Anti-Zerg Mechanics (Theorizing)

ArchivedUser

So what kind of mechanics do you guys thing they will have in place to prevent Zerging?

We have already heard things like:
No fast travel, which will make it much harder for people to meet up easily to Zerg.
"No Zerging bosses without knowing their mechanics"

What kind of systems do you guys think will be in place besides these?

I hope there will be boss mechanics like: (Note, talking about world bosses, event bosses etc)
Boss healing skills like, whenever a player dies boss heals a certain amount, or a healing skill that scales based on players within a certain radius, like a mass energy drain skill used on all players in vicinity that heals the boss. 
Bosses with Damage Aura's, say for example a Fire Golem boss has a Fiery aura that burns everyone within a certain range for xxx dmg per second, making healers be unable to keep up with it in a Zerg. 
Dominance skills that targets a % of players in the vicinity, making it more dangerous the more players there are.

But I'd like to hear your theories  

ArchivedUser

Are your ideas related to world bosses? I'm a bit confused here because I don't see the point in anti-zerg mechanisms when it comes to world bosses, but I'm open to getting convinced otherwise.

ArchivedUser

1. Boss scaling based on participation metrics. In other words, bosses get stronger the more people are attacking them. This can be fine-tuned algorithmically to ensure the scaling does not invalidate the value of gear.
   
   
2. Wiping mechanics. Be
   
   
   
3. Size limits. This will be easily implemented for instanced content, but can also be implemented for open world content by the size of the physical dimensions of the boss "platform". This is possible in Ashes because player entities have collision physics, so it will only be possible for a certain number of players to occupy the same area at once.

ArchivedUser

I always find a heavy bolter works vs zergs unless you meant player then I'm in the wrong game 

ArchivedUser

HeckinBamboozled said:

Are your ideas related to world bosses? I'm a bit confused here because I don't see the point in anti-zerg mechanisms when it comes to world bosses, but I'm open to getting convinced otherwise.

Yeah I am talking about world bosses and event bosses etc.
And why anti-zerg when it comes to world bosses?
It's not exactly a challenge if all you need to do is throw numbers at something as epic as a world/event/lore boss is there? 
Imagine you're going against this Epic Dragon and all you would need to do is throw thousand players at it, it kinda ruins the epicness. 

ArchivedUser

lexmax said:

1. Boss scaling based on participation metrics. In other words, bosses get stronger the more people are attacking them. This can be fine-tuned algorithmically to ensure the scaling does not invalidate the value of gear.
   
   
2. 
   
   
3. Size limits. This will be easily implemented for instanced content, but can also be implemented for open world content by the size of the physical dimensions of the boss "platform". This is possible in Ashes because player entities have collision physics, so it will only be possible for a certain number of players to occupy the same area at once.

1. Oh? That's confirmed? Do you have a source, I'd like to read up on it

2. Yeah that's basically everything I've heard that is a statement from Intrepid, that's why I was wonder what sort of mechanics they could have in place.

3. Hmm, never considered that battle platform could be an option, nice.

ArchivedUser

Ziltch said:

lexmax said:

1. Boss scaling based on participation metrics. In other words, bosses get stronger the more people are attacking them. This can be fine-tuned algorithmically to ensure the scaling does not invalidate the value of gear.
   
   
2. 
   
   
3. Size limits. This will be easily implemented for instanced content, but can also be implemented for open world content by the size of the physical dimensions of the boss "platform". This is possible in Ashes because player entities have collision physics, so it will only be possible for a certain number of players to occupy the same area at once.

1. Oh? That's confirmed? Do you have a source, I'd like to read up on it

2. Yeah that's basically everything I've heard that is a statement from Intrepid, that's why I was wonder what sort of mechanics they could have in place.

3. Hmm, never considered that battle platform could be an option, nice.

Boss scaling isn't confirmed. I thought you were asking for theoretical ways to prevent zerging, which is why I listed this.

Intrepid will need to implement participation metrics for this to work properly. I hope they do this, because it gives them a powerful tool to eliminate toxicity in different areas of gameplay. For example, it could be used in a scaled individual looting system to eliminate loot toxicity.

Just to be clear, by toxicity, I'm talking about behavior that has an unbalanced risk vs reward. The kind of behavior that allows small group of people to dominate a game system with little or no effort or risk. This is the kind of behavior that can destroy a community and cause people to quit the game.

