Every time I am in PVP, everyone is trying to make a large group (i.e. zerg) and complaining about how many green bars there are running around (people who run solo or in pairs, etc).

Joining a 20+ person group (zerg) occasionally can be fun and you can achieve some goals if you plan, but you still need some sort of co-ordination - 24 uncoordinated players in a zerg does not guarantee success.

We have duels and battlegrounds, for 1v1 and small groups. Now you want 'mid-size group' fighting - what is that, 8/10/12 player groups. then someone will want 14/16/18 person groups. Where do we stop?

Me, I am 2 or 3 man group person myself but am still there for the greater good of my alliance. I'll never be emp but I still get my AP, hit the leader board occasionally and have fun. The thought of having to use BG to enjoy any form of PVP is not my idea of fun.

How are you defining a zerg that you see such little skill or learning? (Most of the time when I see my own faction form a "zerg" its a mass of players comprised of 1 or 2 organized groups doing their own thing and the PUGs following them because they look like they know what they are doing. I try to grant the enemy factions the same assumption).

Look, here's my experience. I started off a PVEer who sent into Cyrodiil for skyshards. And then for questing. And then for the alliance war skills. And then, finally, to actually try out "real" PVP.

I started out with no clue. Transitus? Riding? Cyrodiil is very opaque to a new player and so following the crowd is the best option to learning. I died so quick on my own I never had the chance to learn (except learning that being on my own was a bad idea). The reason I learned was because I followed the groups enough, learned how to tell the difference between following an organized group and a random collection of players, and eventually learned through observation and by doing what effective tactics were. Of course, I had to pay attention to what I was doing in order to learn how to do better. So even though I was the very definition of someone "depending on numbers not skill" I was in the process of learning.

I transitioned to one of the those organized groups that I liked running with, and fortunately they were a guild that trains their members in the tactics and strategies that they used. Through running with them for a little over half a year now, I've learned an awful lot about battle tactics, playing the map, and running effectively in both a large organized raid and sometimes small groups. I still can't play solo with any sort of effectiveness - that's just not something I've put in the time to learn to do.

During the Midyear Mayhem event, I got a chance to see how far I'd come. I wound up leading a group of EP pugs one morning in Shor. Now, we were fortunate enough to be the only organized force on the map when we started so most of my work was simply figuring out where we should go next, but I tip my hat to all the PUG wranglers out there. Its hard work, and it gets harder once you start facing opposition. Players who are new to PVP have a ton to learn in order to be effective for their faction, whether that's the basics of sieging keeps (I had to teach that), the strategy of this keep and not that keep (I had to teach that), the skill of keep defense (I had to teach that), or sometimes even the simple math of "you're inexperienced, and we are stronger together, so quit running off to do your own thing, please" (I had to teach that too). I loved that morning, even though it was incredible stressful trying to lead, coordinate and fight sieges, trying to teach new players as much of the "why" I'm telling you to do this, and so on.

There were two things that stuck out to me about that morning. I'd started the group when I'd rode out with four other players, people started LFGing in zone, and I was the only one in the group with a plan, so I got crown. We were the very definition of a PUG zerg-in-the-making. Half my group was new or only out there for the double AP.
First, about halfway through our charge around the Emp ring after we'd just captured Sejanus, someone said in group chat "Wow, PVP is fun when you have an army!" A bunch of people in the group agreed. The thing is, it takes skill and experience to be effective as solo or small group players. No one coming into PVP has that skill or experience without practice. I taught myself to solo resources after I'd played in Cyrodiil for a long time with groups. I didn't jump right into that. A small group of players new to Cyrodiil is completely ineffectual. Of course they have more fun with a group!
Second, we'd made it around the emp ring and now DC was out to play. We met them at Bleakers, us on defense and them with an equal number of DC on the attack. This was the first major opposition my group had faced. We got wiped. Group chat starts up. "Wow." "Well, we got wiped." "We just got ran over by DC." My response was "Yeah, that's what happens when our army meets another army. Rez up at Chalman and we'll fight them again." IIRC we met some EP reinforcements and took Bleakers back. The new players in my group had no context for what they could do or for what the enemy could do to them. Sweeping the map with our group had been their first taste of sustained success in PVP. In the fight at Bleakers, they found out that the enemy could wipe them too, and that the answer was to get up and keep fighting.

