Guild Wars 2

Despite the growing pains (queues, puggers, achievement bugs, etc) I feel like new life has been breathed into WvW with the dawn of season 1.

The queuing problem will probably help with server population imbalance. On the higher servers some people won’t even be able to get into WvW enough to get the season meta achievement, so there will certainly be some spreading out as a result of this.

Sure, a lot of PvE players are carrot-chasing newbs, but a big portion of non-WvW players simply have never taken the time to get into it and understand it. It’s a completely different mindset and attitude from PvE – almost an entirely different game – a lot more players than many of you think are going to continue to enter and play WvW after they get their carrots. Why? Because its kittenING FUN why the hell do YOU play WvW? It’s the single most re-playable aspect of the game. It has never received the attention us hardcore players think it should and now we’re crying because it’s getting too much!?

Yes some leagues, NA Gold for example, are decided before they begin – but so many issues we’ve been QQing about for a year have been flipped on their head:

“WvW gets no love” -> the biggest living story achievement set ever? WvW season 1
“Server gaps too big” -> now even middle servers queuing all maps
“T1 gets too much reward” -> good luck T1 even getting in to WvW
“There’s no GvG” -> ok not league-related but they’re giving us a place to GvG!
“It’s a blobfest” -> now you gotta stop blobbing to escape the skill lag
“Matchups are bad” -> not perfect, but much better now

As far as NA goes, Devon really should be thankful he changed it to 6/9/9 instead of the original 12/12. Crystal Desert vs Anvil Rock or Jade Quarry vs Yak’s Bend would have been just laughable. Now Bronze league is super-competitive and fighting for 2nd and 3rd place in silver is going to be legitimately interesting.

You had me until you said;

“It’s a blobfest” -> now you gotta stop blobbing to escape the skill lag

It’s just the overflow of the PvE and AP hunter masses.

When they’ve got their achievements or new shiny PvE LS comes out, you’ll see how number drops.

AndrewSX.3794:

It’s just the overflow of the PvE and AP hunter masses.

When they’ve got their achievements or new shiny PvE LS comes out, you’ll see how number drops.

yep the #s will drop but they will land above where they used to be, and once the players who leave get bored with their carrots they will not be afraid to come back to WvW because they kinda will understand it unlike previously.

Svarty.8019:

You had me until you said;

“It’s a blobfest” -> now you gotta stop blobbing to escape the skill lag

I play in bronze so I rarely see skill lag because we rarely have large zerg v zerg. I’m just guessing the skill lag will ultimately split up the zergs.

Not saying skill lag is a good thing.

skill lag is present in the bronze league too, so bad at some stage I cannot even use my weapons and there seems to be a bug with reviving people too; outside of that its been a ton of fun so far today.

Solstice.1097:

Svarty.8019:

You had me until you said;

“It’s a blobfest” -> now you gotta stop blobbing to escape the skill lag

I play in bronze so I rarely see skill lag because we rarely have large zerg v zerg. I’m just guessing the skill lag will ultimately split up the zergs.

Not saying skill lag is a good thing.

I think he means that this doesn’t solve the blob issue. Eu has had the worst skill lag for moths due to the fact they all have similar time zones for prime time and blobs still rule the meta.

AndrewSX.3794:

It’s just the overflow of the PvE and AP hunter masses.

When they’ve got their achievements or new shiny PvE LS comes out, you’ll see how number drops.

This really depends on the retention rate. Even if there’s a 15-25% conversion rate from “never WvWs” to “WvWs quite a bit”, that’s a pretty significant population boost, and a shot in the arm that WvW really needs.

Not to mention there will probably be future seasons and possibly other WvW events if the leagues are popular according to metrics.

to be clear, FPS drop is not skill lag. skill lag is when your skill button flashes and nothing happens. FPS drops are common in larger fights but i very rarely get actual skill lag even in a 3 way battle in SMC lord room with ~75-100 players nearby.

Sarrs.4831:

AndrewSX.3794:

It’s just the overflow of the PvE and AP hunter masses.

When they’ve got their achievements or new shiny PvE LS comes out, you’ll see how number drops.

