Guild Wars 2

Bear with me on this one, please.

The way “Downed” works at the moment is completely fine in PvE, but it sucks a lot of fun out of PvP.
Before you shower me with statements (I’ve heard a hundred of times) like “Downed State is only another layer of tactics” or “Downed State only increases skill cap”, I want to tell you how THE MAJORITY of MMO players feel about this. (Not GW vets).

Downed State as a mechanic escalates the power of bigger groups by a lot. So much, that almost always, the bigger group wins. I have noticed this introduces “zerging” (charging obliviously based on pack numbers), and it sadly works quite well. You barely notice you own influence on the fight.
In a fight, it’s mandatory (or at least very beneficial) to kill off casters and ranged heroes before the Warriors and Guardians (tanks) right? Well, in this game, there is little room for assassination/precise target picking (or at least very difficult and can honestly only be done if the enemy group doesn’t pay attention) in bigger and smaller fights.
Being able to solo two or three enemy heroes is impracticable at the moment, but instead of crying about this, I will suggest a minor solution/change accompanied with a big (and positive) impact.

If a player is damaged by another player while “Revive” is being channeled, it will be interrupted.

THERE YOU GO. Much more PvP fun, and PvE is unaffected. Being able to take on multiple enemies is now an aspiring possibility. Players can now efficiently (especially Thieves, which their design is based upon) assassinate key heroes in a big fight or skirmish.

Think about it. It will only add so much more fun and ease off frustration.

This won’t affect the bigger group winning.

As all AoEs hit only 5 targets, all you need is 6 people, and while 5 get interrupted, the 5th goes on. Meaning that the more people in your side, the more resurrections you pass though.

By being able to resurrect anyways, a smaller group ca bring skills like Obsidian Flesh, get into the fray and still resurrect someone even when outnumbered.

MithranArkanere.8957:

This won’t affect the bigger group winning.

As all AoEs hit only 5 targets, all you need is 6 people, and while 5 get interrupted, the 5th goes on. Meaning that the more people in your side, the more resurrections you pass though.

In a realistic situation, everyone in a fight won’t try to Revive one player at the same time. Even if they all try, they can all be AoE’d, and if one isn’t hit be the single AoE (which hits a maximum of 5 players) any single target spell can be used on him. You can even interrupt a group of enemies trying to Revive with only single target spells, requiring only to swap targets to the ones trying to Revive.

By being able to resurrect anyways, a smaller group ca bring skills like Obsidian Flesh, get into the fray and still resurrect someone even when outnumbered.

While a spell like Obsidian Flesh will certainly be useful, the chances are the other group might also bring a similar spell. Even though this spell is used to Revive, he will efficiently exclude himself from the fight for a window of time, and another player could also be able to finish off the downed player before Revive has been finished channeling, if not interrupted by CC. It surely adds a depth of interesting tactical gameplay, but I’m pretty sure a spell like that won’t be such a big game-changer, considering some of the points I pointed out.

You immediately dismiss 2 very good arguments and proceed to to claim that you know what “the majority of MMO players” feels about the downed state. Do you have any hard evidence to back this up? For all we know the criticism for the downed state comes from a small vocal minority like yourself. I certainly do not feel about the downed state like you do.

Questions I would like to see answered:

Why shouldn’t the biggest group win?
Why should you be able to solo a bigger team?
Why don’t you use teamwork and positioning, why get outmatched in the first place?
Why not use fear, knockdowns and stuns instead of asking for an easy interrupt on hit?

Of course I assume you are talking about sPvP and not WvW.

Your actual suggestion is interesting but it’s a compromise more then anything.

About “the majority of MMO players”: I should have corrected it to “the majority of MMO players I know of (IRL and not)”
I don’t know why people rejects this idea. It strengthens the power of a single player’s skill.

“Why shouldn’t the biggest group win?
Why should you be able to solo a bigger team?”
I am very for the idea of that 20 good players should be able to kill 40. The way it is at the moment, the group of 40 must then be beginners for it to be even possible.

“Why don’t you use teamwork and positioning, why get outmatched in the first place?”
Two questions in one. The first one: This is relative to me reply to the first quote.
The second one: So you are saying if you are outnumbered you should just run because there is no hope?

“Why not use fear, knockdowns and stuns instead of asking for an easy interrupt on hit?”
The amount of CC in this game is very short and on longer cooldowns. You will only be able to keep off a maximum of two players off a downed player for a brief amount of time.