Guild Wars 2

Swamurabi.7890:

Straegen.2938:

I like that Anet is trying something new. However the concept that BP #10 has a chance against FA #5 or DB #6 is laughable. DB nearly doubled our score last week. I didn’t mind the uphill fight but pitting servers and corresponding rewards based on this system is ridiculous.

There is virtually no chance a 10, 11, 12 server can win against a 5, 6, 7 server. The odds have to be fantastically high.

On a high note, servers that already dominate in WxP/Karma/XP generation will continue to dominate in new rewards.

They have a chance if you use Glicko rating gained as the determining factor…

4. Tarnished Coast 314,319 -6.162
9. Crystal Desert 112,153 19.633
5. Fort Aspenwood 189,331 -13.084

6. Dragonbrand 284,547 -6.575
7. Maguuma 186,021 -37.988
11. Borlis Pass 147,545 45.069

Looks like the #9 and #11 servers beat servers #4-#7 if you look at rating change.

Do you REALLY think Anet is going to allow the entire WvW population to be stacked into a few servers?

Do we play the same game ? The answer is yes, yes they will allow population stacking … you have far to much faith in them.

Swamurabi.7890:

They have a chance if you use Glicko rating gained as the determining factor…

4. Tarnished Coast 314,319 -6.162
9. Crystal Desert 112,153 19.633
5. Fort Aspenwood 189,331 -13.084

6. Dragonbrand 284,547 -6.575
7. Maguuma 186,021 -37.988
11. Borlis Pass 147,545 45.069

Looks like the #9 and #11 servers beat servers #4-#7 if you look at rating change.

Do you REALLY think Anet is going to allow the entire WvW population to be stacked into a few servers?

Glicko has the opposite problem. A server that is bumped high into a bracket has no chance of losing. Take last week where DB nearly doubled our score. BP went up +45 and DB went down -6.5 despite trouncing us. Neither system works well for determining the outcome of a match. Oh and yes, yes I do think ANet will allow a few servers to be stacked. That is basically the current system in place now.

The effects are already evident. Our server has greatly slowed WvWing in hopes that we avoid getting into the dreaded 12th spot and spend the next few weeks watching zergs roll over us and our population dwindle as a result. I really hope there is more to the matchmaking system than stuffing a greatly under-matched servers against a completely stacked set of servers for weeks. Practically nobody on our server wants to roll against T1-3 and I am willing to bet T1-3 has little interest in backing our server up to our legendaries on every map.

Here’s the delta Glicko Leaderboard for the past 7 weeks with the server rank at the start.

Server End Start Delta
22   Sorrow’s Furnace 1,188.49 1,026.79 161.695
19   Isle of Janthir 1,299.96 1,148.63 151.329
14   Borlis Pass 1,590.30 1,439.16 151.145
24   Eredon Terrace 1,091.69 957.332 134.356
16   Northern Shiverpeaks 1,308.02 1,215.50 92.52
18   Henge of Denravi 1,232.21 1,152.81 79.392
23   Ferguson’s Crossing 1,072.35 1,017.56 54.793
3   Jade Quarry 2,157.11 2,128.43 28.675
4   Tarnished Coast 2,037.64 2,025.18 12.464
10   Crystal Desert 1,665.37 1,654.34 11.039
6   Fort Aspenwood 1,875.22 1,867.44 7.774
17   Gate of Madness 1,183.25 1,189.51 -6.265
7   Maguuma 1,748.71 1,760.68 -11.976
15   Darkhaven 1,340.30 1,355.73 -15.426
13   Stormbluff Isle 1,416.35 1,441.59 -25.236
2   Sanctum of Rall 2,153.04 2,179.48 -26.434
1   Blackgate 2,144.83 2,184.36 -39.534
21   Devona’s Rest 1,052.35 1,093.42 -41.072
5   Dragonbrand 1,863.97 1,927.91 -63.938
8   Sea of Sorrows 1,682.15 1,747.92 -65.767
12   Yak’s Bend 1,488.32 1,560.78 -72.468
20   Anvil Rock 983.737 1,107.99 -124.256
9   Ehmry Bay 1,572.50 1,740.11 -167.616
11   Kaineng 1,421.99 1,643.07 -221.087

Looks like the best “Gold division” server is JQ finishing in 8th place. Take a look at the other stacked servers BG and SoR, coming in a respectable 16th and 17th out of 24. Makes it worth it having 24/7 queues, skill lag and megablobs doesn’t it?

Excepting CD, every server in the gold division finished lower than their inital ranking.

What do you think would happen at the end of the season if this was the results?
People would leave BG, JQ and SoR because they want to win and stacked servers can’t win in a handicap based league.

The disparity between the top four servers (JQ, SoR, BG, TC) continues to mount. As such, I certainly hope that ANet has fully thought the league concept out so that the disparity does NOT continue to grow, but in fact, hopefully shrinks.

WvW points and PPT come strictly from population. If you have more players you can zerg down keeps/towers faster and even have players there to defend them. Add in fair-weather players (ones that only come out when the scores are in their favor or stay away when they see a bad score) and its even worse. Zergs hold the ground and take the ground while small mans harass or flank zergs to weaken or kill them. But a small man can only do so much in this game where a zerg can do everything. Until you make wvw less about numbers and more about tactics, population will be king and having servers that have a huge number advantage fighting smaller servers will be really frustrating for both sides.

In Devon’s defense there are skills involved in wvw. Zergs need to maintain a tight group so they can exploit the 5-aoe cap, focus fire so the enemy zerg doesn’t get the bonus, and move quickly around terrain.
Small man is all of those things, plus maximizing individual builds to make the group even stronger, being in the right place at the right time, and never face tanking an enemy zerg. That requires speed and coordination.

