Raid Changes

[Autotune]

Originally Posted by Sweetbaby Jesus [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

96 hour variance and bi weekly repops would do the same thing for smaller guilds as shortening the variance. Except small guilds wouldn't spend time tracking mobs that TMO will beat them too 10 times outta 10.

actually it won't. You'll have the no variance repop happen, then next week you'll have nothing.

With the shortened windows, you'll have the no variance repop happen, then next week you'll have all Naggy, Vox, Inny, CT, Sev, Tal, Gore, Fay, Phara, xygoz, silverwing, hoshkarr, druushk, and nexona all spawning within about 22hrs of each other (with 18hr windows). That is opposed to them all spawning within about 100hours of each other.

[Lazortag]

Originally Posted by Sweetbaby Jesus [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

96 hour variance and bi weekly repops would do the same thing for smaller guilds as shortening the variance. Except small guilds wouldn't spend time tracking mobs that TMO will beat them too 10 times outta 10.

Why are you assuming we'll be beaten 10 times out of 10? Even as it stands TMO doesn't have the time to track every single mob, do you think if they're all spawning within a 24 hour window that TMO will have an army of trackers spread across every zone, able to track all hours of the day? We got Maestro a couple weeks ago because we happened to be clearing hate while he popped. Sometimes we consciously choose to clear zones while a mob is in window to give us a mobilization advantage - that would be even easier to do if windows were shortened, and not even TMO is big enough to cover every single zone while this is happening. Moreover, the chance of two mobs spawning at the same time is much higher when the windows are shorter. Plus, what if TMO is in a battle with BDA on poop mountain while everything else is in window? Do you really think they have the advantage then? I say this as someone who actually tracks for raid mobs under the current system, it would be much easier for my guild if the windows were shorter, because more people would be willing to track. Your solution is basically to give us no option at all (having to track for up to 96 hours) versus giving us an option which you believe will lead to us losing every time. I'm saying we won't lose every time. And even if we did, I still would agree with shortening the windows because no person, whether they're in TMO or not, should have to track mobs for as long as they're expected to currently.

I'm also not persuaded by this argument that we shouldn't accomodate european players. Frankly, I think that's horseshit, they have every right to enjoy raiding on this server too, and so there should be some kind of variance, just not the insanely long one we have now.

[Wiwi]

Though I play this game in limited windows of time, and hardly ever group these days *gasp*, I like where the discussion is headed.

- Drastically reduce or remove variance.
- Server repops during the week.

Give all these EverCrackheads a break from the insanity of tracking all day. They can't stop, no more than a meth-head can stop hoarding sudafed from every pharmacy he passes by.

[Writ3r]

I think the other frustrating thing for most of these guilds is the fact that they feel they can't participate on some of the mobs at all (who are not exactly prime mobs) when there are other guilds who have an additional zone/set of mobs that they have at their disposal. Then the attitude or action of still negating the lesser mobs toward the guilds who want to make an entrance into the scene remains constant (as it is no surprise due to the amount of work it takes to even see a mob at times). That is the biggest reason change needs to happen, this is a server and in part a community. There needs to be the event where everyone who has invested time has a chance to see and experience the content if they wish to without the big pain that a 96 hour window entails.

Imagine if VP were remotely closer to classic where more (or any) clearing needed to take place to get to the named, then this would allow for again more time to be devoted toward that and an opening for other guilds at other targets during that timeframe. If you had variance it would allow said guilds in VP for example more of a cushion to spend in there and still acquire mobs outside of that particular zone (which promotes training/delaying). If there was no variance then guess what just as with a repop they would have to choose the higher priority which would most likely be VP due to the significantly better gear allowing other guilds to acquire other targets more regularly (plus maybe reduce the drama that can occur in that zone due to time constraints).

It is kind of like the issue on server repops before, it was just DUMB to make it a rolling repop rather than a complete repop due to the fact of one guild having a better chance at being able to dominate that particular scene. The same can be said with variance, if one guild is and can continue dominating what is the sense of it continuing forward when there are far more than one guilds worth of individuals within the confines of the server. Yes the same may continue as far as dominance, but even as some have admitted there would be new variables introduced making it slightly more difficult and/or interesting for that same guild by allowing more guilds to atleast get involved.

