Siege Towers

[Psychedelic98]

This is my take on FatPoulet's idea, based on https://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Sovereignty_guide.

A siege is an attack on a town which if successful, stops generator protection for 30 minutes. To start a siege, the attacking group builds 1-3 siege towers within 100 blocks of the town to be attacked. A siege tower is 5x5, with the center and corners marked by 10 diamond blocks at the base. These diamond blocks are not returned, and are be given to the defending side regardless of the outcome of the siege. Other than that, the design of a siege tower is up to the attacking group. A siege tower is activated similarly to generators, by using a specific item interacting with a diamond block. Once a siege tower is activated, it is protected from physical damage by both parties, so construct it carefully. Once the first siege tower is activated, the siege begins.

When the siege begins, the defending town is notified that they are under siege and given the locations of the siege tower(s). If no players from the defending town are online, the siege takes much longer. The siege will take increasingly less time as the ratio of defenders:attackers approaches 1. If the attacking team had one tower, the siege takes 48 hours, with two towers the siege takes 24. The third tower does not decrease the time, but serves as a backup tower.

To stop the siege, the defending town has to destroy the siege towers. To do this they must start the destruction countdown, by standing in the siege tower for 6 minutes. This must be done on each tower individually, they can be done simultaneously. Once the destruction countdown begins, the tower's siege pauses until it is resumed or destroyed, so a town is never hopeless to defend. The destruction countdown takes 8 hours, but is shortened by the attacker:defender ratio.

Upon completion of a successful siege, the towns protection falls for 30 minutes. The town portal remains open, so that the town members still have a chance to defend. Regardless of the success of the siege, the town will receive the diamond blocks from the towers, likely in the owner's escrow chest.

Everything here is up for debate, especially the numbers. Something else we mentioned was a respawn tower for the attacking team, with 3 minute respawn cooldown.

 

[FatPoulet]

Now it's all about running our brains on what's exploitable and what's unbalanced. Also feel free to add utility tower ideas like the attacker portal tower.

Or attacker respawn tower, it could be a timed teleportation like 1 minute delay or instant warp but limited uses like 50 and you can replenish uses by paying it's cost.

Exemple: you die on the front. You respawn at spawn, take your town portal, gear back up and then take the portal to the respawn tower.

 

[Ivette_Aramis]

Gen protection down for 30 minutes? No thank you. This would kill small towns, loka's population is small enough as it is, and even the lowest siege time (24 hours) is 23 hours more than enough to find everyone's vault and kill the town. Who would want to go through all the hassle of building a high security town knowing that an enemy can just take note of when all/most town players are unable to log on and take everything in one go?

 

[Psychedelic98]

I disagree with all of the points that you've made

This would kill small towns, loka's population is small enough as it is,

For most of the small towns, the 30 diamond blocks they would receive from the siege would be a profit. For the others, it wouldn't be too big of a hit. 30 minutes isn't long enough to clear out everything, especially while you're still being attacked. It's enough to get the best and get out.

even the lowest siege time (24 hours) is 23 hours more than enough to find everyone's vault and kill the town.

This part doesn't make sense, perhaps I wrote my post poorly or you misread it.

Who would want to go through all the hassle of building a high security town knowing that an enemy can just take note of when all/most town players are unable to log on and take everything in one go?

You say that it is a challenge and a hassle to build a high security town, but I'm prepared to give a trade secret away. If there isn't a hole, there isn't a way in. Here's a screenshot of a possible high security town.

 

[FatPoulet]

an enemy can just take note of when all/most town players are unable to log on and take everything in one go?

Defenders can as easily take down attacker towers if the attacking town isn't online, also there could be an alliance thing added so towns under attack can call from allies to help, and therefore add some kind of allied portal the defenders could pay or something. The more the better.

In all honesty I really can't think why anyone would disagree on these new features. Right now raiding is invis pot wait for dirt blocks to be gone of the door and get in steal and get out. Wars right now are written on paper and have no mechanics to them. This would be an upgrade. This would carve the world and spawn tales of bravery.

Also think of the added value to a new player/someone who wants to experience new things in minecraft. Im pretty sure this kind of war mechanic is unique and with the already unique battleground experience we have the server's population will grow. Now you can't argue the server growing is a bad thing no?

