This will be a very long explanation
kleinbuchstabe wrote: Tue Oct 07, 2025 2:32 am
Yes of course RvR will be more fluent when you cut out the siege content. But for what price? You suggest, more or less, to reduce the siege mechanic to a minimum, and make zone locks faster. I dont see any improvement in that, only a reduction of content, and i dont think that is a good direction.
And if you want more active zones, the only way is to spread the players. If they dont do that by themselfes (what they wont do obviously), then the only way is to force them, by implementing a player limit for each zone. That would touch the entrenched situation in the zones directly, without castrating the core of the game even more.
I hear you and while I understand what you're trying to say, most of the conclusions you are jumping to are mere conjecture and is not based on current player behavior or even how RvR works at the moment. It is actually quite the opposite if you lead warbands or understand what is happening and why it is happening.
Players don't spread, because there is no reason to spread, you aren't being rewarded or encouraged in any way to spread out. Even if you do spread because you don't like blobbing, a stronger warband will just join you and demolish you to farm kills - while they lose nothing and just fly straight back into the zerg in the previous zone.
Toshutkidup wrote: Mon Oct 06, 2025 5:25 pm
@hazmy was talking about this idea on my stream. when you can , if u wish come on in so we can get full idea what u would like if u dont mind. I actually like alot of the idea or base ideas ur post represents.
I am happy to explain this idea in more detail but I think this post will also give you more context of why I think it would significantly improve RvR, and go more in-depth of the scenarios it would create.
More Content, Not Less
First of all, this idea is not cutting out Siege content at all. If anything it is promoting it by making it 3x faster to get to, and cuts out the #1 factor by far that prevents the majority of warbands from ever even trying to siege in the current state of RvR or merely fail, which is Oil and Oil Control. This change being a positive effect is pretty much provable by just playing the game for 1 day and talking to warband leaders. Players also like Sieges, what they don't like is dying to a 5 Gold cost spawnable object that stalls time and prevents real pushes and real gameplay, or having to stand in front of a door for 30 minutes.
Allowing players to ATTEMPT to lock down a zone at 3 Star is also anything but reduction in content, as this is already achievable by 5 Staring a zone - which still happens occasionally as a result of Factions doing the SAME THING for 12 hours in the same zone. Why does that happen? Because Sieges are currently extremely hard to pull off with even numbers, or even with AAO, due to defensive mechanics of keeps being buffed through the roof or them taking too long. Currently you can not spread multiple warbands strategically in order to lock down a zone, unless there is heavy AAO.
I also just want to mention here that there is nothing preventing the experimentation of changing how fast/slow it is to level up Keep Stars and it can be adjusted to balance it.
Having to hold all 4 Battle Objectives happens quite rarely in current state of RvR, and even after capturing a PvDOOR Keep with 80% AAO, many zerg have trouble locking the zone down which only requires 3 Objectives currently and results in enjoyable even guerilla fights due to players being forced to spread out and not blob. This happens on a daily basis and is also observable easily - it increases content naturally and forces zerg to spread out. I've seen several sieges fail in this stage just because a zerg doesn't know how to spread out to Battle Objectives.
Yes, there are warbands and usually pugs attempting to "break the blob" by Sieging other zones, which is somewhat of a faulty mindset - because currently Sieges take so long and zone locks require so much time, that the blob does not have to break in order to prevent any zone from being captured, there is no such thing as ninja-capture, a Siege takes 30 minutes minimum. Once the door gets a bit low, the zerg or a guild can just move over to the other zone - wipe the single pug warband AFK on the boring door and move back to the main zerg. ... or both zerg just swap to the other zone at the same time. This also happens on a daily basis and is very observable. The only exception I see is multiple rams in multiple zones happening, and most of those still fail due to Sieges taking way too long, and having to stack all organization on a single siege, if you hope to have any success pushing inner.
This only forces those pug warbands to go to another zone and also level it up, or just disband because once they finished box running... There is nothing they can do realistically, except support the main blob to break the enemy. With making Sieges easier to happen, or allowing to fight for lockdown with Objectives, they have a viable gameplay that they can not only contribute to properly, but also gives them stable content in that zone that they can keep focusing on and get real combat gameplay - and not allow an organized warband to ruin their efforts by just a singular warband wipe. This is an example how kill/death would no longer be a measure of success in RvR because warbands will be able to have significant impact by just pressuring Battle Objectives.
To touch upon your suggestion of creating player limits... do you really think that's a good idea? The current main content for most Warbands in the game is kill-farming, and the skill-gap between Warbands is enormous. Now with a new player limit, you will be forcing players to be locked in an unwinnable RvR-scale scenario of being kill-farmed just like they are in Scenarios right now against premades. Forced Limitations are exactly what they sound like - Forced. Players want freedom without feeling like there is a system manipulating them or telling them how they should be playing, and giving more power to playing Objectives and the Campaign is a natural way of promoting spreading of players.
