The downward spiral of PvP

Wuhy

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Dec 2008

R/

08 Nov 2009 at 01:45 - 41

Quote:

Originally Posted by Warvic

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... ppl need rewards to pvp? I don't think that players should be motivated in pvp by currency in an online game, look at how terrible the zquests/zkeys/titles turned out.. the best thing imho would've been charging 15$/three months for playing the game from the start, carefully and slowly releasing expansions while not breaking game balance nor degenerating the game with titles for example and holding lots of 100k$ tournaments.

AlsPals

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Mar 2007

Sellin hot stock tips for pro[fit]

Me/E

08 Nov 2009 at 04:35 - 42

Originally Posted by Wuhy

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ppl need rewards to pvp? I don't think that players should be motivated in pvp by currency in an online game, look at how terrible the zquests/zkeys/titles turned out.. the best thing imho would've been charging 15$/three months for playing the game from the start, carefully and slowly releasing expansions while not breaking game balance nor degenerating the game with titles for example and holding lots of 100k$ tournaments. Zquests arent that bad of a concept, really. The biggest barrier was of course at one point unlocking skills, but early in the games life, people found out how to get those relatively quickly. This before Balthazar faction. Other than that, lack of real tournaments, dodging problems(Iway, bloodspike, SF in PVP for a while) while adding NF powercreep killed PvP.Just tons of incompetence and half-assed work from people who figured they knew more about their game than people who sat all day playing and testing things the devs might not even really have thought about...a firm ass stance would have been nice from the start. "We want Bspike to still be an option, but not as good in high level.."NO! NO! Stop that! If a good team gets Bspike, its still gonna be as degenerate as it was with a bad team facing another bad team. There were ALOT of good PvP players on the scene when BoonProt meta put GvG at its height, and they made endless suggestions on how to fix this and that...and Anet went right around it. For one, where is the Guild Thief? Why did damage get buffed soooo much over the course of a year that splits were either heavily useless or absurdly efficient? VoD? Caving in and implementing 6v6? Its like there was no firm grasp of "No, this is how we are going to run the game, but we want you to help us work within this frame." Izzy and pals could have been replaced by Upier and he would have done a better job...oh, and am I the only one who stopped playing TOMBS when people started going all /bambi on you?

Krill

Desert Nomad

Join Date: May 2005

America

08 Nov 2009 at 06:50 - 43

Originally Posted by AlsPals

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Zquests arent that bad of a concept, really. As implemented they are. One day a week each format gets to enjoy an influx of shitters that are only there to farm the quest. The concept isn't an inherently bad idea, but they should have made the rewards more difficult to achieve. For instance the HA quest should have been tiered at making it to certain maps, e.g. the first objective unholy temples, second courtyard and third halls with the faction reward tiered as well. As is most of the players just quest farm underworld with searing flames or something equally dumb and it adds nothing positive.

I'm sure many players would cry about the difficulty but if there's even a tiny ray of hope for this game anet needs to stop rewarding stupidity.

Still Number One

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Jun 2008

W/

08 Nov 2009 at 06:58 - 44

The problem with GW PvP is simply that it is old. A.net hasn't been trying to drive people off, they just haven't ever had a clue on how to properly maintain the game. That should be obvious to anyone who has competed in any type of competitive PvP in GW, and if it isn't, to put it bluntly, you are really stupid.

The reward factor for PvP is gone. There are no free trips to various places around the world, there are no real life incentives to putting in the time to get better. The only reward you get is fun. Over time, the degree of fun you can have doing something over and over again usually degrades in almost every situation. Things are almost always the most fun when they are fresh and new, and become more tedious and boring when you do it over and over again. Couple the lack of rewards and the game getting older and you have lots of bored players with little incentive to continue playing. They leave the game, causing it to become harder to find people to play with which then forces longer times to set up teams and then longer waiting periods between matches.

It has gotten so bad that what you put into the game is no longer worth the reward you get out of it. It really is not worth the half an hour or longer it takes to set up a team and the 20 minutes or so it takes to find a match, just to play either a 5 minute massacre or a 28 minute bore-fest. You can't really just say, "I feel like GvGing" then log on and immediately start GvGing. You'll log on, find out your entire friends list is offline, then sigh and sign off.

Guild Wars 2 will be fresh and new and will have a large influx of players to play with. Then after a year or so it will begin to degrade just like GW 1 did and 4 years after release there will be the exact same complaints about it that there are about GW 1. A.net has failed to keep the game fun and exciting, and frankly the way competitive PvP is set up, I doubt there was much they could have done anyways.

Marxon Aurion

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Feb 2008

In my 40/40.

Brave And Strong Guild [FGJ]

08 Nov 2009 at 11:36 - 45

Zkeys should have never been added. That would fix Zquest farming a lot. They can't really exist together, unless it's particularly hard to farm the quest.

