Guild Wars 2

GW1 didn’t have separate servers. Coming from games like WoW, where I had to choose between different groups of friends spread out on different servers, GW1 felt wonderful and revolutionary. Lack of servers is one of the reasons I loved GW1.

When GW2 came around, and we had servers again, I felt that was a huge step back. It’s mostly fixed now with Megaserver, but WvW is left with this legacy and its associated problems.

Let’s pretend that GW2 had the “One Server” technology from GW1, right from the beginning.
YOU are the WvW Lead Designer at ANet. How would you design WvW in a “One server” game?

Would you have servers anyway? (Just for WvW)
Would you have some sort of system based on guilds? Alliances?
Would you still have 3 way battles, or something else?
Would you have fixed matchups, or dynamically generate matches as needed?
etc.

I’m interested in these ideas, to either benefit GW3, “GW2 in a distant future” or other competing upcoming MMOs. And because I’m just curious.

Good thought.

Really don’t know what ANet would have done, but I guess they might have gone for a system of choosing a "side" (faction, alliance, group whatever). And fight for that. This would probably have been different Mist related groups, entirely unrelated to the personal story etc.

Personally I think they should have made three different "Goals", and you picked a side to achieve that goal. I have no idea what those goals could have been, but it would be interesting to have three different teams with different objectives, so people join something that appeals to them.

-The server question is tricky: Having servers is beneficial, normally, if they are MONITORED. So right now considering Anet’s lack of interest in their own gamemode I’m gonna go with no servers since we’re suffering from the bad side of it. Rotting servers left unattended and stamped with a “medium” server label to cover up and ignore the problem.

-A guild/alliance system could be fun if implemented right: you’d need to have obvious benefits from it, like sharing teleports (ie: create guild/alliance specific teleports for the tower/keep they claimed?) or being able to track your alliance players on the map. You’d need to make a guild/alliance separate thread imo but the idea can be messed around even to include in the actual system I think.

-I’d keep the 3Way battle. It’s fun and makes for diverse situations/battles. It can be flawed when servers decide to fix their matchups (cof cof T1NA) but that is more the glickos’ fault. if Anet would interact “manually” with the matchups then the 3-way system would be much more viable. Once again, would require monitoring.

-Dynamically generated matchups. Yes yes all day everyday. With maybe some REGULAR specific tournaments/events. And by events I DO NOT mean pve events like golem week but competitive stuff like “Redbriar is worth as much as a keep for the week” or “manhunter: points from player kills are worth 2/3 times more for the week even without a finisher” kind of events.

-I like that “Goals” idea from Joneirikb; it would make guilds/players swore some sort of “vow” before the matchup according to their lvl and motivate people to compete and complete them!

-Also what would really be cool is if Anet had some sort of WvW forum that they would read regularly and also have someone/a team alocated to monitoring WvW so that the game mode does not enter a state of decay.
Taste the sarcasm.

Designing a serverless WvW system is a relatively simple matter.

Begin by creating three factions. The potential maximum population size of each faction is defined in relation to that of the others (impossible with a server-based system), so that faction populations will always “rubberband” within a certain range of each other. Joining/leaving a faction is handled on a player by player basis, but you can add some sort of guild-based mechanism if you wish that allows guilds to devote themselves to one particular faction. Inactive accounts lose faction membership after a suitable period of time to keep population numbers (relatively) updated.

Next, create a dynamic map system where new maps open up if the current ones are sufficiently full (and close and/or stops accumulating score if sufficiently empty). You can think of this as having a system of “map tiers” instead of server tiers, the main difference being that everything is open to you. That is, there’s just a long list of maps and you can join whichever one you like. If one faction has sufficient players to cause the creation of a new map, but at least one other factions doesn’t, the system stops creating new maps and excess players from the overpopulated faction(s) must join an existing map, filling them up completely and thus eventually generating queues. One important point is that different maps don’t necessarily need to have the same population limit, even if it’s copies of the same map. The system can generate copies of maps with low population limits for those who like more open space, and high limits for those who prefer large zerg fights, so that different folks can have different strokes. Also, there’s no player randomization (i.e. EotM/megaserver style tech). You and you alone dictate where, when, how, and with whom you play.

And of course over time you could get to the advanced stuff, like adding an overland map depicting the territories factions are fighting for, letting players of each faction hold a popular vote between battles to decide which territory to attack, and creating further impediments to population/guild imbalance by using the system to generate maps slanted toward a given faction if it’s losing too much territory (similar to what you saw in alliance battles in GW1).

The project itself is (still) entirely doable. It’s just that a.net chose to do something else.

I like that a lot

ManaCraft.5630:

Designing a serverless WvW system is a relatively simple matter.

There are 3 major issues with using EoTM style design however:

- Community based Teamspeak become impossible to manage. Thus, communities would die (or in this case, never have existed). The communities that have formed is pretty much the only reason for WvW still being a thing after 3 years.

- Guilds would not be able to organize GvGs and have to put in alot of work just to get the raid on the same map. You would pretty much kill raiding. They would never know what guilds they face either.

- Coverage would be a complete mess and pretty much ensure 1 side win every single week. One side having stacked nightcappers and its gg, no point in even playing WvW since nothing will change next week.

TL;DR if we had no servers we would have no WvW.

If I may:
If we had no server we wouldn’t have our ACTUAL WvW. Which happens to be flawed.

Well if they merge everyone I’d assume they’d do it cross continent so that there is no/less downtime (Some Eu servs with some NA servs with some asian servs on each side). so there “wouldn’t” be any night capping anymore since everyone will cycle between daytimes worldwide.

Community based teamspeak will just become alliance based teamspeak. Or Guild based teamspeaks, etc
It would be a big adjustment I won’t deny that but it can be done if you think about it.
You’ll end up with 3 bigger communities, one for each “alliance”. Plus it will end up giving more importance to guilds (their work, renown, etc…) within each community so I can only see that as a plus for a game called guild wars^^

And as for GvGs they mostly happen in obsidian sanctum already where there’s a special arena just for that. Also Hot will introduce GvG special arenas so we could count that as a “way” of getting GvG out of WvW (since it doesn’t really suit the mode anyway)

So yeah still very viable idea imo.

DiscoJacen.1590:

If I may:
If we had no server we wouldn’t have our ACTUAL WvW. Which happens to be flawed.

Well if they merge everyone I’d assume they’d do it cross continent so that there is no/less downtime (Some Eu servs with some NA servs with some asian servs on each side). so there “wouldn’t” be any night capping anymore since everyone will cycle between daytimes worldwide.

Community based teamspeak will just become alliance based teamspeak. Or Guild based teamspeaks, etc
It would be a big adjustment I won’t deny that but it can be done if you think about it.
You’ll end up with 3 bigger communities, one for each “alliance”. Plus it will end up giving more importance to guilds (their work, renown, etc…) within each community so I can only see that as a plus for a game called guild wars^^

And as for GvGs they mostly happen in obsidian sanctum already where there’s a special arena just for that. Also Hot will introduce GvG special arenas so we could count that as a “way” of getting GvG out of WvW (since it doesn’t really suit the mode anyway)

So yeah still very viable idea imo.

