How to really fix WvW through game design

[Ben K.6238]

> @"Reaper Alim.4176" said:

> > @"Klipso.8653" said:

> > Make winning matter again, they don't want to give us tournaments but they can at least add meaning to score

>

> In order for that to happen. They would have to do what ESO had done to Cyrodiil. And make simply having more coverage, bodies on field, and nightcapping not equal instant win.

>

> They would have to refix the whole supply mechanics.

>

> They would have to revamp their whole view of monetizing on Servers of the Month and server transfers.

>

> They would have to look into removing the Tactivators they put in with HoT.

>

> They would have to add some WvW skills that all professions can use. That would give groups that are dealing with outumbered situations a fighting chance.

>

> They would have to make the game more skill based and less spam based.

>

> They would have to start treating WvW and PvE differently.

>

> They would ultimately have to completely do what other relevant RvR ish MMOs have done and release a completely revamped version of the system.

>

> If they can't do this can winning or losing will continue to be pointless. Because game mechanics or players abusing game mechanics with the Devs blessing decides who wins or lose. Rendering competition absolutely worthless in WvW. More so when you have locks on servers so that they can never compete with a server or two or three who balatently abused certain game mechanics to get such a unfair advantage in the first, with the blessings of the devs no less.

>

> GO AHEAD ANET SILENCE ME AGAIN! However remember by doing so you are more or less admitting to those who still believe in you. That you can completely care less about their preferred game modes, and are not interesting in fixing them.

 

As a moderator myself (though not for this forum obviously), you won't be getting silenced for caring about the game mode, but for the way you're saying what you say. If you help us out by posting your ideas about what needs fixing (like you just did here) your posts will stay put.

[Lonami.2987]

> @"Ben K.6238" said:

> > @"Lonami.2987" said:

> >! > > @"Chaba.5410" said:

> >! > > I came upon this article the other day which made a point that perfectly describes what is wrong with WvW.

> >! > >

> >! > > https://www.1843magazine.com/features/tabletop-generals

> >! > >

> >! > > "One of Monopoly’s big mistakes is positive feedback, designer-speak for a mechanism by which a small advantage early on snowballs into a big, insurmountable one later in the game, which makes things boring for the other players. Modern designers tend to prefer negative feedback, in which life gets harder for those doing well. Sometimes that is enforced by explicit penalties. Sometimes it emerges by itself, or through political dealing by other players. Conquering too many planets in a game of Twilight Imperium may make it hard to defend existing territory, for instance, especially if other players decide to gang up on the leader. That helps to keep things interesting for everyone."

> >! > >

> >! > > WvW is designed as a positive feedback game instead of one of negative feedback. I'm not going to go through detailing every little thing that feeds into making it a positive feedback game. I feel that many of you reading this already inherently understand how life in game gets easier when you have upgraded objectives and higher numbers than an opponent. I'm only going to offer some ideas for introducing negative feedback and I encourage others to do the same in this thread.

> >! > >

> >! > > - Introduce a DAoC-like new map/raid/dungeon only accessible to the server that is winning that makes it more difficult for that server to hold onto territory by pulling away population.

> >! > > - Reset objectives back to T1 at start of every skirmish. May need to increase the rate at which objectives upgrade to under two hours. Possibly keep tactics/improvements in place though.

> >! > > - (Once suggested in the past) Enforce a 2v1 against a winning server by making the two other servers temporary allies. Although I feel there are better negative feedback mechanisms that would make this suggestion unnecessary.

> >! > > - Players with outnumbered buff do not show as revealed from Watchtower or Sentries (or players on winning server are always revealed).

> >! > >

> >! > > Edit: Additional suggestions from other posters.

> >! > > - Yaks from camps not in your starting zone deliver less supply. Yaks from camps not in your starting zone are slower. (Swamurabi)

> >! > > - Controlling SMC drains supply from other structures in EBG. Controlling other keeps drains supply from other structures. (Swamurabi)

> >! > >

> >! > > Edit: So far most responses center around using supply as a negative feedback mechanism.

> >! >

> >! > Completely agree with the negative feedback approach. There's more to it than that, but it's a good start. Very interesting article too, good to see stuff like that posted here.

> >! >

> >! > Anyway, how I would improve World vs World. Note that I'm going wild, almost redesigning half of it:

> >! >

> >! > ---

> >! >

> >! > **Buildings and upgrades**

> >! >

> >! > Buildings are one of the major problems of WvW. They just don't work well. Let's stat with a few basic changes:

> >! >

> >! > * Capturing and upgrading objectives does not reset damaged walls and doors.

