Guild Wars 2

Outmanned is a map wide buff that adds so little to the affected player it’s only real use nowadays is to warn you that a shed load of enemies (lots) have just arrived on map (or all your friends left…)
It’s next to useless to be honest.

So how about changing Outmanned, and in the process providing a system that would reduce the impact of population imbalance at any time of day or night.

Here’s what I would do:
1. Make “Outmanned” a local buff. Give it a range of say 2500 which is about the max range of player held weapons. So Outmanned would now apply according to the number of players who could actually do you harm. If you become “Outmanned” not only would you know there’s a lot of enemy on the map, you’d know they’re next to you…

2. Change what “Outmanned” does. Make it scale the player in a similar way to the Lords scale in a structure. Exactly what scales and how much needs deciding as I can’t find the details for Lords, but I’m using this as an example because I’ve only ever seen the Lords win against single or double characters, and at this level you wouldn’t be outmanned anyway.

Edit: over the course of this thread this idea has evolved to use stacks of might to boost the outmanned players damage (up to the usual 25 stack limit) and stacks of “new-resistance” (a 2% damage reduction boon effective against both condi and direct damage – and again up to a limit of 25 stacks). These buffs are already available in game and changing the number in the stack provides the scaling I hoped to achieve.

Why this is a good idea:
The new scoring system is going to favour big blobs (again) and the bigger the zerg is the less time defenders have to rally a defence. I’ve read countless posts claiming that the best fights are ones where both sides have some degree of parity. I have seen very few (serious) posts promoting steamrollering as the most satisfying combat mechanic we have. The idea behind changing Outmanned is about buying extra time rather than blocking progress.
The new Outmanned buff would provide a better balance to times of unequal population: not just for different times of day but in all encounters. Thus the only time a server should end up facing a seriously skewed score “overnight” would be if they had NO-ONE on at all (and I do not believe this happens under the current linking).

Details:
Outmanned needs to kick in at a suitable threshold. I don’t know what the current level is so I’ll suggest it kicks in when the player faces odds of over 2.0 to 1 (so 3 on 1 and 21 on 10 would both trigger outmanned but 4 on 2 won’t). I suggest 2:1 because I think a player has a chance to escape or win at these odds.

Scaling should be dynamic so that the Outmanned player receives a bit of boost at low levels and more when seriously outmanned. I’d expect to have an upper cap to prevent solo players being unkillable for a zerg.
I’m not exactly sure what scales on a Lord so for the sake of discussion I’ll suggest a 1% increase in damage by the player and 2% decrease in damage to the player (both direct and condi) for each step up to a 25% cap. Anet would need to look at what actually would scale and by how much, but you get the idea – the buffed player would do more damage and have more survivability without becoming invulnerable. I would expect to see a fine range of outmanned buffing – proper scaling is required not just Off or InstaGib mode.

Four attempts to game the idea and how to beat them:
1. You face a large incoming zerg so you decide to pull all but 2 defenders out to allow them to scale up fully. Either the attackers all pile in and defeat the defenders anyway or some of them stay outside combat range and reduce the scaling. If you’re stood just out of Outmanned range expect these players to come looking for you…
2. One player zerg busting. The zerg only needs to scatter to strip the Outmanned buff or reduce the scaling. Alternatively focus the player and it’s no worse than fighting a Keep Lord with that number of people.
3. Solo roamer/scout trolling a large group. Simply despatch a couple of players to deal with them, or treat as above example.
4. Single player defending on an arrow cart. OK so they scaled up a lot. Withdraw for a moment and either build a ballista or other longer ranged device to take them down from beyond the buff trigger range, or withdraw and send in a couple of players who can use AoE, or a siege disabler. If you need to, keep doing this until they are dead (or the defenders turn up and you get a decent fight).

The added bonus of this new Outmanned is that it would discourage large mindless blobs. Larger well-led groups will adapt their play (spread instead of stack) and smaller groups will be able to make a stand against a bigger force without melting immediately.

So what attributes should the buff scale up and by how much?

Chinchilla.1785:

Outnumbered buff was discussed in this topic: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/wuv/Outnumbered-and-Points-per-Kills-PpK
There were concerns with stats increases, and increases to AI.

