Maintenance for the week of March 25:
• [COMPLETE] ESO Store and Account System for maintenance – March 28, 9:00AM EDT (13:00 UTC) - 12:00PM EDT (16:00 UTC)

AoE Caps Discussion

  • Armitas
    Armitas
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭✭✭
    Mr Wrobel. Is there any relationship between aoe caps and server performance?
    Retired.
    Nord mDK
  • usmcjdking
    usmcjdking
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭✭
    As for Magicka Detonation, I am going to reference my favorite Dota 2 play of all time.

    https://youtube.com/watch?v=5K2CNiECTeo

    That, my friends, is Echo Slam and what Magicka Detonation should be designed after. Echo isn't that much damage if it only hits one player. Echo is dumb powerful if it hits a lot of players, but unlike magicka detonation, Echo Slam is an all or nothing skill.

    IMO, the best way to fix MD is to rework the skill. Make it very high risk with a very high reward.

    - This skill should cost all of your remaining magicka (whether 100% or 5%). ALL OF IT. It should also prevent magicka regen while it's charging.
    - Base tool tip damage reduced by about 33%.
    - 5m initial AOE.
    - Anyone affected by the primary blast deals 1X% of their maximum magicka in a 5 meter radius around them.
    - No AOE cap.
    Edited by usmcjdking on November 24, 2015 11:50PM
    0331
    0602
  • hammayolettuce
    hammayolettuce
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    FENGRUSH wrote: »
    It is finally here, and the opening post leads me to believe were talking about issues around large scale PvP instead of AOE caps - so Im going to jump right in on this.

    Wrobel wrote: »
    Healing abilities currently cap at 6 targets, where damage can hit up to 60 targets (100% to the first 6, 50% to the next 24, and 25% to the last 30).

    Ive heard this idea dropped in one of our We Are ESO podcasts by you before Wrobel and Id like to strike at it in more detail. If healing and damage mechanics were the same (picking random targets) this issue with AOE caps wouldnt be as bad as they are. But because of smart healing (which I dont expect you to remove or change due to it being core to your game since its inception) is what makes the damage get the short end of the stick.


    If youre hitting 16 people, and 6 for full at a time, youre picking 6 different targets each time. If youre hitting 24, or 30 players, the statistical chance you hit the target that you wanted to hit, who you previously put the most damage on, keeps getting worse and worse. Ultimately, its extremely unlikely to hit the target you want and burst that guy down. Instead, you have to throw out overwhelming amounts of damage and actually out damage their healing by a large margin in a short span of time (something not possible when significantly outnumbered. This becomes impossible when you factor in templar ult for reduction but more importantly: barrier.

    Now you mentioned barrier, which is great. This ability absolutely and completely counters a burst from realistically happening. It also is compounded by the fact that you cant even crit shields (an issue shared with small scale magicka sorcs - but to stay on course here) the amount of uncrittable damage 1 barrier provides a full group is absolutely ridiculous.

    All in all, AOE caps creates a situation that encourages you to bring numbers SIMPLY BECAUSE THE MORE YOU HAVE, THE MORE CHANCE YOULL TAKE 50% DAMAGE. It creates quantity over quality. Quantity already provides you the advantage of having more tools and bodies at your disposal.

    I really wont be satisfied with anything short of full removal of AOE caps - because if you just raise the bar up, you have the same issue at a larger scale and youre not fixing the problem, youre promoting a worse one. To have more people stack more people.


    Whoever takes the most damage, will get all of the heals, because smart healing targets whoever is lowest. Damage is randomly picking targets. Because of this design - you need to remove AOE caps.

    Wrobel wrote: »
    We want AoE abilities to be useful in PvP. That being said, we don’t want them to be the end all be all - single target abilities should also be useful.

    Single target abilities will still be useful - 100%. In fact, I cant even AOE groups if theyre too big, the only viable option is to use single target to hope to burst through specific people. AOE is good, but its only as good as the numbers you have AOEing and the difference between what youre AOEing against. Again, the meta now because of the 50% damage nerf this patch is all about numbers. 50% less damage, then 50% from AOE caps if youre not the unlucky 6.

    With that said - you should be discouraging people from balling up all of the time. THERE IS NO THREAT, NO RISK, NO REASON NOT TO. Fixing det is a good first step, but you shouldnt put 1 skill in the game that is the end all be all of countering these ball groups. The game design IS NOT GOOD to encourage this style of play. THERE MUST BE RISK INVOLVED, OR EVERYONE WILL DO IT. This is what Cyrodiil has become, because that is what has been promoted by all of these changes.

    When players are forced to split and scatter to avoid the damage or ults of another group trying to strike at them while theyre all grouped, THAT is when you would switch to single target. That is how you bring single target combat back into this equation. But a lot of these groups, they dont even use single target at all. Because you dont give them a reason to. They have gap closers, survivals, buffs/utility, and AOE. They will literally gap closer and use steel tornado because it may be there best skill to damage with. If you created a reason for people that they HAD TO SCATTER they would switch to their single target, and back to AOE when they have the ability to counter in the same fashion.

    This style of PvP existed more before, it exists less today.


    Wrobel wrote: »
    The intention of the caps and falloff is that AoE damage will be able to outpace healing in large group battles, but not dominate it.

    This plays into the first part but I want to come back to it again. A large group may take 500k damage, but a barrier will eat up most of that (this is post mitigation damage too, so its being spread pretty slowly) - and technically none of those people could have dropped below 10k hp despite receiving an equal amount of healing, because the smart healing is going to prioritize those who need it, while the damage is being spread all over the place. This system is so screwed up - Im not even sure how it can be tolerated as a thing for mass PvP.

    It sends a clear message to me. You want the game to be more casual friendly and youre giving people a cushion so they dont have to play as well, or try as much. You dont want them to die easily and become discouraged. The reality is, youve lost just as much playerbase creating a ball group meta that has smothered your servers performance, its backfired in a gruesome way.

    Additionally, this patch, more than any other, should allow players to take on AOE damage with the damage reduction, whereas in 1.6, it was easier to burst down with AOE. I get this game is for everyone, and I dont want to discourage people from playing it by making it too hard. But ultimately you have great players making great ball groups too that will crush these more casual players getting into larger groups if you actually did remove AOE caps just as well.

    Removing AOE caps needs to be done because the game in its current state is 100% about quantity over quality. It has never before been as much about it as it is now, and if you dont take radical action to change this, you will lose what remains of players that want to create a great PvP environment. Theres a lot of alternatives around the corner - not to derail/threaten this offtopic, but its a reality. You need change quickly, and if you dont, a lot of the players who have stuck around through a lot of crap, are out once they find that magic we felt in earlier days of Cyro somewhere else.

    Wrobel wrote: »

    Remember that a group of 5 players is not going to be able to kill a group of 20 players in most situations. It is possible if you catch the group completely off guard or funnel them into a tight space, but in a straight up 5 on 20, the larger numbers are going to win most times.

    We use this on We are ESO podcasts, and its true - but I dont even know why you need to say this. Its like a reassurance to ball groups and zergs that you arent willing to make changes to bring things where they need to be. Which is GIVING EVERYONE A FAIR SHOT IN A FIGHT



    Changes that should be made:

    Immediate changes:

    Step 1) Remove AOE caps [No discussion needed] (Wrobel Team)
    Step 2) Change Barrier & Purge [Discussion needed: How do you do this? If you cast 1 barrier in a 24 man group and it hits 12, will a 2nd one hit the 12 who didnt get it? This will change things where groups simply run 2 barriers at a time. Will it randomly pick targets? This changes the design of it, and not necessarily in a bad way, but will alter how its functionally used by ball groups today. As far as purge is concerned, this will still be used to the effect it is today, even if you limited targets down to 4, they would assign 3-6 people that can purge. Consider how strong purge is and how it effects other things, like siege, otherwise changes here will be void.] (Wrobel Team)
    Step 3) Make AP gains distributed equally across the board, no bonus for large groups. [No discussion needed] (Wheeler Team)
    Step 4) Rework siege [Discussion needed - not testing] (Wheeler Team)


    Post AOE caps:

    Step 5) Evaluate Removal of AOE Caps; Discuss Dynamic Ult Gen [Discussion needed post AOE cap removal - NEW ult gen system, not like the old one, but not static] (Wrobel Team)

    Going to stop there for now - because the list goes beyond mechanic changes at that point to design changes. The rest is design changes that can encourage people to be spread out, have other objectives and new things to do. Youve probably heard these ideas on the We Are ESO podcast if youve watched them. EI: City objectives and IC changes. These are mid/long term goals. The above is your short term IMMEDIATE goals that need to come in now.

