Since PvP is not working as intended, why are there not more hotfixes?

Haxer

Obviously the game is new and there are always going to be balance issues. I am concerned however, about some of the larger mechanics that don't seem to work as intended.


Zen: "One team will not be able to hold the entire map, because they'll have more to defend and the other two factions will be able to push back."

Reality: It is very possible for one team to hold the entire map, and keep both opponents trapped in their own spawn for days.

Zen: "Being true 50 or VR will be an advantage, but everyone will be able to contribute effectively from level10."

Reality: I don't know anyone that hasn't experienced three (or less) VR 10's being able to completely shut down 20 or more opponents.

Zen: "Massive battles with hundreds of players on screen, epic continuous world PvP."

Reality: Yesterday, (5/7) I was one of five people online for my entire faction, in Skullcrusher, during prime time hours.

This has happened everywhere, even the untouchable Auriel's Bow has filtered down to low PoP. There are too many campaigns and not enough players. Rather than have a challenge, people have dispersed to create all low-pop campaigns wherever it can be the most one sided.

Is there any plan to combine/shut down campaigns?

What you intended was perfect. Yes true level should be some advantage, yes former emperor-ship should be some advantage, yes factions should have more than 5 players on. But at the moment, that is not what I am experiencing.

Can you give us some idea of when we can expect this to be addressed? I really hope it's not going to be put off until campaign ends.

Warlunatic

go home your drunk, guessing you know more then developers.

Haxer

Warlunatic wrote: »

go home your drunk, guessing you know more then developers.

Thank you for such a well thought out and constructive response, that accurately addresses the facts I've pointed out.

makreth

Don't forget the europeans and the high latency they have to deal with. That's a major factor too.

Hessen

Good OP - if a little ranty

Three main issues have impacted PvP populations
- sub time was up for first free month
- VR10s vs <50s
- Vamp issue
- EU Lag

I'd say our guild has an 80% drop in AvA interest because of those points and we recruited hundreds specifically for AvA and having daily sessions of multiple groups.

I understand the game is fresh and there's a lot to fix, and people are moaning about downtime all the time. But these are huge subscription number affecting things.

Vauleen

The biggest reason for the drop in population is the lack of viable leveling in AvA. Fix that and people will play it. If not you won't see myself and many others out there until VR10. (Which could be a while for many people) The fact is they killed the only way to level out there in the first week of the game being released.

LadyChaos

While I do not think lvl 10 can handle a VR on their own, they do contribute effectively. I have seen low lvls jump into the fight between a couple gank vs anti0gank group and been the sway factor either by support/utility or DPS.

Point being they CONTRIBUTE effectively not solo effectively.

part of the server problem IMO is the "I give up" because xxx is OP or xxxx faction is too far ahead. The factions do not appear to be balanced in numbers. At least not on AB. on AB we AD were last place, for couple weeks. We joked about why red and blue were pushing us so hard... "why does everyone hate us lol?" ... We pulled ahead after a bit and stayed there... but red and blue were still putting up heavy and quality fights retaking entire map on their respective peak times... then mass of boycotting vampires and only AD decided not to boycott?

Now you only see groups of enemy VR10s camping quest locations, rather than organizing keep takes because they can't win, cant keep the towers indefinably etc etc... so just go for the lowbies tryin get shards n stuff? IDK if server combine fixes it if AD is dominant in general.

I really hate spawn camp. I think it kills PvP faster than anything. You get a bunch of bored blood thirsty PvPs chasing the only meat for miles back to their home city... and they just quit. It's fun for like 20 mins then those players just quit, reducing the ability to even seek any kind of exciting fight even more. It's players faults as much as ZOS IMO for boycotting crap had already been announced to be changed, assuming everything is unfair, spawn camping enemies into submission, and ZOS not providing balanced competitive war-grounds.

sorry for lengthy reply, but just my feelings on it.

Haxer

Hessen wrote: »

Good OP - if a little ranty

Three main issues have impacted PvP populations
- sub time was up for first free month
- VR10s vs <50s
- Vamp issue
- EU Lag

I'd say our guild has an 80% drop in AvA interest because of those points and we recruited hundreds specifically for AvA and having daily sessions of multiple groups.

I understand the game is fresh and there's a lot to fix, and people are moaning about downtime all the time. But these are huge subscription number affecting things.

