World population is visible on the labels on the World Selection and Transfer screen. It determines whether you can transfer to a world and, if you can, how much the transfer will cost. These measures historically have been set based on aggregate population levels around all game modes. But because World versus World is the only game mode to which worlds apply these days, we have developed a better model that exclusively uses WvW data to determine population levels and transfer costs.
We will be rolling out the new model soon and some shifts in the population levels should be expected. We’ll continue to monitor the situation, and we’ll make all adjustments we deem necessary to improve the WvW experience. As always, your feedback is very welcome.
This is welcome news. T2 has been crippled by the current methodology with SOS full for quite some time and yet not able to field the #s in wvw that the other t2 servers can…..
While you’re at it could you please redesign the scoring and reward system into something more involving?
For example instead of having just a server winning at the end of the week, PPT could reset on a daily basis with a reward and at the end of the week the server that won the most days wins a greater reward.
Also you could have 1 pts per kill if your server is first, 2 pts per kill if second, and 3 points per kill if last. This would help to keep the scores closer together and give a chance to the losing server to catch up. You could then have a personal reward for 100 kills in a day, 250, 500, etc.
I just spent 1000 gems transfering last week (And only because I wanted to play on EU, now that my NA friends have all quit the game). Any chance of a refund on those gems ?
While you’re at it could you please redesign the scoring and reward system into something more involving?
For example instead of having just a server winning at the end of the week, PPT could reset on a daily basis with a reward and at the end of the week the server that won the most days wins a greater reward.
Also you could have 1 pts per kill if your server is first, 2 pts per kill if second, and 3 points per kill if last. This would help to keep the scores closer together and give a chance to the losing server to catch up. You could then have a personal reward for 100 kills in a day, 250, 500, etc.
While slightly off topic…. I like these ideas… The personal rewards could be like the tracks in pvp…… You want that Arah or Coe armor / weapons (even if just for the skin) – earn it in wvw if that is your preferred game mode……
Thanks. Now, I do acknowledge the fact that it is very hard to “measure” wvw activity as opposed to just residents but it is a good start as it is a difficult undertaking.
This will definitely help combat half the problem that megaservers may have created for wvw, the 2nd half would be to deal with intra-server communication, but one thing at a time, of course. Slow and steady > rushed as previous experience has dictated.
For once you have tasted flight you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skywards,
for there you have been and there you will long to return.
Yup. Can’t wait to see the population numbers. I don’t plan on transfering, but I am really curious on the pop counts (hopefully they give a little bit on how the number is calculated).
Will there be a period of free or very low cost transfers to allow for a slight rebalance of population etc?
Will there be any free transfers, for example to the bottom 3 servers?
There is no plan to change the price per population tier at the moment. We’ll be looking closely at how players are moving/joining World, however. The goal is a better balance, but not a too sudden disruption either.
World population is visible on the labels on the World Selection and Transfer screen. It determines whether you can transfer to a world and, if you can, how much the transfer will cost. These measures historically have been set based on aggregate population levels around all game modes. But because World versus World is the only game mode to which worlds apply these days, we have developed a better model that exclusively uses WvW data to determine population levels and transfer costs.
We will be rolling out the new model soon and some shifts in the population levels should be expected. We’ll continue to monitor the situation, and we’ll make all adjustments we deem necessary to improve the WvW experience. As always, your feedback is very welcome.
See you in the Mists,
— Samuel
Thank you so much!!! You cannot possibly know how much this means to the WvW only communities each server has built in T2 we have been crushed and demoralized for months by the megaserver system, Its absolutely awesome for PvE but when we cant get players/guild that want to move to a higher tier we create problems.
Take for example SoS which is primarily PvE yet we are in T2 WvW FULL, then we have YB NOT FULL gaining 10 guilds and skyrocketing glicko into T1, meanwhile T1 Guilds are flooding to YB since its NOT FULL.
The problem created a massive imbalance in WvW way back when Tournys were announced, people flooded the top servers and crushed the low servers an issue that could never be fixed by the players, and for the PvE community it would cost them REAL MONEY to fix an issue they didnt care about.
We may not always be happy with the Devs but I believe they are truely looking out for us listening and working on how to make this game what we love, it just may take a while but in the end its always been worth it.
