Hello, Dear Arena Net.
I would like to talk about the current World vs World structure and make some suggestions about it.
But before that I would like to say: Your game is awesome and absolutely love it! It’s just that we could make it even better!
What do we have at the moment?
- Three servers fighting over four maps for control and realm-wide bonuses.
- The fighting is non-stop.
- Match rotation is once each week.
What are the problems?
-At the moment WvsW is a ‘zerg fest’ as we like to call it. Masses of people moving together and clashing over certain Points of interest.
-Relatively fun, highly unrewarding game mode.
-Having way too many commanders.
-Guilds have little interest joining it, because it is unrewarding and holding a fort/tower for long period of time is nearly impossible.
-Constant fighting kills the sense of achievement!
Now, the least is the deal-breaker here. You conducted a game mode popular for FPS games (crysis’s power struggle, UT2004 onslaught, planetside etc.).
This is not bad, but MMORPG are meant to be played in a different way.
Here are some ideas that you may like and that will surely improve WvsWvsW aspect of the game:
(1) As a start, restricting point capturing by making them like a chain(s). This means, to capture point “C”, you need to capture “A” and “B” before that.
The “chain” does not have to be strictly a line, it could be a web:
[img]http://i43.servimg.com/u/f43/15/83/77/35/ut_ons10.jpg[/img]
Here is one example from another game. In our case some point could be excluded from the chain – supply posts for example.
(2) Making captured forts/towers/castles more beneficial for guilds – maybe money reward that could be spend on influence?
This will make them wanna play more as a team , than as a big “zerg”.
(2.1) When a guild captures a point, it’s name should also be displayed. For example on the map : Guild XXXX’s Fort Victory.
(2.2) Guild weapon/armors. At the moment they replace the skin of the whole item while destroying set’s looks. Maybe something like tabards would be much better. People would gladly wear their guild’s crest , but not when it throws out of the window the set they tried so hard to gather.
Making guilds more important will make players more likely to conduct guild-wide tactics, abandoning the “zerg” movement that is happening at the moment.
(3) Rewards for WvsW are not as powerful as those in PVE. People are selfish, that’s a fact. Doing dungeons will get them the best gear, why would they play WvsW?
(4) Commander status: At the moment it’s just a way for people to show off that they have(had) 100 gold. There are cases when a commanders walks around picking flowers while being followed by 20 people. Now, making commander book have a temporary status change on character (while being cheaper) or changing the form of commander will do the job.
Forming squads to be allowed to guild masters/marshals instead of a commander sounds reasonable too.
(5) Making server vs server matches last longer, with (1) and (2) conquest would be slower and so more time would be required for good matches. From one to maybe two weeks again. The way it works at the moment is a FPS like fast matches where ranking matters. In two weeks long chain capture structure long-term goals matter. That is why more time is required.
(6) Now this is more complicated thing. What I said until now requires reworking WvsW a lot, here comes an AWESOME idea I read on this forum:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/suggestions/WvWvW-Map-rotation/first#post883413
endeavor.7530’s idea fits perfectly what I believe should be changed. It will be a good balance of power too. Good players should meet bigger challenge and not as skilled ones, should be assisted to.
(*) A problem that you never considered, is that guild wars 2 doesn’t allow players to lose. Really, we are always winners.
Losing is a good way to motivate people to become better at what they do, to organise more, to make some tactics, to THINK.
You may be surprised, but gamers like to be challenged, especially PC gamers.
That is why losing World vs World entirely is something that you should think upon.
Why should you work so much on this? What a lot of people did not like about your game was that there is no grind. Why?
Grinding for something gives sense of purpose and extends greatly playtime.
World PVP is a true form of endgame that doesn’t end and could bring excitement for years. If you do it right, many people will want to play it.
I would really like to hear a reply from the staff. Arena Net does not talk about these things at all and the player base is left in the dark.
“Don’t beg for it, earn it, then it will be granted to you!” – Unknown
Runing around at WvW map creates a feeling of wasting too much power for nothing