Guild Wars 2

So, we all know that the zerg always wins. And when it comes to a contests of the zergs, usually victory goes to the zerg with the zergiest zerg. I was thinking about this problem the other night when I came this epiphany. I will walk through the thought process.

My first thought was to debuff zerg members and/or buff small defending parties. The problem with this is it would be lame, and there is no way you could fairly buff and debuff and have it be enough to make up for the sheer number of people. So we have to find some other way to distinctivize people from grouping up like that.

I think it would help if only the top contributors got rewarded well for the offensive DEs in WvW. The number of people rewarded would scale based on the difficulty of the objective. For stopping a dolyak, which can easily be done with just one person, give gold level rewards to the 1+(max number of defenders during the event) players that ‘contributed’ the most, and an equal number of silver rewards. At the other end of the spectrum, taking the castle would probably reward 100+maxdef players.

With this change you can still bring forth your servers best efforts at primary objectives, but fewer players would clump on to the zerg if they aren’t getting rewarded for it.

Of course the way they calculate contributions would have to be completely revamped to properly account for contributions other than just damage.

At the same time as this the defender rewards would remain the same in order to encourage players to actually work on defending what they’ve taken.

One last unrelated side change I would do is change the defend the dolyak DE to not be an escort. That is, defenders should get rewarded for each attack that they save the dolyak from. If 2 invaders attack, and you hold them off, get rewarded for that, not when the dolyak does or does not reach its destination.

Turn on Friendly Fire. Problem solved!

Downed state is a huge ZERG benifit. Its way to quick to res someone and when they are downed they have WAYYYYYy to many escape and delay options

Stiv.1820:

Turn on Friendly Fire. Problem solved!

The death of WvW is a side-effect for that solution though.

Stiv.1820:

Turn on Friendly Fire. Problem solved!

haha i actually laughed at this comment but man would i like to see this…wonder how it would turn out!

Vonleo.2987:

Stiv.1820:

Turn on Friendly Fire. Problem solved!

haha i actually laughed at this comment but man would i like to see this…wonder how it would turn out!

It would actually be amazing (and totally do-able with this engine). They should add 1 more battleground with it enabled. I bet it would have the longest queue.

:( So the only discussion my idea generates is joking about someone else’s solution. :P Any thoughts on my idea?

Stiv.1820:

Turn on Friendly Fire. Problem solved!

Yes, this has been mentioned from the earliest of betas. But it’s a little late to retrofit.

Remove maximum number of targets that an arrow cart can hit, and possibly increase damage. Arrow carts are supposed to be anti zerg weapons.

Smaller parties can spread out more easily and avoid the arrows, larger groups cannot spread as effectively and many more will get hit. Right now a few arrow carts doesn’t phase a zerg and that should not be the case.

No to friendly fire.

As to the OP’s idea, won’t help much. Most players play WvW cuz its fun not for the rewards. Could care less for xp, karma and such from the events (tho the silver is nice for repair costs).

The silver is actually the biggest part imo. If you are running with the zerg and dying without getting any resources for completing objectives, you are hemorrhaging resources. It just isn’t worth it any more.

There is already a solution to zergs. Ballistas, arrow carts, and catapults.

There is a big difference between a mindless zerg and a zerg being led with a purpose by a commander. Zergs are necessary to take keeps.

“And when it comes to a contests of the zergs, usually victory goes to the zerg with the zergiest zerg.”

- Not when you have an organized defense. Even at 2:1 with supply runs with mesmer portals and portal bombs you can defend against a zerg.

The whole premise of this thread is false. The zerg does not always win. Organization can overcome a numbers disadvantage, at least up to a (rather large) point.

That being said, I am in favor of upping the AoE caps for stuff.

Sure, through extreme organization and a decent number of players you can stop a zerg run, but as someone who has been on both sides, that is not the way it ends up happening.

When I was in the zerg. We were green on eternal battleground, the huge group of players swept north taking every camp and tower in our path until enough people died that it fell apart, and the stuff that we captured was quickly reclaimed. Then we regrouped and did it again. And it was worth it too, because in the process we took 5 or so objectives really fast earning more than enough money to pay for the repair costs from the one death (definitely better money flow than when I was off by myself taking small objectives).

On the other hand, I’m currently on HoD in that current disastrous matchup. Last night I was playing on our home borderlands. We took titan paw started investing in siege (ballistas and arrow carts) and camp upgrades. The 10 or so of us that were there held off against the initial attempt of 20 or so Blackgaters trying to take it. They left, we rebuilt and expanded our defenses. It is quiet for a bit and a couple of the less committed defenders get bored and wander off. Then, as expected 50+ invaders arrive and wipe the 6 or 7 of us that remained.

