Guild Wars 2

Hi@all,

Over the last months, there have been tons of Threads popping up about people wanting GvG in Guild Wars 2, yet, there seems to be no clear concept of what they actually want GvG to look like in GW2 and what they think is that made GvG such a good Game-Mode.

In this Thread, I want to talk about why GvG is such a good Concept for PvP and what exactly it is that made it so good that can actually be applied to GW2.

I played GW1 for years and I’ve played thousands of GvG’s in Top-20 to Top-50 Guilds in the World (Bruderschaft der Verdammnis [BdV] and Capita Cerberi [CC] are probably the most recognizable ones) and for me, there are several Parts about what is essential for a good Game-Mode like GvG.

Multiple Goals and Multiple ways to achieve those goals

In GvG, you could win the game in multiple ways, you could:

1) Go for Flagcontrol and a strong Teamfight-capability
2) Win by raiding the base of the opponent to either kill the Guild Lord or gain an NPC-advantage at “Victory or Death”.
3) You could outmaneuver the opposing team by splitting your team in favourable ways and force them to split.

Teamfights with clear roles and the necessity for coordinated Teamplay

What GW1 lacked compared to GW2 was a very complex and smooth fight-mechanic: There was no dodging, hell, there wasn’t even jumping and most skills were simple “target enemy – press skill”, it truly wasn’t nearly as exiting as GW2 in that aspect. But oh boy did GW1 make up for it by some of the best Teamplay-possibilities I’ve ever seen. There was an absolute necessity for perfect coordination and execution of your Build in order to even be able to kill sth. against a strong Backline. People complain about tanks in GW2, but if they’d ever have to try and kill sth. in GW1 against a good Backline with decent support, they wouldn’t be able to get a target below 50% health with all that mindless zerging and bashing we see in GW2 (I basically only see good coordination in the Top-Teams, but it quickly drops to an uncoordinated mess. ^^’)

Playing mostly Backline, I had to keep an Eye on most of the 16 Players on the Field: I had to know where my ppl are standing, where they’ll stand in a second and position myself accordingly while also watching out for my positioning compared to the opponent.
A good Monk had to always see in which direction the Mesmers and Rangers are looking and keep track of CD’s, because one good Interrupt or Diversion (Hex that stayed on you for 6 seconds or until you cast a spell and if you cast a spell, it’s recast was increased by about a Minute) could literally make your backline crumble.
And as an Infuser, I had to know what the next Target of the spike may be and react within under a quarter of a second, so I had to anticipate, read the movement of the other Team and see where they are facing (If 3-4 ppl suddenly cast sth. and face in the same direction and you see the Melee’s running, it’s of course a dead giveaway, but not every team made it that easy for the Backline).

And each and every role of a Team was as demanding and interesting to play but the whole thing only worked, when everyone of the Team worked together, coordinated spikes and varied their Teamplay depending on the situation.

The Maps

What I liked most about the Maps of GW1 that the current Maps in GW2 lack, is that they just were all around bigger and one of the most important parts is that they had wider spaces where the Teamfights happened most of the time. That’s also why I love Legacy of the Foefire that much: It’s actually the only Map with a big enough Node to make Teamfights on Nodes really interesting and much more about positioning, kiting and general Movement than on other Nodes. Also, other nodes have the Problem that often a Char can simply spam Ranged-attacks on the Node-defender and force him to basically leave the point, which is IMHO kinda silly.

The perfect Team-Size of 8 Players

As mentioned above, GW1 didn’t have a very action-oriented gameplay and it was actually pretty boring compared to GW2 in a Situation where there weren’t many people involved. The whole part where skill, positioning, map-awareness, reaction-time etc. came into play is because of the pretty big team-size. Still it wasn’t too big to make it confusing and hard to coordinate or where spiked-DMG would just get out of control – it was simply the best possible Team-size…. for GW1 that is!

IMHO, it’s not necessarily about the specific Size of 8, but about the fact that it was the right team-size for GW1. GW2 is a different game with more action-oriented gameplay and no dedicated Healers and all-around more versatile characters. But is 5 the right Team-size for sth. similar to GvG in GW2? I really don’t know for sure, but I think it will be somewhere around 5-8, depending on the size of the Maps. On the current Maps, I’d go for 5-6 People and I’d really want to try some 6v6 in Custom Arenas and see how it feels.

