Real Solutions to Real Problems <3

[Leodore]

In regards to certain content being unbalanced, unfair, or giving particular classes a huge advantage in certain content (specifically ranked content). I have read many different ideas from people, but they all require changing mechanics of the classes with nerfs and buffs, and unfortunately not only are those unrealistic to be implemented, they also possibly introduce other problems into other content of the game balance wise. So then I started to wonder what possible solutions WITHOUT changing class mechanics would look like. So I have a few, brief, yet (in my opinion) highly effective solutions so some of this content and would like to hear people's opinions on the topic. 

 

Tower of Infinity:  Taking a quick peek at the leaderboards for TOI, one can easily see a trend among the classes and notice that certain classes are doing exceptionally well, while some other classes are barely even making it onto the leaderboards. I believe this can be remedied a good bit by simply increasing the timer (by about 40%)  for the battles (and the total timer for the ticket) to allow the non-burst classes to perform decently. This isn't a 100% solution to fix all the many problems with TOI obviously, but it does help a great deal. This is based on the idea that most people in TOI aren't being killed by the NPCs but rather the AI of certain classes vs other certain classes simply runs out the clock and prevents people from progressing and ultimately drags down the overall mood and more importantly the rewards from TOI. 

 

Tower of Infinity Practice area: Same solution here as well, simply increase the timer by about 40% and it should help quite a bit.

 

1v1 PVP arena: Given the strange order of the way that content, skills, story, and balance patches have come to NA/EU and given the state of the average ping/latency of people, NA/EU arena is not cut from the same cloth as the KR arena. Thus, some adjustments should probably be made to aid this. Some of the major problems I've noticed among arena players is that some people run out the clock, some fights are ending in 10 seconds due to some classes having easy set up 100-0 combos, and 1 error for some classes = death, while multiple errors for some classes is perfectly fine and recoverable. So my simple solution to this problem is to do increase the HP of ALL classes to be double their current HP in arena (no need to change any other stats), and also to increase the timer of the rounds to triple what they currently are (to prevent people from easily running the clock). This will allow for a little larger window for error (specially due to ping), more engaged battles that the tide can go back and forth, and stops people from 100-0 any class. I believe the overall 1v1 arena experience will be more enjoyable this way

 

3v3 PVP arena: The main issue I've noticed with this content is one that can easily by fixed by limiting that amount of people in a party of the same class to 1. This means only 1 person of each class can be in the party, so this will remove the double and triple stacking of classes in 3v3. This will lead to a greater mix of team compositions, and a potential evolving meta being created within 3v3 and also stops the over dominance of particular classes on leaderboards. 

 

6v6 PVP Beluga: I'll keep these last two, short and sweet. Remove all self buffs upon picking up a horn (this still allow other people to buff you once you've acquired the horn, but not buff yourself). Horn carriers are supposed to be vulnerable, and only have the few skills available to them when the are carrying the horn, and must rely on their teammates as bodyguards. Another change is to have the "ping alerts" on the horns even when players are in stealth (this still makes having stealth an advantage, but not a ridiculous advantage, as nothing should be a ridiculous advantage in content like this). Lastly, allowing only 1 player of each class in the party, no more stacks of one class vs stacks of another class. These 3 changes, I believe, will greatly improve the quality of Beluga. 

 

6v6 PVP Whirlwind: Pretty much the same as Beluga, except of course there is no horn, so the buffs portion does not apply here. But the ping alerts on ALL attempts to capture, and the only 1 player of each class allowed.

 

 

 

Also, food for thought, but taking a gander at the rewards for the rankings, due to the newer content, and the ability to get different things in different ways, maybe BNS should possibly consider changing these tables up a bit to be more worthwhile, and also relevant. 

 

Alsooooo, I'd like to see a gear based 1v1, a gear based 3v3, and a "balanced" 6v6 beluga and whirlwind. I feel like having the options would entice people to be more interested in pvp at different points in their game play evolution. 

