Guild Wars 2

Fozzik.1742:

Kerithlan.1659:

I was in favor of the ratings reset and still am. I am not in favor of oversimplifying the system to the point that it becomes much more problematic than the current environment is.

Resetting the system just delays the inevitable, unless you change the system. After a reset, a few months later you are in the same situation of heavy stagnation. Maybe individual servers’ positions would be shifted from where they are now, but it would be just as bad, and just as stuck.

Is this really what people want? To play the same two servers every week forever? I’d much rather have variety, even if there are some unbalanced matches. Sometimes they would go your way, sometimes not…much more fun and requires effort on the part of players, rather than a guaranteed, predictable outcome every week for most servers leading to players getting bored or frustrated and no longer logging in.

As of right now I would be perfectly happy facing off against Blackgate and Kaineng forever if I had to, even considering that I’m on the smaller server. I like both of our opponents, and I like FA and SoS too. I’m in a good spot right now in terms of potential match-ups.

I understand that not all players are, and I agree that the math should be tweaked. I touched on that slightly before, but to recap I believe that the exponential requirements dictating ratio gains/losses should be toned down week to week as right now it’s a bit out of wack. SF should have moved up by now because HoD should have lost more rating more quickly and SF should have gained more rating more rapidly.

I’m not against rapid rating switches if they’re deserved, but I am against borderline random switches. Tiers shouldn’t switch because, for example, a server doesn’t OCD over the score and half of the crew sleeps for a week (which would happen in the proposed system). Server performance is more important than server score — yes, they’re separate things. Glicko tracks consistency and performance.

Kerithlan.1659:

I’d point to the fact that Kaineng only spent one week in each tier under the glicko system as counter-evidence to the claim that they’d have risen any faster under the system you’re proposing. In fact, your system does not allow for potential shifts to take place where Kaineng would have been able to skip tiers

That is correct, my system would not have allowed them to skip tiers, it also would not have kept them stuck in a tier so long that when the math finally unglued enough to allow them to move they ended up jumping tiers.

In simple words, my system would have noticed the gain, and responded faster to the trend, and awarded them accordingly and moved them up the very week they started winning, saving everyone time and limiting the amount of unbalanced matches.

Ergo, a simple system it is a better system to spot rising stars, and falling ones.

It also keeps evenly matched people rotating around facing roughly the same six equally powered worlds, as opposed to being stuck. Yes, I understand that some people are scared shirtless to step out of some comfort zone, but in what is supposed to be a competitive war game, the last place anyone should be is in a comfort zone.

Swamurabi.7890:

THE BAD:

It will end up that all tiers have the same tactic….SMASH RED
Green wants to wipe red twice as fast as they wipe blue
Blue wants to wipe red as much as they get wiped by green
Red will just try to hold on but won’t be able to match up.

The matches will probably be over before the Oceanics get to play in their prime time.

Look, criticism from someone that understands what I said! Thanks. It is a valid point. It should be fixed by making D the difference from the average score in the matchup instead of the opposite-ranked server, but I’ll have to sleep on it.

Ungood.3054:

Kerithlan.1659:

I’d point to the fact that Kaineng only spent one week in each tier under the glicko system as counter-evidence to the claim that they’d have risen any faster under the system you’re proposing. In fact, your system does not allow for potential shifts to take place where Kaineng would have been able to skip tiers

That is correct, my system would not have allowed them to skip tiers, it also would not have kept them stuck in a tier so long that when the math finally unglued enough to allow them to move they ended up jumping tiers.

In simple words, my system would have noticed the gain, and responded faster to the trend, and awarded them accordingly and moved them up the very week they started winning, saving everyone time and limiting the amount of unbalanced matches.

Ergo, a simple system it is a better system to spot rising stars, and falling ones.

It also keeps evenly matched people rotating around facing roughly the same six equally powered worlds, as opposed to being stuck. Yes, I understand that some people are scared shirtless to step out of some comfort zone, but in is supposed to be a competitive war game, the last place anyone should be is in a comfort zone.

Kaineng never jumped tiers. Your system would have denied them that opportunity were it to arise. The current environment did not.

Sanctum of Rall was in a good match-up before gaining transfers and suddenly getting a ton of score. After this single win, they jumped from tier 5 to tier 3, and the following week went to the top of the tier. They then spent the next billion weeks where they belonged, as second place in T2, until they got transfers again and entered T1.

Under your system, this wouldn’t have happened. They’d actually have moved along at a slower pace, which would have punished pretty much everyone involved.

facts > theory

I want a scoreboard that shows me more detained information of what my team is doing; whether it be flipping camps, repairing, or gathering carrots.

You could break it down into guild points for the map. That would really be nice to see your guild at the top with 1000 points for all of the WvW specific tasks you’ve done on the map, with a trailing other active guild with a meager 650 points.

The overall rankings don’t mean much to me. And we can’t exactly link our achievements from our stats page.

Kerithlan.1659:

Ungood.3054:

Kerithlan.1659:

I’d point to the fact that Kaineng only spent one week in each tier under the glicko system as counter-evidence to the claim that they’d have risen any faster under the system you’re proposing. In fact, your system does not allow for potential shifts to take place where Kaineng would have been able to skip tiers

That is correct, my system would not have allowed them to skip tiers, it also would not have kept them stuck in a tier so long that when the math finally unglued enough to allow them to move they ended up jumping tiers.

In simple words, my system would have noticed the gain, and responded faster to the trend, and awarded them accordingly and moved them up the very week they started winning, saving everyone time and limiting the amount of unbalanced matches.

Ergo, a simple system it is a better system to spot rising stars, and falling ones.

It also keeps evenly matched people rotating around facing roughly the same six equally powered worlds, as opposed to being stuck. Yes, I understand that some people are scared shirtless to step out of some comfort zone, but in is supposed to be a competitive war game, the last place anyone should be is in a comfort zone.

Kaineng never jumped tiers. Your system would have denied them that opportunity were it to arise. The current environment did not.

Sorry sir, but you are dead wrong in this.

My system would have moved them up upon their very first win, and not delayed even for a week, nor denied them any form of progression.

If you think my system would have done otherwise, then sir, do not understand it. Sometimes simple can be too confusing for people who like to over brain things.

and ummm… really?

Kerithlan.1659:

Kaineng never jumped tiers.

After this single win, they jumped from tier 5 to tier 3

facts > theory

While Fact > Theory, you need to get yours straight.

Ungood.3054:

Kerithlan.1659:

Ungood.3054:

Kerithlan.1659:

I’d point to the fact that Kaineng only spent one week in each tier under the glicko system as counter-evidence to the claim that they’d have risen any faster under the system you’re proposing. In fact, your system does not allow for potential shifts to take place where Kaineng would have been able to skip tiers

That is correct, my system would not have allowed them to skip tiers, it also would not have kept them stuck in a tier so long that when the math finally unglued enough to allow them to move they ended up jumping tiers.

In simple words, my system would have noticed the gain, and responded faster to the trend, and awarded them accordingly and moved them up the very week they started winning, saving everyone time and limiting the amount of unbalanced matches.

Ergo, a simple system it is a better system to spot rising stars, and falling ones.

