Guild Wars 2

Once again I ask. Can we get a way to lock the reward track to the one we want to run over and over.

Or a way to remove the reward tracks we don’t want on the list

Thanks Anet! LOVE the new backpiece and all the new rewards coming. Love, love, love it.

Is there any way we can see some previews of the t3 armor? Like chat codes or something juicy like that?

McKenna Berdrow.2759:

It checks if you have the skin. So if you already have the T1 skin then you can buy the T2.

Will we still be able to use our WvW Tournament Tickets to upgrade T1 weapons into T2 weapons? (Not sure that’ll be the way to go, but I want to know in advance if I need to spend them now, or if they’ll be converted, etc). I have all the T1 skins unlocked.

Baldrick.8967:

It didn’t sound too bad, until they added in:

However, this track will reset weekly.

I mean, wtf? So if I am one pip short of a full track during the week, I lose all progression and have to start over? Who thinks that is a good idea?

People who don’t play wvw all that often could log in Tuesday, look at progression, work out they aren’t going to finish the track before reset and just not bother logging in.

As for more rewards for higher ranks, way to feed all those that EOTM’d to gain rank or those on the busiest servers….

I can see dozens of tags on each map as you get more for being a comm- and fights over who is supposed to tag up. I’m guessing they consulted one of their pet commanders before bringing in a bonus for a comm tag…

Why don’t they at least ask some wvw players about these changes before they fester them on us?

It’s now official: k- train ftw. I can see loads of pve’rs running around tagged up and completely clueless…until they realise how hard it is to actually get anything in wvw and off they will go again.

I’m guessing that the actual targets for getting the armor and backpack will be so off target (like wvw achievements were for years) that the vast majority will have to play for the rest of their lives to get one piece of ascended.

OK, there’s quite a lot of criticism on this subject. I’m just quoting you at random.

As it stands, we have a WvW population with no weekly rewards. If we add weekly rewards, we will only gain players, not loose players. If our current population plays less, then they are not true WvWers.

We’ve been asking for a weekly reward sysstem for a long time. Whether this reflects winning or not, remains to be seen. I hate, hate, hate the everyone gets a trophy mentality, so hopefully, it’s not that.

Spurnshadow.3678:

Baldrick.8967:

It didn’t sound too bad, until they added in:

However, this track will reset weekly.

I mean, wtf? So if I am one pip short of a full track during the week, I lose all progression and have to start over? Who thinks that is a good idea?

People who don’t play wvw all that often could log in Tuesday, look at progression, work out they aren’t going to finish the track before reset and just not bother logging in.

As for more rewards for higher ranks, way to feed all those that EOTM’d to gain rank or those on the busiest servers….

I can see dozens of tags on each map as you get more for being a comm- and fights over who is supposed to tag up. I’m guessing they consulted one of their pet commanders before bringing in a bonus for a comm tag…

Why don’t they at least ask some wvw players about these changes before they fester them on us?

It’s now official: k- train ftw. I can see loads of pve’rs running around tagged up and completely clueless…until they realise how hard it is to actually get anything in wvw and off they will go again.

I’m guessing that the actual targets for getting the armor and backpack will be so off target (like wvw achievements were for years) that the vast majority will have to play for the rest of their lives to get one piece of ascended.

OK, there’s quite a lot of criticism on this subject. I’m just quoting you at random.

As it stands, we have a WvW population with no weekly rewards. If we add weekly rewards, we will only gain players, not loose players. If our current population plays less, then they are not true WvWers.

We’ve been asking for a weekly reward sysstem for a long time. Whether this reflects winning or not, remains to be seen. I hate, hate, hate the everyone gets a trophy mentality, so hopefully, it’s not that.

That depends you see, if the reward track progresses too slowly and gets resetted more often than not before u reach your reward box, then players will just do a roflmao and retreat to pve for rewards

Question was answered

XenesisII.1540:

Aeolus.3615:

just a tough i remmembered now…

Anet try to pull pve layers into WvW…
….but by the other handWVW barelly holds servers with the same population fithing each other!!!

i really dont get what they are trying to achieve with this nosense…sicne Anet always ignored the real problems…

Don’t quite get what you’re trying to say here… but where do you expect to pull new players in for wvw? or do you want wvw to just continue dying as usual?

Most of the attention this game gets is for it’s pve, for living story and now raids, there has to be something in wvw to help attract more pve players into wvw, and the biggest thing to do that is actual rewards. You’re not going to get random joeblow off the mmo street to come play gw2 for wvw, that time has passed.

Obviously other major problems exist with wvw, namely combat has gone to kitten since the expansion, but that balancing act is not in the wvw hands. Population balance is as usual an ongoing investigation. Actual wvw game play needs to be freshened up, because the ppt game is stale. Now that skirmish scoring and rewards are out of the way, maybe they can try and tackle one of those issues now.

