Highest PVP scores being promoted by D3

Ludaa

The communication and organization required to reach high scores is one of the the things I enjoy most. As a long time player, I see pve as a horendous waste of time for the rewards. PvP is fun right now, and I worry everytime these threads pop up about gutting the names/shields, and communication. That would gut the fun for a lot of us I think.

mjh

Ludaa wrote:

I worry everytime these threads pop up about gutting the names/shields, and communication. That would gut the fun for a lot of us I think.

I think the only ones that brought this up as worrying was D3 themselves. Other players who had never heard of it or done it probably felt it to be unfair and started to carry a pitchfork that was never really theirs.

Dauthi

IceIX wrote:

mjh wrote:

wymtime wrote:

...if they are really looking at shield hopping and how to eliminating outside communication why are they promoting these scores?

I think this is a bigger issue not being addressed. Would like more discussion on this as well as a comment from D3 to this.

Because until we have something to share, there's not much to say on it. We're well aware of how all that affects the game. What's also a hot topic is the affects any changes will make to try and curb that without the numerous knock on effects that just "killing" hopping would have. Promoting these scores promotes the game in its current form, which we believe is good, but could always be better.

Since you are taking questions on the subject, could you answer mine that have been bothering me?

I assume your company tallies those who are receiving 1k/1.3k rewards. I've seen posts mentioning this when you added points to pvp, after all you would need to make sure the game isn't too easy or too hard.

These top scorers (in the OP post) are claimed to help because their points trickle down to other players, so if their ability to coordinate hops was stopped, points would deflate. However, if points deflated, wouldn't progression rewards just be readjusted, as it has been in the past, to fit the numbers of players hitting 1k/1.3k that you want to see? If so, fixing this wouldn't have an effect on obtaining progression rewards, it would simply take away the inflated point totals and remove the advantage from using outside communication.

I am curious if it could help dry slices too, since inflation at the top in part happens due to these coordinated hops. If the popular time slices become deflated, while the dry ones stay mostly the same, then we could see the dry time slice problem avoided, because progression rewards would be forced to drop.

IceIX

Dauthi wrote:

Since you are taking questions on the subject, could you answer mine that have been bothering me?

I assume your company tallies those who are receiving 1k/1.3k rewards.

These top scorers (in the OP post) are claimed to help because their points trickle down to other players, so if their ability to coordinate hops was stopped, points would deflate. However, if points deflated, wouldn't progression rewards just be readjusted, as it has been in the past, to fit the numbers of players hitting 1k/1.3k that you want to see? If so, fixing this wouldn't have an effect on obtaining progression rewards, it would simply take away the inflated point totals and remove the advantage from using outside communication.

I am curious if it could help dry slices too, since inflation at the top in part happens due to these coordinated hops. If the popular time slices become deflated, while the dry ones stay mostly the same, then we could see the dry time slice problem avoided, because progression rewards would be forced to drop.

Yes, it's true that scores would deflate and that we could adjust based off that. But there's also a player engagement factor to take into account here that would change things up quite a bit. It's far more complex than even this, but:

Right now, there's enormous volatility at the high end of things; Players can hit 1700 and drop 200 of those points down through big chunks to people lower on the totem pole. These top end players, meanwhile, take that in stride as a "failed shield hop" and regain those 200 points on another hop or two. These points can and do "trickle down" every single Versus Tourney. As well, a surprising amount of people hit the 1K/1.3K progressions and then "run naked" and let their points drop. More high value points to the system. If shield hopping weren't a thing, those high end points would maybe possibly be topping out at 1.3-1.5K instead of 2.5K. Less to go around at the high end to trickle, less for the progression runners to get and then let drain away. This is something that could be largely fixed by tweaking progressions, but it would also necessarily lower the top end and make that top placement more arduous to get. We'd likely see most T10s separated by 150 points or less. Rough.

One of the other major issues is that players that haven't learned how to shield well feel that they can't "progress" in Versus. They get to, say, 800 then beat back down to 600 because 600 is their actual equilibrium point. Then they get mad since when they try again, they get beat down again. No-one likes being Sisyphus. Putting in something that actively stops shield hopping stands a good chance of making *everyone* into Sisyphus. When people feel that they're just rolling boulders uphill, they stop rolling. And if more people stop trying, less points get injected overall.

