Guild Wars 2

Yuffi.2430:

SkyShroud. I completely agree about the importance of server identity, but more on that later.
In response to your points:
1. Four tiers is correct, or five for EU. The idea was to maintain a similar structure to the current WvW because people know it and don’t like change. Each tier would promote a different approach to combat, with T1 being about large scale fights and T4/5 about small groups (party of five) and roamers. Other tiers in between. This could be done with different map population limits, but ultimately it would be nice to see specific custom maps. I’m sure the community could provide plenty of ideas if Anet asked us to get the ball rolling.
2. This bit I need to explain more. Each player (individually) can choose which tier they want to play in each time they enter WvW. You can play in T1 (large fights) get fed up with it and go roam in T4 (or stay to roam in T1 if you dare). The idea is that players on a server (or guild) could spread themselves out across the tiers if they wish, or they could also all play on the same tier if they wish. This really would be an ongoing choice.
3. Correct – the tiers themselves are not ranked, so it doesn’t matter which one you play in – you can choose how you want to play and still have your score count towards your guild and server rank.
4. Yes. There has to be a way to split the players into three sides and keeping the colours is the easiest way to do this. If Anet can then use this to balance the total population per colour it means that there will be a similar number of players available on each side (across the tiers). Being able to mix servers together in this way is more flexible for balancing, and since colour does not affect score in anyway it doesn’t matter which colour a server is. I know how disruptive moving servers around is, so I would hope Anet makes as few moves as possible and then only rarely.
5. Yes.
6. I’ll explain below: (I apologise in advance if I over explain things)

• Server league table – a list of all the servers ranked in order of score. The ultimate aim is to become top of the league, or simply beat the score of a rival server. The league table could be divided into three divisions (say gold, silver, bronze – I’d want about 6 servers per division I think) so servers can aim for the top of their division against similar scoring opponents. It would even be possible to put EU and NA servers together on the same list…
• Guild league table – a list of all the guilds in order of score. As players gain score for their server so the same score gained could be added to a total for the guild they are representing. In this way individual guilds can compete for rank. This would work even for guilds within the same server, or guilds who have members across several servers.
• Player league table – a list of players in order of score. This could be interesting as the top scoring players might not be on the top scoring servers…

The idea is to re-energise server identity for the linked servers, and to allow host servers to retain their identity too. The league table means that we can separate servers from tiers so no server gets swamped due to population. If many players bandwagon to one server it will probably be top of the league, but crucially this wouldn’t affect the actual fights in the tiers. If a server loses players until it only has ten members (an extreme example I admit) it can still have a server identity (if the players talk to each other) and can still participate in any fight in any tier. There is no need to close small servers, although they might need to do a bit of recruiting to be able to climb the league table. Also a guild or player in a bottom of the league server could easily be much higher in the other rank tables…

Communications would be the biggest problem. Language differences in EU in particular. Team channel would be colour based so would reach all players on a wider number of servers. From a server point of view we would keep server TS/Discord. Regular commanders would work out a way of communicating between servers; probably a Commanders Guild so they can use the guild chat.

Just previewed this and it’s a “kitten of a wall” of text – sorry.
I’ll stop and let you all think.

I still don’t understand how this will allow one server to continue foster their identity and community when the people you see from WvW are mixtures of players across servers.

Strider Pj.2193:

SkyShroud.2865:

Strider Pj.2193:

SkyShroud.2865:

Quaygal.5327:

Tiny Doom.4380:

No. I’d sooner they deleted WvW altogether than delete the servers.

Server pride doesn’t just matter. It’s the only thing that matters. Without it the game mode is Nothing vs Nothing.

I’m just going to quote this guy as an example of someone who doesn’t comprehend the suggestion. I know a lot of you are intimidated by blocks of text, so here’s my TLDR. What if you choose your server when you stepped into WvW for the first time. Not right before you pick your first character’s hair style? The big advantage being that any server could recruit any unassigned player. The rest of the ideas are optional tweaks in my opinion.

SkyShroud, two words, elevator pitch. Work on it.

Yes, I have difficulty organizing all the ideas, formatting them and write them in a concise manner. =(

Strider Pj.2193:

It is still forced. And you can’t guarantee that guilds would remain together.

Not missing the point at all.

It is true, not all guilds will be together. That ’s absolute truth but what so different from now? Guilds are being forced to move out of their servers with the lowered threshold or guilds can stay to slowly be drained over the weeks, months or years. That is something you repeatedly agree with others (in your post histories) and understood but apparently, you are not admitting the similarity.

You are correct. Aspects of it are happening now. Where I disagree is that under the options listed here, we lose the option to move. It will be initially forced on us. It takes away a choice. I cannot agree with that.

I appreciate that you feel a small number of people will be negatively impacted by this, but if people in my guild cannot get into the world I am on, because they were on vacation, or away from the game, or just took a break, it would truly hurt the game experience that I enjoy. I am unwilling to take that risk.

Yet you agree that guilds now should be slowly drained over the weeks, months or years or choose to pay $$ to save themselves from a decision of anet where they forcefully reduced the threshold?

In other words, you rather watch your friends’ guild be slowly drained while they not able to do anything other than transfer off?

Yet in other words, you rather have your own friends or your friends’ friends who want to join you in the game now get stuck outside of the server due to full server, then being force to choose a new server and have to pay for transfer to move in when open?

As opposed to having a choice?

Yes.

Thankyou. Now I understand it isn’t about friends or guilds or community like what you keep claiming.

Strider Pj.2193:

SkyShroud.2865:

Quaygal.5327:

Tiny Doom.4380:

No. I’d sooner they deleted WvW altogether than delete the servers.

Server pride doesn’t just matter. It’s the only thing that matters. Without it the game mode is Nothing vs Nothing.

I’m just going to quote this guy as an example of someone who doesn’t comprehend the suggestion. I know a lot of you are intimidated by blocks of text, so here’s my TLDR. What if you choose your server when you stepped into WvW for the first time. Not right before you pick your first character’s hair style? The big advantage being that any server could recruit any unassigned player. The rest of the ideas are optional tweaks in my opinion.

