Why Can't We Win a War Zone? Revised 03-27-2012

 

Had an online chat about SWTOR last night. The question posed was "Why can't we win a war zone?" War zones are team player versus player matches.

 

Some of the reasons I shared were comical and psychological. The important ones are behavioral and tactical.

 

Behavioral:

 

In the movies the good guys are the heroes. Ben Kenobi could infiltrate the Death Star solo and complete his mission objective and when he got curb stomped he just became stronger. In SWTOR PvP little could be further from the truth. In the words of an Army Ranger "If you are in a fair fight something has gone very, very wrong."

 

When you approach an objective and it is held by the opponent use your map. It will show you the location of your allies. Do the math. If there are more bad guys than good guys this decision is probably not sound. If there are the same number then it all comes down to tactics. If you out number them then it could very well be you giving the curb stomp and like Santa says it is better to give than receive.

 

Furthermore a enemy avoided is as good as an enemy killed. A historical example of this is the Island Hopping campaign in the Pacific during World War 2. The Allies didn't spend the time and the resources to snuff every soldier or invade every island between Pearl Harbor and Okinawa. They judged which ones were strategically important and concentrated on those.

 

Take your hero hat and fold it up and put it safely in your back pocket, this alone, should advance the cause of your faction in PvP. There is good news though. Sometimes one person doing one special thing at one special time can turn the tide in a match but these are actually rare and most often happen when your tactics are sharp and well practiced and your opponents are lacking.

 

Tactics:

 

Tactics that should be kept in mind are general tactics, role specific tactics and map specific tactics. Tactics are what the winning players have down. It is what makes a war zone map go from a fight to a slaughter.

 

General Tactics:

 

Make sure you are ready to be in a War Zone. Get geared. Buy it, make it, earn it, do anything to have at least green level appropriate gear in every slot. Gear makes a difference. The difference between a 20 in random loot gear versus a 20 in a full PvP commendation set is phenomenal. The difference between a 20 in full PvP gear and a 25 to 35 in random loot could be the edge you need to win a fight. Spend your finances on gearing up. Mount training, for example, never killed anyone. Gear gear gear.

 

Kill the wounded. Given more than one target go for the one that you can finish quickly. Even with one hit point they are still doing full damage. Cull the weak.

 

Focus with your team on one target at a time. Focusing your dps on one target at a time strips the advantages of gear, level, abilities, skill specialization and even pure raw skill. All opponents have tricks to kill you. All opponents have tricks to survive a duel. None of them have any tricks to win a 3 to 1 or 4 to 1 battle. Let curb stomp be your phrase of the day.

 

Explore the newbishness of your opponent. If you are fighting and things are going poorly you have two choices. Fight on or beat feet. Retreat is not a bad thing. Retreat can pull your opponent off of an objective. This is as good as a kill if your team mates are following good map strategy. If you can use your tricks to drag a couple of kill crazy players off the objective and open a hole for your team then your death served a purpose. Anything less than dying to keep an opponent off of an objective or to draw them away from an objective is just feeding them kills.

 

Know what the objectives are for the war zone that you are in. In the Alderaan map, the one with three objectives and the speeder bikes, it is a game of capture the flag. More importantly it is a game of capture the flag and then defend it. In Huttball the objective is to get the ball over the opponent's goal line. The important tools to accomplish this are having the pass the ball icon on your quick bar, passing the ball to other players who are closer to the objective and being a smart curb stomper. For the Voidstar raid map doors are your objective. Fighting anywhere else is helping your opponent win.

 

Be a sneaky healer. Like the punchline of the story of the two campers who were confronted by a bear, "I don't have to outrun the bear, I just have to outrun you." Any time that you can get out of combat use your self heal ability to top off your health and your combat resource. It makes you both a stronger opponent and a less appealing target. Learn the out of the way spots on the map to sneak off to and hide for a quick heal. Learn where the healing power ups are on the map as well. Outrun the stinking bear.

 

Ranged Tactics

 

If you are a ranged attacker use separation as your armor. There is little that a melee character can do to you from 30 meters out. Concentrate on these principles separation, line of sight, elevation, and cover.

 

Separation means the distance between you and your target. Separation in any PvP game is the best armor. Fighting at the edge of your maximum range is the best crowd control. Players can only react to so much stimulus. Be at the edge of your range band and deal damage from there. You will kill more and survive longer.

 

Line of sight means that you have a clear path to the target. An uninterrupted line of fire that allows you do deal damage without having to adjust your position. Especially as a sniper or gunslinger any time spent moving is time spent doing less damage.

 

Elevation is a key to being able to attack without being located or being attacked back. Being at elevation makes opponents make a difficult choice. Should they concentrate on you and ignore the players on the same level or should they ignore you and concentrate on the players at the same level. Use separation and line of sight to make both of these decisions the wrong choice for your opponent.

