Guild Wars 2

Achilles.2197:

Just transferred to JQ and I’m creating a 5man roaming group with a friend. We feel your pain, the let down that GW2 pvp is compared to it’s superior predecessor. We played real GvG not the nonsense that people masquerade as GvG in this game. We played Random Arenas for our 4man random fix, and Team Arena for our organized 4v4s.

GW2 is vastly different but it doesn’t mean we won’t get what we want. What I think a lot of others in this thread are failing to understand is it took many months/few years for GW1 pvp to reach it’s climax and I’m sure GW2 will have it’s time.

Meanwhile, I’ll be organizing my 5man and moving forward. We have our team comp down and now we’re just filling the roles with bodies.

It’s out there, just have to look. Last night (first night on JQ/transfer), we came across a 5man SoR group using a spike build. I have faith there is still a flourishing interest in the 5v5s and I doubt ANET is totally unaware of this. I think at this point it’s not what to implement it’s just a matter of how and when. GL to you guys wherever you go.

Thats refreshing sir. One of our guys was a hardcore top team 8v8 guy from GW1 and preached how poor this game’s focus was to it. I never experienced GW1. Our entire team is DAOC 8 man experienced so we use that as our bar. In the past 3 days since making this thread we have decided like you did to revamp the group setup and added 2 new guys. Has worked so far. DAOC, in all seriousness, took 2 solid years before every server had 5-10 8 mans actively running against the other 2 server’s 5-10 8 mans. 2 years. Hopefully some zergers will start graduating from “meta” school and realize how boring that playstyle is and force the issue of becoming an actual pvper. Cheers for your post my friend.

I think you have been going about this all wrong.

The best thing you could do is to make Topics explaining why small group play is so fun and rewarding and even make guides and suggestions for those who want to get in to it but don’t know how.

From what I see people who pick up the game and enjoy pvp just go out to wvw and all they see is big wvw guilds so they join one not even aware of other options. Many people might be willing to try and create small man groups if shown how much fun they are. Also, one would need to encourage and coach/guide them even if you wipe them right away or they will just turn back to zergs.

Unfortunately, it seems most of the posts about small man groups made by small man groups seem to give off the wrong attitude that would drive most people away.

aathomas.4638:

I think you have been going about this all wrong.

The best thing you could do is to make Topics explaining why small group play is so fun and rewarding and even make guides and suggestions for those who want to get in to it but don’t know how.

From what I see people who pick up the game and enjoy pvp just go out to wvw and all they see is big wvw guilds so they join one not even aware of other options. Many people might be willing to try and create small man groups if shown how much fun they are. Also, one would need to encourage and coach/guide them even if you wipe them right away or they will just turn back to zergs.

Unfortunately, it seems most of the posts about small man groups made by small man groups seem to give off the wrong attitude that would drive most people away.

5 man goes against the grain of current WvW. You only have 4 people to counteract your so-called “badness” where, in a zerg, you have 50 people to depend on.

Why do people think RG was so good? They were the same 20-25 guys who played together for YEARS if my information about them is correct. If you know exactly what your team is doing, you can accomplish some great things and that’s the beauty of 5-10 man groups.

My best memory of this was when FoE and AGG moved from BG to ET. We held Lake with 2 AC and our melee-train from from 80 SF + 40 FC, we had around 20 AGG and 10 FoE. We play the game the same way, we built our groups almost exactly the same and we all got along really well. This just goes against the grain of WvW and playing for PPT rather than having fun and playing how others think we should but how we find it enjoyable.

PAXA – I think T6 would be were you’d find decent fights, sadly group mentality surrounds WvW like the plague.

Jscull.2514:

Achilles.2197:

Just transferred to JQ and I’m creating a 5man roaming group with a friend. We feel your pain, the let down that GW2 pvp is compared to it’s superior predecessor. We played real GvG not the nonsense that people masquerade as GvG in this game. We played Random Arenas for our 4man random fix, and Team Arena for our organized 4v4s.

