Planned Warzone Changes

[KendraP]

It means whatever apparently you think it means. My guild is the only ones I have ever heard use the phase in pvp matches and it’s literally just to describe the enemy team throwing corpses at a node over and over again to stop it from being capped. The point is that, that particular play style is rewarding players for terrible plays which shouldn’t be in the game design. If your being slaughtered in a game you should be penalized, even if it’s in defense of a node. Hence why I think in all node defending maps, kills/deaths should always count for or against you.

 

To me, "tactical" implies you are planning and/or doing something. Running in and stopping a node cap is hardly a "tactic" at least not a difficult one.

 

Maybe you should've killed that guy a second or two faster? Or maybe you need to be more tactically minded than the other team.

 

I just hardly see this as the major issue.

[Mournblood]

Voidstar changes - We want to give the offense a much better chance of completing the objectives. We want to make Voidstar more about a race to complete the objectives as opposed to a map which often ends in a stalemate. Less stalemates will shorten the overall time of the map.

• Characters who hack their way into the last two rooms of the Warzone before the bridge has been extended or the forcefield is down will be killed

 

-eric

 

Eric,

 

Can you please clarify the item I quoted above? On my Operative, I am able to Holotraverse (while cloaked) across the chasm before the bridge is down to an enemy player (who had been killed, respawned on the other side, and is foolish enough to stand on the center edge where there is no force field). I could then plant the bomb on the door before the bridge was down. It was explained to me some time ago that this was not an exploit, but a resourceful use of class abilities.

 

With the outlined changes to Voidstar, is this still going to be possible, or not?

Edited May 30, 2018 by Mournblood

[Hoppinswtor]

I like the actions being taken against exploits, but you wouldn't have to nerf objectives if Time-To-Kill (TTK) was low. Your extremely poor balancing decisions and the laughably high HP-to-DPS-ratio is turning warzones into stalemates, forcing you to make objectives easier...and objectives are already easy. You don't have to have any skill at the game to stop a cap or click on a blinking object.

 

I PvP so little that I don't even understand most of these changes, but the one quoted feels kinda bad to me.

I tend to die A LOT in any and all WZs, and already feel a bit guilty over my noobness. But so far, I at least feel as if being cannon fodder and dying means the better players have a few seconds longer to live, and maybe they can do some good in those seconds.

 

If my death reduces my team's score, I'll PvP even less. I already feel like a burden to any team I end up on. This change would make that feeling worse.

 

Instead of feeling sorry for yourself, why don't you try to improve?

 

But then again, out of the thousands of people I've played with or against, only about ten or fifteen have actually improved noticeably over time. And that includes both pve and pvp. It doesn't help that the devs continue to make the game easier and easier, thereby providing little incentive for casuals to improve. Even Nightmare checks are a joke.

Edited May 30, 2018 by Hoppinswtor

[sayNih]

Voidstar changes -

• Door now take 6 seconds to arm (down from 8)
  
• Defenders now have 15 seconds to disarm door bombs (down from 20)
  
• Extending the bridges and lowering the shields now takes 6 seconds to channel (down from 8)
  

-eric

Stealth-role will be more effective. Tank-role will be less effective.

Stealth specs should lose 40% of their DPS, and their DCDs, because they will no longer need to fight anyone.

It's time to stop calling it a trinity, and recognize Stealth as a separate, specialized role.

[waslaf]

well i like the changes overall, but:

- alderaan and yavin dont take that long in my opinion could have stayed like it was

- novare coast takes by far the most time to play cause if one of the turrets gets blocked and isnt taken at all no one deals dmg. had games there that ended automatically with 100:100 cause of that (happens mostly if both teams stack healers^^). on the other hand this wz is one of the fastest if one team manages to take all three nodes. maybe reduce the time it needs to cap node here too?

- voidstar i like it. one problem is aoe spam at the doors here but dont think you can do more about this aoe already takes much energy on most classes.

- huttball the dsync is a main problem here and in arenas as well (sucks for ranked if things go on cd but it didnt hit cause the game wants to tell you he walked through the ramp...)