 

Cover blocks line of sight. Position yourself so that you have good line of sight to your target area but deny ample line of sight to your opponent. Any cover that allows you to be partially hidden but still have an objective area in your line of sight is good cover. If you start taking damage consider moving to a new area with different cover characteristics.

 

Using the principles of separation, line of sight, elevation and cover wisely will increase your ability to contribute to your team as a ranged attacker.

 

Melee Tactics

 

The same principles of separation, line of sight, elevation and cover apply to you as a melee attacker. Furthermore you have an additional principle that ranged attackers are largely denied. Mobility. Most of your attacks will be within a 10 meter range band. You have to use your mobility to maximize the time that an opponent is in your 10 meter range band in order to maximize your damage output. You also need to use your mobility to be able to move to cover to minimize damage from ranged attacks.

 

For example you are in a tight spot and fighting a ranged attacker and a melee attacker. Move to cover from the ranged attacker and draw the melee attacker into cover with you. This will force the ranged attacker to adjust their position to continue attacking you. This forces the ranged attacker to have less time on the target and minimizes their damage. If they reset their position and have a clear shot adjust your position again until you have defeated the melee attacker and can focus on the ranged attacker.

 

Role Specific Tactics:

 

The roles I will discuss are melee dps, tanks, ranged dps, crowd control, and healing.

 

Melee dps:

 

Sell your life for as high a price as possible. Without range and healing your best use is as a human bomb. Pick a target and go off on it. Choose your target intelligently. Cull the weak. If you are effective as a killer, not a fighter but a killer, then you will get rewarded with time to take a heal break. Take advantage of weak targets and targets that do not use their mobility. Count each time you get to use your master strike or ravage on a stationary target as a personal victory. You will die but if you sell your life for a high price, fight on objectives and cull the weak you will find that you will have some fun and be a benefit to your team.

 

Tanks:

 

Follow the rules for Melee dps in general but you have some of the most powerful and deceptive skills in the game. Especially in Huttball and in the Alderaan maps. Tanks in Huttball especially are game changers. Not as ball carriers, unless another tank guards you which is pure wickedness, but in taking the ball from the opponents or midfield, passing to a player with full health and putting guard on them and watching them /lolscore as you speed aoe debuff and slay the pursuit. On the Alderaan maps you and any other class can defend an objective long enough for reinforcements to arrive if you use your taunts and guards. Using these will also rack up more medals for you. I used to play with guard and taunts on my right hand bar and ignore them. After trying these out recently I have my AOE taunt and guard bound where I used to have attacks.

 

Ranged dps:

 

You will shine in Huttball and the Voidstar raid. You will hold objectives on defense and strip hope away from the other team on offense. When you can fight at the outer edge of your range band. Combine this with getting some elevation and you can kill other players not only without drawing heat from them but without them even seeing you. If you have AOE use it to keep the other team off the doors in the data extraction raid. Focus on both the weak and the ball carrier in Hutt ball. I play all classes and both factions in SWTOR pvp. It is no secret that ranged dps are my favorite for any faction. It is because you can play them to great effect if you have sound tactics.

 

Crowd Control:

 

There is some general cc stuff in one of the paragraphs about the Voidstar data core raid. Your cc, especially AOE cc can be used defensively, for escape purposes, or to thin out the resistance to an assault.

 

There are some general rules of thumb for cc as a stealther especially but I think for a general guide that posting a detailed psy-ops guide to cc'ing in pvp would be a post to itself.

 

One thing that I will stress is that your "from stealth only" sleep cc should be the first priority and is especially useful on the Alderaan maps on defense and assault when confronting a single target or a number of targets you and your partner(s) can handle.

 

I would also suggest that you use a sleep before a stun to give your opponent a chance to burn their /pvptrinket ability and waste it and lay in your stun.

 

Furthermore I would suggest that you read Rome-fu's stickied resolve guide here:

 

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=61363

 

Healers:

 

You must be patient. Most players do not have sound tactics. Most players do silly things. As a healer remember it is you who has the power to grant life or death to any player on the map. This includes yourself. Keep yourself upright. How can you heal if you are lying on the ground? Learn your maps. Find spots to be in line of sight for those you are healing but out of line of sight for the opposition. Expect to be focused upon. Rejoice when you are not. Keep your dps and your escape abilities handy on your quick bar. Don't get too focused on either your ability to heal or your ability to do damage. There is nothing to stop you from being a 'selfish' healer. If you are a selfish healer your personal numbers will be awesome but your team will suffer for it.

