Guild Wars 2

Going back to the old server system (IE: removing megaservers).
….hey, a person can hope :x

I’m bringing this post back up because of something I’ve been seeing the past few days in Cursed Shore, that bothers me to no end and is a good example of why megaservers and temple defenses need to be looked at.

This is something that has been happening in the morning hours (about 7AM to 10AM PST, from what I’ve seen).
People will do the Arah defense event, and whenever they do there’s a small group that purposely does the Grenth defense afterwards to in retaliation. quite ridiculous. One person (who I’d like to name, but know it’s against the rules) even blatantly said, “If you do the Arah defense, we’ll do the Grenth defense” because they’re trying to teach those Arah defenders a lesson. (the Grenth defenders wanted to do the arah chain)

Now, I agree that I’d rather let Arah fail and do the chain, like these people who defend Grenth want to, but I cannot agree with then purposely doing a defense event just to spite others.
If they were people doing the defense because they don’t know the mechanics of temple events, or because they really wanted the trait, I wouldn’t be nearly as upset. That’s understandable, and I can just sit around another hour or two and wait for the chain to hopefully begin again, assuming it doesn’t get defended again (…ugh…)

This is just one of many problems I never had to deal with when I could chose which server I wanted to play on, which community I liked best to play with, and what kind of atmosphere I wanted to experience. I don’t understand why the choice has been stripped from us.
Don’t even get me started on the current state of affairs for World Bosses, or the 52 page forum (as well as a few other forums with many pages) about megaserver problems which have had no communication from ArenaNet, or have even been addressed in updates. ….though I guess that’s a discussion for another time.

I’ve tried to like megaservers for the past nine months it’s been implemented, but things like this just keep pushing me away from Guild Wars as a hole. It makes me sad, because I love the game and still remember how things were before the that fateful April 15th patch.

{In before, "It’s implemented, get over it. I love megaserver, so your point is invalid.}

I definitely agree OP.

Just take a look at the Temple of Grenth event- the part where you defend Jonez as he performs the cleansing ritual. It’s turned into people spamming aoe on the spawn points, and any enemy that isn’t a veteran dies before it even has a chance to appear on my screen.

Things like this are seen in just about any event- the hardest part about events (both major and minor) is tagging enemies in the hopes of getting credit. It’s really not much fun for me.

Maybe ArenaNet is looking into this? I’m not so sure; after almost five months since the megaserver release you think something would have been done to address issues such as helping and doing all you can in an event and getting bronze completion. Or the 150 man zerg swarmed on Taidha Covington (gee, what a fair fight! not to mention having to see kitten comments every single time I do the event).

World bosses used to be fun for me- megaservers killed it.

A way to track events that aren’t world bosses (for example temples) with an API like we used to be able to.

An opt out of megaservers, or an option of how populated we like our maps, or a way to choose which map we get put into.

World bosses to feel like dynamic living world events again, and not be on a schedule.

Alga.6498:

LOVE the Megaserver! Finally you can actually find other players while you’re on your adventure into the Tyria!

If you chose the right server, you could before as well. Now everything is a big mish mash, with no choice in how populated someone might want their map.

Hamfast.8719:

The solution:

1) Kill the Megaserver, and reinstate individual servers.
2) Give everyone 3 free server transfers per year.

This restores server loyalty. This restores seeing people you recognize. This restores the ability to see contested/uncontested waypoints, as well as the location dots of party members in other zones.

They need to post much more accurate accounts of how populous each server is. People will be able to freely choose just how crowded they like to feel in their game. If you want lots of people around for zergs and dragon fights, find a high population server. If you want more challenging fights, and peace and quiet, find a low population server. If you change your mind, freely move to the server size of your choice! Everybody wins, and nobody is permanently locked into a choice that may turn out to be what they didn’t want after all.

That’s your simplest route to making as many players happy as possible. Give us free choice, and the ability to change our minds.

I would be more than elated if this happened. Cannot upvote enough!

Ta-dah! Here’s my necromancer.
Head- none
Shoulders- Heritage Mantle
Chest- Aristocrat’s Coat
Legs- Acolyte’s Pants
Shoes- Winged Boots
Staff- Final Rest

All I want is a way to be able to track when temple events or Arah are up in Orr. They aren’t scheduled, so it’s incredibly difficult to know when they’re up.

At least maybe make it so there’s an NPC at the temple or a nearby waypoint that tells when the event last occurred, that way I have an idea of when to zone back in to see if the temple is uncontested and starting its event chain.

Absolutely. The hardest part of an event, especially in Orr, is hoping that you do enough damage within the first second of something spawning to hope that you do damage to it in order to get any sort of reward for it.

Take the Temple of Grenth cleansing event, for example, where you protect Jonez Deadrun as he cleanses the temple. The only thing I see are people either attacking one of the champions that spawns, or spamming AOE skills at the spawn points. The enemies die before they even have time to appear.