This really depends on the retention rate. Even if there’s a 15-25% conversion rate from “never WvWs” to “WvWs quite a bit”, that’s a pretty significant population boost, and a shot in the arm that WvW really needs.

Not to mention there will probably be future seasons and possibly other WvW events if the leagues are popular according to metrics.

Agreed, if you can convert even 5% of the pve base to we this season that population gap will close a ton for lower tier and mid tier servers in my opinion.

Whatever the issues are, its not just on W v W; Since Blood & Madness became active weird things are happening on some of the P v E maps too.

johnnymiller.5968:

Whatever the issues are, its not just on W v W; Since Blood & Madness became active weird things are happening on some of the P v E maps too.

Not many here care about pve maps :p

Banzie.5248:

johnnymiller.5968:

Whatever the issues are, its not just on W v W; Since Blood & Madness became active weird things are happening on some of the P v E maps too.

Not many here care about pve maps :p

No doubt lol; just a thought – there are issues across the board so to speak, could all be related……

johnnymiller.5968:

Banzie.5248:

johnnymiller.5968:

Whatever the issues are, its not just on W v W; Since Blood & Madness became active weird things are happening on some of the P v E maps too.

Not many here care about pve maps :p

No doubt lol; just a thought – there are issues across the board so to speak, could all be related……

Anet just seems to have put a ton of future code in this last patch which has caused all sorts of issues. At least it will be fixed next big patch rather then getting 10 hotfixes a day xD actually I like the hot fixes… They saved sm/keeps a few times :p

People are here because of the rewards, not because of the league system. Leagues were one of the worst ways they could have implemented all these rewards, but just like you the devs will probably rave about about how it was the leagues that saved WvW.

Solstice.1097:

Despite the growing pains (queues, puggers, achievement bugs, etc) I feel like new life has been breathed into WvW with the dawn of season 1.

The queuing problem will probably help with server population imbalance. On the higher servers some people won’t even be able to get into WvW enough to get the season meta achievement, so there will certainly be some spreading out as a result of this.

Sure, a lot of PvE players are carrot-chasing newbs, but a big portion of non-WvW players simply have never taken the time to get into it and understand it. It’s a completely different mindset and attitude from PvE – almost an entirely different game – a lot more players than many of you think are going to continue to enter and play WvW after they get their carrots. Why? Because its kittenING FUN why the hell do YOU play WvW? It’s the single most re-playable aspect of the game. It has never received the attention us hardcore players think it should and now we’re crying because it’s getting too much!?

Yes some leagues, NA Gold for example, are decided before they begin – but so many issues we’ve been QQing about for a year have been flipped on their head:

“WvW gets no love” -> the biggest living story achievement set ever? WvW season 1
“Server gaps too big” -> now even middle servers queuing all maps
“T1 gets too much reward” -> good luck T1 even getting in to WvW
“There’s no GvG” -> ok not league-related but they’re giving us a place to GvG!
“It’s a blobfest” -> now you gotta stop blobbing to escape the skill lag
“Matchups are bad” -> not perfect, but much better now

As far as NA goes, Devon really should be thankful he changed it to 6/9/9 instead of the original 12/12. Crystal Desert vs Anvil Rock or Jade Quarry vs Yak’s Bend would have been just laughable. Now Bronze league is super-competitive and fighting for 2nd and 3rd place in silver is going to be legitimately interesting.

""It’s a blobfest" -> now you gotta stop blobbing to escape the skill lag" – sadly things don’t work that way… People will have more skill lag then ever, but they will not stop blobbing.

NornBearPig.9814:

People are here because of the rewards, not because of the league system. Leagues were one of the worst ways they could have implemented all these rewards, but just like you the devs will probably rave about about how it was the leagues that saved WvW.

Truth. The very many achievement whoring PVE warriors (and no I don’t mean the class) will go into WvW just to get their living story achievements done. It will be a zergfest not unlike the zerg trains we’ve seen in Orr/FS. That’s abysmal for WvW. Why is ANet actively encouraging more zerg vs zerg action instead of coordination and strategy (both of which disappeared from WvW a loooooong time ago). Not to mention the horrible queue times for people who regularly go into WvW. League makes WvW worse, not better – people who regularly do it will get sick of the queue times and the zerg full of achievement whoring PVE warriors running in circles with the blob will not be any fun for anyone.

