It's time to seriously discuss how to revamp and fix AvA population imbalances and rewards.

Attorneyatlawl

EDIT (11:49pm Eastern Time 6/9): Fixed accidentally omitted line regarding territory control bonuses, and fixed an autocorrect typo.

A lot of people have played in this scenario: You go into Cyrodiil, and your faction has a fraction of the players the enemy one does and it feels useless to try to even take control of the map back mostly, and even if you tried you usually will be zerged down with overwhelming force from both enemy factions as the underdog. Sure, you could split your forces to hit two things at once, but then you're even less prepared and instead of being 4 times your numbers crashing down on you, it's still that just split while you have a smaller number of players to even try to make things work with for each force. People get frustrated, some log off, some mess around doing little or nothing, others repeatedly bang their heads into enemy keep walls as they are farmed for alliance points, and it's generally not exactly a fun time on either side as the overpopulated guys can't find any real fighting, and the underdogs feel like they are just mauled down by a stampede any time they run into an enemy very quickly.

Now, you might say... and I've said this in the past myself, "Well, it's a player-driven problem." However, not only are you actively encouraged, but actively rewarded for cross-factioning in this game, and the campaign assignment means little to nothing as you can simply change guest easily, or teleport on groupmates, guildmates, or contacts at will to any campaign you feel like, leaving control of the map feel largely meaningless on a personal level. You know what? I've thought this over awhile, and I think the halcyon days of community-driven balancing are long gone by now compared to games in the past like Dark Age of Camelot. The broader market and mass-market gaming appeal of a title like ESO just doesn't support enough people who care about that, to make it work. And, in a larger gaming market as we have nowadays, is it really that wrong for people to think they should be able to have fun with their friends and group with them when they want to?

Where does that leave us? It leaves us needing to take care of the problems that spring up from this shift in how the game is played by people. The key issue ends up being population balance, and over time the metagame shifts for the worse for chronically underpopulated ones as the higher ones earn more rewards more quickly, and this trend speeds in momentum in the long haul as they earn faster champion ranks, alliance points to buy better gear/sell gear for care-free siege drops and repairs, potions, pve-obtained bind on equip gear, and other staple needs for AvA in Cyrodiil.

While I could go into a related, and lengthy aside as to how all of this interacts with overall game designs and community trends over time in the MMORPG market, the topic I want to focus on today is what I'd propose as a "best shot" system to alleviate the problems in ESO related to faction population balance. The Imperial City will help siphon some enemies off as they flood into there from the main campaign areas, but they then crush the underdogs in there while still fielding much higher numbers in the mainland of Cyrodiil.

Decouple campaigns entirely from "home" or "guest" systems, and instead add in a scaling percentage stat buff based on how many enemies are in Cyrodiil compared to the most populated and 2nd-most-populated factions in the current campaign-land of Cyrodiil you are in, as well as adding in scaling population caps for the other factions that adjust dynamically based on how many of the smallest faction are in (with a minimum hard number of course so the underdogs can't simply not zone in so no one else can do so ), and finally, give a scaling AP rewards modifier (percentage-based) at the same time. Boom, it's more feasible to fight when outnumbered, enemies can't just stack 300 guys in on one faction and steamroll 75 of the underdogs until only 10 remain as the rest log off for the night, then having no one to fight, and the guys who do stick around would get rewards proportional to the higher difficulty of fighting when significantly outnumbered. EDIT (11:49pm Eastern Time 6/9): Keep and territory control bonuses would remain as they are currently, but only apply to players currently online in the campaign based on which one they are in.

Examples, with hypothetical numbers of course:

AD has 300 people in Cyrodiil.
EP has 250 people in Cyrodiil.
DC has 60 people in Cyrodiil.

Instead of allowing this, have the cap set at 250% of the number of players the smallest faction has, when the smallest faction has over 50 players in-zone. If the smallest faction falls beneath 50 players, allow that percentage to scale upwards so that higher-population factions don't simply get locked out through no fault of their own (10 DC players, allow for 750% of the player count of, or in other words, 75, and scale that downwards to the 250% number as the count approaches 50 DC players).

Similarly, have a scaling/sliding stat boost for the underdogs ranging from 20% when above 50 players in-faction, and scale that to a maximum of perhaps 60% total (1 percent added for each player that leaves) if they fall down to just ten people in-zone.

