Guild Wars 2

I have recently returned to GW2 and found that many of the pre 80 zones to be empty of players. Note that I am on a “high” population server and big cities such as LA and other level 80 zones are filled with players but it just the pre 80 zones are almost empty. I hopped around to number of other “high” population servers and in my experience, zones are empty on all of them.

Empty zones makes levelling up a character a very lonely and difficult affair. Not many people around to do dynamic events, kill champions or even talk to on chat! I think something needs to be done to re populate these pre 80 zones. I would say server merge in other games but does that make sense for GW2? May be zone merge?

The only thing that will fix this problem in to reduce the amount of exp given by crafting, but I don’t really see that happening.

At this point in the game, most players are level 80 already, so naturally these areas will be more empty than others. I’m on Crystal Desert and I can say that I do my daily and stuff like that in the starter zones and there are always tons of folks running around. I even see my fair share of level appropriate players. That being said, I just re rolled a new toon and went the full crafting leveling (using this alt for wvw) I’m sure a lot of people do that to get their characters ready for wvw or such.

It is because the world is huge and people normally congregate on certain areas at a time (world boss, events, dungeons, etc).

It depends on pre-80 zone. Starter zones have nice population, certain mid-level zones are usually packed with people like Harathi Hinderlands. There are zones that don’t have many players around, but there are always alternatives.

Maybe one day they will put is underflow servers to merge low population zones. However it will be a problem with timers. If someone goes to a map to do a particular event and gets put into another server where the event is over with, then that’s a problem I’m not sure how they can get around.

All of my characters take the Krytan route up to 70. I just like the Meta-chains better and events fire off fast in pretty close proximity (at least that’s how I perceive it).

After I got 100% map completion on one character, I obviously favored some areas over others and I ignore the other half of the world for the most part.

So what would make me visit those other areas? I like to fight big kitten monsters. I like fast event chains that span the map. I like the idea that players could mess up and lose a chance at the big kitten monster. Some world bosses and some areas have that. But most don’t.

Want me in the shiverpeaks?

Add some assaults on Svanir camps to draw out a legendary shaman. Killing him drops an ice tablet that you need to get to a Norn shaman to translate before it melts. The tablet is a bundle, so other players need to escort across the map. Drop the bundle or get downed and the event fails. The Norn reads the tablet to reveal locations of two gongs on opposite ends of the map. Players have a time limit to get to the gongs and they have a three second cooperative window to hit them simultaneously. The gongs crack Drakkar late and you fight a giant corrupted octopus. WIN!

How to keep me in the area and doing other stuff? Add a five to ten minute timer between assaults on the bases so I do events during chain breaks. Make the camps assaulted occur in random order so I am active in the map instead of idling in a hot spot.

I would be in the Shiverpeaks for at least an hour every day. And i’m sure a good amount of other people would too. This was sort okittend of experimented with in Southshore with the Karka queen. The problem with that event was Southshore still has a ways to go before it gets rid of the bad taste it left in peoples mouths from it’s launch event, and the general impression I get from /m is that people just don’t like Karka as enemies.

I’m sure my above example probably isn’t possible given scripting or engine limitations. But it gets the tone across. Every map needs something of that scale, interaction and fragility. Not a tiny meta that encourages either being skipped entirely, or everyone crowding the finale because someone can solo the pre-event with little to no risk of failure.

AcidicVision.5498:

All of my characters take the Krytan route up to 70. I just like the Meta-chains better and events fire off fast in pretty close proximity (at least that’s how I perceive it).

After I got 100% map completion on one character, I obviously favored some areas over others and I ignore the other half of the world for the most part.

So what would make me visit those other areas? I like to fight big kitten monsters. I like fast event chains that span the map. I like the idea that players could mess up and lose a chance at the big kitten monster. Some world bosses and some areas have that. But most don’t.

Want me in the shiverpeaks?

Add some assaults on Svanir camps to draw out a legendary shaman. Killing him drops an ice tablet that you need to get to a Norn shaman to translate before it melts. The tablet is a bundle, so other players need to escort across the map. Drop the bundle or get downed and the event fails. The Norn reads the tablet to reveal locations of two gongs on opposite ends of the map. Players have a time limit to get to the gongs and they have a three second cooperative window to hit them simultaneously. The gongs crack Drakkar late and you fight a giant corrupted octopus. WIN!

How to keep me in the area and doing other stuff? Add a five to ten minute timer between assaults on the bases so I do events during chain breaks. Make the camps assaulted occur in random order so I am active in the map instead of idling in a hot spot.

I would be in the Shiverpeaks for at least an hour every day. And i’m sure a good amount of other people would too. This was sort okittend of experimented with in Southshore with the Karka queen. The problem with that event was Southshore still has a ways to go before it gets rid of the bad taste it left in peoples mouths from it’s launch event, and the general impression I get from /m is that people just don’t like Karka as enemies.

I’m sure my above example probably isn’t possible given scripting or engine limitations. But it gets the tone across. Every map needs something of that scale, interaction and fragility. Not a tiny meta that encourages either being skipped entirely, or everyone crowding the finale because someone can solo the pre-event with little to no risk of failure.

/signed

Nice…I would love to see this developed for all of the other areas.

Game population is fantastic if you never leave a city or Queensdale.

lostforever.3106:

I have recently returned to GW2 and found that many of the pre 80 zones to be empty of players. Note that I am on a “high” population server and big cities such as LA and other level 80 zones are filled with players but it just the pre 80 zones are almost empty. I hopped around to number of other “high” population servers and in my experience, zones are empty on all of them.

