Feedback of AoE Changes / Future Suggestions

[Bozzax]

I suggest you devs set up a melee group and go up vs a zerg for an hour or two. Try some different tactics and see if you can engage and disengage larger forces wo using AOE snares. (If you are able to wipe the zerg or the zerg kites away from you it was likely a inconclusive test run).

IMO AOE snares are more beneficial for the smaller side (the more likely to be kiting side).

[bloodi]

That simply tells me that I need to work on more measures for diffusion. However, with one thing or another, it's actually very hard for me to want to do anything here any more. Noticed the lack of patchnotes? It's related to not being able to solve this zerg problem. If I can't solve it, the game has no interest for me, and I've been on the verge of quitting a number of times in the past few months. This is why I will not back down.

Look, its commendable to try to make the game you would want to play but when that conflicts with the game most of your playerbase wants to play, you get in this kind of situation.

After all, if your stance will be "if you dont let me do this, i will take the ball and go home" maybe the best is to take a step back and let someone else do things.

And i dont mind the changes that much, i would just tweak the extreme cases a bit and tie things to the range of the skill rather than iif it does aoe or not. But you hate something most of your playerbase looks forward to play in, despite what a lot of people come here to say, you can see it everyday, is not just the rewards, you can get a lot more medallions/emblems/inf/rr playing small scale, yet they dont want anything to do with what comes with it and rather mindlessly play in big groups around, thats what they like.

There is people who actively tries to find tactics, work in counters, try new setups and the like for warband play and up, a ton of them, you dont like that gameplay? Thats alright, they do, just like there is people who rather play simple stuff and there is people who cant find anything but endless boredom in that kind of games.

The game is what it is, a niche game that attracts people to its various gameplay and so it happens that a ton of them like the simplest form of battle in it.

You dont need to reinvent the wheel, just incentivize playing other aspects of the game and maybe people will look at them but most likely they play zerging in orvr because thats what they like to do and that is fine.

[Aurandilaz]

Okay, since map design is what it is, people will always crowd around keeps, warcamps and BOs.
So since this is given, the solution has to be about making sure people who crowd those areas will still avoid becoming too blobbed;
penalties for crowding:
-Local Area Effect Snare for having too many people in same BO/Keep (limits and speed modifier could be tied to keep ranks/supplies) [traffic jam!]
-Decreased renown gain for playing in crowded sub-region (sure you can zerg as always, but the rewards diminish)
-Diminishing renown gain from kill depending on how many people participated in the kill. Up to 4 persons hitting same target (traditional 6man), 100% normal gain, and diminished renown drop per each new pair of players assisting in the kill:
6 players assisting: 80% renown
8 players assisting: 60% renown
10 players assisting: 40% renown
12 players assisting: 20% renown... and that should probably be lower limit.

You zerg someone with larger force, GG, here's your "reward" for your accomplishment.

In comparison to this "stick", hand out tastier "carrots" for defending BOs, delivering supplies and for basic RvR kills in general.

Maybe zerghammer will always be zerghammer, but with proper incentives, human behaviour changes.

[CegeePegee]

@Bloodi - you're missing the point I think. It's not about what Aza (or any dev) likes vs what the players like. Zerging is only fun for the side who is doing the zerging while it ruins the game for the other side. This cannot be allowed to continue or the game will suffer.

[bloodi]

@Bloodi - you're missing the point I think. It's not about what Aza (or any dev) likes vs what the players like. Zerging is only fun for the side who is doing the zerging while it ruins the game for the other side. This cannot be allowed to continue or the game will suffer.

If the measures were against one side having a much higher number advantage, you would be right but they are simply a tool for small groups to break bigger ones to incentivize making the former and make the later obsolete.

He has been always vocal about how from warband up, there is no balance or skill, just numbers and spam, he is right to a certain extent, one could argue that while what skills you use doesnt really matter wheen to use them and where is more relevant, as is coordination and communication but that exist plenty on small scale too.

The thing is, someone not finding enjoyment from an aspect of the game doesnt mean everyone is the same and with the changes lately we are entering in the realm of making most of the players way to play suffer so we can make a few happy.

I just think there is other ways to do that without being detrimental to the warband level, thats what i mean to say, if you dont think warband play can have any interest and rather destroy it to make other aspects of the game better, maybe taking a step back is the best idea, tons of people play this game to play that way and there is still things to try to accomodate that gameplay with everything else in the game.