Yes, new players come from PvE and PvP. Anet does a blog post, and other posts to promote this WvW change. This makes some players curious and hop in to see what it’s about, what the reward tracks are like, what this pip system is, is this something I want? Will all of them stay? No, but some will. It is also an opportunity to bring back old players as it is making news on GW2.com, Reddit, and other sites.

As long as they keep making smart changes, and the keyword is smart (I’ve pointed out that rewarding tagging up will be disasterous, https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/wuv/My-2c-on-June-1-Blog-Post/first#post6605213 ) then they have more reasons to make PR announcements to bring in new players. They need to keep at it.

And, by the way, I’ve seen a lot of folks saying “you can just turn off the other tags.” Uh, no. It’s really important to see the other, guilded, organized groups on a map. That is not a solution to a problem that should never exist in the first place.

Also, on this subject of tags, I often run tagless. I know other commanders and guilds that almost never run a tag. This is for a good reason. I just don’t feel like getting a lot of people following me. Some guilds don’t want any pugs, and run privately. I just want to play with a small group. I also don’t want to take pugs off the other tag. There’s also the spying issues.

If the current WvW devs played WvW on a regular basis, they would know and understand all this. It’s obvious that whoever’s idea this was is not a regular WvW player. While well intentioned, and I appreciate that, it’s just a bad idea. Please don’t implement it.

I’m interested in seeing the commander tag thing sort out in practice before making a judgment. I understand the concerns of too many tags, but as someone who is super tired of blobbing, I think this is a fairly creative way to discourage blobbing and spread activity around.

I think we should see it in action for at least a few weeks to see how it works out instead of lambasting it here already.

I’m liking these changes on the surface.

With these changes I think it’s fair to say new people will join WvW and if that’s the case I’m hoping server links become a thing of the past.

Some servers are going 8+ hours without a tag and just getting rolled hour-after-hour and people are QQ’ing about there being too many tags with this update?

Spurnshadow.3678:

And, by the way, I’ve seen a lot of folks saying “you can just turn off the other tags.” Uh, no. It’s really important to see the other, guilded, organized groups on a map. That is not a solution to a problem that should never exist in the first place.

Also, on this subject of tags, I often run tagless. I know other commanders and guilds that almost never run a tag. This is for a good reason. I just don’t feel like getting a lot of people following me. Some guilds don’t want any pugs, and run privately. I just want to play with a small group. I also don’t want to take pugs off the other tag. There’s also the spying issues.

If the current WvW devs played WvW on a regular basis, they would know and understand all this. It’s obvious that whoever’s idea this was is not a regular WvW player. While well intentioned, and I appreciate that, it’s just a bad idea. Please don’t implement it.

You guys are starting to blow it out of proportion.

First you say turning off tags is not an option because you want to see tags, then you say you and guilds run without tags, so you ain’t seeing them anyways. You can continue to do all of the above, the bonus is only for the commander and it probably isn’t even going to amount to much.

Also you do remember there’s different tag colors right? Some servers still use the color tag system for roles, you can use those rules to see who’s running. Pug tags=blue, scouts=red, guild=green/purple/yellow. Adapt and use them again.

Wvw isn’t your own personal playground, it’s shared with hundreds of others, there are things you may not like about that, but the devs don’t like exclusive play, just going to have to deal with it.

Wvw needs an infusion of players, it needs to be accommodating to new players and commanders, the old way certainly wasn’t working in that department.

Well it is world vs world. You have to work together as a server. Tagless groups and groups who are unable to deal with newer more clueless players are obviously going to perform worse than those servers who are more accepting and are able to guide the newer players in the right direction and work together as a whole.

Kir Sakar.3647:

SkyShroud.2865:

neven.3785:

SkyShroud.2865:

Given that there is a squad commander bonus, what if people want to run tagless, how to take advantage of this bonus then?

why would you expect a bonus? If you want to be exclusive and not show the map where your group is running, then you do not deserve the bonus. Generally if you want to run closed with a tag, most people respect that, and if they dont, learn to shake pugs and they’ll leave you alone.

But, tagless still doing their part for the server….why are you so mean to tagless?

Then, what would be the difference between a capable commander running tagless with his guild and say… me, running around “tagless” with my little noob-casual-friends guild? Would I deserve that reward as well?

The tag reward is not meant for some form of participation but for showing up on the map (and being an orientation/help in some form to other players).

Your noob casual friends are still helping the server in their noob casual ways.

If you are saying it is to encourage tag up, do note it is 5 minimum, that will encourage a lot of tags. If people are saying it is to reduce blob, then I have to highlight that if multiple tags chose not to defend let say their t3 keep, it will cause conflicts with other players, is that also anet’s intentions?

Well knowing where your allies are is obviously of more worth than trying to be WvW divas and doing your own thing.

To me it sounds like tagless groups are less teamplayers than those who run with tags. Basically like in sPvP you get more rewards if you contribute more to the objectives.

I doubt the reward increase will be that big that its super advantageous to run tags. Plus you always will need to find people who want to follow you. You cant just tag up and get reward. You need followers that actually want to follow you.