Zerging, loot toxicity, PK griefing and Bots/gold selling are all forms of toxic behavior that needs to be addressed by game systems design, rather than assuming that the player community or game masters can deal with this on large server populations. Intrepid have announced a great flagging system to help equalize the risk/reward for PK griefing and an automated detection system to guard against bots and gold sellers. I'm waiting in hope to see how or if they intend to address these other two important areas in the game systems design

ArchivedUser

Ziltch said:

HeckinBamboozled said:

Are your ideas related to world bosses? I'm a bit confused here because I don't see the point in anti-zerg mechanisms when it comes to world bosses, but I'm open to getting convinced otherwise.

Yeah I am talking about world bosses and event bosses etc.
And why anti-zerg when it comes to world bosses?
It's not exactly a challenge if all you need to do is throw numbers at something as epic as a world/event/lore boss is there? 
Imagine you're going against this Epic Dragon and all you would need to do is throw thousand players at it, it kinda ruins the epicness. 

That makes sense. Thank you very much for the answer.

ArchivedUser

lexmax said:

Ziltch said:

lexmax said:

1. Boss scaling based on participation metrics. In other words, bosses get stronger the more people are attacking them. This can be fine-tuned algorithmically to ensure the scaling does not invalidate the value of gear.
   
   
2. 
   
   
3. Size limits. This will be easily implemented for instanced content, but can also be implemented for open world content by the size of the physical dimensions of the boss "platform". This is possible in Ashes because player entities have collision physics, so it will only be possible for a certain number of players to occupy the same area at once.

1. Oh? That's confirmed? Do you have a source, I'd like to read up on it

2. Yeah that's basically everything I've heard that is a statement from Intrepid, that's why I was wonder what sort of mechanics they could have in place.

3. Hmm, never considered that battle platform could be an option, nice.

Boss scaling isn't confirmed. I thought you were asking for theoretical ways to prevent zerging, which is why I listed this.

Intrepid will need to implement participation metrics for this to work properly. I hope they do this, because it gives them a powerful tool to eliminate toxicity in different areas of gameplay. For example, it could be used in a scaled individual looting system to eliminate loot toxicity.

Just to be clear, by toxicity, I'm talking about behavior that has an unbalanced risk vs reward. The kind of behavior that allows small group of people to dominate a game system with little or no effort or risk. This is the kind of behavior that can destroy a community and cause people to quit the game.

Zerging, loot toxicity, PK griefing and Bots/gold selling are all forms of toxic behavior that needs to be addressed by game systems design, rather than assuming that the player community or game masters can deal with this on large server populations. Intrepid have announced a great flagging system to help equalize the risk/reward for PK griefing and an automated detection system to guard against bots and gold sellers. I'm waiting in hope to see how or if they intend to address these other two important areas in the game systems design

Ah, thought it was since you posted that statement as the 2nd point :P 
And while I do agree it is a good way to do it, personally I feel like it is a bit.. "cheap", I mean I can accept it if it is explained by skills and abilities. I like things to make sense lore wise, and bosses randomly scaling according to number of players would not be the best way, in my opinion. But it is a good way to do it My apoligies for misunderstanding tho ;P

And yeah I know, thankfully they are well aware of these things so we will hopefully see some good systems for them

ArchivedUser

HeckinBamboozled said:

Ziltch said:

HeckinBamboozled said:

Are your ideas related to world bosses? I'm a bit confused here because I don't see the point in anti-zerg mechanisms when it comes to world bosses, but I'm open to getting convinced otherwise.

Yeah I am talking about world bosses and event bosses etc.
And why anti-zerg when it comes to world bosses?
It's not exactly a challenge if all you need to do is throw numbers at something as epic as a world/event/lore boss is there? 
Imagine you're going against this Epic Dragon and all you would need to do is throw thousand players at it, it kinda ruins the epicness. 

That makes sense. Thank you very much for the answer.

You're welcome. And thanks for pointing out the lack of context in my original post. I tend to forget myself :P 

ArchivedUser

I agree that boss kills should be about skills and not about zerging.

You shouldn't be limited in how many people you bring (this is MMO) but there should be some drawbacks and increased risks the more people you bring.

- players dieing around boss boosting bosses damage and healing him.
- every X incoming attacks boss does some AoE (the more players, more AoEs happen)
- boss mind controlling certain percent of players periodically and let em attack their friends (the more players, more threat when this happens)
- players not being able to walk through each other (body physics) making it very hard to avoid punishing boss AoEs in crowded space (other players preventing you to dodge out)
- boss puts poison on random players, that affects not only said players but players close to them as well (if you are in crowd of too many people, gonna be hard)
- etc.

