MarkJacobsCEO City State EntertainmentMemberRarePosts: 649
Originally posted by Axxar
As far as keeps are concerned I think there should be very slight or no immediate benefits in capturing a keep. It should be actually HOLDING the keep that makes it worth having.
I couldn't agree more. If we make it so that keep trading will reward players more than fighting, dying for and holding keeps then keep trading becomes a more viable way of earning renown/fame/rank/etc. We need to make the holding of key targets the way good things flow to the realm over time. The longer that the realm holds the objects of their desire, the better it is for the realm and we also have to make losing the objectives hurt too.
Originally posted by Jetrpg
My thoughts are i think mark will fail at just about everything with this game i don't think he has a clue what makes games good and is blaming EA for his design decisions. Infact i know this to be true, its a matter of record. I was hoping he would reflect on his decisions, from his blog post he hasn't, but hey a ton of kickstarter money would be nice.
I could be wrong, i expect far shorter cc (aka wow style) with even less stuns, far less tactical combat, etc. That is what i expect from his posts.
I'm sorry if I haven't been really clear about things but let me say once again, "I have made a number of design decisions for DAoC/WAR that either were wrong or didn't work out the way I had hoped." I've also said that never once did JR reach down from atop Mt. Redwood and say to me "Mark, you must add this to the game now and if you do, I'll give you this special decoder ring and the key to the private jet!" It's not like the only guys/gals making decisions for WAR were me and JR. Certain people did dumb things (me included), certain people did smart things that didn't work out (me included) and the blame for the failure of MMORG like WAR, SWTOR, Secret World, etc. can almost never be laid at the feet of one person. As I've also said before I was the GM of Mythic and as such, it would be disengenous of me to either "name names" or simply try to blame others for my mistakes so I'll simply repeat what I've said about my culpability as head of studio. However, as an employee of EA, certain things were above my pay grade and/or power/control so for those things, I can't take responsibility and it would be equally wrong of me to play the martyr card here.
In terms of WoW style, less stuns, less tactical combat, I'm sorry to say you are wrong. We want more tactical combat, more real decision-making by the player but I think that it is a lot more complicated issue than simply saying "We'll have long CC like Dark Age of Camelot, we'll have Realm Ranks/Abilties like Dark Age of Camelot, we'll do everything like Dark Age of Camelot!!" because, well, that wouldn't be true. For this game to succeed we have to look at what went right and what has gone wrong over the last decade plus of games like this and then make the decision on how to proceed.
I get the skeptical/cynical part, I really do. I'm not asking you (or other people) to change their mind overnight. As per my previous posts, that's why I'm spending so more time here and on other sites. All I ask is that you and other people simply be willing to listen/offer feedback, nothing more. If you need any proof of that (not that anything I or others could say here is proof) is simply that I'm not going around saying "CU will be the only way to get great RVR - fund us now!" or "CU will be everything that all the players want - Pay us!" or even worse "CU will have everything Dark Age of Camelot had and more! - Give me, give me, give me!!" Frankly, It would have probably been smarter (from a pure business perspective) to say that we will have PvE and then, whoops, we had to cut it out knowing that we couldn't get it into the game. But I won't do that even if it means the Kickstarter won't fund. Again, I know it's not proof but I hope that the path I'm taking with CU is at least indicative of who/what I am and what I'm seeking to accomplish with CU. After all, it's really not smart to go around saying things like "We are going to piss off people" and "No, you can't have this or this or this but only this." and/or "We won't be shooting for 1M subs" because if I went down the less honest path, I know I'd get more backers and investors would be interested in this game because for them, it's all about the Return on Investment (ROI) and saying that our game will only make a small ROI is not as attractive as saying it will make a much larger ROI. Again, not proof but...
Originally posted by Storm_Fireblade
Originally posted by Jetrpg
My thoughts are i think mark will fail at just about everything with this game i don't think he has a clue what makes games good and is blaming EA for his design decisions. Infact i know this to be true, its a matter of record
Actually Mark tried to avoid any blaming regarding EA and did mention several times, that he in fact did make mistakes himself. It comes across pretty hostile to allege him of blaming everything on EA, which he didn´t and furthermore disqualifying him from making good games, although he was more than just a sidenote during the design and production of DAoC.
Its absolutely ok to critisize Mark and his mistakes, enough room for that, but it might not be fair to accuse him of things that are plain wrong.
We have plenty of proof that RvR based solely on zerging and keep taking fails (WAR, GW 2). I hope CU would support all types of playstyles from soloing, running a duo, running a full group, and zerging just like DAOC did.
Put keeps, towers, relics, etc. out there with reasons to take them (opening ports, gaining relic bonuses). Make player kills worth points that accumulate and grant the right to purchase powerful abilities. Then let players decide how they want to spend their play time.
Exactly. We don't want to stop zerging behavior entirely (couldn't really be done IMO) but we want to give players the ability to fight the zerg and not just be rolled over by it time and time again. As another poster has pointed out, many players will take thte path of least resistance and its our job as designers to make sure that we present enough varieties of play that the players don't simply do the same thing every day because that's the quickest and easiest level to level.
Originally posted by Lore84 Dont get me wrong, zerging has its place in epic keep takes, absolutely, i just want full groups to be viable in this games rvr too like they were in DAOC. I know this isnt daoc2 but its rvr...so i hope it will be viable and fun
Me to. I also want to give players the tools so that they can decide to make a stand against larger groups and come away with enough of a sense of victory (even if they don't win), that their sacrifice was worth it. I want to see players look at a zerg and say "If we can slow them down, knock out enough of their members, they won't be able to steamroll XXXX" then IMO, we have accomplished on of our goals as designers.
Originally posted by Lore84 Moguy2, yes the game is years away, but people who are thinking of investing in the kickstarter want an idea of the direction they plan on going before they put their money into it. Thats why i made this post, not out of boredom. /shrug
And I support this 100%. That's why I'm here now, was posting here last night to the wee hours, etc. I could habe easily left the forums this week said "Mission accomplished" and have reached a large percentage of the folks I'm going to reach from this site. I'm not going to do that, I want to talk to you guys even if it means I have to read posts that call me a sham, idiot, etc. Believe me, that's not fun and people who know me know that it does get under my skin *but* I want to hear what people say and more importantly, I need to hear what people say and that's why I'm here, why I haven't raised a bony finger and said "Ban him" or done anything like that. I've made some mistakes in the past, did some really smart things and if I need to get dumped on a bit to get the advice/suggestions/feedback I need, I'll do that as long as things don't turn really ugly.
Thanks again guys.
Zod applauds such dedication.
Its great news to hear that small man and the solo game will be kept alive. People saying long duration CC needs to be removed... really didnt play the game.
- Thank you for your replies. This comment is confunding to me, "For this game to succeed we have to look at what went right and what has gone wrong over the last decade plus of games like this and then make the decision on how to proceed." And you figure that pve is where games are going wrong? Or you just want to focus on the RvR? I understand that is your direction, great i wish you well. But i don't believe it will be attractive, nor where games have went wrong. I COULD BE WRONG.
