PvP Destroyed

Turelus · November 2014

AbraXuSeXile wrote: »

I reckon i could capture any single keep within time of anyone getting enough players there to stop us, But that's too much PvDoor. I enjoyed the fights to keep enemy camps down.

Well they said that after this they would be addressing Keep wall/door HP, siege weapons damage vs both keeps and players.
I would imagine those changes will bring the time to take keeps back in line.

Columba · November 2014

tonight has highest DC queue I've seen on thorne for months

dcincali · November 2014

Columba wrote: »

tonight has highest DC queue I've seen on thorne for months

Did EG move to a new server or something and came back? lulz

AssaultLemming · November 2014

I spent a few hours PvP last night to see how I felt about PvP now. On the whole the combat felt more exciting, but more stressful. Killing someone was quite satisfying, dying was quite frustrating.

The problem though was that combat was much less frequent, previously in a 2 hour PvP session a lot of that time was in combat, fast and furious, charge the breach, kill and die, rinse repeat.

Now there was a lot of down time, which was boring. A lot of horse riding which was boring.

We actually grabbed a scroll and got it all the way back with almost no resistance which was boring.

So on the whole not a great change for a casual pvper like myself, I can see how it might appeal to people who spend whole days or weeks doing nothing but PvP, but I quite liked the fast pace of combat previously and this change to higher risk with low reward feels like it is missing something...

Tintinabula · November 2014

Its like this.. certain guilds have the ability to flag and take down outer walls in under 3 minutes(very organized and impressive..*applause*) but without scouts everywhere to alert the alliance when that happens and sometimes even when they do,If you are not at the keep when it gets hit..you simply don't have the time to ride to it before inners are breached or the skeleton crew that was there defending is dead.

So..depending on how fast an alliance can hit and run a keep and flag it usually tells me if I should waste my time in riding to "their" newly renovated keep.

Its the way things are. Its simply not possible to be somewhere else and ride to a keep that's being sieged "efficiently" and get there in time to make a difference.

NO FCs have turned responding to a siege almost impossible.

Teargrants · November 2014

Simple solution is increase wall hp / decrease offensive siege dmg. Maybe even a notification system when guard npc's detect enemies (that would have to scale depending on how many enemies are detected).

Joy_Division · November 2014

Teargrants wrote: »

Hello vocal whiners. May I ask what it is that is so abhorrent about not having insta port FCs as to suddenly make the entire experience of PvP unplayable to the point of unsubbing?

Is it because you can't death port 3 raids across the map to lag bomb a flag? Cuz rest assured, you can still do that, you just have to ride there first.

Is it cuz you can't kamekaze into groups over and over? If that's what you enjoy then I suggest being a sorc, we get to do it without the dying part.

Is it cuz you can't death port to any keep under attack, so it's not even with defending to you? Here's a crazy idea, the same people who were tenting every keep can take a minute to instead ride around the walls and look for siege. Is it less efficient now? Yes, but it's the same for your enemies, use it to your advantage. If having one dude port around keeps now and then is too hard for your raid guild, then I dunno what to say.

Is it cuz riding a horse is taking too long to get to the next keep? Speed horse + maneuvers will get you to the next keep in 1-2 min, and that's allowing time for going along the roundabout way to avoid gankers.

Is it cuz you get ganked on the way to a keep and can't thank them for helping you death port to the FC? This may blow your mind but it's actually much much more dangerous for us gankers now with all the respawners running around and the finality of wipes. People know we have to rez, so they just camp our bodies. Yet we actually like these changes, it makes what we do impactful to the flow of the RvR. We just adjust out tactics.

Is it cuz you just can't stand being out of the action for a few minutes when you die? If this is a serious issue for you, then you are dying too frequently. Improve your build/playstyle and spec more into sustain.

Have you all forgotten the first few months of live where FCs were constantly bugged out?

