Has this game ever been more zerg-friendly?

Actually_Goku

Looking at the live PTS on Nerfmire, it seems as though what some have been saying for a couple of years is finally true - solo and small group play is dead.

The last year of PVP in ESO has been a snipe-fest, and/or a steel tornado fest with some Zaan and Sload’s throw in for good measure.

This isn’t a matter of git gud anymore. It’s group up and spam, or die.

Very close to moving on, though not yet. I am planning on seeing what actually transpired with Murkmire and beyond. Anyone else feel the same frustrations?

SirAndy

Actually_Goku wrote: »

Has this game ever been more zerg-friendly?

There was a time when you could have several hundred players in the same spot/fight with no lag.
Those battles were glorious!



But them days are long gone ...

Gnozo

Darkenarlol wrote: »

zerg friendly ceiling lowering and floor whatever pleases the zerg

but disappoints 1vXers... who can potentially bring more profit?

20+ happy carebear potatoes who can pwn ex-top player and not be punished for their overal scrubness

or 1 (ok let's say 2-4 as smallscale) uber skilled lads who roflstomping those potatoes again and again

making them cry that ESO is broken and full of cheaters ( yep game mechanics knowledge an using skills instead

of just lighy attacks = cheat. and dare you even mention AC)

again - who can potentially bring more profit? skilled players(1-5% playerbase) or carebear potato scrubs (95%)??

that's your anwer about all changes in ESO.

We all know the answer and its just sad.

In the beginning i was playing pve and pvp in a zerg. But i was watching youtube videos of ppl playing outnumbered and these videos got my attention. Some of them have thousands of views and you rarely See videos of zerglings running around and light attacking Everyone, chasing 1 player from Alessia to brindle while losing a home keep in this time.

Smalscale/Solo players are also mostly content creators who bring new players to the game. But zenimax keeps nerfing these players cause the average potato zergling calls these players cheaters or "broken sets " exploiter . While on the other side these zerglings abuse every little thing they can find to make their xv1 even more easy. I remember sloads. Evers zergling had it while complaining about "broken sets" and solo/smallscale player abusing it.

I remember one hate wisp from a cp300 who tbagged our 4 man group after a 20 minutes fight on a ressource where they just respawned at the keep and came back. He wispered me how much of a cheater we are and that we are only tanks cause "you guys buff up". Even tho, 2 of us where in light armor.....

Thats the players Zenimax balance their game for . Just sad.

Starlock

I don’t care about PvP, so no. It’s always been garbage in ths game, as far as I could tell... for lots of reasons that probably aren’t worth going into. I only bother with it for guild events. If I want a decent PvP game (which is rare anyway - not a fan of it in general), ESO has never been on my list. They’d have to make some very dramatic changes for that to shift.

BooPerScOOper

It's been dead for 2 years lol

therift

Cyrodiil is an army zone, as far as I'm concerned. Small groups and solo players do so at their own risk, knowing full well that armies roam the battlefield.

It's disingenuous to think that Cyrodiil should be gimped to support small groups or solo players. Adapt to the battlefield, or try BGs and dueling.

Crixus8000

therift wrote: »

Cyrodiil is an army zone, as far as I'm concerned. Small groups and solo players do so at their own risk, knowing full well that armies roam the battlefield.

It's disingenuous to think that Cyrodiil should be gimped to support small groups or solo players. Adapt to the battlefield, or try BGs and dueling.

You do know that solo and smallscale are the ones being nerfed ? We aren't asking for it to be gimped for us. We are already outnumbered but yeah slow our speed so we can't run too.

VaranisArano

I suspect we'll still see plenty of gankers and tower farming small-man groups.

But if you were wanting to 1vX or take your small man and win against larger organized groups, no, I don't think thats going to work out that well.

Mind you, I'm sure that 1vPotatoes and organized small man vs disorganized mob still works okay, within limits, as long as the lag doesnt strike too hard.

idk

It is not more zerg friendly than the first week the game was live. It is clearly easier to travel in a group.

With that, we had good solid groups with some great leaders early in the game. Over time most of them left. Many during the first year and soon after 1.0 was released. They could get a group setup well with the right set of skills and keep them together and solid. Many, like the group I ran with, could take 6 people and clear out the large Zergs.