A game that ,at least in concept, has in only/largely rvr progression ... similar to the basics of progression in PS2 or GW2, these are weakness of those games (granted great games). But all you have to do is look at wow and other popular mmos to understand the role progression plays (be it levels, skills, items). Growing in diversity !growing in strength (which is actually more diverse). So looking at the very basics of what has been effective in the last decade i cannot see how your vision matches up in even the basic concepts. On top of this many people will pvp but also require pve (i am not saying aim for the greatest number of people, i am saying there is a reason for that, you are getting more with both, you have more thing to invest in, more changes of pace [which are all important in mmos], etc. ).
Mark i do want to give you some praise. The public quest system was wonderful (too scripted) but it was rather new and best done to that date, it was a highlight of the game for sure, and changed many mmos made after WAR. Wonderful. Including BGs awful (not saying none were fun but BG is never RvR).
Another thing positive is your ability ability to confront others, its good. I am not attempting to disparage the man, read what i type about daoc on these forums its very positive, i am not saying Mark cannot make a great game. However, what i am saying i don't think he understands what made daoc work, if he did then why was so little of it in WAR? Why doesn't he express his desire for it in his blog post? No, what i am reading IS a lot of the SAME stuff he wrote about WAR. And thats the record i base my statement on, if wrong then WONDERFUL. I'll state hey Mark i was wrong you got it man. But thats only if i am wrong.
And tactical combat sounds wonderful.
Finally i feel if there is someone who can make a very enjoyable engaging new mmorpg you would be one to do it, i just don't see it in your vision so far. But that doesn't make me correct, nor does it mean CU will miss the mark. What it does mean is i will be rather candid, and i have been to this rodeo many times.
[I redacted most of this post, because, i think its cool Mark is willing to engage the community, and honestly, he seems to be candid with us, and i hope this time the game is as great experience as daoc was.]
The OP asked us what are our thoughts, so i was not detailed nor support of my general thoughts. And the above posts are just my feelings/thoughts. I laid out detailed posts on what made daoc work just a while back that was more objective.
/best wishes and luck in all seriousness.
"Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one ..." - Thomas Paine
Another thing positive is your ability ability to confront others, its good. I am not attempting to disparage the man, read what i type about daoc on these forums its very positive, i am not saying Mark cannot make a great game. However, what i am saying i don't think he understands what made daoc work, if he did then why was so little of it in WAR? Why doesn't he express his desire for it in his blog post? No, what i am reading IS a lot of the SAME stuff he wrote about WAR. And thats the record i base my statement on, if wrong then WONDERFUL. I'll state hey Mark i was wrong you got it man. But thats only if i am wrong.
We have plenty of proof that RvR based solely on zerging and keep taking fails (WAR, GW 2). I hope CU would support all types of playstyles from soloing, running a duo, running a full group, and zerging just like DAOC did.
Put keeps, towers, relics, etc. out there with reasons to take them (opening ports, gaining relic bonuses). Make player kills worth points that accumulate and grant the right to purchase powerful abilities. Then let players decide how they want to spend their play time.
Exactly. We don't want to stop zerging behavior entirely (couldn't really be done IMO) but we want to give players the ability to fight the zerg and not just be rolled over by it time and time again. As another poster has pointed out, many players will take thte path of least resistance and its our job as designers to make sure that we present enough varieties of play that the players don't simply do the same thing every day because that's the quickest and easiest level to level.
OK. This bit of logic is shaking my confidence in the project a little. The idea of "giving players the ability to fight the zerg" is code for a long cc (or the like) that is difficult to break out of or has long duration. Long CC is not about skill, it's about which Enchanter or Bard fires off the first mass mezz. The rest of the classes don't much matter. It's the "I WIN" gun. The first enchanter to fire off the Zs WINS. No ifs, ands, or buts. And it's just ridiculous how a much smaller group can just take its time plowing down a group 5 times their size because of this ridiculously overpowered mechanic. If this mechanic goes into CU and people aren't aware of it ahead of time, I can assure you that it is going to result in mass people complaining and quiting if nothing is done about it. Making RvR about who fires off the MEZZ gun first is going to be a deal-breaker for me.
Fundamentally, you cannot artificially put a small group on equal footing with a larger group. You're just opening up a whole new can of worms that will bite you in the ass down the road.
Originally posted by Lore84 Dont get me wrong, zerging has its place in epic keep takes, absolutely, i just want full groups to be viable in this games rvr too like they were in DAOC. I know this isnt daoc2 but its rvr...so i hope it will be viable and fun
Me to. I also want to give players the tools so that they can decide to make a stand against larger groups and come away with enough of a sense of victory (even if they don't win), that their sacrifice was worth it. I want to see players look at a zerg and say "If we can slow them down, knock out enough of their members, they won't be able to steamroll XXXX" then IMO, we have accomplished on of our goals as designers.
When I started playing your games over ten years ago now I never thought i'd actually have you responding to a post that i've made I have to admit xD Brilliant!
Back to the point, Mark if you really follow through with that and keep that sort of roaming full group gameplay alive and well in CU, you will sure as hell have my kickstarter funding Just don't back down to the easy and simple "oh lets just get rid of long duration crowd control"...that would kill it I think.
This just gets more and more interesting!
Ex-DAOC, Excalibur
MarkJacobsCEO City State EntertainmentMemberRarePosts: 649
Originally posted by Satarious
Originally posted by MarkJacobs
Originally posted by meddyck
We have plenty of proof that RvR based solely on zerging and keep taking fails (WAR, GW 2). I hope CU would support all types of playstyles from soloing, running a duo, running a full group, and zerging just like DAOC did.
Put keeps, towers, relics, etc. out there with reasons to take them (opening ports, gaining relic bonuses). Make player kills worth points that accumulate and grant the right to purchase powerful abilities. Then let players decide how they want to spend their play time.
Exactly. We don't want to stop zerging behavior entirely (couldn't really be done IMO) but we want to give players the ability to fight the zerg and not just be rolled over by it time and time again. As another poster has pointed out, many players will take thte path of least resistance and its our job as designers to make sure that we present enough varieties of play that the players don't simply do the same thing every day because that's the quickest and easiest level to level.
OK. This bit of logic is shaking my confidence in the project a little. The idea of "giving players the ability to fight the zerg" is code for a long cc (or the like) that is difficult to break out of or has long duration. Long CC is not about skill, it's about who sees who first. It's the "I WIN" gun. The first enchanter to fire off the Zs WINS. No ifs, ands, or buts. And it's just ridiculous how a much smaller group can just take its time plowing down a group 5 times their size because of this ridiculously overpowered mechanic. If this mechanic goes into CU and people aren't aware of it ahead of time, I can assure you that it is going to result in mass people complaining and quiting if nothing is done about it. Making RvR about who fires off the MEZZ gun first is going to be a deal-breaker for me.
Fundamentally, you cannot artificially put a small group on equal footing with a larger group. You're just opening up a whole new can of worms that will bite you in the ass down the road.
Why do you think that's the only way to fight the zerg? I don't and I've said several times already that I'm not a fan taking the players out of the game for a long duration simply to fight the zerg, It's not a binary problem, at least not in my opinion. Please don't jump to conclusions based on Dark Age of Camelot or other games, that's one of the reasons I've said quite a few times that this isn't Dark Age of Camelot 2.
