population balance

[Junkpile.7439]

If alliance idea is balance population why one team have huge amount players and other teams are outnumbered. Maybe fix things while beta is on?

[kamikharzeeh.8016]

maybe ur just on the wrong map lel.

 

beta sofar on EU griffonfall (blues),  seven pines (our server) had literally content till 3am today, started again at 10am~ and still going with constant tags, its 3am atm. most of the strongest EU guilds are stacked in our matchup on blues and us, so quite balanced.

 

[idk greens name in our matchup, but that world seems to be full of roamers and ppters. kinda makes sense, as they are also having a ton of play hours/activity count, but normally are used to leech content from some organized groups fighting - i don't think they atm have any coordinated groups in their matchups, they only ppt and roam-gank around]

 

also, ofc, people who avoid the community discords at all cost will NEVER know where people play atm. there's always again "outnumbered" if a blob jumps maps - be it leaving or entering.

[Atrom.1564]

Not all teams are balanced, just like last beta, sadly.

[Zok.4956]

27 minutes ago, kamikharzeeh.8016 said:

beta sofar on EU griffonfall (blues),  seven pines (our server) had literally content till 3am today, started again at 10am~ and still going with constant tags, its 3am atm. most of the strongest EU guilds are stacked in our matchup on blues and us, so quite balanced.

 

[idk greens name in our matchup, but that world seems to be full of roamers and ppters. kinda makes sense, as they are also having a ton of play hours/activity count, but normally are used to leech content from some organized groups fighting - i don't think they atm have any coordinated groups in their matchups, they only ppt and roam-gank around]

 

Reading before writing could have helped. 😎. The name of green team in your match-up is Titan's Staircase - thats where I am.

What I have seen from red (seven pines) team until now (blue team not so much) is either a few uncoordinated and frightened roamers that try to pew pew or very big blobs/zergs where it is just numbers and skill does not matter.  But please, do not turn this much more into a matchup thread.

 

Sure, there are a lot of uncoordinated players and such on all maps. But there still seems to be a big population imbalance issue. 

 

[kamikharzeeh.8016]

@Zok.4956 well, i don't extra log in to check the name, tell me what that has to do with "reading before writing" eh. i won't login extra before posting just so i can put the ppt alliances' world in.

 

u guys simply hide most of the day and miss that we been bvb against greens several times instead of ppt-botting our blob across the maps, i guess? blues and us each have an allianceguild in the matchup with each over 210 players, lel. [JA] and [Chad]... if u have anything alike, tell them to come for fights.

 

everytime we get a 30ish group, we just overrun the greens on EBG. kinda boring, so then com tag down obviously, as there's no opposition.

but don't worry, i'm sure you'll see some [JA] in your keeps for the ritual keepfarming later this week. weekends are mostly for blobfightcontent as it has the most players online during that time.

[Zok.4956]

5 hours ago, kamikharzeeh.8016 said:

u guys simply hide most of the day and miss that we been bvb against greens several times instead of ppt-botting our blob across the maps, i guess? blues and us each have an allianceguild in the matchup with each over 210 players, lel. [JA] and [Chad]... if u have anything alike, tell them to come for fights.

 

Yesterday evening we had a full squad on one (or two?) maps for a few hours. first fights were fun, but then blue and red just vanished. We even took their keeps but they did not come back to us and they hide somewhere else.

Good for you, I guess, that you (and according to you also blue) have a big organized allianceguild in your team that dominates the team during the time your are playing and that has the coverage and numbers to be able to blob the maps. But not all teams have that "luxury" all the time.

Thats the core of this thread: Population is still not balanced. 

 

P.S. And to EBG ... well ... EBG is just EOTM V2 most of the time.

[Junkpile.7439]

So in first beta balance was bad and in this beta balance is just one big joke. Usually you fix last beta problems in next beta. Here things just go worse. Scary think how bad balance is in alliance launch.

