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Would 'alliances' really work?


JTGuevara.9018

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First off, I don't think they're coming so let's get that out of the way... But honestly, do people actually think they're going to work? I don't. And here's why:

1.) It's not much different than server links -- Servers already get partially restructured every 2 months with server links. Guilds across servers already get put into a de-facto alliance, it's just not called an alliance. If anything, the 'alliance' system is just a more souped up version of server links. The population imbalance will still persist. If anything, it will be worse.

2.)Players and guilds won't change -- Try-hard players and guilds will still find a way to bandwagon and game the system. Instead of server stacking, it will be alliance stacking instead. You can have the best matchmaking system in the world for world restructuring that takes different metrics and statistics in mind, but it doesn't mean jack if players just stack the winning alliances and losing or struggling alliances don't show up due to attrition, demoralization, etc. This situation makes things harder for smaller guilds and alliances that are trying to resist them.

3.) Guilds will have too much power -- Alliances will eventually consolidate into powerhouses limited only by the yet to be proposed alliance cap, dominating smaller ones either through victories, bandwagons, or both. So, as with the current server stacking and through historical bandwagons over the years, attrition eventually sets in as smaller guilds desperately try to resist the stacked alliances and people leave or quit WvW entirely out of frustration. Again, it's no different than the current situation. It will be Blackgate all over again but with guild alliances. Due to people quitting, the matching system will get to the point where it cannot find an opposing alliance of equivalent strength, so the system breaks down.

Thoughts to this?

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Yes we know, we came to the same conclusion idk like 2 years ago. It's likely something anet came to the same conclusion about. At best I think they might try and roll the alliance technology that was worked on into a new pvp format. I'm on the fence about that too though coughstrongholdcough.

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For a long time, I just wanted to see alliances. I wanted to see the groundwork for something that could be improved upon if needed. Yet, my expectation for this perfect, new system remained low. None the less, I find starting the groundwork more valuable, so I am not against Alliances personally.

  • First, Anet should decide if they want WvW to be competitive. I'm sorry but winning a match due to better coverage is dull, uninspiring, and pathetic, to say the least. Personally, I believe Anet wants WvW to be more competitive with mentioning Alliances. To put it simply, creating a more competitive environment can drive up motivation in general. So, I am all for this general mindset.

  • I think they need to look at the current system for what it is and not nessarily try to work around it. For instance, the match times . . . They run 24/7 basically until each reset. Even if someone had no life . . . That person would still have to eat, sleep, and take an occasional shit in their toilet. If this current timeframe continues, then there needs to a type of cap to allow for a more competitive environment, hopefully.

  • The final thing I want to say, to keep this response short, is that we have not been updated with Alliances in a long time. Additionally, Alliances were never finalized with concrete grounds for initial implementation. Therefore, me, commenting on what may or may not work now . . . may be irrelevant as to what Alliances actually are today since its brief, initial conception. Even if what Alliances amount to today is nothing.

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There's a huge difference between servers and guilds. The reason given for aliances working is that guilds are more granular. Servers are all roughly the same size but some guilds are smaller, some are bigger, some people play solo, some people play with bigger guilds. There are obvious differences between servers and guilds. There are far more guilds in far more varying sizes allowing more pieces to fill in gaps.

It all depends on how good the algorthym is that figures out not just how many people are playing but when they play.

And it won't be perfect obviously but I don't see how it can not be better than it is now.

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Honestly? No.Guilds will still be free to bandwagon, and some guilds are just way larger than others.Some people have specific small scale Guilds.And ultimately, nothing is stopping a player from being in 5 different Guilds.

Honestly the easiest way to balance WvW population is to shuffle entire populations of players against their will.One month yu can be part of x World, the other month yu will be with another World.

No such thing as Server loyalty in present WvW because people kept changing servers and bandwagoning.

Alternatively, yu can have what ESO has, with 3 static Blanket factions which players join on to fight.Then whatever Guild gets attached to 1 faction for a Week, while solo players get put into whichever faction which needs more numbers.

