UNPOPULAR OPINION ALERT
No CP PVP should be promoted in Cyrodiil. It is my opinion that the Alliance Locked Campaign should not be Grayhost, but Ravenwatch.
We are seeing some changes to BGs, which have historically been a NoCP zone. I believe NoCP allows for more balanced PVP in general. First, the obvious reason it allows for equal footing amongst all players. Second, CP allows for specialized builds that can do enormous amounts of damage or result in extreme damage mitigation. CP can be used in a balanced way; however, it is can be used to create a very unbalanced playstyle as well. In battlegrounds, we had seen matches where it was almost impossible to kill anyone and they were not dynamic or very fun. Over time the developers committed to a NoCP battlegrounds experience, which I am grateful for.
Making the same commitment to Cyrodiil seems to me like an obvious choice. The developers had explored NoCP and NoProc sets in Cyrodiil to improve server performance. While I do not have the data from those events, I do believe that overall the issue is the concentration of the population of players to one area. Many players enjoy CP pvp, if they have high CP. Players with low CP and new players are less enthusiastic about fighting their 2k+ CP counterparts. Skill has a large factor as well, but this further disenfranchises new players who are interested in PVP. If the "default server" or Alliance locked server was NoCP, it would be more beneficial for new players logging on to have a healthy population of players to fight on equal footing. While the skill gap will still be there, they will not be so easily one shot by seasoned veterans. Furthermore, in the spirit of competition it will be more challenging for veterans and therefore more fun.
As a former member of Mostly Harmless, I remember having meetings with the developers about concerns and I know the developers take feedback seriously. I strongly believe that making Cyrodiil more accessible to new players will encourage the PVP community to grow and the game to grow as a whole. There will still be other servers such as Grayhost for people who want to use their CP in PVP, or Blackreach as well. Hopefully this will encourage these servers to be used more and by spreading out the population across several servers, the community may be better equipped to deal with the lag issues when everyone is concentrated in one area.
I remember the days of huge Zerg vs Zerg fights, running down multiple groups in a Mostly Hamfest 24 man. Yet, even the decision to reduce the group size to 12 man represents a move in a different direction. I believe this suggestion is in line with a lot of the developers decision making in the past, and I hope to see a healthier PVP population in the future. I believe this is a joint effort and I am working on training new players who are interested in PVP, and I hope other leaders can follow my example and train the future of PVP so we can all have glorious battles in the Three Banners War. To victory! Let there always be a foe worthy of my blade
Edited by ZOS_Kevin on November 7, 2024 12:36PM ask me about Bruma Bratz, the citizens barracks for the people of Bruma, Cropsford, and Vlastarus. For the people, by the people!