Nodes

Pre-alpha Metropolis node.

Nodes are a pre-set location, wrapped in a zone of influence, in our world that can form into towns of different sizes. These sizes range from a small camp to a sprawling metropolis. The size of the towns depends on the contribution by players and how far they’ve advanced the Node. Players do not create the footprint of a Node, but within that footprint they do have the ability to own land. Players who are part of the government for a specific Node will have the ability to modify building types and services further, but for the most part, a Node will grow along its own specific path (think about this more as NPCs building these towns out, rather than PCs individually putting buildings and walls up). A Node’s contribution area is larger than the actual town itself, allowing for players to adventure while building upon the town. We call the contribution area the Node’s “Zone of Influence,” and it’s the area where players help to advance the Node they are in.

Winstead Village (stage 3) node on Alpha island. Alpha-1 screenshot.

Encompassing each server are carefully placed points of development called Nodes. There will be 85 regular node locations at launch with 15 additional castle nodes (5 castles x 3 castle nodes each) for a total of 100 nodes.

• Previously the developers estimated 103 regular node locations with 15 additional castle nodes for a total of 118 nodes.
  • This decrease in node count does not affect the amount of available player housing, or the estimated server capacity.

We have moved from a 103 nodes to 85 nodes; and there's a few reasons for that. One, when we were doing the calculations behind how- in Alpha 2 and in the game- we want these vassal structures to exist, we had more nodes than what felt meaningful and we wanted to condense some of that those curated story arcs and hooks into the environment and realm around the areas to be more bountiful at a lesser node value: meaning bringing down the node count so that we can increase the richness of each of those nodes more than what was at 103. – Steven Sharif

• There were 9 node locations in Alpha-1.
• Node locations are subject to change prior to Beta-1.

Nodes are the heart of the world, they create the ebb and flow of life. At their core, Nodes are pre-set points in the world, wrapped in a Zone of Influence and surrounded by geographic areas that change over time based upon player participation. The world map is divided into regions, with each region containing multiple Nodes. As a Node advances, it influences the types of content within itself and the surrounding areas. Players do not create Nodes, but if they are a part of the government for a specific Node, they have the ability to influence diplomacy, and modify building types/construction and services within that Node. – Margaret Krohn

Node types

Nodes exist all throughout the world and the location of said node will determine its type; but this type will be... seen at the first stage of development when the first stage when a node propagates real-time assets in the world; is basically these NPCs, these merchants that come into an area and they offer services and/or you know of stores or whatever the deal may be. You will see the flavor of the node from those merchants. So if it's a military node you'll see military people. If it's... an economic node you'll see merchants. If it's a scientific one you'll see scholars; and if it's a divine one you'll see priests and clerics. So players will have a very firm understanding of which node is which type in order to know how they want to progress. – Steven Sharif

Nodes are assigned one of four (4) node types, each of which contain unique specializations.

• Players will be able to identify the type of a node at its first stage of development (Expedition) based on its NPC population.

Node type.	Specialization.	NPCs.
Divine nodes	Faith and skill/equipment augment focuses	Priests
Economic nodes	Trade and merchant focuses	Merchants
Military nodes	Combat and class training focuses	Guards
Scientific nodes	Artisan and construction focuses	Scholars

Ashes of Creation allows you, the player, to decide the fate of the world around you. With each Node Type, you can change the flow of resources and goods in the world. Will you grow the largest Economic Metropolis and help guide the riches of Verra, or will you choose another path unlocking new stories filled with allies and enemies?

Node types are predetermined and are the same across all servers.

• A node’s type is static. It does not change based on the node’s advancement or destruction.

For example, if a level 4 Scientific Node is destroyed, it will become a Level 0 Scientific Node. It will never be any other Node Type other than a Scientific Node. The location of these Types relates to the influences of the area around the Node. – Margaret Krohn

Node types affect various services and systems at each level of node advancement.

• Node governments
• Narrative
• NPCs
• Node buildings and amenities

Node types will be definitive during the Beta testing stages.

Beta testing will require that the node types be definitive; and that's because of how node types are integrated into the relating and corresponding neighboring points of interest and those quest lines. So it's not something we can swap very easily. – Steven Sharif

Node benefits

Kaelar node concept art.

Each node type has a superpower (ultimate ability) that becomes unlocked when the node reaches Metropolis (stage 6).

Divine node benefits

Divine nodes at Metropolis (stage 6) may unlock a procedurally built "mega catacomb" dungeon beneath it that connects to its divine vassal nodes. These may house unique bosses with unique drop tables.

Economic node benefits

Economic nodes that have reached the metropolis stage unlock the linked economy superpower. Economic nodes with this superpower share their Auction house listings with all others.

• Up to two economic metropolises may be linked in this manner.
• Metropolis level economic nodes enable worldwide sale prices for auction houses across Verra.
• Items listed in one linked economic node can be bid on from any other linked economic node.
• Linked economies also connect the economic metropolis and its vassal economic nodes.

Economic Nodes that have reached the Metropolis Stage unlock the Superpower “Linked Economy”. Any Economic Node with this Superpower unlocked shares Auction House listings with all the others, meaning that the items listed in one Linked Economy Node can be bid on from any other Linked Economy Node. Linked Economies also connect a Metropolis and any Vassal Economic Nodes belonging to that Metropolis.

The Linked Economy Superpower has the potential to create a massive market that spans the world. This will allow players to attain and sell goods with ease, providing those who have access to these Economic Nodes a faster path to fortune in the lands of Ashes of Creation.

Military node benefits

Military nodes enable Bounty hunters and (potentially) reduced duration of corruption.

Scientific node benefits

Scientific nodes that have reached the metropolis stage unlock the Teleportation superpower.

• Citizens of metropolis scientific nodes may teleport between the metropolis and any of its vassal nodes, regardless of the stage of the vassal node, so long as the vassal node is not at war.

• Citizens of vassal nodes may teleport to their metropolis node and back.

• If there are multiple scientific metropolises, then an airship will provide faster travel between those scientific metropolises for citizens of those nodes and their vassal nodes, so long as the metropolises are not at war.

This will allow Citizens and Vassals of Scientific Metropolises to do things more quickly than others, as fast travel is limited in the world of Ashes of Creation. They’ll be able to exchange goods and information with ease and get to locations in the world at a quicker speed in order to gather crafting materials to create recipes, as well as participate in limited-time events.

Node citizenship

Alpha-1 node citizenship registration.

Player housing grants the ability to claim citizenship of a Village (stage 3) node or higher.

• Citizenship tickets may also grant citizenship to certain node stages. This mechanic will be decided based on testing.
• A player can only claim citizenship to one node at a time.

You can declare citizenship to only one node and when you declare that citizenship. Let's say for example, one guild perhaps wanting to kind of take all their members and have them all declare the same citizenship to a location. The longer a node exists the higher the prize it is to take and some systems with regards to crafting progression and/or rewards and bonuses or the reliquary that we haven't really touched on a lot, those systems are going to be so enticing that from an incentive standpoint it will compel other groups to either potentially break alliances or siege the city in order to take the goods that are potentially in it. So, from an incentive standpoint we have that at play. Additionally, we don't have a cap per-se that we've announced yet on the citizenship aspect of being in a node, but we do have soft caps. It becomes costlier the higher number of citizens each time one new person wants to join to be part of a node. So, there is sort of a soft cap on how many citizens one node can have and it might be that not all in the guild can participate in that area. So, there's kind of a natural divide: A pseudo faction, so to speak between who is a part of that node and who is not. – Steven Sharif

• Only one citizenship may be declared per account, per server.

Your account is bound to one declared citizenship per server, which means that if you have two alts and your main character on one server you may only be a citizen of one node between those three... If you have an alt on a different server, it could be a citizen of a node as well. – Steven Sharif

• Citizenship is lost if the node is destroyed. A player can then become citizen of another node.
• Node citizenship is not tied to membership of a guild. Guilds don't "own" nodes.
• Players can interact with the node board to get a list of citizens of the node. Clicking on a citizen will reveal information about their guild, society, religion, and property ownership.
• A player does not need to declare citizenship of any node. These players won't need to pay taxes but will miss out on benefits of citizenship.

Citizenship benefits

Citizenship grants a number of benefits.

• Access to limited functions and service buildings within the node.
• Access to merchants that offer specific types of enhancement stones or stat migrations.
• Access to upper-tier crafting benches.
• Access to a weekly allotment of core material that can only be accessed from the node's reliquary.
• Access to buffs from certain events.
• Access to titles.
• Access to organizations and religions.
• Participation in the node’s government (voting or running for office).
• Other stated benefits include: Reputation, Honor, Loyalty, Merit.

