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Teamwork: I just don't see it.
Saydien
Member Posts: 266
Correct me if I am wrong but when reading a few bits about GW2 in advance I got the impression that the ability to create combos and work together as a group/team was hyped quite a bit. Now after playing the BWE2 both in PVE and PVP I am rather disappointed with how this game actually plays.
Breaking with the holy trinity is a design decision that definitely is viable. These combos seem to be an attempt to still make people do more than mindlessly spamming their damage spells/skills on the enemies and assist on the same targets. I have NEVER seen that happen though. The combat is too messy in masses to actually even realize what the others are doing.
So yeah... what was hyped as a viable approach to coop/assist play in PVE and PVP for me so far SEEMS to fail due to people actually just spamming their aoe or heavy single target dps skills/spells. Has anyone made other observations? Am I understanding something wrong here?
Comments
Is there actually any major MMO that requires a whole lot of teamwork in the first few days of play?
Even FFXI, a fairly group dependent game, allowed soloing for at least a couple weeks of play. WoW, LotRO, Asheron's Call, Dark Ages of Camelot, CoH, Anarchy Online... every one of them you can get away with a lot of basically solo play in the beginning.
Yes, group fights there's not a whole lot of teamwork so far, but I've had plenty of teamwork on teams of 2-3 people (With friends)
Hard to say how good of a replacement it is until more people are doing dungeons.
Also, once people get more used to the forced-grouping content (Basically dungeons mostly, since sPvP you hardly ever have 5 on 5 fights), that should improve how they act in events. Should.
Hard to tell how much teamwork there is until we get to the parts of the game where more teamwork is required.
from my experience playing beta weekend, there are many situations that you can't survive by just spamming your skills.
I recommend fielding a group of 5 and start doing tournaments. You'll see how much teamwork is required.
I am not sure what you refer to when you say PvP, but there are 3 distinct ones. WvW, random scenario match and tournaments. I think there is no question that in WvW and tournaments that teamwork is key. The teams in random scenarios are too big at the moment and you can't coordinate with anyone so it feels like there is no teamwork.
Not seeing Teamwork is not the same as it's not there. And team work is based on players skills and knowledge on the game. But recognising if its there or not it is really based on experience with the game.
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Try the Tournaments and the Dungeon. That's where you'll find the teamwork.
Yeah and also teamwork comes with many flavors: the very basic one is is resing and alterning between shooting/AoE and melee according to what the people fighting with you are doing. Then there is basic WvW teamwork, with either melee taking down individual targets or range creating a "no man's land" and cutting open the ennemy lines so that the overextended players are easily cut in pieces by the melee guys, or supply management, and on another scale human resources, with commanders or self-proclaimed war-captains asking for reinforcements. The list is long, and it's all great fun right from the start. Which doesn't mean that you don't need more specific synergies later on.
Hyped and fail? were you in a team or just on your own in a battleground? Teamwork and co-ordination are different things, but they are not mutually exclusive , so you may see the latter in a battleground, but you are far less likely to see the former unless you are in a team. Asside from that its a beta, rather obviously most are just playing with skills.
rpg/mmorg history: Dun Darach>Bloodwych>Bards Tale 1-3>Eye of the beholder > Might and Magic 2,3,5 > FFVII> Baldur's Gate 1, 2 > Planescape Torment >Morrowind > WOW > oblivion > LOTR > Guild Wars (1900hrs elementalist) Vanguard. > GW2(1000 elementalist), Wildstar
Now playing GW2, AOW 3, ESO, LOTR, Elite D
It does not make the combos any less viable if people just decide to spamzerg instead trying something more advanced. Only way to make people actually work together by default would be to turn abilities into something that do nothing unless combined with other people. People would have to work together to get anything done and that would suck harder than a blackhole, people often dont like feeling gimped, unable to complete anything on their own.
I've heard people saying SWTOR is a solo/singleplayer game. Sure you can do that, play as singleplayer, but if you decide to do heroic quests and flashpoints you need other people to complete them and you will cash in better rewards. The principle is the same, it's up to the players if they decide to do so or not, to accomplish something more awesome stuff.
I'm pretty sure the harder content in GW2 also requires teamwork, and it's up to players if they choose to use ability combos while doing so or not, and that's the way it should be, up to people how they want to play their game, but reward those more who works harder, -better, -and with more skill, imo.
Use vent.
Read skills.
Read about how combos work.
Coordinate.
I think the issue is that you have an expectation that you are going to be able to get good, solid teamwork in BWE2 from a bunch of randoms. It's an unrealistic expectation.
Have you even tried to coordinate your combos or did you just not try because you were solo the whole time? Have you communicated with anyone about them in game at all?
Here is something to get you started so that you can begin to understand and bring things to the table when you do get around to trying to accomplish some cool things with others.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Cross-profession_combo
Agreed, and the need for teamwork is not really so big in the starting areas anyways.
When you run dungeons a few weeks after launch things will be rather different.
But yeah, the cross proffesion combos might not be the most important form of teamwork anyways, they are just slightly helpful things.
At first I had a lot of trouble figuring out how to put any viable build together as it all just seemed so extremely chaotic no matter what I did, this obviously would also affect a team working together, when I then however went into a structured pvp match and actually started playing together with one of my friends we automatically started helping and supporting eachother without actually having to talk much to eachother as it all did feel sort of "natural" in a sense.
Especially when I tried out the structured pvp, that was absolutely amazing, probably also something to do with that you get all the best items since its a beta, and all the skills, this actually helped me understanding how to put a build together a lot better as I am used to in GW2 compared to when I was lvl'ing, as when I am levelling I always get new stuff and I tend to want to try these things out and usually they don't work very well, and I am just inclined to think: "this skill sucks!" - Where as later I realize that it could actually work really well together with a differen't build I could set up while also having it work together with other players if they are taking advantage of putting down either field combo skills, or using my field combo skills for some sort of synergy with their own skills.
- TLDR:
When lvl'ing I didden't find it all that easy to find the teamwork between players or how to put a proper build together untill I actually tried playing with RL friends of mine as well as trying out structured pvp.
It's very early in the game's history - I suspect most people are still just running around having fun, unlocking weapon skills and seeing what they do, as well as trying lots of different race/class options to see what they like playing. Given some time the majority of players will have a better awareness of combos and experience in how to use them, and there will be more information in the metagame. Then I think we may see some common patterns emerging in random play - rangers looking out for elementalists putting up firewalls to shoot through etc. I think it's just too soon to see this yet.
As previous replies have said, at the moment, use of combos is likely to be seen mainly in more organised groups such as guild parties or friends using ventrilo etc
As for the chaos - one of the things I love best about GW2 (and there is a lot to love about this game) is the way you can run around freely and suddenly find yourself in a large pitched battle with many players in PvE. The fluid, chaotic, riotous nature of these seems very alive and a more 'realistic' representation of battle to me than the more static gameplay I've seen in a lot of other MMOs.
general pve is very zergy in GW2. Dynamic events etc don't need a lot of teamwork. But I found a lot of teamwork when I started playing with only 1 or 2 other players. Suddenly we were helping each other with slowing down mobs, pushing them away from each other etc. And I didn't even try dungeon yet and I guess there you will be forced to play better.