Guild Wars 2

Nausicca.6038:

People voting for DBL better show their kittening butts and not queue EB when Anet will switch to these BLs .

People will queue for maps that have people on them… sadly in that sense the WvW gameplay is to a degree mandated by a minority. I mean there are plenty of WvW players who I’d wager want little more than follow that familiar blue pip (well it can be other colors now too, but you get my point).

So, outside of roamers, really what determines the outcome of DBL population is if there is a degree of people that will play on them in order to draw other people in… once that has happened over time the play style of the people who are willing to play that map will change to be more suited for that map and as such the way the game is played will change (in theory).

The way I see it, it is simply that the people who play WvW are extremely averse to change and as a result slow or unwilling to adapt. Yes, the DBL map itself has issues, but to a degree unless the playerbase is willing to adapt any map that is actually different in some way besides cosmetics will get the same cold reception DBL’s did.

Vova.2640:

Just wait until they rotate the DBLs back and see wvw population drop, then the same people that voted for DBL will start asking what happened and blaming anet.

Except that the rotation strategy might get axed by the next poll in favor of having both maps in play at the same time. Whatever happens, happens… either way the poll results are about what I would have expected. The echo chamber effect when it comes to DBL hate is real, whereas with this poll people can vote anonymously. They can also vote banking on the next poll reaching mixed borderlands.

At the end of the day, some people are voting based on potential, not just based on immediate impact. Is it a gamble, obviously… but there are people that are simply tired of the WvW “meta” and want a change.

Considering that there have now been two sets of changes (with the most recent patch, as well as the patch that took the map out) to the desert borderlands that none of us has had the chance to play yet. I can’t in good conscience support removing this map entirely.

As such I will vote no on this poll and go for compromise once they poll again about mixed borderlands, to me this seems like the best of both worlds plus we have never experienced that level of map asymmetry and as such I believe it to be worth a shot.

Plus, when has ArenaNet ever gotten something right from the start… okay, maybe that is saying a bit too much, however, they claim to be an iterative company and so far their track record does support this claim, so I am opting to vote to give them the chance to iterate and learn from their mistakes. In the ideal world this will result in multiple good maps in the long run even if it may take a while.

To be honest I don’t mind this… so long as they stay at 1 ticket forevermore as advertised… and if this remains as a one of or at least an infrequent practice.

As someone who used Stronghold as a means to cut off a terrible loss streak in Conquest (as well as to see new people altogether) I wholeheartedly agree that the matchmaking, although sounding good on paper, needs some serious work.

I mean, I happen to like Stronghold, but if I have to game the match making by queuing for Stronghold in order to get matched with different people and/or get matched with people outside of my bracket to have a good time then something is wrong.

kschmidt.5901:

Now I suddenly have to go back to grinding a WvW reward track for a part that I had already completed.

While I think your compromise is a good one, as I believe they should have announced this change in advance. However, I can’t help but to point out that had you completed this part already that implies having purchased Gift of Battle. As in why keep putting it off if you have had the badges…

I can’t support this… You want to make legendaries, learn to play different game types… perfectly fine with that considering how royally obsolete as a currency Badges of Honor are.

I like Stronghold way more than conquest anyways, the AoE is ridiculous, well everywhere except graveyard on foefire, all points should be around that size or AoE rings shouldn’t match the size of the capture point. Alternatively just delete dragonhunter traps from the game, that would be a fantastic start.

Edit: forgot to mention the best part about stronghold being that imbalanced games where one side is at a serious deficit end quickly… whereas with conquest it is wasting everyone’s time until points tick to 500.

Loosmaster.8263:

“That would have been great on the last poll. Then I might be getting content back I paid for.”

Whatever floats your boat….

Only I never said that… check your reading glasses buddy.

Loosmaster.8263:

Then stop saying “You paid for it”.

I didn’t… which you would know if you bothered to read my post.

But, since you brought it up, as a matter of fact… anyone who paid for HoT likely paid, after the fact, for that map to have been created. Because without HoT that map would not exist. Unless you seriously think it was free for ArenaNet to produce said map.

It was advertised as a part of HoT, ergo it was content developed for or at the very least paid for by the expected revenue from HoT. Video games are made first and paid afterwards… before they start to turn profit.

