Guild Wars 2

Again, it really seems you guys haven’t played games with loose AE rules and found out just how poorly things work out when not implemented well. Just removing the AE limit on this game would be absolutely disastrous.

In the other thread someone mentioned DAoC as an example of a game without an AE limit and mentioned how that game worked out perfectly. I have no idea what server he played on, but DAoC had one of the worst PvP mechanics known to man and is the originator of the zerg and train mentality. DAoC had nothing but suicidal AE trains ripping through the frontiers. The only time they were stopped was when you could lock them down from range and attack them from range. You can’t do that in this game due to no real ranged lockdown but you most certainly would adopt the suicidal AE trains given how Ele’s work.

Next up was WoW. When that game first came out, AE was uncapped and the whole game was completely dominated by Arcane Mages with Arcane Explosion (you had to trait into at the time to make it instant). They would run through all of Azeroth both PvE and PvP alike killing everything in their path. It took a year before the cap was put in and it took a year before anyone bothered trying to do Alterac Valley because of how out of whack things were.

The one MMO that I’ve played that actually did AE right was Shadowbane. It had a cap (10 I believe), almost every class had some form of AE option, it was all high damage, and it most of it was easy to use. The way they offset it was one of the greatest spell resist systems ever used in an MMO. Something this game doesn’t have.

The way this game is right now, there is absolutely no way removing the AE limit could ever work. The WvW maps are designed horribly removing the ability to ever counter AE bombs. The siege system here doesn’t provide enough benefit to defenders so even trying to defend a keep isn’t going to stop the AE zerg. Classes are horribly designed so you wouldn’t see anything but Eles in a weeks time. And there’s no effective way to shut down AE other than not standing on it (which we know won’t matter if 2 out of every 5 players in WvW is an ele as each tick of lava font will hit for 2-3k, trigger after a second, have large circles due to blasting staff, x10 because no one will have fewer than 10 eles in a ball).

All removing the AE cap will do is replace mixed zergs of today into suicidal Ele balls tomorrow. If people here had more MMO experience than WoW, or they could actually remember the state WoW was in at launch, they’d know how difficult changing the AE system in this game is going to be.

Very well said. There’s no way the AE cap could be removed without a complete rework on how it works and the ways it can be countered.

Can we have a compromise and just have a few skills, maybe one per class, that can hit unlimited targets?

The necro’s poison/chill mark, guardian staff 3, warrior’s longbow burst skill, ranger’s longbow #5, mage’s whatever, mesmer’s whatever, thieves are lame… no one playes engineers…

That would help break up the zerg balls without overdoing it.

Atherakhia.4086:

Again, it really seems you guys haven’t played games with loose AE rules and found out just how poorly things work out when not implemented well. Just removing the AE limit on this game would be absolutely disastrous.

In the other thread someone mentioned DAoC as an example of a game without an AE limit and mentioned how that game worked out perfectly. I have no idea what server he played on, but DAoC had one of the worst PvP mechanics known to man and is the originator of the zerg and train mentality. DAoC had nothing but suicidal AE trains ripping through the frontiers. The only time they were stopped was when you could lock them down from range and attack them from range. You can’t do that in this game due to no real ranged lockdown but you most certainly would adopt the suicidal AE trains given how Ele’s work.

Next up was WoW. When that game first came out, AE was uncapped and the whole game was completely dominated by Arcane Mages with Arcane Explosion (you had to trait into at the time to make it instant). They would run through all of Azeroth both PvE and PvP alike killing everything in their path. It took a year before the cap was put in and it took a year before anyone bothered trying to do Alterac Valley because of how out of whack things were.

The one MMO that I’ve played that actually did AE right was Shadowbane. It had a cap (10 I believe), almost every class had some form of AE option, it was all high damage, and it most of it was easy to use. The way they offset it was one of the greatest spell resist systems ever used in an MMO. Something this game doesn’t have.

The way this game is right now, there is absolutely no way removing the AE limit could ever work. The WvW maps are designed horribly removing the ability to ever counter AE bombs. The siege system here doesn’t provide enough benefit to defenders so even trying to defend a keep isn’t going to stop the AE zerg. Classes are horribly designed so you wouldn’t see anything but Eles in a weeks time. And there’s no effective way to shut down AE other than not standing on it (which we know won’t matter if 2 out of every 5 players in WvW is an ele as each tick of lava font will hit for 2-3k, trigger after a second, have large circles due to blasting staff, x10 because no one will have fewer than 10 eles in a ball).

All removing the AE cap will do is replace mixed zergs of today into suicidal Ele balls tomorrow. If people here had more MMO experience than WoW, or they could actually remember the state WoW was in at launch, they’d know how difficult changing the AE system in this game is going to be.

I dont agree with you how you think the www will turn out to if the cap was removed.
You think it will be a Elle zerg train, whilst I see the opposite due to retaliation.
AoE cap removal will help the defenders, not the attackers IMO.
Ellies that will be AoE spamming will melt them self of the retaliaiton dmg, and this will probably lead to a smarter way of using AoE attacks to try and funnel enemies into your melee attackers.

Since the majority of players stack power in www, retaliation will be a nightmare for AoE users if the cap is taken away.., retaliation formula is 198.45 + (0.075 * Power)
so an ellie that hits 20 players will probably take around 8500dmg as soon as they throw their spell, if the deffenders stay for a second tick the ellies are dead, the ellies cant defend them self with condition removal or dodge.

so the scenario where a few ellies kills of an entire zerg will never happen in this game from already existing mechanics.

In response to Atherakhia, GW2 classes are different from WoW and as such it will be difficult to compare. I don’t know any classes capable of instantly blowing up people with AoE. Meteor Shower has a 5 second cast time, long cooldown, random meteor impacts and as such is unreliable, moreover it’s easy to avoid. Lava fonts are even easier to avoid. Zergs with almost exclusively squishy mages (which you will say will happen without AoE limit) will get completely destroyed by zergs who actually have a good frontline that can charge in.

Having a lot of elementalists is only useful in sieges, and if they are good enough to keep areas under constant AoE lockdown then going with catapults or trebs would be a good alternative. As soon as they don’t have a wall to hide behind, they won’t be able to stop a good zerg utilizing stuff like mesmer portals to get through choke points like a destroyed wall. They should remove swirling winds’ interaction with siege shots though, because it’s a silly mechanic imho giving elementalists more defensive power than is neccessary.

People shouldn’t be playing in zergballs, they should spread out to counter AoE. No zerg will have enough AoE to make entire battlefields instant death traps. And even they have enough elementalists to put down lots of AoE, those squishy mages are susceptible to direct attack and will fall easily. I think people are greatly exaggerating AoE without a limit, because the only thing that will really notice a difference will be that zergball that stands with more than 5 people in the same spot.

Okaishi.8320:

In response to Atherakhia, GW2 classes are different from WoW and as such it will be difficult to compare. I don’t know any classes capable of instantly blowing up people with AoE. Meteor Shower has a 5 second cast time, long cooldown, random meteor impacts and as such is unreliable, moreover it’s easy to avoid. Lava fonts are even easier to avoid. Zergs with almost exclusively squishy mages (which you will say will happen without AoE limit) will get completely destroyed by zergs who actually have a good frontline that can charge in.

Having a lot of elementalists is only useful in sieges, and if they are good enough to keep areas under constant AoE lockdown then going with catapults or trebs would be a good alternative. As soon as they don’t have a wall to hide behind, they won’t be able to stop a good zerg utilizing stuff like mesmer portals to get through choke points like a destroyed wall. They should remove swirling winds’ interaction with siege shots though, because it’s a silly mechanic imho giving elementalists more defensive power than is neccessary.

People shouldn’t be playing in zergballs, they should spread out to counter AoE. No zerg will have enough AoE to make entire battlefields instant death traps. And even they have enough elementalists to put down lots of AoE, those squishy mages are susceptible to direct attack and will fall easily. I think people are greatly exaggerating AoE without a limit, because the only thing that will really notice a difference will be that zergball that stands with more than 5 people in the same spot.

