Guild Wars 2

Its been nearly 8 months, devs is it that hard to create a new game mode? I mean 8 months…8 MONTHS. Thats a long kitten time. Cmon anet you got people who are smart and know how to critically think….not making one single new game mode in 8 months is either out of laziness or lack of resources…

I mean devs at least be upfront with us..if your working on new modes right now in secret at least post videos up of how they look and take our constructive feedback into account instead of keeping everyone out of the loop on everything

YES PLEASE! And not becouse I would really need it. But becouse I want all the people who treat conquest like deathmatch go and play a proper DM instead of polluting objective based enviroment. Every time I join hotjoin I grind my teeth. No matter how many times I ask on team chat “guys, stop zerging mid, please fight on points, defend them, go cap something” etc. they just ignore me all day long and continue zerging bridges. I would play tPvP excusively but the lack of proper solo queue makes me join hotjoins sometimes to avoid getting farmed by premades. The level of “strategy” in HJ is absolutely non-existent. Most of people there dont even know or care wth is going on on the map. So I believe a deathmatch hotjoin would be a good thing. Even if it would force me to play it. At least I would not rage that my team is blind/deaf becouse they would zerg random areas as usual but in DM this would actually work.

Maybe 3 vs. 3 and a very small map or more people but still small map so you can see all at 1 place. Then it will still be observer friendly?

Or just don’t care about observers… if you want esports and other modes are better for esports then esports guys can just play esports.

I think deathmatch is boring but I don’t think it will hinder other people to do esports if they just can play the other game modes and are not forced to play the deathmatches.

JonPeters.5630:

Deathmatch without other objectives lacks things like a reason to engage, a way to break stalemates, and a tie breaker. It also creates much wider blowouts when someone on your team doesn’t know what they are doing (does this ever happen to you that you get a clueless teammate? Heh)

Hopefully that clears up some of our reasoning for future discussions.

Jon

DM, King of Hill, and CTF (relics) were solid game modes for GW1 along with the fact there were up to 3 teams at a time. Your argument seems to overlook the success of previous work.

Also want to add, body blocking was also a solid meta that is missed.

3 teams… that could be interesting as well. Should not be that hard to implement since WvW basically already uses 3 teams maps only with really big teams.

Especially some bigger versions of the map with the orb(I think Spirit Watch was the name) or the Temple of the Silent Watch could be interesting. Imagine all the 3 teams fighting for the orb or for Tranquility or Stillness buff(or 2 fighting and 3rd team planning something else).

Why not 2v2’s and 3v3’s?

Your testers got it wrong. You dont decide the mode, you should have released several modes and let the community decide by playing which is the most competitive. Than you develop from there.

i would also like to see a deathmatch mode. bunkers and the fact that some classes are unbalanced would make this hard to do though

GW1 had really great PvP maps in Heroes Ascent:
-you start by simple deathmatch mode in first map, after that you get “mixed” mods
-second one had some kind of flag which makes dmg to enemies when placed
-next one had ghostly hero rezzing entire team at base every 2 mins (if ghostly is alive)
-one of them was classic point capture (like the current mode, but with 5 capture points, everybody hated that map)
-other one had relic runs (which was even more fun, because there was body blocking, now we have something similar with orb, but the map is buggy as hell)
-as a finale you had hall of heroes, which was “king of the hill”, and that feeling after winning the halls can’t be compared to any feeling I had in GW2 (even though I like the game, I’m not hating it)

anyway, I personally think deathmatch would be great, because the games would be much faster + people will have to think twice before engaging, because if you die thats it, it will be hard for your team to rezz you

I think GW2 pvp mechanic with GW1 pvp maps and mods would be FANTASTIC !

Also, gvg plzktnx >.<

lowfreq.3674:

i would also like to see a deathmatch mode. bunkers and the fact that some classes are unbalanced would make this hard to do though

Bunkers would be the least of the problem in deathmatch, because there is no point to have a bunker in DM … you won’t have to “hold” a point, so there is no use to sacrifice your dmg when your team really needs big dmg dealer as a bunker, you are pretty much useless in DM, and no matter how big bunker you are, you will eventually die after your entire team gets wiped, because entire opponent team would rush you …

One important thing is to have variation, otherwise it becomes really stale. While the maps made now looks pretty cool, the gamemode is getting really, really stale, even with secondary objectives like killing a PvE boss, or capturing an orb which favours Elementalists.

It gets really, really boring with this one single gamemode.

The main problem is the “tournament” logic …
When we had 3 maps in tournament, we had to wait for 8 teams to sign to make match … In GW1 heroes ascent you needed only 2 teams for first map, and then you are waiting for new opponent team to start second map .. If there are not many teams online, you skip some maps, sometimes you skip from first to last map, and then if you win the last map you stay in it, and wait for the next team to “kick you out”.
In GW2 3-map tournament, even after you win the last map you get kicked out with chest and that it -> repeat until bored (and you get bored quite fast) …

Now we have “2-team tournament” o_O what the hell is that ?! how can you even call that a tournament ?
Quote from wikipedia: A tournament is a competition involving a relatively large number of competitors, all participating in a sport or game.

This conversation reminds me of the call for the removal of red/blue dyes. So many people posted to ask for this, citing numerous reasons to do away with it and why it was totally unnecessary and harmful, yet there was always someone there to claim the sky would fall, no one could tell who was who, and the entire arena would be full of people in hot pink and neon armors the likes of which could make your eyes bleed and destroy PvP as we know it…

As it turns out, it finally got fixed after an immense amount of grief from the community, and today all those naysayers are nowhere to be found. Eventually it was realized that Anet’s preconceived notions about red/blue armor were based on e-sports aspirations and nothing more, yet the community had to suffer needlessly for a long time. I see many of the same characteristics in this debate.

I think it’s a mixed message how we’re being told that TDM is possible without healers, but that it’s still not a great idea… guess we can all keep hangin’ on just in case. However, this does make clear to me a continued unwillingness to support any pvp development that won’t contribute to e-sports. We just can’t take our sights off that cash cow, can we? How about supporting a few other modes to bring in more people instead? I feel many players will be too disillusioned if they save this basic feature for an expansion.

capture
the
flag

please?

