Alright so, as the topic states, I want to discuss ideas involving the Cay quest and how it effect the Sea Battle. In game wise, other than envoying it which would bring no change, I'd rather discuss it here.
As it stands right now, turning cay to your side equals win. There is no other outcome. Neutral is the only way both sides of the table is on equal playing ground. The cay can be done once every 15 hours so for one side to turn it away from the other side and into their favor, would take in the area of 30+ hours, most of that waiting around twiddling their thumbs.
First and foremost, I think 15 hours is way too much for a quest reset that has an effect on epic quest. Secondly, auto win also effecting epic quest is also very frustrating. Why was the Cay ever introduced for this effect in the first place? It makes a nice bashing area, having a quest to do there is also nice, but why does it need to effect the sea battle, or effect it to such an extreme?
From Magnagora point of view, not only is the distance far greater than it is for Celest, we are having to go through enemy territory to even get to the Cay which risks great exp loss if Celest or someone else happens to catch you in the Inner Sea and kill you. The Cay quest never takes you into any part of Magnagora territory so Celest never takes the same risk.
If the admin would ever take opinions about changes to this quest, these are some of my own, and I'd hope the posts that follow this, would give their own, respectfully.
-Cay timmer should be drastically reduced
-Turning Cay in favor should not equal auto win for that side, but make it harder for the other side but not impossible as it is now.
-Because of the location of the Cay, maybe either add a way by land to reach Cay directly from Balach Swamp
OR
-add a counter Cay quest in the Sea of Despair which would make Celest have to take the same risk Magnagora currently does in entering enemy territory to do a quest.
-on this counter quest idea, basically, make it nullify the Cay, set it back to neutral and cause it to reset in an hour or so. In this instance, the current timer really would not be as hard to deal with as it is now.
Comments
I think the request to modify enemy areas is a little silly. That specific change is a little to carebear. Sometimes you die. Run faster next time.
Moving it to Neutral leaves it with a 15-hour neutral period (so everyone can work on it during that time). This also helps prevent it from just being spammed back and forth; I'm pretty sure the reason it has a long cooldown is specifically to prevent such, and that would be a major headache.
Doing the quest gives you a 1-hour guarantee of 'peace', before it can be undone.
I'm not really convinced of the "enemy territory" point simply because of the plethora of ways to teleport into an area. Torus, hermit, demesne center, demigod anchor power, pyramid points, and so on; you really just need to get into the area once, and the first time you run through the Sea you're just not going to get caught. It's the repeated attempts to run through it once they know you're trying that they are watching out for. Plus, the enemy territory is NPC enemy territory, so there's no "risk of great loss".
The real issue would, to me, appear to be that you can be locked out for 15+ hours without being able to do a thing during that time and I'd think it would be pretty simple to adjust that.
To put that another way, more time has to be spent in the Inner Sea or in areas connected to it than in the Sea of Despair or areas connected to it. That fact doesn't change, no matter which side you're on.
yes, you are enemied for killing kelpie (not the ones that are released mutant and warrior), dragon turtles (even the ones that end up in SoD), and dolphins.to be enemied to SoD, ladantine, vampire squid and seawolves if/when we have them.
While you're forced to walk through enemy to get to the cay, at no point are you really forced to be in the Inner Sea for very long during your general epic chain (you have to walk to the Ship of the Dead to raise it, IIRC, and that's the only instance).
Conversely, Celest is forced to spend an entire 1/3 of their epic quests in enemy territory (Spectres) and the majority of another 1/3 in off-prime territory (Reflections of Malacoda). Of the remaining 1/3, it requires, as Magnagora's does, winning the sea battle, and then they are forced partake of an occasionally frustrating (though mitigated by auto walk and hermits, pyramids, etc) trudge through the Sea of Despair to a room loyal to Ladantine, multiple times, to raise Marilynth.
That's excluding the fact their entire city quest requires them to leave to city, alone in that IIRC (save Gaudiguch and its okorushi, I suppose) to collect mobs anyone can steal, and requires a mob that can not only be killed, is deliberately done at regular intervals (not to accuse or point fingers, it's a game of conflict, I certainly don't blame anyone).
