12v12 needs to be reworked

First off, "I think" infers that anything coming afterwords is an opinion so stop with your assumptions.

I am of the opinion that it will reduce the number of leavers solely because those kinds of people do not usually have the patience to form a team.

Secondly I am of the opinion that it waters down the enjoyment of Alliance battles when its probably a good idea to form a group of 3 monks/heal party e/mos and a utility player (such as MM or wards) in order to ensure the random team you get put together with will even have any healing. If you have forced groups of 4 you are more likely to get a balanced makeup of players.

If so many people have a problem getting in teams due to "elitists" just form teams among yourselves, I know I have no problem getting a team in TA.

Hell during the FPE a group of rank 9 Koreans invited me into their group and im only rank 3(I didn't even mention I was in my LFG) As long as your LFG posts are coherant, not spammed and detailed people will want you in their group. At least the kind of people you would want to play with will.

I keep hearing two contradictory arguements that trouble me. First one is that forming a group of four will not be much trouble, and the second is the leavers will not have the patience to get in or form a group.

Personally I don't believe either statement. Casual players may have trouble getting into groups because they won't comform to some flavor of the month build, whereas the leavers can pretend to be whatever will get them in a group.

Yes and both those statements mesh. It shouldn't take more then 5 minutes usually to form a group (it dosent in TA). But leavers aren't of the personaility to even want to spend that long.

This Flavour of the moth stuff is stupid. I have run totally off the wall builds and easily found a group in TA.

I think the format needs a requirement for players to build a full team of 4 before entering the match. In fact, players need to be encouraged to act as this team of four in the battle, as opposed to a 12-man mob. It was too easy on the weekend to simply cap the entire map with 3 guildmates while the rest of the players sat in the middle summoning bone fiends and casting meteor showers. Players should be encouraged to complete the objective of capturing the resource points, and playing as 3 teams of 4 helps you accomplish this objective greatly.

But requiring any more than 4-player built teams would ruin the format. You're crazy if you think people want to put together and coordinate 12-man teams. If that many people are online, you may as well start some GvG.

I liked 12v12s but there was alot of problems that made alot of games unenjoyable.

The random leavers was one issue, where if your team was losing by more than a small margin people would simply leave, followed by a chain reaction of people quitting the match. Overall though, that can be due to the fact that alot of people who were playing were there because of the Beta weekend and had never played Guild Wars before so matches might've looked more hopless than they really were, or they just didn't care, etc.. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt.

Also people running conflicting builds was an issue as well. Such as getting a 4 man group running an EoE bomb that basically slaughtered their own team in the process of killing the other team. Or having a solo interupt Ranger running Nature Renewal while tyring to play a Prot Monk.

Neither of them were huge issues, and the semi-randomness atmosphere was fun, but ending with 4 people at the end of a battle, or trying to play a MM while there were 3 others on your team, well that was less than enjoyable as well.

To be fair, every time my guild and I ran that EoE build we won. Every single time. Most games we went 500-100 or 500-200. We never used it to suicide overall and only used it when the points were in are favor on a bomb. We knew what we were doing and we weren't kidding around at all.

Its not about either one. Its about new players. They have to make a balance for new players. If this was 10v10 or 12v12 cordinated the new players would be locked out.

3 teams of 4 make so people can make groups fast while having a balanced playing field.

Still no word on how alliances work exactly.

/ not signed

Not signed for reasons stated by others. I am a casual gamer who likes to jump in and start playing right away. For that reason I play nowadays almost exclusively in RA. I hate the long waits associated with TA and HA.

I would like to see a Random version of 8v8 as well with a chance to get to HA after 10 straight wins.

IF it requires groupings of four, look for me advertising 'forming team, all welcome!'.

I'll simply accept the first three to invite and go, regardless of classes. Screw the elite! Have fun!

I still don't understand people like this. GW is a team based game. If you want to make a team quickly you need friends. Plain and simple.