Not saying that the current system is the be all, end all, of how we want Versus to run. Just that we have a lot of variables to balance out and we don't want to make changes that will directly affect a core of players that will then roll down-hill towards others in quite possibly unexpected fashions. It's a tough nut to decisively crack.

san

IceIX wrote:

... Not saying that the current system is the be all, end all, of how we want Versus to run. Just that we have a lot of variables to balance out and we don't want to make changes that will directly affect a core of players that will then roll down-hill towards others in quite possibly unexpected fashions. It's a tough nut to decisively crack.

quote shortened to keep this a simple post.

Thanks IceIX for injecting a bit of reality into this. I have, long ago, realized the benefits that these top end folks give us. Without them, I wouldn't be hitting 1000 at any sort of regular rate.

BillyBobJoe

1) Could someone explain what the "problem", is with shield hopping?

Shield hopping is what fills the slices with points. with nobody shielding, all you get is the king of the hill, who can play until the end of the pvp slugfest that was around before shields.

2) Why is out of game communication so bad?

I played world of warcraft, and until I joined a guild, I had a slow and difficult time of it. after I joined the guild, my play experience immediately doubled in quality. aren't alliances the same thing?

aesthetocyst

IceIX wrote:

One of the other major issues is that players that haven't learned how to shield well feel that they can't "progress" in Versus. They get to, say, 800 then beat back down to 600 because 600 is their actual equilibrium point. Then they get mad since when they try again, they get beat down again. No-one likes being Sisyphus. Putting in something that actively stops shield hopping stands a good chance of making *everyone* into Sisyphus. When people feel that they're just rolling boulders uphill, they stop rolling. And if more people stop trying, less points get injected overall.

Exactly and extremely well put! I have experienced many a dry slice. It's a slow, begrudging, grind. A truly miserable experience. Even if the progressions were lowered to match the new normal, it wouldn't be any fun getting to them.

I'd also conjecture that the distribution curve of points would be the same, just reduced in degree across the board. To keep the dev's goals in line, after the progs were lowered, their distribution would also be more or less the same.

End result, everyone gets more or less the same pay, but has less fun doing it

On the flip side, being in a hot slice is a great time. Becomes a race to see who can pile up the points. It's winwinwin for most players, as everyone is chasing the leaders, rather than sniping anything that moves (that is, each other!).

The solution I would suggest would be to drop slices, go back to all players in a common pool, so there no longer are dry slices. But that's easy to say ... no doubt there are additional considerations there as well.

IceIX

aesthetocyst wrote:

The solution I would suggest would be to drop slices, go back to all players in a common pool, so there no longer are dry slices. But that's easy to say ... no doubt there are additional considerations there as well.

Timeshards immediately increased our user engagement numbers and kept them up. When players can play and end an event when they want them to, they're far more willing to partake. Merging everyone into a bucket would necessarily mean killing timeshards. Otherwise if you kept shards but bucketed everyone you get:

Players in shard 1 that get an extra few hours where they're only facing other shard 1-ers. Not very fun, tiny pool. Then they're out of the pool several hours while everyone else has the full pool to work with. Not fun, tons of points and they can't reach them.

Players in shard 5 that get the end of the event with one of two things: Either no one to play with other than other shard 5-ers if we kick people out of the pool when their shard is up, which is very volatile (no way to tell how many points that shard will create in the bucket) and could end up with very low or high scoring shard. Not predictable like shards 2-4. Or else they end up with several hours where the vast majority of opponents can't fight back. No retals, free points. Feeding frenzy! Which means shard 5 is the place to be, which means that shards 1-4 necessarily clear out, which means we're back to step 1 with no timeshards, except for a few poor souls who just act as feeders for everyone else.

BillyBobJoe

[quote="aesthetocyst"
Exactly and extremely well put! I have experienced many a dry slice. It's a slow, begrudging, grind. A truly miserable experience. [/quote]

Play any off season pvp, where ppl dont shield because there is no cumulative season points, and that's what removing shields will be like.

No points, and extremely hard to hit progressions

aesthetocyst

IceIX wrote:

Timeshards immediately increased our user engagement numbers and kept them up.

Well then no need to say more, because this is paramount

Players begged for shards, and they did bring convenience.

