Joy_Division wrote: »

I hate to break it to everyone, but @Wrobel has already answered us and he told us why AoE caps are staying. He just didn't do it explicitly.

Wrobel wrote: »

The two avenues of attack we are perusing are buffing siege weapons and investigating making ranged abilities more effective at damaging large groups of players.

Manoekin wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Erondil wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

andypappb16_ESO wrote: »

Joy_Division wrote: »

I hate to break it to everyone, but @Wrobel has already answered us and he told us why AoE caps are staying. He just didn't do it explicitly.

@Joy_Division
I clearly Missed that..where/what did he say...

Wrobel wrote in this thread:

We want PvP fights to be tactical, involving player positioning as a key element of engagements. We don’t want 2 huge masses of players mindlessly bumping into each other while spamming 1 ability. Part of the issue currently is that damaging PBAoE abilities are very powerful, and there are not a lot of effective options to combat this strategy from range. The two avenues of attack we are perusing are buffing siege weapons and investigating making ranged abilities more effective at damaging large groups of players.

Wheeler is making significant adjustments to siege weapons. You can view and comment on these new changes here. As siege already hits an unlimited number of targets and has an effective cooldown, it’s the perfect tool to get players to spread out.

On the ability side we’ve got a number of changes planned. PBAoE abilities such as Steel Tornado and purge are much too powerful and cause players to want to stack together to make sure they can all hit the same targets and be purged by the same ally. We’ll be reducing the radius of Steel Tornado so it’s not so much more effective at dealing AoE damage relative to the other abilities in the game. Also, we are reducing the initial damage of Magicka Detonation so it’s less effective vs a single target. To compensate, both the bonus damage per target and the max size of this bonus is increasing. In addition to this we’re looking into making other ranged class abilities deal effective AoE damage.

The implication is that they recognize PBAoE is already to strong and encourages stacking/blobbing. Thus they would not make it stronger by raising the caps. They have other solutions in mind for blob/stack busting that do not involve raising AoE caps.

Thankfully we have objective Devs looking out the best interests of the game for everyone versus some players that want to further increase their ability to mindless spam PBAoE and mow down large groups of players.

What you and many others don't understand (including @Wrobel ) is that the removal of dmg AoE caps will incentivize people to spread out. Right now a group of 24 is better of to stack so they can benefit from 37.5% damages reduction (its more mitigation than any ultimate of the game) with AoE smart heals (the 6 taking 100% damages will always be healed first). Now if you remove dmg AoE caps, those groups will want to spread out a bit more, to balance the damage increase. Thus, single target will become more important because an AoE wont hit more than 6 people as often as now. With a removal of AoE caps, you will most likely see AoE less used because people wont stack as much as now, and an AoE is not worth using if it hits less than 4 people.
I will repeat once again, dmg AoE doesnt encourage stacking alone, dmg AoE are meant to do the contrary (look at daoc) but the virtual 37.5% mitigation does. Simply because it makes AoE heals stronger than AoE damages.

I've experienced games where PBAoE without caps has dominated PvP play. Everyone running around in bomb groups mindlessly spamming uncapped AoE ...rinse ....repeat...boring.

Fortunately we dont have this today!

The only true fun fights I have in this game right now are in the open field where AoE button mash groups can be mostly avoided. Inside enclosed areas well that's where the button mashing AoE lagfest hell starts.

Which is why I support the efforts of ZoS to tone down PBAoE mechanics as it is too strong already and not make it worse by simply removing the caps. I know you would like to just run around and kill even larger numbers of players faster with mindless AoE button mashing but thankfully it isn't going to happen.

You missed his point, or you're just avoiding it.

You're trying to say uncapping AOE will lead to something. The reality is though, that "something" is already here, and it's here specifically because of AOE caps. I don't understand how people making this argument figured out how to use these forums in the first place. It's basic common sense.

@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) ...

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.

Sureshawt wrote: »

Erondil wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

andypappb16_ESO wrote: »

Joy_Division wrote: »

I hate to break it to everyone, but @Wrobel has already answered us and he told us why AoE caps are staying. He just didn't do it explicitly.

@Joy_Division
I clearly Missed that..where/what did he say...

Wrobel wrote in this thread:

We want PvP fights to be tactical, involving player positioning as a key element of engagements. We don’t want 2 huge masses of players mindlessly bumping into each other while spamming 1 ability. Part of the issue currently is that damaging PBAoE abilities are very powerful, and there are not a lot of effective options to combat this strategy from range. The two avenues of attack we are perusing are buffing siege weapons and investigating making ranged abilities more effective at damaging large groups of players.

Wheeler is making significant adjustments to siege weapons. You can view and comment on these new changes here. As siege already hits an unlimited number of targets and has an effective cooldown, it’s the perfect tool to get players to spread out.

On the ability side we’ve got a number of changes planned. PBAoE abilities such as Steel Tornado and purge are much too powerful and cause players to want to stack together to make sure they can all hit the same targets and be purged by the same ally. We’ll be reducing the radius of Steel Tornado so it’s not so much more effective at dealing AoE damage relative to the other abilities in the game. Also, we are reducing the initial damage of Magicka Detonation so it’s less effective vs a single target. To compensate, both the bonus damage per target and the max size of this bonus is increasing. In addition to this we’re looking into making other ranged class abilities deal effective AoE damage.

The implication is that they recognize PBAoE is already to strong and encourages stacking/blobbing. Thus they would not make it stronger by raising the caps. They have other solutions in mind for blob/stack busting that do not involve raising AoE caps.

Thankfully we have objective Devs looking out the best interests of the game for everyone versus some players that want to further increase their ability to mindless spam PBAoE and mow down large groups of players.

