Guild Wars 2

As my system is crippled by GW´s low performance bug, sadly I can only watch the PvP from the sidelines.
But just as I noticed in EVE, “The Zerg” has become the main tactical and strategic tool over here too.
Would activating friendly fire at least on the AoEs maybe even the ranged attacks, mitigate this a bit?

Thanks in advance for any constructive input.

Edit: WOW, wasn´t aware of that fact. Incredible oversight by ANet, IMHO. Hope they find the tech to eventually implement this properly.

Fix for the zerg:

• Allow AE to hit unlimited numbers of player

Currently you can only hit 5 people, but unlimited numbers can hit you, so it’s all about the zerg. In DAOC, 1 person could hit the entire zerg with an AE if they were all bunched up, so you’d end up with cases where 5 people mulched 30.

They actually prevented this from happening in this game. The zerg is “works as designed”.

Sorry if this comes off as offensive in any way, it is not meant to but..

No no no no no no no. All that would do is encourage servers going against each other to send a group of so many to transfer to the enemy server go to a tower that they are sieging and go inside and team kill the defenders leaving no one left to protect the tower.

I am a big fan of friendly fire as it adds a completely new layer to player awareness.
I do not think it can work in GW2 though. For friendly fire to work, the game must be built around it, it just wont work as a tacked-on feature.

Scyndek.5273:

team kill the defenders leaving no one left to protect the tower.

Heh, to me that´s actually a good argument for friendly fire.
Small squad action wins over the boring Zerg meatgrinder.

Of course this traitorous guild then has to be fought too. Which would need some type of ally/enemy standing system between Guilds on the same world.

Elthurien.8356:

it just wont work as a tacked-on feature.

Is it that tacked on?
FF doesn´t work only because the game flags you in some way. Nothing is stopping ANet from reversing that flag.

HawkMeister.4758:

Elthurien.8356:

it just wont work as a tacked-on feature.

Is it that tacked on?
FF doesn´t work only because the game flags you in some way. Nothing is stopping ANet from reversing that flag.

Get the feeling you didn’t read his entire post….

I did read his whole post, thanks for making me read it again though. Friendly fire in any form added to a game post release is tacked on. The whole game would need to be rebalanced around it. How is activating friendly fire on AoE not tacked on?

From past experience with mmo’s I can tell you the best way to introduce this without having to build the game around FF and reduce abuse is to make FF a portion of damage, say 10% or 20%. Discuss…

Yeah, no, it would not work.

For instance, Mark of Blood. When triggered, bad guys inside its radius suffer 3 stacks of bleed, while good guys get a few seconds of regen.

So… do the good guys get the bleed AND the regen? Why have the regen there? No one would want to be in it, the bleed damage outweighs the regen by more than 2:1!

Yeah… so, in short it would not work, sorry

some classes (mainly melee) have aoe on almost all attacks, not only would the melee be cleaving there own melee but also both teams ranged classes would be hitting them causing melee to blow up from 3 sources of damage

As a Staff Ele specced into Blasting Staff for bigger AoEs, I vote no kittening way. Sorry. You’d like to punish players for doing their job because you don’t know what to do about a zerg? God I can’t even believe there’s so many people even entertaining the idea. I don’t want to kill my team because you can’t do it yourself. By the way I’m on Fort Aspenwood so the zerg is kicking our behind this week like nothing else and our morale is at an all time low, but I still think it’s a dumb idea.

The best way to limit zergs is to increase the cap on AoE. That’s right ele’s A thief thinks you guys should hit more with AoE

At a glance I would say the AoE limit was put in place to avoid bomb groups that Daoc and War were renowned for. I just think 5 is too low.

Small groups take camps or go play team pvp.

0% chance of friendly fire happening.

There are other ways to be effective in WvW besides zerging. Get a group of like 4-5 people and go around taking undefended camps and fight small groups of enemies. You can easily avoid the zergs especially if you spec your characters for mobility, which you should be doing in small groups.

I hope that advice helps because friendly fire isn’t even worth discussing.

changing aoe’s from 5 to 15 targets might help a bit.

I think you guys are missing the obvious solution. Add more small objectives that can be taken with small groups and/or solo.

Zergs are necessary for the majority of things that you do in WvW. That’s fine but maybe there just isn’t enough alternative stuff for people who don’t enjoy zerging.

but there are more smaller group objectives than “zerg” objectives. Lets dissect it:
Objectives that require large groups

• Stonemist Castle
• Keeps
• Towers
• Orbs

Objectives that can be done with small groups

• Mercenary groups (Hylek, Ogres, Dredge, Quaggan)
• Supply Camps
• Dolyak Escorts
• Dolyak Killing
• Quaggan island for lightning
• Sentries
• Defending all of the above, including towers, keeps and stonemist

These are all WvW based objectives, I didn’t bother mentioning infestations, farming or skill points. There is plenty to do for small groups and you can also avoid zergs while doing them.

