Guild Wars 2

Stark.1350:

As do immobilize and other crowd control affects. The end.

Agreed, stuns and root especially since there are some pretty long stackable root that’s almost unavoidable. But I would argue stability also needs a look at, just as cc needs diminishing returns, stability needs fading effects so people can’t keep such high stability uptime.

Hylgeriak.8250:

still queues >100 on EB. Was hoping so badly TESO could drag away a substential amount of players for that reason, but meh.

As long as there are still PvE players that need the achievements, you’ll see queues. So don’t expect the queues to lower much for another week or two. Oh and ESO did draw plenty of players, know several guilds on the server I’m on that have 1/3 of their players playing ESO right now.

To those dogging ESO based on youtube videos, eh you really have no idea what you are talking about, and you are missing out a lot by not giving the game a chance. Reticle targeting puts action combat up on a whole new level. GW2 did a good job adding action combat into MMO’s. ESO went 1 step above that. In terms of PvP the gameplay is great. Lots of the things people complain about in WvW/sPvP here are non-issues there.

Anyways, I’m splitting time between GW2 & ESO right now, probably 30/70 at the moment. If you’re worried about queues, wait another week or two, most PvE’ers would be done with achievements then.

WvW seasons are nothing but a guaranteed way for Anet to make tons of money off people transferring servers. Don’t expect Anet to do anything to hinder their money making, even if it’s the right thing to do.

Just look at how there’s really no changes to WvW content, it’s not like they’ve added anything new or changed the Borderlands at all. It’s all the same gameplay from before the season started. But yet calling them “seasons” got people all rabid about transferring servers because people want the skins and want to be a winner winner chicken dinner. Got to hand it to Anet’s genius plans.

-Jade Quarry
-Skill lag, button blinks like it’s trying to cast the spell, but it doesn’t go. Spells being cast on me but effects don’t show up until 5-10 seconds later. It can take anywhere from a few seconds to 30 seconds to cast.
-Everybody is experiencing the skill lag, everybody on teamspeak complains about it at the same time.
-It’s anytime when there is a zerg near by, you don’t have to face the zerg or be in line of sight of the zerg. For an example, we knew there was a 3-way fight inside Garrison. But the skill lag can be felt all the way in Bay, or NW/NE towers. The closer you get to the zerg, the worse it gets.

Honestly I find this thread quite pointless, there’s no way anybody who plays WvW on a regular basis would not have experienced skill lag during large scale fights. I’ve played with people that live in Australia and people that live in NA, it doesn’t matter where people live, everybody’s got the skill lag because it’s server-side. I don’t believe for one second the devs/programmers don’t know these skill lag exist, I think they know it very well.

Here’s a video taken tonight, a short clip to show devs exactly what skill lag is like. Spells that don’t go off, attunements won’t switch, getting hit by things with delayed effects, etc.. you can tell players on the other sides were having just as bad of a time as I was during the battle.

http://youtu.be/-EnkyuX8VYQ

If you are scouting, do understand the difference between a zerg & blob. A zerg is around 30 people. A blob is 50+. This also means don’t call it a zerg if it’s just 5-10 people. Mis-scouted reports can kill and potentially pull too many friendly forces off to a location with 10 enemy players, and losing a keep in the process.

It’s why elder scrolls online is launching Sunday for early access, giving you time to play something else while PvE’ers load up WvW & queues.

Stay on pin, follow the commander’s blue pin. Apparently some servers call it stay on tag, so depending on what server you are transferring from/to, you’ll hear different things called. But tag & pin, both just mean to stick with the commander tag.

Portal bomb, there’s a mesmer ready to give your raid a portal to drop right on top of enemies. Be sure to press F quickly to get into the portal, or you’ll be left behind out of action.

Big water, cast elementalist water staff #5 on the commander, and someone needs to blast the water for it to work properly. Small water, cast elementalist water staff #3 on the commander.

Rally, means things are getting hot, people are low in hp, probably have stacks of conditions on them. Everyone needs to rally to the commander for a regroup, refresh, cleanse, heal, might buffs, etc.. ready for another push. Rallies don’t last long so make sure you get there fast or you’ll miss out on heals, cleanses, and buffs.

Stability, usually called during initial rush, or when rushing through a choke point. Guardians, warriors, etc.. make sure to pop your stability or your raid will get cc’ed.

Static cc, elementalist staff air #5, drop it on the commander or where the big clash is about to occur.

Spike damage, full dps, means the enemies are in a nicely packed bunch, load up your best aoe’s and nuke them all down.

Stomp, finish the downed, because nothing is more frustrating to see 10 downed enemies rally up all at once, or get banner rezzed.

Assuming you are talking about organized guild WvW raids, since there are twice as many Guardians as any other classes in WvW, I would have to say Anet has deemed Guardians the most useful class. But outside of that, you will find a heavy population of Warriors that get close to the number of Guardians out there, as Warriors & Guardians form the “frontline”.

