Guild Wars 2

1) I know this is a super sensitive topic and liable to draw flame and
2)I know there have been threads about “common sense” and “who should be responisble for teaching/learning,” but those have been floating around since SW was first released; this is something different entirely.

I’ve basically been farming Vinewrath since it was released (I farmed the Breach too, but not as diligently). I know this is only anecdotal, but for about two weeks I had/saw a 50% success rate on the Breach, but a 100% success rate on Vinewrath. Not just success, but roflstomping: killing every champ on the first try, losing only 0-2 siege carriers. We’re talking walk in the park, total shut outs.

But about two or three days ago the map just absolutely crashed. We’re not just failing VW, we’re failing it hard. Multiple Beekeeper fails in a row, Mangler thrashing people left and right. I’ve only seen us get to Darkwing once in the past three or four days.
And it’s not just about “the early crowd vs the late-night/weekend crowd,” cause I farmed two sessions a day, once in the morning/early afternoon, and again later during primetime. I admit prime time was always a bit rougher, but we still won.

But it’s like… it’s like someone tried to do that magic trick where you rip the sheets out from under a pile of dishes, except they completely messed up and everything got smashed at once: I literally logged in one evening and now I haven’t seen a successful Silverwastes since.

I know there are a lot of factors that could be considered (everyone got their Lumi and left, people got bored and left, Shovel Maps vs Event Maps etc… etc…), but usually that’s a slow tapering off. Not the kind of crash and burn I’m seeing here.

Is anyone else experiencing this kind of thing? Or am I just really, really, really unlucky when choosing maps? Also, what the heck happened? My mind is genuinely and truly boggled.

Last 3 days— 3 attempts—-3 wins—lots of loot! One was this morning—off hrs for me. I found it easy likely because there was a great group of players on. Got a body part in as well, and that was after a successful TEQ too.

Blude.6812:

Last 3 days— 3 attempts—-3 wins—lots of loot! One was this morning—off hrs for me. I found it easy likely because there was a great group of players on. Got a body part in as well, and that was after a successful TEQ too.

Alright. Well I’m somewhat relieved to hear it’s just been some bad luck on my part. I was afraid the map was trashed. I tried twice this morning though with the type of results I posted about…. Anyway, glad you got some wins! I hate you (not really, lol)

edited to add: Probably about nine Breach/VW attempts over the course of sunday-tuesday, all of them the type of fiasco I experienced. Just in case anyone was interested in any further “anecdata.”

Krestfallen.8025:

Or am I just really, really, really unlucky when choosing maps?

Maybe? NA? I was in an instance yesterday doing the event where someone mentioned in chat that all the other VWs were failing (I don’t LFG hop). I successfully completed the event maybe 5-8 times yesterday with only 1 fail due to a lack of players (only ~4 per lane, no reflects – 2nd boss failed). Most of the breaches were also 5/5.

I don’t recall very many fails over the past few weeks either. I’ve even had an undermanned instance succeed with 1 carrier remaining.

I did learn a lesson though—-I was one chest key short. I’ll keep a closer eye on my supply from now on.
Good luck on your next attempt.

Healix.5819:

I don’t recall very many fails over the past few weeks either. I’ve even had an undermanned instance succeed with 1 carrier remaining.

Yeah, like I said I’ve farmed it every week since it was released (three times a day twice a day, so six attempts a day) and they were all succesful. That’s why I was so utterly shocked when we were getting destroyed so badly— both by the champs and in lane! >.<

But again, glad to hear more reports of wins. I’ll just have to hope I start finding the same maps as all y’alls xD

I should do more Silverwastes when I have time to play, haha…

I remember trying to invite you to a map Krest, when we were struggling to succeed. It was the first time doing it in over a month, but I figured it was just due to people have gotten all that they needed from the map and are tired of doing it, so it’s causing problems.

Bristingr.5034:

I should do more Silverwastes when I have time to play, haha…

I remember trying to invite you to a map Krest, when we were struggling to succeed. It was the first time doing it in over a month, but I figured it was just due to people have gotten all that they needed from the map and are tired of doing it, so it’s causing problems.

Haha! Yeah, that was just last night (or maybe two nights ago) right? I remember getting in and helping the fight get started, but that was my fourth omfgwhatthehellishappeningrightnow!? Silverwastes of the evening. I admit (and I think I whispered you at the time), after I saw Beekeper fail twice (or was it three times) in a row my heart couldn’t take another (and I hate to use this term) epic fail Vinewrath attempt. I totally bailed, lol.