[Daldolma]

Originally Posted by Lazortag [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Why are you assuming we'll be beaten 10 times out of 10? Even as it stands TMO doesn't have the time to track every single mob, do you think if they're all spawning within a 24 hour window that TMO will have an army of trackers spread across every zone, able to track all hours of the day? We got Maestro a couple weeks ago because we happened to be clearing hate while he popped. Sometimes we consciously choose to clear zones while a mob is in window to give us a mobilization advantage - that would be even easier to do if windows were shortened, and not even TMO is big enough to cover every single zone while this is happening. Moreover, the chance of two mobs spawning at the same time is much higher when the windows are shorter. Plus, what if TMO is in a battle with BDA on poop mountain while everything else is in window? Do you really think they have the advantage then? I say this as someone who actually tracks for raid mobs under the current system, it would be much easier for my guild if the windows were shorter, because more people would be willing to track. Your solution is basically to give us no option at all (having to track for up to 96 hours) versus giving us an option which you believe will lead to us losing every time. I'm saying we won't lose every time. And even if we did, I still would agree with shortening the windows because no person, whether they're in TMO or not, should have to track mobs for as long as they're expected to currently.

I'm also not persuaded by this argument that we shouldn't accomodate european players. Frankly, I think that's horseshit, they have every right to enjoy raiding on this server too, and so there should be some kind of variance, just not the insanely long one we have now.

Sounds awfully similar to when people would say "do you really think they're going to track for 96 hours straight?" The answer is yes. They'll track every mob and keep 40+ online all day on the one day that repops are due. They're not going to just walk away and say aw, shucks. They'll sell a few more Trak BPs, buy a few more tracker accounts, and be as good to go as ever.

But you're right. Guilds would have the option of sitting in a zone while a mob is in window and hoping he spawns. That's otherwise known as poop-socking, and you'd probably be doing it with 2 or 3 other guilds depending on your target. But yeah, if that's what you want, that would be an option available to you. That was the entire reason variance was added in the first place, though -- to eliminate that kind of behavior.

[Daldolma]

Oh, and re: the European players, you're clearly not getting it. Daytime repops are European prime time. I don't know why you have this delusion that every no variance mob would be spawning US primetime and hanging Europe out to dry. It would depend entirely on when the original server repop was. Given recent server history, it seems more likely that raid mobs would start popping in European prime time and slowly drift toward US prime time with each new pop. Just randomize the time at which each server repop/simulated patch takes place. There will be weeks where European players have an enormous advantage, and weeks where all the pops come in US prime time. Just like classic.

[Autotune]

Originally Posted by Daldolma [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Oh, and re: the European players, you're clearly not getting it. Daytime repops are European prime time. I don't know why you have this delusion that every no variance mob would be spawning US primetime and hanging Europe out to dry. It would depend entirely on when the original server repop was. Given recent server history, it seems more likely that raid mobs would start popping in European prime time and slowly drift toward US prime time with each new pop. Just randomize the time at which each server repop/simulated patch takes place. There will be weeks where European players have an enormous advantage, and weeks where all the pops come in US prime time. Just like classic.

Not like it really matters, there hasn't been an European guild on the server for ages. Another victim of huge variance windows.

[Sweetbaby Jesus]

Originally Posted by Lazortag [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Why are you assuming we'll be beaten 10 times out of 10? Even as it stands TMO doesn't have the time to track every single mob, do you think if they're all spawning within a 24 hour window that TMO will have an army of trackers spread across every zone, able to track all hours of the day? We got Maestro a couple weeks ago because we happened to be clearing hate while he popped. Sometimes we consciously choose to clear zones while a mob is in window to give us a mobilization advantage - that would be even easier to do if windows were shortened, and not even TMO is big enough to cover every single zone while this is happening. Moreover, the chance of two mobs spawning at the same time is much higher when the windows are shorter. Plus, what if TMO is in a battle with BDA on poop mountain while everything else is in window? Do you really think they have the advantage then? I say this as someone who actually tracks for raid mobs under the current system, it would be much easier for my guild if the windows were shorter, because more people would be willing to track. Your solution is basically to give us no option at all (having to track for up to 96 hours) versus giving us an option which you believe will lead to us losing every time. I'm saying we won't lose every time. And even if we did, I still would agree with shortening the windows because no person, whether they're in TMO or not, should have to track mobs for as long as they're expected to currently.

I'm also not persuaded by this argument that we shouldn't accomodate european players. Frankly, I think that's horseshit, they have every right to enjoy raiding on this server too, and so there should be some kind of variance, just not the insanely long one we have now.

