Guild Wars 2

Orbs will destroy GvG as mentioned. Unless you can rig it with friends on other servers to have the 3rd party server have the buff, so the 2 enemy guilds can duke it out.

Stat bonuses for PVE objectives is pointless. Rewards people who play in the biggest blobs. Rewards servers who like to lay siege everywhere. Picture trying to take back “the orb area” defended by 10+ SUP ACs

WvW is meant to be about player vs player, realm vs realm. Quit the objectives, do something about zerg play. If you need suggestions ask, guilds have plenty of ideas. Handholding, cowardly play, lag inducing play (your servers cant handle it) should be penalised.

Liquid.9672:

Guys, wait to see what the buffs do before freaking out. Anet understood that the previous orb buffs only made the strongest server stronger. My guess is it’ll be something along the lines of defense against guards/lords and maybe increased Wexp. Something like that and not direct stat buffs.

I’m thinking it will be just like the Orbs were before but the placement of it will make it impossible to hold + everything else. So unlike before where you could hold the keep and the orb, because they were both in Garrison and you couldn’t touch it without taking a fully defended Garrison, now the Orb and the keeps will have next to nothing to do with one another aside from being on the same map.

Excellent post Dranul. Do WvW Developers visit you in the EU bracket? Just curious.

I have no issue with the GvG people and their method of maintaining interest in the game.

I think they are way off base though demanding that any WvW changes be centered around their chosen style of play.

There is a huge disconnect here.

Get these people an arena so that they can do this game type somewhere else.

This is a cross roads type of situation. These people want to have a dedicated way to show their skill and flaunt their wins which sadly the WvW game does not adequately provide. They want to be recognized and have gone to great lengths to create a game within the game in order to do it.

Failure to give them what they want will result in a twofold backlash. The participants of this GvG sub culture will rage and react in all manner of behavior and the remaining population will either support them out of necessity and the fear of losing server allies or attack them viciously resulting in even more chaos.

Please prevent this fire from happening. Just give them what they want outside of the WvW maps.

sounds cool, i just hope they dont remove the lakes from the BL’s. As those are really nice. Underwater Zerg v Zerg is just hillarious, especially since the only two classes thats left after the turmoil is rangers and guardians

DevonCarver.5370:

ParaldaWind.4523:

DevonCarver.5370:

Are the orbs coming back? No. Are we bringing back the buff? Yes, although the way you get it and hold it is going to be drastically different. Are you going to see a major map change in concert with this? Yes. Is it coming soon? Most definitely.

If this orb replacement gives a stat bonus to the zergiest server, I feel like a lot of guilds will quit.

Here’s the thing to remember, it may buff the better servers for a time, but if it is relatively easy to take from a better server, it isn’t going to cause nearly the same problems that the original buff did. I will say that when this goes back into the game, we’ll continue to monitor the effects and make changes as necessary.

Devon, are you aware the effect this will have on roamers and GvG’s? This aspect of WvW may not be your teams focus, but the backlash could be considerable. I know quite a few groups who don’t care about PPT and log in just to roam and pick fights, PvP offers nothing in this way, it’s the redeeming feature of GW2 for many players who love to PVP.

@Chefdiablo, allowing an objective which in all probability will be able to have siege/defensive position to give a extreme bonus to the side holding it, doesn’t just affect guilds after GvG. It affects roaming guilds, roaming individuals, people who play this game solely for the epic fights to be had. At a guess I’d say less than 33% of players give a rats right testicle about points and server ranking. It’s obvious during each week which servers come out and fight tooth and nail, and which PVD and have about as much skill as green recruits into game even after 11months.

So to buff say by 150 to all stats for sieging up a location and zzzz having ppl sit there on siege defending it. It will KILL roaming for small scale.

I’ve always said the OUTMANNED buff should be +stats while the “orb” should be FLUFF meaningless to people to who care about fights, but worthwhile to the folks who don’t actually fight, like +MF +Gold +XP +WXP +Karma

But no they won’t think about giving the underdog an even playing field… Wouldn’t make sense no sir.

@Problematic – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dT3cmZKd8pg They have spent a few hours on 2 or 3 servers in EU yes. Just running around like headless sheep, no better than the average EB zergling. We had invited them to join us for a guild drunken warband night, alas turned down on that occasion.
Offer still stands though Devon Carter Let me know a night towards end of august your available (ideally European prime time till late) and you can come experience a guild raid :-D

chefdiablo.6791:

I have no issue with the GvG people and their method of maintaining interest in the game.

I think they are way off base though demanding that any WvW changes be centered around their chosen style of play.

