Ganking, Guard-Camping, Zerging, Bind-rushing, and other lame rules exploits [Archive]

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Zanid

02-23-2007, 05:10 PM

The basic premise of this post is that PvP should be a challenge. I feel that PvP fights should be hard and fun, not gank or be ganked. Title-huggers and gankers will not /agree with much of what I've posted here, and that's fine - they're entitled to their opinions. I have had several incredible PvP fights. Many I've won. Several I've lost. Sadly, these amazing encounters are definitely the exception and not the rule thanks to the current PvP ruleset. Please note, that most of my suggestions will increase the frequency of PvP encounters. They will also increase the number of deaths you will receive. If you don't want to die, go play the SIMS - on a PvP server you have two roles to play: hunter AND prey. Also, I play 10 different alts and I play them all with about the same level of skill (or lack thereof) so please do not think any of my comments are biased based on the characters I play. 1) Fix OOC HealingThis fix is already on the test server, so I won't dwell much on this one. However, this has been a problem since day 1 and I'm annoyed that it took so long to fix.2) Make AoE only affect aggro targetsOnce OOC healing is fixed, we will still have baby-sitting. High level opponents stand in the middle of groups to prevent the use of AoE powers. This seriously weakens certain classes and makes as much sense as OOC healing. My pally had to respec his AA line since he was procing and hitting reds. Simple fix....if they're not aggro, AoE doesn't affect them.3) Make Guards Non-AggroGuard-camping is lame. Earning fame by having a guard get your kills for you is also lame. If anything, you should lose fame if a guard has to bail you out. I play on Venekor, and when I visit CL to find Freeps, 50% or more will be within 50 feet of the WFP gate, another 25% are within 50 feet of the Crossroads. The other 25% are either a) moving between WFP and XR, b) bots farming resources, c) traveling in huge raids ganking solo greens. I play on a PvP server because I want to fight players, not guards. I can't fault the Freeps for doing this. They are currently outnumbered at this tier, so they have to exploit the ruleset to gain an edge. Q's used to do the same thing when we were outnumbered. Regardless, it's lame. See #11 for a proposed fix to the population imbalance.4) Bind-Rushing is dumb You've been playing for hours, and you and your full group have finally gotten into a decent, evenly matched battle. You manage to drop their big DPS, swinging the odds in your favor. Things are looking good. Suddenly your nuker drops. Their nuker has returned and gets to re-engage. Unfortunately, your side's respawn is on the other side of the map, so you're down a groupmate, and every time you drop an opponent, they get to come right back (with no risk of lost fame). Total Party Wipeout is inevitable.There are many possible fixes to this:<ul><li>Eliminate the /recent rule - you get to come back, but your opponents get credit for killing you again</li><li>Make revive impossible until PvP is over for your group (which does not help for zerging)</li><li>Respawn in an adjacent zone</li></ul>5) Get rid of Group GankingIn PvE, we pick up groupmates to enhance our abilities so that we can take on tougher opponents that we could not defeat solo. By taking on tougher opponents with a strong group, we increase the rate at which we receive rewards. In PvP, we pick up groupmates so that we can run around and gank greens since this is the fastest way to get titles and status. This is not the PvP I thought I was signing up for. The fix to this is to level adjust groups. For example:<ul><li>+3 levels for an additional member. Thus a level 20 & 17 would be considered level 23 for PvP purposes</li><li>+1 level for each additional member. Thus if the 20 & 17 picked up an 18, their group level would be 24</li></ul>By adjusting the group level, it keeps a +/-4 level range that is challenging. That is, a 20/18/17 group would struggle with a solo 28, but no more so than a solo 24 would. The amount of level adjustment is just an approximation and not the point of this section. It would probably have to be capped at 4 members, with the 5th and 6th being "free". 6) Eliminate the /recent ruleThe 30 minute timer exists to prevent two problems:<ol><li>friend-farming</li><li>griefing</li></ol>Unfortunately, the /recent rule causes more problems than it prevents. Bind-rushing and shadowing being two of them. My group had to kill the same SK 5 times because he kept shadowing us waiting for his HT to recharge so he could one-shot our wizard (who was green to him). He died 5 times, but only one of them counted. I'm sorry, but if you come looking for death that's not griefing, it's stupidity and stupidity should be punished. If you get owned while killing named mobs in WC and immediately return to WC, you deserve to lose fame.I propose a diminishing return on fame & status gain/loss. That is, full status gained/lost on the first kill. 75% on the second within 60 minutes, 50% on the third, 25% on the fourth and 0% on any additional. After each kill the 60 minute timer would reset. This makes friend-farming less of an issue. As for griefing, if you're getting killed by the same opponent over and over, then you're dumb for constantly going back to the same spot. You lose the right to be allowed to hunt where you want on a PvP server.7) Balance the PvP utility of the classesIt's annoying that you will struggle to find a PvP fight without a scout. The utility of tracking makes Scouts the most powerful PvP class in the game and an absolute necessity in a PvP group. Luckily, thanks to this heavy imbalance, at least 50% of all toons are scouts, so finding one is usually not a problem. The solution to this is to give the other classes PvP utility abilities:<ul><li>Fighters: Allow taunt to make opponents come to the Fighter</li><li>Mages: Clairvoyance (lets them do a /who evil or /who good)</li><li>Priests: Sense Aura (allows the Priest to identify the class of opponents)</li></ul><img src="/smilies/b2eb59423fbf5fa39342041237025880.