Finally, top it off with an AP buff that scaled to a significant amount (Warhammer Online ranged it all the way up to 4x the normal earnings, or 400% total as compared to the normal 100% gains), perhaps along the lines of 1% higher AP gains for the underdogs per percent they are out-numbered (example: DC has 60 players, while the biggest enemy faction has 150 players, in this situation the underdogs would get 250% of the normal AP values as they are outnumbered fighting two and a half times times the enemies that they have themselves, total (250% of their player count). Cap this along with the population scaling and it would go a very, very long way to encouraging people to fight back when overtaken.

Now, perhaps you read all of that and are thinking, "Attorney, what the heck happens with Emperorship then!?". Maybe you didn't, and just thought of it immediately in the first place when reading the beginning of this post, and were about to reply regardless. Let's tie up that loose end with a pretend-patchnote set:

"-Alliance War and Campaigns

As the war in Cyrodiil for control of the Imperial City and the Ruby Throne rages on, the Alliance faction leaders have deemed fit to assign Generals to aid in this endeavor!

-Leaderboard scoring by Alliance Points is now game-wide across all normal ruleset campaigns, and totals for the current war period are reset every 21 days. All-time leaderboards have been added for prestige and glory for dedicated warriors in Cyrodiil battles for one-day, one-week, one-month, one-year, and all-time historical totals, along with a handful of other statistics to judge your standing on including deaths per hour, kills contributed to, kill blows landed, and healing and damage totals dealt in each timeframe.

-War periods are now in effect! The scoring will be wiped clean to make way for a new evaluation every three weeks.

-Emperorship is now based on the current war period, with the highest-scoring player at the end of each one being crowned Emperor of Cyrodiil. The remaining players in the top positions 2 through 20 for their home factions will be promoted to Generals by their Alliance leaders in recognition of their combat prowess and contributions to the war. Lieutenants are also recognized for thier service for being in positions 21 to 50 at the end of each war period by their respective commanders and rewarded for their efforts.

-Emperors will receive the following benefits for all characters on their game account permanently:
A 10% boost to Magicka, Health, and Stamina attributes while in Cyrodiil or the Imperial City and all other Alliance War locations.
A 10% reduction in Ultimate ability costs in all game world areas.
A 10% reduction in the purchase cost for all items or rewards costing Alliance Points in recognition of their service and gratitude from their Faction's supporters to assist them in their endeavors. (Note: This is provided in lieu of an earnings increase in order to not affect leaderboard rankings.)
A new and unique active ability that may be used once every 5 minutes and does not use a skill slot on their ability bars, "Emperor's Warcry!", lasting for three minutes. When a player who has obtained the title of Emperor activates this skill while in Cyrodiil, the Imperial City, or other future Alliance War locations they provide a 20% reduction for all allies within a 50 meter radius in damage taken from enemy siege weaponry, and a 20% boost to incoming healing. (Note: This ability may only be activated while in an Alliance War area, and will be removed upon exiting one.)

-Generals will receive the following benefits for all characters on their game account permanently (Note: These benefits are replaced upon becoming an Emperor):
A 5% boost to Magicka, Health, and Stamina attributes while in Cyrodiil or the Imperial City and all other Alliance War locations.
A 5% reduction in Ultimate ability costs in all game world areas.
A 5% reduction in the purchase cost for all items or rewards costing Alliance Points in recognition of their service and gratitude from their Faction's supporters to assist them in their endeavors. (Note: This is provided in lieu of an earnings increase in order to not affect leaderboard rankings.)
A new and unique active ability that may be used once every 5 minutes and does not use a skill slot on their ability bars, "General's Battlecry!", lasting for three minutes. When a player who has obtained the title of General activates this skill while in Cyrodiil, the Imperial City, or other future Alliance War locations they provide a 10% reduction for all allies within a 50 meter radius in damage taken from enemy siege weaponry, and a 10% boost to incoming healing, which will provide its benefits in addition to any active "Emperor's Warcry!" effects that may currently have been received. (Note: This ability may only be activated while in an Alliance War area, and will be removed upon exiting one.)


