Curse

Nadia Roark · Mar 19, 2010, 05:40 PM // 17:40

Quote:

Originally Posted by Killed u man

No. HA doesn't need to get reverted to PvE again. MAYBE if Heroes are incapable of using Hexes, Interrupts, Weapon spells and AoE spells, than yes.

Anyone who says he wants heroes back isn't saying he wants heroes back, he's saying he wants his PvE friends which carried him in PvE back. They're no good bots, only causing grief amongst real PvP'ers because half the time heroes suck hard and get farmed in under a minute (Which isn't fun), and the other half your heal monk got infuse health (Or your prot spirit bond) interrupted 3 times in a row and you loose.

The same goes for their weapon spells and AoE spells. Though those generally have a 100% dead-on effectiveness. Heroes with Smite Hex + Smite Condition will always use it on the guy surrounded by most enemies. Not even top GvG'ers (in GW's glory days) had the skill to check every spell for AoE impact, whereas these bots do.

With heroes (bots), you're always going to have an big advantages, and a big disadvantages.
All these known HA builds made sure there was next to no disadvantages left (they didnd't have to run, snare, put up song, but where a pure skill abuse bar), but filled the bar with skills the heroes could use to a redicilous extend. (Weapon spells -prots in general-, Interupts, AoE spells)

This. I also find myself wondering just what game he's been playing for the last few years, as Heroway was nowhere near "dead" when Heroes were removed from HA. I was fairly active at the time and remember encountering Heroway on every run or every other run right up to their removal.

At any rate, I don't dislike Heroway because it's difficult to beat, I dislike it mainly for the reasons outlined above. It's PvP, not PvBots. I doubt ANet will make any earth-shaking changes to HA, but if they do, reintroducing Heros is probably not the best option.

Edwards · Mar 21, 2010, 07:59 AM // 07:59

People complain about the game dying as if it wasn't close to five years old.

Reverend Dr · Mar 21, 2010, 07:24 PM // 19:24

That attitude is what makes terrible games. While it makes since from a marketing standpoint, the idea of getting people to buy the box, then keep them playing long enough for them to convince their friends to buy the box makes for good sales, that attitude also leads to half finished, non-polished games, that get terrible support.

Kyp Jade · Mar 21, 2010, 07:55 PM // 19:55

On topic, people dont play HoH because its not fun anymore, and gw doesnt support the playerbase that even if it were made fun, it wont be played anything like it was before. So it will continue to spiral downward until no one is playing it, and they will be forced to implement full on pve teams after gw2 release.

Why is it not fun?
1) Working mechanics got changed to "more fun" mechanics, for instance, I have loved everything in HA except for cap points, and Ive played it since the beginning, however my view is not shared by the majority of the community, people left because they HATED the new mechanics, resulting in fewer players (btw back then a lot of nights were 10 fame nights, I didnt get good until shortly before the release of NF, and then I was making 500+ fame a night, over 2k on weekends)

2) The grouping for this arena sucks balls, the socially capable people made good friends, formed closely knit teams, and eventually got very good, or get into a good guild. These are the 'known' good people, and almost always end up with high rank. Why did it work out for them? Because they were able to form a friends list and play with mostly the same people all the time, meaning they are also a lot more likely to work out new strategies and tactics for all of the scenarios, even if thier build never changes.

3) dont complain about rank.
Honestly, the rank title is working exactly like they are supposed to, its a measure of experience winning battles.

IF ANet had wanted to make this arena last a longer lifespan, they wouldve focused much more attention on GROUPING, and not skillbalancing. Skillbalancing inevitably pisses off or makes unfun for a portion of the active playerbase, and they will stop playing, or play not as much (in turn making it more unfun for the remaining players, and the cycle continues)

There are a lot of tactics they couldve used to make grouping easier, a personal rating system similar to what is used for guilds in gvg is a good example. Your fame count would still be unchanged, as its only a measure of how much you win, and your rating would go up or down depending on how much you win or lose. And with that system Anet couldve have done so much to encourage grouping with people you dont know well (such as making the penalties be less harsh when there is someone witha very low rating in the group)

People would still have played for fame and the /emotes. And those with low rank, but not terrible rating would not be shafted from ALL of the groups.