XenesisII.1540:

Spurnshadow.3678:

And, by the way, I’ve seen a lot of folks saying “you can just turn off the other tags.” Uh, no. It’s really important to see the other, guilded, organized groups on a map. That is not a solution to a problem that should never exist in the first place.

Also, on this subject of tags, I often run tagless. I know other commanders and guilds that almost never run a tag. This is for a good reason. I just don’t feel like getting a lot of people following me. Some guilds don’t want any pugs, and run privately. I just want to play with a small group. I also don’t want to take pugs off the other tag. There’s also the spying issues.

If the current WvW devs played WvW on a regular basis, they would know and understand all this. It’s obvious that whoever’s idea this was is not a regular WvW player. While well intentioned, and I appreciate that, it’s just a bad idea. Please don’t implement it.

You guys are starting to blow it out of proportion.

First you say turning off tags is not an option because you want to see tags, then you say you and guilds run without tags, so you ain’t seeing them anyways. You can continue to do all of the above, the bonus is only for the commander and it probably isn’t even going to amount to much.

Also you do remember there’s different tag colors right? Some servers still use the color tag system for roles, you can use those rules to see who’s running. Pug tags=blue, scouts=red, guild=green/purple/yellow. Adapt and use them again.

Wvw isn’t your own personal playground, it’s shared with hundreds of others, there are things you may not like about that, but the devs don’t like exclusive play, just going to have to deal with it.

Wvw needs an infusion of players, it needs to be accommodating to new players and commanders, the old way certainly wasn’t working in that department.

Agreed. We’ll get new players with the rewards. But incentivising having a tag will cause chaos. What’s the point? None. If people want to tag up and command, fine. Go for it. But it should be because they want to lead, not because they want to get more pips on a reward track. It’s too important of a role.

Are the lower tier servers really this desperate for tags that Anet needs to offer a carrot for someone to tag up? Cause in T1 and T2, it’ll be chaos.

FrizzFreston.5290:

Well knowing where your allies are is obviously of more worth than trying to be WvW divas and doing your own thing.

To me it sounds like tagless groups are less teamplayers than those who run with tags. Basically like in sPvP you get more rewards if you contribute more to the objectives.

I doubt the reward increase will be that big that its super advantageous to run tags. Plus you always will need to find people who want to follow you. You cant just tag up and get reward. You need followers that actually want to follow you.

The tagless groups are still in voip, calling out stuff in chat, and are usually known to the other commanders what they’re doing. They run tagless for a reasons which I’ve already outlined.

Wonder how many will try to create 4 free accounts and in-game mail them gold to level-craft until lvl 60. At that point they got their own reward squad.

Belorn.2659:

Wonder how many will try to create 4 free accounts and in-game mail them gold to level-craft until lvl 60. At that point they got their own reward squad.

I must admit, I was wondering about the wisdom of giving extra rewards to commanders. Granted, commanders have extra responsibility, but the real benefit to being a good commander should be that your world does better and you get better rewards because of that. Linking rewards directly to commanding could lead to the ‘too many chiefs’ problem developing.

Maybe they should have a “commander” reward track that lets tagged commanders choose between items that commanders use most.

Sharen Graves.1276:

Once again I ask. Can we get a way to lock the reward track to the one we want to run over and over.

Or a way to remove the reward tracks we don’t want on the list

I think that’s off-topic, the new Skirmish reward track has nothing to do with the currently existing ones.

XenesisII.1540:

Spurnshadow.3678:

And, by the way, I’ve seen a lot of folks saying “you can just turn off the other tags.” Uh, no. It’s really important to see the other, guilded, organized groups on a map. That is not a solution to a problem that should never exist in the first place.

Also, on this subject of tags, I often run tagless. I know other commanders and guilds that almost never run a tag. This is for a good reason. I just don’t feel like getting a lot of people following me. Some guilds don’t want any pugs, and run privately. I just want to play with a small group. I also don’t want to take pugs off the other tag. There’s also the spying issues.

If the current WvW devs played WvW on a regular basis, they would know and understand all this. It’s obvious that whoever’s idea this was is not a regular WvW player. While well intentioned, and I appreciate that, it’s just a bad idea. Please don’t implement it.

You guys are starting to blow it out of proportion.

First you say turning off tags is not an option because you want to see tags, then you say you and guilds run without tags, so you ain’t seeing them anyways. You can continue to do all of the above, the bonus is only for the commander and it probably isn’t even going to amount to much.

Also you do remember there’s different tag colors right? Some servers still use the color tag system for roles, you can use those rules to see who’s running. Pug tags=blue, scouts=red, guild=green/purple/yellow. Adapt and use them again.

Wvw isn’t your own personal playground, it’s shared with hundreds of others, there are things you may not like about that, but the devs don’t like exclusive play, just going to have to deal with it.

Wvw needs an infusion of players, it needs to be accommodating to new players and commanders, the old way certainly wasn’t working in that department.

