I see this is already a hot topic. Let me start by saying I had no idea about this change, these problems were so bad I actually had to come to the forum for the first time to figure out what was going on. “New culling system? Well kitten me…”
I have rarely had culling issues, and only mild lag during LARGE WvW encounters. Last night it was really bad, and it is a very EXPLOITABLE issue.
One incident:
Me and 20+ allies were assaulting a gate, two-three enemies were on the wall. ONE red player jumped down into the midst of us and came running towards me. Tab, targeted a cannon, tab, targeted the gate again. I had to manually click multiple times before I could target him, by the time I did he was about to pass me and still had full health!! No one had even hit him. I turned to follow him as he kept running…. lag…. lag…. lag…. there were actually SEVEN red enemies who had jumped off the wall.
They were now about a range of 1200 from the gate, targeting the allies furthest back (most likely to be low level, not very experienced with WvW) lag… lag… dead…. I had to warn everyone at the gate to turn around, because only a couple of people even noticed this group run right through the middle of them. Everyone thought they had been flanked, not that these guys had gamed the system.
This type of incident happened REPEATEDLY. Is is a major exploit. and EASY to do. One small group hangs back from their main force, just enough for the culling to kick in, then runs full force through the enemies main group = insta-flank. The resulting lag when the culling catches up to them is enough to score several kills each, if not turn the entire affair in their teams favor.
And the THIEVES, I have never been part of the silly anti-thief bandwagon, mesmers and rangers with swords are far more annoying in my book. But as some have said, ANY invis triggers the culling when they are supposed to be visible again.
There’s ONE guy… gone, what? Ow! Lag… where… there he.. was… what? lag… dead. One single person should not be causing lag every time they use a cloak skill. Alone, in a group, they are now invisible gods dispatching mere mortals from the shadows of the culling system.
My two cents: culling and WvW will never work. If a player’s machine can’t handle it, they are already at a major disadvantage. Leave player names and targeting intact, or even better ad some kind of simple-to-render ORB or something to culled player models (IF you can get rid of the lag culling brings to the table now) or institute enemy dots on the radar, at least temporarily. This is a very exploitable issue, and it isn’t hard to figure out how to do it.