Guild Wars 2

Lets take a very long trip down memory lane. Back when Jon Peters was still around as part of the development team.

https://youtu.be/iS74nfyKu3o?t=722

Conquest as a game type, and in theory is not bad. From the way Jon described it, it even sounds fun and exciting. But much earlier in the video, he described the differences of GW1’s GvG and RA, and how Arenanet catered for PvP players of different skill levels and motivations by creating both these modes.

RA was quick and simple, and GW1’s game systems allowed for a high degree of customization without affecting combat significantly. He goes on to describe GvG was a complex game mode for the hardcore PvP players, and it was never promoted to the softcore PvP crowd because of this complexity. This is fine, there is something for everyone.

The same cannot be said for GW2. We’ve been stuck with Conquest only for the longest time, and as Jon describes, is an extremely complex game mode. My opinion is, not only is it complex, there are several other issues that hold it back from being successful, and in turn, doesn’t help create a community. I’m going to approach these problems from the perspective of a ‘softcore’ player.

1: Infrastructure - In the video, Jon highlights the benefits of Conquest being that it is a game mode that requires strategic positioning and location based fights; it forces teams to split and choose their engagement. This sounds great.

The problem is, for the general solo queuer, the game’s PvP interface does little to help communicate between the player and their team mates what each person is capable of. Is your build good for roaming? Are you a support druid? Can you bunker down? Even something as simple as whether a mesmer is running portal or not isn’t information visually available to the player. The preparation time before a match is hardly a solution to all this; crucial strategic information should be available visually or be known by the community by method of experience.

i.e. DotA 2 has an interface for hero selection that will evaluate your team’s combined ability to team fight, to play for the long haul, to pressure, etc. Heroes are also generally known for their early to mid game ability to support, flank, etc.\

Build customization obviously makes an approach to the above very hard, but any semblance of infrastructure and UI like this could go a long way. Perhaps a chatwheel to display standard class messages like “I’m a support druid!”, or allow players to designate their role by assigning a color to their class icon. A green druid icon, visible only to your teammates will indicate you are geared for support, a red druid icon means you can DPS.

The minimap is also terribly uninformative. Often when there are 3 or more players fighting at a node, hovering over their minimap icons will only show one player name. The lack of visual information is detrimental to players are respawn, often they aren’t given the proper amount of information to decide where to concentrate their efforts, even if they wanted to.

The second infrastructure related problem is that there is a dreadful need for a tutorial mode. Conquest, for all its simplicity in explanation, is extremely complex and counter intuitive in practice. It’s too late to try and explain to people once the game has started. Emotions run high, people get angry and no one will want to listen, even when they are making big mistakes.

2: Counter-intuitive game mode - Survival is a PvPer’s most base instinct, and to kill players is a close second. Or vice versa. However, in conquest, these instincts tend to not be the best ones to have. I’ve explained to new players after a game many a times that decapping a point is almost always better than getting a kill. Killing a player earns 5 points, 5 points that they would accrue in 10 seconds. If a player holds out for 10 seconds and you chose to fight them instead of getting a decap, you’re fighting at a deficit. Obviously, this doesn’t apply to every situation, but it is generally true.

A lot of new players don’t even realize that fighting a bunker build on an enemy captured point is effectively doing nothing at all.

I’m not saying conquest is bad because it has complex gameplay, I’m criticizing it for the lack of information for such basic, yet counter-intuitive principles. Combine this with the lack of visual information available and you have a game type where teams of random players have absolutely no idea what each other are doing, nor can they steadily learn about their mistakes afterwards.

It doesn’t help to have hotjoin maps, because the problems stated above can’t actually be solved playing with randoms who have no commitment to the overall match, and it doesn’t help to have team deathmatch maps either, because survive and kill are not the most important concepts in Conquest.

I feel like Arenanet missed a crucial step when making conquest. They forgot that the game mode needs to promote the growth of a community, and somehow expected everyone to just play at an e-sports professional level. Conquest could be great, but not if just one player on your team can ruin the whole teams efforts by not understanding its nuances. A little bit of infrastructure and awareness goes a long way.

Im sorry but not gonna watch the video because conquest has been the game mode for 6 years.

There is nothing wrong with conquest and everything is wrong with balance.