It also keeps evenly matched people rotating around facing roughly the same six equally powered worlds, as opposed to being stuck. Yes, I understand that some people are scared shirtless to step out of some comfort zone, but in is supposed to be a competitive war game, the last place anyone should be is in a comfort zone.

Kaineng never jumped tiers. Your system would have denied them that opportunity were it to arise. The current environment did not.

Sorry sir, but you are dead wrong in this.

My system would have moved them up upon their very first win, and not delayed even for a week, nor denied them any form of progression.

If you think my system would have done otherwise, then sir, do not understand it. Sometimes simple can be too confusing for people who like to over brain things.

http://mos.millenium.org/matchups/history/13#NA

The same week that Kaineng got its first win is the week that TC moved up to T2. The very next week, IoJ won and TC lost. We would have swapped again, even though TC just spent 7 weeks winning T3 by over 90k/week, and IoJ just spent several weeks losing T2 by over 90k/week. Additionally, TC had over 40k less score than IoJ, so even in the reworked proposed WULD system TC would have swapped.

On top of that, the following week Crystal Desert would have been over 50k above TC despite TC having won against CD by over 100k the previous few weeks, so in the reworked/gated WULD system it’d still be wrong.

Sometimes the bigger picture can be lost on those who nitpick details.

Ungood.3054:

Kerithlan.1659:

Kaineng never jumped tiers.

After this single win, they jumped from tier 5 to tier 3

facts > theory

While Fact > Theory, you need to get yours straight.

It’s cool if you want to blatantly misquote me despite the post I made being not even two posts up the page from yours. It doesn’t help your argument when anyone with eyes can blatantly see what you’ve done.

Kaineng did in fact not jump tiers, as I said. Sanctum of Rall did in fact jump tiers, as I said. I’m not sure if you’re trying to be crafty or if this is a legitimate reading comprehension issue, but okay.

Just got this idea from reading another post, asking for comparisons between NA and EU tier strategies.

Is it possible to mix the continental servers based on tier ranking?
That sounds like it could be pretty epic. Don’t know if this has been mentioned before but it has to have been, so I guess there is some kind of issue in doing this or something.

A little Na vs. EU?

Hieronymus.2146:

Just got this idea from reading another post, asking for comparisons between NA and EU tier strategies.

Is it possible to mix the continental servers based on tier ranking?
That sounds like it could be pretty epic. Don’t know if this has been mentioned before but it has to have been, so I guess there is some kind of issue in doing this or something.

A little Na vs. EU?

I’ll assume no for the same reason we can’t cross-region guest: the servers are hosted from different data centers, which causes complications and prevents such behavior.

Kerithlan.1659:

Sometimes the bigger picture can be lost on those who nitpick details.

I could not agree more, but in this case and exchange, you are the one not seeing the big picture here and how over analyzing is working against the worlds having fun and building dynamic match ups, nor are you looking at the details to see how some worlds get stuck in tiers they don’t belong.

Ungood.3054:

Kerithlan.1659:

Sometimes the bigger picture can be lost on those who nitpick details.

I could not agree more, but in this case and exchange, you are the one not seeing the big picture here and how over analyzing is working against the worlds having fun and building dynamic match ups, nor are you looking at the details to see how some worlds get stuck in tiers they don’t belong.

I simply disagree, and as unfair as it may be I’m not considering much of your replies to hold weight due to the context manipulation stunt you just pulled. I’m usually not one to act this way but in this case I’m flatly offended.

This discussion seems to be based on a difference in the foundational perception of which/ how many different worlds are able to have enjoyable 3-way battles with each other. To highlight this, I’ve asked people to catalog their views of competitive matchups in this thread. I invite you to contribute.

wads.5730:

mucco.1867:

Except one-sided matchups will be the norm. Ask T8.

Glicko will freeze everyone in their current position, eventually. If in T4 green constantly does twice as many points as red+blue, and every week the results are the same, in a couple years their ratings won’t shift one point; despite it being a very imbalanced setup. If the intended goal is to freeze the ladder into whatever (usually bad) form it has at the moment, Glicko works perfectly.

With my system, you will NOT have two different opponents every single week because it’s not straight WULD. How many times do I have to repeat it?

except the current rankings aren’t balanced yet. so they won’t freeze where they are now. the system is self correcting over time. any imbalances will iron itself out. in the ideal case, the end result is all tiers have close matches, and their ratings don’t change. this is when you have balance.

Actually, SF has been dominating us with 300-350k+ points now for a couple of weeks already, and is continuing on that path this week yet is suddenly losing rating while dominating us. While I do speak for tier 8 specifically right now, many are saying HoD wouldn’t be very different. The problem is, that is an unknown. Both FC and ET did well against SF for two weeks before their population unexpectedly jumped. Be it from people returning from PvE wintersday hibernation, server transfers, or both is irrelevant. The Sorrow’s Furnace that lost in tier 7, and at that time by ironically a small margin is not the same Sorrow’s Furnace anymore. THAT SAME SF that lost in tier 7, and not by a massive margin, fought FC and ET and was bested by Ferguson’s Crossing in the first week of the match up, and pulled out a narrow victor in the second week of a great match up. Of course similarly HoD’s population may have changed since then too. And that’s the problem, these things will never be measured again. SF is losing rating for no sensible reason. Whether SF or HoD or any other tier 7 server is more suited for tier 8 IS something that CAN and probably HAS changed, therefore it should logically be granted a rematch in that tier, and fast. Yet as it stands, it could be dominating with 350-450k+ victories for a month and be strong enough to hold its own in tier 6 for all we know and yet we will never get to find out if Glicko2 keeps it paralyzed here as it is.

And it’s not just Sorrow’s Furnace that is ending up in situations like this, but tier 8 has a unique problem in that there is no tier below us to fall to. If the system doesn’t deem SF moving up as justified, even though it largely determines this through irrelevant information like historical trends it won’t get the chance ever.

If what others have said is true, which it is, in that the scores between two tiers are apples and oranges, then I ask you all: Isn’t it hypocritical to defend the Glicko2 system with that stance? If they hold no true relevance to each other, why is it that server’s like Sorrow’s Furnace literally need to dominate with 695 ppt at the EXACT SAME TIME the server above randomly starts doing very poorly and losing rating consistently (Something that may or may not happen.) to move up? Just because Sorrow’s furnace can win in our tier with 350k points doesn’t necessarily mean HoD could, or that it could not, or any other server in that tier. Just because SF can’t dominate us with 695 PPT if we don’t let them does not mean they couldn’t compete now, or even win in the tier above. That remains to be seen and tested.

Also, even with a close score not all servers in any one tier are made equal. For example, you have cultural centre servers like Kaineng that boasts one of the largest Chinese, Korean and Asian populations of any server in GW2. Pit that against a server that is a cultural centre for maybe North America, be it both US and Canada or whatever and you might get two servers that get near equal scores from doing a lot of PvDoor on each other when neither is present because their timezones do not align, and yet will see at times MASSIVE drops during periods like holidays in a way that Glicko2 simply cannot predict. One server might lose half its population during Christmas festivities and proceed to be dominated during that period, and regain its numbers and suddenly dominate the other server when half its population is busy celebrating an entirely different cultural holiday, and for a different period.

