Monday 21 June 2010

The biggest and most complicated update RoB has ever seen has arrived.



I'd like to thank you all for your patience with this. Spot & I have been working very hard over the past few weeks, from setting up formulas to coding to testing. I'm really excited to get this rolling and hope you all like it.

It's been a feature which has been lightly suggested for a while but we thought if we're going to do something this big and game changing, we'll do it right, and do it well, and do it with depth. Yeah, we like depth.

It's funny because few weeks ago when Spot & I were on the drawing board with this thing loads of forum posts started popping up about it... we thought you were all onto us, he was giving me shit for telling people about it! (Complete lie btw, i love secrets). I imagine some of you could have guessed the feature, but here it is.

I present a brand new coven war system.

It will replace the current coven "battle system" which is a lazy mans way to get coven exp, i know lots of you like lazy, but lazy doesn't do your health any good.

If you don't want to read how it works, just skip past the italic text.


With the new Coven War System, it is no longer based on a coven's total attack and defence; it is up to the members of the coven to win the war. Each week a coven is given 1 War Declaration. The coven chooses another coven it wishes to declare war on. Only the coven owner will have the option of declaring war. Once war is declared, both covens are involved in a war that lasts 72 hours. In that time the members of each coven kill the opposing coven's members as much as possible. The coven who has drained the most blood at the end of the 72 hours will win the war. If you win the war, you will receive a large amount of coven exp based upon the opposing covens level, average member level, and their total members. If you lose the war, your coven will lose coven exp. Your coven exp will not go below 0/XXX,XXXX and you will not go down a coven level if you lose a battle and the amount of exp you lose is more than the amount of exp you had. Up to 3 covens can declare war on your coven a week (it is only possible for one coven to declare war on you at a time), so you will have to fight off other covens at the same time you are fighting the one that you declared war on. This means your coven may have to make a strategic decision whether to focus its members onto one battle, or to try and fight all of them at once. Not all covens are equal to each other, so we have designed a Tier based system.

Covens are assigned a tier based upon the amount of members they have in their coven.

Tier 1 = 1-50 members
Tier 2 = 51-100 members
Tier 3 = 101-200 members
Tier 4 = 201-500 members
Tier 5 = 501-1000 members
Tier 6 = 1001-2000 members
Tier 7 = 2000+ members
(includes both active and inactive members in the coven)

What tier you are in does not matter; It only matters what tier your opponent is in. You can declare war on covens that are not in your tier, however, to encourage more competitive battles, you receive the full amount of exp for defeating an opponent in the same tier as you, a slightly less amount for defeating someone who is in a tier that is +/-1 tiers from your coven, a less amount if they're +/-2 tiers from your coven, and even less if they are +/-3 tiers from your coven, and so on. The disadvantage applies to if they are further below your tier or further above your tier. This means the further the opposing coven is from your tier, the less exp the winner will receive. You will have to choose either to have an easy battle of a coven that is in a different tier and get less exp for winning, or take the risk to get the full exp and battle a coven in your own tier. Clicking on the info link will display that covens tier. You cannot attack the same coven twice in a row.

Members of both covens will be notified if their coven has declared war or has had war declared on them via a notification displayed when the players log in as well as a notification in the coven news log. Due to the resulting lag, it is not possible to automatically send out mass news or BL notifications to all members to alert them of the war. I am sorry. Please do not request this.

During the war, the scores (the amount of blood you drained) are not displayed to either coven. You won't know whether you are winning or losing. After the war is over, the scores is displayed to both covens on the archive pages.

A coven can surrender a war that is declared on them by another coven, but cannot surrender a war they started. Covens are given 2 white flags a month, they reset each month and are not rolled over. When a coven surrenders, the other team is automatically declared the winner, and you lose a much smaller amount of exp than if they were to continue the battle and lose. If the other team surrenders, it will still count as a win for you, however if you surrender, even though you still lose exp from it, it does not count as a loss, it is displayed as a surrender. The other coven only receives half of the experience they would have won if the other coven surrenders & you will lose half the exp you would have lost if you fought and lost. You can be attacked more in a month than the amount of white flags you receive, so the coven owner will have to decide carefully when to use their white flags. 




Coven owners will see a link to the above guide on their coven pages if they want to read over it again.
- The "info" link on the coven hall now shows that covens tier
- Coven search page has been improved slightly as it'll probably be used more now
- Added a player guide to FAQ system (search "coven wars")
- Updated coven stats page to show war system results
- Update coven leaderboard pages too
- Added active wars & archive in the Dead City

Below is a video I made which basically explains it in action:


I'm not the errr best err speaker but i explained with my current 1.2mb internet (damn sky) an overview. Between the video and the above intro it should cover everything. Couple thing missed from the video, including surrenders, you get 2 white flags a month and can be used at any point during the war. Also that you can search any coven in the archive but it only show you the blood results if your coven was involved in the war.