In fact, I really hate to say it, cause I totally think this is part of the problem and not the solution, but I think I’m just gunna have to start bailing on maps that fail Beekeeper. I’ve seen maps bounce back from things like that in the past, but it’s just become too much of a “tell tale sign” now. And if I’m wasting hours and hours on maps that…. there is genuinely no way to describe how ridiculous these events are going…. while other successful maps exist…

Well I just can’t make that level of self sacrifice anymore (especially since I used to be one of the people who would push a map from 0% to win).

It sucks, and I think less of myself because of it, but that’s what it comes down to. I’m joining the ranks of the “Map Hoppers” and “Bail on Failers.” I’ve explained this fight too many times to too many people who just yell too many explitives back at me to carry the weight of these…. (sigh, there really is no other way to say it), fail maps anymore.

Now if y’all will excuse me, I’m gunna go for a walk and “pass a lake, skip a few rocks, and have some black guy thinking time.”

This whole thing has just made me way to sad….

edited to add: And I know (from past experiences in other threads about communal performance at public events) that a lot of you are going to come in, not read what I wrote fully, and tell me that it’s my responsibility (or the responsibility of people like me) to teach everyone how to do these events. But

1. again it’s impossible to express just how awful the runs I’ve been stuck in have gone, or how aggressive everyone gets at the merest hint of an instruction, a piece of advice, or a scrap of constructive criticism and
2. I’ve spent months (since the launch of Silverwastes) explaining these fights to people (fights that I, and many people like me learned the hard way, by leaping headfirst on day one. Well before any explanations, knowledge or guides even existed). It’s just too much to put on any one group of people anymore.
3. Especially when I get verbally abused for trying to help. And I use smileys and emojis and the friendliest language I can think of when explaining things, or after an event fails to keep morale up, when explaining what’s about to happen, or explaining what went wrong so people can take away a lesson from a loss. But no matter how nice or kind or patient you try to be, if you open your mouth in map chat, you’re instantly demonized (most popular insult is “gluteus maximus head piece” for some reason). I simply cannot, and will not, do it anymore.

And again, it makes me said that I feel like it’s come to this: that I feel I have to abandon my fellow players and behave in “vulture-esque” behavior, but I just can’t waste hours of my time not having fun while failing events and getting yelled at by… I’ll be generous and say, “players as equally frustrated as I am.”

I think it’s just new people that do not know the mechanics and choose not to ask. There’s also the myths about no AoE for the breach bosses still being spread around.

Man, I don’t know if I’m just incredibly lucky or some of the people in this thread are incredibly unlucky, but I have seen very little of the horrible bile involved with the Vinewrath described here.

I definitely saw such things during the Marionette or the Scarlet fights, but every single time I’ve done the vinewrath its been pretty tame to downright positive.

Heck, yesterday I did 4 VW runs. Two were super smooth, every lane effortlessly succeeding. Which, of course, wouldn’t do much for the anger, so no surprise those were pleasant.

But one in particular was laden with lots of fails. South and Mid both failed Beekeeper. North finally got it on their attempt. Then south failed Mangler. Mid got it. Then North took down the Darkwing. I believe we were at 13 of 15 carriers lost by the time it succeeded.

And throughout all of that, I don’t think I recall seeing one single purely negative comment. It was all “nice try” and “good luck next group”. There was some actual advice going around, but all in a respectable tone, not “OMG git gud you useless noobs” type of way.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying there isn’t unpleasantness with regards to the VW. In fact, I’m positive there is somewhere. But for some people to get that over and over again in every run they attempt when it seems relatively rare in my own experience, I dunno. Maybe its certain servers that are more hostile than others and I’m on TC, which is generally friendly all around. Megaservers exist, but supposedly it still tries to group you up with people from your own server to an extent, and that does seem to work a lot of the time as I’ll see people I recognize from other runs. But that only accounts for times when I stick around in the first map I join in, not the ones I taxi into.

Even breaches tend to be pretty calm. There’s the odd “stuck in their ways” person who insists on yelling NO AOE at Platinum and Copper of course, but on the whole its usually only one or two people at most, and even fails bring out disappointment more than rage.

So I tried guesting to Tarnished Coast to see if I had a positive experience: I had my first “non-screaming at each other, actually successful Vinewrath” since Sunday, which was nice.