There is a huge disconnect here.

Get these people an arena so that they can do this game type somewhere else.

This is a cross roads type of situation. These people want to have a dedicated way to show their skill and flaunt their wins which sadly the WvW game does not adequately provide. They want to be recognized and have gone to great lengths to create a game within the game in order to do it.

Failure to give them what they want will result in a twofold backlash. The participants of this GvG sub culture will rage and react in all manner of behavior and the remaining population will either support them out of necessity and the fear of losing server allies or attack them viciously resulting in even more chaos.

Please prevent this fire from happening. Just give them what they want outside of the WvW maps.

GvG is not a subculture, it is the culture now in WvW.

On TC at least, almost all dedicated WvW guilds also do GvG. Those that don’t understand why they do, and any sort of tension there might have been has been pretty much worked out.

Dranul.2094:

@Chefdiablo, allowing an objective which in all probability will be able to have siege/defensive position to give a extreme bonus to the side holding it, doesn’t just affect guilds after GvG. It affects roaming guilds, roaming individuals, people who play this game solely for the epic fights to be had. At a guess I’d say less than 33% of players give a rats right testicle about points and server ranking. It’s obvious during each week which servers come out and fight tooth and nail, and which PVD and have about as much skill as green recruits into game even after 11months.

So to buff say by 150 to all stats for sieging up a location and zzzz having ppl sit there on siege defending it. It will KILL roaming for small scale.

I’ve always said the OUTMANNED buff should be +stats while the “orb” should be FLUFF meaningless to people to who care about fights, but worthwhile to the folks who don’t actually fight, like +MF +Gold +XP +WXP +Karma

But no they won’t think about giving the underdog an even playing field… Wouldn’t make sense no sir.

@Problematic – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dT3cmZKd8pg They have spent a few hours on 2 or 3 servers in EU yes. Just running around like headless sheep, no better than the average EB zergling. We had invited them to join us for a guild drunken warband night, alas turned down on that occasion.
Offer still stands though Devon Carter Let me know a night towards end of august your available (ideally European prime time till late) and you can come experience a guild raid :-D

OMG! See, this is how to change the game. Get this guy in the game. Get the “other” Anet Developer Team employee’s in the game. They need to group with the community and see the combat field more often. Then communication can happen, feedback, and exchange of ideas! What is holding [Devon & team] them back?

I just want to point out that the large open area just down the ramps from the start of the EB jumping puzzle would be an AMAZING place for a gvg. The windmill is such incredibly boring terrain. The start of the puzzle has plenty of LOS to play around with, multiple levels, choke points and even water! It becomes even more attractive if the reintroduction of orbs messes with player stats. Finally, there are tons of incredible spots for spectators to perch on to get a bird’s eye view of the action!

IMHO it would incorporate a lot of open field elements that aren’t available in windmill gvgs (something that pushes a lot of guilds away from having interest in them).

cyyrix.6105:

I just want to point out that the large open area just down the ramps from the start of the EB jumping puzzle would be an AMAZING place for a gvg. The windmill is such incredibly boring terrain. The start of the puzzle has plenty of LOS to play around with, multiple levels, choke points and even water! It becomes even more attractive if the reintroduction of orbs messes with player stats. Finally, there are tons of incredible spots for spectators to perch on to get a bird’s eye view of the action!

IMHO it would incorporate a lot of open field elements that aren’t available in windmill gvgs (something that pushes a lot of guilds away from having interest in them).

Please move your post to the GvG showdown thread by Ogre where it will be seen by the relevant audience. They will have opinions…

problematic.9623:

Excellent post Dranul. Do WvW Developers visit you in the EU bracket? Just curious.

They didt a server tour where they visited (almost?) every server for an evening. On AG they didnt really cooperate, came the last evening before reset on EB while we had a boring matchup = no PUG commander on the map, no guild raids. Basicly they threw some siege around and people who were curious were following them for a few hours. Was an unfortunate timing for that, but I doubt there was more cooperation on other servers tbh.