What you and many others don't understand (including @Wrobel ) is that the removal of dmg AoE caps will incentivize people to spread out. Right now a group of 24 is better of to stack so they can benefit from 37.5% damages reduction (its more mitigation than any ultimate of the game) with AoE smart heals (the 6 taking 100% damages will always be healed first). Now if you remove dmg AoE caps, those groups will want to spread out a bit more, to balance the damage increase. Thus, single target will become more important because an AoE wont hit more than 6 people as often as now. With a removal of AoE caps, you will most likely see AoE less used because people wont stack as much as now, and an AoE is not worth using if it hits less than 4 people.
I will repeat once again, dmg AoE doesnt encourage stacking alone, dmg AoE are meant to do the contrary (look at daoc) but the virtual 37.5% mitigation does. Simply because it makes AoE heals stronger than AoE damages.

I can't figure out whether you really can't understand the destructive result of simply raising AoE caps (especially on damage) or if you think the devs and other players are dumb enough to buy this argument for your own personal entertainment.

I've experienced games where PBAoE without caps has dominated PvP play. Everyone running around in bomb groups mindlessly spamming uncapped AoE ...rinse ....repeat...boring.

I will not play a game completely dominated by running with a group mashing the same button over and over hoping my AoEs wreck the enemy group before theirs do it to mine. It is bad enough right now as it is. AoE should be used tactically in certain situations not spammed every PvP encounter.

Thankfully we have Devs that recognize the danger and are actively seeking other solutions to blobbing/stacking otherwise I'd have to find another game.

Sureshawt wrote: »

Manoekin wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Erondil wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

andypappb16_ESO wrote: »

Joy_Division wrote: »

I hate to break it to everyone, but @Wrobel has already answered us and he told us why AoE caps are staying. He just didn't do it explicitly.

@Joy_Division
I clearly Missed that..where/what did he say...

Wrobel wrote in this thread:

We want PvP fights to be tactical, involving player positioning as a key element of engagements. We don’t want 2 huge masses of players mindlessly bumping into each other while spamming 1 ability. Part of the issue currently is that damaging PBAoE abilities are very powerful, and there are not a lot of effective options to combat this strategy from range. The two avenues of attack we are perusing are buffing siege weapons and investigating making ranged abilities more effective at damaging large groups of players.

Wheeler is making significant adjustments to siege weapons. You can view and comment on these new changes here. As siege already hits an unlimited number of targets and has an effective cooldown, it’s the perfect tool to get players to spread out.

On the ability side we’ve got a number of changes planned. PBAoE abilities such as Steel Tornado and purge are much too powerful and cause players to want to stack together to make sure they can all hit the same targets and be purged by the same ally. We’ll be reducing the radius of Steel Tornado so it’s not so much more effective at dealing AoE damage relative to the other abilities in the game. Also, we are reducing the initial damage of Magicka Detonation so it’s less effective vs a single target. To compensate, both the bonus damage per target and the max size of this bonus is increasing. In addition to this we’re looking into making other ranged class abilities deal effective AoE damage.

The implication is that they recognize PBAoE is already to strong and encourages stacking/blobbing. Thus they would not make it stronger by raising the caps. They have other solutions in mind for blob/stack busting that do not involve raising AoE caps.

Thankfully we have objective Devs looking out the best interests of the game for everyone versus some players that want to further increase their ability to mindless spam PBAoE and mow down large groups of players.

What you and many others don't understand (including @Wrobel ) is that the removal of dmg AoE caps will incentivize people to spread out. Right now a group of 24 is better of to stack so they can benefit from 37.5% damages reduction (its more mitigation than any ultimate of the game) with AoE smart heals (the 6 taking 100% damages will always be healed first). Now if you remove dmg AoE caps, those groups will want to spread out a bit more, to balance the damage increase. Thus, single target will become more important because an AoE wont hit more than 6 people as often as now. With a removal of AoE caps, you will most likely see AoE less used because people wont stack as much as now, and an AoE is not worth using if it hits less than 4 people.
I will repeat once again, dmg AoE doesnt encourage stacking alone, dmg AoE are meant to do the contrary (look at daoc) but the virtual 37.5% mitigation does. Simply because it makes AoE heals stronger than AoE damages.

I've experienced games where PBAoE without caps has dominated PvP play. Everyone running around in bomb groups mindlessly spamming uncapped AoE ...rinse ....repeat...boring.

Fortunately we dont have this today!

The only true fun fights I have in this game right now are in the open field where AoE button mash groups can be mostly avoided. Inside enclosed areas well that's where the button mashing AoE lagfest hell starts.

Which is why I support the efforts of ZoS to tone down PBAoE mechanics as it is too strong already and not make it worse by simply removing the caps. I know you would like to just run around and kill even larger numbers of players faster with mindless AoE button mashing but thankfully it isn't going to happen.

You missed his point, or you're just avoiding it.

You're trying to say uncapping AOE will lead to something. The reality is though, that "something" is already here, and it's here specifically because of AOE caps. I don't understand how people making this argument figured out how to use these forums in the first place. It's basic common sense.

I guess common sense isn't so common. I wanna fix the underlying problem of AoE being the dominant tactic that encourages balling up as does ZoS.

I get that it is already here (I stated that already and so does ZoS). I see it used extensively in any enclosed area or cap areas and sometimes even in the open field.

This idea though that removing AoE caps will make ball groups spread out is pure nonsense because in enclosed areas you can't spread out unlike the open field. Also taking objectives require you to ball up inside the ring to take it.

Simply removing the AoE caps without changing the underlying mechanics first will just result in more of the same except death will come faster for more players.

Is this what you consider compelling game play? Because running around in ball groups spamming AoEs hoping my groups AoEs kill theirs first is not what i consider fun. AoE should be useful when used tactically in certain situations but NOT spammed in every encounter until the cows come home (especially when taking objectives).

IF the underlying mechanics (to either AoE itself or how objectives are captured) are changed AND working as intended then we can discuss removing AoE caps.

I've been down this road before in other games and you don't have to be a genius to figure out how it will end if you simply remove AoE caps without fixing the underlying issues that cause a ball up in the first place.

