Personal Neighborhood; Improvements

In earlier posts I mentioned my idea to keep both ideas of the Backyard Battleground and Giddy Park so we have our own private hub world and a place to hang out with and battle other players; which are the Personal Neighborhood and the Public Battlefield respectively. I wanted to cover some ideas for buildings in your neighborhood here. I’ll go over the core ideas again and then propose some improvements you can use to customize your neighborhood. I’ll be estimating costs and ideas to unlock them, these can easily be changed as needed. Note that it once unlocked, you still pay coins to place the improvements or replace an existing one; turning a lot back into an empty one is free.

Note: for the purpose of this discussion I’ll refer to anything you place or replace in your neighborhood as an improvement. This is to avoid confusion as you’ll be able to place not only buildings, but parks, fountains, docks, boats, cars, and so on.

To start off, you’ll have a setup that is similar to the concept of GW2’s Backyard Battleground, but would be larger and not just a bigger copy, with different starting houses and such, and split into the plant side by their base and the zombie side by their base, along with a town hall that can’t be changed as we need it and a progress-o-meter or similar setup to work (note: you may able to customize your town hall somewhat, maybe with paint, decals, or even a different style of building with the same layout). Some kind of central objective like the flag of power will always be present to fight over. The underground will also be largely fixed so you can find clues about the Gnomes and eventually find their ruins deep down, below the sewers and past the ancient catacombs that will have guardians to watch for…

Plants and zombies will always be spawning and fighting, just like in the backyard battleground, but you can alter this with the improvements you place, which will be outlined below. You can have at least 3 people join your neighborhood like a normal PvZ shooter group, but I’d love to have an option to have it go up to 12v12 and make some great video content and have some crazy fun times as you can sett your neighborhood to invite only, friends only, and public just like in GW2 and BfN. You may be able to turn off the AI too, just like private BfN Giddy Parks, although that would be mostly to solve puzzles and explore in peace, you won’t need it for working on your neighborhood as you have architect more for that. To place/replace/remove improvements, including the basic starting ones that are eligible, you go to the architect table at either base and interact with it and puts you in an eye in the sky, invulnerable mode that allows you to manipulate things in peace, your actual character will be at the table and invulnerable and immovable while working so you can’t be interrupted.

Parts of your neighborhood will start out as under construction empty lots. If the neighborhood is expandable, you’ll see similar construction tape blocking off those areas that you can buy, and these will also have empty lots. Note that most empty lots will be simple inland spots, some will be on a waterfront, and some will be spots in the water, mostly for boats, and there may even be some underwater spots too. Some larger improvements will need multiple lots, others just one.

Neighborhood Battles. Some improvements you place can be used as objectives for these small scale wars. At each base, right next to the architect table will be a button you can interact with that will start such a conflict. It can only be used if at least one objective improvement is placed in your neighborhood (if you want to just fight like the flag of power in GW2, that will always be available in a similar fashion). It will randomly pick one of your objective eligible improvements as the current objective and extra plants and zombies will spawn to fight over it (gnomes too if you’ve placed any of their stuff as well!). The first team to capture the objective, imagine a Suburbination objective for it works, wins. You gain extra XP for participating. There may need to be a timer to keep it from used constantly, but it may not be needed either. Note too that gnomes will also spawn if you have any of their spawn items in your neighborhood and can also take objectives, and are especially interested in their own. If no one side captures an objective before time runs out (5 minutes?), no one wins!

Note: Placing a starting item you removed incurs a cost similar to how much it would cost from Rux in coins, so for example, if you remove a starting house and then place it again, it would cost 1000 coins. I’ll list a sample of ideas here first and post more later, feel free to post your ideas as well!

Improvement Ideas (remember: costs are rough estimates and could be very different live):

• Various Houses. Zombie and plant themed houses of many types are available both the get go for no cost, and from Rux for 1000 coins each, with other more unusual houses (gnome themed perhaps?) available from other sources for different costs. Take 1 lot each. Many of the plots you start the game with are already populated with houses like these. They cost 1000 coins to place as well.
• Various Fountains. Such as Crazy Dave, Brains, zombies, plants, and so on. These are just for decoration and would mostly be made of marble. They’d be unlockable from Rux from day one and cost 1000 coins to unlock and place. Single lot item.
• Gnomolith. Unlocked after spending 25 time shards at either base in the Gnomiverse. This single lot item costs 5000 coins to place and will randomly call in various basic gnomes to spawn in your neighborhood.
• Gnome ruins. Spend 100 time shards for this one and 25000 coins to place it. This requires a 2x2 square of lots to place and there would be different styles you could purchase as well, like the houses above. This will spawn more and more powerful gnomes that invade your neighborhood. This is also an objective for battles, but will be tough to take as the gnomes will be eager to keep it for themselves!
• Dino Park. Unlockable at either side’s vendor in prehistoric peril for 500 currency (dino scales or amber), this provides a huge (4 lots in a square) dinosaur themed amusement park to visit with interactive exhibits that roar and move when you push the buttons. Costs 15000 coins to place. This would also be able to be set as an objective for neighborhood battles.
• Pirate Ship. This would be unlockable by either side from their pirate zone base for 200 currency (barnacles for zombies, doubloons for plants) and would take 1 sea lot or 2 adjacent ones if the ship is big, think Port Scallywag from GW although smaller than that ship. Costs 10000 to place and has a below deck area you can visit, sails to raise and lower, a crow’s next to climb on, and you can even fire the cannons! Would be eligible to be an objective as well.
• Airport. Always available for purchase from Rux. Costs 10000 coins to unlock of place, and takes a 2x2 lot area. A PvZ style airport that can be used as an objective and let’s you interact with and fly a plane or a helicopter around your neighborhood.
• Submarine. Unlocked by spending 200 of the deep sea dive free roam region’s currency (coral for plants, fish bones for zombies). Placed in either an underwater lot or a regular water lot, depending on how it’s set up, and costs 7500 coins to place. Can be climbed into and submerged when you’re inside, can fire torpedoes too! Possibly used an objective but there would be issues with one side submerging it so the other side can’t get in.
• Great Pyramid. Unlocked in the Zgypt region for 500 regional currency (mummy wrappings or scarabs). Comes in 2 versions; plant and zombie themed, takes a 2x2 grouping of empty lots and costs 15000 coins to place. Can be used as an objective. You can enter the pyramid and solve random puzzles for fun (any maybe some minor rewards), the interior is lit by flickering torches.