 

Floor Balance

 

"In raiding and plundering be like fire, in immovability like a mountain." -- Sun Tzu

 

"Disregarding floor balance in SWTOR war zones is like building all of your plants in lane one in Plants vs Zombies and thinking you can pull off a win with sheer talent." -- MC Lovehandles.

 

With the configuration and the objectives in SWTOR war zones the most important tactic to keep in mind to maximize your potential for victory is "floor balance".

 

Floor balance is a basketball term. In basketball it is quite simple. There are 5 players to a team. Look at the defenders. How many are on the left side of the floor? How many are on the right side? Move the ball to the weaker side, penetrate towards the basket. Score.

 

In SWTOR the maximum number of defenders is normally 8 players. There is a bug that, as of this posting, still exists to allow up to 11 players on a team. The dev team has taken steps to fix players from intentionally getting too many on a side but posted in the recent patch notes that teams of greater than 8 can still happen "on accident".

 

We will assume in this post that 8 is your magic number to read for floor balance. You need to use the tools that the game provides to determine the floor balance of your team and the opposing team. Each war zone has different reads for floor balance. I will outline how I use floor blance effectively on both offense and defense on each war zone map to increase my team's chances of winning the game.

 

Voidstar Raid:

 

The key to winning the Voidstar Raid is to be balanced on defense and to be unbalanced on assault.

 

Being balanced on defense means having the door objectives covered with at least two defenders at all times. This takes half of your team to do so. The rest of the team should evaluate the balance of the assault and adjust your location to the side that is taking more heat. Effectively done while playing as a team, setting up in the proper locations and getting a decent amount of healing and the assault will never get through the first set of doors.

 

Being unbalanced on assault means concentrating your efforts on one objective. Since the defense has to cover both objectives to effectively defend having all of your assault on one door means that you will flat outnumber the defense most of the time if you play effectively as a team. It also opens up opportunities to defile the defense. If the defense over-shifts to your active assault side they might leave the weak side under-defended or not defended at all.

 

This is how games get won very quickly. If the defense shifts left and leaves no defenders to the right a good player, stealthers especially, can have the objective popped in 8 seconds. At the end of this 8 seconds you should shift your assault to the weak side to support the capture and to stop attempts at resetting the objective.

 

Even if the defense does not overshift an assault that is unbalanced in the attacking team's favor will lead to a fight where the defense is outnumbered. Focus fire as a team. Set up as close to the door as you can but as far away as you can from the defenders respawn until the defense is eliminated then place a player or two on the door and shift to the pillars close to the defender's respawn to stop defenders getting through to the objective.

 

Once past the first set of doors you have the same game going on with the bridge controls. Get to them as fast as possible. You will have players, on offense and defense, who will break off and start dueling on the way to the next objective. Do not be one of these. Get to the bridge controls and set up your offensive and defensive floor balance again as fast as possible.

 

The key to winning the Voidstar raid on defense is not killing as much as it is delaying the assault team's progress in completing objectives.

 

The key to winning the Voidstar raid on assault is not killing but in minimizing your delay in completing objectives. Indeed killing is important but swift and decisive movement, concentration on objectives and knowing how to use floor balance is just as important if not more important.

 

Alderaan Civil War:

 

This is the primo top priority floor balance map. If your team understands floor balance and your opponents do not then your victory is almost assured.

 

The easiest thing to do is to take an undefended objective. It takes 8 seconds of not being hit. Remind yourself that this is not the same as 8 seconds out of combat. You can take objectives in combat but need an 8 second window of no damage. Sloppy defenders will give you this 8 seconds by leaving the objectives to chase kills, get power ups, pick flowers, chase bunnies or whatever they do. No matter what they do to take them off of the objective after 8 seconds of this poor defense the objective should change hands. Sometimes just looking away for 8 seconds is enough when there is an undetected stealther on the platform. If you are defending an objective always keep the objective in view so that you can toss out an attack to reset a capture attempt.

 

The hardest thing to do is to take one of the side objectives, the east or the west, when it is being controlled by the other faction. If they are playing intelligently then they are communicating in ops chat and defenders at other objectives are shifting and and will reinforce this side objective. Also there are speeder bikes in the respawn that will take players directly from respawn to the objective. This alone can make 2 good players as tough to get off an objective as almost any 5 on assault. With reinforcement from other objectives side objectives are crazy hard to get back after you lose one.

 

The most favorable position to be in on this map is to have both of the side objectives and to have four defenders on each platform. With the respawn bikes alone 4 defenders can keep even all 8 of the other team busy enough to prevent a capture. Many players frown on defense though because they think that their personal numbers suffer. They lack the patience to win.

 

Use floor balance when you need to capture an objective. Visually count the defenders. Check your map to see how many of your allies are moving to the same objective. If that number is about equal you have a good chance if you are fast. You also have a good chance to make the defender shift their defense and open up another objective. Count enemies in sight and count your allies on your map before making an assault. Also communicate where you are going in the ops channel if the assault looks like it has a good chance to be successful because of favorable floor balance.

