Guild Wars 2

The problem many WvWers have is that… sure, we have new stuff added to WvW, but a LOT OF IT, as mentioned before, are bug fixes…

Culling is a bugfix, more or less. We should NOT of had culling issues at launch… at least if ANet wanted to release a polished game for WvW. This was an issue from beta and was exploited many times (part of the tactics) and when “fixed”, became like some HUGE addition to WvW when it fact, it is a fix.

The removal, and when it happens, restoration of the Orb, is going to be viewed as some great addition to WvW… However, again, this was something that was a feature, taken away, and should have already been restored. I really HOPE ANet will not used the restored Orb as “new content” added to WvW, because it was content that we had, and should of had, not something new.

ANet did add stuff like Siegerazor… wow. I mean, it slightly helps server that are completely unmanned, and maybe on low-pop vs. low-pop server Siegerazor makes a huge difference, but often Siegerazor only lends to tower trading as the gates remain paperthin. Ah well.

Stonemist had a slight shift with the Lord moved to the first floor. That was a better option vs. facing the endless rain/reign of ACs from the 3rd floor.

ACs got kitten, then restored, sort of.

Sentries were a nice addition.

And thank God they fixed the Karma Cows/Yaks… so sad were the days when PvE scruffy yakherders came out in mass to escort our freaking dolyaks. Sad.

Regardless though, there are still MANY features in WvW that are broken and have not been fixed….some unlikely to ever get fixed. Team/Map chat, for instance, was not meant to be the EXACT same thing…but during BWE3 the Devs (I think it was Mike F.) mentioned that it was inherent in the programming and unfortunately they weren’t able to get to it anytime soon…

Commander/Squads…. despite TONS of posts here, continue to remain very very inadequate for what WvWers want to use them form. For a game that is supposed to help group players up and encourage cooperation on a deeper level than zerg-ball… the C/S fails on so many levels. It has not really been improved minus /supplyinfo and the ability for the Squad Commander to draw on map (and yet almost NO one actually joins the squads).

When players LEAVE the game while in group, err, their shadow image remains and takes up a slot in your party. Their shadow cannot be booted. I think, in PvE, we can kick them from party, even after they left game, but why not in WvW? Bug? Fix? No yet…

Whispers are still sometimes seriously boinked in WvW…where one cannot whisper another.

Why they allow for cross-realm/server grouping… I do not know.

Unfortunately, ANet had a staff switch over… Mike Ferguson was pretty responsive and seemed to give a lot of notice to feedback when he was the head dev for WvW. Not saying Devon isn’t like that. With that switch though, it probably meant that work for WvW, after culling, was started a new. Sure we got ranks… which, really, many people can care less about. Many of us want a LOT more stuff, more content, more excitement… but it doesn’t look like ANet is going to put the people power into it, unlike Living Story. Folks do make a TON of suggestions, even small fixes here and there that would incrementally help improve WvW, but again, no changes…

Ah well.

Anyhow, still hoping for a dev to comment. =/

Pain, Jayne’s right, we were asking for this once the queues starting hitting… BWE2 and BWE3 were starting to get nuts with queues, and we had asked for such a feature, even a rough “estimated” queue time… but alas, to no avail.

There are MANY things we, as WvWers, have been asking for, some that are just common sense stuff (ability to boot players who left game without leaving group thus leaving a spot TAKEN in group, so we have to reform; broken whispers within WvW, Private Commander Tags… and fixing or even improving the Commander/Squad function, etc.)… and err, to no avail. Just because it’s common sense or it makes sense to implement something, ANet either a. will not do it because it’s not a priority for them, or b. there are issues within the system that causes them problems to fix/improve it (ala Team/Map chat being the same… I remember Beta3 or 4 they actually came out and said that was an issue that they cannot fix any time soon).

Best of luck, because we would like that feature.

I’m actually curious to as to how Spehss got the info. I would like to get some data on that too. =)

From a WvWer point of view…

I agree that the WvW Vistas, POI, and Skill Challenges probably should not count towards world completion (probably have it as a separate achievement for WvW map completion), but I don’t agree with the massed Waypoint argument.

I was fortunate that I got in all my main’s map completion in the early days when rotation was only 3 days vs. 1 week. But I saw a LOT of guildies and PVErs struggle with world completion after that. It also didn’t hurt that I lived in WvW…so eh.

