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  1. #1
    Deleted

    Arrow So, let's talk e-sport.

    I've waited quite some time before I've decided to start discussion about this matter here, mostly because I've seen way too much hostility here in threads about even minor things. But I guess it's time to pick it up and see if people are ready to do some serious talk.

    Ok, let's start with Anet pov. According to what they say, GW2 pvp is being designed with some serious intent to make it fit the e-sport scene. Things like hot join or fps-like server browser should deff help with that, also by allowing players to create their own custom tournaments could play a big role in making gw2 more popular. What really needs to be mentioned is equal gear, another big milestone which helps advertise gw2 as skill based game.

    My pov: I'm coming from very hardcore and competetive scene of quake series, including playing in international tournaments. Experience gained abroad allowed me to first help and then organise my own national leagues and events. I guess my pov is not only a player's look, but also as someone who organise events and decides what games should be included. After all that it is hard for me to accept any MMO in e-sport as most of them lacks the basic reqs for a game that claims it is competetive. At first I thought WoW will be able to break in, but blizz didn't manage to introduce so much needed changes and instead just threw money on promotion. At the moment WoW as an e-sport resembles US economy - still running but god knows how much more adrenaline shots it can handle before stroking out.

    When Anet claimed their competetive ambitions, I was more than sceptical. It took quite a while before I've realized that GW2 has potential. Didn't have the chance to play it so I have to relay on videos, which for starters looked pretty good. That's very important, game aspiring to be an e-sport needs to be pleasent to watch. It is also easy to see which side is winning/loosing - makes it more exciting to follow a match. But I guess what tipped the scale in favour of gw2 is the fact it was very clear who played good and who was just taking a tour around the map. It is also easy to dystinguish different levels of skill (player A better than player B, but still I think player C would beat him) - which means players(playstyles) are distintive.

    So yeah, I'm excited both as a player and future organiser of tournaments. How about you?

    (sorry for gram mistakes, all written on my phone ;p)

  2. #2
    The Lightbringer Malthurius's Avatar
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    I wanted to make a topic about this, but I'm not familiar enough with E-Sports to start such a discussion.

    But yes, I'm very exciting for competitive play in GW2, especially considering how well GW1 did in this regard, and Anet was very good about keeping the PvP scene populated by doing tournaments and other things like that.

    That distinction in play styles is one of the advantages of visceral combat in a game. It also makes it more fair and competitive because it eliminates RNG, not all of it, but a lot of it, and RNG is one of the main things that hold back MMOs from being TRULY competitive. The more player skill you can involve in your game, the better.

    Also, Anet take certain steps to insure PvP balance, like equal gear footing always (Except in WvWvW, which wasn't meant to be competitive anyway.) and abilities have different effects in PvP than in PvE.

    Also, the support of team work through cross profession combos will make PvP teams more of a team than they could have been in WoW, ever. And no healers.
    Last edited by Malthurius; 2011-11-05 at 01:44 AM.
    "Questions are for those seeking answers. Those who have answers are those who have asked questions." -Mike R. (Malthurius)

  3. #3
    The Lightbringer Blufossa's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Malthurius View Post
    I wanted to make a topic about this, but I'm not familiar enough with E-Sports to start such a discussion.

    But yes, I'm very exciting for competitive play in GW2, especially considering how well GW1 did in this regard, and Anet was very good about keeping the PvP scene populated by doing tournaments and other things like that.

    That distinction in play styles is one of the advantages of visceral combat in a game. It also makes it more fair and competitive because it eliminates RNG, not all of it, but a lot of it, and RNG is one of the main things that hold back MMOs from being TRULY competitive. The more player skill you can involve in your game, the better.

    Also, Anet take certain steps to insure PvP balance, like equal gear footing always (Except in WvWvW, which wasn't meant to be competitive anyway.) and abilities have different effects in PvP than in PvE.

    Also, the support of team work through cross profession combos will make PvP teams more of a team than they could have been in WoW, ever. And no healers.
    Pfffft, I'll be throwing no bandages your way! http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Med_Kit

    :P

  4. #4
    The Lightbringer Malthurius's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Grugmuc View Post
    Pfffft, I'll be throwing no bandages your way! http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Med_Kit

    :P
    Hah, well, ok, "And no dedicated healers."
    "Questions are for those seeking answers. Those who have answers are those who have asked questions." -Mike R. (Malthurius)

  5. #5
    The Lightbringer Blufossa's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Malthurius View Post
    Hah, well, ok, "And no dedicated healers."
    Pffffft, no healing turret for j00!

