“We act as though comfort and luxury were the chief requirements of life, when all that we need to make us happy is something to be enthusiastic about.” - Albert Einstein
I for one understand them not wanting to balance from an "eSport" perspective. I have no problem with that seeing that you can reroll another character to max within a week or two eventually. What I have a problem with is the Arenas going from Last Man Standing, to Deathmatch for seemingly no reason.
The two types drive two very different train of thoughts, one gives incentives to do whatever you can to not die, including resource and cooldown management. While gives incentives to do a more damage based gameplay based on barreling down your opponents HP.
Granted we do not know how the game will play out and we don't know all the abilities and skills yet, it's safe to assume that proper cooldown and resource management would be the skill that sets better players apart. That's the whole point of the matchmaking and ladder system.
There is a large difference between blowing all your cooldowns and playing a more Do more damage than they deal to me before I die type Deathmatch, than an Avoid damage all together and use proper cooldowns to get the kill cleanly while the other team is trying to do the same.
Last Man Standing rewards a more meticulous thought out gameplan and cooldown/resource usage, while Deathmatch does not. In the end the better players will come ahead regardless, but I wouldn't be at all suprised if blowing all your cooldowns and button mashing sometimes comes ahead of mechanics.
The correct PvP Enviroment should be that which ALWAYS favors mechanics, which deathmatch may not. But my bigger question is WHY change from Last Man Standing to Deathmatch? What made DM their choice?
TDM is not as based on skill as it would be in LMS.
This is patently false.
If you can't understand that TDM will require skill (though PERHAPS a different skillset than LMS), then you use a poor definition of the word 'skill,' or do not understand what it means.
At this point I feel like people have brought up many of the good points about the pvp system, and the frustration about the system is clear, but can we articulate our thoughts in a more reasonable fashion rather than trolling?
TDM still involves skill, be it a different type of skill due to the nature of TDM, but who says that extremely similar or the same strategies cannot apply to TDM as LMS? Let's think about the roll of skill cooldowns in pvp. With LMS, every skill would be available at the beginning of each round. In TDM, people will have to portion out their skills in order to deal with the stronger/weaker characters or combination of characters currently alive on the opposing team, and how those skills support the characters alive on your own team while LMS might actually support blowing all your cooldowns at once in order to get the kill more so than TDM. TDM forces the player to decide whether it is worth blowing cooldowns in order to get one or two kills and having to play defensive or using skills with lesser cooldowns until the stronger skills are available.
OFC, I'm no stranger to competition and I understand the desire for LMS. There are strategies involved that affect the rest of the match in a much more devastating way than they would in TDM. You can bait out skills with long cooldowns and punish your opponent harshly, which is extremely fulfilling. TDM does not give the player the same sense of fulfillment from outsmarting your opponent in the short term, but there is still strategy involved, and a lot of it.
The biggest question plaguing people right now... Is TDM more casual than LMS? In terms of accessibility, yes. It's a game mode accessible to every player. Does TDM allow for serious competition? Yes, in a much different style than LMS would, but supports a different style of play and different strategy. Is TDM less strategic than LMS? No, it's not less strategic; it involves a different way of thinking.
Am I supportive of TDM over LMS? No, not at all. I want LMS. But I think it'd be extremely beneficial for both modes to be implemented.
In TDM i would blow all my cooldowns instantly on contact just to get them back faster, so basically you'll mash your cooldowns then use regular spells, as soon as the cooldowns pops up you'll mash them again. In that way you'll get more kills because you used your cooldowns as offen as possible in the arena.
Except then you get stunned or blocked by a zombie wall and your 2 min cd is just ticking away uselessly. Now you have 2 minutes without CDs to deal with.
Using CDs to maximal effect > using more cooldowns so that they come up sooner.
While in LMS i would try to use my cooldowns more wisely, for instance: i'd try to push my enemy to use their defencive cooldowns without wasting my own, then blow all cooldowns and take him down.
Even if you get stunned or CC'd, you don't have to worry since the match wasn't going to last 2 minutes either way.
Up to date I haven't been into PvP very much but I'm willing to check it out in D3. I understand the concepts, advantages, and disadvantages of either PvP setup. I think both forms of PvP should be implemented and I'm sure in time and patches a more elaborate focus on PvP will emerge to maintain player interest.
The only part that is troubling me is people are talking about blowing all their cool-downs... how many are you planning on having? The theory this game has presented is you can't have many abilities and if you choose all big ones you’re going to be useless for awhile unless you have a good gear/ability set up to maintain your resources. I may be drastically wrong here but I think people are looking into the mechanics of PvP a little too much considering only a select few have even seen how the game plays.
