Curse

d3kst3r · Mar 27, 2006, 08:44 AM // 08:44

Anyone who has played alliance battles would have heard of them. 3-6-3 offers more offense down the middle however 4-4-4 offers the chance for the sides to claim enemy shrines. And then there's the more slippery and seldom used 3-5-4 which allows the right flank to sweep around the map claiming shrines.

TheYellowKid · Mar 27, 2006, 08:59 AM // 08:59

depends on the map imo.. plus if peeople listen to u or not, countless times people are askin for 4-4-4 but u get 2 on the left 1 on the right 3 at the back and the rest by the middle gate..

d3kst3r · Mar 27, 2006, 09:10 AM // 09:10

Also it pisses me off when lots of people think that the objective of alliance battles is to score as many kills as possible. Then totally don't factor in that each shrines gives 1 point every 8 seconds and that with a few shrines their score output can become more than double what they're capable of doing on their own.

Fourex · Mar 27, 2006, 09:26 AM // 09:26

i am for 4 4 4 because if you a creating a specialised group before hand you don't want to split that up for no good reason. later in the match you may decide it is best to change tactics.

TheYellowKid · Mar 27, 2006, 09:31 AM // 09:31

d3kst3r lol u have no idea the amount of times ive stopped what i was doin and jus started asking the team if they realise that if we have less shrines we are going to lose, i think people had it in their head that its a deathmatch, i always wondered y people were sayin "LOL 500 kills!"

Savio · Mar 27, 2006, 09:39 AM // 09:39

Saltspray: 4-4-4, or possibly just ignore the middle. Res shrines are the most important, as you can't hold an enemy in their base if they're ressing halfway across the map. Defense gives you the Shielding Urn which can save someone, so it gets a bit of priority too. Attack shrines have a minor benefit but you have to be by them. Dragon roost fulfills the fantasy of every noob player to have a pet dragon, so only go after it if you're bored or have the other points.

Etnaran: 3-6-3, there's only one res shrine so nab it. Elite shrines give you the elite NPCs to follow you, I prefer the damage of the Elementalist (kills Glad Defense tanks faster) so a bit more priority on that one if it comes to one or the other. Attack and defense shrines are meh, but they do give you points. The only time I've used the res orb shrine was to res dead NPCs.

IMO the res shrines give you far more control than anything else you can capture, so they should be taken first. Of course, we don't know the other maps and how they're built so I imagine there will be more strategy when Factions comes out.

d3kst3r · Mar 27, 2006, 09:50 AM // 09:50

The dragon is waaay overrated. I can solo it using a W/Mo and I have no idea why all the teams keep putting like 90% of their forces onto capturing it. Usually beforehand I always get 2 friends to make a team with me of 3 and we just cap shrines the entire battle (hence 3-6-3 the 3 part).

tafy69 · Mar 27, 2006, 10:04 AM // 10:04

What is the big thing with just 3 teams, with 7 alters to capture would lots of 2 man squads do better? They could double up on occasion i guess

Savio · Mar 27, 2006, 10:11 AM // 10:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by tafy69

What is the big thing with just 3 teams, with 7 alters to capture would lots of 2 man squads do better? They could double up on occasion i guess

A 2 man squad gets creamed by a 4 man squad. You can handle NPCs solo if you have to, but capping is optimal at 4 if there aren't enemies nearby. Spread yourself too thin and one solid enemy team will just wipe out whatever comes at it.

d3kst3r · Mar 27, 2006, 10:23 AM // 10:23

2 W/Mos can go around capping shrines... only if the other team doesnt send backup to defend them. A 3 man squad is ideal from my experience, a 4 man just offers more speed and is safer to move around in. Which brings us back to the 3-6-3 or 4-4-4 discussion.

JR · Mar 27, 2006, 11:23 AM // 11:23

When we played last night, quite a few times Savio, Lars and I ganked shrines with our Heal Sig warriors. I would feel quite confident with two simmilar groups on shrine capping duty, and 6 guys at the center.

Ensign · Mar 27, 2006, 11:24 AM // 11:24

I think it's unrealistic to expect an entire 12 man, pseudo-random team to stick to any sort of formation that you give it, and godawful to believe that any sort of rigid plan like that matters longer than the first 30 seconds of the game.

Peace,
-CxE

JR · Mar 27, 2006, 11:27 AM // 11:27

Agreed, really. This whole conversation is slightly futile unless they eventually allow us to enter with 12 man guild teams.