Also don't forget: numbers are not definitive there will be a lot of testing and balancing.

 

[Cryptite]

Who would want to go through all the hassle of building a high security town knowing that an enemy can just take note of when all/most town players are unable to log on and take everything in one go?

This is why most siege systems that I'm aware of have some sort of agreed upon time of battle, and is never just 'when we feel like it'. I'll signal Joc to get in here to explain her experience with some siege systems so we can pull from it what we like and the lot.

 

[Ivette_Aramis]

I disagree with all of the points that you've made

This would kill small towns, loka's population is small enough as it is,

For most of the small towns, the 30 diamond blocks they would receive from the siege would be a profit. For the others, it wouldn't be too big of a hit. 30 minutes isn't long enough to clear out everything, especially while you're still being attacked. It's enough to get the best and get out.

Towns small in population may be very rich in items and wealth. 30 diamond blocks would not be profit if their vault already held an amount greater than that (or at least had before their obsidian vault was looted during a siege) as well as have other valuable items such as beacons, Wither heads, Personal items, player heads, RP items etc. A small populated town has a much smaller chance of being able to protect itself during a siege as to 1) smaller population means less or no players on for hours at a time. 2) 30 diamond blocks to make a siege possible would mean the attackers have planned this and possibly can overrun and clear out the town's wealth. New towns would not be able to survive very long.

even the lowest siege time (24 hours) is 23 hours more than enough to find everyone's vault and kill the town.

This part doesn't make sense, perhaps I wrote my post poorly or you misread it.

Perhaps I did read it wrong, since it does not make sense that a siege can last at the very least 24 hours yet the gen protection only goes down for 30 minutes. What are you going to do for the next 23 hours and 30 minutes. Just kill people? You don't need expensive siege towers to do that, most towns have holes in their security that allows you to enter their town.

Who would want to go through all the hassle of building a high security town knowing that an enemy can just take note of when all/most town players are unable to log on and take everything in one go?

You say that it is a challenge and a hassle to build a high security town, but I'm prepared to give a trade secret away. If there isn't a hole, there isn't a way in. Here's a screenshot of a possible high security town.

You leave bugs bunny alone damnit.

 

[FatPoulet]

Towns small in population may be very rich in items and wealth. 30 diamond blocks would not be profit if their vault already held an amount greater than that (or at least had before their obsidian vault was looted during a siege) as well as have other valuable items such as beacons, Wither heads, Personal items, player heads, RP items etc. A small populated town has a much smaller chance of being able to protect itself during a siege as to 1) smaller population means less or no players on for hours at a time. 2) 30 diamond blocks to make a siege possible would mean the attackers have planned this and possibly can overrun and clear out the town's wealth. New towns would not be able to survive very long.

But then again they could just stay logged off when the prot goes down with all valuables in their pockets.

Now we need some CONSTRUCTIVE criticism, or we might as well go back to vanilla minecraft as EVERYTHING EVER in minecraft has an easy way out of some kind. We don't need that bought up every time.

How about you can only siege a town every week or few days so you can't spam attack a town? How about it takes much longer to successfully take a protection down if the town has fewer players?

 

[Ivette_Aramis]

Towns small in population may be very rich in items and wealth. 30 diamond blocks would not be profit if their vault already held an amount greater than that (or at least had before their obsidian vault was looted during a siege) as well as have other valuable items such as beacons, Wither heads, Personal items, player heads, RP items etc. A small populated town has a much smaller chance of being able to protect itself during a siege as to 1) smaller population means less or no players on for hours at a time. 2) 30 diamond blocks to make a siege possible would mean the attackers have planned this and possibly can overrun and clear out the town's wealth. New towns would not be able to survive very long.

But then again they could just stay logged off when the prot goes down with all valuables in their pockets.

Now we need some CONSTRUCTIVE criticism, or we might as well go back to vanilla minecraft as EVERYTHING EVER in minecraft has an easy way out of some kind. We don't need that bought up every time.

How about you can only siege a town every week or few days so you can't spam attack a town? How about it takes much longer to successfully take a protection down if the town has fewer players?

