Removing AOE Caps is a good first step, but more needs to be done

RinaldoGandolphi · January 2018

@ZOS_Wrobel @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_RichLambert

Hi, First off I just want to say thank you for the work you have done on this update. It is looking to be one of the best updates to come out in sometime, and I want make sure your hard work on this update is recognized. Good job, and thanks again!. The new houses look absolutely outstanding, and im not keen on the houses. I have to admit though, they got me wanting to get one!

That being said:

The Removal of AOE Caps

The removal of AOE caps was a good first step! This needed to be done for a variety of reasons that I don't want to repeat here. Allowing outnumbered folks a chance, and some relief on server resources should be noticable. There is however one noticable side effect to removing AOE caps:

it makes AOE's especially PBAOE significantly more powerful. All the so called "Ball Groups" many on here complain about just got a massive buff from the removal of AOE caps, and it will be them that benefits the most from their removal. In the state of the game currently, unorganized players and groups only chance of killing a raid like VE or Drac is by simply stacking more numbers. Yes, this isn't ideal, but its the only way they would have a chance of killing them. Otherwise they would roam free as completely unkillable by the unorganized pugs(lots of Cyrodiil is casual)

Just removing AOE caps alone just further punishes pugs, and has the potential to maybe blow up in everyones faces as guilds like VE, Drac, Zerg Squad, and Fantasia for example who already dominate pugs anyways will dominate them even more to the point they will have no chance whatsoever, and that leads to people quitting.

There is however a solution to this problem, @ZOS_BrianWheeler had the right idea back in 2015 to fix this problem, but for some reason it was backed away from back then and I really don't understand why.

Siege Needs to be buffed to compensate for AOE Cap removal

This has nothing to do with "point and click warriors" and everything to do with balance.

From Wrobels own mouth and I quote:

zos_wrobel wrote:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/232730/aoe-caps-discussion

https://www.reddit.com/r/elderscrollsonline/comments/3vs9ns/quote_from_eso_dev_regarding_aoe_caps/

Thanks for spending so much time and effort writing up detailed posts on this topic. PvP players are very passionate and seeing passionate fans enjoy the game is the reason we get up in the morning.

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.

These modifications are substantial, and we don’t want to stack too many changes at once. We need to be able to measure the impact and performance changes. We’re going to continue working on performance in Cyrodiil - Fixing the lag is something everyone wants to fix.

Here are some additional issues we’re considering based on your feedback from this thread:

• Cone abilities are much harder to hit with than a standard circle, but aren't more effective

• Multiple gap closers used on the same target means they can’t move

• Cammo hunter stealth attacks can double proc, killing targets very quickly

• Force pulse counts as 3 reflects against Reflective Scales

• Retreating Maneuver buff sticks on healers while they are casting

• XP to advance Assault and Support skill lines is very high

So Wrobel admitted that the stack and PBAOE spam lacks counters FROM RANGE and siege was the PERFECT hard counter for this. You cna't exactly take 3-4 people and kill a 16-24 man VE/Drac raid that is using this PBAOE, and you most certinaly will have no chance of doing it without AOE caps. The removal of AOe caps is a HUGE BUFF to organized raids, and pugs will have absolutely no chance whatsoever against these ball groups, none.

We had 3 weeks where siege was an effective counter. I know guys like @Agrippa_Invisus remember, because those were 3 weeks in 2015 where pvp was pretty much lag free. After that, for some reason you guys rolled back the siege buffs, for reasons I really don't understand, and ball groups went right back to dominating.

Siege needs to be buffed significantly from what it is right now...ball groups are impossible to counter from range, and are impossible to counter now without superior numbers or another ball group...this is unhealthy for the game as a whole and is a big reason so many people left.

I am the biggest advocate for "outplaying your opposition" in order to win, but a removal of AOE caps without a significant buff to siege weapons(to give pugs and ungrouped players a viable hard counter) will be a huge boon and buff for the ball groups everyone so desperately wants to split up. Skills would have to be significantly changed, you might even have to change the whole game to address this issue any other way. I like the game the way it is now, the skills are fun and interesting for the most part, but siege needs to be more effective.

its impossible to counter a ball group from range with any skill in the game, siege in its current state is absolutely useless against them as they can heal right through it.Any player that doesn't want to be part of a ball group, with siege in its current state, has getting steamrolled by a ball zerg to look forward to if siege is not properly addressed.

