How to fix Stronghold

How to fix Stronghold

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Posted by: Celeras.4980

Celeras.4980

I posted this mid-season, but it was swept away by the complaint posts. I figured now that the season is over (and before the new balance QQ starts) I can give it another shot. Seeing as ArenaNet implemented my exact suggestion to remedy smurfing (https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/pvp/Suggestion-on-how-you-fix-smurfing/), I figured I’d give Stronghold a whirl.

The problems with Stronghold are the rush and general lack of PvP. The meta is a lame race with minimal enemy engagement. I think two simple changes can take care of this.

1) Players no longer start with any supply.
Tada. Engagements forced. Rush thwarted.

Now maybe you think that won’t matter much past one engagement. Win initial supply push then rush like the old days. Perfectly valid thought and only slightly less lame than the current meta.

2) Gate guards are immune to player damage. Perhaps entirely(overkill?), or perhaps just until a buff is removed via archers or mist champion.

Nobody uses archers because the guards are instantly gibbed by players. Now you need archers, which means you need more supply to push through, which means we can actually fight the other team.

I think that would do it. Thoughts?

(edited by Celeras.4980)

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Posted by: style.6173

style.6173

A good start. Also channeling should cause a player to lose all boons. I want people to fight over the point, not have the player with the longest stability get it.

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Posted by: Ehecatl.9172

Ehecatl.9172

I wouldn’t say Stronghold needs to be fixed. I rather like it the way it is, and have had some of my funnest PVP fights in it due to having open roaming and not being confined into an AoE infested circle.

That being said these changes sound interesting at the very least. As much as I enjoy wiping the guards out with utter ease it isn’t very good for the gamemode as a whole.

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Posted by: Fat Disgrace.4275

Fat Disgrace.4275

Archers are a pain. Few times I have been in a game where people were fighting over mist champion spawns and or, supply and forget about the archers, 2 killed all guards and 1 bomber was left to take down the gates.

The issue is the people Lord rushing in the 2 minutes, and removing supplys on start would just delay that for an extra 20 seconds or so. Can have ri buff on npcs like in wvw camp and tower lords at the start of the game.

Fat Disgrace (banned) Man Flu Survivor – war/The Cabbage -Thief (gunners hold / [TaG])

gw1 – healing signet/frenzy/charge

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Posted by: Exedore.6320

Exedore.6320

@OPs ideas:

1. Do not remove initial supply. The reason players start with supply is to prevent an initial 5v5 at the middle deciding the match. With no starting supply, everyone will head to the middle. Whichever team wins that fight will take full map dominance and you’ll be in a worse snowball situation.

2. Do not make guards more of a gimmick. The NPC guards are a main driver of the PvE feel. Making them highly resistant to player damage only encourages more abuse of the AI, further ignoring player combat.

Better Fixes

1. Doorbreakers die after one attack Damage would need to be increased. This makes killing a single DB more important. It also prevents an initial supply load of DBs from going all the way to the lord. Consider lowering DB HP slightly.

2. Archer damage and HP increased, AI changes Archers ignore players if any gates or guards are alive. Archer damage vs gates increased slightly, HP doubled. Archers become the slower (in terms of damage), but more durable and re-usable alternative to DBs.

3. Guard one-shot DB mechanic gone; guards buffed overall Right now, you can just cheese doorbreakers past guards or even outright kill the guards before they can hit DBs. But if your team isn’t built to do that, guards will cleave multiple DBs with a single slip-up. It’s too binary. Meanwhile, the guards also do nothing to impede players. Guard base damage and HP needs increased. They should be a threat to players, but not require attention over enemy players. AoE snares on the guards would be pretty useful.

4. Damage breaks channels Stability channel on mist essence is just plain silly and should never have gone live. It would be fine if channeling players couldn’t easily have more stability stacks than CC abilities of attackers.

Kirrena Rosenkreutz

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Posted by: Dream Shake.8741

Dream Shake.8741

A good start. Also channeling should cause a player to lose all boons. I want people to fight over the point, not have the player with the longest stability get it.

Completely disagree. It’s a very strategic decision to decide if you got enough hp and stab to make yourself vulnerable for the channel duration. You can be killed, corrupted or CC’d easily in that time.

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Posted by: DeWolfe.2174

DeWolfe.2174

The problems with Stronghold are the rush and general lack of PvP. The meta is a lame race with minimal enemy engagement.

Most of my matches go over 10 minutes and frequently the full 15 minutes. I’m also hitting about 750k damage output sooo… there’s certainly PvP taking place.

Right now I wouldn’t change anything in Stronghold until we see what comes out of the new balance patch.

[AwM] of Jade Quarry.

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Posted by: Celeras.4980

Celeras.4980

@OPs ideas:

1. Do not remove initial supply. The reason players start with supply is to prevent an initial 5v5 at the middle deciding the match. With no starting supply, everyone will head to the middle. Whichever team wins that fight will take full map dominance and you’ll be in a worse snowball situation.

2. Do not make guards more of a gimmick. The NPC guards are a main driver of the PvE feel. Making them highly resistant to player damage only encourages more abuse of the AI, further ignoring player combat.