So what exactly does this mean for GW2? Let’s recap the Points I’ve made and try to give a simple suggestion on how it could be implemented in GW2 or how we can tackle the Issue to come up with a good Solution:

Multiple goals and ways to achieve them
Anet should just toy around with the secondary Objectives a bit more: Make them more important compared to Node-Control and come up with some interesting new ones.
It could also be possible to try and simply convert the whole GvG-Mode with it’s Maps to GW2, but if you’ve read what I’ve been talking about above, this is not a necessity to get a good game-mode for GW2, but it’s one way for sure.

Teamfights
In GW2, there is IMHO a lack of long, engaging Teamfights and it’s IMHO where basically all the things talked about factor in: It’s about finding the right team-size, about bigger Nodes, bigger Maps with more open Areas in places that Teamfights will happen etc.
Because I really do think that GW2 could offer great Teamfights, even without dedicated Healers. I can see having to use the same amount and types of skills I needed in GW1, so the Problem is not on the classes, the gameplay etc. but on other factors.

The Maps
One of the biggest Problems IMHO… If you have a tiny Node where ppl can stand above you and just spam down AoE, it doesn’t really ask for great Teamplay and positioning – it’s just boring and stupid. ^^’
Also, Kiting and positioning get a non-Issue when you have to stand on the Point and the opponent can just barrel down on you with ranged-attacks. Even if Teamfights on certain Nodes happen, it’s basically about 1 guy standing on the point and the other ones spamming stuff on top of it. The Layout of some Nodes is especially horrible:

Mid-Node on Kyhlo:
tiny Node and if you fall down, you need to walk around to get up again, this means the Node is even more restricting, because you literally can’t get off the Node for a Milisecond (because you’ll fall off the Node and loose precious times or CD’s to get up there again). Then, there are the holes and balconies where ppl can spam stuff in, there is no place for kiting and little room for positioning, because the outer balconies are so small, because you can’t shoot in from everywhere etc. It’s just a horrible horrible Mess if you are looking for good Teamfights.

Mid-Node on Nilfhel:
Again a tiny Node, again hard to reach spaces on top where ppl can spam down mindlessly and again a very restrictive Area where the backline can fight, because it’s just such a narrow Space.

So here’s where I strongly urge ANet to try the next new Map, almost non-dependant on the secondary Objectives, that you’ll try one with at least a Big Mid-Node again, maybe even one with big side-Nodes as well, but just at least an open Area around the Nodes.

The perfect Team-Size of 8 Players
To find the right Number of Players, GW2 basically did all they had to with Custom Arenas for now. It’s now up to the community to try out 6v6 or 8v8 and see how it goes and if sth. Gets really popular and Tournaments start to be run in that format, maybe Anet could rethink the Parts beyond Custom Arenas, but thats a thing of the future.
What I urge all the Players though is, that they try out this stuff, get out of your comfort-zone playing with your 4 buddies (atm. this is expecially directed to the top-teams that atm. have access to the CA’s) and really try out 6v6 and 8v8 – theorycraft about it, make tournaments etc.

Should also mention that the progression through a conquest match is not very…tangible? The win condition doesn’t always feel related to performance. Some matches you’re on one point, but killing them nonstop. Your intuition will tell you that this meant you were doing good things, but the reality is that they held 2 points and are now ahead. If you fall behind there aren’t a lot of options available to you, and it generally boils down to “hold 2 points for the rest of the game and hope the points catch up.”

Map design is a huge problem, but not in just the way you mentioned. On points like henge, you don’t know if someone is on it unless you’re standing on it as well. You can’t see in or out of this point, which means you can’t tell if a second person is coming to attack you until they’ve hit you with a bunch of buttons. This obtrusive design also means that if you want to decap henge, you have to walk pretty far towards it to even see if there’s someone guarding it. There’s an added problem on points like this with stealth, if you decide to be a big boy and move more than spell range away from the point it’s going get decapped.

mbh.8301:

Map design is a huge problem, but not in just the way you mentioned. On points like henge, you don’t know if someone is on it unless you’re standing on it as well. You can’t see in or out of this point, which means you can’t tell if a second person is coming to attack you until they’ve hit you with a bunch of buttons. This obtrusive design also means that if you want to decap henge, you have to walk pretty far towards it to even see if there’s someone guarding it. There’s an added problem on points like this with stealth, if you decide to be a big boy and move more than spell range away from the point it’s going get decapped.

True datt! ^^’

Even though it’s a different Problem, it could be solved by the same actions as solving the ones mentioned by me: Larger and more open spaces with less obstacles and other shenannigans, especially on the Nodes, because thats where most Teamfights will take place.

