Guild Wars 2

As everyone knows, and some are loathe to admit, PPT came with the unintended consequence of relegating the efforts of servers that don’t have 24/7 “coverage” to near nothing, and causing a rash of bandwagoning, and mercenary guild purchasing.

In essence the concept of “skill” winning in WvW is negated by the fact that people have to sleep and work. So, presuming that PPT is one of those things Anet will never scrap, I had a thought.

Mercenaries. No, not the guilds that have no real allegiances. NPC mercenaries. Hear me out, and I apologize if this is an old idea.

What is the biggest problem when people are sleeping? They’re not there to man siege or keep eyes out for enemies, or defend objectives. Well what if you could leave behind NPC mercenaries to man that AC, or notify what human players are on the map of enemy movements?

Think of it this way. Each player, can purchase/recruit 1-5 mercenaries. Based on a new Mastery.

(Mastery: Recruiter) (75 Rank Points to Max)
Lvl 1: Allow one Mercenary. Can be used to scout. (10 Rank Points)
Lvl 2: Allow 2 Mercenaries. Can scout, garrison an objective. (10 Rank Points)
Lvl 3: Allow 3 Mercs. Can scout, garrison, be assigned to siege. (15 Rank Points)
Lvl 4: Allow 3 Regular Mercs, 1 Veteran Merc. Scout, garrison, assign to siege. (20 Rank Points)
Lvl 5: 3 reg. Mercs. 1 Veteran Merc. 1 Champ Merc. Merc. Health and damage boosted 10%. (20 Rank Points)

Tasking:
Scout: Merc stays in a stationary spot, and remains stealth-ed, until a group larger than 5-15 (adjustable through conversation interface), passes in it’s field of vision. It then raises the alarm in Map or Team Chat, and un-stealths. Doesn’t fight back.

Garrison:
-Can be garrisoned in the courtyard(s) of towers or keeps.
-Garrison amount is capped to prevent overcrowding, pending issue, balance would need to be tested.
-Garrisoned troops would be equipped with “exotic” level stats/gear.
-Garrisoned troops yield to those of a higher Mastery Rank, i.e. a regular merc with the 10% health/dmg boost would replace one without, so the best mercs are used, and not blocked by inferior ones.

Siege:
-Merc assigned to siege auto attacks targets assigned, via conversation dialog.
-Merc can be set to target enemy siege, or enemy infantry.
-Merc “mastery” of a siege weapon based on its type. Reg. Merc. Mastery lvl 1, Veteran, Mastery lvl 3, Champion Merc., Mastery lvl 5.
-Mercs, yield, siege engines to human players and remain on standby till the weapon is abandoned.
-Mercs can not be assigned to Battering Rams, or Golems.

Payment:
-Mercenaries require upfront payment.
-Regulars, 30 silver/hr of service. If Merc. disbanded/replaced, the difference is returned to player, rounded to the nearest hour.
-Vets, 50 silver/hr of service. Same as above.
-Champ, 1 gold/hr of service. So if leave your champ Merc out for 8 hours it costs you 8 gold. This will discourage, somewhat, a complete Champ Garrison/Siege Running.

Death:
-Mercenaries that die re-spawn under certain conditions.
-Scouts re-spawn 5 minutes after death.
-Garrison re-spawns once the objective is retaken.
-Siege, automatically transferred to any empty siege on the map, 5 minutes after death. If all siege full, it remains in a queue. Separate queue from players.

Global Restrictions/Rules:
-The number of Mercs on the field is capped to the difference between your force and the largest force on the map +20. i.e. you have 20 players and the largest enemy force has 50 players, you can have 50 Mercs on the field.

The Why: Mercs. will be inferior to human players, and the number of players on a map will go up and down so a +20 cap is for balance and to account for changes in human troops.

-Mercs. that are over the limit are removed from the LEAST valuable PPT locations first, and placed in a holding queue. Every 5-15 minutes. Mercs will be re-added as spots pertaining to their assignment open, and immediately to objectives under attack by forces larger than 5.

The Why: The merc. queue and insta-spawn rules are to prevent a large enemy force from purposefully leaving a map to delete mercs at objectives they want and then rushing back in on an otherwise undefended objectives.

The 5-15 deletion process is to compensate for human players that need to switch maps momentarily to defend objectives that are on the verge of defeat in spite of mercenary presence and then wish to go back to the original map.

