The future of Era (Gangs).
 

Hello, lovelies.

Now you're probably wondering why I called you, the players of Era lovelies, and I'd like you to know it's because I care and it has occurred to me that the current gang system and functionalities that accompany them are not as "productive" as I once presumed. In correspondence, there have been a large variety of changes proposed, such as, returning old gangs, the addition of the gang shop and many other things. So after reviewing ideas, I have constructed a method to utilize the benefits of every proposed plan into one integrated form. This means we would be combining the basic ideas of the old gang system, the current system, even adding new raiding methods, gang shop (for major items) and so on and so forth. However, a I do not believe in making such a large decision without first hearing your thoughts on the matter. Simply because if this doesn't pan out, all this work would of been for nothing.

The concept, overall will revert Era to a three-gang system. Now even though there will only be three gangs on Era, they will still be replaceable based on their performance, and activity. Each gang will have a default amount of members, which is twenty-five.

General ideas being proposed

• GMAP Bases
• Gang Shops
• Capture Points
• Gang Guns
• Raid Bonuses

GMAP bases

There will be four adorable bases, each granted a GMAP Design, similar to that of the current avantgarde base. The reason for this is that GMAP bases place a greater emphasis on strategy than the previous individual level bases, as well as they reduce players from laming. In terms of individual design, the avantgarde base will remain the same and will be the primary, "capturable", gang raiding base on Era. This base will only be active during high periods of player activity (player count, in other words). Also, the points received form the avantgarde base will be double the amount of the other bases. The other gang bases will have a GMAP style similar to the original Black Holst, Blazian Bandits, and Los Carteles bases. Each base will also include the healing room, spar room, and the meeting room, which will all be located within each base. I would also like point out that these bases will not have a capture point.

Gang shop

The gang shop will allow gangs to spend their total points and personal points on gang-related items. Items would be something along the lines of gang guns, upgrades, and more slots. Note: Slots will actually increase on their own, so there's no need to spend points on this. Obviously there is more we could add, but as of now I can't think of anything better to add to this shop. So feel free to add your input here.

Gang guns

Gang guns will be available within the gang shop (obviously). The goal is for the gang to be able to choose which gun they would like to have to represent themselves. The other option we could do with this is simply allowing each gang to freely choose which gun they'd like to have and from there they would be able to purchase upgrades for said gun.

Raid bonuses

Now one of the basic ideas I have for raid bonuses will be listed here and will continue to grow with your feedback. One cool idea I thought would be nice to implement into Era is the use of kill streaks. Now after the first five kills, I was thinking it would be neat to have a fun little bonus. What that bonus is, is obviously unknown at this point. I was thinking it could be interesting to gain a bonus gun and as long as you're able to keep your kill streak, the guns stats would also increase or add new features. One fun feature could be a grenade launcher, or a clip increase. Stuff like that I think would be great incentive for players to want to raid. Now one key factor to remember though is that if you die at any point, you lose your kill streak, which means you lose all the progress with the gun. One thing I thought would be fun is to make the gun random, which hopefully wouldn't make things so mundane (boring).

And finally, this is an idea I've been having for a while and I'm not sure how the players of Era would feel about it, so I'd like to talk about it here. What would you, players of Era, think if I made everything on Era that is considered important to be surrounding unstick me. Which is also something I've actually tried implementing, I just haven't gone through with the full transition (talking about the mall). What I mean by this is, making everything that we use everyday, like the hospital, gang bases, and the spar complex to be located fairly close to unstick. This, I think, would help increase gang activity, and even help new players in transitioning into Era.

Thank you for actually taking the time to read this, I appreciate it.

There you go thinking again...One of these days you'll really hurt yourself.

having everything important near unstick defeats the purpose of the rest of the gmap, you'll just turn 90% of era into a parking lot. Furthermore, where do you draw the line that defines 'important'? Because you didn't list any businesses, the player owned houses, the mines, etc. you know..all the other things people use every day
Also inb4 TK can miss the obvious flaws and instead point out (again) that this isn't EXACTLY like the old system
at least you tried, right?