Being able to support multiple play styles is important. Zerg and zerg-like bahavior can be useful at times (like attacking an enemy keep and then moving on) but it is also important for the players to know that they can fight the zerg, damage it and reduce its ability to simply keep running through the world the whole night without losing a single battle. I don't want to see a small group wipe out a larger one simply because they got off their overpowered spells faster than the zerg. But I do want to see players know that the zerg is coming and decide to make a stand because they know that they will lose but their take a lot of those "darned Vikings with them this time" while members of their realm are heading out to fight the zerg after it wins.
I don't want to see a small group wipe out a larger one simply because they got off their overpowered spells faster than the zerg. But I do want to see players know that the zerg is coming and decide to make a stand because they know that they will lose but their take a lot of those "darned Vikings with them this time" while members of their realm are heading out to fight the zerg after it wins.
Does that seem like a good idea to you?
OK, this has me a little intrigued. I will be curious to hear the details. Some sort of early warning mechanic for the smaller groups, if I'm understanding you correctly. Which can actually make sense from an RPG view of it since large groups make a whole lot more noise than smaller groups. Perhaps a villager or wanderer warning the small group, if you want to take RPG up another notch?
MarkJacobsCEO City State EntertainmentMemberRarePosts: 649
Originally posted by alexisevic
Originally posted by Jetrpg
Another thing positive is your ability ability to confront others, its good. I am not attempting to disparage the man, read what i type about daoc on these forums its very positive, i am not saying Mark cannot make a great game. However, what i am saying i don't think he understands what made daoc work, if he did then why was so little of it in WAR? Why doesn't he express his desire for it in his blog post? No, what i am reading IS a lot of the SAME stuff he wrote about WAR. And thats the record i base my statement on, if wrong then WONDERFUL. I'll state hey Mark i was wrong you got it man. But thats only if i am wrong.
Why WAR failed, two words:
Electronic Arts.
I so wish this was true or that I could stand here and lie to you, it would be so much easier but I still won't do that. I know I could garner some support if I simply went out and cloaked myself in self-righteous indignation about how evil EA was or that they meddled in everything or just as bad, I would not say anything and let EA be the fall guy. I've seen this same behavior from developers/ex-devs from EA and othe studios and it disgusts me. I made mistakes, EA made mistakes and other people, most of whom wouldn't apologize for anything unless their life depended on it, made mistakes. I refuse to do that just as I refuse not to learn from my mistakes. I have no right to ask for a single person's support, whether here or elsewhere, if I'm not professional enough to own up to what I did wrong (I have), apologize for it (I have), learn from it (hopefully you guys are seeing some indication of it, since words are not proof) and then go out and try to make a great game.
I do thank you for your support and well-meaning words but WAR not being the game it should have been was the result of many people's mistakes and I won't throw EA under the bus just as I won't throw some of the other decision-makers in WAR's development under the same bus. People make mistakes but the key for me is whether they can admit them, learn from them and move on to greater things. I'm trying very, very hard to do that.
Mark Jacobs CEO, City State Entertainment
MarkJacobsCEO City State EntertainmentMemberRarePosts: 649
Originally posted by Satarious
Originally posted by MarkJacobs
I don't want to see a small group wipe out a larger one simply because they got off their overpowered spells faster than the zerg. But I do want to see players know that the zerg is coming and decide to make a stand because they know that they will lose but their take a lot of those "darned Vikings with them this time" while members of their realm are heading out to fight the zerg after it wins.
Does that seem like a good idea to you?
OK, this has me a little intrigued. I will be curious to hear the details. Some sort of early warning mechanic for the smaller groups, if I'm understanding you correctly. Which can actually make sense from an RPG view of it since large groups make a whole lot more noise than smaller groups. Perhaps a villager or wanderer warning the small group, if you want to take RPG up another notch?
And so much more...
Please do understand that I don't want to come down with the mighty fist of "Game Designer Knows All!" here. I don't, I can't and I never will. What I want is to keep talking to guys who gee, actually have played games like this, garner lots of feedback from them and from the team and then make some key decisions. We've got a lot of interesting ideas (two of our guys are huge Dark Age of Camelot players/fans besides myself) and we will be talking to our backers heavily about these ideas. Nothing is perfect, no solution will be a silver bullet but my belief is that we can accomodate different play styles and be true to our core principle that this game has to be fun for the vast majority of our target audience or we will fail.
I need to vanish for the rest of the day to get some new posts done for Monday, including a "Clear as Mud" post since I've gotten too much feedback that suggests my Friday's posts weren't clear enough about certain things as well as the expanded Rock, Paper post, so I probably won't be posting much till later.
Thanks again for your interest and willingness to keep an open mind.
I don't want to see a small group wipe out a larger one simply because they got off their overpowered spells faster than the zerg. But I do want to see players know that the zerg is coming and decide to make a stand because they know that they will lose but their take a lot of those "darned Vikings with them this time" while members of their realm are heading out to fight the zerg after it wins.
Does that seem like a good idea to you?
OK, this has me a little intrigued. I will be curious to hear the details. Some sort of early warning mechanic for the smaller groups, if I'm understanding you correctly. Which can actually make sense from an RPG view of it since large groups make a whole lot more noise than smaller groups. Perhaps a villager or wanderer warning the small group, if you want to take RPG up another notch?
And so much more...
Please do understand that I don't want to come down with the mighty fist of "Game Designer Knows All!" here. I don't, I can't and I never will. What I want is to keep talking to guys who gee, actually have played games like this, garner lots of feedback from them and from the team and then make some key decisions. We've got a lot of interesting ideas (two of our guys are huge Dark Age of Camelot players/fans besides myself) and we will be talking to our backers heavily about these ideas. Nothing is perfect, no solution will be a silver bullet but my belief is that we can accomodate different play styles and be true to our core principle that this game has to be fun for the vast majority of our target audience or we will fail.
I need to vanish for the rest of the day to get some new posts done for Monday, including a "Clear as Mud" post since I've gotten too much feedback that suggests my Friday's posts weren't clear enough about certain things as well as the expanded Rock, Paper post, so I probably won't be posting much till later.
Thanks again for your interest and willingness to keep an open mind.
First, thank you for the passion and taking the time out to respond to us. You don't see that from too many developers since they're too busy to be bothered in their ivory towers.
I'm definitely willing to hear you out. I just want to make sure that "and so much more" doesn't give smaller groups an automatic "I WIN!" mechanic over larger groups. I like the idea of wounding or somehow slowing down the zerg before reinforcements arrive, but I'll wait for the details before I comment further. I'm glad that you have some hardcore DaoC fanatics on your team. Having the passion is half the battle for making a good game. The other half is keeping an open mind.
I have to wonder if anybody who is talking about CC stopping zergs ever actually fought a zerg in DAOC. Most of the time that my group or other small groups killed a zerg it was because we pulled their melee away from their healers and had our dps assist them down. All the while our healers stayed completely out of range of being interrupted and were able to heal any damage our members took. Then our casters used nearsight etc. to gain the upper hand on their casters and game over. And that's just in the open field. It was even easier in a tower or keep. For every time we stopped the zerg, there were probably 9 times the zerg rolled us. That's what zergs do.