For example there may be merchant tables that only citizens have access to. Those merchant tables might relate to specific types of enhancement stones or specific type of stat migration abilities. You might have access to mundane crafting benches but the upper-tier crafting benches are for citizens. Citizens only have access to the reliquary and the achievements that the node has from its citizens nearby areas and content like raid bosses that they might kill. They may have a weekly allotment of what specific type of core material they can access from the reliquary and only citizens can do that... You might have access to certain types of buffs that occur during like events; and only citizens can have access to those types of buffs. There are obviously going to be title structures within organizations, within religions and stuff that relate to these events and procedures that only citizens can be part of. That title structure for that specific node. – Steven Sharif

Citizenship entitles you to a lot of benefits for that node including; Titles, reputation, honor, loyalty, merit, and probably most importantly is the nodes government. As a citizen you are granted the privilege of participating in a node’s government. From voting to running for office.

Non-citizens will have access to generic node services, mundane crafting benches, and standard rewards from node quests.

There are limited functions and services that non-citizens can gain access to as a result. Obviously you want to attract traffic. You want to attract commerce. You want to track taxation. That's possible because those are the means by which the node continues to grow; and in order for that to be attractive you must offer it to non-citizens alike... We don't want to necessarily be super lockout on content per-se, so most quest-lines are still going to be accessible from non-citizens and citizens alike, however the reward tables for those quests might be higher for citizens. You may have additional rewards that be granted based on quest completion and progression. – Steven Sharif

Zone of influence

Nodes are pre-set locations, wrapped in a zone of influence (ZOI).

Every Node is given purview over a predefined geographic area called a Zone of Influence (ZoI). No matter where you go in the world, whether you’re questing, gathering, or raiding, you’ll be helping determine which nodes will develop, and what Zones of Influence will expand. Any area that a Node controls is considered its Zone of Influence, including Vassal Nodes, and all Vassal Nodes exist within the Zone of Influence of their Parent Node. – Margaret Krohn

Every node is given purview over a predefined geographic area called a Zone of influence (ZOI). Player activity within the ZOI is weighted and counted toward a particular node’s advancement.

The main thing that differentiates us from other MMOs is that we have a living, breathing, reactive world... Our world is separated into zones, which are then separated into what we call nodes. Nodes are sort of invisible zones of influence that listen to everything that a player does; so as players gain experience from killing things, gain experience from doing quests, gain experience through crafting things, the node is also gaining that experience. Once a node gains enough experience it levels up and then starts to attract NPCs to it . – Jeffrey Bard

• By undertaking familiar activities, such as questing, gathering and raiding, players have agency in determining which nodes in the world will develop.

Each Node can form into towns, but are limited by their neighbors. The Nodes have different levels of advancement. There can only be so many of each level. Think of this as advanced settlements needing more elbow room. Nodes encompass more land as they grow and will require more effort to be sustained. This system is a main driver for change in the world because it creates scarcity. As Nodes advance in stages of growth they will lock out neighboring Nodes from progressing, and will absorb their zones of influence.

• Zones of influence connect fully across the world without any gaps.

There is not a space where you will move in to do something and no node will get that experience. – Steven Sharif

• Underrealm nodes and nodes directly above them are considered adjacent but do not exist in the same ZOI.
• Up to one fifth of the world will be encompassed within the ZOI of a Metropolis. The many vassal nodes within a ZOI's "border" could end up looking like a country or nation.

Node simulation

Simulation of node interactions.

This representation does show 111 nodes as part of this particular simulation. I'm not sure what the tick frequency is on this video. It might be something on the magnitude of like every second is probably 12 to 24 hours. So over time you start seeing these larger node systems building up to eventually where you might see Cities and Metropolises after some period of time; and what this allows the design team to do from a tools perspective, as they simulate this idea of how the world is going to progress, is it gives an opportunity to kind of see strange happenings or something that we couldn't necessarily predict but was a possible outcome based on the variables present. – Steven Sharif

The developers have created a simulation of node interactions in preparation for Alpha-2 deployment of the node system.

• This simulates how nodes advance and expand their zones of influence over surrounding nodes.

You can show the initial territories on the Verran map of what these particular nodes have governance over, or their Zones of Influence as we like to call them... As the simulation of this begins to advance and nodes begin to expand their territory and they begin to take over nearby nodes as a result of their of their growth, you start to see these power level ratings that are applied here on specific nodes that determines what type of takeover power it has and and what it pushes back against for other nodes that are looking to take over new territory as they advance. – Steven Sharif

• It also simulates events, such as NPCs attacking and disabling certain node buildings and services. Failure to successfully respond to these will reduce the node's "health ticker", which will slow down the XP gains from the node.

It also simulates events: So each of these nodes will have a health ticker: when that health ticker is impacted it'll stop gaining power or gaining or slow down in its gaining of experience; and that's because certain events can affect a node by disabling certain services, disabling buildings. Players don't respond to that horde of zombies that have come out of the nearby ravine then those zombies can attack stables, they can attack service buildings, and prevent particular types of quests or activities and services from happening until it's repaired. – Steven Sharif

• Node sieges are simulated, with successful sieges destroying the nodes, and where unsuccessful sieges won't destroy the node but may result in disabled buildings or services, similar to events.

It simulates the sieges if a particular node has a certain frequency that's set where we want to see randomization of how nodes get affected by sieges. Sometimes they'll be destroyed in the simulation. Sometimes they'll have disabled services again, similar to an event, because they didn't succeed necessarily at sieging the node but they did succeed at disabling some of the buildings as part of that siege. – Steven Sharif

• It simulates what outcomes may happen in the live game as a result of player activity, such as splitting up a particular ZOI across a waterway, or having territories expand out to islands or across continents.

It simulates what players could potentially do as well when the game goes live; and that might include things like splitting up a particular Zone of Influence across a waterway, having your territory expand out to an island, or across continents. These are these are the types of things that we want to see players do eventually obviously but this tool provides the design team the opportunity to see it repetitively and over a fast period of time so they see these different types of outcomes. – Steven Sharif

List of nodes

This section contains information from Alpha-1 testing. It will be updated when new information is made available.

• Drythorne
• Edgepoint
• Elyon
• Illwind
• Miraleth
• Mistmire
• Moonhollow
• Na'ala
• Traitor's Rock
• Winstead

Node stages

Illustration of node advancement from Wilderness (stage 0) to Metropolis (stage 6).

Nodes advance by collecting experience from the actions of players nearby. As players complete content inside of a Node’s Zone of Influence (the area around the node), they contribute that experience toward the Node’s development. The experience given to the Node may then be modified based on certain Events and Accomplishments. When a Node reaches the experience required, it undergoes the process of advancing to the next stage. There are a few exceptions where a Node cannot advance even though it has the required experience - most commonly, a Node can not advance if a Node is a Vassal of another Node and would advance to the same stage as its Parent Node. – Margaret Krohn

Nodes have seven (7) stages of advancement, with experience thresholds for each stage. When a Node reaches the experience required for its current stage, it advances to the next stage.

	Node stage.	Symbol	Alternate name.	Timeframe to advance.	Player housing.
0.	Wilderness			-
1.	Expedition		Crossroads	Few hours	-
2.	Encampment		Camp	Many hours	-
3.	Village		-	Few days	Small houses
4.	Town		-	Many days	Medium houses
5.	City		-	Few weeks	Large houses
6.	Metropolis		Metro	Many weeks	Mansions

Node advancement

Citizen and non-citizen player activity (questing, gathering, raiding, etc.) within a node's ZOI counts toward that particular node's advancement (progression) to a higher node stage.

The advancement of a node unlocks its unique content, which comes at the cost of locking out an increasing ring of neighboring nodes from progressing to the next stage.

• Nodes advance to the first stage quickly. This enables NPC services such as vending or banking items.
• The more advanced the node is, the larger its ZOI becomes.
• Less advanced nodes (referred to as vassal nodes) that fall within a more advanced node's ZOI can still gain XP, but must remain at a lower advancement stage than the dominant node.
  • The vassal system begins when a node hits Village (stage 3), but neighboring nodes starting from Expedition (stage 1) also block the growth of their immediate neighbors.
• The territory expansion algorithm takes into account the nearest coast, neighboring nodes, and the heatmap of players in surrounding areas over the last weeks or month.
  • Due to the way the progression algorithm calculates territorial (ZOI) expansion during node advancement, there is a small possibility that two nodes of the same stage end up being close to each other.

