Guild Wars 2

The concept of this thread has been sparked by SpaceLord.4590. This thread serves to be our first attempt at giving Newbies information on how to be a productive and successful individual in World vs World.

Hello and welcome to WvW. The first thing I would suggest is leaving WvW if you’re going to be AFK for more than a few minutes. Spots can be valuable and anyone who is away for a prolonged period of time takes up a valuable slot because of the population cap.

Know your class. Open up your traits book and really examine them. See what builds might be better geared for WvW if you’re getting smashed easily. Examine your skill point utilities. There are a lot of situational skills that you won’t need all the time but knowing what you have on hand will allow you to switch out utilities in times of need and really bringing something to the table. Look at your weapon skills, that is one of the most important parts of WvW. Knowing what weapons give you what abilities. Again, situations will call for individuals to step forward and take charge.

Step up and be an individual. The zerg will always be there. Armed with the knowledge of your class you can step out of the zerg and really -mess- things up for the enemy. Here are some examples:

Thieves should contest enemy waypoints when in enemy lands. Hit the door a few times, pop Shadow Refuge, and get the heck out of there. Bam. Longer time before reinforcements arrive.

Mesmers have a really important role. Portal Bombing. Commanders will ask everyone to stack up on. They will need a mesmer who knows what they’re doing to drop a portal entrance and then the exit close or in the objective whether and enemy or not. Currently the portal mechanic is lame and seriously messes up the AoE of an enemy force. However once fixed Portals will still be important. If your side has Golems they are precious. You will be able to distinguish yourself from the herd by dropping portals which GREATLY increase golem survivability, travel time, and over all contributes to your team.

Elementalists should carry a focus I believe. You use swirling winds to protect siege from enemy artillery. A band of dedicated elementalists can seriously cripple enemy offensives on keeps by timing their swirling winds to prevent trebbing.

See? There are plenty of things you can be doing to really help out your team and speaking of helping the team lets talk communication. “SoS inc Stonemist”. This isn’t useful. You’re letting us know there are SoS inc to Stonemist but you need to specify -how many- or at the very least a rough estimate. Don’t go and get yourself killed trying to find out, but try to get a good grasp. Be clear on team chat. You’ll enable commanders to move appropriate forces to locations where they are needed instead of fending off a five man party with a 30 man army.

Read, read, read, and read team and map chat some more. You need to have a good understanding of what is going on. You can mindlessly follow the zerg but they often will just hivemind into some foolish objective that can’t be won. A commander screaming in map for you to move back is asking you to do so for a -reason-. Read the channels, follow the commanders.

Speaking of reading and following. It is amazing that technology has allowed us to play video games with people all around the world. But they’re just that. For instance Stormbluff Isle has an amazing amount of Koreans. A lot of them do not speak English and often we do not speak Korean. If you have an international force present with you and you speak their language, you can coordinate with foreign commanders and help bridge the gap left by language. However, don’t go wild if they’re not listening to your English demands. You’re frustrated trying to tell them to maybe run to Garrison or something, but they’re likely just as frustrated trying to figure out what you’re saying. Often from what I’ve seen on SBI the Koreans have commanders who’re bilingual and are able to coordinate though. I find this to be a really important part to WvW and understanding that your community is so vast that you’re not going to be able to get everyone to understand you.

Do you know what a zerg is? No, not the giant mass of players. The Starcraft race that swarms over everything. They’re guided by overlords. Chances are you’re neither a literal zerg nor are you telepathic. So when you’re part of a zerg (group of players) rush, you still need to maintain a situational awareness. Don’t follow the horde into arrow carts and ballistas and they will run in there to be sure. Often commanders act as overlords and yet still fail to command because people aren’t paying attention and getting themselves slaughtered. Don’t be a goober, no one likes goobers, my friend! Pay attention to the commander icon, what they ask, and move along accordingly.

Edited: Zergs are a race from Starcraft, not SC2 necessarily, sorry Air! ;P

When placing defensive siege, unless it is a ballista, make sure you place the siege on the inner most edge of the wall in the keep/tower. This protects the siege from most conventional AOE attacks and ensures it lasts longer.