- hypergates good changes orbs were only realy usefull in the last round by now but i wonder if it is a bit too much in the later rounds maybe. we will see

 

=> good changes but maybe take a look at novare coast and definitely do something against dsync. also matchmaking with roles for regs would ne nice or cap the maximum of healers per wz or something.

Edited May 30, 2018 by waslaf

[kissingaiur]

To me, "tactical" implies you are planning and/or doing something. Running in and stopping a node cap is hardly a "tactic" at least not a difficult one.

 

Maybe you should've killed that guy a second or two faster? Or maybe you need to be more tactically minded than the other team.

 

I just hardly see this as the major issue.

 

Having your team die 100 times to the enemy team 0 but still winning objective because your managed to pile their bodies on it just right, is not victory. It’s called being farmed. Kills and deaths should count in all warzones and be an objective, by not having it, invite bad play.

[Lhancelot]

I think the best things in this post is that you are going to put changes on the PTS. You should consider giving out some goodies for people to go to the PTS, and also announce dev-play-times like you have sometimes in the past. I remember a lot more PTS participation when that happened.

 

It's easy to theorize how the changes will go, but honestly the only way to tell is to try them first. It's smart to let us test the changes.

[Lhancelot]

Having your team die 100 times to the enemy team 0 but still winning objective because your managed to pile their bodies on it just right, is not victory. It’s called being farmed. Kills and deaths should count in all warzones and be an objective, by not having it, invite bad play.

 

I see two perspectives here, one being it's objective gameplay to stop a cap even if it requires zerging a node and dying over and over versus your perspective which is allowing such "objective" gameplay shows no skill and shouldn't be rewarded.

 

The thing is I always viewed it as Kendra says, if the dominant team can't manage to clear the zerging players fast enough to manage a cap then why should they be rewarded for simply killing and win the match?

 

I also don't see it as inviting bad play when it's simply playing the objective, which is to stop the enemy from capping the node at all costs.

 

In past wars, generals have used soldiers as cannon fodder to accomplish specific goals of the battle regardless of the loss of life. Even IRL, zergs have been used.

[kukumburr]

Having your team die 100 times to the enemy team 0 but still winning objective because your managed to pile their bodies on it just right, is not victory. It’s called being farmed. Kills and deaths should count in all warzones and be an objective, by not having it, invite bad play.

 

If your team is capable of farming the other team for kills then the only reason you're going to lose is if you don't guard your nodes properly or either no one bothers to cap ASAP or no one slows the respawns, which means your team is failing at objectives and they should be punished for that.

[EricMusco]

Eric,

 

Can you please clarify the item I quoted above? On my Operative, I am able to Holotraverse (while cloaked) across the chasm before the bridge is down to an enemy player (who had been killed, respawned on the other side, and is foolish enough to stand on the center edge where there is no force field). I could then plant the bomb on the door before the bridge was down. It was explained to me some time ago that this was not an exploit, but a resourceful use of class abilities.

 

With the outlined changes to Voidstar, is this still going to be possible, or not?

 

This will not be possible. There will now be a forcefield in front of that door until the bridge is lowered. Once the bridge is lowered you can begin planting on the door. You can still get across the gap to get in position to plant the bomb faster, but you can no longer bypass lowering the bridge.

 

-eric

[Banthabreeder]

 

Yavin

• When players die they reduce their teams score by 2 (up from 0)
  

 

-eric

 

Yeah, I'm not too sure about this one. Doesn't really encourage new people to play if they think every time I die, it hurts their team. Sure, I can see it as a motivator, but in today's culture, people don't get motivated, they just pout and rage quit.

[Banthabreeder]

This will not be possible. There will now be a forcefield in front of that door until the bridge is lowered. Once the bridge is lowered you can begin planting on the door. You can still get across the gap to get in position to plant the bomb faster, but you can no longer bypass lowering the bridge.

 

-eric

 

That seems fair. Good compromise. Yes, you still can zip across the gap, get in position for when the bridge comes down, then plant the bomb.

[Mournblood]

This will not be possible. There will now be a forcefield in front of that door until the bridge is lowered. Once the bridge is lowered you can begin planting on the door. You can still get across the gap to get in position to plant the bomb faster, but you can no longer bypass lowering the bridge.