Also, in my experience, the BEST teams that probably give new players the hardest time, are almost always 8/8 good friends, and when they are not full, they still want to play, but only with thier friends, instead of opening that slot to just anyone, they will open it to someone who has been around a lot and they probably have seen before.

The people you see spaming lf rank x++, are people bad at accepting new friends into thier groups, they just want a body, nota teammate more often than not.

Div · Mar 21, 2010, 11:07 PM // 23:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kyp Jade

3) dont complain about rank.

This is the key. Amateurs think getting rid of rank would solve all these rank discrimination problems. No it won't. All it'll do is make the more experienced players not want to play with pugs because they don't want to have to deal with someone who is completely clueless. You're not getting in their groups anyway.

Low ranked players work around it the same way they did before. Get a group of friends together, and stick with them. Occasionally pick up some pugs and if they're good, include them in the group of friends. People that joined r4+ pug groups don't make it far. Those that do usually play with the same group of friends, and it's still the same now.

I liked when you couldn't tell the exact rank, except by their emote. Deer usually means the player has some basic knowledge of most (or all) of the maps. Wolf usually means the player has seen all the different maps and know the most common builds played. Tiger usually means the player has a pretty good idea of what to do for the different maps in addition to knowing what they are and the meta builds. Phoenix/Dragon means the player has similar knowledge to someone with a tiger, but has also been around long enough to accumulate that rank. There's no real need to break it down into specific ranks, because that makes grouping more difficult.

Plus, the game is ancient. Of course the playerbase is shrinking.

IKEA · Mar 22, 2010, 01:02 PM // 13:02

well
at first they should bring back shatterrangers
it was the easiest way for noobs (r3 etc) to get fame
how should a lowrank get fame with balance?

btw anna: lfg

Missing HB · Mar 22, 2010, 01:35 PM // 13:35

Builds are fine at the moment , the only problem is about finding a way to make more people play ha..
Actually 12mn restarts in hall are extremly boring yes , especially when u have 3-4 or more ( on morning ). Maybe making some zaishen fights , or being able chest again could change ...

Killed u man · Mar 22, 2010, 01:52 PM // 13:52

"Bring back SA rangers"
"Builds are fine"

Do any of you guys played HA longer than a year? Cuz you guys seem to be pretty clueless about how HA should work.

PvE'ers farming PvE'ers with PvE builds is NOT HA (or PvP for that matter). It's called Jade Quarry or AB.

IKEA:

We expect PvE'ers to play "easy" builds such as hexway, IWAY and sway (seeping wound way now) untill they get a friend-playerbase large enough to form different teams. None ever said anything about playing balance.

You can play fire ele for 70K fame and still be bad at this game (And there's atleast 2 people out there who fit this description). You can play hammerwarrior for your R11 and still be bad at this game (There's people who fit this description aswell).

It's about versatility and skill. Competitive PvP is about improving, adjusting and beating your opponent, not through bashing buttons on your keyboard, but by activly paying attention, taking notes and understanding why you didn't win if you lost.

Now back on topic:

HA will never be active again. They can, however, make it fun again. As said before: Remove Relic Run, remove Cap Points, re-introduce old maps + old school holding.

Kill Seeping Wound. Nerf VoR, nerf LC and nerf SS. They're still way to effective for being a simple: "Trigger and forget"-skill which require next to no skill to use, but brainless 40/40 spam on the right target.

If it were up to me: Remove the HA title. It means nothing anymore. Give everyone who spent atleast 100 hours in HA a bambi. Everyone who spend 200 hours a wolf, etc...

There's 3 reasons why PvE'ers came to HA (which is also now virtually non-existent, no more influx of new people):

1) Emotes
2) HoM
3) Zkeys

The first category will only run fast, brainless farming builds (sway, hexway, SFway) to get their tiger as fast as possible.
The second partially fits in the first, only they MIGHT actually enjoy HA and take their time. (Play multiple builds)
The third category will leave soon enough when they realize holding HoH is random, and not as easy as it seems. (Due to the randomness)

HA will never be active again, because people have no reason to learn it. In the old days, when HA WAS active, people came to HA for the PvP. GvG was too closed down, so you had to start in HA. You had a constant amount of atleast 5 districts at any time filled with people willing to learn and improve in HA, rather than play brainless farm gimmicks to get their titles. (Though those existed aswell in smaller numbers)

Fluffy Kittens · Mar 22, 2010, 08:59 PM // 20:59

I was thinking a lot about what would make HA more alive (and fun!!!). Besides heroway or 6v6 I think the best option would be to reintroduce killcount mode. Instead of courtyard and in HoH aswell.

