Guild Wars 2

Cribbage.2056:

Balefire.7592:

Solstice.1097:

MakubeC.3026:

Solstice.1097:

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.

Hmmm….interesting idea.

Can we discuss this?

Let’s say server A is the most populated one. So he goes to B and spends time taking B’s BL. He also has to protect EB and his own BL. B is not making points in his BL, and instead it goes to EB and try to stop A there. Since EB is the only place where the battle for points is. The one who domains EB, domains the game.

Now, what would be the balance between EB and a BL? Will a server with his entire BL producing points be enough to fight a server controlling EB?

Well after some thought I think EB could operate the same way, with SMC being the only structure that can give PPT to any server that owns it. Therefore whoever holds SMC becomes the target of the other 2 servers, and encouraging the 2v1 that was initially expected to happen in WvW naturally.

This is the best idea I’ve seen, as the concept in and of itself functions for every tier, it really stresses defense over offense, and it encourages more tactical usage of Borderland maps within the scope of all of WvW.
It also reduces the raw number of points available, which I think is better for the game, since having a 60k deficit breaks morale a lot more than something like 20k. If Server A has terrible coverage, as long as they can maintain their BL, they won’t fall as far behind, and can then try to rally to make up the smaller point gap.

It will seem like a lot less of a good idea once you see a single highly populated server hold it unbroken for days against two low pop servers. Those servers will in your proposed system have no way at all to score points and no meaningful objectives to head for.

And if by some chance the two smaller ones overpower the high pop server, as soon as one of them caps SMC, the fight becomes them vs high pop + the remaining low pop. So they get to hold SMC for all of 5 minutes.

At least as things stand, smaller groups can dodge about taking minor locations.

he didn’t quote the original idea.

go back and read the initial idea it will make more sense.

Solstice.1097:

MakubeC.3026:

Solstice.1097:

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.

Hmmm….interesting idea.

Can we discuss this?

Let’s say server A is the most populated one. So he goes to B and spends time taking B’s BL. He also has to protect EB and his own BL. B is not making points in his BL, and instead it goes to EB and try to stop A there. Since EB is the only place where the battle for points is. The one who domains EB, domains the game.

Now, what would be the balance between EB and a BL? Will a server with his entire BL producing points be enough to fight a server controlling EB?

Well after some thought I think EB could operate the same way, with SMC being the only structure that can give PPT to any server that owns it. Therefore whoever holds SMC becomes the target of the other 2 servers, and encouraging the 2v1 that was initially expected to happen in WvW naturally.

This is a really good idea +1

I think drastically reducing the amount of points available is a really good idea.

I’m not sure if this pertains or has already been mentioned and I will try my best to describe what I’d like to see without getting…too emotional lol. I adore WvW and play whenever I am able. However, due to concerns about OP traits in PvP or problems with AI mechanics, certain classes are at a clear disadvantage comparable to others in WvW. This is a huge blow to motivation for many players of those classes to really dedicate to helping their servers in WvW in thinking that they can not contribute as much or as effectively as other classes. I am not even going to name classes, but I think we all are aware of the class imbalance issues which pertain in particular to WvW. If the devs feel the need to change class traits due to PvP, then for kitten’s sake (yes I actually typed that instead) make the changes affective ONLY for pvp and leave WvW and PvE out of it. Bring class balace to WvW so that all classes can feel they contribute to their servers. I think if this were to happen, not only would many others be more interested in playing WvW but increase in class diversity would certainly add flavor to the fights.

Another aspect I would like to point out would be incentive for healer classes. Healer classes in WvW do not get near the kudos or appreciation they should for the amount of help they bring to their servers. Could their not be some small way to show appreciation? Even in the form of achievements for healing in certain maps or occasions with usage of skills? Maybe receive “X” amount of badges for “X” amount of heals activated which actually healed (otherwise people would stand around spam healing like idiots for nothing). Maybe there could be some way. I’m sure the incredibly smart programmers could come up with something

Solstice.1097:

Cribbage.2056:

Balefire.7592:

Solstice.1097:

MakubeC.3026:

Solstice.1097:

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.

Hmmm….interesting idea.

Can we discuss this?

Let’s say server A is the most populated one. So he goes to B and spends time taking B’s BL. He also has to protect EB and his own BL. B is not making points in his BL, and instead it goes to EB and try to stop A there. Since EB is the only place where the battle for points is. The one who domains EB, domains the game.

Now, what would be the balance between EB and a BL? Will a server with his entire BL producing points be enough to fight a server controlling EB?

Well after some thought I think EB could operate the same way, with SMC being the only structure that can give PPT to any server that owns it. Therefore whoever holds SMC becomes the target of the other 2 servers, and encouraging the 2v1 that was initially expected to happen in WvW naturally.

This is the best idea I’ve seen, as the concept in and of itself functions for every tier, it really stresses defense over offense, and it encourages more tactical usage of Borderland maps within the scope of all of WvW.
It also reduces the raw number of points available, which I think is better for the game, since having a 60k deficit breaks morale a lot more than something like 20k. If Server A has terrible coverage, as long as they can maintain their BL, they won’t fall as far behind, and can then try to rally to make up the smaller point gap.