If you cannot make a party in TA within a few minutes you are doing something wrong or just don't want to make friends. I know many people that are GUILDLESS and get into parties very easily.

Nothing in this game is very short. Most quest and missions will take you at least half an hour or more. TA and RA have battles that can go between 1 minute and 10 minutes with a 20 second delay between each battle. That is the shortest time span for any aspect of the game. If that doesn't fit your schedule then make time. If you don't want to make time then don't play.

You don't have to play the game all day but understand everything you do is going to take some time. I do not want the game to be watered down just to fit the fan base of some one who doesn't play often and doesn't want to make some friends. Then complains when they cannot get a group.

The 12v12s suffer so badly from leavers.

1 of the matches i was in a couple of people left, followed swiftly by another 8 members.
It finished up as 12v2 and we just spent the time killing the base defenders and rushing the spawn point.

EoE bombs were definatly the most entertaining methods of dieing.

Sure, you can get a party in TA in a few minutes. You'll also lose almost all of the time. If you want to actually have a chance of winning a few games, you need a guild group or at least good friends who know what they're doing.

And it's one of the game's biggest flaws. Anything that can be done to improve that situation can dramatically increase the accessibility of the game, which is important for getting more casual players that keep the player count up.

I don't see how adding new accessible gametypes is "watering the game down". If you want to play your serious, hour to find a group gametypes, they're still there. What this game needs is more stuff casual players can get in to, and 12v12 as shown in the FPE goes a long way towards providing that.

A casual player will buy the game play it for a while and move on to another game. They can get their $50 of value out of the game way before it gets old. If you get tired of GW move on its free to play anytime.

C2 is appealing to the casual community but you cannot compare 12vs12 team making to TA its totally different. You can go in with just about anything because you have no control over the 8 other members.

I don't think the content of the game should be less because of a casual player base. We always want more content then players complain that it takes too long. Now that's some irony.

I don't see anyone asking for watered down content, but many are asking for choice. I don't recall anywhere in the thread seeing anyone asking for a completely random 12v12 which would eliminate your choice. Many just want to be able to enter mission without group forming and let thost who want to make thier 4 man team have that choice.

You however are the one I have a hard time understanding. You want it your way, period. Elitist

Thanx for the laugh of the day

If you had bother to read this thread you would see that I've came to the conclusion that I don't care about this format. Also made many other points of why its the way it is because of new players and casual but ya I'm an Elitist.

If I don't like it when alliances are explained then I won't play it. 12vs12 is going to a grind format. You do it when you have nothing better to do much like what HA is.

Once again no elitist can keep a player out of 12vs12 only the player can.

1) You don't play because you don't like the format

2) You can't make a party of 4

3) Do not have enough friends to play with

4) You don't have the time

All of those options are controlled by the player himself nothing to do with the format.

/completely signed

If 12v12 doesn't become not random, or ANet does not have a hidden high end organized form of PvP in Factions, I will not buy it. I would have no reason to.


I'm not looking forward to the endgame PvE, because of the worthless town control system, and if they don't give a good high end PvP format then I would have no reason to buy factions.


DOWN with the random crap, ANet. You dangle this beautiful gem in front of our faces, and we think of how much fun and how awesome it would be, and then you tell us you can only participate with a random group? You have no idea how insulting this is to me.


Make it like TA: You can enter alone or with half a group and the other pieces of your group will be random, but allow fully organized 12-man groups to enter as well. Have the random or half-random groups get paired up against other random or half-random groups, and the organized teams against other organized teams. Anything less will gimp the format entirely.

This is supposed to be a game of skill, not a game of who can get the luckiest group.

For those suggesting that 12v12 lacks skill, see MacGyver, a rubberband, two paperclips, and a drinking straw.

In other news, a random team is -still- a team.

Hi Twicky,

Up until this point I think you were making a decent argument why you think that 12v12 shouldn't be random. I did not brand you as an elitist or anything else, you were just trying to get your point across.

