Fort Aspenwood no longer balanced.

I agree, I was running the old Blackout / Distortion Cripshot just then! Good fun, lots of lag though.

More specifically, the problem is they not only disable the turtle groups, but they are ALSO in a prime position to snare/condition stack everyone on that whole side, are very hard to get to (have to get past next gate and run all the way around, through what is going to be the main battle area and the kurzick warp point), and if killed will be back there in 10 seconds, so really he doesn't need healing at all as long as the player has some kind of self heal for when casters take pot shots at them.

Furthermore, the player does more then just distract the turtle group and take shots at half the enemy team. If you don't have someone healing the turtle he can kill it, then the warriors stay alive and the npc force on the whole side is pretty much permanently disabled, so the kurzick on top can then go screw up the other side. On the other hand, if someone IS healing the turtle, then the ranger is still ahead in terms of strategic value because its stopping the turtle team, its holding back a player to heal the turtle AND can be taking shots at everyone who comes through that gate.

If the turtles just kept up with the battle line and only targeted enemy NPC's (with the warriors defending the siege turtle against players, anet swap 2 warriors for 2 rangers please!) it would ensure that the luxon war machine doesn't stop outside the gates.

FA started out so that PVP-only characters could not access it (they changed that later, though), which by definition would make it a PVE-area when it was originally made.

Hahaha thats like all I do, if you see Raven Zargarda, give him a /wave.

Anyway, to shorten the lenght of the match was a good thing as a good Luxon Team can kill Gunther in 5 Min. while the Kurzick always had to wait the full lenght no metter how good they are, well, unless they run Amber to Gunther which they rarely do, anyhow, way to win faster is going for the Gates and ignoring everything that cant heal.

yes, it isn't balanced
bonders on npcs, rangers snipering(faster arrows), and sometimes kill-everyone-ranger
i always bring well of profane just in case~

I think it's safe to say that the NPC's on either side are issues. I've seen many a gatekeeper run off as far as the first gate to try and heal it (they seem directly tied to their corresponding gates) and then get "stuck" on their way back (even if they are stuck on a gate and it’s opened to allow them to pass). The Turtle and Wa's are also quite a force to deal with regardless if they are moving or not (Try running some amber with a coward chain or a turtle shell -which has a ridiculous range at times) not to mention that they do respawn whereas some of the NPC's on the Kurzick side don't come back (Mes, Sins and gatekeepers). I know it was mentioned above but the whole movement/ snare aspect plays on both sides of the map.

I said it previously in this thread, I've played both sides quite extensively (which by no means makes me an expert but I'd like to think I've got a feel for play on both sides. I’m in excess of 1 mil faction for Kurzick and 800k for Luxon - 80+% earned through FA). What I believe it comes down to is taking what is necessary to win and not what you want to play. Kurzick’s are a defensive role and folks should be taking characters and builds to maximize that. Monks/Rits to keeping things going, toons like Ra's to slow down/ stop advancement or run amber and mine takers to control luxon spawns points and again run amber. The flip side is the Luxon's should be taking offensive toons to push and counteract the typical defense. Nec's and Mes for Melee and caster hate. Ele's for mines and gates etc. and MM’s always worked well for this side (both sides should be considering the movement/snare aspect). The concern many folks are indirectly referring to is that what they use to bring no longer works as effective as it did before so it would suggest re-looking at what you need to do to win.

So for example mentioned a few times above - the Ra's on the ledge - they are line of site and folks often use the same ledge to remove that threat (standing directly beneath them). AoE's are tough to stand in and hex hate isn't something any Ra can do much about. The AoE’s can continue to be useful for output and hex hate can be used for NPC’s and casters too (trying to imply not to build specifically for one aspect but that you can build towards a goal keeping common variables in mind).

A suggestion (if it hasn’t already been made) is to play the other side. See what they are doing, what works for them and then the downside to that and utilize it (there are always pros and cons)

One of the other big frustrations is that you're one of eight. Folks range in experience, class, build and it allows for both PvE and PvP toons. You can come with the best build/gear your capable of providing and it’s optimal to the side you’re playing but if you don’t have any additional help, it’ll often still result in a loss. I’d try to take the new update with a grain of salt and look at all aspects before confirming it’s the new change that’s resulting in poor performance.

