Guild Wars 2

When you lose a keep, all the NPCs redistribute to your remaining keeps.

That way your last keep would have all the keep lords from all the other keeps, making it really really really hard to take, even with a big zerg, and possible to defend even with a small number of players.

That might balance things out and stop everyone changing maps every time a zerg appears.

That isn’t balance at all. That is redistribution of PvE mobs in WvW. Mobs that die quick and easy. It would have little to no effect.

Snowpea.5469:

When you lose a keep, all the NPCs redistribute to your remaining keeps.

That way your last keep would have all the keep lords from all the other keeps, making it really really really hard to take, even with a big zerg, and possible to defend even with a small number of players.

That might balance things out and stop everyone changing maps every time a zerg appears.

That is actually not bad, but they would need to be rescaled. The current keep bosses can be soloed, albeit in a relatively long time, but it has been and is being done. A group of 2-3 players can kill one with extreme ease.

If they were made a lot tougher to beat, added some actual abilities, for example, AOE strip boons cast at range on target player, unblockable, or fire aoe “a la SMC lord”, etc. then made these properly scale up with numbers of enemy players inside the event “a la silverwastes vinewrath” then on top of that for example up the radius of the AOE abilities twofold for each one present, then it would work.

4 of such scaled up lords would be able to not just hold up a blob but also keep it occupied for quite a long time, giving defenders time to to better organize and respond. One of the current flaws on current BL maps for example, is that it takes too long to get from respawn to keeps / garison, and spreads out defending force forcing it to “trickle in” to contest. A blob will inevitably win. This would cause enough of the blobs time to be consumed so that defenders can re-enter as a force, instead of stringed out single players.

So yea, with some scaling up and additional abilities this would be a really good improvement to the current situation.

I think the key to keeping outnumbered players defending is have some chance of success.

I agree with you, the keep lords should be way tougher than they are, maybe even scaling up when there are two in the same location, having a maximum amount of damage they can take (so you have to fight them for a while no matter how big the zerg). I was in a group of 3 when we took garrison. It was hard but we did it.

Fighting amongst NPCs is definitely better than being caught in the open. I must disagree with dancingmonkey.4902, I would always choose to fight in a group of NPCs when I’m outnumbered.

dancingmonkey.4902:

That isn’t balance at all. That is redistribution of PvE mobs in WvW. Mobs that die quick and easy. It would have little to no effect.

Not if they were all drunk siegerazers

I’m not sure this is a solution though, even if it is amusing.

Part of the dynamic of WvW is defending with fewer numbers, or conversely, having more bodies to stomp.

WvW needs a heck load of completely different Balance and Gameplay Changes, not something like this what the OP suggest.

1) Remove all Buff Items from WvW.
The only Buffs that Players should receive in WvW should come from the Shrines, Gear , Guild Claims/Banners and WvW Traits, so WvW’s form of Character Progression. With Buff Items usable in WvW, the Shrines are so meaningless.
Would be there no Buff Items in WvW and the Buffs of the shrines would be significantly more meaningful, then you’d see instantly alot more constant fighting around them, how it was basically intended by the design of them, that all sides should constantly try to fight for them. Each Shrine should provide a different Buff Effect.

2) Players hsouldn’t be able anymore to damage Gates at all, only Rams, Ballistas and Golems should be able to deal Damage to Gates, not Catapults and Trebuchets anymore, they should deal only Damage to Walls. Therefore the Damage of Catapults and Trebuchets to Walls gets increased.
The Limit of how many Siege Weapons a Side can place gets for all sides reduced significantly. Siege Weapons are a strategetic good and thus should be used very wisely and not be spammed like crazy to get Gates/Walls super fast done…
In frotn of Gates and Walls there wil lbe placed now invisible limited SLOTS for the maximum amount of how many Rams/Catapults ect. you can place at specific places.
Siege Weapons won’t be possible to be placed whereever you want, their locations will be more preset now.
Means, in front of a gate you can place now only a maximum of 2 Rams, not anymore more of them to speed up how fast you can break the gate.
In front of Walls will be the maximum of Calapults 3 now, more than 3 can’t be placed then anymore and the game notifies you at the moment where you try to throw a 4th one, that the maximum limit for siege weapons at that location has been reached already.
The only Siege Weapon with no limits will be ACs, but they deal anyways only damage to Players, Rams, Ballitas and Golems, where the Damage versus Rams should be increased