OR

You can play some EOTM and see how an alliance system works

If you like it GREAT! If you don’t THAT’S ALSO GREAT

Just stop coming up with ideas that would kill WvW and all the reasons we (or at least i ) love it

Dawdler.8521:

ManaCraft.5630:

Designing a serverless WvW system is a relatively simple matter.

There are 3 major issues with using EoTM style design however:

- Community based Teamspeak become impossible to manage. Thus, communities would die (or in this case, never have existed). The communities that have formed is pretty much the only reason for WvW still being a thing after 3 years.

- Guilds would not be able to organize GvGs and have to put in alot of work just to get the raid on the same map. You would pretty much kill raiding. They would never know what guilds they face either.

- Coverage would be a complete mess and pretty much ensure 1 side win every single week. One side having stacked nightcappers and its gg, no point in even playing WvW since nothing will change next week.

TL;DR if we had no servers we would have no WvW.

+1,000

Every time I read threads like these, it feels a bit like social engineering, then I feel afraid this is how it will go in HoT.

Whether it would have worked is anyone’s guess, but I’d have looked to parts of Eve and Aion for inspiration. Prior to the betas, my impression of a mode called World vs World was that it would actually take place on a large world map. That’s still what I would prefer to see to this day – you could go to different regions to get different sizes and types of fighting.

I would have done away with servers, except for the geographical blocs (NA, EU, China), and used guild alliances instead. I’d also give forts a substantial bonus and services to the alliance that controlled them, and heavily structure how they could be contested so that it wouldn’t actually be possible to conquer them, or any significant amount of territory, without the controlling alliance being given the right to defend.

I can’t be sure that doing this would lead to a more stable community – it’d certainly mean a lot more rivalries – but it would mean you don’t establish a state of any size without being able to win sieges, and it could largely eliminate karma training.

I use the word state deliberately; that’s ultimately what I wanted to see in WvW at the beginning. These days, of course, I’d go for anything that gives WvW something interesting to do.

Ben K.6238:

I would have done away with servers, except for the geographical blocs (NA, EU, China), and used guild alliances instead.

That would technically still be servers, but yes I have always been in favor of moving the abstract servers to ingame factions. Even though it would work exactly like now, it also make WvW a part of PvE and allow Anet to do some fun things, such as faction halls, ingame rivalry between NPCs, ingame functions for stuff like transfers or rewards, etc. Imagine if you are in Divinity and see a faction hall with an ongoing feast and fireworks etc. Why? Because that faction just won the matchup. Yep, that simple, PvE reacting to WvW.

But an all EoTM design… ugh… dont want.

Mitz.5741:

DiscoJacen.1590:

If I may:
If we had no server we wouldn’t have our ACTUAL WvW. Which happens to be flawed.

Well if they merge everyone I’d assume they’d do it cross continent so that there is no/less downtime (Some Eu servs with some NA servs with some asian servs on each side). so there “wouldn’t” be any night capping anymore since everyone will cycle between daytimes worldwide.

Community based teamspeak will just become alliance based teamspeak. Or Guild based teamspeaks, etc
It would be a big adjustment I won’t deny that but it can be done if you think about it.
You’ll end up with 3 bigger communities, one for each “alliance”. Plus it will end up giving more importance to guilds (their work, renown, etc…) within each community so I can only see that as a plus for a game called guild wars^^

And as for GvGs they mostly happen in obsidian sanctum already where there’s a special arena just for that. Also Hot will introduce GvG special arenas so we could count that as a “way” of getting GvG out of WvW (since it doesn’t really suit the mode anyway)

So yeah still very viable idea imo.

OR

You can play some EOTM and see how an alliance system works

If you like it GREAT! If you don’t THAT’S ALSO GREAT

Just stop coming up with ideas that would kill WvW and all the reasons we (or at least i ) love it

EotM isn’t an alliance system, it’s just a random melting pot of all the servers together. ESO has done it right for the WvW alliance system and it’s what Anet should base a new system upon.

Xillllix.3485:

EotM isn’t an alliance system, it’s just a random melting pot of all the servers together. ESO has done it right for the WvW alliance system and it’s what Anet should base a new system upon.

ESO alliances worked because you could have thousands of players in a campaign and they could still join because the map supported a ton of players. If a GW2 map is supposed to be an ESO style campaign, you’d have to list hundreds of them. Active campaigns would fill instantly, making the global pugs guest flood others, which cause them to guest, etc. Thats not WvW. Thats a ffa sPvP server list with an 80 slot cap per side.

But hey if you can get Anet to try a 2000 player cap on EB, sure. Just let me get far enough away before the server go nuclear.

Xillllix.3485:

Mitz.5741:

OR

You can play some EOTM and see how an alliance system works

If you like it GREAT! If you don’t THAT’S ALSO GREAT

Just stop coming up with ideas that would kill WvW and all the reasons we (or at least i ) love it

EotM isn’t an alliance system, it’s just a random melting pot of all the servers together. ESO has done it right for the WvW alliance system and it’s what Anet should base a new system upon.

If it was only 3 Alliances then yes EotM is exactly that. It would be far too big of a community to ever result anything substantial and no one would care if their side won when they were not playing. If ANET did anything other than worlds with launch they would have had to put major work into developing those factions with enough of them to create distinct communities where people could get to know each other and considering half of the players they wanted to draw from where use to other MMO’s where servers were a thing it would have been a hard sell.

Considering they could not even bother to support the communities that came out of their world system (which was the easy way for them development wise) I have absolutely no faith that they could have had time to do any sort of faction system in a way that would have had any longevity for realm pride folks like myself. It would have gotten stale and old very quickly without any investment in getting to know your fellow fighters and enemies alike.

Dawdler.8521:

Community based Teamspeak become impossible to manage. Thus, communities would die (or in this case, never have existed). The communities that have formed is pretty much the only reason for WvW still being a thing after 3 years.

The point of this thread is to speculate what you could have done with a clean slate, not what you can implement after 3+ years. I wrote my post with that in mind.

That being said, if you did implement factions today, community teamspeak would simply be based around those factions instead of the current servers. TS will be as manageable as it has always been, since players are specifically NOT being randomized as in EotM. You did read that part, right?

Dawdler.8521:

Guilds would not be able to organize GvGs and have to put in alot of work just to get the raid on the same map. You would pretty much kill raiding. They would never know what guilds they face either.

Quite the contrary, GvG conditions will improve massively. Just add your dream GvG map to the map pool. Done. You can even GvG against guilds from your own faction if you wish (cause why not).