Alright, since I made this thread in the first place, I guess I should probably say something :P
First of all, I think instead of wiping out the lake entirely they will make the quaggan shrine in the middle the capture point (on a tower so its harder to reach and you can spot groups easyer) which will win you the buffs of the orb. 3-5 minutes after taking the point and running away to capture points, the quaggans are going to come and try and re-take their throne (im talking veteran quaggans). Most servers would of had left maximum 2-4 people to guard this throne and thats just so a tiny group cant take it and as well as to scout since it is the perfect spot to do just that.
Now the rewards I had in mind for holding the point, that would not affect the gvg people are as follows:
+ 25-33% faster point capture speed
+ 20% DMG and DEF against guards
+10% Increased repair speed
+10% Ram damage
As you can see, these buffs would definitely help even a small server beat the big server because of all the buffs that are designed for capturing keeps, holding them and beating the guards. The tower would not be too hard to take however because of the quaggans that are going to be trying to take the tower, even if they just try and hold the tower, there is no point because they wont have enough people to protect their keeps, even from a smaller server.
I think this wouldn’t hurt the gvg community since they dont fight for keeps in gvg (as far as I know) and it would help the smaller servers fight the bigger ones. The bigger servers can also take it of course

Dranul.2094:

I’ve always said the OUTMANNED buff should be +stats while the “orb” should be FLUFF meaningless to people to who care about fights, but worthwhile to the folks who don’t actually fight, like +MF +Gold +XP +WXP +Karma

They’ll never do that, it’s too much like common sense.

PLEASE, don’t add any stat bonuses, as people said before, it’s gonna ruin the experience for people that play for fights instead of points. GvGs and duels will be almost impossible to arrange. (Unless you decide to finally add an arena for that kind of thing, which shouldn’t be that hard, considering the amount of arenas made to last 14 days with the living story…)

Smashing the GvG scene would probably cause an exodus of guilds / players , since that’s the focus point for many.

I’m extremely concerned about the knock-on effects for roaming.

DevonCarver.5370:

Are the orbs coming back? No. Are we bringing back the buff? Yes, although the way you get it and hold it is going to be drastically different. Are you going to see a major map change in concert with this? Yes. Is it coming soon? Most definitely.

i’m sorry man, but you absolutely went in the wrong direction with this one. the positive aspect of the orbs was that they provided an extra dynamic to the borderlands, and extra objective to be concerned about and made the defense of at least one area on the map high priority. the negative aspects were the hacking to get them, and the buff they provided to the already dominant server.

all you needed to do was return the mechanic in a way that couldn’t be exploited. a way, coincidentally, that was actually laid out already in this very thread. instead, you’ve returned the buffs, which are nothing but a detriment to any PvP activity, let alone one that relies to heavily on population alone. sure, they might not be as open to exploits as they were before, but….. so what? it doesn’t matter if there’s rock solid security if the system you implement actively drives even more players away from WvW for extended periods. no one will be around for it to matter.

right now, WvW has completely devolved into zerging from one tower/keep to the next with a group consisting of 90% of the people on the map. it’s one giant karma train. returning the buffs will only steer even further into the skid, and drive away anyone who actually gives a kitten about competition. all that will remain are people who just want to spam 1 at the doors of empty towers/keeps, to get their easy “rewards”, then move immediately on to the next tower/keep.

if you actually do care about WvW, then you won’t bring back buffs that will only cause lopsided matches to be even more so. it’s just plain a bad idea. unless, of course, you actually DO wish to get rid of competitive players. then it’s spot on. and if that’s the case, then it just lends credence to my tin foil hat theory that you guys are actively trying to get people to migrate away from GW2 to Wildstar for increased box sales.

all the orbs need to do is cause the keep they’re being held in to require a defensive presence. that’s all. NOT buff stats. hell, all you really needed to do with them is make it so people transported them from the altar at the north camp to a keep, then gave it to the keep lord. then, the keep lord holds onto it. have it buff his personal stats if you absolutely need to have stat buffs at all. then he’s impossible to solo, or even take down with a small group, especially when there are defenders present. no one would bother to exploit into keeps to get it, since they wouldn’t be able to get it anyway.

it’s not complicated man. you’re just walking in the opposite direction of where you need to be heading. not for my personal preferences, but for the well being of this kitten game.

DevonCarver.5370:

ParaldaWind.4523:

DevonCarver.5370:

Are the orbs coming back? No. Are we bringing back the buff? Yes, although the way you get it and hold it is going to be drastically different. Are you going to see a major map change in concert with this? Yes. Is it coming soon? Most definitely.

If this orb replacement gives a stat bonus to the *zergiest server, I feel like a lot of guilds will quit.

Here’s the thing to remember, it may buff the *better servers for a time, but if it is relatively easy to take from a better server, it isn’t going to cause nearly the same problems that the original buff did. I will say that when this goes back into the game, we’ll continue to monitor the effects and make changes as necessary.

I know you’re relatively new to WvW, Mr. Carver, and since you have joined the team, I’ve mostly been glad to have you because of your level of dedication and enthusiasm for my favorite game mode. Perhaps you don’t remember, because you weren’t on the team yet, but the REASON players disliked the orbs was the BUFF THEY GAVE THE ALREADY WINNING SIDE.

