Great balance this beta

[Nash.2681]

On 12/5/2022 at 9:57 PM, Believe.4251 said:

Yeah don't blame them ... just don't use the gemstore or play when in unbalanced week 🙂
It's not like the whole point of alliances was to fix stacking and server imbalances right(e.g the maguuma problem) ?

Yeah, but who could have guessed that implementing a system that erases any costs for world transfers and makes it even easier to gather the hardcore WvW players would cause imbalance? Oh wait...

[Aeolus.3615]

On 12/5/2022 at 8:41 PM, Nikola.3841 said:

 

Don't blame Anet because Maguuma put whole server into 1 guild

Dont blame the players, it's the dev's that make the rules.

 

[Demented Lemur.7861]

Honestly I feel like Anets going to have to make changes to reduce the power of mega guilds or alliances.

 

If it's not maguma it gonna be some other guild and the cycle will continue. 

 

Anet may have to make a very unpopular decision to restrict the numbers of players that can be from one guild in wvw. That way mega guilds can still have a decent amount of players together; however, they can't just control the entire map.

 

People would hate this and it would have it's own problems, but I don't see many alternatives.

 

Another option would be to reduce the amount of teams in order to condense the population but that may not fix the issue.

 

There is also the option of buffing the outnumbered buff to make being outnumber less problematic.

 

Fact is mega guilds want players on the opposing side to fight amd have fun; however, their opponents don't see the point in playing a mode where they are just outnumbered all the time. 

 

You can't force these mega guilds to dissolve so the only option is to really reduce the effect of megaguilds or make the number of players a team has not mean as much via outnumbered buff. An unpopular change is needed for this gamemode to survive.

 

For any Mega guild players out there. If you really want  a decent amount of opponents to face you have to admit that you may have to give up something that you don't want to give up

[Aeolus.3615]

On 12/5/2022 at 6:26 PM, laoshanlung.3675 said:

https://i.imgur.com/LkIzvPF.png

 

I'm speechless... peak hours.... red and blue have 0 blobs, green has 2 blobs (25-30 each) and a bunch of roamers on 3 maps taking everything =))

If this is not ANET balance at its best, I don't know what is. It's super annoying playing out number everywhere. All the organized groups/guilds for some magically reasons are all in green leaving red and blue with next to nothing

Working has intended.

 

[Aurorae Aurorum.6950]

On 12/5/2022 at 7:26 PM, laoshanlung.3675 said:

https://i.imgur.com/LkIzvPF.png

 

I'm speechless... peak hours.... red and blue have 0 blobs, green has 2 blobs (25-30 each) and a bunch of roamers on 3 maps taking everything =))

If this is not ANET balance at its best, I don't know what is. It's super annoying playing out number everywhere. All the organized groups/guilds for some magically reasons are all in green leaving red and blue with next to nothing

Pretty same 'balance' ppt scores, except blues are leading in my matchup. Worst matchup ever, blue never lost his ebg keep and never lost the ppt lead. (+200/220 ppt on average)

When one alliance is stronger than the other 2 alliances at all time, there is a serious balance issue.

I've noticed my alliance seems to be pve players/non regular wvw players mostly (very few scouts, roamers, hardly any commander, few tactic/siege usage, no communication, many unclaimed stuff ..) vs blue with very active wvw guilds.

Alliances should be sorted out so "pro" wvw guilds are mixed with "pve" guilds.

 

Edited December 7, 2022 by Aurorae Aurorum.6950

[Absurd.2947]

Most people don't even understand what alliances are about. Let's face it, everyone talks as if alliances were some magic pill that gives them an edge over players they've been bullied by. I'm sorry but bad players will keep losing to better players, alliances or not. 

[Mabi black.1824]

6 hours ago, Riba.3271 said:

Essentially to have success you will need to have 40 trained people ready before you tag up. Start from 0 and magically conjure 40 people. Good luck.

I can also tell you what I see on the other side, since we have one of these ''fighting'' guilds this beta week, when they put the tag it's because there are 40 men. They go to the enemy border where they have no facilities and they try Garry T3 rightly because there are many are organized and are on voice. So they all die 40, the second time they die again all 40, the third time they pretend to try to catch it, the fourth time they jump on another map.

Then they write if there are maps with numerical inferiority (and there are none) and then they write and complain that they do not find content or enemy groups of 40 men. In one week we did not reset 1 enemy Garry T3. My home ''Cloud'' server resets Garry T3 enemy habitually when they have those numbers and without much cinema in Ciat.