The Layout of the Nodes is just too restricting, so ANet: “TEAR DOWN THOSE WALLS!”

The most important thing here i think is that Anet needs to decide if they are gonna try to implement another gametype or they are gonna keep the 3 points conquest model.

The idea i have from watching the foruns and the talk ingame is that almost everyone is in favor of a new gametype, be it either Gw 1 GVG or even deathmatch.

Gunner.7342:

The most important thing here i think is that Anet needs to decide if they are gonna try to implement another gametype or they are gonna keep the 3 points conquest model.

The idea i have from watching the foruns and the talk ingame is that almost everyone is in favor of a new gametype, be it either Gw 1 GVG or even deathmatch.

Check : http://www.twitch.tv/guildwars2/c/2238344
At 16:44 :P

If you wish for more team matches, you seriously need to consider banning certain professions (I’m looking at you, mesmer). It’s stupid in 3v3 already when each team has 1 or 2 of those. How can you possibly imagine a 6v6 or more with several mesmers around?

Currently those funny skirmishes are gvg!

KarlaGrey.5903:

If you wish for more team matches, you seriously need to consider banning certain professions (I’m looking at you, mesmer). It’s stupid in 3v3 already when each team has 1 or 2 of those. How can you possibly imagine a 6v6 or more with several mesmers around?

Well, that’s not a really good solution though, is it?

And yes, Mesmers are strong in certain Teamfight-Situations, but mostly in 2v2’s or 3v3’s. If There are more Players than that, the fact that the Mesmer needs to be kinda close to a Target to do real DMG and the fact that he’s rather squishy, make him an easy Target when it comes to 4v4+ Scenarios.

So if you have sth. in a Teamfight that can pressure the backline (any kind of AoE when the Mesmer is standing back pressuring with his ranged Weapon and preparing for a Spike), you can keep him on so low HP, that he can’t really go in for a kill that easily.

Also, the 6v6-Format probably wouldn’t create even more team setups with a more limited number of classes, especially not Mesmers, cuz you just need 1 Mesmer for the Portal, but not many Teams would take more than 1 IMHO, which leaves space for another Char that they couldn’t take before. But we just would have to test out what 6v6 or 8v8 would do in regards to only picking certain classes. Also, with a larger Number of Players, Support gets more important and there’s a better possibility for Support-builds being picked, because the number of Players is increased. So Support becomes more important AND theres a better chance that you have room in your Team for it!

20 vs 20 at least. What kind of guild have only 8 players?

16 vs. 16 then guilds with 8 players also can play if they all take a ranger. Lol. ;-)

Gunner.7342:

The most important thing here i think is that Anet needs to decide if they are gonna try to implement another gametype or they are gonna keep the 3 points conquest model.

The idea i have from watching the foruns and the talk ingame is that almost everyone is in favor of a new gametype, be it either Gw 1 GVG or even deathmatch.

they have said long before release that they will have more gametypes than conquest, it’s not something to keep or just turn 180 degrees and do something entirely different, it’s something they’ve implemented, then didn’t have time to add anything else so they just released like that. I honestly expected them to have at least 3 gametypes and full esports support out by release. oh well.

Junkpile.7439:

20 vs 20 at least. What kind of guild have only 8 players?

Anything beyond 8 Players would be unviable, because:

1) It would be confusing, especially for spectators
2) DMG would get way out of Hand
3) AoE would be too Powerful
4) There is already WvW for those big types of fights

8 is clearly the highest possible Teamsize for truly structured and e-Sport-worthy PvP and that is what GvG is.

And you believe GW2 8v8 is not

1) Utterly confusing,
2) With damage running out of hand,
3) Aoe spam on nodes,
4) Zergs roaming around,
5) Gozzilion pets,
6) Animations-happy proffessions
7) Tiny, barely detectable/distinguishable characters.

Oh my.

Gvg is/was esports worthy, but way ahead of its time.
GW2 pvp is barely esports worthy, and the reasons for that have been stated many times already.

As for my previous post, obviously banning proffessions isn’t a solution. I was just hinting at how stupid and annoying it’d be having to deal with several mesmers at once, especially if you combine their pets with other professions’ pettage.

Power, the problem… is you spent time on this post, which beta testers did, and were ignored.

For posts like yours to get listened to we need new leadership in the PvP team.

