ZOS please consider dissolving ball groups

Vizirith

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Vizirith wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

When players come to the forum and simply call for group nerfs you aren't empowering players to learn how to deal with such groups for the future. Such as 'Ulti coordination', CC control and timing of pushes, Better group overview of buffs/ leading intention - you know the stuff that we have as groups from good leadership calls (and addons in some cases).

Agreed, having people group up to have heals, especially with a dedicated healer, coordinated cc/roots and ult dumps. Maybe coordinating buffs and sets. Ideally you want to stay close together so treaders would be helpful. A purgebot would go far to mitigate incoming dmg, a rapids bot too for speed. Wait why does this sound so familiar?

You are kind of twisting my words here. Sure being a ball group vs another ball group will often yield good results but there is no reason why players have to have dedicated purge/rapids and heals if they are zerg surfing. Coordinating ultis isn't something unique to a ball group yet you seem to indicate that it is. Equally the timing of pushes is far easier on the surfing group vs the outnumbered group. The outnumbered group has to kill enough not to be overwhelmed, deal with counter siege etc.. The surfing group can simply bide their time and hit whenever they choose to. Yet so few players even consider playing in such a way. They rather stack in pug groups making themselves easy targets or just go to siege (which does have some impact).

I always feel like if ZOS empowered players to actually learn the game rather than 'raising the floor' and giving out participation stickers constantly the result would be a healthier community.

Organized groups use ult dumps, more group members use more ults. Sure a random unorganized mob of 40 can definitely ult dump together with about the same chance a monkey can type out all of Shakespeare's works. Or are you talking about a ult dump of a group of 3 people? Because it would be quite amusing if somehow drac all died to 3 dawnbreakers. Or are you talking about larger groups? Ofc that group wouldn't include stamblades, maybe magblades and sorcs running destro ult, maybe a negate or 2, coupled with a healing ult, preferably someone with roots. In all seriousness I do see what you are saying but the difference between even a pug group of 12 ult dumping vs a ball group dumping is huge. Not a single one of my characters use destro ult, you'd only run it when in a group.

Timing of pushes is great, ofc, and how many times do you see an unorganized group of 40 coordinating anything. Don't forget often the ball groups are setting the location of contact, sure everybody can simply spread apart by flags, and wait. Allowing you to again choose the point of contact. Unless you are talking about a perfectly open field in which case sure people can spread out while still doing damage.

At the end of the day every game should and will be about drawing in new players. Players will always leave for some reason or another, when a game gets to the point where more people leave than start it's dead. To say that basically L2P is the issue is amusing. There is always a counter for everything, if they buff puncturing sweeps damage by 100 times will there be counter play? Of course there would be. Does that mean that it is balanced? Of course not.

Vizirith

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

The "problem " with ballgroups is a problem with the defensive power gained by group purge and stacked healing.
That's as plain as I can put it. Do you agree?

As a short answer - I don't consider it a problem. (This will be taken slightly out of context due to its simplicity, I'm happy to discuss the meta changes and I am quite bored of the current meta in itself but in general I don't consider a groups healing and support factor an issue).

I consider the problem to be that
1) Players don't know how to deal with groups
2) Players should be encouraged to learn and there should potentially be more tools to help this (like fixing the lag on cast time skills, siege and cc break etc).
3) Recovery mechanics should be lessened (e.g. res and camps should function differently).

That's pretty much the git-good answer. It's what some say while wearing the latest unbalanced meta sets. What you'd encourage people to learn is what makes groups "unkillable", as they would put it, and what they'll learn is that group purge and stacking heals are what does that.
Even the best groups get beat, or die eventually to lag/disconnects/very good bombers, but the delta between meta and off-meta is too vast and IMO that is due completely to unbalanced defensive power of two mechanics.

So I guess we'll just have to disagree on whether that's a problem.

Lets take Crimson as an example.
Its a very strong set because players don't deal with it well. if you avoid the proc or make your burst window occur after it has proc'd its not really that strong. (theres raids that run all crimson on NA and they die really fast).

Yet everyone is annoyed because its also annoying to deal with and takes a brain (its easier to use than it is to fight lets say) - is it strong - yes, its probs overtuned especially in combination with other stuff (But I think HP heals and proc dmg are worse), should it be removed completely - no, players should 'learn to play' as you put it.

This is partly why I don't agree with most players on simple 'nerf group' threads. Playing in a group and being really successful at it takes a lot of work and experience its not as simple as throwing on a set and letting it proc on pugs that stack on you. It feels like those asking for group nerfs are just those unwilling to put in a similar amount of effort to fight.

Nobody is saying it doesn't take skill, its just quite forgiving. Monday saw what looked like the start of another dc ball group. First engagement we beat them pretty easily 12 randos vs their12. But they didn't have the correct sets at all, no coordination, bad movement, no purge, no rapids. 2nd time around it was slightly harder but not much but we had 15ish randos vs their 12. 3rd time they had better coordination, better sets, rapids but no purgebot. They still died but they got kills and took a bit of coordinating on our part and we were up to 20ish at that point. Pretty decent for 30 mins and 3 actual engagements. Some of the sets that are specifically allocated for groups are quite good, heck olorime isn't even that bad of a set for solo play compared to some solo sets.

RDMyers65b14_ESO

I am so looking forward to the test in February that removes the proc sets because people will have to run something other than crimson. It is annoying.

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO

Vizirith wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Vizirith wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

When players come to the forum and simply call for group nerfs you aren't empowering players to learn how to deal with such groups for the future. Such as 'Ulti coordination', CC control and timing of pushes, Better group overview of buffs/ leading intention - you know the stuff that we have as groups from good leadership calls (and addons in some cases).

Agreed, having people group up to have heals, especially with a dedicated healer, coordinated cc/roots and ult dumps. Maybe coordinating buffs and sets. Ideally you want to stay close together so treaders would be helpful. A purgebot would go far to mitigate incoming dmg, a rapids bot too for speed. Wait why does this sound so familiar?

You are kind of twisting my words here. Sure being a ball group vs another ball group will often yield good results but there is no reason why players have to have dedicated purge/rapids and heals if they are zerg surfing. Coordinating ultis isn't something unique to a ball group yet you seem to indicate that it is. Equally the timing of pushes is far easier on the surfing group vs the outnumbered group. The outnumbered group has to kill enough not to be overwhelmed, deal with counter siege etc.. The surfing group can simply bide their time and hit whenever they choose to. Yet so few players even consider playing in such a way. They rather stack in pug groups making themselves easy targets or just go to siege (which does have some impact).

I always feel like if ZOS empowered players to actually learn the game rather than 'raising the floor' and giving out participation stickers constantly the result would be a healthier community.

