Nymeros wrote:The BG setting can never be replicated within OF.

Instead of trying to push everything together and remove all diversity we should strive to make each single thing better.

1.) /rp off for bgs
2.) series of fixes for OF

OF will never be the exact copy of a BG, that's true, but it's important to have an end RvR environment that does support BG-like or better casual playstyles which includes: Running out in poor gear without not even standing a chance due to every enemy being way superior to your, building Pick Up groups in 3 minutes that can actually do fun RvR of some sort, improve your character viably both XP and RP wise while having fun in RvR.

OF will always maintain its size, meaning a huge capacity for players, but also a huge need for players since without a basic amount of people in a zone, it will just stay dead 24/7 because everyone expects it to be dead. OF will also not be any faster than it is now. We've probably pushed the timers and movement times to the max and it doesn't need to be any faster either. BG-like (or casual) RvR does not mean instant action, it means relatively easy to find casual action for everyone with the will to RvR, that's what's currently impossible in OF and only possible in BGs, and is what's killing RvR for every non Guild Grp player, starting in Hib and Alb.

As long as the only real option for casual RvR is BGs, things will remain as awful as they are now.


That's why you need to create that possibility in OF and not boost the BG candy even more. Think outside the current Uthgard setting, because Uthgard also includes a near to death end RvR environment, which is already one of the largest problems. If there was absolutely no way to improve end RvR, I'd be shouting for /rp off myself aswell. Luckily there is, you just have to see it.

You can not fix the overall end RvR activity without seriously changing the entire setting. Just adding "some fixes" will never bring the end RvR to the state it needs to be: a healthy self supporting RvR environment for as many players and playstyles as possible.




As long as you don't make the frontiers the main source of RvR and action, you will always have an unnecessarily split up and annoyed community. Just like the current RA setting causes for imbalances that do nothing but annoy the community untill they're fed up and leave. (Close to personal witness of both and I know a lot of players who've already left primarily because of these factors.)


That's the only sad truth on Uthgard at the moment and I HOPE STAFF REALISES THIS (@Blue, a reply to the actual matter would be welcome, it's quite frustrating to see you lurking around avoiding the actual topic and problem...). The OF boost will slowly but surely turn into nothing but an eventual decline of your player base if you do not act. You've still got some time, but don't expect to see the same player count in a year or two if things are going as slow as they are now (meaning no real intention on changing anything so far).

OF was like a candybar for a cancerpatient, it's sweet, tastes good for a while but makes no real difference when his status is just not good enough to survive in the long run.

You will NEVER be able to make endgame RvR support casual play the way Battlegrounds do. It's simply impossible, and any time spent trying to achieve that is a wasted effort.

Casual RvR:
1.) BG like map layout that doesn't encourage camping and is solo-friendly
2.) Instant action

Those are the most important factors of casual RvR and OF can NEVER be anything like that, no matter how much you try.

The people who want to play in bgs should be allowed to do that, especially now that we have OF.

I don't like mixing my PvE with PvP but if I'm going to Xp in the frontiers and get constantly ganked I want more than a slight increase in XP. I mainly XP'd in OF back in the day because other than dungeons the camps in classic suck huge balls, OF was pretty much empty of XPers and you didn't get attacked very often. In NF there were excellent camps all over and a significant XP bonus although you were constantly getting ganked but the XP was worth it.
I don't know what kind of RR the level 50 pop has here, on live servers almost everyone by now has an RR10+ so coming into NF on a new toon who doesn't have a regular group to run with is pretty much suicide. I'd want a higher level cap than 2L2 here no matter what the max level of the BG's are.

One thing they can do to help the solo or small man groups is to get rid of the patrolling guards. During OF I'd solo in Alb or Mid, often never finding anyone but most of the time when I did they'd run to a patrol route where they were pretty much safe since if I followed I ran a good chance of getting pwned by the grape uber guards. Keep them by the keeps.

Whatever is done I'm not going out to the frontiers, other than to XP, until I hit 50 and have a decent temp, even a single level difference is a big disadvantage in this game. Gone are the days of 2001/2 when people had no idea what they were doing and everyone ran around at any level in OF.

There is no way explaining why BGS beat frontiers in a way that cant be read out of context and be flamed. Im on it for 4 hours now and still cant come up with something that can just be completely taken apart and ignored or nullified. So this is whats left.

