Guild Wars 2

A friend recently- As of Sunday- bought this game for me. Issue is, being a new player, I need to pick a home server and both ones I would want are full. Tarnished Coast, where my RP friends are or Dragonbrand, where my offline friends are.

My question is, is there a trick to finding Tarnished Coast available? Since Sunday, I’ve tried and tried. Even as far as to staying up until 5AM and checking around ever 30 minutes.

Is there ever any server downtime, maintenance or such where I could try before or after when the population would be low?

Honestly, I know there are a lot of server homes to pick from yet the fact the two I would want to use are always full is a bit of a bother.

It’s not really a time of day thing. That being said, Server Transfers (afaik) occur on a weekly basis, partially due to the limit being one (free? not sure if you can do a paid transfer in addition) transfer a week, and partially due to the fact that WvW ( World vs World ) has a weekly cycle as well. This causes people to “move to greener pastures” based on their preference ( winning vs. queues ).

You’ll probably need to choose one TC or DB, unless you are fine transitioning between the two like this.

…my point is I cannot access either of those servers as my home. They are full anytime I check. Well, rarely I’ll find Dragonbrand available. I’d like to go to Tarnished Coast more then the other to RP yet -that- one is full anytime I check. I don’t much care for WvW, I simply want to play the game and perhaps role play.

Issue is, Tarnished Coast is always full.

I’m seeking how to get on it. It’s a bit frustrating not to be able to play after getting the game Sunday. Any tips?

This forum tracks the Full server trends:
http://guildwars2roleplayers.com/forum/m/2737230/viewthread/4448428-tc-population-levels-by-daytimedate

My little theory is: probably in two or three weeks TC will move up to WvW Tier 2 which means the server will no longer control the scoreboard. A small set of bandwagon players will likely go elsewhere leaving you an opportunity to transfer.

I can understand if this sounds like whining yet this inability to let me pick what server I want to be on due to WvW is annoying. I know I could pick a different server yet in a way, it’s basically that a friend bought me this game and I cannot play it.

I agree, it is really annoying, but WvW performance really does play a big role in server population. Servers rotate as “flavor of the month,” and TC has seemed pretty hot recently.

I encourage you to join a server now to start playing GW2, keep an eye on those servers that you want to get on, and be patient. Once you hit level 30 you can start doing dungeons. Dungeons other than FotM can be played with people on different servers in the same region, so as long as you and your friends are all on NA servers you’ll be able to play with them eventually (even if you don’t get a server transfer).

I can see how that is frustrating and wish you luck!

ANet has mentioned they will implement a guesting feature which basically allows anyone to travel to any server to do quests and everything with the exception of WvW. Unfortunately, I haven’t heard an ETA for this feature other than they are working on it.

One of the reasons I wanted to play though is to roleplay which I’m told is on Tarnished Coast. That is where my RP friends are too. I also worry, if I start on another server and try to transfer at some point, that by the time TC isn’t full, the transfers won’t be free any longer.

I just started last night, and as I tend to RP in most MMORPGs I too wanted to get into Tarnished Coast. I gave up on it and rolled on a different server.

So a related question: say Tarnished Coast opens up in a week or two. Can I delete my char from this other server (I forget it’s name) and then re-roll on Tarnished Coast? Or is my account alread “locked” onto this other server? Is there any other way to switch servers aside from a paid server transfer (or the aforementioned “guesting” system).

Thanks guys!

@beezer: Server transfers are free for now, so just watch TC. You can move your current character over or start a new one. I believe the button to move servers (or “Move Worlds” as it’s called in GW2) is in the lower left corner of the character select screen, but I’m not looking at that screen right now so I could be wrong. I would hope that Anet will implement paid transfers only after they implement guesting.

Good to know. Thanks!

If I understand this issue correctly, Tarnished Coast has a full population due to World versus World? Am I correct i guessing, this is player feeling if they are on the most populated servers, there are more of them to fight with? If that’s the case, that reminds me of how PVP in The Secret World is a bother because there are more in the Templar faction which leads to more players leaning toward the creating a Templar.

I simply want to RP and enjoy the game yet this WvW seems to be disturbing my right to pick the server my friends are on.

It’s not purely a WvW issue. Servers can only handle a certain amount of traffic so they have to limit the number of people on them, otherwise at peak times there would be huge issues with lag and disconnecting.

If anything WvW is a benefit for people wanting to get onto particular servers because without it hardly anyone would ever have a reason to transfer and popular servers would be even harder to get on to.

I don’t understand how that is a positive concept. It seems everyone will always want on the populated servers to best PVP and thus Tarnished Coast will continue to be difficult for others to want to play on.

WvW is only 1 piece of the pie. You also have people in sPVP tournements , players running around the world doing PvE activities, and players doing RP. Since Tarnished Coast has become the “Unofficial RP Server”, that makes every RP player flock to it which explains why the server is always full.

The “BandWagonPlayers” of WvW that intentionally hop servers just to be on the winning side are being brought up because those are more likely to leave TC then other players who dont care for WvW.

Best advice we can give you is pick another server for now, and keep up with your friends on how TC is doing in WvW, that will give you a decent “Gauge” of when the server will become available, during late hours &/or middle of the week, not weekend. (More then likely, when TC starts losing WvW is your best chance. Its how I got in.)

Zyxith.9328:

I don’t understand how that is a positive concept. It seems everyone will always want on the populated servers to best PVP and thus Tarnished Coast will continue to be difficult for others to want to play on.

Well partially you have to understand how WvW works. It’s an on-going tiered tournament of week long matches. Once a week the best server in each group of 3 moves up a tier and the worst one moves down, so all 3 are matched up against new opponents.

The majority of people playing WvW on Tarnished Coast at the moment aren’t there to be the best at PVP. Those people are on servers at the top of the top tiers (and with TC being mainly an RP server it’s never going to be one of those). They’re on TC because at the moment they’re at the top of their tier and so control most of the map which makes exploring it for world completion (needed to get legendary weapons) easier and/or lets them feel like they’re awesome.

Next week they will move up a tier and be at the bottom and all those people will jump ship to servers which are at the top of their new tier.

This is good for people who want to get on because it will open up a lot of spaces. If this weekly exodus didn’t happen the popular servers would just be permenantly full and instead of being told to wait a week you’d be told there is virtually no chance of ever getting on there and to just give up on it.

Those on TC will leave to another server? Wouldn’t staying on the most populated, therefor most likely to win server be an advantage or does winning somehow reset their tier?

Zyx….try getting on in the early morning hours. 2AM-4AM CST or EST…I’ve had some friends get on that way. Though not lately.

TC seems pretty full lately though. There were big groups running around outside of DR last night. Reminded me of the betas and the August rollout.

Is school out or something?

Give it a shot tomorrow (Thursday) and Friday morning. Sometimes at the end of the week before the next WvW sessions start there is decreased activity.

Since my friend was kind enough to buy this for my Birthday, I’ve been trying since Sunday. Even to the point of staying up and checking every 30 minutes up until around 4AM Mountain time. If this continues, I might give up on trying to play for a while.

Zyxith.9328:

Since my friend was kind enough to buy this for my Birthday, I’ve been trying since Sunday. Even to the point of staying up and checking every 30 minutes up until around 4AM Mountain time. If this continues, I might give up on trying to play for a while.

I had two friends start recently. I had been on SoS since day one. I finally gave up and left to go be where they were. WvW has still been really fun, just a little different from week to week. I left a few days before we made Tier 1. I was a bit sad. But I’m pretty happy where I’m at now.

My issue is I cannot go follow my friends as Tarnished Coast and Dragonbrand are full anytime I check.