AoE Caps Discussion

Bashev

AFrostWolf wrote: »

I'd like to share a story of something that happened about a year ago in PvP before AOE caps were introduced.

I remember an amazing fight that I had a year ago during my emp run. AD had at least 90 people. They were Population locked around 150 total. EP had only 2 bars. AD had a huge group going trying to take Alessia. They were keeping it flagged for a few hours. We were fighting tooth and nail to hold onto their castle. My group was smaller with only 24 people not counting the other random players. Even though we had a smaller group of organized players, we still had the CHANCE to outplay them. Without the AOE cap, my small group was able to hold off 90+ AD for 2+ hours. Siege/Ults/AOE Abilities were hitting everyone for full damage. AD wouldn't let up. They made multiple holes in Alessia, and even took both Inner walls down. The fight kept going and time and time again we would use strategy to win. It was a LONG back and forth. Returning from SEJ, Pushing Alessia farm, retreating to the inside of Alessia. IT was a blast. The defining moment of the fight was when the Outer and Inner walls were down. AD made a HUGE mistake. Their entire zerg force decided to Ball up and charge us. The standard protocol for taking a keep. Stack on crown, pop barrier/rapids/purge and run up the stairs. Our Dk's were waiting at the bottom of the steps behind the wall. Every single one of them used talons. Every single AD was trapped. The oils and siege poured from above. The Standards were ticking, A few negates and Atronach's were dropped. They were bombed. Everything hit them at once for full damage. The ending of a 2+ hour siege in 30 seconds. You don't get those awesome moments in PvP anymore.

When AOE is able to damage all players for full damage, you can run a large group into another large group and have those instant battles decide the fate of the fight. Now days, The fights are prolonged, but not on the epic level as above. They are prolonged because everyone can outheal simply by having so many healing abilities while damage isn't able to be focused.

In most MMO's Single target heal abilities tend to be stronger because the strength of the heal isn't dispersed between so many targets. I see that you are going to touch healing and would like you to understand that it's the AOE healing that needs to be touched and not the single target healing. Single target healing needs to be strong enough to counter damage, but AOE healing needs to be lowered.

Single target abilities still have their place. However, talking about that would derail the thread into class balance and ability balance.

A year ago we had the AoE cap. The fight that you describe was nice not because there were no AoE cap but:

1) Dynamic ultimate generation

2) Good Siege damage - probably ground oil too

3) I bet you used Forward camps as your opponents too

prootch

Enodoc wrote: »

This was one of the reasons behind my suggestion of increasing damage for more targets hit by an AoE. If you're an organised group of 24, you would do more damage against a spamball group of 60.

The spamballs are not 60 from what I can see atm, they are mostly organized warbands. The eventual 60 players groups are mainly pugs and we don't get massive lag when we face them. We do get massive lag when we face organized aoe warbands.

Sublime wrote: »

As for @prootch s suggestion, it might work at in the first few days. After that players would start to bodyblock and use guard...

We have been playing this way for months against organized aoe warbands, some are hard to fall, most don't sustain intense assist.

AFrostWolf

Bashev wrote: »

A year ago we had the AoE cap. The fight that you describe was nice not because there were no AoE cap but:

1) Dynamic ultimate generation

2) Good Siege damage - probably ground oil too

3) I bet you used Forward camps as your opponents too

Hmm, I might be wrong then on the AoE caps. This was at the start of the year. Jan/Feb 2015. If it wasn't AoE caps, then something else. Something else has changed since then that has deteriorated the quality of combat and PvP.

prootch

Sublime wrote: »

Hmm, I might be wrong then on the AoE caps. This was at the start of the year. Jan/Feb 2015. If it wasn't AoE caps, then something else. Something else has changed since then that has deteriorated the quality of combat and PvP.

AoE was already capped. Siege weapons were more efficients.

Sublime

prootch wrote: »

Sublime wrote: »

Hmm, I might be wrong then on the AoE caps. This was at the start of the year. Jan/Feb 2015. If it wasn't AoE caps, then something else. Something else has changed since then that has deteriorated the quality of combat and PvP.

AoE was already capped. Siege weapons were more efficients.

Where did you get that quote from? O.o

prootch wrote: »

We have been playing this way for months against organized aoe warbands, some are hard to fall, most don't sustain intense assist.

Which is why you don't see many guilds actively developing tactics against it.

AFrostWolf

prootch wrote: »

Sublime wrote: »

Hmm, I might be wrong then on the AoE caps. This was at the start of the year. Jan/Feb 2015. If it wasn't AoE caps, then something else. Something else has changed since then that has deteriorated the quality of combat and PvP.

AoE was already capped. Siege weapons were more efficients.

I apologise then. It seems that AoE caps aren't the cause of it. Either way. I want the type of PvP that happened at the start of this year. Whatever it is we have now, that isn't fun.

Crown

hrothbern wrote: »

I would favor the idea of @Crown , for an immediate playing ground, in a real 7 day campaign, and test out. Fast.

We'd all love to get in there and help collect data. I'm sure that I could get at least one full group of AD, and we would have the cooperation of at least two or three other guilds (depending on time of day). If @Wrobel and @ZOS_BrianWheeler asked for specific and realistic scenarios to be played out (such as two 24-person groups vs a single 12-person group, or organized 8 vs 24, or even 24 vs 48 spamming AoEs - or perhaps everyone only uses singel target skills, any of these with 200 bystanders watching from 100 meters - the lag zone), I'm sure that the PvP guilds would be OVERWHELMINGLY HAPPY to come test things out and prove theories.

jeremiah911

I'm a relatively new player coming over from console to PC. Players like @FENGRUSH and @Joy_Division know a whole lot more about this subject than I do so I will pass on commenting further on AOE caps. What I would like to comment on is the PvP environment I experience last night.

I'll be the first to say I'm not very good at PvP but that's besides the point. Since coming over from console I have not attempted to play PvP on PC because I have read so many negative things about the experience. Last night I decided to que up for Azura Star to see the PvP experience for myself.