Empty zones makes levelling up a character a very lonely and difficult affair. Not many people around to do dynamic events, kill champions or even talk to on chat! I think something needs to be done to re populate these pre 80 zones. I would say server merge in other games but does that make sense for GW2? May be zone merge?

“High” population is a relative term. You need to go by what the most popular servers actually are, not what’s merely listed as “High” by ANET.

Even then, you’re not likely to find the 20-70 zones brimming with new players. That’s just the nature of any MMO that’s been out for nearly a year.

AcidicVision.5498:

All of my characters take the Krytan route up to 70. I just like the Meta-chains better and events fire off fast in pretty close proximity (at least that’s how I perceive it).

After I got 100% map completion on one character, I obviously favored some areas over others and I ignore the other half of the world for the most part.

So what would make me visit those other areas? I like to fight big kitten monsters. I like fast event chains that span the map. I like the idea that players could mess up and lose a chance at the big kitten monster. Some world bosses and some areas have that. But most don’t.

Want me in the shiverpeaks?

Add some assaults on Svanir camps to draw out a legendary shaman. Killing him drops an ice tablet that you need to get to a Norn shaman to translate before it melts. The tablet is a bundle, so other players need to escort across the map. Drop the bundle or get downed and the event fails. The Norn reads the tablet to reveal locations of two gongs on opposite ends of the map. Players have a time limit to get to the gongs and they have a three second cooperative window to hit them simultaneously. The gongs crack Drakkar late and you fight a giant corrupted octopus. WIN!

How to keep me in the area and doing other stuff? Add a five to ten minute timer between assaults on the bases so I do events during chain breaks. Make the camps assaulted occur in random order so I am active in the map instead of idling in a hot spot.

I would be in the Shiverpeaks for at least an hour every day. And i’m sure a good amount of other people would too. This was sort okittend of experimented with in Southshore with the Karka queen. The problem with that event was Southshore still has a ways to go before it gets rid of the bad taste it left in peoples mouths from it’s launch event, and the general impression I get from /m is that people just don’t like Karka as enemies.

I’m sure my above example probably isn’t possible given scripting or engine limitations. But it gets the tone across. Every map needs something of that scale, interaction and fragility. Not a tiny meta that encourages either being skipped entirely, or everyone crowding the finale because someone can solo the pre-event with little to no risk of failure.

Fantastic idea….

This is why I suggested heroes and henchmen , because as you go up level in maps population gets scarce and there’s hardly anyone to help you do quests .

In Guild Wars 1 the towns had henchmen you could add to your party. Maybe these zones need henchmen standing by the portals that you could take. Not necessarily a whole parties worth but maybe 2 or so. More can respawn as they are taken.

Sai.5908:

This is why I suggested heroes and henchmen , because as you go up level in maps population gets scarce and there’s hardly anyone to help you do quests .

Henchmen will make levelling easier by allowing you to complete DEs and kill champions but it still will be lonely world without real players. Anyway I don’t think Anet will add henchmen any time soon since adding henchmen to a MMO is admitting a design failure on their part.

Darthaemos.6370:

lostforever.3106:

I have recently returned to GW2 and found that many of the pre 80 zones to be empty of players. Note that I am on a “high” population server and big cities such as LA and other level 80 zones are filled with players but it just the pre 80 zones are almost empty. I hopped around to number of other “high” population servers and in my experience, zones are empty on all of them.

Empty zones makes levelling up a character a very lonely and difficult affair. Not many people around to do dynamic events, kill champions or even talk to on chat! I think something needs to be done to re populate these pre 80 zones. I would say server merge in other games but does that make sense for GW2? May be zone merge?

“High” population is a relative term. You need to go by what the most popular servers actually are, not what’s merely listed as “High” by ANET.

Even then, you’re not likely to find the 20-70 zones brimming with new players. That’s just the nature of any MMO that’s been out for nearly a year.

How can I figure out the most “popular” server please? Is there a community maintained list?

I do agree that nearly after year of release there going to be less new players and those starting alts. However I do feel that there are enough of us but we are spread too thin across servers.

Astral Projections.7320:

Maybe one day they will put is underflow servers to merge low population zones. However it will be a problem with timers. If someone goes to a map to do a particular event and gets put into another server where the event is over with, then that’s a problem I’m not sure how they can get around.

I agree “underflow” servers has issues but so does “overflow” servers but they are supported by Anet. I am surprised “underflow” servers are not in the game from the beginning.

In many MMO (such as WoW) sometimes merging serves will create problems such as unwanted world pvp, competing for resources and quest drops etc. but theses are non issues in GW2. In fact in GW2, another player in a zone is almost always an asset and not a liability so there is more reason to add “underflow” server to GW2.

Isciira.2958:

The only thing that will fix this problem in to reduce the amount of exp given by crafting, but I don’t really see that happening.

If they reduce crafting exp, then it will force some people to go out into the world and level up where by increasing zone population. However I don’t like forced behaviour since we are all different and we have different play styles. Anyway I don’t think drastic change such as this is needed since there are other ways to increase population count.

Cross server zones would be one alternative to the problem. A single virtual server architecture would also solve the problem. You would, of course, lose the sense of distinctive cultures on the servers. It will be interesting to see where they go with this. Not dismissing the problem on many servers I really don’t see it on mine—Tarnished Coast—it always feels relatively populated—everywhere I go.

Isciira.2958:

The only thing that will fix this problem in to reduce the amount of exp given by crafting, but I don’t really see that happening.

That, and the promise of making champions drop better loot (blog post). But who knows when that will happen.

Personally, I’ve vowed never to craft level again. I didn’t do it on my first toon (didn’t have the money) and I felt a lot more accomplished and attached to that toon. It was more fulfilling to put the work in, get out and see the world.