If anything, somehow time zone coverage needs to be taken into account more by the system also. Perhaps point trends at isolated time zones need to be a factor in determining who moves up and falls, because it makes no logical sense to pair servers with conflicting time zones even if the scores can be equal for these servers.

FC and ET can both hold their own and at times even server 1 v 1 against SF during reset, but the moment the SF night crew flips everything that strength is lost throughout the week as we log in to keeps and towers that have been flipped/all upgrades removed but are incapable of doing this same thing to our foes due to lack of timezone coverage.

Also, historical trend data might need to be purged from the system completely, if not the ratings reset. How well a server did in the past, or how poorly, is of zero relevance to the present if its population is completely different from that time due to population shifts during the free transfer period, large portions PvX players hitting up Wintersday and other events on specific servers changing the tier arrangements, and what not. They may even need to purge the history periodically so that it doesn’t taint a server’s position during periods of fluctuations by assessing its past performance. The past performance is irrelevant the moment a major guild in any given time zone transfers, and should no longer be taken to account at that point. The Glicko2 system’s problem may be that it takes into account too many things that it should not, and does not take into account too many things that it should. Entirely new algorithms might need to be added into it to make it relevant to something volatile like World Vs. World Vs. World. This is a series of tiers of THREE often fluctuating COMMUNITIES facing off what kind of is a literal war. This is not two individuals matching up against each other in a game of chess. If the system works for the latter, has absolutely no relevance to the former. I’d like to see if “MORALE” is a factor in tiered chess competition, cause as it stands a server that gets stuck in a horrible match up for weeks on end will suffer morale problems that effect it dramatically, when massive of players lose interest in continuing due to weeks of imbalanced match ups with weeks on the horizon.

Kerithlan.1659:

Kaineng did in fact not jump tiers, as I said. Sanctum of Rall did in fact jump tiers, as I said. I’m not sure if you’re trying to be crafty or if this is a legitimate reading comprehension issue, but okay.

Actually it was a mistake on my part, I lost that among the scroll of those worthless links you posted.

Lets look at something real and current as opposed to one instance that happened in October last year, only 2 months after the game came out, shall we.

Week 2 – 2013
Tier 8 – Sorrows Furnace Wins.
Tier 2 – Sanctum Rail Wins

Week 3 – 2013
Tier 8 – Same Armies. SF wins Again by a Large margin
Tier 2 – Sanctum Rail Wins

Why are these guys still there, no one knows. But they won AGAIN.

Week 4 – 2013
Tier 8 – Same Armies. SF wins Again by a Large margin
Tier 2 – Sanctum Rail Wins again by a massive margin

Again, 3 weeks straight, with one Army decimating the other two, for tier 8 and 2.

Week 5 – 2013
Tier 2 – Sanctum Rail Finally moves Up
Tier 8 – Same Armies. SF wins Again by a Large margin

Ok. Now. Fact > Fiction

My system would have shaved at least 2 weeks off Sanctum Rails accent, and gotten Sorrows Furnace out of Tier 8.

That is a fact.

The fact that this system took way to long to move a rising star is exactly what is wrong with it. In both the details and small print, it is failing and failing hard as time moves it will only get worse.

Worlds are getting stuck in T8, that is a math fail, world getting stalled when they should move, again, another math fail.

As my system would have done, just sooner, you can see Sanctum Rail did quite well after moving up a tier, and Stomebluff Isle did not dominate when it moved down a tier.

Thus all fears and fuss about moving up and down will created steamrolls and curb-stomps is simply not true and the actual performance of the worlds when they do finally get moved, proves that.

So. if I have lost your respect, I am fine with that to be honest, after all, you have neither looked at the big picture OR the details, you picked one obscure event and used that as a basis, and here you are, trying to fight for a system I doubt you even understand or really see how it works and thus blind yourself to it’s faulting.

In the end. The Glicko system robs worlds from having a Win be a Win and a Loss be a Loss, and nothing could be worse then to do that in what should be a competitive arena, if you love the Glico system, well, it’s designed to chart an individual, not a group of people, infer what you will from that.

But numbers don’t lie, and they all point to the fact that, you are wrong that the Glicko system is in fact working.

Sorry for not reading this whole thread first,

While in principle I don’t think there’s anything wrong with changing the math for the ratings. The glicko system “works”, but isn’t optimal, and leads to a lot of kittenty weeks in wvw for a lot of servers.

But the issue is that stagnant matches are not the biggest problem right now. They are, in fact, the solution to the bigger problem. The bigger problem being that servers are so different in their ability to perform in wvw that they simply cannot fight any servers outside of their tier without serious balance.

The stacking of upper servers that has been happening since launch has created such a deviation in servers that there’s just no way (right now) to have volatile matchups and have them resemble any form of balance or competition.

I’d love to see different servers in wvw every week, but something needs to be done about the imbalance between servers before stagnant matches can be remedied.

EnRohbi.2187:

I’d love to see different servers in wvw every week, but something needs to be done about the imbalance between servers before stagnant matches can be remedied.

Totally agree. If my other thread is correct, we have 8 tiers we play in, and we have 9 different levels of competitive play. This is guaranteeing a ridiculous number of blowouts, each week. The thing I find that is truly ironic about this is that we have had numerous threads about what ANet should do to fix the problem, but in the end the first solution (leveling out server pops/coverage) has been in the hands of the player base, all along.

JaironKalach.4938:

The thing I find that is truly ironic about this is that we have had numerous threads about what ANet should do to fix the problem, but in the end the first solution (leveling out server pops/coverage) has been in the hands of the player base, all along.

i just started playing recently (around a month or so). and i didn’t start WvW immediately. i played and had fun and got used to how to play. i didn’t even know HOW to go to WvW…didn’t realize it was as easy as “hit B”. i hadn’t found the forums or the wiki yet… and i remembered that when i first chose my server, i got a warning that “this choice is final, you’ll have to pay if you wish to move.” and i was unaware of free server transfers.

by the time i realized what soul-crushing will-sapping WvW-fun-devouring hole i was in by being on a Tier 8 server, i had already made friends, joined a guild, and free transfers were over. so, pray tell, what should i do to ‘level the field’ at this point? and if your answer is “transfer”… pony up so i can make the transfer. i’m broke…. and break the news to my guild for me that i’m leaving… i hate goodbyes. be sure you send enough for 2 transfers. my husband has to come too

Detharos.3157:

If what others have said is true, which it is, in that the scores between two tiers are apples and oranges, then I ask you all: Isn’t it hypocritical to defend the Glicko2 system with that stance? If they hold no true relevance to each other, why is it that server’s like Sorrow’s Furnace literally need to dominate with 695 ppt at the EXACT SAME TIME the server above randomly starts doing very poorly and losing rating consistently (Something that may or may not happen.) to move up? Just because Sorrow’s furnace can win in our tier with 350k points doesn’t necessarily mean HoD could, or that it could not, or any other server in that tier. Just because SF can’t dominate us with 695 PPT if we don’t let them does not mean they couldn’t compete now, or even win in the tier above. That remains to be seen and tested.

You are confusing score with performance. (snipped for size)

Sorrow’s Furnace needs to perform better than the previous week in order to gain rating. This means that the score gap between opponents needs to be gradually larger than the previous week. As Sorrow’s Furnace earns bigger and bigger victories it is harder for them to increase that gap/margin.

