Announcing Warplots!

So the NDA has dropped and the release date has been announced! But that information is so 2 hours ago! Want to know all about Warplots in Wildstar? Well, look no further, here is everything you need to know on how Warplots will work.

NOTE: Wildstar is still in Beta, thus this information may be subject to change. Warplots are a key endgame feature, and this kind of stuff can always use tweaking and balancing.

With that said, let’s talk Warplots!

Warplot Basics



Warplots are essentially battle fortresses that are fully customizable that you and your closest 39 friends can create in a similar fashion to housing…just more deadly!

Warplots can only be accessed at level 50. Warplots are a 40v40 battle between opposing factions with fortresses created using “plugs” (which are permanent fortifications and have certain features) and “deployables” (which are mines, turrets, etc. and they are temporary for each match).

Warparty

It all begins with forming a Warparty. This is separate from a guild, and it will have its own name, rating, and account of War Coins (used for purchases, see below). Upon creation, the Warparty gets 300 War Coins and an initial rating of 1200. Warparties can have ranks, clearances for things such as accessing vendors, etc.

Building Your Warplot

All members get a recall ability to their Warparty’s Warplot. Warparty members with ranks that have appropriate permissions can access building tools similar to the housing tools, such as:

Landscape: allows you to build plugs on your Warplot. These are the more permanent features of your Warplot. I will post more details about these plugs in coming weeks.

Vendor: allows you to purchase deployables that you can place freely on your Warplot. These are like mines or sentry guns, etc. You can have up to 100 of these on your Warplot at once.

Crate: allows you to place your deployables in storage for use in the middle of a match. You can store up to 100 deployables in your crate at once, though 100 is still the cap for active deployables on the Warplot.

There is also a Warparty bank vault that can hold boss tokens to use on the Warplot or FABKits (fabrication kits) needed to create certain plugs; the bank is available once a Warparty has 10 members. There is also a vendor next to the bank that allows members with permission to purchase boss tokens with War Coins. You can also get boss tokens that drop off of the following bosses in Veteran Dungeons: Spiritmother Selene, Forgemaster Trogun, Mordechai Redmoon, and Stormtalon. It is unknown if the vendor is a permanent feature, or for beta testing only.

The recall ability cannot be used while the Warplot is in battle or in queue. Also, there is a portal on the build map that takes you back to your capital city.

Plugs

I will get into details about particular plugs in future articles, but for now, here are some basics on how they function.

Plugs have specific energy maintenance costs, and this energy is taken from your Energy Pool, the size of which depends on your plugs. This energy pool drains as the match proceeds whether or not your plugs are destroyed, i.e. the plug continues to drain energy even if it no longer functions.

Each plug can be destroyed by targeting its Structure Unit. The plug’s damage will persist between matches. A plug can be repaired in two ways, in-match and out-of-match. You cannot heal a plug with normal player abilities or items. Repairing a plug 10% restores its functionality.

To repair a plug in-match, you use something called Nano-Paks. You initially have zero Nano-Paks, but you can obtain them from locations on the battlefield called Nano-Pak Nodes. These Nano-Paks can be used to repair a plug, use special plug abilities, and upgrade plugs (they start each match at Tier 1 again, and can be upgraded to Tier 3 with varying effects).

To repair a plug out-of-match, you have to spend War Coins. You can do this from the Landscape function of the map, by clicking a button.

Some plugs are created by the Architect, in the form of FABKits. These FABKits are placed in the Bank, then used to create the plug. The addition of the FABKit to the Bank is irreversible, so no selling FABKits you have left over on the Auction House.

Deployables

Deployables are temporary features of your Warplot. Once the next match has concluded, all deployables are erased. Deployables are free-placed, so anywhere is fair game to place one except for the other team’s Warplot. Once you place a Deployable, it cannot be picked up again.

Some examples of deployables are traps that have the stealth mechanic and sentry guns. Once again, Architects can make deployables for your Warplot.

Warplot Matches

Matches between Warplots are accessed via the Warplot queue. You must be level 50 to queue a Warplot, to queue as part of a Warparty, or to queue for Warplots as a free-agent Mercenary.

A Warparty member with permission queues the Warplot up via the group finder. That member and the Warplot are queued together, so if the Warparty member leaves the queue, so does the Warplot. Once the Warplot is queued, the members of the Warparty are given notification to queue, and the Warparty members are allowed to queue before the Warplot to make sure it all gets going at the right time, if needed.

Players without a Warparty can queue as a Mercenary, which means you get PUG’ed into a Warplot match with a similar rating to your personal rating. The queue will look for Mercenaries if there are not enough Warparty members queued. Once all 80 players are queued, the match will start and send notifications to the queued players. Interestingly, it is not required for all the members to be in a raid or even a group to queue. The Warparty does it automatically.

To win a Warplot match, there are two win conditions. The first is to entirely drain the other Warparty’s energy pool. There is already a drain coming from the maintenance cost of the plugs, but you can also drain more of your enemy’s energy by killing their players and destroying their plugs. The second win condition is to destroy the two generators on their Warplot, one on each side in the back of the Warplot.

The generators are healed by the Nano-Pak nodes that you own. When a node is under your control, the generators receive more stacks of a regeneration buff. Too many forces of the enemy dedicated to taking out your generators? Then the Nano-Pak nodes should be easier to attack and capture, which means the enemy will not be able to out-DPS the healing effect. This provides for some interesting anti-zerg gameplay!

Matches can also be surrendered by instigating a /votesurrender command. You have to wait 10 minutes into the match to surrender, and at least 60% of the Warparty must vote to surrender. A surrender is a true loss, and comes with the same consequences (though your Warplot will not be damaged further, saving War Coins if you are truly outmatched).

Rewards

War Coins are the currency that is rewarded to players, and in addition to the base amount for completing a match, there are bonus War Coins for winning and destroying plugs. I believe Prestige (PvP currency) is also granted to players individually.

Rating adjustments are made to the team rating and personal rating at the end of the match, and the Warplots use the Elo system. Certain items on vendors (using Prestige) require a certain Warplot rating, and some items have special stats or functions that unlock with objectives in Warplots that are completed while the item is equipped (called Imbuements). Some plugs also require higher ratings to purchase.

Paths and Mounts

Paths can influence the battle as well! Settlers can make small structures such as a Med Station, Buff Station, or a turret. Scientists and Explorers can work together, with the former creating traps that enemy players can spring or creating power up spawns that will give health, defense, or damage buffs, and the latter can run through these nodes for a speed boost. This speed boost stacks as well. Soldiers can pick up weapons that will allow them to really wreck havoc on the enemy.

Mounts can be used anywhere on the battlefield except in the enemy Warplot.

What do you think of this awesomeness?!? I, for one, cannot wait until launch to do all of this with my guild. What are your plans?