Planetary Conquest is Dominated by LARGE Allied guilds

[scottythebod]

I don't see a feasible solution. One approach would be to add an active players/guild coefficient but it has a big con; Guilds would become reluctant to keep those who are active but not contributing much, in terms of conquest points. Then again, most guilds probably have players like that so it might have balanced out.

 

And what I mean by coefficient is that the guild with the most active players would get 1.0. So if this guild has 500 active players and another guild only has 400 players the smaller guild would get a score of (their conquest points) x (500/400). It would require that the system updates at all times or in a worst scenario used mondays, since they're not included in the conquest week anyway, to calculate the results.

 

Or simply have it revolve around the average score of players who gain more than 10K points.

Here's the problem, this solution would just switch it to small guilds having the advantage. No large guild will ever have all the members putting in the huge numbers A few people will. For example I know in my guild we had people put up over 200,000 conquest points. Given your system the big guilds could take their top 10 point getters & create a separate guild. There's no way a 500 person guild is going to get all 500 members to average 200,000 points. So you've effectively just changed from mega guilds dominating to micro guilds dominating. Which of course makes no sense for a guild of 10 people to conquer a planet from a guild of 500.

 

Furthermore doing this effectively puts less people on the leader board. If the top 10 list is full of 500 man guilds then there are 5,000 people who can say they were part of the leader board. If it's filled with 10 man guilds only 100 people can. Doing it this way allows more people to feel included.

[Failtima]

What you, and others, fail to understand is that most of us understand the nature of competition. We understand that the event is a competition and that the standard rules of competition apply.

 

Unfortunately, you also fail to understand that players will cease to compete if they are pushed out of the competition because of a built in bias towards certain competitors. In this case, mega-guilds.

 

Games can only support so many mega-guilds, and SWTOR is no exception. While their are a number of large guilds, there are only a few mega-guilds and it is these guilds that are seen at the top of the leader board every week.

 

The system needs to encourage all guilds to compete, but to also encourage winners to hold what they have. The current system lets mega guilds dominate every single week when a more competitive system would allow more guilds to compete over time. While mega-guilds would win the initial weeks, the large guilds would then be competitive in later weeks.

 

The current system is akin to a football league composed of 3 NFL teams, 6 College teams and 21 High School teams. The 3 NFL teams compete for the top 3 spots among themselves, the 6 College teams compete for the remaining spots and the High School teams beat each other up for the last spot in the top ten.

 

How long before the High Schoolers give up because they have to keep struggling but receive no return on their struggle because the system is unbalanced?

 

Again you fail to understand that there are only a few mega guilds and large guilds dominating the top one or two spots on the various worlds within the servers. So they have a lock on 1 & 2 on those worlds? That's nice...as it doesn't change the fact that the rest of the top ten is pretty much wide open for any non-tiny guild that puts in the effort. And finishing in the top ten? Yeah, that gets your guild frameworks that you need to expand your guild ship. You do NOT have to come in #1 or #2 to get the frameworks.

 

Who the heck cares if some mega guilds have bragging rights to being #1? Let them duke it out over that. Make the top ten, get the frameworks, & expand your guild flagship.

 

The only way guilds are pushed out of trying for the top ten & the rewards for that is if they are either a very tiny guild or not putting in the effort. Other than the top one or two spots per world, we medium guilds not only have a shot at making top ten, but are already doing so regularly so far.

Edited September 4, 2014 by Failtima

[MidichIorian]

Here's the problem, this solution would just switch it to small guilds having the advantage. No large guild will ever have all the members putting in the huge numbers A few people will. For example I know in my guild we had people put up over 200,000 conquest points. Given your system the big guilds could take their top 10 point getters & create a separate guild. There's no way a 500 person guild is going to get all 500 members to average 200,000 points. So you've effectively just changed from mega guilds dominating to micro guilds dominating. Which of course makes no sense for a guild of 10 people to conquer a planet from a guild of 500.

 

Furthermore doing this effectively puts less people on the leader board. If the top 10 list is full of 500 man guilds then there are 5,000 people who can say they were part of the leader board. If it's filled with 10 man guilds only 100 people can. Doing it this way allows more people to feel included.

