Guild Wars 2

X T D.6458:

MaLeVoLenT.8129:

X T D.6458:

MaLeVoLenT.8129:

X T D.6458:

Balthazzarr.1349:

XTR.9604:

And as far as “Server Pride” goes, I’m sorry to say but that isn’t a real thing, it is just something to complain about. Have guild pride, its guild wars, not server wars.

As noted in a previous post of mine above, I kind of agree it’s not about the ‘server’… but it IS about the community, if you have one. For me it’s not “something to complain about”, but really is sadly enough a reality that we can’t do anything about now.

Shoot me for spitting into the wind I guess but I always hold out a little hope that something will change. Even, as I said above, permanently put us on ONE server. We’ll deal with the zergs etc.. it’s not that hard to roam a lot of the time depending on the time-slot. But it makes it much less of a dedication when you’re just doing it for the sake of running around as opposed to the host server of the period…

Honestly I dont know why they didnt just link the lower tier servers together. That would have made more sense than to add more population to higher tiers which then produces the eventual roller coaster type of effect where there is incentive for bandwagoning that causes a server to rise then fall when it’s link is taken away.

Linking the bottom tiers and not linking the higher tiers creates a drastic imbalance. For 1 there is still your server Blackgate that has the entire game outnumbered to the point where no server can stand up against you. Secondly, the tiers are not locked nor is player movement so it would do harm to the game if they simply linked based off tier considering how rapid we are to move through the tiers once everyone is balanced.

Linking is actually whats making it difficult for you to compete, the sooner you realize that…

What? how?

A server will only hold its link for so long because otherwise it creates an unbalanced matchup. Getting a link initiates the roller coaster effect, people transfer to your LINK rather then your actual host server because it is much cheaper. You can start winning all you want, it doesnt matter, eventually you will lose your link and not be able to compete because you were relying on the population that joined the linked server that was now taken away from you.

BG for example lost like half the matchups in the last linking, I think we lost like 3 of the last 4 weeks but look at the current scores and glicko, it hasnt effected us only the servers we were up against.

My point is stop relying on links, they are temporary short term boosts that can have drastic and negative long term effects. If you want a stable successful server, focus on growing your native population the way BG has over the years.

Linking would be better used for lower tiers to boost their populations, for higher tiers it is a double edged sword.

What you just said doesn’t point out as to why linking is making servers not competitive. In fact if you look before and after, each server is more competitive hence the rotation without a volatility reset. Regardless Links are a short term solution in a 2month cycle and using them for coverage will not work in any servers favor which is something I tried explaining to JQ who insist they need a link.

Regardless links has made more competitive servers not less. Just because you lose a match doesnt make it any less competitive. Telling me you lost matches cause you didnt have a link doesnt mean anything.

Linking the lower servers together would have been WAY better idea. Lower population servers played the same way. Same play styles.

And to these people who say WvW is all about zergs. No disrespect to their zerg fights… but I’ve in all this time not seen real good zerg fighting. Its over in a flash… the bigger numbers stomp through the smaller numbers. They might try twice tops. Then they stop and get back to farming and taking back towers. It’s rare I see a good zerg fight where its pretty evenly matched and you keep going back into the fray to fight for that keep. I’ve saw more zerg on zerg battles on our smaller servers than the big ones. Aye the zergs may have been smaller… but our commanders did more than just one or two tries to break the other zerg.

On smaller servers I remember a hour or more to cap stonemist. The poor thing would be battered and bruised and walls down everywhere! It was a real fight for it. Does that ever happen on big tiers?

Anyhoo… I hope they will change things up and link up lower servers and/or make it permanent pairings. I’d love to have another server along side us if it means we have more WvW. Just make it a permanent!

X T D.6458:

If you want a stable successful server, focus on growing your native population the way BG has over the years.

Every server does try to grow a stable population over the years. Except for maybe 2 periods I can think of which are the Kain train from ages ago, and the DB pushes. Even then, they still have a core who try to bring in more stable success to there game.

The big difference is not in those communities (they do periodically buy guilds, but that’s not the biggest issue). It’s BG being at the helm, was the attractive place for any player to go to. The average joe who wants to win and likely only pay to move once in their game career… will choose by default BG. Because they see potential longevity, and wins. Wins feel good man, until it gets boring. Then they stop playing… and more come. Do this for 4 years and you have BG today.

I would assume the account total (including inactives) would look something like this across the top 6 (these are just theoretical)

BG – 300,000
Mags – 100,000
TC – 100,000
FA – 70,000
JQ – 100,000
SBI – 60,000

Actively … most can pull numbers to queue ebg, and home bl nightly… then home bl becomes t3, and everyone queues ebg only.

If some new shiny came into play in WvW, it wouldn’t even be a competition…. BG hands down will have more players than they would know what to do with all the time, and face issues like guild members not getting into maps… and not playing reset night to let the fair weathers get there shinies. But Sunday – wednesday they would handily lock down the W. It always happens, not because of the communities of the game (while they have a piece, it’s a small part), it’s the average joe’s who flocked over the course of 4 years which actually contribute the most.

Sorry i must have deleted that quote line … and links have had more activity all around, but some players who do not like more activity are the only ones opposed to it. just like some players who like it, you will always have some who do not, because they enjoyed a different style of play.