I agree, I would love seeing more tags around. Sometimes I go into WvW and (as a newbie to WvW) have nobody to join especially when there aren’t any tags in any of the maps.

Belorn.2659:

Wonder how many will try to create 4 free accounts and in-game mail them gold to level-craft until lvl 60. At that point they got their own reward squad.

But they would all need to be logged in at once, so 5 machines just to run a ‘squad’….

Baldrick.8967:

Belorn.2659:

Wonder how many will try to create 4 free accounts and in-game mail them gold to level-craft until lvl 60. At that point they got their own reward squad.

But they would all need to be logged in at once, so 5 machines just to run a ‘squad’….

Multiboxing

I think this is a good change and has got many players more interested in WvW however I would like one thing to be changed.

Only the commander gets the increase in rewards. In my opinion this should be extended to all those in squad as you will end up with tons of tags for the most mundane of things and some simply running a squad just for the rewards. Having the benefits be for being in a squad keeps the incentive to have squads and commanders without making people feel like they need to tag up when there are squads or penalising them for not having their own commander tag.

May I remind people that commander tags are 300g which acts as a significant barrier of entry to a lot of people.

I’m expecting that we’ll see an initial influx of new tags. Who will then learn that being the commander is a bit more than throwing up a dorito and getting rewards.

Some will stay and become good commanders.

Others will decide that they don’t like being attacked because someone doesn’t like their decisions and will tag down.

In the longer run, it might reinvigorate havoc teams…

Junkpile.7439:

“If you’ve been playing on the same world for at least three weeks.” Maybe give reward if you have played on the same world for at least three years? 3 weeks really? What kind of bandwagoner haven’t played in same server at least 6 months?

Heck, how about a huge reward for those of us who have been on the server since GW2 started and NEVER transferred at all.

kenahs.8397:

I’m liking these changes on the surface.

With these changes I think it’s fair to say new people will join WvW and if that’s the case I’m hoping server links become a thing of the past.

Out of all the changes I hope Anet would make is to get rid of the server links.
Unfortunately, I don’t know if that will happen. Certain servers have died off with but a few players remaining, and the only way to make them a viable opponent in WvW is to permanently link them with another server.

If Anet did something like this before merging servers, before killing off server communities, then this would have been a good way to try and boost populations then. However, like you said, maybe the influx of people would cause such a difference that the hopes of severing links would actually be a possibility! crosses fingers

good going team. keep it up!

apharma.3741:

I think this is a good change and has got many players more interested in WvW however I would like one thing to be changed.

Only the commander gets the increase in rewards. In my opinion this should be extended to all those in squad as you will end up with tons of tags for the most mundane of things and some simply running a squad just for the rewards. Having the benefits be for being in a squad keeps the incentive to have squads and commanders without making people feel like they need to tag up when there are squads or penalising them for not having their own commander tag.

May I remind people that commander tags are 300g which acts as a significant barrier of entry to a lot of people.

People who are part of larger groups/zergs already earn more than those who don’t, thus why people call it the k-train. I actually mistakenly thought that the rewards spread to everyone in squad as well, and that’s what made me oppose it because it just encourages people to zerg even more (which has become a very tiresome gameplay for many). Now that I actually understand what this commander reward is lol… Keeping the reward for the commander is a way to finally give something back to a player who spends X gold on siege, X hours running around like a ping pong with legs getting called from one corner of a map to another, and getting blasted for not being “the best”, while they keep everyone’s morale up especially when they belong to a losing team. Some of these guys run for really long hours, because of the lack of other tags within their server, and I have no idea how they can keep their energies up. Lots of caffeine, surely. Of course, there’s the fear that anyone will just tag up all at once, but that’s purely assumption for now.

My suggestion is for there to be something set up for others, especially those running as roamers, but I also understand there are hindrances to that. I honestly don’t like this update, as it’s simply to get people interested in WvW while Anet continues to ignore the real reasons why their populations dropped in the first place, but — at least I get to see commanders get rewarded for their efforts.

I like the updates.

I have one request for the future:

Can we have an alternate method, not requiring gold or far less gold, to obtain a Commander Tag?

I don’t play hard-core, I’m a casual player(2-3 times a week, 1-3 hours at a time), and I just don’t ever seem to rack up that much gold. Please make it challenging and some work, but can we cut down the amount of gold in some way? (I know, I know…I should have gotten one when it was 100 before the increase.)

Keep up the great work ANet. Thanks for giving WvW some love.

Spurnshadow.3678:

Agreed. We’ll get new players with the rewards. But incentivising having a tag will cause chaos. What’s the point? None. If people want to tag up and command, fine. Go for it. But it should be because they want to lead, not because they want to get more pips on a reward track. It’s too important of a role.

Are the lower tier servers really this desperate for tags that Anet needs to offer a carrot for someone to tag up? Cause in T1 and T2, it’ll be chaos.