My two cents, thanks
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Playing Diablo since 97. I know nothing and having nothing good to say, I be a troll.
Up to date I haven't been into PvP very much but I'm willing to check it out in D3. I understand the concepts, advantages, and disadvantages of either PvP setup. I think both forms of PvP should be implemented and I'm sure in time and patches a more elaborate focus on PvP will emerge to maintain player interest.
The only part that is troubling me is people are talking about blowing all their cool-downs... how many are you planning on having? The theory this game has presented is you can't have many abilities and if you choose all big ones you’re going to be useless for awhile unless you have a good gear/ability set up to maintain your resources. I may be drastically wrong here but I think people are looking into the mechanics of PvP a little too much considering only a select few have even seen how the game plays.
My two cents, thanks
Well, right, we're kind of ignorant of a lot of ability capability.
The CD comments are based on the "higher teir skills will have longer CDs" post that was made by a blizz someone somewhere. It may not even apply in the new, skill-pointless, ability design.
But generally speaking, if there are 1-2 skills for each skill "tree" (are those even around anymore?) with lets say a 2 minute CD and since we have access to all abilities, it may be advantageous to have all or many of those abilities in pvp. Certainly in LMS where once someone is dead they're dead, and one would presume long CDs are powerful (edit: since matches are much shorter). In TDM, there is at least the fact that you need to deal with time without those abilities available.
PantheraOnca: Okay, i see. So using the cds to maxmize the effect isnt using them as offen as possible in a TDM? Why not, you'll get your CDs up more offen if you blow them as much as you can which means more dmg and more kills.
Lets say you pop all your CDs and then you die. You just wasted them all (assuming buffs wipe when you die). Now you used your 4/6 abilities, to no effect, and now you have 2 abilities left, likely 1 of which is a movement ability, leaving only 1 skill to do anything with. Concentrated use of cooldowns likely does guarantee ONE kill. How snowbally D3 pvp is we have no idea, but if its not hard-core snowbally, you now have to deal with 2 minutes of reduced power. By the time the CDs come up, you could be low on health or miles away from where the action is happening, and if you just use them then, you're wasting them. You did say as often as possible, if you're not using them for some reason, then you're following my train of thought on superior opportunity>more opportunities.
Sure you can blow all your offensive dps cooldowns and hold off with the defensive until you need them. But it would be the wisest choice to blow them instantly on contact to get that 1 kill advantage. You can blow a stun yourself before popping your offensive CDs, that would be the optimal choice.
Sure, you get one kill, maybe even 2, but without knowing how snowbally the pvp is, we can't say for certain if that will be enough to counteract your downtime.
It is pretty obvious you havent played alot of WoW arena or likewise games. Any real PvPer would prefer LMS with a little more edge and competetive feel to it.
I enjoy you stating opinion as fact. I have played plenty of WoW, and I basically just play LoL atm. I played SC within (against) my circle of friends for years and years. I've played a variety of FPS. Any true scotsman would know that you questioning my credentials is silly.
You cant say that TDM is as competetive as LMS because its not.
Proove it. What evidence do you have that that is the case? Risk, poker, axis and allies, settlers of catan, uno, chess, pick any game you want. They all have the ability to be played competitively. Some require different skillsets, that doesn't make the game less competitive.
In fact we're probably just going to talk past one another, but define "competitive" for me.
Otherwise blizzard wouldnt have switched LMS for TDM since they dont want competetive PvP.
They didn't change from LMS to TDM because it was "too comptetitive" they changed it because "being dead isn't as fun as playing."
They changed the mode to increase fun, not to decrease competitiveness. Increasing fun does not autmatically lead to a less competitive structure.
Those who tried PvP as LMS on blizzcon 2010 thought it rocked hard as i understand it, there is an article about it aswell. There was nothing wrong with LMS at all, blizzard just thought it was a to competetive PvP mode.
There are so many confounding factors here. Did they think it rocked hard just because they got to play d3? Was it because they were all equally unskilled (since no one has really played it) so all the matches were close and exciting? Was it just the atmosphere that was enhancing their enjoyment of the process? HAVE THEY GIVEN TDM A TRY? If blizzard says that TDM turned out to be more fun (i.e. rock harder) why shouldn't we believe them.
LMS is so much more competitive, put on defense/speed abilities and run around like a chicken, let everyone else kill each other then kill the last weakened guy standing... huh wait what? Okay TDM is more competitive gang up on one guy then chain the next wait.. hmm I guess there are draw backs to either one... maybe both of them have particular strategies that make them competitive yes?
