Guild Wars 2

So, I’m sure this has already been brought up somewhere, but in hot join spvp there is no benefit to defending points. While in a hot join match, defending a point can be the difference between a win and a loss. A great example if this is in Raid on Capricorn where engineers or mesmers especially can defend the ruins quite well against would-be-ninja-cappers. This usually leaves the team in a “ring around the rosie” match between docks and beach, and because you have the constant of the midpoint you generally win the match. However, if the teams do choose to ignore ruins for extended periods of time (which they often do) you are left sitting there essentially doing nothing, but just your presence can (and usually does) deter many attackers from wanting to deal with you plus the sharks. This can also be extrapolated to other maps, but it’s the most pressing in Capricorn.

So, the point here being that you can be instrumental in winning a match, and get next to nothing for doing it. On the other hand, you can follow a “zerg” of people and kill a bunch of the other team, capping occasionally as you go and get loads of glory and rank points. I realize this is just hot join PvP, but there are many casual pvp’ers that may not want to do tournaments or do not have people to do tournaments with (where in tournaments this isn’t as much of an issue as an organized team is not likely to ignore a node). The difference being also that in tournaments the goal is to win, where in hot join the goal is to get rank and glory (which is usually correlated with winning, but is not necessary, since the bonus for winning the match is so small)

That being said, I do not know how this issue might be dealt with. Because the focus of PvP balancing is going to be directed towards the most competitive areas, making a change in the entire system could throw the balance of what is already in place. It could be possible to make a change to only hot join, but then it may not be quite the “training ground” that it seems Arenanet wants it to be.

Simple Answer: Don’t bother defending points in Hotjoins.

No one will consciously rotate to help you and you will invariably get zerged down by yourself. Either stay with the zerg or roam constantly searching for opportunities for a favorable fight. Hotjoins are casual time fillers or a place to experiment with a build in combat, or in most cases just farm Glory with some FOTM build.

If you want to play the maps as intended then que for Free tourneys. People who actually know how to play selflessly for a win and with an inkling of strategy are always in demand.

But if queuing alone for free tournies, you end up in pugs fighting premades… and get slaughtered and kicked out after round 1.

Premades and pugs need a clear seperation, even besides the paid tournaments.

Spvp needs work… LOTS of work.

For starters: where is the logic in making spvp 8v8 and tpvp 5v5?
Make spvp 5v5 too and suddenly you’re playing a different game where defending might become a valid option.
This would keep a lot of the pugs out of tournament mode as well.

Open sPvP isn’t really conquest. It’s more like… do whatever you feel like. Which often means running around getting as much glory as you can and fighting players as often as possible.

I’d rather they preserve 8v8 open sPvP for the “I just want to PvP”, and open up a literal solo queue tournament system in addition to a team tournament system and paid tournament system. This would add a decent outlet for the folks that want to do something more serious but don’t want to gather up a team.

Thing is: there is no ‘pvp’ in 8v8 spvp… not in the challenging way.
There is only zerging and being zerged.

I don’t mind having a bracket where it’s more about ‘do whatever you want’ but it should still give good fights.
Spvp doesn’t. It gives uneven fights only.