Epic Battles

I beleive something that guild wars needs is a huge PVP battle. It could be something daily. Guilds would sign up and be assigned a team. They could take place like every hour and it would be like 200 vs 200. Make one team defend some place and anouther attack. This way you could have epic battles for
control over places.

This is something I would personaly like to see, how ever in one the fansite fridays Gaile said that didnt want it in the game.

Why not?

this is not wow.
Slow down and lag will be one reason.
also, it will be total chaos. It will take away from stragey that guild war focus on. Everybody will just use AOE skills all the time.

PVP side already has where 6-8 differnt team battle each teams. (1 team = 8players) 8players x 6 teams = 48 people.

Let's think about how it affects the game.

well... from my own knowledge,and things ive heard.

A. causes alot of griefing from certain spells for such high numbers
B. causes a loss in stradegy.
C. causes limitless battles.

Maybe there should battle within the storyline with specific tasks for each guild.
For example 4 guilds are attacking the enemy while a few other guilds try to sneak around the enemy for keeping the enemys support away from battle. Then anothor team of guilds try to destroy the enemys artillery and so on.

You won't have too much players and npcs at one location and you'd still have the feeling, doing something epic.

Personally, I'd like to see other ways for guilds to compete (hey any new combat idea is fun, but I can't do it all night every night :P).

Worldwide scavenger hunt, salvage (quantity) contest, teams racing from one end of the map to the other (or at least the longest 'race route' you can come up with that doesn't require a map teleport. A brand new mission no one's seen before, points awarded for the guild team to finish it fastest...

Lots of expansion area to play in here.

One thing I would really love to see are sieges and larger teams for pvp. Not 200 vs 200 but something more reasonable like 16 vs 16 or 30 vs 30 instead of 8v8v8v8. For sieges it would need to be epic with lots of people and siege weapons of course. There also will need to be ladders, burning oil, destroyable walls and doors. There should also be a pvp arena just for these sieges where you dont have to make a group before hand, you are auto placed on a team to speed up the process.

I'd like to see larger battles mainly so everyone in a guild can participate. Lately we've been getting people "locked out" of guild battles simply because there isn't enough slots available for everyone.

16 versus 16 would be sweet.

Who mentioned WoW in this thread?
Was WoW the first game to ever introduce Epic Battles?
Do you have absolute proof that lag and slow down would occur?

Don't bash the idea without giving it some thought first, it could be done and it could work. Just like there could be zones that many people could explore instead of just a group.

Hmmmmmm Poison Arrow then Epidemic anyone?

Lets see those monks heal THAT!


EDIT: for the painfully naive, I'm ridiculing this idea.

I think WoW would be a horrible game to compare any other game to. Just because WoW lags horrible 90% of the time and the servers are always down doesnt mean that every other game will be like that.

i have heard of WOW's battle system but thats not where I got the idea from. I believe that there should be different levels like 25 vs 25, 50 vs 50, 100 vs 100, and 200 vs 200. This wouldnt really get rid of strategy but add a new type of strategy, massive battles. This would make it so that you can have a new way to use certain abilities that you have.

Im not saying do away with the other events but i beleive that there should be some big battles, including seiges and attack defend situations. I mean how many guild just send 8 vs 8 and stuff out to fight.

On the lag issue. Couldnt they open an district or even a server for the huge battles. I think that the 25 vs 25 might run fine in its own district.

Also you could make this into a PvE too. You could help defend against Char attacks and attack/raid Char encampments/cities.

Moses

edit: i also love the ideas of all the seige weapons and ladders and walls crumbling. Also think of the name, Guild WARS. A war to me aint 8 vs 8vs8vs8vs8vs8

Gaile claimed she wouldn't personally find it interesting, because the huge battles have no strategy. Which I guess is right. Not that it wouldn't come eventually. In another interview (I have forgotten which) it was stated that there was no technical reason Guild Wars couldn't support even larger battles than the 8v8v8v8v8v8 it has now.

I'd love to see it, slug-fests are a fun diversion. Maybe a permanent Worlds at War Arena with the three worlds battling for domination (poor Europe). And another all vs all. Total chaos. None of them should of course give any rewards, apart from xp.

Moses, my machine (AthlonXP 2400, 1 GB RAM, 9600XT) can hardly handle 100 chars in a city, how should my machine and the machines of many others which are even weaker handle a battel with 400 Chars and als the sfx? Many Players wouldn't be able to join such a battle and I suppose, that this not that, wa A.net wants.

I also dislike the idea of entering a battlefield and slaying simply everything, that moves. Split the armys up into groups, who are fighting at different places with different tasks. I think, that this would work much better and make more fun.

There would be strategy involved, just as there were strategies involved when real armies fight, its just that you'd need one person to command, and getting the commands out would be a difficult process.

Maybe they could orchestrate this huge battle as a massive free for all where no one is on a team and people keep on fighting till there emerges one victor. In the case of a few players left that cant beat one another, they could have the option to Draw (everyone must click) and while they wouldnt get the full bonuses of being victor, they would get something.

