Guild Wars 2

Im sure this is a problem is every server. People claiming camps/towers/keeps/sm with no buffs or intentions of ever activating any. Too many times has this happened that a guild without even a guild emblem claims an important structure.

Why not require some sort of guild upgrades to be able to claim or allow another guild to remove a claim if a place has been claimed unbuffed for X amount of minutes???

Agreed. Solution, a guild must have at least one buff to claim a structure. All claimed structures are unclaimed when the guild buffs expire for the guild.

I find that guild emblems are useless in wvw in that no one that outside of the guild has no clue who claimed the building flags are not click able to show the guild name or abbreviation. As there no way to see the logo Unless you hit G and see the logo on the guild menu no one outside the guild has no clue who owns it. I have took a screenshot in game and sent it in as a bug report a bit back. But also people that get in golems that duno how to use them could be added to your list need like Golem Drivers license wvw skill or something to get into one.

True Rei Hino, but if you use that millenium site that shows camp times and all that you can see which guild has it claimed. I use that to find out which jerks are currently hurting our server. But yes, often times no one has a clue to which guild has whatever claimed so whats the purpose of putting your emblem up if it doesn’t spread any form of knowledge or popularity of your guild.

I dont know if this is the proper section to be asking for a solution but im tired of the crap guild claims ruining WvW. There are very simple solutions to the problem, id expect them to be implemented. Those were just two very quick ideas off the top of my head and im pretty sure the one about no buffs for whatever amount of time one would work.

I always have my buffs ready to go but never a chance to use them cause every place gets claimed and has no buffs. Im stuck claiming camps for +5 and thats about it. I will push on this issue all over the forums till there is a solution.

This is not a new issue, but seems that it’s not something they can spend time on…
Not sure if the developers have anything to do with this, but whoever owns this bussiness and makes decisions, let down many WvW players: no answers, no solutions, nothing changed since beta in a huge number of areas that were continuously asked for.
I enjoyed many good hours in WvW, and will remember those.

Quote of my very old view on this:
“This claiming it’s a very ugly part of GW2, bad design and continually ignored. Those who play WvW and care about their team, knows it, but are powerless and only Anet can solve it.

A previous post about this problem, buried here:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/wuv/wuv/Claiming-Towers-to-avoid-buffs-griefing

and my very old warning relating to this, moved to “suggestions” and forgot there:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/suggestions/Claiming-objectives-promotes-hatred"

also:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/wuv/wuv/Garrison-hijacked-by-troll-guild
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/wuv/wuv/Claiming-keep-buffs-can-we-improve-it

Seems WvW for guilds is pretty pointless, as there are no rewards/pride for taking a tower or keep.

I don’t mind if they don’t have a buffs on towers if they are taking the time to upgrade and siege it properly and are going to camp it. They only things the should really have buffs are keeps.

I think it would help a lot if guildies generated more influence for their guild if they upgrade and defend the tower/keep. T2 tower or keep would generate 15% buff, and fully upgraded T3 could go as high a 50%

thanks for the post, yea its nothing new and ive been bothered by it for many months but ive finally have had enough, its ridiculous. those threads have come and gone, i will not let this one die, and if for some reason i am no longer able to post in it i will make another UNTIL something is done about it. there are REAL problems in WvW and instead they take time to do what? make buffed claimers burn blue? wtf is this? dragon ball z? guilds with active buffs should be able to claim over unbuffed one, period

Yeah WvW is a 24/7 match, but guilds which claims towers are not.

I think the best way to fix these buff issues is that if a guild comes along which has more buffs than the currently claimed guild, they can claim the tower from that guild. It shouldnt be who claimed it first, its should be about what is best for your server.

XacTactX.6709:

Agreed. Solution, a guild must have at least one buff to claim a structure. All claimed structures are unclaimed when the guild buffs expire for the guild.

This is all we need, although I’ll add it should apply to camps as well.

Another crappy design problem is the inability to immediately claim a camp if there is a person who is in a larger guild nearby. If my guild has the +5 buff, I should be able to claim a camp.

Straegen.2938:

Another crappy design problem is the inability to immediately claim a camp if there is a person who is in a larger guild nearby. If my guild has the +5 buff, I should be able to claim a camp.

I’ve seen it said a few times in chat that a camp has +5 supply. How do you know if a camp has that buff in effect? Is it just because you get 15 instead of 10 when you pick up supply there? Also, any time I’ve seen this said, it doesn’t seem to work if I already have 10 supply when I go to try and pick up more.

Seeing this more and more now. Just make it so each claim has to have a min of 3-4 buffs (for keeps & garries) and that the claim will expire after the buffs go down.

Would that be so hard to implement?