    This ^

    Reduce AoE Heals - Amount of targets can be hit.
    Remove AoE Caps or Make 24 take full dmg then 50% reduction + to others.
    Snü (Magicka DK) ♥ Thnu (Stamplar) ♥ Pizza for Breakfast (Magplar) ♥ Sparklefingers (Magicka Sorc) ♥
    Bean and Cheese Burrito (Magicka DK) ♥ Snurrito (Stamplar) ♥
    DARFAL COVANT
  • FENGRUSH
    FENGRUSH
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭✭✭
    usmcjdking wrote: »
    As for Magicka Detonation, I am going to reference my favorite Dota 2 play of all time.

    https://youtube.com/watch?v=5K2CNiECTeo

    That, my friends, is Echo Slam and what Magicka Detonation should be designed after. Echo isn't that much damage if it only hits one player. Echo is dumb powerful if it hits a lot of players, but unlike magicka detonation, Echo Slam is an all or nothing skill.

    IMO, the best way to fix MD is to rework the skill. Make it very high risk with a very high reward.

    - This skill should cost all of your remaining magicka (whether 100% or 5%). ALL OF IT.
    - Base tool tip damage reduced by about 33%.
    - 5m initial AOE.
    - Anyone effected by the primary blast deals 1X% of their maximum magicka in a 5 meter radius around them.
    - No AOE cap.

    You dont fix a meta by putting 1 skill in the game - that is used by only magicka users.
  • Manoekin
    Manoekin
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭
    Wrobel wrote: »
    Last week, we had a really successful discussion on player abilities. It was super constructive and we got a ton of really great feedback. This week, we’d like to have that same constructive discussion with AoE caps and falloff. AoE caps are something that have been talked about on the forums for a while now and discussion has picked up recently, especially with regards to PvP. We’d like to discuss them in a bit more detail and provide some design goals for the system, as well as the overall vision for larger scale PvP in ESO.

    We want AoE abilities to be useful in PvP. That being said, we don’t want them to be the end all be all - single target abilities should also be useful. The intention of the caps and falloff is that AoE damage will be able to outpace healing in large group battles, but not dominate it. Healing abilities currently cap at 6 targets, where damage can hit up to 60 targets (100% to the first 6, 50% to the next 24, and 25% to the last 30).

    With that being said, there are a few situations where healing is able to out scale damage. The first step we are taking is to look at some of the abilities that heal far more than we would like in large group fights. We’re specifically looking at Purge and Barrier initially, and will be reducing the max targets these abilities can hit. While we are looking at specific abilities, we are also looking into Magicka Detonation. This ability was always intended to be more effective versus groups and less effective against individual targets, and it is not meeting those design goals currently.

    Remember that a group of 5 players is not going to be able to kill a group of 20 players in most situations. It is possible if you catch the group completely off guard or funnel them into a tight space, but in a straight up 5 on 20, the larger numbers are going to win most times.

    For feedback this week, we’d love to hear about situations in which you feel like you are having problems against large groups of players. Include the number of players you’re fighting against, abilities you believe they are using, and abilities you feel need tweaks to make them more effective against larger numbers.

    I've caught groups completely off guard just sitting on resources multiple times yet AOE caps give them time to react whereas my group wouldn't have that same protection. I run into a group of 20 with 5 with full ultimates and we kill more than half, but then they are reacting and still outnumber us. Why shouldn't they die instantly like my group would?

    Healing and barriers and purges are not the problem. It's not the reason why you can't kill a large group using all of those things with a smaller group. The reason why is because you only do worthwhile damage to a random 6 targets (not always the same). If I time my damage right, and they don't react in time... why shouldn't I kill them? Even with nerfing Barrier and Purge you can kill half of them and still be outnumbered because the others survived solely through some magical protection you think they need.

    Single target will always be useful in the situations it should be useful. AOE caps aren't making people choose single target over AOE.
    SEE VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RoB6cgSmV2s

    As you can plainly see, an Emperor using AOE does not do more damage than a non-emperor using single target. Can we debunk the theory you put forth now, Wrobel? The point of AOE is to hit a lot of targets. If the fight is small enough single target will always prevail barring a huge difference in player skill. The game already works the way you want it to, letting me hit more than 6 targets with decent damage isn't going to change anything.

    If you think damage will outpace healing by too much in larger group fights then focus on the real issue which would be the heal cap. Change healing springs to not be a spammy skill so healers can press more than one button during a raid and up the healing cap to compensate for the increased group damage (healing springs/grand healing needs a change anyway as 3 smart heals going off every second is a little broken). In any case the larger groups have much more healers to deal with the increased damage anyway.

    Again... the issue is not the skills used by players. The issue every player has is that they simply CAN NOT damage the enemy group because of game mechanic limitations. Remove the limitations please. We don't want it.
  • Leandor
    Leandor
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭
    Proximity detonation: make the attack timer 10 seconds and make it take you out of stealth the moment it is cast, not the moment it goes off. No scaling based on number of targets hit - 5 shall never be able to win against 40 just because they feel they are more entitled to have fun for being a "small group".

    Purge: not only limit number of targets but also make it range based instead of "smart". Do this in general for heal spells in pvp.

    Barrier: don't per se limit targets it can effect. Have the base ability hit 12 targets with half the shield strength it does today. One morph makes it unlimited targets with the small size shield, the other makes it the same 12 targets with the current strength. Remove the resource/health recovery it nowadays has. Give all barrier morphs a 15 second debuff preventing a new barrier from affecting the debuffed target. Reduce ultimate cost down to 75.

    AoE caps: minimize the calculation effort on the servers and give the complainers their cap removal. Reduce their overall damage done to an individual target so far that your dps is higher with single target abilities until you hit more than 4 targets.

    Battle spirit: instead of reducing damage received, reduce damage dealt. That separates mitigation from battle spirit and prevents additive stacking of both. Adjust npcs in IC by reducing their health pools. Stop catering to those that crave big numbers flashing on their screens.

    Steel tornado: reduce radius to at most 5 meters. Have the other morph do half the damage but recover stamina and health for every target hit - a fixed amount of stamina and health in the same order of magnitude as the constitution passive from heavy armor.

    Remove animation cancelling.
  • Morostyle
    Morostyle
    ✭✭✭✭
    From what I understand it is not the fact that 5 players are facing 20, it's how the 20 ball up making a single target impossible and ontop of that reducing the amount of AoE damage.

    In fact a 20 person vs 5 would maintain the 20 man advantage even with an AoE increased damage per player in area.

    It would just force them to seperate allowing for single target, it's not like an AoE covers the whole freaking keep.

    Also, historically speaking, a well defended position SHOULD be able to have 5 vs 20.

    Remember WW2? The allies were looking at a 10 to 1 loss attacking the defended beeches! Yes a well positioned defense should have a mad ratio like that!

    Early stage of this game, we rekt people with 5-8 man vs 20 EASY, due to no cap
  • CP5
    CP5
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭
    1.) You want to break up large groups and tried prox-detonation as a fix. If all aoe's could force people to spread out wouldn't that more generally fix the problem?

    2.) A large number of aoe's just aren't amazing. Volley, WoE, things like that people generally don't use because they are generally lack luster and if you did use them the only thing driving people out of them is their characters frequent grunting sounds by being frequently hit by the "damage." Sorry, people don't melt in these aoe's, they laugh and walk away. Unless its an aoe that can be spammed for high up front damage, in which case I just think you need to rethink the point of that skill in game.
  • Morostyle
    Morostyle
    ✭✭✭✭
    wrong repost :)
    Edited by Morostyle on November 25, 2015 12:14AM
  • usmcjdking
    usmcjdking
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭✭
    FENGRUSH wrote: »
    usmcjdking wrote: »
    As for Magicka Detonation, I am going to reference my favorite Dota 2 play of all time.

    https://youtube.com/watch?v=5K2CNiECTeo

    That, my friends, is Echo Slam and what Magicka Detonation should be designed after. Echo isn't that much damage if it only hits one player. Echo is dumb powerful if it hits a lot of players, but unlike magicka detonation, Echo Slam is an all or nothing skill.

    IMO, the best way to fix MD is to rework the skill. Make it very high risk with a very high reward.

    - This skill should cost all of your remaining magicka (whether 100% or 5%). ALL OF IT.
    - Base tool tip damage reduced by about 33%.
    - 5m initial AOE.
    - Anyone effected by the primary blast deals 1X% of their maximum magicka in a 5 meter radius around them.
    - No AOE cap.

    You dont fix a meta by putting 1 skill in the game - that is used by only magicka users.