Upon entering Cyrodell my FPS dropped from about 58-60 to 35-40. Ping rate jumped from about 80 to 120. This wasn't too bad so I decided to make my way to a keep under contest. Once at the keep I saw a huge ball group of EP and DC. There were some AD sprinkled in my you could not miss the EP and DC ball groups. My FPS went down to 8-19 and ping rate shot up between 300-500.

My experience once a the keep was terrible. The lag was so bad I could not streak after pressing the button 4 times. Wrecking blow went off once every three clicks. The delay on my combat was so bad I decided to stop trying to participate and just observe.

While observing I watched a ball group go into another ball group resulting in a massive stalemate. Healing was going off like the 4th of July and no one was dying, which no doubt contributed to the lag I experienced while in combat. To further expand upon that I saw players spamming the same move or two moves max, over and over. At one point I saw one player literally standing in one spot next to another 20 players doing nothing!

My experience last night will keep me out of PvP moving forward until something is fixed. I can understand how AOE caps can contribute to the stalemate I saw last night and contributed to the massive lag. My question to @Wrobel would be at the end of the day, what PvP experience does ZOS want the player base to have? Does ZOS want players to form up in these massive groups and spam a few abilities to maximize survival? What kind of experience should smaller groups or solo players like myself expect outside these large groups?

I love this game and have truly enjoyed every minute of play time both on console and PC. That was no longer true after last night so needless to say I will not be going back to Cyrodell any time soon.

Xsorus

Xerton wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

This would create the problem that again having more people who can potentially use aoes in a tight space is insanely advantageous because you´d be sure to kill any enemy if you don´t die to their initial hits.

What's the problem of having an advantage if you outnumber your enemy? thats just how things naturlly should be.
If 30 people run into 10 and both groups are equally skilled and no one has the advantage of surprise on their side, the 30 people should win!

But if the 10 just outsmart those 30 and get to suprise them, they sould and will have a fair chance to get them.

So i can't see a problem there

They already have the advantage of having 30 people vs 10...Why build them in a passive advantage just for reasons.

Xsorus

Docmandu wrote: »

hammayolettuce wrote: »

I'll just leave this here and let it sink in a bit ... @Wrobbel @ZOS_BrianWheeler @ZOS_RichLambert

http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/88049/do-you-think-there-should-be-an-aoe-cap/p1

Sorry, but posts like these don't add anything useful to this discussion.. if there's 2 million people playing the game, that 3.5k is a laughable amount.

That said.. I don't want AoE caps.. but I do want falloff on AoE damage.

You understand when they do national polls for elections; they don't actually poll every household right?

Docmandu

Derra wrote: »

Docmandu wrote: »

hammayolettuce wrote: »

I'll just leave this here and let it sink in a bit ... @Wrobbel @ZOS_BrianWheeler @ZOS_RichLambert

http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/88049/do-you-think-there-should-be-an-aoe-cap/p1

Sorry, but posts like these don't add anything useful to this discussion.. if there's 2 million people playing the game, that 3.5k is a laughable amount.

That said.. I don't want AoE caps.. but I do want falloff on AoE damage.

You don´t understand anything about polls and when they become representative do you?

Here, something to read in bed.. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statistics

No poll on a MMO forum is ever going to be representative, since most MMO players don't even visit the forums. Not everybody is as obsessed as we are.

Anyway.. all besides the point.. let's stick to the topic Mr. Wrobel created.. thread already has a low enough signal-to-noise ratio as-is.

AFrostWolf

On a new point then. I don't think AoE caps need to be removed 100%. There has to be a different solution. If a group of say 12 players goes up against a group of 24. The 24 players will drop AoE on those 12 and destroy them. Simply because of the number of aoe abilities. This will happen on any denomination of players. 5v20 20v40 100v150. As long as you are outnumbered then not having AoE caps is going to be a bad thing.

It seems to me that there is a problem with the damage calculations. First, The damage needs to stack instead of picking 6 random targets every time the AoE ability is cast. Damage should be prioritizing the same targets each time it is cast. It should only pick new targets if previous targets are out of range or dead. If I hit 12 people with an AoE and another 12 come stand on top of them. I should keep hitting the original 12 until they are out of range or dead.
Second, I believe that the AoE cap needs to be adjusted on how it works. Adjusting from what it is now (100% to the first 6, 50% to the next 24, and 25% to the last 30). to something like (100% to the first 12, 75% to the next 24, and 50% to the last 24). The secondary effects also have to go through 100%. AoE Snares/slows/interrupts/ect should affect everyone it hits. This in my opinion will cause people to not bunch up as much. With the new mechanics on dodge rolling and blocking you can only break free/Block so many times. Damage can be undone with healing so a bigger group isn't going to disperse just because more of them are taking more damage unless that is looked at also.
Finally, Healing needs to have a look taken at it. We don't want to nerf healing outright because it is important. We don't want to discourage healers or healing abilities being used. However, It shouldn't be possible to out heal all the damage that is being done. Diminishing returns on healing needs to happen. Either in the form of how much consecutive heals do, or an increase in the resource pool with each use in a short period of time to reduce healing spam.

If you combine an adjusted AoE cap with Dynamic ult regen, Better siege damage, More objectives, Class balancing and tweaks to certain problem skills then it's going to solve the problem. If you make it so that the AoE cap is gone 100% without changing anything else. Then you are hurting yourself. Big zerg groups will always happen. This game was sold on Large scale PvP. Zergs will overcome and adapt. They will spread out instead of stacking right on top of each other. But they will all still be at the 1 keep where all the action is. There are so many things that need to be changed. It's a complex issue. Taking it away 100% from the start might lead to it coming back in the future after other changes take place. The best thing to do right now is adjust it up a notch and go from there. If in the end AoE caps do get removed 100% it would be because all the changes made led to it. It won't be a knee jerk reaction and it will hopefully not just drive people away from large scale PvP.

