Removing Bottlenecks - a constructive suggestion for improving RvR and forts

[Haasid]

Removing Bottlenecks - a constructive suggestion for improving RvR and forts
Currently two major bottlenecks exist in RoR. These bottlenecks were probably less of an issue in the past, but with the increase in server population and the introduction of cities, the bottlenecks have become much more apparent.

TL:DR; Widen doors in forts. Reopen t4 zones after every fort battle even on wins. 3 fort locks = City.

The Fort Defense Bottleneck
The fort battle was designed with a certain number of people in mind. Regardless of whether you like the system or not, forts worked fine with less population. Morale pushes were possible with a bit of coordination and the use of skaven bombs. As more people joined the server it became increasingly difficult to get into forts which everyone needs if they want to progress with rvr gear. Thus the population cap for forts was raised. But now that the population cap has increased body collision becomes a real problem. The main entrance and postern were not designed for that, giving the defenders an unreasonable advantage with higher body counts.

Basically, it's a bottleneck.

Suggestion: If designers want to keep forts as is they should widen the doors (especially postern) or create another way of getting inside - either a third entrance or a secret tunnel or teleport to the roof. That would be a relatively easy fix.

The Zone-Lock Bottleneck
One of the fundamental designs of RoR is the three-zone-split of t4 into forts. The three-zone-split is basically good game design. By splitting the war into three zones the side with the smaller population can push several zones to get a population advantage in at least one zone.
That system works really well as long as the three zones stay open. Even with one zone locked it works to split the war. But if both sides get a fort lock there is only one zone left and the winner will most likely be the faction who have the most people stay online when the majority of the server population logs off. The war is won by attrition (player fatigue) rather than strategy. Even organized warbands can make little difference in this war.

Basically it's a bottleneck.

Suggestion: Whenever a fort battle has finished immediately open up the racial pairing again. If you win a fort you get a star. First to three fort stars (=fort locks) win. The war remains split between three zones. There is still incentive to defend. Strategic coordination between guilds and pug warbands will be more important. You can even lower the population cap for forts back down to what was intended since forts will happen more often.

BONUS SUGGESTIONS:
o Whenever a faction pushes all the way to City, immediately open t2 again. That way people who are not 40/40 will have something to do and get a reprieve from all the sov-geared people who usually own them in the rvr lakes.

o Gain a keep star every time you siege down a keep. Lose one if the other side succeeds in a siege. First to three or five keep stars unlock a fort. Forts are unlocked in turn order (elf/dwarf/empire) and only 40/40+ can go.

[Stophy22]

Very much like this suggestion.

[Stkillinger]

I think those orc catapults were very beneficial to solving the bottleneck problem in fort battles. Maybe they should be made standard at these battles? Just you know, not allow people to get catapulted onto the roof and be able to LOS damage people inside >.>

[engharat]

Totally agree on that. We need wider doors for sure, it will improve the fun and the usability of forts and keeps.

[Zlor]

There’s also an issue currently of people either AFK’ing in forts or just not pushing with the main group, so our numbers are less effective overall.

[notre]

Wider doors...or a better Body block.....
If you pay attention you'll see,
you have a strong body block with your faction, and a "soft" bodyblock against your enemy, and i think maybe it's not working "properly".

Right now the enemy has a little or no bodyblock and such they can pass through you ( push 0,5 sec and you can pass through),
BUT you can't pass through you mates (wich you need to push at doors) and sometimes you can get stuck between your faction players, that makes the bottleneck from my point of view, sine you can't actually move.

My suggestion:
Or the bodyblock has to be the same "strong" body block for both factions at least,
or "soft" on the same faction and "hard" on the enemy (soo you can actually block them from moving forward), right now is the other way around.

[Omegus]

Why does the fight need to take place inside the fortress keep? Have the fort-keep serve as the defender's warcamp and respawn point while the attackers have theirs outside the fortress walls. After X amount of time have the lord come out to face the attackers head-on. If the defenders control fortress BOs then the lord gets buffed, if attackers re-take them then the lord loses that buff.

I'd much rather have a giant fight that spread across the fort rather than everyone trying to cram into one tiny room for what is basically a tank and spank boss fight once the defenders have wiped once.

Funnels through tiny doors feels **** for the attackers. Jail feels **** for the defenders.

[Haasid]

This week:

Monday city at 4 am CEST (and a bonus one at 12 CEST)
Tuesday somewhere between 4-6 am CEST
Wednesday 5 am CEST
Thursday 6 CEST

Just noting a pattern. If you want cities to happen at all times of the day patterns are signs of systemic flaws.

[nat3s]

Something needs to be done but the problem with widening doors is late US TZ with 700 online will just ubar farm cities even harder than they are currently with their daily cities (which occur 4am-7am EU time)!

You somehow need a design that scales with pop to counter the fact that a 70vs70 zone is super easy to cap where a 400vs400 zone is super difficult.

That could be:

* Collision through keep/fort doors changes the higher the pop e.g. at low pop hours roughly 5 players/second can filter through the main door funnel, peak hours 20 players/second.

* There is a 2nd postern / 3rd entrance to keeps/forts which only unlocks when pop goes above a certain threshold to give players a helping hand.

* Above a certain pop threshold players stop respawning in the keep once the outer door is hit (rather than the inner door).

That kind of thing so late US TZ 700 pop remains unchanged, but high pop EU prime with 2500 online gets a buff.

[nat3s]

This week:

Monday city at 4 am CEST (and a bonus one at 12 CEST)
Tuesday somewhere between 4-6 am CEST
Wednesday 5 am CEST
Thursday 6 CEST

We need to keep tracking this as, from speaking to the devs on Discord, they currently view this as a "player problem" rather than "design problem".