It will seem like a lot less of a good idea once you see a single highly populated server hold it unbroken for days against two low pop servers. Those servers will in your proposed system have no way at all to score points and no meaningful objectives to head for.

And if by some chance the two smaller ones overpower the high pop server, as soon as one of them caps SMC, the fight becomes them vs high pop + the remaining low pop. So they get to hold SMC for all of 5 minutes.

At least as things stand, smaller groups can dodge about taking minor locations.

he didn’t quote the original idea.

go back and read the initial idea it will make more sense.

Doesn’t really matter with the original idea added or not. It will only work when servers are already balanced. If only one server is weaker than it will fall apart as the strongest server really only needs to focus on 2 borderlands. It’s own and the number 2 one. Hold your own and deny the number 2 points. The weaker server is of no consequence in this equation.

Without semi equal coverage no amount of point tampering will do anything to help the situation.

I’ve said it before there are only 2 ways to battle the imbalance. That’s by removing the imbalance through a restructuring of the servers to make them global. Or to make the imbalance irrelevant by removing the aoe cap. The latter of course won’t really make the match outcome that much different, but weaker server can start having fun again at least.

Make home BL’s harder to take. Make supply lines matter. Give the home BL more supply for siege. This would at least allow smaller servers to fortify there BL faster and stand somewhat of a chance. Maybe make outmanned slowly give your keeps and players supply. Just some random ideas.

Right now some borderlands are being used as EB. If you get outnumbered so badly you might give the defending borderlands some edge over the enemy zerg.
How about not allowing resurection in enemy borderlands for a start. Home team still gets it, even with a resurection penalty.
Look at the bottom of the bronze EU league, mass mass blowouts by servers packed with people.
And waypoint building in enemy borderlands, not a good idea because that sort of thing is only possible if you already outnumbered the server by far. Why make it easier for them.

Wich makes me also think who thought it was a good idea to do country servers in the first place.

Ricky.4706:

I suppose it would be nice to know what the cap is at now and then compare the average attendance of the servers. Even if you did balance out the population, there is the issue of non stop coverage that a server recruited for, vs a server of exclusive na or eu players.

One possible solution would be to color code the matches as opposed to direct server vs server. Then rotate the servers assigned to the colors – this way eu servers and na servers can join 1 common match to have that round the clock coverage without the need to transfer.

The individual servers would then be ranked based on their participation of the match along with servers on the most winning colors. This would eliminate 1 server winning because it has all the people. so if x server capped the most points in their color – they get ranked based on that number. Then the top score would simply represent the most active wvw server – as opposed to “the best pvp’rs”

there could be 3 matches going on with 17 servers per color – which brings it to an average of 4.25 servers per color per match.

Each color would be a mix of bronze, platinum and gold servers. That can join any of 3 matches ( or 4 – which would probably compliment the overflow system you are working on now )

there would be no ques for any of the servers – because a new match would spring up as each map got full.

and if a guild wanted to join and play together – then they could have a choice to que up for the map the rest of their members are on …or just join a new map while they wait.

Great idea!

aspirine.6852:

Right now some borderlands are being used as EB. If you get outnumbered so badly you might give the defending borderlands some edge over the enemy zerg.
How about not allowing resurection in enemy borderlands for a start. Home team still gets it, even with a resurection penalty.
Look at the bottom of the bronze EU league, mass mass blowouts by servers packed with people.
And waypoint building in enemy borderlands, not a good idea because that sort of thing is only possible if you already outnumbered the server by far. Why make it easier for them.

Wich makes me also think who thought it was a good idea to do country servers in the first place.

I like the idea of being unable to build waypoints in enemy BLs.
After all, realistically speaking, the logistics simply are not the same.
In game, this would lessen the pressure on underpopulated servers.

The more I look at this the more it screams just place a dynamic population cap on all the maps.

Total population of each server should be within a certain percentage of each other period. If one server starts having more players, queue starts and players get placed into queues if they switch maps. This way players can get moved out of wvw at the Undermanned servers whim (Undermanned server’s zerg moves map OP server has to move to defend) and balance the population.

Make transfers free for a while to let players move to a server they feel wont have queues.

A dynamic cap should have been in place at the start-up of the game to prevent this debacle we are now facing.

But a dynamic cap is not really a good solution either.
Why should my server be crippled and unable to play WvW because the server we meet can’t muster enough people?

Jaytee.9513:

The more I look at this the more it screams just place a dynamic population cap on all the maps.

Total population of each server should be within a certain percentage of each other period. If one server starts having more players, queue starts and players get placed into queues if they switch maps. This way players can get moved out of wvw at the Undermanned servers whim (Undermanned server’s zerg moves map OP server has to move to defend) and balance the population.

Make transfers free for a while to let players move to a server they feel wont have queues.

A dynamic cap should have been in place at the start-up of the game to prevent this debacle we are now facing.

So you want to exclude players from the fight simply because their opponents don’t show up?
It’s neither the fault of those players that the opponents don’t show up nor that they are matched against those opponents, so why do you want to punish them twice for having a boring matchup?

lordkrall.7241:

But a dynamic cap is not really a good solution either.
Why should my server be crippled and unable to play WvW because the server we meet can’t muster enough people?

Because the intention is for population to balance itself.