Heck, add as many GvG maps to the map pool as is necessary. You are bound by nothing.

Dawdler.8521:

One side having stacked nightcappers and its gg, no point in even playing WvW since nothing will change next week.

Stack all you want. Then watch all your precious extra players get stuck in queues across the board as the map pool shrinks. Remember, the map pool accommodates the faction with the fewest players, not the most.

What would suck with this idea is the 30-something players you’re used to playing and working together with on a daily basis, would be RNG map with overflow because of the sheer volume of players, and the idea of “team” would disappear entirely.

Please no.

Jayne.9251:

What would suck with this idea is the 30-something players you’re used to playing and working together with on a daily basis, would be RNG map with overflow because of the sheer volume of players, and the idea of “team” would disappear entirely.

Please no.

It’s not how it would work. Basically the only difference is that it would be a guesting system for WvW, so you could play with friends from the same alliance. Works fine in ESO and doesn’t remove anything related to your home server (called “campaign”). You still have a home server, but when your server is full you can go help a server with population problems while in queue, providing they are on the same alliance. You can only have 1 guesting server per week.

It’s not a random overflow system like EotM. When guesting there is no xp and loot is not as good.

• I doubt how much choice ANet had about creating ‘servers’ in the first place. GW1 was a WAN game; GW2 is MMO — GW1 only had to worry about having more than 12 players in zones that didn’t allow any combat, few sparkly skills or weapons, and no combos; GW2 has 100+ players dealing with all sorts of graphical and combat complexities.
• The point of WvW isn’t GvG — it’s epic realm vs realm. To set that up, we need something that leads towards cohesive alliances that persist from week to week. So far, none of the proposals include a mechanism to catalyze cohesion or incentivize persistence. Each of the top ‘faction’ maps would be bandwagons, as humans always choose least effort for maximum reward.

So even though I like what the OP liked about GW1 and I agree that there are problems with worlds (esp. as they have come to be in GW2 over time), I don’t agree that that this is what WvW needs to move forward. Instead, I think WvW has earned a reward overhaul (similar to that recently enjoyed by PvP) along with increasing benefits for sticking with your team as well as incentives for moving from high pop to low pop so that the matches aren’t nearly identical month after month, year after year.

Xillllix.3485:

but when your server is full you can go help a server with population problems while in queue, providing they are on the same alliance. You can only have 1 guesting server per week.

Oh hahahaha … have you met the GW2 player? Particularly the WvW version?

Anything that can be potentially gamed and abused is discovered and exploited. This particular part of your explanation would result in pages and pages of “rigging” complaints (we already have those now, but this would just enable it for those who like to do that kind of thing).

Jayne.9251:

Xillllix.3485:

but when your server is full you can go help a server with population problems while in queue, providing they are on the same alliance. You can only have 1 guesting server per week.

Oh hahahaha … have you met the GW2 player? Particularly the WvW version?

Anything that can be potentially gamed and abused is discovered and exploited. This particular part of your explanation would result in pages and pages of “rigging” complaints (we already have those now, but this would just enable it for those who like to do that kind of thing).

When all maps are full the gameplay is fair. It’s as simple as that.

How would I handle the Realm vs Realm implementation in a serverless setup:

The formula is similar as previously mentioned:

Start with factions
The number of factions depends on how many players you think you’ll have in the system. Anywhere from 3 to 5 sounds reasonable. Note this number is difficult to change in the future.

Then implement a 4X game mode around it
The mists is not one map but several “territories”.
- Each faction starts at a home city on the borders of it and must fight to expand their territory.
- Territory can be accessed so long as your faction owns a territory adjacent to it. To get to the territory you use the border waypoint in it. This waypoint is only active so long as you hold the adjacent territory. A portal sits at the border to allow walking through.
- Each territory has towers and a keep. Whoever owns the keep owns the territory.
- Players in a territory who lose access to the territory (lose the adjacent territory) get an “overextended” debuff which prevents them from carrying any new supply. Note that the border waypoint also closes.
- The maximum population a server can sustain on a territory is defined by the number of adjacent territories held at a rate of 60 per territory. Players above this cap if an adjacent territory is lost randomly are subjected to the overextended buff, but also gain an “overpopulated” debuff, which reduces their HP by 40%. Players affected by this buff cannot respawn in the territory but can respawn in the adjacent territories their faction owns.

The number of territories and how they’re accessed limits the number of potential players on a map, solving technological problems while allowing ample places where they can take active effect on their faction’s progress (frontline or backline).

Territories with benefits
Some territories will have supply or fortification setups. Supply territories will generate supply lines to the adjacent territories (yakslapper!) where yak caravans drop off significant supplies to the territory keeps on the line in addition to locally acquired supplies. Supply lines will also allow the hiring of NPC mercenary armies which will defend or attack territories adjacent to the line.

Fortification territories have a large wall across them and serve as defense for the faction who owns them.

Stonemist castle
The center territory is stonemist as we know it today. Controlling stonemist attunes it to your faction, allowing access to Underworld and Fissure of Woe (which have similarly strong rewards that they had from GW1).

Gameplay features for this RvR
Players may join factions in any major city and may change factions once a week for a high ingame gold cost which increases exponentially from 1 gold to 100 gold per change. This cost decreases over time depending on how long a player is on a faction (full decrease takes about 6 months). Players’ guilds may also join factions and fight for them with similar costs to change allegiance. A player may only join a guild whose faction allegiance matches their own.

Access to wvw is gained from a PvE or PvP character.

Rewards for the gameplay
- Players gain an increased magic find and crafting bonus rate based on the number of territories their faction owns.
- The faction who owns stonemist gets access to special raids with higher loot.
- Players who participate in the acquisition or defense of territory get rewards similar to what our rankup rewards are today.
- Players may use PvE acquired equipment . Gear and rewards acquired would go to the account wallet. Items acquired can be carried by pvp characters but not used by them.

-Assuming we want something like Eotm is completely stupid. Eotm is trash that just bumps 9 random servers together without any consideration of population, timezone or WvW activity . A giant Eotm is DEFINITLY NOT what I’m suggesting

-Assuming that the idea of a giant merger would not also imply a rework of population caps and server capabilities/technology is also stupid. OFC I’m NOT suggesting we all kittening pile up in the current EB and have 5h long queues.

However HoT will release four new BIG borderlands (If you played the stress test you know how big they are and how such size will already change the game). So we’d already have a bigger playground from the start, plus if you consider the creation of additional overflow maps to prevent queues (it is a point-based gamemode after all not a conquest gamemode) I really don’t see how that could be a problem.

I understand you guys are having a good time our your server and Tier2 is probably a very fun WvW experience. But please try to understand that this is not what a majority of the other servers are experiencing.

