Guild Wars 2

Just a quick note. While a lot of people, I gather, are frustrated with the matchmaking/grindy component of this season, it is perhaps worth remembering not to channel your frustrations into blame of others. It seems that almost every game, about halfway through, someone starts constantly and rudely blaming their team and swearing and sounding foolish, rather than contributing. It makes me much more sad than do the actual matchmaking problems, skill disparities, etc…

There’s a really important and interesting term for this phenomenon, called “ressentiment” (not resentment). It’s worth familiarizing yourself with if you aren’t already, since S4 is turning out to be quite the case study:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ressentiment

Good luck everyone.

Edit: it’s also worth noting that, if you find yourself frustrated and wanting to vocalize something, a much more constructive approach might be to politely offer advice for your team. Who knows, you might even help!

Here’s the thing: it’s only displaced resentment. The resentment itself is completely warranted. Why would anyone be pleased with the fact that we’re back in a system that was already deemed to be inferior and thus rejected?

WvW got polls for this type of thing. However, sPvP still lives in the dark age where we’re forced to endure a reversion—and only on a 1-day notice. Shameful development practices.

Anyone internal can see the true age of my account. Let’s just say I’ve seen it all for GW2 and this is the nadir of how the development team has treated the players—especially when they seemingly already learned their lessons and tried to fix their practices!

The current leadership just can’t seem to help itself.

Permafrost.2695:

Here’s the thing: it’s only displaced resentment. The resentment itself is completely warranted. Why would anyone be pleased with the fact that we’re back in a system that was already deemed to be inferior and thus rejected?

WvW got polls for this type of thing. However, sPvP still lives in the dark age where we’re forced to endure a reversion—and only on a 1-day notice. Shameful development practices.

Anyone internal can see the true age of my account. Let’s just say I’ve seen it all for GW2 and this is the nadir of how the development team has treated the players—especially when they seemingly already learned their lessons and tried to fix their practices!

The current leadership just can’t seem to help itself.

Blah Blah Blah. An example of ressentiment would be blaming Anet because you can’t win a PVP match. See above :P

Permafrost.2695:

Here’s the thing: it’s only displaced resentment. The resentment itself is completely warranted. Why would anyone be pleased with the fact that we’re back in a system that was already deemed to be inferior and thus rejected?

WvW got polls for this type of thing. However, sPvP still lives in the dark age where we’re forced to endure a reversion—and only on a 1-day notice. Shameful development practices.

Anyone internal can see the true age of my account. Let’s just say I’ve seen it all for GW2 and this is the nadir of how the development team has treated the players—especially when they seemingly already learned their lessons and tried to fix their practices!

The current leadership just can’t seem to help itself.

And what good did those polls do? Wvw is basically unplayable for some servers, now that some servers are grouped with others.

We don’t need polls. We need balance. For way too long ANET has been attempting to balance this game without going through the challenge of actually balancing it (eg, removing amulets, nerfing runes, removing certain maps, etc.). I mean the original RotC map was despised for underwater combat that ANET couldn’t figure out how to balance. So their solution was to scrap the map. Imo, it doesn’t seem like ANET has the resources to balance this game properly. Because the idea that you can do a massive number of changes every few months to achieve balance is laughable.

We all know this, and ANET rarely communicates with us about balance (except to remind us the pvp team has nothing to do with balance!). So it’s no wonder why players are salty.

R O C.6574:

Permafrost.2695:

Here’s the thing: it’s only displaced resentment. The resentment itself is completely warranted. Why would anyone be pleased with the fact that we’re back in a system that was already deemed to be inferior and thus rejected?

WvW got polls for this type of thing. However, sPvP still lives in the dark age where we’re forced to endure a reversion—and only on a 1-day notice. Shameful development practices.

Anyone internal can see the true age of my account. Let’s just say I’ve seen it all for GW2 and this is the nadir of how the development team has treated the players—especially when they seemingly already learned their lessons and tried to fix their practices!

The current leadership just can’t seem to help itself.

Blah Blah Blah. An example of ressentiment would be blaming Anet because you can’t win a PVP match. See above :P

l2readingcomprehension, because my post is about being irked by the way the community is being treated. Or, if that was a troll, I’m glad you enjoy winning every game 500-10. It’s a trash experience for me. On the other hand, the close games of s3 were awesome.

Permafrost.2695:

R O C.6574:

Permafrost.2695:

Here’s the thing: it’s only displaced resentment. The resentment itself is completely warranted. Why would anyone be pleased with the fact that we’re back in a system that was already deemed to be inferior and thus rejected?