> >! > * Some buildings require a minimum number of people to be captured. Towers could be 3, keeps 5, and castles 10. This forces you to group and survive. Lonely roamers don't become that big of a menace now, and you can focus on the bigger threats. A single player can still decapture any building, turning it neutral with no guards, so you can still hurt the other factions even if you don't have the numbers to steal their buildings. The original owners will need to walk in and recapture it if they want it back.

> >! > * Castles now have a third door before the lord. The garrison of each borderland is now considered a castle.

> >! > * Keeps can now be claimed by two guilds at once, each taking care of a side, and have two lords at the capture point. Castles can be claimed by three guilds at once, and have three lords at the capture point. All lords need to be killed to enable capture.

> >! > * Lords have two phases with two health bars. Once you finish the first phase, all the guards run towards the lord's capture point. The lord becomes invulnerable until you kill all the guards. This makes guards useful and worth killing during the siege.

> >! > * Damaged walls and doors of captured buildings get repaired slowly, up to 80%, thanks to repair NPCs. Walls and doors over 80% health lose it slowly, back to 80%. Undefended buildings will be more vulnerable, and defending players have a constant maintenance job.

> >! >

> >! > With that in mind, let's start with the structural upgrades. The whole system is flawed, because the upgrades are permanent. That's the major problem. So instead, we'll turn the upgrades into buffs you have to apply constantly. You would still need to escort caravans to hoard upgrade points. Few examples:

> >! >

> >! > * **Wall upgrades:** Adds a second health bar to walls, and changes their aesthetics. Can be applied twice for two tiers (wood, stone, metal). If any of the health bars is depleted, the upgrade is lost for that specific wall section, and it needs to be bought back. The upgrade is cheaper depending on how many walls it will be applied to. The upgrades have a timer as well, and after 1h they will start inevitably degrading, so you need to refresh the upgrades at least every hour. Camps can now be upgraded with a small palisade to make them harder to capture.

> >! > * **Guard upgrades:** Summons additional guards. Like the wall upgrades, you need to buy this upgrade again to respawn the dead guards and refresh their contracts.

> >! > * **Other upgrades:** Pretty much all the other structural upgrades would work like the two above. Most of the guild upgrades would become structural upgrades.

> >! >

> >! > Additionally, guilds could have special customization options for buildings they've claimed, like custom guards and lords, with unique skins and abilities, and special upgrades, like a telescope to spy the positions of enemies across the whole map for 30 seconds, a supercannon to bombard faraway targets, a shipyard to call in air strikes, and other advanced options, that guilds would have to research, and then select in a new "WvW Guild Build" panel.

> >! >

> >! > Finally, combat between the walls and the ground is really awful, and needs to be improved urgently. Change how visual obstacles work, increase range of weapons, let the players build siege ladders, or whatever, but something needs to be done.

> >! >

> >! > ---

> >! >

> >! > **Siege and player roles**

> >! >

> >! > WvW rank skills are now integrated into the mastery system, and they take less time to level up. They use their own exclusive WvW mastery points, so you still need to play WvW and complete various tasks and achievements to be able to buy each upgrade. WvW ranks work like PvP ranks now, and reward titles and siege skins (instead of finishers) every tier.

> >! >

> >! > Supply and siege blueprints are gone. Now players have to choose a **WvW role** at their spawning point, activated as a bundle with the special action key. You don't need a role to use a siege weapon, but you need it to deploy it and enable the upgrades. Instead of supply, now siege is limited by cooldowns, so you can't have a single player spam everything himself. Siege takes longer to build, but every player can help build it no matter the role. Superior and guild quality siege weapons are gone, relegated to aesthetic skins. All roles have a repair hammer option, for walls, doors, and siege weapons. Since siege now has cooldowns, it's important to not let the enemy destroy it easily.

> >! >

> >! > All roles are unlocked by default, and you unlock additional upgrades and skills through masteries. The WvW roles are as follows:

> >! >

> >! > * **Scout:** The perfect role for the roamers. You can deploy supply removal and stealth disruptor traps, as well as use siege disabler tricks. You also have a few passive mobility advantages, and detection and deactivation options for enemy traps. You can place [sentry towers](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Sentry_Turret) to spy on the enemy, lasting 15min each.

> >! > * **Defender:** For those defending fortifications. You get a stat boost by staying inside said fortifications, and you can use the upgraded skills of cannons, mortars, and burning cauldrons. Additional bonus speed for repairs.

> >! > * **Light Artillery:** Deployment and upgraded skills of arrow carts and ballistae.

> >! > * **Heavy Artillery:** Deployment and upgraded skills of catapults and trebuchets.

> >! > * **Technician:** Deployment and upgraded skills of siege golems and shield generators.

> >! > * **Infantry:** The default role for your common player wanting to fight face to face. Deployment and upgraded skills of flame rams. Additional bonus against enemy guards.

