Top clans: can't progress in PVP game

[Nefasto]

Dear community and developers,
Ark: Survival Evolved is one of the best games (maybe the best game) that I ever played and I thank you for developing and supporting it with such effort.
A lot of things need to done and fixed, and I'm sure that with time they will (almost all) be.

In my (and many others here) opinion, the priority issues of the game are offline raiding and clan level balancing in PVP.
Recently where I play (official server PVP), the "top clan" managed to destroy 2-3 bases without any problems, included my tribe's base.
It's not the first time that we get destroyed; we could restart, but we will always be at the mercy of these high clans. I never entered a cave because of blocks, or ridden a Rex or Argentavis because of raids or kills.
The problem is becoming dominant in game.
Please don't answer with "build stone, metal, diamond walls... go in trees... go in PVE... change game...", because we did all in our power (even in PVE you can find even worse cases).
I also understand the "top clans" point of view, who cannot kill an enemy or dino without be blamed about tyranny.

The game is in early access, and thats why I wanted to underline the problem, so that the first countermeasures can be tested.
I read about a lot of possible solutions, like tribe "wrath", war time delay, base offline immunity, more effort and risks vs weaker clans, and I hope that something is going to be real soon (hope that incoming tripwire will do something). Some of them aren't really effective, but would certanly help.


Hoping that this post will help point out the problem.
Best regards.

[Shino "Sinon" Asada]

i agree, even for pvp some things are just stupid....as i read people build around spawnpoints and kill new players instantly and such, first off you shouln't be able to build there and actually if a max lvl can simply kill a lvl 2 player whos in the game about 2 mins...

the current system should not be called "pvp" but "pve with enabled player and structure dmg"
the problem is once a tribe dominates a server NO other can certainly make a base so become a rival cause someone with a rex simply comes at night destroys whole base and that's it.

I mean in pvp we got the pve demolish thing why don't a offline timer for like 24 hours, if you log off structures are invulnerable for these 24 hours(but goes away instantly if you log in)...if these pass u can attack while the owners are offline, this would at least make it possible to force people to go raiding when the people are online

the problem is (what i got on my pvp server) u have people who yeah simply go around destroying stuff and killing dinos just cause. The worst thing was that WE were the biggest tribe and members acted like having balls. Since me and 2 others of the tribe left the server, we took our dinos gave them to another tribe and they then destroyed our base. Too many kid-minded guys who are having insanely much fun destroying other peoples effort.

And yeah people feel strong for destroying bases when people are offline. If they do it when THEY attack first okay. But seriously i switched to PvE because of that. PvP System needs an overhaul..... the way how it is now is like. Become the best tribe or change to another pvp server, in the end u go pve....

yet in Pve people can rob you but u can't do aynthing about it if they managed to get into your house.... even in PVE people should become attackable for some minutes if they try to acces feorein tribes chests or doors so that even dinos will aggro them.

[NerZ]

As long as you are able to build inside caves, there will allways be few tribes with EXTREME advantage over the others.

[Nefasto]

At the moment I'm playing in singleplayer, and I'm I am fully appreciating the game.
Hope that next patch will improve something (I read balancing, maybe...!).

[DarthaNyan]

Originally posted by Nefasto:

Please don't answer with "build stone, metal, diamond walls... go in trees... go in PVE... change game...", because we did all in our power.
I also understand the "top clans" point of view, who cannot kill an enemy or dino without be blamed about tyranny.

Nefasto of Dino Crisis tribe I hail you from a Battledodos tribe.

Dont build 20 store high wooden building. It looked sooooo tasty for my argent with that wooden bottleneck at bottom... Also i found metaldoors in that wooden construction amusing - i couldnt have condone such heresy myself ever... Still your base had more stuff stockpiled (aka loot) than those russians' we raided before you.

[Nefasto]

Originally posted by EtnaLover:

the problem is once a tribe dominates a server NO other can certainly make a base so become a rival cause someone with a rex simply comes at night destroys whole base and that's it.

Exactly

Originally posted by NerZ:

As long as you are able to build inside caves, there will allways be few tribes with EXTREME advantage over the others.

I didn't get into a cave yet, but you can now find metal and crystals on top of mountains and hills (since recent patch).

Originally posted by Nizidramaniiyt:

Nefasto of Dino Crisis tribe I hail you from a Battledodos tribe.

Dont build 20 store high wooden building. It looked sooooo tasty for my argent with that wooden bottleneck at bottom... Also i found metaldoors in that wooden construction amusing - i couldnt have condone such heresy myself ever... Still your base had more stuff stockpiled (aka loot) than those russians' we raided before you.

I'm glad to see you here, you have to be one of the most reasonable persons in your clan.
You weren't the first who raided me, and I don't blame you.

