Patch Notes 31/1/2017

[Komode]

Are you expecting that people will disband their wbs to several groups and will start to run around separately? For that you need much more selfish leaders to do it and players to be robots, without emotions, wishes, who will just press assist button without thinking about realm progress, guild pride, personal contribution to team progress, BOs, keeps, timers

For the success of the patch, we need a fully working Enemy addon with working assists

Yes, it will be a challenge of available assist addons, cause atm its impossible to apply AOE abilities in time and at the right combat moment at all.

[Tifereth]

Also, I'm sick of reading objective based design being blamed for zerging / blobs. I don't understand what is so difficult to understand about the idea that you can have, in a properly designed system, a large number of players in a single section of the map WITHOUT causing a blob. The blob is caused by the combat system failing to punish blobbing. Nothing - more.

Likewise, it shouldn't be all to hard too understand that there is more truth to the arguement than you may like. Guess people get too hung up on the word "blob". Is it a 100% necessary for everybody to stand in the exact same place? No, granted. Is that a "blob"? Does the gameplay improve when ranged DPS are now forced to fire from the sides into the moshpit of melees, or warbands having to split to do what they always do, only slightly differently? Not really, no. What's stopping 4+ warband alliances to simply rush in from multiple sides, four leaf clover style?

We could discuss all night about the little details and whether blobbing is evil in a massive ORvR game or not. In the end, no matter how hard players actively avoid meeting in the same area and duke it out in small scale, everything leads up to the objectives, latest to the keep, which renders drastic anti numbers measures futile. Keep sieges are a literal auto blob that leaves little to no wiggle room. They're where the new issues are most glaring. Testing on wednesday, we totally dumpstered a destro zerg on the ramp with only a handful of melees. There is no counterplay or gameplay improvement to be found here. How can it be the enemy's fault for not moving out of the way when they're locked into a cramped environment? It's a massive oversight.

I'm still curious how the advice "Well, don't allow them to aoe you down, then!" shall apply onto dozens or so BOs like Icehearth or Squig Pens where there is also no room for multiple pronged attacks or clever maneuvers. Only other counterplay to the new monster melee aoe is to bring no numbers, which is unrealistic at best if people are supposed to play this game. The goal is still to have a big active RvR community, right?
Attacks from multiple sides on the field happened before already regularly, and the new system gives little additional incentives, if any, even. It's now "bring the bigger melee train" which only shifts the problems from one side to the other, really. For me it's hard to understand why warband play should be cut down in exchange for multiple small scale groups when the general outcome will be the same either way.

The old system is flawed by default for sure, and the will to clean up the mess that is this game is very much appreciated. However,
for me personally there is not much more testing needed to call this iteration a miss, I'm afraid. Gameplay has not improved and devolved into one button melee aoe spam while blobbing has not been solved, either.

[Gortoon]

when you only like redhead women then you will always try to change the world to a world with only redhead women.
Ofc all other that like another hair color will just not be there to see.

[slaneesha]

Some comments from yesterday night.

We played as a full wb, testing a hybrid composition: 2 bombing parties, 2 suicide squads.

Once positioning was managed, meaning flanking manoeuvres for example, damage was all right even though it appeared to be random at times. That was sometimes fun, only sometimes, especially when there were adds implying a huge loss of aoe dps. Then it was up to our single target players to do the job, but it was rather uncomfortable.

Therefore, if you still want to do good aoe damages, make sure no one adds your fights... Which is almost impossible. And, if you fight while outnumbered, make sure your enemies won't add either cause in the end, numbers will win all the time...


LNM guild master

[lastalien]

numbers will win all the time...

Exactly. Battle in the area will win big zerg with the organization

[Natherul]

something about SC turn in

I may be wrong here, but Im not sure its possible atm to have multiple turn in points for quests...

[Azarael]

Likewise, it shouldn't be all to hard too understand that there is more truth to the arguement than you may like. Guess people get too hung up on the word "blob". Is it a 100% necessary for everybody to stand in the exact same place? No, granted. Is that a "blob"? Does the gameplay improve when ranged DPS are now forced to fire from the sides into the moshpit of melees, or warbands having to split to do what they always do, only slightly differently? Not really, no. What's stopping 4+ warband alliances to simply rush in from multiple sides, four leaf clover style?

That only works if the opposing force is a) massive b) concentrated at a single point. Yes, you're implying that's the case because of how BOs work. I disagree that it should be the case if a system makes concentration of mass a weakness.