 

Huttball:

 

Huttball has the most complex floor balance of any of the war zones that currently exist. Left and right, up and down, in front of the ball and behind the ball are all important aspects of floor balance in Huttball.

 

If you are on the extreme left side of the field and the ball is on the extreme right you are not playing Huttball. You are dueling.

 

If you are in your end zone and your team has the ball downfield and trying to score you are not playing Huttball. You are loafing.

 

If you are behind the ball carrier padding your stats instead of getting downfield to receive a pass you are not playing Huttball. You are padding your stats.

 

The great equalizer, the great breaker of floor balance in Huttball is the pass. If there are 4 guys on you and you are at ground level and can make a pass to an ally with good health who is alone on the catwalk you have just removed 4 players from the game with one click of a button.

 

The key floor balance element in Huttball is your position in front of or behind the ball. A team of 8 can kill a ball carrier. Any ball carrier. It is just a matter of time until they stunlock and beat the ball carrier down.

 

If your team has the ball move yourself downfield towards the goal and set up to receive a pass.

 

Get past a fire trap. 3.5k dps fire traps are wonderful for shutting off pursuit.

 

If your team mates are on the ball then there will be one or two of your team mates down field from you. Carry the ball as long as you are healthy and can deal with pursuit. If your health gets low or too many defenders jump you pass the ball.

 

Don't be afraid to pass the ball to an opponent if you are weak. Throw the ball to a weak defender so your team mates can come up, quickly kill them, and take the ball back. It is a dirty trick. It is fun. It hurts people's feelings and that is the point of Huttball.

 

Summary:

 

More than stats. More than gear. More than personal skill and ability. A team of 8 players who understand and use floor balance will walk all over a team of 8 who does not understand and use floor balance.

 

Map Specific Tactics:

 

Alderaan:

 

Sun Tzu on the east and west objectives of the Alderaan Map:

 

"Ground which can be abandoned but is hard to re-occupy is called ENTANGLING.

 

From a position of this sort, if the enemy is unprepared, you may sally forth and defeat him. But if the enemy is prepared for your coming, and you fail to defeat him, then, return being impossible, disaster will ensue."

 

Sun Tzu on the middle objective of the Alderaan Map:

 

"Ground which can be freely traversed by both sides is called ACCESSIBLE.

 

With regard to ground of this nature, be before the enemy in occupying the raised and sunny spots, and carefully guard your line of supplies.

 

Then you will be able to fight with advantage."

 

There is an American football quote. "Great offenses win games but great defenses win championships." On this map a great push can take an objective and ring up some nice personal numbers but if you zerg around in a pack like 6 year olds playing soccer and neglect defense you won't win matches. Even worse if you stubbornly wear your hero hat all the time you will do nothing but feed kills to smart opponents.

 

Use your map to see where your allies are. If you see three guys on an objective and you have no back up you are just feeding the opponents kills and medals.

 

Learn to count. If you have one objective and your opponent has two then keep two players on defense and send out six to the same objective for a quick capture. If the defense is successful then gauge the opposition. If they have six guys there too then there is an objective out there with just two defenders. Be flexible and move as a group but stinkin' learn to count instead of feeding the other team kills. In basketball this is called "floor balance". Learn to use floor balance to help you take objectives and win games. Floor balance is the single most important tactic on the Alderaan map and the Voidstar raid map.

 

Communicate. If you are alone on an objective ask for help to defend it. Smart players will come. You get medals and easy kills on defense. You get to curb stomp lone nuts and guys with a hero complex. If there are multiple foes incoming then shout out in the ops channel that you need help. Also don't keep yourself so preoccupied with fighting and ignore ops chat. Good communication and appropriate reaction can make the fight go like you have extra players on your team.

 

Side objectives. If you die on a side objective go back to it via one of the outside speeder bikes. Two people with their act together who can both kill and die in an intelligent fashion can keep 4 or 5 disorganized opponents busy enough to hold the objective until reinforcements arrive. It is hard to take a side objective if you put a big hurt on someone and die and reinforce to the same spot.

 

Middle objective. The middle objective is hard to take, hard to reinforce but easy to keep. It does allow good access to assaulting or defending either of the side objectives. Perhaps the dev's knew how hard it is to assault the sides and made the map like this on purpose?

 

You can get easy wins with brutal assaults and good defense and effective communication if you take the sides. If you learn not only how to count but how to properly react to enemy force numbers and how to curb stomp and kill the weak then it will be no wonder why and how you dominate this map.

