Guild Wars 2

I have a friend trying to join my guild on SoS and for weeks the server has always been listed as full.

Can someone at Anet explain why the Sea of Sorrows server is full, if JQ and BG have about 3-4 times our population in WvW at any given time?

Do server population still take into account people doing PvE? Is it based on old lists of players no longer playing? I mean literally it seems we could all stop playing WvW and the server would still show up as full.

Server being full has nothing to do with WvW. It’s EVERYONE. It has more to do with allocating server resources than anything else.

l2 get your PvE population into WvW like Yaks Bend does and you’ll do just fine.

Hamster.4861:

Server being full has nothing to do with WvW. It’s EVERYONE. It has more to do with allocating server resources than anything else.

l2 get your PvE population into WvW like Yaks Bend does and you’ll do just fine.

Yeah but what’s the point of this with megaservers? Shouldn’t transferring be influenced by WvW population only?

That’s hard for SoS. They melt upon impact.

Hamster.4861:

Server being full has nothing to do with WvW. It’s EVERYONE. It has more to do with allocating server resources than anything else.

l2 get your PvE population into WvW like Yaks Bend does and you’ll do just fine.

Yeah but now with megaservers its difficult. I hope Anet changes the cities or atleast LA to be exempted from this megaserver thing and each server having its own instance.

It isn’t really a point of “getting your pvers in wvw more”. If people don’t want to play WvW then they don’t have to. This isn’t about “omg we are outnumbered all the time fix pls” either.

It is people taking up potential spaces on a servers capacity who never WvW. All those accounts who have either quit, or log in once a fortnight or once a month who still count towards server capacity.

Hamster.4861:

l2 get your PvE population into WvW like Yaks Bend does and you’ll do just fine.

SoS has like 400 times the WvW population of YB.

Buffy.9246:

That’s hard for SoS. They melt upon impact.

Blackgate has 5 times our numbers, we are outnumbered all day long, and we cannot even recruit people to fight back because our server is “full”. Get this: our maps are empty but the server is full. Why? This is beyond broken.

It’s easy to imagine that somewhere down the code Megaservers do not really exists, it’s all mixed servers and PvE population is still calculated on top of WvW server population. It’s a big mess that should be fixed immediately.

Anet has to reset WvW server population according to the actual number of playing WvW, not according to some abstract calculation of people who joined that server before megaservers were made and perhaps do not even play the game anymore.

To be fair, JQ has the same issue and TC had the same issue re: being outnumbered by BG.

Blackgate has massive numbers. We all know why.

There isn’t really a fix for it. aNet allowed the WvW stacking and it basically ruined the T1 bracket.

But, it’s no different than on any other Tier. It’s an inherent problem with WvW.

So just a theory here but I think they locked the higher tier servers because of the recent flood of new players to the game. Where all the people r coming from Idk but I can say the in my guild on sor i know of at least 13 people that stated the game in the last 2 months and have heard much of the same form other guilds. Perhaps Anet is hoping these new people will take up wvw and balance out things a bit

Valik Shin.9027:

So just a theory here but I think they locked the higher tier servers because of the recent flood of new players to the game. Where all the people r coming from Idk but I can say the in my guild on sor i know of at least 13 people that stated the game in the last 2 months and have heard much of the same form other guilds. Perhaps Anet is hoping these new people will take up wvw and balance out things a bit

If that is their hope, it’s a laughable one. WvW was always a very unstable type of system due to the numbers of outside influences that could ruin it – namely WvW population, another issue is timezones, etc.

There doesn’t really exist a fix for it – you can’t force people to WvW. The only solution would be to make WvW servers standalone so rather than getting the WvW population from among PvE’ers and the like, the people who sign up for WvW servers are WvW players.

This would allow aNet to balance along WvW server population.

It is surprising to see the very high list – dark haven, GOM, SOR, and to lesser extent YB -CD.

More surprising FA is high…..