Derra

Docmandu wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

Docmandu wrote: »

hammayolettuce wrote: »

I'll just leave this here and let it sink in a bit ... @Wrobbel @ZOS_BrianWheeler @ZOS_RichLambert

http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/88049/do-you-think-there-should-be-an-aoe-cap/p1

Sorry, but posts like these don't add anything useful to this discussion.. if there's 2 million people playing the game, that 3.5k is a laughable amount.

That said.. I don't want AoE caps.. but I do want falloff on AoE damage.

You don´t understand anything about polls and when they become representative do you?

Here, something to read in bed.. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statistics

No poll on a MMO forum is ever going to be representative, since most MMO players don't even visit the forums. Not everybody is as obsessed as we are.

Anyway.. all besides the point.. let's stick to the topic Mr. Wrobel created.. thread already has a low enough signal-to-noise ratio as-is.

This weakens your argument even more - do you understand that?

Because the people not visiting the forums are most likely the people who do not care or do not understand the mechanics. It´s like making a poll about professional football rulesets and then calling the poll not representative because only professional players voted and not the amateur athletes playing football one sunday a month...

While it might or might not be representative for the whole playerbase (debateable bc of REALLY big sample size) it most certainly is for the pvp players of the game (the ppl affected by the changes).

Xsorus

AFrostWolf wrote: »

On a new point then. I don't think AoE caps need to be removed 100%. There has to be a different solution. If a group of say 12 players goes up against a group of 24. The 24 players will drop AoE on those 12 and destroy them. Simply because of the number of aoe abilities. This will happen on any denomination of players. 5v20 20v40 100v150. As long as you are outnumbered then not having AoE caps is going to be a bad thing.

It seems to me that there is a problem with the damage calculations. First, The damage needs to stack instead of picking 6 random targets every time the AoE ability is cast. Damage should be prioritizing the same targets each time it is cast. It should only pick new targets if previous targets are out of range or dead. If I hit 12 people with an AoE and another 12 come stand on top of them. I should keep hitting the original 12 until they are out of range or dead.
Second, I believe that the AoE cap needs to be adjusted on how it works. Adjusting from what it is now (100% to the first 6, 50% to the next 24, and 25% to the last 30). to something like (100% to the first 12, 75% to the next 24, and 50% to the last 24). The secondary effects also have to go through 100%. AoE Snares/slows/interrupts/ect should affect everyone it hits. This in my opinion will cause people to not bunch up as much. With the new mechanics on dodge rolling and blocking you can only break free/Block so many times. Damage can be undone with healing so a bigger group isn't going to disperse just because more of them are taking more damage unless that is looked at also.
Finally, Healing needs to have a look taken at it. We don't want to nerf healing outright because it is important. We don't want to discourage healers or healing abilities being used. However, It shouldn't be possible to out heal all the damage that is being done. Diminishing returns on healing needs to happen. Either in the form of how much consecutive heals do, or an increase in the resource pool with each use in a short period of time to reduce healing spam.

If you combine an adjusted AoE cap with Dynamic ult regen, Better siege damage, More objectives, Class balancing and tweaks to certain problem skills then it's going to solve the problem. If you make it so that the AoE cap is gone 100% without changing anything else. Then you are hurting yourself. Big zerg groups will always happen. This game was sold on Large scale PvP. Zergs will overcome and adapt. They will spread out instead of stacking right on top of each other. But they will all still be at the 1 keep where all the action is. There are so many things that need to be changed. It's a complex issue. Taking it away 100% from the start might lead to it coming back in the future after other changes take place. The best thing to do right now is adjust it up a notch and go from there. If in the end AoE caps do get removed 100% it would be because all the changes made led to it. It won't be a knee jerk reaction and it will hopefully not just drive people away from large scale PvP.

Ummm...If you're stacked up and 24 people aoe on top of you..you should die...Right now you die but if you actually hit that stack of 24 people with 12..they have a built in passive mitigation that allows them to survive and kill you easier.

This is very simple...If you're 12 vs 24..You have to get the drop on them...This is how its suppose to work..You cannot go head to head with those types of numbers and survive. You either drop a ton of them quickly and then finish off the rest or you'll die...This is how its worked in pretty much every large scale MMO without aoe caps to date.

The removal of AOE caps makes that 24 man group a lot easier to take down as well...Cause any second they're together they're open to being wiped quickly unless they spread.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mI250gU4Ct8

You can see in this old daoc video; they hit pretty much every zerg from the side or behind because you can't take those types of numbers head on. This is how its suppose to work..You also have to kill a lot of them to make the numbers manageable...You can see in the video they died a lot of times afterwards because they didn't get them all. This is how its suppose to work.

Jhunn

Day 2:

Still waiting eagerly on a @Wrobel response

Derra

AFrostWolf wrote: »

On a new point then. I don't think AoE caps need to be removed 100%. There has to be a different solution. If a group of say 12 players goes up against a group of 24. The 24 players will drop AoE on those 12 and destroy them. Simply because of the number of aoe abilities. This will happen on any denomination of players. 5v20 20v40 100v150. As long as you are outnumbered then not having AoE caps is going to be a bad thing.

It seems to me that there is a problem with the damage calculations. First, The damage needs to stack instead of picking 6 random targets every time the AoE ability is cast. Damage should be prioritizing the same targets each time it is cast. It should only pick new targets if previous targets are out of range or dead. If I hit 12 people with an AoE and another 12 come stand on top of them. I should keep hitting the original 12 until they are out of range or dead.
Second, I believe that the AoE cap needs to be adjusted on how it works. Adjusting from what it is now (100% to the first 6, 50% to the next 24, and 25% to the last 30). to something like (100% to the first 12, 75% to the next 24, and 50% to the last 24). The secondary effects also have to go through 100%. AoE Snares/slows/interrupts/ect should affect everyone it hits. This in my opinion will cause people to not bunch up as much. With the new mechanics on dodge rolling and blocking you can only break free/Block so many times. Damage can be undone with healing so a bigger group isn't going to disperse just because more of them are taking more damage unless that is looked at also.
Finally, Healing needs to have a look taken at it. We don't want to nerf healing outright because it is important. We don't want to discourage healers or healing abilities being used. However, It shouldn't be possible to out heal all the damage that is being done. Diminishing returns on healing needs to happen. Either in the form of how much consecutive heals do, or an increase in the resource pool with each use in a short period of time to reduce healing spam.