Didnt say it was a good solution. Then again, I only thought about it for about 5 secs so there's probably room for tweaks. Also, notice how I said "active" players, if a guild has 500 members but only 40 of them are active during the week it'll be counted as a 40-man guild. And to make sure that they don't have 300 people who only earn 5K points, on behalf of not being interested in conquest, they could have a cutoff for what "active" is, score under XK and you won't be counted as active.

 

How about only counting the score of the top XX players of each guild? That would give the smaller guilds a fair chance to compete because even if they don't have the same numbers as the big guilds they can atleast counter it with higher activity. 50 strikes me as a reasonable number, that will exlude the possibility that tiny guilds gain some form of advantage by only recruiting notorious point farmers.

 

Also, I'm only rambling to kill time at work. I will move on to destiny on Tuesday so I don't really give a crap about any of this.

Edited September 4, 2014 by MidichIorian

[scottythebod]

Didnt say it was a good solution. Then again, I only thought about it for about 5 secs so there's probably room for tweaks.

 

How about only counting the score of the top XX players of each guild? That would give the smaller guilds a fair chance to compete because even if they don't have the same numbers as the big guilds they can atleast counter it with higher activity. 50 strikes me as a reasonable number, that will exlude the possibility that tiny guilds gain some form of advantage by only recruiting notorious point farmers.

Here's the problem with that, if I'm not one of the top 50 performers in my guild I may as well not even bother doing anything as my points wouldn't count. So you've effectively removed 450 people out of a 500 man guild from taking part in the conquest system. As it is now a casual player can log on a few hours a week and contribute some points & feel like they're helping the guild. All your doing with that is switching it to "hardcore only" and effectively locking out casuals or people who just don't have 40 hours a week to play.

 

In fact myself & several other below 55 characters ran quite a bit of WZ's week 1 strictly because we were trying to make some contribution. Even though most of us knew we weren't going to be anywhere near the top of our guild in points. Under your system that wouldn't have happened as we'd have had no incentive to take part at all since our score wouldn't count.

 

How about we just leave it like it is. I've yet to see a suggestion that doesn't just move the bias to a different group. And really it just makes more logical sense that if there is a bias it would go to larger numbers given that we're talking about conquesting entire planets. If I have 10 times the force you do I'm probably going to win no matter how much more skilled your force is.

[Infernixx]

I did warn people that this would happen. I even offered a solution to the problem before the system went live.

 

Now that we're 3 weeks into it, I can see that my predictions were right. The same names are dominating the leader board and there isn't much that anyone can do to stop it.

[MidichIorian]

Here's the problem with that, if I'm not one of the top 50 performers in my guild I may as well not even bother doing anything as my points wouldn't count. So you've effectively removed 450 people out of a 500 man guild from taking part in the conquest system. As it is now a casual player can log on a few hours a week and contribute some points & feel like they're helping the guild. All your doing with that is switching it to "hardcore only" and effectively locking out casuals or people who just don't have 40 hours a week to play.

There's still incentive to reach the weekly goal even if you don't happen to be in the guild's top 50. I didnt get the guild rewards on the characters I didnt contribute with the first week (not sure if this is intended or a bug) and I most certainly didnt get the personal rewards. I don't think a top 50 system would change much, in terms of activity, other than that all the "fluff points" from the less active members of huge guilds would be excluded.

 

I don't know, I personally just think it's boring to see the same three guilds top the charts every week and have my own guild sit around and wait to invade a planet, for increased chances, until the other guilds have landed somewhere. I expect a lot of guilds to give up on the whole thing, knowing that they won't stand a chance anyway. I already see a dip in my own guild despite that this is a week where it's extremely easy to earn points.

Edited September 4, 2014 by MidichIorian

[scottythebod]

I did warn people that this would happen. I even offered a solution to the problem before the system went live.

 

Now that we're 3 weeks into it, I can see that my predictions were right. The same names are dominating the leader board and there isn't much that anyone can do to stop it.

