Guild Wars 2

The problem of population imbalance leading to joyless WvW is a problem that the modes inherent design already provides a built in, but unfortunately, non-functioning, solution to.

The missing players in these undermanned servers will not be found very easily by trying to create 24 perfectly population balanced and WvW participating servers. Nor does it need to be. Because your missing players are already there – on the third team!

Whenever a factional PVP game goes to a 3 faction mechanic, it is an accepted crutch, that inherently allows for uneven numbers in fights or less than perfect fairness. But the ultimate objective of this crutch is supposed to be that its better for the game in the long run for the top dog to get piled up on, because it will create a more balanced and more fun game.

Unfortunately in GW2 WvW, we gain no benefits from having a 3rd faction. In fact, it has a negative effect. And the reason why is because the most rewarding and path of least resistance is always to attack the weakest team.

Rarely, rarely ever do the 2nd and 3rd place teams gang up on the first, because there is no good reason to. The top team has the hardest objectives to take, and they are not worth anymore to take them. So instead, its always the bottom two servers fighting for 2nd, and the 1st choosing at whim which side to pile on. Either way, end result is that having 3 factions is actually worse than just having 2.

When Anet figures out how to incentivize attacking the top team, only then will balance begin to happen naturally. I don’t pretend to know entirely how to do this, it is what Anet devs get paid to figure out, but I’m sure some part of the answer lies in objective value.

If I’m on the team in 2nd place, why should we target the Fortified first place team’s structures, when we can endlessly flip paper objectives of the weakest team for the same value? The team in 1st often shows no interest in defending any of the opponents structures they take, because it is most lucrative for them to let those be flipped over and over. They might hold only their own borderland and SM castle out of some sense of pride.

However those objectives they do hold – their own borderland, SM, etc – should gain in value the longer they are held. Taking an objective is far harder than holding it, so why are most of the points in this game accrued simply from holding structures while they are not being attacked? A much much bigger majority of the points should come from initially taking the objective, and then its value should revert to some low number – to penalize re-flipping – that then only grows large again if that Tower or Keep is held for a long time.

If the first place team’s Garrison or even a Tower, fully upgraded and held for days, is worth the same value to take one time, as it is to take the weakest teams Garrison or Towers 5 times, then suddenly it becomes a much much greater target for both losing teams. And even if it remains hard to take, just the fact that it will be targetted more, will force the top team more often on the defensive and less able to simple zerg train around, while leaving their own stuff mostly undefended, due to that it never gets attacked.

This seems a simple and workable start to a solution. Anet even understands clearly this concept in PVE and even in individual combat in WvW, as monsters and players that have not been killed for a long time in the world are worth more experience and loot. Why are not WvW objectives worth more and more points the longer they are held? Generally something easy to take, and re-take, is less valuable than something difficult.

Make 2v1 faction WvW work, and you will have your population imbalance mostly solved.

+1 I like the concept. It would would be a step in the right direction though the rewards would also have to be in wxp (both for defenders and attackers) or karma trains would still just work for maximum wxp/hour with no interest in defending.

It would also not solve the issue of servers with large Oceanic populations that overwhelm all maps every night to win by significant margins, while having a very weak day presence. For that, outmanned and bloodlust would have to switch buffs (so simple)…

Then again, I have zero faith that Anet has any interest in balance in WvW. They have already stated they do not and it just seems like higher population servers are supposed to steamroll the other two by design, no matter how stupid this is for all servers involved.

See, this is called the Mist War. Not sure why people keep complaining about “fairness” or “balance”. War is never fair or balanced. People play on certain servers because they like the odds.

People play play on top 3 because they like a “fair chance” to be winners and lots of friends to share their victory with.

People play in the 4-6 either because they aspire to be the above or (in my case at least) like killing them. It is the same all the way down.

Some people prefer more friends, other prefer more targets. If imbalance really bugs you that much, then just transfer up to a top 3 and join the club. Some of them might even pay you if you make really cool youtube videos of you guild wiping militia zergs.

What are you talking about?

Game ain’t made to be fair, less crying, more killing.

I can see why it goes over your head but the topic is about strategy and why PPT is meaningless and how the two weaker servers end up fighting for 2nd more often than not. And not because of PPT but because there is no incentive for attacking a stronger opponent with more upgraded defenses.

And your analysis is way off. Did you copy and paste that from Devon Carver? First almost no one cares about PPT because it’s meaningless. 99% predetermined by the match up. Second, people prefer tiers under 1 because they prefer fights that aren’t wtf skill lag 1-spam uber blob perma que.

OK, I was trolling.

I actually read it and it is a good idea, has been suggested before, at least something similar.

I get it, basically its like a poker pot. The longer you hold an objective, the more value it holds for an attacker. Balances awarding the points in a way without needing more population.

Consider gaming the system though. Why bother attacking 2nd place and 3rd place hard objectives, when I can let them build up HUGE bonuses, then cap. You would see 1st place defending 3rd objectives from the outside against 2nd, just so they could pop the objective for the bonus. The idea is good but the meta shift has a lot of repercussions.

The title is a bit off putting though. OP should probably edit it to something more fitting of what hes describing.

I agree the title is misleading and OP is too long. Fair point about gaming the system but the only way I could see that happening is if the 3rd server is really just too weak to be in the competition.