Conclusion Q & A:

Q.) We already have NPCs as part of upgrades, why do we need mercs.?

A.) Because those NPC guards suck, to be totally honest. They fight poorly, they don’t let you know what’s going on, and they can’t fire siege. I mean seriously, ambient creatures kill them.

Q.) Why should we give a crutch to servers that don’t exert effort to get 24/7 coverage?

A.) Because ultimately it’s not about will a lot of the time. There are a finite amount of players, and a finite amount of guilds in certain time zones. Servers with larger populations to begin with will always have a greater capacity to “buy” these guilds’ favor.

This is called Guild Wars. Not PPT Wars. Not Coverage Wars. Not Money Wars. Anything that levels the playing field so everyone can feel like they have a shot, even a slim one, is a good thing. It’s the right thing to do. That’s the long and short of it.

If you really think your human players are gonna have so much trouble against some somewhat better scripted NPCs, and objectives that fight back. Then you didn’t deserve to be at the spot you were at anyway. I say that to everyone, even my own server.

Q.) What are you concerns of keeps becoming “super fortresses” with 20 NPC run Superior ACs lining the walls and a full garrison of guild sponsored Champs?

A.) That is certainly a concern. My biggest actually. However, it’s something that can and should be addressed during the process of design, should the idea actually go through.

Furthermore, remember Mercs. #s are capped. Which means if you put them all in 1 Keep you lose the opportunity to control other objectives.

Q.) What about “Trolls” who would build empty siege, or replace Mercs and then disband their own to mess things up?

A.) These things could be address via how the queue functions, perhaps placing unused Mercs in the queue for the full duration of service and spawning them where needed, closest to the location they were originally assigned. Again, major design issue.

Q.) What if a full zerg switches maps to defend an objective already filled with mercs?

A.) It might be a good idea to have an insta-delete function to avoid abuses like that. But testing would be required to measure the effect.

Q.) Don’t you think this idea’s a bit ambitious?

A.) Of course, but then so would scrapping the scoring system that’s in place now and redesigning WvW around a new one. Anything that will fix WvW to be skill based like it’s supposed to be is going to take a good deal of time and effort.

That about wraps up my proposal. If you see any potential issues, or have any ideas by all means provide constructive criticism. I, of course, hope to hear from Anet regarding the idea too.

Also, this is place here because it’s WvW specific. If it was supposed to go elsewhere, my bad.

I stopped reading after “mercenary guild purchasing”

Lol

Just let it be open world and take away the scoreboard because it shouldn’t have been there in the first place. Let people play with their ACs and their creepy lonely backstab thieves. PPT is a joke and only exposes naive game design.

Any solution that proposes more NPC involvement is a crutch and won’t actually solve anything.

Anet needs to do more to encourage the players to spread out/transfer down instead.

Ok, let’s see the replies so far.
1 Troll
1 Person who ignores the fact that PPT is used to benefit the server as a whole with the global bonuses it generates.
1 Person so angry about the issue that they won’t accept anything other then a full trashing of PPT.

So in essence, no constructive criticism.

PPT sucks, no one’s saying otherwise. It was intended to serve a purpose, which was, to measure the overall capacity of a server to perform. It was also meant to include otherwise uninterested players by making a high score mean high bonuses in PvE and crafting. It failed in both regards. So yes, removal would be preferable, but adjustment is more likely.

As for the “get rid of PPT argument itself.” Ok, fine, I want PPT gone too. That said, what if they don’t? So what if it’s a crutch measure? you rather they do nothing to fix things at all? Seriously, look beyond “PPT needs to go!” Start looking at “No, we won’t do that.”

Because as things stand, that’s a very likely response from Anet.

PPT doesn’t suck, not having enough coverage for all servers is what sucks. It is incredibly awesome to be able to log on at any time and have good large scale battles in WvW.

Hopefully either GW2 starts to attract more players or anet starts to attract more people into WvW so more servers can have this experience.

BAITness.1083:

PPT doesn’t suck, not having enough coverage for all servers is what sucks. It is incredibly awesome to be able to log on at any time and have good large scale battles in WvW.