If you combine an adjusted AoE cap with Dynamic ult regen, Better siege damage, More objectives, Class balancing and tweaks to certain problem skills then it's going to solve the problem. If you make it so that the AoE cap is gone 100% without changing anything else. Then you are hurting yourself. Big zerg groups will always happen. This game was sold on Large scale PvP. Zergs will overcome and adapt. They will spread out instead of stacking right on top of each other. But they will all still be at the 1 keep where all the action is. There are so many things that need to be changed. It's a complex issue. Taking it away 100% from the start might lead to it coming back in the future after other changes take place. The best thing to do right now is adjust it up a notch and go from there. If in the end AoE caps do get removed 100% it would be because all the changes made led to it. It won't be a knee jerk reaction and it will hopefully not just drive people away from large scale PvP.

Why do you want and artificial cap on dmg for people who already outnumber their opponent?

Why do you want dmg calculations to become even more complicated - sticking to specific targets no longer working with proximity. How should your dmg stacking work? Like smarthealing where the lowest targets get prioritized by dmg? That would be even worse than removing caps - not for organised grps but for the random players. Once your HP drop that would be a deathsentence - instantly.

Could you explain to me what about your proposal makes more sense than just flat out removing caps?

Taonnor

Hello there!

First. I have written a short time ago an article about aoe caps -> Myth AoE Cap

Wrobel wrote: »

Remember that a group of 5 players is not going to be able to kill a group of 20 players in most situations. It is possible if you catch the group completely off guard or funnel them into a tight space, but in a straight up 5 on 20, the larger numbers are going to win most times.

Correct. My article target this problem too. But with all consequences and calculations im for a simple removing of aoe cap. At the moment there is no option against a larger group. If you catch up a large enemy group or funnel them into tight space, the large group will mostly wins. So in simple, quantity > quality and that is not correct in my eyes. One of the targeted problems of my article was the falloff dmg against large groups, so that healing will be much more powerful as intended.

Wrobel wrote: »

That being said, we don’t want them to be the end all be all - single target abilities should also be useful.

@Wrobel on this part i got a question for you: If the peoples spread out and single target skills do around 20% more damage than aoe skills, which skill will you prefer in this situation?

What i will say is: Bring the peoples to spread out and adjust the damage of single target skills <> aoe skills. One way to bring the peoples to spread out is that is it very very dangerous to stay close. For example aoe skills are deadly and strong against these constelations.

Wrobel wrote: »

The first step we are taking is to look at some of the abilities that heal far more than we would like in large group fights. We’re specifically looking at Purge and Barrier initially, and will be reducing the max targets these abilities can hit.

The approach to take a closer look on healing is in my eyes correct. But i will be more consequent. For example in the first step i would limit the aoe heals to the own group. If you are alone, you cannot aoe heal other peoples. You can only heal peoples in your own group. These restriction will helps in large fights against blobs with far more than 24 peoples.

Purge and Barrier i would not change via the cap. I would be a little bit more creative to find a solution for that problem. My idea is to change Barrier and Purge so that they are counter acting skills. For example if Barrier is active, you cannot be purged.

So that was my first interaction to that.

Joy_Division

Taonnor wrote: »

Hello there!

The approach to take a closer look on healing is in my eyes correct. But i will be more consequent. For example in the first step i would limit the aoe heals to the own group. If you are alone, you cannot aoe heal other peoples. You can only heal peoples in your own group. These restriction will helps in large fights against blobs with far more than 24 peoples.

Gee, thank you for just rendering my character build literally useless.

You just made it so ball-groups can use heals for each other ... while those not in a ball-group can't. How again does this not favor ball-groups?

*****

This whole topic has gotten way to complicated. We do not need more elaborate formulas, cooldowns, various restrictions and their accompanying unwanted server calculations for AoEs and heals. Occam's razor people. Let's not pretend to know what will happen if AoE caps are removed. We have zero clue. Remove them, observe what happens, and then be prepared to make adjustments if necessary.

And, as other people have pointed our, Mr. @Wrobel the burden should lay on those who want AoE caps to remain, not those who want them gone. An overwhelming majority has consistently asked for their removal and we know the Cyrodiil meta sucks with them in place. The question asked should not be "why should we remove them" with the premise that the status quo is somehow desirable, rather "why should we keep them" with the knowledge that they have failed and some compelling reason needs to be raised to justify their continued existence.

AFrostWolf

Derra wrote: »

Why do you want and artificial cap on dmg for people who already outnumber their opponent?

Why do you want dmg calculations to become even more complicated - sticking to specific targets no longer working with proximity. How should your dmg stacking work? Like smarthealing where the lowest targets get prioritized by dmg? That would be even worse than removing caps - not for organised grps but for the random players. Once your HP drop that would be a deathsentence - instantly.

Could you explain to me what about your proposal makes more sense than just flat out removing caps?

I don't want an artificial cap. What I want is for this not to be a knee jerk reaction. There are many things that need to be changed besides just the AoE cap. Right now the best thing to do is to adjust the cap while all the other things are changed as well. Test it out and slowly adjust as needed. What happens if we remove the AoE cap from the start fully, and then it turns out that X Y and Z change later makes it even worse? Alternatively, What if X Y Z change ends up fixing the problem after a bit of tweaking? The issue is far more complex than just remove AoE caps 100%. There are so many little things that will be tweaked it's best to take the time and do it slowly and correctly.

Proximity is a problem skill that Wrobel mentioned needed tweaking. I'm no expert in calculations here, I don't know how they can make the damage stack, but it's something that i thought needs to happen in response to something fengrush said back on the first page.