 

-eric

 

The problem with this is that the enemy player who was killed and respawned on the other side can still be pulled across by a team mate or leap across to an enemy player. So the defending team still has an advantage there that the attacking team does not.

 

Why not just extend the force field to include that center ledge until one of the bridges are down?

[KendraP]

Having your team die 100 times to the enemy team 0 but still winning objective because your managed to pile their bodies on it just right, is not victory. It’s called being farmed. Kills and deaths should count in all warzones and be an objective, by not having it, invite bad play.

 

Eh different philosphies I guess. The instances I've had where this has happened its been a case of "i have 4 people guarding 2 other nodes and the 8 at mid cant kill 4 of us fast enough to cap it"

 

Which i would hardly call tactical dying on our part and more inability to tactically plan on their part.

[Rafiknoll]

Having your team die 100 times to the enemy team 0 but still winning objective because your managed to pile their bodies on it just right, is not victory. It’s called being farmed. Kills and deaths should count in all warzones and be an objective, by not having it, invite bad play.

 

I have to disagree. Objective players currently hate kill farmers because they fail to distinguish playing to win and playing to farm. I don't think the devs should start to blur this line any further in all maps. I laugh the hardest when my team with nearly 0 kills wins 6-0 in huttball because the idiots on the other side could kill everyone except for me and one more guy as we tanking our way to the line with a deception sin and a veng jugg, and my teammates usually laugh with us. I also laugh when their team generally win the mid massacare but I sap-cap or solo-kill the side and win the match. If they add value to kills in all warzones, then good enough teams with FOTM builds will just ignore objectives and farm kills, because it would progress the objective even faster than the objective. That would essentially remake all maps into OWPVP arenas for 8v8. Really no, thank you. I just hope the yaviin turrets still hit fast enough so that they are still more worth it. Seems probable...

 

In GSF they have it right. You need 1000 points, each capped node gives you a point per sec and each kill gives a single point. You would need to kill people faster than they can spawn in order to beat one node scoring, so making them count can be fair because the only way it could turn the tide is in very close matches were both sides play the objective to the best of their abilities and just have a very small time gap between their captures. I could leave to see that in all maps if the scoring would be that insignificant to the objectives so that it can only serve as a tiebreaker when both sides play well and to win.

 

For example, if you changed huttball to require 600 pts and made each goal grant 100 points and each kill to grant 1, then kills would mostly serve as a new tiebreaker in case of equal number of goals by the end of the match, or give super-awesome groups an extra "goal". Still winner would be the one who can actually score the ball multiple times first, mostly.

 

But don't do any such thing to Novare, Novare's best feature is the ability to turn a 100-2 to 0-2, which means it isn't decided until it is over. Any alternative scoring would ruin that

[krosswong]

Having your team die 100 times to the enemy team 0 but still winning objective because your managed to pile their bodies on it just right, is not victory. It’s called being farmed. Kills and deaths should count in all warzones and be an objective, by not having it, invite bad play.

 

The amount of people that claim "lol, get farmed" when they lose a warzone is downright laughable.

[Rafiknoll]

Stealth-role will be more effective. Tank-role will be less effective.

Stealth specs should lose 40% of their DPS, and their DCDs, because they will no longer need to fight anyone.

It's time to stop calling it a trinity, and recognize Stealth as a separate, specialized role.

 

I don't see why these changes indicate what you are saying, but regardless, this isn't a PVP only game and there is definitely no room to call stealth a separate role in endgame PVE, thus their ability to heal/damage/tank can't be less good than the ability of any other class, the end.

 

Not satisfied? Note that the stealth classes are among the least AoE oriented combatants. The stealth classes (when in DPS spec) are best for the side nodes, not the main node, and in Odessen their ability to stealth is nearly useless. If stealthers were to be nerfed by 40% (which is also a ridiculously extreme number), what would they do in Odessen, in arenas or in case there is already a guard on their node?? [Not to mention in all PVE content??]

[septru]

Hi Eric. I among many others are very grateful for these pvp fixes.

 

However are we going to get any update on the dsync issue? I personally can say that my experience with hackers in this game is ridiculously small compared to the amount of times a player has dsynced.

 

In certain maps such as huttball and Yavin Ruins, dsync makes those maps unplayable.

