I don't really have a name for the area, this is just basically a pitch for a new STYLE of area and a mechanic it is built around.

That mechanic? Kill teams! Bare with me here, I will explain.

Its a way to provide interesting and interactive combat that

A) Provides a challenge for even the most experienced adventuring group, but is not cheap so those with less experience can still find success.
B) Rewards adaption and attentive combat, punishes inattentiveness.
C) Allows for a real group experience, but scales as well to the solo adventurer.
D) Solves issues with 'friendly fire' and also allows players to pull out all the stops without affecting the play experience of others.

So here is how this works. You enter the area and choose your path...theres basically a solo path, a small group, and a large group path. Pick the one that fits what you are going in with. Each of these paths are seperate from one another and cannot be influenced by each other. Each path will have a limit...for example, small group is 4 or less, large group 8 or less. Solo is, of course, Solo-dolo. Each area spell strips you when you enter, but once you are in you are free to reapply spells as you will. But you've entered. The countdowns begun. The Kill Teams will start to spawn and start to hunt you down. And these things? These things are no joke.

Instead of single creatures spawning, when something spawns it spawns as a Team of 6-8 creatures (4 max in the solo area). They spawn together, act together (on the same action timer), move together. They cannot be separated one from another. They also cannot move into an area that already contains one of these teams.

So a team has different parts. It has your debuffers, your buffers, your damage dealers, your healers, and a Leader/Loot Pinata. The Leader cannot be damaged at all in any way shape or form until the rest of the Team is dead. AoEs wont work, nothin. Leaders are ALSO the only mob with loot. So if you kill only part of the team? Nothing for you. You HAVE to kill the leader to get a reward.

The teams have a wide variety of different mobs that can spawn in each 'slot' in the group. Each of the mobs is designed to work and help the rest of the team in some way, depending on its role.

Many of these mobs punish you for acting 'incorrectly'. For example, one mob would be a fire golem. Any fire attack done towards the group is punished by a very strong attack...maybe a retaliatory fire nova that acts as 435, I dunno. Or perhaps there is an Anti-AoE mob which nullifies any attempted AoE and retaliates against the offending caster. Or perhaps an anti-melee mob that auto counter attacks any melee attack not directed towards it. There are immunities but they are CONDITIONAL immunities...and that condition is 'remove the enemy who is NOT immune, and everything else also becomes not immune'.

The key here is, that it creates a sort of puzzle...which mobs must you take down in which order...and this puzzle has a soft timer because all these mobs are not only pieces preventing/punishing certain actions, but they are also using abilities to KEEL YOU. Also key is to have enough variations in what can spawn in each slot, with a wide variety of abilities, that you can't just set up a system that always works. Sometimes you'll have anti-aoe mobs. Sometimes you won't. Sometimes you'll have mobs that really punish hiding/ambushing. Some won't have any of these, but will simply have a group of highly dangerous spellcasters you have to end as quick as possible. Some will have bandit-types that hide a lot and ambush for pushdown.

Variety!

To be successful, you will have to be adaptive. It rewards system mastery. Be able to walk into the room, look, and quickly formulate a plan of action then execute it.

Obviously, balance will be important. You'll not want an 'only magic works until I die' to be able to spawn in the same group as a 'only melee works until I die'. But with enough different puzzle pieces that can spawn, you can have a very interesting combat that feels different and unique almost every time.

For this to work, as well, everything would have to be easily and instantly identifiable by name. A group would enter...They'd look and see Fire Golem, Counter Knight, Sorcerer, Cleric, Summoner, Wizard, Leader and know that they couldnt use fire spells/abilities till they dealt with fire golem and should focus fire the Knight before they attempt to melee any of the other guys. All the while, all these pieces are gonna be trying to put them down. Oh and more 'soft' choices will come into play: Kill the cleric first, so he can't rezz his buddies during the fight? Or do you take out the summoner to keep him from summoning adds? Maybe the sorcerers super powerful spells you feel are a bigger threat then those?

It might work better to entirely instance it. If you enter the path solo or with the group, you create a specific instance where no one else can walk in and you can't interfere with other players/groups. But I do feel it could also work as an open area too with a couple tweaks.

Specific numbers are just rough ideas, and obviously will need to be tweaked and balanced in actual testing.

But this allows for people to use their cool awesome abilities but dissuade them from just mindlessly button mashing that cool awesome ability because sometimes it will backfire and smack them in the face. And if it does, they'd have only themselves to blame because the group presents itself with no hidden surprises (except maybe a hidden ambusher, but they would just be damage/threat rather than have a Punish ability). No cheap unavoidable deaths here. Its about choices and skill. If designed right, each group will present a challenge...some more than others, but ALL beatable with the right application of tactics...and maybe a little luck in hitting when you strike ;)

Thoughts?

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AuchandToday at 11:28 PM
I would like to reiterate: Whick is my hero.

What is love? BB don't hurt me05/13/2020
Whick's so helpful! He's our villain even in our backchannel chatter as staff. :smile:

It might not work. This idea might not be feasible at all. And doesn't everything end up being scriptable in the end? I dont think theres any idea that prevents scripting...and that really isn't the goal of the area.

However, people dying because they do something stupid? That should happen. If you do something stupid, you should die or at the least be at an increased chance of biting the dust. You should maybe get others in your group killed too.

This would be a hard hunting ground. Because you are right, there would be many ways for things to go wrong. But the idea would be to put most of that in the hands of the player. If things go wrong, it would ideally be because the player did something wrong. Or there buddy oopsied. Or they were a bit too slow taking out a major threat in the group. Thats the challenge of it. It would not appeal to everyone. I am sure many (most?) might just go back to the easier areas.

However, with ascension coming out which will raise the power level and a lot of people wanting more challenging content...

I would enjoy this area, lets say that. And sometimes when things go wrong, its fun. Theres a whole genre of games out there based on the concept that failure is fun. Ah but the reward when you nail it and are able to consistently take down enemy groups...it would be satisfying, I feel. A rush that currently I do not feel gemstone provides.

But good thoughts, overall.

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AuchandToday at 11:28 PM
I would like to reiterate: Whick is my hero.

What is love? BB don't hurt me05/13/2020
Whick's so helpful! He's our villain even in our backchannel chatter as staff. :smile:

> You lost me at spell strip.

+100

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