Anyways, this exchange has ran its course, we can simply agree to disagree on the matter… however, that will not change realities of game development. Which you seem to want to be oblivious to because at the moment it happens to be convenient for your opinion.

Bowing out, as this is not even on the topic of this poll, bring it back up again when something related is being polled about next week if you feel the need to.

Loosmaster.8263:

Again, there was nothing added in WvW that was taken away that you paid for in the X-Pac. The map was available whether you bought HoT or not!!!

While factually accurate, it is still relevant to consider the desert borderland map as part of Heart of Thorns… the new borderlands map was one of the major core features showcased during the expansion announcement. Whether people got it for free or not doesn’t change that.

Actually, it is is still advertised as a core addition to WvW on the HoT website. They allowed non-expansion players to access the map because it was the only reasonable option in terms of how WvW works, ie. they had no choice. Doesn’t change the fact that without HoT the map would not exist and the expansion pack was what allowed it to exist. This is a fact regardless of what anyone thinks of the map in the end.

The fact that “You got it for free anyways, so you wouldn’t have had to buy the expansion” makes up a convenient excuse, in the case of the maps potential removal, in order to dismiss concerns of people who like the map is just interpreting things in a way that is favorable for your opinion.

Zenith.6403:

4. Team “Don’t count my vote, just let me see the results” is still counted for votes.

I agree with most of your points, however, this is factually not correct, after the poll has ended the percentages will be adjusted by removing the votes that chose this option. They have done this for every previous poll with this option as far as I know, no reason to stop now.

LordAdre.8174:

we will have to, since they swap maps every 3 months because the poll didnt reach 75%.

They will also redo a modified version of this poll afterwards (assuming the map doesn’t get completely removed of course). C’mon try to keep up people. Basically this previous poll about the rotation is now entirely void.

Nokaru.7831:

Is the “Remove Desert Borderlands” poll going to require a 75% majority?

These polls are so strange and confusing to me… Some require a simple majority, and this one required a specific, arbitrary threshold.

Judging from that nothing else has been said the reasoning from Tyler’s earlier post applies: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/wuv/WvW-Poll-31-May-Mixed-Borderlands-CLOSED/page/5#post6185533

This poll was confusing because it had an option that was split in two, if you, however, consider the Yes 1 and Yes 2 options as a single Yes option combined then the poll followed the reasoning all other polls have up until now (ie. 75% majority required for a change to the game, ie. 75% voting Yes in this case as No implied no change).

The same will apply to the remove DBL poll unless they say otherwise… ie. to keep the status quo (no changes) minority of more than 25% is sufficient, whereas to enact a change in game a majority of 75% or more is required.

In order for the polls to remain fair I doubt they will change it at least not for the polls that center around this particular matter — changing it mid way through such controversial decisions, especially in light of the results of this poll, would simply be a bad idea and destroy credibility of future polls most likely.

Kylden Ar.3724:

Crise.9401:

This isn’t actually correct, “Yes” implies one of the two choices with mixed maps, and the 30% that won was the pro-rotation choice. I think you know this, but wrote it out incorrectly though, just pointing it out.

Ummmm…. no…

Tyler Bearce.3427:

69.7% – Yes (55% Double Alpine + 14.7% Double Desert)
30.3% – No

55% > 30.3%.

Your analysis is simply wrong. The only clear majority option in that poll was mixed with double alpine.

My analysis is correct in the context of the post I quoted. The “Yes” option, irrespective of the specific split between the two, means that mixed borderlands maps had the majority. Yes double Alpine had the majority of the two yes options, but the fact remains that having mixed maps had the total majority.

The poll itself was confusing, it had only two choices, yes and no… had yes reached the required 75% majority, then and only then would the split between the yes options been relevant.

Lishtenbird.2814:

“Our vision was to have rotating BLs.”

“70% instead of 75% voted for rotating BLs.”

“Sigh, let’s follow what the community wants and give those 30% something that we don’t see as good ourselves.”

Huh?

Above is the post the bit you quoted was a reply to, and as you can see it is a jumble of mistakes (in particular the bolded part, that and the fact that the 30% that ended up “winning”, by their “super majority” rule not being met, was the pro-rotation choice, whereas either of the yes choices was pro mixed maps.