    Haha, jk jk! I do agree though, no one has to do anything specifically anymore. You don't need any of the Trinity for either PvP or PvE, which will make the game (pardon my French) a hell of a lot harder but a hell of a lot more fun! I can have my healing turret going on my allies while popping out grenades or bombs or my trusty rifle. Or I can be dropping bandages or chucking elixirs while my rifle-turret is going off, helping to down enemies.

    I would love to even see maybe GW2 even have it's own tournaments. Maybe start country-wide and then eventually move to world-wide competitions. But that's just me. :P

  6. #6
    I'm so excited for the competetive PvP.

    Things that make GW2 a great esport:

    -Experience in GW1. GW1 was the first MMO game (even though it wasnt truly an MMO, more like Diablo, but you get the idea) to break in to esports. It was the only one to have a strong competitive backing (including djWheat), and had tournaments with $100,000 prize pools. On top of this, GW1 was a nightmare to balance...and they did it (for the most part). It certainly felt much more balanced than WoW, and definitely helped the team learn more about balancing these types of games. Although spectator mode is not confirmed for launch, it was indeed present in GW1, so there is a high possibility of its return.

    -Server browsers. This is huge. FPS players have been complaining forever about how many games now launch with no dedicated servers/server browsers. This is the first time (IIRC) that an MMO will get them. It allows easy to setup skrimages, and builds a community around regulars of that server.

    -Tournaments. True tournament play is great for esports. Even if you can't be the best, you can still win a few small tournaments here and there and feel a sense of accomplishment. For those who are very competitive, there is monthly and yearly tournaments that have prize pools. Some tournaments are automated, while some can be player run.

    -Small scale PvP. Most MMOs outside of WoW and GW1 have no small scale PvP. GW2 will be the first one in a long time to feature the return of arenas, but in an interesting way. Instead of simply being a box with a few pillars, they play more like a Quake map. Each one has unique terrain to explore, different map dynamics (like trebuchets and dragons), and destructible environments. Is that Necro taking cover behind a wagon? Set it on fire, and burn his cover to ashes!

    -Large scale PvP. WvWvW isn't exactly competitive, but it does bring the PvP community closer together. PvP guilds become more important as they work together to take over keeps, and defend them from enemy guilds.

    -Combat. Unlike most MMOs, the combat is actually fun to watch. Narrowly dodging away from the hammer swing that would have ended your life is exciting for players and spectators. Cross profession combos allow for improvised tactics that can take people by surprise. The limited skillbar allows teams to plan before the game begins, and in more ways then "Frost Mage/Afflic Lock/Resto Shaman". You need to pick your abilities carefully, like building a deck of cards. This also stops a class from ever being totally useless, as they can just "reshuffle" that deck and play a totally different role.

    -No healers. Some of the funnest games in my arena career in WoW was when I played double DPS (Rogue/Lock) and we faced another double DPS. No longer did we stick to the mundane "CC/burst the healer ASAP" strategy, but actually branched out. We had to plan each ability use carefully, as one screw up could mean certain defeat. My only complaint was that the games were way too short, but this is solved by the dedicated healing skill.

    -PvP straight from level 1. Want to buy GW2 as an esport game, and aren't interested in the PvE? No problem! Just play the 5 min tutorial, and you can immediately end in to competitive PvP. No long leveling process is stopping you from PvPing.

    -Equalized gear. In Starcraft, what do you think people would say if one player's units took 20% less damage, just because they'd be playing longer? They'd say that it wasn't a viable esport. The same should apply to MMOs. Only by equalizing gear and abilities (MMO communism!) can there be a leveling playing field. Only then can skill truly matter.

    -PvE and PvP balancing is separate. When you enter a PvP area, your skills change to reflect that. This means that there will never be any stupid nerfs to PvP because of PvE, and vice-versa.

    -It's the perfect time. The only really serious, big MMOs that offer competitive PvP are WoW and GW1. Obviously GW2 is going to take GW1's player base, and WoW's PvP players are disgruntled and quitting. You only need to browse the Arenajunkies forum (largest WoW PvP community) to see this. What once once a bustling site of ideas and opinions as become incredibly pessimistic about the game's future. No other MMO in the near future has support for competitive PvP (several are promising it post-launch, but I never trust developers when they say they'll have things post-launch. Dance studio, Rift competitive PvP, etc. Besides, by the time they release it GW2's PvP will be well established).

