I want to preface this suggestion with my background. I played DAoC when it first came out, spent countless amounts of hours RvRing, was part of one of the premiere 8-man groups in the game during it’s hay day, and felt the RvR system in place was the best there ever was. I note this, because there will be suggestions from myself that were part of the system in DAoC. I know people who will disagree with me will tend to focus on the fact that Guild Wars 2 isn’t DAoC 2 and never will be. I would agree to that sentiment, and I’m not looking to make major changes to the system already in place. I am not a typical Guild Wars player. I played the first GW game for about a month before I got bored and quit. I have played almost every major title mmo that had some aspect of RvR/PvP combat and have quit due to lack of a good RvR system/end game.
I feel that the WvW system in GW2 is a fresh take on PvP combat that involves more than two factions and pushes the idea of seige warfare. All the server realms are exactly the same, and as such, can be a bit tedious, but I understand the undertaking of having to entire zones different from one another.
With that being said, there is little incentive for WvW combat outside of “server pride”, which I do not say mockingly because I do feel it is important to have that. But to have to play day in and day out for something so intangible, so fluid, and so fleeting with no real gain for your personal self or character is not a good, long-term, sustainable model.
People mock the concept of MMO’s using the ‘carrot on a stick’, something that WoW has done incredibly well (and I hate WoW), and it’s hard to mock when the model is so effective. When you keep players coming back and playing because they can continually achieve something or make their character better, or more renown in some fashion, they tend not to leave or quit. The only thing remotely like this in GW2 is your achievement system, and beyond the point of small titles, I don’t see any use in it. But I’m dancing around the point, which is: With WvW, there is no ‘carrot on a stick’. There is no individual incentive, and at best, you are part of a collective with no discernible traits or differences from anyone else.
I understand that your model has been to keep the playing field level, so that a person who started playing a month ago has a chance to compete with someone who has been playing for far longer. In DAoC realm ranks mattered as they gave you realm skill points, which led to realm abilities, which as you progressed your character made you that much harder to kill and much more of an effective killer. I understand why you can’t follow that model, but there were other aspects of that system that could be used that has no impact on the character ability itself that I would like to suggest:
Realm point system – You tie numerical worth to killing individuals in WvW combat depending on how much damage you did to them. These points have no value, but you provide a website for servers to look up individual characters/classes/servers/weekly/monthly/overall numbers to see who has the most “rps”. People can be prideful of their character, compete against others, move up and down in the rankings.
Title system – Much like a realm rank system of daoc, you can argue how you would like to have it set up, and how much you need for each of the ranks, but having these ranks not only show up in a characters hero bar, but when that said character is WvWing, his enemies can see what his title is as well.
Name Display – Players should be able to click on enemies in WvW combat and see what the player’s character name is. This, over time, develops recognition with other servers and makes it more competitive when you come up against a foe that you recognize and have fought many times before.
Rewards – Can be simply cosmetic in nature, but like legendary weapons, when you achieve a certain level of WvW rank/title/etc, having the ability to purchase special WvW skins that can be applied to each class.
I feel all of these things could be added to the game without it affecting balance at all, and would be good incentives for people to play long term. Because, frankly, I’ve been playing GW2 since release and I’m rapidly getting to the point of not wanting to do WvW anymore, and since that was the major reason I came to play GW2 in the first place, my reason to stay is rapidly disappearing. I understand that this is strictly my own opinion and others may not feel the same way, but I would rather provide helpful suggestions, than for myself and thousands of others to simply disappear without reason.
I apologize if this has been brought up before in previous discussions, but from my quick glancing, I had not seem the topic and I don’t post to the boards frequently. I certainly welcome any input/feedback/suggestions and hope that this finds it’s way to someone in GW2!
~Guudx