Xillllix.3485:

Buffy.9246:

That’s hard for SoS. They melt upon impact.

Blackgate has 5 times our numbers, we are outnumbered all day long, and we cannot even recruit people to fight back because our server is “full”. Get this: our maps are empty but the server is full. Why? This is beyond broken.

It’s easy to imagine that somewhere down the code Megaservers do not really exists, it’s all mixed servers and PvE population is still calculated on top of WvW server population. It’s a big mess that should be fixed immediately.

Anet has to reset WvW server population according to the actual number of playing WvW, not according to some abstract calculation of people who joined that server before megaservers were made and perhaps do not even play the game anymore.

You guys do have the wvw force to compete in t1. Always 250k lead in t2. Just SoS is full of fairweathers. Watch next week where you won’t be outnumbered but outnumber mag and FA.

You need to have your friend try to transfer when SoS seems to have the least amount of people on.

Judging from my SoS experience this would be in the morning to early afternoon during the days.

Keep in mind server population is not done according to active WvW playerbase, but overall amount of users on a server.

FYI, the “Full” status has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with how many people are currently online, but rather with how many people have joined the server.

This means that someone who hasn’t logged on in over a year but who happens to have their characters on SoS is blocking your friend from joining your server.

The only way your friend will be able to join the server will be if someone who is currently on SoS decides to transfer off. Banned accounts may also free up space, though they are technically still on the server since the data is never deleted (since someone could contest the ban and get back into the game and server).

mtpelion.4562:

FYI, the “Full” status has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with how many people are currently online, but rather with how many people have joined the server.

This means that someone who hasn’t logged on in over a year but who happens to have their characters on SoS is blocking your friend from joining your server.

The only way your friend will be able to join the server will be if someone who is currently on SoS decides to transfer off. Banned accounts may also free up space, though they are technically still on the server since the data is never deleted (since someone could contest the ban and get back into the game and server).

Not the way that I’ve experienced it at all. Maybe someone can shed some light on this, but I have transferred to a full server by using the servers downtime.

Also many servers in wvw have used the “black-out” option which is a mass log-out that reduces the world population and allows guilds to transfer to the server. Unless that has changed recently, it’s still the way server population is calculated.

Altie.4571:

mtpelion.4562:

FYI, the “Full” status has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with how many people are currently online, but rather with how many people have joined the server.

This means that someone who hasn’t logged on in over a year but who happens to have their characters on SoS is blocking your friend from joining your server.

The only way your friend will be able to join the server will be if someone who is currently on SoS decides to transfer off. Banned accounts may also free up space, though they are technically still on the server since the data is never deleted (since someone could contest the ban and get back into the game and server).

Not the way that I’ve experienced it at all. Maybe someone can shed some light on this, but I have transferred to a full server by using the servers downtime.

Also many servers in wvw have used the “black-out” option which is a mass log-out that reduces the world population and allows guilds to transfer to the server. Unless that has changed recently, it’s still the way server population is calculated.

If you have access to test this, try guesting to a “full” server right now.

You’ll join the server with no problems whatsoever because the population ratings have nothing to do with active players but rather with the total number of accounts on a given server.

I’m going to spend a little time to see if I can find a Red post on this (search doesn’t work well which makes it take more time than it should so I’ll probably give up after several pages).

Buffy.9246:

Xillllix.3485:

Buffy.9246:

That’s hard for SoS. They melt upon impact.

Blackgate has 5 times our numbers, we are outnumbered all day long, and we cannot even recruit people to fight back because our server is “full”. Get this: our maps are empty but the server is full. Why? This is beyond broken.

It’s easy to imagine that somewhere down the code Megaservers do not really exists, it’s all mixed servers and PvE population is still calculated on top of WvW server population. It’s a big mess that should be fixed immediately.

Anet has to reset WvW server population according to the actual number of playing WvW, not according to some abstract calculation of people who joined that server before megaservers were made and perhaps do not even play the game anymore.