Besides Guardians & Warriors, Eles are also very much needed for their utilities, cc, & water fields. Necros at the moment still have a place due to plague, boon stripping, and spike damage when traited properly. Mesmers are nice to have a couple around in a raid, mainly used as a veil/portal bot, or in combat they generally cast null fields, feedback, and timewarp.

After these classes you start to feel bad, because rangers, thieves, and engineers are very much outcasts in organized guild WvW raids. There will be some around, but often they’re asked to play another class instead, usually one of the classes mentioned above. Thieves often get the scouting duty, if that’s your thing, then you’ll fit in. Rangers, while having good single target dps, get lost in large WvW raids due to lack of utilities. So they often get the stomp duty if they are even allowed to play one in their guild raid.

If you’re just talking about pugging, then honestly it doesn’t matter, play whatever you want to play. Certain classes & builds are more powerful in small groups or solo roaming.

I support them putting the merchants back for another week, just as a friendly gesture showing players they are nice people. I also support giving players ways to keep obtaining blade shards for another week. It’s one thing if they put the notices about when these vendors are going away in the patch notes, such as the last patch. It’s quite another to disregard players who don’t browse the forums much, and only click on news and patch notes that they see on the launcher or via ingame notices.

Had they put the notices about when they were going away in the patch notes or on the launcher news links, I would’ve said ok, your own fault. But since they didn’t do any of that, it really doesn’t hurt anybody to have these vendors back in place for another week. Because you see, now that people have noticed they’re gone, they’ll know.

-Size matters
-Banner rez is a very lame mechanic in PvP
-Oceanic/SEA/EU coverage determines match outcome
-Arrow carts could be nominated as one of the most annoying things ever implemented in MMO’s
-3-way open field battles are more fun than siege infested battles
-Anet favors PvE over PvP/WvW, they’d rather let half of the GW2 server’s WvW activities die just so they could sell more server transfers….rather than doing something about it.

-Despite all problems, issues, complaints, and imbalances, WvW can still be very fun. Some bad nights do not overshadow all the fun nights with amazing WvW battles.

The best part of EOTM, in my opinion, is the cross-server instancing. It allows those on the lower tier, or those on servers with little WvW activity, to still enjoy large scale PvP. More and more these days only higher tier servers get WvW fun on a consistent basis. A good portion of the lower tier servers often get bad weekly matchups or low WvW participation. I would say 2/3rd of the servers in this game have bad weekly matchups and low WvW participation. So moving forward, I hope you folks think about implementing cross-server matchups.

I know some may be against a total cross-server instancing like EOTM. You could compromise by matching a higher tier server with a lower tier server, where 2 or so servers would share the same goals and coverage each week to go up against other servers. So instead of 1 server vs 1 server vs 1 server each week, it could be 2 servers vs 2 servers vs 2 servers. This will only work if you match a high WvW participation server with a low WvW participation server. The goal is to make sure this game doesn’t end up with just a handful of servers with any worthy WvW fun, while the rest of 2/3rd of the servers become ghost towns in WvW with only PvDoor action to be had. You would still retain some server pride since you only need to share your pride with 1 other server.

For me personally, had I not spent $25 to transfer off a deadbeat server recently, I would’ve quit the game. Just think of all the players that enjoyed WvW, or wanted to enjoy WvW, but they were punished by their server choice that they made maybe 2 years ago. If you match a high tier server with a low tier server, this will allow those currently with little to no WvW action to still enjoy the game. Let’s face it, there’s a good percentage of the playerbase that will never spend $25 to transfer to another server. Going with this route will ensure those individuals to stay and keep playing GW2.

As far as map design and features wise, I absolutely love the map design. The “all of above” comes to mind when thinking about what to copy over into WvW. EOTM could be a very good WvW map if you just add 1 additional teleport point in the middle, maybe somewhere in Statuary. Make people fight over Statuary and turn it into a teleport point their realm can use. But as far as utilizing the vertical space, having different themed starting points, different bosses to fight over, less trash mobs but more important npc mobs, more choke points to slow down the zerg blob, etc.. are all welcome changes that I’d love to see in WvW.

Bottom line is it makes Anet more money. The worse the balance & matchups are, the more people spend that $25 to transfer. The more guilds transfer together, the more money Anet rakes in via large sums on a weekly basis. So you see why Anet has little to no incentive to fix anything or balance anything. These companies always do things by the status quo.

For Anet to realize they have to do something, people will have to stop playing the game and stop paying for transfers. Since that’s not likely to happen, and Anet knows that, Anet will take their time to resolve these issues. That or a competitive game comes out that will draw their playerbase away, such as say, if TESO turns out to be successful, then Anet may work harder to fix WvW issues. This is why competition is always a good thing, it’s the only time when companies get a reality check and understand they need to do more than status quo to please their customers.

