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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
I think AoEs scaling up in damage when a more numerous enemy is too clumped up isn't lazy design. I think the idea actually lends itself well to giving smaller groups a fighting chance against zergs.
I genuinely don't think you understand even slightly what this post is about. Not even sure how else to explain this to you at this point.
In pvp AoEs should be more effective against deathballs and zeros. The more people caught in the AoE, the more damage potential there is, hence: punishing zergs and deathballs who are careless. Its very simple.
You keep saying "aoes should do more dmg if there's more people in them", but there's gonna be a physical limit on how many people can be in an aoe. I'd imagine that limit will be relatively low (probably less than 16 people), so your suggestion will in no way have the effect you want it to have.
And you only other suggestion so far has been this:
Ashes won't have gunpowder, so no explosives or bombs, but there could be potions or kegs with potion-like substances that could be shot and exploded, though this would simply be a yet another aoe. And a zerg of people would have a much bigger number of these as well, so it's not like it would be a panacea against large groups.
In other words, any "do more dmg" balancing will simply be turned around onto the very groups you're trying to boost. Body collision and good territorial design will already make it harder for zergs to act optimally. Current aoes will make their lives even harder. Overcomplicating mechanics or overtuning them before even seeing how the current design works will only lead to huge overcorrections that might've not been required in the first place.
Maybe the aoe scaling would start at 2 targets then, forgrt 8 or whatever arbitrary number I forwarded initially. Immediately ramping up the more targets there are. Like I said, don't worry about specific numbers. Just in general: the more targets concentrated within an AoE, the greater potential to break them up and counter deathballs.
And you're right, maybe I didnt explain it well (I overexplain things sometimes), but you still managed to somehow completely miss the point when plenty others, especially in the discord, understood it perfectly.
"It's not meant to be a panacea"
Correct, it's not. Just another measure against zergs and deathballs to help stem the tide.
Small guilds will still have parties of 8 people running around as a singular unit. If aoes do a ton of dmg against that amount of characters - the zerg will simply use a few aoes and outdmg the smaller groups.
Your suggestion only works if the game's aoes are smth like 200m in diameter and ramp up to crazy dmg if there's over a hundred people in them. But at that point you have a completely broken OP skill on your hands.
I did not miss any point. I've simply criticized your suggestion. If people on discord said "ah yes, dmging zerg is good", then yeah, no shit - we agree on that. Except your suggestion will not accomplish that, which is exactly what I've been critiquing throughout this entire thread.
I've both been the zerg in an owpvp game and have fought against it. I know how impactful aoes can be and how much more impactful a good play around a corridor with a few turns can be, considering those aoes.
Simply saying "let's make aoes kill zerg really fast" is just a poor suggestion, that, btw, has been suggested several times in the past already.
And on Solvryn's point of Albion (I didn't see that response initially), that shit literally stops at 9+ players
And I already explained the physical limitation of having way more people in an aoe.
There was also some talk of Disarray from Albion, but I didn't see any indication of what constitutes "a group" in Albion. Is it "people from the same guild"? Is it "people in literally one group"? "In one raid"? @Solvryn which one is it?
Cause a scaling debuff on ever-bigger groups is fun and all, but it all depends on how the game views a group. Want a low Disarray score? Just split your zerg into several guilds and/or parties. EZ
p.s. I don't use any translators. I've known english for over 20 years, even if it's my second language.
I saw you mention "40 people attacking 10-20". To me that's a fucking tuesday and nowhere near a "zerg". And definitely nowhere near a headless-chicken-zerg of 300+++ people just running around attacking anything that moves.
sure thats right. using an aoe on 10 people will do more damage in total than using it on 5 people, but each individual player will still take the same damage (assuming same defense). you already have ur scaling right there. you just want additional scaling.
you still didnt address what i said tho. you have your coordinated little group and i have my zerg, then guess what? now i just send an even smaller group than yours to aoe you, boom your death. its a dumb idea. not all ideas are good and not all good ideas are applicable to every game. you just want an advantage because you think you are good enough to beata zerg and you complain that you cant because they have numbers, but you are better than each one of their players. lol...
they are already giving smaller guilds an advantage. you either increase guild size or you get passives. and you want more advantages on top of that because you probably have anxiety and dont wanna join a big guild? well sucks to suck.
Based on what? Youre acting like this is something concrete and not just a concept. Theres nothing about specific numbers here.
Theyre already going to do that by virtue of them having more numbers anyway. At least if they do it and concentrate their forces in one area, the smaller group can force them to take more damage if they play their cards right, and hence have a chance of breaking that zerg up.
Nope, the scaling can start at any number of targets making that point superfluous.
As have I, and most of the time, being in the deathball is incredibly boring.
You're not suggesting a tool against zerg. You're suggesting a tool for solo players to fight against parties, which would then be used by the very zerg you want to counter, because the headless zergs are almost always comprised of solo players.
What, in your opinion, would be the dmg value that would suddenly make a hundred headless chickens disperse instead of just keep hitting the smaller group?
Would it have to be 20% of HP per hit? More? Because your scenario doesn't work in practice. It's either so damn OP that a single aoe can almost one-shot a party (which kills the small guilds in just the same way) or it is simply not enough to overpower the zerg, because that's the entire point of the zerg - overcome that dmg through sheer numbers.
I was talking about it being effective and/or noticeable. A few aoes from a small group will do nothing to the zerg. And if you tune those aoes to a point where it DOES do smth - you've overtuned aoes to such an extent that they break the game.