    Which, if you actually bothered to do anything other than kneejerk-stam/magicka-paradigm respond you would realize that a vast majority of the damage is NOT coming from the initial damage, but the echo'd magicka explosion from other enemy characters standing in proximity. This forces magicka users to stay away from the zergball or get their entire team gibbed.

    Let's put this in the context of your stam sorc.

    You see a nice zerg ball of 15 players just standing on itself derping and spamming purges/healing springs. You buff yourself with surge/lightning form then prime proximity det.

    You hit critical charge when the timer hits 1 second and prox det goes off hitting all players, it does about 2.5k damage on the initial explosion, pretty crappy cuz stam right? Right.

    However, due to these new mechanics, say there was 7 Magicka (Averaging 30k magicka amongst them) and 7 stamina (averaging 14k amongst them) and 1 hybrid tank sitting at 22k magicka. The average for all of their magicka pools is 22k, which means that each target you hit will resonate for another 2.2k (before reduction) damage. That's 35.5k damage as a stam sorc, before reductions.

    So, balling up gets you punished by Magicka Det which is what @Wrobel stated was his purpose for the skill.
    0331
    0602
  • Crown
    Crown
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    Slightly off topic, though relevant with regards to the points that @Sypher (in previous threads) and @FENGRUSH (higher up in this one) have made about AP, there are people who enjoy the larger scale PvP. Making AP equally distributed equally among everyone who contributed to a kill would not work as a base change. Here's an excerpt something I posted in a thread @Sypher made on the topic:
    Crown wrote: »
    @MountainHound Makes a good point about the math. We all agree that the numbers don't seem right, though we also have to consider many scenarios that do not make the calculations so simple.

    Back in the good old days, on campaign reset days we (I ran with Alacrity at the time) used to cap our groups at 12 people until we felt that we needed 4 more to win some fights. 16 was the most we would run with, as beyond that the AP gains were too diluted. Now, most of us who run larger groups agree that we prefer smaller ones. It takes more skill and finesse, and it's a lot easier to control smaller groups than 24 people at once - and is thus more fun for a good leader. The state of the game today makes it less feasible to win consistently against larger groups (which, regardless of what we all say here, will continue to exist), so those of us who can do so will probably continue to run full (24 person) groups when we feel it's necessary.

    Should every player in a group share AP gains? Consider that a lot of roles might not participate as much, or if a target is squishy, two people can kill the target based on whoever has the lowest latency before anyone else's skills go off. I believe that the answer to this question has to be yes. The following questions are based on this answer being yes.

    What about someone who casts a purge or a buff on the players who get the kill? Should they share in the AP? If a healer sees @Sypher about to die while trying to gank a player on the back line of an opposing group, and casts a heal saving @Sypher's life, how much of the upcoming AP that @Sypher makes killing his target - and his next target(s) should that person get? If it would have taken @Sypher 90 seconds to run back to the fight, and he kills 8 people before that time limit is up, how much of the AP he made is fair to be shared? 50% of the first kill is an obvious answer. Perhaps a percentage of all AP made until he goes out of combat? Everything that you want to suggest needs to have a simple mathematical formula that can be implemented in game.

    What about someone who casts a debuff on the opponent? Should they share in the AP? They didn't do much (if any) damage, though their contribution reduced the opponents skills cast / uses their resources / prevents them from being effective for a time. How can that contribution be measured? To test this in current, I tried going solo (not a group member) and fear-spamming while two friends killed opponents. I made no AP doing so. Is this reasonable? My contribution being the stealther who feared a target while two other people killed said target before the fear was over seems like it should be of value (and thus worth AP on the kill).

    What about someone who is in a tank build and absorbs a lot of damage so that the glass cannons who kill the opponent don't have to? Should they share in the AP? There are two people who run with me regularly who are masters of the body block. DKs who gap close to a target with their flappy flap up, shield, and stand in front of a glass cannon build who can finish the target off quickly. The DK protector saved the glass canon, the glass cannon knows that he/she couldn't have won the fight without the protector, so is that person entitled to sharing AP? Logically, there needs to be a game-intelligence-capable decision made about this, so the data that the game collects in real time has to feasibly be able to decide. I'm sure we all agree that the protector sharing AP is reasonable, though how can that be calculated? If it's based on to whom the opponent does damage, then a lot more people in the area will likely share in AP who should otherwise not.

    What about someone who casts a caltrops in order to tag all opponents that other people kill? Should they share in the AP? They've tagged all opponents, but the amount of damage to each target as compared to using DPS skills is minimal. Right now, someone who does minimal damage to a target that dies will get very little AP compared to the player(s) who did most of the damage. I'm not certain what the ratios / math details are, though it is noticeable.

    What about someone who spams mutagen or healing springs to tag all the allies with heals? Should they share in the AP that the people they tag kill? What about the AP that the group members of the people they tag make and is thus shared with the people they tagged with heals? A complex scenario is if non-grouped-person heals a healer who is part of a group and prevents said healer from dying, then that healer heals a glass cannon group member thus preventing him/her from dying, and the glass cannon kills a target. The original person is indirectly responsible for saving the life of the person who made the kill. Should this solo healer get any portion of the AP gain? There are people who like to play solo and prefer healing rather than DPS. How are these people supposed to make AP?

    Another interesting scenario is if two people are each part of different 24-person groups. Those two people participate equally in killing an opponent. Right now, both those people along with everyone in range in their groups (who is in range) will get about 100 AP.

    For the questions / scenarios above I am NOT suggesting and answers, I am suggesting that you consider the options carefully, as what seems fair to some people based on their role and responsibilities in group is very likely not fair to others.

    What I believe needs to be done is to calculate what you @Wrobel and/or the appropriate team(s) believe to be a reasonable amount of AP made per hour - considering that it takes 64 million AP to reach grand overlord (PvP rank 50), the amount of time you believe appropriate to reach that rank, the amount of time played per week for a regular PvP player, and make it feasible for more of the population who plays in that time. Work out how many kills per hour a solo player should be able to / needs to make vs small group vs large group, and if the system needs to be adjusted then do so such that you're not penalizing people in the examples quoted from my other post. Right now most normal group players tend to make about 25k AP / hour when playing the map, and 40k AP / hour when farming AP.

    We saw in the last reset of Azura's Star that @Sypher was about 10% behind me in AP earnings. He got the 20% AP bonus buff consistently, and I not at all. The time lost in load screens when a group goes for the buff is enormous as compared to a solo player, so it's not feasible for a group to do so. I was leading a group that ranged from 15 to 24. We both played about the same amount of time. If you WANT to normalize AP earnings for solo players vs group players, then work out about a 10% increase at the bottom end of the AP awarded to solo or smaller groups.

    On that topic, I've made the suggestion before and I'll make it again: Have your PvP alliance rank be account based, so that players are not penalized for playing multiple toons. The PvP skill lines should still be per character, though AP gains towards the overall rank should be possible on any character (perhaps limited per faction).

    Edit: Typo
    Edited by Crown on November 25, 2015 12:29AM
    Crown | AD NB | First AD/NA Grand Overlord (2015/12/26)
    PvP Guides @ DarkElves.com
  • hammayolettuce
    hammayolettuce
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    usmcjdking wrote: »
    FENGRUSH wrote: »
    usmcjdking wrote: »
    As for Magicka Detonation, I am going to reference my favorite Dota 2 play of all time.

    https://youtube.com/watch?v=5K2CNiECTeo

    That, my friends, is Echo Slam and what Magicka Detonation should be designed after. Echo isn't that much damage if it only hits one player. Echo is dumb powerful if it hits a lot of players, but unlike magicka detonation, Echo Slam is an all or nothing skill.

    IMO, the best way to fix MD is to rework the skill. Make it very high risk with a very high reward.

    - This skill should cost all of your remaining magicka (whether 100% or 5%). ALL OF IT.
    - Base tool tip damage reduced by about 33%.
    - 5m initial AOE.
    - Anyone effected by the primary blast deals 1X% of their maximum magicka in a 5 meter radius around them.
    - No AOE cap.

    You dont fix a meta by putting 1 skill in the game - that is used by only magicka users.

    Which, if you actually bothered to do anything other than kneejerk-stam/magicka-paradigm respond you would realize that a vast majority of the damage is NOT coming from the initial damage, but the echo'd magicka explosion from other enemy characters standing in proximity. This forces magicka users to stay away from the zergball or get their entire team gibbed.

    Let's put this in the context of your stam sorc.

    You see a nice zerg ball of 15 players just standing on itself derping and spamming purges/healing springs. You buff yourself with surge/lightning form then prime proximity det.

    You hit critical charge when the timer hits 1 second and prox det goes off hitting all players, it does about 2.5k damage on the initial explosion, pretty crappy cuz stam right? Right.

