Guild Wars 2

Been playing against the same world every week for months now (SoR vs BG). The result is the same EVERY time (my world has not won once). Why in the world would the system be designed this way? People stop showing up when there is no chance at all. Or else they transfer servers, as I believe many have done, but I’m not going to do, resulting in the problem just getting worse and worse. I don’t get it.

Discouraging.

Honestly it comes down to two things, a very bad ranking system and gross population imbalances. And yes most of us hate it.

http://mos.millenium.org/matchups#NA

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

The ranking system gets worse and worse as time goes on, because potential evolution is not scaling at the same rate as cumulative rating. The way things are going you’re doomed to face BG and SoR for many more weeks.

The system is meant to create “even” matches.. but without a complete blowout, servers rarely move up or down the ladder.

Mif.3471:

http://mos.millenium.org/matchups#NA

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

And if you look at those you will see you arent the only ones, a lot of the NA server are seeing no progressive or even regression at all, they are stuck at 0, so they will always fight the same servers over and over again.

EU servers are not suffering too much from this, but again most are only going up or down 1 rank a week. So again for them they will fight the same servers most of the time.

The thing to blame for this is that the free transfer are still open! A lot of peopl,e it seems, want to be on top without putting in the effort, and so jumped ship to the top tiers.

The only thing that will fix this is if some guilds from the top server transfer to lower servers.
For example a lot of good guilds left Far Shiverpeaks, not sure what the reason was, but due to that it’s fallen from rank 9 to rank 19 in the last month.
Anet should do what what Blizzard do in WoW, end the free transfers, and only make free transfers available to low population/rank servers. Cos there are some low rank server with high populations which are more PvE than WvW, so they never get enough on even though having high populations.

This is a direct result of people and guilds bandwagoning to the same 3-5 servers. Severely imbalanced populations are bad for every aspect of the game – from PVE to WvW.

I don’t understand why the winning server doesn’t just move up while the loser moves down. That or close free server transfers. As long as those exist, populations aren’t stable enough for the current system to apply rationally.

Themanbat.3206:

I don’t understand why the winning server doesn’t just move up while the loser moves down. That or close free server transfers. As long as those exist, populations aren’t stable enough for the current system to apply rationally.

This is an excellent idea – guarantees fresh looks at every tier every week and looks to eliminate stagnation. Nice, simple, effective.

Contrary to some of the posts above, the problem isn’t really the free server transfers. Lock down server transfers and you will still have a ranking system that doesn’t properly account for existing server imbalances. The ranking system is simply WAY too slow to react, and until that gets fixed matchups will still be screwed up.

Don’t hold your breath, though … I haven’t seen a lick of evidence that ANet pays much attention at all to WvW, even though WvW was one of their biggest selling points prior to launch.

Dhampyr.2104:

Themanbat.3206:

I don’t understand why the winning server doesn’t just move up while the loser moves down. That or close free server transfers. As long as those exist, populations aren’t stable enough for the current system to apply rationally.

This is an excellent idea – guarantees fresh looks at every tier every week and looks to eliminate stagnation. Nice, simple, effective.

The problem with this system is that it would match servers from three tiers (weakest of above tier, middle of tier, strongest of below tier). This would end up creating a lot of blowouts. You already have imbalances within tiers. The rating system does need to be adjusted so servers don’t get trapped in a bubble, but the system still needs to attempt to create close matches.

Cactus.2710:

Contrary to some of the posts above, the problem isn’t really the free server transfers. Lock down server transfers and you will still have a ranking system that doesn’t properly account for existing server imbalances. The ranking system is simply WAY too slow to react, and until that gets fixed matchups will still be screwed up.

Don’t hold your breath, though … I haven’t seen a lick of evidence that ANet pays much attention at all to WvW, even though WvW was one of their biggest selling points prior to launch.

