Guild Wars 2

OS:
Windows 7 64bit

CPU:
AMD FX-8120 – 8core – OC at 4.2ghz – stays cold

RAM:
8gigs

GPU:
Nvidia GeForce GTX 550 ti

Power Supply:
750watts

inside WvW in large battles my frame rate drops really low, around 10-15
outside battles, i get roughly 30
same with highly populated areas like Lions Arch

this is with the lowest gfx settings and lowest resolution

i noticed that the fps did not change with medium settings
and my highest resolution 1680 × 1050

yet outside of these areas, like sPvP or any other area in PvE that isnt a city

i can run max settings with a solid FPS of 60

so my question is, what should i upgrade or change?

i’m hoping this is just a GPU issue, and should upgrade that

but i want to be certain before i spend $200+ on a decent card

that it will give me a smooth fps of 40+ with high settings in WvW
otherwise i don’t think it would be worth it

Well you need a better procesor. You wont get stable 40 + in wvw with low costs. You need better proceesor best would be i5 and oc it to 4+ ghz. Your gpu is quite weak but what is most demanding in wvw and places with alot of ppl,models etc is the cpu. Better card would give a boost but only when you get decent cpu. Amd procesors are bad at single core perf and that is what gw2 uses. Even i3 would give better results then your amd.

Ill get straight to the point. You want a new CPU and Motherboard ot increase ur performancein those Big WvW battles.

A Intel i5 3570k or i7 3770k with a 4.5ghz OC (on top end air cooling) will make sure u never drop below 30 fps due to CPU bottlnecks and u can expect 45fps+ in Mid sized battles and 60 fps in LA.
So long as u keep ur graphics settings set so ur GPU doesnt max out.

Ofc Intel r more expensive than AMD so be prepaired for the cost (it aint much imo but still)

The 550ti can handle those framerates but u need to make sure u dont try pushing the graphics settings. .For example.. Keep Rellections on terrain and sky or Off, and shadows on Low or medium. And ofc sampling to native.

even an i5/i7 cant guarntee 40+ in wvwvw, read back pages and pages in this section of the forums…..

Honestly Elusive My advice is dont bother upgrading for this game at this time, you will find if you go pages and pages back, that even some people with crazy builds that cost 4-6x what yours costs, are getting no better results then your getting or not much better.

Anet need to re-write the game to remove the bottleneck, currently the games got 3 perf critical threads, if any one of them maxes out/stalls for even an instant, your fps suffer….

I have an 8120 with dual 6870’s in another rig(was in this one) an 8350 and dual 7870 in this rig and friends of mine are runing i5’s and i7’s, a good number of them have extrem edition chips at 4.5+ghz, and they arent getting any better overall exp then be….they may get higher max fps in some area’s but LA and WvWvW become barly playable or unplayable for them.(why most of them like myself only play Gw2 sparsely lately and are waiting for anet to “fix their kitten”

its also why none of my group of friends are buying any more gems, if anet fixes the game, they will get alot more money, if not…..why put money into a game that runs like kitten poo?

the one upgrade that could really help you is to move to a better videocard, my suggestion would be a 7870 1536 shader model, for the money they are the best bang for your buck at the moment,(specially with the 13.2 beta drivers!!!) it may not help this game much but, it will help other games.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202024

its funny how people badmouth amd and say amd cant game yet there are games like Arma2 where AMD kick kitten and take names….

Oh if your an nvidia guy dont get less then a 660ti, and if you get a factory overclocked one, make dmn sure that its one thats stable at factory clocks, alot of people here and on other game forums have found serious issue with nvidia factory clocked cards stability….

Yeah upgrade just to play gw2 would be waste of cash. In terms of upgrade you should wait for nvdia 700, amd 8000 cards and then just build a new cpu if you rly need one now.

40+FPS in WvWvW sounds unlikely even if you are using a NASA computer…

if you GTX550ti isn’t already factory overclocked, get yourself some knowledge from tutorials all over the internet on how to overclock it (really, make yourself sure on what you’re doing before attempting any overclock!)…you should get around 8-10% more performance out of it that way.

my advice: be patient, wait for optimisations, turn off reflections and lower your shadow settings ingame and mess about at the nvidia-cp.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/tech/FPS-and-Performance-based-issues-1

maybe you wanna try out different driver versions…some may perform better some may not.
except you’re really wanna spend money on new hardware because of one game…if you’re satisfied with your system’s performance at other games/tasks, don’t bother with upgrading your hardware any further.

thank you so much every one who replied, your information was very helpful,
and dissolved all the frustrations I have had with WvW
(trying all these setting “fixes” that did nothing or worsened my fps)

other games and programs run perfect, so i will just deal with WvW and hope anet makes the game optimized for multicore cpus

i am very tempted to upgrade my video card to the one suggested 7870, because mine is really outdated , thank you for the link, i know what to look for now

thanks again every one!

- John

I’m gonna jump on the 7870 bandwagon here because that’s what I use and I almost always have a decent framerate with everything maxed and fullscreen 1920×1080. The only place my fps completely dies in is LA (that place was HELL on Wintersday…), but WvW I have no problems.

I’m running an AMD FX-8350 cpu @ 4.4ghz, too, btw.

The 7870 Tahiti card (thats the 1536 core one)is a great bang for buck card. I’ve usualy used Nvidia except for many years ago. However if i was still running my old 8800GTX cards i had prior to my 560ti ..i would have bought a 7870 tahiti card by now as they r great value.

the way i see it.

if you can get an old 7870 for 200usd or less get that, if not get the new one for 260usd that either one is a beast for its cost, im not at all unhappy i bought my dual 7870 first version cards, they are amazing, and for the 209 i spent on each…..couldnt find a better buy.