I have been running a shard since early 2017, and am looking for a bit of advice on implementing a faction system.
By way of context, my vision was, and is, to have an open-world shard based on the feel of Ultimas VI and V, or at least my interpretation. It launched to a bit of fanfare, but the excitement quickly died due to bugs and my not really knowing what I was doing. I played UO for a year and half back in 1997-1998, and would not consider myself an accomplished player. For me it was more about the atmosphere of the game, that it was multiplayer, and that it was set in the Ultima universe. I am likewise not an accomplished coder, though I have managed to hack together something that works, with considerable help from members of the freeshard community. A few players stuck around and helped me work out the major bugs, iron out the kinks, and give me a better idea of providing a sense of progression. The shard is in a pretty good place now, as far as stability and atmosphere, though it still needs a bit of testing in certain areas.
Some time ago, a few of the players who stuck around suggested I add a player managed town system. First a little background on some of the changes I have made...
I implemented a class system based on the professions of the original Ultima series. This is the area that requires the most testing.
I disabled the original housing system, and instead use Knives' Townhouse script. I removed the items from existing houses, and replaced them with statics. I also added quite a few new houses. Players can join one of the various towns and can then purchase a house in that town. They can renounce their citizenship in the town, but must first sell back the house. I have also added talking Ultima lore-related NPCs to various towns.
I disabled the guild system and replaced it with a system of existing guilds, as was originally planned for UO. Each guild has a guild hall located in a particular town and guild membership brings with it certain advantages, including slightly faster skill gain for certain skills. Part of my goal was to remove powerful guilds in favor of a more egalitarian system with no player as leader and no leadership hierarchy.
There are no overt quests of the “talk to such and such NPC” variety. There are a few less obvious “quests,” though they are somewhat hard to find. I likewise do not want to be ever updating the shard and adding elements, or running large scale quests and the like, though I do plan to release the occasional expansion by way of new maps. I know they have become something of a staple, but quests and gm-run events shatter my sense of immersion. I likewise do not want this to play as an single player game in any sense. I prefer underlying, self-perpetuating systems that allow the shard to sort of run automatically, and other systems that facilitate the players creating the “content” through their interactions with one another and the world.
This brings me to the player managed town system. This will work with the existing towns, and will be the primary source of end game “content” and progression. Towns begin as unmanaged. Players can join these towns and own a house in them. Citizens of the town can hold an election, with the winner becoming the mayor, and the town then becoming player managed. We have cobbled together a pretty solid framework for this, with various benefits and requirements for maintaining the town (else it revert to unmanaged). It took me a while to warm up to the idea, but I can (mostly) see the benefits of such a system. Before I begin trying to code this (*sigh*), there is one area that needs some work, namely the implementation of a faction system.
The player managed town idea includes a system whereby towns could raid one another and steal various resources and the town artifact (something like the sigil of UO). The snag here is that I am trying to find a way to implement this without going against my overall vision for the shard, or the underlying lore. I very much want the main towns- the eight virtue towns, Cove, Vesper, and Serpent's Hold- to be under the control of Lord British and to capture the general feeling of the Ultima series.
My original plan was to have two opposing factions. I have added four “evil” towns; Buc's Den, Haven, Nujel'm, and Sanctuary. This presents another issue by way of there not being nearly as much housing for the “evil” faction as the good.
So far, I can see two possibilities (though am open to entertaining others):
1. Allow all towns to forge alliances or go to war with all other towns. This is obviously the easiest route. The problem of course, is that it goes against my vision, and the reason I started making this shard in the first place. It also causes issues with the lore-based NPCs, for example, Lord British would certainly not sit around in his castle while the towns war with one another (and the same for the other NPCs). There is also the matter of NPC dialog not changing depending on the situation.
2. Use the two faction system, and add more housing to the “evil” towns so that they are closer in number to the “good.” Allow all members of a faction to participate in town raids, but only allow citizens of the towns attacking and defending to steal items or reap rewards. I much prefer this option, though it presents an issue in itself due to limited areas for houses, but I think I can figure something out. This is part of the reason I am asking, as I am currently doing some map editing with the goal of releasing a new client.
I was hoping to perhaps get an outside perspective and feedback and benefit from the vast experience of the ServUO community. Thanks in advance for any input.