We could discuss all night about the little details and whether blobbing is evil in a massive ORvR game or not. In the end, no matter how hard players actively avoid meeting in the same area and duke it out in small scale, everything leads up to the objectives, latest to the keep, which renders drastic anti numbers measures futile. Keep sieges are a literal auto blob that leaves little to no wiggle room. They're where the new issues are most glaring. Testing on wednesday, we totally dumpstered a destro zerg on the ramp with only a handful of melees. There is no counterplay or gameplay improvement to be found here. How can it be the enemy's fault for not moving out of the way when they're locked into a cramped environment? It's a massive oversight.

I'm still curious how the advice "Well, don't allow them to aoe you down, then!" shall apply onto dozens or so BOs like Icehearth or Squig Pens where there is also no room for multiple pronged attacks or clever maneuvers. Only other counterplay to the new monster melee aoe is to bring no numbers, which is unrealistic at best if people are supposed to play this game. The goal is still to have a big active RvR community, right?

I'm still curious as to how it doesn't. The mechanics only favour a small force if a large force is used against it, so why, exactly, is not charging a small force in a dense mass such a huge issue? This seems as usual like an adaptability problem - people play the same way they always did, run into a hard block (which is intentionally easy to use) to that playstyle and rather than playing any differently, they ask for a revert, because that's easier.

Attacks from multiple sides on the field happened before already regularly, and the new system gives little additional incentives, if any, even. It's now "bring the bigger melee train" which only shifts the problems from one side to the other, really. For me it's hard to understand why warband play should be cut down in exchange for multiple small scale groups when the general outcome will be the same either way.

Little or no incentive, huh? By default this game has a 9 target AoE cap, protecting zergs, and is about concentration of damage on a point as a result of that. Splitting doesn't help you in that kind of design.

It certainly will be "bring the bigger melee train" if people are continuing to use dense mass attacks where damage bonus applies. You don't get any damage bonus unless you're hitting enough people, so aside from 15 extra feet of range on AoE attacks with a lower tooltip value than ST attacks, there is no change in damage with correct spread.

Honestly, it's amazing. People complain that blobbing has not been solved, but simultaneously complain that melee AoEs, which perform only against dense mass in the first place, are a problem. I wonder if there's a link? I wonder if people are blobbing, using melee AoEs against each other, seeing highly variable damage because it was never meant to be done like that and then coming back to complain that blobbing wasn't solved? It sure would be surprising to see a lack of general attitude change within 3 days of a patch!

[Karast]

Honestly, it's amazing. People complain that blobbing has not been solved, but simultaneously complain that melee AoEs, which perform only against dense mass in the first place, are a problem. I wonder if there's a link? I wonder if people are blobbing, using melee AoEs against each other, seeing highly variable damage because it was never meant to be done like that and then coming back to complain that blobbing wasn't solved? It sure would be surprising to see a lack of general attitude change within 3 days of a patch!

I have found that many of the people that complain about blobbing do so from a very narrow mindset. You have already done a tremendous amount to break up the larger blobs, with siege, the current BO system, and opening posterns.

Those that play in guild and alliance warbands do not see the current population as being blobbing in any true sense of the word, and I personally don't feel you can do much more to counter those that blob currently.

These changes actually work in favor of the blob to a certain extent since they can just spread out and swarm you, while as a smaller group, you cannot spread out, or you risk members being cut off. Playing against a blob requires tight coordinated movement, and now tight movement is a death sentence if you run from than 2 groups. 2-3 wayward mdps can effectively morale dump you with spammable abilities.

If you spread out, then any chance of countering the zerg with sharp coordinated movements goes out the window.

It is pretty much made it easier for the zergs and uncoordinated groups to take out the guild teams now.

[blaqwar]

But at the same time you can't really argue that large-scale combat in WAR doesn't simplify and dumb down most interactions and abilities because of the need for maximum AoE damage/healing/utility. A lot of abilities and mechanics that are valuable or even necessary in combat with 6 people are simply made obsolete, which is a flaw of how WAR was designed with large-scale combat as an afterthought. The aim of the changes is (that are, as pointed out, made as a necessity in order to fix the mess Mythic made), to somewhat revert the game back to a state where things make sense from a conceptual standpoint, then they can work from there.

I see where you're coming from though, oversimplification and exaggeration are a bad premise for discussion and too many people overuse those two tools, especially when it comes to this topic.

