Guild Wars 2

Please consider reducing the max number of players on a map by 15-25%. ex: If current max before queue for server A is 100 make it 75. This will do two things first reduce the load on the server so people have better experience and reduce chances of skill lag. Second and more important is it will punish servers stacking (ex T1 NA) with queue times making people spread out to T2 and possibly lower ties.

To give T1 additional incentive to destack please adjust transfer costs based on WvW population. You should be able to tell how many people from each server play wvw and hours and come up with some sort of metric. Make it cheaper for people to move from T1 servers to t3/4 and Really cheap to move to t6-8. Only way people are going to move is if you lower the gem costs from moving out of T1.

TLDR.
Reduce max # of players on map to create queues on stacked servers and reduce skill lag. Also consider reducing costs of gem transfers out of kitten lower tiers and figure out transfer costs based on wvw population.

PS: If you can’t do this permalock T1 us in matchup with each other and let the rest matchup like you are doing.

Problem with basing gem costs on wvw population is that these servers can just organize to not turn up to wvw for a week and have the cost reduced as a result. Similar to how full servers would organize blackouts to drop their population to very high.

Also, what would happen if a server has a low wvw population but the server itself was full (as a result of a large pve population)? You can’t let more people in if there’s no space left.

I thought about this as well a while back and wondered why they don’t just reduce the map limit. However, I think part of the problem is that even though it would make sense to do that, I don’t think the maps themselves are designed for small numbers of players, and it would affect the gameplay/feel of WvW. Currently, even if all servers have a queue on a map, I can still go quite a while without seeing an enemy player (let alone fight and kill one without me or them running off), and the map only feels cramped when I encounter a zerg. There are many underpopulated and unused areas of the maps already; reducing the number of players would increase that area and reduce the amount of enemies encountered, thus reducing the amount of pvp. That may be more desirable for those who like to sneak around the map or like that style of gameplay, but less desirable for those who like constant combat, so a balance has to be made. Players who want constant combat may choose higher tiers, while those who don’t may choose less populated tiers. Reducing the chances of pvp occuring by reducing the number of players may not be in the best interest of WvW at the moment.

The best example (really a counter-example) I can think of at the moment in the game is some sPvPers perspective of hotjoin. They think that 5v5 is fine, but that 8v8 is a zergfest. The extra 6 players make the map feel more cramped and affects the strategies you can use. Escaping a fight is a lot more difficult, you have to be more cautious of another player(s) entering the fight, your less likely to capture a point without fighting another player, the (based on some sPvPers’ perspective) skill of each individual player may become less important, some build types become unviable (glass cannon), strategy doesn’t matter, etc. Personally, I find 8v8 more entertaining because of some of those reasons (some of which are false) and would actually prefer WvW to feel a bit more populated by reducing some of the unused space. In WvW, reducing the numbers would have an affect and alter gameplay, although in different ways. Based on perspective some of those changes may be better and some may be worse, so ultimately it comes down to a design decision.

TLDR: In order to reduce the players per map, they would/should shave off some of the unused space by changing the map; a time consuming process.

What and punish all those in WvW that have been on a T1 server for a long time? They should merge their servers before anything.

Also remember there is always a reason why a guild leaves. It is not always because winning gives reward (as it soon will be), its because their previous servers were poor.

The problem isn’t really the pop imbalance but the match up system which creating ridiculously unbalanced match ups. T1 vsT3 or T5vT8 is not a fun fight for either the strongest or the weakest.