Fun is decreasing - lets discuss

[ventiiLatte]

5) Game still brings a lot of fun from leveling alts and grinding for goods, new cosmetics are regulary arriving - this is well designed. Hitting lvl 40 is painful though, because you have to grind through all the pve dunguons to get the wards and viable gear for PvP and save crests for BiS. Maybe it would be better if you had a way to get low lvl PvP gear easier (mentor system maybe? rewards for having a mentor, bringing you sets for free up to invader? could be good, would also help new players). You should be able to just play PvP and gear up in PvP, not losing your opportunity to gear up to BiS fast. Leave PvE to PvE enjoyers, don't force PvP players into it.

I'm a bit confused by this and I'd genuinely appreciate some clarification.

I've mostly been playing PvP since hitting 40 and have been spending my War Crests on the progression sets as I unlocked them.
Reading your post makes me wonder if I've been doing it wrong.

Are you saying that the more efficient route is to farm the PvE dungeons first (Ruin/Sentinel, wards, dungeon gear, etc.) and save as many War Crests as possible for the later BiS PvP sets instead of spending them on the earlier progression?

If that's the case, roughly at what point should you actually start spending your Crests? Is there a recommended progression that veteran players generally follow?
Which PVE content should I be playing focusing on? Is it class dependant?

[rorswar]

5) Game still brings a lot of fun from leveling alts and grinding for goods, new cosmetics are regulary arriving - this is well designed. Hitting lvl 40 is painful though, because you have to grind through all the pve dunguons to get the wards and viable gear for PvP and save crests for BiS. Maybe it would be better if you had a way to get low lvl PvP gear easier (mentor system maybe? rewards for having a mentor, bringing you sets for free up to invader? could be good, would also help new players). You should be able to just play PvP and gear up in PvP, not losing your opportunity to gear up to BiS fast. Leave PvE to PvE enjoyers, don't force PvP players into it.

I'm a bit confused by this and I'd genuinely appreciate some clarification.

I've mostly been playing PvP since hitting 40 and have been spending my War Crests on the progression sets as I unlocked them.
Reading your post makes me wonder if I've been doing it wrong.

Are you saying that the more efficient route is to farm the PvE dungeons first (Ruin/Sentinel, wards, dungeon gear, etc.) and save as many War Crests as possible for the later BiS PvP sets instead of spending them on the earlier progression?

If that's the case, roughly at what point should you actually start spending your Crests? Is there a recommended progression that veteran players generally follow?
Which PVE content should I be playing focusing on? Is it class dependant?

That's indeed the most effcient way.

You need to unlock your wards in order to unlock the next tier up for gear.

You can do that by spending crests from PvP/RvR by buying the relevant sets that unlock those wards, or you can do PvE dungeons to get free sets there.

A lot of people, including myself, question this logic as it's notably less efficient just to purely play RvR. For reference, my SM is RR82 and still doesn't have full Sov as I refuse to play dungeons as I hate PvE with a vengeance.

Now, that's clearly my choice but it's odd that PvE in some aspects is the more efficient route towards BiS gear in what is really a RvR game.

[TheWatchGuy]

When I talk to people pretty much all of them agree that the fun of fighting has decreased over the last years.

Lets gather some input/feedback here. Feel free to answer one or more of these questions:
-> What do you think got worse? Or do you think it got better? Tell as what and why. Keep it short. What got worse and why, maybe short suggestion to improve.
-> What do you think is currently hurting the overall fun? You don't like pulls or stealthers? Tell us.

Keep it short. Please stay on topic.

------
I do the start.

I personally think that there are some "cheesy" game plays that are really hurting the overall fun for me:

1. Fishing for people with pulls. It's such a low risk/high reward strategy that is very easy to pull off and very hard to counter, granting almost a guaranteed kill in most cases. The pull distance for Maras/WLs is just too far. It feels unfair and not fun.

2. Playing golf with people. Tanks with crazy high defenses walking in knocking someone down and punting it into the own lines. Like with pulls it is a low risk / high reward tactic that is again very hard to counter, almost impossible. Again it feels unfair and not fun.

3. Moral drop farming. This I see a lot in orvr by organized warbands. They wait for their morals, pretend to fall back just to overpower them quickly with moral drops. Again a very cheesy play which can be executed almost every minute. For the casual players just wanting to have fun this feels very unfair and not fun because they keep getting killed without being able to kill anything. Works especially well on destro with their fast moral gains, snare prayer from doks and mara aoe kd.