WvW got polls for this type of thing. However, sPvP still lives in the dark age where we’re forced to endure a reversion—and only on a 1-day notice. Shameful development practices.

Anyone internal can see the true age of my account. Let’s just say I’ve seen it all for GW2 and this is the nadir of how the development team has treated the players—especially when they seemingly already learned their lessons and tried to fix their practices!

The current leadership just can’t seem to help itself.

Blah Blah Blah. An example of ressentiment would be blaming Anet because you can’t win a PVP match. See above :P

l2readingcomprehension, because my post is about being irked by the way the community is being treated. Or, if that was a troll, I’m glad you enjoy winning every game 500-10. It’s a trash experience for me. On the other hand, the close games of s3 were awesome.

I’m not seeing blow-outs as much this season. I was in a W/L cycle for a bit, then i started partying up after my wins and i got a win streak going.

OK OP, in which category this falls?

Ranked, sapphire/ruby range, 4 people on my team never left mid (besides when they died), even if there was only 1 enemy there and regardless how much i asked for help at home.
I spent entire match in 1v2, 1v3 situations trying to defend our home, recapping far/our home etc. Thankfully enemy team was just as bad and i could solo their DHs/thief etc.

Cynz.9437:

OK OP, in which category this falls?

Ranked, sapphire/ruby range, 4 people on my team never left mid (besides when they died), even if there was only 1 enemy there and regardless how much i asked for help at home.
I spent entire match in 1v2, 1v3 situations trying to defend our home, recapping far/our home etc. Thankfully enemy team was just as bad and i could solo their DHs/thief etc.

I don’t doubt you’re good, and, while I don’t claim to be amazing, I also don’t like that the system puts people who know what they’re doing with people that don’t. It’s really frustrating and takes a lot of the point out of having divisions. My post is just to point out that a lot of the hate that’s being spread in the teamchat during games is not helpful, and that it, interestingly, seems to be coming from a kind of defense mechanism. In other words, people seem to be insisting, game after game, that their losses are only their teammates’ fault, without wanting to come to terms with the much less satisfying thought that in fact the matchmaking is designed to keep you from winning too much. It is as if people need to create a story to give a logic to a much more systematic problem, as a substitute for simply trying to make the best of their own situation.

I am thus suggesting that, regardless of how frustrated we may be, that we stop name-calling and blaming others, since each game is made specifically to match bad players with good players. If everyone was supposed to be at the same level, then those sorts of complaints would be significantly more justified. But as it stands now, it would be much more helpful to everyone if we all spent our energy trying to help people out who don’t know how to play as well.

Cynz.9437:

OK OP, in which category this falls?

Ranked, sapphire/ruby range, 4 people on my team never left mid (besides when they died), even if there was only 1 enemy there and regardless how much i asked for help at home.
I spent entire match in 1v2, 1v3 situations trying to defend our home, recapping far/our home etc. Thankfully enemy team was just as bad and i could solo their DHs/thief etc.

The point is, Cynz, that OP is saying you’re not allowed feelings. And if you MUST have feelings, you CERTAINLY arent allowed to express them by calling it how it is.

When your team mates appear to suck, it’s actually just you creating an apparition for your own fear and self loathing to attack. Shame on you!

R O C.6574:

(…) I was in a W/L cycle for a bit, then i started partying up after my wins and i got a win streak going.

Wow, you discovered how truly kittened up the matchmaking is because it heavily favors premades… congrats… you are a bit late, but I guess better late than never.

However, all of this doesnt change the fact that the OPs 101 wannabe psycho-analysis of a problem is… well… very narrow-sighted, if not to say… completly wrong.

Lets get a few facts stated before starting the psycho-babble.

1. Current matchmaking throws together players of VERY different skill levels
2. Past matchmaking inflated mmr for especially players with few ranked matches
3. Current “balancing” makes holding a point against 2-3 nearly impossible
4. Current “balancing” doesnt have easy to play builds (aka bunkers)

The result is, that at midway point, the most experienced player of the team realizes how utterly un-carryable the whole match is, since he ALWAYS gets zerged, no matter what he does. After a handful of those matches, that player gets so frustrated, that frustration just needs to be expressed, hence the chat shouting or afking. Depending which outlet that player chooses.

This behaviour has NOTHING to do with ressentiment. Ressentiment would be if you loaded into the map, looked at your teammates and already decided its a loss because the looks of some of them reminds you of previous losses.