Well understand where this person is coming from. To be thrown in it what is a blob vs blob zerg situation. I mean if you do roam you are killed by 6 ppl or if you kill them them they bring moan. All it is a salt game now. I do like the pairing though bc it give other tiers a chance to see what it like to be higher up and the skill it needs to be in there. But i have watched alot of roamer ppl and they just complain about it. It is funny. But then again a zerg is like oh shiney lets kill it and they don’t respect the duelers. But the samething goes for the duelers and they watching the duels, if someone is curious to learn about dueling the duelers friends kill on site. Geez would like to watch and learn. but all in all its just a game,

There is 2 possibilities I can think of to resolve this.

1. Let there be a match for all single servers and all WvW diehard players have a free transfer to other opened servers of their choice. This will increase the pool of WvW players of the servers they moved to. If that is still insufficient numbers, let there be another match up and this will swell the numbers of WvW players leaving 12 WvW servers. The losing servers will now be devoid of any WvW players and be made up of mainly PvE players. As PvE is open world, moving to another server does not matter even for guild members.

2. Another suggestion albeit controversial is for Anet to develop a separate GW2 WvW game mode which is similar yet cater solely for WvW. This means those who opt to participate will need to pay to play either monthly or a one time payment as a dedicated Anet team will be required. Like the HoT expansion, players who do wish to participate i.e. not paying for this game mode, will be lock out from WvW. On the other hand, WvW players can play both WvW and PvE. Needless to say, WvW players will have access to HoT and maybe any future expansions. If implemented, server pride will no longer be an issue, plus the servers will be more competitive and rewards such as cape trims can be awarded.

Those who are dismissing server pride aren’t looking at longterm. You buy the game because it entertains. You stay because of the community.

I agree with OP 100%. Sadly, Anet has shown severe deficiencies in several areas that would have prevented this debacle.

1. They created a game mode that they never really invested in or knew how to moderate. The game mode appeared structured to make server identity valuable, yet everything Anet has done speaks to the opposite. Anet never had core tenets for WvW, and as a result could not possibly know when/if they were deviating from them. Over the course of years, each server did develop core tenets, some more than others. Anet was clueless in that regard.

2. When they finally realized it could use some improvement, they chose a mass poll. Even with the seemingly generous margin of 75/25 needed to make a change, they never asked what percentage of active players were contained in the top few tiers. Or, if they did, they certainly did not care. In other words, it is very possible that over 75% of the players voting in the poll were in a position to feel minimal impact anyway. To them, the change may simply have represented “more loot” because “more peeps” as a result of “more gameplay”. At my most cynical, I would say some of them viewed linking as “low tier players coming to fight for us”.

3. It is worth noting that several of the major changes that have been well received since HoT release have been thematically similar. Reduction in HP needed for specs, altered function of meta events along with massive increase in rewards, addition of reward track in WvW, etc all involve Anet catering to a noisy, insulting, demeaning, childish player base. Linking falls into that category for me as well. The comments in this chain largely reinforce that.

I would challenge Anet to release 1 statistic. The number of active WvW players (let’s set the low bar of 5 hours a week in WvW) in the last 3 weeks vs. the same numbers for the 3 weeks preceding linking. Even more interesting would be that number by server. I strongly suspect that the numbers would support linking having a negative effect on WvW, certainly on the bottom two or three tiers.

The real solution this late in the game is a complete overhaul of the server system. That should not require a change to any WvW mechanics. People who say server identity matters have already been disappointed, and people who say it doesn’t matter shouldn’t care. Right? At least we would all be in the same boat, or airship, or dolyak caravan, or whatever.

-Fates

Jayne.9251:

Those who are dismissing server pride aren’t looking at longterm. You buy the game because it entertains. You stay because of the community.

If people really stayed in certain game because of the community, things like FPS or MOBA (who have extremely toxic communities) would have died long ago.

People stay in the game because they still have fun playing it. Not because of it’s community.

I agree that the server linking as it is now snubs the lower tier servers by taking away their identity. If linking is to continue and I actually would hope it didn’t all the WvW players should have a permanent home server identity.

I also know lots of players that have quit playing because of the linking because they can’t play the game the way they want to and are forced to wait for long ques and play with horrible lag, especially on reset night. WvW game play for us has changed greatly.

As far as server pride I can agree with that. I also am from a small server and really don’t appreciate the bouncing around that is occurring with the small servers. I really don’t expect the larger servers to understand this but if they lost their server identity maybe they would. Anet says they want to even things out in WvW then they should not only alternate the linking like they are they should alternate the home server. I bet we’d see lots of complaining on this.

They could have fixed this very easily by simply cutting down the number of players for each server on the map. Soon players would get tired of waiting in the long ques and move to a less populated server and maybe the WvW population would even out. (I’m sure people from the larger servers will say they would quit playing instead of changing, but that’s no different than what is occurring right now) Anet should have left well enough alone. Oh and I did vote against the linking.

Jeknar.6184:

Jayne.9251:

Those who are dismissing server pride aren’t looking at longterm. You buy the game because it entertains. You stay because of the community.

