Slaughterlines - Feedback/suggestions

Hello friends!

For a PvPer, Slaughterlines was a very exciting release! Finally being able to overcome the constant healing stalemates and the feeling of personal inability! As those who have been in B teams before, there is an interesting dynamic when three teams come together in the middle. No longer do you cheese your way through with 3 healers and no longer does your backline get thrashed by heavy burst melees!

PvP was evolving!
But things haven't quite played out how they were expected...

Full games are quickly turning into chaotic mad-dashes, teaming with Fire, Thunder and Bios! As a Warrior, even I can't last two seconds outside of my team's ramp area (and that's if both Adders and Flames don't camp it as they're known to here on Chaos).

All but two of my Slaughterline games have been wrought with frustration; you could say that 80% of the time, I hated it 100% of the time!

But there have been two unique Slaughterlines games which stood out mainly because of one key feature; these were both 8-man.

All three teams were visible, a player was able to see when one team was pushing and able to see when another team was vulnerable. There was flow and players moved with purpose rather than with panic. These two games were a really fun experience and I felt like I was part of my team rather than another rubber ducky being ferried around on a conveyer belt waiting to be shot down.

Now, Carteneau is a very large map and it'd be a shame to make this mode a 24-man only experience when there's so much ground! Perhaps a scaled down optional version?

Neutral mobs could spawn inside the flag camps from the start similar to Secure preventing the 72-man disaster in middle but we would lose the 3-team dynamic that is unique to Slaughter! Would spawning only 3 neutrals at a time with one always spawning in middle be a viable option? Could this be balanced in distance from all team bases with different spawn locations or changing teleporters depending on their location?

TL'DR - Either make the varient 8-man only or give teams a reason to split into 8's and still face two opposing teams.
What'd you guys think? What would be an appropriate way to splash a slice of order with the chaos?

I'm a fan of making the monsters spawn randomly or semi-randomly, similar to Hunt monsters. Hopefully it would encourage smaller skirmishes as people split up to scout, I say semi-randomly because purely random could just screw you over (all mobs spawn next to Maelstrom, for example). It would also hopefully mean the whole map is used, not just the points from Secure. While those points would generally be where monsters spawn, you'd be moving about around them looking for them, rather than holding the same area.

I like team death match, but 72 man is absurd when it is literally just 24v24v24 at mid... People should be split up looking for something, in some games thats weapons, in this game it would be monsters to gain buffs. It could be anything, the idea is that in any PvP environment you don't want a cluster f*ck of every single participant in one place... Not with this games servers anyway...

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Originally Posted by Nalien

I like team death match, but 72 man is absurd when it is literally just 24v24v24 at mid...

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This exactly. It would probably be better with just 8v8v8 (or like you said 72 man with more reason to roam)

I think personal limit break generate way too fast. If you kill few players with your LB, you can continually use it and spam it.

I think it's good because it's something fresh, but it is very very flawed.

First, healers and tanks don't get achievements nor do they get to enjoy the battle high mechanic.

Then, it's like a 72 man lagfest in the middle. There is very little strategy in it, it's basically try to snipe dps that overextend.

The ratio of people queuing is till the same from the 3 GCs, so if there is a shortage of one GC they will still be the bottleneck causing slow queues. The only plus is that the matches are a bit shorter, so the queue is chewed through a bit quicker.

Lastly, much of the map is unused and it feels like the whole thing was just slapped together.


They need to make this either only 8v8v8, or put some more reason to split up the alliance like they do in secure mode. They can also bring back 16v16v16 for slaughter, and make it so that the 2 teams in the alliance have to split to fight the 2 opposing GCs. They could also abandon the 3 alliance thing, and maybe just go with 2 alliances facing each other. That way the 2 alliances with too many people queuing can still get matches.

So far all the setup is good for is for me to rack up achievement kills on BLM before they nerf it.

Faster matches, faster queues, I don't want to complain while these issues are resolved, but it can't be helped... Bigger issues arise!

I'm a healer. I've killed exactly one person in Slaughter. (We had 3 healers the first match I played!)
After that? Our team composition was 7 DPS 1 Healer.
This started to get stressful especially when I had more than 1 melle dps taking Flare's to the face all day.

There was one game a DPS switched to healer to help me out, but after 5minutes they raged and went back to DPS.

There's no reward for me playing healer when I can't move away from the centre, and I can't deal damage with fear someone takes 2 attacks.
I'm a static Medica II machine. :(

The queue times are still ridic. Waited 45min last night and 34min this morning.

Please get rid of the GC requirements.