It would balance out eventually. The point is the scales get tipped too frequently at the moment by mass guild transfers, which makes the slow ranking system even more defunct. The first idea I gave would balance the match-ups much more quickly, even with the freedom to migrate, but I like the other a little more.

Arcadio.6875:

The problem with this system is that it would match servers from three tiers (weakest of above tier, middle of tier, strongest of below tier). This would end up creating a lot of blowouts. You already have imbalances within tiers. The rating system does need to be adjusted so servers don’t get trapped in a bubble, but the system still needs to attempt to create close matches.

While I agree this would be possible, you wouldn’t be looking at the SAME blowout week after week (like we do in at least a few tiers). IMHO, stagnation is a big reason for people to quit WvW – simple boredom. Once you’re teamed against the same two opponents for weeks on end, you learn what they do and when, and how. Kinda loses its luster.

Arcadio.6875:

Dhampyr.2104:

Themanbat.3206:

I don’t understand why the winning server doesn’t just move up while the loser moves down. That or close free server transfers. As long as those exist, populations aren’t stable enough for the current system to apply rationally.

This is an excellent idea – guarantees fresh looks at every tier every week and looks to eliminate stagnation. Nice, simple, effective.

The problem with this system is that it would match servers from three tiers (weakest of above tier, middle of tier, strongest of below tier). This would end up creating a lot of blowouts. You already have imbalances within tiers. The rating system does need to be adjusted so servers don’t get trapped in a bubble, but the system still needs to attempt to create close matches.

That actually already happens under the current system. It just takes longer to progress so some tiers become roflstomps for 3 or 4 weeks.

Ending free xfers would be bad now. The damage is done. The only hope of tier match ups evening up ever is for the people who want challenges heading to lower tiers. If paid xfers went into place it would never happen.

xxxzavulonxxx.8413:

Ending free xfers would be bad now. The damage is done. The only hope of tier match ups evening up ever is for the people who want challenges heading to lower tiers. If paid xfers went into place it would never happen.

That’s what everyone going to DR and Kaineng said. And look at the mess now… The damage will never be done as long as it keeps happening. I’m also not entirely sure what “challenge” all those xfers were looking for. They bring hundreds of people to a tier where every server has about 40-60 average players on at prime time and things were pretty even and their new server rolls all over everybody.

Population and coverage imbalance. Nothing else. When the scores are a blow out, the winning server generally jump to another tier relatively quickly. They probably won because of a higher population/coverage. If scores are close nobody moves anywhere because the population/coverage between the three servers is about equal.

It appears Ferguson’s Crossing is a server taking heavy assaults from (read: reinvigorated WM and krewe) guild transfers.
Good luck FC.

FC and ET both seem to be in a situation that regardless of who the 3rd server they fight is, they’re going to get stomped because of pop/coverage imbalance… And there’s no tier lower for them to fight in.

Just a bad situation to be in and nothing Anet does can directly fix it for them. They can put incentives for switching to their server, which is the best they can hope for atm.

Rhyis.7058:

FC and ET both seem to be in a situation that regardless of who the 3rd server they fight is, they’re going to get stomped because of pop/coverage imbalance… And there’s no tier lower for them to fight in.

Just a bad situation to be in and nothing Anet does can directly fix it for them. They can put incentives for switching to their server, which is the best they can hope for atm.

Actually after next week, the tier should be pretty balanced, as long as Kaineng moves up. Transfers, again, are only going to create more problems.

Breaking opponent server’s morale is a strategy that all competitive servers strive for. Unfortunately, lower (all?) tiers may not appreciate that “style” of play.
Before I get l2p, I know WvW is war. But with apparently exploitable, poorly enforced computer rules .

Rhyis.7058:

FC and ET both seem to be in a situation that regardless of who the 3rd server they fight is, they’re going to get stomped because of pop/coverage imbalance… And there’s no tier lower for them to fight in.

Just a bad situation to be in and nothing Anet does can directly fix it for them. They can put incentives for switching to their server, which is the best they can hope for atm.