If people really stayed in certain game because of the community, things like FPS or MOBA (who have extremely toxic communities) would have died long ago.

People stay in the game because they still have fun playing it. Not because of it’s community.

Totally disagree with you. I look at games like EQ2 that are still chugging along WITH a paid monthly sub after ten plus years. It’s because SONY nurtured and cultivated the emotional attachment to the game through community. Heck, that attachment even survived when SOE sold it.

I WAS apart of a super close, friendly server. Every week we had “Theme Night” where we all voted on a subject (Asura Night, or Staff & Hammer Night) these events made our server so close and basically like a second family. With server merges it’s something of the past. It is harder to be a close community of server-mates when you have 1 or even 2 servers sharing maps with you. I have lost contact with TONS of players/friends that basically threw in the towel when server merges happened. That once close and friendly community/server was wiped away by other servers and players mixing and confusing our usual play-style.
My server wasn’t very populated but frankly it doesn’t matter we were closer than any server out there. With these server merges its just who has the bigger piece of the pie. Zerg v Zerg. Roaming is a thing of the past, and those roaming guilds who run around in 10-15 man groups are gone, or forced to join the zerg.
WvW isn’t about individual servers anymore whom are, in my case, very close, now it’s about how many servers you have with you and how many people are contained within. Server merges is just as bad as Braham buzzing his long locks off.

Rip Server Pride

PS. When the server your linked with wipes a zerg and says “Nice job their server” and doesn’t say my servers name, even though we helped, there’s something wrong my server is nothing anymore.

Not trying to be a fly in the ointment but if the upper tier/high pop servers don’t feel that server pride or server identity is a problem can you honestly say that you would enjoy playing and fighting for 2 months under the server name of the linked (lower pop) server and not the host server? Completely losing your server name and giving your glicko to the lower pop server name. Only to be placed with yet another server without your name once again.

Hoaxintelligence.4628:

Arenanet wiped server pride in the following 3 steps..

Step 1: they replaced the old lions arch for some weird looking waterpark without waterslides. (everyone loved to stand afk in front of the bank)

Step 2: They introduced the mega servers. (randomised peeps all over the place)

Step 3: they merged servers. (rollplayers suddenly pop up in Wvw causing huge Q’s, veterans start to play different games)

There is no such thing as server pride in guildwars2. Those who beleave that Im wrong are tripping.

This is exactly what I was thinking when I read the thread title. If they would have just done proper server mergers none of this would have happened. But no, that would mean Arenanet is admitting that the population had dropped. The fact that they thought it was a better idea to throw man power into these ideas rather than just move accounts around and admit the truth is rather silly.

Since the megaserver happened though, server linking was inevitable and needed. WvW was always about large scale warfare. Camps and even towers can still be taken by small groups but you have to fast and smart about it. You should not be able to run across a map and not have any resistance unless you have stealth and mobility.

I agree! WvW was something a small party was able to roam in and have a little fun with before linking. Dying to mass blobs very often and repeatedly is the new roaming. Not all of us belong to large mega guilds and sometimes do not have many people on during certain hours to form larger squads with. Or maybe we don’t want to join with the larger squads on the map. Also, we put a lot of effort into WvW just to be assigned a new link to a new server/tier after a designated time. I really don’t want to spend the time and effort if it matters nothing for our server in the end.
I’ve been on a map where the hosting server is telling the linked servers how to run WvW and that the way our server may do things is not welcome or “the right way” and then constantly TALKS IN CAPS at our server in map/team chat. So, yeah server domain may be just a name to some of you, but it’s a lot more to most of us.

This is a strange case, in that I agree with every single post so far.

Should note one thing, at Poll for linking, one of the ANet people said that they checked the amount of votes and percentages from each separate server. And with a single exception they where very close to the final outcome of the vote. So except for a single server, every other server voted pretty close to the final outcome.

Iirc there was some hints that the Server that was the exception was FC which was heavy against it. But I can’t verify that, so don’t quote me on it.

X T D.6458:

Honestly I dont know why they didnt just link the lower tier servers together

Because 0 + 0 + 0 is still 0. The thing with these 0 population servers being linked to high tier servers is it allows people to join them for a cheap gem price and Anet just watch the sales fly.

I couldn’t agree with you more server pride. You were able to articulate your ideas very well.
i wish that we could go back a year and look how well WvW was running. I am one of the people that gave the new system a try and it didnt work for me and rarely play WvW anymore. I miss it!!. Hopefully Anet can really look hard at this and make adjustments to make it fun to play again.

Jeknar.6184:

Jayne.9251:

Those who are dismissing server pride aren’t looking at longterm. You buy the game because it entertains. You stay because of the community.

If people really stayed in certain game because of the community, things like FPS or MOBA (who have extremely toxic communities) would have died long ago.

People stay in the game because they still have fun playing it. Not because of it’s community.

MMOs are social games. FPS and MOBAs are not.

