AB is going down hill.

Kaelyn the Dove

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Dec 2007

Chile

Rizen from the Ashes [Ra]

Me/

Quote:
Originally Posted by CougarTheTall
So who was around last night for our epic nature ritual spam?

AB=Teh Funnay lol, we did that a couple of nights ago. The kurz teams we were getting teamed with were pretty fail (as in the only group to ever cap a shrine was ours while the other groups were headless chickens trying to rambo the mob) at Kaanai, so we rolled 3 trappers with natural rituals. We trapped and spammed natural rituals near the rez at the bridge. What ensued was pure slaughter, as the opposition was too braindead to just cap around and let us be.

RiKio

RiKio

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Dec 2007

Plato's Cave

W/E

Problem of AB is that it is a PVP arena with PVE players. See how much Terra Tankers, 55hps, wammos, touchers and chars with farming builds are in AB

Keekles

Keekles

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: May 2005

Floating amongst the ethereal seas of placating breezes.

Like A [Boss]

Mo/

Quote:
Originally Posted by RiKio
Problem of AB is that it is a PVP arena with PVE players. See how much Terra Tankers, 55hps, wammos, touchers and chars with farming builds are in AB Which is exactly why a good group that's build around each other can usually decimate other groups they come across.

I Will Heal You Ally

I Will Heal You Ally

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Feb 2007

In my HoM

Canthan Refugees [TOGO]

E/Rt

the only way AB would become popular again would be if they add new maps or new goals or even increase the reward point or lower the cap point system cuz at this rate fff is way faster and more productive cuz you get money for completing with faction... As far as the time goes it takes you amx. an hour ot get 10k while ABing you win max 4 matches so depending on where you win it isn't much.

Kurt

Kurt

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Jan 2008

Belgium

N/

The game just becomes frustrating because way too many people just want to kill players instead of capping shrines ...

X Black Chaos X

Academy Page

Join Date: Jan 2008

In your basement

Team Fruitcake

Mo/W

I think the faction(balth and allegiance) awarded should be increased to regain popularity. I kno AB right now works around capping shrines but if you have matches with ppl just running around from shrine to shrine it would be extremely boring. I think kills aren't rewarded enough in AB. Think about it if kill counted maybe for 2 points or more, matches would go by alot faster and that would make room for more matches and decrease wait time.

Tyla

Emo Goth Italics

Join Date: Sep 2006

Quote:
Originally Posted by Kurt
The game just becomes frustrating because way too many people just want to kill players instead of capping shrines ... Agreed....if you wanna kill players, go to RA! >.>

fireflyry

fireflyry

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jan 2007

New Zealand

A/D

I love AB.

It's fun and far less annoying than RA and my class pwns there far more than we ever will in high-end PvP unlike my Warrior.

Good times for my Sin.

It's like a crappy b-film compared to The Godfather.They both have their place and purpose.

Craywulf

Craywulf

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Apr 2007

Righteous and Honorable (RAH)

N/Me

What a minute, this thread topic complaining that there's too many new players? Isn't growth a good thing?

You see a new player, enlighten them with sage advice, don't ridicule them for their inexperience.

fireflyry

fireflyry

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jan 2007

New Zealand

A/D

GW is based on the insult of noob as much as anything else.

Sad but true.

Bobby2

Bobby2

Furnace Stoker

Join Date: Jun 2007

Delayed in order to meet ANet's high standards

[MaSS]

W/E

Only noobs make out other players for noobs. In my experience decent players tend not to use local chat too much.

Dervish Kid

Dervish Kid

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Aug 2007

Florida

D/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Leeds
Hi as you may have noticed AB is no longer for getting faction if Luxons/Kurzicks wants faction they FFF because theres too many nubs at this i think we should start to step up and make AB more popular and get better matches who with me? I think that too sometimes but hey..we were all noobs @ abing at one point..Some still are with tweaking the right builds and knowing how to fast cap and such.

artay

artay

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Feb 2006

Australia

The Agony Scene

E/

Imo AB Started at the bottom of the hill.

Good for fun

Lews

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Mar 2005

Seattle, Washington

R/E

when was it up the hill?

Turtle222

Turtle222

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Oct 2007

:D:D

D/W

ive recently got back into AB (hardly ever abed for a while). It's such a stress relief system. How lovely it is to see a ranger panic his ass off when he realises i have wild blow xD

NecroticChanter

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Nov 2007

Toronto

Real Eyes Realize Real Lies[Tree]

P/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Craywulf
What a minute, this thread topic complaining that there's too many new players? Isn't growth a good thing?

You see a new player, enlighten them with sage advice, don't ridicule them for their inexperience. Ya, the over flowing noobs are killing AB. I'm a devout Kurzick but the sudden rush of noobs have told me sumting...It's time to FFF. Screw the noobs, I'm here to get faction not teach noobs.

