PTS PvP Normalization Test – Tuesday, 8/14 @ 4PM PDT

[Arcshayde]

Well if you read you will actually likely NOT see a number of them. GW2 minimizes the gear. I queue for PvP whammo I am gear AND leveled. With some customization GW2 actually takes normalization to the next level. The people complaining here want a rigid and heavily biased gear based progression preserved. That is not GW2 by any stretch, which is actually the selling point of the other game to me.

Have you done much PvP in the GW2 betas? Just curious because you are either misunderstanding GW2s PvP system or the argument being made here. Then again, looking at your account creation date, maybe you are just using a troll account.

Depending on sPvP or WvWvW you are bolstered, not completely leveled. You don't have access to lvl80 abilities until you're lvl80 in WvWvW. I was actually glad they each had a unique pvp system. You could sub to Rift and still play Gw2 for free. If Rift becomes a cheap imitation, why pay for it?

If Rift wants to make PvP more accessible for newcomers, then make the gear more accessible don't invalidate it.

[V1rul3n7]

Well, as a PvPer since the Half Birthday, I say the one thing that seems wrong to me is an almost constant nerfing. Either of classes/callings and then of gear, WFs, and gains. It always seems like pushing things back to make them easier for people cause its "too hard" or "I die too much" I was just in a wf earlier and someone complained that the group sucked, when they had some of the lowest stat output, and werent even trying to support the group in any fashion other than "Ugh smack with stick" style of play.

If a class or a specific set of people are complaining, dont nerf someone else, try and fix that class before you mess with others. Rift is a unique game in that you have a great level of control over your character and how it plays. However, that's a double edged sword. That means that not every player is going to -want- to fit into the shellings that make a group good. Sometimes (and more often than not) you get people who will flat out refuse to do something that their class is better suited for. combine that with people searching for the "Magic Bullet" spec that will just pwn everyone. (and yes, I tried this myself) Which, in my opinion, should NEVER happen in this game, or any other for that matter. Bottom line is, some classes/spec will just always have a class/spec you wont do well against, regardless of gear.

The gear issue is a big deal for people, as Rift has been established since launch as a progressive gear based MMO. Hell most of them are. I've seen some things on GW2 and personally don't seem all that interested. I tried Tera (which was supposed to be similar) And it wasn't bad, and given that it didn't have so many flaws I may have stuck with it.

I think the issue making everyone upset is the fact it seems like Trion is worried they will lose many people to the release of GW2, so they are trying to scramble to find a way to keep people interested. So to me, it seems like PvP didn't TRULY matter till it came time for sub renewal and the choice of a new game or not. When was the last time pre 1.9 that PvP got a nice change or something that we could enjoy? I have seen several patches and releases of new content for PvE and world events, but not a great deal to actually look forward to in PvP.

First it was the nerfing of the ranking system, which didnt really make it easier to grind the gear, changing from P8 system, to a P40. In fact, there were quite a few people left in the void that it created that got totally screwed when their gear became obsolete, and the prices just ruined without any compensation for time already spent. Then you had to deal with the conquest debacle. Which to me all seemed like a huge joke in the first place.

When I first heard of it, I thought, "Great, it will be port Scion with another group of to watch out for. so an even worse cluster F*CK" I couldn't have been more right, yet so wrong. Not only was it a giant mess that cause a huge imbalance in PvP. But then they made it a massive PvEvP match.

Conquest was PvP for all of a few hrs. When that fresh Warfront smell was in the air, and you had groups of friends rushing out with wild abandon to find whatever group they could and smash some faces! Then... as is PvP, people started camping. All the while Trion just kind of sat and watched... Didn't really do anything drastic to fix the issues.

And now this, the third time they are working to "fix" PvP and this seems to be just one more thing they take from the ones that spend the time to enjoy it the way it was meant to be.

I just hope they listen to some of the things they said here. And at least think it through. They said in the PTS that is was a 'Metrics Gathering" test. To that I say:

What metrics of value could you possibly gain by having EVERYONE in that match capped at certain points regardless of spec? And then you throw in consumable exploits in that and you get an even more skewed look. Personally a test like that should have been run/done/recorded souly by devs. not players. There was no need for it, and if you are -using- any of what I would now call faulty data for SL, i shudder to think of what that could mean.

Totally agree with a lot of your points.