Siege needs a significant buff in its damage across the board...it needs to be "Scary" to be in that circle. I wouldn't even be opposed to the intial hit of Ballista's and Trebs doing 70% of your max health in damage with the damge dot ticking 3 times for 10% max health(that may be extreme I do admit), but something needs to be done.

in Trials if you stand in red...you die...in PVP you stand in red and laugh with your ball group...this kinda behavior should not be encouraged, and pugs need to have some sort of chance against these ball groups. Right now the only chance they have is numbers, after the AOE cap removal they have no chance, even if they do outnumber them....siege needs to be the equalizer it was designed to be...shelling your target with artillery is and should be a valid tactic, and it should hurt badly, far more then any other player skill in the game....

Ball groups have only been so dominant because siege has been emasculated in this game for far too long, thus the only ranged counter to ball groups was and still is toothless. Until siege is made a vaible ranged counter to ball groups, they will continue to dominate this game. If siege is not adjusted prior to this change going live, all the pugs might as well log out the moment an elite guild comes on, because you will have absolutely no chance whatsoever of defending any objectives against them.

Again I am not against AOE cap removal, Im all for it. I also recognize that siege needs to be buffed to compensate, and their needs to be more ranged counters to these types of groups.

thank you for your time, and thanks again for all you do.

sincerely

Rinaldo

PS: no offense to any of the guilds mentioned here, its a compliment. I see you all as the elite of the group raids. So please don't take it as disrespect, your the best at what you do. be proud of it.

Rianai · January 2018

I'd rather have to deal with ball groups than buffed siege ...

techprince · January 2018

Seige does decent dmg in nocp environment. However, cp makes this dmg laughable. How about increasing the damage done according to the number of players in the radius?

Takuto · January 2018

Remove the 2 second cast time from "Inevitable Detonation" and make it instant cast.
I think this change alone would pretty much spell and end to the ball group meta.

Recremen · January 2018

I can see where you're coming from, but I absolutely do not agree. I would rather still have to fight ball groups (which aren't even ball groups any more, they are just large groups) than deal with massive siege damage again. We've been down that road many times in the past and it is without a doubt one of the worst things to happen to PvP every time it comes around.

Siege damage is already an extremely powerful game-changing tool in a keep battle. Good countersiege can apply a great deal of pressure even to experienced groups stacking siege shields and purges. That's already the case on live. If you get enough countersiege up and know how to hit opponents with it through coordinated strikes, then you can severely stall or even stop a siege effort, allowing the attacking group to be harried at the flanks and eventually overwhelmed by reinforcements.

I know you claim that it's not about enabling point-and-click warriors, but that is frankly an empty statement, since the actual end effect is entirely about enabling point-and-click warriors. At some point, you need to value good coordinated play instead of the ability to sit back in safety and deal massive damage without effort.

Seriously, what is the actual end game for the people complaining about ball groups? How spread out do people need to be for you to be satisfied? Use hard figures or some kind of metric. Is it a certain number of meters? The length of a gap closer? What? And what will it accomplish? Should Cyro just be a series of one-on-one fights in the general proximity of each other? Should people who like large group play have to coordinate single-target attacks from 30 meters away from each other? What do you actually want combat to look like?

Sandman929 · January 2018

I guess it depends on how you interpret the direction of this "first step". I'm not convinced removing AoE caps is in the direction of eliminating ball-groups as much as it is a step in the direction of harming the ungrouped masses that ball-groups target.

Recremen · January 2018

Sandman929 wrote: »

I guess it depends on how you interpret the direction of this "first step". I'm not convinced removing AoE caps is in the direction of eliminating ball-groups as much as it is a step in the direction of harming the ungrouped masses that ball-groups target.

Honestly it goes both ways. It makes scrubs zerg diving hit better, but if a bunch of other scrubs are not simultaneously also diving in then they aren't likely going to deal the damage to take anyone out. But if they DO get a bunch of other people coordinated enough to all dive in and deal some vicious AoE, they're no longer scrubs, they're just another coordinated "ball group". Not to say that everyone not in a coordinated group is a scrub, you just don't see not-scrub solo players leaping into a 16+ member group.

