Another lag reducing thought, inspired by today's discussion.

relentless_turnip · October 2020

I know a lot of players love the current test in cyrodill and also plenty players do not.

After discussing it with my guild and plenty of people on here I am very much on the fence... Being on PC EU my opinion on it improving performance is mixed. I can see it is better than the 3 weeks before(not better than the first test).

For me this test suits me, I rather play solo or small-scale with my guild. We have 2 healers that regularly join us and they don't tend to heal outside of our group.
However hearing people explaining how much it affects their own gameplay made me fully realise, despite their efforts to embrace it how detrimental it can be.

Also speaking to others and hearing their own ideas to deal with this issue made me think. What if we queued for cyrodill in our roles as we do for say a dungeon. What if these roles were limited in both the amount of each role you can have in cyrodill and their utility in cyrodill.

A healer - heals, can share buffs and hots with no limitations

A DD - Can only heal himself and cannot share any buffs.

A tank - would have certain skills they could share, but not heals. I.e. skills like the alliance one where you take your allys damage, I forget what it's called...

We then limit the amount of each roles that are permitted in cyrodill to hopefully achieve the same net effect as the current test. For instance:
If there are 500 people in each faction(I have no idea of the real number)
84 healers would be enough for 4 healers per 24 man group. This is obviously an example and not representative of any true numbers. It limits cross healing and radius checks whilst not limiting support roles to groups, it doesn't tackle ballgroups either which I think most people agree are a big issue.

I would genuinely love to hear people's thoughts and pick holes in this idea. I'm sure there are plenty, but I am looking for middle ground here. I also don't believe this is the answer, but could make up part of it. I have previously expressed my thoughts on other elements that could reduce lag.

The_Old_Goat · October 2020

I wonder if the role checks would overtax the system here but I like your line of thought.

relentless_turnip · October 2020

The_Old_Goat wrote: »

I wonder if the role checks would overtax the system here but I like your line of thought.

Thanks man, I have no idea whether their current gf could handle it... It survived the last undaunted event 🤞

relentless_turnip · October 2020

@idk @NeillMcAttack @Joy_Division

As people I have had meaningful discussions with regarding this subject, I would love to hear your thoughts on this idea?

idk · October 2020

^^^^

If you are talking about the idea of a role check then there are multiple issues.

The biggest, and most significant issue, is this goes completely against the core design of this game and completely changes the game from its foundation. The fact that we are not forced into a specific role is more core to this foundation of this game than the lack of cooldowns.

With that, I see no reason to go into the other issues starting with it being unknown of what net effect this change could have.

Edit: BTW. I am not knocking suggesting an idea and certainly not saying anything about you. Just speaking to the suggestion itself. I do not think you will take it personally, but we all see some do.

Second edit: I only run with large zergs on characters I am just trying to get to Tier 1 (geodes). For my fun time in Cyrodill I run solo if I am not with my small group guild as I prefer a good leader with a group that listens rather than listens as we can accomplish much more than zergs.

ExistingRug61 · October 2020

Firstly, let me commend you for having constructive discussions and taking on board the experiences of others. I followed the discussion in the other thread with some interest. For reference I would say I somewhat align with the comments made by Joy_Division in that thread, as group only healing would significantly impact on my play. As such I am quite open to alternative suggestions.

Its an interesting idea. Hard to know if there would be the extra restrictions wouldn't just add its own burden on the system that eliminates any gain. But, assuming it didn't I would think that there would need to be balance on the restrictions and requirements between the roles. For example you list the healer role as being able to heal/buff everyone. If there is no other restriction on this role what would stop all players simply queuing as healer even though they aren't a true healer and taking up all the available spots just so they can play without restrictions. If it is balanced out well in this way, it could be that this helps while still allowing players some choice in playstyle. It would need to be very careful that it doesn't just create another barrier to players being able to get into cyrodiil - this needs to be as accessible as possible to not just keep the already small PvP population but also attract new players.

I'm still not sure how I would feel about having somewhat arbitrary restrictions on players though, and probably would prefer that it is the skills themselves that get looked at and redesigned.
[edit: just saw the above reply by idk added while I was typing - his statement probably explains my reservations on this quite well]

Also, ZOS has never before looked at putting restrictions/requirements on roles, even though it has been suggested multiple times as a possible solution to fake tanks/fake healers in the dungeon queue, so I am not sure if there would be an appetite on their end to go down this path. But I guess this is a time where they are trying many things they previously never would have considered, so who knows.

barney2525 · October 2020

So, if you go to Cyradil, and your tank has a group heal skill on the bar, why exactly does it work for him and no one else?