The way that the algorithm expands the territories takes into account a few things: One it takes into account the coast like where's the closest coast. Two it takes into account the neighboring nodes so it can take over and essentially vassal state those nodes, but what's more important is essentially the initial population based on like how players choose their races. Because we have nine different races and four different starting points that branch out, each server's population density is going to dictate essentially the first few nodes that are highly populated and then that initial seed is what's going to determine the node structure as it moves inland into the into the world essentially; and based on the performance and successes of different sieges will determine which nodes that got locked out from the previous the initial advancements what nodes can now be available to advance further. So I really think that with so many variables that are present in the equation of how nodes advance and stay existing with the more variables you have, the higher likelihood there is for there to be a significant diversion in world progression. – Steven Sharif

Normally the algorithm that's applied to the node territorial expansion will prevent significant nodes from being in close proximity to each other... There could be a perfect storm where all of the algorithmic progression of territory leads to having these nodes very close to each other because there's certain requirements that should that need to be available to satisfy node vassal takeovers; and it's possible that two nodes would never take each other over as vassals and end up kind of close together and spanning their territories in kind of opposite directions: The Tale of Two Cities kind of thing. – Steven Sharif

• A node does not receive XP from the nodes within its ZOI until these nodes have reached their cap.

• Citizens of one node can contribute to the advancement of other nodes.

• Node experience gain opportunities will be equitable across the four node types.
  • The exact percentage of advancement from obtaining items or killing monsters is not going to be explicitly known to avoid "gaming" the system.

Different people have different resources invested in nodes progressing and it would be a little "gamey" if you could know exactly what was necessary at that point because that would disincentivize people from participating. – Steven Sharif

Node advancement spawns a series of animations and visual effects (within the footprint of the node).

• Players within the node are teleported to a safe location, likely a respawn area near the node.
• Supplies will spawn around the node and system driven caravans are spawned to bring these supplies into the node. These caravans are not able to be attacked.
• NPCs will begin construction activities.
• Players outside the node will see the new facade of the node pop into existence as the node advances in stage.

The Development Area of a Node is where civilization will appear as the Node advances. As the Node Stage increases, different buildings, NPCs, and services will become available in the Development Area. The higher the Node Stage, the more complex and populated the Development Area becomes. Development Areas will also vary depending on the Node Type - Economic, Military, Scientific, or Divine. – Margaret Krohn

Vassal nodes

Vassal node structure.

This vassal mode structure tells you what it looks like for a sovereign at a level six metropolis stage; and what it can control at a maximum vassal network is two level five nodes, of which a level five node can control one level four and one level three as direct vassals; and then the four can control a three; and every three can control a one or a two. Now if the three gets removed through siege, the one or the two is removed as well. So that's an important distinction between the three's vassals, which technically isn't really a vassal relationship because there's no citizenships possible. Those vassals don't exist between three and X, but they do exist between four and three, five and four, and six and five. And what this also allows is that because there are 85 nodes that are within the world, we have a buffer zone of about 20 nodes that lives in a max server state. So if you had maximum five metropolises form in a world, you will have a number about 20 nodes that can live alongside those metropolis networks; and when or if a metropolis falls, that extra cushion of nodes around the five metropolis structures allows for the map to be redistricted in a way that is unique. It doesn't mean that one of the fives is just going to pick up where the last six left off and form the same exact metropolis structure. From a territory perspective it has ancillary nodes to play with and expand towards that redistricts the map, so that if a metropolis falls there's a significant difference in the layout of the world and the layout of these almost nation-like territories. – Steven Sharif

Village (stage 3) or higher nodes enslave nearby nodes, converting them into vassal nodes.

• A Metropolis (stage 6) can control up to two City (stage 5) nodes. A City (stage 5) can control one Town (stage 4) and one Village (stage 3) node. A Village (stage 3) can control an Encampment (stage 2) or an Expedition (stage 1). If the Village (stage 3) gets destroyed through a siege, its dependant Encampment (stage 2) and Expedition (stage 1) nodes are also destroyed.
  • A vassal network can extend across seas and also include islands.

There is a layer of intricacy between how the neighboring nodes advance and what potential parent structure they have in the vassalship tree. – Steven Sharif

• Vassal nodes gain benefits from their sovereign node (parent node) even if the node type of the parent is different to the vassal.

It is not a bad thing to be vasseled, it is a good thing to be vasseled. It brings many benefits from the Sovereign, which is the the ultimate parent of that vassal network down to the vassal node itself; and it allows that vassal node to even live outside of its normal mechanics. You get to adopt some of the benefits that the node type of your sovereign is, even if your node type as a vassal node isn't the same. – Steven Sharif

• Sovereign nodes collect taxes from their vassal nodes. These taxes cannot be taken by the mayor or other players.

• Vassal nodes must remain at least one node stage below their parent node.
  • Neighboring/Adjacent nodes from Expedition (stage 1) upward block the growth of their immediate neighbors. This was intended to be tested in Alpha-1.
  • Vassal nodes first apply any experience earned to their own deficit (see Node atrophy). It then applies excess experience earned to its parent node.
  • If the parent node advances, the vassal is once again able to advance.

• Vassal nodes give excess experience to their parent node and may have their own vassals; so long as they fall within the parent node’s zone of influence.
  • If a node is capped and is both a vassal and has its own vassals, any experience earned from itself or its Vassals is first applied to its own deficit. Experience beyond that is then sent to its parent node.

When the vassal reaches its cap it overflows experience up to the parent; and so it can be very good early on for parents to get vassal nodes that are very productive- that have a lot of traffic. – Steven Sharif

• Vassals are subject to the government, alliances, wars, taxes, and trade of their parent node, and are able to receive federal aid from them.
• Vassal nodes cannot declare war on their parent node or any of their vassals.
• Citizens of vassals are bound by the diplomatic states of the parent node.

If a Node is a Vassal Node and is capped from advancing further, it first applies any experience earned to its own deficit (see Node Atrophy section), and then applies excess experience earned to its Parent Node. If the Parent Node advances and the Vassal is able to grow, it becomes uncapped. If a Node is capped and is both a Vassal and has its own Vassals, any experience earned from itself or its Vassals is first applied to their own deficit. Any experience beyond that is then sent to its Parent Node. – Margaret Krohn

Adjacent/Neighboring nodes

Adjacent nodes (Neighboring nodes) starting from Expedition (stage 1) may block (lockout) the growth of their immediate neighbors.

• Vassal nodes must remain at least one node stage below their parent node.
  • Encampment (stage 2) and Expedition (stage 1) nodes are technically not vassal nodes as they do not support citizenships. If their parent Village (stage 3) node is destroyed by a node siege, these nodes are also destroyed.

Zones and progression

Dungeons, Raids, World bosses, Mobs, Quests, Events, Resources, Narratives and other content within a node's ZOI will have a diverse level range; but will scale with the advancement of that node and its racial influence.

• Portions of the spawn tables (for mobs and resources) are static and other portions are dynamic and adapt to node development.

We don’t have a strictly level 25 zone. Instead, that zone might have some level 10 creatures near the road, some level 20 creatures deep in the forest, and some level 30 creatures up the mountain. These ratios will change based on the Nodes that inform them, becoming generally more dangerous as the Node grows. All this civilization attracts the attention of Things-That-Should-Not-Be. This does not mean that wilderness areas are safe, by any means. Some may be safe-er, but all will have dangers that even the most experienced traveler needs to watch out for. – Steven Sharif

World manager

The World manager is an algorithm in Ashes of Creation that controls dynamic world elements. It acts as both a throttle and an incentive system for various activities to ensure certain parameters are within acceptable thresholds.

A world manager is a technical term to define a server process that lives alongside the game server; and when the game server needs to do things- communicating with other game servers within that grid- it tells that manager and that manager sends it down to the appropriate server. – Steven Sharif

• Prices of hunting certificates.
• A heatmap of experience being gained to apply to node advancement.
  • The territory expansion algorithm takes into account the nearest coast, neighboring nodes, and the heatmap of players in surrounding areas over the last weeks or month.
  • Due to the way the progression algorithm calculates territorial (ZOI) expansion during node advancement, there is a small possibility that two nodes of the same stage end up being close to each other.
• Transit of resources and goods between regions to drive quest rewards for nodes.

For example if you know iron is being used as a raw resource for a specific crafting path that might drive up the price of mithril or silver; and that will incentivize the market to course correct a little bit. The idea is to provide soft incentives that help to alleviate the demand and also to prop up the supply that might not be present from the economic systems. – Steven Sharif

Node atrophy

Some of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.

Nodes accumulate an experience deficit each day based on the node's level, called node atrophy. The deficit is subtracted from any experience earned that day. If any deficit remains, then this is subtracted from the node’s experience pool.

• An atrophy system may be implemented, where accumulated atrophy points will progressively disable services within a node. The node may be destroyed if a significant points threshold is reached.