I don’t usually type in caps like that, but I feel very strongly that this is a bad move.

If the purpose is to further unbalance WvW in an effort to make players who desire balanced combat to migrate to sPvP, it won’t work. That game mode is boring to many who like large scale combat. Fight over 3 little circles for 10-15 minutes? Heck no, I want a war game!

I don’t want to win by holding some stat advantage, and I don’t want to lose by my enemies having a stat advantage.

My guild enjoys taking on larger numbers. Sometimes we win, often we lose, it’s fun. That gets a lot less fun when one side or the other has a stat advantage. I’m not sure I’ll be able to find the motivation to play WvW much if the old orb style buffs return.

I remember the day the orbs were removed:
We (TC) had been fighting SoR and they had us pretty much spawncamped all week. It was all we could do to hold a tower or two most of the day and their night crew would take everything and hold all 3 orbs in t3 keeps on maps with siege set up at spawn. Hitting a wall of 80 players all buffed with +15% to all stats and t3 everything, even with our own 80 players, was basically suicide.
The day the orbs were removed we ticked at a higher PPT than SoR most of the day…..
Overnight coverage + orbs absolutely dominated in those days.

Bringing back the buffs, even if they are “easy” to retake, is just one more thing to do for the “morning crew” to struggle uphill against. Just another straw, poor poor camel, so sorry little camel…..

*The post quoted said “zergiest” not “best” and there is the disconnect. Read my above example of TCvSoR the day the orbs were removed for a prime example. Look at scores on reset nights, when all things are equal (all maps queued, nothing upgraded, only minimal supply available) and you’ll see the difference between best and zergiest….

All was needed to be done to the orbs was swap the Out-manned buff With the Orb buff. So many players asked for this, a completely fair solution instead of freaking out and removing them all together and yet it got completely ignored.

Do i agree with bringing back the buff in the same way? No, because the problem still remains the same of the strongest server holding a buff to make them even stronger, encouraging zerging even more. It doesn’t matter for how long or limited it will be, the problem will remain the same.

Give low population servers a chance by doing this, show that you care about all of us and not just the high population servers that rampage through everything already.

Keep in mind that GvGs are one of the only things holding a lot of people to this game, bring OP buff back and you will destroy that scene.

Give us a map with a hill with a tree on top and 50 player cap. We will love you forever.

By the way, if the orbs have to be placed in a keep like they used to be there are still routes to bypass walls to west keep and east keep lord. So lol if you think it’s not going to be exploit city all over again!!

Orbs were terrible even without the cheating, please do not put them back in.

Mif.3471:

Dranul.2094:

I’ve always said the OUTMANNED buff should be +stats while the “orb” should be FLUFF meaningless to people to who care about fights, but worthwhile to the folks who don’t actually fight, like +MF +Gold +XP +WXP +Karma

They’ll never do that, it’s too much like common sense.

Yeah, too bad Anet has no common sense though. This idea is pretty much what every roamer would want. I was happy to see the orbs go bye-bye. Bringing them back is just going to reward zergy stacked servers even more, when they should be punished. There will basically be no point in roaming as the server with the orb bonus will always have a completely unfair advantage against you. Not only will the server with more people have a huge army to crush you with, they’ll also have higher stats as well. Who thought this was a good idea?

Could we get a reply from Devon please. In relation to why the UNDERDOG/OUTMANNED buff isn’t the orb stat bonus. Rewarded/balancing out the outmanned against “best” (in English, most populated) servers.

Bringing in stat bonuses to the zerg, will lead to more zerging. These skill less folks aren’t what WvW is about. You are giving no love to the guilds at all.

Maybe you can give a straight answer – guild halls/guild battles like from gw1 any intention of implementing something substantial for guilds? Again that doesn’t mean guild missions and pve fluff.

Perhaps on the US servers its different but at least in EU, rewarding coverage and the big zergs with more = fail. Ill thought out idea.

Maybe just asking the devs will work?

Devon, two questions:

1. Why are you bringing the orbs back? What do you want them to do? Do you want them to promote zergs over roamers or do you want them to be neutral to that?

2. What is your view on zergs vs roamers in general? You probably want to support both types of gameplay, that’s understandable, but it looks like if you just let these types of gameplay sort themselves out, zergs tend to win in that zergs become the default mode practiced by the majority because roamers have to jump through too many hoops just to find their gameplay. Do you agree with this? If you do, do you have any plans to support roamers and make roaming look more competitive to just zerging it than how it currently is?

Thanks a lot.

