Given the dynamic changes of content (such as the simple fact that increasing the enrage timer on Kephess substantially lowers the overall difficulty) and the fact that Kephess is the most difficult encounter on NiM by far (equating that fight to Vorgath is nonsensical in itself) this static mathematical calculation makes this ranking system nothing but pointless pastime. Raiding does not take place in a mathematical vacuum, especially in the inexperienced realm of SWTOR.

 

Whichever guild killed Kephess on 16m first is the best, that's the only ranking that should be obvious to anyone whose logic is not limited to static calculations at the level of primary school.

I'm glad we agree that this is nothing but a stupid pasttime to keep rankings. I will repeat the notion that if someone chooses to say that rankings are purely based off the order in which the guilds completed a full clear - they are welcome to do that - and my tracking system will provide that information to them. You are perfectly allowed to have your own opinion.

My only point is that we determined the two ranking systems that I keep track of prior to the content being released. It would be unfair of me to go back and change the way those ranking systems worked now.

On a separate note, I would like to point out that the two systems I track were to account for the former complaints on the HM TFB runs. One is weighted to the latter kills and the other is not. The controversy here is that Ace took their time getting started , but went through the content very quickly. FF got a really fast start, but took their time to finish off kephess (and I talk to them and know why that was; they are a very good guild, they essentially took a long break).

I honestly believe both Ace and FF are deserving of being ranked #1. These are merely tracking systems, how you decide to interpret the data is up to you.

Whatever Krewel says about FriendlyFire is personal, so most of his arguments are invalid.

The only thing that's invalid here is the ranking system that equates Vorgath with Kephess (the very idea is an abomination), doesn't take into account two major nerfs to both Tanks and Kephess, and doesn't know racing 101, meaning whoever crosses the finish line first wins (a simple logic known to any 10-year old). If you had actually bothered to read what I wrote you would see my issue with the whole "structure" of this questionable system ... so, who's being personal now? And besides, it was Elidhu himself who raged about Kephess and the whole world first race being entirely irrelevant after the nerf (didn't he say he was going to quit until the expansion?) - check your own shoutbox from time to time.

The only thing that's invalid here is the ranking system that equates Vorgath with Kephess (the very idea is an abomination), doesn't take into account two major nerfs to both Tanks and Kephess, and doesn't know racing 101, meaning whoever crosses the finish line first wins (a simple logic known to any 10-year old). If you had actually bothered to read what I wrote you would see my issue with the whole "structure" of this questionable system ... so, who's being personal now? And besides, it was Elidhu himself who raged about Kephess and the whole world first race being entirely irrelevant after the nerf (didn't he say he was going to quit until the expansion?) - check your own shoutbox from time to time.

Finish the operation the quickest isnt always the best way to show on whos the "best" guild. When we had our best 16 people online, we took 3 world firsts. After that people started to leave and we basically had to build a new team with new people before we could finish off Kephess, and now when we had a proper team we, i would say, easily killed him. With the team we had i think we would have killed him before the nerf too. But i give huge props to Ace for having all 16 people with enough dedication to kill it, which clearly we didnt have.

I agree, the area that Ace exceeds in and should be massively praised for is the ability to continuously occupy a 16-man raid team throughout progress.

Ace deserved world first because they were the only competative guild strong enough to keep attendance high throughout.

The hardest part about all of EC NiM was trying to maintain attendance enough to raid 16-man. I wouldn't be wrong if i said that we(FriendlyFire) had to cancel or downsize about 75% of our raids since the content was released.

We are in the process of strengthening our numbers and stockpiling for the new content, whenever it may be. We won't be making the same shortcomings with attendance that we did this time around.

I urge all 16-man guilds to do the same. Don't give up and drop to 8-man. Put in the extra effort to recruit on your appropriate servers and keep the 16-man progress race a worthwhile challenge.

As stated above, ranking systems cannot please everyone. The challenge will be to dominate the race from all aspects without contestation.