Yes, it’s nice. Everyone is excited and takes it serious in primetime. I’m afraid nights and mornings will decide the outcome tho.

Also, the achievements need some tweaking. Some take way more time than others. I got the 450 kills and 10 keeps today already for example. Those are achievements, ment for 7 weeks!! It’s just weird.

OP.. YES! Its great to see a positive perspective on the leagues in the forums… I think this may be the only one :P So many people looking to find the dark side of everything. Any change is a good change, it means they care about improving it.

I agree 100% !

AndrewSX.3794:

It’s just the overflow of the PvE and AP hunter masses.

When they’ve got their achievements or new shiny PvE LS comes out, you’ll see how number drops.

I think Anet is trying to design it so “getting their achievement” will take a significant amount of time. For most people who don’t play 24/7, it may mean sticking with the whole season to get the achievement. Which will be great!

for those of us sitting In a 1 hour and counting que, it is definitely not a success.

Not a success for me either, 1 hour plus in a queue and still waiting. Do they think WvW players will keep playing their game if they can not get on a WvW map?

At least put an audible alarm when travel to WvW is available so I can go watch tv and listen out for the alert. I have no desire to craft or PvE.

up to 90 minutes in Q. Hey ANET, how about you let all of us in and see how it goes…

kenny blankenship.6354:

up to 90 minutes in Q. Hey ANET, how about you let all of us in and see how it goes…

And here is what their servers would look like …

from what I hear from those who got in, that is kinda what it looks like now. Infinite was overstated. I think 50 is more like it.

Having gotten in from reset, I have noticed that the survivability of a lot of enemy players is really low.

Several times you see 5-10 players melt on the first push. I haven’t seen that since culling.

Sea of Sorrows had 3 maps queued this reset, on the 3 maps Sos bl had a 10 min queue, TC bl had a 2 min queue and EB had a 5 min queue. Just a heads up for anyone looking to WvW without queues.

IoJ… Who lost over 200 WvWers recently. Just queue’d 3 maps for 1 hour plus. Holy PvE players.

Obviously the long queues will diminish. It’s reset day and everyone wants to see the new achivement.

Leagues are the best thing that has happened to WvW in months.

NornBearPig.9814:

People are here because of the rewards, not because of the league system. Leagues were one of the worst ways they could have implemented all these rewards, but just like you the devs will probably rave about about how it was the leagues that saved WvW.

This. You have to think whether it was the leagues or the APs that brought people out. I think it’s pretty clear it’s the APs. So the thread title should be “AP incentives in WvW are a success.”

But then this is day one. We expected AP hunters to come out in droves. The problem is, the nature of the AP hunter is such that when the next set of APs come out, they all go do that instead.

Yeah ive had my first experince with that crazy lag that people on T1 must experience regularly. Cant say i like it, but having full maps is fun.

There might be a bit of rejuvenation, and queue’s may cause a couple transfers. I still think it is too early to deem leagues a success. Could be a flash in the pan. We’ll see if excitement dwindles when the novelty wears off and we start seeing some blowouts again. The only reason they’re close right now is because it’s reset night and this 1st week, the matchups are all in sequential order so there is only a two rank gap (at maximum) in each of the matches. These are probably the closest matches we will see all season.

Agreed OP, it was a success for Anet given all the mass transfers coming and going. In the end nothing wrong with it as it allows them further financial stability so they continue to support GW2 which is a win win for the players.

arpack.4931:

AndrewSX.3794:

It’s just the overflow of the PvE and AP hunter masses.

When they’ve got their achievements or new shiny PvE LS comes out, you’ll see how number drops.

I think Anet is trying to design it so “getting their achievement” will take a significant amount of time. For most people who don’t play 24/7, it may mean sticking with the whole season to get the achievement. Which will be great!

Actually is a terrible thing cause means you’ll have those useless pvers/APhunters/rallybots getting in the way both on maps and on queque for the whole season.

