Guild Wars 2

A three-page demonstration of why being a game developer sucks.

Daemonne.5018:

It’s not even all about the queues. ET’s identity in WvW is just gone. We have a few guilds who pride themselves in taking up the call, slapping on the commander tag and running the circuit. I actually made it into one of the Borderlands tonight. I did love seeing the groups running around and the battles that ensued. the horrible thing is that this is not our tight knit little community though.

Even if we had been merged with one or two of the lower tier servers, we would at least have the same styles in common to work with.

It should be quite clear that if they merged the servers a certain way and eliminated the lower tiers that was because the population – and the gameplay style they supported- isnt the intended way for WvW. You may have had a tight knit community but that doesnt mean that with the changes you cant cooperate and coordinate with the larger server who is very likely willing to help as theyre as much stuck with you as you are with them.

Part of the coordination I talk about is ACTIVELY communicating your intentions, numbers and schedule to the different guilds so that they can also give you similar information and you can try to split off with them in a way that best mitigates queues (blackgate does this every week for reset so that the large guilds arent all stacked in a single map). Teamspeak is also important as it further helps out coordinate movements between guilds specially important in float or when help is required. Im sure builds and other resources can also be shared if you ask and intend to make changes to better adjust to the gameplay.

Im pretty sure that additional changes will happen but I can bet that even if they do you will never return anywhere close to the WvW you knew of back in t8, so id start coping rather than complaining

If anything this Beta also highlights the utter abject failure of the borderland maps.
I have to agree with many comments posted on the forums about bringing back the old maps the current setup makes this merging process just the more painful.

To follow up my last post after 4 hours in a queue I did get a game.. then needed to leave to sleep and go to work.. so all in all my original gripe stands it really Kills casual players.

I really enjoyed this change. Its fun and the fights are even. The game feels alive for once and seeing all the BLs being used is really rare. The only thing that could be a issue is the Q’s but it is reset night. Give it a few weeks and then start crying. Calm down and be glad that wvw isn’t dead anymore and you get to see NEW faces and not the same match ups over and over. Keep up the good work Anet.

robotempire.2451:

A three-page demonstration of why being a game developer sucks.

I was going to write something about this being a beta and give the developers some slack and then I turned to page 4 and this was the last post No need to write that any more.

A few observations about the EU pairings (and an answer to an earlier post):

1. Only 2 English servers (Piken Square and Seafarer’s Rest) are not linked
2. In answer why these two servers are not linked: They are the two highest ranked English servers so that makes sense. PS is finally the number 1 server in Europe. It took us almost 4 years And yes, I play on PS (not a lot of WvW) so I am probably prejudiced.
3. But looking at previous rankings: Would it not have been better to link two more DE servers together? Abaddon’s Mouth and Dzagonur? Or is the population on these 2 servers so high that linking wasn’t a good option?
4. More in general: Are the DE servers so popular, and is GW2 so popular in German speaking countries, that they can fill 6 servers? While the rest of Europe (not speaking German, French or Spanish) only fill 8 servers (or server pairings)? I know for a fact that some German/French/Spanish speaking players are on an EN server. I just have to look at the officers of my guild and I see proof for all three languages of this.

I am curious about this. Maybe a developer can shine some light on this?

Is Maguuma’s pairing with Devona’s Rest strong enough to be in T2 versus that new Tarnished Coast and Dragonbrand full of former TC transfers? That is what we shall see this week along with queue times.

Rose Solane.1027:

1. But looking at previous rankings: Would it not have been better to link two more DE servers together? Abaddon’s Mouth and Dzagonur? Or is the population on these 2 servers so high that linking wasn’t a good option?
2. More in general: Are the DE servers so popular, and is GW2 so popular in German speaking countries, that they can fill 6 servers? While the rest of Europe (not speaking German, French or Spanish) only fill 8 servers (or server pairings)? I know for a fact that some German/French/Spanish speaking players are on an EN server. I just have to look at the officers of my guild and I see proof for all three languages of this.

Merging DE servers gather so many nightcappers in one place that they reach critical mass and cause spontanious fusion, wiping out half the planet.

So “better” is a relative term.

Everyone keeps telling me wvw supposed to be 80v80v80 massive zerg fights and back in the old days the queues where normal on most servers so suck it up. Im sorry but i started playing wvw a year ago and you rarely queue 2 maps let alone 4. In HOD and Ebay queue we had at least 150+ people waiting. Its reset night i dont mind a 10 man queue but when half you guild group cant even got on the same map and then get wipe by 60+ people it really does take the fun out of play with your guild. We need t5 and t6 back in na just so its a bit more spread out. Only 12 servers is stuipd and the queues are just going to worse if more people stay and people join the game. Im sorry i dont want to wait in queue for 4 hours to play wvw on reset night

I don’t understand how people can’t realize that it was the first night and an overwhelming great tesponse in numbers. It wont stay this way. But the huge response tells me that the idea of getting to play with lots of other people is enticing.

Love the merger albeit a mid-tier server or two got the short end of the stick. Everyone complaining about queues on the first night of a huge new change, at RESET – lol. Calm down.

What I loathe is the identity being entirely stripped from the low pop counterparts. I’m fighting beside these people who just got completely devoured by my server’s title. What pride do they have as WvWers? They’re not representing themselves anymore. They’re on their tiny server, but work for big daddies like little slave mules. They’re seen as invaders from my server, my server is above their score, and their effort contributes to the power of my server’s name.

I’m in T3? or something like that—on SoS/GoM. We haven’t decided on Gate of Sorrows or Sea of Madness yet, but I like both.

We had a 100 queue for EB and ~15 queue for each BL. I was one of the first folks in but others were able to get into the BLs in ~20-30m or so. I can’t be super sure of that as I only got info from one person. It’s definitely not business as usual but I don’t think it’s unacceptable for a reset night with as much hype as this one.

As for the link, I pretty much love all of GoM. There’s definitely a difference in playstyle, but we did a pretty good job of making it work. We had a zerg big enough to contend with enemy zergs and also had scouts and fluid groups of roamers to apply pressure on enemy fronts and starve their holdings of supply. Also, everyone seemed super nice. I honestly wouldn’t mind being linked forever, if it goes on like this.