So you can have the perspective on one side and also on the other side, but it changes little.

[Dawdler.8521]

There seems to be a common theme among many of the complaints that can be summed up in two words...

"No commander."

The population is probably there its just when randomized all those brave server pride people turned out to be mostly aimless zerglings.

And then they blaim Anet.

[ande.9832]

58 minutes ago, Dawdler.8521 said:

There seems to be a common theme among many of the complaints that can be summed up in two words...

"No commander."

The population is probably there its just when randomized all those brave server pride people turned out to be mostly aimless zerglings.

And then they blaim Anet.

Just play for 1 day in my alliance, we cant upgrade our garri to t3, even if we have a voicetag there...just be in such an alliance and youll understand whats going on..but i guess youre in a high population match up..so

[Chaba.5410]

7 hours ago, Nash.2681 said:

Yeah, but who could have guessed that implementing a system that erases any costs for world transfers and makes it even easier to gather the hardcore WvW players would cause imbalance? Oh wait...

Wait, you thought the cost of transfer was some obstacle for "hardcore WvW players" to gather?

[Chaba.5410]

On 12/5/2022 at 10:26 AM, laoshanlung.3675 said:

https://i.imgur.com/LkIzvPF.png

 

I'm speechless... peak hours.... red and blue have 0 blobs, green has 2 blobs (25-30 each) and a bunch of roamers on 3 maps taking everything =))

If this is not ANET balance at its best, I don't know what is. It's super annoying playing out number everywhere. All the organized groups/guilds for some magically reasons are all in green leaving red and blue with next to nothing

Anet is placing players on teams based on their average number of playhours.  After one of the past betas, they reported that all the teams were within 4% difference in playhours to each other (as opposed to a 30% different with server links).

What would be interesting and far more informative to me would be to measure how much the actual playhours drop (if at all) on teams facing MAG.  Anet can't do much about players choosing to avoid playing when they see MAG tags.  That's a player-created imbalance.

[TheGrimm.5624]

2 hours ago, Dawdler.8521 said:

There seems to be a common theme among many of the complaints that can be summed up in two words...

"No commander."

The population is probably there its just when randomized all those brave server pride people turned out to be mostly aimless zerglings.

And then they blaim Anet.

 

I am one that uses the server pride lines to be truthful. Actually not playing as much this week because this isn't my server and there is not really any reason to try and win a beta so just popping on to take a look at the numbers and players. See even less defending during betas as well so that removes that element as well. Checking friends list see a number of regular WvWers out in other parts of the game this week as well. See a lot of low rank people out and and about chasing the call to War. Could see low ranks looking for tags, makes sense if you are in it just for the Call to War you may not be used to being tagless or running in havocs nor roaming. Could havoc or solo targets since even less defending but no point to it this week since it won't impact next week. Which to be fair to the tests, this maybe causing some of the population variations if people don't play their normal hours but some of it also might be the changes to the algorithms used to create the teams. But I wouldn't equate server pride to aimless zerglings. Its more I don't know most of these peeps, will only be with them for a week,  and does it matter if we own Stonemist or Garri even? Call To War, will draw non-WvWers in and people chasing levels but not much incentive for people fighting for their server. Why should I try and have my havoc hold a keep from a zerg since its a rental keep for the week. When roaming its even less motivating. Why take their rental keep? Betas do need to be done in production but they aren't very motivating weeks for server pride peeps since you aren't doing things to support your servers position for the week after. Makes it feel like its not worth the time. 

[TheGrimm.5624]

55 minutes ago, Chaba.5410 said:

Anet is placing players on teams based on their average number of playhours.  After one of the past betas, they reported that all the teams were within 4% difference in playhours to each other (as opposed to a 30% different with server links).

What would be interesting and far more informative to me would be to measure how much the actual playhours drop (if at all) on teams facing MAG.  Anet can't do much about players choosing to avoid playing when they see MAG tags.  That's a player-created imbalance.

 

Actually would prefer to have been placed against MAG, then might have had more motivation for the week since the roaming would have been good sport. Not against them but also not with many guilds I even have seen much of this week so even less reasons to be out there much. Would be curious how many people that are out are non-regulars and how many that didn't group are not out there as well. Not grouping outside of guild on purpose to see how the splits work and can't fault the people trying to form communities guilds but it does seem to impact the server divisions which is hopefully good data for them to consider the logic they have in place. Said before and will again, the WR project will favor those that are more organized and I still think we will see tiers define the level of recruitment and organization.  