How do you prevent players from accessing valid skills on their bars, simply because of the Role they are playing - especially since the last I checked, entering Cyradil does Not require anyone to declare a particular role ?

relentless_turnip · October 2020

idk wrote: »

^^^^

If you are talking about the idea of a role check then there are multiple issues.

The biggest, and most significant issue, is this goes completely against the core design of this game and completely changes the game from its foundation. The fact that we are not forced into a specific role is more core to this foundation of this game than the lack of cooldowns.

With that, I see no reason to go into the other issues starting with it being unknown of what net effect this change could have.

Edit: BTW. I am not knocking suggesting an idea and certainly not saying anything about you. Just speaking to the suggestion itself. I do not think you will take it personally, but we all see some do.

Second edit: I only run with large zergs on characters I am just trying to get to Tier 1 (geodes). For my fun time in Cyrodill I run solo if I am not with my small group guild as I prefer a good leader with a group that listens rather than listens as we can accomplish much more than zergs.

@idk I don't take it personally at all, in fact I completely appreciate you taking the time to read and make a thoughtful reply. I also expected nothing less, but honesty from you.

This by no means is the be all and end all for me, it merely feels like the lesser evil and utilises essentially what is already exists in the game. If cyrodill works i don't mind what is implemented and considering this group test caused a lot of discussion. Both positive and otherwise I felt it was worth a similar alternative.

However I don't necessarily feel it does impact the freedom we have as players. I like you run small scale, but we very much have these roles defined already. Though in PvP we have to be open minded of which each of these roles mean. You could enter as a healer and have the freedom to support ally's in anyway you see fit and not necessarily be restricted to healing. I appreciate a lot of smallscalers are all dd's with support skills slotted and this so fine too, but it would be up to ZOS to define each roles limitations. I also think these roles would have to be clearly defined to the player everytime we enter cyrodill and what we are entering as.

relentless_turnip · October 2020

barney2525 wrote: »

So, if you go to Cyradil, and your tank has a group heal skill on the bar, why exactly does it work for him and no one else?

How do you prevent players from accessing valid skills on their bars, simply because of the Role they are playing - especially since the last I checked, entering Cyradil does Not require anyone to declare a particular role ?

@barney2525 It doesn't require you to choose a role at the moment. it is an idea formed from the current test and the current discussions around it.

It is an idea that is hopefully less impactful on others than the current one.

relentless_turnip · October 2020

ExistingRug61 wrote: »

Firstly, let me commend you for having constructive discussions and taking on board the experiences of others. I followed the discussion in the other thread with some interest. For reference I would say I somewhat align with the comments made by Joy_Division in that thread, as group only healing would significantly impact on my play. As such I am quite open to alternative suggestions.

Its an interesting idea. Hard to know if there would be the extra restrictions wouldn't just add its own burden on the system that eliminates any gain. But, assuming it didn't I would think that there would need to be balance on the restrictions and requirements between the roles. For example you list the healer role as being able to heal/buff everyone. If there is no other restriction on this role what would stop all players simply queuing as healer even though they aren't a true healer and taking up all the available spots just so they can play without restrictions. If it is balanced out well in this way, it could be that this helps while still allowing players some choice in playstyle. It would need to be very careful that it doesn't just create another barrier to players being able to get into cyrodiil - this needs to be as accessible as possible to not just keep the already small PvP population but also attract new players.

I'm still not sure how I would feel about having somewhat arbitrary restrictions on players though, and probably would prefer that it is the skills themselves that get looked at and redesigned.
[edit: just saw the above reply by idk added while I was typing - his statement probably explains my reservations on this quite well]

Also, ZOS has never before looked at putting restrictions/requirements on roles, even though it has been suggested multiple times as a possible solution to fake tanks/fake healers in the dungeon queue, so I am not sure if there would be an appetite on their end to go down this path. But I guess this is a time where they are trying many things they previously never would have considered, so who knows.

@ExistingRug61 I too would like them to look at skills and reduce aoe and radius checks where they can. This has its limits in terms of a support role as you will always need skills to do radius checks.

I think part of the problem is that we are all sharing buffs constantly, in a group or not... When I buff with my warden it will check the 30 players around me when I just want my vines 😂 but a healers mentality would be totally different.