Or are you talking about a ult dump of a group of 3 people? Because it would be quite amusing if somehow drac all died to 3 dawnbreakers.

I'm talking about a group of 6-8 (or 2-3 with less organized or experienced groups) coordinating ultis along with when groups are at their weakest and taking damage from the pugs around. Especially if that is combined with some even more powerful ulti's like negate etc.

I'm not saying simply 'burst' with 'just' 3 ultis im saying if you understand how groups play you can counter them fairly easily if you build for it and have good timing/awareness of group gameplay tactics. (Understand that you still have to put effort in to doing it but its easier than fighting outnumbered in a group)

Ranger209

Speaking in regards to purge and its strength, just for fun one night I continually casted Haunting Curse on a ball group for about a minute and a half. At no point did it stay on anyone for more than a second for a minute and a half straight. Another time I casted Restraining Prison for probably 30 seconds on a ball group, immune, immune, immune... I mean why even bother at that point. AOE does nothing to them and DD gets over-healed. When it feels like I can do absolutely nothing to them I have to ask why I am engaging them. At this point I really don't anymore unless I unwittingly run into one, and then just leave as fast as I can. They should be more powerful than unorganized groups of people, but the degree that they are more powerful is what I have issue with, and why I just won't play their game anymore. That's no fun for anyone, and if enough people take my approach it won't be any fun for ball groups either.

Sandman929

Ranger209 wrote: »

Speaking in regards to purge and its strength, just for fun one night I continually casted Haunting Curse on a ball group for about a minute and a half. At no point did it stay on anyone for more than a second for a minute and a half straight. Another time I casted Restraining Prison for probably 30 seconds on a ball group, immune, immune, immune... I mean why even bother at that point. AOE does nothing to them and DD gets over-healed. When it feels like I can do absolutely nothing to them I have to ask why I am engaging them. At this point I really don't anymore unless I unwittingly run into one, and then just leave as fast as I can. They should be more powerful than unorganized groups of people, but the degree that they are more powerful is what I have issue with, and why I just won't play their game anymore. That's no fun for anyone, and if enough people take my approach it won't be any fun for ball groups either.

That's what I'm saying. The meta is too far away from anything else in terms of defense.

Vizirith

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Vizirith wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Vizirith wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

When players come to the forum and simply call for group nerfs you aren't empowering players to learn how to deal with such groups for the future. Such as 'Ulti coordination', CC control and timing of pushes, Better group overview of buffs/ leading intention - you know the stuff that we have as groups from good leadership calls (and addons in some cases).

Agreed, having people group up to have heals, especially with a dedicated healer, coordinated cc/roots and ult dumps. Maybe coordinating buffs and sets. Ideally you want to stay close together so treaders would be helpful. A purgebot would go far to mitigate incoming dmg, a rapids bot too for speed. Wait why does this sound so familiar?

You are kind of twisting my words here. Sure being a ball group vs another ball group will often yield good results but there is no reason why players have to have dedicated purge/rapids and heals if they are zerg surfing. Coordinating ultis isn't something unique to a ball group yet you seem to indicate that it is. Equally the timing of pushes is far easier on the surfing group vs the outnumbered group. The outnumbered group has to kill enough not to be overwhelmed, deal with counter siege etc.. The surfing group can simply bide their time and hit whenever they choose to. Yet so few players even consider playing in such a way. They rather stack in pug groups making themselves easy targets or just go to siege (which does have some impact).

I always feel like if ZOS empowered players to actually learn the game rather than 'raising the floor' and giving out participation stickers constantly the result would be a healthier community.

Or are you talking about a ult dump of a group of 3 people? Because it would be quite amusing if somehow drac all died to 3 dawnbreakers.

I'm talking about a group of 6-8 (or 2-3 with less organized or experienced groups) coordinating ultis along with when groups are at their weakest and taking damage from the pugs around. Especially if that is combined with some even more powerful ulti's like negate etc.

I'm not saying simply 'burst' with 'just' 3 ultis im saying if you understand how groups play you can counter them fairly easily if you build for it and have good timing/awareness of group gameplay tactics.

Sure having multiple groups built for fighting ball groups would in fact kill ball groups. The amount of time involved in actually doing enough damage to pressure and get enough players dead to where they can't just res/necro res them may take quite the while. Most small scale groups I've seen don't really bother with the incredibly long drawn out fight with a pretty good chance they won't matter anyway. Should that 6-8 man group be bunched up with the pugs? Should they ult dump from 28m away? With ults they specifically selected for that? Should they have a negate? Healing ult? Dedicated healer? Purge? Rapids bot? Wait no losing small scale focus. Small scale groups are good because of movement but don't run purge and can be ult dumped right back except better. Not to mention that more than half the players in this game are melee and in a bad spot to fight ball groups anyway.

Saying something is balanced because it has a counter or a L2P component is short-sighted. Almost everything you could possibly imagine in game has a counter. 175k necro bash tank was countered, so therefore was it balanced? Perma-Invisible Man was killed, so therefore was it balanced? Every aspect of balance is simply weighing cost to counter it vs anything else. Cloak was very good when it had inherent purge and detection wasn't easy to get. It still had counters, it was simply determined that the counters were too uncommon to be effective counters. If they remove every source of detection in the game you can still counter cloak with aoe's, so would it make it balanced?

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO

Vizirith wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Vizirith wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Vizirith wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

When players come to the forum and simply call for group nerfs you aren't empowering players to learn how to deal with such groups for the future. Such as 'Ulti coordination', CC control and timing of pushes, Better group overview of buffs/ leading intention - you know the stuff that we have as groups from good leadership calls (and addons in some cases).

Agreed, having people group up to have heals, especially with a dedicated healer, coordinated cc/roots and ult dumps. Maybe coordinating buffs and sets. Ideally you want to stay close together so treaders would be helpful. A purgebot would go far to mitigate incoming dmg, a rapids bot too for speed. Wait why does this sound so familiar?

You are kind of twisting my words here. Sure being a ball group vs another ball group will often yield good results but there is no reason why players have to have dedicated purge/rapids and heals if they are zerg surfing. Coordinating ultis isn't something unique to a ball group yet you seem to indicate that it is. Equally the timing of pushes is far easier on the surfing group vs the outnumbered group. The outnumbered group has to kill enough not to be overwhelmed, deal with counter siege etc.. The surfing group can simply bide their time and hit whenever they choose to. Yet so few players even consider playing in such a way. They rather stack in pug groups making themselves easy targets or just go to siege (which does have some impact).

I always feel like if ZOS empowered players to actually learn the game rather than 'raising the floor' and giving out participation stickers constantly the result would be a healthier community.