Nimble Night

Academy Page

Join Date: Jan 2007

london

History Repeats Itself [Cry]/Get Pooped[NJoY]

Mo/

08 Nov 2009 at 12:15 - 46

It is very sad that the game has become so dead, however I still believe if they actually balanced the game alot of players would come back. Guildwars, despite its age, still has the potential to be one of the best pvp games around. I know so many people that log on every other month to see if they should play again, see crap like primal rage and illusion of pain and log off again until next month.

The fact is bi-monthly skill balances are little more than lazy.

I also believe that reverting aegis would make the meta a LOT more enjoyable. Remember when people brought shut-down instead of paragons that spammed shouts on recharge then 3-2-1?

Regulus X

Banned

Join Date: Oct 2007

N/A

D/W

08 Nov 2009 at 19:55 - 47

Originally Posted by axe

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When all is said and done, its the players that are ruining PvP That, and Anet both. Welcome to the End of GW1.

DreamWind

Forge Runner

Join Date: Oct 2006

E/Mo

08 Nov 2009 at 22:28 - 48

Originally Posted by axe

When all is said and done, its the players that are ruining PvP No its not...it was Anet. Do you see why?

ruemere

Academy Page

Join Date: May 2009

FALLOUT PRIME

N/

09 Nov 2009 at 14:12 - 49

Originally Posted by moriz

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coordination vs uncoordinated opponents tends to be very effective. the correct response is to become coordinated yourself, so you don't get rolled over by coordinated opponents. you are essentially trying to nerf basic coordination out of the game, and then subsequently slow the game down even more. so no. Coordination is not only about fast reaction. It's sometimes also about developing right strategy.
With very narrow time margins, you need a very good team to be able to fight.

Consequently, your game becomes a playground for elites.

In the end, non-elites, beginners and people who could become elites but need tutoring, leave or stay and break your game.

Of course, you may feel fine with zero or few newcomers. But in the long run your environment will become stale and then it will stagnate.

Also, separating training grounds into newbie and "professional" arenas is not a good idea. You won't learn how to be good at PvP at newbie training grounds - you need to participate in games with better players to improve.
The only way to solve it, or rather, the only working way I have seen so far, was to allow beginners into "professional" teams, however with certain special factors. For example:
- beginner characters are intentionally weaker than experienced characters, however their actions have significantly decreased influence upon final score
- beginner characters are forced into simpler roles (like "hold this point", "body block this path", "spam AOE here")

Regards,
Ruemere

moriz

??ber t??k-n??sh'??n

Join Date: Jan 2006

Canada

R/

09 Nov 2009 at 14:29 - 50

Originally Posted by ruemere

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Coordination is not only about fast reaction. It's sometimes also about developing right strategy.
With very narrow time margins, you need a very good team to be able to fight.

Consequently, your game becomes a playground for elites.

In the end, non-elites, beginners and people who could become elites but need tutoring, leave or stay and break your game.

Of course, you may feel fine with zero or few newcomers. But in the long run your environment will become stale and then it will stagnate.

Also, separating training grounds into newbie and "professional" arenas is not a good idea. You won't learn how to be good at PvP at newbie training grounds - you need to participate in games with better players to improve.
The only way to solve it, or rather, the only working way I have seen so far, was to allow beginners into "professional" teams, however with certain special factors. For example:
- beginner characters are intentionally weaker than experienced characters, however their actions have significantly decreased influence upon final score
- beginner characters are forced into simpler roles (like "hold this point", "body block this path", "spam AOE here")

Regards,
Ruemere and at the same time, you don't want to castrate the professional crowd. how do you think they will feel, when all their hard work won't makes them any more effective than your average newbie?

if you want to make the game more accessible, fine. however, intentionally weakening spiking, one of the easiest and most basic (and ironically enough, one of the first things new players learn) is not the way to do it.

The Josip

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Aug 2009

Me/

13 Nov 2009 at 11:15 - 51

Originally Posted by Sweets to the Sweet

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On the other hand without titles many players have no incenetive to continue playing the specific formats. I don't think there is a correct answer at this point. There is - aesthetics. Earning pvp currency used to unlock all and any kinds of skins. Unfortunately, every time I suggested that a bunch of PvErs go crying bohooohoooo... as if PvP character will come to PvE and they will suddenly look less cool.

PvP title grinding did destroy PvP. As well as forced skill balancing ("let's buff this on purpose we want it to be new FotM.. and let's not do anything with 500 useless skills").

