Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Right now I must admit that the War-dec changes are pretty good. Much love for merc corps especially. However the concern over lack of consiquence to the attacker seems somewhat of a foundation but also seems pretty easy to solve.

By giving the defender the ability to "Escalate" the war if they feel they are winning.

What would this mean...

By escalating the war the defender gains the ability to extend the war on a week by week basis, much like the attacker would, only at no cost.

Any ally the defender invited into the war would also be locked into the war. However, if they have not already done so they lose the ability to call in an ally once they escalate.

Just like before the escalation the agressor may not invite an ally.

This would make war a lot more of a gamble and could even make it profitable for the defenders as they are forcing the attackers to "surrender" rather than simply waiting the week out. This of course is a gamble for the defender also as the war could change direction in favour of the agressors once more.

makes too much sense not to do it.

+1

CCP, read this. This guy has a point. And a good one, that is.

The premise is good, but I think your going a little too extreme.

Extending the war for the defenders and their allies, indefinitely, for no cost.....

That's too much....

Extending the war for a week: Very Reasonable.
Extending the war for a Month: This is on the cusp of too much.
Extending the war for multiple months..... That's blatantly too much.

I think the better option would be that if the defender chooses to "escalate" that it simply locks defender + allies + aggressor into the war without either side being able to choose to extend or retract, and the only way it can end would be for one side to surrender. That way it adds consequences for the attacker which they will have to have some serious thoughts about when they choose to declare war, but also mean that the defender has to seriously think about escalating since ending the war would not be an option to them neither.

Having watched the fanfest video about war changes and the Q&A I have a tendency to agree that people may have alts in corps that seem to do a lot of war-decs. There needs to be something that can prevent them from just using another alt for a week. Lets face it a lot of these decs happen on indy corps and the alliance system will help them out with that, but if we were to go on floppies idea of the attacker and defender simply switching roles people are still going to be putting war-decs on primarily indy corps since the indy will not choose to escalate if they can't keep their ally or the previously designated attacker may call in an ally. However I do agree that simply allowing the defenders to simply extend at no cost and be able to choose not to extend may be far too much in favour of the defender and that they will always choose to continue the conflict.

The compromise would seem to rest with the defender being able to choose to not allow the attacker to withdraw (or "escalate" which seems like a nice term since CCP has been calling this period "Escalation to Inferno") but in doing so also removing their option to simply turn the tide and wait it out. I think there is merit in being able to remove control of the war from the attacker and that simply allowing them to wait out a war-dec that has backfired adds very little more consequence than allowing them to withdraw the dec like in the current system.

I think the general intent (or what I assume it to be) is a good idea. I just feel the actual implementation needs some consideration. It would certainly make "war more meaningful" that's for sure.