Jogabilidade

We like to really refer to ourselves as a PvX game, because in those systems of PvP, PvE, crafting they're all intertwined: They're interdependent on each other... Our system of development really requires some interdependence there between those things. You're going to need a crafter to give you the best items. You're going to need PvPers to secure cities and castles. You're gonna need PvErs to take down those world bosses for those materials to craft.^[1] – Steven Sharif

Ashes is a comprehensive game. It is not a PvP focused or a PvE focused, it is a comprehensive PvX game and as a result these systems are all interconnected and have to coexist with one another with certain types of mechanisms that can provide that give and take, that push and shove.^[2] – Steven Sharif

Ashes of Creation is a PvX game. Players will naturally encounter both Pvp and PvE elements.^[2]^[3]^[4] It is unlikely that a player could purely focus on just Pvp or just PvE.^[4]

There is a balance between Pvp and PvE in Ashes of Creation.^[4]
All stats relate to a player's combat effectiveness in PvX.^[5]
There won't be separate PvE and Pvp servers but some servers may be more PvP focused than others.^[3]^[6]
There will not be different Pvp and PvE gear types.^[7]
Progressão in the game might require PvE elements.^[4]

We're very clear with our objective and philosophy on the game and we understand that they may not appeal to everybody. But you know it is an important reciprocal relationship between the content that's related to PvE and the content that's related to PvP and they feed off of each other. They're catalysts for change: Their progression, their development. It's things that people can value when they see something earned and they see something lost. That elicits an emotional response from the player: That they've invested time in to either succeed or fail; and PvP allows for that element to be introduced into gameplay. And we're very clear that is our objective: That risk versus reward relationship, that achievement-based mentality. Not everybody's going to be a winner and that's okay.^[8] – Steven Sharif

Pvp

Alpha-1 open world caravan Pvp.^[9]

O combate entre jogadores no Ashes of Creation é vasto e pessoal. Ele abrange muitos aspectos do jogo em si. Desde grandes batalhas políticas realizadas nos campos de castelos maciços, até conflitos mundiais abertos, lutando pelo orgulho dos Líderes da Guilda. Um jogador pode escolher participar do destino do mundo balançando a maré de batalha com sua destreza de combate. Nossas mecânicas de PvP seguem um sistema de sinalização, bem como zonas estáticas de PvP em certos pontos de interesse; lute pelo controle de cidades, castelos, caravanas, ou locais de caça. Nosso PvP é projetado para oferecer aos jogadores um mundo equilibrado e justo para moldar através da caneta, ou da espada, caso eles escolham.^[10]

O Pvp (combate jogador vs jogador) é o catalisador para a mudança no Ashes of Creation.^[11] O combate entre jogadores pretende ser significativo, desde batalhas de Caravanas até vastos conflitos mundiais abertos disputados pelo orgulho de Reis e Rainhas.^[12]

Os jogadores são motivados por coisas diferentes, porque querem algo do jogo que os outros jogadores não querem, isso vai fazer com que as pessoas tenham desavenças. Jogadores diferentes vão querer experiências diferentes e o conflito entre os dois vai criar uma coisa maior e melhor. Da briga vem o renascimento e isso é um símbolo central, é um tema central que ocorre durante todo o jogo.^[13] – Jeffrey Bard

Há muitas razões para engajar no PvP de mundo aberto em Ashes of Creation.^[14]

Só porque nosso sistema de sinalização dá corrupção aos pkers, não significa que o PvP não vai acontecer. Há muitas razões para o PvP ocorrer em um mundo aberto. Recursos escassos, áreas de caça no mundo aberto, caravanas, cercos, guerras entre guildas, etc.^[14] – Steven Sharif

As penalidades de morte não se aplicam a eventos baseados em objetivos (tais como caravanas, guerras entre guildas, e cercos de bases).^[15]

Caravan PvP

Caravan PvP in Alpha-1.^[16]

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.^[17] – Steven Sharif

Caravanas create an open PvP zone that flags players for combat (purple).^[18]

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.^[17]
- Cargo is represented in this way even if a cosmetic caravan skin has been applied to the caravan.^[17]
Players will be able to state their intentions to attack, defend or ignore via a user interface window.^[19]^[20]^[21]
- The proximity that the UI window appears is determined by the player's performance as either a defender or an attacker in previous raids.^[19]
A group will be required to successfully attack a caravan.^[22]^[23]
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.^[24]
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.^[25]

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.^[19] – Steven Sharif

There will be incentives and risks for both caravan attackers and defenders.^[26]^[27] These will be tested and refined during the alpha and beta testing phases.^[28]