A dynamic cap is the only way for there to be truly balanced matchups. But ANet has already vetoed this idea, so I don’t know what the point of bringing it up over and over is.

Visiroth.5914:

Because the intention is for population to balance itself.

A dynamic cap is the only way for there to be truly balanced matchups. But ANet has already vetoed this idea, so I don’t know what the point of bringing it up over and over is.

But it won’t balance itself.
It will simply make people stop playing.
It is most likely impossible to get every single server to have around the same amount of WvW-players, and as such a dynamic cap will always hurt at least one side.

This is so long now, I can’t read through everything… but I think having the 3 biggest servers match up in the first week and last week is an absolute fail too. There’s tons of posts about the queues on big servers, I don’t need to go into it. But to give the worst collisions the worst weeks for it is absurd. Those two weeks are ultimately going to decide everything, and have them be the 2 weeks where everything is clogged with people jumping on the achievements in first week or rushing to get them done in the final week is just crippling to what the game is about. If the balance to overall populations is not created by season 2, these weeks need to be scheduled differently.

As far as balancing the servers though… My only suggestion is actually looking at the forces of the smaller servers and you just figure out which has the biggest time zone coverages for the ones that lack certain ones. But once you target what servers could benefit form a virtual merge of the two, reach out to those people directly and personally. Offer them something discreetly. Do NOT reach out to the GW2 base as a whole and expect us to work it out on honor. We’re obviously a community made up mostly of people that want to break dungeons, fail events to farm faster, and refuse to work appropriately on open world additions that require people to work together. It’s sad, but it’s true. Looking at scores and problems of the gold league right now, you could offer me 10 precursors to move off the big 3 and I would laugh at you. I’d rather queue for hours than have my face pushed in, and I doubt I’m the only one who feels that way.

Leagues are a complete fiasco in regard to pop numbers.
Just look at it. A whole 3 matches out of a total of 17 aren’t already complete blowouts, by Sunday evening.

Do you really think some cheaper transfers or more expensive T3 upgrades will fix that? There needs to be a complete and utter revolution.

lordkrall.7241:

Visiroth.5914:

Because the intention is for population to balance itself.

A dynamic cap is the only way for there to be truly balanced matchups. But ANet has already vetoed this idea, so I don’t know what the point of bringing it up over and over is.

But it won’t balance itself.
It will simply make people stop playing.
It is most likely impossible to get every single server to have around the same amount of WvW-players, and as such a dynamic cap will always hurt at least one side.

Are you saying that offered the following 3 options:

1) Play fair (i.e. fun) WvW with a very long queue on the server you are on now

2) Free transfer for you whole guild, including influence to a low population server, where you would also get fair (i.e. fun) WvW due to dynamic pop cap

3) Stop playing

You would choose option 3?

Your question is not really “why should people on a high pop server be penalised?” It is “why should people on a high pop server be given the motive and means to move?” and the answer is BECAUSE WE NEED BALANCED SERVERS.

Only people who stubbornly believe the game should be fixed for them, without them needing to contribute, will defend the right to stay on a server with a population that puts other servers at a disadvantage.

Cribbage.2056:

Are you saying that offered the following 3 options:

1) Play fair (i.e. fun) WvW with a very long queue on the server you are on now

2) Free transfer for you whole guild, including influence to a low population server, where you would also get fair (i.e. fun) WvW due to dynamic pop cap

3) Stop playing

You would choose option 3?

Your question is not really “why should people on a high pop server be penalised?” It is “why should people on a high pop server be given the motive and means to move?” and the answer is BECAUSE WE NEED BALANCED SERVERS.

Only people who stubbornly believe the game should be fixed for them, without them needing to contribute, will defend the right to stay on a server with a population that puts other servers at a disadvantage.

I am personally on a server that is outnumbered 95% of the time.
I still don’t think it is a good idea to punish people for playing on a server with high WvW population.

The thing is, no matter what they do to try and balance the servers there will always be someone that is punished, and I simply don’t think that is the way to go.

Also some guilds actually care about the server they are on, and won’t transfer even if they would get special treatment and so on.

What should be done is trying to get more people into WvW, not trying to force people to transfer off their server.

How about having any PPT ‘buffs’ apply up to the equal number of players on a given server?

Server X has 100 players
Server Y has 80 players
Server Z has 40 players

Buffs apply to the ‘first’ 40 players in the map per server.

MERGE THE LOWER TIER SERVERS… sorry for the caps, but isn’t this the easiest, most obvious fix? -

I don’t understand why we need a 1000+ post discussion on this issue when this is the first thing that should be done when seeing a bunch of servers with only a handful of people in wvw.

It can only be positive for pver’s as well.. Mindboggling they need this discussion for an issue that is totally in their control.

Server merging is like an MMO admitting defeat/decline. I don’t think NCSoft will do this especially 1 year into the game’s life.

lordkrall.7241:

Visiroth.5914:

Because the intention is for population to balance itself.

A dynamic cap is the only way for there to be truly balanced matchups. But ANet has already vetoed this idea, so I don’t know what the point of bringing it up over and over is.

But it won’t balance itself.
It will simply make people stop playing.
It is most likely impossible to get every single server to have around the same amount of WvW-players, and as such a dynamic cap will always hurt at least one side.