I also notice that you were a monk player. An awful lot of GW2 players from Gw1 seem to identify themselves as monk players. GW1 did that right, they had the best support class in any RPG to date.

But they did away with that, because recognizing what their fanbase found fun isn’t something this team does.

@KarlaGrey:

In the current sPvP Game-Mode, 8v8 would most likely be not a very good Idea. In my Post, I stated that maybe 8v8 could sth. we can think about when we have sth. very similar to GvG, which means bigger Maps, bigger Areas where ppl fight etc. I also stated, that for the current Game-Modes, 5v5 OR 6v6 would probably be the best Option, but we’d simply have to try it and find out if 6v6 is viable on the current Maps.

@ryston:

The Problem before was that ANet knew exactly what they had to do for PvP: Leaderboards, Custom Arenas, spectator Mode, balancing etc. and Ideas could’ve been absolutely genius, but the above mentioned Issues were too pressing; there was simply no time for anything else. Now ANet has a bit more breathing room, so I think it’s a good time to make a Post like this.

Also, the Poster above you mentioned that GW1 was ahead of it’s time and instead of doing exactly what GW1 was with better Graphics, they again went in another Direction with a more action-oriented Gameplay, no dedicated Healers etc.
I also really don’t think that having no dedicated Healers makes it harder to be a good e-Sports Title. Besides, they could easily buff the Support of some classes or change them so they become more similar to a Healer.

It’s about having different Roles for the Characters that require good Teamwork and individual Skill to fullfill correctly, I really don’t care if the specific Skillset of a Healer in GW1 isn’t used to that extent in GW2, if the overall required Skill to play the Game isn’t diminished.

However much I resent their decision to roll without healers in GW2, it is not (the main) obstacle to esports. It’s become quite clear by now as to why that is, hasn’t it.

Also, it isn’t just the map size, but also the importance of secondary objectives/alternatives. As for the teamwork, most teamwork I’ve experienced so far was coordinating snares and boon removals, or spamming combo finishers in a field.

PowerBottom.5796:

1) It would be confusing, especially for spectators
2) DMG would get way out of Hand
3) AoE would be too Powerful
4) There is already WvW for those big types of fights

1) Who cares about spectators? Again that eSports crap? Then take 2 or 3 experienced spectators each observing a different part of the map like in sports in TV and let them broadcast it and explain to other persons watching.

2) + 3) If you can make a map that needs players to be at different locations. Of course the usual capture + zerg mid node + zerg bosses / npcs won’t help here. Then I agree. It would be tons of people at one point zerging and too much damage and AoE.

But if you need to be at 2-3 locations at the same time(maybe some switches to open some door) the enemy needs to do the same or at least try to stop you.

4) WvW is much bigger. 3 teams and more like 40-50 people at least in the higher tiers… or even more.

Luthan.5236:

PowerBottom.5796:

1) It would be confusing, especially for spectators
2) DMG would get way out of Hand
3) AoE would be too Powerful
4) There is already WvW for those big types of fights

1) Who cares about spectators? Again that eSports crap? Then take 2 or 3 experienced spectators each observing a different part of the map like in sports in TV and let them broadcast it and explain to other persons watching.

2) + 3) If you can make a map that needs players to be at different locations. Of course the usual capture + zerg mid node + zerg bosses / npcs won’t help here. Then I agree. It would be tons of people at one point zerging and too much damage and AoE.

But if you need to be at 2-3 locations at the same time(maybe some switches to open some door) the enemy needs to do the same or at least try to stop you.

4) WvW is much bigger. 3 teams and more like 40-50 people at least in the higher tiers… or even more.

1) Being a good Spectator-Sport is absolutely essential for e-Sports and the e-Sport-potential is again heavily linked to the longevity of successful PvP. I doubt you’ll find anyone saying that 8 isn’t very likely to be the highest Team-number imaginable for successful structured e-Sport.
There needs to be a clear differentiation between WvW and structured PvP and the Team-size is simply one very curcial Aspect.

Now do I say that 20v20 shouldn’t be possible at all – of course not: The more Modes the better, but ANet clearly needs to focus on sth. around a core Game-Mode for PvP with sth. like 5-8 Players. They can’t make Maps balanced around 20v20, they can’t balance Skills in PvP around it etc.
Although, the Maps that I envision for PvP in the future should definitely be better for 20v20 than the ones we have now – much wider, bigger and more Open.