SkyShroud, two words, elevator pitch. Work on it.

Yes, I have difficulty organizing all the ideas, formatting them and write them in a concise manner. =(

Strider Pj.2193:

It is still forced. And you can’t guarantee that guilds would remain together.

Not missing the point at all.

It is true, not all guilds will be together. That ’s absolute truth but what so different from now? Guilds are being forced to move out of their servers with the lowered threshold or guilds can stay to slowly be drained over the weeks, months or years. That is something you repeatedly agree with others (in your post histories) and understood but apparently, you are not admitting the similarity.

You are correct. Aspects of it are happening now. Where I disagree is that under the options listed here, we lose the option to move. It will be initially forced on us. It takes away a choice. I cannot agree with that.

I appreciate that you feel a small number of people will be negatively impacted by this, but if people in my guild cannot get into the world I am on, because they were on vacation, or away from the game, or just took a break, it would truly hurt the game experience that I enjoy. I am unwilling to take that risk.

Yet you agree that guilds now should be slowly drained over the weeks, months or years or choose to pay $$ to save themselves from a decision of anet where they forcefully reduced the threshold?

In other words, you rather watch your friends’ guild or even your own guild be slowly drained while they not able to do anything other than transfer off?

Yet in other words, you rather have your own friends or your friends’ friends who want to join you in the game now get stuck outside of the server due to full server, then being force to choose a new server and have to pay for transfer to move in when open?

Strider Pj.2193:

@skyshroud: there are no attacks. I am simply pointing out my disagreement with your premise and why. Much like you are doing,

Also, your last quote takes my comment out of context. With context, my statement about the GM of MaS choosing to move.

And yes, you chose to stay.

Again, both not attacks but accurate statements.

I am not here to attack you nor Pensadora. I respect the work that you have put into this idea.

I respectfully disagree and have been vocal in that disagreement. That’s all.

You would like people to vote for deletion. I would not.

Please watch the video.

Ad Hominem attacks is having you criticizing Pensadora’s decisions to move server and not critising Pensadora’s suggestion in itself.

Furthermore, you also wrote Pensadora and myself are from same server thus implying we some evil agenda thus using that to discredit the suggestion. Again, not criticizing the suggestion itself. Of course, I counter argue I made similar post 2 years ago, thus proving you claims false. Please be objective.

Quaygal.5327:

Tiny Doom.4380:

No. I’d sooner they deleted WvW altogether than delete the servers.

Server pride doesn’t just matter. It’s the only thing that matters. Without it the game mode is Nothing vs Nothing.

I’m just going to quote this guy as an example of someone who doesn’t comprehend the suggestion. I know a lot of you are intimidated by blocks of text, so here’s my TLDR. What if you choose your server when you stepped into WvW for the first time. Not right before you pick your first character’s hair style? The big advantage being that any server could recruit any unassigned player. The rest of the ideas are optional tweaks in my opinion.

SkyShroud, two words, elevator pitch. Work on it.

Yes, I have difficulty organizing all the ideas, formatting them and write them in a concise manner. =(

Strider Pj.2193:

Quaygal.5327:

Tiny Doom.4380:

No. I’d sooner they deleted WvW altogether than delete the servers.

Server pride doesn’t just matter. It’s the only thing that matters. Without it the game mode is Nothing vs Nothing.

I’m just going to quote this guy as an example of someone who doesn’t comprehend the suggestion. I know a lot of you are intimidated by blocks of text, so here’s my TLDR. What if you choose your server when you stepped into WvW for the first time. Not right before you pick your first character’s hair style? The big advantage being that any server could recruit any unassigned player. The rest of the ideas are optional tweaks in my opinion.

SkyShroud, two words, elevator pitch. Work on it.

It is still forced. And you can’t guarantee that guilds would remain together.

Not missing the point at all.

It is true, not all guilds will be together. That ’s absolute truth but what so different from now? Guilds are being forced to move out of their servers with the lowered threshold or guilds can stay to slowly be drained over the weeks, months or years. That is something you repeatedly agree with others (in your post histories) and understood but apparently, you are not admitting the similarity.

fishoa.9648:

I had to login to back up your idea. I played a long time in a dead server (T3) so I know the struggle. Unfortunately, people in this forum are very against server changes because either they are in T1 servers and don’t want things to shake up or they’re bandwagoners themselves.

Only issue I can find in your plan is that ANET maybe doesn’t have the tech and might have to develop it. Building a system like this seems like a monumental amount of work and, in their eyes, wouldn’t change much: this is an abandoned mode that seldom sees any updates and it the new server system wouldn’t add to their bottom line.

Anyway, great thread. I’m afraid your ideas are a tad too late to salvage this game mode.

Most of the suggestions are backend changes. The only frontend and biggest change will be the non-mandatory server. I don’t think the development time will be extensive but the resistance to change will be strong.

Thanks for the support.

Neftex.7594:

dude can you make 1 page max summary of this? who do you expect to read all this…

didnt read it all but servers should stay, server community is important, especially now when theres less wvw guilds

It is important, if you don’t read, you will not understand and likewise, you are not gonna support something you don’t understand.

Sarrs.4831:

No thankyou. Permalocked core servers means they’ll get starved out and people will slowly but surely migrate into the link servers, which can be effectively managed.

Please read, it took some efforts to put all the posts out.

There isn’t enough to go around so many servers to cover a 24 hours coverage. Linking will only end up in imbalance linking in the end.

Strider Pj.2193:

Sarrs.4831:

No thankyou. Permalocked core servers means they’ll get starved out and people will slowly but surely migrate into the link servers, which can be effectively managed.

Agreed. The OP and their server mate would like to force a change on us because they made a choice to go to the server they are on, (or in the case of this OP stay on the server they are on) which did not work out as they intended. Now that they are locked, they want to nuke the servers.

They made a choice, and had that opportunity, but because that choice did not work out the way the wished, they want to take away our choice.

It’s classic really. But that is what this comes down to.

Please read.

I made similar post 2 years ago, do you think my server was full then? Nope. Looking at your post histories, you have carrying out ad hominem attacks and we all know is not a good thing.

