Duels
This has been suggested about five times in this thread already, but I would like to go into a little more detail other than just “I want duels”.
TL;DR version:
- New location added to the Mists as part of the lobby map (see listing towards end of post for details)
- Duel requests are only allowed in this new location
- 5 second countdown before match starts
- When dueling, all players who aren’t an opponent should disappear from view
- Forced into permanent combat mode while dueling
- Player leaving the location while dueling has ~10 seconds to return or lose the duel
- Falling into the Mists counts as losing the duel
I participated in some duels that broke out during sPvP matches, and it became apparent that the flowing, parkour-esque style of combat in GW2 could provide much more than just simply dueling in the open. For the duels, we had to come up with places that were out of the way so we could avoid interruptions from other non-dueling players in the match. These locations were:
- Kyhlo – Top of the clock tower
- Capricorn – Entire ship
- Niflhel – Common area between the two spawn points (southern part of map)
- Foefire – One of the team bases after clearing out the NPCs
The Foefire and Niflhel locations are basically wide open (flat and boring) places to duke it out, but the Kyhlo and Capricorn areas were great.
The roof of Kyhlo presented interesting use of LOS thanks to its extremely steep angle. In some duels, a player would take the high ground, knockback their opponent, and use it offensively. Others used it defensively and utilized the additional time to reacquire LOS for recovery.
In Capricorn, the ship deck is much smaller than the open areas of Niflhel and Foefire, and possibly even than Kyhlo roof. The ship created some fun cat-and-mouse situations thanks to having both an upper and lower deck. The ship interior had some really melee intensive fights, whereas the deck provided a more open environment. The hall between the decks was perfect for LOS tactics and could turn a losing battle into a winning one with a well executed retreat.
Not only were the Kyhlo and Capricorn locations far more fun to duel in than Forefire and Niflhel, it was more fun to watch the duels since it was more than just trading attacks on a flat surface.
Ahead of time we had agreed not to knock anyone off the roof of Kyhlo or the deck of the ship in Capricorn, due to other players and sharks. We had a few from each team on bouncer duty to take care of anyone interfering and actually trying to play the match (lol). This leads to my suggestion: a designated dueling area within the Mists.
In my opinion, this location should be in a lowered area of the Mists, or behind one of the Mists walls. I would prefer having this be in a lowered area so it won’t be essentially hidden from players, causing it to go unused. One side of the area should have a single staircase to exit, and the rest should just fall into the Mists. The reasoning for the staircase is to prevent players from accidentally running out of the dueling area since that is the only exit, and to prevent people from forcing a timeout via mass CC. Falling into the Mists is an obvious threat and I feel it will be naturally avoided, so it should automatically cause that player to lose the duel. The new location should be large enough to allow 3-4 duels happening simultaneously and have some of the following:
- Interior areas such as houses, corridors
- Objects within some of the interiors that block movement, but not LOS, and must be jumped over
- Walls with staircases leading up at different locations that can be fought upon/knocked down from. The wall itself should have areas to walk through, but the top should be contiguous like WvW fort walls
- An underwater area with small water surface area for entry points, so time spent swimming on the surface is minimized. Example: something like a sewer pipe/manhole/well leading to a large underwater reservoir
- Multi-level structures like the ship in Capricorn
- A tower high enough to kill a player if they fall. Climbing the tower should be mostly interior with a few exits that have a ledge for sniping/booting people out of the tower. The top should be fully opened and slightly larger than the Waterfall capture point in Foefire, so there is a little leeway in being kicked off, but not much.
- Gaps large enough so they can only be crossed with a gap closer. These should be easily accessible if unable to make the gap. Example: staircase leading to Mansion in Kyhlo
- Some of the large gaps should have interiors below them. Example: leap from a large wall to the roof of a house, with the house having an interior
- Some of the large gaps should have an interior on one or both sides. Example: leap from the roof of a house to a tower entrance
- A large open area for those who prefer a more traditional style of dueling