Classes aren’t as different as you seem to think. And lets not forget that eople complain to this day that Elementalists can out tank warriors. And while Meteor Shower has randomized damage, 10 eles casting it and you can count on at least 2 of them hitting you. Lava Font doesn’t have randomized damage and with the staff trait has a fairly large AE impact. And these are the non-suicidal spells.

What about 10 Eles Rain of Lightning into a zerg at 2k damage each? Didn’t know RTL does damage? do you realize that 10 eles flying into a zerg can’t be stopped or killed and that this alone would kill half the classes out there? What about these same eles after they RTL into the zerg using Fire Grab at upwards of 10k damage? Didn’t remember this is a dagger skill which 9 out of 10 eles have? What about mesmer berserkers that hit for insane damage? Shatter clones?

Hell! Ranger longbow isn’t random, hits for about 1k, has an enormous AE, AND snares! Hell with the ele trains, lets get some ranger trains out there!

I’m sorry, but I really don’t think you guys have thought this stuff through.

Did you think this through? Every single example you use involved the zerg in a cute tight pack formation that would make them vulnerable to that very AoE. 10 elementalists casting Meteor Shower and some of those meteors would hit you indeed, if you stand still in that area long enough. And there’s no excuse for anyone to take more than 1 tick of damage from Lava Font, because that’s one of the most obvious AoEs in the game.

D/D eles can deal a fair amount of damage, but unless they sacrifice survivability for it it’s not going to be the stuff that instakills entire groups of people. And again, this is only in the case zergs stick to the stupid zergball mentality after removing the AoE cap. Please stop using the current ‘brainless’ zergball meta as an example as to why removing the AoE limit would be broken.

Okaishi.8320:

Did you think this through? Every single example you use involved the zerg in a cute tight pack formation that would make them vulnerable to that very AoE. 10 elementalists casting Meteor Shower and some of those meteors would hit you indeed, if you stand still in that area long enough. And there’s no excuse for anyone to take more than 1 tick of damage from Lava Font, because that’s one of the most obvious AoEs in the game.

D/D eles can deal a fair amount of damage, but unless the sacrifice survivability for it it’s not going to be the stuff that instakills entire groups of people. And again, this is only in the case zergs stick to the stupid zergball mentality after removing the AoE cap. Please stop using the current ‘brainless’ zergball meta as an example as to why removing the AoE limit would be broken.

The only way you’re going to stop zerg balls from being out there is by turning on collision detection (I’ve played several with this too). The very fact that this is a sieging game forces you to be ikittenerg ball because you can’t spread out in keep courtyard or when knocking down a door for example. And most AE’s are large enough to cover 3/4 of the total courtyard.

I’d be more concerned you’ll see what the above poster mentioned and people will zerg vs zerg, but the only counter to AE is going to be retaliation which isn’t nearly as effective as he pretends and is only viable if your zergs agree to stand at 1200 range using Meteor showers on each other. Run a suicide train and it’s over. And coming from Shadowbane, I know all about Druid+Wizard suicide bombs.

People need to stack for buffs. They need to stack to get through doors. They need to stack to get heals. No my friend, the zerg ball will be here to stay in every MMO past, present, and future unless you turn on collision detection.

And when you don’t have AE caps you don’t need to go in berserkers gear as a 2k rtl isn’t hard to get. And do you honestly think it will be difficult for 10 eles to communicate RTL into a zerg at the same time and then pivot 180 degrees and use firebrab? Even if these spells hit for half what I mentioned they’re going to kill everyone.

Atherakhia.4086:

Okaishi.8320:

In response to Atherakhia, GW2 classes are different from WoW and as such it will be difficult to compare. I don’t know any classes capable of instantly blowing up people with AoE. Meteor Shower has a 5 second cast time, long cooldown, random meteor impacts and as such is unreliable, moreover it’s easy to avoid. Lava fonts are even easier to avoid. Zergs with almost exclusively squishy mages (which you will say will happen without AoE limit) will get completely destroyed by zergs who actually have a good frontline that can charge in.

Having a lot of elementalists is only useful in sieges, and if they are good enough to keep areas under constant AoE lockdown then going with catapults or trebs would be a good alternative. As soon as they don’t have a wall to hide behind, they won’t be able to stop a good zerg utilizing stuff like mesmer portals to get through choke points like a destroyed wall. They should remove swirling winds’ interaction with siege shots though, because it’s a silly mechanic imho giving elementalists more defensive power than is neccessary.

People shouldn’t be playing in zergballs, they should spread out to counter AoE. No zerg will have enough AoE to make entire battlefields instant death traps. And even they have enough elementalists to put down lots of AoE, those squishy mages are susceptible to direct attack and will fall easily. I think people are greatly exaggerating AoE without a limit, because the only thing that will really notice a difference will be that zergball that stands with more than 5 people in the same spot.

Classes aren’t as different as you seem to think. And lets not forget that eople complain to this day that Elementalists can out tank warriors. And while Meteor Shower has randomized damage, 10 eles casting it and you can count on at least 2 of them hitting you. Lava Font doesn’t have randomized damage and with the staff trait has a fairly large AE impact. And these are the non-suicidal spells.

What about 10 Eles Rain of Lightning into a zerg at 2k damage each? Didn’t know RTL does damage? do you realize that 10 eles flying into a zerg can’t be stopped or killed and that this alone would kill half the classes out there? What about these same eles after they RTL into the zerg using Fire Grab at upwards of 10k damage? Didn’t remember this is a dagger skill which 9 out of 10 eles have? What about mesmer berserkers that hit for insane damage? Shatter clones?

Hell! Ranger longbow isn’t random, hits for about 1k, has an enormous AE, AND snares! Hell with the ele trains, lets get some ranger trains out there!

I’m sorry, but I really don’t think you guys have thought this stuff through.

You keep saying this, But dont you realize that removing aoe cap would insta kill all ellies in your exampels due to retaliation.
Ellies with 9k HP that hit anything from 10+ players Will just insta kill themself.
If removing aoe cap would Do anything för ellies it would be using them för support more, cause glass cannon aoe ellies would never exist Long if the cap got removed.

Zorion.7504:

Atherakhia.4086:

Okaishi.8320:

You keep saying this, But dont you realize that removing aoe cap would insta kill all ellies in your exampels due to retaliation.
Ellies with 9k HP that hit anything from 10+ players Will just insta kill themself.
If removing aoe cap would Do anything för ellies it would be using them för support more, cause glass cannon aoe ellies would never exist Long if the cap got removed.

Try to understand the concept of a suicide hitsquad hiding ikittenerg ball. 10 eles for example. They could be in any gear you want, I presume if they’re hiding ikittenerg ball with the intent to be a suicide squad they’d be in full serkers and knights. Their RTL will crit for 2-4k. With 10 of them that’s 20-40k damage. This damage can’t be stopped or damaged. They’re coming at you at 200% movement speed. They come from 1200 yards away. They have a radius of 600 on the AE. Do you think they care if they die? Do you think you can react to this fast enough to stop them? I’m confident some out there could. But then again they’re eles…. they’ll mist form back to their ball, wait 20 seconds, and do it again.

And that’s just Eles using a pointless skill. By the time the ele’s have died to your example of retaliation, they’ve already got Meteor Shower to the point where it will continue its auto cast given its randomized nature. Lava font as I mentioned has a very large AE when traited, hits for a tone in power gear, and can be left on the ground.

And to my knowledge, retaliation won’t pierce mist form so if the ele is in trouble, they’ll pop a cooldown. And this is of course ignoring that the removal of AE caps now allows Necros to consume all boons on every target.

/shrug.

If you’re talking " suicidal zerg balls", I would be more worried about the necromancer than the elementalist. Necromancer marks already do good AoE damage, Wells can do even more, but there is one thing that would be absolutely disasterous when unchecked:

Life Transfer. It has a radius of 600, deals damage while healing the necromancer, and since it happens in Death Shroud the necromancer isn’t truly at risk. It is very easy to trait for: 10 points in Soul Reaping increases the recharge, 10 points in spite to grant retaliation, and should they be so dedicated 30 points in Soul Reaping to grant stability.