Death penalties (mostly) do not apply to objective-based events (such as caravans, guild wars, and node sieges).^[26]^[27]^[15]^[29]
- Gear degradation applies on death during Caravan PvP.^[26]^[27]

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.^[26] – 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.^[26]^[27]^[28]

Other incentives and risks are social and are created (informally) between players.^[26]^[28]

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.^[28] – Steven Sharif

Cercos do castelo

Alpha-1 castle siege gameplay.^[30]

Throughout Ashes of Creation, the player has an opportunity to participate in massively multiplayer siege warfare. Since castles are likely the world’s most limited resource, it will be a task to secure and hold them. Involving hundreds of players on a single battlefield, our sieges will employ many moving parts and intricate design features. Because of the difficult nature of taking and keeping a castle there are great rewards available to the players for their efforts. Castles will allow players to exert control over nearby lands and allow for the development of unique buildings in the nearby towns.^[10]

Guildas participate in Cercos do castelo in an effort to capture and occupy one of the five guild castles in Ashes of Creation.^[31]

Sieges occur once a month within a server prime-time window.^[32]^[31]^[33]^[34]

The minimum goal is for 250x250 players to be on a single battlefield. It is hoped that this can be increased to 500x500 over time.^[35]

There will be systems that mimic some of the mechanics of sieges, but there won't be practice sieges.^[36]

There may be instanced locations within otherwise open-world castle and node sieges, where specific groups can participate in small, short duration objective-based battles that will affect the overall outcome of the siege.^[37]
- It was previously stated that castle sieges may or may not be (entirely) instanced in the final game.^[38]
- Alpha-1 castle sieges occurred in an open-world zone that was accessible via a NPC teleporter.^[39]^[40]^[38]^[41]

A guild that captures a castle will own that castle for a month before it is sieged again.^[42]^[43]

Each week leading up to the siege week... is a week that's dedicated to one of the three castle dedicated nodes. So around the castle there are three nodes. They represent week, one, two, and three; and then the fourth week is the siege against the castle. Those can only be elevated up to stage three. We've discussed this in the past and there's definitely information out there on the community ran wiki.^[42] – Steven Sharif

In the first three weeks that a guild occupies a castle they will need to level up each of their castle nodes to Vilarejo stage through questing.^[42]^[43]
- Each of the three castle nodes have a siege against it at the end of each of these three weeks.^[43]^[44]
The fourth week is declaration week, where other guilds have the opportunity to lay down their declaration flag or to sign up as a defender of the castle.^[42]^[43]
Depending on how well the guild defends their castle nodes results in better defenses for the castle.^[43]^[44]
Different siege weaponry will grant the attackers the ability to destroy walls, doors and sections of the castle in order to gain access to the inner keep area.^[45]
When castles change hands (following a siege), some taxes stay with the castle and some stay with the guild.^[46]

There will be benefits to attracting people... even if they're not in your guild or alliance – kind of a feudal like system, where you can attract other players who are just independent of this whole politic. They will have things to do there - benefits to receive - and there will be a reciprocal relationship between who you can attract, what they do for you; and how that benefits you and them.^[43] – Steven Sharif

Alpha-1 castle sieges

Alpha-1 preview castle.^[47]

Trebuchets in the Alpha-1 preview castle siege attackers headquarter camp.^[48]

Alpha-1 preview castle siege gameplay.^[49]

Alpha-1 castle sieges are based on Ashes of Creation Apocalypse castle sieges.^[50]^[41]

Players will be able to join guilds. These guilds can register for the siege events.^[48]
Castle siege events will be 100v100 battles that occur daily and will last for three hours.^[48]
Attackers will start on the opposite end of the map (from the defenders).^[48]
Attackers will be able to use trebuchets to drive to and assault the castle.^[48]
- Trebuchets have a single primary fire that does a small amount of damage to players and heavy damage to buildings.^[48]
- Trebuchets will be fully physical when they are being driven.^[48]
When the attackers have breached the castle they will be able to channel a cast on the relic in the throne room to try to capture the castle from the defenders.^[48]
The victors of castle sieges will receive benefits, such as cloaks, flying mounts for guild leaders and potentially also for guild officers.^[48]
Alpha-1 castle sieges are in a separate zone that is accessible via a NPC teleporter.^[39]^[40]^[38]
Currently the siege zone is actually in the open world, but separated by mountains and off in the sea a bit. There is actually no instancing in A1, although the siege zone will only be accessible in A1 through a registration NPC teleporter.^[39] – Steven Sharif
- This zone includes the following raid bosses.^[50]
- These bosses will also appear in the open-world (outside the siege zone) with slightly different mechanics.^[40]
The opposing team is notified when these raid bosses are being attacked.^[50]
Teams who get the last hit on these bosses will receive buffs that will help them in the siege battle.^[50]