You guys do have the wvw force to compete in t1. Always 250k lead in t2. Just SoS is full of fairweathers. Watch next week where you won’t be outnumbered but outnumber mag and FA.

SoS doesn’t have anywhere near the people to become remotely competitive in T1. Have you even taken 1 look at the score? The only reason they have been winning by 250k in T2 is because of the collapse of Mag. Even TC’s SEA easily outnumbers that of SoS, and they are supposed to be “weak” during that time. Just like every other server, SoS has had a very noticeable increase in the weekly matchup. Sure, being up against SoS sucks a bit. It is nothing in comparison to what it is like being up against TC. Just because SoS is dwarfed by T1, that doesn’t mean they are fairwhether. Not that you would know how to even use that word properly seeing how often you love to throw it around like it is your own personal catch phrase.

You seem to love to spew kitten at every opportunity you can, my guess is that you are from Mag and you are still bitter about your own server’s failings. nothing says “fairwhether” like a server implosion. Go sit in the corner with Bucket Lips so you can cry about big meanie SoS and kitten all night.

mtpelion.4562:

Altie.4571:

mtpelion.4562:

FYI, the “Full” status has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with how many people are currently online, but rather with how many people have joined the server.

This means that someone who hasn’t logged on in over a year but who happens to have their characters on SoS is blocking your friend from joining your server.

The only way your friend will be able to join the server will be if someone who is currently on SoS decides to transfer off. Banned accounts may also free up space, though they are technically still on the server since the data is never deleted (since someone could contest the ban and get back into the game and server).

Not the way that I’ve experienced it at all. Maybe someone can shed some light on this, but I have transferred to a full server by using the servers downtime.

Also many servers in wvw have used the “black-out” option which is a mass log-out that reduces the world population and allows guilds to transfer to the server. Unless that has changed recently, it’s still the way server population is calculated.

If you have access to test this, try guesting to a “full” server right now.

You’ll join the server with no problems whatsoever because the population ratings have nothing to do with active players but rather with the total number of accounts on a given server.

I’m going to spend a little time to see if I can find a Red post on this (search doesn’t work well which makes it take more time than it should so I’ll probably give up after several pages).

Guesting and transferring are not the same thing though…..

Liston.9708

Guesting and transferring are not the same thing though…..

In terms of current active population, they are exactly the same thing.

mtpelion.4562:

Liston.9708

Guesting and transferring are not the same thing though…..

In terms of current active population, they are exactly the same thing.

But above you said it is not based on active population (which I don’t think is right). Guess I i don’t understand what you are really trying to do…

In the past, people could transfer to “full” servers at certain times of the day because the status would drop to “very high” for brief slices of time. Prior to season 2 this happened at or near NA prime leading to the “server black out” discussions to squeeze guilds in. This leads me to believe it is related to active/on-line pop, but I can’t say I know that for sure – maybe it is some calculation of active-online and total pop……

Unless changed I am certain that server population is based upon current active accounts online. Server black-outs are/have been a confirmation of this system.

Guesting works entirely differently because it takes other metrics into the equation, such as friends/guildmates etc on other servers.

Liston.9708:

But above you said it is not based on active population (which I don’t think is right). Guess I i don’t understand what you are really trying to do…

In the past, people could transfer to “full” servers at certain times of the day because the status would drop to “very high” for brief slices of time. Prior to season 2 this happened at or near NA prime leading to the “server black out” discussions to squeeze guilds in. This leads me to believe it is related to active/on-line pop, but I can’t say I know that for sure – maybe it is some calculation of active-online and total pop……

If “Full” is a count of current logged in players/characters for the server, then you would be unable to guest to the server because the number of active “slots” remaining would be 0. For example, if a server allows 100 people to be online at once and 100 people were online, anyone attempting to guest would be rejected because that would mean 101 would were online on that server.