GW2 is vastly different but it doesn’t mean we won’t get what we want. What I think a lot of others in this thread are failing to understand is it took many months/few years for GW1 pvp to reach it’s climax and I’m sure GW2 will have it’s time.

Meanwhile, I’ll be organizing my 5man and moving forward. We have our team comp down and now we’re just filling the roles with bodies.

It’s out there, just have to look. Last night (first night on JQ/transfer), we came across a 5man SoR group using a spike build. I have faith there is still a flourishing interest in the 5v5s and I doubt ANET is totally unaware of this. I think at this point it’s not what to implement it’s just a matter of how and when. GL to you guys wherever you go.

Thats refreshing sir. One of our guys was a hardcore top team 8v8 guy from GW1 and preached how poor this game’s focus was to it. I never experienced GW1. Our entire team is DAOC 8 man experienced so we use that as our bar. In the past 3 days since making this thread we have decided like you did to revamp the group setup and added 2 new guys. Has worked so far. DAOC, in all seriousness, took 2 solid years before every server had 5-10 8 mans actively running against the other 2 server’s 5-10 8 mans. 2 years. Hopefully some zergers will start graduating from “meta” school and realize how boring that playstyle is and force the issue of becoming an actual pvper. Cheers for your post my friend.

All in due time. While coming up with our team comp last night we were debating making it a 6man group for the build we wanted. In the end we decided to stick with 5 (at least for now). But I can say that I like the idea of being able to change our team size at will which is one of the few +’s for a GW2 roaming group.

LilMcGinley.3890:

aathomas.4638:

I think you have been going about this all wrong.

The best thing you could do is to make Topics explaining why small group play is so fun and rewarding and even make guides and suggestions for those who want to get in to it but don’t know how.

From what I see people who pick up the game and enjoy pvp just go out to wvw and all they see is big wvw guilds so they join one not even aware of other options. Many people might be willing to try and create small man groups if shown how much fun they are. Also, one would need to encourage and coach/guide them even if you wipe them right away or they will just turn back to zergs.

Unfortunately, it seems most of the posts about small man groups made by small man groups seem to give off the wrong attitude that would drive most people away.

5 man goes against the grain of current WvW. You only have 4 people to counteract your so-called “badness” where, in a zerg, you have 50 people to depend on.

Why do people think RG was so good? They were the same 20-25 guys who played together for YEARS if my information about them is correct. If you know exactly what your team is doing, you can accomplish some great things and that’s the beauty of 5-10 man groups.

My best memory of this was when FoE and AGG moved from BG to ET. We held Lake with 2 AC and our melee-train from from 80 SF + 40 FC, we had around 20 AGG and 10 FoE. We play the game the same way, we built our groups almost exactly the same and we all got along really well. This just goes against the grain of WvW and playing for PPT rather than having fun and playing how others think we should but how we find it enjoyable.

PAXA – I think T6 would be were you’d find decent fights, sadly group mentality surrounds WvW like the plague.

I don’t understand why you quoted me, you neither refuted my post or added anything to it.

All I am trying to say is that if you want a culture of small man group, you will need to help create it. That starts with getting people excited about it with posts showing how fun it is, then following up with posts explaining how other people can go about enjoying it themselves.

Making posts that seem like clique lists/giving off the impression that anyone who doesn’t already run small man groups must be bad is not the best way to go about it and will only further alienate small man groups from the “meta” instead of creating a culture to cause more people to want to try to form and create them.

I quoted you because you said people just join and find a zerg, my post was saying that people don’t want to create small groups because it goes against the grain of the current WvW style, which is adding onto and in agreement with your post… and added a further explanation of why they don’t look for other options (because they can’t depend on 50 people, only 4). I also gave a great example of how “small man tactics” and “group composition” have been applied to larger guilds which was to further the discussion on this topic not a direct response to you.

PAXA did do something to create a 5man culture, ANet promptly blew that up.

tldr – people don’t 5man because its not easy.