The simple explanation: if Sorrow’s Furnace defeated Ferguson’s Crossing by a margin of 50,000 points last week, then in order to gain rating they need to win by a statistically larger margin this week. After a certain point in time that becomes nearly impossible.

Two weeks ago, SF defeated Ferguson’s Crossing by a margin of 158,053 points, and 2.05 times the score. Last week, Sorrow’s Furnace defeated Ferguson’s Crossing by a margin of 243,580 points, and 2.96 times the score. This is a point margin performance increase of ~154% and a score multiplier increase of 144%.

This week, SF’s current score multiplier over FC is 2.06 times. Without having the final score margin it’s hard to predict, but unless they get near or above 2.96 times FC’s score they’re likely to lose some points to FC as the margin required is going to be larger.

This math is all wrong and I understand that. It’s a simplified version of things. The problem is that SF is unable to perform at a higher level than last week… which honestly is to be expected, considering there’s a full 3 1/2 days left in this match. By the end of the week SF will break even or go positive.

Regarding holidays, glicko actually preserves better matches and compensates for such sudden dips. In the WULD model any server taking a break would be punished by dropping a tier (perhaps unnecessarily and to the detriment of the game) simply because they did not play 24/7 that week. Glicko protects against some of that by ensuring that servers that suddenly tank in rating usually have an opportunity to win it back and maintain their position the next week, rather than putting artificial intervals in the way (tier shuffling).

Also, I’m not defending glicko. I’m attempting to explain why it’s a better option than the one proposed (Winner Up; Loser Down + gating). I’m in favor of any system that makes WvW better. The proposed system does not perform such an act.

Ungood.3054:

Ok. Now. Fact > Fiction

My system would have shaved at least 2 weeks off Sanctum Rails accent, and gotten Sorrows Furnace out of Tier 8.

That is a fact.

This post is cute (snipped for size) but it ignores the fact that SoR didn’t deserve to move up until half of a server transferred over to them, pitting a gutted server against a bloated server. They moved up one full week after that happened. Le gasp.

SoR moved up after their bloated population had one full start-to-finish match against one server whose population tanked. Half of SBI transferred to SoR mid-match. The glicko system adequately and appropriately compensated for the change.

I really am not trying to be sassy, but apparently you don’t know what facts are. I apologize because I know I sound like a jerk. This is becoming a peeing contest over nothing — the simple truth is that you haven’t proved anything or provided evidence as to why the glicko system is inferior to a system that would put you in bad matches more frequently.

I understand that your current match-up is bad and I agree that it needs to change, but to get so hung up on a system that is clearly a negative change is the wrong way to go about seeking improvements. Glicko isn’t perfect but it is way better than this crap.

katz.8376:

JaironKalach.4938:

The thing I find that is truly ironic about this is that we have had numerous threads about what ANet should do to fix the problem, but in the end the first solution (leveling out server pops/coverage) has been in the hands of the player base, all along.

i just started playing recently (around a month or so). and i didn’t start WvW immediately. i played and had fun and got used to how to play. i didn’t even know HOW to go to WvW… and i remembered that when i first chose my server, i got a warning that “this choice is final, you’ll have to pay if you wish to move.” and i was unaware of free server transfers.

by the time i realized what soul-crushing will-sapping WvW-fun-devouring hole i was in by being on a Tier 8 server, i had already made friends, joined a guild, and free transfers were over. so, pray tell, what should i do to ‘level the field’ at this point? and if your answer is “transfer”… pony up so i can make the transfer and break the news to my guild for me. i’m broke. be sure you send enough for 2 transfers. my husband has to come too

“At this point”?
Wait and see if your server gets more dedicated wvw population after things settle down from paid transfers.

99% of new players purchasing the game will not research the server they pick before they register an account, the best you can do if you don’t want to transfer is to hope your server improves and make the best of wvw while you’re waiting.

The original point was valid,
The playerbase is entirely responsible for wvw being in the state it’s in right now.
Now, it’s an effect of mass transfers that wasn’t apparently obvious when they started, so you can’t blame players for not thinking ahead and realizing that stacking the top servers was only guaranteeing stale and stagnant matchups.
But not having the foresight to prevent it doesn’t mean that the playerbase didn’t cause the problems we’re experiencing now.

Think about how much more competitive every server would be if every player in the game was still on the server they signed up their account on.

katz.8376:

touching, but slightly hostile, story snipped

A few points in response.

#1. As a player on a T8 server, I would hope that you would stay, not leave. You leaving would not solve the imbalance at all.
#2. Please understand that while you came late to the game, there have been significant numbers of people who played WvWvW during the era of free transfers. And instead of trying to balance servers out, they made the problem worse by overloading certain servers.
#3. There are still people who do have the funds to transfer, possibly even entire guilds. Particularly to a more empty server, which will be on the cheaper list. It is those people who still have the power to make a difference, not those who, as in your case, can’t afford it.

oh trust me. i’m not going anywhere. as i said. my friends are here. my guild is here. my husband is here.

i just may bow out of WvW even though i quite enjoy the concept, because being rolled every week by the same server over and over and over and over and over and (you get the point) because they have more people than us, and the math is too stupid to actually move them up…and no end in sight because the math expects them to be able to roll us? yeah. not fun. that is the very definition of hopelessness.

it doesn’t matter how good or bad we do this week. we’re still stuck with SF next week. and the week after. and the week after. and… and… and…

seriously guys. how are you not seeing this.

katz.8376:

oh trust me. i’m not going anywhere. as i said. my friends are here. my guild is here. my husband is here.

i just may bow out of WvW even though i quite enjoy the concept, because being rolled every week by the same server over and over and over and over and over and (you get the point) because they have more people than us, and the math is too stupid to actually move them up…and no end in sight because the math expects them to be able to roll us? yeah. not fun. that is the very definition of hopelessness.

it doesn’t matter how good or bad we do this week. we’re still stuck with SF next week. and the week after. and the week after. and… and… and…

seriously guys. how are you not seeing this.

No one said they didn’t see it.
Everyone knows there’s problems with the wvw tiers and matchups.

But there’s nothing to be done until servers balance out.
Seriously.

If SF moves up a tier, you’re just gonna get rolled by the server that falls from tier 7 so SF has room to move up. The only difference will be the name of the server.

Servers are incredibly out of balance right now due to the guild’s stacking higher servers. Yes, it’s a problem. No, there’s no easy or quick solution.

The wvw population decided that winning was more important than having a balanced game mode.

EnRohbi.2187:

If SF moves up a tier, you’re just gonna get rolled by the server that falls from tier 7 so SF has room to move up. The only difference will be the name of the server.

This is not necessarily correct. However what is correct is that SF moving up and potentially balancing T8 is guaranteed to break the current balance in T7.

The question is not “should that balance be broken” but rather “when will it be?” Will SF be balanced in T7, or will they drop down again? Will they move up to T6 and break more things?

It’s circular imbalance at work. Exchanging one imbalance for another doesn’t solve the problem. It just moves it. Glicko can’t correct it, but the WULD system exacerbates it horribly.