TwistedFate.8705:

They could make an exception for the next poll. And they could make an exception for any poll where the leading vote is in front by 40 dam percent…

Of course they could, however, if they do… they undermine the importance of any future poll. They laid out the requirements for the poll to pass, changing them because it suits their own views means that when they next say X percent majority is needed to enact a change no longer means anything as people will just think, they said that last time too and look what happened.

SyLaR.3628:

Also next poll will be rigged, people will vote to remove desert bl just because it will be in rotation every 4 months, because you- Anet have decided to do it and ignore 70% of players.

I very much agree with this… but they have to stick to their decisions, they decided 75% majority would be needed for all major game changes… going back on it now would not be fair.

However, I don’t think the next poll about removal of DBL entirely will be a representative sample either, because of the reasons you and others pointed out. Unfortunately, nothing they can do about it… if they change their minds now, all credibility of these and future polls will be voided.

Personally, I think DBL could be a good map, yes it needs work lot of it even… but I would hate to see it disappear completely too. Especially, since the changes they made for it and upcoming changes already made, that we have yet to play, as well as potential changes they have talked about seem promising. I always saw the yes 1 option of this poll as the perfect compromise as well as an interesting thing we have never tried before. Theory is often different than practice.

Gigiobalt.7625:

Where is the option “No Desert BL’s at all” on the pool?

It is coming with the poll after the next one… this current poll is already over anyways. See Tyler’s earlier post for reasoning. That said the polls should have been conducted in reverse order in my opinion or combined into one poll with adjusted passing criteria and two questions (ie. if removing DBL does not reach 75%, which of the two options remaining would you prefer as the second question).

TwistedFate.8705:

I think if you are going to have a vote the highest result should be in favor.

I would agree with you, however, not anymore… this should have been the way they did it for all the polls. Changing now, mid way through a set of polls that should have been resolved in a single poll, isn’t exactly fair for the previous results.

Lishtenbird.2814:

“Our vision was to have rotating BLs.”

“70% instead of 75% voted for rotating BLs.”

“Sigh, let’s follow what the community wants and give those 30% something that we don’t see as good ourselves.”

Huh?

This isn’t actually correct, “Yes” implies one of the two choices with mixed maps, and the 30% that won was the pro-rotation choice. I think you know this, but wrote it out incorrectly though, just pointing it out.

Vavume.8065:

The 3 month rotation is your own vision…

Maybe originally, but judging from Tyler’s post their opinion changed, and I can’t blame them… they obviously like DBL otherwise it would have been made into something different from the beginning, however, they also see that not everyone in the community agrees… so it makes sense to advocate for the choice that is most likely going to be agreeable compromise for all involved parties in the long run.

Taxidriver.2043:

only 30% wants DBL and now u going to do quarterly update to put it back in that doesnt make any sense.

How exactly do you see the previous poll as only 30% wanting DBL… this poll that just ended only reflects three things

1) around 15% would prefer 2 DBL 1 ABL (likely implying they like DBL more than ABL)
2) 55% percent were willing to compromise having 1 DBL in order to have ABL always available.
5) 30% want to have 3 months of ABL and 3 months of DBL as a rotation.

The people voting “no” were simply voting to retain the status quo, which has been quarterly map rotation pretty much since they took DBL out.

Now it will be interesting to see what the poll after the next one will be like, I am hedging my bets that it will be pretty close too, only this time the minority that will decide, once again, while keeping the status quo intact, will result in three months of DBL every other quarter living on.

Teon.5168:

I don’t know. The way the polls are structured, all it will need is 26% or greater to vote against destroying the dbls. That’s not much.

Make that 25.1% their “super majority” rule has a flip side.

Teon.5168:

Although, I don’t trust the dbls haters on this forum……as has been said before, wvw players will play the areas that are given to them. I was already beginning to see some new zerg strategies and such being employed in the dbls just before they were yanked…..and I am sure that will continue. Plus, the roamers, havocers, and small group players will enjoy having the dbls back for a chunk of time.

The thing is, Alpine borderlands had more than 3 years, people optimized their play styles for that map. Then Desert borderlands comes along and has less than a year. Sure it had issues, it still does… however, the dislike for it is not as simple as that. People gravitate towards other people, so if you happen to be in a guild that denounces DBL completely whatever you might actually think about the issue will soon cease to matter entirely, you will just echo the popular opinion because you want to have people to play with.

