How do we get people to spread out across maps more?

[phs.6089]

> @"Trise.2865" said:

> > @"phs.6089" said:

> > > @"Trise.2865" said:

> > > > @"phs.6089" said:

> > > > Imo, just IMO they gotta stop producing this 1111zeg!111 metas.

> > >

> > > Can you then explain how exactly one is supposed to promote singular play over group play in an MMO? and how individuals or small groups could EVER be as powerful as large groups?

> >

> > I don't promote single gameplay. Zergs dont' make this game more social.

> > I just gave one of many possible solution 'instanced meta events for 20-30' hard enough to wipe 11111players and not that hard for average slakers that know how to dodge and can ouput some damage with good rotation and tactics.

>

> Yes, forcibly split the player base. Genius.

>

> It's highly amusing how the "easy, obvious solution" to zerging is to not be an MMO.

>

 

How it is spiting if you can join a party small enough to talk with each other and big enough to get the job done.

Then join to another for another thing

Zerging is too big and lets plenty of rooms to idle and afk and leech.

Where was last time you talked in zergs? Besides meme 'PICNIC'

 

[Turkeyspit.3965]

> @"MoriMoriMori.5349" said:

> > @"Turkeyspit.3965" said:

> > Go ahead and read your own post again and tell me how it doesn't punish players, because there is no way for you to know who is playing or who is farming.

>

> I went, and still didn't find anything about punishing players, only about lowering gold/hour dynamically for overpopulated maps, to move part of people caring about it somewhere else, making events less crowded. I fail to see how it's punishing those playing there. As somebody else said above, you can perfectly do 95% of event with 5-10 people, and others may be scaled down as well, if needed. Except from lowering gold/hour, I still fail to see any "punishment" for people **playing** there. Surely, you don't need 30 gold/hour to enjoy combat mechanics, right?

>

 

So wait, in your mind if I decided to do "x" meta, and because I happened to zone in at a time when there are many players participating, I receive a penalty on the rewards received?

 

That is the very definition of punish, unjustly I might add. Go ahead and google it if you don't believe me.

 

Your idea would penalize a player who has been running the meta non-stop for 8 hours straight as well as the player who just got to that zone and is running that meta for the very first time.

 

Additionally:

> @"MoriMoriMori.5349" said:

>> Surely, you don't need 30 gold/hour to enjoy combat mechanics, right?

 

Whoever you think you are, deciding how much gold/hour any other player needs, or how it will impact their enjoyment of combat mechanics, let's just both face the facts: you are not that person.

 

[MoriMoriMori.5349]

> @"Turkeyspit.3965" said:

> So wait, in your mind if I decided to do "x" meta, and because I happened to zone in at a time when there are many players participating, I receive a penalty on the rewards received?

Exactly! And know what? If you'll decide to choose warrior as your profession, you'll be unable to heal others as effectively as druid! What's a horrible limitation, who could even come up with this one? Here is a hint: game mechanics are built upon limitations of different sorts, if it's needed to make the game more engaging. Ponder over it a bit.

 

> @"Turkeyspit.3965" said:

> Whoever you think you are, deciding how much gold/hour any other player needs, or how it will impact their enjoyment of combat mechanics, let's just both face the facts: you are not that person.

Yea, right, who am I to decide. Luckily, we've got Anet around, and judging by their last nerfs to Ishtan meta, they may happen to have a very similar opinion on the subject ;)

 

 

[runeblade.7514]

>How do we get people to spread out across maps more?

 

Make "something" that is tracked by experience. That something can be a PvE reward track.

 

Literally almost everything you can do in the game gives exp. Killing a mob gives exp, mining ore gives exp, doing events gives exp, doing meta events gives exp, etc. By having PvE reward tracks that is separated by zones, there is a reason to go back to all areas of the old content in the game. Repeatable Hearts and Meta events isn't all that effective because it only works with a small specific part of the zone. You don't go back to Sparkfly Swamp for the Frog city, no you go there for that small beach where Tequatl spawn. When you do the repeatable hearts in Living Story, you don't go outside of the hearts because there is nothing to gain. By tracking exp, you have a reason as mobs gives more exp the longer they are alive. Event completer daily is a example of bad design to get people back because I have to ignore everything to search for events.

 

Even if PvE reward tracks aren't the answer, I want something that is tracked by exp because literally almost everything gives exp and that gives us the most flexibility on how we get to play.

[hellsqueen.3045]

> @"phs.6089" said:

> > @"Trise.2865" said:

> > > @"phs.6089" said:

> > > > @"Trise.2865" said:

> > > > > @"phs.6089" said:

> > > > > Imo, just IMO they gotta stop producing this 1111zeg!111 metas.

> > > >

> > > > Can you then explain how exactly one is supposed to promote singular play over group play in an MMO? and how individuals or small groups could EVER be as powerful as large groups?

> > >

> > > I don't promote single gameplay. Zergs dont' make this game more social.

> > > I just gave one of many possible solution 'instanced meta events for 20-30' hard enough to wipe 11111players and not that hard for average slakers that know how to dodge and can ouput some damage with good rotation and tactics.

> >

> > Yes, forcibly split the player base. Genius.

> >

> > It's highly amusing how the "easy, obvious solution" to zerging is to not be an MMO.