For those that are screaming, doom an gloom, I think you might be really far off. If this is what I think it is, it will be awesome, promote open-field combat, and encourage small-mans.

What we know:
-Maps are changing, quaggans are out
-Orb-type bonuses will return
-They will be relatively easy to flip

Combining this, I think they are going to take the central area of the quaggan lake, make it a bit bigger, maybe urbanish, and make the orb held there. No door, or a door on the level of the pvp lord-door. The bonus will be given to whomever controls this area. This is essentially instituting a king-of-the-hill function to wvw, will promote players attacking a lightly- or un-fortified position, and open-field/urban fighting. THIS WOULD BE AWESOME and I hope I am right.

BlackBeard.2873:

For those that are screaming, doom an gloom, I think you might be really far off. If this is what I think it is, it will be awesome, promote open-field combat, and encourage small-mans.

What we know:
-Maps are changing, quaggans are out
-Orb-type bonuses will return
-They will be relatively easy to flip

Combining this, I think they are going to take the central area of the quaggan lake, make it a bit bigger, maybe urbanish, and make the orb held there. No door, or a door on the level of the pvp lord-door. The bonus will be given to whomever controls this area. This is essentially instituting a king-of-the-hill function to wvw, will promote players attacking a lightly- or un-fortified position, and open-field/urban fighting. THIS WOULD BE AWESOME and I hope I am right.

That would only be fun if the orb doesn’t provide a stat bonus… if it does, it means only the server with the largest zerg will be able to take the bonus from another server.

If buffs are given to players in the open field then small scale roaming, duels, and GvG’s will no longer be viable. The lack of variety in WvW has made things stale for a while now but we finally have a booming GvG scene to liven things up and you’re effectively killing it off. It just seems so heavy handed and unnecessary given how unwelcome these buffs are, and how unwelcome they were in the past.

If you insist on keeping the buffs please make them only apply within keep/towers/castles and allow us to face other players/groups on an equal footing in the open field.

fab.3298:

If buffs are given to players in the open field then you’re killing off any small scale roaming, duels, and GvG’s – there’s just not enough variety in WvW and things have been growing stale for a while now. We finally have a booming GvG scene to liven things up and you’re effectively killing it off. It just seems so heavy handed and unnecessary given how unwelcome these buffs are, and how unwelcome they were in the past.

If you guys insist on keeping the buffs please make them only apply within keep/towers/castles and allow us to face other players/groups on an equal footing in the open field.

…there is that…

…or…when they put orbs back in…they could also put a Guild versus Guild game mode into the game called Guild Wars…

Just take any “openish” area with some interesting terrain in PvE, chop it off, shove a fence around it, boot it up on some servers, and let us kill each other in 15 v 15, 20 v 20, 25 v 25, and 30 v 30. No stupid capture rings, no arrow carts, just one side gets loot bags and the other one dies. Its that tried and true good ol’ fashioned team death match game mode. It’d blow anything and everything ever done in sPvP straight out of the water the day it went live and create a massive resurgence of competitive PvPers.

But it wont happen, because it’s a logical, rational, and genuinely good idea. How do I know it’s a good idea? Because they actually already did it before…

Obscure One.4357:

fab.3298:

If buffs are given to players in the open field then you’re killing off any small scale roaming, duels, and GvG’s – there’s just not enough variety in WvW and things have been growing stale for a while now. We finally have a booming GvG scene to liven things up and you’re effectively killing it off. It just seems so heavy handed and unnecessary given how unwelcome these buffs are, and how unwelcome they were in the past.

If you guys insist on keeping the buffs please make them only apply within keep/towers/castles and allow us to face other players/groups on an equal footing in the open field.

…there is that…

…or…when they put orbs back in…they could also put a Guild versus Guild game mode into the game called Guild Wars…

Just take any “openish” area with some interesting terrain in PvE, chop it off, shove a fence around it, boot it up on some servers, and let us kill each other in 15 v 15, 20 v 20, 25 v 25, and 30 v 30. No stupid capture rings, no arrow carts, just one side gets loot bags and the other one dies. Its that tried and true good ol’ fashioned team death match game mode. It’d blow anything and everything ever done in sPvP straight out of the water the day it went live and create a massive resurgence of competitive PvPers.

