Guild Wars 2

It has been a couple of years since I have actively played GW2, but now that I am back I am enjoying working a new class from the start, heading towards lvl 80 and then re-exploring WvW. As excited as I am about getting back into WvW, I have read quite a few threads containing much unhappiness with, what I viewed prior to GW2’s initial Lauch, as the main focus of the game for many people.

The main concerns I have noticed were with Server Pop, Night Capping and lack of Contact with enemy forces at times.

The idea that has crossed my, currently not truly up to date on GW2, mind is this:

Why not make each borderland completely unbreachable by opposing servers UNLESS they control Stonemist castle?
Once controlled and the servers banner is placed, (here comes the theatrics) a cut scene (Exit option included) would take over and 2 beams of light (colored for the Borderland controlling Stonemist Castle) would shine forth striking the Portals of the other 2 servers Borderlands. Once struck, the portals would take on the hue of the controlling Borderland showing access for that server to the enemy lands.

Now, ONLY the defenders of an individual Borderland and the oppressors controlling Stonemist Castle have access through those portals. No more 2v1 on a defenders home turf. (STOP, don’t nay say until you have reviewed the reasons for this)

Reason One: This keeps more focus on battling in EB than in the Borderlands prior to first control of Stonemist Castle being established since no one will be able to invade the other territories due to no portal access. This would make pockets of fighting easier to find with everyone on the same map. (Quite a few threads stating people having issues with the lack of enemy contact with everyone spread all over the place)

Reason Two: A controlling server now has some choices to make: Stay and defend their newly ill gotten gains. Split their force into two or three smaller forces to defend as well as take one or two of the other borderlands. Yes, same as before but there will be a noticeable difference, they have the reward of not worrying about defending their homeland as their portal will not allow access for the other two Borederlands to invade unless they first seize control of Stonemist castle.

If they split their force into two to defend and attack one of the Borderlands, the Third Borderland will focus on retaking EB as they cannot invade through the Second or First Borderlands gates. if they focus on a two Borderland front, they may spread themselves very thin and chance being overrun in smaller groups, as the Second or Third Borderlands won’t be sidetracked by making stabbing strikes into each others territories. (Yes, I am capitalizing First Second and Third as well as Borderland in an attempt to show proper nouns instead of adding specific server names as example, forgive me)

Reason Three: An invaded server has only to focus on pushing the First Borderland out without losing territory to the Third as well. With the Third Borderlands forces being barred from entry through the portal, that leaves less forces to sweep up in clearing out the enemy.

Reason Four: This should keep night capping down to being focused on EB, or in the least only dealing with one night capping server at a time, the one currently in control of Stonemist Castle. (Spoils to the victor)
In essence, a forced treaty is imposed on the Second and Third Borderlands, although in EB all is fair game.

In my opinion, and I’m sure everyone will have their own view on this, not having the opportunity to invade an unbreachable Borderland will cut the choices to be made, assisting in more focused groupings towards the main objectives.

This will cut out on Borderland Three hitting Borderland Twos territory after Borderland One has pillaged it, and sucker punching the beaten server for easy points.

Two servers keeping pressure on the oppressive Goliath server may just help balance WvW out.

Now I am not fooling myself into thinking this will knock out the night capping “issue” or correct server pop imbalances, but it may give the underdogs a fighting chance.

Also, this is just a base idea, I have not take into account for WvW game mechanics in any way. World exploration may and completion may be a little more difficult as your server will have to take StoneMist Castle at some point to allow your population to explore other Borderlands. Etc Etc and so on.

I appreciate your time in reading my idea, I apologize if this idea has been brought to light before but it is a large forum and I do not wish to explore it all to make sure I haven’t posted a “Johnny come lately”.

Tweaks and constructive feedback is welcomed and appreciated. The purpose of this post is NOTto “Fix” WvW or “Make It More Fun”. Those views differ from player to player. I a, merely searching for a way to hopefully push the odds in our favor for more frequent encounters without having to traverse each and every map to do so, with a possible result of a renewed interest in WvW for those who have left.

Thank you,

Daemonne

P.S. if you just view it as a wall of text then the topic probably didn’t interest you enough to review the details. :-)

There are times when my server has been in a match-up dominated by another much more populated server. Usually when this happens the stronger server takes EB and holds this and their own borderlands as a minimum. They then pillage the remaining borderlands whenever they get bored.

Your proposal would mean a smaller server would not even be able to sneak into another borderlands to gain any points – we’d have no choices at all – fight in our BL, or try to take Stonemist against superior numbers.
A server dominating like this would only need to take and hold Stonemist to guarantee winning the match-up. Sorry but I think your suggestion would make it easier for a larger server to dominate a match and that’s not helpful.