I agree wholeheartedly with what Server Pride said. I miss running with the friends I’ve made in WVW. It was so much fun playing with the guilds I associated with? I feel the new system makes it extremely hard to play being in a smaller guild. Please bring back the old system

Pandoras Titan.1583:

I agree wholeheartedly with what Server Pride said. I miss running with the friends I’ve made in WVW. It was so much fun playing with the guilds I associated with? I feel the new system makes it extremely hard to play being in a smaller guild. Please bring back the old system

Depends on personal experience to be honest. I didn’t WvW much in the last year (I was on NSP) until we merged with SoS. After the merge changed, I transferred over and I pretty much exclusively play WvW now. I made lots of friends and can safely say I 100% approve of merging.

joneirikb.7506:

Iirc there was some hints that the Server that was the exception was FC which was heavy against it. But I can’t verify that, so don’t quote me on it.

Considering the DH+FC link fiasco when it was introduced, I wouldn’t doubt it.

I used to be that kind of player, I used to play for my community, and it was fun, till situation was inconsistent and I´m not talking from a low tier server perspective, but from a medium one. I just enjoy the fun I can get with the people I like to play with, meaning I have transfer a lot in the last 2 years. On the other hand. I understand your concern, I think it´s kind of hard to get used to for some big guilds to play against and with more competitive and more populated servers, but if its what I need to get fun, I´ll take it.

I hope you guys can get the chance to play like you want to in this new system with the linkings, but if it does not happen, it´s time to find new ways to keep your community alive, because I don´t think this is going back. OR LETS TRY HARDER.

PD: Believe.

Literally this can all be solved with server tags. Then you know who everyone is and everyone can have their ‘server pride’.

Yeah the links change all the time, but as long as you know who is from what server then no identity lost.

I do love all the talk about identity and pride though when people have been mass transferring to the ‘best’ server for years. Nothing like having entire guilds leave a server on a whim, killing the WvW activity.

At least now, we are guaranteed activity and coverage. If you don’t want blobs, stay out of EBG. My server last link was hosted by NSP and we were in T2 for a week…didn’t see all that many blobs when I played. Was still able to solo cap camps like always.

Gotejjeken.1267:

At least now, we are guaranteed activity and coverage. If you don’t want blobs, stay out of EBG. My server last link was hosted by NSP and we were in T2 for a week…didn’t see all that many blobs when I played. Was still able to solo cap camps like always.

Honestly, i feel the people crying about blobs are actually crying that they cannot solo cap an entire map without resistance anymore because it’s not dead T8. Sure, it’s easier to get yourself in a outnumbered situation because there are a lot more people running around, but it’s much better than running in a map for 1 hour and not find a single player.

My recommendation is not to attach yourself to a server box in some random building, and hoping it never changes. Find like minded individuals, make a guild, and play together.

Is it convenient to have a server ts? Yes. It sucks to have to get a new one, but people stop playing the game for various reasons, and community’s will end this way naturally no matter what you hope for.

Furthermore, it is not necessary to have “server identity” for community to exist. Pulling from the giant list of issues with Gw2 found in https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/wuv/What-do-WvWers-want/first:

B. People’s concerns with server identity. I will get hate for this, but merging should have occurred over this linking concept that requires upkeep from ANET. The idea of community would actually shift to the Guilds themselves. See Guild Wars 1.

Even in Everquest 2, I had no real community tie to the server called “Kithicor” but rather my guild Unleashed. Does that mean I lacked a sense of identity? No. I chose people first.

After all, neither GW1 or 2 were called Server Wars.

Jayne.9251:

Those who are dismissing server pride aren’t looking at longterm. You buy the game because it entertains. You stay because of the community.

I would like to add less eloquently;

Always feel free to speak for yourself, and only yourself.

I still have server pride, I miss the guild mates who moved on and wish them well.

I started in Ferguson’s Crossing and felt as if I was forced into another more powerful server due to the fact of just plain zerging overpowering our group fighting. Wvw has gotten so bad that it is merely a daily chore that gets completed other than that it is just zerg on zerg fighting throughout the whole time of the week. I too have had friends that have lost interest due to the changes that happened throughout wvw. I agree that merging shouldn’t occur just because they feel that wvw is more strategy based than just power with numbers.

I do agree with LionPride. Since the implementation of the server linking I have not played WvW as much, nor have many of my friends and fellow guildies. The old system may not have been good with the imbalance of the servers, but you at least felt like you were accomplishing something for your server and you weren’t just zerg fodder for another server.

Throw out Linking or Merging Servers…

Both of these solutions are horrible & perpetuate a toxic culture that consistently support certain servers to win based on population…imho

Tiers typically pigeon holes servers into the Have & Have Not.

Remove the Tiers & Use a Modified version of World Guesting tailored to fit the WvW game mode that let players pick which servers they want to fight against for themselves.

Jayne.9251:

Those who are dismissing server pride aren’t looking at longterm. You buy the game because it entertains. You stay because of the community.

Of whom you find a small close knit group you end up playing with in a guild, who end up hopping servers and you follow them because you only enjoy playing it with them. Server pride has never existed…it has always been guild pride. You take pride in playing with your guild.

Jeknar.6184:

joneirikb.7506:

Iirc there was some hints that the Server that was the exception was FC which was heavy against it. But I can’t verify that, so don’t quote me on it.

Considering the DH+FC link fiasco when it was introduced, I wouldn’t doubt it.

Well that was cause FC and DHs pug guilds couldn’t humble themselves to play nice and neither had/have any good enough guilds to act like their something special.