But, the waypoint argument has been made… and counter argued, over and over. For those that do a LOT of WvW, we understand why there is a limitation on WP… WvW is not about insta-fights all over the place. It’s a strategic game (which has since devolved into zerg-ball) where the maps are balanced… part of the game is dying, and running… sucking up “time” to get across a map… which actually doesn’t take 20 minutes… maybe 5 minutes from top to bottom… at least for those who know what they are doing, and are able to dodge zergs and hide and get to where they need to be getting to. It’s not a big deal. The maps are in fact, quite small, compared to other games that have had a more solid focus on WvW/RvR/mass PvP. So yes, death costs you time to run on the map, which in fact, isn’t all that long… especially if you know what you’re doing. This coming from someone who is on a zerg heavy (vs. other zerg heavy) server.

Hey, just wanted to say, this was a fun week for our guild running havoc squad(s). DB and FA, you guys were awesome in that we met up with way more 5 man-ish groups, and people willing to duel and fight outside of zergballs. That was a lot of fun for us… a definitely welcome change of pace. To both servers, we salute you!

I don’t know if ANet has to explain WHY they did away with the two week match up. I mean, seriously, does it need to be explained why especially since many have already posted some of the more obvious reasons above? I thought it was just kind of common sense, even when they first announced it, that two weeks was just WAY too freaking long.

The weeklies aren’t bad, but I do wish they shorted the scoring cycle again, like during beta… where you score once per 6 minutes or something that wasn’t once every 15 minutes. In this way, smaller objectives seemed more… worth it, vs. flip wars.

Urrid, if you had followed Ahmrill’s post, and necroing of ancient threads… once every so often he’ll dig up almost EVERY Commander thread from the past year and bring it back to the front page.

So far, NO Dev response. =/

I’ll double Miiro’s point. Most nights, I run in our guild “havoc” groups, raiding camps, or tapping on tower gates to draw out players to fight. However, in T1, vs. SOR/BG, the game is more … dodge the zerg. On a good night, we are able to hit the tail ends of zergs, or cut off reinforcements to a Bay/Hills/Garri battle… but again, it’s navigating around the zergs. Group fights do exist, but that is not the norm coming from the JQ perspective.

Now that JQ is facing DB and FA, there are a lot more smaller group vs. group action, which we enjoy a lot more now. FA in particular seems to have a good number of smaller guild groups running around looking to play. =)

Well, I hope it happens. Private Commander Squads, a better UI to tell who is in your squad along with Supply Count/Who has Supply, etc. something better than /supplyinfo. And allowing Squad members to see other Commanders… there are just so many basic things that can be done to improve the Commander feature that hasn’t been done.

For a company that wants to promote people grouping up and working together…especially PuGs, they have seriously failed us on this front via the poor excuse that is the Commander/Squad feature. Sorry.

This has been suggested before, and/or a possible Second Spike (longer Spike on a corpse that forces the corpse of respawn). In either case, I support this mechanic. The maps are small enough where a run back or a regroup isn’t all that horrible. Even a 5 minute cap on death (resets if someone starts a revive) forcing a respawn wouldn’t be too bad.

I agree with most of what the OP suggested.

As noted by others above, instead of a pure “Guild Commander”, something along the lines of a “Private” Commander that can invite more than just guildies to his squad would be appreciated.

Also, I wouldn’t mind an option for players WITHIN a Commander Squad to see other Commander Tags. Currently, unless you’re the Commander, if you’re in a Squad, you cannot see other Commander tags on the map. That… seriously does not make sense, especially for folks who do a LOT of scouting on the map. It is SO much easier to know where the Commanders all, call out locations, and note where our zergs our and moving towards. If in squad, we are blind to our own commanders’ movements. I don’t see why we can’t have a toggle that allows us to see other tags.

As a Thief (albeit not a good one), Armor/Toughness does make a difference, at least in WvW. I do considerably LESS damage when critting/backstabbing (one of the few times during a fight that I’ll actually notice my damage output) vs. someone is Heavy Armor vs. Med/Light. I’m hitting for about 20% less damage on crits.