For the past couple of years, Anet owns the game that caters to the “RvR” crowd. Now that TESO is going to be released soon, and it’s built by one of the guys that invented RvR in the first place, Anet might finally have some competition and will finally do a bit more for WvW. This is why GW2 players should cheer TESO on, because a successful TESO will push Anet to do more for WvW.

It’s not as if Anet doesn’t have any choices when it comes to WvW balance. Look at EOTM, by combining servers of higher tier with lower tier together in a cross-server instance, all of a sudden there’s more PvP activity, and there’s fun to be had for everybody, no transfers needed. A player on a server with little to no WvW participation can now have fun in cross-server instances. Anet could’ve made EOTM a part of the WvW matchups, but instead they’ve made it a side game, something that won’t affect the matchups other than some supplies drops. It’s what one would call a kitten attempt at helping players who are playing on 2/3 of the game’s servers that get bad matchups weekly and see little WvW participation.

Bombsaway.7198:

AE is one of the most important skills in ANY MMO. Otherwise, you have Melee Wars 2 and Zerg Wars 2. The whole point of AE is to bust up zergs and provide characters with less defensive capability the ability to do serious damage at range.

If anything, this game needs far more AE. I would up the AE cap from 5-7 as a start.

+1, without aoe, you might as well remove any casters from any large scale combat games. Why are melee trains and zerg blobs so effective in WvW today? Because the lack of aoe cc and low cap aoe. It’s bad enough as-is right now, casters are encouraged to play like a melee running dagger/double weapon builds so they could stay up there and roll with the melee trains to avoid getting run over. Which in my opinion, are lame as I’ve always enjoyed playing caster classes in MMO’s like spell casters, not cloth wearing rogues. All these are direct results of the lack of aoe cc and low cap aoe.

Classes that are often shunned in WvW such as engineers and rangers could greatly benefit from receiving some game changing aoe cc & aoe abilities that’ll make them wanted in WvW again. Until then, we’re going to continue seeing 2 Guardians & Warriors to 1 of every class. The state of WvW today is a reflection of a lack of effective aoe cc and low aoe cap.

Ever wonder why in games like DAOC why it was possible for a lower number of defenders to defend a keep from a larger zerg that are twice their numbers? While in WvW in GW2, the larger blob will win 99.9% of the time guaranteed? AOE. Removing AOE will be the worst idea ever. It’s bad enough as is right now. Although seeing the demographics of the classes out in WvW, with the amount of melees playing, it’s no wonder why so many support such a dumb idea.

Terravos.4059:

People who think ESO has a Cash shop clearly don’t know what an actual Cash Shop is.

GW2 has a Cash Shop.

ESO has Account Services (Character Transfers for example)

As for the Comparison between WvW and AvA in ESO..

There is no contest, ESO AvA is far far superior.

Not only does it run way way better….(Zero lag…and I mean that..Zero..I have never seen an MMO to date have the performance that ESO has in PvP)

It doesn’t have crappy gimmicks like GW2, There is no Down System, If you want to Res someone, You have to walk up to them, and cast a Res Spell, that takes like 10 seconds almost to cast…If someone interrupts you, You have to start over with the cast.

It also doesn’t have an AOE Cap, Countless times in beta I’ve seen 8 People absolutely Blow the Hell out of Large Groups of Players trying to Zerg something…

If you bunch up in ESO, you will die… Like you’re suppose to.

The Map is also vastly superior to GW2 as well…I mean its not even close… Not only its it bigger then all the Borderlands,EB,EOTM combined…It actually pushes you not to zerg objectives…

You get more for killing someone Solo, Then you do for taking an Undefended Keep..

There is no contest..It is the better PvP Game.

Good post, it actually points out a lot of the issues in WvW today. People used to complain about DAOC’s AOE’s and how smaller roaming groups could kill a zerg blob. But yet you look at WvW in GW2 today, it’s either you run a bigger blob or you die. This is a direct result of the lack of aoe CC and having an aoe cap. GW2 WvW rewards blob zergs, the bigger the better, no questions about it.

You mentioned stacking, yup, with a proper cc and aoe combat system, stacking will get you killed together. In this game, WvW again encourages you to stack as many people into the blob as possible. I never understood how stacking and following the train encourages tactical play. To me it simply encourages zerg blobs, which as we see today, is the case in WvW.

I always had a mixed feelings about the downed system. But now that you mentioned it, I do find it lame that downed people could rally up. Personally I think dead people should be dead, unless resurrected otherwise. There are times you simply can’t kill off a blob because they just keep rallying back up. Again, the system encourages large blobs.

I’m sure ESO will have its own problems, but I do think with Anet’s lack of attention to WvW, a lot of the GW2 players will at least try ESO for a few months. This isn’t to say GW2 is bad or Anet won’t do something to counter the release of ESO. It’s simple facts that people will find a new game exciting to try, a game that offers a bit different gameplay styles in PvP. WvW participation will definitely go down even more, which may just prompt Anet to actually do something to help WvW.

