Guild Wars 2

I didn’t get mine. Same glitch as above, it shows me placing at the same place as last season and doesn’t give a chest.

I guess that’s one way to get me to stop complaining about the broken swiss system.

Jeknar.6184:

Terrahero.9358:

arenanet didnt favor EB. It simply uses the glicko system as a tie breaker.

If either AR or EB had to be in a higher tier fight, with equal points, the server with the higher rating goes to the higher tier and the server with the lower rating goes to the lower tier.
Very predictable.

Let’s not forget to say that this was announced prior the seasons even started… So everyone knew that the higher rating server would always be placed above the lower rating ones in the matchup making…

Other servers tanked week 8 in order to be able to get better rewards on week 9 like SBI, NSP and DR (SBI got screwed tho because FA is bigger than they could handle). AR had the chance to do it aswell, yet they decided to K-Train ET/Kain without a doubt.

They posted that “the team with the higher world rating will be considered the higher seed for the purposes of the matchup.” They never said that “the team with the higher world rating will fall into the higher bracket.” The swiss style tournament specifies that the higher seed be matched with the lower one. Most systems tend to follow that theme because it’s logical and stops this type of nonsense.

You’re right, AR could have tanked to pull ahead of EB. That way, none of us could have Mistforged weapons! I guess you wanted us to make sure that EB lost 75 tickets and Kain lost 25 just so we could get 25 more and so none of us could have 300. I’ll make a note that ET prefers the “if I can’t have it, no one can!” mentality.

Lord Kuru.3685:

Dosvidaniya.3260:

But go ahead and pretend you “earned” it when it is just some tie-break technicality.

Coverage, coverage, coverage. No one really “earned” anything anyway.

Yeah, but coverage doesn’t even enter into the equation for AR and EB. We lose simply because AR and EB were tied with points during the season. Rather than follow the swiss tournament rules, ANet opted to simply leave EB in the lower bracket for these ties. As a result, they played 7 of 9 weeks in the lowest bracket and are beating AR. Never mind the fact that AR never lost a match to EB or any of the servers EB beat. This time, we’re losing simply because ANet clearly didn’t have any idea how to properly handle a tie while the tournament was progressing.

Shyn.3407:

Dosvidaniya.3260:

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

If two worlds tie, both will receive the better reward.

For example, if there are two worlds tied for 1st place, both will receive 1st place rewards. Then the next world would receive 3rd place, and so on.

What about servers who are now placed lower than they should be because of ties during the season?

For example, Anvil Rock (AR) and Ehmry Bay (EB). AR is going to end up placing 7th. EB is going to end up tying for 4th. AR beat EB 2 wins, 0 losses. Why is EB higher? Well, when the two tied on points (twice) during the season, ANet opted to place EB in the lower tier (giving them more points) while leaving AR in the higher tier (decreasing their points). As a result, AR is now ranked lower than the server they clearly beat.

- I will keep this simple we all had 8 weeks up to now to see how the system was playing out and the places were displayed weekly for the standings. So to complain about a systems you had 8 weeks to learn is not going to help now. Simply put we noticed on DR that it would be best to lose on week 8 for the best possible placement in week 9 because of how the system was laid out with the brackets and played the way it was most beneficial to us. It didn’t take much to do the math. and it is a 9 week tournament. You are placed where you are because of the simplest part…. you have less points.

I know why we’re placed where we are placed. It doesn’t make the system less broken. Please try to read what I actually posted. This has to do with ties during the season; something we didn’t know about for 8 weeks.

Due to EB losing in the bottom tier, AR and EB were tied on points during the tournament. ANet left EB in the bottom tier each time this occurred. Because ANet opted to favor them, they played 7 of their 9 weeks in the bottom tier. Because of this, they are beating AR. AR never dropped a match to EB or any of the servers that EB actually beat. The reason we are losing is simply because we were tied during the matchup and ANet decided to make EB win.

Edit: And no, there is not some way to tank and still come out where we should be. When ANet opts to screw you whenever you are tied by tossing you into a higher tier, you’re kittened.

Rimmy.9217:

Dosvidaniya.3260:

What about servers who are now placed lower than they should be because of ties during the season?

For example, Anvil Rock (AR) and Ehmry Bay (EB). AR is going to end up placing 7th. EB is going to end up tying for 4th. AR beat EB 2 wins, 0 losses. Why is EB higher? Well, when the two tied on points (twice) during the season, ANet opted to place EB in the lower tier (giving them more points) while leaving AR in the higher tier (decreasing their points). As a result, AR is now ranked lower than the server they clearly beat.

Because the servers aren’t being ranked on how they fought every single other server, they’re being ranked on how they did in the totality of their three-way fights…

Except the matchups were chosen by ANet due to a tie. Had ANet spent 2 minutes reading the swiss tournament wiki page, they’d know how to actually handle this situation. If we were placed against the lower matchup and you against the upper, we’d be ahead of you (which is actually what you’re supposed to do per the tournament style they chose). But go ahead and pretend you “earned” it when it is just some tie-break technicality.

Rimmy.9217:

You’re a T7 server with a rating about 80 points above us. You want props for beating the special class?

You beat Kaineng the only time you were matched with them, but you’re going to end up tied – why not include that in the examples you’re unhappy about?

