Upcoming Changes to Battleground Queues

prof_doom

I don't personally like the idea, but I won't pretend that's for any other reason than I'm not big on the "run in and smack someone in face" style of PVP in the first place. Even in Cyrodill, the groups I ran with were the back-cappers and supply line sabotagers.

Einstein_

i really like this change. But i would change even more.

1. Get rid of the 3-way fights, this always only creates imbalance.
2. indruduce a 1v1/2v2/4v4 deathmatch (solo/group, maybe even with a better ranking)
3. make a 2. mod where you can play the other objectiv games (only solo, without any ranking)

this sems like little effort, but will give the game and its PvP player base alot more content.

ealdwin

ajkb78 wrote: »

The problem is your data won't include the players like me who can't stand death match mode. We just won't play BGs while the other modes are disabled.

Engagement data is very likely the type of data they are looking to collect, to determine the interest in DM and the relative popularity of that mode. Choosing to not engage is actually a good method of letting your opinion and preferences be reflected in the data. And, if anyone feels the same, I'd say do likewise and not participate in BGs during the testing period.

Aldoss

To anyone who feels disappointed by this news: I'm sorry.

I'm sorry that the management team that rules the game we love has once again made a decision that actively spurs tension and division amongst its player base.

Lashing out at the death matchers for this change is completely uncalled for. We didn't ask ZOS to do this. All we wanted was for us ALL to be given back the choice we all used to have. If you like flag matches, you should be allowed to specifically queue for that because it's what makes you happy.

We are not whiners nor are we happy that ZOS has removed your choice. I'm sorry that you're feeling the same sort of abandonment that we've felt for the last year.

FWIW, I'm in (what I presume to be) the largest BG player guild on PC NA and I do choose to adapt my play style to what suits my team most if, and only if, the bg environment statisfies what I believe to be a healthy PvP experience.

Here are some things that violate a healthy PvP experience:

- Perma block tanks that sit on relics/flags
- Max speed sprinters that pop immovables while carrying the relic at 200% speed
- Game designs that actively discourage conflict

You can call it "strategy" all you like, but there should be counters in place for when a random match pits multiples of these play styles into the same match. This debate is no different from the 'fake tank/fake healer' issue regarding dungeon queues.

If you've never played a BG where all 3 relic teams had a perma block tank, then you should know that this scenario results in a 15 min long deathmatch (which is actually quite enjoyable once everyone realizes it's impossible to actually grab a relic).

By contrast, when only one of these teams has a perma block tank, that team, almost by default, wins swiftly, with minimal actual conflict.

If you've never played a BG where teams are comprised of mostly tanks and healers in a flag game, then you should know that this scenario results in a match where literally no one actually fights each other. It becomes a race of "who can run to the next flag without conflict and turn it faster than the other two teams.

If you've never played a BG where one person had a max speed build in a relic game, then you should know that it's deeply dissatisfying to spend 10-20 min in queue, only to have the bg over in less than 3 minutes with no real conflict.

These scenarios aren't every game, but they highlight the poor structure of game design that ZOS has employed for this type of PvP combat, or lack thereof.

I think play styles should have purpose and I do, legitimately, see some value or at least recognize that someone should be given the opportunity to feel valued for playing the objective. However, if a block tank on my team is capturing flags, and I'm killing opponents that make it easier for them to do so, why is that contribution not valued?

In that same light, why are support roles not valued in deathmatch scores?

There's a fundamental flaw in BG design and it transcends way beyond 'deathmatchers are whiners' or 'objective players are pve noobs'. We all want for BGs to feel satisfying and feel like we're contributing in same way. Right now, the system doesn't allow for that.

It's not your fault and it's not my fault. It's ZOS's fault. Tell them that you want them to do better. They can, and should, do better.

GoopCooper69

Firstly, there are three types of BGs: Deathmatch, Flag games, and capture-oriented games (including capture the relic and Chaosball). What is important to note is that the playstyle within those different types and the optimal group comps for those three types are vastly different from each other. By only having a queue that randomizes the game type, those who want to go on a kill frenzy will do so within any of those types. Those who want to play the objective will play the objective.

Making BGs deathmatch-only will discourage those who want to play objective-based games from playing BGs. An ideal option would be to give us the option to queue into different game types and then tailor the rewards based off of a players' objective-based performance within those types.

Giraffon

It doesn't make sense to me. There are better ways to collect data than forcing everyone to DMs.

Why not put something on the BG screen where you queue up? It could show your default setting (character specific) along with a drop down menu that allows you to easily change it. It would be fairly similar to role selection for dungeons.

