Debate about why Order is how it is.

[jtj5002]

What would you change in this to make our faction more appealing to people and veterans? Also, do you not think that because the developers have tweaked quite a few things the faction is much close to 50-50 than 33-66 like it was on live apparently?

It wasn't 33-66 on every server, but on some it was. The problem itself is really just long-term effects of consistent underpop.

This is a very deeply rooted problem in how they set up the faction identities, and how they modeled the classes, it's not something the devs can really fix through balance or a lot of modeling work (thankfully). Since the problem is essentially long-term population mismatch, the solution is to try to offset that mismatch and provide some compelling reasons for people to play the low pop faction with the goal of correcting that mismatch long-term.

The best way I think this could be done without screwing over balance is to buff XP and renown gain for a underdog faction population-wise. To determine that, take the average weighted pop difference throughout the day across the factions and automatically apply buffs to whichever one is at a consistent disadvantage over the previous 2-weeks/month, with the amount of the buff scaling with the amount of disadvantage. This could translate into a higher gear droprate too. Additionally, use that same sort of information to try to funnel new players to the underdog faction, with potentially even larger benefits for the early levels of new accounts. However for a quick and dirty feature, jsut apply the buff globally to the faction and tweak it by hand as developers monitor the population. The automatic part described above is more of a self-sustaining population balance system, but given these are long-term plays it really doesn't need to be programmed in as a system, just something that' easy for devs to change as they see population metrics shift.

For example, Imagine if it was 25% faster to level Order characters for career and renown, and they gained medallions and loot drops 25% faster (The numbers are just for example, don't get hung up on them). For anyone on order thinking of rerolling to a more warband-desirable class, or who wants to have an alt for different realm situations or composition flexibility, this becomes tempting, as is it tempting for destruction players to consider spending time on Order leveling an alt they may end up enjoying. Maybe 25% is too much. Maybe it's not enough. I dont' know. I dont' think something like 10% would be compelling enough, and what is "compelling" is going to vary person to person. I do know at some point you'll get a number that's very tempting to a lot of players, and that long-term this will help correct the issue, its just a matter of tuning. This is a long-term play, so implementing it won't see results overnight, it'll take months before you start to see the effects.

And for the players on the other faction not getting that bonus, I think most would probably be OK with it honestly, since its purpose is to try to balance out the realm so it is a net win for them too long-term when their realm pop isn't stacked and they have faster scenario queues and more RvR action going on.

Also, higher prioritization on aesthetic and quality of life bugs on Order would be a small help. We spend a lot of time staring at our characters, and little aesthetic bugs are going to grate on some people over time, and fixing dying issues or maybe tweaking particularly ugly armor if possible would help out, as would fixing some of the minor annoyances we face every day (like getting dismounted all the time riding through Altdorf, wtf). Things that just make the characters we play and our experience on order more enjoyable would contribute to long-term faction sustain.

Except Order isn't really the underdog faction. Order consistently wins ORVR and most forts due to having more RDPS and have a higher RVR turnout than destro. Giving them buffs would make RVR even more of a shitshow than it already is.

Order simply loses more in cities because they have too many RDPS and not as many city loggers as destro.

[jokerspsycho]

Except Order isn't really the underdog faction. Order consistently wins ORVR and most forts due to having more RDPS and have a higher RVR turnout than destro. Giving them buffs would make RVR even more of a shitshow than it already is.

Order simply loses more in cities because they have too many RDPS and not as many city loggers as destro.

I think Orvr isnt a good tell tale sign. That's a numbers game more often then not, depending on the site you are defending. For example, I spent all of yesterday (5/6) in AAO of at least 40% often times us out numbered by 100 most of the night. Around 11-12est it started evening out.

Also arent forts made for the attacking realm (destro) to have more population then the defender? Or do most of the forts just end up having 220~ vs 190~?

[jtj5002]

Except Order isn't really the underdog faction. Order consistently wins ORVR and most forts due to having more RDPS and have a higher RVR turnout than destro. Giving them buffs would make RVR even more of a shitshow than it already is.

Order simply loses more in cities because they have too many RDPS and not as many city loggers as destro.

I think Orvr isnt a good tell tale sign. That's a numbers game more often then not, depending on the site you are defending. For example, I spent all of yesterday (5/6) in AAO of at least 40% often times us out numbered by 100 most of the night. Around 11-12est it started evening out.

Also arent forts made for the attacking realm (destro) to have more population then the defender? Or do most of the forts just end up having 220~ vs 190~?

Defenders always have 20% less than attackers. Order wins the mass majority of forts whether they are attacking or defending due to having much more ranged dps.

