[HMMM] Cross realming - Guilds are a PVP Blunder + PVP Balance issue
As many older gamers can attest to...
Cross realming is annoying. This is when a player is able to see the enemies chat and strategy and plan accordingly. While some may argue that this brings realism to PVP and that warband or group leaders should be more secretive and careful about who is in the party and voice chat... the simple fact remains that PVP in this game is rather humerous.
Currently we have a system where the current season of PVP is laughable at best. Players were able to farm AP early on when the quests were repeatable back to back in the same day, instead of daily limits being placed on them. This allowed some to rack up hundreds of thousands of AP by simply getting there before the game was released. Sadly the developers made the mistake of allowing the AP to remain on player accounts, instead of acknowledging the error as it is, and resetting AP. If they had reset the AP then players would find more value in competing in the current season, but since it was not reset at official launch...the current season is a joke and people instead are abusing cross realming to farm gear.
Back on topic...
Cross realming has always been an issue for PVP game developers. As we know, there will always be childish minds who wish to cheat their way to the top to feel special. Current methods involve the failure of a guild system that allows players to be in up to 5 guilds are a time per account. The reason this is a problem is that people are able to communicate and view communications of enemy factions while in PVP. It simply amazes me that the developers have not attempted to thwart this by blocking communications from guilds not on your current characters factions while in a PVP area.
If developers would take steps to block communication in a PVP environment from those in other factions, then this is the first step.
Next a Developer would need to take action to prevent the ability to change characters on other factions by adding a time limit on cross over. I have witnessed a couple of games do this before and while they implemented long wait times, I feel a 15 minute time between changing factions could benefit the community. What this would do is limit factions from changing over to:
1. Spy
2. Swap to winning side
3. Swap at last moment when all is lost to gain points for another toon
4. Harass another realm
Spying is one of the main concerns of any good leader, and the current system allows people to jump over at ease and spy on chat as well as movement. Its been many years since I have allowed myself to be stuck in a leadership role, but I have lead many warbands as well as scream out my opinion when the current leaderships are being illogical. Spys ruin PVP games when its easy to spy because they can then share information that would be more difficult to get. Id rather have to watch out for an enemy sneaking around on our flank and reporting our positions, rather than a spy in our ranks. Of course they could still do this with the use of a second account, but that would be costly and I do know some who have used that method for 2box in the past.
Swapping to the winning side after your castle door is taken down... seriously this is where the dev's failed the most. Currently you can swap over and still have time to ride to a keep and gain points or achievements upon capture. This is being abused heavily and needs to be stopped. A simple 15 minute wait between changing factions is a method of blocking suck cheats. People also do this so they aren't being on a losing side because no one wants to be a loser, even though it can be challenging sometimes to take as many of the enemy with you. Some games are amazing because you can defend with 10% of the numbers of the enemy and still wipe them all. Points systems need to be adjusted as well as PVP mechanics to make things more valueable. This is where I would suggest tat the devs do some research or ask some of us 10-14 year MMO vets for our expertise.
Harassing the other realm is also an easy feat in the current system. People are able to swap over and jump on a level 10 and spam channels. This can create lag on a realm due to improper programming. Im sure this bug will be fixed, but currently it is not so you have to be able to ignore quickly. I believe some of this was addressed when the chat limit was lowered, but there are still exploits for inserting pictures to fill chat windows beyond the limit and taking away the ability to see and link a name that needs ignored.
Changes that would need to be made for success.
1. Limit the character swap to another realm to 15+ minute timer.
2. Revamp the PVP points system.
3. Reset the PVP season
4. Update EXP earned while in PVP
5. Update the support skills
6. Revamp defense systems
LAST AND MOST IMPORTANT!
BALANCE THE PVP SERVERS...
Currently there is little to no balance among the large number of PVP servers. When you take a step back and look at how PVP is working in these first 2 weeks, you can see that people are taking advantage of the guest feature, as well as changing their PVP realm too often. Factions have migrated to the servers where their faction is dominate.
This can be addressed by balancing the factions on servers by:
1. Label servers by AP rankings
2. Label servers by 10-50 and V1-10
3. Limit differences in faction numbers by certain percentages
If you split up the servers by rankings, you could limit balancing to the vetern PVPers in this game, or the higher levels. As it stands the imbalance of a level 10-50 fighting a V1-10 is an interesting situation. This makes things a bit real, but also discourages the balance in PVP. Taking a look at how KOS wants its PVP to exist, there needs to be reason to work hard and get V10 (regardless of the many who cheated their way there). This is why it will in any PVP game be important to level up, so you are stronger or at least no one is stronger than you. Same reason is why you gear up, and gain points to upgrade gear.
