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No balance between Space PvP and Ground PvP populatoin

SystemSystem Member, NoReporting Posts: 178,019 Arc User
edited March 2010 in PvP Gameplay
Admiral level PvP, and all levels of PvP for that matter, have an unbalanced population of players between Space and Ground matches. Today the Federation Admiral players are queuing Space vs Ground 40:1. There is an obvious dislike of ground PvP in favor of Space. There are a number of reasons for this with the end result being the same, players favor Space combat over Ground.

An effect of this problem is that the players who do enjoy ground PvP have a significantly smaller player pool and therefore have much fewer options for matches. Beyond that, some of the players who join matches then leave when they see the score or player number imbalance, which causes the numbers to become even more skewed for that match.

For your consideration, please look at options to encourage Ground PvP. For instance, consider Ground PvP item rewards. As an example, at the end of a Ground PvP match an item loot window pops up for all players in the match who scored points. All players get to roll/pass on the item. One lucky player gets it. The item could be random Uncommon to Very Rare level appropriate gear, Space and Ground based. This would encourage Space players to join a Ground PvP match now and then.

Another idea that has been previously discussed is to flag players who leave matches so they are not able join another queue for some period of time. If this was instituted there would need to be some control to ensure that players that drop game can get back into their same (ongoing) match without penalty.

What other options/ideas do people have to encourage or reward Ground PvP and to keep players in matches?
Post edited by Unknown User on

Comments

  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Etheria wrote: »
    Beyond that, some of the players who join matches then leave when they see the score or player number imbalance, which causes the numbers to become even more skewed for that match.

    That happens sometimes in space too.And get super frustrating. In fact, it might start to happen a lot more in space simply because the larger population allows one to "hop" into a new encounter much easier.
    For your consideration, please look at options to encourage Ground PvP. For instance, consider Ground PvP item rewards. As an example, at the end of a Ground PvP match an item loot window pops up for all players in the match who scored points. All players get to roll/pass on the item. One lucky player gets it. The item could be random Uncommon to Very Rare level appropriate gear, Space and Ground based. This would encourage Space players to join a Ground PvP match now and then.

    Interesting idea. However, it might not work. The item (in order to encourage space players to participate) would have to be a space item. Not a ground item. And then there'd be a lot of arguing about the distribution system (I have nightmares still about the Champions Online Christmas event and the drops from Clarence). Still an interesting idea.

    Might I suggest simply giving "double" PVP medals for ground than for space? You get items from the vendors faster that way? Could have the same effect.
    Another idea that has been previously discussed is to flag players who leave matches so they are not able join another queue for some period of time. If this was instituted there would need to be some control to ensure that players that drop game can get back into their same (ongoing) match without penalty.

    Another interesting idea. But I think it might not be popular since that would discourage gameplay rather than encourage it. And I think the development team would much rather encourage players to play their game more.
    What other options/ideas do people have to encourage or reward Ground PvP and to keep players in matches?

    I think you're much more on the right path with your idea about rewards. I think my idea for "double" medals might be over the top and too much. But maybe if you got 150% more medals compared to space? Something palpable that was more. Or drops like you suggest. Something along those lines. A carrot to chase. Rather than the stick to get smacked by as your other suggestion would be.

    ;)
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    I mostly do ground PvP, and honestly I can't complain about the population I see there most of the time.

    Ground controls are all jacked up, which gives the ground game a steep learning curve. If Cryptic would make the keyboard movement always relative to the camera facing and make "never auto-target objects" so that it never auto-targets objects, that would be all the change I think the ground game really needs.

    IMO people don't do the ground game more often because it's balanced. There is nothing on the ground to compare to VM, SNB, FBP, etc. there is no way that you can build or equip your character to guarantee a win against an equally skilled player the way you can in space.

    Most MMO PvPers want their talent spec and gear to win fights for them, and they really can't do that the way the ground PvP is in this game.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    IMO people don't do the ground game more often because it's balanced.
    Ground also has an insane amount of holds. Like, truly insane. That might also have a little bit to do with it. ^_^
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    brainfacer wrote: »
    Ground also has an insane amount of holds. Like, truly insane. That might also have a little bit to do with it. ^_^
    You can actually work around them. Even before hypos removed them you could work around them. Yeah, if you let a whole team hit you at once you couldn't get out of it, but 1-1 or 5-5 it's normally okay. I've been doing ground PvP on my tactical officer all day today and I think I've died to holds maybe 4 times.