It was pretty obvious from the start that a system allowing guilds to conquest planets was probably going to favor larger numbers. Predicting that wasn't exactly something to write home about. In fact I made a comment on one of the "50 million is too much" threads that as soon as the people complaining about there guild being too small to afford the ship would immediately switch to "we're too small to conquest". Every MMO I've ever played that had large scale events were slanted toward larger guilds, again this wasn't surprising.

 

And you may have suggested a solution, as did a lot of people, it's just that most of them are just as full of problems as the current system. But by all means what was your great solution?

[Infernixx]

I proposed weeks ago that once a Guild places on the Leader board, they get a Debuff to go along with their success equal to whatever week of the month it is, preventing them from invading for a few weeks.

 

Short version:

 

Place/win on the Leader Board on Week 1 of the month = 4 weeks of rewards all at once and a debuff that keeps you from earning Conquest points beyond your weekly goal for 4 weeks. Your guild cannot Invade nor place on the Leader Board for the next three weeks.

 

Place/win on the Leader board on Week 2 of the month = 3 weeks of rewards and debuff lasts 3 weeks.

 

Same thing with Week 3, only it only lasts 2 weeks and you get you 2 weeks worth of rewards.

 

Last week of the cycle and you get the basic rewards and no debuff.

 

First week of the new cycle and everyone competes again.

 

This would give a huge incentive to play to win in Week one, but removes those winners from the Leader Board for the rest of the month, but doesn't penalize them for winning. It just clears them out of the system to let smaller guilds compete in the following weeks.

[Rasen]

You all laughed, but I knew it! I KNEW IT! I knew we would argue over something today. I made that prediction back in 2011. I KNEW IT!!!

 

Back on topic I'm not a fan of cross faction guilds working together, but I like the conquest system as is. I feel like, as usual, many of you are jumping the gun and getting all heated up over menial issues that will erode with time, but due to your collective impatience(I know it is hard in 2014) you all just have to incessantly argue over big guilds. On JC there are about 5 really big guilds who dominate. That leaves on average 25 slots to fight over. I like those odds. And it is clear that those guilds will be swallowed up by drama, exhaustion, identity crises etc... and falter like every other big guild eventually does. And for those that don't? They deserve to be on top because they have good leadership. I don't understand why the denizens of the sky is falling SWTOR forums are unhappy about the existence of big guilds. Usually bodes well for the game's population and life.

[MidichIorian]

You all laughed, but I knew it! I KNEW IT! I knew we would argue over something today. I made that prediction back in 2011. I KNEW IT!!!

 

Back on topic I'm not a fan of cross faction guilds working together, but I like the conquest system as is. I feel like, as usual, many of you are jumping the gun and getting all heated up over menial issues that will erode with time, but due to your collective impatience(I know it is hard in 2014) you all just have to incessantly argue over big guilds. On JC there are about 5 really big guilds who dominate. That leaves on average 25 slots to fight over. I like those odds. And it is clear that those guilds will be swallowed up by drama, exhaustion, identity crises etc... and falter like every other big guild eventually does. And for those that don't? They deserve to be on top because they have good leadership. I don't understand why the denizens of the sky is falling SWTOR forums are unhappy about the existence of big guilds. Usually bodes well for the game's population and life.

27 of the slots won't give you the achivement.

[scottythebod]

There's still incentive to reach the weekly goal even if you don't happen to be in the guild's top 50. I didnt get the guild rewards on the characters I didnt contribute with the first week (not sure if this is intended or a bug) and I most certainly didnt get the personal rewards. I don't think a top 50 system would change much, in terms of activity, other than that all the "fluff points" from the less active members of huge guilds would be excluded.

 

I don't know, I personally just think it's boring to see the same three guilds top the charts every week and have my own guild sit around and wait to invade a planet, for increased chances, until the other guilds have landed somewhere. I expect a lot of guilds to give up on the whole thing, knowing that they won't stand a chance anyway.

Problem is those "fluff points" as you call them can add up. That fact encourages EVERYONE in the guild to participate as much as they can, as opposed to just the top performers. As I stated I personally did WZ's with guild mates that I would not have done if your system was in place. And honestly I'm glad I did, even though I didn't even make my personal conquest goal (I think I had almost 30,000 points) it ended up being so close that if a few of the people like myself providing "fluff points" didn't participate we would have probably not won.