After reading this however, I really am starting to think that maybe you ought to think a little bit more before you go on insulting a great majority of people playing Guild Wars.

That list you just wrote is pretty insulting and I am sorry to say a tad bit 'Elitist'.

First off there is no Right or Wrong way to play guild wars. You seem to say that people who are playing on their own for the most part are playing the game wrong...how is this possible? Why is it bad if a majority of the people want a randomized 12v12? You already have your HA, which BTW currently doesn't have a randomized equivalent...can't you be happy with that? You get all those nonsense Rank emotes and such to flaunt off. Isn't this good enough for you?

I play guild wars on a regular basis. I have belonged to many different guilds and played both PVE and PVP quite extensively. I have found that my preferred style of game play is doing Random PVP. I enjoy it. And as I stated before, I would like to get a random 8v8 going as well.

I think you really need to take a look at 90% of the responses here. I am sorry to say, that according to the responses on this thread, you are really on the wrong side of this argument.

There is a small hard core of PVP elitists that are trying to dictate the entire PVP aspect and mechanics of this game. PVP is not just for you Twicky. It is for everyone. Let other people enjoy the game as well. As you clearly said in this thread:

Let me rearrange it to be relevant in your case:

Thank you and good night!

Well I like the semi-random way of 3 groups of 4. If you want to go in with a guild just make 2 or 3 groups and hit enter, you likey will end up on the same battle. It is chaotic now because ppl were just tryin it out and things, tell me HOH had all the bulds when GW first came out...I think not it was most likely the same way. I love being able to easily jump in and fight, if there is one thing I hate about GW it is trying to find a group. I spend more time in HA LFG then I do playing. Not my idea of fun. The 12 v 12 is just a nice laid back big map of fun. If you want to be uber-comptetive stick with the HoH and GvG. I think Anet made the arenas the way they are so ppl are not like R3+ Only group etc.

The only thing that needs changing is punishment for the quitters. Some ppl leave if they are loosing by 10 points. I think they should make soething like "If you quit you loose 100 faction." or You can not join another team for 15 mins or quit over 5 times and baned from 12 v 12 for a day or something. Also the quiters should be immediatly replaced by other players.

Also I can see faction farmers join groups and just run, hide somewhere and go watch TV. Get the faction and go make Jade and sell to merchant do it all over again. Easyway to fix this is a idle timer that replaces a idle player after so long or maybe a vote kick type deal?

Yes, the problem with 12 v 12 is ppl join for the faction and not the fun. These people need to be detured from this by harsh punishment I think.

Skull I think you misread my post. The elitist part at the end of the first paragraph was sarcasm. You are absolutely right there is no RIGHT way to play GW. Each player has their own format they like that is fine. Still to play that format you need the requirments for a team. That is not the formats fault if you cannot meet those requirements.

That list I pointed out is what is req for play in 12vs12. It is very easy to fill in 3 other slots in a team. Even if its random it doesn't take long. Since the format is set up with 3 teams of 4 players the creation time will be quick with minimal friends needed or none at all.

Also since there is multiple instances of the format running at one time then the elitist cannot lock you out. HA only runs every 10 minutes. Which means 1 team of all of GW will hold every 10 minutes. Add in the rank and you have an elitist environment that I hate. I'm a RANKLESS player so don't fit me into the HA player box because that's not me at all. I'm rankless because I choose not to play the format even though I've played GW since 04 beta. Once rank was introduced I left HA for good. HA and 12vs12 are both grind formats. HA has rank 12vs12 has faction. If faction is used at the merchants for items its going to get really ugly with bots. If faction is used then gold will be useless (like it usefull now) and the bots will turn to farming faction.

I'd say majority of players in this game are farmers including myself at times. Faction will be a grind fest so ya the farmers want it to stay random so they can get faction quicker. It would also allow bots to enter and just sit there and do nothing for the team to gain faction at the end of battle. If your group ends up with even 2 of these kind of bots you most likely won't win. Combine that with leavers and you have a jump in and out environment. Instead of trying to find a team you'll be trying to find a decent game. You want to make team making as effortless as possible but effort is still needed for the incentive. A player that puts effort into making a team or build for 12vs12 is more likely to stay in the battle and play continuously.