I agree about the need for an objective but I dont think conquest was the right choice. The main problem with conquest/domination in generial is that deaths lack impact. In many of the popular esports, deaths have/had a major impact. For example in LoL/Dota dying has a huge impact especially in the late game and in high level competition. In CS dying obviously has a huge impact as you can’t come back. The same goes for WoW arena, which while incredibly flawed and never a true esport, was enjoyed by a large population during BC and WotLK. You could even argue that in CoD deaths are more sigificant in pubs as a lot of the thrill comes from getting large kill streaks and therefore not dying. I feel that we either need a new mode or conquest needs to be changed so that deaths are more significant. I know that this is no easy task and that it may be too late but I think it is whats needed to make the spvp population stick.
TLDR: deaths need to be significant

Creepz.3860:

I agree about the need for an objective but I dont think conquest was the right choice. The main problem with conquest/domination in generial is that deaths lack impact. In many of the popular esports, deaths have/had a major impact. For example in LoL/Dota dying has a huge impact especially in the late game and in high level competition. In CS dying obviously has a huge impact as you can’t come back. The same goes for WoW arena, which while incredibly flawed and never a true esport, was enjoyed by a large population during BC and WotLK. You could even argue that in CoD deaths are more sigificant in pubs as a lot of the thrill comes from getting large kill streaks and therefore not dying. I feel that we either need a new mode or conquest needs to be changed so that deaths are more significant. I know that this is no easy task and that it may be too late but I think it is whats needed to make the spvp population stick.
TLDR: deaths need to be significant

In conquest, everybody kills and dies alot because outnumbering people is way more prevalent and effective than skill, so that makes a great game AND e-sport, right? oh…

So you say there are classes that just disappear and run away AND bunkers that can’t be killed 1v1? Well I guess not everyone has to die alot…

/end sarcasm: you still have a good point

Kinda confused…

But Custom arenas will have options to “emulate” a TDM mode, i hope?

(i.e. turning off conquest points; only counting kills)
At least via some diverse options to emulate other game modes in custom arenas the Com could “decide/show” which playmodes are prefered.
i.e. The game mechanics for CTF are already IG (snowballmayhem) where is the problem to transfer it onto the other already existing maps with regular skills.

Let the Com be able to try what works and what they like.
If a mode or map doesnt work out, it wont be played a lot for sure.

Anet’s got a fever for them e-sport dollars, and the only cure is moar conquest!

Additional options like rest and lots of fluids? (TDM, Arenas)… that’s just stupid

Obviously PvP will just lie there and stare at you until it’s elite healing ability comes of cooldown, and that won’t make any money at all!

JonPeters.5630:

As we have stated many times we have tried many modes and there is a reason we ended up where we did. This is not to say we will not introduce new modes at some point, however a few notes on death match.

1) You can obviously have it without a healer.
2) Even games people consider to be DM have tons of secondary objectives (Quake 3, counter strike, Starcraft, etc.)
3) Objective based games tend to be both more total noob friendly AND more esport observer friendly as players/watchers can go/look at where the action will likely be.

Deathmatch without other objectives lacks things like a reason to engage, a way to break stalemates, and a tie breaker. It also creates much wider blowouts when someone on your team doesn’t know what they are doing (does this ever happen to you that you get a clueless teammate? Heh)

Hopefully that clears up some of our reasoning for future discussions.

Jon

Well, but you also have to consider that lots of people dont like the “roam and holding” gameplay.
Despite being a dedicated GW1 PvP Fan I’ve never had any fun with PvP in GW2 cause of the gamemode.
PvP in GW2 just feels like HB from GW1 with players instead of heroes (and i never liked HB because it just was a lame “get the best holding heroes and you win” meta).

I have some big problems with conquest.

1) It rewards defensive play over offensive play. This makes it naturally a less exciting mode. I, personally, find it funnier to play against players that can kill me and get killed by me, than fighting bunkers in a stale fight for the sake of keeping a point neutral. Things only get worse when a third player pops up out of nowhere and kills one of us. It’s unsatisfying and leads to another problem:
2) It’s not pug friendly. Conquest, as a game mode, is all about communication and coordenation. It’s a game mode where you don’t know where to go, or where your opponents are, unless the team communicates. Conquest is strategical for premades, but it feels random to pugs.
3) Point holding is cool as an objective, and makes sense in this game’s mechanics, but it does not feel interesting or intuitive as the main objective. Why? First, because it has no flavor, at least in this context. It works better in wvw, because it truly feels like you’re conquering a territory there. You’re invading a fortress there, you’re conquering it. In pvp, you’re bunkering a cemetery or a beach. Not quite the same thing. Second, because from a viewer’s point of view, due to this lack of flavor, it’s hard to understand what is going on. It gives the perception that people are cluelessly sitting in a place waiting for a skirmish against another player.
4) Finally, playing with a bunker is boring. You’re literally being told to spend your entire time sitting in the same place, waiting for someone to come. I suppose that for excellent premades, this does not happens as often; but for everyone else, it’s better to not leave a point unguarded when you don’t know where your opponents are.

I’m sure that secondary objectives can cover those flaws, and I do feel that khylo is the best “pure” conquest map in this game, because the trebs work really well at countering bunkers and dividing the team. I also feel that spirit watch works really well by having two “main” objectives, because orb running incentivates more roaming, more cc, more party suport, and disables bunkers, making it, in my opinion, the most dynamic map so far. The big problem with Spirit Watch, however, is that orb running is exclusive to only a few party members: everyone else is still capping points,a nd things only get more interesting than normal IF the carrier goes their way. So the exciting things that the orb offers to the map does not affects all players, only some.