Guardians are some of the worst to go up against… but then again, a lot of it has to deal with their various weapon skills and utilities. Necros actually rank up there in terms of tanky careers to take down (mainly since they have so much Vitality and Death Shroud) and their condition damage which WILL melt my Berserker Thief.

And a note about Berserker geared characters, we are made of glass. Running around with 12.8k Health (all Berserker minus 1 Valkyrie gear) means I literally MELT when Necros pop Staff AOEs right on top of themselves (hey, gotta get close for a backstab right?), or some of their other effects.

Learn the weaknesses of Berserker gear, and fully take advantage of that against glass cannon builds. And worse comes to worse, as a Necro, don’t tank it in front, but weave in after most of your group charges into a battle then pick and choose your targets while supporting your teammates. =)

ANet hasn’t really given us WvWers much, besides Culling (and err, Siegerazor). Ascended Gear via Badges was only "equaling WvW to PvE. Masteries are “nice” but they don’t really improve the enjoyment of WvW much, like there’s no real NEW content, unlike the Living Story. What I hear from some of our more vocal posters in this thread is that ANet ISN’T giving WvW as much attention as we want them to, and I agree.

What IS there to work towards for end game in WvW? Cooler looking gear? There doesn’t seem much of that? Special finishers to look better… well, aren’t the finishers based off sPvP and NOT WvW in this upcoming patch? Why wouldn’t it be based off WvW Ranks? Purchasable dance moves through Ranks/Badges? Maybe?

Personally, I don’t need “improvement” of stats or gameplay, etc. for my time in WvW. However, I would like to recognized for my time there… something that sets me, as a decently dedicated WvW player (compared to time spent in PvE). PvErs get different skins for each dungeon set. They can work towards Legendary Weapons. Every two weeks they get some new content (which I’ll dip into for fun). And WvW… we pretty much get nothing.

As others have pointed out…there are still bugs exclusive to WvW…like not being able to whisper people. And the Commander system…. still is not really up to par for what a great number of us would like. ANet CAN put some thought and energy into this, but are they? Are we seriously only getting Masteries for this year?

As for Orbs… to me, it’s not some big boon great prize bonus for us WvWers. We HAD Orbs in beta. and early game. Sure it was broken. Sure people could somehow sneak into Bay and hit the Altar without even breaching the inner gate/wall… but it was something that could have been fixed and returned to game…. much sooner. It was not. If the return of the Orb is the BIG WvW update I will be highly disappointed…it’s NOT new content.

As with Culling. With the elimination of Culling, many WvWers were cheering happy for this great…new thing… but really… it’s a fix that should have not been a problem at launch. It gave us what the game SHOULD have already been. Does that make sense?

Although I still enjoy GW2, and especially the WvW aspect of the game, I WOULD however, like to see ANet start putting some serious thought to improve WvW…perhaps first by doing fixing some of the more basic aspects of the game (whispers/booting folks who left group, and improving the Commander)… and then creating new content for us (new maps, more dynamic UI, etc.).

I wasn’t planning on responding, but eh, what the heck…

What I get from Pariah’s post isn’t about really, stopping the recruitment of additional guilds for JQ, BG, SOR (well, we dropped so whatever right?)… nor is it really the “hypocrisy” of JQers complaining about skill lag (I see the complaints) yet wanting MORE players on the field….

Truly what I get out of it is that ANet doesn’t seem to be doing a kitten thing about the skill lag issues. I don’t know anything about the technical aspects of the game… like servers, and whatnots, and how many players start to slow things down, etc. etc. But what I do know, or at least feel, is that ANet doesn’t seem to have a lot of staff dedicated to WvW compared to a lot of other aspects of the game.

Seriously, we still don’t have a decent “warband” type tool to REALLY help us better organize groups… or even have private squads which would benefit smaller and mid-sized guilds running in WvW. Not much really has been done to radically improve WvW since probably the culling… Orbs are still dysfunctional and inert. Nothing new, nothing interesting… and sure we have Ascended Gear in WvW, but is that really a major improvement or just catching up with the rest of the game?

And here PvE has new content every other week.