I’d personally like to see more comments in the thread about what players have changed and how they’ve adapted to the new mechanics. What they are bringing to address and what is working for them (both sides) instead of how it’s broken and why they’re losing now.


elk

it is definately favored toward the kurzick side. a couple good healers on the kurz side is all that is needed to rebuke the unorganized and usually poor attack power of the luxon side. a couple of siege turtles isn't enough to make up for this

The ranger up there wants you to do that. If by some miracle you manage to hurt him, he backs off for 5 seconds to cast troll unguent or whatever. He still draws the turtle fire and is distracting a whole 1/8th of the enemy team away from the NPC's you actually need to attack. He doesn't have to be attacking you or the turtle to do that. Tell me how are AoE's useful against players in PvP please. You realize how much room the ranger has to run around in up there right?

The fact is FA has always been unbalanced. Luxons don't win FA, the kurzicks screw up something and lose. The reason for the decent odds each side had before was because the FA team's are subaverage and screwed up plenty enough times before for the luxons to punch through. Kurzicks have a lot less time to make mistakes now.

Since the update I'm finding it necessary to run more monk hate than before, dom mes with lingering curse or power block mes, something like that on luxon side. I used to play my ele more often before but with all the monks its often not enough to drop a gate. Even running more anti monk builds seems not to get much further, cant shut down all the monks. I played kurz side yesterday and ended up in a team of 6 monks, 1 mes and 1 para, needless to say we won.

Tend to find a lot of melee on lux side too, not sure why that is...

I was gettin kinda pissed last night. Playing on luxo side if kurzick players exploit all the advantages theres no way luxon can win. All they need is healers/mesmers,runner. I even rolled a necro there to fight bonders, gaze contempt, rip enchmanet, well prophane, discord...

-you get one guy running around aggroing turltes so they don't go foward. Retarded AI.
-Bonders stands on the front gates, delays entry.
-mesmers shut down me as a necro(anti bonder)
-everyone then retreats behind main door holds up npcs while a couple runner get amber. time runns out.

First question I have for you - have you played the Kurzick side? (I'm assuming you have but it would make a difference in the statements your making).

You imply that there's a lot of room to move around up on that ledge whereas I would argue that it's relatively limited (please note that I've been both the Ra on the ledge and the caster on the ground). Bow swaps are definitely a plus and a longbow is needed to reach the first gate or the opposite wall created by the stairs to the outer ledge.

You indicate the Ra will just move away and cast troll which is fair but if s/he's bright, they'll move outside of cast range first to ensure there's no interruption of the troll. I'm assuming you're using the line of sight aspect therefore the Ra is moving a minimum of half your cast range bubble before activating. This is taking him/her well outside of the aggro range of the turtle. Turtle attack cycle is 10secs (same as dshot) so with a bunch of running, most likely a long bow to activate the interrupt far enough out to be effective, the player can get back and forth to interrupt the turtle. The question is how long can they maintain it before the pressure you're applying is too much (they don't get back in time or your output of dmg actually kills them - we'll assume they're focused on goals/tasks like the turtle and rely on respawn instead of staying alive. The staying alive technique will generally lead to the turtle being more effective – see running away to heal). I'll tell you from experience that folks can and will move you off of the ledge and can/will effect how much you aggro/interrupt the turtle. That is what you call game play (it's the design of the map and you need to come prepared to play it). Respawn time plus time to get back to the ledge will translate into a broken gate unless there are others to take the Ra’s place or defense at the gate (such as a monk). Having said that, the Luxon will also have teammates who should be applying pressure to both the ledge and gate respectively. If not, than it was a staggered push and will often result in a poor attempt.


The AoE aspect is a direct coloration to what you're playing. Bringing AoE to certain PvP game types are ineffective but places like FA isn't one of them (HA use to be another example with some of the hold maps but I'm pretty far removed from it now therefore not able to comment accurately). Taking mines and gates are an important aspect and I hope you're not telling me that you haven't seen things like fire ele's running around popping these (when playing the Kurzick side, a savannah heat ele controlling the mines therefore the Luxon spawn points is a great way to stagger the Luxon attack making it less effective. It also allows for the ele player and others to return amber as well as can result in the Luxons focusing on retaking mines or the player themselves). Similar situations can be applied to the luxon side for taking AoE damage too. This also doesn't imply that your entire bar is AoE.


This one is definitely subjective and a personal opinion (not a fact). My opinion is that the Kurzick’s always had more to coordinate to win (prior to the update). There is need to stop pushes based on a particular side (or both) and actively repair gates while taking/maintaining mines long enough for the weapon to finish (and it only took a few mistakes or a strong last minute push to ruin a long hold.) There is need of several types of characters to effectively do all tasks and does work better when folks are actually communicating (I don’t see it often but matches where folks are team chatting back and forth result in more frequent wins). For the Luxon side, I always found it was necessary to maintain a forward mine for respawn and push with as many folks as possible (with turtle preferable). Go in and do as much damage as possible, rinse and repeat. It again was more effective when folks were talking and pushing a color. The time aspect; again in my opinion, means that the team coordination is much more important. The comment I made above about staggered attacks is a down fall to the Luxons and with the responsibilities the Kurzick need to look after (therefore spreading them out), often allows for overwhelming numbers to work. I see the comment from qawersder about 6 monks being an issue but there in lies the issue of random teams (same goes for Ra with 3 Monks and a Rit). This also results in the comments I made before about adapting. Qazwersder said it with what s/he is finding to bring to compensate. I’d imagine an MM or two with Well of Profane and a few Mes would have been an interesting scrap for the Monks.