Right now we are in a situation where 30% of the voters decided for two thirds, and the next poll about DBL’s removal might end up being the same thing, only the roles reversed… and if that happens it will be a lose lose situation no matter which side of the fence you are on.

Tyler, correct me if I am wrong but doesn’t some type of in-game polling system already exist… at least it used to exist.

I distinctly remember in-game feedback forms in the beta tied to events.

Johje Holan.4607:

For the upcoming poll of whether to get rid of the DBL entirely I was going to vote no because some people like it and I could have delt with a mixture.

But now, because of the result of this vote, I am forced to vote yes to scrap it entirely so I don’t have to put up with 3 months straight of only DBL available and no Alpine.

Sadly, regardless of what I think about DBL, I have to say I can agree with your reasoning. These polls should have either been combined, as some people suggested, or be done in different order.

Because, as things stand people will have to compromise for both polls and the result of one will have adverse effects on the other. For the record, I doubt more than 75% will vote to scrap DBL (majority probably, but at the end of the day that ain’t enough), but of course that is just my feeling. Tyler said they went with 75% in order to avoid 49/51 splits, sadly those splits exists in whatever criteria they choose.

Justine.6351:

Its already up, no point in causing mass confusion now.

While I agree with you, I also agree with the OP, the way he laid it out is how the poll(s) should have been executed from the beginning. For starters it would have saved time and gotten the resolution faster as well as had smaller likelyhood of people voting differently due to missing or partial information.

Tyler Bearce.3427:

• World Linking Schedule – How often should we relink worlds?
• Desert Borderlands – Should the map be removed indefinitely?
• Repair Hammer – Do you want to be able to spend supply to repair siege?
• Deployable Mortars – Do you want to be able to buy and deploy Mortars?
• Deployable Cannons – Do you want to be able to buy and deploy Cannons?

• World Linking Schedule – Once every quarter unless there is a massive population shift for whatever reason.
• Desert Borderlands – I don’t think so.
• Repair Hammer – Doesn’t matter either way, if repairing existing siege was notably cheaper or faster then it could be interesting…
• Deployable Mortars – Could also be interesting…
• Deployable Cannons – Could be interesting…

Teon.5168:

Agreed. The way the poll is worded right now, I would be willing to bet that there are a lot of people voting “NO” that think their vote will count towards getting dbl removed. They’re going to be shocked when they realize that their no vote contributed to getting full dbl for 3 months at a time in the rotation with the abls.

The polls should have been created in different order initially, however, too late for that now.

Puck.9612:

Because with their new found communication abilities they can create a map that the majority of the community will enjoy.

I honestly find this unlikely, no matter how much communication there would be it would only reach minority of the player base, unless they would be willing to throw some really raw unfinished prototypes in the actual live game as they would be working on this hypothetical map. There is only so much you can do with polls and surveys, lot of things that sound cool on paper actually aren’t good in game.

Puck.9612:

Also a new map will come without the prejudice attached to the dbl.

This I can agree with 100%, however, after DBL (especially if it is removed) to get a poll passed that would cause them to work on new maps would be a first hurdle, and it would also require them to want to put it up for a vote which they might not want to do any time in the foreseeable future.

Tyler, curious here… is it possible for you guys to pull stats like, how many people got the in-game notification about a poll vs how many people actually voted.

Just curious as to what the voting percentage is like in this poll, I mean 75% 15,000 is a lot less than 75% of 250,000 votes. Just interested in how well these polls actually reflect the general opinion of people playing the game vs people active on forums or on reddit.

Brown Fang Thump.9482:

Still, the fact that it takes a lot of hard work to make things better is never a good reason to not make things better.

Well, it is not that they won’t do that eventually, however, right now they are working on the scoring changes we voted in as their priority. This is what takes most of their resources at this time. These other polls are things they can do relatively easily, if we want them to.

That means that they may revisit map selection or the number of maps at a later date, however, to use their famous table… those things are not on it until what we asked for first is mostly done.

lil devils x.6071:

Of course! That must be it? How much you care to wager?