A zerg doesn’t require individual skill to be high to be effective, it requires situational awareness more than anything while the small man requires situational awareness and a higher individual skill.

I think this will be like obamacare, a train wreck. you will have a lot of players transfering to the bigger servers just to get the “special finisher rewards”. If anything everyone should get the same rewards but the winners should get a bigger quantity.

You would think Arena-net would learn how to do rewards without unfairly screwing over a majority of the population.

Example. mr. sparkles was only given out to people who did attend a real world event and without announcing the special rewards would be given out. That’s pretty sad because you have people with full mini collections that have a missing spot since you put it on there. You really think kitten ing off the small % of your population base which are dedicated collectors who purchase your mini’s every month is worth it to hand out a mini that 50 people will have and probably just ebay them? I don’t think so.

You did one thing right by allowing people to puchase old skins for their PvP locker collections rather than trying to get people to spend $600 to$6000 on RNG for 12-16 tickets because that was the only way you would get them because farming ingame takes too long for a short event to get that many and you would have to play 24/7.

I know it was a thing on gw1, but really Anet, learn how to hand out rewards right. I see this being a train wreck already of trying to get people to transfer for rewards.

The poster above me is smart, and with only 2 leagues in NA and 4 “full” servers, two of them I bet will be the winners of this league and everyone else will be screwed over on rewards SIMPLY BECAUSE they don’t play on a certain server.

Face it, zerging runs WvW on a casual note. We all know a good placement of SUP AC’s and tricking a zerg to funneling into a tower can own as far as low numbers but it’s not going to casually happen with random people often nor can you do it when your server is sleeping and there is hardly anyone on.

Swamurabi.7890:

Here’s the delta Glicko Leaderboard for the past 7 weeks with the server rank at the start.

Server End Start Delta
22   Sorrow’s Furnace 1,188.49 1,026.79 161.695
19   Isle of Janthir 1,299.96 1,148.63 151.329
14   Borlis Pass 1,590.30 1,439.16 151.145
24   Eredon Terrace 1,091.69 957.332 134.356
16   Northern Shiverpeaks 1,308.02 1,215.50 92.52
18   Henge of Denravi 1,232.21 1,152.81 79.392
23   Ferguson’s Crossing 1,072.35 1,017.56 54.793
3   Jade Quarry 2,157.11 2,128.43 28.675
4   Tarnished Coast 2,037.64 2,025.18 12.464
10   Crystal Desert 1,665.37 1,654.34 11.039
6   Fort Aspenwood 1,875.22 1,867.44 7.774
17   Gate of Madness 1,183.25 1,189.51 -6.265
7   Maguuma 1,748.71 1,760.68 -11.976
15   Darkhaven 1,340.30 1,355.73 -15.426
13   Stormbluff Isle 1,416.35 1,441.59 -25.236
2   Sanctum of Rall 2,153.04 2,179.48 -26.434
1   Blackgate 2,144.83 2,184.36 -39.534
21   Devona’s Rest 1,052.35 1,093.42 -41.072
5   Dragonbrand 1,863.97 1,927.91 -63.938
8   Sea of Sorrows 1,682.15 1,747.92 -65.767
12   Yak’s Bend 1,488.32 1,560.78 -72.468
20   Anvil Rock 983.737 1,107.99 -124.256
9   Ehmry Bay 1,572.50 1,740.11 -167.616
11   Kaineng 1,421.99 1,643.07 -221.087

Looks like the best “Gold division” server is JQ finishing in 8th place. Take a look at the other stacked servers BG and SoR, coming in a respectable 16th and 17th out of 24. Makes it worth it having 24/7 queues, skill lag and megablobs doesn’t it?

Excepting CD, every server in the gold division finished lower than their inital ranking.

What do you think would happen at the end of the season if this was the results?
People would leave BG, JQ and SoR because they want to win and stacked servers can’t win in a handicap based league.

What are you talking about?

They never said they would determine the winner by the DELTA or the increase/decrease…

They are matching the top 12 by"WvW Rating"

Quote Here:

“Europe will feature three leagues and North America will have four leagues two leagues, each league containing several 12 worlds (sorry for the confusion there!). The idea here is to look at recent WvW ratings and match up worlds in similar levels, with a gold league, a silver league, and so on.”

Then based on your position….1st 2nd 3rd (Green, Red Blue) you will be awarded points…weekly, bi-weekly I don’t know….at the end of the season they add up all of your points for every server… order them within your league 1-12 / 12-24 if your N/A…that determines the winner. They will matchup the servers by WvW Ratings…so that the matches are “balanced”

Quote here:

“As the first season progresses, each world will have a shot to earn points every week based on its standing. First place awards the most points, but your side will still get some points for lower rankings too. At the end of the season, the points will be added up and the world with the most points will get a cool trophy and a unique custom finisher. However, there will be smaller rewards doled out along the way, and even if you don’t participate in WvW, you could be on the receiving end of some goodies if your server does well.”

Gamadorn.2659:

Ware you talking about?

They never said they would determine the winner by the DELTA or the increase/decrease…

They are matching the top 12 by"WvW Rating"

Quote Here:

“Europe will feature three leagues and North America will have four leagues two leagues, each league containing several 12 worlds (sorry for the confusion there!). The idea here is to look at recent WvW ratings and match up worlds in similar levels, with a gold league, a silver league, and so on.”

Then based on your position….1st 2nd 3rd (Green, Red Blue) you will be awarded points…weekly, bi-weekly I don’t know….at the end of the season they add up all of your points for every server… order them within your league 1-12 / 12-24 if your N/A…that determines the winner. They will matchup the servers by WvW Ratings…so that the matches are “balanced”

Quote here:

“As the first season progresses, each world will have a shot to earn points every week based on its standing. First place awards the most points, but your side will still get some points for lower rankings too. At the end of the season, the points will be added up and the world with the most points will get a cool trophy and a unique custom finisher. However, there will be smaller rewards doled out along the way, and even if you don’t participate in WvW, you could be on the receiving end of some goodies if your server does well.”

