AV is the past! Look to the future!

Zoro · 12/19/06, 9:31 AM

Inspired by the 'what's wrong with AV' thread, I started thinking yesterday about what I'd actually want in a PvE/PvP mixed BG. Very quickly became apparent that required more than an overhaul of the existing AV and something akin to a complete new BG build. If Blizz are reading, or covergent design creates any of this in the future I'll be over the moon; however I suspect Blizz aren't looking to sink this much Dev time into a BG any time soon.

As much as this is a 'my dream BG', I daresay plenty of other people have their ideas too - the more the merrier! Though we've got to be wary of creating some kind of Franken-bg made up of stolen parts from everywhere...

Right, I've tried to be ordered about this stream of consciousness. So I'll start with the map.

No faction specific static scenery
No orc huts. No dwarf bunkers. Or at least not as fixed every time locales. The idea behind this is that faction starting points can be altered around the map. At BG start up, the two faction start points get randomised from the possible start points and faction NPCs and dynamic scenery spawned appropriately.

The idea behind this is that it injects some variation into the bg with minimal effort. Reversing the spawn points in AV would make a whole different BG for everyone, and the only reason it's not doable is because frankly it'd jar to have Tauren's popping up in Dun Baldar. You could actually cheat on this one in terms of coding, rather than have a single map that has spawns chosen at random, have multiple maps and randomly choose one. That shifts the overhead to the client and their HD space - but I doubt anyone playing would notice.

To my eyes, the easiest way to implement that kind of map would be a ruins backdrop or similar. It allows plenty of scope for building structure whilst remaining faction neutral.

North / South vs. East / West
If you're going to do the above, why limit yourself to simply switching sides in a binary fashion? Why not have multiple configurations on the same map like RTS maps often have? Okay, you can't go overboard as coding for a 12 spawn point map might be a doddle to do and balance for RTS but would be a nightmare for WoW. But a four point map with games played N/S or E/W doesn't seem beyond the whit of man.

That'd mean going into each game you'd have potentially four different starting locations/strategies. That'd be enough to keep people on their toes and keep the bg fresh for longer.

Neutral forces
What you going to do with the two spawn points unused by either faction each game? Seems a pity to waste them. Populate them with hostiles and make side objectives with appropriate rewards for completion. Very much in the style of the AV mines.

On the other hand, I didn't like Korack. Free roaming, one time only per bg uber bosses seem to just spawn a tag fest as a side show to just getting on with the battle.

Two levels
All existing bgs are largely one level fields, WSG has small areas in the bases on two levels and AB/AV has areas of large height difference. But I'd like a bg that makes much wider use of tunnels, flyovers, building interiors etc. to add the 3rd dimension to fights on a more strategic level. I realise that part of the currnet lack of height in bgs is due to ranged superiority when you have to many positions to snipe from. However, I see that as more of a LoS issue than a multiple level issue. Blind corners, tunnels, interior stairs - there's plenty of ways to cut down LoS overpowering and turn control of level changing areas into a strategic desicion.

Flight
It's coming in TBC, make it an integral part of the BG. But, even the playing field. AQ bugs show that it's perfectly possible to get zone specific mounts, have a BG specific mount that people can get in the BG. Everybody is flying at the same speed. I'd actually drop the speed down to say normal Elite mount speed at the same time, to force people to think carefully about flying routes rather than zooming straight over head and over enemies. That'd require bringing the flying ceilng right down too I imagine, but that's just simple enough a hand wave to implement and paint big storm clouds as the sky.

Similar to the neutral forces, have areas accessible to flying characters only. Make them side objectives with worthwhile reasons to capture.

Choke points, valleys, and attack routes
AB has no real choke points. WSG bottles up in the flag rooms, whilst AV is renowned for it's choke points. What I would like to see however is a BG where the choice of which attack routes to take is less clear. By use of blocking measures on the defenders part such as closing and barring gateways and errecting barricades and use of offensive options to counter them I'd prefer a map with many possible attack routes but with routes maleable and often closed. Again, it's all about strategic desicions on where best to deploy resources.

Okay, that's a glimpse at what kind of map I'd like. Something with a bit of variation, and a much more complex design in terms of character flow paths. I guess I'm looking for a much more RTS/FPS hybrid map than the current open fields.