I know ya’ll are kitten Pariah and even possibly lost respect or whatever for her. But honestly, I think she wants US, as the WvW community, or at least the T1 WvW community, to step up and not just accept the status quo of whatever ANet gives us, but instead, step up our voices, and challenge the game developers to do something MORE for WvW… like focus some man power on the Skill Lag issue… as they did Culling.

Anyhow, just my two cents.

Amy, +1, and if I may add…

Allow for Co-Commanders who have some of the “command” options that the Commander has… such as being able to draw on the map, kicking/removing/adding members, access to the Commander chat, and supply count check.

In this way, a Commander can focus a lot more on leading… and have his lieutenants help with running the Squad. We actually practiced this in other games… freeing the “commander” from some of the administrative work of the squad, and it was a great way to train up new leadership at the same time.

Just a question out there to the WvW community…

What are your thoughts about the Commander Pin being Account Bound as opposed to Character Bound?

What are your thoughts on the pros and cons IF ANet could and would make that adjustment?

Thanks…

Other people than Ahmrill suggesting private commander squad? WHAT???

Recently Necro’d Commander threads are starting to get moved to the Suggestion Sub-Forum… how unfortunate that any WvW suggestions are just BURIED under a ton of other suggestions…

Perhaps it’s time ANet, to create a WvW Suggestion Sub-Forum… would it be THAT hard to do so?

Ahmrill.7512:

The only solution possible is to create multiple 5 person groups, try and run together by marking a “driver” and having to use a 3rd party voice program to communicate as there is no dedicated chat channel for the private force. This is not an adequate option for many of us.

Ahm, your only “current” solution mentioned… as we’ve experienced, is greatly inadequate. In this day and age of computer gaming, I would expect vastly superior tools (inherent to the game) to what we had in say, DAOC… instead, we are relying on 3rd party VOIP, to coordinate our guildies…in WvW, without the use of a Commander pin (so as not to confuse other server mates or draw players away from our server commanders).

Some may argue that, we’ll your players SUCK… you can’t coordinate in WvW well with only VOIP… what’s wrong with you? Or your players don’t have never keep, tower, camp, sentry name and location memorized, as with every nook and cranny on map memorized… you guys suck…. okay, no ones said that to me directly yet, and perhaps I imagine it…

BUT…. I think myself, as well as many of those that are in WvW (especially in the old days when JQ was forming up with the Relic players… old school Daoc/Warhammer/Shadowbane/Darkfall players) are CASUAL gamers. Many of us are career folk, married (or with partners), with 2.5 children, and a dog, or cat… or charr. Having simple tools available to us to use saves us time, helps us gather up easier, and makes gaming fun…. as opposed to spending half the time trying to get anything more than a group of five together…

And sorry, my initial comment was to buttress Ahmrill’s comment about the inadequacy of the current solution available…

This is a great idea… love the different colored tags… also what would be nice is an Private/Public commander toggle… so those that wish to run private groups (that are not necessarily epic zerg size), like say a guild, can do so… allowing their players to more easily gather up on their smaller group commander… without the commander tag confusing other players on the map. That would be a great “small step” implementation.

Luthan.5236:

They should at least make a commander party(squad) UI. Tried to join a squad 1 time and there is absolutely no reason to join… other than being able to see the squad chat [bold](which is barely used)[/bold] there is no other advantage… and you can see the commander icon without having joined the squad.

Luthan, you bring up a very valid point… why even bother joining a Commander squad…

Here’s what we get as a non-Commander…

A. We see Commander Squad Chat – WHICH NO ONE USES…. seriously, who uses it???
B. Commander can now scribble on map for squadmates, which is nice.
C. We can NO LONGER SEE OTHER COMMANDER PINS… really? WHY??? It just doesn’t make sense.

Totally with ya there bud.

Plus, a UI would help… in at the least it helps squad people “feel” like they are part of a squad… I mean, I know ANet has mentioned they didn’t want a Raid UI feature because it breaks immersion or something like that (can someone dig ANet’s statement up please?)… but then, why even have your group/party UI then? It doesn’t make sense…sorry.

Totally am supporting the movement to improve the Commander pin. Digging up these old threads sadly reminds me that it unfortunately may not be a priority for ANet… but hopefully, it’ll show them that it is on the forefront of what we, the WvW community, would like improved.

This is an awesome thread… lot of great ideas, even after being necro’d there’s still a lot of great input… keep it coming folks!