You made a good point, and it was too ranty. I have edited to re-word the rantiest parts and still maintain the same meaning.

Gilvoth

i think it was awesome at first untill we saw large groups of V10's camping and dominating. i dont see how the people who are V10 even got there so fast and how they could have even enjoyed the game or did anything but spam thier way into immediate endgame within 2 days or a week of playtime.
thier max level and maxed out weapons and armor, how?
(yellow armor and weapon grade)
those of us who went slow and enjoyed the story line and took our time and had fun will suffer. the people who within only a few weeks hit V10 will have now and Keep the upperhand in pvp untill we get to thier level. i am only V1, and its true i hate when 3 or more V10's are allways there to defend and Keep the entire map on our campaign.
in another month will i and others make V10? i can tell you right now that leveling for me has really slowed down since i hit V1. the same things i did in lv 1 - 49 are no longer giving very much xp.

Azarul

Vauleen wrote: »

The biggest reason for the drop in population is the lack of viable leveling in AvA. Fix that and people will play it. If not you won't see myself and many others out there until VR10. (Which could be a while for many people) The fact is they killed the only way to level out there in the first week of the game being released.

This is spot on IMO. Either fix the leveling or wait 2 months for everyone to be V10 through PvE.

NordJitsu

I'd like to see the following done.

1. End a bunch of the under populated campaigns and give all those players the ability to freely switch to the remaining ones.
2. Immediately increase the AP cost to switch your home campaign.
3. Increase the cool down on switching

And finally:

4. GIVE US A REAL SCALING SYSTEM

The scaling system was universally hated since the first PvP test it was introduced in (October or Novemeber I think).

It does not scale you in anyway. It sets you to an awkwardly generated pre-set template where everyone gets the same stats.

So you're leveling a mage? Not when you go into PvP. You get evenly split between Stamina/Magicka/Health. So you're leveling a Warrior in Heavy Armor? Not in Cyrodiil. You now get 700 armor (squishy) and a miserable health pool.

The "scaling" system needs to stop negating player choices. It needs to set your attributes as if you were level 50 at the current ratio of your attribute point distribution. And armor? Armor should not be a pre-set value independent of gear. Your armor itself should scale to be as if it were level 50 stats. That means a player in all Light armor might be at 700 Armor but a person in all heavy would be above 1,000. Someone with 5 light and 2 heavy might be at 850.


And yes I know that Battle Leveled players are receiving a buff in the next patch. Guess what? So are all the NPCs in Cyrodil. Not just in keeps even. Dungeons, overworld, ect.

They've all been set to VR5. And they hit hard. Level 10s are going to get destroyed.

NOTE:

I'm currently VR3 going on VR4. I'm not asking for a buff to myself. I want the people I'm successfully fighting 6v1 in the open field to get a buff, because right now players are encouraged to stay away from PvP until they reach VR1. And as often as not that means just staying away from ESO because they don't have the time to put in to rush to Vet Rank in a week or less.

e.gamemarkb14_ESO

Yes they have a long ways to go, as I can go into Cyrodiil on my lvl 3x Templar and run out of magicka with 3-4 casts, which is silly, because in PvE while healing dungeons I can manage my healing to rarely run out.

Their scaling needs a bit of work, granted, but supposedly that is being changed a little with the next build (1.1)

I think the bigger issue for AvA currently is how badly thought out the "soft caps" are, and how it literally trivializes or makes some skills completely worthless, as players are not able to get the actual full effect (or even 50%) of the effect, such as Spiked Armor, or any other skill from other classes that give a temp boost to your armor / magic resists (heavy armor skill comes to mind).

Players want the ability to branch out and diversify, but currently that's not possible because everyone will share the exact same stat outcome because of how the "soft caps" are set.

Between OP's blunt truths and this, I can see why ESO is losing a ton of it's subs already. I hope they can hunker down and actually listen and make fixes, which we gave them during Beta a long time ago.

Starshadw

Excellent post, OP (and I didn't think it was too long. I'm tired of the lack of attention span found amongst most people these days.)

