Guild Wars 2

yeah, the spy griefing is annoying – but on the same hand maybe each transfer can have a penalty as Devon pointed out – you can wvw but you can’t chat in wvw mode, or lay down siege, or see the commanders tag for a week. – that’s the only thing I can think of that would circumvent the spy issue without overly penalizing a legit player. “At least I can play”

Griefing may still happen to a lesser extent with teamspeak and a person calling out the oppositions movements – but being out of chat will give them less power to interfere and not be informed for the week of the event – thus making the whole spy game much less fun and more of a job. spying does exist as part of rpg – but it’s unrealistic to think that it’s as easy as flying out to your enemy and just wasting their supplies and demoralizing them as if no one is going to shoot you for it.

In a roleplay sense transferring should have a more dramatic impact on the player – if you suddenly move to another country in the opposite side of the earth – it’s not as easy as just getting up and leaving, and heading to work the next morning after you move. Transferring to another server should have the same impact as a person moving to another country. Things like wxp loss – you can’t transfer to a foreign military enemy and expect them to respect your rank as general, that would be even more painful if it was an account wide perk from your server.

gw2 is an rpg game, the solutions should be rpg based with rpg value.

In the end it’s all math – and wvw is a type of simulation – a spy is a job – but not an easy one – if that’s the life you choose – you better be prepared to pay dearly to live it.

It could be a fun mechanic too – like when a person joins a server – they can choose being a spy and new spying tools are created for it – if they are caught, they log on their server like an enemy and have to figure out ways to sneak out on the field lol. They would have to avoid wvw for a week after reset to rejoin the game as an ally.

it doesn’t have to be a problem and can be an rpg mechanic since there is obviously an audience share willing to give up playing normal to do it.

“Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed on an equal or greater benefit.” – Napoleon Hill

DevonCarver.5370:

Sticking to the lines of transfers, what are reasonable restrictions to place on players after they transfer? No WvW for the rest of the match? No WvW for 24 hours? Would that help any or would it actually exacerbate the problem?

The restrictions you mentioned above will have zero or negligible impact on transfers. They would have to be far more drastic.

For example, when you (a-net) work on the que problems, making it FIFO instead of random, you may wish to reconsider that and instead of FIFO give priority to original server inhabitants for a long long time, maybe 6 months or 2 league seasons.

Yes, you will hear a lot of whining about it, but if you lay out the rules before hand and well in advance, so vast majority of players will have a very fair warning and make a more serious informed decision, then the responsibility for the transfer will be shifted more towards transferring playerbase rather then you and the systems in place in their current state.

That will make a difference, anything short of that is just a wasted effort.

Solstice.1097:

Waffler.1257:

DevonCarver.5370:

So, if prices for server transfers were based on WvW population, what would a fair distribution of costs look like from the lowest population servers to the highest? Keep in mind that making it completely impossible to transfer to a server puts a burden on other players. That doesn’t mean that you couldn’t have an incredibly high price, just that completely blocked isn’t an option.

Paid transfers in any form will only cause server population to be more imbalanced. The top tier servers have hoards of gold and gladly pay guilds to transfer to their servers to make them even more stacked. This causes guilds that are thinking of transferring to choose between transferring to a stacked server which will win most every week for free, or transferring to an empty server that gets smashed every week and on top of that have to pay a hefty gem price. The choice is pretty obvious.

look up at my solution and does this apply? if you transferred down to T8 you would pay 300 gems and then after transferring you would get a 1200 gem rebate to spend on whatever you wanted.

T1 would cost 2400 gems (approx 100+ gold per player) and you get nothing in return except to convince yourself that queues are worth a gold dolyak finisher.

This is Anet, anything that would even slightly reduce the amount of revenue they collect won’t even be considered. A 1200 gem rebate definitely falls into that category.

Waffler.1257:

Solstice.1097:

Waffler.1257:

DevonCarver.5370:

So, if prices for server transfers were based on WvW population, what would a fair distribution of costs look like from the lowest population servers to the highest? Keep in mind that making it completely impossible to transfer to a server puts a burden on other players. That doesn’t mean that you couldn’t have an incredibly high price, just that completely blocked isn’t an option.

Paid transfers in any form will only cause server population to be more imbalanced. The top tier servers have hoards of gold and gladly pay guilds to transfer to their servers to make them even more stacked. This causes guilds that are thinking of transferring to choose between transferring to a stacked server which will win most every week for free, or transferring to an empty server that gets smashed every week and on top of that have to pay a hefty gem price. The choice is pretty obvious.

look up at my solution and does this apply? if you transferred down to T8 you would pay 300 gems and then after transferring you would get a 1200 gem rebate to spend on whatever you wanted.

T1 would cost 2400 gems (approx 100+ gold per player) and you get nothing in return except to convince yourself that queues are worth a gold dolyak finisher.

This is Anet, anything that would even slightly reduce the amount of revenue they collect won’t even be considered. A 1200 gem rebate definitely falls into that category.

