Guild Wars 2

1. Megaserver WvW
2. Increase WvW rewards to something useful and comparable to fractals monkey runs
3. …
4. …
5. …

1. ELIMINATION of tactics. They completely ruin everything.
2. Timezone coverage
3. Maps that I don’t get lost in
4. Maps that don’t take excessive time to move across

That’s all.

TheHeretic.3529:

1. ELIMINATION of tactics. They completely ruin everything.
2. Timezone coverage
3. Maps that I don’t get lost in
4. Maps that don’t take excessive time to move across

That’s all.

Tactics are important in a game, especially WvW. It is called ‘Map Politics’.

As far as coverage, I do not know how A.Net can deal with that.

Maps are easy, once you learn them., especially the Desert BL’s

4. If your on you desert BL and you have Gari – it is easy to get across the map. Not on your onw BL, it should take a while, need to take things, eh? Again ‘Map Politics’

Gaile Gray.6029:

I have been tracking this thread with a lot of hope, thinking that this is a good premise for a conversation, something I could spotlight for the dev team. Forum members like Dayra, Stand The Wall, Dusty Moon, Norbe, and several others have made a solid effort over a few weeks to contribute constructive ideas. Thank you!

I believe this is can continue to be a very productive exercise, even if the moderators had to do some “housekeeping” to remove the unconstructive, non-contributory comments.

So please post constructively to share your thoughts on this subject. If there’s an off-topic or a unconstructive post, please flag it so we can keep the thread on track. The substantive ideas shared so far are good and we’d welcome more. If you want to share greater details or link to other threads — that would be fine, too. This thread in no way replaces other constructive commentary on the subject of WvW, but it could be one valuable high-level gathering point for feedback that helps in the overall review of the subject.

TL;dr: Please post on topic and let’s make this really useful!

Gaile – one thing you can say about WvW players is they are passionate about this game. It would be ashame to lose that passion.

Can you even give us any inklings about what is planned and when?

Gaile Gray.6029:

unconstructive, non-contributory comments.

lol im so guilty. i cant help myself sometimes, sorry.
you forgive me though, right?
hah, anyways, cheers gaile and i hope some of our comments get heard at least.
or mike could just put me in charge of the wvw team with no oversight ;D
alright alright.

Gaile Gray.6029:

I have been tracking this thread with a lot of hope, thinking that this is a good premise for a conversation, something I could spotlight for the dev team. Forum members like Dayra, Stand The Wall, Dusty Moon, Norbe, and several others have made a solid effort over a few weeks to contribute constructive ideas. Thank you!

I believe this is can continue to be a very productive exercise, even if the moderators had to do some “housekeeping” to remove the unconstructive, non-contributory comments.

So please post constructively to share your thoughts on this subject. If there’s an off-topic or a unconstructive post, please flag it so we can keep the thread on track. The substantive ideas shared so far are good and we’d welcome more. If you want to share greater details or link to other threads — that would be fine, too. This thread in no way replaces other constructive commentary on the subject of WvW, but it could be one valuable high-level gathering point for feedback that helps in the overall review of the subject.

TL;dr: Please post on topic and let’s make this really useful!

This was started 30 days ago. If you would have popped in here and said “I’m watching you”, you would have a lot more input.

This is the type of more communication I would like to see. Usually after 2 weeks the threads devolve to ranting.

And I want to be the first to Officially nominate you as the WvW Forum Moderator. There is no clauses for denying the position once nominated!!!

Gaile Gray.6029:

Dusty Moon.4382:

Gaile – one thing you can say about WvW players is they are passionate about this game. It would be ashame to lose that passion.

Totally agree! WvW is a marvelous system, and we love that people love it and that they want to help us make it better.

Dusty Moon.4382:

Can you even give us any inklings about what is planned and when?

I don’t have that information at hand, and I’m sorry for that. However, I believe it’s real clear from the conversation last Friday that this is subject is important to us and we are going to be listening to what you have to say.

Stand The Wall.6987:

Gaile Gray.6029:

unconstructive, non-contributory comments.

lol im so guilty. i cant help myself sometimes, sorry.
you forgive me though, right?
hah, anyways, cheers gaile and i hope some of our comments get heard at least.
or mike could just put me in charge of the wvw team with no oversight ;D
alright alright.

All is forgiven. As we were saying just now, passion can result in impassioned speech. I know it — you know it — it’s ok. But, really, to keep on track we did a little clean-up, because it’s way better to read 30 or 50 constructive posts than have to weed through 80 or 100 with a 50% value rate. (Oh, btw: your post was just fine and I liked that you shared those ideas!)

so back to topic?
why dont you share your own idea here Gaile

Gaile Gray.6029:

All is forgiven.
(Oh, btw: your post was just fine and I liked that you shared those ideas!)

gaile youre my new favorite person in the world, lol.
yeah this post here i was ok but i can get carried away or trolly in other threads.
overall though i try to take a fairly balanced standpoint in analysis and theory.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Loosmaster.8263:

This was started 30 days ago. If you would have popped in here and said “I’m watching you”, you would have a lot more input.

Yes, and I’m sorry that I did not. I’m here now, and obviously familiar enough with the comments to appraise the value… ~she says, looking around guiltily.~

You’ve been around a while and you know that sometimes, when I post comments like “Keep the ideas coming” people think I’m on auto-pilot, and that I’m not actually assessing a thread for value. But hey, I do, and I believe this one has potential!

The key to what you do is you forward the information or flag the threads and you let us know you did it.

-Bring Back Alpine Map

-Get rid of Oasis event, or disable it until you can actually fix the godawful lag which has gotten worse since you “fixed” it

-Fix overall lag, many times skills just are not working and there is to much rubberbanding.

-Revert Change to waypoints, they should be built not automatic

-The gimmicks need to be removed or heavily nerfed, banners, fog, airship etc…

-Nerf siege use against players, enough of the kitten siege wars and siegehumping cancer. Heavily nerf or remove ac’s from the game enough is enough.

-Create a wvw reward track, not progressable in eotm

-Enable Autoloot

-Change scoring system to award points on cap (PointsPerCap) based on upgrade tier of objective taken. Make PPT also reflect the tiers of objectives, paper t1 keeps should not give the same PPC and PPT as an upgraded t3 keep.

For Example: Capping or Holding a keep would score like this

t1 keep-10points
t2 keep-15points
t3 keep-25points

-Move Reset back to Friday

-Bring back seasons/tournaments

-Change the loot tables from drops and rank chests, sick and tired of claws and spikes dropping from players seriously

-Make excess wxp points and proofs of heroics useful

-Make more stats available, make karma gear salvageable

-Redesign fire/air keeps, to much verticality, fire keep only has one side to attack inner, air keep is a giant mess

-Tweak the scaling on keep lords, it just takes way to long, and tone down the cc’s seriously the cc spam is ridiculous its not fun or challenging its just plaing annoying. There is nothing more frustrating then fighting your way through an enemy blob, their siege, a structures walls/gates just to get thrown around by a keep lord who is basically a dps/hp sponge while enemies can keep porting in behind you and sandwich you in a small area.