On to more specific game mechanics...

Time
Nobody wants to be stuck in a bg forever. Humans being humans, perceived investment loss means nobody wants to pull out once they've put effort in. The more complex a bg is, the more potential there is for it to go long.

Set a time counter. The bg will finish at that time, regardless of the state of play. As an AV suscessor I'd say put it at 1-2 hours.

Complete Victory/Partial Victory
Complete vicotory is defeating the opposition within the time allowed. That should remain some tangible goal as it currently is - either kill their big base NPC, tap their base node, nick their base flag, have 20 horde in their base room for 10s. Whatever, some tangible 'if you do this you win' condition.

At the same time, have a partial win condition. Something like the AB resource counter, so that if time is called one side has clearly 'more' of something and wins - or indeed less one supposes.

Loss, 1 mark. Partial victory, 2 marks. Complete victory, 3 marks. On completion of the game, anyone who was in the game for more than X amount of time gets mailed the marks. Nothing more irritating than being in a bg right up to the end then getting a d/c or RL concern that means you miss the conclusion and hence the marks.

Screw hand ins. BG resources
The whole loot hog inducing drop system in AV is flawed. Firstly, it promotes individual greed over the good of the team. Everyone sees those sparkles and goes for the loot, and it doesn't matter if they're contributing or freeloading. Secondly, having to keep running back to the back lines to hand them in is a pain and forces a 'if I leave the fight now, will the advantage I bring be enough to mitiagte the loss on the front line?' desicion. Thirdly, Stormpike soldier flesh. Never turned any in. I know who, and where but the git is never there.

So do away with that. Every time your faction kills a player/enemy NPC tick a BG resource counter. No need to scurry back. No need to loot whore. Set up different resource counters for different resources, and skew tick rates differently across mobs and you let players decide where they want to prioritise. Want 'Improved Flangorium Armor'? Better kill the enemy 'Flangorium Knights', because you'll have to kill twice as many 'Thingdoodle Riders' to get that amount of resources. Which leads to big desicions over where to attack.

Total resources acrued acts as your partial victory condition.

Personal BG resources
Want that BG flying mount? You got to earn it. Any number of personal buffs/items/abilities specific to the BG can be available via the personal resource counter. Every time the faction BG resource ticks, tick the personal one. Tick extra if you're on the aggro list of a Lt. that gets killed. If you're with X feet of a capped node/bunker. If you complete one of the side objectives. When you leave the BG, your honour is based on your total personal resource counter. Means you get rewarded for how much you contributed regardless of what you actually did. Not os good to honour leech by afking in the entrance.

Greater Class Roles
Face it, healing in AV sucks. Honour comes from kills, and healing still aggroes all the untagged mobs. Hopefully the above honour/resource system sorts out some of the disparity. But to really take a dent out of the 'dps is king' superiority, you need to give other class roles objectives in the bg that a) aid your faction's overall triumph and b) reward you for your alternate play style. And no, 'keep Icy alive' doesn't count.

Things like spawning a bunch of NPCs that need to be kept alive at a certain point before going supreme mode (and ticking extra BG resource + more personal resource for their healers when they do) is a trivial implementation. From there you move to more complicated implementations as 'keep this doomed mob alive as long as possible' and challenging ones as 'nominate a player in your raid, whilst he remains alive he gains X offensive ability for Y incoming damage. Only you may heal him for the duration and he and you gain Z personal honour a tick'.

Equally you can incentivise crowd control, tanking, debuffing, aoeing, stealthing - you name it; just by creating spawns/events that rely on players using their skills other than 'zerg with the pack'.

Siege Engines / Temporary fortifications
They're cool. BLizz acknowledged they're cool by originally intending them.
Implement them, because they're darn cool. They allow for that fluid, shifting avenue of attack routes as I mentioned before. Fortifications block routes, seige engines open them up.

Or just blow players to smithereens. That's fun too.

Right that's the generics of what I would like from AV: The Next Generation
Next post is going to be the more specific BG that formulated in my mind as a response to that.

Zoro · 12/19/06, 9:32 AM

Sorry for a deliberate double post. It just made more sense to me to write the generic specifics in two parts - and allowed me a break. I'll be filling this in as I go.