To recap, stability + retaliation + heal + recharge reduction + very large AoE. It has a base damage of 684, which isn’t too much, but that climbs very quickly if the necro is built as a glass cannon. The “fear” is that about 10 of these necros would gather together in full zerker gear, and just speedily run around with the locust signet. Should an enemy group appear, they pop in DeathShroud to get stability and retaliation, and then all use life transfer. Then they heal themselves for massive amounts of health while doing massive amounts of unavoidable damage to everyone within range. After that is done, they wipe up the remains with marks and wells, while most likely having the trait where marks regain life force.

The biggest limit to this would be the long recharge on Life Transfer, hitting 34 seconds with the recharge bonus. It is here that it would become suicidal: After life transfer is done with, if the enemy zerg isn’t taken out then it is very possible to retaliate and kill the necro squad. While distance may seem like a good idea at first, it is easy to forget that marks have a range of 1200+ their radius, and the necro is perfectly capable of fighting at arm’s length. Should they run away, the necros can all just spam wells behind themselves so it is nigh impossible to chase.

Again, to be fair this does take a lot more organization than the current mindless zerg mentality we have now.

Atherakhia.4086:

The only way you’re going to stop zerg balls from being out there is by turning on collision detection (I’ve played several with this too). The very fact that this is a sieging game forces you to be ikittenerg ball because you can’t spread out in keep courtyard or when knocking down a door for example. And most AE’s are large enough to cover 3/4 of the total courtyard.

I’d be more concerned you’ll see what the above poster mentioned and people will zerg vs zerg, but the only counter to AE is going to be retaliation which isn’t nearly as effective as he pretends and is only viable if your zergs agree to stand at 1200 range using Meteor showers on each other. Run a suicide train and it’s over. And coming from Shadowbane, I know all about Druid+Wizard suicide bombs.

People need to stack for buffs. They need to stack to get through doors. They need to stack to get heals. No my friend, the zerg ball will be here to stay in every MMO past, present, and future unless you turn on collision detection.

I agree it can be hard to properly spread out in some keeps. Best possible counterplay to this is to keep up pressure on the walls/other spots where elementalists will be AoEing from. At the moment you don’t even have to care because stacking on top of eachother counters pretty much anything in the game, especially as soon as zergs are 50+ people, which is becoming more and more common. Hardly ever will AoE be pressuring you enough to start to worrying about those elementalists, and even if they manage to down a few, you will simply be able to revive them instantly. The only thing that might be somewhat of a threat is a LOT of arrow carts, but that can be avoided by simply going for a different gate (depending on how much supplies/siege the defenders have available) or building some catapults on the back wall.

I don’t think they should remove the limit of certain buffs/heals. It should be dependant on how powerful a certain skill is buffing a certain amount of people. Shadow refuge shouldn’t apply to an entire zerg for example. Might stacking shouldn’t either. People wouldn’t need to stack up for heals and buffs if it’s not going to affect everyone anyway. People could stack up before a battle to get as many buffs as possible, but hardly ever should they do this in combat. It should be punished to blindly push through a gate as a zergball. But yeah, that’s just what I think.

so many theories…
Guys aoes had no cap since few months ago….
And people was happy while nobody asked for aoe cap :|

Yes really FEW aoe were OP… to the oint that is a bigger evil the AoE cap than those….

you can find old www vids with players spread on the battlefield, where any of them impacting the game and actually playing.

Nowaday its more ZERGS piloted by commanders….you don t matter that much unless you have specific zerg skills.

It seems as the biggest fears are that zergs Will be destroyed with aoe cap gone.., well would that be a bad thing?
If 10 anything suicide squad could kill a zerg, wouldn’t that just automaticly change how zergs plays?
If a zerg wants to take a keep it would be forced to higher tactics then stack on the door…

In either way I can’t see aoe cap removal as a bad thing for www.

Make all “AoE” spell instant cast or increase range to 1800.

Zorion.7504:

It seems as the biggest fears are that zergs Will be destroyed with aoe cap gone.., well would that be a bad thing?
If 10 anything suicide squad could kill a zerg, wouldn’t that just automaticly change how zergs plays?
If a zerg wants to take a keep it would be forced to higher tactics then stack on the door…

In either way I can’t see aoe cap removal as a bad thing for www.

It wouldn’t though. Things like Guardian barriers and bubbles for example or the simple fact that blast heals can heal for the same amount as some of the higher damage AE and be blasted for 15 seconds straight. Or are you honestly trying to pretend that removing caps on AE won’t also come with the removal of caps on buffs? Because I don’t think this game can handle the flood of guardian and mesmer tears.

And we also have to have a real discussion on what constitutes a zerg ball…. because I would argue that 30 people in a general area the size of an arrow cart’s reticule not to be a zerg ball… and yet 10 hunters could decimate this area with impunity at 1200 yards with 5 stacks of bleed, 1k a second damage, and an AE snare for each ranger.

A solution to the zerg balls needs to be found, but removing AE caps is hardly the way to approach it. Especially in this game where it’s clearly not capable of handling it given the current environment.

Things like a better designed WvW map where we aren’t just running loops around the zone all day but rather are encouraged (forced) to siege keeps in a progressive manner.
Keeps far enough away so siege in one can’t be used to siege another.
Allowing siege to be used regardless of the side who made it so people had to clean up after sieging a keep.
Arrow Carts having longer range when placed on walls or provided a damage bonus when used for defense instead of offense.
Controllable waves of elite NPC’s to help defend and repell attackers.

Anyone remember when Alterac Valley first came out and you actually had to gather resources to train guards and you could send out waves of guards to help you push enemies out of bottle neck positions? Why not have rectangular shaped WvW maps with a series of towers and keeps and you can’t take the keep unless you have all 3 towers. The keeps have progressively stronger guards in them that can be sent out in waves to help take towers back. If you manage to take the map all the way to the other teams main borderland entrance, those guards should be able to repel pretty much anything to regain their keep. Especially with a siege breaker assisting. And bottlenecks… a couple of those wouldn’t hurt WvW. It’s like someone used their 5 year olds maze they got in kindergarten class that day to design the layout for these maps.

I know I know… PvE in muh PvPz wut! But that’s why we have 4 different border lands to choose from.

LordByron.8369:

so many theories…
Guys aoes had no cap since few months ago….
And people was happy while nobody asked for aoe cap :|

Yes really FEW aoe were OP… to the oint that is a bigger evil the AoE cap than those….

you can find old www vids with players spread on the battlefield, where any of them impacting the game and actually playing.

Nowaday its more ZERGS piloted by commanders….you don t matter that much unless you have specific zerg skills.

this +1
today when you log in to a www map you see 1 cmd.., anything more is just not good tactics with the current mechanincs.
Small grps can still be used to cap camps and scout, but the big ever feeding zerg rolls across the realm like a single cell organism consuming all the joy in the world.

with aoe cap gone, you might log in to see 2 or 4 cmders, all leading diff. fronts and only using /squad for orders for thier zerg and /team for communicating with the other cmders and scouts.., but hey.., we dont live in a perfect world now do we… =P

LordByron.8369:

so many theories…
Guys aoes had no cap since few months ago….
And people was happy while nobody asked for aoe cap :|

What are you saying? Damaging spells have had the current AoE caps since old betas …

Entire screen and battlefield filled with AoE’s. Now, dodge.

I posted this on the WvW thread but will post it here as well.

What it needs is two things:

1) remove AOE cap
2) split AOE abilities for PVE/WvW . Lower the damage coefficients for AOE skills in WvW but give them control elements, like Daze, Knockdown … For instance, Ele Staff Meteor Shower could give 50% chance to Knockdown on hit, but damage is reduced by around 50% – this means that AOE is used more as a control element to funnel rather than a big damage skill to wipe.

In doing so you don’t give an AOE heavy squad the means to wipe a zerg, but you give them control tools to keep a blob in place while your ground crew moves in to mop up.

declan.3968:

I posted this on the WvW thread but will post it here as well.