In short, permanent stats increases to players is not wise in a 1v1v1 setting.
Server 1 has 10 people, Server 2 has 15 people, and Server 3 has 30 people. It is bad when the outnumbered buff gets turned on/off in the midst of combat (if it provides raw stat increases).

Example:

Server 1 gets the outnumber buff while fighting Server 2 (who does not get the outnumbered buff). Server 3’s 30 people is disruptive by turning on/off the out number buffed.

For AI, people didn’t like increase the stats to the “pve” aspect, especially when lords scale pretty high already.

At best, in that topic, killing the players who are outnumbered won’t grant PPK was suggested.

Yeah – point taken.
But the difference is that I’m suggesting Outmanned is a local buff not map wide. So Server 3 can only turn the buff on and off if they’re within combat range. Would they really just jump in and out of range to toggle the buff or would they go in for the bags?

Although the players stats would not be permanently changed I think you’re referring to during the buff and will treat the comment as such. I think a damage in/out change would do – it would be like having fury. In fact the Outmanned buff could be applied via might stacks and health regen. The mechanics for this already exist and are used.

Taking it a step further. As I seem to understand it so far. You want to be able to take on larger group while you/your server has very few people. I can see the initial allure of that. However, it means that are artificially increasing the value of your people to be on par with a larger amount of people (or being able to avoid them completely).

Going past some technical limitations, this is my issue: you/your server isn’t matched well with the opponent. I don’t think this is the route to take to resolve that issue of match making. If we statistically raise the value of a 3rd place server you are holding back those beneath your tier from going up. In essence, you could be locking the match up.

Personally, I thought ideas like Siegerazor/Siegerazor to help a server “breakout” of spawn were good. They could have been done more/differently (perhaps give said server a free dragon banner…). But I don’t think giving statistical increases to outnumbered is the right way to go.

Interesting ideas.

Whatever they do, outmanned needs a buff. A really big buff if they want to counter the “stack the servers to win” design we have currently.

The current design favors blobs in a big way. It’s boring and stupid. Any two year old can design a zerg game.

Chinchilla – I think you’ve misunderstood what I’m trying to achieve. The idea is to try to reduce the impact of local and global population differences when they reach a certain level of unbalance. This is not about artificially boosting the level of any server since the system would be available for all players on all servers at all times and would only cut in with local population variation.
I don’t believe it would artificially support servers in third place because all players would gain the same benefits when outmanned irrespective of their server ranking.

To be honest, given the choice between a universal system like this that is available to all players at any time, or the time scaled scoring being suggested here then I’d always go with the system that is available for and supports all the players.

From the limited feedback, and with a bit more thought I’m even more convinced this rework of the Outmanned buff could be achieved using a stack of might per step, combined with regeneration and a stack of reworked resistance (to reduce damage).

I would change resistance from ignoring condi damage to reducing condi damage by 2% per stack. You could also add in a 2% physical damage reduction (like the one hour Armor buff reduces damage by 5%, but for a much shorter time and make it stackable). This would allow resistance to be built up as a temporary defence boost like might boosts attacks for a short time.

So this would now make Outmanned a local (2500 range) buff that gives a rapidly ticking, short lived, stack of might and a stack of new-resistance (2% reduction in condi and physical damage) per step of scaling up to a maximum of 25 stacks when extremely outmanned.
Outmanned would only apply when you are in combat range of more than twice as many opponents (all from one server) and would scale up as the odds got worse (to a limit).

This has to be better than what we have, and could reduce both k-training and population imbalance problems.
Better – yes?!

I thought about some ideas how anet could help discourage blobing up into 70 man blob and running over everyone else.
One thing I came up with is if there is a fight going on, the side that is outnumbered could get a buff that allows their abilities to hit more targets.

Right now most abilities are capped at hitting 5 enemies. What this would allow is for every 10 (this number an be adjusted) people you are outnumbered, you get to affect +1 target with you abilities. For example this means necro wells will hit 6 enemies or guard will grant stab to 6 allies.
This buff could scale by how much you are outnumbered in a fight.
10 = +1 target, 20 = +2 targets, etc.