    However, due to these new mechanics, say there was 7 Magicka (Averaging 30k magicka amongst them) and 7 stamina (averaging 14k amongst them) and 1 hybrid tank sitting at 22k magicka. The average for all of their magicka pools is 22k, which means that each target you hit will resonate for another 2.2k (before reduction) damage. That's 35.5k damage as a stam sorc, before reductions.

    So, balling up gets you punished by Magicka Det which is what @Wrobel stated was his purpose for the skill.

    Stam user using prox det and magicka user using prox det I two totally different dmg numbers.

    Prox det isn't the answer

    Removing AOE caps is the answer.
    Snü (Magicka DK) ♥ Thnu (Stamplar) ♥ Pizza for Breakfast (Magplar) ♥ Sparklefingers (Magicka Sorc) ♥
    Bean and Cheese Burrito (Magicka DK) ♥ Snurrito (Stamplar) ♥
    DARFAL COVANT
  • Dagoth_Rac
    Dagoth_Rac
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭✭✭
    This would probably be difficult to implement, but what if AoE caps applied to new PvP players but not experienced PvP players? Like once you reach a certain Alliance War Rank, AoE will always hit you for 100% damage. This would hurt the "pro zergs" where everyone has millions and millions of AP and all the top skills and passives unlocked. But it would still allow new and casual players to go for a "safety in numbers" approach so that they don't get wrecked nonstop by experienced pro players. By the time they reach the rank cutoff where AoE hits them 100% all the time, hopefully they have played enough in Cyrodiil to spread out and still be good.
  • usmcjdking
    usmcjdking
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭✭
    usmcjdking wrote: »
    FENGRUSH wrote: »
    usmcjdking wrote: »
    As for Magicka Detonation, I am going to reference my favorite Dota 2 play of all time.

    https://youtube.com/watch?v=5K2CNiECTeo

    That, my friends, is Echo Slam and what Magicka Detonation should be designed after. Echo isn't that much damage if it only hits one player. Echo is dumb powerful if it hits a lot of players, but unlike magicka detonation, Echo Slam is an all or nothing skill.

    IMO, the best way to fix MD is to rework the skill. Make it very high risk with a very high reward.

    - This skill should cost all of your remaining magicka (whether 100% or 5%). ALL OF IT.
    - Base tool tip damage reduced by about 33%.
    - 5m initial AOE.
    - Anyone effected by the primary blast deals 1X% of their maximum magicka in a 5 meter radius around them.
    - No AOE cap.

    You dont fix a meta by putting 1 skill in the game - that is used by only magicka users.

    Which, if you actually bothered to do anything other than kneejerk-stam/magicka-paradigm respond you would realize that a vast majority of the damage is NOT coming from the initial damage, but the echo'd magicka explosion from other enemy characters standing in proximity. This forces magicka users to stay away from the zergball or get their entire team gibbed.

    Let's put this in the context of your stam sorc.

    You see a nice zerg ball of 15 players just standing on itself derping and spamming purges/healing springs. You buff yourself with surge/lightning form then prime proximity det.

    You hit critical charge when the timer hits 1 second and prox det goes off hitting all players, it does about 2.5k damage on the initial explosion, pretty crappy cuz stam right? Right.

    However, due to these new mechanics, say there was 7 Magicka (Averaging 30k magicka amongst them) and 7 stamina (averaging 14k amongst them) and 1 hybrid tank sitting at 22k magicka. The average for all of their magicka pools is 22k, which means that each target you hit will resonate for another 2.2k (before reduction) damage. That's 35.5k damage as a stam sorc, before reductions.

    So, balling up gets you punished by Magicka Det which is what @Wrobel stated was his purpose for the skill.

    Stam user using prox det and magicka user using prox det I two totally different dmg numbers.

    Prox det isn't the answer

    Removing AOE caps is the answer.

    Slightly, different. Bother to do the math? 1.3k spellpower at that many targets will produce 80% of the damage that 3.5k spellpower will.

    Anyways @Wrobel, don't know about you but I prefer skilled, well timed, skill-based gameplay over spam2win. There need to be more skills that work off percentages unaffected my max stam/magicka and more skill shots, because right now there are very little (volcanic rune/beast trap/daedric mines).
    Edited by usmcjdking on November 25, 2015 12:41AM
    0331
    0602
  • MrBeatDown
    MrBeatDown
    ✭✭✭✭
    1. Completely remove Proxy Det from game.
    2. Reduce the efffectiveness of barrier
    3. Make siege more powerful again against players.
    4. Remove the AOE cap and let the damage do its job.


    I think that would spread people out alot, and make for a much better Keep/resource battle. If 20 people want to steel tornado into 3 fire balista AOE damage then they deserve to die. I would love to see it.

    Oh and then allow siege to be used in Imperial City so we can start utilizing that space as a war zone also.
    Edited by MrBeatDown on November 25, 2015 12:51AM
  • blabafat
    blabafat
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    Agree with most people here in that the advantage of being in a large group should be the large group itself. Promoting zergplay by giving damage reduction to large groups is silly. The main cause of lag is zerging. AoE Caps are promoting it
    Fire Cloak - VR12 DK - Nord - EP
    Ámeer - VR15 Templar - Imperial - AD
    The Mágician - VR16 Templar - Imperial DC
    Magíc - VR16 DK - Dark Elf - DC
    Àmeer - VR16 Templar - High Elf - DC
    ámeer - VR16 Templar - High Elf - AD
    Æ ámeer - VR16 Templar - High Elf - EP
    Ameer Flow - Level 34 Nightblade - High Elf - EP


    Youtube:
    https://youtube.com/channel/UCFNmXCgmTVo-T-p1BIVLxbQ
  • Moglijuana
    Moglijuana
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    Remove the cap and buff the Magicka DK in the same blow! Let Inhale hit more than 3 people! Leggooooooo
    Ps4 - PSN:jdmaya
    Dårth Måul (AD- Dunmer Mag DK) Legate
    Latest Vid:https://youtu.be/WZp_IdyrL6Q
  • MisterBigglesworth
    MisterBigglesworth
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    @Wrobel @FENGRUSH

    Since Barrier seems to be a major part of this problem, why not make a new Ultimate that instantly removes damage shields within a target area? That's what we want right? Counters to powerful abilities instead of just nerfs to those abilities, in order to reward smart play? Tweek the Ultimate cost of the "Anti-Barrier" ability if it's deemed too effective.
    Edited by MisterBigglesworth on November 25, 2015 1:00AM
    Really we do it without like, the musical instruments. This is the only musical: the mouth. And hopefully the brain attached to the mouth. Right? The brain, more important than the mouth, is the brain. The brain is much more important.
  • PainfulFAFA
    PainfulFAFA
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    FENGRUSH wrote: »
    It is finally here, and the opening post leads me to believe were talking about issues around large scale PvP instead of AOE caps - so Im going to jump right in on this.

    Wrobel wrote: »
    Healing abilities currently cap at 6 targets, where damage can hit up to 60 targets (100% to the first 6, 50% to the next 24, and 25% to the last 30).

    Ive heard this idea dropped in one of our We Are ESO podcasts by you before Wrobel and Id like to strike at it in more detail. If healing and damage mechanics were the same (picking random targets) this issue with AOE caps wouldnt be as bad as they are. But because of smart healing (which I dont expect you to remove or change due to it being core to your game since its inception) is what makes the damage get the short end of the stick.


    If youre hitting 16 people, and 6 for full at a time, youre picking 6 different targets each time. If youre hitting 24, or 30 players, the statistical chance you hit the target that you wanted to hit, who you previously put the most damage on, keeps getting worse and worse. Ultimately, its extremely unlikely to hit the target you want and burst that guy down. Instead, you have to throw out overwhelming amounts of damage and actually out damage their healing by a large margin in a short span of time (something not possible when significantly outnumbered. This becomes impossible when you factor in templar ult for reduction but more importantly: barrier.

    Now you mentioned barrier, which is great. This ability absolutely and completely counters a burst from realistically happening. It also is compounded by the fact that you cant even crit shields (an issue shared with small scale magicka sorcs - but to stay on course here) the amount of uncrittable damage 1 barrier provides a full group is absolutely ridiculous.

    All in all, AOE caps creates a situation that encourages you to bring numbers SIMPLY BECAUSE THE MORE YOU HAVE, THE MORE CHANCE YOULL TAKE 50% DAMAGE. It creates quantity over quality. Quantity already provides you the advantage of having more tools and bodies at your disposal.

    I really wont be satisfied with anything short of full removal of AOE caps - because if you just raise the bar up, you have the same issue at a larger scale and youre not fixing the problem, youre promoting a worse one. To have more people stack more people.