-Lieutenants will receive the following benefits for all characters on their game account for the following war period only (Note: These benefits are replaced upon becoming an Emperor or General):
A 5% boost to Magicka, Health, and Stamina attributes while in Cyrodiil or the Imperial City and all other Alliance War locations.
A 5% reduction in Ultimate ability costs in all game world areas.
A 5% reduction in the purchase cost for all items or rewards costing Alliance Points in recognition of their service and gratitude from their Faction's supporters to assist them in their endeavors. (Note: This is provided in lieu of an earnings increase in order to not affect leaderboard rankings.)
A new and unique active ability that may be used once every 5 minutes and does not use a skill slot on their ability bars, "Lieutenant's Rallycry!", lasting for three minutes. When a player who has obtained the title of Lieutenant in the current war period activates this skill while in Cyrodiil, the Imperial City, or other future Alliance War locations they provide a 10% reduction for all allies within a 50 meter radius in damage taken from enemy siege weaponry, and a 10% boost to incoming healing, which will provide its benefits in addition to any active "Emperor's Warcry!" or "General's Battlecry!" effects that may currently have been received. (Note: This ability may only be activated while in an Alliance War area, and will be removed upon exiting one.)"

So, what does everyone else think? What are your thoughts on these types of rewards, in particular their effect removal from PvE areas such as questing locations or Trials other than the Ultimate benefit that remains to provide an incentive for players to play well at both if they enjoy PvE and PvP rather than preferring one or the other? Would these scoring changes entice you to play more actively in Cyrodiil, knowing that you would still gain some nice benefits even if you fall short of the top of the heap? How about the effects a scaling reward and statistics boost would have on campaign activity?

I look forward to your thoughts, and would love to hear from the Alliance War team as to theirs if anyone such as @ZOS_GinaBruno, @ZOS_JessicaFolsom, or even @ZOS_BrianWheeler himself want to chip in .

Thanks everyone.

Hypertionb14_ESO

the biggest problems lie in the Campaign Scoring system, which gives incentives players to stay in campaigns where you are winning for better rewards.

Removing Home and Guest and allowing everyone to freely score for at least the end of campaign bonuses in all campaign would give pugs and guilds reason to move more fluidly...

but we DEFINITELY do not need another buff system in PvP... let alone any that are permanent and likely to be exploited in mass by blob guilds.

Former Emp is bad enough.. However, i do like the idea of only having ONE emp per cycle, requiring a sustained effort for the entire Cycle to get the title, tho im sure in the case of Thorn and Azuras the emps would get bored and would not even remotely stick around for the duration of the Campaign. This change should be seriously considered as it would stop Emp Flipping and require more dedicated pushes for one of the most desired PvP rewards which currently is being passed out like Diabetes on Holloween.

uso245

I like many things said in here and noted like Hyper pointed out the permanent buff is kinda iffy in my book. Never the less making it worth maintaining emperorship as opposed to passing it out is always good in my book. I remember back in the day when people would literally just completely back off the keeps and allow enemy factions to freely cap which annoyed me so I went out and would pick off members of the zergs/reinforcements.

Attorneyatlawl

Hypertionb14_ESO wrote: »

the biggest problems lie in the Campaign Scoring system, which gives incentives players to stay in campaigns where you are winning for better rewards.

Removing Home and Guest and allowing everyone to freely score for at least the end of campaign bonuses in all campaign would give pugs and guilds reason to move more fluidly...

but we DEFINITELY do not need another buff system in PvP... let alone any that are permanent and likely to be exploited in mass by blob guilds.

Former Emp is bad enough.. However, i do like the idea of only having ONE emp per cycle, requiring a sustained effort for the entire Cycle to get the title, tho im sure in the case of Thorn and Azuras the emps would get bored and would not even remotely stick around for the duration of the Campaign. This change should be seriously considered as it would stop Emp Flipping and require more dedicated pushes for one of the most desired PvP rewards which currently is being passed out like Diabetes on Holloween.