Until people realize they can’t stand the lag and drops are still not worth it..
so they go back to champfarming until the Ascend to madness dungeon comes along..

just saying..

This game has too many conflicting game modes lol, WvWers hate the PvErs, who hate the PvPers who hate everyone else.

I think leagues are alright, eventually the general pop will go down, and skill lag will be rare, it was even rare before when i got in EB.

PvErs will go back to candy farming, zerkers will get frustrated from dying so much and stop queuing, and we’ll have the solid WvW crowd fighting again.

“skill lag will be rare, it was even rare before when i got in EB.”

lol @ this. no it won’t be rare..

Merlin Dyfed Avalon.5046:

“skill lag will be rare, it was even rare before when i got in EB.”

lol @ this. no it won’t be rare..

Are you saying over the course of the entire season, the population will not drop on some servers to a level where skill lag will be in fact rare?

Even with a massive queue this morning, it was rare during massive fights, dunno wat to tell u, i had a very decent time in WvW for hours.

yes population might drop on servers..
No lag will still be present when servers meet.

maybe you play NA servers or have a beast of a pc.. i don’t know.

I do play NA, the server had a 30 min queue tho so it was indeed full, i do have a good computer and very fast internet, don’t know how much that effects skill lag but i don’t really care, i played fine.

Sorry about your lag, i hope that the devs improve performance for people who do have constant lag, and won’t be turned off by WvW.

Moan or Mentor,

So far i have read a lot of moaning about skill lag, about players only entering for the Achievement etc. etc.

May i suggest to those moaners to start mentoring? Instead of using up your time to scare away new influx of players by moaning on this forum, you could also use it to mentor the newbie PvE players.

Just my 2 cents.

P.S. WvWvW should be the place where sPvP and hardcore PvE spend their time togheter to better themselfs for their respective game modes. Yes i know, haters gona hate, but that won’t stop me from dreaming about more cooperation.

Solstice.1097:

Despite the growing pains (queues, puggers, achievement bugs, etc) I feel like new life has been breathed into WvW with the dawn of season 1.

The queuing problem will probably help with server population imbalance. On the higher servers some people won’t even be able to get into WvW enough to get the season meta achievement, so there will certainly be some spreading out as a result of this.

Sure, a lot of PvE players are carrot-chasing newbs, but a big portion of non-WvW players simply have never taken the time to get into it and understand it. It’s a completely different mindset and attitude from PvE – almost an entirely different game – a lot more players than many of you think are going to continue to enter and play WvW after they get their carrots. Why? Because its kittenING FUN why the hell do YOU play WvW? It’s the single most re-playable aspect of the game. It has never received the attention us hardcore players think it should and now we’re crying because it’s getting too much!?

Yes some leagues, NA Gold for example, are decided before they begin – but so many issues we’ve been QQing about for a year have been flipped on their head:

“WvW gets no love” -> the biggest living story achievement set ever? WvW season 1
“Server gaps too big” -> now even middle servers queuing all maps
“T1 gets too much reward” -> good luck T1 even getting in to WvW
“There’s no GvG” -> ok not league-related but they’re giving us a place to GvG!
“It’s a blobfest” -> now you gotta stop blobbing to escape the skill lag
“Matchups are bad” -> not perfect, but much better now

As far as NA goes, Devon really should be thankful he changed it to 6/9/9 instead of the original 12/12. Crystal Desert vs Anvil Rock or Jade Quarry vs Yak’s Bend would have been just laughable. Now Bronze league is super-competitive and fighting for 2nd and 3rd place in silver is going to be legitimately interesting.

Its a different mindset.. really lets see we get a zerg train running champs all over Tyria in Pve and in WvW we get karma trains playing zergwars in WvW.. yes now I see the difference Karma and WXP as opposed to Loot and Karma…. that mindset is totally different.
Though to be fair what’s left of UW WvW can likely call anything more than 3 opponents bearing down on us a zerg or a blobfest…. funny thing is both FSP and FR still believe they need Golem assaults on us to get the job done

Tobbygnome.6793:

This game has too many conflicting game modes lol, WvWers hate the PvErs, who hate the PvPers who hate everyone else.