IF you want a league where the skill levels of the players are different, then you MUST use a handicapping system to have a FAIR game. Think bowling or golf leagues. The way the game is played isn’t changed(buffs, debuffs), just the score at the end. Everyone can win as long as they play better than they are expected to play. You adjust the handicaps after each match and at the end you find out who was best.

What if first place isn’t determined by score but instead determined by your increase/decrease in Glicko. After each match you rank the servers 1-12 or 1-9 for EU based on delta Glicko and give the top team 12 or 9 points on down to 1 point for the worst. Modify each servers Glicko just like it’s done now and create new randomized matchups. Repeat till the season is over and you’ll get a winner.

Don’t assume that points = game score and ranking = Glicko rating. You think that Anet wants to have a game where everyone wants to be on a single server so everyone wins? That’s not a business model that survives. Queues, skill lag, megablobs on the top servers and vast empty spaces on the lowest servers. Is this what you think Anet wants?

Handicapped matches means that ANY server can win a season. That’s a better model.
Anet just needs to find a way to prevent players from gaming the system, which they will try to do.

What does numbers on a chart matter when the underdog server is still getting mopped up on the battlefield? It’s still going to be a kitteny experience. What are they going to do to change that?.

LadyHorus.8214:

Lorelei.3918:

Devon, c’mon man…it’s not about skill. Skill is not a major factor in wvw outcomes. It never was and never will be. It’s population, population, population. And do you know what happens when you match a rank 12 server against a rank 1 server? Rank 12 goes home. That’s what happens. And if you think that’s ‘pathetic’ or something, then maybe you need to rethink what it is you are making. It’s a game and people want to have fun in a game. Being outnumbered 5 to 1 all the time is Not Fun.

In fact, it doesn’t even need to be a 1-12 difference. CD spent just 3 weeks fighting t2-3 servers and by the end of it we had pretty much given up. It’s much worse for others I hear.

Sorry, this isn’t angels in the outfield. Miracles aren’t going to happen. The outcome of matching servers with more then 1 tier of disparity is pretty much already decided.

I’m ready to go back to the old system now. I’ll take the same ‘boring’ old 3 servers every week to the way things have been: not being able to even play for weeks at a time.

This, so much. I left GW2 for some months (long before the randomized matchups) and I have to say, coming back to this mess wasn’t fun. My server (Mag) against JQ? Really stupid.

And from what I gather about this leagues system, it is only going to get worse from here.

I really have begun to miss fighting against Ebay, CD, Yaks and others… Yes the fights were always the same few servers, but it was fun and enjoyable that way. Friendly rivalries between all our servers, but we always had a good time.

I don’t call running into 40 man+ zergs of two other servers (sometimes at the same time) with our fewer numbers fun lol. If we have good commanders who’re good at open field fights it can be really fantastic, but at the end of the day, numbers is really what decides the war’s outcome. And as everyone else has so aptly pointed out, it is very much about coverage and numbers.

And I’d daresay that zerging would hinder someone from really learning how to fight properly where there’s less riding on your performance than there would be in smaller fights or skirmishes. The reason I didn’t transfer to a top tier server was because I enjoyed the middle tier. we had good fights, some zerging, some skirmishes but it’s nearly unheard of now that we’re being matched up with much bigger servers. And it’ll only get worse with this leagues system. I don’t like roflstomping smaller forces just as much as I don’t like getting roflstomped by bigger forces… I don’t see how that’s so hard to understand, and makes me wonder how much our dev really plays WvW. And if he’s ever seen it from a top tier, middle tier or lower tier perspective in all ways.

Both of these replies +1. The leagues are going to fail so hard if they don’t do something about the populations or the scoring. We just had three weeks of hell vs FA, TC, SOS. Literally on reset night when everyone jumped in and saw the matches people were leaving to go to pve or logging out. And i’ve said this before, it’s not an issue of “oh we don’t have skill yada yada yada” we just literally don’t have the numbers to cover all the bases getting hit. Plain and simple. The devs should know this, they have the numbers for each server.

And want to know the really kittenty part? At the start of that three week hell we were T3 and we got BLASTED each week…yet our score went up…how in any world does that make any bit of sense. So in order for us to lose points and go back down to our appropriate tier with appropriate opponents we literally need to completely quit playing wvw for the week…because the second someone kills a single dolyak we get +20 rating pts -______-

I would much rather face the same servers every week if it meant it was a balanced fight. Actually i’m kinda looking forward to us (CD) facing SOR, JQ, BG….it will be so incredibly hilarious and the fail will be so enormous not even Anet will be able to ignore it (they might try though)

Swamurabi.7890:

Gamadorn.2659:

Ware you talking about?

They never said they would determine the winner by the DELTA or the increase/decrease…

They are matching the top 12 by"WvW Rating"

Quote Here:

“Europe will feature three leagues and North America will have four leagues two leagues, each league containing several 12 worlds (sorry for the confusion there!). The idea here is to look at recent WvW ratings and match up worlds in similar levels, with a gold league, a silver league, and so on.”

Then based on your position….1st 2nd 3rd (Green, Red Blue) you will be awarded points…weekly, bi-weekly I don’t know….at the end of the season they add up all of your points for every server… order them within your league 1-12 / 12-24 if your N/A…that determines the winner. They will matchup the servers by WvW Ratings…so that the matches are “balanced”

Quote here:

“As the first season progresses, each world will have a shot to earn points every week based on its standing. First place awards the most points, but your side will still get some points for lower rankings too. At the end of the season, the points will be added up and the world with the most points will get a cool trophy and a unique custom finisher. However, there will be smaller rewards doled out along the way, and even if you don’t participate in WvW, you could be on the receiving end of some goodies if your server does well.”