Will there be a period of free or very low cost transfers to allow for a slight rebalance of population etc?
Will there be any free transfers, for example to the bottom 3 servers?
Less populated servers should cost less money but making them free would be very bad for WvW.
Can’t emphasize this enough. Lower cost transfers to lower populated servers is great. Free transfers would be disastrous. There’s just way too much instability caused by making transfers free.
Edit: Forgot to say, thank you Samuel, this is a fantastic change, very much appreciated.
This will be very interesting because some servers have been “Full” merely due to their PvE activities (they were even Full during this golem week when maps were often empty). It’ll be interesting to see how many other servers will get up there once they start to only count WvW activities.
Thanks for this, but please start to work on better server matchups to prevent/fix stale matchups. Particularly NA T1 & T2 issues.
Nice to see a dev posting here, but I dont see how this will change anything in wvw :/
If the determined population levels truly reflect actual WvW server population fairly well, this could be a tremendous change. Having lower (not free, but lower) transfer costs to lower population servers offers a tremendous incentive to players and guilds looking to transfer to transfer down, not up. This has the potential to significantly even out populations across servers over time. It’s not a panacea, but it could go a long way toward fixing problems with population balance.
i have mixed feelings
it is great to see such a change after much complains for a year, after some server die or dying due to it…
at the same time, feeling sad that all those problems that have arise from it could have been long avoided.
i assume the pricing will be following the old like “Low” = free?
i wonder which server you guys are using as baseline for the population calculation, which server has the highest wvw pop?
Nice to see a dev posting here, but I dont see how this will change anything in wvw :/
If the determined population levels truly reflect actual WvW server population fairly well, this could be a tremendous change. Having lower (not free, but lower) transfer costs to lower population servers offers a tremendous incentive to players and guilds looking to transfer to transfer down, not up. This has the potential to significantly even out populations across servers over time. It’s not a panacea, but it could go a long way toward fixing problems with population balance.
Perhaps but who would those guilds fight? It’s so kitten empty on the low tier that I would not go there even if it was free.
EDIT: guess it would be better to let everyone a cost change is potentially coming as well, in case anyone wants to hold off that long enough before transferring.
Another derailing post. ^^ North Keep: One of the village residents will now flee if their home is destroyed.
“Game over man, Game Over!” – RIP Bill
If NA is smart, it’ll take this opportunity to emulate EU and spread out for the fights — not the blue ribbon (which is meaningless now).
You’re giving us far to much credit, we’re not that smart.
Sad but true . NA really needs to stop with the super-stack nonsense but now its been going on for so long that even if we manage to use this opportunity to move in the right direction the Glicko wont let us feel the results in a manner that will properly reinforce the use of logic and it will end with us returning to our bad habits before any sense of stability can be achieved. >.<
Good news, let Adam Smith come up with something dynamically changing the price demand/supply based.
Now that could be very interesting indeed.
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Will there be a period of free or very low cost transfers to allow for a slight rebalance of population etc?
Will there be any free transfers, for example to the bottom 3 servers?
There is no plan to change the price per population tier at the moment. We’ll be looking closely at how players are moving/joining World, however. The goal is a better balance, but not a too sudden disruption either.
Thank you for the response. I’ll look forward to the details.
Indeed it is, though without a change in the transfer costs, it still does nothing to prevent server stacking on its own.
I can understand why they’re doing it this way though, as it will give them a better idea of exactly how the transfer costs need to be adjusted. I just hope that it doesn’t take them another two years to figure that one out. :P
I don’t think it’ll affect WvW much actually, though. People try to get into the high tier WvW worlds and jump the lesser ones anyways.
Some servers are full status yet the wvw population has dropped making it harder for them to recruit more wvw players.. Wouldn’t say this change is to change wvw just make it easier for servers with full status to recruit again.
Will be interesting to see which servers actually stay at full status if any..
NA really needs to stop with the super-stack nonsense but now its been going on for so long that even if we manage to use this opportunity to move in the right direction the Glicko wont let us feel the results in a manner that will properly reinforce the use of logic and it will end with us returning to our bad habits before any sense of stability can be achieved. >.<