Woutsie · Mar 27, 2006, 11:45 AM // 11:45

If it's the Dragon map: 3-6-3.

d3kst3r · Mar 27, 2006, 11:50 AM // 11:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

I think it's unrealistic to expect an entire 12 man, pseudo-random team to stick to any sort of formation that you give it, and godawful to believe that any sort of rigid plan like that matters longer than the first 30 seconds of the game.

Peace,
-CxE

I'd agree that the best combo is 6 in the middle as the main force for keeping the enemy main force busy and the two left and right 3 teams just to run around capping shrines all day. I won every single round with 3-6-3 formation.

And to answer your quote you'd be suprised how well organised some of the teams I got in were. The main organisational strength is that at the start you have a whole minute to quickly get organised and by the final day of the preview event most people were automatically assigning themselves to 3-6-3 without any verbal input. (Mind you I was playing Kurzick so I can't answer for the Luxon side :P)

minor · Mar 27, 2006, 01:07 PM // 13:07

I saw both extremes of the 12v12 planning this weekend. Went in with 3 guildies met another 4 man guild group; we all typed important stuff throughout the battle, won that one and several others easily. Later on i went with a pug, a few people tried to talk strategy but it was hopeless, we got creamed. Did i mention other team had a guild group? Basically the odds of a random group working well in 12v12 is not the best only takes a few idiots to mess things up. It mostly comes down to where the good guild groups end up.

rii · Mar 27, 2006, 06:06 PM // 18:06

I played throughout the weekend, mainly using the ranger/assasin premade with leaping mantis sting out for jagged strike. Apart from the elementalist shrine, all the alters are up for grabs solo, and its a pretty good runner. A possible side strat would be to have two teams of two similar builds push the sides with a large contingent of 8 crushing the middle section and pushing hard to the enemy base. Two skilled cappers can make a lot of trouble (i could hold one side of the map more or less on my own except when they sent a large amount of people after me), and while its untested against guild teams, it would give the edge to the larger team for sure.

Also... you can actually solo with anything. On the dragon map at least, i played a flash turret.. and as long as you cast at max range the npcs dont come at you... and you can slowly L.strike them to death. After that, the terrain is sufficienty awful that when capping the Rt posts (and a few others) as long as you stand near the high wall none of the spirits can hit you.

Also, four man teams with a good monk and maybe a flasher can do fine against 4-6 players... which again would give the capper team a big edge. As for the dragon, as said above its overrated.

Mage Henchnem · Mar 27, 2006, 06:26 PM // 18:26

I agree with the overall mood of the thread, whitch is no matter the formation, it really depends on the team and their coordination. I got on a team that had several people I recognized from HA that were higher ranking, we talked a little beforehand, even had a few PvE types in there with us but they followed instructions. We had a rough start but ended up turning it around, at first we were down about 70 to 30 and I got a little discouraged, but thats when the strat calling started, and we ended up winning by over 50, I know its not a huge turnaround, but it just goes to show that if you work together a little and follow the instructions of someone (assuming the know what there doing) You can basically control the map.

Ensign · Mar 27, 2006, 10:38 PM // 22:38

Well there are really two aspects of 12v12 - the huge mess that inevitibly occurs in the center of the map, and the skirmishes that take place over the outlying points. Players need to understand that, and where their character is strongest. If you have a strong central fight guy (like a minion master, a monk, or something with AoE) you go to the middle. If you have a good skirmisher you went off to the side to deal with those points. The numbers aren't nearly as important as people knowing what they're good at on the map. If I had a team of 12 skirmishers I wouldn't bother sending anyone to hold that middle, you'd just get wiped.

I'll give you that some minimal input is valuable at the beginning to get the new players organized, but honestly I just made skirmishers all weekend, and did my job. I'm really over having concrete inflexible plans in this game right now.

FWIW playing as a skirmisher in 12v12 is the fastest way to get good at Guild Wars outside of GvG.

Peace,
-CxE

Guillaume De Sonoma · Mar 27, 2006, 11:29 PM // 23:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by JR-

Agreed, really. This whole conversation is slightly futile unless they eventually allow us to enter with 12 man guild teams.

My guild Tor, SoF, and DOG managed to all get on the same team. It is much easier entering through International Districts in groups of 4. We had 11 so we just sent out blind invites until we got one and in TS some one just counted off. Other times we got 8 most of the time, but 12 was nice.

I prefer 3-6-3 with the 6 acting as a holding group for the one rez shrine (etenaran keys). I still like 3-6-3 on other Saltspray because the larger groups helps you control the rez shrines more.