FriendlyFire will be ready....will you?

1. This whole topic is a storm in a puddle, as only 15-20 guilds doing 16 men raids Worldwide. Bioware should cancel alltogether the whole 16 men raiding. There isnt enough player to support 16 men raiding, not with the current player numbers.

2. Theres only 1 guild killed Kephess prenerf, so why is there a debate at all whos the world first in this irrelevant contest? The other 3 boss is a joke, comparing them, even mathematically, to Kephess is a joke.

Gratz for FF for the kill guys, too bad i couldnt watch the stream last night as we were raiding that time.

I have to say that I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw this ranking.

The way it is made makes us...stunned. Well, after all, why not ?

As for me, I will simply... ignore it.

I just want to make sure that it is not perceived as an "official" ranking, because it's not, as it's not approved by all guilds nor all players. The parameters taken into account are yours. They wouldn't necessarily be ours.

It's also a shame that Bioware has nerfed the fight.

To answer FriendlyFire's member Elidhu, we'll do everything we can to get ready =)

It's a pleasure to compete with such talented players.

Friendly,

Qualem.

Shouldn't Ace get bonus points for not only doing kephess first, but also accomplishing Warstalker in 16m? something no other guild has accomplished? Just sayin...

I'm a sniper for Ace know as "Metos" IG.

I d'ont care about the warstalker or not and have a bonus point for it. Juste because Warstalker is a joke now.

Zorn & Toth is pretty easy. And, after the Tanks, the rest is a joke. Vorgath is ridiculous... and Kephess isn't so hard anymore (I will talk about it later)

This week we made kephess with a deconnection of one of our Main Tank while another had a graphic bug and can't focus nor see Kephess when he appeared, we had some casual members with us that died... but we killed him easily!!!

That's not the same fight at all... Kephess is weak now!

I mean, comparing with what he was when we killed him... now, he's a joke!

I heard the critics about our waitings during the first down... waiting for the CDs came up. That's the mecanic dudes... It was impossible before the nerf to kill Kephess without that! Just open your eyes.

I congrat all the guys that had down Kephess after us. But, its clearly not the same Kephess since he was nerfed!

We tried hard on Kephess, so much tries... he was really hard, but it's because he was hard that we fought him so intensively! Some people of ours spent hours and hours analysing this fight, trying to find the secrets and keys of this boss.

We talked for hours, nights after nights, watching our videos, the battles... where we could gain dps or time, then we tried our tricks and tips during the next night.

Searching how to kill the bomber in a better way, how to dps the Walker a maximum, how was the best things to do for every thing. We played hours and hours on Kephess before the down. But, we spent so many time too in analyzing this fight.

And all of this was streamed! Every guild could have access to our videos, could have our strats and see that we were waiting for CDs to came back up.

I think that's a lack of respect to made us 3rd.

We are the only guild that really killed Kephess... and that wasn't a stroke of luck at all, we killed him and killed him again BEFORE the nerf. Who else?

Who else was abble to kill Kephess before... who did it?

Who else can say "I cleaned EC Nightmare before 2013" ?

The weak of the apparition of EC Nightmare, the server was down till 22h for us. And we just played another night after.

Ok, we stay a lot on the tanks, our bad. But the other guilds can kill kephess 4 weeks after us... and a "nerfed" Kephess and have so much points that we become 3rd?

That's clearly a joke!

And I'd like to bring at your attention that Ace wasn't on the PTS!

Some guilds were quicker than us for Zorn & Toth, then Firebrand and Stormcalled or Vorgath too... but maybe thay had an access on PTS that we hadn't!!!

I think we could have been really quicker if we had played on PTS too...

Yes, in order to kill Kephess, we had "delayed"... but is it a cheat? NO!

Did we even tried to exploit bugs like the Dark Malgus Statue? NO!

Did we cheated or tried to? No

We used all the regular mecanics of fight... and it was clearly impossible to own Kephess without before this nerf.

All the fight was done according to the state of the art.