You don't want the zerg to be stopped by a vastly smaller force every time nor do you want superior numbers to always win (see also: the first month of NF in DAOC when Albion ruled everything on most servers). It's a fine balancing act in which all aspects of the game factor in from how effective healing is, how freely melee are able to shake off CC, to what abilities there are to interrupt, blind, or silence casters, to the design of maps and keeps, and more.
Hey Satarious, I'd rather no automatic i-win buttons in the game at all. However, there were counters to the long crowd control. I honestly get the impression you seem to be forgetting that. There needs ro be this sort of mechanic to give groups a fighting chance against marauding zergs. Also, hey, if someone was good enough to get their CC off first it SHOULD give them an advantage.
You don't want the zerg to be stopped by a vastly smaller force every time nor do you want superior numbers to always win (see also: the first month of NF in DAOC when Albion ruled everything on most servers). It's a fine balancing act in which all aspects of the game factor in from how effective healing is, how freely melee are able to shake off CC, to what abilities there are to interrupt, blind, or silence casters, to the design of maps and keeps, and more.
Exactly, I hope this is how it will be Numbers should not always = win. *fingers crossed* You are quite right too, its not always just down to CC.
As a DAoC Vet and refugee, I have to say that both zergs and 8mans deserved to be in game, in fact it would not have been the game that it was pre and post NF without both gameplays.
Keep in mind that DAoC's groups were 8 players, there was no raid UI. Zergs were just friends, guildies or allies running together beyond the capacity of a group. Regardless if it was 8man or zerg, the groups needed to be balanced enough to hold their own at any time, and we all withnessed more than once how a very strong group could dismantle a small zerg.
As long as there are guilds and alliances, there will be zergs. Players join a guild to play with others, logically they will RvR together as well, as many as possible, the more the merrier right?
In DAoC it was understood that wherever the action was, a zerg (if not all three) would eventually show up, so 8mans would either steer away or roam specific circuits to pick off other groups or reinforcements.
Personally I was disgusted to see what RvR became after WAR released, it was elite 8man group or get out. The point of RvR is to invade and defend, take relics, create bonuses for your realm...in the end it was called Realm vs Realm, not Your Eight vs My Eight.
As for the solo players, I don't mention them because they are the most flexible and most creative, they always found a way to get their solo fun regardless of what everyone else was doing.
SO you are running along in a Siege BattleGroup OTW to take a Keep and or Tower When suddenly all 60 of your fellow zerglings stop dead in there tracks. You wonder to yourself what just happened. And then Bang your dead. Oh shit it must have been an 8man grp with Warlocks. 8 men killing 60 in 3 secs? Yes it happens in DAOC everyday. Should it???
I wanna play a game were skill matters in PVP, not who gets the 60 sec mezz off first. You?
SO you are running along in a Siege BattleGroup OTW to take a Keep and or Tower When suddenly all 60 of your fellow zerglings stop dead in there tracks. You wonder to yourself what just happened. And then Bang your dead. Oh shit it must have been an 8man grp with Warlocks. 8 men killing 60 in 3 secs? Yes it happens in DAOC everyday. Should it???
I wanna play a game were skill matters in PVP, not who gets the 60 sec mezz off first. You?
Actually, because DAoC had no balance as all the classes were completely different, there were more than enough ways to avoid that, with a combination of class skills/RA/items.
Also just because you are in a zerg does not mean that you stick all together in a ball, it's tactically and trategically bad, specially when we all know about the AoE CC, you would think groups would run a bit separated in flanking distances. So if a big zerg dies to AoE, it's their own fault.
SO you are running along in a Siege BattleGroup OTW to take a Keep and or Tower When suddenly all 60 of your fellow zerglings stop dead in there tracks. You wonder to yourself what just happened. And then Bang your dead. Oh shit it must have been an 8man grp with Warlocks. 8 men killing 60 in 3 secs? Yes it happens in DAOC everyday. Should it???
I wanna play a game were skill matters in PVP, not who gets the 60 sec mezz off first. You?
The players in that zerg should have been panning their cameras and keeping an eye out for incoming, and then communicating that to the rest of the group.
If they didn't, then yes, they should have got bombed.
SO you are running along in a Siege BattleGroup OTW to take a Keep and or Tower When suddenly all 60 of your fellow zerglings stop dead in there tracks. You wonder to yourself what just happened. And then Bang your dead. Oh shit it must have been an 8man grp with Warlocks. 8 men killing 60 in 3 secs? Yes it happens in DAOC everyday. Should it???
I wanna play a game were skill matters in PVP, not who gets the 60 sec mezz off first. You?
The players in that zerg should have been panning their cameras and keeping an eye out for incoming, and then communicating that to the rest of the group.
If they didn't, then yes, they should have got bombed.
What ever happened to the lost art of good old fashioned tactical surprise? Are these ridiculously overpowered mechanics (like long duration cc) really necessary for a smaller group to fight off a larger group? Alexander the Great was outnumbered 8 to 1 at the battle of Issus and he STILL managed to pull off a victory without "the Gods" providing him with some special MEZZING ability. To me, that would be FAR MORE satisfying as the victor than if you had some artificial, in-game boosting capability like long duration cc to aid you. Farming mezzed players is a hollow victory at best, imho. I rolled in those groups and our bard/enchanter was great at firing off the "I WIN" button while we all assist killed 1-3 at a time, but that gets old.
As far as keeps are concerned I think there should be very slight or no immediate benefits in capturing a keep. It should be actually HOLDING the keep that makes it worth having.
I couldn't agree more. If we make it so that keep trading will reward players more than fighting, dying for and holding keeps then keep trading becomes a more viable way of earning renown/fame/rank/etc. We need to make the holding of key targets the way good things flow to the realm over time. The longer that the realm holds the objects of their desire, the better it is for the realm and we also have to make losing the objectives hurt too.
Cool. Of course there also needs to be incentive to assault more keeps so each Realm doesn't just sit on the keeps they have in an eternal truce... I think?
What ever happened to the lost art of good old fashioned tactical surprise? Are these ridiculously overpowered mechanics (like long duration cc) really necessary for a smaller group to fight off a larger group? Alexander the Great was outnumbered 8 to 1 at the battle of Issus and he STILL managed to pull off a victory without "the Gods" providing him with some special MEZZING ability. To me, that would be FAR MORE satisfying as the victor than if you had some artificial, in-game boosting capability like long duration cc to aid you. Farming mezzed players is a hollow victory at best, imho. I rolled in those groups and our bard/enchanter was great at firing off the "I WIN" button while we all assist killed 1-3 at a time, but that gets old.
first of all ench never had a ae mezz so ... scnd maybe in the old days when purge was on a 30 min timer(pre ra revamp so like 8(?) years ago) and your grp didnt even knew that you have demezz this ae mezz was a curse but all of this change dramatically today ... tanks now do have det(55% cc reduce) 50% resis(50% reduce+secundary resis) charge and purge so ... as a tank u are maybe like 6 seconds mezzed even if its a single target max lvl mezz (the longest in game) this for tank ... supps/Caster do stand longer in cc but realy if u grp gets fully mezzed on of your (with a normal grp setup) 2 demezzer purges(if its a def tank he can demezz the whole grp with 1 shout) and demzzes the whole grp within 5 secs wich means IN CASE you were stupid enough to mezz the whole enemy grp on inc u basically gave em 1min cc timer for nothing
today the cc'S still got this ae 72sec duration in its info put practically you have so many ways to escape the mezz(as long as you arent solo and hey this game is about grps) this whole to long cc duration isnt about the cc duration its ALL about the escape mechanics ...