    Ground holds are mostly very short duration, and you can use cover to limit the number of enemies shooting you at one time. In space, if you don't have the proper counter for something ready, you're just screwed, there's nothing else you can do about it.

    The only hold that really bugs me on the ground are on melee spam, but melee spam does crappy damage and there's usually enough gap in the holds to counter with your own melee spam. Once you're out as long as you keep moving around and shooting you'll kill the melee-monkey before he can kill you.

    Honestly I think the people who can't handle the ground holds are probably still having trouble with the camera, movement, and targeting controls as well. And they're probably going in without 10 or 20 of each consumable type ready. I've been playing all day on a character with no holds, not even a stun gun, and haven't really had a problem.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Well I suck at ground PvP so I am always pwning others in space =) The ground controls are bad, I cant move there properly and use all skills. I dont know if it happens to you as well, but when I press direction buttons (WASD), sometimes when pressing side buttons (A and D) character turns himself right or left and sometimes he runs right or left. This is completely random and I really dont know what my char will do if I press A or D. So the thing I do is i have right hand on mouse and use it which solves the problem but then I miss one hand to press hotkeys for all those abilities. This should be made better.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    If we wanted ground pvp, this would not be the game for it. This is Star Trek, hence space.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    inktomi19d wrote: »
    You can actually work around them. Even before hypos removed them you could work around them. Yeah, if you let a whole team hit you at once you couldn't get out of it, but 1-1 or 5-5 it's normally okay. I've been doing ground PvP on my tactical officer all day today and I think I've died to holds maybe 4 times.

    Inktomi you are right in so many ways, but it doesn't matter. Ground PvP is not going to become more popular without a major overhaul for one major reason...

    The system as currently designed heavily favors offensive teamwork (the other end of offensive teamwork is the person dieing to too many holds and dead in seconds). There is no evidence that can be cited in ground PvP where defensive teamwork can balance the overwhelming power of offensive teamwork. The best teams move with remarkable speed and focus targets, and simply overrun enemies quickly with stacked debuffs and damage.

    There is no defense for it in ground PvP. There is nothing about STO ground PvP where defensive teamwork is encouraged. Even cool downs favor offensive kit abilities, not defensive kit abilities. On the flip side, offensive teamwork (stacking debuffs and damage) is the most lethal way to play STO ground PvP. Until that is balanced, ground PvP will remain unpopular.

    Fortifications can slow people down, but neither the shield or medical generator actually offers a significant defensive bonus, and the offensive debuff stack effect has no equivalent defensive buff stack a team can utilize. Does any science officer actually use a healing kit in PvP? Every good defensive buff I have seen heavily utilized is self-provided by a tribble, not part of a team buff.

    There is also the issue that very little focus in Star Trek was ever on ground combat, even though it has always existed. Many folks have become content being that unknown away team member who dies.

    It is remarkable irony in my opinion. Space PvP in STO is not very well balanced between the classes, but has great skills that encourage teamwork between players including heals and buffs - thus making it more popular gameplay among the masses. Ground PvP in STO is very well balanced between classes but has no skills at all to encourage teamwork between players with heals and buffs.

    It is a reminder that class balance is not the ivory tower of PvP as is sometimes touted on the forums, and team balance is actually closer to the ivory tower than class balance.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Billy.Mays wrote:
    If we wanted ground pvp, this would not be the game for it. This is Star Trek, hence space.

    You're right. Kirk and Spock never beamed down to a planet or space station, ever. Good point.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    inktomi19d wrote: »
    IMO people don't do the ground game more often because it's balanced.

    Personally I just find the gameplay mechanic to be very dull. For some reason I find KOTOR's more exciting, which is weird considering it's a single player turnbased battle system.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    I won't be doing Ground PVP because I decided to not spec points in the ground game. My last char slot might be a ground pvp char... engineer most likely :P
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Darksided wrote: »
    Inktomi you are right in so many ways, but it doesn't matter. Ground PvP is not going to become more popular without a major overhaul for one major reason...

    The system as currently designed heavily favors offensive teamwork (the other end of offensive teamwork is the person dieing to too many holds and dead in seconds). There is no evidence that can be cited in ground PvP where defensive teamwork can balance the overwhelming power of offensive teamwork. The best teams move with remarkable speed and focus targets, and simply overrun enemies quickly with stacked debuffs and damage.

