Brawl Bawl

Iosyne

This discussion was created from comments split from: Ankyrean Anguish - Aetolia-based RAGE.

Luna

I hate the way the brawls are devolving. The teaming was silly in the first one, worse in the second, and atrocious in the third.

Damonicus

@luna: I was ONLY involved in the first one. I will take blame for that one. But I haven't been around for the other two.  I will say though I was very happy with the new arena mod of knockout. Everyone was waiting on Leana and I, a shaman vs a lummie (that has no clue what I was doing), but it was very nice to have a tournament style arena.

Xarian

Just echoing the sentiment that yes, the brawl was a travesty.

My idea for a perfect brawl mode:

Instanced knockout collapse mode with a 25 minute forfeit.

Knockout, for obvious reasons. A 25 minute forfeit, so that two people can't hold up the match forever. Collapse, so that someone who can't beat someone else, can't also force them into a forfeit by running all day. Instanced, so that spam from one fight doesn't hit other players when the collapse happens. The collapse speed should probably be a lot faster than normal. Technically I guess instanced isn't totally necessary, since you could use tunnelvision. I've never tried that skill though, not sure how well it works.

Haven

I totally forgot tunnelvision even existed!

Seir

Teaming in a game called FREE-FOR-ALL has to die in some shape or form. Both sides are guilty of it, but I know that I've been especially annoyed when I'm fighting someone in a free-for-all and two people team against another during the course of it. I'm personally glad for the new arena mode despite whatever faults it may have as it is a step in the right direction. The game already devolves into group fights with people jumping into fights despite not having a solid reason of doing so except "well, they're my citymate" when realistically, they're just doing it for "lol teh peekayz".

I'd like to see group fights kind of die away unless they should involve the organization on a large-scale level. Leylines would be a good example of when it is an appropriate time for organizations to band together to fight one another. Everyone and their mother from one organization banding together against someone who has cause to go after a single individual from that organization (e.g. bounty on their head) is a reason why group fights need to have both mechanical and rule-based enforcement for when they are NOT appropriate.

Raeche

I think it sucks to be at the receiving end of a team, but to institute rules against that would be imposing on people a kind of honourable conduct that sanitises that dimension of the game.

A free for all means no-rules - not a kind of one-by-one tournament. In the out-of-arena context, or free-for-alls, anything should still go.

What should be requested, however, are that there be competitions/events where teaming is exclusively disallowed.

Haven

Raeche said:

I think it sucks to be at the receiving end of a team, but to institute rules against that would be imposing on people a kind of honourable conduct that sanitises that dimension of the game.

A free for all means no-rules - not a kind of one-by-one tournament. In the out-of-arena context, or free-for-alls, anything should still go.

What should be requested, however, are that there be competitions/events where teaming is exclusively disallowed.

:-? Hrm, never really thought about it that way. Good point.

Luna

Raeche said:

I think it sucks to be at the receiving end of a team, but to institute rules against that would be imposing on people a kind of honourable conduct that sanitises that dimension of the game.

A free for all means no-rules - not a kind of one-by-one tournament. In the out-of-arena context, or free-for-alls, anything should still go.

What should be requested, however, are that there be competitions/events where teaming is exclusively disallowed.

I don't really agree with your line of reasoning. Your point is valid for whatever happens out of arena, but ALL arena modes have some sort of mechanical restrictions placed upon them- and that includes the brawl. Arena events are, by definition, always 'sanitized' in some respects. So your point is moot as the question isn't whether there should be mechanical restrictions in the first place, but what these restrictions should be. And I'm going to argue that the brawl isn't working well because it fails to be a brawl (instead it resembles a derped up sort of Red vs Blue team FFA). The brawl as is is a format that might work and be fun for competitions in which there isn't really anything but honour and glory at stake, but it tends to fall apart and become distinctly unfun the moment rewards are introduced.

Actually, come to think of it, were you in any of the brawls? Honest question because I can't recall.

Mastema

I was a little disappointed in the one I entered today,in all honesty I was hoping it would be worth a go. But instead it was pretty much gank one person at a time into a team of people, rinse repeat. Which took all the fun out of getting involved in these events? It would be nice to have more one vs one in these kinds of events or small teams of three

Raeche

Luna said:

Raeche said:

I think it sucks to be at the receiving end of a team, but to institute rules against that would be imposing on people a kind of honourable conduct that sanitises that dimension of the game.

A free for all means no-rules - not a kind of one-by-one tournament. In the out-of-arena context, or free-for-alls, anything should still go.

What should be requested, however, are that there be competitions/events where teaming is exclusively disallowed.