Balancing the servers though by level or points could help encourage players to fight in a balanced environment rather than a dominate one for them. I know people hate to lose, but sometimes its more interesting to us when you are fighting as the under dog. Heck... you could even BUFF the underdog faction... This would have to be a 10 minute wait on buffing a faction side though, or people would simply mass logout to get a buff for their faction, mass login and then race before the buff wears off... again... think carefully how any change will impact the PVP environment.
The easiest fix is to limit the percentages of imbalance for each faction. There fore you have instead of LOW, MEDIUM, HIGH population PVP servers... you would have more designation to them... Say for instance you have populations of 600/100/400 ... this would be improper balance... instead you would limit login to a difference of 50... so that server would then be limited to 150/100/150... players would then have to find another server to join for 1st and 3rd faction... or swap over to 2nd faction and join their fight.
Currently the no limit is hilarious to me as a Vet gamer... When you see the server dominance its obvious people are avoiding the fight, or swapping over to trade castles and achievements. Some servers are even player designated as PVE farm zones for question and skyshards....
REALLY ...
REALLY ??
YES, and that's rather pathetic that its being allowed to continue in that manner... so for the sake of your game, and the sake of things many of us have come to enjoy... PLEASE fix the system as PVP is the backbone of this game. I know the PVE is amazing and I freaking love it... but with so many exploit possibilities... and a failed PVP environment... this game will be dead within 3 months after losing a 65% population by the end of the first month.
Gamers are not forgiving ... not as much as they used to be and most development companies realize this. They take the wrong move and change features based on who cries the hardest for a change... Instead... I as well as many others would urge you to have a serious meeting and make the necessary changes now... this week... as fast as you can before the end of the first month... otherwise once you lose that population... you lose them... its not like the old days where you can afford to lose 2 million subs and hope to gain them back at an expansion... It just doesn't happen anymore...
QUESTIONS ?
COMMENTS?
Cross realming is annoying. This is when a player is able to see the enemies chat and strategy and plan accordingly. While some may argue that this brings realism to PVP and that warband or group leaders should be more secretive and careful about who is in the party and voice chat... the simple fact remains that PVP in this game is rather humerous.
Currently we have a system where the current season of PVP is laughable at best. Players were able to farm AP early on when the quests were repeatable back to back in the same day, instead of daily limits being placed on them. This allowed some to rack up hundreds of thousands of AP by simply getting there before the game was released. Sadly the developers made the mistake of allowing the AP to remain on player accounts, instead of acknowledging the error as it is, and resetting AP. If they had reset the AP then players would find more value in competing in the current season, but since it was not reset at official launch...the current season is a joke and people instead are abusing cross realming to farm gear.
Back on topic...
Cross realming has always been an issue for PVP game developers. As we know, there will always be childish minds who wish to cheat their way to the top to feel special. Current methods involve the failure of a guild system that allows players to be in up to 5 guilds are a time per account. The reason this is a problem is that people are able to communicate and view communications of enemy factions while in PVP. It simply amazes me that the developers have not attempted to thwart this by blocking communications from guilds not on your current characters factions while in a PVP area.
If developers would take steps to block communication in a PVP environment from those in other factions, then this is the first step.
Next a Developer would need to take action to prevent the ability to change characters on other factions by adding a time limit on cross over. I have witnessed a couple of games do this before and while they implemented long wait times, I feel a 15 minute time between changing factions could benefit the community. What this would do is limit factions from changing over to:
1. Spy
2. Swap to winning side
3. Swap at last moment when all is lost to gain points for another toon
4. Harass another realm
Spying is one of the main concerns of any good leader, and the current system allows people to jump over at ease and spy on chat as well as movement. Its been many years since I have allowed myself to be stuck in a leadership role, but I have lead many warbands as well as scream out my opinion when the current leaderships are being illogical. Spys ruin PVP games when its easy to spy because they can then share information that would be more difficult to get. Id rather have to watch out for an enemy sneaking around on our flank and reporting our positions, rather than a spy in our ranks. Of course they could still do this with the use of a second account, but that would be costly and I do know some who have used that method for 2box in the past.