Just about every post in these threads are so full of hyperbole and bias that they are utterly worthless as it is neigh impossible for Zenimax to get any constructive feedback from them. But you got style and actually articulated what I feel are valid points, so as one of the whiners I will answer.

- We know we can still "lag-bomb" a flag. Takes a bit longer to do, but still as effective as ever. Not an issue.

- It's not really about death porting to an attacked keep. AD knows if DC tries and even succeeds at ninjaing Blackboot, they can be evicted easily enough since they are cut off.

- Kamikazing into a group over and over was fun. I will miss those names I have come to learn and respect who just threw themselves into a horde of enemies without any backup...I liked seeing them continually come back again and again for punishment; it was a very enjoyable. But you are right, a sorc can do that and live

- Riding a horse is part of the complaints. You are right that this can be mitigated through the use of a skill in the game and purchasing a very specific horse. I would counter the skill is kind of counter-productive (you have to get on and off your horse to cast which is not only annoying but also defeats the purpose). I do think horses *should* be used and have a role in Cyrodiil. I don't think they should *always* be used after rezzing. But again, part (as opposed to THE) complaint.

- It's not about getting ganked. We hated getting ganked even when they got us to our objective faster. No FCs just made them more annoying than they already were and more satisfying to kill. Besides, we can learn not to leave keeps alone.

- It kind of is that we can't stand being out of the action for a few minutes. Kind of. More specifically, it's about potentially being out of the battle you were participating with no way of getting back even if you get killed through no fault of your own. It is very easy to get insta-killed in this game with little you can do to prevent it. And sometimes you just die in an inconvenient place that makes getting rezzed highly unlikely. With the idiotic way this game handles attack/defense ticks, this means you can kiss your AP goodbye. If you are part of a TS raid group, prepare to hear other people play in something you can't participate in. If you were actually immersed in the experience of fighting at a particular keep and just happened to get "zerged" by a batswarming impulsing DK, it kind of sucks not having a second chance. You answer of don't die so quickly ignores the realities of Cyrodiil where you can get killed even if you play correctly.

- It isn't that we forgot Beta or the time when FCs were bugged. It's that the Cyrodiil of today is very different. I have a youtube video up from Beta. Embarrassing to post it because I see how much of a noob I was, but watch this and tell me if there are even a fraction of the amount of people actually in Cyrodiil during "locked" times.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alNl0Re4hmA - what people call "zergs" today are tiny compared to back then. Maybe when Zenimax stated that 2000 people could be in a Cyrodiil server at a given time they meant the entire "megaserver," but the reality is I see the same names over and over again and it's not because of FCs. What we played during Beta when Cyrodiil actually did have "action everywhere," which is what the people who hate FCs promise, is not happening now simply because of numbers: the number of people in "wabbajack" BETA was much higher than "wabbajack" 1.5. My recollection could be faulty, but I *think* the number for a faction to be locked was noticeably higher back in April (at launch) than it is now. Give me the Cyrodiil in that video and I won't even whine about no FCs again.

- THE complaint, at least for me, is the loss of the epic AvA battles that this game promised and at times delivered. Because the population in Cyrodiil is (now) quite low for the size of the map, the only way to generate these titanic clashes is find a mechanism that shrinks the map and recycles the combatants. It's obvious that some people dislike these large scale and lengthy clashes and they are entitled to their opinion. But some of us like these and want more after the "zerg" of 25-30 enemies - an insult to the term zerg - is wiped out and won't be back until the keep is long since repaired. Two of the most enjoyable experiences I have had with ESO were: an extended AD scroll raid on a Fort Warden that was sustained by FCs at the mine and a DC attempt to capture Castle Bloodmayne on the last night of the old Auriel's Bow server (sustained by FCs at Lumbermill). These battle were not measured in minutes but hours and involved the type of ebb and flow, attack and counter-attack that is only possible with numbers that exceed Zenimax's "locked" server population cap. Such battles are now logistically impossible without FCs and certainly can never happen again in the corners of the map (which, unfortunately, have a large strategic significance). You might say "good riddance," but the reality of the situation is that these experiences that gave me a lot of joy are gone and I am not alone.