If this is tied to how we were competitive servers over a year ago, let it go. You’re the bigger and badder (not in a negative way) server. We know it, you know it, everybody else knows it…

I’m not complaining about Kain because I don’t care. If they gave everyone the 4th place rewards, I’d be happy. However, I am upset that I’m once again being screwed by ANet. This time it isn’t even due to coverage and other nonsense. No, this time it’s because of some stupid decision on what to do in the event of a tie while the tournament is going. And that stupid decision isn’t even logical.

I honestly believe that everyone of the bottom of bronze deserves 300 tickets. I’ve got nothing against EB. However, it’s utter lunacy that a server that perpetually beat the bottom three be rated lower and rewarded less than one of them.

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

If two worlds tie, both will receive the better reward.

For example, if there are two worlds tied for 1st place, both will receive 1st place rewards. Then the next world would receive 3rd place, and so on.

What about servers who are now placed lower than they should be because of ties during the season?

For example, Anvil Rock (AR) and Ehmry Bay (EB). AR is going to end up placing 7th. EB is going to end up tying for 4th. AR beat EB 2 wins, 0 losses. Why is EB higher? Well, when the two tied on points (twice) during the season, ANet opted to place EB in the lower tier (giving them more points) while leaving AR in the higher tier (decreasing their points). As a result, AR is now ranked lower than the server they clearly beat.

Vargamonth.2047:

draxynnic.3719:

The problem is that apparently, in the Pavilion once the group is larger than a certain size, the bosses durability scales up substantially faster than the expected damage output of a single additional player.

As I said before, I could be wrong, but this is probably a myth.
I’ve seen huge blobs defeating a boss on gold reward time right after activation, which shouldn’t happen if the events oversclaed that much.

…

It’s not a myth.

Yes, you can see a blob beat a boss within the gold timer. A good small group can kill most of the bosses in 2 minutes. You can still take 3 times as long and make the gold timer.

Here’s the reason it isn’t a myth; boss leveling. As the number of players increase past certain thresholds, the level of the boss increases as well. This means an increase in glancing hits. If a player comes and causes a 2% decrease in damage to everyone while scaling the boss, there is no way they’ll make it up.

Boom-boom makes this really obvious. If you see that turret hit level 84, you know it’s going to take forever. By then, the boss has scaled up enough to reduce everyone’s damage by 6% in addition to the normal scaling. That hurts. It’s not a myth. The scaling is such that an additional player can hurt more than help.

Rimmy.9217:

That said, can AR beat EB? Absolutely. But did AR do as well in their tier as EB did in theirs? No.

Weird and unsatisfying as this method is, I’m glad that it’s not entirely about population. And yes, I’m from EB.

/bias

That’s the most arbitrary justification I’ve ever heard. You guys fell out of silver and hadn’t come close to being stable when the tourney started. If I use the average from the 4 weeks prior to the tourney, you’ve dropped from 21.5 to 22. Just because you stayed at the top of the bottom three doesn’t mean you’ve done better than the guy who stays at the bottom of the 3 servers higher. It’s silly.

Lets be honest, you’re happy simply because the nonsense that is this leaderboard opted to place you higher than you should be. I’d be happy if that happened to me. Never the less, it is something that has to be fixed. A server shouldn’t place lower than someone they beat unless the entire system is based on improvement.

Latinkuro.9420:

WvW pre-Season 3 thoughts

This is not a QQ thread, please do NOT make it into one

All I’m saying is this:

A.net needs to learn from the mistakes made in seasons 1 and 2 before thinking of implementing WvW season 3.

• Season 1 was coverage and transfer issues.
• Season 2 was match fixing, manipulation, intentional match losses, and arbitrary placement decisions made by ANet to determine the winner.
• Seasons are way too long, especially considering how broken and easily cheatable their setup is.

I like seasons but I’d rather they don’t have any at all if they are not willing to do them right.

Fixed that for you. They seriously need a real bracket for this.

Explanation: This tournament has a number of issues. I’ve just discovered that AR (the server I’m associated with) is going to place 7th; while a server (EB) we’ve beaten twice out of the two matchups with them is placing 4th. How did that happen? Well, the two times that we’ve had the same number of points, ANet arbitrarily put AR into the higher bracket and left EB in the lower bracket so they could get the extra points while we lost them. End result is that AR who is the 2/2 victor over EB places 7th compared to their 4th.

My favorite part is that AR is going to be placed below EB; a server they have beaten twice and lost to zero times.

Why is this happening? Both times (2) that AR and EB have had the same number of points, they’ve dumped AR into the higher bracket and EB into the lower bracket. The net result is that AR is now placed lower than the server that they have beaten.

Ticket number: 584189.
Submitted: May 1.
First and second response: May 15.

I just want to confirm that ANet will not reimburse players if they purchase items 24 hours prior to the item going on sale.

Sendai.9562:

abomally.2694:

Sendai.9562 -

You are running out of memory due to the 32 bit OS RAM limitation.

Your best option is to upgrade to a 64 bit OS – otherwise you’re just wasting all that memory because a 32 bit OS kernel can’t make use of it (well, certain versions can, but most home users don’t install server OS’).