That said, I do feel really sorry for the folks that got linked into T1. Not only do I abhor the playstyles there but it also seems like most of the non-Maguuma toxicity is concentrated in the highest ranks. I think it would be fine if tier 1 was left alone and tier 8 as well, maybe?

Mypinkbunny.4513:

Everyone keeps telling me wvw supposed to be 80v80v80 massive zerg fights and back in the old days the queues where normal on most servers so suck it up. Im sorry but i started playing wvw a year ago and you rarely queue 2 maps let alone 4. In HOD and Ebay queue we had at least 150+ people waiting. Its reset night i dont mind a 10 man queue but when half you guild group cant even got on the same map and then get wipe by 60+ people it really does take the fun out of play with your guild. We need t5 and t6 back in na just so its a bit more spread out. Only 12 servers is stuipd and the queues are just going to worse if more people stay and people join the game. Im sorry i dont want to wait in queue for 4 hours to play wvw on reset night

That is why there were many that would actually avoid reset nights, being hard to get your group in together and just getting run over if you try to do anything that isn’t sitting on a zerg. In all honesty what I saw at reset, and what I’ve seen said here is precisely what I expected. While I never went to ET, I did leave my home server a year ago after some drama bs suddenly appeared, and forced in a tier that hated. It was so nice to be away from the queues and the large blobs, to be able to play wvw without being forced to sit on a tag of 60+ just to do something.

Much like others have said, if wanted large zergs, would have gone to t1/t2 before.

Yes queues will likely not be quite as bad going forward, but no it is not entirely just because of the changes, although people seeing queues like seen at reset is likely to make at least some not bother trying at subsequent resets, especially if the weekend still sees queues.

At this point, I’m rather more interested in how the servers are going to deal with the drama between groups that will occur (especially in certain cases now, or in the future with changes to linked worlds, where some that for reasons cannot stand each other find themselves forced to play for the same team), how the linked servers will work together, how the smaller link will maintain identity, and how many will try to control their linked server, etc., than I am with actually going in wvw at all.

ArenaNet,

The change has been good and feels like a net positive for long term. Thanks for having the nerves to do it.

My server also had instant queues; 150 EBG, 50 for each BL. I don’t mind this on reset night.

All things considered, having seen how both extremes played out over the past 3.5 years, it’s fine to do this now as a first step to better ways later. Reset queues game-wide are far preferable to one-sided queues fighting against half-full maps for the entire week. I think you weighed these extremes and made the right choice for now.

Everyone else—especially TC, BG, JQ, YB,

If your queues are punishing to the point of being unplayable, then that is how it should be, and you should be moving your guilds to the bottom of the board. Your queues are why we didn’t move into your servers when you were throwing gold at us for the past 3.5 years. Then we did move in when the queues died because the game died. Now the queues are back, and now you’re persona non grata for transfers again.

Get used to it.

I used to be on a T9 server, but transferred to a T2/3 server a year ago, then now got linked with a T9 server. I already have a lot of concerns about the pairings, but these are very initial concerns, it will change over time.

To me in a T2/3 server:
- I love it, because it means there’s more activity everywhere.
- Most of them are nice to play with so far, I haven’t met everyone yet though.
- However it also means we’re now “Full”, I understand that it’s so that there won’t be a mass server switch.

To T9 servers:
- There are hostilities against them, because they play differently than higher tiers. (I hear some are even unwelcomed. ) Hopefully this will be gone in the near future, by communicating and co-ordinating between the 2 servers.
- Some lower tier server players would rather fight with and against a lower number, instead of blobbing everywhere and fight against blobs.
- Huge queues on reset yesterday night, I don’t think it will happen for the whole week, but maybe some players aren’t used to that.

The reason why glicko (doing its job properly) is causing stagnation is because there simply aren’t enough entities being rated, and therefore different entities of similar performance are always going to be found right next to each other in the ratings. Ratings-based competition was never intended to work with such a small number of teams. There’s a reason why real world sports leagues don’t use ratings. And conversely, online video games aren’t real world sports, there’s no reason to limit competition to 24 teams. You ideally want thousands of rated entities, so that the rating system can have a healthy spread. Maybe thousands in this game isn’t practical for technical reasons, but certainly we can have a lot more than 24.

But there’s a conflicting issue. We want a more consistent WvW experience to all players (so fewer matchups with even population spread), but at the same time we want more matchup variety (so more matchups with population imbalance). The cause underlying both issues is in using “worlds” to delineate teams. Worlds, by definition, are arbitrary assignments of players to teams, without regard to their desires to compete or even to participate. This is patently absurd. Anet implemented WvW in this manner primarily for one big reason, and that reason has recently left the company. Now’s your chance to set things right. Please don’t waste any more time trying to balance one fundamental flaw against another. It’s well past time to fix WvW, by converting it to a GvG/Alliance system, as players had always expected and wanted from the game.

I am pleased that World Linking is a beta. It means there is a possibility that a so far negative experience gets evaluated and not necessarily continued in the way initially envisioned.

I think there’s probably metrics Anet has that show people went nuts after the Tuesday patch to get in and play, the idea of stoking that even further artificially by lumping together populations sounds like it wasn’t considered in light of the feeding frenzy begun just a few days before.

I’m pleased we had a dev running with our group last night, he’d have seen our pre-comped squad all made into swiss cheese with people stuck in LA or wherever for an hour or more… oops drag all the “not here yets” into squad 10. He’d have seen that when our commander had a disconnect, welp we won’t be seeing her for a couple hours, fortunately a good guy in the squad took charge and tagged up so we had an ele as the tag, still meant a couple dozen people whether guild group or folks tagging along were sorta “ok now what” for twenty minutes, other tag on the map was I think a non-English language guild group so a little harder to just switch channels and coordinate with that group.

Again, maybe it’s the sentiment that there’s a lot of die hards who “kept the light on” for WvW, we’re in most cases hugely pleased to see action action action (though it’s interesting to see some people intentionally picked low pop worlds preferring small group operations), it’s a bummer if now our favourite hangout has such a long line in front of it that forget about it, I wasn’t going to PvE anyhow (and won’t do something time/group sensitive like Fractals in case q pops), I may as well go to bed or go do something non-gamey.

