Can a company function as a "group"


Pathfinder Online

Goblin Squad Member

I alpha we have only seen group operations, where the other groups were not able to coordinate together. When a company wants to perform an activity, do they have to break down in to 6 unit groups or can they be single entity which can shift formation and partnering.

If companies have to work as 6 person groups and combat takes out half of 2 groups, those 6 are no longer working as a unit, they need to reorganize .

A cleric needs to be able to assist whoever is in the company.

Depending how damage is occurs, there may be reformed groups with no or 6 clerics. A group of wizards may find themselves to gather but no effectively support the combat because they reformed into local group when the units took damage, not into a proper combined arms team.

So, can a company fight as a group together (or does that take an aristocrat and formations to exceed 6)?

Goblin Squad Member

I am totally okay idea with the max party size being 6-10, and then needing someone with specific skills to expand it further. Just because a group of people are in a company together, doesn't mean they are automatically any good at working together as a unit (without someone with organizational prowess in charge).

Goblin Squad Member

@Lam, I expect that Formations will be the only way to have a group larger than 6.

Goblin Squad Member

Companies are not intended to act as raid groups or fleets; they're a social group not a tactical one. I'm with Nihimon in suspecting that that's what formations are for.

Goblin Squad Member

I actually was playing Planetside 2 the other day, and I was somewhat struck by the platoon/squad breakdown.

Each squad can have 12 men. Six squads can form into a platoon, where the first squad is concerned as the HQ.

In GW terms, there will be squads of six with formations of indeterminate/undisclosed sizes. Or, conversely, you will either be in squads, OR formations.

Either way, we will probably need to wait for Formations.

CEO, Goblinworks

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I think the party size is too small. But there won't be any changes in Alpha.

Goblin Squad Member

Note ps2 platoons need only two squads to make a platoon

Goblinworks Executive Founder

Ryan Dancey wrote:
I think the party size is too small. But there won't be any changes in Alpha.

What do you think the final maximum party size is likely to be, and what design considerations factor into that?

Goblin Squad Member

DeciusBrutus wrote:
Ryan Dancey wrote:
I think the party size is too small. But there won't be any changes in Alpha.
What do you think the final maximum party size is likely to be, and what design considerations factor into that?

Or even without formation mechanics and support, what can mere players handle as largest group?

What limits will UI have (e.g. identify character to whom buff is appiled)?

Goblin Squad Member

Guurzak wrote:
Companies are not intended to act as raid groups or fleets; they're a social group not a tactical one. I'm with Nihimon in suspecting that that's what formations are for.

Pretty sure some of the bonuses including some from early enrollment will only function within the same company.

I always saw companies as EVE fleets and Settlements as EVE corporations. (when you form a fleet in EVE, characters in certain roles can apply bonuses to other fleet members and PvE rewards are shared)

Goblinworks Game Designer

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The primary reason for the group size right now is keeping size on the UI manageable (particularly at different screen resolutions).

But it will have additional ramifications as systems come online such as:
* We're planning to share achievement credit for things with everyone nearby in your party; letting you have bigger parties makes those proportionately easier to get, and might require unintuitive diminishing returns to keep biggest party from being best party when going for achievements
* We've talked about auras and possibly other proximity buffs being limited to party members. Bigger parties makes these better. We haven't looked at this tech-wise at all, though, so it could still go either way.
* I can't recall at the moment exactly where we landed on party involvement in PvP flags and hostility, but a larger party probably makes any PvP situation more complex.
* Dungeons are a long ways out, but any kind of crafted PvE experience becomes harder to build with a larger potential variance in group size. This is probably the least of many challenges with such content, but it is a minor concern.

In a long-ago writeup for Formations, the Unit was the term for what was essentially a raid group: you'd first gather into a Unit before you could turn that Unit into a particular Formation. But even without the Formation, you'd still be able to be technically joined up. Units were primarily meant for PvP, and might lose some of the advantages of smaller parties for the larger organizational control. We haven't done any serious work on Formations in a while, so that could change drastically, but the concept of giving a higher-level view of subordinates for larger-scale play is certainly still something we're interested in.

The trick is keeping it so it actually is organizational control. I don't think we want to make the default behavior in most situations to pile into the largest group you can and zerg.

Goblin Squad Member

@Stephen Thank you

Watching the escalation, part of it was the chaotic style of play. I guess none of those charters were part of a lawful community (sic). Still, I wondered, how do a number of groups take on an escalation and help each other. If players are limited to groups of 6, taking on a hex can be a serious challenge, not because they are big, but tripping over heels of others.

THis is very out of character AS I often play more chaotic than the current alpha player. But his is driven by the GM is my more romantic memories of TT.

Scarab Sages Goblin Squad Member

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Stephen Cheney wrote:
* Dungeons are a long ways out, but any kind of crafted PvE experience becomes harder to build with a larger potential variance in group size. This is probably the least of many challenges with such content, but it is a minor concern.

Quick digression: I understand that dungeons the size of Moria in LOTRO or the Emerald Spire in the tabletop Pathfinder book are "a long ways out," but what about much less ambitious enclosed encounter areas, like the little temple in the PFO Environment Experience? Are two-chamber caves and three-room ruins likely to show up much sooner than 10 level dungeons and 20 story towers?

Goblin Squad Member

Lam wrote:
Still, I wondered, how do a number of groups take on an escalation and help each other.

The Escalation Quests are "Public Quests" that are shared by everyone in the hex. So, when you see "Kill 40 Grave Sniffers: 23/40" you know that 23 Grave Sniffers are already dead. If group on the other side of the hex kills 2 more Grave Sniffers, you and your party will see that counter go from "23/40" to "25/40" even though your party didn't kill any. This means that multiple parties operating independently can absolutely help clear out an Escalation; in fact, that's probably the best way. When two or more parties are together, they clear an area very fast then have to go and find new quest spawns. If they're on different sides of the hex, that should be less of a problem.

Goblin Squad Member

Nihimon, do you know how (if at all) do those carry over/reset? If groups A and B clear 30/100 tody then leave, and groups C and D come in the next day and do 70 more, is that done? If so, do Groups A and B still get "credit" for clearing the escalation?

Goblin Squad Member

Caldeathe Baequiannia wrote:
Nihimon, do you know how (if at all) do those carry over/reset? If groups A and B clear 30/100 tody then leave, and groups C and D come in the next day and do 70 more, is that done? If so, do Groups A and B still get "credit" for clearing the escalation?

It's not completely clear to me, but it appears that the Escalation grows at a set interval (I think every hour?). If that growth moves the Escalation into a new phase, or if player activity causes the Escalation to shrink back to a prior phase, it appears that some quests go away and others appear. Because of this, I believe it is extremely unlikely that the progress on a quest would last for a day.

Goblin Squad Member

Nihimon wrote:
...(I think every hour?).

In Bonny's first !raffle-run, I believe we determined, with Cheatle's help, that the escalation you were cleaning out was increasing by 0.2 at the top of each hour. I'm not sure whether that's a characteristic of all escalations, or only that type, or only that one.

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