Guild Wars 2

Been trying for a couple days now to get into a server that bounces from full to the very occasional high. I am curious if there’s ever been a definitive answer on:

A.) Does the server status (full, high, etc.) update dynamically as you watch the list?
B.) Each time you close the window with the [X] in the corner? or
C.) Do you have to log completely out of the client and back in for it to refresh?

I guess on a related note…it seems as if the server’s status changes over the course of the day so is it safe to assume the status is determined by people logged on currently or is it figured on accounts that call that server home?

I’ve never seen it change while I was watching, but then I don’t spend too much time staring at the list.

The servers’ population is determined by accounts calling it home. It would not really work otherwise; what would happen if all players associated with a particular server decided to log on at the same time? Remember, certain events will bring many onto the servers at once.

Good luck on your transfer. =)

I think most MMO’s operate under the premise that it is unlikely that everyone will decide to log on at once. For the times when a few too many do decide to login they usually have some sort of queue system or in GW2’s case an “overflow” server.

Doesn’t seem like a server population based on accounts calling it “home” would do a whole lot to account for inactive accounts. Especially in a game like this where there’s no subscription to maintain.

If there was an ‘overflow’, there would be no need to have a Server cap. There are, indeed, overflows for maps, but not for Servers.

And, since there is no subscription to maintain, those ‘inactive’ accounts may choose to return at any time. I would guess they would not like to be locked out of their server of choice, should they choose to do so.

Regardless, you can watch and wait…or choose another server.

Good luck.

ANet has only released very vague details about how home world population is determined. From their remarks, this is what I believe to be true: the status shown in the world guesting/transfer screen depends on several factors:

• The number of accounts currently logged on.
• The number of accounts logged on recently, perhaps a moving average such as ‘last 72 hours’ or ‘last month’ or even a combination.
• The number of accounts registered to the server.
• Concurrency of all players, i.e. how many people logged on across all worlds in the region.

Thus, if you refresh the guesting screen and sort by population, you’ll see the order of worlds change, e.g. sometimes TC will be on the top, sometimes JQ. But it’s not at all clear how often this changes or whether it means anything meaningful for those of us trying to transfer or guest to get into a new instance.

Wow! Thanks, Illconceived…I didn’t even know you could change the listing order. As I clicked ‘population’, on each click the order changed, where the top 5 changed which was most populated. That would seem to suggest you don’t need to leave the page.

I was thinking, though, that since the advent of the MegaServer, the populations may get their determination by some metrics that follow how populated the WvW maps are (not minute by minute, of course), and that might be a large part of determining how ‘Full’ a server will be listed as. Since it really doesn’t matter anymore with regards to which server a player calls Home, anymore, except in the case of WvW. /shrug