Debate about why Desto is how it is

[Sonnenritter]

I just did my first city this morning. We won all three rounds, but man, THIS is the end game content in this game? THIS is what causes so many arguments? You go from massive RvR battles with fun mechanics and tactical maneuvering in a large area (with organized warbands) to... a 24 vs. 24 instanced grindfest. You go from something more epic & more fun, to something less epic & less fun. That makes the progression seem very odd to me. Well, I am glad I won't ever have to face the dilemma of staying up late waiting for city alerts or going to bed at least, because I want to avoid them at all costs. It's a shame that when cities are going on they kill the open RvR population though.

You city loggers can keep cities. This is the worst end game content I've ever experienced in an MMO. Even if they were fun, the fact that they happen at random times and can't exactly (to some extent yes) be planned for is terrible. But they suck, so whatever.

Some people like cities, some don't. But they are not "the end-game content" as you would normally understand it, like the highest tier raid in WoW. They are simply an 24v24 instance at the "end" of a RvR campagin, and almost exclusive (unfortunetly) with rewardring Royal Crests. You could say there's no endgame in this game. Or the endgame is the PvP wherever it happens and where you like it, whether it's RvR, scenarios, forts, cities. Maybe PvE duengons too.
I could add what i think about this whole system, but judging by the GM response in this thread, it's probably a big waste of time. If you don't like cities, maybe you should try more scenarios, and the ranked one too? I dont know, it's up to you man.

You get the best gear in the game by getting royal crests which mainly come from cities (the very unlikely fort bags aside as Royal Crests no longer are rewarded for simply participating in a fort). All of the RvR is ultimately working towards the goal of attacking the other faction's city. So yes, cities are indeed the end-game content of Return of Reckoning. You can do whatever you want with your playtime, yes, but that doesn't change what the end-game content actually is. I hate scenarios and the PvE in this game is absolutely terrible, so I'll just stick with open RvR which I love. I don't mind never getting the best gear in the game. I was just really disappointed in how unfun the end-game content is, the content that all of my efforts and the efforts of fellow faction members in RvR leads to unlocking.

[jvlosky]

I just did my first city this morning. We won all three rounds, but man, THIS is the end game content in this game? THIS is what causes so many arguments? You go from massive RvR battles with fun mechanics and tactical maneuvering in a large area (with organized warbands) to... a 24 vs. 24 instanced grindfest. You go from something more epic & more fun, to something less epic & less fun. That makes the progression seem very odd to me. Well, I am glad I won't ever have to face the dilemma of staying up late waiting for city alerts or going to bed at least, because I want to avoid them at all costs. It's a shame that when cities are going on they kill the open RvR population though.

You city loggers can keep cities. This is the worst end game content I've ever experienced in an MMO. Even if they were fun, the fact that they happen at random times and can't exactly (to some extent yes) be planned for is terrible. But they suck, so whatever.

We are all the victim of the game cycle circumstance.

The reason I really like city is when you have a premade 24 man and go against another really good premade 24 man. There is no other experience like it in the game where you get to stretch your legs and use all your knowledge, communication, cal-louts, builds, and skill.

If there was an environment outside of city that fostered this environment I would totally be for it. 24v24 guild sc's for royals anyone?

Also buff Order.

[Noslock]

Hello everybody so i have learnd from Wonshots "Debate about why Order is how it is" that Destro have a clear Moral advantage, better classes, better synergy between classes, more ppl, more and (stronger???) Guilds etc. can someone tell me why Destro is not taking an advantage in the campaign with all this things. IC is constant at 1-2 stars the last few days while Altdorf is at 5 stars for like 4-5? days. It is not like Destro is not trying to siege Altdorf but they almost lose every Fort this week how can that be with all this advantage on Destro? In my opinon there is a huge imbalance in RVR maybe only in Forts but still an imbalance. Am i wrong?

1 Failing fort mechanics and fort rewards allows fort to be capped most of the time when attackers outnumbers defenders big time in early morning eu time or if defenders decide to throw the fort.200 people in that tiny room with those 2 tiny door defending are not so easy to wipe.Even more difficult since aoe goes tru walls ,pulls goes tru walls, lowbies that are basically cannon fodder in a fort,tank classes goin 2h and meltin like squishies,solo mentality of players that prefer to go suicide themselves instead of joinin a wb and try to do something useful
2 People moving free from destro to order or viceversa to defend fort / pride zones
3 Destro have like 3 guild able to do something and pushing forts seems to not be the priority
4 Farming order after they ve spent their time pushing to city is easier and reward are the same considering how bad is contribution mechanic in city.As an example one player who was afk 90% of time not only become champ in s3 (having 7k damage and being afk as tank) but also got gold bag meanwhile people who do their job most of their time got literally no bags cause contribution mechanics is totally random.