Swapping to the winning side after your castle door is taken down... seriously this is where the dev's failed the most. Currently you can swap over and still have time to ride to a keep and gain points or achievements upon capture. This is being abused heavily and needs to be stopped. A simple 15 minute wait between changing factions is a method of blocking suck cheats. People also do this so they aren't being on a losing side because no one wants to be a loser, even though it can be challenging sometimes to take as many of the enemy with you. Some games are amazing because you can defend with 10% of the numbers of the enemy and still wipe them all. Points systems need to be adjusted as well as PVP mechanics to make things more valueable. This is where I would suggest tat the devs do some research or ask some of us 10-14 year MMO vets for our expertise.
Harassing the other realm is also an easy feat in the current system. People are able to swap over and jump on a level 10 and spam channels. This can create lag on a realm due to improper programming. Im sure this bug will be fixed, but currently it is not so you have to be able to ignore quickly. I believe some of this was addressed when the chat limit was lowered, but there are still exploits for inserting pictures to fill chat windows beyond the limit and taking away the ability to see and link a name that needs ignored.
Changes that would need to be made for success.
1. Limit the character swap to another realm to 15+ minute timer.
2. Revamp the PVP points system.
3. Reset the PVP season
4. Update EXP earned while in PVP
5. Update the support skills
6. Revamp defense systems
LAST AND MOST IMPORTANT!
BALANCE THE PVP SERVERS...
Currently there is little to no balance among the large number of PVP servers. When you take a step back and look at how PVP is working in these first 2 weeks, you can see that people are taking advantage of the guest feature, as well as changing their PVP realm too often. Factions have migrated to the servers where their faction is dominate.
This can be addressed by balancing the factions on servers by:
1. Label servers by AP rankings
2. Label servers by 10-50 and V1-10
3. Limit differences in faction numbers by certain percentages
If you split up the servers by rankings, you could limit balancing to the vetern PVPers in this game, or the higher levels. As it stands the imbalance of a level 10-50 fighting a V1-10 is an interesting situation. This makes things a bit real, but also discourages the balance in PVP. Taking a look at how KOS wants its PVP to exist, there needs to be reason to work hard and get V10 (regardless of the many who cheated their way there). This is why it will in any PVP game be important to level up, so you are stronger or at least no one is stronger than you. Same reason is why you gear up, and gain points to upgrade gear.
Balancing the servers though by level or points could help encourage players to fight in a balanced environment rather than a dominate one for them. I know people hate to lose, but sometimes its more interesting to us when you are fighting as the under dog. Heck... you could even BUFF the underdog faction... This would have to be a 10 minute wait on buffing a faction side though, or people would simply mass logout to get a buff for their faction, mass login and then race before the buff wears off... again... think carefully how any change will impact the PVP environment.
The easiest fix is to limit the percentages of imbalance for each faction. There fore you have instead of LOW, MEDIUM, HIGH population PVP servers... you would have more designation to them... Say for instance you have populations of 600/100/400 ... this would be improper balance... instead you would limit login to a difference of 50... so that server would then be limited to 150/100/150... players would then have to find another server to join for 1st and 3rd faction... or swap over to 2nd faction and join their fight.
Currently the no limit is hilarious to me as a Vet gamer... When you see the server dominance its obvious people are avoiding the fight, or swapping over to trade castles and achievements. Some servers are even player designated as PVE farm zones for question and skyshards....
REALLY ...
REALLY ??
YES, and that's rather pathetic that its being allowed to continue in that manner... so for the sake of your game, and the sake of things many of us have come to enjoy... PLEASE fix the system as PVP is the backbone of this game. I know the PVE is amazing and I freaking love it... but with so many exploit possibilities... and a failed PVP environment... this game will be dead within 3 months after losing a 65% population by the end of the first month.
Gamers are not forgiving ... not as much as they used to be and most development companies realize this. They take the wrong move and change features based on who cries the hardest for a change... Instead... I as well as many others would urge you to have a serious meeting and make the necessary changes now... this week... as fast as you can before the end of the first month... otherwise once you lose that population... you lose them... its not like the old days where you can afford to lose 2 million subs and hope to gain them back at an expansion... It just doesn't happen anymore...
QUESTIONS ?
COMMENTS?
*Policing the MMO community since 1997*
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Saved for copy/pasting comments from others deserving of attention.*Policing the MMO community since 1997*0
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reignfyre✭✭✭Spies will always be a problem, but you highlighted some issues I was not aware of. I'd love to get into PvP. But I have only played cyrodil for maybe an hour and I didn't find it very engaging.