Elthurien.8356:

Objectives that can be done with small groups

• Mercenary groups (Hylek, Ogres, Dredge, Quaggan)
• Supply Camps
• Dolyak Escorts
• Dolyak Killing
• Quaggan island for lightning
• Sentries

Thanks for the nice list, but when all boils down how effective are these compared to just zerging the main objectives?

Very effective. The greatest limitation of the zerg is that it’s only ever in one place, at one time. The zerg may be faster in taking down the objective, but once you get more than 5 people on a sentry, or 10 people on a supply camp, any extra are a waste of resources just there for a free ride, likely not even getting a hit in. It adds up to a whole lotta people running around useless that could be far more valuable elsewhere.

There’s also something to be said for a small team breaking into a tower or keep completely undetected due to not triggering orange crossed swords to alert the enemy of their intentions until it’s too late.

Zerg tactics will be in big trouble if servers ever coordinate enough to spread out into smaller strike teams and hit multiple targets simultaneously.

Allow AE to hit unlimited numbers of player will cause more worst problem…

In fact, they should add unit collision when people fighting at WvW.

Sorry to burst all of your bubbles, Friendly will never happen due to one thing: griefing. ’nuff said.

Edit-same goes for player collision, it would cause to much frustration and anger.

Slamz.5376:

Fix for the zerg:

• Allow AE to hit unlimited numbers of player

Currently you can only hit 5 people, but unlimited numbers can hit you, so it’s all about the zerg. In DAOC, 1 person could hit the entire zerg with an AE if they were all bunched up, so you’d end up with cases where 5 people mulched 30.

They actually prevented this from happening in this game. The zerg is “works as designed”.

This would be amazing.

Friendly fire would be terrible.

HawkMeister.4758:

Elthurien.8356:

Objectives that can be done with small groups

• Mercenary groups (Hylek, Ogres, Dredge, Quaggan)
• Supply Camps
• Dolyak Escorts
• Dolyak Killing
• Quaggan island for lightning
• Sentries

Thanks for the nice list, but when all boils down how effective are these compared to just zerging the main objectives?

Supplies are very important to other objectives. You can’t build siege without supplies, you can’t repair without supplies, you can’t upgrade without supplies… plus, you distract them from whatever else they might have been doing to go take back their supply camp.

Friendly fire? In an MMO? Hahahahahahahaha.

Do you know how much griefing would take place?

“Dude you stole my kill” , “No way it was mine”, “You suck”, “No you suck”

Commence friendly fire in the middle of a zerg while two people argue it out…..

Yeeeeeah, no.

If you did that IOJ would be ion last place considering all of their players are Horribad!

In many games friendly fire is mutual (meaning the one who commits the friendly fire is also damaged), I think it the damage you inflict on teammates were equal or greater than damage inflicted on teammates, and possibly some negative karma, griefing or bad actors could be minimized.

IOJ Is the most Pathetic Server in the Game!!! Had a guy 1/1 on my lev 45 he was 80 and he RAN to the Zerg OMG PLZ just delete this server!

1. Unfortuately low level characters have no karma so no penalty there.

2. Even if they do recieve damage upon friendly fire, one accidental meteor storm would be chaos for any nearby ally, zerg or not.

3. multiple characters would attempt to grief the same person, negating the damage focused on a single character.

4. I could go on forever about the huge drawbacks of Friendly fire, so Ill end it with this; if friendly fire was implemented, not only would it be a bad idea to zerg, but it make it nearly impossible if you wanted to.

also everyone else remember this thread is on Friendly Fire!

Kuthos.9623:

Friendly fire? In an MMO? Hahahahahahahaha.

Do you know how much griefing would take place?

Surprisingly little(see EVE Online) as it leads to something the typical bully-griefer abhors.

Consequences.

Nothing would stop you(or your guild, or your alliance) from “putting” the offending person in your kitten-book. Automatically leading to a bad reputation for not only this alt but the whole account.
Military experts are calling this, emergent gameplay.

“Dude you stole my kill” , “No way it was mine”, “You suck”, “No you suck”

Commence friendly fire in the middle of a zerg while two people argue it out….

And again, an inadvertent argument for friendly fire.
It would be simply h*y*larious to witness this. *ebil

Lord Aargadon.4135:

Sorry to burst all of your bubbles, Friendly will never happen due to one thing: griefing. ’nuff said.