> >! >

> >! > These would be the basic roles, with a mastery track each. Then squads would have some special roles as well, included in a single mastery track:

> >! >

> >! > * **Commander:** This role is assigned by default to the commander of the squad, giving him a stat boost depending on the number of nearby squad members, and making him tougher and harder to kill. Additionally, the commander gives a small buff to all nearby squad members, making him an important figure beyond leadership. Losing the commander will now have very negative repercussions. The commander also gets a break bar, and can apply stances to the whole squad. The "March!" stance would apply a swiftness boost to the whole squad, and the "Hold!" stance would give squad members a "solid obstacle" effect, which wouldn't let enemies cross through your ranks, letting players barricade a bridge or a door with their own bodies.

> >! > * **Bannerman:** This role is assigned by the commander. It would focus on giving minor support to his squad allies, by carrying the guild emblem in a huge banner that would be seen clearly by his enemies. Centaur, Turtle, and Dragon Banner tactics would be removed as schematics, and be partially integrated into this new role. The bannerman can place the banner in the ground, where it keeps boosting allies, and then retake it later. Dying drops the banner.

> >! > * **Musician:** Another support role, the musician would charge into battle playing the guild's battle anthem, with a huge horn of battle, giving his squad comrades various small boosts.

> >! >

> >! > I know these might sound crazy and chaotic at first, but I think they could turn WvW battles into very interesting situations, where strategy and planning matters more than mindless zerging. The squad roles encourage guild pride and competition too, now you will know who's your enemy by just looking at their banner and hearing their battle anthem playing.

> >! >

> >! > Roles force infantry players to defend their teammates with the special roles too. A smart enemy commander could break a siege by just killing the siege masters, and leave the infantry stranded with nothing but rams to keep going on.

> >! >

> >! > ---

> >! >

> >! > **Other things**

> >! >

> >! > * The weekly league chest should be changed to a monthly version. Right now, unless you're really dedicated to WvW, you will be left out of the ticket rewards. Let people work their way up slowly over a month, instead of feeling forced to rush each week. Make the last chest repeatable for those who finish the track.

> >! > * NPC enemy waves can be interesting, since player activity is never guaranteed. Used wisely they can create defense situations in unexpected locations that don't see much action. For example, a band of bandits spawns and starts hunting caravans. The dead rise from the crypt of a keep, and start attacking the guards. A wyvern attacks a castle with too many resources, and if you don't stop him he burns all of them. Stuff like that, nothing game-changing, but enough to force action when there's nothing going on. These events could target high tier buildings, as a sort of handicap, to make them harder to hold even if the other teams aren't interested in attacking.

> >! > * WvW caters to way too many playstyles right now, and some of them outright contradict each other. It needs to go on a direction, and stick to it. That's why the game would really benefit from [a new PvP/WvW mode, battlegrounds](https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/1601/pve-got-raids-time-for-pvp-to-get-battlegrounds), giving guilds a 10v10 mode where they can play competitively without queues and server problems.

> >! >

> >! > ---

> >! >

> >! > Just way too many crazy ideas. I could write more but let's leave it there for now.

>

> Long post but some really neat ideas. I've always thought it's a bit strange that walls magically reappear once you've captured an asset, and having to rebuild what you knock down only makes sense. I'd actually skip the repair NPC bit, as it makes things easier for the server that just won the fight - they don't need the help!

>

> I'm not so keen on the development of different WvW roles - I feel players are already playing what they want to, and I'm not getting how pigeonholing is going to address the positive feedback loop problem. Personally, I'd prefer to have a pool of configurable NPCs available at spawn that can follow you around when you're outnumbered, which progressively time out if your server gains more people. It's a way to level the playing field a little using resources that are versatile but not quite as good as having another human player.

>

> This is something similar to the NPC enemy waves you mentioned, but I believe all such things should be player-led. If we're going to have wyvern or zombie raids, they should be led by a player. They may be fortified by the NPCs around them, but as the linchpin of the operation it fails if they die. If this potentially puts them over the walls, they should be unable to cap anything during the raid, and be aborted/teleported back to spawn if a wall or gate is breached.

>

> I also feel that WvW doesn't cater to _enough_ play styles, but ironically agree with the 'battleground' concept for a different reason - I'd like to see it supported on peripheral maps where it affects the WvW ecosystem but allows players a space for more structured battles within that context.

 

The repair NPC is important to make players lower their guard. Repairing is boring, let the NPCs do it. It's a risk-reward situation, you can move the zerg to the next objective, or waste time repairing. If there were no repair NPCs, players would always be forced to repair, and we wouldn't have those kind of situations.