I’ll still be playing, watching with interest how this all develops, but was definitely left with some level of concern last night that this super-full / super-queue thing is going to be bad. Maybe the die hards won’t be scared off but the people who were planning to dip in a toe will be? Guess it’s wait and see.

I started with a big ball of feedback but i deleted it. I think this says it all. and shows why people rage in both directions.

Back in the day you gave us the ability to transfer between servers. People transferred to the places they wanted to be. Even the people in the low tiers.

weather you liked big servers or small ones. we could choose.

All this update did was remove our ability to choose. Just give that back to us, and we’ll be fine.

I want to go back to my old server,
I want to go home.

I used to play on t5 server in europe and left because i didn’t like the blobbing so i went to a t9 server. After 3 months we had a nice growing community and were almost t7. It was a place where we could roam solo without problems had nice 20v20 fights. It was our home and our family which is now messed up because of the queue’s and blobbing. If i wanted that i would tranfer to the high tier servers. But us low tier servers lost our home and family now. So yeah thank for making us homeless and alone.

We worked hard for Underworld name, we almost got to tier 7 till Arena net kittened us over. We created a large community and now all hard work gonna disappear?
We liked in low tier, I was in T1 and T2 servers before, but I moved back to Underworld, coz I love the server.
Give us back Underworld !!!

Afther 3-4 years playing world vs world and fighting in name of your server….. they have killed my server….. so i would like to ask a refund for my 3-4 years of playing the game :) everysingle day…. because it was all time wasting…………………………………. The only thing wvw reall needed was a good wvw update…….. then u can see if people are accually coming back or not …….. afther the patch uw prim zerk went from 20-25 ppl to 40-50 ppl now we even linked with a already blobbed server …. well i want my time wasted in this game refund…..

Hi all,

Guild leader from Kaineng here; we’ve been on our server since launch, never transferred – we’re core WvW and have fierce pride in our server and our players. So, as you can imagine, server identity and a sense of community are important to us and part of what we love about GW2 and this game mode.

First, I’m pleased that Anet is paying attention to WvW and attempting to address the population issues. I also realize that this is Day One of the beta. However, I hope you take this early feedback to heart.

Being pushed to a T1-2 server might very well destroy our tight-knit and hitherto happy community, so this is a plea from the heart:

Server identity: The sense of server identity for the low tiers is being erased – we don’t show up when we cap, we are a hover-over on the WvW panel, basically we’ve been reduced to non-entities. This may not seem like a big thing but it’s noticeable and has a morale effect.

Playstyle: Guilds like ours stuck around on Kaineng for a specific reason; we don’t transfer up to higher tiers because we love our server and we like the playstyle – creating a system where 90% of the time WvW is zergs/blobs is going to drive many of us away.

Weekends: The queues are bad, although hopefully that will ease up. However, if there’s always a queue on the weekend nights, and if it’s always zergs and blobs those nights, the weekend warrior guilds like us are in trouble – this is when we get together to WvW and without that, well I have no idea what we’ll do.

Outcome: There are many Kaineng players (including me) that will have to stop playing WvW if this change stays. We’ve spent 3+ years playing this mode, learning it, loving it, fighting hard and building our guilds and our server up under tough circumstances. We’ve learned to stick with things through thick and thin, so when I post here please know it’s not idle whinging – I’m worried.

I thank you for listening, and we’ll stick around and see how this shakes out. If I have any advice to give, it would be to pair the lower tier servers or just put it back the way it was (again, not everyone WANTS to play on high pop maps – and I hope our voices matter too).

We have faith that Anet will listen to the players and help us enjoy our favorite mode with the friends we’ve made here.

Thanks for listening,

Nanesh of Kaineng

Rose Solane.1027:

1. In answer why these two servers are not linked: They are the two highest ranked English servers so that makes sense. PS is finally the number 1 server in Europe. It took us almost 4 years And yes, I play on PS (not a lot of WvW) so I am probably prejudiced.

Piken has always been the Number 1 server on EU, just not for WvW reasons!

To ET and other Low Population Servers thrown into High Population Servers

I come from IoJ and our server has been in the top (3 years ago) and then to the very bottom. I get the culture shock. IF you want to get in on reset with your guild-mates, make sure you are in a squad already; choose which BL you’re going to and as soon as it resets hop in. (Hint-avoid EB) We got 15+ players in right off the bat, and it took about 20 minutes on average for others to get in. After 2.5 hours most of the queues were gone. Reset nights are always the biggest nights, and it should all calm down soon.

One of the major WvW complaints has been not enough players & fights in WvW and this is the first step in fixing things. IoJ had been losing players mainly because of this and we’re not the only ones. Pairing up with a bigger server should not destroy your community, but hopefully most of us smaller servers will find a way to merge with them that adds to the game.

I don’t care for blobs but sometimes you have to team up to capture and defend, and some of those fights can be a lot of fun.

As for new partners ours (JQ) was friendly and we were invited into their TS. We stayed our own IoJ server for less confusion at this stage but, communicate, communicate, communicate.

As for servers who were paired with unsportsmanship like servers, hopefully it was just a few toxic players and not a toxic server, because no one can fix that. .

sionnach.5391:

Hi all,

Guild leader from Kaineng here; we’ve been on our server since launch, never transferred – we’re core WvW and have fierce pride in our server and our players. So, as you can imagine, server identity and a sense of community are important to us and part of what we love about GW2 and this game mode.

First, I’m pleased that Anet is paying attention to WvW and attempting to address the population issues. I also realize that this is Day One of the beta. However, I hope you take this early feedback to heart.

Being pushed to a T1-2 server might very well destroy our tight-knit and hitherto happy community, so this is a plea from the heart:

Server identity: The sense of server identity for the low tiers is being erased – we don’t show up when we cap, we are a hover-over on the WvW panel, basically we’ve been reduced to non-entities. This may not seem like a big thing but it’s noticeable and has a morale effect.

Playstyle: Guilds like ours stuck around on Kaineng for a specific reason; we don’t transfer up to higher tiers because we love our server and we like the playstyle – creating a system where 90% of the time WvW is zergs/blobs is going to drive many of us away.