3rd Party Tools – someone mentioned that “other” games are irrelevant, however, players will always compare GW2 to other MMORPGs… one reason why GW2 is so awesome is because they evolved this genre to a whole new level by improving on those “other” games… however, where ANet excelled in many areas of the game, they also regressed in other aspects. Communication, organization, and forming up within WvW has been a mess. Since BWE3 we found out that map/team chat was somehow inherently screwed up in the programming that they couldn’t change it… not even to this day. The Commander/Squad feature probably was not as well tested… period. It was a novel concept, loved the pin idea… but beyond that, it was just clunky and felt like they threw something together last minute to spice up the soup.

In this new tech age…it seems that MOST WvW servers organize through 3rd party tools. Want to talk about exclusion? How many times have you read… “join server TS, now!”… tell me that isn’t discouraging for new players coming into a game…or the casual gamer who doesn’t necessarily want to download software, or buy a headset. Or, more so, when you challenge that statement “err, sorry, I don’t want to join the TS, or I don’t have the program, or can’t you just type in map?” and face a searing retaliation making you feel like a total idiot… and then you realize you’re a pariah unable to join in on all the reindeer games (fortunately or unfortunately for me, for early GW2 I actually was an admin, but I still didn’t like using the JQ TS at the time).

ANet “could” have created more ways to better organize players… if their intent was to focus on the casual gamer, without providing stronger in game mechanics, on some level they failed. Sure players can easily follow the zerg… but often, the zerg does not talk back to them…or from what I’ve seen, many Commanders don’t talk in Squad nor Map/Team chat…nor do they have lieutenants that help communicate to the rest of map. It’s Server VOIP or nothing. To me, that is NOT friendly towards the casual players.

Likewise, ANet probably did not see how Commander Pins would evolve… and basically begin the “culture” of zerging in WvW. Although a given map can have up to ten commander pins showing, most WvW servers (I can be wrong here, but just from what I’ve seen) run 1 or 2 commander at most… so as to NOT confuse the players. This, unfortunately, is not a “friendly” mechanic for guilds or players who want to form up smaller raid groups (as Devon wants to emphasize).

Example… when our guild gets on map… we usually run raid groups… hitting camps, killing yaks, murdering sentries, baiting out opposing players and ganking reinforcements running to their zerg while dumping supply where it’s needed. However, when we get 2 groups, or start peaking a 3rd group… here’s where things get muddy. When we run around, often we have folks lost, especially when the 2 groups split up (due to combat, or a wipe). Some of our newer to WvW member don’t know the maps as well, and have a hard time regrouping. And so on and so forth… it WOULD be a lot easier if we popped a commander pin, but we don’t, because when we do, then A LOT of people start following us because ANet has TRAINED players to follow the Commander pin (does that make sense? You want action, go to the pin). However, on some level, that is detrimental to our larger map efforts where our zerg is, and it becomes hard to be a backline raid group when you start piling on more than 20 players. Also, in a pure economical sense, it would have been better to have two raid groups going… less players are needed to cap camps and disrupt the backlines… multiple teams work better than say, one larger one. So we don’t pop the pin.

So my suggestion to ANet and Devon… to at least consider adding in elements that would help the organization of those mid-sized groups of guilds and even PUGs that want to more easily gather up together to hit behind the enemy lines, far away from the zerg….

Two quick suggestions…

1. Private Squads – many have stated this before, and although it seems exclusive, it does allow guilds, and those that do not want to confuse players to more easily organize and hone in where those raid teams are going.

2. Allow Squad Members to See Other Commander Pins – there are many that can benefit to see where other pins are… it’s so much easier to coordinate your group if you can SEE where other commanders are… without having to go into a 3rd party VOIP tool to hear what the other Commanders are doing. Although Commanders can see other Commander pins, their squadlings cannot. It’s often those Squadmates that are strong tactical players, or they are always “map” aware of what is going on… and it helps a lot for more than just the commander to see what’s going on.

Where as I don’t necessarily agree with the title to this thread (removing the commander pin), I do think that ANet can learn a thing or two from the Warband system (from Warhammer On-line).