I don't really agree with your line of reasoning. Your point is valid for whatever happens out of arena, but ALL arena modes have some sort of mechanical restrictions placed upon them- and that includes the brawl. Arena events are, by definition, always 'sanitized' in some respects. So your point is moot as the question isn't whether there should be mechanical restrictions in the first place, but what these restrictions should be. And I'm going to argue that the brawl isn't working well because it fails to be a brawl (instead it resembles a derped up sort of Red vs Blue team FFA). The brawl as is is a format that might work and be fun for competitions in which there isn't really anything but honour and glory at stake, but it tends to fall apart and become distinctly unfun the moment rewards are introduced.

Actually, come to think of it, were you in any of the brawls? Honest question because I can't recall.

Nope. I wasn't in any of the brawls. But does it matter? I hope the principle of people organising themselves into teams to gank people isn't so complex that I must participate in one in order to fully comprehend it.

In any case, you aren't disagreeing with me, even though you think you think you are. I never questioned whether there should be mechanical restrictions in place. As you rightly pointed out, there already are. Even a bait the frog game is a mechanical restriction.

I said free-for-alls should remain free-for-alls, because that is the definition of the word. It means no rules. It does not mean no ganking. People should thus be able to team if they want.

If you want to make the brawl like a real brawl where everyone fights everyone else, then by all means. Such an additional restriction makes sense, because we not only envision brawls to be no holds barred (just like FFAs), but we also envision it to be a messy royal rumble of sorts where people do not organise themselves into teams. It would be a misnomer to call it an FFA.

So yes, even though you were pretty eager to shoot me down, it was a strawman that you attacked, and I agree with your point insofar as we were never at odds.

Raeche

Anyway, turns out ALL THIS is moot, since HELP BRAWL now indicates that the brawl is meant to be a free-for-all like the Hunger Games and not so much a drunken-bar-brawl type brawl.

So if you guys want a real brawl where people don't end up teaming, I suppose that is entirely possible as long as it's called something else. Just keep bugging the imms for it. There seems to be quite a lot of people who think the 'brawl' was lame. Maybe push for an actual royal rumble then.

Seir

Yeah, uh... You should probably change the name from free-for-all then to Team Free-For-All because that is all these are going to become when people are allowed to team. This contest should be about who is more talented individually rather than who can call the most friends to help them gank everyone. There's no talent or sport in that.

Edit: And while I'm on the subject, this means that this avenue of combat is absolutely no different than any other currently out there. I don't really see how you can measure someone as a "champion" if their abilities aren't stemming from personal talent but rather from those around them. What exactly stops a bunch of people from naming random newbie as the Champion of Delos exactly? Nothing. If a group gets together and wants to create some humor, there's nothing stopping them from killing all other opposing forces and then allowing some random non-combatant John Doe from winning. This defeats the entire spirit of what I thought the brawl was about.

Seir

My last comment here is that Aetolia should be attempting to find more means of encouraging solo combat instead of finding numerous ways to stamp it out completely. There is a reason that we have individual abilities and not all AoE abilities for groups. There's a reason that it is nearly impossible to balance group combat not only here but across other games. PvP in Aetolia will basically become (assuming it hasn't already) a contest of who is capable of bringing more individuals from their city to help them in a group than the other. It's really a sad day when Player versus Player isn't a measure of how much time and practice you put into knowing and learning your class and how to counter others, but rather how we can just spam our damage/hinder abilities on one notable target and that is defined as "player versus player" combat. Last I checked, that word "player" in PvP was singular and not plural. Not to mention that you're basically telling rogues that don't belong to a city that they never have a chance of winning this event.

If you want to create avenues for group combat, I'm all for it. Leylines, war, events. These are all perfectly acceptable mediums for group combat. However, we should stop pretending then that our abilities are for single targets and just commit entirely to this concept by getting rid of bounties and anything else that would fit within the spectrum of solo combat.

Rivas

This sounds like a job for...




I made that myself. Hard to believe, I know.

Iosyne

Your wish is my command.

Luna

Raeche said:

Luna said:

Raeche said:

I think it sucks to be at the receiving end of a team, but to institute rules against that would be imposing on people a kind of honourable conduct that sanitises that dimension of the game.

A free for all means no-rules - not a kind of one-by-one tournament. In the out-of-arena context, or free-for-alls, anything should still go.

What should be requested, however, are that there be competitions/events where teaming is exclusively disallowed.

I don't really agree with your line of reasoning. Your point is valid for whatever happens out of arena, but ALL arena modes have some sort of mechanical restrictions placed upon them- and that includes the brawl. Arena events are, by definition, always 'sanitized' in some respects. So your point is moot as the question isn't whether there should be mechanical restrictions in the first place, but what these restrictions should be. And I'm going to argue that the brawl isn't working well because it fails to be a brawl (instead it resembles a derped up sort of Red vs Blue team FFA). The brawl as is is a format that might work and be fun for competitions in which there isn't really anything but honour and glory at stake, but it tends to fall apart and become distinctly unfun the moment rewards are introduced.