However, I feel that other’s maps secondary objectives don’t have as much effect as they could have. About Forest, I don’t know if anything else can be done about it. About Temple, I feel that the weaker buffs should be a bit stronger, to be worth fighting for too. I also feel that its vertical map design would work well in a team deathmatch game, should all the players be spread out, or in an orb-running game. And finally, about Foefire, I feel it’s where there is the most missed potential. It has a base to conquer and a lord to kill: if this objective could be expanded upon and become more relevant, the map would be far more exciting. For now, it’s an “all-or-nothing” secondary objective, but it could potentially reward movement and offensive playing with some revision. (I would personally suggest that killing a lord would win the game, but gates could only be broken through secondary mechanics (bomb-carrying?) gotten from point capture).

JonPeters.5630:

1) You can obviously have it without a healer.
2) Even games people consider to be DM have tons of secondary objectives (Quake 3, counter strike, Starcraft, etc.)
3) Objective based games tend to be both more total noob friendly AND more esport observer friendly as players/watchers can go/look at where the action will likely be.

Deathmatch without other objectives lacks things like a reason to engage, a way to break stalemates, and a tie breaker. It also creates much wider blowouts when someone on your team doesn’t know what they are doing (does this ever happen to you that you get a clueless teammate? Heh)

1) Yes, BUT – given all the animations, pets and whatnot, it would be nothing short of horrid to have death matches with more than 6 participants at a time, and even that is borderline unacceptable and eye-cancer inducing, depending which professions are taking part.

You once claimed how it would be possible to tell what is going on in a match by simply watching the battlefield. However, there are far too few skills with animations distinct enough for one to discern their casts in the midst of all the aoe and pet (there are some good animations such as warrior riffle n5, chunning earth, guardian/warrior blocks and rtl).
Cast bars on GW1 do a better job in that regard, and so do skill effects (e.g. the animations of diversion, shame, empathy after they have been cast on a target; naturally, the problem here was you could only tell after the cast which spell had been cast, but that problem hasn’t really been resolved on GW2 either, bar for some exceptions; those animations nevertheless gave important information you could obtain >by watching the field<).

2) GW1 random and team – now custom – arenas both have secondary objectives, but here’s the catch – those secondary objectives can either be completely ignored (which rarely happens in high level matches), or are likely to give one of the teams massive advantage, if their opponent did not bring a certain proffession (that ring any bells?), or team setup (classics: caster teams on priest maps camping the priest pit, flag maps without a caster on your team to carry the flag). So no, secondary objectives can easily create uneven situations and thus limit (or broaden, if done right) team composition choice.

3) How are objective-based games MORE beginner friendly than straight-out death match? They’re EQUALLY beginner friendly at best, but they’re usually far LESS beginner friendly. The reason for that is you need the kind of game knowledge that goes far beyond mastering, or at least knowing, your own/other proffessions.
Just imagine sending a team of 8 random players completely new to pvp into gvg and fight anyone who has half an idea about the map and its objectives.
I believe a choice has to be made here regarding which of the two – profession mastery/learning and tactical awarness – is easier to achieve, and create casual and hardcore arenas based on that estimation, instead of using a one-size-fits-all approach. I dare say that one of the two is, for the most part, more an innate player characteristic than something that can be learned through practice, and yet the game mode resolves around it completely.

I also cannot see how death match is less observer friendly – changing player perspectives and having overview over the field as an observer is far easier in a straight-out death match, simply because it usually takes places in a relatively small place, unless there are secondary mechanics involved.

From my own experience, the ONLY times people refused to engage in a death match was because of SECONDARY objectives that would give one team a significant advantage over the other.
Moreover, the blowouts beginners create in straight-out deatch matches are not much different than the ones created in objective-based game modes ala conquest style. As a matter of fact, they will very likely put their team at an even BIGGER disadvantage due to the tactical aspect that is an innate characteristic of such game modes. How can you possibly deny that?

I did my best not to go all rambo on you, but I would really like to see you at least elaborate on those points some more.

DiogoSilva.7089:

I have some big problems with conquest.

These aren’t problems with the format. They’re problems with players and inexperience.

1. Offensive play is in theory just as good or better than defensive. However, bunker strategies are simpler to understand and organize and some professions are a little too good at it right now. Strategies just need time to mature as players figure out what works solo and in combination with others and as balance changes and bug fixes are implemented. In the past month, a few anti-bunker builds have seen a rise in prominence. Starcraft Broodwar took years of professional play in Korea until the game was “figured out”.
2. Every good competitive format in a team game requires communication and coordination as a tenant of good gameplay. This is true even outside of video games.
At a PUG level, it’s more of a problem with tunnel vision – attack what’s in front of me and ignore objectives. And no matter what format you propose, that will happen. 8v8 has a tendency to exacerbate this behavior because new players can constantly stream into a fight and prolong it.
3. So in a team deathmatch, you’re killing other players because … ? The point control format is easy to understand through the simple UI. If it’s your color, you earn points every tick. If it’s your enemies, they do. First to a certain number wins. How is it hard to grasp that someone standing on their point is guarding it? Why do players in other sports run around when the ball doesn’t go to them?
4. Opinion. Some people enjoy it and others see the greater good. If you don’t like it, find a team where someone else will guard.

I agree that secondary objectives could use tweaks, but I disagree with some of your assessments. I find Spirit Watch to be one of the worst secondary objectives because of its special orb rules (inconsistent and heavily favor some professions and builds) and the map layout. I do agree that out of the tournament maps, Legacy of the Foefire is the worst. The secondary objective doesn’t have a persistent impact on gameplay and the map structure entices large clashes in the center instead of spreading out players.

Defensive is not always better. Especially if you have stuff like buffs on the Temple of the Silent Storm or the other map with the orb where you need to carefully decide where to go and if to hold more points or to get orb(and defend the person carrying it).

I think defensive is good at the end of the match if it is close and you can be sure that you are able(at least for some time which is enough to win and get enough points) to hold at least 2 points or maybe even 1 if you have far more points than the enemy and it is okay to get to 500 slowly(and maybe farm some kills if all your people are at 1 point only and the enemy is coming not all at same time and easy to kill then).

I’m not trying to pick on you dude, but it seems like (next to Anet) you are the most adamant about the community having nothing more than conquest, so…

Exedore says:

“Why do people still want team deathmatch PvP (with no other objectives)? It doesn’t work well in MMORPGs and if you’re looking at making an e-sport, team deathmatch is a bad choice for spectators. I’m sure ArenaNet tried it during development before settling on Conquest.”