From reading this thread, there seems to be a lot of “fear” that warbands exclude while Commander pins include the PUG players. And although it’s “easier” to follow a commander pin and run wild in a zerg ball, ANet, in a sense, has allowed a dumbing down of their players by doing so. However, warband were NOT exclusive as many might think they were.

In use of this “raid” UI system, etc. we easily were able to get PUG players into open warbands. By simply “communicating” using in game map chat (region 2) we broadcasted which warbands had room, we asked if anyone needed a warband (for newer players who didn’t know how to join), we helped reorganize PUG players into groups that worked (formed them into their parties to make sure each one had at least one healer)… individual warbands would train new players how the warbands worked (warband chat was nice). When we had more players than warbands could fit… I had asked warbands to split up… usually the warband leader would take half (or a quarter of his band) and his Warband Assistant Leader (which also was a nice feature) took over the rest… forming up. In time, we were training players to lead… multiple leaders to lead…as the system encouraged us to split warbands to create more warbands as more PUG players joined in the fray. This was done on a continual basis on our server faction (Phoenix Throne – Destro) and it actually worked well for the community as we were actively being inclusive and catered towards the PUG players. At the same time, guilds also formed private warbands… often either leading some of the more daring maneuvers or raiding in coordination with our “zerg”.

What made the Warband nice to work with was as Ahm mentioned above… there were a LOT of tools at our fingertips as in game mechanics. It felt way more streamlined and workable than say, our current Commander/Squad system in GW2. Warband/Raid UIs are quite… intuitive… they are not clunky to use. And fine, ANet doesn’t want WvW UI because it messes up immersion… fine… but why work with a system that is SO clunky to use?

Raine Akrune.8416:

Azylynne.9487:

Right now, once I join someone’s squad (or they join mine), we cannot see another commander pin. It makes it a little difficult sometimes to follow map chat or VOIP when noting activity elsewhere on the map. For coordination, it helps to know where OTHER commanders are too.

As a commander you should be able to see other commanders on the same map as you, I know I can. I would disagree if your suggesting everyone in a squad should be able to see other commanders as this can confuse people/new comers. It makes a lot of sense that once you join a commander squad that you can no longer see the other various commanders on the map as you should NOT be following them.

Raine, Pariah actually hit the nail on the head. Sure as a Commander I can see other Commanders on the same map… but folks in my squad cannot. Why? When I have other players in my squad who are smart, competent, and able to act and react to what is going on the map… it doesn’t make sense that they cannot see what the other commanders are doing… there’s almost a “disrespect” towards players’ intelligence with this feature….

And here lies my complaint about the Commander feature (this part is not addressed towards you Raine =)). At first we thought it was a great idea… Commander, 100 gold, blue pin on the map. That was a pretty novel and cool concept during the BWE and only a few guilds were able to muster up the Commander on our server (JQ). However, once things got rolling… in many ways, the Commander pin dumbed down play. I don’t blame our good solid commanders in the early days of the game. They did well, coordinating the zerg, forming up balls, and thought up new and creative tactics (a lot of credit to the Tempest Wolves now on SoR).

BUT… as time rolled on, it seems that more and more focus is purely ONLY on the Commander pin. People flock to it like a moth to light. Commanders flood map/team chat with micro-managed chatter about their zerg (use Local?). The emphasis of the game radically shifted from multi-pronged groups attacking many targets at once to what the commander was doing.

Compare this to (my) beta… where during those days, without the commander pin, we relied on good communication across the board, usually having two main prongs of attack with various smaller raid groups in between flipping and defending camps and catching enemy reinforcements or running havoc behind enemy lines… players new to map or just got on map asking where the action was were directed towards various places that needed help on the map…or joined the smaller raid groups that went about fighting in smaller engagements. Players had to work a bit harder in coordinating (no server VOIP yet at that time), and played smarter… instead of say, “come to my pin”, “stack on my pin”, etc.

That’s just my rant… and I’m sure people are going to rip it apart with tons of counter arguments and what not.