Bgs vs frontiers is Go-kart vs Touring championship.
The first one you do for fun, the second for competition.

Level 50 is not a reward, its a punishment.

The pool of viable targets gets smaller the higher the maximum RR is.
Of course, if I had the high RR myself, it could even out to an extend.

But do I really want to spend a whole year or maybe more every day being frustrated and ****** off just that one day I might have a chance to fight on even ground again?
Not really, no.
This is supposed to be entertaining.
Playing a game that makes me go to bed aggressive is not my understanding of entertainment.

In the Bgs the difference in Power between the average realmrank and the highest possible realmrank is rather small and hence, the additional power you get from your Ras is not that overwhelming.

As you progress through the Bgs, you notice this gap getting bigger. Classes that gave you a very close fight before with the survivor having 5% hp left and the winner decided by that one critical hit, by that one fired proc, by that one evade or that one resisted spell become more and more difficult to beat, to a point where you dont even try anymore.

in the Bgs, you can attack anybody that you consider a good fight. Some you win, some you lose. If you lose, you /rel and your back in action in a few minutes, there is always something around to fight and there is never more then 10 minutes between good close fights.

The more Ras you have or the more powerful they become, the more the fights get about RA against RA, not class vs class or skillset vs skillset.

Battle two classes that are by themselves pretty much balanced. Now give one of them a selection of strong Ras and none or very weak Ras to the other. Guess who will win from then one pretty much always.
That means if the class your fighting has a higher realmrank then yourself or has a better range of Ras available to it, there is no way to beat that player except ganging up on him and even then the strength of the Ras might be too much to beat.

If he gets beaten by 2 vs 1, he wont come again or bring reinforcements – most likely those will be long time rvr players as well and by now your RR will be outdone 5 to 1.

sure, Ras add versatility to the game, dampend weaknesses, reinforce strength – but they can also ****** up the balance big time. Not between evenly ranked players, but high vs low for sure.

Thidranki with its average 3l7 shows that quite good already, you can get some pretty strong Ras with that, but its not completely over the top, not unbeatable.

as an additional thought, a lot of those now high RRs made a big part of their rps by farming level groups in agramon.

they stil ahve their high rr, but newcomes dont have that source of rp anymore.

the only realistic chance you have to eventually reach them is fighting them on a regluar basis with superior numbers.
and that doesnt happend often since the mentality here is not realmbased. its clique based.

on live we had 3 fractions, hibs, albs and mids.
one fraction was out there, the others tried to beat them.
here everybody is doing his own little war, its many bands of mercenarys rather then an army.

see that is a problem I always thought wasn't so big but I somewhat agree to what you are saying..

however there is no good way of dealing with this "problem"

from my end the solution is as simple as it gets.

let the people that just log in for a bit of quick fun have their short span entertainment in the bgs and let the highly competitive rvr junkies do their thing in the frontiers.

again, you cant force players to adapt a playstlye that you consider as the only right one. some of them dont have the time needed, some of them lack interest in the competitive win or get lost attitude in the frontiers and some of them just log in to chat and pve with their guildies,
some have small kids and have to check on them every few minutes.

you can not force players like that into the frontiers.
you can only force them away from uthagard and daoc by trying^^

new frontiers, old frontiers, new ras, old ras, more bonis, better camps, more exp, increased rewards takeing down stronger players, all that is just trying to fix something that is not broken in the first place.

if they want to play frontiers, they will, if they dont, they wont.
let - them - be^^

Nymeros wrote:You will NEVER be able to make endgame RvR support casual play the way Battlegrounds do. It's simply impossible, and any time spent trying to achieve that is a wasted effort.

Casual RvR:
1.) BG like map layout that doesn't encourage camping and is solo-friendly
2.) Instant action

Those are the most important factors of casual RvR and OF can NEVER be anything like that, no matter how much you try.

The people who want to play in bgs should be allowed to do that, especially now that we have OF.

You made a pretty big mistake there. Casual RvR is NOT made by a map and instant action, it's made by the casual style of the actual RvR, which is only partially inluenced by the instant ports and the map.
Both of those help finding inc quicker, that's basicly all they do. If you have a BG with nothing but /rp off SCed templated stealthers and FGs, you will not have casual RvR at all because you can't afford to go out 'unprepared', just like you can't now in OF.