Since a lot already touched on what most want so I’m not going to repeat those and I can’t really think of anything else right now besides this:

Updated gear stats from WvW vendors. Lots of different gear stats have been added to this game over time and currently there is no way of getting them in WvW.

I’m basing this on the current problems I see the most and hear about commonly, it’s also opinionated of course. :P

1. The old maps back in some respect, any way to stop the bleeding, patch the leak, etc… A map rotation sounds like it would work, once every week or two the maps swap, anything for the old Alpines’ return.
2. Rewards, everyone I know, including me, play WvW to have a good time, but quite often you need to do a considerable amount of PvE to get the gear you want, and to an extent, need. This is highlighted with guild upgrades. WvW also doesn’t have many, I can’t think of any, cosmetics that set it apart like both PvE and PvP does, Fashion Wars
3. Population balance, I was in ET for the first 3 years of the game, watching it decline, I know ET isn’t the only server. I’d suggest collapsing/merging some of the bottom servers, I know it’s not a pretty option but with the games current reduced, and dropping or stagnating, WvW population it might be the best. I’m sure you guys and gals at ANet will figure out the best option to balance population.
4. Stability balancing. I find this particularly important, stability plain doesn’t work in entirely too many situations, most of them involving Hunter’s Ward spam and/or outnumbered fights. The best suggestion I’ve seen that I believe would fix this issue was a .5 second ICD on each stack of stability, still fully corruptible. I really, truly hope stability and/or CC get looked at because it’s really bad in outnumbered situations, even when baiting half of the other group’s CC.
5. Encourage more combat. I’m one of those players that would rather fight than practically everything else, that said I think WvW should be more lively. Siege effectiveness against players is a bit better than I think it should be, but that argument has been beaten into the ground by others so I’ll let it rest. I can’t think of a whole lot for incentivizing fights aside from increased PPK, that could also reduce fights, lower PPT, more rewards for killing other players, or maybe a 30 seconds-1 minute period where you cannot waypoint and must sit there and think about what killed you? That’s probably not a great idea but I’d make use of it for sure.

I can elaborate further later. I’m glad to see someone’s watching Gaile Gray, it’s why I decided to post this from my phone, keep up the good work and communication!

Hmm. A moderator is watching. I’d better add my 2 cents:

1. Stability stability stability – All of the changes for PVE breakbar mechanics are wreaking havoc in WvW. A lot of the great fun of WvW was winning uneven fights and switching between kite and melee. Now anyone who tries to jump into a melee fight with uneven numbers is immobilized and massacred. Since breakbar mechanics are still needed for PVE, a return of a strong stability boon is the easiest way to fix this.

2. AOE stacking – along the same lines as #1 running into what looks like a single circle and getting insta-downed by a dozen necro circles also needs to be addressed in some fashion. These 1st two are the big contributors to the un-fun pirate ship meta.

3. Population imbalances – this has been well discussed in several other threads; it needs to be addressed to get populations back up in the maps.

4. The new BLs – I think they can be saved but would take some work. The major problems I have are navigation, defensibility, and too much PVE. I look back on fights outside of Bay with great fondness (A large open field, a spawn nearby, a tower within siege range, a camp at extremely close proximity, some elevation, and a choke point). Even fights inside Bay were extremely fun with the water barrier and the height differences. Zones like this need to be created (esp zones without major PVE interference.)

5. Rewards – I think the last tourney was close to 2 years ago? People got amped up for those because there were decent rewards at the end (I love my myst longbow skin to this day.) Make WvW and “event” again and not just another empty map to farm some dailies or karma train in.

1. We need to know the basics of what is planned, otherwise all is speculation.
- let us know something like “we are planning alliances” so we can give ideas on HOW to do it.
2. Move reset back to Friday. This change was when I noticed the wvw inactivity as it made the Saturday fight almost unimportant most of the day.
3. Scoring matters. Right now I get nothing other than a number for winning wvw. Winning needs to have an incentive.
4. We need conquest events that spawn, not pve events. These events should draw the focus of the entire map. Maybe a defensive structure behind enemy lines that can be captured and used as an advance base. It should be telegraphed to the map so people will focus it. No pve mobs other than a lord.
5. Players start upgrades once yak limit is reached.
6. Rotate bl maps.
7. Gliding added for free to wvw. Work maps to prevent exploits. It’s just awkward to go from pve to wvw and suddenly a huge mechanic is gone.
8. Add auto loot as a training alongside other wvw masterys. It is unfair to provide it in pve only. Adding it to wvw training for rank will nullify the previously stated keeping tyria mastery separate from wvw.

9. We pay gold and badges for wvw gear. Salvaging gives only a minimal amount of badges. Remove the gold cost or better the salvage rewards.
10. The rank tokens being soul bound needs to go. No one does wvw on a character that does not already have its spec unlocked, making the tokens useless for this regard.
11. Ability to gain ascended gear from wvw. Right now in 600 ranks I’ve seen ONE armour chest drop. At this rate I might have a full set from wvw by rank 3600. Is anyone even to 3600 yet? This speaks for itself.
12. Higher liquid gold rewards the first time you capture an objective that day. A maximum of say 10 distinct captures will reward this per day, afterward the rewards revert to normal until day reset. This will prevent people capping each fort once on all maps disturbing the rhythm of wvw.
13. Personal idea, rather than ever remove EBG add an underground tunnel network. This allows for a very simple overland travel hassle free, or for stealth travel by expd players underground. No exit from the tunnel network should be behind the first level of forts on each side eg klovan durios etc. this keeps
Players wanting be to stay forever happy while adding a new element to it. Maze tunnels would be even better for roamed to memorize the way out.

No, not really. Just throwing some ideas down from my iPhone as my laptop died and my new rig hasn’t arrived yet.
Edit: but 13 is my favorite for implementation.

1. Please take away pve mechanics in borderlands like fire and air spitting out of keeps, for me it is just an annoyance that takes away from the pure pvp/ skill vs skill.
2. Remove oasis event for similiar reasons stated above.
3. Remove Banners
4. Remove shield generators. If you are trying to defend a keep from a giant zerg who sets up 3-4 gens and 5-6 trebs its impossible to take them out without having the numbers, I liked the days when it was you built counter trebs and it was who was more accurate first in taking out enemy trebs. Also, very frustrating to waste 400+ supply building counter siege only to watch all your attempts to defend be for nothing.
5. Please bring back stability the way it used to be. Hammer train was way more fun than pirate ship. Its just not as much fun running a melee spec anymore. I used to see a lot more commanders on the field before. Now, its like, good luck getting through 20 rings of CC. Gotta bring back Stability the way it was imo.
Thats my 2 cents.
Also, Its very nice to see a response in forum. Thank you very much

< Points at the activity Gaile has created by her presence!!!