Last year, I spoke of attempting to incorporate sieges into the Alpha One experience. This has obviously been a goal of mine because it provides considerable data and a consistent event within the world that players can participate in to help stress test the deployment. Well, I am happy to say that it is appearing more and more likely by the day! Initial implementation of the Apocalypse siege code has been migrated into the Alpha One client, and we should begin internal testing next month. I will caveat this expectation with the fact that we are cutting it a bit close from an internal QA standpoint, but I have some confidence that the system will be online and capable of inclusion for the Alpha One test in the month of June. The siege component will obviously not be representative of what the siege system will be at launch, or even in Alpha Two.^[41] – Steven Sharif

Destructible structures (such as walls and gates) are present in Alpha-1 castle sieges.^[51]
- The ability to repair structures (and siege weapons) is a long term design goal that will not be present during Alpha-1.^[51]

Cercos de base

Cercos de base (vídeo do Pre-alpha).^[52]

À medida que certas áreas do mundo crescem, outras cairão. Essa é a fundação do mundo vívido e ativo que é Ashes of Creation, onde os jogadores tem a habilidade de tomar decisões cruciais que importam para a longevidade de uma área se tornar uma cidade, ou a decisão de cercear uma cidade rival. Erga-se das cinzas, crie o mundo ao seu redor, e seja parte da história que é escrita através das suas ações e decisões.^[53] – Margaret Krohn

Cercos de base permitem que os jogadores destruam bases.^[53] Isso abre o caminho para novos desenvolvimentos e o acesso a conteúdos bloqueados nas bases próximas. Devido a essa dinâmica, o conflito político e a intriga fazem um papel importante na estrutura do mundo.^[54]

Cercear uma base não será uma tarefa fácil para os atacantes. Cidades e metrópoles terão uma vantagem defensiva considerável.^[54]

Se você possui um lar em uma base e não quer que ele seja destruído, terá que defender a cidade!^[13] – Steven Sharif

Bases podem cair de nível de acordo com a Atrofia de Base.^[53]

Guerras Guild

Guild war features are currently still in the design stage, but the overall goal is for guild wars to be objective-based with great risk for each side.^[55]

Guild war objectives are designed to be more fluid than castle siege objectives.^[56]
Guild wars can be declared at any time, but the objectives will only spawn during server prime-time.^[57]
- Players can kill each other at any time during the war (not only during server prime-time).^[57]
Guild wars will not be permanent. Definitive victory conditions exist that are based on the level of the warring guilds and the assets that those guilds have.^[58]

I can't really define exactly what those features are yet because that design stage is still up in the air from a discussion standpoint. There's a lot of different ideas that relates to how those two can come into play, but I will say that in every MMO I've ever played guild wars are very binary. They're very like 'Okay you've declared, you have a number of kills to deaths and the guild war's over, thank you...' My objective to kind of change that dynamic is to include greater risk for the sides to initiate the war and also to make it more objective-based than just a binary kill death ratio; and the fortresses and guild halls come into that type of facilitating that change.^[55] – Steven Sharif

Hunting grounds

You are on the prowl, and notice an unsuspecting player chopping trees. What would you do?^[59]

Hunting grounds are open-world Pvp corruption-enabled areas that encompass most of the map.^[60]

Hunting grounds refer to killing monsters or NPCs in the open-world.^[60]^[61]
This also refers to contesting resources.^[62]

One of the interesting components of Ashes of Creation and our flagging system is that it presents the potential for two conflicting parties to have open conflict in the open world over pretty much anything that they may want or disagree with; and if that pertains to a hunting ground, not just the caravan or the castles or the nodes or whatever, it can exist in that area.^[63] – Steven Sharif

Outside of PvP for certain things like caravans, sieges of nodes and/or castles is that you're going to have those open-world hunting ground fights that may occur. You're going to have resources fights that may occur. You're going to have political fights that may occur between members of guilds; and we're taking the guild politics to a whole new direction in regards to playing those conflicts out.^[62] – Steven Sharif

Our PvP mechanics follow a flagging system, as well as static PvP zones at certain points of interest; fight for control over cities, castles, caravans, or hunting grounds. Our PvP is designed to offer the players a well-balanced and fair world to shape through the pen, or sword should they choose.^[64]