Kerithlan.1659:

EnRohbi.2187:

If SF moves up a tier, you’re just gonna get rolled by the server that falls from tier 7 so SF has room to move up. The only difference will be the name of the server.

This is not necessarily correct. However what is correct is that SF moving up and potentially balancing T8 is guaranteed to break the current balance in T7.

The question is not “should that balance be broken” but rather “when will it be?” Will SF be balanced in T7, or will they drop down again? Will they move up to T6 and break more things?

It’s circular imbalance at work. Exchanging one imbalance for another doesn’t solve the problem. It just moves it. Glicko can’t correct it, but the WULD system exacerbates it horribly.

It is not necessarily true; no.
But it is likely, given that most tiers are pretty far separated from the tiers below and above them.

If FC and ET are just really far below every other server in the game for wvw skill/coverage, then you will never see a balanced match in tier 8.
At least not until your server gains some new population.

Again,
It sucks.
My tier has a similar problem, though not as severe, where there are only two servers that really belonging in tier 3 and the third server is the one that doesn’t fit into tier 2.

But it is the reality of the situation with servers being so disproportionate with each other.

EnRohbi.2187:

If SF moves up a tier, you’re just gonna get rolled by the server that falls from tier 7 so SF has room to move up. The only difference will be the name of the server.

maybe. maybe not. SF was hovering around tier 6 before they took a 1 month dive into the pit of despair AKA tier 8. by the time they finally claw their way back out, IF they ever claw their way out with how the stupid math has them locked in place, they’ll probably shoot BACK up to tier 6. i’d welcome a true tier 7 over that.

also. wow. saying we’ll get rolled anyway, doesn’t matter by who. are you TRYING to make me quit or transfer? talk about demotivating.

katz.8376:

EnRohbi.2187:

If SF moves up a tier, you’re just gonna get rolled by the server that falls from tier 7 so SF has room to move up. The only difference will be the name of the server.

maybe. maybe not. SF was hovering around tier 6 before they took a 1 month dive into the pit of despair AKA tier 8. by the time they finally claw their way back out, IF they ever claw their way out with how the stupid math has them locked in place, they’ll probably shoot BACK up to tier 6. i’d welcome a true tier 7 over that.

also. wow. saying we’ll get rolled anyway, doesn’t matter by who. are you TRYING to make me quit or transfer? talk about demotivating.

I’m not trying to be insulting, I just prefer to speak realistically about a situation.
The tiers in wvw are not in a good place right now, and unfortunately the solution is not super easy or quick.

I believe that a certain amount of the problem will solve itself with time. That being the issue of servers being extremely disproportionately effective against each other in wvw. As populations balance out and new people buy the game and end up going to lower population servers.

At THAT time, a review of the math or ratings of servers would probably be quite appropriate to handle the huge ratings differences between some tiers. Because the glicko system is, indeed, stopping some servers from moving as easily as they should (Like SF, as you say).
But the bigger problem is the imbalances between servers more so than it is just the math.

Solving either issue will not fix the problem with wvw unless both are addressed.

it’s not that you insulted me. but come on. it’s already been over a month that SF has been sitting on us, and no end in sight. “no quick fix” is all well and good, but every person reaches the end of their patience at some point, and right now, there IS no light at the end of the tunnel. at all.

katz.8376:

it’s not that you insulted me. but come on. it’s already been over a month that SF has been sitting on us, and no end in sight. “no quick fix” is all well and good, but every person reaches the end of their patience at some point, and right now, there IS no light at the end of the tunnel. at all.

Agreed.
As I said, wvw matchups are in a poor state right now.

“Transfer, quit or deal with it” are not good choices, but they are unfortunately the choices right now.

You can try to help be a solution, if you are motivated to do so, and try to encourage more people on your server to go wvw, try to encourage more coordinated group play. Basically make the best of the situation.

People will join in if they see you actually trying. Most people would quit and walk out of wvw when they enter a map and don’t see anyone at all. Your server’s morale has a lot of bearing on how many people will show up for wvw (Dragonbrand suffered a massive guild loss some months ago and has since rebuilt, I have seen every part of the morale-spectrum in my own server and can speak here from experience). Motivating the players on your server to participate even in a losing battle is a huge factor in how your server is going to fare in wvw.

Tactics and well coordinated small group play can be quite effective, and even more so, on lower tiered servers, where teams simply don’t have enough players to have a zerg on every map.

EnRohbi.2187:

katz.8376:

it’s not that you insulted me. but come on. it’s already been over a month that SF has been sitting on us, and no end in sight. “no quick fix” is all well and good, but every person reaches the end of their patience at some point, and right now, there IS no light at the end of the tunnel. at all.

People will join in if they see you actually trying. Most people would quit and walk out of wvw when they enter a map and don’t see anyone at all. Your server’s morale has a lot of bearing on how many people will show up for wvw (Dragonbrand suffered a massive guild loss some months ago and has since rebuilt, I have seen every part of the morale-spectrum in my own server and can speak here from experience). Motivating the players on your server to participate even in a losing battle is a huge factor in how your server is going to fare in wvw.

My biggest concern is that for a server like FC or ET, this is an unsustainable proposition. It’s certainly a significant uphill battle. It’s probably a topic for a different thread, but I don’t think that the psychology of the situation will allow for the balance we are looking for to come through natural attrition/growth. It is too punishing for a new player on a server such as ET to stick it out, with little incentive. I would advocate that ANet introduce something to help manage this, but… It’s not really clear to me what they would be able to effectively do.

katz.8376:

it’s not that you insulted me. but come on. it’s already been over a month that SF has been sitting on us, and no end in sight. “no quick fix” is all well and good, but every person reaches the end of their patience at some point, and right now, there IS no light at the end of the tunnel. at all.

Unfortunately, for the servers that are getting facerolled week after week, the only options are to get more players and get more coverage. You can’t really improve your skill because you’re always outmanned, spawn camped or breakout camped.

Map population and coverage are the two biggest factors that separate the servers from T4-T8.

If only there was a “Enemy of my Enemy” buff that allowed the two dominated servers, either in total points or ppt, to become allies and combine their forces against the leading server…..

i’m in a guild that is active in WvW. we have several commanders in our ranks, and i’ve run under several other good ones. MOST of the time i’ve observed reasonably well organized fighting, and LOTS of /map chatter on where to go and what to hit. /map is almost never silent unless it’s really off hours. (yeah. it was pretty quiet at 11pm on a monday night. >.> ) in fact last night was the FIRST time in the past month that i personally witnessed a cluster **** of confusion and (in my opinion) poor leadership, leading to in-fighting and losing fight at hand.

not to say that we all know what the heck we’re doing, but as a whole we frequently hold off forces at a 1 to 3 or more ratio.

last few weeks that i’ve actually been paying attention to it, it’s always the same. friday reset… ET jumps in headfirst. paints the map red. leads the points all night… until we finally succumb and go to bed. then the infamous nightcap crew goes to work.

if we kept our level of organization and skill, and tripled our numbers… it would be a very different story indeed

and yet, despite all our skill and perseverance, we get told “you’re on the bottom of tier 8. you obviously suck and deserve to be there.”

