Joy_Division wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I mean... lol? All guilds that I know in this game quit because they struggeled to compete and/or find good activities and entertaiment for their members. I agree with Iz, no one quits because of having a good times.
The two most recent guilds that come to mind are KHole and probably VE. KHole quit while it was still arguably the best guild active. And VE didn't seem like they quit because they were struggling to put groups together.
I guess it's also worth pointing out that there's a difference between asking which guilds quit because they couldn't compete and asking which guild quits when times are good for them. Some guilds might last longer due to high performance even if players are experiencing game fatigue, but that doesn't necessarily mean the guild degraded to being noncompetitive by the time those players actually called it quits. I think it's worth honing in on one of those points if we're gonna continue brainstorming here.
I don't know anything about guilds on EU, but I couldn't think of any on NA that quit because they simply couldn't compete. You guys can name a couple as examples. I don't pretend to know the why's and how's of every guild that called it quits so I am curious.
Both the guilds you mention were not in comparison to their hay day performance by the time they quit.
Lets take mag dk as an example. At launch Mag DK had some serious bugs and over performance. Because of this many mag dk's were born. When they got brought back into line (despite still being viable) the vast majority quit the game or changed class. You could still reck people on Mag DK as people like Etaniel, Skaffa, Rubixy (and many others who I havent named) showed yet because they weren't performing at their best the others quit.
This is an example of the problem. I see many guilds struggling with their performance, even on streams etc often dieing whilst outnumbering pugs even. Some take it upon themselves to try and improve, others quit or dwindle. I don't think that's too hard to see personally.Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Joy_Division wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Both the guilds you mention were not in comparison to their hay day performance by the time they quit.
No you didn't insinuate anything. You flat out said that both VE and Khole had taken a step and left the game because of it.
If both guilds in your eyes declined, that is symptomatic of a boring meta and buggy game run by developers utterly apathetic to PvP, not what caused them to leave.
I don't know when Khole are meant to have 'Officially quit' seeing as I don't see their members coming to the forums very often but I was fighting some groups of 10~ with tabards not so long ago. The point of my post (if you had read it) was that the game is harder for groups now then it was in the past.
I didn't attribute a reason to why it was harder.
The funny thing is that all the discussion of meta is still referencing only bomblades and destro in group as if that was still the meta. It has actually evolved since previous patches and constantly does with each patch it just takes groups to experiment and present it.
I read posts that I reply to.
Because you believe the game is harder, does not mean it makes it so. It's very ambiguous. It can also be argued that a bunch of PugS with Earth Gore, Destro ulti, and VD can make even an average group much more dangerous and thus effective than it was say back in 1.5 or after Imperial city.
Guilds leave for a variety of reasons and I'm not even sure how that's debatable. Also I do not accept what passes for most people as common sense. Just because a game, a meta, or whatever is hard, does not mean people will shy away from it and meekly accept the past of least resistance. People wants to attribute this sort of behavior to everyone, yet many somehow claim that they would not shy away from a challenge or competition, as it they are some special snowflake fundamentally different from all the other sheep, PuGs, and brainless automatons out there. If people are leaving ESO, it's not just because it's too hard. It could be too boring, too buggy, too frustrating, too monotonous, too laggy, too simplistic, too different from what it once was, too anything. Or maybe they just like Destiny 2.
Whatever subtle changes you believe changes the meta from patch to patch, if I were to ask someone who quit the game back in 1.5 to look at organized guild-play, they would instantly recognize the basic mechanics that have always been and still are super effect: stack on crown and overwhelm with mass coordinated PBAoEs. The means and mechanics have changed in the delivery of those PBAoEs, yet it still resembles just a bunch of bots following the same path. It's that same old stack-on-crown pain train that I believe is the source of the many frustrations with "destro-bomb groups." Just because your guild has devised a different way to murder disorganized masses who stand zero shot at beating you without overwhelming numbers, doesn't mean that all of a sudden people are going to be interested in what you feel is a different meta.
Edit: of course you beat other guilds contently and not just murder Pugs. But pain trains in general have in ESO too effective at dealing death and destruction for just following the leader and delivering PBAoEs, that is what I meant by that comment.
I think you are right on a lot of points. But consider this: If it were easy everyone would be doing it. Yes I see a lot of groups running all the same abilities and comps and so on and so forth but no one does it like Dracarys. The simple fact it's not easy to do what they do. Even the other EP groups that try to mimic the precision fail at it. Sorry but that is my opinion. I don't think ZOS will change this because those of us that have been around since launch remember what we were told. Organized play will always beat unorganized play. ZOS not only believes this but obviously actively supports this. Its been around since launch and it's not going to end overnight. If it did, you may as well delete cyrodiil and just have battlegrounds as the only source of pvp in the game.
So, I've been back to PvP after a long time and I got to say I agree with this. I'm not competitive or anything (old, with 300 ms ping, hehe), but I used to have lots of fun in Cyrodiil and even joined a guild back in the day.
But I've spent several hours there these last couple of weeks and it is really frustrating how almost every single non-zerg group is now a Destro ulti bomb group.
Even when my middle sized (8-12), average players groups met other average sized groups, most "fights" were summarized in the other group retreating, retreating, retreating, BOMBING... retreating, retreating, retreating, BOMBING. I mean, we faced clearly more skilled players in same sized groups and still they mostly didn't fight... Just reatreated and bombed, over and over. And I just say the other group because I refuse to join a bomb group because I find it really boring, personally.
On Xbox NA, during this time, when EP had emp, emp group was a Destro ulti bomb group.
When DC got emp, it was a Destro ulti bomb group.
When I queued in Shor to wait for the queue in Vivec, AD had emp and it was a Destro ulti bomb group.
It has come to a point where there is no other option for 90% of the non zerg groups anymore. 90% of the time those groups will have one or two DK tanks, one or two healers, a few Encase spamming sorcs and as many Nightblades as possible.
After about 20-30 hours of PvP the last few weeks, I'm actually surprised now if I find a non-zerg group and it is NOT a Destro bomb group.
As I said, I'm not competitive or anything, but I used to have fun... With the prevalence of Destro ulti groups outside of zergs, PvP just got a lot more boring. The truth is you either join the zerg to actually do some fighting or all you will do is chase people retreating to build ulti and get bombed. No in-between.
And before anyone dismisses my opinion just because I'm not competitive, remember that you can't fill 4 campaigns with only top notch players. You need average players like me to actually have a full, active PvP server.
At this point I wouldn't be sad if ZOS simply deleted EotF/S from the game... I just wish there were other viable and effective alternatives for non zerg groups to use so we could go back to actually have head on fights outside of zergs. As long as having a Destro bomb group is much more effective than any other alternative, this will be the general state of PvP.
Sandman929 wrote: »So, I've been back to PvP after a long time and I got to say I agree with this. I'm not competitive or anything (old, with 300 ms ping, hehe), but I used to have lots of fun in Cyrodiil and even joined a guild back in the day.
But I've spent several hours there these last couple of weeks and it is really frustrating how almost every single non-zerg group is now a Destro ulti bomb group.
Even when my middle sized (8-12), average players groups met other average sized groups, most "fights" were summarized in the other group retreating, retreating, retreating, BOMBING... retreating, retreating, retreating, BOMBING. I mean, we faced clearly more skilled players in same sized groups and still they mostly didn't fight... Just reatreated and bombed, over and over. And I just say the other group because I refuse to join a bomb group because I find it really boring, personally.
On Xbox NA, during this time, when EP had emp, emp group was a Destro ulti bomb group.