But it wont happen, because it’s a logical, rational, and genuinely good idea. How do I know it’s a good idea? Because they actually already did it before…

I’m just saying, the name of the game is completely unrelated to GvG and has to do with something else.
But everyone needs to calm the heck down. Did the Developer actually mention that there was going to be a stat buff? The answer is no. I’m sure if the devs already didn’t know it, they know now from this forum that no body wants the stat buffs, they won’t do anything like that. Arena Net isn’t a stupid company to put in something that players are gonna leave the game for. They still have time to change the orbs if they were planning to put them in the next update, so chill out and wait for the Devs to actually say something.
Or, if you wanna say something in this forum, make suggestions on how they should return the orbs of power since you are the people that are going to be actually palying the game, tell them how you want it to be.

SomeoneElse.3685:

Did the Developer actually mention that there was going to be a stat buff? The answer is no.

actually…… that’s exactly what he said.

DevonCarver.5370:

Are the orbs coming back? No. Are we bringing back the buff? Yes, although the way you get it and hold it is going to be drastically different. Are you going to see a major map change in concert with this? Yes. Is it coming soon? Most definitely.

Devon only said they are bringing back the buff. but he did not said what the buff will be.

Hule.8794:

Devon only said they are bringing back the buff. but he did not said what the buff will be.

“The buff” was a stat bonus before. I’m sure it’s the same buff.

PLEASE DON’T IMPLEMENT STAT BUFFS or anything that is gonna give advantage to one side or the other.

NOONE WANTS IT

So please just don’t do it, it’s that simple. Don’t do stuff that the players don’t want.
You might think that once it’s gonna be implemented people are gonna love it.
Well it’s not going to happen, people don’t want it for a kitten good reason

DON’T DO IT.
PLEASE.

well, if nothing else, at least we have asuraball.

Phantom.8130:

[…]

Thrashbarg.9820:

[…]

He already said in that it’ll be much easier for the losing server to strip it out of the winning servers hands. In fact, I think this will be one of the main purposes behind the new “orbs”, an objective for the underdog servers even if their homelands are overrun, maybe even one that could turn the tables (or atleast heighten morale).
If you just made the buff karma fluff or a minor boost to a NPCs stat nobody would care about acquiring it. It has to become significant enough to be a secondary objective of equal importance to flipping keeps, and in certain strategical situations more so.

Also could people please stop using Inception-type quotation.

Vex.7486:

All was needed to be done to the orbs was swap the Out-manned buff With the Orb buff. So many players asked for this, a completely fair solution instead of freaking out and removing them all together and yet it got completely ignored.

This is a horrible suggestion and likely stems from a lack of understanding of the implications behind both buffs.
That would make the Orb another Overgrown Grub.

SomeoneElse.3685:

I’m just saying, the name of the game is completely unrelated to GvG and has to do with something else.

Yes it is.

Delta Blues.8507:

PLEASE DON’T IMPLEMENT STAT BUFFS or anything that is gonna give advantage to one side or the other.

NOONE WANTS IT

So if not stat-buffs, what do you suggest should be the orb buffs? Because e.g. coin and karma bonuses doesn’t make it a strategically valuable target.

What i dont understand is why players are even supporting a stat buff mechanic, the orb could be an equally or more important objective if it acted like a power node which allowed wp use or a gate switch which unlocked routes into the north of the map for example.

There are so many ways to implement interesting and emergent gameplay rather than this severely unbalancing, snowball effect inducing travesty that is stat buffs.

Servers with smaller coverage and population already have an uphill climb, why make it even steeper?

The incredible thing is that we’ve tried this before, and everyone HATED it, but now months on we are going to like it again?

The only thing people enjoyed about the orb was the gameplay during the acquisition process.

But once buffs went active, it was a gameplay killer, resulting in a strong snowball effect.

zastari.1730:

Please just take a kittening page from DAoC and put something like Darkness Falls in for the server that has the most PPT. That was the best solution; it was figured out a while ago; there’s no reason to keep trying to do something different.

This.

For those who never played DAOC, Darkness Falls was a huge dungeon that connected all 3 realms, where the centre connecting area (“the diamond loop”) consisted of densely-packed hard mobs. Only 1 realm at a time could access it at one time, effectively the leading PVP realm. It contained a good portion of the hardest and most rewarding PVE content in the game.

DAOC’s Darkness Falls was a masterstroke on multiple levels.

• it provided a tangible reward for leading
• it drew people out of the winning side, thereby re-balancing the power level
• it effectively created a PVP “dynamic event”: the new owners of DF rush the spawn area of the former owners to clear them out of the instance. Some of my best memories of DAOC were of rushing the opposing side’s DF and cleaning up PVE groups deep in the dungeon.
• it offered, all in the one dungeon, low-level PVE, high-level PVE, as well as solo, group and zerg PVP.

Jamais vu.5284:

So if not stat-buffs, what do you suggest should be the orb buffs? Because e.g. coin and karma bonuses doesn’t make it a strategically valuable target.

