AoE Caps Discussion

Sublime · November 2015

Lava_Croft wrote: »

A zerg of random players doesn't cause my game to break though. Organized AoE spam blobs do.

Lava_Croft wrote: »

Too many people pretending to be experts and too little actual problem solving.

Um...?

jakobandersen84prb18_ESO · November 2015

I think that ZOS should call valve and ask for lord gaben to fix this broken pvp game

usmcjdking · November 2015

@AFrostWolf this isn't directed at you. You are too nice and reserved to lay it out.

So, in the really real world where if you make a decision people are affected, you have these things called second and third order effects. For those of you who haven't spent any time doing anything else other than being a desk jockey or unemployed college student this is what those closed door 4 hour meetings are about. There is usually lots of yelling, arguing, coffee, Chinese food and tobacco products. Sometimes if you have a hot coworker that's been flirty, it can lead to fun time to blow off some pent up aggression. AoE caps cannot just be removed. Removal of caps will just institute new moans and groans as new ball group strategies are realized and implemented which continues the pain train.

Example (inc RL story and potential feels):
>I get job offer for 250k a year in Lansing, MI
>It's cold, but 250k a year *** YEAH!
>Move there.
>Dog hates cold. She is my little sunshine (half pit, half yellow lab).
>Won't go outside during winter months, won't play inside. (1st order effect)
>She gets depressed. (2nd order effect)
>Starts having health issues. (3rd order effect)
>Move back to liberal land California.
>Runs everyday with me, comes to the boxing gym and flirts with all the boys and demands I take her to the park whenever she feels like it.

If you don't account for 2nd and 3rd order effects, then you have more problems which create more multitudes of bad effects which is how we got to this place in PVP to begin with.

Xsorus · November 2015

Here's an idea; since we've tried a multitude of other band-aid fixes that clearly haven't worked....and since we have countless examples of Caps causing nothing but trouble..lets try for maybe once..not having caps..just to see how it goes.

PainfulFAFA · November 2015

Xsorus wrote: »

Here's an idea; since we've tried a multitude of other band-aid fixes that clearly haven't worked....and since we have countless examples of Caps causing nothing but trouble..lets try for maybe once..not having caps..just to see how it goes.

It would make killing a zerg much easier. Which is what is all about. Efficient ways to destroy a zerg instead of stacking numbers and breaking the hamster wheel that zos calls a "megaserver."

Its already easy picking off zerg stragglers
But when it comes to defending the inside castles, its impossible to dish out damage to every single player when you can only hit 6 people for full damage and HITTING THE SAME 6 PEOPLE A SECOND TIME OR THIRD TIME IS ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE. Don't forget the fact that you can just press 1 button and those 6 people's health are back up to 100%.

Merlight · November 2015

usmcjdking wrote: »

#1 - A vast majority of these calculations have to be via peer simulation which is where the source of desync issues occur (discrepancy between client and host). Your computer/console computes the damage itself (why FPS goes to the trash can) and the server verifies it is correct. Much less taxing on both the network and systems. If it were the opposite (host processes everything), I would expect the lag to be much worse than it currently is and this game to be completely unplayable. That'd simply be too much information to pass over their allocated bandwidth.

Up until the last sentence I was going to give you the benefit of doubt, because we don't know how they implemented it. Although there are some signs. For example several cases of incorrect numbers on the character sheet, explained to be client display issues -- i.e. server had the stats right. As for bandwidth, how exactly is sending "hey, drop Meteor on this guy" from client to server and receiving back "well done, you hit him and these 10 other folks", more information to pass than "hey, drop Meteor on this guy and these 10 slackers around him" and receiving back "well done"?

usmcjdking wrote: »

#2 - Your use of the term overhead is...not right.

Talk about brain block. That paragraph and the two above it were about excess computations.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overhead_(computing)
In computer science, overhead is any combination of excess or indirect computation time, memory, bandwidth, or other resources that are required to attain a particular goal. It is a special case of engineering overhead.

Efficient · November 2015

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.

I just wanted to quote this very good post in the back here, in case people missed it. This is the post you should listen to @Wrobel

@Wrobel What are your thoughts on this? Can you respond? Hello?

usmcjdking · November 2015

Merlight wrote: »

usmcjdking wrote: »

#1 - A vast majority of these calculations have to be via peer simulation which is where the source of desync issues occur (discrepancy between client and host). Your computer/console computes the damage itself (why FPS goes to the trash can) and the server verifies it is correct. Much less taxing on both the network and systems. If it were the opposite (host processes everything), I would expect the lag to be much worse than it currently is and this game to be completely unplayable. That'd simply be too much information to pass over their allocated bandwidth.