You are afraid that your community will get destroyed? Just because it could change form? How weak is it if something as simple as that can topple it? To stay on the piken square exemple; instead of being the piken square community you’ll become the piken square alliance within the red faction.
You’ll just have to coordinate with a little more ppl. Big woop.
Plus most of you top dogs are already filling time slots on a spreadsheet somewhere to play WvW at specific times; how is a system that would allow everyone to do it would be worse than the one you already have?

I’m really happy for you guys who actually have a good WvW experience. And disagreeing on the subject is your right. But please don’t label good ideas as stupid just because your cozy “way of life” would somehow the threatened by some changes.

That is just ridiculous.

If wvw was more of a chose a side type of game it would have its own build in wvw servers such as EotM has with its OF maps but more hard lock. So we would still have servers and still have the same problems as we do now. I am still of the strong belief that unless you comply lock down your game (having its own host of problems that come with that) your going to run into pop and time zone problems in all RvR games.

The only true fix is to have 3 sets or 2 set or 4 set (how ever you want to split up the rvr) of super world that lets every one play on a few maps but i am not sure if this tech exists as things stand. Though you would still have odd servers out forever in a fight its just a human thing that is not something that tech or organization can fix.

Xillllix.3485:

Jayne.9251:

Xillllix.3485:

but when your server is full you can go help a server with population problems while in queue, providing they are on the same alliance. You can only have 1 guesting server per week.

Oh hahahaha … have you met the GW2 player? Particularly the WvW version?

Anything that can be potentially gamed and abused is discovered and exploited. This particular part of your explanation would result in pages and pages of “rigging” complaints (we already have those now, but this would just enable it for those who like to do that kind of thing).

When all maps are full the gameplay is fair. It’s as simple as that.

Doesn’t address your statement that if map is full you can jump to another server. That would be abused. You know that.

Am i the only one that thinks we turned a “What if” thread into a debate thread???

Anyway, a lot of these ideas require either: LOTS and LOTS of Monitoring

OR Godly server capability( that can live through 100v100v100 blob fights that ARE going to happen if 27 servers are suddenly reduced to 3)

Maybe its just me,but i love WvW as it is right now and would’nt change it at all (except for the rewards…WvW just isn’t a decent way to get money )

Hmm tough one. Probably three factions each with their own colour and players can choose which colour, or change colours once every few months. Players can only join guilds that belong to the same faction/colour, which I kind of hate, but if you can change colours you can always join your friends.

But the kicker is because the population can vary, that would mean instanced maps. Which means all that hard work you did the night before, might not even exist the next day. Instances would have to be opened and closed to balance populations. Which could mean certain colours will end up with terrible queues if too many people stacked on one colour. It also means a completely new scoring system.

It wouldn’t be the WvW we know, better or worse? No idea. But at least you’d always have players to play against. It would suck having to leave you guild to colour swap though. I think they were trying to go this way with EoTM, but it doesn’t seem to have worked out too well. I lean towards population imbalances being the biggest issue. Which I’m sure lots of people would fight me on, but if you know your outnumbered why would you bother to fight the other zergs?

MY MIND NEVER STOPS THINKING AND THATS HOW I WRITE.
SO READ THIS AND IF YOU DON"T UNDERSTAND JUST FORGET IT.
—————————————————————————
This topic is so funny.
Have you guys ever thought of the consequences if we didn’t had servers when gw2 started.
Because atm all 51 servers can have roughly 80 people per map active.
Thats 16320 players.
Without a Server system you would have either 3 factions and ~5440 Players each Side.

Only thing i never understanded is why GUILDS can hold 500 people.
And 1 server can only have 320people playing at the same time across 4 maps.
So 1 guild can in theory have 4 maps full and still 180 people in queue.

=======
So if Anet didn’t made servers.
They should had made Guilds be the faction.
and since Guilds can have 500 people.
500 people is a Nice size for a faction.

but 500 people is to small to fill 4 maps 24/7
Because MATH says 320people * 24hour = 7680 Manhours.
7680 Manhours/ 500 people =15,36 Hours per player.
So for a 500 man guild to have all maps full 24/7
You need every player to play WvW 15hours and 22Minutes.

=======

So i believe that if we didn’t had servers we would have had guilds.
Guilds would be more populated.
Maps would have to be Changed Maybe only 1 map per 3 Guilds fighting on it.
Player size have to be bigger per map.
There would be more Guilds then there are servers.
So match making would have to be differend.
mmmm ill stop here i can go on and on and on.

Would you have servers anyway? (Just for WvW)
-Not sure if I’d cut down the server numbers. Seems like T8-T7 are dead and they could roll with 10-12 servers today if they wanted. I do like the style though and I remember at launch always getting excited to fight someone new and guilds. I hate EOTM mainly due to I’m a fan of community, which is long lost these days with the transfer craze. I think server identity was the cool think about this game because you got to go out in wvw and represent.

Would you have some sort of system based on guilds? Alliances?
-I think guilds for hire or bidding on would be an awesome idea. Pugs, server guilds, roamers could donate to a server pot. Thursday night they submit a vote to an NPC to what guilds will be hired to help the server that week based on the bidding war. Mercenaries for hire In a sense you could solve coverage problems and help those struggling servers. Though I could see gold being an issue for the poor unpopulated servers. But kinda like a country rising who is broke as hell. Might give the game a dynamic aspect but a T1 guild on ET might really suck, so just an idea.

Would you still have 3 way battles, or something else?
-I don’t think wvw could handle anymore lag so 3 way battles seem like where we are stuck. I think 3 way server fights give gvg oriented guilds more opportunity though so they can find more guilds to fight.

Would you have fixed match ups, or dynamically generate matches as needed?
-Going back to my hiring guild idea, dynamically generated matches based on hired guilds roster size. I also think the more serious guilds would like the idea because more variety of guilds to fight gvg wise based on what server hires or bids on them for the week.

Anyway, just a thought. It just seems guilds, thus the title guild wars, could become that dominate guild in the game. I also think it could bring those hard core guilds back to the game. Rebuilding their great name again and getting players motivated again to build their server name up again.

Personally, I’d prefer a more open-world-sandbox, kinda like EVE Online.

For example:

- Have a world map composed of tiles. Each tile is an instance. There are several different types of tiles available, with different terrain.
Each tile can have up to 8 exits along its edge, to take you to the next tile.
eg. 9×9 map:
ABC
DEF
GHI

- To travel from tile A to tile C, you’ll have to walk all the way across tile B. However, if tile B is full, then you can either queue for B, or skip it and go directly to C, D,E, or F.

- In each tile are a variety of keeps, towers, camps, and other objectives.

- Each guild is its own faction. Guilds can ally together to form alliances.

- Every guild/alliance is just out to expand its territory and defeat its enemies. There are rewards associated with holding objectives and entire tiles.

- Just like EVE, to move supplies, equipment, siege, anything around, you have to physically carry or escort a yak across the map, allowing enemies to come and steal/destroy your stuff if they intercept you.

