Alliances overhaul: changes in response to your feedback 2023-02-13 15:00

A bit of background

Before presenting the changes, I think a little bit of background is in order. There are several things to keep in mind here:

• When we add a new feature or new system to the game, each player adopts it and adjusts to it in their own way. Habits are formed (though not always in the expected ways). Even so, different players' opinions about a system and their ways of using it may be diametrically opposed. When designing such a system, one of the key objectives for our game designers is therefore to try and reconcile everyone's point of view and minimize any dissatisfaction for players. Alliances are no exception.
• Sometimes, rules need to be put in place for the good of the community as a whole. Whether it's to limit abuses, excessive behaviors, or any other problem, the goal with these rules is to protect players and ensure a safe in-game environment.
• And of course, it sometimes happens that certain in-game systems that are accepted by everyone and used on a large scale aren't satisfactory to us in terms of the overall game experience (lookin' at you, idols). As a result, we occasionally need to make decisions that aren't necessarily to everyone's liking.

With that background in place, let's turn to the changes we've made to alliances relative to what we described in the previous devblog.

"PvM" alliances

One point often raised in your comments on the devblog post has to do with so-called "PvM" alliances, or alliances with a large number of exclusively PvM players. Players use these alliances to recruit other players for dungeons, quest fights, or other fights against monsters.

While this use of alliances doesn't have a negative impact on other players' in-game experience, it's a long way from the original intended use of alliances, which is to face off against other alliances for control of territories. The limit on the maximum number of characters per alliance is a rule aimed at keeping certain alliances from getting so big that smaller ones have no chance to compete against them, simply because they have far fewer members.

For players who use alliances in these unintended ways, we understand that a reliable tool is needed to help you connect with each other. In the meantime, you can continue to use alliances, but without adding your whole guild; adding just a few representatives instead (for example) should allow you to partially recreate this group effect. As a complementary tool, the "Recruitment" channel is specifically dedicated to looking for characters. We're aware that this channel is frequently affected by spam, which is why we're making a big effort to clean it up. In addition, as Logan mentioned in his New Year's message for 2023, a new search function for groups and trades is also currently under development, and should be ready to take over for these kinds of needs around the time when DOFUS Unity comes out.

To try and find a compromise, however, we've decided to increase the maximum number of players per alliance from 200 to 250. This new limit will also be applied to guilds, for which the maximum will thus increase from 240 to 250 members.
 

Perceptors

In addition to transferring guild perceptors to alliances, a number of changes were announced for perceptor fights. First of all, as indicated in our first devblog post, the plan is still that the perceptor will be controllable in combat and that its death will not be a factor in how the fight ends. We feel that it's important for defenders to be able to defend themselves properly, and not have to depend on an AI which may not play according to the team's preferred approach. Even so, the death of a perceptor will still have an impact on the fight. We mentioned perceptor equipment in the previous devblog. Among other things, this equipment will allow you to obtain bonuses in combat on all defenders. The effects will disappear when the perceptor dies.
 

Finally, many of you raised concerns about placement slots, which are known in advance to the attackers, giving them an additional advantage. From now on, when a fight is initiated against a perceptor, the initial placement slot will be independent. The arrangement of placement slots will be selected at random for each fight, so neither the attackers nor the defenders will be able to predict it.

Limiting alliance monopolies

One of the main goals of this overhaul was to limit any one alliance's ability to acquire a monopoly. The only strict rule we've imposed is the one limiting the maximum number of characters in an alliance. However, several more organic limitations have also been developed in support of this goal:
 

• In line with the previous point, we hope (and also encourage players) to focus more closely on this system. Going forward, triggering an AvA will be easier and much less predictable. But our intention is not to have one alliance keep control of the same territory for months on end. In addition, by better protecting alliances that control only a few territories, we're making it easier for them to organize attacks on tougher alliances. Triggering a KOTH battle is now easier for all alliances! Alliances which are less optimized for combat can choose to reduce the durability of the prisms. Due to the limitation on the number of members, it will be very difficult or even impossible for an alliance to carry on multiple KOTH battles at the same time. The largest alliances will probably have to focus on the territories they consider most essential. All in all, we hope that with the changes we've made to the system, control of any given territory will regularly pass from one alliance to another.
• As mentioned earlier, directly attacking a prism is not the only way to trigger a KOTH. Less optimized alliances can choose to target the durability of the prisms. The new roles and the associated new ways of earning points should also allow these less powerful alliances to hold their own during the KOTH phase.
• And finally, as some of you noted in your comments on the previous devblog post, certain rules can lead to toxic behaviors within an alliance. This is the case for two rules in particular: the limit on the number of perceptors per group of territories, and the right to distribute nuggets. These two rules are probably the most organic of all, since they depend directly on the players with whom you share an alliance. Because recycling is now open to everyone and because monopolies will be harder to maintain, we encourage you to join an alliance that's right for you. If you don't like your alliance's rules for nugget distribution, organization, or agreements on perceptor placement, don't hesitate to create an alliance with rules that work better for you. We hope to create a situation where despotic alliance leaders end up driving their members away.

