Guild Wars 2

I was trying to think of a way to “Fix” the “Zerge issue” that many people are claiming is causing the Meta events to fail*

1. Instead of having champs drop the normal “Deluxe Gear Boxes”, Make them drop “Locked Deluxe Gear Boxes.” At the end of each group event award 1-3 “Gear box Keys” and at the end of the Meta event, award players with 5-8 “Gear box Keys”

This would give players who are farming the incentive to also work to complete the event instead of just farming the Champs.

Some other things that might also help are…

1. Remove Molten and Aetherblade group events once their meta event has finished

2. De-spawn ALL Npcs from a event when it ends

Another option would be to give each group event a set number of waves (For example 3 waves) but only allow one Champion to spawn during the 2nd and 3rd wave (If there are enough people)…

• I don’t really see anyone trying to stall events for champs.. I do see champ farming.. but no event stalling.. So really this “Zerge Issue” has been a non-issue for me personally.

I don’t really see anyone trying to stall events for champs.. I do see champ farming.. but no event stalling.. So really this “Zerge Issue” has been a non-issue for me personally.

So you don’t see a problem personally but it must need to be fixed because…..umm..why does it need fixed again, I forget.

Rizalee.4593:

• I don’t really see anyone trying to stall events for champs.. I do see champ farming.. but no event stalling.. So really this “Zerge Issue” has been a non-issue for me personally.

Exactly. This has been my experience in 20-40 invasions. I lost count. The only issues I run into is a lack of bodies in overflow to farm or finish the events. It is a non-issue and if the people complaining about it would realize that they would just find something else to complain about… Like (LuLz) afkers.

Well.. the thing is, just because I don’t see a problem, doesn’t mean that maybe its not a problem. I have been pretty lucky that 8/10 times I go to an event it is not on an overflow..

Really.. They should remove the ability to get a reward if you don’t participate.. but that is just my opinion..

What they need to do is make it easier TO participate in the actual event.

-Some zones have too many regular events going on and blocked waypoints.
-You have targets all over the place, some you should complete some you shouldn’t.
-You have commanders on the map and you don’t know if they are doing the event to win or farming.
-If you do happen to know where you should go next, well if you waypoint you might get stuck in a different overflow or DC or randomly lose the ability to get credit for completing the zone.
-You should move on after your current target event is done but sometimes there are still mobs there and you are in combat. So you either have to kill the mobs or run far enough away to waypoint.

The thing is, people need to be organized to complete the event. Random people are thrown together into overflow servers with commanders they don’t know and you are in a timed event. This is not conducive to an organized effort.

Farmers will find every possible excuse in the book to farm. I have nothing against farming, but when you’re ruining the experience for everyone else, then you deserve to be punished. You’re no different than botters. Why even play the game?

I’m trying to get the achievements. I want to complete the events properly. Once I am done with 13/13, I may or may not do them anymore because I’m way tired of them. Especially when some of them don’t give me credit and I have to repeat the same zone yet again.

However, I don’t want to do all that work and leave all my reward behind because it is in the middle of mobs left. There are design flaws contributing to this. Partly it is due to people farming and ignoring the event and partly it is due to design flaws.

If you cant get loot from the event people will simply stop doing it and farm the Pavillion again,it ether keep it like this and win it sometimes or nerf it so you cant farm it and lose always

I’m 11/13 and I farm champs. I’ve not seen the last 2 maps I need in rotation yet so I don’t understand what the problem is. It doesn’t matter whether you complete the event or not. It’s, what, a one loot bag difference?

Easy

Start of with 25 Exotic boxes available as a reward, and for each champion you kill that doesn’t have an event associated with it(e.g sharmans) deduct one…

frostyraziel.1854:

Farmers will find every possible excuse in the book to farm. I have nothing against farming, but when you’re ruining the experience for everyone else, then you deserve to be punished. You’re no different than botters. Why even play the game?

By “everyone else” you must mean the minority. As there are far more people interested in farming champs during the invasion than there are people more interested in completing it.

The solution is easy, the only “problematic” spawns are the aetherblade pirates. This can easily be fixed by changing it so once the aetherblade moral is depleted and the aetherblade captain spawns, no more aetherblade trash spawns from that area. So there is some farming, but the amount is basically cut in half. This also makes the aetherblade spawns easier and brings them more in line with all other invasion types.