 

The goal of roles is limitation of siege weapons, and making certain players more important than others. If there's a siege battle and you kill the enemies who can deploy catapults, the enemy zerg is defenseless. Same for the commander, losing should hurt the squad more. All of this is to avoid mindless respawning and zerging. Death should have an impact, and spamming siege shouldn't be that easy to do by a single player.

 

The key of NPC enemy waves for some situations is that there's no players involved. Their goal is to "boost" the losing side, and requiring players to lead them would miss their point, which is adding distractions to the winning team, so the losing teams have an easier time.

[Svarty.8019]

Read this.

https://systemsandus.com/2015/01/04/the-feedback-loops-in-games-what-makes-monopoly-world-of-warcraft-and-mario-kart-so-much-fun/

 

I've advocated a handicapping system that is what this article calls "Balancing", but Arenanet seem averse to balance of any kind ;) My ignored posts have been along the lines of adding mechanics that give each team an objective counter, so when they have a specific number of objectives across each map, they get handicaps such as fewer guards at each, lower supply to each from the camps etc etc. Things that make it more difficult to maintain such a large empire. These suggestions fell on stoney ground, ofc.

 

The funny thing is that Reinforcement loops emulate our economic system and Balancing loops attempt to emulate what a fair taxation system might look like. And who wins anyway? The people who control the Reinforcement loops, obviously.

[ToPNoP.2493]

give more points to kdr, that way servers cant tank for easier fights.

[Dawdler.8521]

> @"ToPNoP.2493" said:

> give more points to kdr, that way servers cant tank for easier fights.

Thats how the game worked during those brief months when Anet made a good skirmish system (reduced the timer to 5m etc) and before they destroyed it by adding tier based PPT. PPK was a substantial part of the score.

[Swamurabi.7890]

> @"Dawdler.8521" said:

> > @"ToPNoP.2493" said:

> > give more points to kdr, that way servers cant tank for easier fights.

> Thats how the game worked during those brief months when Anet made a good skirmish system (reduced the timer to 5m etc) and before they destroyed it by adding tier based PPT. PPK was a substantial part of the score.

 

Unfortunately for NA, the game changed so that only one or two servers played the PPT game and only one server played the PPK game. For every other server it was the same boring match, unless you were in one of the of the matches without those servers.

[ToPNoP.2493]

It all boils down to SMC, if no other server in the current match can take smc, and the kdr is strongly in favor of the server that holds smc, then the stronger server should get more points (call it points creep). Purposely tanking, or being a "fight server" and proud to destroy every blob before it can form, is what drives these complaints. No one wants to get smashed, and if servers are skirting the intended game play in the name of KDR, then the rules of play should change to promote a better matching system based around the ability of servers to face each other in a war.

 

Right now SBI (0.86kdr total) is against JQ (1.85kdr total) and they are tied in war score. It would not make sense to move up sbi to fight Maguuma in t2 because sbi sneaks out to get a tower before the JQ voltron blob comes in and destroys all the players. Mag is tanking with an equal kdr as bg, therefore are on equal kdr terms with bg. Both Maguuma and JQ currently own a waypointed smc, maguuma moving down to t2 is about as crazy as jq NOT moving up to t2.

 

I am not saying take ppt out of the points game, I'm just saying that server kdr should be placed above ppt in extreme cases. Such as when the kdr is more than 1.5 :1 and key waypoints are held (such as smc).

[Carighan.6758]

> @"Chaba.5410" said:

> - Introduce a DAoC-like new map/raid/dungeon only accessible to the server that is winning that makes it more difficult for that server to hold onto territory by pulling away population.

 

This would, by **far**, be **the** biggest possible fix to WvW. A *Darkness Falls*.

 

And this would **need to be** the best PvE farming place. That was what balanced it so well in DAoC: You won RvR, but as you did your population steadily drained away because they all went into DF (make sure that the total player limit of EBG + BLs includes the players in "GW2DF", so that players in there **really do** reduce the amount of players for realm defense).

 

And then when your enemy took over you stayed in DF but they came in, and you couldn't respawn if defeated, so holding out (respectively flushing out the enemy) became a big thing.

[Avigrus.2871]

Ah when I took my Nightshade to the other side of DF, parked him there and ganked newbies when they got access to DF.

 

That was fun. I support this.

[Captain Kuro.8937]

> @"Chaba.5410" said:

> - (Once suggested in the past) Enforce a 2v1 against a winning server by making the two other servers temporary allies. Although I feel there are better negative feedback mechanisms that would make this suggestion unnecessary.

 

A less costly idea with little negative feedback would be :

Random roamer finds Ancient Orb , that last 24 hours in his inventory .

He can throw it on the ground where only the Commanders can pick it up (and the player is rewarded for each commander that pick it up) .