If this was the state of events when I first started playing I can honestly say I would have laughed at dynamic events and would never have done them. It’s just not fun for me.
Unfortunately, I know how fun it used to be to be challenged with these events pre megaserver, as there were fewer people, so mobs took longer to die and actually were able to damage you. So now I’m left holding on to the hope that megaservers will either get a massive overhaul that addresses things that are serious issues for me….or, in my perfect world, be removed or have an option to choose if one would like to be placed in the megaserver and allow others to remain in their home server instancing if they so desire.

Hopefully this thread isn’t deleted and told to be merged into the megaserver threads. Any moderator reading, please! I think this is more an issue about scaling as a whole. Megaservers really just made it more convoluted and difficult for the scaling technology.

I’m not sure if this is the right forum to post this in, but I’m wondering at any possible way to track or know when temples in Orr occur?

Ever since megaserver the only way I know when a temple is up is if I go to a map and look for the uncontested waypoint. If it’s not, then I do other things and hop back into the map every now and then and pray people don’t do the defense event (which makes me feel really bad… that I want people to fail an event…. can we please address why it is that the defense events have to displace the temple events another two hours? Please make them more lucrative to do! Or, maybe if the defense is done it would only prolong an uncontested temple for another half hour or so…)

Another thing is that I try guesting to other servers in the hopes that I get put into a different megaserver shard, but because only two guest passes are allowed often I get put right back into the same map, and then the hope of getting a new map where maybe a temple event is up dies.

Now, I understand that temple events shouldn’t always be happening because they’re really loot heavy, and constant uncontested temples would mean that they aren’t as special or I guess it could mess with the economy, but it has become such a chore to even try to do the events that it simply isn’t worth it. I miss the days of doing temple runs with my server, or being able to use an API so that I could level my other characters and be alerted when a temple event pops.

Now, if I’m not constantly hopping in an out, I end up missing half the event or the event entirely. When that happens, I have to wait two hours until it happens again (assuming no one defends the temple. If that happens, it’s another four hours…. I don’t have that much time to play!)

Does anyone have any tips on what servers to guest to that usually place you in different shards? Is there any genius that’s been able to make a tracker yet for Orr?
Please help me, I’m desperate for tips! :P

I hope this isn’t completely off topic for this forum, but I figured it would help to show how much megaservers has ruined Orr for me.
I get that there’s more people, but that’s another issue I actually have with it. Enemies die so quickly because of massive zerging for temple events – or most events across all maps, for that matter – that the hardest part of an event is tagging an enemy.
The only viable weapons to use are AOE skills, and if you’re not a guardian or a staff necro, or a very quick elementalist, good luck looting anything.

I’ve been wondering whether or not a district system like we had in Guild Wars 1 would actually really be the best way to improve megaservers. If you think about it – unless you grouped up with others the only people you ever saw were in towns. When you went to do missions or quests you got an instance/map all to yourself.

With GW2, people are around all the time. While districts would be an improvement for hopping around to see if random events (like temples) are up, I imagine it would essentially be the same system as we have now, with overcrowded maps where events are already completed – you would simply have a greater chance by shard hopping to do them because there are more copies of the same temple available.

This was something that I saw that happened when server guesting was, for a brief period, unlimited (which was for about two weeks after the April 15 update). Because I got tired of uncontested temples, I decided to go into Cursed shore, and by typing /ip was able to find out which shard I got placed in based on what server I guested on. I did this for every single server, for about a week, and made a table of which shard placed me in which server. (Re-guesting would put me in that same server, so I knew it was pretty consistent)
My result was that each day, about five servers would get placed on one shard. Another five on a different shard, and so on. The next day was the same, but the five servers jumbled together would be slightly different, so I gather they randomly rotate out the servers that are together and rotate the IPs to make it seem different.

I never tried this for zones that become overly populated, for example Sparkly Fen during Tequatl or any map with a world boss. My guess is that the same thing happens, however when the map reaches the soft/hard cap the overflow system takes effect and makes a shard that simply puts people together randomly, like before.
This, to me, would explain why some people are seeing the same people as before while others are not. I seem to see people from my home server only when I’m in a map with a low pop – high pop and I’m lucky if I see one person.

With this in mind , I really have a hard time seeing how it’s any different that a server merge. MS is worse in my opinion simply because it’s so random and you can’t really rely on the system to get it right. It also makes an API that can let you know when random events are up impossible, because the shards are randomly rotated out, whereas a server merge would be like what we had before where the IPs are set.

I imagine if they managed to make a district system, it would just be those few shards to choose from, then any overflow shards that were created (there were usually about five different shards total, each with about five servers on them).
It would definitely be better than what we have now, because we would have some play with choosing where we want to go, but in my mind it wouldn’t be an improvement to other issues that we have like temples that are always uncontested or the ridiculous zergs at world bosses…. you’d simply get to choose which 100 man zerg you run with.

From my experiences MS as a whole is not better than what we had before, for so many of the reasons already voiced that have already been explained well enough, and looking at the way the system works just confirms it for me.

ArenaNet, I my plea:

If you have enough time to pump out weekly Black Lion trading items so that I throw my money at you, can you at least find time enough to give a status update regarding something that has a mass amount of views on your forums?

Thank you.