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Playing Diablo since 97. I know nothing and having nothing good to say, I be a troll.
LMS is so much more competitive, put on defense/speed abilities and run around like a chicken, let everyone else kill each other then kill the last weakened guy standing... huh wait what? Okay TDM is more competitive gang up on one guy then chain the next wait.. hmm I guess there are draw backs to either one... maybe both of them have particular strategies that make them competitive yes?
This is basically what I'm saying. People are clamoring how "LMS is THE ONLY WAY TO BE COMPETITIVE, TDM HAS NO COMPETITIVENESS" (possible hyperbole) but in reality neither is more or less competitive than the other.
I'm not saying LMS is LESS competitive than TDM. I'm also definitely saying that LMS is NOT more competitive than LMS.
For some reason some people are lock-jawed on to only being able to judge skill in LMS, when skill is more flexible and complicated than that and can be measured in a variety of ways (such as through different game types).
PantheraOnca: Yeah lets kite till our team mates respawns. That sounds fun, balanced, fast paced and competetive.
We have limited information and even less first-hand experience. I'm sorry I couldn't give you an action-by-action-thought-by-thought breakdown of a theoretical series of events that neither of us knows much about.
I'll give you a better example as soon as we have more complete and up-to-date ability information.
Alternatively:
Running away can be fun. Did you never play tag?
Kiting can certainly be balanced.
Its pace depends entirely on ability information we don't have, respawn timers we don't know, and terrain we have no knowledge of.
Would the opposing team just sitting there and flailing their arms sound more competitive? Kiting is essentially a tactical retreat, are you saying that retreating while you're at a temporary disadvantage is non-competitive? Is zerging someone in LMS competitive? Why is that competitive when kiting isn't?
Lets say you're a football player and im a football player. We both got infinite footballs and the goal is to make as many goals as you can in 5 minutes. How is that in anyway competetive/interesting/fun? just because you can win or lose dsnt make it to competetive play.
Replace "player" with "team" and "5 minutes" for "1 hour of gametime" and you have pro football.
Hehe not really PantheraOnca:) its far more then that.
See, it is both what I said, and far more than that.
On a high level, not getting down to the nitty gritty of the game, you want to score more points than the opposing team in the time alotted. This is the point of the game.
On a lower level, some teams go about this by having a high-powered offensive game (which can be further broken down to run/pass/combo) or a high-powered defensive game (making each yard gained by the opponent backbreaking, or turning over the football).
This is analogous to a "zerg" mentality (concentrated focus fire to "outscore" the other team) or something like a kiting game (wear the other team down and get points off the other team's errors).
What about paper football. Or who can throw a rock the farthest. Or who has worse smelling armpits. Or who can jump on top of the cat without being caught by mom. Or who can eat the most hot dogs in 5 minutes. Or who can push someone else's arm down.
These are all competitive. I'll let you decide which ones are fun or not, but they surely aren't serious, right? Oh wait... there are hot dog eating contests, paper football competitions, arm wrestling tournaments, and the guinness book of world records. Oh and I forgot about the other variable called fun.
When it comes down to it, TDM is still going to be fun whether or not it's taken seriously. We're going to be able to kill the crap out of each other. To me, that's fun.
PVP is needed for the game to have a productive end game.
People are saying Diablo 2 didnt have good PVP but it was better than WOW.
Diablo 2 PVP was a hidden gem. You had to be really into the game and know a lot about the mechanics to make a actual good PVP character and there was even clans. It just was as someone had stated earlier that the PVP communities were more underground.
You had to know where to look but the PVP in Diablo 2 was intense. I loved how you could just go anywhere and fight but a arena is a good idea.
I dont mind the aspect of a arena but the PVP needs to be as good as Diablo 2 or its gonna suck.
The only bad thing really about PVP in Diablo 2 was the absorb... being able to absorb elemental damage made sorc suck, especially piled on with the fact everyone could teleport.
Anyways the game is going to suck in the end if PVP is no good. I have faith in Blizzard but I just dont want them to go straight PVE because that is a horrible idea.
PVP is needed for the game to have a productive end game.
/snip
Anyways the game is going to suck in the end if PVP is no good. I have faith in Blizzard but I just dont want them to go straight PVE because that is a horrible idea.
Such certainty.
I'm particularly lacking on inclination towards an explanation right now, but to your points I say this: don't be so sure.
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The two types drive two very different train of thoughts, one gives incentives to do whatever you can to not die, including resource and cooldown management. While gives incentives to do a more damage based gameplay based on barreling down your opponents HP.