Heezdedjim.8902:

Straegen.2938:

Another crappy design problem is the inability to immediately claim a camp if there is a person who is in a larger guild nearby. If my guild has the +5 buff, I should be able to claim a camp.

I’ve seen it said a few times in chat that a camp has +5 supply. How do you know if a camp has that buff in effect? Is it just because you get 15 instead of 10 when you pick up supply there? Also, any time I’ve seen this said, it doesn’t seem to work if I already have 10 supply when I go to try and pick up more.

The bug was fixed so now if you have 10 supply you’ll properly take up 15 (you used to have to spend 1 supply and re-pick it up). As for seeing if it has the buff, you’ll see a buff on your bar that is something like Guild Fortification (it looks like a white gear emblem).

I think the reason they made it so large guilds get “priority” if they’re around is to prevent someone following a large guild and claiming everything they encounter with a dummy guild. However, I do agree that I think they should make it so that guilds without buffs shouldn’t be able to claim. Also, it’d be cool if after the buffs ran out, it sent a notification or something to that guild’s officers (or anyone in that guild who has access to claim) saying that they’re no longer buffing their fortification. That, or give commanders the ability to talk to an NPC to request (like once per hour) that the objective get unclaimed.

Julie Yann.5379:

I don’t mind if they don’t have a buffs on towers if they are taking the time to upgrade and siege it properly and are going to camp it. They only things the should really have buffs are keeps.

I agree with this. I don’t mind guild claiming without a buff on a tower if the claimed upgrades and camps it for a while. What bugs me are people who claim and leave with no buffs. Camps, on the other hand, shouldn’t be claimed without a supply buff.

VaticanIscariot.1732:

Seems WvW for guilds is pretty pointless, as there are no rewards/pride for taking a tower or keep.

Exactly. There are so many games that had a system rewarding a guild for keeping and defending a fortification. They got chances at creating interior, becoming castle lord, giving bonuses to their guild etc.

GW2 has none of that. Conclusion? GW2 is not a guild game but a rip-off from GW1.

Straegen.2938:

Another crappy design problem is the inability to immediately claim a camp if there is a person who is in a larger guild nearby. If my guild has the +5 buff, I should be able to claim a camp.

wait, is that an actual thing? you are unable to claim a camp if someone in a bigger guild is nearby? i have tried to figure why i could and why i couldnt immediately claim a camp or tower before. i noticed the other day as i kept spamming the lord JUST after taking a keep i never got the “claim option” to pop up but this one guild was able to do so keep after keep

it’s my understanding that, for the first 3-5 minutes after capture (I don’t remember which, but I think it’s either 3 minutes or 5 minutes), an objective can only be claimed by the guild that had most of the players present for the capture. after that period, if the objective remains unclaimed anybody can claim it.

I don’t know the precise rules of how this works. if a zerg rolls through where 30 are from one guild, and 10 are from a mix of other guilds, the guild with 30 should be able to claim it right away (a clear majority). but if there are 20 from one guild, and 10 each from 3 other guilds (i.e. a plurality but not a majority) I have no idea what happens.

-ken

Snowreap.5174:

it’s my understanding that, for the first 3-5 minutes after capture (I don’t remember which, but I think it’s either 3 minutes or 5 minutes), an objective can only be claimed by the guild that had most of the players present for the capture. after that period, if the objective remains unclaimed anybody can claim it.

I don’t know the precise rules of how this works. if a zerg rolls through where 30 are from one guild, and 10 are from a mix of other guilds, the guild with 30 should be able to claim it right away (a clear majority). but if there are 20 from one guild, and 10 each from 3 other guilds (i.e. a plurality but not a majority) I have no idea what happens.

-ken

All I know if me and 1 other guy take a camp, I can’t claim =(

hmmmm, well ill have to do some research and find a thread with an official answer. ive always figured if i cant claim immediatly ill have to wait for the 2 minute mark (3 minutes after cap) before i can claim it. but if this is due to other people being present while camp is capped thats just dumb. I have a commander tag and im always running +5 when I play (swap them between two guilds) but I dont have many in my guild so its usually just me near the cap.

MasterJunior.7150:

wait, is that an actual thing? you are unable to claim a camp if someone in a bigger guild is nearby? i have tried to figure why i could and why i couldnt immediately claim a camp or tower before. i noticed the other day as i kept spamming the lord JUST after taking a keep i never got the “claim option” to pop up but this one guild was able to do so keep after keep

Based on my experience and a Reddit post with others trying to figure out why we cannot claim after taking a camp, this seems to be the consensus. It is not uncommon for our skirmish group to take a camp with one or two stragglers from a larger guild and not get the option to buff.