Players will always find the fastest way to increase their stats-- xp, gold, AP, whatever. Game designers must do what they can to encourage players to play the game, rather than find the fastest way to increase stats. Seems like ZOS has not figured out how to encourage players to play the zone as intended.1 -
jambam817_ESO✭✭✭I didn't even read it. But... Looks like you've got what it takes to make a PVP game, get after it! don't stand around here, go, do eeet, NOOOW!2 -
jambam817_ESO wrote: »I didn't even read it. But... Looks like you've got what it takes to make a PVP game, get after it! don't stand around here, go, do eeet, NOOOW!
Been working on an App on the side for ipad/android PVP game... something better than the junk offered at the moment for those devices. Brave Frontier, Clash of clans, book of heroes, puzzle trooper... all decent but still boring PVP. Mine is a mix with a twist of addiction. Needs another 2-3 months work though.
Id rather help ESO become strong here as they have a great start and still time to fix before people bail.
ESO franchise.
*Policing the MMO community since 1997*0 -
Spies will always be a problem, but you highlighted some issues I was not aware of. I'd love to get into PvP. But I have only played cyrodil for maybe an hour and I didn't find it very engaging.
Players will always find the fastest way to increase their stats-- xp, gold, AP, whatever. Game designers must do what they can to encourage players to play the game, rather than find the fastest way to increase stats. Seems like ZOS has not figured out how to encourage players to play the zone as intended.
Yea but end game, we need balance for success...
competition needs fairness*Policing the MMO community since 1997*0 -
Chryos✭✭✭✭People want more participation in PvP. It's the Pvp'rs themselves who make it miserable for anyone else to want to give it a shot. I couldnt pay some of my guildmates to give it a shot because of the sheer imaturity of many pvp'rs. Whether its name calling, griefing, exploiting or cheating. The PvP'rs, namely the "young adults" are what give us the sterotype, that we are all Aholes. If people have to feel compelled to beat the system or rage(whatever) against people then why would anyone want to join PvP? Treat each other better and maybe we would have fuller pvp campaigns.If I am going to quote someone, it's going to be me.1 -
Sarenia✭✭✭✭✭People want more participation in PvP. It's the Pvp'rs themselves who make it miserable for anyone else to want to give it a shot. I couldnt pay some of my guildmates to give it a shot because of the sheer imaturity of many pvp'rs. Whether its name calling, griefing, exploiting or cheating. The PvP'rs, namely the "young adults" are what give us the sterotype, that we are all Aholes. If people have to feel compelled to beat the system or rage(whatever) against people then why would anyone want to join PvP? Treat each other better and maybe we would have fuller pvp campaigns.And this is why I don't PvP. Nowhere on the internet will you find a higher concentration of racism, elitism, misogyny and general asshattery than in PvP fights. There's good people everywhere, but mostly MMOs are full of jerks, and PvP tends to cluster the jerkiest of the jerks into a small, concentrated area.
If ESO ever somehow invalidates that, I'll give PvP another try.[beta_group_85b_9]1 -
RaZaddha✭✭✭You can't have two characters of different factions on the same campaign, so you can't leave or swap factions just to get credit on a keep being taken.
Edit: Good necro on this thread.Edited by RaZaddha on May 4, 2014 5:31PM0 -
Alyrn_Grey✭✭✭So you want to limit the spying to those who have the money for multiple accounts only.0 -
Alyrn_Grey✭✭✭You can't have two characters of different factions on the same campaign, so you can't leave or swap factions just to get credit on a keep being taken.
Sure you can my 1st character is in the Ebony Pact and my second is in the Daggerfall Covenant. Both characters are in the same campaign on different sides.0 -
RaZaddha✭✭✭Alyrn_Grey wrote: »You can't have two characters of different factions on the same campaign, so you can't leave or swap factions just to get credit on a keep being taken.
Sure you can my 1st character is in the Ebony Pact and my second is in the Daggerfall Covenant. Both characters are in the same campaign on different sides.
That's a bug.
Edit: I can't find the patch notes, maybe it was "fixed" in beta, but I found this:
"The only lock on Campaigns are based on your Characters to ensure you don’t have a Dominion, Covenant and Pact character all in the same Campaign. For launch we are going to relax the 24 hour lockout for switching campaigns to a smaller window and the cost, but we are aware of possible guild flooding and will be looking into those issues as they arise."
http://dulfy.net/2014/03/20/eso-reddit-ama-summmary/Edited by RaZaddha on May 4, 2014 5:40PM0 -
Alyrn_Grey✭✭✭To be perfectly honest I would actually prefer they be in different campaigns as the one I'm in has the DC dominating which makes it not much fun to take my EP character into Cryodiil. The DC one is getting plenty of time there.0
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Ashigaru✭✭✭✭Alyrn_Grey wrote: »You can't have two characters of different factions on the same campaign, so you can't leave or swap factions just to get credit on a keep being taken.