Getting frustrated after missing the last possible snowball-point and vocalizing that frustration doesnt have anything to do with some kind of unconcious aversion towards your teammates. From a psychological point of view, that vocalization is actually quite healthy, as long as it doesnt get too abusive.

andrew.5607:

(…)
Edit: it’s also worth noting that, if you find yourself frustrated and wanting to vocalize something, a much more constructive approach might be to politely offer advice for your team. Who knows, you might even help!

It might also be worth noting, that I tried that repeatedly, and 99% of all pvp players arent interested in listening to advice. You either get blocked, verbally abused or ignored.
PvP players are so emotionally invested in their own subjectiv view of the match, they never do anything wrong in their eyes.
Best example was a match yesterday in which someone told me how stupid I was for trying to decap a node instead of going mid to snowball that fight there. However, the score difference was so high, the enemy only had to hold a single node to win.
After re-watching my recordings I saw that on top of that, mid fight was already lost before I made the decision to go and try decapping close. If I had gone mid, I only would have added another +5.
He still believes he was right. I know, objectively thanks to my recordings, that I made a solid decision and the match was lost before that decision.
This little anecdote shows that trying to correct someone elses view of a match, forcibly or nicely, is never going to work. Because for that to work, the other person has to realize that they did something wrong. As long as they think they are in the right, you cant change a thing. Ergo, it wont help. The vocalization of frustration also is rarely aimed at actually improving a situation… and most often just used as a way to relieve the stress that frustration is causing. Hence why it can be quite healthy to do that… again, as long as it doesnt turn too abusive.

Yasi.9065:

R O C.6574:

(…) I was in a W/L cycle for a bit, then i started partying up after my wins and i got a win streak going.

Wow, you discovered how truly kittened up the matchmaking is because it heavily favors premades… congrats… you are a bit late, but I guess better late than never.

However, all of this doesnt change the fact that the OPs 101 wannabe psycho-analysis of a problem is… well… very narrow-sighted, if not to say… completly wrong.

Lets get a few facts stated before starting the psycho-babble.

1. Current matchmaking throws together players of VERY different skill levels
2. Past matchmaking inflated mmr for especially players with few ranked matches
3. Current “balancing” makes holding a point against 2-3 nearly impossible
4. Current “balancing” doesnt have easy to play builds (aka bunkers)

The result is, that at midway point, the most experienced player of the team realizes how utterly un-carryable the whole match is, since he ALWAYS gets zerged, no matter what he does. After a handful of those matches, that player gets so frustrated, that frustration just needs to be expressed, hence the chat shouting or afking. Depending which outlet that player chooses.

This behaviour has NOTHING to do with ressentiment. Ressentiment would be if you loaded into the map, looked at your teammates and already decided its a loss because the looks of some of them reminds you of previous losses.

Getting frustrated after missing the last possible snowball-point and vocalizing that frustration doesnt have anything to do with some kind of unconcious aversion towards your teammates. From a psychological point of view, that vocalization is actually quite healthy, as long as it doesnt get too abusive.

andrew.5607:

(…)
Edit: it’s also worth noting that, if you find yourself frustrated and wanting to vocalize something, a much more constructive approach might be to politely offer advice for your team. Who knows, you might even help!

It might also be worth noting, that I tried that repeatedly, and 99% of all pvp players arent interested in listening to advice. You either get blocked, verbally abused or ignored.
PvP players are so emotionally invested in their own subjectiv view of the match, they never do anything wrong in their eyes.
Best example was a match yesterday in which someone told me how stupid I was for trying to decap a node instead of going mid to snowball that fight there. However, the score difference was so high, the enemy only had to hold a single node to win.
After re-watching my recordings I saw that on top of that, mid fight was already lost before I made the decision to go and try decapping close. If I had gone mid, I only would have added another +5.
He still believes he was right. I know, objectively thanks to my recordings, that I made a solid decision and the match was lost before that decision.
This little anecdote shows that trying to correct someone elses view of a match, forcibly or nicely, is never going to work. Because for that to work, the other person has to realize that they did something wrong. As long as they think they are in the right, you cant change a thing. Ergo, it wont help. The vocalization of frustration also is rarely aimed at actually improving a situation… and most often just used as a way to relieve the stress that frustration is causing. Hence why it can be quite healthy to do that… again, as long as it doesnt turn too abusive.