    -Easy to form teams. You sign up as a team just like you would a Starcraft team. You just enter the game with your formed team, and get rated as such. You can join as many teams as you like, so you can play with both your RL friends and your serious team. The guild system is also good here, as you can join a serious PvP guild and a casual, funtime guild.

    As you can see, GW2 has a lot going for it. They've stated that when people hear MMO and esports, they should think Guild Wars 2. And I think they're on the right track to accomplishing this.
    Norn Mesmer: GW2
    Rattataki Sniper: SWTOR

  7. #7
    Quote Originally Posted by Creepjack View Post
    My pov: I'm coming from very hardcore and competetive scene of quake series, including playing in international tournaments. Experience gained abroad allowed me to first help and then organise my own national leagues and events. I guess my pov is not only a player's look, but also as someone who organise events and decides what games should be included. After all that it is hard for me to accept any MMO in e-sport as most of them lacks the basic reqs for a game that claims it is competetive. At first I thought WoW will be able to break in, but blizz didn't manage to introduce so much needed changes and instead just threw money on promotion. At the moment WoW as an e-sport resembles US economy - still running but god knows how much more adrenaline shots it can handle before stroking out.

    When Anet claimed their competetive ambitions, I was more than sceptical. It took quite a while before I've realized that GW2 has potential. Didn't have the chance to play it so I have to relay on videos, which for starters looked pretty good. That's very important, game aspiring to be an e-sport needs to be pleasent to watch. It is also easy to see which side is winning/loosing - makes it more exciting to follow a match. But I guess what tipped the scale in favour of gw2 is the fact it was very clear who played good and who was just taking a tour around the map. It is also easy to dystinguish different levels of skill (player A better than player B, but still I think player C would beat him) - which means players(playstyles) are distintive.

    So yeah, I'm excited both as a player and future organiser of tournaments. How about you?

    (sorry for gram mistakes, all written on my phone ;p)
    eSport died when they released stupid fps like CoD, BF etc (in my opinion)

    What was your nick in Quake series? Still involved with the Quake live community or you were mostly there during Q3? I'm coming from hardcore competitive scene also (q3, ET and from time to time now some QL)

  8. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by Alatian View Post
    -Combat. Unlike most MMOs, the combat is actually fun to watch. Narrowly dodging away from the hammer swing that would have ended your life is exciting for players and spectators. Cross profession combos allow for improvised tactics that can take people by surprise. The limited skillbar allows teams to plan before the game begins, and in more ways then "Frost Mage/Afflic Lock/Resto Shaman". You need to pick your abilities carefully, like building a deck of cards. This also stops a class from ever being totally useless, as they can just "reshuffle" that deck and play a totally different role.
    well, that's not exactly true as, while all this was true for GW1, in GW2 as i recall, you can still change your weapon/skills once ooc. and while it will obviously be way harder to do in an arena setting, i don't think i saw anything saying it won't be allowed.

    Quote Originally Posted by Alatian View Post
    -No healers. Some of the funnest games in my arena career in WoW was when I played double DPS (Rogue/Lock) and we faced another double DPS. No longer did we stick to the mundane "CC/burst the healer ASAP" strategy, but actually branched out. We had to plan each ability use carefully, as one screw up could mean certain defeat. My only complaint was that the games were way too short, but this is solved by the dedicated healing skill.
    i'd disagree on that, having healers never prevented GW1 from becoming a great PvP game, far from it. or should i say healing (for MMOs that is) is a necessity as otherwise all you'd have to do on either side would be focusing anyone on the opposing team one at a time. healing pushes people to better work on how (and on who) they blow their cooldowns.

    Quote Originally Posted by Alatian View Post
    -PvP straight from level 1. Want to buy GW2 as an esport game, and aren't interested in the PvE? No problem! Just play the 5 min tutorial, and you can immediately end in to competitive PvP. No long leveling process is stopping you from PvPing.
    well, you could do that but i believe an actual lvl80 would have a little advantage over a freshly side-kicked player.

    Quote Originally Posted by Alatian View Post
    -Equalized gear. In Starcraft, what do you think people would say if one player's units took 20% less damage, just because they'd be playing longer? They'd say that it wasn't a viable esport. The same should apply to MMOs. Only by equalizing gear and abilities (MMO communism!) can there be a leveling playing field. Only then can skill truly matter.

    -PvE and PvP balancing is separate. When you enter a PvP area, your skills change to reflect that. This means that there will never be any stupid nerfs to PvP because of PvE, and vice-versa.
    stats don't need to be perfectly the same, but yeah, you need a game to be properly balanced for it to succeed as an esport imo.