I disagree. FC and ET will acquit themselves very well against whoever moves down. The only reason the score is a blowout is, as has been stated earlier, due to numbers and coverage. I don’t think HoD or SF, whichever takes our place, has our numbers.

If anyone has taken part in the actual toe to toe fighting, they’d know how evenly matched things are on the ground. I wouldn’t be surprised at all to see whichever T7 server takes our place plummets straight to #24 rather quickly.

The rating system is flawed and actually rewards the losers in a tier rather then the winner.

pot.6805:

The rating system is flawed and actually rewards the losers in a tier rather then the winner.

That’s the way it was designed. To increase or decrease their rating relative to how well they performed. Not to give them free points for winning against a much easier opponent, especially if their win was only 10k at the end of the week. You wouldn’t give Manchester United a pat on the back for beating a local school’s U16 soccer team would you?

The glicko system is designed to give players (or in our case servers) an individual rating on their performance. This rating will go up or down depending on the performance against the rating of other servers, not whether you win or lose. It is much more balanced then a +1 for a win, 0 for 2nd, -1 for 3rd.

The glicko system works in most implementations, but not in GW2. Why?

It is assumed with the glicko system that you are matched up against different, but similarly rated opponents in every match, but in Guild Wars 2 this doesn’t happen. Instead, ratings are put into numerical ranking and every grouping of 3 servers gets to duke it out for the week.

If the matchup stays the same week after week after week, then the rating no longer applies to their ranking as a whole, but how well they compete against other 2 servers in the matchup.

Good example of this recently was Tarnished Coast. We’d been rank 7 for about 2 months, but couldn’t break out of tier 3. When IoJ fell, and TC went up, we gave the two servers in our new tier BG and SoR great competition, often flirting with the lead at the start of the match. Ironically enough, a statistician posted in one of the other threads on this topic, saying that we’d get smashed. Didn’t happen due to our rating stagnating in tier 3, and not giving an actual indication of our ability as a server.

Two things that could alleviate, but not 100% fix this problem, whilst still giving balanced matchups.

Idea 1 – Merge the NA and EU tier. 24 (or 27 for EU) servers split between about 1600 rating means finding different servers that are evenly matched is quite a problem. ~150 to 200 rating difference often leads to a blowout in a matchup. With an increased server pool to create grouping from, there’d be higher chance of a balanced match. More importantly however, less rating difference between tiers would increase the likelihood of a different matchup each week. I worked out the matchups for last week, and only 1 match out of the top 10 combined tiers would have been the same (NA T1 becoming World T1).

Side effects may include another week of 1 day matches, (or some combination of 1, 2 and 3 days) to ensure the merged tiers are equally rated, and possibly a few hundred ms of lag when entering WvW against servers in different parts of the world.

Idea 2 – Add in some form of manual rating change if certain conditions are met. One possible method would be that if a server in a higher tier lost 3 matches in a row, and a server in the tier lower won 3 matches in a row, they’d have their ratings made near equal, with the lower tier server having 1 rating higher then the higher tier server, essentially having them switch places.

Of course, this could still end up in a blowout if the servers in question are too different in ability, and would result in a blowout in both tiers.

Also to all the people blaming server transfers….. People moving increases the volatility of the matches, because it’s still change. Change increases the likelihood of servers moving up or down the rankings. If anything closing transfers would make the problem worse as players would have no freedom of movement, just causing this whole dilemma to get worse.

+1 for merging this thread with all the other topics on the exact same thing.

TLDR: Glicko as a system works, but Anet’s implementation of it is poor.

Zynthetic.2954:

The glicko system works in most implementations, but not in GW2. Why?

It is assumed with the glicko system that you are matched up against different, but similarly rated opponents in every match, but in Guild Wars 2 this doesn’t happen. Instead, ratings are put into numerical ranking and every grouping of 3 servers gets to duke it out for the week.