I think the roles would need to be clearly defined and decided everytime you go to enter cyrodill. As in "enter campaign as ****, this role does this". Certainly smallscalers and specific members of ball groups may queue as a healer.

There is no way to stop people abusing it, but limiting players to roles to the numbers I used an example would lead to 16.8% of people cross healing as oppose to what we have in an ordinary cyrodill. Which I imagine would be close to 90% as so many heals, hots and buffs do a radius check. Potentially being more effective than the current test, being that even within a group the majority won't be causing radius checks.

NeillMcAttack · October 2020

Hi,
Straight up, I don’t know how this could work, it’s easily exploitable and actual healers wouldn’t be able to join due to the limit on them. But I appreciate the effort. We as a community are not giving enough valid feedback on these tests. There are too many personal biases being thrown through threads until the place becomes an echo chamber of what’s popular, so a few things I want to get off my chest. And these are not aimed in any personal direction.

Performance has greatly improved at different levels throughout the tests. People complaining because their current build is basically none functional is no help to anyone.
“Just increase the servers” is another non point that helps nobody and floods these topics to a point any forumite let alone a dev couldn’t possibly bare reading through it.
Something is going to have to change in how Cyro functions on a networking level, ever since update 25 where everything was moved server side, there are simply too many process’ happening on the servers. And no, just reverting isn’t likely to happen sadly, so let’s get on board and see what we can come up with.

I’ll have some suggestions myself later, but I’m currently at work and can’t make the time to type it up on the phone.

danno8 · October 2020

So how would solo roamers fare? Cyro would be organized group only?

This sounds like better balance at the expense of everything else that makes the game fun, like flexible roles, fluid grouping, expansive skill selection etc...

relentless_turnip · October 2020

NeillMcAttack wrote: »

Hi,
Straight up, I don’t know how this could work, it’s easily exploitable and actual healers wouldn’t be able to join due to the limit on them. But I appreciate the effort. We as a community are not giving enough valid feedback on these tests. There are too many personal biases being thrown through threads until the place becomes an echo chamber of what’s popular, so a few things I want to get off my chest. And these are not aimed in any personal direction.

Performance has greatly improved at different levels throughout the tests. People complaining because their current build is basically none functional is no help to anyone.
“Just increase the servers” is another non point that helps nobody and floods these topics to a point any forumite let alone a dev couldn’t possibly bare reading through it.
Something is going to have to change in how Cyro functions on a networking level, ever since update 25 where everything was moved server side, there are simply too many process’ happening on the servers. And no, just reverting isn’t likely to happen sadly, so let’s get on board and see what we can come up with.

I’ll have some suggestions myself later, but I’m currently at work and can’t make the time to type it up on the phone.

@NeillMcAttack I totally agree with everything you said here. Especially the second paragraph, everyone needs to accept this is the way cyrodill is going to be unless something fundamental changes. No changes will be reverted and I like to believe if it was a hardware issue we would have seen it remedied by now, given the growth of the game. Though I am not without my own suspicions.

I truly thought that limiting healing to groups would be part of the answer, though taking the time to read the comments on those affected I believe it wouldn't be a fair solution. This suggestion ^^ was by no means the only answer in my mind, but felt it was a healthy middle ground. I would say at the very least I'd like to see this idea tested to see how it could be exploited and to what degree. With a quick calculation I would say this would have an even greater reduction in radius checks than the current test and whether it was exploited or not we would see better performance.

In what way do you think it could be exploited? Queueing as a healer when you are not, in my mind is only going to hinder your ability to survive. As you will be sharing your buffs and heals. Of course certain members of ball groups would queue as a healer and some small scalers, perhaps even zergers. I'm sure you have imagined another way and I haven't thought of it.

Thank you for taking the time to reply and I look forward to reading your own thoughts!

relentless_turnip · October 2020

danno8 wrote: »

So how would solo roamers fare? Cyro would be organized group only?

This sounds like better balance at the expense of everything else that makes the game fun, like flexible roles, fluid grouping, expansive skill selection etc...

@danno8 Well solo players would be unaffected as they are surviving of their own heals, unless you mean people that follow groups?
Essentially your faction would be divided into roles, but you wouldn't be restricted to a group as you are with the current test.