I also see a huge swing in player ability since FFF went down hill. Returns were increased for FA and those folks are going to continue to grind out the title so they follow the rewards (excluding things like Vanq etc.). The number of “interesting” players who normally farmed PvE now definitely shows on a team.

I just think that it’s not the balance of the map or the change in the mechanics you’re frustrated with as much as it’s what you now need to do to compensate for it (I’m drawing that conclusion from one of your comments regarding traveling around the open gate to access the ledge which implies a melee based character. Maybe you enjoy the upfront, bash their faces in style of play and its chance to be effective is drastically diminished now?). I also don’t want you to think any of this is considered personal or an attack in anyway and if any of it came across in that manor, my sincerest apologies.


Ugh - looks like lunch is over - back to the grind that pays the bills!


elk

Enchantment removal is the key!
They bond? Shatter it!

Im kurzick but since im no longer playeing FA, i dont care!

I have played the kurzick side. I've won exactly 100% of battles so far, out of maybe 25ish. About half of those are me as a Ranger doing exactly as I described above and the other half are as a WoH monk. I've probably played slightly more as luxon (kurzick is just too easy imo) as ranger, necro or monk. I've played the map inside and out because its one of the few interesting things left in the game, and I can say its too much in the kurzicks favor now. I'm winning about 60-70% of my matches as luxon so far and I think I'm rather lucky to do so most of the time. For kurzick its so easy you would think I was FF'ing.

I can tell you for sure, no caster on the ground could ever prevent me from holding up the turtle group. You CAN keep the turtle attacking you fairly easily from outside casting range of people below The only possible thing I can think of that could take me down when I've up there is a shadowstepping assassin (dunno if that even works, gates must be open in any case). You don't have to be attacking the turtle every second to draw its fire, as long as you attack it for a few seconds it will stay locked onto you unless you start moving really far away. It doesn't even really matter whether the turtle breaks down the gate once to be honest, as long as you keep the turtle from fireing into the center area clusterf**K your team can hold off enemies until the end of time with their nigh-instant respawn rate.

I didn't say AoE's were useless in FA, quite the opposite. I just said that using your Savannah Heat against a lone ranger on upper level was dumb. Your post pretty much said "AoE's is a good idea against someone camping the top level".


Everything you list is pretty much unneeded for kurzicks. Running amber is really unimportant (except for all caster's getting a hold of one in the first 30 s, that gives a nice advantage). The reason being that 1 amber = 3 NPC's. In the time it takes any character to run amber a luxon can take down twice that number of NPC's, so its a losing proposition when you should be protecting npcs. The turtles are very easy to disable (either by holding them up or just killing them and letting warriors run around like noobs), once you do that its an 8v8 in the center area where the kurzicks respawn at the battle field and the luxons respawn 10 seconds away. Assuming two teams of equal strength, kurzicks will never lose that fight.

To sum up kurzick strategy: screw over the turtles ASAP, stalemate them 8v8 right outside the last gate. The reason kurzicks lose is because they didn't follow that plan.

Once again too many idiots relying on the turtles for victory. I told you suxon luxons how to win. Touch Rangers with enchant removals, they can hold the turtles in place all they want to all you have to do is kill npc's and get to the green gate. You don't have to kill all those kurzick npc's in the MIDDLE, just down two gates and rush the green gate npc's if enchant removing eles with all their firestorms and fire bombs can't bring down the green gate then you don't deserve to win. If you don't bring enchant removals then you're an idiot.

Any team dumb enough to lose because of touch rangers was going to lose regardless of what build you were running. Any kurzick team that isn't retarded will put all their strength on anyone going near the last npc's. Grats on making a build that can beat retarded kurzick teams.