Weekends: The queues are bad, although hopefully that will ease up. However, if there’s always a queue on the weekend nights, and if it’s always zergs and blobs those nights, the weekend warrior guilds like us are in trouble – this is when we get together to WvW and without that, well I have no idea what we’ll do.

Outcome: There are many Kaineng players (including me) that will have to stop playing WvW if this change stays. We’ve spent 3+ years playing this mode, learning it, loving it, fighting hard and building our guilds and our server up under tough circumstances. We’ve learned to stick with things through thick and thin, so when I post here please know it’s not idle whinging – I’m worried.

I thank you for listening, and we’ll stick around and see how this shakes out. If I have any advice to give, it would be to pair the lower tier servers or just put it back the way it was (again, not everyone WANTS to play on high pop maps – and I hope our voices matter too).

We have faith that Anet will listen to the players and help us enjoy our favorite mode with the friends we’ve made here.

Thanks for listening,

Nanesh of Kaineng

If there is one thing this test has done, it has brought all the lower tier servers to agreement. Just last match up myself and a few in my guild where cursing the guild of the gentleman/woman I am quoting and today I am standing in full agreement with him/her I am one of the last remnants of SoR’s old T1 days, there is a reason I am still on SoR and have not left for the imagined glory back in the top ranks.

I think many of us are in agreement, this is beta testing, we know our servers have died and needed some changes, but to this? Here are a couple of my thoughts for what they are worth…

-Go back to 24 servers.

-Remove the mega-server in all PvE cities except Lions Arch to allow server identity to grow, even at the expense of almost empty cities. Rest of PvE would remain on mega-server.

-In all lower tiers, (5 and down) in WvW you reinstate Alpine BL’s, smaller maps for smaller populations. This give Anet the added ability to utilize what has been made and also gives incentives to those in the top tiers who really enjoyed Alpine to move down in the ranks. Alpine maps are smaller and a much better fit to lower tiers.

-Make server transfers free for a short time frame, I know this is a gamble as it may do more harm then good, but we need the stability. After this initial transfer time, change the amount of Gems it takes to transfer, moving to T8 should almost be free, and increase in increments through Very High, close off transfers for Full servers. This is a quote straight from wiki… “Periodically, ArenaNet will offer incentives for players to transfer to lower population worlds, including waiving transfer costs.” I dont think I have ever seen a transfer fee waived or an incentive to move.

I think the added reward system was a huge plus and will bring some players in to at least try WvW

I know many of my guild which is PvX focused and run together in WvW, we will not be willing to just be a havoc group, on a T1 tier, and because of that we may not touch WvW as much as we had, or have planned if this remains the norm with large zergs everywhere.

The original game design of WvW was Capture and Hold, this is why PPT is calculated, in most of the top tier, PPT is a byproduct of nothing more then massive zerg fights. I want to see the impact that I make, and if not myself, then those following me and my guild when we go out into WvW. By forcing us to conform to the zerg does not aid in this concept.

Others have talked about merging just the smaller servers, this is an option but I recommend a system in which looks at active WvW players, maybe looks at who spends more then say 5 hours a week in WvW and make it fluid week to week or month to month to match up lower servers, if you lock it to current ranks, then you will continue to have the spread between T1 and TX divide more. Sure it adds some unknowns on resets as to what server you are going to be matched with, but its a change to prevent the degeneration of lower servers and people will adjust as its a minor issue as compared to 2+ hours queue if the remain the norm for a while.

These are all just ideas, I am not sure what the final solution will be and I am glad Anet is finally doing something to attempt to address it.

Lets see how a couple weeks of this plays out, Queues should come down, but I fear game play is forever changed by this for all of us that enjoy small scaled fights and tactics on taking objectives.

Rest of my T6-T8 friends, that are not pleased yet, lets give the beta some time, but know we are together on this.

Essays aren’t changing the fact that stubborn small town pride is misplaced in this, here and now.

Virtute.8251:

then that is how it should be, and you should be moving your guilds to the bottom of the board.

The reason a lot of us moved off of the lower tiered servers is because those servers made it very clear to any and all guilds/players that were wvw focused that we had no place there as part of the larger “community”. Especially if we had a desire to be competitive and win the matchups. Servers like BG, JQ, TC, YB, etc are the servers that welcomed the people who wanted to win and play on a more competitive level.

So unless those lower tier servers have a change of heart and want to be competitive and want to climb the ladders or stay in the top tiers why would we want to move back down and deal with all that frustration? Why would we want to hear how our “elitist” attitudes (aka competitive attitudes) aren’t welcome?

Kanebrake.6192:

The reason a lot of us moved off of the lower tiered servers

I know. I’m from old Anvil Rock, 2012. I’ve played in every tier, and in most NA servers.

The rest of it doesn’t matter. Deal with the one, or deal with the other.

Virtute.8251:

The beta is for confirming that the merger works. It’s not for confirming that the gameplay design decision is a correct one for most players. We already know the correct gameplay design choice in an MMOG: Force players together, by forcing them to play together or not play at all.

Kanebrake.6192:

Virtute.8251:

then that is how it should be, and you should be moving your guilds to the bottom of the board.

The reason a lot of us moved off of the lower tiered servers is because those servers made it very clear to any and all guilds/players that were wvw focused that we had no place there as part of the larger “community”. Especially if we had a desire to be competitive and win the matchups. Servers like BG, JQ, TC, YB, etc are the servers that welcomed the people who wanted to win and play on a more competitive level.

So unless those lower tier servers have a change of heart and want to be competitive and want to climb the ladders or stay in the top tiers why would we want to move back down and deal with all that frustration? Why would we want to hear how our “elitist” attitudes (aka competitive attitudes) aren’t welcome?

I’m sure you and your playstyle wouldn’t want to be forced to join a lower tier community (as you described) just as many of us from lower tiers don’t like being forced into the higher tiers (where we are losing our playstyle). Most of us are working to play with the higher tiered servers (Maguuma has been great on the BLs so far), but we enjoyed our 5v5 and 10v10 fights over the 50+ vs 50+. Playstyles differ, that’s not a bad thing, but it still sucks to deny us the choice.