RyuDragnier.9476:

Jayne.9251:

Those who are dismissing server pride aren’t looking at longterm. You buy the game because it entertains. You stay because of the community.

Of whom you find a small close knit group you end up playing with in a guild, who end up hopping servers and you follow them because you only enjoy playing it with them. Server pride has never existed…it has always been guild pride. You take pride in playing with your guild.

There’s a lot of solo players who stick to a server because of the community and actually they are the community and there’s others who enjoy playing and hopping servers with their guilds – it’s both true.

Like all game implementation or improvements, it is used to try to increase the overall traffic and/or keep the consistency of its gameplay. No developer would want his/her competitor to take away from its fan base. This can have a negative or positive effect depending on each individuals preference. As for server linking, there are benefits but also consequences.

As for the benefits of linking, it includes a larger population base for WvW players, for most servers, if not all. This allows a larger time spectrum for groups when you log in for fun and/or want to accomplish objective within WvW. These include more enemies to fight, players that can help, and meeting new players to kill or befriend.

For the consequences, these include not being able to easily join WvW gameplay whenever you wanted to due to high queue during primetime and reset time, especially when players usually hardly had a queue before link. Bad reception from other servers caused by some of its players. No recognition of home server for the smaller servers. Larger population means larger coverage for your enemies that could deny all small guilds from doing anything unless they merge two guilds together. Being thrown around like a hot potato until they determine their next step for WvW.

Unfortunately, there is no right or wrong answer to this linking “problem”. With server linking, most likely it has brought in new players due to higher level of activity for those that are playing or have just started playing. But this also caused problems for those in a community.

For me, a community is a place where you feel like you belong and have fun. It can be a server or a guild as it is the people you interact with that makes it worth a while to stay. The server I am on, Ferguson Crossing, had fun time doing server activities on certain days which is why a lot of us do not like the server linking as at times, we would even queue a map just to play around as a lone server.

Though I would personally would like to go back to the old days before linking, I have to say that even if it did change back, it will NOT be the same as before. People have acquired the taste of linking and quite a few people like it. This in turn will damage the current gameplay/community and fan base if it once more turn back to lone servers.

So, in the end, the linking has already happened and any changes will have side effects. If people can actually get enough support for lone server then that would be great which mean people enjoyed the old system more than linking. If they do not change linking then they should at least have a more stable linking to create interaction and community with different servers. They should also see if people want our own server names when enemy sees our name tag so they have a sense of rivalry/impression of that server.

Now we wait and see.

I understand that it is frustrating for all the people that got used to empty servers and enjoyed that gameplay. But the fact that those servers were mostly empty lately also shut out a lot of players that are now free to enjoy the game. So while I understand that this is a problem of dedicated wvw-players, I would like you to understand that linking solved problems the majority of people were unhappy about. The whole reason why your servers were empty in the first place and you could roam freely is because people didn’t enjoy the gamemode with empty maps and no tags enough to play wvw.

“Wait and see”-mentality: I thought about it and I think smaller communites should focus on solutions; what can be done to solve the problems and what can they do themselves:

- Make a server-guild that includes all the players on your server that are still active in wvw. So you will know who is on and where they are and you can group up regardless of guild. Everything you do with that group will be “your” accomplisment, in this groups your major link will only be “pugs” and know it.
- If you don’t like to be tossed around and want permanent merge, you can transfer this guild to a bigger host server and stay there. You can also move to EU as NA or NA as EU to create more small scale battles instead of fighting zergs. This way the ones that still want to stay on their server will not be forced to merge. Merging would hurt the balancing the linking accomplishes right now and it would force people to change servers, something you can do now voluntarily if you want to anyway.
- If you guys want a merge of all small servers: this is also something you can do right now too, you can discuss with other small scale communities and transfer to one small server, forcing Arenanet to make this a host server in next linking if it surpasses the population of CD, HoD or NSP.
- You can consistently fight for your ideas, but it would be better to find a easy and realistic solution with other affected people and servers. Arenanet will not get rid of the linking and go back to empty tiers. But maybe they will implement a small roaming-tier where 3 new servers will fight with a lot smaller population-limit on the maps, if enough people want it and they are willing to pay for it (so expansion-material; or spending gems for transfer) and this “solutions” is getting consistently pushed. But you will have to be fast and consistent with your ideas to stand a chance, because I am sure the content of the next expansion will be fixed very soon or is fixed already.

@Rink: The servers aren’t suited for more than 70 players each, class balance isn’t suited for nearly nothing, but 100 vs 100 vs 100 (if you can activate anything other than 1) is really painful. A lot of players quit due to the linking as you can’t do anything else than blobbing (unless you’re online at offtimes in which some other server still always has a zerg – and that again is a structure and profession balance issue – anet can’t solve population or coverage issues – they can’t force me or anyone to play).

ETA: The OP suggested merging and I think that’s the smartest approach but it still wouldn’t fix wvw. And, anet, merging would even work on EU. We don’t need monsterblobs and queues of 50.

Lahmia.2193:

Jeknar.6184:

Jayne.9251:

Those who are dismissing server pride aren’t looking at longterm. You buy the game because it entertains. You stay because of the community.