Naval PvP

Operators of a ship's weapons platform can initiate naval PvP against another ship in the following three cases.^[65]

Another important change that has occurred is the open seas is now an automatic flagged location. So when you move off of land we have a flagging system that protects and the open seas are international waters where you need to be careful; and there is a lot of opportunity at Sea; and because there's a lot of opportunity that's unique to that content- that's unique to that sea: that's treasure finding; that's NPCs; that's a lot of different stuff there needs to be risk associated with opportunity.^[66] – Steven Sharif

When the ships move into an open sea (open waters/deep ocean) area. This will automatically flag players as Combatants (purple).^[67]^[66]^[65] Corrupted (red) players will remain red while in the open sea.^[68]^[69]
- Players entering an open seas area will be notified by the UI ahead of time.^[70]
- Open sea zones have better resources in more abundance to compensate for the added level of risk.^[71]

We have a very intuitive UI that that as you approach the border between open sea and coastal area you are notified of that. You are warned ahead of time. There's a countdown when approaching. We interpolate the distance travel and speed you're moving and you get to see "I'm entering open waters"; and when you do you have this big trophy call out on screen that says "You have entered the open sea. Territory fraught."^[70] – Steven Sharif

The result of events (such as guild wars or node wars) between the parties.^[65]
As the result of open-world PvP, utilizing the flagging and corruption system.^[65]

Arenas

Pre-alpha arena combat footage from PAX West 2017.

Pre-alpha Arena UI.^[72]

As arenas são cenários de Pvp instanciados e não fazem parte do PvP de mundo aberto.^[73]

As arenas terão 1x1, 3x3, 5x5 e possivelmente um Free-For-All de 20x20 (Deathmatch).^[74]
Não haverão especificamente arenas de guilda vs guilda porém, um matchmaking baseado em equipas, permitirá um grupo enfrentar outro grupo.^[75]
Haverá um sistema de rank de arena.^[74]
As recompensas para os ranks de arena serão reveladas mais tarde.^[76]
Títulos poderão ser recebidos por participação em arenas.^[77]
Pontos de arena que podem ser usados para comprar equipamento não estão planejados no momento.^[77]
Os Prefeitos de bases militares são escolhidos entre os cidadãos através de um "last man standing" (estilo arena gladiatorial).^[78]^[77]
O sistema de arena poderá suportar combate cross-server.^[79]
As arenas serão instanciadas mas podem haver espectadores através de uma interface.^[80]

PvE

Alpha-1 Elder Dragon of the Tundra raid boss.^[81]

The environment in Ashes of Creation is a visually stunning realm, with fantastical beasts and creations designed to both inspire awe and instill fear. The world is harsh and unforgiving, presenting a clear and present danger to the players. Dungeons, demons and dragons, oh MY! Our unique and adaptive AI means that an encounter with similar creatures will yield a completely different experience to adapt to as a player. Keeping you on your toes for constantly changing responses from your adversary. The world awaits its heroes.^[10]

Elder Dragon of the Wood raid boss gameplay.^[82]

Whenever you have a player versus environment setting you don't want a stagnant kind of overly repetitive because its lackluster. It does not have that a component that engages.^[83] – Steven Sharif

The Node system facilitates the generation of new PvE content such as Missões, Masmorras, Raids and Moedas do monstro.^[12]

There is going to be a lot of PvE content for all portions of the playerbase... Part of that risk versus reward: Your risk is your time you're putting in to having a chance at getting the reward and successfully completing; and that should feel good based on how much time you devote. Now I know that there's a spectrum of casual and hard-core players in the time there, what we can do, but that's why we have many different content paths that play towards how you affect the world around you.^[84] – Steven Sharif

PvE content adapts to the development of the world to avoid repetition.^[83]

Alpha-1 PvE content

PvE content in Alpha-1:

There are over 200 quests in Alpha-1.^[40]
- Questing will be placeholder until Alpha-2.^[85]^[86]
Approximately 10 percent of the artisan system will be online in Alpha-1.^[87]^[88]
There are approximately 49 unique gear sets obtainable in Alpha-1.^[40]
- These are unique sets with different stats, but some may be similar in appearance.^[40]
There is no instancing in Alpha-1.^[39]
Approximately 6 or 7 dungeons with one almost raid-level difficulty.^[89]
Two world bosses requiring party-sized groups.^[89]
One true 40 person raid boss.^[89]
Alpha-1 castle sieges occur in a zone that is accessible via a NPC teleporter.^[39]^[40]^[38]^[41]
- This zone includes three Elder dragon raid bosses.^[40]^[50]
- These bosses will also appear in the open world outside the siege zone with slightly different mechanics.^[40]