Manoekin wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Manoekin wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Erondil wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

andypappb16_ESO wrote: »

Joy_Division wrote: »

I hate to break it to everyone, but @Wrobel has already answered us and he told us why AoE caps are staying. He just didn't do it explicitly.

@Joy_Division
I clearly Missed that..where/what did he say...

Wrobel wrote in this thread:

We want PvP fights to be tactical, involving player positioning as a key element of engagements. We don’t want 2 huge masses of players mindlessly bumping into each other while spamming 1 ability. Part of the issue currently is that damaging PBAoE abilities are very powerful, and there are not a lot of effective options to combat this strategy from range. The two avenues of attack we are perusing are buffing siege weapons and investigating making ranged abilities more effective at damaging large groups of players.

Wheeler is making significant adjustments to siege weapons. You can view and comment on these new changes here. As siege already hits an unlimited number of targets and has an effective cooldown, it’s the perfect tool to get players to spread out.

On the ability side we’ve got a number of changes planned. PBAoE abilities such as Steel Tornado and purge are much too powerful and cause players to want to stack together to make sure they can all hit the same targets and be purged by the same ally. We’ll be reducing the radius of Steel Tornado so it’s not so much more effective at dealing AoE damage relative to the other abilities in the game. Also, we are reducing the initial damage of Magicka Detonation so it’s less effective vs a single target. To compensate, both the bonus damage per target and the max size of this bonus is increasing. In addition to this we’re looking into making other ranged class abilities deal effective AoE damage.

The implication is that they recognize PBAoE is already to strong and encourages stacking/blobbing. Thus they would not make it stronger by raising the caps. They have other solutions in mind for blob/stack busting that do not involve raising AoE caps.

Thankfully we have objective Devs looking out the best interests of the game for everyone versus some players that want to further increase their ability to mindless spam PBAoE and mow down large groups of players.

What you and many others don't understand (including @Wrobel ) is that the removal of dmg AoE caps will incentivize people to spread out. Right now a group of 24 is better of to stack so they can benefit from 37.5% damages reduction (its more mitigation than any ultimate of the game) with AoE smart heals (the 6 taking 100% damages will always be healed first). Now if you remove dmg AoE caps, those groups will want to spread out a bit more, to balance the damage increase. Thus, single target will become more important because an AoE wont hit more than 6 people as often as now. With a removal of AoE caps, you will most likely see AoE less used because people wont stack as much as now, and an AoE is not worth using if it hits less than 4 people.
I will repeat once again, dmg AoE doesnt encourage stacking alone, dmg AoE are meant to do the contrary (look at daoc) but the virtual 37.5% mitigation does. Simply because it makes AoE heals stronger than AoE damages.

I've experienced games where PBAoE without caps has dominated PvP play. Everyone running around in bomb groups mindlessly spamming uncapped AoE ...rinse ....repeat...boring.

Fortunately we dont have this today!

The only true fun fights I have in this game right now are in the open field where AoE button mash groups can be mostly avoided. Inside enclosed areas well that's where the button mashing AoE lagfest hell starts.

Which is why I support the efforts of ZoS to tone down PBAoE mechanics as it is too strong already and not make it worse by simply removing the caps. I know you would like to just run around and kill even larger numbers of players faster with mindless AoE button mashing but thankfully it isn't going to happen.

You missed his point, or you're just avoiding it.

You're trying to say uncapping AOE will lead to something. The reality is though, that "something" is already here, and it's here specifically because of AOE caps. I don't understand how people making this argument figured out how to use these forums in the first place. It's basic common sense.

I guess common sense isn't so common. I wanna fix the underlying problem of AoE being the dominant tactic that encourages balling up as does ZoS.

I get that it is already here (I stated that already and so does ZoS). I see it used extensively in any enclosed area or cap areas and sometimes even in the open field.

This idea though that removing AoE caps will make ball groups spread out is pure nonsense because in enclosed areas you can't spread out unlike the open field. Also taking objectives require you to ball up inside the ring to take it.

Simply removing the AoE caps without changing the underlying mechanics first will just result in more of the same except death will come faster for more players.

Is this what you consider compelling game play? Because running around in ball groups spamming AoEs hoping my groups AoEs kill theirs first is not what i consider fun. AoE should be useful when used tactically in certain situations but NOT spammed in every encounter until the cows come home (especially when taking objectives).

IF the underlying mechanics (to either AoE itself or how objectives are captured) are changed AND working as intended then we can discuss removing AoE caps.

I've been down this road before in other games and you don't have to be a genius to figure out how it will end if you simply remove AoE caps without fixing the underlying issues that cause a ball up in the first place.

People aren't balling up because AOE is too strong. If AOE was too strong, people wouldn't ball up because they'd die easily. People ball up because it's the best way to survive due to game mechanics favoring that type of behavior. ZOS wants to encourage people to spread out, but everything they've done and that I've heard in this thread tells me they want the exact opposite.

The underlying issue is AOE caps and don't forget that. That's the main issue at the heart of this discussion. When I come up on some lazy group just standing around afk and we drop a few ultimates and AOE them, and only half of the group dies while the other half lives solely due to RNG factors you have a problem. That's when you're not promoting tactical gameplay. I don't go, "oh man I wish my volley hit harder.. they really need to buff ranged AOE's", or "wow why couldn't we single target that afk group down fast enough they weren't even paying attention". If you want people to spread out more than they do now and encourage smart play there's really only one way to do it. Anything else is just dodging the issue trying to keep it together with bandaids here and there.

You say it will bring death faster and for more players. I say bring it on. People should die faster if they play stupid. People that continue playing in the same fashion will have a hard time. Good luck to them. I remember the days when you used to have to move out of AOE's, and now people just stack up and face tank them. ZOS has moved the game in a direction where we can't go back to that without removing AOE caps. They've shown by increasing the cap that they should be open to this idea. The only other option would be to rebalance the game with softcaps, but that's not happening because of the champion system.