Today, we have much less of that kind of talent.

JimmyJuJu

Cyrodiil is clearly intended for large-scale combat. There are base camps, faction zones, strategic choke points, structures that can be captured and held, a rapid deployment network (i.e. transitus), supply stations (farm, mill, mine), and so on. I find it curious that people demand small-scale combat in Cyro when the map isn't setup that way. But whatever.

eso_nya

yes. much more. in 2014, first few month after release. back than it was called "large scale" tho. amazing battles.
than somewhen "1vX" became thing and the population tanked (dont remember which one happened first). feels like a different time in a different game now.

"zerging" became a thing in 2015, when pvers grouped up in ic to deal with stealth gankers.

frostz417

Most of the people who do the “cyrodiil is meant for large scale zerg fights” are most likely people who go into cyro every day and type “LFG” in zone and wait at the gate until they’re in a zerg where they can be safe in numbers and are those who likely complain about gettin 1vX’d by better players.

RedRook

SirAndy wrote: »

Actually_Goku wrote: »

Has this game ever been more zerg-friendly?

There was a time when you could have several hundred players in the same spot/fight with no lag.
Those battles were glorious!



But them days are long gone ...

Yeah. It was a lot more PVP-friendly across the board, a long long long time ago.

I don't think I've ever seen it less friendly to solo and small-man PVP in open world than it is now, though, no. There was room for a lot of different kinds of engagements back when there were a lot more PVPers.

Jeremy

Actually_Goku wrote: »

Looking at the live PTS on Nerfmire, it seems as though what some have been saying for a couple of years is finally true - solo and small group play is dead.

The last year of PVP in ESO has been a snipe-fest, and/or a steel tornado fest with some Zaan and Sload’s throw in for good measure.

This isn’t a matter of git gud anymore. It’s group up and spam, or die.

Very close to moving on, though not yet. I am planning on seeing what actually transpired with Murkmire and beyond. Anyone else feel the same frustrations?

I've been saying this for months. Years. Cyrodil is nothing more than a numbers game and may the biggest zerg win. It's been that way since I can remember. This game simply doesn't have enough effective escape options or "Oh Shi_!" moves to make solo play interesting or fun, especially now that they are nerfing move speed. Maybe a good Nightblade could pull it off with a cunning stealth strategy. But that's really the only way I see it possible.

But at least they have battle grounds as an alternative option. So those who enjoy smaller (and fairer) combat that doesn't revolve around zerging have those they can join. So this is a problem that already has a solution. Though I'm not disagreeing with you. It would be nice (and fun) if solo play in Cyrodil was more viable.

VaranisArano

frostz417 wrote: »

Most of the people who do the “cyrodiil is meant for large scale zerg fights” are most likely people who go into cyro every day and type “LFG” in zone and wait at the gate until they’re in a zerg where they can be safe in numbers and are those who likely complain about gettin 1vX’d by better players.

Or we don't need to LFG, because we're already members of an organized raid or a PVP guild.

There's fewer of us than there used to be due to ZOS' neglect of Cyrodiil's performance issues, but not all large group players are LFG PUGs.

Edited to add: I have a lot of respect for good organized small scale groups, but the larger organized raids dominate Cyrodiil by design.

NBrookus

JimmyJuJu wrote: »

Cyrodiil is clearly intended for large-scale combat. There are base camps, faction zones, strategic choke points, structures that can be captured and held, a rapid deployment network (i.e. transitus), supply stations (farm, mill, mine), and so on. I find it curious that people demand small-scale combat in Cyro when the map isn't setup that way. But whatever.

Because the devs have repeatedly said Cyro is supposed to be for all size groups.

That's not what they are doing with combat balance, but that's what they say they want. When the game is 100% who has the bigger group, who will still play? Because if you can't out-skill, out-build, out-maneuver or out-think your opponent, only outnumber, there is no winning. Only showing up on the bigger side.

VaranisArano

NBrookus wrote: »

JimmyJuJu wrote: »

Cyrodiil is clearly intended for large-scale combat. There are base camps, faction zones, strategic choke points, structures that can be captured and held, a rapid deployment network (i.e. transitus), supply stations (farm, mill, mine), and so on. I find it curious that people demand small-scale combat in Cyro when the map isn't setup that way. But whatever.