• A previous design concept was that nodes could delevel based on accumulated atrophy.

There are intrinsic problems with reducing a nodes level as opposed to removing the node and it may be possible I'm just gonna say now that we don't actually atrophy nodes to delevel but rather accrue atrophy points that must be replenished over time; and if not it begins to disable services and further compound the atrophy problem; at which point when it reaches a certain atrophy point then the node would just disappear. – Steven Sharif

Node governments

Alpha-1 winner of Mayoral election.

Node governments are chosen from a node's citizenry when a node reaches Village (stage 3).

Positions within a node's government are attained through titles that grant special access to NPCs in the node.

• Mayor.
• Priests, bishops or acolytes in certain temples.
• Patron guild leader.
• Chief bounty hunter.

There are a lot of things that you can strive for within [a node] that grant you that special treatment. – Steven Sharif

Mayors

Alpha-1 Empyrean city node information panel.

Mayors are leaders of a node's government who control the development of that node.

• Allocate resources, taxes, and quests to help develop node defenses.

• Coordinate the transfer of needed supplies with citizens operating caravans.
  • Mayors must communicate what resources are necessary for a particular node then motivate the citizens to fulfill those needs.

• Other leadership powers.

Only node citizens may be elected mayor.

• Only one citizenship may be declared per account, per server.
  • This may have changed to one citizenship per account.
• A king or queen can also become a mayor.

You may only ever be a citizen of a single node at a time. – Steven Sharif

Mayors gain new powers and responsibilities as their node advances.

• Nodes have a number of node policies that are proposed by the mayor to be voted on by citizens.
• The mayoral title unlocks special abilities and stats during sieges or events.
• Mayors are notified when their node is named on a siege declaration scroll.

The mayor is made aware of what scroll has been generated if their node is the one that's named on the scroll. – Steven Sharif

Node elections

Alpha-1 node election user interface.

Once a node has reached Village stage there will be a one week cooldown period before node elections begin.

• This cooldown period allows players to establish citizenship at the village; which may require them to relinquish previous citizenship at another node.
• Following the initial cooldown, there will be a one week election process, then from that point on, elections will follow a monthly cadence.
• Node sieges may not be declared for 21 days following a node advancing to any stage.
  • This was previously stated to apply only to nodes advancing to Village (stage 3), not higher stages.

The village stage is a unique stage because that's when the government system comes online and all other stages past village there will have already been a cadence for the election system and it will follow that cadence, but after the initial village stage is completed there will be a one week period where players have an opportunity to establish citizenship at the village that also provides for the cooldown time that is- that would be present on players leaving another node to kind of participate in in this particular node leveling up. But that after that one week period then there will be a one-week election process and then from that point moving forward will be the one month cadence that the node experiences elections on. – Steven Sharif

Node elections occur on a monthly basis.

• Election notices will be mailed to the accounts of citizens.
• Only citizens of a node may participate in its elections.
• Only node citizens may be elected mayor.
  • Only one citizenship may be declared per account, per server.
• A king or queen can also become a mayor.

Node governments and mayors are chosen through different methods according to the node's type.

• Divine node governments are chosen from citizens via service oriented quests that prove faith and dedication to the node.
  • Most of the devotion-oriented tasks are going to be on an individual basis and won't utilize outside support.
• Economic node governments are able to be bought and sold by citizens with the most money.
  • The developers are in favor of a public accounting of campaign funds and contributions for mayoral candidates.
• Mayors of military nodes are chosen from citizens through last man standing (gladiatorial arena style) combat.
  • An idea currently under consideration is to have players build out a champion that they can then fight in the arena, rather then using their regular characters. These champions can be equipped with gear and skills via quests, along with materials and gold to make the champion stronger.
  • The reason for the champion idea is because the game isn't balanced for 1v1 PvP. Utilizing champions makes arena combat more of a level playing ground.
  • Arena style combat is instanced but spectators may be possible through an interface.
  • The winner of the combat can not transfer the mayoralty to another player.
• Scientific node governments are elected democratically. Records of who voted for who are not published.

Leadership powers

Depiction of a mayor.

The government has a lot of say in the direction of the nodes development. Directing assets, building projects, tax allocation, defensive ability etc. Players have the ability to not only create these cities, but they have the right of self-governance.

Government officials have wide-ranging leadership powers.

• Mark foreign citizens of other nodes as enemies of the state.

• Declaring war on another node and rallying citizens to the cause.

• Entering into trade agreements with other nodes.

• Mayors are able to set tax rates for their node.
  • This includes setting tax rates that apply to tavern games.

• Allocating money gathered via node taxes.
  • Directing treasury funds into building projects and/or improving node defensive structures, such as stronger walls and gates, traps, and siege equipment.
  • Mayors can also allocate treasury funding to hire mercenary NPCs to defend their node during sieges.
  • Tax money may only be used to fund node development.

• Mayors are able to initiate quest-driven systems that non-citizens can participate in. The mayor can use a portion of the node's treasury or goods as rewards for quest completion. Players will be able to interface with the node to view the quests that are available to them.
  • These quests can be used to bring in material components to help combat node atrophy.

• Nodes have a number of node policies that are proposed by the mayor to be voted on by citizens.

• Governments may be able to choose a node name from a predetermined list.

There are levers and dials that are present to both the owners of Castles as well as the elected officials of Nodes that during their administration they have the ability to impact and influence the region around them. – Steven Sharif

Guilds do not control nodes. Guild leaders (kings and queens) can become mayors of nodes.

• Guilds hold separate roles in the direction of the node than the roles held by private citizens.
• Only a certain number of guilds may participate in these roles.
• Separate guild roles are reserved for small, medium and large guilds.

Guild’s also hold separate roles in the direction of the node, than the roles held by private citizens, and only a certain number of guilds may participate in these roles. Separate guild roles are reserved for Small size guilds, medium size guilds and large size guilds.

Node taxes

Alpha-1 mayoral user interface.

Mayors are able to set tax rates for their node.

• This includes setting tax rates that apply to tavern games.

Mayors/Node governments allocate resources, taxes, and quests to help develop node defenses.

• Tax money only goes toward funding node development. This gold cannot be withdrawn by the mayor or any other player.
• Taxation rates scale based on when a player joined a node as a citizen. The goal is to exert financial pressure on node populations by making taxes increasingly expensive as nodes advance, rather than putting in place hard population caps.

Parent (Sovereign) nodes take a cut of all taxes from the housing and any services that occur within their vassal node structure.

• This tax doesn't necessarily impact the individual citizen, because citizen's tax levels are determined by their node, but the node's finances are affected by the taxation levied by its parent nodes.

Node wars

Node governments may declare war on another node and rally citizens to the cause.

• This mutually flags the citizens of the warring nodes, including their allies, as combatants.
  • Social organizations quests will either be cooperative or adversarial based on the war status of their parent nodes.
• Vassal nodes cannot declare a node war on their parent node or any of their vassals.
• Node wars can be declared at any time, but the objectives will only spawn during server prime-time.
  • Players can kill each other at any time during the war (not only during server prime-time).

We have conditions that you can set between nodes with regards to either nodes being friendly with each other and acting trade alliances, or they can declare war on nodes similar to how guild wars may function in different games, where those citizens become hostile to each other based on the player government that's elected in the particular node. So those systems all kind of cater to allowing a conflict that's meaningful and that also provides a non-imbalanced relationship between stronger guilds and not as strong guilds. – Steven Sharif

Internal conflict

There won't be a civil war mechanic within nodes but there will be scope for internal political conflicts; such as undermining the current leadership and disrupting trade.

• The only way to remove an elected mayor prior to the end of their term is by destroying the node.

We want consequences to matter and if that person got elected then you need to work within the means of the mechanics to get them unelected. – Steven Sharif

Alliances

Ashes of Creation may have specific content that revolves around Alliances.

• Progression pathways within alliances.
• Guilds sharing common services with alliance members.
• Alliances can toggle relationships with nodes.

Content that revolves around alliances specifically and progression within the development of that alliance; and the ability to share some common services between guilds that are part of that alliance. I think that additionally allowing alliances to toggle certain relationships with nodes as an interaction is beneficial. That's going to provide an interesting dynamic for players who are either members of the particular node that has the relationship established or members of the Alliance. So I think that obviously building systems is is about creating the channels by which these players can form bonds and the more layers you have around those you know channels of bonding between the different guilds or players, the more sustainable that relationship. – Steven Sharif

Node quests

Storyline quests can have multiple stages. These quest stages can actually be failed.

• The ability to retry a failed quest depends on Node progression.
• Quests involving citizens from multiple nodes are unlocked based on the alliances and other relationships between the nodes and their progression.
• Quests may differ based on the stages of nearby nodes, seasonal influences, and events such as world bosses.