What it needs is two things:

1) remove AOE cap
2) split AOE abilities for PVE/WvW . Lower the damage coefficients for AOE skills in WvW but give them control elements, like Daze, Knockdown … For instance, Ele Staff Meteor Shower could give 50% chance to Knockdown on hit, but damage is reduced by around 50% – this means that AOE is used more as a control element to funnel rather than a big damage skill to wipe.

In doing so you don’t give an AOE heavy squad the means to wipe a zerg, but you give them control tools to keep a blob in place while your ground crew moves in to mop up.

A game should never need different rules for PvE and PvP. Especially a game like this where PvE is nothing more than a distraction to prepare you for PvP. Now as for AE CC and such, I’m very much in favor of this and I was shocked to find no real dispels, purges, controls, and heals in PvP in this game.

There’s just no depth to PvP in this game. And without any depth you limit the number of tactics and strategies players need to succeed. And when players don’t need tactics or strategy to succeed they clump up in a ball and play follow the leader all day.

Adding more depth to this game is never a bad thing. Adding unlimited AE or forcing 2 rulesets (1 for PvE and 1 for PvP) isn’t a solution.

The other night in Deso BL, around our Garrison SFR was holding with split groups both side towers and constantly taking the north supply camp. Send the whole zerg to cap a tower too ages because the place was constantly painted with AoE circles everywhere. And during that time the towers were still trebing the walls.

SFR did a very good job of managing a single zerg blob with their split push tactic and still managed to hold territory well thanks to their generous usage of AoEs.

And you want to make AoEs even stronger? :’(

Aridia.3042:

killcannon.2576:

It enables the zerg, that’s the point of it. The question you should ask is why the devs want the zerg.

It drastically lowers the skill cap so even noobs could log in and not get decimated. Guarantee you’ll have less players in wvw if new players would log in and get wiped easily even when they’re in a large group because roaming with no gear, lvl and experience with the class is not an attractive option.

But I don’t agree with that rationale though. What they should’ve done is to give subs lvl 80 players some kind of aoe defense buff that gradually gets worse as they lvl towards 80 and finally take those training wheels off when they hit lvl 80. If you haven’t learned to roll out of the red circle when you get to lvl 80, you deserve to die.

After all, everyone always has the endurance to dodge, especially when facing a lot of AoEs

Caps are a balance thing (as well as mentioned, probably a performance thing). If they removed the cap, they’d probably either a) nerf the damage of AoEs hard, or b) put a cap on the total damage an AoE can do (so it’d be total damage allowed divided by number of targets hit)

Now, I’ll agree it’d be nice for some AoEs to have higher target caps, but I’m also (among other Archtypes) a former City of Heroes Blaster Player. 25 cap nukes for the win

Atherakhia.4086:

Zorion.7504:

Atherakhia.4086:

Okaishi.8320:

You keep saying this, But dont you realize that removing aoe cap would insta kill all ellies in your exampels due to retaliation.
Ellies with 9k HP that hit anything from 10+ players Will just insta kill themself.
If removing aoe cap would Do anything för ellies it would be using them för support more, cause glass cannon aoe ellies would never exist Long if the cap got removed.

Try to understand the concept of a suicide hitsquad hiding ikittenerg ball. 10 eles for example. They could be in any gear you want, I presume if they’re hiding ikittenerg ball with the intent to be a suicide squad they’d be in full serkers and knights. Their RTL will crit for 2-4k. With 10 of them that’s 20-40k damage. This damage can’t be stopped or damaged. They’re coming at you at 200% movement speed. They come from 1200 yards away. They have a radius of 600 on the AE. Do you think they care if they die? Do you think you can react to this fast enough to stop them? I’m confident some out there could. But then again they’re eles…. they’ll mist form back to their ball, wait 20 seconds, and do it again.

And that’s just Eles using a pointless skill. By the time the ele’s have died to your example of retaliation, they’ve already got Meteor Shower to the point where it will continue its auto cast given its randomized nature. Lava font as I mentioned has a very large AE when traited, hits for a tone in power gear, and can be left on the ground.

And to my knowledge, retaliation won’t pierce mist form so if the ele is in trouble, they’ll pop a cooldown. And this is of course ignoring that the removal of AE caps now allows Necros to consume all boons on every target.

/shrug.

And then ONE or TWO guardians uses Shield Sphere and stops ALL of them.

GOOD COUNTER PLAY.

I agree that retaliation needs toning down, but then again it doesn’t either. If your spamming AOEs and not watching the enemies buffs. (For example, Necromancers can strip boons before they use there AOEs and then spread the love.) Then you deserve that death.

GOOD GAMEPLAY DECISIONS

Removing the AOE Cap will make sieging fun again, no more blobbing.

What they should do is remove the AoE limit for damage and conditions, but keep it for buffs.

- But I don’t PvP. And so, they should only do this if zerg mobs are seen as a problem. If zerging is the desired tactic (in ArenaNet’s opinion), then leave as is.

They’d also have to change the way loot is acquired. Everybody will want to play a class that can tag enemies the easy way, considering you can simply tag a whole zerg then.

Kichwas.7152:

What they should do is remove the AoE limit for damage and conditions, but keep it for buffs.

So people finally stop playing any support role at all. Smart move.

Daecollo.9578:

And then ONE or TWO guardians uses Shield Sphere and stops ALL of them.

GOOD COUNTER PLAY.

I doubt in those big fights the guardians will be able to react fast enough to cast a 1.5s duration Sanctuary/Shield of Absorption spell. RtL takes 2s from start to finish.

Also, the RtL users can be stealthed or under Stability if needed.

If AoE cap is removed it should indeed be removed for both dmg and boons.
This dosnt mean that shadow refugee or the such will be irritatingly annoying again, just make them party buffs.

There are some buff skills that indeed should only work for party members, and if you want to use them on more then 5 players you use combo fields.

1 thief shouldnt be able to stealth 60 players I agree, but 1 offhand pistol thief with any blast finisher should be able to stealth 60 players.

I dont belive that removing aoe cap will be insta OP skills etc etc, somethings will need tweaking into party buffs, but mostly its the zerging that will change.

zerg vs zerg with perma speed/regeneratio/protection and no aoe cap on dmg skills, will make it so fights lasts longer, single combat will probably happen more often, today its never any 1vs1 1vs 3 in a blob crash.

stof.9341:

I doubt in those big fights the guardians will be able to react fast enough to cast a 1.5s duration Sanctuary/Shield of Absorption spell. RtL takes 2s from start to finish.

Also, the RtL users can be stealthed or under Stability if needed.

It kinda sounds like RTL might be the problem. The list of charges which can’t be countered in this game is pretty short.

If AoE Limit were removed:

- I would kill myself faster against zergs who apply the turtle tactic because of Retaliation if I cast even a single AoE on them.
- The turtle tactic would remain the same, if before they could pull it successfully with healing, healing wouldn’t also have a limit and things would be the same. Absorptions, protections and reflections would have the same value as well, since these don’t apply for the AoE limit.
- Weak, disorganized turtles would fall quick because they wouldn’t be able to outheal / absorb the damage.
- Big zergs vs Small zergs would be more balanced for both sides. The bigger zerg already has the advantage in numbers, but this means that AoE controls and damage would work best for the small zerg since the big zerg has more players (meaning more players taking damage).
- For all types of battles, more skilled play would roll, such avoiding AoEs, more spreading, group composition, coordination, these would be more valuable than just having more players.
- Having more players is still a big advantage, they also have AoEs and without the AoE limit, means they have more firepower as well. If the outnumbered group doesn’t play smart, they’ll get wiped faster.
- A 30~ group has no problems fighting 3 groups of 10 in a row, if the 10 group plays “smart”, they’ll end up running because they lack the firepower. Without the AoE limit, the 3 groups of 10 actually has a decent chance of wiping the 30 group if they play better. Again, more points for skilled play.

So if you think about it, in nearly all situations you’ll get better results for more skilled play without the AoE limit. Some things will still remain the same, such as zerging still being desireable (30 is better than 10, always), but wouldn’t put the smaller groups into a higher disadvantage than they already have.