That said… I would like to encourage ANet to have some deeper considerations to changes in WvW…. making it a more…. intelligent challenge… like how the maps are designed (with balance), like with supply, and caravans, etc. Many suggestions for commander are towards improving the more social and organizational aspects of the game… Squad UI, flags to mark targets, etc. I would appreciate ANet focusing on those aspects of the Squads… in addition to the someone more “fun but brainless” aspects of +% damage within Range X of the Commander…

I’m also not saying to kill the zerg… the Commander pin/ball zerg strategy works… but create incentives for the non-zerg gamers too. Those that run the smaller raid groups striking camps timing it for the flips for score… those that wait patiently for dolyaks to leave a camp to score extra points for their side, those that bait out enemy players to kill, tagging towers, or flash capping towers, cutting off enemy reinforcements from the enemy zergs and major engagements… there’s a lot of fun to be had for these gamers too… and based on ANet, they seem to want to put some emphasis on these guys as well.

Here are some of my thoughts on how to improve the squad system, INCLUDING private squads….

1. More Versatility (options) for the Commander (and co-Commanders)
Such as… toggle on/off squad members to see other Commanders pins in game. Right now, once I join someone’s squad (or they join mine), we cannot see another commander pin. It makes it a little difficult sometimes to follow map chat or VOIP when noting activity elsewhere on the map. For coordination, it helps to know where OTHER commanders are too.
And possibly… Pin Visible to all or Pin Private – so only members of your squad can see your pin.

2. Creation of Co-Commander who can help with adding/removing people from squad, and/or drawing on the map (that was a cool feature added, thanks ANet).

3. Easier or Alternative Methods of adding Players to Squad – this will especially come in handy if and when squads go Private. A text command for Commanders/co-Commanders to add players would greatly help and/or for players to join squads. A simple /squadinvite [player name] or something similar would help. This helps especially if players are farther from the commander, or are not as familiar with the game (to click on pin and join squad). Sometimes a text command (/joinsquad Ahmrill etc.) could make things more simple.

4. Additional Color Text for Commander/Co-Commanders. Not everyone uses VOIP… this can help. As well as Commander/Co-Commander options to mute individual players from squad chat or the ability to easily boot them.

5. Squad Interface – sometimes it would greatly help to see a “master list” of all the players in the squad. I other games there are ways to easily see who is in your squad, their careers, and if they are co-commanders etc (like a raid panel from WoW or Warbands from Warhammer). It also would help if there was a symbol listing if the player has supply (or how much) and a total tally somewhere, maybe near the bottom or top of the squad panel that shows TOTAL supply.

6. And of course, as mentioned, Private Squads. For many who run with just their guildies (and a few tag-a-longs), this will help tremendously. I know ANet is supporting that WvW allows for smaller group on group or 2 group vs. 2 group action… outside of the zerg… this is alive and well in WvW… except, currently, with the commander pins and squads, it’s VERY clunky for smaller scale guild group to run together. Sure we can “see each other” in 2-3 different groups… but since we already have a commander feature… with a pin, once we activate that pin, the smaller group can easily become a zerg… which, we don’t necessarily want to do (mostly because it confuses players… we’re hitting camps and flash attacking towers… we don’t need 20-30 players for that, meanwhile our main force has breached inner at Garrison etc.). And again, the ability to toggle your pin so that ALL can see, or only those within your Squad can see would be tremendously helpful. It will help our 2-3 groups of guildies and friends to find each other MUCH faster.

Anyhow, I am sure there are hundred and ten better suggestions… and I am sure Ahmrill has already collected and posted them two to three dozen times already. Sorry, I probably shouldn’t have posted this here… but again, private squads… squad display, would greatly greatly help out WvW players.

I vote for the trained sharks with laser beams.

Actually, the cannon yak or even siege yak is interesting. However, I don’t think it should be part of the caravan yak… as they serve a specific function and are as vulnerable as they are for a reason.

1. Cannon Yaks – would be nice addition to the current yaks, providing some extra protection for the current yaks and/or sent on different routes… like one could be purchased from a Quartermaster or something for x amount of silver/karma/supply… then sent to a specific objective. E.g., one purchases a Yak from Durios, and its final destination is Ogrewatch… it then SLOWLY moves on it’s merry way to Ogrewatch alone a specified path (west of Ogroth) … any time friendly players come up to it, they can do their magic with the yak… set it up, fire cannons, etc. etc. When it reaches Ogrewatch, it sits there, in front… kinda like Siegerazor and gang… It will be vulnerable to guards… and it has limited life that can be healed.