Over populated rdps is what's causing order to win a lot of forts and lose a lot of cities. Having more city loggers on the destro side is also another reason destro wins a lot of cities. Solo quers and 6 mans gets in cities easily on orders side, while they pretty much will almost never get in on destro side.

[malorn]

Except Order isn't really the underdog faction. Order consistently wins ORVR and most forts due to having more RDPS and have a higher RVR turnout than destro. Giving them buffs would make RVR even more of a shitshow than it already is.

Order simply loses more in cities because they have too many RDPS and not as many city loggers as destro.

I'm talking strictly population, not a subjective interpretation of faction balance. I'm not advocating giving Order any form of balance buffs; I'm advocating giving the lower population help in resolving the population difference problem.

If, as you say, the problem is too many RDPS, then buffing leveling rate and renown rate will help them allevaite that problem more quickly and create their own city loggers.

[jtj5002]

Except Order isn't really the underdog faction. Order consistently wins ORVR and most forts due to having more RDPS and have a higher RVR turnout than destro. Giving them buffs would make RVR even more of a shitshow than it already is.

Order simply loses more in cities because they have too many RDPS and not as many city loggers as destro.

I'm talking strictly population, not a subjective interpretation of faction balance. I'm not advocating giving Order any form of balance buffs; I'm advocating giving the lower population help in resolving the population difference problem.

If, as you say, the problem is too many RDPS, then buffing leveling rate and renown rate will help them allevaite that problem more quickly and create their own city loggers.

Population is still depending on the specific content of the game. Order have a higher RVR population and dominate that aspect of the game. Destro have a higher city siege population and dominate that aspect of the game. You can't just balance the game around city population and end up having order even more dominate in RVR.

Also how would you know if people won't just roll even more ranged classes and make the problem even worse?

[videogamer]

Been dabbling in Order lately. You guys really need to execute the Engineer apologists in /advice tbh. Everytime you get that guy on the fence is like "what should I play" immediately roleplayers start piping up about how great dwarfs and Engineers are, that you should pick fun over what's needed drowning out the usual actual good advice of playing something useful. Now in a way they're right, it's a video game after all and some people just wanna be casuals instead of being competitive cause they work a 9-5 job and support their families and blah blah etc typical gamer dad excuse.

That's the kind of people giving newplayers advice on Order side, atleast on Destruction the roleplayers are just like "green is best" and everyone understands it's a meme and has a hearty cackle before proceeding to create something the faction actually needs. We need to execute these scum on Order tbh, time to put the gallows in Aldorf square to use and then make some real video gamers out of this rabble on Order.

[malorn]

Population is still depending on the specific content of the game. Order have a higher RVR population and dominate that aspect of the game. Destro have a higher city siege population and dominate that aspect of the game. You can't just balance the game around city population and end up having order even more dominate in RVR.

Also how would you know if people won't just roll even more ranged classes and make the problem even worse?

You're still confusing game balance with population balance. And if more people want to roll ranged classes to play, so what? They're having fun.

There's a flaw in this line of thinking that people need to be forced into playing specific classes, and that is the alternative to them having fun as a ranged class could be rolling a tank or healer. It could also be rolling a melee dps, or playing ranged dps on the other faction where they are allowed to play how they want, or not playing the game at all. You can't force people to play the game, and if you forbid them from playing what they enjoy the most likely outcome is that they won't play at all, which neither helps the faction, nor the game as a whole. The worst outcome would be that person playing the other faction, because now you've swung it the other way and exacerbated the situation. And the meta is always changing. You never know when stacking ranged might become a good thing.

The point is that whatever the meta is or game balance is irrelevant when there's a population imbalance. Justifying imbalanced pops because of perceived game imbalance is flawed thinking. If you believe that on even populations Order performs better then that will be extremely obvious when there's even populations and that's something to address with game balancing. Judging from the rest of this thread, order being consider OP is not really the issue with Order.

I have a difficult time believing "Order have a higher RVR population" when they have lower population overall. It's possible that is the case, but only the devs have the data to know that for certain. Players do not have access to the data to definitively make that claim. The data we do see is population of the server, and zone pop. And most of the time I see zone pop, it's in Destruction's favor by a fair margin and fits with overall realm pop.

However, do agree that Order has some better designed classes in many cases for specific roles, but that's not really relevant to this. Even back in 2008, particularly in the realm of effective heal debuffing, Order had a big advantage, and this was long before high end RR or gearing set in. At this point, such imbalance is likely a crutch for Order and helping compensate for the otherwise lack of appeal for the faction. If you want to remove that crutch, remove the population discrepancy first, and then its far more obvious and can be fixed with wide support. Removing the crutch while they are at a population disadvantage is extremely risky for the game and could make things much worse. So if your goal is addressing perceived game imbalanc then addressing population difference is the first step to alleviating that.

