Where Are We Headed?

x99Needles

I am going to disclaim now; this is going to be quite a long post. I do not come to the forums often for various reasons. Exceptions being when I have something to say or in response to someone. Everyone has their two cents about what’s going on with this game, these are mine.

It is no secret that Cyrodiil is in a poor state. Between the constant lag issues, the stale “how many can I stack and who’s got barrier” Meta, and the discouraged or tired out leaving Cyrodiil at a frightening rate leaves Cyrodiil feeling just a little emptier than it was before. I can agree as I think most all of us can that something needs to change. I mean we all wish the lag would be “fixed” or just go away but the reality of the situation is that the game cannot currently operate as was intended. Say what you will about how it “should” work or how the game has been out for two years why can’t they get it together already. Things are not as simple as “fix” or “make it work”, they take time and I hope to god they do figure something out because the number one reason people stop playing is because they literally can’t play.

What I am more concerned about further each day I watch this game is where we are currently headed. The upcoming changes to Alliance War Skills and Siege Weapons inside Cyrodiil are excellent examples. We are reducing the effectiveness of skills meant to be used inside the alliance war and increasing the effectiveness of siege damage. Why? What’s the problem?

The problem is evident and easily explained with the such a simple word that is has become casually interpreted as the root of all of the game’s problems. Zerg.

“If people wouldn’t zerg.” “Zergs are the only reason it lags.” “Zergs ruin this game.”

Maybe so. It cannot be denied, when you stack even just 48 people in one Keep or Outpost, the ping skyrockets in search of the next galaxy over. Skills become things that just look pretty on your bar, movement looks like a poorly edited Claymation, and you sit back at your computer letting out a heavy sigh because that’s just about the extent of what you can do. And because of this, the forums, and zone, the community in general gets flooded with “anti-zerg” mentality and advocating warriors. I hate stacking, I hate fighting zergs, I hate when the game isn’t playable. Just like all of you.

But we’ve come to the point when a zerg is simply whenever you lose outnumbered, whether it be by a few or a dozen players. Quick, point and shout zerg! This mentality that has built up, and been encouraged by several players who have done nothing inside Cyrodiil but complain and keep to their corners of the map. It is plain toxic and not informative either. Zerg shaming has become a downright display of ignorance, no longer equitable.

I understand just as well as any of us, zergs are a problem. What I do not understand is reducing this games play to point and click on a siege weapon and removing the skills that allowed us to counter that. For those of you who do not know who I am, I am the GM of Vehemence (VE). I run 24 man raids every night.
The allotted group size in Cyrodiil, and yet I am constantly alongside my players accused of mindless zerging. Yet, every night the number of fights we do, the sheer numbers we face. I am outnumbered 8 out of ten times in any given situation in Cyrodiil. This is the fact of the game. Sometimes it works okay, sometimes it really sucks. It is not our fault, nor the players we are going up against that the game’s performance is poor.

Despite contending odds, we still manage to take objectives, defend objectives, sometimes with help sometimes alone. This is capable because of our teamwork and the skills available to us. I agreed that the “how many can I stack and who’s got a barrier” Meta is boring and needs a change. However, making the skill almost completely useless in raid play alongside nerfs to purge, is not the solution in my opinion. “The zerg is the problem so we’ll just make it so you can easily kill anything with siege and they won’t be able to defend themselves adequately.”

The game is slowly ever crawling to favoring the solo or smaller groups inside Cyrodiil. We are blaming the larger groups inside Cyrodiil for lagging the server and being “what’s wrong with the game.” Who do you think responds to the hordes of the opposing factions when it’s called out in zone? Who pushes back the faction that is on your front door? Who went out of their way to save that scroll? The guilds and groups inside Cyrodiil that run “larger” numbers when they are simply filling the group size inside Cyrodiil. And it cannot be argued that the larger groups are more successful than the smaller ones. Zergs aside, take 4 against 10, unless you’re dealing with a severe gap in skill the 10 are going to win and that’s how it should be. War is not a game of morale victories.

The mentality that has evolved inside this game is almost unbelievable. You are playing an RvR Game. We are all playing a game designed around taking objectives inside Cyrodiil that revolve around at the very least 18 man groups. This game does not support dueling or arenas (yet as they say.) And here we are shaming players and groups for playing the way it was intended…

Has anyone thought what Cyrodiil would like without all the large groups? Perfect right? You could all go do your solo and small man things to your hearts content inside an open world RvR realm where the Keeps simply become decorations on the map. A ghost town for your needs and desires. But we like playing this game too. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to play small. Nothing at all. You aren’t shamed or attacked for it. You aren’t blamed for things that are clearly out of your hands. And you also do nothing for your faction. You don’t take keeps. You don’t fight back. You don’t contribute to the score. You play alongside your faction's zergs and scold or you keep to your corners fighting duels while the map conflicts.

Where are we headed like this? Are we going to continue experiencing game changes that favor simplified play and how much siege you can set down? As a community there are no other options we can come to? No other solutions besides complaining and shaming and name-calling? This is what this game is becoming?

Do you think we enjoy the lag as well? Do you think I get into cyrodiil and immediately ask, “who can I stack with?!” I spend half my night making calls to avoid colliding with friendly guilds and I still end up surrounded by DC at times. You think I run 24 members so I can chase down 3 or 4 people in a field and exclaim, “Get rekt! We are so good!” That's it, I've been compiling footage for my Xv1 video for the past year and a half guys. No. We don’t play for that. It’s not fun to play in lag, but the next time you’re fighting “a zerg” take off your own zerg goggles and take a quick look around you. Chances are, you are surrounded by your own faction. Just because you aren’t grouped doesn’t mean you aren’t a large force. Taking objectives and defending in Cyrodiil against the masses would not be possible without large groups. You are inside an RvR game. There are going to be large groups, and it’s not our fault. We aren’t what’s wrong with this game. The mentality and hate inside the community is what’s wrong. If you didn’t have large groups in Cyrodiil what a sad place it would be. But we keep pushing for groups to get dissolved.

Food for thought:

Stacking is a problem right now because the game can’t handle it. If we can’t fix the lag right now, why not institute more objectives inside Cyrodiil required for scoring? Force factions to spread for teamwork. You’re always going to have that jerk who stacks a raid or two because L2P but are there no ways for us to create or force factions to spread? If all we have left to defend is Aleswell and EP is pushing from Bleakers. Where do you think these two factions will collide? And quite literally the factions will collide. Because there is no other objective to push now. The next course of action has already been decided. The game was designed with natural choke points in Cyrodiil without the actual ability to handle the confrontations. It’s not EP nor DCs fault for going towards the objective when there’s no other option provided. They are playing as intended.