For both keeps and camps, anyone with a buff should be able to claim. Anyone with more buffs should be able to override.

Make it so the guild has to come “refresh” the claim like siege every 1-2hours. The buffs are part of the claims, but if a guild is putting in time and effort upgrading it and dropping siege they should be able to claim it too.

shiri.4257:

Make it so the guild has to come “refresh” the claim like siege every 1-2hours. The buffs are part of the claims, but if a guild is putting in time and effort upgrading it and dropping siege they should be able to claim it too.

I think this is a good alternative. There may be a guild that has no buff to apply to a fortification, yet is spending considerable time, effort, and coin defending a tower or keep, upgrading it, and building siege. In such a situation, I feel the guild has every right to claim that tower or keep; even in the absence of a buff.

That said, I do understand and appreciate the arguments in favor of guilds using buffs when claiming. Rather than penalize a guild or create a hostile environment, let’s instead look for ways to incentivize activating buffs to make it in the claiming guild’s own interest to do so.

Here are the changes I’d like to see implemented:

1) If a guild claims an objective but applies no buffs, no member of the guild orders an upgrade, and no member of the guild places siege which is built to completion, then the guild’s claim to that objective will expire after 1 hour.

2) The guild’s claim can be refreshed if a guild member – with the appropriate permission to claim objectives – speaks to the supervisor (camps) or lord (towers and keeps). This will reset the claim timer to 1 hour, similar to siege weapons.

3) If the claim timer expires, then the guild which had first claimed the objective will not be permitted to re-claim the same objective for 15 minutes. This allows another guild to claim the objective, should they wish.

4) For each successfully built upgrade ordered by a member of the claiming guild and
and for each fully built siege weapon placed by a member of the claiming guild, the guild will earn guild influence. There may be some scaling involved here, as well. For example, ordering a “Fortify” upgrade will earn more influence than ordering “Reinforced Walls”.

Tying the guild influence earned to successful construction rather than simply placing an upgrade order or throwing down blueprints which are never built prevents abuse of this feature by players simply looking to earn the influence without actually defending the objective.

5) For each guild buff activated while the guild has claimed an objective, the claiming guild will earn 1 guild merit. This will be limited to 1 merit per buff per week.

In other words, activating “Fort +5 Supply” while having claimed an objective will earn the claiming guild 1 merit. If the guild then queues “Fort +5 Supply” in the upgrades panel, completes the construction of this upgrade before the end of the current week’s WvWvW match, then activates the “Fort +5 Supply” buff a second time in the week, they do not earn another guild merit for this same buff.

6) A guild which has claimed an objective and activated buff(s) will earn guild influence over time while their claim and the buff remain active. The influence gained will be cumulative.

For example, activating a single buff while claiming an objective may earn 10 influence per tick (15 minutes). Activating two buffs would earn 20 influence per tick, etc. A claimed objective with no buffs active will not earn any influence over time (though influence will still be earned on a per event basis whenever a guild member orders an upgrade or places a siege weapon which is built to completion as per #4 above).

7) Guild names and tags will display when mousing over the banners of a claimed objective. I’m a bit ambivalent about this one. On the one hand, it could be a useful addition which enhances communication and coordination among guilds if we all know who has claimed what. On the other hand, it could be easily abused as players use this information to harass the guild which has claimed the objective.

I’ve seen this happen even when there have been buffs present. One guild wants the bragging rights that come with claiming a particular keep, for instance. They don’t like the fact that another guild claimed it before they did. They then harass the other guild in a bid to get control of the keep for themselves. Allowing everyone to see which guild controls which objective would only exacerbate this problem. So there are pros and cons to this suggestion.

Love the ideas but please realize that it would be very hard for Anet to justify adding more processor allocation for something like this. You are talking about many variables that would have to be added to the system, then multiply that by all the different structures on each map that can be claimed, then multiply that by how many matchups are occurring.

I think it is much more likely that they would look favorably upon just letting it expire like siege if it is not refreshed. Or maybe make it another gold sink, 5g to take over a claim as long as no buffs are running….

I don’t agree that it would be that much additional processing. Much of what I suggested already exists in the game in other forms. A claim timer is just a siege timer applied to a camp, tower, or keep. There’s thousands (tens of thousands?) of siege timers already in-game; a couple hundred more in the form of claim timers won’t break the bank (and they’re only running if an objective is claimed).

Guild merits for activating a buff; no different than earning guild merit(s) for completing a guild mission. As my suggestion for the guild merit reward comes from a one-time event – activating a buff – there’s no need to track it over time. Activate a buff, get a merit; processing complete. It probably amounts to adding one function call to the function that already exists for handling the “Activate” button in the guild interface. If they’ve coded reusable functions (as they should if they’re good programmers), then they can simply call the one that rewards a merit for completing a guild mission to reward a merit for activating a buff.