I never said it would actually work or it was what was best for the game or WvW, was just playing a little Devil’s advocate. I don’t actually think a dynamic cap is a good idea. It sterilizes the gameplay and eliminates a lot of dynamic situations where you defeat a larger group of players in a siege or in the open field.

Not to mention that day by day, hour by hour people on 2 servers will probably get shafted by queues. Server population and coverage will always follow a trend barring mass transfers, but the actual number of people playing will vary.

Snorcha.7586:

MERGE THE LOWER TIER SERVERS… sorry for the caps, but isn’t this the easiest, most obvious fix? -

Not at all? Let’s assume we combine the bottom 6 servers into 3 servers. There’s no guarantee that these servers will be balanced against each other, or against whatever tier they now find themselves in. Population shuffling does nothing to address flaws in core WvW mechanics or the meta. And even if it’s balanced, there’s nothing stopping people from joining or leaving the servers, destroying the equilibrium.

So you merge the ‘lower tier’ wvw servers. Next thing you know people are complaining about being kicked into overflow all the time (as those server were actually pve heavy, just light regarding wvw).

well all I can say is having as many servers as they have now is really working out for them. I for one hardly ever see people in PVE zones anyways, and I’m on apparently a FULL server.. I’d rather be put in an overflow, then PVE in a ghostzone, call me crazy o.O

Jaytee.9513:

The more I look at this the more it screams just place a dynamic population cap on all the maps.

Total population of each server should be within a certain percentage of each other period. If one server starts having more players, queue starts and players get placed into queues if they switch maps. This way players can get moved out of wvw at the Undermanned servers whim (Undermanned server’s zerg moves map OP server has to move to defend) and balance the population.

Make transfers free for a while to let players move to a server they feel wont have queues.

A dynamic cap should have been in place at the start-up of the game to prevent this debacle we are now facing.

You’ve been around here on these forums long enough to be able to understand what a poor idea that is … for all the reasons that have been posted here that you either didn’t read or don’t understand.

I think you just have to make it more rewarding if you do 95% of the damage as opposed to 5%. Consideration would have to be made for the effect of non-damaging conditions and healing in some way (for those that are supporting, rather than DPS).

This means you’re part in a zerg would likely be worth less than your part in a smaller group.

Cribbage.2056:

lordkrall.7241:

Visiroth.5914:

Because the intention is for population to balance itself.

A dynamic cap is the only way for there to be truly balanced matchups. But ANet has already vetoed this idea, so I don’t know what the point of bringing it up over and over is.

But it won’t balance itself.
It will simply make people stop playing.
It is most likely impossible to get every single server to have around the same amount of WvW-players, and as such a dynamic cap will always hurt at least one side.

Are you saying that offered the following 3 options:

1) Play fair (i.e. fun) WvW with a very long queue on the server you are on now

2) Free transfer for you whole guild, including influence to a low population server, where you would also get fair (i.e. fun) WvW due to dynamic pop cap

3) Stop playing

You would choose option 3?

Your question is not really “why should people on a high pop server be penalised?” It is “why should people on a high pop server be given the motive and means to move?” and the answer is BECAUSE WE NEED BALANCED SERVERS.

Only people who stubbornly believe the game should be fixed for them, without them needing to contribute, will defend the right to stay on a server with a population that puts other servers at a disadvantage.

You refuse to see the gigantic negatives of a system like that.

1. People will then AFK to not lose their spot due to long queues, this once again fuels imbalance. That is not fun. OR the opposing side leaves a map to prevent the other side from fielding enough to retake things, not fun. Leaving a map also punishes the other server by making people wait even longer for a queue. Losing the match? Stop queuing and at least frustrate your opponents!

2. You’re guild will still be subject to the dynamic caps and half your guild might be locked out for most of the night, that is not fun. Not to mention that some people like playing WvW with lots of other people on the map, so low pop maps aren’t fun for them.

3. Considering long queues you won’t be able to play and having guildies locked out due to low pop cap, neither of which is fun, this isn’t a far out option.

Placing dynamic population caps just opens the game up for more exploiting/cheap tactics. This ultimately punishes more players and that’s generally not a good thing for a game to do. If the dynamic cap route is even remotely being considered then WvW might as well just be scrapped and a new AV style 40v40v40 battleground created.

TLDR: If you want to balance WvW populations, separate WvW and PvE servers – after that the task is easy. (The chance of anything else working is extremely low.)

(Come back after a break and we are onto page 22 of this discussion – can only hope Anet are still reading this. Apologies if you’ve covered this ground already somewhere in the previous 22 pages.)

WvW populations are broken because they are tied to individual PvE servers. This is because:

1. Levels of WvW participation vary significantly across the different PvE servers.
2. Transfer limits are set by the PvE population not WvW participation
   With the relatively low levels of WvW participation, not only are WvW populations effectively uncapped, they are also effectively uncappable.

We need to face the fact that WvW server populations are imbalanced because they are tied to the PvE severs.

Even if Anet are somehow able to create the perfect incentives for balancing WvW populations, population movements are too unpredictable and too reactive to shifts in the incentive and play balance in WvW to enable the serves to balance effectively.

The only reliable solution is to manage WvW sever populations directly, and this can only be done by separating WvW and PvE servers populations.