"If youre hitting 16 people, and 6 for full at a time, youre picking 6 different targets each time. If youre hitting 24, or 30 players, the statistical chance you hit the target that you wanted to hit, who you previously put the most damage on, keeps getting worse and worse. Ultimately, its extremely unlikely to hit the target you want and burst that guy down. Instead, you have to throw out overwhelming amounts of damage and actually out damage their healing by a large margin in a short span of time (something not possible when significantly outnumbered. This becomes impossible when you factor in templar ult for reduction but more importantly: barrier."

Derra

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

Why do you want and artificial cap on dmg for people who already outnumber their opponent?

Why do you want dmg calculations to become even more complicated - sticking to specific targets no longer working with proximity. How should your dmg stacking work? Like smarthealing where the lowest targets get prioritized by dmg? That would be even worse than removing caps - not for organised grps but for the random players. Once your HP drop that would be a deathsentence - instantly.

Could you explain to me what about your proposal makes more sense than just flat out removing caps?

I don't want an artificial cap. What I want is for this not to be a knee jerk reaction. There are many things that need to be changed besides just the AoE cap. Right now the best thing to do is to adjust the cap while all the other things are changed as well. Test it out and slowly adjust as needed. What happens if we remove the AoE cap from the start fully, and then it turns out that X Y and Z change later makes it even worse? Alternatively, What if X Y Z change ends up fixing the problem after a bit of tweaking? The issue is far more complex than just remove AoE caps 100%. There are so many little things that will be tweaked it's best to take the time and do it slowly and correctly.

Proximity is a problem skill that Wrobel mentioned needed tweaking. I'm no expert in calculations here, I don't know how they can make the damage stack, but it's something that i thought needs to happen in response to something fengrush said back on the first page.

"If youre hitting 16 people, and 6 for full at a time, youre picking 6 different targets each time. If youre hitting 24, or 30 players, the statistical chance you hit the target that you wanted to hit, who you previously put the most damage on, keeps getting worse and worse. Ultimately, its extremely unlikely to hit the target you want and burst that guy down. Instead, you have to throw out overwhelming amounts of damage and actually out damage their healing by a large margin in a short span of time (something not possible when significantly outnumbered. This becomes impossible when you factor in templar ult for reduction but more importantly: barrier."

So you don´t want equal chances - because that´s what no caps would do.

It has nothing to with knee jerk reactions. People want a level playing field. I still don´t understand what you don´t want about that apart from large grps having an arbitrairy advantage apart from being more ppl in the first place.

You give no good reason for caps to exist. Please explain to me the reason why there should be a cap in the first place.

What you want is the kneejerk approach. Changing the cap while also changing a million things beside that. Remove the cap and see what you have to change afterwards or if you have to change something at all...

Lava_Croft

Why is this such a difficult subject for some? Why can't we just try it without AoE caps and see what happens instead of these nearly 2 years if theorycrafting? Cyrodiil can hardly get any worse besides a return to the permanent 3fps of yore.

AFrostWolf

Derra wrote: »

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

Why do you want and artificial cap on dmg for people who already outnumber their opponent?

Why do you want dmg calculations to become even more complicated - sticking to specific targets no longer working with proximity. How should your dmg stacking work? Like smarthealing where the lowest targets get prioritized by dmg? That would be even worse than removing caps - not for organised grps but for the random players. Once your HP drop that would be a deathsentence - instantly.

Could you explain to me what about your proposal makes more sense than just flat out removing caps?

I don't want an artificial cap. What I want is for this not to be a knee jerk reaction. There are many things that need to be changed besides just the AoE cap. Right now the best thing to do is to adjust the cap while all the other things are changed as well. Test it out and slowly adjust as needed. What happens if we remove the AoE cap from the start fully, and then it turns out that X Y and Z change later makes it even worse? Alternatively, What if X Y Z change ends up fixing the problem after a bit of tweaking? The issue is far more complex than just remove AoE caps 100%. There are so many little things that will be tweaked it's best to take the time and do it slowly and correctly.

Proximity is a problem skill that Wrobel mentioned needed tweaking. I'm no expert in calculations here, I don't know how they can make the damage stack, but it's something that i thought needs to happen in response to something fengrush said back on the first page.

"If youre hitting 16 people, and 6 for full at a time, youre picking 6 different targets each time. If youre hitting 24, or 30 players, the statistical chance you hit the target that you wanted to hit, who you previously put the most damage on, keeps getting worse and worse. Ultimately, its extremely unlikely to hit the target you want and burst that guy down. Instead, you have to throw out overwhelming amounts of damage and actually out damage their healing by a large margin in a short span of time (something not possible when significantly outnumbered. This becomes impossible when you factor in templar ult for reduction but more importantly: barrier."

So you don´t want equal chances - because that´s what no caps would do.

It has nothing to with knee jerk reactions. People want a level playing field. I still don´t understand what you don´t want about that apart from large grps having an arbitrairy advantage apart from being more ppl in the first place.

You give no good reason for caps to exist. Please explain to me the reason why there should be a cap in the first place.

It is a knee jerk reaction. A damn popular one. You want an even playing field. We all do, But Aoe caps and just AoE caps alone IS NOT the only factor. That is why it needs to be adjusted multiple times till we hit the right balance between the AoE cap and all the other things that need changing.

Derra

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

Why do you want and artificial cap on dmg for people who already outnumber their opponent?

Why do you want dmg calculations to become even more complicated - sticking to specific targets no longer working with proximity. How should your dmg stacking work? Like smarthealing where the lowest targets get prioritized by dmg? That would be even worse than removing caps - not for organised grps but for the random players. Once your HP drop that would be a deathsentence - instantly.

Could you explain to me what about your proposal makes more sense than just flat out removing caps?

