One of the most important aspects of Guild Wars 2 is the spirit of collaboration that we want to foster between players. It’s a core principle behind the event system, the skills in the game, the way we created gathering nodes, etc. Simply put, if a change will cause players to be less inclined to playing with other players, we won’t make it. Changes to WvW that incentivize players to avoid others on the map or that create incentives to have a smaller general population on the map create just that problem. When we look to make changes to WvW we look towards encouraging players to play together, finding ways to empower groups of skilled players to be able to make their mark even against superior numbers, etc. Solutions to the population imbalance would absolutely have to take that into account.
This is one of the problems with WvW population, 80 players working together to just roll over the 10 defending players. just do not stand a chance. That’s why I would say that before Anet can do something about population imbalance they need to first do some thing about blobbing. Many of us have seen how our side fun and interesting fights while the numbers are balanced and suddenly the BLOB arrives and just walks over everyone, the players then get discouraged and leave WvW and this just adds to the imbalance. Now with less players on your side it becomes even harder to take back those lost keeps/towers.
Another thing that I think also adds to the feeling of population imbalance is the map hopping blob and Anet should do something about this. It is possible for a 80 man blob to fully supply in their home Garri and then port to the next border and cap both southern towers and keeps without needing to resupply, then resupply again at their home garri and be back in minutes to wipe out the rest of the border. I think that any player changing a WvW or spawning to WvW from PvE should start with no supply. This will discourage map hopping blobs and bring some balance in populations across all the maps and would add to coverage issues. It would also entourage smaller squads of around 20 to 30 players instead of the 80 man blob. 10 Defenders behind walls can realistically defend better against 20 -30 attackers than, 20 defenders can against 60 – 80 attackers because of the supply cost of siege vs the supply carried by a blob. We have all seen that a reinforced gate fall in seconds to a 80 man blob with the monasteries that allow for faster siege building and ram mastery combined, it is as is there is just no door there then 5 superior rams get instantly placed and built. 80 men spawning in my home border and then have to scramble around for supply to attack gives us a fighting chance.
Another thing that add to population imbalance is fair weather players. We see it so often reset is all balanced and this last until prime time ends then one server pulls ahead and starts dominating. Players see the out-manned buff and abandon the maps whit out even trying to put up a fight. Anet can keep the buff but not allow players to see the icon as it is sad when you try to rally players to start the breakout event and the first response you get is something like this “can you not see we are out-manned?”
One thing that I saw mentioned here quite a few times is prime time differences, I think that that although a big factor in the PTT should not be Anets problem when servers can actually sole it themselves by a bit of creative recruiting. get some players from other time zones, recruit players that are often online during your down time. We started doing that on our server and our small night-shift although they cannot dominate everything is a force to reckoned with. this should not be Anet’s headache but our own to solve.