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> Balance the PvP strength of the classesCertain classes show up over and over again. There is only one reason for this - these are the uber PvP classes. I will not bother ranking them since that will create an endless debate. However, we all know which classes are the most powerful, and although these classes still have a match-up or two that they struggle with, they are overpowered in general. There is very good reason that you never see Templars and Guardians on the PvP servers. A typical group will have 3 scouts, 2 healers and either a tank or a mage. For Scouts, non-bards are the norm. Healers are almost always druids, and tanks are SKs. Paladins, Dirges, Guardians, and Templars really get the shaft for PvP. Although there are notable exceptions (due to exceptional player abilities), the normal player will die often with any of these classes. <img src="/smilies/b2eb59423fbf5fa39342041237025880.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> Fix Avoidance (so that it actually works)I've been running a parser lately and notice that almost all swings result in hits in PvP. For example, I hit 264 of 269 times in an epic battle with my 19 Mystic versus a 16 and a 15. Granted, they were both green to me, but that's less than 2% avoidance for a Scout against a healer!Basically, you will never miss blues, greens or even cons. Against yellows, you will hit 90% and against oranges you will hit 75%. I'm considering ditching my shield on my pally since it doesn't seem to be doing anything for him.The lack of avoidance is likely why my 19 Mystic consistently owns orange Scouts who should be difficult for me to hit. It is also why two opponents on my Mystic can keep me chain-interrupted despite my 25% avoidance.9) What about the non-rooters/non-snarers?If you can't root an opponent, then soloing is not really an option since most of your opponents will just run off. Non-brawler fighters and non-druid healers suck for solo PvP. The majority of your fights will be against opponents that you cannot beat. Everyone else will just run off in search of easier prey. With zone lines, griffons and run speeds dropping once you enter combat, it's just too easy to get away from the non-rooting/non-snaring classes. And since almost everyone has run speed enhancements, snaring someone who has not yet engaged is pointless unless it's for 50% or better. Even if they engage, as soon as you start to win, your opponent will just run off, so the only fights that non-rooters/non-snarers will finish when solo are the ones in which they die. And grouping is not a very good option either since these are the classes that also tend to get targeted first in the group.The fixes: <ul><li>make combat start when you hit OR get hit. This will put everyone to the same speed. </li><li>Give the non-rooting classes a chance:</li><li>Give the in-combat run speed to a class that doesn't get root, snare or uber nukes - Paladin/Berserker/Guardian. Although these classes would get away a lot more due to their good MIT, this is balanced by the fact that they struggle to finish an opponent when the opponent runs due to weak DPS (Berserker being the obvious exception here)</li><li>Alternativley, let tanks pull you back to them with a taunt. This makes Scouts less likely to want to tangle one. There would suddenly be consequences for picking a fight you cannot win!</li><li>SKs can already snare. Add their HT and they're already a viable PvP class (which is why there are so many of them)</li></ul>10) Fame calculations make no senseMy 24 Slayer Paladin got jumped by 5 unranked greens and greys. Rather than run off to protect my title (in a very un-Paladin-like fashion), I stayed and gave them the best beating I could muster. I killed 2 before they got me. I lost fame. Huh? I stayed and valiantly battled against overwhelming odds, and killed 2 of my adversaries in a fight that I thoroughly enjoyed (and can only imagine that my opponents did as well). Shouldn't the bards be singing my name in the taverns?Later I was battling a named mob. A yellow con assassin unstealthed behind me and backstabbed me. I tried my best to defend myself (since pallys never get away), but eventually died due to the additional DPS/interrupts of the named. The backstabbing assassin who engaged a blue opponent (who's hands were already full) got fame. Huh? The way fame is calculated makes players more likely to avoid fights than engage in them. Champions running from Hunters? If you get hit by a lower rank and don't kill them, you should lose fame. If you engage higher level opponents (using group level adjustment), you should earn more fame, and lose less if you lose, regardless of their title. Afterall a level 24 Hunter tends to be a tougher kill than a 16 Destroyer.11) Exiling creates unbalanced populationsThe previously underpopulated Qeynos got a huge boom with the release of the Fae. This boom in our population was magnified by the fact that all the Freeps who were enjoying their ability to raid-gank were not enjoying the taste of their own medicine. So many defected since they don't want a challenge - they want easy, gankable targets. The population swing was further magnified by the fact that certain previously overpowered Freep classes got nerfed, so those players either rerolled or defected (again to avoid a challenge). The simple fix to population imbalances is to make Exiling one-way. Anyone should be allowed to Exile, but you should only be allowed to join the city with the lower average server population for the previous month (on a rolling average). This would reduce the imbalance and eliminate the need for the weaker side to exploit all of the above. Lame players will still exploit these rules, so they still need to be fixed. However, fixing the population imbalance will eliminate the need to do so. As I stated earlier, the premise of this post is to create more exciting and challenging PvP encounters. The sort of ones that you'll remember. Who remembers the name of the greenie that you raid-ganked? Or of the raid of oranges that ganked you? But I'll remember my 5 on 1 with my pally, and the time my 17 Mystic and 14 Troub partner defeated a 20 Warden and 19 Dirge that jumped us. I'll remember the time my 19 Mystic ran off a 22 Assassin, only to get jumped by a 17 Assassin - the 22 came back and I managed to kill them both. I'll also remember my Swash getting owned by a blue necro who completely outplayed me. PvP should not be about ganking - it should be about good fights. Some you win, some you lose, but the majority are fun!