First reason is that it would bring way more builds into HA and people would stop playing so defensive and boring (pd mes, melshot ranger, rit, monks = 5 defensive chars) and some builds like searing flames and other would come back, easy builds to play maybe but yet hard to hold HoH.

Other reason is that these objectives in HoH just lost their sense these days. Capture points and relics were fun back then when they were first introduced because people actually did some tactic instead of standing still 8 min. But what i noticed from all of my HoH games is that profile of the players has changed and doesn't fit the objectives anymore. I give you 2 standard examples:

1. On relics: You snare a team near beginning because they were getting a bit ahead, they call you ganker and sometimes it happens that they stop running and do full gank of you.

2. On capture points: You go cap opponents base with 2 people and same scenario happens again, they give up and do a gank.

I'm not talking about unranked teams here I'm talking mostly about R10+ I know thats quite a low rank these days but they should know some basics.

In conclusion, Killcount should be back to provide far better games and many different builds which will lead to more fun HA which will again lead to more players being active in HA.

IKEA · Mar 22, 2010, 09:35 PM // 21:35

they should bringt back R/A cuz it was anti vs ultra lame builds like rspike or bala!!!
also they should change maps that its not so easy to hold for a balance
you cant win 1on1 koth capture or relic vs a balance when they are not retarded.

vinoth · Mar 22, 2010, 09:59 PM // 21:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Killed u man

IKEA:

We expect PvE'ers to play "easy" builds such as hexway, IWAY and sway (seeping wound way now) untill they get a friend-playerbase large enough to form different teams. None ever said anything about playing balance.

I can tell you for a fact iway is not an easy build.

I am certain winning with hexway and sway are just as hard as winning with any other build. Whilst these builds do not require vent, the players need to be good to pull it off efficiently.

Its build wars, build against it, dont call it brainless if u lose to it consistently. If your definition balance is to be capable vs every team, then you should have no reason to complain about the versatility of hexway/sway/iways. Its your fault that you consistently lose.

Conclusion: Good players will beat bad players regardless of the build.

Now back on topic:

Anet need to cater for low ranks somehow (although this is prolly not gonna happen).

1) Enable players to get 2x fame atleast up to r9. This will increase the number of people playing the game just cuz they get 2x fame. Eventually the good players will make contacts and move up.

2) I never felt sway was op (considered it to be free fame). IT still helps the people who are infactuated it. There is no reason not to bring it back. It comes down to who is good at the end of the day. If you are bad , think about what u did bad, kick the failors and take people who u can work with.

3) As the aim is to increase the HA player base, Anet needs to lure the pvers with titles or keys, what ever be it. They need motivation to come there. I suggest 2x keys or 2x faction or what ever. If ur a true pvper, I am sure u dont care, as long as the player base increases.

4) Stop promoting the idea that vent play is for the advanced brain. Its stupid. You want HA to be accessible to all. I am sure low ranked ppl will try different builds that work and find someting comfortable and use it for ever.

Tips for the low ranked. Try to play with people who u lose to, if you think u are of even footing, rather than cussing at them. If you join a team, tell the team leader how much time u have. Tell the team brb if u want to leave team to go somewhere, this way ppl wont rage assuming u have raged. If you have lost UW and your leader does not leave, stick with him for a couple more runs.

Killed u man · Mar 23, 2010, 12:05 AM // 00:05

@ IKEA:

You're either a troll, or a very unintelligent swayer. And having seen your name in-game, I know you're not trolling. (Sad Story

)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rezz Anna

.
First reason is that it would bring way more builds into HA and people would stop playing so defensive and boring (pd mes, melshot ranger, rit, monks = 5 defensive chars) and some builds like searing flames and other would come back, easy builds to play maybe but yet hard to hold HoH.