I don’t understand this. If stat-buffs are bad (noone wants them, which surely is an alarm), then they are bad and shouldn’t be implemented. If that means there’s nothing useful to put on orbs, then don’t do orbs. /shrug

Please don’t do stats-buff again, they only take away from the merit of fighting and crushing your enemy. From the moment you start winning because you have x% more stats, and not because you are out-playing the enemy, the game becomes so much duller.

Make the buff be a strategic advantage such as:
-All sieges on the map do x% more damage against doors and gates.
-Supply capacity increase.
-Ability to build a special type of siege.

Vex.7486:

All was needed to be done to the orbs was swap the Out-manned buff With the Orb buff. So many players asked for this, a completely fair solution instead of freaking out and removing them all together and yet it got completely ignored.

This is an incredibly bad idea, and is detrimental to the entire concept of cooperation.

Without some sort of meaningful bonus to the Borderlands (MF and experience boosts are not meaningful) they are nothing more than small-scale EBGs without a SM to fight over and shift the dynamics of the battle. They are just PPT fodder.

An open field, choke-rich central point encourages people to go out and fight, not hide in their keeps. It allots a significant value to havoc squads that can threaten that point if it is left unattended. It breaks the monotony of staggered/locked BL after everyone has their own little share of the pie but can’t do anything offensive. It turns the BLs into something meaningful.

mjharrison.3209:

DAOC’s Darkness Falls was a masterstroke on multiple levels.

GW1 had the same concept and, to put it lightly, it was a terrible idea and was shelved.

PvE’rs don’t want to have to wait/deal with PvP to do PvE.
PvP’rs don’t want PvE’rs clogging up queues to “get the leet dungeon!”.

If you put anything of worth inside of said dungeon, you exasperate the problem (OS is bad enough with all the tears and q.q it produces over simple things like kites). Considering that GW1 is years younger than DAoC and existed amongst the modern generation of gamers… well, you get my point.

Niim.9260:

Game would open up a lot more without them and no more suicide charges because you know you can port back in 30 secs. Enjoy your crutch dynamic though.

1.) Remove Waypoints Upgrade.
2.) Fortified Doors Upgrade -> Resistant to Golems.
3.) Cannons deal more damage to Golems.
4.) ???
5.) Profit.

VOLKON.1290:

I agree, removing waypoints would be far more detrimental to WvW than beneficial. You’ll wind up with much less going on as more people will be needed to stay at home and keep eyes on keeps. Staying at home is boring for a lot of people, so the inability to ever be able to travel quickly will begin to suck the fun out of it to a degree. That should be the lowest priority on the list, somewhere beneath “flossing the neighbor’s cat”.

No Waypoints (with a few additions, see above) will lead to a lot better “world war” environment. Right now, laying siege to a keep amounts to a check list of things to do with golem rushes almost being a necessity at T3 Keeps with Waypoints, because the moment you so much as sneeze at the door, a force of 80 people teleports in from out of nowhere into the heart of the Keep.

If you have no WPs, people have to maneuver a lot more in the open field and they have to actually engage in combat with one another if they are cut off, not run away until the WP opens up for 3 seconds. If you get caught with no scouts, you lose a keep not “Quick everyone spam WP!”.

The only keep one could argue for having a WP is Garrison, it is the heart and soul of the Borderlands, but that might just be too strong of a boon to the home team besides their nigh-impervious North-Eastern Tower and the already nigh-impervious Garrison.

Ok then, since everyone seems to hate stat buffs why not make a the waypoint cost money to use.
If they did this you could make the buff be something like:
Free waypoint traveling and stuff like increased siege power and supply capacity

Jamais vu.5284:

He already said in that it’ll be much easier for the losing server to strip it out of the winning servers hands. In fact, I think this will be one of the main purposes behind the new “orbs”, an objective for the underdog servers even if their homelands are overrun, maybe even one that could turn the tables (or atleast heighten morale).

Delta Blues.8507:

PLEASE DON’T IMPLEMENT STAT BUFFS or anything that is gonna give advantage to one side or the other.

NOONE WANTS IT

So if not stat-buffs, what do you suggest should be the orb buffs? Because e.g. coin and karma bonuses doesn’t make it a strategically valuable target.

While I agree that it must be something that makes it a strategically valuable target, stat buffs to the server holding it is the worst idea imaginable. The worst thing about the old orbs wasn’t the ease of their being hacked, it was the power that they provided to the already stronger server.