  9. #9
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    Quote Originally Posted by sacrypheyes View Post
    i'd disagree on that, having healers never prevented GW1 from becoming a great PvP game, far from it. or should i say healing (for MMOs that is) is a necessity as otherwise all you'd have to do on either side would be focusing anyone on the opposing team one at a time. healing pushes people to better work on how (and on who) they blow their cooldowns.
    You're comparing Guild Wars 2 to games that needed and were designed with dedicated healers. In Guild Wars 2 every profession has a heal and multiple defensive cooldowns, cc's, debuffs and buffs. Watching PvP videos for GW2 I've only ever seen people get focused when they were by themselves.

    Also, in WoW arenas and BG's (as well as GW1) don't people just focus the healer any ways? That's what my experience was.
    Quote Originally Posted by SW:TOR
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  10. #10
    well you don't always need to focus the healer if you're able to prevent him from healing to his full potential, should it be via healing debuffs, silences, stuns or sometimes, just change your main target to burst someone else down while he's not paying enough attention.

    but as you've said, it looks like fights may last quite a while (understand more than a minute) in GW2, which is great for someone like me bored of seeing people getting burst down in matter of seconds (or less).

  11. #11
    Quote Originally Posted by Blznsmri View Post
    Also, in WoW arenas and BG's (as well as GW1) don't people just focus the healer any ways? That's what my experience was.
    In WoW it depends on what comp you're running and what comp you're playing. There are plenty of comps that get the healer CC'd and destroy one of the DPS in that time.

    OT: I don't know if I would actually want to see it picked up, at least not for a while. Having it in such a competitive setting like that has unfortunate side effects for the majority of the players, especially when developers are trying to balance at the highest levels of play. Look at WoW's history with tournaments, and how many times a class or spec got nerfed after they performed well in a tournament. It didn't matter if that class/spec was generally horrible, but shined in one specific team comp because it function so well as a counter-comp, the class/spec still got nerfed.

    While I love to watch/would love to see competitive play, I'd be surprised if it could even be picked up and taken seriously if there is any significant amount of RNG in the game. The more RNG a game has, the less seriously it's taken when played competitively.

  12. #12
    Quote Originally Posted by sacrypheyes View Post
    well, that's not exactly true as, while all this was true for GW1, in GW2 as i recall, you can still change your weapon/skills once ooc. and while it will obviously be way harder to do in an arena setting, i don't think i saw anything saying it won't be allowed.
    Actually they specifically said a couple of times that the swapping of weapons/skills once the pvp match had started was only for the demos and would be disallowed in the live version. For the demos where nobody knows the skills and they only have time for 2-3 matches tops they wanted people to be able to try out different abilities. They were a bit less clear if the lock-down would occur once you queued in or when the gates opened (allowing you to coordinate with a pug group during the minute or so countdown to the match beginning) So just like GW1 you need to pick what ability's you'll have before PVP combat commences and if you choose poorly you must make do with what you have.

    Who is John Galt?

  13. #13
    Deleted
    Tbh, I've always felt healers in arena in WoW were a totally horrible idea. It's always either one of the following: you simply don't have enough burst to kill the healer and thus you've already lost, or you just burst the healer down within seconds and you've already won. Or the enemy priest consumes all your mana and thus you can't do jack-shit. There is no in-between and skill hardly comes into play at all.

    It remains to be seen how GW2 PvP works out in practice, but atleast there is the potential for more interesting fights. Not that it really matters for me: if there's no interesting rewards I have no interest in going in and taking a beating.

  14. #14
    Deleted
    Great responses, I'm happy to see different povs on this matter.

    @GUESSWHOIAM good to see someone from FPS scene. I hope you don't mind if I will continue to use this blessing of internet which allows me to hide behind my anonymous avatar . I've parted my ways with quake series just after QL launch. Though I still have q3cpma installed and I'm playing it whenever I have a chance to gather "old friends".

    @Alatian , I share your view. You've managed to write down most of the things that will help introduce GW2 in to competitive scene.

    I see also that almost everyone acknowledges that removal of the dedicated healer is a very good move on Anet side (both PVE and PVP wise). It's huge, cause now teams don't have "obvious" targets any more. That not only frees up the gameplay, but also allows more dynamic fights.