Now the big thing with this change is that there is no longer a damage drop off. You would be extremely hard pressed on live to hit even 20 people with a single AoE, let alone 60. That was never the issue. But this lack of a damage drop off does mean that however many you hit get the full damage, whereas before after a certain number you're doing less and less to further targets. This will increase the stress on group play, as they now have to heal and survive more damage on average than they used to take, but it also benefits them if their damage is well-coordinated because nobody is going to take reduced damage just from being in a zerg. That could make help secure more full group wipes than before, where the cockroach effect normally takes hold. So we'll see.

Sandman929 · January 2018

Recremen wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

I guess it depends on how you interpret the direction of this "first step". I'm not convinced removing AoE caps is in the direction of eliminating ball-groups as much as it is a step in the direction of harming the ungrouped masses that ball-groups target.

Honestly it goes both ways. It makes scrubs zerg diving hit better, but if a bunch of other scrubs are not simultaneously also diving in then they aren't likely going to deal the damage to take anyone out. But if they DO get a bunch of other people coordinated enough to all dive in and deal some vicious AoE, they're no longer scrubs, they're just another coordinated "ball group". Not to say that everyone not in a coordinated group is a scrub, you just don't see not-scrub solo players leaping into a 16+ member group.

Now the big thing with this change is that there is no longer a damage drop off. You would be extremely hard pressed on live to hit even 20 people with a single AoE, let alone 60. That was never the issue. But this lack of a damage drop off does mean that however many you hit get the full damage, whereas before after a certain number you're doing less and less to further targets. This will increase the stress on group play, as they now have to heal and survive more damage on average than they used to take, but it also benefits them if their damage is well-coordinated because nobody is going to take reduced damage just from being in a zerg. That could make help secure more full group wipes than before, where the cockroach effect normally takes hold. So we'll see.

That's what I mean. I don't see the removal of AoE caps as a detriment to a coordinated group, it's a detriment to the zerg they're attacking. It helps small group Vs larger group (a bit), and it helps large group Vs zerg, but it's not a step toward making coordination less relevant.

zyk · January 2018

Helping disrupt ball groups was something I've enjoyed doing in the past. After the nerfs to Barrier/Rapids/Purge in 2.3, ball groups were in a good place in terms of balance, I think, until 3.1. Skilled ungrouped randoms could and did defeat them and individual bombers/disruptors could be difference makers.

What's made all ball groups OP recently is the Earthgore monster set that was introduced in 3.1. It has made even the most mediocre ball groups formidable and tough for individual players to have an impact against. I'm very surprised ZOS isn't taking a harder look at this set in this PTS.

I've never been for or against AE caps. There's a lot of reasons for and against them and it ultimately comes down to personal preference. However, the way ZOS is removing them is reckless because they've been in the game for so long that practically every AE is balanced according to them by now. This blanket change will impact each AE differently and therefore balance will surely suffer in ways that cannot be exposed by the kind of activity seen on PTS.

It's much like the blanket change to proc sets that removed their ability to crit -- or, more specifically, changed their crit modifier to 0. This change affected each proc set differently and failed to address many of the problematic sets, resulting in more changes later. Not only did the blanket change to proc sets not solve the issue players had with sets like Viper's Sting at the time, it made the zerg buster set Vicious Death much less effective and is one of the factors that has lead to the improved survivability of ball groups.

I hate to sound overly critical of ZOS by calling them lazy, but that's what blanket changes are. They need to enable their game designers the time and resources needed to make meaningful changes to AvA gameplay that consider nuances and won't make problems worse. Had ZOS done this prior to 3.1, I think the ball group stress experienced by AvA players over the past few months could have been avoided.

Minno · January 2018

Sandman929 wrote: »

Recremen wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

I guess it depends on how you interpret the direction of this "first step". I'm not convinced removing AoE caps is in the direction of eliminating ball-groups as much as it is a step in the direction of harming the ungrouped masses that ball-groups target.

Honestly it goes both ways. It makes scrubs zerg diving hit better, but if a bunch of other scrubs are not simultaneously also diving in then they aren't likely going to deal the damage to take anyone out. But if they DO get a bunch of other people coordinated enough to all dive in and deal some vicious AoE, they're no longer scrubs, they're just another coordinated "ball group". Not to say that everyone not in a coordinated group is a scrub, you just don't see not-scrub solo players leaping into a 16+ member group.