Atherakhia.4086:

Adding more depth to this game is never a bad thing. Adding unlimited AE or forcing 2 rulesets (1 for PvE and 1 for PvP) isn’t a solution.

I beg to differ; GW1 had split rulesets for PVE and PVP so you could have PVE only imba skills while maintaining balance in PVP. Forcing 2 rulesets is a good solution that has been implemented in their previous game.

declan.3968:

Atherakhia.4086:

Adding more depth to this game is never a bad thing. Adding unlimited AE or forcing 2 rulesets (1 for PvE and 1 for PvP) isn’t a solution.

I beg to differ; GW1 had split rulesets for PVE and PVP so you could have PVE only imba skills while maintaining balance in PVP. Forcing 2 rulesets is a good solution that has been implemented in their previous game.

There are already skills that are different in PvE and PvP. But WvW is considered PvE, and there any AoE changes have the biggest impact.

Atherakhia.4086:

A game should never need different rules for PvE and PvP. Especially a game like this where PvE is nothing more than a distraction to prepare you for PvP. Now as for AE CC and such, I’m very much in favor of this and I was shocked to find no real dispels, purges, controls, and heals in PvP in this game.

There’s just no depth to PvP in this game. And without any depth you limit the number of tactics and strategies players need to succeed. And when players don’t need tactics or strategy to succeed they clump up in a ball and play follow the leader all day.

Adding more depth to this game is never a bad thing. Adding unlimited AE or forcing 2 rulesets (1 for PvE and 1 for PvP) isn’t a solution.

Which game are you playing exactly? GW2 already has different rules for PvE and PvP.

Everybody is saying that AOE without a cap would be OP against the zerg. That’s the point. We’re talking about a way to discourage people bunching up into large groups which results in the uninteresting gameplay you mention. Don’t want to get murdered by AOE? Don’t all stand in the same spot. Be aware of your surroundings. Think and whatnot.

Of course AOE would be OP without a cap against the zerg. You know when it wouldn’t be? If 10 people weren’t standing in the same spot. Then it would be exactly the same as it is now The idea is to encourage people to spread out.

Listen, removing the aoe cap won’t even change the majority of combat situations. The only time it will make a difference is when you have more than 5 people standing in the middle of an aoe which is exactly what we’re trying to discourage. At all other times, there would be no difference in aoe.

Your reasoning is backwards. People don’t ball up into zergs because the game lacks depth and tactics. They ball up into zergs because it is the best tactic. People will always follow the path of least resistance. So until you make it dangerous for everyone to stand in the same spot, people will continue to do so.

The Rooster.2615:

Atherakhia.4086:

A game should never need different rules for PvE and PvP. Especially a game like this where PvE is nothing more than a distraction to prepare you for PvP. Now as for AE CC and such, I’m very much in favor of this and I was shocked to find no real dispels, purges, controls, and heals in PvP in this game.

There’s just no depth to PvP in this game. And without any depth you limit the number of tactics and strategies players need to succeed. And when players don’t need tactics or strategy to succeed they clump up in a ball and play follow the leader all day.

Adding more depth to this game is never a bad thing. Adding unlimited AE or forcing 2 rulesets (1 for PvE and 1 for PvP) isn’t a solution.

Which game are you playing exactly? GW2 already has different rules for PvE and PvP.

Everybody is saying that AOE without a cap would be OP against the zerg. That’s the point. We’re talking about a way to discourage people bunching up into large groups which results in the uninteresting gameplay you mention. Don’t want to get murdered by AOE? Don’t all stand in the same spot. Be aware of your surroundings. Think and whatnot.

Of course AOE would be OP without a cap against the zerg. You know when it wouldn’t be? If 10 people weren’t standing in the same spot. Then it would be exactly the same as it is now The idea is to encourage people to spread out.

Listen, removing the aoe cap won’t even change the majority of combat situations. The only time it will make a difference is when you have more than 5 people standing in the middle of an aoe which is exactly what we’re trying to discourage. At all other times, there would be no difference in aoe.

Your reasoning is backwards. People don’t ball up into zergs because the game lacks depth and tactics. They ball up into zergs because it is the best tactic. People will always follow the path of least resistance. So until you make it dangerous for everyone to stand in the same spot, people will continue to do so.

The rule differences are subtle. Like not being able to use elite skills and things of that nature (which is ignored for various classes). They aren’t making a spell work entirely different depending on where you choose to play.

Zerging is the best tactic because it’s the only one to choose. I’ve played dozens of mmos and all used zerging. Only a few offered no real solution to it. None of which had limitless AE.

And I’ve already pointed out with the hunter scenario that 30 people in a courtyard spread out will still be covered with AE, aren’t balled up, and would all die without the ability to retaliate.

If you want ‘more AE’ then why not give it to more classes? Why should Rangers need to channel their barrage? Why can’t Guardians have a second ranged AE? Why can’t Warriors have a 1200 yard ranged AE? Why is thief AE travel time so slow? Why aren’t there classes that can drop AE spells that pulse AE knockbacks to dispurse zergs? Why aren’t doesn’t the mesmer spell that reflects spell reflect AE’s back onto the enemy zerg and damage them?

Dozens of better ways to ‘nerf zerging’ than just removing an AE cap that will do nothing but open up the door to even more abuse, further alienate classes, and ultimately not change anything when it comes to zerg play.

Atherakhia.4086:

The Rooster.2615:

Atherakhia.4086:

A game should never need different rules for PvE and PvP. Especially a game like this where PvE is nothing more than a distraction to prepare you for PvP. Now as for AE CC and such, I’m very much in favor of this and I was shocked to find no real dispels, purges, controls, and heals in PvP in this game.

There’s just no depth to PvP in this game. And without any depth you limit the number of tactics and strategies players need to succeed. And when players don’t need tactics or strategy to succeed they clump up in a ball and play follow the leader all day.

Adding more depth to this game is never a bad thing. Adding unlimited AE or forcing 2 rulesets (1 for PvE and 1 for PvP) isn’t a solution.

Which game are you playing exactly? GW2 already has different rules for PvE and PvP.

Everybody is saying that AOE without a cap would be OP against the zerg. That’s the point. We’re talking about a way to discourage people bunching up into large groups which results in the uninteresting gameplay you mention. Don’t want to get murdered by AOE? Don’t all stand in the same spot. Be aware of your surroundings. Think and whatnot.

Of course AOE would be OP without a cap against the zerg. You know when it wouldn’t be? If 10 people weren’t standing in the same spot. Then it would be exactly the same as it is now The idea is to encourage people to spread out.

Listen, removing the aoe cap won’t even change the majority of combat situations. The only time it will make a difference is when you have more than 5 people standing in the middle of an aoe which is exactly what we’re trying to discourage. At all other times, there would be no difference in aoe.

Your reasoning is backwards. People don’t ball up into zergs because the game lacks depth and tactics. They ball up into zergs because it is the best tactic. People will always follow the path of least resistance. So until you make it dangerous for everyone to stand in the same spot, people will continue to do so.

The rule differences are subtle. Like not being able to use elite skills and things of that nature (which is ignored for various classes). They aren’t making a spell work entirely different depending on where you choose to play.

Zerging is the best tactic because it’s the only one to choose. I’ve played dozens of mmos and all used zerging. Only a few offered no real solution to it. None of which had limitless AE.

And I’ve already pointed out with the hunter scenario that 30 people in a courtyard spread out will still be covered with AE, aren’t balled up, and would all die without the ability to retaliate.

If you want ‘more AE’ then why not give it to more classes? Why should Rangers need to channel their barrage? Why can’t Guardians have a second ranged AE? Why can’t Warriors have a 1200 yard ranged AE? Why is thief AE travel time so slow? Why aren’t there classes that can drop AE spells that pulse AE knockbacks to dispurse zergs? Why aren’t doesn’t the mesmer spell that reflects spell reflect AE’s back onto the enemy zerg and damage them?

Dozens of better ways to ‘nerf zerging’ than just removing an AE cap that will do nothing but open up the door to even more abuse, further alienate classes, and ultimately not change anything when it comes to zerg play.