2+3) Agreed, on sth. like for example an old GW1 GvG-Map, I could see Teams of 10 and higher be kinda funny, but it wouldn’t be a smart Idea to make it the Focus and the main game-mode, it’s just unpractical for competetive e-Sport in so many ways.

4) Well, there is at least the possibility for Custom Arenas with 10v10 afaik and maybe in the future, we will see even bigger Maps and a higher Number of Players per Team as a possibility in CA’s, but I’m pretty sure you see why this can’t really work as the main PvP-Mode, right?

I’m not mentioning the removal of healers because I think it doomed the game.

I’m mentioning it because it’s a good example of this development team’s decision making. They weighed a solid success against their desire to be unique, and they opted for unique. It’s like they were trying too hard to be innovative and so they made triangular wheels.

I don’t believe these people failed to respond to good ideas like yours because they had too much to deal with already. They failed to respond to good ideas like yours because they didn’t think of it themselves and they’ve got some sort of napoleon complex which compels them to prove to the world what geniuses they are. But much like George Lucas, they just aren’t — and we’re left to notice the changes in staff between GW1 Prophecies and this.

I kind of want to have copies of the Prince mailed to them all.

ryston.7640:

I’m not mentioning the removal of healers because I think it doomed the game.

I’m mentioning it because it’s a good example of this development team’s decision making. They weighed a solid success against their desire to be unique, and they opted for unique. It’s like they were trying too hard to be innovative and so they made triangular wheels.

I don’t believe these people failed to respond to good ideas like yours because they had too much to deal with already. They failed to respond to good ideas like yours because they didn’t think of it themselves and they’ve got some sort of napoleon complex which compels them to prove to the world what geniuses they are. But much like George Lucas, they just aren’t — and we’re left to notice the changes in staff between GW1 Prophecies and this.

I kind of want to have copies of the Prince mailed to them all.

Well, I guess you’re clearly frustrated with ANet and you think good sPvP needs Healers or sth. similar to them. I personally like what kind of skills it required to be a Healer and I think if there are builds that require similar skillsets, it could be fun. But this can also be achieved without clearly designated Healers, but can work with various different classes:

Let’s take the Ele for example and how he could be played very similarly to a Healer in GW1

1) Positioning/Movement was extremely important as a Healer and it was also necessary that the Frontline didn’t overextend and run out of the Healers range. Sometimes the Healer needed to push forward, but sometimes, it would’ve just resultet in a Kill. It was also important to stay out of range of certain Classes like Warriors.
—> This could IMHO factor in even more in GW2, because there are certain interesting Support/Heal Skills that require you to be near your Teammate (Cleansing Wave and the CW on dodge) and there are skills that get much more effective with good Positioning (Water Trident)

2) Awareness of whats happening in a Teamfight and reacting appropriately: Anticipating Spikes, anticipating possible CC on the Healer itself etc.
—> Again this skillset could come into play in GW2 as well: The Metagame could evolve easily to a point where everything is tanky enough so everyone HAS to do coordinated spikes, it’s even often the case in the current Meta, so anticipating spikes is very important: one good Heal, CC or Blind can often safe a Teammate. There are also some good CC-Effects that could hinder you from doing what you want, so it’s important to know how much Adrenaline a Warrior has and to see when he’s trying to attack you or another Player.

3) Fast Reaction-time: This is basically a given in GW2, with all the dodges, insta-stunbreakers and some very fast burst-combos.

4) Knowing how to play in certain situations (more aggressive or more defensive). In GW1, the Monk could actually deal lots of (very) indirect DMG: He could heavily heal the Frontline and let them play very aggressive and/or spend Mana to cleanse them from Conditions/Hexes to allow them to do full DMG. But when your Backline is falling apart, there’s really no reason to spend mana on getting rid of Blind, movement-impairing Hexes/Conditions etc. on your Frontline and you quickly have to spend you mana very defensively and just keep stuff alive.
—> This can also be applied to GW2 if you play a Support/Tank Ele of any kind: Do I just dodge, kite and heal myself up, or do I CC stuff and spend more time casting DPS-Spells rather than healing and running?

IMHO, to almost fully utilize the Potential of the Ele and certain other classes like the Guardian that could be potential Healers and/or Heavy Supporters, they just need to increase the Healing onto your Teammates a bit and reduce the Healing on yourself, so they won’t just create an Über-Tank or at least give the people an opportunity to play a Char this way.