There will be many different quests that actually have stages of the storyline; and these stages can actually be failed. You can actually fail a storyline; which sucks when you think about it, but at the same time that risk makes your investment that much more important. – Steven Sharif

Racial quests

Quests may be based on a character's race.

Different quests may relate to who the primary cultural contributor is to a node. This won't lock out content, but will add flavor to the quests.

There might even be different directories of the quest that exist for specific races, and even though you're sharing a quest to kill a boss, if you're human and I'm an elf, I will have a different arc potentially that leads in a different direction than you, even though we took the same quest; and this can relate to who the primary cultural contributor is to a node unlocking different arcs for cultures that share the primary culture of a node - not that locks out content but it gives a flavor in a different direction so that not everything is so cookie cutter. – Steven Sharif

Race matters because narratives have paths that also are influenced based on the primary contributing culture to the node... If you're a Niküa and you have you're in a Niküa node that's predominantly Niküa, you're going to have certain services and/or abilities as a member of the Niküa race that other races may not have access to... They may have alternative quest lines, but they won't have specific ones. Now those specific Niküa quests will then relate to the meta-narrative that's present in the world and they'll start to direct some of that meta-narrative; and that'll be beneficial for your kind because it will unlock certain content for your race that other races haven't unlocked yet. So there is an incentive there to see progression along that line now in order to curb the progress of a dominant race. – Steven Sharif

Quests that are race specific, title specific, or guild specific will likely be less than 10% of the total number of quests. 90% of quests should be able to be shared by everybody.

Mayoral quests

Mayors are able to initiate quest-driven systems that non-citizens can participate in. The mayor can use a portion of their node's treasury or goods as rewards for quest completion. Players will be able to interface with the node to view the quests that are available to them.

• These quests can be used to bring in material components to help combat node atrophy.

Node reputation

Good actions, such as participating in civilization building, may result in that character gaining positive Node reputation. Bad actions taken, such as failing certain quests, may result in gaining negative reputation. This reputation is gained or lost on a per-node basis.

• Certain NPCs react differently to player characters based on their node reputation.
  • This might result in higher prices (for goods or services sold at that node).
  • NPC guards will kill corrupted players on sight.
  • NPCs will add a player to their hate list if that player heals, buffs or otherwise assists any player on their hate list.
• Negative reputation may also open up certain quest lines that the darker, seedier side of the world are interested in.
• Excessive negative reputation may cause a character to be deemed "enemy of the state" of a node.
  • Mayors may also declare foreign citizens of other nodes as enemies of the state.

The more good aligned or civilization building aligned tasks that you complete, you get higher positive reputation. But if you get low or bad reputation you could be deemed enemy of the state of a node. You could be deemed kind of a bad actor and it might raise prices for you, but it also might open up certain quest lines that the darker, seedier side of the world are interested in. – Steven Sharif

Node buildings

• Academy
• Alchemist
• Apartments
• Armory
• Auction house
• Barracks
• Blacksmiths
• Caravanserai
• City hall
• College
• Crafting stations
• Emporium
• Exchange
• Galleria
• Guild halls
• Inns
• Library
• Lumber yards
• Marketplaces
• Markets
• Reliquary
• Royal stables
• Scholar's academy
• Static housing
• Taverns
• Temples
• Thieves' guild
• Trader's company
• University
• Warehouses

Node layout and style

Racial architecture of the same Village (stage 3) node on different servers. Dünir Dwarven influence (top). Kaelar Human influence (bottom). Alpha-1 Non-NDA screenshot.

The layout and architecture within a Node’s development area are determined by influential race. For example, a stage 3 Node with the majority of player contribution being Py'rai would have a Py'rai village with Py'rai architecture. Most NPCs would be Py'rai elves, and offer questlines within the Py'rai narrative. – Margaret Krohn

Each player’s contributed experience is flagged with their character race and other identifiers. When a Node advances, the race with the highest experience contribution determines the Node’s style and culture. This style and culture change can happen at every Node Stage. For example, if a Node advances to Level 2 - Encampment Stage and 51% of all experience was earned by Ren’Kai players, the Node will be a Level 2 Ren’Kai Node. If that same Node advances to a Level 3 - Village Stage Node, but the Py'Rai contributed 62% of all the experience earned, then the Node will be a Level 3 Py'Rai Node. – Margaret Krohn

Node layout and style is determined by several factors:

• Environment (biome) and location of the node.

  The way that the node system is built is that they can exist across a spread of 18 biomes, but at the same time have to represent the cultural influence of these cultures that are intrinsically a part of a specific biome. – Steven Sharif

  • Nodes will adjust the local topography to fit the aesthetic and mechanical requirements of the node.

Currently the way that the platform system is set up, is it's capable of adjusting the topography of the node's footprint, regardless of the surrounding terrain. So the reason for that is we want to have flexibility in the presentation of the node's layout and how it is essentially both from an aesthetic standpoint as well as a mechanical standpoint with node sieges- how it's constructed and that construction should have the ability to take on a variance of different types of topography. So it shouldn't be dependent on the surrounding area. Now that's not to say that the surrounding area isn't going to have some influence over. So for example... we're experimenting a little bit with the platform tech and putting up a node up against the side of a mountain or on the edge of a cliff or something that has a beautiful vista. Those are things that we're going to test out obviously as we continue to work on the node tool and how that platform system works, but the idea is to have the node independent of the surrounding terrain. – Steven Sharif

• Node type.

Some parts are determined by the area it's in. Some parts are determined by the type it is. Some parts are determined by the race it is; and then the rest of it is determined by the mayor. – Jeffrey Bard

• Race that contributed the highest percentage to the node's advancement will alter the racial appearance of its buildings, NPCs, and props.
  • Parent races do not combine their cultural influences. For example, Py'Rai and Empyrean count as different cultures. Their parent race, the Pyrian, no longer exists.
  • This style and culture change happens at every stage.
  • This applies to all nodes, including castle nodes.

All nodes whether they're associated with a castle or associated with normal node structure has cultural influences that replicate over to the buildings that are produced and the NPCs that are present. – Steven Sharif

• The rest is determined by the node's mayor.
  • It should be possible for a node to complete several building projects within a mayor's one month term in office.

Q: How long would you say it will take players on average to fill slash build up a node completely from wilderness to metropolis?

A: It's one thing to get a node to a certain level: it's another thing to develop the node; and I can't really give you an on-average expectation, because there's a lot of variables at play. There's how many citizens does the node have attracted to it; what's the type of traffic that the node is attracting to it based on things like its tax rates, or the specialization that it chose to spec into, based on the building types it's chosen to build. All of those things are variables that can affect the quote-unquote "average build-out time" of a particular node. So it's kind of difficult to give you an average when there's so many variables along those lines. But the idea is that if there is a particular project that players are interested in in developing based on the node stage, that they would have the ability to complete several of those projects as within a single term of a mayor; and a term of a mayor is one month. – Steven Sharif

Racial influences

Alpha-1 Village node layout.

We have essentially sets that exist across all races; and each race that dons those armor sets is going to have their own racial influence on the presentation of those particular sets. So that's something that's unique in how each of the races get diversified. Additionally, the more that one particular race contributes to a node's development, it's going to manifest in that particular node's architectural influences. You're going to see the architectures of those races become manifest within the nodes as well: That's another way that we diversify each race and we present each race's culture in the game as through those architectures, through those props that exist, through the tailoring of the armor sets that the NPC might wear, to the different factions that exist. Factions will have their own affiliation with different races as well. Each race will also have some different nomenclature when it comes to the lore, or comes to locations in the world. They're going to have their own language influences as well: The way they speak is something that's going to be distinct between races; when you have dialogue trees with particular NPCs. So all of those things really go into setting an immersive world where the cultures have their own identity. – Steven Sharif

Cultural influences manifest in many ways, from node and gear aesthetics to NPC languages and lore.

• Gear appearance of certain armor sets is influenced by the player's race.
• Node layout and style is influenced by the race that contributes the most to that node.
  • Benefits may apply to citizens of the dominant culture but can also apply to mechanics of the node, which can also be of benefit to members of other races.
  • There are attrition mechanics that affects experience and influence to curb a single race from dominating the entire world.
• NPCs will react differently to different character races.
  • Languages will be distinct between NPC races and in the lore.

There is an attrition and that attrition on experience and influence is heightened based on the performance of the race in the world. So if all these nodes are Orc nodes then their attrition rate is very high to compete with the cultural establishment of new nodes because they have more influence in the world and a popular opinion is against them in their outlying regions that they do not have influence in. – Steven Sharif

Constructible node buildings

Alpha-1 mayoral node building user interface.