Fortunately, separating the WvW and PvE servers not only makes balancing WvW populations possible, it also makes this far easier to achieve as it opens up a whole range of options for managing WvW populations (e.g. WvW population caps, WvW specific transfer pricing, WvW population based rewards and buffs, etc.)

Instead of wasting time trying to tweak the system in vain hope of getting WvW populations to balance themselves, Anet need to drop the unsuccessful link between PvE and WvW servers (it was a nice idea but lets face it, not only hasn’t it worked, it has caused most of the population imbalance problems in WvW) and manage WvW populations separately from PvE.

Separate PvE and WvW populations, and the rest is easy – fail to do this and the problems will continue.

The solution is really simple.

Make points in your own personal Borderlands more valuable to your server.

Cap the amount of people that can be in any borderlands to a specificnumber, we’ll go with 50. When there are fifty of all three servers present in the borderland, increase the number by ten. The number will only go up if all three servers are ‘even.’

Keep EBG just the way it is.

This will force more competitive, strategic play into the Borderlands. You can’t just focus on your own Borderland, you also have to knock out your enemies too to keep them from gaining too many points, but you also need a force in to protect yours.

EBG can stay exactly as it is. We can have one server with two groups running around ruining the other servers day, but while they’re doing that, the Borderland teams will be doing all the buff getting and point giving.

This is a bonus to the strategic, smart, even, non-zerg play. If y ou can’t roll over and get all the buffs because you have greater numbers, the buff you give your server (Even if they are outmanned in EBG) will be more meaningful.

In the end, server population will balance itself out. If you’re tired of sitting in queue because your server is massively overpopulated, you’ll transfer off of Jade Quarry and Blackgate onto SoR, TC, Mag, or SoS.

I mean, honestly, look at these numbers.

Five in the morning on the East Coast, Jade Quarry has +500 points. Blackgate has +445. Fort Aspen has +565.

I think it is pretty obvious where the problems in PvP lie.

If we capped population, I don’t know, maybe all these night people on those servers would spread out to other servers.

And maybe we’ll actually have some night time WvW instead of waking up the next day to nearly the entire map being flipped to one servers side.

What we have right now isn’t PvP. If you are worried that less people can play because there aren’t enough people on other servers, then you’re focused on the wrong issue.

If people on server A are being locked out because people on server B and C don’t have the numbers to keep up with them, that is a problem. A limit that raises itself based on attendance is the best way to accomplish ‘even’ and ‘fair’ game play. Right now, from the examples I’ve given, these match ups are not even or fair.

You don’t need buffs or bandaids to fix this. You need to open up free server transfers to less populated servers from more populated servers. That’ll solve your problem.

If people refuse to transfer that is on them. You tried. You can’t keep things the way they are though with these insane leads night teams are gaining. Look at the scores, the game is just not fun. A server can hold its own during the day then lose out entirely at night.

You might think server caps are intrusive but the reality is, without them you won’t have PvP. You’ll have what we have now.

Edit: Forgot Stormbluff Isle. +445.

Just another random thought.

There is a difference between server Population (PvE) and WvW Population.

Maybe do something like this determine the average queue time for servers (might be a bit tricky considering prime time) then close transfers to servers that is above the average and also new accounts cannot join on these servers and make transfers to servers with queue times are below average free. P:vE players can still guest on the server of thier choice so should not be affected.

Over time this should spread the WvW population between servers.

Cribbage.2056:

lordkrall.7241:

Visiroth.5914:

Because the intention is for population to balance itself.

A dynamic cap is the only way for there to be truly balanced matchups. But ANet has already vetoed this idea, so I don’t know what the point of bringing it up over and over is.

But it won’t balance itself.
It will simply make people stop playing.
It is most likely impossible to get every single server to have around the same amount of WvW-players, and as such a dynamic cap will always hurt at least one side.

Are you saying that offered the following 3 options:

1) Play fair (i.e. fun) WvW with a very long queue on the server you are on now

2) Free transfer for you whole guild, including influence to a low population server, where you would also get fair (i.e. fun) WvW due to dynamic pop cap

3) Stop playing

You would choose option 3?

Your question is not really “why should people on a high pop server be penalised?” It is “why should people on a high pop server be given the motive and means to move?” and the answer is BECAUSE WE NEED BALANCED SERVERS.

Only people who stubbornly believe the game should be fixed for them, without them needing to contribute, will defend the right to stay on a server with a population that puts other servers at a disadvantage.

Unfortunetly, that is what people want though. They want stacked servers and blow out wins. That is why people bandwagon to the winning servers, like what has been happening here. I agree though, that there needs to be a dynamic cap. It should have been in at the start of the game so this would of never have happened.

Blaeys.3102:

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?

When transferring to higher ranked server, I think restrictions have to be multifold and palpably punitive. At minimum, blocked from WvWing for at least one week. I would also add some kind of PVE ramifications – something along the lines of temporarily (and significantly) reducing magic find on a sliding scale based on how high ranked the server you are transferring to is.

Likewise, I would look at rewarding people who choose to transfer to lower population/ranked servers – no cost at minimum (possibly even giving people gems who transfer to low population/losing servers) and a temporary increase in magic find in PVE and WvW.