Faerun.3091:

there was no gameplay to be had there, it was just running around in a big zerg and spamming #1 skill. It was no fun. This time we need to split the zerg in medium size groups, and this time player skills matter more.

This is exactly how I feel about world bosses and Orr temple events, and after megaservers why I hardly ever bother with them….which, unfortunately, means I hardly play at all anymore. =(

Tyops.5894:

Would pay gems for a devpost about the megaserver.

Don’t give them any ideas. :P
……though I definitely would too. At least some acknowledgement that this 39 page+ forum exists, please??

After the April 15th patch, guesting was unlimited between servers. Now with the May 20th patch, the guesting system is back to only allowing you two different servers per day.
Finding temple events in Orr is extremely difficult with the new megaserver system, however the unlimited guesting made it much more feasible to be able to find an event and actually have the chance to be able to do it.

Is this a bug, or is guesting again limited?

nGumball.1283:

Romo.3709:

nGumball.1283:

This is the answer for the thread, where people asked why Anet is silent.
Players either want a comment on every post or won’t be statisfied and I don’t want any arguments going ‘’if they just had one comment explaining’’, players will react negativly whatever Anet does.

They may as well be silent and let the players complain cause they complain anyhow.

Are you saying that none of the issues or concerns are valid at all?

I am saying that since the players always react negativly, it maybe a reason why Anet is starting to be more silent. I am not saying it is good, or bad…neither I am a supporter of the situation or vice versa, just simply my own thougts. Players usually complain about the information from Anet wether it is little, or it is hype and if none of those they complain about why Anet does take long time before releasing what they promise.d which usually makes sense since they sometimes release info about things they are planning to work on and may take months just to start the process.

The playerbase of this game and other MMOs is the same and it is basically based on complaints since the player-base so huge and there will always be groups not happy with the game, therefore complaining on the forum. Since Anet know the forums ALWAYS gonna be complained at, wether the game is trash or amazing, they may simply have given up on the communication that usually lead to misunderstandings rather than soultions.

I have to disagree here. I’ve been reading forums for quite some time for many different games (WoW, GW1, GW2, Neverwinter Online… to name a few) and never have I seen such discontent with a new feature – both in game and in forums. Of course there are people that like it, and they should be able to use the feature if they choose to. Likewise, those of us who do not like it should be able to opt out, as megaservers truly destroys some of our favorite aspects of the game, and because the feature is forced on us we have no choice in the matter.

In any case, I’ll be waiting until the next update to play again. If they’ve fixed many of my quarrels with megaservers (or the best case scenario: remove them…but unfortunately I doubt they will) then I will keep living in the world of Tyria.
If things keep going the way they are, well then it was the best 2000+ hours over 607 days I’ve ever spent in an mmo, and rather than watch the game die I’ll unfortunately be finding a new place to call home.

I loved everything about the patch… except this. Not only does the schedule make events feel rigid (I thought they were suppose to be dynamic??) but it makes running events feel like a complete chore. And, with megaservers, there is no way to tell when events in Orr are beginning without sitting in the map and camping them, not to mention the overpopulation that leads to me simply pressing buttons as fast as possible to hope I can have any slim chance of getting loot.

Events were the most fun part of the game for me, but the new megaserver and event system has completely sucked the play value of GW2 dry.

You know that crazy biotoxin that Scarlett unleashed and plagued Tyria with after we killed her? It was megaservers.
Okay Arenanet, I solved the riddle! You can heal the land and remove the curse now.

When I first read about the megaservers before being implemented, I was excited because I love doing events and thought that this would mean they would occur more frequently and there would be more people to complete them with. After a week or so of testing them out, I can say with utmost confidence I’m hating megaservers and all they’ve brought. My reasons:
I) Events like Lyssa or Dwayna (or any temple event in megaserver) have become impossible to know when the event chains are starting unless you’re constantly zoning in and out of the map, or standing around and waiting for them to begin. I would like to be able to do other things while waiting for them to respawn (assuming I even get put in the correct megaserver).

II) There are way too many people at events. Not only do things die incredibly fast, but the lag from the oversized zergs makes it difficult to tag anything (and my computer can max graphics with no problem in major zergs in WvW on Blackgate, as well as having a fast internet connection). Events are no longer challenging – the hardest part of them is trying to mash buttons as quickly as I possibly can so I can actually tag mobs for loot. It makes it feel more like some cheap arcade game where I’m fighting the clock, as opposed to a fighting game where technique is required.

III) I really miss the group I used to do events with, and have only seen one of the ten to fifteen usuals in megaserver. It make me feel completely disconnected from my home server and community (the “being lonely in a crowd” effect). There are so many people in these zergs that people have become disposable, which completely severs the idea of a community. Even if it exists in one megaserver, the chances of it being carried over into the next are slim to none.

….Just my two cents. Maybe if they develop some sort of API system to let us know when temple events occur in megaserver zones (like it worked before) would fix some of the issue for me, as well as making it so that the population cap of each zone is less. If I had my druthers, megaservers would be removed and we’d go back to the way it was before. For those in low population servers, I would simply remove them and give those players free server transfers.