Now the big thing with this change is that there is no longer a damage drop off. You would be extremely hard pressed on live to hit even 20 people with a single AoE, let alone 60. That was never the issue. But this lack of a damage drop off does mean that however many you hit get the full damage, whereas before after a certain number you're doing less and less to further targets. This will increase the stress on group play, as they now have to heal and survive more damage on average than they used to take, but it also benefits them if their damage is well-coordinated because nobody is going to take reduced damage just from being in a zerg. That could make help secure more full group wipes than before, where the cockroach effect normally takes hold. So we'll see.

That's what I mean. I don't see the removal of AoE caps as a detriment to a coordinated group, it's a detriment to the zerg they're attacking. It helps small group Vs larger group (a bit), and it helps large group Vs zerg, but it's not a step toward making coordination less relevant.

Helps bombers too, which were the closest direct counter to raid groups.

asneakybanana · January 2018

RinaldoGandolphi wrote: »

@ZOS_Wrobel @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_RichLambert

Hi, First off I just want to say thank you for the work you have done on this update. It is looking to be one of the best updates to come out in sometime, and I want make sure your hard work on this update is recognized. Good job, and thanks again!. The new houses look absolutely outstanding, and im not keen on the houses. I have to admit though, they got me wanting to get one!

That being said:

The Removal of AOE Caps

The removal of AOE caps was a good first step! This needed to be done for a variety of reasons that I don't want to repeat here. Allowing outnumbered folks a chance, and some relief on server resources should be noticable. There is however one noticable side effect to removing AOE caps:

it makes AOE's especially PBAOE significantly more powerful. All the so called "Ball Groups" many on here complain about just got a massive buff from the removal of AOE caps, and it will be them that benefits the most from their removal. In the state of the game currently, unorganized players and groups only chance of killing a raid like VE or Drac is by simply stacking more numbers. Yes, this isn't ideal, but its the only way they would have a chance of killing them. Otherwise they would roam free as completely unkillable by the unorganized pugs(lots of Cyrodiil is casual)

Just removing AOE caps alone just further punishes pugs, and has the potential to maybe blow up in everyones faces as guilds like VE, Drac, Zerg Squad, and Fantasia for example who already dominate pugs anyways will dominate them even more to the point they will have no chance whatsoever, and that leads to people quitting.

There is however a solution to this problem, @ZOS_BrianWheeler had the right idea back in 2015 to fix this problem, but for some reason it was backed away from back then and I really don't understand why.

Siege Needs to be buffed to compensate for AOE Cap removal

This has nothing to do with "point and click warriors" and everything to do with balance.

From Wrobels own mouth and I quote:

zos_wrobel wrote:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/232730/aoe-caps-discussion

https://www.reddit.com/r/elderscrollsonline/comments/3vs9ns/quote_from_eso_dev_regarding_aoe_caps/

Thanks for spending so much time and effort writing up detailed posts on this topic. PvP players are very passionate and seeing passionate fans enjoy the game is the reason we get up in the morning.

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.

These modifications are substantial, and we don’t want to stack too many changes at once. We need to be able to measure the impact and performance changes. We’re going to continue working on performance in Cyrodiil - Fixing the lag is something everyone wants to fix.

Here are some additional issues we’re considering based on your feedback from this thread:

• Cone abilities are much harder to hit with than a standard circle, but aren't more effective

• Multiple gap closers used on the same target means they can’t move

• Cammo hunter stealth attacks can double proc, killing targets very quickly

• Force pulse counts as 3 reflects against Reflective Scales

• Retreating Maneuver buff sticks on healers while they are casting

• XP to advance Assault and Support skill lines is very high

So Wrobel admitted that the stack and PBAOE spam lacks counters FROM RANGE and siege was the PERFECT hard counter for this. You cna't exactly take 3-4 people and kill a 16-24 man VE/Drac raid that is using this PBAOE, and you most certinaly will have no chance of doing it without AOE caps. The removal of AOe caps is a HUGE BUFF to organized raids, and pugs will have absolutely no chance whatsoever against these ball groups, none.

We had 3 weeks where siege was an effective counter. I know guys like @Agrippa_Invisus remember, because those were 3 weeks in 2015 where pvp was pretty much lag free. After that, for some reason you guys rolled back the siege buffs, for reasons I really don't understand, and ball groups went right back to dominating.