DreamRunner

DreamRunner

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Nov 2006

W/

Someone told me that the most important warrior attribute is tactics.

arsie

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Jun 2007

N/

AB is like NM PvE without DP.

yesitsrob

yesitsrob

Elite Guru

Join Date: Sep 2005

Manchester, England

SMS/Victrix

It's clear about half of you guys are the "running noob", "mobbing noobs", "wiki build noobs" and "I'd own you 1v1" local chatters who sucks horribly at the game

AB has never been up a hill, it's always been in a pit, a very very deep one.

Splitisoda

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Nov 2007

STALKER!

Not in One

N/A

I like AB. I use it to test out builds for my chars, I don't mind how long the round goes just as long as I test it out . It does get a bit confusing though, because of lots of MM's these days I in fact faced 2 whole armies of MM's who were each camping one of the teleporters out, the other 10 of their team was sitting at our gate. And instead of that nuker ele going to THE ******* MINIONS HE NUKED THE HUMANS

Hamsterstyle GYM

Academy Page

Join Date: Apr 2006

Washington

[GYM]

EARTH!

...I only AB when I have my guild with 3 other elements and we rely on 1 single person to call out HEART! but it never happens.

The only reason I AB is to summon Captain Planet just once...in all these years it has not gone off without a hitch, but I am r7 Luxon by now

Disappointing though =/

No one puts any HEART! into it >

intimidator89

Academy Page

Join Date: Feb 2007

Urgoz Warren

Nice Cream of Ice [Nice]

W/

I have been AB'ing alot recently since I'm tired of grinding titles and farming. The AB experiences really vary depending on the group I go with. Get a good group of 4 people who know to cap shrines, avoid mobs and kill stragglers when appropriate, it's alot of fun! Even more fun with friends or guildies that are there to have good time, run whatever build but still cap shrines and stay together. I've made several new friends in the AB pug's and met some really good players. I've been in terrible disorganized groups that won and great groups that lost because we were the only four capping shrines. M

Maybe it's that type of organized randomness that makes it fun. The thing that gets on my nerves is the solo sin/derv/warrior that leaves the group to go "solo" another player or wait in a corner so he "gank some noob" running by. As far as I'm concerned they can go back to WoW!

N1ghtstalker

N1ghtstalker

Forge Runner

Join Date: Dec 2007

E/

it's a very low form of AB where ppl with the most ridicilous builds come and i don't quite know how they got into the team in the first place
i've seen wars using backfire and sins using migraine and then i seriously wonder what's happening
i only let good people in my team that have an elite so i'm sure of a good fighting team for AB
also in one fight half the luxons left the game since we were missing about 4 people that didn't connect >_>
there were about 5 luxons left to fight 12 kurzicks and we had no way to go, all the kurzicks began camping in front of our base

KMVRanger

KMVRanger

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Feb 2008

East Coast USA

Me/Mo

Quote:
Originally Posted by obsidian ectoplasm
like warrior nuker, 8 skills of self heal only...List could go on forever LMMFAO

There is just no smiley for how hard "8 skills of self heal only" made me laugh. It's like those ads with the office guys competing for promotions by fighting gladiator style with office supplies.

Now I just have to meet one of these build in AB. I know, I can holla over local "If anyone is running Warrior Nuker or 8 self heals, please come fight me".

Sethellington

Sethellington

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Sep 2005

nn

N/

"going" as in hasn't already?

Apple

Apple

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Dec 2005

N/Mo

Wow. As if AB was ever at the top of the hill.
It's always been a ridiculously diluted form of pvp that's only use is cripshot practice. Pretty much every player that plays there is completely devoid of any skill, and always has been, and "English Warrior X" certainly sounds like a run of the mill AB player name. Jesus christ.

Shuuda

Shuuda

Forge Runner

Join Date: Jul 2006

Guildless

Me/

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...php?t=10243293 pointy pointy, I'm surprised this hasn't be locked yet.

Lexar

Lexar

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Aug 2005

Organised Spam

W/

I think AB is one of the healthier parts of guildwars actually. There's a good mix of casual and somewhat competitive play, there's good and poor players, and they all need each other to win as well, and although with a strong group and good tactics you can make a difference (and generally win more than you lose, saying everything is random so you have no influence is a poor excuse, I can honestly say I win roughly 75% of the AB's I play in), there's still a large margin for error, which makes it accessible for new players as well, unlike stuff like GvG or HA.

MasterSasori

MasterSasori

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Dec 2007

USA

[Thay]

R/Mo

Quote:
Originally Posted by [Apple]
Wow. As if AB was ever at the top of the hill.
It's always been a ridiculously diluted form of pvp that's only use is cripshot practice. Pretty much every player that plays there is completely devoid of any skill, and always has been, and "English Warrior X" certainly sounds like a run of the mill AB player name. Jesus christ. AB is the lowest form of PvP in GW, but to say that pretty much every player is completely devoid of any skill is a ridiculous exaggeration. Poking fun at ABers is one thing, but saying basically everyone there is incompetent makes you totally wrong.

Red Sand

Red Sand

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Mar 2008

New England

Warriors of Wynd [WoW]

W/

AB isn't going downhill. It's on a flat plain between Random Arena and Team Arena.

RA is beginner PvP, mostly random and not to be taken too seriously; it's just a step to TA.