I'd blame my fractured psyche for it. If I had one.

So specific BG with all that in?

Okay, total blue skies thinking coming up.

Backstory is both factions found a chunk of rock in Outlands with a bunch of old ruins on it and a temple in the middle. Turns out the temple was being used to summon 'Gribbly the Antogonistic', a rather powerful demon when it all went Pete Tong and the ritual grabbed all the poor warlocks from age of yore into the portal there.
Now the factions have found this chunk of dirt, they reactivated the portal and all got sucked in. Course the only people who could actually stand a chance of binding Gribbly where those buggers sucked in ages ago.

In two hours time Gribbly will sacrifice all those sucked in and make his entrance into Outland. (That's your time limit)
Both sides have figured out the right magics to stop themselves being sucked in, and indeed to rescue some of those sucked through. The race is on to rescue the poor explorers before Gribbly sacrifices them all. And bonus if you can kybosh the other side's rescue plans, as their lot get sarcificed to summon a demon which the dudes you now rescued can bind for your side. Everyone's a winner (well save the sacrificed blokes).

Obviously the burning chappies would rather you didn't bind him and he comes through as soon as poss - hence they've got demons present on the rock too. (That's your neutral forces)

Keeping the portal from sucking everyone in requires resource A. THe more resource A you accumulate, the more guys from back home can summon in to help you out. (That's your first BG resource)
Resource B is what is expended in the effort to drag people out the portal. (That's your second BG resource)
Resource C is kept on hand as it's what's needed to bind Gribbly (That's your third BG resource)

A drops from enemy players mainly.
B drops from enemy NPCs mainly.
C drops from the third party Demons mainly. For added shenanigans, C can be 'stolen' from the enemy in chunks by Silithyst/Flag capping.

I'm envisagening a map with lots of blind alleys, flying overhangs, narrow corridors, toppled buildings and with wide open interiors commanding the stairs up and down.
At a certain amount of each resource cummulated various different options become available.
Barricades/gatehouse type constructions can be deployed at points up to the furthest GY capped by your team. Sadly, with all large maps I see GY capping as a neccessity. That's actually fairly easy to code. You set a NPC with the dialogue options for where you wish the barricade is going to go. Once selected that spawns a mob there (that happens to have the graphics of a wall). The mob has a large hit box, and slap bang in the middle it creates an impassable wall like the opening gates of BGs, and also denies LoS for spell effects.
Give it 99% mitigation to normal attacks or something equally stupid and normal guys can brake it down if they really try hard enough, but the ideal way is to use a siege engine.

Again, buy them on a faction level when you have accumulated enough resources. Mobs with dialogue options for 'Attack the barricade at ...' and some half decent AI so they can't be kited and have a 'Stop!' command. Let them rip at defenses where they're not subject to the high mitigation rate.

Hmm. Come to think of it, more and more they sound better implemented as combat pets.

Things like battering rams are close combat mobs, whilst catapults range fire.

The other thing I thought you could use faction resources for is to pull guys out of the portal who spawn in your base or at your nodes or whatever who mimic Galvanger. Periodically they let out a shout and everyone in your raid gets a buff.
Make a selection available of effects - but you'd have to wait them to be useful to all classes at once so you don't end up with 'damnit, we spawned the mage shouter again!' syndrome.
I guess you could broadly class them as Buff your offence stats, Buff your defence stats, Debuff enemy offence stats.

Set up a load of conditional side objectives similar to AV currently has and make them worth a damn.
Have a node on a floating lump of rock only flying BG mounts can get to, whilst it's capped you gain access to faster resource ticks of one kind, a defensive or offensive option for the raid and more personal resource purchase options.
Same for the Demon populated spawns. Have nodes there that are gathering resources, tag them and run back for extra resources or try and cap them for semi-permanent resource tick boosts, expanded options etc. (AV mine style resets).
Spawn escort quests. Spawn 'deliver this item to X location' quests - those seem prime candidates for blowing enemy barricade up endeavours.
The scope for side bjectives that can be completed quickly for positive effects is huge. The problem with AV at present is they're normally just not worth leaving the front lines for.