Trion left PvP development too late thats the problem, they were slow getting around to it and were totally focused on their "awesome new pve content" so its no wonder they lost PvP'er subs. Some peoople may argue "well 90% of the game are pve'rs" or some such arguement "so why bother working on it" well the answer is so Trion can attract NEW subscribers who enjoy PvP rather than isolating the market entirely by thinking to themselves "oh well its a pve game, nobody likes our pvp so we wont bother working on it", that is just a defeatist arguement.

Trion as developers need to understand that a balanced holistic approach to both gear design and class design is absolutely crucial REGARDLESS of the amount of people playing that specific class, reason being is because classes are supposed to support one another in both PvE and PvP content so if a specific class is underpowered then they are most probably having less fun/having a harder time gaining on their more overpowered counterparts and thus more likely to unsubscribe.

They should just normalize weekend warfronts so they can collect data and they should try and include an equal amount of both pvp and pve content in every patch or they are obviously going to lose peoples interest in one market or the other.

Its like when they balance classes, they shouldnt be just balancing ONE specific calling because they usually do a bad job of it and everything ends up a little OP, they need to be more holistic in their approach to class balance (past the storm legion expansion) otherwise they are only going to mess up all the hard work they have done already.

Plus when they DO balance its with a giant spoon of a nerf here or a giant buff there, they need to be more delicate with their alterations rather than the big coarse changes we have seen in the past.

[Antigonos]

This change will simply create more world pvp and ganking as people wont go in warfronts anymore but will party up just looking around to kill others while they are simply questing or trying to close a rift or walking around exploring. this really wont help the situation...

and there's a HUGE flaw on PVE servers that get people into PVP combat, a toon may simply put themselves on PVP "ON all the time" and stand close to someone that wants nothing to do with pvp waiting for an AE to turn on their PVP status "on" as well and just kill them off. I know because I done it with my rogue, I had it on due to questing the daily that turns it on(I have 2 rogues, 1 that pvp's strictly and 1 that pve strictly so I dont wanna keep switching sets back and forth, they could make some kind of thing like they did with profession to make it a lot easier to switch directly from the bank rather than having to keep it all in your bags).

.

1. More open pvp is a GOOD thing
2. you are wrong you can completly turn of pvp and will NEVER be flagged. Look in options.

[Arcshayde]

its not implementation that was the issue. It's the theory. Setting class based hard caps will lead to more cookie cutter specs and gear combos than before. And I personally left WoW for that very reason.

The idea of lessening the gear disparity for new players. I agree, homogenization is a terrible idea, especially for a game based on character customization.

[irieguin]

Posted on another thread but...

How about tiers for pvp that a player can chose (say t1, t2, t3, t4). Each tier is for a particular level range (1-16, 17-25, etc...). Players can pick what tier they want but rewards are based on your level range vs the level range you pick. If you pick your level range you get 100% rewards, If you pick one tier below you get 50% rewards. More than 2 levels below and you get no reward. Level 50 can only pick the highest tier. At level 50 there are additional rewards that do not affect gameplay (titles, leaderboards, whatever).

My 2 silver

Treaa

[Meina]

Posted on another thread but...

How about tiers for pvp that a player can chose (say t1, t2, t3, t4). Each tier is for a particular level range (1-16, 17-25, etc...). Players can pick what tier they want but rewards are based on your level range vs the level range you pick. If you pick your level range you get 100% rewards, If you pick one tier below you get 50% rewards. More than 2 levels below and you get no reward. Level 50 can only pick the highest tier. At level 50 there are additional rewards that do not affect gameplay (titles, leaderboards, whatever).

My 2 silver

Treaa

What you propose is splitting up the queue. Bad idea.

We don't have enough people to support matched WF's, never mind 4 different queues.

[Flashmemory]

I think normalization is a good idea as long as you award players for pvping as much as you award others. I mean it is so easy to make a few daily pvp warfronts to award ISS and even marks. I actually don't know why you don't do this. Want people to play cq make it have bi weekly reset with same rewards added. Or to play in warfronts then you make it award iss and marks on a daily basis. Maybe even consider a ladder system with upgrading marks through pvp so everyone can choose what they want to get wether it be the raid or dungeon gear or pvp gear.


We can see proc rates are something that is a problem in the normalization process and some builds can be unkillable (mages and clerics) again.

What we should be looking at is actually making a clear and concise distinction of abilities and talents for both pvp and pve. Pvp changes should not effect pve changes in anyway and from what I see it still does. And that is the number 1 problem. Having normalization would only cover up the problem but won't fix it until we can have balance of the classes.

