This really needs to be fixed. There are probably topics already posted about how broken this is, but I’ll share a story on how an epic 6+ hour Stonemist castle siege lead by SBI forces was shattered due to character model culling.
SBI rogue forces effectively began to shut down HoD supply lines around 1230 PM PST. This was during a time we had no commander online, and nobody to rally a large main force. We stuck to defense. About an hour later, a commander and a well-respected siege leader logged into EB. Shortly after, several trebuchets were placed to pelt the wall of Stonemist. Our main force led by the commander defended these trebs (we had 3 up at a time, losing between 10 to 15, I wasn’t part of this crew I’m not sure, but I was in direct contact with the ‘siege commander’ the entire time) while the rogue forces continued to drain supply through Yak interception and camp raiding (Rogue’s Quarry and Golanta).
Meanwhile, JQ constantly raided our eastern supply camp and tried to push durios/bravost. Within an hour or two stonemist supply was dry. We had JQ pushed back over Ogrehill, and held this line while working HoD supply and walls. Within three hours, Lowlands Keep was about at half supply, and the two forward towers were empty. At 1230 PST, stonemist had 2800/2800 supply, lowlands 1700/1700, and the outer towers 500/500~ to give you perspective of how much supply was lost during this period.
At this point, JQ seemed to realize what we were doing and they started to finally raid Rogue’s Quarry and intercept Yaks. After about four hours, Lowlands keep, the two forward towers, and Stonemist castle were completely dry of supply, and the walls were down. JQ was still on the north door, while SBI has the southeast walls down.
We finally started an assault on inner Stonemist, with everyone being ordered inside for the final siege. In retrospect, having EVERYONE come was a mistake… but that’s beside the point here. After perhaps thirty minutes the inner wall was breached. JQ attacked from the northwest while SBI attacked from the northeast.
Once inside, we were met with the expected lagfest. But we quickly set up several ballista and arrowcarts in the hallway and continuously fired. After about another 20 minutes, we finally managed to push the forces back enough to work on the keep boss. Over the next 40 minutes, we managed to kill the keep boss at least 4 times. With around 30 of us sitting in the keep circle and another 15 in the hallways and around the edges. We saw nobody inside. But magically the keep lord continuously revived every time we killed him. After the first revive, we were confused. After the second revive, we knew what was going on and ordered everyone to continuous aoe the circle.
After two more keep boss kills and still unable to kill (or even damage) the invisible defenders, we gave in. Due to everyone being pulled to the castle, supply lines resumed and we realized the walls and doors were going up more and more often (we saw 200 supply in the depot at one point), at this point it was a lost cause and we pulled out. Six hours is a long time to siege for in a coordinated effort. Regardless, I am proud of my server pulling together in this epic siege, everyone in SBI seemed to be pulling their weight. As far as I’m concerned, we showed HoD we can match and even surpass them during this assault.
Here’s an account from an HoD defender perspective: http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/64700-hod-vs-jq-vs-si-1week-format/page__st__210#entry1937438
That was truly an epic siege, and props to HoD for the defense… even though you don’t deserve to hold the castle due to the culling issue. We outplayed you hard during that six hours, only to be met with a server issue halting progress.
I was there. (EvE Reference)
tl;dr There is none, read about this epic battle. For it was glorious. Model culling must be fixed ASAP.
(edited by emoleas.4309)