IF you want a league where the skill levels of the players are different, then you MUST use a handicapping system to have a FAIR game. Think bowling or golf leagues. The way the game is played isn’t changed(buffs, debuffs), just the score at the end. Everyone can win as long as they play better than they are expected to play. You adjust the handicaps after each match and at the end you find out who was best.

What if first place isn’t determined by score but instead determined by your increase/decrease in Glicko. After each match you rank the servers 1-12 or 1-9 for EU based on delta Glicko and give the top team 12 or 9 points on down to 1 point for the worst. Modify each servers Glicko just like it’s done now and create new randomized matchups. Repeat till the season is over and you’ll get a winner.

Don’t assume that points = game score and ranking = Glicko rating. You think that Anet wants to have a game where everyone wants to be on a single server so everyone wins? That’s not a business model that survives. Queues, skill lag, megablobs on the top servers and vast empty spaces on the lowest servers. Is this what you think Anet wants?

Handicapped matches means that ANY server can win a season. That’s a better model.
Anet just needs to find a way to prevent players from gaming the system, which they will try to do.

Your comparison’s are flawed…while they are correct when talking about Golf and Bowling…

Golf and Bowling are individual sports, where your score is a direct result of the skills you possess.

In GW2, WvW is made up of many people in a more team-like fashion and not only that…heavily favors numbers over individual skill level. Even a team-like handicap doesn’t apply here because the players from each team are not even…

Plus my post was just reiterating what they say they are going to do.

Trying to implement a handicap system based on skill, where the teams are uneven and winning is based more on numbers than skill would be difficult..

Gamadorn.2659:

Golf and Bowling are individual sports, where your score is a direct result of the skills you possess.

In GW2, WvW is made up of many people in a more team-like fashion and not only that…heavily favors numbers over individual skill level. Even a team-like handicap doesn’t apply here because the players from each team are not even…

Plus my post was just reiterating what they say they are going to do.

Trying to implement a handicap system based on skill, where the teams are uneven and winning is based more on numbers than skill would be difficult..

Team sports are handicapped all the time. It is called a spread. Now if players could “bet” on the outcome of a match and the spread altered itself based on said betting… GW2 would have something on its hands… well it would still suck to be a T4 against a T1 but at least a spread would even out the rewards.

Swamurabi.7890:

Here’s the delta Glicko Leaderboard for the past 7 weeks with the server rank at the start.

If every server has to play every other server at least once using Glicko, JQ can never beat BP in a week. In fact JQ couldn’t beat any server outside of T1 in a given week. They would get pummeled because they would be constantly playing lessor scored servers. The flip side is that a server like BP can never lose a match outside of T4 no matter how poorly they do. Glicko rewards lessor players for just showing up and punishes better players for taking the game. If the ratings were completely reset, maybe it would show something but it usually takes dozens of matches for Glicko to stabilize and early on is more or less tracking the total score.

Gamadorn.2659:

“As the first season progresses, each world will have a shot to earn points every week based on its standing. First place awards the most points, but your side will still get some points for lower rankings too. At the end of the season, the points will be added up and the world with the most points will get a cool trophy and a unique custom finisher. However, there will be smaller rewards doled out along the way, and even if you don’t participate in WvW, you could be on the receiving end of some goodies if your server does well.”

Thanks for the quote. So it seems winner of the league will be determined by medals, and glicko will essentially cease to matter once it starts. At least, that’s what I think this means, since “ranking” in this context seems to mean how you finish in a particular weekly match, i.e. 1/2/3 decided by points. Bit confusing since when they refer to “ranking” in the context of who is in what league they mean glicko ranking.

Anyway the whole thing sounds like a total mess regardless. Hopefully the finisher/trophy will be the only thing that is rewarded based on who wins the league, and everything else will be based on participation in some way. Pretending anyone outside of T1 has a real shot at winning is insane.

Swamurabi.7890:

Here’s the delta Glicko Leaderboard for the past 7 weeks with the server rank at the start.

Server End Start Delta
22   Sorrow’s Furnace 1,188.49 1,026.79 161.695
19   Isle of Janthir 1,299.96 1,148.63 151.329
14   Borlis Pass 1,590.30 1,439.16 151.145
24   Eredon Terrace 1,091.69 957.332 134.356
16   Northern Shiverpeaks 1,308.02 1,215.50 92.52
18   Henge of Denravi 1,232.21 1,152.81 79.392
23   Ferguson’s Crossing 1,072.35 1,017.56 54.793
3   Jade Quarry 2,157.11 2,128.43 28.675
4   Tarnished Coast 2,037.64 2,025.18 12.464
10   Crystal Desert 1,665.37 1,654.34 11.039
6   Fort Aspenwood 1,875.22 1,867.44 7.774
17   Gate of Madness 1,183.25 1,189.51 -6.265
7   Maguuma 1,748.71 1,760.68 -11.976
15   Darkhaven 1,340.30 1,355.73 -15.426
13   Stormbluff Isle 1,416.35 1,441.59 -25.236
2   Sanctum of Rall 2,153.04 2,179.48 -26.434
1   Blackgate 2,144.83 2,184.36 -39.534
21   Devona’s Rest 1,052.35 1,093.42 -41.072
5   Dragonbrand 1,863.97 1,927.91 -63.938
8   Sea of Sorrows 1,682.15 1,747.92 -65.767
12   Yak’s Bend 1,488.32 1,560.78 -72.468
20   Anvil Rock 983.737 1,107.99 -124.256
9   Ehmry Bay 1,572.50 1,740.11 -167.616
11   Kaineng 1,421.99 1,643.07 -221.087

Looks like the best “Gold division” server is JQ finishing in 8th place. Take a look at the other stacked servers BG and SoR, coming in a respectable 16th and 17th out of 24. Makes it worth it having 24/7 queues, skill lag and megablobs doesn’t it?