If you have high mobility you should be glassy or bunkery not both. Currently in GW2 there are no bunkers, just support characters or support bruiser classes like engy and ranger.

Also if i may point out your example is no good, it isnt realistic for any situation.

If a player can decap/cap a node they probably will. If a player cant there is probably a reason like the player going to stop them will win the fight and cant decap it. Also there are very few ESL level players in the game. Like the top 50 players in the game all know one another and if your on the out side looking in there is probably a reason. A tutorial that helps you better understand base mechanics/rotations will not all of a sudden turn a above average player to a ESL player.

Seriously conquests issue is that you need multiple styles of play with multiple individual build comps as well as team comps.

This game hasnt had it since the D/D ele meta days and i think the community has finally said enough.

Ramoth.9064:

I’ve explained to new players after a game many a times that decapping a point is almost always better than getting a kill. Killing a player earns 5 points, 5 points that they would accrue in 10 seconds. If a player holds out for 10 seconds and you chose to fight them instead of getting a decap, you’re fighting at a deficit. Obviously, this doesn’t apply to every situation, but it is generally true.

Okay, i can see the reasoning behind this point.

However, i have to disagree, that kills aren’t as important as decapping. It’s really complicated to articulate, but removing someone from the game for 15seconds+the time it takes for them to get back into the fight+a decap and or fullcap is much more important than just forcing a node into contest.

There’s more to it then that, but its complex. For example, if you are fighting a tanky team, getting a kill might not be worth it because by the time you kill somebody else, that previous guy comes off of respawn to further contest their node. On the other end of the spectrum, chasing down a tanky engi trying to kite is important because if you give him too much time, he will just reengage the node and reset the fight. I’ve won 2v1’s like this on my necro (and 3v1’s on my ele) because people focus on trying to full cap the contested node, or defend their node rather than trying to pressure and kill me.

kdaddy.5431:

Im sorry but not gonna watch the video because conquest has been the game mode for 6 years.

There is nothing wrong with conquest and everything is wrong with balance.

If you have high mobility you should be glassy or bunkery not both. Currently in GW2 there are no bunkers, just support characters or support bruiser classes like engy and ranger.

Also if i may point out your example is no good, it isnt realistic for any situation.

If a player can decap/cap a node they probably will. If a player cant there is probably a reason like the player going to stop them will win the fight and cant decap it. Also there are very few ESL level players in the game. Like the top 50 players in the game all know one another and if your on the out side looking in there is probably a reason. A tutorial that helps you better understand base mechanics/rotations will not all of a sudden turn a above average player to a ESL player.

Seriously conquests issue is that you need multiple styles of play with multiple individual build comps as well as team comps.

This game hasnt had it since the D/D ele meta days and i think the community has finally said enough.

I just played a placement match yesterday where two people chased a warrior for a full rotation of the map in foefire. They eventually killed him, but seriously, at what cost?

Another issue is when you have a few people fighting at lord. You cant see how many people are there on the minimap. If you have too many people going back, you lose, not enough, you lose.

Good balance, of course, is necessary, but people should also have the tools to understand the game mode better when they start out.

JusticeRetroHunter.7684:

Ramoth.9064:

I’ve explained to new players after a game many a times that decapping a point is almost always better than getting a kill. Killing a player earns 5 points, 5 points that they would accrue in 10 seconds. If a player holds out for 10 seconds and you chose to fight them instead of getting a decap, you’re fighting at a deficit. Obviously, this doesn’t apply to every situation, but it is generally true.

Okay, i can see the reasoning behind this point.

However, i have to disagree, that kills aren’t as important as decapping. It’s really complicated to articulate, but removing someone from the game for 15seconds+the time it takes for them to get back into the fight+a decap and or fullcap is much more important than just forcing a node into contest.

There’s more to it then that, but its complex. For example, if you are fighting a tanky team, getting a kill might not be worth it because by the time you kill somebody else, that previous guy comes off of respawn to further contest their node. On the other end of the spectrum, chasing down a tanky engi trying to kite is important because if you give him too much time, he will just reengage the node and reset the fight. I’ve won 2v1’s like this on my necro (and 3v1’s on my ele) because people focus on trying to full cap the contested node, or defend their node rather than trying to pressure and kill me.