Whoa - wait a sec. You're winning more than half of your matches and concerned? I'd say you are adapting and overcoming what you're up against quite well (nice btw).
I do question the win percentage on the Kurzick side (or maybe I'm a worse player or have poor luck because I'm sure not coming up with a 100% win ratio on the Kurzick side )

Two things there - It sounds as though there isn't any pressure (other than a sin) that can move you from the ledge and that just doesn't sound right. Casters and Ranged are your only concern prior to the gate falling and then after it's down (or opened) it becomes a free for all (as to who can pressure you). I just go back to your 60-70% win ratio - folks have to be dealing with this on some level since the final push through green is often supported by the turtle groups (overwhelming numbers again). The second comment is in relation to the gate being down. I've always found that once folks can advance through the 2nd gate, it's rather difficult to stay at that ledge. Folks push past down the stairs to green gate or to the center npcs. With players pushing to the center, you can get separated from your teammates (basically poor positioning). If they can pressure you directly and you move from the turtle's aggro, it'll advance through the 2nd gate. If they attack green directly there's always the possibility of loosing a gatekeeper or two in the process making it difficult to stay at that ledge.


I did imply it is useful for moving them. So for our Savannah Heat example, the AoE range is nearby (2nd ring) therefore ample enough to cover a good portion of the ledge. I'm assuming you're gonna move out of it and that the caster will continue to pressure you causing you to retreat/heal or stay on the turtle and risk respawn. All I'm trying to suggest is that you don't need to kill them as much as you need to move them (allow the turtle to pressure the gate or a chance to move). This also excludes other aspects such as snare for when the person moves away/back to aggro the turtle, castable blocks on the turtle, shutdown and so on (I know it's impossible to cover all aspects in one toon but they've all been common factors I've run into making the turtle shutdown more difficult).


I do disagree with the amber aspect in that you can continually wear down and separate assaults (trapping players or separating them makes them easier to deal with). I've found that as long as I can maintain a mine and don't have to continually re-take it before running amber, I can often return it in time to repair the gate they just broke (so it often feels like they would break say outer purple, I'd fix it, I'd grab more amber, they'd break it down again and I'd be returning just in time to fix it again – using movement buffs of course).

More so though is that it's a spawn point which is even more valuable than the amber itself (at least in my opinion). Using the "U' map allows me to determine where a majority of them will be spawning and which side will need more support (or fixes). It also plays directly into the staggered attacks I've mentioned a few times. Based on the Savannah example for the Kurzick side, I'd toss as much hate into all 3 mines trying to control/maintain them and rinse/ repeat so that most folks would spawn in the far back (or spend their time chasing me/taking mines instead of pushing). This amplifies your comment about final pushes at green gate (10sec reinforcements vs. 25sec) or amplifies how difficult it is to maintain pressure. Limited numbers are easier to deal with.

The comment about a 10sec time frame to get back to green relates to the comments made about team pushes versus staggered pushes. You're right - if you respawn and get back into the Kurzick base and the team has been held off/ minimized, than it's best to wait for the next wave (although most folks keep throwing themselves to the fire). The 8vs8 aspect is all good if it stayed that way - generally though you've got the 2 turtles, 10 Lux Wa's and the 8 players (once you're at green, folks don't come out much to aggro turtles for the reasons mentioned above about team separation/ bad positioning and overwhelming numbers/odds).

I still like your win ratio - make sure you pm me when on so I can grab some good returns on faction

elk

heh, I probably have just been lucky enough not to get infamous kurzick teams which are half leechers and the other half wammos . But really I have yet to have a fight that was truly close on the kurzick side. On the other hand the majority of luxon fights is won in the brink of time. The worst that has happened as kurzick is that the inner gate get breached, but luxons still didn't manage to get near the target. As long as you spam the hell out of calling the luxon turtles even the dimmest kurzick teams will get the idea to go after them sooner or later, and once you get at least 1 turtle out of the picture I've never had too much troubles. When I'm luxon the way kurzicks lose are either by ignoring the turtles or by splitting their forces up instead of defending together. Thankfully, the kurzicks do that often enough to allow me a comfortable chance of victory of about 2/3 matches. The good thing about the luxon side is that 1 or 2 good players if they get going can generate a lot of inertia and get their turtle group inside the first 2 gates in around a minute. Unfortunately its partially luck, if the kurzicks manage to stall you a minute more they usually have enough to for their side to retreat and have their whole team ready to defend inside. The first 2 minutes of the game really are critical because of this.


The reason luxon's can win is specifically because kurzicks _dont_ screw up the turtles. If kurzicks were doing that every time I would bet my win rate would plummet to 30% or lower. When you occupy that turtle you take so much killing power away from the luxons and give your side so much more time to react to enemies and protect npcs. Honestly caster's really can't touch a ranger up top. They have 100 armor vs elemental, if hurt they can back off out of spell range and heal up, and if the turtle isn't under constant healing its going to die pretty fast. in theory once the gate is broken the luxons can go around and kill the ranger, but then we are faced with the problem of the average FA'ers intelligence. They c-space and that's that. On the off chance someone does figure out that they should kill you the turtle is usually dead by then. Now, if you really, really wanted to you could make a build dedicated to getting rid of the ranger from the bottom, but in maybe 90% of the fights there isn't going to be a ranger, I'm just using it as a demonstration of how easily the turtles are disabled.