As someone said any brainless player can spam rof in fort and its funny that someone even brag about it in their signature when probably 80% of their kills is spamming rof in fort....then you met em in city where they can put rof up their xxx and you farm them like they deserve and thats the only reason i still play city.make them cry and bath in their salty tears on forum when they say how op is destro.

Salty passive agressive post , 5/5 golden stars .

Not salty at all. On my third set and counting

[Jastojan]

I just did my first city this morning. We won all three rounds, but man, THIS is the end game content in this game? THIS is what causes so many arguments? You go from massive RvR battles with fun mechanics and tactical maneuvering in a large area (with organized warbands) to... a 24 vs. 24 instanced grindfest. You go from something more epic & more fun, to something less epic & less fun. That makes the progression seem very odd to me. Well, I am glad I won't ever have to face the dilemma of staying up late waiting for city alerts or going to bed at least, because I want to avoid them at all costs. It's a shame that when cities are going on they kill the open RvR population though.

You city loggers can keep cities. This is the worst end game content I've ever experienced in an MMO. Even if they were fun, the fact that they happen at random times and can't exactly (to some extent yes) be planned for is terrible. But they suck, so whatever.

We are all the victim of the game cycle circumstance.

The reason I really like city is when you have a premade 24 man and go against another really good premade 24 man. There is no other experience like it in the game where you get to stretch your legs and use all your knowledge, communication, cal-louts, builds, and skill.

If there was an environment outside of city that fostered this environment I would totally be for it. 24v24 guild sc's for royals anyone?

Also buff Order.

I think, if you want to enjoy more long time battles where you have to use all of your knowledge, skill, etc. ... (not only in cities), the aoe dmg morales and 24 aoe dmg cap should be remowed. In cities you dont have time to build m3 or m4 so the aoe from morals dont mean so much (yes, there could happen m4 too during longer fights, but it is not so often and many times only few players could reach m4) AND you dont have to be affraid of other random engies or BWs to come from nowhere like in forts or keeps who could melt you in seconds. This is the main reason why the battles in oRVR and forts suck. Healers can not face to such a huge aoe dmg from morals and aoe cap.

[toffikx]

I just did my first city this morning. We won all three rounds, but man, THIS is the end game content in this game? THIS is what causes so many arguments? You go from massive RvR battles with fun mechanics and tactical maneuvering in a large area (with organized warbands) to... a 24 vs. 24 instanced grindfest. You go from something more epic & more fun, to something less epic & less fun. That makes the progression seem very odd to me. Well, I am glad I won't ever have to face the dilemma of staying up late waiting for city alerts or going to bed at least, because I want to avoid them at all costs. It's a shame that when cities are going on they kill the open RvR population though.

You city loggers can keep cities. This is the worst end game content I've ever experienced in an MMO. Even if they were fun, the fact that they happen at random times and can't exactly (to some extent yes) be planned for is terrible. But they suck, so whatever.

Some people like cities, some don't. But they are not "the end-game content" as you would normally understand it, like the highest tier raid in WoW. They are simply an 24v24 instance at the "end" of a RvR campagin, and almost exclusive (unfortunetly) with rewardring Royal Crests. You could say there's no endgame in this game. Or the endgame is the PvP wherever it happens and where you like it, whether it's RvR, scenarios, forts, cities. Maybe PvE duengons too.
I could add what i think about this whole system, but judging by the GM response in this thread, it's probably a big waste of time. If you don't like cities, maybe you should try more scenarios, and the ranked one too? I dont know, it's up to you man.

You get the best gear in the game by getting royal crests which mainly come from cities (the very unlikely fort bags aside as Royal Crests no longer are rewarded for simply participating in a fort). All of the RvR is ultimately working towards the goal of attacking the other faction's city. So yes, cities are indeed the end-game content of Return of Reckoning. You can do whatever you want with your playtime, yes, but that doesn't change what the end-game content actually is. I hate scenarios and the PvE in this game is absolutely terrible, so I'll just stick with open RvR which I love. I don't mind never getting the best gear in the game. I was just really disappointed in how unfun the end-game content is, the content that all of my efforts and the efforts of fellow faction members in RvR leads to unlocking.

There’s a lot of people that feel that way. Cities can be fun sometimes (imo) when the teams are even. But anyway. Just do the RvR then. Or anything else that you find interesting. And cities you can do from time to time, for the gear. Or something.