It’s just something to encourage people to run smaller groups and giving the smaller groups a chance to fight big unorganized blobs.

Dont forget about strong Guild groups of 25 that could completely steamroll a pug blob especially with added buffs provided by some people here.

It wont be hard to manipulate and abuse that.

I understand your concern but look at it again.
The skilled guild group of 25 will probably beat the pug blob anyway (as you point out). But think it through:

• The guild group won’t get Outmanned unless the pug blob is over 50 players, and that’s for the minimum scaling.
• If the pub blob scatters (the most likely scenario since they may lack the discipline to stack) then the chances of the guild group being outmanned by at least 2:1 (within 2500 range) drops quickly.
• Now consider if the pugs run, either individually or in small groups. If the guild group chases them down the pugs may become outmanned – possibly by 25:1 (serious buff time!) so although they may die eventually at least they can fight back and will give the guild group a better challenge than now. They may even escape to regroup.

All in all I’d say that was a good example of the suggested Outmanned working to spice up combat rather than giving an unfair boost to an already better skilled group.

Pug blobs are usually around those numbers and i don’t see them splitting up anytime soon.You can’t take into consideration that pugs might flee or might not flee that’s totally depending on what servers you’re facing at the time and if they provide any fights at all.

It does seem nice in theory though,but then again will anet servers even be able to handle all that extra load of constantly having to calculate all of this ?

Coming from a smaller server, and non prime time too, I hadn’t seen pug groups of over 20 let alone 50+. I’d suggest with a map limit of 80 players each side a group of 25 would never get more than 2 or 3 stacks of buff, and to do that they would have to be facing EVERYONE from the other server. Might reach 4 or 6 stacks if they faced the entire full map population of both opponents – so 6 stacks of might and 12% damage reduction, versus 160 players. Now that could be fun…

The guild group could perhaps split into two or three smaller groups to gain the buff, but would it be worth trading a couple of stacks of might and resistance for half your guild force? I would guess not but that’s just my guess.
The tricky bit would be deciding how to scale Outmanned so it isn’t the deciding factor in the combat.

Whether players stack or scatter would of course be player choice – it always should be. This version of outmanned would perhaps change the consequences of that choice a bit, but I think overall the advantages might outweigh the disadvantages.

Server load could be an issue, yet distance info is calculated already for fog-of-war and for the range bars under your weapon skills so perhaps it’s already available.

I think the current outmanned buff should be kept in its current form as it is, however, there should also be an additional local outmanned buff which stacks with it that should seriously do something actually useful.

I disagree with stat buffs and scaling. If you played WOW during the Lich King expansion there was a mass PVP map of which I forgot the name (I think it was Wintergrasp, but not sure) and on that map that was exactly what Blizzard did. They gave outmanned side scaling stat buffs, and it was very stupid and rediculous. I played both sides of it and its just horrible, a very bad idea which I do not want to see in this or any other game ever again.

I could see some combat abilities from the local outmanned buff such as:

- 3 seconds of resistance on a 60 seconds CD
- 1 additional stunbreaker with 1 stack of stab on a 60 second CD
- convert all conditions to boons, on a 60 second CD

etc. etc. If there are not too many of these, and they are spaced out on longer CDs (60 secs minimum, maybe more, a lot more) then that would be ok, but stat increases, especially scaled ones, is just very bad.

Non combat wise, this is where it should be concentrated in the following manner:

Any player killed while under the effect of local outmanned buff should be worth only half the score points, that is in addition to and on top of other score limitations such kitten min after respawn etc.

Any player killed by any other player who is under the effect of outmanned buff, should give the outmanned player roughly twice the total score, experience counting towards rewards tracks, etc.

This is so it reflects the challenge and skill levels, lets face it, its far more difficult to kill people while being outmanned then otherwise, especially a local outmanned, meaning you are very near or picking off a large zerg that can turn on you at any moment. I think players who take those sort of risks and actually pull it off should yield a greater reward for doing so.

Giving a single player an overpowered buff like that sounds like a good idea, but consider, not everyone plays the same. Some people solo roam outnumbered bls looking for duels, others from 3Rd server roam the 2nd server bl ganking defenders headed to defended a keep against the first server. In the case of the honest solo roamer up against a 25+ enemy zerg, it makes sense, but you can’t guarantee that all of them would play by the rules and not exploit the buff by only going after other solo roamers without that buff.