 

Anyways, that's my 2 cents, please let me know what you think in the comments ^_^ 

[Leodore]

Please don't just give me a bunch of reputation, please give your comments, and draw attention to this thread if you believe these are good ideas. These would require very little change to existing mechanics, and would be fairly simple in terms of development to implement. A discussion around this will be the only way they even pay attention, don't let the thread sink into the abyss of other well meaning threads people have posted. 

[Deathrainer]

my main is blade dancer... in 1v1 i dont agree with you... yes there are games that are fast but is in that the game is fun, to outplay the other and dont let him breathe... maybe im a bit sadistic but i like the arena the way it is know... all the classes have their good points and can beat each other in arena, you only need to know what to expect and what to do against each class... i think increased time and health would be punishing the time of waiting in the lobby and i dont like to wait too much.

 

I also dont agree with the 3v3 no repeated class in each team... if u want to play a tag match with a guild member and its the same class as you, then you wont be able to play with him... and i dont agree that this will affects the meta in a good way... you are cutting off the number of team comp of 3v3

 

I agree with u in the 6v6 equalized cause nowadays you need a lot of stats for going in a 6v6 match and if u dont have them, their team sees you as an obstacle and will flame you, again  i dont agree in on the no repeated class same reason before.

 

 

[Meginb]

100% agree with 6v6 needing to be equalized, as it is, it should be called True Soul vs not True Soul or Raven weapon vs not Raven. There's no point in even attempting 6v6 since the 1% with those items dominate it.

 

As for multiple classes, kinda mixed on that, as someone else said, you couldn't play with your friends of the same class. Maybe a compromise of allowing sets of 2 or 3 of the same class on one team and making it even by sticking the same number on the opposing team. Something along that line is used in World of Warships, and although it doesn't make it completely fair, it gives better chances for skilled people to make the difference.

 

Imho, there needs to be a pvp mode for everyone who wants to show off their whale character, hates teamwork and just wants some player killing action... aka King of the Hill, since faction pvp is basically nonexistent, this would give people that chaos that comes from groups of players going all out on each other.

 

I didn't see anything mentioned about leechers/afkers... my suggestion: add a reputation system to BGs/Arena/Dungeons. The punishment could be something like, oh, a 24 ban from that activity. After recieving a certain number of negative rep points, you'd get a debuff that prevents you from entering that activity for the next 24 hours. Your account wouldn't be in danger and you'd be pissed, but you'd be reaping what you sowed by acting like a complete jerk or afking/leeching. The required amount of negative reputation would be like 30 negatives and would be cumulative, furthermore people could only down rep you once per day, so you'd have to tick off 30 people to get a ban which by that point, you most definitely deserve. On the opposite spectrum, for being nice/helpful/skilled, people can upvote you once a day and when you reach 30 positive votes, you get a 24 buff that rewards some goodies like bonus loot or exp.

 

They could also add long term bonuses like, a day of premium or cash shop currency as well as outfits/titles. For being a repeat offender with negative votes, you could be labeled with an icon or debuff that shows what kind of player you are and will warn whatever group who they're playing with. Could this be exploited? Probably, which is why a vote would be limited to once per person, per day and they have to be in the group at the end of whatever they were running in order to cast a vote. At 30 votes, it would prevent a 24man from griefing someone but if that person goes to another run after that and continues bad behavior, they'd get a ban from running the place again the rest of the day.

[PatchKid]

I'm going to disagree about a few things here...

 

Firstly - the primary problem with 3v3 is not overlapping the same classes.  It's that specific classes have overwhelming group utility, while others do not.

 

The primary culprits are:

 

1. Grabs - these allow teams that are coordinated to actually 100-0 a player with a single tag.  If a BD (and sometimes a Dest) can grab their opponent, in those 6 seconds they're locked into grab CC, a teammate tag-in can obliterate them with PvE skills.

 

2. Heals - SF and Summ can basically pop in with their tag, and heal their teammates substantially.  No one else has this level of team utility, and it greatly imbalances the match when the opposing team has no way to deal with that mechanic.