Other reason is that these objectives in HoH just lost their sense these days. Capture points and relics were fun back then when they were first introduced because people actually did some tactic instead of standing still 8 min. But what i noticed from all of my HoH games is that profile of the players has changed and doesn't fit the objectives anymore. I give you 2 standard examples:

1. On relics: You snare a team near beginning because they were getting a bit ahead, they call you ganker and sometimes it happens that they stop running and do full gank of you.

2. On capture points: You go cap opponents base with 2 people and same scenario happens again, they give up and do a gank.

Mesmer, Ranger defensive? Last time I checked, you ran quadruple backline (2 E/Rt's, 1 Expel, 1 Rit Soul Twisting) and 3 sins who are insane linebackers.
You should really reconcider playing balanced every now and then, even the shit-ranger balanced, and see how defensive it really is. Untill then, I wouldn't make too much statements about balanced because quite frankly, I almost laughed in real life when I read: "5 Defensive characters in balanced".

Second part of your post is mostly true, only you once again completely miss the ball on the true nature of the problem:

You claim when Cap Points and Relic Run got introduced, people actually used tactics, rather than standing around for 8 minutes. As I remember, people actually didn't have ANY tactics, and they just ran around brainlessly (Including the "top teams"), and to tell the truth here, I myself, and maybe 2-3 other times at that time were the ONLY callers at that time who used tactics. Everyone else just let their team walk around like brainless chickens. Also Relic Run was murder ball back then, and rather easy to understand.

The ganking problem you explain is exactly why Cap Points and Relic Run are flawed from the base up. They simply allow for ganks way too easily, and being passive gets benefited over being active.

Quote:

Originally Posted by vinoth

I can tell you for a fact iway is not an easy build.

I am certain winning with hexway and sway are just as hard as winning with any other build. Whilst these builds do not require vent, the players need to be good to pull it off efficiently.

Its build wars, build against it, dont call it brainless if u lose to it consistently. If your definition balance is to be capable vs every team, then you should have no reason to complain about the versatility of hexway/sway/iways. Its your fault that you consistently lose.

Conclusion: Good players will beat bad players regardless of the build.

1) IWAY IS an easy build. You got 4 warriors c-spacing around. There is no calling involved whatsoever, and not interrupting keyskills is about the ONLY thing you can do wrong on an IWAY war. You don't even have to worry about frenzy cancelling or IMS/IAS swapping, because IWAY stacks with your IMS, making IWAY PR without double damage nor calling. (And PR is concidered autopilot)

Spamming spirits requires skill?
Spamming some party heals and throwing the occasional prot on one of the 3 soft targets is hard?
Spamming heals and weapon spells requires skill?

Winning with hexway and sway is as hard as winning with any other build? I'm just gonna assume you're trolling here...

Good players SHOULD beat bad players, that's the intire premise of a competitive game, but it's definatly not always the truth. The truth is that certain buttonbash builds, when played right, far outclass more "skill-related" builds. The caster sin is a perfect example. Required next to no skill to use, but beat just about every other build in Hero Battles.

Quote:

Originally Posted by vinoth

Anet need to cater for low ranks somehow (although this is prolly not gonna happen).

Anet never needed to cather low ranked players. Anet shouldn't even have done it in PvE, because that's why PvE'ers are always bitching about HA. PvE'ers have the mentality that you can take some heroes, smash some buttons and win Guild Wars. (Which is a true story in PvE)

To all the other stuff you said:

1) I couldn't care less, implement this for all I care, but this won't make more people join HA. Or atleast not in the way it should be. This will only promote more PvE'ers playing more brainless buttonbash builds for half the time. Because they only want their tiger anyways, they'll just leave afterwards.

2) OP is what you make of it. The general concensus (There was a big debate either here or on QQ forums about this) that OP = skill/reward ratio is completely out of check with other builds. Thumpers, R/A's, R/D's, Seeping Wound sins, hexways all fit those descriptions, or atleast when they were in their most potent form. Simply by rolling your head over the keyboard, you can apply major pressure. That is concidered OP, not wether or not balance beats it.