I disagree. To go to tier 8 the player first has to buy 300 gems, then after transferring they get 1,200 to spend in the gem store or convert to what… 50 gold or so? 50 gold is nothing to those who buy gems, and for those who never do, it’s not hurting anything to give away virtual currency that costs Anet exactly $0.

Indirectly, however, it ‘starts’ to solve an issue that is driving some players (dollars) away.

Solstice.1097:

I disagree. To go to tier 8 the player first has to buy 300 gems, then after transferring they get 1,200 to spend in the gem store or convert to what… 50 gold or so? 50 gold is nothing to those who buy gems, and for those who never do, it’s not hurting anything to give away virtual currency that costs Anet exactly $0.

Indirectly, however, it ‘starts’ to solve an issue that is driving some players (dollars) away.

It might not cost them anything, but it does let someone get 900 free gems, which means ArenaNet loses out on a bit over $10.

DevonCarver.5370:

Hey everyone,

…

I wanted to further discuss a couple of ideas. Firstly, several posts have called for reduced map caps in WvW. The problem that would create is that we’d be allowing even fewer people to play in a given period of time if we were to do that. So I wonder if there is another way to accomplish the same goal, while not disenfranchising people who would now be unable to get into the maps? It’s a hard problem because the more populated servers face long queues while the less populated ones face empty maps. From my perspective there aren’t a ton of good options, which is why discussing this problem is pretty important.

…

…

One way of alleviating over long queuing for WvWvW is to have mandatory 2 hour play time in WvWvW, after which time the player is giving 10 min warning before automatically go back to PvE. If the player want to continue with WvWvW, the player is allowed to immediately re join the queue or enter WvWvW if there is no queue.

Such a WvWvW player rotation system is fair to both types of high pop and low pop servers. An additional benefit of the WvWvW player rotation system is that it also automatically rotate commanders tags impartially. So that everyone will get a chance at commanding for high pop servers while low pop servers can have their less numerous commanders immediately re join WvWvW when there is no queue.

Edit: the WvWvW mandatory play time can be adjusted according to outcome e.g. from 2 hours to 1 half hour.

DevonCarver.5370:

Sticking to the lines of transfers, what are reasonable restrictions to place on players after they transfer? No WvW for the rest of the match? No WvW for 24 hours? Would that help any or would it actually exacerbate the problem?

IMHO the rest of the match → 1 week of no wvw will definetly make people think twice about jumping ship and server hoping to get the wins.

Avariz.8241:

One way of alleviating over long queuing for WvWvW is to have mandatory 2 hour play time in WvWvW, after which time the player is giving 10 min warning before automatically go back to PvE. If the player want to continue with WvWvW, the player is allowed to immediately re join the queue or enter WvWvW if there is no queue.

So basically punish people that like to spend much time in WvW?
I really don’t think that is a solution. When we have events with our guild it is quite unusual that the event ends within two hours. With a system like this it would more or less force the end of the event if there was a queue.

If you make the cost to move to tier 1 punitive, fewer guilds will pay that cost, and they might go to less populated servers, instead of stacking in the top 3.

lordkrall.7241:

Avariz.8241:

One way of alleviating over long queuing for WvWvW is to have mandatory 2 hour play time in WvWvW, after which time the player is giving 10 min warning before automatically go back to PvE. If the player want to continue with WvWvW, the player is allowed to immediately re join the queue or enter WvWvW if there is no queue.

So basically punish people that like to spend much time in WvW?
I really don’t think that is a solution. When we have events with our guild it is quite unusual that the event ends within two hours. With a system like this it would more or less force the end of the event if there was a queue.

Since the forthcoming new map Edge of the Mist is a type of overflow to WvWvW perhaps the new map can be used as a possible solution to reward WvWvW players who prematurely mandatory 2 hours time expired before completion of an achievement.

Soren.9316:

DevonCarver.5370:

Sticking to the lines of transfers, what are reasonable restrictions to place on players after they transfer? No WvW for the rest of the match? No WvW for 24 hours? Would that help any or would it actually exacerbate the problem?

IMHO the rest of the match -> 1 week of no wvw will definetly make people think twice about jumping ship and server hoping to get the wins.

But are we not trying to get people to spread out ? All this would do is prevent people from transfering and thus spreading the population which make the whole concept pointless. Now if they imposed something like this for people moving UP then maybe it would make sense but the people moving down to help … well its just idiotic to punish them.

DevonCarver.5370:

titanlectro.5029:

I promise you that Devon is looking at all of these metrics and measurements you are theorizing RIGHT NOW, he just doesn’t share them with you.

This is literally true. We don’t share those numbers as a company policy, but we have them and I am looking at them right now.

Still better to use WvW server rank as the mechanism to determine transfer costs. A server’s WvW is well known by everyone and easy to understand. That way you can keep the population secret and yet players can understand why a server costs a certain amount.