Granted we do not know how the game will play out and we don't know all the abilities and skills yet, it's safe to assume that proper cooldown and resource management would be the skill that sets better players apart. That's the whole point of the matchmaking and ladder system.
There is a large difference between blowing all your cooldowns and playing a more Do more damage than they deal to me before I die type Deathmatch, than an Avoid damage all together and use proper cooldowns to get the kill cleanly while the other team is trying to do the same.
Last Man Standing rewards a more meticulous thought out gameplan and cooldown/resource usage, while Deathmatch does not. In the end the better players will come ahead regardless, but I wouldn't be at all suprised if blowing all your cooldowns and button mashing sometimes comes ahead of mechanics.
The correct PvP Enviroment should be that which ALWAYS favors mechanics, which deathmatch may not. But my bigger question is WHY change from Last Man Standing to Deathmatch? What made DM their choice?
This is patently false.
If you can't understand that TDM will require skill (though PERHAPS a different skillset than LMS), then you use a poor definition of the word 'skill,' or do not understand what it means.
TDM still involves skill, be it a different type of skill due to the nature of TDM, but who says that extremely similar or the same strategies cannot apply to TDM as LMS? Let's think about the roll of skill cooldowns in pvp. With LMS, every skill would be available at the beginning of each round. In TDM, people will have to portion out their skills in order to deal with the stronger/weaker characters or combination of characters currently alive on the opposing team, and how those skills support the characters alive on your own team while LMS might actually support blowing all your cooldowns at once in order to get the kill more so than TDM. TDM forces the player to decide whether it is worth blowing cooldowns in order to get one or two kills and having to play defensive or using skills with lesser cooldowns until the stronger skills are available.
OFC, I'm no stranger to competition and I understand the desire for LMS. There are strategies involved that affect the rest of the match in a much more devastating way than they would in TDM. You can bait out skills with long cooldowns and punish your opponent harshly, which is extremely fulfilling. TDM does not give the player the same sense of fulfillment from outsmarting your opponent in the short term, but there is still strategy involved, and a lot of it.
The biggest question plaguing people right now... Is TDM more casual than LMS? In terms of accessibility, yes. It's a game mode accessible to every player. Does TDM allow for serious competition? Yes, in a much different style than LMS would, but supports a different style of play and different strategy. Is TDM less strategic than LMS? No, it's not less strategic; it involves a different way of thinking.
Am I supportive of TDM over LMS? No, not at all. I want LMS. But I think it'd be extremely beneficial for both modes to be implemented.
Except then you get stunned or blocked by a zombie wall and your 2 min cd is just ticking away uselessly. Now you have 2 minutes without CDs to deal with.
Using CDs to maximal effect > using more cooldowns so that they come up sooner.
Even if you get stunned or CC'd, you don't have to worry since the match wasn't going to last 2 minutes either way.
I think you're overestimating the spawn timer.
The only part that is troubling me is people are talking about blowing all their cool-downs... how many are you planning on having? The theory this game has presented is you can't have many abilities and if you choose all big ones you’re going to be useless for awhile unless you have a good gear/ability set up to maintain your resources. I may be drastically wrong here but I think people are looking into the mechanics of PvP a little too much considering only a select few have even seen how the game plays.
My two cents, thanks
Well, right, we're kind of ignorant of a lot of ability capability.
The CD comments are based on the "higher teir skills will have longer CDs" post that was made by a blizz someone somewhere. It may not even apply in the new, skill-pointless, ability design.
But generally speaking, if there are 1-2 skills for each skill "tree" (are those even around anymore?) with lets say a 2 minute CD and since we have access to all abilities, it may be advantageous to have all or many of those abilities in pvp. Certainly in LMS where once someone is dead they're dead, and one would presume long CDs are powerful (edit: since matches are much shorter). In TDM, there is at least the fact that you need to deal with time without those abilities available.
Lets say you pop all your CDs and then you die. You just wasted them all (assuming buffs wipe when you die). Now you used your 4/6 abilities, to no effect, and now you have 2 abilities left, likely 1 of which is a movement ability, leaving only 1 skill to do anything with. Concentrated use of cooldowns likely does guarantee ONE kill. How snowbally D3 pvp is we have no idea, but if its not hard-core snowbally, you now have to deal with 2 minutes of reduced power. By the time the CDs come up, you could be low on health or miles away from where the action is happening, and if you just use them then, you're wasting them. You did say as often as possible, if you're not using them for some reason, then you're following my train of thought on superior opportunity>more opportunities.