3) If Anet wants to increase the HA playerbase in a positive way (And NOT attract farmers), they need to change PvE from the ground up, which wont happen. All they need to do is make it fun again, and then atleast some of the old garde will come back, and hopefully there will be a small influx of PvE'ers who are comming for the fun, rather than to farm the format. Relic Run and Cap Points simply isn't attractive, it's repulsive.

4) Vent play IS for the advanced team. I'll agree that for HA, vent isn't necessary, especially not when you're running brainless gimmicks such as sway, hexway, etc... But when we're talking about competitive PvP in general, you simply can't do without voice-com. If you can't acknowledge this fact, you're an idiot, I'm sorry.
Snaring people, splitting, collapsing, getting song, interrupting keyskills, is all stuff that your party is better off knowing, but takes forever to type in team chat. So unless you've played sway and hexway for all your fame, you would understand how vital vent is for a non-shitway team that is actually trying to win.

OblivionDanny · Mar 23, 2010, 01:00 AM // 01:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Killed u man

But when we're talking about competitive PvP in general, you simply can't do without voice-com.

Yes you can, it is very possible to do with any build/part of the game.

We do not use it in HA nor did we use it in GvG when we used to.

We use other things to "communicate" with each in game, that works perfectly fine too.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Killed u man

You should really reconcider playing balanced every now and then

Playing "balanced" is a lie, its not even truely balanced, the definition of balanced is 1 of each profession, every balanced uses 2 monks and 2 warriors with some midlines.

Going by that theory most builds these days could be called balanced.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Div

Plus, the game is ancient. Of course the playerbase is shrinking.

Even if the playerbase is shrinking, people should not need to wait in HoH for 2 hours doing nothing, something needs to be done to stop that from happening.

vinoth · Mar 23, 2010, 01:05 AM // 01:05

[QUOTE=Killed u man;5091398

1) IWAY IS an easy build. You got 4 warriors c-spacing around. There is no calling involved whatsoever, and not interrupting keyskills is about the ONLY thing you can do wrong on an IWAY war. You don't even have to worry about frenzy cancelling or IMS/IAS swapping, because IWAY stacks with your IMS, making IWAY PR without double damage nor calling. (And PR is concidered autopilot)

[/QUOTE]

I stuck u on an iway war once a few months ago before i decided u were a waste. I think u fit the description u gave above. Clueless in short!. If u want to succeed u need to know where your other wars are pressuring, what target is extended, what targets are likely to run due to mh, predicting dchops on rit and monks - i never see balance wars do that. 95% of balance wars random dchop. (prolly 99% of iway wars do random dchop too). If u think playing a balance war who can count 3 2 1 to land kills with support must superior to an iway war who observes the battle as the match goes on, u should try playing a war in RA. Man do i see some GOOD wars in RA.

[QUOTE=Killed u man;5091398

Spamming spirits requires skill?
Spamming some party heals and throwing the occasional prot on one of the 3 soft targets is hard?
Spamming heals and weapon spells requires skill?
[/QUOTE]

ranger is there to split the grp left right and center for split and destroy. Besides spamming spirits, fake casting a spirit at the right time to land a dshot on pd is where the skill is. Ofc, u may think playing ranger is just spamming dshot. channel monks dont use hp? or the prot does not use guardian? There is skill in that ? Btw the ranger is there to dshot soc which u seem to think needs vent to do.

[QUOTE=Killed u man;5091398
Winning with hexway and sway is as hard as winning with any other build? I'm just gonna assume you're trolling here...

Good players SHOULD beat bad players, that's the intire premise of a competitive game, but it's definatly not always the truth. The truth is that certain buttonbash builds, when played right, far outclass more "skill-related" builds. The caster sin is a perfect example. Required next to no skill to use, but beat just about every other build in Hero Battles.
[/QUOTE]

This is your own problem, if u want to win (which is what the majority of HA considers fun), play a build ur good at. Dont play skilled balance ' cuz a mesmer needs to time diversion when war counts 3 2 1'. If u think balance is the build that shines vs any team and any map, dont complain about skill. People play builds because they enjoy it because they win with it. Dont victimise people on the build they run. That attitude is not gonna repopulate HA, which is the aim of the thread.