Personal resources should be spent on things that benefit not just yourself but the whole game. Okay, the BG flying mount is pretty personal, but you're going to be using it to better position yourself. Flat things like '+AP' are the wrong way to go as they allow infividuals to go rambo. Instead, create one time only group buff effects from them that the canny player can use to swing a close fought defense/offense.

Crack open a one shot combat pet that has 'Ice reflect on nearest 5 friendly allies for 10s' and you've got the perfect tool to smash through a mage defense. You need the combat pet, or at the very least an obvious graphic on those 5 as you have to give poor mages a chance. Similarly you could do the same for fear resistance, stealth visibility, grant invisibilty, movement buff, snare resistance, bonus to damage versus fortification, immunity to stun - the list of potentials is endless.

Anyway. Enough of me running my mouth off.
Hopefully you can see I was attempting to create a much more fluid and changing BG experience where strategy across many choices matters. Something more akin to the RTS that we are afterall playing a MMO based on.
I'd like to see confrontation points engineered between the factions and fought over, but not in the sense 'if we loose this zerg we've lost'. Lose a battle, you fall back re construct a line of defense and push out at a different line of weakness. At the same time, strategic teams are off fulfilling objectives that whilst might not be directly leading to victory are nonetheless important on a right here right now basis.

Meh. I talk too much, and have too much free time.

Kodus · 12/19/06, 9:42 AM

I've been thinking about the healer's role in PVP a lot recently. My shaman is resto spec (was for raids, changed up a bit for BG's now). I am by far the most effective person on the BG...until the team we are fighting realizes that they've done 15k damage to that mage and he's still somehow at full health. Then I am instantly burned down the second I come in range and spend the rest of the game running from the graveyard, healing one person, dying, running from the graveyard, healing one person dying...

Might it be possible to have a "shield bearer" or something similar. A guy that absorbs your damage, but requires you to keep them healed. They can't do damage or anything else, just a base hp buff for folks that want to keep them alive. I don't know, I just think there should be something else for us to do execpt look for people casting AE's and heal them until burnt down. Most classes roles don't change a lot on BG's, mages still CC and nuke, warriors still charge in and take a a beating as the give one out.

I am reasonably happy with my role in a BGs, mainly I am just throwing suggestions out there to get another idea out there. My ideal BG is something like DotA in WC3, fast paced but still with strategy and tactics required beyond your "run to LM" types we've seen. WSG is a good variation, but mankind has spent millenia thinking up new ways to kill each other, we should be able to get some more in a game.

Antarius · 12/19/06, 9:46 AM

As much as I hate "armchair designer design documents", you've still got some pretty decent ideas that would elevate a Battleground in WoW to the level of sophistication of most FPS style multiplayer maps.

Regarding the healing not being important, it certainly was important in AV when both faction's bosses were spawned... The alliance usually ended up pushing back all the way to our base because invariably they'd have 20 paladins keeping up their comparatively weaker boss.

Zoro · 12/19/06, 9:55 AM

You're going to hate the second post then Antarius :)

Too be honest I don't like them either, but I figured what the hell - it's my flight of fancy and y'all can't stop me.

It's the first post that I think contains the meat of it. This is what [i[could[/i] have been done with AV. This is what I personally believe AV was intended to be, just failed. Not a bad first shot - but I'm waiting out for the next Pve/PvP Bg.

We might as well toss all our off the wall aspirations up in the air and see what we'd all fancy...

Dynalisia · 12/19/06, 9:56 AM

Your scenery and dynamic base locations idea could be easily adapted by the next TBC battleground, as the theme of the expansion easily allows for the factions occupying old ruins and making it into a base. The two levels can then be implemented by making these the ruins of some kind of ancient temple city or fortress, which also allows for other interesting stuff, like the closing/opening of passages as BG sub-objectives.

Vosk · 12/19/06, 9:58 AM

Originally Posted by Kodus

I've been thinking about the healer's role in PVP a lot recently. My shaman is resto spec (was for raids, changed up a bit for BG's now). I am by far the most effective person on the BG...until the team we are fighting realizes that they've done 15k damage to that mage and he's still somehow at full health. Then I am instantly burned down the second I come in range and spend the rest of the game running from the graveyard, healing one person, dying, running from the graveyard, healing one person dying...