A few points:

1. “Psychoanalysis” is generally not hyphenated, and hasn’t been for around 100 years or so, since Strachey’s early translations.
2. Your confident assertions about the concept of ressentiment are, unfortunately, not correct at all. If you’re interested, I’d urge you to take another look at the wiki. It’s a very fascinating concept.
3. I don’t have a problem with people venting their anger, if it helps them cope with the defeats. I would maybe argue that it’s perhaps not actually super healthy to lash out when things don’t work in one’s favor, but really, as you said, what is unfortunate is when it becomes abusive toward others.
4. Your anecdote about people being unwilling to accept advice in PvP is a fascinating one, and sadly I see this a lot as well.

I urge you to take a look at the works of Max Scheler instead of trusting wikipedia. Personally, I dont like to recommend Nietzsche, because imo he was a sadistic pig, but if you really want to go all the way… Nietzsche actually was the one that mostly shaped the term “ressentiment”.

You totally missed the point of what ressentiment really is. On the one side, that term stands for negative feelings, correct… such as grudges, envy, revenge. BUT the other side of that term is just as important, and you are completely ignoring it…. its COVERTLY. To hold a grudge covertly. To secretly envy someone. To not do something about it, but keeping all those negative feelings bottled up. Staying polite while being internally eaten up by ressentiments. Slandering someone instead of telling him/her directly.

The opposite of ressentiment is a swift and open action against whatever frustrates someone. So if someone vents that frustration by cursing in chat…. thats just such a swift action that Nietzsche actually prescribed against ressentiments.

Im sorry, but most of the time, wikipedia just doesnt give you the full picture.

Yasi.9065:

I urge you to take a look at the works of Max Scheler instead of trusting wikipedia. Personally, I dont like to recommend Nietzsche, because imo he was a sadistic pig, but if you really want to go all the way… Nietzsche actually was the one that mostly shaped the term “ressentiment”.

You totally missed the point of what ressentiment really is. On the one side, that term stands for negative feelings, correct… such as grudges, envy, revenge. BUT the other side of that term is just as important, and you are completely ignoring it…. its COVERTLY. To hold a grudge covertly. To secretly envy someone. To not do something about it, but keeping all those negative feelings bottled up. Staying polite while being internally eaten up by ressentiments. Slandering someone instead of telling him/her directly.

The opposite of ressentiment is a swift and open action against whatever frustrates someone. So if someone vents that frustration by cursing in chat…. thats just such a swift action that Nietzsche actually prescribed against ressentiments.

Im sorry, but most of the time, wikipedia just doesnt give you the full picture.

I referred you to the wiki since I linked to it above. And since it seems to contradict what you said. I can’t speak to the Scheler, but I think you misunderstand Nietzsche, and his use of the term. Slave-morality is often characterized by a lashing out; and what is opposed to it, for him, is a certain notion of what he calls “health”, which I’ll admit can be fairly problematic. Essentially, however, it involves overcoming one’s tendency to blame others, in an attempt to move beyond those kinds of grievances with the world. For Nietzsche it has to do with getting over, if I can put it this way, being re-active in favor of simply being active. Specifically I am thinking of the Genealogy of Morals, or even some of the later stuff on Wagner, in a way.

But it sounds as if we are approaching the term from two different perspectives. If you want to whisper me about it I’m sure we could have an interesting discussion.

andrew.5607:

Cynz.9437:

OK OP, in which category this falls?

Ranked, sapphire/ruby range, 4 people on my team never left mid (besides when they died), even if there was only 1 enemy there and regardless how much i asked for help at home.
I spent entire match in 1v2, 1v3 situations trying to defend our home, recapping far/our home etc. Thankfully enemy team was just as bad and i could solo their DHs/thief etc.

I don’t doubt you’re good, and, while I don’t claim to be amazing, I also don’t like that the system puts people who know what they’re doing with people that don’t. It’s really frustrating and takes a lot of the point out of having divisions. My post is just to point out that a lot of the hate that’s being spread in the teamchat during games is not helpful, and that it, interestingly, seems to be coming from a kind of defense mechanism. In other words, people seem to be insisting, game after game, that their losses are only their teammates’ fault, without wanting to come to terms with the much less satisfying thought that in fact the matchmaking is designed to keep you from winning too much. It is as if people need to create a story to give a logic to a much more systematic problem, as a substitute for simply trying to make the best of their own situation.

I am thus suggesting that, regardless of how frustrated we may be, that we stop name-calling and blaming others, since each game is made specifically to match bad players with good players. If everyone was supposed to be at the same level, then those sorts of complaints would be significantly more justified. But as it stands now, it would be much more helpful to everyone if we all spent our energy trying to help people out who don’t know how to play as well.