Jscull.2514:

I give everyone who doesn’t know who we are the benefit of the doubt naturally. We did do that hoss. Before matchups became random, we set up a tier and invited a bunch of 5 mans down into tier 8. Real 5 mans, teams only running 5. In 2 weeks of promotion…. TWO only we had 4 teams xfer from diff servers, and had 3 already down there. The bottom two tiers never were moving due to population so it was perfect. For 3 weeks we roamed and there were legit 5 mans all with your “same purpose” in mind, hunting the other 5 mans. IT WAS THE BEST 3 WEEKS IN A YEAR. There are a couple guys on this thread that were apart of it. We had 4-5 other 5 mans interested in our 5 man tier and then Anet comes out with the glorious idea: “were randomizing matchups”. THE END. 5 man tier blew up, now there’s lucky to have 1 per server. So we did do what your “great” advice offered months ago buddy. It’s not our first rodeo. Anet once again killer of all skilled intention.

You still didn’t give a reason why his suggestion doesn’t give you exactly what you say you’re looking for.

Mammoth.1975:

Jscull.2514:

I give everyone who doesn’t know who we are the benefit of the doubt naturally. We did do that hoss. Before matchups became random, we set up a tier and invited a bunch of 5 mans down into tier 8. Real 5 mans, teams only running 5. In 2 weeks of promotion…. TWO only we had 4 teams xfer from diff servers, and had 3 already down there. The bottom two tiers never were moving due to population so it was perfect. For 3 weeks we roamed and there were legit 5 mans all with your “same purpose” in mind, hunting the other 5 mans. IT WAS THE BEST 3 WEEKS IN A YEAR. There are a couple guys on this thread that were apart of it. We had 4-5 other 5 mans interested in our 5 man tier and then Anet comes out with the glorious idea: “were randomizing matchups”. THE END. 5 man tier blew up, now there’s lucky to have 1 per server. So we did do what your “great” advice offered months ago buddy. It’s not our first rodeo. Anet once again killer of all skilled intention.

You still didn’t give a reason why his suggestion doesn’t give you exactly what you say you’re looking for.

The best suggestion at this point is wait the 2-3 years for camelot unchained. Hopefully jacobs puts in a real pvp system that shows chumps that started playing wow when they were 14 and now game at 21 and think they are “experienced” pvpers what the F is up in player vs player. WoW allowed all games to follow the “cooperate structure” of building games and culture and its to the masses for their $$$. Jacobs openly said were not building unchained for $$$, its for hardcore players. LOVE LOVE LOVE to see zergers from this starter mmo play that game, r i c k r o l l daily comes to mind. Literally more than 70% of this games population would quit first couple months. “Why cant this game be like GW222222 waaaahhhhhh” lol…Joke

Fort Aspenwood!!! Best of both worlds decent zerging but def. plenty of open field small scale fights. My guild does it almost every night. Server has a lot of small guilds that work together so our blobs almost never get to be more than 30ish.

Jscull.2514:

camelot unchained

tell me more and make me believe that it’s what it claims to be because I got suckered by GW2’s claims

Jscull.2514:

The best suggestion at this point is wait the 2-3 years for camelot unchained. Hopefully jacobs puts in a real pvp system that shows chumps that started playing wow when they were 14 and now game at 21 and think they are “experienced” pvpers what the F is up in player vs player. WoW allowed all games to follow the “cooperate structure” of building games and culture and its to the masses for their $$$. Jacobs openly said were not building unchained for $$$, its for hardcore players. LOVE LOVE LOVE to see zergers from this starter mmo play that game, r i c k r o l l daily comes to mind. Literally more than 70% of this games population would quit first couple months. “Why cant this game be like GW222222 waaaahhhhhh” lol…Joke

You still didn’t give a reason why his suggestion doesn’t give you exactly what you say you’re looking for.

Oroibahazopi.9074:

Jscull.2514:

camelot unchained

tell me more and make me believe that it’s what it claims to be because I got suckered by GW2’s claims

Right? GW2 false advertising lol. “The newest tri-faction open world pvp system in almost a decade”

Fine print DIDNT say: “Catered to the starter mmo’ers, ZERGING will be about the same as WAR, and skill? Our updates will increase Siege effectiveness. That will help with you skilled players” Enjoy our Anet production.