From my experience in becoming a PVPer, which I don't think is all that disimilar to a lot of PVEers, joining a group or following the group/zerg is an important step in learning anything at all about PVP in Cyrodiil. When I was learning, I was flailing my way towards effectiveness so that I would never have been remotely effective anywhere other than a large group. Safety in numbers, whether that's organized groups or the "zerg" of disorganized players, was probably the only thing that allowed me to learn about what worked and what didn't in PVP. Without the group, I'd been learning a whole lot more about what didn't work with very few successes.

From the Midyear Mayhem event, that made it clearer that the Cyrodiil PVP experience is very opaque to the average player first setting foot on Alliance War soil. My raid and I did so much teaching those two weeks whenever we picked up pugs from zone. Joining or following a group is at least understandable and when people are willing to explain, players learn so much faster than by trying and failing on their own. Joy_Division's Guide to the Midyear Mayhem Event is still the best introduction to Cyrodiil I have ever found: https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/360956/joy-s-advice-for-midyear-mayhem-event/p1

So I don't know about your experiences with players in a zerg, but I can tell you what I learned from playing in a zerg. I learned to get around Cyrodiil, I learned when to stand and heal, I learned when to run, I learned what skills kept me safe, I learned what skills were effective on enemy players and which weren't. Most importantly, I learned the difference between running with a disorganized group of players with no siege and no plan and running with an organized group with siege and a plan - and I learned which one I preferred. I run with an organized raid now who trained me to be even more effective because I ran with the "zerg". I learned the basics of PVP by running with a zerg.

Other than the lag aspect I don't see why people have a problem with zergs in a game like this, it is supposed to be mass scale PvP, that would include large groups, and as far as games go it is one of the few things that MMORPG PvP actually has to offer over other PvP games, where as in terms of things like 1v1 ESO is just trash compared to fighting games, SC2, etc.

Deep_01 wrote: »

The thing that bothers me is the absolute skill-less-ness playstyle of a zerg (they learn very little in the process) and the amount of reward they can get for that.
And, as for rewards, in 30-day campaign, running solo, I can easily hit leaderboard 60s. I know solo players getting upto leaderboard 5.
I now understand it's a part of Cyro and it isn't going away, but in zergs today, all I see is no effort is put by the individual player to kill or defend. The have little knowledge of what they play. They purely depend on numbers and have no regard for any of resources management, stats, sets or any similar thing. This is the case of majority of Cyro population. I feel disappointed of the fight when I kill an AD August Palatine who has no idea how to fight me 1v1 (uses Resto staff, has healing ward but no idea when to use it and just panicks). I dueled my alliance's Overlord who uses vigor, rally, cleave, dizzy and execute. He did no light attacks or any damage except for his sets. Each duel took less than 15 sec. Is that what PvP is should be? Casual trade of time for sense of thrill and accomplishment with max rewards for least or no effort?

I go into pvp for 3 reasons right now. 1) skyshard hunting. 2) fishing achievements (don't blame ME for pop cap issues, take the fact that there are fish in a pvp zone up with the devs) 3) to unlock skills that I need Alliance ranks for my build. Outside of that i stay out of pvp. When i do, well i zerg. i dont care about skill, i dont care about leader boards, I just want to get my skills unlocked and then leave. You will find in any zerg that about half are like me just trying to get their skills so they can move on. Most zergs rely on groups of 18 to 24 with a core of 6 to 10 elites and the rest scrubs like myself. we distract, heal, and die while the good people do the actual pvping. Alliance Points are given out based on what your group does and where it is (outside of keep flips, etc).

I am not sure how you could change this. Cyro is a big map that was created to facilitate large scale combat which means zergs. not sure how this will change without shrinking group sizes or the population cap. both of which will ruin your pvp experience.

Smaller groups means less room for newer or PVE players in said groups. which gives people like me 3 options: skip PVP, Learn to PVP (the most annoying option for some of us), or we just sit in a keep and defend it being semi AFK until it is attacked and spam chat with I am bored comments.......

If you remove or alienate such a large group of players from groups on such a large map what you will eventually get is a zone that is PVE with occasional PVP.