Just to clarify, the suggestion in my feedback of decoupling the leaderboard rewards from individual campaigns and then making them game-wide, while also making them only awarded once per 21-day war period, would largely help prevent the system from being gamed as it currently is by certain groups. I'm actually recommending the removal of campaign-specific Emperorship (and proposed General/Lieutenant statuses) entirely, alongside making them largely unable to impact PvE activity like Arenas and Trials. In a game where the player total is numbered in the millions, 21 people earning permanent rewards for playing actively, and playing well, wouldn't have a large effect on the game as a whole as compared to now where an active Emperor in their specific home campaign is an absolute monster when online and receives 75% bonuses to all attributes and triple Ultimate generation. The suggested Lieutenant rewards, as mentioned, would be provided only for the single subsequent war period cycle.

themdogesbite

Some intresting ideas here, im not sure about the status of NA but the main issue of EU is that AD and DC have spread over campaigns whilst EP still stacks in TB, partly due to exessive nightcapping and partly due to the unplayable lagg that is innevitable when theese.. "raids" collide. Population issues would not be a problem in campigns on EU if the servers could handle the pressure on them.

I personaly like all ideas provided here except the Emperor, General and Lituenant idea, why? caus i believe it will bring forth emperor "trading" again which is a problem by it self, and whilst the "benefits" are neat and a nice idea, but not something i feel would add to much to the game itself.

Also i feel that there needs to be a reward for running in a smaller group / less insentives to run in theese big blobs that strain the server so hard, and a solution to dieying right now on EU for some seems to be to simply add more numbers to their "raid group". I got a whisper the other night were a raid leader of a guild explained to me that the reason they were "forced" to have so many players was to be able to kill us (12 player group ususally) and they had no concern about server performance or anything else as long as they could achive their goal. I mean i dont mind dieying to 40 organised players following the same guy, but i do mind dieying to it thanks to my skills not working, my weapon swap not working and my CC break not working. If i actually could have lagg free fights im certain that i could atleast dent them with a smaller group or maybe even kill them all.

The suggestions that makes big groups like theese earn less AP and XP / smaller group gains more is nice ideas and im certain there is a way to expand to this.

And there needs to be a reason to WIN a campaign again, first few cycles bragging rights were enough, but who cares now about winning "Thornblade cycle 15" and 30k gold when i could just farm AP and sell PvP items for 120k gold +.

I dearly do hope that there is some room again for PC now, we have been bleeding for a long time and the bandaids are starting to run out faster then ever before, more and more friends and players are dissapering every day, almost everyone that i knew that came back to check the game out after Tamriel Unlimited hit have quit again cause PvP have the exact same issues still as when they quit, diffrence is that its just in a worse state then by the time they left.

Hypertionb14_ESO

im sorry but this buff idea is literally no better than the former emperor bonuses... and thats enough of a problem on its own.

you cannot add a bonus that exclusively helps one side of the war..

if you were to have those Generals and such, they would have to be on each faction regardless save the Emperorship, but must still revert back when lost. that is not a title you share.

I suppose they can rename the Former Emperor Ship bonuses to "General or w/e" and grant that as skill line for that, but DEFINITLY not more than one with the actual benefit of being Emperor...

19 generals every 21 days is almost more than we get on former emperors currently even across all campaigns..... i dont suggest having any more than 4 as generals on the faction that gets emp and having the others get 5 for the top 5. we dont want a system that gives out bonuses like candy anymore than it already does. i suppose its possible the leaderboards would be pretty static if the score was global, and that would only see a new to the numbers person rarely. but we REALLY dont want any more perma buffs.

most and most and most importantly... The leader board for those positions must not count kills, as killing players alone does nothing to help a war... the real leaders direct the carnage and tell/lead you to where you kill... the people who are emp and his lackys should be the people who are most active in taking and defending keeps and objectives.. ie the ones that contribue to the wars success overall rather than the success of individual battles.

Attorneyatlawl

Hypertionb14_ESO wrote: »

im sorry but this buff idea is literally no better than the former emperor bonuses... and thats enough of a problem on its own.

you cannot add a bonus that exclusively helps one side of the war..

if you were to have those Generals and such, they would have to be on each faction regardless save the Emperorship, but must still revert back when lost. that is not a title you share.

I suppose they can rename the Former Emperor Ship bonuses to "General or w/e" and grant that as skill line for that, but DEFINITLY not more than one with the actual benefit of being Emperor...