They still need 5 people with them, and they will need to be do a decent enough job to keep those 5 on them and interested enough to stick around and not move to another tag, unless it’s a friends/guild. Wvw players are impatient, they don’t like to sit idle for very long when action is happening, they don’t like getting killed over and over again, they don’t like not working on capturing stuff and getting shinies. The new commanders will find that out quickly enough and either adapt and get better or tag down.

If a server can get two or three new regular pug tags that can lead decently enough to make progress especially in every none prime time hours of a server, why is this a bad thing? There was nothing before to help encourage new players or commanders, most of the day we mostly have three empty dead maps, even in prime NA during weekdays we get mostly one maybe two maps queued.

Wvw has always been chaotic and it’s the players that work together and bring organization to overcome that, by using voice chat, by telling players to tag up or down when needing groups and usually one on map if a big group is needed, by assigning color tags to roles server by server, having scouts and defenders making calls, etc.

How many of the pve players would even have tags anyways, they get a free one for pve from mastery, there’s no real need for them to actually buy it yet. Even if we get flooded with 10 tags that’s 50 players they would need on them to get the incentive, hey if they can get that many on them and into the desert bl I’m all for it, hell they may even gravitate to it since it would feel more at home with the HoT maps.

OK, seen a couple more things I need to address.

I’ve seen many folks state that the commanders need the reward track in order to pay for siege and whatever else their expenses might be. Well, no. 1) we have increased rewards already in WvW. 2) We are getting the weekly rewards, so our expenses will be even less. 3) Making siege is pretty cheap now and easier. 4) Most commanders are in a guild and get support from their guildies in the form of gold, siege, badges, etc. Even if you’re in a guild of just 5 people, that is more than enough to cover costs.

I personally got very little support, or just refused support form people and pay for all my siege with in game gold. I almost never was at a point where I didn’t have siege, and I’d tag up to some extent usually every other day.

Keep in mind, that the post said that tagging up with a party of 5 will contribute towards the weekly pip. I imagine this will actually be a small contribution, as there are still all the other aspects of WvW that are contributing as well. However, it is still an incentive, and many players will take any edge, especially if it’s is passive, to earn rewards. I doubt that we are going to get a huge influx of “actual” commanders here.

Zooming out a bit, I feel this argument is systematic of a greater issue: population, community, and identity.

If the lower tier servers are having such an issue with not having any tag on any map that Anet feels compelled to do this, then this isn’t the issue, it’s population, community, and identity. If that is the case, then the solution is not providing an incentive to tag up, but rather consolidate servers.

It’s impossible for a community to spark when T4 has 3 random servers thrown together every two months. Under what server’s flag do they rally to? Have they set up a community TS? If so, then who’s gonna pay for 3 servers worth of people? What happens when the relinking happens and the TS looses funding? How do you recruit more people into your guild when 2/3s of them are on other servers? Etc.

Anet is acting like commanding is just as easy as popping your dorito. No. To be just a half-way decent commander, you need support. Squads are only as good as their players. The closer knit, the more in line with some kind of build cohesion and group comp, the more that people are in voip, the better. Being a great commander takes a commitment, a guild, a bit of luck, and some talent. Popping a dorito isn’t going to do those things, but having a server behind you will. Consolidating servers will go more good to solving commander issues than providing a small incentive to tagging up.

@ McKenna Berdrow

Any thoughts on skill / class balancing for wvw? It seems so far its more of a case by case balancing such as epi changes in wvw only is this the way things will be done or is there something else coming alone?

Also thank you for posting here you too Gaile!

Spurnshadow.3678:

If the lower tier servers are having such an issue with not having any tag on any map that Anet feels compelled to do this, then this isn’t the issue, it’s population, community, and identity. If that is the case, then the solution is not providing an incentive to tag up, but rather consolidate servers.

Dunno why you think this is a lower tier problem only, there have been times I’ve logged on my BG account and don’t see tags either. Even Mag and TC when they were T1 didn’t have tags up all the time either. It’s not like T1 and 2 have an abundance of tags over lower servers.

Now here you are talking about wanting to consolidate servers when we’re on the eve of having a patch that could potentially strongly revitalize servers, including those lower tier servers which mostly lost their wvw players (pve players had no reason to move).

The complaint has been registered, let’s see how the system goes next week and take it from there.

Huge thanks to the WvW team! Can’t wait for the update (if I ever see WvW again with the 1000-man queues on patch day)

XenesisII.1540:

Spurnshadow.3678:

If the lower tier servers are having such an issue with not having any tag on any map that Anet feels compelled to do this, then this isn’t the issue, it’s population, community, and identity. If that is the case, then the solution is not providing an incentive to tag up, but rather consolidate servers.

Dunno why you think this is a lower tier problem only, there have been times I’ve logged on my BG account and don’t see tags either. Even Mag and TC when they were T1 didn’t have tags up all the time either. It’s not like T1 and 2 have an abundance of tags over lower servers.