- PUG players can list themselves on a marketplace to be hired as mercenaries, or they can simply enter the maps solo/in a party and try to do bandit raids on yaks etc.

- If your guild/alliance holds some objectives in a tile, you can teleport into the tile and spawn along any edge.

- If you don’t hold any objectives anywhere, you can only spawn along the outer edge of the entire map.

- ANet can add more tiles to accomodate more players. The size of the map is adjusted to fit the game’s population.

- There is no reset, the match continues. However, if one alliance has taken all/most of the tiles, ANet can declare a winner and reset.

So yeah, basically I wanted fantasy EVE Online, with GW2 combat. (Well, ideally, Dark Souls combat :P)

There are many ways to implement a non server based wvw environment, one of the easiest methods would be to make it like castle wars or stealing creations mini games from that old runescape game. Like you pick a team to play on go to the waiting area when a match is full it is full and the game starts/ or it starts at a set time once there is enough players for a match if a player leaves the match another player can join that current match to keep it balanced. The latter even allowed for GvG maps where guilds formed up on opposing teams. Yes there are many other ways to do so that add much more to the gameplay, but even a simple system like this allows for players to have different players to play with and against at their choosing ( not decided for them) to prevent stale gameplay.

Although in this scenario, there are servers, but players are not locked into them and can play on opposing teams on the same server. You only switch servers to get into different matches, are not locked into playing on one.

Rieselle.5079:

Personally, I’d prefer a more open-world-sandbox, kinda like EVE Online.

For example:

- Have a world map composed of tiles. Each tile is an instance. There are several different types of tiles available, with different terrain.
Each tile can have up to 8 exits along its edge, to take you to the next tile.
eg. 9×9 map:
ABC
DEF
GHI

- To travel from tile A to tile C, you’ll have to walk all the way across tile B. However, if tile B is full, then you can either queue for B, or skip it and go directly to C, D,E, or F.

- In each tile are a variety of keeps, towers, camps, and other objectives.

- Each guild is its own faction. Guilds can ally together to form alliances.

- Every guild/alliance is just out to expand its territory and defeat its enemies. There are rewards associated with holding objectives and entire tiles.

- Just like EVE, to move supplies, equipment, siege, anything around, you have to physically carry or escort a yak across the map, allowing enemies to come and steal/destroy your stuff if they intercept you.

- PUG players can list themselves on a marketplace to be hired as mercenaries, or they can simply enter the maps solo/in a party and try to do bandit raids on yaks etc.

- If your guild/alliance holds some objectives in a tile, you can teleport into the tile and spawn along any edge.

- If you don’t hold any objectives anywhere, you can only spawn along the outer edge of the entire map.

- ANet can add more tiles to accomodate more players. The size of the map is adjusted to fit the game’s population.

- There is no reset, the match continues. However, if one alliance has taken all/most of the tiles, ANet can declare a winner and reset.

So yeah, basically I wanted fantasy EVE Online, with GW2 combat. (Well, ideally, Dark Souls combat :P)

Thats actually not such a bad idea. If we consider GW2 limitations and try to translate WvW directly to your idea, I would however do this:

- an 10×10 grid for a near 1:1 duplicate of current map counts.
- no freeform “alliances” between guilds, forget about that
- 8 servers form a faction (some EU servers bite the dust). These 8 are friendly to each other and share similar colors, but not names (ie you still see other friendly alliance tags as “servername rank”)
- 3 factions duke it out in the matchup.
- a matchup would last longer than now (2 weeks? 3?).
- when a matchup ends, alliances are shuffled per individual perfomance into 3 new factions to keep them fairly balanced.

This should in theory allow everyone to share the same battlefield while maintaining server size communities (with an option for even bigger ones) and rivalry against other servers in a matchup.

it isnt a simple issue to design wvw due to the huge populaton and gw2 doesn’t support large scale fight due to a huge impact to game performance. furthermore, it is quite impossible to control the population. while it is possible to guide the population into certain direction but it will never be perfect.

if the system is designed in one way, the players will find some ways to exploit it to gain advantage. we can never have nice things because of that and thus a lot of systems are designed to restrict players forcefully in some ways. however, this become even more complicated when you try to do a population balance.

one way is to make players to make a choice of queuing map or to go to a slightly emptier group. but players will then complain you can increase the cap or “add” new map which then become similar to EOTM which people complain again yet again.

another way is to adapt the old school approach of castle siege war but castle siege war are restricted by timing which again is not what WvW wanted to be. WvW meant to be open all day long, similar to Aika Online of nation raiding at any timing but much less hardcore than that.

all kind of solutions will never be able to please any one.

the best solution is most likely to adapt what most MMORPG adapted, region restrictions.

SkyShroud.2865:

it isnt a simple issue to design wvw due to the huge populaton and gw2 doesn’t support large scale fight due to a huge impact to game performance. furthermore, it is quite impossible to control the population. while it is possible to guide the population into certain direction but it will never be perfect.

if the system is designed in one way, the players will find some ways to exploit it to gain advantage. we can never have nice things because of that and thus a lot of systems are designed to restrict players forcefully in some ways. how, this become even more complicated when you try to do a population balance.

one way is to make players to make a choice of queuing map or to go to a slightly emptier group. but players will then complain you can increase the cap or “add” new map which then become similar to EOTM which people complain again yet again.

all kind of solutions will never be able to please any one.

the best solution is most likely to adapt what most MMORPG adapted, region restrictions.

EoTM is just the testing grounds for what they planned on implementing in wvw, not an additional in play map. ( although it should just be burned with fire)Adding an actual in play map that adds to the ppt would be like adding more EBGs to choose from at once in wvw instead. Adding more EBG’s =\= EoTM. Region restrictions do nothing to resolve the different times that people work and play in the same countries. In the US ,for example, when the east coast is going to sleep is when the west coast is getting home from work. MANY players work night jobs and different shifts. So region locking really would not do much except prevent friends/ couples/ families from playing together when out of town. One of the guilds I am in is primarily active military members, where they can play with their friends and family while stationed abroad and is the only way they can actually spend time together. Having some of the guild stationed in Qatar, while others on base in Texas and others in Okinawa, it is great that they can actually come on here and spend time with their families no matter where they are. GW2 would ALSO get bad press for then " not being military friendly" in addition to losing the players. Games are all many military can do in their free time.

