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Invasion zone and events

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Nadira
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Invasion zone and events

In any superhero story these are pretty much a given, so we should expect (and hope for) this in CoT as well.

I only ask to implement it a little better than is usually done.
CoH had the Rikti invasion zone of course, but it really did not feel like an invasion that the heroes and villains had to go all out to repell. It never does because the logic of game development demands that the situation remains static,and worse, that encounters are scaled to what the player can handle. This removes the sense of scale from any invasion scenario.

Games about WW2 often do this a little better in their obligatory 'storming of Omaha beach' level, by adding a lot of action around the player so that even if they have to fight only a handfull of german soldiers, the scale of the entire event feels huge. As long as they do not overdo it and turn the player into the 'chosen one' who singlehandedly is responsible for the landing on the beach succeeding.

For multiplayer games this is not as easy to do, but I think we still can have a better approach that preserves the sense of scale and awe while not breaking the computers or the server.

First of all, while there are small skirmishes going on at all time, where groups of enemies test the defensese and either are repelled or make a temporary advance into hero held territory. These would be mini event like guild wars runs regularly in many zones. Player can join in for intangible rewards (like reputation) and a chance at a better than average reward.

At longer intervals and scheduled and announced ahead of time, there will be large scale events where the enemy tries to push through in a large scale battle. This gives players the time to prepare for this event. The event must run for a relatively long time (don't worry, I think I have a solution for the CoH Taskforces) and be scheduled for different time zones.

There must be a significant risk at failing the event, and this will have lasting consequences for the zone that may take days or weeks to be fixed in the following invasion events (that is, if the players 'lose' the scenario the zone becomes much more hostile and dangerous and a lot of amenities go away. The subsequent invasion event are not about defending or staging an offense, but rather about trying to regain the ground that was lost).

Players sign up for the invasion event either individually or as a group. In the first case they are assigned to groups by the game.

The event is structured like a story arc with many parallel missions. Each player group is assigned one of the many missions that is going on at any given time during the event, based of course on the make-up of the group. If it is tank heavy they are given a task to defend an important target or to front an incursion into enemy territory. A group that is stealth heavy gets infiltration missions against hardened enemy targets. And so on.\

Missions for which there is no group available are handled by game generated and run 'groups' of generic super soldiers. so that at any time the battle field is busy with conflict.

All these missions are run in parallel sometimes in a shared area of the zone, and depending on the mission in an isolated (by forcefields aka invisible walls) part of it to prevent bleed over from other groups. But it is important that players can /see and hear/ what is going on around them even if they cannot interfere directly, or cannot afford to be distracted by it. (after all, if you are part of a blaster group tasked with keeping enemy fliers away from the frontline as soon as you start shooting at enemies for another mission the game can immediately send in a wave of fliers and overwhelm you )

Regardless if a group succeeds or fails in their mission they are given a short time to recover (or they are 'rescued' by the game after failing badly). Depending on the overall success or failure rate of the groups the game sets up new missions as makes sense for the larger story of the invasion event. If most missions succeed the missions will be to press the advantage and the enemy will throw in more defensive units, or apply stealth strikes to stall the advance. And if players start losing they may have to try to defend their ground against increasing enemy attacks. And if one side made enough progress for the story of the event then the other side will start with scorched earth attacks and will start disrupting the lengthening supply lines, making it increasingly difficult for the 'winning' side to advance further.

When an equilibrium is reached the event is over, with the logic that both sides need to recover and build up new resources for another push. (and yes, I think that the 'regular' missions in the zone should be about supporting the war effort. Bringing in resources, spying out the enemy, sabotage, small targeted strikes at enemy strongholds that hinder their ability to build up forces for a next push).

Players can at any time between missions flag themselves as 'injured'. They will be evacuated to the field hospital near the start of the zone and from there they can leave the event. Either a new player or a temporary NPC will be assigned to the group so they can continue.

The developers would have to design dozens of relatively small scale missions with a simple goal for different types of groups, offensive or defensive, evacuation or air drop, stealth, artillery or tanks, against regular enemy troops, enemy heroes. THere could be giant monsters involved (requiring many groups to cooperate tot take it down) and machines of war or specially bred creatures to fight against. These would then be the building blocks of the story of the invasion event that is being told by the game, and influenced by the players. While not a trivial task, it is mostly building blocks and a system to combine those in a narrative whole that tells a unique story of a battle that should feel important to the players and that presents it at an awe inspiring scale. After all, the game easily can, and should !, run dozens of parallel missions staffed entirely by NPCs that are going on around the players at all time while they struggle to achieve their individual goal in the battle.

Radiac
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In GW2 when any outdoor event

In GW2 when any outdoor event fires off (and the larger daily ones are on a schedule that is made public), you can just start fighting alongside everyone and not be in a team and still get rewards, if the game can somehow track your participation. Of course, that's easier in a game where everyone does damage. That said, I think every hero should be able to be built for solo play in CoT, as a design philosophy. Not that you'd have to, you might configure one build for doing raids and another for soloing, for example.