Now here you are talking about wanting to consolidate servers when we’re on the eve of having a patch that could potentially strongly revitalize servers, including those lower tier servers which mostly lost their wvw players (pve players had no reason to move).

The complaint has been registered, let’s see how the system goes next week and take it from there.

With the massive tightening of population caps, we will not have tags all the time. We used to have waaaaay more players on BG 1, 2, 3 years ago than we do today, but we’re still full. Yes, I know we were open for a few days recently, but that just goes to show how little population even the T1 servers have. But this just supports my argument.

Anet has artifically lowered the population caps on servers in order to justify having 24 servers still. Enough. They’re not fooling anyone. It’s one of the reasons so many players have gotten frustrated over the years. Go through the forums. We’ve been noticing the trend of lower population since the end of seasons. Heck, even before that, but seasons caused a massive influx but started declining again after S2 and the more noticeable downward trend after s3. Why are they so stubborn on this issue? Yes, there will need to be a little work to change things. All changes are going to require work. But it’s what’s needed to keep the game healthy.

I’m sure that the commander tag participation aspect went something like this: a bunch of devs were in a meeting and discussing the weekly pip reward system. They were spit-balling ideas about what will contribute towards this. Someone added this to the mix and everyone was like, sure, throw that in there; but there weren’t enough WvW regulars to realize how bad this would be. Changes need to have positive results, not negative ones. Anything that is going to turn off more players than it attracts is bad. It is of my opinion that this will turn off more people that it will attract.

I wanna get EotM legendary bag. I don’t want that people think that i am some silly WvW player.

Spurnshadow.3678:

With the massive tightening of population caps, we will not have tags all the time. We used to have waaaaay more players on BG 1, 2, 3 years ago than we do today, but we’re still full. Yes, I know we were open for a few days recently, but that just goes to show how little population even the T1 servers have. But this just supports my argument.

Anet has artifically lowered the population caps on servers in order to justify having 24 servers still. Enough. They’re not fooling anyone. It’s one of the reasons so many players have gotten frustrated over the years. Go through the forums. We’ve been noticing the trend of lower population since the end of seasons. Heck, even before that, but seasons caused a massive influx but started declining again after S2 and the more noticeable downward trend after s3. Why are they so stubborn on this issue? Yes, there will need to be a little work to change things. All changes are going to require work. But it’s what’s needed to keep the game healthy.

How about we wait and see what effects this has on populations before we complain about fixes to the new system? They lowered caps to keep certain top servers locked, it affected like 4 servers out of 24, and guess what the 20 other servers don’t care if you’re locked because they still couldn’t compete with your population and coverage. But that’s just the other servers problem right? after certain servers bought guilds for YEARS from those lower servers to keep their population that high in the first place. BG is still a top 3 server that can beat every other server, whenever their population feels like it.

They lowered the caps, they can certainly raise them if there’s a need. The seasons were temporary events, that had pve players leave because they had no reason to stay unless they actually enjoyed wvw enough (which the vets even make that hard enough to do for new players). Wvw players left because they burnt themselves out.

With this infusion of players coming in, which we still don’t even know how big of an affect it will really have, and the one up one down system being worked on, I would for sure propose to take off the caps and let people go where they want when that system is implemented. Let players stack if they want and keep themselves in T1 permanently, t2 will be wreck being the 3rd wheel, but hey t3/4 should be fun with all the fight guilds and none blobbers moving there.

Hey will we get the option to exchange WvW Infusions in this update…

My opinion about the “Feature Pack”

Skirmish Rewards:
- Pointless if it resets
- Nice way of “recycling” old content as new rewards (Tournament Ticket Stuff)
- 4 to 1 Points that favor high activity over casual play in the reward calculation, which makes the system pointless for casual players

Match History:
- A nice little QoL, but nothing thats worth it to be called a “Feature” to be added by a FP. Something like that could just be added with ANY simple patch ANYTIME.

Improved LFG:
- See above. Tons of more Commanders will be just chaos for WvW, especially if it are just reward driven people that play just for their personal gain and not for the sake on their servers and have no clues of leading people, which is why I think that this point:
“Whether you’re commanding a squad with at least five people in it” – should get removed ASAP again directly from the calculation list. It should play no difference, if you are commander, or not. No one should get reward advantages over others, only because you are commanding. Being a commander is in itself already a privilege thats blocked behind a gold wall, it shouldnt be turned into a reward advantage over other players that currently can’t be a commander and people shouldnt be incentivized to become commanders just to be able to get more easier rewards from skirmishes.