Or are you talking about a ult dump of a group of 3 people? Because it would be quite amusing if somehow drac all died to 3 dawnbreakers.

I'm talking about a group of 6-8 (or 2-3 with less organized or experienced groups) coordinating ultis along with when groups are at their weakest and taking damage from the pugs around. Especially if that is combined with some even more powerful ulti's like negate etc.

I'm not saying simply 'burst' with 'just' 3 ultis im saying if you understand how groups play you can counter them fairly easily if you build for it and have good timing/awareness of group gameplay tactics.

Sure having multiple groups built for fighting ball groups would in fact kill ball groups. The amount of time involved in actually doing enough damage to pressure and get enough players dead to where they can't just res/necro res them may take quite the while. Most small scale groups I've seen don't really bother with the incredibly long drawn out fight with a pretty good chance they won't matter anyway. Should that 6-8 man group be bunched up with the pugs? Should they ult dump from 28m away? With ults they specifically selected for that? Should they have a negate? Healing ult? Dedicated healer? Purge? Rapids bot? Wait no losing small scale focus. Small scale groups are good because of movement but don't run purge and can be ult dumped right back except better. Not to mention that more than half the players in this game are melee and in a bad spot to fight ball groups anyway.

Saying something is balanced because it has a counter or a L2P component is short-sighted. Almost everything you could possibly imagine in game has a counter. 175k necro bash tank was countered, so therefore was it balanced? Perma-Invisible Man was killed, so therefore was it balanced? Every aspect of balance is simply weighing cost to counter it vs anything else. Cloak was very good when it had inherent purge and detection wasn't easy to get. It still had counters, it was simply determined that the counters were too uncommon to be effective counters. If they remove every source of detection in the game you can still counter cloak with aoe's, so would it make it balanced?

If you are considering the group of 6-8 people having the objective of being a good small group then they probs should be finding a better fight somewhere else. However as I mentioned in a post above if you took 6-8 people out of the zerg groups that regularly try to kill groups and those players actually decided to make something decent (Whilst still surfing that zerg) they would pose more of a threat vs just running in a zerg group stacked on crown.

I'm not going to reply to the second paragraph because it just becomes a straw man argument of what's more balanced / what should be possible in game and not possible etc..


Regarding @Ranger209 's point on 'trying to cast haunting curse for 1m 30 without it going off'. This is kind of the point i've been making with my posts. You know now that Haunting curse is useless, so when you go to fight a group (and you know there is a group at a location because it's called out / you died and respawned etc) its a good idea to adapt your setup in order to fight them.


It would be like me saying im going to try heal myself by using spell sym. Sure I can try it but it would be way better for me to actually think about a good skill to use.

Sorc's do have negate just saying

Psiion

Greetings all,

After editing and removing a few posts, we would like to remind everyone that Baiting is both non-constructive and against the Forum's Community Rules. Please sure to keep conversation civil going forward and ensure that posts and replies are within the Community Rules.

Vizirith

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Vizirith wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Vizirith wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Vizirith wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

When players come to the forum and simply call for group nerfs you aren't empowering players to learn how to deal with such groups for the future. Such as 'Ulti coordination', CC control and timing of pushes, Better group overview of buffs/ leading intention - you know the stuff that we have as groups from good leadership calls (and addons in some cases).

Agreed, having people group up to have heals, especially with a dedicated healer, coordinated cc/roots and ult dumps. Maybe coordinating buffs and sets. Ideally you want to stay close together so treaders would be helpful. A purgebot would go far to mitigate incoming dmg, a rapids bot too for speed. Wait why does this sound so familiar?

You are kind of twisting my words here. Sure being a ball group vs another ball group will often yield good results but there is no reason why players have to have dedicated purge/rapids and heals if they are zerg surfing. Coordinating ultis isn't something unique to a ball group yet you seem to indicate that it is. Equally the timing of pushes is far easier on the surfing group vs the outnumbered group. The outnumbered group has to kill enough not to be overwhelmed, deal with counter siege etc.. The surfing group can simply bide their time and hit whenever they choose to. Yet so few players even consider playing in such a way. They rather stack in pug groups making themselves easy targets or just go to siege (which does have some impact).

I always feel like if ZOS empowered players to actually learn the game rather than 'raising the floor' and giving out participation stickers constantly the result would be a healthier community.

Or are you talking about a ult dump of a group of 3 people? Because it would be quite amusing if somehow drac all died to 3 dawnbreakers.

I'm talking about a group of 6-8 (or 2-3 with less organized or experienced groups) coordinating ultis along with when groups are at their weakest and taking damage from the pugs around. Especially if that is combined with some even more powerful ulti's like negate etc.

I'm not saying simply 'burst' with 'just' 3 ultis im saying if you understand how groups play you can counter them fairly easily if you build for it and have good timing/awareness of group gameplay tactics.

Sure having multiple groups built for fighting ball groups would in fact kill ball groups. The amount of time involved in actually doing enough damage to pressure and get enough players dead to where they can't just res/necro res them may take quite the while. Most small scale groups I've seen don't really bother with the incredibly long drawn out fight with a pretty good chance they won't matter anyway. Should that 6-8 man group be bunched up with the pugs? Should they ult dump from 28m away? With ults they specifically selected for that? Should they have a negate? Healing ult? Dedicated healer? Purge? Rapids bot? Wait no losing small scale focus. Small scale groups are good because of movement but don't run purge and can be ult dumped right back except better. Not to mention that more than half the players in this game are melee and in a bad spot to fight ball groups anyway.

Saying something is balanced because it has a counter or a L2P component is short-sighted. Almost everything you could possibly imagine in game has a counter. 175k necro bash tank was countered, so therefore was it balanced? Perma-Invisible Man was killed, so therefore was it balanced? Every aspect of balance is simply weighing cost to counter it vs anything else. Cloak was very good when it had inherent purge and detection wasn't easy to get. It still had counters, it was simply determined that the counters were too uncommon to be effective counters. If they remove every source of detection in the game you can still counter cloak with aoe's, so would it make it balanced?

If you are considering the group of 6-8 people having the objective of being a good small group then they probs should be finding a better fight somewhere else. However as I mentioned in a post above if you took 6-8 people out of the zerg groups that regularly try to kill groups and those players actually decided to make something decent (Whilst still surfing that zerg) they would pose more of a threat vs just running in a zerg group stacked on crown.

I'm not going to reply to the second paragraph because it just becomes a straw man argument of what's more balanced / what should be possible in game and not possible etc..