The concerns about returning to a common pool sound similar to the divide between early starters and late climbers, but at a higher level. If only competitive players could be incentivized to divvy themselves between the slices; Hopes for placement should do that, but players have some to put more stock in progressions, so more high-powered players are piling into the same slice (or two) to drive up the points. Placements are limited, progressions are open to whoever hits them. Placements are seen as a nice bonus, not a right.

Have you considered ... if it's even possible ... having an "enrollment period"? Each player having an end time based on their start time? Could be a way to return to a common pool, while also retaining the benefits time shards brought.

scottee

IceIX wrote:

aesthetocyst wrote:

The solution I would suggest would be to drop slices, go back to all players in a common pool, so there no longer are dry slices. But that's easy to say ... no doubt there are additional considerations there as well.

Timeshards immediately increased our user engagement numbers and kept them up. When players can play and end an event when they want them to, they're far more willing to partake. Merging everyone into a bucket would necessarily mean killing timeshards. Otherwise if you kept shards but bucketed everyone you get:

Players in shard 1 that get an extra few hours where they're only facing other shard 1-ers. Not very fun, tiny pool. Then they're out of the pool several hours while everyone else has the full pool to work with. Not fun, tons of points and they can't reach them.

Players in shard 5 that get the end of the event with one of two things: Either no one to play with other than other shard 5-ers if we kick people out of the pool when their shard is up, which is very volatile (no way to tell how many points that shard will create in the bucket) and could end up with very low or high scoring shard. Not predictable like shards 2-4. Or else they end up with several hours where the vast majority of opponents can't fight back. No retals, free points. Feeding frenzy! Which means shard 5 is the place to be, which means that shards 1-4 necessarily clear out, which means we're back to step 1 with no timeshards, except for a few poor souls who just act as feeders for everyone else.

The main problem is the uneven distribution of players within each slice. I never understood why we went from no time slices immediately to five. It essentially split the player pool into fifths, which gives much higher variance for distribution. Something like 3 slices would still give people a time they can probably make, while keeping the available player pool in each slice at a lower variance, meaning less dry slices.

Dauthi

IceIX wrote:

Dauthi wrote:

Since you are taking questions on the subject, could you answer mine that have been bothering me?

I assume your company tallies those who are receiving 1k/1.3k rewards.

These top scorers (in the OP post) are claimed to help because their points trickle down to other players, so if their ability to coordinate hops was stopped, points would deflate. However, if points deflated, wouldn't progression rewards just be readjusted, as it has been in the past, to fit the numbers of players hitting 1k/1.3k that you want to see? If so, fixing this wouldn't have an effect on obtaining progression rewards, it would simply take away the inflated point totals and remove the advantage from using outside communication.

I am curious if it could help dry slices too, since inflation at the top in part happens due to these coordinated hops. If the popular time slices become deflated, while the dry ones stay mostly the same, then we could see the dry time slice problem avoided, because progression rewards would be forced to drop.

Yes, it's true that scores would deflate and that we could adjust based off that. But there's also a player engagement factor to take into account here that would change things up quite a bit. It's far more complex than even this, but:

Right now, there's enormous volatility at the high end of things; Players can hit 1700 and drop 200 of those points down through big chunks to people lower on the totem pole. These top end players, meanwhile, take that in stride as a "failed shield hop" and regain those 200 points on another hop or two. These points can and do "trickle down" every single Versus Tourney. As well, a surprising amount of people hit the 1K/1.3K progressions and then "run naked" and let their points drop. More high value points to the system. If shield hopping weren't a thing, those high end points would maybe possibly be topping out at 1.3-1.5K instead of 2.5K. Less to go around at the high end to trickle, less for the progression runners to get and then let drain away. This is something that could be largely fixed by tweaking progressions, but it would also necessarily lower the top end and make that top placement more arduous to get. We'd likely see most T10s separated by 150 points or less. Rough.

One of the other major issues is that players that haven't learned how to shield well feel that they can't "progress" in Versus. They get to, say, 800 then beat back down to 600 because 600 is their actual equilibrium point. Then they get mad since when they try again, they get beat down again. No-one likes being Sisyphus. Putting in something that actively stops shield hopping stands a good chance of making *everyone* into Sisyphus. When people feel that they're just rolling boulders uphill, they stop rolling. And if more people stop trying, less points get injected overall.

