Is the drastically reduced AP for Keep defense intended or a bug?

Arrodisia · September 2018

Maybe I'm slipping, but I didn't see anything about a reduction of "AP" for keep defense in the patch notes. I did see some changes to gameplay, and the 8% increase for brindle, drake, and dragonclaw, but again, nothing about an overall change to reduce the AP for defensive ticks after successfully defending a keep. Yet multiple times over the last couple of weeks I noticed we only received for example 2.9k for a defensive battle that lasted well over a half an hour. None of us dced either.

Some of the cyrodiil fights last more than 45 minutes, heck even over an hour, and use a lot of sieges from ballistas, to flame pots, to resource drain, .... and we weren't even compensated for 10 % of what we used. We(my guild+some randoms) were there the entire fight and fighting really hard. Previously we would get anywhere from 25k upwards past 55k for such a long intensive fights. Why are we getting drastically less now? and why wasn't it in the patch notes?

Imho, it makes defending for some people not worth doing anymore, which significantly dimishes the forth and back strategic gameplay of Cyrodiil PvP in both Sotha and Vivec. It's not fun to siege a keep and meet no resistance. Yet, I can't blame them if they aren't getting even 10% of the cost they put into defending.

Is this intended, or a bug, or an oversight of some kind?

VaranisArano · September 2018

Its intended, as far as I can tell. With Summerset, ZOS connected D ticks to resource ownership and levels. So earning D ticks while owning resources for a while made for big AP counts. But with Wolfhunter, ZOS adjusted how resources gain levels (2 instead of 5) and that seems to have dropped the D ticks again.

Arrodisia · September 2018

I'm not trying to be negative here. I'm just trying to get to the bottom of this massive change. As I mentioned above the only written change to AP(that I saw) in the patch notes since Wolfhunter was the 8% increase for 3 keeps only. Those were Brindle, Drake, and Dragonclaw. So if AP and not only the health of a keep is reduced because of the resources owned a.) it should've been in the patch notes and b.) it sounds more like a bug purely, because the drop in AP is very drastic and not in line with the time and resources spent.

OrphanHelgen · September 2018

The problem as I saw it (not a hardcore pvp'er btw), was that people defended some keep/castle that wasn't our home keep and since they spent so much time defending it, resulting in us losing all our home keeps all the way into the scrolls. One of the reasons I think they was defending so hard and refused to help our home keeps, was because of the def tick. Maybe if they made home keeps only back to level 5? Or at least the 3 first would be a solution?

Arrodisia · September 2018

but for this last fight, we didn't lose any other keeps. We were holding the entire south and some northern outposts and keeps.

It makes sense that the health of the keeps is reduced when we lose resources and keeps, because it is in the patch notes. However, it makes no sense that our AP is also reduced to a small fraction of what we received before without them putting it in the patch notes, which they did not do. also we had the resources sorry forgot to add that. We don't even officially know why it is happening and how the AP is calculated anymore.

Anrose · September 2018

It’s likely because the multiplier for an old Level 5 Keep was larger than what the multiplier for a now Level 2 Keep is.

I would bet it’s because ZOS kept the coding and the current Level 2 multiplier is the same as the old Level 2 multiplier was.

Arrodisia · September 2018

Anrose wrote: »

It’s likely because the multiplier for an old Level 5 Keep was larger than what the multiplier for a now Level 2 Keep is.

I would bet it’s because ZOS kept the coding and the current Level 2 multiplier is the same as the old Level 2 multiplier was.

This and the other posts actually sound plausable and like some kind of bug.

Arrodisia · September 2018

@ZOS_GinaBruno Can you please let us know if this is intended or not and if it will be readjusted?

Universe · September 2018

It is good that ZOS has reduced the overall AP per hour(from defending) by making high defense ticks extremely rare - non existent.
The ticks were absurdly high for doing almost nothing.
Also, the previous high defense ticks made many players to concentrate too much on defending non-strategic keeps for just farming the AP.
This change also add incentive to spread out more and conquer rather to stay on the defensive.

