Guild wars

Guild wars are objective-based PvP events between guilds.

• Guild 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).

• Guild war objectives are intended to dynamically spawn based on various conditions that exist within each guild.

• Guild wars are not permanent. Definitive victory/surrender conditions exist that are based on the level of the warring guilds and the assets that those guilds have.

• Guild wars operate outside the PvP flagging system.
  • Death penalties (mostly) do not apply to objective-based events, such as guild wars.

• Guild wars are considered a core system of Alpha-2.

Q: How do you plan on keeping wars fresh long term? Typically in other games wars become one dimensional in terms of strategy. Will intrepid be looking at map changes every few years, or will you give guilds / node mayors the ability to customize the layout or objectives of the battlefield?

A: Our guild wars have objective-based gameplay that spawn in the world based on several different factors and predicates that might exist. Some of those predicates might be where is your guild a patron guild of? Does your guild have a guild hall? What node is your guild leader and/or officers a citizen of? What was your last completed raid boss? All of those can serve as predicates to then spawn a certain objective within the world that players have to either engage with in a number of different manners. Either they can be kill objectives, they can be control objectives, they can be capture and move objectives. They could be a caravan caravan summons that need to take supplies from those objectives. The idea is to incorporate all of these other ancillary systems that exist within the game in some way shape or form- tie it into the guild war, because we've created those systems for a reason. We want players to engage with those systems, so why not hook those systems into the guild war format? And I think that that creates a very dynamic setting where it is not just about killing and logging out, but rather strategy in both your resource placement, how you respond, and when you respond, the composition of your raid/group teams. Those types of things play a role now in the outcome of those guild wars and I think they keep it fresh because it'll be different per war. – Steven Sharif

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

• Guilds may war multiple guilds/alliances at a time.

PvP flagging

The open world PvP flagging system is designed to deter people from griefing other players without limiting opportunities for open conflict.

We do incentivize players to fight back, or to participate in PvP through the flagging system, but not to PK. Not to go corrupt. – Steven Sharif

• Players can participate in open world PvP with one another without having to resort to murder.
  • Players will gank other players, but the intention is for Ashes of Creation to not be a "gank box".
• The penalties are intended to be severe enough to deter any type of spawn camping.
• Summons follow the same PvP flagging rules as players and share the player's flag status.
• Items are not provided to players until crafting or gathering interactions are complete. Players interrupted before completion will not lose these items or resources.

There are three levels of flagging for world PvP in Ashes of Creation.

• Non-combatant (green)
  • All players start as non-combatants.
  • Non-forced attacks, including AoE and status effects, will not hit non-combatant players.
  • Green players killed by mobs (the mob deals the killing blow) do not flag attacking players as corrupt, but since the exact health of another player is not known (outside of the same party, raid, alliance, or guild), attackers run the risk of killing the player and becoming corrupt.
  • Player abilities with CC effects do not apply to non-combatants. The target of a CC ability must be flagged in order to suffer the CC effects. This prevents players from opening attacks that stun non-combatant players during a pull for example.
  • Non-combatants will not be flagged for looting bodies.
  • Players will be able to opt-in (via a checkbox) to allow their beneficial spells, or non-beneficial AoEs to hit combatants.

If you have that check-box for flagging with your AOEs and heals available then you will flag. If you do not have that box checked then on completion of the skill it will not flag you because the check was made at the start that there was a flagged party member; and then he will not he or she will not receive the beneficial effect as a result or the damage, if it's an offensive spell. – Steven Sharif

• Combatant (purple)
  • Players are flagged as combatants if they attack another (non-corrupted) player when carrying out a forced attack. If the attacked player fights back, they are also flagged as combatants, otherwise the attacked player will remain flagged as a non-combatant.
    • This also applies to attacks made by combat pets, summons, or any other player-controlled entities.
  • Non-combatants entering an open world battleground (PvP event) are automatically flagged as combatants and remain flagged for a period of time after leaving that battleground.
  • Non-combatants who heal, buff, or otherwise interact with combatants or corrupted players will be flagged as combatants.
  • Players can kill combatants without repercussions, and are encouraged to do so, since dying while a combatant has reduced death penalties.
  • Players are not able to manually set their flagging status to combatant.
  • Players remain flagged for a period of 90 seconds following their most recent attack on a non-combatant or another combatant.
  • Players cannot log out while flagged as combatants.

You're not going to see griefing in the game very often; and that's because our flagging system. The corruption mechanics are based around disincentivizing a griefer or PKer but still offering the opportunity, should the occasion arise, where the benefits outweigh the risk, you have the ability to do so. If you gain corruption, which is killing a non-combatant - a player who is not fighting back basically - if you gain that corruption, your world has changed. It is not going to be a very beneficial place to be and you have the potential of losing your gear. Your combat efficacy decreases based on the amount of corruption you accrue. It is a comfortable balance between player agency and grief and basically removing player agency for other players. – Steven Sharif

• Corrupted (red)
  • If a combatant player, or their summon, kills a non-combatant player, including any of their controlled entities, such as their battle pet, mount, or summon, the player's character will be flagged as corrupted.
    • Corruption gained for killing controlled entities is a lower value than killing the players.
  • A character's PK value increases with each non-combatant player killed over the lifetime of that character.
  • The wider the level disparity between the players, and the higher the attacker's PK value, the more corruption score they gain.
  • A character's corruption score multiplies their death penalties and reveals a their location to bounty hunters.
  • If a non-combatant attacks a corrupt player, the non-combatant will not flag as a combatant.
  • Corrupted players may kill bounty hunters without acquiring additional corruption score.
  • There is a 60 second timer to logout while corrupt. Force-disconnecting the client during the cooldown will leave the character in-game.

It's important to note that the idea is going to be that, unless a player is in your party, alliance, guild, or raid that you will not have definitive knowledge of their exact hit point values. So when you do something that's sketchy like that, where you want to bring them close to death and let a monster finish him off, you are taking the risk of overhitting and actually gaining the corruption. – Steven Sharif

• Objective-based PvP events do not use the flagging system.
  • A player may not flag on members of the same party, raid, guild or alliance.

See also

• Guilds
• PvP