When DC got emp, it was a Destro ulti bomb group.
When I queued in Shor to wait for the queue in Vivec, AD had emp and it was a Destro ulti bomb group.
It has come to a point where there is no other option for 90% of the non zerg groups anymore. 90% of the time those groups will have one or two DK tanks, one or two healers, a few Encase spamming sorcs and as many Nightblades as possible.
After about 20-30 hours of PvP the last few weeks, I'm actually surprised now if I find a non-zerg group and it is NOT a Destro bomb group.
As I said, I'm not competitive or anything, but I used to have fun... With the prevalence of Destro ulti groups outside of zergs, PvP just got a lot more boring. The truth is you either join the zerg to actually do some fighting or all you will do is chase people retreating to build ulti and get bombed. No in-between.
And before anyone dismisses my opinion just because I'm not competitive, remember that you can't fill 4 campaigns with only top notch players. You need average players like me to actually have a full, active PvP server.
At this point I wouldn't be sad if ZOS simply deleted EotF/S from the game... I just wish there were other viable and effective alternatives for non zerg groups to use so we could go back to actually have head on fights outside of zergs. As long as having a Destro bomb group is much more effective than any other alternative, this will be the general state of PvP.
Also Xbox, and I agree to an extent. That extent is that I can't remember the last time I saw an effective Emp group that wasn't centered around the Emp spamming EotS. If that doesn't tell ZOS something (as though they're even paying attention) there's little that can be done because it's unlikely that players are going to gravitate towards what's less effective for the sake of diversity.
I would rather EotS didn't exist. Or I would rather that other ultimates were competitive just for the sake a variety. But where I disagree is that the answer to running into a frustrating group meta is to give in to frustration. Look at what those groups are doing. Talk with your group about what makes them effective and discuss what your group can do to combat it. If your group isn't interested in coordinated group play, I'm sorry to say getting EotS erased from the game isn't going to help you against what the coordinated groups will pick up after it's death.
Joy_Division wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I mean... lol? All guilds that I know in this game quit because they struggeled to compete and/or find good activities and entertaiment for their members. I agree with Iz, no one quits because of having a good times.
The two most recent guilds that come to mind are KHole and probably VE. KHole quit while it was still arguably the best guild active. And VE didn't seem like they quit because they were struggling to put groups together.
I guess it's also worth pointing out that there's a difference between asking which guilds quit because they couldn't compete and asking which guild quits when times are good for them. Some guilds might last longer due to high performance even if players are experiencing game fatigue, but that doesn't necessarily mean the guild degraded to being noncompetitive by the time those players actually called it quits. I think it's worth honing in on one of those points if we're gonna continue brainstorming here.
I don't know anything about guilds on EU, but I couldn't think of any on NA that quit because they simply couldn't compete. You guys can name a couple as examples. I don't pretend to know the why's and how's of every guild that called it quits so I am curious.
Both the guilds you mention were not in comparison to their hay day performance by the time they quit.
Lets take mag dk as an example. At launch Mag DK had some serious bugs and over performance. Because of this many mag dk's were born. When they got brought back into line (despite still being viable) the vast majority quit the game or changed class. You could still reck people on Mag DK as people like Etaniel, Skaffa, Rubixy (and many others who I havent named) showed yet because they weren't performing at their best the others quit.
This is an example of the problem. I see many guilds struggling with their performance, even on streams etc often dieing whilst outnumbering pugs even. Some take it upon themselves to try and improve, others quit or dwindle. I don't think that's too hard to see personally.Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Joy_Division wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Both the guilds you mention were not in comparison to their hay day performance by the time they quit.
No you didn't insinuate anything. You flat out said that both VE and Khole had taken a step and left the game because of it.
If both guilds in your eyes declined, that is symptomatic of a boring meta and buggy game run by developers utterly apathetic to PvP, not what caused them to leave.
I don't know when Khole are meant to have 'Officially quit' seeing as I don't see their members coming to the forums very often but I was fighting some groups of 10~ with tabards not so long ago. The point of my post (if you had read it) was that the game is harder for groups now then it was in the past.
I didn't attribute a reason to why it was harder.
The funny thing is that all the discussion of meta is still referencing only bomblades and destro in group as if that was still the meta. It has actually evolved since previous patches and constantly does with each patch it just takes groups to experiment and present it.
I read posts that I reply to.
Because you believe the game is harder, does not mean it makes it so. It's very ambiguous. It can also be argued that a bunch of PugS with Earth Gore, Destro ulti, and VD can make even an average group much more dangerous and thus effective than it was say back in 1.5 or after Imperial city.
Guilds leave for a variety of reasons and I'm not even sure how that's debatable. Also I do not accept what passes for most people as common sense. Just because a game, a meta, or whatever is hard, does not mean people will shy away from it and meekly accept the past of least resistance. People wants to attribute this sort of behavior to everyone, yet many somehow claim that they would not shy away from a challenge or competition, as it they are some special snowflake fundamentally different from all the other sheep, PuGs, and brainless automatons out there. If people are leaving ESO, it's not just because it's too hard. It could be too boring, too buggy, too frustrating, too monotonous, too laggy, too simplistic, too different from what it once was, too anything. Or maybe they just like Destiny 2.
Whatever subtle changes you believe changes the meta from patch to patch, if I were to ask someone who quit the game back in 1.5 to look at organized guild-play, they would instantly recognize the basic mechanics that have always been and still are super effect: stack on crown and overwhelm with mass coordinated PBAoEs. The means and mechanics have changed in the delivery of those PBAoEs, yet it still resembles just a bunch of bots following the same path. It's that same old stack-on-crown pain train that I believe is the source of the many frustrations with "destro-bomb groups." Just because your guild has devised a different way to murder disorganized masses who stand zero shot at beating you without overwhelming numbers, doesn't mean that all of a sudden people are going to be interested in what you feel is a different meta.
Edit: of course you beat other guilds contently and not just murder Pugs. But pain trains in general have in ESO too effective at dealing death and destruction for just following the leader and delivering PBAoEs, that is what I meant by that comment.
I think you are right on a lot of points. But consider this: If it were easy everyone would be doing it. Yes I see a lot of groups running all the same abilities and comps and so on and so forth but no one does it like Dracarys. The simple fact it's not easy to do what they do. Even the other EP groups that try to mimic the precision fail at it. Sorry but that is my opinion. I don't think ZOS will change this because those of us that have been around since launch remember what we were told. Organized play will always beat unorganized play. ZOS not only believes this but obviously actively supports this. Its been around since launch and it's not going to end overnight. If it did, you may as well delete cyrodiil and just have battlegrounds as the only source of pvp in the game.
The last time that VE raided was over a month after we retired and Steve came back to lead a drunk raid on a Friday night. We stomped Dracarys twice in under 10 minutes, after which they left that entire side of the map for the rest of the night. Gotta love that thirst for good competition.
The idea that VE "left because they could no longer compete" is beyond asinine.
ShadowProc wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »ShadowProc wrote: »asneakybanana wrote: »ShadowProc wrote: »Vilestride wrote: »Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »Vilestride wrote: »Vilestride wrote: »Vilestride wrote: »Well ESO took all the things that made DAOC great and then decided to copy in a bunch of bad ideas from *** games like GW2.
The players of the game didn’t help either; when you have a lot of people trying to convince everyone that 24 people is one group in pvp you’re not going to have a good pvp game.