Khrunk

02-23-2007, 05:16 PM

saying that only freeps do this cause we are outnumbered is lame, i see qs do these "exploits" alot. i like being outnumbered gives me more chances for pvp than the way it use to be. though i agree some of these ideas are not bad.

Zanid

02-23-2007, 05:51 PM

Actually, I never said that only Freeps do these exploits. In fact, I stated that Q's used to be the guard campers in Ant. However at this point, if you go to CL almost ALL the freeps in the zone are camping the guards. I don't think that Freeps are lame. I think that players who exploit the crappy PvP rules are lame, regardless of their faction. Most of my examples are about Freeps simply because I play Qeynosian toons. I do believe that Freeps in general are currently exploiting some of these rulesets more often due to the population imbalance.

Killque

02-23-2007, 06:42 PM

<ol><li>Guards: Lots of people use the guards from both sides. If you want to hang around the guards all day thats fine by me. I dont fight near them if I dont have to anyway, and if everyone followed that rule (not going to happen) they would get mighty bored and probably move. People run to guards to save themselves. Uh, DUH! I even do this, and if you care about pvp, you would too. Every time someone from the oposite team makes a kill they get stronger. I will not let them have that luxury, they will need to earn it from me. That dosent mean we camp the guards but we may have to run half way accross the map to get to safety. With the zone changes you will see this more.</li><li>Aoe: This is fine as it is. Play smart, if there are a bunch of high levels coming to help, shout for help of your own. Lie if you need to. Shout out theres a Dread or Champion of a specific level. People are motivated by that. Use it to your advantage, or just move.</li><li>Group/Solo ganking: "/dresses up in bear suit" Only YOU can prevent ganking! Seriously, this has to be one of the easiest to avoid. Get the appropriate items. Totems arent even needed anymore as there are tinkered items for the job now. Play smart and you wont be "stabbed in the back" or rolled by a x4..</li><li>Recent Removal: Remove the recient rule and I will abandon my personal rule of griefing and kill everyone every chance I get, over and over and over if they let me.</li><li>Class Balance: HAHAH, I dont think Spud Webb (5'6" NBA Basketball Player) ever complained about not being the Center... Wanting everyone to be able to do something like or simiar to everyone else is retarted. What seperates us then? Furys can root, but they cant wear plate. Templar cant root, but can wear plate, and do other things that are class defining. Why does everyone have to be able to do everything, jeeze!</li></ol>

Zanid

02-23-2007, 11:53 PM

Okay, it's starting to get annoying replying to someone's rebuttal to something that was never said in my original post. Nowhere in my original post did I suggest that everyone should get root. Nor did I say that everyone should be made the same. I did say that several classes get the shaft for PvP and some balancing needs to be done. I know that this is a controversial topic since almost everyone who posts here is a Druid, Scout or SK (who are thoroughly enjoying the imbalance). And you're correct. If I don't want to give my opponents all the unfair advantages that most are currently exploiting, then I can just avoid them. But since 90% of my opponents are currently using these exploits, I would effectively be avoiding PvP which defeats the purpose of playing on a PvP server. And for the record, most of my kills come from group ganking, and my healers OOC heal every chance they get. The current ruleset is very poor for PvP in my opinion. It's for gank-or-be-ganked, and since nobody wants to be ganked, everyone exploits at least some of the crappy rules I mentioned in my OP. However, in my opinion, that's just not fun (and may be why the PvP server populations are constantly decreasing). Change those rules and we'd have some fun, challenging PvP.