The draw backs from completely random are too deep. Yes the format is fun because its new and completely chaotic. Eventually it will implode and get very boring if kept under the same system. I see too many ways for people to abuse the random system and ruin it for everyone else.

One of the main reasons I created this post was because of the hardcore pvp fans. Since the game is a competative pvp game with pve added in these are going be the players that are going to buy every chapter just to keep up on the skills. We are being left behind with factions. We have no new competative environment. We have GvG and HA which we have been playing for over a year now and would like something new. We do get new guild halls and skills but that is it. So basicly the only reason any hardcore pvp fan is going to buy factions is for skills.

I see many skills that are going to be broken so I'm forced to by factions just to keep up. Anet can say you don't have to buy each set to remain competative but that is very untrue. They compare themselves to MTG (which is not a bad thing they know what they are doing) but its really nothing the same. MTG has many different formats you could play in limiting what edition (skills) you could use. There is nothing in GW like this so to stay competative you MUST buy each chapter to get the skills or be left behind.

Its still yet to be decided if 12vs12 will be a competative format. Still no clear explaination of how alliances work. We could argue all day because everyone has an opinion of their own or wait until its explained. Call me an Elitist it doesn't matter. That doesn't change the flaws with the system that EVERYONE will be subject to.

Anet did many things right with the format but like usually implemented poorly. Like with many other things they do. That's where Anet's greatest str is. They can change the system anytime to fix things. Just takes them forever and a day to do it.

Hi Twicky.

After reading this I maybe did misunderstand you on some points.

If you were being sarcastic about the list you made then I understand your point and I take back my remark about you being an 'elitist'.

I agree there are flaws in the 12v12 that have been listed here before, the top of the list is the leavers and ppl who want to screw around and annoy everyone else. I think these things need to be addressed properly. I just differ from your opinion about taking the randomness away from 12v12. I wouldn't mind a similar system to the 4v4 TA and RA though.

I just don't want the 12v12 to turn into another HA.

About your reasons for not playing the PVE part...I don't understand them at all (but it is your choice to play as you like). Once again Guild Wars is not just PVP and it is not just PVE. It is a combination of both. I think that ANet has done an excellent job at least of keeping me interested in buying the upcoming Factions release. Maybe you should give PVE a shot?

I wasn't beeing sarcastic about the list. That is req for playing any form of semi organized pvp. Its a team based game which means you have need friends, guildies, or be able to pick up players in game. If you can't do those then don't blame the format that you cannot get a group. The only exception to this would be HA because of the rank system. Again 12v12 will never turn into HA because there is no rank. You get faction you can spend at the faction guys in your GH. Its a consumable resource unlike rank. There will be no req to get into a party for 12vs12.

I was being sarcastic about being an elitist. I'm really a casual player much like other people. I play maybe 2-3 hours a day when I have the free time. I don't think that's very hardcore. I play in the high end gvg. I got in by talking to other players that I had never met. Got up to rank 84 before my guild imploded. Applied at another guild and started playing with them. Guilds are easier to get into than people make it out to be. Find a forum that has a recruiting threads and search around. Give them a reason to want you and ask for a try out to show you skills.

12v12 will not be completely random in the end. I don't know all of the details because alliances have not been explained but as gaile said that it will not be completely random.

PvE is great the first time. After that its just farming that's left. After you have made a character with each class, beat it, and unlocked most of the skills for every character it gets very old. Even during the FPE I was yawning at the pve environment because its more of the same with different skins. They still use the same AI so it makes no difference in the game play to me. PvE will offer me lots of pretty colors then its time to move on. I don't think there is something there to keep me interested for very long because its the same AI I've been killing for nearly 2 years now.