[Chaba.5410]

Just now, TheGrimm.5624 said:

the WR project will favor those that are more organized and I still think we will see tiers define the level of recruitment and organization.  

To be honest, WvW has always favored those who are more organized.

[TheGrimm.5624]

13 minutes ago, Chaba.5410 said:

To be honest, WvW has always favored those who are more organized.

 

Not wrong but, MAG is a good example of server pride where people just know their teammates and can expect what actions they will take and still not be organized. Don't get me wrong communities will have options to form up as well and that's their best options if their server isn't into mega guilds. My server doesn't have a lot of organization either but we know what others will do and can act in tandem with those actions to get things done and back each other up. I know when certain people make callouts on home they really need a hand. I can expect some guilds to be running logistics so can support them when they make a callout or likewise havoc in the area they are working to aid as we can. I know when I can build up siege in a structure since it will be refreshed based on the guilds there and when not to since it will be gone in an hour anyway. I know Sit is going to pull the emergency waypoints when its not under attack so I can go and get free fruits, veggies and leathers and then get back on station. So again for server pride peeps beta weeks are even more kind of meh. Again they do need to be done in production but it still kind of blah weeks. I want to get thru the WR project so we can get to what comes next and see other improvements to the game mode, but when I tell others I am more of a server pride side, not joking there. I will jump into aid a 1v5 if that person has my server tag even if its means we are both going to go down. But if it means we take some of them with us, all the better, and when it turns out we take out the 5, yum yum give me some, priceless.

Edited December 7, 2022 by TheGrimm.5624
spelling

[Nikola.3841]

6 hours ago, Absurd.2947 said:

Most people don't even understand what alliances are about. Let's face it, everyone talks as if alliances were some magic pill that gives them an edge over players they've been bullied by. I'm sorry but bad players will keep losing to better players, alliances or not. 

 

That is fine, problem comes from fact that game is designed that "better" means "having more people"...I didn't have problem with zergs in DAOC... Why? Because we had tools to deal with it, my highest win was 8 vs 96, and winning vs 20-30 or even 40 was pretty often

 

Another big win for DAOC was that it was designed to force two weaker realms to fight the strongest one...GW2 is designed so two strong ones gang up on weakest one, making already bad situation even worse

Edited December 7, 2022 by Nikola.3841

[Dawdler.8521]

4 hours ago, ande.9832 said:

Just play for 1 day in my alliance, we cant upgrade our garri to t3, even if we have a voicetag there...just be in such an alliance and youll understand whats going on..but i guess youre in a high population match up..so

On red team in a matchup where green totally dominate at 200+ppt most of the time, so nope. One of the first things I saw on the weekend after reset was 2 people having difficulty killing 4 wolves while I was on a cata facetanking said wolves that they couldnt kill. Logged in just a sec to verify and yep green ticking 222 with a T3 SM they've held for the past 13 hours.

So sure whatever you guess. I dont even need the beta to tell me "what's going on". I see it every other week because you know... this is pretty kitten common in WvW. And coincidentally, people blaim Anet for it in normal WvW too and want them to do something to balance it.

Edited December 7, 2022 by Dawdler.8521

[Nash.2681]

21 hours ago, Chaba.5410 said:

Wait, you thought the cost of transfer was some obstacle for "hardcore WvW players" to gather?

Obstacle in the sense of "to prevent something"? No. But at least balling up came with a price and server population put another layer to it. So gathering up is definetly easier now than befor.

[jahaan.1405]

Blue has organized mobs??? I am on blue this week and my server never has organization, leadership or teamwork. I'm NA and as far as I can tell there has never been a strong guild presence on my side, nothing even remotely resembling an "alliance", no communications, no scouts. If someone on blue is doing this, it's never when I play. Yes true we have had a few good fights this week, but this is rare. Most of the time it's just a lot of roamers banding into loose groups for protection. At least for this WR I haven't seen the rude behavior I saw on all sides the during the last one.

Edited December 8, 2022 by jahaan.1405

[T G.7496]

These are not Alliance betas.

They are World Restructuring betas.

The distinction might seem unimportant, but I'm not sure that there is much effort in balancing the teams going on in these betas. Certainly in the way it's intended to work eventually for Alliances. It's just a mashup rn.

Even so, my own experience of the betas so far has actually been pretty fun.

kitten, it feels awkward going in to bat for Anet like that. I need a shower now.