PeaSy1

02-24-2007, 12:13 AM

Id like to say that if you aoe in a group you will NOT hit red targets unless you have them targeted. I do like the idea of changing the group level by size.

Radigazt

02-24-2007, 02:53 AM

Wow, very nicely thought out post. I agree with some points and disagree with others, but nicely presented by the OP. <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />Here's my thoughts:1. OOC Healing - Agree Fix is on the way ... very overdue IMHO, but glad it's fixed.2. Make AoE only affect aggro targets - Disagree The level disparity is a pain, no doubt, and I wouldn't have a problem with changing this rule, but I don't have a problem with this rule either. I'd rather they fix the Mentoring system to make mentored people the equivalent of Twinks, not ultra-uber when mentored. Until they fix the Mentoring system, they cannot allow Mentored PvP, and the level disparity will cause problems. 3. Make Guards Non-Aggro - Disagree This is another change I don't have any problems with making, but I disagree because I realize that sometimes there is a force that is superior to another. That's when the inferior force uses the Guards to help even the odds. I'd rather they be able to do that and there still be some PvP than the alternative, which would be for that inferior group just giving up and not PvP'ing at all. 4. Bind-Rushing - Agree I'd rather it be something simple like this ... if someone just killed you (regardless of infamy/status/faction), you can't attack that person for 5 minutes. If you want to beat them, beat them the first time. I can't tell you the number of times Q's have bind-rushed me attacking me immediately after I'd killed them and I only had 10% health left. They got their infamy back. The current solution is klunky IMHO, because the revived sickness is a major hindrance to much more than just bind-rushing. And, it doesn't prevent bind-rushing! A new solution is needed. 5. Group Ganking - Disagree Hey, I came to PvP, so I want as much PvP as possible. In all the games I've played I have soloed extensively, including many years of first-person shooters. But what I've found is that the dynamic of group PvP is much more demanding and also rewarding. In a 1v1 I can eventually control the crucial resources and learn a pattern or system to win, and the variables are quite limited, so I know how each fight will go. But in group v. group PvP, I'm often surprised as the makeup of the group changes often, their group-strategies change, and they're unpredictability always adds a thrill for me. When I'm rolling with a group, why should I avoid a solo player or smaller group? I'm here to PvP, and I'm going to PvP. I often see groups of Q's raiding up, so their groups are significantly larger than my group, but I often engage them anyway. Like today, we had 5 of our crew together, we hunted an x2 Raid of Q's that averaged the same levels as us. When we found them ... it was an x2 Raid with a lot of non-raided hangers-on, and we were faced with about 18 people. We fought valiantly, used fantastic teamwork, but eventually 18 of them was just too many to handle, so when we started dying we used some creative strategy and managed to escape losing 2 people and 3 getting away. None of us got anything from that encounter, and two people lost a good amount of infamy, which stung. But everyone enjoyed the challenge. Some days we're a group of 6 rolling a group of 6 Q's, or a group of 3 Q's, or a solo Q. Other days we're a group of 5 getting overwhelmed by 18 Q's ... but we enjoy the challenge, and we take our chances when they come and we take our lumps when we must. Group PvP is the most enjoyable thing on this server IMHO, and I'd really hate to see this become a glorified Arena of nothing but 1v1's. And if the current trend by SOE to change this into a care-bear server continues (Evac only for the people who want to avoid PvP, zoning only for the people who want to avoid PvP, run-speed only for the people who want to avoid PvP, etc.), it may be time for me to start looking for a new game. If you want to change the Q mentality of perpetually looking only for greens to gank, I suggest adjusting the infamy system to give MUCH less infamy for killing greens, and to divide all infamy equally amongst group members. Then, soloers would get higher rewards for soloing and people would have more incentives to attack higher cons. 6. /Recent rule - Agree I like your solutions to deal with the /Recent rule. 7. Balance the PvP utility of the classes - Agree I agree that Tracking makes Scouts the ultimate soloers and indespensible in a PvP group. I also agree that each class should have some sort of utility to change the problem of soloing, and to make a Scout not a required member of a PvP group. But, I majorly disagree with your solutions. I'd much rather see Tracking Totems be made available by Woodworkers. Balance the PvP strengh of the classes - Agree Agreed, and I think the Dev's are trying to do that, but they just don't PvP on the live servers nearly as much as we do, so they're not always as aware of the problems like we are. In T6 and T7 Rangers, Assassins, Swashy's and Brigands go from being the best classes to being virtually unstoppable. They're at or near the top in every Tier, but in T6 and T7 it's just ridiculous. The Dev's need to make sure that every class can solo PvP in every tier from level 10 to 70. This will require a lot of tweaks, but it's the right solution. Avoidance - Disagree I disagree on this one. Avoidance is a major advantage, and I always notice the difference. 9. Non-Rooters/Non-Snares - Agree I have been advocating your first fix in this list for a long time. If I'm throwing daggers into your back, I may move a little slower, but when I hit you in the calf or thigh, you're going to be moving a LOT slower, not at full speed. I think the best fix would be to eliminate the speed disparity for in-combat vs. out-of-combat. When you enter combat, you should have all of your speed buffs still in tact, OR, take that speed away from someone whenever they hit or get hit, like you said. I agree mele classes like the Tanks need snares. The danger is that when you have a high survivability class like a tank and make them almost exclusively mele, giving them the ability to prevent you from getting out of mele runs the risk of creating a tank-mage. But on PvP servers, I think the Scout classes already are those tank-mages. I categorically disagree with your taunt solution, as I think that's a fear and it would definitely make tanks overpowered. 10. Fame calculations make no sense - Agree The losses associated with dying incentivizes avoiding PvP way too much. IMHO, they should revamp the system to give you a minimal loss for dying and a big gain for winning. Then people would want to PvP instead of zoning/running away from an even fight. Furthermore, if I manage to kill a Champion when I'm a Hunter, I should not only gain fame/infamy, but I should gain more. I think the infamy should also depend upon the difficulty of the fight. Greens should give less infamy than yellows. Six people killing one victim shouldn't yield much infamy, but one person killing two people at the same time should yield a lot of infamy. 11. Exiles - Disagree I think the two things they should do with Exiles are 1) give them the same aggro level ranges that Q's and FP's have so that they can't be attacked by deep red-cons, and 2) some way to obtain PvP gear. There simply aren't enough targets to make me happy in PvP anymore, and anything that allows me to hunt more targets has the potential to be a great thing ... but opening myself up to someone 30 levels above me isn't my idea of competition. I like the faction system, but I'd prefer more targets. To the OP, great points and very well presented. The only ones I have major disagreements with are 5 (Group Ganking) and 11 (Exiles). I think everything else you've proposed has some merit, even if I disagree with it on a whole.