Most people PvP to kill each other, not for the excitement of standing in circles or killing NPCs. Things like that get added in for a) highly organized top-teams who want to develop deep strategies around more than just fighting, and b) spectators (esports). We don’t have a spectator mode yet. This game is not an e-sport, and if nothing major changes, it’s not going to be. That’s not to say TDM would be, but it’s also unfair to say any other mode needs to be. Most people agree combat is what makes this game fun (and that conquest blows.)

“ Team Deathmatch often begins with stand-offs or staring contests until someone gets antsy and everyone jumps in. If you rush in or open before-hand, you usually get focused and die. This is bad for casual play and wastes time in organized play. For a spectator, this is also boring to watch.”

I’ve spent plenty of time arranging 2v2s in servers. Those fights are always quickly engaged and settled in a decent amount of time: there has never been a standoff or stalemate, yet (just like conquest) there have been some balance issues. As far as focusing, it’s gonna happen no matter what mode, but it’s a lot worse when the odds are uneven (1v2, 2v3, 3v4, ect…) Focusing is just part of battle, and that is why there is a button for calling target. Honestly though, it’s much better having a fair, even fight compared to being in conquest and getting inundated with interlopers, ruining nearly every balanced skirmish. I’m so tired of being 1v2’d or 2v1ing someone, and it really takes very little skill for 3 people to stunlock and destroy a lone person, yet it happens over and over in conquest. People get sick of being killed with no recourse other than running away.

“Team Deathmatch is not enjoyable for many players when teams grow larger. Players who are learning to play or trying new builds can be easily frustrated by being shredded by a full enemy team. Just look at all the complaints about how big of a zerg-fest 8v8 conquest is. Team Deathmatch would exacerbate that.”

You’re right. Truth is, TTL/TTK is too short for even 5v5 TDM. This game isn’t WoW or TOR: people can be killed in 3 seconds or be virtually unkillable, such is GW2 balance and build extremities. Look at the beginning of spirit watch: the area around the orb is absolute chaos every time. Ranged hangs back and saturates the area with aoes while the engaging melee simply gets destroyed. I’d say anything more than 3v3 is just unintelligible, unmanageable clusterf’s (especially for melee). On the other side, 1v1, 2v2, (and most likely 3v3s) are great ways for newcomers to practice because they are naturally more fair and ability-centric, relying on skill and execution rather than the more dominant factors of field positioning and reinforcements in which conquest demands.

continued…

“Team Deathmatch limits roles and in doing so, limits builds. This also leads into some professions being shunned in teams because there is no mainstream build for them. Other game formats, like Conquest offer additional roles such as area control, both defensive (bunker builds) and offensive (trap rangers, necros), mobility vs static, etc. In general, any format that favors balling up and entire team is bad.”

The same can be said for conquest. Conquest created bunkers, then burst. TDM would support a dynamic for balanced builds. Conquest requires someone to stand in one place: how fun is that? Admittedly, mobility disparities could be a factor in TDM, but they are even more so in conquest, where people are expected to run from point to point, always having an incentive to disengage from battle.

“Balance is put under a microscope in Team Deathmatch. Because of limited roles and playstyles and the relatively short time in which most matches are decided, balance between professions is crucial. In an RPG where skill variety and profession identity is important, it’s near impossible to achieve this. On the other hand, the conquest format reduces the burden of balancing by providing alternative strategic decisions to overcome some profession imbalances. Balance still matters, but it doesn’t need to be as tight as for Team Deathmatch.”

Balance should be under a microscope. You still have 1v1 scenarios in conquest, and when one class’s build completely trumps any possible build of another, it feels like paper, scissors, rock. Balance is fairness, and I don’t really see any excuse or medium for less fairness.

“Team Deathmatch isn’t fun to watch. To an observer that doesn’t know a lot about the game, it just looks like a huge ball of particle effects and then someone dies. To be a good e-sport, someone with basic understanding needs to be able to observe progress or quickly make sense of what actions accomplish. When you have a score and a node control list, it’s clear who is winning. Also, Conquest tends to avoid a full 5v5 and often has encounters ranging from 2 to 6 players, which are much easier to follow.”

The same can be said for conquest. Who cares about the non-existent observers at this point? I think being saddled with esport expectations is the main factor that has killed PvP up to this point via this ‘conquest only’ stance, which has facilitated crap balancing few people can stand.

My best guess why Anet would only allow one game mode since beta: conquest is the best idea they can come up with for e-sports. That’s where the biggest pvp money is at, so not only will they not abandon it, but they won’t even allow anything else. At this point, the player base is so small they’re probably even more scared to introduce any other mode in fear of dividing the PvP community away from the prospect of big profits, yet I would argue a lot of money was made off of straight sales from hyping a good PvP game, and a lot more could be made just from having one.

Master Charles.7093:

continued…

“Team Deathmatch limits roles and in doing so, limits builds. This also leads into some professions being shunned in teams because there is no mainstream build for them. Other game formats, like Conquest offer additional roles such as area control, both defensive (bunker builds) and offensive (trap rangers, necros), mobility vs static, etc. In general, any format that favors balling up and entire team is bad.”

The same can be said for conquest. Conquest created bunkers, then burst. TDM would support a dynamic for balanced builds. Conquest requires someone to stand in one place: how fun is that? Admittedly, mobility disparities could be a factor in TDM, but they are even more so in conquest, where people are expected to run from point to point, always having an incentive to disengage from battle.

“Balance is put under a microscope in Team Deathmatch. Because of limited roles and playstyles and the relatively short time in which most matches are decided, balance between professions is crucial. In an RPG where skill variety and profession identity is important, it’s near impossible to achieve this. On the other hand, the conquest format reduces the burden of balancing by providing alternative strategic decisions to overcome some profession imbalances. Balance still matters, but it doesn’t need to be as tight as for Team Deathmatch.”

Balance should be under a microscope. You still have 1v1 scenarios in conquest, and when one class’s build completely trumps any possible build of another, it feels like paper, scissors, rock. Balance is fairness, and I don’t really see any excuse or medium for less fairness.