Right now what happens is everyone rushing to flip undefended objectives with no upgrades because they give the same rewards as the more difficult upgraded objectives. In a way, this is gaming the system already and really no depth of strategy. It makes more sense that the upgraded objectives which are harder to take, should be worth more, and also worth more to defend.

Rather than flip 5 empty towers or the weakest servers unupgraded borderland, it should make strategic sense (for rewards and PPT) to make an epic siege on the strongest server’s keep or garrison. If deepening the strategy would also help to create a more competitive 3 way match, it’s icing on the cake.

Zephyrus is correct in that the increased rewards would need to be in the form also of increased gold, karma, and WXP, not just scoreboard points, to offer the proper incentive.

But make no mistake the end goal is ultimately to create a situation, through this or any other design change, where the 2nd and 3rd place teams are always extremely encouraged to be attacking the first place team in order to help population balance.

Fixing bloodlust (reversing it with undermanned for instance) would also help along the way, but is a different topic.

It’s true that some people may never care about PPT, but the reason most don’t now is because its meaningless due to the current system, there is no competitive balance, and not because the idea in general is bad. sPVP is the deathmatch mode in this game, and is blindingly simple, if you just want to fight people. In WvW though, most would want ‘good fights’ on top of good strategy pvp if they could have both, its not a choice. Sadly right now we are getting neither in most matchups. 2 on 1 vs the bigger guy would in fact increase the quality of the fights. It’s a win/win.

Also, by reducing the value of ‘just flipped’ targets, to something very small, you would reduce the desire of karma trains and pvdoor, and just maybe people would think about picking battles against real players more often, as they would be more rewarding in relation.

If the point system was better and more competitive rather than being predetermined by a matchup, people would start using different strategies and would probably try to accomplish 2v1 anyway in order to get a chance of winning the matchup. But point system sucks.

alliance? yes!

great, alliance players are now green! lets go for that T3 garri now

See my post about this here:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/wuv/wuv/Add-a-Server-Alliance-option-to-WvW/first#post2929704

The idea was good but from the recent posts, you see can see why I mentioned the title.

The rally/down system would make a 2 v 1 zerg fight near impossible. I fought many 3 way 1v1v1 and 2v2v2 the down/rally system makes the whole thing such a chaos it’s near impossible to team up even if you wanted to.

Great idea. It amazes me that servers don’t ally against the dominant server on thier own. I guess people need an incentive more than “it would make the match more fun”. Better to QQ on the fourm about unbalanced matches than do something about it in the match.

Another part of the problem is there needing to be a reason to even strive for a first place win. Right now we get what for wining? Bragging rights. While its true that a server racking up a serious win will have higher global point bonuses they are not particularly noteworthy over what the loosing teams will have by the end of the match anyway and they dont carry over to the next week so what are you really gaining? Adding a reward such as a mini unmaned buff (+xp+MF+karma not the no death penalty) as a reward for the week following a first place finish would give some incentive to trying for first place. Alternatively some of the bonus you get from the score could persist through the next week if you finish first.

Now on to the issue of makeing it more favorable to attack the first place server instead of ganging up on the other weak server. While the idea of rewards based off how long an objective has been held is a good start I also think a multiplyer based off relitive score would not be amiss. If any objective you take thats held by the first place team awards several times more of its base reward than targeting the last place team its more favorable to target the top dog. Higher risk but much higher reward than going after the low hanging fruit.

I dont like the idea of totaly moveing the warscore over to awards for takeing an objective based on the time its held over PPT. That could result in some very counter intuitive and unfun stratagies to win the game. What would happen if each objective was worth x point sfor every hour it had been held and takeing them was the primary means of gaining warscore? While you could win by just dukeing it out an alternitive stratagy would be let the top server hold all the map for the first 5-6 days, acumulating no points asside from that initial capture session, and then blitz the maps gaining thousands of points per objective and catapulting into first place with no chance for recovery and no real way to stop it as the blitz could come at any time and you cant keep defenders everywhere all the time) Not playing all week then doing a mad dash for first at the end would not be a fun gameplay mechanic IMO.

PPT is still needed because takeing and holding significant amounts of teritory should still be a key victory condition. However we also need incentive to go after the hard targets from a score standpoint as well as the rewards the karma train was after. I would propose something of a fusion of the ideas. Leave PPT as it is, it mostly works for a reward for holding territory. On top of that add an additional warscore boost to capturing an objective. For example, when you flip a camp your team gets 1 warscore for every hour it was held(caped at 12 hours) times the number of upgrades. If you flip a camp that is fully upgraded and has been held for 10 hours you get 40 points. Towers and keeps not only have more potential upgrades for a larger multiplyer but also would have a larger base per hour amount. The final numbers should be balanced so that the max capture bonus does not eclipse the PPT of holding the objective for the same amount of time otherwise you still get a situation where the wining stratagy is to wait till maximum bonus and then flip objectives. However the additional acumulating points makes it more benificial to target the hardened targets vs just refliping everything in a circle with enemy zergs chaseing eachothers tails.

While this is not perfect, a stronger team could for example not upgrade to try and deny points to the other team this is also somewhat offset by an upgraded target being much easier to breach. On the other hand you could also tie the PPT into the upgrade status of the objectives to encourage not only upgrading a location but holding it.