Back on topic...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Killed u man;5091398
Anet never needed to cater low ranked players. Anet shouldn't even have done it in PvE, because that's why PvE'ers are always bitching about HA. PvE'ers have the mentality that you can take some heroes, smash some buttons and win Guild Wars. (Which is a true story in PvE)

To all the other stuff you said:

1) I couldn't care less, implement this for all I care, but this won't make more people join HA. Or atleast not in the way it should be. This will only promote more PvE'ers playing more brainless buttonbash builds for half the time. Because they only want their tiger anyways, they'll just leave afterwards.

2) OP is what you make of it. The general concensus (There was a big debate either here or on QQ forums about this) that OP = skill/reward ratio is completely out of check with other builds. Thumpers, R/A's, R/D's, Seeping Wound sins, hexways all fit those descriptions, or atleast when they were in their most potent form. Simply by rolling your head over the keyboard, you can apply major pressure. That is concidered OP, not wether or not balance beats it.

3) If Anet wants to increase the HA playerbase in a positive way (And NOT attract farmers), they need to change PvE from the ground up, which wont happen. All they need to do is [B

make it fun again[/B], and then atleast some of the old garde will come back, and hopefully there will be a small influx of PvE'ers who are comming for the fun, rather than to farm the format. Relic Run and Cap Points simply isn't attractive, it's repulsive.

4) Vent play IS for the advanced team. I'll agree that for HA, vent isn't necessary, especially not when you're running brainless gimmicks such as sway, hexway, etc... But when we're talking about competitive PvP in general, you simply can't do without voice-com. If you can't acknowledge this fact, you're an idiot, I'm sorry.
Snaring people, splitting, collapsing, getting song, interrupting keyskills, is all stuff that your party is better off knowing, but takes forever to type in team chat. So unless you've played sway and hexway for all your fame, you would understand how vital vent is for a non-shitway team that is actually trying to win.

1. Yes it will make people come to HA. I see it accounting for atleast another extra district. Why do u care what build pvers run? If they are good players, they will be absorbed by good teams.

2. Again, why do u care that skill:reward ratio is poor? If u want to win go run that build. If you want to win with balance, be good at it. Comes down to if you are good or not.

3. Ha has always been about farming. farming in HA is fun. Winning HOH is fun.

4. You do not need vent to snare people. You can work that without vent. You need to watch what mesmer/ranger/hammer war are doing around u.

You do not need vent to collapse, u need to have good battle awareness.

You do not need vent to get soc or to prot your soc.

If you are good and play with ur team on a consistant basis, people will know what to rupt and will communicate in team chat.

You need to grasp some of the basic concepts that HA revolves around.

Only you and a hand full of people with inferiority complex think that HA revolves around a succsesful 3 2 1 to kd a target on lots of fire while ranger rupts the rit and mesmer diversions a prot. You can do this by just observing.

Become good, you will win. Stop complaining and think about why u lose to hexway and sway. I believe that they need to be in the game, to enable the lower ranks to get some fame and therefore keep HA relatively healthy.

superraptors · Mar 23, 2010, 01:30 AM // 01:30

sway and iway takes alot less co-ordination than balance, this is not disputable.

Yea i agree that hoh cap points favour far too much passive play, Offensive splitting for points before the last 2 minutes results in ganks or giving free points to the team that isnt splitting/ getting split on. Everyone just plays for the middle and even when they are down by a considerable margin they either play for centre or split to the team that doesnt even have the highest amount of points. Everyone even including high ranks need to move away from the mentality that splitting is not ganking, and people shouldnt be pissed because it.

emuking · Mar 23, 2010, 06:24 AM // 06:24

most the people on guru have played GW quite some time now so i know most of you (majority maybe?) have already established your pvp connections; i know i basically have. I'm just curious why you want to make HA a lot more active.

Let's say it does become tenfold more active overnight... GW servers open in Africa or something, all new players ready to learn... why do you want that? most HA pros dont reach out to help the noobs, the noobs try to reach out to them; and sometimes those pros help.

your experienced HA team is going to stomp all these other new teams... at least i would hope so given that fact an experienced HA player has years under his belt. Do HA players just want more punching bags? because that seems kinda selfish...