Same with the influence reward that comes from completing an upgrade or building a siege weapon; they’re one time occurrences. Upgrade gets built, simple bit of code runs to check if that upgrade was ordered by a claiming guild member, influence rewarded, processing complete. Functions already exist for calculating guild influence rewards based on one time events (guild member logs in, for example). Just reuse the same function to calculate a set amount of influence earned from building upgrades or siege weapons.

Where it might be argued that the processing starts to get a bit taxing is the tracking of earned influence over time when a guild claims an objective and has an active buff. However, the code for this already exists in the Point Per Tick calculations. A timer counts down and, when it reaches zero, it tallies up some numbers and adds them to a running total. Functionally, this could be applied to earned influence per tick just as easily as Points Per Tick.

It may be the case that we’re approaching a problem from two different directions or it’s two distinct problems looking for a common solution. On the one hand, I hear players complaining that guilds are claiming objectives, not applying buffs, then failing to relinquish their claims. This sounds like a problem of more guilds than there are objectives to go around. On the server on which I play, it’s the opposite; I only wish we could get more guilds to claim objectives let alone activate buffs.

The suggestion I made seeks to address both issues. It gives guilds which are claiming objectives an incentive to activate their buffs because they will be rewarded for doing so. In the case of a server where there’s little claiming going on to begin with, this may encourage guilds to start claiming and applying buffs if they see there’s something in it for them (influence and merits). Lastly, it has a mechanic in place for removing expired claims; but in a fairly benign fashion which avoids friction between guilds.

I understand and agree that what you are proposing will help with more responsible claiming.

However, even if the code is still there you are still talking about thousands upon thousands of executions of that code and then storage of the resulting data. The timer on siege is very simple, very static. They even keep track of who threw the siege so they can re-claim it from someone so that code can be applied structure claiming.. But the code already being there has nothing to do with the amount of transactions that would be increased.

You changed some of what you said about the influence in your second post. I agree that if it is a one time influence posted to that guild then the processing is minimal (but still additional to the current state). In your first post you talked about the influence (#6) gaining per additional structure and over ticks. The tracking of something like that per structure will add more system stress. I work on servers for a living and while it may seem like not much more code and a couple transactions, when implemented in such a large scale it can really back those queues up.

I am not saying it wouldn’t be worth it, at least to me. I think all your suggestions are great. All I am saying is if you really want Anet to implement, keep it to something less dynamic (cumulative) and more static (one-time transactions). Your second post was much more accurate as far as keeping the transactions down to a minimum.

Simplify it, no if this or that. 1 or 2hour “guild claim refresh” like siege, put a timer on it. First one there or however the system has it now gets first dibs. After 2 hours it becomes unclaimed or the timer just sits at 0 until another person does.

Cantur Soulfyre.5409:

You changed some of what you said about the influence in your second post. I agree that if it is a one time influence posted to that guild then the processing is minimal (but still additional to the current state). In your first post you talked about the influence (#6) gaining per additional structure and over ticks. The tracking of something like that per structure will add more system stress. I work on servers for a living and while it may seem like not much more code and a couple transactions, when implemented in such a large scale it can really back those queues up..

In the first post, I proposed both actually. Point #4 spoke to one-time influence rewards; either when an upgrade ordered by a claiming guild member is completed or when a siege blueprint thrown down by a claiming guild member is built to completion. Point #6 then went on to add influence-earned-over-time rewards while an objective is claimed and a buff is active.

There are 61 claimable objectives between all three borderlands plus Eternal Battlegrounds. Three each of the twenty-seven EU servers are placed into a match for a total of nine matches running per week. Assuming every single objective was claimed by a guild and every guild simultaneously activated their buffs (a situation I’ve never seen happen, but let’s assume the worst case scenario), this would result in 9 × 61 = 549 additional transactions/processes to keep track of if implementing an influence-earned-over-time reward.

What’s more is these influence-earned-over-time rewards aren’t really being tracked over time. That’s just the perception from a human standpoint. Programmatically, they’re still one-time events. Timer ticks down and reaches its zero point. This triggers a function call. Function checks if (a) an objective is claimed by a guild and (b) does that guild have a buff or buffs active. If both those conditions are true, then the function adds some influence to the guild’s existing pool based on the number of buffs active.

Timer is now reset and – 15 minutes later – the process repeats; but there’s no calculations or tracking happening second by second. It’s only the humans watching the clock who are telling themselves, “If we can just hold this tower for another 6 minutes and 32 seconds when the timer reaches zero again, we’ll get another reward of influence.” The code itself makes no such assumptions; it’s a discreet event which occurs once every 15 minutes just like the PPT calculations.