For starters HoT’s poor performance is reference to less than expected rate of conversion from F2P to HoT purchases. It doesn’t necessarily correlate with the people playing the game right now vs before HoT. It just means there is/was less than expected number of actual paying customers.

Secondly, short of that one month shift in their internal priorities there is no public record of expansion pack 2 being “pushed back” or delayed. As far as anyone here is concerned bulk of their development resources are still on expansion pack 2. Beyond that we have never known when it was supposed to be coming at all. We know/knew next to nothing about their content pipeline for this year beyond the last raid wing and LS3, likely coming around the next quarterly update.

As far as WvW is concerned the most current authoritative sample of its state are these recent polls and so far, this utter loathing for DBL is not evident. At least not to the degree that you make it out be or then people are more willing to accept a compromise than you think.

This dialogue has probably ran its course, so I too will be bowing out now.

Teon.5168:

I know a lot of people in game that actually like the linking and are excited about the possibility of having 2 different border lands at the same time.

I have to second this, I remember talking about DBL and Alpine in guild chat the day of the patch that rotated out DBL. The general vibe from that chat was that while Alpine does lot of things fine, it is also a bland, as in less atmospheric, map by comparison and smaller as well. In particular I recall someone who started playing with HoT wondering if Alpine borderlands would be too small.

At the end of the day, it comes down to what you are used to, but in general I can’t say that at least based on that chat in our guild DBL is as universally disliked as most people here portray it to be.

Teon.5168:

Translation: Source does not exist. Have fun wasting your time trying to find it.

I would tend to agree, I am pretty sure I have read every single red post on these forums, at least since HoT, and most dev comments or reddit on top of that. However, I don’t recall anything having been mentioned about next expansion beyond the fact that Mike Z is at the helm of that ship and that the team was “offline” for about a month to fix up HoT.

There is no feasible way to construe that as ArenaNet changing the next expansion ETA, because to my recollection we never had any ETA to begin with outside unofficial predictions by third parties or trying to divine the future from NCSoft forecasts.

Tongku.5326:

Keep in mind, that if there are too many choices, then there will be no possible way to reach 75%. In fact, thats what things look like at the time I write this on the BL poll because it has 4 choices.

While I agree with your sentiment there, we are not at that point yet, because…

There are actually 3 choices… the 4th choice doesn’t count, as in when they look at the percentage 100% is constructed from the three remaining options (Yes 1, Yes 2 and No).

The 7.5 percent or whatever the fourth “show results” option is right now equals to the same as not voting at all, because those votes will be thrown out before the final tally. They did this for the previous poll too.

The fact that this option exists at all is kind of silly because the result page can be accessed without voting. Although it does give some insight onto how big portion of the voters are indifferent.

lil devils x.6071:

They already stated they HOTperformed miserably and they greatly LOST numbers from WvW due to Hot, not gained them. They posted this INFO on these forums months ago.

If you are going to make such a bold claim at least bother to provide a source, either way… people that are no longer here do not matter, why would ArenaNet at this point have any reason to cater to people who have already left their game.

As for Alpine borderlands coming back, that was always the plan eventually, as much was said during HoT announcement at PAX.

lil devils x.6071:

You do realize that there ALREADY was a game wide boycott of the DBL — since this already happened and is going to happen again.

You have an interesting definition of game wide

Majority of the playerbase will play what they are given… it is only a matter of time before compromises would have been found. Besides, any player that joined the game with HoT was not boycotting DBL, they were just naturally gravitating towards other players (as they had no experience with Alpine map, so their opinion of desert borderlands was not as big of a factor on what map they chose to play on).

Also, the current votes on the poll hardly reflect your interpretation of the situation, which makes sense as why should players who already left the game matter. If these players are willing to come back every three months then, they have an option to vote for right now, that being no… otherwise they are no longer relevant in how this decision turns out.

Hesacon.8735:

I’ve come to the conclusion that the majority of desert haters are a very very vocal minority of the overall population. The majority of the overall population will play whatever they’re given.

This is absolutely correct and I think although the current poll hasn’t been running that long the current results correlate with that conclusion as well.

I agree with most of what you are saying, however, particularly on Alpine I think more waypoints would make the map too fast to navigate (disclaimer: I play thief). I don’t think they have hit the sweet spot on either map when it comes to traversal, but frankly I have no idea what that sweet spot would be.