Savannah heat alone is going to do nothing to a half decent ranger (and I think I can assume they are decent, they are smart enough to go for turtles after all). At most it will get 1 hit unless the ranger fails to notice the huge fire display on their screen. Now if the ranger is water snared, you will do quite a bit more, but then you still have to deal with their 100 armor against elemental. And I have yet to see someone carry such a build. Not that there is any need to really, outside of myself the number of times I have seen kurzicks smart enough to distract turtles can be counted on one hand, so I can't fault people for not knowing how to stop it. Everyone is too occupied bringing counters to the stupid bond monks instead.

Ehh, I don't bother with outer gates that much. Considering how hard it is to stop the turtle that far out and how you are risking the other side being breached and the luxons getting past the main gate before you can react to defend (very very bad). If you had stayed to defend that gate instead of run amber you could very well have killed them, saving your npcs and sending them back to spawn for another 10 seconds. Constantly killing luxons like that can help a lot, it ensures they are running in at a trickle instead of in waves. If you just make the npcs respawn ontop of the luxons they are usually killed very fast and will barely slow them down a bit, though it sometimes catches them by surprise. As a luxon though, I can't count how many wins are because the kurzicks were messing around running amber or defending the outside while my group was going straight for the kill. It's absolutely vital that as soon as the outer gates are breached you be ready to fight the center battle.

It also exposes you out in the front (being the only kurzick on the luxon radar tends to draw some aggro), and there is the chance that your team will be outmatched without you back in base. It works in a pinch if you can tell your team is ok on their defense without you for a few minutes, but I would say that if they are so incapable as to be unable to hold onto their mines the game should be yours no matter how you play it. IMO, the big reason I don't do this is you have to capture both mines for it to make the luxons spawn further back. The time it takes to do this can easily let luxons get an advantage inside the kurzick base. Remember that if the luxons die and you are attacking the mine, you are gonna have to face them, and there's a decent chance that they can take you out. On the other hand, if the luxons aren't dieing that means they are probably winning the fight in your base, which is very very bad. You also definitely can't defend both mines, so the next luxon to spawn can retake one and then you are back to having nothing.

Yeah, if the luxons get their turtles inside the 2nd gates you can be in trouble fast. A good kurzick team should be preventing that the majority of the match, but when it does happen is when the game starts getting fun. The problem being that the luxon healers will definitely be looking out for the turtles as much as possible, and the turtles have decent defenses as it is. If the luxons have ALL 8 warriors too, thats a really bad situation. Fortunately luxon healers usually can't watch the warriors too well, so you have to target them first. After that you are usually best off putting heavy degen on the turtles while putting the rest of your pressure on the monks. Best thing to do of course is to just not get in that situation. If a turtle makes it past the 2nd gate line everyone on the team should be attacking either it or whatever might heal it.

I do agree with you dude its imblanced now and silly on the kurz side. just when the updated happend i walked into FA and got a team with 6 bonder monks...... we won but mostly cus of me and a derv running amber : s

I find peeps are pulling the few builds off wiki that can be used in FA or at least have FA somewhere in the description. i even saw the "Thunder Bow" yesterday and that dnt even work anymore after the Thunderclap change >.>
But yea luxons have it hard in FA now not that i mind, it may be imbalanced but its fun on both sides... imo anyway.

Hey I went in, won and increased my Faction cap... who cares anymore about FA?

Battle report!

Alright, played almost 10 games, and the summary is:

Total victory of Kurzicks! Didn't lose a single battle


Note: In only 1 battle did Luxons manage to kill one Gatekeeper. In other battles they didn't manage to kill a single one.

This time I played with my new PvE mesmer that finally got here; SoI ice and fire build, pretty devastating against turtle and luxon warriors around it, instant kill if no healer around.
Oh.. with SoI (at 16 illusion), casting Iron Mist on Luxons outside is hilarious Especially when they try to reach the Commander to send new turtle squad.


A lot of people who like to play the arena because of unique design and excellent fun factor?
That's the reason why people play FA and not JQ, even when FA is imbalanced, even when FA was giving miserable rewards back there. We played for fun.

If you don't care about it, what the heck are you doing in this thread? Your post doesnt contribute to the discussion at all, but hey, I do understand, everyone needs to have an opinion these days and spam the Internet.