yeh i think the cooldown for flag locks should be longer. i think the team locking should have to fight for the flag not run in, chain cap and then run out.

Chain locking is annoying.  I think there should be a cooldown increase so that one person can not chain lock.  I think chain locking with multiple people is ok though because it rewards good teamwork.

I don't think it's a flag lock issue, but more a Cataract issue : Portals are far too easy to get to.

Adding towers at the lanes' entrance would probably slow the game's pace too much, so it's beyond that point that towers should be added. Maybe a couple archer towers behind the gold / CD flag light towers, and another couple near the portal's gold mine ?

Wouldn't slow the game too much (archer towers fall fast), but would help prevent the "rush through towers and cap flag" tactics...

I've been in games where the enemy has been smashing us back to the citadel. But we've still won just because we just ignored them and the creeps and the towers and capped their portals and chain locked them. It just seems to easy late game to run through and chain lock them. It seems if you get late game and ninja a portal and lock it, it is game over. They just end up running between the portals locking.

I think the towers should get more damage with upgrades and get tougher with more range. It just means that it takes more then one solo person to kill a tower, or the help of a lot of creeps. It would make it tougher to ninja portal flags, especially if there were towers at the portals on all maps.

There's no magic number on range and damage you could reach which would give all DGs a fair shot at knocking down towers, but there is one universal counter to stopping a flag lock, and that's teleporting in and saving it. I just think that the time it takes to contest a flag is just too short to make locks a fun game mechanic. It takes what, about 3 seconds to contest, 3 seconds to cap, and then 1 second to lock it? If you don't TP in those first 3 seconds you're not likely to get there in time to stop the lock, and on a map like cataract with a cooldown flag (or two) every single character can easily perma-lock flags.

So I would rather see a fix focused on improving the counters to them. Perhaps flags could be tagged as neutral or light/dark, and capping the a flag from the opposing side would take twice or there times as long as capping a neutral flag or recapping your own. Also I'd like to see the locks themselves changed, but I just don't get the feeling that any of this stuff will happen.

Artefact is shit because often all other flags are taken so you cant go to the artefact shop.

Flag locks are fine as they are now. You probably never played against good opponents or (more probably) your opponents were much better than you, if you are saying locks need nerf. Without flag locks, game would be almost impossible to win. This game is great to play short 30-40 minutes little battles. Don't make from Demigod a 3-4 hours game. We have a lot of other games to play single battle that long !

Right now it's all about protecting your portals and (if possible) take opponents portal. It's not easy (defenders have tp scrolls), but it's possible, and if you capture opponents flag if SHOULD be hard for defenders to take it back. It's really hard to take good players portal flag, so it's perfectly fine it's equal hard to retake that portal.

If you change flag locking system somehow, you will get something like Exile map. On this map you can't take opponents portal flag, because there is no one ! So when both sides have similar skilled players, one side can easly defend citadel even near their crystal... just forever. Your creeps will hold opponents creeps, and you will just help them (and regen hp/mana meantime, because you have your crystal right there !). I think every map should have possiblity to take opponents portal. Portals are startegic points, and if you don't know how to defend them, surely you will lose.

The ONLY thing I think should be changed is flag lock cast time. Right now you can lock flag in 1 second. That's not much time to use some interrupt. Imo, flag lock cast time should be increased to 1.5, maybe 2 sec, so it will be easier to interrupt lock. Beside this, flag locks are just perfect.

BTW: Tower strenght is completely different story here.
Towers are definatelly too easy to destroy by a single, low level demigod.

Well from my point of view its completely opposite. Why ? It's very easy:

1) You CAN teleport to your flag to defend it. You CAN'T teleport to enemy flag to take it.

2) Portal flags are near your crystal. If you need to regen after fight, just go to crystal, it's just few meters. Opponent need to return to his base, so basically run through whole map, or use tp scroll. If he use tp scroll, remember his tp scroll will have 30 sec cooldown, so it's good time for you / your allies to push.

3) There are towers near portals. Ok that's not a big problem late game, but if you defend towers well (using tp scrolls and universal gadgets), they are actually usefull (but still should be buffed imo). 2 towers supporting 1 defender, even late game makes a difference.

4) You can lock your own portal. Lock it, and try to strike meantime. Attacker can't take locked flag. Beside, even when you can't fight 1 vs 1 against opponent (eg. he has much better gear), you can tp to your portal and lock it, before he get even close to this portal ! It's all about how good you are controlling moves of your enemies.

5) When you own portal, there are creeps supporting you. Of course minotaurs and archers won't help you much, but priests/angels/catapults and especially giants helps you A LOT. Sometimes it's even hard to take unprotected portal, when giants come out.

6) Portal flags are just great to make a trap (others can join defender and strike attacker from behind). I killed houndrets of players who thought it's a great idea to take my portal flag Well they were wrong Most of the time, it's like free money, and money always gives you advantage. So capturing enemy portals is very risky, if you fight against experienced players.

BTW: If you don't know how to use the advantage from defending (in this case), you can't say something needs to be nurfed. That's why we have dozens topics here, something is overpowered and need to be nurfed. If someone is beaten by a better player, he just look for the reasons why it was unfair, instead of THINK how to improve himself !

9/10 games against decent players, the game is over at the first portal lock.

First off let's remember that the cooldown on TP scrolls is not 30 seconds in most cases where locks are out of whack. They're affected by cooldown flags and thus are at about a 26 second cooldown on Cataract, or less if you happen to have both flags, which makes TP'ing back before the lock expires even easier.

So say we have UB/whoever/whoever on one side and we've got Regulus/whoever/whoever on the other team. If UB pushes a flag then most likely two players need to TP in to stop him, which means the other flag can be 2v1'd.

Also it's silly to assume that even the best players will react within the 5-9 seconds or so that it takes to cap a flag and end a game, and also a DG death can mean the end of the game in a way greatly disproportionate to the balance of the previous 15-25 minutes. I'm all for games accelerating as time goes on, but I really dislike the current time scale on which these games are decided. It's purely personal preference, but so is support of how things are now.

Melric, that's why you need to be good player before judge things like this one.

Sorry, but face the truth - if you can't hold your own portal, you are newbie, and you have to completely change your strategy ! What are you doing, when enemy takes your portals ? Exp ? So, if you don't care someone is taking your portal, how can you say something is wrong with the game ? It's just ridiculous ! You are wrong, not the game !

According to your last post. For me, your words means clearly, you just don't care when enemy takes your portals, but when they own them, you just start to think: "OMG now when they have my portals, I should somehow take them back !! But wait a sec... they locked them while I exp ! How could they ?! I'll better write on the forum something is wrong with flag locks !!".

From the other side, if you are saying chain locking is so easy, why don't you do this to your enemy ? Everyone has EQUAL chances to use flag locks. If you can't hold your own portals, and can't capture opponents portals, what the hell are you doing on the battlefield ? Especially, you always plays with friend (even Pantheon games), so you guys SHOULD have huge communication advantage, especially with flags (both defending and attacking).

Well sorry if you feel bad after criticism, but if you can't play, don't shout for nurf !

One solution could be to increase the cast time of flaglock so that it is fairly easy to interupt.