I never said OF has to mimic the BG playstyle completely and neither should it. It should just offer the possibility to viably do casual RvR if you like to, which it currently doesn't at all. Any effort to improve the setting for casual RvR is more than welcome and the exact opposite of a waste of time.
Of course casual RvR in OF will be slower, but it should be at least doable and worth your time, which it currently isn't. (Yes, time/action ratio will be more effecient in BGs, you won't be able to change that, but that's not the intention either.)

Neither is it the intention to remove BG RvR. In the contrary, splitting up lvls 20-25 in 3 BGs is a way better system than the one we are currently using for that level range. The only negative aspect I can see is the low RR and/or level where it ends. Perhaps a 4th BG up to something like 3L0 - 3L5 would be a better inbetween even tho this is more a detail than a fundament.

RA's are only overpowering when each combatant is equal in ability. A couple years ago I dusted off my RR5 NS which I had not played since OF but soloed 100% of the time on. I went out with my Pre-NF temp and smoked players 5 RR's higher than me easily including a RR10 SB twice who then brought a RR8 SB which I also killed in a 2 on 1 and finally she came back with three Hunters to MoS me down(still killed one of the Hunters). These people were zergers so they never really learned how to play well. Once I came up against known soloers I was pretty much meat.
Perhaps RA's never should have given as much of a bonus as they do with more of a variety of them but being this is a RPG type game you want to keep advancing your character and have your extra effort rewarded. If you just got to 50 and never got anything new people would just reroll something else. It's one fo the reasons why I actually like everything Mythic has added as the game grew it's just that they should have kept the abilities more in line with CL effectiveness.

Zarkor wrote:You made a pretty big mistake there. Casual RvR is NOT made by a map and instant action, it's made by the casual style of the actual RvR, which is only partially inluenced by the instant ports and the map.
Both of those help finding inc quicker, that's basicly all they do. If you have a BG with nothing but /rp off SCed templated stealthers and FGs, you will not have casual RvR at all because you can't afford to go out 'unprepared', just like you can't now in OF.

What? I was twinked out in every bg, and met many people that were also. What's stopping everyone from getting a sc suit if they want it? Is PvE now also not casual? And yes, the fact that you do not have a single gate that is camped 24/7, the fact that you can go out solo any time you want and the fact that there is no wait time involed after deaths DOES make it a casual experience.

Please name two other things that make RvR casual.

Nymeros wrote:What? I was twinked out in every bg, and met many people that were also. What's stopping everyone from getting a sc suit if they want it? Is PvE now also not casual? And yes, the fact that you do not have a single gate that is camped 24/7, the fact that you can go out solo any time you want and the fact that there is no wait time involed after deaths DOES make it a casual experience.

Please name two other things that make RvR casual.

The fact that you do not need a great setup and thus are able to build, join and find PuGs much more rapidly and the fact that you can meet enemies that are a lot less stronger than average (high level without good gear is somewhat average in BGs).

Whether or not you CAN maximise your toon makes no difference, it's the fact that you can or can not find enemies below a certain standard. In the current end RvR, you won't find anything below that and the standard is extremely high, even higher than just gear (SC) and RR(4-5) even. Skill gets taken into account highly in Hib and Alb aswell. The skill standard alone for end RvR is already a lot higher in than in BGs.

What I'm trying to achieve is to lower those standards drastically, so that more players will find enough enemies of their own strength without having to resort to BGs for that, which is where players below the current standards are going to to RvR. The problem is that this causes a way smaller frontier population, which also affects the players that DO meet those standards, because they will also be unable to break the routine playstyles by themselves. In order to be able to viably adapt new playstyles, such as solo and smallman RvR, you need a way bigger frontier population than what we have now. The funny thing is, that a lot of those potential players, have switched to BGs exactly becaus the frontier does not support any other playstyle than the one determined by the awfully high standards. Currently, it's a downward spiral without end.

Just look at how hard it is for the actually potential RvR active smallman and solo players to establish that kind of playstyle in the frontiers on their own. It doesn't work spontaneously because there simply isn't enough regular action. The only way to change that is to break the current standards, create a new fresh influx of players into the frontiers to PvE/PvP/raid/..., so that smallman and solo playstyles automaticly start gaining interest, instead of having to be artificially ignited every single day throuh third party tools most of the new players don't even keep track of.