Alpha-1 node building construction early preview.

Node governments decide the location and types of constructible node buildings to be constructed within sectors of a node.

• Apartments
• Marketplaces
• Royal stables

These are buildings that the mayor has agency over determining whether or not they should be a constructed project. Constructible buildings can be selected at open plots that are gained as the node advances. If they elect to begin construction of one of these types of buildings- one of which is the marketplace- it'll grant certain trade benefits as well as some stalls that the citizens may participate in. – Steven Sharif

The government decides how to specialize their node. Once they choose certain things they won't be able to choose other things.

• Node buildings live within a "tech tree" based on the stage of the node. Each stage offers stronger services to the node but must satisfy prerequisites for the building construction.
• Different governments may change the buildings within a node.

And there could be regime change... If somebody doesn't like the fact that a market was built and they want to re-elect a new government next cycle, they can do so... and that market could be destroyed and a new building take its place.

When the building types are determined, the community will then need to bring resources into the node (using caravans) and come together to construct the buildings (via quests and the like).

• Materials contributed toward building a node building are lost if the mayor decides to scrap the project.
• Pre-defined parameters limit the number of buildings at in-node locations.

Unique node buildings

Alpha-1 Node buildings.

Each node type has a unique node building associated with it that can be activated at the Village stage of node advancement. The unique building plays a central role in the progress of civilization for a server.

• Divine nodes
  1. Temples
• Economic nodes
  1. Markets
  2. Exchange
  3. Galleria
  4. Emporium
• Military nodes
  1. Barracks
• Scientific nodes
  1. Library
  2. College
  3. University
  4. Academy

Reliquary

Reliquary concept art.

Each city has what's called a reliquary and the reliquary begins to spawn unique items for the citizens to take advantage of based on the performance, progression and achievements that those citizens have within the world. So if your citizens are part of downing a world boss or completing a dungeon in a record time or crafting a legendary item or whatever: all of these different types of progression paths for the cities could result in the production of a relic that exists within the reliquary. – Steven Sharif

Relics are achievements for a node that unlock over time. They allow node citizens to craft certain legendary items and progress in certain legendary quest lines.

Relics are embodiments of certain types of achievements. You may have the scale of a dragon that's been defeated- the all-scale aspect of it- and from that every week a citizen might be able to derive one scale material component that can be used across a plethora of high-end types of crafting. – Steven Sharif

• Relics automatically manifest in the node's reliquary when specific conditions are met by that node. For example, it may require a certain number of citizens to accomplish a particular achievement a number of times before the relic is granted to the node.

Let's say for example there is a dragon nearby and this dragon is a large raid boss; and the number of citizens that the node has that participates in that raid the first time- if you have 30 citizens present you may not achieve the relic. And it's not a matter of capturing it at that location taking back to the city. It'll automatically manifest within the reliquary if a number of citizens accomplish a particular achievement a number of times necessary to create the relic. So if you only have 30 citizens present at that raid boss you may need to do that raid boss four or five six times in order to unlock the achievement which grants the relic in the reliquary. So it's essentially incentivizing the citizens to participate in the world events around the node. – Steven Sharif

• Relics can also be awarded for accomplishments that span many different progression paths, such the number of citizens achieving advanced stages of their artisan classes.

The other component of relics that's important to note is that it's not just adventuring relics, these are accomplishments that span a lot of the different progression paths. So you could have accomplishments get unlocked by how many number of citizens achieve you know the creation of a particular type of item. You may have now an alchemical genius that is a citizen of your node and as a result there is an alchemical relic that's been granted to your reliquary in a similar fashion to the dragon. – Steven Sharif

• Relics stored in a node's reliquary grant passive and active benefits to node citizens and vassal states.
  • Area-of-effect buffs to damage, attack range or the health of the defenders.

• Limited access to the relics stored in a node's reliquary are granted to players after a node is destroyed by a node siege. Benefits are also conferred to those who capture, steal, or sabotage relics held the reliquary.
  • Looting a relic from a node will create a shard of the relic, which can be used in recipes for certain crafted items and enchantments; or it can be consumed for a single-use buff that reflects the original relic's purpose. These shards can be traded.

• Relics include the four Ancient artifacts of Verra that were originally discovered by King Atrax in his pursuit of the power of The Essence.
  • These artifacts were in close alignment to The Essence on Verra due to their proximity to the ley lines of Essence spread across the world.
  • These artifacts were originally housed in the vault of Fallow's Hold, which is one of the great dungeons of Ashes of Creation, located near the capital city of the ancient Toren empire, Torall.

• Constellations enable the acquisition of certain relics.

• Certain relics can only be discovered through exploration.

Node building destruction

Destructible castle.

You could be more precision oriented in the decision to attack a city. Let's say it's a rival node that's trying to reach you know a node stage five or something and you want to disable their ability for the religious system to progress so you target the temple during the attack, or you want to disable their scholars academy from reaching a higher level so that your nodes can; or you want to disable multiple buildings that allow for experience and quests to be undertaken by its citizenship, which prevents them from keeping up in pace of experience gained with your node. These can be more precision oriented and don't have to effectualize an actual takeover of the node. – Steven Sharif

Node buildings (including player housing) have hit points and can be damaged or destroyed by different systems.

• NPC-driven events that are a response to story arcs or node atrophy.
• Node sieges and node wars.
  • Attackers may not be capable of destroying a node during a siege. Instead they may carry out precision attacks to disable specific service-oriented buildings within the node. These buildings can be targeted with siege weapons and bombs.
• Hazardous events such as tornadoes or hurricanes.

If buildings suffer more than approximately 25% damage, any NPCs or services offered by that building will not be available until the building is repaired.

• Players must repair damaged buildings (or rebuild destroyed ones) in order to reactivate the services from those particular buildings.
  • Citizens will need to obtain the resources needed to repair and rebuild any damaged infrastructure.
  • Larger more advanced buildings will require more resources to repair them. In-node housing will likely require the least resources to repair.

Buildings that take significant damage are destroyed and appear as rubble on the plot they occupied.

• Node governments must clear any rubble on plots before any buildings can be reconstructed. Any prerequisites for the building reconstruction must be satisfied beforehand.

  Buildings also live within a prerequisite system. So in order to build down the tech tree of what these buildings provide, as the node grows larger to access stronger building types, you may get a kink in that chain if it's destroyed and you'll have to stand that back up in order to support the service again. – Steven Sharif

• If the node is destroyed by a node siege, the debris field will contain spoils that are lootable to the victors of the siege.
  • Player housing that is destroyed during a node siege can no longer be sold. Furnishing and decorations are retained and can be placed again later.

Player housing

Pre-alpha Empyrean freehold homestead.

Players will have the ability to survey and develop land anywhere in the world. Be a pioneer deep in the wilderness, build the home of your dreams, and work the land to cultivate resources and supplies. Alternatively, stick with civilization and safety in numbers – purchase a home within the confines of a village and watch your investment grow as that village turns into a city. Homeowners in our game will have the ability to develop their plot of land as they see fit. Focus on farming, animal husbandry, or own your very own smithy. You’ll be able to specialize your land to maximize your profits or your comfort – be sure to choose wisely.

Pre-alpha Aela (human) housing by Michael Bacon.

Player housing is player-owned accommodation in the form of Static housing, Apartments and Freeholds.

A player may own up to 1 of each type of housing simultaneously. Static housing and Apartments are one per server; Freeholds are one per account.

Player housing	Type.	Availability.	Starting count.	Ownership limit.
Apartments	Instanced.	Village stage and higher.	50.	One per character per server.
Freeholds	Open world.	Village stage and higher.	Ample.	One per account.
Static housing	In-node.	Village stage and higher.	8.	One per character per server.

Static housing

Purchasing in-node housing in an Alpha-1 village node.

Static housing provides non-instanced player accommodation within a node, also known as in-node housing.

• Players are able to purchase small one room houses (cottages) starting at the Village stage (Node stage 3).
  • There will be 8 cottages available for purchase at the village stage.
  • The amount of static housing increases as a normal part of node advancement.
• The architecture of static housing is predetermined by the racial influence of the node's layout and style.
• Taverns and Player shops are not tied to in-node housing.

Apartments

Pre-alpha apartment complex in a metropolis node.

Apartments are internal only (instanced) spaces within a node that offer some housing functionality. There will be an initial 50 apartments available for purchase when a node advances to a Village (stage 3). Additional apartment buildings can be built at Town (stage 4) if the mayor chooses to construct them and if there is an available plot to do so.

• The number of available apartments increases as a normal part of node advancement.
• It was previously stated that apartments would be available at Town (stage 4) or above.