Might it be possible to have a "shield bearer" or something similar. A guy that absorbs your damage, but requires you to keep them healed. They can't do damage or anything else, just a base hp buff for folks that want to keep them alive. I don't know, I just think there should be something else for us to do execpt look for people casting AE's and heal them until burnt down. Most classes roles don't change a lot on BG's, mages still CC and nuke, warriors still charge in and take a a beating as the give one out.

I am reasonably happy with my role in a BGs, mainly I am just throwing suggestions out there to get another idea out there. My ideal BG is something like DotA in WC3, fast paced but still with strategy and tactics required beyond your "run to LM" types we've seen. WSG is a good variation, but mankind has spent millenia thinking up new ways to kill each other, we should be able to get some more in a game.

On a slight tangent, I've been amusing myself lately in seeing just how much healing I can do in a single AV. It's an entertaining little game. I don't care about winning, or losing, honor, or objectives.. I just need people who are taking damage so that I can elevate my 'healing done' number. If only those people who praised me for healing them knew how I was just using them to further my own aspirations.

I've always thought it'd be nifty to involve an instance encounter or a pvp objective where healing done was the most important thing.

Ghiest · 12/19/06, 10:00 AM

Originally Posted by Antarius

As much as I hate "armchair designer design documents", you've still got some pretty decent ideas that would elevate a Battleground in WoW to the level of sophistication of most FPS style multiplayer maps.

Regarding the healing not being important, it certainly was important in AV when both faction's bosses were spawned... The alliance usually ended up pushing back all the way to our base because invariably they'd have 20 paladins keeping up their comparatively weaker boss.

I dont see why elevating pvp to the status and complexity of a FPS map being a bad thing, if they had actually put some thought into AV before it was put down they could have had an outstanding format for PVP, but as it is it's just a farm fest or 10 min shoot and scoot affair.

40 man pvp is supposed to be epic and at least a little longer than both wsg and ab, but as often as not it ends up being shorter than both now. Some nice design idea's but no one ever accused Blizzard of good pvp design (looking at the previous honour ranking system here ...).

Evert · 12/19/06, 10:03 AM

Loss, 1 mark. Partial victory, 2 marks. Complete victory, 3 marks. On completion of the game, anyone who was in the game for more than X amount of time gets mailed the marks. Nothing more irritating than being in a bg right up to the end then getting a d/c or RL concern that means you miss the conclusion and hence the marks

Watch out, once players figure out the time requirements they just have a friend queue them for an arena match, and then back to the BG's: Maximum markage.... Though right now the choke point seems to be honor and not marks, and thats with losing most games.

I like some of your ideas, but I'm pretty sure that blizzard won't ever put NPC's on a Battleground again. Which is a shame, because it allows for pure raid specs to be much more useful, healing and otherwise.

Antarius: I don't know if you ever healed on an old AV map... but it was basically inevitable death, or running in circle's in bear form shouting "HEALS" while being chased by 200 NPC's. It really was aweful. :(

Edit: Hey, proabably we don't want to talk about old AV much in this thread?

• frmorrison · 12/19/06, 10:39 AM

I like your design ideas, Blizzard already has a new BG that combines AB/WSG type playing in one map, so they aren't making a new BG anytime soon.

It would be nice to have a AV 2.0 BG with something like what your idea spells out.

Kodus · 12/19/06, 10:57 AM

Originally Posted by VoskOn

a slight tangent, I've been amusing myself lately in seeing just how much healing I can do in a single AV. It's an entertaining little game. I don't care about winning, or losing, honor, or objectives.. I just need people who are taking damage so that I can elevate my 'healing done' number. If only those people who praised me for healing them knew how I was just using them to further my own aspirations.

I've always thought it'd be nifty to involve an instance encounter or a pvp objective where healing done was the most important thing.

I do the same. I "win" if I heal more then the total combined healing of the other 39 people. Generally I win :(

My new goal is to double their output, but I don't have the pacience to sit back and watch us stall on the bridge, so I end up putting on tanking gear and charge+warstomp a bit too often. Ah, oh well.

I do generally earn ~400 honor/hour out of it, assuming we lose (on our battlegroup we loose AV something like 85% of the time). Not too shabby if there are no guild BG groups running, but still I'd like to see something more...dynamic.

Of course, on the good side of BG healing there are no dipshits padding their healing meter numbers with newly resurrected people.