    Whoever takes the most damage, will get all of the heals, because smart healing targets whoever is lowest. Damage is randomly picking targets. Because of this design - you need to remove AOE caps.

    Wrobel wrote: »
    We want AoE abilities to be useful in PvP. That being said, we don’t want them to be the end all be all - single target abilities should also be useful.

    Single target abilities will still be useful - 100%. In fact, I cant even AOE groups if theyre too big, the only viable option is to use single target to hope to burst through specific people. AOE is good, but its only as good as the numbers you have AOEing and the difference between what youre AOEing against. Again, the meta now because of the 50% damage nerf this patch is all about numbers. 50% less damage, then 50% from AOE caps if youre not the unlucky 6.

    With that said - you should be discouraging people from balling up all of the time. THERE IS NO THREAT, NO RISK, NO REASON NOT TO. Fixing det is a good first step, but you shouldnt put 1 skill in the game that is the end all be all of countering these ball groups. The game design IS NOT GOOD to encourage this style of play. THERE MUST BE RISK INVOLVED, OR EVERYONE WILL DO IT. This is what Cyrodiil has become, because that is what has been promoted by all of these changes.

    When players are forced to split and scatter to avoid the damage or ults of another group trying to strike at them while theyre all grouped, THAT is when you would switch to single target. That is how you bring single target combat back into this equation. But a lot of these groups, they dont even use single target at all. Because you dont give them a reason to. They have gap closers, survivals, buffs/utility, and AOE. They will literally gap closer and use steel tornado because it may be there best skill to damage with. If you created a reason for people that they HAD TO SCATTER they would switch to their single target, and back to AOE when they have the ability to counter in the same fashion.

    This style of PvP existed more before, it exists less today.


    Wrobel wrote: »
    The intention of the caps and falloff is that AoE damage will be able to outpace healing in large group battles, but not dominate it.

    This plays into the first part but I want to come back to it again. A large group may take 500k damage, but a barrier will eat up most of that (this is post mitigation damage too, so its being spread pretty slowly) - and technically none of those people could have dropped below 10k hp despite receiving an equal amount of healing, because the smart healing is going to prioritize those who need it, while the damage is being spread all over the place. This system is so screwed up - Im not even sure how it can be tolerated as a thing for mass PvP.

    It sends a clear message to me. You want the game to be more casual friendly and youre giving people a cushion so they dont have to play as well, or try as much. You dont want them to die easily and become discouraged. The reality is, youve lost just as much playerbase creating a ball group meta that has smothered your servers performance, its backfired in a gruesome way.

    Additionally, this patch, more than any other, should allow players to take on AOE damage with the damage reduction, whereas in 1.6, it was easier to burst down with AOE. I get this game is for everyone, and I dont want to discourage people from playing it by making it too hard. But ultimately you have great players making great ball groups too that will crush these more casual players getting into larger groups if you actually did remove AOE caps just as well.

    Removing AOE caps needs to be done because the game in its current state is 100% about quantity over quality. It has never before been as much about it as it is now, and if you dont take radical action to change this, you will lose what remains of players that want to create a great PvP environment. Theres a lot of alternatives around the corner - not to derail/threaten this offtopic, but its a reality. You need change quickly, and if you dont, a lot of the players who have stuck around through a lot of crap, are out once they find that magic we felt in earlier days of Cyro somewhere else.

    Wrobel wrote: »

    Remember that a group of 5 players is not going to be able to kill a group of 20 players in most situations. It is possible if you catch the group completely off guard or funnel them into a tight space, but in a straight up 5 on 20, the larger numbers are going to win most times.

    We use this on We are ESO podcasts, and its true - but I dont even know why you need to say this. Its like a reassurance to ball groups and zergs that you arent willing to make changes to bring things where they need to be. Which is GIVING EVERYONE A FAIR SHOT IN A FIGHT



    Changes that should be made:

    Immediate changes:

    Step 1) Remove AOE caps [No discussion needed] (Wrobel Team)
    Step 2) Change Barrier & Purge [Discussion needed: How do you do this? If you cast 1 barrier in a 24 man group and it hits 12, will a 2nd one hit the 12 who didnt get it? This will change things where groups simply run 2 barriers at a time. Will it randomly pick targets? This changes the design of it, and not necessarily in a bad way, but will alter how its functionally used by ball groups today. As far as purge is concerned, this will still be used to the effect it is today, even if you limited targets down to 4, they would assign 3-6 people that can purge. Consider how strong purge is and how it effects other things, like siege, otherwise changes here will be void.] (Wrobel Team)
    Step 3) Make AP gains distributed equally across the board, no bonus for large groups. [No discussion needed] (Wheeler Team)
    Step 4) Rework siege [Discussion needed - not testing] (Wheeler Team)


    Post AOE caps:

    Step 5) Evaluate Removal of AOE Caps; Discuss Dynamic Ult Gen [Discussion needed post AOE cap removal - NEW ult gen system, not like the old one, but not static] (Wrobel Team)

    Going to stop there for now - because the list goes beyond mechanic changes at that point to design changes. The rest is design changes that can encourage people to be spread out, have other objectives and new things to do. Youve probably heard these ideas on the We Are ESO podcast if youve watched them. EI: City objectives and IC changes. These are mid/long term goals. The above is your short term IMMEDIATE goals that need to come in now.

    Pretty much sums up what the remaining PvP community wants.
    PC NA
    Aztec | AZTEC | Ahztec | Aztehk | Master of Mnem
    MagDK | Magplar | Magward | Mageblade | Stamsorc

  • GreenSoup2HoT
    GreenSoup2HoT
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭
    For feedback this week, we’d love to hear about situations in which you feel like you are having problems.
    The number of players you’re fighting against.
    -Usually against any group of player's who know how to stack on-top of each other, explanation below. (Ball Group's)
    Abilities you believe they are using, and abilities you feel need tweaks to make them more effective against larger numbers.

    You already know what abilities large groups are using that need tweak's. However for ability's that could be more effective against these "Ball Group's", i would say Bombard need's a range increase. Wall of element's needs a huge damage increase. We have no real good ranged AoE ability's to fire at these "Ball Group's" without getting run over by a literal steel tornado.

    You could maybe place a new cooldown into the game, "Gap Closer Immunity". A whole Zerg can gap closer on you and jump to who ever is next. At least with some type of cooldown player's have a chance to get away or fight the player who jumped on them. It's far to easy for player's to just jump around. This would also give ranged user's some room to kite there enemy instead of getting gap closed every 2 second's.



    Here's what i think about AoE cap's.

    Ball Group's
    The current Problem:

    These group's have very good coordination and abuse your mechanic's. These group's know how to abuse the damage mitigation and out heal any damage being done to them. They stack on top of one another and have dedicated player's to spam one ability. Healing spring's, Steel Tornado, Barrier, War horn, ETC.

    What you end up getting is what i like to call the "Tasmanian devil effect". A tornado that you cannot stop. It is impossible unless you have yourself a group doing the exact same thing to even combat them.

    BTUwY2o.gif

    There are only 2 solution's i can think of.

    Complete Removal of AoE Cap's:

    Pro's and Con's

    Pro's

    - A small man group can take out these ball group's with good coordination.

    - Siege weapon's will be alot more deadly [Disregard current damage. This is getting fixed hopefully.]

    - Choke points. You can know have a small group of player's hold a choke point against massive amount's of player's. [Siege damage need's to be fixed for this to be possible.]

    - Player's will spread out in fear of group's ultimate/AoE bombs which leave's more room for 1v1 play style's to pick people off. Which i really like. The more people spread out, the more play-style's become viable.

    Con's

    - Essentially you will receive more ball group's but with fewer people. For example, you could have 5 friend's all vampire's with steel tornado + clouding swarm, they will charge up there ultimate's on npc's and kill anyone in a 10 meter radius once they strike.

    - Less use of single target abilities in group play. Personally if AoE cap's where removed every stamina build would be using steel tornado. Not that this is a bad thing, you should build for how you want to play. Like i said above, many player's will also use single target abilities to take out player's who spread out from the group.

    - Caltrop's. This ability would slow everyone from getting inside a keep. Another thing to look out for. Not to opposed of this either but some may find this very annoying. [If siege damage got fixed this would be deadly.]

    -Ball group's can still be ball group's.
    This one need's more of an explanation.

    With enough AoE healer's and damage dealer's. It would still be very hard for a small group of player's to take these guy's out. You are still going up against twice the AoE damage and healing. There is still going to be that man advantage. Not to say it's impossible however AoE cap's will not give you a definitive counter to these group's of player's.