If shifting focus from ST DMG/buff/debuffs to AoE DMG/buff/debuffs while maintaining most the the same GRP utilities you use in smaller scales is dumbing it down then yes.

Just because you chose several targets instead of one doesn't mean you exercise less planning or brain power to do so. If anything you need to consider position of more targets in relation to others, archetype composition of that clump of players, if or if not rest of the WB can hit the same grp, will it accomplish the task. Whether you chose to ignore singular tank to hit the more squishy target or you ignore a group of tanks +- MDPS to hit the soft healer clump makes little difference, you still make a conscious decision where to hit em for it to hurt. You are pretty much doing the same thing, you do in smaller scales, you just use abilities than affect more than 1 target. There are, like it or not, multiple factors that need your attention during the proper play [premade 24vs24, fending off 3 times your numbers], sometimes there is more to consider than during smaller scale.

And it is not tat you suddenly lose access to the more ST abilities, far from it, good DPS with seize the chance to ST finish a 5% HP healer/DPS [in most cases you have 1 AoE tree and more points than you can put into it, so you off spec in ST trees], as they know that will put the enemy on res chain.

True you don't use all of the abilities you have access to, but neither you do that in smaller scale where you don't utilities all of the AoE abilities in small scale.

You simply have different objective in mind and use different tools. When you want to dig a small hole you gonna use a shovel, but you wont use it to dig up one that is hundreds of meters long/deep, if you have access to some heavier tools like excavators and such.

So yes I can argue that, while indeed it would take away some importance/focus form ST effects and abilities, it creates it own challenges and interaction that you need to deal with or keep track off.

It's really simple, when you scale combat up in numbers you automatically start ignoring game features and mechanics. In a 6v6 every player in it in general has to be at least somewhat aware of every other player if not straight focusing on what they're doing.

As a healer for example you can't ignore their healers, you'd want to know when they use their morales to know when pressure is coming or if that Zealot is moving in for a risky stagger. You'd watch their tanks, making sure you kite away from a quake or god forbid get quaked together with the other healer, or if that WE stealthed and might be opening up on you, you need to be aware of sorc burst, when/what to cleanse, guard swaps from your tanks and who their DPS is focusing. Deciding between using riskier AoE heals or single-target heals etc... If you're really good you'll watch for tiny details like if a Sorc/BW had to use Dark Gathering/Burnout to know when they'll have pressure downtime. And all careers have the same/similar tasks to perform if they want to play at a high level, the amount of attention you pay to details is what makes or breaks the engagement in this game of numbers and you cannot afford ignoring any enemy player. The margin for error is much narrower. I'm sure you're aware of the above I just wanted to make sure that it's given as an example.

Now in a WBvsWB engagement most of this goes out the window. You're very rarely paying attention to single enemies and it only happens when it's a high impact person that pushes forward (a Knight/Chosen with a stagger or a Knight with Solar Flare, or an Engi/Magus for example). Most of the time the focus is on the indiscernible mass, we don't posses the processing power to pay attention to everything even if we wanted to. And not that there's much need for that. You see red names, you make moves to delete said red names based on how many there are and what positions they are in, much rarely in response to who they are and what they are doing. A lot of the information just goes out the window and the shape the combat takes is much rougher and generalised.

A warband can be lead by a single person calling out simple orders as long as you have (as someone else pointed out, you or Haojun) set rotations for challenge/morale/rez. If you try something similar in small-scale it definitely won't work as well. You can have a single person calling the shots but the majority of the decisions will still fall on the individual, while individual input in a WB is almost non-existant, or at best has very little impact.

You're arguing that large-scale has complexities of its own that you don't see in small-scale (which I agree with to an extent) and is just as complex in itself because of them (which is strongly disagree with). The base and foundation for the combat in WAR is and always will be small-scale. The lack of AoE utilities/healing that span over the limit of 6 grouped players indicate that the game was designed around combat involving 6 people, not 24. And while there are abilities that see usage in large-scale that are not used in small-scale there are far more abilities that lose value in large-scale. We can go through the hassle of making a list if you wish. We'd end up discounting several careers as well while all of them have a place in small-scale.

Note that the above is true for the pre-patch ORvR situation, the patch is shifting the way ORvR is played as it was intended.