Hopefully, this step is before adding additional alliance ranks, I have submitted a few ideas to ZOS, maybe we shall see some new alliance ranks in update 20

Though I'm just hoping , nothing official

Lieblingsjunge · September 2018

The defence ticks... were insanely huge. And they were rightfully changed. 25k defence ticks for killing 3 people that tried to tag a back-keep to draw attention away from emperor ring? No. Just no. There's already an inflation of AP thanks to it being so easy to obtain. The changes to D-ticks were the best decision they made in a very, very long time.

Keep it as it is now. It's much healthier in the grand scheme of things.

TequilaFire · September 2018

Universe wrote: »

It is good that ZOS has reduced the overall AP per hour(from defending) by making high defense ticks extremely rare - non existent.
The ticks were absurdly high for doing almost nothing.
Also, the previous high defense ticks made many players to concentrate too much on defending non-strategic keeps for just farming the AP.
This change also add incentive to spread out more and conquer rather to stay on the defensive.

Hopefully, this step is before adding additional alliance ranks, I have submitted a few ideas to ZOS, maybe we shall see some new alliance ranks in update 20
Though I'm just hoping , nothing official

Baloney, I spend a lot of time and AP buying oil, camps and siege to defend a keep.
Of course people that don't want reward for defense are those that want to have an easy time PvDooring an undefended keep.
Doing almost nothing is running around trees, bunny hopping your way across Cyrodiil.

Arrodisia · September 2018

Lieblingsjunge wrote: »

The defence ticks... were insanely huge. And they were rightfully changed. 25k defence ticks for killing 3 people that tried to tag a back-keep to draw attention away from emperor ring? No. Just no. There's already an inflation of AP thanks to it being so easy to obtain. The changes to D-ticks were the best decision they made in a very, very long time.

Keep it as it is now. It's much healthier in the grand scheme of things.

As stated above, I'm actually talking about large zerg on zerg fights that cost a bunch of resources to sustain, not 3 trolls who think they can take a keep on a pop locked server during prime time. These changes would actually cost all of us AP to play the realm strategically, rather than compensating us for spending the AP to play the realm, which imho further breaks PvP in Cyrodiil.

TequilaFire · September 2018

Lieblingsjunge wrote: »

The defence ticks... were insanely huge. And they were rightfully changed. 25k defence ticks for killing 3 people that tried to tag a back-keep to draw attention away from emperor ring? No. Just no. There's already an inflation of AP thanks to it being so easy to obtain. The changes to D-ticks were the best decision they made in a very, very long time.

Keep it as it is now. It's much healthier in the grand scheme of things.

Exaggerate much? No 25k dtick came from killing only 3 people.

Universe · September 2018

TequilaFire wrote: »

Universe wrote: »

It is good that ZOS has reduced the overall AP per hour(from defending) by making high defense ticks extremely rare - non existent.
The ticks were absurdly high for doing almost nothing.
Also, the previous high defense ticks made many players to concentrate too much on defending non-strategic keeps for just farming the AP.
This change also add incentive to spread out more and conquer rather to stay on the defensive.

Hopefully, this step is before adding additional alliance ranks, I have submitted a few ideas to ZOS, maybe we shall see some new alliance ranks in update 20
Though I'm just hoping , nothing official

Baloney, I spend a lot of time and AP buying oil, camps and siege to defend a keep.
Doing almost nothing is running around trees, bunny hopping your way across Cyrodiil.

Perhaps you defended a strategic keep.
But many players stayed on the defensive in non-strategic keeps/outposts for far too long only to receive high defense ticks.
For example, AD staying and defending Alessia with 100 players (with occasional push to bridge) only to lose Faregyl and then Black Boot/Bloodmayne due to no defense is a bad decision.
Cyrodiil AVA gameplay is also about knowing where to siege and what is important to defend.
The defense ticks were too high most of the time and players didn't push to where they are needed.
Furthermore, long defensive battles made server performance worse due to alliances not spreading out in Cyrodiil.

Varana · September 2018

Reading these comments, esp. the "A level 0 Keep will still have the same D tick as it did in Update 18" part, leads me to believe that it really is broken in some way because that's obviously not true.