Then just run a report on the back end to see what players are setting as their defaults.

Franchise408

This is a horrible change. Just give a queue that allows people to specify their desired BG modes.

Why would you *remove modes from the game* when all people asked for was the ability to queue into deathmatch?

Franchise408

Aldoss wrote: »

To anyone who feels disappointed by this news: I'm sorry.

I'm sorry that the management team that rules the game we love has once again made a decision that actively spurs tension and division amongst its player base.

Lashing out at the death matchers for this change is completely uncalled for. We didn't ask ZOS to do this. All we wanted was for us ALL to be given back the choice we all used to have. If you like flag matches, you should be allowed to specifically queue for that because it's what makes you happy.

We are not whiners nor are we happy that ZOS has removed your choice. I'm sorry that you're feeling the same sort of abandonment that we've felt for the last year.

FWIW, I'm in (what I presume to be) the largest BG player guild on PC NA and I do choose to adapt my play style to what suits my team most if, and only if, the bg environment statisfies what I believe to be a healthy PvP experience.

Here are some things that violate a healthy PvP experience:

- Perma block tanks that sit on relics/flags
- Max speed sprinters that pop immovables while carrying the relic at 200% speed
- Game designs that actively discourage conflict

You can call it "strategy" all you like, but there should be counters in place for when a random match pits multiples of these play styles into the same match. This debate is no different from the 'fake tank/fake healer' issue regarding dungeon queues.

If you've never played a BG where all 3 relic teams had a perma block tank, then you should know that this scenario results in a 15 min long deathmatch (which is actually quite enjoyable once everyone realizes it's impossible to actually grab a relic).

By contrast, when only one of these teams has a perma block tank, that team, almost by default, wins swiftly, with minimal actual conflict.

If you've never played a BG where teams are comprised of mostly tanks and healers in a flag game, then you should know that this scenario results in a match where literally no one actually fights each other. It becomes a race of "who can run to the next flag without conflict and turn it faster than the other two teams.

If you've never played a BG where one person had a max speed build in a relic game, then you should know that it's deeply dissatisfying to spend 10-20 min in queue, only to have the bg over in less than 3 minutes with no real conflict.

These scenarios aren't every game, but they highlight the poor structure of game design that ZOS has employed for this type of PvP combat, or lack thereof.

I think play styles should have purpose and I do, legitimately, see some value or at least recognize that someone should be given the opportunity to feel valued for playing the objective. However, if a block tank on my team is capturing flags, and I'm killing opponents that make it easier for them to do so, why is that contribution not valued?

In that same light, why are support roles not valued in deathmatch scores?

There's a fundamental flaw in BG design and it transcends way beyond 'deathmatchers are whiners' or 'objective players are pve noobs'. We all want for BGs to feel satisfying and feel like we're contributing in same way. Right now, the system doesn't allow for that.

It's not your fault and it's not my fault. It's ZOS's fault. Tell them that you want them to do better. They can, and should, do better.

I didn't read your whole post, but the top part is right. I'm not a DM'er, but this is not the fault of the DM'ers.

In fact, the DM queue should absolutely, positively, 100% be put back in. There should be a queue for Deathmatch, and a queue for objective based games, and let the 2 different demographics enjoy the modes they want, and randoms for those that are happy to play any sort of battleground.

Removing the ability to play non-Deathmatch BG's is a horrible decision, and I will not be partaking in battlegrounds for the duration. While I don't play battlegrounds all the time, they were one of my preferred means of PVP due specifically to the objectives, because there was more purpose than just randomly killing anyone I come across.

Not a fan of deathmatch. Don't take away the options, just add separate queues for the different game modes. That doesn't even need any sort of data feedback. Just do it.

Vaoh

CyberOnEso wrote: »

I do personally prefer the non- deathmatch modes.

I think the main reason why people do not play BG's is the lack of rewards, and little knowledge of the rewards that do drop from BG's, rather than the enjoyment of the gamemode.

With the motifs that can sometimes, rarely, drop from doing BG's I think it would be good to highlight these on the battleground queuing.

Whereas rather them dropping by chance they would drop 1 after completing so many battlegrounds, so you know you are working towards a reward.

Maybe something like this.

Awesome suggestion here!

Lauranae

so you thought that because some teams were only doing death match during all others BG, we all want deathmatch ....

Quite not well thought then.

Why did you removed the choice we had ? i am certain i am not alone to enjoy Relic, chaos, crazy and domination.