Make us 3rd is, in my opinion, a real joke and a huge lack of respect. Sorry to say.

I really don't want to do a lack of respect to other guilds that killed Kephess after us. Again, all my congrutaltions my friends... But we all know that Kephess isn't the same anymore and we tried so hard to kill him to see that ranking now... that's really not fair.

This was a couple of weeks ago, but I forgot to post.

Guild: Catalyst

Server: POT5

Boss: Zorn & Toth

Difuclty: Nightmare

Raid size: 16 man

SS: http://i.imgur.com/lbJI1.jpg

Make us 3rd is, in my opinion, a real joke and a huge lack of respect. Sorry to say.

I think you <Ace> guys are honestly putting more stock in these 2 ranking systems than you should. Everyone that cares has seen your video and knows that <Ace> was the guild to kill Kephess as originally designed, and those of us that also spent nights crunching numbers respect you for finding the tricks to the fight and most importantly, executing them. These rankings' most important feature is that they track the progression and organize the kills. The point system is obviously just a way to show a basic ordering. There's no need to request adjustments or put down the maintainers of the threads. If you're of the mindset that all that matters is the final boss, then you don't need a ranking system

Make us 3rd is, in my opinion, a real joke and a huge lack of respect. Sorry to say.

Anyone who knows what NiM Kephess means has an immense amount of respect for your accomplishment, both the fact that you got world first, *and* that you did it pre-nerf. I wouldn't take the rankings too much to heart. At this point, it's really too late to change the ranking system. It was debated and tacitly agreed to prior to anyone clearing the content; changing it now wouldn't be fair to anyone.

Here's where I stand: Ace is on top, in my book. You guys cleared the content when it was nearly unbeatable, and you did it before anyone else. I suspect most of the community will see it that way. That's not meant as a slight to Friendly Fire; their kill is very impressive, and he fact that they got T&Z, the tanks and Vorgath first is not to be ignored, but Ace won the race.

I think you <Ace> guys are honestly putting more stock in these 2 ranking systems than you should. Everyone that cares has seen your video and knows that <Ace> was the guild to kill Kephess as originally designed, and those of us that also spent nights crunching numbers respect you for finding the tricks to the fight and most importantly, executing them. These rankings' most important feature is that they track the progression and organize the kills. The point system is obviously just a way to show a basic ordering. There's no need to request adjustments or put down the maintainers of the threads. If you're of the mindset that all that matters is the final boss, then you don't need a ranking system

So we shouldn't have to take care about an unfair ranking system ? So why does it exist ? For what purpose if it does not reflect reality ?

I'll just say that we didn't have the PTS to try the boss before the official release, nor we use some bugs exploit as we saw in some logs on TORParse. We do not blame anyone, after all, why not ?

It's indeed a controversial topic. But after all we did to achieve this first down of EC 16 men NiM, understand that we are a bit disappointed to be considered only 3rd...

It doesn't matter if it's 8 man or 16 man, there's Nightmare EC, and then there's Nightmare Kephess. It would be wise not to mix the two up. Ace won at Nightmare Kephess in a manner that can't be replicated due to the nerf. Putting Friendly Fire ahead of them in any sort of guild ranks would be the same as putting CKN ahead of Friendly Fire because they cleared TFB HM first.

With that said, Friendly Fire impressively downed the tanks first before that fight got nerfed, and anyone who downs Nightmare Kephess in 8 or 16 man has my outright respect, though more so for a 16 man kill.

I'm a sniper for Ace know as "Metos" IG.

I congrat all the guys that had down Kephess after us. But, its clearly not the same Kephess since he was nerfed!

 

[...]

 

I think that's a lack of respect to made us 3rd.

 

[...]

 

Ok, we stay a lot on the tanks, our bad. But the other guilds can kill kephess 4 weeks after us... and a "nerfed"

 

[...]

 

Make us 3rd is, in my opinion, a real joke and a huge lack of respect. Sorry to say.

