Imagine being actually able to do something when being outnumbered.
Like, you’re already undergeared, could barely escape death by instantly running away after seeing your opponents hp and figuring out he got 200% more dmg and dmg reduction than you thanks to all his no life gear… and on top there’s 3-6 of them.
This is extremely stupid because it narrows the gameplay choices down to one style only: stay in a big group. Always outnumber the enemy. That’s basically the best advice if you were only able to give one.
So how do you fix it?
Two suggestions:
Here’s a simple solution… (ballpark example numbers)
Reduce cc duration for -1 sec per nearby enemy in combat,
and increase it back +1 sec for every ally nearby in combat.
For example you charge into 5 enemies, they hit you with a stun, silence, interrupt, snare, anything and it gets instantly reduced by 5 sec, 1 per enemy.
You are already 1v5 and are going to eat a ton of dmg. At the very least the game should allow you to do something as a token of your honorable courage.
You’re still dead in 4-8 sec depending what class/spec you are but you’re sure as hell won’t kill them. But at least you get to DO SOMETHING and that’s how it should be. Let the brave underdog do something.
I am so sick and tired being interrupted silenced stunned and feared 90% of the time, especially when playing a caster. Any big BG and it’s just spinning my thumbs waiting to be able to do something and such a design is extremely poor and leads to nothing but frustration and anger. Let people DO SOMETHING should be the top 1 priority for future pvp design.
To debunk some incoming stupid replies:
“But one guy can just rush to a tower, bunker, high ground, lumber mill and knock 5-10 guys down because he’s immune to cc”.
Yeah in theory he can. If you’re stupid. Learn some awareness? Check how many allies are near you, you got a hud and eyes don’t you?
If you with your 5-10 guys fail to nuke down the incoming lonely rider knockback guy with raw dps, then you deserved to get pwned. 5-10 of you were sleeping, you suffer the consequences, stop crying like a baby. He took a massive risk, massive rewards. That’s logical and fair.
Also more into the details:
As I suggested, this cc -1 sec buff should count anyone in combat with that player. Maybe based on the player who used the highest range ability, dmg or healing, with the most yards counted. This range is applied to the underdogs “buff aura”, counting enemies who are in combat with said player/s.
I’m not 100% how combat works right now, but I assume it links anyone with threads that interacts with another player, hostile or healing action, and if anyone is in combat you get tagged too.
This would be easier to work out with a dynamic simple program that mimics player units, checks who is in combat, changing the debuff aura stack value based on enemies caught in the radius near enemies, and then moving them around in a virtual 2d space to see how it plays out.
I think this is something they should absolutely look into.
- Heroism: -1 sec to hostile cc duration per nearby enemy in combat with you. Stacks 10 times. Every friendly player within range removes 1 stack.
The other suggestion is more complicated with far reaching domino effects.
All cc skills apply a debuff that fades over time.
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Snares pretty much stay the same but can reapplied for longer or stronger effects.
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Interrupts and silences reduce the spell power and casting speed (meaning you cast slower, not mistaken for a lower cast time). For example you get pummeled or kicked while casting a 3 sec heal, it might go up to 4-5-6 seconds with a 30-50-70% reduced effect. Again just example values to paint a picture.
The point being, no more diminishing returns, no more hard cc’s.
So what about stuns, fear, poly, icetrap, cyclone?
I guess to avoid repeating several lines of text every time I need to describe what effects a skill applies, let’s just call them debuffs. They can apply either one or a multitude of stacks, of one or more types, with different durations.
So basically you got stack type t, stack count c, and stack duration d.
Type list contains: movement speed, casting speed, attack speed, spell power, attack power. The stacks would have a increasingly lower effect, and faster fadeout time.
For example concussive shot has almost no cd and is a somewhat soft snare that slows you 40% for 4sec. Applied again +20% up to 60% for +2sec up to 6sec, third application +10% up to 70% slowed for +1sec up to 7sec. Every time the latest stack fades out, the previous stack is refreshed. Roots is somewhat similar.
But mass entanglement since it affects all targets, is instant and has a 1min cd, would apply something like 9 stacks, meaning movement speed is reduced 99% for 1 sec, after that 80% for 8 sec, 70% for 7 sec, 60% for 6 sec, and fading out in that linear manner.
And for the knockback skill issue:
Add a power factor for spell and physical based abilities that move or push players. So if a shaman tries to thunder you off a cliff after you silenced him, his default whatever it might be 100 yard knockback power is reduced to 10 or 5.
If you stun a prot warr who tries to charge you sideways off a cliff, his knockback power is also reduced to move you only 10% of the original distance.
The point of them is to disable you opponent, buying time to heal your own or nuke someone else. The end result remains the same; apply a negative hurdle.
Stuns stun your target… they get dazed, dizzy, big oof… their cast time, spell power, movement speed, attack speed, attack power all get reduced significantly be it 77, 88, or 99 %. They are almost as good as stunned, but giving them still a change to DO SOMETHING. And that is such a important point I have to keep repeating it. You need to let people DO SOMETHING all the time. Even if all our abilities, powers and action speed is reduced 99%.
Fear could force the player to run backwards (without messing up their camera orientation my god is that annoying).
Icetrap shocks you into a stunned hypthermic state, like a stun.
Cyclone has the same effects too, being caught in a small tornado vortex that slows your hand movements, making you cast slower, with less power since the winds redirect all that energy you’re trying to cast. See how good it feels when you design skills and combat with LOGIC and dynamic reasons, cause and effect?
This is what the game needs, skills and abilities that work like you think they would do.
Poly and hex are a bit tricky.
They could have the same stun effect, while transmorphing your char into whatever critter. Hex let’s you move freely, but poly slows you 90%.
Ideally I’d like the players to still wield their weapons but it would look really silly having a frog or sheep whirlwind with a huge 2h weapon. Making a “mutant hybrid” model for every race and model would be too much work I assume.
No perfect answer here, up for suggestions.
So… if your group gets to time and manage their cc’s better than your enemies, you win. You had better targeting, positioning, rotation, etc. You were more skilled, you win. But on both sides everyone was still able to DO SOMETHING instead of sitting in a 10 sec chained silence stun lock.
Trust me, this is a by far superior combat mechanic design than what we have now. They just need to flesh it out and start testing it. Everyone would love it, finally being able to do stuff, even if you get hit by 20 people in a row with every stun and cc in a row non stop, you would still be able to stay in control of your character and not… pick your nose while waiting for the cc to end next year.
I’ll be back with more if anyone is interested in adding something constructive.
Testing this internally and giving us some videos and exchanging feedback would be appreciated and surely not lost, since at least then it would have been given a shot and we could tell with greater confidence if it actually improves the gameplay in battlegrounds and makes it more fun or not, and why.