I don't feel it would affect build diversity drastically, certainly the ability to change from DD to support on the fly would be restricted. There are plenty of support builds that don't require buff or heal sharing as well and even if you have made group focused build you could queue as a healer. I would hazard a guess to say the largest percentage of players are built for essentially their own damage and survival. Essentially what this says is "this is maxiumum amount of people we can have sharing buffs in cyrodill at a time". This is simplified for new players and displayed as the holy trinity.

I would love to see this tested so we could see the real repercussions as at the moment all of it is speculation. Including the idea itself.

relentless_turnip · October 2020

Would this be something that could feasibly be tested @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_BrianWheeler ?

Joy_Division · October 2020

relentless_turnip wrote: »

I know a lot of players love the current test in cyrodill and also plenty players do not.

After discussing it with my guild and plenty of people on here I am very much on the fence... Being on PC EU my opinion on it improving performance is mixed. I can see it is better than the 3 weeks before(not better than the first test).

For me this test suits me, I rather play solo or small-scale with my guild. We have 2 healers that regularly join us and they don't tend to heal outside of our group.
However hearing people explaining how much it affects their own gameplay made me fully realise, despite their efforts to embrace it how detrimental it can be.

Also speaking to others and hearing their own ideas to deal with this issue made me think. What if we queued for cyrodill in our roles as we do for say a dungeon. What if these roles were limited in both the amount of each role you can have in cyrodill and their utility in cyrodill.

A healer - heals, can share buffs and hots with no limitations

A DD - Can only heal himself and cannot share any buffs.

A tank - would have certain skills they could share, but not heals. I.e. skills like the alliance one where you take your allys damage, I forget what it's called...

We then limit the amount of each roles that are permitted in cyrodill to hopefully achieve the same net effect as the current test. For instance:
If there are 500 people in each faction(I have no idea of the real number)
84 healers would be enough for 4 healers per 24 man group. This is obviously an example and not representative of any true numbers. It limits cross healing and radius checks whilst not limiting support roles to groups, it doesn't tackle ballgroups either which I think most people agree are a big issue.

I would genuinely love to hear people's thoughts and pick holes in this idea. I'm sure there are plenty, but I am looking for middle ground here. I also don't believe this is the answer, but could make up part of it. I have previously expressed my thoughts on other elements that could reduce lag.

@relentless_turnip

First off I want to commend you for publicly acknowledging you now have mixed feelings about this and seeking my input when my previous reply to you was less than very cordial. That demonstrates an admirable character and something I wish I was better at.

When I was really excited about this game and spent 5 of 7 nights playing it, I would say half my experiences were ungrouped and half were grouped. I have and do run in those organized groups and I know what it's like to fight against them on your own.

Probably the most compelling thing about this game was that at any time, I could log into Cyrodiil and play without any restrictions: I didn't have to be in group or wait for my friends to be online, could log into whatever campaign and whatever character suited my tastes and my interests for that particular night, which happened to change frequently. One of the reasons this appealed to me because my main was a templar, and take a wild guess what people expected me to do when grouped: "heal and support." Ugh.

My thoughts about your suggestion is that it is unnecessarily restrictive and has gameplay issues that contradict being in the same alliance together. If I and an alliance random happened to run into a group of two who qued in as a DD and a healer under your system, I'd be at an incredible and perhaps unsurmountable disadvantage assuming the skill level was even. ZOS has balanced the Purifying Light and Extended Ritual skills to act as a heals. If they can't heal the other random whose on my team because I logged as a DD, well, then my skills are being nerfed and I'm being punished for daring to go outside the Templar's "heal and support" role. Does the stamblade I am fighting who has the Resolving morph of vigor give a crap that their selfishly designed DPS skills can't be shared? No, she doesn't. If I can't heal my teammates when that's what half my skills do even though I'm technically a DD, I'm screwed in that fight because I'm playing with one-hand tied behind my back.

There are going to be thousands of situations like this because the game and skills were designed 7 years ago to "play as you want." Adding hard-coded restrictions years later is going to totally mess up the game's foundation.

As far as the wanting to achieve the same effect this test has, I seriously question the reports of "lag is so much better!" reports I am hearing. So let me get this straight. Performance has sucked for over 6 years despite 1001 effort by ZOS to fix this. And the moment they put in a test that conforms to the loudest (albeit not necessarily the most) advocates on this forum who hate ball groups, all a sudden performance is worth celebrating? The great lag problem is addressed. This reeks of confirmation bias. I played twice this week - in no CP - and both nights lag sucked at the usual times, skills still didn't fire, etc. Last night Fengrush brought his orc army and in the most intense fights, I might as well have been on the CP zerg server on prime time weekend. This is far from the silver bullet that some people are making it out to be; it's a BB at best.

