Our future as a realm

[Ame]

Not a while, just a view. No complaints, just advice.

If we're ever going to be able to survive as a realm in New Frontiers, we're going to have to be able to take keeps, and towers, effectivly. Atm I have noticed that we don't really care about our keeps sowhat, and most of our attitudes is to leave the keeps alone, and just roam amg - mmg in emain. Even if we only need dc to gain df, not many people bother to help. This isn't the case all of the time, but I have seen it loads of times.

If we want to survive in NF, we're going to have to take keeps frequently and DEFEND them. Not once in my 20 days /play'd have I seen a force defend a keep, and overpower the enemy. Well this is a lie, I've seen it twice, but it was at a possible relic raid attack, so there was no choice.. but given the choice most people would rather go emain then sit at a keep defending it.

So how can we progress in NF? Simple, learn your Siege Craft skills high, we'll be needing rams, trebuckets etc.. really soon. Read the NF webpage on the europian daoc home site.

I would also recommend actually taking keeps, defending them right now. Though this doesn't accomplish much, it'll let us gain df, and a slight advantage on our enemies (or not ). It'll also help us get in practise, when RvR almost only revolves around the keeps and towers.

I swear if we aren't prepared for NF, that the first week would be horrid for us, we'll have no keeps; our relics would have been gone the first day. And as someone said who plays the US servers, its difficult to get them back. So if we prepare now, we'll have the fighting chances against the hibs and mids.

Same olde routine.. if none of this makes sense, pm me or reply.

Take care, and safe Travels..
Amer Soleil

 

[Nebel]

Tbh i dont have the slightest doubt, that albs WILL attack/defend keeps... caus NF obviously IS 80% keep-fights.... peeps are there where the action is...so..

The transport-system will help too on that matter... i must admit: for me atm its often just too damn boring to run from CS to Beno if it doesnt count really (danger of loosing a relic or what).

But indeed: peeps should get to know siegecraft... also cant hurt to read the manuals from camelotherald.... caus also for siege-veterans alot will change in NF.

 

[Night]

Thanks for the heads up!

 

[Bracken]

When taking/defending keeps is about relics, people will be there. When its just about getting DF, people generally won't. It's always been the same

 

[Sendraks]

When taking/defending keeps is about relics, people will be there. When its just about getting DF, people generally won't. It's always been the same

Yeah but practice makes perfect. If people get into a routine of not bothering to defend keps, as is the norm atm, because the bigger guilds/as won't come to help or the higher lvl RR characters are to busy RP farming in Emain, then it really only breeds disinterest in that kind of thing.

It wouldn't surprise me if we lost a few relics in prime-time shortly after the NF release, because our relam is so poor in responding rapidly to assaults on our keeps. Of course, NF will make it easier to port out to the frontlines, but I'm betting the Mids and Hibs will have the common to attack the right keeps and prevent teleporting right out to where alb forces could do the most good.

As Amer says, I think we need practice as a realm, otherwise we will get stuffed come NF.

 

[Flimgoblin]

because the bigger guilds/as won't come to help or the higher lvl RR characters are to busy RP farming in Emain, then it really only breeds disinterest in that kind of thing.

there will be no Emain as it exists at the moment....

 

[Draylor]

Not once in my 20 days /play'd have I seen a force defend a keep

Stop looking in Albion then. Theres no reason to defend those keeps, so (virtually) noone does it.

 

[Aussie]

Make me King

 

[Gordonax]

Make me King

When you come back with the "7 RVR dedicated alb guilds which are interested in taking, retaking and retaking those relics forever at any hour on every day" maybe we will...

 

[Sendraks]

there will be no Emain as it exists at the moment....

Yes I am abundantly aware of that. I was talking about the circumstances of the present and how they may have knock on effects to the success of albion in NF.

The fact that the all frontier zones will be different (yay) does not detract from the fact that currently, as a realm, Albion is very Lackadaisical with regards to responding to assaults on its keeps. It seems that a lot of people are looking to the new features of NF to somehow mysteriously turn Excal/Albion into a well honed keep defending realm. I'm sure a lot of the new features, such as being able to port out near to where the action is (unless the Hibs and Mids sever the keep line) will help, but it won't be enough.