Edit-same goes for player collision, it would cause to much frustration and anger.

See post above, it automatically means you can “grief” right back.

And sadly I think you don´t have to worry about player collision(was going to suggest that too), as the devs already have enough on their plate dealing with the invisible players problem. Adding that collision “n-problem” to the pipe surely won´t happen in quite a while.

HawkMeister.4758:

Lord Aargadon.4135:

Sorry to burst all of your bubbles, Friendly will never happen due to one thing: griefing. ’nuff said.

Edit-same goes for player collision, it would cause to much frustration and anger.

See post above, it automatically means you can “grief” right back.

And sadly I think you don´t have to worry about player collision(was going to suggest that too), as the devs already have enough on their plate dealing with the invisible players problem. Adding that collision “n-problem” to the pipe surely won´t happen in quite a while.

If I wanted to kill friendlies I’d be playing TERA. Besides, in WvW we need to be focused on the enemy, not rivalries within our own server. You’re creating a huge other game system by adding in friendly fire. Not to mention AoE is generally a good thing in WvW so everyone’s going to be using it and thus everyone will be killing each other. Ugh there are just so many things to say about this idea, I really see no upside but I see a ton of downsides.

Another poster already made the point that small groups are an important part of WvW anyway. I also would just like to point out the obvious – WvW is designed to be a large scale seige warfare type of PvP, aka lots of people involved is the point. If you don’t like it, do sPvP.

Sorry but I still disagree, even if you can “grief” right back, its easy to start a blame game on who started it, and heck bad rep? Ever heard of a troll? Bad rep is their first last and middle name. Also not every game is Eve online.

Now theres also players that aren’t griefers, mainly spies, but also people that ragequit.
Server X has spy X on server Y. Spy X decides to lay down some “accidental” friendly fire on a crucial location in the heat of battle.

Now, so and so gets mad at a group for whatever reason so he decides to throw some damaging aoe at them( maybe killing them, but I seriously doubt that would be case) now invader X also happens to wonder by right in the middle of this, so he takes advantage of a few distracted and damaged players.

And friendly fire and player collision means that the server has to handle more info leading to more culling, o yay….

Honestly two people duking it out really isn’t that funny when they should be contributing to a team effort. Everything about friendly fire is anti cooperation, as a fan of the Halo series, the only time I enjoy friendly fire is when someone gets in the way or is a griefer (Aslo adding to that example many friendly fire griefers of that game wouldnt exist if friendly fire didnt), so I promptly shoot him with a shotgun

Leiloni.7951:

Besides, in WvW we need to be focused on the enemy, not rivalries within our own server. You’re creating a huge other game system by adding in friendly fire.

Something badly needed, judging from all the “bored” threads.

Not to mention AoE is generally a good thing in WvW so everyone’s going to be using it and thus everyone will be killing each other.

Guess we have to agree to disagree. AoE spamming is about 2nd on my kitten-list of boring game-designs(Zerg is 1st).
And the more effective it currently is, the sooner it will be nerfed into oblivion.

Also one of the reasons I suggested it for AoEs only.

Lord Aargadon.4135:

Also not every game is Eve online.

Thank god. Though every game(and gamers BTW) could sure learn something from those crazy Icelanders.

Trolls, griefers, stupid arguments because of bruised micro-egos, are all problems which currently everybody solves by running to big mama ANet. Friendly fire and a robust non-anonymous based standing system makes true PvP gameplay out of these problems. Solving them very elegantly.

Your spy argument is actually another pro, as they are already there now but currently you´re simply helpless against them.

As for Halo(seriously?), lets see how that crowd deals with DUST. But that´s a whole other topic and has no place in this thread.

Elthurien.8356:

but there are more smaller group objectives than “zerg” objectives. Lets dissect it:
Objectives that require large groups

• Stonemist Castle
• Keeps
• Towers
• Orbs

Objectives that can be done with small groups

• Mercenary groups (Hylek, Ogres, Dredge, Quaggan)
• Supply Camps
• Dolyak Escorts
• Dolyak Killing
• Quaggan island for lightning
• Sentries
• Defending all of the above, including towers, keeps and stonemist

These are all WvW based objectives, I didn’t bother mentioning infestations, farming or skill points. There is plenty to do for small groups and you can also avoid zergs while doing them.

HawkMeister.4758:

Elthurien.8356:

Objectives that can be done with small groups

• Mercenary groups (Hylek, Ogres, Dredge, Quaggan)
• Supply Camps
• Dolyak Escorts
• Dolyak Killing
• Quaggan island for lightning
• Sentries

Thanks for the nice list, but when all boils down how effective are these compared to just zerging the main objectives?

Sometimes very essential.

