If you're not gonna use your settlement, can I has it?

[Hobson Fiffledown]

As we get closer to some world wide PvP, I can't help but wonder what will happen to the empty settlements. Finding a "sweet spot" to begin was tough enough, between (eventual) allignments, resource locations, settlement views, distance to training options, and so on. I know it's still a bit early, but I'm interested to hear what you all have to say on this.

And no, I don't really want your settlement. I've been accidentally put in charge of 1500+ person alliances before... Never again...never, never, never.

[Doc || Allegiant Gemstone Co.]

I hope they go up for grabs.

[Hobson Fiffledown]

Fiffledown Vale does have a bit of a ring to it.

I'm not sure a nekkid halfling town full of longweed smoke, lyre music, and dancing would stand much of a chance in the WoT.

But, oh, our Spring Harvest festivals would be the talk of Golaria.

[Guurzak]

Is Golaria the plural of Golarion?

[Hobson Fiffledown]

...little bit of accent, little bit of auto-correct, but I mainly blame the longweed.

[Savage Grace]

I like ghost towns.

[Capitalocracy]

I'd be interested in one, but I don't think anyone would be interested in joining it for me.

[Caldeathe Baequiannia]

I think people who think they've got what it takes should start petitioning GW to open a new landrush for settlements that don't have at least six active company members by the end of month one. They wouldn't have to change the templates, or anything, just offer active teams a chance to manage a barren site. In fact, why wait?

[Capitalocracy]

To play devil's advocate, what if they want to wait until full release? Perhaps they should be involved in the decision-making process and the reasons for the lack of activity explored first.

[Caldeathe Baequiannia]

Those sites will be empty after the great cataclysm. If they haven't built any credit by holding towers, they will be no more capable of putting a settlement down than any other group of people.

[Atheory]

I do have an ambition to run a true neutral / independent / free-city style of settlement. Would also love to elevate myself into a higher state of diplomacy.

Mayhaps I will bug GW as the game moves forward. An interesting notion to say the least.

Atheory

[Ziggumesh of Katapesh]

I always thought that GW jumped the gun by offering 33 settlements. orignally it was going to be 10-15 and they should have stuck to that. It was a bad decision and you only compound it by handing keys over to other individuals who don't have the #'s either.

[Ryan Dancey]

We are going to keep an eye on them, and if there's no activity we will recycle them and put them into a future promotion.

[Jakaal]

Ryan Dancey wrote:

We are going to keep an eye on them, and if there's no activity we will recycle them and put them into a future promotion.

Is the monitor going to be on the companies that hold the settlement or some metric of the buildings within a settlement? I ask b/c I know we Forgeholmers are using BFK's facilities a lot so we would skew those numbers.

[Caldeathe Baequiannia]

Jakaal wrote:

Ryan Dancey wrote:

We are going to keep an eye on them, and if there's no activity we will recycle them and put them into a future promotion.

Is the monitor going to be on the companies that hold the settlement or some metric of the buildings within a settlement? I ask b/c I know we Forgeholmers are using BFK's facilities a lot so we would skew those numbers.

the same would be true of Ozem's Vigil and Guardheim's numbers. It's just so darned handy for crafting.

[Lifedragn]

I'd rather see them recycled for use as the first claimable settlements through the hex clear/influence purchase mechanics. Unless we get a good swarm of new sizeable companies in that could realistically manage settlements.

[<kabal> Bunibuni]

I would imagine it would be something like keeping track of how many people are in the companies that are registered in a settlement. Since with EE all, previous companies were disbanded and had to start again. And perhaps keeping track of how many towers a village holds, if they can't even hold six, then they probably are not a viable village and could be recycled.

[Thod]

Here are some numbers from alpha - mid December - tower numbers. Was also having members numbers but never updated them - so not posting them here.