If people are unsubbing, I can almost guarantee you it is not just because of the removal of FCs, but the straw the broke the camal's back: since April and even before, there have been issues about PvP that have been explicitly communicated to Zenimax that have not been resolved and in some cases not even acknowledged. It could be something as simple as the obscenely and unnecessarily long global cooldown attached to the Templar Focused Charge skill. It *REALLY* bothers me that after months, not only has this not been mechanically brought in line with the other charge skills that have no cooldown, but also that Zenimax has never issued any explanation or acknowledgment of the cooldown. I can't even begin to imagine what nightblades have gone through since launch. And let's not even mention the lag. It takes a lot of love for this game to stick with it. I personally wouldn't go as far as to say it is unplayable. But for many people, whatever hopes they had from Beta or from buying the game have simply not materialized.

martinhpb16_ESO · November 2014

Teargrants wrote: »

Less action? Yet my nightly kill counts are consistently higher than they were pre 1.5 because there is literally action all over the fields. So much action in fact that we have to pull further off the main gank line between keeps to keep from being zergged down.

Are you one of the types that sits at the shrine until transit is open to the front line, and be damned if you have to ride to the battle, time's too precious for that crap?

Not so sure why you feel the need to put me into an insulting "type". Does it make you feel better about yourself?

Oughash · November 2014

Joy division, well said!

Evergnar · November 2014

Ishammael wrote: »

Joy division, well said!

Agree. JD nailed it and I haven't forgotten what it was like in the beginning. I also haven't forgotten what the #1 complaint about Cyrodiil was back then either. Here's to hoping Zos hasn't forgotten either and can find some solutions that will make PvP/AvA have a bright future.

Winnower · November 2014

As PvE leveling slows down drastically there will be fewer people who will want to compete against players who already grinded to VR14 and have a significant advantage in terms of attributes & skill points (oh and gear) in the future.

The new nerf to VR / champion leveling is going to kick PVP in the head.

Lava_Croft · November 2014

Tintinabula wrote: »

NO FCs have turned responding to a siege almost impossible.

My experience on EU-TB does not agree. The removal of forward camps has made responding to sieges actually a lot more fun, since people will frantically scramble to the nearest uncontested keep and move en masse to the contested keep. Much better gameplay than having everyone suicide at the nearest enemy base.

Maulkin · November 2014

Lava_Croft wrote: »

Tintinabula wrote: »

NO FCs have turned responding to a siege almost impossible.

My experience on EU-TB does not agree. The removal of forward camps has made responding to sieges actually a lot more fun, since people will frantically scramble to the nearest uncontested keep and move en masse to the contested keep. Much better gameplay than having everyone suicide at the nearest enemy base.

To be fair that's how it should be. Camp or no camp. I'm a huge fan of what camps provided to the game, but suicide travel (blood porting to some) was not one of them.

Agrippa_Invisus · November 2014

Camps should have had a limited rez radius (to eliminate blood porting) and provided a temporary rez sickness debuff to prevent spawn rushing.

That rezzing with a soul gem left you in worse shape to fight than just respawning at the tent was slightly ridiculous.

Maulkin · November 2014

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

Camps should have had a limited rez radius (to eliminate blood porting) and provided a temporary rez sickness debuff to prevent spawn rushing.

That rezzing with a soul gem left you in worse shape to fight than just respawning at the tent was slightly ridiculous.

Too true.

All we ever asked was the two things you mentioned, plus to only allow camps to be placed at resources or keeps (inside the tick circles basically). To stop troll camps and effectively end the fight if your opponent cleared you off the resource or keep courtyard.

Bramir · November 2014

Basically, removing FCs screwed AD because they can no longer take keeps through the continuous respawn of a bigger zerg than anyone else has. Now, when we waste the first 20 players who show up mindlessly ahead of the rest of their army, it actually matters. When the next 60 of them die trying to storm a breach, it means we don't have to do it again and again until someone forgets to put down a FC.