1) worthwhile rewards

2) better population balance, combin small servers

3) split skills or WvW-only skills

4) useful, interesting, valuable, challenging, meaningful strategic goals where defense matters

5) autoloot, so I can concentrate on the fight, not worry if something cool dropped and I might miss it

1) find a way to prevent stability from being entirely inconsequential with all the new cc’s flying around (guardian longbow 5, tbh). Maybe an icd on how frequently stacks can be lost. 0.5 second icd should be good.

2) consider balancing skills around WvW where we get PvE stats so the power creep is far more real than in PvP. Skills might work great in PvP where something like CoR and gunflame hit hard, but in WvW it’s far easier to stack might and power and crit and ferocity. Same with condition damage, it’s far too easy to stack. Perhaps up the values given by PvP amulets and then balance skills according to that? Damage in PvP wouldn’t change at all if it’s done correctly, but stat stacking in WvW will be less troublesome

3) Remove some of the terrible guild buffs you can get for structures. Stealth in SM, chilling fog, banners, etc. All of them are great as ideas, but they should either have LONG cooldowns or short durations. Stealth in SM, for example, I would be fine with lasting 3 minutes, but it should then prevent you from using that stealth again for 20 minutes. That’d still make it incredibly valuable if used correctly, but not so overpowered that your group can just duck back into SM, stealth, pop out and attack, pop back in and continue the cycle.

Anet, whatever suggestions people are making you need to understand one basic idea that stands behind why people play WvW: People want to have fun.

And different people have fun in WvW in different ways. There are at least several categories of people, who play WvW. I am gonna descrive you who they are, how they have fun and which mistakes you made in HoT update that ruined their fun:

1) Roamers – solo players who look for other players to have 1 vs 1, 2 vs 2, may be 1 vs 2, 2 vs 3. They need easy way to find people to fight. Before HoT you could find a map where enemy scouts were upgrading keep, flip camps around that keep and snipe dollies. That would force enemy to come to flip camp / defend dolly and here we go, we have fight. By adding autoupgrades to objective you pretty much ruined fun for these players. (I saw some of devs said that OS is map for duels, in practice it does not work).
At this moment roamers exist only around Stonemist on EB.

2) Snipers – players who gather in small group (around 5 men) and assault enemy “paper” (tier 0) and “wooden” (tier 1) objectives in sneaky and fast way, forcing enemy to come to defend objective. The most effective attack is to assault “wooden” (tier 1) keep just before it turns into tier 2. That would force enemy to come with several players and defend keep. And here we have 5 vs 5 fight, near the keep, or inside keep, or in lord room. Fight, fun, succeful or failed assault. A set of HoT upgrades ruined fun for these players: autoupgrades, siege cost increase, hard access to +5, nerf of guild siege, nerf of spots from where you can attack both outer and inner walls, defensive tactics and improvements, long travel distances, etc. etc. Pretty much every HoT upgrade destroyed fun for these players. At this moment snipers are dead or turned in to brainless karmatrainers.

3) Scouts – players who upgrade and defend critical objectives (keeps, home towers). Before HoT scouts were the MVP of WvW making huge difference. Good scouts could save upgraded and sieged keep against enemy blob suddenly attacking objective. Bad scouts would lose it. Scout had to prebuild siege to defend objective, know where to build siege, how and when to use it. Attakers must know how to counter defensive siege or they would fail. Scout could “fight” a blob solo if he was good. That just was a siege fight. In HoT new maps does not need scouts. Autoupgrades, Watchtower, Emergency Waypoints, keeps easy defensive layout, nerf to siege, buff to gates/walls and lords and other stuff made scouts unnessesary. If before HoT to save tier 3 and sieged keep you need scout inside all the time, manning critical siege then in HoT it is enough to have random player to run from Rampart to contested objective to defend it. This player does not need to know a lot about scouting. All he needs to do is call commander to defend, activate Emergency waypoint or build ballista on top and kill offensive siege. At this moment scouts are dead or theer quality dropped to kitten.

4) GvG players – players usually from one guild who play for guild size fights (15 vs 15, 20 vs 20 or 25 vs 25). They don’t really care about objectives and all they want is good maps layout, size and ability to fight other guilds 24/7. They have asked for GvG support in WvW since day one. And they still did not get it. HoT introduces guild arena but it is designed for PvPers. Arena is designed for maximum 5 vs 5 fights, so GvG guilds have only 15 vs 15 in these arenas and arena is still too small. New borderlands introduced oasic event that lags every time it pops, ruining any GvG or blob scale fights on the map. Bug is still not fixed. New maps are also larger that makes harder to find another guilds. New maps also have kitten loads of chokes so sudden/unorganized fights usually turns into stale choke holding.

5) Blob fighters – players who gather in massive group lead by commander (40-70 players) and look for another blobs to fight. They want to fight another blob. The easiest way to find enemy blob is to ping enemy keep. If keep is upgraded and sieged enemy have to come and defend with blob. And here we have blob fight. Near keep, inside keep, inside lord room. Similar to snipers but in big clusterkitten. Before HoT if enemy does not have prebuit siege in keep and scouts and you come with a blob, enemy will probably lose a keep. After HoT defending keep became much easier. You don’t even need a blob to defend keep now. You pop Hardened Gates, kill offensive siege (or build shield generators) and build million ACs or/and hold a choke. If server does not have blob or don’t want to fight with blob you can’t force them, unless you go for their EB keep. In addition, there is an oasic event on new borderlands that lags any blob fights. So all blob fights moved to EB, leaving borders for PvD and karma trains. The result is huge queues for EB and noone plays borders. You can found massive description of what is wrong with new WvW system for blbo fighting in Ins’ interview: https://www.twitch.tv/reyana_atac/v/31478828 .

6) Karmatrainers and nightcappers – players who capture undefended objectives while another servers are figthing or sleeping, They are hated by all other players categories and represent the boring part of WvW that affects one of most critical parts of WvW: server scores and ratings. The reason they exist is population imballance. Especially in specific hours (night, morning, working hours). A huge population drop that happened after HoT made these category more effective and benefited brainless door fighting against player figthing. The more WvW turns into PvE, the more WvW dies and the more people leave.

Important: I highligthed word fight to show that the most categories of players play WvW for fights. People want fights in WvW, bring it to them.

Summary: HoT updages ruined fun for the most categories of WvW players, by benefiting PvE and PvD in WvW. If you want to fix WvW and bring player back, when you create any upgrade in future keep one thing in mind: Upgrade must benefit players fights. If upgrade benefits PvE/PvD/Karmatrain that upgrade should never go live.

Yo, nice to see a dev presence, this isn’t a direct 5 points of priorities, but I’d like to explain what should form the priorities and how it relates to the statements made by Anet in terms of the AMA on Sunday, would appreciate if you took the time to read this.

WvW population was always going up and down since day one, new players come in, love or hate it, leave or stay, some stay for a couple of years until they get bored, some stay as part of the core WvW community spread across all servers, it’s the core groups of players who keep WvW the population ticking up and down at that present moment in time. Let me explain below.