Many Thanks! I will acquire a 64 bit OS and report back. Kind of a bummer that I’d need to do a clean OS install. Are you saying that all 32 bit operating systems have this issue? Because a mate of mine is running 32, almost an identical set up actually, and does not have this issue…

Obviously there are variables. But I don’t think I’m putting much stress on my PC…

I don’t think it is an issue with the 32 bit OS. Yes, you are running out of memory and it will hurt performance.

However, I’m on a 64-bit OS (with 16gb of RAM and always have 10+ gb unused). I keep getting the same OOM crashes. Looking at my logs, this appears to be a result of my virtual memory. I’m not sure if windows isn’t adjusting it or what. I’m going to try hard coding the amount to 1.5 times my ram. That’s my current test. I’ll post back in a couple days if it helps. You could try the same.

uknortherner.2670:

People will moan regardless of what Anet says or does. Virtually all MMOs have their army of career complainers.

And their army of white knights.

Some of these issues really do need to be addressed.

Becka Williams.4978:

NTDK.4897:

Cursed Shore is now megaserver.

This megaserver “virus” is infecting at an alarming rate.

Finally, our last haven of temple is now screwed.

Good bye temples. You will be missed

Spreading? It’s already spread, and I’m afraid the patient’s terminal.

It’s in Gendarran now. Zerg Wars 2 is in full force. RIP server community. RIP any semblance of “self” contribution. Welcome one and all to the hivemind.

Whelp, apart from the complaints about Orr and waypoints, I have to say this change is really painful for guilds. If a guild mission bugs out, it now propagates to everybody! So much for getting those done. Getting guildmates together for guild missions is terrible. Please make it like gw1 where we can at least pick a shard. Constantly grouping and ungrouping to ferry people is downright obnoxious. World boss fights are the most zergy things I’ve every seen. The world does feel like it’s populated. However, it is like it’s been populated by a rampaging group of zombies. Please reconsider this design. It makes me want to stop playing.

Justin ODell.9517:

JinDaVikk.7291:

How about the missing armor sets? Without a list available to me from old version How am I to know all the armor sets now missing? Thanks for stealing from me.

:edit

They were gem bought sets.

You can see your entire skin collection from the bank, it’s a new tab. You should check out this thread for better answers and discussion.

Thanks, that is helpful.

Also, thanks for deleting my masquerade set. Heaven forbid pvp actually have a unique set. Heaven forbid you guys actually compensate players instead of just deleting whatever strikes your fancy. Couldn’t even bother to give us the pve version; that’s sad.

Completely exit the game and come back. You’ll see the skins and charges.

Ugh, too many cons outweigh the pros.

1. Waypoint contestation is terrible. As much fun as it is to double the cost and load times, why can’t you guys just fix the waypoint redirect to actually work? The mechanic already exists in the game.
2. Primetime or GTFO! I’m on Anvil Rock. During non-prime time, bosses (besides starting zone bosses) don’t happen. One of the greatest things about tier one servers is that they serve as a meeting ground for high scaling bosses. You can actually get a group to do them. There are enough people. Now you are completely removing this option for a reason I don’t understand. Events can overlap! Maps can scale! Why are you removing them from time slots? Do you guys just hate non prime time WB players? Put the megadestroyer and karka queen at 9pm at the same time! If people don’t show, the map scales. I thought this was the entire point of the system.
3. Synchronous spawns. Why are the spawns synced like this? To get all the standard events will take hours. So much for a decent efficient run. Guess you guys want to make us go champ farm instead. Kudos.
4. What happened to the other WBs? Where is the dredge commander? Where is the fire shaman? Where is ogre wars?
5. Trying to do temples is going to be horrendous. We can’t know the progress since we can’t know the map.

Honestly, your system causes just as many problems as it fixes. Here’s an idea, leave the maps alone and just megaserver the living story zone. This is coming from a guy on a small server. This is not an improvement.

Justin ODell.9517:

I think the big reason we need to streamline things and make it easy to pickup is NOT because newbies are dumb or incapable of figuring it out, but rather because PvP is very, very intimidating. Reduction in apparent complexity helps PvP be more approachable and less intimidating.

Also, I can’t undersell the benefits of reducing conceptual complexity for assisting designers achieve balance. We are finite creatures, us humans, and can only hold so many things in our mind at one time. We can create tools to help work around this, but anything that helps make balance easier gets my vote.

On the surface, these appear to be valid. However, they become invalid when I remember that pvp does not exist in a vacuum.

For anyone else familiar with the game, how does reducing the complexity of an already simplified gearing system make it less intimidating? They are already familiar with a far more complex system. For brand new players, it has that potential. However, they will either end up learning a good chunk of it through PvE (its not exactly obvious on how to get to pvp from pve) or they will be so avid about PvP that they’ll look it up (and won’t be intimidated regardless). PvP tends to be intimidating because you are up against players and you will die. I really believe that the “gearing intimidation barrier” is next to non-existent.

The second reason holds even less weight when we remember that the game also has the PvE (and WvW) elements. So, in a game where PvE and WvW should also be balanced; how does simplifying PvP help? It’s not like those other options were actually removed from the game. They were simply removed from PvP. In order to balance PvP, you have to do it based on full stat allotments. In order to balance WvW, you have to do it based on a large range of allotments. By keeping one and not the other, it appears to be more difficult because you can’t even use the WvW options as a balanced middle ground for PvP.