I mean, I agree that the execution was poor between balance and straight up server performance. What we got was not what was promised But fundamentally I don't see why we could not have had this. I fail to see why the principal of a 24 man grouping system in huge war like battles is inherently 'bad'.
We don't want DAoC v2. We want an elderscrolls online that works.
Large group battles is what many of us signed up for. I know I did. If I wanted smallscale tactical competitive play I would have just kept playing CS And LoL. As from time to time when I want this I do.
You had 200 man + zergs in DAOC
Know what ya didn’t have?
24 man zerg balls calling them self a group.
Use to... in games if you were in an organized group you generally ran less then the actual zergs and pubs you were fighting against. Then bad games came along with terrible guilds that decided instead of playing better in an organized group they’d just keep stacking numbers.
I'd say IN most games if you're an organized group you play exactly the same numbers as your enemies in a competitive format.
But this isn't most games. And I don't imagine we want more of the same.
I don't mean to be argumentative I just want us to not get caught up on the negative and try to be as constructive as we can.
I'm sorry; did you really just try and say you run the same numbers as your enemies in a competitive format?
A. You're running a organized zerg group fighting 90% of the time Pugs with less numbers then you who aren't running multiple earthgores/rapids/purges ect ect..
Wow, you did a good job of interpreting that one didn't you mate.
Yeah. I was about to say ... doesn't Drac specialize in embarrassing half a faction (or more) at a time?
To be honest I wasn't talking about ESO at all, let alone referencing my guild. What I actually intended by the statement was to suggest that perhaps any MMO, including DAoC, is not the best example or idol for when talking about competitive PVP. Because more typically any competitive PVP is done in a structured and controlled format. Where two opposing teams compete against one another with equal numbers, nothing more, nothing less. This isn't naturally achievable in an open world environment like ESO. in a truly competitive environment, there wouldn't be pugs, or 40 man stacks.
In that regard, DAoC is hardly the gold standard of competitive gaming...
This was my primary point. My second being that this isn't, and shouldn't be, DAoC. I usually find the best remedy for getting frustrated when my apples don't taste like oranges is to just go eat oranges instead.
DAOC had 8v8.... It was very very competitive... and it was in a world pvp environment. Yes you had Adds...But that was what made it fun a lot of the times.
Basically half the time the terrain is where the two groups met and fight. In fact I had more competitive Fights in DAOC then I've had in every single MMO since then in terms of actual Group vs Group or Guild vs Guild fights.
hell you can go to youtube right now and search for DAOC 8v8, and get scores and scores of videos right now because its because of how that game worked.
You go do that with ESO, and what are you going to put in? ESO XvX? That's ESO's main problem...You can't have competitive PvP in a game where the people running range from 4 to 24 people..
With the amount of times you have referenced DAOC in the last 3 years, why did you leave? Go back if it is so much better. lol
I do agree with you on the fact that taking on 40 pugs now with 16 is not skillful. Earthgore and destro bombs made it easy mode. It use to be real difficult to take on 3 times your number of pugs and win. Now, not so much.
It wasn't ever necessarily difficult to take on 3x your numbers, it always depended on who you were fighting. Pre 1.6 12 man groups could easily hold vs. 60+ with right group comp. Whether it was ground oils or blockade bug or perma banners/negates that healed you and gave full resources or perma invis bats they were all extremely effective and probably more effective than the destro earthgore meta right now. Then came 1.6 and you would go around basically dropping 3 or 4 meteors that hit for 20k+, along w/ well timed prox dets, and 1 shot most pug groups. Also having 30k+ barriers from magicka stacked sorcerer. Can't really speak for how pvp actually felt in group play from IC until Thieves Guild as I pretty much played solo and duo for most of that time, but from what I do remember was it was heavy barrier and steel tornado stam specced groups where it was simply either drop meteor or dawnbreaker and spam PBAOE while you had 8 barriers in rotation (still probably stronger than the current EotS+EG meta in terms of group effectiveness). Then came Thieves Guild patch and that was Mag NB/Mag Sorc meteor or tether bombing enemy groups and using VD, this is probably the only meta that I can think of being harder for groups to fight 3x your numbers. And while EG has made it a little easier it hasn't changed things much since destro came out, I am still running the same gear since 1T patch and feel our group is equally survivable but we also only use 2-4 EG in raid.
Fair points. However, it is much more forgiving/easy if you are running around with 30k+ health and still able to drop a destro ulti and do decent damage. That ulti and earthgore make it far easier now imo.
I have 29.9k health I guess that makes it more of a challenge anything else to put on an easy mode checklist? Maybe using potions and food? Perhaps equipping any gear or at the least making it legendary?
I would love to see videos of you playing in groups (in eso to clarify) to show us how easy fighting 4x your group size is inside a keep and to take that objective.
Would love to but I quit ESO 2 months ago. Game is boring and dead. I am stuck in the middle of the Atlantic on a carrier killing time so I will read anything to pass the time.
Your saying Fantasia never took on 4 times our number? Or IR? lol That's one thing I loved about Crystal. He told us not to post about our achievements. We knew how good we were. There was no need to post daily videos about destroying pug zergs.
There were actually tons of great guilds back then. Not like the current extremely poor state of pvp, or extremely low population of total players or quality players.
I think you are right on a lot of points. But consider this: If it were easy everyone would be doing it. Yes I see a lot of groups running all the same abilities and comps and so on and so forth but no one does it like Dracarys. The simple fact it's not easy to do what they do. Even the other EP groups that try to mimic the precision fail at it. Sorry but that is my opinion. I don't think ZOS will change this because those of us that have been around since launch remember what we were told. Organized play will always beat unorganized play. ZOS not only believes this but obviously actively supports this. Its been around since launch and it's not going to end overnight. If it did, you may as well delete cyrodiil and just have battlegrounds as the only source of pvp in the game.
One thing we’ve recently come to realize is that when players see us coming with our prox dets ticking they mistake it for multiple destro ultis. If we’re using even two at once it’s because we have a huge mass of players stacked in a juicy choke point.Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »We had 3 people on destro last night in a 14-15 man group. It's hardly a destro train at that point surely
Drummerx04 wrote: »
Food for thought: All organized groups use purge and rapids, but no one ever considers that the "unorganized" pug resistance not only doesn't use these tools, but are mechanically unable to use these tools to help allies resist a group.
ShadowProc wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I think the clearest example of this is the fact that so many guilds are quitting because they don't perform as well as they used to.
Wait, what?
I think I quite adequately explained it in my post.
After I read your post I thought about it and I couldn't pin down any guilds that I think quit because they couldn't compete anymore though. That just feels like kind of a bold statement to make considering guilds quit for a myriad of reasons. I dunno. I am curious to know which guilds you think quit for that reason though (not bait, genuinely curious).
I can't think of any guild which quits when times are good for them. Perhaps you can name some which you think did.
That's easy. IR did. Crystal got Grand Overlord and if I recall correctly he quit for the most part within 2 weeks. IR was one of the top 3 guilds at the time.
Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I think the clearest example of this is the fact that so many guilds are quitting because they don't perform as well as they used to.
Wait, what?
I think I quite adequately explained it in my post.
After I read your post I thought about it and I couldn't pin down any guilds that I think quit because they couldn't compete anymore though. That just feels like kind of a bold statement to make considering guilds quit for a myriad of reasons. I dunno. I am curious to know which guilds you think quit for that reason though (not bait, genuinely curious).
I can't think of any guild which quits when times are good for them. Perhaps you can name some which you think did.