Tier 3 WvW Armor:
- WvW Rank Grind wooo, because the WvW Rank Grind is so much fun and the best system of GW2s WvW Character progression ever /sarcasm (casude anet is since Release Day clueless how to give this game mode some kind of proper character progression, with making it feel like an eternal boring grind for exp points that lead into tons of Rank Points which currently have no usage once you go over like Rank 1355+ around and maxed everything while theres room till rank 10000 and no progression content beyond that low limit since YEARS, when theres so much more unused potential there)

Legendary Backpack Warbringer
- The only real nice thing about the patch to me, but again absolutely nothign thats worth it to be called a “Feature” for a Feature Pack Update.
—-

What I personally would expect from a WvW based proper Feature Pack are things like:

• Class based WvW Talents for more specific individual Character Progression in WvW that gives Classes in WvW more individual “Roles”, Pros and Cons, Strenths and Weaknesses so so that that make WvW Battles more interesting and allow classes to do individual unique things for what the classes are designed for in WvW to allow players to play out their classes in a more game mode based tactical and strategetic manner, than ever it was possible before currently.
• Rework for this all of the generic WvW Rank Skills into “Basic WvW Masteries” that players have to earn like normal Masteries through gaining enough WExp and WvW Mastery Points for fulfilling specific WvW Challenges/Achievements, so that all WvW Rank points are now used completely only for class based WvW Character progression to 100%

• If WvW gets not Legendary Armor as unique Reward Content, then I always said that its inevitable, that the Game Mode should get instead then Legendary Accessoires that should provide as unique feature “Skill Skins” with that players can get different looks for their Skills as unique legendary reward to lure people into WvW that way.
  I’d say Amulets makes most sense for WvW, Rings/Earrings should stay for Jeweler 500/PvE/Fractals with Amulets being for Weapon Skill Skins and Rings/Earrings beign for Utility/Elite Skill Skins

• A 3rd new different Borderland Map like one thats based on Tropical Islands, Underwater Combats, Naval Battles thats like a completely different gameplay experience compared to the other Borderlands together with a complete Balance Patch based on all underwatrer Combat Skills and the implementation of individual “Underwater Traits” for all Classes so that classes don#t lose anymore liek half of all theiir builds and gamepplay elements just because the Trait System has been based on 100% land combat from begin on…

• Rework of the World Reward System (Power of the Mists) that you barely see having any IMPACT in the game.
  It takes way too long to let the various aspects of it grow up to the point, where you slowly feel a tiny difference and when you have reached that point, the match is already nearly over again and resets and you have to start over again…
  Winning a match should lead to a more impactful world reward for the server which has won the match and its effect should be significantly for the winner server for the full duration of the NEXT MATCH.

These points together with improved rewarks and improved balance would make it worth it to call that update a “WvW Feature Pack”
But just only a few improved rewards from which half of them are just recycled old content and a few implemented little QoL changes aren#t worth it to call such an update a “feature pack” tbh.

That’s more like expansion content not a free feature pack to be honest.

Compare what ANets wants to tell us should be here a “Feature pack” with the last Feature packs that they added in the past that were truly worth it to be called FP’s and repeat this sentence again.

You will realize by then, how much of a “joke” it is to call this patch a “Feature Pack”

Class Based WvW Talents with a rework of the WvW Skill System into Basic WvW Masteries, so that WvW gets actually some kind of proper individual Character Progression and not a simplistic system where everyone is just exactly THE SAME over the course of the 10000 ranks grind.
Legendary Accessoires (Amulets)/Skill Skins, a 3rd unique Borderland and finally a rework of the Power of the Mist System to make it more impactful are a total of 4 Tasks that range between mostly medium to once bigger effort (3rd Borderland being the biggest task of those 4)

However, the few FP’s of the past that we had so far already have added features, which were of similar effort, and easily could have been added as Features for HoT as well if they would have been part of the expansion at this time.

But 2 tiny QoL improvements, 1 another backpack/glider skin, 1 armor set reskin (tier 3) and recycled old content as “new rewards” reworked into the new Skirmish Rewards is hardly worth it to call this package a “Feature Pack” if you compare the content of this update with the earlier Feature Packs of the past which improved greatly the game and were much more, than just 2 QoL improvements, and a few skins and more new rewards.

But whatever, if you are personally happy with such small updates being defined now as feature packs nowadays, so be it. I personally just await more from a Feature Pack than 2 QoLs, a few skins and recycled rewards.

I am optimistic about these changes, cautiously optimistic, but optimistic! We will definitely see how they pan out over the next few months, they feel like a very quality of life change to WvW and I have this feeling we will see more new WvW content in terms of maps etc. when we get closer to the expansion announcement.

Spurnshadow.3678:

And, by the way, I’ve seen a lot of folks saying “you can just turn off the other tags.” Uh, no. It’s really important to see the other, guilded, organized groups on a map. That is not a solution to a problem that should never exist in the first place.

Important for commanders, not so much for everyone else.

Spurnshadow.3678:

Also, on this subject of tags, I often run tagless. I know other commanders and guilds that almost never run a tag. This is for a good reason. I just don’t feel like getting a lot of people following me. Some guilds don’t want any pugs, and run privately. I just want to play with a small group. I also don’t want to take pugs off the other tag. There’s also the spying issues.

Your play style is good for YOU, not for new players who can’t find someone to run with. You want to run tagless? Go ahead. Want instead to run with a tag, attract pugs or newbies and mentor them a bit, possibly creating new WvW players? Awesome! Here’s a bonus to your rewards for your efforts.

MMOs that don’t think about attracting new players eventually die because the existing player base continually shrinks from natural attrition. You must ensure new players enter the world, and stay there, at least at the rate that players leave. This also applies to game modes. You make it easier for players to experience and be rewarded by WvW, as well as easier to find a tag to run with, and you drastically increase the chance that those users will become long term WvWers.

This is a well thought out change and is a great way to bring new blood to the game mode, while rewarding veterans with higher world ranks as well.

Orpheal.8263:

Compare what ANets wants to tell us should be here a “Feature pack” with the last Feature packs that they added in the past that were truly worth it to be called FP’s and repeat this sentence again.

Yep, you got it in one – what’s important isn’t the contents of this update, but what it’s called. Yep, you’d be singing the praises of this release if it had been called a “June competitive update” but the devs deciding to have the disrespect to you and the other pedants on this forum of calling it a “feature pack?” Yep. Pitchforks and semantic arguments ahoy!

Gaile Gray.6029:

Here’s the full blog post: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/updates-to-world-vs-world-skirmishing-and-rewards/

Enjoy!

Not being warned in game email that transfers will be stopped (locked all of a sudden) and that we will be penalized for moving this close to any update is not very sporting or forward thinking.

If you are going to make such big changes, how about warning us?

It doesn’t take any more time to craft an email to all player than it does to answer here in the forums – where most players almost never use.

Adzekul.3104:

Admin edit: Adding link to today’s full blog post. (Thank you Adzekul.)

“If you’ve been playing on the same world for at least three weeks”

Respect

Hope this has a positive impact on the game mode. My feelings on the other 4 points are mixed, but the weekly reset idea might simply overrule those concerns. Let’s see how it works.

Legendary back item from WvW. Looks good in principle, but will wait until full details of all tiers are posted. Some bright spark in team chat said you had to be in Tier 1 to get it, but I see no evidence for this.

The pressure to win skirmishes might be a problem, though. Will wait for more details before I decide if I like or dislike this aspect.

An update that we could have rejoiced for would have the following in it:

The return of tournaments

Unlinking all servers

Not destroying present rewards for ‘new’ rewards

Announcing that all employees who work on GW2 will be _playing GW2 with us

These changes have been asked for since their removal or inceptions.

I am sure many could add to the list but these seem to be the most ‘wanted’ by those who remember WvW ‘back in the day’ when we felt like we were part of something good, not forced into links that don’t do a thing for any of the servers other than keeping people from knowing one another well.

Spurnshadow.3678:

Zooming out a bit, I feel this argument is systematic of a greater issue: population, community, and identity.

If the lower tier servers are having such an issue with not having any tag on any map that Anet feels compelled to do this, then this isn’t the issue, it’s population, community, and identity. If that is the case, then the solution is not providing an incentive to tag up, but rather consolidate servers.

It’s impossible for a community to spark when T4 has 3 random servers thrown together every two months. Under what server’s flag do they rally to? Have they set up a community TS? If so, then who’s gonna pay for 3 servers worth of people? What happens when the relinking happens and the TS looses funding? How do you recruit more people into your guild when 2/3s of them are on other servers? Etc.

Server identity was thrown out the window by Anet themselves when they decided to link smaller/lower tiers to whomever. Those of us from these servers, me included, have spoken up about how badly these links will affect the community and identity, thus affecting participation more greatly. We said that people will most likely leave, that this will push our larger guilds to transfer, that this will kill the server we’ve felt compelled to continue fighting for. We weren’t dead, in spite of how much other people kept saying we were, but that linking us to different servers every few weeks or months will undoubtedly lead to that. So what happened? All of that happened. When people kept bringing up the issue, Anet wanted us to shut up about it. Which is what irritates me about this update the most- it’s a sparkly band-aid for something they messed up on big time. But I don’t think they’re interested in revitalizing the game mode in the long term, and I think that’s where the real discrepancy lies. What some players, especially long term WvW players, want don’t match with Anet’s business model.

XenesisII.1540:

They lowered the caps, they can certainly raise them if there’s a need. The seasons were temporary events, that had pve players leave because they had no reason to stay unless they actually enjoyed wvw enough (which the vets even make that hard enough to do for new players). Wvw players left because they burnt themselves out.

With this infusion of players coming in, which we still don’t even know how big of an affect it will really have, and the one up one down system being worked on, I would for sure propose to take off the caps and let people go where they want when that system is implemented. Let players stack if they want and keep themselves in T1 permanently, t2 will be wreck being the 3rd wheel, but hey t3/4 should be fun with all the fight guilds and none blobbers moving there.

I just want this to be clear that many of us didn’t leave because of burn out, but as a direct correlation to Anet’s changes right after the release of HoT.

That is all… and I do agree with the last proposal of letting people be where they please.