Of course zerging is a problem. There is only so much organization you can put together to hold of against vastly superior numbers. It should not be worthwile for a team to send way more players than they need to take objectives. They need to encourage people, rather than take a lap with the zerg, to stick around and actually attempt to hold the things that they capture.

50+ steamrolls 6-7 at a very non-defensible position. Sounds about right. What was the rest of your team doing on the map while this was taking place?

Why is the OP trying to solve ‘zergs’?

Mass WvWvW – thats the entire point of the game. You want to play solo duellist thats what SpvP is for. personally i want to throw 100 ppl at each other with siege engines and kitten.

tagnut.8621:

Why is the OP trying to solve ‘zergs’?

Mass WvWvW – thats the entire point of the game. You want to play solo duellist thats what SpvP is for. personally i want to throw 100 ppl at each other with siege engines and kitten.

THIS.

When I saw the title for this thread, I was just like here we go again, someone trying to fix something that is not broken. A big selling point of Anets was the fact that EVERYONE can jump in at an event, and as long as they helped out even a little, they would get rewarded. Sounds like to me you need an entirely different game.

Removing the AoE cap would go a long way in helping smaller groups of people defend against zergs.

@Kintari
The rest of my team was off trying to cap Cragtop and Sunnyhill, even though we didn’t have a secure hold on Titanpaw at all. Why? Because capping objectives is more rewarding to individuals than defending objectives that have already been taken.

and @tagnut and ThyOwnage
THAT is the problem with the zerg. The rewards for individual contributors does not line up with what makes for strategic play for your team. We will never be able to reclaim the map if we are unable to hold on to what we have taken. Without Titanpaw, Cragtop and Sunnyhill are ultimately indefensible.

I agree awesomeness in WvW can be found in giant battles between hundreds of people. That wouldn’t be affected by my solution because the more people defending a point the more people are needed and rewarded for attacking it. In that sense we aren’t even talking about a zerg any more. More like a clashing of armies. Clashing of armies is good and entertaining. The problem is when a large group of players does their little circuit of capturing objectives and then leaves/dies as the other team’s large group of players can take them back and repeat the process.

I’m trying to fix the problem where everything is a nail. If you ever fail an objective in WvW it is because your hammer wasn’t big enough. Until you cap the number of players possible at a given objective, the solution is almost always throw more people at it.

I don’t think it is unreasonable or game-changing. I want the mechanics of the game to encourage the intelligent allocation of human resources. A well organized guild can manage people on a map very well, but not everyone is in a well organized guild. The mechanics of the game should still encourage players to go to where they are needed. Also the internal competition, if contribution is calculated correctly would encourage players to improve their game to actually be useful to their team.

Give us back our AoE in WvW simple as that because why the hell do Mez get to keep their AoE Stealth at max and Ele’s get nerffed to be near enough useless against a zerg.
If we are limited to 5 Peeps then they should be to.

The way to discourage zerging is by beating it. It isn’t the only tactic, nor is it even the best.

If the overall populations in a given WvW zone are reasonably matched, zerging isn’t a problem. If they are not reasonably matched, population imbalance is the problem, not ‘zerging’.

“Until you cap the number of players possible at a given objective, the solution is almost always throw more people at it.”

I’m not sure if you’re actually suggesting capping numbers at an objective or not, but it is such a mind-blowingly bad suggestion that I feel compelled to respond. Just … no.

No, I’m not saying that team-wise zerging is the best tactic. I’m saying it is the best individual tactic. There is no incentive for individual players to try group up any differently. As such there is no incentive for individual players to break this trend. If a group of players is steamrolling objectives, there is no reason for me not to hop in and start reaping the benefits, even if I am completely unnecessary. I want incentivize individual players to form up into groups appropriate for what they are trying to accomplish. Large groups in WvW act like gravity. The bigger it is the more people join it because it is the safe bet for good rewards. Why would I go off and try to find a smaller group that is struggling to complete their objective when I have sure shot at steamrolling over multiple objectives with the biggest zerg of a group. 4 people at a tower trying to hold off a massive attack while the rest of the server is off in a giant group capping a tower somewhere else? Why would I bother trying to help when we will probably lose that tower anyway, likely dying in the process, when I can join the giant group and easily reap the benefits?

No I’m not suggesting capping numbers at an objective. I was talking about capping more along the lines of when everyone who could possibly be there already is. Obviously you can’t throw more people at the problem anymore. Only at that point do people starting thinking about how they could be utilizing the players more effectively.