Hopefully either GW2 starts to attract more players or anet starts to attract more people into WvW so more servers can have this experience.

nah, PPT does suck. it’s extremely easy to manipulate and does more to encourage karma train style play than a strategic one. that being said, we’re stuck with it. there would need to be a replacement for it before they could even decide whether or not they wanted to replace it, and that replacement would need to be extremely convincing to even have a chance.

that being said, i do like the idea of NPCs fleshing out the gaps. what i’d be concerned about would be server load. all the players tend to stress things pretty heavily as it is. as each new player comes onto the map, a corresponding NPC would need to be either removed entirely or placed into some sort of temporary vault type of deal. that’s more signals that would need to be sent back and forth to everyone, which would add more weight to their already overburdened servers. unfortunately, the only real solution to the overburdened servers would be to redesign the game from the ground up, simplifying and condensing the systems to limit the amount of information that needs to be passed around. that’s not something that’s ever going to happen though. it would cost too much money with a comparatively tiny return. at the end of the day, money is more important to NCSoft than a quality product and their players. so we’re pretty much just stuck with what’s already there.

Well made point Phantom. Given that skill lag generates on EU servers under normal conditions, and on NA servers for huge 3 way fights, a whole bunch of new, highly specific NPCs seems like a daunting workload for the servers.

I have no specific technical fix for that potential issue and would have to leave that portion of issues to the minds of Anet who have more direct knowledge of system capacity than I.

Nonetheless thank you for raising the issue.

Phantom.8130:

BAITness.1083:

PPT doesn’t suck, not having enough coverage for all servers is what sucks. It is incredibly awesome to be able to log on at any time and have good large scale battles in WvW.

Hopefully either GW2 starts to attract more players or anet starts to attract more people into WvW so more servers can have this experience.

nah, PPT does suck. it’s extremely easy to manipulate and does more to encourage karma train style play than a strategic one. that being said, we’re stuck with it. there would need to be a replacement for it before they could even decide whether or not they wanted to replace it, and that replacement would need to be extremely convincing to even have a chance.

that being said, i do like the idea of NPCs fleshing out the gaps. what i’d be concerned about would be server load. all the players tend to stress things pretty heavily as it is. as each new player comes onto the map, a corresponding NPC would need to be either removed entirely or placed into some sort of temporary vault type of deal. that’s more signals that would need to be sent back and forth to everyone, which would add more weight to their already overburdened servers. unfortunately, the only real solution to the overburdened servers would be to redesign the game from the ground up, simplifying and condensing the systems to limit the amount of information that needs to be passed around. that’s not something that’s ever going to happen though. it would cost too much money with a comparatively tiny return. at the end of the day, money is more important to NCSoft than a quality product and their players. so we’re pretty much just stuck with what’s already there.

Actually, it encourages the opposite of karma training. Running around the map in one force is one way to guarantee you lose PPT every time. When a server like SoR does that to us we split into several groups and backcap everything they have. The change to give points for stomps as well was an excellent one that does not reward fights of large numbers, as those are usually full of AoE with no chance to get a stomp off. This game has done this point system pretty kitten well.

The complaints people actually have against PPT are 100% that they feel cheated that when they log off, they can no longer defend their structures. The solution is not to hurt the people that play when they can and capture those structures, but to encourage more people that can play during those times to defend them.

BAITness.1083:

Phantom.8130:

BAITness.1083:

PPT doesn’t suck, not having enough coverage for all servers is what sucks. It is incredibly awesome to be able to log on at any time and have good large scale battles in WvW.

Hopefully either GW2 starts to attract more players or anet starts to attract more people into WvW so more servers can have this experience.

nah, PPT does suck. it’s extremely easy to manipulate and does more to encourage karma train style play than a strategic one. that being said, we’re stuck with it. there would need to be a replacement for it before they could even decide whether or not they wanted to replace it, and that replacement would need to be extremely convincing to even have a chance.

that being said, i do like the idea of NPCs fleshing out the gaps. what i’d be concerned about would be server load. all the players tend to stress things pretty heavily as it is. as each new player comes onto the map, a corresponding NPC would need to be either removed entirely or placed into some sort of temporary vault type of deal. that’s more signals that would need to be sent back and forth to everyone, which would add more weight to their already overburdened servers. unfortunately, the only real solution to the overburdened servers would be to redesign the game from the ground up, simplifying and condensing the systems to limit the amount of information that needs to be passed around. that’s not something that’s ever going to happen though. it would cost too much money with a comparatively tiny return. at the end of the day, money is more important to NCSoft than a quality product and their players. so we’re pretty much just stuck with what’s already there.