Albion being well drilled in keep defense now, a change in attitude if you like, will make a far bigger difference I'm sure.

 

[Chilly]

Yes I am abundantly aware of that. I was talking about the circumstances of the present and how they may have knock on effects to the success of albion in NF.

The fact that the all frontier zones will be different (yay) does not detract from the fact that currently, as a realm, Albion is very Lackadaisical with regards to responding to assaults on its keeps. It seems that a lot of people are looking to the new features of NF to somehow mysteriously turn Excal/Albion into a well honed keep defending realm. I'm sure a lot of the new features, such as being able to port out near to where the action is (unless the Hibs and Mids sever the keep line) will help, but it won't be enough.

Albion being well drilled in keep defense now, a change in attitude if you like, will make a far bigger difference I'm sure.

Albion IS a good keep taking/defense realm, and as has been said before no one cba to do it atm cos its worth nothing apart from a small exp bonus or DF - and no one cares about either enough to bother with active frontier activity - including me, i whore TOA atm farming stuff and selling it to the unwashed masses cos small group/solo RvR is very hard to find and if you go FG to emain it generally sucks, well for me cos im a slag.

Come NF where the majority of fights will be at keeps, thats where the majority of albs will be, and for a start wer blatently gonna wtfpwn all the relics anyway - assuming the fucking gameboy can handle it.

 

[Sendraks]

Albion IS a good keep taking/defense realm, and as has been said before no one cba to do it atm cos its worth nothing apart from a small exp bonus or DF -

I totally agree with the reasons why people are not doing the keeptakes/defense at the moment, but the fact is that skills which are not practised, do grow stale. Of course, all the existing knowledge may become redundant in NF anyway and judging by some of the flak the US "1337" crowd have thrown at the expansion, I really suspect that this may be the case.

So, ToA stuff and RR aside, it may actually put the more experienced RvR-ers on an even footing with those who are less so.

Which is somehwat problematic, imo, because then in order for things to work for us in RVR, we're going to have to communicate and co-operate and I really don't think Albion is so great at that at the moment. Certainly not when compared to the co-ordination that Hib and Mid players seem to have.

I'd be thrilled if I could be proved wrong in that respect.

Come NF where the majority of fights will be at keeps, thats where the majority of albs will be, and for a start wer blatently gonna wtfpwn all the relics anyway - assuming the fucking gameboy can handle it.

I fear for our servers come NF. Given all the problems the US players have had on their lower populated servers, I'm looking forward to playing Dark Age of Server Down - The Waiting, for a few weeks.

 

[Dordanov]

Can't agree more with that..

Although people stating that there will be no new emain, and albs will care when it's about relics, yadayada... Albs need practice really, as some more people stated.

It's really shocking to see how few Albs know about siegecraft, taking/defending keeps, and how disorganised albs are etc..

If we ever expect to be able to compete in NF we need to practice.. ALOT

Even just listening to people for organisation seems to difficult atm.. really, if NF would go live today we would loose our relics within a few hours and fall back to mindless zerging frontiers, simply because it's the only thing we know how to do atm..

 

[Painbringer]

Not once in my 20 days /play'd have I seen a force defend a keep, and overpower the enemy. Well this is a lie, I've seen it twice, but it was at a possible relic raid attack, so there was no choice.. but given the choice most people would rather go emain then sit at a keep defending it.

Hmmm you weren't in our frontier last night then when we successfully defended Caer Boldiam twice from a larger hib army aswell as shroom gardens, 2 epic and very well fought and fun battles, then we secured Boldiam and went on to retake Erasleigh and fought off an attack from mids when we were fighting guards at Erasleigh. Then we went to retake Beno and successfully defeated hibs who attacked us when on guards, in general we f00kin' kicked some major arse

is very hard to find and if you go FG to emain it generally sucks, well for me cos im a slag.

Agreed, your penis is very hard to find you dirty old TAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRTTT!!!!!!!!! :kissit:

 

[Flimgoblin]

there are plenty of people capable of running brutally efficient keep takes in albion.

They just don't bother at the moment because there is no point and as much fun as taking a defended keep or defending an attacked keep is at the moment - it's rare to find one that doesn't just involve killing NPCs or the albzerg being wftpwned in seconds by a pbaoe bomb.