One way to do so could be to create a New Amulett that had stats or either Valk, Cleric or Shaman with the simple addition: Healing on your Teammates increased by 33% (or sth. like that) and Healing on yourself decreased by 33% (this would be fair IMHO in the current Game-Mode).

Also, there are some quite interesting Skills on other classes, that could be so fun and useful if they got a buff, like:

- Healing Breeze and Orb of Light on the Guardian
- Restorative Illusions on Mesmer (maybe give it some kind of AoE-Heal to make it a viable Support-Spell with the Healing either emenating from the Mesmer or the where the Shatter effectively takes place)
- tons of Blast/Leap finishers that could be geared more towards support. Like on Water they could only heal your Teammates, but for more.

Now if sth. like this happened (and the stuff mentioned really isn’t impossible to implement, it would IMHO be quite easy) what exactly do Healers miss in GW2 then, compared to GW1?

1) Positioning / Movement in GW2 suffers because everybody has access to at least one teleport. This makes positioning less of a tactical decision. Additionally, he PbAOE nature of many skills and the nature of ‘point control’ mode result in what I’m going to go ahead and call ‘no line’ combat — where everybody has to be set up to brawl in melee and an epic Frenzy + Heal Sig behind the enemies front line isn’t really epic or risky at all because… what’s a line?

2) Heh. I used to count the adrenaline charges so I could reversal an eviscerate or a final thrust. GW2 is too much of a cluster, and between position and cast times… I tried a staff ele back when your rolls could be blast finishers on water fields. I tried playing a support. Those heals just didn’t go far enough to keep your glass up. Cool downs and cast times, cool downs and cast times.

4) Ya reaction time is still there, more than ever really.

ryston.7640:

1) Positioning / Movement in GW2 suffers because everybody has access to at least one teleport. This makes positioning less of a tactical decision. Additionally, he PbAOE nature of many skills and the nature of ‘point control’ mode result in what I’m going to go ahead and call ‘no line’ combat — where everybody has to be set up to brawl in melee and an epic Frenzy + Heal Sig behind the enemies front line isn’t really epic or risky at all because… what’s a line?

2) Heh. I used to count the adrenaline charges so I could reversal an eviscerate or a final thrust. GW2 is too much of a cluster, and between position and cast times… I tried a staff ele back when your rolls could be blast finishers on water fields. I tried playing a support. Those heals just didn’t go far enough to keep your glass up. Cool downs and cast times, cool downs and cast times.

4) Ya reaction time is still there, more than ever really.

1) Okay, lot’s of Chars have teleports, but in GW1, Teams had 2 Melee classes most of the time, everything else was ranged. Often, there were even builds without Melees at all or with just one, or the Melees had Teleports on them (Warrior/Assa’s for example).

Yet, defensive Positioning was absolutely curcial, because besides the Spikes, you could avoid tons of pressure-DPS (making it harder for Warriors to Target-switch, because there was a bigger walking-distance in between) and of course avoiding AoE-DMG was important as well. Also, staying out of range of certain classes is crucial and all those Aspects could be important for GW2 as well, if the Maps weren’t so horribly restricting.

Even with defensive teleports, Positioning is important, because you don’t want to use up your Teleport, which is a Stunbreaker, because of bad Movement, but to counter Spikes.

If you are playing aggressively, teleports are basically a non-issue, because almost no class besides the Thief uses Teleports offensively and on the squishy Thief, offensive teleports are IMHO okay.

And yes, the current Maps together with the restricting Points don’t make for great Movement, but that’s again almost fully the fault of the Map-Design. Holding Points could actually reward good Positioning greatly, because there is one additional Aspect that GW1 didn’t have: keeping always 1 Member on the Point, not more, not less. So ppl have to position themselves if your Nodeholder might get knocked out, to hold the point until he’s back on it.

But if you are talking about strong PbAoE, why would you then suggest balling up on the Point? I think you’d want to NOT have many Players balled up against AoE.

Yes. This is a great idea, and you are exactly correct.

Ya the Assasin really changed the metagame because it had teleports. Before that we had… necrotic transversal.

Just about every melee weapon set has a gap closer. Some ranged sets have a gap opener. Kiting works in GW2 but it has nothing to do with positioning. Your team doesn’t punish them for being over extended and out of range of their black line. lol.

Nah it’s just running around in a circle so you stay close to the point, the teams eventually sort of merge into a mixed blob. The team who’s ‘back line’ is best able to scrap has a pretty big advantage. Putting down a snare field is silly cause someone will spam a gap closer to ignore it.