Because the devs have repeatedly said Cyro is supposed to be for all size groups.

That's not what they are doing with combat balance, but that's what they say they want. When the game is 100% who has the bigger group, who will still play? Because if you can't out-skill, out-build, out-maneuver or out-think your opponent, only outnumber, there is no winning. Only showing up on the bigger side.

Unless we're talking extreme numerical imbalance, this really isnt the case. Superior organization and tactics allows organized groups of all sizes to take on many times their number of disorganized opponents all the time in Cyrodiil.

Now, between organized groups of equal skill and tactics, or disorganized groups of equal (bad) skill and tactics, then yes, numbers are going to make the difference.

Basically, the smarter and more organized you play, the less nunbers you need. But if two organized forces meet, the one who can use the most numbers effectively will probably win.

Thats pretty much how it ought to be, IMO.

DanteYoda

Stop playing it and things would change. If you don't it wont.

Casul

I personally love running with my group of 40 people. Especially when we meet another group of 40. Even better when the last group of 40 comes in as the cleanup crew. Best pvp I’ve had in a long time.

All in all if you want to run solo or small group you should understand the positives and negatives associated.

Example.

Pro would be you have less of a battlefield presence, so you will be able to navigate the battlefield more freely.

Cons. You need to plan your attacks accordingly because there is a good chance you will be outnumbered.

Drummerx04

VaranisArano wrote: »

I suspect we'll still see plenty of gankers and tower farming small-man groups.

But if you were wanting to 1vX or take your small man and win against larger organized groups, no, I don't think thats going to work out that well.

Mind you, I'm sure that 1vPotatoes and organized small man vs disorganized mob still works okay, within limits, as long as the lag doesnt strike too hard.

It's not that small scalers expect to "win" against an entire enemy faction, but we do expect to have the ability to harass a siege line of inexperienced players and not have set procs completely negate all healing or deal more damage than the actual enemy player does.

We just expect to be able to hold off an unorganized blob of players for more than 2 seconds with kiting, healing, defensive measures, LoS etc... and maybe kill a few that get to far ahead of the mob before getting overwhelmed.

Jeremy

Drummerx04 wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

I suspect we'll still see plenty of gankers and tower farming small-man groups.

But if you were wanting to 1vX or take your small man and win against larger organized groups, no, I don't think thats going to work out that well.

Mind you, I'm sure that 1vPotatoes and organized small man vs disorganized mob still works okay, within limits, as long as the lag doesnt strike too hard.

It's not that small scalers expect to "win" against an entire enemy faction, but we do expect to have the ability to harass a siege line of inexperienced players and not have set procs completely negate all healing or deal more damage than the actual enemy player does.

We just expect to be able to hold off an unorganized blob of players for more than 2 seconds with kiting, healing, defensive measures, LoS etc... and maybe kill a few that get to far ahead of the mob before getting overwhelmed.

That's my sense of it as well.

No one here is expecting to 1 man an army. But it would be nice if could at least have a bit of fun first before you were zerged into the dirt.

Mistform had potential as an effective escape maneuver - at least as it was originally designed. But oh no - they had to nerf that. We can't have players successfully moving away from zergs. It seems these developers want players to just sit there and die when out-numbered, and anything that may prevent that is nerfed to prevent it.

Crixus8000

BuildMan wrote: »

I personally love running with my group of 40 people. Especially when we meet another group of 40. Even better when the last group of 40 comes in as the cleanup crew. Best pvp I’ve had in a long time.

All in all if you want to run solo or small group you should understand the positives and negatives associated.

Example.

Pro would be you have less of a battlefield presence, so you will be able to navigate the battlefield more freely.

Cons. You need to plan your attacks accordingly because there is a good chance you will be outnumbered.

If a zerg spots you they spam rapids and charge at you like crazy, and there is more than a good chance of being outnumered if your solo. Now the cons are that you can no longer survive because you move like a snail while the large groups move at full speed still.

