Contested Missions

**GypsyJuggler**

One of the things I got excited about when I first got the game was the suggestion of running missions against other players. I'm not sure where I got this idea, maybe I misread a review or invented it myself without noticing. Either way, I was disappointed not to see it.
A whole new dimension of gameplay could be added to MxO with the concept of Contested Missions.
Essentially the idea is this; When two or more players of the same level but different factions request a mission from a contact at about the same time, the game sets them a mission working against each other.

For example:
I request an escort mission from my contact who sends me to a building to pick up the person to be escorted.
While I am en-route an operative from another faction but of my level requests an assassination mission and is sent co-ordinates that describe the locations where I will be picking up and dropping off my charge.
I make the pick up and head for the drop-off point and my operator warns me that someone is on their way to stop me.
The opposing operative approaches my mission on an intercept course and eventually we run into each other.
The mission resolves depending on who survives.

There are a great many possibilities from the very complex - adding several operatives to a mission with changing parameters - to the very simple such as a direct assassination of another player.
I know it would be much more satisfying to kill 'Aardvark' after having defeated the player guarding him rather than an anonymous 'Merovingian Selective Phage' or somesuch.
It would probably have to be an optional feature though. Perhaps involving the creation of three more mission contacts so that you could choose a regular mission or a contested mission depending on who you called.

Anyone else have ideas about this sort of thing? I think it would be an excellent way to expand upon the great virtues of this game.

Balzak

I agree that this would be a great idea, i have a rough outline for how it could work and will most likely post it within a week, be sure to keep and eye out for it and post your thoughts

**bannanaphone**

but what would happen to A: people under lvl 16 on vector or

B: ~~carebear~~ non-hostile servers? as the assasin would easily win if he could not be attacked?

SEETHER

na, cool idea but it should be something that is done on a case by case basis, meaning both players have to choose a contested mission together.

But making the team pvp feature work would be better than this. Or make it so someone can duel or pvp on a non hostile server even if they are on a mission team. oh, that is team pvp kinda.

**GypsyJuggler**

I guess you'd either have to have enforced pvp during contested missions or set up a new 'contest' condition along the lines of duelling/pvp so that players involved could combat each other.

**Tytanya_MxO**

I like the concept here a great deal but do wonder if the implementation is a straightforward as it sounds....timming becomes very significant. If the game could create mision instances then these could be perma hostile....in fact contested missions probably shouldn't become available until the player exceeds level 16 and has 50+rep. An alternative to the instance would be to send the player into their relevent construct, spawn a npc to be escorted from the heart of the construct to your jack out point and then issue a system message to all operatives of one of the rival orgs telling them to stop you....you need to get into the construct and deliver your escort against odds which range from zero to impossible.....would be a useful team exercise.

Chuui

"but what would happen to A: people under lvl 16 on vector or
B: ~~carebear~~ non-hostile servers? as the assasin would easily win if he could not be attacked?"

The solution is fairly simple. Have these as an entirely new mission set, keeping the current missions for players that wish to run pure PVE missions, then set your contested missions as PVP missions only available to those over level 16 or those currently flagged for PVP.

I personally hate PVP, but with missions like this giving PVP a meaning, even I may be tempted to try running such missions. But you always need to keep pure PVE missions so that people (mainly new players/those on non-hostile servers) can still play the game in the manner they chose too.

SEETHER

I really likes Tytanya's idea. I relieves alot of the what ifs and puts use to the archives. Once I grew beyond Yuki, I rarely even visit them.

Called

Tytanya_MxO wrote:

I like the concept here a great deal but do wonder if the implementation is a straightforward as it sounds....timming becomes very significant. If the game could create mision instances then these could be perma hostile....in fact contested missions probably shouldn't become available until the player exceeds level 16 and has 50+rep. An alternative to the instance would be to send the player into their relevent construct, spawn a npc to be escorted from the heart of the construct to your jack out point and then issue a system message to all operatives of one of the rival orgs telling them to stop you....you need to get into the construct and deliver your escort against odds which range from zero to impossible.....would be a useful team exercise.

Fantastic, easily (I hope) implementable idea. SMILEY

Or, like Wow where I like the idea, is to "request" a type of mission and level. When someone else "requests" the same mission and level the mission is on. Teams would be frozen to players level, bracketed by5 levels either way. So a level 50 couldnt join a lvl 16 contested mission.

ArdenStarmariner

The objection I have to this is that they way players end up with a contested mission. Weither or not a mission is contested must be selectable by the player, not the uncontrolled way you wrote it up. People will get a bit ticked off having to abort a bunch of missions until they get an uncontested one. The mission panel needs a checkbox so the player can specify if being assigned a contestable mission is acceptable or not. Not providing this is just a sneaky way of slipping forced PvP into the game and the player base won't tolerate that.

Called

ArdenStarmariner wrote:

The objection I have to this is that they way players end up with a contested mission. Weither or not a mission is contested must be selectable by the player, not the uncontrolled way you wrote it up. People will get a bit ticked off having to abort a bunch of missions until they get an uncontested one. The mission panel needs a checkbox so the player can specify if being assigned a contestable mission is acceptable or not. Not providing this is just a sneaky way of slipping forced PvP into the game and the player base won't tolerate that.

/agree on this point

There should be 3 sets of missions:

Criticals (same as it is now)
Standard (same as it is now)
Contested

Contested will be either any type mission, or level based.

**GypsyJuggler**

Ahh, I see what you mean and I can say I didn't mean it to be a forced situation when I wrote it up. I should say I agree with Chuui's post and Tytanya's suggestion about level and Rep. Thanks for the continued interest in this thread.

**ShadowReapr**

I like this idea. Could be more than one type though: Espionage: One team (A) must keep the other (B) from retrieving their ViP (for intended 'information retrieval'), yet an alternative option is for the B team to bug the extraction location, getting the option anyway.

The stated Assassination type: Team A must escort ViP to extraction, keeping the ViP alive (would not be highest-level, but definitely able to survive a suicide squad). A team would have to scout out the roads ahead, because there might be a Sniper lurking on a rooftop somewhere...

Protect the Engineer: Something needs fixing, and it's up to Team A to protect the Engineer from Team B. These missions would be placed relatively near hardline, to reduce dead-time, and leave the option open for co-ordination.

It'd be kind of like the days of Protect the Shaper, except without the Lag-Bombs going off.

**Tiango**

Or i could send a system messege to the other represented enemy faction of all the required level to try and eliminate your if you succeed in the escort you get XP if the enemy suceeds he get's the XP.................... and so on

**GypsyJuggler**

I should say at this point that Rarebit has said on the current 'Ask the Devs' thread that PvP missions are extremely unlikely to ever see the light of day. Even so, keep the ideas flowing, one day someone may decide it's worth the trouble and dig up this thread for the keen insights contained within. Thanks everyone SMILEY