[americanaussie]

I PvP so little that I don't even understand most of these changes, but the one quoted feels kinda bad to me.

I tend to die A LOT in any and all WZs, and already feel a bit guilty over my noobness. But so far, I at least feel as if being cannon fodder and dying means the better players have a few seconds longer to live, and maybe they can do some good in those seconds.

 

If my death reduces my team's score, I'll PvP even less. I already feel like a burden to any team I end up on. This change would make that feeling worse.

 

Agreed. I dont like this change at all. I fear people will be harassed even more than they already are.

[Mournblood]

Having your team die 100 times to the enemy team 0 but still winning objective because your managed to pile their bodies on it just right, is not victory. It’s called being farmed. Kills and deaths should count in all warzones and be an objective, by not having it, invite bad play.

 

Absolutely not. What you're talking about is forcing the Ranked format on regular WZs, and I for one would stop playing WZs if that ever happened. In fact, that is a growing cancer in WZs currently where players who think they are hot **** farm the other team and completely ignore the objectives. The problem with that is that regular WZs are objective, team-based PvP, not a death match. And quite often, those teams that kill farm or parse DPS to the exclusion of the objectives lose the match. Maybe that single premade doesn't care about winning because they have all their toons in full 248s, but I can promise you that someone who's stuck on their team and still trying to grind CXP and UC would prefer 20 UC for a win rather than 8 UC for the loss.

[snave]

Some of the comments on this are hilarious.

 

HOW DARE YOU OBJECTIVELY PLAY TO BEAT OUR SUPERIOR DPS YOU SWINE!

 

Some of these changes are good, some are pointless, some are bad. Arguing that being stalled by players correctly rotating because you have better dps is some of the stupidest stuff I've read on these forums. Why can't you appreciate our synergistic death swaps lol.

 

And I was here to see the Sorc class rep ask the devs for left-handed lightsabers.

[Mycroft-Tarkin]

Will you guys be looking at ways to reinvigorate lowbie and mid bracket pvp?

 

I think they should un-restrict lowbie and midbie PvP from F2P players. Let them queue as much as they want. Before this forum decides to lynch me, think about it. This will have 2 big benefits:

 

1. Queues will be healthier. This helps subscribers too.

2. They'll be able to see how truly inferior PvE is , and be motivated to sub to enjoy level 70 warzones (and arenas)!

Edited May 30, 2018 by Mycroft-Tarkin

[Mycroft-Tarkin]

60-70 points isn't that bad. Or do you see more than 35 kills often?

 

Fair enough. I overestimated how many kills actually take place in warzones. I guess being a healer does that......

Edited May 30, 2018 by Mycroft-Tarkin

[KendraP]

Some of the comments on this are hilarious.

 

HOW DARE YOU OBJECTIVELY PLAY TO BEAT OUR SUPERIOR DPS YOU SWINE!

 

Some of these changes are good, some are pointless, some are bad. Arguing that being stalled by players correctly rotating because you have better dps is some of the stupidest stuff I've read on these forums. Why can't you appreciate our synergistic death swaps lol.

 

And I was here to see the Sorc class rep ask the devs for left-handed lightsabers.

 

LOL a much less nice version of what I've been trying to say. Maybe if your dps is that good, you should kill my healer and I faster so that the rest of the team cant respawn in that time?

 

Otherwise. enjoy the 8 on 4 or 6 number farming loss.

[snave]

Fair enough. I overestimated how many kills actually take place in warzones. I guess being a healer does that......

 

You're not overestimating, people are making vacuum comparisons and aren't looking at the real game implications.

 

If you have a "losing" team and they cap 1-0-1 (with your team having one and the enemy the other) you always lose because the body count needed to stall them will more than make up any stall duration, this is different to before where you could stall the 0 or neutral node to win the game. If you're 1-0-1 in your favour, as in you control the two nodes, then you still win in exactly the same way. So basically this removes the only win condition when you're vs a "stronger" team while keeping the rest the same. It also encourages brain dead zerging because kills win games now amirite!

 

Contrary to some of the people posting here, 1 or 2 players stalling a superior number of players with superior dps / comp and actually playing the map is far more skilled than just spurting your dps advantage everywhere.

 

They bioware'd it.