Unfair Conquest

[MarkMaximus]

The way that points are acquired for Conquest only allows larger guilds to win and no way for smaller guilds to win unless for some reason there happens to be just enough planets to do conquest that a smaller guild will be top 10. The way it was before allowed smaller guilds to win because even though there was less players, if those players put enough time in to win, they could. Now, there is no way in hell that a smaller guild can win a planet for conquest. Please make this more fair to all guilds and not just larger guilds. That means crafting should be back on the table as infinite and not just a one time deal for each week, allowing smaller guilds to rival the larger guilds with more people collecting points.

[DarrelDawson]

Since there aren't any conquests going on right now, it makes me wonder if they are currently working on changes.. but I haven't read anything about that. Although I think you posed the wrong question. Guilds should exist to facilitate multiplayer interaction. At this point in time, they are basically a "global" chat channel with a level boost. (Including some nice RP areas.)

 

It makes sense that large guilds would out-compete smaller ones in the conquest system. Even with your crafting change... I think large "leveling guids" would still be able to beat a guild of 10 dedicated players. Instead of trying to make things fair, I think they should work to make ways to reward quality guilds. That way being a good guild leader doesn't feel like an unpaid internship.

 

I personally think that a guild that keeps players actively engaged increases the "health" of a game. Imagine if guilds had a rating system. So a "Grade A" guild is one that actively plays together. A "grade D" guild is just a loose coalition of unaffiliated players that don't play together. I'm not married to this idea, but I think it's worth thinking of ways for the game to reward quality guilds and their leaders.

 

I currently own a guild that is basically a "capital ship deed" for my legacy. I don't bother recruiting because I want to maintain ownership of my capital ship, should I take a break for a few months. So I don't really focus on conquests much because even if I started recruiting, it wouldn't reach the top 10 for a long time.

 

Something as simple as a guild bank credit reward for completing events together would go a long way.

[SteveTheCynic]

The way that points are acquired for Conquest only allows larger guilds to win and no way for smaller guilds to win unless for some reason there happens to be just enough planets to do conquest that a smaller guild will be top 10. The way it was before allowed smaller guilds to win because even though there was less players, if those players put enough time in to win, they could. Now, there is no way in hell that a smaller guild can win a planet for conquest. Please make this more fair to all guilds and not just larger guilds. That means crafting should be back on the table as infinite and not just a one time deal for each week, allowing smaller guilds to rival the larger guilds with more people collecting points.

The last time there was a non-Iokath crafting conquest, my tiny guild crushed all comers. We scored at least twice what any other guild scored on any planet. But it's a tiny guild so by your logic we should not be able to win.

 

So what happened? We did what it takes to win. No, we don't have the numbers to win "normal" conquests,(1) but if you pick your battles and prepare correctly, you can win some of them.

 

(1) Crudely put:

* *this* list of activities is once-per-legacy, so a guild needs lots of accounts to be able to score lots of points at those things.

* *this* list of activities is repeatable (e.g. Heroic missions, Flashpoints, etc.), so to score fast, you need lots of active players in the guild because each player can only do one mission at a time.

* Crafting (in weeks where crafting is repeatable) requires preparation, but once that preparation is done, the scoring rate of crafting depends on the number of *characters* in the guild, not the number of *players*, if those players are willing to suspend "normal" play in favour of switching around feeding the crafting process.

[MarkMaximus]

The last time there was a non-Iokath crafting conquest, my tiny guild crushed all comers. We scored at least twice what any other guild scored on any planet. But it's a tiny guild so by your logic we should not be able to win.

 

So what happened? We did what it takes to win. No, we don't have the numbers to win "normal" conquests,(1) but if you pick your battles and prepare correctly, you can win some of them.

 

(1) Crudely put:

* *this* list of activities is once-per-legacy, so a guild needs lots of accounts to be able to score lots of points at those things.