If the matchup stays the same week after week after week, then the rating no longer applies to their ranking as a whole, but how well they compete against other 2 servers in the matchup.

<snip>

Also to all the people blaming server transfers….. People moving increases the volatility of the matches, because it’s still change. Change increases the likelihood of servers moving up or down the rankings. If anything closing transfers would make the problem worse as players would have no freedom of movement, just causing this whole dilemma to get worse.

TLDR: Glicko as a system works, but Anet’s implementation of it is poor.

This is exactly correct. The Glicko system (you can get the full description on WikiPedia) was designed for large pools of players as in chess, where everyone might eventually compete against each other. It pretty much falls apart when used in a tiered system because teams from one tier don’t compete against teams in other tiers. Your server’s rating becomes almost strictly a function of your score against only two other servers and loses relevance with other tiers.

I suspect that GW2 has some mechanism for Glicko ranking tiers against each other as well, but that’s hugely flawed in both theory and practice since tiers don’t actually compete against each other. If they use a server’s performance in a previous tier to do that you get the kind of horrendous unresponsiveness to changing demographics that now exists, as well as the obvious delay that occurs while the system has to wait for servers to actually change tiers.

It is also true that performance fluctuations (such as may be caused by server transfers) can actually reduce a server’s Glicko rating even if the score goes up because the Glicko system essentially adds in a penalty for variability.

All in all it seems ArenaNet totally misunderstood how the Glicko system works because it is fundamentally inappropriate for tiered WvW. They really need to go back to the drawing board to fix this, because merely freezing server transfers will not.

4 months into the Glicko Rating System and the only matchup this week that isn’t a blowout is Tier 3.

Working as intended? I think not.

Simply put, if we had more servers for WvW, it’d all be fine. Sadly, NA and EU are separate, and unless GW2 gets a large influx of players, it will likely stay this way.

Or if tiers are merged, but god knows if / when / why that’d happen.

On a side note, lets all just be thankful there’s no 2 week matches.

Yeah NA and EU should be together in WvWvW at the end isnt that the main purpose of WvWvW success, coverage 24/7.

The Glicko system is not working fine for this kind of measurements, its seems to should be, winner move up, loser move down, second place grats you have a second chance

I have discussed this with some guildies regarding the current rating system. I agree with what Themanbat said earlier.

I don’t understand why we don’t have winners move up, losers move down and the 2nd place team stay put. With a difference for the top 2 tiers which would be winner stays put and 2nd and 3rd place move down and 1st and 2nd of Tier 2 move up.

You may get unbalanced match-ups but this already happens but it allows for fresh faces and a more rewarding system for finishing 2nd in the lower tiers. The other week we finished 2nd in a Tier 5 match-up yet the 2 teams below us in Tier 6 moved up. It still felt like we actually failed rather than achieved what was for our server a very good 2nd place finish in a Tier we thought was above our pay grade.

The problem with this system is that it would match servers from three tiers (weakest of above tier, middle of tier, strongest of below tier). This would end up creating a lot of blowouts. You already have imbalances within tiers. The rating system does need to be adjusted so servers don’t get trapped in a bubble, but the system still needs to attempt to create close matches.

But even so that would create a better variety of experiences. Instead of being evenly matched every week, you would alternate between being evenly matched, then completely out matched, then completely overwhelming. Each of those types of experiences have their own fun to be had, and it would better distribute which color you had each week, rather than being stuck with the same color for months on end (as my server has been).

JemL.3501:

Yeah NA and EU should be together in WvWvW at the end isnt that the main purpose of WvWvW success, coverage 24/7.

The Glicko system is not working fine for this kind of measurements, its seems to should be, winner move up, loser move down, second place grats you have a second chance

I think the main reason GW2 separated EU and NA servers is the physical location of the server banks. All the EU servers are ran out of a server farm in Europe. Linking them together would add lag and longer data transfer time. GW2 already cant support the current data transfer and uses culling as a poor mans band-aid. Don’t lean on the broken rail.