I understand compartmentalization, but I really think the three departments need to get together when decisions are made. The choice to reward the most structured PvP based on effort while rewarding WvW based on quantity (or whatever you want to call it) is so backwards that it’s ludicrous. The decision to simplify pvp gear for balance when you still have to do it for another form of pvp and pve seems equally nonsensical. The list goes on. You guys really need to consolidate your viewpoints.

SHTSKATE dot com.9310:

The flaw in your unsympathetic argument is that they only stated GLORY would be phased out. They did not state until today that all pvp crafting materials and tokens would be phased out as well and no longer available. Anyone with half a brain would have assumed that they would move from glory to a coin-based system while still keeping pvp crafting materials and reward chests. The whole tone of their news posts was that they were moving to a more universal reward system regardless of what mode you prefer to play, thereby implying a shift to coin from glory. Not a removal of all pvp crafting/rewards and their associated items, because the wardrobe had not been announced for months after glory was stated to be on the way out. It’s a massive miscommunication and bad timing issue on their part.

They told us that the vendors would be gone.

At that time we will also be removing all existing random reward chests from PvP. This means that all rank reward vendors will be removed and we will no longer be rewarding bonus chests for winning Solo and Team Arena matches.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/phasing-out-pvp-glory/

Since they stated that the reward chests would be gone, I have no idea why “anyone would … have assumed that they would move from glory to a coin-based system while still keeping pvp crafting materials and reward chests. " There was no way the chests were moving since they explicitly stated that they were going to be removed. Relying on the assumption that we’d get crafting stuff for gold was crazy given the hard axe they were doing to everything.

Soul.9280:

That’s because it isn’t fair, and probably not something the devs considered when they decided to make this change. However the good news is that it shouldn’t be too hard to program a solution into the game that does award chests for earned ranks beyond rank 80.

Dev’s this would be a good opportunity to get some good PR through fast damage control, and keep your most loyal players happy by treating them fairly.

Disclaimer: I’m only rank 47 and wouldn’t be affected by this, but my sensibilities are still offended that high rank players would be “cheated” out of rewards that lower rank players would receive with this change.

I disagree with giving them the chests. (Disclaimer: Rank 42). It could have some nasty market repercussions. If you want to give them tomes, that’d be fine. However, that loot could be messy.

However, I really think they should award gifts of exploration (and possibly a full legendary) to some of these guys. Give rank 80+ their pick of a legendary and a gift of exploration. Give the guys that are rank 70+ two gifts of exploration. Give the ones that are 60+ a gift of exploration. Now they don’t have to do the most mind numbing pve on the planet to get their legendary. Honestly, they deserve it. They deserve to get out of doing that horrendous task. They did a grind. It’s a balance that won’t crash markets but will let them progress a legendary without forcing a horrid amount of pve down people that clearly enjoy pvp.

ReMortis.4287:

After your PvP skins have been unlocked, they will be removed from your PvP gear locker, and you will have account-wide access to them through the Wardrobe tab in your Hero Panel. As the Wardrobe replaces the gear locker, PvP crafting materials will be removed from the game, so be sure to craft anything you want before the April 15 update.

From the dev post

I’d sure love to craft some PvP gear and items, but I’ve already spent all my Glory buying Mystery coffers and level up tomes and whatnot before the Glory-removing patch hit, now I can’t even afford any of the Gear Tokens from the rank vendors.

Could we get confirmation that the Rank Vendors will sell the Gear/Consumable/Arcane Converter for coins before the 4/15 patch hits so we that have earned our PvP crafting mats can actually put them to use. Thanks.

Apologies if this has already been answered but I searched and found nothing thus far.

You won’t get a confirmation of pvp stuff purchasable with gold because it isn’t going to happen. I have sympathy for a lot of the issues associated with this transition; this is not one of them. You had warning that glory and the vendors would be gone back in February. Rather than budget your glory, like others did to prevent this issue, you spent it all on random stuff. Sorry man, but this issue is entirely your own choice. You chose to not spend it on crafting mats. I understand that choice. I chose to spend mine on these crafting items (and consequently didn’t end up with many tomes or mystery coffers like you did). You made your choice. This one is on you.

My only beef is that they seem to have forgotten that people can have more than one character. It doesn’t matter if you have one character in starter gear or 5 characters decked out in full sets. If you are the same rank, you get the exact same number of transmutation charges for the transition. One guy loses nothing and gets charges. The other guy gets 5 sets deleted for the same charges. This game seems to hate alts.

Evan Lesh.3295:

enzoh.5302:

When you enter the Heart of The Mists for the first time after the April 2014 Feature Pack goes live, all of the skins you have collected in PvP will unlock in your Wardrobe. There will be a vendor selling basic, level-appropriate weapons and armor for you to apply unlocked skins to.

What is the point of these “basic” armor/weapons if looks carry over from pve and vice versa? You have to apply the pvp skins to them first to unlock them?

The wardrobe is only for appearances, it does not contain usable items. If you’ve never played PvE, or for some reason don’t have actual items to apply skins to, you can get them from the vendor.

Speaking of this topic, I have a question.

Background: Yes, I’m one of the weirdos that is running around in starter gear even though I’m over rank 40. I’ve had a few people whisper me about it. Prior to the patch, I saved up glory so I could finally get the set I wanted for my main and various alts. The skeptical voice in my head told me to wait in case ANet did something crazy. So, my question.