 

Voidstar Raid:

 

Sun Tzu on the Voidstar raid:

 

"When the position is such that neither side will gain by making the first move, it is called TEMPORIZING ground.

 

In a position of this sort, even though the enemy should offer us an attractive bait, it will be advisable not to stir forth, but rather to retreat, thus enticing the enemy in his turn; then, when part of his army has come out, we may deliver our attack with advantage."

 

This raid is strongly ingrained in the French language. "Je t'adore" means "I love you (because you are fighting at the door)". "Je te déteste" means "I dislike you (because you are not fighting at the door)".

 

Who is the hottest blonde who ever lived? Diana Dors. You love doors. You love them on assault as they are your keep to rapid victories. You love them on defense because they are demoralizing barriers of rejection to your opponent. Doors, doors, doors. Love them doors. Don't you love her madly? Jim Morrison … The Doors.

 

Defense. Be a smart player. Learn to count. If there are 7 guys from your team on one door don't be and idiot and make it 8. Try to balance your force. Keep at least two on each door at all times to focus attacks and cull the weak.

 

Melee. If you are melee your primary job is to keep folks off the doors. Your secondary job is to use your mobility and find nasty ranged players set up in smart places and eliminate them.

 

Ranged. If you are ranged your primary job is to keep folks off the doors. Your secondary job is to find smart places to set up and be nasty.

 

Healer. As a healer it is your job to make your team seem invulnerable. Even better is to just flat make it invulnerable.

 

Know where the power ups are on the map. Know if they are up. Use them if you or your team needs them. Use them if you or your team doesn't need them to deny them to the enemy.

 

Save your crowd control for people trying to chat up your door. Save your, pardon the phrase, pvp trinket to protect your door.

 

Ranged and healers should set up blocking line of sight from the enemy reinforcement area and keep your own reinforcement area at your back. Any smarty who wants to bring an end to your magnificent kill numbers must do so at their peril and with your reinforcement area to their back.

 

In short this means left shoulder to the pillar and back to your spawn on the left side. Right shoulder to the pillar and back to the spawn on the right side. If your melee does its job killing pesky ranged guys and your healers do their job and keep you alive you will be 10 feet tall and bullet proof; you will also keep your team alive through covering the melee and the healers.

 

Once you have killed all the opponents take a count of how many team mates are in the area. If there are enough for defense check the other door. If they are fine come back to middle and deploy to where you are needed.

 

Melee should pick a door and 'own' it. Ranged and healers should be flexible and move to where there is pressure from the enemy.

 

If the opponent places a charge on a door you should seriously consider dying to defuse the bomb. This may suck for you personally but if your team is playing smart your defense will hold.

 

If, despite your brilliant play, a door is breached get to the next set of doors. Cull the weak along the way. Take a heal when you can get one either from a power up or from getting out of combat. If you can't heal then sell your life for the best price you can. Sacrifice yourself to delay enemy progress to give your team time to recover.

 

On defense a delay is as good as a kill. With your mighty defense, team work and mad skills no one should ever get past the first door.

 

Attacker. Be a smart player and learn to count. If there are 7 guys from your team on one door be smart and make it 8. Screw balance. Make the defense adjust to you.

 

Melee. If you are melee your primary job is to kill your way to the door. Focus on ranged players. One trooper or bounty hunter left alive can keep a whole team off of a door. One agent or smuggler ignored can demolish your whole team. Mobility and separation are the best defense against melee players. Being 4.1 meters away from another melee player is awesome. The same is not true of ranged. If there is one within 35 meters they are a threat to your hopes of victory as either an individual or a team.

 

Ranged. Set up so that you have the door in line of sight. Set up so that you cut yourself off from your reinforcement area. Idiots will fight in the area between cover and your reinforcement area. Don't let idiots get ideas to come after you by seeing you do your job. Also if opponents are in that area they will see their doom soon enough and cannot distract you from your job. The job of covering the door is so that melee can place charges and so you can keep entire teams off the task of defusing the charge with your AOE abilities.

 

Healer. As a healer it is your job to make your team seem invulnerable. Even better is to just flat make it invulnerable. If you are a trooper or bounty hunter then you have the secondary job of using your aoe to assure a breach. As an agent or a smuggler use your aoe to assure a breach. An 8 second delay is as good as a handful of kills. As a force user hang back and resist the urge to force sweep to assure the breach unless it is absolutely necessary. Hang back and pop your force speed at the time of the breach to sprint to the next objective before the other team can recover.

 

If, because of your brilliant play, the door is breached haul donkey to the next one. The best time to breach a door is when your opponents are in a state of disarray or locked up in respawn.

 

Huttball:

 

Sun Tzu on Huttball:

 

"With regard to PRECIPITOUS HEIGHTS, if you are beforehand with your adversary, you should occupy the raised and sunny spots, and there wait for him to come up.

