NW Map: Thoughts and Predictions

TheDan - Sanctuary · March 2013

Well, I'm 99% sure the NW map is getting updated tonight with a 4 hour maint and a 260MB patch that's the least I can expect...

So does anyone else besides me think NW Contribution is going to tank? Since there's way more land, players are going to be way more spread out so you'll run into a lot of empty or half empty instances. Will squads become useless? 10 man squads vs these half empty or empty instances will significantly affect points due to soul-force gap and point ranking distribution.

On the other hand it might help losing nations defend their land because they'll have 6 lands outside of base instead of 4... Players might just say **** base defense knowing you're up against the OP r999 squads right outside of base whereas if you go further out you get medium geared G16/R9 opponents.

TheDan - Sanctuary · March 2013

This actually could go on to NW sub forum, forgot about it before I posted. Cough, mods? b:surrender

opkossy · March 2013

Don't cough on us. You'll spread germs.

XCableX - Archosaur · March 2013

No, keep the thread here. Don't you love us Dan?b:laugh

About the first... paragraph thingy regarding the empty rooms, maybe it could be a server issue. Not sure, the cycle of players I go through in Nation War is the same in my server. I pretty much end up fighting my own friends or acquaintances or anyone I end up knowing in my fights.

Does it seem to be the same for any other server regarding the population? Or do we all meet the same requirement and go hurrdurr on your friends and spamming heart pm's?

TheDan - Sanctuary · March 2013

XCableX - Archosaur wrote: »

No, keep the thread here. Don't you love us Dan?b:laugh

About the first... paragraph thingy regarding the empty rooms, maybe it could be a server issue. Not sure, the cycle of players I go through in Nation War is the same in my server. I pretty much end up fighting my own friends or acquaintances or anyone I end up knowing in my fights.

Does it seem to be the same for any other server regarding the population? Or do we all meet the same requirement and go hurrdurr on your friends and spamming heart pm's?

There's roughly 200-300 people per nation on Sanctuary on average depending on days, usually less on Sunday.

But since prices have fallen I have noticed less geared players going less often as it wouldn't be worth their charms. I usually don't run into friends as we're both on opposite ends of maps trying to base lock.

Haila - Sanctuary · March 2013

You sure? Funny to hear it from a player and not from pwi b:chuckle

Anyways this map could be good against base locking, but with so many maps to choose from we might end up getting less players fights. Imagine 2-3 R999 players against 5-6 normal geared players instead of against 20 b:chuckle
So i think more players will quit and after a few months there will be only 1 vs 1 fights b:laugh

Just a guess XD

XCableX - Archosaur · March 2013

TheDan - Sanctuary wrote: »

There's roughly 200-300 people per nation on Sanctuary on average depending on days, usually less on Sunday.

But since prices have fallen I have noticed less geared players going less often as it wouldn't be worth their charms. I usually don't run into friends as we're both on opposite ends of maps trying to base lock.

Ah, okay that makes sense. For you and your server, it would seem interesting. Here, the NW rewards become more poopier and the population declines a bit. It's around 100-130 for Archosaur per nation... last I checked on last weekend.

Zheii - Archosaur · March 2013

I don't know about everyone else but I haven't really noticed the "less noobie people doing NW" I swear I can go into some instances and there is nothing but tt90 geared people and basically cap a territory with 20 v 2.
But yes, the amount of people doing NW is lessening, it might have something to do with the fact that these squads made up of RRR9 people go in, and baby sit a nations base for the whole NW so that everyone in the nation is stuck in base, and that just sucks the fun right out of NW, don't you think?
But with the coming update to the NW map, it's going to make it even harder to base lock a nation, and therefore, most people will be able to spend more time fighting rather than sitting and waiting for someone OP to go in and wipe out whatever pesky squad is base sitting.
Also; I think this will really be a positive thing, I don't know how many times I have gone to go into a battle and it's been full and I've been sent back to base and wasted all that time, spreading out the people into more and more battle fields will hopefully eliminate that problem, + it'll make Nation Chat alot more useful cause you will actually be able to say "WE NEED MORE PEOPLE IN A4" (for example) and then people can actually go and fill in the spaces that are left in the battle, instead of when someone says that in nation chat you look at the 20 people on both sides of the battle, shake your head and continue on your way (which is what happens at the moment)
All in all, I approve of this map expansion and believe that hopefully it will grab more people into NWing again.