Actually, come to think of it, were you in any of the brawls? Honest question because I can't recall.

Nope. I wasn't in any of the brawls. But does it matter? I hope the principle of people organising themselves into teams to gank people isn't so complex that I must participate in one in order to fully comprehend it.

It matters because I've yet to see anyone that took part who actually liked the format. You can opine from the side if you want, but it's pretty obvious that the goal of arena events should be to provide fun, not frustration, for those involved, primarily. And I've yet to see anyone who were part of the events speak out in defense of the way they currently play out- just a bunch of people stating they're not coming around for the next one.

Raeche said:

In any case, you aren't disagreeing with me, even though you think you think you are. I never questioned whether there should be mechanical restrictions in place. As you rightly pointed out, there already are. Even a bait the frog game is a mechanical restriction.

Yes, I am. When you rail against restrictions imposing honourable conduct that sanitizes the game, it implies this is bad, and those sort of restrictions are precisely what I want to see implemented in the brawl (or whatever we may want to call it) to determine the Delosian champion.

Raeche said:

I said free-for-alls should remain free-for-alls, because that is the definition of the word. It means no rules. It does not mean no ganking. People should thus be able to team if they want.

If you want to make the brawl like a real brawl where everyone fights everyone else, then by all means. Such an additional restriction makes sense, because we not only envision brawls to be no holds barred (just like FFAs), but we also envision it to be a messy royal rumble of sorts where people do not organise themselves into teams. It would be a misnomer to call it an FFA.

This is beside the point. My argument was never that FFAs that allow teaming should be banned, but that this format shouldn't be used for the official Brawl event. If people want to go wild with arena events that are always going to end up with unbalanced teams, they can do so to their heart's content for what I care, just don't make it the basis for distributing honours lines and artifacts.

Raeche said:

So yes, even though you were pretty eager to shoot me down, it was a strawman that you attacked, and I agree with your point insofar as we were never at odds.

It's not a strawman if I respond to things you've actually written and don't misrepresent your position. The bolded part of your post is a pretty clear argument against imposing new restrictions on the brawl, and, again, I disagree with that.

Raeche said:

Anyway, turns out ALL THIS is moot, since HELP BRAWL now indicates that the brawl is meant to be a free-for-all like the Hunger Games and not so much a drunken-bar-brawl type brawl.

So if you guys want a real brawl where people don't end up teaming, I suppose that is entirely possible as long as it's called something else. Just keep bugging the imms for it. There seems to be quite a lot of people who think the 'brawl' was lame. Maybe push for an actual royal rumble then.

Yes please.

Haven

Participants can role-play a treaty of sorts for "honorable" conduct in the Brawl and PK those that break such a conduct. I don't think that's against the rules anywhere.

Just an idea. Might be worth a try to see if it can be done ICly.

Raeche

@Luna:

To clarify, I was talking about free-for-alls in general. Not the brawl event.

Raeche said:

I think it sucks to be at the receiving end of a team, but to institute rules against that would be imposing on people a kind of honourable conduct that sanitises that dimension of the game.

A free for all means no-rules - not a kind of one-by-one tournament. In the out-of-arena context, or free-for-alls, anything should still go.

What should be requested, however, are that there be competitions/events where teaming is exclusively disallowed.

That was in response to Seir, who seemed to be talking about free-for-alls in general. See below:

Seir said:

Teaming in a game called FREE-FOR-ALL has to die in some shape or form. Both sides are guilty of it, but I know that I've been especially annoyed when I'm fighting someone in a free-for-all and two people team against another during the course of it. I'm personally glad for the new arena mode despite whatever faults it may have as it is a step in the right direction. The game already devolves into group fights with people jumping into fights despite not having a solid reason of doing so except "well, they're my citymate" when realistically, they're just doing it for "lol teh peekayz".

I'd like to see group fights kind of die away unless they should involve the organization on a large-scale level. Leylines would be a good example of when it is an appropriate time for organizations to band together to fight one another. Everyone and their mother from one organization banding together against someone who has cause to go after a single individual from that organization (e.g. bounty on their head) is a reason why group fights need to have both mechanical and rule-based enforcement for when they are NOT appropriate.

If you put it all together, my point is thus this:

If the brawl is meant to be a FFA, in the literal meaning of the term, then there should not be restrictions in place.

However, if it is meant as a royal rumble, then there should be restrictions in place, because organised combat just isn't true to the meaning of that sort of fight.