But, sure, if limiting the rewards to one-time events will strike a balance between incentivizing guild claiming while not placing too great a strain on the servers, then that’s a fair compromise. I just don’t see it as being that great a load on the servers to add an influence-earned-over-time reward when we consider how much processing is already going on in a typical WvWvW match.

Kraag Deadsoul.2789:

In the first post, I proposed both actually. Point #4 spoke to one-time influence rewards; either when an upgrade ordered by a claiming guild member is completed or when a siege blueprint thrown down by a claiming guild member is built to completion. Point #6 then went on to add influence-earned-over-time rewards while an objective is claimed and a buff is active.

There are 61 claimable objectives between all three borderlands plus Eternal Battlegrounds. Three each of the twenty-seven EU servers are placed into a match for a total of nine matches running per week. Assuming every single objective was claimed by a guild and every guild simultaneously activated their buffs (a situation I’ve never seen happen, but let’s assume the worst case scenario), this would result in 9 × 61 = 549 additional transactions/processes to keep track of if implementing an influence-earned-over-time reward.

What’s more is these influence-earned-over-time rewards aren’t really being tracked over time. That’s just the perception from a human standpoint. Programmatically, they’re still one-time events. Timer ticks down and reaches its zero point. This triggers a function call. Function checks if (a) an objective is claimed by a guild and (b) does that guild have a buff or buffs active. If both those conditions are true, then the function adds some influence to the guild’s existing pool based on the number of buffs active.

Timer is now reset and – 15 minutes later – the process repeats; but there’s no calculations or tracking happening second by second. It’s only the humans watching the clock who are telling themselves, “If we can just hold this tower for another 6 minutes and 32 seconds when the timer reaches zero again, we’ll get another reward of influence.” The code itself makes no such assumptions; it’s a discreet event which occurs once every 15 minutes just like the PPT calculations.

But, sure, if limiting the rewards to one-time events will strike a balance between incentivizing guild claiming while not placing too great a strain on the servers, then that’s a fair compromise. I just don’t see it as being that great a load on the servers to add an influence-earned-over-time reward when we consider how much processing is already going on in a typical WvWvW match.

Like I said, I get what you are saying. But you sounds like my boss who has no idea about how these things actually work. “We have a nice server we just paid a lot of money for, surely we can add a program to it.” Of course we can, but then you start dragging the server down from it’s original purpose.

If you pay attention to load times and skill lag during peak WvW times you know that the servers are already overloaded with transactions and that a queue of transactions build up, hence the skill lag and game lag. This is the queue bottleneck slowing transactions down. Just from that we can safely deduce that their server hardware is already overloaded during those times. Add more to that without addressing the queues AND the hardware and you are in for a big letdown. (Queues on servers are not just fixed by adding hardware, you have to resolve the queue bottleneck too, especially when it comes to read/write queues, which even at a minimum the database that stores their information will have to be increased also to store the information on the additional things to keep track of).

Would the total added transactions you are proposing shut stop the servers from running? No. Will it cause lag every second? No. Will it affect gameplay unless hardware is added/upgraded? Yes.

And that is all I am saying. Great ideas and I hope Anet decides to implement them. Just realize it is a cost to benefit thing for them.

Cantur Soulfyre.5409:

Like I said, I get what you are saying. But you sounds like my boss who has no idea about how these things actually work. “We have a nice server we just paid a lot of money for, surely we can add a program to it.” Of course we can, but then you start dragging the server down from it’s original purpose.

If you pay attention to load times and skill lag during peak WvW times you know that the servers are already overloaded with transactions and that a queue of transactions build up, hence the skill lag and game lag. This is the queue bottleneck slowing transactions down. Just from that we can safely deduce that their server hardware is already overloaded during those times. Add more to that without addressing the queues AND the hardware and you are in for a big letdown. (Queues on servers are not just fixed by adding hardware, you have to resolve the queue bottleneck too, especially when it comes to read/write queues, which even at a minimum the database that stores their information will have to be increased also to store the information on the additional things to keep track of).

Would the total added transactions you are proposing shut stop the servers from running? No. Will it cause lag every second? No. Will it affect gameplay unless hardware is added/upgraded? Yes.

And that is all I am saying. Great ideas and I hope Anet decides to implement them. Just realize it is a cost to benefit thing for them.

Will it affect gameplay unless hardware is added/upgraded? Yes.

Will it affect gameplay so significantly that an extra 549 transactions (in the most extreme, unrealistic, worst case scenario) once every 15 minutes would be noticed amid the spamming and queueing of tens of thousands of skills, calculating hits, and tracking conditions ? Probably not.