The core population consists of different factors, casual players, server loyal players and hardcore players and guilds.

Casual: pops into wvw each/every night for a couple of hours or so, spread out with pve/pvp.
Server Loyal players: Dedicated to their home servers in it’s leaderboard ranking/ fight rep.
Hardcore: Guild raiding/GvG/PPT, Fight guilds who want to fight vs enemy public zerg/other guild groups, GvG who come under this also, but then PPT guilds, whi somply will PPT all night, primetime etc these are an important part of the community still due to server rating and keeping them high.

Population issue is the stated Anet focus now, so what factors into population dropping?

Gameplay/Fun/Reason to play.

World vs World erupted with fast paced mass pvp combat fights, where often there was a more preferred style of fighting, looking at Hammertrain and Pirateship here.

- Fighting was intense and a small 5v5 with your party and another random party on borders could last 10 minutes and be epic.
- A constant 1v1 with an enemy roamer in Alpine borderlands vying for camps could go on for hours.
- Public zerg fights could last hella long time and even in lower tiers fights could be legendary and players could jump in and fit in.
- GvG including both random encounters and organized equal numbe fights on borders and OS, I might get emotional here.. Godlike fights of an crazy intensity and levels of skill/discipline and teamplay rewarding the strongest guilds. Hardcore/Semi Hardcore/Casual guilds all took part because it was a fight club where everyone wanted to be the strongest.

Due to the combat changes and skill/build balance since the Stability change in 2015 there is a dominant ranged presence within WvW focusing mainly on pirateship fights creating a stale environment to fight in.

- Damage power creep.
- Stability change, then the amount of NEW CC added with HoT, with CC countering stability.. (same goes for aegis and the amount of unblockable).
- Condition spam.
- Amount of drop AoE and run away mindless skills, DH bow 5 promoting unskilled gameplay.

Why borderlands now are killing the population further?

- New players enter, can’t find a tag to follow as it’s not fun to command on borders due to the gimmicky terrain and different ground levels resulting in new players leaving instantly, why do new players go to borders opposed to EB when they first join in primetime? Because EB usually has a Queue of 50+ on high tier servers and even mid tier, I was on Ring of Fire for a bit and we hit up some monster 60 man queues there some nights.
- Players get bored of EB blob fights and there’s nothing for a random player on borders, which is basically all EB is at the moment if you don’t guild raid still.

Why have so many guilds left?

- Combat gameplay/balance is not fun to fight with or against, please ignore guild arena as that’s simply a who has the better push wins.
- Maps aren’t fun to run around, fight on, capture objectives and when you do capture an objective it’s meaningless.
- Some guilds can’t recruit because the flow of players is so low now and lots of people don’t enjoy to raid or want to play casually as guild raiding is mainly on desert borders which people despise. (Some people love it, don’t get me wrong but the majority don’t, i tried to promote it at the start I developed a foul taste in my mouth as the thought of it).

It all comes down to one thing on you fixing population, making WvW fun to play again for most players, making changes to bring back old fighting styles, making capturing objectives worthwhile, making players feel like they are making a difference, the removal of manually upgrading hurt alot of players, I remember 4 guildies going to capture a tower and hold it vs blobs as long as possible trying to get it upgraded in a tower defence playway stuff like that.

Bringing alpine back won’t fix population issues alone, but it will STOP more people leaving which is the first step you have to take. Stopping players leaving.

Combat and the function of WvW made it the best mass pvp game mode out there, sadly from 2015 it went downhill BUT it’s not too late. The WvW population can rise to what it once was, but first you have to stop people leaving, bringing back the Alpine maps and balancing combat once again.

The minds of WvW players are great here, they have good ideas and excellent suggestions, but months and years of verbal neglect leave us mad and upset more than anything.

I’ve made rage posts before because we all loved this gamemode and still are clinging on. You have until the new mass pvp games, Camelot, Crowfall etc come out, maybe less time, so about 6 months to turn it around before the final exodus is here and the once mighty servers are all low population, except national servers who will keep banging on doors for eternity x) Revert and adapt to the old generation of wvw players and you’ll have a brand new generation along with the old to guide and create with them once again and WvW can thrive as the greatest mmo pvp game mode around once again.

Hope you took time to read this,

Gaius

Just read what Amarath read, (was writing mine as he posted haha) he points out FUN this is what people want and got from 2012, 2013, 2014, early 2015 and this is what keeps players in the game, new join, old leave, some stay like me the entire time, and now praying for a resurrection.

If you took the time to read what I wrote and feel it helps give a good insight into WvW more then I’d be more than happy to go more in depth

maybe there should be a ladder system that people can elect to subscribe their character to the ladder of choice ? from there wvw would become a source of how they climb the ladder ?

this way you could even make a ladder of who made the most karma per match, or who killed the most people as a roamer, or even a duel 1v1 – or who capped the most camps, a ladder for every flavor of pvp and each person makes a choice of their favorite ladders. – at least those scores would have more meaning than server vs server.

and if none of the other suggestions work, can we at least have an asuran only server so we can look like this ? https://youtu.be/kkPfdh-XhWg?t=3m2s nothing would make me smile more than a blob of midgets.

I’m not going to delve into a swath of negativity here, but I do want to leave a word of caution. This thread, out of all the feedback provided, being noticed and highlighted by Gaile worries me because it is quite possibly the worst form of feedback provided on this forum.

It is mostly just a bunch of oppinions and holds very little argumentation and discussion. People who prioritize things like autoloot are unable to connect autoloot to loot and loot to content providing them loot (commanders that enable loot-generation or a balance that reliably generate loot). Data sampled from threads like this say alot about what people want unreflectedly and short-sightedly but very little about what they need or want once they have been provided context and have negotiated an understanding.

I fear that a majority wishlist will create more community backlash, long term. The quantity approach is very likely to yield new “you do not understand us” remarks as there is very little understanding to be derived from mere metrics. There are only whats, no whys or hows. If we want understanding we can not just collect piecemeal data.

With that said (worried that this thread is being prioritized…),

1. Get the old stability back, it worked (= fix population imbalance)
2. Dynamic scoring system: score/map/players (=fix population imbalance)
3. Progression in the game mode (=skins, finishers, ascended etc.)
4. Old maps (= roll back and iterate on solid ground, Alpine + small changes)
5. Balance, balance and balance (=get the fluff out and work on classes/specs)

As far as top priorities go I don’t have many.

1 Population balance. This is a bit of a sticky wicket. Many people have transferred up and don’t see the need for it. Some like their smaller communities. But I feel that many players on less populated servers are getting discouraged due to having their face smashed into the dirt and not really being able to do anything about it due to population imbalance. I feel this hurts the mode as much as any of the severe issues facing wuv wuv. It should be addressed sooner rather then later.

2. Skill split or WvW being taken into consideration during skill balance changes. A good example of this would be the stability change that gutted a playstyle many enjoyed. The WvW community saw the implications of this a mile away and addressed their concerns. The change went through and I feel as though many players I spoke to felt marginalized I suppose. That their feedback was irrelevant in preference to other game modes. That is unfortunate if perhaps sometimes unavoidable but it began the wedge I feel persists between the developers and the community.