If people really stayed in certain game because of the community, things like FPS or MOBA (who have extremely toxic communities) would have died long ago.

People stay in the game because they still have fun playing it. Not because of it’s community.

MMOs are social games. FPS and MOBAs are not.

Don;t see what that has to do with WvW. WvW is not really the mmo part of GW2. And besides the social aspect of the game comes in many forms other than just servers.

RyuDragnier.9476:

Jayne.9251:

Those who are dismissing server pride aren’t looking at longterm. You buy the game because it entertains. You stay because of the community.

Of whom you find a small close knit group you end up playing with in a guild, who end up hopping servers and you follow them because you only enjoy playing it with them. Server pride has never existed…it has always been guild pride. You take pride in playing with your guild.

While I do enjoy my own company, I’m in a guild alone. I prefer it that way. A lot of people do.

And it’s with those people that communities are born and help with the longevity of a game because people are emotionally invested.

Server pride has always existed. Look at people flipping out on here not even a month ago:

Jski.6180:

Jayne.9251:

I love how invested people are after four years.

I’d also like to point out that investment is to the server.

Well ya that what wvw is for an investment to your world. Shame that it was changed on a whim like this.

Jayne.9251:

While I do enjoy my own company, I’m in a guild alone. I prefer it that way. A lot of people do.

Re-read this on its own. How does this translate to community? Who are these “a lot of people?”

Jayne.9251:

And it’s with those people that communities are born and help with the longevity of a game because people are emotionally invested.

Communities are not born based on single person guilds. If they are, name that server community. If we are going to talk about any investment, don’t put it all into a single bubble that will pop. In other words don’t put all your money in the housing market, or don’t put all your effort in ACT/SAT scores.

Jayne.9251:

Server pride has always existed. Look at people flipping out on here not even a month ago:

Server pride has not always existed. It didn’t on Guild Wars 1. As for the last, people flipping out on the forums does not reflect the majority of those playing WvW nor does it mean they flip out over ‘server pride.’

I’m like Jayne.9251

While I do enjoy my own company, I’m in a guild alone. I prefer it that way.

I’m still emotionally invested “TO” my Guest Server.

Given the chance I’d work extremely hard to re-build my community that has a unique “team identity” if World Linking is removed.

It’s not about server pride…it’s about this unique “team identity”.

If WvW was compared to the NFL …World Server names would be like the Football team’s names.

Players & Fans are emotionally invested in their “team”. Win or Loose – Live or Die … you fight for your “team”. Put enough of these “solo” people that believe in the same idea together & it can turn epic. The Super Bowl franchise is a perfect example.

I’ve never heard of the NFL fixing things by linking or merging teams.

Playing from a Guest Server I play selfishly for the Host Server. It’s a toxic kind of game play because I’m not invested “TO” whatever Host Server I’m paired with.

Host Server Commanders need to win, or I switch to selfish game play, or I just quit playing. I don’t buy gems anymore, because there isn’t a reason to.

It’s not about server pride…it’s about this unique “team identity”.

Any modern MMO created today should embrace single world on top of a grid-style server/network system. If we know anything about humanity, we know that people will always find a way to divide up and try to kill each other. We don’t need “servers” to artificially divide us up… we are very efficient in doing that ourselves. Server’s are an old MMO design that has outlived its usefulness.

For example, Eve Online has the most interesting and involved political and social system of any MMO ever created. While it has multiple “servers” one large cluster is key to it having such a vibrant and long running active warring MMO community. “Server Pride” is not even a thing in that game. Corporate loyalty or disloyalty is first and foremost.

Diku.2546:

I’m like Jayne.9251

While I do enjoy my own company, I’m in a guild alone. I prefer it that way.

I’m still emotionally invested “TO” my Guest Server.

Given the chance I’d work extremely hard to re-build my community that has a unique “team identity” if World Linking is removed.

If you are not going to create the chance yourself or put the effort in, then do the next best thing. Form a guild together, play together, and re-establish a new community that you can have an attachment.

Changing the words to team identity won’t fix anything.

Diku.2546:

It’s not about server pride…it’s about this unique “team identity”.

If WvW was compared to the NFL …World Server names would be like the Football team’s names.

Players & Fans are emotionally invested in their “team”. Win or Loose – Live or Die … you fight for your “team”. Put enough of these “solo” people that believe in the same idea together & it can turn epic. The Super Bowl franchise is a perfect example.

I’ve never heard of the NFL fixing things by linking or merging teams.

Playing from a Guest Server I play selfishly for the Host Server. It’s a toxic kind of game play because I’m not invested “TO” whatever Host Server I’m paired with.

Host Server Commanders need to win, or I switch to selfish game play, or I just quit playing. I don’t buy gems anymore, because there isn’t a reason to.

It’s not about server pride…it’s about this unique “team identity”.

NFL is not a good example of this at all. NFL is more of a gvg: the guilds are the teams, and the players are watching in Obsidian Sanctum. What you are trying to connect with WvW is where the fans on the stands get to jump in and play with the players… which defeats the entire example.

Community is always going to be a dynamic creation of the players, I’ll give you that much. The game may give you a fancy chat program to make those social connections…sure.