That said, there needs to be a local chat where you can just yell "send me a PM for invite to invasion team"

The maps on GW2 also show events in progress as an orange circled area on the map.

R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising

Fireheart
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Radiac wrote:
Radiac wrote:

The maps on GW2 also show events in progress as an orange-circled area on the map.

There's also, most often, a zone-wide Event Notification, saying 'complete the event' and pointing towards it. These events usually occur in Open Zone locations and the timed Daily Events almost always draw a large crowd. 'Fire Elemental', 'Ice Shaman' and 'Jungle Wurm' events are notorious for lasting mere moments, due to overwhelming force, as a hundred max-level heroes stomp the goo out of them. The trick, for lower-level participation, is to Learn the encounter, get at least one significant attack in, even if it kills you, and be a pleasant member of the community. Once the horrible monster is dead, you'll most likely be resurrected by some kind stranger and you get equal access to the loot chest.
Of course, there are other events, mostly involving Dragons, where even the high-level characters have to be careful. There have been plenty of times when I've just said, "Nah" to 'The Shatterer' event, because I'm Guaranteed to get killed at least once. I'm not gonna stand out of range and only launch long-range blasts. If I did that, the beast would sicc its minions on me and I have no interest in having some rock-dog gnawing on my clusters, while I try to get one more shot off at the horrendous giant beast.

Be Well!
Fireheart

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I can't remember what game it

I can't remember what game it was, I've played so many, but there were live open-world events like that and anyone taking part was AUTOMATICALLY added to the raid. It might be FFXIV... Whichever, the roster starts out populating a single party, but once more people show up, the party becames a raid and additional people are added to additional parties. Maybe someone else out there can remember that game, but I think that would be better than trying to get the attention of people fighting in an event to look at the chat window to answer people's requests.

Edit: If I remember correctly, if you were already in a party the party leader was given a prompt asking if he or she wanted to join the raid and then the whole party would join as a raid party. Maybe there was no prompt and the party just joined as a raid party once one of them started contributing... the details are sketchy. But I prefer this over asking to join.


I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
Cobalt Azurean
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Huckleberry wrote:
Huckleberry wrote:

I can't remember what game it was, I've played so many, but there were live open-world events like that and anyone taking part was AUTOMATICALLY added to the raid. It might be FFXIV... Whichever, the roster starts out populating a single party, but once more people show up, the party becames a raid and additional people are added to additional parties. Maybe someone else out there can remember that game, but I think that would be better than trying to get the attention of people fighting in an event to look at the chat window to answer people's requests.

Edit: If I remember correctly, if you were already in a party the party leader was given a prompt asking if he or she wanted to join the raid and then the whole party would join as a raid party. Maybe there was no prompt and the party just joined as a raid party once one of them started contributing... the details are sketchy. But I prefer this over asking to join.

I can't speak for FF but I know RIFT did this with their aptly named rifts that would appear in the persistent world.

Edit: Hi everyone.

Redlynne
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Also ... Red Talks Kaiju

Also ... Red Talks Kaiju

And then there's always TCPD with 8m tall police robots labors ...

Of course, every time I've tried to convince MWM of doing something like this, the conversation has wound up going ... something like this ...


Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.
Huckleberry
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Cobalt Azurean wrote:
Cobalt Azurean wrote:
Huckleberry wrote:

I can't remember what game it was... Whichever, the roster starts out populating a single party, but once more people show up, the party becames a raid and additional people are added to additional parties. ... I prefer this over asking to join.

I can't speak for FF but I know RIFT did this with their aptly named rifts that would appear in the persistent world.

Right you are! I just back into RIFT and there was a huge invasion, and I automatically got a quest to help defeat it because I was in the same zone. Then, as soon as i got close, a big "Join Public Group" button showed up at the top of my screen. Here's a screenshot I found on the web. It's not mine but you see the button at the top:

I can't think of a better way to do it.


I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
Tannim222
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Huckleberry wrote:
Huckleberry wrote:

I can't think of a better way to do it.

We want to do something similar for our world events. Will see....


I don't use a nerf bat, I have a magic crowbar!
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Tech Team.
amievil
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Going to just chime in here

Going to just chime in here and say I have ideas.

Senior Gameplay Engineer.

Huckleberry
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I'm reminded of the

I'm reminded of the Influencer's alien invasion of Titan City in Issue 4 of Hijinx. I'll quote the author here (don't know who wrote it.. Dale, or Stillwell maybe?):

Quote:

And remember, folks, Hijinx not only supports City of Titans, but it reflects it. Issue 4 was all about a PUG and a public event. The Influencer may not make it to the streets more than once or twice a year, but I feel like it was a good example of the kind of feel we want to have for our more anarchic sorts of 'everybody join in and punch something' fights.


I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.