ANet Developers,

Please consider doing a Google Search – “Reboot Base Map Mechanic”

Diku

Mistress Collisto.1546:

If there is one thing this test has done, it has brought all the lower tier servers to agreement. Just last match up myself and a few in my guild where cursing the guild of the gentleman/woman I am quoting and today I am standing in full agreement with him/her I am one of the last remnants of SoR’s old T1 days, there is a reason I am still on SoR and have not left for the imagined glory back in the top ranks.
I think many of us are in agreement, this is beta testing, we know our servers have died and needed some changes, but to this? Here are a couple of my thoughts for what they are worth…
Lets see how a couple weeks of this plays out, Queues should come down, but I fear game play is forever changed by this for all of us that enjoy small scaled fights and tactics on taking objectives.
Rest of my T6-T8 friends, that are not pleased yet, lets give the beta some time, but know we are together on this.

Thank you these great insights – yep, gentlewoman here and Owls salute you (I had a good laugh from your second sentence – we take this as a compliment and you all put up great fights!) We’ll stick it out and hope that our feedback is heard.

Essays aren’t changing the fact that stubborn small town pride is misplaced in this, here and now.

Server pride is unique to this game mode. I think it’s especially strong on the lower tiers, where you develop really strong bonds over the years and have had to fight against wild odds and put up with a lot of guilds coming and going. So, I don’t think it’s misplaced at all – I think it’s important and it keeps us coming back to this particular game over others.

I’m sure you and your playstyle wouldn’t want to be forced to join a lower tier community (as you described) just as many of us from lower tiers don’t like being forced into the higher tiers (where we are losing our playstyle). Most of us are working to play with the higher tiered servers (Maguuma has been great on the BLs so far), but we enjoyed our 5v5 and 10v10 fights over the 50+ vs 50+. Playstyles differ, that’s not a bad thing, but it still sucks to deny us the choice.

Thank you, exactly! Also Hi from Owls, GIT!

I think we’re ALL in favor of better population balance, but this beta may eradicate two unique WvW aspects: identity/community for many servers, and smaller group playstyles.

Thanks for the feedback, all.
Nanesh (Kaineng Forever!)

Virtute.8251:

Essays aren’t changing the fact that stubborn small town pride is misplaced in this, here and now.

If anything, the responses here are a great indication the community ties and server identification are still incredibly important motivators as to why people still play.

sionnach.5391:

Server pride is unique to this game mode.

Realm pride has always been a central feature of RvR. Server pride in WvW is as much a kittenization of realm pride as WvW is of RvR. This current form of it—the ever parroted “game mode”—is weakest in every one of the ways that would lend credibility to strongly held pride that approaches foolish patriotism.

sionnach.5391:

I think it’s especially strong on the lower tiers, where you develop really strong bonds over the years and have had to fight against wild odds and put up with a lot of guilds coming and going. So, I don’t think it’s misplaced at all – I think it’s important and it keeps us coming back to this particular game over others.

I agree in principle but not in fact. The facts of WvW design do not match the intent of your principle, and I believe that opinions to the contrary are foolish.

Jayne.9251:

Virtute.8251:

Essays aren’t changing the fact that stubborn small town pride is misplaced in this, here and now.

If anything, the responses here are a great indication the community ties and server identification are still incredibly important motivators as to why people still play.

Sure. It’s anthropologically interesting in the same way that any tribalism is.

Kanebrake.6192:

Virtute.8251:

then that is how it should be, and you should be moving your guilds to the bottom of the board.

The reason a lot of us moved off of the lower tiered servers is because those servers made it very clear to any and all guilds/players that were wvw focused that we had no place there as part of the larger “community”. Especially if we had a desire to be competitive and win the matchups. Servers like BG, JQ, TC, YB, etc are the servers that welcomed the people who wanted to win and play on a more competitive level.

So unless those lower tier servers have a change of heart and want to be competitive and want to climb the ladders or stay in the top tiers why would we want to move back down and deal with all that frustration? Why would we want to hear how our “elitist” attitudes (aka competitive attitudes) aren’t welcome?

The reason that I personally saw for not wanting the ‘elitist’ attitudes in their wvw, was because those in the same situation you are describing (not saying it is the reason for you seeing it against you but considering responses…) were expressing every negative connotation of ‘elitism’. I like to roam, and I dislike being on a zerg. Sometimes you do it but primarily I’d rather avoid it unless for a good fight, then I’m back to small group things after. Those playing like this don’t exactly like being told to get off a map or get on the tag because they aren’t contributing.

I’m going to stop here and state: As long as they are not standing around in WvW indefinitely doing nothing at all (continued in spoiler for space)

My concern even before reset was that the linked world would either feel (continued in spoiler to clean up large post)

It’s a beta test, yes, but it completely affects current(well current as of before reset) server identities and communities, and whatever comes out of this WILL have lots of short term, and most definitely, long term consequences. For good or bad, these effects will likely be irreversible, even if this test is ended in a few weeks.

Mypinkbunny.4513:

Everyone keeps telling me wvw supposed to be 80v80v80 massive zerg fights and back in the old days the queues where normal on most servers so suck it up. Im sorry but i started playing wvw a year ago and you rarely queue 2 maps let alone 4. In HOD and Ebay queue we had at least 150+ people waiting. Its reset night i dont mind a 10 man queue but when half you guild group cant even got on the same map and then get wipe by 60+ people it really does take the fun out of play with your guild. We need t5 and t6 back in na just so its a bit more spread out. Only 12 servers is stuipd and the queues are just going to worse if more people stay and people join the game. Im sorry i dont want to wait in queue for 4 hours to play wvw on reset night

Yeah because a year ago WvW had already died.. We are talking about the way it was 2 and 3 years ago. You are youngblood sit back and learn.

HeliosTheTurnt.8439:

Ariel.6291:

I couldn’t have said it any better.

I’m really happy that I’ve paid money to be forcibly removed from the place I wanted to be and put into a place that is as unplayable as most Early-Access Survival games on Steam. Here’s the kicker, on top of that, a lot of the people on the server we’ve been assimilated into are actually quite rude. I guess if I were a masochist that hated my own existence I would praise the patch. People being condescending to me and my friends, for free!

The WvW team must be history connoisseurs, this is a pretty accurate replication of the Americans colonization west into the US, converting or ending anything in their way.