If they are spread out, then the 5 aoe limit does not even matter. What point are you trying to make? The current way it is, all 30 of them are balled up because it increases there survivability dramatically.

Daecollo.9578:

Atherakhia.4086:

The Rooster.2615:

Atherakhia.4086:

A game should never need different rules for PvE and PvP. Especially a game like this where PvE is nothing more than a distraction to prepare you for PvP. Now as for AE CC and such, I’m very much in favor of this and I was shocked to find no real dispels, purges, controls, and heals in PvP in this game.

There’s just no depth to PvP in this game. And without any depth you limit the number of tactics and strategies players need to succeed. And when players don’t need tactics or strategy to succeed they clump up in a ball and play follow the leader all day.

Adding more depth to this game is never a bad thing. Adding unlimited AE or forcing 2 rulesets (1 for PvE and 1 for PvP) isn’t a solution.

Which game are you playing exactly? GW2 already has different rules for PvE and PvP.

Everybody is saying that AOE without a cap would be OP against the zerg. That’s the point. We’re talking about a way to discourage people bunching up into large groups which results in the uninteresting gameplay you mention. Don’t want to get murdered by AOE? Don’t all stand in the same spot. Be aware of your surroundings. Think and whatnot.

Of course AOE would be OP without a cap against the zerg. You know when it wouldn’t be? If 10 people weren’t standing in the same spot. Then it would be exactly the same as it is now The idea is to encourage people to spread out.

Listen, removing the aoe cap won’t even change the majority of combat situations. The only time it will make a difference is when you have more than 5 people standing in the middle of an aoe which is exactly what we’re trying to discourage. At all other times, there would be no difference in aoe.

Your reasoning is backwards. People don’t ball up into zergs because the game lacks depth and tactics. They ball up into zergs because it is the best tactic. People will always follow the path of least resistance. So until you make it dangerous for everyone to stand in the same spot, people will continue to do so.

The rule differences are subtle. Like not being able to use elite skills and things of that nature (which is ignored for various classes). They aren’t making a spell work entirely different depending on where you choose to play.

Zerging is the best tactic because it’s the only one to choose. I’ve played dozens of mmos and all used zerging. Only a few offered no real solution to it. None of which had limitless AE.

And I’ve already pointed out with the hunter scenario that 30 people in a courtyard spread out will still be covered with AE, aren’t balled up, and would all die without the ability to retaliate.

If you want ‘more AE’ then why not give it to more classes? Why should Rangers need to channel their barrage? Why can’t Guardians have a second ranged AE? Why can’t Warriors have a 1200 yard ranged AE? Why is thief AE travel time so slow? Why aren’t there classes that can drop AE spells that pulse AE knockbacks to dispurse zergs? Why aren’t doesn’t the mesmer spell that reflects spell reflect AE’s back onto the enemy zerg and damage them?

Dozens of better ways to ‘nerf zerging’ than just removing an AE cap that will do nothing but open up the door to even more abuse, further alienate classes, and ultimately not change anything when it comes to zerg play.

If they are spread out, then the 5 aoe limit does not even matter. What point are you trying to make? The current way it is, all 30 of them are balled up because it increases there survivability dramatically.

The 5 AE limit is still important because all 30 of them could still be under barrage’s circle but only 5 could be hit. Whereas without it, all 30 would be hit even though they aren’t balled up.. they’re spread out all over the courtyard to the keep. Only they can’t fire back due to the wall’s lip, the rangers have them all perma snared and bleeding, and barrage has a 100% chance to crit.

Removing the cap is a terrible idea because it opens up the game to this kind of abuse.

Atherakhia.4086:

Daecollo.9578:

Atherakhia.4086:

The Rooster.2615:

Atherakhia.4086:

A game should never need different rules for PvE and PvP. Especially a game like this where PvE is nothing more than a distraction to prepare you for PvP. Now as for AE CC and such, I’m very much in favor of this and I was shocked to find no real dispels, purges, controls, and heals in PvP in this game.

There’s just no depth to PvP in this game. And without any depth you limit the number of tactics and strategies players need to succeed. And when players don’t need tactics or strategy to succeed they clump up in a ball and play follow the leader all day.

Adding more depth to this game is never a bad thing. Adding unlimited AE or forcing 2 rulesets (1 for PvE and 1 for PvP) isn’t a solution.

Which game are you playing exactly? GW2 already has different rules for PvE and PvP.

Everybody is saying that AOE without a cap would be OP against the zerg. That’s the point. We’re talking about a way to discourage people bunching up into large groups which results in the uninteresting gameplay you mention. Don’t want to get murdered by AOE? Don’t all stand in the same spot. Be aware of your surroundings. Think and whatnot.

Of course AOE would be OP without a cap against the zerg. You know when it wouldn’t be? If 10 people weren’t standing in the same spot. Then it would be exactly the same as it is now The idea is to encourage people to spread out.

Listen, removing the aoe cap won’t even change the majority of combat situations. The only time it will make a difference is when you have more than 5 people standing in the middle of an aoe which is exactly what we’re trying to discourage. At all other times, there would be no difference in aoe.

Your reasoning is backwards. People don’t ball up into zergs because the game lacks depth and tactics. They ball up into zergs because it is the best tactic. People will always follow the path of least resistance. So until you make it dangerous for everyone to stand in the same spot, people will continue to do so.

The rule differences are subtle. Like not being able to use elite skills and things of that nature (which is ignored for various classes). They aren’t making a spell work entirely different depending on where you choose to play.

Zerging is the best tactic because it’s the only one to choose. I’ve played dozens of mmos and all used zerging. Only a few offered no real solution to it. None of which had limitless AE.

And I’ve already pointed out with the hunter scenario that 30 people in a courtyard spread out will still be covered with AE, aren’t balled up, and would all die without the ability to retaliate.

If you want ‘more AE’ then why not give it to more classes? Why should Rangers need to channel their barrage? Why can’t Guardians have a second ranged AE? Why can’t Warriors have a 1200 yard ranged AE? Why is thief AE travel time so slow? Why aren’t there classes that can drop AE spells that pulse AE knockbacks to dispurse zergs? Why aren’t doesn’t the mesmer spell that reflects spell reflect AE’s back onto the enemy zerg and damage them?

Dozens of better ways to ‘nerf zerging’ than just removing an AE cap that will do nothing but open up the door to even more abuse, further alienate classes, and ultimately not change anything when it comes to zerg play.

If they are spread out, then the 5 aoe limit does not even matter. What point are you trying to make? The current way it is, all 30 of them are balled up because it increases there survivability dramatically.

The 5 AE limit is still important because all 30 of them could still be under barrage’s circle but only 5 could be hit. Whereas without it, all 30 would be hit even though they aren’t balled up.. they’re spread out all over the courtyard to the keep. Only they can’t fire back due to the wall’s lip, the rangers have them all perma snared and bleeding, and barrage has a 100% chance to crit.

Removing the cap is a terrible idea because it opens up the game to this kind of abuse.

Then they should play smarter. Barrage SHOULD do that. If they see a ranger Barraging they can use defensive moves to repel it, like Guardian Sphere or other things as a direct counter.

Well of Power Target area pulses, converting conditions on allies into boons, turning that cripple into swiftness, same duration as barrage. ONE example, this also can heal allies as well.

Your offering “ONLY” the diminishing factor and not the defensive factor.

The players in the keep defending “SHOULD” have an advantage over the ones not defending. Do you know how hard it was back then to take a keep?

You say “Abusive Gameplay” I say the current system is pretty much a “Player Skill Cap.” Removing such will make good players stand out over bads which it is how it is suppost to be. Artificial skill caps are unhealthy and make games more and more boring, old games never had such things, which is why people still play them.

Atherakhia.4086:

The 5 AE limit is still important because all 30 of them could still be under barrage’s circle but only 5 could be hit. Whereas without it, all 30 would be hit even though they aren’t balled up.. they’re spread out all over the courtyard to the keep. Only they can’t fire back due to the wall’s lip, the rangers have them all perma snared and bleeding, and barrage has a 100% chance to crit.

