Impact of AoE cap removal on ball groups

Sanct16

With Update 17 aoe caps will be removed. I wonder what people think about the impact such a change will have on ball groups.

kpittsniperb14_ESO

It's a buff.

A slight buff, will allow ball groups to kill larger numbers faster, will not impact their defense as the majority of good ball groups never really benefitted from aoe caps often. It will be interesting to see how this actually plays out. Looking forward to the change

Leandor

I don't think it will change much. The ball grouos motivating the change have long since built for play without the caps, since losing a critical component due to bad luck had to be prevented.

If you look at the most efficient ball groups, they were running with 30k+ health and relatively low damage numbers on individuals. These will survive the same also without AOE caps.

The thing that changes is that now, those 80+ unorganized faction zergs steamrolling less populated servers will die even quicker against small teams and bombs.

And that is a very welcomed change.

ToRelax

It's a nerf.

I suppose it depends what numbers we're talking about? A full group will be much easier to burst down and not see much in return, except against similar or larger sized zergballs.
Against random zergs and small groups, AoE caps never were that much of a factor.

IxSTALKERxI

Everything will stay the same.

The game will still be played in the same way, however this is a good change. In my opinion this change helps with future ability/ultimate balancing which could add more fun and diversity. It's better to remove AoE caps than it is to add extremely hard hitting abilities which will just be used against you x60.

Large groups (16-24) with poor group composition /healing ratio's (lots of dead weight) will get hurt a lot by this change.

Min-maxed group comps will be buffed.

Turelus

Everything will stay the same.

I'm not predicting any radical changes but it will help against the "stack tight and heal" a little better.

frozywozy

Sanct16 wrote: »

With Update 17 aoe caps will be removed. I wonder what people think about the impact such a change will have on ball groups.

Everything is relative to the amount of players you are fighting.

Let say the ballgroup (12-16) is fighting 5 stam wardens who run Shalk, Dawnbreaker, Steel Tornados, the removal of Aoe caps is a nerf to the ballgroup. On the other end, if the ballgroup is fighting an entire enemy faction, this will be a buff.

What I'm the most excited about is the performance increase latency wise from the removal of so many calculations on the server. This should be promising and a great way forward.

DeadlyRecluse

Everything will stay the same.

I don't see it affecting organized balls much at all. I see it decimating unorganized, accidental ball groups and pugzergs.

The organized groups will adjust, maybe run a few more heals/earthgores. The high mobility they bring makes this less of an issue for them.

Unorganized balls that end up stationary, on a flag, in siege for a while as the leader types frantically for someone to rez them? They're going to get eaten alive.

I think a lot of people overestimated how often they were hitting 6+ targets with one ability or how often they lost a fight due to aoe caps they would have won without them.

Just my prediction. We'll see in a few months!

Kilandros

am excited for what this will do for 6-8 man groups fighting heavily outnumbered

Drummerx04

frozywozy wrote: »

Sanct16 wrote: »

With Update 17 aoe caps will be removed. I wonder what people think about the impact such a change will have on ball groups.

Everything is relative to the amount of players you are fighting.

Let say the ballgroup (12-16) is fighting 5 stam wardens who run Shalk, Dawnbreaker, Steel Tornados, the removal of Aoe caps is a nerf to the ballgroup. On the other end, if the ballgroup is fighting an entire enemy faction, this will be a buff.

What I'm the most excited about is the performance increase latency wise from the removal of so many calculations on the server. This should be promising and a great way forward.

You can expect to be massively disappointed by expecting a latency improvement.

All AoE caps amounted to - calculation wise - was a damage modifier when iterating over a list.

Essentially:

local targetList = GetInRangeTargets(player, range)        -- this is the actual expensive part of an AoE
local count = 0
for p in targetList do
  local damageAmount = CalculateDamageAmount(attack, p) -- Whatever ZOS's damage formula is
  -- determine AoE cap strength.
  if count < 6 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 1
  elseif count < 30 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 0.75
  else
    damageAmount = damageAmonut * 0.50
  end
  p.ApplyDamage(damageAmount)  -- apply the damage to the current player
  count = count + 1
end

In essence if ZoS coded the damage calculations decently in the first place, AoE caps add such a nominal overhead as to be almost completely irrelevant.