Question: Are we really only being reimbursed for one character’s worth of transmutation charges (regardless of whether they are actually wearing the armor and regardless of how many alts also have gear)?

Justin ODell.9517:

We removed glory and match reward chests early to prevent a flood of PvE players from coming into PvP just to fill their wardrobe. While the our team would LOVE everyone playing PvP, some super smart economist peopleguys said it would have negative repercussions on the in-game economy or something.

It’s really unfortunate that we had to do this, but we explored other ways of handling it and nothing was really feasible except holding wardrobe back until the next feature pack (which also meant holding back lots of other PvP changes) or removing some of the PvP rewards for a month.

Edit: Tune in this Friday for news about the next phase of the new reward system.

Sorry, but I don’t buy it.

You were worried that players would hear about the locker and immediately flood to pvp? That’s just laughable. I’m rank 42. I have nearly every single piece you can get from rank rewards and tournament chests. Looking at the list it’s pretty obvious that I could get the vast majority of those skins by bouncing around to hearts, crafting, farming anything, and maybe spending a little money on the TP. There is no way any pve’er would dedicate the amount of time necessary to get these skins when they’re far easier to get from pve. I think I salvaged most of the rank 30 skins today after a bit of WvW and a World Boss train. One of the rank ten sets you can get just by creating a character.

I don’t know why you guys decided to go this route. But it’s sad how little care is being given in regards to pvpers. I get to participate in another WvW season where I get rewarded based on my server population while the pvp leaderboard is ignored (how this can be justified is beyond me). I also get to know that a pve’er can have the exact same skins for a fraction of the time. In addition, we get to have a lack of pvp rewards while the transition occurs because of “super-smart people” who also gave pvp such a horrendous luck salvage rate that you actually got more luck by spending your glory on wintersday gifts instead of salvage kits (that assumes the pvp gear itself didn’t cost glory).

Yeah, I’ll tune in to the ready up to hear all about the new system. I’m hopeful it will be a good one because the transition from the old one has been worse than the old one itself.

FreeRide.2547:

Join AR and I’ll drop something for you.

True story.

Come to Anvil Rock. Our opponents drop precursors!

ZudetGambeous.9573:

How has changing from-> Zerker is best to -> Zerker is best, reduced build diversity… there was only 1 viable build before the change and there is only 1 viable build after the change. Every other build is just different shades of not as good as zerker.

I deleted my post as I needed to verify my napkin math. However, the answer to your question is that PvE is not the only game mode available. Believe it or not, some people use cavalier pieces in WvW; those players will no longer use them. Running full zerker as a hammer warrior in a zerg busting guild is the stupidest thing you can do. SPvP also has builds that aren’t full zerker builds. Feel free to try them out some day!

4) Playing PvE/WvW
5) Playing other games
7) Playing the forums. Player vs Forum/Developer is the real PvP.

silvermember.8941:

Actually, its funny you are claiming to know more about statistics and you prove how little you know.

TAking a strawpoll here only gives information about a subset of gamers that visit the forums, it doesnt provide a good sample of the PvP population at large, unless you believe the people here represent the whole PvP base, which that would be wrong.

Statistics relies on RANDOM spread, that would be like taking the opinion of 300 that read Fortune magazine and claiming since they all voted against the minimum wage increase that must mean every american hates an increase in the minimum wage.

And where did she mention a sampling bias as a reason for invalidity? Oh, she didn’t.

I guess you couldn’t be bothered to read the entire post or read subsequent posts. I stated “there are reasons the poll can be called into question.” Of course there is a potential sampling bias. We have no idea if the participants were indicative of the population. It’s likely that they aren’t. As I stated in the subsequent post, even 300 is probably too low assuming it was actually random.

That said, many opinion polls aren’t truly random. That’s a fact of life. You can bet that people without a phone (or that refuse to answer it) get excluded all the time. By your logic, every bit of CDI is a waste because it isn’t what the players want since there is a bias for the forum population.

The data is still useful and the size of the population does not factor into the validity of the poll. The reasons that were stated (by Allie) for discarding the poll are completely irrelevant. If that is truly the reason that ANet tossed the results, they are just cherry picking for something they want. If they discarded it because of sample size or proven bias, then they are actually using the data correctly. Either way, I wish people would stop perpetuating the myth that a larger population means you need a larger sample.

Shockwave.1230:

Dosvidaniya.3260:

Allie Murdock.8152:

Countless,

Yes, I did say that. I also said in that post that we are investigating ways that we can get proper metrics to reflect the majority of the playerbase. If you knew the amount of players that actually played PvP in our game, then you would understand why a strawpoll with 300 votes is not sufficient.

That’s not to say that we don’t talk about it internally. We talk about it quite a lot.

If the issue was as simple as me making a strawpoll, I’d do it; but it’s not. A very, very small percentage of our playerbase even visit these forums, let alone vote on a poll.

That is not how statistics work. I really am starting to wonder if actual mathematics is used at all in design decisions. No offense to you Allie; it’s not your job to know the math. I just dislike the perpetuation of the misconception of sample size and population. I also dislike how some of the “math” (in regards to loot and luck) in this game doesn’t make any sense.

Yes, there are reasons why the strawpoll can be called into question. Population size is not one of them.