Lieblingsjunge · September 2018

TequilaFire wrote: »

Lieblingsjunge wrote: »

The defence ticks... were insanely huge. And they were rightfully changed. 25k defence ticks for killing 3 people that tried to tag a back-keep to draw attention away from emperor ring? No. Just no. There's already an inflation of AP thanks to it being so easy to obtain. The changes to D-ticks were the best decision they made in a very, very long time.

Keep it as it is now. It's much healthier in the grand scheme of things.

Exaggerate much? No 25k dtick came from killing only 3 people.

If you had all lv5 resources + lv5 keep it was easy. I stepped in on my non-vet sorc to get a skyshard near Roebeck. I killed off 3 guys, got a 45k defence tick(that was with double ap-buff, though). So around 25k without ap buff shouldn't be too far off, of what you actually get. And no, there were no low pop bonus involved. Unless you get multiplicatiors on AP in non-vet, that is.
--

juttaa77b16_ESO wrote: »

Lieblingsjunge wrote: »

The defence ticks... were insanely huge. And they were rightfully changed. 25k defence ticks for killing 3 people that tried to tag a back-keep to draw attention away from emperor ring? No. Just no. There's already an inflation of AP thanks to it being so easy to obtain. The changes to D-ticks were the best decision they made in a very, very long time.

Keep it as it is now. It's much healthier in the grand scheme of things.

As stated above, I'm actually talking about large zerg on zerg fights that cost a bunch of resources to sustain, not 3 trolls who think they can take a keep on a pop locked server during prime time. These changes would actually cost all of us AP to play the realm strategically, rather than compensating us for spending the AP to play the realm, which imho further breaks PvP in Cyrodiil.

Yes, it costs AP to play. It costs AP to place camps. But you get that AP back by killing off those zergs anyway. Especially if you siege.

Add in the huge O-ticks for taking empty keeps and you will always make more AP than you spend. Given that you actually do something.

TequilaFire · September 2018

Lieblingsjunge wrote: »

TequilaFire wrote: »

Lieblingsjunge wrote: »

The defence ticks... were insanely huge. And they were rightfully changed. 25k defence ticks for killing 3 people that tried to tag a back-keep to draw attention away from emperor ring? No. Just no. There's already an inflation of AP thanks to it being so easy to obtain. The changes to D-ticks were the best decision they made in a very, very long time.

Keep it as it is now. It's much healthier in the grand scheme of things.

Exaggerate much? No 25k dtick came from killing only 3 people.

If you had all lv5 resources + lv5 keep it was easy. I stepped in on my non-vet sorc to get a skyshard near Roebeck. I killed off 3 guys, got a 45k defence tick(that was with double ap-buff, though). So around 25k without ap buff shouldn't be too far off, of Iwhat you actually get. And no, there were no low pop bonus involved. Unless you get multiplicatiors on AP in non-vet, that is.

But you have no way of seeing what else happened on the grounds during the defense and what other players may have contributed, not just you. Remember it is a shared pool.

NBrookus · September 2018

TequilaFire wrote: »

Lieblingsjunge wrote: »

The defence ticks... were insanely huge. And they were rightfully changed. 25k defence ticks for killing 3 people that tried to tag a back-keep to draw attention away from emperor ring? No. Just no. There's already an inflation of AP thanks to it being so easy to obtain. The changes to D-ticks were the best decision they made in a very, very long time.

Keep it as it is now. It's much healthier in the grand scheme of things.

Exaggerate much? No 25k dtick came from killing only 3 people.

If you solo kill a troll sieger on a level 2 keep, you get over 7k. It's plausible.

Arrodisia · September 2018

Accordiing to the other thread we should still get the same ticks. It seems broken to me because we aren't getting anywhere near the ticks we got before. We can't even come close to the cost of the siege weapons we use to sustain the larger and longer battles. So something is a miss here. I'm hoping. We get some official clarification.

Universe · September 2018

Lieblingsjunge wrote: »

The defence ticks... were insanely huge. And they were rightfully changed. 25k defence ticks for killing 3 people that tried to tag a back-keep to draw attention away from emperor ring? No. Just no. There's already an inflation of AP thanks to it being so easy to obtain. The changes to D-ticks were the best decision they made in a very, very long time.

