Guild Wars 2

I had someone mention this to me last night while I was commanding; he would lose me when I pushed into the enemy zerg. Perhaps the tag size could be increased a little bit, or raise the contrast on the tags a bit. Either way, it’s been an issue since forever.

Best way to deal with it is to target your commander. Honestly, that red reticle is pretty kitten good for keeping track of where your commander is.

I will be out in WvW tonight representing SOR. Whoever we get paired up with let’s Party! Will be nice to see some action once again!

Back in my day all we had was Blue and we liked it. Kids these days.

Nobody is pointing a gun to your head to play EotM .If You don’t like it don’t abuse yourself by going there.

Let it go peeps, eotm and the rewards are here to stay. Go beat up pixels in wvw and enjoy the update.

TLDR: A scoring system that tries to find balance between Fight oriented play and Territorial control play. PPT is removed and 40% of the score is now the result of fight skill. PPT is replaced with a Dolyak based scoring system (PPC,PPU,PPSC) that gives roamers and havoc groups more impact on score. And by increasing the scoring options, more creative strategies can be developed leading to more interesting gameplay. You still must play to win, but now the outcome is based on Fighting skill, strategy and community organization.

How do you think this type of scoring mechanism would alter WvW strategies and Behavior?

FIGHTS AND DOLYAKS

There are many complaints about PPT regarding nightcapping. While this is a problem it isn’t the biggest problem with PPT. IMO the biggest problem with PPT is the lack of scoring options. Prior to PPK, the score was 60% PPT and 40% PPSC (Points per Supply Caravan). The addition of PPK didn’t alter this balance much. The basic strategy in this scoring mechanism is to hold as much as possible while killing yaks or protecting deliveries. All other events while they could aid in the scoring factors were at best tangential. Creating more options in the scoring mechanism can lead to more creative strategic gameplay.

It addition to the existing systems lack of options, many players feel that it completely disregards the value of fighting oriented playstyle. Due to population imbalances, the score no longer reflected who could defend the best of capture the best because off hour captures offered little resistance. In addition the off hour scoring greatly imbalances the final result.

What I suggest is a somewhat balanced scoring system that takes into account Fights, territorial control and logistics: Fights and Dolyaks.

The Dolyaks

The dolyaks become the primary focus of territorial control scoring. Unlike PPT which benefits from holding large amounts of assets, dolyaks can be easily contested by small groups. And since the new mechanic for upgrades is dependent on Dolyaks small groups and stifle an enemy with guerrilla tactics by disrupting supply caravans. In addition Dolyaks are only useful if supply connection exists between the camp and objective it supplies. So camp control becomes instrumental and a potential area of high conflict.

Terminology and score calculation for territorial control:

PPC: Points per Capture. Whenever a non-camp objective is captured points are given on a one time basis based on the tier of the objective. Tier simply represents a multiplier (tier + 1) to the objectives old PPT value. So a Tier 0 Tower is worth 10 points (10 X 1) and a tier 3 tower is worth 40 (10 × 4). Camps are excluded because their primary function is now the production of dolyaks.

PPU: Points per Upgrade. Whenever any objective upgrades points are awarded based on the old PPT value. 5 for camps, 10 for towers, 25 for keeps and 35 for castle. PPU rewards defense and creates an additional incentive to capture objectives. These points are dependent upon camps and dolyaks.

PPSC: Points per Supply Caravan. Every time a Supply Dolyak makes it to its objective, 1 point is awarded to the owner of the objective. If a dolyak is killed, a point is awarded to the killing team. Dolyaks become the most important component on the territorial control side as it still represents a form of passive scoring, but is easily contestable by small groups. And unlike PPT, capturing camps can completely shut down all passive scoring and stop upgrades. Roamers and Havoc groups can make a more meaningful contribution to the score by shutting down enemy supply.

Weights and multipliers:
These are used for experimental purposes to balance the score. Scoring occurs as above but then modified by a multiplier to adjust the relative value of each component. My current model applies the following multipliers: PPC x 2, PPU x 3, PPSC x 2.

The Fights

There are two problems with PPK. First, 1 point for one kill says nothing of the skill of the fighters. Simply engaging in more fights will ultimately result in more kills. Excluding deaths from the equation makes PPK a measure of volume of activity. Secondly, the relative value of PPK is dependent on the amount of fight activity going on. If fewer fights are occurring, then the score is quickly skewed towards territorial control. This could be the result of a low activity tier or players intentionally avoiding fights.