19 generals every 21 days is almost more than we get on former emperors currently even across all campaigns..... i dont suggest having any more than 4 as generals on the faction that gets emp and having the others get 5 for the top 5. we dont want a system that gives out bonuses like candy anymore than it already does. i suppose its possible the leaderboards would be pretty static if the score was global, and that would only see a new to the numbers person rarely. but we REALLY dont want any more perma buffs.

most and most and most importantly... The leader board for those positions must not count kills, as killing players alone does nothing to help a war... the real leaders direct the carnage and tell/lead you to where you kill... the people who are emp and his lackys should be the people who are most active in taking and defending keeps and objectives.. ie the ones that contribue to the wars success overall rather than the success of individual battles.

The idea of 1 emperor crowning and 20 generals is that it would be game-wide across all factions, as well, while granting bonuses proportional to the added difficulty in obtaining those ranks for a war period. Inside of 21 days, we currently see far more than that become Emperor on the NA megaserver, each receiving a 75% bonus to all stats and triple ult regen until dethroned, after which they retain a fairly insignificant 5% ultimate cost reduction permanently.

However, Emperor flipping or even pre-decided line succession is and was a common practice on the live servers, where a faction would purposefully line up 10 or more people in the top ranks, then lose one keep in the emperorship circle by not defending it just for this purpose, at which point the current emperor would home to a different campaign and the next guy in line could grab emp immediately by flipping that one lone keep back again. This was rinsed and repeated for months and is why you see former emperors around like candy right now.

With the far more difficult road to gain the General or Emperorship passives under this proposed system, you would gain a better set of permanent passives, instead of a huge boost temporarily and a small ultimate cost reduction afterwards as on live (which leaves most players not caring generally about ever achieving it, especially if they aren't in the top 5 or so players and not in a succession line that was pre-arranged). One of the biggest issues facing PVP participation at this point in time is there being little incentive to top the leaderboards other than pride. This would reduce the number of positions gamewide significantly, mostly or entirely resolve the passing-the-crown problems that players have abused, and add a palpable reward for doing well.

Armitas

I think a lot of people will see the length of the post and walk away. It might be better to just get right down to it so more people respond.

- I like the concept of generals. It might actually strengthen the underdog, as it will be the underdogs who will log in together while the overpopers will log in sporadically as they protect their buff server. The increased AP will also make fighting in these buff server campaigns much more tolerable.

I like the idea of having PvE buffs derived from PvP because it draws in players who would otherwise never enter PvP. This fluffs our actual numbers and makes the total PvP numbers look larger than they may actually be. That in turn gives us a better seat at the development table. There is another way to further use that to our advantage. That is to make PvP buffs based on total alliance success rather than individual campaign success. Total keeps, OPs, resources, and scrolls across all campaigns. With each objective set providing their own specific and scaling buff.

It is the buff server crowd that perpetuates these intolerable buff servers. This would necessarily redistribute those populations across all the servers evenly as all campaigns are now valid and necessary for those buffs. Sending all your forces to maintain only 1 buff server would leave you with 1/4 of the total buffs.

I think this could tie in to your decoupling of home and guest regarding the global population scaling. So in the case of DC they would have a modifier that increased their PvE buffs based on their global underpopulation. The result would be that they could achieve the same level of buffs as another faction through less alliance ownership.

There are quite a few benefits from this.

• Necessarily redistribute populations evenly ending the buff servers.
• Normalize buffs across factions making Trial guild competition more evenly based
• Supports the underdog with buffs through success in other campaigns.
• Allows you to PvP as the underdog and still be on par with your friends in your PvE guild for trials due to the new distribution of buffs.
• With all objectives now being more valuable people will be more likely to spread out to maintain those objectives and possibly reduce the lag.

FMonk

The easiest way to fix population imbalances:

People need to reroll.


Months ago when AD was by far the most overpopulated faction, there was a massive crusade on these forums encouraging AD to reroll EP/DC, led largely by @Agrippa_Invisus. The same arguments are valid now, ZOS has yet to show that they are willing or able to do anything to fix population issues, so it's up to the community to take it into their own hands.

Bouvin

This about sums up the dev responses on PvP issues for the last 8 months.

Parrotbrain

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

EDIT (11:49pm Eastern Time 6/9): Fixed accidentally omitted line regarding territory control bonuses, and fixed an autocorrect typo.