ArchivedUser

Gothix said:

I agree that boss kills should be about skills and not about zerging.

You shouldn't be limited in how many people you bring (this is MMO) but there should be some drawbacks and increased risks the more people you bring.

- players dieing around boss boosting bosses damage and healing him.
- every X incoming attacks boss does some AoE (the more players, more AoEs happen)
- boss mind controlling certain percent of players periodically and let em attack their friends (the more players, more threat when this happens)
- players not being able to walk through each other (body physics) making it very hard to avoid punishing boss AoEs in crowded space (other players preventing you to dodge out)
- boss puts poison on random players, that affects not only said players but players close to them as well (if you are in crowd of too many people, gonna be hard)
- etc.

Boss damage increasing per kill is a great idea, stacking it per kill like "Bloodlust" or something :P 

Oh that's a nice idea, poison aura on players, auras stack.
Or even, boss puts DoT on a player that, when they die, they explode for a lot of damage or spread a poison cloud to others. 

ArchivedUser

there should be a certain zone around the bosses, where u step into to get into fighting radius with the boss, that notices and counts the players participating in the combat. 

so if 20 people would participate, the boss should adapt towards that number of people, and become more resistant, stronger, and more unpredictable, to make the fight way harder that it gives zergs as big of a challenge's as if you would try 4 man it 

theres probably better additions to make it even more interesting, but i think this could be one of the solutions to prevent hack & slashing of big HP bosses )

ArchivedUser

Some mechanics mentioned so far will work well on a mindless zerg - the unstructured zerg of random players who zoom on a boss fight because they heard it was happening.

However, many will not work on an organised zerg - a number of fully formed and organised 40 man raids that descend in an organised way on an unsuspecting world boss.

The idea of cheesing the mechanics of world bosses is an incredibly difficult one to combat. 

What happens if three full raids are organised by an alliance and it is agreed upon that only one raid will attack for the majority of the fight and then the other two raids will chime in at 20% to just smash it down? Or wait until a particular phase that hurts large numbers is past? Even if the boss dynamically scales up it might be too late from the influx of that extra sudden damage.

One mechanic I would like to see implemented is that the boss is healed for a percentage of his health for each new player that attacks after say the first 5% of his health is removed. This would then punish the influx of players who just rush in on an almost downed boss. 

I think the idea of limiting the fighting area is a good one, especially when coupled with punishing mechanics that, with collision detection, could kill half the attacking force in one go if there are too many sandwiched in.

Another excellent mechanic is disease (boss specific of course). If one player is struck by disease but will infect any other players within 10 yards, this can quickly get out of hand in a zerg. There is even an incidence of this occurring in WoW that epidemiologists studied as the disease was brought back from an instance and spread throughout the capital city populace, killing hundreds of players - until Blizzard hotfixed it.

ArchivedUser

Just make dodge rolls not able to let you pass through people. And make boss AoEs very punishing.

Too large zerg = very hard to move around
very hard to move around = very hard to avoid boss AoE
boss throws AoE + zerg of people around you = RIP

ArchivedUser

Bajjer said:

Some mechanics mentioned so far will work well on a mindless zerg - the unstructured zerg of random players who zoom on a boss fight because they heard it was happening.

However, many will not work on an organised zerg - a number of fully formed and organised 40 man raids that descend in an organised way on an unsuspecting world boss.

The idea of cheesing the mechanics of world bosses is an incredibly difficult one to combat. 

What happens if three full raids are organised by an alliance and it is agreed upon that only one raid will attack for the majority of the fight and then the other two raids will chime in at 20% to just smash it down? Or wait until a particular phase that hurts large numbers is past? Even if the boss dynamically scales up it might be too late from the influx of that extra sudden damage.

One mechanic I would like to see implemented is that the boss is healed for a percentage of his health for each new player that attacks after say the first 5% of his health is removed. This would then punish the influx of players who just rush in on an almost downed boss. 

I think the idea of limiting the fighting area is a good one, especially when coupled with punishing mechanics that, with collision detection, could kill half the attacking force in one go if there are too many sandwiched in.

Another excellent mechanic is disease (boss specific of course). If one player is struck by disease but will infect any other players within 10 yards, this can quickly get out of hand in a zerg. There is even an incidence of this occurring in WoW that epidemiologists studied as the disease was brought back from an instance and spread throughout the capital city populace, killing hundreds of players - until Blizzard hotfixed it.

Read what i wrote above ur post  
more players = adaptive and harder boss