To fix these elements I add KDR adjusted killscore and make the fight portion of the score locked at 40% of total score (or 0.667 of the total territorial score.)

Calculating the Fight points:

First calculate KDR by dividing kills by deaths (Max KDR is 3, Min KDR is 0.334). Then multiply the KDR by the number of kills to get a killscore.

The next step is to weight the killscore points to 40% total points. It goes like this:
(PPC + PPU + PPSC) * 0.667 * (server Killscore/sum of all Killscores)

This calculation results in the fight score being equal to 40% of the total score. However the portion of that 40% that goes to each server is dependent on the their fighting skill and fighting volume.

EXAMPLES:

Tier 1 NA (charts attached)

This example assumes that all dolyaks successfully arrive to their destinations. It bases the Tier of the Objective on the old time model. The reason for these two assumptions is that I do not a this time have access to dolyak success or objective tier data in the API. So I am guessing but it is still useful to give a sense of how the score would look and how much each scoring component contributes to the overall score.

The first chart shows the raw data for PPT, Killscore, PPC, PPU, PPSC and PPT before adjusting the weights.

The second chart shows the weighted values and the final total score. PPT and PPK are weighted zero so have no score contribution. overall killscore contributes 40%, PPC ~15%, PPU ~15% and PPSC ~ 30%. While the Killscore is fixed at 40% the other three contributions can vary depending on activity level. Low activity can result in a much larger contribution from PPSC.

Tier 8 NA (charts attached)

This shows how the score contribution changes in a low activity environment.
Killscore is still 40% but PPC, PPU and PPSC are 6.5%, 11%, and 42.5% respectively. This shows a high amount of passive scoring however it would be easier for an out-manned server to compensate by securing camps and hunting yaks. These examples cannot account for how strategies would change since they use historical data based on another system.

Dolyak Tweaks

Here are couple tweaks that could be done to dolyaks but are not represented in the data.

Asymmetrical Dolyak value: Killing a dolyak is always worth the base one point however successful dolyak deliveries are now worth the tier + 1 points. This means that enemies will be less likely to let you coast with a tier 3 objective as it is now producing more points.

Modulating Yak spawn rate: If off hours play is still considered a problem the Yak spawn rate can be slowed down during off peak hours. This reduces not only the PPSC points but slows down upgrades which reduces that scoring as well.

WvW map completion was removed because it was part of world completion. For some players in low tier servers it was near impossible to get all 4 maps completed since the matchups never changed and you simply do not take enemy keeps with 4 people left in your server. If you are purely PvE player, that is really unfair.

As about map completion in WvW without it being part of world completion, I am all for it. I mean it would be not required but it would give you small prize if you do it.

Many current vets came into wvw only for map completion and stayed. Commanders on my server and most likely every server at one time or another have purposely attacked a well defended keep just so some of the newer people could get the vista.

Map completion may not have pulled in all pvers, but it pulled in more than the system since megaserver did.

Depending on how many new people the reward track coupled with server pairings pulls in, this might be something to look at again in 6 months or so. Right now though, we can be pretty positive we’ll see an increase in forces over the course of the beta tests.

In the future though, bringing back another incentive to get new people in would be a good idea. The new people of today, may be missing out on a huge part of the game they dont know exists and could actually enjoy.

I don’t get it.
EoTM is completly different from WvW.
It is used differently by the people who use it.
Why should you take it away from people who like it (or want to grind tomes?).
WvW for me is not something you can force on somebody else by taking away content they maybe? rather do…

Angel Heart.6739:

Well WvW has been reworked, it allows you do the things you did in EOTM without any stress. So come back to WvW.

It’s very simple:

• I like to go into TS, then I go into WvW
• I don’t like to be in TS, then I go EotM

In any case, its now less than 2h a week (WvW+EotM), while it was 20+ hours a week 3 years ago, so yes, 95% of me are gone for WvW

The only thing that could bring me back is a competition, that can be taken serious, not this 24/7 PvD-nonsense with open teams allowing troll/spy-accounts on every team.

But I don’t see any steps in that direction nor do I believe anylonger that ANet will ever do them.

This is a game. It is to entertain. Some people like EotM. Some like PvE, WvW or PvP. Play what YOU like and leave others to have their fun.