 

If the enemy has occupied them before you, do not follow him, but retreat and try to entice him away.

 

If you are situated at a great distance from the enemy, and the strength of the two armies is equal, it is not easy to provoke a battle, and fighting will be to your disadvantage."

 

I used to play basketball. I went to a camp hosted by a legendary high school coach. "The key to basketball is penetration." This is also the key to Huttball.

 

Penetration is moving the ball towards the goal. As in basketball the most efficient way to do this is to PASS THE STINKIN' BALL.

 

Make sure you have the hot key to pass the huttball on your quick bar. Passing when you are being swarmed is nice. Passing and getting penetration down the floor before you get swarmed is nicer. Pass to penetrate down the field and not in vain hopes to save yourself.

 

The secondary key to Huttball is owning the catwalks. As a melee or ranged or healer you can best serve your team by owning the catwalks. Use your push back abilities to clear the catwalks of foes. A foe in the pit or at ground level when you or your team have the ball on the catwalk is as good as a kill.

 

Also be mindful of moving past hazards to provide your ball carrier an outlet pass that will provide penetration towards the goal. Nothing is more frustrating than having the ball and have no one to pass the ball off to because the team is chasing bunnies on the sidelines.

 

Your third job is to sell your life for as much as possible. If you can drop the opposing ball carrier and get the ball back for your team you have denied the opponents progress and have aided your team to victory. If you are about to die and can get three idiots to chase you into the pit because they are hungry for the kill then you have served your team.

 

Don't forget to heal from objectives or self heals when you can. Basic tactical rules are still in effect.

 

There are many strategies and abilities that you can bring to bear in Huttball but the two key things are penetration and owning the catwalks. If you are playing Huttball with nothing in your mind but racking up kills then you are of poor service to the efforts of victory and a handicap to your team.

 

I cannot stress enough the use of tanks guarding and taunting in Huttball. The ability to give your health to enable another player to complete a team objective is a very tankish behavior and beneficial to a team win. Taunting also helps you rack up protection medals. One good AOE taunt can get you your 2k protection on one life badge as well as adding to your total over all badge count.

 

Why Can't We Win in the War Zones?

 

Not reading this and not practicing good tactics are a good start down the road of constant defeat.

 

--m.

 

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Edited March 28, 2012 by mclxviii

This thread should be mandatory reading before anyone is allowed to play PvP Warzones.

I think you should change the title. It makes it sound like a whine thread.

Nice writeup!

Well said. Thank you for spending the time to write this up.

 

I had to log out in frustration last night after entering a pug huttball match that was already in progress and down by 2 with 10 min left. More than enough time to catch up and win right? I grabbed the ball, looking for someone to pass it to, no one, my entire team was behind me going for their kills. Needless to say I died quickly, all I could do was jump down into the pit to make it harder for the other team.

While in the respawn cage, the other team scores again, they ran from their pit all the way for the score, not once being engaged. as my entire team is on the opposite side of the map, oblivious.

Upon release, I run for the middle, the opposing team grabs the ball again, being a PT BH, I yank him into the acid and stun him, then do my 1-2-3 pyro rotation, and take the ball. I get up onto the cat walks while taking heavy fire, finally, I have a teammate, sorceror, ahead of me after the fire trap,as I go to pass, he force pulls me through the fire and kills me. The military term for this is fratricide.

While once again I am in the respawn cage, I watch in awe as my team has finally learned to pass the ball. They just happen to be passing the ball backwards, towards our own goal line. Helpless, I watch the last teammate to receive the ball die, on our goal line, giving the other team an easy score.

After that, being down by 5, half the team logs out, making it too easy for the other team to make the final score and end the match.

 

I sincerely hope, that those on my pug team can read and learn from what you have written above.

There should be a mandatory 10 question multiple choice quiz on what you wrote before anyone queues for WZs.

Great post, thanks

1. When facing multiple opponents alone you should:

 

A) Heft your mighty sword and get to choppin'.

B) Hum the Carmina Barata like Conan does.

C) Rethink your priorities and move elsewhere.

 

2. When playing Huttball you should pass the ball when:

 

A) Ball what ball?

B) Never. No one can survive my double pump head fake.

C) When you see an ally downfield in an advantageous position.

 

3. On the Civil war map which objectives are easier to reinforce:

 

A) We need more folks to rush middle.

B) I lurk in the tunnel mostly.

C) The east and west objectives when held by your team.

 

4. AOE is best used where on the data core raid?

 

A) To knock people off the bridges.

B) To assault and defend doors.

C) All of the above.

 

5. According to the band 'Right Said Fred' where should you be in Huttball.

 

A) I don't listen to dance music.

