Curse

MarkyX · Sep 12, 2005, 07:42 PM // 19:42

So a friend of mine from another guild invited my sweet ass, as a guest, to his guild hall today. They needed a ranger for their uber-build, and I happened to be online when their ranger wasn't.

I haven't GvGed in a long time, mainly due to stupid FOTW builds being used in GvG or ..the guild I was currently in for the day (anything more is a big shock) just sucks. However, I knew this guy's guild: Not the best thing, but they are self-aware about the skills the power of certain skills and whatnot. I wouldn't expect them to run smite or IWAY.

Game starts. We are facing a guild that is behind us in ranks. We assume this will be an easy fight and decided to cap the flag asap. My job as the ranger was to deal insane amount of damage while using 'crippling shot' to slow the bastards down. Might not sound the best, but it was effective on a somewhat highly aggressive build. Our warrior kept using charge, we had an air ele with windborne, blinding flash, and then typical three air dmg spells. The main core of this build was to deal a lot of damage and have high mobility.

We finished the group in literally under the minute at the flagstand. I decided to go after the archers while the gate became unlocked by our rather slow and mildly retarded thief.

Pindown hits my guy.

Anet, I understand that the whole purpose of putting NPCs and making healers next to the guild lord was to prevent ganking, but with your changes, you have totally screwed up the pace of GvG. I *almost* want to go back to tombs because I don't have to deal with 20 archers using pin down.

Let's take a look at the kickass Canadian-sport known as Hockey, aka NHL. They had a strike, but settled for some nice changes, including the rules and zones. I know what you're thinking, "But MarkyX, why are you comparing a sport to a video game?"

Guild Wars' GvG and PvP is competition. There are two teams, violence, and a scorecard. There is strategies like defensive, offensive, and neutral. Positioning is importent, as well as player roles. The warriors are the center, the monks are the left and right defence, while the eles are the wings. Or whatever the hell your lines are. Either way, while it might seem very foreign to compare the two, the concept is very identical.

Back to the NHL analogy, so after the strike, many rules were introduced. Offensive zone are bigger, no more two line passing, and there is a border where the goalie cannot cross. Goalie equipment is now smaller too.

Why were these changes made? To increase the pacing and scoring of the sport.

The 'scoring' in GvG *should* be eliminating the other team, not 'sending two guys to attack guild lord' or 'turtle for half an hour for SD'. Imagine if a sport where one team tried not to get the other NOT to score, but didn't score themselves, so they go for a timeout. In a nutshell, this is bullshit.

I have nothing against defensive builds. To me, a defensive build should wear the opponent out to the point where your little damage overwhelms them. An offensive build would try to deal as much damage as possible, at the risk of being open for other attacks. Finally, a neutral build should be unpredictable, yet have no real strength at all.

The problem with the GvG changes is it promotes defensive builds now, and totally slows down the pace of action. While I understand that ganking is a rather lame tactic, this is not the way.

Get rid of the guild lord and replace him with a level 28 priest with a heal area, orison of healing, healing touch, and mark of protection. Put back the old NPCs.

Now the only way to WIN now is by simply laying the smackdown on the other team. If the priest is around...you guessed it, every two minutes. 60 DP means no one resses. That way, once the priest is destroyed, then you have to destroy the other team's members. Keep the flag part though, it's good.

This way, the battle focuses more on the OTHER team, instead of the NPCs as it is now. Games that involve killing other players should have a score on killing other players, not the NPCs.

*waits for a reply from Gaile*

- Mark Iradian
Writer of Chronicles of Garas (A dark tech fantasy webcomic)

Esprit · Sep 12, 2005, 07:46 PM // 19:46

Double thread post alert!

And,

Quote:

Now the only way to WIN now is by simply laying the smackdown on the other team.

Isn't that the point of GvG, defeating the other team?

MarkyX · Sep 12, 2005, 07:46 PM // 19:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Esprit

Isn't that the point of GvG, defeating the other team?

No, it's killing the guild lord.

Esprit · Sep 12, 2005, 07:48 PM // 19:48

And you expect the other team to sit there idly and let them kill your Guild Lord?

You defeat the team first, then defeat the Guild Lord.

ANET strengthened the Guild Lord purposely to avoid "ganking", meaning you actually have to fight the other team, rather than spiking the Guild Lord faster than the other team.

Afterall, it's not called Guild and Guild Lord vs Guild and Guild Lord.