When placing a catapult, please make sure you take into account that you also want to be able to throw a stone OVER the gate rather than just onto the gate. This helps you be able to defend against a potential catapult on your gate AS WELL as rams next to the gate.

my 2cents

supplies – Never run around with none, but do NOT take them from the towers/garrissons supplies unless the commander tells you to do so. These supplies are needed for upgrading and defense. Take supplies from the suppliecamps. Protect the Dollies, they are essential.

Good iniative. +1

/bow

/Osicat

So you’ve read up on your skills, you’ve got your favorite sword out, you’ve got those amazing utilities slotted and look at that. BananaBob commander is leading you to a tower and with you are twenty-nine other people. So you get to the tower and you attack the door, right? Wrong. First part of tower taking is realizing you suck. Yep. You, good sir, suck. At least in comparison to the door which is like a honey badger on steroids, your shiny awesome sword of pwn is worthless to it.

You are going to see build sites where people lay ram blueprints right in front of the door. You should run up and build those because those rams are the Chuck Norris of honey badgers and he does not give a rats batooy about doors. If you are out of supply you need to get more. Realistically, you should always be hitting up supply camps. No one tries to take keeps these days without flipping supply camps.

If the supply camp is empty and you’re in need of supplies really bad waypoint back to your keep. Chances are if you’re WPing back into the keep its got everything it needs and has a stockpile of supply. If not, DO NOT take supply from it or anywhere else but the supply camp. Seriously, do not take supplies from towers or keeps especially if they’re upgrading but it is poor taste to do it regardless.

So you’re supplied up and ready to go. In most cases the the door will break and you’ll charge in and swarm the place. For credit on flipping objectives stand in the circle where the lord was slain (usually they’re killed right by where they originally stood). The tower flips and you’re off to another objective right? No. Everyone should be Mesmer sweeping. I mentioned the portals earlier, they can and will portal everyone back into the keep and you’ll just be out of luck. Also CHECK FOR EMOTES. * invader has gone to sleep, or something akin to that usually means a mesmer is playing dead nearby. This isn’t done in towers but in keeps where there are a lot of land to hide on they do this to look dead.

Once the tower is taken assist with supplying blueprints for siege weapons. If you’re especially patient, go to a supply camp and escort the Dolyak to the tower/keep to ensure a steady amount of supply is granted to the tower/keep for quick upgrades. It is essential but a little boring at times.

Upgrading. There is an “order” to upgrading. Build the door first. NOT the oil. I’ll explain in a little why not. Then upgrade the walls, add cannons, fortify and then build a waypoint if you have the cash and what is being upgraded is your keep. Everything else can be added later. 2 workers upgrade is handy as well as it speeds up the process of upgrading.

The order of destruction when assaulting any objective is:

Guards (quick kills), cannons/siege on the wall (they will DESTROY you and the siege you build), and then pots of oil. Again the oil wrecks rams and players. Harassment is encouraged, AoE all over the wall to ensure that your enemy is either dying or having to keep on their toes. As stated before, run supply to your builds once all of this has been wiped out.

If assaulting an actual keep and there has been a significant time where the enemy has dug in DO NOT, I repeat DO NOT run forward when the inner breaks. You will likely be devoured by the soul hungry anti-personnel siege set up in the lord’s room. You break the door, then you run as fast as possible onto the walls, and you wipe out siege and players. If people drop blueprints, help build.

I stress this. Stormbluff Isle has weathered so many assaults on keeps by siegeing up the Lords room and watching mindless zergs charge into it. Play smart, win swift.

Know your role in WvW. Know that you can make a difference, your name can be recognized by commanders as someone who is dependable and able to get stuff done. If you have questions, ask them. Who cares if people reply snarkily if you get a good answer in the end? Everyone started out at some point. WvW is frustrating. You’re going to die. You’re going to lose keeps that you fought with hellish tenacity to hold. But WvW should be -fun- first and foremost.

Having fun in WvW is why you’re playing WvW. So my advice to you is remember that when tensions are getting bad and team chat is cluttered with frustration. Enjoy yourself, educate yourself, and kick some Asura booty!

Thank you Raehvyn! Awesome info and you give very good insights as to why we do certain things the way we do

aNEt how about those stickies…come on get this info saved!

You have started a craze SpaceLord!

Raehvyn, would you mind if I added a link to this thread in mine own guides ‘useful Links Section’? I believe this style of guide may suit people who don’t appreciate the style of mine

Here is the short and sweet version for casual/new players:

1. Supply and siege is what wins WvW battles. Use both wisely because it can make or break losing or getting a point of interest (camps/towers/keeps). Always pick up supply and always help build siege.