Sylvae - Sanctuary · March 2013

It honestly seems that the map change would increase the reward opportunities for lowbies, because they aren't going to be stuck fighting R9rr while being stuck in a baselock earning nothing, while being told not to join. And even with the OP squads around base, they can have a better chance getting out, and fighting some other squads. And fighting other lowbies, who also won't be running charmed, means decent contri in decent fights without high cost.

And if it did die in population, eventually it would again lure the lowbies in since the OP won't be running around in there. Same thing.

Really it seems that it will adversely affect the OP squads more than others, as people will just not bother. Which would make them need to split up more, and be easier to take down. Without getting the huge old contri amount.

Professor_X - Heavens Tear · March 2013

All this new map would do is require 3 squads instead of 2 to baselock a nation. Not much of a change. However, the Point totals will vary significantly making the winning nation get a larger share of the reward. You're likely to see scores that are 200-300+ apart from first to last place.

Asterelle - Sanctuary_1381265973 · March 2013

Ehh I don't care how many lands are around the HQ... any battle next to the HQ is going to fill up with 20 noobs no matter what. Personal contrib should stay the same but with more battles going on token reward should go down. This is assuming they don't up the total token amount.

I'm more curious about the actual battle map. I think they are changing it and adding towers.. maybe in lieu of the flag.

Neodaystar - Sanctuary · March 2013

I love how they increased the amount of land surrounding the base to increase the difficulty of base lock, but 132 lands is a bit too much, and it will change the way NW is played.

On Sanctuary Server you get on average 200-250 players per nation, so that's about 800-1000 toon participants. With 132 lands, that can hold up to 5000+ active players if there is no base lock for any nation. Good for PWCN, but a bit excessive for PWI. There is going to be a lot of one sided battles where there is no defense resistance, and that means lower personal scores.

In the end you are faced with 2 different approach when playing NW:

1) Help your nation to win by capturing as much land as possible or defending where it is needed, which will result in very little personal credit if little resistance is met in those battle fields.

2) Pick battles near enemy bases and meet as much resistance as possible to gain as much personal credit as possible. However, if you are unable to base lock your enemy, they can divide and conquer most of your lands resulting in earning more score for their nation.

Oh, anyone know how to confirm that this new map we have has labeled lands or know what file that is?

Asterelle - Sanctuary_1381265973 · March 2013

Neodaystar - Sanctuary wrote: »

I love how they increased the amount of land surrounding the base to increase the difficulty of base lock, but 132 lands is a bit too much, and it will change the way NW is played.

On Sanctuary Server you get on average 200-250 players per nation, so that's about 800-1000 toon participants. With 132 lands, that can hold up to 5000+ active players if there is no base lock for any nation. Good for PWCN, but a bit excessive for PWI. There is going to be a lot of one sided battles where there is no defense resistance, and that means lower personal scores.

In the end you are faced with 2 different approach when playing NW:

1) Help your nation to win by capturing as much land as possible or defending where it is needed, which will result in very little personal credit if little resistance is met in those battle fields.

2) Pick battles near enemy bases and meet as much resistance as possible to gain as much personal credit as possible. However, if you are unable to base lock your enemy, they can divide and conquer most of your lands resulting in earning more score for their nation.

Oh, anyone know how to confirm that this new map we have has labeled lands or know what file that is?

The number of battles doesn't go up in proportion to the number of lands. You can only have battles along the perimeter of your territory and the perimeter only increases by the square root of the area. Even though the area increased by 65% the perimeter only increases by 28%.

Sylvae - Sanctuary · March 2013

Asterelle - Sanctuary wrote: »

The number of battles doesn't go up in proportion to the number of lands. You can only have battles along the perimeter of your territory and the perimeter only increases by the square root of the area. Even though the area increased by 65% the perimeter only increases by 28%.

Wouldn't that be the case if it was a static front line though? With people pushing through for base locking, and branching out, don't think it's going to be a straight number like that, except for the very start.

Asterelle - Sanctuary_1381265973 · March 2013

Sylvae - Sanctuary wrote: »

Wouldn't that be the case if it was a static front line though? With people pushing through for base locking, and branching out, don't think it's going to be a straight number like that, except for the very start.

Hmm, well if the base is locked then the battles will still go down dramatically. It is possible the average perimeter has a fractal dimension like the coastline of great britain. That would put its true dimension somewhere between 1 and 2. I'm pretty sure it would still be significantly less than 2. Maybe like 1.3 which would be a 38% increase.

