Guild Wars 2

I can’t tell if this is a personal preference of mine or the community as a whole dislikes this feature:

I’ve seen a thread here or there with complaints on the red vs blue team colors. It seems like our hard earned dyes and unique color patterns go entirely forgotten thanks to this.

I would prefer that team colors are left out, and instead we could be given an option of team tabards/capes/markers, or simply have color coordinated names. Never do I associate enemy players by their color, I simply look at their name and name plate.

I understand that the colors add legibility for spectators in the match, which you could leave in tact if you so chose to, but why not have this as a toggle-able option for players?

This frustrates me because its such a simple change and its so aesthetically displeasing.

Does anyone else dislike red vs blue?

Could always strap a red and blue flag on a pole to your back and call it a day, but I dont think people would like that as much either.

Don’t like team colors at all. I never use team colors as the deciding factor to know if its an opponent or ally, I got targets nearest enemy, I got tab, I got red names above thier heads and green above my allies heads.

We also only had capes in guildwars one and chances are you were looking at the front of your enemies not the cape on their back, and had no problems knowing who was who.

The team colors are pointless and doesn’t let me look fabulous in my dyes.

Don’t like the red and blue, at all. This has been an issue since day 1 with many people.

It seems like they’re taking one of their best features (dyes and customization) and nullifying it in favor of potential future onlookers. Meanwhile, I’ve never heard of a single player that needs or enjoys this, nor any game where this was necessary.

Id think it would be obvious enough since the opposing teams names are in “Red”

Team colors kinda defeats the purpose of having “skins”

in addition to our original issues, we could develop more iconic “looks” with custom colors.

if developing esports and efame is important to the devs, consider that certain color patterns could be like “jerseys” for popular teams.

IMO set team colours for Paid tPvP and Ranked (when it’s eventually implemented, assuming it will be), as they are trying to head in an e-sport direction, but otherwise take it out for pickup 8v8 and free t5v5.

edit:

if developing esports and efame is important to the devs, consider that certain color patterns could be like “jerseys” for popular teams.

Also +1

Your brain recognizes the contrasting colors way faster then it notices the red text above them. Not even going into the headache infusing color combos that are possible and the additional “distraction” your brain has to deal with during tight combat situations. It is mostly done on a subconscious level afaik, but enforcing color discipline for team play aids situational awareness and prevents any issues coming from “distracting” color combinations.

I HATE team colours. Not only do they diminish the importance of your characters style, they are functionally a hinderance to some of us.

I have no trouble telling the difference between a red NAME and a blue NAME to distinguish between enemies and allies.

On the other hand, when I see multiple people clumped together with similar armour and the exact same colour scheme, keeping track of a target becomes difficult. How the hell am I supposed to know the difference, at a glance, between one blue charr warrior and another blue charr warrior? How about multiple mesmers of the same race?

Seriously, give us an option to turn this off, please.

silencer.5028:

Your brain recognizes the contrasting colors way faster then it notices the red text above them. Not even going into the headache infusing color combos that are possible and the additional “distraction” your brain has to deal with during tight combat situations. It is mostly done on a subconscious level afaik, but enforcing color discipline for team play aids situational awareness and prevents any issues coming from “distracting” color combinations.

Actually “My Brain” sees the “red” names a lot sooner then any colors.. especially over hills or around corners.

No way, Red vs Blue. Classic halo, I love it haha.

silencer.5028:

Your brain recognizes the contrasting colors way faster then it notices the red text above them. Not even going into the headache infusing color combos that are possible and the additional “distraction” your brain has to deal with during tight combat situations. It is mostly done on a subconscious level afaik, but enforcing color discipline for team play aids situational awareness and prevents any issues coming from “distracting” color combinations.

with respect, completely disagree on this.

played many mmo’s, never noticed a body color before a name color

You’re more likely to get a rainbow of color crapped into your brain with all the layers upon layers of particle effects. I don’t wanna play like this in fear of some clown coming to battle in hot-pink armor! Chances are if he didn’t take his appearance seriously he won’t be playing seriously either.

I’m more inclined to think this is a symptom of ’we’re building an e-sport (eventually)’ rather than an effort to keep things nice and neat.

Bottom line: very few players want this, and it’s disheartening that it’s still around

Im actually fine with the team colours, prefer it, but i dont see why they couldnt have a toggle or colour setting for it.

Angelus

Actually “My Brain” sees the “red” names a lot sooner then any colors.. especially over hills or around corners.

Which is exactly why the tags should only show up after you actually see the player, but thats beyond the point.

Angelus

with respect, completely disagree on this.

played many mmo’s, never noticed a body color before a name color

And you wouldn’t. Your brain does that for you so you don’t have to. You remove a possible conflicting factor by standardizing colors, which lets you focus on other things faster.

Nametags are a convenience, especially in close range encounters. Outside of situations where you shouldn’t be able to see them in the first place like the previous quote I’ve answered to, I am fairly certain that rainbow colored enemies with no consistency would contribute to situational awareness and tire you out quicker.