Leaa.2943:

No, no no no and no. I mean how can you even consider such thing when you see how the bandwagoners destroy WvW and you wan them to be able to bandwagon for free and build up even worse bandwagon. If anything servers need to be back and the small servers merged. I can’t even begin to understand how you think this is good?

Further more, i am not willing to remove servers and replace it with what have been tried in so many other games already with the same result. A group of bandwagon people move to one of the sides/colors/facctions/whateveryouwanttocallit. They run over two servers to a point were those two server will no longer play, because why would anyone want to be rolled over. And the bandwagoner will not move to the now empty servers because why would they want to be rolled over so they simply quit. This is the case in any other game that have this as a option.

The reason it worked in GW2 for so long is the servers, and the population on it. Because you know most of the players on your server and what you can expect from them and they know what to expect from you. This is still very valid on my server, and if it changes i am fairly certain that a big chunk of the players will leave WvW because we never wanted to be a bandwagon server, we wanted to be the server that can do a lot with what ever we have. And it mostly works.

So no, just no. Servers are the reason why WvW is still a valid game. Removing them and it will be like any other game out there. And all of them have not managed to be what WvW are.

Those wall of text are written with some efforts, I do hope you can read them.

Stacking servers is not possible under dynamic cap. The moment the disparity between servers exceed the acceptable range, the bigger server will be locked and will continue to be locked until the disparity narrowed. It is a merciless system and to game such a design require the whole server efforts, including the pugs to boycott WvW for weeks for population algorithm to update. Even if by some miracle to be able to get great majority to cooperate to game it, the server will only end up in a extended period of lock due to huge disparity.

You mention it has been tried, I have played games for close two decades, including hardcore pvp mmorpg but I have yet to see similar approach. Can you tell me what games have tried it?

Edit: If you are talking just on “delete servers” alone, then please, read the posts.

Snowskau.4369:

Update for you guys: The counter may be broken by entering downed state. See if you can reach 50 kills without getting downed at any point. Worked for me and my guildies. Anise is invincible and can solo the whole thing, so go hide in the other side of the henge after Shadow escapes and have her aggro all the mobs herself – stealth skills help in slipping away while she catches the mobs.

so using thief is better
sad, this ap is so class discriminating
i will try it, ty

Tiny Doom.4380:

No. I’d sooner they deleted WvW altogether than delete the servers.

Server pride doesn’t just matter. It’s the only thing that matters. Without it the game mode is Nothing vs Nothing.

You can always develop a new identity, a new server pride.

Mysteriax.6049:

SkyShroud.2865:

Artaz.3819:

snip

12 bottom servers community already killed or near death when they are being shuffled around, perhaps the only remaining is DH. You need to recognize that.

Gate of Madness is very much alive. Our guilds have spent a great deal of time and energy keeping our server community alive and thriving. I don’t want to see Gate of Madness (as a group/Server/community) removed from the game. In some capacity, original server identity needs to stay.

I remember that GOM had a influx of guilds from the upper tier. I am not sure how many of those stayed but I am sure some have stayed. The thing is for bottom servers to even have the chance to progress forward, they need guilds for that to happen. Afterall, it is guilds that actively recruit people. However, for most parts, many bottom servers don’t have enough guilds or guilds that willing to put that effort to recruit more.

In some of the guest servers I have seen, there are a lot of guild-less players, not part of any guilds. This pretty much show just how little guilds there are in those servers. Naturally, many of those guild-less went into the host servers’ guild and transferred there. This of course resulted the complains from players about guest servers getting drained.

The thing is for guest server to maintain their identity is very hard, extremely hard. Likewise, for guest servers to actually build up their community is not easy when their players are getting drained by the host servers. I feel that it is very tiring thing for the guest servers. It is like a fighting for survival which you won’t even know when will get better.

I feel that is way less tiring and easier to get a new start and develop a new identity. Likewise, smaller servers will find it way easier to get together their community to enter any particular new servers as compare to the host servers where they might end up hitting the cap if they tried to.

Yuffi.2430:

SkyShroud – yes that’s the one, however from your response, I suspect you don’t quite get the key principles of my idea.

• Server identity would continue to exist because of the Server league table. Servers battling for rank is no different to what we have now since the tiers/glicko scores are the current rank position. I also introduce the idea of competition between guilds and between individual players…
• Players don’t select “up to 4 tiers”. Each tier would have a different population level (this could ultimately be different maps too but that depends on development) and players would be free to select the (singular) tier they wanted to play in at that time. You can only play in one map/tier at a time (not 4) but you are free to choose each time you log into WvW – this allows players freedom to play as they like, when they like.
• Don’t get hung up on the colours system – that’s only there so there can be three sides to each tier. The other thing the colours do is let Anet shuffle servers between these colours so the total population of each colour is roughly the same – if they want to balance things out.
• My idea is definitely not megaserver – there are a limited number of permanent instances just as now. If you are on, for example, the red side and you join the T3 maps your guild mates can also join the same map with no fear of being put in a different instance or being unable to play together (subject to map queues).
• My idea allows small servers to have an identity regardless of their population. Your idea deletes them due to their size. I’m not in favour of deleting any servers if we can avoid it.
• Guild and Server recruitment can still continue, since the biggest Guilds and Servers probably have the best chance of topping the league tables. However, this doesn’t affect the matches so much because several smaller servers can compete directly with one big server simply by playing in the same map. In fact I would suggest that having a greater number of players available on the Team channel makes for better recruitment potential (since Team channel should work across all maps for that colour).
  I’m sorry that I didn’t explained it well enough in the first instance for you to fully understand just how flexible and different-yet-similar WVW could be. Hopefully I’ve been able to make the idea clearer.

Ermmm.

1. There are 4 tiers
2. Each server’s players are able to choose one of the 4 tiers, at any time, to play. They just cannot split themselves up to play in two places at the same time.
3. Each tier are design in sizes than actual rank, in other words, different map cap.
4. Servers are assigned with certain colors which is decided by anet
5. Servers with color A will play at A side, B at B side, C at C side
6. There is a server league (not much info what this is)

Is that right?

