Not only did Celest decide not to build their special construct, but they decided not to build any constructs. If you decide that the constructs are not worth the cost, wouldn't you also agree that it's unreasonale to be expected to pay that cost over and over when the constructs are destroyed? I think we all agree that the constructs are worth the base cost, and probably even the upkeep. When they are destroyed and the organization has to keep rebuilding them, they become less and less worthwhile. This is what should be looked at.

Fair enough, I didn't know the details. It sounds like you weakened two constructs at the first weakening, then destroyed them both at the second weakening, because they had not been sufficiently healed. This sounds, in my mind, like it equates to destroying one construct for each weakening...



It is impossible unless you have a vastly superior force - which New Celest generally does. The raiders should have to have a largely superior force in order to destroy constructs. This hasn't posed any problem for New Celest so far; they have successfully dominated in the weakenings from the beginning (and rightfully so, you have had better forces and been more organized). Still, the admin has deemed it worthwhile to protect the entry point on every other plane, to allow defenders to look around and prepare themselves. Why should the Nexus Worlds be any different?

Krellan - your safe room is actually found inside the construct. Only the org citizens can enter that construct or colossus.

As for demesnes - in one recent battle, Feyrll had melded the entire Magnagoran nexus world beforehand. I was able to break and remeld myself. It just takes knowledge of where and when to break.

As for not building our construct - it's worthless. Almost everything it can do I can do already.

Same with the crypt, darling. I've got Lich already. But it's not all about you or me. Constructs are for the community.

Just a note, last weakening we are outnumbered. Most of the people with us has no experience in fighting or haven't been in a nexus world battle. You had Daevos, Krellan, Kristov and a whole lot of Mags at your side not to mention a traitor from our side. We even suffer casualties while staying in there.

Lich for all >> Shielding/Puella for all.

Heh, umm, it's curious that you state with such certainty what Celest has and has not decided but okay.

Again, what is worth it depends on what your organization considers worth it. I would personally not consider it worth it to keep building constructs if it seems clear that I am unable to currently adequately defend them.

But I agree with you, in the long term constructs are a losing proposition if you have an enemy that is dedicated to destroying them at any given opportunity. It's why I suggested that the longer you are able to keep your construct up, the cheaper it should be to rebuild it up to and including the next one being free if it gets destroyed. For example every month the power cost to rebuild goes down by a thousand or something. If an organization cannot keep the construct up long enough for this to be beneficial then maybe the organization needs to stop building constructs. But there should be something that rewards successful defense beyond just getting to keep the construct because at some point you're going to be unlucky a few weakenings in a row and it's going to come down.




Er, you yourself have said you haven't been around for a weakening. I'll assure you it's not remotely the same as that heh. If I remember correctly the spire had been attacked when the system first came out and then not attacked again until the crypt was built. There were quite a few weakenings in between those two times in which the spire could have been healed up to full, but it wasn't. If the opposition is on the ball then you need two very strong performances in weakenings in a row in order to take down a construct. In the latest crypt destruction it took three weakenings in a row to do it. In one that I participated in there were like 4 of us and a horde of Magnagorans. Yet we were able to set up the colossus and do some damage to the construct. Numbers help but it's not totally about them. Strategy plays a huge role.

I'm not going to discuss tactics or anything here but when your opposition has to fly to your dock in order to even get onto your nexus world, you have quite a few opportunities to stop them right there regardless of what your numbers look like. There are only 5 useful stations on an Aethership during combat after all.

I would like to see some way for the defenders to actually get into their construct though. As it stands, an attacking force can initially get past any great pentagrams set up and the annoyance of a meld etc. but setting up the colossus and having it walk there. Now, this isn't necesarily as easy as it sounds but it is possible. But the defenders, as far as I know, have no way to get past pentagrams and melds in order to get into their construct. I don't think a safe room would actually help this at all. Maybe there can be some sort of security skill that at the cost of power allows the security member to be transported into the construct. It would need to take a comparable amount of time as it takes to set up a colossus but it would be cheaper in terms of power costs.