Now, I am fine with limiting group sizes and in fact I have a post from 2017 basically arguing that doing so is necessary. If people and ZOS wants to go this route, I am perfectly fine with it being 12. If performance has increased marginally to just bad as opposed to miserable, then this is the route they should explore as the only restriction / inconvenience it imposes is that groups used to running 24 will have to delegate, which is perhaps how groups that size should have been running all along.

But not everybody wants to run in a group. I really don;t see the point, reason, or benefit in all but forcing them to do so. Even healers. I started this game as a healer and still preferred to be ungrouped because I wanted to have DPS skills on my bar and not be a sitting duck should I wonder off crown, among other reasons. Besides, the PuGs need heals too and somebody has to do that.

I don't think my arguments are grounded in just my personal taste. If ungrouped players can not heal or buff each other, 2 randoms will be at a profound disadvantage when fighting two players who are grouped up. That's objectively true and there isn't any good reason why that should be the case. The fight should come down to player skill, not because the game developers deem it correct to punish people not in groups.

And for those people who hate ball groups, now take the 2v2 situation above and apply it on a larger scale. It is 100% undeniable that restricting buffs and heals to groups will only strengthen and enhance the already powerful organized groups that are perceived to be a menace. As it is, the only chance ungrouped players have is overwhelming them with superior numbers. A group only restriction is going to require larger numbers on the PuGs part, which is completely self-defeating to what people claim to want: less stacking, less potent ball groups, more viability for solo play.

relentless_turnip · October 2020

Joy_Division wrote: »

relentless_turnip wrote: »

I know a lot of players love the current test in cyrodill and also plenty players do not.

After discussing it with my guild and plenty of people on here I am very much on the fence... Being on PC EU my opinion on it improving performance is mixed. I can see it is better than the 3 weeks before(not better than the first test).

For me this test suits me, I rather play solo or small-scale with my guild. We have 2 healers that regularly join us and they don't tend to heal outside of our group.
However hearing people explaining how much it affects their own gameplay made me fully realise, despite their efforts to embrace it how detrimental it can be.

Also speaking to others and hearing their own ideas to deal with this issue made me think. What if we queued for cyrodill in our roles as we do for say a dungeon. What if these roles were limited in both the amount of each role you can have in cyrodill and their utility in cyrodill.

A healer - heals, can share buffs and hots with no limitations

A DD - Can only heal himself and cannot share any buffs.

A tank - would have certain skills they could share, but not heals. I.e. skills like the alliance one where you take your allys damage, I forget what it's called...

We then limit the amount of each roles that are permitted in cyrodill to hopefully achieve the same net effect as the current test. For instance:
If there are 500 people in each faction(I have no idea of the real number)
84 healers would be enough for 4 healers per 24 man group. This is obviously an example and not representative of any true numbers. It limits cross healing and radius checks whilst not limiting support roles to groups, it doesn't tackle ballgroups either which I think most people agree are a big issue.

I would genuinely love to hear people's thoughts and pick holes in this idea. I'm sure there are plenty, but I am looking for middle ground here. I also don't believe this is the answer, but could make up part of it. I have previously expressed my thoughts on other elements that could reduce lag.

@relentless_turnip

First off I want to commend you for publicly acknowledging you now have mixed feelings about this and seeking my input when my previous reply to you was less than very cordial. That demonstrates an admirable character and something I wish I was better at.

When I was really excited about this game and spent 5 of 7 nights playing it, I would say half my experiences were ungrouped and half were grouped. I have and do run in those organized groups and I know what it's like to fight against them on your own.

Probably the most compelling thing about this game was that at any time, I could log into Cyrodiil and play without any restrictions: I didn't have to be in group or wait for my friends to be online, could log into whatever campaign and whatever character suited my tastes and my interests for that particular night, which happened to change frequently. One of the reasons this appealed to me because my main was a templar, and take a wild guess what people expected me to do when grouped: "heal and support." Ugh.