The problem is, there’s little to no information for a new player to understand this. Like I said, sure, it doesn’t apply for all situations, but there is likely more certainty in getting a decap, than there is killing an enemy.

There are lots of low level games where people fight off points, when they could have gotten a decap definitely.

Isn’t it better to arm the average player with this information rather than have them discover it for themselves blindly?

Ramoth.9064:

The problem is, there’s little to no information for a new player to understand this. Like I said, sure, it doesn’t apply for all situations, but there is likely more certainty in getting a decap, than there is killing an enemy.

There are lots of low level games where people fight off points, when they could have gotten a decap definitely.

Isn’t it better to arm the average player with this information rather than have them discover it for themselves blindly?

I’m gonna try and respond to this with an example :

John Conway’s “Game of Life” is essentially a computer program with 3 very simple rules. From these simple rules, the complexity of the system increases exponentially as time passes, until the program starts exhibiting structures that we see similar to the mega-structures we see in the universe., like galaxies, and star systems and just increasingly complicated behavior for a computer program.

Conquest is very similar with regards to its complexity. There are very simple rules, and from this, a vast array of different possibilities become possible. It’s the reason why we see such drastically different approaches to the same mechanic in both low level and high level game-play.

For example, in low-level game-play, people tend to fight off nodes because they are tunnel visioning and zerging. While in high-level game play, people tend to fight off nodes because the securing kills and surviving become more important than keeping a node contested. Both are the same in terms of mechanics, but used in vastly different ways.

The appeal of conquest as a game-mode is it’s complexity from simplicity, something that Death-match doesn’t really have to offer.

In addition, there is really no straightforward tutorial that can be made to streamline the process of winning. Like you said, there are situations in which fighting bunkers on their capped point does nothing, while at the same time, you might be forced to fight a bunker on their point because your team forced a rotation (for example, if your team wipes mid and home, your not gonna fight an outnumbered 2v1 at mid/home…you have to fight the 1v1 at far)

JusticeRetroHunter.7684:

Ramoth.9064:

The problem is, there’s little to no information for a new player to understand this. Like I said, sure, it doesn’t apply for all situations, but there is likely more certainty in getting a decap, than there is killing an enemy.

There are lots of low level games where people fight off points, when they could have gotten a decap definitely.

Isn’t it better to arm the average player with this information rather than have them discover it for themselves blindly?

I’m gonna try and respond to this with an example :

John Conway’s “Game of Life” is essentially a computer program with 3 very simple rules. From these simple rules, the complexity of the system increases exponentially as time passes, until the program starts exhibiting structures that we see similar to the mega-structures we see in the universe., like galaxies, and star systems and just increasingly complicated behavior for a computer program.

Conquest is very similar with regards to its complexity. There are very simple rules, and from this, a vast array of different possibilities become possible. It’s the reason why we see such drastically different approaches to the same mechanic in both low level and high level game-play.

For example, in low-level game-play, people tend to fight off nodes because they are tunnel visioning and zerging. While in high-level game play, people tend to fight off nodes because the securing kills and surviving become more important than keeping a node contested. Both are the same in terms of mechanics, but used in vastly different ways.

The appeal of conquest as a game-mode is it’s complexity from simplicity, something that Death-match doesn’t really have to offer.

In addition, there is really no straightforward tutorial that can be made to streamline the process of winning. Like you said, there are situations in which fighting bunkers on their capped point does nothing, while at the same time, you might be forced to fight a bunker on their point because your team forced a rotation (for example, if your team wipes mid and home, your not gonna fight an outnumbered 2v1 at mid/home…you have to fight the 1v1 at far)

I don’t see why a simple tutorial cannot be made. There are players who don’t even understand that having two people on one node does not make the node capture faster. Arenanet shouldnt require people to have to explain these things mid game.

Or that UI changes are actually important for better competitive play, across all levels.

The thing is, if there are no explanations for the basic core concepts in conquest, you’re left with people stuck on the live, die, repeat train, over and over again, never really learning half of what makes conquest, conquest.

I agree there needs to be some in game rewarded compulsory tutorials for conquest, also with links to a section say in the forums that provide more expensive guides and good streamers to follow.

Showing in game what advantages/disadvantages are and explaining conquest terminology such as overextending/over-commiting/peeling/disengaging would be very helpful to newer and more casual players.