Removing the cap is a terrible idea because it opens up the game to this kind of abuse.

That just doesn’t make sense. They’re either balled up and the aoe cap is a factor, or they’re spread out and it is not. What is it that you’re trying to argue?

If you’re standing in an aoe, the counter is to dodge out of it. If you’re talking about people spreading aoes over a large area to encompass a large amount of people, there is no difference from the current game mechanics as people are not stacked up. I’ll say it again, the only time removing the aoe cap makes a difference at all is when more than 5 people are standing in it. At all other times there is absolutely no difference from the current game mechanics. The solution? Avoid having large numbers of people stand in the same spot so as to avoid getting melted by uncapped aoe. You now have a choice, follow a mindless zerg and be killed mindlessly. Or think, be aware of your surroundings, spread out to avoid aoe but work to not get too separated from your group, employ tactics to exploit weak spots in enemy formations. In other words, use some skill.

Daecollo.9578:

You say “Abusive Gameplay” I say the current system is pretty much a “Player Skill Cap.” Removing such will make good players stand out over bads which it is how it is suppost to be. Artificial skill caps are unhealthy and make games more and more boring, old games never had such things, which is why people still play them.

This too.

I don’t know how many different ways you want me to explain the same thing. AE’s don’t have a 5 yard radius. They have a 300 yard radius. Which means they have a 600 yard area to deal damage. In a keep’s courtyard, a single AE of that size can cover 75% of all open land. Fortunately, there’s a 5 player cap so not everyone will be hit running up the ramp to the lord’s room. Your change would make it so everyone under that rather large AE is now being hit by a move that ticks for 1k a second, snares you, applies bleeds, and has a 100% chance to crit. You then multiply by several Rangers and you’re left with an enormous amount of power provided to a relatively small number of people against odds they should have lost against without tactics or skill playing any part in it. All they did was stood on a ledge and targeted the ground.

If you can’t follow it that time then so be it.

Now these are the areas that an AE without a cap has:

1.) It provides enormous power to a very small number of classes because so few classes actually have any real AE option.

2.) It doesn’t resolve anything because zergs will still ball up regardless. All it does it shift balance from a specific set of classes to another.

3.) It opens up the game to even more abuse because some AE’s ignore LOS, others aren’t counterable (RTL), others provide too many side effects.

The issue right now is how the amount of boons, blast heals, and things of that nature nullify a lot of the effects of AE in this game. Why not propose something reasonable like increase the AE cap to 10 but leave the beneficial boons/blasts to 5? This way more weight is placed on the offensive side of things instead of equal weight on offense and defense?

Why not simply introduce more AE into the game? Why not AE that actually has a real impact on a zerg? Like give thieves a shadow field skill that pulses every second blinding up to 5 targets? Why not give Warriors a move that spawns a tornado that doesn’t move and pulses once a second knocking up to 5 targets 300 yards away? Why not make Mesmers reflect actually affect enemy AE so people under the AE can only cast AE’s in the circle of influence and if they cast, it actually hurts allies? Why can’t Rangers get an explosive collar and send their pets darting into the zerg to explode into a horrendou ball of blood and fur?

It just feels like the people who suggest removing the AE cap don’t have a real grasp on just how many different AE’s there are, how they can be used, and how few classes actually have them.

Atherakhia.4086:

I don’t know how many different ways you want me to explain the same thing. AE’s don’t have a 5 yard radius. They have a 300 yard radius. Which means they have a 600 yard area to deal damage. In a keep’s
courtyard, a single AE of that size can cover 75% of all open land.

I honestly have no idea how you came to the conclusion that 600 yards = 75% of all open land in a keep.

Atherakhia.4086:

Fortunately, there’s a 5 player cap so not everyone will be hit running up the ramp to the lord’s room. Your change would make it so everyone under that rather large AE is now being hit by a move that ticks for 1k a second, snares you, applies bleeds, and has a 100% chance to crit.

For as long as you stand in it, yes. Do you make a habit of standing in aoes for their entire duration? This also means that people can’t just run blindly up the ramp to the lord’s room.And once again, the only time this would be any different from the current game mechanics is if more than 5 people are standing in the aoe. If people simply spread out (which is the intended result) then there is no difference.

Atherakhia.4086:

You then multiply by several Rangers and you’re left with an enormous amount of power provided to a relatively small number of people against odds they should have lost against without tactics or skill playing any part in it. All they did was stood on a ledge and targeted the ground.

If you can’t follow it that time then so be it.

You are assuming that these rangers with an enormous amount of power (lol, btw. Ask on the Ranger forums how many of them feel they would have an enormous amount of power simply by removing the aoe cap from one of their skills) would decimate all odds. This is only true if their targets stand in their aoe and let themselves die. Or to use your own words, not use tactics or skill.

Why do you assume that everyone is going to sit still in the red circles? If they do, they should die. You’re now invariably going to argue that these all powerful rangers can spread their aoe out to encompass a large area. (Or as one might call it, “using tactics”) Now if 5 rangers can do this well enough to wipe a zerg, which would be all but impossible due to the long cooldown on lb#5, then that zerg deserves to be wiped.

The only way to do enough damage fast enough to wipe a zerg would be to stack the aoes in the same spot, in which case anyone with half a brain is going to move out of that spot. If the aoes are spread out, then they’re doing a normal amount of damage in each one which is not going to wipe anyone. What it will do is pressure them back and make them unable to blindly charge up to a gate, stand in one spot and knock it down.

Atherakhia.4086:

Now these are the areas that an AE without a cap has:

1.) It provides enormous power to a very small number of classes because so few classes actually have any real AE option.

2.) It doesn’t resolve anything because zergs will still ball up regardless. All it does it shift balance from a specific set of classes to another.

3.) It opens up the game to even more abuse because some AE’s ignore LOS, others aren’t counterable (RTL), others provide too many side effects.

1. The enormous power you’re referring to is countered by simply not standing in those red circles that all have long cooldowns.

2. How can you argue that the aoe will have enormous power to wipe zergs, and that zergs will still ball up regardless? You’re contradicting your own argument.

3. AEs that ignore LOS are the exception as opposed to the rule. There are very few of them in comparison and are hardly used for “abuse”. I’m assuming by RTL you mean retaliation… which is not an aoe.

Atherakhia.4086:

The issue right now is how the amount of boons, blast heals, and things of that nature nullify a lot of the effects of AE in this game. Why not propose something reasonable like increase the AE cap to 10 but leave the beneficial boons/blasts to 5? This way more weight is placed on the offensive side of things instead of equal weight on offense and defense?

Two thumbs up. I’m all for it.

Atherakhia.4086:

Why not simply introduce more AE into the game? Why not AE that actually has a real impact on a zerg? Like give thieves a shadow field skill that pulses every second blinding up to 5 targets? Why not give Warriors a move that spawns a tornado that doesn’t move and pulses once a second knocking up to 5 targets 300 yards away? Why not make Mesmers reflect actually affect enemy AE so people under the AE can only cast AE’s in the circle of influence and if they cast, it actually hurts allies? Why can’t Rangers get an explosive collar and send their pets darting into the zerg to explode into a horrendou ball of blood and fur?

While these are interesting, the likelihood of any or all of these being incorporated is minimal. Adding multiple new skills to different classes requires far more balancing than simply increasing or removing the aoe cap.

Atherakhia.4086:

It just feels like the people who suggest removing the AE cap don’t have a real grasp on just how many different AE’s there are, how they can be used, and how few classes actually have them.

We fully understand it. We understand it would make WvW much more difficult. It will indeed be VERY difficult to take a well defended keep. This is exactly the kind of change we are asking for.

Atherakhia.4086:

It just feels like the people who suggest removing the AE cap don’t have a real grasp on just how many different AE’s there are, how they can be used, and how few classes actually have them.

Your arguments consistently ignore an important point. Both offense and defense have access to the same professions, skills and siege weapons. Sure, a bunch of elementalists can blanket a courtyard, at which point the hard counter would be the same number of rangers with Eagle Eye Barraging their position.