I'm assuming we will be beaten 10 out of 10 times because it's pretty much fact. Say variance window did change and somehow smaller guilds did start beating TMO to targets(which we won't) the very next thing that would happen is TMO members that are taking breaks or whatever would start playing again for the "competition" then their numbers would grow even more. And they would have no problem keeping everything tracked, As if they even have that problem already. TMO keeps eye on everything around the clock with a 96 hour variance. What makes you think they won't be able to do the same with shorter variance?

[Lazortag]

Originally Posted by Daldolma [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Oh, and re: the European players, you're clearly not getting it. Daytime repops are European prime time. I don't know why you have this delusion that every no variance mob would be spawning US primetime and hanging Europe out to dry. It would depend entirely on when the original server repop was. Given recent server history, it seems more likely that raid mobs would start popping in European prime time and slowly drift toward US prime time with each new pop. Just randomize the time at which each server repop/simulated patch takes place. There will be weeks where European players have an enormous advantage, and weeks where all the pops come in US prime time. Just like classic.

...What?? Every patch for the past year has been between 7PM and 11PM EST as far as I can recall, which is way too late for most European players. If you took away variance entirely, then all mobs would die within a 30 minute time frame, and next week they'd respawn only slightly later. If your suggestion is to have random simulated patch days then you'll have the opposite problem since for several weeks straight, mobs will only spawn early in the morning for westerners. The time of day that mobs spawn one week shouldn't determine when they spawn the next week on an international server.

Originally Posted by Daldolma

Sounds awfully similar to when people would say "do you really think they're going to track for 96 hours straight?" The answer is yes. They'll track every mob and keep 40+ online all day on the one day that repops are due. They're not going to just walk away and say aw, shucks. They'll sell a few more Trak BPs, buy a few more tracker accounts, and be as good to go as ever.

But you're right. Guilds would have the option of sitting in a zone while a mob is in window and hoping he spawns. That's otherwise known as poop-socking, and you'd probably be doing it with 2 or 3 other guilds depending on your target. But yeah, if that's what you want, that would be an option available to you. That was the entire reason variance was added in the first place, though -- to eliminate that kind of behavior.

The problem is that currently, they have a few people who are able to track for unreasonably long stretches of time. If the windows were shortened, they'd need multiple people able to track for smaller stretches of time. Even if they could track every mob, smaller guilds would probably camp near their priority mobs*, or just outrace them when more than one mob spawns at a time. What if Trak or some VP mob is in window during a day when everything else is popping? Do you think TMO and BDA are going to risk giving the other guild a free shot at Trak if they mobilize for some low-priority target like Inny? Another huge difference is that if you lose a mob that you tracked under the new system, you don't lose 4 days of your life for nothing, and you still have a reasonable idea of when the TOD was if a mob spawns when your guild was asleep.

Basically what will happen is this: TMO will lose mobs because they can't be everywhere at once. The current system gives them more security because if they go for a mob, the chance of another one spawning at the same time is extremely low, and they keep track of all the TOD's so that if another mob is in window, they don't lose a huge part of their raid force trying to track it. If 10 other mobs are in window, are you going to spare 10 of your raiders just to track them? I doubt it.

*I'm not ashamed about poopsocking for a few hours if the alternative is to poopsock it for several days. Also, 2-3 guilds poopsocking one mob is extremely unlikely given that there are over a dozen raid mobs and less than a dozen raid guilds.

edit: also, I think that small guilds *can* beat TMO to certain targets, and they just need to be willing to track. Currently I don't see how any casual player would be willing to track because it is such a colossal time investment.

[Daldolma]

18 hours isn't going to be the rapid-fire respawn that you seem to think it is. It takes less than 20 minutes for TMO to mobilize and take down a mob once it spawns. Multiple priority targets popping at the same time is going to be the exception, not the rule. Maybe they'll choose to let a Maestro, Sev, or Talendor slide every now and then, but they're not going to have any problem at all taking down Trak, VS, Inny, CT, VP, and Gore. They don't even have any real competition for VP and Gore.

There are two scenarios given an 18-hour variance. One is that TMO will go zone to zone annihilating everything as it spawns, and the only hope other guilds will have is to poopsock. This is the most likely scenario.

The other is that TMO will poopsock Trak and/or VS with BDA for 18 hours.

There's one thing in common with both of those scenarios: return of the sock. It's not classic, it's not how the endgame was meant to be played, and there's no reason for it. There are 9,000 better ways to cater to a small European population that, as Autotune pointed out, doesn't even comprise a guild of their own at the moment.