Alderwag 3
Aragon 15
Auroral 0
Blackfeather Keep 9
Blackwatch 0
Blackwood Glade 13
Brighthaven 21
Callambea 2
Canis Castrum 0
Dagedai 8
Deadman's Glen 0
Doomhammer 0
Emerald Lodge 22
Forgeholm 8
Freevale 10
Golgotha 15
Guardheim 0
Hammerfall 9
Hammerforge 0
Highroad 0
Hope's End 9
Iron Gauntlet 0
Keeper's Pass 9
Kreuz Bernstein 5
Ozem's Vigil 16
Phaeros 26
River Bank 0
Stoneroot Glade 23
Sunholm 32
Talonguard 19
Tavernhold 14
Terra Firma 0
New Daggermark 0

Some will have become active now. So need to update this

[Kadere]

It is worth noting that during this time Sunholm was holding the Alpha Six towers of our allies on their behalf...and just about every other tower in the southwest, because we could. Take these numbers with a grain of salt.

[Thod]

Here are member numbers - please be careful - some of them are way to low as I only counted the company assigned to a settlement. So all 24 members of Bloody Hand are not included in Golgotha for example.
There are several EE settlements not yet active (as far as my search tells me) who have been active in alpha.
Auroral, Hammerforge and Canis Castrum have become active despite inactivity in alpha - at least early alpha.

early alpha EE
Alderwag 7 none
Aragon 18 4
Auroral 0 3
Blackfeather Keep 7 4
Blackwatch 0 none
Blackwood Glade 11 2
Brighthaven 69 13
Callambea 2 9
Canis Castrum 0 2
Dagedai 3 none
Deadman's Glen 0 none
Doomhammer 0 none
Emerald Lodge 14 17
Forgeholm 9 8
Freevale 2 8
Golgotha 38 4
Guardheim 0 none
Hammerfall 5 none
Hammerforge 0 1
Highroad 0 none
Hope's End 3 4
Iron Gauntlet 0 none
Keeper's Pass 13 12
Kreuz Bernstein 6 4
Ozem's Vigil 7 16
Phaeros 30 37
River Bank 2 none
Stoneroot Glade 11 8
Sunholm 12 4
Talonguard 7 none
Tavernhold 10 2
Terra Firma 0 none
New Daggermark 0 none

[Thod]

Kadere wrote:

It is worth noting that during this time Sunholm was holding the Alpha Six towers of our allies on their behalf...and just about every other tower in the southwest, because we could. Take these numbers with a grain of salt.

I generated them to see movements in tower numbers - and soon didn't bother as hardly any movement occured.

Yes - some are misleading. It was enough to place a single member in a unclaimed tower and just wait. They hardly ever were challenged afterwards.

But a number > 0 means activity

[Hobson Fiffledown]

And I do wish everyone out there the best of luck with their settlements. A lot of stuff goes on outside of the forums and the game, some groups may show up en masse soon. I would rather see a lot of settlements succeeding modestly than not at all.

That being said, I think eventually a settlement may end up empty or leaderless. I would prefer some sort of Company capture mechanic, and one that by default leaves the base settlement as it is (crafting, wiz/rogue, etc.). I think the new owners should be allowed to change it for a hefty cost, or just build on what's there.

I only prefer the default because the training location of both myself and my DT seems a little...precarious right now.

It may well lead to too small of groups trying to run settlements, but I think that would be fun. It could create little frontier areas, or opportunities for growth. On the other hand, ghost towns could be fun too.

[Avatar-1]

I have to say, if anyone asks me if they can have something of mine with "can I has it?" the answer is always automatically no. Even if I'm desperate to give it away.

[Hobson Fiffledown]

That will be the least of my verbal infractions along the way. Good luck to you, sir.

[Lee Hammock]

We are currently discussing plans to take settlements that don't have anyone in them after the first couple of months of EE and redistributing them to interested parties that have the strength to hold them. There are lots of particulars to figure out, and we will warn settlements in danger of getting reassigned before it happens.