B) *SLOBBER* MUST KILL !!!1!!!1 lLoneone!1!

C) On the catwalk. On the catwalk.

 

6. When you outnumber people rushing the objective what dance move do you suggest?

 

A) The Cabbage Patch.

B) The forbidden dance of love, The Lambada.

C) The Curbstomp

 

7. Who should you kill first?

 

A) The guy in the cool looking gear.

B) That hot looking Twilek.

C) The opponent with the fewest hit points.

 

8. Who should attack the person you should kill first?

 

A) Dude I am still on that guy with the cool gear.

B) That Twilek in the slave girl outfit is SSOOO HAAAWWT!!

C) Everyone within 35 meters of the objective.

 

9. Would you rather be a Rotworm or a Frogdog?

 

A) What's the point spread this week?

B) Which one is ahead?

C) Which team is penetrating and using passes more?

 

10. Who is the hottest blonde who ever lived?

 

A) Roseann Barr.

B) Chuck Barris.

C) Diana Dors.

Edited February 3, 2012 by mclxviii

Too bad the baddies don't read these forums, which makes all of this pointless :\

I play both factions and invite either faction to use these tactics or even better tactics like voice comms, target calling and coordinated team play.

 

It was written because I have heard both factions frustration at not being able to win in the war zones. It is not impossible.

 

It is only impossible if you and your teammates are 'wrong-headed' about basic tactics.

Please add the bit about getting ahead of the ball.

You cant move forward with a pass if there no one ahead to pass to.

 

Defending the ball carrier is not as important as giving the ball carrier an out.

Added:

 

"Also be mindful of moving past hazards to provide your ball carrier an outlet pass that will provide penetration towards the goal. Nothing is more frustrating than having the ball and have no one to pass the ball off to because the team is chasing bunnies on the sidelines."

 

due to your suggestion.

 

Thank you.

Man ...

 

Tactics of no real use now at least in Huttball.

 

Just watched my first match with a wall/speed hacker. They scored within about 2 seconds of the game start and were outside deployment 90 sec before game start just waiting to stick a toe over the line.

 

Then less than 15 sec later they had scored again.

 

Dear SWTOR, please don't go all APB on me. I don't think my heart could take it.

Edited February 4, 2012 by mclxviii

Constructive posts like this is such a breath of fresh air to these forums. Thank you for your well thought out input! I really wish this was a sticky.

tl:dr

 

Last time some one posted what you posted, they got a warning. Have you been warned yet?

 

On topic: In my mind its simple, PvP skill is not positively motivated in this game -as in increasing it as a player. PvP servers are designed in such a way players who could care less about PvP feel at home. That is just wrong.

Edited February 4, 2012 by Cempa

Thanks for the positive feedback. I am a retired procedure writer and active mmo junky.

 

Often the two come together and make posts like this possible.

 

--m

2. When playing Huttball you should pass the ball when:

 

B) Never. No one can survive my double pump head fake.

 

If you're talking street legends, you gotta bring up a guy called Lamar Mundane....

I liked the use of, "Cull the weak."

Probably worth a second bump.

 

And come on? No bites on Lamar Mundane?!?

When I was young our Lamar Mundane was "Bob Hussey". I played college football and a couple of us were in on the joke. We had invented Bob one afternoon at practice.

 

Bob could do anything. I guess he was our Chuck Norris too. The most common reference was "Bob Hussey can bench press 550 ... with a pause." That meaning he could drop the wait to his chest, pause and release his muscle tension, and pop it back up. A feat I don't think could be done but we got hundreds of guys to believe it over the next 5 years.

 

It was a couple of decades before google and quite a lot of fun.

Thats a lot of text to say: Republic is sentinel/guardian heavy while empire is sorc/merc heavy.

While I will never claim to be 'pro' (makes me feel icky just to type it). I do think that any AC is viable and fun in PvP. I have at least one of each AC spread across the multiple servers that I play on and I primarily play PvP.

 

I play melee. I play ranged. I heal. I have a lot of fun and kill a lot with my melee. I feel, especially with my commando, that I can have more of a control of the outcome of the game and it doesn't really matter what spec.

 

I play different toons and specs and enjoy the different feels of each AC. Not a fan of any one in particular even though BH and Trooper types work quite well for my style of play. I don't have great twitch skills and big armor and range give me time to react versus twitchy players.

 

The gist of the article isn't to promote one class over another or even really one play style over another.

 

The gist of the article is to provide a baseline of sound tactical ideas and concepts so that people will play in a way that promotes team performance over purely individual play.

 

One of my favorite thinkers is John Nash. He won a Nobel Prize in economics for his work in game theory.

 

What his Nobel Prize boiled down to was that even if you play perfectly as an individual, and really who does, that the only way to perform better is to cooperate.