Heidi · 12/19/06, 1:53 PM

I don't think I've seen anyone in this or the other thread mention a "tickets" format, similar to that used in Battlefield 1942 et al. In the large-scale 40 v 40 pvp, it seems ideal instead of adding a "timer" to add a "number of dead people" per side. If your team wipes out all of their tickets, you win, just as if you killed the npc boss.

It encourages people to stick together (or lose consistently). It encourages actual pvp, not pve inside a pvp map. It encourages capturing nearby graveyards, so portions of your group are not stuck alone, losing tickets at various places around the map.

Am I not seeing a reason why this hasn't been implimented? I realize its similar, but distinctly different in my mind, from AB.

Aphyrax · 12/19/06, 2:30 PM

I have been AV'ing on my full resto druid lately. I am in tree form 80% of the time. And surprisingly enough, hardly anybody ever focus fires me. It appears nobody considers tree druids a threat or people confuse us with treants or whatever. One game I had 0 deaths, 112 HKs 170k healing done in 25ish minutes (ironically I could have done a lot more healing had I died since I was OOM and in combat most of the time). As a pure healer. Who still wears some crap cloth gear on account of being an alt. Despite my crap gear I top the healing charts in mosty BGs I play and it seems it is almost always druids on top in both AV and AB. At least in PuGs, I once got into the same game as a 30 man guild group which had 2 geared healer priests with full support. They outhealed me by a mile.

Originally Posted by Vosk

Originally Posted by Kodus

I've been thinking about the healer's role in PVP a lot recently. My shaman is resto spec (was for raids, changed up a bit for BG's now). I am by far the most effective person on the BG...until the team we are fighting realizes that they've done 15k damage to that mage and he's still somehow at full health. Then I am instantly burned down the second I come in range and spend the rest of the game running from the graveyard, healing one person, dying, running from the graveyard, healing one person dying...

Might it be possible to have a "shield bearer" or something similar. A guy that absorbs your damage, but requires you to keep them healed. They can't do damage or anything else, just a base hp buff for folks that want to keep them alive. I don't know, I just think there should be something else for us to do execpt look for people casting AE's and heal them until burnt down. Most classes roles don't change a lot on BG's, mages still CC and nuke, warriors still charge in and take a a beating as the give one out.

I am reasonably happy with my role in a BGs, mainly I am just throwing suggestions out there to get another idea out there. My ideal BG is something like DotA in WC3, fast paced but still with strategy and tactics required beyond your "run to LM" types we've seen. WSG is a good variation, but mankind has spent millenia thinking up new ways to kill each other, we should be able to get some more in a game.

On a slight tangent, I've been amusing myself lately in seeing just how much healing I can do in a single AV. It's an entertaining little game. I don't care about winning, or losing, honor, or objectives.. I just need people who are taking damage so that I can elevate my 'healing done' number. If only those people who praised me for healing them knew how I was just using them to further my own aspirations.

I've always thought it'd be nifty to involve an instance encounter or a pvp objective where healing done was the most important thing.

Taikero · 12/19/06, 2:43 PM

Originally Posted by Heidi

I don't think I've seen anyone in this or the other thread mention a "tickets" format, similar to that used in Battlefield 1942 et al. In the large-scale 40 v 40 pvp, it seems ideal instead of adding a "timer" to add a "number of dead people" per side. If your team wipes out all of their tickets, you win, just as if you killed the npc boss.

It encourages people to stick together (or lose consistently). It encourages actual pvp, not pve inside a pvp map. It encourages capturing nearby graveyards, so portions of your group are not stuck alone, losing tickets at various places around the map.

Am I not seeing a reason why this hasn't been implimented? I realize its similar, but distinctly different in my mind, from AB.

A ticket system would vastly change the way AV is played, I think, in one of two ways.

A) Neither side would fight each other at all, and instead would increasingly avoid each other. Healers would heal more, that's about it.

B) Both sides would stage guerrila warfare tactics to blast away the other side's "tickets" while trying to take as much of the objectives as possible before "time ran out". This way, most games probably wouldn't finish.