I fully agree that, yes, from a very literal and strictly technical standpoint, the addition of an influence reward once every 15 minutes for guilds which claim objectives and activate buffs will introduce a performance hit on the servers.

From a relative viewpoint of comparing that performance hit to the several orders of magnitude larger amount of processing that is already taking place, it will be below the threshold of human perception. There’s what the machines do, then there’s what the humans experience.

I do appreciate what you’re saying. I understand scope creep and taxing servers. It’s all the little things incrementally added up together which bring down performance more so than a single large processing task. But this addition’s performance hit would be so negligible as to not even register with players.

Furthermore, there’s precedent for this. The game already performs a Point Per Tick calculation once every 15 minutes; it doesn’t cause the servers to come to a screeching halt every time the clock reaches zero. The influence reward once every 15 mintues would take up even less resources since – unlike the PPT calculation which must be run against all 61 objectives in a match – it’s unlikely all camps, towers, and keeps will have been claimed and have active buffs.

What’s more is, there’s subtext to my suggestion. That subtext being that perhaps ArenaNet should consider putting more resources into WvWvW than they have to date so they can start implementing additional features and eliminating bottlenecks. I’m not saying that my suggestion is so uber godly that it needs to be implemented ASAP.

As a matter of fact, I fully expect that it will probably never be implemented. To my mind, forums are more a brainstorming session or a “If I was king for a day, what would I change in GW2?” rather than an actual design and implementation process. If my idea isn’t put into the game, that’s fine. But if it sparks another idea on the part of a developer or another player which does make it into the game or adds one more voice to the chorus calling for improvements to WvWvW, then it’s served a useful purpose.

I agree with most of that, though the tick of each structure wold begin when that structure is claimed, right? Not on the score tick, so it is still a slightly dynamic process and not included with the current score tick.

I actually really hope these ideas get implemented somehow, especially if they can also reward the folks who defend/repair/upgrade/walk yaks, etc. with more wxp than they do now for these tasks. People I have played with for a long time in WvW are far ahead of me in rank because I do the behind the scenes support work unless it is a raid time.

Thanks for the good conversation about all this, refreshing to find here after some of the “interesting” conversation I have been a part of. Some people just do not know how to discuss and argue without bring rude.

shiri.4257:

Simplify it, no if this or that. 1 or 2hour “guild claim refresh” like siege, put a timer on it. First one there or however the system has it now gets first dibs. After 2 hours it becomes unclaimed or the timer just sits at 0 until another person does.

Simplify it even further. A guild with more relevant buffs can assume a claim. No timers to track and no sophisticated system. Just a simple IF check when a claim attempt is made.

Cantur Soulfyre.5409:

I agree with most of that, though the tick of each structure wold begin when that structure is claimed, right? Not on the score tick, so it is still a slightly dynamic process and not included with the current score tick.

That is a good point and one I’ve been considering since making the initial suggestion; even if I didn’t explicitly write to it in my previous posts.

There’s two approaches that immediately come to mind.

In the first, the timer starts as soon as an objective is claimed and a buff activated. The pro argument is this is fair and balanced across the board; every guild has to wait the same amount of time to gain their influence reward. The con argument is this creates multiple asynchronous processes, each with their own timer, which places a greater load on resources.

The second approach would be to tie the influence reward to the universal PPT timer; whenever it reaches zero, rewards are tallied. The pro argument is all the processing happens synchronously once every 15 minutes on a single timer, potentially avoiding the performance hit of the first option. The con argument is some may consider this unfair. A guild which claims an objective and activates a buff 1 minute before the PPT timer reaches zero will be rewarded the same as a guild which claimed and activated 14 minutes earlier.

Despite the “unfairness” of the second option, I’d still choose that one in the interest of performance. The “unfair” awarding of influence to the guild that claimed and activated 1 minute before the timer reaches zero only happens once; after that, they’re on the same timer as everyone else.

What’s more is the spirit of the suggestion isn’t to count seconds or establish a race against the clock between guilds, but rather to motivate and reward guilds for activating buffs when they claim an objective. Whether they do this when the timer is at 14 minutes or when it’s at 1 minute is less relevant. As long as they’ve been incentivized to activate a buff on a claimed objective, then mission accomplished.

Cantur Soulfyre.5409:

I actually really hope these ideas get implemented somehow, especially if they can also reward the folks who defend/repair/upgrade/walk yaks, etc. with more wxp than they do now for these tasks. People I have played with for a long time in WvW are far ahead of me in rank because I do the behind the scenes support work unless it is a raid time.

I hear ya. Spent many a WvWvW session defending, upgrading, repairing, and building siege in fortifications. They began to move in the right direction with the awarding of WXP for repairing and building siege; there’s more that could be done, though.