The removal of Prox Det as a skill entirely. No matter how you look at this skill or how many times you want to change it, it favors the group. It will never favor the smaller force enough to justify it. This is by far the best group AoE ever given to group players.

The adjustment of Barrier and Purge to only effect group members with the possibility of a slight number reduction. Not a drastic drop to where it’s not even worth mentioning as an Alliance War Skill.

The abolition of AoE caps and return of dynamic ultimate. Without AoE cap reduction and dynamic ultimate regen returned to players, you would be able to fight larger forces more easily as your ultimate would generate faster and your damage would not be mitigated because they stacked raids.

Strengthen AoE damage across the board for all class based skills. Pull players away from the stale "impulse and steel tornado only please". Nerf steel tornado’s range and remove the execution proc completely.

Institution of completely group based effects. This would include heals, set bonus buffs(as they already implemented), and all Alliance War Skills and any skills that effect nearby allies. Encourage players to group, stop discouraging and shaming it. This game was made to play with a group, stop arguing it.

Do not adjust siege damage against the player further, revoke the idea that siege should drain resources as well. If this becomes nothing but a siege vs siege game, it will be the most boring pvp experience on the market right now. All siege effects should be purgable as an alliance war skill inside alliance war siege damage.

Adjustment of the mentality that groups are what’s wrong with this game. Remember you are playing an RvR game. This PvP is undeniably group based. It is not the group’s fault that the lag is present. That is a strictly development issue. And I’m not saying scream at ZOS either. Exercise some patience and grace. We are all playing this game, just because someone plays a way you don’t doesn’t even come close to making them wrong.

I love this game; I seriously have never had so much fun playing a game. During the frustrations, the lag, the disappointment, we are all still playing for some reason. We love this game. I don’t want to watch this game drift into a brain dead hate fest dumbing down the game every patch. If you ask a majority of players they will tell you something similar to, “just here waiting for the next game to come out.” Hearing that phrase always saddens me, I love playing this game, but what’s the point if no one wants to and the people who still will are going to constantly harass the way you play? I am starting to count myself among those waiting for something else, because I’m not quite sure where TESO is headed like this.
-Like a Bulbasir/Permarekt

@Wrobel @ZOS_BrianWheeler @ZOS_GinaBruno

Satiar

Was not expecting a Bulb thread, but a lot in there I agree with.

I love the idea of fixing Steel Tornado, bringing it in line with other AoEs. I'd love a meta where burst is not King, where purge isn't so strong that CCs, debuffs, and roots were something that mattered. Longer fights, more strategy. But alas, we seem to simply being going towards more burst, less sustain, more dumbed down gameplay...

It gives me a sad

Rossphi

I don't mind the changes to siege or any large group in general. What's frustrating is the mindless AP farming. In scourge (XB1 NA) the sole reason for taking a scroll now is to get the enemies attention, so they can be farmed. As someone who is on the faction that's constantly being farmed by the other two, I see very little reason to enter cyrodill.

CITADALO

x99Needles wrote: »

I am going to disclaim now; this is going to be quite a long post. I do not come to the forums often for various reasons. Exceptions being when I have something to say or in response to someone. Everyone has their two cents about what’s going on with this game, these are mine.

It is no secret that Cyrodiil is in a poor state. Between the constant lag issues, the stale “how many can I stack and who’s got barrier” Meta, and the discouraged or tired out leaving Cyrodiil at a frightening rate leaves Cyrodiil feeling just a little emptier than it was before. I can agree as I think most all of us can that something needs to change. I mean we all wish the lag would be “fixed” or just go away but the reality of the situation is that the game cannot currently operate as was intended. Say what you will about how it “should” work or how the game has been out for two years why can’t they get it together already. Things are not as simple as “fix” or “make it work”, they take time and I hope to god they do figure something out because the number one reason people stop playing is because they literally can’t play.

What I am more concerned about further each day I watch this game is where we are currently headed. The upcoming changes to Alliance War Skills and Siege Weapons inside Cyrodiil are excellent examples. We are reducing the effectiveness of skills meant to be used inside the alliance war and increasing the effectiveness of siege damage. Why? What’s the problem?

The problem is evident and easily explained with the such a simple word that is has become casually interpreted as the root of all of the game’s problems. Zerg.

“If people wouldn’t zerg.” “Zergs are the only reason it lags.” “Zergs ruin this game.”

Maybe so. It cannot be denied, when you stack even just 48 people in one Keep or Outpost, the ping skyrockets in search of the next galaxy over. Skills become things that just look pretty on your bar, movement looks like a poorly edited Claymation, and you sit back at your computer letting out a heavy sigh because that’s just about the extent of what you can do. And because of this, the forums, and zone, the community in general gets flooded with “anti-zerg” mentality and advocating warriors. I hate stacking, I hate fighting zergs, I hate when the game isn’t playable. Just like all of you.

But we’ve come to the point when a zerg is simply whenever you lose outnumbered, whether it be by a few or a dozen players. Quick, point and shout zerg! This mentality that has built up, and been encouraged by several players who have done nothing inside Cyrodiil but complain and keep to their corners of the map. It is plain toxic and not informative either. Zerg shaming has become a downright display of ignorance, no longer equitable.

I understand just as well as any of us, zergs are a problem. What I do not understand is reducing this games play to point and click on a siege weapon and removing the skills that allowed us to counter that. For those of you who do not know who I am, I am the GM of Vehemence (VE). I run 24 man raids every night.
The allotted group size in Cyrodiil, and yet I am constantly alongside my players accused of mindless zerging. Yet, every night the number of fights we do, the sheer numbers we face. I am outnumbered 8 out of ten times in any given situation in Cyrodiil. This is the fact of the game. Sometimes it works okay, sometimes it really sucks. It is not our fault, nor the players we are going up against that the game’s performance is poor.

Despite contending odds, we still manage to take objectives, defend objectives, sometimes with help sometimes alone. This is capable because of our teamwork and the skills available to us. I agreed that the “how many can I stack and who’s got a barrier” Meta is boring and needs a change. However, making the skill almost completely useless in raid play alongside nerfs to purge, is not the solution in my opinion. “The zerg is the problem so we’ll just make it so you can easily kill anything with siege and they won’t be able to defend themselves adequately.”

The game is slowly ever crawling to favoring the solo or smaller groups inside Cyrodiil. We are blaming the larger groups inside Cyrodiil for lagging the server and being “what’s wrong with the game.” Who do you think responds to the hordes of the opposing factions when it’s called out in zone? Who pushes back the faction that is on your front door? Who went out of their way to save that scroll? The guilds and groups inside Cyrodiil that run “larger” numbers when they are simply filling the group size inside Cyrodiil. And it cannot be argued that the larger groups are more successful than the smaller ones. Zergs aside, take 4 against 10, unless you’re dealing with a severe gap in skill the 10 are going to win and that’s how it should be. War is not a game of morale victories.