But I had to leave my map because after Vinewrath the Shovel Train took over, and it was a bummer fighting and holding forts by myself.
So the server community might be impacting my experience, but because of the way Silverwastes is built I’m still going to be stuck with the randomization factor of LFG Map Hopping :\

And yeah, I don’t have to Map Hop, but I’ve been around the block enough times to know how quickly one can expect the “Pact Assault Progress” Bar to fill up, and… yeah. If you can’t trust an Event Map to stay an Event Map, your just up a creek without a paddle T-T

Anyway, I’m glad everyone else is still finding good maps and having fun and getting loot. I’m gunna keep trying. Hopefully things turn around soon.

Krestfallen.8025:

But I had to leave my map because after Vinewrath the Shovel Train took over, and it was a bummer fighting and holding forts by myself.

The idea of SW is nice, but this kind of ruins it for me. You have a good map going, then either everybody leaves ar they follow a set path after the vine for those chests… And I wish ANet would do something about the latter (maybe only have chest popup in the timeout phase and in the time the fortresses are safe, or something)

Blude.6812:

Last 3 days— 3 attempts—-3 wins—lots of loot! One was this morning—off hrs for me. I found it easy likely because there was a great group of players on. Got a body part in as well, and that was after a successful TEQ too.

Lots of loot, really? really? Or perhaps you mean lots of items, because there is no such thing as loot in this game.

This is what I was talking about wiht the new HoT maps, which they’ve warned will follow a similar model to SW/DT. Those maps are fun IF and ONLY IF the rest of the map is coordinated towards doing the activities you want to be doing, otherwise they are massively frustrating, so if they want to double down on this philosophy, they need to provide better tools to allow players to easily join up with maps that are succeeding at the tasks you want to complete, rather than ones that are filled with people who are doing various other things with their time.

Ohoni.6057:

Those maps are fun IF and ONLY IF the rest of the map is coordinated towards doing the activities you want to be doing, otherwise they are massively frustrating

Assuming a full map is ~100 players, only 20% of the map needs to participate to successfully complete the Breach and Vinewrath. For comparison, Tequatl was designed for 80% of the map.

The catch is, the less people you have, the more each individual matters. If events actually scaled 1:1 however, zerging events would probably be devastating.

Personally, I’d rather do a group event with 2 others than with 10 others simply because it’s much easier for me to carry them.

Assuming a full map is ~100 players, only 20% of the map needs to participate to successfully complete the Breach and Vinewrath. For comparison, Tequatl was designed for 80% of the map.

You’ve defeated the Vinewrath with only six people per lane? I’m massively impressed. I’ve had boss attempts wipe with even four times that many.

Ohoni.6057:

You’ve defeated the Vinewrath with only six people per lane? I’m massively impressed. I’ve had boss attempts wipe with even four times that many.

Well, the bosses themselves scale and all should in theory be doable with only a handful of players, provided that everyone’s on board with the mechanics. Fort defence with about five people is fine, plus a handful of 1-2 man groups who take care of supply and provide backup to any forts that end up struggling. Lane defence seems like it would be the most problematic part.

I wouldn’t personally expect 20 to be enough, but 30 should be. I’m of the opinion that ‘actions’ on the scale of The Silverwastes should have a hard cap of 50.

Ohoni.6057:

Assuming a full map is ~100 players, only 20% of the map needs to participate to successfully complete the Breach and Vinewrath. For comparison, Tequatl was designed for 80% of the map.

You’ve defeated the Vinewrath with only six people per lane? I’m massively impressed. I’ve had boss attempts wipe with even four times that many.

It’s not the amount of people though, because the bosses do scale. If you have six people that all know just what to do, it’s easier than having 40 people with 20 of them not knowing what to do.

So we just need to be able to kick out those 20 people, or for them to design a game system that accepts that those 20 people will be useless, without actually making them a liability to everyone else.

Ohoni.6057:

So we just need to be able to kick out those 20 people, or for them to design a game system that accepts that those 20 people will be useless, without actually making them a liability to everyone else.

Or help them learn. Many of the people others have given up on, I’ve taught how to play pretty well.

Or help them learn. Many of the people others have given up on, I’ve taught how to play pretty well.

Nah, “help them learn” doesn’t work in practice. Oh, they might do better the next time, but chances are they will still scuttle the run you’re on at the moment, and by the next time around there will be new players who don’t know what they’re doing. No, the game’s mechanics just need to be more forgiving of players that have no clue, or it needs to do a better job of keeping them away from players who know what they’re doing and just want to complete the event.

For vinewrath you only really need 1 lane that is able to kill all 3 bosses. The rest just has to make sure they can keep the carriers alive.