This is the core of the new system, we've spent a lot of time working on this, the actual workings are so complicated and complex that we're not going to explain the inner workings of them. All you need to know is what's in the guide above.

We would love feedback on this, good or bad. I've setup a forum post where you can discuss feedback and we can reply to it.

I'll be tweaking the layout of the pages throughout the day, so you may see some small changes being made.

I hope you enjoy it, we've worked really hard on it!
I'm reading for the hatin' ....

Ash

59 comments:

Aftershock "Spot" said...

For all those covens annoyed that they don't get an instant EXP boost when they kill the same coven day after day, give this system a try before you condemn it.

Anonymous said...

Love it! Great idea!

Anonymous said...

Thats kind of stupid that if a Tier 1 took out a Tier 7 they would get less experience than if they took out another Tier 1.

DarkAsh said...

"To encourage more competitive battles, you receive the full amount of exp for defeating an opponent in the same tier as you"

Aquena said...

I think this is a great idea. Cant wait to see in motion. Goodwork boys :)

Anonymous said...

OMG this is going to be a demented experience. If covens were competitive before this is going to take it to an entirely new and much more personal level.

Anonymous said...

How is that encouraging competition if one is penalized for taking out higher levels..... Hitting lower tiers I can see but not higher.

Duke Danse Macambre said...

Good show, I like the new feature but has me tempted at having a coven again.
Its a good thing I want to keep my cash or I would. :P

Now Raven can finaly declare war in style. :)

Aftershock "Spot" said...

The reason it works both ways is because 1 a larger coven has more members and can throw it's weight around quite easily.. A smaller coven with few but powerful members would have hundreds of targets to attack in the bigger coven, but the bigger coven would only have 5-10 people it could attack once per hour. So really it can swing both ways when you're far outside your tier, depending on your and their coven.

Wolfpack said...

great work guys, im really looking forward to see this in action!

Anonymous said...

That makes some sense. Spot. Now I understand the penalizing.

Whiz said...

How can we search for members of a specific coven? I don't see anywhere that lists members.

DarkAsh said...

battle tab at the top >> coven search

Aftershock "Spot" said...

Go to the Battle tab and then click Coven Search. There you can select a coven and other options such as dead/alive and how many members to display and it will show you their members.

Anonymous said...

It looks great!! I can't wait! Great job Ash and Spot!


-Fairah Montalvo

Teada Moon said...

This will be fun!! Can't wait to get started :D

Anonymous said...

It all seems cool, with exception of one thing.
I think Owners and Co Owners should be given the ability to Coven Battle.
Owner and Co Owners own the Coven equally,that being the case, both offices should be allowed to use that function.

Shadow Stalker said...

Sooooooooooo fucking tempted to get me a coven with a few mates and seriously kick ass around RoB :d Hope this works like I am thinking it will dam shame I'm going away for a few days :(

DarkAsh said...

Added quick link to list alive members in enemy coven on the battle arena page.

Anonymous said...

I like the idea Ash

Anonymous said...

I think the whole coven war thing is kinda stupid. Most of us have vamps from several different covens in our enemy lists & now we have to limit them to only 1-3 covens. Also, vamps who are either inactive or busy training won't be able to contribute--which makes things even more unfair.

At the very least, remove the Coven EXP penalty for loosing when another coven declares war upon you. This is no different than vamps loosing Blood every time they are attacked & killed by other vamps.

Both are equally wrong & discourage advancement. The loss of Blood from being attacked (which I hope to never see happen) would discourage one from ranking-up. The loss of Coven EXP from being picked on by a stronger coven will discourage Coven Owners from recruiting newbies--which are the future of Reign of Bloods continued success. I vote against being penalized for merely being targeted by another. Whether a bully vamp or a coven full of bullies, it is just wrong. Getting killed hourly/every 15 minutes is harassment enough. They do not need the added pleasure of forcing another coven to loose Coven EXP as well.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, Lemme guess.. Buds is going to be the worst coven to get in war.. lets just say that :L :)

Sinara Dominor said...

This just added a whole new dimension to the game... can't wait to see how activity will be affected with the new level of competition. Kudos, fellas.

Anonymous said...

I don't like it. It messes with my strategies. I don't attack vampires. Right this moment, I'm trying to raise my stats so I can be able to defeat higher levels than myself. And it's working. Now, this tells me I have to be an even more active member in my coven, and use my precious turns to attack opposing covens... That's some bullshit. Not only will this cause pressure, but it will also be harder for me to play RoB Because I can't always be around to work on it.