I will start with server identity first. Server identity isn’t something that can be easily detonated using a leaderboard, it isn’t just a name on a list. Server identity or more importantly pride is the result of shared feelings born from connections between players doing things day and night in the wvw, people want to protect those feelings.

However, in your approach, if server’s players are allowed to choose tiers base on their choice, that also means the players are spreading out. When players are spreading out, it won’t be that easy to build that connections and without it, we can’t develop feelings. Not to forget, servers are mashed together because of their colors. This means that there will a range of players from different servers playing side by side with you. The sense of server identity will become vague at that point.

Another issue will be the guild recruitment. Guild currently and in your suggestion has a common recruitment issue and that is the server issue. Guild only has few choices they can make; Get the person to transfer over, Pay for the transfer, Explicitly not recruit different server or Just recruit into roster and hope one day will be on the same side. Most guilds are unlikely to take the last option because it affects long term combat quality of the guilds. However, you stated that guild mates can select same tier to play with which kinda imply that they can play on same side even if their server are assigned different colors. Is that what it is or did I read it wrong?

50 kills no ap too

Korgov.7645:

SkyShroud.2865:

How to improve it! <snip>

Thanks for putting so much thought into this. With diagrams and all.

In short:

1. Kick inactive players from their servers every 3 months
2. Give serverless players a free transfer when they attempt to join WvW
3. Set servers’ Full status dynamically as the total WvW population grows or wanes

Did I miss something?

Base on the understanding I have on the servers, it aims to eliminate all the problems it has now.

Alas no. You need to give an incentive for over stacked servers to unstack.

Simply locking popular servers does not make players to transfer to dying servers. Players rather wait until the desired server unlocks.

Yes, it would take time for the most populated server to shrink and likewise for other servers to catch up. I also agree that there is a possibility that catching up will take long due to the competition over the limited new players.

Thus I too agree that to hasten the progress, one can allow a cheaper transfer option for those in locked server to other non-locked server, instead of charging them with the original full cost. I do not really want to put too much idea into post as it will be quite difficult for some to absorb all of it.

I am glad you notice it.

Edit: Also, if dying server become more dead, then the server of their choice will never open because of the dynamic cap limitation.

Artaz.3819:

1. You are killing pre-existing server community. Longevity of WvW is based on the principle that allies and rivalries are just as important as the game mode itself. It’s what keeps people playing WvW. It keeps the team play and competition healthy in a very static map in a very static meta with a very static strategy based on your population at a given time.

2. You are making buckets for PUGs versus Guilds. Very bad idea simply because PUGs are not PUGs. PUGs are WvW players that don’t want to be lumped into some random function of chance that they get the right leader/active world. And in order for this to self-correct, you then have to wait ~3 months for the reset…yeah, that won’t kill WvW. /s

3. Your system mimics EotM too much. If you’ve spent any significant amount of time in EotM, you’d see the flaw with being lumped with strangers into a match destined for snowballing for one side over another.

4. There are simpler and much more easier to implement solutions. If you are trying to get server transferring for free and basically forcing everyone off their current game world to reset where people go, why not just do that. In your scenario, guild leaders get first crack at where they go but I’m not sure that even makes the most sense since all that does is encourage mega-guilds.

A much simpler alternative solution would open up free world transferring for a specific period of time (announce a month+ ahead of time so guilds can coordinate) using the server population cap of the highest WvW server currently (BG in NA). Then after a few weeks, force move (must choose a different server) the low population server players also for free. Everyone is now on a closer to “high” population server. Re-lock worlds/start new glicko and reboot as a new WvW season.

12 bottom servers community already killed or near death when they are being shuffled around, perhaps the only remaining is DH. You need to recognize that.

I have no idea what your second point means. Players, be it pugs or guilds, all have to choose a new server. There is no discrimination. However, since servers are made non-mandatory, players do not have to choose it at the start of the game but rather only when they entered WvW. This server is tied to them, they have the option to transfer by paying gems just like now. If they ever gone inactive, the system will purge them out, leaving only active accounts in the server. Again, I really have no idea what your second point referring to and how you even come to that idea.

The system doesn’t minic eotm. EOTM works by having the same colors on the same side while creating instances of it if too many people. That is eotm. The system I propose, on a even simpler terms, is similar to merging, shrinking total number of servers by at least half. At the same time, all the players that are not involved with WvW are not part of the server, they are “server-less”. However, explaining it in even simpler terms will make everything loses its depths and depths is really important when come to solutions.

Free transfer, yes, I have thought of that but that doesn’t change the underlining problems as mentioned in the previous posts. We do not have enough to go around and in the end it will affect the gameplay negatively.

I really did put some efforts in writing the posts, I do hope you really read them.

Elon, I think we will only touch the surface of it. Anet is just trying to fill up the world map that we see now.

Malerian.8435:

I see what your trying to do. My vote would be an emphatic NO!!

Elaborate please.

Juba.8406:

OK with this suggestion we should rename WvW to Edge of the Mists !!!

This will be the final nail to WvW, Delete your thread dude …

Edge of the mist is megaserver like solution. This isn’t, this is similar to merging servers but instead of merge, deletion is carried out due to better spread on the players. You are still tied to the server, unless you went inactive for 3 months then the purge will purge you out. As long you are active, you are still subject to the transfer cost if you want to transfer. The purge is there to ensure no inactive accounts are residing in the servers otherwise we will just revert back to the current server of accumulated populations and be screwed over by returning players every once in awhile. There is a some depths on what is accumulated populations.

You should really read the posts, afterall, I did put quite a bit of effort to put them together.

Yuffi.2430:

I see what you’re trying to achieve SkyShroud and it’s good to see some serious thought on alternatives other than restart everything. But, how does your idea work better than the one I posted here (sixth post or so down) ?

Oh and responding to your title: I vote to keep servers and server identity.
Despite the trauma of linking I still feel a loyalty to, and camaraderie with, my server through my guilds and my friends. I doubt I am alone in this.