Have u ever thought twelve man ragner spike? that dominates 3 people ata time, so unfair

Iway for 12? like 3 trappers and like 5 iways plus orders tainted and add like two monks to make it interesting?

Also if u dont randomize it then guilds will start winning alliance battles so there guild owns the capitals

Ok so 1 guild wins every battle they go into. While there are 100s of instances of battles taking place at one time. It will make no difference at all. Its all a numbers game. Which ever side wins more battles will maintain control. Not only which side wins more but by how many points more since both sides get faction. So you won 1 match while the other side won 50. Top players cannot lock you out. Wonder how many times I'll have to repeat that before people get the point?

A close game between the 2 sides is not going to make things change very much.

Once again for people that do not read the entire pose spike will NEVER work in 12vs12. You have to split up to win. We all know that's rspikes biggest weakness. Read the thread before posting plz.

If you think there will be hundreds of 12v12 battles going on at once you're vastly overestimating the number of players PvPing at any time. They can't even get enough 8v8 players in HA to fill all the rounds.

Many spike builds could easily split into two teams of six and I'm sure people can and would come up with those that could split into three teams of four if 12v12 were to become serious competition. I'm not saying it would be significantly effective, because I haven't tried it and don't really care, but dismissing it out of hand is foolish.

So two or three people as bait would keep the spikers chasing them while the rest capture the strongpoints. Not a good strategy. The map's way too big for that to be effective.

HA is exclusive to only those with rank. If you don't have rank you are most likely going to be there for hours trying to get a group. 12vs12 does not have rank. Its pick 4 players then go. There will be 100s of people playing this format at once. There are well over a 100 people in HA battles at one time. But only 1 can win every 10 minutes while this is no the case with 12vs12.

Since it has a direct affect on PvE its more of an incentive to get the majority of players into the format.

As said in the PREVIOUS post. Read the entire thread before offering a suggestion that has already be said 10 other times.

Props to you Twicky. I brushed on this a little earlier in the thread but you said it much more throughly.
I dont think people are really thinking of the consequences of a completely random 12v12 match. Especally when the incentive to win is PvE rewards.
At the same time, getting a team of 12 together is asking to much from individual players. So 3 teams of 4 is a nice balance.

And the requirments you put down are very realistic for what we have to work with for now. However I would say that the "format" for getting a team is bad, ..very bad. Im making a faithful assumption that anet is working on a way reformat thier team building "feature" (which consist of typing LFG and hoping youll find someone in your district) into something more orginized and user friendly.

But other than that, all these people asking for a completely random 12v12 dont know what they are asking for. They think they are asking for a casual friendly game, but instead they will invite all sorts of grief and a poor understanding of coorpertive pvp to the general public. And if they get what they want it will backfire and many of those people will blame anet first.

Anyhow, Im glad they decided to go with 3 teams of 4. That subsides some skeptisim I have about the upcoming GW:Factions.

Huh? Why on earth would you spike the other team? You'd go around spiking the NPCs and capturing the points while avoiding the other team at any point where you can't immediately spike them down.

However, I did say I don't know whether this would be effective, and since I doubt you tried it, neither do you. All I said is to not dismiss builds out of hand. Since this has little to do with the thread anyway, I'll drop it at this point.

Yeah, right. If Arenanet doesn't provide a rank equivalent, HA rank WILL be used instead, regardless of how terrible a measure that actually is. People will find a number to equate to someone's skill in an attempt to make it easier to find competent teammates and also to simply enjoy bashing on those of lesser rank.

12v12 Alliance battles should not be turned into another /rank arena but the though of having it random doesnt sound right either.

Arent you suppose to participate in Alliance Battles by grouping with members of "your Alliance" in conjuction with "other Alliances" of your selected Faction against the other for land control? Having it as a random large arena doesnt fit into the mindset i personally have as what i would call a proper alliance battle, but you are free to your views. Similar idea applies for co-op missions.... however the risk of making 12v12 co-ordinated would just make it a larger HA in Factions where everyone is concerned about rank and exclude PvErs and causals.

