Curse

Winstar · Sep 01, 2009, 03:54 PM // 15:54

Many people are really looking forward to the introduction of a proper sealed play format. There are a lot of details to sort out in terms of how the format should run (time to construct bars/Maps objectives/what skill pool is used will it be variable- proph only for example/....). But one thing that needs to be the case is that competing teams get the same pool of skills to build with. Without this, winning in the format is going to degenerate into whoever gets the most bombs in their skill pool to work with (getting woh and a decent compliment of healing for example while the team tries to work with seriously inadequate defense).

Any other thoughts on the details of the upcoming format?

Xsiriss · Sep 01, 2009, 04:57 PM // 16:57

Without a doubt,limiting the amount of monks in teams.Rits are much easier to take down...As for the actual skills yeh it could get quite boring just watching the same combo's over and over again even with constant shuffling.HB will degenerate into a cap fest even more I think.

Winstar · Sep 01, 2009, 05:20 PM // 17:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xsiriss

Without a doubt,limiting the amount of monks in teams.Rits are much easier to take down...As for the actual skills yeh it could get quite boring just watching the same combo's over and over again even with constant shuffling.HB will degenerate into a cap fest even more I think.

As long as there is parity in the skills, the amount of a classes skills shouldn't be a problem. Its when one team has access to a much stronger pool of skills than another that problems arise.

FoxBat · Sep 01, 2009, 05:43 PM // 17:43

Actually my main concern is that they do it this way:

- Every day there's a new sealed pool, used by everyone.
- Take as long or short as you want building, and hop on in.

How to win this format:

- Enter, get beat a few times, copy what everyone else is running

So you will get different bars every day, but there's no building skill involved, and the constant mirror matches will get old fast.

Not that there aren't problems with assymetrical pools - who gets the pools, the team or the player? Do you keep changing accounts/leader until someone gets a good pool, and just skip playing that day if you can't find one?

Basically if they don't limit the time you spend building, there are going to be serious issues. And that isn't easy to do considering the current situation with rerolling primaries, unlocks and so forth, no idea how much effort they will put into UI. Nor what is to stop people from just rolling a new pool. In the end I'm not seeing how this is supposed to work outside of a tournament format.

ChopChop · Sep 02, 2009, 07:28 AM // 07:28

A day per 'new deck' is a good time I think, if there is no obs mode then there will still be room for people to out build everyone.

Just look at GvG, the meta-game doesn't settle 1 day after a patch and here we even get to see everyone good on observer mode.

However a week between each deck will lead to what you describe.

Cantos · Sep 02, 2009, 09:44 AM // 09:44

The most frustrating thing about Random Arena is that the result of matches is random. You can be the best player in Guild Wars, and it still wont matter if your teams build synergy is less than your opponents'. This frustration is exactly what will happen with any sealed deck format that includes asymmetric skill pools. It is utterly a deal breaker.

I dont want to see any 'nuke the NPCs and cap the point' maps in this. NPCs are always bad in PvP formats, and capturing points in AB leads to a format where the winning strategy is to ignore your opponents so you can nuke more NPCs. It is perverse. There's a lot of PvE in this game, and it's enough to say that when I want to beat some AI scripts, I dont lack options. When I want to beat complex, unpredictable opponents, I do.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ChopChop

A day per 'new deck' is a good time I think, if there is no obs mode then there will still be room for people to out build everyone.

Just look at GvG, the meta-game doesn't settle 1 day after a patch and here we even get to see everyone good on observer mode.

However a week between each deck will lead to what you describe.

You know, I was hoping for a new deal every game. But thinking about it, daily updates wouldn't be bad either. The larger the pool of skills available in each deal would mean it would be harder to determine the ideal ones quickly. This could be used as a great way to tweak the feel of the format with minimal effort.

Kaon · Sep 02, 2009, 09:53 AM // 09:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by FoxBat

Actually my main concern is that they do it this way:

- Every day there's a new sealed pool, used by everyone.
- Take as long or short as you want building, and hop on in.

How to win this format:

- Enter, get beat a few times, copy what everyone else is running

So you will get different bars every day, but there's no building skill involved, and the constant mirror matches will get old fast.

Not that there aren't problems with assymetrical pools - who gets the pools, the team or the player? Do you keep changing accounts/leader until someone gets a good pool, and just skip playing that day if you can't find one?

Basically if they don't limit the time you spend building, there are going to be serious issues. And that isn't easy to do considering the current situation with rerolling primaries, unlocks and so forth, no idea how much effort they will put into UI. Nor what is to stop people from just rolling a new pool. In the end I'm not seeing how this is supposed to work outside of a tournament format.

On the other hand, this is the best form of sealed deck I can come up with. Do you have anything better?

Also yes it means that there will be a handful of builds best each day, but the guy that finds out first will be on a rolling streak. If you want to play 5 hours of arena a day you might get bored, but if you just want to enjoy yourself for a short while it's brilliant. The people that are good at making builds will have massive leads over the other players.

Vazze · Sep 02, 2009, 06:19 PM // 18:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cantos

I dont want to see any 'nuke the NPCs and cap the point' maps in this. .... You know, I was hoping for a new deal every game.