Though I hate to break it to you, I don’t want your blobs and your salt. I prefer my cozy little land back on ET. This is honestly not fair. (inb4 Infraction because of the truth) Just don’t link T1 Servers, link smaller population servers with similar servers, so there is no culture shock that ensues.

Sincerely,
Some faceless ET dude

I’m very sorry you experienced salt. I promise that is not the majority. I welcome you and any ET to run with my guild as it would be fantastic to run with you all please be a bit patient with queues. reset nights are always like that. It dies out typically right after reset and i promise the changes of t1 fights and coordinating with other large groups can be a wonderful change if you keep an open mind. BG has no problem working with any of their new server mates and we hope we can be clear in aiding you in any accommodations. We are highly a guild oriented server, so we often queue maps with some of larger guilds. That also means we have specific raid times we can move around and avoid said queues. I think with some communication we can orient ourselves to work best together. That being said as a guild oriented server, if you get salt from someone with a guild tag. We police that. Many guilds will not stand for that blatant salt/rudeness, especially to our new oncoming allies. Let us know and we can deal with it accordingly to the situation.

-Mr Bear

As a former Underworld player and as a current Far Shiverpekean/Underworld hybrid, I approve of this change.

Maybe add more people who can be on a map because of the queues?

Queen of FA.7398:

Maybe add more people who can be on a map because of the queues?

Raising the cap would make the game unplayable because of lag issues.
More people = more lag.

Raising the cap not only would ruin the servers (you haven’t been in a tier 1 3 way fight, have you?) but make the blobs issue an even bigger one… It’s not logical.

If you want to play a reset night, this is how you do it (and the majority of veterans of WvW know this):

- Plan which BL you want to be on with your group. (Blue? Red? Green? EBG?)
- Mind that EBG is pug centric and will be the most queued (literally has been this way since the start of the game)
- Stand by the portal of your chosen BL.
- When it resets: spam that portal baby!
- Result: You’re in or you’re in the top of the queue.

If you’re late to the queueing, that’s your problem. Go play EotM and make it a real pvp game mode.

Plus this is literally day 1 of the most major core WvW change Anet has ever done. Deal with it :/

Jayne.9251:

Virtute.8251:

Essays aren’t changing the fact that stubborn small town pride is misplaced in this, here and now.

If anything, the responses here are a great indication the community ties and server identification are still incredibly important motivators as to why people still play.

If I wanted to play on Blackgate, I’d transfer to Blackgate. I was proudly Eredon Terrace; now, I am a faceless, nameless blobling on Blackgate. My boyfriend was also proudly ET but he has just quit the game, period, because of linking, as it has ruined his favourite game mode. I am incredibly disheartened by linking, and am also considering quitting as well, despite enjoying other modes.

This is the wrong way to deal with WvW. It is essentially a forced transfer that takes away any and all player agency. Go back to the old way and let players who want to transfer do so. At least that way, players can choose to join whatever style of server they wish. If you’re going to taker away players’ choice inside the game, they are going to choose to go outside the game. I would choose ET – with its “deadness”, low population and low tier standing but tight and welcoming community – over a “free” transfer to Blackgate or any other server any day. If you take away my ET, I have much less reason to stay and support the game. This WvW linking beta has soured all of the great features in the spring quarterly update. Please don’t let this idea ruin Guild Wars 2 for me.

Virtute.8251:

ArenaNet,

Everyone else—especially TC, BG, JQ, YB,

If your queues are punishing to the point of being unplayable, then that is how it should be, and you should be moving your guilds to the bottom of the board. Your queues are why we didn’t move into your servers when you were throwing gold at us for the past 3.5 years. Then we did move in when the queues died because the game died. Now the queues are back, and now you’re persona non grata for transfers again.

Get used to it.

You have no concept of loyalty, do you? Carpekitten is not a solution, it’s the problem. Server moves were a mistake from the get-go. If you want to play on another server, buy another account and start over. Without meaningful server loyalty what exactly is the point of “world versus world versus world”?

Virtute.8251:

sionnach.5391:

Server pride is unique to this game mode.

Realm pride has always been a central feature of RvR. Server pride in WvW is as much a kittenization of realm pride as WvW is of RvR. This current form of it—the ever parroted “game mode”—is weakest in every one of the ways that would lend credibility to strongly held pride that approaches foolish patriotism.

sionnach.5391:

I think it’s especially strong on the lower tiers, where you develop really strong bonds over the years and have had to fight against wild odds and put up with a lot of guilds coming and going. So, I don’t think it’s misplaced at all – I think it’s important and it keeps us coming back to this particular game over others.

I agree in principle but not in fact. The facts of WvW design do not match the intent of your principle, and I believe that opinions to the contrary are foolish.

Jayne.9251:

Virtute.8251:

Essays aren’t changing the fact that stubborn small town pride is misplaced in this, here and now.

If anything, the responses here are a great indication the community ties and server identification are still incredibly important motivators as to why people still play.

Sure. It’s anthropologically interesting in the same way that any tribalism is.

Antropologically interesting… Virtute, will you please get off your high horse?
1. Low tier playstyle is just as good as high tier playstyle, it is just different.

2. Yes, we have strong bonds in low tier servers, and that is especially because we see the same few people in WvW from day to day. High tiers in that regard are by their nature less prone to become a joyful community.

3. In the lower tiers those players with the same mindset gathered, those who weren’t interested moved away. Most of my friends who did move to another server, moved after WvW became dead, which was the result of HoT.

Also, I really do not think the ‘world linking’ is as kittenome people say it is, but I do want to see some changes to preserve our own server’s identity.

We want to cooperate with the bigger server, but we don’t want to be part of the bigger server.

Im sad to see these handful of ET people throwing their salt around as if it’ll make a difference. You should figure out you’re in an underwhelming minority of people who dislike the change when you are the ONLY NA people complaining in the whole thread.

I encourage you to talk to people in Blackgate, join them on WvW, ask them for help if you need to since all of BG’s guilds are open about cooperating with any and all ET people so we can have a nice time. Well at the very least be linked for the remainder of the beta so make the best of it.

To that handful of people who cant let the salt go? transfer off. Go try and chase your t8 dream which obviously doesnt exist anymore since even t4 people are reporting similar results in queues and map activity to what happened in t1. I wish you luck.