MarkyX · Sep 12, 2005, 07:50 PM // 19:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Esprit

And you expect the other team to sit there idly and let them kill your Guild Lord?

You defeat the team first, then defeat the Guild Lord.

ANET strengthened the Guild Lord purposely to avoid "ganking", meaning you actually have to fight the other team, rather than spiking the Guild Lord faster than the other team.

Have you played GvG?

It just focuses on killing the NPCs now or wait it out on sudden death. If I make a build that meant to NEVER take damage...I can simply wait it out in sudden death.

I agree that ganking should've stopped, it's a rather skillless and cheap tactic (did it several times over the PvPx weekend), but this is the wrong way to do it.

With my idea, even if the priest was ganked, they still need to kill the other team members. How many ganking builds are meant for that?

mm00re · Sep 12, 2005, 08:12 PM // 20:12

Exactly why I won't bother to play pvp or gvg anymore.

So many people can't play it the way it was meant to be and when changes are made to correct that they still complain because they can't just run in and wax the other team without a fight.

If someone wants to make a defensive build then by all means they should, especially if they know a team that likes to take advantage of a spell glitch.

It is my belief you were meant to earn the victory in the first place instead of trying to find a way around by using a glitch with a skill or the old favorite "yank and gank".

TheArrow · Sep 12, 2005, 08:26 PM // 20:26

With the new changes teams now simply turtle it up until VoD and then try to gank your lord while he's alone because thier build doesn't have the power to take down the other team and lord and NPC's at the same time.

Sanji · Sep 12, 2005, 09:00 PM // 21:00

The problem isn't the players, it's that Guild vs. Guild only has an Assassinate NPC win condition.

Turtle fests aren't any better than Gank fests.

Sassy James · Sep 12, 2005, 09:16 PM // 21:16

I never really considered ganking that big of a deal. Its a legitimate way to win. If your not paying attention enough to notice their trying to gank you then you deserved to lose. They are wickedly easy to counter since most of them only have self heals, if any at all. All you gotta do is recognize they're ganking and let them focus on your guild lord while you gleefully tear through their damage dealers and your monk heals up the lord. The npc changes aren't a very big deal, just kill them and get some faction. I would really like to see different game types for GvG. Things like deathmatches, guild tourneys, etc. I also like your priest idea.

MarkyX · Sep 13, 2005, 10:49 PM // 22:49

So nothing else? Not even agreements?

I know Nu wants the priest idea as well.

TheArrow · Sep 14, 2005, 03:51 AM // 03:51

The lord should act as a priest yes. Then you would actually have to kill the other team, like you should have to do now.

Navaros · Sep 14, 2005, 04:35 AM // 04:35

they could just remove the Guild Lord from the game entirely

what's the point of having one anyhow?

it doesn't even make any sense. all of a sudden you have Guild Lords and Guild Thiefs. what the heck?! isn't the Guild Leader supposed to be the Guild Lord?

and where are all these Guild NPCs if you want them to help you anywhere else in the game besides GvG? that's right, nowhere! seems to me like the Guild Lord/Guild Thief etc. are dead weight

Ellipson · Sep 14, 2005, 04:38 AM // 04:38

I would tend to agree with Espirit: GvG is a form of PvP, not a form of PvE-and-oh-yeah-there's-other-real-players-too. Guild Lord ganking, IMO, shouldn't be the point of GvG.

WARNING: OFF-TOPIC

Current NHL hockey fans, in most of my experiences, will tell you that the rule changes were a cheap trick to make the game more marketable. If I wanted to watch European hockey, I would go to Europe. If you don't understand what I mean by this, please don't reply.

END OFF-TOPIC RANT

MarkyX · Sep 14, 2005, 04:42 AM // 04:42

Quote:

Current NHL hockey fans, in most of my experiences, will tell you that the rule changes were a cheap trick to make the game more marketable. If I wanted to watch European hockey, I would go to Europe. If you don't understand what I mean by this, please don't reply.

Heh.

I kind of like the idea of more goals and no two-line passing.

And I really, really, really like the whole "4 on 4 OT then shootout." Make the game a little quicker.

NHL before had way too many restrictions before, now there should be less stoppage and more plays involved. Smaller goalie equipment now makes it a serious challenge for goalie's now.

I wonder how well Patrick Roy would perform with these new rules.