Guild members that join in on reset get to stay in their selected Faction for the entire week, while people who join during a week are given the "merc" treatment and shuffled into whatever side needs more players for the entire week. (yur own fault for missing reset)

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Alliances when!?

Oh, likely not. But at this point part of the meme is about how ANet ignores the game mode, lies to us, and leads us on.

At this point most of us would be happy with them just coming out and saying, "Hey, we know we talked about this 2 years ago, but the project has been dropped." Because at least then it would be honest communication.

At this point I don't really want it, because they will figure out a way to monetize it like they did build templates. I am pretty sure part of the reason it was dropped was because they didn't think it would get as much gem sales as the bandwagoners get them now.

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They will release it along with the expasion that will come with balanced non-powercreeped classes and Warclaw will be usable only in EBG so maybe people come back to this dead gamemode that every single time i come back i have to move to a high pop server cuz the server i was in is completely dead outside peak times.Holy shit i love gw2

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i think the main thing alliances will be able to do is relocate solo players and smaller guilds to servers to give them adequate population. it gives them more control to balance out population. as long as they stack the 3 biggest alliances together, like they do with the current systems servers, i think things will remain relatively the same.

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No, it won't work. The main reason is that there is not enough population.

We barely have enough population to fill 12 servers. So, at the maximum, we will have enough population to fill 12 alliances... With so few participants, it's not very fun.

Also, an alliances would be too big. The goal of an alliance would be to create a sense of community. But, to create a sense of community you have to know the other players and the amount of players needed to fill all 4 maps is way too big to know nearly everyone, or even a decent portion of the players in your alliance. You will basically be fighting with strangers...

The requirement to fill 4 maps, instead of 1, doomed WvW from the start.

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Yes.

Alliances helping with scoring/population imbalance was meant to be a first step. That wasn't the heart of the motivation for it. The key thing alliances fixes is that I SHOULD NOT HAVE TO TELL MY FRIENDS THEY NEED TO SPEND MONEY TO TRANSFER TO MY SERVER (If it's not full) TO PLAY WITH ME.

For a mode about working together, the fact people cannot easily play with others without it, at best, being locked behind a paywall is by and far the biggest detriment to the mode bar none.

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@God.2708 said:I SHOULD NOT HAVE TO TELL MY FRIENDS THEY NEED TO SPEND MONEY TO TRANSFER TO MY SERVER (If it's not full) TO PLAY WITH ME.

For a mode about working together, the fact people cannot easily play with others without it, at best, being locked behind a paywall is by and far the biggest detriment to the mode bar none.

Totally agree with that but the easy fix would be to make server transfer free.

I want them free, but I doubt ANET will want to make them free. Maybe, if enough ask for it.

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@Gudradain.3892 said:No, it won't work. The main reason is that there is not enough population.

That is what makes it so Allianced MAY work. Population flux is what can make this potentially successful.

We barely have enough population to fill 12 servers. So, at the maximum, we will have enough population to fill 12 alliances... With so few participants, it's not very fun.

For starters, it would be likely 2 alliances per ‘world’

And the number of ‘worlds’ will be dependent on overall population. So, there may only be 9 worlds (3tiers) or there may be more if enough people (5 tiers etc)

Also, an alliances would be too big. The goal of an alliance would be to create a sense of community. But, to create a sense of community you have to know the other players and the amount of players needed to fill all 4 maps is way too big to know nearly everyone, or even a decent portion of the players in your alliance. You will basically be fighting with strangers...

So, an ‘Alliance’ of 500 people would be too big?

And again, one alliance wouldn’t have to fill 4 maps. Likely it would be two alliances with some unaffiliated guilds and random single players that would make up a ‘world’

The requirement to fill 4 maps, instead of 1, doomed WvW from the start.

It really didn’t. But maybe at some point in the future that would change.