Nuzt.7894:

Soren.9316:

DevonCarver.5370:

Sticking to the lines of transfers, what are reasonable restrictions to place on players after they transfer? No WvW for the rest of the match? No WvW for 24 hours? Would that help any or would it actually exacerbate the problem?

IMHO the rest of the match -> 1 week of no wvw will definetly make people think twice about jumping ship and server hoping to get the wins.

But are we not trying to get people to spread out ? All this would do is prevent people from transfering and thus spreading the population which make the whole concept pointless. Now if they imposed something like this for people moving UP then maybe it would make sense but the people moving down to help … well its just idiotic to punish them.

The players brave enough to move to lower tier servers (such as I did) to support and help build the server up for wvw, should be applauded and rewarded for having the ability to use their own brain in a constructive manner. Those individuals who have a Lemming mentality to go over the cliff – transfer upward to win – should not be given any perks what-so-ever.

I still say

That I dont believe the root of the problems with WVW are simply because of transfering.

Transfering has its benefits. Also its cons.

Fixing the cons is what will need to be tackled.

Lets say I am on a tier 1 server, the likelihood of me transferring to a tier 6 server will probably never happen, even if you award me 2000 gems.

But if I was on a tier 6 server and it wasnt my speed, no matter what punishment or gem cost or time, I would do it because its what ,with patience, will help with my fun factor.

The problem that exists is much like stealth, stealth isnt what kills you, damage does or points. An even playing field will never truly exist.

Short from creating server versus server versus server with equally geared same class npcs.

Its my opinion that you look more at how the points are tallied so that those that are undermanned stand a chance.

Or

If you are strongly striving to achieve a balance, put all servers in 1 of 3 leagues, when in Q for their home server, it could put them in their weaker linked sister server, matches could still be similar, and total points for each league would be displayed, this would certainly begin to bring the point spreads closer together and could help balance server loads as perhaps some would transfer to help for coverage on each of that leagues maps.

Also, there is still no real reason to defend anything or rally and muster people.

Im assuming the Season 1 chest will be another RNG box or some fluff, while great for an individual achievement does nothing to help promote the WVW community.

Also

Although this may be slightly off topic, commander pins being color changable would be welcomed immediately to help organizing on the battlefields.

Keep up the good work ANET, you are certainly on the right track no matter what you decide and thanks for listening to us.

A simple concept that goes a really long way

Borderland structures can only give PPT to the native team to that BL. You cap stuff in enemy BL to deny enemy points, but you do not gain them for yourself.

This instantly makes the game more defensive-minded, forcing offensive pushes to be more strategic, which moves more towards rewarding coordination and skill and a little bit away from sheer numbers.

Strategies will quickly adapt. I imagine towers being much more sieged up, and therefore trebuchets and other longer, more drawn out sieges, resulting in more fighting and less of a musical chairs back-capping game.

See the thing is if server A caps all of server B’s borderlands, that sets server B back, but it does not give server A a point advantage over server C, so if server C sees that happening and goes after server A, forcing A to pull back off B, etc, you can quickly see how it would quickly become a more thought-out macro-strategic game.

You need to offer free transfer OFF t1 servers

If this has already been suggested I apologize but how about a system where you can only get into enemy borderlands though EB. What I am suggesting is a portal gate system that has to be taken and held so that you have access to enemy borderlands. This would force smaller pop servers to have to fight together in their home borderland and push into EB for defense and larger servers could in theory push into multiple borderlands. What this could do is keep smaller servers from spreading out too thin and not able to defend anything and larger servers would have to make a choice on how to invade but be aware they could be cut off as well and give the defenders a change to repel them other than endless zergs respawing in at will. It doesn’t have to be like this exactly but we need some incentive to defend and a system that lets you gain and loss access into areas would feel more like a real conquest and help keep numbers more balanced…

i’m seeing a trend -

it seems casual wvw’rs favor the “score isn’t much to me, i don’t only wvw, so price will affect my choice, these guys are rude and the ques are long so i’ll transfer down”

the hard core player favors making it easy to transfer up “4 packed servers would be sweet, just remove a few empty servers”

the hard core players loyal to their server “break up the t1 so they can’t roflstomp us”

the people in t1 “haha, as if i plan to move, just fix the kitten que, skill lag, filter out the pve players and I’m good”

anet is like “yeah, transfers are good, i like this subject.”

and I’m like “facepalm”

DevonCarver.5370:

Sticking to the lines of transfers, what are reasonable restrictions to place on players after they transfer? No WvW for the rest of the match? No WvW for 24 hours? Would that help any or would it actually exacerbate the problem?

In the interest of WVW, I feel that individuals that transfer should be prohibited from WVW for the duration of the current season. This restriction could be lifted during the off-season. This would allow guilds and individuals to freely shift around during the off-season. Also, it would act to maintain a level of competition during the season by preventing the over stacking that we are currently observing.

I have played this game since nearly the beginning, and the one act that causes many players to stop playing WVW or give up is the over stacking of servers. I feel that the transfer restriction would combat this, and through encouraging “In-season” competition, more players would continue to enjoy the game.