JaironKalach.4938:

EnRohbi.2187:

katz.8376:

it’s not that you insulted me. but come on. it’s already been over a month that SF has been sitting on us, and no end in sight. “no quick fix” is all well and good, but every person reaches the end of their patience at some point, and right now, there IS no light at the end of the tunnel. at all.

People will join in if they see you actually trying. Most people would quit and walk out of wvw when they enter a map and don’t see anyone at all. Your server’s morale has a lot of bearing on how many people will show up for wvw (Dragonbrand suffered a massive guild loss some months ago and has since rebuilt, I have seen every part of the morale-spectrum in my own server and can speak here from experience). Motivating the players on your server to participate even in a losing battle is a huge factor in how your server is going to fare in wvw.

My biggest concern is that for a server like FC or ET, this is an unsustainable proposition. It’s certainly a significant uphill battle. It’s probably a topic for a different thread, but I don’t think that the psychology of the situation will allow for the balance we are looking for to come through natural attrition/growth. It is too punishing for a new player on a server such as ET to stick it out, with little incentive. I would advocate that ANet introduce something to help manage this, but… It’s not really clear to me what they would be able to effectively do.

And this is the problem.
Everyone wants a solution to what everyone knows is a problem,
But there might not be one,
Short of merging servers or waiting for natural growth to happen.

Which tier 7 server would you rather take SF’s place?
Is there any other server in the whole game who you think would be a fair fight against FC and ET?

Darkhaven would almost certainly rock you more than SF is doing currently, so let’s rule them out.
If both HoD and GoM are at the same level of competition that SF is at (Which I would say is likely to be true), then there are exactly zero combinations of servers in tier 8 that would give you a balanced match, and nothing Anet does to the ratings system or ratings themselves will create a third server on par with ET and FC.

This is why I suggest that you try to increase wvw participation on your respective servers before calling for a change to the math (EDIT: I’d like to point out again, right here, that I do think a change in the math is required. But changing the math now would be likely to make the problems worse than they already are).

Right now there just aren’t enough servers at similar levels of play to have balanced matchups in every tier, regardless of how those tiers are calculated.

katz.8376:

i’m in a guild that is active in WvW. we have several commanders in our ranks, and i’ve run under several other good ones. MOST of the time i’ve observed reasonably well organized fighting, and LOTS of /map chatter on where to go and what to hit. /map is almost never silent unless it’s really off hours. (yeah. it was pretty quiet at 11pm on a monday night. >.> ) in fact last night was the FIRST time in the past month that i personally witnessed a cluster **** of confusion and (in my opinion) poor leadership, leading to in-fighting and losing fight at hand.

not to say that we all know what the heck we’re doing, but as a whole we frequently hold off forces at a 1 to 3 or more ratio.

last few weeks that i’ve actually been paying attention to it, it’s always the same. friday reset… ET jumps in headfirst. paints the map red. leads the points all night… until we finally succumb and go to bed. then the infamous nightcap crew goes to work.

if we kept our level of organization and skill, and tripled our numbers… it would be a very different story indeed

and yet, despite all our skill and perseverance, we get told “you’re on the bottom of tier 8. you obviously suck and deserve to be there.”

Sounds like you’re running into the night capping flaw in WvW. You’re good enough to hold or gain ground in your peak time, but the next day you find all your gains lost as well as having to go up against fully upgraded objectives.

The “breakout” event might give you a tower, but it’s never enough to let you expand because the next tower/keep already is full of defensive siege. Coupled with the painfully slow supply getting to the tower, you always have to defend paper walls while you attack fortified walls. I can’t understand why a yak with 100 supply only drops off 35 if that is it’s only stop.

Currently SF has the second highest point total among NA servers and has the highest ppt total and is LOSING rating?!?!?

Obviously unless Anet fixes this game flaw for ET, you’ll end up having fun playing WvW only on Friday after reset. Eventually ET might be the next Kaineg, but by then you’ll have stopped playing GW2.

Ungood.3054:

For example:

in a 8 Tier system.

Tier 1 – 1st and 2nd place, stay, 3rd place moves to Tier 2
Tier 2 – 1st place moves to Tier 1, 2nd Place Stays, 3rd Place Moves to Tier 3
Tier 3 – 1st place moves to Tier 2, 2nd Place Stays, 3rd Place Moves to Tier 4
Etc, etc, etc, all the way Down to the List till Tier 8.
Tier 8 – 1st place Moves Up, 2nd and 3rd Stay.

This would keep words cycling, but also keep people close to where they belong without any form of stagnation, or would there be top or bottom tier traps.

So yah. My feeling is that WvWvW was over analyzed and that needs to go away, and a simple method of making winning and losing mean more in the here and now should be put in.

Absolutely HORRIBLE idea.

Instead of saying do away with logical thought process I think you should include some of it in your suggestion.

In your example, the 2nd place server is stuck. That’s it. It will always be blue for extended periods of time. Drop down server will be stronger than it, bring up server will be weaker than it. So it’s forced to fight in the worst color yet again… Blue.
This would repeat for months potentially for every single tier.

No thanks. Good job so far Anet.

My suggestion is to ONLY add a bonus to the winning team. AKA, if you win you earn 20 (or whatever is deemed best) rating points only. Maybe just maybe you might add that if you lose you are deducted 20 rating points only but I’m not sure that’s necessary.

That will help some stagnation but will not pigeon hole the 2nd place as much as this suggestion above.

currently, all i really do is fart around in EB or SF borderlands flipping camps and road points just to be an annoyance. but even that’s not so much fun when i run into the retaliation force… and there’s 10 of them and 1 of me.

it’s a great big “whats the point” now.

EnRohbi.2187:

JaironKalach.4938:

EnRohbi.2187:

katz.8376:

it’s not that you insulted me. but come on. it’s already been over a month that SF has been sitting on us, and no end in sight. “no quick fix” is all well and good, but every person reaches the end of their patience at some point, and right now, there IS no light at the end of the tunnel. at all.

People will join in if they see you actually trying. Most people would quit and walk out of wvw when they enter a map and don’t see anyone at all. Your server’s morale has a lot of bearing on how many people will show up for wvw (Dragonbrand suffered a massive guild loss some months ago and has since rebuilt, I have seen every part of the morale-spectrum in my own server and can speak here from experience). Motivating the players on your server to participate even in a losing battle is a huge factor in how your server is going to fare in wvw.

My biggest concern is that for a server like FC or ET, this is an unsustainable proposition. It’s certainly a significant uphill battle. It’s probably a topic for a different thread, but I don’t think that the psychology of the situation will allow for the balance we are looking for to come through natural attrition/growth. It is too punishing for a new player on a server such as ET to stick it out, with little incentive. I would advocate that ANet introduce something to help manage this, but… It’s not really clear to me what they would be able to effectively do.

And this is the problem.
Everyone wants a solution to what everyone knows is a problem,
But there might not be one,
Short of merging servers or waiting for natural growth to happen.

Which tier 7 server would you rather take SF’s place?
Is there any other server in the whole game who you think would be a fair fight against FC and ET?

Darkhaven would almost certainly rock you more than SF is doing currently, so let’s rule them out.
If both HoD and GoM are at the same level of competition that SF is at (Which I would say is likely to be true), then there are exactly zero combinations of servers in tier 8 that would give you a balanced match, and nothing Anet does to the ratings system or ratings themselves will create a third server on par with ET and FC.