How Anet will fix Alliance battles to fit its description w/o making it exclusive will be interesting to see.

Good luck Anet 17 days more to go.

Imagine 12 man Iway....*shudder*.

.. I've been out of touch with this thread for awhile.

I think when people are asking for a random 12v12 though, they mean to say, "Keep the 12v12 as it was during the Factions preview."

To me, that's random. And it worked. 'cause it's what he had during the preview event.

And despite the randomness of that, I still saw cooperative play and teamwork. To once more cite personal experience, while both teams were dog-piling on the dragon shrine, I called two random names and told them to follow me 'cause we were going to take another shrine.

And they said, paraphrased, ROGER ROGER.

Both sides of this argument need to cut down on the gloom and doom. ;P

I don't see rank becoming important here, either.

Hasn't Gaile already said 12v12 is remaining as it was, save you can't actually just hit "enter" anymore--that you actually have to make a team up?

That's probably what will happen with 3 formed teams...

If IWAY stays popular of course.

I totally agree

12v12 was awesome, and when it starts getting a 12v12 HA, I won't be playing it much (and many others won't either).

The meaning of 12v12 alliance fights is that everyone can play and can get ASAP into it, not have to wait 10 min to get a team. There need to be alot of alliance fights, so that the borders will change like they should.

I say it again: congrats A.net, these 12v12 fights were awesome, pls keep them

I agree with SilentAssasin, 12vs12 was fun. If you don't have time for anything big like a mission, FoW, UW or anything big, and you don't feel like farming, 12vs12 is a great option. I liked the fact that it was easy to form a group, and sometimes you are lucky with groups and sometimes u aren't, but that's life. I don't wanna see 12 man IWAY, 12 man Ranger spike or anything like that.

No HA build is going to work in 12vs12. There is no ghost to babysit. What makes HA build affective is the tiny maps forcing a showdown. The maps are way to big for those kinds of teams to work.

You will see small 3 and 4 man groups running around the map at once. Very rarely will you see the entire team together. If you do see the team together the other side will most likely win.

You have to have at least 3 people attacking a shrine or you won't take it over fast enough. NPCs do count for the alter control. You have to outnumber the NPCs and real players to take over that alter.

Agree with Goonter that creating a team in general is bad because of the system of spamming in chat channels. Might want to check out this link as a way to fix PUG creation.

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...d.php?t=126531

/Signed ... x 4 for my 2 accounts and my fiance's 2 accounts..

If you ask me, I'd say it's false advertising! They hook us on one thing and give us another. I feel like I just got sold a used car with no engine in it cuz I forgot to look under the hood!

I guess I'm the biggest sucker of all. I have always been totally anti-pvp until the FPE. I LOOOOOOOOOOVED the 12 vs 12!! Everyone in my rather large PvE based guild loved it. It was a huge selling point for influencing me to buy Factions. So huge... I bought 6 copies!! Yes, 6!!! Including 2 Collector's Editions which I don't have.

Why did I buy 6? 2 For myself (1 SE & 1 CE), 2 for my fiance' (1 CE & 1 SE), and 2 extra for guildies who I knew couldn't afford it but I just couldn't stand the thought of playing Factions and 12 vs 12 without.

But it get's worse... I also bought 3 Prima Guides (all the store had) to give away as contest prizes in my guild. I'm a guild leader and love all my guildies.

Wait, I'm not done yet... I also bought 10, count them **********10, preorder kits from amazon.com just for guildies who were not preordering so we could all play the head start together. Yes, you could buy just the preorder from Amazon.

So... all in all, I just spent about $500 on a game I don't even like now.

Thanks alot Anet! It just keeps getting better. Now I wish it was pay to play. At least then I could cancel my subscriptions!

P.S. At least in the FPE you could yell out to the WHOLE team of 12 when you were losing a control point. Why don't the just nerf the fact that we have legs and make us all run around on nubs.