Posting in all caps draws the wrong attention

[Kaelang]

It is also your absence online when the city passes, or your body is needed as a number for a push Сampaign, but your level is too low to participate in a result of this push.

Sure - absence online can suck. But that's the point of a constantly developing open RvR campaign. You push when you're online to get that city pop. And if you're too low level to participate in a city, then sovereign gear shouldn't be your focus.

Why royals, they would be happy with a pack of scout or soldier's emblems, or whatever they need there at their level. And a campaign cannot be pushed in one game session, with an equal aspect ratio.

Gear progression pre-sovereign is already fast as it is.

[doxifera]

For a time I thought making ranked solo sc rewards on par with sovereign gear could be worth a shot

Alt Sov, according to logic, should be obtained for ranked solo, like all pvp sets before Invader.
After Vanq/Oppr the system, rvr-main set, sc-off set - stopped working.

[AxelF]

Cities are the end-game content, in an RvR 24v24 based game. The classes you have listed definitely have their spots in 24 man content - it's just the current meta says otherwise. Now metas come and go, but the fact remains in that a meta is player driven - it isn't something that the team can control without getting involved in the core gameplay mechanically. WH / WE can harass the backline. Scout locations. Etc. What's actually happening though, is AoE cleave comps running in bombs and blowing everything up beforehand - which you guessed it - leaves less for WH / WE's to do. At this point - should the team redesign the core fundamentals of these classes to suit the meta? And solidify it even more? No. You said it yourself, this isn't how the classes are built in the first place.

The problem is though that certain classes don't have a role in 24v24 scale, and you as a team have been very vocal and very adamant that not every class has to be viable in every scale. Sure, a WB could take a 'non meta' class to harass the backline or scout locations, but they never will when they can achieve three times as much with far less effort by attacking the classes you've designed/allowed to consistently over perform in 24v24 scale.

We're constantly hearing that no input/involvement is needed from the community in proposing balancing suggestions, but classes that fulfill the current AoE cleave meta slots like BW, slayer, sorc, choppa and more recently mSH that you rightly point out are the problem (one that has been enhanced and made more so by you) remain completely untouched, some over the course of years and years, while others like WE/WH and SW are on the sharp end of 'bug fixes' that remove the slight chance they might have had of getting a slot.

You talk about 'the meta' like it's some completely intangible thing that you have no influence over, but the only way the meta is going to change is through balance tweaks to tame slightly the overperforming classes, until you reach a point where the current 'non meta' classes are worth bringing instead, and things like scouting or harassing the backlines becomes as valuable as stacking yet another AoE DD.

tl,dr : this is your game - there's no point complaining that people have worked out the easiest way of achieving the desired result and refuse to deviate from it - it's consistetently giving them the win. If you want the meta to change, the only people who can do something about it are you.

[doxifera]

Sure - absence online can suck. But that's the point of a constantly developing open RvR campaign. You push when you're online to get that city pop. And if you're too low level to participate in a city, then sovereign gear shouldn't be your focus.

Why royals, they would be happy with a pack of scout or soldier's emblems, or whatever they need there at their level. And a campaign cannot be pushed in one game session, with an equal aspect ratio.

Gear progression pre-sovereign is already fast as it is.

It's not about gear, it's about rewards for contributing to victory.

[Alfa1986]

let's be realistic. the devs have already said hundreds of times that they will not create alternative ways of obtaining high-end equipment, respectively, all classes (meta or not meta) will be forced to participate in city sieges, donzt matter they like it or not. therefore it is better to have discussion how to improve / create a more human look for city sieges. I see two main problems here:
1. This is the missmatch system, when a pre-made warband and a pug warband without a single healer cross in one instance.
2. the city siege scenario/script itself, which is (let's be honest) rather boring at all three stages.

[Nameless]

I would like to see pve sc for wbs that didnt got city pop. Something like april fools day sc where waves on monster attack the wb (scavens that protect sewers from attackers trying to reach city from there). It wont be easy and wbs that manage to survive 40 min will gain 5 royals, if u wipe 1.
The good part is that even non meta classes could be usefull at this game mode

[losvtranse]

I feel that one of the obvious bandaids would be to introduce city soloqueue. This will allow for "less desired" classes to get in while also introducing a randomness factor into the composition. You can say that this can be abused by organized wbs by soloqueuing at the same time, but in all honestly it won't be worse than the current situation when organized wb gets mathed against pug wb.
For me tho one of the major issues with the city is the lack of scale. For soloqueue i think 2-3 wbs at each side would be optimal

[Kaelang]

I feel that one of the obvious bandaids would be to introduce city soloqueue. This will allow for "less desired" classes to get in while also introducing a randomness factor into the composition. You can say that this can be abused by organized wbs by soloqueuing at the same time, but in all honestly it won't be worse than the current situation when organized wb gets mathed against pug wb.
For me tho one of the major issues with the city is the lack of scale. For soloqueue i think 2-3 wbs at each side would be optimal

You can solo queue. The issue here is if we restrict solo queues to their own instances, war bands who rely on additional players and backfills will start losing pops. The point here is to join a warband, if we start moving away from that, then we’re just catering to solo players, at the highest level.

[losvtranse]

You can solo queue. The issue here is if we restrict solo queues to their own instances, war bands who rely on additional players and backfills will start losing pops. The point here is to join a warband, if we start moving away from that, then we’re just catering to solo players, at the highest level.

Your point is completely valid and i totally agree with it - it's the endgame after all, if it isn't organized then it's a really weird endgame, however restricting soloqueuers just to their instances isn't the exact thing i had in mind. Let's say: if and only if the matchmaking can make wb vs wb from the current soloqueuers then they will get matched. Until then they will be waiting for being a backfill. Additionally they can queue right from the start, however they''ll start to get matched against eachother only after some time, let's say, 10-5 minutes before the end of queuing. This will allow proper wbs to get their backfills while allowing pugs to fight pugs occasionally. When the time for queuing ends it may also match the remaining people ignoring full wb vs wb part, just with the even numbers.
As i said i see it only as a bandaid solution - in ideal world every class and spec would be needed for the endgame content, however it's more a target than a reachable destination, and it will take time to get closer to it. Besides - pugs gonna pug so far as there are unwanted people either because of their RR or their class, this can let them at least get some fun without being rolled over by a proper warband.

[nat3s]

I think there are a couple of problems, but i've no idea on what could be done to change the design:

1. Cities are boring as things stand. They are and must be the pinnacle of winning an RvR campaign right, as that feels appropriate, but they're just a bit boring for me. With PNP we stomp pretty much every City for free royals. For the pugs it must be even worse.

2. Sov is so expensive as to feel unachievable for anyone not in a decent guild.

3. Xrealming just before queues open leads to people missing queues. Our WB and 12 mans have missed queues quite a few times. After carrying a big push alongside the other big guilds, that's pretty crushing.

4. Campaign is really easy to push with low pop leading to lots of late US cities and few EU prime cities.

5. Lack of a proper solo 2/2/2 queue system hurts pugs.

6. Some classes are poorly balanced for WB play and need a helping hand lest those players that lost the game at the char creation screen leave us.

I fear that the current design is losing us those casuals who we need to entice to stick around.

Please don't misconstrue this as a flame, it's said with passion because I would love to see a return to 3k+ online