There is this thing with prestige that one can build a city worth 3 millions and its based purely on blocks and size etc. It can be a ghost place and the player(s) can even stop playing but if in GC it may stand there for months being a capital of a world even though nothing is happening there.
So, what if settlement ranking was based on both prestige of builds and activity inside a settlement?
Reputation would be the new stat showing how busy is a given settlement. It wouldn’t affect footfall, only decide about settlement ranking.
I imagine it could be based on last month (4 weeks) crafting and shop stand/basket transactions. So, as an example - add all crafting xp within settlement to Reputation. If all players crafting within settlement beacons crafted for 4 million xp, turn it into Reputation (1 to 1? 2 to 1? anything else? matter of balancing).
The same way turn all transaction worth in coins (only stands and bakets, no trading included) into Reputation. If all stands and baskets in settlement recorded transactions for 3 million coins, calculate Reputation based on this (again, in what proportions is a matter of balancing).
Add Reputation and Prestige to create total stat for each settlement (whatever you want to call it: maybe Impoortance lol). Count only last month (4 weeks) and roll weeks by replacing the first week in the calculation with the currently completed week. This way Reputation would truly show changes in activity of settlements citizens.
EXAMPLE (how it could switch the ranking in favor of active communities):
Big but not very active city: 3,000,000 Prestige but only 500,000 Reputation from activities = 3,500,000 Impoortance ()
Smaller city but very active: 1,500,000 Prestige but also 3,000,000 Reputation = 4,500,000 Impoortance.
I like the Idea but I think crafting XP is a bad indicator for activity, since it can be massively exploited by a single character and is also strongly liked to prestige dumping which creates the ghost town capitals in the first place.
Shop turnover or even number of footfall payments generated is a way better indicator.
I find the idea horrifying but interesting at the same time Giving another reward for banding together would make tighter communities, but at the same time it might make big groups that want to stay competitive be forced to move all their workshops. No small feat to some I’d imagine.
Sounds very exploitable by one person with two characters. Xp exploit, sell rock back n forth between characters at 9c to avoid tax on shop stand rinse repeat
It may be better to call it Activity and have it more as a separate column/list on the settlement rankings screen. See how it affects people in game before tossing the prestige system on its head. Why would a person move to the capital if they are looking for a community when the #2 or #3 prestige city is where all the action is at? It may help change the capital organically without really changing prestige at all.
There have been many of these threads in EA that a few of us here were heavily invested in, but none of us ever found a way to add activity, player rep, or anything like that directly into prestige without it being easy to exploit.
Prestige doesn’t have to do with the number of people or something being a city. A single person can build a #1 prestige build on a planet and be larger then a city of several players.
This suggestion takes that concept and minimizes it in favor of hubs or ‘cities’.
If an individual takes the time to craft some huge amazing build on a planet…I think it can be #1…even if people aren’t buying from their shop stands
If it comes to exploitation - all systems are prone to that. Including prestige now (all the machines placed for it, in the past it was gleam, we have other “expensive” blocks too).
So, at the moment it’s only a very general idea - would need refining, more details and exploit-limiting measures etc. Then balancing etc.
But I think it would be very good to have something that lifts active settlements up the list of cities on worlds.
Activity here, I meant not just more players being online or organizing events. More like crafting/trading fame for cities. The way cities in human histories were famous for producing marble, great quality metals or amazing art or for being trading centers. That’s why I put crafting there as counting towards Reputation. If a city has a player with big crafting house and that player crafts thousands of bricks and sells them then in his shop in that city, why not reward that settlement for being a brick production/trade center in a world or even in entire Boundless universe?
I am against adding anything other than prestige to capitals because I would love more accurate ways to see the cities listed. Manufacturing and tourist locations are not limited to the 5 largest cities in a county. So why are we limiting ourselves to just a single list? Add more lists so reputation actually means something other than a new name for prestige.
Landmark list based on player likes for a city.
Recent economic activity so its easy to see market locations.
Manufacturing so we can see the most active workshops or upcoming builds.
^ i have 4 alts it would be super easy for me to spend a hour farm a inv full of stone then pop it into shop stands and sell them to my alts then have my alts sell them back to me and repeat it evey day to keep cap
Note the month time span for Reputation. It’s not additive over time either so no matter how much Reputation you got in the past, you are judged by what you have done recently.
You might think you can add to crafting and trading easily, but you need to do it on regular basis all the time. Sure that must be tiring to repeat the same thing every day instead of actually playing the game (doing things you want to do like mining, hunting, keeping portals up etc.).
You might find will and energy to farm rock and turn it to stone for xp or trade between alts, but after 1 million xp one month you will be down to 100.000 xp next unless you are a robot lol. Someone genuinely buying a lot of resources from people and then crafting and selling gem tools, brick, marble etc. will always beat you to it. So you will be better to spend your time crafting and selling/buying what you really need and take your place in the worlds prestige list (with satisfaction and pride whatever it is).
Measures against exploiting can be easily added this way or another.
But even in its basic form it gives genuine crafters/traders advantage over any exploit master who would want to use their alts to trade and craft for Reputation.
Other than that - current prestige is exploitable anyway and we live with it. It gives us some kind of goal to work towards and classifies settlements in a way. This suggestion at least adds element of activity and moves dead settlements down the prestige list, showing any exploring players more accurate picture of who is doing things in game rather than sitting on pile of prestigious blocks with no one around. At the same time big empty builds are not removed from prestige lists, and will be still there to find and visit for those interested.
My thinking is this: impressive build in the middle of a dessert is nice to see but prestige lists should show places that are alive on top.
Hail Impoortance!!
If you want to have something that is 100% isolated from the prestige system, then that’s fine by me.
However I do not agree with combining it with the current system. Anyone who wants to should be allowed to try to displace and take capital status if they put the effort in, even if it is just one player. It is even an achievement in the game. I rather not see this be locked to portal hub owners.
its a MMO game - its normal that group endeavors stand better chance and to be true that’s the case with capitals based solely on prestige anyway - a single player can only really do it on worlds where there are no big groups trying to build a city
it’s normal and healthy that way; it’s enough that this game is playable solo (hunting, mining, exploring, running a shop etc. - all very much doable alone)
guilds affording big buffs, running portal hubs, being a capital of a world - naturally achievable in larger groups; this kind of goals don’t need to be within reach of a solo player
Yes groups have a better chance, but the thing you suggest reduces the chance of a solo player by quite an obscene amount in most cases.
I disagree with this from personal classified experience relating to ███ █████ on █████ at ██/██/████.
And I disagree with this. And I will keep on disagreeing with this statement until the time comes they actually add valuable group content in which grouping is an requirement (z.B. Raiding and Dungeons.)
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Giving another reward for banding together would make tighter communities, but at the same time it might make big groups that want to stay competitive be forced to move all their workshops. No small feat to some I’d imagine.
