TLDR: The party system is severely lacking and inefficient. Add a group posting board similar to the ones in GW1 or AION.
I propose a simple party board similar to the one in GW1/Aion. This could be zone-wide or world-wide and would allow players to make small postings which would allow them to find players to group with. I know there are players out there who would be willing to/want to group for certain things, but we are too spread out across zones that it becomes hard to connect and form groups for dungeons or any activity.
I know alot of people have been suggesting a WoW style dungeon finder. I think this would be terrible as it would randomly match players up and teleport them to the dungeon, stripping away an important part of the mmo experience, which I think a party board would be able to retain.
It takes way too long to form dungeon groups/any groups currently. The LFG tool in place is not effective, I think I’ve only ever seen 1 other player in it, AND you are removed from the tool as soon as you’re in a group (cant do “GLF more”). I’m confident that a party board system would significantly reduce wait times while allowing more types of groups to be formed. It would go beyond just dungeon finding, players would be able to find like-minded people to group for WvW, random adventuring, vistas, keg brawls, and so on.
Spamming map chat for groups is not good design. Our group postings only reach a limited audience and are likely to be missed in the flood of chat spam. Many players also turn map chat off because of all the immature chatting and spamming.
Whatever your opinion, I think we can all agree that something needs to be done ASAP about this inadequate party-forming system.
Edit: Aion’s system is the best example I can think of. They have the same kind of somewhat “open” world as GW2, while also being divided up into zones. Yet the group posting board/Lfg system there is server-wide. When you make a post, anyone can read it on the whole server via the tool available through UI.