[toffikx]

If there was an environment outside of city that fostered this environment I would totally be for it. 24v24 guild sc's for royals anyone?

Not sure they would make a 24v24 scenario like that (but i’m all up for it though).
But what you can do is make 24v24 discord. Get people in there and make a LFG lobby. There’s already a 6v6 discord like that.
Yea, getting 24v24 matches is a little bit more of an organisational hassle. I made thread earlier asking some warband leady guys what they think about a 24v24 discord, and the few responses that were given, were mostly negative.
But nonthing bad will happen if some1 makes a 24v24 disc and atleast see how it goes. You maybe?
For 24v24 scenarios outside city (with rewards), you could have to wait an awfully long time before they are introduced. Or it may never happen. So there’s that.

[carthagerising]

this thread is full of some real gems i gotta say.

guy has his first city, turns into a slaughter and then judges the whole concept on that one experience. genius.

I think a major cause for destro being the way it is is most people do what ever it is they wanna do, when they want and **** anyone who tries to say other wise.

this might be a fun philosophy to live by but in a game that really benefits from coordination its quite a detrimental mindset. Try leading some time, you see obvious things about to happen, you try to steer people towards countering it and no one follows and then it happens and everyone's salty as ****. happens every day, almost every failed keep defense or attack, in forts, in orvr, everywhere.

If people would just try coordinating and getting on the same page a great many of destros failures wouldnt be and we would make much greater progress. It would also help with the general lack of desire to push. If people who need sovereign and/or enjoy cities saw that fort assaults for destro had a decent chance of not turning into a total **** show after 1 failed push in stage 3 then mayb there would be a much higher desire to contribute and push zones to get to altdorf rather than just sitting back and hoping for IC.

Also as someone pointed out earlier, the dominance on the server comes and goes. People act as if the game has been running a week and its been all one faction. Destro have had their time as have order, for years. try to have some perspective and enjoy the fact that in this game winning or losing offers rewards and ways to profit. Also order have won what...3 (maybe its more but its a very low number) cities maybe total since their implementation? lets not get carried away with their dominance too soon.

Finally on cities, its extremely tempting to only log on for cities, with a good guild/alliance they can provide insanely good content that for me personally the rest of the game struggles to match (if you have good opposition) and really who can blame people who have many alts all geared from rvr and forts for simply wanting the source of the next tier gear to happen. The self righteousness of realm priders is incredibly obnoxious. sure defend the fort and or keep, im not advocating for throwing but the fact this argument has gripped destro for months now and caused such bitter divide is retarded.

[Sonnenritter]

this thread is full of some real gems i gotta say.

guy has his first city, turns into a slaughter and then judges the whole concept on that one experience. genius.

We won all three rounds, but it wasn't exactly a slaughter. Many of the fights lasted quite some time, especially the final one where all of the champions on both sides died. How many city sieges must I do for me to conclude that they are, at their core, boring as ****? Please tell me, Mr. Gatekeeper. I have done plenty of scenarios, and I also hate those. I play this game for open world PvP, not instanced trash.

[Honshu]

Finally on cities, its extremely tempting to only log on for cities, with a good guild/alliance they can provide insanely good content that for me personally the rest of the game struggles to match (if you have good opposition) and really who can blame people who have many alts all geared from rvr and forts for simply wanting the source of the next tier gear to happen. The self righteousness of realm priders is incredibly obnoxious. sure defend the fort and or keep, im not advocating for throwing but the fact this argument has gripped destro for months now and caused such bitter divide is retarded.

As the saying goes, don't hate the player, hate the game. The devs have constructed a system where the best gear is gated behind a specific kind of content that is only unlockable through lesser-rewarding content yet the former can be jumped into by those who had nothing to do with the latter.

This, of course, is compounded by the fact that the devs, based on what reading I have done on the forum, seem content to allow there to be a vast disparity between individual classes and their ability to meaningfully contribute to that content. If you're a WB leader, why take Ironbreakers instead of Knights of the Burning Sun? Why take Shadow Warriors instead of Bright Wizards?

As a relative newcomer, it seems plain that this system is flawed from conception. This city-logging issue is just a symptom of a design problem which leads to some pretty unhealthy sounding gameplay.

[Stophy22]

People don't read long posts so hopefully this is adequate. I had a lot I wanted to say about, "How the game is the way it is" and I've had enough about "why destro/order is the way it is". You can read the whole thing just as it is, that's how it was written and it should make sense haha.

Some ideas

Spoiler:

Instead of singling out city loggers, you can try to up the content levels of other content to match that of cities.