Devon, Thank you for your time and consideration in making our game better.

DevonCarver.5370:

So, if prices for server transfers were based on WvW population, what would a fair distribution of costs look like from the lowest population servers to the highest? Keep in mind that making it completely impossible to transfer to a server puts a burden on other players. That doesn’t mean that you couldn’t have an incredibly high price, just that completely blocked isn’t an option.

This isn’t going to solve the problem. This will just allow lower tier pop servers to buy guilds cheaper than higher pop servers, thus just stacking other servers.

Sure, it will change the balance of power, but at the end of the day, their will still be nothing but blow out matches.

Scoring is the real issue, and how to a scoring system that can take in population imbalance would be the key to success. But that system is very hard to design.

Ricky.4706:

i’m seeing a trend -

it seems casual wvw’rs favor the “score isn’t much to me, i don’t only wvw, so price will affect my choice, these guys are rude and the ques are long so i’ll transfer down”

the hard core player favors making it easy to transfer up “4 packed servers would be sweet, just remove a few empty servers”

the hard core players loyal to their server “break up the t1 so they can’t roflstomp us”

the people in t1 “haha, as if i plan to move, just fix the kitten que, skill lag, filter out the pve players and I’m good”

anet is like “yeah, transfers are good, i like this subject.”

and I’m like “facepalm”

Best post made today , lol’d

Amori.7598:

DevonCarver.5370:

Sticking to the lines of transfers, what are reasonable restrictions to place on players after they transfer? No WvW for the rest of the match? No WvW for 24 hours? Would that help any or would it actually exacerbate the problem?

In the interest of WVW, I feel that individuals that transfer should be prohibited from WVW for the duration of the current season. This restriction could be lifted during the off-season. This would allow guilds and individuals to freely shift around during the off-season. Also, it would act to maintain a level of competition during the season by preventing the over stacking that we are currently observing.

I have played this game since nearly the beginning, and the one act that causes many players to stop playing WVW or give up is the over stacking of servers. I feel that the transfer restriction would combat this, and through encouraging “In-season” competition, more players would continue to enjoy the game.

Devon, Thank you for your time and consideration in making our game better.

FOR THE WHOLE SEASON?

That is absurd. What about the people who transferred off t1 servers, so they could actually get into wvw to play? Your response would leave them with only 1 option, and that would be to play the queue game, and hope they can play. That would also affect everyone else on their server. By transferring off, they were able to actually play WvW, and free up some queue space for other people on their old server.

They already have it set up that you can only transfer once a week. I don’t think you should punish players and not allow them to even play wvw because they transferred.

Banzie.5248:

Ricky.4706:

i’m seeing a trend -

it seems casual wvw’rs favor the “score isn’t much to me, i don’t only wvw, so price will affect my choice, these guys are rude and the ques are long so i’ll transfer down”

the hard core player favors making it easy to transfer up “4 packed servers would be sweet, just remove a few empty servers”

the hard core players loyal to their server “break up the t1 so they can’t roflstomp us”

the people in t1 “haha, as if i plan to move, just fix the kitten que, skill lag, filter out the pve players and I’m good”

anet is like “yeah, transfers are good, i like this subject.”

and I’m like “facepalm”

Best post made today , lol’d

People forget that transfers used to be free. So, stop trying to pin the server transferring to anet just wanting to be greedy.

I agree, transfers are good. It is an option for players, and it is a freedom those players have.

I will maintain that the scoring system is the biggest issue, since it doesn’t take into account the imbalance of population coverage.

Anet will not be able to balance servers, through restricting transfers, etc, for 24 hour coverage. Their will still be imbalances that could lead to blow out matches.

Charak.9761:

You need to offer free transfer OFF t1 servers

What would this accomplish? They could just transfer to a t2 server, and now that t2 server can become the next stacked t1 server.

I remember the days when the end of free transfers happened. That is when our t1 server (SBI) started its plummet to t5. Oh, and then Kaineng rose from the depths of t8 to t2. Don’t really think transfers from t1 servers will solve the problems, cause t2 and t3 servers would still smash t4, t5, t6, t7, t8 servers.

Raising/lowering the transfer cost isn’t going solve this ongoing problem. lowering cost to transfer down is counteracted with people tying their " fun factor" strictly to winning. you can see that in the abandonment when a server looses favor. Raising the cost creates stability no doubt however, world population =/= wvw participation. It severely punishes worlds that are higher in pve. no one is going to pay the transfer cost of a t1 server to transfer to a t7 server. the wvw population itself is far too random to really put a price on it.

Think the concept of server v server v server was good on paper but it was bound to end up like a gym class sport game ( jocks on one team, everyone else on other).

IMO they should scrap the individual server competition and make a alliance system. it’d server vs other servers with overall contribution to their respected alliance. The issue with population and possibly coverage problems through how points are achieved in respected alliance. For example Jq, ioj, et are in the same alliance. Jq has a blowout week, however ioj and et loss their matches, thus putting their alliance behind the others were 2 or 3 of their servers have won their respected matches.