TIME TO DUST OFF MY RANGER! WOO!

I will miss the leap, but I’ll take the ability to dodge during AA over that any day. This was my #1 complaint about ranger since day 1 and was one of the biggest reasons I quit ranger, even though it was my first character and former main.

Thank you ANet for not giving up on this!

From Reddit AMA

https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/4fkhku/reddit_ama_summary/

• For now we plan to rotate the borderlands once each quarter.

Other parts are interesting too:

• Language/National worlds will only be paired with other worlds of the same language.
• We can link many worlds together, though in this Beta worlds will only have a single partner (if they are linked at all). Many high ranking worlds in EU will not be linked with another world.
• Worlds that are paired will have lower population caps.
• At most we’d re-link worlds every 3 months.
• World Linking decisions were primarily based on a combination of both Glicko rating and time-sliced activity levels.
• We plan to continue balancing for WvW, splitting skill damage between modes if necessary. This will likely be gradual though, tackling a few outlier skills at a time.
• EotM earns reward track points at a somewhat slower rate
• Superior Siege on Portable Provisioner- we will add this.
• There will be a partial reset of Glicko (Deviation & Volatility) on Friday. We’ll put a forum post explaining our reasoning, and listing world pairings on Friday as well.
• WvW Participation points begin decaying after 10minutes of no participation gain.
• Development of build templates will occur in WvW first and if it goes well sPvP will get it too.

Who gives a kitten if you can get it in EOTM. Let those people there get it idc. They’re also available in Spvp..

Aezyr.5304:

Coldtart.4785:

You would prefer the pve farmers clogged up real wvw?

Just in case you have missed it but we having a huge issue with getting new people into wvw maps. Those “pve farmers” might be the next recruit for your guild.
Without new people guilds will die and the game mode will die.

Incase you missed it, we’ve had plenty of events in the past where pve farmers had an incentive to get into WvW. The general concensus from the WvW players was that these players were detrimental to the WvW experience. They only mindlessly zerged, stood on every sentry point, hogged siege, wasted supply, etc etc.

What you’re saying would only apply to a small portion of the players, and i’d much rather see them go to EotM and experience some WvW there, get a taste for it and move to actual Borderlands because they want more WvW and not for the reward.

I know some people have a hard time dealing with this, but EotM is also WvW, and certainly for the last couple of months has been a place with consistently fairer fights while the Borderlands were abandoned and a true PvDoor fest.

The food you get from Provisioner is good enough. It does not need to be “best” to be useful. If you must always have best food, buy it old fashion way or craft it yourself.

Dawdler.8521:

Plus, it would wreck havoc on the communities if they part ways after a long 3 months.

This suddenly feel… not so good.

Don’t panic. Not quite yet at least.

At core, you’re staying within your existing community, your existing server, no matter who you’re paired up with. That means the people you’ve been playing with for years stay with you.

Every three months (and I believe this is an arbitrary number and just meant to advise people it can change so there’s no forum freakouts and is actually quite clever in making sure the game isn’t, well, gamed), you get “guests”. So you still play with the community you know and love, but you get extra people visiting.

Now that could be great or it could be destructive, but if you come from a particularly strong community, you’ve been through it at least once with the bandwagonners.

What I took away from it was good, they’re leaving us intact.

And a reddit post said that they will never pair national servers with international ones in EU, nor will they merge the top EU gold servers with any other server for the near future. So for EU, it will not be much of a difference, except in the lower tiers.

For an account in T1, my contact list now shows players on servers in other matches listed as being on a T1 map according to the map color. So for example a friend in T3 is listed for me as being on Jade Quarry Desert Borderlands while when seen by a player in T7, he is listed as being on Kaineng Desert Borderlands. Both of those BLs are the blue map.

Sviel.7493:

There are dozens of threads from the beginning of WvW that detail the suffering that happened while waiting for rankings to sort themselves out. Whatever problems we have now, a reset would surely make them worse.

So much ^^^that^^^.

So, no.

There are dozens of threads from the beginning of WvW that detail the suffering that happened while waiting for rankings to sort themselves out. Whatever problems we have now, a reset would surely make them worse.

So far i’m liking the changes they made for WvW (and outside of WvW).

Things we spend 3 years asking for. Better rewards, unique rewards, a fix to boring but neccesary roles, and my personal favorite, recognizing WvW as a seperate entity in terms of balance.