[TheGrimm.5624]

I admit glad beta is over, that one did feel less balanced than the prior ones. Was nice to get back to the normal server groups. 

[godfat.2604]

This was indeed the most unbalanced or unpopulated beta I had comparing to the previous ones. Beside random factors pushing people away (1 week is really not very representative), I think it might be affected by:

* People are less excited about these beta which didn’t bring anything new regarding to contents comparing to the previous beta. I still recalled the very first beta was great, great population and so much activities, and that somehow declined over each beta. This should be especially true for server pride people. It should be improved next when ANet actually introduces the alliances composed with multiple guilds, which can be counted as sort of new contents. How long this excitement can last, we’ll have to see.

* This beta had the shortest notice from ANet. At best just 2 days, and only on this forum. Game messages might be bugged and I believe most of the players didn’t receive that, adding that the new team selection UI was very confusing and some reported that it caused incorrect team assignments. Whatever the reasons were, we did see a lot of guilds mentioned that they were split, that was a fact. This must stop those guilds from raiding, which should further reduce commanders showing up, and it should be easy to understand that would further reduce the activities.

I would also personally guess that they somehow changed the algorithm they’re distributing the population, based on the experience with this beta and the current link we have. I am currently on JQ and mostly playing in SEA timezone, and JQ is linked with EB which also has a huge presence of SEA players, resulting domination in SEA even against Mag, taking literally ALL objectives amongst all 4 maps. Funnily during AMER it would then be completely reversed.

I suspect they’re trying to somehow accommodate timezone in their algorithm now, even though it’s clearly done poorly. This will did cause population imbalance during specific times, and further reduced activities. It would be interesting if we can see the activities over time for each match ups to understand if this is the case.

The last point I want to make is, even when the population seemed to be balanced when it’s distributed, it can change a lot during the course. Some guilds might not like the other guilds, and if we put them on the same world, both might reduce their activities, comparing to when they’re operating alone in each of their own worlds. The algorithm can hardly accommodate that, so we do need some time to let people get familiar with their “new world”, and let the match making algorithm does its work after the worlds have been settled, or let unhappy guilds to transfer to another world where they can operate better on their own. All those take time to get to a stabilized state. Redistributing too often can only cause chaos and defeat the purpose of match making.

Edited December 10, 2022 by godfat.2604
Fix tense

[Mabi black.1824]

2 hours ago, godfat.2604 said:

The last point I want to make is, even when the population seemed to be balanced when it’s distributed, it can change a lot during the course. Some guilds might not like the other guilds, and if we put them on the same world, both might reduce their activities, comparing to when they’re operating alone in each of their own worlds. The algorithm can hardly accommodate that, so we do need some time to let people get familiar with their “new world”, and let the match making algorithm does its work after the worlds have been settled, or let unhappy guilds to transfer to another world where they can operate better on their own. All those take time to get to a stabilized state. Redistributing too often can only cause chaos and defeat the purpose of match making

I completely agree with that observation.

Ps. In this beta anet must have had some technical problems surely, in fact the beta 5 had numbers much but much more balanced

[Mabi black.1824]

On 12/7/2022 at 6:25 PM, Chaba.5410 said:

Wait, you thought the cost of transfer was some obstacle for "hardcore WvW players" to gather?

This observation of yours ( however correct ) does not justify anything. I mean if the new mechanics brings with it some unexpected problem, it is better to say it and reason together a possible solution. 

[Cyninja.2954]

22 minutes ago, Mabi black.1824 said:

I completely agree with that observation.

Ps. In this beta anet must have had some technical problems surely, in fact the beta 5 had numbers much but much more balanced

 

Depends on what the goal of the beta is/was. Given nearly every tier (except for T3, which was the most balanced from a victory point perspective) saw 1 dominating world, most often far ahead of the other 2, and 2 very closely tied worlds (we are talking 2-4 victory points), maybe they were testing things with the algorithm.

 

Again for everyone who missed it, or who was to lazy to read, or who forgot:

Quote

The goal for this first phase is to ensure that the system works at scale. We’ll be keeping a close eye on player population balance, queue times, and victory point disparity.

- https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/studio-update-world-restructuring-and-the-future-of-world-vs-world/

 

We are in phase 1. Phase 1 does not necessarily mean perfect balance across all sides. In fact it probably even shouldn't if things need testing. Given a ton of back-end sorting systems still seem buggy, I would refrain from drawing any grand conclusions until we actually get to the phase where match-ups are supposed to be actually balanced.