Practically every melee weapon in this game has a gap closer. Ranged weapons usually have a gap opener. The result: You can kite 1v1. This mentality has an obvious problem when you get into a team situation.

Remember when cripple was a big deal instead of just getting auto removed, because there were like, cover conditions… and now you just spam conditions on people and remove all every x seconds.

ryston.7640:

Ya the Assasin really changed the metagame because it had teleports. Before that we had… necrotic transversal.

Just about every melee weapon set has a gap closer. Some ranged sets have a gap opener. Kiting works in GW2 but it has nothing to do with positioning. Your team doesn’t punish them for being over extended and out of range of their black line. lol.

Nah it’s just running around in a circle so you stay close to the point, the teams eventually sort of merge into a mixed blob. The team who’s ‘back line’ is best able to scrap has a pretty big advantage. Putting down a snare field is silly cause someone will spam a gap closer to ignore it.

Practically every melee weapon in this game has a gap closer. Ranged weapons usually have a gap opener. The result: You can kite 1v1. This mentality has an obvious problem when you get into a team situation.

Remember when cripple was a big deal instead of just getting auto removed, because there were like, cover conditions… and now you just spam conditions on people and remove all every x seconds.

Not overextending beyond the healrange of your Backline was but one aspect of Positioning and IMHO, Positioning is still one of the biggest Problems of even Top-Tier Guilds.

Often, If I watch streams, ppl are standing at places where they shouldn’t or don’t have to while balling up, not creating bigger distances between them and DD’s if they have to play defensively or not positioning themselves offensively when they need to. This makes it easier to hit them with AoE (and AoE that hits more than 1 Target is free DMG you don’t need to take) to pressure/spike them with Melee etc. Also, there are still classes with Heals that need to be in range of you to heal you, there are shouts etc.

Yes, it’s not as big a deal as in GW1, but this doesn’t mean you don’t have to perfect it. Again, it’s only the Maps and the laziness of some ppl that make Positioning so lackluster in GW2 atm.

There are still some heavily underused cripples that could be potentially useful in certain Team-setups and Maps. Mostly, I’m thinking about Caltrops, Glyph of elemental Power on Earth, the small Caltrops on Thief-dodge, Box of Nails etc. If you for example run a Melee-Warrior on a Map where kiting is possible (Foefire midpoint for example) crippling your target can literally double your pressure-DMG with a Warrior or other Melee-classes.

Things are just too squishy and no1 runs much good Teamsupport so we’ll be able to see stuff like that.

If we’d have a mid-fight on Foefire with a 4v4+ and no simple glasscannons, all those things mentioned above would be seen much more often, why? because it would be necessary and you couldn’t just spam Grenades or burst sth. down real quick.

ANet made it too easy for newbs to kill stuff, because they whine if they can’t mindlessly bash on a tank long enough without it going down. ^^’

Great post.

I’m going to add my thoughts to your points not because I want a GW1 v1.5, but because to this day I don’t know why ArenaNet threw away what made GW1’s GvG the greatest non-FPS PvP, instead of correcting its flaws and blending it into GW2’s design and architecture.

The strengths of GW1’s GvG were its strategical depth and its deep combat system that emphasized team coordination.

It was strategic because you had up to 8 points you could fight over at any given time and you had the choice on when and where to fight:
- 2 flag spawn
- 2 bases
- 1 flagstand
- 2 paths from the flag spawn to the flagstand
- 1 secondary mechanic

The combat’s system was amazing because it was built upon 3 pillars:

- Damage/protection/shutdown trinity.
An absolute jewel. The equation was something like shutdown>protection>damage>healing. Meaning you needed perfect coordination between your team to achieve anything – killing or keeping someone alive.

- damage driven by melee, protection by the backline and support – whether offensive or defensive- from the midline made positionning and mind games so important.

- Skills designed on trade-offs : high risk / high reward. Frenzy and infuse to name the most emblematic skills. You had to think before using any skill. You had to anticipate and observe the field to maximize your efficiency.

All of this combined gave birth to an amazing team PvP. It had some core issues, like the inability to play or even to train without a guild, a complexity that could lead to stale fights and made it hard to understand for the casual players, a general advantage for defensive play and zillions of skill combinations that made the game impossible to balance.

