A new set of mid and high level PvE raid like events is being considered. These events would provide semi scaling PvE content with raid like mechanics. You can think of these as “light raids” or “Fort Tusken On Muon Gold”. Implementation or scheduling is neither guaranteed nor implied. This is simply a "Request For Comments".
A system is being considered that will provide scalable (to the number of players participating) and challenging PvE combat “arenas”. These arenas would provide themed invasion scenarios. An arena could be something like Fort Tusken, a portion of a City or simply a cordoned off area in the wilderness.
There would be a number of these invasion arenas all over the galaxy. Much like Fort Tusken, successive waves of NPC enemies would have to be fought off to get the next harder wave of enemies to advance. If the enemies aren’t defeated in time, the event goes back to the previous wave. Essentially, the enemies must be beaten back all the while they get harder and harder.
Once the final wave of enemy guards is defeated, the boss wave occurs. Once the boss wave is defeated, rewards are distributed among the participants. Some of the rewards that the bosses distribute can be rare items, schematic drops, etc. Also, bosses may drop special “keys” that can be combined with other boss “keys” to kick off even higher level and more rewarding invasion events.
Some invasion arenas might have special objectives such as “defend the prisoners” or “defend the transmitter”. If you were around for phase 4 of the Aurellian village quests you are familiar with the flavor of this type of event (yes, the Village is being considered as one of the sites for these arenas).
Suppressing these invasions will count as accomplishments towards overall Galactic Achievement Collection system that is being tracked on a per-faction and individual basis. Each achievement helps unlock benefits and access to various items and enhancement for combat and non-combat activities while your faction has ownership over a particular achievement. Achievements may be held for a certain period of time without contestation after which the achievement will be contested for a period of time.
Achievement Examples:
· Build A Mon-Cal Cruiser
o Crafters must all pitch in to build a Mom Cal cruiser. This might be in the form of donated resources, crafted items of certain quality, etc. The side that completes the Mon Cal Cruiser first gets ownership of the “Build Mon-Cal Cruiser” achievement for 1 week. While your faction claims ownership of the Mon-Cal Cruiser achievement all crafters on that side get a “Plus 1 Experiment Point” buff and all officers get access to a new temporary AOE orbital strike ability called “Ion Barrage”.
· Destroy The Mon-Cal Cruiser (Invasion)
o Only available if the Mon-Cal cruiser is currently in the world
o Only available if the Mon-Cal cruiser has been in the world for one week
o Only available to players of the faction opposite of the faction that built the Mon-Cal cruiser
o Players must defeat an invasion wave event of NPC vessels to destroy the Mon-Cal cruiser. Being better at destroying the Mon-Cal cruiser than the opposite faction is at saving it destroys the Mon-Cal cruiser and makes the “Build A Mon-Cal Cruiser” achievement available again.
· Defend a Mon-Cal Cruiser
o Only available if the Mon-Cal cruiser is currently in the world
o Only available if the Mon-Cal cruiser has been in the world for one week
o Only available to players that are of the same faction as the faction that built the Mon-Cal cruiser
o Players must defeat an invasion wave event of NPC vessels that are attacking the Mon-Cal cruiser. Being better at defending the Mon-Cal cruiser than the opposite is at destroying it causes the Mon-Cal cruiser during the contested period causes the cruiser to be safe for X number of days.
The examples here use space, but only serve to demonstrate the basic concept of invasion-raid content and the Galactic Achievement system. The concepts will apply equally to different and diverse achievements for all play styles. Achievements would also be tracked on an individual level, with lesser rewards.
-The Dark Lord Helios
-Lead Designer
"YEEEE-HAAAWWW!"