> >

>

> How it is spiting if you can join a party small enough to talk with each other and big enough to get the job done.

> Then join to another for another thing

> Zerging is too big and lets plenty of rooms to idle and afk and leech.

> Where was last time you talked in zergs? Besides meme 'PICNIC'

>

 

I actually try to chat in zergs frequently and have a little fun with it.

 

My issue isn't zergs, but more limiting how many times someone is going to go on to the same map in one day and do the same thing over and over. If you make it so that the most significant rewards are provided once and lessened compared to another meta that is running next and the next one and so on until they run out of metas, they have free time to find another activity that can be run in smaller groups to profit off. But as someone else mentioned, it could cause trouble for off peak times which isn't something I had properly considered.

[hellsqueen.3045]

> @"runeblade.7514" said:

> >How do we get people to spread out across maps more?

>

> Make "something" that is tracked by experience. That something can be a PvE reward track.

>

> Literally almost everything you can do in the game gives exp. Killing a mob gives exp, mining ore gives exp, doing events gives exp, doing meta events gives exp, etc. By having PvE reward tracks that is separated by zones, there is a reason to go back to all areas of the old content in the game. Repeatable Hearts and Meta events isn't all that effective because it only works with a small specific part of the zone. You don't go back to Sparkfly Swamp for the Frog city, no you go there for that small beach where Tequatl spawn. When you do the repeatable hearts in Living Story, you don't go outside of the hearts because there is nothing to gain. By tracking exp, you have a reason as mobs gives more exp the longer they are alive. Event completer daily is a example of bad design to get people back because I have to ignore everything to search for events.

>

> Even if PvE reward tracks aren't the answer, I want something that is tracked by exp because literally almost everything gives exp and that gives us the most flexibility on how we get to play.

 

ooh. This is definitely an interesting idea.

Maybe update the map rewards to incorporate this sort of idea where you earn everything on an exp based system rather than the weird event bonus they have now and then make sure maps offer exclusive rewards to rare materials or highly sort after material and shuffle them around. EG. Offer linen or wool on a map and shuffle that to different core maps frequently, low level matieral is a highly sort after for a higher level players and yet it is harder to get than the higher tier mats.

[Genuinetheo.6591]

> @"runeblade.7514" said:

> >How do we get people to spread out across maps more?

>

> Make "something" that is tracked by experience. That something can be a PvE reward track.

>

> Literally almost everything you can do in the game gives exp. Killing a mob gives exp, mining ore gives exp, doing events gives exp, doing meta events gives exp, etc. By having PvE reward tracks that is separated by zones, there is a reason to go back to all areas of the old content in the game. Repeatable Hearts and Meta events isn't all that effective because it only works with a small specific part of the zone. You don't go back to Sparkfly Swamp for the Frog city, no you go there for that small beach where Tequatl spawn. When you do the repeatable hearts in Living Story, you don't go outside of the hearts because there is nothing to gain. By tracking exp, you have a reason as mobs gives more exp the longer they are alive. Event completer daily is a example of bad design to get people back because I have to ignore everything to search for events.

>

> Even if PvE reward tracks aren't the answer, I want something that is tracked by exp because literally almost everything gives exp and that gives us the most flexibility on how we get to play.

 

They tried to do something like this with the Map Reward system, which believe it or not was not always around. However they made it so unprofitable that people still play in higher level areas for that reason.

 

I feel like there's just not an easy way to bring people back to lower level maps, and not make it become more profitable than any level 80 map out there. Doing so would have an impact on the market, and would see nerfs (like Istan). Kind of like the Map Reward system, it would have to be almost nonprofitable income for Arenanet to be OK with it.

[mDane.7182]

My 2Copper.

 

I think a good template for a map/meta event is the Silverwastes. It's a meta that is completely driven by the player-base, the only timer you have there is the timer for when the main meta ends successfully/fails. While there can still be "zergs" doing chest or champ trains, it is more organized.

 

Not sure why Anet never adopted this formula in other maps.

 

As for profit, i think, in terms of raw gold, Silverwastes is still one of the most lucrative.

[MikeG.6389]

Spread people out more? Announce that there is an extremely low chance of a random Legendary to drop as an event reward. But don't tell them which event.

Edit: wording.

[runeblade.7514]

> @"Genuinetheo.6591" said:

> > @"runeblade.7514" said:

> > >How do we get people to spread out across maps more?

> >

> > Make "something" that is tracked by experience. That something can be a PvE reward track.

> >

> > Literally almost everything you can do in the game gives exp. Killing a mob gives exp, mining ore gives exp, doing events gives exp, doing meta events gives exp, etc. By having PvE reward tracks that is separated by zones, there is a reason to go back to all areas of the old content in the game. Repeatable Hearts and Meta events isn't all that effective because it only works with a small specific part of the zone. You don't go back to Sparkfly Swamp for the Frog city, no you go there for that small beach where Tequatl spawn. When you do the repeatable hearts in Living Story, you don't go outside of the hearts because there is nothing to gain. By tracking exp, you have a reason as mobs gives more exp the longer they are alive. Event completer daily is a example of bad design to get people back because I have to ignore everything to search for events.