Breaking the Zerg through Functional RvR Campaign
With changes to lowering Keep HP Door and allowing 3 Star lockdowns, there would be multiple reasons this would massively change the balance and actually promote small-scale skirmishing that breaks the blob - you say it is a mentality problem, but it isn't, there is no reason for a blob to break as of now:
1 - By lowering Door Health, players will be forced to either prepare or react to enemy faction Rams a lot faster due to time required to get to Lord stage and losing your Inner Keep funneling advantage - if you fail to react in time you will be forced to engage in the race of holding 3 Battle Objectives or re-taking the keep, which is some of the most active phases of current RvR design.
2 - Simultaneously, by allowing to lockdown with 3 stars, the earlier mentioned player behavior by you of blobbing with 300 players in a single zone will also be heavily punished, because even if you blob - by focusing on Battle Objectives, a faction will be able to lock down the zone through smarter play, allowing small-scale or other different playstyles to flourish, while guilds and kill-farming warbands will be still able to do what they currently do if they wish and they aren't going to hold the zone and everyone else hostage to the "back and forth" fights that certain players detest.
Example: If holding 4 Battle Objectives can lock the zone - the back and forth playstyle will be instantly risky because if you give up your ground for Morale Building, which is the basis of push-and-pull... If you just left a BO and you ignore trying to hold the rest of the Objectives, you've just given up the zone and a lockdown will happen. If a single powerful warband is also dominating a zone by Warcamp farming, small-scale players will now have the power to lock down the zone without having to beg for that warband to stop kill farming. This is also technically a forced Campaign progression that prevents Warcamp farming and killing RvR.
Currently, there are warbands going to other zones to do box running and avoid the blob gameplay, but there is absolutely no real reward for them to do so, because all they achieve is level up keeps to a Star System that only rewards organized gameplay, since pugs or weaker warbands will never be able to complete in an even Siege in the current Design. Even if they were able to compete, it would currently only promote both factions to zerg the same keep with 300 players.
If lockdown on 3 Stars is possible, If there is action in multiple zones, now there is a very good incentive for warbands to spread, becuase a single box-running warband can be a threat to locking down another zone either through BOs or a weaker Siege. In both cases the main blob HAS to spread out, because if everyone leaves for the 2nd zone together, the 1st zone can be locked down just as much, but now there is an incentive to stay in both zones because you don't have to wait for a Ram to respawn, you don't have to wait for walls repairing or going down - there is a real threat to multiple zones being flipped at the same time if you are not playing strategically and just blob mindlessly.
Of course we also have to be mindful of PvDoor and faster sieges with this, but that is also why my suggestion says that RvR Bags need a rework and rewards shouldn't be as good as they are currently, which is quite an easy fix to apply.
I also do not worry about "easy zone flips" because holding 4 Battle Objectives at the same time in a zone is actually quite difficult even right now, just like I explained earlier how we struggle to hold 3 BOs after Keep Sieges for just 1 minute... it is much harder than just saying oh ninja flips will happen. Witch Elves, Witch Hunters and all small-scale groups or solo players will get a heavy increase in content that actually contributes to RvR now.
Why would any of this incentivize warbands to spread? Because everyone wants War Crests and everyone wants to get kills, but with the current skill-gap between warbands, this is almost impossible for newer players or weaker warbands. Through this system they would be rewarded for spreading and different players of different skill-levels would be able to chase each other down in other zones through the encouragement of the RvR System and not by relying on random player mindset or hoping that the other side also wants to spread. Stronger Warbands would not be able to pray on others constantly, because so much pressure would be applied on the RvR Campaign, that you will have to choose a front that you dedicate your warband to, in order to defend/push Zones. The Campaign itself would promote spreading of forces, faction-pride and more quality gameplay.
The current system actually punishes splitting for most unorganized players, which is why we have such a high rate of players logging off after they try to have fun in another zone on their own terms, but get absolutely no rewards for it and usually get mowed down by an organized warband.
Active RvR Campaign is Back
Finally, if you tie all of this together - allowing to attempt a much faster Siege with 1 Star with all of these changes - you can force this breaking of a blob a lot faster than currently, and you can engage in a variety of different RvR content, versus the stalemate that we have now. Blob Fights will still happen, Warbands will have a reason to spread in zones naturally, and small-scale and solo content will be encouraged either by fighting for Battle Objectives or hunting down the groups who try to hold those Battle Objectives.
And if multiple zones get flipped at the same time? Well your faction is playing mindlessly and you are losing the campaign to the opposition - that is the exact purpose of a functional RvR Campaign and what should happen if you don't care about it.