If “Full” is a count of “Home Accounts” (accounts that call a server their home), then “Full” doesn’t consider how many people are online at any given time. This means that a “Full” server would prevent new Home Accounts from being created there, but would still allow people to guest there and play (since guesting increases the number of ACTIVE users, not the number of Home Accounts).

Since you are able to guest to a “Full” server and play there, “Full” clearly doesn’t mean “maximum number of current log ins” but rather “maximum number of Home Accounts”.

As an anecdote supporting this, Devona’s Rest, up until December 2013, was one of the lowest population servers. Our best attempt at the Marionette included 20 people, some of them guests. Our Queensdale Champ train never had more than 15 people. Lion’s Arch was a ghost town with maybe 25 people. We NEVER had a SINGLE overflow instance. Ever. We were still listed as a “Very High” population server though because we were a popular server when the game launched and had a very high number of accounts who NEVER logged on.

Wait until the post season lull. Seems every tournament has a big drop in population as soon as it is over. This one may not follow suit thanks to the new way they are distributing tickets but I suspect there will still be at least a small drop in activity.

Here’s some red:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Server-Populations/first#post703192
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/account/Choosing-initial-home-world/first#post4335953
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/account/Server-Transfer-Concerns-merged/first#post1257830

aquabat.2986:

Buffy.9246:

Xillllix.3485:

Buffy.9246:

That’s hard for SoS. They melt upon impact.

Blackgate has 5 times our numbers, we are outnumbered all day long, and we cannot even recruit people to fight back because our server is “full”. Get this: our maps are empty but the server is full. Why? This is beyond broken.

It’s easy to imagine that somewhere down the code Megaservers do not really exists, it’s all mixed servers and PvE population is still calculated on top of WvW server population. It’s a big mess that should be fixed immediately.

Anet has to reset WvW server population according to the actual number of playing WvW, not according to some abstract calculation of people who joined that server before megaservers were made and perhaps do not even play the game anymore.

You guys do have the wvw force to compete in t1. Always 250k lead in t2. Just SoS is full of fairweathers. Watch next week where you won’t be outnumbered but outnumber mag and FA.

SoS doesn’t have anywhere near the people to become remotely competitive in T1. Have you even taken 1 look at the score? The only reason they have been winning by 250k in T2 is because of the collapse of Mag. Even TC’s SEA easily outnumbers that of SoS, and they are supposed to be “weak” during that time. Just like every other server, SoS has had a very noticeable increase in the weekly matchup. Sure, being up against SoS sucks a bit. It is nothing in comparison to what it is like being up against TC. Just because SoS is dwarfed by T1, that doesn’t mean they are fairwhether. Not that you would know how to even use that word properly seeing how often you love to throw it around like it is your own personal catch phrase.

You seem to love to spew kitten at every opportunity you can, my guess is that you are from Mag and you are still bitter about your own server’s failings. nothing says “fairwhether” like a server implosion. Go sit in the corner with Bucket Lips so you can cry about big meanie SoS and kitten all night.

1) I’m not on mag.
2) I know sos are fairweathers. All FA know this.
3) take out some SoS wps and they stay in the keeps all day which stops the k-trains

Honestly, the server population status should be changed to reflect only the population that logs into WvW.

Servers don’t matter a single bit in PvE now. There is literally no reason why the PvE population should be counted toward that status when the megaserver has combined every server’s PvE population together.

It really does irritate me that they haven’t changed this. The only reason you’d transfer servers now is for WvW, since guild stuff has been fixed to be global instead of server-specific. Why have the PvE population count for a WvW player who’s transferring? Does not compute.

FYI: “Guesting” doesn’t actually do anything now. When megaserver was first implemented, it did still put you on the server you selected. Now, it just drops you in the same place it would if you hadn’t tried to guest at all. It’s actually quite frustrating and makes me wish for the GW1 district selection mechanism.

storiessave.3807:

Servers don’t matter a single bit in PvE now. There is literally no reason why the PvE population should be counted toward that status when the megaserver has combined every server’s PvE population together.