> >

> > Even if PvE reward tracks aren't the answer, I want something that is tracked by exp because literally almost everything gives exp and that gives us the most flexibility on how we get to play.

>

> They tried to do something like this with the Map Reward system, which believe it or not was not always around. However they made it so unprofitable that people still play in higher level areas for that reason.

>

> I feel like there's just not an easy way to bring people back to lower level maps, and not make it become more profitable than any level 80 map out there. Doing so would have an impact on the market, and would see nerfs (like Istan). Kind of like the Map Reward system, it would have to be almost nonprofitable income for Arenanet to be OK with it.

 

Map reward system is not anything close to what I am talking about. Map reward system rewards for doing events. It is closer to event completer daily where I ignore everything to find events. Trying to find events for map rewards is just unfun and boring. Even if they were rewarding, I would drop it.

[Genuinetheo.6591]

> @"runeblade.7514" said:

> > @"Genuinetheo.6591" said:

> > > @"runeblade.7514" said:

> > > >How do we get people to spread out across maps more?

> > >

> > > Make "something" that is tracked by experience. That something can be a PvE reward track.

> > >

> > > Literally almost everything you can do in the game gives exp. Killing a mob gives exp, mining ore gives exp, doing events gives exp, doing meta events gives exp, etc. By having PvE reward tracks that is separated by zones, there is a reason to go back to all areas of the old content in the game. Repeatable Hearts and Meta events isn't all that effective because it only works with a small specific part of the zone. You don't go back to Sparkfly Swamp for the Frog city, no you go there for that small beach where Tequatl spawn. When you do the repeatable hearts in Living Story, you don't go outside of the hearts because there is nothing to gain. By tracking exp, you have a reason as mobs gives more exp the longer they are alive. Event completer daily is a example of bad design to get people back because I have to ignore everything to search for events.

> > >

> > > Even if PvE reward tracks aren't the answer, I want something that is tracked by exp because literally almost everything gives exp and that gives us the most flexibility on how we get to play.

> >

> > They tried to do something like this with the Map Reward system, which believe it or not was not always around. However they made it so unprofitable that people still play in higher level areas for that reason.

> >

> > I feel like there's just not an easy way to bring people back to lower level maps, and not make it become more profitable than any level 80 map out there. Doing so would have an impact on the market, and would see nerfs (like Istan). Kind of like the Map Reward system, it would have to be almost nonprofitable income for Arenanet to be OK with it.

>

> Map reward system is not anything close to what I am talking about. Map reward system rewards for doing events. It is closer to event completer daily where I ignore everything to find events. Trying to find events for map rewards is just unfun and boring. Even if they were rewarding, I would drop it.

 

You're explaining everything wrong with the map reward system, but not looking for the connection. The map bonus is a progressive system that slowly rewards the player for participating in that map, kind of like your reward track system would reward the player for even being in the map. The map rewards themselves are usually negligible and not worth farming unless you have those mapping materials. Your reward track would be a lot like PvP and WvW, where the rewards themselves are not there to validate playing in the mode - but to reward those who like playing it.

 

The original dilemma here is how to get people to like playing in lower level maps. Rewarding them over time has not proven to work thus far.

[Khisanth.2948]

> @"hellsqueen.3045" said:

> **Please don't get angry about anything said here, this is my opinion based on various observations and I would absolutely love to get people's opinions and hear other people's ideas on spreading the population back into some other areas/activities.**

>

> I am of the personal opinion that by making metas more equally a profitable experience but giving them the Istan treatment of only being profitable once a day, you end up forcing people into finding other profitable materials to fill the new gaps in their schedules. The metas would include LWS4 metas in this rotation hopefully and also spark some life into Serpent's Ire. While those other profitable activities need to be enough to give a fairly decent loot pool but should feel as if they come second to metas in a day.

> For example, I could see more bounties being run if metas were once a day.

>

> Basically, I feel as if making more metas doesn't really help change the situation of population feeling lack luster in some maps because people will not leave their most profitable maps unless they are given a reason to leave. If you make it most profitable once and leave only map currency and EXP and karma profit and a few basic room chests as the major loot for any run done after the first, then they will feel their effort is better served on another map. If they have run out of map metas to chain but still desire an activity that earns them profit, they need to look for other activities that also provide profit and this means they will likely spark life into activities that largely go ignored because they can start running the activities on their own newly made time.

>

 

Most meta rewards are already once per day per character or account. That aside most take at least an hour to cycle. What do you think is the average length of a play session?

 

> I feel like this would be a pretty controversial change, people really like their metas and I think it is deserved. They bring people together and the best ones bring people together without forcing heavy coordination in terms of needing commanders and subgroups (IE. Auric Basin is good no matter what, Serpent's Ire is disliked for the high coordination requirements and the need for a guild like TTS to run it) and yet they still provide top notch loot. They also manage to provide a sense of community (Auric Basin Chat: **WEST?!?!??! SOUTHHH???! ARE YOU GOOD?**).

>

 

Uh ... you might want to do some more research first. SI doesn't require any coordination. It does require slightly more clueful people for phase 2 just as you need slightly more clueful people for AB south. Maybe north as well when the vine is being buggy. Phase 1 can also be a bit tedious and boring.