HazyDaisy – I’m not sure what you mean – sorry. Are you thinking of a solo roamer who is buffed as “Outmanned” under my idea hunting down other single players to take advantage of the buff?
If so then the idea is that Outmanned would only be triggered locally and NOT map wide. So the only way a solo player could have outmanned is if there are more than twice as many opponents within combat range. Pursuing a single roamer is likely to take you away from the group that gave you outmanned and you’d lose the buff.

Also because the buff would scale the initial level of boost would be low (eg 1 stack of might and 1 stack of resistance). This maybe wouldn’t make much difference to the combat. You would only get a serious buff if you were serious outmanned within combat range. And that’s the beauty of the idea, it adjusts to local conditions not map wide population or times. You could even have three separate fights between the servers where each has a solo roamer outmanned by her/his opponents, all on the same map, but bring them all together and no-one gets the buff because it’s not needed.

• Like the local outnumbered part
• Dislike the scaling part
  # In general dislike messing with stats in a pvp mode, keep it equal
  # Despite low scaling it can create situations of “leave so we get buff”

Outnumbered is tricky. I’ve suggested a few things in the past, and I’m still not sure how well they would fix things (if at all). But the +X targets posted above was one of them. In general things that helps smaller numbers compete against larger numbers, without changing the combat mechanics (of a 5vs5) much or at all.

I suggested things like:

• Carry more supply
• Use Supply faster
• Increase target limits
• Adjust rallying to outnumbered

I can see the value of carry/use more supply with a map-wide Outmanned buff. For the local version I’m suggesting I’m not sure this would be useful – if you’re outmanned there’s a sizeable group within combat range.

Increasing target limits is interesting. I’m not sure if this is a local or global variable however and so it maynot be easy to change for an individual. It would also favour condi players over direct damage and condi is already strong enough that I’m not so keen on this idea myself. The idea of Outmanned stacking might would cover both condi and physical daamge which is I feel fairer.

I agree that the tricky bit is maintaining a balance under all situations. If the minimum outmanned is 1 stack of might and 2% reduction in damage for free – that’s not much of a decider but it would help a bit. Since it would only kick in at over 2 to 1, I suspect it won’t unbalance fairly even fights. The real difference comes when you’re outmanned by 5 or 6 to 1. At this level if you gained 5 or 6 stacks of might and 10% or 12% damage reduction you have a reasonable boost.

Remember 5 or 6 stacks of might is not hard for a player to stack for themselves so this is just giving a quick boost to their combat. The reduced damage is a bit more controversial but I think you can get close to this with in game stuff anyway (an armor booster is 5% less damage for an hour and superior runes of the scrapper give 7% less damage at up to 600 range).

The time you’d see a serious boost is when a solo player meets a 25+ group and gains say 25 stacks of might (max cap anyway) and 50% damage reduction. That’s enough of a boost to make a nuisance of yourself and maybe kill a player or two (which reduces your buff because the enemy numbers go down) but not enough of a bonus to become invulnerable – I would expect a 25+ group can produce more than twice the damage needed to down a single player!

The overall effect should be that any player at any time who faces overwhelming odds has a better choice to flee or fight. At the moment, unless you can stealth or have immunity to cc your choice is pretty much limited to hoping the bigger group will ignore you.

I dont really like the idea of scaling players like lords, but something must be done with “blobing”, it is too easy, better rewarded, and overpowered.
Things like increase the target limit, more supply, better rewards if you are outnumbered, are much better solutions.

I would also add new debuff, if there are more than 50+ people around you, for more than x minutes. For example:

- decrease the travel speed
- decrase the max amount of supply you can use
- (very controversial) reduce the outgoing dmg.

I’d like to see outnumbered increased it’s a joke now, but don’t think it can apply to players as , as per discussion 1v1v1v1 makes it unfair the players will be op.
I’d like to see the NPC’s scale up though so they can help and an auto supply drop at the waypoint. If you are outnumbered and they have spawn camped you , sups is the first big issue for those that want to play.

