My issues with PvP

[Atrayl]

I've been pushing for the Garo mounts this past week. I'm currently on an 18 game losing streak at 7/10 for the silver one. Feels bad man.

Anyway, I've been PvPing in MMOs for 15+ years, and these are my observations of what I think PvP in this game is doing wrong. Keep in mind that this is considering PUG vs PUG, which is the vast majority of PvP that occurs.

1. Healing is too strong/Time To Kill is too high. From what I can tell, SE didn't even try to balance healing for PvP. The numbers seem to be pulled straight from PvE, where healers need to heal through raid boss damage.

A semi-competent healer can heal through 6+ PUGgers attacking them or another player. It should be well known and should have been easy to foresee that expecting the level of coordination from a PUG that it takes to properly counter a healer is unreasonable.

It's an imbalance of responsibility: one healer vs 6+ strangers needing to coordinate burst, CC, and cooldowns. In the case of the Feast, they need to do all of this without the ability to even talk in some cases!

This is the #1 issue that sucks the fun out of PvP for me. Most encounters turn into two walls banging against each other for 10 minutes.

2. Frontlines have too much RNG. Ice and Tomelith spawns contribute too much to the outcome of the game. When the winning team gets 3 Tomeliths close to their base, it's a real punch in the gut.

3. Three-faction PvP doesn't work if people don't understand what tactics they should be using. When #3 keeps attacking #2, then the entire system breaks down and #1 just stays #1 uncontested.

4. Losing points on death creates a "dead zone" where it's not even worth trying to win anymore, because you'll just lose faster. This is most noticeable in Sieze when someone is close enough to winning. You can't even assault their Tome because you'll for sure suffer some sort of causalities in the process, and the points from your deaths will put the enemy over the top anyway.

5. If it isn't already, premades should be matched with other premades whenever possible. A premade on any side is too strong of an advantage given the other points I've made. It's a snowball effect.

6. The available game types and sizes rarely allows for individual players to make a mark on the game. Whereas other MMOs have game types where a player can feel good stealing a node or capturing the flag, Frontlines (especially Shatter) are almost entirely about moving as a group.

[KusoWat]

Can you people please just consolidate to one post

[Atrayl]

Can you people please just consolidate to one post

The character limit is too low.

[Arisato]

The character limit is too low.

Just make the post, then edit it. You'll be able to fit it all in one post.

[Atrayl]

Just make the post, then edit it. You'll be able to fit it all in one post.

Thanks. That's some really silly forum software. Seems like it should be something to easily fix.

[Canadane]

Thanks. That's some really silly forum software. Seems like it should be something to easily fix.

It's most certainly international.

[Urthdigger]

1. Healing is too strong/Time To Kill is too high. From what I can tell, SE didn't even try to balance healing for PvP. The numbers seem to be pulled straight from PvE, where healers need to heal through raid boss damage.

A semi-competent healer can heal through 6+ PUGgers attacking them or another player. It should be well known and should have been easy to foresee that expecting the level of coordination from a PUG that it takes to properly counter a healer is unreasonable.

It's an imbalance of responsibility: one healer vs 6+ strangers needing to coordinate burst, CC, and cooldowns. In the case of the Feast, they need to do all of this without the ability to even talk in some cases!

This is the #1 issue that sucks the fun out of PvP for me. Most encounters turn into two walls banging against each other for 10 minutes.

Try actually playing healer in PVP and come back to say that. While healers ARE strong, they're nowhere near that strong. Tanks can shut them down, and DPS that actually know how to burst can take people out in spite of healers. On top of this, healers can't do much of anything on their own due to a complete lack of offensive ability, and can be squishy when they run out of cooldowns and instant heals making them rather reliant on having a team that actually sticks near them (You would not BELIEVE how many DPS just straight up Leeroy Jenkins when they see a pack of foes)

[SuperZay]

Healing in 4vs4 is the hardest thing in this game. Not a lot of successful healers there, even the best can die 5 times per match. Heals may be strong but dps bursts are stronger.

[Khalithar]

1. I absolutely agree with this, it's certainly the worst part about PVP which is even more glaringly obvious in the feast. But smaller group PVP always puts class balance under a microscope, in 4v4 yeah 1 healer has a tough time, but in 8v8 with two it's a completely different beast and yes, healing is strong in that setting and having to sit there waiting for 4-5 stacks during culling time is the opposite of fun. I understand why the crowd is booing! I feel the same way when I see no one dying because of OP healers.

2. Yeah, I don't like the RNG in shatter either. I will grant that it definitely makes the games more unpredictable, but getting screwed by RNG is never fun at all.

3. I actually like the 3 faction PVP, if one side is too strong, the other two have the option of ganging up on them and knocking them down a peg. If two sides keep throwing themselves at each other and one side dominates, I never quite understood why they do that in any scenario.

4. I'm a bit torn on the lose points if you die thing. On the negative it makes people play very "safe" and they constantly retreat and get healed and run back and then attack and then retreat again repeat ad nauseum rather than just staying and finishing a 1v1 or fighting to the last man, again, PVP where no one ever dies is dreadfully boring, that includes healing being too strong and too much incentive to just run away. On the positive, I've won plenty of games where both sides threw themselves at a team with the lead and evened out the scores, with this mechanic it gives teams that are behind an option rather than just slowly lose a game with no recourse.

5. Agree again. Premades should have to play against other premades regardless of how long their queue is, if they want faster queues, queue solo, period.

6. I don't necessarily agree with this either. I've seen done a few things myself that helped win a game in a noticeable way. I've held off a party at seal rock at a critical node long enough for my team to come and reinforce the position so the node wasn't lost and broken a stalemate in feast by knocking off both healers from the bridge and stunning them while all their dps above died. I've also seen some pretty great tanks and healers that have used their defensive mechanics and support abilities at a really important time and saved the day, etc. The problem is there isn't much acknowledgment or ways to show off what you did. Clutch moments like that aren't reflected on a scoreboard.

[Atrayl]

Try actually playing healer in PVP and come back to say that. While healers ARE strong, they're nowhere near that strong.

I just can't agree. Every single Feast I do goes to time with very few people actually dying. Again, we're talking about PUG PvP, where coordination doesn't exist. All a healer has to do is run back to the other healer, and both together are just invincible against a group of 8 who need to miraculously coordinate perfectly to counter a simple healing rotation, because the potency of the heals is just that high.

Tanks can shut them down

Never once seen it happen. The other healer just heals them.

and DPS that actually know how to burst can take people out in spite of healers

Yes, multiple DPS executing a burst perfectly can kill someone with only one healer on them. Two makes it impossible, even all 8 bursting won't do it.

It just simply isn't fun, and I promise you it will not be fun to the majority of MMO PvPers. PvP will never be a strong draw for this game if things remain as they are. And if SE doesn't want it to be, then that's fine. I'm just saying, that if they do want to capture a PvP audience, that this is currently the most imbalanced, frustrating, and unplayable instance MMO PvP that I have ever seen, and the strength of healing vs the lack/difficulty of countering it is the cause.

When you need a group of strangers that cannot communicate with one another to work in sync to counter the effects of one player, then that one player is too powerful.