Guild Wars 2

For my intentions, I am looking for options that might cause more people on my server to participate in Wv3.

If the entire week was somewhat close to friday night in numbers, we would still be likely losing (its been a long drop) but it would be more fun for everyone whether you’re winning or losing. I am getting frustrated repeatedly entering a borderland that is an absolute ghost town. And it can’t be any fun for members of the other servers that basically sit with nothing to do either.

I cannot comment on macro numbers (keep in mind without subscriptions getting accurate information on the health of the game is more difficult), but I am already losing people. Since they don’t have to pay subscriptions, they may pop back in to check in a few weeks or months.. but this is already having an impact on a game that hasn’t been on the shelf very long.

Developers can say what they want at release, but the current state of Wv3 does not bode well for the long term health of the game. It would seem that maybe, they might want to review their initial stance. I am not referring to items that increase your abilities, developers never want to get into that unending game of trying to balance gear/skills over and over.. just titles or cool skins etc. They give skins out now for PvE and I thought this was a PvP focused game.

At the end of the day, I am looking for anything that would promote more people to participate in Wv3 on my server. Different people are motivated by different things. If it does not upset the balance of play, why not take a look at it.

We are still seeing matches without much balance on a weekly basis. Scores that are all but decided by noon on Saturday. While there are some servers that may fight the good fight all week, this is not what I see on my server nor what I believe it to be across most servers. We all have our share of “fair weather Wv3ers”. This morphs matches from being pretty one sided into boring for one side and frustrating as kitten for the few still trying to fight on the other.

Why not give people more reasons to participate even when they don’t feel their participation is going to impact the winner of the match? I felt that DAoC had one of.. if not THE best system for macro pvp. I loved the ranking system as it kept people out fighting every night even if you knew you were going to be outnumbered.

Currently in Wv3 you have what? Badges? I have stacks of badges just sitting in my bank now. Badges can’t give you anything you couldn’t get with gold. Give people more reasons and I think we will see better fights. They may still be pretty one sided at this point, but at least there will still be fights going all week long.

It gets old taking a guild group into a borderland only to find there are a total of two other people from your server on the entire map. Couple that with the bored enemy force sitting around just waiting for something to light up. Not good mojo for long term enjoyment of the game.

Let me shed some perspective on the other side if you will. I am a commander, but do not have it active more than 50% of the time when I am in Wv3. Why? Because having it on often leads to more frustrations than having it off. It’s still usually people shouting over each other in /m trying to force the group to go where they think the best place is, this is even worse when you have multiple Commanders on the map if they don’t communicate with one another.

I spent great deal of time leading forces in DAoC where macro fighting was a major piece. But, I didn’t spend the time farming gold and taking donations from the guild to get the book to try and be a realm leader again. I got it specifically because I felt Commander would make it easier to move our guild group around the map. It has failed miserably in that respect. Sure everyone can see where I am, but I cannot see where the members of my squad are (they should be a colored dot on the map much like groupmates are).

I think part of the problem that leads to confusion and drama on the map is that the players on the map don’t always have the same goals on a given night, this is especially true late in weeks where there is a rout in effect. Part of the map is still trying to score points (take/hold fortifications), part of the map is farming karma/money, and part of the map is merely looking to fight other players. I think that it is important for any commander to communicate their goals often during the night so people outside their guild/alliance are aware of what is going on. While not eliminating it.. I feel it would dramatically reduce the drama.

As an aside, a few days ago I was looking to get back into small group fighting and waiting for someone to pass lead of the main group to. I finally saw another Commander come onto the map and was going to drop my tag and let him/her run the main group, but then I watched his/her tag run up to the jump puzzle area… then leave. Wow.. if that’s your plan, fine. But please turn off your Commander flag first, it leaves a bad taste with many people to see that.

Bottom line.. Commanders are like Guild leaders in one respect: Successful guilds are successful because of their members not the leader. A leader can however ruin it for everyone. A good leader places people in a position to be successful. Its up to the individuals to make it happen.

Spacelord, I know of a few guilds that have transferred to lower population servers and there is something to be said of that. Queue times are not an issue, and in the bottom tiers the other servers aren’t exactly fielding zergs 24/7 either. Another option to consider is becoming someone else’s night time crew. Some guilds have moved to EU servers where they can (A.) compete on a top tier server and (B.) not deal with any queues since everyone else is sleeping.

I honestly am not sure how it will settle out. I get your thinking that in 6 months or a year things will even up more, however ‘gamers’ are a very fickle lot especially in a fairly narrow focused game. You don’t know what the overall player population is going to look like in 6 months or a year and that will have an impact on the viability of multiple servers from a purely competitive standpoint.