Your whole argument is that because ball groups have a counter that they are balanced. My argument is that those counters are too uncommon in practice to put it in very watered down terms. Sorry for some reason my posts keep vanishing so this is the third time I've responded. The second paragraph isn't a straw man at all because it is referring to your underlying argument about counters and their existence implying balance.

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Regarding @Ranger209 's point on 'trying to cast haunting curse for 1m 30 without it going off'. This is kind of the point i've been making with my posts. You know now that Haunting curse is useless, so when you go to fight a group (and you know there is a group at a location because it's called out / you died and respawned etc) its a good idea to adapt your setup in order to fight them.


It would be like me saying im going to try heal myself by using spell sym. Sure I can try it but it would be way better for me to actually think about a good skill to use.

Sorc's do have negate just saying

Again just because a setup has a counter no matter how implausible doesn't mean it is inherently balanced.

EDIT: I guess that's where zos stands on the issue.

Ranger209

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Regarding @Ranger209 's point on 'trying to cast haunting curse for 1m 30 without it going off'. This is kind of the point i've been making with my posts. You know now that Haunting curse is useless, so when you go to fight a group (and you know there is a group at a location because it's called out / you died and respawned etc) its a good idea to adapt your setup in order to fight them.


It would be like me saying im going to try heal myself by using spell sym. Sure I can try it but it would be way better for me to actually think about a good skill to use.

Sorc's do have negate just saying

The issue is haunting curse is but one example. Basically any DOT, or delayed ability like curse that needs to reside on the target for longer than 1 second to have an effect is rendered useless. So basically DD abilities are in play, and that is about it. It is virtually impossible to put any kind of sustained pressure on a ball group as it is just purged away, and as I said the DD stuff gets overhealed as fast as you can deliver it. The only time a good ball group is able to be defeated is if by chance 40 people not communicating with each other happen to have about 6 or more ultis land in the same couple of seconds along with a negate. I mean everyonce in a while you will see the collective hp of a good ball group drop about 20-30%, and if enough people keep throwing ultis at that point in time in can be done, but with lag and whatnot it may already be too late as the hp has been topped off without us knowing it.

Really the lag thing needs to be fixed to determine what is really OP and by how much, but under the current server conditions good ball groups are best left alone.

The negate thing, yeah I use it, many times it gets overwritten by another negate from the ball, and then I wait 30-60 seconds to build another up, and try and figure out a good time to drop it. Normally when I see that spike drop in ball group hp, whether that is in time or not, probably not most times.

I don't necessarily want to see ball groups go away, but the balance is way out of whack. I would rather see them go away than stay like they are, but if ZOS can bring them into whack I would be just fine with it. I think there are ways, some of which I have alluded to in other posts, and some others have brought up. I could get into a whole list of ways to bring in debuffs, or change gear set to have negative effects for grouped members when too many are in too close of proximity to each other. That really is the only way to curtail ball groups with having minimal effects on regular groups, and still apply these types of things under the condition of being in a group.

ShadowProc

Satiar wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

Stacking heals and group purging. That's all that needs to be addressed to change organized groups for the better.

How do you think heals and purge should work in an mmo? What you suggest essentially means there shouldnt be any type of support or healing role.

Less about what I think should be, and more about what it will take to change a very stale, very dull, group meta.

Well I feel that if you have no idea what should be changed then suggesting that simple nerfs aren't the key to making 'organised groups for the better'. For example there have been a lot of changes since launch which have affected group healing and yet we are now at this stage. Do you feel like one of these past stages was better or have they all been bad?

Additionally lets say you remove all cross healing and cross purge. How do pugs and groups deal with counter siege at that point? Just stack up and hope that you can push through and overwhelm numbers? - This leads to more lag and faction stacking. Groups for example would likely just go for classes that can easily self purge. For example lets say I run 12m of templars. (obviously would be some other roles there but just as an example) 12x purify on the ground will give quite a lot of cross healing even though the 'mutagen' won't be stacking. Damage would be lower but equally now pugs can't purge effectively.

Its very dangerous to just suggest a change and not consider its impact as we have seen with countless ESO changes.

It's only dangerous to those seeking to preserve it.

Tell this to people asking for ball group nerfs when they got their group size reduced to 12 and healing to group only

People are generally asking for the wrong solutions. Thinking they can end people playing well together, and that's the wrong way. The offensive power of organized groups can't be touched. The defensive power can easily be changed though, and in my opinion should be changed.
I'm perfectly comfortable doing what works and thinking what works should be changed. I wore Crimson, I wear Malacath and procs...I don't think those things should be preserved.

the issue with constantly calling for group nerfs (I also think the current meta has run its course and it would be nice to have changes) is that people don't consider what happens afterwards.

Lets say for example that ball groups suddenly don't exist. You can run a group and beat equal numbers of pugs but fighting outnumbered with a small group isn't really possible. What happens then? Do you think it leads to groups magically finding equal numbered fights all over the map? or does it just lead to those groups sitting at their factions frontlines surrounded by 30-40 other players (who may or may not be in their own groups) pushing the next keep in the row?

The only thing which has changed as groups have been systematically nerfed since launch is that less and less groups venture out to their own fights and spread out combat around the map, conversely group size (in terms of 'running together' not people inside the group) has increased drastically. We've had the bridge/gate corridor fights for over 4 years now. Compared to launch this is a really sad sight to see.

The amount of groups we see daily in cyro who will now literally just run away if any enemies show up to their backline siege is crazy, and those are the guys who at least aren't really contributing to the frontline fight lag currently. If they instead just frontline I think the lag will get way worse personally.


Note: For my guild honestly I don't think there's any change that ZOS could make which would prevent us being able to fight outnumbered but do you really want there to only be 1 or 2 guilds left in the game who can do so and the rest stay on frontlines? (we're almost there right now lol)

People are sick of it. What I see more and more is beating groups with boredom...in short, just ignore them. They are defensively too strong. I would never advise any player to stay behind the front lines to fight a ball group because they simply won't win.
Even against a mediocre group, ungrouped players won't win easily because they are outmatched defensively.
The defensive power of organized groups has to be brought back down to earth with solo and small group play.
It's nice to think about groups spreading combat, but when they get bored because no one wants to fight them they will/do come to the frontline fights.
I have no problem with organized group play. I think offensively they are powerful through cooperation and timing and that is deserved.
Defensively, large groups are miles ahead of all other playstyles because of stacked healing and group purging.
Not everyone wants to play that way, and playing that way is far too advantageous because of these mechanics.
There can't be a change in the meta until that is addressed.