The mentality that has evolved inside this game is almost unbelievable. You are playing an RvR Game. We are all playing a game designed around taking objectives inside Cyrodiil that revolve around at the very least 18 man groups. This game does not support dueling or arenas (yet as they say.) And here we are shaming players and groups for playing the way it was intended…

Has anyone thought what Cyrodiil would like without all the large groups? Perfect right? You could all go do your solo and small man things to your hearts content inside an open world RvR realm where the Keeps simply become decorations on the map. A ghost town for your needs and desires. But we like playing this game too. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to play small. Nothing at all. You aren’t shamed or attacked for it. You aren’t blamed for things that are clearly out of your hands. And you also do nothing for your faction. You don’t take keeps. You don’t fight back. You don’t contribute to the score. You play alongside your faction's zergs and scold or you keep to your corners fighting duels while the map conflicts.

Where are we headed like this? Are we going to continue experiencing game changes that favor simplified play and how much siege you can set down? As a community there are no other options we can come to? No other solutions besides complaining and shaming and name-calling? This is what this game is becoming?

Do you think we enjoy the lag as well? Do you think I get into cyrodiil and immediately ask, “who can I stack with?!” I spend half my night making calls to avoid colliding with friendly guilds and I still end up surrounded by DC at times. You think I run 24 members so I can chase down 3 or 4 people in a field and exclaim, “Get rekt! We are so good!” That's it, I've been compiling footage for my Xv1 video for the past year and a half guys. No. We don’t play for that. It’s not fun to play in lag, but the next time you’re fighting “a zerg” take off your own zerg goggles and take a quick look around you. Chances are, you are surrounded by your own faction. Just because you aren’t grouped doesn’t mean you aren’t a large force. Taking objectives and defending in Cyrodiil against the masses would not be possible without large groups. You are inside an RvR game. There are going to be large groups, and it’s not our fault. We aren’t what’s wrong with this game. The mentality and hate inside the community is what’s wrong. If you didn’t have large groups in Cyrodiil what a sad place it would be. But we keep pushing for groups to get dissolved.

Food for thought:

Stacking is a problem right now because the game can’t handle it. If we can’t fix the lag right now, why not institute more objectives inside Cyrodiil required for scoring? Force factions to spread for teamwork. You’re always going to have that jerk who stacks a raid or two because L2P but are there no ways for us to create or force factions to spread? If all we have left to defend is Aleswell and EP is pushing from Bleakers. Where do you think these two factions will collide? And quite literally the factions will collide. Because there is no other objective to push now. The next course of action has already been decided. The game was designed with natural choke points in Cyrodiil without the actual ability to handle the confrontations. It’s not EP nor DCs fault for going towards the objective when there’s no other option provided. They are playing as intended.

The removal of Prox Det as a skill entirely. No matter how you look at this skill or how many times you want to change it, it favors the group. It will never favor the smaller force enough to justify it. This is by far the best group AoE ever given to group players.

The adjustment of Barrier and Purge to only effect group members with the possibility of a slight number reduction. Not a drastic drop to where it’s not even worth mentioning as an Alliance War Skill.

The abolition of AoE caps and return of dynamic ultimate. Without AoE cap reduction and dynamic ultimate regen returned to players, you would be able to fight larger forces more easily as your ultimate would generate faster and your damage would not be mitigated because they stacked raids.

Strengthen AoE damage across the board for all class based skills. Pull players away from the stale "impulse and steel tornado only please". Nerf steel tornado’s range and remove the execution proc completely.

Institution of completely group based effects. This would include heals, set bonus buffs(as they already implemented), and all Alliance War Skills and any skills that effect nearby allies. Encourage players to group, stop discouraging and shaming it. This game was made to play with a group, stop arguing it.

Do not adjust siege damage against the player further, revoke the idea that siege should drain resources as well. If this becomes nothing but a siege vs siege game, it will be the most boring pvp experience on the market right now. All siege effects should be purgable as an alliance war skill inside alliance war siege damage.

Adjustment of the mentality that groups are what’s wrong with this game. Remember you are playing an RvR game. This PvP is undeniably group based. It is not the group’s fault that the lag is present. That is a strictly development issue. And I’m not saying scream at ZOS either. Exercise some patience and grace. We are all playing this game, just because someone plays a way you don’t doesn’t even come close to making them wrong.

I love this game; I seriously have never had so much fun playing a game. During the frustrations, the lag, the disappointment, we are all still playing for some reason. We love this game. I don’t want to watch this game drift into a brain dead hate fest dumbing down the game every patch. If you ask a majority of players they will tell you something similar to, “just here waiting for the next game to come out.” Hearing that phrase always saddens me, I love playing this game, but what’s the point if no one wants to and the people who still will are going to constantly harass the way you play? I am starting to count myself among those waiting for something else, because I’m not quite sure where TESO is headed like this.
-Like a Bulbasir/Permarekt

@Wrobel @ZOS_BrianWheeler @ZOS_GinaBruno

In Cyrodil there is no GvG mechanic like other mmo, maybe you should ask ZOS to implement that .This game don't support big group playstyle.

ataggs

I really believe the upcoming changes were not in the long term plans, but are reactions to a few vocal players demanding change because they want to play this game differently than it was designed.

My role is a support role and I wear a set designed for that role (it was not cheap attaining all of these pieces with the desired traits). That set will be almost worthless with the planned changes to the support line. Purge will be nerfed, barrier will be nerfed, that leaves me with guard and revealing flare. Oh wait, I still have siege shield...looks like we will be using that more.

Why create new sets (since IC) and then make them worthless in just a few months? Just stupid! The only up side is that these same vocal players that claim to play solo or small man (run alongside organised groups and leech the benefits) will no longer get the buff from the support sets.

I wish people would wake up...these super elite, we are so cool 1 v whatevers don't care about you, your play style,or the game..they care about making videos. Thanks for listening to these guys ZOS,and thanks for taking all of that spare gold that was weighing my toon down. Pfft!

ataggs

CITADALO wrote: »

In Cyrodil there is no GvG mechanic like other mmo, maybe you should ask ZOS to implement that .This game don't support big group playstyle.

I know it doesn't seem that way, but large group battles have worked in the past and are the reason many of us were attracted to them is game. I paid for epic, large scale PvP. If small scale was the intention,why such a large map with objectives designed for large groups?