Keep it as it is now. It's much healthier in the grand scheme of things.

Indeed.
The ticks were extremely high.
It was a good decision by ZOS

Hopefully, they will be right about more PVP features in the future

TequilaFire · September 2018

Have already seen a large decrease in participation because of the as usual over nerfed tick.
Defended Arrius against a full group of DC for a whopping 2K defense tick.
Might as well just farm resources.

Arrodisia · September 2018

Universe wrote: »

Lieblingsjunge wrote: »

The defence ticks... were insanely huge. And they were rightfully changed. 25k defence ticks for killing 3 people that tried to tag a back-keep to draw attention away from emperor ring? No. Just no. There's already an inflation of AP thanks to it being so easy to obtain. The changes to D-ticks were the best decision they made in a very, very long time.

Keep it as it is now. It's much healthier in the grand scheme of things.

Indeed.
The ticks were extremely high.
It was a good decision by ZOS
Hopefully, they will be right about more PVP features in the future

I, politely, disagree that the defensive ticks should be across the board nerfed a:) because it wasn't in the patch notes and b.)because we will spend way more AP buying sieges than we will earn back playing strategically. The entire Cyrodiil PvP shouldn't be broken for a few trolls, who once or twice bite off more than they can chew while attacking a keep.
Holding a keep against zergs requires the use of a lot of sieges. I fail to see how 2.9k can compensate us in a 30-60 minute battle where we spend a minimum of double that and more often 3-5 times that. let's not forget that camps cost 20k and are vital.

Imho, it will encourage more people to not buy and use siege weapons in Cyrodiil, as well as steal other people's sieges. Not to mention, the people actually playing strategically will run low on AP at some point and no longer be able to buy enough siege to defend, which would break PvP further.

Varana · September 2018

Or just not defend keeps.
Because running around capturing 2-3 resources is way better AP for your time than defending a keep. You usually don't even need to buy sieges for that.
There will still be people who actually care about the strategic layer. But those who're in it for the AP have even less reasons to take part in keep warfare.

Universe · September 2018

I hope that one day players will care less about AP.
So you're making less AP per hour, so what ?
AP farming shouldn't be the main focus of Cyrodiil AVA.
AP per hour gain was already buffed many times since launch, the current average AP gain per hour is about 3X times as fast.
AP per player kill used to be 850 AP, 25 AP for resource capture etc.
The all point is having fun while helping your alliance to win, i.e completing essential objectives like sieging/defending the important keeps, helping to escort an elder scroll etc.

Cyrodiil shouldn't be mega AP farming area with no strategic thinking and the nerf to AP per hour(no huge defense ticks) certainly helped to prevent it from becoming one.
There are and always be AP farmers who don't care about their Alliance's campaign scoring, but this nerf helped to remove many from this list of farmers and changed the focus to more important objectives of the alliance war.

Arrodisia · September 2018

Universe wrote: »

I hope that one day players will care less about AP.
So you're making less AP per hour, so what ?
AP farming shouldn't be the main focus of Cyrodiil AVA.
AP per hour gain was already buffed many times since launch, the current average AP gain per hour is about 3X times as fast.
AP per player kill used to be 850 AP, 25 AP for resource capture etc.
The all point is having fun while helping your alliance to win, i.e completing essential objectives like sieging/defending the important keeps, helping to escort an elder scroll etc.

Cyrodiil shouldn't be mega AP farming area with no strategic thinking and the nerf to AP per hour(no huge defense ticks) certainly helped to prevent it from becoming one.
There are and always be AP farmers who don't care about their Alliance's campaign scoring, but this nerf helped to remove many from this list of farmers and changed the focus to more important objectives of the alliance war.

I must, politely, disagree again. This nerf was way too drastic and those who are playing the realm will lose the most. After a while they will no longer have enough AP to defend their keeps because the cost of buying them is now significantly higher than the return for that defense, especially for long defenses. A small nerf would already have been too rough for strategic players, but this was way too high a nerf whether intended or not.