You meant this https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/wuv/Has-the-time-come-for-some-Brave-New-Worlds/first#post6650866 right?

That approach seems megaserver like to me and server identity is not gonna be maintained in that approach since players get to choose up to 4 different tiers. I believe server identity only come to be when everyone in the server stick together days and nights to achieve something. However, you are splitting them up like how guild system let people join 4 guilds but in this case, without the cross chat function. Their identity is the guild they are in and in this case would be the tier they are in. However, their identity isn’t going to last because you are resetting the colors every now and then and so is the group of players you play with. It also will make recruitment hard for guilds.

In my approach, we are indeed rebuilding the words but it also means everyone are given a chance to build a concrete server identity unlike now where guest servers are being pushed around like some pushovers.

hotcatz.6834:

The OP clearly wants to smash the final nail in WvWs coffin….
NO
NO
NO

Elaborate please.

Norbe.7630:

SkyShroud.2865:

Norbe.7630:

i vote for thread deletion

dynamic queuing is an alternative balancing to linking

sadly no more outnumbered pips bonus………

We already have people complaining about server full, unable to recruit to replace and fight other servers. We also had map queues complain during starting of rewards patch. Now, you want to force a map limit base on the lowest pop while shutting the side with more people, you are inviting complains and it is way more intrusive than my suggestions.

ive bolded the words
its like prime vs prime
NA EU SEA AU etc

however yours is not bad…. its just WvGlobes thingy before

Yes, the dynamic queue is limiting base on the timezone but not every server has equal number in those timing. People are gonna complain if they are stuck in queue. They will call that “discrimination” which it isn’t wrong and likewise “punishment”.

No, this isn’t WvGlobes but a merge yet instead we blow it up and add in couple of long term preventive measures to make sure the same issues don’t occur again.

ThunderPanda.1872:

No, you just want WvW with free bandwagon transfer.

You should read the post, it takes quite a bit of effort to put them together. Possibilities of stacking servers is slim under dynamic capping. Stacking servers is the result of not only guilds but also the accumulated base populations over the years. By remaking the servers, one is forcing that accumulated populations to spread and second is to make wvw population truly only wvw population. All stacking attempt will be futile under the system for the server will only open if the disparity is acceptable.

Norbe.7630:

i vote for thread deletion

dynamic queuing is an alternative balancing to linking

sadly no more outnumbered pips bonus………

We already have people complaining about server full, unable to recruit to replace and fight other servers. We also had map queues complain during starting of rewards patch. Now, you want to force a map limit base on the lowest pop while shutting the side with more people, you are inviting complains and it is way more intrusive than my suggestions.

I mentioned about a slightly improve idea than the nuking every 3 months. The diagram shows that idea.

Base on the understanding I have on the servers, it aims to eliminate all the problems it has now.

First, we start with merging all the tanks into a true common tank. To do that, we have to make servers non-mandatory. This is really important because we can eliminate the differences between the main tanks and not only that, we can pour the new players into a common tank for all the guilds to compete over with. We also eliminate the upsurge of players due to the pump (like reward patch). This is due to the fact that we make them choose a server before they can join in.

Now, you might think what difference will that make in long run. It is a huge difference because the solution isn’t in parts but as a whole. We next need to look at the WvW container. When we all choose servers, people get assigned the server tag and if they go inactive, they will remain in the server tag, at least that’s how the current server works. However, in this approach, we gonna purge all the inactive accounts, untag them, periodically let say 3 months inactive. We will put them all back to the main tank and if one day they want to WvW again, they have to choose a new server while subjecting to the status cap. You might ask if they be unhappy? The answer is most likely no since you get to choose a new server for free again.

Finally, we need to shrink the number of servers so we can implement the dynamic threshold. Currently, anet is forcing servers to shrink down, in attempt to spread evenly across servers, I believe. However, that is not appropriate because you will lose more overall populations in the long run. Furthermore, to spread to 24 servers also means that none of the server will be able to have a 24 hours coverage, we just don’t have enough to go around. Thus, we need to shrink the number of servers and not only that, we need a dynamic threshold to handle population imbalance between server dynamically. The idea is to simply decide a acceptable disparity between A and B, if A far exceed the allowed disparity, you close off A until B catches up. Doing so, you give everyone in every server a chance a grow, a sense of hope that they can recruit and fight back. This also should be able to handle any sudden surge of populations without ridiculously locking everyone out. Likewise, keep population similar and thus reasonable balance.

This approach cannot be implemented on current servers. The populations disparity is too huge. We would have to force merge a lot of servers and we can arguably say that deleting is better than merging when come to long term balancing. Some servers might be locked for a very very long time if go by merging route.

Edit: Some might be confused over “server” this term. In this approach, “server” is misleading, “fraction” is the more appropriate term since you can join and leave the fraction though the leaving part is decided by the purge. You can transfer between fractions.

I am gonna explain for the benefits of the anyone that has no idea what the server really looks like using a simple diagram, diagram 1.

Despite having megaserver, it doesn’t change how the server looks like from a formal perspective.

We still have our main container where all the pvers, pvpers, wvwers chose the same server in. This main container is the server base population, all your pugs population come from there. This main container is a accumulation of players over the course of near 5 years. Can you imagine just how much accounts are in there?

Next we have the pump, basically the incentive to get people to play WvW. Initially is all about fun, then we have the reward patch.

Next is the wvw itself. Currently, the server status is not calculated base on that main container but rather wvw itself. It uses a population algorithm that calculate server status base on play hours. So, 500 people that play 1 hour theoretically same as 250 people that play 2 hours. At least I believe that is how it works but I am sure it has couple more math formula to improve the accuracy, still that is the gist of it.

Basically, that’s the entire makeup of a single server.

What happens if we put multiple the servers side by side? (Diagram 2)

I am sure you starting to see the differences.

Starting from the main containers. Why is the main containers so different from each other? Simply because the server status wasn’t calculated using wvw population at the start. Anet only change the algorithm 2 years ago. They only did that because DH and DB were full at that time due to their huge pve populations yet empty wvw populations. That is to say anet never gave a single thought about population imbalance since day 1. Still, why is base population different in so much? Another reason is because threshold for servers were not the same for all servers at the beginning as well. There were a number of times where anet repeatedly mentioned they raised t1 servers cap and likewise I am sure great deal of players prefer to choose a “Very High” server than a “Medium” server. The compounding effects resulted in the current base populations we have.