Commander can cleanse this Orb amd apply a fragment of it , in his ''NEWLY'' captured Stractures ( his server and himself get rewarded with extra PiP + silver , as long as he hold it and that Commander is Online) .

If the enemy team captures all your heavy stractures (Keeps+ Towers+ Castles) in all maps , he ''steals'' your Orb mechanic for 3 hours (while you loose it) .

So our Commanders should be carefull , that if they use the Orbs , then the biggest enemy server will rolfstomp you 24/7 .

 

Your commander allthought can drop a fragment on a gound (most likely near the respanw area of the least overpowered team) where they can Apply Orbs to their newly stractures (or escord a caravan with it)

Forcing the Biggest team to conquer ALL yours and the lesser teams heavy stractures to ''steal'' this mechanic .

 

If the Biggest enemy server finds the ''dropped Orb in the ground '' and take it or captured everything , the need to apply it to **_''NEWLY'_**' captured heavy styractures (in most cases , there will be few) .

 

Edit: Or simply throw the Orb ...lure the enemy commander ...get marked...get killed... kill his headless Zerg

[Sovereign.1093]

just kills. base it on kills. ppt and kills.

 

ppt for the land held.

 

ppk for the kills of players.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

> @"Chaba.5410" said:

> I came upon this article the other day which made a point that perfectly describes what is wrong with WvW.

>

> https://www.1843magazine.com/features/tabletop-generals

>

> "One of Monopoly’s big mistakes is positive feedback, designer-speak for a mechanism by which a small advantage early on snowballs into a big, insurmountable one later in the game, which makes things boring for the other players. Modern designers tend to prefer negative feedback, in which life gets harder for those doing well. Sometimes that is enforced by explicit penalties. Sometimes it emerges by itself, or through political dealing by other players. Conquering too many planets in a game of Twilight Imperium may make it hard to defend existing territory, for instance, especially if other players decide to gang up on the leader. That helps to keep things interesting for everyone."

>

> WvW is designed as a positive feedback game instead of one of negative feedback. I'm not going to go through detailing every little thing that feeds into making it a positive feedback game. I feel that many of you reading this already inherently understand how life in game gets easier when you have upgraded objectives and higher numbers than an opponent. I'm only going to offer some ideas for introducing negative feedback and I encourage others to do the same in this thread.

 

I think this is a really interesting way to look at WvW and some of the underlying issues. I'd be very interested if the WvW team agrees that it would be useful to rethink the game mode's mechanics to introduce more "oscillation" and use fewer constructive or destructive rules.

 

We might all disagree about the _details_ for how best to implement the concept, but I hope that people can agree that we'd end up with more dynamic matches if the "best" team couldn't snowball a few successful battles into a runaway victory. If something like this was in place during tournaments, I think more people might have had more fun.

 

 

[Carighan.6758]

Good catch-up mechanics work by slingshotting more than hampering the top-player, anyhow.

 

Darkness Falls feels like the better solution (to me!) but in the end was just a very hidden way of hampering the ones at the top by draining away their WvW population with the promise of money and crafting materials.

 

An approach of how to slingshot things might be than the less players a realm has (and the more they actually lose as a result of that) the less territory they own **while still being considered "equal"**. Say if you only have one fourth the active WvW population, then your points-per-tick will be considered "equal" if you only own your keep/garri in **one** battleground (as a rough idea). Ofc this means if you were to actually own your home keep/garri on all four, you'd have a massive advantage in income, quickly allowing you to get back at the other realms in total whenever you win, but suffering comparatively few loses if you lose everything (Beacuse there's so few structures you can lose to begin with).

 

So in other words, **baseline income**. Based on missing WvW activity.

[primatos.5413]

> @"Sovereign.1093" said:

> just kills. base it on kills. ppt and kills.

>

> ppt for the land held.

>

> ppk for the kills of players.

 

If so then please somehow scale ppk by numbers of players involved in a kill or idk the ppt based points ? High ppt leads to low ppk ... but pls don´t feed the gankers anymore always trying to chase some down bcz of precious ppk no matter if they do it 5 on 1 .. even @ most 1on1 stomping already is meta where once was to let the defeated opponent rezz up and start again .. these days lot of players don´t even know there once was a fair play behaviour...

And offtime capping still is an issue .. it shouldn´t be in an competitive gamemode .. kicking the ball in an empty goal and without other players isn´t really competitive

 

Edit says: Maybe it´s time for some new WvW polls -real ones this time not reduced to a bunch of needless crap choices- sorry that i have to say this but the last WvW polls made by anet felt like this to me .. as none of them were in touch with what was really needed

[ProverbsofHell.2307]

> @"primatos.5413" said:

> > @"Sovereign.1093" said:

> > just kills. base it on kills. ppt and kills.