The mathematics of probability proves the size of the population is irrelevant unless the size of the sample exceeds a few percent of the total population you are examining. This means that a sample of 500 people is equally useful in examining the opinions of a state of 15,000,000 as it would a city of 100,000.

• http://www.surveysystem.com/sscalc.htm

There’s oversights here, but the perspective offered is strictly academic so it’s understandable. In reality you have to identify a proper sample group to gather opinions from, and even then polls of opinions can only provide so much value.

Your sample group could easily be like minded individuals. Or they could not be like minded, wanting all different things, but what they want is actually in the minority of the playerbase.

Additionally as much as people think they know what they want, they often don’t think everything through and understand the scope of potential feature implementations.

If statistics on opinion polls were currently a silver bullet solution to feedback, they’d be done non-stop. They’re not a silver bullet unfortunately, but they can be helpful (they can also be harmful).

You’re referring to a sampling bias and questioning the validity of the knowledge of the population. As I mentioned, there are reasons to question the validity of the survey; these are some of them. To be honest, even the 300 mark is probably too low for a good confidence interval even assuming the sample isn’t biased. (Yes, I’d agree that we can’t know if this one is representative of the whole).

I just really don’t like the propagation of the myth that because the population is significantly large, the sample also needs to reflect that. If that is why they tossed the poll out, they are creating their own bias by cherry picking the result. If they tossed it because of actual biases, like you mentioned, more power to them. No, a proper survey wouldn’t solve everything. However, I really wish they’d collect one in regards to skyhammer. Personally, I’d be happy to never see that map again.

Allie Murdock.8152:

Countless,

Yes, I did say that. I also said in that post that we are investigating ways that we can get proper metrics to reflect the majority of the playerbase. If you knew the amount of players that actually played PvP in our game, then you would understand why a strawpoll with 300 votes is not sufficient.

That’s not to say that we don’t talk about it internally. We talk about it quite a lot.

If the issue was as simple as me making a strawpoll, I’d do it; but it’s not. A very, very small percentage of our playerbase even visit these forums, let alone vote on a poll.

That is not how statistics work. I really am starting to wonder if actual mathematics is used at all in design decisions. No offense to you Allie; it’s not your job to know the math. I just dislike the perpetuation of the misconception of sample size and population. I also dislike how some of the “math” (in regards to loot and luck) in this game doesn’t make any sense.

Yes, there are reasons why the strawpoll can be called into question. Population size is not one of them.

The mathematics of probability proves the size of the population is irrelevant unless the size of the sample exceeds a few percent of the total population you are examining. This means that a sample of 500 people is equally useful in examining the opinions of a state of 15,000,000 as it would a city of 100,000.

• http://www.surveysystem.com/sscalc.htm

YourFriendMarvin.4127:

The amount of magic find, dyes, and carpal tunnel will be strong…

Yeah! And just think, if you had spent all that glory on Wintersday Gifts instead of salvage kits, you’d have 1.5 times the luck and mats that you could sell while avoiding the carpal tunnel!

Stof.9584:

After the stream tonight I want to enquire again about the Ready Up broadcasts!

The information is too vague and not available outside of a stream or ovd, people will miss it and feel cheated when the patch hits.

Can you please tell us in a concise manner what we can do to prepare for the removal of glory?

You really didn’t miss anything in the RU. This is the summary of glory preparation and the RU:

• You will keep stuff in your locker. It will play some role in the future. So, consider filling it.
• PvP mats, boosters, and chests will be deprecated. Use them before they are removed come the feature patch.
• Vendors will stick around post 3.18 patch. However, you will be unable to earn any additional glory.
• Additional rank points and glory will be awarded this weekend. The amount will be announced later.
• RU will move to a weekly basis for the next 3 weeks.

JTan.1687:

Can you guys add Consumable token to be sold as copper? coz i got tons of pvp mats and i don’t have enough glory because i use them to buy pvp salvage kits.

I find it heavily ironic (and a bit sad) that the devs tell us that glory boosters can’t be compensated because others have used them. Meanwhile they make salvage kits purchasable with money. Hey, thanks for letting me know ahead of time instead of making me blow the glory to salvage! Wait… the opposite of that.

The same holds true for these tokens. They gave you the heads up three months ago. It wasn’t feasible for some players to use all their boosters. It’s far more feasible that players manage their glory. If they put in an exchange, it better favor players that actually followed their instructions.

It was cleared up in another thread. They will not be removing rank vendors. So, the answer to the OP is that yes, you’ll be able to buy consumable tokens post March 18. Come the feature past (who knows when), you will not be able to purchase anything and any remaining pvp chests will be deleted. Ultimately, the patch on the 18th will be removing glory from the game. It will also modify rank up chests and remove arena win chests. It may also remove the dungeon and cultural armor sets from the glory vendor. That’s it.

Proven.2854:

Hey, I’m a PvP player. I also play the other parts of the game. I’m sorry they’re trying to get you to participate in other parts of the game too. I’m one of those people that want level up tomes for the classes I’ve gotten used to playing at full capacity, but can only play a crippled version outside of the Heart of the Mists. And if you really don’t want the materials then just sell them on the trading post.

But the stuff that’s coming for PvP players that refuse to leave the Mists is coming too. But that stuff can’t arrive without the new reward system. How can they give you a new PvP specific reward if they don’t exist in game yet to be given? Don’t you want them to take their time so we don’t get stupid bugs like the EU<->NA transfer bug that makes you lose out on tournament reward chests?