As an addendum of sorts this extends to classes in a way. Ranger for example which has a large chunk of their personal offensive ability tied up into a pet have no recourse to keep said pet alive during the large dynamic player “interactions” that are the hallmark of WvW. This leaves Ranger, which may be someone’s one true beloved class feeling marginalized by mechanics outside of their control with no real consideration given to the game mode. There are most likely scant few players who enjoy the challenge of stepping into the mode at a 33% disadvantage straight off the bat. This extends to other classes I’m aware but ranger is the most dynamic of these in my mind because they can’t run a non pet build. That damage is always invested there. Class design should probably be addressed with the idea that they should be functional in ALL modes in mind. This would help to reverse what I feel is an exclusionary vibe. That and seeing all the beloved fur friends limping around breaks my heart. Think of the broken paws!

3 rewards. I don’t feel this as much as others as I actually only get good drops in wvw. Can’t get an exo in pve for the life of me but it rains gold for me in wvw. Still I hear its a problem. Just don’t nerf me. That and I don’t really wvw for loot. I like killing people in the face, so there is that.

4. Obstructed. Why does a leaf block all my attacks? Foliage op, please nerf.

5. I hear the new bls are unpopular (like very much so) I actually enjoy them for what they are but I very much see where they could be improved. If they are beyond that I’d be apathetic to the return of alpine borderlands. It doesn’t matter so much to me but I’m sure the return of the old maps would be welcomed be many. Doing guild missions on the new Bls are troublesome (it takes forever to hold anything for the gm) and I would like to see the oasis used a bit more sparingly and the lag of that event addressed or the event disabled all together.

1 – Shrink the gap between towers/keeps/camps, let us find each other easily.
2 – Reduce number of terrain altitude, i don’t wanna play with fear of losing my step all the time.
3 – I hate sand, please give us a chance to play at Alpine borderlands again. At least let us pick what we want to play.
Dota 2 solved it with terrain skins, you can try something like this if you transform the heights and lows to same amount at these two borderlands (desert and Alpine).

My problem is desert borderlands, please solve it quick or I don’t think I’ll wait for 20 minutes to join EB again.

Yes WvW used to be great.

Too bad you ignored it since launch, ignored us, and let it become the Deserted BL it is yoday!

Exactly what Subversion said.

Reading alot of peoples lists, and comparing it to Anets statement of fixing population imbalance all comes down to WvW being fun to play nad having that old diversity it used to have where you could do whatever you wanted and it all came together, roam upgrade, duel, GvG, zerg, PPT and you each method had a high competitive level that casual players could join (save for ppt because BORING) but that wasn’t something we had to think about as it all rolled into the same ball.

Subversion.2580:

I’m not going to delve into a swath of negativity here, but I do want to leave a word of caution. This thread, out of all the feedback provided, being noticed and highlighted by Gaile worries me because it is quite possibly the worst form of feedback provided on this forum.

It is mostly just a bunch of oppinions and holds very little argumentation and discussion. People who prioritize things like autoloot are unable to connect autoloot to loot and loot to content providing them loot (commanders that enable loot-generation or a balance that reliably generate loot). Data sampled from threads like this say alot about what people want unreflectedly and short-sightedly but very little about what they need or want once they have been provided context and have negotiated an understanding.

I fear that a majority wishlist will create more community backlash, long term. The quantity approach is very likely to yield new “you do not understand us” remarks as there is very little understanding to be derived from mere metrics. There are only whats, no whys or hows. If we want understanding we can not just collect piecemeal data.

With that said (worried that this thread is being prioritized…),

1. Get the old stability back, it worked (= fix population imbalance)
2. Dynamic scoring system: score/map/players (=fix population imbalance)
3. Progression in the game mode (=skins, finishers, ascended etc.)
4. Old maps (= roll back and iterate on solid ground, Alpine + small changes)
5. Balance, balance and balance (=get the fluff out and work on classes/specs)

By far the best post in this thread as of now.

Posting because thread was atleast seen zoned by Gaile.

Now my top things I would love to see:

1. Reworking the point system. PPT is a failed metric.
2. Something meaningfull to spend excess WvW rank points.
3. Incentive reward system that encourages new blood to try out WvW. Veterans won’t keep the game mode alive forever.
4. Guild only visible commander tags.
5. Remove verticality from DBL. Honestly I wouldn’t mind moving forward with them if the terrain was more forgiving. Taking 10 minutes to get from 1 point to another is ridiculous.
6. Sorry going to be more than 5. Make siege and banners and airships and whatever gimmick have less impact on actual player vs player combat.
7. Proof of heroics needs to be acc bound.
8. WvW season.
9. Better use for WvW currencies.
10. Dev communication. There have been recent efforts of this but it is still immensely lacking.
11. CC needs a general rework overall. Diminished returns may be necessary.
12. Fix lag issues. (I’m confident this will be fixed, but the fix.is not coming soon enough)
13. Don’t turn WvW into another EoTM.
14. Need a server only chat if we plan to keep server system. If going forward with alliance or whatever it may be, need alliance chat.
15. Remove guild tags from NPCs.
16. Not actually WvW but pls increase guild arena size.
17. Lastly: post on these forums.

There are 3 gamemodes in gw2: PvE, PvP, WvW

so whenever you like to change things… keep in mind why people play those gamemodes!

my Top 6 :

1. Remove PvE from WvW ( Farming in PvE for Guild-Buffs, insane HP-/Defiancebar-Scalling, Orb Collecting, Banners, map Completion does not reward WvW XP… so why it is there ?! )
2. Give players possibilities in tactics (old Waypoint system, Map Overview like the old BL, specialization balancing Gw2<→HoT)
3. Think about the following when doing changes: Why people play WvW and NOT PvP or even PvE !!!!! …. why are other genre games like cs 1.6. , Battlefield, … so successful (Hint: its neither the PvE content nor the graphic …….. it’s the work on Balancing and the game mechanic)
4. Events/Tournaments/Rewards are missing at the moment and need an update
5. Timing, player skills, Mobility, Roaming … lost it’s importance due to new Waypoint-system, HoT…overwhelming CC-skill-spaming, Upgrade-Process is too quick/strong, Too much Doylaks/Mats on the maps —> Lost priority
6. all in one upgrades (walls,gates,guards … and NOT the auto-update) ruined another tactical option. —→ add Upgrade selection for Guilds

1. Either bring back alpine maps, or if you can’t or must stay with desert, changes will have to be made. And changes will have to be made soon before this game mode dies completely.

-Towers used to be important. In Alpine losing NE/NW towers meant your garrison was going to get trebbed. Losing SW tower/supply camp meant your bay was going to get knocked open. In Desert BL towers don’t mean much, they don’t give you any strategic values, and they are very hard to defend because they’re so far away. The positioning and strategic values of towers in Desert BL’s need to be improved if you want people to play there. Right now in Desert BL’s, there is no strategy, no rhyme and reason for how things are, or why.