[Flori.2194]

12 hours ago, kamikharzeeh.8016 said:

blues and us each have an allianceguild in the matchup with each over 210 players, lel. [JA] and [Chad]

And that's the big problem, if none of the baffoons of this useless "alliance guild" is online, we are outnumbered everywhere and left with some roamers. Seven Pines is losing in ppt AND ppk and that's not really balanced... 

[Sirius.4510]

Yeah, there does seem to be something screwy with the population this time around. Seemed pretty even in the matchup I got for the first beta, though that may not have been everyone's experience.

This time I see a matchup between Thornwatch (red), Giant's Rise (blue) and Phoenix Dawn (green). About 40 hours in, Blue has won over half the skirmishes, Green the remainder, and Red has yet to win a single skirmish and is usually in dead last.

I'm sure you can explain some of the gap by player quality, but a gap that large seems implausible - it seems like they have a lot fewer players, somehow.

[kamikharzeeh.8016]

10 hours ago, Flori.2194 said:

And that's the big problem, if none of the baffoons of this useless "alliance guild" is online, we are outnumbered everywhere and left with some roamers. Seven Pines is losing in ppt AND ppk and that's not really balanced... 

its pretty odd to ppt during beta, nobody really cares about HBL as it is red /desert border. obviously, if u play not during EU times, nobody will be around. and saturday been like over 8 hour long fights, if not more. first on GBL or BBL, gvg spot and then on eotm map center.

 

idk who is dying all the time, we'll have one of the strongest blobs and many of the best players currently there.

 

afaik anets algorithm simply put the balance by "played hours = activity count". and by that these worlds been created.

 

numberwise it kinda is maybe a bit unbalanced, as we usually don't have huge queues. i didn't log a lot into my alt to check if we really have thaaat small Q compared to other matchups.

 

but i think we again have the aequivalent of 5 tiers, which is simply not good for EU. should rather be 4 tiers.

[Dawdler.8521]

11 hours ago, Sirius.4510 said:

I'm sure you can explain some of the gap by player quality, but a gap that large seems implausible - it seems like they have a lot fewer players, somehow.

Is it really though? I mean a team that is consistently 5% better than second place and 10% better than third will win every single skirmish. Unless Anet actually tells us what the population is, we wont know. And they'll never give us numbers for that.

I still think that alot of this is due to the fact we're ignoring tiers and overall strength of the server population. A gap can be that large by very little cause - I've seen matchups decided by a couple guilds of ~5-10 because the servers they fight hate DBL so they can just dominate.

[trignich.7523]

I have to agree that the population in this beta feels weird. I'm more of a solo player who occasionally joins a tag to get bigger objectives but since I play in the morning (off hours for EU) there is barely anyone. I get chased to death when I try to go cap a camp next to the spawn point.

I'm on the Seven Pine server mentioned above and it's good to hear there is some bigger guild running around bc I thought I was put together with all the other players without a guild to form some roamer server that imo would stand no chance against a orginized guild.

Anyway won't be playing much this week and will wait for the actual alliance and how the matchmaking will work for no guild ppl. I don't care who I play for but I would like to not be spawn camped even in off hours, which I think is the goal of the aliance, to make the population more even so one server isn't "dead".

[SweetPotato.7456]

On 1/15/2022 at 10:05 PM, Junkpile.7439 said:

If alliance idea is balance population why one team have huge amount players and other teams are outnumbered. Maybe fix things while beta is on?

In my observation the match system is placing  us with the player
that has the "same playstyle" in the same team.  If you are not players that play in a big 50 players squad (mega guild),  
you will never see activities when alliance launch. Hence why we are experiencing "emptiness" in wvw,
because according to the matching system, the team is full,
(500 players per team, so they must have put 500 on every team already)
but it's filled with the same type of players, therefore we don't see any activities,
those activities are being team with the other "same playstyle" players on another team.
 