Server pride isn’t necessary to keep, and has been given up for sake of game play. Many have transferred servers to find better action with their guild communities as population dwindle over the years. It is your choice to attach yourself forever to a server that has disappeared. I am not saying your memories are invalid, but you should make the best of the limited time left in this game; all things end, so try to have fun with the game play before it does!

@Chinchilla.1785

I did try & I don’t like what World Linking does to Guest World Servers…imho

I also don’t care for World Merging.

I feel NFL is a very good example. You have your opinion & I have mine.

Let’s agree to disagree.

Everybody can decide for themselves which opinion they prefer.

I do agree that server pride as you put it isn’t necessary.

However, without it…the game mode will never become something epic…based on what I feel that unique teams bring to the table…

I still feel that the NFL Super Bowl Franchise is very successful & highly lucrative at marketing all teams…and not just the Super Bowl winners…imho

WvW should be re-designed to use the best aspects that allow healthy competition like the NFL Super Bowl.

Not looking to use the same game mechanics of the NFL Super Bowl, but I strongly believe that it’s possible to get the same feel & end result that players & fans talk about after the event…

Then it’s a wait for the next season to happen again…which would be an annual tournament event for WvW.

It’s not about how many make up a team, but allowing the idea & concept of “team” to drive a healthy competition fueled by emotionally invested players loyal to their “team”.

Players can loose for the season, but they’ll continue to play passionately for their “team”…if we can give them a fair playing field where their efforts can make a difference in their own minds.

There’s a better Long Term Alternative that’s better than Linking or Merging…imho

I posted this in another thread. Its not the end all be all but its something that could address some issues:

I’d like to see wvw done in more of a structured bracketed system.
Right now we have two types of wvw in play. One is dominated by super guilds that want to win at all cost including stacking servers, spying, and making deals with enemy teams to dog another with a rolling blob.
Then there is the other that wants a solid wvw server community. less blobbing while utilizing “more” smaller groups/roamers.
In my honest opinion a three team face-off should be reserved for the top tiers like the superbowl of wvw play and the ladder up to it should be 1v1 with less maps to fight on.
The very lowest tiers maybe just 2 borderland maps, a tier higher maybe just two desert maps, next tier maybe two border land maps with a modified 2 team EB, then the next tier could introduce three team play with just an EB while the last and highest tier is all out with what we have now.
I think that would accommodate everyone’s play style nicely by simply adapting the map system to be more intuitive to wvw server population.
Other than that I’d like to see more incentive given to those that place and refresh siege. Defenders need some love.

Chinchilla.1785:

If you are not going to create the chance yourself or put the effort in, then do the next best thing. Form a guild together, play together, and re-establish a new community that you can have an attachment.

Try to understand it: To us our server is our guild. No matter which guild comes or leaves. On Gunnars I was really allowed to run with any closed guild raid – because I was part of them although I haven’t been in their guilds. There are people who hold a server together and who are in big guilds, but mostly it is the solo players who do that. You think it’s all simply solved by pressing everything into one guild, but we’re friends with all guilds, no matter their style (PPT, havoc, GvG, roaming) – and that is the community of a server.
There are lots of people like me, Diku and Jayne and they are important to all servers.

ETA: Come to think of it: GH’s best commander was a “solo roamer” (with 60 people following him) for a very long time.

Balthazzarr.1349:

It’s so sad that the huge majority of the comments you see in here now are about removing the linking even though the apparent poll asked for it. But of course the poll was in favor since MOST people that play gw2 are on the top 4 tiers… that in itself skewed the results of the poll. Those of us in the lower tiers that really liked how we played had no chance.

We have also seen our community slowly broken down into either roaming guild groups or simply groups that come in for missions and leave. Most hosts are gracious and fun to run with but it is THEIR server, not ours. A large number of the people I know personally don’t like the big zergs and don’t run in them. I would rather run with a few people and run havoc on camps and towers and battle other roamers than be a “borg” drone.

ANet will continue to see these posts; will continue to ignore them because they know better; and will continue to see people like us play less. As I’ve said in other posts, I’ve seen so many of my friends stop playing completely. The other leader of my guild and her partner are two of them. My guild went from a nice roaming group of about 10 on average, to a group of 1-3 on a good day in WvW. I know at least 6 other people personally that stopped playing because of the linking…. and that’s just people that I know.

One positive thing financially has come out of this for me though.. I spend a LOT less money on gems than I used to since my commitment to WvW and even to this game has dropped off significantly.

I truly don’t understand why ANet thinks that it’s ok to toss people around from server to server and really think that they love it… because I believe most of us don’t. The ones that do (for the most part) already had moved to higher tier servers… :P

We asked for linking but we didn’t get what we asked for.

Anet used a model no one on the forums laid out.

Many players went to great lengths to show Anet several viable and server saving options for linking but they ignored all of us, giving us a horrid system that buries the servers, doesn’t create better alliances since we have no idea who is whom any longer.

Case in point? We asked that the top three never be linked – ever.

Case in point? Servers go from first to seventh in less than two weeks when “relinked”.

There are many more I am sure all of you could list.

The problem is, and has been, that Anet isn’t listening to players who play more than a couple of hours over those who are in WvW many hours a day and rarely in other game modes.