4. Small scale died off with all the overtuned stealthers everywhere. Nothing to add there. Should be obvious.

There is only one point for me that really made the game better than before:

1. I like the new scenario queue system. Works really well and I think it's the best you can get out of that queue system. Fun in scenarios increased due to more equal matches.

Your turn.

1) Pulls from Mara/WL. Why can't you Devs put a CD on a fail "Fetch"? Mara makes a pull, gets disrupted, and he pulls immediately again; please fix this? It also needs a much longer CD, like 1min once? Right now, even if you disrupted the pull, Mara just keeps spamming the same spell on you!

2) Punting. If the tank knocks you down and punts you, the distance should be 50%. If he punts you without knocking you down first, yes, give him the 100% distance. This way it's fairer to the target.

3) Morale dumping. I think it's ok at the moment.

4) Small-scale fighting. I think we should enlarge the RvR areas on each map, so many of the PvE areas can be used. This way the fights can be more spread out, and smaller-scale fights can happen with a lower proability to get run over by multiple WBs.

5) Blobbing. The current state of play does not penalise blobbing, which is killing the game. We need to implement a system where the more you blob, the more HP and DPS are reduced. For example:
- 1 WB, no penalty
- 2 WBs, HP and DPS reduced 25%
- 3 WBs, HP and DPS reduced 50%
- 4 WBs and more, HP and DPS reduced 75%
This way, no WBs will blob, and the fights will be more spread out. Even if 4 WBs jump on 1 enemy WB, the 1 enemy WB has a good chance to fight.

These are my 2 cents' worth.

[arEntropic]

5) Game still brings a lot of fun from leveling alts and grinding for goods, new cosmetics are regulary arriving - this is well designed. Hitting lvl 40 is painful though, because you have to grind through all the pve dunguons to get the wards and viable gear for PvP and save crests for BiS. Maybe it would be better if you had a way to get low lvl PvP gear easier (mentor system maybe? rewards for having a mentor, bringing you sets for free up to invader? could be good, would also help new players). You should be able to just play PvP and gear up in PvP, not losing your opportunity to gear up to BiS fast. Leave PvE to PvE enjoyers, don't force PvP players into it.

I'm a bit confused by this and I'd genuinely appreciate some clarification.

I've mostly been playing PvP since hitting 40 and have been spending my War Crests on the progression sets as I unlocked them.
Reading your post makes me wonder if I've been doing it wrong.

Are you saying that the more efficient route is to farm the PvE dungeons first (Ruin/Sentinel, wards, dungeon gear, etc.) and save as many War Crests as possible for the later BiS PvP sets instead of spending them on the earlier progression?

If that's the case, roughly at what point should you actually start spending your Crests? Is there a recommended progression that veteran players generally follow?
Which PVE content should I be playing focusing on? Is it class dependant?

The way most of old players do it:
1) you hit 40, you need to unlock the wards, you start with conq ward - it's either 3 Gunbad runs, or you save your time and buy conq, it's pretty cheap and a good starting set for every role;
2) vanq ward - you do 4 runs of crypts or BB, depending on faction, you do it on every toon, because sentinel ring is hard preBiS for every class;
3) invader ward - you do 4 runs of BS, here you do it every time as well, because unlocking inv ward with crests is very-very expensive, you can maybe buy invader for SW for extra range, but you'll still need at least 2 BS runs for bloodlord weapon - this weapon is BiS for every DPS class;
4) you do 4 LV runs, you get darkpromise set - it's also preBiS set for most of classes (for some classes it's mix of this set with others), darkpromise weapon is a very-very good pick if you're a dual wielder or range dps with extra weapon slot, or a tank/healer, also secret bosses in LV grant Band of Temptation - BiS jewel for a lot of classes who lack wounds.
Also hitting 40 you do beastlord run and possibly 4 HV runs, beastlord is good for mixing sets, HV 5pc mix is preBiS for healers, good for DPS before they get LV set.
It's a lot of PvE grind in this game to save crests for BiS. You start buying gear pieces when you can equip triumphant, and then you invest the most in sovereign. Sov/Tri mix and the ammount of pieces you need of each depends on a class you play. Shield tanks wear full sov, no Tri pieces. Some classes/specs go for warlord instead of sov. Talking about weapons, you can start spending crests on weapons you need early, if they unlock your BiS weapon option later. BiS weapons are also different for every class, but every dps wears bloodlord (which comes from pve).

[BloodnTears]

wow, this poll clearly shows how out of touch with the community devs are.