Right now as long as Anet is making a lot of money off server transfers, I don’t think it gives them any incentive to balance things. And as long as Anet can keep making money selling fluff to PvE players, or pull stunts like nuking a perfectly good hub to make people buy tickets to access the same hub as before, well then Anet is encouraged to continue doing such things rather than spend resources taking care of WvW problems. To GW2 players, you should view ESO’s success (if it’s successful) a good thing. Because every company needs a kick in the balls every once in awhile to remind them that they’re in a competitive market, and that they need to please their customers or they’ll find better.

Blackhat.4016:

That’s the biggest problem WvW currently has imo. Coverage decides whether you stomp the other 2 servers or your server is being stomped. Nothing else really matters and tbh, both sides aren’t fun for me anymore. You either get your kitten kicked or you have no opponents.

After a few matches you know the servers with barely any players, a strong prime time or ~24/7 coverage. The ones with 24/7 coverage are obviously at the top of the leaderboards so you should go ahead and switch to one of the top 3.

Yeah unfortunately this is inevitable in a game like this. Which is why I think Anet, moving forward, will start to utilize cross-server instancing much like EOTM to help resolve these types of issues. A smaller server or server with less WvW participation will benefit from being able to play with other servers.

For now, our only choice is to server transfer to one of the tier 1 or 2 servers. Anet has a choice to make. See Anet stands to benefit from leaving things the way they are, because people will spend a lot of money transferring to other servers. They have a financial incentive to not resolve the coverage issue, or the server imbalance issues. Whole guilds moving at once is a lot of money in Anet’s pocket.

On the other hand, if they see they’re losing too many people due to the whacked server balance, bad WvW matchups, and how people just don’t have fun playing on a server that constantly get beat down all the time…then maybe Anet will move forward with cross-server instancing like EOTM sooner.

Speaking as someone who recently moved to a tier 1 server, that $25 was the best $25 I’ve spent in entertainment in awhile. For me it was either spend $25 to server transfer, or quit the game. I was having fun in WvW, when the server had good WvW participation and good leadership. But ever since some guilds transferred off, it just hasn’t been fun for at least a couple of weeks straight. Of course all these server transfers just entices Anet to not fix these coverage/participation/imbalance issues with WvW.

Getting credit has been an issue for me. If it’s an escort quest, people should not be made to rush up with the npc’s to make sure they’re there when they crossed the line. Totally ignoring fallen allies, people who are killing mobs that spawn to protect quest npc’s, etc.. For such large events please make the area to get credit is much much bigger.

For events where mobs come in waves, I’ve also not gotten credit several times. It’s so random I have no idea what the problems were. I was there along with everybody else killing, healing, reviving, etc..

Please fix the bugs, but also make sure it’s easier to get credit especially when people participated in the events and helped.

I really enjoyed it. The only thing is it’s buggy, some events don’t work properly, and I keep not getting credits for multiple things I did from start to finish. Those escort quests should not have such a small finish radius, seriously expand it by at least 10x in size. People who are helping with killing mobs should not get cheated out of getting credit if they didn’t get right up to the npc’s when they cross the finishing point.

Other than those buggy things, I had fun.

They’re releasing quality content for a game that costs no monthly to play. Personally I think it’s ok they make some money, they deserve it. I’d rather they make money so they can keep releasing quality content, rather than go the ways of SOE games where people pay for expansion packs and still don’t get quality content.

+1 to everything said, regular WvW seems bland now that I’ve played EOTM. There’s simply more things to do, more strategy to be had, more back & forth, more flanks, more surprise “oh crap” moments, and more “darn I should’ve known not to get baited onto that bridge” moments.

The map being more “dynamic” is a good way to describe it. It’s definitely more dynamic & more fun, there’s simply more things to do, more ways to attack & defend. And the fact that 3 sides look so much different with their own theme and weather effects, all are just icing on the cake.

MiLkZz.4789:

What I heard is that JQ is stacked to the max with bandwagoners, so Eotm is not bad for the other 2 servers, good alternative to not get blobbed 24/7.

And WvW actually gets a lot of love, A LOT. Eotm IS for WvW, you remember people complaining about queues? That they were bored and didn’t have anything to do? They created an entire waiting map for that. And they fixed the queue and added a position in queue.

Let’s look back, ranks got added, siege improved, masteries, w exp from drops, better loot (from chests), soon we get account bound w exp.

They actually do listen and add a lot of stuff. I am sure a better integration of the commander icon will come soon aswel.

If you stack your server and expect people to stay when they get blobbed 24/7 than you are pretty wrong, move to another server, my server is still getting great fights in WvW. Eotm ain’t that noticable.