If the issue is that you’re scared or angry about being in the dark, well I’m sorry. But ranting about it here isn’t changing anything.

You’re missing the point. Yes, the stuff for PvP players is “coming.” The issue is that PvP players are left without stuff until it does come. No, bug testing is not an excuse to leave PvP in that state. If it isn’t ready then wait to deploy it and wait to remove the old one.

In everything, the general rule is to have minimal system downtime. We currently will receive PvE rewards worth about 30 minutes in LA right now for a rank up! In addition, we won’t receive jack from the actual matches. Leaving pvp in this state is an atrocious software decision. Maybe they won’t make us go months. However, most of us are no longer optimists; especially when they still haven’t told us anything in regards to time or functionality.

TLDR: Leave the old or put in the new. Don’t replace the old with a worse version while the new one gets its bugs removed.

alexei.9364:

Will there be an alternate way to obtain crafting materials that you are short on once glory is removed? I’m thinking specifically about consumable tokens, which everyone had to buy with glory.

No. Tyler alluded to this in the thread earlier. It does appear that the rank vendors will still be there. So, you’ll still be able to buy them with glory. But once you are out, you are out.

Tyler Chapman.1832:

DiogoSilva.7089:

Will there be any difference if we start opening our chests now, or should we hold for the maintenance patch next week before doing that?

There’s no real difference if you just wait. Just be aware you won’t be able to earn more glory if you are short on anything.

Liewec.2896:

any info on what we can expect on march 18th?,

You can’t get glory any more. Arena wins will not reward win chests. Rank points from victories will be increased. PvP vendors will stick around. You will get chests from pvp ranks; they will contain PvE stuff. (See https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/pvp/Opening-Chests-after-March-18th/ ).

Liewec.2896:

also any idea about when the “feature build” will arrive?
we’re a little bit in the dark,
your comments in this post are great and all,
but we’ve not really had any balance changes or pvp content in months,
throw us a bone!

I’d love to know when the feature patch is coming. It’s good that they’ve further elaborated on the specifics for glory removal; however, I really want to know how long pvp is going to be without rewards.

moolie.5927:

Tyler Chapman.1832:

I suggest to open all your chests, don’t just leave them unopened as they will be deleted.

Deleted on the March 18th patch or in the feature patch after?

The feature patch.

Basically, he said that the vendors will be sticking around so we can still buy stuff. However, it will all be removed (including old chests) when the feature patch hits.

It really depends on when it comes out. If pvp is without rewards and communication for over a month, I expect the fallout will be high enough that most pvp players won’t bother coming back. If it comes out two weeks after reward removal, then it may do wonders for the remaining players. I’m skeptical of the release date and think the pvp corpse will be far too dead to be revitalized by the patch.

Originally, I would have said no. However, Allie said the following:

• We’re switching them from rank vendors to glory vendors, and are keeping rank vendors.

Now, I have no idea what that means. So, who knows.

Solstice.1097:

given that very few people are rated lower than 70% or so, I’m thinking that the rating % is based on total GW2 population and not just PvP players.

That would mean that the leaderboard is roughly equivalent to the top 7% of PvP players across all of the GW2 population. Let’s say 15% of GW2 population plays PvP at least once a week, even if just for daily, that would mean that the top 46% of active players get themselves onto the leaderboard which would mean there are about 2,173 active soloq players in North America.

There are probably another 500 teamq that don’t normally do solo, and another 750 that just do hot join mostly, bring the total PvP population in its entirety to around 3,423 players.

I originally estimated 5,500 but that doesn’t make sense to me now because I’m rank 33 in soloq and I don’t feel like I should be ranked that high, but that’s also partly due to the flaws in the matchmaking and ranking system.

I’m fairly certain it is higher than that.

Here’s some information for solo queue from my guild. There is a player that played yesterday and has a 27.8% win rate. He is at 52% on the leaderboards. There is another player that stopped solo queue the 16th of Feb. He is at 65%. Everyone above 65% in my guild has played in the last 12 days.

I think it safe to assume that the players over 76% are active (while there are exceptions, those are likely cancelled by exceptions under 76%). Assuming the top 7% make the leaderboard, that places us at 3429 active players in solo queue. That may be a bit high, but I think it’ll ballpark around 3000 (which would be ~79%).

AlbertoUlkesh.4517:

I don’t mean they will be adding things. Just that the random spot of a Glory booster will be filled by something else – but nothing that’s not in there already.

But no, I don’t have proof either way.

I highly doubt that they’ll do it.

Since they are refusing to compensate for glory boosters, I don’t know why you’d think they’d replace the loot slot for the unopened chests. Doing so is compensating the boosters only for players who haven’t opened the chest.

In addition, they probably would have removed them already if this were the case. They removed them from the daily. The odds of them removing from win chests or rank chests after the aforementioned chests become unacquirable is next to 0%. Now, I agree with the premise on Black Lion Chests and AP chests. However, everything stated and done by ANet would indicate that the pvp chest loot will stay the same.

Fello.8673:

Since there won’t be glory anymore after the March 18th patch, I won’t be able to purchase pvp salvage kit to salvage items from tourney chests. Will there be other ways to salvage chests after patch?