Your key idea is needlessly complicated

Shanaeri Rynale.6897:

Easy

Start of with 25 Exotic boxes available as a reward, and for each champion you kill that doesn’t have an event associated with it(e.g sharmans) deduct one…

Awesome! That way I can get more rewards by going afk than by actually getting kitten done. What an amazing idea!

Shall we also proceed to publicly flog anyone who dares do a JP or heart or personal story instead of joining the event?

I recently finished a Clockwork Chaos invasion in Fireheart Rise that failed due to the concerted efforts of a farming group spamming chat. While I have certainly benefited from the champion loot changes as much as anyone else, it has become increasingly difficult to complete ANY major world events due to farming groups. The other day I was with a group that was trying to defeat the Claw of Jormag in Frostgorge Sound for an hour. The event failed even though there was a large group of players in the zone farming champs because it was less profitable for them to assist in a world boss fight than to continue the champion circuit.

I was trying to think of a way to “Fix” the “Zerge issue” that many people are claiming is causing the Meta events to fail*

1. Instead of having champs drop the normal “Deluxe Gear Boxes”, Make them drop “Locked Deluxe Gear Boxes.” At the end of each group event award 1-3 “Gear box Keys” and at the end of the Meta event, award players with 5-8 “Gear box Keys”

This would give players who are farming the incentive to also work to complete the event instead of just farming the Champs.

I think Riza is proposing an excellent solution to at least one of the issues, which is making completion of an event more beneficial than allowing it to fail. The nerf to the champions’ loot drops in world boss fights has not made it easier to actually finish the events, and the general champ loot drops have caused the earlier difficulties with world boss fights to crop up in the living world events.

We can’t be the only ones who have tried to think of solutions to the experience dissonance between farmers/market players and event/story players. I think that I’d really like this page to turn into a brainstorm for constructive solutions because we all have a right to a fun experience.

What else can individual players, guilds, or even ANet do to make this work better for everyone?

I think it’s a myth that the champions need to be fixed at all.

When they initially announced champ rewards they said: “This change will make champions more rewarding, and will make playing in Orr and Southsun Cove (where events can scale up to add champions) more exciting and fruitful for guilds and players joining together in the open world.”

This is precisely what we’re doing when we zerg Aetherblade events.

The rewards for winning the meta event (which is still easy to do even with farming) is minor compared to killing aethers, so why do people desire it so much?

Diy.5296:

The solution is easy, the only “problematic” spawns are the aetherblade pirates. This can easily be fixed by changing it so once the aetherblade moral is depleted and the aetherblade captain spawns, no more aetherblade trash spawns from that area. So there is some farming, but the amount is basically cut in half. This also makes the aetherblade spawns easier and brings them more in line with all other invasion types.

Your key idea is needlessly complicated

People are farming the champs because

• there is practically no difference between winning and losing: the difference in loot rewards is very small and killing just a few champs makes up for it; and there is zero difference story/world-wise whether you win or lose.

• the event is not fun — the way the invasions are designed, there’s very little inherent fun in trying to win (it’s a bit to try to organize an win, but the event is very repetitive and tedious) So the only players who participate are farmers and people who need the achievement; neither need to win so they don’t try to.

Kagamiku.9731:

frostyraziel.1854:

Farmers will find every possible excuse in the book to farm. I have nothing against farming, but when you’re ruining the experience for everyone else, then you deserve to be punished. You’re no different than botters. Why even play the game?

By “everyone else” you must mean the minority. As there are far more people interested in farming champs during the invasion than there are people more interested in completing it.

Just because farmers are noisier does not mean that they are a majority.

Regardless of any claims to a democratic majority, can’t we try to find a way to keep the game fun for everyone? Because that’s what it is: a game, not a job nor a grinding experience.

Lady of Letters.8601:

Kagamiku.9731:

frostyraziel.1854:

Farmers will find every possible excuse in the book to farm. I have nothing against farming, but when you’re ruining the experience for everyone else, then you deserve to be punished. You’re no different than botters. Why even play the game?

By “everyone else” you must mean the minority. As there are far more people interested in farming champs during the invasion than there are people more interested in completing it.

Just because farmers are noisier does not mean that they are a majority.

Regardless of any claims to a democratic majority, can’t we try to find a way to keep the game fun for everyone? Because that’s what it is: a game, not a job nor a grinding experience.

It’s more the fact that the aetherblades are all but finished before scarlets minions bar is even 20% done.