As an EU player who is not one of the severs paired with a lower tier server:

We have 18 servers still in the ranking and 9 that you basically scrapped. That could be fine in theory, but the moment you are on a sever with a moderately high WvW population and paired against a server with the same WvW population that was plused you will we fighting in the minority most of the time.

I’m Elona Reach (DE) and paired against Desolation +Vabbi. Yes, the Vabbi players aren’t as good as the Deso people. The problem I have atm is that it doesn’t matter how good they are if it’s 3 vs 1 in their favor.

I was trying to capture a camp today and two Vabbis came along. As a moderately skilled Wvw and PvP players I could hold my own against them … until a Deso popped up and I was dead. A variation of that scenario happened to me a few more times until I just gave up doing the daily solo and joined the 40 people queue for the Eternal Battlegrounds.

It’s a saturday so that’s fine, but what do I do on a weekday where I don’t have the time to queue or there is no map with a zerg to begin with? I understand that this is a beta, I’m just kinda scared that it will stay that way and WvW won’t be doable for me anymore unless my sever is the plused one.

And why is Deso that is listed as a “full” sever +1 with Vabbi vs. Elona and Riverside, which both only have “high” populations? What factors decide on the sever pairings? Is the actual WvW population taken into account or just the general population of the server?

I would appreciate a little transparancy on this.

Now that I think about it … why are severs that have a relatively high population paired with another server anyway? Wouldn’t the mid-level populated severs profit more of this?

Rasudido.6734:

Im sad to see these handful of ET people throwing their salt around as if it’ll make a difference. You should figure out you’re in an underwhelming minority of people who dislike the change when you are the ONLY NA people complaining in the whole thread.

I encourage you to talk to people in Blackgate, join them on WvW, ask them for help if you need to since all of BG’s guilds are open about cooperating with any and all ET people so we can have a nice time. Well at the very least be linked for the remainder of the beta so make the best of it.

To that handful of people who cant let the salt go? transfer off. Go try and chase your t8 dream which obviously doesnt exist anymore since even t4 people are reporting similar results in queues and map activity to what happened in t1. I wish you luck.

There’s no salt toward Blackgate. Linking’s just not what we want.

Sirendor.1394:

1. Low tier playstyle is just as good as high tier playstyle, it is just different.

We want to cooperate with the bigger server, but we don’t want to be part of the bigger server.

The entire point of what we are saying is that we want that “t8 dream which obviously doesnt exist anymore” [sic]. We’re not upset about having to play with Blackgate. We’re upset because linking has completely destroyed what we had when what we had was good for us!

I can’t help but think that 4 matches was too little for NA servers. It should have been reduced to 5 or 6.

Additionally, I was surprised to see IoJ and JQ paired up if these pairings were truly done with time-sliced activity levels considered.

Chaba.5410:

I can’t help but think that 4 matches was too little for NA servers. It should have been reduced to 5 or 6.

Additionally, I was surprised to see IoJ and JQ paired up if these pairings were truly done with time-sliced activity levels considered.

Or better, that the Dev’s didn’t account for “current” populations. After the leak, 8 or so Guilds left JQ and the population dropped heavily. The Dev’s didn’t account for it at all.

Ariel.6291:

I have been playing this game since pre-release on Eredon Terrace. In effect, by the changes you made tonight, you have taken our server away.

We had a great community and loved playing on our server. Now we don’t even have a borderland. In addition, you put us in a server that has so many people that we have been told there is no chance of getting in on reset night. You didn’t even make adjustments in how many people could be on a map. You did this without any input from us, without any warning and I feel your lack of allowing people who have been paying your salaries ANY input into something this important is a really incredibly bad business model.

I invite any developer who cares about this game, your customers, and who could consider the different modes of play to come that has grown out of the different server population sizes come and join us for a discussion of Eredon Terrace’s opinion of the changes. We would welcome you on our team speak to initiate a conversation.

There are better solutions to your population issues And since the server sizes are forcibly keeping your players from playing due to server OVER population, perhaps you should have considered going smaller NOT larger.

Please feel free to contact me should you care to discuss this further.

Thank you,
Ariel.6291

I agree with everything Ariel (Ursa) has said, and I have a few things to say myself.

The problem with linking servers like Eredon Terrace to Blackgate (or any low-tier server with another in the upper tiers) is that it potentially destroys ET’s sense of community while, at the same time, introducing even higher queue times to Blackgate. How anyone could have thought this was a good solution to low populations on the bottom-tier servers I’ll never know. A better solution would have been to link servers in the lower tiers, which would have roughly doubled the numbers those servers have while stopping smaller servers from simply being absorbed by much larger ones. This would have preserved the communities on the smaller servers that evolved out of necessity over the years (more on this below), and those servers would have felt like they were contributing, because each one in the linked pair would be bringing roughly the same numbers to the matchup.

I realize that ArenaNet likely has no idea what sort of communities have grown on servers like Eredon Terrace, so I’ll talk about our server for a moment. Most of us know one another, care about one another, and have become friends. We meet regularly on TeamSpeak to talk about WvW strategy. We host server-wide events, organized by our guilds, with prizes. Negativity is kept to a minimum because we’re a relatively small community. Those who attack others find very quickly that it goes over like a lead balloon, so arguments are almost non-existent, and we tend to work together regardless of guild affiliation. The point is that we’re a tight, friendly community because it was necessary to be friendly and helpful. We didn’t have the numbers to ignore one another, and most of us (all of us?) felt this made us stronger. And queue times… what are those? We’d heard of them, and almost all of us would say we didn’t want to be on the higher tiers where we had to deal with them. Most of the guilds that left ET over the years would avoid the high tiers, preferring instead to find a server that had more players, but not so many that they had to deal with queues.

(For an example of one of our server-wide events, have a look at “A Scandal in Eredon Terrace”, the “mystery night” event all our guild leaders hosted a while back — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2ZTGq3iZX0 — We’ve had many of these events on our server, ranging from larger, more elaborate events to smaller, more impromptu events, over the years, and we are currently hosting an event once a month.)