Joy_Division wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I mean... lol? All guilds that I know in this game quit because they struggeled to compete and/or find good activities and entertaiment for their members. I agree with Iz, no one quits because of having a good times.
The two most recent guilds that come to mind are KHole and probably VE. KHole quit while it was still arguably the best guild active. And VE didn't seem like they quit because they were struggling to put groups together.
I guess it's also worth pointing out that there's a difference between asking which guilds quit because they couldn't compete and asking which guild quits when times are good for them. Some guilds might last longer due to high performance even if players are experiencing game fatigue, but that doesn't necessarily mean the guild degraded to being noncompetitive by the time those players actually called it quits. I think it's worth honing in on one of those points if we're gonna continue brainstorming here.
I don't know anything about guilds on EU, but I couldn't think of any on NA that quit because they simply couldn't compete. You guys can name a couple as examples. I don't pretend to know the why's and how's of every guild that called it quits so I am curious.
Both the guilds you mention were not in comparison to their hay day performance by the time they quit.
Lets take mag dk as an example. At launch Mag DK had some serious bugs and over performance. Because of this many mag dk's were born. When they got brought back into line (despite still being viable) the vast majority quit the game or changed class. You could still reck people on Mag DK as people like Etaniel, Skaffa, Rubixy (and many others who I havent named) showed yet because they weren't performing at their best the others quit.
This is an example of the problem. I see many guilds struggling with their performance, even on streams etc often dieing whilst outnumbering pugs even. Some take it upon themselves to try and improve, others quit or dwindle. I don't think that's too hard to see personally.Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Joy_Division wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Both the guilds you mention were not in comparison to their hay day performance by the time they quit.
No you didn't insinuate anything. You flat out said that both VE and Khole had taken a step and left the game because of it.
If both guilds in your eyes declined, that is symptomatic of a boring meta and buggy game run by developers utterly apathetic to PvP, not what caused them to leave.
I don't know when Khole are meant to have 'Officially quit' seeing as I don't see their members coming to the forums very often but I was fighting some groups of 10~ with tabards not so long ago. The point of my post (if you had read it) was that the game is harder for groups now then it was in the past.
I didn't attribute a reason to why it was harder.
The funny thing is that all the discussion of meta is still referencing only bomblades and destro in group as if that was still the meta. It has actually evolved since previous patches and constantly does with each patch it just takes groups to experiment and present it.
I read posts that I reply to.
Because you believe the game is harder, does not mean it makes it so. It's very ambiguous. It can also be argued that a bunch of PugS with Earth Gore, Destro ulti, and VD can make even an average group much more dangerous and thus effective than it was say back in 1.5 or after Imperial city.
Guilds leave for a variety of reasons and I'm not even sure how that's debatable. Also I do not accept what passes for most people as common sense. Just because a game, a meta, or whatever is hard, does not mean people will shy away from it and meekly accept the past of least resistance. People wants to attribute this sort of behavior to everyone, yet many somehow claim that they would not shy away from a challenge or competition, as it they are some special snowflake fundamentally different from all the other sheep, PuGs, and brainless automatons out there. If people are leaving ESO, it's not just because it's too hard. It could be too boring, too buggy, too frustrating, too monotonous, too laggy, too simplistic, too different from what it once was, too anything. Or maybe they just like Destiny 2.
Whatever subtle changes you believe changes the meta from patch to patch, if I were to ask someone who quit the game back in 1.5 to look at organized guild-play, they would instantly recognize the basic mechanics that have always been and still are super effect: stack on crown and overwhelm with mass coordinated PBAoEs. The means and mechanics have changed in the delivery of those PBAoEs, yet it still resembles just a bunch of bots following the same path. It's that same old stack-on-crown pain train that I believe is the source of the many frustrations with "destro-bomb groups." Just because your guild has devised a different way to murder disorganized masses who stand zero shot at beating you without overwhelming numbers, doesn't mean that all of a sudden people are going to be interested in what you feel is a different meta.
Edit: of course you beat other guilds contently and not just murder Pugs. But pain trains in general have in ESO too effective at dealing death and destruction for just following the leader and delivering PBAoEs, that is what I meant by that comment.
I think you are right on a lot of points. But consider this: If it were easy everyone would be doing it. Yes I see a lot of groups running all the same abilities and comps and so on and so forth but no one does it like Dracarys. The simple fact it's not easy to do what they do. Even the other EP groups that try to mimic the precision fail at it. Sorry but that is my opinion. I don't think ZOS will change this because those of us that have been around since launch remember what we were told. Organized play will always beat unorganized play. ZOS not only believes this but obviously actively supports this. Its been around since launch and it's not going to end overnight. If it did, you may as well delete cyrodiil and just have battlegrounds as the only source of pvp in the game.
ishilb14_ESO wrote: »ShadowProc wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »ShadowProc wrote: »asneakybanana wrote: »ShadowProc wrote: »Vilestride wrote: »Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »Vilestride wrote: »Vilestride wrote: »Vilestride wrote: »Well ESO took all the things that made DAOC great and then decided to copy in a bunch of bad ideas from *** games like GW2.
The players of the game didn’t help either; when you have a lot of people trying to convince everyone that 24 people is one group in pvp you’re not going to have a good pvp game.
I mean, I agree that the execution was poor between balance and straight up server performance. What we got was not what was promised But fundamentally I don't see why we could not have had this. I fail to see why the principal of a 24 man grouping system in huge war like battles is inherently 'bad'.
We don't want DAoC v2. We want an elderscrolls online that works.
Large group battles is what many of us signed up for. I know I did. If I wanted smallscale tactical competitive play I would have just kept playing CS And LoL. As from time to time when I want this I do.
You had 200 man + zergs in DAOC
Know what ya didn’t have?
24 man zerg balls calling them self a group.
Use to... in games if you were in an organized group you generally ran less then the actual zergs and pubs you were fighting against. Then bad games came along with terrible guilds that decided instead of playing better in an organized group they’d just keep stacking numbers.
I'd say IN most games if you're an organized group you play exactly the same numbers as your enemies in a competitive format.
But this isn't most games. And I don't imagine we want more of the same.
I don't mean to be argumentative I just want us to not get caught up on the negative and try to be as constructive as we can.
I'm sorry; did you really just try and say you run the same numbers as your enemies in a competitive format?
A. You're running a organized zerg group fighting 90% of the time Pugs with less numbers then you who aren't running multiple earthgores/rapids/purges ect ect..
Wow, you did a good job of interpreting that one didn't you mate.
Yeah. I was about to say ... doesn't Drac specialize in embarrassing half a faction (or more) at a time?
To be honest I wasn't talking about ESO at all, let alone referencing my guild. What I actually intended by the statement was to suggest that perhaps any MMO, including DAoC, is not the best example or idol for when talking about competitive PVP. Because more typically any competitive PVP is done in a structured and controlled format. Where two opposing teams compete against one another with equal numbers, nothing more, nothing less. This isn't naturally achievable in an open world environment like ESO. in a truly competitive environment, there wouldn't be pugs, or 40 man stacks.
In that regard, DAoC is hardly the gold standard of competitive gaming...
This was my primary point. My second being that this isn't, and shouldn't be, DAoC. I usually find the best remedy for getting frustrated when my apples don't taste like oranges is to just go eat oranges instead.
DAOC had 8v8.... It was very very competitive... and it was in a world pvp environment. Yes you had Adds...But that was what made it fun a lot of the times.