Cantur Soulfyre.5409:

Thanks for the good conversation about all this, refreshing to find here after some of the “interesting” conversation I have been a part of. Some people just do not know how to discuss and argue without bring rude.

And thank you, as well. It’s been a good conversation. Now, if only we could get some dev feedback…

Straegen.2938:

shiri.4257:

Simplify it, no if this or that. 1 or 2hour “guild claim refresh” like siege, put a timer on it. First one there or however the system has it now gets first dibs. After 2 hours it becomes unclaimed or the timer just sits at 0 until another person does.

Simplify it even further. A guild with more relevant buffs can assume a claim. No timers to track and no sophisticated system. Just a simple IF check when a claim attempt is made.

The problem is this is a stick rather than a carrot approach. Rather than introduce a punitive system (guild A has more buffs than guild B, so guild A gets preferential treatment over guild B ), the suggestions I’ve made seek to motivate guilds to activate buffs by rewarding this behavior.

When frustrated and one’s focus narrows in the middle of a WvWvW round, it’s seems the logical solution to say, “Just kick the bums out! They didn’t activate a buff or don’t have as many buffs active as my guild, so they don’t deserve to claim the objective!” Over time, though, this will lead to a lot of drama and animosity between a server’s guilds.

Using this logic, it could be used to support the argument that the only players allowed in WvWvW are level 80s with full Ascended and 1000+ rank. Hey, anyone with less than that is bringing their server down and taking up a valuable spot in the map limit which would be better filled by a player with more experience, more skill, more blah, blah, blah, right? As patently ridiculous as this form of player discrimination would be, it’s really no different than discriminating against an entire guild simply because another guild has more buffs.

Could it be objectively argued that a guild that brings more buffs to the table is of greater benefit to their server and thus should be given preferential treatment? No, not really. The number of buffs active in a WvWvW round does not correlate with win or lose. There are too many other factors and variables involved. Does the server with more buffs take advantage of them to full effect? Or is the guild placing the buffs mostly a PvE guild which has enormous amounts of influence to spend but couldn’t fight their way out of a wet paperbag? Maybe the guild with the fewer buffs has fewer members with which to earn influence, but every one of them is a pro PvP-er worth 10 PvE PUGs.

Rather than push for the ideal scenario of every objective is claimed by a guild which can activate all buffs in the game, learn to work with what you’ve got. As the Marines say, “Improvise, Adapt, and Overcome.”

The goal is to build inclusivity rather than exclusivity. It’s a slower process requiring patience to see results. Long-term, however, it leads to better outcomes.

Kraag Deadsoul.2789:

The problem is this is a stick rather than a carrot approach. Rather than introduce a punitive system (guild A has more buffs than guild B, so guild A gets preferential treatment over guild B ), the suggestions I’ve made seek to motivate guilds to activate buffs by rewarding this behavior.

If the objective of WvW is for a server to win, whoever has the best buffs should be able to claim a location.

I really don’t care about some petty guild’s imposed drama. “Oh heavens me I cannot keep Overlook claimed because my guild isn’t running all the buffs.”

Besides practically no location is taken or defended by one guild. Why should XYZ Guild have rights over a location… because they got there first? What is that about?

Just make it so that the best buffs can claim a location, problem solved, any drama created from this change is ridiculously petty at best and in the worst interest of a server.

Straegen.2938:

Kraag Deadsoul.2789:

The problem is this is a stick rather than a carrot approach. Rather than introduce a punitive system (guild A has more buffs than guild B, so guild A gets preferential treatment over guild B ), the suggestions I’ve made seek to motivate guilds to activate buffs by rewarding this behavior.

If the objective of WvW is for a server to win, whoever has the best buffs should be able to claim a location.

I really don’t care about some petty guild’s imposed drama. “Oh heavens me I cannot keep Overlook claimed because my guild isn’t running all the buffs.”

Besides practically no location is taken or defended by one guild. Why should XYZ Guild have rights over a location… because they got there first? What?

I think this is more practical than the current system, however even with more buffs than the current claiming Guild I think there should be a waiting period or it cannot be subjugated until any current buffs expire. Claiming something and not having buffs is useless so I think you should be able to take over a claim when that happens or when the buffs expire.

But just to take something because your Guild has more buffs, in my opinion, shouldnt be allowed unless they also then either restore that buff (or buffs) back to the guild that had it up OR something like charge the new claiming guild 5g (or whatever) and give that to the guild that possession was taken from. Again, if the claiming guild has no buffs running then i see no problem taking the claim from them.