AJ_1988

PvP before absurd proc sets was good back in the day, I remember a 2 hour long stalemate at mill gates and 6 hour defence of ash as last emp keep out numbered 2alliances vs 1 all doors and walls down, to me that was fun and had a sense of accomplishment and comradeship when the defenders were victorious.

I miss those days, hell you could even set siege at a scroll gate without people charging past and stealing the scroll before you got a shot off. Even the times of solo defending dragon claw with my imperial Heavy Armor healer just by buffing and healing npcs and using aoe skills. Once their was risk to charging a breach, very rarely is that the case now. I can dream can’t I lol.

VaranisArano

Drummerx04 wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

I suspect we'll still see plenty of gankers and tower farming small-man groups.

But if you were wanting to 1vX or take your small man and win against larger organized groups, no, I don't think thats going to work out that well.

Mind you, I'm sure that 1vPotatoes and organized small man vs disorganized mob still works okay, within limits, as long as the lag doesnt strike too hard.

It's not that small scalers expect to "win" against an entire enemy faction, but we do expect to have the ability to harass a siege line of inexperienced players and not have set procs completely negate all healing or deal more damage than the actual enemy player does.

We just expect to be able to hold off an unorganized blob of players for more than 2 seconds with kiting, healing, defensive measures, LoS etc... and maybe kill a few that get to far ahead of the mob before getting overwhelmed.

That's fair, small organized groups ought to be able to tackle larger numbers of disorganized opponents.

Tackling large numbers of organized opponents is another matter. I just want to clarify that, because sometimes people get sloppy with defining a zerg. It makes a big difference whether the opponents are a larger disorganized or larger organized group.

Haashhtaag

JimmyJuJu wrote: »

Cyrodiil is clearly intended for large-scale combat. There are base camps, faction zones, strategic choke points, structures that can be captured and held, a rapid deployment network (i.e. transitus), supply stations (farm, mill, mine), and so on. I find it curious that people demand small-scale combat in Cyro when the map isn't setup that way. But whatever.

Then implement some small scale servers with a max cap for group at 12. BG's are boring, the MMR system is broken, and not everyone wants to play no CP.

Jjitsuboy98

I see what they are doing killing solo PVP. Nerfmire may be the moment I quit and look for something else to play. I don't see why they are supporting Zerg play because even if I wanted to the damn game is to laggy to get near a dang Zerg. They can't argue that. So what in the heck are they doing to cyrodil?

Biro123

Was at the wrong end of a new low today.. Alone Vs around 30, trying to escape to the nearest keep (which they were about to siege)..
Then (I'm guessing) around 3-4 of them started spamming timestop on the door I was heading to... Constant timestop layered over timestop over the whole door area.
Really?

Haashhtaag

Jjitsuboy98 wrote: »

I see what they are doing killing solo PVP. Nerfmire may be the moment I quit and look for something else to play. I don't see why they are supporting Zerg play because even if I wanted to the damn game is to laggy to get near a dang Zerg. They can't argue that. So what in the heck are they doing to cyrodil?

Because zerg play and zerglings are casuals. ZOS caters to casuals, it's obvious. Just look at rapids not getting the blanket major expedition nerf.

generalmyrick

im not seeing very many people playing these days.

it feels really empty to me.

Mr_Walker

Haashhtaag wrote: »

Jjitsuboy98 wrote: »

I see what they are doing killing solo PVP. Nerfmire may be the moment I quit and look for something else to play. I don't see why they are supporting Zerg play because even if I wanted to the damn game is to laggy to get near a dang Zerg. They can't argue that. So what in the heck are they doing to cyrodil?

Because zerg play and zerglings are casuals. ZOS caters to casuals, it's obvious. Just look at rapids not getting the blanket major expedition nerf.

Yes, I am a casual. It's called having a real life and job.

Mr_Walker

VaranisArano wrote: »

I just want to clarify that, because sometimes people get sloppy with defining a zerg.

That's easy, it's any group of opponents larger than 8.

Especially if they kill me.

VaranisArano

Mr_Walker wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

I just want to clarify that, because sometimes people get sloppy with defining a zerg.

That's easy, it's any group of opponents larger than 8.

Especially if they kill me.

There is that Any group larger than mine is a zerg. Unless I'm in a raid, and then it takes the whole faction to bring me down!