However I don’t understand why Anet had to throw everything away for gw2

Gw2’s combat is more exciting in 1v1 or 2v2 situations and requires heavier micro management, but it’s such an overall step backward compared to its predecessor…

Just one example among many how can you step down from a skill like spirit bond that required field awareness, mana management, reflexes and a perfect timing to those invulnerability panic-button skills

It’s not too late to improve on gw2’s mechanics really : you could slow down the pace of the game and rework the range/melee damage so that positionning, protection and shutdown were more important than brute focus in teamfights.

You have a dynamic game. Add some finesse to it now:p

Hugs.1856:

Great post.

I’m going to add my thoughts to your points not because I want a GW1 v1.5, but because to this day I don’t know why ArenaNet threw away what made GW1’s GvG the greatest non-FPS PvP, instead of correcting its flaws and blending it into GW2’s design and architecture.

The strengths of GW1’s GvG were its strategical depth and its deep combat system that emphasized team coordination.

It was strategic because you had up to 8 points you could fight over at any given time and you had the choice on when and where to fight:
- 2 flag spawn
- 2 bases
- 1 flagstand
- 2 paths from the flag spawn to the flagstand
- 1 secondary mechanic

The combat’s system was amazing because it was built upon 3 pillars:

- Damage/protection/shutdown trinity.
An absolute jewel. The equation was something like shutdown>protection>damage>healing. Meaning you needed perfect coordination between your team to achieve anything – killing or keeping someone alive.

- damage driven by melee, protection by the backline and support – whether offensive or defensive- from the midline made positionning and mind games so important.

- Skills designed on trade-offs : high risk / high reward. Frenzy and infuse to name the most emblematic skills. You had to think before using any skill. You had to anticipate and observe the field to maximize your efficiency.

All of this combined gave birth to an amazing team PvP. It had some core issues, like the inability to play or even to train without a guild, a complexity that could lead to stale fights and made it hard to understand for the casual players, a general advantage for defensive play and zillions of skill combinations that made the game impossible to balance.

However I don’t understand why Anet had to throw everything away for gw2

Gw2’s combat is more exciting in 1v1 or 2v2 situations and requires heavier micro management, but it’s such an overall step backward compared to its predecessor…

Just one example among many how can you step down from a skill like spirit bond that required field awareness, mana management, reflexes and a perfect timing to those invulnerability panic-button skills

It’s not too late to improve on gw2’s mechanics really : you could slow down the pace of the game and rework the range/melee damage so that positionning, protection and shutdown were more important than brute focus in teamfights.

You have a dynamic game. Add some finesse to it now:p

If you think ANET will ever change the direction of their PvP (that is whichever way is required to maintain status quo) then unfortunately, you’ll be disappointed.

Any real changes now would require a ton of work and balancing, whereas they’d rather push out a few ineffectual changes every so often.

So instead of adding to my post you create your own where you don’t actually propose any sort of game, just “things that need to be done”

I don’t think cap points are a good idea for GvG; we already have those in sPvP.

you talk too much about “mindless zerg”; have you played wvw on any higher tier server using voice comm with your guild?

Quick Mouse.7635:

So instead of adding to my post you create your own where you don’t actually propose any sort of game, just “things that need to be done”

I don’t think cap points are a good idea for GvG; we already have those in sPvP.

you talk too much about “mindless zerg”; have you played wvw on any higher tier server using voice comm with your guild?

Uhm, I made this Thread ~3 days ago….

Capping points may not be everyones favourite Game-Mode, but I simply think it still could be used to make a solid PvP-Mode. I’m not necessarily all for it, but if done right, I’m not against it as well.

Btw, compared to how organized GvG was in GW1 during it’s prime, even what we now see from Top-Teams could be considered mindless zerging. ^^’

There is still looong ways to go in terms of positioning, support, spiked DPS, coordinated CC etc. Simply because it’s not as needed as in GW1, ppl seem to neglect it heavily. But as soon as we get Guilds of the caliber of former War Machine, The Last Pride etc. those things will become a necessity.

I still hope The Last Pride [EvIL] quit this horrible World of Tanks and start to play GW2 again together with NaDa (yes, THE NaDa from SC:BW is currently playing WoT together with the Last Pride. Yes, THE “the Last Pride”)

I don’t see guilds of that calibre EVER touching a pvp such as this. This very thread lists all the reasons that support that prediction, sadly.

Do not compare GW1’s GvG to the 20v20 in WvW please.

GvG at its finest lives on gw1 or used to do at least.

R.I.P. I do not want to resurrect it.

But it pains me to see its designers pushing it into oblivion by not integrating any if its core qualities into the sequel