How do you know on which team you are then? If you look at the nodes and they are blue/red and you can’t remember your team color..

why not something like customizable team color templates.. like a team uniform in the NFL

steelers: black/yellow
49ers: red/gold
cowboys: blue/silver(white)

^ match the teams/cap zones to those colors to allow for at least a little bit of customization

I really don’t wanna be forced to wear a uniform. This conflicts with some of the game’s greatest strengths: pvp rewards, individuality, personalization, showmanship, dyes and the market surrounding them, ect…

Shindar the Reaver.2518

‘’…when I see multiple people clumped together with similar armour and the exact same colour scheme, keeping track of a target becomes difficult…’’

I realized this happens all the time: it’s when I start having to go beyond name colors to actively read and retain names, because everyone is the same color. So instead of just looking at an easily distinguishable character model, I’m distracted by an incomprehensible name.

Most of us have played several games with customizable colors where this was never an issue. This is clearly derived in part from e-sport aspirations, and I am disappointed. At this point, I wish they (e-sports) didn’t even exist.

This has already been suggesed many times, but we havent heard Anet about this yet.

Arenanet said: spvp goal is to improve cosmeticly.. Thats the spvp progression.

What they then did is add blue and red dyes that screw up your gear and everyone looks the same.

Remove blue and red… You can make a smaller difference between teams, but other suggestions already made it clear that even if everyone wore the same gear with the same dyes.. It would not affect the performance. So please in the name of god.. Make the spvp autodyeing an option instead of making it even harder to feel the difference between rank 1 and rank 100

I hate the team colors and it goes against one of the things that is part of the sPvP – cosmetic armor collecting.

I mean you spend time earning ranks to unlock nicer looking armor and spend time using salvaging kits etc to try and get that cool armor you’ve wanted, and for what? – because as soon as you join a match it’s all blue or red and looks horrid.

It’s one of those weird design choices IMO, competative games for years have worked just fine with colored names (or similar) to easily make out friend from foe, so it makes no sence at all to do this.

They should make it normal (your chosen dye) in sPvP, and then maybe only RvB in proper payed PvP (and even this is pushing it).
—-
I haven’t played much sPvP and yet the only things i’m actully trying to get are the custom weapon skins, i’m not bothering at all with the armor as there is no point at all with this RvB armor system.

silencer.5028:

Angelus

Actually “My Brain” sees the “red” names a lot sooner then any colors.. especially over hills or around corners.

Which is exactly why the tags should only show up after you actually see the player, but thats beyond the point.

Angelus

with respect, completely disagree on this.

played many mmo’s, never noticed a body color before a name color

And you wouldn’t. Your brain does that for you so you don’t have to. You remove a possible conflicting factor by standardizing colors, which lets you focus on other things faster.

Nametags are a convenience, especially in close range encounters. Outside of situations where you shouldn’t be able to see them in the first place like the previous quote I’ve answered to, I am fairly certain that rainbow colored enemies with no consistency would contribute to situational awareness and tire you out quicker.

To each his own is what I say..people are different. Brain experts popping up all over the place here…..

Angelus

To each his own is what I say..people are different. Brain experts popping up all over the place here…..

This is not a question of people, its a question of how your brain works. I could have sworn I actually saw newer research on the topic, but here, after a brief moment of google-fu:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/videos/2006/1202-tracking_your_team.htm

The key abstract:

People can focus on more than three items at a time if those items share a common color. Psychologists at Johns Hopkins University have demonstrated that when players wear uniforms, it allows spectators, players and coaches at major sporting events to overcome humans’ natural limit of tracking no more than three objects at a time. The common color of uniforms allows them to overcome the usual limit because they perceive separate individuals as a single set.

This comes straight from the body of the research itself, I was not able to find the actual data for free anywhere, but the method and results is very briefly described there. Name tags let you pick out enemies and target them, but I don’t find myself tracking neametags in intense close quarters group combat, but rather the characters themselves to be able to try and mark their attacks.

The jersey idea given here seems like a reasonable compromise to me. Upon creation/registering for a tounrey a team picks its color either out of presets or the colors available to its leader from the same hue group. They also select a “backup” color form a different hue in case both matched teams use the same hue as their first pick. Seems more or less the middle of the road between it not creating chaos and adding some customization and personalization to tPvP.

A thousand times yes! Let us choose our own dyes, but to make up for the loss in visibility we should have a block of red/blue that our name is surrounded in. I hate going into battle looking like a blueberry or a bottle of ketchup.

Yeah, I have to agree with this, be it not really an issue that should take priority over many others.

I personally go by the player names, and I think if any color was needed a tabard would suffice.

So in short, give us an option to toggle it, and when specator mode comes out, make that a seperate toggle. So regular players can view the way they want, and casters can cast the way they want. Isn’t that a major selling point of GW2? Play the way you want?

If arena net want to do something about colours… stay with the enemy colour (red or blue) but dont change OUR colours T_T

Change it or remove it

PS: I want a full colour remove!