You need to adjust for people leaving a dead server to go to a mid-tier one. If you’re server is dead last with empty maps, you shouldn’t be punished for transfering to someplace the game is played.

Many of us seem to be missing the point. Map caps and server merging etc are not going to happen. WvW is not going to be forced into even numbers. The point here is to make fighting outnumbered still fun and worthwhile so that when incentives to de-stack are put into place people will actually take advantage of it. Currently nobody wants to destack because fighting outnumbered sucks.

I still like my idea best (lol) – which is that you only get PPT from your own BL and your side of EB. You cap things to deny enemy points, you earn points by holding your own stuff. SMC is the only structure that can give points to any server and whoever has it will naturally then get 2v1’ed. Wiping server B’s entire borderland out does not give you a PPT advantage over server C.

Solstice.1097:

Many of us seem to be missing the point. Map caps and server merging etc are not going to happen. WvW is not going to be forced into even numbers. The point here is to make fighting outnumbered still fun and worthwhile so that when incentives to de-stack are put into place people will actually take advantage of it. Currently nobody wants to destack because fighting outnumbered sucks.

I still like my idea best (lol) – which is that you only get PPT from your own BL and your side of EB. You cap things to deny enemy points, you earn points by holding your own stuff. SMC is the only structure that can give points to any server and whoever has it will naturally then get 2v1’ed. Wiping server B’s entire borderland out does not give you a PPT advantage over server C.

The problem is number still will rule, regardless of what you do. Without caps, the server that has the most people will win, regardless of what happens. Sure they can make it more fun, but for how long? People want some hope to win and right now for most servers that is not possible.

You can try to adjust points for one thing or the other, but again, the server that has the higher population will still win. Unless you buff the server where a person can singly take down a zerg on their own, nothing will change.

Tought love needs to be done. If dynamic server caps were in the game to begin with, I do not think we would be having this discussion. People would have spread out fairly well. However, with the stacking of servers now, it will be almost impossible to change anything unless a giant change is added. People need to be forced to de-stack off servers. Again you can change the scoring etc but number will always trump everything unless something drastic is done.

The single biggest problem with this game (WvW that is) is the way it is played/designed.

Think about it in terms of sPVP:
You have even numbers on each map, but lets pretend that you didn’t. Ok now you are 5v10 and 5 of those 10 players are just standing in the circle/capture points holding those points. Now the other 5 are actively hunting down your five players and making sure their circles/captures are protected.

Pretty soon you look up (no time at all) and the lead that they have built just by standing in some circles is pretty much insurmountable. You enjoy the game so you stay, but you lose 2 of your 5 players (fairweathers) and the winning team gains 5 more because people seen they were winning so handily. So now you are 3 vs 15 and have no chance at winning, and there is no incentive or reason for the 15 people to be bothered about it in the slightest, nor is there reason for anyone on your team (server for wvw) to come to your aid.

When you look at it through a lens like this, the root issues with WvW in regards to population imbalances becomes more evident.

WvW is (essentially) a 7-day sPVP match (with walls), that does not have the benefit/possibility of balanced populations, but still implements PPT (points per tick), allowing “the winners” to essentially build snowball fairweather leads that continue to build & build (snowball).

One issue with population imbalance is the snowball effect. Possible help would be to limit siege by server and not just map. A dominate server can not only clear all maps, but can upgrade everything, build massive siege in every tower/keep/camp, and have unlimited siege for crushing anyone trying to fight back. In a truly balanced 3 way fight this is less of an issue since they rarely own 90% of all maps.
If in a normally unbalanced match up there was a limit, example yaks bend can only have 60% of all siege across all 4 maps total, then these unbalanced matches would not allow a complete dominance. The under rated server would have at least a chance to make some headway. Dominate server still wins the week easily, but the underdogs can have some fun.

IMO give the outnumbered server a buff that means something when faced with being outnumbered like making them more powerful, then if servers want to practice the art of zerging by feeling their numbers up more power to them if you want to practice the art of havoc then you move to a server that does that style play or has more even numbers and we as players have the choice of which style play/challenge we want to experience….so if you like wandering and playing havoc and you move to servers that practice zerg and continue to play havoc on the server you dont get the buff and play well still doing havoc on the zerg server you are truly skilled…. if you are on zerg server facing people with the outnumber buff then you can think you are skilled cuz lets face facts if you are in a zerg….. do you really know if its your playing style or the 20 with you

but lets face it there is a game that already did this and it made for some exciting play cuz even if you went in outnumbered, you still had a chance at winning or at least participating w/o just being someones loot bag……. if you were the truly skilled player you could take on 5/8 players and still come out alive although the 5/8 players were probably low skilled at playing their toon but it made it a more fair fight on both sides

I wanted to make one more plea for a little discussed aspect of the population issue. Matchmaking.

This would be the simplest and quickest change to make. Doesn’t require anything new. Could be implemented immediately after Season 1 ends. And would make for better population dynamics now, while you work on the harder stuff.

Please don’t go back to RNG – too much imbalance.
But simple static tiers are not the answer either since there are more than three servers that match up well (except NA T1).

The answer is for you to manually make the matches.

There have been a lot of changes and lots of movement since leagues started. The old Glicko ratings are no longer valid. And if you have continued keeping track of them as the leaderboard suggests, then they are even worse because there has been no inter-league play.