-There’s too much emphasis on chokes and siege in Desert BL. Everywhere you go inside the air, fire, and garrison keeps are chokes for you to get rained on by siege. Small areas, blocked by lava, rock walls, cliffs, PvE mobs, and over-tuned lords made even more ridiculous with annoying abilities & iron hide buff. You know why people like fighting over smc? Because you can siege it from all around, the courtyards are large inside for you to maneuver, you can get some pretty darn good fights in the courtyards. There are no annoying PvE gimmicks such as rock walls, cripple fields, lava, or high cliffs. Same with alpine keeps, large keeps, able to siege all around, large courtyards for fights, etc.. Just because you’ve designed Desert BL keeps to be grand and impressive, doesn’t mean they are fun to fight in.

There used to be tons of fights outside of Bay/Hills. There used to be very fun back & forth never ending zerg fights between garrison and NE/NW towers. There’s just no such fights in Desert BL’s because the terrain sucks. Nobody likes to fall into lava while fighting. Nobody wants to get crippled and stuck by rock walls that are super annoying and do nothing for either defending or attacking teams. There isn’t even good fighting ground near the air keep, all uneven terrain, large cliffs, choke points, etc..

How about the good ‘ol garrison fights? You could circle all around in the garrison, multiple levels, both inner and outer have large areas for fights. The garrison fights now happen at roughly 2 points, the areas just inside inner gates, and the top level where the lord is with annoying rock walls. The new garrison is not fun to fight in for either defending or attacking side. There’s no strategy, no sustain, no pulling back and regroup, no circling around, it’s just go and hope you outnumber them and roll them over while getting annoyed by moving rock walls everywhere.

When designing these keeps for your players, sometimes less is better. People go into WvW wanting to fight other players. They don’t login to WvW and say, “hey I want to be challenged by a lord that does aoe fear, knockback, warp around, and have super DH LB 5 traps with no target limit”. Nobody logs into WvW wanting to get crippled running from point A to point B, and get stuck in rock walls while trying to fight enemies. Less gimmicks, give us large areas to fight in, less annoying stuff, that’s what people want when they go into WvW.

I know some devs/desginers are going to say, but there are large flat areas you can fight in if you want to. True, I can think of some large open areas to fight in without npc’s and gimmicks in the Desert BL’s. But there’s no reason to fight over those areas. You know in Alpine maps, the flat area between Bay and sw supply camp. People fought there because whoever wins likely have the supply camp and advantage over Bay or spawn tower. You know the large flat area between NE/NW towers and Garrison? People fought over those large areas because again, you are fighting over the towers and garrison. That large flat area between Garrison and Hills? You fought over them and winner likely have the supply camp and Hills. You can’t just toss random flat areas at random places in Desert BL and say, “there, that’s what you asked for, go there”. We used to fight over land not just for fun (and they were great fun btw), but we did so for strategic reasons. We did it for supply camps, towers, keeps, etc.. on top of the fact that fights are fun and they give you a break from siege.

2. The emphasis on siege/gimmicks against players are overboard these days. Chilling fog, not needed. They annoying players, they waste time, and they don’t really do a whole lot. It’s just a very annoying feature that have nothing to do with player vs player combat. New shield generators, I would’ve been fine if they were designed to protect players/siege assets from projectiles. But they are being over used against players for mass knockbacks and impassable walls. Again, annoying things that make players rage, and they have nothing to do with player vs player combat. Cripple fields, invis fog, rock walls, none of these things add anything but annoyance in WvW. Rock walls especially since they c’block you when you’re trying to make pushes or retreats, and they negatively affect your combat gameplay for both attackers and defenders. You know without the rock walls, land mass is much bigger, making it better for fights. Just saying, that is what people want, less chokes and annoying gimmicks that negatively affect player vs player combat.

Arrow carts, they were annoying before, they are still annoying now. More so because of the amount of chokes in Desert BL’s. Ever tried to siege a heavily defended, fortified, and siege capped keep? You’ll get chain knocked back, knocked down, crippled, chilled, burned, it just makes you sick to your looking at the amount of siege used on players. These things turn players off, they don’t encourage players, especially new players, to jump into WvW. They are not fun, and fun is what will get players into WvW. You want to reinvigorate WvW, you do away with these annoying gimmicks.

I’m not proposing to get rid of siege, nobody is. I think most are ok with siege being a part of WvW gameplay. Back in DAOC where they invented RvR, siege was used primarily to open a keep wall/door. But the main focus of the gameplay was always player vs player combat. Siege merely enables more player vs player combat. DAOC’s lord room last stand defense was all player vs player combat, no siege, no arrow carts, just players duking it out for the rights to a keep/tower. I’m proposing you limit where players can build siege, such as siege inside lord room shouldn’t be a thing, and attackers also shouldn’t be able to build siege and rain ac’s, trebs, cata’s, bals at players holed inside the lord room either. You want the keep? You fight for it.

I’m also proposing that siege get a reduction on its effects on players. Use siege against siege, I’m all for. But siege shouldn’t do this much damage on players, and players shouldn’t get chain knocked down without diminishing returns and resistance to it. People that use siege to chain cripple/chill players, the effects should get diminishing returns, so you become immune to its effects for a few mins after being hit for awhile.

Airship bombs should do less damage unless you are outnumbered. The game should be smart enough to scale the damage these gimmicks do. I know it’s unlikely you’ll take out airship, so let’s compromise, make it do less damage if you have a map blob defending smc.

3. PPT is an outdated concept. PPT creates drama for servers, most servers do not have what it takes to grind ppt every day without players rage quitting. Either remove ppt and revamp scoring, or if you must keep ppt, put a cap on the amount of ppt a server can gain during each hour. This way no one server could do nothing but ppt to gain great advantage over other servers. And in order to gain the kind of scores you are gaining now, you must fight players for it. Reduce ppt dependencies is what I’m proposing.

There are some servers that already get a great lead by Monday morning, thus it leads to a boring week because other servers give up playing or trying because they know they can’t catch up. You want to reduce this from happening. You want people to feel they have a chance so they will continue playing this game, spend money, and keep WvW active. An active WvW is a healthy WvW. You can even reduce the ppt gains by the leading server, so the more they lead, the less they can gain compared to the servers behind. Ultimately fun and engaging player vs player combat is what will bring players back into WvW. I can guarantee you it isn’t PvE, PvDoor, or backcap ppt tryhards. To have a healthy WvW ppt dependency needs to be lowered or removed.

4. Server vs Server vs Server is really an outdated concept. It’s why mega servers were invented in the first place. WoW for an example have been doing battlegroups for their BG’s and world PvP since forever. I’m huge on DAOC when it invented RvR. But even back then I saw the flaw of the concept of 3 realms. The idea was an utopian idea where you hope the 2 lesser realms would band temporary alliances to go against the leading realm. But what happened more often than not was that the 2 lesser realms tear each other’s throats out for 2nd place, while the leading realm simply push both enough to keep themselves in 1st place.