Now i guess i will just pass on BG. Following your logic, soon we will not be able to enter cyrodill alone, and probably be forced to group, to follow the orders of megalo emperor knowing all

Thank you for ruining BG once again

Arcanasx

I like how when deathmatch players created threads asking to have their own queue, many of the "objective" players aggressively insisted that they shouldn't split the queue to keep the wait times short. Now with the same amount of queue options as before but DM only, they start complaining about not being able to choose what they want to play. I guess when random queue only has DM happen 10% of the time for about a year its no big deal for the Player Vs Objective crowd, now suddenly not being able to play your favored mode is absolutely terrible.

The funny thing is, DM is still an objective, and that objective is to seek out and engage the enemy, secure the kills on them while minimizing your owns team's deaths. This has far more tactical potential and actual teamwork involved than the other "objective" modes where you get awarded for avoiding PvP. In the 3 way team format, the winning strategy is usually to wait for the other 2 teams to engage and then go somewhere else to capture the flag/relic uncontested, and that's incredibly shallow and boring "strategy" to win by. When it's mentioned that other games have objective based battlegrounds/matches you have to ask yourself; how many of these other games have 3 teams fighting in the same instanced match as opposed to the usual 2?

Deathmatch isn't perfect either with 3 teams, but more often than not its far more engaging at least. The objective players would have a point when they mention the "strategy" involved in winning these games if there were only 2 teams and on maps designed for it as that would usually force PvP confrontation to win.

It's clear many of the players who say they will stop playing were never really interested in PvP in the first place, treating battlegrounds as something to milk rewards from with minimal player engagement, and honestly Battlegrounds should not be catered to and designed for these kinds of players.

UrbanRoses

I’m so deeply disappointed by this decision. Everything has been said by others it seems.

I’m pretty new to BG but do them every day and enjoy all of my selections and the surprise of what it will be. I don’t want one option.

For what it’s worth this will make events like Midyear Mayhem intolerable to most PVE players but maybe you want to increase crown store sales of tickets.

You just took a bit of joy from my day.

wolfie1.0.

I was just starting to enjoy BGs. I hate deathmatch. Loved the other modes since I could win while everyone was pretending it was deathmatch. Deathmatch is boring mode honestly.

LonePirate

How about increasing the chance to 50% that a random BG will be a Deathmatch and the other game modes can split the other 50% chance between them? Or maybe even move to a 60/40 split in favor of Deathmatch so it will pop a majority of the time but players still have a respectable chance of landing in one of the other modes.

Magio_

wtlonewolf20 wrote: »

Deathmatch is boring mode honestly.

You just hold W from empty flag to empty flag and that's more fun for you than engaging in combat vs another player. Yikes.

wtlonewolf20 wrote: »

I was just starting to enjoy BGs. I hate deathmatch. Loved the other modes since I could win while everyone was pretending it was deathmatch.

You enjoy "winning" when you're aware you're not really competing because your opponents don't care. Sounds about right for vocal Obj Gamers. Most aren't honest enough to admit it though. Most likely why you were against DMers getting their own queue back.

MasterSpatula

"We've noticed the players have absolutely ruined Battlegrounds with their own behavior, so we're going to make that same behavior your only option. Have... fun?"

Urvoth

MasterSpatula wrote: »

"We've noticed the players have absolutely ruined Battlegrounds with their own behavior, so we're going to make that same behavior your only option. Have... fun?"

"We've noticed the majority of players don't want to run away from every fight to cap uncontested flags, so we implemented the gamemode that most people want."

Franchise408

Urvoth wrote: »

MasterSpatula wrote: »

"We've noticed the players have absolutely ruined Battlegrounds with their own behavior, so we're going to make that same behavior your only option. Have... fun?"

"We've noticed the majority of players don't want to run away from every fight to cap uncontested flags, so we implemented the gamemode that most people want."

By... taking away options from players.

How is *removing content* ever a good idea?

Elwynee

This is exactly the reason most people playing the game won't play battlegrounds - I hate that you guys are rewarding people that avoid the objective in other game modes. The answer isn't to get rid of all game modes but deathmatch because a lot of people love them and find deathmatch to be the least enjoyable.

As someone who just started to get back into BG's it's really disappointing that you're trying to change it yet AGAIN if we only have deathmatch then I won't be playing.

Nirntrotter

The more I think about it the more it baffles me. What data is this supposed to generate? Is it just to see how full the queue will be? Or if people treat deathmatch like... deathmatch??

GuildedLilly

I've had time to cool off since my initial reaction.

ZOS, this is a mistake.

I will be avoiding BGs on all my toons across 4 servers for the duration of your experiment. DM BG fans deserve to have their own queue-- objective BG players didn't deserve to lose ours.