We have plenty of proof that RvR based solely on zerging and keep taking fails (WAR, GW 2). I hope CU would support all types of playstyles from soloing, running a duo, running a full group, and zerging just like DAOC did.
Put keeps, towers, relics, etc. out there with reasons to take them (opening ports, gaining relic bonuses). Make player kills worth points that accumulate and grant the right to purchase powerful abilities. Then let players decide how they want to spend their play time.
Exactly. We don't want to stop zerging behavior entirely (couldn't really be done IMO) but we want to give players the ability to fight the zerg and not just be rolled over by it time and time again. As another poster has pointed out, many players will take thte path of least resistance and its our job as designers to make sure that we present enough varieties of play that the players don't simply do the same thing every day because that's the quickest and easiest level to level.
OK. This bit of logic is shaking my confidence in the project a little. The idea of "giving players the ability to fight the zerg" is code for a long cc (or the like) that is difficult to break out of or has long duration. Long CC is not about skill, it's about which Enchanter or Bard fires off the first mass mezz. The rest of the classes don't much matter. It's the "I WIN" gun. The first enchanter to fire off the Zs WINS. No ifs, ands, or buts. And it's just ridiculous how a much smaller group can just take its time plowing down a group 5 times their size because of this ridiculously overpowered mechanic. If this mechanic goes into CU and people aren't aware of it ahead of time, I can assure you that it is going to result in mass people complaining and quiting if nothing is done about it. Making RvR about who fires off the MEZZ gun first is going to be a deal-breaker for me.
Fundamentally, you cannot artificially put a small group on equal footing with a larger group. You're just opening up a whole new can of worms that will bite you in the ass down the road.
This is where I truly find myself frustrated. If you ever played Dark Age of Camelot you know that it was not simply who got the first CC off and then just plowing through a group 5 times your size. DAoC had abilities like cure mezz, purge, determination, charge, group purge, etc etc etc. that prevented this from happening more than 90% of the time. Now, were there times when a player had to sit out a long duration CC because his friend was too busy zapping enemies to pay attention to his friend in need of a cure? Absolutely. Or, did a person simply use his purge too quickly on a 3 second stun that he could have simply waited out, just to get mezzed again by an enemy player actually paying attention? Again, absolutely. But that is the point of tactical combat and decision making and team work. It really turns me off when someone simply says "WHOEVER GOT THE CC FIRST WON" because that simply is a false statement and your spreading of these rumors and false accusations misleads people who have never played or are not experienced with Dark Age of Camelot.
The crowd control system of Dark Age of Camelot was extremely tactical and rewarding to those who paid attention and assisted each other. Please don't make it into something it was not.
EDIT: I also hope you realize that this kind of behavior and whining has to created these watered down, free from decision making PvP games. They didn't just come into being - they were created by the people.
This is where I truly find myself frustrated. If you ever played Dark Age of Camelot you know that it was not simply who got the first CC off and then just plowing through a group 5 times your size. DAoC had abilities like cure mezz, purge, determination, charge, group purge, etc etc etc. that prevented this from happening more than 90% of the time. Now, were there times when a player had to sit out a long duration CC because his friend was too busy zapping enemies to pay attention to his friend in need of a cure? Absolutely. Or, did a person simply use his purge too quickly on a 3 second stun that he could have simply waited out, just to get mezzed again by an enemy player actually paying attention? Again, absolutely. But that is the point of tactical combat and decision making and team work. It really turns me off when someone simply says "WHOEVER GOT THE CC FIRST WON" because that simply is a false statement and your spreading of these rumors and false accusations misleads people who have never played or are not experienced with Dark Age of Camelot.
The crowd control system of Dark Age of Camelot was extremely tactical and rewarding to those who paid attention and assisted each other. Please don't make it into something it was not.
EDIT: I also hope you realize that this kind of behavior and whining has to created these watered down, free from decision making PvP games. They didn't just come into being - they were created by the people.
I'm well aware of purge, determination, group purge, etc. etc. My point is that the REASON those systems were put into place in the first place was because of the huge outcry the players had over being mezzed and taken out of combat for long stretches of time. Also, it literally turned pvp into a game of who fires off the first mezz shot. All the other non-mezzing classes were just a bunch of assist monkies when the mezz was in place. I don't know about you, but that kind of takes the fun out of true pvp when everybody is mixing it up.
My whole point is why bother trying to implement a flawed system? Det, purge, etc. is nothing but a bandaid on a sore. I hope Mark Jacobs & company won't be afraid of a more innovative approach at handling the "extinction of small group" problem without the need for long duration cc that will only open up a whole set of new problems.
This is where I truly find myself frustrated. If you ever played Dark Age of Camelot you know that it was not simply who got the first CC off and then just plowing through a group 5 times your size. DAoC had abilities like cure mezz, purge, determination, charge, group purge, etc etc etc. that prevented this from happening more than 90% of the time. Now, were there times when a player had to sit out a long duration CC because his friend was too busy zapping enemies to pay attention to his friend in need of a cure? Absolutely. Or, did a person simply use his purge too quickly on a 3 second stun that he could have simply waited out, just to get mezzed again by an enemy player actually paying attention? Again, absolutely. But that is the point of tactical combat and decision making and team work. It really turns me off when someone simply says "WHOEVER GOT THE CC FIRST WON" because that simply is a false statement and your spreading of these rumors and false accusations misleads people who have never played or are not experienced with Dark Age of Camelot.
The crowd control system of Dark Age of Camelot was extremely tactical and rewarding to those who paid attention and assisted each other. Please don't make it into something it was not.
EDIT: I also hope you realize that this kind of behavior and whining has to created these watered down, free from decision making PvP games. They didn't just come into being - they were created by the people.
I'm well aware of purge, determination, group purge, etc. etc. My point is that the REASON those systems were put into place in the first place was because of the huge outcry the players had over being mezzed and taken out of combat for long stretches of time. Also, it literally turned pvp into a game of who fires off the first mezz shot. All the other non-mezzing classes were just a bunch of assist monkies when the mezz was in place. I don't know about you, but that kind of takes the fun out of true pvp when everybody is mixing it up.
My whole point is why bother trying to implement a flawed system? Det, purge, etc. is nothing but a bandaid on a sore. I hope Mark Jacobs & company won't be afraid of a more innovative approach at handling the "extinction of small group" problem without long duration cc that will only open up a whole set of new problems.