 

> @"phs.6089" said:

> Imo, just IMO they gotta stop producing this 1111zeg!111 metas.

 

Look at how well that worked out for SI. :p

 

> What comes in mind are instanced events and bosses(maybe final fight of LWs? mb something else) for 20-30 people with about t3s difficulty that can be complied once per day per acc.

 

So basically you just want ANet to work on more and bigger raids ...

 

> @"thehipone.6812" said:

> One example of content that does work for spread out, small groups is bounties. In a group of five to ten people you can knock down bounties in a minute an a half to two minutes each. Get a zerg (like on days when it is Crystal Oasis bounty hunter daily) and it takes 4 or 5 times as long when the boss gets upscaled. They're not on a "every two hours" timer like metas. The bounty rewards don't seem to draw players and that's an issue that should be looked at whether it is an awareness one or lack of interest. "Unique rewards" is somewhat of a forum meme by now, but the bounty unique rewards that include two sets of in-game obtainable armor skins, a handful of weapon skins, and rare minis don't draw the farming effort. Small groups farming forged bounties for the warbeast recipes (5-25 gold) or the rare minis should in theory be a thing.

 

How about simply having awful fight design? Some of the bounties are just annoying and that is before their interaction with the various unstable magic abilties.

 

> Heck, only 3-6% of the gw2efficiency players have bounty hunter armor unlocked, why not go for it? Guild missions could also fit the bill, but they are so stale by now.

 

because it's cheaper to get it through the WvW/PvP reward track. There is an argument about opportunity cost in there but I am not going to bother.

There is no value in having the recipe unlocked because there is no reason to craft more than once.

 

> Junundu Rising is another example of an event that scales well and also gives solid rewards, with the chance for a jackpot drop.

 

but that is partly because so few people do it so there is a very tiny supply

 

 

> @"hellsqueen.3045" said:

> ooh. This is definitely an interesting idea.

> Maybe update the map rewards to incorporate this sort of idea where you earn everything on an exp based system rather than the weird event bonus they have now and then make sure maps offer exclusive rewards to rare materials or highly sort after material and shuffle them around. EG. Offer linen or wool on a map and shuffle that to different core maps frequently, low level matieral is a highly sort after for a higher level players and yet it is harder to get than the higher tier mats.

 

That would solve nothing. This is like having a pile of dirt under the rug and instead of cleaning it up you are just moving it around under the rug. No matter how you move it that pile of dirt is still there. You also can't have guaranteed predictable rewards on frequent rotation that is also rare. It stops being rare very quickly.

 

 

[FrigginPaco.4178]

Oddly enough, I think the return of monthly tasks would manage to create a decent enough map rotation. They may wish to incentivize it in a new way, however. Perhaps cool monthly selectable rewards of some sort that change each month, but come back the next year with a new option for that particular month's reward?

 

May comes around 2019 for example

 

Options are May 1, May 2, & May 3 rewards

 

May comes around 2020

 

Options are May 1, 2, 3 from the prior year, but also add 4.

 

Something like that, and apply it to each month, making it unique and rotating.

[Rasimir.6239]

> @"hellsqueen.3045" said:

> I am of the personal opinion that by making metas more equally a profitable experience but giving them the Istan treatment of only being profitable once a day, you end up forcing people into finding other profitable materials to fill the new gaps in their schedules.

Your suggestion could work in a perfect world, but we're dealing with everyday humans here. Most of the maps and metas that are frequented by many are being played not because they are objectively the "best" but rather because of a variety of subjective reasons.

 

Serpent's Ire is a great example. Mechanically it's not harder than many of the popular metas (anyone remember the outcry about the Chak Gerent meta in the early days of HoT?), but there's an opinion circulating among the playerbase that it's "impossible", reducing the amount of people even trying to run it, and subsequently reducing the amount of people that learn the mechanics enough to carry those that haven't grasped them yet. It's a vicious cycle, as without participation, the playerbase as a whole won't develop enough knowledge and skill to give this meta a good enough chance to succeed to get people to play and learn it. As long as it keeps that way, it will never be profitable in any sense since it's too prone to failure.

 

Another example are all of those people farming Istan and Silverwastes because those are the meta events to gain gold, but never checking how to actually make gold from them. A lot of those people would end up with as much if not more gold if they played other maps with their playstyle, but they blindly follow what's said to be "the best" without realising there's much more to it than just showing up for the event on time.

 

Forcing people into this or that playstyle never works. I know a lot of people accuse ANet of forcing them into different playstyles, but unless it's something that's vastly out of sync with the rest of the game (like the original AB multiloot, the initial Istan even, or even the recent Kourna multiloot exploit) all of their changes are really more of a nudge to check out other parts of the game than outright invalidating of playstyle. Besides the fact that it is debatable if doing the same small set of events for hours on end can be called a playstyle to begin with ;) .

 

This game is built on the foundation that you should always be happy to see other players around. We don't have kill stealing, we don't have node stealing, and we certainly don't want to have people make a fuss because other people show up at "their" event and reduce the rewards. If you want people to spread out, try to learn some of the less frequented events, advertise them in the lfg (and possibly spread the word on some of the city map chats if you're tackling something interesting), and get people to realize that there's shinies and fun to be had all over the world. The more people are introduced to mechanics, the easier the events will be, and the more populated they will end up in the long run.