The tower building was the fun part, I built the 4 upper levels in about 4 hours, and the intention was to make harder any attack from the roof (have to destroy all levels before moving to floor).
The air protection was under construction, but wasn't started in time...
The base of the tower was instead heavily reinforced (in our opinion), with stone walls and internal core metal building as a skeleton.
The idea was to have an outside building in trivial wood and the core reinforced (stronger fortresses call only stronger attackers, it worked few times).
Loot? I never would have thought such a compliment.

It's nice to hear the opinion of the "attackers", what would you suggest to improve gameplay in this sense?


I found even worse cases now:
http://steamcommunity.com/app/346110/discussions/0/530647080131021044/

[DarthaNyan]

Originally posted by Nefasto:

It's nice to hear the opinion of the "attackers", what would you suggest to improve gameplay in this sense?

I think that game is fine as it is in terms of raiding/protection.

Using current game mechanics you can build structures that are impervious to attacks from ground and you'll need tons and tons of resources to breach from above. So its all about creative construction and thinking out of box. Simple walls wont protect you ever.

If you want an example: one of your ex neighbors (Tea Party tribe) built an amazing thingy on the river, but a couple of engineer mistakes cost them their base... twice.

Tactical dilos (they can spit through the walls) and scorps inside the base make attack much more complex and annoying.

If anything - turrets should be fixed as they are pointless now. They need better tracking of targets and better LoS detection. I've starved 3 turrets of your neighbors out of bullets by doing nothing and thats what enabled (well not really, we could've just used rocket launchers instead) us to carpet bomb their metalbox from above.

On the other side stone tier needs a bit of nerfing in terms of materials required for construction: swap thatch requirement with metal ingots in 10/1 proportion and it'll be fine. IMO.

Originally posted by Nefasto:

I'm glad to see you here, you have to be one of the most reasonable persons in your clan.

Now that is a strange thing: most of our tribe members are well over 20+ and reasonable and they often say that i'm evil.

[Nefasto]

Originally posted by Nizidramaniiyt:

I think that game is fine as it is in terms of raiding/protection.

It's fine, but only between consolidated tribes.
Smaller or not perfectly organized tribes are destined to perish, or work 10 times more than the first tribes did to be competitive.
Two examples:

1. Building base effort ~= 10 to 100 times destroying/breaching in base effort
   
2. Time needed to tame a dino ~= 100 to 1000 times more than kill it.

They are simply irrational.

Originally posted by Nizidramaniiyt:

Using current game mechanics you can build structures that are impervious to attacks from ground and you'll need tons and tons of resources to breach from above. So its all about creative construction and thinking out of box. Simple walls wont protect you ever.

Again, strong walls are essential, and "thinking out of box" costs even more than usual in most cases.
We found pretty nice spots to place a base, but they were surrounded by rexes and harshness: how can possibly my mates lvl 20 manage to build the base? Thats not even the major problem (teamwork).
Usually, good spots don't have building resources near, problem solved if you have "nice" dinos or argetavis, but you need a base to keep them in a safe place: vicious circle.

Originally posted by Nizidramaniiyt:

If you want an example: one of your ex neighbors (Tea Party tribe) built an amazing thingy on the river, but a couple of engineer mistakes cost them their base... twice.

Wonderful example, I was there scouting when you attacked :).
Took quite few time to breach in, but, building was built in stone (maybe 10.000 stones? Or more?) and wasn't neither the main base but only a deposit (other "top clan").

Originally posted by Nizidramaniiyt:

Tactical dilos (they can spit through the walls) and scorps inside the base make attack much more complex and annoying.

We had few in our base too.

Originally posted by Nizidramaniiyt:

If anything - turrets should be fixed as they are pointless now. They need better tracking of targets and better LoS detection. I've starved 3 turrets of your neighbors out of bullets by doing nothing and thats what enabled (well not really, we could've just used rocket launchers instead) us to carpet bomb their metalbox from above.

True, they need to be fixed, but being an "end game" mechanic and concerning only few players might not be addressed soon.

Originally posted by Nizidramaniiyt:

On the other side stone tier needs a bit of nerfing in terms of materials required for construction: swap thatch requirement with metal ingots in 10/1 proportion and it'll be fine. IMO.

Yes, stone is actually a bit too hard to gain, and/or further requirements are too high.

Originally posted by Nizidramaniiyt:

Now that is a strange thing: most of our tribe members are well over 20+ and reasonable and they often say that i'm evil.

You might be evil only in game!
The most evil persons have to be reasobable to be such evil! :)

PS: finally, how can we possibly defeat an 30.000 hp rex (and its even fair cause of example 2 ahah)?