Excepting CD, every server in the gold division finished lower than their inital ranking.

What do you think would happen at the end of the season if this was the results?
People would leave BG, JQ and SoR because they want to win and stacked servers can’t win in a handicap based league.

You are missing one very large factor, Fun, yes that’s right, fun. Regardless of numbers and how YOU think it will work, the lower population servers are still going to get destroyed by the higher populations. Let me rephrase that, they are going to quit playing for the entire match-up because who want to be spawn camped for 7 days ? The larger populations will have nothing else to do but spawn camp, when their opponent can’t even Que 1 map while they can Que all 4.

So really, the rewards don’t mean kitten, Glicko scores doesn’t mean kitten, what rank you are in or perceived to be in doesn’t mean kitten, its going to be a kitten show of epic proportions.

Also to be honest, the Glicko system was a joke from the start for these types of matches and now that Anet has “tweeked” it, its even more of a joke, so if they base it off of what your saying, then they should probably just pick server names out of a hat and call them winners.

Nuzt.7894:

You are missing one very large factor, Fun, yes that’s right, fun. Regardless of numbers and how YOU think it will work, the lower population servers are still going to get destroyed by the higher populations. Let me rephrase that, they are going to quit playing for the entire match-up because who want to be spawn camped for 7 days ? The larger populations will have nothing else to do but spawn camp, when their opponent can’t even Que 1 map while they can Que all 4.

Why do YOU assume that BP or YB is going to be put in a match with BG? College and pro teams in a football league don’t face every other team in their leagues. Even an eighteen handicap golfer is going to lose badly to a two handicap golfer without handicap adjusted score, but with the handicap they just might win, and the possibility of winning makes the match FUN. Look at Anvil Rock, the lowest ranked server in NA, getting 95ppt and NOT QUITTING. Their 139K score is higher than four other servers, one of which is #7 Maguuma. Anvil Rock will probably never get to the 272K score that TC has, but if AR does better with the addition of a handicap than BG/JQ/SoR/TC/FA/DB with their handicaps, AR should get the rewards they deserve.

Nuzt.7894:

So really, the rewards don’t mean kitten, Glicko scores doesn’t mean kitten, what rank you are in or perceived to be in doesn’t mean kitten, its going to be a kitten show of epic proportions.

And yet after one year there are a lot of people still playing, lining up at the portals on Friday night. All this without any rewards, drops, or even balanced matchups. Everyone knows on Friday reset what the outcome of the matches is going to be.

Nuzt.7894:

Also to be honest, the Glicko system was a joke from the start for these types of matches and now that Anet has “tweeked” it, its even more of a joke, so if they base it off of what your saying, then they should probably just pick server names out of a hat and call them winners.

Irrespective of the rating method, after a year everyone knows that population is proportional to points and Anet should have enough data to predict the score of every possible matchup. Wouldn’t you rather play WvW knowing that on any given matchup, your server could win with a handicap? Wouldn’t that be FUN?

2 leagues.

Dang, I knew they were detached from the community, but at this point it’s like a borderline fantasy that is like playing a completely different game.

Actually play your own game, guys.

Swamurabi.7890:

Why do YOU assume that BP or YB is going to be put in a match with BG? College and pro teams in a football league don’t face every other team in their leagues.

I think he assumes that, because Devon has stated that every server will face every other server in their league at least once.

Swamurabi.7890:

Nuzt.7894:

You are missing one very large factor, Fun, yes that’s right, fun. Regardless of numbers and how YOU think it will work, the lower population servers are still going to get destroyed by the higher populations. Let me rephrase that, they are going to quit playing for the entire match-up because who want to be spawn camped for 7 days ? The larger populations will have nothing else to do but spawn camp, when their opponent can’t even Que 1 map while they can Que all 4.

Why do YOU assume that BP or YB is going to be put in a match with BG? College and pro teams in a football league don’t face every other team in their leagues. Even an eighteen handicap golfer is going to lose badly to a two handicap golfer without handicap adjusted score, but with the handicap they just might win, and the possibility of winning makes the match FUN. Look at Anvil Rock, the lowest ranked server in NA, getting 95ppt and NOT QUITTING. Their 139K score is higher than four other servers, one of which is #7 Maguuma. Anvil Rock will probably never get to the 272K score that TC has, but if AR does better with the addition of a handicap than BG/JQ/SoR/TC/FA/DB with their handicaps, AR should get the rewards they deserve.

Nuzt.7894:

So really, the rewards don’t mean kitten, Glicko scores doesn’t mean kitten, what rank you are in or perceived to be in doesn’t mean kitten, its going to be a kitten show of epic proportions.

And yet after one year there are a lot of people still playing, lining up at the portals on Friday night. All this without any rewards, drops, or even balanced matchups. Everyone knows on Friday reset what the outcome of the matches is going to be.

Nuzt.7894:

Also to be honest, the Glicko system was a joke from the start for these types of matches and now that Anet has “tweeked” it, its even more of a joke, so if they base it off of what your saying, then they should probably just pick server names out of a hat and call them winners.

Irrespective of the rating method, after a year everyone knows that population is proportional to points and Anet should have enough data to predict the score of every possible matchup. Wouldn’t you rather play WvW knowing that on any given matchup, your server could win with a handicap? Wouldn’t that be FUN?