 

There's something interesting to be had in most if not all events. Things like the [endless Djinn tonic](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Endless_Djinn_Tonic "endless Djinn tonic"), the [specialization minis](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mini_Holosmith_Baraz_Sharifi "specialization minis"), or [very rare skins](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Berserker%27s_Lightward%27s_Battlestaff " very rare skins") are of interest to many people, and often it only takes one person to take charge to get many to join in and produce a snowball effect.

 

[Cristalyan.5728]

> @"MoriMoriMori.5349" said:

 

> And here is an easy, already tried solution: reduce gains from farm on a map proportionally to growth of number of players playing there, **dynamically, in real-time** (not statically by hand, how Anet does it atm). So it becomes not as efficient to play on a map where a lot other players are playing, farm-wise, but more efficient on maps which are half-empty atm. Make this thing react to rapid grows of players' number promptly, to prevent exploits, like deliberately leaving map until it will become very profitable, then suddenly dropping a zerg there. Problem solved.

 

Amusing =) I like the "solution" solving nothing but instead creating a lot of other problems. This explain a lot about the logic used by the "solution designer".

 

So if the number of players on a map is growing, the rewards are reduced. In the current Mega Server environment a map is open to the players until it is considered "full" by the server and a new instance is generated.

 

**Question(s)**:

- How can you prevent a player wanting to play that map to join your "profitable" map and turning it into a "less profitable one"?

- Even if the joining player acknowledges that he destroyed the "efficiency" of a map (I try to imagine the "blessings" he will receive) and wants to play another instance, how can he open another instance of that map if the map he is in is not considered "full" by the server?

- If a map is almost empty (because it is not profitable) how do you plan to make it more profitable? Otherwise we will turn back to the first point where most of the players will play a profitable map turning it into a non-profitable one.

 

From your previous posts I saw you enjoy solo content or content requiring a low number of players. Did you ever consider that a MMO is not the right environment for you and a single player is more suited for your taste?

 

[kharmin.7683]

> @"mDane.7182" said:

> I think a good template for a map/meta event is the Silverwastes. It's a meta that is completely driven by the player-base, the only timer you have there is the timer for when the main meta ends successfully/fails. While there can still be "zergs" doing chest or champ trains, it is more organized.

>

> Not sure why Anet never adopted this formula in other maps.

>

> As for profit, i think, in terms of raw gold, Silverwastes is still one of the most lucrative.

 

While I agree that SW is a good example of map/meta events, I would not like to see this adopted across all of Tyria. Some players don't prefer this style of map and some of the toxicity that can come with it when those not playing the meta are doing things "out of sequence".

[zealex.9410]

No more stuff turned into glorified dailies. Alot of the game activities already feel like a job.

[hellsqueen.3045]

> @"Rasimir.6239" said:

> > @"hellsqueen.3045" said:

> > I am of the personal opinion that by making metas more equally a profitable experience but giving them the Istan treatment of only being profitable once a day, you end up forcing people into finding other profitable materials to fill the new gaps in their schedules.

> Your suggestion could work in a perfect world, but we're dealing with everyday humans here. Most of the maps and metas that are frequented by many are being played not because they are objectively the "best" but rather because of a variety of subjective reasons.

>

> Serpent's Ire is a great example. Mechanically it's not harder than many of the popular metas (anyone remember the outcry about the Chak Gerent meta in the early days of HoT?), but there's an opinion circulating among the playerbase that it's "impossible", reducing the amount of people even trying to run it, and subsequently reducing the amount of people that learn the mechanics enough to carry those that haven't grasped them yet. It's a vicious cycle, as without participation, the playerbase as a whole won't develop enough knowledge and skill to give this meta a good enough chance to succeed to get people to play and learn it. As long as it keeps that way, it will never be profitable in any sense since it's too prone to failure.

 

Serpent's Ire isn't hard, but it needs more people and it needs those people to be coordinated to complete it, just like Triple Trouble but with even more emphasis on taking particular skills. It isn't hard more than it is just an inconvenience to do because of it's design.

You won't find people to do it unless you have a large guild to run it and give people the roles required and tell people the skills to take to successfully complete it.

Making Metas that force people to need to heavily coordinate with each other rather than just requiring them to group up and do the event as they appear the way AB or TD do is the mistake they made in designing Serpent's Ire.

 

> Another example are all of those people farming Istan and Silverwastes because those are the meta events to gain gold, but never checking how to actually make gold from them. A lot of those people would end up with as much if not more gold if they played other maps with their playstyle, but they blindly follow what's said to be "the best" without realising there's much more to it than just showing up for the event on time.

 

Then that is a fault of a person not doing their research into the meta, that being said those people are still all joining the map that they think are making them the most profit even if they are doing it wrong. So they follow and therefore abandon other maps in favour of the one everyone else is doing for profit.

 

> Forcing people into this or that playstyle never works. I know a lot of people accuse ANet of forcing them into different playstyles, but unless it's something that's vastly out of sync with the rest of the game (like the original AB multiloot, the initial Istan even, or even the recent Kourna multiloot exploit) all of their changes are really more of a nudge to check out other parts of the game than outright invalidating of playstyle. Besides the fact that it is debatable if doing the same small set of events for hours on end can be called a playstyle to begin with ;) .