What the matching system
cannot achieve or understand is that
a healthy team needs players of all playstyles,
on different time zone.

1) The players who are happy with alliance beta are most probably all in mega guilds
(speculation, but who would feel left out or outnumbered
if they have a mega 50 players squad wiping the other team, right?!  Right.)

2) Those that does not like the alliance are the roamers and small guild who get use as fillers.
Loosing all identity and familiarity that was build up for the pass 9 years.
Can't even scout correctly since I don't know who the heck is on the other team

3) The players that don't care are those small squad off hour ppt-ing type,
that has one tag flipping stuffs and doesn't respond to defend or fight.  

That is why people think this matching system is a success if they are not #2 and 3. 

my speculation of what the playstyle matching system is base on
playing as a single player
playing in squad of 5-10 players
playing in squad of 10-20 players
playing in squad of 30-40 players
playing in mega squads

because I don't see how they can know or want to track who you play with.
That's the part where you select your guild comes in, 
 that doesn't really solve the problem of the who you play with, 
since i can be in guild A and playing with players who are in guild B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K,L, M, N, O, P 

 

Edited January 17, 2022 by SweetPotato.7456

[Flori.2194]

7 hours ago, kamikharzeeh.8016 said:

its pretty odd to ppt during beta, nobody really cares about HBL as it is red /desert border. obviously, if u play not during EU times, nobody will be around. and saturday been like over 8 hour long fights, if not more. first on GBL or BBL, gvg spot and then on eotm map center.

That's the thing: this is not WvW. You just want to fight, go for it. But it does nothing for the game mode itself, it doesn't help your team winning a match etc. That's why the balance is kittened up. You guys take 5% of the game mode and only do that while the rest of us tries to do the other 95% but we fail miserably because we are lacking the numbers. 

[Flori.2194]

7 hours ago, kamikharzeeh.8016 said:

many of the best players currently there.

And you should be more precise please: We have many of the best fighters currently in our team. They are not the best WvW-players. If they were we wouldn't be last place with such a big gap to the second place.

[achkira.2907]

Your system is just a joke.

Balancing? Where ?  When ? 
Thornwatch is still outnumbered, eb, rbl, bbl, gbl. Match up ends on Sunday evening.

[Strider Pj.2193]

1 hour ago, achkira.2907 said:

Your system is just a joke.

Balancing? Where ?  When ? 
Thornwatch is still outnumbered, eb, rbl, bbl, gbl. Match up ends on Sunday evening.

It’s a beta to work though how team assignment is done.  It’s not alliances.

 

There has been no alliance formation as of yet, so as far as matchups, it’s not indicative of how it will be.

 

This week was more like a typical ‘relink’ week where matchups are off.  The difference being, this only lasts a week.  
 

 

[kamikharzeeh.8016]

3 hours ago, Flori.2194 said:

That's the thing: this is not WvW. You just want to fight, go for it. But it does nothing for the game mode itself, it doesn't help your team winning a match etc. That's why the balance is kittened up. You guys take 5% of the game mode and only do that while the rest of us tries to do the other 95% but we fail miserably because we are lacking the numbers. 

 

2 hours ago, Flori.2194 said:

And you should be more precise please: We have many of the best fighters currently in our team. They are not the best WvW-players. If they were we wouldn't be last place with such a big gap to the second place.

these posts just tell that u don't really understand Wvw. the mode is dusty and rusty as hell. nobody that got experience with it still cares about the points per tick score. it's worthless.

 

"winning" matches doesn't matter. not even a tiny bit. the maps are our playground, nothing more.

 

players that know how to fight and position in larger scale combat are the only real resource in Wvw. lately a cowardish playstyle became more widespread, but that's also due to a lot of people waiting for EoD, i guess. surely also due to removal of the retaliation boon. it's just too easy to play cookie cutter crap builds atm.