3) There needs to be introduced a new type of Item in WvW aside of Traps and Tricks – Tools. There need to exist Tools that help you out in WvW Defense as like Offense.
There needs to be a Tool, that can remove the effect of the Siege Disabler.
There needs to be a tool, with that you can repair Mortars, Cannons and also upgrade them to that they receive significantly lesser damage, and protect the player also better, while usign them from conditions and aoe spam

4) There need to be added more,better as like reworked upgrades for Camps, Towers and keeps that make it better to defend them, especialyl against large Zergs to be able to buy your side enough time, so that reinforcements can arrive, before its already way too late and the lords have been killed already minutes ago, before a large enough own zerg can help out to defend the place

5) Mostly all of the WvW Traits need a complete rework/rebalancing and hsould get also finally advanced to the point, that they provide all 10 tiers of effects, so that also all those people, which have already maxed out everythign since ages finally receive something new to spent their tons of earned rank points on

6) WvW needs improved Class Roles, the Game mode is in a dire need of receiving finally Class Based WvW Traits, so that all classes in WvW are useful and can do in it something unique with that they can help out their side to win, like for example Thieves having it alot easier to infiltrate places, to gain enemy intel that will be useful to know for the Commander and so on.
Like Elementalists becomign the only class, that will be able also to deal significant damage to Gates and Walls, like Guardians having some unique options with that they can defend places much better, than any other class and so on and so forth

7) WvW needs the most direly general Game Balance of the Conditions, mostly Burning, Confusion and Torment..these conditioons are since the last patch completely out of control and where it already partwise before of the last patch, due to buff items and stuff like perplexitiy runes ect that need nerfs..seriously Confusion every 15s on interrupts and the same time 30% increased confusion duration increase together with the last buff of confusion is just nuts..the ICD needs to get increased
to 30s
Effect 4 can get its IDC reduced from 25s to 20s, if the Chance for activatino gets also decreased from 25% to 15%
Tons of other total useless crap rune sets and sigils should get some buffs to make them finally viable and competitive compared to the current standard meta runes and sigils

8) The Ressource System of WvW needs to get split up from just only Supply to have more different sorts of ressources that you need, so that Players are alot more forced to split up, so that zergign gets lesser encouraged and that the huge zergs split up due to this into more smaller groups.
Supply should get splitted up into 4 different ressources:
1. Energy Crystals – Delievered by doing specific WvW Events, like gettign help from ogres ect., and they reward you with them, if you recruit them/help them and doing other new added events
2. Food (Meat, Water, ect.) – Delievered by killing the Wild Life on the map
3. Metal Ore – Delievered my mining on (respawning) Metal Ores on the Map
4. Wood – Delievered by chopping off (regrowing )Trees in the WvW Map

9) Protecting and Guarding Dolyaks needs to become more important.

10) WvW NPCs need to receive serious reworks, so that they become alot more useful, especially the archers that defend keeps/towers..they should learn finally also to use also cannons/mortars when no players are in the near to manually use them

11) The Undermanned Buff needs a serious rework, so that it actually really helps people from sides that have not enough players on the map to come back.

• it should increase the Maximum Health of Players so that they have permanently as much Health, as if Siegerazer would be with them, so Constant NPC Commander Buff
• Undermanned Side Players should receive 10% lesser Damage
• Undermanned Side Players should lose not per second Health when being downed and revive 10% faster downed and heal 20% stronger in Downed State, while doing also 20% more Damage in Downed State
• Undermanned Side Players should have permanent Super Speed and receive a Break Bar
• Remove the Crap with increased Exp, karma, Gold blah blah, thats no help…at all and iwll also never be a help to gain back your spawn tower easier ect. and to defend yourself easier against anti social Spawn Campers
• Undermanned Side Players don’t lose their Buff Effects from Gear and WvW traits after their Death!! – means, if you had like 25 Stacks of Bloodlost, you will still have them when you respawn, as long as the Undermanned Buff is there…
  if you had 5 Stacks of both WvW trait Buffs and you di,e the U-Buff is therer, you will keep them then when you respawn!!
  Thats the absolute most important thing, that needs to happen!!!