[Omegus]

To give you an idea of how organised destro have to be: in the siege that just happened there were 4+ full destro 24-man warbands that didn't get into city and they all queued up as quick as possible, say nothing of the 12-mans, 6-mans and soloers.

How many order soloers got in?

[Nekkma]

There's a flaw in this line of thinking that people need to be forced into playing specific classes, and that is the alternative to them having fun as a ranged class could be rolling a tank or healer.

Flaw or not, that's the game. There are plenty of games where all classes are jack-of-all-trades and more or less self sufficient. This game is not and I think alot play it because of that (I do at least).

Regarding population balance I think it will be much more static because of the heavy grind for endgame gear / pve etc. Back in the T3 and early T4 days I played both sides more or less daily but now I have completely abandoned order as I just do not have the time to rank up and gear characters on both sides anymore. I have the somewhat unpopular opinion that x-realming is mostly good for the game as a whole.

[Wam]

To give you an idea of how organised destro have to be: in the siege that just happened there were 4+ full destro 24-man warbands that didn't get into city and they all queued up as quick as possible, say nothing of the 12-mans, 6-mans and soloers.

How many order soloers got in?

was a full warband... instant qued (no breaks in the que)

took 20 minutes, and was instance 11 out of 16...

Order simply do not organise on the scale of destro and it shows ... that is why there is a big difference. It's a mentality issue, and its been like this for years, order pugs use to literally hate order guilds because they would play for fights and fun... use to be toxic ASF, i know because i could see realm chat and also when we are more friendly to our enemies in the lakes than their own allies...

Pugs just want to be carried and have easy mode as per usual, when zerging is not enough in rvr... sorry you cannot create overflows in cities and numbers are even so you have to put in some teamwork instead...

It is end game, but still they want to cry and get things nerfed and altered for their needs... because their needs outweighs everyone elses and it should be based around them... dare they adapt to the situation like destro pugs did, they got semi organised fast... its not that hard if you put half as much energy into posts to organise you would be on your way.

Just the attitude and apetite is not there for order and hasn't been for years... you see it in the whine, when there is plenty of good advice, order cry about imbalances... it always go to the excuse well, yet do not talk about order strengths lol... just because you do not utilize them doesnt mean they do not exist... LOB show this, we have shown this, some other groups have shown this on order side...

Order's failure in city sieges is of their own making... you need to own and accept this, then you know do something about it... like organise more alliance warbands, or more order discords and work on your composition / teamwork... I don't know if order groups are allergic to working with one another... but I know destro is more in unison when it comes to this, my guys and gals have joined many other destro premades no problem.

Dev's have already bent over backwards for years with changing loot/gearing system to make it much faster paced and "participation award" ... to do so for end game gear will make a massive mockery of entire system and what is to seperate premade from pug, because last 3 cities i was in i could define as pug mix. Players should not be punished for grouping / organising themselves ... otherwise that is death of game, its time order stopped being lazy and caught up but i doubt because the entitlement and expectation is too high without putting in any real effort.

Zdps nerfed into ground, dps dok nerfed, chosen nerfed, mara drain nerfed... but still destro is op? Both sides have strong tools, just one side takes advantage of theirs more often... other side accepts defeat then complains without putting in effort. Order got defeatist mentality and rage when things do not go their way... and its been shown whats possible order side, but order prefer to look at what destro do, instead of what your best order groups do... you complain about morale bomb so much but ask PNP when we brought proper city setup on order how we played around their morale and that is when they could drain us alot easier...

Order advice for more success, AM is very useful but only if it can heal and morale pump, that is very limited amount of AM's who can pull this off under heavy pressure... too many are liability and not worth a spot sorry you need to sc and ranked more to hone your skills (it is a high skill level class) if you cannot find a top tier AM, do not bring one, double stack warrior priests if you cannot find enough good RP's to boost your WP's... WP's hard carry you.

Run as many 2hander tanks as possible (that dont go full yolo) just more assist and pressure whilst still performing tank duties

Bring a mix of aoe and ST pressure... work on positioning and assist ... dont bring pure melee train, dont bring pure bomb group.

BW/SL/WL are your top dps picks, then you can bring in something niche in one spot imo. (Overstacking niche usually doesnt go well which is usually where order fail, too many AM, too many WH, too many Engi all in the same warband...)