D2 - New Frontier zone ideas - RvR or Coop?

[Tolakram]

Pondering the following ideas.

First off here are the RvR ideas, next post discusses a Coop PvE idea.

We will have New Frontiers (calling it D2F) as an RvR zone, this much is a given.

- Keep Captures reward XP, RP, and BP. Keep capture counts are recorded with titles being given at certain levels of achievement.

- Keep Defense rewards BP if the player is at the keep when certain time limits expire. A successful defense is recorded if the keep combat timer expires (is no longer under attack). These counts also reward titles at various levels.

- When a team reaches the magical number of keeps needed to open up custom merchants, content, etc the feat is recorded for each player and again various titles are available.

This much is easy, and most of the implementation is easy, but now I want to make sure there is incentive to RvR and extend the game a bit, so I have two lines of thought.

Idea #1:

- Once a player reaches Hell they can access D2F and level up inside if they want. Hell is still the last difficulty level.

- Each player starts on a team (Red, Blue, Green) based on their race realm but can pay money to switch teams. I'm thinking a significant amount of cash, say 50 platinum. Yes, most Hell players can afford to switch, but not very often.

- The winning team gets a bonus to all XP and RP, but no bonus to BP.

- The losing teams get a bonus to BP, so taking back keeps and towers is more rewarding.

Ok, that's pretty straight forward, but a lot of people have gotten to hell mode and called it quits. Hmmm, so I think up

Idea #2:

- Once you finish Hell level (and I will add a finishing quest for Baal to level players to 80) you now can choose the RvR difficulty level and you have to level up yet again, but this time have access to D2F which has been optimized for 0 - 80 leveling. You can do all the quests over again if you want access to the various D2 regions, but you can also purchase quest completion credit with BP.

- Everything else as stated above.

and then I thought about team switching and wondered what if each RvR team required the player to level up?

Idea #3: Once you finish Hell you decide what team you want to be on and you start over at level 1 as a member of that team. Once you level up to 80 with that team you can choose to switch teams for a smaller fee, say 10 plat, but you will need to level up all over again. So in the end, if you leveled up all 3 teams, you would need to hit level 80 6 times to finish the game.

Perhaps a little too much?

For all of the above, you will always be able to switch back to Normal, Nightmare, or Hell, or your current RvR team for free. Only the switch of RvR teams costs money.

Finally ... I have no idea how RvR is going to work with overpowered D2 classes. Could be insanely fun, insanely bad, or just plain boring. RvR modes will probably need to disable some D2 skills (mana shield for example) in order to be balanced.

Let me know what you think.

[Tolakram]

I wanted to add another option to this.

Idea #3

If D2 players don't like RvR or PvP for an end game then D2F can be made more like coop frontiers where keeps revert back to un-captured after a set amount of time. The goal could be to raid enough keeps to activate a special feature, merchants, etc.

Perhaps this is a preferred option to RvR?

[Argo]

How about this, give the keeps in to hands of some Ancient whatever npc's, with keeplord to beat and all the stuff. Let some Ancient whatever oponents roam the land, capped with resis as they should be with someone who goes into rvr. give them styles, spells and all the goodies, give them even the RvR abilities which they should have at a particular realm rank. And then let the players fight them with all their shiny overpowered glamour . Strong players need strong NPC oponents. Give them a challenge for their overpowered classes. let the relic keeps be entrances to the labby or hall of the corrupt or any other RvR dungeon which they have to open first by killing the keeplord which ofcourse respawns after a while. let the good stuff drop in labby, hall of the korrupt and so on.... Got my point ? Oh yeah, most important point i forgot, ofcours those ancients should give RPs or BPs or both

just an idea
Argo

[Argo]

another nice idea to implement the relics would be like on Gaheris the Coop Server. Take the relic and get only a splinter, you could turn it in for some really precious Jewelry, weapon or whatever just an idea

Let every keeplord be a toughie and let him drop something which is fighting worth for. How about ML coins ?

[xmidnight8x]

I like Argo's two suggestions. I think you guys have done such great work with D2 that the PvE is actually very fun and I don't think we would get a lot of people (if any) involved in RvR for New Frontiers. I vote for Coop, you've done so well with the content already I think if you made each keep have some cool bosses and custom rewards it will be great

Before I left live servers I played Gaheris, I loved that server especially for what they did to frontiers and the relics. The relic encounters were very hard but great reward. Also, PLEASE have Passage of Conflict dungeon!!

[Argo]

... Also, PLEASE have Passage of Conflict dungeon!!

i second that

[Overdriven]

I like idea #2 -> How will the RvR gear (Assuming there is?) effect other modes of gameplay? - Looking at a further boost of stats for RvR mode in comparison? - Though, you have to pick a team once the quest is complete (Base quest) then level to 80 2 other times to be able to change realms.