Erondil

There is long post, and then there is that

Satiar

Erondil wrote: »

There is long post, and then there is that

I think he canceled Drunk Raid night AND our sacred Invite A Pug To Raid event to write this.

booksmcread

CITADALO wrote: »

x99Needles wrote: »

I am going to disclaim now; this is going to be quite a long post. I do not come to the forums often for various reasons. Exceptions being when I have something to say or in response to someone. Everyone has their two cents about what’s going on with this game, these are mine.

It is no secret that Cyrodiil is in a poor state. Between the constant lag issues, the stale “how many can I stack and who’s got barrier” Meta, and the discouraged or tired out leaving Cyrodiil at a frightening rate leaves Cyrodiil feeling just a little emptier than it was before. I can agree as I think most all of us can that something needs to change. I mean we all wish the lag would be “fixed” or just go away but the reality of the situation is that the game cannot currently operate as was intended. Say what you will about how it “should” work or how the game has been out for two years why can’t they get it together already. Things are not as simple as “fix” or “make it work”, they take time and I hope to god they do figure something out because the number one reason people stop playing is because they literally can’t play.

What I am more concerned about further each day I watch this game is where we are currently headed. The upcoming changes to Alliance War Skills and Siege Weapons inside Cyrodiil are excellent examples. We are reducing the effectiveness of skills meant to be used inside the alliance war and increasing the effectiveness of siege damage. Why? What’s the problem?

The problem is evident and easily explained with the such a simple word that is has become casually interpreted as the root of all of the game’s problems. Zerg.

“If people wouldn’t zerg.” “Zergs are the only reason it lags.” “Zergs ruin this game.”

Maybe so. It cannot be denied, when you stack even just 48 people in one Keep or Outpost, the ping skyrockets in search of the next galaxy over. Skills become things that just look pretty on your bar, movement looks like a poorly edited Claymation, and you sit back at your computer letting out a heavy sigh because that’s just about the extent of what you can do. And because of this, the forums, and zone, the community in general gets flooded with “anti-zerg” mentality and advocating warriors. I hate stacking, I hate fighting zergs, I hate when the game isn’t playable. Just like all of you.

But we’ve come to the point when a zerg is simply whenever you lose outnumbered, whether it be by a few or a dozen players. Quick, point and shout zerg! This mentality that has built up, and been encouraged by several players who have done nothing inside Cyrodiil but complain and keep to their corners of the map. It is plain toxic and not informative either. Zerg shaming has become a downright display of ignorance, no longer equitable.

I understand just as well as any of us, zergs are a problem. What I do not understand is reducing this games play to point and click on a siege weapon and removing the skills that allowed us to counter that. For those of you who do not know who I am, I am the GM of Vehemence (VE). I run 24 man raids every night.
The allotted group size in Cyrodiil, and yet I am constantly alongside my players accused of mindless zerging. Yet, every night the number of fights we do, the sheer numbers we face. I am outnumbered 8 out of ten times in any given situation in Cyrodiil. This is the fact of the game. Sometimes it works okay, sometimes it really sucks. It is not our fault, nor the players we are going up against that the game’s performance is poor.

Despite contending odds, we still manage to take objectives, defend objectives, sometimes with help sometimes alone. This is capable because of our teamwork and the skills available to us. I agreed that the “how many can I stack and who’s got a barrier” Meta is boring and needs a change. However, making the skill almost completely useless in raid play alongside nerfs to purge, is not the solution in my opinion. “The zerg is the problem so we’ll just make it so you can easily kill anything with siege and they won’t be able to defend themselves adequately.”

The game is slowly ever crawling to favoring the solo or smaller groups inside Cyrodiil. We are blaming the larger groups inside Cyrodiil for lagging the server and being “what’s wrong with the game.” Who do you think responds to the hordes of the opposing factions when it’s called out in zone? Who pushes back the faction that is on your front door? Who went out of their way to save that scroll? The guilds and groups inside Cyrodiil that run “larger” numbers when they are simply filling the group size inside Cyrodiil. And it cannot be argued that the larger groups are more successful than the smaller ones. Zergs aside, take 4 against 10, unless you’re dealing with a severe gap in skill the 10 are going to win and that’s how it should be. War is not a game of morale victories.

The mentality that has evolved inside this game is almost unbelievable. You are playing an RvR Game. We are all playing a game designed around taking objectives inside Cyrodiil that revolve around at the very least 18 man groups. This game does not support dueling or arenas (yet as they say.) And here we are shaming players and groups for playing the way it was intended…

Has anyone thought what Cyrodiil would like without all the large groups? Perfect right? You could all go do your solo and small man things to your hearts content inside an open world RvR realm where the Keeps simply become decorations on the map. A ghost town for your needs and desires. But we like playing this game too. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to play small. Nothing at all. You aren’t shamed or attacked for it. You aren’t blamed for things that are clearly out of your hands. And you also do nothing for your faction. You don’t take keeps. You don’t fight back. You don’t contribute to the score. You play alongside your faction's zergs and scold or you keep to your corners fighting duels while the map conflicts.

Where are we headed like this? Are we going to continue experiencing game changes that favor simplified play and how much siege you can set down? As a community there are no other options we can come to? No other solutions besides complaining and shaming and name-calling? This is what this game is becoming?

Do you think we enjoy the lag as well? Do you think I get into cyrodiil and immediately ask, “who can I stack with?!” I spend half my night making calls to avoid colliding with friendly guilds and I still end up surrounded by DC at times. You think I run 24 members so I can chase down 3 or 4 people in a field and exclaim, “Get rekt! We are so good!” That's it, I've been compiling footage for my Xv1 video for the past year and a half guys. No. We don’t play for that. It’s not fun to play in lag, but the next time you’re fighting “a zerg” take off your own zerg goggles and take a quick look around you. Chances are, you are surrounded by your own faction. Just because you aren’t grouped doesn’t mean you aren’t a large force. Taking objectives and defending in Cyrodiil against the masses would not be possible without large groups. You are inside an RvR game. There are going to be large groups, and it’s not our fault. We aren’t what’s wrong with this game. The mentality and hate inside the community is what’s wrong. If you didn’t have large groups in Cyrodiil what a sad place it would be. But we keep pushing for groups to get dissolved.

Food for thought:

Stacking is a problem right now because the game can’t handle it. If we can’t fix the lag right now, why not institute more objectives inside Cyrodiil required for scoring? Force factions to spread for teamwork. You’re always going to have that jerk who stacks a raid or two because L2P but are there no ways for us to create or force factions to spread? If all we have left to defend is Aleswell and EP is pushing from Bleakers. Where do you think these two factions will collide? And quite literally the factions will collide. Because there is no other objective to push now. The next course of action has already been decided. The game was designed with natural choke points in Cyrodiil without the actual ability to handle the confrontations. It’s not EP nor DCs fault for going towards the objective when there’s no other option provided. They are playing as intended.