If you want more skilled teams to arrive in HA its not happening, same thing happened with TA basically... maybe we should take the TA approach and delete HA for a NEW!!! 8v8 FORMAT CODEX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

lol euros

okay if you want lots of people in HA just get one of these omega PvE guilds to help you out.. its within reach rather than asking anet.. Maragon wasnt too bad for [KISS] (which was incredibly pug friendly which made it successful kinda) try to contact them and maybe make some HA day with those 800+ members guilds/alliances.

Killed u man · Mar 23, 2010, 08:09 AM // 08:09

Vinoth:

I'm just gonna leave it at that. I've said what I believe is something people realized 4 years ago (IWAY is shiteasy compared to balanced), and if I can't convince you of this, I can only conclude you probably played sway and IWAY for all of your fame, which is your full right, and heck, I'll leave it at that.

Back to the 4 points made before:

1) Offcourse it will make people come to HA. So will giving 20 zkeys reward for every win you have, aswell as giving out mini ghostlies for every HoH win. But you're missing the point: attracting new people isn't the problem. It's attracting people with the right mentality/mindset.

Why did HA get so shit in the first place? Becuase it got farmed for over 4 years by PvE'ers (such as some people posting in this very thread) who can run brainless buttonbash builds till R10-11, who then believe this is a viable way to play PvP. When you got one brainless guild buttonbashing against another brainless guild, it's not competitive PvP anymore, and you might as well be playing: "Who can smack the most amount of keys in the least amount of time?!"

It's about attracting people who don't give to PvP solely for the rewards, but for the PvP itself. Cuz they are the people that will actually bother NOT running sway, hexway and IWAY, because they understand those builds arn't competitive in the least bit. (But again, just brainless buttonbashers)

2) You're, once again, missing the point. Why do I care if the skill/reward ratio is messed up? Think about that for a second. How can you even understand game balance, if you can't see something as simple as this...

If skill1 reads: "If target foe is moving, that foe takes 100 damage" and skill2 reads: "Target goe takes 500 damage", both with the exact same cast time, recharge and energy, it doesn't take a genius to realize one skill is harder to use than the other, whereas the easier one is better aswell.

That's the intire problem with gimmicks such as hexway and sway. It's not necessarily that they are better than balanced, it's the fact that they require no coordination, no skill and no insight to use. They're all examples of skill2: easy to use, straightforward brainless buttonbash builds. There definatly not always better than balanced (IWAY for example), but some other builds definatly were.

Pretty much every sway combined with hexway (3 R/A's or SW's with a barbs and VoR) could beat a good balanced if played right, simply because you do such redicilous amounts of straightforward, often uninterruptable damage a balanced can not coop with it. And this also goes for some other builds: The old jaggedway for example. Or dual paragon holding, or SoMW, or ritspike, or bspike, or this or that.

Those were all builds that not only were easy to play, but at the same time were actually better than balanced. The sway you guys run is still better than balanced, and therefor needs to be fix'ed.

3) HA has always been about farming for you, clearly (Seeing as how you like IWAY), but it definatly hasn't been for people who played some real builds.
In the early days, HA was about PvP. It was about seeing your name up there every 8 minutes, getting PM'd by 20+ PvE'ers sucking up to you saying how awesome you were. Then the title farmers came, and when HoM got announced, it went completely down the shitter. But HA definatly wasn't about farming, by friend.

4) If you still believe vent isn't needed in a competitive PvP game, which HA isn't, read the following sentence over and over untill you start accepting it as truth:

Quote:

Originally Posted by killed u man

But when we're talking about competitive PvP in general, you simply can't do without voice-com. If you can't acknowledge this fact, you're an idiot.

P.s.: I played just about every build in HA, besides the brainless meta buttonbashers. I've played balanced, spikes and pressure. I've played every role in every build (front, mid and backline). I know HA balanced is no more than knocklocking people in AoE, but that's only because HA maps promote balling up, and builds such as E/Rt's can't keep up with the many pulses of fire damage.

And KD'ing stuff in AoE as a hammer warrior is still a thousand times harder than just about every bar in IWAY or the sway the rest of you run... (And I don't even like playing hammer warrior in HA)

Missing HB · Mar 23, 2010, 08:11 AM // 08:11

The point of this thread is to give suggestions about how to make HA better , not to discuss about so called " balanced", hexway , vent using , etc....