    There is no defense for it in ground PvP. There is nothing about STO ground PvP where defensive teamwork is encouraged. Even cool downs favor offensive kit abilities, not defensive kit abilities. On the flip side, offensive teamwork (stacking debuffs and damage) is the most lethal way to play STO ground PvP. Until that is balanced, ground PvP will remain unpopular.

    Fortifications can slow people down, but neither the shield or medical generator actually offers a significant defensive bonus, and the offensive debuff stack effect has no equivalent defensive buff stack a team can utilize. Does any science officer actually use a healing kit in PvP? Every good defensive buff I have seen heavily utilized is self-provided by a tribble, not part of a team buff.

    There is also the issue that very little focus in Star Trek was ever on ground combat, even though it has always existed. Many folks have become content being that unknown away team member who dies.

    It is remarkable irony in my opinion. Space PvP in STO is not very well balanced between the classes, but has great skills that encourage teamwork between players including heals and buffs - thus making it more popular gameplay among the masses. Ground PvP in STO is very well balanced between classes but has no skills at all to encourage teamwork between players with heals and buffs.

    It is a reminder that class balance is not the ivory tower of PvP as is sometimes touted on the forums, and team balance is actually closer to the ivory tower than class balance.
    I was going to disagree about the lack of defensive teamwork, but I see your point. To me, defensive play is putting a Weapon Malfunction on the guy who's lining up an exploit shot on my team mate, or running over to Palm Strike the 3 -foot tall doofus with the 4-foot bat'leth who's got my buddy locked down. But both of those are really a defensive use of an offense ability.

    The only "defensive" power I can really think of using on a team-mate is when my engineer uses equipment diagnostics to clean weapon malfunction off of someone. The same character can heal shields, but that's not really useful for healing other people. It's fine for myself, because I can use it preemptively, but it's useless on team-mates because they will either duck behind cover and let their shields recharge naturally, or they won't duck behind cover and they'll die too fast to get a heal off. In other MMO's if I'm playing a healer then I can keep most people alive for as long as I'm active, but that really isn't the case here.

    I actually kind of like that defense is mostly "stop getting shot at, hide behind a corner". It makes the ground PvP play a lot closer to an FPS than most MMOs manage. I could see where that's a turn off for other players though, because in most MMOs you can pretty much ignore anything the other team tries to do to you as long as you have a good healer with you.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    I won't be doing Ground PVP because I decided to not spec points in the ground game. My last char slot might be a ground pvp char... engineer most likely :P
    I'm not even sure how you do that... my characters are mostly specced for both. You can succeed if you just spec for 1 ground talent at each tier.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    inktomi19d wrote: »
    I'm not even sure how you do that... my characters are mostly specced for both. You can succeed if you just spec for 1 ground talent at each tier.

    Agreed. The way the skills are set into their tiers (forcing you to spend them before opening the next tier) it's really hard to avoid taking at least one ground centered skill.

    Even with the new space combat stuff added.

    And if you're an engineer, you might as well pick up all 9 ranks of Technician just for the Phaser Turret III for your away team.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    I really enjoy the ground PvP, infact I enjoy it alot more than the space fighting and if I had my way I would do away missions/pvp most of the time.

    things I wish they would do differently is put everyone on same team in pvp so we can use team chat. I play as Fed and to be honest its painful. Feds 9 times out of 10 are spread out around the map and the Klinks are clustered together using teamwork.

    I really hope pvp gets more popular on the fed side or I will prob have to go Klink later or Romulan when they add that.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    tacomamaru wrote: »
    I really enjoy the ground PvP, infact I enjoy it alot more than the space fighting and if I had my way I would do away missions/pvp most of the time.

    things I wish they would do differently is put everyone on same team in pvp so we can use team chat. I play as Fed and to be honest its painful. Feds 9 times out of 10 are spread out around the map and the Klinks are clustered together using teamwork.

    I really hope pvp gets more popular on the fed side or I will prob have to go Klink later or Romulan when they add that.

    Hang in there is all I can say. There are some very good Fed teams that group up and use teamwork.

    I think the klingons do it more than your average Fed "Pug" simply because until now Klingons ONLy had PVP to level with. And even now, it's still heavily PVP-weighted.
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