[Tolakram]

I don't think we'll be RvR, frankly, I'm not sure what the level of interest is. After thinking about it for a few days I can see the addition of real RvR as making the rest of the game just something for people to finish to get to RvR, rather than what has mostly been a coop game.

I'm starting to like the idea of PvE keeps, with the D2 Act bosses being some of the keep lords. Rather than rush to a decision I'm willing to sit on it for a few more days, to see if we get any more input. D2 has lost a huge chunk of population, probably to the newer servers, and I'm not sure it will come back. D2 population has bee odd. Low for a few weeks, then high (for D2) for a few weeks.

I would like to hear from some of the players who are no longer here as to what they would like to see, or have fun doing?

[adekhine]

I like Coop-Frontiers. And re-revelling form lvl 1.

If people want D2-RvR, you can improve D2-Thidranki. I think about remove all potions when you go in Thid, and when a realm capture the keep, the possibility to claim it.

[Argo]

In my opinion, D2 has turned from a nice idea in to an awesome experience, with lots of room for new ideas and many kind of wishes. Just imagine Albs, Hibs and mids fighting together a keeplord mean beyond any means.... Or imagine any class fighting a roaming npc keep mob being pushed to its limits. Uncountable oportunities Tola. I say respect for your idea to give a D2 shard to the players. Oh and Btw. i think players will come back from time to time cause your shard is ageless.

just my 2 cents
Argo

[baradien]

argo you lost a lot of 2 cents by now

Tola you always got good idea in past as future just like argo said.
You are the president there, and we are you guards in other words

[Tolakram]

Thanks for the input so far.

[Bidyoufarewell]

i like the ideas thus far. my only request is to not make it a requirement to rvr. the gaheris coop style would be nice in deed. i know i am only 1 player, but the reason i did come and make d2 my home is not to be required to rvr for realm points and levels. my current condition still makes it difficult to pvp in the pvp areas which is why i have given it up for the most part. i just cant do it anymore.
with the gaheris style and making keep mobs and keep lords difficulty set to a point like nightmare / hellmode would definately make it one heck of a challenge. the rewards would of course need to be set to the according level. allowing this to only be opened like you mentioned after completing hellmode would be a nice reward for those of us that have been here for some time as well as something for the new or even the returning players to aspire toward.
other things to keep in mind: some players may not be able to run a "bot" this would encourage grouping for the gaheris style keeps and keep take rewards. a reward similar but lower level for taking towers should be rewarded also. those players able to take towers say 5 can trade their reward to the equivalent of 1 keep take. realm takes such as mentioned the relic keeps taken opening new storyline? something to work through at a much higher difficulty to of course reach rewards of greater utility.
in my year + of being here i havent seen a lot of pvp / rvr other than the occasional thid take or killing in the pvp / level area which doesnt generally last long. thus my thoughts toward the gaheris style to get players to work more together vs against would benefit all players more in a long term idea. there is already thid, and the 3 pvp instances for those that do like pvp / rvr gives them room to do their thing. gaheris style NF zones as i mentioned before allows groups to work keeps as well as those players that would prefer to solo and opportunity to do so as well taking towers. implementation of BP's would be welcomed, however what about those of us that have sank vast amounts of time in leveling realm rank without bp's? is there going to be some kind of grandfather clause to reward some bp's for the kills before this has been implemented?
i will fight for as long as i can to continue playing daoc. i appreciate the work and time that has already been invested into d2.

thanks

Bid

[Tolakram]

It is coop style, the region is active and populated with mobs, but only Andariel (keep) and The Countess (some tower in alb) is setup. Still very early in development, but you can go there.

Keep takes in this new area reward BP's. I'm not interested in any grand fathering ... that's the kind of thing that takes a ton of my time and frankly would stop development in its tracks. I'm not really sure what you mean by reward anyway? Did I miss something?

Anyway, in the end, once everything is completed, I expect there to be rewards for taking towers, keeps, and going on a raid (completing objectives, like take all boss related keeps to free the realm).

[Bidyoufarewell]

my apologies i was reading forum before i logged on yesterday. didnt know it had already been implemented. ty Tola!

<last line 2nd paragraph> rewards being obviously greater than NM / HM current. the rare cloaks in nm/hm helms weapons and shields are excellent. i would like to see set jewelry pieces like the items from baal and diablo2's cloak. higher end pieces that would require little to no crafting player made items. armor pieces, weapons, shields, and jewelry pieces as a high end replace all armor for those that can manage to finish realm mode.