This is why I suggest that you try to increase wvw participation on your respective servers before calling for a change to the math (EDIT: I’d like to point out again, right here, that I do think a change in the math is required. But changing the math now would be likely to make the problems worse than they already are).

Right now there just aren’t enough servers at similar levels of play to have balanced matchups in every tier, regardless of how those tiers are calculated.

Alright how about this, can you present to me some evidence that Sorrow’s Furnace would not roll up Henge of Denravi and smoke it just as badly? Can you present evidence that it would not surpass even GoM or DH, let alone Henge of Denravi?

Think about it, Sorrow’s Furnace had some great matchups, close matchups with Henge of Denravi.

http://mos.millenium.org/matchups/history/13#NA
Week 50, desepite having a tier5/ near tier 4 server in their midst, we see Henge of Denravi and Sorrow’s Furnace with very close scores with SF winning.

Week 51, Sorrow’s Furnace Defeats Henge of Denravi in an awesome close match
http://mos.millenium.org/matchups/history/14#NA

Week 52, Sorrow’s Furnace loses to Henge of Denravi in a another awesome close match

Week 01, the same Sorrow’s Furnace that rivaled Henge of Denravi comfortably falls to tier 8 and is defeated by Ferguson’s Crossing in an awesome and close matchup
http://mos.millenium.org/matchups/history/15#NA

Week 02, Sorrow’s Furnace defeats Ferguson’s Crossing in another awesome and very close matchup. The relationship already represents the Henge of Denravi. Vs. Sorrow’s Furnace matchups to a tee.

Week 03, Sorrow’s Furnace starts seeing major population booms in WvW.
http://mos.millenium.org/matchups/history/18#NA
Despite this unexpected WvW population increase it is still a relatively great matchup in comparison today. FC and ET could deal with this without too much stress.

Week 04, Sorrow’s Furnace has its population boom met with yet more increases. It’s NA population in WvW grows drastically, as well as a few more in other time zones. The beginning of the week resembled the previous one, but as Tuesday-Friday played out massive growth in those days was seen and we lost our foothold, both us and Eredon’s Terrace.
http://mos.millenium.org/matchups/history/19#NA

Week 05, Sorrow’s Furnace’s booming population had reached its peak and it begins to set the score trend for every future match up we will have with them.
http://mos.millenium.org/matchups/history/20#NA

And current week, week 6:
http://mos.millenium.org/matchups#NA

Week 06 and continuing its clear its just gonna be another approximate repeat of the previous week albeit perhaps some SLIGHT score shift from a non-aggression pact formed between ET and FC. Because of Glicko2 Predictions functionality, it begins to punish Sorrow’s Furnace ratings for not meeting the growth rate it projects. Hopefully the rating will be in the positive by the end of the week, but if not we could be stuck fighting them for MONTHS.

Now, since we did almost equally as well as Henge of Denravi did against Sorrow’s Furnace for TWO WEEKS (Long enough to prove that population shifts at the time were stable and the numbers HoD and us were facing from SF were near identical) and only begun to lose when their population shot through the roof, to numbers many long time Sorrow’s Furnace players are saying would of had them rolling straight back up tier 6 if they saw while they were in tier 7 against GoM and HoD, how is it that you, some random guy from Tier 3 with no apparent experience with any of these servers in recent time seem to perceive there being a massive difference between Henge of Denravi and Ferguson’s Crossing and Eredon’s Terrace?

Notwithstanding the possibility of Henge of Denravi having received transfers or unexpected population booms (Mass transfers extremely unlikely, almost nobody ever changes to a blue or red team like they’ve been.), something that you a member of tier 3 have no apparent way of knowing and isn’t really suggested by the scores. It seems that Darkhaven was on par with Gate Of Madness and its being thrown in there acted as a buffer to keep Henge on the scoreboard, from the points perspective and history of points trends in the tier.

In other words there is no real evidence present with which to believe that Henge of Denravi wouldn’t give FC and ET a great match-up like it had with Sorrow’s Furnace in its first week, nor have you provided any guarantee that SF in its current state might even be capable of stomping servers like DH or GoM with 250k leads, or at least competing with them very closely. So how is it that you babble this nonsense when you defend the system from the complaints of people in our tier? Henge of Denravi might very well be tier 8 material, and PROBABLY is a better fit for tier 8 by far than Sorrow’s Furnace currently is.

Supposing you’re correct, and we finally get SF freed of T8, and replace it with HoD…. Do you think that that magically improves all of the other tiers? Does it improve T1,2,3,4? The proposed and discussed changes won’t only affect T8? In fact, the proposed changes would ensure that the one fully competitive tier (6) is automatically destabilized at least every week. Not really sure what you think you’re arguing for, or if you just have T8 tunnel vision…

No of course not. I never said I 100% agree with Winner moves up and loser moves down, albeit I think it would be interesting to meet other servers just for the sheer sake of witnessing unseen strategies and cool and effective major wvw guilds from other servers in action. There would be a lot to be learned at least and some might even find themselves making new friends if such a change is applied. However that said, I find the thought of strong servers, especially in higher tiers bumping down and up between the same two tiers as might happen a rather disturbing thought at the same time, so its on shaky ground for me personally.

But the fact is, the Glicko2 system is being applied to situations that are kind of out of its bounds. It’s trying to predict trends that it is not designed to, and in some cases literally can’t because unfortunately, Glicko2 is not a sentient/sapient being to know that World vs. World vs. World. in Guild wars 2 /=/ A bunch of 1 vs. 1 tiered chess matches or whatever else it was created for.

But what really needs to happen above all else is that ArenaNet needs to break the silence and admit that there are some massive, not small, massive problems with this system. Probably the greatest frustration of those of us in Ferguson’s Crossing and Eredon’s Terrace is not the imbalanced matchup itself, nor its not having any promise of an end withing months as SF’s rating drops despite dominating; No our greatest frustration surely is hearing “Working as intended.” all the time and being ignored, played off or having our concerns, questions and complaints dodged.

I know tier 8 isn’t the only one stuck in a situation like this, and having only 4 weeks of balanced matches here and there amidst 4 weeks of one-sided domination of costly, unrewarding depressing WvW is a MASSIVE, not a small problem. Just because the majority of the population is located perhaps in balanced tiers, doesn’t mean those who rolled on a lower server and befriended people and formed communities yet share no less a zeal for WvW should have to suffer the large population’s whims in this broken system.

I’m sure we all can agree SOMETHING must be done. And it must be done SOON. No more waiting for weeks. No more “It will fix itself in time.” No more procrastination, no more defending the system on the basis that it works for only the most important match ups, we’re all customers here and deserve to be treated with the same respect as anyone in any tier. But above all, even if ArenaNet has zero solutions in mind, and none in the foreseeable future, it should take the time to inform the community that it is having problems making WvW work for everyone. In the very least that contact would give people the confidence and faith that they are AWARE of the problem, and trying to solve it. As it stands, it seemed that ArenaNet was aware when they announced the ratings reset, which while not an ideal solution on anyone’s books, the way they announced its cancellation sounded like a whole lot of “Shut up, its working as intended be patient and you may all get a good matchup in a couple months.” just worded with more sugar coating.