Yup, take EOTM away, people would simply not play the game as much. Nobody wants to get blobbed 24/7. EOTM provides escape and a chance to still have fun given these already lopsided, whacked matches. Some servers can just summon humongous zergs all hours of day & night, it’s pointless to play into the system during those match ups.

EOTM is just a cop out, a fodder, for those blaming it for WvW problems. Those issues in WvW have existed for quite some time now.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

Qaelyn.7612:

While it’s only been about 12 hours since the reset, I can’t help but notice some rather disturbingly lopsided scores in the current NA matchups. In particular, the BG/JQ/SoR fight and the Mag/SBI/BP matchup. I’ve never seen such imbalances before in my few months of playing, and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that it’s happening the first new cycle since EotM.

There’s no imbalance. Maguuma’s skill level has always been off the charts.

Maguuma can summon some very large blobs, and not just during the day or night, but all hours of day and night. Last week DB was matched up against them, DB got beat down so badly that people got demoralized and stopped participating in WvW. Some commanders that used to run WvW raids every day stopped tagging up. It was pretty sad. The whole week it was about how to avoid the zerg, which usually meant going off to cap empty keeps (borrring).

Thank Anet for EOTM, I wasn’t going to play the game much during the last match up but EOTM allowed me to still enjoy PvP. This is precisely why EOTM is a good thing.

Crunk n monkey.3749:

It won’t kill it.

Cause when you are on the losing end. Edge of the Mists isn’t even fun to play.

Yeah but, you could simply exit, then re-enter to get into a different EOTM instance, one that may be more balanced or even with your side dominating. Where as in WvW, if you are being outzerged and outplayed, there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it other than to logout or hide in PvE. Well that’s until EOTM got launched, now people have a choice and places to go PvP and have fun.

There’s a reason cross-server instancing was added in other MMO’s. This is because ultimately, you can’t count on gamers to always tough it out. When going gets tough, gamers will either 1) transfer to another server, as we’ve seen happen, or 2) simply not play the game as much, as we’ve always seen it happen before EOTM was launched. Sure there are always a small % of players that will stick with a server no matter what, but they simply don’t make enough difference to match the zergs.

People need to realize for many servers, WvW was already damaged long before EOTM was released. Many servers have not been able to compete well in WvW for quite some time now. Some servers only do well when matched up against other lesser servers or servers with less organized WvW guilds.

So could EOTM damage WvW? If Anet plays it right, EOTM should compliment WvW gameplay. Winning EOTM should add to your realm’s score. Anet also needs to make the queues so you can choose which instance to enter, this way it will allow people from the same guild/servers to go into a specific queue when they want to. Better queue matching will help as well, they need to dump large guilds queuing together into the same instance so there are some large guild vs guild vs guild from various servers going on.

EOTM has been a success, they really need to just build on top of it and enhance it even further.

He has a point, I was playing on the Overgrowth side when EOTM launched, until today when our server got flipped to Frostreach side. I have to say, Frostreach is seriously underpowered. The kodan champion is the easiest to kill of the 3, and they don’t have access to scorpions (crazy at knocking down keep walls for Badlands), and immunity ball that runs very fast allowing Overgrowth to speed safely to other parts of the map.

Would love to hear from the dev why the oversight.

Minos.5168:

What a wonderful mentality for the WvW player-base to have…

No wonder there are so many PvE players opposed to this update, and WvW in general.

Please don’t confuse elitist with the “WvW player-base”. Also, never generalize. Otherwise you are no better than those you despise.

Ironvos.9014:

Maybe your server has horrible people and you don’t interact with people from a guild other than your own, but i can assure you that is not the case for the majority of the people who play wvw on a regular basis.

You are lucky to be playing in one of the few server mach ups where all 3 servers in your match can compete. But if you bother to look at the other server’s match ups, you’ll see some servers are not able to compete, and things simply can’t be too fun for those that get rolled over constantly.

Again you want to punish players based on their server choices? Or rather, punish those who do stick around on a server and not switch servers, because those are the players that get affected the most.

This whole “community” thing is fine and dandy, in an utopian world we would all hold hands, help each other, and sing kumbaya. The reality is much harsher however. Games are supposed to be fun, and when people can’t play competitively in WvW, and have to be forced to running off in a corner taking empty keeps until the blob arrives, then that’s simply not fun. Oh I interact with the server’s community alright, and I still see some guild groups trying, heck I was trying. But it’s sad to see people fall off the face of this earth day after day when they get beat back every single battle due to a larger, more organized zerg.

I saw the server I play on (DB) go from the previous match up where we fielded huge blobs daily & nightly, capable of competing in WvW….to this week’s match up where there are barely any commanders willing to tag up because the server can’t compete with Mag zerg. The whole tactic this past week has been to avoid the Mag blob, which often meant going off to cap empty keeps until the blobs arrive. I didn’t buy this game to cap empty keeps. Nor did spend time playing, gearing up, learning my characters, just to get rolled over by an obviously bigger blob.