[Theseus]

Spoiler:

Likewise, it shouldn't be all to hard too understand that there is more truth to the arguement than you may like. Guess people get too hung up on the word "blob". Is it a 100% necessary for everybody to stand in the exact same place? No, granted. Is that a "blob"? Does the gameplay improve when ranged DPS are now forced to fire from the sides into the moshpit of melees, or warbands having to split to do what they always do, only slightly differently? Not really, no. What's stopping 4+ warband alliances to simply rush in from multiple sides, four leaf clover style?

That only works if the opposing force is a) massive b) concentrated at a single point. Yes, you're implying that's the case because of how BOs work. I disagree that it should be the case if a system makes concentration of mass a weakness.

We could discuss all night about the little details and whether blobbing is evil in a massive ORvR game or not. In the end, no matter how hard players actively avoid meeting in the same area and duke it out in small scale, everything leads up to the objectives, latest to the keep, which renders drastic anti numbers measures futile. Keep sieges are a literal auto blob that leaves little to no wiggle room. They're where the new issues are most glaring. Testing on wednesday, we totally dumpstered a destro zerg on the ramp with only a handful of melees. There is no counterplay or gameplay improvement to be found here. How can it be the enemy's fault for not moving out of the way when they're locked into a cramped environment? It's a massive oversight.

I'm still curious how the advice "Well, don't allow them to aoe you down, then!" shall apply onto dozens or so BOs like Icehearth or Squig Pens where there is also no room for multiple pronged attacks or clever maneuvers. Only other counterplay to the new monster melee aoe is to bring no numbers, which is unrealistic at best if people are supposed to play this game. The goal is still to have a big active RvR community, right?

I'm still curious as to how it doesn't. The mechanics only favour a small force if a large force is used against it, so why, exactly, is not charging a small force in a dense mass such a huge issue? This seems as usual like an adaptability problem - people play the same way they always did, run into a hard block (which is intentionally easy to use) to that playstyle and rather than playing any differently, they ask for a revert, because that's easier.

Attacks from multiple sides on the field happened before already regularly, and the new system gives little additional incentives, if any, even. It's now "bring the bigger melee train" which only shifts the problems from one side to the other, really. For me it's hard to understand why warband play should be cut down in exchange for multiple small scale groups when the general outcome will be the same either way.

Little or no incentive, huh? By default this game has a 9 target AoE cap, protecting zergs, and is about concentration of damage on a point as a result of that. Splitting doesn't help you in that kind of design.

It certainly will be "bring the bigger melee train" if people are continuing to use dense mass attacks where damage bonus applies. You don't get any damage bonus unless you're hitting enough people, so aside from 15 extra feet of range on AoE attacks with a lower tooltip value than ST attacks, there is no change in damage with correct spread.

Honestly, it's amazing. People complain that blobbing has not been solved, but simultaneously complain that melee AoEs, which perform only against dense mass in the first place, are a problem. I wonder if there's a link? I wonder if people are blobbing, using melee AoEs against each other, seeing highly variable damage because it was never meant to be done like that and then coming back to complain that blobbing wasn't solved? It sure would be surprising to see a lack of general attitude change within 3 days of a patch!

Hm Azarael, you have a point in what you say, but you cant get around one thing.... and thats the keeps. The keeps will always be a focus where the whole realm army comes together to either attack or defend. Because you need both keeps to lock a zone. True you can breake up your army via bacdoors and so on but its still a pretty narrow place if you have 2 warbands. Maybe it might get better if we had more siegeweapons. (heard some rumor about siege towers after client control) But that only works until you are at the keep lord, then naturally all people will concentrate there. You next could say, yes but the Bos have to be defended too... but the truth is, you defend the bos as long as you need the resources to deploy the ram. After that its much more economic to just guard the posterns as you can get reinforcements from the main door way quicker. True you need the Bos to get enough VP to lock but after keep take you have 45 min or so to get them while you wont have to worry about the keep.... so you can just disregard them while taking the keep. So as long as the keep remains the center of each map progression and as long as you dont have to defend both keeps and get the bos at the same time, breaking up the blob is futile, because each tactic where you not concentrate your forces on the main objective is uneconomich and inefficient. So rather than changing skills to threaten the zerg with annihilation it would be more effective to make the keep attackable right after take, make bos more important even during the keep fight ( for example let the ram be deployed on a special bo, the cannons at another and so on, and if the bo is taken, your ram cant be sustained and gets hightened damage or something like that). I think that aproach might be more effective.