Jscull.2514:

Oroibahazopi.9074:

Jscull.2514:

camelot unchained

tell me more and make me believe that it’s what it claims to be because I got suckered by GW2’s claims

Right? GW2 false advertising lol. “The newest tri-faction open world pvp system in almost a decade”

Fine print DIDNT say: “Catered to the starter mmo’ers, ZERGING will be about the same as WAR, and skill? Our updates will increase Siege effectiveness. That will help with you skilled players” Enjoy our Anet production.

You know… on second thought SoR or BG might be a better fit for you. Odds are you’ll face some smaller JQ groups where it’s much rarer to see SoR or BG running around with a 5 man. Not impossible, but much rarer.

Any updates on what you guys are going to do, PAXA?

Probably stay put for a bit. We changed group comp around and a bit personnel, but plan on roaming and worrying less about Anet and this games meta. More just getting back to boot stomping with less forum crap.

aathomas.4638:

LilMcGinley.3890:

aathomas.4638:

I think you have been going about this all wrong.

The best thing you could do is to make Topics explaining why small group play is so fun and rewarding and even make guides and suggestions for those who want to get in to it but don’t know how.

From what I see people who pick up the game and enjoy pvp just go out to wvw and all they see is big wvw guilds so they join one not even aware of other options. Many people might be willing to try and create small man groups if shown how much fun they are. Also, one would need to encourage and coach/guide them even if you wipe them right away or they will just turn back to zergs.

Unfortunately, it seems most of the posts about small man groups made by small man groups seem to give off the wrong attitude that would drive most people away.

5 man goes against the grain of current WvW. You only have 4 people to counteract your so-called “badness” where, in a zerg, you have 50 people to depend on.

Why do people think RG was so good? They were the same 20-25 guys who played together for YEARS if my information about them is correct. If you know exactly what your team is doing, you can accomplish some great things and that’s the beauty of 5-10 man groups.

My best memory of this was when FoE and AGG moved from BG to ET. We held Lake with 2 AC and our melee-train from from 80 SF + 40 FC, we had around 20 AGG and 10 FoE. We play the game the same way, we built our groups almost exactly the same and we all got along really well. This just goes against the grain of WvW and playing for PPT rather than having fun and playing how others think we should but how we find it enjoyable.

PAXA – I think T6 would be were you’d find decent fights, sadly group mentality surrounds WvW like the plague.

I don’t understand why you quoted me, you neither refuted my post or added anything to it.

All I am trying to say is that if you want a culture of small man group, you will need to help create it. That starts with getting people excited about it with posts showing how fun it is, then following up with posts explaining how other people can go about enjoying it themselves.

Making posts that seem like clique lists/giving off the impression that anyone who doesn’t already run small man groups must be bad is not the best way to go about it and will only further alienate small man groups from the “meta” instead of creating a culture to cause more people to want to try to form and create them.

I agree.

80% of my gameplay is with ~5 man group stuff and I love it but PAXA you guys always approach it with a “holier than thou” attitude has always made it a turn off to talk to you guys. Tired of watchin you guys talk about how everyone else is doin it wrong and how some other game I didn’t buy or want to buy was the best MMO ever *see edit below.

There are gripes to have with the game, I agree, but when it comes to WvW, I think the happiest people are the ones who integrate themselves with the world they’re in. It gives context to the battle beyond upping kill count. It gives you goals that vary with the map state (draw zerg attention, hold back reinforcements, be the tide turning flank attack etc.) and keeps the small man stuff fresh and shows how relevant small groups are in WvW. I can only speak for myself but I’d like to see more awareness raised on that sorta things. What small groups can do on a map, to let people know why to play them.