Sylvae - Sanctuary · March 2013

Asterelle - Sanctuary wrote: »

Hmm, well if the base is locked then the battles will still go down dramatically. It is possible the average perimeter has a fractal dimension like the coastline of great britain. That would put its true dimension somewhere between 1 and 2. I'm pretty sure it would still be significantly less than 2. Maybe like 1.3 which would be a 38% increase.

Does the fractal include the OP squads that end up surrounded by opposing nations? Or is it just a baseline involving different variations the frontlines shifting could have? Because a couple times we've ended up with a pretty checkered map from all the OP squads shifting around during an even distribution of land, and with the larger map it seems like it would increase the possibility of having pockets form more and more, while still having a shifting frontline.

EDIT: And the pockets could enlarge from 1 squad to a couple, if they aren't getting a good amount/quality of players to require them to stick to 10 man. So they would be cut-off, but then attack different territories to boost contri earning potential.

Asterelle - Sanctuary_1381265973 · March 2013

Sylvae - Sanctuary wrote: »

Does the fractal include the OP squads that end up surrounded by opposing nations? Or is it just a baseline involving different variations the frontlines shifting could have? Because a couple times we've ended up with a pretty checkered map from all the OP squads shifting around during an even distribution of land, and with the larger map it seems like it would increase the possibility of having pockets form more and more, while still having a shifting frontline.

EDIT: And the pockets could enlarge from 1 squad to a couple, if they aren't getting a good amount/quality of players to require them to stick to 10 man. So they would be cut-off, but then attack different territories to boost contri earning potential.

Even as the NW progresses there are still plenty of clear lines drawn between nations. All what the fractal dimension claim is stating is that the average number of battles won't increase in proportion to the number of lands. If it was 1 dimensional it would increase with the square root of the number of lands (since the lands are arranged 2 dimensionally) but fractional dimension is possible where it increases at some rate between those two.

Magnanimous_ - Heavens Tear · March 2013

In the old map, the number of battles was limited by the size of the map because all available battles fills up pretty quickly and there is always people waiting in base or behind the front lines. The number of battles is around 10~11 simultaneous battles per nation... with 200~220 players engaged in battles per nation. So, on HT server, we have around 275 people showing up per nation... translating into 50+ players on average waiting in base or in empty lands at any particular moment.

In the new map, the number of battles will be limited by the number of people per nation. It looks that the map can accommodate up to on average 16 battles (320 players) which is more than the current attendance numbers.

Anyways, the point is... the number of simultaneous battles will increase, thus increasing the total credits generated by the entire nation. Overall, the amount of tokens that can be earned per 1000 credits will be lower (although the majority of players will still earn more credits since it will be easier to get into battles). It will also 'flatten the token distribution' and bridge the reward gap between op-players and non-op players.

There will also be a likely increase in player base in NW... there will be returning players due to the announcement of this update. Less people DC-ing (since they said it got fixed). We will also witness more alts leaching off credits because it will be much easier for them to move around. (All of that assuming that Hp charms will still be readily available if val put up another bonus charm sales next week)

Lolegi - Sanctuary · March 2013

with the addition of new lands, wouldn't there be a increase in the token stash?

leitemagro · March 2013

So it seems that the overall result was not what I expected in terms of prize distribution.

The same amount of people around 220 per nation on archosaur server. I say overall the battles were very odd numbered, even some were >20vs20, was not as many as on
the past weeks but for the 1st time that I recall (not went 100% of NW) was a nation with more than 400 points (420 or so) But the token were "less" than expected. Even I got let's say a average reward but not as I use to get, when in a winning nation, as well with such a result of the nation and personal contribution was in good results too. I was expected more reward considering the results.

Was no base lock even a nation get more than half map for a good time, the no base lock was achieved, the balanced battles for now I say was not yet achieved but new strategies will come up.

For the ones concern with prizes think if we see same results on next weeks prices of supply token will get a good rise up.

soundslegit · March 2013

Thoughts: I like it.
Predictions: OP squads won't like it because it diminishes their value.

OP squad ratio to land just went down and NW was more fun for me. Doubt its a coincidence. I don't think people are going to get too spread out. Fights will still be along perimeter. When choosing battles I tried to take land that would cut off an enemy square so they couldn't get more people. This worked and I saw it happen over and over. If you drive too deep you get cut off. Fights will always be along the perimeter.

NW Map: Thoughts and Predictions

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