There's also no incentive for taking the keeps - DF is frankly tedious unless it's a HL/Legion raid (and even then the loot still sucks), and we have no relics to protect.

Were you playing when albion last had the strength relics? (for longer than 2 days that is - I'm not counting the ninja vs alarm clock war recently - talking about back before Ladonna and the evil demon "server stability" put the final nail in the coffin of the relic game)

Albion retook and defended its keeps well.

Chilly - on the gameboy front, in theory there's no 200x200 relic keep fight anymore in NF, and the yanks have been optimising like buggery since NF was released due to the US servers getting similar numbers to an excal relic raid out in RvR for a change

 

[Clipse]

Tbh, taking and defending keeps, Albs are very good at. If it is worth something. Defending Alb keeps is a waste of time with no relics, and 0 interest in DF. If u want keep practise b4 NF, organise raids in Emain and odins

 

[Sendraks]

there are plenty of people capable of running brutally efficient keep takes in albion.

I know, I've been on some great keeptakes, but really not that often. I'm sure the people and the skills are there, but the co-ordination and communication to pull these greats events together and get the realm working as a whole seem to be increasingly few and far between in the past few months.

On the re-take front however, I still maintain that our communications and response time is sluggish. Heck, I've seen Hibs and Mids respond faster to us retaking a keep in our frontier they hold than we do when they take it in the first place.

There's also no incentive for taking the keeps - DF is frankly tedious unless it's a HL/Legion raid (and even then the loot still sucks), and we have no relics to protect.

I do agree. However on the few occasions where we've had keeps recently, I'd say that the albion response to defending them wasn't so great. Yeah we fought them off for a while, but from where I was, the communication was lacking. People were clearly wanted to assist, but from where I was out in the frontier, people were not exactly flocking to help. It wasn't as if there was a shortage of people online, so whats the cause of the lack of interest?

Albion retook and defended its keeps well.

Aye, I do remember those days and yes the job done by the RvR groups at the time was a solid one. I still maintain that a little practice, involving everyone who wants to help, wouldn't hurt the realm at all.

Its pretty clear that all we want Albion to do better in RvR and happily WTFPWN the hibs and mids come NF. We not only want our own relics, but we also want to be able to take and keep those of our enemies.

All I'm trying to do, as are others, is suggest that perhaps there are things we could be doing now to make sure we're well prepared as a realm when NF comes. Some people seem to think there is a problem and just because things were great in terms of keep defense when we had relics before christmas, doesn't mean that they are now or will be come NF. People leave, guilds and alliances change and everything will be very different come NF.

But if everything rosy and there is an RvR relic defense force ready to roll come NF, great!

 

[Tay]

there are plenty of people capable of running brutally efficient keep takes in albion.

They just don't bother at the moment because there is no point and as much fun as taking a defended keep or defending an attacked keep is at the moment - it's rare to find one that doesn't just involve killing NPCs or the albzerg being wftpwned in seconds by a pbaoe bomb.

There's also no incentive for taking the keeps - DF is frankly tedious unless it's a HL/Legion raid (and even then the loot still sucks), and we have no relics to protect.

Were you playing when albion last had the strength relics? (for longer than 2 days that is - I'm not counting the ninja vs alarm clock war recently - talking about back before Ladonna and the evil demon "server stability" put the final nail in the coffin of the relic game)

Albion retook and defended its keeps well.

Chilly - on the gameboy front, in theory there's no 200x200 relic keep fight anymore in NF, and the yanks have been optimising like buggery since NF was released due to the US servers getting similar numbers to an excal relic raid out in RvR for a change

Seeing his 20 days/played made me cringe a bit, last time I looked at my Arms that has not seen RVR in over a year and basically played ML1-6 and a few artis he had 80/90 odd days on him (One of a number of level 50's).

ALBs can defend and attack when required, With GP gone et all I look forward to seeing the RA's leveled somewhat, it still disappoints me that class differences wont get a review (Casters with stun, insta CC etc). But RA's alobe shoudl make for a pleasent change.

I think it'll be fun for Alb Xcal, I think the other realms will take a little while to adapt but Albs hopefully will flood NF and wtfpwn everythign in sight before the Mids/Hibs get a hold.