Supply starving:
A decent sized group can hold off tons of enemies as long as they have incoming supply for their keeps/towers/castle. That’s why almost any tactial player/server knows to cut the supply of their enemy, make them use all of it to “repair” walls/gates, and then goes in, once the enemy has a lack of supply to build siege/replace lost siege apon the 1st wave of attacks. So YB didnt cut the supply and SOR had the advantage of constantly being able to repair/replace siege, and walls. Giving SoR an advantage.

Figure it this way, let’s use Stonemist castle as an example.

Wave 1 rushes in they get killed, but also take out 10 siege weapons that were in lord room.(While SM has 0 supply left)
The defenders wont be able to completely resupply, and chances are by that time they only ahve enough to replace 1-3 siege weapons.)
Wave 2 can then rush in and not have to worry as much about siege as the 1st wave did.

Quaagans:
You can destroy enemy siege, and altars if your server has them and the power node.

Mercenary groups of Mobs:
They can help defend or take supply camps.(or in Quaagan case, attack/defend a keep in the borderlands.)

To directly answer your question on how effective it can be.
SoR had Dreaming bay. Yak’s Bend didnt cut off all supply to the SoR keep. (Thus allowing the supply to come in.)
As YB set up trebs and so forth SoR set tons of siege, in the lord room. We also set trebs, and mortars and killed apx 15-20 of the enemy trebs. While being pinned in DB and out numbered. The fight went on for a long time, YB made a few pushes into the lord room, while wiping each time. They did kill some siege, however we were able to rebuild due to having constant supply incoming to the keep.

Well seeing as you obviously will not change your mind and do not listen to any of my suggestions and largely ignore the value of others, this will probably be my last post here. The only problem at the moment is you, you resort to taking small quotes out of other post to make yours look good and theirs bad. I try to keep the forums civil, but you’re just being a pathetic troll atm. ZERGS are aslo not the problem, the problem is also the PEOPLE, and the solution is also not FRIENDLY FIRE. Im sorry but thats just how it is. If you want to do something in WvW then get involved and get small groups to join you.

I have a fairly decent guild, about 50 people are on at any given time. We organize teams and attack individual points, then follow up with massive coordinated attack on a keep or anything important while the enemy zerg is wasting all of their numbers on reclaiming smaller structures. I don’t have to deal with zergs. My final suggestion to you is to stop wasting your time on the forum whining for a magic solution for everything you don’t like, and organize some people so you can have more fun playing.

Also you keep stating that “how effective are smaller groups compared to a zerg” immediately after another suggest small groups are very efficient then acting as if they aren’t efficient, but your whole post is against zergs.

And lastly, I enjoy how you cannot, or simply do not adress all of my arguements while I adress yours.

And if you run into a zerg and are completely helpless, Im not sorry you dont have your magical anti zerg weapons , thats just how its supposed to be.

Edit- also small groups are extremely effective at taking main objectives. I’ve broken into multiple keeps containing orbs while the enemy is occupied elsewhere, unfortunately never secured it, but Im very happy with being able to break into a fortified keep with 5 people.

Lord Aargadon.4135:

And lastly, I enjoy how you cannot, or simply do not adress all of my arguements while I adress yours.

I quite do not enjoy your petty arguing. Your and the others good arguments obviously stand on their own and don´t need my happy yapping and tail waging.

If you can´t have a discussion without somebody agreeing with your every point to then take this personally, then don´t.
I hope others can see the value in this question, as this whole board clearly shows that all is very much NOT well with GW2´s current PvP.

Im sorry but our arguements do not stand on their own and I do agree with others arguements, You on the other hand are very alone on this thread. Reading through all the comments, I see yours, and two others that are partially alligned with friendly fire, but do not believe it would work without a redisign of the system.

Edit- agreeing to my every point? You don’t agree with a single one.

And Hawk, enough with the troll, I will no longer be responding to any of your comments until you can come up with a decent arguement for Friendly fire. As for fix the eternal zerg? No,again, friendly fire would not, zerg would simply become even more organized murder machines, dettering any less organized players.

Edit again..- also these now super zergs would greatly deter many players from WvW, since they would not stand a chance.

Oh! And last and definitely not least, Anet has also stated many times before, There will be no way to damage allies in this game

Friendly fire will never work in a game like GW2. Requires entirely different game mechanics. More in tune with actual aiming from PlanetSide etc.

Friendly fire will not work in a game like this, then you have to remove all AOE hits and have a Catapult that only hit 1player, arrowcart that only hit 1 will not work and it most defenly will not work with Friendly fire as they hit now.

You’re comparing Eve to Guild Wars 2…….

nuff said.