> >

> > ppt for the land held.

> >

> > ppk for the kills of players.

>

> If so then please somehow scale ppk by numbers of players involved in a kill or idk the ppt based points ? High ppt leads to low ppk ... but pls don´t feed the gankers anymore always trying to chase some down bcz of precious ppk no matter if they do it 5 on 1 .. even @ most 1on1 stomping already is meta where once was to let the defeated opponent rezz up and start again .. these days lot of players don´t even know there once was a fair play behaviour...

> And offtime capping still is an issue .. it shouldn´t be in an competitive gamemode .. kicking the ball in an empty goal and without other players isn´t really competitive

>

> Edit says: Maybe it´s time for some new WvW polls -real ones this time not reduced to a bunch of needless crap choices- sorry that i have to say this but the last WvW polls made by anet felt like this to me .. as none of them were in touch with what was really needed

 

Seems like a bad reason not to have it. People already gank. Another kill for Ultimate Dominator or whatever. Just pick a better route to avoid people.

 

And imo nightcap is no problem. Some people can only play then, don't they deserve the same chance to play?

 

[Rasp Sabreblade.5421]

Personally, I would like to see Anet add twice as many camps, but reduce the amount they hold by half and the amount of supply the yaks run.

Then make the camps act similar to the PvP map "Battle of Champions Dusk". The first tier yaks out get guards, then tier 2 they get little skritt bombers that can be killed, these only come out when the camp owner/color doesn't match the tower/keeps. Upon receiving tier 3 status the bombers become invulnerable, but can be slowed/stalled. So then the only way to stop them is to take the camp. This might make people try to defend camps instead of just flipping them. However, this would really effect the ppt system, with ppl standing around trying to defend these areas and at its current state ppl might not care do to lack or loot or progress.

 

Also, the rune areas should all be just a tower with an outside stair and a little wall with an opening (think stairs like the circular ones in the fire keep in DBL), but when you hold 3 of them they spawn a treb (at each held location, which only fires at 1 location on either the tower or keep) that can be used to fire at keeps and towers and required 5 supply to fire, but as soon as they drop below 3 the treb de-spawns. so you don't need supply to build a treb, but to fire it. Then it takes 45-60 supply to bring down the wall.

 

I think by making more meaningful objectives it would split of the zergs up more. sure you will still have the larges group for taking SMC or garrisons, but everything would else would require some type of defense or management, which theoretically would be to much for 1 or 2 zergs to manage by running around.

 

regarding DBL - add an exalted looking version of SMC to the center of the map since nothing really happens in the middle of this huge map.

 

edit - regarding special dungeons only the wining server can use it, is a bad idea. It would just make ppl migrate to the servers who win the most, which would cause even more imbalance in server populations or servers wanting to fail just so they fall down ranks to steam roll the lower tier server. Anet tried this in GW1, and eventually they just opened the dungeons to everyone.

[DeadlySynz.3471]

I actually think the idea behind the server that holds SMC causes supply drain to all structures, but there should be a caveat to this.

 

- The server in the lead is holding SMC, there is no supply drain to the other servers

- The server in 2nd place causes a 10 supply drain to all structures of the first place server per tick(does not drain from the 3rd place server)

- The server in 3rd place causes a 10 supply drain to all 2nd place structures and a 25 supply drain to all 1st place structures per tick

 

Or change these numbers to 25 and 50. I'd even go as far to say as this the supply drain should span across ALL maps.

 

In the end, it really should even things out. Servers typically in first place (or far off in 1st place) in their match-ups wont likely stay in first place the whole time (or they will be perilously close to dropping out). If they do fall out, they gain access to supply drain. The moral is, the better fighters at even numbers will win (as they always do), and will hold SMC. When their numbers diminish on maps (as they do), and the top servers outnumber them (always happens), SMC will likely get taken again.

[Swagger.1459]

> @"Illconceived Was Na.9781" said:

> > @"Chaba.5410" said:

> > I came upon this article the other day which made a point that perfectly describes what is wrong with WvW.

> >

> > https://www.1843magazine.com/features/tabletop-generals

> >

> > "One of Monopoly’s big mistakes is positive feedback, designer-speak for a mechanism by which a small advantage early on snowballs into a big, insurmountable one later in the game, which makes things boring for the other players. Modern designers tend to prefer negative feedback, in which life gets harder for those doing well. Sometimes that is enforced by explicit penalties. Sometimes it emerges by itself, or through political dealing by other players. Conquering too many planets in a game of Twilight Imperium may make it hard to defend existing territory, for instance, especially if other players decide to gang up on the leader. That helps to keep things interesting for everyone."