I used to play TA a lot, and it was great fun in the old days. People played all kinds of builds, some GvGers used this to test split teams etc. Ever since titles, TA has turned into HA grind fest, with everyone using one of few cookie cutters, and no one was interesting in HAVING FUN and trying creative builds. No no.. it was just about being uber and getting higher title.

emuking

Academy Page

Join Date: Oct 2008

[zulu]

R/

14 Nov 2009 at 14:57 - 52

can u imagine guild wars without titles /aion /zrank /rank...? people meet other people through the use of those titles and basically prejudge everyone seeing how much experience they have based on their title. You got the competitive people playing hardcore that want prestige and favor the title while the more casual and more common gamer just wants a brief moment of "woot i won!"

Unfortunately those "woot i won" gamers cannot experience that constantly facing the dominant force of the PvP elite and can never join them without that title unless they know a guy who knows a guy who knows a guy... its improbable that this problem can be fixed this late into the release of Guild Wars but it should be something the developers of Guild Wars 2 should consider if they want to retain a fanbase as strong as WoW for a longer period of time.

Animate

Academy Page

Join Date: Nov 2006

14 Nov 2009 at 22:13 - 53

Originally Posted by Moonlit Azure

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Your being really over dramatic, but you have a point, sort of.

Anet just doesn't feel the obligation to bring the same quality of gaming that they did previously now that GW2 is in the works. Over dramatic? He is exactly right.
They are ruining everything.
This should be clear since Smiter's Boon.
Oh, this skill is too strong, hmmm.. nah, we don't want to waste our time thinking about how to adjust it properly.... say, 25e, 5sec effect, 90 recharge. Yea, that should about kill it. Just loveless, devoid of any concern for the quality, like bleh, here take that garbage unusable skill instead of a solution.

After way over a year of abused syncing, they come up with a brilliant solution of fixing it by simply throwing all districts together. Great: No matter where I enter from, I always play on servers that are located in america, africa, or atlantis and i get a constant 500ish ping.

Countless threads about wishes for TA such as an observer mode, a ladder, an emote or new maps later, they come up with the same manner as how they fixed Smiter's Boon: We delete TA. And HB.

And what happened to VoD? Npc problems fixed? No, VoD deleted.

Playing RA, I get a DC, reconnect function doesn't work of course, I redial back in, and I am hexed with dishonorable.

Over dramatic? If they didn't lift a finger, the game would be in a better state.

I Jonas I

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Jul 2008

14 Nov 2009 at 23:25 - 54

Originally Posted by Animate

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Over dramatic? He is exactly right.
They are ruining everything.
This should be clear since Smiter's Boon.
Oh, this skill is too strong, hmmm.. nah, we don't want to waste our time thinking about how to adjust it properly.... say, 25e, 5sec effect, 90 recharge. Yea, that should about kill it. Just loveless, devoid of any concern for the quality, like bleh, here take that garbage unusable skill instead of a solution Destroying smiter's boon is one of the few good decisions Anet made in the game. the fact that the smiting line could heal for a significant chunk of health, remove hexes/conditions, prevent and return damage, had party heals (well, kind of if you look at heaven's delight and such), and did armor ignoring AoE damage made it pretty overpowered. If you need more proof, look at the 3 RaO axe, 4 smiter's boon monk and 1 flagger meta pre smiter's boon nerf.

The Fallen One

Academy Page

Join Date: Jul 2006

Vandal Hearts [VH]

Mo/

15 Nov 2009 at 02:13 - 55

Originally Posted by IninefingersI

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At the apex of Guild Wars popularity, Anet had constructed one of the best, and most comprehensive PvP formats of any MMO going. There have always been malcontents, but there was something for everyone. From the instant gratification of RA, to the highly structured and orchestrated GvG and HA with TA, HB and AB in between.

Along the way, through a number of seemingly nonsensical decisions and inconsistent administrative practices, every PvP format in the game has degraded to near ruin.

My question … are the decisions actually nonsensical, or is the game being degraded on purpose? They knew before they axed TA and HB that RA syncing was going to be a deal breaker. Does anyone actually believe they couldn’t do anything about it other than mix districts? If you do, you’re crazy. They just didn’t want to. You think they couldn’t do anything to make CA less cumbersome? BS!

When they were still making expansions and people were buying games, Anet touted the Free2Play format as a huge success. They said they would continue to support it as long as people played it. Now, nobody is buying games, they are losing money. I think the degradation of the game is actually their exit strategy. Try and nurse people on a dry teat long enough to get out the cash cow of GW2. It’s very frustrating. I had a friend of mine actually hypothesized in the same way, except he thought that the logic also applied to PvE.

Guild Wars doesn't make constant income, they simply sustain themselves on the profits from the last game in the series. As such, any strain on their server resources is a direct impact upon profits. He, and I after our conversation, question whether it isn't better for their business model to attempt to have people migrate from the original Guild Wars and simply wait until they can start hosting Guild Wars 2.