The idea that you have to sacrifice core basic game mechanics of " being able to play with the people you enjoy playing with" is not what many consider “acceptable state of the game”.
Players playing on different servers than dead ones or not having wvw connected to servers is far less of a deal breaker than splitting up families, guilds and friends. It IS a deal breaker for players not to be able to play the game with those they care about. That just starts the chain reaction of " well we can’t play GW2 anymore so we are playing this other game want to join ?" Until everyone has moved on eventually.

lil devils x.6071:

SkyShroud.2865:

it isnt a simple issue to design wvw due to the huge populaton and gw2 doesn’t support large scale fight due to a huge impact to game performance. furthermore, it is quite impossible to control the population. while it is possible to guide the population into certain direction but it will never be perfect.

if the system is designed in one way, the players will find some ways to exploit it to gain advantage. we can never have nice things because of that and thus a lot of systems are designed to restrict players forcefully in some ways. how, this become even more complicated when you try to do a population balance.

one way is to make players to make a choice of queuing map or to go to a slightly emptier group. but players will then complain you can increase the cap or “add” new map which then become similar to EOTM which people complain again yet again.

all kind of solutions will never be able to please any one.

the best solution is most likely to adapt what most MMORPG adapted, region restrictions.

EoTM is just the testing grounds for what they planned on implementing in wvw, not an additional in play map. ( although it should just be burned with fire)Adding an actual in play map that adds to the ppt would be like adding more EBGs to choose from at once in wvw instead. Adding more EBG’s =\= EoTM. Region restrictions do nothing to resolve the different times that people work and play in the same countries. In the US ,for example, when the east coast is going to sleep is when the west coast is getting home from work. MANY players work night jobs and different shifts. So region locking really would not do much except prevent friends/ couples/ families from playing together when out of town. One of the guilds I am in is primarily active military members, where they can play with their friends and family while stationed abroad and is the only way they can actually spend time together. Having some of the guild stationed in Qatar, while others on base in Texas and others in Okinawa, it is great that they can actually come on here and spend time with their families no matter where they are. GW2 would ALSO get bad press for then " not being military friendly" in addition to losing the players. Games are all many military can do in their free time.

The idea that you have to sacrifice core basic game mechanics of " being able to play with the people you enjoy playing with" is not what many consider “acceptable state of the game”.
Players playing on different servers than dead ones or not having wvw connected to servers is far less of a deal breaker than splitting up families, guilds and friends. It IS a deal breaker for players not to be able to play the game with those they care about. That just starts the chain reaction of " well we can’t play GW2 anymore so we are playing this game want to join ?" Until everyone has moved on eventually.

you have taken for granted that there are enough players to handle additional maps in off hours when compared to the peak hours.

region locking minimize timezone related issue by separating the primary timezone players. this population imbalance is caused by the primary timezone players, not the graveyard employees. looking at EU server which compose mainly of EU players, their matchup has more varieties than comparing to NA because they have lesser population imbalance issue caused by the different primary timezone players. well, even locking region is not a solution as it will cause more drama now. to begin with, there should have been a region server for the east side of the world.

the population imbalance has gone too far for any “solution” to work effectively. it is now just merely a matter of cutting fats and redistributing the population evenly which is what anet is doing now.

your complains of wanting your one or few sisters to join your server will never matter. naturally, you can get your that sister(s) to make support tickets for a transfer, provided that sister of your’s is blood related. making any further changes to the population system will just lead to players exploiting it to stack any server even further and that will be counter productive to the population balancing

SkyShroud.2865:

lil devils x.6071:

SkyShroud.2865:

snip

That just starts the chain reaction of " well we can’t play GW2 anymore so we are playing this game want to join ?" Until everyone has moved on eventually.

you have taken for granted that there are enough players to handle additional maps in off hours when compared to the peak hours.

region locking minimize timezone related issue by separating the primary timezone players. this population imbalance is caused by the primary timezone players, not the graveyard employees. looking at EU server which compose mainly of EU players, their matchup has more varieties than comparing to NA because they have lesser population imbalance issue caused by the different primary timezone players. well, even locking region is not a solution as it will cause more drama now. to begin with, there should have been a region server for the east side of the world.

the population imbalance has gone too far for any “solution” to work effectively. it is now just merely a matter of cutting fats and redistributing the population evenly which is what anet is doing now.

your complains of wanting your one or few sisters to join your server will never matter. naturally, you can get your that sister(s) to make support tickets for a transfer, provided that sister of your’s is blood related. making any further changes to the population system will just lead to players exploiting it to stack any server even further and that will be counter productive to the population balancing

No, if you have actually been reading the forums a bit, you would understand that off hours and prime has already been addressed. You remove ALL servers that do not have 24/7 coverage, add more EBG’s in play depending on the number of players currently playing solving que issues and balance issues in one blow, When ALL servers in a matchup reach a certain number in que calculating the total population of all maps, then an additional EBG comes into play for a set amount of time players can play on that map just as they would EBG during that amount of time. You can have maps come into play and disappear as needed to accommodate ques. If one server is much more heavily stacked than the others in the matchup, they will have much higher ques unless the other servers in their matchup get more numbers on keeping it balanced at all times.

I disagree, It hasn’t gone too far at all for a solution to work well, they just have to think their solutions through a bit more rather than make things worse. No, players should not have to put in support tickets to play with their family and friends, killing word of mouth recruitment for the game is not the way to ensure it’s longevity. Most of the players in wvw play on full servers now, so most of the players in wvw cannot invite friends, family, co workers, neighbors to come play with them. It isn’t just about my sister and her husband, or my guilds, or the 200 people who came to my birthday party, it is about ALL of the players that are now on full servers who can no longer even advertise the game to people to come play with them.

Removing all servers that do not have 24/7 coverage and making it so more players can play at once by adding more maps as needed solves most of the problems right there. However, ONE thing it doe snot solve is STALE game play over time playing the same people over and over gets boring.

The only way to actually have variety long term is to disconnect wvw from servers and allow players to play with different players of their choosing and against different players every match if they so choose. There is a variety of successful ways to accomplish that, they would just have to choose the best method to fit the direction they wish to go with it. Like I said earlier, you could even allow for gvg maps in that system and only use servers as hubs for the different wvw matches going on at once and change servers at will to play with and against who you wish ( similar to the system used in old runescape for castle wars and stealing creation). People go into a portal and choose their team, once it has enough players the match starts, when one player leaves the match another can take their place to make sure all teams stay even. Even that is a very simple system that could be modified and implemented in a variety of ways to make it work.

I think you are under the false impression that players cannot still move to T1 and that players will move off of full servers.. they will just start buying accounts to get there instead of transferring and once players find out how much their accounts are worth they will be selling them instead turning full servers into gold mines where accounts never leave just get new owners like in other games.

again, based on your logic, you are adapting eotm way of doing things.

SkyShroud.2865:

again, based on your logic, you are adapting eotm way of doing things.

No, EoTM is people mashed up against their will, no choice of who they play with unless they take forever to taxi people in, the score does not count, Linear, gimmicky PVE choke pointed K training place where you are more likely to die falling off of something than die from players. No, that is not the same as an actual battle field map without all the gimmicks, choke points and cliffs, where you choose who you play with, can even choose to have it closed off to public to gvg, and actually prevents players from entering the other maps unless it is balanced as the system I suggested.