Of course those "below par" characters will try to avoid the most active RvR zones since they will just get eaten alive if they don't show in great numbers, but the moment you can attract a key amount of such players in the alternative frontier zones, you create a snowball effect that attracts more players each day due to the different action and thus playstyle possibilities.

The reason why i avoid the 50 RvR is the following one:

You join a random grp of 50´s. You start running and get killed by a high RR Midgrp. /rel -> another try.... if you are very lucky you can find a medium RR group, if you are even luckier you can kill them, but in 70% - 80% of all the fight you win you are added by either a stealth-grp or another fg that is roaming.
At least OF RvR means /rel and waiting for port most of the time.

And if anyone is noticing that u are not fully SC´ed u get a tattoo on ur forehead and will never ever get a group again untill you can prove that u spend a hell lot of money to get a decent template!

There is just no fun in OF since u got >rr5 or rr6 and have a perfect equiped char....

@WakeupF's posting: Sadly, but true. That's the actual situation for non-mid players without having a certain player pool they can choose from.

But as Nixian said before, it's less a problem about game mechanics (ofc those points mentioned before are the case) then about player's mentality. The "casual" concept is not up to date anymore. People in 2010 played MMOs before, and learned the logics of MMOs in earlier times. Back in 2001 most of them didn't even knew about MMOs and started their career with DAoC. So in some sense everybody was kind of casual.

I would sell my soul if I could erase my knowledge about MMOs, because I bet I would have lots more fun than now.
Maybe not that kind of fun I had in the good ol' days, because other people like you, without knowledge about game mechanics and stuff, made those times unique.

In the end it's a quest for staff members to shorten that gap between casualty (itc having less time and motivation than other players) and high-lvl theorycrafting.

However, I'm very corious about how this discussion here will develop.

Ah, the only thing in this thread that kinda ****** me off:

Toblerone wrote:It's not sad. The point of rvr is to have fun. The point of any game is to have fun. "Defending the realm and fighting for the realm" is a purely roleplaying perspective, roleplaying is for people who live two lives, not for people who play games for fun.

Ignorant in every single aspect. Nowadays people who like to behave RP-stylish in MMOs are often branded as noobs/casuals. I don't know where this attitude comes from, maybe it's a side effect of this elitist "lolkiddie"-WoW-community thinking.
Your statement implies that a roleplaying attitude cannot generate fun. I am sure that I am not the only player here who did some roleplaying in the early times (let us say pre-SI), and I had a ball.
I do not live two lives, and I did not play D&D in my parent's basement with a freaking ogre-skin helmet on my head.
But the idea of roleplay here comes from the basic concept of DAoC, and that is what Blue said. And trying to reach this concept generates most of MY fun.
Well, maybe this concept does not fit to nowadays Uthgard's situation.
Adding may (well, it simply does) cause people to quit/log on their BG alts. That is what nobody wants on long time considerations. And that is what needs to be changed.

I some what agree - a lot of my fun while leveling up and while in BGs goes in "lets smash those xxx into pieces!" and not so much: "oh lets kill x and y to get xp the fastest" and most of the time not "oh that was a nice 1v1 or 8v8"

"zergs" can be somewhat fun if players have the right mentality - but they don't .. atleast on hib


however I do agree - on some part of the hib/alb mentality .. it makes no sense or fun to run out when you only meet superior numbers and setups..

a challenge is fine - not having a chance is not

tharid wrote:

Toblerone wrote:It's not sad. The point of rvr is to have fun. The point of any game is to have fun. "Defending the realm and fighting for the realm" is a purely roleplaying perspective, roleplaying is for people who live two lives, not for people who play games for fun.

Ignorant in every single aspect. Nowadays people who like to behave RP-stylish in MMOs are often branded as noobs/casuals. I don't know where this attitude comes from, maybe it's a side effect of this elitist "lolkiddie"-WoW-community thinking.
Your statement implies that a roleplaying attitude cannot generate fun..

Ignorant in every single aspect. I never played WoW even for a second. Sure it generates fun, but not because of gamePLAY, but because it allows whatever person with a giant potwhole in their real life to lead a completely different one with fewer problems in a virtual world. I'm not saying they're noobs, I'm saying they don't play the game for what the game is, they play it for what the game allows THEM to be. Two different things.