Joy_Division

Everything will stay the same.

As long as Earthgore is still in its present form, I don;t think much will change.

Besides, ZoS has already taken a lot of the teeth out of AoE caps in previous patches. 7th target went fro taking 0% damage, to 50%, to 75% (what's on Live right now).

I welcome their final removal, though not sure how big of an effect it will have, especially with Earth Gore still out there

Getern

It's a buff.

Presonally I consider it buff becasue I am almost never close to big group from my faction. Lack of negative impact.

At least one of a few problem Lagodill was strugglin with is resolved.

VaranisArano

An organized group will always do more damage and heal more effectively that disorganized players. So an organized group stands a very good chance of out-healing the extra AOE damage and outputting a lot more AOE damage.

Agrippa_Invisus

Drummerx04 wrote: »

frozywozy wrote: »

Sanct16 wrote: »

With Update 17 aoe caps will be removed. I wonder what people think about the impact such a change will have on ball groups.

Everything is relative to the amount of players you are fighting.

Let say the ballgroup (12-16) is fighting 5 stam wardens who run Shalk, Dawnbreaker, Steel Tornados, the removal of Aoe caps is a nerf to the ballgroup. On the other end, if the ballgroup is fighting an entire enemy faction, this will be a buff.

What I'm the most excited about is the performance increase latency wise from the removal of so many calculations on the server. This should be promising and a great way forward.

You can expect to be massively disappointed by expecting a latency improvement.

All AoE caps amounted to - calculation wise - was a damage modifier when iterating over a list.

Essentially:

local targetList = GetInRangeTargets(player, range)        -- this is the actual expensive part of an AoE
local count = 0
for p in targetList do
  local damageAmount = CalculateDamageAmount(attack, p) -- Whatever ZOS's damage formula is
  -- determine AoE cap strength.
  if count < 6 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 1
  elseif count < 30 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 0.75
  else
    damageAmount = damageAmonut * 0.50
  end
  p.ApplyDamage(damageAmount)  -- apply the damage to the current player
  count = count + 1
end

In essence if ZoS coded the damage calculations decently in the first place, AoE caps add such a nominal overhead as to be almost completely irrelevant.

See, that's where you erred -- in assuming ZOS could code a ham sandwich decently, let alone a damage calculation.

Ghostbane

Drummerx04 wrote: »

frozywozy wrote: »

Sanct16 wrote: »

With Update 17 aoe caps will be removed. I wonder what people think about the impact such a change will have on ball groups.

Everything is relative to the amount of players you are fighting.

Let say the ballgroup (12-16) is fighting 5 stam wardens who run Shalk, Dawnbreaker, Steel Tornados, the removal of Aoe caps is a nerf to the ballgroup. On the other end, if the ballgroup is fighting an entire enemy faction, this will be a buff.

What I'm the most excited about is the performance increase latency wise from the removal of so many calculations on the server. This should be promising and a great way forward.

You can expect to be massively disappointed by expecting a latency improvement.

All AoE caps amounted to - calculation wise - was a damage modifier when iterating over a list.

Essentially:

local targetList = GetInRangeTargets(player, range)        -- this is the actual expensive part of an AoE
local count = 0
for p in targetList do
  local damageAmount = CalculateDamageAmount(attack, p) -- Whatever ZOS's damage formula is
  -- determine AoE cap strength.
  if count < 6 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 1
  elseif count < 30 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 0.75
  else
    damageAmount = damageAmonut * 0.50
  end
  p.ApplyDamage(damageAmount)  -- apply the damage to the current player
  count = count + 1
end

In essence if ZoS coded the damage calculations decently in the first place, AoE caps add such a nominal overhead as to be almost completely irrelevant.

Don't you mean,

local targetList = GetInRangeTargets(player, range)        -- this is the actual expensive part of an AoE
local count = 0
local day = os.date("*t").wday
for p in targetList do
  local damageAmount = CalculateDamageAmount(attack, p) -- Whatever ZOS's damage formula is
  -- determine AoE cap strength.
  if count < 6 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 1
  elseif count < 30 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 0.75
  else
    damageAmount = damageAmonut * 0.50
  end
 
  if day < 6 then
    p.ApplyDamage(damageAmount)  -- apply the damage to the current player
    count = count + 1
  end
end

laksikus

It's a buff.