Straegen.2938:

Kraag Deadsoul.2789:

The problem is this is a stick rather than a carrot approach. Rather than introduce a punitive system (guild A has more buffs than guild B, so guild A gets preferential treatment over guild B ), the suggestions I’ve made seek to motivate guilds to activate buffs by rewarding this behavior.

If the objective of WvW is for a server to win, whoever has the best buffs should be able to claim a location.

I really don’t care about some petty guild’s imposed drama. “Oh heavens me I cannot keep Overlook claimed because my guild isn’t running all the buffs.”

Besides practically no location is taken or defended by one guild. Why should XYZ Guild have rights over a location… because they got there first? What is that about?

Just make it so that the best buffs can claim a location, problem solved, any drama created from this change is ridiculously petty at best and in the worst interest of a server.

Regardless of the merits of the suggestion (and I can even agree with letting a guild with buffs take over a claim from a guild with no buffs active), ArenaNet isn’t going to do this.

They allow trolls to build siege all the way to max cap and defend it as “artistic expression” and “playing the game their way” just because the blueprints are arranged into geometric patterns (and, yes, this did actually happen on the server on which I play and was tolerated despite a ton of reports to ArenaNet).

There’s no way, no how – in that kind of environment – that ArenaNet will ever allow one guild to override another guild’s claim to an objective; even if you had one-thousand buffs. Therefore, I won’t put time into arguing for something that will never be implemented.

I’m not saying that my suggestion has that much greater chance of being implemented, either. But it’s in keeping with the philosophy of rewarding rather than punishing or disenfranchising players or guilds in an effort to change behavior. That’s likely to gain more traction with the devs than an adversarial mechanic which potentially gives preferential treatment to a sub-set of of the player base.

Simple solutions usually are only simple for those who benefit. For everybody else, not so much. And though some could care less, they aren’t the ones creating and maintaining the game. ArenaNet has a vested interest in keeping as many players happy and satisfied playing their game as possible. When mechanics are introduced which run counter to that, it winds up sowing animosity and frustration among the player base.

Simply put, ArenaNet is very, very unlikely to ever allow one guild to override the claim of another. So we have to find different solutions. Mine are one suggestion, but I’m sure we can come up with plenty more which will address the problem of guilds claiming but not activating buffs without also introducing tension between guilds.

Cantur Soulfyre.5409:

But just to take something because your Guild has more buffs, in my opinion, shouldnt be allowed unless they also then either restore that buff (or buffs) back to the guild that had it up OR something like charge the new claiming guild 5g (or whatever) and give that to the guild that possession was taken from. Again, if the claiming guild has no buffs running then i see no problem taking the claim from them.

If I come up to a camp and XYZ guild has it claimed but no +5 supply buff, why should they get to keep the camp claimed? The current system is stupid. The concept that somehow a guild “owns” a shared resource is ridiculous.

Why does the first person to make the claim have priority? Why would they deserve money to override the claim?

Snowreap.5174:

it’s my understanding that, for the first 3-5 minutes after capture (I don’t remember which, but I think it’s either 3 minutes or 5 minutes), an objective can only be claimed by the guild that had most of the players present for the capture. after that period, if the objective remains unclaimed anybody can claim it.

I don’t know the precise rules of how this works. if a zerg rolls through where 30 are from one guild, and 10 are from a mix of other guilds, the guild with 30 should be able to claim it right away (a clear majority). but if there are 20 from one guild, and 10 each from 3 other guilds (i.e. a plurality but not a majority) I have no idea what happens.

-ken

Agreed. After a guild claims a keep, it wouldnt hurt to make the requirement in keeping the claim higher. Something in the lines of: if no upgrades have been purchased after 1 minute the keep will be open for claim again. An anouncement in the teamchat would be nice too.

I always loved the fact you could raise your guild banners on a tower after a hard won battle, it made the victory sweeter.

Straegen.2938:

Cantur Soulfyre.5409:

But just to take something because your Guild has more buffs, in my opinion, shouldn’t be allowed unless they also then either restore that buff (or buffs) back to the guild that had it up OR something like charge the new claiming guild 5g (or whatever) and give that to the guild that possession was taken from. Again, if the claiming guild has no buffs running then i see no problem taking the claim from them.

If I come up to a camp and XYZ guild has it claimed but no +5 supply buff, why should they get to keep the camp claimed? The current system is stupid. The concept that somehow a guild “owns” a shared resource is ridiculous.

Why does the first person to make the claim have priority? Why would they deserve money to override the claim?

That is why I said if there is no buff then no penalty or wait time. However if a buff IS active, then a penalty should apply.

Some great ideas in there ^ I dont care for all the fancy stuff but please god something be done…

Who has a Dev friended? point them in the right direction. WvW could use a little love