By way of context, my vision was, and is, to have an open-world shard based on the feel of Ultimas VI and V, or at least my interpretation. It launched to a bit of fanfare, but the excitement quickly died due to bugs and my not really knowing what I was doing. I played UO for a year and half back in 1997-1998, and would not consider myself an accomplished player. For me it was more about the atmosphere of the game, that it was multiplayer, and that it was set in the Ultima universe. I am likewise not an accomplished coder, though I have managed to hack together something that works, with considerable help from members of the freeshard community. A few players stuck around and helped me work out the major bugs, iron out the kinks, and give me a better idea of providing a sense of progression. The shard is in a pretty good place now, as far as stability and atmosphere, though it still needs a bit of testing in certain areas.
Some time ago, a few of the players who stuck around suggested I add a player managed town system. First a little background on some of the changes I have made...
I implemented a class system based on the professions of the original Ultima series. This is the area that requires the most testing.
I disabled the original housing system, and instead use Knives' Townhouse script. I removed the items from existing houses, and replaced them with statics. I also added quite a few new houses. Players can join one of the various towns and can then purchase a house in that town. They can renounce their citizenship in the town, but must first sell back the house. I have also added talking Ultima lore-related NPCs to various towns.
I disabled the guild system and replaced it with a system of existing guilds, as was originally planned for UO. Each guild has a guild hall located in a particular town and guild membership brings with it certain advantages, including slightly faster skill gain for certain skills. Part of my goal was to remove powerful guilds in favor of a more egalitarian system with no player as leader and no leadership hierarchy.
There are no overt quests of the “talk to such and such NPC” variety. There are a few less obvious “quests,” though they are somewhat hard to find. I likewise do not want to be ever updating the shard and adding elements, or running large scale quests and the like, though I do plan to release the occasional expansion by way of new maps. I know they have become something of a staple, but quests and gm-run events shatter my sense of immersion. I likewise do not want this to play as an single player game in any sense. I prefer underlying, self-perpetuating systems that allow the shard to sort of run automatically, and other systems that facilitate the players creating the “content” through their interactions with one another and the world.
This brings me to the player managed town system. This will work with the existing towns, and will be the primary source of end game “content” and progression. Towns begin as unmanaged. Players can join these towns and own a house in them. Citizens of the town can hold an election, with the winner becoming the mayor, and the town then becoming player managed. We have cobbled together a pretty solid framework for this, with various benefits and requirements for maintaining the town (else it revert to unmanaged). It took me a while to warm up to the idea, but I can (mostly) see the benefits of such a system. Before I begin trying to code this (*sigh*), there is one area that needs some work, namely the implementation of a faction system.
The player managed town idea includes a system whereby towns could raid one another and steal various resources and the town artifact (something like the sigil of UO). The snag here is that I am trying to find a way to implement this without going against my overall vision for the shard, or the underlying lore. I very much want the main towns- the eight virtue towns, Cove, Vesper, and Serpent's Hold- to be under the control of Lord British and to capture the general feeling of the Ultima series.
My original plan was to have two opposing factions. I have added four “evil” towns; Buc's Den, Haven, Nujel'm, and Sanctuary. This presents another issue by way of there not being nearly as much housing for the “evil” faction as the good.
So far, I can see two possibilities (though am open to entertaining others):
1. Allow all towns to forge alliances or go to war with all other towns. This is obviously the easiest route. The problem of course, is that it goes against my vision, and the reason I started making this shard in the first place. It also causes issues with the lore-based NPCs, for example, Lord British would certainly not sit around in his castle while the towns war with one another (and the same for the other NPCs). There is also the matter of NPC dialog not changing depending on the situation.
2. Use the two faction system, and add more housing to the “evil” towns so that they are closer in number to the “good.” Allow all members of a faction to participate in town raids, but only allow citizens of the towns attacking and defending to steal items or reap rewards. I much prefer this option, though it presents an issue in itself due to limited areas for houses, but I think I can figure something out. This is part of the reason I am asking, as I am currently doing some map editing with the goal of releasing a new client.
I was hoping to perhaps get an outside perspective and feedback and benefit from the vast experience of the ServUO community. Thanks in advance for any input.