-Generals will receive the following benefits for all characters on their game account permanently (Note: These benefits are replaced upon becoming an Emperor):
A 5% boost to Magicka, Health, and Stamina attributes while in Cyrodiil or the Imperial City and all other Alliance War locations.
A 5% reduction in Ultimate ability costs in all game world areas.
A 5% reduction in the purchase cost for all items or rewards costing Alliance Points in recognition of their service and gratitude from their Faction's supporters to assist them in their endeavors. (Note: This is provided in lieu of an earnings increase in order to not affect leaderboard rankings.)
A new and unique active ability that may be used once every 5 minutes and does not use a skill slot on their ability bars, "General's Battlecry!", lasting for three minutes. When a player who has obtained the title of General activates this skill while in Cyrodiil, the Imperial City, or other future Alliance War locations they provide a 10% reduction for all allies within a 50 meter radius in damage taken from enemy siege weaponry, and a 10% boost to incoming healing, which will provide its benefits in addition to any active "Emperor's Warcry!" effects that may currently have been received. (Note: This ability may only be activated while in an Alliance War area, and will be removed upon exiting one.)


-Lieutenants will receive the following benefits for all characters on their game account for the following war period only (Note: These benefits are replaced upon becoming an Emperor or General):
A 5% boost to Magicka, Health, and Stamina attributes while in Cyrodiil or the Imperial City and all other Alliance War locations.
A 5% reduction in Ultimate ability costs in all game world areas.
A 5% reduction in the purchase cost for all items or rewards costing Alliance Points in recognition of their service and gratitude from their Faction's supporters to assist them in their endeavors. (Note: This is provided in lieu of an earnings increase in order to not affect leaderboard rankings.)
A new and unique active ability that may be used once every 5 minutes and does not use a skill slot on their ability bars, "Lieutenant's Rallycry!", lasting for three minutes. When a player who has obtained the title of Lieutenant in the current war period activates this skill while in Cyrodiil, the Imperial City, or other future Alliance War locations they provide a 10% reduction for all allies within a 50 meter radius in damage taken from enemy siege weaponry, and a 10% boost to incoming healing, which will provide its benefits in addition to any active "Emperor's Warcry!" or "General's Battlecry!" effects that may currently have been received. (Note: This ability may only be activated while in an Alliance War area, and will be removed upon exiting one.)"

So, what does everyone else think? What are your thoughts on these types of rewards, in particular their effect removal from PvE areas such as questing locations or Trials other than the Ultimate benefit that remains to provide an incentive for players to play well at both if they enjoy PvE and PvP rather than preferring one or the other? Would these scoring changes entice you to play more actively in Cyrodiil, knowing that you would still gain some nice benefits even if you fall short of the top of the heap? How about the effects a scaling reward and statistics boost would have on campaign activity?

I look forward to your thoughts, and would love to hear from the Alliance War team as to theirs if anyone such as @ZOS_GinaBruno, @ZOS_JessicaFolsom, or even @ZOS_BrianWheeler himself want to chip in .

Thanks everyone.

Why would you want to make general and lieutenant benefits exactly the same?

c0rp

Maybe if they just fixed the lag, more people would play and population imbalance wouldn't be a thing.

Attorneyatlawl

Parrotbrain wrote: »

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

EDIT (11:49pm Eastern Time 6/9): Fixed accidentally omitted line regarding territory control bonuses, and fixed an autocorrect typo.



-Generals will receive the following benefits for all characters on their game account permanently (Note: These benefits are replaced upon becoming an Emperor):
A 5% boost to Magicka, Health, and Stamina attributes while in Cyrodiil or the Imperial City and all other Alliance War locations.
A 5% reduction in Ultimate ability costs in all game world areas.
A 5% reduction in the purchase cost for all items or rewards costing Alliance Points in recognition of their service and gratitude from their Faction's supporters to assist them in their endeavors. (Note: This is provided in lieu of an earnings increase in order to not affect leaderboard rankings.)
A new and unique active ability that may be used once every 5 minutes and does not use a skill slot on their ability bars, "General's Battlecry!", lasting for three minutes. When a player who has obtained the title of General activates this skill while in Cyrodiil, the Imperial City, or other future Alliance War locations they provide a 10% reduction for all allies within a 50 meter radius in damage taken from enemy siege weaponry, and a 10% boost to incoming healing, which will provide its benefits in addition to any active "Emperor's Warcry!" effects that may currently have been received. (Note: This ability may only be activated while in an Alliance War area, and will be removed upon exiting one.)