 

I don't think it could be called a playstyle because a playstyle generally involves the way you utilise a character and not so much the way you explore and earn money in an MMO.

 

> This game is built on the foundation that you should always be happy to see other players around. We don't have kill stealing, we don't have node stealing, and we certainly don't want to have people make a fuss because other people show up at "their" event and reduce the rewards. If you want people to spread out, try to learn some of the less frequented events, advertise them in the lfg (and possibly spread the word on some of the city map chats if you're tackling something interesting), and get people to realize that there's shinies and fun to be had all over the world. The more people are introduced to mechanics, the easier the events will be, and the more populated they will end up in the long run.

 

There is a reason the most profitable maps are run frequently and other content left abandoned. Farmers have no reason to spread to other content. You have to give them a reason to leave the maps more often in favour of other maps without completely making the other map redundant. We have world boss trains, meta event trains would cause people to run things once and then find other content they can farm.

 

Turn the map bonus into an exp based map reward track that actually offers things like wool and linen for players could attract more attention to maps, low level mats will more likely attract high level players. Unless you are giving them good Lodestones and T6 mats, the lower tier loot is harder to obtain.

 

> There's something interesting to be had in most if not all events. Things like the [endless Djinn tonic](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Endless_Djinn_Tonic "endless Djinn tonic"), the [specialization minis](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mini_Holosmith_Baraz_Sharifi "specialization minis"), or [very rare skins](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Berserker%27s_Lightward%27s_Battlestaff " very rare skins") are of interest to many people, and often it only takes one person to take charge to get many to join in and produce a snowball effect.

 

Those are odd items that people may desire but this isn't really loot that will get people to stick around for very long. It isn't loot you farm for profit really.

For example, I do metas for the salvage loot.

I don't desire tonics all that much. I can get plenty of other tonics and not waste time on one Djinn Tonic.

I could just buy that mini off the TP for 2 gold, which time I spend doing loot runs make me way more gold than what could be made going out of my way to earn that mini.

There are tons of exotic skins out there and rare ones at that, the one you linked can drop from the Dragon Stand final boss chest, which is a meta people actually run and is a bad example. Otherwise it comes from airship cargo which you can run around opening and not involving yourself in events and spreading yourself around.

Tons of exotics drop from just doing the stuff you are already farming, this doesn't spread people around.

This wouldn't work.

[gateless gate.8406]

Some of the major reasons HoT metas continue to be popular are: 1) Chance at infusion drops, and 2) materials for legendaries (crystalline ore, amalgamated gemstone, gift of maguuma mastery). PoF metas, as far as I know, have lower raw gold-per-hour and don't drop anything required for legendaries. In other words, the rewards are completely imbalanced. I guess ANet considers that fine? Who knows why.

[thehipone.6812]

> @"Khisanth.2948" said:

> > @"hellsqueen.3045" said:

> > **Please don't get angry about anything said here, this is my opinion based on various observations and I would absolutely love to get people's opinions and hear other people's ideas on spreading the population back into some other areas/activities.**

> >

> > I am of the personal opinion that by making metas more equally a profitable experience but giving them the Istan treatment of only being profitable once a day, you end up forcing people into finding other profitable materials to fill the new gaps in their schedules. The metas would include LWS4 metas in this rotation hopefully and also spark some life into Serpent's Ire. While those other profitable activities need to be enough to give a fairly decent loot pool but should feel as if they come second to metas in a day.

> > For example, I could see more bounties being run if metas were once a day.

> >

> > Basically, I feel as if making more metas doesn't really help change the situation of population feeling lack luster in some maps because people will not leave their most profitable maps unless they are given a reason to leave. If you make it most profitable once and leave only map currency and EXP and karma profit and a few basic room chests as the major loot for any run done after the first, then they will feel their effort is better served on another map. If they have run out of map metas to chain but still desire an activity that earns them profit, they need to look for other activities that also provide profit and this means they will likely spark life into activities that largely go ignored because they can start running the activities on their own newly made time.

> >

>

> Most meta rewards are already once per day per character or account. That aside most take at least an hour to cycle. What do you think is the average length of a play session?

>

> > I feel like this would be a pretty controversial change, people really like their metas and I think it is deserved. They bring people together and the best ones bring people together without forcing heavy coordination in terms of needing commanders and subgroups (IE. Auric Basin is good no matter what, Serpent's Ire is disliked for the high coordination requirements and the need for a guild like TTS to run it) and yet they still provide top notch loot. They also manage to provide a sense of community (Auric Basin Chat: **WEST?!?!??! SOUTHHH???! ARE YOU GOOD?**).

> >

>

> Uh ... you might want to do some more research first. SI doesn't require any coordination. It does require slightly more clueful people for phase 2 just as you need slightly more clueful people for AB south. Maybe north as well when the vine is being buggy. Phase 1 can also be a bit tedious and boring.

>

> > @"phs.6089" said:

> > Imo, just IMO they gotta stop producing this 1111zeg!111 metas.

>

> Look at how well that worked out for SI. :p

>

> > What comes in mind are instanced events and bosses(maybe final fight of LWs? mb something else) for 20-30 people with about t3s difficulty that can be complied once per day per acc.