These are good things, unless all you want to do is zerg.

Maulkin · November 2014

Bramir wrote: »

These are good things, unless all you want to do is zerg.

Maybe all I want to do is farm that zerg at the breach for 2 hrs for 100k AP, until they get demoralised and go elsewhere. Maybe, just maybe, I get my kicks from big sieges and big fights rather than going back and forth between keeps all the time. And it's possible that other people find fun in things you don't.

Agrippa_Invisus · November 2014

mike.gaziotisb16_ESO wrote: »

Bramir wrote: »

These are good things, unless all you want to do is zerg.

Maybe all I want to do is farm that zerg at the breach for 2 hrs for 100k AP, until they get demoralised and go elsewhere. Maybe, just maybe, I get my kicks from big sieges and big fights rather than going back and forth between keeps all the time. And it's possible that other people find fun in things you don't.

Maybe just maybe we don't like having to deal with inexhaustible waves of bodies.

Maybe we don't like having to worry about one player spawning 20 (and more) if they happen to escape our sweep of an area.

Maybe we don't like having to deal with guilds farming resource nodes (like the Arrius Mine) for hours because you can't completely wipe them. Even if you flip the node, they have a designated stealther drop a tent five minutes later and they're right back on the resource.

Maybe we don't like having strategy erased by Tentaporting/Bloodgating. When one guild can defend five-six keeps in a thirty minute span by using a suicide node to reappear everywhere.

You losing your AP farm is a small price to pay for tents to be balanced.

In my opinion, restricting their rez radius and giving them a rez sickness debuff on use would have been sufficient. This appears to be what ZOS is willing to do and it was far better than the current meta.

I am sick and tired of spending sieges circling keeps to make sure one dude can't spawn 100 with a tent in a tower. I am tired of the endless resource node farm. I am tired of wipes meaning nothing to the opponent.

There should be negative consequences to death in PVP. Being sent to respawn is a mild one in the history of MMO gaming. Go look at the consequences of a PVP death in EQ 1, UO, or Asheron's Call. Brutal.

Maulkin · November 2014

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

mike.gaziotisb16_ESO wrote: »

Bramir wrote: »

These are good things, unless all you want to do is zerg.

Maybe all I want to do is farm that zerg at the breach for 2 hrs for 100k AP, until they get demoralised and go elsewhere. Maybe, just maybe, I get my kicks from big sieges and big fights rather than going back and forth between keeps all the time. And it's possible that other people find fun in things you don't.

Maybe just maybe we don't like having to deal with inexhaustible waves of bodies.

Maybe we don't like having to worry about one player spawning 20 (and more) if they happen to escape our sweep of an area.

Maybe we don't like having to deal with guilds farming resource nodes (like the Arrius Mine) for hours because you can't completely wipe them. Even if you flip the node, they have a designated stealther drop a tent five minutes later and they're right back on the resource.

Maybe we don't like having strategy erased by Tentaporting/Bloodgating. When one guild can defend five-six keeps in a thirty minute span by using a suicide node to reappear everywhere.

You losing your AP farm is a small price to pay for tents to be balanced.

In my opinion, restricting their rez radius and giving them a rez sickness debuff on use would have been sufficient. This appears to be what ZOS is willing to do and it was far better than the current meta.

I am sick and tired of spending sieges circling keeps to make sure one dude can't spawn 100 with a tent in a tower. I am tired of the endless resource node farm. I am tired of wipes meaning nothing to the opponent.

There should be negative consequences to death in PVP. Being sent to respawn is a mild one in the history of MMO gaming. Go look at the consequences of a PVP death in EQ 1, UO, or Asheron's Call. Brutal.

The bolded part contradicts the rest of your case. I also agree with what you say in the bold part, but you will have inexhaustible waves of bodies coming to you, until you push and clear those camps.