Moving on to WvW population. I am sure you will notice the differences, why are some server bigger than another yet lower in activity level? This is because of algorithm that calculate play hours so server 2 play longer hours than server 1. There are flaws accompanying this approach and the main flaw is if server one play an hour more, they may overwhelm server 2.

Moving on to the threshold. Now, unlike the past, we all share the same threshold, hurray! Still, it isn’t a good time to celebrate because the threshold is a fixed threshold and can only be adjusted by anet. It is the only logical conclusion of why some servers are full when they couldn’t match the coverage of some other servers. With this fixed threshold, we can all come to a conclusion that matchup can be unbalance. Let say server 5 fight against server 1.

Now, you might want to argue that they are in different tier but that’s not exactly it. We also have something called matchup algorithm that goes one up and one down. So, one of them will pit against server 1 and 2. Likewise, what if we don’t have 3 equal servers of equal strength? One of the servers will suffer in that matchup.

Then, we also have something called attrition. Guilds have to replace their players that went ianctive or quit somehow. For server 1, they could try their luck on their main container. How about server 6 though? Their main container pretty small so chance is that they will shrink to go below threshold, then recover to go up and locked. In this manner, they can never hope to handle server 1 or 2.

Next is we also have something I would call inflow of new players. New players have to choose servers. The obvious choice is server 3, it sound really alright. In reality, we have 24 NA servers and we have to spread new players over 24 NA servers. Do you really think gw2 is still popular like in the past to attract enough to spread 24 servers?

That is the simple explanations of the servers. There certainly more depths than that but this is the gist of it.

Long ago, not sure how long is that, maybe 2 years? A small group of players, including myself, advocate for something really simple and that is deletion of servers. We saw something many couldn’t and that is a inherent imbalance between servers, something that is pretty much impossible to fix without hurting everyone’s gameplay.

There was a few officers from some t1 wvw guilds opposing it greatly citing community reason but well, we all know that isn’t true since they always transfer around. However, many months down the road, those same officers asked for deletion. The reason being because the t1 servers they were in got affected by the imbalance. This make me realize one very important thing and that is unless the majority get affected by this imbalance, the majority will not care enough to know. In fact, they have no idea what is it all about. Realistically speaking, by the time for the silent majority to actually learn about what all these balancing about, the tiers would likely to be compressed to 2 by then which pretty much too late for any rectification.

Back then, I suggested deletion repeatedly over many threads and I am sure, really sure devs did read it because devs did drop hint that nuke is a option, with repeatedly nuking every few months. It was almost like what I suggested.

Of course, we all know linking is used in the end which I assume because is the least resistance change.

Still, months and years down the road, has the balancing improved? Not really. The only noticeable different is all of us get more people but imbalance still the same in ratio. Are people happy with the balancing? I don’t think so since we do have groups of guild leaders and officers across servers banding together talking about the imbalance. They plan to submit something concrete to the devs, honestly speaking, I have no idea how far they went since I stopped keeping up to the progress.

I personally wanted a more balance gamemode, I am not expecting perfection but at the very least, a fighting chance and not just a one sided gameplay. Unlike back then, now I have even better understanding of the servers and now thought up a slightly different approach.

Regardless, I ask of you all, do you all want balance or do you want to keep the current imbalance?

PS: I will talk about servers and the modified approach on the next two posts.

Zaxares.5419:

It also depends on which timezone you are playing in. I think we still have decent’ish numbers during prime time (although we did indeed lose most of our old core WvW guilds), but TC is like a ghost town during OCX/SEA. It’s always been our weakest period, and while there’s regulars who do their best to hold down the fort, we basically can’t muster enough numbers to deal with the sizeable zergs that our opponents can bring against us during these quiet periods, let alone try to take offensive action apart from forming some small havoc squads to ktrain a bit.

TC link has ODA running during SEA time, what are you talking about?

Warcry.1596:

SkyShroud.2865:

I have zero idea on NSP geodemographic.

So why did you bother saying anything in this thread? :p

It is like a “in before assumption” thingy

Reminder. Not fixed in 25-Jul-2017 patch.

Hi,

The story progress for party is buggy. For example, if a A already completed the 2nd story and he joined B’s 2nd story midway then completed it, the checkpoint will be bug out for A and make A lose the progress, resetting A to the beginning of 2nd story.

I have zero idea on NSP geodemographic.

Nerf direct damage so to indirect buff condi, great, just great.

I would like the decoration overall cap to be increase. Guild hall is so big yet the cap limit is too low to deco it.

I prefer fist weapon

Powercreep
You can ask anet to nerf our skills across board, that surely will increase difficulty as well.

Poll…not a good place to get feedback on what updates we want. It is more like what updates we don’t want.

Please….don’t.

The last time anet did that was before hot with that shake the meta nonsense. Every once awhile we have to do new builds while the balancing never improve.

I got 29.5k ap…

There are still AP to do, skins to get but…..it is really pointless.
The game need something….more meaningful.

You can just….sell them.

StrawHat.2639:

And yet last night in red bl (TCs bl), they had a grp of 30+ and the map was all blue except their garry…when we had only 2 roaming guild tags on map with militia following both…TC seems to not know what to hit to maximize ppt it felt…in any case TC has horrible off hour coverage but yous aren’t dead…am in the CD link and Ive seen huge TC grps around…its just that the T3 dropouts have more offhour…cough sos cough hod cough db…cough….

CD had 4 maps queue after the reward patch, do you want to google it? CD has a big base population then it dies down after a week, regardless of how casual it is. Of course, sometimes it do resurface thus CD keeps go up and down.

The point is the current WvW system is horrible and incapable of dealing with all those abnormal surge of populations.

I do hope they are adding new activities specifically designed for guilds, afterall, guild is the only reason I left to play this game.