The only thing i wil lsay about it is that , build almost every team plays ( dual war , dual rupt , sh , etc..) win very easily some maps ( relic , shrines , court, Hoh ( and especially any 1v1 being blue )), while other build ( sway , iway , etc ) might have more chance on normal 1v1 fights , where you only need to kill to win ; thus , you cant call any build more " lame " than other one.

And , to people who only think that way , like " haha , your build doesnt require any skill to play its lame", if that statement was true , then more " low rank " teams would form and win.

Anyway , to come back to topic , i think that kill count back in hall wouldnt really be a good idea , since all builds played have some defense , when 1 kill is made then the team will just run around. In my opinion , The old HoH, with last to cap mid wins would make all ganks disappear( almost ofc), and make all play until last instant .

Edwards · Mar 23, 2010, 10:02 AM // 10:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by Reverend Dr

That attitude is what makes terrible games. While it makes since from a marketing standpoint, the idea of getting people to buy the box, then keep them playing long enough for them to convince their friends to buy the box makes for good sales, that attitude also leads to half finished, non-polished games, that get terrible support.

I'm not saying that Anet should stop supporting the game, or that people should quit their efforts to improve the format of HA, I'm just saying that after such a long period of time, it's normal to expect that the player base would start to dwindle.

I quit GW because it got to the point after a few of my friends quit where if I wanted to play HA, I'd have to wait at least an hour for a group that would often fail and break up fairly quickly. A format where you're expected to find yourself a group of eight players before you can participate needs a BIG player base to be workable. HA is dying/dead because there simply hasn't been enough of an influx of new players who enjoy the format and are willing to tolerate the rather steep learning curve.

Personally, I came into HA a few years ago without much PvP experience or any friends to help me. I randomway'd, PUG'd, joined guilds, made friends, tried out just about every build in the meta and experimented with making a few of my own. The fact is though, eventually my friends and I got tired of it and quit, and there really aren't any new people to the format to replace people like us, who were middle-of-the-road talent wise and just had fun messing around and trying to get our ranks up.

I'd like to comment on the suggestion of a personal win-loss rating system. This seems like a TERRIBLE idea to me. Some of the most fun I've had in HA has been running stupid builds just for giggles. Personalized win-loss ratios would NOT be representative of a player's skill in such a team-based game, and would KILL the idea of casual play. Guild ratings work because you can always reform or leave the guild. Personal ratings which follow you around would really hurt people who just want to mess around and have some fun.

The suggestion made earlier to double the rate which fame is earned at until r9 won't do much imo. Newbies come into HA and get discouraged that they can't make ANY progress, not that they make slow progress. The learning curve for HA is stupidly high right now, which makes few people willing to stick around, especially now that much better prestige items exist than a tiger in the eyes of a PvE'r.

There are certainly lessons to be learned from the current state of HA for GW2 or other games, and not just for developers. As a player, if you want to be part of a healthy, long-lived gaming community, you have to keep in mind that it's just that - a community. I'm not saying that top level teams should bring newbies with them when they're serious about having big nights, but it really couldn't hurt to join a low ranked group or run a randomway every now and then and encourage players who are new to the format. People treat HA and earning fame like it's the most serious of business and forget that it's just a game. I know I did it. Sometimes earning fame felt more like a job than a fun pastime. Ultimately, if people set aside their manic desperation for the next emote and just had some fun, they'd be much better off and enjoy the game a lot more.

Reverend Dr · Mar 24, 2010, 07:13 PM // 19:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Edwards

I'm not saying that top level teams should bring newbies with them when they're serious about having big nights, but it really couldn't hurt to join a low ranked group or run a randomway every now and then and encourage players who are new to the format.

The thing is, they already do, just in GvG not in HA. The actual top level players, despite any personas that they have on messageboards, are generally pretty laid back, will play with just about anyone, and generally fairly encouraging. The self-described "top players" are the shitters that call everyone bad and make the game unfun; these shitters are never really going to learn (while an individual may learn, as soon as that individual does a fresh individual is going to enter, this demographic is always going to be present).

The real problem is that the actual top level players don't want to play HA.