12) The Event for sending out the Siegerazer NPc ect needs to get changed..first the npcs should move alot faster, it takes freakign ages, until they are finalyl at the tower..seriously, anet, increase their movement speed by 100%!!
Make the event UNSTAGNANTABLE… often enemies just kill the dolyak only and leave the commander, because the stupid commander alone does NOTHING, this prevents your side from progress, because you can send out only maximum 1 npc commander – seriously!!?
If the dolly gets killed, then the commander should simply spawn a NEW ONE… also the Commander should get protected by some seriously upleveled Lvl 84 Mercenaries, that protect the commander, because the commander alone is simply SOLOABLE..just takes time, but its doable, if you don’t get disturbed for long enough.

13) It takes also way too much time to get the siege weapons spawn, reduce the time, players need to stand in these idiotic circles, to get the siege weapons spawned, and those sieges should be also ready INSTANTLY with Barrier Field, that ALSO lets enemies not get IN to melee atack the sieges, so that players using the sieges are as long the barrier field is up protected from ALL atacks, so that they need to focus on attacking players that don’t use any sieges – and all that without that you need to waste supply on them to build them up

14) Players that defend places, should receive significantly better rewards, defendign a place should be alot more rewarding, than claiming something and not vice versa..because thats the total idiotic crap, that leads in first place to this silly karma train mentality, because quickly claiming things is alot more rewarding, then defending places… its ridiculous!!. The reward for winnign a match needs to become significantly better that the intention for why you want to claim quickly stuff and win the match, for the end reward..but meanwhile should be defending places the much better rewrdign thing to ensure, that you don’t lose points.
it must get out of the heads from the people, that they simply abandon their claimed tower instantly for example, because it is currently more rewarding to claim it like 10 minutes later back, than to defend it for those 10 minutes.

15) Street Guards need to get overworked, they are way too weak,m they are essentially totally useless, because killing them gives your side nearly absolutely nothing and having them gives you also absolutely Nothign at all.
Strret Guards need to receive an overworked skill set, they need to become UPGRADEABLE too and owning them should provide for nearby players also some buffs while being on their protected streets, like for example that enemy thieves have on protected streets instead 6s of reveal instead of 4s. Like Enemy Elementalists on protected streets can’t change so fast their attunements.

Street Guard Upgrades:

• Oversight – Enemies on protected Streets receive class specific Debuffs, while allies receive every 10s seconds random boons
• Increased Street Patrol – Hire more Mercenaries that will patrol on your protected Streets and make alarm if they see large enemy groups. This Upgrade also buffs Dolyaks that move on protected streets to move 100% faster and receive lesser damage.
• Elite Patrol – Increases the Stats of the Street Guard, gives him better skills
• Patrol Reinforcement – You have to fight now against 3 different builded Street Guards, before you can claim the Streets
• Street Bunker – Improve the Street Guard place into a little Bunker that needs first to get destroyed, before you can attack directly the Guards, that provides also some Siege Weapons to defend the place on large range. The Street Bunker will provide Charr Technology Machine Guns, Sniper Rifles, Grenade Kits and a Mortar.

Orpheal.8263:

…

What do you mean by shrines?

@OP: Love the idea.

@Orpheal: First impression is "Nope, don’t want that".

1) Wouldn’t mind removing all the food/util bonuses, but that will not happen, because it would invalidate chef and many other craftings. Though they should definitively look them over and streamline the design of all those.

2) No PvD I agree with rest, no thanks. Limited siege spots vs trolls and set locations remove finding new and creative places.

3) If they fixed the problems with aoe bombing and ranging cannons etc, this wouldn’t be as much of an issue.

4) Same as 3.