TA, with the ability to develop balanced (or imbalanced) team builds, becomes the first step toward serious PvP.

AB sits between RA and TA, more serious than RA, but less serious than TA. I think it's a full step up from RA, and a half step down from TA, but none of my friends consider AB "serious" PvP.

What most folks need to come to grip with is "serious" PvP is only as serious as the people playing it. As fars as AB is concerned, only a fraction of the people playing are serious about winning AB, the others are just serious on getting some faction, serious about getting their gank on, or serious about having fun pissing everyone else off.

The result: AB as some kind of hybrid between serious PvP and silly PvP. Fortunately, I have come to terms with this and do not have a problem with it. I cap, and when my team refuses to cap, I kill. Flexibility is key to enjoying AB.

Try to enjoy AB for what it is: casual and stress-free team PvP.

MasterSasori

MasterSasori

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Dec 2007

USA

[Thay]

R/Mo

Quote:
Originally Posted by Red Sand
AB isn't going downhill. It's on a flat plain between Random Arena and Team Arena.

RA is beginner PvP, mostly random and not to be taken too seriously; it's just a step to TA.

TA, with the ability to develop balanced (or imbalanced) team builds, becomes the first step toward serious PvP.

AB sits between RA and TA, more serious than RA, but less serious than TA. I think it's a full step up from RA, and a half step down from TA, but none of my friends consider AB "serious" PvP. I wouldn't consider AB to be higher than RA despite the fact RA is pretty horrible at times.

Pretty much when things are really bad, the difference between the teams are which side has a monk and doesn't have a farming build

Red Sand

Red Sand

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Mar 2008

New England

Warriors of Wynd [WoW]

W/

Quote:
Originally Posted by MasterSasori
I wouldn't consider AB to be higher than RA despite the fact RA is pretty horrible at times. I didn't understand this statement, but I thought about it overnight and decided that most of us don't agree on what PvP actually is.

For me, PvP isn't all about killing other players. That's just a happy by-product.

Of the six forms of Guild Wars PvP competion, only two of them require that you actually kill players to win: RA and TA. All of the other PvP contests, although fighting and killing is part of the overall strategy, do not require the other team to be vanquished to win. Control of the battlefield leads to winning: that's what the meta is all about.

So on reflection, I think I could argue that AB is a higher form of PvP than TA. Like HA and GvG, it's large scale, large team, and has an overall strategy to winning a match that does not require that you kill the whole other team.

The fact that a team is formed of three random teams actually makes AB challenging. The two things that would ruin AB would be to make the entire team random, or allow guilds to make teams of 12. Random 12, we have that in Jade Quarry and Fort Aspenwood, who's actually playing those? Last time I did one, it was all for mapping and random fighting, and not to complete the mission for which it had been originally developed. Guild Teams of 12 in AB would be dominated by guilds that would normally be trying to make their way up the GvG ladder. AB would become a GvG training ground, and discourage many people from trying out PvP.

I think the designers knew what they were doing when they made AB the way they did.

Either that, or they got really lucky.

Ate of DK

Ate of DK

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Oct 2005

Netherlands

None but Fools [nuts]

Before taking a look at AB they should take a look at HA, imo.
I really don't see a reason to change something in AB.

MasterSasori

MasterSasori

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Dec 2007

USA

[Thay]

R/Mo

Quote:
Originally Posted by Red Sand
I didn't understand this statement, but I thought about it overnight and decided that most of us don't agree on what PvP actually is.

For me, PvP isn't all about killing other players. That's just a happy by-product.

Of the six forms of Guild Wars PvP competion, only two of them require that you actually kill players to win: RA and TA. All of the other PvP contests, although fighting and killing is part of the overall strategy, do not require the other team to be vanquished to win. Control of the battlefield leads to winning: that's what the meta is all about.
If this is how you define PvP, then yes, AB can be more sophisticated at times, but only if the other teams consider capping an option. AB is probably the most variable in terms of skill as we have the terribad and the occasional exceptional teams.

I always thought that AB resembles most like GvG, though it is ironic as many PvPers consider GvG the pinnacle of GW PvP and AB the rejects.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Red Sand
The fact that a team is formed of three random teams actually makes AB challenging. The two things that would ruin AB would be to make the entire team random, or allow guilds to make teams of 12. Random 12, we have that in Jade Quarry and Fort Aspenwood, who's actually playing those? Last time I did one, it was all for mapping and random fighting, and not to complete the mission for which it had been originally developed. Guild Teams of 12 in AB would be dominated by guilds that would normally be trying to make their way up the GvG ladder. AB would become a GvG training ground, and discourage many people from trying out PvP. I really agree with this statement other for the fact for no one playing Ft Aspenwood (wait times are disgusting) though I havne't touched it in over 6 months. A single group of 12 or 12 guild members would turn AB into HoH or Ft. Aspenwood.

It would be nice to add more environmental effects though just to spice things up a bit. If we have an arena where the surroundings matter significantly, why not allow other to use it as an advantage if we're already favoring teams that run and cap?

Just a thought.