Crazy idea to make the entire game fun and not just cities, right?

Cities are competitive and interesting and challenge on one end of the spectrum and a complete stomp and waste of time if you don't get in on the other end.

If you want people to Orvr to get into a city you have to make it fun, and even then thats a terrible idea. Even in WoW you get your attunement or whatever and you're good to go, as many times as you want with a weekly lockout. Whats fun for most people in WAR is PVP. Orvr tends to get zergy so thats not really fun, your game lags and you get run over by uneven numbers for mere moments of inattentiveness to ones surroundings.

We won't talk about forts because if no one thinks anything is wrong with them its blatant ignorance at this point.

So to recap:
-Cities have potential to be fun, but sometimes fall short.
-Orvr has more potential to fall short because of zerg and lag, but can be fun.
-Putting unrealistic restrictions on content does more harm than good

Some Suggestions

Spoiler:

So lets ask more questions like: How do we fix it? What would improve Orvr? What would improve cities? What would improve the game?

Now with whatever you suggest you're bound to upset someone but we're an alpha server so content changes for testing purposes should be rolled out as regularly as possible to see what works. Whatever gets positive feedback or negative feedback. Easy incentive to Orvr is make players of appropriate renown (which is practically everyone at this point) Drop Royals/Invaders. If this is such a sin, then increase the cost of the sets. How many people complain about Vanq/Opp grind compared to Invader/Sov grind? Limiting content and lowering price is absolutely worse than the original Big-cost-Big-fun approach that has been taken thus far.

Then lower the RR progression so people don't fly from rr40->60 in like a day with a rrpot. Allowing people to blaze through their RR just kinda defeats any meaningful sense of achievement, you just get to start a new alt and max our another character RR-wise in a week/month whatever. Very few players are sticking to their one to two characters and honing them because it means absolutely nothing or its done in a month and now it's time to start a new project.

Black and White About How It Is (or how it feels)

Spoiler:

Run dungeons when you don't have lockouts, participate in forts when they happen, skip vanq and oppressor grind because it is insane compared to how easy sent/redeye/bloodlord is to get or just do it passively while waiting for forts/cities. Git that invader ward and GG you got yourself another city logger alt. And all of this **** takes no time at all to achieve, in retrospect to what an MMO-grind should or has been in today standards or older standards. (not talking korean mmo, lol)

And then you get the white-knights, "Don't play the game if its not fun." "Servers free, you should be thankful." "Cancel ur sub." Thanks guys, I really am thankful to be able to play RoR and the problem is not that the game isn't fun. It's fun and nostalgic for a lot of us. The issue is we want to see it better, to its full potential. I don't want to see it die, again. I don't want the population to split when another server comes out that does things better/differently. Maybe that's greedy, maybe its passion. Call it what you want. And I know man power is low so I don't expect all these changes immediately or next patch notes, obvious 2 weeks* is the standard. Simple acknowledgement that the team sees the issues with the game that the community sees and is working on it would be enough. And of course follow through. Possible an organized game plan to share with us would be nice too. More and more players get the feeling that this is just a sandbox and they are lucky to walk its fertile soil. If that's the case say it, lets be honest with each other. If it's not well lets communicate and work together, please. I really enjoy this game and I want to see it thrive to the best of an 8-10year old mmo's ability.

TLDR (and then some)

Spoiler:

The current state of the server has a lot of people wanting. Wanting for dream patch-notes (changes). Wanting for more class correction (balance/diversity). Wanting for enjoyable forts and cities they can get into (Fixes). The game feels less fun than its been in a while not because of its lack of fun things to do but because the game has changed to a state where players don't have the tools to get to the content they want and participate in it (if you want forts and cities). So what's left is to be efficient (run dungeons, Log on when you see a fort/city and try to get in.) I'm sorry if you think city logging is ruining the game or a terrible thing but the state of the game incentives city logging and ignoring of RVR zones until its pushed because you just have no reason to participate in Orvr content because the rewards don't mean anything to someone above Vanq. Sure helping new players out is always a good thing to do, and having a fun time in the lakes still exists. But nothing actively attracts you out to the lakes. Subj weapons are old news. Vanq is lower than invader and can be skipped. 1royal/invader or whatever it is, feels more like a slap to the face than a carrot on a stick.

None of this was meant to be disrespectful or hurtful so I apologize now if it came off that way. Being a passionate nerd about something maybe makes you word things strongly and it was not the intention to hurt/discredit as much as it was to bring-to-light/educate. As an aspiring game dev I've always loved RoR for what it is and always wanted to see it achieve what it can achieve