Open warband leading and rewards

[wonshot]

Hello,

A server with playerdriven action and replay loop of pvp mainly, argubly needs to have some level of incentives for players to step-up and start leading the troops. Day in and day out they provide the action and get the ball rolling and its a very ungreatful and thankless job.
Over the years there have been known and consistant leaders stepping up, some are still here, some are long gone.

I think most would be willing to agree that Pick Up Groups (pug) make the server alive. It might not be for everyone, and organization still holds strong advantages over open warbands.

But what can we do to make open warbands more appealing for leaders, because imho this is the first step to creating action and to put boots on the ground(?) The whole server for new players also seems way more alive when you see there are several open warbands, more options are better in most cases to join a leader whos style you like or you know they lead well or consistantly.

Rewarding the leader with faster progression could be one way.
But what if opening warbands and getting progression done for your realm would not only benefit your warbandmembers for being succesful, but at the same time the pug leaders could get unique cosmetic unlocks?

Im just spitballing ideas here:
- Openwarband leaders get X amount of faster rp/exp/inf or bonus to bagrolls if more than 6+ players in their open warbands to prevent abuse on zonelocks
- Temporary mounts that decay after 7days. Makes it easier to see the warbandleader and follow them
- Unique realm related cloak apperances With blue/red background and order/destro symbol. Maybe on top of a leaderboard for how many boxes/keepstars/zones you have captured while leading an open warband each week?
- A real time update on map toggle for all on the realm to see if they have been in the zone for 30minuts. So open warband leaders can see where eachother are in the zone (potential spying abuse acrossrealms so therefor a toggle)
- Instead of having addons form a 2-2-2 setting or recruiting specific classes give more options in the openwarband menu for leader to shape a thematical warband for racial-restricted themed warbands (im bias here, but for the Dwarf, greenskins, empire, elf etc guilds or players out there this would be a nice addition to openwarbands for cool factor)
- City statues for the openwarbandleaders who were most succesful during the week/month maybe also a section on the killboard for most "points" for openwarband leaders?
- Top3 most active/succesful openwarband leaders per week on each realm getting a discount on their next one purchase from warcrests coupon which expires within 7days

[Fey]

Great ideas as per usual. I particularly like the cosmetic mount and cloak for the PuG leaders.

I think it would be neat as well if there were some way to make the warband leader grant extra Renown on falling, and renown if successfully rezzed. That might be open for abuse though. Something about getting back to the leader and rescuing them appeals to me.

PuG warbands and scenarios are critical to the success of this server. Scenarios are often quite punishing for casual players, and we need friendly mechanics for open world so casuals have a reason to keep playing.

[Flowson]

@wonshot

In General:

i agree, WarBandLeaders(WBL) should be rewarded for their extra work and the added value and Service they provide for each fraction.

The only question is what kind of rewards and which requirements must be met for this. e.g. Duration of the total warband Leadtime, total of BO's or Keeps captured, numbers of slayn enemies or most resuscitations etc.

The rewards should also be take zone population into account . Mainly not every TimeZone has the same player population and leaders who perform as good as others would always get less rewards in their zone just because a lack of players.

Regarding Appearance:

- Temporary mounts that decay after 7days. Makes it easier to see the warbandleader and follow them
- Unique realm related cloak apperances With blue/red background and order/destro symbol.

Temporary items such as Mounts and Appearance should only be active for the duration of beeing an active Warbandleader. Otherwise there is a risk that several inactive WarbandLeaders, who in fact no longer lead a WB, will still be running around with visual characteristics / appearences and thus might cause more confusion than good.

It should be noted that this mount must scaled propperly so it cant be misused to cover up smaller characters such as Runepriest or Shaman.

The game has a Guild-Banner bearer function - perhaps this can be modified for this, by useing a different Logo ("Follow the Crown" Alpha Company, Bravo Company, etc.) and color on it to highlight the WB-Leaders.

Maybe we can get a additional Flag on a Horse or Bear or Boar as well. Concepts have been made couple of Months ago.

Optionally, we might use the mechanics from the "City" and scale WB Leaders equal to Champions eg. 20% larger than regular Characters.

On the other hand, this would also make the WarbandLeader more visible to the enemy and therefore an easier target for attacks by others.

The question that arises at this point is whether there is a bonus for the other sides if they kill a WB leader, so to speak an extra loot as a downside and risk for the leader - for being the leader.

