Some ORvR ideas :)

[GRUSZKA]

Reducing PUG Warbands to 12 while leaving guild WB 24 is twice a bad idea.

- The only strength PUG may have is in numbers, as they lack in coordination (no discord) and often skill and gear. Now you want to take away also 'numbers'.
- Most guilds / alliances are running in own WBs anyway, so no real change for them at all. Thus no real change into ORvR situation.
- From my perspective Destro is able to perfectly blob over Praag in 100+ people, so no matter if you divide them into groups of 24 or 12 or 6, they will still steamroll you anyway.
- Effort/work/time of solving ORvR should be put into something else - PvE against empty keeps, how-to-defend zone if you have 60%+ AAO, xrealming to more numerous side etc.

Making Guild Standards useful is a good idea though. Banner on BO to boost resource generation or sth (but locking banner for X minutes there) and other ideas like that.
Same like taking keeps by guild where you can by upgrades, flight master etc. makes it 'fun' to use.

[Alfa1986]

If you just change the number of players in wb from 24 to 36 or 18, 12 it will not change much. But if you change the number of players in the group, from 6 to 5 or 7), then this will already make a serious restructuring in the game schemes. Imagine that your group can now consist of 3 DPS, 2 Healers and 2 tanks, or 2 DPS, 3 Healers and 2 tanks). Or vice versa, not 7 but 5.
Rvr
Short campaigns and fast-changing zones are not very interesting, but stagnation in zones for a long time, when neither side can block the zone for a whole day, are also not interesting.
I think the optimal time for playing in one zone from a psychological point of view is about 2-4 hours, so that it is not too fast, but also not too long, otherwise people just get tired of doing the same things that do not bring any result ... This can be done with an existing resource system.

[gyps]

Why don't we allow big orvr wb opt for inviting some pugs? Instead of posting directly on LFG it would be nice for wb leaders to be able to search in a new window all the players that are currently marked (this would be new also) as Looking for group instead of the other way around where a Pug can only see the open wb. There may be some chance that those random pugs enjoy the wb or the guild wb do want to add that pug to their guild.

Keeps/Castles and proudness are a big thing for a Guild, claiming a keep was a big thing back then and I remember how my whole guild in k8p logged just to defend ours, now as others stated before me people just rush to get to the cities because of the equipment, how about creating a system of keep optimization which would contribute to give to the guild some "special chests" on a week basis? if guild X maintain that keep during 7 days they get that roll chest between their guild members participating in defense. That specific guild will tend to protect x area instead of rushing to cities for sure. For sure keep optimization shall be revised as its nearly impossible to protect a keep 24/7, so it would be nice to add new mobs, siege weapons respawn on defense (or maybe "alive" like mobs) and many other things... to be defined how a Guild can optimize a keep, maybe by renown contribution by its guild members, money..etc...
The respawn thing some guy mentioned could be one of these things to "unlock" and would work only for their guild members.

Talking about the "buff to the underpopulated side" this thing could be epic, Warhammer world is a world of Heroes with name and surname in its profound lore, how about buffing ONE party (not wb) and just one in the orvr zone with some crazy stats (maybe just a raise on the amount of their wounds? toughness, resists? different buffs depending on the class, self-less...etc..) . This would create some random legendary parties defending or attacking which could balance the game if played well, maybe this is a crazy idea but receiving this buff and win while underpopulated could be a lot of fun.

Last but not least is the endgame, if claiming keeps and zones is going to get more difficult, getting to cities is going to be more a once-in a week or once every some days thing, needing the coordination of many guilds / wb / pugs to conquering it. What about keeping the city for your faction after winning a siege? how crazy is that? Then order or destro would have to push back to their own city starting from middle map and when reaching their own city they would have to attack! instead of defense! With different enemy mobs around the city map like Emperor Karl Franz in IC! People would tend to opt for their second city orcs or dwarves atm while their main city is not reconquered in the meantime enemy could visit the whole city / dungeon and PVE stuff to be seen in that city.

Sorry for the long post, I was just brainstorming here.

[zulnam]

As an intersting solution/test, reducing warband classic/PU size to 2 groups (12 players max) and set aside 4 groups warband for (the guild level you want) Guild/Ally warbands only (atleast it could justify to have a guild...).

What does it change? No so much in fact, but probably enough to make things a little different in term of imbalances population management, acting as a lift.

> It "splits" a faction in smaller blocks and encourages communication, focusing on a scaled objective, without depriving the possibility to gather with other groups for common objectives (or "zerg" (but it should be slightly harder in term of focus))
> It "reintroduce" in a emphasized way 6mens in ORvR, and justifying in extenso the fact to have a full BiS character and continue to play it, for fight and fame (not the purple one).
> It gives the possibily to find scaled and enthusiastic fights (thats the point no?). 6 vs 12 is always better than 6 vs 24...
> As a bonus, it may open the way to WB scenarios (12 players).
> As a bonus (bis) it may helps to enter cities more efficiently.
> It could invite players to join Bigger guilds, and guilds to recruit more players to create the game in a different way

I'm not necesarily against this idea, but you must realise that cutting warband size by half would be a major disruptive change for organised guilds that are putting in the effort now to make RvR work the way it is.

It will also mean the meta is shaken up again. Can you even have an ST group when that would mean 50% of your warband doesn't do AoE? In a 24-slot warband, you have 8 slots for dps and 6 classes to choose from*. Cut that down to 4 slots and all of a sudden a lot of people are gonna start thinking in min-max terms again. Most warbands today already have 4 dps slots just with slayer/WLs or Choppa/maras. If 4 is the maximum that's gonna be it.

* - not counting tanks/healers since they are usually in demand, but reduce those slots to 4 and i imagine we will start seeing the exact same issue with those roles as well. Why take an AM (hard to master) when you have 3 WPs and a RP? Same on Destro side. Don't even get me started with BG. When SnB, it's literally a filler tank.

Bringing an axe to how things are just so that the same content can be run in the same way but slower will only ensure the ire of the population. I'm down to try it out for a week or two, as a temporary change just to see how and if it would spice things up. I just don't think people would particularly like it.

[Aethilmar]

The suggestion of dropping PUG warbands down from 24 to 12 smells like a way for dedicated six-man teams to farm pugs easier instead of getting run over and having their egos bruised. Meanwhile guild/alliance WB would not be affected so they could continue to run over the zones with impunity.

Also, it fundamentally does not solve the rewards issue which is why zones flip "too fast" (which is debatable anyway but another topic).