[Tesq]

@aza post

if all of that was the aim then

-remove the aoe cap for every skill in game so aoe will punish enemy zerg and the dmg reduction applied by friendly zerg (out of wb not also inside) will punish your zerg and
-> remove dmg increase please

This will punish both frienly /enemy zerg; also no i/we/most of us disagree with you, blob is not zerg, because 1 wb is a form of party set up and ppl should not feel ashamed to play it jeez. In fact aoe was designed to have no target cap, but instead put a dmg reduction due to your concentration they apply a pug solution by limiting the target cap because pug do not understood the term positionig and move away from bomb.

This way 1 WB can return to kill all the enemy zerg as number mean nothing, and go aoe do not have contr on you; friendly zerg only does. Because your solution dosen't anyway fix 2 wb vs 1 from each side , by your fix now 2wb vs 1 not blobbing BUT ACTULLY ZERG 1WB HAVE DMG INCREASE.

IF THAT dmg increase would had not existed and that zerg wb had not aoe cap limit then the fight would had been more equal and zerged wb skill would had matter more.

[CptPiggy]

80% of this server population will still zerg no matter what Aza I think they will never learn. They dont read forums patch notes etc.

[Morf]

It's not about what Aza (or any dev) likes vs what the players like. Zerging is only fun for the side who is doing the zerging while it ruins the game for the other side. This cannot be allowed to continue or the game will suffer.

I agree although zerging is something you cannot fix, ever.
I was a fan of the aoe changes on paper thinking it would penalise players being stacked together which it does however it is also hugely overpowered and pushes players further towards mindless 1 button aoe spamming.
The problem has been greater increased by having just a single open zone and quite frankly i have grown tired having to make the same points over and over to justify having more open zones to fight in, Az is aware of my thoughts as i have pm him on skype (with no response back).

There have been times in the past where staff members have pointed out how medieval combat played out and compared it to war to justify a change or a reason to go down a certain route, now if you look at medieval combat where keeps are the focal point (same as warhammer) you will notice the importance of chokepoints and holding a defensive position to fight against the odds, the current system tries to push players away from chokepoints and into the open field, players knowing the importance of using los and chokepoints will always look to hold such positions to gain an advantage, when they can no longer do so they are open to be slaughtered by superior numbers.
No more do players tankwall outer/inner doors due to postern availability for attackers and oil not functioning as it did on live, now all players do is hold the lord room where a single mdps can wipe wb's with 1 button aoe spamming, this is very wrong imo.

Look at ESO for example, while i havent played it for some time players still zerg even tho the map is huge and there are multiple objectives to fight over.
Unless each map gets a huge overhaul where pve areas are transformed into pvp areas with objectives then nothing will change if we are locked into a single zone, having 3 open pairings doesnt always mean easymode players capping empty keeps, it also means out smarting your opponents to push the campaign in your favour.

You need to look back at how war functioned on live (pre removal of keep lords) sure it was not perfect but it worked, then look at how to improve that system instead of the current vision which strives for perfection and anti zerging methods in a single zone which i believe will never work, you cannot change players mentality all that happens is players move to another game.

[navis]

The new system punishes BLOBBING not ZERGING and BLOB formation isn't the biggest problem. Most of the game mechanics forces players act like a BLOB.

For example [in warband size]:
-Circular aoe abilities.
-Guard
-Assisting
-Hold the Line
-Rift
-Keeps
-All BO's
-Warcamps

Fixed and I fully support this push-back against the incentive to neutralize large scale AOE.
I think the coding is excellent, and "isn't that bad" all in all, however possibly some bounds should be considered rather than keeping this code as game-wide.
Some example tweaks
- remove from BO's and Keep interiors (but keep at door areas)
- play with the effect so it only increases defense rather than output (in attempt to maintain TTK at least 3 seconds+ in any situation)
- amplify effect near warcamps

I find much of these discussions with the Dev's difficult as the dev's state opinion as fact and that is often not possible to digest, agree with, or debate with.

cheers

[altharion1]

Watching warbands crumble in 2 gcds to my slashing blade is beautiful.

Devs should remove the ability to even form warbands in the first place, its a cancer on the game. The "open warband mentality" of players just looking for an easy ride, safety in numbers and a free ride on the renown train.