I think the outnumbered “buff” is actually self-perpetuating: A lot of people jump into WvW see the outnumbered icon and then leave. It needs to actually have real meaning to counter this phenomenon.

Miko: I think we’re looking at two different things. Map wide, I could agree with you. If you are unfortunate enough to face a server with many more players I can see how gaining supply (you won’t have many camps) and having the NPCs scale in your map might help.

I was suggesting something that isn’t map wide but local – just combat range. This would mean that in 1v1 or 1v2 combat no one would be buffed so I don’t really understand your comment about 1v1v1 being unfair with players being over powered.

My idea was specifically about helping the players to survive when outmanned. If you boost the NPCs across a map based on the map-wide population of servers you could end up unfairly penalising solo players.
Consider a solo roamer that has come onto the map where their 20 player team is running around. A map wide buff to NPCs would put this player at a disadvantage – they now have a harder time capping a camp simply because some of their team mates are busy elsewhere. Somehow this doesn’t seem fair.
With my idea of a localised player buff, a few defenders would have a better chance of standing up to the 20 player group, while not affecting anyone else on the map, for any of the servers. This seems much fairer all round.

For a spawn camping situation, a group of five players would trigger the new outmanned buff for a single player or a pair trying to break out. It wouldn’t trigger for a group of 3 or more – but then this many players has a better chance of dealing with a group of five. The more campers you have the more resilient a single player would be. If the odds become more even outmanned would scale down or stop. Isn’t this an improvement?

The most common argument being presented against this idea seems to be “we shouldn’t buff players because it will be unfair”. We can already stack might, and some builds can reduce damage. I’m simply suggesting similar buffs be automatically made available for players when they are facing overwhelming odds.

Added thought – NPCs should not count towards the buff trigger (I don’t think they would as it stands but perhaps it needs to be made clear for this suggestion).

Jaruselka – I agree. I think my suggested changes would make “outmanned” useful but not overpowered. Hopefully players would recognise the benefits rather than “oh no there’s a lot of enemy on the map!”.
Also you would only see “outmanned” when you spawn if there were a significant number of enemies within combat range and therefore in your spawn area… At this point I suggest it would be time to file a report on cheating!

The outmanned buff should not effect player stats but siege. Why siege when you have few players on the map siege its the only thing that enables you to defend a point. Something like 10% siege dmg, reduce siege dmg taken by 15% and 25% extra wxp. They could also effect supply like carry 5 more supply and siege cost 10 less supply when outmanned. Roamers and havoc groups are the players that normally choose to be on a outnumbered map. Any buff to outmanned should buff the activities of roamers making them more of a strategic threat to the other server.

can’t agree with local buffs, so 5 vs 20 the 5 get a buff the map doesn’t?
so roaming groups boot/abuse non ascended players? 5 in a tower + 3siege can occupy 20 at the moment. once the walls go they should lose, that’s the game… why would they then have 5vzerg chance in combat? I don’t mind making it fairer and the current boost is a joke. But I’m a no to player buffs. Plus I don’t think its feasible technically to implement live with all the calcs and players. what happens if 20-1, 5% reduction in buff, whats the range? what if 5-1 and so on, does the last person resemble the incredible hulk? not a fan.

Edit: Warning, wall of text! Read at own risk >_<

Yuffi:

I so agree that the scaling is not excessive, I’m just saying that I really don’t like messing with combat stats at all. Even with the local variation of the Outnumbered, and how that would work with lots of people within 2500 range, it is going to be either too little, or too much. I just don’t think there is a golden range of this.

Some players just aren’t good enough tat even with the buff, they’re getting killed. Then I’ve seen people go 1vs5 and win, or 1 vs 20 eotm zerglings and kill almost all of them before dying, imagine such a player or 2-3 such players with this buff.

The skill level is too different between players, but the target of the Outnumbered and the Outnumbering, that what is "enough" for one person, is too much or too little for the next 99.

Anyway. The idea is that defensive objects like towers and keeps are advantages to be used while outnumbered. And should be used to fight against an outnumbering foe. The Outnumbered shouldn’t make us able to fight off the enemy, but give us OPTIONS that we CAN do against them to be somewhat efficient.