Edit: I was a GvG’er in Guild Wars 1 myself, mostly through the first couple years. Back when you would have nothing to spend Balthazar faction on, so I’m used to playin for the fun of it rather than any reward. I’m also used to having stats be level across everyone so it was always people’s skill to decide things.

styx.7294:

aathomas.4638:

LilMcGinley.3890:

aathomas.4638:

I think you have been going about this all wrong.

The best thing you could do is to make Topics explaining why small group play is so fun and rewarding and even make guides and suggestions for those who want to get in to it but don’t know how.

From what I see people who pick up the game and enjoy pvp just go out to wvw and all they see is big wvw guilds so they join one not even aware of other options. Many people might be willing to try and create small man groups if shown how much fun they are. Also, one would need to encourage and coach/guide them even if you wipe them right away or they will just turn back to zergs.

Unfortunately, it seems most of the posts about small man groups made by small man groups seem to give off the wrong attitude that would drive most people away.

5 man goes against the grain of current WvW. You only have 4 people to counteract your so-called “badness” where, in a zerg, you have 50 people to depend on.

Why do people think RG was so good? They were the same 20-25 guys who played together for YEARS if my information about them is correct. If you know exactly what your team is doing, you can accomplish some great things and that’s the beauty of 5-10 man groups.

My best memory of this was when FoE and AGG moved from BG to ET. We held Lake with 2 AC and our melee-train from from 80 SF + 40 FC, we had around 20 AGG and 10 FoE. We play the game the same way, we built our groups almost exactly the same and we all got along really well. This just goes against the grain of WvW and playing for PPT rather than having fun and playing how others think we should but how we find it enjoyable.

PAXA – I think T6 would be were you’d find decent fights, sadly group mentality surrounds WvW like the plague.

I don’t understand why you quoted me, you neither refuted my post or added anything to it.

All I am trying to say is that if you want a culture of small man group, you will need to help create it. That starts with getting people excited about it with posts showing how fun it is, then following up with posts explaining how other people can go about enjoying it themselves.

Making posts that seem like clique lists/giving off the impression that anyone who doesn’t already run small man groups must be bad is not the best way to go about it and will only further alienate small man groups from the “meta” instead of creating a culture to cause more people to want to try to form and create them.

I agree.

80% of my gameplay is with ~5 man group stuff and I love it but PAXA you guys always approach it with a “holier than thou” attitude has always made it a turn off to talk to you guys. Tired of watchin you guys talk about how everyone else is doin it wrong and how some other game I didn’t buy or want to buy was the best MMO ever *see edit below.

There are gripes to have with the game, I agree, but when it comes to WvW, I think the happiest people are the ones who integrate themselves with the world they’re in. It gives context to the battle beyond upping kill count. It gives you goals that vary with the map state (draw zerg attention, hold back reinforcements, be the tide turning flank attack etc.) and keeps the small man stuff fresh and shows how relevant small groups are in WvW. I can only speak for myself but I’d like to see more awareness raised on that sorta things. What small groups can do on a map, to let people know why to play them.

Edit: I was a GvG’er in Guild Wars 1 myself, mostly through the first couple years. Back when you would have nothing to spend Balthazar faction on, so I’m used to playin for the fun of it rather than any reward. I’m also used to having stats be level across everyone so it was always people’s skill to decide things.

Yeah, I wish that GW2 put more emphasis on groups. I can live with the other bad mechanics that encourage zerging, but the only thing being in a group gives you is 4 blue dots on the minimap.

I also really miss the DAoC where being in a group actually meant something. CU, I can’t wait for you.

i run 5man havocs (actually fighting other players) in T1 on JQ and T2 has been more promising TBH. If i were to move servers i wouldnt go T1.

I’ll double Miiro’s point. Most nights, I run in our guild “havoc” groups, raiding camps, or tapping on tower gates to draw out players to fight. However, in T1, vs. SOR/BG, the game is more … dodge the zerg. On a good night, we are able to hit the tail ends of zergs, or cut off reinforcements to a Bay/Hills/Garri battle… but again, it’s navigating around the zergs. Group fights do exist, but that is not the norm coming from the JQ perspective.