The removal of Prox Det as a skill entirely. No matter how you look at this skill or how many times you want to change it, it favors the group. It will never favor the smaller force enough to justify it. This is by far the best group AoE ever given to group players.

The adjustment of Barrier and Purge to only effect group members with the possibility of a slight number reduction. Not a drastic drop to where it’s not even worth mentioning as an Alliance War Skill.

The abolition of AoE caps and return of dynamic ultimate. Without AoE cap reduction and dynamic ultimate regen returned to players, you would be able to fight larger forces more easily as your ultimate would generate faster and your damage would not be mitigated because they stacked raids.

Strengthen AoE damage across the board for all class based skills. Pull players away from the stale "impulse and steel tornado only please". Nerf steel tornado’s range and remove the execution proc completely.

Institution of completely group based effects. This would include heals, set bonus buffs(as they already implemented), and all Alliance War Skills and any skills that effect nearby allies. Encourage players to group, stop discouraging and shaming it. This game was made to play with a group, stop arguing it.

Do not adjust siege damage against the player further, revoke the idea that siege should drain resources as well. If this becomes nothing but a siege vs siege game, it will be the most boring pvp experience on the market right now. All siege effects should be purgable as an alliance war skill inside alliance war siege damage.

Adjustment of the mentality that groups are what’s wrong with this game. Remember you are playing an RvR game. This PvP is undeniably group based. It is not the group’s fault that the lag is present. That is a strictly development issue. And I’m not saying scream at ZOS either. Exercise some patience and grace. We are all playing this game, just because someone plays a way you don’t doesn’t even come close to making them wrong.

I love this game; I seriously have never had so much fun playing a game. During the frustrations, the lag, the disappointment, we are all still playing for some reason. We love this game. I don’t want to watch this game drift into a brain dead hate fest dumbing down the game every patch. If you ask a majority of players they will tell you something similar to, “just here waiting for the next game to come out.” Hearing that phrase always saddens me, I love playing this game, but what’s the point if no one wants to and the people who still will are going to constantly harass the way you play? I am starting to count myself among those waiting for something else, because I’m not quite sure where TESO is headed like this.
-Like a Bulbasir/Permarekt

@Wrobel @ZOS_BrianWheeler @ZOS_GinaBruno

In Cyrodil there is no GvG mechanic like other mmo, maybe you should ask ZOS to implement that .This game don't support big group playstyle.

Cyrodiil is designed to be Group v Group. The fact that people can 1vX or duel or other activities despite it being outside of the core design of PvP in this game is great. But the core mechanics of the game are Group v Group.

Elong

Satiar wrote: »

Erondil wrote: »

There is long post, and then there is that

I think he canceled Drunk Raid night AND our sacred Invite A Pug To Raid event to write this.

Outrageous behaviour!

Agree with a lot of Bulby there. I know a few people may be thinking that of the changes he wants, VE is one of the guilds that runs things like prox det, steel tornadoes etc the most. However that is because they are simply the best group skills in the game right now, and it simply is about winning at the end of the day. It would be awesome to have more variety and options that were equally successful, as this game tried so heavily to market, "play your own way".

Teargrants

Sylveria_Relden

Why is it so hot in here? And what are we doing in this handbasket?

KenaPKK

A zerg is any group larger than is necessary to achieve its objective. I've been saying this for a long time, and I stand by my definition of the word. No one dislikes large groups existing. People dislike two things: uneven fights and lag.

The game was marketed as a "play how you want" sandbox within a RvRvR environment capable of supporting large scale battles. All group sizes should be accommodated, and big groups shouldn't "zerg" down little groups with unnecessarily large numbers.

But as for your suggestions, yes, more PvP objectives in Cyrodiil and IC, removal of AoE caps and Prox Det, implementation of mild dynamic ulti generation, free movement between campaigns + incentive to participate in all of them, reworked campaign victory rewards...

The list goes on an on, all things we've been calling for in the name of "fixing" PvP. >.<

Zheg

Bulb tried to put this into the guild motd, went over the character limit, and was forced to leave us a pokemon quote and head to the forums.

For the TLDR:

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqDaH2CRH7A[/video]

To be super cereal, there aren't many pvp guilds left in the game, and even fewer can muster the numbers for a full raid. I always found it hypocritical to see hypercritical anti-group rhetoric from people that very recently (weeks to months) played in full raids, and probably still would be if the game didn't suck and their friends still logged in. You hear "well the game just can't handle large groups" as a terribad excuse (even though stacking and total numbers are the issue, not a single raid), particularly when we still have the clustereff emperor mechanics left that promote obscene stacking and funneled objectives. For now, until the lag can be properly addressed, I'd tack onto that laundry list OP a removal/neutering of the emperor system. Having an active emp during primetime is a clustereff each and every time it happens, and almost all of them are crowned when there is little to zero resistance. If all it does is exacerbate the lag (and cause endless drama) what's the point of keeping a failed mechanic like that in game?

With regards to the siege patch, I've resigned myself to it happening, going in broken, remaining in game for 6+ months, and taking solace in the fact that I can trolol the QQ threads once the same people that have been hysterically praising the broken changes start dying to the broken siege and realizing that it ended up just promoting even more numbers for keep assaults.

As bulb said in the end of his wall o' text, our TS spends almost as much time talking about camelot unchained (a game not even in beta yet) as we do eso. I know we're not the only ones, and hopefully ZOS at least realizes the colossal eff up they've made of ESO over the past two years.

Poxheart

Which faction interests you folks?

Zheg

Poxheart wrote: »

Which faction interests you folks?

That is the question "that shall not be asked" right now, strong feelings across the board.

Poxheart

Hahahaha.

Teargrants

Zheg wrote: »

I know we're not the only ones, and hopefully ZOS at least realizes the colossal eff up they've made of ESO over the past two years.

Ahem, about that...


Btw, You should have posted this thread on Reddit, Bulb.

dodgehopper_ESO

@x99Needles I'm glad you posted this. I agree with you that people are getting the wrong ideas about Cyrodiil. I'd like to add that you're my rival in the RvRvR so I'm not piping up because we have some kind of connection in game. I don't know if aoe's should be made better (I'd personally rather if single target skills were relatively stronger than they are). I also think it is odd how little damage elemental wall does as an aoe, but steel tornado or the other aoe skills did so much more. I think the way the damage is calculated on the aoe front has been off for a long time. Caltrops is a reasonable level of AOE as far as I'm concerned. At any regard those things can be adjusted, but I agree the hostile talk about Zergs is pretty preposterous. I understand the dueling crowd want something to do, but ZoS should do what I have suggested (and now I see you doing it) which is to make the small scale missions in Cyrodiil have more bearing on the war. I would love it if players doing missions in the towns like Bruma, Cheydinhal, etc effected the earnings of the factions as well as had some bearing on how easy/hard it is to take down a fort. They need to add more relevance to IC as well.

zyk

To me, it's simple. If ZOS can't fix the server (they can't in the near-term), then gameplay needs to be adjusted so that players are unable to exceed the capabilities of the server.