 

Again the system isn't perfect, but no system will be. IMO it's about the best option they have.

[scottythebod]

I proposed weeks ago that once a Guild places on the Leader board, they get a Debuff to go along with their success equal to whatever week of the month it is, preventing them from invading for a few weeks.

 

Short version:

 

Place/win on the Leader Board on Week 1 of the month = 4 weeks of rewards all at once and a debuff that keeps you from earning Conquest points beyond your weekly goal for 4 weeks. Your guild cannot Invade nor place on the Leader Board for the next three weeks.

 

Place/win on the Leader board on Week 2 of the month = 3 weeks of rewards and debuff lasts 3 weeks.

 

Same thing with Week 3, only it only lasts 2 weeks and you get you 2 weeks worth of rewards.

 

Last week of the cycle and you get the basic rewards and no debuff.

 

First week of the new cycle and everyone competes again.

 

This would give a huge incentive to play to win in Week one, but removes those winners from the Leader Board for the rest of the month, but doesn't penalize them for winning. It just clears them out of the system to let smaller guilds compete in the following weeks.

OK yeah I remember that thread. And I'm sorry but that is waaaaaay worse than what's in place.

 

It absolutely does punish guilds for winning by locking them out of the content for 3 weeks. Again if they implemented this the boards would be just as full of complaining, just from different people.

 

So yes you suggested an idea, however it falls pretty short of solving the problem IMO.

[Kryand]

The current system is akin to a football league composed of 3 NFL teams, 6 College teams and 21 High School teams. The 3 NFL teams compete for the top 3 spots among themselves, the 6 College teams compete for the remaining spots and the High School teams beat each other up for the last spot in the top ten.

 

This is a bad analogy. It implies that the conquest winners are somehow more skilled. A better analogy would be referring to all of the above as high school/college level players (at best), but the big guilds get to play with 50 more people on the field. That all seems fine to me. My problem is when the NFL-tier players do enter the equation (NiM-caliber players). In reality, I would assume a basic NFL team could still crush a team of high-schoolers even if they had 100 people the field. But the conquest system doesn't currently work like that. The skill difference between an NFL player and a high-schooler amounts to nothing in the current system. If they want to compete, they still need to bring the same numbers.

 

On one hand, larger guild should have some sort of an advantage. I mean, when conquering a planet, having a giant army is pretty advantageous. On the other hand, the Dread Masters were 6 people, and they were dominating the crap out of both the republic and empire at the same time. Sure they had soldiers, but considering they were forcing most of their soldiers into obedience with their massive power, they still get credit for being 6 against the entire armies of the other factions.

 

The easiest way to rectify this is rewarding tons of points for NiM and even HM ops. But that doesn't have much to do with the conquest planets themselves. The best solution would be actually adding new content to every planet specifically for conquests, rather than having it all just be the existing boring-*** heroics and whatever other queues that also have nothing to do with the planet. Make some of that content legitimately difficult and reward lots of points for it, and you're good to go. Imagine something like the Gree event on every planet whenever it's in the conquest rotation, except with a higher range of difficulty.

 

However, given that this was a " " " "free expansion" " " ", you can't expect that level of content. However, 3.0 or whatever will not be free as far as I know, so maybe it will come with a massive conquest upgrade.

[MidichIorian]

I personally did WZ's with guild mates that I would not have done if your system was in place.

Don't let the PvP'ers catch wind of that, they'll show up with torches and pitchforks.

[Ilayas]

So, what does everyone think these mega guilds are going to do after they've got their "conquer of the galaxy" titles? Are they going to push really hard to take over planets they have already taken over and earn titles they've already earned? Or, are they going to refocus their efforts elsewhere giving other guilds a chance to earn those titles.

 

So what if you don't win the first time around, that doesn't mean you'll never win.