I dont think much will change for medium sized groups.
Ball groups like Zerg Squad didnt really rely on aoe caps in the first place.
Healing and spreading in the right moment is the cue.

Sure in surprise moments when a NB comes from stealth and goes boom when they dont expect it, they might die easier. But in day to day farming where heals and attention is up, not much will change for their survivability.

But groups like DE who play the number game instead of the skill game will have it alot harder.

Drummerx04

Ghostbane wrote: »

Drummerx04 wrote: »

frozywozy wrote: »

Sanct16 wrote: »

With Update 17 aoe caps will be removed. I wonder what people think about the impact such a change will have on ball groups.

Everything is relative to the amount of players you are fighting.

Let say the ballgroup (12-16) is fighting 5 stam wardens who run Shalk, Dawnbreaker, Steel Tornados, the removal of Aoe caps is a nerf to the ballgroup. On the other end, if the ballgroup is fighting an entire enemy faction, this will be a buff.

What I'm the most excited about is the performance increase latency wise from the removal of so many calculations on the server. This should be promising and a great way forward.

You can expect to be massively disappointed by expecting a latency improvement.

All AoE caps amounted to - calculation wise - was a damage modifier when iterating over a list.

Essentially:

local targetList = GetInRangeTargets(player, range)        -- this is the actual expensive part of an AoE
local count = 0
for p in targetList do
  local damageAmount = CalculateDamageAmount(attack, p) -- Whatever ZOS's damage formula is
  -- determine AoE cap strength.
  if count < 6 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 1
  elseif count < 30 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 0.75
  else
    damageAmount = damageAmonut * 0.50
  end
  p.ApplyDamage(damageAmount)  -- apply the damage to the current player
  count = count + 1
end

In essence if ZoS coded the damage calculations decently in the first place, AoE caps add such a nominal overhead as to be almost completely irrelevant.

Don't you mean,

local targetList = GetInRangeTargets(player, range)        -- this is the actual expensive part of an AoE
local count = 0
local day = os.date("*t").wday
for p in targetList do
  local damageAmount = CalculateDamageAmount(attack, p) -- Whatever ZOS's damage formula is
  -- determine AoE cap strength.
  if count < 6 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 1
  elseif count < 30 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 0.75
  else
    damageAmount = damageAmonut * 0.50
  end
 
  if day < 6 then
    p.ApplyDamage(damageAmount)  -- apply the damage to the current player
    count = count + 1
  end
end

Are you implying that ZOS would add completely irrelevant calculations and system calls everywhere with no perceivable benefit or reasoning?

I have to assume they are a little better than that... don't I?

laksikus

It's a buff.

Drummerx04 wrote: »

Ghostbane wrote: »

Drummerx04 wrote: »

frozywozy wrote: »

Sanct16 wrote: »

With Update 17 aoe caps will be removed. I wonder what people think about the impact such a change will have on ball groups.

Everything is relative to the amount of players you are fighting.

Let say the ballgroup (12-16) is fighting 5 stam wardens who run Shalk, Dawnbreaker, Steel Tornados, the removal of Aoe caps is a nerf to the ballgroup. On the other end, if the ballgroup is fighting an entire enemy faction, this will be a buff.

What I'm the most excited about is the performance increase latency wise from the removal of so many calculations on the server. This should be promising and a great way forward.

You can expect to be massively disappointed by expecting a latency improvement.

All AoE caps amounted to - calculation wise - was a damage modifier when iterating over a list.

Essentially:

local targetList = GetInRangeTargets(player, range)        -- this is the actual expensive part of an AoE
local count = 0
for p in targetList do
  local damageAmount = CalculateDamageAmount(attack, p) -- Whatever ZOS's damage formula is
  -- determine AoE cap strength.
  if count < 6 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 1
  elseif count < 30 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 0.75
  else
    damageAmount = damageAmonut * 0.50
  end
  p.ApplyDamage(damageAmount)  -- apply the damage to the current player
  count = count + 1
end

In essence if ZoS coded the damage calculations decently in the first place, AoE caps add such a nominal overhead as to be almost completely irrelevant.