I understand that you did not like the system - I truly do indeed. However, you are making your opinion seem like it was everyone elses when in fact it was (and still is) not. We all have the right to an opinion but you speak from a very opinionated place that really comes off wrong. Just because you didn't like the system doesn't mean it lacked innovation or was a mistake.
We have plenty of proof that RvR based solely on zerging and keep taking fails (WAR, GW 2). I hope CU would support all types of playstyles from soloing, running a duo, running a full group, and zerging just like DAOC did.
Put keeps, towers, relics, etc. out there with reasons to take them (opening ports, gaining relic bonuses). Make player kills worth points that accumulate and grant the right to purchase powerful abilities. Then let players decide how they want to spend their play time.
Exactly. We don't want to stop zerging behavior entirely (couldn't really be done IMO) but we want to give players the ability to fight the zerg and not just be rolled over by it time and time again. As another poster has pointed out, many players will take thte path of least resistance and its our job as designers to make sure that we present enough varieties of play that the players don't simply do the same thing every day because that's the quickest and easiest level to level.
OK. This bit of logic is shaking my confidence in the project a little. The idea of "giving players the ability to fight the zerg" is code for a long cc (or the like) that is difficult to break out of or has long duration. Long CC is not about skill, it's about which Enchanter or Bard fires off the first mass mezz. The rest of the classes don't much matter. It's the "I WIN" gun. The first enchanter to fire off the Zs WINS. No ifs, ands, or buts. And it's just ridiculous how a much smaller group can just take its time plowing down a group 5 times their size because of this ridiculously overpowered mechanic. If this mechanic goes into CU and people aren't aware of it ahead of time, I can assure you that it is going to result in mass people complaining and quiting if nothing is done about it. Making RvR about who fires off the MEZZ gun first is going to be a deal-breaker for me.
Fundamentally, you cannot artificially put a small group on equal footing with a larger group. You're just opening up a whole new can of worms that will bite you in the ass down the road.
This is where I truly find myself frustrated. If you ever played Dark Age of Camelot you know that it was not simply who got the first CC off and then just plowing through a group 5 times your size. DAoC had abilities like cure mezz, purge, determination, charge, group purge, etc etc etc. that prevented this from happening more than 90% of the time. Now, were there times when a player had to sit out a long duration CC because his friend was too busy zapping enemies to pay attention to his friend in need of a cure? Absolutely. Or, did a person simply use his purge too quickly on a 3 second stun that he could have simply waited out, just to get mezzed again by an enemy player actually paying attention? Again, absolutely. But that is the point of tactical combat and decision making and team work. It really turns me off when someone simply says "WHOEVER GOT THE CC FIRST WON" because that simply is a false statement and your spreading of these rumors and false accusations misleads people who have never played or are not experienced with Dark Age of Camelot.
The crowd control system of Dark Age of Camelot was extremely tactical and rewarding to those who paid attention and assisted each other. Please don't make it into something it was not.
EDIT: I also hope you realize that this kind of behavior and whining has to created these watered down, free from decision making PvP games. They didn't just come into being - they were created by the people.
Like Zod said before... If you had a problem with long duration CC ... you didnt really play the game
Comments
I couldn't agree more. If we make it so that keep trading will reward players more than fighting, dying for and holding keeps then keep trading becomes a more viable way of earning renown/fame/rank/etc. We need to make the holding of key targets the way good things flow to the realm over time. The longer that the realm holds the objects of their desire, the better it is for the realm and we also have to make losing the objectives hurt too.
I'm sorry if I haven't been really clear about things but let me say once again, "I have made a number of design decisions for DAoC/WAR that either were wrong or didn't work out the way I had hoped." I've also said that never once did JR reach down from atop Mt. Redwood and say to me "Mark, you must add this to the game now and if you do, I'll give you this special decoder ring and the key to the private jet!" It's not like the only guys/gals making decisions for WAR were me and JR. Certain people did dumb things (me included), certain people did smart things that didn't work out (me included) and the blame for the failure of MMORG like WAR, SWTOR, Secret World, etc. can almost never be laid at the feet of one person. As I've also said before I was the GM of Mythic and as such, it would be disengenous of me to either "name names" or simply try to blame others for my mistakes so I'll simply repeat what I've said about my culpability as head of studio. However, as an employee of EA, certain things were above my pay grade and/or power/control so for those things, I can't take responsibility and it would be equally wrong of me to play the martyr card here.
In terms of WoW style, less stuns, less tactical combat, I'm sorry to say you are wrong. We want more tactical combat, more real decision-making by the player but I think that it is a lot more complicated issue than simply saying "We'll have long CC like Dark Age of Camelot, we'll have Realm Ranks/Abilties like Dark Age of Camelot, we'll do everything like Dark Age of Camelot!!" because, well, that wouldn't be true. For this game to succeed we have to look at what went right and what has gone wrong over the last decade plus of games like this and then make the decision on how to proceed.
I get the skeptical/cynical part, I really do. I'm not asking you (or other people) to change their mind overnight. As per my previous posts, that's why I'm spending so more time here and on other sites. All I ask is that you and other people simply be willing to listen/offer feedback, nothing more. If you need any proof of that (not that anything I or others could say here is proof) is simply that I'm not going around saying "CU will be the only way to get great RVR - fund us now!" or "CU will be everything that all the players want - Pay us!" or even worse "CU will have everything Dark Age of Camelot had and more! - Give me, give me, give me!!" Frankly, It would have probably been smarter (from a pure business perspective) to say that we will have PvE and then, whoops, we had to cut it out knowing that we couldn't get it into the game. But I won't do that even if it means the Kickstarter won't fund. Again, I know it's not proof but I hope that the path I'm taking with CU is at least indicative of who/what I am and what I'm seeking to accomplish with CU. After all, it's really not smart to go around saying things like "We are going to piss off people" and "No, you can't have this or this or this but only this." and/or "We won't be shooting for 1M subs" because if I went down the less honest path, I know I'd get more backers and investors would be interested in this game because for them, it's all about the Return on Investment (ROI) and saying that our game will only make a small ROI is not as attractive as saying it will make a much larger ROI. Again, not proof but...
This. As per above and elsewhere.
Mark Jacobs
CEO, City State Entertainment
Zod applauds such dedication.
Its great news to hear that small man and the solo game will be kept alive. People saying long duration CC needs to be removed... really didnt play the game.
- Thank you for your replies. This comment is confunding to me, "For this game to succeed we have to look at what went right and what has gone wrong over the last decade plus of games like this and then make the decision on how to proceed." And you figure that pve is where games are going wrong? Or you just want to focus on the RvR? I understand that is your direction, great i wish you well. But i don't believe it will be attractive, nor where games have went wrong. I COULD BE WRONG.
A game that ,at least in concept, has in only/largely rvr progression ... similar to the basics of progression in PS2 or GW2, these are weakness of those games (granted great games). But all you have to do is look at wow and other popular mmos to understand the role progression plays (be it levels, skills, items). Growing in diversity !growing in strength (which is actually more diverse). So looking at the very basics of what has been effective in the last decade i cannot see how your vision matches up in even the basic concepts. On top of this many people will pvp but also require pve (i am not saying aim for the greatest number of people, i am saying there is a reason for that, you are getting more with both, you have more thing to invest in, more changes of pace [which are all important in mmos], etc. ).