I guess the primary issue is the skill lag. It is unfortunate but skill lag is something that has been complained over the years and nothing is really done about it. It is either anet doesn’t care or just has no idea how to fix, I personally don’t believe is the latter.

Regardless, in a skill lag fight your only option is to be the first to do the damage and even glass canon can win the fight.

LaurenLizzy.8429:

You said this way better than I did, I’m glad someone else notices how the system backfires.

I post this 4.5 months ago but current full server is now a issue of this, plus the increase of players due to rewards and uneven base populations, plus the fixed threshold. A combination of factors, basically overall bad designs.

Euryon.9248:

suggestion from someone else in another thread was to add a 5th tier and give 3 more servers “host” status. That might help distribute populations better and get some of the marginally “full” servers off the bubble.

That’s not how full server works, they will still be full.

SweetPotato.7456:

Server population NOT WvW population.

WvW Population comes from server populations, you cannot eliminate the relationship.

Strider Pj.2193:

As far as the pop cap, I think they changed the threshold drastically, which is why worlds haven’t opened up even after the exudes of the PvE peeps who tried it out. I dont think we’ll see BG open for months. And some of the others, like TV and other low pop servers are just on that edge.

I think they are trying to force people to spread out.

That’s not gonna work, any decent businessman will know that. Why would people move, especially if they have to pay for it? Why should they pay for it especially when they know it was intentionally lowered over and over again. It is common sense. People will just complain, like how I am complaining. If it doesn’t work, we let it die, we quit, we move on to other games, it is not like gw2 the only game. At the end of the day, anet stand to lose more than we do.

Anet only got two choices, fix it or lose the players.

OMG, that thread so triggered me. It literally reminds me how anet revamp the entire server population calculation just because one server complains about it for just ONE month but did little to population imbalance when people from different servers complain about it for YEARS. Gosh. kitten . Argh! I need to get my dose of hello kitty online.

But, it isn’t just the population calculation issue now. The overall population boosted due to the reward patch, pulling a lot of PvE players from base populations. We all know every server base populations are different and obviously, some are hugely bigger than some. This is a huge population imbalance and the fixed threshold is not helping, it is nothing but a growing discontent for servers that are at the bottom of the “full” servers.

Swagger.1459:

SkyShroud.2865:

Swagger.1459:

Pensadora.9478:

Tiny Doom.4380:

Thing is, as per the dev explanation linked by Swagger above, ANet don’t balance WvW by “population”. They balance it by “play hours”.

Yep, and I’m sure that I could quote some very interesting Dev statements from the past. This later referenced “THE POLL” and was from a year ago. A YEAR AGO … let that sink in just a few minutes. In this game, in any game – a year is a long, long time.

This bolsters my argument to blow it all up. We have now invested an entire year, doing this tweak and that tweak, and look we’re all still talking about blowout matches, groups bandwagoning to T1, bloated servers, dying servers, etc etc.

Tiny Doom.4380:

As to whether that works for “balancing” the game mode… obviously not.

Thank you. I agree. Let’s blow it up and start with a clean slate. Let’s envision something better instead of continuing to beat this dead horse of ‘WvW the way we’ve always done it.’

Tiny Doom.4380:

According to the dev statement above, though, it’s the best they’ve been able to come up with.

It’s the best they’ve come up with given that we have boxed them into restrictions that say : “Don’t touch my e-world.” I’m pretty certain they have quite a few ideas on the shelf they could dust off, if they didn’t have their hands tied behind their backs over this one issue.

Let’s erect a monument to all the existing servers in LA , celebrate their accomplishments, blow them all up in a hail of fireworks, and move forward!

Let’s progress, people. We’re in the Paleolithic age of WvW and some of us want to stay there… forever. I’m sure it was really comfortable for people back in the days. But, those who don’t adjust… die. We’ve been treading water in the same place for a long, long time.

I would like WvW to survive. I’d like it be amazingly awesome. To get there, I believe we’ll have to let go of some of the ideas that are currently killing us and the gamemode. We need to free up our thinking and the designing to be able to cure what is ailing us.

We’re stuck in “Nowheresville”, not WvW, and, it’s not such a great place to be, or to recommend to your friends.

And, that is why I continue to ask for some clarity.

A year is nothing in terms of game development, it’s just long to you.

Linking, reward tracks and updated rewards have increased population and participation. WvW is surviving just fine right now… Seems you don’t really have a finger on the pulse with how the game has progressed, and you obviously haven’t followed any dev comments either.

Your vague “blow it up and start over” comments show you didn’t think anything through. You’ve provided zero input aside from “we need to change”, but you don’t even bother to suggest how things should change.

Edit- You can attempt to ignore the answers I provided as clarity, but that won’t change the facts. Those are dev quotes, so perhaps you should absorb them.

Fine as it is now? Are you saying that while ignoring the slightly more than handful of guest servers that are lacking in both guilds or numbers? Are you saying that while ignoring the population imbalance between servers? Do you WvW?

It’s kind of helpful when you put the entire sentence in context… right?

It’s also helpful to follow the discussion and not spin off into assumptions…

It is what it is.

Swagger.1459:

Pensadora.9478:

Tiny Doom.4380:

Thing is, as per the dev explanation linked by Swagger above, ANet don’t balance WvW by “population”. They balance it by “play hours”.

Yep, and I’m sure that I could quote some very interesting Dev statements from the past. This later referenced “THE POLL” and was from a year ago. A YEAR AGO … let that sink in just a few minutes. In this game, in any game – a year is a long, long time.

This bolsters my argument to blow it all up. We have now invested an entire year, doing this tweak and that tweak, and look we’re all still talking about blowout matches, groups bandwagoning to T1, bloated servers, dying servers, etc etc.

Tiny Doom.4380:

As to whether that works for “balancing” the game mode… obviously not.

Thank you. I agree. Let’s blow it up and start with a clean slate. Let’s envision something better instead of continuing to beat this dead horse of ‘WvW the way we’ve always done it.’

Tiny Doom.4380:

According to the dev statement above, though, it’s the best they’ve been able to come up with.