As far as the OP's ideas go, I got through the first post so far. The second post will have to wait until my eyes recover from the W A L L O F T E X T. Good ideas overall though. I dislike the idea of too much depth (e.g. sniping spots) though, mainly because melee is already screwed in AV. We don't need to give ranged more of an advantage there. However, smart use of tunnels and carefully placed other bridges/overhangs would be very fun, as long as it was all done without making any of these areas chokepoints where ranged attackers would commonly sit on top of sniping melee.

Honestly.....The proximity thing has always bugged me in battlegrounds. If you're on offense, you're not getting rewarded for what defense is doing. If you're on defense, you don't get rewarded for any kills that offense makes if the other side has people turtling. It's worse in games like AB/WSG where defense usually gets you little defending a node in AB and in WSG if you ever move away from your team (e.g. Trying to get the flag or defend the flag), you'll get owned by a zerg group from the other side.

Snowcrasher · 12/19/06, 4:12 PM

I think Blizzard should design a battleground that incorporates the use of an RTS commander per side over the rest of the team (who remain first person units).

Essentially this would extremely similar to (or exactly like) the game Savage. Each team would start far apart on a relatively large map seperated only by terrain (no NPCs, maybe some neutral mobs). Each commander could send instructions to his teammates (who could choose to obey or ignore them) for gathering, building, attacking, defending etc. and the commander would control the allocation of powerups that his base produced. Each side would be building defences and the game ends when the other sides HQ is destroyed.

Commanders would be assigned randomly at the start much like BG raid leader now is.

Blizzard would be incorporating a RTS role (& feel) into a battleground, something they have a wealth of experience in.

Lok · 12/19/06, 4:33 PM

Some features I would like to see-

1. Premade v. PUG- if you queue as a group you will only fight others that queue as groups. This means PUG's fight PUG's and premades fight premades.

2. AFK policing- I would like to see random wandering hostiles...something like an ooze. It slowly wanders up to someone and consumes them, dumping them out of the game and giving them a coward flag. Oozes would have to get around standard anti-afk features such as jumping. I think players using hard packed snowballs to knock afk's out of the game is a great thing, but I would rather have the game do it.

3. Literacy check- the game checks periodically to see if you read raid chat. If you don't, you get branded illiterate and booted from future literate games. This gets all the idiots who never read raid chat out of the game so you can game with people who actually do read.

Celandro · 12/19/06, 4:55 PM

Continuing on the healing done thread derail, it would be nice if PW:S absorbs showed up under healing done. When I play my wife's priest I'm constantly throwing shields and renews to everyone who is getting hit which works pretty well if specced properly for it.

Regarding future BGs, I think the original DOTA style design would work great. The key that is missing is that the player characters have to continually get more powerful as the BG continues. Ramping drastically up in damage dealt and to some extent survivability. Implementation wise, a stacking, undispellable, zone wide, flask style buff that gave the equivalent of T2 -> T3 after some prerequisite amount of bg objectives were obtained would work great. Gaining 100 to every stat after every 500 AB points or each AV tower destroyed for example. Other examples would be gaining 'virtual levels' every X Honor, (including the crushing blow mechanic!), turning into a Raid Boss (drastically growing in size/strength) upon hitting 25 killing blows, gaining new abilities (war stomp/shadowmeld/super chain heal/super bubble) upon capturing various objectives. These types of drastic changes to player stats/abilities would greatly help equalize the playing field as these buffs would become the dominant factor in the mid to late game and help prevent stalemates.

It'd also be a lot of fun turning into the Onyxia model for example, gaining flying, thousands of hps and the ability to throw fireballs for a few minutes.

If I can come up with crazy fun things like this in 15 minutes, I'm sure there are tons of fun and creative things that could be done, reusing old boss special abilities. The most important thing design wise should be using the giant personal/group power carrots to convince the players to do what you want and temporarily overcome gear disparities if you play better than your opponents.

Hal · 12/19/06, 4:58 PM

All blizzard really needs to sit down, play a Warcraft multiplayer map, and make 20 bullet points as to why people played our product.

1. Players liked seeing an army steamroll stuff
2. People felt like resource gathering was going to build their war machine of doom
3. Players liked feeling Like the Lord of the Rings (back before the Tolken family authorized a movie).

Do we see that in the game, World of Warcraft?

a. Do I, paladin 36,987 really feel like I'm a part of a larger war machine defending my kingdom?
b. Do our warriors feel like they are in combat as front line troopers?