The scores should still count and there should be actual personal player rewards for winning.

is similar based on your logic, the only different is the map contents and the rewards that come with it

ebg is created as and when need
ebg upgrade therefore will not become persistent as it is a temporary ebg
ppl in queue are being sent to that specific ebg, separating from the ebg they want to go to so they can play with their guild therefore they have to click and click to enter the same ebg
ppl r restricted to one map which is ebg like how eotm is restricted to one map.

ur solution in a nutshell include flooding a few servers with players to create non-persistent ebg when need which players can find themselves separated from their guilds and restrict guilds from jumping to other BL when as they like due to the queue.

a lot of your suggestions are about your immediate surroundings, nothing really about the heavily populated timezone.

lil devils x.6071:

SkyShroud.2865:

again, based on your logic, you are adapting eotm way of doing things.

No, EoTM is people mashed up against their will, no choice of who they play with unless they take forever to taxi people in, the score does not count, Linear, gimmicky PVE choke pointed K training place where you are more likely to die falling off of something than die from players. No, that is not the same as an actual battle field map without all the gimmicks, choke points and cliffs, where you choose who you play with, can even choose to have it closed off to public to gvg, and actually prevents players from entering the other maps unless it is balanced as the system I suggested.

The scores should still count and there should be actual personal player rewards for winning.

You’re assuming people will behave like adults. Which, historically on GW2, they aren’t capable of. This will lead to a whole series of screechy threads about elitism and that kid won’t give me my ball back, blah blah blah.

Rieselle.5079:

GW1 didn’t have separate servers. Coming from games like WoW, where I had to choose between different groups of friends spread out on different servers, GW1 felt wonderful and revolutionary. Lack of servers is one of the reasons I loved GW1.

When GW2 came around, and we had servers again, I felt that was a huge step back. It’s mostly fixed now with Megaserver, but WvW is left with this legacy and its associated problems.

Let’s pretend that GW2 had the “One Server” technology from GW1, right from the beginning.
YOU are the WvW Lead Designer at ANet. How would you design WvW in a “One server” game?

Would you have servers anyway? (Just for WvW)
Would you have some sort of system based on guilds? Alliances?
Would you still have 3 way battles, or something else?
Would you have fixed matchups, or dynamically generate matches as needed?
etc.

I’m interested in these ideas, to either benefit GW3, “GW2 in a distant future” or other competing upcoming MMOs. And because I’m just curious.

Servers started because even in PvE, there was only so many people that could join on one map. Now that they rolled out the PvE -megaserver, the only 2 things that are tied to server are PvP and WvW.

I think first – divorce WvW/PvP from PvE, like they had in GW1 – they had PvP only toons or ones that can do both.

SkyShroud.2865:

is similar based on your logic, the only different is the map contents and the rewards that come with it

ebg is created as and when need
ebg upgrade therefore will not become persistent as it is a temporary ebg
ppl in queue are being sent to that specific ebg, separating from the ebg they want to go to so they can play with their guild therefore they have to click and click to enter the same ebg
ppl r restricted to one map which is ebg like how eotm is restricted to one map.

ur solution in a nutshell include flooding a few servers with players to create non-persistent ebg when need which players can find themselves separated from their guilds and restrict guilds from jumping to other BL when as they like due to the queue.

a lot of your suggestions are about your immediate surroundings, nothing really about the heavily populated timezone.

1) ONLY if you keep wvw server based would you need to create more than one EBG in play at once in same match, and no, players would not be forced to go there if in que, it would just become available and hurt their team if no one does, as the other teams surely will take advantage of using the additional map once it is available. It would just alert all players in wvw or que that the new map is available. Now at the higher tiers, you frequently do not hold things for long even after they are fully upgraded due to the 2vs 1 to take it as it should be. The whole point of having 3 servers in a battle is if one becomes too powerful the two lesser servers are supposed to keep them in check. I personally love the 2 vs 1 all day long and think that makes for the best gameplay the game has to offer. The best fights are when all your walls are down on the keep, all your siege is dead, both enemy serves have a map que in your keep with an Anet Dev sitting next to a treb they built inside your own keep to treb you with and you STILL wind up killing them all, spiking a dev, and pushing them out. Those are the best days ever. That way if you win you earned it, if you lose you learn from it.

2) You are not restricted to one map, the only limitation is working with the other guilds on your team to make sure you coordinate efforts and shift populations accordingly to cover your bases. As long a you have all commanders on ccoms with each other, that should not be a problem and you can switch maps as needed. On JQ with all maps que, we still switch maps as needed by working with other commanders to make it happen. We even hop maps on reset night at times LOL It is just a matter of being organized and working as team.

Personally I would prefer they unhook wvw from severs instead though, as that is the only way I have seen thus far that will allow for all the problems to be resolved at once. Coverage wars, balance, players playing with family and friends, gvg, and variety to prevent stale game play are all easily solved though that method. You can still have your server you play on and can play on any of 3 teams per server, or you can go play on any of 3 teams on another sever if your server is not busy at the time you come in to play at will. Servers exist, they are just not your wvw team anymore unless you want to make it so via creating a guild for that. It would actually be guild wars in that case rather than server coverage wars. Players are much more dedicated to their guilds than their servers anyhow.

a lot of problems will be solved if we abolish servers.

make it instance based like EOTM so that off peak hours can still have respectable numbers on all sides, and kitten , balance the numbers in eotm!

with regards to server identity, you can still do it by creating like say 3 races/organizations/countries etc something like helbreath’s elonia vs aresden

Zackie.8923:

a lot of problems will be solved if we abolish servers.

make it instance based like EOTM so that off peak hours can still have respectable numbers on all sides, and kitten , balance the numbers in eotm!

with regards to server identity, you can still do it by creating like say 3 races/organizations/countries etc something like helbreath’s elonia vs aresden

And you’d still introduce 3 new problems for every problem you solved.

In regards to server identity, its not the identity thats the most important part. Its the community around that identity. Today, we have server size communities. But they arent really that big, are they? No, because WvW player counts are comparably few on the server. In the middle of primetime, our TS could have as few as 40 peeps in the pug channels. Thats for all borders, fighting T1 servers.

Good samaritans host these communities. Anet doesnt care, they dont host communities. They shut down the WvW matchup forum. Server pride is not a thing for them, so if EoTM would become baseline, these good samaritans would have to host 500+ pug players. And thats the low end. Our TS also has like 50 guild channels and various others, which means that guilds can join each others channels and be a true community. With all servers smashed together we are talking a TS so big you could see 5,000+ players on it. Good luck managing that. Anet could do it easily, with their own servers… But as I said, they arent going to.

The end result would be that guilds go back to their own TS and pugs have to read what the commander write in say, like how they commanded in the medieval times.

Dawdler.8521:

Zackie.8923:

a lot of problems will be solved if we abolish servers.

make it instance based like EOTM so that off peak hours can still have respectable numbers on all sides, and kitten , balance the numbers in eotm!

with regards to server identity, you can still do it by creating like say 3 races/organizations/countries etc something like helbreath’s elonia vs aresden

And you’d still introduce 3 new problems for every problem you solved.