Now that JQ is facing DB and FA, there are a lot more smaller group vs. group action, which we enjoy a lot more now. FA in particular seems to have a good number of smaller guild groups running around looking to play. =)

Miiro.3124:

i run 5man havocs (actually fighting other players) in T1 on JQ and T2 has been more promising TBH. If i were to move servers i wouldnt go T1.

Same. I’ve ran with several different small groups (not necessarily 5man, but 5-7) on JQ.

Jscull.2514:

I’m thinkin maybe going to BP to fight the CD guilds and heard a couple on EBay? Thoughts on that? Not interested in the server were going to’s small mans because we can’t fight them. Thanks for the input too. And no kitten this is Daoc, not even close. This game is 1/100 the competitive atmosphere that was due to game mechanics and the general population this mmo attracted.

Didn’t see this thread earlier, a little late but replying now anyway.

I’m on Ebay, we have a few roaming groups, though they are not necessarily 5 man groups, they do place focus on open field and finding decent fights over zerging. GH/GF/CHAR are some good examples. vT on CD are also good fights, unsure of their group size, though they don’t seem to be large. I am oceanic, but even during my time zone getting together people from these guilds for group roaming isn’t too difficult.

That being said, matchups for middle tier servers are so unpredictable so it’s hard to anticipate the matchup. Regardless, good luck with what you decide.

I don’t think you’ll find what you are looking for naturally occurring in the wild. I know you’ve already done a lot of work to help yourself out, but, you may need to do a little more and be an advocate for your style of play more than you have. Sorry – “where should I go” just leads to people recruiting you to cap camps or keep enemy havoc squads busy. If you’re not fighting behind the windmill then I suggest staying away from top 2 tiers.

im on fa and we run in small groups quite often. yes, there is zergballs on almost every server, but u will find small groups on FA, TC, EB, mag, sos so check them out.

@Boulderbolg omg yes me neither i cant wait for CU!wvw only! :-)

I almost everyday run with duos to 5 man grps in JQ. I play a mix of roam and havoc and if an urgent need arises, to assist the border commander.

Havoc because I want to call out the attention of other grps and roam because i come from a 8-man DAoC roaming mentality which i played for 8 years and roaming is awesome fun.

Having played JQ since beta, in both top tiers, there is no assurance you will face equal numbers. But thats the fun of roaming. You do not know what lies ahead, unless its a zerg which offcourse is detected by my crappy PC with incoming lag and a drop in FPS which is useful for escaping zergs. A good 2 seconds in warning.

At this point, I miss Warhammer’s RVR a lot, I wish EA hadn’t just abandoned the game and made it f2p instead….At least itd still have people playing.

You could wipe the hell out of zergs in that game back in the day.

Hopefully though CU is going to be like DAOC, no more down system, no more rewarding zerging more then anything else, an actual Realm Rank system.

sostronk.8167:

From the 12 servers I have played on, the best small man groups play on Eredon Terrace and Fergusons crossing. There are bad groups on every server, but those two have some of the strongest small man havoc guilds I have played against. Ive played with and against most server tiers.

But if you haven’t already, I suggest you try sPvP. WvW is in a bad place right now and I doubt it is going to change. It seems WvW is only designed to cater for casuals and Anet seems intent on keeping it that way.

Those 2 servers have some of the worst players I have ever fought in WvW “skill wise”.

I am also currently looking for a server where small man groups flourish. I am assuming that is lower tier servers actually. I saw a few people saying JQ but I would advise against that. We are currently up against them and I can not see how a small man group would matter when they have nearly 24/7 coverage and enough people to have a 20+ man zerg on each map. I havnt even been in WvW the last week cause a small man group will just get zerged down the moment they attack a camp.

You inbox is full so I can’t respond to you lol.

SBI faces alot of small man group servers, especially on the borderlands. BP, CD, SoS, its 5-10 man groups out there in the BLs basically constantly. Annoying as a soloer, but probably what you’re looking for. Particularly CD and Ebay this week, there’s a few really awesome individual/5man guilds out there tearing it up.