My thoughts about your suggestion is that it is unnecessarily restrictive and has gameplay issues that contradict being in the same alliance together. If I and an alliance random happened to run into a group of two who qued in as a DD and a healer under your system, I'd be at an incredible and perhaps unsurmountable disadvantage assuming the skill level was even. ZOS has balanced the Purifying Light and Extended Ritual skills to act as a heals. If they can't heal the other random whose on my team because I logged as a DD, well, then my skills are being nerfed and I'm being punished for daring to go outside the Templar's "heal and support" role. Does the stamblade I am fighting who has the Resolving morph of vigor give a crap that their selfishly designed DPS skills can't be shared? No, she doesn't. If I can't heal my teammates when that's what half my skills do even though I'm technically a DD, I'm screwed in that fight because I'm playing with one-hand tied behind my back.

There are going to be thousands of situations like this because the game and skills were designed 7 years ago to "play as you want." Adding hard-coded restrictions years later is going to totally mess up the game's foundation.

As far as the wanting to achieve the same effect this test has, I seriously question the reports of "lag is so much better!" reports I am hearing. So let me get this straight. Performance has sucked for over 6 years despite 1001 effort by ZOS to fix this. And the moment they put in a test that conforms to the loudest (albeit not necessarily the most) advocates on this forum who hate ball groups, all a sudden performance is worth celebrating? The great lag problem is addressed. This reeks of confirmation bias. I played twice this week - in no CP - and both nights lag sucked at the usual times, skills still didn't fire, etc. Last night Fengrush brought his orc army and in the most intense fights, I might as well have been on the CP zerg server on prime time weekend. This is far from the silver bullet that some people are making it out to be; it's a BB at best.

Now, I am fine with limiting group sizes and in fact I have a post from 2017 basically arguing that doing so is necessary. If people and ZOS wants to go this route, I am perfectly fine with it being 12. If performance has increased marginally to just bad as opposed to miserable, then this is the route they should explore as the only restriction / inconvenience it imposes is that groups used to running 24 will have to delegate, which is perhaps how groups that size should have been running all along.

But not everybody wants to run in a group. I really don;t see the point, reason, or benefit in all but forcing them to do so. Even healers. I started this game as a healer and still preferred to be ungrouped because I wanted to have DPS skills on my bar and not be a sitting duck should I wonder off crown, among other reasons. Besides, the PuGs need heals too and somebody has to do that.

I don't think my arguments are grounded in just my personal taste. If ungrouped players can not heal or buff each other, 2 randoms will be at a profound disadvantage when fighting two players who are grouped up. That's objectively true and there isn't any good reason why that should be the case. The fight should come down to player skill, not because the game developers deem it correct to punish people not in groups.

And for those people who hate ball groups, now take the 2v2 situation above and apply it on a larger scale. It is 100% undeniable that restricting buffs and heals to groups will only strengthen and enhance the already powerful organized groups that are perceived to be a menace. As it is, the only chance ungrouped players have is overwhelming them with superior numbers. A group only restriction is going to require larger numbers on the PuGs part, which is completely self-defeating to what people claim to want: less stacking, less potent ball groups, more viability for solo play.

@Joy_Division Thank you for your well thought out reply and just so you know I hold no grudges for not sharing an opinion. I didn't feel animosity following our debate and merely felt we were both accustomed to a different playstyle and had our own bias as a result. I would also add your replies gave me a lot to ponder.

I totally understand your reservations, but as someone said further up this thread. ZOS will most likely never undo the changes that have had a detrimental effect on the performance. I believe we will see a fundamental change to this game made in the name of performance. It has already been made clear by the announcement of these tests.This leaves us to ponder the lesser evils...

I don't think this idea is necessarily a good one, I would like to see it tested so reprocutions would at least become apparent. As we discussed before, healing being restricted to groups suits me, but I wouldn't want others deterred by changes that I have come to realise are unfair.

I would also argue that the dynamics you described of a duo with one being a healer, exist at the moment. Where a small unit or even a duo will overpower anyone they encounter. Those encounters couplings are preconceived by the participants. Regardless of how zos restricts players in the future, people will always find a way to optimise the format they're given. I can't imagine the odds being any worse than they frequently are at the moment.

I too am dubious of performance during this test, I would say it is better than the 3 weeks prior, but not better than the first test. I also agree there is a fair amount of agenda pushing.

I don't think this addresses ball groups at all and I think perhaps just stopping skills from stacking would achieve this and would most likely have a positive impact on performance. Which is another suggestion floating around the forums.

I would be curious to hear what change to current format you could get on board with? And I am thinking in a similar extremity to this idea.
As in a huge reduction to radius checks.