You keep saying to disregard numbers, but your suggestion is built on them. You want bigger numbers. You want huge numbers, otherwise your suggestion simply doesn't work.
This is why I keep saying that changing skills is a bad way of achieving your goal.
Point of posting Albion scaling is to support the thread because it AoE scaling absolutely can function well when designed properly. Proximity Det also scales up in damage the more people it hits.
AoE damage scaling does work, it prevents one or two people from getting nuked into orbit while doing massive damage to clumped people (there’s no justification for an AoE to hit as hard as a single target ability against one person) There’s versions of it in a few MMORPGs. It’ll work in Ashes when applied to AoEs, it just needs to be designed for this game.
It stops balling and encourages line/formation fighting and actually emphasizes movement and positioning.
I can go into mass depth to how to design it for Ashes too. But most of all as a mechanical function of an AoE it can absolutely punish disorganized play abs mindless zerging, while encouraging organized grouping and rewarding calculated, strategic, and tactical play.
What, in your opinion, would be the dmg value that would suddenly make a hundred headless chickens disperse instead of just keep hitting the smaller group?
If it's so impactful in Albion, what kind of dmg does it do there? Is it 20% of hp of the entire group from a single aoe? Is it more?
Also, you didn't answer how Albion counts people in a group. Cause scaling of Disarray went into the hundreds, but it still just said "in one group". Dafuck do they mean by "group"?
But even then, disregarding that Albion is a non-collision game - the territorial design has a WAY bigger impact on any group movement than any given aoe. There's constantly small chokepoints, corridors, bridges, trees, mountains and rocks.
If anything, Albion is the best argument for my side of this discussion. A smaller group can be more mobile around those chokepoints and use them to turn the fight to their favor from time to time. And with AoC's body collision the path through rate will be even lower than it is in Albion, so those small groups will be able to hit more people with aoes before receiving a shitton of aoes back (as opposed to the zerg just rushing through onto the other side and outside the aoes).
And as I said in another comment here, I'd be all for a few channeled aoes that ramp up in dmg the more people walk through them. But randomly scaling a aoes to 40-50%HP dmg is silly imo.
In other words, I've been correct from the start
Albion has a few really good anti-zerg mechanics. I really like the red blob on the map showing large clusters of players as well.
Would love to test AoE friendly fire outside of raid / guild in a2.
What in my opinion would make a hundred headless chickens disperse? You'll have that answer in A2 when we're able to see exactly how many hotboxes we can stuff into an AoE.
That link I shared should have a chart to what it's calculations are for Albion.
Keep in mind, I also said Prox Det in ESO, so don't ignore the fact that as a mechanic its adapted to several IPs and not just one. That's just how Albion handles it.
Algorithms can always be adjusted Nik.
The AoE works in conjunction with territorial design though and it's not adversarial.
I can if I choose to point out where your argument isn't adversarial to AoE scaling at all. I just haven't, yet.
It's not random, there's a calculation that has been linked to you that tells you what the scaling percentage is per body in the AoE for this particular game. Did you read it? Judging by your response, you have not.
Seems to me you're on the side for AoE scaling.
As I said before, it promotes line/formation fighting movement. It promotes calculated strategic and tactical gameplay, which using the terrain is. What you're describing is exactly why AoE scaling works, not why it doesn't work.
Be correct all you want because your argument is the result of AoE scaling working as intended.
Albion's ttk is way shorter than AoC's, which is why highly scaled (only 56% stronger btw) aoes deal half an HP bar to several people. And Albion has no body collision so it's way easier to move through its terrain, which makes those aoes even more effective.
Ashes will have a longer ttk and body collision, which means that a huge zerg group won't just drop dead from 2 aoes, especially if they're going through a chokepoint in an almost single file manner.
No, I'm on the side of good territorial design, which Albion seems to have. I got no clue what Prox Det is, but I will go check out a few vids of ESO mass pvp to see its presumed effects.
I'm fine with channeled aoes growing in strength because they'd be a tradeoff and a risk/reward-based action. I don't want AoC's single-cast aoes to do the same 50%HP dmg as Albion's do.
Either way it's hard to see if eso's antizerg is in any way effective. But I doubt it would magically change my opinion on this point, cause unless it has some smart mechanic/design to counter zergs - I ain't really interested in it.
ESO's mass pvp also seems to be mainly located around forts/castles, which are full of chokepoints, so this still plays into what I've been saying from the start. We already have aoes in the game, so just having good territorial design will resolve majority of zerg issues.
I'm not trying to sway someone's opinion, yours or anyone elses, scaling AoEs work and are proven effective in several titles. I came here to bump and support the OP.
They do exactly what the OP wants them to do, they turn a ballgroup into mulch and reward organized gameplay.
Using the terrain to someone's advantage is good gameplay and neither AoE scaling nor proper movement are adversarial to each others design, they compliment it.
It doesn't matter to me if someone believes it or not, what matters is that its working in several titles and it works better than anything else I've seen anyone suggest.
Also, from what I've seen, both ESO and Albion still had way smaller fights than what I've had in L2, where such aoes would simply turn any and all mass pvp into "who got their aoe off first", which would be dumb beyond belief imo.
So you're telling me Warhammer players didn't have good strategy/tactics?
There isn't much to do, since Intrepid never thought of creating interesting PvP systems