 

That is the gist and spirit of the post.

Man ...

 

Tactics of no real use now at least in Huttball.

 

Just watched my first match with a wall/speed hacker. They scored within about 2 seconds of the game start and were outside deployment 90 sec before game start just waiting to stick a toe over the line.

 

Then less than 15 sec later they had scored again.

 

Dear SWTOR, please don't go all APB on me. I don't think my heart could take it.

 

Were you in that match, too? Lol...some ******* did exactly that, but was banned 45 min later.

I was in one (/speed & /position hacker game) the other night on Zhar Lestin then I cruised youtube and found videos of other speed hackers on other servers. I guess they have less of a /wall hack as a /position hack where after using their /speed hack they can tp back to the center of the court and pick up the ball again. I am guessing that this /position hack is what got the guy outside of the deployment cage before the game started.

 

Earlier in the week I saw my first consular/sorcerer speed burst through a flame trap with the ball and live. I thought nothing of it though until I saw a cranked up speed hacker burst through multiple fire traps with the ball and began to wonder.

 

I watched one of the videos direct from a /speedhack maker on youtube who suggested that you keep the hack on but keep it at a level of about 10 to 20% so as not to draw attention to yourself. I know there are skill choices and combat forms that give you speed buffs and bursts but I now scratch my head more when someone flat outruns me in a match.

 

I know that there are a lot of snare abilities but sometimes I just wonder.

 

*****

 

Have seen a lot of smarter play in Huttball over the last couple of days.

 

Cool behaviors and tactics include:

 

Camping a stealther on the platform of the goal and running to the pit and passing to them when in range. Very hard to defend against in a PUG. People don't like the pit and solo stealthers are hard to detect unless you have a couple of people actively playing in a goalie spot. This is a strong coordinated strat that takes good cooperation at least and voice chat probably to pull off well.

 

Even if you do have people snooping for stealthers in a goalie spot that leaves you vulnerable to force leap ball carriers. The stealther and passer combo is a lot more reliable pit strategy than the force leap from the pit or even force leap from the catwalks.

 

This tactic would also work well with a force pull but a solo stealther has more survival than a consular or sorc standing about in the goal area solo and loitering for a passer to get the ball to the pit for the force pull goal.

 

The second strat that I saw depends on getting a couple of goals ahead of the other team and then climbing up onto the platforms on the side and stalling to collect kills. Very frustrating to counter when pugging a war zone when your team is scattered all over the map and a ball carrier and a healer have a distinct z-axis, range, and line of sight advantage.

 

I wouldn't call either of these tactics, stealther camping and platform stalling. an exploit. They are smart (if annoying in the second case) tactics that are rather hard to defend against.

 

*****

 

Popular civil war map strats last night are as follows:

 

Republic was sending 1 person west and the rest rushing middle. For the first game or two of the night this was effective.

 

Empire started rushing 6 west and 2 east and then converging on middle. They got quite a few three caps and punished us a lot mainly because we stuck to the same strat every game for several games in a row.

 

The way that I feel that we could have improved is to have sent 2 to west and then checked middle and been more fluid. Two people can hold a side objective long enough for reinforcements to come. One person usually can just holler in ops and be a speed bump at best.

 

Some games the Empire skipped any rush at middle at all, curb stomped our west and let us have mid and stomped the slow streams of ones and twos trying to assault the sides.

 

I was playing a scoundrel and had to be very sneaky and put the gotcha on sloppy defenders and do a lot of solo stealth capturing which is difficult because you have to rely on having no more than one or two defenders who were sloppy, inattentive and overly aggressive.

 

We also played a lot of games outnumbered 6 to 8 at times. We had one where we played very well and though we lost it was down to the last 25 points. We did win one outnumbered with a last minute solo stealth capture.

 

I didn't listen to my own advice and pulled my hero hat out of my back pocket and hopefully taught some Empire players the importance of fighting and guarding the platform and not leaving it to chase an easy kill.

 

There is great importance to fighting on the platform on the east and west objectives. It gives you clear line of sight versus your opponents and enables your ranged and healers to support you with a clear line of sight. It also eliminates sneaky stealth captures.

 

When I am playing a stealther and you leave to platform for at least 8 seconds that objective is MINE. Period. End of paragraph.

 

I got about three or four solo stealth captures last night. One in combat and the rest when people left the platform to go chase bunnies. I plan on playing my Republic stealther again tonight. I will do my best to make sloppy defenders pay for their lack of judgement.

 

Once again I do not favor one faction over the other. I have an agent on another server that once I level it up high enough to be able to /sap I will teach some Republic players the error of leaving the platform as well.

Edited February 6, 2012 by mclxviii

You should use the word "Roflstomp" instead of Curb stomp.

 

Great post btw!