Reduce/cap resource pools and regen so we can't spam abilities endlessly. Increase the cost of the most server intensive abilities; ZOS must know which they are.

Give us a live test server on which they can rapidly test this approach and consider it an interim solution.

Add new objectives in the form of new outposts near the gates/bridges where none presently exist to spread us out. Entirely lock out IC on this campaign.

Quick and dirty, yes; but better than the horrible experience that is Allaince War PVP today.

Rylana

KenaPKK wrote: »

A zerg is any group larger than is necessary to achieve its objective. I've been saying this for a long time, and I stand by my definition of the word. No one dislikes large groups existing. People dislike two things: uneven fights and lag.

The game was marketed as a "play how you want" sandbox within a RvRvR environment capable of supporting large scale battles. All group sizes should be accommodated, and big groups shouldn't "zerg" down little groups with unnecessarily large numbers.

But as for your suggestions, yes, more PvP objectives in Cyrodiil and IC, removal of AoE caps and Prox Det, implementation of mild dynamic ulti generation, free movement between campaigns + incentive to participate in all of them, reworked campaign victory rewards...

The list goes on an on, all things we've been calling for in the name of "fixing" PvP. XD

Except for the small vs large thing becomes a strawman most of the times it is used.

We talked about this in game briefly during that PM discussion, where I mentioned I try to keep groups manageable but able to handle whatever is thrown at us.

[snip]

So really, its just scapegoating to save ego more than a real problem. God forbid people cant "safely" gank people 4-6 on 1 every time they see a rider on horseback. People dont normally ride alone anymore because they got sick of it. As a solo ganker on one of my chars, I know this one all too well. Its hard to find a good gankspot nowadays that isnt crowded with 20 other gankers fighting over the occasional piece of meat, and running to the cubbies and rocks every time a full raid steams through.

Now, stacking three raids onto a keep flag and spamming springs + tornado and causing 2k ping for everyone? Yeah thats a whole other issue and definitely a problem.

Moderator edit - post edited for naming and shaming

Vaoh

I can't help but type "eso huge battle" into Google and see the scale of battles in videos that come up. This'll never happen ever again, will it? PvP doesn't seem to be their real priority anymore. And I totally agree with what you've said! I may not run with zergs, but Cyrodiil would be dead without large groups running around contributing to the war effort.

Back at release on console there was very little lag in PvP. Even in Vet campaigns there was barely any lag.
After awhile though, Vet campaigns became laggy, but Non-Vet was still perfect.

When the new scaling (Orsinium) update released, non-vet became "burst someone down within 2 seconds" like it is in Vet, lag spiked up, and the awesome balanced experience that was there became a gear/CP contest. This scaling is great for PvE in Wrothgar, but certainly drives new players away from PvP.

As a side note, I got Magicka Detonation on my Sorc about a month ago. It just so happens that I also quit PvP immediately after getting it because I'm tired of playing in lag. Imperial City is full of door gankers, and last I checked the Barathrum Centrata event was still bugged. Everytime I try to return I leave even more discouraged. At least PvE is great atm...

themdogesbite

Stacking / turteling with big groups was always a problem and always a huge cause for lagg. I dont think nayone blames anyone for wanting to run a large raid or whatever. But doing it when it's blatant how it will affect the game is kinda meh.

https://youtu.be/QSgx68ZZ8wk?t=10m38s

This is just after they fixed the lightning patch fiasco. FPS is horrible and as you will see as the fight prolongs, the ping isnt to great either with skills takeing forever to go through. (Instance i refer to is starting at 10.40)


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hyK9tLzG5o

This is BEFORE the lightning patch, FPS is notably better but notice how bad the server performs as soon as large groups collide. (Althought still better then now lol.)

I even remember a instance from when i was a total noob at release and was in a random guild i found in zonechat, we had 3 full groups running after the same guy and we lagged everything to ***.

At the end of the day we all just want to be able to play a game we at one point throughly enjoyed in the way we want to..

koby-xxrwb17_ESO

zyk wrote: »

To me, it's simple. If ZOS can't fix the server (they can't in the near-term), then gameplay needs to be adjusted so that players are unable to exceed the capabilities of the server.

Reduce/cap resource pools and regen so we can't spam abilities endlessly. Increase the cost of the most server intensive abilities; ZOS must know which they are.

Give us a live test server on which they can rapidly test this approach and consider it an interim solution.

Add new objectives in the form of new outposts near the gates/bridges where none presently exist to spread us out. Entirely lock out IC on this campaign.

Quick and dirty, yes; but better than the horrible experience that is Allaince War PVP today.

Balancing the game around the server is a terrible idea, no skill should be nerfed purely for the servers benefit. While I agree with nerfing resources and the rest of your suggestionI think nerfing a skills cost purely because the server can't handle it properly is ridiculous

joker0137

"We're on a road to nowhere"

zyk

koby-xxrwb17_ESO wrote: »

Balancing the game around the server is a terrible idea, no skill should be nerfed purely for the servers benefit. While I agree with nerfing resources and the rest of your suggestionI think nerfing a skills cost purely because the server can't handle it properly is ridiculous

On the contrary, it is ridiculous to allow ANY gameplay conditions that the server cannot handle. All gameplay must be designed within the boundaries of the technical capabilities of the hardware and software. When designers fail to do this, the result is always a broken game.

In any case, I am not advocating changing any abilities in particular. My suggestions are intentionally very general.

The bottom line is that ZOS needs to reduce the per-player command rate on VR campaigns to the point that the server isn't overwhelmed. At least in the short-term until the underlying architecture/technology is improved. At least give us one test environment with experiments of this nature and let players decide which they prefer.

Rune_Relic

Chances are, you are surrounded by your own faction. Just because you aren’t grouped doesn’t mean you aren’t a large force. Taking objectives and defending in Cyrodiil against the masses would not be possible without large groups

So you need large groups to take on the masses because the masses are so effective ?
I agree with the majority of your post but I think you are overplaying your hand a little there
This simply means you need an equally effective mass of players....not a ballgroup.