When Anet finally listened to players on many issues it was because there was a reddit that gained a huge up arrow percentage on that particular issue. Most of us don’t read reddit.

Reddit, more than the forums, (which four plus years on still can’t be ‘searched’ at all since the search NEVER worked) has driven this game’s direction.

Fix the forums.

Fix your listening skills of those who do WvW more than any other game mode.

Realize that the true ‘end game’ of GW2 is WvW, not pvE or PvP – always has been, always will be.

Until they realize it and put in the same effort they do in other game modes WvW will always be the red-headed-step-child-who-never-has-enough-to-eat-and-shabby-clothes-to-wear.

Go to any Vista in WvW… any, and see the ‘care’ has been given. There’s nothing… no name, no cool thing, just a blank space where a name should be and that’s four plus years of ignoring that and so many other issues, glitches and mistakes.

Ask many WvW’ers when the last time someone ‘glitched’ into a keep or tower.

Yeah, WvW is the red-headed-step-child-without-any-protection.

The only way ANET would end server link is for more players to play wvw.

To do that they need to drastically increase the rewards on WvW so that those PVE kittens would be entice to play WvW. They also need to give bulk of the rewards to Competitive Players in order to encourage players to Gear Up and Get Good, so that the kittens who are aiming for Karma Train would instead be encourage to group up, and turn into a ferocious group that aims for larger rewards.

In most Mmo i played, end game items can only be found on competetive gameplay like guild battle etc.. I think this game titled “Guild Wars” should try to do the same

Jana.6831:

Try to understand it: To us our server is our guild. No matter which guild comes or leaves.

Try to understand it: To us our server is our guild. No matter which guild comes or leaves. On Gunnars I was really allowed to run with any closed guild raid – because I was part of them although I haven’t been in their guilds. There are people who hold a server together and who are in big guilds, but mostly it is the solo players who do that. You think it’s all simply solved by pressing everything into one guild, but we’re friends with all guilds, no matter their style (PPT, havoc, GvG, roaming) – and that is the community of a server.
There are lots of people like me, Diku and Jayne and they are important to all servers.

ETA: Come to think of it: GH’s best commander was a “solo roamer” (with 60 people following him) for a very long time.

+1

Couldn’t have said it any better.

That’s the essence behind all these words: (Server Pride, Team, Community, etc.)

World Linking only allows Community to exist on Host Servers & denies it on Guest Servers.

World Merging forces Guest Servers to accept their Host Server’s Identity.

Both are horrible Long Term solutions that limits growth or leads to a dead end…imho

Thanks for starting this thread Leona. Although, I have noted that there are a myriad of opinions on the matter. I myself loved this game from the day it started and everyone on our server which is Ferguson’s Crossing, totally enjoyed the process of making our server a community. When we started WVW we had so much fun using our wits, intelligence and skills to win one for the gipper. We even took pride in being one of the first servers to use the 50 man golem rush. We never had enough people to be at the top of the tiers but we were ok with the middle and sometimes below that. Then all of a sudden the slide started. Server populations changed, guilds wanted to move to a server that was in the upper tiers. Those of us in the middle found ourselves in the bottom tiers. So when the poll occurred, a lot of people voted to try it out as a possible solution. Another possible solution of merging the bottom tier servers never happened. We were so shocked after the change to see that our server name wasn’t even or ever shown as the host server. It was as if we were wiped from the face of the earth. I believe these new zergs or blobs are used for the player power and to control the players, mostly by the host server. It is very difficult for roamers as they have no defense against the zergs. There were a couple of pairings that were good and we started to make more friends and then the rotation changes and you find you are in a new match killing some of those new friends. I feel that those who downplay the problems are probably those that move from server to server trying to find the best way to get to the top or they have always been in the top tiers. Those that stayed with their servers will understand this post.

McKenna Berdrow GW2 forum post….

“The poll has ended! After removing all votes for “Don’t Count My Vote”, the final results are:

82.7% – Yes

17.3% – No

This mean that World Linking is now officially a Guild Wars 2 Feature. Thank you to everyone who voted!"

AnetChrisB post on Reddit…

“We’ve also had a substantial increase in global WvW participation since reward tracks, world linking, and the return of the Alpine borderlands.”

Move along people, the devs will work on name plates so you can show your server, but nothing prevents any of you from forming groups with players on your server… Stop complaining about things that are in your hands.

Jana.6831:

Chinchilla.1785:

If you are not going to create the chance yourself or put the effort in, then do the next best thing. Form a guild together, play together, and re-establish a new community that you can have an attachment.

Try to understand it: To us our server is our guild. No matter which guild comes or leaves. On Gunnars I was really allowed to run with any closed guild raid – because I was part of them although I haven’t been in their guilds. There are people who hold a server together and who are in big guilds, but mostly it is the solo players who do that. You think it’s all simply solved by pressing everything into one guild, but we’re friends with all guilds, no matter their style (PPT, havoc, GvG, roaming) – and that is the community of a server.
There are lots of people like me, Diku and Jayne and they are important to all servers.

ETA: Come to think of it: GH’s best commander was a “solo roamer” (with 60 people following him) for a very long time.

This.

Times 1,000.