We on Eredon Terrace feel that we’ll simply be swallowed whole by Blackgate. We can’t play on reset night anymore (something we really enjoyed, because there’s obviously a lot of energy on the first night, so it was considered a server-wide event we’d all participate in; we’d meet prior to reset, go over the plan, and head out together). Further, this linking of servers is actually worse than merging them. Separate voice chat. Separate communities. We feel like guests on Blackgate, not like part of the same community.

“TylerB” said (on Reddit) that he expects “WvW will be a whole lot more exciting for those smaller servers. Like most changes, there are potential tradeoffs … we believe more players will benefit from the change than be hurt by it.” (source: https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/4fjrxt/we_are_the_gw2_dev_team_here_to_chat_with_you/d29n0az) You’re missing the point, Tyler. You could have taken a different approach and preserved what we liked about the lower tiers while also increasing numbers. Those two ideas are not at odds with one another. Why didn’t you ask us? It’s obvious that no one making this decision has been to ET. We would have told you what we thought would work, and it’s not much different than what you did, so it wouldn’t have been technically impossible.

Had ArenaNet chosen instead to merge servers on the lower tiers, Eredon Terrace would have been on equal footing with our new servermates. We’d have had an equal say in the direction of the server, we’d have welcomed our new friends, and we’d have worked with them as allies. We had hoped to do that with Blackgate as well, and Eredon Terrace met to discuss this a few times this past week. Last night, however, 95% of the comments we saw from Blackgate players mocked us and the number of people we were able to contribute to the WvW effort. We hope they are a minority, as Mr. Bear has promised in another comment, but the minority seemed to those with a welcoming attitude. I understand this. Look, we’re increasing your queue times. I wouldn’t be happy if I were you, either. I don’t take it personally at all, but comments like the ones we saw from your players last night would have been shut down by everyone else on ET if we heard them. Our guilds don’t allow it, and when we see it, we speak up immediately. Two different communities, I guess.

I realize that the community created on Eredon Terrace, born out of necessity, was probably an accident in ArenaNet’s eyes. For years now, ArenaNet has done absolutely nothing about the unbalanced populations. Several suggestions have been made over the years (e.g., merging lower tiers, making server transfers free for a short time to give guilds on higher tiers a chance to try lower tiers without worrying about the cost of changing their minds, etc), but no action was taken. So Eredon Terrace made it work for our players as best as we could. Aside from the low player numbers, we liked what we had.

Now, ArenaNet has decided to throw us into tier one. Why? Do you think we stayed in the lower tiers because we couldn’t afford the gems to transfer? Do you think it was merely about loyalty to ET? We’ve had guilds leave and return over the years. It’s not about that. We stayed here because we never wanted to be in the higher tiers. We don’t want queue times (what a terrible waste of an evening and our time). Further, we’ve learned to play a slightly different game on the lower tiers than they play above us, and that’s why we stayed. We liked it. Sure, we wanted more players, but ArenaNet had other options that would have preserved, for the most part, the sort of communities and gameplay we like in the lower tiers while also adding more players. Instead, you threw us into tier one without notice.

Is Blackgate happy about this? Were you guys desperate for more players? Were you begging ArenaNet to sent ET to fight alongside you? Now you have even higher queue times, so ArenaNet has made that issue worse for you. This was simply a bad decision all around. Had ArenaNet asked the community — their customers — what they wanted, I’m positive this solution wouldn’t have ever come up or would have been pushed to the bottom of the list. And, yes, ArenaNet, we are your customers, and you’re making a bad business decision here. We’ll be the ones buying your expansions. We buy gems. We trade our money and time for a service, we expect to be heard when we have complaints, and we expect you to take everything into consideration when you attempt to resolve those complaints. You let this population problem persist for years, and then you didn’t listen to other ideas or ask us how we felt when you chose to merge Eredon Terrace with Blackgate. Instead, you solved one problem (server populations on lower tiers) and created several new problems.

To my friends on Eredon Terrace, the time to remain silent is over. Be heard by posting your comments to this thread. Many of you may not know what to say. You may feel that others have already said it. Do not let this stop you from saying something — anything — about the way you feel. Everyone on ET (and Blackgate) who doesn’t like what they see right now needs to speak up immediately and add their voices. Otherwise, ArenaNet will assume that it’s just a small minority of players who have a problem with this, and Tyler will tell us that the majority of players are happy with the change because the complaints are minimal. What I heard last night on TeamSpeak paints a different story. Not a single ET player seemed happy.

As Ariel has said, we welcome anyone from ArenaNet to our TeamSpeak server to discuss this matter further. We’d be happy to tell you more about our server, the way we play your game, what we’ve come to love about it, and why we’re unhappy about this change.

Thank you for your time.

Regards,
Xander
The Forgers of Orr [TFoR]

I have made another post on another forum about this, but after being able to log into Blackgate today , running with the tags, seeing faces that I have seen on ET before that have had the chance to follow me on ET and know what we are coming from felt good.

I was mad last night and I know a lot of my fellow ETers are still mad but I am willing to give this a shot and help try to bridge that network between BG and ET.

Lets GO BGET or Black Terrace.

Foust

Dominus.7013:

Had ArenaNet chosen instead to merge servers on the lower tiers, Eredon Terrace would have been on equal footing with our new servermates. We’d have had an equal say in the direction of the server, we’d have welcomed our new friends, and we’d have worked with them as allies. We had hoped to do that with Blackgate as well, and Eredon Terrace met to discuss this a few times this past week. Last night, however, 95% of the comments we saw from Blackgate players mocked us and the number of people we were able to contribute to the WvW effort.

Really do you have any evidence of Blackgate mocking you or anyone from ET?

I ask because the server as a majority has been waiting for the link so we can cooperate with the linked server (we frankly didnt care if who it was). Most if not all of our guilds are willing to share builds, resources and even open recruitment for people in ET if they wish to join and play with a BG guild. We also already discussed how to handle ET when it came to community decisions for WvW and even that was decided that you got as much a say as any BG guild (and before you say something: guild size has never made any difference when it came down to agreeing on something for BG)

I dont even know who in BG would “mock” the amount of people you can contribute because frankly we have multiple more than a couple small guilds of 5-10 players who roam around and do their own thing away form the large guilds. Guess what we love and support them as much we can because what they do is really helpful.

Your post just seems like a convenient story to show the ‘horrors’ of world linking in an attempt to justify your attitude.