Not saying that the current system is the be all, end all, of how we want Versus to run. Just that we have a lot of variables to balance out and we don't want to make changes that will directly affect a core of players that will then roll down-hill towards others in quite possibly unexpected fashions. It's a tough nut to decisively crack.

I have tried to hit 1300 many times, and it is a daunting task. You have to wait for a very small group of individuals to un-shield, which means refreshing your queue every 20 minutes or so before your shield drops and crossing your fingers. Hitting your friend who you know is unshielded and hopping after he re-shields guarantees you a target however, makes hopping much more efficient.

What if you just removed the ability to attack other players in your alliance, while leaving shield system intact? What I was pointing at wasn't removing shields, but stopping timed coordinated attacks against players in your alliance (or a friendly group) who are also in your time slice. Do you believe that this tactic is substantial in obtaining these high scores? Is it something the company is aware of or has a stance on that they can say?

hex706f726368

Dauthi wrote:

What if you just removed the ability to attack other players in your alliance, while leaving shield system intact? What I was pointing at wasn't removing shields, but stopping timed coordinated attacks against players in your alliance (or a friendly group) who are also in your time slice. Do you believe that this tactic is substantial in obtaining these high scores? Is it something the company is aware of or has a stance on that they can say?

Organized alliances would just disband until the final hours then.

Dauthi

hex706f726368 wrote:

Dauthi wrote:

What if you just removed the ability to attack other players in your alliance, while leaving shield system intact? What I was pointing at wasn't removing shields, but stopping timed coordinated attacks against players in your alliance (or a friendly group) who are also in your time slice. Do you believe that this tactic is substantial in obtaining these high scores? Is it something the company is aware of or has a stance on that they can say?

Organized alliances would just disband until the final hours then.

A deterrence doesn't ever stop everyone, but it does stop some and slows others. Taxes on cigarettes (or other taboo items) is a good example of this effect. It would be better than nothing, and I don't see a reason to hit your own alliance members to begin with. It seems contradictory to an alliance.

IceIX

Dauthi wrote:

What if you just removed the ability to attack other players in your alliance, while leaving shield system intact? What I was pointing at wasn't removing shields, but stopping timed coordinated attacks against players in your alliance (or a friendly group) who are also in your time slice. Do you believe that this tactic is substantial in obtaining these high scores? Is it something the company is aware of or has a stance on that they can say?

Wouldn't work without also implementing a complex grouping set of allies to not show, otherwise multi-alliance groups would have a distinct advantage over single alliances. Sure, X-Men 1 can't hit X-Men 1. But they can hit X-Men 2. So now they just reshuffle members to get around the alliance hit exception. So we make a "fuzzy search" where if a name is substantially the same you can't hit. So now DeadpoolsRings and DeadpoolsTacos can't see one another. Now the Alliances would just suck up the name changes and we'd have X-Men, X-Factor, X-Force, Excalibur instead of X-Men 1-4. We'd pretty much have to manually watch for players exploiting the system as such and create groupings based on that. Which is obviously untenable, not to mention prone to user/admin error.

Also, not saying that any of those Alliances are "exploiting" or anything, just that those Alliances in particular are well known, so good for naming illustration.

hex706f726368

Dauthi wrote:

A deterrence doesn't ever stop everyone, but it does stop some and slows others. Taxes on cigarettes (or other taboo items) is a good example of this effect. It would be better than nothing, and I don't see a reason to hit your own alliance members to begin with. It seems contradictory to an alliance.

I wouldn't see this as deterrence to much of anyone, especially not the ones this thread seems targeted at.

As for hitting your own alliance members, they are the best targets. You should know when it's safe to hit them and if you lose, at least the points stay within your alliance.

For the record, I'm happy with the way things are, but I'd adjust to the system if it changed in whatever manner, at least until the game was no longer fun for me.

Buret0

IceIX wrote:

Dauthi wrote:

What if you just removed the ability to attack other players in your alliance, while leaving shield system intact? What I was pointing at wasn't removing shields, but stopping timed coordinated attacks against players in your alliance (or a friendly group) who are also in your time slice. Do you believe that this tactic is substantial in obtaining these high scores? Is it something the company is aware of or has a stance on that they can say?