First off I play on AR, I really don’t need you to try and explain how were doing or if were enjoying ourselves. Now that that is out of the way, this is not football, this is not a sport, you ask why I assume things when all the while you have been assuming that Anet will do things the way you think.

One would think that Anet would do what makes sense right ? I ask you this, did leaving free transfers in for as long as they did make sense ? No. Did allowing players to stack on servers make sense ? No. Does having 2 leagues vs. 4 make sense ? No. With the implementation of guesting does basing transfer costs on server wide population rather than monitoring WvW population (as that is the only reason to transfer) and base it on that make sense ? No. Has ANYTHING Anet done with WvW make sense ? No. So with their track record, I’m going out on a limb and going to say they won’t do what makes sense.

As for people lining up at the portal every Friday, hello from AR, this is a myth. Those servers that do line up have a population, it might not be equal but they will not spend the entire match watching 1 server completely dominate.

Lastly, Anet doesn’t care about about fair, Devon has made that very apparent. No I would not enjoy being dominated then being told by Anet that I won because of a handicap. Yay I won but it was the worst week of WvW I have ever had the displeasure of playing.

Again you are assuming Anet is going to do things your way, it won’t happen, you can dream and hope, but the matches will be lopsided, many will quit logging because no one enjoys complete domination (loser or winner).

Your trying to convince the community everything will be OK because this is the way you would do things, well you are not Anet, they don’t care about your opinion (I know it sucks but the truth hurts). As I said, as a payer on AR I don’t want to be told I won because of handicaps, I want to win because it was fair, and competitive. This isn’t pre-school I don’t want a gold star for showing up.

Nuzt.7894:

…snip..

I don’t want to be told I won because of handicaps, I want to win because it was fair, and competitive. This isn’t pre-school I don’t want a gold star for showing up.

This is not the place to you know..make sense and stuff :P

I agree, I don’t care what a scoreboard says, getting hammered into powder at every turn isn’t fun or entertaining.

Um guys, I don’t want to rain on your anti-nightcapping parade (I agree, it’s a horrible problem that needs addressing, stop seeing no evil WvW devs. Fully upgraded T3 keeps shouldn’t be razed back to wood with 5 attackers), but are you telling me in that third of the day that is primetime (roughly 5PM-1AM) that you can’t dominate those blobbing servers, if it’s only as you say due to numbers and not skill? Because during that time, unless you’re like Vabbi, every server should have full or near full maps. You have equal numbers. If you do dominate them, raze their keeps, hold SM, flip all their camps and all that jazz, the difference in points should nowhere near as pronounced as it is currently, right?
And if your zerg is still smaller in primetime (with only one commander per map) despite full maps, then well … maybe it’s because you are worse at organizing your forces, i.e. less skilled as a server? Yeah maybe you’re really so much better in duels and maybe 5 guys of your mid-ranked server can really easily trash twice your numbers from a top 4 server, but sheer combat ability is only half the battle in war.

DevonCarver.5370:

I never said they did. However, I’d argue that they do in fact stand a chance against the 6th ranked server and the 5th ranked server. We are not trying to only ever match you up against your closest comparable server. That was what was happening with the system before and it was bad. If you are saying you don’t ever even want the chance to try and show your skill against a higher ranked server, then I don’t know what to say.

If you actually believe that WvW at it’s current state is skill-depended then I don’t know what to say. Such a statement coming from a dev just shows how clueless you really are about the part of the game your in charge off.

DevonCarver.5370:

We want to make it so that skill is more important than sheer numbers and we have some ideas. None of them are so easy/safe to implement that they are going to happen in the near-term.

You seem to be using the term “skill” pretty often, can you please specify what you mean, as I think my, and many others, view of having “skill” differs a lot from your perspective.

DevonCarver.5370:

bradderzh.2378:

We, the people of lower tiers, don’t mind testing our metal against tough odds. We do however mind it when the servers with the most players and best coverage gets the best rewards purely for the numbers reason only.

But as you said in another topic, wvw isn’t fair. All rank 12 has to do is throw enough matches to drop to rank 13 and get the best rewards.

So, as I’ve said before, we are still looking into ways to try and alleviate those problems, but that is also what WvW is like right now, so while this season will create new rewards and new incentives to play, it isn’t as though this is a brand new problem. We want to make it so that skill is more important than sheer numbers and we have some ideas. None of them are so easy/safe to implement that they are going to happen in the near-term.

“Skill is more importanat than sheer numbers…”

How can I take your comment seriously. Everything you done or havent done just cater to zerglings.

A freaking PvE Warg or Worm gives more WXP than a player kill. Shaking my head.

Speaking of transfers, they need to implement lower gem transfer cost to lower pop servers to help attract players there. Hell even WoW and Rift offered free transfers to lower pop servers.

Don’t know why the devs are so determined to destroy wvw.

Jamais vu.5284:

Um guys, I don’t want to rain on your anti-nightcapping parade (I agree, it’s a horrible problem that needs addressing, stop seeing no evil WvW devs. Fully upgraded T3 keeps shouldn’t be razed back to wood with 5 attackers), but are you telling me in that third of the day that is primetime (roughly 5PM-1AM) that you can’t dominate those blobbing servers, if it’s only as you say due to numbers and not skill? Because during that time, unless you’re like Vabbi, every server should have full or near full maps. You have equal numbers. If you do dominate them, raze their keeps, hold SM, flip all their camps and all that jazz, the difference in points should nowhere near as pronounced as it is currently, right?
And if your zerg is still smaller in primetime (with only one commander per map) despite full maps, then well … maybe it’s because you are worse at organizing your forces, i.e. less skilled as a server? Yeah maybe you’re really so much better in duels and maybe 5 guys of your mid-ranked server can really easily trash twice your numbers from a top 4 server, but sheer combat ability is only half the battle in war.