> >

> > WvW is designed as a positive feedback game instead of one of negative feedback. I'm not going to go through detailing every little thing that feeds into making it a positive feedback game. I feel that many of you reading this already inherently understand how life in game gets easier when you have upgraded objectives and higher numbers than an opponent. I'm only going to offer some ideas for introducing negative feedback and I encourage others to do the same in this thread.

>

> I think this is a really interesting way to look at WvW and some of the underlying issues. I'd be very interested if the WvW team agrees that it would be useful to rethink the game mode's mechanics to introduce more "oscillation" and use fewer constructive or destructive rules.

>

> We might all disagree about the _details_ for how best to implement the concept, but I hope that people can agree that we'd end up with more dynamic matches if the "best" team couldn't snowball a few successful battles into a runaway victory. If something like this was in place during tournaments, I think more people might have had more fun.

>

>

 

I understand the thought process behind the ideas, but is trying to find creative ways to punish the 1st place team healthy for the long run?

 

Would it be more beneficial to get more players playing, and more veterans to come back, to balance out matches by fixing the main issues?

 

 

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

> @"Swagger.1459" said:

> I understand the thought process behind the ideas, but is trying to find creative ways to punish the 1st place team healthy for the long run?

The idea isn't to "punish" the 1st place team, but to make sure that being in first isn't a permanent advantage. It discourages #2 and #3 from worrying about the match, which ultimately leads to faster burnout. The trick is to create "oscillation" rather than a virtuous cycle overwhelming the two vicious cycles.

 

> Would it be more beneficial to get more players playing, and more veterans to come back, to balance out matches by fixing the main issues?

This is a main issue. Or at least, that's the OP's theory: that making it possible for 3rd place to come from behind makes that world more vested in the match up and also gives 1st place more incentive to work at staying number one, rather than coasting.

 

During the early days of WvW, I remember a typical week was something like this: my world dominated one night and people would go to sleep and wake up with everything belonging to Server X (the one with the bigger OCE presence, i.e. night cappers) and we'd spend the 2 hours the next re-capping everything and building stuff back up. Rinse, repeat like that all week. Frustrating for the worlds being dominated, frustrating for dominator. Imagine if instead of needing "nightcaps", 3rd place had a chance to make some progress. The match up would be more dynamic for everyone.

 

If done well, it should lead to better match-ups, more fights, and more fun for everyone. (Done poorly, it would make things worse.)

 

One of the problems with "fixing the main issues" is that it's hard to get general agreement about what those issues are. And there's very little agreement about how to deal those issues. People agree that match-ups aren't in a good place, but few agree as to why. Lots of people don't like linkages, but no one has proposed a solution that addresses the existing issues without creating worse ones.

 

Or in other words, the trick to making things better in WvW might be to change how we think of the mode, of what is fundamental and what is just "what we are used to" rather than what's good for the mode.

 

[Swagger.1459]

> @"Illconceived Was Na.9781" said:

> > @"Swagger.1459" said:

> > I understand the thought process behind the ideas, but is trying to find creative ways to punish the 1st place team healthy for the long run?

> The idea isn't to "punish" the 1st place team, but to make sure that being in first isn't a permanent advantage. It discourages #2 and #3 from worrying about the match, which ultimately leads to faster burnout. The trick is to create "oscillation" rather than a virtuous cycle overwhelming the two vicious cycles.

>

> > Would it be more beneficial to get more players playing, and more veterans to come back, to balance out matches by fixing the main issues?

> This is a main issue. Or at least, that's the OP's theory: that making it possible for 3rd place to come from behind makes that world more vested in the match up and also gives 1st place more incentive to work at staying number one, rather than coasting.

>

> During the early days of WvW, I remember a typical week was something like this: my world dominated one night and people would go to sleep and wake up with everything belonging to Server X (the one with the bigger OCE presence) and we'd spend the 2 hours the next night capping everything and building stuff back up. Rinse, repeat like that all week. Frustrating for the worlds being dominated, frustrating for dominator. Imagine if instead of needing "nightcaps", 3rd place had a chance to make some progress. The match up would be more dynamic for everyone.

>

> If done well, it should lead to better match-ups, more fights, and more fun for everyone. (Done poorly, it would make things worse.)

>

> One of the problems with "fixing the main issues" is that it's hard to get general agreement about what those issues are. And there's very little agreement about how to deal those issues. People agree that match-ups aren't in a good place, but few agree as to why. Lots of people don't like linkages, but no one has proposed a solution that addresses the existing issues without creating worse ones.

>

> Or in other words, the trick to making things better in WvW might be to change how we think of the mode, of what is fundamental and what is just "what we are used to" rather than what's good for the mode.