Ellipson · Sep 14, 2005, 05:00 AM // 05:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by MarkyX

Heh.

I kind of like the idea of more goals and no two-line passing.

And I really, really, really like the whole "4 on 4 OT then shootout." Make the game a little quicker.

NHL before had way too many restrictions before, now there should be less stoppage and more plays involved. Smaller goalie equipment now makes it a serious challenge for goalie's now.

I wonder how well Patrick Roy would perform with these new rules.

I'll give you the 4v4 OT then shootout point: I agree wholeheartedly.

The point I've been hammering away in my hockey groups is that the NHL will become a twisted half-brother of the European Leagues. The reason all of the "opening the ice" rules in Europe work is the result of the larger rink the Europeans play on. No two line passing is no big deal in those leagues because you don't get nearly as much out of it. Check a dimension map of a rink for European Leagues if you don't believe me. Obstruction has been a rule, hopefully the second incarnation of "call it more" will get it where it should be. The new icing rules are just... wrong. And that's the short list, obviously.

I am by no means a Patrick Roy fan, but I will say what I've said a thousand times about that issue: Patrick Roy didn't have the biggest pads by far, he was just the most publicized. Everyone did it, they just didn't have the whistle blown on them because they weren't legendary goalies.

Now, to tie this all back into Guild Wars!

Basically, if ArenaNet were to streamline GvG like the NHL streamlined hockey, you would end up with less NPC's than before, no flag stand, no catas on certain maps, no gates on certain maps, weaker or similar Guild Lord, and no terrain obstructions: tar, lava, etc.

Hooray, you made the experience more streamlined and quick. At the same time, you took away a lot of what made GvG interesting to play. As the NHL will soon be, (IMO) GvG would turn into a rock, paper, scissors of 8-man builds.

Inviolable D · Sep 14, 2005, 09:29 AM // 09:29

Looks like someone never read the original post. If you actually cared to read it Esprit.

He does not want there to be Guild + Lord v Guild + Lord, he wants it to be GUILD VS GUILD not some silly competition who can run into there base and destroy a silly NPC.

MarkyX · Sep 14, 2005, 12:42 PM // 12:42

Quote:

Basically, if ArenaNet were to streamline GvG like the NHL streamlined hockey, you would end up with less NPC's than before, no flag stand, no catas on certain maps, no gates on certain maps, weaker or similar Guild Lord, and no terrain obstructions: tar, lava, etc.

I'm not saying that.

GvG and NHL are totally seperate things. However, I've only mentioned the NHL rule changes because NHL now wants to make the game more exciting and faster pace.

With the new GvG changes, its slow and relies way too much on defensive builds.

They only need to do the following:

- Change the npcs back to where they were before.
- Make a powerful priest (not Tomb-style, much more)
- If you kill the priest, no more res, just now you need to defeat the other team.

This way, ganking will cease to exist and there will be no anti-climatic conclusions in GvG. The current system now is heavily flawed and goes everything against a typical PvP game (e.g. Quake).

If the priest is killed, the only thing the team does is lose an ability, not the game. They can still win the game if they manage to defeat the other team, which is what it *should* go down too.

Ellipson · Sep 14, 2005, 05:36 PM // 17:36

If ganking exists in the Tombs games, why wouldn't it exist in this? The way you describe this Priest, it sounds like all you need to gank him is a mesmer with damage dealing support. Healing NPC's are notorious for casting orison right through Backfire, not to mention throwing a few interrupts in there to make it even easier. The priest will go down fast.

crimsonfilms · Sep 14, 2005, 06:06 PM // 18:06

I don't think ANet wanted ganking eliminated at all. I just think they are promoting a bit deeper level of competition. Something that that takes longer than 1 minute.

I am unsure about you guys, but my guild enjoys a long (not too long) competative guild battle.

Arathorn5000 · Sep 14, 2005, 07:57 PM // 19:57

I agree crimonfilms. We were GvG'ing yesterday, and had a good amount of really fun battles. We fought nuclear launch detected, and lost after a damn good fight (unless they were lying that we were decent competition :P) and another real good fight against Breakfast Cereal. The kind that go back and forth, and finally one team takes the upper hand and finishes it.

If a guild really does turtle in their own base, then your job is actually much easier: take the flag stand, then make raids on their base to knock out NPCs, then pull back if you need to. Your constant morale boosts counter any DP that you may get during your raids on their base.