Up until the last sentence I was going to give you the benefit of doubt, because we don't know how they implemented it. Although there are some signs. For example several cases of incorrect numbers on the character sheet, explained to be client display issues -- i.e. server had the stats right. As for bandwidth, how exactly is sending "hey, drop Meteor on this guy" from client to server and receiving back "well done, you hit him and these 10 other folks", more information to pass than "hey, drop Meteor on this guy and these 10 slackers around him" and receiving back "well done"?

usmcjdking wrote: »

#2 - Your use of the term overhead is...not right.

Talk about brain block. That paragraph and the two above it were about excess computations.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overhead_(computing)
In computer science, overhead is any combination of excess or indirect computation time, memory, bandwidth, or other resources that are required to attain a particular goal. It is a special case of engineering overhead.

Engine block. Brain block. Vroom vroom? Rust? Dating yourself to 2003? Perhaps the euphemism missed the mark there.

#1 Because this is TCP/IP and not UDP. Host processing ALWAYS requires a 3 SYN-SYN+ACK-ACK for all information, server-client does not once the connection is established. This is clearly evident in how ESO servers deal with fragmented packets (they can't). This is 101 level information.

#2 I stand corrected. Was under the impression overhead is solely utilized for networking.

Higgs_Field · November 2015

usmcjdking wrote: »

More importantly, if information can not be destroyed, then when something quad zeros.....where does it go? @Higgs_Field I SUMMON YOU.

Maybe it falls into a black hole!

Bashev · November 2015

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtN-rB0OQVU

Here is a video of some skills without AoE cap at 1.1

Ara_Valleria · November 2015

Bashev wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtN-rB0OQVU

Here is a video of some skills without AoE cap at 1.1

You stack and dont spread when being bombed... you die.

Looks good to me.

Manoekin · November 2015

Ara_Valleria wrote: »

Bashev wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtN-rB0OQVU

Here is a video of some skills without AoE cap at 1.1

You stack and dont spread when being bombed... you die.

Looks good to me.

This. They never reacted.

Jhunn · November 2015

Day 3:

Still waiting eagerly for @Wrobel response

PainfulFAFA · November 2015

Bashev wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtN-rB0OQVU

Here is a video of some skills without AoE cap at 1.1

Beautiful ;')

Mindlessly spamming aoes like a zerg is gonna get you killed. Thats how it was back then, thats how it should be now.

Ishammael · November 2015

Bashev wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtN-rB0OQVU

Here is a video of some skills without AoE cap at 1.1

Looks about like it should be.

Nifty2g · November 2015

I really don't understand why ZOS want to keep this in the game if majority of the player base is warning you guys not to take the game in this direction. I don't believe AoE caps should be in the game, 1 it promotes bad and mindless play and gives an unfair advantage. 2 The lag that has come from this is just unacceptable to ever let you game get to this point, I'd expect this from a 5 year old game not a recent one. The lag is horrible, since Imperial City I have not gone back into Cyrodill I can't stand it. Removing the AoE caps will be a step in the right direction for both game play and game performance.

FENGRUSH · November 2015

Bashev wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtN-rB0OQVU

Here is a video of some skills without AoE cap at 1.1

Thats amazing - those guys literally walked in there so slowly and even casted a skill or two before bombing. Hilarious. And exactly how it should be.

Ffastyl · November 2015

tinythinker wrote: »

What do you think of Endoc's suggestion of inverting the caps?

This is a good idea to counter zergs, impulse trains and the like, but it also negates the advantage of numbers. Seeing more skill based battles, seeing smaller groups conquer larger groups, seeing valiant stands to the last man is welcome but seeing a true battlefield, littered with hundreds of bodies and hundreds more still fighting in bloody conflict is also welcome. Implementing the reverse caps prevents those epic battles from happening for longer than several seconds. For me, I prefer no caps to inverted, but if small to medium scale PvP is the goal, inverted caps is an answer.

cschwingeb14_ESO · November 2015

This thread has gone downhill in spectacular fashion. Let's get back on track

If target caps on AE damage get removed (out set high enough that they might as well be removed), then AE area/radius NEEDS to be balanced across skills.

I could list what I think radius should be on every ability, but I just want the devs to not be afraid of making some serious changes in that regard.

Melee range is 5-7m. Any person-centered AE should be using that distance as a baseline. And ground target AE DoTs (rain of arrows, blockade) should be larger, simply because of how easy they are to avoid

PainfulFAFA · November 2015

cschwingeb14_ESO wrote: »

This thread has gone downhill in spectacular fashion. Let's get back on track

If target caps on AE damage get removed (out set high enough that they might as well be removed), then AE area/radius NEEDS to be balanced across skills.

I could list what I think radius should be on every ability, but I just want the devs to not be afraid of making some serious changes in that regard.