In regards to server identity, its not the identity thats the most important part. Its the community around that identity. Today, we have server size communities. But they arent really that big, are they? No, because WvW player counts are comparably few on the server. In the middle of primetime, our TS could have as few as 40 peeps in the pug channels. Thats for all borders, fighting T1 servers.

Good samaritans host these communities. Anet doesnt care, they dont host communities. They shut down the WvW matchup forum. Server pride is not a thing for them, so if EoTM would become baseline, these good samaritans would have to host 500+ pug players. And thats the low end. Our TS also has like 50 guild channels and various others, which means that guilds can join each others channels and be a true community. With all servers smashed together we are talking a TS so big you could see 5,000+ players on it. Good luck managing that. Anet could do it easily, with their own servers… But as I said, they arent going to.

The end result would be that guilds go back to their own TS and pugs have to read what the commander write in say, like how they commanded in the medieval times.

Please state the 3 new problems for each problem i solved

also not everyone uses TS or is involved in your “communities”

Many people are still thriving in eotm without the need for TS and i must say that the fights in EOTM are much more fun than in TS “guild groups style”.

Zackie.8923:

Please state the 3 new problems for each problem i solved

I cannot. You only said that it would solve alot of problems. You didnt actually solve any problems with WvW in your post.

also not everyone uses TS or is involved in your “communities”

Then they are not really part of the TS community so they wont care either way.

Many people are still thriving in eotm without the need for TS and i must say that the fights in EOTM are much more fun than in TS “guild groups style”.

Few WvW players think that EoTM is real WvW.

If you want to give WvW players EoTM, thanks but no thanks. You can keep it.

Dawdler.8521:

Zackie.8923:

Please state the 3 new problems for each problem i solved

I cannot. You only said that it would solve alot of problems. You didnt actually solve any problems with WvW in your post.

also not everyone uses TS or is involved in your “communities”

Then they are not really part of the TS community so they wont care either way.

Many people are still thriving in eotm without the need for TS and i must say that the fights in EOTM are much more fun than in TS “guild groups style”.

Few WvW players think that EoTM is real WvW.

If you want to give WvW players EoTM, thanks but no thanks. You can keep it.

Main problem that my solution solves, 24h coverage issues. now state the 3 problems it will lead to.

oh look, another holier than thou EOTM is not wvw argument.

I am just thankful that ANET is gearing the new map to be EOTM style. There were right to not listen to people like you.

Zackie.8923:

Main problem that my solution solves, 24h coverage issues. now state the 3 problems it will lead to.

And you only have to kill WvW for it, what a deal. Its like taking a hamburger and stating that the solution to make it bread is to remove the meat. I get that. You like bread. But its no longer a hamburger. I like hamburgers. But anyway, sure, I can state problems with your “solution”.

- It does nothing for 24h coverage. More players doesnt automatically mean coverage. Sides will still stack nightcappers to win.

- “balance the numbers in eotm!” you say? How? If you want to balance it, I assume you see it as a problem too.

- Even if we assume that the 3 sides are originally created equal, how do you plan on balancing the EoTM matchup in the long term to avoid a complete stalemate in the scenario of one side having all the nightcappers and winning constantly? With WvW, this ensures that they only meet the 2 servers that are performing second and third best. With EoTM, this could mean that we see an SFR vs Elona vs Underworld matchup every week.

Zackie.8923:

a lot of problems will be solved if we abolish servers.

make it instance based like EOTM so that off peak hours can still have respectable numbers on all sides, and kitten , balance the numbers in eotm!

with regards to server identity, you can still do it by creating like say 3 races/organizations/countries etc something like helbreath’s elonia vs aresden

Well, then you would lose most or all of your hardcore WvW players. You would also end up with all maps being like EotM which right now people use to: 1. increase their Karma. 2. Increase their WvW rank w/o having to deal with true WvW players. 3. leveling up a new toon. 4. Sometimes all 3.

Sorry, but I think servers are here to stay. EotM is an accident waiting to happen most times.

Yeah I really like the idea of picking a side to choose from, and maybe each team could have some advantages and disadvantages, like say red team can have more overall members but seige takes more supply, or maybe blue gets a bonus for holding all the towers near water and stuff. These are just dumb examples but I’m sure A-net could come up with some cool stuff.

WvW as a whole could be given more incentive, maybe it would have its own story that you work through as you rank up and take objectives, nothing too extreme but something a bit more enticing than “We’re all fighting in the mists, come join!” Hell, you could even just have the mist be an extension of the current story, each Order is practicing in order to better take down the dragons and you choose which one to fight for (maybe make this separate from the storyline so guilds can stay together)

Fun events thrown in would be great, 1 thing I love about my Guild is our main officer comes up with weird events all the time, just last night we ran the iRobot event (his idea) where all players other than the mesmers were stuck at walking speed, so we had to coordinate portals well and move from tower to tower together. Was a lot of fun, and made me think that if everyone followed these rules for a night, or a few days it would break up the blobbing and general tedium. =

Dr Gonzo.6259:

Yeah I really like the idea of picking a side to choose from, and maybe each team could have some advantages and disadvantages, like say red team can have more overall members but seige takes more supply, or maybe blue gets a bonus for holding all the towers near water and stuff. These are just dumb examples but I’m sure A-net could come up with some cool stuff.

WvW as a whole could be given more incentive, maybe it would have its own story that you work through as you rank up and take objectives, nothing too extreme but something a bit more enticing than “We’re all fighting in the mists, come join!” Hell, you could even just have the mist be an extension of the current story, each Order is practicing in order to better take down the dragons and you choose which one to fight for (maybe make this separate from the storyline so guilds can stay together)

Fun events thrown in would be great, 1 thing I love about my Guild is our main officer comes up with weird events all the time, just last night we ran the iRobot event (his idea) where all players other than the mesmers were stuck at walking speed, so we had to coordinate portals well and move from tower to tower together. Was a lot of fun, and made me think that if everyone followed these rules for a night, or a few days it would break up the blobbing and general tedium. =

What incentive does this give the hardcore WvW player? None. It gives newbies an incentive but not the current population of WvW players. This is the crux of the whole thing. 1. They need to attract new players to WvW. 2. They need to keep most of the current population of WvW players. 3. They need to have LESS PvE events in WvW as most hardcore WvW players complain about that fact. If they wanted to do PvE they would do PvE. Also, many WvW do not PvP all the time either. So that means there are 3 distinct game modes in GW2.

Actually, your idea would actually promote blobbing, not get rid of it. Why do I say that. All one needs to do is look at EotM – it is blob heaven and random blob heaven. Most of the Commanders in EotM know very little WvW strategy and WvW would end up being a more massive k-train than it already is.