* *this* list of activities is repeatable (e.g. Heroic missions, Flashpoints, etc.), so to score fast, you need lots of active players in the guild because each player can only do one mission at a time.

* Crafting (in weeks where crafting is repeatable) requires preparation, but once that preparation is done, the scoring rate of crafting depends on the number of *characters* in the guild, not the number of *players*, if those players are willing to suspend "normal" play in favour of switching around feeding the crafting process.

 

You just said lots of active players to gain points ...

[SteveTheCynic]

 

You just said lots of active players to gain points ...

Yes. Lots of active players to gain lots of points by playing repeatable content activities. However, those are not the only way to gain repeatable points in conquest. Some weeks the crafting targets are also repeatable, and to score lots of points by repeatable crafting objectives, you need lots of *characters* crafting, but it can be relatively few players. (80 active players with one character each will produce fewer crafted things per hour than 5 active players who can launch crafting on 20 characters each.)

 

If you want to win *a* conquest but don't care which one, and you're a small guild, then you have two options:

* Recruit more players. Not more characters, but more players. It is permissible to seek to recuit the guildless.

* Choose your conquest carefully.

 

The second point is important. A guild with only a few active players can still, if the players are willing to do what's necessary, prepare for a repeatable-craft conquest week by farming relevant materials for crafting and credits for the white materials that are also needed, and in parallel by crafting the ingredients for the conquest objects.

 

Then, during the conquest week, you break out those ingredients, pass them around, and craft like mad things to earn conquest points.

 

Oh, and if you aren't by nature interested in decorating strongholds, open them up and fill them with junk, basic metal chairs and similar, to get your stronghold decoration conquest bonus up. It maxes out at 150% now, so go to it.

[BlackSilverRoar]

The way that points are acquired for Conquest only allows larger guilds to win and no way for smaller guilds to win unless for some reason there happens to be just enough planets to do conquest that a smaller guild will be top 10. The way it was before allowed smaller guilds to win because even though there was less players, if those players put enough time in to win, they could. Now, there is no way in hell that a smaller guild can win a planet for conquest. Please make this more fair to all guilds and not just larger guilds. That means crafting should be back on the table as infinite and not just a one time deal for each week, allowing smaller guilds to rival the larger guilds with more people collecting points.

 

^I totally agree, small guilds are and have been for a long time 》 getting hosed big time. Conquest needs giant overall. Many small guilds want to stay small guilds, for various reasons, personal, social , etc. They shouldn't have to change to a large guild and give up playing how they want to, in order to open up guild ship rooms, something that like every other mmo already comes fully unlocked from the get go.

Edited November 4, 2017 by Willjb

[MarkMaximus]

If you want to win *a* conquest but don't care which one, and you're a small guild, then you have two options:

* Recruit more players. Not more characters, but more players. It is permissible to seek to recuit the guildless.

* Choose your conquest carefully.

 

If you recruit more players then you are no longer a small guild. /Sigh Someone is not getting the point.

[AmiHale]

I do kinda feel the same way. I'd at least like something that members of a small guild can go into together and get something for the guild out of it. A title, decos, frameworks, encryptions, or something that makes it worth being a tiny guild. I rarely get members to join because they always ask how many people are in the guild. I've already resigned myself to never being on the board. I'd rather not grind away at the repeatable stuff for conquest as that is just begging to get burnt out and hate conquest and whatever it is you ground away at to get there.

[Ratajack]

If you recruit more players then you are no longer a small guild. /Sigh Someone is not getting the point.

 

And someone is ignoring the second option that "small guilds' have and that is to choose your conquests carefully.

 

 

If you wish to remain a small guild, then you should also accept that your guild may have a difficult time competing against larger guilds in conquest. My guild is a small close knit group of friends. We know and accept that choosing to remain a small, close knit guild puts us at a sever disadvantage, to say the least, when it comes to conquest.

 

The OP reeks of:

 

"We want to be a small guild, but we want to win conquest, too!!! BW, you owe it to us to 'handicap' the larger guilds and 'give smaller guilds a bonus'. Never mind that each and every guild has the same opportunities to recruit and compete."