 

3. Soulburn - Warlocks being able to jump into a fight, pop resists + soulburn to inflict insane damage while making it possible for their teammate to inflict insane damage is also a key contributor to quick matches.

 

None of the above are completely over-powered as there are counter mechanics to each of them, but you're going to be playing at the expert PvP level to counter any of these tactics (by planning your strategy in advance and coordinating over voice chat with your other teammates).

 

 

1v1 is pretty balanced overall.  If you doubled the HP, you could negate the 100-0 mechanics, but that also then favors classes that can heal over time like Summ, FM, Dest and SF (sometimes KFM) because they will basically restore the HP they lost much easier than other classes while classes like Sin, BD, BM, and WL will be stuck without any substantial means of restoring the HP.  Doubling the timer doubles that issue also.  Stall styles still have to out-damage their opponents, and that can be harder than it seems.  I don't think changing 1v1 much would change anything.  Adding more time actually gives Summoner the biggest advantage...

 

 

6v6 is all about Whales.  The problem with 6v6 is simple to solve - a single buff that gives anyone who does not meet the general minimum standards of PvP stats a set of stats which would be "competitive" is enough.  This buff lets you join the game in your PvE stuff, and still have enough crit defense, and HP to survive for long enough to be a useful contributor.  Sure, Whales will still dominate the boards, but they will not 3-shot your average player in these cases.  While those under the general buff will not be useful as "killers", they will be useful as guards and defenders.  Just protecting and providing cover is extremely valuable in 6v6, but you can only do this if you can live long enough to contribute.  Once you get enough "experience" into 6v6, you can start to accrue the equipment needed to be a powerful force and move up the ranks.

 

 

Overall though, the match-making system is truly to blame.  I've been matched up against high golds (1700+) when still working up through the low 1400s in 1v1.  I've seen Bronze have to fight against Gold in 6v6...  Match-matching needs some significant work.

[Leodore]

Everyone is bringing up good points and interesting ideas, however, every single suggestion requires a completely new mechanic, or modification of classes, which is unrealistic to achieve to be done. My solutions just simply modify existing mechanics and don't effect mechanics outside of that particular content. 

As for limiting team comps, honestly, that's the point. For example, everyone knows if you bring a 3 member team of SM to 3v3, the odds of you winning are nearly guaranteed. 
As for the time limit being increased, this benefits the healing classes, yes, because those are generally the one's that aren't succeeding in 1v1. 
As for 6v6, most games that have goal oriented pvp limit the amount of 1 particular class allowed on the team, there is a very good reason as to why they do this. You can attempt to balance a class for a piece of content, but to balance it so that having multiple of that same class on a team, is down right impossible. If "heals" are the problem, having a limitation of the amount of healers on the team helps aid that. If grabbers are the problem, having limitation on the amount of grabbers helps that. If invisibility is a problem, same thing. etc etc etc. Stacking classes causes more problems than it may possibly solve. 

As for the afker's and leechers, unfortunately my solutions don't directly attack this problem, but however, they may adversely solve that problem by accident. I believe these solutions would greatly increase the amount of people participating in these pieces of content (instead of, oh well, i'm gonna lose anyways, might as well just afk, only way i'm going to get these points). So it is possible that these may also help this situation as well. 

 

 

[PatchKid]

9 minutes ago, Leodore said:

As for limiting team comps, honestly, that's the point. For example, everyone knows if you bring a 3 member team of SM to 3v3, the odds of you winning are nearly guaranteed. 

 

This may be true for PUG 3v3, but not organized 3v3.  True Arena teams don't stack summoners.  Summoners are viable, useful, and one of the better options, but you need a Grab (restraint) class like BD to be really powerful.  You can replace the summoner with an SF for group healing, and it will work fine.  I think I read that the #1 team that won the 3v3 tournament in KR was a BD+Dest+SF.  They have 2 restraint classes, both of which are very hard to control, and have party healing with the SF - who also has excellent methods of forcing opponents to use their TAB escape.