This is what is happening today in GW2’s WvWvW. You would hope 2 servers losing the week would go up against the 1st place server, but what ends up happening is the 2 servers fight over 2nd, so the 1st place server is always 1st place uncontested. And just like back in DAOC days, people transfer to the winning server more than the 2nd or 3rd place server in each tier. The problem just gets worse and worse. Yes it’s another utopian idea to expect players to join the losing server to have something to fight for. But in reality, gamers more often than not take the easy way out, that’s why winning servers get higher in population and activities, while things get worse for the other servers.

It’s time for the alliance/battlegroup idea. You can still keep server tags if you worry about server pride. But the idea is simply you match servers together by their activities and winning percentages, and try to create better competition & better match ups. So you don’t end up with always the same server winning, or the same servers losing, or the same servers greatly outnumbered and not able to compete. There are too many servers with too little WvW participation. This is needed now if you want to save this game mode.

5. I would like to see unique WvW skins for armor, weapons, and siege models. Would like to see more customization to display guild pride in WvW. DAOC was all about guild pride, you knew which guild claimed a keep from the distance. You also could tell which guild was coming at you before you clash. We could use more skins, fluff, rewards, and customization for guilds. Since this game isn’t about gear grind (and I’m happy about that), give us rewards tracks for skin grind.

Subversion.2580:

I’m not going to delve into a swath of negativity here, but I do want to leave a word of caution. This thread, out of all the feedback provided, being noticed and highlighted by Gaile worries me because it is quite possibly the worst form of feedback provided on this forum.

It is mostly just a bunch of oppinions and holds very little argumentation and discussion. People who prioritize things like autoloot are unable to connect autoloot to loot and loot to content providing them loot (commanders that enable loot-generation or a balance that reliably generate loot). Data sampled from threads like this say alot about what people want unreflectedly and short-sightedly but very little about what they need or want once they have been provided context and have negotiated an understanding.

I fear that a majority wishlist will create more community backlash, long term. The quantity approach is very likely to yield new “you do not understand us” remarks as there is very little understanding to be derived from mere metrics. There are only whats, no whys or hows. If we want understanding we can not just collect piecemeal data.

With that said (worried that this thread is being prioritized…),

1. Get the old stability back, it worked (= fix population imbalance)
2. Dynamic scoring system: score/map/players (=fix population imbalance)
3. Progression in the game mode (=skins, finishers, ascended etc.)
4. Old maps (= roll back and iterate on solid ground, Alpine + small changes)
5. Balance, balance and balance (=get the fluff out and work on classes/specs)

Pretty much this. If these 5 things get fixed you get a working wvw.

Also consider that melee attacks should always do more damage while using same stats when compared to ranged. Atleast for non-channeled skills.

Make elite specs for classes that are not popular in wvw, that would make them usefull.

Firstly, there have been countless CDI’s and a massive number of threads on this already, that Anet are posting in here to say they are ‘watching this space’ is perhaps indicative of their ‘we don’t have a clue’ approach. Regardless:

1) Manual Upgrades
2) Not just less PvE, no PvE would be ideal
3) Wp’s all can use in the various keeps
4) Revert stab changes
5) Server merges

Thanks for showing some interest.

1º Rework on borderlanes in order to make easier for people to walk around.
1.1: Remove all guild upgrades and buff that makes harder to move and give advantage on fighting, or at least only let them be used when overhelmed buff is on.
1.2 Remove Shrines and roadblocks.
1.3 WP should be able when keep is fortified or at least secured not at capping. Also Fire and Air WP should be used by whoever has the structure.
1.3 Develop faster ways to walk from east to west.
1.4 Give back north towers relevance.
1.5 Force people to activate upgrades don´t let a tower of an empty map get fortified.
1.6 Let me give you a glance of my ideal BL.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/external?l=http%3A%2F%2Fimgur.com%2FhOG0ojt

2º Reduce time of afk Kicking when map is full.
3º Remove all innecesary stuff from respawn, crafting workshop, , npcs, etc. Just need a repair npc and a merchant, with all stuff available, consumables, traps, siege bank, guild bank and Lion Merchant, all other npcs should be moved to a Mist lobby.
4º Give more purposes to WvW currency, so players can get food or ascended armor and weapons.
5º Change the long red names by server initials, rank in number, class and guild: for instance "Baruch Bay silver explorer [GWDS] BB 870 Guardian [GWDS]

1. Just give us better rewards please, reward tracks? unique weapons? anything.
2. I’m fine with a megaserver as long as we get something like server alliances that allows us to keep server identity, otherwise its EotM and everybody is a stranger you will never see again. Maybe make those server alliances seasonal for re-balancing purposes.
3. The desert borderlands need to be made smaller, this is part of the reason people don’t go there, it has very good aesthetic design but towers are irrelevant because they can’t hit any keep.
4. If you aren’t going to give us more gold income, let us buy WvW only food and utility with badges of honor.

1. makes fights fun again. that requires a extra balacne for wvw. revert stab change. it´s broken atm cause more ppl in a fight means more target unlimited cc everywhere but not a single stackss tab more per party.
2. revert the power creep. every patch we get more dmg/boons/aoes/conditions on every class. it´s no fun that in bigger numbers everyone can have nearly every boon all the time and groups 2 shot each other
3. back to old bl and make hiding behind walls with tons of ac´s less rewarding
4. more rewards andmake every gear you need for wvw optainable in wvw (looking at you durability rune and other expensive pve locked stuff. we doesn´t want to get forced to play pve for anything
5.make the maps flat,easy and fast to get in pvp action. we doesn´t need lords with rings you cannot cross even with stab , or stupid stealth fogs or chokes with moving walls everywhere.

1. WvW seasons with good seasonal rewards (i.e. only available in WvW for that season)
2. Big reduction of PvE style events (especially when events tank our FPS)
3. Map population balance
4. Remove guild hall buffs etc.
5. Class and fighting style balancing, ranged conditions are the in thing now and it isn’t fun for melee fighters

Gaile Gray.6029:

RlyOsim — You’re right, of course. But, too, collective desires can change over time, can shift, can be better defined or reprioritized. I think it’s helpful — and thanks for participating — to get a view in the here-and-now.

Presumably it’s far more important to re-entice the players ANet has already chased away, which no doubt is a much larger population than what remains. In that vein I’d say it’s pretty crucial that the devs dig through the 3+ years of carefully ignored feedback. But since the decision-making behind WvW has gotten progressively worse and unhinged, I agree priorities have shifted. Here are my top two:

1) Bring back the Alpine BL: Once upon a time people grew bored of Alpine, little did they know it’s replacement would decimate the game mode. Despite some boredom and fatigue, a sizeable population continued to play in Alpine for 3 years. Forget making BS incremental changes to DBL (you can return to that project after you’ve restored some trust), which will still likely disappoint and alienate already vanishing WvW communities, and bring back Alpine now – we already know it’s engaging and fun to play (sans all the awful HoT additions, chilling fog, etc).