I'm a big fan of waiting at least a week before passing judgement. New strategies will evolve. Like all melee teams rushing into zerg spamming aoe completely shutting down all loltrollblms and preventing them from casting. I'll be trying this soon. Melee aoe is pretty nice in big groups of casters. It makes them scatter and prevents them from casting/killing you. Use to do this all the Time on flags to prevent heal stackers on flags and it works wonders.

I think Wolves' Den is a better option than changing Slaughter to 8v8v8.

Other than tanks/healers not being able to get Battle Highs very often because they aren't really killing much (well, tanks probably way more than healers), I really like Slaughter. I wouldn't want any big changes to the format. I like how focused it is on the center and fighting each other in a grand melee.

If you just wandered the map, the weaknesses of a lot of jobs would show through heavily, which is what I was worried about when I first read the patch notes.

Tanks/healers should get bonuses for something other than just kills, that's all I would change.

My suggestion: don't be lazy and make a new map that is actually conducive to deathmatch-style PvP. There's almost no reason to leave mid so 90% of the map is completely wasted.

Yep, my thoughts exactly. 72 is way too much to have fighting up at the middle. We need a smaller number of people per match or more reason to spread out across the map.

I'm not actually a fan of how the battle high system works. To me, when I first heard about it, I figured that it would be better off as the direct opposite.

Instead of the people who were already doing good getting the battle high and continuing to slaughter the opposing teams, it would have been more interesting to me if the opposing teams got it instead. Giving the boost to the weaker teams would then make the #1 team a target.

This sort of strategy happened in Assassin's Creed multiplayer where the first person to come out ahead and get a kill got more people targeted to them and they had to survive against more people. Once they died, they were balanced again.

It just seemed to me that it was just a kind of death fest with no real strategy besides the whole "Don't cross the line" thing where all melee got hosed. I would prefer a system where if the ranged dps are dominating, it turns the tables against them. If they still win out, they get the ego boost and if they lose, the buff goes to them next.

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Originally Posted by Ophie-Mio

This sort of strategy happened in Assassin's Creed multiplayer where the first person to come out ahead and get a kill got more people targeted to them and they had to survive against more people. Once they died, they were balanced again.

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I'd appreciate at least bonus points for shutting down somebody with Battle High or Battle Frenzy, it'd add another layer of strategy to both the offending and defending teams!

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Originally Posted by Ophie-Mio

This sort of strategy happened in Assassin's Creed multiplayer where the first person to come out ahead and get a kill got more people targeted to them and they had to survive against more people. Once they died, they were balanced again.

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Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Assassin's Creed's multiplayer also give a bonus for killstreaks? So both games helped the winning players keep winning in a way. It's worth mentioning that slaughter does have a comeback mechanic in the fact that the losing teams build their adrenaline faster. So, I suppose that any of the melee could take advantage of their adrenaline boost to quickly kill the people on a battle high and erase their buff. Well, at least I think that idea wrecking that buff is enough put that particular enemy at the top of the kill list.

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Originally Posted by Mutemutt

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Assassin's Creed's multiplayer also give a bonus for killstreaks? So both games helped the winning players keep winning in a way.

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It did, but with 3-4 more people hunting just you, it was really hard to keep the streak. The issue I'm seeing in Slaughter is that it gives the winners more to keep winning and it literally allows them to keep slaughtering people. Adrenaline just didn't seem enough to really break the battle high or battle frenzy. To me, personally, it just seems like it should be switched.

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Originally Posted by Fadigre

I'd appreciate at least bonus points for shutting down somebody with Battle High or Battle Frenzy, it'd add another layer of strategy to both the offending and defending teams!

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I was saying as much the moment the preliminary patch notes were released. Couple that with people being spread out and the team which is better at scouting and communicating has a far bigger advantage than Battle Fever could ever give.

I don't know everything that was factored into the equation, but I took out a BLM with Battle High and the message that was like- An Order of Twin Adder person has defeated a member or Maelstrom with Battle High or something like that. And then I had it and showed on the map. So I think that Battle High does transfer somehow, based on that and the fact it displays a message.

What I would like to see added:
How about throwing a few Morbols in you can kite and turn on a crowd? Vs the static drones where someone calls out the same spawn timer every game. Would give tanks a use for enmity skills if they could try to outkite each other. Maybe whoever defeats a monster outside of mid gets an item in their Inventory in the special item tab that disappears after battle if they don't use it and which spawns that monster upon use. Run into where the other two GC's are fighting, drop a Morbol, and run.