Just to give you an idea… normally we don’t even fill a que on any particular map except only in special circumstances. IE, reset night, and sometimes other times but it is kind of rare for us. And that is during primetime hours for our server. Once it gets into prime time for our opposing servers like TC for instance, they outnumber our forces 10 to 1 give or take. And often times it isn’t only one server trying to disrupt our stuff, it is both of them lol. Kind of hard for us to be in so many places at once and still fight off much greater forces.

I admit, it feels like our server’s older commanders, the ones I remember at least, have either gotten tired of it and left wvw or simply wont lead anymore because many of them seem to think “what’s the point when we get steamrolled by top tier servers every week?”

And honestly I don’t blame them. Mag used to be very good (we still are, morale is just… low to say the least) and I was proud of this server. We have a few shining stars so to speak that are still amazing at what they do far as commanding goes, I just wish not so many of them decided to step down. Our “night shift” commander whom was one of my favourites doesn’t seem to be anywhere lately and it kinda makes me sad really. :/

In the end though, I think many people are just tired of being up against servers we shouldn’t even be up against. I don’t know exactly how the current system determines who we’re supposed to fight but… considering we keep going up against tier 1, 2, 3 and 4, and we’re supposedly tier 7 or 8? Seems kind of lopsided to me. I’d be saying the same thing if we were up against tier 12 or 13 or something every week. There’s a reason they put in place the tiers which means you were expected to go up against servers equal or in your bracket. I really don’t know where their current bright idea of a system came from or why.

LadyHorus.8214:

I really don’t know where their current bright idea of a system came from or why.

Because the ones that stacked onto the tier 1 servers are tired of only fighting other stacked servers so they moaned and complained.

We have 24 servers… yet they listened to the ones from only 4-5 servers and ignored the rest of us saying “plz dont do this!”

Ostra.3927:

LadyHorus.8214:

I really don’t know where their current bright idea of a system came from or why.

Because the ones that stacked onto the tier 1 servers are tired of only fighting other stacked servers so they moaned and complained.

We have 24 servers… yet they listened to the ones from only 4-5 servers and ignored the rest of us saying “plz dont do this!”

I think Anet wants to create a better experience. I also think they fundamentally believe they know better than their forum players. On some level as a dev myself, I can identify with their perspective. As a player/user, I have zero interest in hanging around fighting servers with 2 or more times the population that my server has. Call me fair weather but I will leave an overly dominant or dominated server because what I want are fun fights during my play time that are challenging, not lopsided either way, offer some skirmishing and I don’t want to wait in queues.

Straegen.2938:

Ostra.3927:

LadyHorus.8214:

I really don’t know where their current bright idea of a system came from or why.

Because the ones that stacked onto the tier 1 servers are tired of only fighting other stacked servers so they moaned and complained.

We have 24 servers… yet they listened to the ones from only 4-5 servers and ignored the rest of us saying “plz dont do this!”

I think Anet wants to create a better experience. I also think they fundamentally believe they know better than their forum players. On some level as a dev myself, I can identify with their perspective. As a player/user, I have zero interest in hanging around fighting servers with 2 or more times the population that my server has. Call me fair weather but I will leave an overly dominant or dominated server because what I want are fun fights during my play time that are challenging, not lopsided either way, offer some skirmishing and I don’t want to wait in queues.

Well, that’s the thing though. I mean… I started out on Borlis Pass server in the very beginning and once I ventured into WvW territory and saw all it was, was just a big karma train (at the time) I decided to try visiting other servers, which is when Mag caught my eye and I stayed here ever since. When I joined, everyone was important, everyone contributed. Our commanders worked together very well, even though at the time we were getting crushed by SoS. We put up a great fight, and it was impressive to me at the time. And ever since then I really enjoyed this server and its fights in wvw. Had a lot of great contributors to the community, for instance there was a mesmer specific guild for a long time that taught good hiding places in keeps and portal placements in certain situations… stuff that I’ll always remember. List goes on.

But that compared to what the community feels like now, is like night and day. I don’t know if the new matchup system is entirely the cause of it, all I know is that it feels like Mag is but a shadow of what it was once. I don’t know how it’s affected other servers but I wouldn’t be surprised if it was something a bit like this. And I’ll never leave Mag, it’s become my home. Granted, I wont go out and fight 80 guys in a small 20 man team all the time because it gets tiresome, but there’s no way I’m going to transfer servers again even if I had the money just so I could hope I’d have better fights elsewhere. I think that’s a lot of the reason the top tiers became what they are; fair weathers who wanted to always win (or at least most of the time) transferred to their servers, and thus the fights got boring for them. I would suspect crushing a small server all the time would be equally as boring though, but that’s just me. I like beating the odds when it’s reasonable but the current state of things doesn’t look very… fair to me. But that’s just the perspective of someone who was gone for 3 or 4 months and came back to a very different atmosphere.

Swamurabi.7890:

Look at Anvil Rock, the lowest ranked server in NA, getting 95ppt and NOT QUITTING. Their 139K score is higher than four other servers, one of which is #7 Maguuma. Anvil Rock will probably never get to the 272K score that TC has, but if AR does better with the addition of a handicap than BG/JQ/SoR/TC/FA/DB with their handicaps, AR should get the rewards they deserve.

I hope those rewards will pay for their massive repair bills.

Looks like he didn’t change his mind, so we are really going to see BG, SOR, and JQ versus Emry Bay and Crystal Desert. I have no idea what Anet is thinking.

Give a little more equality as in handicap in the seasons, as making the outmanned buff so it removes the AoE cap.

timidobserver.7925:

Looks like he didn’t change his mind, so we are really going to see BG, SOR, and JQ versus Emry Bay and Crystal Desert. I have no idea what Anet is thinking.