Don't you mean,

local targetList = GetInRangeTargets(player, range)        -- this is the actual expensive part of an AoE
local count = 0
local day = os.date("*t").wday
for p in targetList do
  local damageAmount = CalculateDamageAmount(attack, p) -- Whatever ZOS's damage formula is
  -- determine AoE cap strength.
  if count < 6 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 1
  elseif count < 30 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 0.75
  else
    damageAmount = damageAmonut * 0.50
  end
 
  if day < 6 then
    p.ApplyDamage(damageAmount)  -- apply the damage to the current player
    count = count + 1
  end
end

Are you implying that ZOS would add completely irrelevant calculations and system calls everywhere with no perceivable benefit or reasoning?

I have to assume they are a little better than that... don't I?

Only if you are an optimist.
He rather seems to be a realist.

Irylia

It will require a slew of changes to completely break the ball zerg.
Such as ap gained on objectives when rolling deep. Around emp keeps and resources lower the ap gained.
Additionally lower the ap by a % for each player in the tick range that exceeds group cap. This still won’t deter important takes such as a final emp keep or a pivotal capture to retake a scroll. Because ap is less of the focus in those times.
Allow geodes to remain the way they are as a reward for earning ap. And you earn more ap by spreading out.

Scrolls need to be worth much more scoring points.

Rewarding more ap for Home keep resources/keeps. Applying dolmens and towns to be more influential on scoring.

Agrippa_Invisus

Drummerx04 wrote: »

Ghostbane wrote: »

Drummerx04 wrote: »

frozywozy wrote: »

Sanct16 wrote: »

With Update 17 aoe caps will be removed. I wonder what people think about the impact such a change will have on ball groups.

Everything is relative to the amount of players you are fighting.

Let say the ballgroup (12-16) is fighting 5 stam wardens who run Shalk, Dawnbreaker, Steel Tornados, the removal of Aoe caps is a nerf to the ballgroup. On the other end, if the ballgroup is fighting an entire enemy faction, this will be a buff.

What I'm the most excited about is the performance increase latency wise from the removal of so many calculations on the server. This should be promising and a great way forward.

You can expect to be massively disappointed by expecting a latency improvement.

All AoE caps amounted to - calculation wise - was a damage modifier when iterating over a list.

Essentially:

local targetList = GetInRangeTargets(player, range)        -- this is the actual expensive part of an AoE
local count = 0
for p in targetList do
  local damageAmount = CalculateDamageAmount(attack, p) -- Whatever ZOS's damage formula is
  -- determine AoE cap strength.
  if count < 6 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 1
  elseif count < 30 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 0.75
  else
    damageAmount = damageAmonut * 0.50
  end
  p.ApplyDamage(damageAmount)  -- apply the damage to the current player
  count = count + 1
end

In essence if ZoS coded the damage calculations decently in the first place, AoE caps add such a nominal overhead as to be almost completely irrelevant.

Don't you mean,

local targetList = GetInRangeTargets(player, range)        -- this is the actual expensive part of an AoE
local count = 0
local day = os.date("*t").wday
for p in targetList do
  local damageAmount = CalculateDamageAmount(attack, p) -- Whatever ZOS's damage formula is
  -- determine AoE cap strength.
  if count < 6 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 1
  elseif count < 30 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 0.75
  else
    damageAmount = damageAmonut * 0.50
  end
 
  if day < 6 then
    p.ApplyDamage(damageAmount)  -- apply the damage to the current player
    count = count + 1
  end
end

Are you implying that ZOS would add completely irrelevant calculations and system calls everywhere with no perceivable benefit or reasoning?

I have to assume they are a little better than that... don't I?

Objection. Assumption of facts not in evidence.

Tillalarrien

Everything will stay the same.

Its pretty simple.. AOE damage will increase slightly overall - Ball groups will be bit easier to get bombed but they will also do more dmg themselves. Nothing groundbreaking, nothing a good group cant adapt to.