There's over 200 quests in the game right now. There's a bunch of dungeons. We've retooled all of the boss fights. Those dragons that you see in the siege are also in the world- part of the open-world too. There will be a slightly different- there are some extra mechanics in the siege versions versus the ones that are in the world, but there's plenty of cool things to get on both of them, so make sure you check them out and hunt them down.^[40] – Jeffrey Bard

Missões

Alpha-1 early quest user interface.^[90]

Questing in our world combines the best elements of traditional MMO’s as well as the introduction of our unique player driven experiences. Ashes of Creation offers area quests, public quests, and quest chains that change dynamically and in real time based on the player’s experiences and choices. Players will have the ability to directly alter world events and change the landscape through their actions, as an individual and as a community. Server quests will allow political rivals to compete for the fate of the world.^[10]

Alpha-2 quest journal user interface early preview.^[91]

We actually used the journal as one of our test cases for the style guide because it's a very complex screen. There's a lot of things that are going on, where we have different tiers of story arcs that might be available for players; and so we wanted to make sure the color denoted different information for them. We also have iconography to support that as well; and we have a little bit of a twist on what a traditional quest system would be like. With these story arcs we wanted to make sure that it was organized in a familiar way, but also something that supported all of the designs needs.^[92] – Colby Marchi

Missões in Ashes of Creation are divided into three categories: Events, Tarefas and Narrative quests.^[93]^[94]^[95]

All three categories of quests will be available from a variety of local, hidden and discovered sources, such as bulletin boards and NPC quest givers.^[96]

We’re going to be breaking up what is traditionally called ‘questing’ into three different categories: Narratives, Events, and Tasks. We want to avoid going down the path of trying to force narrative into gameplay where it doesn’t really fit (ie: filler stuff that doesn’t really relate to what’s happening in the world).^[95]

Questing will be placeholder until Alpha-2.^[85]^[86]

Masmorras

Dünzenkell Crypt open-world Dünir dungeon in Alpha-1.^[97]

Alpha-0 Dünir Dünheim dungeon design by Michael Bacon.^[98]^[99]

Masmorras in Ashes of Creation will range in size and will be mostly open-world.^[100]^[101]

Open world dungeons will be populated to facilitate multiple groups within the dungeon.^[102]
- 80% of dungeons will be open world.^[103]^[104]
Instanced dungeons will also be present and will cater for solo and group questlines.^[102]
- 20% of dungeons will be instanced.^[103]^[104]

There are going to be smaller, simpler, linear dungeons. There's going to be bigger, more complex, nonlinear dungeons. So, It's a little bit of both. We want the environment to be a character. In order for the environment to be a character, these places need to be interesting and there needs to be a dynamicism to them.^[100] – Jeffrey Bard

Half the problem won't just be solving the dungeon, it will be solving other players too.^[102] – Jeffrey Bard

Dungeon difficulty will increase the further a player ventures into the dungeon.^[105]

Mobs and mob mechanics will become more difficult.^[105]
Terrain and environmental dangers will increase.^[105]

Deeper darker types of interactions will be found deeper in the dungeon.^[105] – Steven Sharif

There are approximately 6 or 7 dungeons in Alpha-1.^[89]

One will almost be raid-level difficulty.^[89]

Raids

Alpha-1 Brood Queen raid boss.^[106]

Entering an Alpha-1 open-world raid.^[107]

Raids will either be based on triggered events or more traditional systems. Traditional world bosses will change based on node development.^[108]

We want things to be more fluid and one of the ways that we make them more fluid is through our triggered event system. That is one of the methods by which we make these more spontaneous. We make them more accessible to a wider audience. You can be just in the city and not normally be a part of a raid team, but now get to participate in this organic event that's kind of popped up around the city and if you are not participating then buildings are gonna get destroyed and NPCs are going to die... It's not just how fast can we do it, how will we get it done in its schedule, but oh my god this thing popped up if we don't kill it we're not going to access to our stables this week and we can't get our animal husbandry certificates... It's that risk versus reward that gives you a sense of adrenaline.^[109] – Steven Sharif

There is one true 40 person raid boss and an almost raid-level dungeon in Alpha-1.^[89]

Chefes mundiais

Alpha-1 preview Sorrow's Hunger world boss in the Underrealm.^[110]

There will be ancillary effects that happen as a result of downing certain world bosses.^[111]

When a server downs a legendary boss, I want it to cost time, resources, dedication; and when you do that I want everyone to benefit from it.^[112] – Steven Sharif