I don't know how much you have experienced playing in group this patch (I know you watch a lot of streams/vids etc) but I can tell you that as a group if we fight 30-40 pugs + some organised 6-8m who actually knows what they are doing these fights are extremely difficult to win. The problem is that players don't understand how to combat groups at all and most pug groups actually do more harm to themselves then good. Honestly 90% of the time it would be better for players to all be solo rather than in some of these 'herding groups' (not mentioning any names but you know the ones if you play).

When players come to the forum and simply call for group nerfs you aren't empowering players to learn how to deal with such groups for the future. Such as 'Ulti coordination', CC control and timing of pushes, Better group overview of buffs/ leading intention - you know the stuff that we have as groups from good leadership calls (and addons in some cases).

Honestly when i've been watching most other groups I don't think they really have many successful fights these days unless there aren't enough player to challenge them anyway, or there are no coordinated small groups / other 'ball groups' online. (Kiting fights can be considered successful depending on the gains but im talking more so about securing ticks and performance in combat).
Note: This is when observing them as an enemy. All it takes for most groups to die these days are 2-3 coordinated players inside a zerg.

I don't disagree with a lot of that. All I'm saying is the group meta is stale, and boring and almost futile to fight against.
I'm bored of playing it, and bored of seeing it.

I agree that the meta is a bit stale but its difficult to see how they change it aside from making certain playstyles completely redundant.

here's a video from 2015 - https://youtu.be/HWyHEH2osps tactics are almost identical.

The main differences are:

Now almost everyone in the group is responsible for healing in some part, still dedicated heals are needed but equally off-healing is more important - Imo a good change because it means that groups don't need to find as many dedicated healers and everyone needs to think a bit more about their skill choice.

Rapids - Doesn't need to be cast as often, so a dedicated rapids guy isn't always needed now - A good change for those who were upset that groups had dedicated support players, but imo a bad change for groups because it takes away from playstyles.

Purge - Same as before - The only interesting purge patch was 1.4 (iirc, could be 1.5) - the one where when you purged you could destroy your group to wall of elements bug. Although these days with all the proc sets and siege changes that would probs be really horrible to deal with.

The only reason everyone is responsible for healing now is because healing springs no longer stacked. 2-3 dedicated healers used to be able to stack 8-12 instances of springs, so not everyone HAD to heal. That might seem like a change, but it isn't because the defensive mechanic that was overtuned was still "stacking heals". Now, we need more sources of regeneration to to get up to the level of 3 sources of 4 stacked springs. It's the same mechanic of stacking heals bringing too much defensive power.

Rapids got a duration that doesn't break on action, so yeah the support role is still vital but can do more than just keep rapids going for the group. I have no problem with that support role. It does lend the group strength through mobility. Even in solo play, line of sight is crucial to mitigating incoming damage and mobility helps with that.

Purge is pretty much unchanged and this is the other overpowered source of defensive strength effectively eliminating the threat of powerful siege damage while also adding to the strength of mobility.

All playstyles can get strength from mobility, but only large groups can get the benefit of deep healing stacks and group purging without severely hampering their damage potential and those two benefits are over tuned, IMO.

There is no solution to change the meta without changing the 2 mechanics that make the meta so strong. Any group with any composition can coordinate damage to great effect in an outnumbered fight, but only these 2 defensive mechanics make that group almost futile to fight from an ungrouped perspective.

There is a way to change it. Remove or cap heal stacks, remove group purging. Groups can still be strong and coordination will still often win against disorganized masses, but only to a point, and I think it's a much more reasonable point.

If everything in the game didnt snare/root and siege wasn't a thing, I'd say that would be reasonable. As is, purge isn't just a win condition or a defensive countermeasure. It's how you operate in Cyrodiil without mashing your face into your monitor in a fit of rage in anything larger than a 2v2.

You are adding to the point. You are saying by extension it is an OP skill that is required for success. We all agree to that.
The problem is the investment to maintain it is not up to par.

Make everyone slot it so resource management becomes a thing and group members have to press 4 buttons instead of three

ShadowProc

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

The "problem " with ballgroups is a problem with the defensive power gained by group purge and stacked healing.
That's as plain as I can put it. Do you agree?

As a short answer - I don't consider it a problem. (This will be taken slightly out of context due to its simplicity, I'm happy to discuss the meta changes and I am quite bored of the current meta in itself but in general I don't consider a groups healing and support factor an issue).

I consider the problem to be that
1) Players don't know how to deal with groups
2) Players should be encouraged to learn and there should potentially be more tools to help this (like fixing the lag on cast time skills, siege and cc break etc).
3) Recovery mechanics should be lessened (e.g. res and camps should function differently).

Izzy plz post a video of you and 2 or three other players wiping VE or Tyr.

You continually say players just need to get better. Post a video doing it, not staged, and I will eat my words.

Satiar

ShadowProc wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

The "problem " with ballgroups is a problem with the defensive power gained by group purge and stacked healing.
That's as plain as I can put it. Do you agree?

As a short answer - I don't consider it a problem. (This will be taken slightly out of context due to its simplicity, I'm happy to discuss the meta changes and I am quite bored of the current meta in itself but in general I don't consider a groups healing and support factor an issue).

I consider the problem to be that
1) Players don't know how to deal with groups
2) Players should be encouraged to learn and there should potentially be more tools to help this (like fixing the lag on cast time skills, siege and cc break etc).
3) Recovery mechanics should be lessened (e.g. res and camps should function differently).

Izzy plz post a video of you and 2 or three other players wiping VE or Tyr.

You continually say players just need to get better. Post a video doing it, not staged, and I will eat my words.

You can get a good bomb. Someone has a video of getting a good Nova bomb on us for a huge VD. It can happen. It’s just rare, and now that groups are 12 man (read: tanky, fast, mobile) it’s gonna be very rare.

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO

ShadowProc wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

The "problem " with ballgroups is a problem with the defensive power gained by group purge and stacked healing.
That's as plain as I can put it. Do you agree?

As a short answer - I don't consider it a problem. (This will be taken slightly out of context due to its simplicity, I'm happy to discuss the meta changes and I am quite bored of the current meta in itself but in general I don't consider a groups healing and support factor an issue).

I consider the problem to be that
1) Players don't know how to deal with groups
2) Players should be encouraged to learn and there should potentially be more tools to help this (like fixing the lag on cast time skills, siege and cc break etc).
3) Recovery mechanics should be lessened (e.g. res and camps should function differently).

Izzy plz post a video of you and 2 or three other players wiping VE or Tyr.

You continually say players just need to get better. Post a video doing it, not staged, and I will eat my words.

Ok i'll start to record stuff if i'm surfing

ShadowProc

Satiar wrote: »

ShadowProc wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

The "problem " with ballgroups is a problem with the defensive power gained by group purge and stacked healing.
That's as plain as I can put it. Do you agree?