It’s the best they’ve come up with given that we have boxed them into restrictions that say : “Don’t touch my e-world.” I’m pretty certain they have quite a few ideas on the shelf they could dust off, if they didn’t have their hands tied behind their backs over this one issue.

Let’s erect a monument to all the existing servers in LA , celebrate their accomplishments, blow them all up in a hail of fireworks, and move forward!

Let’s progress, people. We’re in the Paleolithic age of WvW and some of us want to stay there… forever. I’m sure it was really comfortable for people back in the days. But, those who don’t adjust… die. We’ve been treading water in the same place for a long, long time.

I would like WvW to survive. I’d like it be amazingly awesome. To get there, I believe we’ll have to let go of some of the ideas that are currently killing us and the gamemode. We need to free up our thinking and the designing to be able to cure what is ailing us.

We’re stuck in “Nowheresville”, not WvW, and, it’s not such a great place to be, or to recommend to your friends.

And, that is why I continue to ask for some clarity.

A year is nothing in terms of game development, it’s just long to you.

Linking, reward tracks and updated rewards have increased population and participation. WvW is surviving just fine right now… Seems you don’t really have a finger on the pulse with how the game has progressed, and you obviously haven’t followed any dev comments either.

Your vague “blow it up and start over” comments show you didn’t think anything through. You’ve provided zero input aside from “we need to change”, but you don’t even bother to suggest how things should change.

Edit- You can attempt to ignore the answers I provided as clarity, but that won’t change the facts. Those are dev quotes, so perhaps you should absorb them.

Fine as it is now? Are you saying that while ignoring the slightly more than handful of guest servers that are lacking in both guilds or numbers? Are you saying that while ignoring the population imbalance between servers? Do you WvW?

Dawdler.8521:

SkyShroud.2865:

This is how a single server looks like

and

This is how a group of servers looks like

You are welcome everyone, if you need a visual explanation why wvw is unbalance. Btw, it is really a simplified diagram, it doesn’t even include inflow of new players and timezones.

I disagree with your analysis.

Here is an even simpler diagram of WvW servers and the tier system:

Hey! That diagram is pushing my paint skill to its limit!

I even made a new diagram on the possible new approach to WvW if we ever blow up!

I hope this explain why blowing up is actually better in long run!

If we have a shared main container aka where everyone in there are “serverless” thus it means we need to remove the mandatory server requirement, everyone in any server will get to enjoy the same source of base populations, this eliminate one issue we have on our current system. Likewise, solve the unexplained issue of spread for inflow of new players due to having a common container for all new players.

Then, we need to periodically purge inactive “server-ed” players from the servers, otherwise, it will just revert back to our current system.

Then, we have dynamic threshold that make comparisons between servers to determine if the said server is too big compare to another. If any of the servers are too big to one or more servers, we close it off until that one or more servers chase up in populations.

Of course, it is still a simplified diagram and doesn’t talk about the negative effects of too many servers but in that design, you cannot have too many servers because it will be too small to put together 24/7 forces due to the dynamic threshold enforcement. Likewise, I can actually expand the diagram to include a expanded version of population analyse algorithm to include time slice players tagging.

This is how a single server looks like

and

This is how a group of servers looks like

You are welcome everyone, if you need a visual explanation why wvw is unbalance. Btw, it is really a simplified diagram, it doesn’t even include inflow of new players and timezones.

HazyDaisy.4107:

They can’t just blow it up and create however many new NA/EU servers…

First, it wouldnt solve the problems.

Second, everyone has to select a server when they install the game, even those that never come into wvw, so they’d have to move EVERYBODY in the game.

Third, it wouldn’t be a quick activity…

Do you really think Anet would take the game offline for a week or more to redistribute every account in game to appease the wvw population?

If you make servers non-mandatory, then, wouldn’t that solve your second issue?

Swagger.1459:

Pensadora.9478:

When FULL at T3/T4 is equated to FULL at T1, things appear to be a bit wonky in the universe, to say the least.

What could be worse than the slow, painful, demoralization of all the host server communities so that they join the linked servers, an already demoralized group? Why try forced re-colonization? Why not try exploration? I argue the later is far, far and away more positive.

Isn’t it more obvious than ever that it’s time to activate the nuclear option? Let’s blow it all up and start over, so that we can begin to build our brave new world(s).

This could be one of the most exciting things to happen in WvW. It will be fresh, challenging, and risky. To go where no one has gone before….To march off into the horizon to form new worlds and conquer the unknown.

This story: All bandwagon to T1, Locked down, Not enough population, Lost Community Identity, Imbalanced Matchups …. is old, tired and needs to be shelved. No one… and I mean no one… wants to read this story any more!

“….That’s what exploration is all about. Going to places where others haven’t been and returning to tell a story they haven’t heard before. " J. Cameron.

Let’s do it! What say you?

You need to be much clearer than “blow it all up and start over”… You’re going to have to think this through, explain the entire process and how exactly we end up in a better place… instead of being completely vague and not offering any well thought out ideas to discuss.

I have made one in the past and it was so well thought that people don’t want to discuss about it because most don’t want to discuss something that has too much substances. Most people in the forums just want to post count and not really make constructive comments.

Strider Pj.2193:

New players can only pick open servers. With the upcoming expansion, it would likely lead to new players. Those will go to the servers who are not full, likely starting with the very high, then high until they fill. Of course that stinks for the servers who sit in the ‘just full’ category which from the OP would include a server like HoD, but like MaS did before, they could moVe again.

And run the risk of missing guildies.

Which they would run the risk of with blowing it up.

The risk will be minimum if a new system uses dynamic threshold instead of a static threshold. Now, servers are just waiting for the nails to be nailed into their coffin, some don’t even realise that is happening because their server is just that big but eventually they will and when that happen, it is all too late.

Turk.5460:

The reality is that 90%+ of existing server A would relocate to new server B.

This is not a very helpful suggestion.

That is only if they continue to use the old system. If balancing rule is to be enforced right from the start and dynamically increase or decrease the threshold across board by using the highest and lowest server differences as benchmark, it will be quite impossible to stack any server.