Illyanna
Junior
Posts: 181
(11/25/03 3:28 pm)
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November Siege Report
Since the August report, siege received new models and art, Alchemists and Spellcrafters were given Siegecraft as a skill (with a low skill cap), ballista targetting has been fixed to its utility in 1.60, several MLA were added to effect siegecraft and sieging, anti-keep camping code was added, and keep gates were moved in most of the keeps.
Bugs:
1. /groundset instantly resets the siege target to the new ground target without a new AIM step. This results in inadvertantly changing targets (sometimes assisting others get a GT, or an accidental macro press) and also allows siege operators to skip the AIM step after the initial AIMing.
2. There is a damage bug where ranged siege fails to damage targets in the area. No failure messages. About 1 target in 6 seems to not be effected. Assumed to be a missing 'resist' message but unconfirmed. Most noticable when attacking rams with a palintone where the target is obviously not moving.
3. Siege Related: When keep or milegate doors are the target of cast spells there is not a line of sight check. This allows casters to bypass walls and AE doors out of LoS. Targetting is achieved by /assist or select nearest object. Please consider disallowing AE from spells directly targetting inanimate objects.
Use Issues:
1. Unstacking ammo requires a multiclick process. Hope for an interface addition to select a single object (ammo) and drop on the siege. Alternately when moving a stack to the siege it gives the message about not placing stacks on the siege, remove one ammo and add to the siege.
2. Siege Salvage - at 1sec per board, salvage takes too long relative to the speed of RvR. Enemy players can gain access to leftover wood much faster than the owning realm. Battlemaster ability Faultfinder allows enemy players to speed this up to the point where siege may be lost to the enemy in less than a minute.
3. Ram and Siege Ram graphics interfere with groundlevel visibility. While the interruption of visibility from attackers above (towers and walls) is a small benefit, the inability to see the inner gate for targetting and whether the gate is open is bothersome. Rams left near an open outer gate also block visibility for defending players entering the keep granting attackers an advantage. The models still act as an AE anchor effecting all targets underneath despite lack of visibility. Suggest changing ram shape from a teepee design to a rafter design with open sides.
4. Both siegemaster and player crafted weapons do excessive damage for the level of their operators in the lower BGs. Possibly consider reworking to damage formulas to be more operator level dependant.
5. Scorpian and Onager maximum range is 2500 compared to 3500/4500 for the two higher grades of siege. This range difference amounts to a 60%+ loss in area of coverage compared to the 3500+ range weapons on level terrain. Please increase the maximum range on scorpion and onager. Combined with the minimum range of 1500 and the archery code for elevation, the effective coverage area can become very small. In cases of a hilltop siege targetting a tower top the coverage area becomes very small (only ~200 units). This is smaller than the radius of the typical ammo.
6. Targetting of siege by spells - the size and immobility of siege makes them ideal targets for AE spells. This allows players to damage/effect players not otherwise in LoS by targetting siege and other inanimate objects in LoS. The spells themselves do minimal damage to siege but make it very difficult for operators to use the siege.
7. Documentation - old information on the HowTo is incorrect and misleading. Also should include intended ways to use siege (i.e. ballistas ignore walls for targetting, and the siege triangle: rams vs. gates, catapults vs. players, ballistas vs. siege)
Wishlist:
1. Reduce minimum range on ranged siege to allow more flexibility in placement for defending siege. Current options are limited to the keep rear for targetting the outer gate area. (Keep size is roughly 2400 square, with the inner gate ~300 into that and minimum range of 1500, defending siege must be placed in the rear 600 units of the keep - much of this is occupied by the lord tower and rear walls.) A siege placed in a front corner cannot target the gate area which is only 1200 away or less. With the removal of the second door, the minimum range limits use to only the first phase of a keep defense. Including response time this is the shortest phase.
2. Allow siege to be moved post creation. Giving the option of moving siege to a new location makes it more likely to get the cash investment involved used in a meaningful way, Possibly as a control interface option ('ADJUST' pushes siege object 50 units toward target aimed at - with timer) or by a pick up and drop method (no player movement allowed but can adjust position by pick up range). Also possibly go as far as allowing pick-up of siege and player movement (while the decay timer continues).
3. New siege engines - especially items that are categorically different. Oil pots, blocking walls, craftable bombs/traps, ladders, siege towers. New ammo with alternative spells (including variations on damage type): DoTs, disease, stuns, root.
Preliminary post ToA, analysis:
1) New siege art - for the most part very nice; ballista and palintones could be visually distinct and the tarp over the larger two rams blocks visibility as noted.
2) Siegecraft for the magical trades - solution for a longstanding request.
3) Ballista targetting fixed - this change was unannounced in patch notes and has the flavor of a bug to players expecting LoS for ballistas. The intended targetting method for ballistas has never been officially clarified to players.
4) Siege related MLAs:
a) Siege Master - 30% timer decrease results in a damage over time increase for all siege. Since rams are the most commonly used siege they benefit the most. This serves to lower the time it takes to knock down a gate.
b) Faultfinder - near ram grade damage vs. gates with melee allows gates to go down faster. In some situations, rams are no longer used in favor of this no-cost alternative.
c) Anti-siege MLAs - I haven't seen these yet but the leaked info suggests a number of sabotage abilities for use against siege. Mostly likely to effect attacking siege since defending siege would normally be placed inside the tower.
5) Anti-keep camping code - defenders may no longer login within a large radius around their keep. Unless already present this makes defending more difficult.
6) Keep gates moved - splits the keep assault into two phases; only the first phase is succeptible to defensive siege. Both gates are open to repair and PBAE by defenders.
Conclusion:
The recent changes have certainly changed keep sieging. The boring 'bash-the-gates' step has been shortened significantly and has been split into two separate locations (with different strategic set-ups). Defenders are much less likely to be present (no login) or to arrive in time to make a defense (shortened take times). PvE keep takes are the norm with the defending realm more likely to take an enemy keep in retaliation rather than defend.
When a keep is defended and the attackers continue their assault, the defense can be more fun or interesting than previous however if the attackers have enough GTAE, PBAE, volley, and siege they can destroy defending players backed into the confining lord tower. Faultfinder and Siege Master can be used by defenders to increase damage output and remove enemy rams when defenders have a significant numbers. However many times attacking players are more interested in taking a keep than having a fun fight. They can switch keeps and many times have it down before defenders in the original keep arrive due to the speed of keep taking.
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