ToRelax wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Manoekin wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Manoekin wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Erondil wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

andypappb16_ESO wrote: »

Joy_Division wrote: »

I hate to break it to everyone, but @Wrobel has already answered us and he told us why AoE caps are staying. He just didn't do it explicitly.

@Joy_Division
I clearly Missed that..where/what did he say...

Wrobel wrote in this thread:

We want PvP fights to be tactical, involving player positioning as a key element of engagements. We don’t want 2 huge masses of players mindlessly bumping into each other while spamming 1 ability. Part of the issue currently is that damaging PBAoE abilities are very powerful, and there are not a lot of effective options to combat this strategy from range. The two avenues of attack we are perusing are buffing siege weapons and investigating making ranged abilities more effective at damaging large groups of players.

Wheeler is making significant adjustments to siege weapons. You can view and comment on these new changes here. As siege already hits an unlimited number of targets and has an effective cooldown, it’s the perfect tool to get players to spread out.

On the ability side we’ve got a number of changes planned. PBAoE abilities such as Steel Tornado and purge are much too powerful and cause players to want to stack together to make sure they can all hit the same targets and be purged by the same ally. We’ll be reducing the radius of Steel Tornado so it’s not so much more effective at dealing AoE damage relative to the other abilities in the game. Also, we are reducing the initial damage of Magicka Detonation so it’s less effective vs a single target. To compensate, both the bonus damage per target and the max size of this bonus is increasing. In addition to this we’re looking into making other ranged class abilities deal effective AoE damage.

The implication is that they recognize PBAoE is already to strong and encourages stacking/blobbing. Thus they would not make it stronger by raising the caps. They have other solutions in mind for blob/stack busting that do not involve raising AoE caps.

Thankfully we have objective Devs looking out the best interests of the game for everyone versus some players that want to further increase their ability to mindless spam PBAoE and mow down large groups of players.

What you and many others don't understand (including @Wrobel ) is that the removal of dmg AoE caps will incentivize people to spread out. Right now a group of 24 is better of to stack so they can benefit from 37.5% damages reduction (its more mitigation than any ultimate of the game) with AoE smart heals (the 6 taking 100% damages will always be healed first). Now if you remove dmg AoE caps, those groups will want to spread out a bit more, to balance the damage increase. Thus, single target will become more important because an AoE wont hit more than 6 people as often as now. With a removal of AoE caps, you will most likely see AoE less used because people wont stack as much as now, and an AoE is not worth using if it hits less than 4 people.
I will repeat once again, dmg AoE doesnt encourage stacking alone, dmg AoE are meant to do the contrary (look at daoc) but the virtual 37.5% mitigation does. Simply because it makes AoE heals stronger than AoE damages.

I've experienced games where PBAoE without caps has dominated PvP play. Everyone running around in bomb groups mindlessly spamming uncapped AoE ...rinse ....repeat...boring.

Fortunately we dont have this today!

The only true fun fights I have in this game right now are in the open field where AoE button mash groups can be mostly avoided. Inside enclosed areas well that's where the button mashing AoE lagfest hell starts.

Which is why I support the efforts of ZoS to tone down PBAoE mechanics as it is too strong already and not make it worse by simply removing the caps. I know you would like to just run around and kill even larger numbers of players faster with mindless AoE button mashing but thankfully it isn't going to happen.

You missed his point, or you're just avoiding it.

You're trying to say uncapping AOE will lead to something. The reality is though, that "something" is already here, and it's here specifically because of AOE caps. I don't understand how people making this argument figured out how to use these forums in the first place. It's basic common sense.

I guess common sense isn't so common. I wanna fix the underlying problem of AoE being the dominant tactic that encourages balling up as does ZoS.

I get that it is already here (I stated that already and so does ZoS). I see it used extensively in any enclosed area or cap areas and sometimes even in the open field.

This idea though that removing AoE caps will make ball groups spread out is pure nonsense because in enclosed areas you can't spread out unlike the open field. Also taking objectives require you to ball up inside the ring to take it.

Simply removing the AoE caps without changing the underlying mechanics first will just result in more of the same except death will come faster for more players.

Is this what you consider compelling game play? Because running around in ball groups spamming AoEs hoping my groups AoEs kill theirs first is not what i consider fun. AoE should be useful when used tactically in certain situations but NOT spammed in every encounter until the cows come home (especially when taking objectives).

IF the underlying mechanics (to either AoE itself or how objectives are captured) are changed AND working as intended then we can discuss removing AoE caps.

I've been down this road before in other games and you don't have to be a genius to figure out how it will end if you simply remove AoE caps without fixing the underlying issues that cause a ball up in the first place.

People aren't balling up because AOE is too strong. If AOE was too strong, people wouldn't ball up because they'd die easily. People ball up because it's the best way to survive due to game mechanics favoring that type of behavior. ZOS wants to encourage people to spread out, but everything they've done and that I've heard in this thread tells me they want the exact opposite.

The underlying issue is AOE caps and don't forget that. That's the main issue at the heart of this discussion. When I come up on some lazy group just standing around afk and we drop a few ultimates and AOE them, and only half of the group dies while the other half lives solely due to RNG factors you have a problem. That's when you're not promoting tactical gameplay. I don't go, "oh man I wish my volley hit harder.. they really need to buff ranged AOE's", or "wow why couldn't we single target that afk group down fast enough they weren't even paying attention". If you want people to spread out more than they do now and encourage smart play there's really only one way to do it. Anything else is just dodging the issue trying to keep it together with bandaids here and there.

You say it will bring death faster and for more players. I say bring it on. People should die faster if they play stupid. People that continue playing in the same fashion will have a hard time. Good luck to them. I remember the days when you used to have to move out of AOE's, and now people just stack up and face tank them. ZOS has moved the game in a direction where we can't go back to that without removing AOE caps. They've shown by increasing the cap that they should be open to this idea. The only other option would be to rebalance the game with softcaps, but that's not happening because of the champion system.