Agrippa_Invisus · November 2014

mike.gaziotisb16_ESO wrote: »

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

mike.gaziotisb16_ESO wrote: »

Bramir wrote: »

These are good things, unless all you want to do is zerg.

Maybe all I want to do is farm that zerg at the breach for 2 hrs for 100k AP, until they get demoralised and go elsewhere. Maybe, just maybe, I get my kicks from big sieges and big fights rather than going back and forth between keeps all the time. And it's possible that other people find fun in things you don't.

Maybe just maybe we don't like having to deal with inexhaustible waves of bodies.

Maybe we don't like having to worry about one player spawning 20 (and more) if they happen to escape our sweep of an area.

Maybe we don't like having to deal with guilds farming resource nodes (like the Arrius Mine) for hours because you can't completely wipe them. Even if you flip the node, they have a designated stealther drop a tent five minutes later and they're right back on the resource.

Maybe we don't like having strategy erased by Tentaporting/Bloodgating. When one guild can defend five-six keeps in a thirty minute span by using a suicide node to reappear everywhere.

You losing your AP farm is a small price to pay for tents to be balanced.

In my opinion, restricting their rez radius and giving them a rez sickness debuff on use would have been sufficient. This appears to be what ZOS is willing to do and it was far better than the current meta.

I am sick and tired of spending sieges circling keeps to make sure one dude can't spawn 100 with a tent in a tower. I am tired of the endless resource node farm. I am tired of wipes meaning nothing to the opponent.

There should be negative consequences to death in PVP. Being sent to respawn is a mild one in the history of MMO gaming. Go look at the consequences of a PVP death in EQ 1, UO, or Asheron's Call. Brutal.

The bolded part contradicts the rest of your case. I also agree with what you say in the bold part, but you will have inexhaustible waves of bodies coming to you, until you push and clear those camps.

Killing blood gating/tentporting and the rez sick debuff actually clears a lot of it.

You can't get fresh bodies just zoning into Cyrodiil, seeing there's a fight at BRK, and then hitting their suicide node to join it. They have to run -- and if they get ganked on the way, don't make it.

If you give them a rez sickness debuff, that puts delays on each wave of reinforcements -- giving time for the defenders to sally out or even to assault the tent. It also prevents coming out of a tent with fresh resources against a tired enemy. So many fights swung around due to one Vamp mister getting a tent and then facing a full raid of Impulsers at full magicka/hp/stam while you had no resources -- that was bad game design. If they come out rez sick, they just get smashed again.

Vlakna · November 2014

Shhhhh. If u are not resubbing leave in peace. And stop trolling.

AbraXuSeXile · November 2014

So we started to pvp again last night, EP on High, DC low-medium for the remainder. Within 2 hours we took the entire map, the only PvP we really got was the last imperial keep. Most of the night it was PvDoor or killing a few scrubs.

I made a point to my raid to not place any camps down at all no matter what, EP was placing them down at will which is utterly crappy that people still have camps and some don't. Should be all or none.

So i wake up today and and it was mostly red, I have a 3 man group vs 15 - 20 reds. Impossible to defend or actually get any PvP.

Boring.

Columba · November 2014

Tons of huge fights last night on thorn. Chalman, ales, nickel, ash. Disagree that the chaotic large scale fights have diminished.

Varicite · November 2014

mike.gaziotisb16_ESO wrote: »

Bramir wrote: »

These are good things, unless all you want to do is zerg.

Maybe all I want to do is farm that zerg at the breach for 2 hrs for 100k AP, until they get demoralised and go elsewhere. Maybe, just maybe, I get my kicks from big sieges and big fights rather than going back and forth between keeps all the time. And it's possible that other people find fun in things you don't.

Maybe that was never the design intent for Cyrodiil.

In fact, it goes pretty much directly against what was described numerous times prior to launch as the design intent for ESO PvP.