The AoE cap functions as a crutch for mindless play, the design of the keeps and WvWvW in general feeds into the problem.

While I admit that the need to address total AoE, including status effects, boons and damage altogether is a daunting prospect, I believe it is necessary to keep WvWvW viable for the long term. But to sit back and argue that a 5 target cap for AoE makes sense, and that clustering in red circles is the best and smartest tactic just seems stupid. To hear a commander or someone shout to sit in Meteor Storms to lessen the damage is crazy. Its counter-intuitive and from a gameplay perspective makes zero sense. Especially when you throw in the fact that players who play the PvE side are taught from level 1 to NOT stand in red circles, especially in harder content like dungeons and fractals.

A few changes that would help WvWvW, including removal of the AoE cap would be:

1. To break down a door or wall, siege must be used. Player skills can kill other players on top of walls, but do no damage against keep walls/doors. Rams now have a destructible/repairable roof that protect their operators from AoE damage but not melee attacks. This puts the focus of keep sieges on siege items, and makes protecting supply lines very important, and sending raiding parties to hit supply as part of a keep defense a valuable tactic. No more Wammos banging down gates with Twilight.

2. Siege weapons can be manned by anybody. So its no longer a good idea to leave a trebuchet sitting on a hill once you’ve smashed through a wall/gate, as the defenders could send out a small party to flank, take the weapon and siege the invaders with their own weapon!

3. As part of the above, siege weapons can now be broken down and partially recovered. The person who purchased the blueprint gets the blueprint placed back in their inventory, but the supply used is spent (unless a way can be figured to return a percentage, based on the total health of the siege weapon, of supply back to surrounding camps/players). This allows the use of a lot more siege, which is required as player skills can no longer effect a breach, apart from killing defenders.

I’m sure there are more ideas, but these are just a few I could think of in short order.

Kaleban.9834:

Snip

A few changes that would help WvWvW, including removal of the AoE cap would be:

1. To break down a door or wall, siege must be used. Player skills can kill other players on top of walls, but do no damage against keep walls/doors. Rams now have a destructible/repairable roof that protect their operators from AoE damage but not melee attacks. This puts the focus of keep sieges on siege items, and makes protecting supply lines very important, and sending raiding parties to hit supply as part of a keep defense a valuable tactic. No more Wammos banging down gates with Twilight.

2. Siege weapons can be manned by anybody. So its no longer a good idea to leave a trebuchet sitting on a hill once you’ve smashed through a wall/gate, as the defenders could send out a small party to flank, take the weapon and siege the invaders with their own weapon!

3. As part of the above, siege weapons can now be broken down and partially recovered. The person who purchased the blueprint gets the blueprint placed back in their inventory, but the supply used is spent (unless a way can be figured to return a percentage, based on the total health of the siege weapon, of supply back to surrounding camps/players). This allows the use of a lot more siege, which is required as player skills can no longer effect a breach, apart from killing defenders.

I’m sure there are more ideas, but these are just a few I could think of in short order.

1) Doesn’t work well in A.Net’s ideas. They already significantly reduced player damage to doors and walls by 1/10th of what they used to be. However, damage still needs to be done because players still want to fell like they’re contributing, even a very small nearly insignificant amount. With only allowing siege, you’ll see either cases of where only the single ram operator has any role in the siege at all for a length of time, or people dropping multiple prints all over willy-nilly to try to feel important (this causes a domino effect of both chugging down the area with more artifacts within that area as well as supply spread thinly across many incomplete build sites).

2) This one I’ll agree with. It would be good that siege can be manned by anyone…after a certain length of time of abandonment (5 minutes). Because having a stealth Thief come up behind your ballista operator, stunning him to knock him off the thing, then taking control of it and using the Ballista on your entire group of field soldiers is just madness and absurdity.

3) No, cost is cost. I see no need to break down what’s there to recover. That would cause issues with how supply camps work in their current mechanic form. Breakdown is fine if there’s no recovery, so that allies can clear out trash siege for better siege if they so choose within that same area (restrictions of time, ownership, and so on of course).

But that’s completely here no there as it’s related to siege weaponry mostly only. This thread is basically want to to remove AoE cap to help counter massive zerg-ball operations within the game’s WvW content.

Class imbalance is a non-issue, as this is a team game and each team has the same access to the same classes, races, and builds; Elementalists nuking a whole group of 50 people is an absurd assumption that cannot be backed in any way shape or form (especially when it’s coming with the same ability every time which is Meteor Show, a long cast, long cooldown ability that has a random chance to hit people within a defined static red ring that they can move out of).

Notes:

-Everyone has the ability to dodge, the developers want them to learn to use it in combat as a key feature.

-AoE’s are clearly spelled out for people with red or white rings for dangerous or helpful abilities.

-Keeps do not have a single entry point and can be broken into from multiple places at the same time.

-Siege equipment is there to use, not just be ignored due to you having an overwhelmingly large group as a “substitution”.

-Hiding in a large group should not be a method to avoid damage, being in an area set to be damaging should apply the same conditions of damage to everyone who crosses into that area.

So key-idea is to make AoE so overpowered that whole game revolves around it?

People zerg because that’s easy and it gives best personal rewards.

Aoe is always going to be the most important thing in a pvp mode that pits groups of 50+ against each other, cap or no cap. Thing is, the natural counter to aoe that has a target cap is to stack up, which is the exact opposite of the natural counter to aoe in both real life and every video game ever: spread out.

Aoes in games like WoW have to work differently because they generally are instant-effect and so cannot be avoided or countered. Aoes here are very slow, have long cooldowns and take a very long time to deal their full damage. People say ‘whole area gets blanketed by aoe, dodge what now?’ but that would be a death sentence with or without a cap.

The clearest indication that uncapped aoe is not game breaking is meteor shower. The large number of hits that all have independent target caps allow the spell to pretty much ignore the aoe cap, but you don’t see whole zergs crumbling under the iron fist of the elementalist now do you?

I’m also seeing a lot of talk about being able to simply carpet bomb the keep lord’s room. Besides the fact that siege already allows this; I think we need to remember that if the enemy is in range, so are you. Plenty of classes also have ways of simply brute-forcing through the fire with invuls or charges/teleports that could be used to break through and disrupt the aoe defensive.

The issue is more what do you remove the limit for.

AOE Damage
AOE Conditions
AOE Boons
Healing

If you remove the cap for damage you have to remove the cap for conditions, if you remove the cap for conditions you have to remove the cap for Boons to remove those conditions and balance out the negative

The issue is that means that some skills would be overpowered , Shadows refuge could make an entire zerg invisible and AOE cripple would slow an entire zerg down, mix that with AOE damage and so many players will die instantly.

Timewarp on an entire zerg? Mass healers supporting the DPS meaning a smaller group cant dent anyone?

so many things could go wrong with removing the cap up it to 10 to start with and see how it goes

@coldtart finally somone that understands how aoe works ._.
Notice how many players don t want aoe cap removal in fear of meteor shower….that displays quite a lack of knowledge….

Meteor shower IS affected by the target cap … And it would be much stronger without.

Kaleban.9834:

But to sit back and argue that a 5 target cap for AoE makes sense, and that clustering in red circles is the best and smartest tactic just seems stupid. To hear a commander or someone shout to sit in Meteor Storms to lessen the damage is crazy.

Have you actually tried this? Alot of people don’t seem to understand how aoe mechanics work in this game. Whilst most aoe damage has a limit to the number of concurrent enemies that can be hit, clustering in red circles will still get you utterly destroyed.

The absolute best way of mitigating damage is to avoid taking it altogether or to block/evade it. A team that clusters for reasons of buff synergy should be running avoiding red circles, not standing in meteor showers or whatever. Even if you have the active healing and damage mitigation to stand in aoe dots, you still don’t want to do this because players on your team will have to use skills to mitigate negative effects they can completely avoid for free or at lesser cost if they had the group mobility and freedom of movement to run through it or around it.

Immobile stacking used to work because certain skills like Empower and Virtue of Resolve used to provide an uncapped area heal, so if you ran the correct ratio of guardians to everyone else, you could do ridiculous things like this.