The key to population spread would to put opposite servers, high tier with a medium and low. It wouldn’t be immediate but it would create an incentive to shore up the ranks in those servers.

It would also serve to solve another problem, stacked servers or in this case stacked alliances. In the current state, the only thing anet can do is stem the tide by increased transfer cost……which is clearly working. By the time the cost gets high its already too late, anet can’t/won’t force people on to other servers. However with this alliance idea, if anet notices an alliance start to become one sided, they can move servers around and thus friends/guilds would still be together

DevonCarver.5370:

Sticking to the lines of transfers, what are reasonable restrictions to place on players after they transfer? No WvW for the rest of the match? No WvW for 24 hours? Would that help any or would it actually exacerbate the problem?

Not sure if serious, but I will bite….. how does restricting WvW activity in any way help say a low WvW pop bronze league or even silver league server.. the point of balancing populations is to promote decent action not lock out action, especially if you have just raked in a fair amount of gem sales to allow it… that is such a poor question to put out there, it misses the point by a country mile and to me illustrates the lack of creative thinking around the problems the game is facing right now, sorry if that’s harsh but NO, just NO.
WvW needs more players spread around the servers more equally so transfers are part and parcel of both the problem and the solution.. locking out one side of the equation in no way helps server balancing in fact I think it will deter anyone moving at all, which as it stands now helps no one or ANET as it players will begin drifting out of WvW/GW2 from both sides of the server issues.
Penalties for transfers, if that is the way its deemed best to go, need to be relational to the rewards and character actuals imo… ie rank deductions and sliding scale reward penalties until those ranks are recovered.

this has nothing to do with anyone being greedy, it has to do more with looking at the real issues. The transfer prices will only affect people who aren’t serious about wvw and will not fix the balance issue.

The imbalance is due to the fact that you can transfer to win. Let’s tackle the cause.

Let’s redefine what winning means.

If you transfer up you should “ride the pine” if you transfer down, there should be no penalties. This is basically what we should be trying to accomplish is it not ? To try and populate the less populated servers ? I think alot of people think there will be some sort of mass exodus from the top servers to the bottom servers mid season so thats why they feel there should be a penalty for any and all transfers. Most players do not want to be steam rolled or do the steam rolling, they want fights, your not going to see all of JQ (for example) transfer down to GoM and PvD for 7 weeks.

Just my 2 cents

Nuzt.7894:

If you transfer up you should “ride the pine” if you transfer down, there should be no penalties. This is basically what we should be trying to accomplish is it not ? To try and populate the less populated servers ? I think alot of people think there will be some sort of mass exodus from the top servers to the bottom servers mid season so thats why they feel there should be a penalty for any and all transfers. Most players do not want to be steam rolled or do the steam rolling, they want fights, your not going to see all of JQ (for example) transfer down to GoM and PvD for 7 weeks.

Just my 2 cents

They should, upset bronze league.

Serious note, as many of us have said. We know why t1 exists, we understand it. Doesn’t mean we have to like it. There should be ways, and there are if anet doesn’t want wvw to ultimately fail, that you don’t have to be In the big 3 to have fights all day everyday. All the big 3 do now is provide fights, and continually kill servers.

Nuzt.7894:

If you transfer up you should “ride the pine” if you transfer down, there should be no penalties. This is basically what we should be trying to accomplish is it not ? To try and populate the less populated servers ? I think alot of people think there will be some sort of mass exodus from the top servers to the bottom servers mid season so thats why they feel there should be a penalty for any and all transfers. Most players do not want to be steam rolled or do the steam rolling, they want fights, your not going to see all of JQ (for example) transfer down to GoM and PvD for 7 weeks.

Just my 2 cents

Except, the mass exodus from t1 servers has happened before (dec through feb).

Should be no penalty for transferring.

winning should not be about which server has the most coverage and transferring over.

winning should be about how much you contributed to the fight – being outmanned should have a greater value than attacking 10 guys with an army of 100. The winner should be a legend for facing impossible odds with courage – the lore should be about that guild or people….

A fight doesn’t have to happen to know that there is a 99.999% chance that the 100 man army will walk all over the 10 man army. There is always a chance of some crazy power outage disconnected the 100 man army. for the week.

The fights are unbalanced, but the winner should be the underdog to counter act that.

a courage ladder would have more value than a roflstomp ladder.

only in a balanced fight is a courage based ladder moot.

in an rpg world, us chaotic neutrals are against anyone having absolute power – absolute power brings absolute corruption – transferring to win, is a conduit to that kind of power – so the rules of winning must be changed.