It really does irritate me that they haven’t changed this. The only reason you’d transfer servers now is for WvW, since guild stuff has been fixed to be global instead of server-specific. Why have the PvE population count for a WvW player who’s transferring? Does not compute.

This is exactly the issue I wanted to bring forward with this thread. Why is an almost empty WvW server (at certain times of the day) labelled as “full” when it is getting wrecked by another “full” server that has 5 times our WvW population? It all seems so wrong.

And 1 year ago they said their would consider a transfer queue. What has been done? Nothing. Some people have been waiting for 2 weeks now to transfer to join our guild. How long will they have to wait? 3 months? 1 year?

Wait…I thought the game was dead, WvW was almost a barren desert and no one played this game anymore?

I am not sure how the server population is determined, as you can still get on a full server at non peak times. But just because its full doesn’t mean that the WvW population is going to be a healthy one. Maybe people just don’t like to WvW there…who knows.

Buffy.9246:

1) I’m not on mag.
2) I know sos are fairweathers. All FA know this.
3) take out some SoS wps and they stay in the keeps all day which stops the k-trains

Yeah, I’m on FA as well, begrudgingly. You don’t speak for me and the general sentiment from asking different maps at different times of days this week says you don’t for for FA either. I also know for a fact, despite having having more then 2 WPs ever (and actually getting a third this evening), SoS have been out in full force all week, as well as taking out BG waypoints multiple times. Would you look at that, they are even leading ppt as I type this. That isn’t being fairwhether.

Curiously though, is how all the noise made from SoS being “over stacked”, “T1 stacked” and how much better it would be with TC in their stead turned out. Besides FA fielding more people daily across NA against SoS, they struggle to match TC in ppt for 2 hours a day. How close to T1 is SoS again? After all that is said and done, I guess that is why most the maps this week have been almost entirely barren. Fairwhether much? Not that this has anything to do with how a server population status is calculated, go cry in the corner.

The population levels should be measured dynamically. It is obvious that there is a huge amount of accounts that are counted toward the population count of a server when none of them even enter WvW. The megaserver system removed the restrictions of being on X server, yet it all still affects the WvW side of things. As far as I know, an account still has to be tethered to a “home” server. It would also be unfair to move people without telling them, so maybe there can be something in place to give people who don’t WvW an option to move off full servers. It is a lot easier for most people to get full WvW map complete as well, so that would be a plus. Population restrictions that only affect WvW should only be measured by the active WvW player base.

pdavis.8031:

Maybe people just don’t like to WvW there…who knows.

To WvW where? The game supposedly has something called “Megaserver” technology for PvE.

Server populations should concern WvW only.

Xillllix.3485:

Hamster.4861:

Server being full has nothing to do with WvW. It’s EVERYONE. It has more to do with allocating server resources than anything else.

l2 get your PvE population into WvW like Yaks Bend does and you’ll do just fine.

Yeah but what’s the point of this with megaservers? Shouldn’t transferring be influenced by WvW population only?

^^ THis.

One way to get populations uncapped might be to shuffle non-WvW players around a bit.

aquabat.2986:

Buffy.9246:

Xillllix.3485:

Buffy.9246:

That’s hard for SoS. They melt upon impact.

Blackgate has 5 times our numbers, we are outnumbered all day long, and we cannot even recruit people to fight back because our server is “full”. Get this: our maps are empty but the server is full. Why? This is beyond broken.

It’s easy to imagine that somewhere down the code Megaservers do not really exists, it’s all mixed servers and PvE population is still calculated on top of WvW server population. It’s a big mess that should be fixed immediately.

Anet has to reset WvW server population according to the actual number of playing WvW, not according to some abstract calculation of people who joined that server before megaservers were made and perhaps do not even play the game anymore.

You guys do have the wvw force to compete in t1. Always 250k lead in t2. Just SoS is full of fairweathers. Watch next week where you won’t be outnumbered but outnumber mag and FA.