Melee range is 5-7m. Any person-centered AE should be using that distance as a baseline. And ground target AE DoTs (rain of arrows, blockade) should be larger, simply because of how easy they are to avoid

Agreed
If AoE Caps are removed, i absolutely agree AoE radii will need to be relooked and balanced.
If caps are removed and nothing else changed, all we will see will be steel tornado trains.

Derra · November 2015

Editet out: I don´t see any discussion point anymore. I´m interested in a dev answer that´s about it.

Sublime · November 2015

PainfulFAFA wrote: »

Bashev wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtN-rB0OQVU

Here is a video of some skills without AoE cap at 1.1

Beautiful ;')

Mindlessly spamming aoes like a zerg is gonna get you killed. Thats how it was back then, thats how it should be now.

A couple of points:

dynamic ult generation (i.e. the more the easier)
he was consciously using AOE's to build up ultimate, so I don't why this would be mindless
AOE type skills are most likely intended to be the superior choice against larger groups (again, conscious decision)

Sublime · November 2015

prootch wrote: »

Now in the meanwhile a lot of calculation have been transfered to servers to kill bots and pvp servers are not maintained so often they used to, steel tornadoes did not exist as execute and therefore were not used systematically... ect ect... they are lots of potential causes for lag, among which aoe cap has never been recognized as a major lag factor by zos... and they do have game stats, so if it would be so easy to suppress lag, they would already have done it i'm sure.

And you don't remember, but ... it did lag like hell while approaching that kind of organized aoe spam groups for which winning is more essential than the quality of the gameplay for all other players... and that gameplay is just purely vomitive.

prootch wrote: »

lol just lol. You guys are so obsessed bragging with pugs mass killing you don't even see how aoe lagtrain are killing pvp. And read the above posts for arguments...

prootch wrote: »

Who mainly leads eso pvp where it is today ? Organized aoe lag spam groups that mistake aoe stacking for skills, trying to pretend that pugs are causing lag while they do cause massive lag each time they launch their steel tornagoe-deto-aoe stack spam routine. They could revert to mono target spells easily, and still win fights, but they are far too much interested in "winning" to try reduce they aoe spam lag.

Then again, the lag is the responsability of zos... but it does not qualify their request for aoe decap as valid. And it has been uncapped in the past on spells like pulsar and batswarm... with no positive effect.

prootch wrote: »

So we do know it wont do anything good for depack, we will just get enormous aoe stackers with more lag, aiming to outdamage everyone. I remember pretty well 3 warbands running in circle and dropping distance aoe and siege weapons on it with little effect on that kind of spamball... and incredible lag.

Then the caps were introduced... that's why they exist by the way.

prootch wrote: »

usmcjdking wrote: »

All this talk about lag and calculations is literally like watching circus monkeys try to perform competitive synchronized swimming. Entertaining to say the least.

Precisely what I was saying. No stats, no analysis capacity... so no proof.

What I find entertaining in this field is the absolute certitudes with which some self assumed "experienced" players determine they have any data on what is going on server side calculation...the best scenario is for them to realize that their proposals are in the end only what they would like to happen as far as gameplay is concerned. Except zos no one here has any real statistical knowledge of what could or wouldn't solve lag issues, that matter being complicated enough.

Completely agree on the last paragraph.

prootch · November 2015

Sublime wrote: »

Completely agree on the last paragraph.

Man... I've seen you among others defending aoe decap with so called calculation for pages and pages, and for some of you months and months... as much I appreciate the irony in your last post, i'm happy to to see you get back to evidences: you have no clue, you just have a forum opinion on a target gameplay...

At least i'm not pretending to identify a solution by so called calculation, just stating what I see in game and doubting aoe decap would do the job.

Sublime · November 2015

prootch wrote: »

Man... I've seen you among others defending aoe decap with so called calculation for pages and pages, and for some of you months and months... as much I appreciate the irony in your last post, i'm happy to to see you get back to evidences: you have no clue, you just have a forum opinion on a target gameplay... and you don't like it thrown to your face obviously. too bad.

Detailed arguments, quotes, specific points would really help the discussion here...

prootch · November 2015

Sublime wrote: »

Detailed arguments, quotes, specific points would really help the discussion here...

Detailled argument: you among others have no statistical data on the server capacity needed to address actual ingame damage calculation. Your so called mathematical demonstrations as based on pure assumptions.

So, what I see here are players with a personnal target as far as gameplay is concerned, trying to argue their gameplay choice would cause less lag. They, you, me have really no clue statistically if our choices are the right ones lag wise.

Hopefully, some of you are beginning to realize it... and we will all have to agree our choices (aoe decap or aoe max cap) cannot be labelled "lag free" unless tested in real conditions. It does not make any of theses opinions unvalid, but any of them can be opposed with valid arguments.