    This is where people usually say "dynamic ultimate generation" should be put in place. Bigger group's should have the clear advantage, i don't want to see small group's just crushing bigger group's because they know how to drop ultimate after ultimate. I don't want to see the old D.U.G, we need something new entirely. Something to give small group's a chance.

    I still believe More>Less, not More=Less. With the removal of AoE cap's, anyone's small group may become a miniature "Tasmanian devil effect". However the bigger the Tornado should win most of the time. How i like to think about it, if you want to be successful as a small group you need to play smart, be like 300 and use the Hot gates. If you can funnel your enemy to your size it become's a much fairer fight.

    3850431-2831049-urukaaaa.jpg


    So in my opinion. AoE cap removal is a step in the right direction. Let's start with that and fix siege damage and see how it play's out.

    2: Complete the implementation of AoE cap's and cap any skill not effected. [IN PVP] :

    Pro's and Con's
    Pro's

    -Less effected player's with barrier mean's less overall damage needed to kill that group.
    -Less player's effect by purge resulting in more casualties in choke point's from siege weapon's. [Disregard current siege damage.]
    -No more Templar Ultimate heal's, healing the entire group.
    -Smaller group's will still gain full benefit from purge/barrier etc if they don't exceed the limit.

    Con's

    -Ball Group's can still mitigate Damage stacking on one another.
    -Player's have no need to spread apart.
    -Small group's still hit with full damage from ball group's




    This is only an alternative way of thinking. I still prefer the removal of AoE cap's over this scenario. This scenario would only be realistic if Siege damage was the only thing not effected by AoE cap's. If this were the case, siege weapon's would massacre anyone who dare's to bundle up and stack like these so called "ball group's".

    Also to reiterate, siege damage in it's current stage is pitiful. It's so bad that i can get hit by 2-3 at the same time, use purge and be good to go. Once the damage is drastically increased to almost one shotting player's with 20k health, ball group's would defiantly be less of an issue.

    Overall i think two thing's need to happen immediately. Remove AoE cap's and increase the Siege Weapon Damage.

    Thank's for reading my opinion on AoE cap's. Have a great day!
    Spike.Spiegel.full.787489.jpg
    Edited by GreenSoup2HoT on November 25, 2015 2:08AM
    PS4 NA DC
  • skillastat
    skillastat
    ✭✭✭✭
    Wrobel wrote: »
    Remember that a group of 5 players is not going to be able to kill a group of 20 players in most situations. It is possible if you catch the group completely off guard or funnel them into a tight space, but in a straight up 5 on 20, the larger numbers are going to win most times.

    In that case, why does the 20 player group need the added advantage of free damage reduction given that you are admitting that they have the advantage and will most likely defeat 5 players anyway? Currently in a 5 v 20, the 20 player group gets reduced damage just for standing next to each other on top of their natural numbers advantage.

    this sums up my thoughts

    Oh and @Fengrush as always +1
    Edited by skillastat on November 25, 2015 1:35AM
    (PC NA)
    -Saulo Stamina Sorcerer
    -skillastat Stamina Nightblade
    -a blade spirit Stamina Templar
    -Ultima Online I Magicka Dragonknight
    -'Solo DC* Stamina Sorcerer
    -'Ultima Online Stamina Dragonknight
    -Nerd Dk Tank Dragonknight
    -Solochi Magicka Sorcerer
    -Solo Lucci Magicka Nightblade
    -Sølomon Magicka Warden

    *All characters are EP, except for one DC.


    French Canadian!
  • Crown
    Crown
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    I'm curious how difficult it would be to remove the AoE caps on the coding side.

    Why not make a 7-day campaign to test PvP changes like this?
    Crown | AD NB | First AD/NA Grand Overlord (2015/12/26)
    PvP Guides @ DarkElves.com
  • RinaldoGandolphi
    RinaldoGandolphi
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭✭✭
    @Wrobel

    To Chime in here, Yes i think AOE caps should be removed, I think this will help the game out considerably. Some other changes however need to be addressed.

    1. Purge The Purge skill needs to be changed completely. As it stands right now Purge renders every DOT build(DK's) and all siege useless with a very cheap skill. Purge is the @1 skill that allows these ball groups to survive because its a core skill that makes them immune to siege fire.

    Purge needs to be addressed as follows:
    • When Purge is cast it removes negative effects from X amount of targets.
    • On the targets that had an effect removed(except the Purge caster him/herself), a buff needs to be placed on those players that will show up on the character sheet, and that player can not be purged again for 4 seconds from any source even if a different player cast Purge inside that 4 sec window they can't be purged again until the timer is up.

      If Purge is cast again within that 4 sec time frame from any other friendly player, , the game will check if player has the Purge buff active.If purge buff is active it won't remove the effect, if purge buff is not active, the effect will be removed.

      This will put a stop to these ball groups just bathing in oils and siege fire, its gotten to the point of absurdity, You can't have mechanics in the game that allow people to stand in concentrated siege fire. this just leads to needing more numbers to attack or defend anything .



      2. Barrier - Right now Barrier is just OP. It gives far too many people a very very large shield. large amounts of players with a 15-20k Shield is just far too much as Fengrush talked about at length in 1 of the ESO podcasts.. It needs to have its the amount of targets it shields reduced, and the targeting of the Barrier ultimate needs to be RNG based meaning if I cast Barrier and get 6 people shielded, and then my buddy casts Barrier, 3 people that already had a sheild get a new shield and only 3 other people get a shield that didn't have one...it needs to be RNG based and it should not discriminate on who gets a shield just because they already have one, it should refresh duration if the RNG picks the same person twice so these ball groups can't just get enough folks running Barrier to cover their whole group.

      3 Siege

      "Change siege where it gets a 5% increase in damage for each target hit with no cap on targets that can be hit and scaling damage up to 300%. Also, damage shielding effects such as Barrier and Hardened Ward no longer mitigate or absorb damage from siege artillery, and siege damage is no longer reduced by the Battle Spirit nerf"


      This means:
      • if you hit 10 targets the siege does 50% more damage to everyone hit.
      • If you hit 20 targets it does 100% more damage to everyone hit.
      • If you hit 30 targets it does 150% more damage to everyone hit.
      • if you hit 40 targets its does 200% more damage to everyone hit.
      • if you hit 50 targets it does 250% more damage to everyone hit.
      • if you hit 60 targets it does 300% more damage to everyone hit.

      As it stands right now, Purge and Barrier in their current form can render siege absolutely useless. I watched outside Warden the other night, a Ball group of 24-30 all standing together took 5 Siege shots (1 Cold fire Ballista, 1 Fire Ballista, 1 Lighting Ballista, 1 Cold Fire Treb, and 1 Reg Fire Treb) all hitting at pretty much the same time and not a single one of those folks died...this is just rubbish no matter how you want to shake it.

      In PVE if you stand in stupid(Red circles) you die, in PVP you stand in stupid red circles(Siege) you can just heal and purge thorough it like nothing with no risk of dying at all...i watched ball groups ram doors with 6-7 oils being poured on them from above and Cleanse/Purge+Healing renders its useless, and Barrier allows them to just face tank all the damage to the face like it don't even matter.....defenders have no chance in this game unless they have a similar sized zerg inside the keep...Keeps were supposed to give defenders an advantage, but having the high ground don't matter when your enemy can simply stand in any siege you can use as defense it and it don't matter.

      Thats my 2 cents. These things need to be addressed, changing AOE caps will help, but it will not fix the core issues that allow these ball groups to function, the majority of the playerbase that is frustrated with the current state of the game are frustrated at the fact if your not in a 20+ man group you can't defend anything in this game, siege is useless, tactical positioning is useless, standing in red is not punished at all, this needs to change......im sorry but when your 20 man group is standing under 6-8 flaming oils being poured on you, you should die and its stupid that these people can stand in this and have on eof their many purge bots click 1 button and render it useless. This is the single biggest issue facing this game...make siege what it should have been day one along with fix AOE caps and it will be a positive step in the right direction for this game.

      Cheers
    Edited by RinaldoGandolphi on November 25, 2015 1:40AM
    Rinaldo Gandolphi-Breton Sorcerer Daggerfall Covenant
    Juste Gandolphi Dark Elf Templar Daggerfall Covenant
    Richter Gandolphi - Dark Elf Dragonknight Daggerfall Covenant
    Mathias Gandolphi - Breton Nightblade Daggerfall Covenant
    RinaldoGandolphi - High Elf Sorcerer Aldmeri Dominion
    Officer Fire and Ice
    Co-GM - MVP



    Sorcerer's - The ONLY class in the game that is punished for using its class defining skill (Bolt Escape)

    "Here in his shrine, that they have forgotten. Here do we toil, that we might remember. By night we reclaim, what by day was stolen. Far from ourselves, he grows ever near to us. Our eyes once were blinded, now through him do we see. Our hands once were idle, now through them does he speak. And when the world shall listen, and when the world shall see, and when the world remembers, that world will cease to be. - Miraak

  • MisterBigglesworth
    MisterBigglesworth
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    Crown wrote: »
    I'm curious how difficult it would be to remove the AoE caps on the coding side.