2. All points can be upgraded. There is an “upgrade” NPC at all points. All upgrades require supply (reason why not to take from towers or keeps until fully upgraded). Upgrades make A HUGE difference in defense – huge.

3. When building siege in a tower/keep place them on the inner side on top of the walls, else they can be destroyed by players. Just one arrow cart can deter 20 incoming enemies. Again siege is key. READ the description of each siege so you know what to use. Each has specific use.

4. When speaking in chat be specific about THREE items: a)How many enemies are coming b)Point of interest name c)% of gate or wall damage. For instance don’t say “BG coming to tower”. Instead say “20 BG at Langor Tower. Gate at 75%”. People appreciate this.

5. Don’t assume there is one strategy to win. There is not.

6. Points is what wins so know your points: Camps (5) Towers (10) Keeps (25) Stonemist (35). Every 15 minutes each server gets points based on the points of interest held.

That’s all you need to know.

Raehvyn.4530:

Do you know what a zerg is? No, not the giant mass of players. The Starcraft 2 race that swarms over everything.

I hate you so much for calling them a Starcraft 2 race……

They are a Starcraft race.

You don’t need to run in the zerg to be a huge part of WvW. Matter of fact, we rely on people NOT being part of the zerg. Here are a few things you can do:

Carefully venture into enemy lands. If you’re alone and not level 80 I don’t recommend you do anything and return back to the main force. If you’re able to kill mobs though flip mobs in areas marked with the two axe icon colored by whoever owns them. These will stop NPC assistance, make them go somewhere else for siege blueprints, and gives karma and money.

Genocide. You should feel inclined to wipe every single Dolyak out of existence. With siege warfare a lot of keeps and towers will simply FALL if dolyaks are slain. Keep in mind, they’re often protected or upgraded to have guard escorts, but either way never hurts to kill the Dolyaks.

Sentry points: You can take them but they’re almost worthless. They give away your position or at least let the enemy know that you’re in the area. I don’t recommend it but if you need exp might as well.

If you’ve a small band of people lets say a party of 5: Supply camps. Expect to lose the camp obviously, but flip it so upgrades are lost, people have to be drawn away and retake it, and you force em to lose the supply cache they built up. They often have dolyaks about to head out as well. These are really good for lower level people in groups with higher level people able to kill dolyaks.

You also can attack keep/tower doors. Light the keep up so it looks contested and flee, this makes people send scouts or bands of people to check an area out. Expect heat when you do it so get lost as quickly as possible. Lighting up waypoints deep in enemy lands also makes it a lot harder for the dead to reinforce sieges in your land.

Expect to die, be happy that you lived. Call out a noteworthy amount of players, if you find their zerg shout it into Mapchat or Teamchat so commanders can take note and react accordingly. If you can make out their intent, all the better.

Remember. You might not be part of the zerg or gloriously taking keeps but you’re vital. It isn’t hard to find 5-man groups either, some people specifically only run in small bands.

Eternal Battlegrounds is so clustered that without a thief in the party who can stealth everyone it is really challenging but in Borderlands “Havoc” squads really save the day.

KinkyWarrior.1879:

You have started a craze SpaceLord!

Raehvyn, would you mind if I added a link to this thread in mine own guides ‘useful Links Section’? I believe this style of guide may suit people who don’t appreciate the style of mine

Not at all. Go ahead and add anything if you think of stuff I haven’t touched on! I tried to add a little humor or spice to the guide so it wasn’t like reading a technical manual. Hopefully that is alright with the Moderators.

Kinky,

Nah, I was just frustrated with no info or threads on this board worth reading. Nothing to help with actually learning WvW.

You guys did all the work.

It is scary to think that half the people in our groups do not even know there are 3 ways out of each spawn…. or that this weekend we were with a commander that did not know Hills had a inner back door up on the Vista once inside the outer gate.

Not being mean to him at all or placing blame, we just have to get more info available.

Wouldnt it be nice if everyday we could keep at least one actual Tactical/Educational post going?

And

That aNet would sticky some of them….

This is a post that a member of krew did on our guild website to help others get a basic understanding of seige placement.
Ballista – red.
Catapult – yellow.
Arrow Cart – green.
Trebuchet – blue.