-Lieutenants will receive the following benefits for all characters on their game account for the following war period only (Note: These benefits are replaced upon becoming an Emperor or General):
A 5% boost to Magicka, Health, and Stamina attributes while in Cyrodiil or the Imperial City and all other Alliance War locations.
A 5% reduction in Ultimate ability costs in all game world areas.
A 5% reduction in the purchase cost for all items or rewards costing Alliance Points in recognition of their service and gratitude from their Faction's supporters to assist them in their endeavors. (Note: This is provided in lieu of an earnings increase in order to not affect leaderboard rankings.)
A new and unique active ability that may be used once every 5 minutes and does not use a skill slot on their ability bars, "Lieutenant's Rallycry!", lasting for three minutes. When a player who has obtained the title of Lieutenant in the current war period activates this skill while in Cyrodiil, the Imperial City, or other future Alliance War locations they provide a 10% reduction for all allies within a 50 meter radius in damage taken from enemy siege weaponry, and a 10% boost to incoming healing, which will provide its benefits in addition to any active "Emperor's Warcry!" or "General's Battlecry!" effects that may currently have been received. (Note: This ability may only be activated while in an Alliance War area, and will be removed upon exiting one.)"

So, what does everyone else think? What are your thoughts on these types of rewards, in particular their effect removal from PvE areas such as questing locations or Trials other than the Ultimate benefit that remains to provide an incentive for players to play well at both if they enjoy PvE and PvP rather than preferring one or the other? Would these scoring changes entice you to play more actively in Cyrodiil, knowing that you would still gain some nice benefits even if you fall short of the top of the heap? How about the effects a scaling reward and statistics boost would have on campaign activity?

I look forward to your thoughts, and would love to hear from the Alliance War team as to theirs if anyone such as @ZOS_GinaBruno, @ZOS_JessicaFolsom, or even @ZOS_BrianWheeler himself want to chip in .

Thanks everyone.

Why would you want to make general and lieutenant benefits exactly the same?

Heya, @Parrotbrain! The Lieutenant benefits are only for the next war period in this system (in other words, a temporary three-week buff) . The General ones would be permanent.

"-Lieutenants will receive the following benefits for all characters on their game account for the following war period only (Note: These benefits are replaced upon becoming an Emperor or General):"

I know it's an extremely long post, so I can't blame you for your eyes glazing over a little bit by that point ! As @Armitas commented, a classic tl;dr ("too long; didn't read") section would probably be suitable here, even though I'd initially avoided it because of how big the changes would be and a lot of explanation really needs to surround them as it's a large amount of detail.

Parrotbrain

My bad... it's past midnight here already and I should be finishing my merit report for the boss instead of reading the forums. By the way I think your suggestions are great

Attorneyatlawl

Parrotbrain wrote: »

My bad... it's past midnight here already and I should be finishing my merit report for the boss instead of reading the forums. By the way I think your suggestions are great

Thank you! Also just to be clear although I think you got it, that wasn't a remark at you but rather the length of my post .

G0ku

c0rp wrote: »

Maybe if they just fixed the lag, more people would play and population imbalance wouldn't be a thing.

This, just this. Fix the freaking performance of this game and a whole bunch of players will return because lag-free there is no other game that beats TESO pvp...

Attorneyatlawl

G0ku wrote: »

c0rp wrote: »

Maybe if they just fixed the lag, more people would play and population imbalance wouldn't be a thing.

This, just this. Fix the freaking performance of this game and a whole bunch of players will return because lag-free there is no other game that beats TESO pvp...

That is true in my opinion, though it could be better (see: this thread ). I'm hearing the console megaservers have little to no server latency even in gigantic fights... . Which makes me wish they'd put the same resources into the PC and Mac versions.

Makkir

I appreciate what you are doing but this is a really tough topic. The fact our PvP battles are not instanced and queued like they are in WoW makes it even harder.

For starters, I think a free 7 Day trial of the game is good avenue to get more players interested in trying the game. Bringing in more people is one way to get more players in Cyrodiil.

In the meantime, it's going to be put in the hands of the players to own some responsibility and provide our own content. Reroll projects, etc.

Rakno87

Haven't read the whole thread yet... but BUMP!!!!