5) As long as they don’t make the WxP "required" for anything it is fine. Seen enough "get off ram! let master ram!" etc. I’m just glad they’re removing the applied bonuses.

6) That doesn’t sound like what I see those classes do. I see most guardians in open field/zergs or roaming groups. Eles I see mostly roaming daggers or defending towers with mistform. Thieves are to busy trying to gank solo roamers to care about commanders etc. So the problem becomes what is each class’s "role" ? I don’t think a class should be pigeon-holed into anything.

7) The usual condi stuff, fire is a bit to strong and needs a slight reduction. The rest is probably more on a per class/skill basis. Perplexity runes is a chapter in itself. But again Conditions doesn’t really become a problem once you have a certain mass of players. Even 5 players can bring enough condi cleansing that it isn’t a problem (and they’ll die to zerg spamming 20 staff attacks before the condis). Rebalancing rune sets etc has to balance up to every game mode not only WvW, so is a big undertaking, it is just that most players in this game only scream "MOAR DAMAGE!!!" and doesn’t care about other attributes.

8) Uhm, no thanks. more logistics, more confused pugs, more arguments in chat "I thought you guys got material X !" etc. And I just don’t see much gain. Complexity for complexities sake, do not want.

9) Agreed.

10) Agreed.

11) Absolutely not! This is one thing I think ANet been really good at, to make certain that the outnumbered buff DOES NOT give you an advantage in a fight! The buff is there to make those wins you can get sweeter, not to win you fights. It primary acts like a warning signal. If there should be buffs for it, it should be buffs to counteract the numerical deficiency you have compared to the opponents. Things like increased supply limit, faster building/repairing to counteract that the enemy has 20-80 people that can carry supply and build instantly anything. Not messing with fights.

12) Kinda agreed that it feels weird that Siegerazer just stands there if you take out his poor Yak. But I’d rather want to see Siegerazer build his own ram and start ramming. Not just magically summoning more dolyaks.

13) I don’t see the problem, it takes a few seconds to stand in the ring, and you can build the siege for what 5 supply ? and almost instantly. Except that the flame ram has been bugged since who knows when, I don’t see a problem. And nope, no immune to melee attacks on siege, that is a valid counter tactic.

14) Better rewards for defending, nobody is going to argue against that. Better rewards for winning a match-up on the other hand, no thank you. There are way to many people out there that actually care about easy rewards and will constantly change around to servers that win, and we will end up with lots of annoying stuff until they all find one server they’re happy with that dominates everything else around them for easy match-up rewards. Do not want.

15) HoT is already making improvements to Sentries, so no worries. Don’t like the class specific idea, except that I’m always for more reveal in this game. And I don’t think players are ever going to bother upgrading Sentries, they don’t offer anything back for it. Just wait for HoT and see how they turn out.

The title of this thread, and its point are a logical contradiction to the design and concept of WvW. What is with the obsession of trying to “balance” and unbalancable game mode? Why does everyone incorrectly believe their idea of balance is actually balance?

So many posters confuse their subjective opinion with that of objective fact in this area in particular. I agree rewards need to be rethought and reworked, otherwise, every suggestion that is mentioned as a “balancing improvement” in this thread, does as much harm as it does good.

coglin.1867:

The title of this thread, and its point are a logical contradiction to the design and concept of WvW. What is with the obsession of trying to “balance” and unbalancable game mode? Why does everyone incorrectly believe their idea of balance is actually balance?

So many posters confuse their subjective opinion with that of objective fact in this area in particular. I agree rewards need to be rethought and reworked, otherwise, every suggestion that is mentioned as a “balancing improvement” in this thread, does as much harm as it does good.

“Why does everyone incorrectly believe their idea of balance is actually balance? "

I try to see it with another objective.

I think “balance” means players want something more than stacks and aoe bombing atm.
They want more mechanics, more options that doesnt mean the balance of achieving equality on a unbalanced number fight.

Change for the sake of change, is not even remotely balance for one.

More mechanics and options is more mechanics and options, not balance, that is diversity.