There's also a perceived disparity between the difficult to raise turtles and sea wolves - one requires time, luck, and a bit of bashing, the other requires a bit of bashing (or waiting for invulnerability to wear off). I think (but could be mistaken) that when the "evil" cay quest is done, Lanikai can't be reached to do the Celest beacons quest altogether.
Regarding the Cay, I think reducing the reset time greatly would cause far more frustration than you would ever imagine. Not everyone remembers back to the daily sea battles and fighting over that quest, but as it is now is far better/more comfortable.
I note there is another quest which has a direct effect on the Sea quests as well, and is essentially an "I win" button should it be completed, in the same vein as the Cay. Nothing stops you from completing it.
Edit: I did just remember the Arysian quest requires hunting Merians in Nyalia, though that's rarely a place of contention. Still, I do feel obligated to point it out.
I understand the point. I simply disagree that a slight "imbalance" in terms of enemy territory time requires a change simply because people don't like being in enemy territory/risk a death. The argument wasn't to change the quest to include possible Mag deaths, so I can only assume people just don't like the risk.
Does it being in enemy territory make the quest difficult to complete for competent and equipped players to a degree that it's unfair for Magnagora? That's the question, really, and to which I answer "Not any more so than someone spawn killing mobs."
I see no issue with addressing the rest of the problem. I just don't thin having to walk through enemy territory which will take a small handful of seconds requires admin code time. Just walk faster. Or learn to escape better. Welcome to Lusternia, people die.
Anyhow, I am focusing purely on this part of the epic for celest and mag, the winning of the sea battle, nothing more.
1. The Sea battle happens ~7 RL days after Marilynth/The Ship of the Dead goes down from the last sea battle. Who wins is decided by totalling up the number of Sea Wolves in the Sea of Despair and the number of Dragon Turtle in the Inner Sea and comparing the two. Whoever has more is the victor.
2. Celest makes more Dragon Turtles by leading an already existing Dragon Turtle to the Isle of Light in the Inner Sea. You can only get a Dragon Turtle to follow you if it is "searching around frantically" which happens at a semi-random time after the turtle is first spawned and you give it a shark corpse. Magnagora gets rid of Dragon Turtles by killing them, except for 1 dragon turtle that respawns as long as the Cay isn't Pro-Magnagora.
3. Magnagora makes more Sea Wolves by giving Dolphin corpses to Ladantine. This requires that Ladantine be alive, that the Dolphins not be protected by either the Celest-Cay quest or the Seashell Necklace quest. Celest gets rid of Sea Wolves by killing them and giving them to Lanikai, which spawns another Dolphin in the Inner Sea as a result. The sum of Dolphins and Sea Wolves is fixed.
4. Each Warrior Kelpie alive at the time of the Sea Battle counts as one Dragon Turtle or one Sea Wolf for the purposes of who wins the Sea Battle. It spawns about 30 of them or so. Seriously. If you do the Joiya side quest, they appear in the Inner Sea and count as Dragon Turtles and if you do the Jeitara side quest, they appear in the Sea of Despair and count as Sea Wolves. In either case, they don't enemy and you lower their numbers by going into enemy territory to kill them.
5. The Cay has 3 possible states: Pro-Celest, Neutral or Pro-Magnagora. The Celest Cay quest moves it one step toward Celest and the Magnagora Cay quest moves it one step toward Magnagora. If it's at Pro-Celest, Dolphins, Dragon Turtles, Lanikai and Kelpies cannot be killed, making it imposible for Magnagora to gain Seawolves or remove Dragon Turtles. If it's at Pro-Magnagora, all of the Dragon Turtles (including the one respawning one), all of the Kelpies and Lanikai die and don't respawn until it's at least Neutral, making it impossible to kill Sea Wolves and getting rid off all the Dragon Turtles automatically.
My personal suggestions:
-Make a ship on Nyalia that goes to the Cay. This lets you go Alabaster Highway to Tidal Flats, Tidal Flats to Nyalia and then Nyalia to Cay without ever stepping into the water. I bet you could even convince Celest to fund it.
