and the quests/bounties put up generally just consist of killing someone which has no appeal since most people are AFK or just turn it into a firefight. 

A sort of victim protection roleplay would be sweet for those kinds of bounties. Air out Bounties being on people's heads so Clones can be aware. 

There is alot that needs done with Civ faction. The village isn't the biggest issue.

Edited May 17 by Mystic

[Bane]

19 hours ago, Mystic said:

A mix between Anaxes and Corellia. 

Corellia has a sweet ass design for the buildings making it seem like they have no help from the GAR. Which puts a great emphasis on the Civillian part. The Anaxes one had everything this one is missing. Space, a compact bar/village (the bar is above the village) 

Village is like 9 houses which is FINE but there is nothing else to do there. I think the Guild attempted to even RENT them out. The Cantina is the only wow factor for the village. This may largely be due to our perma prop restrictions and native lack of roleplay on the server overall. 

Civvie is also just a lowkey garbage faction. They should be EJs imo. 
The RP quality on server is not enough to make playing a Civ even worth it. It's "shoot on sight" or "do you have a basepass" RP. Not really a middle ground. They just have no purpose other than being a thorn in our side. 

Hunters are a cool concept but they are just all wannabe Mando's. There is no real bounty hunting on server and the quests/bounties put up generally just consist of killing someone which has no appeal since most people are AFK or just turn it into a firefight. 

A sort of victim protection roleplay would be sweet for those kinds of bounties. Air out Bounties being on people's heads so Clones can be aware. 

There is alot that needs done with Civ faction. The village isn't the biggest issue.

Civilian needs a lot of TLC. More models, more darkrp type stuff, like we need the ability to actually tangibly be criminals, assassins, smuggles, or guns for hire, and civilian in general needs to be expanded. Less hunters, more actual civilians  

[Kase]

Honestly, I think making the civi faction like a little pocket for DarkRP style of play isn't a bad idea cause it creates that societal feeling for the planet that we would be occupying and it creates quality RP scenarios for some of the other groups on the server.

For example, Naval and CG could do warrants for arrests, check for smuggling and drug operations, conduct patrols. Groups like 41st could do recon portions or offer translation for Naval when it comes to alien members.

This could also make way for groups and factions to form naturally based on shared interests like they have somewhat with the current way Civi is set-up, you could have a PMC group who can be bought out for store security, you could have hitmen be bought to take out targets and allow these people to slowly build up rep based on how sucuessful they are at their job, drug cartels whos whole thing is to sell drugs and keep their drug operations under wraps, allow shop owners to do a ban on military personnel in their establishment through the jedi order/Naval and have CG enforce it


So many different ways the Civi faction could be done if it was treated like a lil DarkRP pocket and their own little community.

Now for my cons, it would have to have a lot of ground rules and it could be hard to deal with during events and such if people are trying to roleplay while an event is going on. I could think of a few solutions for these but again, it would take a lot of work and would most likely required an entire rework on how civi works. Also the big thing is that it would take time for the society to actually build up and get proper leadership/rules and that could ultimately kill any current groups and players in Civi. (Turning it from a Bounty Hunter guild, to an actual Governing body, maybe operating as like a board of people. Like for example, Member of Commerce which establishes rules on business and etc)

Edited May 20 by Kase

[Baelfire]

I do miss the sith. Gave us something to do as shadows lol