Siege needs to be buffed significantly from what it is right now...ball groups are impossible to counter from range, and are impossible to counter now without superior numbers or another ball group...this is unhealthy for the game as a whole and is a big reason so many people left.

I am the biggest advocate for "outplaying your opposition" in order to win, but a removal of AOE caps without a significant buff to siege weapons(to give pugs and ungrouped players a viable hard counter) will be a huge boon and buff for the ball groups everyone so desperately wants to split up. Skills would have to be significantly changed, you might even have to change the whole game to address this issue any other way. I like the game the way it is now, the skills are fun and interesting for the most part, but siege needs to be more effective.

its impossible to counter a ball group from range with any skill in the game, siege in its current state is absolutely useless against them as they can heal right through it.Any player that doesn't want to be part of a ball group, with siege in its current state, has getting steamrolled by a ball zerg to look forward to if siege is not properly addressed.

Siege needs a significant buff in its damage across the board...it needs to be "Scary" to be in that circle. I wouldn't even be opposed to the intial hit of Ballista's and Trebs doing 70% of your max health in damage with the damge dot ticking 3 times for 10% max health(that may be extreme I do admit), but something needs to be done.

in Trials if you stand in red...you die...in PVP you stand in red and laugh with your ball group...this kinda behavior should not be encouraged, and pugs need to have some sort of chance against these ball groups. Right now the only chance they have is numbers, after the AOE cap removal they have no chance, even if they do outnumber them....siege needs to be the equalizer it was designed to be...shelling your target with artillery is and should be a valid tactic, and it should hurt badly, far more then any other player skill in the game....

Ball groups have only been so dominant because siege has been emasculated in this game for far too long, thus the only ranged counter to ball groups was and still is toothless. Until siege is made a vaible ranged counter to ball groups, they will continue to dominate this game. If siege is not adjusted prior to this change going live, all the pugs might as well log out the moment an elite guild comes on, because you will have absolutely no chance whatsoever of defending any objectives against them.

Again I am not against AOE cap removal, Im all for it. I also recognize that siege needs to be buffed to compensate, and their needs to be more ranged counters to these types of groups.

thank you for your time, and thanks again for all you do.

sincerely

Rinaldo

PS: no offense to any of the guilds mentioned here, its a compliment. I see you all as the elite of the group raids. So please don't take it as disrespect, your the best at what you do. be proud of it.

I agree that siege needs to change, but it was plain broken during those 3 weeks, firepot trebs 1 shotting everywhere. It's not just a counter for a ball group its a counter for all pvp, ranged melee, whatever. It will be a fight for who can get their siege engines up first and that person will make by far the most AP. Im sure you remember emp siege back in thieves guild patch, where emp siege was doing double damage to players. It was basically free ap and made it so that all an emp had to do was have cold fire siege and drop 1 or 2 in a keep breach and then just watch the free ap roll in as fireballistas were ticking for 15k and stone trebs were hitting for 30k+. No one wants that in pvp, the only effective butff IMO would be to scale damage up based on number of players hit starting at a base damage for hitting 8 players and scaling 5% increase damage for every player hit after 8.

Yolokin_Swagonborn · January 2018

techprince wrote: »

Seige does decent dmg in nocp environment. However, cp makes this dmg laughable. How about increasing the damage done according to the number of players in the radius?

Or just making siege not resistible by champion points. Siege is well balanced in No-CP. it doesn't one shot you but you cant just lay in it.

Simple fix.

Recremen · January 2018

Sandman929 wrote: »

Recremen wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

I guess it depends on how you interpret the direction of this "first step". I'm not convinced removing AoE caps is in the direction of eliminating ball-groups as much as it is a step in the direction of harming the ungrouped masses that ball-groups target.

Honestly it goes both ways. It makes scrubs zerg diving hit better, but if a bunch of other scrubs are not simultaneously also diving in then they aren't likely going to deal the damage to take anyone out. But if they DO get a bunch of other people coordinated enough to all dive in and deal some vicious AoE, they're no longer scrubs, they're just another coordinated "ball group". Not to say that everyone not in a coordinated group is a scrub, you just don't see not-scrub solo players leaping into a 16+ member group.