“Team Deathmatch isn’t fun to watch. To an observer that doesn’t know a lot about the game, it just looks like a huge ball of particle effects and then someone dies. To be a good e-sport, someone with basic understanding needs to be able to observe progress or quickly make sense of what actions accomplish. When you have a score and a node control list, it’s clear who is winning. Also, Conquest tends to avoid a full 5v5 and often has encounters ranging from 2 to 6 players, which are much easier to follow.”

The same can be said for conquest. Who cares about the non-existent observers at this point? I think being saddled with esport expectations is the main factor that has killed PvP up to this point via this ‘conquest only’ stance, which has facilitated crap balancing few people can stand.

My best guess why Anet would only allow one game mode since beta: conquest is the best idea they can come up with for e-sports. That’s where the biggest pvp money is at, so not only will they not abandon it, but they won’t even allow anything else. At this point, the player base is so small they’re probably even more scared to introduce any other mode in fear of dividing the PvP community away from the prospect of big profits, yet I would argue a lot of money was made off of straight sales from hyping a good PvP game, and a lot more could be made just from having one.

Spot on.

If i recall corectly , ppl where saying that new modes (like Spirit Watch) would create more balanced specs , instead of the burst-bunker specs :P

If ppl are happy with the Spirit Watch midfight or Hotjoins zergs(without healers , teams fights are called zergs now ?) , then they gladly love Deatmatches with more cordinated aoe :P

Master Charles.7093:

continued…

“Team Deathmatch limits roles and in doing so, limits builds. This also leads into some professions being shunned in teams because there is no mainstream build for them. Other game formats, like Conquest offer additional roles such as area control, both defensive (bunker builds) and offensive (trap rangers, necros), mobility vs static, etc. In general, any format that favors balling up and entire team is bad.”

The same can be said for conquest. Conquest created bunkers, then burst. TDM would support a dynamic for balanced builds. Conquest requires someone to stand in one place: how fun is that? Admittedly, mobility disparities could be a factor in TDM, but they are even more so in conquest, where people are expected to run from point to point, always having an incentive to disengage from battle.

“Balance is put under a microscope in Team Deathmatch. Because of limited roles and playstyles and the relatively short time in which most matches are decided, balance between professions is crucial. In an RPG where skill variety and profession identity is important, it’s near impossible to achieve this. On the other hand, the conquest format reduces the burden of balancing by providing alternative strategic decisions to overcome some profession imbalances. Balance still matters, but it doesn’t need to be as tight as for Team Deathmatch.”

Balance should be under a microscope. You still have 1v1 scenarios in conquest, and when one class’s build completely trumps any possible build of another, it feels like paper, scissors, rock. Balance is fairness, and I don’t really see any excuse or medium for less fairness.

“Team Deathmatch isn’t fun to watch. To an observer that doesn’t know a lot about the game, it just looks like a huge ball of particle effects and then someone dies. To be a good e-sport, someone with basic understanding needs to be able to observe progress or quickly make sense of what actions accomplish. When you have a score and a node control list, it’s clear who is winning. Also, Conquest tends to avoid a full 5v5 and often has encounters ranging from 2 to 6 players, which are much easier to follow.”

The same can be said for conquest. Who cares about the non-existent observers at this point? I think being saddled with esport expectations is the main factor that has killed PvP up to this point via this ‘conquest only’ stance, which has facilitated crap balancing few people can stand.

My best guess why Anet would only allow one game mode since beta: conquest is the best idea they can come up with for e-sports. That’s where the biggest pvp money is at, so not only will they not abandon it, but they won’t even allow anything else. At this point, the player base is so small they’re probably even more scared to introduce any other mode in fear of dividing the PvP community away from the prospect of big profits, yet I would argue a lot of money was made off of straight sales from hyping a good PvP game, and a lot more could be made just from having one.

This man deserves a medal for putting forth a reasonable and non-aggressive argument to adding TDM. Balance being the biggest factor should not be shunned just because a certain game mode allows for more than just fighting. Team(and solo) fights WILL happen and those with the best builds will win. This, in turn will allow for said team to take the point anyways because of these imbalances.

Personally, I find it to be more entertaining watching strategic fights than strategic point holding. Observing someone hold a point in spectator-mode will put me to sleep. This game has the best combat system ever made, we need to put it to use in more ways than one.

Master Charles.7093:

continued…

“Team Deathmatch limits roles and in doing so, limits builds. This also leads into some professions being shunned in teams because there is no mainstream build for them. Other game formats, like Conquest offer additional roles such as area control, both defensive (bunker builds) and offensive (trap rangers, necros), mobility vs static, etc. In general, any format that favors balling up and entire team is bad.”

The same can be said for conquest. Conquest created bunkers, then burst. TDM would support a dynamic for balanced builds. Conquest requires someone to stand in one place: how fun is that? Admittedly, mobility disparities could be a factor in TDM, but they are even more so in conquest, where people are expected to run from point to point, always having an incentive to disengage from battle.

“Balance is put under a microscope in Team Deathmatch. Because of limited roles and playstyles and the relatively short time in which most matches are decided, balance between professions is crucial. In an RPG where skill variety and profession identity is important, it’s near impossible to achieve this. On the other hand, the conquest format reduces the burden of balancing by providing alternative strategic decisions to overcome some profession imbalances. Balance still matters, but it doesn’t need to be as tight as for Team Deathmatch.”

Balance should be under a microscope. You still have 1v1 scenarios in conquest, and when one class’s build completely trumps any possible build of another, it feels like paper, scissors, rock. Balance is fairness, and I don’t really see any excuse or medium for less fairness.

“Team Deathmatch isn’t fun to watch. To an observer that doesn’t know a lot about the game, it just looks like a huge ball of particle effects and then someone dies. To be a good e-sport, someone with basic understanding needs to be able to observe progress or quickly make sense of what actions accomplish. When you have a score and a node control list, it’s clear who is winning. Also, Conquest tends to avoid a full 5v5 and often has encounters ranging from 2 to 6 players, which are much easier to follow.”