>

 

I understand these angles, but certain issues are resolved by getting more players playing, so we don’t have to use creative mechanics to force different outcomes.

 

Having followed the forums, I can say there are some major issues that have been brought up regularly. Some examples...

 

- Game engine does not handle mass combat well.

 

- Profession updates are too slow, and often do not tackle the core issues.

 

- Professions, weapons, slot skills, traits, stealth mechanics, condition system... are primarily designed for pve, and players have asked there be a certain separation in “balance” from pve. The devs won’t do this because of resources (“adds a lot of overhead to balance patches”)

 

- Reward still being lackluster

 

... I want you to get a feel for my angle a bit more, so I’ll ask you this... What would get more players playing and generate more buzz in the gaming community? Anet announces that there is a new 2v1 mechanic in wvw, and they made changes to the supply mechanics... OR Anet announces that it made upgrades to the game engine and did a serious professions update for competitive modes?

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

> @"Swagger.1459" said:

> ... I want you to get a feel for my angle a bit more, so I’ll ask you this... What would get more players playing and generate more buzz in the gaming community? Anet announces that there is a new 2v1 mechanic in wvw, and they made changes to the supply mechanics... OR Anet announces that it made upgrades to the game engine and did a serious professions update for competitive modes?

 

Those are good questions. Those might generate a lot of renewed interest.

 

But we probably can't predict how much they'd matter in the long run. Upgrades to the game engine would be popular, of course. But it only takes people a month or three to start taking such changes for granted. Four months later, people would be back to complaining about the mode being stale. (It takes even less time for people to start complaining about professions, but that's a discussion worthy of 5-6 threads all by itself.)

 

But here's another angle on that: game designers can't do anything at all about the game engine; they are at the mercy of the underlying tech and the engineers trying to make that tech conform to their will. In contrast, game designers can do just about anything they want (within the tech's limitations) to game design. That is: changing how WvW works might be something they can start designing today, whereas changing the game engine might be something that they can't do anything about.

 

Here's a similar angle: what if the cost of adjust the mode rules (as described by the OP) was 10% the cost of adjusting the game engine or 20% of overhauling the professions. Which would make more sense for ANet to tackle first?

 

Put another way: I'm not saying that the OP is absolutely correct about their analysis (and I don't agree with many of the specific suggestions). I'm saying: this seems like a fruitful avenue for ANet to pursue. It might turn out to be impractical (easier said than done, e.g.) or expensive. But I think it would be worth ANet taking a look to see if part of the problem with matchups is that a handful of victories can snowball into one world dominating for hours or perhaps other frustrations that have plagued the game mode.

 

At the very least, it might be a way to make the mode feel less stale. (Maybe.)

[jaif.3518]

Tweak that may help:

 

- +20% rewards for taking things belonging to the #1 server

- -20% rewards for taking things belonging to the #3 server

 

Radical notion (brainstorming):

 

- Redesign to race war, 1 v 2 v 2, rebalancing every week by population.

- If you switch races during the week, you don't get rewards for 60 minutes.

 

-Jeff

[LetoII.3782]

> @"ProverbsofHell.2307" said:

 

> And imo nightcap is no problem. Some people can only play then, don't they deserve the same chance to play?

>

Play, yes.

Should 5% of the population determine every match?

 

 

[Naix.8156]

> @"Feanor.2358" said:

> > @"Chaba.5410" said:

> > - (Once suggested in the past) Enforce a 2v1 against a winning server by making the two other servers temporary allies.

>

> There's no need for that, because it usually happens naturally and is a kind of auto-balance. And even better, leaving it to happen naturally also leaves the element of uncertainty. You never know when your supposed "allies" will turn on you.

 

Hey, and welcome to Guild Wars 2. You're obviously very new here and I can see how you'd assume that would be the flow of gameplay: for the two trailing servers to gang up on the winning server in a match. Unfortunately, that is extremely rare for the gameplay to progress in this way. What happens is that it's easier to go after the other losing server as their objectives will be less likely to be upgraded, sieged and defended. It's also the a sort of 'prisoners dilemma' situation in that if I'm one of the trailing servers in a match and I commit to hitting the winning server I've opened exposed myself to having you (the other trailing server) attack my objectives while I'm committed elsewhere.

 

[Naix.8156]

> @"Bish.8627" said:

> Know what I would love? Put the emphasis on players defending towers and keeps rather than siege and walls. Stop giving abilities that pull off walls and make far less skills work damaging defenders on walls. Then nerf siege and defences especially for T3.

>

> Seriously, stop us being pulled off walls.

 

Care to elaborate on how this would actually look/work in game? The way your post reads is that you'd like to be able to plink attackers from the safety of a wall without risk of being pulled off or hit with AoE.