Here is the real issue, the pvp gameplay changed drastically with the boost in keep take AP. It is no longer about the fighting and killing, it is about getting that tick. This has also helped usher in the age of" unkillable but can't kill *** tank builds "

CyrusArya wrote: »

but deer in headlights when caught in a fair fight kind.

There is very rarely a fair fight in this type of PvP, if some guy from zerg encoutners a guy roaming then that is not a "fair" 1v1 because the roaming guy will have a build designed for smallscale the zerg guy normally will not.

CyrusArya wrote: »

The mount up and chase your group of 2 with 12 people kind.

Whilst at times that sort of thing is lame as hell, what some alleged smallscale players conveniently forget is that often they get chased because they have been ganking zergers going back to their zerg (because ganking some guy in a zerg build is much skill, LOL), because apparently the concept of there being consequences for your actions is unknown to most of the bads that play games like ESO.

There is also a hilarious amount of hypocrisy when you have say a five man group who QQ about being chased by zerg, yet 10 mins earlier they were killing a two man group 5v2, because that is "skilled" gameplay.

Always the hate on zergs.... people thinking small scale is the only "true" way to PvP. A lot of people love large scale fights, and I am gonna continue to zerg surf until Cyrodiil is no more. There is nothing that makes small scale "better" other than the fact that some enjoy it more, others do not, its a taste thing, but just cause you don't like the zerg play style doesn't mean it needs to go.

SydneyGrey wrote: »

Deep_01 wrote: »

Keep capture/defense shouldn't be done by players. It shouldn't be done by 30 players who just die, rez and repeat till one side dominates other in a numbers game. Right now, all I see is that happening in prime time.

?????? If it's not done by players, then who would it be done by?
I agree it's not realistic for people to be able to resurrect and re-join the fight, though.

Realism has no place in this discussion.

OpponentSmile66 wrote: »

Here's an answer to all your problems.

The new sorcerer ultimate who replace the storm atronach?

Still removing the reduced damage if hitting many target with AoE would help
Problem is that an large group has an obvious benefit. An tight formation also make lots of sense.
Real world the american civil war was the end of tight formations as firepower was to large.
Still an large group has an benefit even if having to spread out.
Coordination is more important, you can rip zergs apart pretty easy, has been in them

How to stop zerging and couple other problems in pvp? take lunar infunsion buff (the one that makes you to explode if you hug other player)
from Maw of Lorkhaj and introduce it into pvp in way or another.

PlagueSD wrote: »

You must construct additional pylons to beat the zerg.

i see what you did! nice!

Girl_Number8 wrote: »

Don't worry Op, soon it will just be stamyblades poking each other in stealth.

this is imperial city? right? ;-)

MattT1988 wrote: »

generalmyrick wrote: »

Deep_01 wrote: »

What if I started supplying my alliance zergs with resource poisons for free. Ask them to use it. Give them all cancer build advice in game. Ask them to run Destro and Resto ult etc.

This could lead to other alliance zergs using it too. In a few days or over time they might rage quit on each other and become toxic enough that they leave PvP altogether.

In the meantime, if players playing for love of PvP, keep up the etiquettes, we might later have an almost zerg free cyro.

Thoughts?

EDIT: Let me know if any other ideas to curb zerg groups exist.

a really popular person/youtuber/leader could destroy zerging as a strategic option = by advertising this

You do realise that the majority of the player base don’t give two *** what Youtubers think right? A lot of players that visit the forums might but the forums represent a small part of the gaming community.

mmm....sure.

VaranisArano wrote: »

wazzz56 wrote: »

Here is the real issue, the pvp gameplay changed drastically with the boost in keep take AP. It is no longer about the fighting and killing, it is about getting that tick. This has also helped usher in the age of" unkillable but can't kill *** tank builds "

Or, to put this another way, its less about open field fighting and more about playing the map and capturing or defending objectives that give AP.

Which makes a certain amount of sense. The solution to an unkillable tank who can't kill you in the open field is to ignore that tank and continue towards the objective.

However, I don't see the shift towards rewarding playing the map and capturing objectives to be a bad shift. It just rewards a certain playstyle that focuses on capturing or defending objectives more than open field fighting.

I also like strategic gameplay...