People don't ball up for the single reason of reducing damage and you must know that.

People ball up to reduce damage with the AoE cap but they also do so for the all these reasons as well:

-People ball up to maximize damage/kills with AoE
-People ball up to get AoE purges/heals/shields
-Objective capturing requires players to ball up inside a ring

If you simply raise AoE caps without addressing ALL theses underlying issues that encourage balling up then people will still ball up not because of stupid game play but because the mechanics encourage and in some cases dictate it.

There are plenty of ways to try to address these issues before making an already strong mechanic even stronger particularly one that is already a major contributor in the first place.

So how exactly does removal of AoE caps make them stronger for the stacked up group? Only in the case their enemy does the same. And you don't want to argue now the fight should take longer rather than shorter when both raids make themselves as vulnerable as possible, do you?
In every other scenario, AoE caps are only helping the group that already is spamming PBAoE. Maybe it's a good thing to buff ranged AoEs for example, but it makes little sense doing it before removing the AoE caps. Because that has to happen anyway.

ToRelax wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

ToRelax wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Manoekin wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Manoekin wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Erondil wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

andypappb16_ESO wrote: »

Joy_Division wrote: »

I hate to break it to everyone, but @Wrobel has already answered us and he told us why AoE caps are staying. He just didn't do it explicitly.

@Joy_Division
I clearly Missed that..where/what did he say...

Wrobel wrote in this thread:

We want PvP fights to be tactical, involving player positioning as a key element of engagements. We don’t want 2 huge masses of players mindlessly bumping into each other while spamming 1 ability. Part of the issue currently is that damaging PBAoE abilities are very powerful, and there are not a lot of effective options to combat this strategy from range. The two avenues of attack we are perusing are buffing siege weapons and investigating making ranged abilities more effective at damaging large groups of players.

Wheeler is making significant adjustments to siege weapons. You can view and comment on these new changes here. As siege already hits an unlimited number of targets and has an effective cooldown, it’s the perfect tool to get players to spread out.

On the ability side we’ve got a number of changes planned. PBAoE abilities such as Steel Tornado and purge are much too powerful and cause players to want to stack together to make sure they can all hit the same targets and be purged by the same ally. We’ll be reducing the radius of Steel Tornado so it’s not so much more effective at dealing AoE damage relative to the other abilities in the game. Also, we are reducing the initial damage of Magicka Detonation so it’s less effective vs a single target. To compensate, both the bonus damage per target and the max size of this bonus is increasing. In addition to this we’re looking into making other ranged class abilities deal effective AoE damage.

The implication is that they recognize PBAoE is already to strong and encourages stacking/blobbing. Thus they would not make it stronger by raising the caps. They have other solutions in mind for blob/stack busting that do not involve raising AoE caps.

Thankfully we have objective Devs looking out the best interests of the game for everyone versus some players that want to further increase their ability to mindless spam PBAoE and mow down large groups of players.

What you and many others don't understand (including @Wrobel ) is that the removal of dmg AoE caps will incentivize people to spread out. Right now a group of 24 is better of to stack so they can benefit from 37.5% damages reduction (its more mitigation than any ultimate of the game) with AoE smart heals (the 6 taking 100% damages will always be healed first). Now if you remove dmg AoE caps, those groups will want to spread out a bit more, to balance the damage increase. Thus, single target will become more important because an AoE wont hit more than 6 people as often as now. With a removal of AoE caps, you will most likely see AoE less used because people wont stack as much as now, and an AoE is not worth using if it hits less than 4 people.
I will repeat once again, dmg AoE doesnt encourage stacking alone, dmg AoE are meant to do the contrary (look at daoc) but the virtual 37.5% mitigation does. Simply because it makes AoE heals stronger than AoE damages.

I've experienced games where PBAoE without caps has dominated PvP play. Everyone running around in bomb groups mindlessly spamming uncapped AoE ...rinse ....repeat...boring.

Fortunately we dont have this today!

The only true fun fights I have in this game right now are in the open field where AoE button mash groups can be mostly avoided. Inside enclosed areas well that's where the button mashing AoE lagfest hell starts.

Which is why I support the efforts of ZoS to tone down PBAoE mechanics as it is too strong already and not make it worse by simply removing the caps. I know you would like to just run around and kill even larger numbers of players faster with mindless AoE button mashing but thankfully it isn't going to happen.

You missed his point, or you're just avoiding it.

You're trying to say uncapping AOE will lead to something. The reality is though, that "something" is already here, and it's here specifically because of AOE caps. I don't understand how people making this argument figured out how to use these forums in the first place. It's basic common sense.

I guess common sense isn't so common. I wanna fix the underlying problem of AoE being the dominant tactic that encourages balling up as does ZoS.

I get that it is already here (I stated that already and so does ZoS). I see it used extensively in any enclosed area or cap areas and sometimes even in the open field.

This idea though that removing AoE caps will make ball groups spread out is pure nonsense because in enclosed areas you can't spread out unlike the open field. Also taking objectives require you to ball up inside the ring to take it.

Simply removing the AoE caps without changing the underlying mechanics first will just result in more of the same except death will come faster for more players.

Is this what you consider compelling game play? Because running around in ball groups spamming AoEs hoping my groups AoEs kill theirs first is not what i consider fun. AoE should be useful when used tactically in certain situations but NOT spammed in every encounter until the cows come home (especially when taking objectives).

IF the underlying mechanics (to either AoE itself or how objectives are captured) are changed AND working as intended then we can discuss removing AoE caps.

I've been down this road before in other games and you don't have to be a genius to figure out how it will end if you simply remove AoE caps without fixing the underlying issues that cause a ball up in the first place.

People aren't balling up because AOE is too strong. If AOE was too strong, people wouldn't ball up because they'd die easily. People ball up because it's the best way to survive due to game mechanics favoring that type of behavior. ZOS wants to encourage people to spread out, but everything they've done and that I've heard in this thread tells me they want the exact opposite.

