Concerns with contracts/battles.
As you have explained it, once the "contested" time starts, you need to form a 12man team to attack, once that team is "made" then an ALERT to defend goes out. The attack team has to wait around till the defending team is made.
Not lets consider Cappellen Confederation and Free Worlds League have a 4 planets in contention, the FWL forms a 12man, and then waits..... for CC to form a 12man, but there isn't enough players.... they wait, wait, wait.....
It would make sense that Merc Units can fill these spots, but still the FWL team may end up waiting for some time. At what point does a timeout occur?
Even now I see wait times of several mins for groups. With the restriction of Factions/Planets/Contracts this will compound the issue even more.
Proposal:
Since you are having standard times for contested areas, you could eliminate the "unique" queues. For example along the Kurita Border you have planets in contention, then along the CC and FWL border you have planets in contention. Once the timer starts both sides (defending and attack) get notice. Each faction would get the appropriate message, so if Clans are attacking Kurita planet, and FWL is attacking CC planet, then an attack message would go out to the Clans and FWL with the appropriate planet that is being assaulted. Also a defend message is sent to Kurita and CC for their defending planets.
An team from clans form up 8man group, while FWL forms up a 2x2man groups, which forms an "attacking" 12man team, while Kurita has 2x4man groups and CC has 4man group and 2x2man groups form up, the MM picking first come first server form up a 12man defending team. Then a battle ensues, the attacking team wins (thus gaining X tokens) Both Clans gain the token for taking the Kurita planet, and FWL gains tokens to take the CC planet. Repeat...
This would reduce the number of unique 12man teams you need to create, the above if done in the current PGI implementation would require 4x12man teams, whereas the above proposal would only require 2x12man teams. One side still wins and one side still loses, it's results just effect 2 planets instead of 1.
Also you could further enhance this, lets say you have your Clan 4man team, your FWL 4man team, and another FWL 4man team, but attacking a different border planet (lets say between FWL and LC - 2 different borders even). The 3x4man teams form up a 12man attacking team, and when resolved (win or loss) it effects 3 different planets instead of 2 (or even 1).
This makes match making much easier as you are only having to form an Attacking queue and a defending queue.
From a "role player" point of view, the other "team mates" are Mercs (hired guns).
This would allow for much easier integration of Lonewolves/Mercs as they would again pick defending (or attacking) contract and be grouped up with the apporpriate teams.
Also as suggested many times before, if one side is lacking players, lets say defending side, you can "incrementally" increase the contract to attract more merc units to that side. So initially a contract starts at 2mil C-Bills to attack defend. 15 mins into the "contested" time the system sees that defending teams are lacking players, while the attacking teams have 12man teams waiting, it would up the contract for the defending to 2.5mil C-Bills hopefully attracking more players. This would increase as one side continues to see a lopsided number of players. Once enough players sign up for a contract it would automatically start to reduce the contract prices to avoid too many players jumping on.
Edited by Syrkres, 25 September 2014 - 12:12 PM.