The mayor may additionally construct apartment buildings when the node hits stage 4 at one of the building plots in the node, along with cities gaining additional static housing and apartments by default as a normal part of the leveling process. – Steven Sharif

Freeholds

Freeholds in Alpha-1.

The whole goal of the freehold system is to give everything a purpose and not just have it be like "oh this is my pretty design", but it's a design towards something for your character- towards something for the world. – Jeffrey Bard

Alpha-1 freehold early preview.

Freeholds are sizable player housing plots that can be situated within the Zone of influence (ZOI) of a Village (stage 3) or higher.

• Freeholds are limited to one per account.
• Freeholds are approximately half an acre in size.
  • The footprint of a freehold does not change with node progression.
• Expansions and upgrades become available as node progression allows.
• Freeholds may not be sold to other players.
• Blueprints are required for the construction of the freehold buildings that are used to process resources into processed goods.
  • The best processing can only be carried out on freeholds, so obtaining a freehold will require a large amount of effort.

  If a player wants to achieve a freehold they can achieve the freehold, however the amount of effort resources and time that's required in order to achieve that freehold is a large amount. It is something that is a monumental achievement for you to to get that freehold; and the reason why is because freeholds tie in very heavily to the processing artisanship aspect. Some processing can be done in nodes, but the best processing is done on freeholds; and we want to make sure that there's a little bit of a throttle or gate on the amount of effort that's necessary to achieve that influence over the processing market. – Steven Sharif

  • Inns and other player housing options are available that are easier to obtain for players who do not need the benefits of a freehold.

  Just because the freehold is very difficult to attain doesn't mean that you don't have a space for housing and furniture that you can achieve through our apartment system or an inn or the static in-node housing. Those are alternate methods as well but they do not have that aspect of the best processing is done on the freehold. – Steven Sharif

The freehold system interacts with multiple other systems in-game.

• Node progression.
• Artisan classes.
• Spawn actors.
• Quests.
• Taxation.

Events do not target personal belongings such as freeholds.

Buying and selling (Real estate)

Players buy the deeds for housing from the node itself. Players can also buy and sell properties from other players.

• Housing will have a base price that scales with the number of citizens in the node.
  • In-node housing will be at a premium, and is expected to be hotly contested.
  • The more apartments that have been purchased in a node, the higher the price scales.
• The developers are considering an auction-based method for listing new properties that become available for purchase when a node advances.
  • A grace period will occur before the housing becomes available for auction.
  • Bids will then be accepted starting at a minimum reserve value that is based on the number of citizens in that node.
  • At the end of the auction, the highest bidder will win the house.
• Static housing and apartments can be listed and sold to other players.
  • There is no cap on the price of player-originated housing sales.
  • Player housing that is destroyed during a node siege can no longer be sold.
  • Freeholds may not be sold to other players. This is subject to change based on testing.

There's no cap essentially in player originated sales. Those are determined essentially by supply and demand as it is within the game and there's no artificial barrier to how high that demand can go. – Steven Sharif

• Housing ownership can default back to the node if the owner fails to pay their property taxes. A balance and penalties will be charged to the new purchaser of the home in the manner of a "foreclosure process".
• Players will not be able to exceed their allotment of housing in the game.

This will allow players to transfer real property goods. This includes ... static housing, this includes apartments that they may own; and they can sell those because those will have a limited and finite quantity. – Steven Sharif

Rental and leasing concepts are currently under consideration.

Some concepts that we have is going to be rental or leases that could be had allowing players to kind of lease a property for a period of time where they will have control rights over utilizing storage based on the area, controlling the furniture or access point; all that kind of stuff. – Steven Sharif

Node sieges

Node sieges (Pre-alpha footage).

As some areas in the world grow, others will fall. This is the foundation of the living, breathing world that is Ashes of Creation, where players will have the ability to make important decisions that matter in the longevity of an area becoming a city, or whether to siege a rival town. Rise above the ashes, create the world around you, and be a part of the story that unfolds because of your actions and decisions. – Margaret Krohn

Node sieges enable players to destroy nodes starting at Village (stage 3). This paves the way for new development and access to the locked content in surrounding nodes. Due to this dynamic, political strife and intrigue play an important role in the structure of the world.

• Sieging nodes will not be an easy task for the attackers. Cities and metropolises will have a considerable defensive advantage.

• There will be systems that mimic some of the mechanics of sieges, but there won't be practice sieges.

• Death penalties do not apply to objective-based events such as node sieges.

If you own a home in a node and you don't want to see that home destroyed, you need to defend that city! – Steven Sharif

• The majority (~80%) of content in Ashes of Creation is open-world but there may be instanced battles within castle and node sieges where specific groups can participate in small, short-duration objective-based battles for specific waypoints.

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Node destruction

Nodes can be destroyed starting at Level 3 - Village Stage, and are destroyed through sieges. Sieges are started via an item which is acquired through a quest that scales in difficulty with respect to the level of the Node which is being targeted for the siege. Once the item is brought to the Node and is activated, the declaration period begins and a countdown is initiated for players in the region to see. This countdown runs for a number of days equal to the level of the Node being sieged. Once the countdown is complete, the siege begins. There is a cooldown between sieges, and players must wait a certain amount of time after an unsuccessful siege before a new siege can be declared. The higher the Node level, the longer the cooldown between sieges. If a siege is successful, then the Node is brought down to Level 0, and anyone who was a citizen of that Node is no longer a citizen. – Margaret Krohn

Nodes can be destroyed starting at Village (stage 3) following a successful siege against that node.

• Players lose their node citizenship after their node is destroyed.

• After a node is destroyed, the footprint of the node will enter a ruined state and will become an open PvP zone for a number of days equal to the node's level. These ruins consist of a debris field of treasures that are lootable by players entering the area.
  • Previously it was stated that attackers who participated in the siege will have exclusive looting rights for period of time following the node's destruction. Any loot remaining after this period will be open for anyone to loot.
  • After a number of days equal to the destroyed node's level, the node will revert back to stage 0 (wilderness) and any modified terrain will revert back to its original state.

• Treasures in the debris field will take time and tools to uncover.
  • The warehouse debris will contain a portion of all Materials (crafting components) and Gatherables that were stored in the destroyed node.
  • The reliquary debris will contain a stockpile of shards of the relics that were stored there.
  • The town hall debris might contain tax-oriented certificates that were held within the vaults and in the treasury.
  • The stables debris might contain mount certificates that can be added to caravans in the future or sold on the auction house.
  • Gatherables and processed goods that were stored in in-node housing and apartment storage chests become lootable. These are not lootable if the node survives the siege- even if the housing buildings are destroyed or damaged during the siege.

Impact on player housing

Player housing designs and decorations are retained and can be placed again later if the housing is destroyed during a node siege.

• Blueprints are mailed to the player to utilize for future placement.
• Destroyed freeholds are subject to material loss.
• Certificates will track major milestones (such as Furnaces and Homesteads, for example).
• A possible design idea is for items such as furnishings to be boxed in crates that are accessible inside the new home.

Impact on in-node housing

Some of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.

Following a node siege, static housing will be scaled back or destroyed based on the advancement of the node.

• If the housing was purchased at a higher advancement than the node currently is then it will be destroyed, otherwise the housing will be scaled back.

Impact on apartments

Apartments may be destroyed in the following circumstances:

• If their building was destroyed during a node siege, even if the siege was not successful.

• If the mayor decides to destroy apartment buildings all items and layouts will be mailed to the owner.

Some of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.

• If a mayor built extra apartment buildings at Town (stage 4) or higher and the Node deleveled below that stage.

Impact on freeholds

Freeholds may be attacked by any player for a period of two hours following a successful siege against its parent node.

• Players and their allies may defend their freehold for this period of time.
• Structures and guards may be obtained to defend freeholds during this period.

After the two hour period of open combat following a successful node siege, any remaining freeholds will exist under a grace period for roughly 1 week where another node may take over the zone of influence of the freehold.

• The freehold owner will be required to undertake a quest process to have their freehold adopted by a new node if one exists.
• At the end of the grace period, if the freehold does not reside within the ZOI of a Village (stage 3) node or above, it will be destroyed.
• Players who are registered as a defenders of their node cannot loot their own destroyed freeholds.

If a siege is successful, then the Node is brought down to Level 0, and anyone who was a citizen of that Node is no longer a citizen. Freeholds within the Zone of Influence are subject to a period of vulnerability. These Freeholds can be destroyed by other players during a period of roughly 2 hours after a successful siege. Destroyed Freeholds are subject to material loss, and blueprints for them are mailed to the player to utilize for future placement in order to allow the player to keep their Freehold’s layout and structure. Once the vulnerability period is complete, any remaining Freeholds will exist under a grace period for roughly 1 week where another Node may take over the Zone of Influence of the Freehold. – Margaret Krohn

Node redevelopment

A node that was successfully destroyed by a node siege may develop differently due to the following influences:

• Different races becoming primary contributors.
• Design elements determined by different governments.
• Reactions and interactions with other nodes in the world.