>

> So basically you just want ANet to work on more and bigger raids ...

>

> > @"thehipone.6812" said:

> > One example of content that does work for spread out, small groups is bounties. In a group of five to ten people you can knock down bounties in a minute an a half to two minutes each. Get a zerg (like on days when it is Crystal Oasis bounty hunter daily) and it takes 4 or 5 times as long when the boss gets upscaled. They're not on a "every two hours" timer like metas. The bounty rewards don't seem to draw players and that's an issue that should be looked at whether it is an awareness one or lack of interest. "Unique rewards" is somewhat of a forum meme by now, but the bounty unique rewards that include two sets of in-game obtainable armor skins, a handful of weapon skins, and rare minis don't draw the farming effort. Small groups farming forged bounties for the warbeast recipes (5-25 gold) or the rare minis should in theory be a thing.

>

> How about simply having awful fight design? Some of the bounties are just annoying and that is before their interaction with the various unstable magic abilties.

>

> > Heck, only 3-6% of the gw2efficiency players have bounty hunter armor unlocked, why not go for it? Guild missions could also fit the bill, but they are so stale by now.

>

> because it's cheaper to get it through the WvW/PvP reward track. There is an argument about opportunity cost in there but I am not going to bother.

> There is no value in having the recipe unlocked because there is no reason to craft more than once.

>

> > Junundu Rising is another example of an event that scales well and also gives solid rewards, with the chance for a jackpot drop.

>

> but that is partly because so few people do it so there is a very tiny supply

>

>

> > @"hellsqueen.3045" said:

> > ooh. This is definitely an interesting idea.

> > Maybe update the map rewards to incorporate this sort of idea where you earn everything on an exp based system rather than the weird event bonus they have now and then make sure maps offer exclusive rewards to rare materials or highly sort after material and shuffle them around. EG. Offer linen or wool on a map and shuffle that to different core maps frequently, low level matieral is a highly sort after for a higher level players and yet it is harder to get than the higher tier mats.

>

> That would solve nothing. This is like having a pile of dirt under the rug and instead of cleaning it up you are just moving it around under the rug. No matter how you move it that pile of dirt is still there. You also can't have guaranteed predictable rewards on frequent rotation that is also rare. It stops being rare very quickly.

>

>

 

Congrats, you win the prize for the least helpful post in this thread. How about your ideas to address OP's question?

[ugrakarma.9416]

Compared to other MMOs the guild wars up that goes well in that matter. When I played Neverwinter, 99% of the maps were uninhabited full-time, except for some that involved dailies and only . This is the default for most MMOS, maps that are only used during the character's up level

 

In GW2 the meta-system, and the achievments spread on maps reduce this effect.

[kharmin.7683]

> @"gateless gate.8406" said:

> Some of the major reasons HoT metas continue to be popular are: 1) Chance at infusion drops, and 2) materials for legendaries (crystalline ore, amalgamated gemstone, gift of maguuma mastery). PoF metas, as far as I know, have lower raw gold-per-hour and don't drop anything required for legendaries. In other words, the rewards are completely imbalanced. I guess ANet considers that fine? Who knows why.

 

Who knows why? Maybe because not everyone wants what HoT has to offer, so ANet has made alternative content?

[Rasimir.6239]

> @"hellsqueen.3045" said:

> > @"Rasimir.6239" said:

> > > @"hellsqueen.3045" said:

> > > I am of the personal opinion that by making metas more equally a profitable experience but giving them the Istan treatment of only being profitable once a day, you end up forcing people into finding other profitable materials to fill the new gaps in their schedules.

> > Your suggestion could work in a perfect world, but we're dealing with everyday humans here. Most of the maps and metas that are frequented by many are being played not because they are objectively the "best" but rather because of a variety of subjective reasons.

> >

> > Serpent's Ire is a great example. Mechanically it's not harder than many of the popular metas (anyone remember the outcry about the Chak Gerent meta in the early days of HoT?), but there's an opinion circulating among the playerbase that it's "impossible", reducing the amount of people even trying to run it, and subsequently reducing the amount of people that learn the mechanics enough to carry those that haven't grasped them yet. It's a vicious cycle, as without participation, the playerbase as a whole won't develop enough knowledge and skill to give this meta a good enough chance to succeed to get people to play and learn it. As long as it keeps that way, it will never be profitable in any sense since it's too prone to failure.

>

> Serpent's Ire isn't hard, but it needs more people and it needs those people to be coordinated to complete it, just like Triple Trouble but with even more emphasis on taking particular skills. It isn't hard more than it is just an inconvenience to do because of it's design.

> You won't find people to do it unless you have a large guild to run it and give people the roles required and tell people the skills to take to successfully complete it.

> Making Metas that force people to need to heavily coordinate with each other rather than just requiring them to group up and do the event as they appear the way AB or TD do is the mistake they made in designing Serpent's Ire.

>

> > Another example are all of those people farming Istan and Silverwastes because those are the meta events to gain gold, but never checking how to actually make gold from them. A lot of those people would end up with as much if not more gold if they played other maps with their playstyle, but they blindly follow what's said to be "the best" without realising there's much more to it than just showing up for the event on time.