Basically half the time the terrain is where the two groups met and fight. In fact I had more competitive Fights in DAOC then I've had in every single MMO since then in terms of actual Group vs Group or Guild vs Guild fights.
hell you can go to youtube right now and search for DAOC 8v8, and get scores and scores of videos right now because its because of how that game worked.
You go do that with ESO, and what are you going to put in? ESO XvX? That's ESO's main problem...You can't have competitive PvP in a game where the people running range from 4 to 24 people..
With the amount of times you have referenced DAOC in the last 3 years, why did you leave? Go back if it is so much better. lol
I do agree with you on the fact that taking on 40 pugs now with 16 is not skillful. Earthgore and destro bombs made it easy mode. It use to be real difficult to take on 3 times your number of pugs and win. Now, not so much.
It wasn't ever necessarily difficult to take on 3x your numbers, it always depended on who you were fighting. Pre 1.6 12 man groups could easily hold vs. 60+ with right group comp. Whether it was ground oils or blockade bug or perma banners/negates that healed you and gave full resources or perma invis bats they were all extremely effective and probably more effective than the destro earthgore meta right now. Then came 1.6 and you would go around basically dropping 3 or 4 meteors that hit for 20k+, along w/ well timed prox dets, and 1 shot most pug groups. Also having 30k+ barriers from magicka stacked sorcerer. Can't really speak for how pvp actually felt in group play from IC until Thieves Guild as I pretty much played solo and duo for most of that time, but from what I do remember was it was heavy barrier and steel tornado stam specced groups where it was simply either drop meteor or dawnbreaker and spam PBAOE while you had 8 barriers in rotation (still probably stronger than the current EotS+EG meta in terms of group effectiveness). Then came Thieves Guild patch and that was Mag NB/Mag Sorc meteor or tether bombing enemy groups and using VD, this is probably the only meta that I can think of being harder for groups to fight 3x your numbers. And while EG has made it a little easier it hasn't changed things much since destro came out, I am still running the same gear since 1T patch and feel our group is equally survivable but we also only use 2-4 EG in raid.
Fair points. However, it is much more forgiving/easy if you are running around with 30k+ health and still able to drop a destro ulti and do decent damage. That ulti and earthgore make it far easier now imo.
I have 29.9k health I guess that makes it more of a challenge anything else to put on an easy mode checklist? Maybe using potions and food? Perhaps equipping any gear or at the least making it legendary?
I would love to see videos of you playing in groups (in eso to clarify) to show us how easy fighting 4x your group size is inside a keep and to take that objective.
Would love to but I quit ESO 2 months ago. Game is boring and dead. I am stuck in the middle of the Atlantic on a carrier killing time so I will read anything to pass the time.
Your saying Fantasia never took on 4 times our number? Or IR? lol That's one thing I loved about Crystal. He told us not to post about our achievements. We knew how good we were. There was no need to post daily videos about destroying pug zergs.
There were actually tons of great guilds back then. Not like the current extremely poor state of pvp, or extremely low population of total players or quality players.
Were you actually in IR? It's great to see taxpayer dollars paying for someone to casually voice their non-opinion on the forums of a game they no longer are active in.
ShadowProc wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I think the clearest example of this is the fact that so many guilds are quitting because they don't perform as well as they used to.
Wait, what?
I think I quite adequately explained it in my post.
After I read your post I thought about it and I couldn't pin down any guilds that I think quit because they couldn't compete anymore though. That just feels like kind of a bold statement to make considering guilds quit for a myriad of reasons. I dunno. I am curious to know which guilds you think quit for that reason though (not bait, genuinely curious).
I can't think of any guild which quits when times are good for them. Perhaps you can name some which you think did.
That's easy. IR did. Crystal got Grand Overlord and if I recall correctly he quit for the most part within 2 weeks. IR was one of the top 3 guilds at the time.
I gotta stop you man. I was in IR, I loved my time in IR. At NO POINT in ESO history was IR ever a top 3 guild. We were never better than no mercy, lol, or havoc, all of which were active during IR’s prime and there was at least one, maybe two of those old AD guilds hanging around(hard to tell because shared members) that routinely waxed us.
IR was a great guild and Crystalized is the best raid lead I’ve ever run with, so calm and composed, but really precise. But you gotta stop it with this top 3 guild stuff man
ShadowProc wrote: »ShadowProc wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I think the clearest example of this is the fact that so many guilds are quitting because they don't perform as well as they used to.
Wait, what?
I think I quite adequately explained it in my post.
After I read your post I thought about it and I couldn't pin down any guilds that I think quit because they couldn't compete anymore though. That just feels like kind of a bold statement to make considering guilds quit for a myriad of reasons. I dunno. I am curious to know which guilds you think quit for that reason though (not bait, genuinely curious).
I can't think of any guild which quits when times are good for them. Perhaps you can name some which you think did.
That's easy. IR did. Crystal got Grand Overlord and if I recall correctly he quit for the most part within 2 weeks. IR was one of the top 3 guilds at the time.
I gotta stop you man. I was in IR, I loved my time in IR. At NO POINT in ESO history was IR ever a top 3 guild. We were never better than no mercy, lol, or havoc, all of which were active during IR’s prime and there was at least one, maybe two of those old AD guilds hanging around(hard to tell because shared members) that routinely waxed us.
IR was a great guild and Crystalized is the best raid lead I’ve ever run with, so calm and composed, but really precise. But you gotta stop it with this top 3 guild stuff man
Agree to disagree then. Cant compare Havoc as they were on our faction as well. NM for sure you are right. They were beasts. AD had WRX guild which we did well against.
There were nights where we wiped maybe one or two times. And that's because Crystal had us doing aerial maneuvers. lol So yes I stand by what I said.
ShadowProc wrote: »ShadowProc wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I think the clearest example of this is the fact that so many guilds are quitting because they don't perform as well as they used to.
Wait, what?
I think I quite adequately explained it in my post.
After I read your post I thought about it and I couldn't pin down any guilds that I think quit because they couldn't compete anymore though. That just feels like kind of a bold statement to make considering guilds quit for a myriad of reasons. I dunno. I am curious to know which guilds you think quit for that reason though (not bait, genuinely curious).
I can't think of any guild which quits when times are good for them. Perhaps you can name some which you think did.
That's easy. IR did. Crystal got Grand Overlord and if I recall correctly he quit for the most part within 2 weeks. IR was one of the top 3 guilds at the time.
I gotta stop you man. I was in IR, I loved my time in IR. At NO POINT in ESO history was IR ever a top 3 guild. We were never better than no mercy, lol, or havoc, all of which were active during IR’s prime and there was at least one, maybe two of those old AD guilds hanging around(hard to tell because shared members) that routinely waxed us.
IR was a great guild and Crystalized is the best raid lead I’ve ever run with, so calm and composed, but really precise. But you gotta stop it with this top 3 guild stuff man
Agree to disagree then. Cant compare Havoc as they were on our faction as well. NM for sure you are right. They were beasts. AD had WRX guild which we did well against.
There were nights where we wiped maybe one or two times. And that's because Crystal had us doing aerial maneuvers. lol So yes I stand by what I said.
ishilb14_ESO wrote: »ShadowProc wrote: »ShadowProc wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I think the clearest example of this is the fact that so many guilds are quitting because they don't perform as well as they used to.
Wait, what?
I think I quite adequately explained it in my post.
After I read your post I thought about it and I couldn't pin down any guilds that I think quit because they couldn't compete anymore though. That just feels like kind of a bold statement to make considering guilds quit for a myriad of reasons. I dunno. I am curious to know which guilds you think quit for that reason though (not bait, genuinely curious).