    Why not make a 7-day campaign to test PvP changes like this?

    That's a great idea, though I'm skepitcal the big ball groups would willingly switch over when they know they would be put at a disadvantage.

    Kinda like what happened with the gated access IC campaign.
    Path of least resistence and all that...

    Really we do it without like, the musical instruments. This is the only musical: the mouth. And hopefully the brain attached to the mouth. Right? The brain, more important than the mouth, is the brain. The brain is much more important.
  • Cogo
    Cogo
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    AoE is fine as it is. People needs to improve their playstyle, instead of complaining over everything else.
    Oghur Hatemachine, Guild leader of The Nephilim - EU Megaserver
    Orc Weapon Specialist and Warchief of the Ebonheart Pact - Trueflame Cyrodiil War Campaign
    Guildsite: The Nephilim

    "I don't agree with what you are saying, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it"
    -Voltaire

    "My build? Improvise, overcome and adapt!"
  • Ezareth
    Ezareth
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭✭✭
    Mr. @Wrobel I would love to hear your justification for AOE caps. What are your thoughts behind implementing them in the first place? What is it that they do which is favorable to you?

    From my understanding of calculations, the number of computations that must be made with caps is far more than the computations that would be done without caps. Correct me if you possess some knowledge that counters this but the greatest issue we face during serious Cyrodiil performance degradation is server response time. Wouldn't removing thousands of calculations that would need to be handled by the server have a positive impact on response time?

    I strongly feel that this topic is one that you should listen to your community on as it is something we all feel strongly about. If they are removed and things become worse there is no reason why they could not be put in place again. I think you will find your community is right on this one, and it isn't the time to make a stand for what you may feel is the correct action.
    Permanently banned from the forums for displaying dissent: ESO - The Year Behind
    Too Much Bolt Escape - banned for "hacking the game to create movement not otherwise permitted by in game mechanics."
    Ezareth VR16 AD Sorc - Rank 36 - Axe NA
    Ezareth-Ali VR16 DC NB - Rank 20 - Chillrend NA
    Ezareth PvP on Youtube
  • Crown
    Crown
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    Crown wrote: »
    I'm curious how difficult it would be to remove the AoE caps on the coding side. Why not make a 7-day campaign to test PvP changes like this?

    That's a great idea, though I'm skepitcal the big ball groups would willingly switch over when they know they would be put at a disadvantage.

    Make it active for 7 days only just to get test data. I'm sure that there are enough of us who can run 24 person groups who would come to see what it's like. There are also a LOT of us who would much rather run 8 person groups, so we could happily set up some fights to see what happens!
    Crown | AD NB | First AD/NA Grand Overlord (2015/12/26)
    PvP Guides @ DarkElves.com
  • Prospering
    Prospering
    ✭✭
    wat fengrush said
  • Sublime
    Sublime
    ✭✭✭✭
    Derra wrote: »
    Maneuver should just break on casted heals too (not hot ticks) - that would solve all of it´s issues

    IDK, but 24x Vigor is pretty much the same as 24x Healing Springs/BOL.

    On topic:

    First off, I want to summarize some of ZOS' recent statements into bullet points (as how I interpret them):
    • 1. There should be a real choice between single-target and AOE skills.
    • 2. You want as many players to have fun in AvA as possible. Meaning, neither should players be able to ball up and be unkillable, nor should few players be able to reliably win against large numbers.
    • 3. ESO's PvP is designed as a large war between three alliances, and therefore the ability to play solo or in small groups isn't a priority.

    So let's take a look at some of the problems with these design values.

    As the AOE caps increases it is more difficult to keep single target abilities in balance, since high-damage single target skills can be very problematic (-> snipe/cystal fragments/wrecking blow) when it comes to high damage builds, meaning a single target skill that is comparable to a steel tornado that hits 60 targets for 100% would one-shot everybody.. Another difficulty is the versatility of encounters in cyrodii, if a player only fights two players AOE's are much weaker compared to single target abilities, but the more enemies are around the stronger an AOE gets.

    By now you can probably see, that the current AOE caps basically are a solution to the problems mentioned above. Unfortunately, the second statement potentially suffers from this solution. So let's take a closer look at this specific form of PvP:

    As any player dies without sustain, let's start off with the defensive side:
    • As smart healing obviously makes sustain a lot easier without any trade-offs it is a key factor of large groups. However i do not expect it to get thouched, so I won't go any deeper. The two key point here are, that there is no wasted healing healing and that stacking is the best tactic by default as every member is always within the range of the healers
    • Healing springs, Vigor, BOL can be casted without sacrifice and have huge HPS values, making them the go-to heals for any bombsquad. Their ease of use is required when a player is under pressure, but makes them problematic as it is basically a no-risk vs reward situation.
    • Barrier, the probably stronges group ultimate in the game. It moves with the group, is relatively cheap and has an AOE cap of 24 - way above all other damage mitigation skills, and also lasts as long as normal shields. The replenishing morph even cuts the cost by ~40%.
    • With Purge and retreating maneuver a raid has all the tools needed to get out of any bad situation they got into. While debuff-removing mechanics are certainly needed, the effectiveness of these skills is rediculous.
    • The AOE cap effecitvely reduces the damage taken from AOE skills by a 24-man group by 37.5%, making it the best defensive mechanic in the game

    Offensive side:
    Since a players streangth isn't reduced by a lower HP bar, the most effective tactic to win a fight to burst down a single or a few enemies. To get a better idea of this concept, let's check out a few scenarios:

    Scenario 1, Target: 3-4 spread out players
    As an AOE most likely would not hit enough targets to be effective single target abilities provides the most use.

    Scenario 2, Target: 24 spread out players
    As it is very difficult to get the required damage to kill a target, single target skills are the superior choice.

    Scenario 3: Target 24 stacked players
    It is very difficult to target and focus an individual player within a large number of close-by enemies. Apart from that the additional damage taken by nearby hostile players, makes AOE's easier and more efficient to use, despite them actually not having the most desired effect


    We can conclude that stacking is incentivised by two basic things:
    • 1. Range/radius limitations of defensive spells
    • 2. Stacked enemy players

    Since healing spells going from one end of the battlefield to the other would not only be extremely immersion-breaking but also very frustrating to play with, limitations on the range/radius of healing is indispensable. As a result, incentive number two follows immediately, resulting in the bombsquad meta we currently have.

    This means that stacking will always be desirable in one or the other way. To prevent players from actually stacking up, artificial mechanics have to be implemented, which discourage players from stacking. The only way to achieve this, which I know, is AOE spells. They do not necessarily have to deal damage, CC works just as well as debuffs. Unfortunately CC and debuffs are kept in place by purge and retreating maneuver, while AOE damage is reduced by the AOE caps, rendering both tools ineffective.

    As you are already looking into modifying Purge and Barrier, I'd strongly suggest to also revisit Rapid Maneuver as it has a very similar position in PvP combat. The necessity of changing the AOE caps depends on the results of the changes mentioned above.

    To conclude, let's take a look at how i think this problem could be solved while still satisfying all goals:

    Purge:
    • Reduce the radius to 3m
    • Reduce the AOE cap to 3 players
    • Streak treatment

    Barrier:
    • Reduce the duration to 15s
    • Reduce the radius to 6m
    • Reduce the AOE cap to 6 players

    Retreating Maneuver:
    • Reduce the radius to 6m
    • No longer grants Major Gallop
    • Reduce AOE cap to 6
    • Streak treatment

    Charging Maneuver:
    • Now only grants Major Gallop

    AOE Caps:
    • Reduce the radius of all AOE's to 5m
    • Remove the caps
    • Slightly increase the damage of AOE's

    The ideas behind the suggestions:
    Basically CC should be the prime tool to break up stackedd players, therefore the cost for getting rid of CC is very high but doable if major missteps are avoided. Charging Maneuver is now the skill for fast easy fast traveling and therefore does not get the penalties Retreating Maneuver gets.

    As all those skills are still very the easiest to use when stacked unlimited AOE's are the most effective way to punish the unattentive use of this easy formation. The small radius ensures that it is less likely to hit many targets, which in turn makes it more easier to balance AOE's vs single target abilities. As a result the base damage of AOE skills can be increased as their power spike is now less of a problem as it used to be.