I’ve left out the customary catapult behind every door and most of inner keep defense. It also helps to use common sense. You want to place arrow carts where you can still see them, but they cannot hit you, like on the back edge of a wall. You have to place ballistas where you have line-of-site of your target.

This doesn’t include every piece of siege you should put down, but it shows the more important ones. The exception is the siege placed in the camps. Obviously, only place siege there if you’re planning on defending the camp.

Now that is useful Hadan!

Thank you and please pass of the thanks to your Krew as well.

That is a ridiciously detailed map, Hadan! Awesome that you posted it, thank you! I hadn’t touched on actual siege placement. But yeah.

Catapults are usually built a little behind our doors so that when enemies set up shop to take keeps or towers they’re faced with AoE splash damage that wrecks rams and players especially. This -may- get fixed at some point but as of right now AoEs go through doors.

Inner defense siege is common sense as Hadan said and needs no real explanation.

This is the basic WvW guide we reccomend all New members to check out when they first join.

Basic WvW 101

Join a Group (Just type in guild chat for a WvW Group)
Join a Commander Squad – Click on the Commander Title you are going to follow – Join Squad (Other Commander’s will then disappear from your vision)

Full Death and Half Death
Priority Number 1 should be getting HALF Dead comrades up again. If they die completely they have a chance to let every enemy half dead player back up again.
*IF YOU ARE FULLY DEAD * GO BACK!!* Idiots will try to res your full dead body which will distract them from A-Doing Damage & B-Ressurecting Half Dead Guys

Supply (Located at the top center of your WvW screen – A number between 0-10 supplies)
Always try to keep 10 supply on you at all times.
Create Siege – GO FOR SUPPLY! (One person from the group at a time)

Party Leader
Follow your party leader -he/she is there to teach you about what needs to be done. Especially if that person is on ventrilo listening to our commands.
Manages what target to attack (to select his target hit ‘T’)
Manages party supply – Don’t let too many people go back for supply at once
Press ‘t’ to take your leaders target or Press ‘Ctrl + t’ or ‘Ctrl + Click’ to make a target

Offence

Key “Targets of Interest” for a Tower/Keep

Pri 1 – EVERYONE – Cannons (Left and Right)
Pri 2 – Ranged AOE (Area of Effect) GROUP – Siege on Walls (Usually you can hit them with large AOE (area of effect) spells in the L+R Corners
Pri 3 – Ranged AOE GROUP – Mortars (Farther away from the door but will devastate your siege equipment)
Pri2/3 – Non AOE GROUP – Keep hostile players out of the keep/tower OR use siege equipment OR heal people on seige equip
Pri 4 – EVERYONE – Burning Oil (Used against RAMS and Golems)
Pri 5 – EVERYONE – Start building your own siege

Defence
Building Siege to Defend a Keep/Tower

Build arrow carts away from edges to prevent small aoe from destroying it
Build Ballistas with a LINE OF SIGHT to the target
Build Catapults/Arrow Carts behind the door to damage invaders/Rams/Golems without having your siege destroyed
Build Trebuchets/Catapults to defend against enemy Trebuchets/ Catapults

Those pictures are a very nice touch. I hope this thread gets stickied, those are going to be quite handy for people learn better by seeing than reading!

For some reason i couldnt post 2 screen shots together in 1 post but this goes with the above guide as well. I truely do hope this helps, even those on the servers we face

Hadan.2841:

This is a post that a member of krew did on our guild website to help others get a basic understanding of seige placement.
Ballista – red.
Catapult – yellow.
Arrow Cart – green.
Trebuchet – blue.

I’ve left out the customary catapult behind every door and most of inner keep defense. It also helps to use common sense. You want to place arrow carts where you can still see them, but they cannot hit you, like on the back edge of a wall. You have to place ballistas where you have line-of-site of your target.

This doesn’t include every piece of siege you should put down, but it shows the more important ones. The exception is the siege placed in the camps. Obviously, only place siege there if you’re planning on defending the camp.

Thanks this will help me tremendously! I’ve lost way to many ballistas & Acarts….not anymore though.

I’m really hoping a Moderator will sticky this and we can compile everything down into a single thread solely for helping other people out. Space was right, the forums are mucked with negativity and could use a nice boost.