I can't think of any guild which quits when times are good for them. Perhaps you can name some which you think did.
That's easy. IR did. Crystal got Grand Overlord and if I recall correctly he quit for the most part within 2 weeks. IR was one of the top 3 guilds at the time.
I gotta stop you man. I was in IR, I loved my time in IR. At NO POINT in ESO history was IR ever a top 3 guild. We were never better than no mercy, lol, or havoc, all of which were active during IR’s prime and there was at least one, maybe two of those old AD guilds hanging around(hard to tell because shared members) that routinely waxed us.
IR was a great guild and Crystalized is the best raid lead I’ve ever run with, so calm and composed, but really precise. But you gotta stop it with this top 3 guild stuff man
Agree to disagree then. Cant compare Havoc as they were on our faction as well. NM for sure you are right. They were beasts. AD had WRX guild which we did well against.
There were nights where we wiped maybe one or two times. And that's because Crystal had us doing aerial maneuvers. lol So yes I stand by what I said.
Can you stop talking about IR. It died like 2 years ago and you weren't even in it.
One thing we’ve recently come to realize is that when players see us coming with our prox dets ticking they mistake it for multiple destro ultis. If we’re using even two at once it’s because we have a huge mass of players stacked in a juicy choke point.Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »We had 3 people on destro last night in a 14-15 man group. It's hardly a destro train at that point surely
ShadowProc wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I think the clearest example of this is the fact that so many guilds are quitting because they don't perform as well as they used to.
Wait, what?
I think I quite adequately explained it in my post.
After I read your post I thought about it and I couldn't pin down any guilds that I think quit because they couldn't compete anymore though. That just feels like kind of a bold statement to make considering guilds quit for a myriad of reasons. I dunno. I am curious to know which guilds you think quit for that reason though (not bait, genuinely curious).
I can't think of any guild which quits when times are good for them. Perhaps you can name some which you think did.
That's easy. IR did. Crystal got Grand Overlord and if I recall correctly he quit for the most part with 2 weeks. IR was one of the top 3 guilds at the time.Joy_Division wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I mean... lol? All guilds that I know in this game quit because they struggeled to compete and/or find good activities and entertaiment for their members. I agree with Iz, no one quits because of having a good times.
The two most recent guilds that come to mind are KHole and probably VE. KHole quit while it was still arguably the best guild active. And VE didn't seem like they quit because they were struggling to put groups together.
I guess it's also worth pointing out that there's a difference between asking which guilds quit because they couldn't compete and asking which guild quits when times are good for them. Some guilds might last longer due to high performance even if players are experiencing game fatigue, but that doesn't necessarily mean the guild degraded to being noncompetitive by the time those players actually called it quits. I think it's worth honing in on one of those points if we're gonna continue brainstorming here.
I don't know anything about guilds on EU, but I couldn't think of any on NA that quit because they simply couldn't compete. You guys can name a couple as examples. I don't pretend to know the why's and how's of every guild that called it quits so I am curious.
Both the guilds you mention were not in comparison to their hay day performance by the time they quit.
Lets take mag dk as an example. At launch Mag DK had some serious bugs and over performance. Because of this many mag dk's were born. When they got brought back into line (despite still being viable) the vast majority quit the game or changed class. You could still reck people on Mag DK as people like Etaniel, Skaffa, Rubixy (and many others who I havent named) showed yet because they weren't performing at their best the others quit.
This is an example of the problem. I see many guilds struggling with their performance, even on streams etc often dieing whilst outnumbering pugs even. Some take it upon themselves to try and improve, others quit or dwindle. I don't think that's too hard to see personally.Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Joy_Division wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Both the guilds you mention were not in comparison to their hay day performance by the time they quit.
No you didn't insinuate anything. You flat out said that both VE and Khole had taken a step and left the game because of it.
If both guilds in your eyes declined, that is symptomatic of a boring meta and buggy game run by developers utterly apathetic to PvP, not what caused them to leave.
I don't know when Khole are meant to have 'Officially quit' seeing as I don't see their members coming to the forums very often but I was fighting some groups of 10~ with tabards not so long ago. The point of my post (if you had read it) was that the game is harder for groups now then it was in the past.
I didn't attribute a reason to why it was harder.
The funny thing is that all the discussion of meta is still referencing only bomblades and destro in group as if that was still the meta. It has actually evolved since previous patches and constantly does with each patch it just takes groups to experiment and present it.
I read posts that I reply to.
Because you believe the game is harder, does not mean it makes it so. It's very ambiguous. It can also be argued that a bunch of PugS with Earth Gore, Destro ulti, and VD can make even an average group much more dangerous and thus effective than it was say back in 1.5 or after Imperial city.
Guilds leave for a variety of reasons and I'm not even sure how that's debatable. Also I do not accept what passes for most people as common sense. Just because a game, a meta, or whatever is hard, does not mean people will shy away from it and meekly accept the past of least resistance. People wants to attribute this sort of behavior to everyone, yet many somehow claim that they would not shy away from a challenge or competition, as it they are some special snowflake fundamentally different from all the other sheep, PuGs, and brainless automatons out there. If people are leaving ESO, it's not just because it's too hard. It could be too boring, too buggy, too frustrating, too monotonous, too laggy, too simplistic, too different from what it once was, too anything. Or maybe they just like Destiny 2.
Whatever subtle changes you believe changes the meta from patch to patch, if I were to ask someone who quit the game back in 1.5 to look at organized guild-play, they would instantly recognize the basic mechanics that have always been and still are super effect: stack on crown and overwhelm with mass coordinated PBAoEs. The means and mechanics have changed in the delivery of those PBAoEs, yet it still resembles just a bunch of bots following the same path. It's that same old stack-on-crown pain train that I believe is the source of the many frustrations with "destro-bomb groups." Just because your guild has devised a different way to murder disorganized masses who stand zero shot at beating you without overwhelming numbers, doesn't mean that all of a sudden people are going to be interested in what you feel is a different meta.
Edit: of course you beat other guilds contently and not just murder Pugs. But pain trains in general have in ESO too effective at dealing death and destruction for just following the leader and delivering PBAoEs, that is what I meant by that comment.
I think you are right on a lot of points. But consider this: If it were easy everyone would be doing it. Yes I see a lot of groups running all the same abilities and comps and so on and so forth but no one does it like Dracarys. The simple fact it's not easy to do what they do. Even the other EP groups that try to mimic the precision fail at it. Sorry but that is my opinion. I don't think ZOS will change this because those of us that have been around since launch remember what we were told. Organized play will always beat unorganized play. ZOS not only believes this but obviously actively supports this. Its been around since launch and it's not going to end overnight. If it did, you may as well delete cyrodiil and just have battlegrounds as the only source of pvp in the game.
That proves the point IMO. Dracarys does it because their roster is stacked with players that have been around forever. The game is very punishing now for newer players going up against veterans. There is no argument for that.
To their credit there is no dead weight at all which leads to way fewer VD procs. Everyone performs their job extremely well.
Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Drummerx04 wrote: »
Food for thought: All organized groups use purge and rapids, but no one ever considers that the "unorganized" pug resistance not only doesn't use these tools, but are mechanically unable to use these tools to help allies resist a group.
I would love to see purge and rapids brought back to be true utility skills which could affect others. They should prioritise your group but not be exclusive to it.
