Rewarding victory AND sieging in oRvR

[kpihuss]

[Proposal] Rewarding victory AND sieging in oRvR (less WC ↔ WC, more objective-driven gameplay)

Important note (please read first):
This post is a set of ideas designed to interact with each other. It should be evaluated as a package, because some parts intentionally compensate others (e.g. attacker incentives vs defender tools, victory bonus vs defense ticks, etc.). Looking at one bullet in isolation may give the wrong impression of overall balance.

Summary (TL;DR)

• Zone locks should explicitly reward the winning realm (a Victory Bonus to RR / War Crests / lock rewards).
• If a keep is under a real siege (ram spawned + door damaged) and defenders have AAO ≥ 40%, improve keep entry tools (more supplies or fewer requirements) so outnumbered keep defenses can actually happen.
• Add a zone-lock bonus based on Keep Stars (RR + War Crests) to incentivize BO/flag play, star-building, and splitting fights across the map (less blobbing).
• Also incentivize deploying rams and progressing sieges so zones don’t stall for hours with pure WC ↔ WC farming and no keep pressure.
• Keep roamers relevant: BO control during sieges should matter more, so roaming groups contribute by denying supplies / defender logistics.
• Address reward-balance concerns: even if the losing side gets less, cross-realming reduces long-term imbalance.

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Context / Problem
Lately, in several pairings/maps (e.g. High Pass, Eataine, etc.), there’s a recurring pattern: players often skip defending keeps (even at 3★) and instead stick to endless “WC ↔ WC” fighting.
A big reason seems to be that winning/locking a zone doesn’t feel rewarding enough compared to simply farming kills.

At the same time, we also see the opposite kind of stall: hours in the same zone with lots of fighting, but nobody deploys a ram or commits to an actual siege, so the campaign doesn’t move.

Goal: align incentives so that winning, defending, taking/holding BOs, building keep stars, and starting real sieges feels clearly worthwhile.

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1) Zone lock: a clear Victory Bonus
The proposal is simple: the winning realm should receive an explicit victory reward at zone lock.

Proposal

• On zone lock, the winning realm receives a Victory Bonus, for example:
  • +X% Renown from the zone lock reward (winner only)
  • +X% War Crests from the zone lock reward (winner only)
• (Optional, if applicable to the current reward system): add a win modifier to zone-lock roll bag rewards

Expected impact

• Defending (or trying to get inside) a keep stops feeling like “wasted time”.
• Less “we can ignore the campaign outcome because winning doesn’t feel impactful” → fewer endless WC ↔ WC loops and more objective play.

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2) Defense with AAO: better keep entry when outnumbered
When a keep is under a real siege (door damaged + enemy ram spawned) and defenders have AAO ≥ 40%:

• Spawn more supply boxes (or increase frequency) to allow defenders to fly in.
• Alternative: reduce the number of BOs/flags required for supplies to spawn during that siege state.

Suggested anti-abuse conditions

• Only active while the ram is present and the door has taken damage.
• Turns off once the siege is broken (ram gone / no active siege).

Expected impact

• Outnumbered defenders can still stage an actual defense instead of being permanently locked out after one wipe.
• More meaningful keep fights (and less “door tapped = defenders disappear”).

• Add-on: “Flight Ticket” from BO captures during AAO sieges
  • If AAO ≥ 40% and the keep is under a real siege (enemy ram deployed + doors damaged),
  • then when a defender player/group successfully captures a BO, they also receive a temporary currency item: “Flight Ticket”.
  • The Flight Ticket has a 5-minute decay timer and can be consumed to fly directly to the keep (obtained similarly to the War Crest you receive on BO capture — i.e., earned through objective play, not a free teleport).
• Extra benefit: promotes map play and forces blobs to split
  • This creates meaningful gameplay away from the keep. If defenders can earn Flight Tickets by capturing BOs during an AAO siege, then attackers can’t just stack 100% of their force on the keep forever.
  • If the attacking blob ignores BOs, defenders will farm Flight Tickets and reinforce the keep repeatedly.
  • To successfully take the keep, attackers are incentivized to split (send groups to contest/hold BOs) to deny BO captures and slow down defender re-entry.

[/list]

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3) Zone lock bonus based on Keep Stars (RR + War Crests)
At zone lock, grant extra Renown + War Crests based on your realm’s keep stars at the moment the zone locks.
This encourages BO/flag play and helps spread fights across the map instead of one big blob.

Suggested values

Code: Select all

0★: +0% RR  / +0% War Crests
1★: +5% RR  / +5% War Crests
2★: +10% RR / +10% War Crests
3★: +15% RR / +15% War Crests
4★: +20% RR / +20% War Crests
5★: +30% RR / +30% War Crests

Why this helps

• More incentive to fight for BOs/flags and build stars.
• Encourages splitting and map play (less blobbing).
• Rewards strategic progress, not only kill farming.

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4) Also incentivize SIEGING (so zones don’t stall for hours with no ram)
To avoid “endless fighting but no campaign progress”, we should also reward active siege play (deploying rams, door pressure, keep stages), so players are motivated to move the zone forward.