Shadelang.3012:

But if we give up on it entirely. Then quite frankly the largest single contribution given to WvW will have been entirely for nothing. And I honestly doubt we would EVER see any more WvW maps if we gave up on desert borderlands entirely.

---

In other words. If we give up on new content for WvW such as the desert borderlands just because of the past then WvW is dead and we should all give up now because all that awaits it is stagnation

Well said, I am one for playing the long game when it comes to DBL… and in the mean time I believe that it is better to have a choice over three months of being force fed one map over the other. While I can’t say which of the choices on offer would actually produce faster results in terms of iterating DBL to be in a better place, I would still hope most people see the long term benefit of not forsaking DBL entirely.

Come future expansions it will be harder and harder for ArenaNet to excite WvW players, all the more so if we tell them now that we don’t want to see different maps. With HoT they tried to give WvW players a major piece of content, and arguably failed, but I’d rather they keep trying than allow the game mode to hit a glass ceiling because the playerbase can’t think in the long term.

Hesacon.8735:

Variety is the spice of life, have both at once regardless of it’s 1 desert and 2 alpine or 2 desert and 1 alpine. It also opens the opportunity for a third map later.

This is a nice concise way to put it… if mixed borderlands becomes the status quo the majority of the playerbase will adapt to it one way or another. What exactly that way will be is anyone’s guess but I’d wager in the long term it would only mean that DBL would have to be played differently to Alpine.

Asymmetry is not the same thing as imbalance, if used right it can actually be used as a tool to create more even playing field by assigning a map that requires more resources to hold to a server that otherwise would have an advantage in numbers in any particular matchup.

schlake.2718:

Today’s poll, about the borderlands, was also lacking for me. The notion of rotating borderlands on a three month basis seems like a bad idea to me. Two alpine/one desert or two desert/one alpine also seems like a bad idea to me. There are other options, better options in my opinion.

There probably are better options, however, as was said by the devs either here or on reddit. Majority of their dev time is now tied up by the decisions made by the first two polls. Before majority of the voted scoring changes are done they will not look at solutions to these or other problems that would require a lot of dev time.

So, these polls are things they can do with comparatively little time investment in the interim and potentially have significant impact on WvW regardless. They are basically giving us the opportunity to shake things up and change the status quo of WvW if we as a collective so choose. But for them majority of their time is spent on things we already decided upon.

The OP’s post deserves some merit for expanding on the poll. They really need to work on delivering more information to players before they vote as most won’t be looking over on forums or somewhere else for it.

msalakka.4653:

This is disappointing, because if my server draws the short stick and ends up as the one with the deserted map for the week, I don’t need to log on that week. I am a home border scout, and the desert borderland is undefendable.

I find it interesting that you identify yourself in such a specific role as to have no desire to play the game type for a week if DBL would be in play. Does this also mean then that come next quarter you will not play for three months?

At the end of the day, no matter which option wins, the players will eventually adapt… or in the extreme case leave the game (mode) altogether.

lil devils x.6071:

Mixed Borderlands = Players that came back for Alpine leave game all together.
Rotate Borderlands = Players only Play when Alpine is in use.
Mixed Borderlands= Broken game ALL the time
Rotate Borderlands= Working game part of the time.

You are, incorrectly, assuming that the status quo about the two maps would hold long term if mixed borderlands wins. Considering we have never been in a situation where the borderlands maps have been asymmetrical what would happen if that becomes the norm is anyone’s guess.

At the end of the day, you are assuming people hate DBL more than what could potentially be as bad as loosing by default. There will never be a game wide boycott of DBL, if mixed borderlands does happen, because there will always be people looking to capitalize on the fact that some people would ignore one of the four maps and at that point the majority will either sit by and let it slide or play the fourth map they would rather ignore.