I think leagues are alright, eventually the general pop will go down, and skill lag will be rare, it was even rare before when i got in EB.

PvErs will go back to candy farming, zerkers will get frustrated from dying so much and stop queuing, and we’ll have the solid WvW crowd fighting again.

You obviously haven’t played WvW or if you have you musta been strolling around the outback counting butterflies… Skill Lag has never gone away and I cant remember any fight with more than 20 players involved not having some kind of issue.. especially when 3-way action is either close or on top of you…. still at least there is one slight positive from it.. you can feel when there is something sizeable about to jump your group or tower cos that all to common slow down of the game sends the goose pimples up your arm and your brain shouts out ALERT!

Yes, the world could be wonderful…sadly its not. I like the league, I like the future new GvG arena, I like the future new WvW Overflow map. It’s great! What I dont like are queues (which come from PvErs and bandwaggoners) and catastrophic game performance. Also I dont like guilds leaving because they just cant play anymore.

And really, I try to “mentor” new PvE-WvWers. I tell them to please no run around in a circle in the ruins because we already have the buff and other ppl are in the queue. I tell them not to waste supplies and repair a wall that gets trebbed for hours (Must be boring to do the same thing all over again, but I guess thats PVE). Sadly I have the impression most of them just want to finish their achievement treadmill and are not interested in WvW or the WvW community. I have the impression another farming event would have been more satisfiying for them.

I guess I’ll just wait until everything hopefully improves and take a break until then.

Banzie.5248:

Solstice.1097:

Svarty.8019:

You had me until you said;

“It’s a blobfest” -> now you gotta stop blobbing to escape the skill lag

I play in bronze so I rarely see skill lag because we rarely have large zerg v zerg. I’m just guessing the skill lag will ultimately split up the zergs.

Not saying skill lag is a good thing.

I think he means that this doesn’t solve the blob issue. Eu has had the worst skill lag for moths due to the fact they all have similar time zones for prime time and blobs still rule the meta.

Our server played #3 (Piken) a few weeks ago and #2 (Vizuna) last week. They both have zergs of such unbelievable size! They literally cram everybody on the map into one massive zerg, there are no singletons flipping guards or someone off on their own in a jumping puzzle or anything like that. It’s just one gigantic blob.

The trick to WvW is the speed of moving the blob around. And that’s it, really. Viz do it much more quickly than Piken.

The main problem with the blob is how quickly it gets around, the fact that the objectives are very close together, that the maps are too small for people who run with swiftness 24/7.

It’s far to early to call the leagues a “success.” In fact, given that they’ve barely started, I kept re-reading the original post, looking for signs of sarcasm. It’s possible to see when something fails quickly, I’d say we’d probably need to get to week 3 or so before we have enough data to call it a “success.”

I just have to say that the league seems to be off to a good start. A lot of close matches during reset. Wonder if that could be sustained over the week.

The queue does blow, and I’m on SBI. I can only imagine what t1 servers are going through.

I am eager to see how the leagues play out, with actual points that you earn for where you place. I think that is better than the crappy ranking system they had before.

Bloodstealer.5978:

You obviously haven’t played WvW

Don’t tell me i obviously haven’t played WvW, i’ve played WvW since the start. And i hardly ever roam without a large group. 20 players and u get lag? You must have a pretty crappy setup.

It’s day one. Let’s evaluate this a few weeks from now.

It’s depressing to think that achievement points have this strong a hold over so many people. I have little hope that ArenaNet will be encouraged to make quality content over achievement point grinds after seeing a zerg circle the ruins for an hour with four commanders, just to get the ruins achievement.

It seems players will do almost anything if you stick some achievement points on it.

League will not be successful as long as the competition element of it is a farce. Coverage Wars does not make for good league play.

Also PvEers flooding WvW for opening night does not make for success. Sure on a winning server some of those folks might stick around, but all the servers that are going in with lower population to start with, how many of those WvWers are going to stick around? Those are the ones we need to stick around.

Honestly I have no idea why all the PvE’ers are rushing to get these achievements, we have 7 weeks, what is the kitten rush? I felt like I needed to go troll the canons at tequila just to get even.