Manually made matches, combined with an adjustment in the transfer cost is something that can be done immediately and will actually compliment each other.

Actually I think if a voting system was implemented where each server could vote what server(s) they want to face, we would end up with some awesome balance because almost everyone, at least the vast majority, wants competitive matches. Also, Anet would no longer have to take the blame if the match-ups were unfavorable.

It would be worth a test.

The issue isn’t about balance or which servers are matched against which.

The issue is that most content (pretty much all – in both WvW and PVE – including the new map they showcased last week) is designed (and probably rightfully so) around having large numbers of people on the map almost all the time. It’s more fun to play with other people – and large EPIC battles is what WvW is supposed to be about.

Sadly, this isnt happening on many servers. Due to a number of factors, primarily bandwagonning to large servers, the population on these servers simply doesn’t fit with a tenant of the game’s core design.

With that in mind, better matchmaking wont fix the issue. It requires a more drastic move. The three viable solutions Ive seen floated are 1. merge lower population server, 2. truly incentivize players to move to lower population servers (meaning simply – bribe them. pay them through gems or really significant rewards to move), or 3. uncouple WvW from servers and come up with some other way to determine who is on each of the three teams facing each other each week. There is no guarantee that 2 (incentives) would work, so I would opt for 1 or 3.

Anything else doesn’t address the core issue, which again isnt balance, but whether or not people on lower population servers can have as much fun (as often) as people on high population servers.

All in all there are many good and really bad ideas thrown out in this thread. No matter what gets implemented, some players will leave, there is no way to fix this without that happening, but if the WvW population balance issues are addressed, then the WvW population will stabilize and / or grow making up for the ones that left and adding many more.

There are only 2 things that are certain.

1. If you do not address the core population issues then the current WvW playerbase with exception of the best coverage stacked servers will leave as soon as any decent semblance of competition shows up on the market.

2. Your (A-net’s) actions or lack thereof on this subject, will pretty much determine the fate of the game.

So you have to make a decision, do you want your game to become limited to the top 5-6 servers only, or are you willing to upset a very small segment of the wvw population to the point of leaving for the sake of a healthier game and log term gain ?

This is a band-aid fix, but I think WvW needs regular infusions of participation, especially from undermanned servers.

Every 3 hours, the horn blows all across Tyria inviting everyone to come WvW. A large NPC army goes out to retake keeps and such. Size/Power of the NPC force depends on how badly the server is outnumbered.

Psychology plays an important role in WvW, if players see allies forces fighting (and not getting completely stomped) they will be encouraged to continue fighting themselves. This is a way to get many players to show up at once.

The ideas I like:

1. Make transfers to lower population servers (based on current server population) rewarding to allow some population rebalancing by players.

Belenwyn.8674:

You have to encourage/corrupt new players to chose a low pop server. Maybe you could offer a WvW starter pack with boosts, blueprints, badges of honor and WXP. The lower the WvW population of a server is the better the starter pack is filled. If you accept the starter pack you are bound for six months to this server.

For existing players we would also need a kind of transfer box with nice perks in it to encourage people or even guilds (guild box?) to transfer. Maybe you could place special offers (boxes for guilds and players; maybe even gems) for transfers limited in time and numbers for each server and simultaneously introduce dynamic map caps.

2. Allow volunteer WvW season transfers with rewards to lower population servers to allow limited time player balancing, which may lead to permanent transfer.

sminkiottone.6972:

Why not implement a voluteer mechaninc ?

like spvp, a guy from the more populated servers can voluteer to join a less populated server for the entire duration of the league and get rewars for that :

- Wxp boost
- karma boost
- Gold boost
- Magic find boost
- The possibility to get back to the native server once the league is ended ( for free)
- Anything that can lure people out of the stacked servers, even entire guilds.

3. Allow optional alliances to be created between the two losing teams to create optimal fights in EB.

LimeTwyst.7039:

MeatShield.1983:

snip if the T1 score is greater that T2+T3 then teams 2 and 3 are forced to make an alliance. snip

Something along those lines, I know its probably not a perfect idea, but I think it would make the weekday more fun for blowout matches. I think I saw Devon posted earlier he was surprised this didn’t happen more naturally to begin with and I think it seems to be and unwritten rule that you don’t form alliances. Any time that I have seen people do this or try to do this people become very angry. snip

TL;DR: Some sort of alliance system would really help with population imbalances and make matches a lot more fun. snip

I have an idea along these lines, but instead of being a forced alliance, make it optional. If you want to participate, you have to “opt in.” Entire guilds and/or individual players could opt in. Have a truce area -unlocked only to the losing servers- at a certain percentage of score blowout where you could sign a treaty. You could also break the treaty via an option in your personal interface (“leave the alliance”).

Then there needs to be alliance chat so you can communicate about the 2v1 strategy.

I get that 2v1 was intended from the start, but we’ve never been given tools to make it happen.

4. Change the way that the scores are calculated to prevent morale decline. 10 to 4 isn’t as demoralizing as 100k to 40k.

Solstice.1097:

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.

I am not current on the 22 pages of this thread but I have an idea after reading the dev responses : what if you changed the map cap system to be dynamic where it starts off as a lower set number and then once all the maps have reached that cap it increases until it reaches the current max map cap so then every side has the same amount of people at any given time. thus making it so no one server can have more numbers with in reason at any given time. (this would have to be something that came about after the edge of the mists was implemented.)