CyberDavid

02-24-2007, 04:06 AM

My opinion plain and simple is stop complaining I personally thought pvp was just fine when it first started but there is two and only two points that i agree with which is OOC healing. I personally am a healer and have when I can done OOC healing and have also been on the receiving end of it. Gaurd camping is also extremely noobish and needs to be fixed. (I dont know why mabye its because of X-rodes but freeporters tend to do this more) Even after saying this I could, can, and have lived with these problems since the day pvp servers came out and I have yet to post a complaint or "quick fix" because you gotta remember its pvp you cant control it like pve crazy things that you will hate happening can and will continue to happen and you have to live with it.

Norrsken

02-24-2007, 07:29 AM

<cite>CyberDavid wrote:</cite><blockquote>My opinion plain and simple is stop complaining I personally thought pvp was just fine when it first started but there is two and only two points that i agree with which is OOC healing. I personally am a healer and have when I can done OOC healing and have also been on the receiving end of it. Gaurd camping is also extremely noobish and needs to be fixed. (I dont know why mabye its because of X-rodes but freeporters tend to do this more) Even after saying this I could, can, and have lived with these problems since the day pvp servers came out and I have yet to post a complaint or "quick fix" because you gotta remember its pvp you cant control it like pve crazy things that you will hate happening can and will continue to happen and you have to live with it.</blockquote>Omg. you need to roll a Q and see the world with new eyes.

MalkorGodchyld

02-24-2007, 07:50 AM

Very good post man...everything you wrote has merit. The solutions are not all perfect but thats not the point...the ideas & direction is there. I really like the + lvl Con. depending on how many group members you have. As well as the no reviving while in combat...(unless u get rezzed of course) Devs should really look at some of this stuff imo & get crackin on it. Im way too tired to critique specifics so basically this is just a bump for a positive post. ~ Marius Darkchyld~ 70 Defiler RETIRED ~ Llfe or' Death~ 27 Warden NAGAFEN