-Make it so that if you do the Pro-Celest quest while the Cay is currently Pro-Celest, or the Pro-Magnagora while the Cay is Pro-Magnagora, it resets after only 1 hour. This means that Celest isn't going to complete the Cay quest every time it opens in order to keep Magnagora from doing it and that Magnagora can't do the same if they end up on top next summer.
Also is Spectre isle linked to SoD enemy territory? I always thought they were separate areas.
The divine voice of Avechna, the Avenger reverberates powerfully, "Congratulations, Morkarion, you are the Bringer of Death indeed."
You see Estarra the Eternal shout, "Morkarion is no more! Mourn the mortal! But welcome True Ascendant Karlach, of the Realm of Death!
Also, if any shark corpse works, culling all of the sharks in the Basin would be nearly a full-time job.
Equivalent to that would be saying this - get rid of the sea shell quest to protect the dolphins and then, for every sea wolf you have, there's a percent chance (less than 50%) you might be able to convert one more dolphin per hour. There will always be one sea wolf.
I've only been skimming (the past couple of days have been really busy for me), but it seems like a lot of the people complaining about the quest itself actually don't understand the quest mechanics of the opposing side. Not all, but it seems there's a few. I also note the seashell quest, while nice, can't be used to protect all the dolphins in one run (it takes a couple). The protection is also not too long-lived (a few hours), so you'd have a small off period before having to do more runs, just to keep them all protected.
While it may seem unfair that dolphins can be protected and seawolves cannot, you can very easily raise 20 sea wolves in half an hour - conversely, dragon turtles take a fair amount of effort over an extended period of time (you have to scour the Inner Sea to find all the turtles, see if any are golden, if so find a shark to kill, then find that wandering, golden turtle again - every hour for quite a while).
So your 'way to halt turtles' request/thought is pretty far awry. And I think in the long run, you'd find it to be untenable to maintain actively due to low population at the current time, and worse that sea wolves being harder to raise will make it that much worse for you.
To note, the winner of the Sea Battle is determined by the number of dragon turtles versus the number of sea wolves. Kelpies, etc don't play into it (beyond the effects of the Carai Caroo quest, that do have an effect on Ladantine/Lanikai).
Also, while you can say 'Nothing on spectres enemies to Ladantine so you can just walk through protected', nothing on Cloadahi enemies to Kelpies so you can just walk through the Inner Seas, protected. So it seems like either both are perceived problems, or neither are. Particularly since the argument being made is Magnagora is forced to spend too much time in enemy territory for their epic quest versus Celest.
Like I said though, I really don't have a formed opinion on whether or not it's a problem. I think the real issue (as touched on by Phudmog) is the population disparity. Honestly, I don't think any of you genuinely want the Cay quest reset time to be reduced. It would just prove frustrating to both orgs when the objective becomes 'complete it or frustrate them until they can't'. Which would lead to calls demanding it be open PK (which have already started, even though on-prime areas are not and won't be open PK save for specific events), or enemy-able territory. And given there's no sapient population save the transmogrified souls of a Holy Celestine Empire project participants and they're invulnerable, that doesn't really make sense (or, for the organizations it would make sense - like the Kelpies - it would tilt it pretty unfairly in favour of Celest).
And while some are griping regarding having to walk through 4 rooms of the Inner Sea to the Cloadahi Cay, they're in the same group who has no problem entering the Inner Sea to kill Lanikai and run away. Certainly, you can make your way through those four rooms pretty quickly, before anyone can attack (or instead of killing Lanikai, send someone to get diplomacy - or run around the Cay until the attack timer wears off - or hermit/pyramid/anchor.
While I'm still not really of an opinion regarding the 'fairness' of the battle, I don't think the proposed solutions really 'work' in the long run to resolve the problem(s) - nor do I really buy some of the problems (having to walk through enemy territory) are actually such big deals as they're made out to be.
It won't be so easy to kill Ladantine/Lanikai. Nor will Lanikai always be dead, so Celest can complete their other parts of the epic quest.
Cubix/Torus/Medallions have a direct exit to spectre isle, even I cannot get to Cay without passing the Inner Sea.