 

u don't lack numbers, like 90% of the population is extremly casual and views ppt score as the aim, due to lacking the real experience of playing Wvw with a coordinated group.

 

anet removed tournaments to make people LESS focus on ppt. yet this was in ? 2014, and people forget the problems apparently. due to not getting useful changes within the format, there is still really people thinking ppt score is what matters in Wvw.

 

@trignich.7523 well, the prime times in EU start at roughly 1800 and go till 2300, sometimes smaller groups continue till 2am. guildraids are usually 2000-2200 ~

most tags run closed (hidden tag) because they perform movement that pugs cannot survive anyways due to lack of support classes.

afaik nobody of us plays during earlier day. most people in EU work there. mostly randoms log into early hour content normally, and thats nearly exclusively ppt groups, doing their karmatrain stuff. few guilds also, but those are none worth really naming. it's more roleplaying if u guildraid during superdead times.

but ye, i guess Seven Pines got numerically less players in, idk. if ur willing to go on voice, u can always join the closed runs (discord).

 

 

 

 

Edited January 17, 2022 by kamikharzeeh.8016

[Ged Kealmen.7210]

On 1/15/2022 at 6:05 AM, Junkpile.7439 said:

If alliance idea is balance population why one team have huge amount players and other teams are outnumbered. Maybe fix things while beta is on?

 

It depends. I've not yet seen specific info on what it is they are testing in this last Beta. They might be testing the team assignment issues or who knows what, but not necessarily pop balance.

Having said that, I agree that pop balance is completely wrong. As a roamer, twice now I've been Beta assigned to what turns out to be the crappiest team in a match BY FAR. And this "by far" is the issue, I don't think we've won a single skirmish yet. Not only that, but it seems like this team got virtually no large groups assigned to it. We seem to be mostly made out of noob roamers, noob tags, and unskilled fighters with a tendency to die instantly when engaging or run away as fast as they can. 

It makes me think that maybe as a single roamer we just get chucked into the "whatever's left after assigning the other teams" team, which doesn't speak well for whatever Anet is doing to spread out the population. If single players are meant to fill the gaps after large guilds/alliances are spread out as evenly as possible, this is definitely not evidence of that being done correctly.

[trignich.7523]

23 minutes ago, kamikharzeeh.8016 said:

@trignich.7523 well, the prime times in EU start at roughly 1800 and go till 2300, sometimes smaller groups continue till 2am. guildraids are usually 2000-2200 ~

most tags run closed (hidden tag) because they perform movement that pugs cannot survive anyways due to lack of support classes.

afaik nobody of us plays during earlier day. most people in EU work there. mostly randoms log into early hour content normally, and thats nearly exclusively ppt groups, doing their karmatrain stuff. few guilds also, but those are none worth really naming. it's more roleplaying if u guildraid during superdead times.

but ye, i guess Seven Pines got numerically less players in, idk. if ur willing to go on voice, u can always join the closed runs (discord).

 

I think we have a different ways of enjoying WvW. I like runing around, taging camps, killing enemies 1v1 - you seem to prefer organized GvG fights. I tried those and didn't like them at all, I'm not interested in joining voice, learning blob fighting strategies. I'm not saying that either of those are good or bad way to play WvW, just that different ppl enjoy diffrent things.

But it seems the current matchmaking system works better for ppl like you, who want to fight big with guild, while some of us more solo players are either put all together and no blob appears or we are on server where the main guild will do just GvG for few hours in the evening and then log off. On my current server (UW) we get some early morning ppt squads, so I know if there is annoying enemy blob I can just call them over. On this new server I have no idea how it works, what ppl are there, and it seems morning is just not their time (btw I'm in CET timezone, I just prefer playing mornings).

With servers I could notice which one is active in morning or which is focused on GvG and join the one I liked more. Now I would need to search for a guild instead, I guess?