As a short answer - I don't consider it a problem. (This will be taken slightly out of context due to its simplicity, I'm happy to discuss the meta changes and I am quite bored of the current meta in itself but in general I don't consider a groups healing and support factor an issue).

I consider the problem to be that
1) Players don't know how to deal with groups
2) Players should be encouraged to learn and there should potentially be more tools to help this (like fixing the lag on cast time skills, siege and cc break etc).
3) Recovery mechanics should be lessened (e.g. res and camps should function differently).

Izzy plz post a video of you and 2 or three other players wiping VE or Tyr.

You continually say players just need to get better. Post a video doing it, not staged, and I will eat my words.

You can get a good bomb. Someone has a video of getting a good Nova bomb on us for a huge VD. It can happen. It’s just rare, and now that groups are 12 man (read: tanky, fast, mobile) it’s gonna be very rare.

That’s my point. Izzy and others repeatedly state you just need to learn to counter ball groups. That’s not true. As you stated it’s extremely rare. A ton of factors have to line up for it to occur. That’s not balance.

I stand by it’s still a selfish way to play. I won’t say Drac or VE as I haven’t seen them play in a while but Tyr goes out of there way to farm pigs which kills performance. Players will keep leaving if they don’t have fun and get crushed over and over by the use of broken group play.

ShadowProc

You at least use to be able to whittle them away. I would stealth and knock them off their farms one by one. Now they ruined that tactic as well. Necro ultimate needs to go. Again another tool that favors groups. Allows them to farm longer and needs to go

techyeshic

ShadowProc wrote: »

Satiar wrote: »

ShadowProc wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

The "problem " with ballgroups is a problem with the defensive power gained by group purge and stacked healing.
That's as plain as I can put it. Do you agree?

As a short answer - I don't consider it a problem. (This will be taken slightly out of context due to its simplicity, I'm happy to discuss the meta changes and I am quite bored of the current meta in itself but in general I don't consider a groups healing and support factor an issue).

I consider the problem to be that
1) Players don't know how to deal with groups
2) Players should be encouraged to learn and there should potentially be more tools to help this (like fixing the lag on cast time skills, siege and cc break etc).
3) Recovery mechanics should be lessened (e.g. res and camps should function differently).

Izzy plz post a video of you and 2 or three other players wiping VE or Tyr.

You continually say players just need to get better. Post a video doing it, not staged, and I will eat my words.

You can get a good bomb. Someone has a video of getting a good Nova bomb on us for a huge VD. It can happen. It’s just rare, and now that groups are 12 man (read: tanky, fast, mobile) it’s gonna be very rare.

That’s my point. Izzy and others repeatedly state you just need to learn to counter ball groups. That’s not true. As you stated it’s extremely rare. A ton of factors have to line up for it to occur. That’s not balance.

I stand by it’s still a selfish way to play. I won’t say Drac or VE as I haven’t seen them play in a while but Tyr goes out of there way to farm pigs which kills performance. Players will keep leaving if they don’t have fun and get crushed over and over by the use of broken group play.

Drac is the only ball group I have seen go at other ball groups. When they were EP, I specifically remember them at Ales owned by DC and when they realized an AD ball group was at the front they went around and engaged. With Drac now on DC; we definitely notice EP and AD ball groups show up on days drac are not on and have been on opposite sides of Ash and stayed there not engaging each other at times. And if Drac is on and they hear about an enemy ball group; I have seen them come more times than not, and make short work of them.

For that; I have grown to have a lot of respect for Drac; but they are proving to be an exception as far as behavior goes. Im not really a fan of that being the style to play, and have made that known pretty often on the forums; yet now I see faction stacking more than ever with all these procs and tons of health, free purges and heals. The people I run with, although we do not go into role builds to the level of a ball group as its still mostly people just bringing their self sufficient builds; I think we have been mistaken as a ball group at time because we will tighten up, use purge and regen, time negates, roots, fears and bomb with synergies. Its still just a lot of damage coming from just a clusters stack of PUGs to where sometimes I think being a ball group might be the only way. I think just most of us don't enjoy that and want to be organized as a group of well rounded fighters rather than play a role. Everyone is seemingly happy about this cross healing coming back as it was. I am concerned we will see a return of groups that ran like a ball group but went 24 deep again so they double in size

TLDR is Balance might a bit out of whack if you did find a way to nerf ball groups as there are a lot of other things that needs to be considered. Primarily; ZOS has to consider how they want their game to be played and what it looks like

FENGRUSH

I dont think theres any changes happening here anytime soon. Especially with CP rework, its gonna take a couple patches to figure that out and then build on it.

Those who do not spam purge with multiple regens ticking at all times will be remembered for their uphill efforts as the real ones. There is nothing else to gain.

Ranger209

techyeshic wrote: »

ShadowProc wrote: »

Satiar wrote: »

ShadowProc wrote: »

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

The "problem " with ballgroups is a problem with the defensive power gained by group purge and stacked healing.
That's as plain as I can put it. Do you agree?

As a short answer - I don't consider it a problem. (This will be taken slightly out of context due to its simplicity, I'm happy to discuss the meta changes and I am quite bored of the current meta in itself but in general I don't consider a groups healing and support factor an issue).

I consider the problem to be that
1) Players don't know how to deal with groups
2) Players should be encouraged to learn and there should potentially be more tools to help this (like fixing the lag on cast time skills, siege and cc break etc).
3) Recovery mechanics should be lessened (e.g. res and camps should function differently).

Izzy plz post a video of you and 2 or three other players wiping VE or Tyr.

You continually say players just need to get better. Post a video doing it, not staged, and I will eat my words.

You can get a good bomb. Someone has a video of getting a good Nova bomb on us for a huge VD. It can happen. It’s just rare, and now that groups are 12 man (read: tanky, fast, mobile) it’s gonna be very rare.

That’s my point. Izzy and others repeatedly state you just need to learn to counter ball groups. That’s not true. As you stated it’s extremely rare. A ton of factors have to line up for it to occur. That’s not balance.

I stand by it’s still a selfish way to play. I won’t say Drac or VE as I haven’t seen them play in a while but Tyr goes out of there way to farm pigs which kills performance. Players will keep leaving if they don’t have fun and get crushed over and over by the use of broken group play.

Drac is the only ball group I have seen go at other ball groups. When they were EP, I specifically remember them at Ales owned by DC and when they realized an AD ball group was at the front they went around and engaged. With Drac now on DC; we definitely notice EP and AD ball groups show up on days drac are not on and have been on opposite sides of Ash and stayed there not engaging each other at times. And if Drac is on and they hear about an enemy ball group; I have seen them come more times than not, and make short work of them.