Now the big thing with this change is that there is no longer a damage drop off. You would be extremely hard pressed on live to hit even 20 people with a single AoE, let alone 60. That was never the issue. But this lack of a damage drop off does mean that however many you hit get the full damage, whereas before after a certain number you're doing less and less to further targets. This will increase the stress on group play, as they now have to heal and survive more damage on average than they used to take, but it also benefits them if their damage is well-coordinated because nobody is going to take reduced damage just from being in a zerg. That could make help secure more full group wipes than before, where the cockroach effect normally takes hold. So we'll see.

That's what I mean. I don't see the removal of AoE caps as a detriment to a coordinated group, it's a detriment to the zerg they're attacking. It helps small group Vs larger group (a bit), and it helps large group Vs zerg, but it's not a step toward making coordination less relevant.

Praise The Eight on that point, though.

DKsUnite · January 2018

Why should you be rewarding uncoordinated messes in the first place? Let them learn to group and play as a team rather as a clump of 50 solo players....

rustic_potato · January 2018

Lol. Well ball groups just got uberbuffed. Bridge farming and chokepoint farming is going to be easy for any organized group. I guess the idea is to have more coordinated activity instead of the massive mindless zerg balls doing stupid stuff.

GreenSoup2HoT · January 2018

DKsUnite wrote: »

Why should you be rewarding uncoordinated messes in the first place? Let them learn to group and play as a team rather as a clump of 50 solo players....

Should Vicious Death still be a thing now tho? Or can it be removed?

IxSTALKERxI · January 2018

No no no no no no no no.

Step 1: Remove AoE caps complete.

Step 2: Nerf earthgore
Step 3: Reduce Eots radius to 8m and stop it from damaging people through the ground to the floor below.
Step 4: Continue to monitor and evaluate ability / ultimate balance - (the larger the radius the more it benifits from aoe cap removal) and make changes where necessary next update.

If you want to make siege more effective, nerf earthgore. Simple. Half the worlds problems can be solved by nerfing earthgore.

I've played during all the patches where siege was overbuffed, and it's never a good thing. Whoever has the most number of players wins as they have spare people to setup 20 siege whereas the other group doesn't.

IxSTALKERxI · January 2018

GreenSoup2HoT wrote: »

DKsUnite wrote: »

Why should you be rewarding uncoordinated messes in the first place? Let them learn to group and play as a team rather as a clump of 50 solo players....

Should Vicious Death still be a thing now tho? Or can it be removed?

AoE caps should of been removed in thieves guild patch instead of adding vicious death. I don't think you can remove VD from the game now but you can change it slightly so it's not instant burst.

EG. Make it a 2 second damage over time so it does like 10k, 10k instead of doing 20k damage instantly.

IxSTALKERxI · January 2018

If you do want to buff siege even further, make it ignore CP. Siege is already overly strong in no-cp campaign. Nerf earthgore first though.

At the moment Red CP tree reduces incoming siege damage which is why siege is more effective in non-cp. This also gives high CP players an advantage over low CP players and siege gets weaker every patch when they increase the CP cap.

Joy_Division · January 2018

I respect the OP a ton and I can tell a lot of thought was put in, but I'm not sure I agree.

I think siege is pretty strong right now. Take a look at what happens the next time you see a CP 114 on her treb get hit with counter-siege. Siege may not appear to do much Vs. organized guilds (or good solo players for that matter), but that is because we know how not to die to it, not necessarily because it is too weak. If you want to make siege devastating to players who know what they are doing, it will be in effect a tactical nuke and melt the very newer players you want to encourage to come out to Cyrodiil.
Nobody has hated AoE caps more than me with the possible exception of FENGRUSH, but ZoS has already neutered them such that I don't think the update will make too much difference. Back in 1.5, the 7th target took 0% damage. Then ZoS made it so it took 50% damage. On Live that 7th target takes 75% damage. I applaud their final removal, but I'm not sure that extra 25% damage is going to have a dramatic effect. And when I run in a destro-bomb group, I can absolutely say I am almost always benefiting from that free damage mitigation. It cuts both ways.
As many others have noted, the Earth Gore set is ridiculously strong.
For those three weeks in 2015, I wanted to throw my computer out the window. Sure, "don't stand in stupid." Tell me that when I'm on that skinny oil lip trying to defend the Inner Chalman breech. Yes, in Trials standing in red means you die. But these red circles come from predictable mechanics, usually appear in predictable areas, and do not cover the entire area in red, all things that does not characterize siege weaponry.