The same can be said for conquest. Who cares about the non-existent observers at this point? I think being saddled with esport expectations is the main factor that has killed PvP up to this point via this ‘conquest only’ stance, which has facilitated crap balancing few people can stand.

My best guess why Anet would only allow one game mode since beta: conquest is the best idea they can come up with for e-sports. That’s where the biggest pvp money is at, so not only will they not abandon it, but they won’t even allow anything else. At this point, the player base is so small they’re probably even more scared to introduce any other mode in fear of dividing the PvP community away from the prospect of big profits, yet I would argue a lot of money was made off of straight sales from hyping a good PvP game, and a lot more could be made just from having one.

Quality.

Master Charles.7093:

I’m not trying to pick on you dude, but it seems like (next to Anet) you are the most adamant about the community having nothing more than conquest, so…

My argument was that it’s better than other formats, so why create an inferior format. Maintaining multiple formats also has its own set of issues that will lead to one being favored.

Most people PvP to kill each other, not for the excitement of standing in circles or killing NPCs.

No, most people PvP in order to compete against other players. Conquest allows this perfectly fine while adding other elements to keep the game interesting. Killing isn’t the only option – out-thinking your opponent is enjoyable as well. Also, most people do not agree that “conquest blows”. It’s just a vocal minority.

I’ve spent plenty of time arranging 2v2s in servers. Those fights are always quickly engaged and settled in a decent amount of time:

Once you add something long-term, like prizes or ranking, this behavior will immediately change. This is also a by-product of some profession balance issues where those professions have nothing to lose by attacking recklessly into small groups (elementalists are the prime example). If things go bad, run away and reset. Conquest counters that by adding a consequence for abandoning a fight even temporarily.

Complaining about unequal numbers in skirmishes in Conquest or other objective-based formats shows lack of understanding. Part of playing intelligently is avoiding battles you can’t win or delaying their conclusion to achieve a secondary benefit. Positional gameplay adds a level of depth to the competition. You can place defensive players to hold areas and send high damage players to take out disorganized opponents or utilize mobile players to always outnumber opponents in skirmishes.

The 2v1 stunlock to death scenario is very exaggerated. Most professions have access to stun breaks or stability, as well as dodging. In a TDM scenario, the same thing can happen and the only thing an ally can do in GW2 (with the exception of guardian elite) is provide minimal healing or stun back. But your attackers can employ stun breaks and stability as well. In Conquest, if you are in a 3v1, your team has a potential 4v2 somewhere else. Intelligent play will capitalize on that.

On the other side, 1v1, 2v2, (and most likely 3v3s) are great ways for newcomers to practice because they are naturally more fair and ability-centric, relying on skill and execution rather than the more dominant factors of field positioning and reinforcements in which conquest demands.

Even small TDM involves far more than skill and execution. Positioning still plays a huge role with the use of terrain to obstruct attacks or limit opponents’ movement options. Unless you want your TDM to happen in middle of the biggest flat and open field ever.

TDM being the better for beginners is only true when viewed within its own context. TDM only teaches players TDM builds and tactics, which are very limited. By virtue of less options, it makes it easier. However, when your goal is more options in building your character for PvP, which I’m sure everyone can agree is a good goal, TDM’s limits are a poor teaching ground. Many builds that exist in conquest will fail miserably in TDM. For example, conquest allows you to run a build that can unload high damage and escape while being somewhat squishy. In TDM, you would just train down a build like that. Are you going to teach new players not do play like that?

The crux of the issue is that it’s hard to balance skill levels among players and teams in any format. If you want to test a build, then you want to eliminate the variable of being carried or being crushed. But when others want the same and may be trying a build that just doesn’t work (but is unknown to them), it creates large disparities. Having 8v8 hot join is a bad decision in my opinion because it does turn into giant battles too often. I feel that using 5v5 or 6v6 for hot join (6v6 gives some buffer against players leaving and joining) would do enough improve the learning environment for the conquest format.

(continued…)

(… continued from previous)

[Team Deathmatch limits roles and in doing so, limits builds] can be said for conquest. Conquest created bunkers, then burst. TDM would support a dynamic for balanced builds. Conquest requires someone to stand in one place: how fun is that? Admittedly, mobility disparities could be a factor in TDM, but they are even more so in conquest, where people are expected to run from point to point, always having an incentive to disengage from battle.

There is a lot of misunderstanding here based on your perception of conquest and the meta-game in PUG tournaments. First, the conquest format has far more depth, so it takes longer to “figure out”. In beta weekends, sPvP was all about 100blades warriors. That quickly became obsolete once people learned the combat system. Then bunker builds – your “stand in place” comment – and strategies that employ them emerged, which isn’t unprecedented; they are easy to figure out and implement. It took longer than I had expected, but teams have figured out how to break bunker strategies. And strategies in conquest will continue to evolve as balance tweaks are made and players develop new builds and strategies.

Mobility in conquest isn’t a problem as you portrayed; it’s an element of depth. Certain builds aren’t very mobile and that’s a weakness, this is true. However, in order to gain mobility, you often sacrifice damage, control, or survivability. So the mobile players have weaknesses too. Part of the strategy in conquest is balancing the two in a build and on a team and using them properly.

To contrast, TDM strategy has always been shallow and stale. The two options are 1. Have everyone be as survivable as possible or 2. Burst and CC so much in a short interval that no one can survive it. I doubt anyone finds stalemates or dying 10 seconds from the start of combat enjoyable. Sure, the builds and professions for that change, but that’s usually in response to balance changes, not players learning new things.

Balance should be under a microscope.

I probably didn’t explain that well. What I meant by “balance under a microscope” is that any tiny advantage has to be eliminated. That’s impossible to ask in an RPG where there are so many variables. I guess the counter analogy would be “balance with a ruler” where it’s “close enough”. In an RPG, there will always be builds that will win against another when both players are of equal skill. Balance under a microscope would demand that those be eliminated and the win rate be 50%. Balance under a rule would say “a better player of the disadvantaged class will win more than 50% of the time and at even skill, it’s only a 65% win rate, which isn’t too excessive”. The reason conquest can get away with this is because you can avoid the disadvantaged matchups. If warriors always lose to mesmers (just an example), you rotate your assignments so that the warrior doesn’t end up engaging with the mesmer or has a teammate with him that counters the mesmer. Or you just avoid fighting the mesmer altogether through clever maneuvering and delay tactics. Team splitting is something conquest requires that TDM shuns.