Andrew Clear.1750:

Nuzt.7894:

If you transfer up you should “ride the pine” if you transfer down, there should be no penalties. This is basically what we should be trying to accomplish is it not ? To try and populate the less populated servers ? I think alot of people think there will be some sort of mass exodus from the top servers to the bottom servers mid season so thats why they feel there should be a penalty for any and all transfers. Most players do not want to be steam rolled or do the steam rolling, they want fights, your not going to see all of JQ (for example) transfer down to GoM and PvD for 7 weeks.

Just my 2 cents

Except, the mass exodus from t1 servers has happened before (dec through feb).

Should be no penalty for transferring.

True but, this is when you could climb ranks, you can’t paintrain your way to T1 during Leagues. At least not in the Silver and Bronze League.

I think and it’s only my opinion but transfer prices should be rewarded off server rank and not world population and to remove the WvW season prizes, also maybe add a 4th league.

Another idea: Maybe go back to 8 leagues but reset all the points, have a round robin and let servers fall into right leagues/rank then sort out a leagues system then? Yes, it will be painful for AR to fight JQ but at least it might only be 1 grueling week instead of 7 and have free transfers for a week leading up to this.. (keeping domino effect in mind – Guilds in stacked servers might say “hey I actually want to be able to play WvW when I want to, lets go to FC”, therefore maybe balancing out the WvW population among other servers) ….

Also: Please remove the living story.

DevonCarver.5370:

So, if prices for server transfers were based on WvW population, what would a fair distribution of costs look like from the lowest population servers to the highest? Keep in mind that making it completely impossible to transfer to a server puts a burden on other players. That doesn’t mean that you couldn’t have an incredibly high price, just that completely blocked isn’t an option.

Transfer to lowest Tier/Populated servers for each region needs to be free. Any gem cost, even if it is very little, will turn people away just for the mere fact there is kitten cost. Is this an option or do your overlords insist on having a gem cost for every single transfer?

There has been debate on what exactly defines “low” WvW server since there is PvE population, not everyone does WvW. Right now however it is crystal clear even without statistics which servers need help, which are in the middle, and which are completely dominating due to population. If we ever get to the point where population advantage vs success becomes too muddled – that means things are much better place than they are now. So pick a metric (rank, server pop, total hours spent in wvw, etc.) and go with it, and adjust as things start to balance out.

DevonCarver.5370:

Sticking to the lines of transfers, what are reasonable restrictions to place on players after they transfer? No WvW for the rest of the match? No WvW for 24 hours? Would that help any or would it actually exacerbate the problem?

No server bonuses for a period of time like 1-2 weeks. Low priority in any WvW queues for the rest of the season.

Arbitrarily limiting WvW participation would exacerbate the problem, because the transfers we want to encourage (high to low) will get the full artificial punishment and the server will not get their help, while the bandwagons (low to high) are already being hindered by the queue and near maxed out in population. So this hurts low pop much more than bandwagons.

DevonCarver.5370:

titanlectro.5029:

I promise you that Devon is looking at all of these metrics and measurements you are theorizing RIGHT NOW, he just doesn’t share them with you.

This is literally true. We don’t share those numbers as a company policy, but we have them and I am looking at them right now.

Such a troll! Lol

If the players were actually ice cream, how many gallons of ice realm could you fit into a borderland?

I am not sure if you have read my post two pages ago, why focusing on the “players transfer problem” if you can just get rid of it once and for all? ^^;

Grevender.9235:

I am not sure if you have read my post two pages ago, why focusing on the “players transfer problem” if you can just get rid of it once and for all? ^^;

If you get rid of players transferring, then you are saying you want the imbalance that currently resides on all the servers.

Transferring is a service the player can choose, and it should be left for them to decide if they want to stay on their server or leave to another.

NornBearPig.9814:

DevonCarver.5370:

So, if prices for server transfers were based on WvW population, what would a fair distribution of costs look like from the lowest population servers to the highest? Keep in mind that making it completely impossible to transfer to a server puts a burden on other players. That doesn’t mean that you couldn’t have an incredibly high price, just that completely blocked isn’t an option.

Transfer to lowest Tier/Populated servers for each region needs to be free. Any gem cost, even if it is very little, will turn people away just for the mere fact there is kitten cost. Is this an option or do your overlords insist on having a gem cost for every single transfer?

There has been debate on what exactly defines “low” WvW server since there is PvE population, not everyone does WvW. Right now however it is crystal clear even without statistics which servers need help, which are in the middle, and which are completely dominating due to population. If we ever get to the point where population advantage vs success becomes too muddled – that means things are much better place than they are now. So pick a metric (rank, server pop, total hours spent in wvw, etc.) and go with it, and adjust as things start to balance out.

Maybe, full charge to transfer into gold, half price for silver, free for bronze.

Gudradain.3892:

Visiroth.5914:

Relying on players to destack themselves is a losing proposition. What incentive is there for someone to leave their current server for a lower tier server. And if it happens how do we ensure that the population doesn’t try to stack on a single lower tier server, which has happened many times.

You got the wrong question… The real question is : What incentive is there for someone to leave their current server. It doesn’t matter if they want to leave for a lower or a higher server. Why do they want to leave their server?