Nope to both of them.

The sad difference between this game, and what blizzard wants to target in demographics ( as Furor said, PVP is supposed to emulate the same feeling as a Counter Strike matchup, or like a Bnet skirmish), battlefield 1942 or CounterStrike is the playstyle.

CS and BF both realize they are trying to emulate a soldiers perspective on the battlefield, and all abilities and devices given to the players highlight that.

Blizzard needs to focus on this and provide players with tools, or plot devices that make players believe their a part of a larger war machine.

The pve quests were an excellent idea of this in AV. The problem with AV was however they made the maps linear because not everyone can rally and calculate a multi staged offensive. Most military students fail this also, so expecting a 12 year old ADHD recluse could invest 5 hours into AV and break a siege was a bit much.

Blizzard needs to I believe put a time constraint on each game, in Battlefield they use the 'reenforcement ticker', in Arathi Basin Blizzard used the resource ticker.

Setting future battlegrounds to a fixed 'number' of respawns for all players would rectify this issue. Secondly, to give the players a method of siege and air platforms we have already seen is feasable for the engine (TBC bombers).

Placing siege platforms in AV would certainly be logical given the current map layouts, towers and map debris. It would also give the horde incentive to destroy our defenses rather then just ninja exploit pull the general.

Would blizzard do this?

That's a good question, but as it stands the new TBC battleground is more of the same. A love letter and proof ranged classes are broken as hell (warlocks / hunters again rule this map with snipers and a healer/ spotter). A general clusterfuck for non premade squads.

discofiend · 12/19/06, 5:19 PM

Random thought on the topic of premade vs PuGs, and how to deal with non 40 vs 40.

I'd suggest that a possible way to do matching is very similar to the way that monopolies are classified in some cases.

for every group or single person in the que, square the number of people in that group, and add them up. Match based on this.

For instance:

40 individuals que'ing = 40 * 1^2 = 40
20 pairs que'ing = 20 * 2^2 = 80
4 groups of 10 que'ing = 4 x 10^2 = 400
2 groups of 10 and 10 groups of 2 = 2 x 10^2 + 10 x 2^2 = 200 + 40 = 240

try to match AV games in which both sides have approximately equal group-ratings.

It implicitly respects that larger groups have advantages over smaller groups, but that just because you're in "a group", you shouldnt be penalized (put up against 40 person guild groups) with one partner the same way as if you're joining a game with 39 partners (in which case you *should* be put up against that 40 person guild opponent).

Bury · 12/19/06, 5:22 PM

Originally Posted by Snowcrasher

I think Blizzard should design a battleground that incorporates the use of an RTS commander per side over the rest of the team (who remain first person units).

Essentially this would extremely similar to (or exactly like) the game Savage. Each team would start far apart on a relatively large map seperated only by terrain (no NPCs, maybe some neutral mobs). Each commander could send instructions to his teammates (who could choose to obey or ignore them) for gathering, building, attacking, defending etc. and the commander would control the allocation of powerups that his base produced. Each side would be building defences and the game ends when the other sides HQ is destroyed.

Commanders would be assigned randomly at the start much like BG raid leader now is.

Blizzard would be incorporating a RTS role (& feel) into a battleground, something they have a wealth of experience in.

I don't much trust the BG Raid Leader's calls of where to attack, much less their ability to play an RTS. In a pug? I can see the potential for griefing already. Perhaps implemented as a "premade-only" would be interesting.

Also, a tangent: AV is not available past 60.

AcAc · 12/19/06, 5:45 PM

MORE SHRUBBERY

I know this sounds foolish, but one thing I like about WSG and AB is that there are more shrubs (and other terrain features) for healers to hide behind. Any good team ganks the healers first, and as a healer, I hate the big KICK ME sign on my back. Any terrain feature that increases my longevity will make me happier and want to heal more.

I would hope that Blizzard gets feedback from healers when designing new content.

Abi · 12/19/06, 6:36 PM

Originally Posted by Bury

Also, a tangent: AV is not available past 60.

Wait, what? How does this stuff work if you can't get AV marks once you've leveled beyond 60? Did they just forget to update to EoS marks perhaps?
http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=9232