 

[Vandar]

We don't organise aswell as Mids. I remember a few weeks ago at Fen... about 100 Albs defending with a CS up, getting slowly worn down by well organised mids with about 8 trembs placed strategically around the keep, constantly interrupting casters and occassionally killing. Rams on the door with silly amounts of aoe to stop pbaoer's getting close.
SB gank squads going for the CS.

We'd have turned up with maybe a ram or 2 and eventually got bored and left after being wiped a few times.

 

[Sendraks]

I think it'll be fun for Alb Xcal, I think the other realms will take a little while to adapt but Albs hopefully will flood NF and wtfpwn everythign in sight before the Mids/Hibs get a hold.

As Vandar highlights in his post, flooding NF is not a long term solution. Our reliance on "Teh zerg" is frankly what is crippling Albion RvR more than anything else. We're nothing more than an RP farm for Mids and Hibs.

Co-ordination between groups, Herbals Hib RR with forces going through Summoners and Emain was a good example of how to set this up, is what we need. If people listen to whats happening, rather than just zerging off to farm RPs, then we'd probably kick a lot more ass.

 

[Ame]

Seeing his 20 days/played made me cringe a bit, last time I looked at my Arms that has not seen RVR in over a year and basically played ML1-6 and a few artis he had 80/90 odd days on him (One of a number of level 50's).

ALBs can defend and attack when required, With GP gone et all I look forward to seeing the RA's leveled somewhat, it still disappoints me that class differences wont get a review (Casters with stun, insta CC etc). But RA's alobe shoudl make for a pleasent change.

I think it'll be fun for Alb Xcal, I think the other realms will take a little while to adapt but Albs hopefully will flood NF and wtfpwn everythign in sight before the Mids/Hibs get a hold.

Tbh I have no real idea how long my play time is, since I play camlann most of the time now due to the situation of friars being left out of rvr grps, despite them having pretty nice damage, and main resists.

 

[sibanac]

As Vandar highlights in his post, flooding NF is not a long term solution. Our reliance on "Teh zerg" is frankly what is crippling Albion RvR more than anything else. We're nothing more than an RP farm for Mids and Hibs.

Co-ordination between groups, Herbals Hib RR with forces going through Summoners and Emain was a good example of how to set this up, is what we need. If people listen to whats happening, rather than just zerging off to farm RPs, then we'd probably kick a lot more ass.

no relics = no use taking or defening keeps
mid taking relics back at 6am = no use taking relics

so whats left, zerging emain, smaller battles in odin and HW empty.

As to what will happen in NF so far it looks like the alb zerg will own NF, judging from US reports.
What will happen beyond that is anyones guess, but i am pretty sure alb will adopt

 

[Bracken]

Yeah but practice makes perfect.

Many people have been involved in loads of keep takes and defenses since DAOC was released so they've had plenty of practice - and tbh it generally isnt fun after you've done it so many times. If something is neither fun nor has any point (for most people having df isn't sufficient motive) then why should people do it? People generally play to have fun...

 

[Bracken]

We'd have turned up with maybe a ram or 2 and eventually got bored and left after being wiped a few times.

Not if we had relics to defend...

 

[Sendraks]

no relics = no use taking or defening keeps
mid taking relics back at 6am = no use taking relics

Not sure that there is anything in NF which will prevent that from happening, despite pleas from players to nerf alarm clock raids.

Taking and defending keeps is self fulfilling in terms of its purpose, i.e. you get better at it. There are right and wrong ways to go about a keeptake, I'm sure you'll agree and the more people who know what the right way is, the better surely?

Best & quickest way to learn this is being part of experience keeptake BGs who you can learn from.

so whats left, zerging emain, smaller battles in odin and HW empty.

True. Emain does have a better layout which is more conducive to RvR activity.

 

[sibanac]

Taking and defending keeps is self fulfilling in terms of its purpose, i.e. you get better at it. There are right and wrong ways to go about a keeptake, I'm sure you'll agree and the more people who know what the right way is, the better surely?

Best & quickest way to learn this is being part of experience keeptake BGs who you can learn from.

There is no lack of keep taking skill in albion (as far as there is any skill involved), there is just a genuine lack of will to defend and take keeps.