Where I do think AOEcap removal will be slightly noticable tho is any type of organised vs disorganised play on a bit smaller scale - bombing mindless pugs pushing into the keep should be easier with small timed group ect - so im happy about that.

Overall im expecting it to be small, maybe even barely noticable buff to organised groups (of any size).

Taonnor

Ball groups will become smaller.

frozywozy wrote: »

Sanct16 wrote: »

With Update 17 aoe caps will be removed. I wonder what people think about the impact such a change will have on ball groups.

Everything is relative to the amount of players you are fighting.

Let say the ballgroup (12-16) is fighting 5 stam wardens who run Shalk, Dawnbreaker, Steel Tornados, the removal of Aoe caps is a nerf to the ballgroup. On the other end, if the ballgroup is fighting an entire enemy faction, this will be a buff.

What I'm the most excited about is the performance increase latency wise from the removal of so many calculations on the server. This should be promising and a great way forward.

See here -> https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/224997/myth-aoe-cap/p1

Ankael07

They will surely have hard time since there will be more bombers around to challange them but as long as we have an AOE cap on secondary effects and item sets like Earthgore they're here to stay.

But maybe its a good thing because theyre good at fighting overwhelmingly large groups.

Soul_Demon

It's a buff.

Organized groups that will be hurt are the 14 Earthgore strong groups and Templar/Heal stacks with nominal damage already. They will perish quickly, but normal organized groups will feel nothing with exception of rise of "bomb squads" they will see. Several bombers in sequence will start to pop up more routinely, but that counter is simple and easily survived already.

I think the real overestimation is the single player or solo types believing they use AOE's in the first place, and next problem would be their assumption that they even placed it correctly to stop organized groups. That will be funny to watch.

Xsorus

It's a nerf.

I said before; it’s a nerf to ball groups in that ball groups rarely are hitting huge numbers stacked up but in general rolling over an area with destro ult. Ball groups are running in general 12 to 16 people or more now and they stay stacked up most of the time. That means you have members taking st times 25% less damage randomally from abilities.

Now I think earthgore makes it less likely they’ll die but they still are eating a slight nerf.

VaranisArano

Irylia wrote: »

It will require a slew of changes to completely break the ball zerg.
Such as ap gained on objectives when rolling deep. Around emp keeps and resources lower the ap gained.
Additionally lower the ap by a % for each player in the tick range that exceeds group cap. This still won’t deter important takes such as a final emp keep or a pivotal capture to retake a scroll. Because ap is less of the focus in those times.
Allow geodes to remain the way they are as a reward for earning ap. And you earn more ap by spreading out.

Scrolls need to be worth much more scoring points.

Rewarding more ap for Home keep resources/keeps. Applying dolmens and towns to be more influential on scoring.

More AP for PVDoor. Sure, why not!

(That's how spreading out and grabbing the back keeps works. With a fast moving organized raid, you'll mostly do PvDoor against the back keeps unless you get spotted on the way in or for some reason there's an enemy raid hanging out and guarding the keep. Most enemy raids don't hang out and guard the back keeps because its boring. So spreading out of of the emp ring becomes mostly PvDoor.)

frozywozy

Drummerx04 wrote: »

frozywozy wrote: »

Sanct16 wrote: »

With Update 17 aoe caps will be removed. I wonder what people think about the impact such a change will have on ball groups.

Everything is relative to the amount of players you are fighting.

Let say the ballgroup (12-16) is fighting 5 stam wardens who run Shalk, Dawnbreaker, Steel Tornados, the removal of Aoe caps is a nerf to the ballgroup. On the other end, if the ballgroup is fighting an entire enemy faction, this will be a buff.

What I'm the most excited about is the performance increase latency wise from the removal of so many calculations on the server. This should be promising and a great way forward.

You can expect to be massively disappointed by expecting a latency improvement.

All AoE caps amounted to - calculation wise - was a damage modifier when iterating over a list.