Sure, you get one kill, maybe even 2, but without knowing how snowbally the pvp is, we can't say for certain if that will be enough to counteract your downtime.
I enjoy you stating opinion as fact. I have played plenty of WoW, and I basically just play LoL atm. I played SC within (against) my circle of friends for years and years. I've played a variety of FPS. Any true scotsman would know that you questioning my credentials is silly.
Proove it. What evidence do you have that that is the case? Risk, poker, axis and allies, settlers of catan, uno, chess, pick any game you want. They all have the ability to be played competitively. Some require different skillsets, that doesn't make the game less competitive.
In fact we're probably just going to talk past one another, but define "competitive" for me.
They didn't change from LMS to TDM because it was "too comptetitive" they changed it because "being dead isn't as fun as playing."
They changed the mode to increase fun, not to decrease competitiveness. Increasing fun does not autmatically lead to a less competitive structure.
There are so many confounding factors here. Did they think it rocked hard just because they got to play d3? Was it because they were all equally unskilled (since no one has really played it) so all the matches were close and exciting? Was it just the atmosphere that was enhancing their enjoyment of the process? HAVE THEY GIVEN TDM A TRY? If blizzard says that TDM turned out to be more fun (i.e. rock harder) why shouldn't we believe them.
This is basically what I'm saying. People are clamoring how "LMS is THE ONLY WAY TO BE COMPETITIVE, TDM HAS NO COMPETITIVENESS" (possible hyperbole) but in reality neither is more or less competitive than the other.
I'm not saying LMS is LESS competitive than TDM. I'm also definitely saying that LMS is NOT more competitive than LMS.
For some reason some people are lock-jawed on to only being able to judge skill in LMS, when skill is more flexible and complicated than that and can be measured in a variety of ways (such as through different game types).
We have limited information and even less first-hand experience. I'm sorry I couldn't give you an action-by-action-thought-by-thought breakdown of a theoretical series of events that neither of us knows much about.
I'll give you a better example as soon as we have more complete and up-to-date ability information.
Alternatively:
Running away can be fun. Did you never play tag?
Kiting can certainly be balanced.
Its pace depends entirely on ability information we don't have, respawn timers we don't know, and terrain we have no knowledge of.
Would the opposing team just sitting there and flailing their arms sound more competitive? Kiting is essentially a tactical retreat, are you saying that retreating while you're at a temporary disadvantage is non-competitive? Is zerging someone in LMS competitive? Why is that competitive when kiting isn't?
Replace "player" with "team" and "5 minutes" for "1 hour of gametime" and you have pro football.
Having or displaying a strong desire to be more successful than others.
If you can win or lose, then there are varying degrees of success. And if you want to win, then it fits that definition for competitive.
See, it is both what I said, and far more than that.
On a high level, not getting down to the nitty gritty of the game, you want to score more points than the opposing team in the time alotted. This is the point of the game.
On a lower level, some teams go about this by having a high-powered offensive game (which can be further broken down to run/pass/combo) or a high-powered defensive game (making each yard gained by the opponent backbreaking, or turning over the football).
This is analogous to a "zerg" mentality (concentrated focus fire to "outscore" the other team) or something like a kiting game (wear the other team down and get points off the other team's errors).
These are all competitive. I'll let you decide which ones are fun or not, but they surely aren't serious, right? Oh wait... there are hot dog eating contests, paper football competitions, arm wrestling tournaments, and the guinness book of world records. Oh and I forgot about the other variable called fun.
When it comes down to it, TDM is still going to be fun whether or not it's taken seriously. We're going to be able to kill the crap out of each other. To me, that's fun.
People are saying Diablo 2 didnt have good PVP but it was better than WOW.
Diablo 2 PVP was a hidden gem. You had to be really into the game and know a lot about the mechanics to make a actual good PVP character and there was even clans. It just was as someone had stated earlier that the PVP communities were more underground.
You had to know where to look but the PVP in Diablo 2 was intense. I loved how you could just go anywhere and fight but a arena is a good idea.
I dont mind the aspect of a arena but the PVP needs to be as good as Diablo 2 or its gonna suck.
The only bad thing really about PVP in Diablo 2 was the absorb... being able to absorb elemental damage made sorc suck, especially piled on with the fact everyone could teleport.
Anyways the game is going to suck in the end if PVP is no good. I have faith in Blizzard but I just dont want them to go straight PVE because that is a horrible idea.
Such certainty.
I'm particularly lacking on inclination towards an explanation right now, but to your points I say this: don't be so sure.