 

3x Summoners are not definitely a win.  They're a nasty combination for sure, but matched up against a couple of good FMs/KFMs, and those summoners are actually pretty vulnerable.

 

13 minutes ago, Leodore said:

As for the time limit being increased, this benefits the healing classes, yes, because those are generally the one's that aren't succeeding in 1v1. 

I don't find that healing classes are failing in 1v1.  Instead, it's "sustain" builds that are failing in 1v1.  If you focus on healing, and not on damage, you lose.  Summoners who switch from being healbots in 1v1, and focus on locking their opponents down, and using their pet wisely to CC while their TAB is on CD instead of just spamming CCs when they're off cooldown, will succeed.  Healing classes don't existing in 1v1.  A KFM can be a "healing class" if they spec to grapple and heal 11% every time they grapple an opponent along with 10% every time they use Z.  Dest can be a "healing class" in 1v1 if they spec Stone Shield to heal 20%, and go full sustain with every CC break playing the avoidance game.  That's not the point of 1v1.  It's not about out-lasting your opponent...  Anyone who plays 1v1 that way is likely to lose more than win.

 

16 minutes ago, Leodore said:

As for 6v6, most games that have goal oriented pvp limit the amount of 1 particular class allowed on the team, there is a very good reason as to why they do this. You can attempt to balance a class for a piece of content, but to balance it so that having multiple of that same class on a team, is down right impossible. If "heals" are the problem, having a limitation of the amount of healers on the team helps aid that. If grabbers are the problem, having limitation on the amount of grabbers helps that. If invisibility is a problem, same thing. etc etc etc. Stacking classes causes more problems than it may possibly solve. 

There will never be an introduction to a class limitation for group content like 6v6.  Two incredibly powerful reasons:

 

1. People want to play with each other, and on their preferred class.  Not restricted to playing an "alt", so they can team up with friends.

2. Matches will basically never happen.  You already have to wait 10-15 minutes for a 6v6 to start - even on days when that is the daily quest goal - so to limit or reduce the match-making options to only allow 1 of any particular class into the match means you will never again be able to do 6v6 matches.

 

I've seen games try these kinds of strategies in the past, and they never work.  They always have to revert the change within the same month because it violates the basic premise of online gaming.  Play how you want, and what you want without being "punished" by in-game systems.

 

Healing has been problems with MMO PvP for ages.  There have been numerous solutions to this implemented at the class and system level.  One game (WoW) implemented a healing reduction debuff applied by various classes.  One game (Rift) implemented a healing power reduction that made it so your heals were always at least 50% weaker in PvP vs PvE.  Honestly though, BnS does not suffer from problems with healing in 6v6.  Yes, it gives a distinctive edge to some teams if they have a lot of healing, but it doesn't directly impact the objectives of the match.

 

Summoners are actually a problem because of class mechanics - not because of healing.  Blade Dancers (and somewhat Destroyers) are also a major issue in 6v6 because they have abilities that render a target completely defenseless to the enemy, and it does not break on damage.  Assassins are also a concern, though more minor than the other two.  There are solutions to these problems...

 

1. Summoners have pets that continue to perform combat actions and crowd controls while the summoner is incapacitated.  This includes when the summoner is carrying a tusk in Beluga.  It means you cannot disable the summoner and capture a node in WWV, so they can defend solo very easily.  The pet shouldn't have all these abilities, the summoner should have them.  That way when the summoner is incapacitated, the pet can't do a ton on it's own.

 

2. Restraint lasts 6 seconds, and if you have no way to break free, you're dead.  Instead, Restraint should break on %HP damage.  If a target takes 50% HP damage before Restraint ends, the effect expires.  This would fix 3v3 and 6v6 problems with the skill.

 

3. Anyone should be removed from stealth the second they touch objectives in 6v6.

 

Yes, these are class changes.  Yes, they require work from the devs that overhaul things in the game to balance, but that's the correct way to fix the problems.