    I want to address weapon/skill swaping during a match. Personally I'm torn on this matter, on one side being able to shift possibilities of your character by 180 degrees in just few click during OOC is tempting and allows for very unpredictable play (interesting) it may also cause some bad side effects like "too long" matches or some strange victories. One is clear though, Anet has to make sure that meta game stays important but will not be deciding during the match. I don't want to see situations where a team /forfeits just because they've realized their skill compositions are useless against the other team.

    I'm being tasked with organising quite big event (national scale) December next year. By the spring I need to have list of games ready and I'm deff considering GW2 as one of the platforms. By that time I'm sure people will be playing it already so I hope I will be able to get some feedback and some more information on tools available for creating custom tournaments/skirmishes. It's crucial for Anet to provide us (I'm not only talking here about potential coordinators, it's important for every player too) with easily deployable solutions.

    All in all things are looking good, I'm pretty sure that thanks to very approachable and casual friendly WvWvW GW2 will help introduce more people to PVP than ever before.

  15. #15
    The game needs a replay feature to go back and watch your matches, akin to SC2 and TF2. That alone would make it a better eSport.

  16. #16
    Deleted
    Quote Originally Posted by Creepjack View Post

    I'm being tasked with organising quite big event (national scale) December next year. By the spring I need to have list of games ready and I'm deff considering GW2 as one of the platforms. By that time I'm sure people will be playing it already so I hope I will be able to get some feedback and some more information on tools available for creating custom tournaments/skirmishes. It's crucial for Anet to provide us (I'm not only talking here about potential coordinators, it's important for every player too) with easily deployable solutions.

    All in all things are looking good, I'm pretty sure that thanks to very approachable and casual friendly WvWvW GW2 will help introduce more people to PVP than ever before.
    National tourney? What country?

  17. #17
    Weather or not guild wars 2 will make a good esports will be unknown until beta , there are alot of things a game needs to do in order to make a esport, it needs to be fast paced(well fairly face paced i mean it cant be like, no one will die in the 1st 10min or somthing crazy like that), it needs to be exciting ,and it needs to be a game alot of people play. Wow arnea is a perfect example of a game that did some of this right, it was played by alot and it was fast paced but it was kind of boring to watch and thus got dropped by MLG.

    Now ofc we dont know what itll be like until beta and ofc if it had competitive large scale pvp rather then just arena it could do well.

    And on the no healer subject, theres no healers in LoL or dota 2, they seem to be doing well and lets face it in terms of an esport lol is still a newb and it still gets huge views

  18. #18
    Deleted
    Quote Originally Posted by Barrowmore View Post
    The game needs a replay feature to go back and watch your matches, akin to SC2 and TF2. That alone would make it a better eSport.
    Amen. Considering GW2 is being developed with competitive nature in mind, I'm sure build in recording functionality is something Anet is thinking about or even already got it covered. Will it be available at launch? No idea, but quick patch after release is very possible.

    Quote Originally Posted by roflatorlunde
    National tourney? What country?
    I'm not sure it is good idea to talk about it more considering the rules of this forum. I'm afraid it could quickly become discussion about my company and THAT could lead to posting few links and further down to accusations of advertising. I would like to continue posting here, so allow me to use this anonymous avatar .

  19. #19
    Quote Originally Posted by Creepjack View Post
    Great responses, I'm happy to see different povs on this matter.

    @GUESSWHOIAM good to see someone from FPS scene. I hope you don't mind if I will continue to use this blessing of internet which allows me to hide behind my anonymous avatar . I've parted my ways with quake series just after QL launch. Though I still have q3cpma installed and I'm playing it whenever I have a chance to gather "old friends".
    Sure, no worries, I'm doing the same. Glad to see some old Quake players .

  20. #20
    I dont watch Arenas on streams etc I find it really boring and unexciting.
    The vids from GW2 I found interesting and fun to watch, but it may or may not to do with the fact that GW2 is simply new to me.
    I however like that there wont be dedicated healers and such, but then again I always found pvp to be shit in wow after high stat gain mid expac.
    I like that you could make some of your own tourneys - or well... I LOVE IT.
    When HALO first came out I managed to create a community in it for my country ran some tourneys etc., it was really fun. We started to fix some prizes and so on. Was really entertaining and real time killer - and kept us hooked, made our own leader boards and such.
    In WoW I never experienced such, so Im really hoping that GW2 will give me that.
    Oh yea... if there would be ingame replays (just like SC2 ones) it would be... *NERDGASM*
    Last edited by Rapti; 2011-11-05 at 02:21 PM.

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