[not being fun to watch] can be said for conquest.

I can’t really respond to you on this since you basically constructed a straw man and rather unsuccessfully beat it down.

Balancing has nothing to do with the PvP format. With a new game, you have be careful with balance changes. Something may be too powerful because players haven’t adjusted to it, not because the skill or build is too good. You don’t want to destroy something that isn’t broken. See my 100blades warrior example from earlier in this post. The only point you could reasonably argue is that the developers have been overly cautious when it comes to balance changes.

E-sports was not the only reason conquest was chosen. It was a secondary factor. The other points I listed also favored Conquest over TDM and I could do the same other formats such as capture the flag.

Would be nice just having some deathmatch style play in hotjoins.

Can go from there later.

Minion of Vey.4398:

Would be nice just having some deathmatch style play in hotjoins.

Can go from there later.

I agree, but won’t happen because ARENAnet is too busy being CONQUESTnet. They need arena like WoW has (maybe not exactly the same, but the same idea)

Exedore.6320:

1. Offensive play is in theory just as good or better than defensive. (…)
2. Every good competitive format in a team game requires communication and coordination as a tenant of good gameplay. (…)
4. Opinion. Some people enjoy it and others see the greater good. If you don’t like it, find a team where someone else will guard.

1. I’m not talking about player builds directly, but about the format. Conquest is a defensive format, or at least, the way conquest was implemented in GW2. Conquest is about defending points. This is a fact. And usually, the audiences prefer offensive formats over defensive formats. Formats that incentivate teams to push forward, and not to stay on a point passively.

I don’t have much experience in pvp games whatsoever, but I remember an offensive-oriented conquest/ base assault hybrid format I’ve played in Unreal Tournament 2004. In that game, capture points were linked to each other in a semi-linear fashion, and you could only capture some points further into the map after you captured some before them. I’m not saying that GW2 should have something like this, I’m just giving an example of an offensive-oriented conquest format.

In comparison, GW2’s conquest is very defensive.

2. I never said otherwise. But there are game modes that don’t depend so much on communication to be organized or deep at a basic (read = pug) level. Pugs barely have any communication between each other, and that’s the most normal thing for pugs. Conquest’s depth and fun comes mostly from something that is not accessible to pugs. That makes conquest not very pug-friendly. This can be somewhat softned up with better UI support, but there are game formats that work much better with pugs. Especially formats that guide the players into a specific point, like defend/ assault, or get-the-flag-at-their-base-and-come-back capture the flag, or many others. Conquest, in comparison, is a non-linear format. It’s a “there are three points: pick one”. And that translates to pugs running like headless chickens around the map, in an extremely unorganized way.

Short version: pugs need something more linear and/ or better UI support to guide them up.

4. There are many times where I had to bunker because most of my team didn’t want it, didn’t enjoy it, or weren’t good enough. I don’t enjoy bunkering because it mostly forces me to stay at one point for the entire match, especially in casual/ amateur premades. Other times, I asked for friends to bunker for me, and they would always ask, “wait, do I have to sit here the whole time”? and “can I leave my point already? Should I help you guys”? Yes, in well-organized premades, things aren’t as simple, and it’s easier to leave your post due to team communication and coordenation. But in pugs and casual premades, it’s simply safer for a bunker to stay at one point the entire time, because they’ll have no idea where all of their opponents are.

For the love of God, get off the E-Sport kick. You are just limiting yourself. So many fans are pleaing for more game modes and you continue to resist to your detriment. You could easily institute additional game modes that aren’t used for competitive play, but just for fun.

The more fun people have, the more players, equals more opportunity for money.
E-Z-P-Z-Japa-NE-ZE.

Sauncho.8076:

For the love of God, get off the E-Sport kick. You are just limiting yourself. So many fans are pleaing for more game modes and you continue to resist to your detriment. You could easily institute additional game modes that aren’t used for competitive play, but just for fun.

The more fun people have, the more players, equals more opportunity for money.
E-Z-P-Z-Japa-NE-ZE.

QFT

JonPeters.5630:

As we have stated many times we have tried many modes and there is a reason we ended up where we did. This is not to say we will not introduce new modes at some point, however a few notes on death match.

1) You can obviously have it without a healer.
2) Even games people consider to be DM have tons of secondary objectives (Quake 3, counter strike, Starcraft, etc.)
3) Objective based games tend to be both more total noob friendly AND more esport observer friendly as players/watchers can go/look at where the action will likely be.

Deathmatch without other objectives lacks things like a reason to engage, a way to break stalemates, and a tie breaker. It also creates much wider blowouts when someone on your team doesn’t know what they are doing (does this ever happen to you that you get a clueless teammate? Heh)

Hopefully that clears up some of our reasoning for future discussions.

Jon

You listed a bunch of esport deathmatch based games, granted with secondary objectives that are considered noob playable, if not noob friendly. This is no justification for keeping conquest for this long. Youve already dabbled with plenty of secondary objectives; theres no reason why you cant have a deathmatch, no respawn mode with secondary objectives.

Deathmatch modes with secondary objectives lack all of the flaws you stated. It really is time for new modes.

JonathanSharp.7094:

Also yolo.

Don’t ever say that again!!! It is lame! ughh…

JonathanSharp.7094:

Brutalistik.6473:

JonathanSharp.7094:

Also yolo.

Don’t ever say that again!!! It is lame! ughh…

You mean AWESOME:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5Otla5157c

“No blankets or pajamas
they can choke you in your sleep.
Two words about Warriors:
killing machines.”

…

i had to. Yolo.

On a serious note tho, its good to know " Those are the places we’re pushing now – trying to find ways to take those game-types and get them to be FUN and FUNCTIONAL in GW2’s combat system."