The underlying issue is AOE caps and don't forget that. That's the main issue at the heart of this discussion. When I come up on some lazy group just standing around afk and we drop a few ultimates and AOE them, and only half of the group dies while the other half lives solely due to RNG factors you have a problem. That's when you're not promoting tactical gameplay. I don't go, "oh man I wish my volley hit harder.. they really need to buff ranged AOE's", or "wow why couldn't we single target that afk group down fast enough they weren't even paying attention". If you want people to spread out more than they do now and encourage smart play there's really only one way to do it. Anything else is just dodging the issue trying to keep it together with bandaids here and there.

You say it will bring death faster and for more players. I say bring it on. People should die faster if they play stupid. People that continue playing in the same fashion will have a hard time. Good luck to them. I remember the days when you used to have to move out of AOE's, and now people just stack up and face tank them. ZOS has moved the game in a direction where we can't go back to that without removing AOE caps. They've shown by increasing the cap that they should be open to this idea. The only other option would be to rebalance the game with softcaps, but that's not happening because of the champion system.

People don't ball up for the single reason of reducing damage and you must know that.

People ball up to reduce damage with the AoE cap but they also do so for the all these reasons as well:

-People ball up to maximize damage/kills with AoE
-People ball up to get AoE purges/heals/shields
-Objective capturing requires players to ball up inside a ring

If you simply raise AoE caps without addressing ALL theses underlying issues that encourage balling up then people will still ball up not because of stupid game play but because the mechanics encourage and in some cases dictate it.

There are plenty of ways to try to address these issues before making an already strong mechanic even stronger particularly one that is already a major contributor in the first place.

So how exactly does removal of AoE caps make them stronger for the stacked up group? Only in the case their enemy does the same. And you don't want to argue now the fight should take longer rather than shorter when both raids make themselves as vulnerable as possible, do you?
In every other scenario, AoE caps are only helping the group that already is spamming PBAoE. Maybe it's a good thing to buff ranged AoEs for example, but it makes little sense doing it before removing the AoE caps. Because that has to happen anyway.

Removing AoE caps makes all AoE mechanics stronger in general. I'm not sure how anyone could even fathom that it wouldn't. I never said it would make them stronger for the stacked group per say. Now obviously more players spamming AoE equals more overall damage output but that's a result of multiplicative math.

What you all seem to gloss over every time is the fact that removing the AoE cap will not force people to spread out because they will still ball up for these reasons which raising the cap does not resolve.

-People ball up to maximize damage/kills with AoE
-People ball up to get AoE purges/heals/shields
-Objective capturing requires players to ball up inside a ring


I mean is the issue "We wan't to be able to do damage to more people with AoE spam'
or
is the issue 'We want to encourage players to spread out and not ball up'

I'm starting to sense that people in favor of raising AoE caps are really not interested in resolving the balling up issue but instead just want mash a single button to kill large numbers of players faster to feed their online egos.

You mention 3 points that have been talked about a lot already and in part will definitely be addressed. Removing AoE caps just should be among the first changes, because they more than any other mechanic give an unfair advantage to a specific playstyle.

Sureshawt wrote: »

ToRelax wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Manoekin wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Manoekin wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Erondil wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

andypappb16_ESO wrote: »

Joy_Division wrote: »

I hate to break it to everyone, but @Wrobel has already answered us and he told us why AoE caps are staying. He just didn't do it explicitly.

@Joy_Division
I clearly Missed that..where/what did he say...

Wrobel wrote in this thread:

We want PvP fights to be tactical, involving player positioning as a key element of engagements. We don’t want 2 huge masses of players mindlessly bumping into each other while spamming 1 ability. Part of the issue currently is that damaging PBAoE abilities are very powerful, and there are not a lot of effective options to combat this strategy from range. The two avenues of attack we are perusing are buffing siege weapons and investigating making ranged abilities more effective at damaging large groups of players.

Wheeler is making significant adjustments to siege weapons. You can view and comment on these new changes here. As siege already hits an unlimited number of targets and has an effective cooldown, it’s the perfect tool to get players to spread out.

On the ability side we’ve got a number of changes planned. PBAoE abilities such as Steel Tornado and purge are much too powerful and cause players to want to stack together to make sure they can all hit the same targets and be purged by the same ally. We’ll be reducing the radius of Steel Tornado so it’s not so much more effective at dealing AoE damage relative to the other abilities in the game. Also, we are reducing the initial damage of Magicka Detonation so it’s less effective vs a single target. To compensate, both the bonus damage per target and the max size of this bonus is increasing. In addition to this we’re looking into making other ranged class abilities deal effective AoE damage.

The implication is that they recognize PBAoE is already to strong and encourages stacking/blobbing. Thus they would not make it stronger by raising the caps. They have other solutions in mind for blob/stack busting that do not involve raising AoE caps.

Thankfully we have objective Devs looking out the best interests of the game for everyone versus some players that want to further increase their ability to mindless spam PBAoE and mow down large groups of players.

What you and many others don't understand (including @Wrobel ) is that the removal of dmg AoE caps will incentivize people to spread out. Right now a group of 24 is better of to stack so they can benefit from 37.5% damages reduction (its more mitigation than any ultimate of the game) with AoE smart heals (the 6 taking 100% damages will always be healed first). Now if you remove dmg AoE caps, those groups will want to spread out a bit more, to balance the damage increase. Thus, single target will become more important because an AoE wont hit more than 6 people as often as now. With a removal of AoE caps, you will most likely see AoE less used because people wont stack as much as now, and an AoE is not worth using if it hits less than 4 people.
I will repeat once again, dmg AoE doesnt encourage stacking alone, dmg AoE are meant to do the contrary (look at daoc) but the virtual 37.5% mitigation does. Simply because it makes AoE heals stronger than AoE damages.

