You remained waaaaay back panzie. The devs in the end rejected that idea and suggested that probably forts would have been defended only by turrets (they are not yet sure about whether automatic or player manned) #lazyorkwhodoesn'tlinksource, yoi may try look in the streams summary though....
It came up again and I even said if it is still eligible. So you go update the OP, not me, he wants so direly to know. Like I said a thousand times by now: I probably ain't got time to play EC even if it would be out, lol.
Well I mean it depends on how they're used, I supported the implementation of like Base Guard NPC so there's a garrison, but not something like battle pets. It's not like many real players will just hang out at a base just in case there's an assault. Basically just enough NPCs to make sure noone can solo cap a base, but not enough to withstand a coordinated effort for more than a few minutes.
Thats a good point, either some form of NPC guards or as stated above automatic turrets to prevent solo caps. Solo capping would be a major issue if there is not protections, bc i doubt players would be willing to stand around waiting for 1-2 ppl to attack.
I forgot about the turrets thing. Too bad that. I suppose at this point it's too much to ask for NPC's to fight in PVP. I still think they have a place though.
If there are no players around the game is probably dead so the NPCs will solve little to nothing... if you have a weird work schedule it might be better that you play in other server instead of adding NPCs... Also, there is gonna be just 1 server per region, that's a lot of people, and there is still the possibility of having one server for EU and USA, that will be huge, probably something like 70% of the game population.
Even if it doesn't "solve" their problem of underpopulation, it's not like they couldn't do it just to make the game world more lively. Case-and-point, look into Planetside 2. Off hours on PS2 continents are pretty desolate and are probably a good look into the total activity this game will have at 6 months-in, realistically. Now, take these sparsely to unmanned fortresses and throw some NPC's on there with relatively competent AI and some extra power. Then you have a secondary threat making things more interesting, or at least more complicated. On the flip side, attackers can have NPC's spawn near them and help attack the fortress in a quasi-MOBA fashion. Nothing crazy, 3 to 5 per person.
Maybe it would be good to start implementing more and more NPC's sometime in the future when player population starts to drop. But until that time comes allowing more Players in battles should always be the top priority.