When EOTM launched, it was the first time this past week I was able to have fun and play competitively in WvW. Size, unfortunately, does matter. Having commanders willing to lead the charge and run tactics matter a lot in this game. Having WvW guild groups capable of standing up to other server’s WvW guild groups matter.

Anyways, it’s pointless for us to argue. There’s a reason why Anet is testing this, and it’s because they see the problems with many servers and how players are simply punished for their server choices. There’s a reason why Blizzard went with cross-server queues many years ago and never looked back.

Edit: One common theme I see with people who dislike EOTM’s cross-server queue system is that they are playing on a server doing rather well in their weekly match up. So I don’t think those people really see how it is for other servers who aren’t competing well.

Agreed, the way WvW is setup was sound on paper initially, we all applauded Anet for coming up with it. But with server transfers available, some servers could lose all organized WvW gameplay with just 1 or 2 WvW guilds transferring off those servers. Just look at the WvW matchups. In each given 3 servers match up, there are almost always 1 server that can’t compete for the #1 spot…sometimes there are 2 servers that can’t even get near the #1 score. When you can’t compete for the first place, personally I find it quite lame to fight over the #2 spot while trying to dodge the greater zerg or greater organized WvW from other servers.

In a perfect world you would have 3 servers competing on a fairly even field, neck to neck, working to be the best for that week. Well those days are over, servers that get rolled consistently will fall back more and more as guilds transfer off those severs. WvW on some servers are all but dead. Do we tell everybody who wants to WvW on those servers to fork over the cash and transfer as well?

One thing game developers often don’t account for is human nature. In an ideal world, you would have all players working together for the common good, never giving up when they get beat back, never caring about losing all the time. But gamers are fickle, if there’s a way they could transfer to more successful servers that are doing well in WvW, many would simply do that rather than grind through tough times. This results in servers that have little to no organized WvW activities, or servers that simply can’t compete with others. The current system punishes players who are sticking it out with their servers, like players willing to stick with the sinking ship so to speak.

WoW switched to cross-server queues many years ago, their BG’s started out as a server only thing. But Blizzard started seeing the same problems, so they migrated to cross-server queues so more people could have fun. I’m guessing Anet sees similar things happening to GW2 servers, so they’re now testing cross-server queues. Like it or not, cross-server queues is the future. It’s the only way for these PvP MMO’s to make sure they can provide fun to everybody, and that people aren’t punished for their server choices.

Remember EOTM are instances, and there are several instances open at once. You could very well have been in an EOTM instance where your side greatly outnumber the others. Usually when I get into a lightly populated instance or one where I see the “outnumbered” buff, I exit and re-enter for a different EOTM instance.

Granted Anet should improve their queuing system so this doesn’t happen as often. But for now, just know that if you’re winning easily and don’t see many enemies, you could simply exit and switch to a different instance. The nature of EOTM currently is that you could be winning by a large margin in one, but switch to one where there are no keeps in your color.

For players on servers that are losing, with low WvW participation, demoralized by the always larger zergling blob that other servers are able to summon in their match up. In EOTM people can actually play, fight, and have a chance. Are there zergs in EOTM? Sure. But there are also many smaller pocket fights, lots of 10 vs 10, 1 vs 1 ganking, and small group vs small group happening. All things that simply don’t happen much anymore in WvW, especially if you’re on a server in a match where your choices are 1) get rolled by a blob that has 10x the number, or 2) go off to take empty keeps until the blob arrives. Both of which, are boring and sucks for those in the given situations.

EOTM being cross-server queued also allow those usually with no access to big blobs to join big blobs. Honestly it’s a win/win, one of the reasons why it’s popular.

WvW design was a plausible one, it’s an enhancement over DAOC’s Realm vs Realm for sure, without a doubt. But one fault with WvWvW is that they allow for server transfers. This makes the whole tiering and server vs server pointless. The system becomes just like DAOC’s RvR, where you ultimately have 1 server ruling the match up with their massive zerg, they’ll always outnumber the other 2 servers in the match up. This then demoralizes the other 2 servers in the match up, making people play less, or making them simply transfer to other servers. Occasionally you’ll have 2 servers able to compete somewhat, but you still have 1 black sheep server that won’t have much fun during the match up. In other words, with server transfers, this WvW system isn’t as ideal as it was on paper initially.

But now with EOTM, where they allow cross-server queues, these issues above mostly go away. Not completely, but mostly. Lower populated servers or servers with less WvW participation can still go in EOTM and have fun. They may even find themselves doing well since there are players from other servers to play with. EOTM is really the ideal system, cross-server queues allow for more even matches. One guild moving from one server to another should not affect a cross-server match system like EOTM. Where as in the current WvW system, 1 or 2 active WvW guilds moving to another server could mean the death of WvW for a particular server.