 

Sometimes you cannot have your cake and eat it, too.

[BRKMSN]

If you recruit more players then you are no longer a small guild. /Sigh Someone is not getting the point.

 

However, the general purpose of Conquest is to promote guild growth. A guild can choose not to grow if they prefer to remain small. That decision will leave them less competitive in Conquest. Some people simply want a personal guild so they can have extra storage and/or some of the other guild perks. Those guilds really shouldn't be able to win against big guilds.

 

I'm not against the idea of giving small guilds a way (through conquest) to get flagship plans. After the mergers, it will likely be hard for a while to place in the top 10 for even large guilds. Maybe they can offer the flagship plans to every character that reaches their personal goal so long as the guild reaches a minimum guild total. Or maybe the Flagship plans can be awarded to everybody that doubles their personal goal for the week. I don't know, but I do believe the conquest winners should consist of guilds that try to amass large (active) guild memberships.

[fushnchips]

And someone is ignoring the second option that "small guilds' have and that is to choose your conquests carefully.

 

 

If you wish to remain a small guild, then you should also accept that your guild may have a difficult time competing against larger guilds in conquest. My guild is a small close knit group of friends. We know and accept that choosing to remain a small, close knit guild puts us at a sever disadvantage, to say the least, when it comes to conquest.

 

The OP reeks of:

 

"We want to be a small guild, but we want to win conquest, too!!! BW, you owe it to us to 'handicap' the larger guilds and 'give smaller guilds a bonus'. Never mind that each and every guild has the same opportunities to recruit and compete."

 

Sometimes you cannot have your cake and eat it, too.

 

I don't agree much on what rata posts but in this case he is 100% on the dot.

[Eli_Porter]

I absolutely abhor crafting weeks. Gathering materials is by far the most boring SWTOR activity I've ever put myself through.

 

I want to actually play the game in order to win conquest, not gather mats for hours on end. I want guilds playing together to do operations, flashpoints, PvP and heroics to be the deciding factor, not whoever spent the most time clicking resource nodes on yavin/zakuul.

Edited November 6, 2017 by Eli_Porter

[KrullD]

-take small guild with 8 or so, dedicated players-

-have those 8 dedicated players make 8 characters-

-plan out who fills what roles with said characters-

-use teamwork to conquer pvp or pve or both-

-you should have an infinite ammount of lockouts through this with ops-

-if you don't op you have infinite shots at all content under Ops-

-you have infinite shots at pvp (you can even queue and fight each other if need be)-

-use teamwork-

-win-

-become a top spot guild-

-remain small-

-crafting is not content-

-you are talking about wealth-

[SteveTheCynic]

If you recruit more players then you are no longer a small guild. /Sigh Someone is not getting the point.

I *am* getting the point you're trying to make. Unfortunately, what you're asking for is not reasonable.

 

If you want to win, you have to do what it takes to win. This is as true in SWTOR conquest as it is in any other situation. Nobody expects that a "conference" soccer team in the UK will win the FA Cup against the top Premier League teams. It happens sometimes (and when it does, they are called "giant killers"), but nobody expects it. And it's unreasonable to expect it, because those top teams have the money to hire the best players, and the would-be giant killers do not.

 

In SWTOR, the big and highly-active guild has the resources to win any conquest it wants, as a matter of course, and it is unreasonable to expect it to be otherwise. But it's possible to deliver your small guild an upset victory if you are willing to do what it takes to win.

 

If you want to remain small as measured by the number of players, then you must choose very carefully what you do, and in general that will mean you have to stick to repeatable-craft conquests with as many alts as you can fit in the guild.

 

If you want to win other conquests, then you must sacrifice your small-guild nature, at least for the duration of the conquest week. Recruit people for that week, on the basis of "You join us for this week so we can win". Who knows? Maybe you'll like them and they'll like you, and if so, you should probably let them stay.