Good to know that new game modes are already being thought at.

We have tweaks to do for conquest maps, but overall we like a lot of them (and some of them we’re still not 100% happy with – so they may never make it into the tournament rotation).

I’m slightly confused here. :P Are you only talking about unicorn’s map (the only one that never made it into tournament), or about conquest maps that are currently in development, or are you mentioning the possibility of some other existing maps being taken out of tournament?

Apolo.5942:

You cant have death match with out Healer Classes, Kiting and Ranged classes would overshadow Melee classes even more than they do now (If that is even possible).

Gonna post a quote here. . .

" I have to argue that I think that an Arena format in Guild Wars 2 would work better than in World of Warcraft, especially because of the lack of healers. Do have in mind that the Holy Trinity in World of Warcraft was designed for PvE content – PvP wasn’t introduced until later on and Arenas came a few years later.

There is plenty of Arena Teams that runs without a healer and form what I’ve seen most people prefer not to be up against a healer. Then you’ve to consider that the Professions in Guild Wars 2 is designed to work without the Holy Trinity and without a healer. Instead, combat is based around the following elements: Damage, Support and Control. The Combat system is in fact a lot more skill based than in World of Warcraft and a lot more fleshed out. Just because something was a big feature in another MMO doesn’t mean that it’s necessary – or even beneficial for this MMO."

Death match would be a horrible game mode in GW2… you really don’t think this game is zergy enough? Yeah put this mode in so we can have a bunch of zerkers 1shotting each other and a few bunkers dragging the game on for hours. No thanks!

How about some decent objective based games like GvG (I HATE conquest with a passion, BORING, almost no tactics)

Mathias.9657:

Death match would be a horrible game mode in GW2… you really don’t think this game is zergy enough? Yeah put this mode in so we can have a bunch of zerkers 1shotting each other and a few bunkers dragging the game on for hours. No thanks!

How about some decent objective based games like GvG (I HATE conquest with a passion, BORING, almost no tactics)

I agree 100% with the last bit. However, I think that it’s fully possible to make an Arena format that’s all about skill and coordination where 2 teams meet, without making neither Zergs, Bunkers, nor Zerkers much of an issue. It’s all about profession balance and the design of the game mode. Abilities and Traits are already being split up into PvE and PvP versions in order to properly balance them.

Conquest would probably be more entertaining if there weren’t 3 pts.

Master Charles.7093:

At this point, the player base is so small they’re probably even more scared to introduce any other mode in fear of dividing the PvP community away from the prospect of big profits, yet I would argue a lot of money was made off of straight sales from hyping a good PvP game, and a lot more could be made just from having one.

Basically they fooled us, took our money, and yet still not delivering after such a long time.
The question is not when but if they wil deliver…… sadly

I see all this talk about how it wouldn’t work etc. but in gw1 random arenas was basically team deathmatch and it worked out great. Everyone loved it and it was a blast to play.

Honestly if you just implemented the entire pvp system from gw1 I doubt there would be manycomplaints.

People just want to test their skills against other people. Its why dueling servers are so prevalent, its why hot join is the way it is. Both game types (spvp and wvw) discourage even fights. Can we just have one thing that let’s us kill each other without additional bs.

Master Charles.7093:

continued…

“Team Deathmatch limits roles and in doing so, limits builds. This also leads into some professions being shunned in teams because there is no mainstream build for them. Other game formats, like Conquest offer additional roles such as area control, both defensive (bunker builds) and offensive (trap rangers, necros), mobility vs static, etc. In general, any format that favors balling up and entire team is bad.”

The same can be said for conquest. Conquest created bunkers, then burst. TDM would support a dynamic for balanced builds. Conquest requires someone to stand in one place: how fun is that? Admittedly, mobility disparities could be a factor in TDM, but they are even more so in conquest, where people are expected to run from point to point, always having an incentive to disengage from battle.

“Balance is put under a microscope in Team Deathmatch. Because of limited roles and playstyles and the relatively short time in which most matches are decided, balance between professions is crucial. In an RPG where skill variety and profession identity is important, it’s near impossible to achieve this. On the other hand, the conquest format reduces the burden of balancing by providing alternative strategic decisions to overcome some profession imbalances. Balance still matters, but it doesn’t need to be as tight as for Team Deathmatch.”

Balance should be under a microscope. You still have 1v1 scenarios in conquest, and when one class’s build completely trumps any possible build of another, it feels like paper, scissors, rock. Balance is fairness, and I don’t really see any excuse or medium for less fairness.

“Team Deathmatch isn’t fun to watch. To an observer that doesn’t know a lot about the game, it just looks like a huge ball of particle effects and then someone dies. To be a good e-sport, someone with basic understanding needs to be able to observe progress or quickly make sense of what actions accomplish. When you have a score and a node control list, it’s clear who is winning. Also, Conquest tends to avoid a full 5v5 and often has encounters ranging from 2 to 6 players, which are much easier to follow.”

The same can be said for conquest. Who cares about the non-existent observers at this point? I think being saddled with esport expectations is the main factor that has killed PvP up to this point via this ‘conquest only’ stance, which has facilitated crap balancing few people can stand.

My best guess why Anet would only allow one game mode since beta: conquest is the best idea they can come up with for e-sports. That’s where the biggest pvp money is at, so not only will they not abandon it, but they won’t even allow anything else. At this point, the player base is so small they’re probably even more scared to introduce any other mode in fear of dividing the PvP community away from the prospect of big profits, yet I would argue a lot of money was made off of straight sales from hyping a good PvP game, and a lot more could be made just from having one.

QFT. This, good sir, couldn’t be said better!

Some good points on both sides.

BUT…main reasons for (T)DM are:
FUN to play
…not saying its that fun to watch or balanced^^
But its uncomplicated enough to attract newbs to pvp. Gives guilds some GvG and duelling ground.

Combat Training
If you only like to better your class and its only fights your after… holding/captureing or additional objectives can get a real nuisance…
While only searching fights in conquest actually hurts the team.

Thats why at least Custom Arenas should have some options to emulate (T)DM X vs X