Before people think I just don't want my group to get nerfed or threatened, ever since Summer 2014 I have asked, pleaded, and hoped that ZoS would make some reforms such that the better organized groups's tactics did not revolve around stacking on crown and delivering PBAoE en masse.

I'm just not sure relying on siege weapons is the way to go because if its going to bust up the best guilds, imagine what it's going to do to your weekend warrior Pug who doesn't have purge.

I could get behind doing something to the weak siege weapons like Ice trebs and stone cats, but I'd really like to just see what happens without AoE Caps AND making Earth Gore merely a good set instead of ridiculously strong.

Soulac · January 2018

No

Mayrael · January 2018

Recremen wrote: »

I can see where you're coming from, but I absolutely do not agree. I would rather still have to fight ball groups (which aren't even ball groups any more, they are just large groups) than deal with massive siege damage again. We've been down that road many times in the past and it is without a doubt one of the worst things to happen to PvP every time it comes around.

Siege damage is already an extremely powerful game-changing tool in a keep battle. Good countersiege can apply a great deal of pressure even to experienced groups stacking siege shields and purges. That's already the case on live. If you get enough countersiege up and know how to hit opponents with it through coordinated strikes, then you can severely stall or even stop a siege effort, allowing the attacking group to be harried at the flanks and eventually overwhelmed by reinforcements.

I know you claim that it's not about enabling point-and-click warriors, but that is frankly an empty statement, since the actual end effect is entirely about enabling point-and-click warriors. At some point, you need to value good coordinated play instead of the ability to sit back in safety and deal massive damage without effort.

Seriously, what is the actual end game for the people complaining about ball groups? How spread out do people need to be for you to be satisfied? Use hard figures or some kind of metric. Is it a certain number of meters? The length of a gap closer? What? And what will it accomplish? Should Cyro just be a series of one-on-one fights in the general proximity of each other? Should people who like large group play have to coordinate single-target attacks from 30 meters away from each other? What do you actually want combat to look like?

Simple. Angry army. Google it

Coordinated team play? Yes pls. Runing in circles while using the biggest cheese in the game? No thank you. Without aoe cap one negate + one bomber can kill whole ball group, thats all. Single player aoes matter again. Two well aimed sieges can make the difference again. Im not against coordinated team play, Im against using cheese mechanics that can be stoped only by other cheese.

jhharvest · January 2018

You want to get rid of ball groups? Easy: friendly players take 10% of your AOE damage.

IxSTALKERxI · January 2018

jhharvest wrote: »

You want to get rid of ball groups? Easy: friendly players take 10% of your AOE damage.

People would still run around in a ball, but would use ranged aoe abilties instead like placed destro ult/ meteor etc lol. Oh and impulse would make a comeback. Would be impulse monkeys again.

Minno · January 2018

I agree and disagree.

1) make seige ignore CP mitigation stars. This should make seige more effective without being too overpowered (and help with calculations during seige battles)

2) make inevitable Det have lower cast time ( if the 1.5 cast time change this patch turns out to be too long).

3) give unique mobilty for all players. I'd rather see a moving game of ESO dodgeball than a giant ERP parade of EoTS+Earthgore.

Otherwise aoe caps removal will be a good change with the return of bomb builds helping keep all large groups in check while also being effective against smaller groups.

Elyu · January 2018

techprince wrote: »

Seige does decent dmg in nocp environment. However, cp makes this dmg laughable. How about increasing the damage done according to the number of players in the radius?

This^^^

A_G_G_R_O · January 2018

Delete Earthgore

RinaldoGandolphi · January 2018

I don't want to buff the siege back to 2015 levels, but I think there is a happy middle ground to be had.

the suggestion to make them ignore CP mitigation seems like a solid idea all around. Siege actually is viable in no-cp, its really in the CP campaigns that its useless.

RinaldoGandolphi · January 2018

Great feedback @Joy_Division I could get behind those ideas as well.

thanks again, you know I respect you a lot as well friend!

ak_pvp · January 2018

Remove secondary effect AoE caps too.

Malamar1229 · January 2018

Rinaldo I didn't read your volume library of a post but I gave you an awesome under the assumption it was well thought out and said.