[Ged Kealmen.7210]

Another factor for midweek population imbalance are the effects of morale breakdown after a couple of days of noobish players participating in a clearly skill-imbalanced matchup. People get tired of being rolled over and stop playing until Beta is over and they can go back to the relative safety of their usual teams' zergs.

So then you can add increased pop imbalance to the original skill imbalance.

[Sylosi.6503]

 

2 hours ago, kamikharzeeh.8016 said:

...few guilds also, but those are none worth really naming. it's more roleplaying...

 

No guilds are worth naming, because as a skilled, competitive PvP game WvW is a joke, to pretend otherwise is simply more roleplaying.

Edited January 17, 2022 by Sylosi.6503

[Sirius.4510]

On 1/16/2022 at 9:51 PM, Dawdler.8521 said:

Is it really though? I mean a team that is consistently 5% better than second place and 10% better than third will win every single skirmish. Unless Anet actually tells us what the population is, we wont know. And they'll never give us numbers for that.

I get what you're saying, but it's not a 10% difference in this case - currently third place's cumulative war score is 26% behind first place and 20% behind second place. Which is actually an improvement over where it was at the 2-day mark where it was 31% behind first place. And it has finally won one skirmish (out of 39 so far). But most of the time it struggles to hold two keeps.

If we have a large group of randomly-chosen players, it seems implausible to me you could draw a group that much worse. This is more like what I've seen in regular WvW where the population gap is very significant.

(Part of the reason I got suspicious was seeing the "Outnumbered" effect pop on home BL about 2-3 hours after the beta started, not long after all four maps were queued... but there are other reasons that could have happened, e.g. everyone jumping on EBG as fast as they could.)

 

That's not a guarantee that the population is broken, but everything about it kind of smells that way. I'm wondering if we had a few big guilds sign up but not show up, or something like that. I presume ArenaNet's algorithm thinks it's balanced.

[Strider Pj.2193]

16 minutes ago, Sirius.4510 said:

I get what you're saying, but it's not a 10% difference in this case - currently third place's cumulative war score is 26% behind first place and 20% behind second place. Which is actually an improvement over where it was at the 2-day mark where it was 31% behind first place. And it has finally won one skirmish (out of 39 so far). But most of the time it struggles to hold two keeps.

If we have a large group of randomly-chosen players, it seems implausible to me you could draw a group that much worse. This is more like what I've seen in regular WvW where the population gap is very significant.

(Part of the reason I got suspicious was seeing the "Outnumbered" effect pop on home BL about 2-3 hours after the beta started, not long after all four maps were queued... but there are other reasons that could have happened, e.g. everyone jumping on EBG as fast as they could.)

 

That's not a guarantee that the population is broken, but everything about it kind of smells that way. I'm wondering if we had a few big guilds sign up but not show up, or something like that. I presume ArenaNet's algorithm thinks it's balanced.

And in a ‘one up, one down’ scenario, that would be balance matchups after one or two weeks.  Which effectively is how it is now….
 

Except now, large guilds, AFTER the matchup is set in motion, can move thus making it take even longer to balance.  

 

Which, theoretically will be less likely to happen when alliances actually goes into effect, not this current beta system.  

 

So, the concerns about matchmaking within the beta are understandable, but not accurate to the finished product.

[Dawdler.8521]

1 hour ago, Sirius.4510 said:

I get what you're saying, but it's not a 10% difference in this case - currently third place's cumulative war score is 26% behind first place and 20% behind second place. Which is actually an improvement over where it was at the 2-day mark where it was 31% behind first place. And it has finally won one skirmish (out of 39 so far). But most of the time it struggles to hold two keeps.

Well again tiers are supposed to even out that percentage, but it wont happen at all this week. Its just random now because thats how not using tiers work.

My team has gotten 3rd almost every skirmish, yesterday primetime we lost to second place by 6 points, lol. First place was 100 points or so ahead. I thought it was kind of funny.

Edited January 18, 2022 by Dawdler.8521