They said it plenty of times; they don't want waves of endless respawning bodies. They want battles to have a definitive end when you've killed the attackers or defenders and wiped out the rest of their stragglers so they can't rez their buddies.

Maybe what you want isn't what ZOS wants.

Xexpo · November 2014

Lava_Croft wrote: »

It's much more fun in Cyrodiil now that the camps are gone, since people are actually forced to travel for a few minutes to and from objectives,...

Traveling isn't what I would consider fun

Columba wrote: »

tonight has highest DC queue I've seen on thorne for months

I was pvping all night, even during the couple of short times DC population was "locked" the queue was ZERO when I tried to get back in, that's a far cry from the 30-40 person queue from just over a month ago

Ishammael wrote: »

@Joy division, well said!

serenenightmare · November 2014

Teargrants wrote: »

Have you all forgotten the first few months of live where FCs were constantly bugged out?

Oh god... the horror, please! No more memories!

Agrippa_Invisus · November 2014

kaer426 wrote: »

Lava_Croft wrote: »

It's much more fun in Cyrodiil now that the camps are gone, since people are actually forced to travel for a few minutes to and from objectives,...

Traveling isn't what I would consider fun

Columba wrote: »

tonight has highest DC queue I've seen on thorne for months

I was pvping all night, even during the couple of short times DC population was "locked" the queue was ZERO when I tried to get back in, that's a far cry from the 30-40 person queue from just over a month ago

Ishammael wrote: »

@Joy division, well said!

Actually, the traveling makes a huge difference for many different players.

It gives solo and small group players a reason to fight and move around outside of keeps and their environs. This rewards players who want to be scouts and sneak assassins.

It changes the dynamic of the 'enemy army materializes out of nowhere' that the tentaporting encouraged previously. One of the attempts to recapture the scroll of NiMohk from Arrius by DC on Thornblade NA was foiled on Sunday due to a scout seeing the large DC force come through the north Chalman milegate.

That wouldn't have happened pre-1.5. One runner would have set up a tent near Arrius and then 20+ people would have suicided to appear there magically.

So... EP was rewarded by more time with the scroll by playing smart and having scouts out watching. The scout was rewarded by getting to kill some stragglers and knowing he helped the Alliance when there were defenders waiting at Arrius for the assault force.

Magus · November 2014

I've been tracking the comments and I'm seeing a pattern. If you play on Thornblade or a locked server, then you love the change. If you play on any of the other servers, you do not. I fall in the latter category. The smaller scale battles on the less populated servers were immensely more fun pre-1.5 since you could have a high level of action with no downtime - typically 60 vs 60 (or less, most fun when it's 20 defending against 40 or so) in a single location around a keep. Post 1.5 these servers are completely dead except when a guild or two decides to come over and push emp for themselves and mostly PvDoor or against inexperienced PUG PVErs without TS and coordination. I tried Thornblade after 1.5, there wasn't a queue, and I was in a zerg that stood on the flag until it flipped. It was not fun. Lately I've found a lot more fun on an alt in the non-vet campaign since the numbers are more reasonable - the 60-80 vs 60-80 split that I like. I played on volendrung back in season 1 and got so frustrated with the caltrops exploit that I took a break to go play wildstar, archeage beta and came back right before the craglorn update. When EP and DC both came to Haderus for a couple of weeks it was the most fun I've had in ESO.

What I would really like ZOS to do is to either bring back FC with the death radius suggestion or if this is simply too difficult for them to code, then offer a server with FC and a server without FC. One where they work as they did before and one where you can't place them at all even if you have them in inventory, to prevent people from farming FC on the first server and using them in the second.

Wreuntzylla · November 2014

Odd. The launcher linked, with approval, the MMORPG's aticle on removing FCs, which was all for it. Now it seems to be gone from the launcher.

https://www.facebook.com/MMORPGcom

Sanct16 · November 2014

If you like playing in a big zerg, you like the change. If you like to gank ppl, you like the change.

If you like to play with a small group versus superior numbers or bombsquads you hate the change.