Expand WST Concept to other areas

[KelvinKole]

I like the WST concept a lot. It gives me an incentive to visit some content I might otherwise pass on, or revisit content that I’ve out leveled. It also brings together people of varying levels. Although I dislike “speed runs”, I accept it is sometimes inevitable and for the best. 
 

Can we expand the concept of offering an incentive on specific content?

 

Weekly Strike Zone: Radio missions in this zone offer 1 merit per, to a maximum of 10. Since my radio doesn’t work in skyway city at level 50, I can join someone who does or switch to a character in level range. 
 

Weekly Monster Target: Taking down this GM awards double merits. Can be completed once. 
 

Weekly Story Arc: Completing this story arc, either through traditional means or through Ouroboros, awards double merits. Can be completed once. 
 

Weekly AV Target: Taking down this AV awards 10 merits. Can be completed once. 

What other weekly objectives could be given?
 

 

[wjrasmussen]

To sum up, give me free stuff!

[KelvinKole]

Eh, that’s not really what it’s about. I care a lot less about the merits as I do about the reason to go and do something or the focus it provides to a relatively small player population to have a common objective for a week (other than AE). 

Edited June 10, 2021 by KelvinKole
I don’t always edit posts, but when I do I edit this one.

[Veracor]

Weekly Streetsweeps: Enemies in these zones give more rewards and/or snarky defeat messages than usual.

 

It'd be a good way to clean up all those Skulls from Perez Park!  Could have different level zones on rotation at once.

[ZorkNemesis]

2 hours ago, Veracor said:

Weekly Streetsweeps: Enemies in these zones give more rewards and/or snarky defeat messages than usual.

 

It'd be a good way to clean up all those Skulls from Perez Park!  Could have different level zones on rotation at once.

 

Only real issue there is the lack of zones for red and gold.  While Blue has all those empty hazard zones, Red only has Nerva and gold has pretty much nothing.

 

(not trying to jab at Nerva, I just find i'm never there for any reason these days.)

[Aeroprism]

I understand where the OP is going with this but I also agree with @wjrasmussen

 

If you want to do other things, do them.  There is no need for a reward but the reward of doing it. 

 

[old man] I remember, playing Everquest. Mobs didn't stop chasing you unless you changed zones and the more you fled, the more aggroed. This is what we called a "train". I used to hang out in low level zones, managing trains and buffing new characters.  The reward?  Itself.  [/old man]

 

You want to do things even if they don't give XP or merits?  Do them.  It's already easy enough to break this game, let's not break it further.

[KelvinKole]

The game is 17 years old and shouldn't even exist anymore. I don't think we need to be as concerned with breaking it as we do with maintaining accessibility to the content.

 

I hear the point about doing things solely for the enjoyment of it but I think the playerbase is largely casual these days; I know I am. The quickest way to get into the game and play, when you have 60min or less per day, is usually just to join a PUG running radios. The WST gives you a good chance to find a team doing that instead. Without it, you could spend 30 minutes just recruiting for the thing you want to do. Expanding that to other areas means I could log on to find multiple teams running missions in Kings Row (for merits), or teams running a story arc in Ouroboros (for merits), etc. I think it brings people together.

[wjrasmussen]

22 hours ago, KelvinKole said:

Eh, that’s not really what it’s about. I care a lot less about the merits as I do about the reason to go and do something or the focus it provides to a relatively small player population to have a common objective for a week (other than AE). 

I want free stuff

[Carnifax]

I actually think this is a really good idea. I've merits pouring out my ears but WST is a good way to focus teams towards certain content. 

 

I'd love to see some mechanism where a story arc got a better reward and auto-exemped people for a week to encourage / suggest content for people to run. 

 

I'd also love to see some system where some chosen / curated AE stories became "live" for a week or two in the same sort of vein. 

[Marshal_General]

They could make Weekly Go Hunt missions where it targets a mob that has a defeat badge attached to it.

[KelvinKole]

I like the AE idea a lot. I always feel so overwhelmed trying to find an arc to play. Some curated choices would be a great way to encourage utilization, for both makers and players. 

[Eldyem]

I'd love if the signature story arcs (Who Will Die? and Pandora's Box) were added to the WST rotation or given their own WST-esque rotation; it's annoyingly hard to get people together to do the villain ones even with the pretty substantial reward-to-time-investment they give right now.

[Eva Destruction]

A GM of the week would be a good idea, actually.  It can be difficult to get a team together to kill them, especially redside.   Make it one GM per week, period, not one red and one blue, and have the redside ones appear twice each in the rotation, to give people a bit of incentive to go over and help redsiders.  Increase the spawn rate for the monster of the week just to make it easier for people who don't play as much to get theirs (I actually wouldn't mind if all GMs could be deliberately spawned, like Adamastor and Caleb, but that's probably more work for the dev team than just making Jurassik spawn more than once in a blue moon.)

[Turric]

I am onboard

[Col. Kernel]

On 6/10/2021 at 5:11 PM, wjrasmussen said:

To sum up, give me free stuff!

 

No, it's more like "Whatever you subsidese you get more of."

 

 

[Heraclea]

I will admit that I do run weekly SFs for the merits.  This is so my established characters can work for the benefit of up and coming characters in my factory system.  I also enjoy the opportunity to collect lowbie salvage and recipes they often provide; lowbie salvage and set recipes that aren't level 50 are things that are in everlasting short supply. 

 

I do think that tagging along for a fair number of the preliminary missions and the final mission on old school content should give merit rewards to teammates who were there for more than half of the journey and not just to the mission owner. 

[Yoru-hime]

I like the idea in general. It's a common enough thing in other games to give an incentive for players to see a variety of content. The WSTs succeed at encouraging TF/SFs that otherwise aren't as commonly formed as the TFC series and ITF/Tinpex (Sutter, Kal, Respec trials). Expanding that to a more generic "Most Wanted List" or "Bounty Hunter's Weekly" might help people see that there's more to the game than they may have realized.

 

It can also be a variety of rewards, not just "more merits". Personally, I've usually got all the merits/influence I need, but I'd love to be able to score some form of extra XP boost to help get a character through the slog of the late 30s and 40s without grinding ITFs or radios. There are some good story arcs in that range but the XP gains while doing them are usually pretty terrible comparatively.

 

I like the idea of including AE as a way to show that there's more going on there than farming. Perhaps as a starting point, pick a Dev's Choice arc per week and have it award bonus tickets.