To me it looks like Sorrow’s Furnace’s rating is going up since the WvW population boom you described in Week 2.

http://mos.millenium.org/servers/view/45/#history

Last 2 weeks it’s gone up by over 50 points each match. At that rate, it should catch Henge of Denravi or us in Gates of Madness.

their rating is going down atm so several weeks more of this hellhole match up

SniffyCube.6107:

their rating is going down atm so several weeks more of this hellhole match up

That’s because they haven’t had a week to make the actual measured point gap in their match. Friday at reset their rating was going down a ton because the score was tied 0-0-0 but it didn’t matter then either.

We’ll see what their rating change is on Friday.

JaironKalach.4938:

Supposing you’re correct, and we finally get SF freed of T8, and replace it with HoD…. Do you think that that magically improves all of the other tiers? Does it improve T1,2,3,4? The proposed and discussed changes won’t only affect T8? In fact, the proposed changes would ensure that the one fully competitive tier (6) is automatically destabilized at least every week. Not really sure what you think you’re arguing for, or if you just have T8 tunnel vision…

In very short order it would make things better for all tiers.

While, yes, the mass hysteria crew likes to toss out grandiose claims that if you move a tier up or down the world will end with skulls spitting razors into your eyes and your children will be devoured by fire ants, but time and time again that has proven not to be case.

In fact, of their is too much a disparity between bottom tier 7 and top tier 6, then the system needs to readjust and do so quickly.

However, while I relaize that there are some PvP people here, and they live and die by Glicko, I want to be clear, the problem is not with the Glicko system.

Glicko does a great job at what it is designed to do, and that is chart personal progress.

If I wanted to calculate the standing of every individual in the entire game, and then place them among 8 tiers of PvP Skill, Glicko-2 is the go-to bad boy to make that happen. That is why most PvP games use it.

No one is questioning if Glicko works to do what it is intended to do.

The problem is that Anet is asking Glicko to determine the outcome of 24 random pugs facing off, without telling it who is on each team.

And no matter how you slice it, that is a trainwreck waiting to happen (and has already happened on some tiers)

Now, my Proposed idea, simply makes a Win a Win, and a Loss a Loss, without needing to feel leashed and shackled to last weeks performance, or having demands placed upon you for next weeks.

You may win, you may lose, But at the end of the day, it would never be stagnant, and I can not fathom anyone wanting stagnation and what should be a dynamic game of simulated medieval war.

Ungood.3054:

While, yes, the mass hysteria crew likes to toss out grandiose claims that if you move a tier up or down the world will end with skulls spitting razors into your eyes and your children will be devoured by fire ants, but time and time again that has proven not to be case.

Going to have to fundamentally disagree with you here. My experience has been that for a number of servers, going up a server leads to a blow out of one sort and going down leads to a blow out of another. I believe this is true for DB, Mag, and FA to start with. I think if you look at the consensus on where things are tiered for competitive play (I may drag my thread back from page 2), you’ll find that this is the case for a significant number of servers.

I agree with the OP. While I do love WvWvW it tends to get stale after facing the same 2 servers week after week. I havn’t been keeping track but I think this is week 4 or 5 of the Borlis Pass, Anvil Rock, and Northern Shiverpeaks match up.

It’s kind of cool because you get the sense of which guilds to watch for and more of an idea of what a particular guild may do as far as tactics. But new blood would be great at this point.

Not to mention that our BP vs AR vs NSP threads on the forums just degrade into people complaining about the same people week in and week out.

JaironKalach.4938:

Ungood.3054:

While, yes, the mass hysteria crew likes to toss out grandiose claims that if you move a tier up or down the world will end with skulls spitting razors into your eyes and your children will be devoured by fire ants, but time and time again that has proven not to be case.

Going to have to fundamentally disagree with you here. My experience has been that for a number of servers, going up a server leads to a blow out of one sort and going down leads to a blow out of another.

Ok. Lets look at the real number then.

Week 3
Dragonbrand – Moved UP from T4 to T3 – Took Second place.
Magumma – Moved UP from T5 to T4 and Took 1st Place.
Kaineng – Moves UP from T6 toT5 and Destroys it.
Borlis Pass – Moves Down from T5 to T6, Took a close 2nd

Week 4
Magumma – Moves UP from T4 to T3 – takes Tight 3rd.
Kaineng – Moves UP from T5 to T4 – Destroys it.
Crystal Desert – moves Down from T3 to T4, takes a Tight 3rd.
Isle of Janthir – Moves Down from T4 to T5 takes 3rd

Highlights:
Blackgate – Loses again Tier 1 (2 weeks in a row now)
Sanctum Rail – Destroys Tier 2 (2 weeks in a row now)
Kaineng – Utterly Destroys Tier 4
Ehmry Bay – Destroys Tier 5 (crushing Isle of Janthir that moved down from Tier 4)
Darkhaven stomps Tier 7
Sorrows Furnace – Destroys Tier 8

Week 5
Sanctum Rail – Moves UP from T2 to T1 – takes a tight 3rd place
Blackgate – Moves DOWN to from T1 to T2 – Takes a Solid 1st
Fort Aspen – moves UP from T3 to T2 – takes a tight 3rd
Kainenge – Moves UP from T4 to T3 – Destroys it
StormBluff Isle – Moves Down from T2 to T4 – takes a tight 3rd.

Highlights:
Ehmry Bay – lays the beat down on Tier 5 – 3 weeks going.
Darkhaven – owns Tier 7 – 3 weeks going now
Sorrows Furnace – Destroys Tier 8 – 3 weeks going now

Week 6 - Current Week
Kainenge – Moved UP from T3 to T2 – looking at 2nd
Fort Aspenwood – Moved Down from T2 to T3 – looking at 1st

Highlights:
Ehmry Bay – is looking all set up to Stomp Tier 5 – for a Full Month in a Row now.
Darkhaven – yah, Looks like T7 is all set up to conclude a – full month of losing to these guys
Sorrows Furnace – has a nice lead in T8 as expected again – to blow out the month.

Continued from above

Are we all Starting to see that the Problem is not just Tier 8,

Also notice that moving up and down a tier does not cause a blow out or being stomped. Worlds have moved down and kept losing, moved up and took second, etc, etc.

If my system was in place, these lop sided matches would move around, quickly and people would rotate to where they belonged as opposed to stomping the same tiers again and again like we have now.

Also, if not for Kaineng moving up the ranks, I doubt most of these worlds would see any rotation at all, as most of the motion was caused by Kaineng’s ascension.

There is a real problem with using the wrong system for this, they need to keep it simple, if that means people move, then that really is for the better, as opposed to stale match ups, and dead end tiers that we have now.

My list would include close to 20 tiers.

Things seem even like with SOS and SOR, and BG and Kain right now.. but take JQ out of the mix and do a few SOS/BG/SOR runs? it won’t look as even most likely. SOS and SOR only look even when they are both being suppressed by JQ.

points-wise, the system we have that arenanet has created is not capable of producing balanced matches in the way most would normally consider a match balanced.

as such I would say my subjective impression is we have around 20 separate tiers, with 24 servers.