Magilacuddy · September 2018

Universe wrote: »

I hope that one day players will care less about AP.
So you're making less AP per hour, so what ?
AP farming shouldn't be the main focus of Cyrodiil AVA.
AP per hour gain was already buffed many times since launch, the current average AP gain per hour is about 3X times as fast.
AP per player kill used to be 850 AP, 25 AP for resource capture etc.
The all point is having fun while helping your alliance to win, i.e completing essential objectives like sieging/defending the important keeps, helping to escort an elder scroll etc.

Cyrodiil shouldn't be mega AP farming area with no strategic thinking and the nerf to AP per hour(no huge defense ticks) certainly helped to prevent it from becoming one.
There are and always be AP farmers who don't care about their Alliance's campaign scoring, but this nerf helped to remove many from this list of farmers and changed the focus to more important objectives of the alliance war.

Not getting any decent AP for defending does the opposite of encouraging people to play the realm. it seems pointless and expensive to do so, rather than being rewarded for good play. I understand AP shouldn't be the primary focus but like it or not it is the primary incentive to play PvP in Cyrodiil - playing the realm is down to character not AP.

geonsocal · September 2018

not so ironically, most the time when I keep my mind off earning AP I enjoy myself more...

however, like most other human beings - I have compulsive tendencies...so, I check my score, and, i'm a little too aware of when, where, and what I'm doing to earn AP...

on top of that - guess what, we're not all the same...

different folks have different playstyles...I like hanging around keeps and fighting...I don't mind meeting out and between the emp keeps and battling it out also...

but, after the 3rd or 4th keep capture where I need to spend a bunch of time hitting rapids and chasing o-ticks...I'm done with that type of play...

and, if I'm being honest - I really enjoy pouring flaming oil on folks (RIP VD and those other fun sets that used to proc off seige)...

change isn't always for the better...

Kadoin · September 2018

Magilacuddy wrote: »

Universe wrote: »

I hope that one day players will care less about AP.
So you're making less AP per hour, so what ?
AP farming shouldn't be the main focus of Cyrodiil AVA.
AP per hour gain was already buffed many times since launch, the current average AP gain per hour is about 3X times as fast.
AP per player kill used to be 850 AP, 25 AP for resource capture etc.
The all point is having fun while helping your alliance to win, i.e completing essential objectives like sieging/defending the important keeps, helping to escort an elder scroll etc.

Cyrodiil shouldn't be mega AP farming area with no strategic thinking and the nerf to AP per hour(no huge defense ticks) certainly helped to prevent it from becoming one.
There are and always be AP farmers who don't care about their Alliance's campaign scoring, but this nerf helped to remove many from this list of farmers and changed the focus to more important objectives of the alliance war.

Not getting any decent AP for defending does the opposite of encouraging people to play the realm. it seems pointless and expensive to do so, rather than being rewarded for good play. I understand AP shouldn't be the primary focus but like it or not it is the primary incentive to play PvP in Cyrodiil - playing the realm is down to character not AP.

It's true. Why heal and protect scroll for 45 min when I can just kill 10-20 people for a better tick in less than 5 min on the bridge, and use little to no resources to do so? It costs more potions and AP to defend keeps as well. Where is the incentive? So far, after Wolfhunter, my AP gains in the negative after defending keeps every time. I guess I should not buy camps, should not repair wall, should not buy siege, and shouldn't heal anyone, shouldn't revive anyone, etc., since its costing me with no gains. I'm sure that's what ZOS wants...

Or just go to BGs since its always positive.

geonsocal · September 2018

it's all about getting on the 'list' now...

I get somewhere - I'm not looking to fight right away - I'm looking for a door or wall to repair...

gotta get on those lists...

Waffennacht · September 2018

Just curious, does this have anything to do with keeping all of the outside-the-keep resources?

Like keeping the Mine, lumberyard etc?

Arrodisia · September 2018

It shouldn't because ZOS said in another forum post that was linked above that we should be seeing the same returns, unless it's bugged, but we aren't seeing the same returns or anything close to it.