Heres my CONSTRUCTIVE criticism. Gen protection going down for any length of time is OP. My suggestion for the siege is a lower time limit, and instead of gen protection going down, for tnt entrance to be reintroduced, with the CreeperHeal Plugin http://loka.minecraftarium.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=991&hilit=tnt+creeperheal in place (with some tweaking ofc). This allows for towns to be able to continue to defend their vaults with obsidian, as well as allow theives to have some fun and a little challenge as compared to an OP invasion.

 

[Psychedelic98]

Heres my CONSTRUCTIVE criticism. Gen protection going down for any length of time is OP. My suggestion for the siege is a lower time limit, and instead of gen protection going down, for tnt entrance to be reintroduced, with the CreeperHeal Plugin http://loka.minecraftarium.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=991&hilit=tnt+creeperheal in place (with some tweaking ofc). This allows for towns to be able to continue to defend their vaults with obsidian, as well as allow theives to have some fun and a little challenge as compared to an OP invasion.

So you're suggesting that the attacking town pay 30 diamond blocks, defend two towers for up to 2 days, then design a tnt cannon to have a chance at getting some stuff that isn't even that good because the vault is obsidian?

Towns small in population may be very rich in items and wealth. 30 diamond blocks would not be profit if their vault already held an amount greater than that (or at least had before their obsidian vault was looted during a siege) as well as have other valuable items such as beacons, Wither heads, Personal items, player heads, RP items etc. A small populated town has a much smaller chance of being able to protect itself during a siege as to 1) smaller population means less or no players on for hours at a time. 2) 30 diamond blocks to make a siege possible would mean the attackers have planned this and possibly can overrun and clear out the town's wealth. New towns would not be able to survive very long.

One thing that non-raiders don't realize is how long it takes to clear out a vault. 10 doublechests is 20 loads if you have basic raiding materials with you. A good group might be able to put a sizable dent in a stocked vault, but not kill a town. This is especially so when the members know that you're inside. As far as population goes: How many wealthy towns have more than 7 active members? How many towns regularly have more than 5 people on at a time? Saying that this will hurt low population towns is false, because really all towns are low population. Loka was once ruled by the words: "Survive or be killed. Horde and hide or be poor. Defend or die."

Perhaps I did read it wrong, since it does not make sense that a siege can last at the very least 24 hours yet the gen protection only goes down for 30 minutes. What are you going to do for the next 23 hours and 30 minutes. Just kill people? You don't need expensive siege towers to do that, most towns have holes in their security that allows you to enter their town.

Protection only falls if the siege is successful, the 24-48 hours is the time that the town has to stop the siege by destroying the towers. This isn't some op insta gen remover, it's a war mechanic that's been thought out and tested. It may need some tweaking, but this is the best move for loka.

I think the biggest issue right now is that towns cannot fall or fail under any circumstance other than running out of emeralds.
-Cryptite, Feb 2013

 

[Ronshaud]

Well, a siege is a great idea. Gives raiders a chance to get in and take what they want before its too late. But the town members have a chance to defend for themselves but have a certain amount of time to defend for it. When the siege starts, the whole towns protection isn't worn off until the siege is over, and after the the siege is over, the raider or raiders can just break the dirt from the doors and just walk through without no hesitation. To me, I think its a great idea and then again, a bad idea. Most towns of Loka wouldnt like this idea, because they can't defend for themselves. If you cant defend for yourself, why not try and not give up? Anyways, with me, this is a great idea for raiders, but a bad idea for members of a Town. The raiders can set up 3 towers. Each tower cost 10 diamond blocks. If the members bring the tower or towers down they receive 10 diamond blocks. If they dont bring it down, they still recieve 10 diamond blocks. I like diamonds, so I'm kind of on board with this idea.

 

[ValenceLP]

Alright, I don't know if it has been said before, but i have some ideas towards a siege tower or towers.

So what I would like to see is there be number of towers you can have, like what psy originally said, 1-3 towers, with the minimum needed being 1 and the maximum possible being 3. Now this would come into play with the idea that each tower would grant an amount of time for the people sieging to have without having to worry about generator protection. But, I do think that thirty minutes without protection is too long of a time. I'm thinking that each tower should be worth five minutes time. So, for example: If I have one tower made, I have five minutes to raid at my heart's content. Two towers means I get ten, and three means fifteen. With fifteen being the max, obviously.
Making the time shorter would appeal to both parties equally, because the attackers would only have time to take a few things, but they could make those few things be the most important, if they can find them, of course.
Maybe, after the time runs out, chests could lock for anyone not part of the town being attacked, just so that the time spent raiding is SUPER valuable.