As for strategy, there may be some strategy when determining who / what to kill. And if there isnt oh well, the remaining 99% of the game would be based on strategy, and this area would just be "Kill everything that moves without mercy or strategy"

it could be cool... but not every hour. every hour everyone would be kicked off the servers from the strain of all those people in one instance

However if it could be arranged, maybe even just as an annual thing or something... would be kinda cool. Perhaps a battle between the number one guilds from america, europe and korea... a kind of 'live' favour of the gods... hehe

Whats the difference of slaying everything in sight from doing the first PVP option (cant remember name)? I also didnt say it would just be endless killing. You could have objectives such as attack/defend, capture the flag/relic, whatever. I just suggested attack/defend because it would be sweet to have a wall of ememy soldiers and anouther army assaulting up ladders or seige towers and fighting.

And i agree. Not every hour but maybe, idk, 5-8 times a day? The huge free for all would be sweet too.

I love those two ideas.

m19

Big battles with hundreds of people are dumb. Know what would be nicer? Wars. A large battlefield, with a bloody objective for each side to complete that involves conflict with the opposing side. That still has tactics, since its invasion and siege.

A simple Attacker side and Defender side premise would work wonders. Especially if a structure like a Fort is used. Bliss!

We dont really need 100's of people. Even a 20 vs. 20 battle in a huge war battlefield would be great.

We just need something more along the lines of Assault maps from UT, they are getting there with the obelisks and objectives, however, I'd love to see these. Besides, wasn't there one done basically like Fort Kryta a while ago where you have to slay the captain or whatever with a few NPC guardsmen and 8v8.

Massive battles do lose strategy, and uniqueness of what makes Guild Wars its own, the fact that no matter the core of a class, such as a Warrior, it isn't exactly what you believe.

Ok lets go ahead and recap whats been argued about so far.

Epic Battles

Proposal
1. A huge battle between 200 vs 200 to 25 vs 25.
2. Styles of Battle:
Attack/Defend (Seige)
Free for All
PvE invasions/raids/seiges
3. Things to be added for Attack/Defend
Seige Towers/Ladders
Destroyable Gates/Walls
Catapults/Trebuchets (like in 2nd mission)
Pots of Boiling Oil
Buildings you can get on top of to shoot off of

Aruguements
1. Too much lag.
2. Too much unbalance because of AoE abilities.
3. Loss of Strategy.
4. Computers cant handle it.

Counter Arguement
1. Set aside districts or even a server in the future for this.
2. Still envoles strategy but a different style.
3. Would make AoE skills just more useful.
4. Guild WARS.

Other Ideas
1. Other events other then wars:
Scanvenger Hunt
Races
Salvage Contest
New Mission Race


Moses

P.S. If i forgot anything let me know, Ill add it.

EDIT: Changed the Battle Numbers
Mispelled Strategy

Anyone here ever play Tribes 2? That game could support up to 64vs64 tribal battles over a huge landscape involving fortresses, armoured vehicles and flying machines. And it all ran mint on the old winme-2000 platform with geforce 2 card specs. But! Like many people here have mentioned already it only worked well with tribe vs tribe with a direct chain of command and the majority of players used voice chat. Tribes 2 had built in voice chat support and it also had command structures where the general character could monitor the battlefield via cameras and sensors, this worked for that game since it was sci-fi, but how would that sort of thing transfer over into Guild Wars? Flag bearers, drummers? Medieval war was chaotic and messy with most battles being won as they still are now by the side that does not lose it's chain of command and maintains the ability to see that orders get to where they are needed. I like the idea of say 20vs20 or 32vs32 in a attacker/defender game but they would have to introduce a character class that can repair equipment for that to work. The problem I forsee is how do you fix structures that the siege equipment is destroying or in the case of the attacker how do you breach the fortress walls if all your equipment has been destroyed? Not that this couldn't be figured out since their are many quests already in game where siege equipment exists and walls/doors can be destroyed, the Shiverpeak maps and quests are a perfect example of this. Hold the bridge and all that, or take out the machines before they breach the walls. Just an idea, Valarian.

Stop the rampaging army in a set time limit?
or better yet bring down the rampaging dragon before it eats all the farmers!

We don't need enamorously large battles, 32v32 would be more then enough. Provided its -not- any kind of freeforall or just a big battle. The game would lose its charm. The other way to pump in tactics with such large numbers is with attack and defense of an actual structure, and outposts. A fort with a gate, walls, posts, places to guard, etc. would be ample for such combat, and still have plenty - if not more - tactics involved.


psst,
I love that idea.

We gotta throw in CTF...GOT TO; even if it was relatively small (8v8) Capture the Flag would be great.

Another thing I would like to see is flag capture points, sort of like Day of Defeat (HL mod). This could definitely be done with large amounts of people.

And, as a personal contest...who can kill the most Charr (multiple waves of enemies, for a single player only)

honestly i think the reason they don't want that to be in place is cause necro primaries would be god...with all the people dying i would have a full bar of energy all the time.