I could not disagree more. Aside from fully wiping in a 5v5 (which means you’re already terrible), the snowball potential of getting supply is non-existent in trickle form. The map already has built in counterplays, they’re just never used because matches are over in 30 seconds.

As for the guards are the main driver of the PvE feel.. what? How could one even come to that conclusion? They’re a complete afterthought in the current meta. They don’t exist and serve no purpose. As for your suggestions:

1. Doorbreakers die after one attack

Every match would be a stalemate. This is not workable in any sense.

2. Archer damage and HP increased, AI changes

They are still useless if the players can kill guards before they even walk half the distance.

3. Guard one-shot DB mechanic gone; guards buffed overall Right now, you can just cheese doorbreakers past guards or even outright kill the guards before they can hit DBs. But if your team isn’t built to do that, guards will cleave multiple DBs with a single slip-up. It’s too binary. Meanwhile, the guards also do nothing to impede players. Guard base damage and HP needs increased. They should be a threat to players, but not require attention over enemy players. AoE snares on the guards would be pretty useful.

That’s what stronghold needs. More PvE. I don’t think you have a firm grasp on the problems the map actually has.

4. Damage breaks channels Stability channel on mist essence is just plain silly and should never have gone live. It would be fine if channeling players couldn’t easily have more stability stacks than CC abilities of attackers.

They don’t want stalemates at every buff like Temple of the Storm. There are no capture mechanics here to drive players to other locations. It would be an endless stall with little consequence.

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Posted by: Varezenem.2813

Varezenem.2813

If you want to counter the rush strategy start out with 3~4 on defense with a support that’ll probably make you unkillable. Defense requires less people than offense.

Senbu Ren[Wind]
Herald of Ventari

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Posted by: Celeras.4980

Celeras.4980

If you want to counter the rush strategy start out with 3~4 on defense with a support that’ll probably make you unkillable. Defense requires less people than offense.

Have you even played Stronghold? You want to counter a 5 man rush by sending 3-4 people, fighting outnumbered, and trying to kill DBs with the entire other team supporting them?

Wins don’t get any easier.

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Posted by: DeWolfe.2174

DeWolfe.2174

matches are over in 30 seconds.

Have you even played Stronghold?

I’m really beginning to wonder how much you’ve played Stronghold?

[AwM] of Jade Quarry.

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Posted by: Celeras.4980

Celeras.4980

30 seconds was an exaggeration. The average match would be approximately two or three minutes if I were trying to be accurate. If you disagree, you’re wrong.

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Posted by: Valkyriez.6578

Valkyriez.6578

Where are these short SH matches? Every single time I do stronghold of times out after the full 15 minutes.

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Posted by: Furienify.5738

Furienify.5738

Short SH matches are really common on regional off-hours and in lower tiers. New players get matched with more experienced ones, have no idea what they’re doing, and generally never defend until it’s too late. Experienced players try to exploit this by rushing, even though uncoordinated rushes can be easily shut down.

In my experience, a solid 5v5 full of players of even footing and knowledge will go to time 90% of the time. These matches tend to be brutal back-and-forth slugfests, and probably my favorite part of GW2 PvP so far.

But Stronghold does have several problems, and I’m curious as to what it has in store for the future. Off the top of my head:

1. The precarious balance of healing. A strong, organized escort team can succeed in a doorbreaker rush almost 100% of the time. The only real counter is to go for an escort/rush of your own, and unless you’ve got a mirror comp, you will probably fail. The recent buffs to Thief/Warrior damage, Necro boonstrip, and nerfs to Elementalist make this reality less certain than it was before. But it will loom over any future changes.

2. Reapers/Druids being completely god mode in Mist Champion fights. Stability OP.

3. Archers sucking.

4. Mist Champions having poor follow-through. Their war cries are great. Their lord room abilities are great. It’s the in-between that sucks. They take ages to reach enemy territory and do poor gate damage. There’s no point in committing to escorting them because they cross a big swathe of no-man’s-land where you have no objectives to contest. Very rarely will your champion reach the enemy gate, thus forcing a fight with you benefiting from their auras, with the enemy’s gate low enough that it drops before they do.

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Posted by: Atharian.7092

Atharian.7092

I do not agree. The only issue I have with the mode is that a skilled healer can make a minion wave kitten near immortal. If that was not the case, it would be easy to rush them down and force a supply fight or to force them to defend their gate. The meta right now is entirely based on having a healer escort your breakers and keeping them alive.

(edited by Atharian.7092)

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Posted by: kuritsutian.2987

kuritsutian.2987

1) Players no longer start with any supply.
Tada. Engagements forced. Rush thwarted.

Love the idea, I would say keep it simple, …this little change alone would do heaps!

Suddenly in the Forums Everyone is now a Game designer!

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Posted by: Errant Venture.9371

Errant Venture.9371

Instead of completely eliminating player damage to gate guards, you could give them a buff like the Amulet of Protection Guild Lord buff in GW1. Basically it prevented players from doing damage to the Lord over a certain amount, and the cap slowly increased as the match went on.

The Battle Bakery [vPie]