You said that you’ve only recently returned to WvW after an absence. You may have missed the fact that we no longer have a “home” borderlands at all. Each BL map is like EB now with an area we’re supposed to defend, and push out from there into enemy territory. This is why the side keep WP are not accessible to you on what used to be your home BL, even if you control the keep. I think the idea was to bring three way fights to each Desert Borderlands but in the lower tiers all it did was split an already small defending force up, not sure how it plays out in the higher tiers.
I know this is a different issue and don’t want to interrupt your thread – just thought I’d mention it because currently Anet is trying to get every server to be active on every map even when they don’t have enough players.

Yuffi.2430:

You said that you’ve only recently returned to WvW after an absence. You may have missed the fact that we no longer have a “home” borderlands at all. Each BL map is like EB now with an area we’re supposed to defend, and push out from there into enemy territory. This is why the side keep WP are not accessible to you on what used to be your home BL, even if you control the keep. I think the idea was to bring three way fights to each Desert Borderlands but in the lower tiers all it did was split an already small defending force up, not sure how it plays out in the higher tiers.
I know this is a different issue and don’t want to interrupt your thread – just thought I’d mention it because currently Anet is trying to get every server to be active on every map even when they don’t have enough players.

I did not realize that. Good to know.

Small servers are always going to be an issue. I don’t believe they will ever solve that short of combining servers into factions as I noticed one poster suggest.

I still die a little inside from back when they allowed all of those servers.

I poked my head into the WvW zones for a bit. Ran around a few territories and saw only NPCs. Hopefully later tonight during prime-time Ill see more activity. It’s just so saddening.

It’s good to put forward ideas. It would be even better if we as a community could have some sense of being involved in the development of WvW.

Good luck in finding the fights and fun you seek. The new maps feel bigger and you can easily miss other players because the maps are so convoluted – they look empty but there may be a few people scattered around. It does seem a bit of a haunted wasteland though doesn’kitten

Yuffi.2430:

There are times when my server has been in a match-up dominated by another much more populated server. Usually when this happens the stronger server takes EB and holds this and their own borderlands as a minimum. They then pillage the remaining borderlands whenever they get bored.

Thats so true. We have been in the matchups against servers with much more players for very long time now. Some weeks SM never flips even once. The EB is always first to go and the idea suggested in this thread would mean we can’t even attempt to take anything in other BL maps. Or, you know, be spawnganked forever at EB.

Throttling the number of maps based on certain situations has been suggested many, many times before. It would require more balanced maps though (EB, EoTM). A “border” wouldnt work.

Thats why I sometimes wish Anet would have gone all the way with desert instead of making it a kitten version that no one likes. Imagine “desert EB” with garri in the center instead of oasis and an additional keep up north. This would easily have facilited closing/opening of maps, focusing population and restricting rampant PPT.

Ok now imagine its 8pm and all the guilds come in. Where do they go?
To EBG with 70 man queue? To home border that has no invaders?
Not every server is starved of population u know, even as gandara we frequently have queues in borderlands in primetime when guilds have raids. By this fact alone, your idea is not to be even considered.

I saw a queue once, two years ago. Only once though. Back then I leveled all my characters to 80 in WVW. In fact, I never finished the map completion or story on any character. I just did WvW. WvW was in bad shape back then. It’s a dead zone these days.

“all the guilds come in” made me laugh tbh. The highest number of players I’ve seen of late (friend and foe included) was 9 in anything other than EotM. Even there it’s poorly balanced and sporadic.

Except that the tactivators in SMC make this idea not that great because whoever owns SMC will likely drop a ton of tactics into it even more so than now.

Cloaking Waters is rather broken and Airship defense is still rather broken (was around 10k damage before).

Attacking a borderland gives the enemy team multiple choices: defend their borderland, counter-attack your borderland, or stay in EBG.

Ok – I like what you’re trying to get at with this idea, and it does a good job at preventing 2v1s, but there’s a few hitches.

First, what happens to the people on an enemy BL when they lose SM?

Second, what about the WvW guild missions that become complicated without enemy assets to cap? The 10 sentries in 15 minutes one is going to be almost impossible if you can only go to EB.

Third, there are still a few servers where two maps is not enough at reset or primetime. What are all the other players supposed to do?

Half the bloody Guild Missions are constantly bugged anyway.

at this moment the new WvWvW system is being tested out. We should have news by april and a release in june.

ifelldown.5426:

I saw a queue once, two years ago. Only once though. Back then I leveled all my characters to 80 in WVW. In fact, I never finished the map completion or story on any character. I just did WvW. WvW was in bad shape back then. It’s a dead zone these days.

“all the guilds come in” made me laugh tbh. The highest number of players I’ve seen of late (friend and foe included) was 9 in anything other than EotM. Even there it’s poorly balanced and sporadic.

Im realy sorry you are on low pop server, but even on gandara and we are rank 9, we get occasional queue on borderlands, sometimes not only made by guilds but by a good commander that just felt inspiration to tag up there. Not to suggest desert borderlands are good, but its still better to get fights and wait for EBG there instead of waiting in LA for EBG queue to pop.

As for situation 2 years ago, we were having queue on every map every primetime. Acctuly roughly until stability change.