I don't want an artificial cap. What I want is for this not to be a knee jerk reaction. There are many things that need to be changed besides just the AoE cap. Right now the best thing to do is to adjust the cap while all the other things are changed as well. Test it out and slowly adjust as needed. What happens if we remove the AoE cap from the start fully, and then it turns out that X Y and Z change later makes it even worse? Alternatively, What if X Y Z change ends up fixing the problem after a bit of tweaking? The issue is far more complex than just remove AoE caps 100%. There are so many little things that will be tweaked it's best to take the time and do it slowly and correctly.

Proximity is a problem skill that Wrobel mentioned needed tweaking. I'm no expert in calculations here, I don't know how they can make the damage stack, but it's something that i thought needs to happen in response to something fengrush said back on the first page.

"If youre hitting 16 people, and 6 for full at a time, youre picking 6 different targets each time. If youre hitting 24, or 30 players, the statistical chance you hit the target that you wanted to hit, who you previously put the most damage on, keeps getting worse and worse. Ultimately, its extremely unlikely to hit the target you want and burst that guy down. Instead, you have to throw out overwhelming amounts of damage and actually out damage their healing by a large margin in a short span of time (something not possible when significantly outnumbered. This becomes impossible when you factor in templar ult for reduction but more importantly: barrier."

So you don´t want equal chances - because that´s what no caps would do.

It has nothing to with knee jerk reactions. People want a level playing field. I still don´t understand what you don´t want about that apart from large grps having an arbitrairy advantage apart from being more ppl in the first place.

You give no good reason for caps to exist. Please explain to me the reason why there should be a cap in the first place.

It is a knee jerk reaction. A damn popular one. You want an even playing field. We all do, But Aoe caps and just AoE caps alone IS NOT the only factor. That is why it needs to be adjusted multiple times till we hit the right balance between the AoE cap and all the other things that need changing.

Explain please why you feel an aoe cap should exist and why removing it would be a kneejerk reaction in terms of creating a level playing field in cyrodiil.

Frawr

I simply want aoe caps gone. I want the AoEs to hit everyone. I want the fight to be quicker to reduce the lag.

I also want siege to hit harder/be less purgeable

Just those 2 changes.

Let us test it please.

AFrostWolf

Derra wrote: »

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

Why do you want and artificial cap on dmg for people who already outnumber their opponent?

Why do you want dmg calculations to become even more complicated - sticking to specific targets no longer working with proximity. How should your dmg stacking work? Like smarthealing where the lowest targets get prioritized by dmg? That would be even worse than removing caps - not for organised grps but for the random players. Once your HP drop that would be a deathsentence - instantly.

Could you explain to me what about your proposal makes more sense than just flat out removing caps?

I don't want an artificial cap. What I want is for this not to be a knee jerk reaction. There are many things that need to be changed besides just the AoE cap. Right now the best thing to do is to adjust the cap while all the other things are changed as well. Test it out and slowly adjust as needed. What happens if we remove the AoE cap from the start fully, and then it turns out that X Y and Z change later makes it even worse? Alternatively, What if X Y Z change ends up fixing the problem after a bit of tweaking? The issue is far more complex than just remove AoE caps 100%. There are so many little things that will be tweaked it's best to take the time and do it slowly and correctly.

Proximity is a problem skill that Wrobel mentioned needed tweaking. I'm no expert in calculations here, I don't know how they can make the damage stack, but it's something that i thought needs to happen in response to something fengrush said back on the first page.

"If youre hitting 16 people, and 6 for full at a time, youre picking 6 different targets each time. If youre hitting 24, or 30 players, the statistical chance you hit the target that you wanted to hit, who you previously put the most damage on, keeps getting worse and worse. Ultimately, its extremely unlikely to hit the target you want and burst that guy down. Instead, you have to throw out overwhelming amounts of damage and actually out damage their healing by a large margin in a short span of time (something not possible when significantly outnumbered. This becomes impossible when you factor in templar ult for reduction but more importantly: barrier."

So you don´t want equal chances - because that´s what no caps would do.

It has nothing to with knee jerk reactions. People want a level playing field. I still don´t understand what you don´t want about that apart from large grps having an arbitrairy advantage apart from being more ppl in the first place.

You give no good reason for caps to exist. Please explain to me the reason why there should be a cap in the first place.

It is a knee jerk reaction. A damn popular one. You want an even playing field. We all do, But Aoe caps and just AoE caps alone IS NOT the only factor. That is why it needs to be adjusted multiple times till we hit the right balance between the AoE cap and all the other things that need changing.

Explain please why you feel an aoe cap should exist and why removing it would be a kneejerk reaction in terms of creating a level playing field in cyrodiil.

I already have. You are refusing to comprehend it.

Derra

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

Why do you want and artificial cap on dmg for people who already outnumber their opponent?

Why do you want dmg calculations to become even more complicated - sticking to specific targets no longer working with proximity. How should your dmg stacking work? Like smarthealing where the lowest targets get prioritized by dmg? That would be even worse than removing caps - not for organised grps but for the random players. Once your HP drop that would be a deathsentence - instantly.

Could you explain to me what about your proposal makes more sense than just flat out removing caps?

I don't want an artificial cap. What I want is for this not to be a knee jerk reaction. There are many things that need to be changed besides just the AoE cap. Right now the best thing to do is to adjust the cap while all the other things are changed as well. Test it out and slowly adjust as needed. What happens if we remove the AoE cap from the start fully, and then it turns out that X Y and Z change later makes it even worse? Alternatively, What if X Y Z change ends up fixing the problem after a bit of tweaking? The issue is far more complex than just remove AoE caps 100%. There are so many little things that will be tweaked it's best to take the time and do it slowly and correctly.

Proximity is a problem skill that Wrobel mentioned needed tweaking. I'm no expert in calculations here, I don't know how they can make the damage stack, but it's something that i thought needs to happen in response to something fengrush said back on the first page.