Forum bug /15 charrs dancing on the table.

mcarswell.3768:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/4lx2gx/may_31_new_wvw_poll/d3qwc2f

[–]Anet-TylerB 32 points an hour ago
If simultaneous borderlands wins, we’d be more likely to work on another borderlands map. So that each team could have a unique borderland, but it’s not something we are currently working on.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/4lxt91/psa_if_simultaneous_borderlands_wins_the_wvw_poll/d3r3768

[–]Anet-TylerB [score hidden] 9 minutes ago

Just to clarify. The Simultaneous Borderlands is a system that better supports a third map, than the rotation strategy. So an additional map would be more likely in that respect. However, our development priorities are still community driven. We wouldn’t start building another WvW map unless it was put to a vote, and won.

I’ll just say this… whatever the result of this poll will be could have huge impact on WvW development in the long term. Particularly when it comes to future expansions. I mean they didn’t exactly say it it, but this poll could be a major factor when they decide if we ever see major map level changes in WvW going forward.

Personally, I’d also rather have the choice on which map to play every time I load into WvW as opposed to being stuck with one of the two existing maps for three months. I also think that WvW is and it should be asymmetric by nature to a degree and as such I don’t see a strict reason to stick with the current two map format in the long term.

Regardless of what I think of DBL, seeing as it was only ever their 4th WvW map I think they did okay, and I believe they have the ability to learn from that, and I would want to see them eventually be able to develop new substantial WvW content such as the maps with confidence, because without that confidence eventually WvW will hit a glass ceiling in terms of the kind of content they can add in an expansion for example.

The entire poll was created very much in a way that is biased towards removing world linking. For one, as it has been understood, 25% or more “no” votes will result in immediate action whereas 75% will not result in any action at present time.

So basically, if you are unhappy enough to never want to see worlds linked again, you get what you want instantly, and with a significant minority of all the votes, whereas anyone who thinks world linking has problems but is worth keeping around for now or anyone who is happy about the current situation has to reach a very specific threshold of votes before their votes have any meaning.

If the poll was unbiased it would require the same 75% majority for either choice to be valid.

Had I seen a change to the center of the map which has received a ton of negative feedback, I might be more inclined to be a little excited by it.

Ah, the center of the borderlands… ArenaNet seems to have real problems nailing down what to put there :P. Desert of Alpine alike.

As for the map itself, when it comes to flavor it looses hands down to most other maps. The jury is still out on some of the game play when it comes to me, since I haven’t played it in so long.

Well this is a historic moment either way, the (WvW) playerbase asked for content to be removed from the game and got their wish. That content also happened to be one of the major advertised features associated with HoT. Definitely something you don’t get to see every day.

Would have been much better to implement a new system with 4 different maps, instead of having 3 copies of the old map back.

I doubt we will see them develop new WvW maps again, I mean the community basically told them they don’t know how to do that. If I was in charge I wouldn’t take such a big risk again.

I mean, maps are not cheap to make that much we know. For example, before launch something that was suggested was to have each borderland map be the same map but in different seasonal state (summer, winter, etc.) and they said even that was too much work.

It will be interesting to see what they end up doing with the borderlands… it is obvious Desert will be back, otherwise there would have been no point to fixing it at all, or keep taking feedback and talking about other changes to it after they announced Alpine’s return.

If they do the once per quarter thing, which might very well happen, because it doesn’t look like they have the tech to automate the switching of maps at the moment, there will be interesting three months or so following next quarterly patch.

I don’t subscribe to this mentality that Alpine Borderlands are so clearly, and automatically, superior to the Desert borderlands, because it won’t be the same map we had before. That map had completely different upgrade systems for keeps and towers.

Little early for this… personally I think both maps have up and downsides. For one I think skill lag could be more pronounced on Alpine than Desert, however, it has been too Iong since I played Alpine to be sure.

I also think that while Desert is bigger, and I agree on Alpine being small, I don’t think the extra space on Desert can be used efectively. It is not as simple as one map being objectively better than the other. I liked themed keeps on Desert, but ultimately that is more of a flavour thing than a pure gameplay reason, and definitely subjective.

I am all for QoL at this point, it will take some time still for the dust kicked up by the previous patch and the upcoming return of Alpine borderlands to settle. Let them collect data on these changes properly before they start mucking about with scoring or further population changes.

We have yet to experience Alpine with the guild upgrades too. I could see given a bit more time for my opinions about the current problems with the matches themselves to change. Which is why I voted for QoL, and hey cross map server chat absolutely sign me up right now.

I sort of hope there was an option for bit of both, so we could have the best from both categories.