@Jhunn
Your arguments are founded on the fact you want to go on with organized aoe farming, possibly more efficiently through aoe decap. I'm telling you I would prefer to kill aoe spamball gameplay. No wonder we don't have the same point of view on a lag killing solution.

1 - there are no proof that aoe decap would eventually lower lag, and so called "calculation" are just lolcats facts when compared to the actual complexity of ingame fights. And as far as soz is concerned, they - do - have the server stats... wether they make good use (or any use) of them is another matter.

2 - aoe decap would certainly not be favourable to the vast majority of players, and certainly favour the most op organized aoe groups, among which yours... I fail to see how making aoe op instant kill more efficient would be favourable to the majority of players.

Sublime · November 2015

prootch wrote: »

Detailled argument: you among others have no statistical data on the server capacity needed to address actual ingame damage calculation. Your so called mathematical demonstrations as based on pure assumptions.

I specifically pointed out that it was built up on assumptions, and doesn't have any evidence behind it.

Sublime wrote: »

So while we're at throwing around assumptions, here are my 2 cents.

prootch · November 2015

ok so lets be pragmatic and discuss what is actually really in our reach with the data we actually have.

Wouldn't you prefer a gameplay where each group should organize assist cells to target specific classes in an opponent raid in order to win a fight. Or do you prefer to just spam so massive aoe damage on an ennemy group until eventually the right targets will explode on impact... just being aoe overwhelmed ?

(provided of course the lag pb would be solved either ways)

I personnaly would prefer to organize each 4 man group in our raid with specific tasks... is it more complicated to lead ? sure it is. Would it offer a better quality gameplay, sure it would.

Lag issues are zos pb, suggestions on gameplay are what they obvioulsy await from us in @Wrobel post. I'm always amazed at players who obviously (from what I read in majority ) don't have the technical background needed to develop and admin a mmorpg , giving dev courses to the actual devs and game owners. I'm not developper, but since I work in the saas business, I'm professionally somewhat aware of network and server calculation complexity facing massive users access.

So let's just take this debate where it should be: gameplay.

Jhunn · November 2015

prootch wrote: »

@Jhunn
Your arguments are founded on the fact you want to go on with organized aoe farming, possibly more efficiently through aoe decap. I'm telling you I would prefer to kill aoe spamball gameplay. No wonder we don't have the same point of view on a lag killing solution.

1 - there are no proof that aoe decap would eventually lower lag, and so called "calculation" are just lolcats facts when compared to the actual complexity of ingame fights. And as far as soz is concerned, they - do - have the server stats... wether they make good use (or any use) of them is another matter.

2 - aoe decap would certainly not be favourable to the vast majority of players, and certainly favour the most op organized aoe groups, among which yours... I fail to see how making aoe op instant kill more efficient would be favourable to the majority of players.

[snip]

Okay. So you don't want AOEs. No AOEs = no way for a smaller group to take out large numbers. What will this be then? A numbers game where a keep is undefendable if you're a group 10 guys defending vs 30 pugs. If you want that, well fine, because you'll probably be a part of the 30 pugs. But I prefer skill > numbers.

Gratz, ZOS has the server stats. How well are they doing with performance? It's logic how no AOE cap would improve PVP performance compared to the 6/24/30 people thing we have now.

[edited for flaming]

Sublime · November 2015

prootch wrote: »

ok so lets be pragmatic and discuss what is actually really in our reach with the data we actually have.

Wouldn't you prefer a gameplay where each group should organize assist cells to target specific classes in an opponent raid in order to win a fight. Or do you prefer to just spam so massive aoe damage on an ennemy group until eventually the right targets will explode on impact... just being aoe overwhelmed ?

(provided of course the lag pb would be solved either ways)

I personnaly would prefer to organize each 4 man group in our raid with specific tasks... is it more complicated to lead ? sure it is. Would it offer a better quality gameplay, sure it would.

Lag issues are zos pb, suggestions on gameplay are what they obvioulsy await from us in @Wrobel post. I'm always amazed at players who obviously (from what I read in majority ) don't have the technical background needed to develop and admin a mmorpg , giving dev courses to the actual devs and game owners. I'm not developper, but since I work in the saas business, I'm professionally somewhat aware of network and server calculation complexity facing massive users access.

So let's just take this debate where it should be: gameplay.

Personally I want a mix of both, just single target abilities makes the game feel like an fps, which I don't want either. Ideally skills like healing would encourage stacking to get the best use out of the resources, while it would be extremely punishing to stack up. In my eyes this would create a interesting playground where there's a choice to make. I think the benefit from stacking would be a good incentive for a high-risk (wipe) reward (barrier on 6 members) scenario.