The Phoenix Gate

Andy wrote:

We've mentioned in previous posts that we are considering and open to adjusting the rulesets of various Scenarios for our Weekend Warfront events. These adjustments may come in the form of total ruleset changes or, in the case of this weekend's Warfront: Battle at the Gate, in the form of small tweaks.

This weekend you'll notice that we've made a small adjustment to the Phoenix Gate Scenario. Player kills will no longer count toward Scenario Win points. In order to accrue points for the Scenario win, players will have to successfully capture their enemies flag at either their Capture point near the friendly flag (150 pts) or at the Bridge Drop Off point when it is available (25 pts).

This small change will have a noticeable impact on the way that the Phoenix Gate Scenario is played. We believe that this will focus players more on the objectives if they wish to maximise their rewards and be a refreshing change of pace for all players involved.

Of course we want your feedback on these Scenario tweaks, so please take a moment to answer the following questions:

• Does this change makes the Phoenix Gate Scenario more enjoyable for you? Why?
• Do you feel this change accomodates many playstyles?
• Do you feel as though the rewards are appropriate for this change to the Scenario?

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I decided to go a bit more in-depth on the topic then the mythic official forum police would allow.

• Does this change makes the Phoenix Gate Scenario more enjoyable for you? Why?
  Yes, it brings the focus to the objectives instead of player farming. The battles of player vrs player end up being the result of the objectives if properly implemented.
• Do you feel this change accomodates many playstyles?
  yes.
• Do you feel as though the rewards are appropriate for this change to the Scenario?
  This should happen throughout all scenarios and also applied to Open RvR. Reducing/removing the player skirmish will promote the "losing" realm to actually TRY to take objectives back in open RvR. Please learn from this change, if you want players to fight for something, you need to not punish them for trying. giving skirmish points in open RvR and Scenaros punishes the players for trying and failing. Don't get me wrong, they need not be rewarded for failing, but they need to not be punished for failing. Failing already is enough of a punishment.
  So please, remove skirmish from RvR zone control. Remove SCs from RvR zone control. Just have RvR zone control be the open Rvr objectives.(generating points for controling them). Or just view the podcast feedback
  On top of all this, you really need to rethink the rewards for scoring points. Perhaps for every 100 points in the Sc you are rewarded 1 officer insignia, if your realm WINS the sc you are rewarded 2x total insiginas. (of course it would be a better system if it use the influence points for RvR as a whole, but that is a topic for another day).
  Having the game score reward more for a higher score and win would result in less player farming at the spawn camp, and more trying to complete the objective. Which we will see players trying to finish SCs sooner with 500 points instead of just feeding for 500 points from player kills. Also it would indeed punish players that spawn camp for 15 mins instead of running the part do to not earning any insignias.
  Maybe you can also add another bonus mulitplyer reward if the SC has a victory before the 15 mins, maybe at the 5 min 10 min and 15 min marker offer different rewards. maybe at 5mins SC finish offer 3x the Upper tier insignia, at 10 mins offer 2x the upper tier insignia, at 15min offer 1x the upper tier insignia.
  What we see here is another example of how Mythic doesn't explore the end result of the changes they make. If they posted this change to the public before implementing it, then perhaps we the gamers would have told them that the SC would turn ino 15 mins of Spawn Camp renown farming. Then maybe (i doubt) they would have added a system to counter that mechanic, or at the very least adjust it in a way so that you don't earn Renown until the SC is finished, and your total Renown pooled up isn't earn until you have a 500 point victory. Now thats just me ranting on a random idea which i myself haven't even thought out fully.
  
  All in all i'm glad mythic is making adjustments to a SC, i'm not just glad that we are paying monthly fees to beta test a game.