RWZ: Am i wrong?

[huehuebrbr]

Or this game is not "compatible" with only 8-man ranked warzones? From reading the boards and talking to people ingame, i observed a few patterns. I'm trying to understand how things work, i'm not saying this is absolutely true, i just want to hear people's opinion. Also, i feel no desire to play rankeds with this system.

 

1) This game live of cycles. Imagine you have a full team for ranked warzones, suddenly there's either a hiatus from BW or another game that take a few people away (i'm not saying they ragequit just stop playing for sometime and maybe come back) and guilds/teams are completely crushed.

 

2) If your team weren't affected directly by item 1, you would still get less people to play against, leading to longer queues and a lot of times you end it up facing the same teams, or they queue dodge. Suddenly your team is not motivaded to play. The entrance gap is way higher than a game like League of Legends and there's no way we can have the same number of people, so we can't expect to use a similar system without a lot of changes.

 

3) If you didn't had a team and played with pugs, you probably have a pretty bad rating. It's to hard to compensate for that, even if you are skilled it's a huge pain to recovery from that. Example: going from 900 to 2400, is that even possible?

 

I'm not even playing rankeds anymore, all the people i knew left the game and it's a pain to fit in another team. I would suggest a solo or 4-man max queue ranked (with some requirement like having valor 70, so you know people would have at least battlemaster gear) on a Elo system so you can still compete with other people on a better level than regular "recruit gear" zones. The problem is this would fragment even more the 8-man.

 

Maybe i'm asking too much but can a dev elaborate on the current state of ranked warzones, and if they are thinking about changing the system or introducing something new?

Edited September 19, 2012 by huehuebrbr

[Master_Nate]

I agree with you on this as well. I think RWZ's need more options such as the one you suggested, the 4 man team. I would love to see a 4-5 man setting as well as the one originally implemented. The maps aren't designed for this few of players, which makes sense, but I would love to see some more options offered rather than 8 man only RWZ games.

 

8 Man games are fun, just not always the easiest to establish and even if you do get one, there is no guarantee you'll have anyone to face off against. I think with your solution, there would be constant pops as getting 4 people together is quite a bit easier than a full team of 8.

[huehuebrbr]

Just to clear things up, i wasn't talking about making PVP 4x4, just to allow people to queue with 4 people (and then filling the team with another 4 pugs). That's a place we can't go since class balance would be a huge mess. Edited September 19, 2012 by huehuebrbr

[Master_Nate]

Just to clear things up, i wasn't talking about making PVP 4x4, just to allow people to queue with 4 people (and then filling the team with another 4 pugs). That's a place we can't go since class balance would be a huge mess.

 

Ahhh, okay that makes sense. Sorry for misinterpreting your original post.

[Pistols]

IMO, the next best option is to have a RWZ Group finder. I used to be pro solo or 4 man, but after giving it a bit more thought, and of course reading these boards, neither is going to help. For example, we have all seen the massive crying that goes on with pre-mades vs solo queue'ers in regulars. Now, imagine if two 4 man groups enter a RWZ, and faceoff against an 8 man team. First off, there is no guarantee either 4 man will have a single healer, let alone 2 among them. Secondly, each 4 man team would be just thrown together with a good chance of no voice comms. The next step in complaints would be to seperate 4 man groups from 8 mans, or seperate solo vs 4 man and 8 mans, etc. I wouldn't mind if they expanded the LFG tool to RWZ's, where people can create a group, and also have some control on which classes to bring in (as well as verify armor status, etc).

 

This also allows for these groups to perhaps join a voice comm channel, which would be a nice boost in communication. On that same note, I'm beginning to wonder if BW could implement an IG Voice comms utility, where groups can automatically chat with one another. I know SWG implemented this feature, and it worked wonders for PUG groups. I think getting players organized, with a better set of tools is needed more, than just random solo or 4 man teams at this point. Afterall, these are Rated matchs, not PUG regulars, and players need to be prepared for them as best as possible. Nobosy wants to lose to 8 man pre-mades all day, and pre-mades don't want easy mode (those that take PvP seriously anyways) against PUG's. Just my .02

[huehuebrbr]

Yeap, even if you make 8-man VS pug ignore the rating system (nobody lose or gain any points) it would still be unfair and boring.

 

Your idea of a group finder is neat, but i think it would only work if we completely remove 8-man queue, so people could form 4-man groups and queue (4+4 VS 4+4). Then you could base the gain/loss of points on other peoples rating. Maybe even create an additional rating (individual) so people don't feel like they are getting pulled down by the other 4 "pugs", and be able to buy the 2400 gear/speeders with that rating too.

Edited September 19, 2012 by huehuebrbr

[Antipodes]

You need a very healthy population to keep organized 8 man PvP active. Even the 5v5 bracket in WoW drastically declined in WotLK because it was hard to get 5 good people on at the same time.

[Kadesworld]

Adding ranked warzones to the group finder would help a lot. I think the biggest thing that they can do to make ranked warzones worth playing, is making new maps for the ranked warzones. Have the newest 4 maps for ranked, every time a new maps comes out have it go to ranked que, and have the oldest map from the ranked que join the rotation for the normal warzone que. That way if you want the newest coolest maps you need to play ranked, combine that with adding ranked to the group finder and you might actually get people queing for the ranked warzones. Edited September 20, 2012 by Kadesworld

[Master_Nate]

Adding ranked warzones to the group finder would help a lot. I think the biggest thing that they can do to make ranked warzones worth playing, is making new maps for the ranked warzones. Have the newest 4 maps for ranked, every time a new maps comes out have it go to ranked que, and have the oldest map from the ranked que join the rotation for the normal warzone que. That way if you want the newest coolest maps you need to play ranked, combine that with adding ranked to the group finder and you might actually get people queing for the ranked warzones.

 

Though what you are saying I understand, I don't agree with limiting new maps to ranked games only. As a paying subscriber, this idea would not work imo. Not to mention that they have only came out with one map this year and by your logic, this map would still not be available to the rest of the crowds who don't play ranked or can't get on a team to do them. I get that you are saying you wish they'd come out with four maps, but since they have only released one map so far, with another one on the way which will be closer to end of the year, asking for four is pretty demanding at this point.

 

The only incentive to play ranked is for the boost to rank comms, for gear completion and alt rolling, and for a strong competitive atmosphere. However, the stronger ranked teams seem to have put a damper on other groups steam and so the outcome is that the "pro" teams don't log in anymore due to their belief in a lack of competition and the "semi-pro" teams don't que as to avoid being stomped repeatedly to the same group as no one really seems to que other than a handful of groups.

 

Therefore yes, would be nice to have some sort of incentive I suppose but don't see how it will correct the issue. However, to me, I think the issue is a lack of competitive groups running them. If Group A always wins, why que up when they are the only ones who do que? With that same logic, why not join Group A....thus making any competition obsolete.

Edited September 20, 2012 by Master_Nate

[Darth_Philar]

Ideally they would have a full group option (like what exists now) and a no group option (similar to regular, except no groups would be allowed at all).

[huehuebrbr]

then you fragment rankeds even more and you cant even play with your friends (1~4 man queue), since imo a lot of the problems is to find 8 people and keep they as a team

[Darth_Philar]

then you fragment rankeds even more and you cant even play with your friends (1~4 man queue), since imo a lot of the problems is to find 8 people and keep they as a team

 

There are no "teams" in SWTOR. Any group of 8 people can queue up for ranked. Nothing is stopping you and your 1-6 friends from inviting random people on your server from joining your group for a RWZ or two.

 

If you mix grouped people with random people you'll just reignite the premade versus pug debate that constantly ravages the PvP forums.