"If youre hitting 16 people, and 6 for full at a time, youre picking 6 different targets each time. If youre hitting 24, or 30 players, the statistical chance you hit the target that you wanted to hit, who you previously put the most damage on, keeps getting worse and worse. Ultimately, its extremely unlikely to hit the target you want and burst that guy down. Instead, you have to throw out overwhelming amounts of damage and actually out damage their healing by a large margin in a short span of time (something not possible when significantly outnumbered. This becomes impossible when you factor in templar ult for reduction but more importantly: barrier."

So you don´t want equal chances - because that´s what no caps would do.

It has nothing to with knee jerk reactions. People want a level playing field. I still don´t understand what you don´t want about that apart from large grps having an arbitrairy advantage apart from being more ppl in the first place.

You give no good reason for caps to exist. Please explain to me the reason why there should be a cap in the first place.

It is a knee jerk reaction. A damn popular one. You want an even playing field. We all do, But Aoe caps and just AoE caps alone IS NOT the only factor. That is why it needs to be adjusted multiple times till we hit the right balance between the AoE cap and all the other things that need changing.

Explain please why you feel an aoe cap should exist and why removing it would be a kneejerk reaction in terms of creating a level playing field in cyrodiil.

I already have. You are refusing to comprehend it.

No you did not. You refuse to give an answer to my question why an aoe cap should exist in the first place and why a removal would be counterproductive in creating a level playing field for grps of all sizes.

Do you not agree on the point that having dmg reduction on hitting more than 6 targets with an aoe spell is something counteracting equality?

Merlight

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Second, I believe that the AoE cap needs to be adjusted on how it works. Adjusting from what it is now (100% to the first 6, 50% to the next 24, and 25% to the last 30). to something like (100% to the first 12, 75% to the next 24, and 50% to the last 24).

You acknowledged that AoE caps provide additional damage mitigation to large groups, and suggested lowering this added mitigation. You don't understand that anything less than removing it completely keeps this buff (whose power grows with the number of people stacked on one spot) in place.

AFrostWolf

Derra wrote: »

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

Why do you want and artificial cap on dmg for people who already outnumber their opponent?

Why do you want dmg calculations to become even more complicated - sticking to specific targets no longer working with proximity. How should your dmg stacking work? Like smarthealing where the lowest targets get prioritized by dmg? That would be even worse than removing caps - not for organised grps but for the random players. Once your HP drop that would be a deathsentence - instantly.

Could you explain to me what about your proposal makes more sense than just flat out removing caps?

I don't want an artificial cap. What I want is for this not to be a knee jerk reaction. There are many things that need to be changed besides just the AoE cap. Right now the best thing to do is to adjust the cap while all the other things are changed as well. Test it out and slowly adjust as needed. What happens if we remove the AoE cap from the start fully, and then it turns out that X Y and Z change later makes it even worse? Alternatively, What if X Y Z change ends up fixing the problem after a bit of tweaking? The issue is far more complex than just remove AoE caps 100%. There are so many little things that will be tweaked it's best to take the time and do it slowly and correctly.

Proximity is a problem skill that Wrobel mentioned needed tweaking. I'm no expert in calculations here, I don't know how they can make the damage stack, but it's something that i thought needs to happen in response to something fengrush said back on the first page.

"If youre hitting 16 people, and 6 for full at a time, youre picking 6 different targets each time. If youre hitting 24, or 30 players, the statistical chance you hit the target that you wanted to hit, who you previously put the most damage on, keeps getting worse and worse. Ultimately, its extremely unlikely to hit the target you want and burst that guy down. Instead, you have to throw out overwhelming amounts of damage and actually out damage their healing by a large margin in a short span of time (something not possible when significantly outnumbered. This becomes impossible when you factor in templar ult for reduction but more importantly: barrier."

So you don´t want equal chances - because that´s what no caps would do.

It has nothing to with knee jerk reactions. People want a level playing field. I still don´t understand what you don´t want about that apart from large grps having an arbitrairy advantage apart from being more ppl in the first place.

You give no good reason for caps to exist. Please explain to me the reason why there should be a cap in the first place.

It is a knee jerk reaction. A damn popular one. You want an even playing field. We all do, But Aoe caps and just AoE caps alone IS NOT the only factor. That is why it needs to be adjusted multiple times till we hit the right balance between the AoE cap and all the other things that need changing.

Explain please why you feel an aoe cap should exist and why removing it would be a kneejerk reaction in terms of creating a level playing field in cyrodiil.

I already have. You are refusing to comprehend it.

No you did not. You refuse to give an answer to my question why an aoe cap should exist in the first place and why a removal would be counterproductive in creating a level playing field for grps of all sizes.

Do you not agree on the point that having dmg reduction on hitting more than 6 targets with an aoe spell is something counteracting equality?

You are assuming that I want an Aoe Cap to exist. You are ignoring the problem that lies with HOW we remove it.

We used to NOT have AoE cap. Now we do.
We have an AoE cap. Now it's gone.

In both cases are the addition and removal of the AoE caps an extreme. We go from 1 to the other without taking into account all the other things that need to be taken care of. Here is a small list of some things that also need to be taken into account.

We have Emperor buffs to look at.
We have Siege damage to look at.
We have Ap gains to look at.
We have many different abilities to look at.
We have Dynamic Ult regen to look at.
We have new objectives on the map to look at.

And the list can go on. Each and every one of these things play into how and why Ball groups exist. Why do you want AoE caps gone so badly? What is the end all goal of removing AoE caps? To create an even playing field. That means reducing the power of Zerg groups.

Yes, I understand that the AoE caps in it's current form gives a bonus to a ball group. That is why i said it needs to be changed. Does that mean it could potentially be taken away completely. Yes it does. I just don't think it should be taken away 100% right off the bat, especially since there are so many other little things that contribute to an uneven and unfun playing field. If they tweak the AoE cap then maybe the problem is solved. Maybe it's not. If you increase the cap on AoE in one patch, you can always tweak it again in another. If you completely remove the AoE cap and it doesn't fix the problem, or makes the problem worse, or creates a new problem, then you have to bring it back in another patch. I would rather they tweak the cap increasing the limits till they get it right rather than have them take it away only for it to be introduced again later.