Essentially:

local targetList = GetInRangeTargets(player, range)        -- this is the actual expensive part of an AoE
local count = 0
for p in targetList do
  local damageAmount = CalculateDamageAmount(attack, p) -- Whatever ZOS's damage formula is
  -- determine AoE cap strength.
  if count < 6 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 1
  elseif count < 30 then
    damageAmount = damageAmount * 0.75
  else
    damageAmount = damageAmonut * 0.50
  end
  p.ApplyDamage(damageAmount)  -- apply the damage to the current player
  count = count + 1
end

In essence if ZoS coded the damage calculations decently in the first place, AoE caps add such a nominal overhead as to be almost completely irrelevant.

I have no idea why you're saying that the Aoe Caps are not heavy on the server. Brian Wheeler already explained in a ESO Live the weight that Aoe Caps put on the server because it has to do several of check per player cast and take into consideration the range of every single player around and prioritize the closest first and then distribute the damage to each of them. Also, it does not mean that a player is ignored by the AOE caps that the server doesn't query its client. Brian explained it very clearly and it made sense. We are about to see a big improvement, trust me.

Prince_of_all_Pugs

Ball groups will stop to exist.

I DONT WANNA GROUP UP, I AM A 1vX KID.

frozywozy

Taonnor wrote: »

frozywozy wrote: »

Sanct16 wrote: »

With Update 17 aoe caps will be removed. I wonder what people think about the impact such a change will have on ball groups.

Everything is relative to the amount of players you are fighting.

Let say the ballgroup (12-16) is fighting 5 stam wardens who run Shalk, Dawnbreaker, Steel Tornados, the removal of Aoe caps is a nerf to the ballgroup. On the other end, if the ballgroup is fighting an entire enemy faction, this will be a buff.

What I'm the most excited about is the performance increase latency wise from the removal of so many calculations on the server. This should be promising and a great way forward.

See here -> https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/224997/myth-aoe-cap/p1

Yes, this post confirms that AOE caps are a burden on the server.





Thank you.

Vilestride

It's a buff.

Xsorus wrote: »

I said before; it’s a nerf to ball groups in that ball groups rarely are hitting huge numbers stacked up but in general rolling over an area with destro ult. Ball groups are running in general 12 to 16 people or more now and they stay stacked up most of the time. That means you have members taking st times 25% less damage randomally from abilities.

Now I think earthgore makes it less likely they’ll die but they still are eating a slight nerf.

I dunno about that. Maybe some of them but if a 'ball group' isn't herding enemies into tight stacks to hit them at once then they're already doing something wrong.

I really like this change, at the least it's not going to make things worse. It lays the foundation for future combat and balance changes however as it is, I have to vote for buff if anything as it strengthens destro meta.

If we consider typical engagements and compare how often you hit more than 6 targets with a destro ult or a prox det compared to hitting 6 targets with other skills like Dawnbreakers, leaps, shalks or even steel tornado, then destro ult wins out almost every time because it simply covers a larger area and continues over a duration. To put it another way, I think if you randomly took 100 cases as samples from the last 3 months where AoE caps actually came into play (which I think people are dramatically overestimating the frequency of) then I would guess around 30% of them would regard Destro ult.

In short, Destro ult is more likely to hit more people than anything else, and so will receive the biggest numerical damage buff over a big enough case study with the pending removal of AoE caps.

Albeit, all that doesn't necessarily relate to ball groups, because there are a large range of players who use destro ult. What does have the most potential to affect ball groups is that this change will widen the skill gap. As someone said before, the only threat to well organised raids is massive numbers, or other organised raids. That much is not going to change.

It is already expected of a good ball group to spread out from large incoming damage, and to foresee it by predicting the movements of enemy raids, so their tactics won't require adjusting in that sense. Only now, organised groups that haven't perfected these strategies will just fall even further behind those who have, because they will be even more critical to groups survival. On top of this, it is going to be much easier to clear the PUGs that typically surround ball groups.

This is why I am most excited for the change, because in my opinion it will mean, if anything that the mostly casual 'ball groups' will now have to start taking it a little more seriously and either start improving their strategies, or fall even further behind.

Elong

It's a buff.

Increasing AOE damage to a good, well organised ball group is obviously a buff.

The key word is "good". And they deserve to be buffed and rewarded for being a good group.

Bad ball groups gonna get blown up, but they're more likely zergs than well organised.