I will not be renewing my ESO+ subscription on XB1, and I probably won't extend my ESO+ sub on PC. IF you don't fix the constant freeze and crashes that came with update 31, you will lose me as a player completely.

It's a shame, since I've been a fan of Elder Scrolls since Morrowwind, and I've been playing ESO since the console launch. I got into the PC version because of addons. I've been having fun with XB1 NA/EU and PC NA/EU for years... but I'm about ready to say goodby to Tamriel. You keep punishing your PVErs with every PVP event by making us go to IC to feed gankers, when we could do objectives in Cyrodil instead. You robbed the DM fans of their queue, and now have stripped objective BG players of ours. You haven't listened to your players when it comes to BGs or PVP events, and you effectively actively encourage some of the most toxic behavior in your player base.

Whoever was responsible for this decision did not think it through-- & I'm beginning to seriously think that enough is enough.

Nogawd

I gave some cooldown to think as well.

I still don't get what they are trying to analyze.

I play a lot of BG's. I have multiple pvp characters that are suited for every type of match. I use each one to try and best help the team with that random I get. I love playing and trying to collect every single style page.

Is DM my least favorite? Yes.

Do I think that BG's and IC need a serious rework? Yes.

Will I take part is this particular data experiment? No. Though, I guess not playing is taking part in some manor.

PS: Fix the BG achievements! No reason why they have been broken for so long.

CameraBeardThePirate

There's quite a few arguments I'd like to throw my two cents in about. Firstly, I absolutely love battlegrounds. Besides IC on well populated nights, BGs are my favorite form of PvP. I love deathmatch, and when every player is playing the objectives WHILE ALSO PvPing, I find the objective modes really fun.

However, the objective modes have a lot of issues. As others have said, the objective modes do not encourage PvP in the slightest, and this is a problem. Some have brought up the counter argument that other objevtive-based PvP games revolve around things other than getting kills, but this is only partially true - in games like Overwatch, CSGO, and MOBAs, you should not, and in fact cannot, win consistently by avoiding any and all fights. These games punish dying and reward killing - whether it's through limited respawns or increased respawn times or no respawns altogether. In the objective BG modes, this isn't the case. Why bother fighting if you can just run away (or even purposefully die) and respawn relatively quick (sometimes instantly) to just run to the new objective while the other players are still fighting? You should not be encouraged to win by going 0-10, avoiding any and all fights. This is PvP after all, and while movement, positioning, and picking your battles should be important, the current state of objective based modes goes well beyond that.

So how should this be fixed? Well the easiest way would be to punish dying and reward killing more, but let's explore the other options that don't involve drastically altering the scoring system.

Flag Games
For domination and crazy king, the main problem is that 1 team (or even 1 player) can simply elect not to fight anyone and instead either run from flag to flag or stand on one flag face tanking. While not strictly a bad thing, I think this playstyle is promoted a little too much in the modes' current states. In my opinion, the easiest way to do this would be to simply remove at least one flag from the game (or for crazy king, lower the number of flags that spawn). This would (in theory) result in more battles fought because there would be fewer places to run away to. Personally, I think lowering the cap to 2 flags would be best (to promote a kind of musical chairs approach to capping) but this would be a bigger change and might promote 1 team stomping more often (but hey if they're getting kills while defending they kind of deserve a win no?)

Chaosball
Honestly, chaos ball probably promotes more pvp than relic or flags, solely because if you want to gain points, you need to kill the ball carrier. The problems arise when there's an omega tank (more of a balance issue than the objective modes fault) or when someone trolls by getting in to an unreachable or a first-person restricted area (preventing targeting). Besides that, I think the other only problem is people that get the ball and just kinda run away all match. You could easily prevent this by applying some sort of debuff to the ball carrier outside of the health drain, or just leave it as is. I don't mind this game mode too much personally so if anyone has any suggestions I'm all ears.

Relic
To be honest, this game mode needs a complete and total overhaul. Capture the flag just doesn't really work too well with a three team setup. A smart, strong player (that wants to) can just end the match in about 2 minutes if one team leaves their relic unguarded or only guarded by one player. On the flipside, if one team is significantly better at DMing than the other, they can just hold the relics until well past the defile debuff is supposed to "kill" them. CTR is kind of beyond fixing in my opinion unless the entire game mode gets an overhaul.


Objective gamemodes could be about 10x more enjoyable for 90% players even if they incentivised teamfights just a little more. For most of the gametypes, it wouldn't really even require that big of any changes for the modes to provide a more balanced blend of DMing and objective-ing.

StarOfElyon

I prefer death match. I can deal with domination too though.