For that; I have grown to have a lot of respect for Drac; but they are proving to be an exception as far as behavior goes. Im not really a fan of that being the style to play, and have made that known pretty often on the forums; yet now I see faction stacking more than ever with all these procs and tons of health, free purges and heals. The people I run with, although we do not go into role builds to the level of a ball group as its still mostly people just bringing their self sufficient builds; I think we have been mistaken as a ball group at time because we will tighten up, use purge and regen, time negates, roots, fears and bomb with synergies. Its still just a lot of damage coming from just a clusters stack of PUGs to where sometimes I think being a ball group might be the only way. I think just most of us don't enjoy that and want to be organized as a group of well rounded fighters rather than play a role. Everyone is seemingly happy about this cross healing coming back as it was. I am concerned we will see a return of groups that ran like a ball group but went 24 deep again so they double in size

TLDR is Balance might a bit out of whack if you did find a way to nerf ball groups as there are a lot of other things that needs to be considered. Primarily; ZOS has to consider how they want their game to be played and what it looks like

And this right here is why group centric PvP doesn't work, and frustrates so many. What happens is all the best players gravitate, are recruited, and congregate together. Of these groups that form over time 1 rises above the others as superior. The ones who cannot beat the top dog stay away from them, and farm lesser than opponents. Seen it in many MMORPG's that incorporate group PvP in an open world setting.

The only advantage ESO has over most is that it is part of an AvAvA siege warfare system. If Cyrodiil was nothing but exclusively PvP without the other objectives it would look like Imperial City Sewers where this type of group play is allowed. Even that has some PvE elements, but there is no alliance tie in other than you can't attack groups of your alliance. There is really nothing to work for as an alliance as opposed to just working as independent groups.

ShadowProc

FENGRUSH wrote: »

I dont think theres any changes happening here anytime soon. Especially with CP rework, its gonna take a couple patches to figure that out and then build on it.

Those who do not spam purge with multiple regens ticking at all times will be remembered for their uphill efforts as the real ones. There is nothing else to gain.

Translation: Small group and solo play. 100% agree. Like I get how ball grouping can be fun for awhile. Seeing hordes blow up is very stimulating. But. That grows stale quick where small group and solo, especially solo never gets old until you get constantly zerged down by ball groups (Drac). Lol

Just kidding Vile and Aegon. I learned my lesson. It was deserved.

I agree Drac is admirable now for who they engage. Others are not. The other well known DC guild that transferred from EP goes out of their way to concentrate pugs so they can pat themselves on their back for VD chains while relying on OP defensive ball group mechanics.

That’s really what I don’t get. How it can be fun to stack 35k health and abuse purge and heal stacking for more than a month or so and obliterate pugs that have 1% chance of killing them. And some have been doing it for years.

helena21

maboleth wrote: »

I'm sorry, what? I'm not against groups, whatsoever, even though I play solo most of the time. And not against zergs either. But ball groups. The mechanics of it, endless heals and toxic trolling without doing anything for the game.

You know, it's funny how in the game itself people that actually play Cyrodiil (attacking keeps, defending, scrolls, strategy, battling etc.) HATE ball groups. And I wrote this post on behalf of those players in Cyrodiil, knowing it's futile, but at least to try.

But here, on forums, it's like - shoot the messenger. Alright. Shoot.

I just want to add a loud thanks for your post. Let em shoot, I agree with your second paragraph and many many do. I hope some good suggestions in this discussions are finally heard.

CrustyCroco

Imo bashing "Ballgroups" isn't really leading to a healthier Cyro gameplay. There was a time when players wanted tools to fight blunt faction stacking and tools like sets and skills like VD and Proxy supported players to successfully counter the stacks to some extend. These tools are of course getting more powerful the more theorycraft players do to get the best results out of it and yes, it probably looks a bit out of control if organised players meet unorganised "solo" (yea, sure) zergsurfing ones.

Some tools for organised groups already got nerfed over the years. Now there are a lot more faction stacking groups running from one keep to the next closest one and just a few successful groups looking for outnumbered and GvG fights.
Taking away the tools of those few left groups, to make even them stack with their faction to then crush their enemies even harder, doesn't really sound like an idea that achieves what people want to take them away for. Imagine one of the highest organised groups playing together with their faction stack. Is that really what you want?

Imo players should be encouraged to NOT stack with their faction too much. While i see it can be frustrating for newer or inexperienced players to fight highly organised groups, i actually think it should be made a little bit easier and/or rewarding for everyone to play in a group and encourage smaller group sizes. With like penalties in AP gain the more players are included in an offensive or defensive tick for example, to encourage spreading out fights throughout the map.

Right now it takes a crazy amount of time to theorycraft around good setups that do well vs zergs as well as other organised groups, if you want to fight together with your group only. Also lead and groupmembers have to be somewhat synced and on the same page to pull off some of those outnumbered fights. Especially on no cp it's not as easy as some people make it sound here, small changes in group setups can decide about crushing other guilds or being crushed, taking a keep outnumbered or failing. There are, if even, just a handfull of groups that are able to fight on their own successfully.
So yea, if you want to encourage more players to group up and have success to some extend, the effort that's needed atm can be quite intimidating.

But again, i don't think that taking away the tools for successful groupplay is achieving what people think it did and what's healthy for the overall cyro experience (which i know everyone got their own perceptions tho).

Vizirith

CrustyCroco wrote: »

Imo bashing "Ballgroups" isn't really leading to a healthier Cyro gameplay. There was a time when players wanted tools to fight blunt faction stacking and tools like sets and skills like VD and Proxy supported players to successfully counter the stacks to some extend. These tools are of course getting more powerful the more theorycraft players do to get the best results out of it and yes, it probably looks a bit out of control if organised players meet unorganised "solo" (yea, sure) zergsurfing ones.

Some tools for organised groups already got nerfed over the years. Now there are a lot more faction stacking groups running from one keep to the next closest one and just a few successful groups looking for outnumbered and GvG fights.
Taking away the tools of those few left groups, to make even them stack with their faction to then crush their enemies even harder, doesn't really sound like an idea that achieves what people want to take them away for. Imagine one of the highest organised groups playing together with their faction stack. Is that really what you want?

Imo players should be encouraged to NOT stack with their faction too much. While i see it can be frustrating for newer or inexperienced players to fight highly organised groups, i actually think it should be made a little bit easier and/or rewarding for everyone to play in a group and encourage smaller group sizes. With like penalties in AP gain the more players are included in an offensive or defensive tick for example, to encourage spreading out fights throughout the map.