I like the concept... But to implement it, is... Bad.

Perhaps if you'd allow more turns per hour, I would like it better. That way I can set aside a certain amount for training, and battling. And just because I don't have VIP doesn't mean that you can tell me to buy VIP to get more turns.. I'm poor folk, and have no monies.

Seriously, like 20 turns an hour would be perfect for the free accounts. And like 25-30 for VIP would be amazing.

But like I said. I'm not attack based, and I don't like this.

zephyr said...

let's all just try it out before we form an opinion.then we can comment and make suggestions from experience...thanks for the hard work you guys put in. : )=

QP said...

I love it Ash!!

Aftershock "Spot" said...

"I don't like it. It messes with my strategies. I don't attack vampires. Right this moment, I'm trying to raise my stats so I can be able to defeat higher levels than myself."

Aww, I'm sorry Anonymous, did we mess up your plans for world domination? :(
You're more than welcome to quit your coven, or simply do nothing to help your coven and be lazy and selfish. :)

Anonymous said...

This is cool and all, but you guys really need to start making options like this for Co-Owners as well. Hell, I'm Co-Owner of my coven and I'm the leader of the Army, meaning it's my job for declaring war and seeing it out, not the Owner's.

I would just like to see more options for the Co-Owner's, seeing as we help our coven just as much, if not more, than the Owner themselves.

Private Dexter Grif said...

Hold on... if the win/loss determiner is total blood earned from the opponent over the week timespan, would it not give an absurd advantage to any coven with an extremely low number of members?

Stick with me here - let's say I have a coven of just me: one Rank 26 vampire. I then declare war on Buds. If I get killed every TOH, or let's even say once every 15 mins, the MAX times I could be killed is 4 per hour X 24 hrs X 7 days, which if my head math is right, is a grand total of 672 deaths (only possible if I don't sleep and keep reviving after each time I'm killed). I believe I get about that much in turns in one day.

So I, as a theoretical one-vampire coven, can get 7X more wins MINIMUM than any coven with at least enough members on which I could use all of my turns. That's all but a GUARANTEED victory. All I'd have to do is show up.

This idea, IMHO, is excellent. It makes people actually WORK for their covens. However, the inherent flaw in it is that the win-loss system favours the smaller active coven vastly more than the larger one.

If I'm missing something here in the explanation, please let me know... but it seems as though I've found a loophole that would destroy the very spirit of the competition the plan is seeking to create.

Sirius said...

DarkAsh but I think some people are wondering about what if a lower Tier defeats a higher Tier, does the Lower tier get more EXP because they defeated a higher tier?

Anonymous said...

My only issue with this system - While we all hate whiners and this IS a killing game. In the long run, don't you think this will hurt the n00bs who have yet to learn that it doesnt matter if they are killed, and they'll leave?

DarkAsh said...

@Sirius - Read aftershock spots previous comments.

@Private Dexter Grif - If you take down buds with a coven with just you in it, you'd get bugger all exp if you do win, which is why there is a tier system to help stop that. If you wanna say you "beat" buds, that's fair enough, but you'll be wasting wars because you would advance very slowly.

Anonymous said...

This new system may be more beneficial to some covens, but not for all.

Why not just use both systems or let the Owners choose which they like best? All covens could still be targeted via either system. However, the Coven EXP gains would be determined by the method chosen (aka Daily Attack or Coven War).

Why not have it so it can only be changed on the first of every month? That should be fair.

P.I.M.P. said...

This is a great idea, I love it. I can't wait to see how this pans out. Although, it would be nice to have a retreat feature. Besides the other couven always has the option of a counter offensive anyways. Guess it is what it is and maybe I can chisel away at you for this.

Anonymous said...

I love that English commoner accent. lolz

Anonymous said...

All my inactives got the boot baby. Is that what you wanted? And well I can just kill all the members in the coven then the other coven can not kill them. A plus to being a small coven.

Anonymous said...

Well my inactives in the coven got the boot as no dead weight needed. I can just kill all the members in my coven and then the other coven can't kill them. The plus to being in a small coven.

Legion White Tiger said...

I'm liking this, it gets players more involved. Well done guys. :)

Miyo Tenshi said...

Omg its awesome it worried me at first, but then i came here, it made sense, Im happy that when you kill them they are taken off the list, so you are not confussed about who you just attaked. Lol, but its great Can't wait for the next round!

Aidric Aeternum said...

I like what i see n i cant wait to try it out!!!!:p


nice accent ash:p

Ravyn Alexion Darkbourne (214404) said...

Thus far I believe it is a fantastic addition to the site because this way people don't just have the ability to click and button and get free experience. This way you will be able to see what coven not only have the leader but also the members that are dedicated enough to further their coven and see them rise to the top.