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@Strider Pj.2193 said:

@"Gudradain.3892" said:

For starters, it would be likely 2 alliances per ‘world’

And the number of ‘worlds’ will be dependent on overall population. So, there may only be 9 worlds (3tiers) or there may be more if enough people (5 tiers etc)

A strong argument for alliance is to create an identity the players can relate to. If you just do "alliance-link" you just killed alliance identity just like server-link killed server identity.

Also, having very few worlds will never create an healthy competitive scene. There will be worlds (alliances) stronger and everyone will know which one and there will be weaker worlds and everyone will know which one. As soon as the matchup begin, you already know: "Ok this world will win, and this one will lose".

You need more worlds and smaller worlds to create an healthy and interesting competitive scene.

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For starters, it would be likely 2 alliances per ‘world’

And the number of ‘worlds’ will be dependent on overall population. So, there may only be 9 worlds (3tiers) or there may be more if enough people (5 tiers etc)

A strong argument for alliance is to create an identity the players can relate to. If you just do "alliance-link" you just killed alliance identity just like server-link killed server identity.

You would identify with your alliance. (If you choose to be in one).

Also, having very few worlds will never create an healthy competitive scene.

You said earlier it would be ‘too big’ to create relationships with people yet, when I note they are smaller than servers, you say it won’t work.,

There will be worlds (alliances) stronger and everyone will know which one and there will be weaker worlds and everyone will know which one. As soon as the matchup begin, you already know: "Ok this world will win, and this one will lose".

Of course their will be alliances stronger than others. Just like our current tier system. And you don’t know that now?

You need more worlds and smaller worlds to create an healthy and interesting competitive scene.

Which prevents people from having coverage and creates empty maps.

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@Strider Pj.2193 said:

You would identify with your alliance. (If you choose to be in one).

You said earlier it would be ‘too big’ to create relationships with people yet, when I note they are smaller than servers, you say it won’t work.,

No, it won't work.

Yes, you chose your alliance but if a world is a combination of alliance that constantly change then the whole alliance idea is pointless. You can't create an identity as a world when most of the players you play with are chosen randomly and will change in a few weeks. The current server-link system is proof enough that it doesn't work. It's not because you give it a new name and redo the exact same thing that it's suddenly better.

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To the OP:

  • will there be ‘gaming the system? Yes
  • Will there be population disparity? Yes
  • Will coverage still rule? Yes

But ask yourself: how does a guild actually recruit players for WvW?

The current system encourages those guild to bandwagon to open servers, recruit people from those servers and their links, while making the jump again , to open servers to recruit.

With alliances, if someone sees your guild and they like it, and the guild has space, they can select that guild for WvW selection so during the next world formation, they go with the guild.

Anet has effectively crippled Guilds in WvW. They need to give something back.

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The biggest change the alliance system would have done is spread out the pug population and maybe smaller guilds, so it would have affected servers as big as blackgate at the time. Time zones sorting weren't even going to be in initial release, so overnight time zone stacking would still be a problem anyways.

Guilds and their alliances would be together regardless of the system in place, unless they plan on shutting down transfers... lmao yeah right. They're better off just not bothering with alliances at this point and maybe work on better incentives for guilds and commanders, maybe even do eotm system with all the maps instead. Kinda pointless talking about this stuff anyways.

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To be honest, we dont even know if they would keep the initial iteration they gave when they presented the project, if they actually did it.It's gone to the point that Alliance coming soon for 2 years is not meme worthy, memes are meant to be funny. This is just sad.

It would help guilds actually playing across servers together aaaaaand I think that's it ? You mention it in 3 that guilds will have too much power but honestly, they already Have all the power. It'll always be the same guilds getting in the same objectives and defending said objectives. It'll still be the same guilds leading kill trains. What might change is that it may -potentially- lead to newer guilds on the scene if it's easier for them to play together.

All of this is purely hypothetical due to how little is known and honestly the 2 year (Isn't that closer to 3 now btw ?) has all but voided any possible hype players may have had on the matter.

Edit : Yeeeeup... 3 years ...

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