We’ll have to wait and see how the World merging works out come Friday, but at least anet is actually trying to adress the problem.

I’ll give anet kitten when they deserve it, but i’ll happily recognize it when they do something good. This was a good update, a really good update.

Crafting would be made completely redundant, 5 badges is spare change for a 30min buff. This brings the food disparity much closer together, those who don’t spend any gold get a good buff and those who want the even better buff can fund the cooks.

I’m honestly surprised with how generous this already is.

STIHL.2489:

Swagger.1459:

STIHL.2489:

Swagger.1459:

STIHL.2489:

Hyper Cutter.9376:

Swagger.1459:

I mean, if we go that route, let’s start killing off fractals so you raid more. I’m sure that’s great incentive right?

Anet’s literally way ahead of you, they already gutted dungeons to drive players into fractals and raids.

LOL, Yah, in light of what Anet already did, I gotta agree it was a bad move to use the analogy he did.

And it was a bad decision. They acknowledged it and are reverting it…

This is news to me. Where did they say they are reverting it?

Do you understand my points about eotm?

Well, since EotM was intended to be nothing but a means to pass time while waiting on a WvW Que to pass, and it had the adverse effect of pulling WvW players away from actual WvW, if you were trying to make a point about a company admitting a mistake, I think, you are on the wrong side of this discussion.

What were the points in my recent post?

I made that point because you defend a game mode (like wvw and fractals), but have issues with another game mode (eotm and raids), but I’m not going to quote your post history here. Killing off “stuff” from one game mode (like eotm or fractals) won’t make another game mode (like wvw or raids) better, more attractive or increase participation. Killing off one game mode (like wvw or fractals) won’t force you into another game mode (like eotm or raids) correct?

I’ll let you think about all that.

They already changed it so you cant rez fully dead players in combat. WvW is built around large scale combat, that means large groups. What players do with their groups is a different story. So of course there will always be an advantage for groups that greatly outnumber another. Those who are rezzing are very vulnerable and easy to attack. I understand this can be frustrating for small groups, but again WvW is built around large scale combat. Simply taking away the ability to rez would do more harm then good. The change that was made to rezzing I think was a good balance, because it also affected rallying.

Please dont characterize all higher tier players as if we have one hive mind and all think the same way. Its as innacurate as saying the same about players in lower tiers. We are all playing with the same game mechanics.

What? Why pick on Guardians? What about eles? Are they actually not excellent at anything? Reapers aren’t far behind.

Also, Guardians haven’t escaped all nerfs. Virtues range was cut to 600. Dodge heals are utter trash thanks to the stat/trait split. Might of the protector has a cooldown now. Guardians are also the only class that must wear traveler runes if they don’t want to fall asleep roaming.

Hunter’s Ward IS stupid, but fixing stability would go a long way. The other thing that needs toning down is spear of justice as it is unstoppable with zero tell. Reflects shut down about 1/2 of what a DH can do in bigger fights, though.

I’m thinking there won’t be a merge at all, just a battle group of 2 or more servers working as one. The alliances may not even be fixed.

Advantage of this method is that people who do love their ‘server’ are still fighting for theiR server, but as part of a bigger war….

Nope.

Even though I have HoT and have a Druid I prefer to play my pre-HoT Ranger build. Yes I die sometimes but I don’t die any faster or any more often. I’ve fought and beaten Dragon Hunters, Revenants and Reapers. To be fair I’ve also been killed by them too, but it’s about even so far.

Things I’ve learned:

• I can’t win every fight.
• When arrows start raining down, dodge away. It’s either an Arrow Cart, Ranger Barrage or DH longbow 5. Doesn’t matter which, I’m not about to stand around and wait to find out.
• Most Reapers love the cool Reaper Shroud. I like it on mine too, but it’s mostly melee range, so don’t melee them.
• Revenants have nasty condi damage (Mallix) and crazy long range hammer stuff too (I like my Herald) but they struggle to condi clear so use that knowledge. Either spike them or condi and kite.

I too could go on with my list…

Old System vs New System?
You’ll see some really good players who have bought HoT and made the new classes and are playing them because it’s new and fun – these players can be naturally good, and many are way better than I am. That does not mean their classes need nerfing, it means I need to get smarter and faster, or pick my fights more carefully and lead them into an area that hinders their play.

I’ll take a well played pre-HoT build over a poorly played Elite spec any day.