Now before I start, I wanted to clarify what I believe is the ideal WvW experience. This is rather subjective, but I do believe most will agree that this format would probably more ideal than the one we have at the moment. I believe a person who enters into WvW whether solo, small groups, or zergs should have something to do and be rewarded equally for doing so. I also believe that the top WvW realms should include players that can coordinate many small groups at a time, one or two large groups, and solo players able to scout and identify enemy movements. The top realm is the realm with the most coordinated and efficient WvW playerbase that balances between offensive and defensive movements. Finally, rewards should reflect the time invested, and the risk that went into your actions. Higher risk should reward higher rewards, and more skilled people should be able to achieve those higher rewards. I think we can all agree that at the moment this certainly does not happen. One of the biggest problems is the “zerg”. It simply is too large, can get around the map too fast, too easily defend all but keeps and the occasional tower against. In the current meta, there’s simply no point to having a 5-10 man group defending a supply camp when you know a zerg can just steamroll right on through you. Furthermore, a good, coordinated zerg gets rewarded so much more highly than a small group, especially if that group is simply defending. Many people have focused on the zerg as one of the most prevalent causes for the problems WvW has today. A well-coordinated zerg is usually achieved by several guilds on a server, voice chat, and the occasional talented commander. However, those in the zerg are getting rewarded much more than the skill it takes to mindlessly follow along.
In a zerg-run WvW, we have no real reasons for small groups, we have no reason to defend smaller objects, and we certainly have no reason to play outside of a zerg except for our sole enjoyment. So how do we solve it?
My solution is three-fold. We need inhibit the efficiency of zergs, to reward players for risk vs. reward, and have a system where the match winners actually receive something of value.
1) We inhibit the efficiency of zergs in two ways. One, we make the maps bigger with more objectives (both small and large, now slightly aided by the recent reveal). With more objectives and a larger ground to cover, zergs can’t do an entire circuit around the map in as short of a time. If the zerg roams from target to target, suddenly, defensive forces can come behind and recapture the point. The one giant zerg, now has to break into smaller forces to be as efficient as they once were. Two, we scale supply camps and towers past x number of players. For an example let’s say 10. This means that if a force of 30 come into a supply camp, the camp scales up the number of targets and health pools that it will roughly take the same amount of time as 10 players. We could do this to camps easily, and effectively destroy the efficiency of zergs in smaller objectives where they really have no place.
2) Risk vs. Reward. For a game type that revolves around PvP, there are many players that won’t fight groups that are larger than them. They will simply (attempt to, at the very least) run away. I think we should be encouraging players to be challenge themselves by taking on larger forces. In practice, I think we should be scaling reward structures based on the size of the forces colliding. In effect, if a 2v2 occurs the rewards are a 1:1 ratio. If a 2v10 occurs, that reward system should favor the two players attempting to fight 10. What that will likely mean in implementation is that more small groups will be formed and coordinated, and become much more prevalent in WvW. A server favoring many small, well-coordinated, highly skilled groups will likely win the match and get more rewarded during it.
3) However, the match has to mean something. If players don’t care about winning the match up, then players begin to care less about effective coordination. ArenaNet, you have tried making matches take a week and make it mean something. It has failed. No one truly cares about their server winning, because it doesn’t really mean anything. I propose that we shorten that matches to two-hour matches. Suddenly the average single player’s impact on a match dramatically increases and people become more active and invested during the time they play. Furthermore, we don’t have this battle of recruiting EU and other players on to NA servers and vice versa, because we don’t have to defend/maintain the lead we gained during the day overnight. Make the WvW battles like the Alterac Valley of old, and you can easily grant x number of marks to the winner, etc. Of course, that would mean that the current WvW currency needs to mean something. (whether that be World xp consumable, a similar item to the karma-oriented Orrian box, etc.)