Balancing Battlegrounds

There has been some talk on the EQ2 Forums both in PvP circles and elsewhere, in the Beta forums, not to mention EQ2 Flames, with a lot of concerns about how fairness is going to play out in the Battlegrounds. There have been suggestions that people will exploit and game the system as a stepping stone to progress further in raiding. I am not taking sides in this, but so far I am reasonably happy that these issues are being watched like a hawk.

Parts 1 and 2 of what should probably be a 2 part post. 😉

Crabbok posted some ideas regarding the possible exploits of Battlegrounds. I’ve gotten his permission to paraphrase them.

The assumption is, that (in order to acquire powerful gear), players will farm each other, or farm some exploitable aspect of Battlegrounds.   If for example, you get 1 token for every 5 kills, players farming could eaisly get 100 tokens in one battleground, and avoid getting reported by dropping from the Battleground over and over until they find a battleground that consists of all players who know the “secret code”.

• Gentlemen’s Fight Club – Players seek to “take turns” farming each other for battlegrounds currency, with unwritten rules and regulations which cover such an underground league.  Guild A on Unrest, and Guild B on Kithicor for example, might have an arrangement to take turns weeknights at 3 AM farming each other and gear up with fabled BG gear in a short timeframe.
• Pre-Made Teams – Obviously this is the perfect way for people to coordinate and make exploits possible, yet also a necessary device in order to make BG’s fun.  Luckily if you catch someone exploiting, and they have a track record of coming in with the same team, chances are the whole team may be doing the same exploit.
• Secret Code – Another possible situation, if the randomness of team matchups makes it difficult to end up being faced with a specific team, would be a secret code.  If players spread the word that anyone who shouts “MEATBALL” in the Battleground is speaking code, and MEATBALL actually means “Let’s Farm Each Other!”.   If my Secret Code has spread enough, I’ll hear other MEATBALLs in response, or perhaps the code will require them to send me a tell with more code, like “Spaghetti” or something.  Now we know who is cool with us farming each other for kills.
• Fast Games – I’m imagining that all participants in a game will get SOME currency for playing even if they loose.  If this is the case, players will try to find a way to end games as fast as possible.   Maybe Speedhacking on Capture the flag, maybe having everyone but 1 person surrender, and the last guy in game is declared winner by default and gets tokens.

Timetravelling took the time to inform us of safeguards being put in place to prevent such exploits:

• Chat between teams is disabled. Public chatrooms, out-of-character, and shout are all disabled on the Battlegrounds server.

• You can form pre-made groups or raids, but cannot pick the opponent.

• Rewards at this time are set in stone: 3 tokens for winning, 1 for losing. Eventually we definitely want to add some sort of reward for participation–more rewards for trying really hard even if you end up losing–however, scope had to be reigned in for the xpac. Hopefully we’ll be able to return to stuff like this in the near future.

• [There is a] 15min lockout if you leave a BG w/out finishing it. If you wait til it finishes normally, then there is no lockout.

Olihin, PvP developer for EQ2, has this response to concerns that current PvP gear does not have the Toughness effect which operates like Critical Mitigation but against other players.

Those of you wishing to focus on PvP will now want to buy the Mastercrafted Armor that has toughness on it for the enhanced benefits of that attribute. Adding toughness to our current armor would make it unbalanced vs. the rest of the items available.

Changes to resists are also going to make casters more of a challenge, but that will balance itself as players earn their toughness gear. It will definately make those that are not familiar with their class a bit more squishy, but at the same time it will encourage players to work together and more strategicaly when out in the wild.

We will do our best to adjust what we can based on feedback.

Domino reported in with:

There are two sets of crafted armor geared towards Battlegrounds use.

The first set, at level 80, can be crafted by ts level 80+ armorers (plate/chain) or tailors (cloth/leather) who can purchase the recipe book from the faction merchant on the Isle of Mara.  It requires ally faction to purchase.  The armor requires one rare per piece to craft.  (Brellium/Toxnettle root/Spotted pelt).

The second set, at level 90, can be crafted by level 85+ armorers or tailors who can purchase the recipe book from the faction merchant (Purrak) on Kerra Isle.  This faction requires doing a number of new expansion quests for the Kerra, and will be purchasable a minimum of 15 days after the expansion is released (details of these quests can be found in the tradeskill forum).  It also requires one rare per piece to craft.

Rothgar further elaborated:

Critical Mititagion is something that only appears in significant quantities on top-end raid gear and we had no desire to have battleground matches be dominated by raiders due to gear differences. Higher end PvE gear will be somewhat better than lower end PvE gear, but Battleground-specific gear will still be superior to both.

We will continue to work on problem areas in making Battlegrounds fair. Until then, you always have the option to form up and queue as a group. Strategy and communication will always be your biggest asset in a BG match.