If a server start getting a lot of transfer, it will go up in ranking and the transfer will stop. Problem solved. Tier 1 server are staying tier 1 because they get a constant influx of transfer. It’s not skill, it’s transfer.

The question was framed around your suggestion. If we restrict transfers to higher ranked servers then that means you can only move downward. How do we destack the current servers? That is the problem any population shifting solution must address. You are implying that high rank servers will slowly die without transfers, which is a dubious claim as they have strong guild backbones. New players are also free to start on any server they wish.

Ranking up is faster than it used to be, but it is still not an immediate process. Mass transfers to the lowest tier would still take weeks to work up to T2, more than enough time to allow for bandwagoning. The problem of creating a new powerhouse rather than equally distributed population isn’t solved whatsoever.

DevonCarver.5370:

So, if prices for server transfers were based on WvW population, what would a fair distribution of costs look like from the lowest population servers to the highest? Keep in mind that making it completely impossible to transfer to a server puts a burden on other players. That doesn’t mean that you couldn’t have an incredibly high price, just that completely blocked isn’t an option.

One thing to look at, other than the cost, is allowing the transfer if guild influence down, especially to a server on the bottom, but not up. That might help encourage guilds to move down in the rankings.

I’ve had several ideas and read all 20 pages of this post and here is my FINAL SOLUTION if it were up to me:

Phase I

Transfer system is the best place to start since it will be the easiest to fix, immediately making stacking less desirable and offering an incentive to de-stack.

Transfer fee = (9 – tier) x 300 gems. Transferring to tier 5 or lower comes with a “rebate” upon transfer. Rebate = (tier – 4) x 300 gems. Rebates can only be received by accounts active more than 90 days with no rebates in the previous 90 days, and only when transferring “down” one or more tiers. Transferring to tier 1 comes with a probation period where some WvW functionality is restricted for a period of time. It also comes with an option to undo the transfer and receive 50% of your gems back. Transfers, including “undo’s” take effect until the weekly reset following your transfer.

Phase II

Scoring change – no longer do you receive points for holding enemy structures. You only earn points for holding what is naturally yours. You win by capping enemy structures to deny their points, while holding your own. The game becomes more strategic and scores become visually closer. You still earn points for stomps, dolyaks, and sentry caps and these become a much bigger factor in the overall score. Currently they can be up to 30% or more of the score, under this system they would likely make up 50% or more. Bloodlust and dolyaks become potential game changers.

Phase III

Actual changes to the game mechanics.

Waypoint contesting mechanic is revised to allow 1 player every 12 seconds to use waypoints that are contested, however the waypoints stay contested for 10 seconds after the event ends, meaning there will not be a “split second” for everyone to spam in during a continuous siege. This allows people to slowly WP in and starting sieging up to try to slow down the enemy while the main force runs there. Previously you could wait 2.5 minutes and spam a 50-man zerg in. Now in 2.5 minutes you’ll have 12-13 people inside with the rest on the way.

Outmanned buff now allows you to see enemy players on your mini map within X range.

Zergs of 40+ even when not in combat create an orange troop icon on the map showing their location.

Other possible good ideas here!

DevonCarver.5370:

Sticking to the lines of transfers, what are reasonable restrictions to place on players after they transfer? No WvW for the rest of the match? No WvW for 24 hours? Would that help any or would it actually exacerbate the problem?

The main thing that people have asked for is a prohibition on using supplies or dropping siege for a week and possibly using siege weapons, specifically golems, since this seems to be a major form of griefing plaguing some servers. It should be applied to new players, too. It won’t stop spying but it will limit a spies ability to actively undermine a server through supply waste and siege destruction, and if it’s applied to new accounts, it will limit the damage people can do during free trials and such.

Replace PPT. I think its the biggest contributor of stacking servers. It encourages off hour play and having more off hour players, which makes it unfair for those who don’t play off hours or don’t have enough off hour players

Replace PPT with system similar to points gained from stomps when you capture nodes/ruins. Towers gives 10 points per kill, keep gives 30 points per kill, camps gives 5 points per kill. This basically don’t reward timezones where its PVDoor, when theres noone to kill. This will work well for most NA/EU servers that don’t have off hours players and encourage fights

Under this system, the good guild and players would try to form alliances and move to other servers esp to lower tiers wheres theres very little players that give needless points to hostile server.

sil.4160:

Replace PPT. I think its the biggest contributor of stacking servers. It encourages off hour play and having more off hour players, which makes it unfair for those who don’t play off hours or don’t have enough off hour players

Replace PPT with system similar to points gained from stomps when you capture nodes/ruins. Towers gives 10 points per kill, keep gives 30 points per kill, camps gives 5 points per kill. This basically don’t reward timezones where its PVDoor, when theres noone to kill. This will work well for most NA/EU servers that don’t have off hours players and encourage fights

Under this system, the good guild and players would try to form alliances and move to other servers esp to lower tiers wheres theres very little players that give needless points to hostile server.