Drummerx04 wrote: »One thing we’ve recently come to realize is that when players see us coming with our prox dets ticking they mistake it for multiple destro ultis. If we’re using even two at once it’s because we have a huge mass of players stacked in a juicy choke point.Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »We had 3 people on destro last night in a 14-15 man group. It's hardly a destro train at that point surely
Actually you probably aren't too far off. With the recent change allowing you to modify hostile and friendly telegraph circles, if you up the brightness on those things, the previously benign looking proxy rings look like a destro ult death bomb.
The difference in the graphical display is pretty extreme with the brightness field.
ShadowProc wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I think the clearest example of this is the fact that so many guilds are quitting because they don't perform as well as they used to.
Wait, what?
I think I quite adequately explained it in my post.
After I read your post I thought about it and I couldn't pin down any guilds that I think quit because they couldn't compete anymore though. That just feels like kind of a bold statement to make considering guilds quit for a myriad of reasons. I dunno. I am curious to know which guilds you think quit for that reason though (not bait, genuinely curious).
I can't think of any guild which quits when times are good for them. Perhaps you can name some which you think did.
That's easy. IR did. Crystal got Grand Overlord and if I recall correctly he quit for the most part with 2 weeks. IR was one of the top 3 guilds at the time.Joy_Division wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I mean... lol? All guilds that I know in this game quit because they struggeled to compete and/or find good activities and entertaiment for their members. I agree with Iz, no one quits because of having a good times.
The two most recent guilds that come to mind are KHole and probably VE. KHole quit while it was still arguably the best guild active. And VE didn't seem like they quit because they were struggling to put groups together.
I guess it's also worth pointing out that there's a difference between asking which guilds quit because they couldn't compete and asking which guild quits when times are good for them. Some guilds might last longer due to high performance even if players are experiencing game fatigue, but that doesn't necessarily mean the guild degraded to being noncompetitive by the time those players actually called it quits. I think it's worth honing in on one of those points if we're gonna continue brainstorming here.
I don't know anything about guilds on EU, but I couldn't think of any on NA that quit because they simply couldn't compete. You guys can name a couple as examples. I don't pretend to know the why's and how's of every guild that called it quits so I am curious.
Both the guilds you mention were not in comparison to their hay day performance by the time they quit.
Lets take mag dk as an example. At launch Mag DK had some serious bugs and over performance. Because of this many mag dk's were born. When they got brought back into line (despite still being viable) the vast majority quit the game or changed class. You could still reck people on Mag DK as people like Etaniel, Skaffa, Rubixy (and many others who I havent named) showed yet because they weren't performing at their best the others quit.
This is an example of the problem. I see many guilds struggling with their performance, even on streams etc often dieing whilst outnumbering pugs even. Some take it upon themselves to try and improve, others quit or dwindle. I don't think that's too hard to see personally.Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Joy_Division wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Both the guilds you mention were not in comparison to their hay day performance by the time they quit.
No you didn't insinuate anything. You flat out said that both VE and Khole had taken a step and left the game because of it.
If both guilds in your eyes declined, that is symptomatic of a boring meta and buggy game run by developers utterly apathetic to PvP, not what caused them to leave.
I don't know when Khole are meant to have 'Officially quit' seeing as I don't see their members coming to the forums very often but I was fighting some groups of 10~ with tabards not so long ago. The point of my post (if you had read it) was that the game is harder for groups now then it was in the past.
I didn't attribute a reason to why it was harder.
The funny thing is that all the discussion of meta is still referencing only bomblades and destro in group as if that was still the meta. It has actually evolved since previous patches and constantly does with each patch it just takes groups to experiment and present it.
I read posts that I reply to.
Because you believe the game is harder, does not mean it makes it so. It's very ambiguous. It can also be argued that a bunch of PugS with Earth Gore, Destro ulti, and VD can make even an average group much more dangerous and thus effective than it was say back in 1.5 or after Imperial city.
Guilds leave for a variety of reasons and I'm not even sure how that's debatable. Also I do not accept what passes for most people as common sense. Just because a game, a meta, or whatever is hard, does not mean people will shy away from it and meekly accept the past of least resistance. People wants to attribute this sort of behavior to everyone, yet many somehow claim that they would not shy away from a challenge or competition, as it they are some special snowflake fundamentally different from all the other sheep, PuGs, and brainless automatons out there. If people are leaving ESO, it's not just because it's too hard. It could be too boring, too buggy, too frustrating, too monotonous, too laggy, too simplistic, too different from what it once was, too anything. Or maybe they just like Destiny 2.
Whatever subtle changes you believe changes the meta from patch to patch, if I were to ask someone who quit the game back in 1.5 to look at organized guild-play, they would instantly recognize the basic mechanics that have always been and still are super effect: stack on crown and overwhelm with mass coordinated PBAoEs. The means and mechanics have changed in the delivery of those PBAoEs, yet it still resembles just a bunch of bots following the same path. It's that same old stack-on-crown pain train that I believe is the source of the many frustrations with "destro-bomb groups." Just because your guild has devised a different way to murder disorganized masses who stand zero shot at beating you without overwhelming numbers, doesn't mean that all of a sudden people are going to be interested in what you feel is a different meta.
Edit: of course you beat other guilds contently and not just murder Pugs. But pain trains in general have in ESO too effective at dealing death and destruction for just following the leader and delivering PBAoEs, that is what I meant by that comment.
I think you are right on a lot of points. But consider this: If it were easy everyone would be doing it. Yes I see a lot of groups running all the same abilities and comps and so on and so forth but no one does it like Dracarys. The simple fact it's not easy to do what they do. Even the other EP groups that try to mimic the precision fail at it. Sorry but that is my opinion. I don't think ZOS will change this because those of us that have been around since launch remember what we were told. Organized play will always beat unorganized play. ZOS not only believes this but obviously actively supports this. Its been around since launch and it's not going to end overnight. If it did, you may as well delete cyrodiil and just have battlegrounds as the only source of pvp in the game.
That proves the point IMO. Dracarys does it because their roster is stacked with players that have been around forever. The game is very punishing now for newer players going up against veterans. There is no argument for that.
To their credit there is no dead weight at all which leads to way fewer VD procs. Everyone performs their job extremely well.
Time played is not the factor that determines how we perform. If it isthen I am the worst player in the guild because i started playing this game during Dark Brotherhood, while everyone else started before me.
Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Drummerx04 wrote: »
Food for thought: All organized groups use purge and rapids, but no one ever considers that the "unorganized" pug resistance not only doesn't use these tools, but are mechanically unable to use these tools to help allies resist a group.
I would love to see purge and rapids brought back to be true utility skills which could affect others. They should prioritise your group but not be exclusive to it.
Agreed 100% here. A lot of the changes ZOS has made to combat that were designed to hurt group mobility or nerf unkillable troll tanks or make it easier on the solo player have all just made the better groups that actually assign roles and skills a lot stronger. Rapids and Purge being group-bound and dropping off after healing makes it a requirement to run full support builds, and most people in unorganized or less-serious groups don't want to do that, be it stubbornness, lack of interest in the playstyle (cuz let's face it, purge and rapids spam feels like ***-work), or the fear of being too dependent on other players around you to kill enemies for you.Drummerx04 wrote: »One thing we’ve recently come to realize is that when players see us coming with our prox dets ticking they mistake it for multiple destro ultis. If we’re using even two at once it’s because we have a huge mass of players stacked in a juicy choke point.Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »We had 3 people on destro last night in a 14-15 man group. It's hardly a destro train at that point surely
Actually you probably aren't too far off. With the recent change allowing you to modify hostile and friendly telegraph circles, if you up the brightness on those things, the previously benign looking proxy rings look like a destro ult death bomb.