2) Un-nerf stability: The pirate meta blows hard and melee needs to be viable again.

(And, yes, my evident bitterness was necessary.)

My advice would be to give the least possible things that can detract ppl from the game itself. The less there is to farm the better and the less EoTM it will be.

Hi Gaile – Kind of an off-topic question:

What type of communication from you guys can we expect to see as a result of these threads? It’s great that you’re watching them and have taken the time to let us know that but, going forward, will we be informed of ideas and suggestions you’re actually taking from them before the team implements any future changes, if at all?

With that said, here’s my top 5:

1. Changes to the Desert Maps then rotate with the Alpine Maps:

Whilst I appreciate the idea of the Desert Maps providing new features and gameplay options, there are significant changes that need to be made before the WvW community as a whole will accept them; Less vertical, Less gimmicks, Revert Waypoints, Nerf Siege, etc. I also understand the issue of not simply just being able to switch the borderlands back to the Alpine Maps, however. So until such a time comes when the maps can be rotated, the changes toward the Desert Map should be deemed as high priority. This will be the most direct way to show that things really are on the up for WvW.

2. Rewards & Loot

The payout for WvW has forever been an issue, especially for many of us who only play this gametype. Maybe a Rewards Track, similar to sPvP could be the way forward? Naturally the most favorable answer would be anything that makes it sustainable to play WvW only, without having the venture into PvE for Gold/Gear. Karma could work here as the current WvW Karma Vendors hold nothing of value for hardcore WvW players. A revamp of those could be a viable option.

3. Separate Skill Balance for WvW

WvW’s combat approach is vastly different to anything you’ll find in PvE and somewhat PvP (Except for roaming maybe). Yet we constantly feel like we’re at the bottom of the bucket when it comes to skill balancing. Oftentimes we’re coerced into finding manageable workarounds for the Meta that seems governed by PvP or PvE, with almost no regard to how they might affect things in WvW. Splitting skill balancing (like in GW1) between PvP/WvW & PvE, with more of a thought on how changes will affect the large-group combat, seems like an ideal solution to me.

4. Tournaments

Quarterly, Bi-Annual, something, anything? Whilst it’s great to run around all week, bashing our faces into doors, walls and practically everything else in WvW, it wouldn’t hurt to have some sense of achievement every once in a while. I’m asking for something that will create memorable moments within WvW, that will keep players coming back and entice new players to join in. PvE has the Living Stories and sPvP has their own Seasons. But don’t you think it’s time for WvW to have its’ own Superbowl? Something that we’ll all look back on with pride and definitely look forward to in the future. Maybe a season format similar to MLS or BPL with pre-set fixtures pitting completely different servers against each other in order to promote population balance. Either way, we need something to happen so that the game-type doesn’t stagnate.

5. Communication

Probably the most important priority in many cases. I don’t want keep harping on about it but for the longest time, we in the WvW community have felt neglected and forgotten. Hence some of the unfavorable responses we’ve had to several threads like this and the salt thrown toward the Devs during the recent AMA. But things are going to change as you’ve said, which is great. However, you really should consider how it’s going to change where communication is concerned. As you might have gathered, after being fed so many previous promises and hearing nothing or changes being implemented that we never wanted, the WvW community is rather skeptical of changes. So maybe devising a more concrete form of communication back and forth between us should be something that is discussed when looking to save WvW. I guess this one also ties into my question above.

(Please note that these are not in order of priority.)

Gaile Gray.6029:

RlyOsim — You’re right, of course. But, too, collective desires can change over time, can shift, can be better defined or reprioritized. I think it’s helpful — and thanks for participating — to get a view in the here-and-now.

Peazomanco — I see what you did there.

Loosmaster.8263:

The key to what you do is you forward the information or flag the threads and you let us know you did it.

I did it.

If you ever want to give a random internet person a good laugh I’d love to see a post of Anet’s general WvW perceived desires. Should make a 10/10 read based on the new bl’s ^^

There are a lot of good points people have already touched on. Here are mine, which may be repeats:

1. DBL maps editing – they are already huge, but they feel even bigger because of the zig-zaggy routes you have to take to get anywhere safely (I have a guildie that hates the careful descents and just jumps off the cliff on purpose waiting for the rest of us to rez). There are no sneaky routes from enemy bl spawn; all 3 exits go within visual range of the camp or tower, making it too easy for spawn camping/troop movement reporting. Make towers matter to the keeps; there needs to be strategic advantage to holding the tower. Open 1 or 2 more ways to get to tower lords. Make the shrines matter to attackers as well. The white swords on an objective triggered by a guard chasing is too easy for roamers and stressful for defenders.

2. PvE content – If scribing is supposed to contribute mainly to WvW, then the scribing materials should drop readily in WvW, whether through player kills, rank up chests, and all events in WvW (defense, capture, escort). It truly is illogical to make WvW-focused guilds turn to PvE grind to get the materials for WvW. You could say they could just buy the materials on the trading company, but they don’t get enough gold from WvW; they’d have to spend money on gems or turn to PvE. The cost for max scribing currently is abhorrent to anybody but the big guilds.

3. Rewards – the extrinsic reward for winning the week is nothing. The rewards for ranking up are small. The rewards for events are negligible. Once you reach gold rank, there is very little purpose to ranks, except making you a target. I’d suggest giving participation rewards per week that depend on placement, wvw finisher rewards for certain ranks (just like pvp), and making leftover rank points into currency (for siege, traps, boosts, armor, weapons) or give the option to change them into Proof of Heroics (which ought to be account bound).

4. Server ranks – once whatever population solution is done, please mix up the matches every once in a month. One of the reasons (among many) why Tarnished Coast didn’t fight hard to stay in t1 is because it was tiresome to face the SAME KITTEN POODLE JERRYMOUSE TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLE players month after month after month. In t2 now, it is “refreshing” to face Dragonbrand, even though they are winning every week, because they do things differently than Sea of Sorrows….REFRESHING, I TELL YOU!

5. Transferring – since the only reason to switch servers is WvW, the cost for switching should be reduced by a lot (I would say 600 gems for an almost full server, free to a low population one). Transferring used to be also for more populated PvE maps, but the megaserver has taken care of the desolate maps, so PvE players have no reason to transfer. Remember, loot and gold acquisition in WvW is much lower than the other 2 game modes!

Oogabooga.3812:

4. Server ranks – once whatever population solution is done, please mix up the matches every once in a month. One of the reasons (among many) why Tarnished Coast didn’t fight hard to stay in t1 is because it was tiresome to face the SAME KITTEN POODLE JERRYMOUSE TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLE players month after month after month. In t2 now, it is “refreshing” to face Dragonbrand, even though they are winning every week, because they do things differently than Sea of Sorrows….REFRESHING, I TELL YOU!

That is “your” own fault – servers on NA locked the tiers so that the same servers would face each other every week – it’s different on EU, we rarely have really stale matchups.
Just saying.