I can't resist posting a few thoughts on this thread. First, let me begin by stating that Wargaming's implementation of Clan Wars caused me to quit WoT. The frustration factor given clan limits and requirements to being constantly online were simply too much.
The most important issue for me --
timezone scheduling. Please, for the love of all that's good and decent, do not use a pre-set scheduling system for battles. It penalizes people who work, people with RL commitments, it is simply too annoying to have to schedule your life around the game rather than the other way around. Instead, attacks and defenses should occur in real time.
I'm sure this must have been posted previously, but I would like to go over how the role-playing shell in EGA MPBT worked; a system that I truly loved. A few elements are already out the window, but here goes:
I. Map Combat - House to House combat
A. Attacking a Planet
Any house player holding a command position(lance leader/unit XO or CO/Prefecture CO/Military District Commander/HXO/HL) can start an assault; or any merc unit member with the right privileges in that merc unitcould also start an assault. The ownership was displayed in a pie-chart form, with each faction present having a percentage. Assaulting the planet grants a slice proportional to the rank+position of the person ordering the assault. As part of the assault, lances are moved on the planet that in turn grant more of a "weight" to missions as well as a larger initial slice of the pie.
The "weight" of each lance moved should perhaps depend on the number of people in the lance, an empty unit would have less importance. There should also perhaps be a multiplier for "elite" House canon units as well.
Since there were a finite number of lances available, deployment in both offense and defense was the key issue in planning military campaigns. When a lance is just moved to a new planet, its power rating is reduced to 50%, and it grew back to 100% over time after 24 hours. So a lance carefully placed ahead of time (24 hours or more) in defense counted for two freshly moved attack lances.
Merc lances often counted for significantly more than a house lance based on the rating and strength of the merc lance.
B. Planetary Control
Control of a planet requires a majority ownership. A planet can be attacked by any House as long as they have a "supply line" to that planet. Battles won contribute to planetary control after being modified by the overall Lance Strength. If your side had 1/3 of the actual lance-strength on the planet, you would need to run 3 successful missions to equal one defense mission. If your side had 3/4 of the lance-strength, you would get a 75% bonus towards capture. The moment a given faction gained key majority (if I recall correctly 65% or so), they gained control in real-time.
C. Supply lines
To start an attack you had to have "supply" to the target. That meant an uninterrupted connection from the target traced back to a core world that creates supply. The greater the distance from one of the supply-line originating planets, the more difficulties ensued unless the supply line was "broadened" beyond the minimum of one link to the target if you were deep into enemy territory.
What that implies is that you can't just attack anywhere, you had to build a supply route to the key target you wanted to capture (the capital of the enemy House).
D. Role of Mercs
Unlike what has been stated as planned for MWO, merc unit could not own planets. However, in that ancient game, mercs held an amazing amount of power by being able to bolster the lance strength of a House, as well as their prowess in running missions. Powerful merc companies influenced diplomacy and wielded a lot of power in the InnerSphere by working through their chosen House. The key for them was "standing". Basically Loyalty Points in MWO, without them counting towards rank. Rank points were separate. Running missions for a House earned standing, running against a House lost standing against the particular House. The higher the standing, the better the contract terms awarded for each mission by the House (completely computer controlled, no player involvement in merc contracts).
Standing also existed for house faction players, but since they would only run missions for their House it was seldom relevant.
E. Victory condition
There was an actual way to win -- take out all the Houses supply line points, controlling them to 100% and you won as the House would be unable to start an attack. This meant that there were regular resets of the I.S. Map.
II. Applying this to MWO?
As I noted previously, this goes out the window with what has been announced as the plan for community warfare. The first problem is the split of the map into different categories of planets - core, faction, merc.
IMHO, dividing the battle-space is a mistake. Everyone should fight for the same real estate. Faction and Merc players should be given the option of working together towards strategic goals; they should be relevant to each other instead of being split. It also creates a fundamental problem -- if merc players get to "own" their planets, what do faction players get? It makes mercs inherently more interesting and brings me bad flashbacks of WoT clans fighting clans in Wargaming's Clan Wars instead of what its really about --- houses vs houses.
That being said, if a merc unit takes a contract to conquer X and accomplises it, they should gain the rights to benefit from X until someone takes it from them. But this would not mean that planet X is a merc only planet.
And of course, given whats been announced as untouchable core worlds it appears that there will be no way to "win"; there will be no Victory condition, just an endless struggle.
TL;DR - Please do not use anything like WoT's Clan Wars. Just don't. For the love of all that's good and decent. 
Edited by Kyrie, 16 August 2012 - 01:43 AM.
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CocoaJin, on 15 August 2012 - 09:07 PM, said:
