Guild Wars 2

After the recent patch I have only been getting credit for less than half my kills in WvW.
I’ll either deal a ton of damage such as 10k to an enemy and get 0 credit for the kill and then on the other hand I dish out 1k damage to an enemy and get credit. Has this been happening to anyone else in WvW?

I have had this happen too, with champs as well as players. It might just be in my head, but I never had issues tagging things before.

Based on my initial experiences with this, it feels like they added a cooldown to giving experience/loot on death. Something like players needing to be alive for five or ten minutes before granting experience and loot on death. Killing players near their spawns rarely seems to reward anything for me anymore, and I’ve frequently killed someone two or three times in a short span and only received rewards on the initial kill. It probably needs more testing, though.

I’ve noticed the same thing. These weren’t players fresh out of “safe” zones, and spawn camping wasn’t happening. They were usually killed while we were defending a camp, or a yak, or something. I know I did enough “tag” damage (generally getting off an “eviserate” is enough to do that) and sometimes no kill awarded even with a stomp. Maybe it’s a bug?

Sure has. I don’t get credit for a number of them in group combat which has made building up stacks a lot slower.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/WvW-No-credit-for-kills/first#post4416051

Brought this over to the bug forums. Maybe someone can shed some light on this.

Stormleaf.1769:

Based on my initial experiences with this, it feels like they added a cooldown to giving experience/loot on death. Something like players needing to be alive for five or ten minutes before granting experience and loot on death. Killing players near their spawns rarely seems to reward anything for me anymore, and I’ve frequently killed someone two or three times in a short span and only received rewards on the initial kill. It probably needs more testing, though.

The cool down was actually always there. It is 1 minute. In that minute you will not get drops, get exp, or get a kill count. Conversely if you try to res an NPC or player within a minute of resing them prior, you will not get exp nor the res count.

Anet might have changed the cool down, or even made it so that if people rally, all tags on them will have expired or something like that.

Thank you for responding so fast This clears up my issues, but is there any way to confirm that you got credit for killing a player? Even if I don’t get any rewards I would like to know if an enemy combat logs or falls off a cliff and dies.

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

It has been the case for a while now that players who very recently respawned are not worth any WXP. To bring other systems in-line with this, players who are not worth any WXP are now also not worth any loot or XP. We are aware that this also affects sigil stacks, and are evaluating whether we want to treat the stacks the same way: only when a player is worth WXP/XP and loot, can stacks be gained from killing them.

Are there any reasons besides consistency (which frankly is far from a valid reason) that made you implement this change?

A lot of players are unhappy about this, myself included.

There are a lot of such situations in PvE, too. Maybe instead of making some things worth 0xp, there could be some sort of sliding scale.

• Personal Story, newly respawned: 1 xp exactly, junk loot table only
• Open world, not recently respawned: 100% xp, regular loot table
• Long time since killed: bonus xp, regular loot table

The first two mechanics already exist.

WvW is hardly a lucrative endeavor. Quite the opposite really, especially compared to PvE.

Nerfing loot seems mean.

How recently is “very recently”? What is the reason for that mechanic?
And if it is to avoid some sort of possible abuse, should it really disrupt honest gameplay?

I’ve always had difficulty getting loot from everything other players hit (except in pvp) whether it was a player or a mob. I hear people talking about “tagging” something to get loot but, in my experience, it takes more than a “tag” to get credit and often quite a bit more.

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

It has been the case for a while now that players who very recently respawned are not worth any WXP. To bring other systems in-line with this, players who are not worth any WXP are now also not worth any loot or XP. We are aware that this also affects sigil stacks, and are evaluating whether we want to treat the stacks the same way: only when a player is worth WXP/XP and loot, can stacks be gained from killing them.

Let’s assume a fight takes place near a spawn so that an enemy player can return to the fight while his death CD is still active.

Why have no reward for killing him repeatedly? Is he somehow less of a challenge, or threat to kill? Rewards are supposed to be based on effort, and the effort remains despite you removing the reward.

Perhaps you’ve implemented this system to avoid some form of abuse. However if a person wants to farm WxP, XP, or Loot, an eotm experience at any given time on any given day will provide exponentially more rewards than respawning enemy players ever could, and that’s without engaging a single other human being while playing.

I think you guys haven’t put good thought into this one. You should review the whole topic.

Also since more and more foes, be they players, NPCs or other critters are made into 0 exp foes, shouldn’t the text for stacking/on kill sigils be updated? For example, bloodlust currently reads:

Gain a charge of +x power each time you kill a foe, five if you kill an enemy player.

Proper text for that sigil would be:

Sometimes gain a charge of +x power each time you kill certain foes in certain environments, five if you kill certain enemy players that haven’t given a charge recently, except for PvP, in which there is no limit on charges gained from enemy players yet.

And since it not only confuses new players, but experienced players even more, how about adding a warning pop-up on entering locations/instances, in which stacking sigils won’t work, such as:

This area/content has enemies that award no “on kill” charges or effect for sigils that otherwise would grant such charges or effects. Play this area/content at your own risk if you have such sigils in use.

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

GreenAlien.5623:

What is the reason for that mechanic?

The purpose of this mechanic has always been to mitigate spawn camping, kill trading, and as an added benefit, it also discourages botting.

The threshold of time before a player is worth WXP (and now also XP/Loot) has not changed, and is low enough that it is almost always the case that a player’s death will award WXP and loot in the time it takes for them to run from a portal keep to a nearby objective.

I’d argue that it’s high enough to notice with surprising frequency in relatively ‘normal’ WvW play now, where it wasn’t before (if only because we were always rewarded with something, at least). Delaying WXP is one thing (and a good thing, I believe), but not being rewarded anything for killing a player does feel a bit disheartening, considering that they’re significantly more difficult to kill than normal PvE mobs.

I can’t help but think, given the timing of this change, that it was done to combat the rampant spawn-camping killfests in Obsidian Sanctum that occurred at the beginning of the previous tournaments. If there’s any truth to this assumption, I’d then argue that it is a welcome change exclusively for Obsidian Sanctum, but not the other WvW maps. I have trouble believing that kill-trading was frequent enough outside of the Sanctum to warrant such a noticeable nerf.

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

The purpose of this mechanic has always been to mitigate spawn camping, kill trading, and as an added benefit, it also discourages botting.

The threshold of time before a player is worth WXP (and now also XP/Loot) has not changed, and is low enough that it is almost always the case that a player’s death will award WXP and loot in the time it takes for them to run from a portal keep to a nearby objective.

I’m probably in the minority here. But there should be something that can be done to prevent spawn camping, botting and kill trading. Instead of 0 xp/loot, how about a punishment of some kind to help discourage such behaviors? Like losing 1gold per offense?

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

GreenAlien.5623:

What is the reason for that mechanic?

The purpose of this mechanic has always been to mitigate spawn camping, kill trading, and as an added benefit, it also discourages botting.

The threshold of time before a player is worth WXP (and now also XP/Loot) has not changed, and is low enough that it is almost always the case that a player’s death will award WXP and loot in the time it takes for them to run from a portal keep to a nearby objective.

Spawn camping??? Isn’t that why we have 3 exits to every spawn point on every map (and more on each citadel)?

Can kill trading possibly yeild enough of a reward when you have to run from a WvW spawn point without being killed just to die to someone and trust they wont kill you next time?

Finally, if botting is a problem, can’t we treat the problem and not the symptoms?

This is something I’m noticing in wvw, not just with players. Just tonight I did not get credit for 3 camp supervisors and 2 tower lords, yet at other times I got credit for the same towers/camps. And the past week or so I’ve noticed issues with player kills and not getting any experience at all, despite the fact at least some of those times they were killed in my server’s ‘corner’ of EB.

edit: To clarify, I am not normally a part of the ‘big zerg’ and every one of these cases was generally with ~10 players or less, especially the player kills I noticed. I agree that there should be a limit on wxp/xp/loot for those being spawn camped, but if they run to my side, and I kill them, I very well should get loot/wxp for it.

As for this ‘discouraging’ spawn camping, it will really have little to no additional effect (also the outnumbered buff could, you know, actually be useful).

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

GreenAlien.5623:

What is the reason for that mechanic?

The purpose of this mechanic has always been to mitigate spawn camping, kill trading, and as an added benefit, it also discourages botting.

The threshold of time before a player is worth WXP (and now also XP/Loot) has not changed, and is low enough that it is almost always the case that a player’s death will award WXP and loot in the time it takes for them to run from a portal keep to a nearby objective.

Spawn camping : every spawn has always 3 exits and some of them have camps very close, yesterday I killed a guy in north camp and gave me nothing, this is not correct, also a mesmer portal can port a lot of people inside a garri in no time, if I die a loose my stacks but I cannot gain them back by killing people ? that happened too many times in the past days, very wrong.

Kill trading : why would anyone waste time to kill trade when they can join a karma train and get 100 times more loot/wxp ? are you still against GvGs ?

No comment for the botting thing in WvW :/

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

It has been the case for a while now that players who very recently respawned are not worth any WXP. To bring other systems in-line with this, players who are not worth any WXP are now also not worth any loot or XP. We are aware that this also affects sigil stacks, and are evaluating whether we want to treat the stacks the same way: only when a player is worth WXP/XP and loot, can stacks be gained from killing them.

Does this affect rally mechanic as well? What about food with on kill effect?

There have been times in the last week when roaming with guild mates that I do a ton of damage and do not get any exp, yet my guild mate does. Is this a bug or intended?

This is a very poorly thought out change.

ErionHashimoto.3015:

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

It has been the case for a while now that players who very recently respawned are not worth any WXP. To bring other systems in-line with this, players who are not worth any WXP are now also not worth any loot or XP. We are aware that this also affects sigil stacks, and are evaluating whether we want to treat the stacks the same way: only when a player is worth WXP/XP and loot, can stacks be gained from killing them.

Are there any reasons besides consistency (which frankly is far from a valid reason) that made you implement this change?

A lot of players are unhappy about this, myself included.

I like this change even if that it means less xp/loot/stacks for me mainly because it doesn’t encourage more of spawn loot bag farming when the whole zerg camps a spawn.

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

GreenAlien.5623:

What is the reason for that mechanic?

The purpose of this mechanic has always been to mitigate spawn camping, kill trading, and as an added benefit, it also discourages botting.

The threshold of time before a player is worth WXP (and now also XP/Loot) has not changed, and is low enough that it is almost always the case that a player’s death will award WXP and loot in the time it takes for them to run from a portal keep to a nearby objective.

How about bloodlust-stomping score?

its totaly ok form me because make sense, just next time pls add it to release notes. i wondered so hard why i not gain sigil stacks

Ive noticed that a bunch of kills are not gaining me stacks since the patch. These aren’t near their spawn or anything.. in fact they were near MY spawn. I play in T1 so there are a lot of turnover for deaths, only getting stacks for maybe 2-3 of 5 kills is starting to get annoying. I don’t typically zerg so running in a zerg and whacking a hammer getting my stacks in 5 seconds isnt something I’ll do ;P So yeah, please reconsider at least the sigil aspect of this anet. I dont care if I dont get a bag but I really would like a stack if I successfully kill someone. (and not everyone can afford the sigil for underwater weapon requirements to keep your stacks, I can but not on everyone can.. it gets really annoying having to regain your stacks every time you get wet and now you have to kill just that much more to regain them..)

That said, many people who willfully spawn camp dont really care about XP or bags. They do it either to assert their dominance over the other server or they do it to ensure they have a fight. I mean there are those who do it for the bags, but in my experience, it has very little to do with it and spawn camping will happen with or without the absence of xp and bags.

Maybe instead of this new addition, add direction signs or something on each borderland and on EB showing people that they have other ways out of spawn

One concern I have is that often times the XP (or WXP) is the only way to be sure you’ve actually killed or stomped a player. Now, it can be quite difficult to tell if someone is killed if they WP immediately, especially if they were stealthed or go into a stealth downed state, PLEASE AWARD A MINIMUM of 1 WXP or XP on EVERY KILL. Also, from my perspective this is just another in a series of major WvW nerfs that was not needed, but yet another very poor band aid for inherent WvW issues that should be given a real fix.

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

GreenAlien.5623:

What is the reason for that mechanic?

The purpose of this mechanic has always been to mitigate spawn camping, kill trading, and as an added benefit, it also discourages botting.

The threshold of time before a player is worth WXP (and now also XP/Loot) has not changed, and is low enough that it is almost always the case that a player’s death will award WXP and loot in the time it takes for them to run from a portal keep to a nearby objective.

Can you tell us what the threshold is? also it would be helpful if players have an icon showing I will not get credit so I can choose a different target. also I don’t think this effects spawn campers much at all as loot/exp isn’t their motivation in the first place.

also are sure nothing has been changed? i never even knew you couldn’t get credit for kills until this week, it is happening all the time. If nothing was intentionally changed there is definitely a bug because I’m not getting credit often, when before this week I’ve never noticed it happen

Why not just remove the loot table and leave the experience as it was? No one is going to sit there trading kills for a small amount of experience. That would fix the problem of players not knowing if they got the kill and the problem of players not getting sigil stacks.

I’m in a big fight in the middle of EBG, I stomp some one, I don’t get any experience or loot, I don’t think the system works as intended…

I’m not sure why kills even have reduced WXP anymore; since the mechanic was introduced, every other form of WXP distribution has been increased and new ones added, save for that.

There has also been the introduction of WvW traits 230 deep that are effectively mandatory (On par with the new Guardian Grandmaster trait force of will!), should newer players be punished for playing against a server with a lower success rate of taking objectives? [Thus depriving them of the opportunity to take objectives.]

You’ve also significantly increased the number of WvW gold sinks in this release with both gems to bank usage and the trick— has consideration been given to the cost of upgrades, bank use, etc. in light of these changes?

(Aside, I’ve seen win trading happen with objectives, but NEVER with regular WvW kills, unless you count letting the enemy res after a GvG, in which case the amount of time between rounds— based mostly on the warrior banner cooldown— greatly exceeds the threshold. I think you’re preventing behavior that does not occur.)

If the goal is to prevent spawn camping, why have we seen an increase in strength of snow-ball traits? Applied Fortitude was once removed on down, but no longer is. Do you think consideration could be given to modifying balance instead of rewards in order to make spawn camping less of a problem?

Will we see additional nerfs in the future to prevent tower trading now that a stronger server has an incentive to catch-and-release on spawn towers?

this is to prevent bots from killing npc stuff and getting xp because the Devs can’t be bothered to correct the botting problem with a real fix. That is the only explanation if you look at Jessica’s rational for the change, spawn camping and kill trading are not really the issue they are addressing….

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

GreenAlien.5623:

What is the reason for that mechanic?

The purpose of this mechanic has always been to mitigate spawn camping, kill trading, and as an added benefit, it also discourages botting.

I hate to break it to you, but it doesn’t stop or even slow down any of those 3 things. If you want to know why, it’s because spawn camping is often done as a sort of punishment/victory dance to the enemy a server has just crushed. Kill trading? Yeah, nothing there. Botting? Who bots a spawn? How does that even work?

I assume if you want to get yourself sure kills, just camp near one of those vistas or SPs until a poor soul who hates WvW, has no specific gear nor build to stand a fight there will arrive, thinking to be just about to reach 0.0000001% more map completion. It’s what happens to me 4/5 of the times, then they ask me why I hate so much WvW.

Lytalm.5673:

I’m in a big fight in the middle of EBG, I stomp some one, I don’t get any experience or loot, I don’t think the system works as intended…

Given that other similar systems limiting loot etc clearly have bugs this wouldn’t be a surprise.

Let’s be perfectly honest, no one spawn camped for the loot or xp. If they really wanted that, they’d PvE. Spawn camping is done for a number of other reasons: strategically cutting off reinforcements, preventing a breakout on your map, flexing your e-muscles, trolling an enemy server you dislike, among others. Removing loot or xp will do absolutely nothing to reduce spawn camping.

And, really? Kill trading? Just about no one does that. Again, the reward is too poor for anyone to consider this a viable way of leveling or making money.

Obsidian sanctum tower in EB is right new red keep. Just tried taking the tower and wasn’t getting credit for any of the kills! Despite what Jessica says, I assure you it has not always been like this. It’s either bugged, or the upped the no loot/xp time by a LOT. I just got credit for about 5/20 kills on red defenders, maybe its because it’s near their spawn? Either way they were actively defending so that isn’t fair. I thought those guvrds that are invulnerable to damage and deal like 20,000 damage were there for spawn camping, didn’t think we needed this

Fascinating…. we got a red response, which is awesome (Thank you, Jessica!). The community doesn’t agree that the reasons cited for this change are even remotely relevant, and they disagree in a respectful manner, and then…… no more red responses.

To be completely honest, it doesn’t seem like you guys (ANet) play enough WvW to know what the real problems are. Hopefully this adopt-a-dev program has a lot of participation on the ANet side, and offers some insight to our developers as to what is really lacking in WvW and what really needs to be fixed.

I’ve noticed that this change appears to affect the rally system? Can anyone else confirm? If so, that completely incentivises graveyard rushing.

I might not have a problem with this if it was working in any reasonable manner. But I’ve had a ton of kills for people on the complete opposite side of the map from their spawn, and I know they came from there because I just killed them and watched them release, that gave me no stacks.

That doesn’t even include the issues it presents for the other sigil effects and food, such as sigil of restoration or omnomberry compote, that you should be able to count on. And if it effects the ability to rally off of an opponent… That could be very problematic indeed.

Nerf the loot of fresh killed people is one thing, but how about the balancing action of improve the loot of people not killed for a long time?

It’s not that WvW is already over-rewarded. And nerfing at one end without improving at the other is a overall nerf.

It’s to discourage 2v1 when two worlds push one back to spawn. But no one talks about that.

Maybe it would be great to implement this into PvE as well. To make it more consistent. So people coming from one world to other have similar experience and are not surprised how different these worlds are. Something like newly spawned mobs don’t give loot, XP and their kill don’t count for first 5-10 minutes of their existence. To prevent spawn camping and kill trading in open world, during events and in dungeons.

Killed 2 blue players at the red keep on EB.
Got no loot.
Don´t tell me this is intended.

Earlier today I spent probably close to an hour killing the same terrible BG ele as he contested water gate over and over again. Every time I’d down him and every time he’d go to login screen before I could stomp him. He then, presumably, would log in dead, have to waypoint before entering WvW gain then run all the way back to do it over again. Most of the time he gave no wxp or loot. The intervals were 3 and half to 5 minutes. That seems a little excessive. Also, as WvWers our gold tends to come from lots of little pieces of loot that add up over time. We already get crap for rewards in general, more or less removing the potential to accumulate gold this way is a real kick in the pants.

So this means eotm karma trains are full of loot, since they are leveling there for several hours, or farming FREE WXP and badges? o.O