[scottythebod]

So, what does everyone think these mega guilds are going to do after they've got their "conquer of the galaxy" titles? Are they going to push really hard to take over planets they have already taken over and earn titles they've already earned? Or, are they going to refocus their efforts elsewhere giving other guilds a chance to earn those titles.

 

So what if you don't win the first time around, that doesn't mean you'll never win.

^ This

 

Take my guild for instance we pushed hard for the first one, we wanted to win that first one badly. However the second round our guild message of the day basically told us to relax & go back to doing what we normally do & just go for conquest points at our own pace. We basically stopped worrying about winning. When we tried we put up the server best score, but after the first one we just didn't care as much. If we win great, if not oh well.

 

Once other guilds get their ships unlocked & their titles there will be little incentive other then pride & most will not put the same effort into it. That will open the doors for smaller dedicated guilds to creep in.

[TUXs]

You all laughed, but I knew it! I KNEW IT! I knew we would argue over something today. I made that prediction back in 2011. I KNEW IT!!!

I was laughing with you...but I shall never doubt you again...

 

As for the part I snipped out, I agreed with it. I think we'll be wise to wait a couple more weeks to see how things pan out. I've loved conquests so far!!!

[Infernixx]

So, what does everyone think these mega guilds are going to do after they've got their "conquer of the galaxy" titles? Are they going to push really hard to take over planets they have already taken over and earn titles they've already earned? Or, are they going to refocus their efforts elsewhere giving other guilds a chance to earn those titles.

 

So what if you don't win the first time around, that doesn't mean you'll never win.

 

Farming Frameworks is a very lucrative process, I imagine. They're going for 10-20mil per Framework so far.

[Failtima]

Farming Frameworks is a very lucrative process, I imagine. They're going for 10-20mil per Framework so far.

 

Only need to make top ten to get the framework rewards.

[Infernixx]

Only need to make top ten to get the framework rewards.

 

If you win, you get the Flyby items to let you break shields early and kill Commanders without much interference. That's where the money is.

[Psychopyro]

So, what does everyone think these mega guilds are going to do after they've got their "conquer of the galaxy" titles? Are they going to push really hard to take over planets they have already taken over and earn titles they've already earned? Or, are they going to refocus their efforts elsewhere giving other guilds a chance to earn those titles.

 

So what if you don't win the first time around, that doesn't mean you'll never win.

 

I already know one intends to rename the guild and sell the ship/guild for cash... AFAIK he even has a buyer lined up... Would not shock me in the least that there are several guild leaders planning to do this....

 

And then start again with another guild...

Edited September 4, 2014 by Psychopyro

[LanceCorporalDan]

If you win, you get the Flyby items to let you break shields early and kill Commanders without much interference. That's where the money is.

 

True having the named commanders on farm status is very nice.

 

You don't have to hold the planet however to farm them, but dropping the shield can help.

[Infernixx]

True having the named commanders on farm status is very nice.

 

You don't have to hold the planet however to farm them, but dropping the shield can help.

 

Without Flybys, you're stuck waiting for the shield to drop and that could be 5 hours. Five hours in which any and all guilds swinging through can see that he's up and will be available at a certain time.

 

With Flybys, you find him, assemble a group and go down him while no one else is around. Easy peasy.

 

Of course, now I'm hearing that Flybys are bugged and 'anyone' can use them, not just Conquering guilds....

[LanceCorporalDan]

Without Flybys, you're stuck waiting for the shield to drop and that could be 5 hours. Five hours in which any and all guilds swinging through can see that he's up and will be available at a certain time.

 

With Flybys, you find him, assemble a group and go down him while no one else is around. Easy peasy.

 

Of course, now I'm hearing that Flybys are bugged and 'anyone' can use them, not just Conquering guilds....

 

Yeah that's what I've heard as well. Which kind of takes away one of the largest points of conquering the planet in the first place.

[MisterBlackJack]

My guilds active membership is usually 8-10 during prime time, sometimes getting as high as 12-14 if it gets really busy.

 

We managed to place 6th on Balmorra last week and that was without cheesing pre-fix BoI/FE with stealthers.

 

That doesn't seem that bad to me.

 

Same my guild placed 5th on balmorra