The only thing Anet needs to do now is to improve their queuing system. Large guilds should be allowed to queue together, but they should be dumped into an EOTM instance where other large guilds are queued up. This will create more of a competitive environment where organized guild zergs get to go up against other organized guild zergs, with some pugs thrown in the mix. Rather than organized guild zergs steam rolling pugs without even a commander in charge.

I do see this system as being the better system moving forward. It will solve a lot of the issues with the current matching system in WvW. I also think EOTM should be a part of WvW, it should allow you to score for your side when you win, there’s no reason it should be a castoff. Yes this is what WoW does with their BG queues. But sometimes when something works, you just want to copy it, enhance it, and make it work for your game.

The whole map isn’t near a cliff, there’s sizable landmass so if you don’t want to fall off, then don’t run/stand near a cliff. It isn’t rocket science, but it does add an extra element to player vs player. Being aware of your surroundings has always been a part of PvP since the beginning of time. Anet having added this element simply makes you learn the other classes even more, makes you be a bit more aware of where you’re standing. I see no problems with it. You quickly learn the tricks enemies use to bait you near a cliff. It’s like a knock me off once, shame on you…knock me off twice, shame on me kind of thing. I believe it enhances the gameplay. It’s like indiana jones + world vs world pvp.

People want things that are anti blob, well there’s absolutely nothing anti blob in WvW. In EOTM however, the lesser team being outnumbered can utilize clever strategies to shave some enemies off the blob by using the environment. I can understand complaining about it if the size of landmass is small, if the areas you can stand on is tiny. But that’s simply not the case. EOTM is huge, huge enough for some people to complain about the size of the map and how long it takes to run.

I agree with the above, learn the map, you’ll do much better that way. An example is we were at a bridge standoff, it was one of those open bridges where if you fight on it, you’ll for sure get knocked off. So both sides were smart enough to stay on their sides, both sides built sieges and utilized aoe’s. There were small charges across the bridge but every charge got pushed back.

But then after about 20mins 1 mesmer got smart and went below, turns out there’s a route to the other side of the bridge from down below (remember this map is 3D with multi-layers). That 1 mesmer summoned portal for us, and a bunch of us jumped into the portal and hit the blob from their side of the bridge, while rest charged across the bridge. Needless to say 1 min later, they were all dead since they got sandwiched.

Clever use of strategy, 1 smart player who knew the map broke the stalemate and won the battle for us. Perfect example of “learn the map”.

I don’t need gold, but it’d be nice if winning gives points to your server in WvW. It really needs to tie into WvW somehow. Not many care about the resources it adds.

Blue is actually pretty difficult. Green is probably the easiest. But at the moment Green can summon pretty big zergs so that seems to even it out.

Red is definitely a pain, it’s even a pain when us Reds have to take it back.

After having played EOTM all last night and all afternoon, I find regular WvW to be boring and uninspiring. When they took EOTM down briefly for the patch just now, I had major withdraws.

EOTM is giving people a chance to compete, I think most people on the losing or lesser populated servers would appreciate it. You can’t fault people for going into EOTM because it’s probably the only time they can have fun if you’re with a server that gets beat down by massive blobs every day.

I think Anet did it right. Now of course this doesn’t fix WvW issues for lower populated servers, or at least servers with lower WvW participation. But I don’t think there’s much Anet could solve those problems. By giving EOTM a cross-server, joint matches, it gives those on the losing side hope and a chance to have some fun in WvW.

I see it as a good thing honestly. Because I’m from DB and for the past few days, we already saw less WvW participation due to the massive blobs that Mag are able to summon every day & night, all hours of day & night. This happened not because of EOTM, this was due to the match up. If I have to go to EOTM to have some fun and not get rolled continuously, then that’s what I’m going to do.

Fafnir.5124:

just push the zerg off cliff and use chock points better.

^^ I’m surprised last night I was one of the few actively trying to push a zerg off the cliffs. Everybody else just tried to fight a larger number zergs head on, even when they are running through those tiny ledges and bridges.

People realize that you push them off, they can’t rally back up right? I get that the map is new to many, but come on folks, strategy & tactics. My g/f even successfully baited someone into chasing her near a cliff, and I went and pushed them off. It’s a perfectly legit tactic, especially if you are on the side getting outnumbered.

I was just trying to say that WvW players aren’t all that bad, just ask for help, I’m sure plenty of people will be willing to assist. I played probably 8 hours in EOTM last night (yes I was having that much fun), not once did I see someone ask in zone chat for help. I saw PvE players complain about getting killed, but not one asked for help getting somewhere or assist clearing an area.

To get in more balanced matches, simply exit and re-enter. I had to do that a few times last night, really not much trouble at all. You will usually get into a different instance doing so, and likely find a better group of people, or if you’re lucky a map with multiple commanders working on objectives.

It’s not bad, but I do wish ANet would do a bit better matching the zerg queues. I saw some large guild zergs. It’d be nice if Anet would dump guild zergs together into the same instance, creating a more balanced gameplay. Because an organized large guild blob often rolls over pugs easily, especially one without a commander leading the charge.