3 * 25 = 75. Why cap your playercount at 75?

I think your ideas on raiding are misguided. The GMAP bases are decent, but they don't compare to some of the old bases. The classic BB and BH bases had their problems, but they were still a lot of fun to raid because of all the different ways you could do it. The GMAP bases are so large that they limit this. I think you'll find most people prefer the old bases.

Capture points are also a mistake. They sound really good on paper (and work well in KotH), but they end up focusing all of the fighting on one area of the base and making the rest unused. With the old system, a gang would often just sit on the first floor, or maybe the heal floor, and fight off opposing gangs as they came in. One gang owned the base and could open doors, but it didn't have that big of an impact on the raiding. Capture points take away the fun of being able to hold a certain floor and wait for some gang to burst in because the gang is too busy sitting within 5 tiles of some chest on the third floor. Perhaps all gang doors would have to be broken down by everyone or some other arrangement without a capture point.

As I told you before, if you can keep the killstreaks simple (e.g. one kill = instant heal when you die, three kills = respawn at unstick, five kills = heal faster for 60 seconds—stuff like that), they are a good way to make raiding more interesting. However, without doing anything else, all you're doing is adding rewards and making it like grinding. If you double the rewards you get from mining, it doesn't get more fun, just more tolerable. The same applies here.

Chris is right: the main reason why everyone hates this gang system is avantagarde and avantarge v2 (there are always gang members on tag. they play ulms even without points, gang events but most choose not to raid in avantgarde since they don't like to chase ppl down the whole raid): 2 bases which failed miserably. So why would you award double points in avantgarde v2?
Scoper u don't pk so u might not understand this: everthing close to unstick=fast paced game. I love the idea, and I also like chris's ideas of killstreaks which would also increase the pace of the game.
how to defeat door laming in the old bases? make something that damages you when ur standing to block door (something like an unlimited caltrop), which will also affect you when you're trying to escape with ur tail between ur legs. but door laming wasn't an issue imo, since any properly lead gang would take sewers to avoid door laming

just put the old Gang Bases , and put the system 15 seconds to get out.

Everyone will like.

This is perfection. Or even just 7-10 seconds to make it fair.

Blocking off doors is fun and If I ever had any trouble getting in due to 4 people blocking all 4 angles I usually bring something explosive as surprise.

I agree with Chris here.

Except I personally believe adding the kill streaks would just induce more running/laming/healing/etc. And this would definitely have to be balanced; ex. people like Wil Soul can walk in a base and burn 5 kills every time without breaking a sweat, being able to say.. respawn at unstick with full hp every time he does this (aka every time) would essentially make him unkillable, because he would appear in the base mere seconds later.

there should be at least 4 gangs. the more gangs, the more competitive it is. think about if there were only 2 gangs. that would be boring. 3 makes it a bit more interesting, but 4 is the perfect balance in my opinion. also, the member cap is really unnecessary. from what I've noticed, era has been pulling in a pretty decent player count lately, and limiting content to a select group of people isn't smart.

you really should consider developing more content for players who either can't get in a gang, or choose not to, because right now there's very little. the chunk of the server's content revolves around gangs.

make the gmap smaller. don't just cram everything in the middle. the gmap desperately needs to be redesigned. just press m and look how messy everything is. start off by cutting out everything below the south beach and the area up north with all the houses. recreate southridge strictly as a residential player housing area, but make it a separate gmap and accessible by train. not everything has to be connected together with one gmap.

the main island of era can be reduced a lot, and the overall map layout can be redesigned so unstick me and the hospital is in the middle and the 4 gang bases can be located within each corner of the map. it would make things fun and a lot more visually appealing as well compared to the current gmap now.

bases r best when they're next to unstick or hospital


wil can't kill 3 ppl every life unless u let him cookie..maybe in the avantgarde base but not in a tight base where it's easy to get cornered
if killstreaks only concern respawning (when u respawn it means you've died) it doesn't break the ballance too much since the gang controlling the base is bound to die less since they can get revived or defended by team-mates. on the other hand if ur given extra damage, speed or anything that OP it'll turn the best gang (or the decent gang with more members on) into an unbeatable squad
i think 90% of era can agree that as 1 of the new bases they'd like to see the old bh base added, which was the place where raids happened most of the time with the old gang system. you could position it replacing by era mafia, auction house or anything near unstick.

now that we know the future of gangs, can we actually have some bases to raid in? this weekend's activity was very poor so there havnt been any raids that lasted longer than 10minutes since last weekend

I love all of the ideas that you posted Tim! Good job.