What I'd like to change:
Unnecessary waiting due to GC locked queueing and PVP rank. Ok so unlike all other instanced content, Frontlines is the ONE instanced thing that has the potential to allow players to actually play vs wait and wait and wait for no good reason except, oh yeah, lore. Some people might like that aspect but the player base feels overwhelmingly like they'd rather spend more time playing the game than killing time waiting to play the game. I know I used the word 'wait' here a lot but that's because I have to do a lot of waiting and it's tedious and no one likes it. I get that if I queue for Stone Vigil as DPS or something, then there is a legitimate delay until someone who queues in each role is matched up with me. But this is the first mode of game play that should be able to kick an instance off as soon as enough people have queued up to start it but no we have to wait so much longer than that because of this artificially imposed restriction. The people have spoken.

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Originally Posted by PotatoTree

They need to make this either only 8v8v8

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24 TDM is kinda fun but 72 is just mindless zergfest where everyone is competing against eachother in kills, also why did they remove 48man mode? that was the most balanced amount of players in secure mode that made it super fun.

PS: If you REALLY want to have fun in slaughter you need a full premade party, then that modes all nifty things and meta starts to shine.

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Originally Posted by Synestra

24 TDM is kinda fun but 72 is just mindless zergfest where everyone is competing against eachother in kills, also why did they remove 48man mode? that was the most balanced amount of players in secure mode that made it super fun.

PS: If you REALLY want to have fun in slaughter you need a full premade party, then that modes all nifty things and meta starts to shine.

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You might be a small minority that enjoyed the 48-man Secure. Now that it's brought up though, 48-man Slaughter might not be so bad with so much of the action happening at the top.

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Originally Posted by Atreus

You might be a small minority that enjoyed the 48-man Secure.

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Really? why would anyone not like 16vs16vs16 that results balanced amount of players in each objectives o.O if anything it was 72man mode that should have been removed due it ending mostly always in zergfest. But yeah 48 and 24 should be imo only sizes for slaughter so you could atleast remotely enjoy it while not rolling with premade.

Are we talking about the same thing? Secure, ie. classic Frontline.

72-man matches enable each team to go a direction of their own at the start. Any stacking that takes place after that point is merely tactical to either lock down a lead or to put down the leading team. Said stacking was typically temporary, as each team had a key responsibility. I'm not sure how you concluded it as nearly the zergfest that Slaughter is. 48-man made you have to roll the dice on how many players to send where, leaving part of the game to chance. I can't really think of a single person who enjoyed 48-man Secure, at least on my server.

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Originally Posted by Atreus

Are we talking about the same thing? Secure, ie. classic Frontline.

72-man matches enable each team to go a direction of their own at the start. Any stacking that takes place after that point is merely tactical to either lock down a lead or to put down the leading team. Said stacking was typically temporary, as each team had a key responsibility. I'm not sure how you concluded it as nearly the zergfest that Slaughter is. 48-man made you have to roll the dice on how many players to send where, leaving part of the game to chance. I can't really think of a single person who enjoyed 48-man Secure, at least on my server.

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I loved 48 man secure. It was large enough to see people all over the map, but not small enough to where it's all about the Nodes.

Least you have good reasons, lol I always saw a bunch of groaning on Sultansworn when the 48's popped.

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Originally Posted by Atreus

Least you have good reasons, lol I always saw a bunch of groaning on Sultansworn when the 48's popped.

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To be fair I think I've only witnessed one 48 man on Aether that IF's lost. They always won 48.

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Originally Posted by ZanzhizExaverion

I loved 48 man secure. It was large enough to see people all over the map, but not small enough to where it's all about the Nodes.

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I also love 48-man Secure. Each Grand Company could have up to 3 flags near their spawn but as each GC only has two teams players need to get creative in how they handle their resources to stay at the top!
72 man games have an abundance of man-power which leads to 10 minute Scholar fights over flags which do have their own set of strategies and gives a purpose to the B alliance but ultimately not as satisyfing.

I have a few ideas have the adds in the middle and further away throw out effects that make bunching up in a 24 person group in the middle near suicidal for the entire group.

• Large AoEs that target a single member of that party and deal a nasty amount of damage. Not enough to kill a dps or healer with a single hit, but will kill a dps if hit by 3 together.
• 3 different transmittable DoT that initially infect only one party each in each alliance and get boosted if a player is infected with multiple different ones. Having one is minor, having two is annoying but can be healed through, all 3 will melt you.

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Originally Posted by Fadigre

I also love 48-man Secure. Each Grand Company could have up to 3 flags near their spawn but as each GC only has two teams players need to get creative in how they handle their resources to stay at the top!
72 man games have an abundance of man-power which leads to 10 minute Scholar fights over flags which do have their own set of strategies and gives a purpose to the B alliance but ultimately not as satisyfing.

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You kinda naled it. Oh well i hope we see maps in future that are aimed for 16vs16vs16 as best and most intense matches i have had all happened in 48man so thats why im kinda sad SE removed it ;__;