I've experienced games where PBAoE without caps has dominated PvP play. Everyone running around in bomb groups mindlessly spamming uncapped AoE ...rinse ....repeat...boring.

Fortunately we dont have this today!

The only true fun fights I have in this game right now are in the open field where AoE button mash groups can be mostly avoided. Inside enclosed areas well that's where the button mashing AoE lagfest hell starts.

Which is why I support the efforts of ZoS to tone down PBAoE mechanics as it is too strong already and not make it worse by simply removing the caps. I know you would like to just run around and kill even larger numbers of players faster with mindless AoE button mashing but thankfully it isn't going to happen.

You missed his point, or you're just avoiding it.

You're trying to say uncapping AOE will lead to something. The reality is though, that "something" is already here, and it's here specifically because of AOE caps. I don't understand how people making this argument figured out how to use these forums in the first place. It's basic common sense.

I guess common sense isn't so common. I wanna fix the underlying problem of AoE being the dominant tactic that encourages balling up as does ZoS.

I get that it is already here (I stated that already and so does ZoS). I see it used extensively in any enclosed area or cap areas and sometimes even in the open field.

This idea though that removing AoE caps will make ball groups spread out is pure nonsense because in enclosed areas you can't spread out unlike the open field. Also taking objectives require you to ball up inside the ring to take it.

Simply removing the AoE caps without changing the underlying mechanics first will just result in more of the same except death will come faster for more players.

Is this what you consider compelling game play? Because running around in ball groups spamming AoEs hoping my groups AoEs kill theirs first is not what i consider fun. AoE should be useful when used tactically in certain situations but NOT spammed in every encounter until the cows come home (especially when taking objectives).

IF the underlying mechanics (to either AoE itself or how objectives are captured) are changed AND working as intended then we can discuss removing AoE caps.

I've been down this road before in other games and you don't have to be a genius to figure out how it will end if you simply remove AoE caps without fixing the underlying issues that cause a ball up in the first place.

People aren't balling up because AOE is too strong. If AOE was too strong, people wouldn't ball up because they'd die easily. People ball up because it's the best way to survive due to game mechanics favoring that type of behavior. ZOS wants to encourage people to spread out, but everything they've done and that I've heard in this thread tells me they want the exact opposite.

The underlying issue is AOE caps and don't forget that. That's the main issue at the heart of this discussion. When I come up on some lazy group just standing around afk and we drop a few ultimates and AOE them, and only half of the group dies while the other half lives solely due to RNG factors you have a problem. That's when you're not promoting tactical gameplay. I don't go, "oh man I wish my volley hit harder.. they really need to buff ranged AOE's", or "wow why couldn't we single target that afk group down fast enough they weren't even paying attention". If you want people to spread out more than they do now and encourage smart play there's really only one way to do it. Anything else is just dodging the issue trying to keep it together with bandaids here and there.

You say it will bring death faster and for more players. I say bring it on. People should die faster if they play stupid. People that continue playing in the same fashion will have a hard time. Good luck to them. I remember the days when you used to have to move out of AOE's, and now people just stack up and face tank them. ZOS has moved the game in a direction where we can't go back to that without removing AOE caps. They've shown by increasing the cap that they should be open to this idea. The only other option would be to rebalance the game with softcaps, but that's not happening because of the champion system.

People don't ball up for the single reason of reducing damage and you must know that.

People ball up to reduce damage with the AoE cap but they also do so for the all these reasons as well:

-People ball up to maximize damage/kills with AoE
-People ball up to get AoE purges/heals/shields
-Objective capturing requires players to ball up inside a ring

If you simply raise AoE caps without addressing ALL theses underlying issues that encourage balling up then people will still ball up not because of stupid game play but because the mechanics encourage and in some cases dictate it.

There are plenty of ways to try to address these issues before making an already strong mechanic even stronger particularly one that is already a major contributor in the first place.

So how exactly does removal of AoE caps make them stronger for the stacked up group? Only in the case their enemy does the same. And you don't want to argue now the fight should take longer rather than shorter when both raids make themselves as vulnerable as possible, do you?
In every other scenario, AoE caps are only helping the group that already is spamming PBAoE. Maybe it's a good thing to buff ranged AoEs for example, but it makes little sense doing it before removing the AoE caps. Because that has to happen anyway.

Removing AoE caps makes all AoE mechanics stronger in general. I'm not sure how anyone could even fathom that it wouldn't. I never said it would make them stronger for the stacked group per say. Now obviously more players spamming AoE equals more overall damage output but that's a result of multiplicative math.

What you all seem to gloss over every time is the fact that removing the AoE cap will not force people to spread out because they will still ball up for these reasons which raising the cap does not resolve.

-People ball up to maximize damage/kills with AoE
-People ball up to get AoE purges/heals/shields
-Objective capturing requires players to ball up inside a ring


I mean is the issue "We wan't to be able to do damage to more people with AoE spam'
or
is the issue 'We want to encourage players to spread out and not ball up'

I'm starting to sense that people in favor of raising AoE caps are really not interested in resolving the balling up issue but instead just want mash a single button to kill large numbers of players faster to feed their online egos.

Sureshawt wrote: »

-People ball up to maximize damage/kills with AoE
-People ball up to get AoE purges/heals/shields
-Objective capturing requires players to ball up inside a ring

Sureshawt wrote: »

Manoekin wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Manoekin wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

Erondil wrote: »

Sureshawt wrote: »

andypappb16_ESO wrote: »

Joy_Division wrote: »

I hate to break it to everyone, but @Wrobel has already answered us and he told us why AoE caps are staying. He just didn't do it explicitly.

@Joy_Division
I clearly Missed that..where/what did he say...

Wrobel wrote in this thread:

We want PvP fights to be tactical, involving player positioning as a key element of engagements. We don’t want 2 huge masses of players mindlessly bumping into each other while spamming 1 ability. Part of the issue currently is that damaging PBAoE abilities are very powerful, and there are not a lot of effective options to combat this strategy from range. The two avenues of attack we are perusing are buffing siege weapons and investigating making ranged abilities more effective at damaging large groups of players.