Derra

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

AFrostWolf wrote: »

Derra wrote: »

Why do you want and artificial cap on dmg for people who already outnumber their opponent?

Why do you want dmg calculations to become even more complicated - sticking to specific targets no longer working with proximity. How should your dmg stacking work? Like smarthealing where the lowest targets get prioritized by dmg? That would be even worse than removing caps - not for organised grps but for the random players. Once your HP drop that would be a deathsentence - instantly.

Could you explain to me what about your proposal makes more sense than just flat out removing caps?

I don't want an artificial cap. What I want is for this not to be a knee jerk reaction. There are many things that need to be changed besides just the AoE cap. Right now the best thing to do is to adjust the cap while all the other things are changed as well. Test it out and slowly adjust as needed. What happens if we remove the AoE cap from the start fully, and then it turns out that X Y and Z change later makes it even worse? Alternatively, What if X Y Z change ends up fixing the problem after a bit of tweaking? The issue is far more complex than just remove AoE caps 100%. There are so many little things that will be tweaked it's best to take the time and do it slowly and correctly.

Proximity is a problem skill that Wrobel mentioned needed tweaking. I'm no expert in calculations here, I don't know how they can make the damage stack, but it's something that i thought needs to happen in response to something fengrush said back on the first page.

"If youre hitting 16 people, and 6 for full at a time, youre picking 6 different targets each time. If youre hitting 24, or 30 players, the statistical chance you hit the target that you wanted to hit, who you previously put the most damage on, keeps getting worse and worse. Ultimately, its extremely unlikely to hit the target you want and burst that guy down. Instead, you have to throw out overwhelming amounts of damage and actually out damage their healing by a large margin in a short span of time (something not possible when significantly outnumbered. This becomes impossible when you factor in templar ult for reduction but more importantly: barrier."

So you don´t want equal chances - because that´s what no caps would do.

It has nothing to with knee jerk reactions. People want a level playing field. I still don´t understand what you don´t want about that apart from large grps having an arbitrairy advantage apart from being more ppl in the first place.

You give no good reason for caps to exist. Please explain to me the reason why there should be a cap in the first place.

It is a knee jerk reaction. A damn popular one. You want an even playing field. We all do, But Aoe caps and just AoE caps alone IS NOT the only factor. That is why it needs to be adjusted multiple times till we hit the right balance between the AoE cap and all the other things that need changing.

Explain please why you feel an aoe cap should exist and why removing it would be a kneejerk reaction in terms of creating a level playing field in cyrodiil.

I already have. You are refusing to comprehend it.

No you did not. You refuse to give an answer to my question why an aoe cap should exist in the first place and why a removal would be counterproductive in creating a level playing field for grps of all sizes.

Do you not agree on the point that having dmg reduction on hitting more than 6 targets with an aoe spell is something counteracting equality?

You are assuming that I want an Aoe Cap to exist. You are ignoring the problem that lies with HOW we remove it.

We used to NOT have AoE cap. Now we do.
We have an AoE cap. Now it's gone.

In both cases are the addition and removal of the AoE caps an extreme. We go from 1 to the other without taking into account all the other things that need to be taken care of. Here is a small list of some things that also need to be taken into account.

We have Emperor buffs to look at.
We have Siege damage to look at.
We have Ap gains to look at.
We have many different abilities to look at.
We have Dynamic Ult regen to look at.
We have new objectives on the map to look at.

And the list can go on. Each and every one of these things play into how and why Ball groups exist. Why do you want AoE caps gone so badly? What is the end all goal of removing AoE caps? To create an even playing field. That means reducing the power of Zerg groups.

Yes, I understand that the AoE caps in it's current form gives a bonus to a ball group. That is why i said it needs to be changed. Does that mean it could potentially be taken away completely. Yes it does. I just don't think it should be taken away 100% right off the bat, especially since there are so many other little things that contribute to an uneven and unfun playing field. If they tweak the AoE cap then maybe the problem is solved. Maybe it's not. If you increase the cap on AoE in one patch, you can always tweak it again in another. If you completely remove the AoE cap and it doesn't fix the problem, or makes the problem worse, or creates a new problem, then you have to bring it back in another patch. I would rather they tweak the cap increasing the limits till they get it right rather than have them take it away only for it to be introduced again later.

What does anything of the other things you mention have to do with aoe caps?

You agree that aoe caps create inequality on the battlefield. Yet you say tweeking caps might be enough to solve the problem of unfun gameplay.
What you don´t understand is that the existence of this inequality is the unfun gameplay (even if something is less inequal it still is inequal).

There is no logical reason why an aoe cap should exist from a fairness point of view. There is no middle ground in this. It´s either fair (no caps) or unfair (caps of any form and shape - it could be 1% dmg reduction for every player above 30 players hit and i would argue against it´s existance because in it´s core it does not go along with having a level playing field).



That´s why i always advocate to remove caps first (because they´re the only thing truely creating mechanically unfair situations atm) and if that is not enough start to adress other issues empowering ball/zerg gameplay.
All of the other things you mention can be looked at when caps are gone. Some might not even be problematic anymore when caps do not exist. If you go the other way round and start tweaking skills / mechanics with caps in place they might be underpowered and have to be revisited when caps are finally removed...
It´s putting the cart in before the horse with your approach imho (one could also say the ZOS approach judging by their history of changes to the game ).


Edit: Apart from that i can´t remember anything about the noncap aoe era of the game that had it´s root problems in aoes being uncapped. The problems back then were skill mechanic related so going back there really does not have any drawbacks from my pov especially with dynamic ultimate gains gone.

Edit2: Also you still did not say why you feel caps should exist. Just because they do exist currently is not an argument in this case.

Manoekin

Derra puttin in work. Removing AOE caps isn't going to fix all of our problems, but it's definitely a great first step towards fun and balanced gameplay.