This idea basically boils down to

• The lowest pop server in the match up, sets the map cap for the other two servers.
  • so if the lowest pop server in the match up some how makes it so there are queues then every server could have queues.

You need a dynamic queue system that lifts and lowers the cap based on population, not one that locks people out from the get go.

Zesbeer.8365:

• The lowest pop server in the match up, sets the map cap for the other two servers.
  • so if the lowest pop server in the match up some how makes it so there are queues then every server could have queues.

There should not be a map cap at all. That is not the solution really. If you want that go play SPvP or another game. This has been a problem that dates back to DaOC and the 2 AM US relic raids. Not much you can do other than try to catch it and prevent it from happening. Or, do what they do and set alarm clocks. Been there, done that. It is, ironically, a rather interesting problem and game dynamic (although I don’t think that is what Arena Net had in mind).

No, what is needed actually is some notifications from claiming keeps, towers, and camps. Furthermore, the game needs an alliance option so guilds can join and form larger entities. Combine this with notifications from claimed areas and NPC’s messages get sent and people in /g and alliances will know. If it matters, people will stop what they are doing and join in. Plain and simple.

However, there has to be a bit bigger reason to engage in WvW. Incentives are what draw people in just like moths to a flame. Maintaining the keep or other objects should grant something like higher magic find, more exp if killing / leveling up near claimed objects, more nodes or mats dropping, something. This way people stop what they are doing and have a reason to go protect the keep or such regardless of time.

Otherwise all rewards must be the same because there is no balance across the realm ranks. You happen to be on a lower populated server, only timezone player base, or higher and your rewards are based on the server? I think that is a foul and people shouldn’t be penalized because they stayed on the server at start…

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THIS IS IMPORTANT
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Theory and conjecture is fine, but over the course of this lengthy thread, I arrived at the conclusion the best bet would be good old fashioned practice/experience.
What I mean with that, maybe Anet should stop worrying so much about the whats-and-ifs, and start doing a massive public test runs for different solutions that were collected.
Maybe one week were two obviously outmatched servers play from start to finish as one team.
Another, server pops in WvW would be equalized.
Or the outnumbered servers gets buffs and whatnot.
Or you playtest mechanics that reduce the momentum of Friday/Saturday.
Etc. etc.
And whatever sticks in the end, keep that.

This can’t be done internally. It has to be done on a natural, i.e. global scale.

lowering the map cap in the first step towards balance match up.

it is just that ANET is afraid to experiment with that, even after so many of their previous experiments failed anyway.

Why are we hanging on to the idea that WvW and PvE servers should remain tied together? That design feature is what’s causing the population imbalances in the first place:

• WvW participation varies widely across the different PvE servers
• PvE population limits are too high to prevent WvW players stacking on a few servers

So lets fix the problem at its cause by unhooking WvW from the PvE servers.

Things that would be needed for this to work:

1. Accounts need a separate PvE and default WvW server
   (For WvW balancing, the default WvW server does not need to be allocated until the player starts to WvW on that account)
2. Each guild subscribes to a single (or no) WvW server
3. Player WvW info and travel based on whichever guild they are representing at that time, or personal default if not representing a guild with a WvW server.
4. Accounts and guilds can transfer to different WvW servers with cost and limitations based on available WvW population capacity and WvW server rank.

At initial set-up:

• Accounts and guilds with WvW history are allocated a default WvW server based on their current PvE server.
• All other accounts and guilds start without an allocated WvW server.
• Merge low population WvW servers to improve to WvW server population balance at day 1

Thereafter:

• Free/reduced cost for accounts and guilds to select their first WvW server
• Block transfers to overpopulated WvW servers
• Free/reduced fee to transfer to a lower population WvW server
• Reduced fee to transfer to a lower ranked WvW server
• Higher fees to transfer to a higher ranked WvW server
• Increased guild subscription change if guild increases in size and its WvW server has high population or rank (needed to prevent players using guild server access to bypass population caps and transfer fees for top servers).

Costs:

• Doing the work outlined above

Benefits:

• Day 1 improvement in WvW server population balance and
• Ability to manage WvW server populations directly
• Ability to adjust number of WvW servers to better fit overall WvW population
• WvW specific revenue stream for server transfers
• [Edit]Players can participate on WvW server of their choice without losing ties to their PvE community[/edit]
• Significant population balance improvements without messing with WvW game mechanics

TLDR: Separate WvW and PvE servers and get significant improvements to WvW population balance without expensive, time consuming and risky changes to WvW game mechanics.

azizul.8469:

lowering the map cap in the first step towards balance match up.

it is just that ANET is afraid to experiment with that, even after so many of their previous experiments failed anyway.

This does not solve population issues. Lowering the map cap just makes for infinite queues.

Dynamic queues are the way to go, people have already been saying it in this thread. People who are still crying for lowered population caps per map need to start thinking outside the box and about other people.

there is no way to make dynamic queues work without ruining the game for many players.

the issue comes down to timezones. you get a NA server vs an Oceanic server and now neither of them can play because their enemy can’t lift the queue cap for their time zone.