    Just my 3 cents. :3
    Edited by Sublime on November 25, 2015 2:05AM
  • Ffastyl
    Ffastyl
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    The best thing for finding out how and why PvP has degraded over time is comparing a time when PvP was more fun to the current build. Looking at pre-1.6 and groups, there were impulse trains and 1vX. Impulse trains aside, ESO PvP was heavily skill based. Given a large enough gap, one person could and did hold a structure (e.g. a gate or bridge) against fifty attackers.

    The reasons this was possible were many. Dynamic ultimate generation allowed ultimate to build faster the more people you fought - more people meant more hits which meant more crits which meant more ultimate (I have to speak on dynamic ultimate generation here). This is what was simultaneously good and bad about the old ultimate generation system: it gave the outnumbered more power but it lacked rewards for those who played well, the intention of the old system. The sole flaw I see in the old dynamic ultimate generation system is awarding ultimate for critical hits. In theory, a critical hit is an uncommon event and is therefore reasonable to add a bonus to - a random bump. With critical rates of 3%, 5%, or even 15%, awarding the infrequent critical hits does not imbalance the skill factor because the collective reward for critical hits is small relative to the rewards for skilled play.

    Critical rates are easily boosted in ESO. Base critical rate is 10% and even a primarily defensive build like my own can reach 25% critical rating with little effort (wear one Medium Armor piece and unlock Perfect Strike under the Ritual tree). As theory crafted on the forum a while back, with the right race, class and trait combination (Khajiiti Nightblade, I believe) it is possible to achieve a critical rate of 107%. Several of my DPS oriented friends mention critical rates in the 80s and 60% as "low." This is why rewarding critical hits is flawed.

    The rest of the dynamic ultimate generation system was fine, awarding ultimate for playing properly. The lack of cooldowns on ultimate generation from any source meant fighting multiple opponents at once multiplied the rate at which ultimate was gained, counter balancing the inherent advantage of superior numbers.

    For illustrative purposes, let blocking an attack award 2 ultimate. I have Empowering Sweep slotted, a 72 cost ultimate. It will take 36 blocked hits to raise the ultimate for its use. If I am fighting one opponent, perhaps a duel, I may be able to use Empowering Sweep once or twice, depending on how adept my foe is at attack weaving / animation canceling. Against two opponents? It will take half as long, perhaps even quicker to reach 72 ultimate as I reflexively hold block more often due to not being able to predict all incoming attacks. Against two I would be able to use Empowering Sweep four, five, six, maybe even seven times across the duration of the 1v2 fight. Now extend that to fighting five opponents, or six. The ultimate generated by blocking attacks from a half dozen players will keep Empowering Sweep active for most of the battle - it might even be usable again before the previous sweep ended at times. The almost constant damage reduction of Empowering Sweep will blunt the collective damage of the six I am fighting, prolonging the fight and giving me a chance of winning. Not a large chance either, as if I kill one, while I am occupied by the other four, the fifth can resurrect the one I killed, undoing my progress towards victory.
    However, it is a larger chance of winning than under the current system(s).

    Back to the tangential topic, 1vXs were also allowed by permablocking in conjunction with block casting, the attackers coming in by twos and threes (there is a skill / experience gap), and the zone of control afforded by AoE attacks.


    Single target attacks on a member of a clustered group are nearly pointless. The several healers will, with the aid of smart healing, undo any damage inflicted almost instantly. One Hit Wonder builds are the only ones that can outpace the constant healing from HoTs (Regeneration, Mutagen, Healing Springs, Vigor, etc.) and instant heals (Breath of Life, Rally, etc.).

    Siege creates (or created) a zone of control, also called a zone/area of denial. The massive damage dealt by siege, almost enough to instantly kill for lower health players, means no player wants to stand in its area of impact. This forced scattering sends some players out of range of the group's healers. No longer receiving healing from several sources, these separated players can be killed by single target attacks.

    Removing AoE caps, as many call for, allows AoE abilities to form zones of control as well. By uncapping the targets and damage, the area of effect of AoE abilities becomes a place players want to avoid, forcing scattering similar to siege. Because these are abilities players can cast on demand, zones of control can be made quickly and tactically, something the sluggish siege engines struggle to do. However AoEs are inherently less debilitating than siege, making siege the winner in any straight fight between the two tools. This is as @FENGRUSH has argued. Removing AoE caps will incentivise players to spread out, leaving the range of healers and becoming susceptible to the (generally) stronger single target attacks.

    But there is a downside to removing AoE caps shown to us by pre-1.6 behavior: impulse trains. While impulse itself has been tweaked, any AoE ability can be used in its stead. A group can ball up tightly and spam a single AoE, the collective damage enough to destroy any who fall within range. Other groups will scatter to avoid such high damage but the AoE train, being mobile, will lock onto a pocket of scattered players and eliminate them, then turn to another pocket of scattered players and repeat. The scattered group can no longer muster the collective damage to stop the train, especially since getting close means death.

    The counter pre-1.6 players found was siege. Siege will always deal more damage than AoE abilities, thus one of the players in the scattered group could place a siege and force the AoE train to scatter. Previously oil pots were the best option because it was easy to lure impulse trains into them and dump. With the 6m minimum height limitation, players will have to use ballistae and catapults to counter AoE trains. It takes skill to hit a moving target with siege, so PvP will not be threatened with returning to a numbers game.

    So, AoE caps. If removed ESO will become a more skill based game on the small to medium scale PvP conflicts. On the large scale conflicts, the group that can ball up tightest and spam AoE most efficiently will win, unless siege is made so significantly stronger that even these large groups will scatter when under siege fire.

    To this end, Purge will need to be addressed, namely capping the number of people it can cleanse or how often it can cleanse the same person. I personally have never used Purge, playing primarily a Templar in PvP. The inclass Purifying Ritual fulfills the same goal of removing debuffs in a different way. Some old threads I have read on balancing Purge suggest moving its debuff removal effect to a synergy, like in Purifying Ritual, since that has a delay on top of a positional/awareness requirement. Aside from this, I cannot offer much on a skill I am ill versed in.

    Magicka Detonation should work similarly to chain lightning, ideally. A spell from Skyrim that reappears in Aetherian Archive during the Mage fight. It deals little to moderate damage (3000 or less tooltip damage for an average build - there will be some crazy min/maxed build with a 6000 tooltip, probably) to a single target but will bounce to a nearby target, dealing increasing damage to all chained. The range of jumping should be 5m, like most splash damage attacks. The chain damage should be similar to the current bonus per person seen under Magicka Detonation, but with a much higher cap - 200% (max 9000 damage for average build) to start. It may be better raise that to 300% (12000) or even 400% (15000) extra damage so that against very large groups it can remove roughly 50% HP from the group. When considering the percentage increase in damage per person, decide what defines a "very large" group. If the percent increase is 10% and the cap 400%, 40 players are needed to reach the maximum damage output of 15k. This also means if it is used on a small group of, say, 6, the bonus damage is a manageable 60% (4800 damage). This chain lightning esque spell should the target and all splash targets with the base damage first before calculating and applying the bonus damage at the end, when there are no more targets to splash to.

    While there is the Mage's ability and current Magicka Detonation code to refer to, I doubt the kind of ability described above will be easy to code and even one use of it will likely require significantly more calculations from the server as it is used on larger groups. Ideal for the player, not the developer, really. As a compromise, Magicka Detonation can see similar base damage and percentage increases and caps as the described ability. The potential range will be shorter, but the potential damage should be the same.

    On reexamination, removing roughly 50% HP from a large group is rather trivial since the healers can refill them. But it will take a while. I almost suggested bumping that maximum bonus damage to be enough for 80% HP but then this becomes a no-skill zerg-buster. Skill should be the biggest factor, not an "I kill armies" button.

    Skill should be the biggest factor but still a factor. If ESO (or any game) becomes purely skill based, all newcomers will be immediately crushed as the veterans have the most skill. But if skill is (largely) removed from the equation, fights become arbitrary and frustrating for anyone beyond newbie in skill. Or a numbers game.



    I hope I managed to one-up myself from the class balance thread. :s
    "A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals and you know it."

    PC NA
    Daggerfall Covenant

    Ffastyl - Level 50 Templar
    Arturus Amitis - Level 50 Nightblade
    Sulac the Wanderer - Level 50 Dragonknight
    Arcturus Leland - Level 50 Sorcerer
    Azrog rus-Oliphet - Level 50 Templar
    Tienc - Level 50 Warden
    Aldmeri Dominion
    Ashen Willow Knight - Level 50 Templar
    Champion Rank 938

    Check out:
    Old vs New Intro Cinematics


    "My strength is that I have no weaknesses. My weakness is that I have no strengths."
    Member since May 4th, 2014.
Sign In or Register to comment.