Posts by Belzor

My take on VoD.

I played from late Prophecies (pretty low level so I don't proclaim myself as an expert here but have watched videos from this period after I got good) all the way to getting 2nd place in the last mAT with VoD with [KMD].

It was superior in every way compared to Lord damage. In excitement, build diversity, the fact that every game ended with one Lord actually dying, strategic diversity and comeback potential.

All NPCs mattered which ment most characters could split and achieve something.

Casters (the ones which could kill without line of sight) and split healing were in general weaker too which made it actually dangerous to engage some NPCs as well. Risk/reward.

I don't remember exactly what the state of the NPC AI was at the end or when the Lord walked etc as it was changed a few times. Perhaps the NPCs came in waves?

I do remember that they were decently easy to ball though which obviously was an issue but to me the main issue with VoD was skill balance and Scythes (amount of easy to bring AoE, especially in defensive attribute lines) and how skills and armor stacking through better knowledge kept power creeping to higher levels making it easier to abuse.

Examples:

Smiting - Smiter's boon obviously was the final straw that broke the back and allowed for a 4th healer who could also blow up NPCs. There are several skills in here though that just punish offensive play and can blow up balls of NPCs.

Illusion - Adding AoE to Clumsiness and it's copy gave a highly splitable and against physicals defensive character huge VoD power.

Splinter weapon - Was nerfed several times and while not being in a defensive line, was easily brought on a defensive character.

Overall, AoE got little benefits in GvG, especially AoE dps and high damage armor ignoring damage.

Skills like Ice spikes/Deep freeze, Barbed trap and perhaps Energy surge (even though it breaks my comment above) are to me some of the few good ones.

Side note: [EviL] seemed really taken on the bed and played VoD horribly against [iQ]. They should have won easily if they replayed those games again after analyzing what happened. To me, those games have been given too much credit to the destruction of VoD even though they of course put ideas into people's heads.

[EviL] did not split their sins when NPCs came out to force 6v6 but instead trained targets facing an Air of enchantment smiter and let iQ ball up NPCs among other things.

Hey,

Starting a bit shorter but can expand on any given point and will give my take on previous posts later.

There were many issues which made me quit from top tier GvG once upon a time and similar issues keeping me from returning surrounding, but not exclusively Skill balance (Removal of utility and team skills in favor of individualistic builds and high dps) , Game mechanics (VoD removal for example) and all focus on ATs instead of the quicker and slightly more random feeling of Ladder.

Some possible solutions from me from the top of my head, starting with what Motoko possibly was looking for.

1a. GvG in-activeness - Clean up the ladder from syncers and hit obvious cheaters quick and hard. Remove restrictions around teams only being able to face each other x amount of times. Remove incentive to farm title, at this point the game being fun should be the incentive I would hope. Monthly/Bimonthly ladder reset (the old claim that ladder was not reset due to historic preservation is not viable). Widen the Matchmaking search so finding games is quick.

1b. Make GvG Pug-able. One idea is to have an "Arena" where people can meet to find people. Once this is done, the leader of the team can choose any Guild hall and the team is transferred there. There should be a Balth priest and Storage chest. Here the team can setup a build and enter GvG just like normal.

For ease, either let team leader choose a Name/Cape or just assign one and leave cape blank.

You must be able to be part of a Guild while at the same time allowing this.

Ladder rating etc, I am not sure about but the activity now is so low I would not worry about this at this stage.

Otherwise of course easiest is just something similar to TA but for GvG or a mix of above and this.

2a. Give more possibilities in Scrimmages. Allow Heroes, let the one who starts the scrimmage choose flux (I don't like fluxes so mostly it would be to remove it) and possibly let the one who starts the scrimmage choose Guild hall.

2b. Allow people to scrimmage alone or in team with/against Heroes/Henchmen. Just have the Opposing Heroes/Henchmen run to the flag stand and stay there. Can help players/teams practice.

2c. Give possibility of Guild members to "lock" skills and equipment for everyone in the Guild hall so Sealed deck scrimmages can more easily be organized since skill balancing is not being done. I had my go with Banned battles a year ago but every time a new player came, mistakes and misunderstandings occurred.