Holy kitten, we’re going to see a 3v2?

:D

DevonCarver.5370:

skeet.1390:

So do 4 leagues in NA. This eliminates the enormous population difference from server 1 to server 12 and 13 to 24.

If you really think the server that is ranked 12th at the start of this stands any chance against the top servers you are delusional.

I never said they did. However, I’d argue that they do in fact stand a chance against the 6th ranked server and the 5th ranked server. We are not trying to only ever match you up against your closest comparable server. That was what was happening with the system before and it was bad. If you are saying you don’t ever even want the chance to try and show your skill against a higher ranked server, then I don’t know what to say.

We will continue to look into ways to change scoring to try and even out some of the population based imbalances, but that is not an easy task and it won’t happen during the season.

One way to fix the whole “coverage wins WvW” is to group servers into something like a war group. basically group a set of severs with different coverage strength into said war group. bam a more equal WvW system…

So instead of listening to the community about how terrible a 2 league split of NA was you went ahead and pushed through your terrible idea.

Outstanding.

Even after the blog post, I am still secretly hoping that there is an about face to switch to 4 leagues in NA. The idea of a league is good in that it gives structure and a time frame with a goal. The idea of participation unlocking the server earned rewards is very good. The idea of varying up matches to bring spice is in itself good. I think the changes to the borderlands are exciting and a step in the direction of providing new strategy and alternative ways for a player (and organized groups) to contribute to the war.

But, the idea of making only 2 leagues just for the sake of varying matches and at the very real risk of roflstomp games is bad. Now my math might be rusty, but 4 leagues of 6 would give you C(6,3) = 20 combinations of servers in a given league (so 10 sets of pairings). Certainly way less numerical variation compared to what you can get with 12 servers and there might be consequences to how you would score these smaller leagues, but at least these match-ups would much more likely be competitive. If variation is so much more important than realistic competition, just allow for adjustments between seasons.

An example of the problem in match-ups: two strong servers and a low being placed together in a given week actually undermines the core 3-way fight design because there is a reduced risk-reward for going after one server at the expense of opening up to the other. Its definitely not fun for the whipping-boy and its not as tactical as if all three servers are close in strength.

I guess I’m just worried that fair-weather effects from getting completely steamrolled (or steamrolling) will completely tarnish what the league brings to the table in the first place: a competitive playoff-like atmosphere with rewards.

tldr: I hope it works. I fear completely uneven matchups will take away from what could be a good idea. I’ll be playing some WvW either way.

timidobserver.7925:

Looks like he didn’t change his mind, so we are really going to see BG, SOR, and JQ versus Emry Bay and Crystal Desert. I have no idea what Anet is thinking.

Well, we successfully demolished every statement Devon made about this change so far.

You’ll notice he did not dared reply again here for 5 days now.

I told you Anet would not change their mind about this. Doing so would be to admit they are wrong, and that’s something Anet will never do.

If you are saying you don’t ever even want the chance to try and show your skill against a higher ranked server, then I don’t know what to say.

I don’t mean any offense, but when you say things like this, it makes it seem like you’re out of touch with how WvW outcomes are really decided. Population and coverage decides WvW matches almost every time. (I say almost just in case someone dredges up a one-in-a-thousand case where an undermanned server pulled out some kind of big win, but I really doubt the “almost” qualifier was even needed)

There’s no testing your skill against higher ranked servers. It’s just not a realistic statement. In fact, if you’re talking about skill, there’s probably no serious difference between a high rank and a low rank, it’s just about coverage. (That’s not even getting into how the combat system, skill lag and so on exacerbate the problem of numbers trumping all else in most situations)

Hearing a developer in charge say something like this is like hearing your psychologist say, “Well, why don’t you just get over it?” It just suggests that somewhere along the line there’s a disconnect.

You can’t have a WvW system where skill matters unless you have a coverage handicap.

Make it happen Devon. You know it’s the right thing to do.

It would appear the devs like wvw, they just don’t appear to like us players. We all know, from practical playing experience that skill matters, in some fashion.

But, coverage is significantly more important, beating those doors down when the other servers have no coverage still gets you the PPT and WXP.

Anet still has a few weeks to add PvD mastery skill.

We still have hacks, “glitches”, broken/missing merchants, upgrades that bug, sentries that can’t be capped, Lords that can be bugged, UI’s that need addressing, command systems to implement, yet we get this joke-scoring league.

We apparently don’t matter in the big scheme. Zerging is here to stay, population imbalances get worse (show us some evidence that wvw populations are stable) and yet we get Finishers.

The Goat.1940:

One way to fix the whole “coverage wins WvW” is to group servers into something like a war group. basically group a set of severs with different coverage strength into said war group. bam a more equal WvW system…

Great idea, I was thinking along these lines myself but couldn’t figure out how it could be done. But 2 small servers combining into one big battle group to go up against a bigger server makes sense to me.

kitten just go back to the system you had at the beginning and stop creating these convoluted Rube Goldberg contraptions and calling it progress. Did anyone but you have a problem with the old system? You know, keep it simple and all. Most of us down at the lower tiers don’t give a crap about scores or winning we just want to have good, balanced fights and fun, preferably without our skills lag-failing. Getting steamrolled by a “skilled” zerg that outnumbers you five to one gets old real fast, as does being in that steamroller.

timidobserver.7925:

Looks like he didn’t change his mind, so we are really going to see BG, SOR, and JQ versus Emry Bay and Crystal Desert. I have no idea what Anet is thinking.

based on devon’s warped sense of reality, this will be an excellent opportunity to showcase “skill”.

this dude is beyond delusional at this point

its broken how did yaks bend and Kaineng get put in with dragonbrand? weird oh well this will be a bad week