I’d recommend opening them now. You won’t get different rewards if you wait. You may still be able to get salvage kits. (They’ve said that the new rewards merchant will stick around). However, you won’t be able to get consumable tokens, item tokens, or arcane converters. So, you won’t be able to do much with the mats anyways. Honestly, open the things now. Waiting is just going to make this terrible process far worse.

Pifil.5193:

ColinJohanson.2394:

We’ll go into more detail soon, just to re-iterate so it’s clear:

“The next round of major features will be bundled together into a large “feature only” release that will come after the first season of the Living World 2014 has finished.”

A feature release is not an expansion, it’s a release focused on game features. Examples of game features we’ve done in the past would be: guild missions, account achievement system, spectator mode, new pvp maps, daily world boss chests, removing culling and giving visibility options, the WvW WxP system, etc.

I’m wondering two things now, how long a break should we expect and just how much is in the really big feature patch (for PVP, WvW, PvE, Dungeons)? It’s better to start managing expectations very soon rather than continue to let speculation spiral.

From the eurogamer interview linked above.

“When [Living World Season One] ends [on 4th March], we’re going to take a break for a little bit and then we’re going to do one really big feature patch that is more akin to what people see from some of our [MMO] competitors,” said Johanson, "where they bundle a lot of features together into a really big patch every now and then.

For PvP, there is going to be a lot. They are removing our rewards system. The assumption is that they’ll actually replace it with the next patch. Of course this also leads to the expectation that PvP won’t be without rewards until June. If it is, you can expect a small riot before the exodus of the remaining pvp players.

Allie Murdock.8152:

I’m going to try to answer as many of these questions as possible, but keep in mind that some of this stuff we can’t talk about.

I imagine most of my questions fall into that category. I’m still hoping that you’ll take the list of questions to your higher ups and see if there is any way to get permission. I know you can’t talk about everything. I know things are subject to change. I’ll accept reasonable ranges on when things will be coming. However, pvp is currently in an information blackout when it comes to any updates and it is really starting to upset players.

A decision to remove an entire reward system without any information or time table in regards to the replacement would cause severe backlash. I’ve seen the post where the increase in pvp activity (back in December) is mentioned with a bit of pride. (The devs have a right to a bit of pride when they increase the numbers). However, if you really remove the rewards without saying a word about what is coming, it’ll make that increase look like a speed bump compared to the cliff that pvp is currently heading towards.

1. When will we have rewards in pvp again? Will it be post WvW season 2?
2. When will we have more information about the new pvp reward system?
3. When will the balance patch land?
4. Any talk of additional features being added to pvp?
5. What are your thoughts about team arena removing so many players from solo arena?
6. Any consideration into converting old mats or boosters into something useful instead of the current plan?

Kuper.2641:

Just a quick question,

Are the Match Win Reward Chests for Solo Queue and Team Queue being removed as well on the March 18th Patch? If so, is it best to open them before the 18th?

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Match_Win_Reward_Chest

I say this because I have saved over 250 of them now, thinking they might give different rewards, but I don’t wont to log-in on the 18th and find they are missing or deleted.

Anyone else saving these up?

Win Chests will no longer be awarded come the 18th. Those in your possession will stay in your possession. No, the rewards inside will not be changed. Waiting will not help you in any form. I do not know if you’ll still be able to obtain salvage kits come the 18th. I can say that luck from win chests isn’t bad. (I averaged 50 luck per salvage on my last batch).

Psychol.5783:

I must read something wrong because I thought mixing tournament tokens will give a random pvp.
This recipe list on wiki is wrong, I just mixed http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/PvP_Wrench this wrench and I received arcing mace…
So they changed recipes or it’s just only one wrong information from this list?

Read that page again. At the bottom it tells you that the recipe can create any of four possible weapons. You got one of them. Multiple attempts may be required to get the item you want. Some recipes are shared and create multiple options. In addition, getting a “critical success” on a recipe will give the higher tier option.

All weapons and armor use the same basic recipe.

• Item Token (1). The token for the item you want. For example, if you want an axe you’ll want to use an Axe Token. These can be salvaged or purchased.
• Rank Token (1). This is a token corresponding to the rank. For example, rabbit token, deer token, free tournament token, etc. These come from salvaging gear of the corresponding rank.
• Arcane Orb, Arcane Crystal, or Arcane Sliver (1). These come from salvaging gear that use the aforementioned item to be created.
• Arcane Powder (5). These come from salvaging any gear.

The mats used will give a specific outcome (of up to 4 rewards). I’d recommend looking at the wiki and working with the recipes listed there to get the ones that you want.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/PvP_reward

geist.3980:

those weapons will lose all worth if they are handed out to every server, no matter how poorly they did, or sold/given away in PVE. if players on mostly pve servers want a chance at winning one then they need to move up the server ladder. this isn’t T-ball where 5 year olds are given a medal so they don’t grow up kitten, servers need to fight for the shinies.

When the solution is not to improve as a player, but to move servers, the rewards already don’t mean jack. They should be given to all. But I know that many players and devs seem to ignore that. That’s why we see t-ball references and other metaphors that have nothing to do with the fact that skill isn’t the determining factor. That’s why this game rewards WvW leaderboards and strips the rewards from spvp. Rewards aren’t about skill in this game, they are about having the biggest zerg.