This.
I am hoping for a beta version first (knowing how things work, once it is called final, it won't change for a year or so no matter how broken it is).

sLiceR · Sep 02, 2009, 07:21 PM // 19:21

Periodically changing symmetric skill pools is the only way to go to make the format not suck and not cause frustration to the players.

As for the the frequency of the changing it all the depends on the rules of the format imho.
If they go for a consecutive based (like the current gladiator) a change of skill pools every 24 hours is imho the best choice.
If they go skirmish based like hb/gvg I think changing skills more often would lead to more variety into the gameplay (I would say change skills every 2 hours).
If they implement tournaments a custom skill pool for the tournament (or even for each match) would be cool: maybe giving a small time to setup (like 5 minutes?) to stir things up a bit.

FoxBat · Sep 02, 2009, 08:30 PM // 20:30

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kaon

. If you want to play 5 hours of arena a day you might get bored, but if you just want to enjoy yourself for a short while it's brilliant. The people that are good at making builds will have massive leads over the other players.

Depends on the size of the decks I suppose. I've done a number of GvGs where we have about ~40 min build/setup time, and as monk I noticed the enemy monk tended to build the exact same retarded bar from skills given. (E.G. wildcarding RoF to spam divine boon under Air of Enchantment as the only real healing.) If you give reasonably intelligent people the small sealed pools, they often end up building similar (albeit not identical) bars for at least the monks and frontline. (janky midline may vary) And yeah the crucial 1 or 2 skill difference can be a big deal, but that's really easy to correct after a few matches.

A much larger pool than is normally used in the sealed rules might grant enough diversity that it actually takes a few hours to figure out the "best" build, but on the other hand it makes it more likely you end up using the same boring overpowered skills instead of trying to make jank work, I.E. not really any more variety.

Shadowspawn X · Sep 02, 2009, 09:36 PM // 21:36

It could work if say there was 5 different decks per day, it still would be mirror matches but would avoid the "build of the day" type scenario.

Elephantaliste · Sep 02, 2009, 09:50 PM // 21:50

deck sets will probably be limited like zquests

what about new players that don't have enough skills unlocked in a deck ?

Kaon · Sep 02, 2009, 11:06 PM // 23:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elephantaliste

what about new players that don't have enough skills unlocked in a deck ?

You get so incredibly much faction so incredibly fast, how is this even a problem? I'm sorry if i'm not going to cry for the noob that spends all his faction on zaishen keys and then complains on skill unlocks.

On another note, am I the only one assuming here they're going to use the TA maps? I suppose they might use the HB maps but that would just be a stupid run around, a really boring version of byob gvg or AB.

Elephantaliste · Sep 02, 2009, 11:29 PM // 23:29

i got everything unlocked thanks... the fact is that not everyone have 100% of skills unlocked at a given time. The answer could be : well they need to go unlock skills for decks of the day.

To answer you if it does... some quotes from linsey journal :

Quote:

Team Arena will be renamed and repurposed to support the new Sealed Deck format.
The maps used in Hero Battles will be modified and reused, including the outpost.

FoxBat · Sep 03, 2009, 01:50 AM // 01:50

Buried somewhere in Wiki

Quote:

I like playing magebane ranger in TA even against hexway/shoveway, I hope I will be able to do the same in the new format

11:40, 2 September 2009 (UTC) (random user)

It depends on what skills are available in any given week. - Linsey Murdock 18:27, 2 September 2009 (UTC)

So it sounds like we are getting (very large?) weekly mirror pools.

I'm sure the rawrs and dongs of the arena will get an advantage with good but non-obvious builds, but for most people this seems more like TA with a rotating meta. As mentioned most people's starting point will be grab something random, get mashed a few times, then copy and tweak. Better than TA, but not nearly as cool as a sealed tourney. Still they have to start somewhere I guess.

P.S. I would LOL if PvX tried to keep up with the weekly meta...

sLiceR · Sep 03, 2009, 07:07 AM // 07:07

weekly rotation is utter crap imho.

Kaon · Sep 03, 2009, 10:42 AM // 10:42

We'll have to see how it turns out. With a large skillpool it could be alright. But in my theorycraft a weekly rotation would be absolutely RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing horrible. In my subsequent theorycraft Anet will realize this, and change the routine to daily about 4-5months after SD release.

The entire point of SD is that you continuesly play with new skills, not that you have a rotating meta every week.

Then again this is all theorycraft, and SD is one of the things that is hard to theorycraft.

Vazze · Sep 03, 2009, 12:17 PM // 12:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kaon

The entire point of SD is that you continuesly play with new skills, not that you have a rotating meta every week.

I don't know, with a weekly deck it is not really SD, it's more like a (brutally) balanced TA.

Winstar · Sep 03, 2009, 07:58 PM // 19:58

Using the AT format with one set of decks per AT would be much more interesting and better capture the feel of actual sealed played. The problem with only ATs is that you're replacing 2 gametypes where you could easily jump in and play at any time with one that can only be played on a restricted AT time schedule. So I would like to see both types of play - open play with daily card pools ideally - along with an AT schedule. Shouldn't be hard as this is essentially the HB setup right now.

Selket · Sep 06, 2009, 06:32 PM // 18:32

Daily rotation for regular matches, separate skill set per AT.