Traveller.7496:

I can’t get to the golem part without people ganging up on me and killing me. Great update. Really makes me want to play more.

That’s an issue PvE players have, you are all too used to getting things done by yourselves. Getting ganged up on? Gather some friends, guildies, look for a commander, or simply ask for help in the zone! I saw PvE players complain about getting killed last night all night, and not one of them, not one, asked for help.

There were plenty of roaming WvW groups, guild groups, and large blobs out there, they’d be more than happy to clear an area out for you, get some credit doing so while farming some loot bags. Not to mention you should know you aren’t the only ones wanting to get to an area and having difficulties doing so, so you should easily have no trouble getting a group together for such adventure.

Nick.6972:

Why play EOTM over the real WvW?

Judging from the feedback I saw from most of the EOTM instances I was in, I would say a lot of the people will choose EOTM simply because it’s more fun. The map design creates a more dynamic WvW flow, and allows for more smaller scale fights that span across the map.

Standard WvW will still be played of course, but it has all but turned into a “let’s see who has the bigger blob”, or “let’s go cap empty bases until blob arrives”. It has been overplayed, and for a lot of the WvW players, EOTM at the moment is simply more interesting and fresh.

Also remember in a standard WvW match, some servers simply aren’t matching up well against the servers that could bring the larger zerg. So EOTM gives them a chance to join other like-colored servers and actually have some fun. When organized large guilds leave a server, they affect WvW. But in EOTM, it’s less of an issue.

There are EOTM instances where the larger guild blob overruns pugs, but you could simply exit and re-enter to get into a different instance to avoid such issues. You can’t do that in WvW. Anyways, both will be played still, just that EOTM provides a place for everybody to have fun. Not to mention some will simply choose EOTM over WvW for the better map & more interesting map design.

It does suck to be in an outnumbered instance. I resolved this by simply exiting, and entering again. Usually you get put into a different instance. I’ve had to do it 3 times to get into a decent one at one point, but it doesn’t seem like to troublesome.

However this is probably about the only downside to EoTM that I’ve seen. I do wish they would just show you the instances available, and let you choose which you want to enter, like how WoW does BG queues.

Also, it’d be nice if the queuing algorithm would match guild zergs together, so a large guild queuing together from Red would be matched with a large guild queuing from Blue and Green. This way you would create a more competitive instances where each side would have a chance. I saw there were times when a large guild from the same server were rolling over all the pugs of the other colors, as they should since they’re organized. But those were the instances where people eventually leave and create the “outnumbered” buff situation. So if the queues would match guild zergs together, it’d at least create less of these outnumbered situations or easy rolling zerg situations.

Played all night and all morning, loved every second of it. Beautiful map, nice vertical design of multi-layers. Nice keep & outpost design, lots of variations, lots of attack routes, choke defense points, and open bridges allowing people to knock some zerglings off. While zergs can still cause good damages, there are multiple routes to get around so you can avoid the zergs if you want to. One game we had 3 commanders, 1 doing defense, 2 going separate routes pushing offense, it was great fun.

Only down side I see so far is that you could get dumped into a lopsided, outnumbered instance. You quickly realize it and have to exit and enter again, hoping to get into a different instance. It’d be nice if they just show you a list of instances available and let you choose. Kind of like queuing for BG’s in WoW.

By the way, in those lopsided instances, or instances where your zerg/blob/guild zerg are owning everything, good for you. But just know that there may be other instances where your color is getting owned. It would be nice if the queue is smart enough to match up guilds queuing together so they put more guild vs guild into those matches together. Because obviously an organized guild zerg all on ts will likely overrun any pug instance without commanders.

Agreed, +1. Awesome map design, visually beautiful, while at the same time allow for better strategy & tactics. I won’t lie, I fell 4 times tonight, and all 4 were by myself. Some people get angry when that happens, me, I was lmao. New map, new live & learn moments, great fun all around.

I do love the fact that big blobs of zergs aren’t as effective on this map. I never thought ANet could actually find a way to solve the “who’s got the bigger blob” issue in WvW. But it looks like they have with this new map design.

Absolutely love the map design. Not only do you just fight enemies now, you have to watch where you’re standing. And there’s great joy when knocking a greater zerg off the cliffs, knowing you’ve just saved the battle.

There are multiple layers, allowing the “weaker” side to have a better chance at fending off the greater zerg. That in itself is a huge improvement over what we’re used to in WvW. There are multiple routes, so you have choices how you want to attack, or where you want to defend. It just feels like you can utilize more strategy than just blobs running into each other.

The only downside is that there are some spawned EoTM’s completely lopsided, so you have to switch instances just to get with a decent amount of people sometime. It can be frustrating until you realize you’re in a hopeless instance & switch. Overall, great fun so far, about to jump right back in for some more