Ohoni.6057:

…rather than being stuck with the same color for months on end (as my server has been).

Simple fix to that is to not tie the colors to the tier ranks. The server colors should be randomly picked each week.

Themanbat.3206:

xxxzavulonxxx.8413:

Ending free xfers would be bad now. The damage is done. The only hope of tier match ups evening up ever is for the people who want challenges heading to lower tiers. If paid xfers went into place it would never happen.

That’s what everyone going to DR and Kaineng said. And look at the mess now… The damage will never be done as long as it keeps happening. I’m also not entirely sure what “challenge” all those xfers were looking for. They bring hundreds of people to a tier where every server has about 40-60 average players on at prime time and things were pretty even and their new server rolls all over everybody.

Once upon a time tier 8 was pretty balance with Ferg, DR, and Kain. Then free transfers of large guilds mainly disrupted the balance. First making DR to have overwhelming odds and now since DR left, it seems Kain is the popular server for large guilds to recently join. I been on Kain since day 1 and had to deal with getting our kitten kicked by DR and now we are owning everything. Not sure why these guilds have been joining us when we already occupying 100% of the map or pretty close to it most of the time. One guild said it was to practice, which I find it funny because who are they going to practice against when it is so hard to find Fergs or ET on the maps. If they really wanted to practice they would join the server who is in last place and help them instead of further give Kain a big advantage.

Persephone.7436:

I think the main reason GW2 separated EU and NA servers is the physical location of the server banks. All the EU servers are ran out of a server farm in Europe. Linking them together would add lag and longer data transfer time. GW2 already cant support the current data transfer and uses culling as a poor mans band-aid. Don’t lean on the broken rail.

Definitely true … all of it.

Cactus.2710:

Persephone.7436:

I think the main reason GW2 separated EU and NA servers is the physical location of the server banks. All the EU servers are ran out of a server farm in Europe. Linking them together would add lag and longer data transfer time. GW2 already cant support the current data transfer and uses culling as a poor mans band-aid. Don’t lean on the broken rail.

Definitely true … all of it.

Actually, the rankings and ladders are outside the game.. They can create a single ladder without even merging the servers or data centres..

The match-up finally changed, but the root of the problem remains.

I would like to see a play-off system implemented, in place of the current system. You should not be going up against the same worlds time after time. I mean, what is there to prove? The same world that wins this week will win next week, or so that has been our experience EVERY single week. A playoff system would allow the winners to play the winners, the 2nd placers to play the 2nd placers, and the losers to play the losers, until a final standings come in and a victor is determined. Then it can start all over again with new match-ups. Eventually I should be able to see every other server out there as an opponent sooner or later. Sure you get blown out at times, but I can deal with that if it’s not EVERY single week. Each week would be a new match-up and a new chance.

Also, a related problem is that all of our matches seem to be fully decided by Sunday night, leaving the rest of the week as kind of a lame duck session. Why not make it best 2 out of 3 instead? The weekend could be part 1; Monday-Tuesday part 2; Wednesday-Thursday part 3. Best 2 out of 3 wins, or otherwise at worst it’s a 3-way draw, which has its own possibilities. Anyway, that way at least things can go until Tuesday night before they are decided.

Wastrelz.8235:

The match-up finally changed, but the root of the problem remains.

I would like to see a play-off system implemented, in place of the current system. You should not be going up against the same worlds time after time. I mean, what is there to prove? The same world that wins this week will win next week, or so that has been our experience EVERY single week. A playoff system would allow the winners to play the winners, the 2nd placers to play the 2nd placers, and the losers to play the losers, until a final standings come in and a victor is determined. Then it can start all over again with new match-ups. Eventually I should be able to see every other server out there as an opponent sooner or later. Sure you get blown out at times, but I can deal with that if it’s not EVERY single week. Each week would be a new match-up and a new chance.