Can you supply any dev or official language that suggest “balance” is intended to exist in WvW? Because I can show you multiple dev post and official explanations that specifically state that WvW is not intended to be balanced on neither a profession to profession comparison not controlled population.

Changes happen to give a more and enjoyable explerience overall, not just to do the same with other name, im not telling either it should be balanced.

Creating diversity is a good thing.

Aeolus.3615:

Changes happen to give a more and enjoyable explerience overall, not just to do the same with other name, im not telling either it should be balanced.

Creating diversity is a good thing.

I understand what your saying, but diversity and balance are completely different thread. This thread is about balancing. If you wish to discuss diversity, perhaps you should create a thread on it.

coglin.1867:

The title of this thread, and its point are a logical contradiction to the design and concept of WvW. What is with the obsession of trying to “balance” and unbalancable game mode? Why does everyone incorrectly believe their idea of balance is actually balance?

So many posters confuse their subjective opinion with that of objective fact in this area in particular. I agree rewards need to be rethought and reworked, otherwise, every suggestion that is mentioned as a “balancing improvement” in this thread, does as much harm as it does good.

The best way for you to understand “why” is to transfer into T7 or T8 or around there, wait for one of the matchups vs higher tier. Run on tag with the other 4 people, throw yourself repeatedly at the map blob. See results. Experience them 1st hand. Answer your own question.

And no, the game mode can be balanced relatively easy, there are a ton of good ideas floating around, many of which would not consume huge resources (manhours) to impliment and would not be drastic by themselves, but rather coupled with other improvements for a far better overall experience. Except maybe T1 + YB stackers, who are at fault for creating vast majority of these issues and thus should be disregarded in these matters anyways.

I would absolutely love to see some forms of the ideas put forth here in this thread:

1. Tiered meaningful outmanned buff, perhaps a second stacking outmanned buff on Home BL only.

2. No server should be able to keep what it can not actively defend on enemy BLs. Period. I would love to see ingame systems/mechanics that revert territory back to its owner after some time passes. I do not care if its NPCs or just automatic process, whatever. But NPCs “a la” Automatic Siegerazer on steroids, would actually be good. Active defense = extra champ bag for K-trainers, lack of it, means less PPT gained due to inactivity and timezone imbalance.

3. Complete restructuring of PPT system. Get rid of it altogether maybe and repalce with 1 up 1 down ? Currently off-hours k-trainers disproportionally contribute to the overall score, bring that inline with active players contributions and effort. Effortless k-trainign should not yield far greater reward then active battles, as it currently does.

Many, many other things can be done which you can find in countless posts on these forums and then many more outside of these, they are not done not because they cant be done, but because A-Net has chosen not to. Do not confuse those 2.

That doesn’t make sense to me. Why would we redesign the game around the smallest population possible?

It is majority rules, not the smallest minority rules.

And that’s why WvW turned into bandwagons and ghost towns. Majority rules.

The NPC relocation idea is going to have a slight problem – the veterans are going to provide an army of rallybots. You’ll have to kill everyone in the zerg 4 times for them to stay dead.

dancingmonkey.4902:

That doesn’t make sense to me. Why would we redesign the game around the smallest population possible?

It is majority rules, not the smallest minority rules.

I believe you meant to say majority rule with minority rights. That’s to say that while the majority does get to dictate the terms, they must be respectful of the minority. But as I see it, you are already the minority, just not in the way you think.

Looking over the guilds that I’m still a part of and remembering some that I used to be with, of which some are/were 200+ strong, the log on data shows (or showed) 80-90% of those accounts haven’t been logged into for over a month, >50% in over 6 months. These, mind you, were WvW guilds first and foremost. So, if you still play WvW, you are the minority of what’s left. Most players either got bored or recognized the eventuality of an uneven game design culminating into the current server stacking and server surfing wars. Every grossly outnumbered server player base will either have to transfer for a better experience or quit. Most apparently have chosen the latter. If Anet wants to recapture these players, they and they alone will have to do the rebalance. I’m sure there will be a lot of unhappy people no matter what they do, but given its whittled down to so few potential players, I’m not sure they have any options left.