2. Supply off a Caravan Yaks… I actually wouldn’t mind seeing Yaks drop supply once in a while. I think if players go up and get supply from a yak… it would prove to be interesting. However, I also can see the complaints players make to NOT grab supply off the yaks either, like how players take supply from depots at the various objectives. Hmm.

Can always start a lowbie character. =)

I am not sure if I am using the right terms, but her e-mail was “registered” as her user name (the one we use for log ins just about everywhere for GW2). However, the e-mail authenticator or IP authenticator (like when you reset your router or play from a different location), she didn’t do that as she was not even able to log into game.

Usually we get the e-mail authentication now when we log in for the first time, ever… and it makes sure our IP is where we are gaming from. We check our e-mail, click the link, check yes or whatever, and the log in proceeds forward. So in that sense, she did not get to the authentication step.

Yeah, I tried variants of her password, caps, no caps, caps on various letters, numbers forwards and backwards, etc. Maybe I should have tried more. She tried many variants too… no avail. Dunno what the issue is…

Bluestone, although she used her regular e-mail address, she did choose a NEW and unique password, that is at least 10 characters long. This was a new password she has never used for other games.

Just to confirm, my friend went through the steps in the video via this link:

: https://en.support.guildwars2.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/8982

She got the confirmation e-mail that read….

Forwarded Message——
From: noreply@guildwars2.com
To: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Sent: Wed, Dec 19, 2012 4:06 PM HST
Subject: Thanks for registering!

Congratulations on successfully completing the registration process for Guild
Wars 2!

Save this e-mail for future reference!

Your account name is: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Use your account name to log in to the game client and to access your account
management page (http://account.guildwars2.com) and the official Guild Wars 2
forums (http://forum.guildwars2.com). Please keep your account name confidential
in order to protect your privacy and your account security.

Your Guild Wars 2 display name is: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The Guild Wars 2 display name is your unique identifier that will be seen
in-game and when you post on the Forums.

You may download the game client at account.guildwars2.com/download. If you are
having issues downloading or playing the game, please visit support.guildwars2.com.

We’ll see you in-game!

The Guild Wars 2 Team

So I believe she did register correctly…. just weird that the password she used to register, which she had to type in TWICE, correctly, is not incorrect. She did not even get to the e-mail authenticator notice, nor was she able to get into game to create a character.

Hi, my friend finally purchased GW2 at my bequest and she finally installed it and loaded it today. However, after registering the game, via serial code, name, birthday, display name, and getting a registration confirmation e-mail… she tried to log into game.

Apparently her user name/password was not working.

She had since submitted a ticket. But I recall that it should be easy to change password as long as you have your username (e-mail), your serial code from the box, and your character name.

Problem is, under the forgotten password recovery page, you need a character name, but that hasn’t worked for her since she doesn’t have a character yet…as she hasn’t been able to log into game to create a character.

This is really perplexing, as I have been strongly advocating this game for her, as with others. This is one of the first times myself and my guildmates, and many on my server (duriny beta and earlier release) have come across this problem… what can we do to remedy it?

Her ticket info is…[Incident: 121220-000770], I think. She has submitted a ticket, but now she can’t even log into her support account. She is having serious issues, and coming from World of Warcraft, she keeps asking me if there is a number she can call for live customer support. Anything like that at all?

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

Selwynn, you are completely correction.

Originally ANet had announced a diversified payment option for transfering to a different server. I forgot the exact costs but transfering to a “larger” server costed more than transfering to a “smaller” server. Likewise, there was supposed to be a seven day lock out for WvW in anticipation of a two week WvW period.

ANet had stated in the days leading up to launch that free transfers will be available until the server pops stabilized.

Well, neither has happened, and servers for WvW are getting wrecked all over the place. It’ll be very interesting to see how this plays out.

Good game. Fun WvW, but for the servers on the higher tiers, getting into WvW was atrociously long, and the constant flood of “hanger ons” or “band wagoners” really makes things complicated and messy for those that helped build the server community during beta.

Ah well.

My friend uses Xpadder for his Xbox 360 Controller for Guild Wars 2. He loves it. Might be something for you to consider. He actually did quite a bit of research beforehand and his only contigency to play GW2 was that he could do it on his XBox controller.