1. Yes, one faction is able to hold the entire map for days on end. It's particularly aggravating when one sees v10s camping a faction's home gates. One way to help deal with this situation is to add more NPCs to the home gate areas - not just right at the gate, but along the road. Put more mage NPCs there, so they can hit from long distances. Give them a fast respawn as well, and in this case only, I'd say they should be allowed to see through ALL stealth, at a very long radius (because what we see on Goldbrand is 3-6 high vet rank folks stealthed just outside the aggro radius of the NPCs, and they simply gank players as they leave. And that's when there isn't a whole group of 10-15 parked right outside the gate and out in the open because they've slaughtered the NPCs. We've actually had them use siege engines right up at the gate). Factions should not be able to camp other faction's home gates. I despise home base camping, and would like to see it stopped.

2. For the reasons others have mentioned, it IS difficult for non-vet-rank and even lower vet-rank folks to not get discouraged in Cyrodiil. We are the weak links, and we are, of course, the ones most often first targeted since folks know how quickly we will die when attacked. I've lost count of the number of times I have been Taloned, Bat-Swarmed, and Standard-ed to death by high vet-rank enemies. I agree that the "scaling" system needs to be looked at and improved.

3. The problems here insofar as numbers are concerned are two-fold.

The first problem is campaign population. There are far more campaigns with low populations than those with high populations. This makes those "massive" battles with hundreds of players on each side impossible to achieve for many campaigns. However, this actually wouldn't be a horrible thing IF the "we're temporarily switching campaigns to roll the map/farm Emperor" situation were dealt with. Some folks prefer fights where the numbers are closer to 15-50 per side, than 100+. But the unfortunate reality we're facing is that the low-population servers have become a place where big guilds come in to roll the map (either for free as "guests" or by making a temporary switch) and, sadly, often act condescendingly towards the home population crowd in the process.

The second problem is that while the PvP here is touted as Alliance versus Alliance, many are unwilling to be in large groups (or even group at all) because you receive fewer AP when you do so. And if you're trying to earn the AP to buy PvP gear, you want to get the most bang for your buck, which means solo ganking or a small group. If Zen wants the PvP to be AvA, then they need to provide robust rewards for players for creating those large groups.

gloryhammer

Haxer wrote: »

Zen: "Being true 50 or VR will be an advantage, but everyone will be able to contribute effectively from level10."

Reality: I don't know anyone that hasn't experienced three (or less) VR 10's being able to completely shut down 20 or more opponents.

I felt like a real contributor when I entered Cirodyl for the first time with my level 15 DK and saw a VR10 DK sneeze a bat swarm and clear 20 enemies.
I'm sure he could do that only because I was watching his back.
Will check this province again when I get to at least VR1.

Niffo

Because if they wait to put out a big patch it makes it look like their content patches are better than they really are, the patch notes for 1.1 will probably be a couple pages. This is the same issue the Arenanet had with Guild Wars 2, instead of putting out hotfixes for major issues they held off for more than a month to create the illusion the patch was bigger.

RazzPitazz

All of the patches are on PTS as well. And they are still being modified. Hotfixes are only great when they work. While sooner os better I will gladly wait for the patch as long as they actually work.

Haxer

Wow, thank you guys for taking the time to contribute, there are a lot of good points here. Particularly, the scaling ratio between hp/mana/stam that you would actually need on your character. I hadn't thought of that.

And I just felt the need to reiterate for myself (not that anyone implied otherwise), that VR 10 should be better than level 10 in PvP, it doesn't need to be Guild Warized, but it shouldn't be this drastic. Same with former emperorship, but no one should ever be able to solo 16 people.

Nijjion

They need to delete 7 of the campaigns and keep the other 3.

All of AD and EB have gone onto separate servers and have destroyed the balance because they want to be on the fotm winning server. It's low and cheap but aye what are you going to do... can't blame them for Zenimax bad design choices.

Haxer

I agree, obviously they're trying to have more than enough room, rather than not enough room to accommodate players which makes sense. But they could get rid of half (doubling the pop on the remaining) and still be fine.

frwinters_ESO

Nijjion wrote: »

They need to delete 7 of the campaigns and keep the other 3.

All of AD and EB have gone onto separate servers and have destroyed the balance because they want to be on the fotm winning server. It's low and cheap but aye what are you going to do... can't blame them for Zenimax bad design choices.

This is a catch 22. You cut out servers then it will create ques on the other servers then we will have more posts here on the forums saying "QQ I can log in cause there is a queue, i cant get in, i cant play with my friends im unsubbing QQ"

Yes i was being sarcastic but stating a point at the same time. This is the first season of PvP for the game. I doubt we will see any major changes in the servers before the campaigns are up so we probably got awhile.