Mark i do want to give you some praise. The public quest system was wonderful (too scripted) but it was rather new and best done to that date, it was a highlight of the game for sure, and changed many mmos made after WAR. Wonderful. Including BGs awful (not saying none were fun but BG is never RvR).
Another thing positive is your ability ability to confront others, its good. I am not attempting to disparage the man, read what i type about daoc on these forums its very positive, i am not saying Mark cannot make a great game. However, what i am saying i don't think he understands what made daoc work, if he did then why was so little of it in WAR? Why doesn't he express his desire for it in his blog post? No, what i am reading IS a lot of the SAME stuff he wrote about WAR. And thats the record i base my statement on, if wrong then WONDERFUL. I'll state hey Mark i was wrong you got it man. But thats only if i am wrong.
And tactical combat sounds wonderful.
Finally i feel if there is someone who can make a very enjoyable engaging new mmorpg you would be one to do it, i just don't see it in your vision so far. But that doesn't make me correct, nor does it mean CU will miss the mark. What it does mean is i will be rather candid, and i have been to this rodeo many times.
[I redacted most of this post, because, i think its cool Mark is willing to engage the community, and honestly, he seems to be candid with us, and i hope this time the game is as great experience as daoc was.]
The OP asked us what are our thoughts, so i was not detailed nor support of my general thoughts. And the above posts are just my feelings/thoughts. I laid out detailed posts on what made daoc work just a while back that was more objective.
/best wishes and luck in all seriousness.
"Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one ..." - Thomas Paine
Why WAR failed, two words:
Electronic Arts.
OK. This bit of logic is shaking my confidence in the project a little. The idea of "giving players the ability to fight the zerg" is code for a long cc (or the like) that is difficult to break out of or has long duration. Long CC is not about skill, it's about which Enchanter or Bard fires off the first mass mezz. The rest of the classes don't much matter. It's the "I WIN" gun. The first enchanter to fire off the Zs WINS. No ifs, ands, or buts. And it's just ridiculous how a much smaller group can just take its time plowing down a group 5 times their size because of this ridiculously overpowered mechanic. If this mechanic goes into CU and people aren't aware of it ahead of time, I can assure you that it is going to result in mass people complaining and quiting if nothing is done about it. Making RvR about who fires off the MEZZ gun first is going to be a deal-breaker for me.
Fundamentally, you cannot artificially put a small group on equal footing with a larger group. You're just opening up a whole new can of worms that will bite you in the ass down the road.
When I started playing your games over ten years ago now I never thought i'd actually have you responding to a post that i've made I have to admit xD Brilliant!
Back to the point, Mark if you really follow through with that and keep that sort of roaming full group gameplay alive and well in CU, you will sure as hell have my kickstarter funding
Just don't back down to the easy and simple "oh lets just get rid of long duration crowd control"...that would kill it I think.
This just gets more and more interesting!
Ex-DAOC, Excalibur
Why do you think that's the only way to fight the zerg? I don't and I've said several times already that I'm not a fan taking the players out of the game for a long duration simply to fight the zerg, It's not a binary problem, at least not in my opinion. Please don't jump to conclusions based on Dark Age of Camelot or other games, that's one of the reasons I've said quite a few times that this isn't Dark Age of Camelot 2.
Being able to support multiple play styles is important. Zerg and zerg-like bahavior can be useful at times (like attacking an enemy keep and then moving on) but it is also important for the players to know that they can fight the zerg, damage it and reduce its ability to simply keep running through the world the whole night without losing a single battle. I don't want to see a small group wipe out a larger one simply because they got off their overpowered spells faster than the zerg. But I do want to see players know that the zerg is coming and decide to make a stand because they know that they will lose but their take a lot of those "darned Vikings with them this time" while members of their realm are heading out to fight the zerg after it wins.
Does that seem like a good idea to you?
Mark Jacobs
CEO, City State Entertainment
OK, this has me a little intrigued. I will be curious to hear the details. Some sort of early warning mechanic for the smaller groups, if I'm understanding you correctly. Which can actually make sense from an RPG view of it since large groups make a whole lot more noise than smaller groups. Perhaps a villager or wanderer warning the small group, if you want to take RPG up another notch?
I so wish this was true or that I could stand here and lie to you, it would be so much easier but I still won't do that. I know I could garner some support if I simply went out and cloaked myself in self-righteous indignation about how evil EA was or that they meddled in everything or just as bad, I would not say anything and let EA be the fall guy. I've seen this same behavior from developers/ex-devs from EA and othe studios and it disgusts me. I made mistakes, EA made mistakes and other people, most of whom wouldn't apologize for anything unless their life depended on it, made mistakes. I refuse to do that just as I refuse not to learn from my mistakes. I have no right to ask for a single person's support, whether here or elsewhere, if I'm not professional enough to own up to what I did wrong (I have), apologize for it (I have), learn from it (hopefully you guys are seeing some indication of it, since words are not proof) and then go out and try to make a great game.
I do thank you for your support and well-meaning words but WAR not being the game it should have been was the result of many people's mistakes and I won't throw EA under the bus just as I won't throw some of the other decision-makers in WAR's development under the same bus. People make mistakes but the key for me is whether they can admit them, learn from them and move on to greater things. I'm trying very, very hard to do that.
Mark Jacobs
CEO, City State Entertainment
And so much more...
Please do understand that I don't want to come down with the mighty fist of "Game Designer Knows All!" here. I don't, I can't and I never will. What I want is to keep talking to guys who gee, actually have played games like this, garner lots of feedback from them and from the team and then make some key decisions. We've got a lot of interesting ideas (two of our guys are huge Dark Age of Camelot players/fans besides myself) and we will be talking to our backers heavily about these ideas. Nothing is perfect, no solution will be a silver bullet but my belief is that we can accomodate different play styles and be true to our core principle that this game has to be fun for the vast majority of our target audience or we will fail.
I need to vanish for the rest of the day to get some new posts done for Monday, including a "Clear as Mud" post since I've gotten too much feedback that suggests my Friday's posts weren't clear enough about certain things as well as the expanded Rock, Paper post, so I probably won't be posting much till later.
Thanks again for your interest and willingness to keep an open mind.
Mark Jacobs
CEO, City State Entertainment
First, thank you for the passion and taking the time out to respond to us. You don't see that from too many developers since they're too busy to be bothered in their ivory towers.
I'm definitely willing to hear you out. I just want to make sure that "and so much more" doesn't give smaller groups an automatic "I WIN!" mechanic over larger groups. I like the idea of wounding or somehow slowing down the zerg before reinforcements arrive, but I'll wait for the details before I comment further. I'm glad that you have some hardcore DaoC fanatics on your team. Having the passion is half the battle for making a good game. The other half is keeping an open mind.