Proc sets and the broken builds they enable are a bigger issue to me.

Moriz

Nice.

Great change, can't wait for it

JACKYSANGRIA

I am so upset to see this change, even if it’s temporary. I love objective based games and can share countless screenshots of me grabbing the MVP, top score each game. All this is doing is appeasing people who willfully abuse the game and punishing those who play the fight way. When I queue in, I light up to see Capture the Relic or Chaosball. My whole character was made to be able to play any Battleground, including Death Match. If anything, you should incentivize people to play the objective by offering better rewards to players with higher objective-based medal counts. Or just bring back the option to choose the game type like we had a few years (?) ago. Deathmatchers can be pretty toxic, clearly they have been. This isn’t the way.

gariondavey

JACKYSANGRIA wrote: »

I am so upset to see this change, even if it’s temporary. I love objective based games and can share countless screenshots of me grabbing the MVP, top score each game. All this is doing is appeasing people who willfully abuse the game and punishing those who play the fight way. When I queue in, I light up to see Capture the Relic or Chaosball. My whole character was made to be able to play any Battleground, including Death Match. If anything, you should incentivize people to play the objective by offering better rewards to players with higher objective-based medal counts. Or just bring back the option to choose the game type like we had a few years (?) ago. Deathmatchers can be pretty toxic, clearly they have been. This isn’t the way.

Myself and my bg guild receive way more hate tells from objective players than deathmatchers.

Urvoth

Franchise408 wrote: »

Urvoth wrote: »

MasterSpatula wrote: »

"We've noticed the players have absolutely ruined Battlegrounds with their own behavior, so we're going to make that same behavior your only option. Have... fun?"

"We've noticed the majority of players don't want to run away from every fight to cap uncontested flags, so we implemented the gamemode that most people want."

By... taking away options from players.

How is *removing content* ever a good idea?

Prior to this change, objective players were arguing for the current system because "the BG pop is too small" when DM players were asking for a DM only queue. Well, this is what you get now. DM is a better mode with more dedicated BG players interested in playing it, so using the same objective player logic, we can't have an objective queue because "the BG pop is too small."

By the way, you don't have any options with the current system anyway. The gamemodes are random, there is no choice.

Eevee_42

Can we stop pretending that objective gamers possess some tactical superiority over brainless deathmatch enjoyers already? While there are a small handful of players who truly enjoy the objective game modes, if we are telling it like it is, most people “enjoy” them because they’re easier to win, don’t require much pvp skill, and it’s less effort to earn your daily and move on. Running around and avoiding pvp while others are playing deathmatch is the reality of BGs right now. It isn’t that DM players don’t know how to play objectives, they’re simply poorly designed and discourage the reason many of us are there which is to engage in pvp.

If we are viewing these modes from a high MMR perspective, deathmatch takes the most strategic gameplay. There is a lot of nuance that goes into each and every choice you make in a high level deathmatch. Positioning, ability and ultimate timing, having a good healer, keeping up your buffs, your build, having good target priority, avoiding a 3rd party, potion timing, and so much more go into it. It’s disingenuous to act like deathmatch is a brain dead kill fest. There is no other game mode where team synergy is as important. There are tournaments centered around TDM because it is the most competitive game mode that requires the most skill and tactical ability by far.

While I don’t like the fact that we still can’t technically choose a game mode, I’m happy that the most competitive one is going to encourage people to actually learn how to pvp and have to earn their wins. Maybe you’ll realize along the way that you have more fun pvp’ing as a team rather than running around on some flags. Many of the best sets are base game or available in guild traders, so no excuse to blame your gear either. Put some effort into it and don’t just stroll into a BG in your pve gear expecting a win. Think about how long DM players have been stuck being forced into objective games 90% of the time over the past year. You could go days without seeing a deathmatch. I hope ZOS can build up a healthy pvp population to support all game modes eventually so we can all play what we enjoy at the end of the day. If the population is truly as small as people make it out to be, it makes sense to have the most popular game mode be the only option right now.

P.S. can we fix the broken dark convergence and hrothgar’s sets already? BGs will not be truly enjoyable until these are addressed.

the1andonlyskwex

I haven't been playing much lately, but this pretty much guarantees I won't be back any time soon.

As others have said: You're basically rewarding the petulant children for throwing tantrums (i.e. treating objective modes as deathmatch and ruining them for everyone else).

Also, the main reason avoiding combat is a winning strategy in objective modes is because the childish deathmatchers aren't playing the objectives. If they actually captured and held objectives instead of spawn camping or gathering in the middle of the map, they might actually win.