Wouldn't work without also implementing a complex grouping set of allies to not show, otherwise multi-alliance groups would have a distinct advantage over single alliances. Sure, X-Men 1 can't hit X-Men 1. But they can hit X-Men 2. So now they just reshuffle members to get around the alliance hit exception. So we make a "fuzzy search" where if a name is substantially the same you can't hit. So now DeadpoolsRings and DeadpoolsTacos can't see one another. Now the Alliances would just suck up the name changes and we'd have X-Men, X-Factor, X-Force, Excalibur instead of X-Men 1-4. We'd pretty much have to manually watch for players exploiting the system as such and create groupings based on that. Which is obviously untenable, not to mention prone to user/admin error.

Also, not saying that any of those Alliances are "exploiting" or anything, just that those Alliances in particular are well known, so good for naming illustration.

Speaking of which...

How's fixing retaliations coming?

Thanks to the server being down I went from 20 points from 1,000 to 175 points from 1,000 and one retaliation node showed up. Now everyone is on at the same time and hitting hard with no way to hit back.

Unknown

IceIX wrote:

Dauthi wrote:

What if you just removed the ability to attack other players in your alliance, while leaving shield system intact? What I was pointing at wasn't removing shields, but stopping timed coordinated attacks against players in your alliance (or a friendly group) who are also in your time slice. Do you believe that this tactic is substantial in obtaining these high scores? Is it something the company is aware of or has a stance on that they can say?

Wouldn't work without also implementing a complex grouping set of allies to not show, otherwise multi-alliance groups would have a distinct advantage over single alliances. Sure, X-Men 1 can't hit X-Men 1. But they can hit X-Men 2. So now they just reshuffle members to get around the alliance hit exception. So we make a "fuzzy search" where if a name is substantially the same you can't hit. So now DeadpoolsRings and DeadpoolsTacos can't see one another. Now the Alliances would just suck up the name changes and we'd have X-Men, X-Factor, X-Force, Excalibur instead of X-Men 1-4. We'd pretty much have to manually watch for players exploiting the system as such and create groupings based on that. Which is obviously untenable, not to mention prone to user/admin error.

Also, not saying that any of those Alliances are "exploiting" or anything, just that those Alliances in particular are well known, so good for naming illustration.

Why not make players be discover-able while they are shielded, but the shield still protects their points. For those of us that don't communicate outside of the game, we can still queue them and get points off of them. This would be fair for players that just want to be competitive and play the game rather than be at a disadvantage.

Sure this makes it dangerous for the shielded person to always have a chance of losing points when he removes shield, but isn't that what Versus/PvP is? You always run the risk of being attacked.

So many people are concerned about how these top end players are giving them an easy climb on progression, this would still be the case for them since points are equally obtainable.

As much as I like to receive rewards and covers, I enjoy Versus because it is similar to PvP in other games. Right now it's such a friendly game mode where everyone helps each other to gain rewards, and unless you join that group (outside communication), you can't climb as high as them.

IceIX

Buret0 wrote:

Speaking of which...

How's fixing retaliations coming?

Thanks to the server being down I went from 20 points from 1,000 to 175 points from 1,000 and one retaliation node showed up. Now everyone is on at the same time and hitting hard with no way to hit back.

We made a couple exploratory fixes which definitely helped, but none were a silver bullet. Main problem is that it's so intermittent that we're having the darndest time tracking it down on our QA servers. It's very likely got something to do with load that we can't replicate easily.

If you have any specific instances with screenshots and timestamps of:
Your Username
Points loss
Post shot showing any retal nodes that *did* pop versus ones that didn't

That would help. PM me, or pop them over to CS.

lukewin

BillyBobJoe wrote:

1) Could someone explain what the "problem", is with shield hopping?
2) Why is out of game communication so bad?

Some people believe that because the 1300 pt reward is there that it should be obtainable by everyone. I am not one of those people. I grab my 1k, and call it a day.

A lot of people have figured out how to get it via shield hopping. Some people use the method, some don't want to use those methods. Some that don't want anyone to use those methods, crusade to try to get it removed for everyone. It's not fair to them, if there are methods out there that people use but they choose not to, so instead of sucking it up and moving on, they want the game to cater to their style of play.