 

[Sendraks]

Many people have been involved in loads of keep takes and defenses since DAOC was released so they've had plenty of practice – and tbh it generally isnt fun after you've done it so many times.

I’m not sure who these many people are. From what I’ve seen, the many are the minority and everyone else could benefit from the experience of the minority.

I do appreciate, very much so, that the experience players play the game for fun as much as the rest of us do and I do understand how sickeningly boring the umpteenth hundred keep take must be for some players. I’m not asking them to start running workshops on basic realm defence for everyone elses benefit.

Unless they want to, of course.

Most of what is being suggested, is straightforward enough and isn’t going to eat into anyone’s game time, unless communicating really is such a chore for some. While it would be nice if more people in emain, especially the experience high RR players, responded more readily to someone’s request to assist with a keep retake, I can understand the lack of interest. Especially if the getting in emain is good.

But keeptakes happen often enough in Emain and that’s where all the RvR action is, but the level of communication, teamwork between all the groups there (unless it is all the almighty zerg) I think is pretty poor. Thats something that can be improved upon without leaving Emain, if people put their minds to it.

Not trying to tread on anyone's toes here, just trying to make a few suggestions as to how we can improve as a realm. Can't hurt can it?

 

[Flimgoblin]

But keeptakes happen often enough in Emain and that’s where all the RvR action is, but the level of communication, teamwork between all the groups there (unless it is all the almighty zerg) I think is pretty poor. Thats something that can be improved upon without leaving Emain, if people put their minds to it.

Not trying to tread on anyone's toes here, just trying to make a few suggestions as to how we can improve as a realm. Can't hurt can it?

Keeptakes in emain happen when there's a massive emain zerg and nothing to kill , they usually have a grand total of 0 rams and are led by someone who once saw Dun Crauchon when they ran past yelling in caps in the emain cg...

A proper keep assault (cf. Fellowship+SS take over X mid keeps raids or the recent FC+co? (wasn't there so not sure who organised it ) attacks on fensalir) is usually pretty brutal and efficient - the Midgard response to that sort of thing is also very efficient, but they have something to defend

Keep retakes at the moment are usually about getting DF back - which doesn't appeal to many. Leading a big zerg of people to take a keep is hard work - it can be fun and rewarding at times but mostly it's just stress.

People have better things to do these days, unfortunately, than take keeps, and at the end of the day any tactics and such learned from the current keeps (with two doors, indestructable walls, pbaoe through doors/walls, guards who ignore LoS, shrooms on ramparts, tanks hammering doors down in no time at all thanks to faultfinder) are going to be obsolete come New Frontiers anyway (where you can actually sit by a keep wall in relative safety, or stay at range 2500 and pound the wall into dust, ignoring the door completely... easily obtainable, very portable siege, boiling oil so that attacking a door without a ram is suicidal etc.)

Who wants to take 2 hours out of their leisure time to lead a bunch of people who don't listen to you to kill some NPC guards who are no more interesting to fight than the average old world monster and drop almost nothing for loot just to teach these people some tactics that will be obsolete in two months anyway.

I appreciate the sentiment and more power to you if you want to go out and lead some keep retakes, but you'll probably find you need to draw your muscle from those people that haven't taken 100 keeps before and still care about their frontier sans relics (try the newer players, we're all old and jaded )

 

[Gorre]

scouts

 

[xcalibre256]

I aggree that the main lack of interest in keep taking is the complete lack of benefit for all involved. If you roam you have more chance of bumping into da enemy and getting some RP's. Generally when you take a keep you just kill npc's. If you do get enemies to fight it's only 1 or 2 in the inner keep and maybe a group or coming at you from behind, which is bad cuz people aren't paying enough attention to inc and are hurt/lop from fighting the npc defenders, giving the attackers a big advantage.

And then when you do take the keep... woot... you get... ummm... maybe DF, but if you wanted to go PvE you'd go ToA not RvR generally, so the RvR players don't generally want DF for themselves. And the RP reward is just not there, which is why they are in RvR after all.

I think NF will solve the majority of this problem by giving out RP's for taking keeps, and for defending them. And the ability to set up a mini-base in a tower will help too.