 

But to expect that the game will change to accommodate your wish to win without working for it is unreasonable.

[merovejec]

They did mention they are working on improving the conquest system. However I dont think there will be an improvement which will make it that a 10-man guild can face off a 1000-man guild.

 

Nevertheless, there was the story of <The One> guild on Progenitor where one guy made a guild and won the conquest

[casirabit]

I absolutely abhor crafting weeks. Gathering materials is by far the most boring SWTOR activity I've ever put myself through.

 

I want to actually play the game in order to win conquest, not gather mats for hours on end. I want guilds playing together to do operations, flashpoints, PvP and heroics to be the deciding factor, not whoever spent the most time clicking resource nodes on yavin/zakuul.

 

While you hate gathering but would rather do operation and pvp some hate pvp and operations and love crafting and resource gathering. So the way they have it set up there is something for everyone.

[Darevsool]

They did mention they are working on improving the conquest system. However I dont think there will be an improvement which will make it that a 10-man guild can face off a 1000-man guild.

 

Nevertheless, there was the story of <The One> guild on Progenitor where one guy made a guild and won the conquest

 

I've won many conquest weeks on Prophecy of the 5 with my own private guild <Dead Wookiee Storage>

I've had to put toons in larger guilds on that server to get some of the more contested weeks/titles (like iokath), but easily 1/2 of what I have done was entirely solo (using my two paid accounts anyway).

 

At the same time, I completely disagree with the OP. Conquest should not be artificially propping up small guilds, it should have the same rules and point scale for everyone. With there being only 5 servers now, competition is going to be much more intense. You can either join a larger guild, or make a new guild getting toons from other smaller guilds to try to compete, keeping your original small guild name intact.

Edited November 6, 2017 by Darevsool

[Eli_Porter]

While you hate gathering but would rather do operation and pvp some hate pvp and operations and love crafting and resource gathering. So the way they have it set up there is something for everyone.

 

I'm sorry but that's something I'm failing to get. How can clicking resource nodes for hours on end be fun or entertaining in any way? What am I missing here? And why should such a simple and boring activity be rewarded so heavily by the conquest mechanic instead of encouraging people to play the game together?

Edited November 6, 2017 by Eli_Porter

[AlrikFassbauer]

However, the general purpose of Conquest is to promote guild growth.

 

I firmly believe that it is actually vice versa.

 

Do you really believe a game is promoting getting bigger and bigger and bigger teams to be played with it ?

Why do you think has football / soccer a limited number of team members ?

 

At the same time, I completely disagree with the OP. Conquest should not be artificially propping up small guilds, it should have the same rules and point scale for everyone. With there being only 5 servers now, competition is going to be much more intense. You can either join a larger guild, or make a new guild getting toons from other smaller guilds to try to compete, keeping your original small guild name intact.

 

I merely need to look at RL economy to see what happens if the same rules are applied to small and big companies ... Just look at Microsoft, Apple, Intel, IBM, NVidia ... And that's only the computer area ...

Edited November 6, 2017 by AlrikFassbauer

[KrullD]

it's pointless to compare conquest to RL economy. even the largest, most active guild still can't monopolize and dominate the other 9 spots on the conquest list.

 

players are free to choose to be a part of something bigger. business and industry are forced to forclose and dissipate due to resource and market domination.

[BRKMSN]

I firmly believe that it is actually vice versa.

 

Do you really believe a game is promoting getting bigger and bigger and bigger teams to be played with it ?

Why do you think has football / soccer a limited number of team members ?

 

What is the roster limit of a guild again? Now a soccer team ...

 

There's a sizable difference there that, whether you like it or not, is intended. Guilds are smaller social groups within a large player base. The idea behind guilds is to promote camaraderie among players in the hopes that any social bond created would encourage players to play (use the product) more, in turn, strengthening the player base and the game's future. That is the intent and conquest has clearly been designed to promote / encourage guild growth.