The only downside that I can see so far is the disruption in enemy list killing and the use of turns people might want for training. Then again, just vote and there you go! Anyway good job guys, as a coven leader I love this new feature!

~R.A.D.

Anonymous said...

This means that inactive are not going to be a bonus for a Coven [Like Buds]... but instead a hindrance... Sure You can kill Coven Members for war to keep the other Coven to get them.. but honestly how long will that last? One War? MAYBE Two? -- Who is going to continue killing so many members when They could be using those turns to train into a better position for Their Coven? You can't mass message all Your members that there is going to be a War, or that War was even declared... You can't check the status of the War between.. I think the new set up is extremely interesting and could be a very good thing for RoB as a whole.. No longer do the massive Coven's win due to a member count in stats.. But instead with hard work and organization. But there are plenty of kinks that need to be worked out.

Arkhon said...

This is truly a revelation, congratulations to both of you for making what I think it’s the best upgrade so far. I’m looking forward to see this in action.

Anonymous said...

Any chance we can get a "view all members" button on the 'more info' page when viewing a coven in the coven hall?

Aftershock "Spot" said...

Anonymous, you can have Battle >> Coven Search opened up in another window/tab and just search the coven there. If you have the "All" status set it will show members alive and dead.

Anonymous said...

This thing sounds good.but one thing bad is that other coven member will kill me everyhour so i will lay dead everytime.:(

Aftershock "Spot" said...

Coven Owners can choose whether or not coven members can kill members within their own coven. It would be smart for them to allow it, but if it's causing a problem within the coven, the owner can always stop it.

Ham said...

Am disliking how when you click on the Coven War Enemies that you are at war with, it shows all "Alive" members, but still shows those "Been attacked in the last 15 minutes".

Anonymous said...

I think that it should be based on how much coven experience you give to the coven rather than blood. Simply because coven experience doesn't do the whole x2 x3 thing the way blood does when you kill someone of same or higher rank. And it's more level and fair. So basically by this, I could kill a rank 156 (Bux) and get 400+ blood and only kill him a couple times and in that alone give a huge advantage to my coven.

Blood hasn't been involved in anything coven based, so I don't see why it would be now. Makes more sense to have it corrolate to coven experience gained.

Otherwise, this is super neat and I'm really excited. Hopefully this'll give RoB some life outside of the chatrooms finally!

Anonymous said...

Aftershock "Spot" said...

"I don't like it. It messes with my strategies. I don't attack vampires. Right this moment, I'm trying to raise my stats so I can be able to defeat higher levels than myself."

Aww, I'm sorry Anonymous, did we mess up your plans for world domination? :(
You're more than welcome to quit your coven, or simply do nothing to help your coven and be lazy and selfish. :)

I think that this comment was completely out of line "SPOT" seeing as some Vamps have been in the game long enough to actually rank up then sure this idea works. But this post actually makes sense. We will not be able to train and kill and if you look at most covens they actually tell you to train your stats to help the coven. now I will be having all the lower ranks fighting to save face instead of using there turns to actually train and get stronger. It's ok we all know that you have "ROB WORLD DOMINATION" as ASH's side-kick however you should not knock someone's opinion just because you don't agree with it. very unprofessional if you ask me and just goes to show that you don't take what we as the people that support ROB by buying VIP and PLASMA the respect and courtesy to just say ok your concern was noted instead of disrespecting someone. Karma's a bitch and you have shown your true colors "friend".

Riz said...

YES! Thrill to kill is how we roll! ~flashes razor sharp fangs and snarls~

Anonymous said...

I agree co-owner should have power to battle

Anonymous said...

maybe there could be a separate turns which u get eg. 5 an hour but u only receive during the Coven war and can only be used to attack other vampires and clear at the end of the war unless another war is on at the time. That way people can train and battle

Anonymous said...

war is battle

Anonymous said...

ima go fap

Anonymous said...

so... our coven is in a battle with another coven. the opposition's highest level vampire kills their entire coven and then attacks ours.

not sure how that will work out in the end, but having them do that kinda sucks.

Anonymous said...

Amazing. First you pick our pockets with the nonsense of the rubies and the new weapons, punishing us for being prosperous. Now you bring one element of Immortal Night into a game which is not Immortal Night and you don't even provide a way of telling how the battle is going... we're supposed to wait until it's over and a number magically appears telling us if we've won or lost, without the slightest idea of how that number was arrived at; what a great way of making a mockery of the work we've put into developing ourselves and our coven.

Thank you so much.

Anonymous said...

ash has a sexy accent (non-homo)

Anonymous said...

still fapping

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