Lol it was Saint Patrick's Day.

Even I wasn't on...

i thought u guys were american not irish lol

Love the idea !

I'm pretty sure Halloween is Scottish or Irish or something, why didn't you complain about that?

He did?

We still never got that Halloween shop.

lmao halloween is only celebrated in the USA (also mexico it seems though)

He was complaining about St.Patricks being celebrated, he never complained about Halloween being celebrated.

It's celebrated worldwide..

not in europe, u can stay sure about that..we have carneval
we celebrate november the 1st though, the day of/for the dead

Speaking of Killstreaks, this is a ticket I submitted last April.

"Killstreaks in Raids: (only active inside gang bases)
-2 kills: 20 armor points
-4 kills: .03 extra speed, lasting 1 minute after 4th kill
-6 kills: Bullets cause people to bleed, lasting 1 minute after the 6th kill
-8 kills: Come back to life after death at half-health (killstreak reset)"

but maybe 1,3,5, and 7 would be better than 2,4,6, and 8 kills.

those r quite OP xD

make it nasty

Great Britain does celebrates Halloween. I'm not sure if England does as they have guy fawkes night. But the rest celebrates halloween. I'm british and i live in the UK. :)

Guy Fawkes was a boss.

i'm sure u love to celebrate halloween, but i'm 99% sure u dont get vacation on halloween anywhere in europe
alf is now trolling me but his excuse for being too lazy to make a halloween shop was: "why should i make a halloween shop? it's only a US holiday which most of the world doesn't even celebrate" or something similar with a bit of mexican slang in it

We don't even get vacation in the US for halloween.

cause halloween day is just a blasty blast isnt it

Halloween is the best day ever. Especially if it falls on a weekend. Usually ends up as 4-5 days of drinking... uhhhhh juice

apple cider bro

Rubbin' on that italian leather got those convict jeans on

wasn't he a terrorist? lol

He was a conspirator, a traitor and a murderer.

aka terrorist

Well i'm not American so i'm quessing they use the word vacation for time of? If so, then i'm 100% we do get vacation for halloween :)

Just bring the old base, old gang system, and maybe old Leaders back...
This one is getting boring, and the base is one HUGE level, for no reason.

Vote +1 for Old Gang Sys,

As someone who misses the old gangs as well, I know how most of you guys feel about them being gone. Unfortunately Era does not have the same RPG elements in it anymore to enforce gang conflict without physical rewards. I've been working on something fairly lengthy to make gang raids more interesting while also keeping its dynamic nature intact (meaning not static like admin-enforced gangs that BH, LC, BB, etc once were).

It's not a half-assed system by any means. I feel a lot of you will enjoy it when it's done. As for now I only have basic systems and templates built, so I'll hold off on anymore info until I get a solid foundation for presentation.

it's good that staff is working a lot on gangs, but what era wants (as we could see from the gang poll) is quite simple:
1. less gangs so that gangs will become larger in order to have larger raids and larger/more frequent gang events
2. smaller bases (just bring old BH and maybe even BB bases back..it took years of taking off/adding walls, furniture and that kind of stuff to reach a final result everyone liked) so that people can't run around the base in circles when they're at low hp AND raids will also be possible when there are 2 or 3 members of each gang online who want to raid and not only when there are loads of people online and on gang tag (which usually only happens on weekends).

I think you should just elect TK as GBA.
straight up

players to be heeded and players to make staff are two very, very different things.

probably the biggest misunderstanding in graal administration