Crystals and modules on prisms

In response to your feedback, we're making changes to and adjusting the balancing of crystals and modules:

• First of all, a delay has been added between any two modifications to prism modules. This will prevent players from switching too quickly between a teleportation module and a recycling module (or vice versa), which would allow them to teleport at no cost. As a result, this delay will force you to really choose which module is most appropriate for a given prism. This will also prevent an alliance from placing a recycling module just long enough to recycle its resources, then immediately removing it to prevent other players from using it.
• Pacifier crystal:
  • Original proposal: This crystal stops any attack on the prism by another alliance.
  • Change in response to your feedback: This crystal power was a bit too powerful. A tradeoff has been added: the pacifier crystal is now incompatible with the use of a prism module.
• Inhibitor crystal:
  • Original proposal: This crystal prevents recycling on the prism by any player outside of the alliance.
  • Change in response to your feedback: Although this crystal would prevent other players from having an impact on the prism's durability, the alliance that controlled the territory no longer got any benefit from using it. We've therefore made a slight change in how it works. From now on, when this crystal is active on a prism, the impact of recycling on its durability will be reduced by half.

Captured/defended territories

In order to make capturing a territory more rewarding and to limit any harassment or "alliance-crushing" behaviors, but also to give a fair shot to the smallest (or least optimized) alliances, a new rule has been added. After a KOTH, the winning alliance will have a priority period to place a prism on the territory (unchanged). However, after placing it, the alliance will automatically be invulnerable to attacks from other alliances for a certain amount of time (recycling will still be possible). This period of invulnerability will give the alliance a moment to breathe after a victory. How long this period lasts after the prism is placed will depend on how many territories are controlled by the alliance. Specifically, the more territories an alliance controls, the shorter the invulnerability period will be.

King of the Hill and its new roles

Contrary to what some of you seem to have understood, fights in AvA areas will indeed be Alliance vs. Alliance, but will absolutely not be limited to 1v1 fights. What we meant here was that in a fight, team 1 can't be exclusively made up of players from alliance A and team 2 can't be exclusively made up of players from alliance B. So there's nothing stopping you from launching a fight between one player from alliance A and 8 players from alliance B… Just remember that from now on, the outcome of each fight will win or lose points for your alliance! Each of you will therefore have to adopt the strategy that seems best to you.

Besides this point of clarification, a number of changes have been made in response to your feedback:

• First, we've created a system to limit the number of players in specific roles during an AvA fight. For example, there can only be one Champion per alliance. Based on your feedback about the Scout, it seemed to us that limiting roles could help to bring more diversity to the ranks for your alliances. Therefore, every role now has a limit. As a reminder, this limit only applies in an AvA area, so all members of your alliance can have the same role if you like – but you'll have to take turns going into the AvA area. The new limitations are as follows:
  • Champion: 1
  • Seer: 10
  • Scout: 50
  • Healer: 100
  • Sentinel: 150
  • Undertaker: 150
  • Cannon Fodder (default role): 250
• A new rule has been added: only members who have been in an alliance for at least 48 hours can participate in AvA fights. The idea is that we don't want an alliance to exclude members eliminated during KOTH so that they can bring in other players to send into combat instead, thereby getting around the limit on the number of members per alliance. As a result, new alliances will have to wait for 48 hours before they can capture a territory. This constraint may be modified for specific events like the opening of the Temporis servers.

Some players are also concerned that alliances will become elitist groups in which there will be no room for weaker players. We can't deny that the best PvP players will be able to join together in an alliance and control certain key territories. However, as we explained earlier, it will be extremely difficult for them to control all the territories on a server. Therefore, players who aren't as strong at PvP will still be able to get a foothold in certain well-chosen areas, even if it's only for a shorter period of time.

In conclusion

That brings us to the end of this devblog with the list of the changes we've made. As we mentioned at the beginning, our goal is to reconcile our vision and our intentions with all of your opinions and constraints, while also limiting any potential abuses as much as possible ahead of time. We sincerely hope that these changes will be satisfactory for as many of you as possible. For those who are disappointed that their suggestions have not been adopted, we hope you can understand our point of view and why we've made these choices.

The version of alliances presented in this devblog will be testable next month in the beta for the March update. We can't wait to see you try this new system out. As always, we're eager to hear your feedback, especially during the beta period once you've had a chance to test things for yourself. Your comments and suggestions will be essential in helping us to offer the best possible version of alliances when the update is released.

Thank you!