SoS doesn’t have anywhere near the people to become remotely competitive in T1. Have you even taken 1 look at the score? The only reason they have been winning by 250k in T2 is because of the collapse of Mag. Even TC’s SEA easily outnumbers that of SoS, and they are supposed to be “weak” during that time. Just like every other server, SoS has had a very noticeable increase in the weekly matchup. Sure, being up against SoS sucks a bit. It is nothing in comparison to what it is like being up against TC. Just because SoS is dwarfed by T1, that doesn’t mean they are fairwhether. Not that you would know how to even use that word properly seeing how often you love to throw it around like it is your own personal catch phrase.

You seem to love to spew kitten at every opportunity you can, my guess is that you are from Mag and you are still bitter about your own server’s failings. nothing says “fairwhether” like a server implosion. Go sit in the corner with Bucket Lips so you can cry about big meanie SoS and kitten all night.

In general SoS WvW players quality is definitely lacking, on pushes they’re more expected to flee should a similar force comes their way. This might be due to the abundance of rangers who like to stay out of harms way and always have the I’m ready to pull out and bail on the rest of their teammates mind set. Same goes with JQ, lesser on TC. Like what my friend on JQ told me, if they’re not winning they give up.

Svarty.8019:

Xillllix.3485:

Hamster.4861:

Server being full has nothing to do with WvW. It’s EVERYONE. It has more to do with allocating server resources than anything else.

l2 get your PvE population into WvW like Yaks Bend does and you’ll do just fine.

Yeah but what’s the point of this with megaservers? Shouldn’t transferring be influenced by WvW population only?

^^ THis.

One way to get populations uncapped might be to shuffle non-WvW players around a bit.

We’ve got another thread on this kind of stuff already going: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/wuv/wuv/Solution-to-fix-the-population-imbalance/page/18#post4449437

There’s a Dev involved in the conversation, so feel free to hop in and voice your opinion. Most people seem to agree that we need some way to seperate population limits based on WvW population rather than PvE population, and there are 3 or 4 ideas in that thread about how to do that already.

Fluffball.8307:

Hamster.4861:

l2 get your PvE population into WvW like Yaks Bend does and you’ll do just fine.

SoS has like 400 times the WvW population of YB.

As someone who spent months on SOS and a week on YB, this is ONLY true in OCX. SOS is a ghost town in NA, I have no idea how they held on to things in NA prime. No one ever tagged and when they did they were mostly afraid to fight and would just build acs until the other server got bored of trying to siege a t3 tower/keep. From what I’ve seen T3 has a much stronger NA population than T2, glicko and SOS ocx is the only thing keeping that matchup the same once tournament ends.

SoS sit in t3 keeps/sm all day on seige. That’s how they r t2.

sucks to be the fairweather pve server

Xillllix.3485:

pdavis.8031:

Maybe people just don’t like to WvW there…who knows.

To WvW where? The game supposedly has something called “Megaserver” technology for PvE.

Server populations should concern WvW only.

The should, but apparently they don’t. What I was saying though is say Stormbluff Isle (just for sake of illustration) is shown as a full server, but in terms of WvW population they are sevearly lacking, and have a difficult time fielding 50 players at any given time. This doesn’t stop the server from being full, as there are enough players who selected SBI as a home server. Thus their player information is stored on that server, which counts toward the server population. Megaserver only really effects where one plays in PvE.

But I don’t see how to determine which players play enough WvW to have it count toward server population. Sometimes PvEers jump into WvW, maybe to check it out, or for map completion, or easy travel/crafting/etc. Do you need to spend x amount of hours within WvW to be eligable to count toward population? Also if you are not counted toward server population, where is your characters information stored? From what I understand, server population is another way of saying server HDD space. So when a server is listed as “full” That means the server has run out, or close to running out, of HDD space reserved just for character information. But then again I could be wrong about all of this so…..

Thank you for fixing it, my friend was able to join my server.