My argument thus is -  'if this, then this, if that, then that'. It was not 'I disagree with you guys, x should not be like blah blah blah', or much less, 'I disagree with you guys, the -brawl- should not be like blah blah blah'. Either you did not understand, or I was not clear enough. I will assume the latter, just to give the the benefit of doubt. I hope that my clarification now makes it foolproof and impossible to misunderstand.

Since the aim of how the brawl is meant to be played has been clarified by the administrators, and it seems that there are many who seem to dislike that format, the next logical thing to do would be to press for an actual royal rumble.

Damonicus

Knockout mod for next brawl.

Borscin

I honestly only skimmed over most of the posts, so if anyone mentioned what I'm about to say.. well w/e.

I think part of the issue is we now have options for more organized FFAs, or I guess what should be called arena events. And that everyone on the losing side will be very displeased that an FFA is turned into a TFFA when there is a more individualistic reward for the winner of the event. Instead of being able to say 'I was better than everyone who joined.' it becomes 'My team beat their team and then I beat everyone on my team.' Which is not what people join arena events for (at least, ones that are not TFFA specific). We used to just complain and maybe submit ideas for better alternatives to the FFAs that would just turn into team events. But now we actually have those options for a better alternative.

Another part is that reward. Being shut out of that reward in a mostly uncontrollable manner is also going to make this sort of thing unappealing. When everyone has their relatively fair chance for that reward (honors line and crown), then the most grief you'll have about losing is that the one person you lost to maybe used cheap tactics or w/e. In the end, you lost to that one person, so it's on you. When you just get ran over by multiple people, it makes the whole experience really unenjoyable. And my thought would be that you want the game your making for the players who spend money to be enjoyable. 

To be fair there is a secondary reward in the star aura stuff that does reward a city, although it technically comes in a manner of a 'pixie wish' which I suppose you could wish for something else (next winner should wish for a better Brawl style imo).

You might as well remove the concept of FFAs for awarded arena events. If you want an FFA style event, you might as well make a mod that is a two team TFFA (or more, I guess), that turns into a knockout when one (or all but one) team is defeated. Otherwise, we now have the knockout option that can and should be utilized, especially if the admin want these gripey posts to not come up anymore.

Anyway, I wouldn't call the Brawl an FFA. It's a TFFA/knockout without the proper mod. I know that if it stays in it's current style (which I already said it most likely would, which the help file now reiterates), the only reason to join will be if your side has more people than the other side so your side can win the TFFA portion and, if you survive that part, be able to participate in the secondary knockout portion. But since it seems to be staying the same, all you're going to get is having one side of the game getting annoyed every month when the brawl rolls around. In this manner, it's similar (on a lower scale) to some of the other things that are annoying and unfair to deal with, like the entire city war mechanic, which is now completely removed. And the holywar mechanic, which was recently being griped about because it's annoying to be rolled over by a larger org.

Either way it's what could be a fun concept that has turned out to be more aggravating, and will not be worth participating in depending on how it looks like in the minutes before joining.

Damonicus

A gate mod would be fun. Say you have 10 people join. 2 start out and every 3 minutes one person is released from the cave. If 2 of the same "team" join and do not start fighting within a minute then release npcs like the Nazhedu to come and join as well.

Luna

Just add a random chance of nuclear holocaust singularities (20k unblockable, to be on the safe side) spawning in any room with 3 or more people in it, with the chance increasing exponentially based on the number of people in the room.

Haven

xD I see the birth of suicide bombers then Luna.

Malak

Luna said:

Just add a random chance of nuclear holocaust singularities (20k unblockable, to be on the safe side) spawning in any room with 3 or more people in it, with the chance increasing exponentially based on the number of people in the room.

+1 Yesplz.

Ilyon

1. Walk to a room with two people fighting
2. Wait for the bombs to spawn
3. Leave, repeat as needed
4. Profit

Luna

Nuclear holocaust sings clearly need to be instant to rectify this hypothetical abuse.

Haven

Luna said:

Nuclear holocaust sings clearly need to be instant to rectify this hypothetical abuse.

When I said suicide bombers I was more thinking along the lines of people purposely entering the brawl to lose in an effort to trigger the nukes and take out side <x>.

Raeche

I think it's a fun idea though.

I'd take it any day compared to something that rejects you with, 'You can't attack X while he/she is fighting Y'. Doing it this way would add a dimension to the game, instead of taking away, whileserving the same purpose.

Haven

I'm not against the idea. I was just clarifying what I meant by what I think it'd birth.

Luna

Haven said:

Luna said:

Nuclear holocaust sings clearly need to be instant to rectify this hypothetical abuse.

When I said suicide bombers I was more thinking along the lines of people purposely entering the brawl to lose in an effort to trigger the nukes and take out side <x>.

Would be fairly easy to prevent being suicide bombed by not standing with anyone from your own side. I guess it could still happen, but the bomber would be killing off her own allies too, in that case.