I think that all in all, without raiding, the server will lose it's fanbase. If raiding is kept alive, it will force people to rebuild their area, and therefore, spend more time on the server doing stuff.

 

[Psychedelic98]

Alright, I don't know if it has been said before, but i have some ideas towards a siege tower or towers.

So what I would like to see is there be number of towers you can have, like what psy originally said, 1-3 towers, with the minimum needed being 1 and the maximum possible being 3. Now this would come into play with the idea that each tower would grant an amount of time for the people sieging to have without having to worry about generator protection. But, I do think that thirty minutes without protection is too long of a time. I'm thinking that each tower should be worth five minutes time. So, for example: If I have one tower made, I have five minutes to raid at my heart's content. Two towers means I get ten, and three means fifteen. With fifteen being the max, obviously.
Making the time shorter would appeal to both parties equally, because the attackers would only have time to take a few things, but they could make those few things be the most important, if they can find them, of course.
Maybe, after the time runs out, chests could lock for anyone not part of the town being attacked, just so that the time spent raiding is SUPER valuable.

I think that all in all, without raiding, the server will lose it's fanbase. If raiding is kept alive, it will force people to rebuild their area, and therefore, spend more time on the server doing stuff.

As I said previously, one thing that many raiders don't realize is how long it takes to move items. Even if you know where everything is in a town (which is incredibly unlikely), you're lucky to get 2 loads in 30 minutes. With only 5 minutes, you'll probably end up trapped with no gain. I'm not saying it should be the easiest thing in the world, but it should at least be feasible.

 

[Ivette_Aramis]

Perhaps I did read it wrong, since it does not make sense that a siege can last at the very least 24 hours yet the gen protection only goes down for 30 minutes. What are you going to do for the next 23 hours and 30 minutes. Just kill people? You don't need expensive siege towers to do that, most towns have holes in their security that allows you to enter their town.

Protection only falls if the siege is successful, the 24-48 hours is the time that the town has to stop the siege by destroying the towers. This isn't some op insta gen remover, it's a war mechanic that's been thought out and tested. It may need some tweaking, but this is the best move for loka.

It might be because I'm tired and I was not able to open my fucking eyes and read or my brain went full NOPE when I read gen protection goes down for 30 minutes, but I did not see the siege has a period of 24-48 hours to be stopped before the gen protection goes down. I read it as the towers go up, gen protection goes down immediately, your vault gets cleared a minute later while you're off trying to destroy towers, and you then have 24-48 hours to do basic walking around the town and killing. I've got to admit after rereading it for the 5th time I finally understood what you were saying.

I've got to say that now that I realize towns have a chance to defend themselves against this before the protection goes down, I am for this. My current suggestions are that the period of 24-48 hours is unrealistic, the attackers are not going to be able to defend their tower for an entire day. Aside from it being boring to stand guard for a minimum of 24 hours, once the attackers go to bed the town can go in and stop the siege safely. Unless they are trap filled towers, they are going down every time. If any of these sieges are to be a war mechanic and hope to be successful the max time for a siege to be stopped would be hours not days, depending on the activity of the town in question. Towns like Dellsmite and my own town would never experience a successful siege given a period of 24-48 hours.

 

[Psychedelic98]

I've got to say that now that I realize towns have a chance to defend themselves against this before the protection goes down, I am for this. My current suggestions are that the period of 24-48 hours is unrealistic, the attackers are not going to be able to defend their tower for an entire day. Aside from it being boring to stand guard for a minimum of 24 hours, once the attackers go to bed the town can go in and stop the siege safely. Unless they are trap filled towers, they are going down every time. If any of these sieges are to be a war mechanic and hope to be successful the max time for a siege to be stopped would be hours not days, depending on the activity of the town in question. Towns like Dellsmite and my own town would never experience a successful siege given a period of 24-48 hours.

If no players from the defending town are online, the siege takes much longer. The siege will take increasingly less time as the ratio of defenders:attackers approaches 1.