The force that had to battle their way through a meld to the construct in this last weakening was not remotely "vastly superior". And again, you don't seem to understand what you're speaking of here. There have been multiple weakenings where Celest was outnumbered. Quite often by a huge amount. I recall sitting inside a colossus with a couple other Celestians and glancing out to a crowd of like 15 Magnagorans or more. I can't speak to what sort of resources and effort Magnagora has devoted to construct defense but I can tell you that Celest has committed a lot to being successful at this. There have been failures. The first weakening attempt was not terribly successful. The first bombarding attempt was a dismal failure. There have been times when the raiders couldn't even get to the dock.

So honestly, I don't think it's the largely superior force at work here. Celest does not have hordes of elite fighters. But they do have a lot of people willing to step up and take charge and organize themselves.

If there is a safe room then let it just be a room that can't be melded. No guards. Guards tend to tempt people to try to pull the opposition into them. Then there will be an entry point with no meld that you can take stock of the situation in. The bulk of the attacking force shouldn't be in that room given that no constructs can be built in that room and they'll be focusing on the construct.

Seems that the admins are stuck in a pickle here. When they make the constructs uber, everyone wails about how unbalancing it is. When they don't make them uber, everyone decides they're not worth the cost and risk, which makes the whole nexus world/construct/colossus/etc. system, and the admins plans to use it to support-but-contain conflict, a waste of time. But if they didn't cost a lot to make, there'd be no point in defending them, and then the whole conflict thing still doesn't work.

Proposed solution: scale everything down a little. Especially the ongoing costs, which are almost always the kicker when someone's deciding not to build them. Make the powers nice, but half as uber as the ones we've seen so far. And make the costs a third what they are now. People would be more likely to be willing and able to build and defend them then, I bet, and then we'd have the contained conflict we want, without the game getting unbalanced.

I've been at two weakenings, outnumbered badly once (outcome - raiding aethership destroyed before docking) and once with superior numbers for the initial assault and inferior numbers shortly after as reinforcements arrived for the defenders - including several heavy hitters for Magnagora. Malarious, in particular, entered the room we held twice and did so alone both times, for which I salute him - had his example been more widely followed, supported, or aggressively exploited, the crypt might have even survived that weakening.

A concerted defense, willing to take casualties, can in the end overcome almost any group of raiders as long as they deal some casualties in return. Logistics matter, and raider reinforcements are neither nearby, nor easily able to fight through defenders who should control the bubble but for the construct location - eventually, the numbers favor the defenders enough that a tipping point occurs.

I can also tell you that on that latter weakening, we faced a meld at the dock. The entry point was melded, hostile, and unbreakable there - as it should have been. Yukari, I believe, held the meld throughout, and therefore cost us our casualties on the retreat when an unfortunate meld tick split a few off, including myself. It is not impossible to launch a successful assault without a safe room at the entry, nor would this change if the assault had to come through the nexus instead of out of a ship.

@Gwylifar I can't speak for everyone, but I don't think the constructs built so far are disastrously overpowered. Nifty, yes. I would also favor Catarin's idea to make keeping the construct up longer help rebuilding when they inevitably, at some point, come down. Otherwise, the defenders are just staving off fate, and that is more demoralizing than fun.

This is debateable.

I have yet to hear one Glomdoring member besides Daedalion say that they think ours is worthwhile on just the construction costs OR the upkeep costs alone, much less both together.

It's a heck of a lot cheaper to just sip vitae and get suspect. *shrugs*

Especially since vitae works all the time, while an egg requires that you know exactly where you're going to die ahead of time.

Or... carry the egg with you? Doesn't that work just as well as sipping vitae, better even? You pop back up, no experience lost, right where you died?

I do think you're due a tweak on the duration, so it isn't a power-sink to use.

Nope. We were told that it doesn't do that in a later discussion.

Further, there is essentially no experience lost from vitae, AND you get suspect. Would you seriously pay 600p per month so you can die twice, as well as spend 10p on an egg and 10p on vitae?

Edit: As a point, look at vitae off-Prime. A number of people prefer not to use vitae off-Prime because it essentially means two deaths. Since it gives so suspect, an attacker can just keep going. It works well for someone with a cubix, say, or a medallion-- but for the average person, it's kind of pointless. That "vitae on Prime without suspect" would essentially have the same effect.