And farmers are not noisy at this meta-event, all I ever see are people who want to complete the event whining at everyone else who has zero interest in the marginal reward that it provides. Eventually people will realize that the ones who try to force others to complete something they don’t want to are just as selfish (if not more so) than the ones who want to do whats the most profitable for them.

Kagamiku.9731:

It’s more the fact that the aetherblades are all but finished before scarlets minions bar is even 20% done.

Well, in my experience, it’s the other way round: Scarlet’s minions are 1/3 done by the time the aetherblade bar actually starts moving.

I don’t see how that’s possible. I’ve done the event at least 50 times, and Scarlet’s Minions have never been done before aetherblades.

Every time there is a close call, you can be sure it’s the Scarlets Minion events that need finished.

frostyraziel.1854:

Farmers will find every possible excuse in the book to farm. I have nothing against farming, but when you’re ruining the experience for everyone else, then you deserve to be punished. You’re no different than botters. Why even play the game?

This comment really bothers me. A “botter” is a person who uses a 3rd party program of some sort to automate the the game so that the person can walk away while the character collects items and gold for them. A “farmer” as you call it is actively playing the game in order to collect items and gold. One involves breaking ArenaNet’s Terms of Service with absolutely no effort on that person’s behalf while the other involves complying with the ToS as someone’s sitting at the computer and pushing buttons in order to obtain their stuff.

Why punish a person for playing the game within the rules? With the way legendaries work, you either have to farm for mats and money or else you have to shell out a couple thousand real-world dollars to quick-buy everything… That someone else farmed. Even normal exotics require farming of some sort; be it WvW honor badges, dungeon tokens, karma, materials for crafted exotics, or the raw drops. Farming is part of the game.

As for the zerg-failures, I’ve only seen this happen when the majority of the players are in it for the farming and/or most of the people don’t know to move on as soon as an event clears. In this case, you’re sadly in the minority, but the game makes up for it by still giving you a participation reward and credit towards your achievement (assuming you went to a unique area and not a repeat zone). It’s also very possible to counter zergs by breaking off and going to a different event within the zone. You can easily find other people doing the same. If there are 3 or more of you, give the event a try and you can usually succeed then move on to a new one as soon as that event succeeds. Another thing to keep in mind is that there’s no replay value in this event after you get your participation achievement credit for that zone, so there needs to be real incentive to bring people back for 40-minutes each time an invasion starts.

Kagamiku.9731:

Eventually people will realize that the ones who try to force others to complete something they don’t want to are just as selfish (if not more so) than the ones who want to do whats the most profitable for them.

Kaga, while I don’t agree with the “if not more so” I do agree that it is selfish to demand that people complete an event that they don’t want to do.

1) I’m assuming that those who are going into the invasion zones are going because they want to participate in the invasions

2) That it is considered to be more profitable to farm than to complete the event is a problem but I don’t think that the problem lies with the farmers. ANet has said in the past, with the Orr farming controversy last month, that they wanted event completion to be more rewarding than farming and preventing completion. So far their solution has changed but not fixed the problem.

People who are more interested in loot gains are still not trying to complete events, which means that the current reward system isn’t properly scaled or isn’t working in a way that encourages those most motivated by loot toward completions. There has to be a way to both limit inflation and appropriately reward event completion and heroic actions.

The “locked box” idea is one plausible solution.

The best way to remedy the situation would be to make the end reward better, and I mean way better. While not giving a reward (or a very minor one) for failure. Or even better, reward each individual person based on the number of events they participated in (and the reward is only given after successfully completing the invasion) that were related to the Invasion-meta. That way, completing the event is comparable to farming champions, and the ones that afk get no reward like they deserve. However, they would need to limit the champions so that the event does not become too rewarding. Between the end reward and the champion loot bags, it could become a tad too lucrative.

Further nerfing the event won’t help, it just drives farmers to try harder to milk all they can out of the event. How would you like people running into one of the events, looking for a champ, and then immediately leaving for the next one if no champion is there? This is literally what it will turn into.

A better solution is to improve the reward for killing Scarlett in such a way, that there is a real incentive to complete the event quickly. A varied reward based on the time it took to complete the event should do the trick nicely.

I think the best solution would be that at the very end of this content scarlet comes down and says:

“Now now, while all you little PvE zerglings have been farming my minions for massive amounts of gold and drops, the real heros have been defending your borderlands in the mists! That’s why they are all getting precursors and you get a kitten-slap in the face! Toodaloo!”