For me personally, the single largest frustration today was having a guild member buy the game and try to create a character only to find that our server is full. Yes… the same server that cannot consistently fill even one borderland in Wv3. THAT is very frustrating to me. I keep thinking that since the only real endgame in GW2 is Wv3 (really how many times can you run the same event/instance over and over) that the PvE hordes we have would turn to Wv3 and fill the ranks, but it still hasn’t happened. Its the same few core people everyday.. and often now using alts due to boredom. So now our forces are often undermanned and very squishy. Trust me, being the commander of a group of 17 total people with maybe 5 that are actually 80 can make you wish you could sell the book back sometimes. I will hop off my personal soapbox and head to bed before I QQ too much though.

Have a great time out there all,

I agree with Roo. In fact, my only complaint is that it doesn’t take long enough. DAoC had it right. If no one can rez you, you should be out of the fight for an extended period of time. This allows smaller groups to use strategies to whittle down a zerg force and still win against larger numbers. Even now in Wv3, its basically a numbers game as reinforcements can get back into the fight too quickly.

I don’t think you can bunch it into one reason or another. I have watched many guilds move from my current server over the last few weeks and they gave numerous reasons. I will list a few that may be in play for them.

1. They get annoyed taking a map and spending alot of resources building it up only to have it nightcapped while sleeping. Therefore, they look to transfer to a server that has a stronger population during their off-hours.

2. Competition. A guild gets tired of losing each week and doesn’t think it will improve, they look for another server they feel will give them a better chance to win.

3. Friends/Allied guilds. Other guilds in their alliance or that they are friendly with either moves or started on another server. They move to hang with their friends.

4. Poor community. They feel the server they are currently on provides a very poor community.. ie. its just not fun. Or there is a guild/alliance on their current server that they are simply sick of dealing with and would rather fight them than help them.

Bottom line, guilds move because the players in the guild are looking for something they do not think their current server either provides or will provide in the future. Whatever that might be. This issue is real, because it is something that is strong enough to make them move and start over with their influence.

As an aside, currently the only penalty to a guild for moving in the loss of influence. Sadly, it is the large guilds moving that have the dramatic impact on Wv3, yet the large guilds are the ones really not impacted by the influence loss very much.

Anyway.. that’s my take on the whys.

I prefer borderland maps, in particular enemy borderland maps. Once you learn the terrain well, you can use it to your advantage. I don’t overly care for zergfests which turns me off on EB somewhat. I will pop in on occassion, but not very often.

HenryAu.7523:

DB looks to be primarily made up of leveling alts and are squishy to my toughness stacked engi.

When your outnumbered you bring any able bodies. I have had people in my groups that were level 19 and 20 at times. It’s still another body and they are getting experience both towards their levels and on how to Wv3 at the same time.

Threads of this nature are invitations for people to “pat their own backs” or take shots at the other servers whether deserved or not. TC is going to win the match running away. If we on DB or FA voice frustrations about the lack of balance in the match, it will merely look like crying or an excuse. It’s NOT TCs fault they outnumber us the way they do now. On DB, there have been matches where we were the zerg (this was before 80% of our Wv3 population decided to move). I didn’t feel like we were being unfair.. you play with what you have. The only time I have been annoyed at another server relating to Wv3 was in one of our matches where a particular server was using wide-spread use of hacks. That simply has not been the case in this match with either TC or FA.

To TC, congratulations and wish you luck as you move on. I do ask that you consider the resources available when your posting here however.

To FA, maybe next week will prove to be more of a match than this week has been.

To my comrades on DB. We were in the 2nd Tier when the bottom basically dropped out on us as a server. One of the main alliances moved and it caused a chain reaction that continues this week as more and more guilds leave. We have a long way to fall before we are matched up with servers sporting similar Wv3 resources again and it will be a frustrating fall. I have been searching for ways to reduce the frustration.. focusing on smaller victories rather than larger ones. For example, securing the northern half of our borderlands and holding it for 3 hours.

As far as the mass exodus goes, guilds leave for the singular reason that the players who make up those guilds are looking for something they do not feel their current server offers. In different guilds, those reasons may be totally different, but they are all real (at least to the people involved). Rather than taking shots at the groups who have left, it would behoove us to try to find out the reasons. Many we have no control over (like the lack of night time support that I told triggered the initial alliance to move), but some we might be able to work on if we make an effort. In the end, until you can create a community that is ‘fun’ to play in.. people will continue to leave. Creating that community is up to all of us who participate in it. How you treat your teammates does have an impact. I ask that we make an effort to be aware of that as we move on and not take our frustrations out on one another.

Another week starts soon.