Hmm. Would you clarify what you do have to do to get it to all come together? I've been assessing its usefulness off of some bad information, and I don't know how good the rest of what I thought I knew about it is.

We were told the following:
1. If the egg is left somewhere in the local area, when you die you will be "called" to the egg, just like a Crow user is currently called to their egg at their nest.
1a. If you are holding the egg, *nothing* will happen. You will just die, vitae, pray, whatever.
1b. 1a was wrong. If you are holding the egg, you will have a "vitae"-like effect, which will bring you back to life where you died.
1c. 1b is wrong. No correction as to what actually happens when you are holding it, which leaves us back at 1a again.

What if someone else is holding the egg?

If you are holding the egg, you drop the egg and resurrect where the egg is. Experience loss from this is similar to lich. In many ways this is similar to lich except you always resurrect where the egg is (so long as its in the same area).

I think some people may want every death to bring them back to a safe location (like at the dark nest construct) but we aren't amenable to that. No one has really mentioned an outside-the-box idea (like having the egg roll around when dropped).

So, it is having to predetermine where you'll be when/if you die. Holding it, doesn't drop and resurrect?

Sounds like she just said it drops and you resurrect on the spot. I think it's a miscommunication about what each perceives as a vitae-like effect.

I wasn't really sure. The last little bit to the first paragraph kinda threw me off.

Actually all they need are the few webbers they bring and Forren, that way all he has to do is either hailstorm or point staff to damage kill everyone in 2-4 attacks without them being able to run. That is how battles with them have been going lately, they just web and let Forren use his OP damage to kill everyone. Sounds like a real fun time doesn't it? Especially in construct battles, since they don't have to risk anything, since they have said they didn't want the construct that was given to them on a silver platter.



Forren in a battle all you do is weave phantoms and use hailstorm or pointstaff. You don't need a demesne, you sit and say mages are supposed to be damage killers, yet druids (the commune version of a mage) needs a demesne to even try to pull off 1/3 of the amount of damage you do. You don't even bother fighting with telekinetics, since you hit so hard and if people are with you, they just web for you, so of course Celest will always have the upper hand when you are there. What you don't get to see is how quickly people will ditch from raiding efforts, etc when you log off.




Actually you construct is much better, but since you all don't seem to want to build it, well just keep tearing ours down with no worries. And think of poor Glomdorings, they see you all get a nice construct, with what 5 prayers and 3-4 other things? And what do they get a local rezz only egg? C'mon, I can totally understand why Glomdoring wouldnt invest in putting up a crap construct, but you were given an actually decent one, that helps all members of your city and is made nicer for people with sacraments. While Crow really gets nothing good out of their construct, and everyone else basically needs to plan on where they want to die. If not they can drop their egg and come back right were they died and be killed once again, since it is "lich like" I would assume that means eq/bal loss, no power, no defs and basically in a world of hurt when they come back. At least liches can try to run when they are blind by that stupid soul blind bug.


Anyways, back on point, I still don't understand why cooks cannot fully heal a construct in the few days it has between battles, which again is rather quick per battle. Also why do collossi just get to sit in an enemy nexus without being able to be dismantled? People just seem to store Collosi in Mag, waiting for the next weakening? I think if we are some form of motel, they should at least pay rent.

How accurate.


I don't fight with telekinesis? Tell me, Ildaudid, how much do you know about using telekinesis in a fight? There are basically two options - I use my channels to go for heartburst (very impractical in this situation) or use a dagger and leglock. I usually use the latter. Yes, I do hit hard. I'm an Imperial Merian Demigod with two damage buffing karma blessings, 23 int, and champ staff. We've lost plenty of times when I'm there. It does not take much to totally nullify my offense. Aeon, anyone?


Nice facts here. Let's correct them.

What does our construct do? It removes power costs for sacrifice and resurrect and allows you to (while consuming regular equilibrium) heal health, mana, ego, or make a shield. You can also heal a random ailment. I'm not sure about you, but I can do all of these things with other abilities much more efficiently.