Guild Wars 2

Interesting reading for anyone wanting to know why it is that the 2 losing servers rarely join together against the leading server.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner%27s_dilemma

Anet should really should look at incentives to try and make the losing servers join together as a counter to the ‘folding’ effect.

Not exactly off track as it demonstrates trends that servers generally show. It’s not about ‘people now days being ’flaky’.

http://www.economist.com/node/9867020?story_id=9867020

“The problem, of course, is that if everyone is counting on others to act, no one will…”

/rant

Yep. One of my majors in college was Business Economics and this is a classic prisoner’s dilemma.

If Server 2 attacks Server 1 and Server 3 attacks Server 1, they both gain.
If Server 2 attacks Server 1 and Server 3 attacks Server 2, Server 3 gains a lot and Server 2 loses a lot.
If Server 2 attacks Server 3 and Server 3 attacks Server 1, Server 2 gains a lot and Server 3 loses a lot.
If Server 2 attacks Server 3 and Server 3 attacks Server 2, they both lose.

Let’s look at this from Server 2’s perspective. They can attack Server 1 or Server 3. If they attack Server 1, they have reason to believe Server 3 will attack them since that is the most beneficial move for Server 3. If they attack Server 3, they have reason to believe Server 3 will attack them since it is still the most beneficial move for Server 3. Regardless of what Server 2 does, Server 3 benefits the most from attacking Server 2. Server 2 rationally decided they will have to attack Server 3. Server 3 uses the same reasoning and attacks Server 2.

Anet has to change the payoffs so Servers 2 and 3 will gain more benefit from attacking Server 1 regardless of what the other server does.

11 was a racehorse, 22 was 1 2.
11 1 1 race 1 day and 2 2 1 1 2.

thank you and good night.

The system is absolutely set up so that the two weaker servers will viciously tear into each other in their fight over second.

The game needs to be set up so that the most efficient way to guarantee second, rather than 3rd place, is to attack the leader, rather than your rival for second place.

Points taken from the leader need to be worth about twice as much as they are now. Maybe 3 times as much. Remember, besides the built in bias that if you are trying to edge out another server for second, every point you take from them is essentially worth 2 points to you, the winning server also has all the orb buffs, more people, and tons of upgrades. Taking their stuff is just harder, as WELL as being less points efficient.

Don’t know if this has been suggested before but i believe it could at least give a somewhat fair handicap. Block tower/keep upgrades depending on position on the leaderboard. So if your 3rd you have access to all the upgrades but if your first you only have access to the first tier of upgrades. Making it more difficult to hold those keeps and towers that are giving you that point gain. now if you were say 3rd but go up to 2nd position you still keep your upgrades you had you just can’t upgrade to tier 3 anymore only to 2. So losing that keep or tower means even if they recapture it they can’t reupgrade to full cause of their position.

I don’t know this is just a random rambling suggestion.

tl:dr I’m a rambling man

BlackRabbit.1259:

11 was a racehorse, 22 was 1 2.
11 1 1 race 1 day and 2 2 1 1 2.

thank you and good night.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_code

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki kitten for_tat is a highly effective strategy in game theory for the iterated prisoner’s dilemma.

The strategy was first introduced by Anatol Rapoport in Robert Axelrod’s two tournaments, held around 1980.

Geez i got an infraction by saying kitten for-tat solves prisoner’s dilemma. Geez these mods should do their research first.

t i t for tat wtf is a kitten for tat?

The problem could be solved with more clever map design. Current map design means all 3 teams are almost always in contact with each other. The top two teams can simply beat up on the 3rd place team all week long if they want.

In Planetside, the winning team tends to cut the other two teams off from each other by virtue of owning the intervening territory. 2nd and 3rd place are forced to gang up on 1st place simply because they can’t get at each other.

GW2 maps are all clearly designed to create non-stop 3-way battles — you can always cut through the ogres or cross the southern bridge, etc, to fight the 3rd place team. It’s really hard for the 1st place team to own so much stuff that 2nd and 3rd place are cut off from each other. Maybe the thinking was that this would create better wars but it leads to “smear the kitten”.

3 Way PvP as a balancing intent has failed in GW2. That simple.

In all the weeks WvW, my server has been in only one truly great 3 way match. All the other weeks would have been improved, and more competitive, simply by having a head to head between the most closely matched 2 servers.

I think having 4 teams would be an awesome alternative, with 2 allied on each side. Tiers would not get stale with the same matchups and same winners every week like has been happening a lot. Each week you would get a random ally server, and it could be a strong one or a weak one, as long as the combined ranks of both sides came out about the same. This way you would get to experience facing servers both way above you and below you over time. The way it is now, most servers are in a small group, where they will only see the same few opponents over and over, maybe occasionally going up or down a tier. It gets stale

Pendragon.8735:

3 Way PvP as a balancing intent has failed in GW2. That simple.

In all the weeks WvW, my server has been in only one truly great 3 way match. All the other weeks would have been improved, and more competitive, simply by having a head to head between the most closely matched 2 servers.

I think having 4 teams would be an awesome alternative, with 2 allied on each side. Tiers would not get stale with the same matchups and same winners every week like has been happening a lot. Each week you would get a random ally server, and it could be a strong one or a weak one, as long as the combined ranks of both sides came out about the same. This way you would get to experience facing servers both way above you and below you over time. The way it is now, most servers are in a small group, where they will only see the same few opponents over and over, maybe occasionally going up or down a tier. It gets stale

While I agree 2v2 with an ally would be great, I don’t think its possible. They would need a tighter player cap per server and the culling issues would need to be perfected by then. So basically it will never happen.

Leo Paul.1659:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki kitten for_tat is a highly effective strategy in game theory for the iterated prisoner’s dilemma.

The strategy was first introduced by Anatol Rapoport in Robert Axelrod’s two tournaments, held around 1980.

Geez i got an infraction by saying kitten for-tat solves prisoner’s dilemma. Geez these mods should do their research first.

t i t for tat wtf is a kitten for tat?

Haha that is their auto filter at work. One time I had to change the word “fun” into something else because it came out as “kittenn”

OP, you nailed it. Using the formula of that Wikipedia page, it appears that the devs need to reduce the reward of “one side betrays” to the point where it is no longer more beneficial than “both sides cooperate.” If this is accomplished, then the three-way war should work as intended.