Cut some out to focus on the main points.

I have now said this twice but will say it a third time.

These rankings are a TRACKING system that was set MONTHS before the content was released. THERE CANNOT BE A SHOWING OF DISRESPECT WHEN IT IS ENTIRELY UNBIASED.

I did not set these rankings, these rankings are automatically set by time of kill.

I'll say it again ... I consider Ace to be the best guild in the world right now ... I am judging this through my ability to analyze all the data given - namely your timing on the kephess kill. Just because your overall ranking, which was automatically set due to the timing of your first 3 kills, is lower, doesn't make me view you as anything less than best anyway.

Do you need a hug or what?

By the way, the only nerf on kephess was 30 seconds longer on enrage (i realize this is a big nerf) but that is not the entirety of the fight. You must also realize that you spent a lot of time perfecting your kill, of course the fight is going to get easier the more you do it.

Cut some out to focus on the main points.

 

I have no said this twice but will say it a third time.

 

These rankings are a TRACKING system that was set MONTHS before the content was released. THERE CANNOT BE A SHOWING OF DISRESPECT WHEN IT IS ENTIRELY UNBIASED.

 

I did not set these rankings, these rankings are automatically set by time of kill.

 

I'll say it again ... I consider Ace to be the best guild in the world right now ... I am judging this through my ability to analyze all the data given - namely your timing on the kephess kill. Just because your overall ranking, which was automatically set due to the timing of your first 3 kills, is lower, doesn't make me view you as anything less than best anyway.

 

Do you need a hug or what?

 

By the way, the only nerf on kephess was 30 seconds longer on enrage (i realize this is a big nerf) but that is not the entirety of the fight. You must also realize that you spent a lot of time perfecting your kill, of course the fight is going to get easier the more you do it.

There"s not only 30 seconds longer but 90 !!!

And, as I said, we weren't abble to play on PTS...

But if you want to hug me, it's possible I guess...

There"s not only 30 seconds longer but 90 !!!

And, as I said, we weren't abble to play on PTS...

 

But if you want to hug me, it's possible I guess...

My mistake on that.

My point is, saying that I am disrespectful by doing the community a favor and keeping track of all these kills doesn't just make me feel bad, it makes me not want to keep tracking the information...

The point of the dual system was to reduce the complaining from the last tier of content, but clearly the system needs to be refined yet again for the next tier. If all the guild leaders of the top 10 guilds want to get together and make a decision on how to appropriately track the information in the future, i would be amenable to that. I am not, however, going to change the current tracking system now.

*hug*

My mistake on that.

 

My point is, saying that I am disrespectful by doing the community a favor and keeping track of all these kills doesn't just make me feel bad, it makes me not want to keep tracking the information...

 

The point of the dual system was to reduce the complaining from the last tier of content, but clearly the system needs to be refined yet again for the next tier. If all the guild leaders of the top 10 guilds want to get together and make a decision on how to appropriately track the information in the future, i would be amenable to that. I am not, however, going to change the current tracking system now.

 

*hug*

Actually... I thing you just wanted that hug

Actually... I thing you just wanted that hug

Jeesh I kinda do. Sucks to be ragged on when you think you are doing something good. It wouldn't bother me if I didn't actually respect Ace

Some of the responses in this thread make me wish my guild could field a 16m team again. I thought the competition in this game was dead, but obviously I was wrong. It may be greatly diminished but there are obviously still some competitive guilds worth racing here. Good job on your kills guys and lets see if bioware will implement their own system to rank guilds on progression.

Make the effort, it's definitely worth it! The 16 man community in this game is the friendliest i've seen and we would love to have more people join us

PTS has been brought up a few times, and for clarity I think it should be noted that the fights went untested on the PTS for 16m. No guild did it. That's how a fight like pre-nerf Kephess made it into the game in the 1st place as I seriously doubt it was an intentional mechanic to essentially pause the game for CDs to come back up.

Yeap, no one got on the pts to test it as far as I know