The siege only takes 24-48 hours if the town members aren't online. This is to avoid well timed sieges designed to overpower towns that are inactive at certain times. With more members, it should go along much faster. I was vague on this because I had no clue what would work out well. Should a 6v1 be any faster? How long is fair for a 3v5?

 

[IdkKhev]

I like the idea of sieging. Raiders don't really have much to work with other than playing the waiting game. Or somehow deceiving a town member into letting them in the town.

This idea obviously needs to have some tweaking in order for it to be fair.
For one. Since the town protection would be lifted for half an hour, there would be some limit to how much destruction the attackers would be able to do. Let's say the vault was in an obscure location, away from any buildings, and the attackers knew that. Obviously x-raying wouldn't be allowed, so the only way they could find the vault was to scout out the town effectively before the sieging. Or just uplifting a ton of dirt to try to find it. Obviously, this wouldn't be a problem if the damage was somehow restored after the sieging was done.

Another thing is time frames. A dedicated attacker could plan out their attack, assuming they're hard time frames of 24 hours and 48 hours, depending on the amount of towers. They could very well start a siege at 3 am, when everyone's sleeping. Wait 24/48 hours. Get on again to raid the sleeping town, who may have a job, or school to wake up to the next day.

An implementation of a cool down so that a town can't be repeatedly raided would be nice as well. Obviously defending a town for the duration of the siege would probably be tiring. Especially if there was multiple towns attacking the same one. No cool down for being able to attack though. Seeing as how they're guaranteed to lose 10 diamond blocks per tower.

I could also imagine ridiculous siege tower placements. Like at block height or underground. No comment on that though.

 

[FatPoulet]

One thing is there are actually no interactions with the town's defenses and we're pretty much back to the issue of just making a multiple layer of obsidian wall to make the entry take a while ... therefore negating even more the time without protection.

That's what I hate about Minecraft protection mindset. "Everything and every situation can be met with an absolute 100% counteraction"

In my honest opinion the lethargy of Loka right now is because of this mindset. Protection offers 100% thief proof capability. If you get stolen from it's because of human error only. I can't really QQ about this, I wouldnt want myself to lose stuff so I would just build a massive obsidian wall ...

Actually not just "Protection" mindset, just Minecraft mindset.

 

[Psychedelic98]

An implementation of a cool down so that a town can't be repeatedly raided would be nice as well. Obviously defending a town for the duration of the siege would probably be tiring. Especially if there was multiple towns attacking the same one. No cool down for being able to attack though. Seeing as how they're guaranteed to lose 10 diamond blocks per tower.

You're right, I forgot to post a cool down. I was thinking that a town could only be sieged once every 3 days, with at least a week between sieges from the same group.

I could also imagine ridiculous siege tower placements. Like at block height or underground. No comment on that though.

I can't see this being too much of an issue since the location of the tower will be given in the message, but it could be interesting to see what happens.

One thing is there are actually no interactions with the town's defenses and we're pretty much back to the issue of just making a multiple layer of obsidian wall to make the entry take a while ... therefore negating even more the time without protection.

That's what I hate about Minecraft protection mindset. "Everything and every situation can be met with an absolute 100% counteraction"

In my honest opinion the lethargy of Loka right now is because of this mindset. Protection offers 100% thief proof capability. If you get stolen from it's because of human error only.

Slowing people down is a much better mindset to be in than stopping them 100%. With siege towers, those who enjoy a challenge can put more thought into how to slow down, mislead, and trap raiders. Those who prefer other things can hide their items deep, high, or far away.

 

[Ivette_Aramis]

A few questions that I have

1) What is fair game here? Are we only allowed to take only from chests? Or are we allowed to indulge in items placed in the town as well, such as player heads and beacons?

2) Like John said, to what extent are we allowed to look for vaults before it is determined griefing?

 

[Psychedelic98]

A few questions that I have

1) What is fair game here? Are we only allowed to take only from chests? Or are we allowed to indulge in items placed in the town as well, such as player heads and beacons?

2) Like John said, to what extent are we allowed to look for vaults before it is determined griefing?

I think heads should be game, but everything else should be protected as builds in a town. Perhaps some sort of rollback (one that excluded heads and containers) could fix problems of potential grief.