At the end of the day we have a problem...LAG.
There is no PvP while this lag exists.
The cause of that lag is twofold.
1. AoE hitting too many targets at any moment in time (with attack or defensive AoE skills).
2. Too many players clustering up so they can be hit at any moment in time (with attack or defensive AoE skills).

Enhancing point 1 to achieve point 2 isnt productive. Especially with TTK being a major issue.

Single target skills are not the issue here.
AoE and nothing but AoE is the problem.
And the only reason its a problem is because of the number of people hit per second.
Less people hit per second = less server code generated (call me a liar).
And the less targets AoE attack/defense hits...the more viable/required/competitive single target skills become.
When you are guarenteed to hit 3+ people 75% of the time, why would anyone load single target for RvRvR other than gankers ?
When defensive AoE abilities is far more effective than single target why would you use anything else (if you had a choice) ?

The simlpe fact is (some) people crave power and are addicted to the desire to WIN.
They wont use the weak arse skills to do that.
That is why AoE dominates because AoE is all powerful in group warfare...unless its artificially neutered.
You have 1,000,000 people to go to war against.
You can send in the boys/girls to die in a war of attrition 1 on 1..or simply drop a bomb and be done with it.
There is a reason atom bombs ad nukes were created and it wasn't to extend the length of warfare...quite the opposite
We need the bombs removed to force a war of attrition.
Then we wont nuke the server at the same time

WillhelmBlack

I'd love a campaign with no Alliance War skill line or AoE. People would actually be forced to fight 1v1.

Zheg

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Rylana wrote: »

KenaPKK wrote: »

A zerg is any group larger than is necessary to achieve its objective. I've been saying this for a long time, and I stand by my definition of the word. No one dislikes large groups existing. People dislike two things: uneven fights and lag.

The game was marketed as a "play how you want" sandbox within a RvRvR environment capable of supporting large scale battles. All group sizes should be accommodated, and big groups shouldn't "zerg" down little groups with unnecessarily large numbers.

But as for your suggestions, yes, more PvP objectives in Cyrodiil and IC, removal of AoE caps and Prox Det, implementation of mild dynamic ulti generation, free movement between campaigns + incentive to participate in all of them, reworked campaign victory rewards...

The list goes on an on, all things we've been calling for in the name of "fixing" PvP. XD

Except for the small vs large thing becomes a strawman most of the times it is used.

We talked about this in game briefly during that PM discussion, where I mentioned I try to keep groups manageable but able to handle whatever is thrown at us.

Most "small man" groups want to just Xv1 people. The lord's group is a good example of this. If you have 20, he throws a fit on his stream about being zerged, but if you are by yourself, he will cheerfully critrush you with six other guys in a 7v1 steamroll and talk about how awesome he is.

So really, its just scapegoating to save ego more than a real problem. God forbid people cant "safely" gank people 4-6 on 1 every time they see a rider on horseback. People dont normally ride alone anymore because they got sick of it. As a solo ganker on one of my chars, I know this one all too well. Its hard to find a good gankspot nowadays that isnt crowded with 20 other gankers fighting over the occasional piece of meat, and running to the cubbies and rocks every time a full raid steams through.

Now, stacking three raids onto a keep flag and spamming springs + tornado and causing 2k ping for everyone? Yeah thats a whole other issue and definitely a problem.

Come on to read the forums a little and this is the first thing I come across.

Does it make you feel better citing me for no reason at all as the person who goes around on stream 7v1ing people? For all of the people that fight poorly and with numbers on their side in this game, youre going to call out FENGRUSH for it? Good laughs Rylana. Keep on jabbing.

I'm not the type to watch someone else playing the game that I could be playing myself, so I've never seen your stream and won't comment on Rylana's call-out. In general, the people referenced in the OP are the first to start saying, "you had 2.38 players more than us! FFS stop zerging". The race to the bottom to run fewer people in group than the guy next to you so you can announce it to the world and think it somehow merits respect and awe has resulted in smaller group sizes, but just as big if not bigger clusters of people attacking the same objective. You'll fight a small group, kill them, and then get salty ego-saving whispers after about how they were zerged down and you're bad and they're good, meanwhile, there were enough additional small groups and pugs on their side during the fight that they had ended up having significantly more numbers at the keep. Try telling that to the small group you killed, and you're told to l2count and called a liar. Try pointing out the hypocrisy when the tables are turned and suddenly they go quiet - now you're trying to stir up drama and looking to pick a fight, and "when did pvp become so toxic" - yadda yadda yadda. I'll tell you when pvp became toxic - when people starting focusing on their own group size to the exclusion of all else, expecting opponents to react in real time and only ever allow exactly equal numbers to fight when the smaller group tries to stealth bomb (exaggerating here and having a little fun) while the overflow crowd moves off to the side and/or is allowed to fight the 20 pugs running around that don't count and never existed and weren't at the keep to even begin with.

Some legitimate imbalances between large v small group play have spiraled into large groups being responsible for all of the lag (and of course, somehow 5 small groups of 9 people contribute nothing at all compared to the opposing 1 large group of 24 during a fight), and even though the two issues are entirely mutually exclusive, large groups just became the scapegoat because it was easier to cast them as the cause for both issues. Much of the anti-group rhetoric left reality months ago.

FENGRUSH

Zheg wrote: »

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Rylana wrote: »

KenaPKK wrote: »

A zerg is any group larger than is necessary to achieve its objective. I've been saying this for a long time, and I stand by my definition of the word. No one dislikes large groups existing. People dislike two things: uneven fights and lag.

The game was marketed as a "play how you want" sandbox within a RvRvR environment capable of supporting large scale battles. All group sizes should be accommodated, and big groups shouldn't "zerg" down little groups with unnecessarily large numbers.

But as for your suggestions, yes, more PvP objectives in Cyrodiil and IC, removal of AoE caps and Prox Det, implementation of mild dynamic ulti generation, free movement between campaigns + incentive to participate in all of them, reworked campaign victory rewards...

The list goes on an on, all things we've been calling for in the name of "fixing" PvP. XD

Except for the small vs large thing becomes a strawman most of the times it is used.

We talked about this in game briefly during that PM discussion, where I mentioned I try to keep groups manageable but able to handle whatever is thrown at us.

Most "small man" groups want to just Xv1 people. The lord's group is a good example of this. If you have 20, he throws a fit on his stream about being zerged, but if you are by yourself, he will cheerfully critrush you with six other guys in a 7v1 steamroll and talk about how awesome he is.