Help command 3 out of 3 successful runs last night. Whoop

Ohoni.6057:

You’ve defeated the Vinewrath with only six people per lane? I’m massively impressed. I’ve had boss attempts wipe with even four times that many.

The lowest amount of people I’ve ever successfully done a lane with was 4 people. I was managing both mortars at the same time while also attacking in between.

At first, I didn’t think the Vinewrath actually scaled for small groups because every time I did it, regardless of how many people were in the lane, the enemies were always level 82-83. The problem was, all lanes are a single event, so they all scale the same, which is based on all players within the event’s area. When people stack in one lane, they’re really hurting everyone else.

Playing late nights, I have occasionally encounter smaller groups, as in ~5 per lane. All the enemies are only level 80 and they’re much faster kill. The 2nd boss is really the only difficult part due to the low amount of people. Personally, I find it a lot more fun with less people.

Lastly, more isn’t always better. If you bring 5 zerkers that know how to play, the results are going to be ridiculous, as in the bosses melt. If you throw in 20 players that can barely DPS however, you’re going to cause them to fail. That’s the problem with scaling.

aspirine.6852:

Blude.6812:

Last 3 days— 3 attempts—-3 wins—lots of loot! One was this morning—off hrs for me. I found it easy likely because there was a great group of players on. Got a body part in as well, and that was after a successful TEQ too.

Lots of loot, really? really? Or perhaps you mean lots of items, because there is no such thing as loot in this game.

picky picky picky—what r u? A kindergarten teacher?

I don’t think I’ve ever had a Vinewrath fail. There have been a couple of breach fails, but never a Vinewrath. Maybe it’s just me though.

There is one thing that kind of bugs me in Silverwastes. It’s not the bandit chest trains, its the AFKers at the chest in the hidden depths. They all sit there waiting to get to a higher tier, but don’t participate. Last night saw about 10 people just chilling at the chest, it failed. But when it started up again, those same people just hung out, and went and grabbed the chest when we finally made it to tier 2.

If thats what they want to do, fine, but I just find it rude and irritating.

Personally I’m not sure if what you’re experiencing (and me too lately) isn’t a combination of indeed, a lack of need to be there as most have the lum armor by now AND the fact that it WAS School vacation over much of the Country. I may be wrong but in my experience mapchat in general gets a lot more nasty with the influx of less mature players during school breaks. That’s NOT to say we don’t have some immature adult players of course, it just feels like it’s exacerbated during these times.

Blude.6812:

aspirine.6852:

Blude.6812:

Last 3 days— 3 attempts—-3 wins—lots of loot! One was this morning—off hrs for me. I found it easy likely because there was a great group of players on. Got a body part in as well, and that was after a successful TEQ too.

Lots of loot, really? really? Or perhaps you mean lots of items, because there is no such thing as loot in this game.

picky picky picky—what r u? A kindergarten teacher?

Perhaps, am I teaching you something?

SW usually goes downhill at weekends, when it’s a more casual crowd. Has it been a public holiday somewhere?

aspirine.6852:

Blude.6812:

aspirine.6852:

Blude.6812:

Last 3 days— 3 attempts—-3 wins—lots of loot! One was this morning—off hrs for me. I found it easy likely because there was a great group of players on. Got a body part in as well, and that was after a successful TEQ too.

Lots of loot, really? really? Or perhaps you mean lots of items, because there is no such thing as loot in this game.

picky picky picky—what r u? A kindergarten teacher?

Perhaps, am I teaching you something?

Not really-since to don’t know the definition of ‘loot’-oh well-just another person to ignore.

Can Someone explain whats difficult in It? In being seriously, tib of post whining that the content is too difficult every where… Personally never seen an event fail if not for shortage of people ( like 20 in one entire map) AND that rarely happen, all just autoattacking mind less AND the event will Not fail… Maybe eu had different type of player? Not being rude or sarcastic, just trying to understand :/

AndRec.3496:

Can Someone explain whats difficult in It? In being seriously, tib of post whining that the content is too difficult every where… Personally never seen an event fail if not for shortage of people ( like 20 in one entire map) AND that rarely happen, all just autoattacking mind less AND the event will Not fail… Maybe eu had different type of player? Not being rude or sarcastic, just trying to understand :/

It’s luck of the draw as to what sorts of players the map gets. I play in the EU and have had incredibly smooth VW runs. Each boss goes down with a lot of time left on the timer. But I’ve also had serious failures. Then there are the times when people get shunted on to near empty maps with no pips. NA would be the same.