So, tell the people who play off hours to take a hike, and make the match only decided by the prime time players?

That right there makes your solution fail, because the game mode is 24/7 and everyone needs to be considered.

So for the record I think server population balance is an impossible task. It wont happen simply because you cant control human behavior without some measure of force. For example lowering map population to the lowest number fielded by a server in your match up. That would be BAD and just force people out of the game mode. Not good. However here’s a crazy idea. Alliances. It would be interesting at least in terms of season rewards if the end rewards weren’t determined by individual servers performance in a league but an alliances performance across all servers. That way even if your server is getting smashed (cough sos) in their league their overall contribution point wise in, say, red alliance would still be meaningful to an overall goal. It would also allow for the organizers to better distribute matchups in an organic manner while still having them fight for a first place or overall reward. If that makes sense. Maybe. Its kind of a crazy idea. I’m not sure if its even possible. But it would beat logging in to wait around to collect your pre determined 6th place prize.

Just an observation; there seem to be several issues being discussed here:

1. population imbalance in general
2. population imbalance at off-peak hours
3. length of queues during primetime

2 & 3 are not tied to each other and the solution for each may be different.
Tweaking transfers may be a good idea for balancing peak population , but for off-peak population going to less populated servers does not make any sense at all. We do not have a queue in sfr (t1) at 4 am so nothing to be gained by moving down. On the contrary, quite a lot to lose, because there will be no one to play with or against in a t8 server at 4 am. Seriously, when I started playing in Jan, there were times where I was completely alone in sfr home bl and even now that we may have 3 and 4 hour queues at prime time, there are times during my morning when we may not have more than 5 ppl in a bl – do I really want to transfer and play with even less than that? When discussing off peak coverage, do consider that stacking on high WvW population servers (which ppl determine by rank, rightly or wrongly) may not be about winning for truly off-peak players , it may just be about having other ppl to play with.

And about making off peak points count less, Asian & Australians have no choice but to play off peak (and so will some ppl in eu/na because of their personal schedules), which ever region or server they choose. I do not think it is reasonable to make their efforts count any less. they bought and they play the game just like everyone else.

DevonCarver.5370:

Sticking to the lines of transfers, what are reasonable restrictions to place on players after they transfer? No WvW for the rest of the match? No WvW for 24 hours? Would that help any or would it actually exacerbate the problem?

Whatever you might implement in this area, only implement it for people transferring up. Remember the overall aim here is to encourage people to spread out; there must be as few barriers to transferring down as possible.

• Show average queue length for prime time in the server list: you’ll think twice before transfering to a server with a 2h average wait time. Maybe even make the player wait for the average time before confirming the transfer: “are you really, really sure?”
• In the server list, show servers with 0 queue on top by default
• Let guilds keep their upgrades when transfering server
• Let guilds use influence and merits to gain discounts on transfer fees

Solstice.1097:

I’ve had several ideas and read all 20 pages of this post and here is my FINAL SOLUTION if it were up to me:

Phase I

Transfer system is the best place to start since it will be the easiest to fix, immediately making stacking less desirable and offering an incentive to de-stack.

Transfer fee = (9 – tier) x 300 gems. Transferring to tier 5 or lower comes with a “rebate” upon transfer. Rebate = (tier – 4) x 300 gems. Rebates can only be received by accounts active more than 90 days with no rebates in the previous 90 days, and only when transferring “down” one or more tiers. Transferring to tier 1 comes with a probation period where some WvW functionality is restricted for a period of time. It also comes with an option to undo the transfer and receive 50% of your gems back. Transfers, including “undo’s” take effect until the weekly reset following your transfer.

Phase II

Scoring change – no longer do you receive points for holding enemy structures. You only earn points for holding what is naturally yours. You win by capping enemy structures to deny their points, while holding your own. The game becomes more strategic and scores become visually closer. You still earn points for stomps, dolyaks, and sentry caps and these become a much bigger factor in the overall score. Currently they can be up to 30% or more of the score, under this system they would likely make up 50% or more. Bloodlust and dolyaks become potential game changers.

Phase III

Actual changes to the game mechanics.

Waypoint contesting mechanic is revised to allow 1 player every 12 seconds to use waypoints that are contested, however the waypoints stay contested for 10 seconds after the event ends, meaning there will not be a “split second” for everyone to spam in during a continuous siege. This allows people to slowly WP in and starting sieging up to try to slow down the enemy while the main force runs there. Previously you could wait 2.5 minutes and spam a 50-man zerg in. Now in 2.5 minutes you’ll have 12-13 people inside with the rest on the way.

Outmanned buff now allows you to see enemy players on your mini map within X range.

Zergs of 40+ even when not in combat create an orange troop icon on the map showing their location.

Other possible good ideas here!

LOL. What part of that achieves population balance?? Did you forget which thread you were posting in? And don’t tell me that your first suggestion does that, because it won’t.