The difference in the graphical display is pretty extreme with the brightness field.
That, and the change to being unable to see friendly AoEs. I still think that's more harmful to solo players. I have hardly any way of knowing whether another group of friendlies is actually committing to a bomb or trying to attack an enemy rather than just feint or bait them, when it used to be much easier to note that, and that was even MORE the case when the sound bug was more prevalent and you couldn't even hear friendly attacks. When I'm solo and there's another group fighting near me, unless I choose to literally get into their TS I'm not going to be able to really know when they're making their move.
It just leads to even more disorganized chaos amongst ungrouped folks - last patch, if you and I were duoing together, and I drop my bomb and you toss your negate out, the other solos nearby would see my bomb going out and jump in to the fight. Now, they have a delay to wait and see "oh wait, he's actually killing stuff", and THEN they move in, likely after Earthgore has already wiped away your Negate - and as any decent group lead will tell you, those few seconds are a *** eternity and can make a big difference in being able to recover.
"Oh crap, there's a high-ranked recognizable bomber with a VE tabard on jumping into a fight with his Destro rolling, let me get in on this!" has turned into "WTF is that solo Nightblade doing jumping into the middle of that stack of - oh, ***, they're dying, he's bombing, ***, I gotta get into that - except oh wait, bomb is over, no one pushed in to help, and he's misting away now, they're rezzing, damn, too late..."
That's not to say it's not possible to watch the telegraphed movement of other friendly players around me, but if you're not experienced enough to look for those things or recognize certain players or builds, as is the case with newer players or more casual folks, it's just that much harder.
Drummerx04 wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Drummerx04 wrote: »
Food for thought: All organized groups use purge and rapids, but no one ever considers that the "unorganized" pug resistance not only doesn't use these tools, but are mechanically unable to use these tools to help allies resist a group.
I would love to see purge and rapids brought back to be true utility skills which could affect others. They should prioritise your group but not be exclusive to it.
Agreed 100% here. A lot of the changes ZOS has made to combat that were designed to hurt group mobility or nerf unkillable troll tanks or make it easier on the solo player have all just made the better groups that actually assign roles and skills a lot stronger. Rapids and Purge being group-bound and dropping off after healing makes it a requirement to run full support builds, and most people in unorganized or less-serious groups don't want to do that, be it stubbornness, lack of interest in the playstyle (cuz let's face it, purge and rapids spam feels like ***-work), or the fear of being too dependent on other players around you to kill enemies for you.Drummerx04 wrote: »One thing we’ve recently come to realize is that when players see us coming with our prox dets ticking they mistake it for multiple destro ultis. If we’re using even two at once it’s because we have a huge mass of players stacked in a juicy choke point.Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »We had 3 people on destro last night in a 14-15 man group. It's hardly a destro train at that point surely
Actually you probably aren't too far off. With the recent change allowing you to modify hostile and friendly telegraph circles, if you up the brightness on those things, the previously benign looking proxy rings look like a destro ult death bomb.
The difference in the graphical display is pretty extreme with the brightness field.
That, and the change to being unable to see friendly AoEs. I still think that's more harmful to solo players. I have hardly any way of knowing whether another group of friendlies is actually committing to a bomb or trying to attack an enemy rather than just feint or bait them, when it used to be much easier to note that, and that was even MORE the case when the sound bug was more prevalent and you couldn't even hear friendly attacks. When I'm solo and there's another group fighting near me, unless I choose to literally get into their TS I'm not going to be able to really know when they're making their move.
It just leads to even more disorganized chaos amongst ungrouped folks - last patch, if you and I were duoing together, and I drop my bomb and you toss your negate out, the other solos nearby would see my bomb going out and jump in to the fight. Now, they have a delay to wait and see "oh wait, he's actually killing stuff", and THEN they move in, likely after Earthgore has already wiped away your Negate - and as any decent group lead will tell you, those few seconds are a *** eternity and can make a big difference in being able to recover.
"Oh crap, there's a high-ranked recognizable bomber with a VE tabard on jumping into a fight with his Destro rolling, let me get in on this!" has turned into "WTF is that solo Nightblade doing jumping into the middle of that stack of - oh, ***, they're dying, he's bombing, ***, I gotta get into that - except oh wait, bomb is over, no one pushed in to help, and he's misting away now, they're rezzing, damn, too late..."
That's not to say it's not possible to watch the telegraphed movement of other friendly players around me, but if you're not experienced enough to look for those things or recognize certain players or builds, as is the case with newer players or more casual folks, it's just that much harder.
Actually @Ixtyr, you'll be happy to know there is an option in either the video or gameplay settings to view friendly AoE effects
ShadowProc wrote: »ishilb14_ESO wrote: »ShadowProc wrote: »ShadowProc wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »I think the clearest example of this is the fact that so many guilds are quitting because they don't perform as well as they used to.
Wait, what?
I think I quite adequately explained it in my post.
After I read your post I thought about it and I couldn't pin down any guilds that I think quit because they couldn't compete anymore though. That just feels like kind of a bold statement to make considering guilds quit for a myriad of reasons. I dunno. I am curious to know which guilds you think quit for that reason though (not bait, genuinely curious).
I can't think of any guild which quits when times are good for them. Perhaps you can name some which you think did.
That's easy. IR did. Crystal got Grand Overlord and if I recall correctly he quit for the most part within 2 weeks. IR was one of the top 3 guilds at the time.
I gotta stop you man. I was in IR, I loved my time in IR. At NO POINT in ESO history was IR ever a top 3 guild. We were never better than no mercy, lol, or havoc, all of which were active during IR’s prime and there was at least one, maybe two of those old AD guilds hanging around(hard to tell because shared members) that routinely waxed us.
IR was a great guild and Crystalized is the best raid lead I’ve ever run with, so calm and composed, but really precise. But you gotta stop it with this top 3 guild stuff man
Agree to disagree then. Cant compare Havoc as they were on our faction as well. NM for sure you are right. They were beasts. AD had WRX guild which we did well against.
There were nights where we wiped maybe one or two times. And that's because Crystal had us doing aerial maneuvers. lol So yes I stand by what I said.
Can you stop talking about IR. It died like 2 years ago and you weren't even in it.
Another pointless comment. Yes I was. For a year. What would be the point of claiming to be in a guild and not be? Please hurry and make your next pointless comment. My lunch break is almost over. Don't want to waste any more tax payer dollars!
And for gods sake read all the comments. He asked to name a guild. I did.
Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »Please, ZOS, give us reasons to want to continually come back to your game. We want to love it. We want to love you as a dev team. You just make it real hard.
Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »Well, I've read the length of this thread since I first opened it.
I'm just going to give a summary of my current thoughts:
My opinion is unchanged.
PVP is in dire need of a shakeup or it's going to continue to calcify and deteriorate.
I want the challenge of having to figure out how to rebuild classes for a new meta. I want the challenge of having to figure out a new rotation, playstyle, or role in a group. I want there to be multiple ways for competitive groups to approach combat, making each group even more unique, and needing more thought and effort to understand how to defeat them.
I spent most of the weekend playing Total War: Warhammer II and I didn't really miss ESO all that much.
Please, ZOS, give us reasons to want to continually come back to your game. We want to love it. We want to love you as a dev team. You just make it real hard.
Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »We had 3 people on destro last night in a 14-15 man group. It's hardly a destro train at that point surely
Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »We had 3 people on destro last night in a 14-15 man group. It's hardly a destro train at that point surely
@Irylia