Every class should be able to bring something to the raid for support. Some classes bring very little to the table for the raid in pvp and pve. Some classes are forced into some builds in order to be valuable to the raid. For instance the problem with Lingering Wounds and such pin holing warriors into some champ spec...or the problem with range being dominant in stuff like Cq because of range and no effective counter for it. ...normalization won't fix those problems.

[Tufelhunden]

I agree with you flash. There has to be some type of progression for the PVP folks, besides fluff. It just cannot affect warfronts.

[Galibier]

The idea of lessening the gear disparity for new players. I agree, homogenization is a terrible idea, especially for a game based on character customization.

This is a test though. You have to start testing somewhere. Often developing is like artillery. You call in a grind coordinate and it lands long. You drop 200 and it falls short. You add 100 and it is on target so fire for effect is called.

There are many people though that want NO change whatsoever. They are in denial that PvP in this game is a joke and that without some sort of change it is only a matter of time before it will be almost impossible to justify PvP servers which will make it ibcreasingly difficult to justify new PvP queued content. They basically have the old school Frat attitude of "I had to get hazed with the goat so you do to." This is neither objective nor logical.

[Arcshayde]

This is a test though. You have to start testing somewhere. Often developing is like artillery. You call in a grind coordinate and it lands long. You drop 200 and it falls short. You add 100 and it is on target so fire for effect is called.

There are many people though that want NO change whatsoever. They are in denial that PvP in this game is a joke and that without some sort of change it is only a matter of time before it will be almost impossible to justify PvP servers which will make it ibcreasingly difficult to justify new PvP queued content. They basically have the old school Frat attitude of "I had to get hazed with the goat so you do to." This is neither objective nor logical.

It just feels like this particular change is a cheap imitation of gw2, which was designed and advertised that way all along? I'd rather see everyone have equal access to r40, r50, rXX gear than hard caps on stats that do not scale equally between classes. Maybe have a time unlock for gear? R40 immediately at rank 50 and r50 at x days played or 500 wf's or something?

[Meina]

It just feels like this particular change is a cheap imitation of gw2, which was designed and advertised that way all along? I'd rather see everyone have equal access to r40, r50, rXX gear than hard caps on stats that do not scale equally between classes. Maybe have a time unlock for gear? R40 immediately at rank 50 and r50 at x days played or 500 wf's or something?

If I understand your use of "Hard caps", I don't think you have much to worry about. You will still be able to modify your stats through the use of PA, runes and anything else that is not specifically armor or weapons.

[Malark]

Find a way to get the PVP specifics out and it's a win IMHO.


Keep it so you can get items from PVPing, keep all the armor and what have you but remove valor/veng as a tweakable/upgradeable stat. That's it, way it should have been in the first place.

The question is, should the PVP gear be as good as the best PVE raiding gear ? I dunno I'd say probably not, but I might be biased.


The problem is you get PVP specialists that do nothing but PVP and these guys end up fighting directly against people that aren't as obsessed over it all. I mean if it's to the point where you're building a valor sigil it's time to really ask why it's all kept so separate.

[HannonHellbringer]

If I understand your use of "Hard caps", I don't think you have much to worry about. You will still be able to modify your stats through the use of PA, runes and anything else that is not specifically armor or weapons.

PA will be the next big thing EVERYONE cries about, watch lol

Players will never be happy until everyone is handed a victory for free.

[Meina]

PA will be the next big thing EVERYONE cries about, watch lol

Players will never be happy until everyone is handed a victory for free.

No matter what happens, some people will cry about it. That's the problem with dealing with thousands of people, you can't satisfy them all.

The trick here is to try and figure out when there's a legitimate complaint and when people are crying about inconsequential.

[Tufelhunden]

Find a way to get the PVP specifics out and it's a win IMHO.


Keep it so you can get items from PVPing, keep all the armor and what have you but remove valor/veng as a tweakable/upgradeable stat. That's it, way it should have been in the first place.

The question is, should the PVP gear be as good as the best PVE raiding gear ? I dunno I'd say probably not, but I might be biased.


The problem is you get PVP specialists that do nothing but PVP and these guys end up fighting directly against people that aren't as obsessed over it all. I mean if it's to the point where you're building a valor sigil it's time to really ask why it's all kept so separate.

I have a valor sigil TYVM and I don't PVP to the exclusion of everything else. In fact after I get this one where I want it I will probably make a vengeance sigil for a more DPS oriented build.