Well, i am sry (or am i?), i spent half match begging them to help me – 0 reaction. So yes, eventually i became mad and yelled at team WHY THE HELL THEY DON’T EVER LOOK AT MAP OR HELP TO DEFEND HOME!!!!

It felt good :P

Cynz.9437:

Well, i am sry (or am i?), i spent half match begging them to help me – 0 reaction. So yes, eventually i became mad and yelled at team WHY THE HELL THEY DON’T EVER LOOK AT MAP OR HELP TO DEFEND HOME!!!!

It felt good :P

I understand your frustration – I think many of us have felt the same in the last days. Current games are not fun at all for me, besides a few rare exceptions. I’m just going on in the hope that things improve when people reach the division they belong to.

Venting one’s frustration on the map chat has funny consequences. Of course one feels refreshed, but others feel bad. As a result, they may start to misbehave as well, propagating the frustration to all players. What’s ironic is that it may sometimes hit back the original source, without him/her knowing, creating a feedback loop.

Cynz.9437:

andrew.5607:

Cynz.9437:

OK OP, in which category this falls?

Ranked, sapphire/ruby range, 4 people on my team never left mid (besides when they died), even if there was only 1 enemy there and regardless how much i asked for help at home.
I spent entire match in 1v2, 1v3 situations trying to defend our home, recapping far/our home etc. Thankfully enemy team was just as bad and i could solo their DHs/thief etc.

I don’t doubt you’re good, and, while I don’t claim to be amazing, I also don’t like that the system puts people who know what they’re doing with people that don’t. It’s really frustrating and takes a lot of the point out of having divisions. My post is just to point out that a lot of the hate that’s being spread in the teamchat during games is not helpful, and that it, interestingly, seems to be coming from a kind of defense mechanism. In other words, people seem to be insisting, game after game, that their losses are only their teammates’ fault, without wanting to come to terms with the much less satisfying thought that in fact the matchmaking is designed to keep you from winning too much. It is as if people need to create a story to give a logic to a much more systematic problem, as a substitute for simply trying to make the best of their own situation.

I am thus suggesting that, regardless of how frustrated we may be, that we stop name-calling and blaming others, since each game is made specifically to match bad players with good players. If everyone was supposed to be at the same level, then those sorts of complaints would be significantly more justified. But as it stands now, it would be much more helpful to everyone if we all spent our energy trying to help people out who don’t know how to play as well.

Well, i am sry (or am i?), i spent half match begging them to help me – 0 reaction. So yes, eventually i became mad and yelled at team WHY THE HELL THEY DON’T EVER LOOK AT MAP OR HELP TO DEFEND HOME!!!!

It felt good :P

Haha, well I’ve done that too ; )
We’ve all done it at one point or another. Not really trying to condemn anyone here.

R O C.6574:

Permafrost.2695:

Here’s the thing: it’s only displaced resentment. The resentment itself is completely warranted. Why would anyone be pleased with the fact that we’re back in a system that was already deemed to be inferior and thus rejected?

WvW got polls for this type of thing. However, sPvP still lives in the dark age where we’re forced to endure a reversion—and only on a 1-day notice. Shameful development practices.

Anyone internal can see the true age of my account. Let’s just say I’ve seen it all for GW2 and this is the nadir of how the development team has treated the players—especially when they seemingly already learned their lessons and tried to fix their practices!

The current leadership just can’t seem to help itself.

Blah Blah Blah. An example of ressentiment would be blaming Anet because you can’t win a PVP match. See above :P

ROC… you are in simple denial. Another psychologic term:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial

Actually, Permafrost is quite right. No customers in this world would endure to get that kind of treatment for so long.

It’s one of the main reason, the pvp trains is on a downward spiral for so long. F2P was one hope to get it done right but i’ts not the case. They wrecked many of their redeemable attempt to get the critical masses need for the system to work.

But it was successful only for 3 month before HoT came on. F2P need to buy HoT to win.

Matchmaking need to pair same skill level for both team.

Season 1 is mix and matches bads and good.
Season 2 and 3 was match GOOD versus BADS.
Season 4 should had been match GOOD versus GOOD, Bads versus Bads.

So… those both decisions from Anet, day 1 on season… show they don’t really care about “healthy” pvp population from the get go.

And this is just 2 exemples of 100 that still show this kind of bad decision that simply don’t let a pvp player base to grow.

They just need to pay some classes to their “decision” maker:
http://advertising.utexas.edu/undergraduate/major-public-relations

That would solve the issues.