Proposal options

• Siege Participation Bonus: while a keep is under siege (ram spawned), grant a small but noticeable RR/crests bonus to players actively participating near the keep objective area (attackers and defenders). Optionally scale slightly with keep stars.
• Ram milestone incentives (RR buffs tied to real siege progress)
  • Deployment Buff: grant a Renown (RR) buff to all players within 150 feet of the player who deploys the ram. Duration: 5 minutes (short on purpose to avoid “deploy ram and walk around” abuse). It refresh once for 10 minutes when the ram hit the outer door.
  • Outer Door Break Buff: when the ram breaks the outer door, grant a Renown (RR) buff to all players within 150 feet of the ram. Duration: 10 minutes.
  • Inner Door Break Buff: when the ram breaks the inner door, grant a Renown (RR) buff to all players within 150 feet of the ram. Duration: 10 minutes.
• Progress-based lock rewards: add a minor bonus to end-of-zone rewards if the realm contributed to meaningful campaign progress during that zone (e.g., BO captures/defenses, keep star progression, successful siege stages). This discourages pure WC ↔ WC farming with no objectives.

Note on balance: attacker incentives are partially offset by existing keep defense ticks
One concern might be: “If we add extra incentives for attacking/sieging, won’t it tilt rewards too much toward attackers?”

• Keep defense already provides defense ticks (XP/Renown/Influence) during/after defending, scaled by contribution.
• Because defenders already have a baseline reward mechanism from defending (defense ticks), adding moderate attacker-side incentives for starting and progressing sieges can be balanced without making defense unrewarding.

Anti-abuse considerations (suggestions)

• Rewards only apply inside a defined siege area and/or require recent objective interaction (door damage, BO captures/defenses, ram presence).
• Cap the bonus per time window to avoid AFK farming.
• (Optional) Add a cooldown per keep so the same ram milestone can’t be repeatedly farmed in a short time window.

Expected impact

• More rams get deployed, more real sieges happen.
• Less “same zone for hours” stagnation.
• Fights remain fun, but with a clearer purpose and better campaign momentum.

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5) Roamers also stay relevant (and useful) during sieges
Another positive side effect is that roaming groups who don’t directly join the main keep push can still contribute meaningfully to the campaign:

• By contesting / holding BOs, roamers can help deny supply spawns (or make them harder to obtain), which prevents defenders from re-entering the keep too easily or too frequently.
• This creates a healthier split of roles: the main warband applies keep pressure, while roamers play the map to control BOs and choke defender logistics.
• It also reduces the “all-in blob” mentality, because BO control becomes a real part of winning and sieging efficiently.

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6) Anticipating the “reward imbalance” concern (and why it may be acceptable)
A common concern will be: “If the losing realm gets fewer rewards, won’t that create long-term imbalance?”
My counterpoint:

• In practice, a significant portion of the playerbase is cross-realming, meaning players frequently swap realms based on where action is, who is online, etc., which reduces the risk of long-term structural imbalance from a moderate victory bonus.
• Because of this constant switching, a victory bonus is less likely to create permanent structural imbalance, and more likely to encourage the behavior we want: pushing objectives, defending keeps, and ending zone stagnation.
• The keep-star bonus also rewards map play and effort, and can partially soften the “all or nothing” feeling.

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Questions for feedback

• What Victory Bonus values (X% RR / X% Crests) feel impactful without causing snowball?
• Is AAO ≥ 40% the right threshold for reinforced defense (supplies), or should it be adjusted?
• Are the keep-star percentages reasonable, or should 5★ be toned down?
• Which siege incentive feels best: Siege Participation, Ram milestone buffs, Progress-based lock rewards, or a combination?

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Thanks for reading. The core idea is simple: if the game rewards winning, defending, and pushing objectives more clearly, we’ll see fewer endless WC ↔ WC loops and fewer zones stalling for hours with no siege pressure.

[Ksekwlothreftis]

Locking a zone is already more rewarding to the winning side, making it even more so would only incentivize stacking on one side and just locking zones till the mass logs off. It should be the other way around where both sides get an equal amount of rewards based on contribution.

As for the box suggestion it goes counterintuitively with your small roam revival since it will just be warbands camping BOs waiting for those fast and easy boxes to get everyone in, do u expect 6man or less groups to fight that. U can already almost guarantee entry into a keep by going from PvE in most t4 zones.

Should be kept in mind that I also am disgusted by the endless back and forth around taverns, war camps and squares or the extreme one sided stacking and taking keeps for free and would love these things addressed.

I would much rather have keeps become unsiegable when aao goes beyond 60% or at the very least a boost in stats to the weaker side based on aao aswell.

[DirkDaring]

While it sounds nice, I`ve been trying for a long time to get players to avoid blobbing and farming kills at 1 BO, and to spread out with smaller groups attacking multiple BO, to try and get the blob to split up. It doesn`t work, you have players that are perfectly happy just farming kills, and having the other faction carry them from zone to zone.

As far as rewarding the winning side, that would be rewarding mostly Order, going back a couple years now not much has really changed. Order on average capture between 4 and 7 forts every 3 days for 3, more weeks out of every month, With Dest normally only doing good one 3 day period out of the month, actually capturing more forts than Order

As an example, between June 12 2025, and Dec 15 2025, there were a possible 60 city sieges, one siege every 3 days, in order to have a city siege one side must capture the most forts in that 3 day time period.

During that 6 month timeframe Order invaded IC 50 times out of a possible 60 city sieges , while Dest only invaded Altdorf 9 times out of 6 months. So that means that in that 6 month period Order was capturing the most forts every 3 days, not counting all the zones tied to that pairing. With Dest only capturing the most forts 1 time a month on average

The only time Dest does well on the server is 1 or 2 days a week, when Order logs on their Dest alts, after they are bored locking Zones, and Forts the other 5 or 6 days of the week

[DiMakss]

The only real problem behind no def, that you simply can't get in. Especially on maps like caledor and dw; and sieging side use population advantage to not let other side get in. This is the only reason.