So really, its just scapegoating to save ego more than a real problem. God forbid people cant "safely" gank people 4-6 on 1 every time they see a rider on horseback. People dont normally ride alone anymore because they got sick of it. As a solo ganker on one of my chars, I know this one all too well. Its hard to find a good gankspot nowadays that isnt crowded with 20 other gankers fighting over the occasional piece of meat, and running to the cubbies and rocks every time a full raid steams through.

Now, stacking three raids onto a keep flag and spamming springs + tornado and causing 2k ping for everyone? Yeah thats a whole other issue and definitely a problem.

Come on to read the forums a little and this is the first thing I come across.

Does it make you feel better citing me for no reason at all as the person who goes around on stream 7v1ing people? For all of the people that fight poorly and with numbers on their side in this game, youre going to call out FENGRUSH for it? Good laughs Rylana. Keep on jabbing.

I'm not the type to watch someone else playing the game that I could be playing myself, so I've never seen your stream and won't comment on Rylana's call-out. In general, the people referenced in the OP are the first to start saying, "you had 2.38 players more than us! FFS stop zerging". The race to the bottom to run fewer people in group than the guy next to you so you can announce it to the world and think it somehow merits respect and awe has resulted in smaller group sizes, but just as big if not bigger clusters of people attacking the same objective. You'll fight a small group,, kill them, and then get salty ego-saving whispers after about how they were zerged down and you're bad and they're good, meanwhile, there were enough additional small groups and pugs on their side during the fight that they had ended up having significantly more numbers at the keep. Try telling that to the small group you killed, and you're told to l2count and called a liar. Try pointing out the hypocrisy when the tables are turned and suddenly they go quiet - now you're trying to stir up drama and looking to pick a fight, and "when did pvp become so toxic" - yadda yadda yadda. I'll tell you when pvp became toxic - when people starting focusing on their own group size to the exclusion of all else, expecting opponents to react in real time and only ever allow exactly equal numbers to fight when the smaller group tries to stealth bomb (exaggerating here and having a little fun) while the overflow crowd moves off to the side and/or is allowed to fight the 20 pugs running around that don't count and never existed and weren't at the keep to even begin with.

Some legitimate imbalances between large v small group play have spiraled into large groups being responsible for all of the lag (and of course, somehow 5 small groups of 9 people contribute nothing at all compared to the opposing 1 large group of 24 during a fight), and even though the two issues are entirely mutually exclusive, large groups just became the scapegoat because it was easier to cast them as the cause for both issues. I can't comment on what Rylana said, but you've certainly been a contributor on this front, though I certainly won't single you out, because it's easily a majority of the regular forum posters that fall into this category. Much of the anti-group rhetoric left reality months ago.

Ill tell you then since you dont watch - Im not one of the guys that goes to every fight complaining about numbers on stream. Also, I dont run around with 7 people hitting others off horses who are alone and tell my stream how good I was. Frankly, I dont even think Ive been grouped with 7 people outside of Khole in the last few months, which was about a week ago.. and I had a lot of fun grouping with them. And Khole was definitely not fighting people off their horse, they were engaging a multiraid guild of AD groups. Throughout my time streaming with Khole I was harassed for 'zerging' after being some sort of anti-zerg prophet. I was harassed on stream, in PMs, in guild chat - its whatever. I know how it goes, and what is going on there (this is despite fighting in a Khole group of 12 vs 40+ AD).

Most of my stream is not 1vXing, but I like to try when I can. This patch is the absolute worst to 1vX in. My first points here are just to say, I am not a guy that goes around headcounting fights to save face - nor am I one to quickly label people as a zerg and disregard them. Im probably the farthest from that as far as a lot of the streamers go, because Ive played in bigger groups as well. I just couldnt stream it until a couple weeks ago when I built a new PC.

To tackle the other part about people referencing numbers and stuff as a larger issue - I honestly attribute that mostly to this patch being what it is. It was the case before that you could be outnumbered 25v20 and really not notice much difference. And its still pretty minute all things considered, but its more relevant now than before. Numbers count for so much now, and its something that drives me nuts. People dont die as easily as before, and while Id like to see the game go in that direction, the math behind it is completely fubar allowing numbers to be more relevant than player skill due to the mechanics were ruled by in PVP.

So I think there is a reason for the hateful rhetoric youll get. But when people see 30-40+ people marching in a blob, a lot of players are simply turned off by it. I typically dont want anything to do with it either, because if a real fight breaks out, I know the quality of gameplay will hit rock bottom, and I dont enjoy streaming that to people. People dont like watching it either.

Zheg

FENGRUSH wrote: »

... I was harassed on stream, in PMs, in guild chat - its whatever. I know how it goes, and what is going on there (this is despite fighting in a Khole group of 12 vs 40+ AD).

To tackle the other part about people referencing numbers and stuff as a larger issue - I honestly attribute that mostly to this patch being what it is. It was the case before that you could be outnumbered 25v20 and really not notice much difference. And its still pretty minute all things considered, but its more relevant now than before. Numbers count for so much now, and its something that drives me nuts. People dont die as easily as before, and while Id like to see the game go in that direction, the math behind it is completely fubar allowing numbers to be more relevant than player skill due to the mechanics were ruled by in PVP.

So I think there is a reason for the hateful rhetoric youll get. But when people see 30-40+ people marching in a blob, a lot of players are simply turned off by it. I typically dont want anything to do with it either, because if a real fight breaks out, I know the quality of gameplay will hit rock bottom, and I dont enjoy streaming that to people. People dont like watching it either.

The post was meant to clarify that the OP focused on people that have blinders on when running in a small group and think that just because they're in a group of 9 (or whatever) they're free of any blame for having too large numbers in a fight, even though they can frequently end up in a sea of allies that end up dwarfing the other side who then gets accused (somehow?) of zerging because they put 20 people in a single group. It's lunacy. I bolded the part of your post that demonstrates what we'll see on a nightly basis.

To the rest of your post, I think (?) part of the point bulb was trying to make is that large groups are one of the best vehicles to handle insane numbers and push objectives so everyone isn't condensed at the last meaningful objective. Numbers certainly do matter more in this patch, but when you have a balanced larger group, you can handle being outnumbered better than you can in a smaller group (at least, I've found). All of the new changes that have been hailed seem focused on turning large groups into small groups, and the point trying to be made is that if this ends up getting pushed to the point where we just don't have large groups any more, there is a significant risk that the clusters of small groups and pugs just end up stacking even harder because now there isn't a front lines force pushing into the crapstorm and taking on the bigger numbers before they become obscene and all bear down on the last important objective while people sit in keeps because broken siege mechanics make it counter-productive to play offensively without significantly outnumbering your opponent. The irony that seems to be missed by a lot of people is that larger groups end up reducing the amount of stacking that happens on the map because they're able to go hit an objective without needing the pug herd behind them to do so.