Still have people in gold who sit afk on close point, it’s ridiculous you’d think it’s common sense to know that to defend something there actually needs to be something offending it first.

OP is 100% correct, it is not good for the game mode, it decreases morale and generally is quite disheartening and in extreme cases antagonising. This is reflected in an toxic infectious trash talking epidemic of a community.

As for kills>caps, in the wise words of himself at higher level you have to adapt:

There are a lot of problems with Conquest, with one of the most significant problems is that many builds/traits/utilities are not designed for playing on-node PvP.

I just never understood the concept of over complicated pvp with adding little circles to dance on and around in when they had the perfect pvp style in gw1. I see now anet is wising up to we want some team death match. I welcome the new 2v2 map in hopes conq will finally die off and we can get competitive here finally after almost 5 years.

I don’t think a tutorial will make an average player an instant ESL player, but honestly, it will go a long way to making new players into average players. In my opinion, an “average” pvp is a healthy pvp – as average people are happy people, with the potential to grow into ESL.

As the game mode stands, it’s complete chaos for a newbie – and the teams you are assigned are often either apathetic, clueless or outright toxic. Not only this, but Anet’s class descriptions are outright false, so builds are often confusing – a lot of buttons, but how does one begin to use it effectively?

I think a little more could be done in regards to communicating the roles one might be expected to participate in pvp.

He is right on the first point tho. We should be able to see what a team member has equipped and traited. Then again there would probably be a lot of hate towards people not using meta builds and Anet would be finally forced to make non meta builds that much better, tho I doubt that would ever happen.

On the other hand I am scared of seeing what trash builds people run in PvP

kdaddy.5431:

Im sorry but not gonna watch the video because conquest has been the game mode for 6 years.

There is nothing wrong with conquest and everything is wrong with balance.

If you have high mobility you should be glassy or bunkery not both. Currently in GW2 there are no bunkers, just support characters or support bruiser classes like engy and ranger.

Also if i may point out your example is no good, it isnt realistic for any situation.

If a player can decap/cap a node they probably will. If a player cant there is probably a reason like the player going to stop them will win the fight and cant decap it. Also there are very few ESL level players in the game. Like the top 50 players in the game all know one another and if your on the out side looking in there is probably a reason. A tutorial that helps you better understand base mechanics/rotations will not all of a sudden turn a above average player to a ESL player.

Seriously conquests issue is that you need multiple styles of play with multiple individual build comps as well as team comps.

This game hasnt had it since the D/D ele meta days and i think the community has finally said enough.

What?

Tomiyou.3790:

He is right on the first point tho. We should be able to see what a team member has equipped and traited. Then again there would probably be a lot of hate towards people not using meta builds and Anet would be finally forced to make non meta builds that much better, tho I doubt that would ever happen.

On the other hand I am scared of seeing what trash builds people run in PvP

We don’t need to see everything, but if say, in your build setup, theres another tab that lets you declare your build type. There’d be 4 build types; Attacker, Defender, Support and Roam. Each will describe what the role entails briefly, and suggest the types of skills your class should have.

Instantly, for a new player, they are given direction, an effective yet simple understanding of what they are supposed to do, and what a team mate can do. If you enter a game and everyone is running support, you can now quickly change.

Information needs to be visual. Popular MoBAs, love them or not, are excellent at this stuff. Arenanet’s handle on it is downright atrocious.

Eg. You click Roam. Your class icon will have an orange color. There will be two descriptions.

The brief description says: “I will scour the battlefield and disrupt the enemies’ efforts”.

The long description will say “Roam builds should have high mobility and skills that can do a lot of damage in a brief amount of time. Aim to capture undefended nodes, or ambush enemies moving alone. Achieve victory by tipping the balance of team fights to your team’s advantage”.

Simple.

Conquest is a great game mode actually. But it needs this:

• Save/Load build templates
• Ability to change build while standing in respawn before leaving platform

Ramoth.9064:

https://youtu.be/iS74nfyKu3o?t=722

He talking about treb is so fun lmao (fun fact, we still have trebs)

I also made a post talking about conquest, it’s bad. Doesn’t make sense to have a game mode that needs so much support when you can spend way less on a 2v2 and do way better.

Btw, I agree with pretty much everything you said. They really need to rethink about this game mode if they want a competitive PvP.