(Also yes, the ones I’ve suggested are for the map wide Outnumbered, since it doesn’t look like they’ve been planning to change it).

The reason I suggested things like the faster/more supply is because this allows you to somewhat counter the enemies number in a siege war. If you got 10 that can carry 15 supply that is 150 supply. If enemy is 20 with 15 each then that is 300 supply and they can also hammer it into things twice as fast. It was meant as a way to counteract some of that, so you have a more even ground on a defensive siege of a keep.

Reduced siege damage to players, trigger some other defensive advantages in towerskeeps like boons or such, might make your siege take less damage, might even make gates/walls take more punishment. Dunno.

I think that those kind of options would be better for outnumbered.

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On the other hand, I’d love to see a new "trap", a "Cluster-bomb" that like the other ones cost a few silver or bdges or something, takes 10 supply, and a cool down. When it blows up it does a small number of damage in a good size aoe, +1% damage per other enemy player inside the aoe, to each.

You know, that moment when they breach the doors, and everyone just swarm through the door. Standing on the stairs in hills looking down at south outer gate as this happens, and just screen shot away, and the salt comes pouring in. Priceless.

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Sylux:

ANet will never ever give you a debuff for having more players around you. Their entire design philosophy for the game has been that you should always be happy to see another player with you. So any reason to scream for someone to "go away, you’re ruining it for us!" is totally a nono.

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Jaruselka/Yuffi:

Regarding the "oh noes we’re outnumbered" reaction. Reward playing defensively. Say it gives a huge bonus to reward tracks, kill points, especially when near or by towers/keeps. If slapping on some other bonuses to defending, playnig outnumbered would be about trying to be as much of a pain to the enemy as possible, and get lots for it.

Stat increase on out manned is bad idea Maine make kills give 2x more to scoring?

One of the key problems with the existing outmanned is that it is triggered when a large number of enemy players enter your map and you can’t do much about it against overwhelming odds.

Giving a boost to PPK so kills give x2 score is fine in theory but realistically outmanned is usually caused by the presence of a zerg now. Most players in this situation have little hope of challenging the zerg. So giving them extra points for kills they can’t make isn’t that helpful… If it is a map wide bonus they are more likely to use it by seeking out other smaller groups or roamers and meanwhile the zerg rolls on.

Similarly I’m less keen on using Outmanned to provide extra siege or supply. I can see the appeal of it for defence, but believe it would lead to small numbers being forced to camp in towers and keeps behind as much siege as they can put up. Although this is realistic I have the impression most players dislike this sort of situation. It also further promotes zerging because you know the defenders will turtle so therefore you need more players to take a target.

The changes I’m suggesting for Outmanned should lead to small numbers of players having an impact on large blobs. If they are able to kill some of the blobbers then the odds reduce and so does their outmanned buff – which should help keep the fight fair.

One problem I see is the small, skilled groups who are specialised in anti-zerg tactics would become more effective. Two co-ordinated players facing a 25 person group might be able to sit either side of the bigger group and each be outmanned to the limit gaining perhaps 25 stacks of might and 50% damage resistance. They may be able to kill players in the group with this advantage. But every player they killed would reduce the buff they have and they would have to be very careful not to enter combat range of each other or the buff would drop to half. It would take skill to pull this off, so I don’t mind that happening – in effect they’ve earned the bonus. If the zerg doesn’t like it they can spread out and reduce the effect of outmanned on their opponents.

The other problem I foresee is duelling. If two players are duelling and 20 friends are watching the player from one server (and the other duelist has no one nearby from their server) his/her opponent would get a substantial buff making the fight unfair. The solution of course is for spectators to back out of combat range and the duelling players don’t get buffed. Or start a new “duelling” style of 1 vs many to practice multi opponent combat. I don’t know – I’m not a duelist – but I don’t see this as a big issue.

If you’ve read the posts you’ll remember my suggestion has evolved into a change that gives stacks of might and new-resistance (damage reduction) rather than scaling player stats directly. I am defining this as not a stat increase because these buffs already exist in game for players and are in common use, whereas “stat increase” sounds like a change to the players base stats rather than a short term top-up.