Wheeler is making significant adjustments to siege weapons. You can view and comment on these new changes here. As siege already hits an unlimited number of targets and has an effective cooldown, it’s the perfect tool to get players to spread out.

On the ability side we’ve got a number of changes planned. PBAoE abilities such as Steel Tornado and purge are much too powerful and cause players to want to stack together to make sure they can all hit the same targets and be purged by the same ally. We’ll be reducing the radius of Steel Tornado so it’s not so much more effective at dealing AoE damage relative to the other abilities in the game. Also, we are reducing the initial damage of Magicka Detonation so it’s less effective vs a single target. To compensate, both the bonus damage per target and the max size of this bonus is increasing. In addition to this we’re looking into making other ranged class abilities deal effective AoE damage.

The implication is that they recognize PBAoE is already to strong and encourages stacking/blobbing. Thus they would not make it stronger by raising the caps. They have other solutions in mind for blob/stack busting that do not involve raising AoE caps.

Thankfully we have objective Devs looking out the best interests of the game for everyone versus some players that want to further increase their ability to mindless spam PBAoE and mow down large groups of players.

What you and many others don't understand (including @Wrobel ) is that the removal of dmg AoE caps will incentivize people to spread out. Right now a group of 24 is better of to stack so they can benefit from 37.5% damages reduction (its more mitigation than any ultimate of the game) with AoE smart heals (the 6 taking 100% damages will always be healed first). Now if you remove dmg AoE caps, those groups will want to spread out a bit more, to balance the damage increase. Thus, single target will become more important because an AoE wont hit more than 6 people as often as now. With a removal of AoE caps, you will most likely see AoE less used because people wont stack as much as now, and an AoE is not worth using if it hits less than 4 people.
I will repeat once again, dmg AoE doesnt encourage stacking alone, dmg AoE are meant to do the contrary (look at daoc) but the virtual 37.5% mitigation does. Simply because it makes AoE heals stronger than AoE damages.

I've experienced games where PBAoE without caps has dominated PvP play. Everyone running around in bomb groups mindlessly spamming uncapped AoE ...rinse ....repeat...boring.

Fortunately we dont have this today!

The only true fun fights I have in this game right now are in the open field where AoE button mash groups can be mostly avoided. Inside enclosed areas well that's where the button mashing AoE lagfest hell starts.

Which is why I support the efforts of ZoS to tone down PBAoE mechanics as it is too strong already and not make it worse by simply removing the caps. I know you would like to just run around and kill even larger numbers of players faster with mindless AoE button mashing but thankfully it isn't going to happen.

You missed his point, or you're just avoiding it.

You're trying to say uncapping AOE will lead to something. The reality is though, that "something" is already here, and it's here specifically because of AOE caps. I don't understand how people making this argument figured out how to use these forums in the first place. It's basic common sense.

I guess common sense isn't so common. I wanna fix the underlying problem of AoE being the dominant tactic that encourages balling up as does ZoS.

I get that it is already here (I stated that already and so does ZoS). I see it used extensively in any enclosed area or cap areas and sometimes even in the open field.

This idea though that removing AoE caps will make ball groups spread out is pure nonsense because in enclosed areas you can't spread out unlike the open field. Also taking objectives require you to ball up inside the ring to take it.

Simply removing the AoE caps without changing the underlying mechanics first will just result in more of the same except death will come faster for more players.

Is this what you consider compelling game play? Because running around in ball groups spamming AoEs hoping my groups AoEs kill theirs first is not what i consider fun. AoE should be useful when used tactically in certain situations but NOT spammed in every encounter until the cows come home (especially when taking objectives).

IF the underlying mechanics (to either AoE itself or how objectives are captured) are changed AND working as intended then we can discuss removing AoE caps.

I've been down this road before in other games and you don't have to be a genius to figure out how it will end if you simply remove AoE caps without fixing the underlying issues that cause a ball up in the first place.

People aren't balling up because AOE is too strong. If AOE was too strong, people wouldn't ball up because they'd die easily. People ball up because it's the best way to survive due to game mechanics favoring that type of behavior. ZOS wants to encourage people to spread out, but everything they've done and that I've heard in this thread tells me they want the exact opposite.

The underlying issue is AOE caps and don't forget that. That's the main issue at the heart of this discussion. When I come up on some lazy group just standing around afk and we drop a few ultimates and AOE them, and only half of the group dies while the other half lives solely due to RNG factors you have a problem. That's when you're not promoting tactical gameplay. I don't go, "oh man I wish my volley hit harder.. they really need to buff ranged AOE's", or "wow why couldn't we single target that afk group down fast enough they weren't even paying attention". If you want people to spread out more than they do now and encourage smart play there's really only one way to do it. Anything else is just dodging the issue trying to keep it together with bandaids here and there.

You say it will bring death faster and for more players. I say bring it on. People should die faster if they play stupid. People that continue playing in the same fashion will have a hard time. Good luck to them. I remember the days when you used to have to move out of AOE's, and now people just stack up and face tank them. ZOS has moved the game in a direction where we can't go back to that without removing AOE caps. They've shown by increasing the cap that they should be open to this idea. The only other option would be to rebalance the game with softcaps, but that's not happening because of the champion system.

People don't ball up for the single reason of reducing damage and you must know that.

People ball up to reduce damage with the AoE cap but they also do so for the all these reasons as well:

-People ball up to maximize damage/kills with AoE
-People ball up to get AoE purges/heals/shields
-Objective capturing requires players to ball up inside a ring

If you simply raise AoE caps without addressing ALL theses underlying issues that encourage balling up then people will still ball up not because of stupid game play but because the mechanics encourage and in some cases dictate it.

There are plenty of ways to try to address these issues before making an already strong mechanic even stronger particularly one that is already a major contributor in the first place.