As for it being much easier for the losing server to take it back – that is rediculous. If it simply gives stat bonuses, there is absolutely no way for them to make it easier for the weaker server to take it back than the stronger server to hold it. It makes no logical sense – if they stronger server is already stronger, plus they now have a stat bonus, how on earth is the weaker server going to take it back? (Especially since “weaker” really means less populated).

The only way stat bonuses would work is an idea I read on another thread. The orb mechanic only gives the bonus to the weaker servers (on a sliding scale or something). That means that the weaker servers have a large incentive to get together to try to take it back. And the stronger server has an incentive to keep them from getting it. (Even with this, I don’t think it should be straight up bonuses to individual stats because of the obvious reasons already mentioned.)

DevonCarver.5370:

ParaldaWind.4523:

DevonCarver.5370:

Are the orbs coming back? No. Are we bringing back the buff? Yes, although the way you get it and hold it is going to be drastically different. Are you going to see a major map change in concert with this? Yes. Is it coming soon? Most definitely.

If this orb replacement gives a stat bonus to the zergiest server, I feel like a lot of guilds will quit.

Here’s the thing to remember, it may buff the better servers for a time, but if it is relatively easy to take from a better server, it isn’t going to cause nearly the same problems that the original buff did. I will say that when this goes back into the game, we’ll continue to monitor the effects and make changes as necessary.

Now I appreciate the effort .. with that being said..are you f’ing serious?! What do you mean the better servers for a time?

Logically….if there is something on the map to be held…..inherently THE STRONGER SERVER HAS THE ADVANTAGE….ALWAYS…. They have more opportunities to hold it, more opportunities to defend it…

Unless you are planning to only make it available to the weakest server??

Again…inherently….any buff that you add to a map that requires something to be kept and held…will INHERENTLY be an advantage to the STRONGER/BIGGGER server….

What if the buff isn’t a point or something like that? What if transporting the orb will just give points when delivered and that’s all? I mean I don’t think its gonna be something like this but you never know

SomeoneElse.3685:

What if the buff isn’t a point or something like that? What if transporting the orb will just give points when delivered and that’s all? I mean I don’t think its gonna be something like this but you never know

I believe he said the buff is coming back in its original form…just the orbs themselves will be removed.

The original buff I believe is: the owning world a 5% boost to maximum HP and 50 bonus points to all stats.

I just think it’s going to make things worse…

SomeoneElse.3685:

I’m just saying, the name of the game is completely unrelated to GvG and has to do with something else.

Wrong. Some random off hand remarks about some random events that happened before the events of the first game are not the source of the games name. Those were boring little lore nuggets to explain the source of guilds, their fit into the game universe, and provide background for the lore freaks to go off of to explain guilds and the reasons they still fight each other.

Or maybe it makes sense to make a game called World War 2 and have it be set in present day Kansas and be entirely about the DEA shutting down illicit drug production. That would have an equally logical naming convention.

ParaldaWind.4523:

BlackBeard.2873:

For those that are screaming, doom an gloom, I think you might be really far off. If this is what I think it is, it will be awesome, promote open-field combat, and encourage small-mans.

What we know:
-Maps are changing, quaggans are out
-Orb-type bonuses will return
-They will be relatively easy to flip

Combining this, I think they are going to take the central area of the quaggan lake, make it a bit bigger, maybe urbanish, and make the orb held there. No door, or a door on the level of the pvp lord-door. The bonus will be given to whomever controls this area. This is essentially instituting a king-of-the-hill function to wvw, will promote players attacking a lightly- or un-fortified position, and open-field/urban fighting. THIS WOULD BE AWESOME and I hope I am right.

That would only be fun if the orb doesn’t provide a stat bonus… if it does, it means only the server with the largest zerg will be able to take the bonus from another server.

But if it is as easy to flip as Quaggans/a supply camp, that means 1 of 2 things:

1. The large zerg leaves a significant portion of their force to stay king of the hill, thus removing forces from that zerg and weakening their presence to maintain a stat buff

2. Only a small or no group stays, making it easy to flip and promoting small-mans coming to fight (you will probably need a few larger numbers to fight a stat-buffed small crew.

If the area is also very urban, with chokepoints and ways to abuse LOS, the fights could be epic.

Sure, the super-zerg could show up and flip it at any time, but as the position isn’t fortified (no huge walls/gates that require siege), they can’t maintain its benefits for long after leaving b/c another small-man will come and take it from whomever they left behind.

+1 to no combat related stat bonuses. I’m excited for changes as much as anyone else, but making one server stronger than another is a bad direction to take world versus world, in my opinion.

We don’t have evidence about how the orb is gonna work, so all we can do Is say what we do not want it to be