Caravans

Alpha-1 caravan 3D render. Modelled by Adam Will.

Caravans facilitate the transfer of goods for players wishing to turn a profit.

Mayoral Caravan system - Work in Progress.

The caravan system is an open world PvP system that revolves around opportunity and risk. Caravans facilitate the transfer of goods for players wishing to turn a profit.

• Caravans are for the transfer of personal goods, supplies for castles and nodes, as well as quests.
  • Caravans can transport goods for one or more players.

• Caravans are initiated from and arrive at caravanserai node buildings within Village (stage 3) nodes and above.

Caravan types

Ramstone Hauler pre-order pack cosmetic caravan skin.

There are different types of Caravans in Ashes of Creation.

• Mayoral caravans.
• Quest driven caravans.
• Personal caravans.

The caravan system is another very big part of the node system. They are the main driver of economic activity and there is a bunch of different types of caravan. – Jeffrey Bard

Caravan PvP

Caravan PvP in Alpha-1.

You won't be able to see inside specifically but as part of the caravan structure itself there will be little hints as to what the the cargo is. So for example if you've seen some of our recent footage with caravans you kind of see sitting on top of the caravan there's some gold or some silver or some iron. – Steven Sharif

Caravans create an open PvP zone that flags players for combat (purple).

• Players will not be able to see the exact contents of a caravan before they decide to attack or defend, however there will be some visual hints to the cargo of the caravan, such as gold, silver, or iron visible on top of the caravan.
  • Cargo is represented in this way even if a cosmetic caravan skin has been applied to the caravan.
• Players will be able to state their intentions to attack, defend or ignore via a user interface window.
  • The proximity that the UI window appears is determined by the player's performance as either a defender or an attacker in previous raids.
• A group will be required to successfully attack a caravan.
• Basic attacks will not slow caravans, but certain items, attacks, or status effects can slow or block caravans.
• A caravan will persist in the world for a period of 5 to 10 minutes from the time its owner logs out or is disconnected from the server.
• Each caravan is its own bespoke event. Players can't participate in more than one caravan event at a time, but running decoy caravans is a valid tactic.

It's still intended from a design standpoint to be a window that is presented to the player based on proximity; and that proximity it can be greater depending on your performance as either a defender or an attacker in previous raids. – Steven Sharif

There will be incentives and risks for both caravan attackers and defenders. These will be tested and refined during the alpha and beta testing phases.

• Death penalties (mostly) do not apply to objective-based events (such as caravans, guild wars, and node sieges).
  • Gear degradation applies on death during Caravan PvP.

There is a level of risk that comes with the attacker. We have progression paths that exist for bandits and that exists for defenders; and if you choose to opt into a caravan attack- you sign up for that attack and you fail that attack- it is detrimental to your path of progression down the bandit area. That's one thing: Two is of course you have gear decay. You have degradation that can be suffered if you die. That is a cost. And then you also have a reputation; and if your reputation precedes you when you want to transit goods across the world; and you see somebody who's doing it and you want to participate as a defender or a participant, they might say hey screw you, you were just murdering my people last week and I saw that you're like on the top of the bandit list for killing caravans. So it has repercussions in the sense that it locks you out of certain player groups. It provides decay to your armor. It has deleterious effects on your progression, and the attacking- and the bandit progression of caravan attacks or defense. – Steven Sharif

• A quest system will track a player's successful or failed defenses and attacks. This will provide rewards that scale up over time based on the player's history.

• Other incentives and risks are social and are created (informally) between players.

The caravan defender role is going to have its own progression questing and rewards associated with it that are going to attract a certain subset of players and then you know vice-versa wise we're going to have incentives that appeal to the more highway brigand type players; and you know you might not always be on one side or the other: that might change depending on what your interests are in the at the time. But obviously you know those types of systems need to have robust you know consequential type rewards and benefits associated with them in order to compel the player; and that's something obviously we're going to test in alphas and betas and see how performant it is in actually attracting players to participate and make sure it's not just one-sided so-to-speak. – Steven Sharif

Caravan destruction

If a caravan is destroyed (becomes a wreckage) it will drop a portion of the goods it was transporting. The remainder of the caravan's goods are sunk (lost) when the caravan is destroyed.

The caravan becomes a wreckage upon destruction and that wreckage is an interfaceable item that players can come up to and they can receive certificates for a portion of the goods inside the caravan. Now the idea with that certificate is that it must be taken back to the point of origin, or at least a region within that point of origin. We'll see about that last part because there's a few things I want to test in the Alpha from a gameability standpoint. The reason why for this is because what might happen is you may have some type of collaboration within a guild to kind of game that system. Hey I'm gonna reach this caravan just to the border of the region and then we're all destroy it, collect the goods and take it to you know that region's warehouse; and have to skip out on the last half of the way. So it must successfully reach its destination before the goods can be considered a part of that region. – Steven Sharif

• Anyone may loot the caravan's wreckage.
• Caravan components may also drop when a caravan is destroyed. These components may be salvageable by the caravan owner or by other players, in the case of high grade components.
• Caravans drop certificates for heavy goods that are redeemable at the origin node for a portion of the goods.

Q: What is the reason for requiring the destruction of a caravan by the attackers as opposed to the attackers gaining possession of the caravan?

A: With caravans we really want to emphasize this idea of not necessarily stealing the vehicle, but being forced to achieve victory through destruction; and when you do you then have the logistical issue of how you're going to transport those goods on your own rather than servicing the transport of that by just hijacking. – Steven Sharif

Underrealm nodes

Underrealm nodes and nodes directly above them are considered adjacent but do not exist in the same ZOI.

• There will be "bleed over" between underrealm nodes and surface nodes in terms of influence and interaction.
  • There may be visual cues above ground that indicate influence from underrealm nodes in that area.

That might be a little bit of a departure from our design in the past. I know originally you know like two-plus years ago we were discussing how those would be independent of each other, but I think as we further defined the layout of the world map itself you know it made more sense for those to have some interaction and influence that's combined. – Steven Sharif

• Caravan routes will go underground.
• Node sieges occur in the usual manner.
• There will be underrealm Metropolises.

Coastal/island nodes

Pre-alpha naval concept.

There will be healthy amounts of sea content within the coastlines of the continents that does not fall into the "open sea" area. – Steven Sharif

There will be nodes along the coast and on islands.

• These nodes will have specific water oriented influences and abilities, services, questlines, that relate to the seas.
  • There is a healthy amount of sea content within the coastlines of the continents that does not fall into the open sea area.
• Coastal nodes change the spawn tables of the nearby water content and can also trigger specific events.
• Harbors in coastal nodes will have quest lines that relate to the ocean and nearby islands.
• It may be possible to siege a coastal city by sea.

Island chains are part of Ashes of Creation naval content.

Underwater nodes

Underwater points of interest that have NPC structures may appear to be like cities, but they will not be nodes.

• There won't be nodes underwater or in the water.

Patron guilds

Whether an organization is the patron of their node means it contributes the most amount of work to the node from its members.

Patron guilds unlock the following benefits for their members.

• Emblems can be applied to guild armor that can be purchased from the node.
• Participation in the node's stock market.
• Ability to participate in specific guild-based missions that will progress the guild's leveling and development.
• Allocation of guild points to unlock specific node abilities for guild members.
• Ability to claim an in-node guild hall. These have different perks and benefits to halls placed on freehold plots.

Any number of guilds can be in a node, but the number of patron guilds within a node is limited by node stage.

• Villages and lower do not have patron guilds.
• Towns can have up to 1 patron guild.
• Cities can have up to 2 patron guilds.
• Metropolises can have up to 3 patron guilds.

Sharemarkets

Some of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.

As nodes develop, player governments may open a Stock exchange (also called Stock markets and Sharemarkets) where players can buy and sell shares in Nodes, Guilds and Social organizations.

• The value of stocks is influenced by world events and the performance of nodes, Social organizations or guilds.
  • Hard metrics, such as quest lines, nearby resources, citizen progression, and purchases of local real estate, will determine the value of purchasable shares.

• Sieges will halt trading of shares in a node. This opens up potential for economic sabotage.

• There is no regulatory commission to restrict the purchase and sale of stocks.

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Community guides

• Ashes101 - Nodes.

See also

• Node sieges
• Player housing
• Economy
• Social organizations