>

> Then that is a fault of a person not doing their research into the meta, that being said those people are still all joining the map that they think are making them the most profit even if they are doing it wrong. So they follow and therefore abandon other maps in favour of the one everyone else is doing for profit.

>

> > Forcing people into this or that playstyle never works. I know a lot of people accuse ANet of forcing them into different playstyles, but unless it's something that's vastly out of sync with the rest of the game (like the original AB multiloot, the initial Istan even, or even the recent Kourna multiloot exploit) all of their changes are really more of a nudge to check out other parts of the game than outright invalidating of playstyle. Besides the fact that it is debatable if doing the same small set of events for hours on end can be called a playstyle to begin with ;) .

>

> I don't think it could be called a playstyle because a playstyle generally involves the way you utilise a character and not so much the way you explore and earn money in an MMO.

>

> > This game is built on the foundation that you should always be happy to see other players around. We don't have kill stealing, we don't have node stealing, and we certainly don't want to have people make a fuss because other people show up at "their" event and reduce the rewards. If you want people to spread out, try to learn some of the less frequented events, advertise them in the lfg (and possibly spread the word on some of the city map chats if you're tackling something interesting), and get people to realize that there's shinies and fun to be had all over the world. The more people are introduced to mechanics, the easier the events will be, and the more populated they will end up in the long run.

>

> There is a reason the most profitable maps are run frequently and other content left abandoned. Farmers have no reason to spread to other content. You have to give them a reason to leave the maps more often in favour of other maps without completely making the other map redundant. We have world boss trains, meta event trains would cause people to run things once and then find other content they can farm.

>

> Turn the map bonus into an exp based map reward track that actually offers things like wool and linen for players could attract more attention to maps, low level mats will more likely attract high level players. Unless you are giving them good Lodestones and T6 mats, the lower tier loot is harder to obtain.

>

> > There's something interesting to be had in most if not all events. Things like the [endless Djinn tonic](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Endless_Djinn_Tonic "endless Djinn tonic"), the [specialization minis](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mini_Holosmith_Baraz_Sharifi "specialization minis"), or [very rare skins](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Berserker%27s_Lightward%27s_Battlestaff " very rare skins") are of interest to many people, and often it only takes one person to take charge to get many to join in and produce a snowball effect.

>

> Those are odd items that people may desire but this isn't really loot that will get people to stick around for very long. It isn't loot you farm for profit really.

> For example, I do metas for the salvage loot.

> I don't desire tonics all that much. I can get plenty of other tonics and not waste time on one Djinn Tonic.

> I could just buy that mini off the TP for 2 gold, which time I spend doing loot runs make me way more gold than what could be made going out of my way to earn that mini.

> There are tons of exotic skins out there and rare ones at that, the one you linked can drop from the Dragon Stand final boss chest, which is a meta people actually run and is a bad example. Otherwise it comes from airship cargo which you can run around opening and not involving yourself in events and spreading yourself around.

> Tons of exotics drop from just doing the stuff you are already farming, this doesn't spread people around.

> This wouldn't work.

 

And your point?

 

You pretty much rephrased what I already said: the other metas are neither hard nor intrinsically bad, but people tend to flock to what they perceive to be best, not what objectively is best. You won't change that behavior by fiddling with rewards, dailies, or whatever else. (Many) people don't want to spread out, they want to play what they perceive to be best reward for least effort, and if everybody else is doing it, it must be THE best thing, right?

 

Just accept that a lot of people just go where others go, because those that look like they've got a purpose sure know what they're doing, right? Just like people aimlessly standing in WvW spawn because they see no commander they can follow without thinking, just like people piling up on a commander tag in VB nighttime despite that being really counter-productive to the meta, there's thousands of examples. They're just being people, and no matter how you change events and rewards around, there will always be many that prefer to follow others instead of thinking for themselves and taking responsability for what they do in game.

 

For some, "optimal rewards" are a draw, for some "fun tonics and rare skins" are a draw, but for many it's just following where others go. This game does a really good job at keeping rewards comparable across the game world and allowing a ton of different ways to play the game and still come away with similar worth. People (in general) obviously can't cope with that choice, but taking away the choice to force people to play in different ways certainly isn't the way to change this.

[Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497]

Bringing back the collections for legendaries. BUT INSTEAD of making them a grindy mess where the collection empties a players wallet, or forces them to grind out a bunch of materials. Five them genuinely difficult challenges that they must comolete with increasing difficulty per tier.

[gateless gate.8406]

> @"kharmin.7683" said:

> > @"gateless gate.8406" said:

> > Some of the major reasons HoT metas continue to be popular are: 1) Chance at infusion drops, and 2) materials for legendaries (crystalline ore, amalgamated gemstone, gift of maguuma mastery). PoF metas, as far as I know, have lower raw gold-per-hour and don't drop anything required for legendaries. In other words, the rewards are completely imbalanced. I guess ANet considers that fine? Who knows why.

>

> Who knows why? Maybe because not everyone wants what HoT has to offer, so ANet has made alternative content?

 

Alternative content? It needs to be roughly as rewarding or participation numbers will always be very skewed. It doesn't necessarily need to involve large meta events like HoT. They could link the gold gain / legendary materials / etc to something like bounties, but they don't.