Overall good stuff, looking forward getting more people into it.

Flowson

[wonshot]

@wonshot

The game has a Guild-Banner bearer function - perhaps this can be modified for this, by useing a different Logo ("Follow the Crown" Alpha Company, Bravo Company, etc.) and color on it to highlight the WB-Leaders.

Maybe we can get a additional Flag on a Horse or Bear or Boar as well. Concepts have been made couple of Months ago.

Optionally, we might use the mechanics from the "City" and scale WB Leaders equal to Champions eg. 20% larger than regular Characters.

On the other hand, this would also make the WarbandLeader more visible to the enemy and therefore an easier target for attacks by others.

The question that arises at this point is whether there is a bonus for the other sides if they kill a WB leader, so to speak an extra loot as a downside and risk for the leader - for being the leader.
Flowson

Hey Flow!
My first initial thoughts about mounts is that if exotic mounts were optainable from openwarband leading, then it would take away from Live events and they kinda cover that role. Same for when the RR80+ Main incentive forum topic was active a few days ago. So unless it was a specific mount you can only ride while in an open warband with "X" requirements met for succes/duration/amount of people in the warband w/e.

Scaling people bigger would indeed make you a bigger target for the Enemy realm too, this is something I also thought about and in the same forum topic about incentives for RR 80+ mains I suggested a glowing aura around your character model (Diablo2 full item set inspiration) that only your own realm can see. As there are already both strategical and Ego motivations for killing leaders. Cut the head of the warband and many warbands lose their compactness and direction. Also I think some of the orc classes would be upset about if other classes are suddenly bigger than them dunno.

With inspiration from Eden Daoc freeshard they hold some "for the realm" events a couple of times ayear, where a scoreboard is made for each realm. The more Towers, Keeps, Relics and kills your relic does the more points you get for your realm on that event leaderboard.
What if the same system was created for RoR, the more BOs you capture, the more kills your open warband does, the more resources and keeps you contribute for the realm the higher you climb on the weekly openwarband leaderboard and then you get cosmetic rewards that will fade (to promote you keep coming back doing it) while you get rewarded and stand out for actively driving the action on the server. Just thinking out loud at this point.

There are already many open warband unsung heroes who day after day carry the action and start the zones up but rallying troops, putting people in the lakes and make it appealing for the enemy to come out and fight. I think its only fair to reward those players finally, its just a matter of what is a fitting reward without giving out powerspikes or speeding up replayability with crazt progression.

[Hellforce]

Great idea as usual my friend...I also agree that Pug WB Leaders is one of the main reasons the game stays alive all these years mainly cause they are the first touch with RvR for new players and also a nice time to spent in the game for veterans!! Some cosmetics or special mounts when they are leading or a flag on their mount if they lead for x hours per week with a more than 6people wb is a very good idea to effort more players to lead cause beside PvE RvR is the main cause end enjoyment in the game!!

[SZ244663]

This is Iulus/Poliphomos/Grootster.
I have had fortune of being one of the Pug wb leaders and it's definitely hard work but will keep doing the service to #1 keep game alive and #2 make many many friends

Love for you all <3

[Rotgut]

"give more options in the openwarband menu"

The biggest one to me. Open Warbands are a **** great mechanic this game has, the problem is its effect get nullified by how the game is balanced. Non 2/2/2 pugbands don't function, giving players this awesome "Log In and Play" option but dumping them into a WB that will get 35 kills in 2h is so bad for player retention.

A good chunk of players will not respond to LFG. That's one issue with expecting 2/2/2 Pug Leaders to take on all the responsibility of creating content. I've done a lot of pugleading, spamming /5 for Healers and Tank the whole time, just to see an Open Warband pop up that immediately gets 3 Healers and 2 Tanks. Some people want to click the Join Warband button and play, and its awesome that RoR has that function (its very ahead of its time isn't it), but we have to make their experience better.

Open Warbands should be a default 2/2/2 with a button the Leader can click to change its settings.

Additional rewards are welcomed too, but i can't speculate on their impact cuz i don't care about cosmetics. I can only speak about my experience as a pug leader, and i would gladly lvl a third character by leading pugs 90% of the way if it was less work.

[Emissary]

There are ways in the API to add a flag to WBLeader hence the Paint the Leader addon. I would say at minimum that should be standard in the game. That your wb leader is flagged with an icon. There are also several icons we have found in the database that would work well for this.
My opinion only stated here.