Also, a related problem is that all of our matches seem to be fully decided by Sunday night, leaving the rest of the week as kind of a lame duck session. Why not make it best 2 out of 3 instead? The weekend could be part 1; Monday-Tuesday part 2; Wednesday-Thursday part 3. Best 2 out of 3 wins, or otherwise at worst it’s a 3-way draw, which has its own possibilities. Anyway, that way at least things can go until Tuesday night before they are decided.

If you actually watch the matches in the various tiers, you’d see that balanced matches are way more important for player interest than are matches with new opponents, even though players obviously would also like to go up against new opponents from time to time. The current ranking system sucks, but it sucks because of blowouts and replacing it with a system guaranteed to generate blowouts (which your proposal would do) isn’t the answer.

Let’s see what changes ANet has in store for next month, shall we?

There is no way I’d want them to introduce more volatility into the Ranking System while Free Transfers are still in effect. Look what happened to SBI – I seriously doubt you would have seen that kind of mass migration (especially considering where many of the large guilds moved to) if they all would have been forced to pay Gems to flee.

The Colin “Brohanson” interview at ZAM (further commentary at GuildCast) shows that ANet is in fact very aware of what is happening in WvW and a lot of changes are planned.

Outside of those with the “T1 Mindset” most WvW’ers I’ve encountered are looking for good, fun fights throughout the week regardless of PPT and overall score. We don’t know what the changes are or how effective they will be, but anything that makes the immediate experience more fun is a good thing.

Cactus.2710:

If you actually watch the matches in the various tiers, you’d see that balanced matches are way more important for player interest than are matches with new opponents, even though players obviously would also like to go up against new opponents from time to time. The current ranking system sucks, but it sucks because of blowouts and replacing it with a system guaranteed to generate blowouts (which your proposal would do) isn’t the answer.

Actually, I think it would almost guarantee that it’s not always a blowout, or at least if it is, we wouldn’t know in advance….unlike now. Ultimately, just about every world will have a reasonable chance of winning at least one week in the schedule. Only the worst of the worst would lose every single time, but at least even that server would have a chance. Personally, I’ll take having a chance to win (or conversely, a chance to lose) every week any day over the current system.

If you would prefer going into matches week after week and knowing that there is no way your server is ever going to win (until enough people quit playing that you drop down after 2 months and finally play someone you can beat, and in turn know you are going to beat THEM every single time), then you have different tastes than I do.

No one seems to like the rating system besides ANET. Servers should not need to play against each other more than 2 weeks in a row.

Of course, this would all be solved by the whole winner moves up, loser moves down system that has been discussed so much here already.

Wastrelz.8235:

If you would prefer going into matches week after week and knowing that there is no way your server is ever going to win (until enough people quit playing that you drop down after 2 months and finally play someone you can beat, and in turn know you are going to beat THEM every single time), then you have different tastes than I do.

How on earth did you ever read that into my comment? What part of “sucks because of blowouts” did you not comprehend?

MarMaster.6241:

Breaking opponent server’s morale is a strategy that all competitive servers strive for. Unfortunately, lower (all?) tiers may not appreciate that “style” of play.
Before I get l2p, I know WvW is war. But with apparently exploitable, poorly enforced computer rules .

No doubt you’re right about their strategy, but I don’t believe it’s for the best for people to take that kind of attitude. It’s a game, not war. What kind of game do you have if the other side stops showing up? Do the Chicago Bears want to put the Green Bay Packers completely out of business just because they’re rivals? No, I think the betterment of the game will be to promote the welfare of both teams, regardless of which side I’m a fan of.

And as for me, I want the other worlds to keep logging on and showing up for the matches because they’re having fun too. If they’re not, then eventually neither will I be.

But as you pointed out, a lot of that has to do with the design of the game and enforcement of the rules.