I have to wonder if anybody who is talking about CC stopping zergs ever actually fought a zerg in DAOC. Most of the time that my group or other small groups killed a zerg it was because we pulled their melee away from their healers and had our dps assist them down. All the while our healers stayed completely out of range of being interrupted and were able to heal any damage our members took. Then our casters used nearsight etc. to gain the upper hand on their casters and game over. And that's just in the open field. It was even easier in a tower or keep. For every time we stopped the zerg, there were probably 9 times the zerg rolled us. That's what zergs do.
You don't want the zerg to be stopped by a vastly smaller force every time nor do you want superior numbers to always win (see also: the first month of NF in DAOC when Albion ruled everything on most servers). It's a fine balancing act in which all aspects of the game factor in from how effective healing is, how freely melee are able to shake off CC, to what abilities there are to interrupt, blind, or silence casters, to the design of maps and keeps, and more.
DAOC Live (inactive): R11 Cleric R11 Druid R11 Minstrel R9 Eldritch R6 Sorc R6 Scout R6 Healer
Ex-DAOC, Excalibur
Exactly, I hope this is how it will be
Numbers should not always = win. *fingers crossed* You are quite right too, its not always just down to CC.
Ex-DAOC, Excalibur
As a DAoC Vet and refugee, I have to say that both zergs and 8mans deserved to be in game, in fact it would not have been the game that it was pre and post NF without both gameplays.
Keep in mind that DAoC's groups were 8 players, there was no raid UI. Zergs were just friends, guildies or allies running together beyond the capacity of a group. Regardless if it was 8man or zerg, the groups needed to be balanced enough to hold their own at any time, and we all withnessed more than once how a very strong group could dismantle a small zerg.
As long as there are guilds and alliances, there will be zergs. Players join a guild to play with others, logically they will RvR together as well, as many as possible, the more the merrier right?
In DAoC it was understood that wherever the action was, a zerg (if not all three) would eventually show up, so 8mans would either steer away or roam specific circuits to pick off other groups or reinforcements.
Personally I was disgusted to see what RvR became after WAR released, it was elite 8man group or get out. The point of RvR is to invade and defend, take relics, create bonuses for your realm...in the end it was called Realm vs Realm, not Your Eight vs My Eight.
As for the solo players, I don't mention them because they are the most flexible and most creative, they always found a way to get their solo fun regardless of what everyone else was doing.
SO you are running along in a Siege BattleGroup OTW to take a Keep and or Tower When suddenly all 60 of your fellow zerglings stop dead in there tracks. You wonder to yourself what just happened. And then Bang your dead. Oh shit it must have been an 8man grp with Warlocks. 8 men killing 60 in 3 secs? Yes it happens in DAOC everyday. Should it???
I wanna play a game were skill matters in PVP, not who gets the 60 sec mezz off first. You?
Actually, because DAoC had no balance as all the classes were completely different, there were more than enough ways to avoid that, with a combination of class skills/RA/items.
Also just because you are in a zerg does not mean that you stick all together in a ball, it's tactically and trategically bad, specially when we all know about the AoE CC, you would think groups would run a bit separated in flanking distances. So if a big zerg dies to AoE, it's their own fault.
The players in that zerg should have been panning their cameras and keeping an eye out for incoming, and then communicating that to the rest of the group.
If they didn't, then yes, they should have got bombed.
Ex-DAOC, Excalibur
What ever happened to the lost art of good old fashioned tactical surprise? Are these ridiculously overpowered mechanics (like long duration cc) really necessary for a smaller group to fight off a larger group? Alexander the Great was outnumbered 8 to 1 at the battle of Issus and he STILL managed to pull off a victory without "the Gods" providing him with some special MEZZING ability. To me, that would be FAR MORE satisfying as the victor than if you had some artificial, in-game boosting capability like long duration cc to aid you. Farming mezzed players is a hollow victory at best, imho. I rolled in those groups and our bard/enchanter was great at firing off the "I WIN" button while we all assist killed 1-3 at a time, but that gets old.
Cool. Of course there also needs to be incentive to assault more keeps so each Realm doesn't just sit on the keeps they have in an eternal truce... I think?
first of all ench never had a ae mezz so ... scnd maybe in the old days when purge was on a 30 min timer(pre ra revamp so like 8(?) years ago) and your grp didnt even knew that you have demezz this ae mezz was a curse but all of this change dramatically today ... tanks now do have det(55% cc reduce) 50% resis(50% reduce+secundary resis) charge and purge so ... as a tank u are maybe like 6 seconds mezzed even if its a single target max lvl mezz (the longest in game) this for tank ... supps/Caster do stand longer in cc but realy if u grp gets fully mezzed on of your (with a normal grp setup) 2 demezzer purges(if its a def tank he can demezz the whole grp with 1 shout) and demzzes the whole grp within 5 secs wich means IN CASE you were stupid enough to mezz the whole enemy grp on inc u basically gave em 1min cc timer for nothing
today the cc'S still got this ae 72sec duration in its info put practically you have so many ways to escape the mezz(as long as you arent solo and hey this game is about grps) this whole to long cc duration isnt about the cc duration its ALL about the escape mechanics ...
This is where I truly find myself frustrated. If you ever played Dark Age of Camelot you know that it was not simply who got the first CC off and then just plowing through a group 5 times your size. DAoC had abilities like cure mezz, purge, determination, charge, group purge, etc etc etc. that prevented this from happening more than 90% of the time. Now, were there times when a player had to sit out a long duration CC because his friend was too busy zapping enemies to pay attention to his friend in need of a cure? Absolutely. Or, did a person simply use his purge too quickly on a 3 second stun that he could have simply waited out, just to get mezzed again by an enemy player actually paying attention? Again, absolutely. But that is the point of tactical combat and decision making and team work. It really turns me off when someone simply says "WHOEVER GOT THE CC FIRST WON" because that simply is a false statement and your spreading of these rumors and false accusations misleads people who have never played or are not experienced with Dark Age of Camelot.
The crowd control system of Dark Age of Camelot was extremely tactical and rewarding to those who paid attention and assisted each other. Please don't make it into something it was not.
EDIT: I also hope you realize that this kind of behavior and whining has to created these watered down, free from decision making PvP games. They didn't just come into being - they were created by the people.
I'm well aware of purge, determination, group purge, etc. etc. My point is that the REASON those systems were put into place in the first place was because of the huge outcry the players had over being mezzed and taken out of combat for long stretches of time. Also, it literally turned pvp into a game of who fires off the first mezz shot. All the other non-mezzing classes were just a bunch of assist monkies when the mezz was in place. I don't know about you, but that kind of takes the fun out of true pvp when everybody is mixing it up.
My whole point is why bother trying to implement a flawed system? Det, purge, etc. is nothing but a bandaid on a sore. I hope Mark Jacobs & company won't be afraid of a more innovative approach at handling the "extinction of small group" problem without the need for long duration cc that will only open up a whole set of new problems.
I understand that you did not like the system - I truly do indeed. However, you are making your opinion seem like it was everyone elses when in fact it was (and still is) not. We all have the right to an opinion but you speak from a very opinionated place that really comes off wrong. Just because you didn't like the system doesn't mean it lacked innovation or was a mistake.
Like Zod said before... If you had a problem with long duration CC ... you didnt really play the game