Right now it takes a crazy amount of time to theorycraft around good setups that do well vs zergs as well as other organised groups, if you want to fight together with your group only. Also lead and groupmembers have to be somewhat synced and on the same page to pull off some of those outnumbered fights. Especially on no cp it's not as easy as some people make it sound here, small changes in group setups can decide about crushing other guilds or being crushed, taking a keep outnumbered or failing. There are, if even, just a handfull of groups that are able to fight on their own successfully.
So yea, if you want to encourage more players to group up and have success to some extend, the effort that's needed atm can be quite intimidating.

But again, i don't think that taking away the tools for successful groupplay is achieving what people think it did and what's healthy for the overall cyro experience (which i know everyone got their own perceptions tho).

I don't disagree but quite honestly if you don't have a ball group you HAVE to faction stack to fight one. In grey host there is a dc ball group that play in the morning eastern time. As they are the only ball group on the map they can take quite alot unless we literally faction stack. As izanagi was saying about a ball group vs 40+ is a good fight, a ball group vs 20 is barely even considered a fight.

ks888

You also have ways of working around a "ball group" if you're outnumbered, you may not win, but you can buy time til a few more people come to help you out. You have the tools with your class abilities, siege, and just observational skills folks. Turn on nameplates so you can see guild tags. Step back and look for a second "oh these guys seem to struggle with siege on them = boom, throw up a meatbag or some oils while you ask for some help. Group X seems to rely heavily on healers and you're on a sorc = try a negate. Group X is a guild that seems to back off their siege of a keep when you start to pressure them, then pressure them more they will probably abandon that siege. Each leader or guild or group has a weakness, just have to learn them. If all else fails, you tap a keep door or wall to keep it flagged hoping some friendlies show up. Most of those groups want a challenging but winnable fight, so make it challenging. That's the whole point of having an organized group = to use your brains and have good fights.

FantasticFreddie

You can't just wave a magic wand and dissolve ball groups. All a ball group is is a group of highly organized players. Any steps to get rid of them will only punish non-ball groups more, because a group of people working together will pretty much always have the advantage over players that aren't working together.

NotTaylorSwift

This whole thread is so strange. It’s like saying “nerf the pve groups because they can complete x veteran hard mode trial and I can’t do it with pugs”. It just doesn’t make sense. As many people have said already, any group that is coordinated and using voice is going to be more effective...

We spend lots of time working on our group composition, what sets each person will use, even down to what skills exactly. We look at which buffs we want to have in the group, which buffs we can afford to skip. All to make it run as efficiently as possible. What’s so bad about that? Anyone who plays with other people has the ability to do that...

And then of course comes the ‘ballgroups are the main cause of lag”. If ballgroups were the main cause of lag then surely we would also be lagging for the entirety of our 2h+ raids? But no. We can take keeps fine. Fight small numbers of enemies fine. Fight even numbers of enemies fine. But when the whole AD faction turns up Bloodmayne... well ye. It’s the mindless zerging in 40+ man groups, running from one keep to the next where you will find the most lag

Vizirith

ks888 wrote: »

You also have ways of working around a "ball group" if you're outnumbered, you may not win, but you can buy time til a few more people come to help you out. You have the tools with your class abilities, siege, and just observational skills folks. Turn on nameplates so you can see guild tags. Step back and look for a second "oh these guys seem to struggle with siege on them = boom, throw up a meatbag or some oils while you ask for some help. Group X seems to rely heavily on healers and you're on a sorc = try a negate. Group X is a guild that seems to back off their siege of a keep when you start to pressure them, then pressure them more they will probably abandon that siege. Each leader or guild or group has a weakness, just have to learn them. If all else fails, you tap a keep door or wall to keep it flagged hoping some friendlies show up. Most of those groups want a challenging but winnable fight, so make it challenging. That's the whole point of having an organized group = to use your brains and have good fights.

Sure and by more you mean 30+ right? Oils and meatbags do negligible damage to them and only work in conjunction with players or full siege. I agree people need to pressure them and be tanky enough to survive when they focus you, but at the end of the day you still need 40+ to combat them like izanagi said. Dropping a negate unto itself is rarely useful without enough pressure from alot of other players.

FantasticFreddie wrote: »

You can't just wave a magic wand and dissolve ball groups. All a ball group is is a group of highly organized players. Any steps to get rid of them will only punish non-ball groups more, because a group of people working together will pretty much always have the advantage over players that aren't working together.

There is a big difference between an organized group and a ball group, "farming" groups are usually stamdens/stamcros with aoe ult bombing and decent tankiness, they are good for resource farming and can get a keep but are weaker in the open field. They don't run the "ball group shoes" overlapping sets, don't often have a designated healer besides sometimes an off-healing magden etc. It isn't about organized vs unorganized but rather the sheer difference in power between ball groups and even organized non-ball groups. Heck olorime is better than alot of stat based dmg sets, like burning spellweave or spell strat. Harder to use but having a group based set exceeding most individual sets shouldn't be possible. They should scale up in usefulness the bigger the group gets not right off the bat.

orion_1981usub17_ESO

A ball group is just a moving front of mobile aoe dps. If you really wanted to get rid of ball groups the only logical ability to negate their power is to not stack mobile aoe dps. Meaning the highest dps would be the only one effecting the enemy or aoe dps remains at the spot it was triggered. Can't stack mobile aoe dps, the real power of the ball disappears. Of course this would lead to an even greater imbalance of the unkillable solo players who no longer have to worry about you stacking mobile aoe dps on them... and the forums would be salty of all the folks that enjoyed the stacking of mobile aoe dps.

Vizirith

orion_1981usub17_ESO wrote: »

A ball group is just a moving front of mobile aoe dps. If you really wanted to get rid of ball groups the only logical ability to negate their power is to not stack mobile aoe dps. Meaning the highest dps would be the only one effecting the enemy or aoe dps remains at the spot it was triggered. Can't stack mobile aoe dps, the real power of the ball disappears. Of course this would lead to an even greater imbalance of the unkillable solo players who no longer have to worry about you stacking mobile aoe dps on them... and the forums would be salty of all the folks that enjoyed the stacking of mobile aoe dps.

...Or just heal stacking. It's pretty much all that's needed, would have no impact on solo players, barely any effect on groups of 2-4ish, some effect on small scale groups stacking echoing vigor (although as those players also tend to also run solo even echoing vigor is less common vs the solo morph) and a much bigger effect on ball groups who, you know, all stack heals.

Ball group's damage output isn't the issue, unless you are squishy as heck and group up you should be able to deal with the damage. I rarely get killed while fighting a ball group unless they focus me, as in I'm the only player left and then that's just 12 v 1 so ofc I'll eventually die.