Changelog 25/11/16

[Ravai]

I dont think I'm alone in saying that people would prefer to die to aoe skills from players that can be seen and avoided with good positioning, than from some guy in the safety of a keep semi afk untouchable on a cannon.

Will be fun to try whatever you decide anyway, spices things up :>

[Theseus]

Either your timing is absolutely impeccable or you saw my comments about wanting to rework AoE. Either way, I'm happy you posted.

I would have done it this way (because of performance restrictions, some of your ideas are impossible:)

1) No AoE cap, it's gone.
2) Base damage of all AoE attacks drops by 50%.
3) The range of cleave-type PBAoEs increases to ~45-50 feet.
4) AoE attacks increase in damage as more enemy targets are struck, hitting their previous level of 100% after 9 targets, and going up to a suitable maximum when hitting tons of targets.
5) AoE attacks reduce in damage as more friendly targets are struck. The reduction is additive with the increase in 4).

So, let's go through the core of this:

I am sick to the back teeth of bastard chuffing zerg. No, really. I've had enough.

AoE caps of any kind favour the zerg and should not be implemented in any game. The correct answer is to implement an AoE system which increases in effectiveness when employed by smaller formations or diffuse/surrounding formations relative to large blob formations. Only by doing this, using the game's base combat system, will you force an engagement to spread out.

"But Aza, that will favour bomb warbands! Age of Bright Wizards!"

Nope. A capped AoE system is what favours bomb warbands because it shields their inner members from AoEs which should be devastating them. With no AoE cap, and a bonus for hitting many players with AoE, and a penalty for hitting friendly targets which is significantly more potent when few enemies are hit, the blob / zerg loses its ball defense and takes vastly more damage than it deals when facing a smaller or surrounding force using actual tactics against it, just as it should be. The friendly fire penalty is effective against the zerg because of its ball nature - players in the middle and back of it will AoE through other players.

And the counterplay against AoE? Very simple. Split the hell up. Nothing more, nothing less. 9 player formations notice no change, and anything smaller takes less damage than now. This zerg bullshit is going to go on forever unless we strike in a way that makes deathballing a complete losing strategy.

An excellent side effect of this is that it knocks the Slayer skill Inevitable Doom right out of small scale, because a melee train using ID will have its damage ruined by their very presence.

Ok, I get your dislike of Zergs, you mentioned it often enough to even get trough the thickest skull, after all, but at some time you need some kind of a zerg, as you will never be able to get a keep with one wb when a wb of equal strength defends it. And when you gather your forces to get the keep, i just would get some BWs, sorcs or whatever on the walls ad hit the hell out of those WB who try to get through those 3 doors, on this occasion they have to gather. And it would be bloody effective. You would do some nice skills, and the only risk is to get to the inner keep in time to bomb the living **** out of the people in the inner keep, trying to shoot open that gate. And here will start the main problem in my eyes, of course you will have to dissipate some of your guys to the bos for supplies and to hinder the opposite realm in their intent to take the bos to get supplies, but you still need a larger force to control the inner keep, and they are just cannonfodder for the aoe people.

In my conclusion, this game has much to many AoE skills and should have way less.

[Azarael]

That's why you link the maximum number of defenders in a keep to the keep's rank. There should be some people attacking and defending the keep, and others who have to maintain open world control to prevent repairs and maintain attacking rank.

[Theseus]

That's why you link the maximum number of defenders in a keep to the keep's rank. There should be some people attacking and defending the keep, and others who have to maintain open world control to prevent repairs and maintain attacking rank.

Hm ok, do you have certain numbers there? Judging from my experience, I would say you need 3 times more attacers than defenders to get a keep with absolute certainty, and that number may even go up if you have to maintain map control, so It still might be easy to hold a keep with a good organized small group with ranged AoE.

So I really would appreciate some more concrete numbers and a to know what exactly happens if you have more people in the keep as you are allowed. Some debuff like the rations debuff, faster keep deranking, something more drastic?

That would be most interesting to know, as it would affect the strategies to either attack or defend a keep greatly.

Thanks in advance for the explanation.

P.S: Yeah I know its kind of obnoxious to just expect you to explain all those things to me.... i decided i do it anyways, as I simply hate it to work with variables.^^

[Azarael]

Keeps should not be balanced around requiring three times as many attackers than defenders to take.

Ideally a rank 0 keep should support 30-40% of the attacker's total force size before debuffing, with repairs from supplies being significantly larger than they are now.

[seara]

The max AOE was 12 in v1.0 it worked unlike in v1.2 because the resistance nerf gave a 20% damage increase, and the toughness/initiative nerf who knows how much that accounted for.

I dont think it will make much diffrence for sorc/BW, going from current 0 Sorc/BW per 24ppl if facing less then 72ppl. Over to 1 sorc/BW per 24ppl if somehow maintaining 72 enemies within how many hundred feet? the mechanics was removed in ROR, the dps/mana ratio dosent add up.

[Akalukz]

they had pop caps at Forts once upon a time. Its very hard to implement. Half groups and half warbands were in the forts, while others couldn't get in etc. I am all for spreading the zerg Just need to make sure the stuff happening "outside" the keep is as important as what is happening at the keep.

On AoE cap, i am for it, as long as you don't bring back unbreakable mez and stacking RoF/PoS I would even go as far as saying certain types of AoE should not have thier caps increased. GTAoE being a specific type

[dur3al]

I'm interested in trying out the removal of aoe cap to see how it goes. I think its a step in the right direction.

I also like the postern changes, i wouldn't make it rank 0 though only though, possibly rank 1 you'd also be able to go through enemy posterns.

The main issue I'm seeing now its not really the funnel, is just massive DCs at the Keep Lord fight, if that didn't happen repeatedly, zones would be flipped much quicker.

I also strongly disagree with anything "faction-wise" buff or debuff based in your population... I'd rather see a hard-lock for 24hrs or 48hrs + a debuff when switching sides to not gain any rr/inf/currency for 3h or so.

PS: On the kill counter from today's Praag fighting there was only our group with high killing count as mDps, everything else was rDps... #prayformeleeinoRvR.

[lastalien]

1) No AoE cap, it's gone.
2) Base damage of all AoE attacks drops by 50%.
3) The range of cleave-type PBAoEs increases to ~45-50 feet.
4) AoE attacks increase in damage as more enemy targets are struck, hitting their previous level of 100% after 9 targets, and going up to a suitable maximum when hitting tons of targets.
5) AoE attacks reduce in damage as more friendly targets are struck. The reduction is additive with the increase in 4).

1. It's Ok, Because right now we do not have enough damage for killing zerg with AOE limit - 9 targets.
2. There is no need, in the first, it strongly reduces the flexibility in SL/CH, they can not be used as the main AoE build, secondly, the players have to constantly change carier to achieve the best effect. Often, the game starts as a confrontation between gang packs and grows into a Zerg rollers. It is trite to enrage the people, for example by changing the career I rearrange a lot of skill place.
3. Its will be OP, and i am going to my Slayer
4. Removing the cap AOE enough, there is no need to scale damage
5. This will kill all the social basis of the game, will not be necessary in the guild, it will work to the party.

[Grunbag]

Keeps should not be balanced around requiring three times as many attackers than defenders to take.

Ideally a rank 0 keep should support 30-40% of the attacker's total force size before debuffing, with repairs from supplies being significantly larger than they are now.

For this you should make a timer for ppl that afk inside keep like it was on live . Afk ppl moved to warcamp