Sure you can my 1st character is in the Ebony Pact and my second is in the Daggerfall Covenant. Both characters are in the same campaign on different sides.
That's a bug.
Edit: I can't find the patch notes, maybe it was "fixed" in beta, but I found this:
"The only lock on Campaigns are based on your Characters to ensure you don’t have a Dominion, Covenant and Pact character all in the same Campaign. For launch we are going to relax the 24 hour lockout for switching campaigns to a smaller window and the cost, but we are aware of possible guild flooding and will be looking into those issues as they arise."
http://dulfy.net/2014/03/20/eso-reddit-ama-summmary/
I can my characters in same campaign I just cant have same home campaign. Not sure if thats how its supposed to be or what but..0 -
RaZaddha✭✭✭Alyrn_Grey wrote: »You can't have two characters of different factions on the same campaign, so you can't leave or swap factions just to get credit on a keep being taken.
Sure you can my 1st character is in the Ebony Pact and my second is in the Daggerfall Covenant. Both characters are in the same campaign on different sides.
That's a bug.
Edit: I can't find the patch notes, maybe it was "fixed" in beta, but I found this:
"The only lock on Campaigns are based on your Characters to ensure you don’t have a Dominion, Covenant and Pact character all in the same Campaign. For launch we are going to relax the 24 hour lockout for switching campaigns to a smaller window and the cost, but we are aware of possible guild flooding and will be looking into those issues as they arise."
http://dulfy.net/2014/03/20/eso-reddit-ama-summmary/
I can my characters in same campaign I just cant have same home campaign. Not sure if thats how its supposed to be or what but..
"We have removed the Alliance War note stating that we had fixed an issue where you could occasionally have characters of different factions in the same campaign. This was published in error, and is something that will be available in a future patch."
http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/discussion/84259/patch-notes-v1-0-5#latest
This was added 2 days after the patch.Edited by RaZaddha on May 4, 2014 6:01PM0 -
TicToc✭✭✭You keep saying that certain things are being heavily abused, yet there is no way you could possibly know that. All you can know is that a few people might be doing it. Also, it takes a good deal of time to get to a fight, especially if travel pathways are cut off by the enemy. The load times into Cyrodiil, alone, would likely be enough to prevent it happening. Add to that, all the travel time, and i just don't see it being viable. A battering ram can take down a keep door fairly quickly, especially if it is not defended. I just don't see it happening unless you get very lucky, and i certainly don't see people doing it often. It would be far too time consuming and boring, just for the slight possibility that you could get there in time for a capture.
Plus losing a wall does not mean defeat. I have been in many battles where the outer wall was breached, but we were still able to route the attackers. Plus, you could always move on to another location where you could capture something for your own faction, rather than going through some convoluted and extremely boring and time consuming process. I just don't see it being nearly the issue you make it out to be, if it exists, at all.
Also, the idea that people don't like losing so they will keep switching, makes no sense. If they keep switching, they are not winning. They essentially would have no team, and losing one keep is just part of the battle, it is only a small part of the total war. If they know they cannot hold, their time would be better spent joining up with other members of their faction in a battle they can win. I just don't see that switching method being "heavily used" by anybody.
Still, I think lockouts timers would be a good idea. I actually thought they had them in place. or were planning on putting them in place. I do remember them talking about it.
You make far too big an issue over spies. Even if the opposition knows exactly what you are doing they can't be everywhere at once. Even if they tried, there is a lot of ground to cover. However, they can never know everything. In truth, they can actually learn very little. At most, they can know what one group is doing. If they move to thwart them they become exposed in other areas, to other groups. Having multiple guilds is irrelevant to PvP. It's not like your 5 guilds know what you are doing. It's not like what you type in chat is broadcast to all your guilds. Most people don't even use guild chat for PvP, they use raid chat and teamspeak.
I think segregating the servers by level is a bad idea. It was popular for a bit in DAoC, but then people felt disconnected from the "Real" PvP, and the low level PvP zones started emptying out as people were spending their time grinding to end-game, until it finally gave way to autoleveling to bypass the low levels altogether. The same would happen here. The low level PvP zones would become vacant as people spend all their time PvE grinding to get to VR. It is far better to keep everyone playing together, and let them PvP as they wish. Sure, a level 10 character cannot hope to win 1v1 against a VR10 player, but that is why you play in groups. On the large scale it all levels out.
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