Actually, it encourages the opposite of karma training. Running around the map in one force is one way to guarantee you lose PPT every time. When a server like SoR does that to us we split into several groups and backcap everything they have. The change to give points for stomps as well was an excellent one that does not reward fights of large numbers, as those are usually full of AoE with no chance to get a stomp off. This game has done this point system pretty kitten well.

The complaints people actually have against PPT are 100% that they feel cheated that when they log off, they can no longer defend their structures. The solution is not to hurt the people that play when they can and capture those structures, but to encourage more people that can play during those times to defend them.

hence why i said “karma train style” backcapping is included in that. you’re not holding your objectives. you’re letting the other server take it, then flipping it back when they leave. which is exactly how karma trains work.

upgraded areas are worth the same PPT as paper ones, so there’s not reason to bother trying to defend what you have. if they take your upgraded garrison, you can go take the paper hills. the PPT evens out. strategically, it’s much better to hold your upgraded garrison, but that isn’t what’s encouraged under the PPT system. karma train style play is. allocating people to defense gets viewed as wasting resources that could be additional bodies on offense. otherwise, there wouldn’t be server blobbing. there’d be a distribution of troops. some on defense, some on offense, some roaming. with PPT, there’s a couple of extremely overworked people trying to handle all of the defense, maybe a roaming group or two if you’re really lucky, and the vast majority of the map on offense. if you don’t have a queue, bodies aren’t pulled out of offense. defense and roaming usually gets tossed out the window. is PPT the only thing contributing to this? no. but is PPT playing a part in this? absolutely. the map layout itself is a big culprit, as is the commander and squad “system”, but PPT does deserve it’s share of the blame.

Reverence.6915:

I stopped reading after “mercenary guild purchasing”

Lol

oh oh! yer point about buying guilds seems to have annoyed someone from buygate. isn’t that the fourth sign of the apocalypse?

OR they could just delete PPT altogether but then all those scoreboard watchers would riot.

So the best solution (IMO OFC) is to handicap/balance the scoring/ppt based on current real world WvW-map populations.

Or they could just leave it alone, like it has been, as many will QQ in this thread for…Because that has worked out so well up until this point. (looks at all the bandwagon servers)

BAITness.1083:

PPT doesn’t suck, not having enough coverage for all servers is what sucks. It is incredibly awesome to be able to log on at any time and have good large scale battles in WvW.

Hopefully either GW2 starts to attract more players or anet starts to attract more people into WvW so more servers can have this experience.

No, PPT does suck. Well, suck is the wrong word.

When you utilize a PPT system that runs 24/7, there will ALWAYS be coverage gaps.
There are many, many ways to have a scoring system that a) doesn’t rely on coverage + population and b) maintains the same feel as the current ‘PPT’ system does.

Think of how many guilds there are that run untagged and simply go looking for fights. Our guild is one, and there are definitely many others. We haven’t touched an objective for a month, and yet Blackgate still wins because of it’s population. We just log on and look for fights. If we played for PPT it would be even more lopsided during OCE/SEA.

We’ll see what EOTM brings us, and what Arenanet is learning from that. They have around 4 months before most competitive WvW guilds jump ship to Wildstar or ESO for a ’ new ’ PvP experience. That’s all we want. Something new.

No amount of NPCs will stop the enemy from mowing through your objectives.

The biggest problem with coverage is the MOMENTUM it creates. You may have equal daytime forces, but when the night leaves you 100% paper and supply-starved and the enemy is 100% fortified with endless supply, then even with equal numbers its not an equal battle.

This doesn’t even factor in morale, or the 3rd server’s behavior.

Oh, you mean scrapping!

WvW in T1 is so boring now. Some server just doing PPT and avoid all fights on the champaign.

PPT server only sneak attack the tower/keep that while no one keep an eye on it. Otherwise, they rush camp or tower only in the last 5 minutes. In sea time, i played about 4 hours and we have only 1 battle on champaign. Finlly, we got 3 server guild fight in the Garri, than we have terrible skill-lag.

No fights on champaign. No huge battle cause the horrible skill lag. All you can do is scouting scouting scouting scouting and sneak-attack camp/tower/keep in the last 5 minutes.

Stupid WvW just wasting my time. I quited this rubbish WvW unless Anet want to change it.