Defense is dead

[Xenesis.6389]

26 minutes ago, TheGrimm.5624 said:

Yeah, checked home this afternoon and things were just getting papered. Won't fully blamed that on changes since its Sat afternoon but a lot less responding to defense. Not worth the frustration, just logged and will head out to another game for this afternoon.

There's more people playing, so the slow/dead times when most of the upgrading happens maybe isn't going to be so slow, plus is saturday not a weekday... 🤷‍♂️

Having said that... sor desert currently has three t3 keeps.... 🤷‍♂️

[Heibi.4251]

I can agree with the OP's pain borderland defenders feel. The problem wasn't that SMC was running out of supply, it was because players were sponging off the really high rewards for simply putting 10 supply in a wall of an objective every few minutes. The "participation" ANET was seeking to create turned into a sort of supply bot farm on defense. Most of this was in EBG of course since SMC and corresponding towers could and can hit each other constantly. So they took a more harsh answer to the problem and got rid of all the repair for rewards. Sad, they could have adjusted it or simply made it so it only doesn't happen in EBG.

[blp.3489]

Would players still fight over SMC if there were no defense rewards there?

If the same problematic repair behavior be less problematic if it were spread out over all the keeps and towers on the four maps because they aren't under constant attack?

If so, wouldn't the easy fix be to just exclude SMC from the rewards achieved by repairing instead of giving it higher rewards?  If people will fight over SMC anyway there is no need to offer bonus rewards to do so, let alone extra large bonus rewards.

That said, they should fix what else qualifies for defense participation.

[Chaos God.1639]

2 hours ago, Heibi.4251 said:

I can agree with the OP's pain borderland defenders feel. The problem wasn't that SMC was running out of supply, it was because players were sponging off the really high rewards for simply putting 10 supply in a wall of an objective every few minutes. The "participation" ANET was seeking to create turned into a sort of supply bot farm on defense. Most of this was in EBG of course since SMC and corresponding towers could and can hit each other constantly. So they took a more harsh answer to the problem and got rid of all the repair for rewards. Sad, they could have adjusted it or simply made it so it only doesn't happen in EBG.

and now players farm the rewards by flipping towers/camps/keeps every 5 minutes like bots and nobody really cares to defend them, because they can just flip them again after 5 minutes. this is what happens when you mostly reward for the offense.

Edited March 18, 2023 by Chaos God.1639

[Heibi.4251]

37 minutes ago, Chaos God.1639 said:

and now players farm the rewards by flipping towers/camps/keeps every 5 minutes like bots and nobody really cares to defend them, because they can just flip them again after 5 minutes. this is what happens when you mostly reward for the offense.

Exactly the OP's point.  Also seems to be ANET's goal to get things moving. I think they went to far in the nerfing defense direction. But remember, the more feedback they get the sooner things will change. 

[Astralporing.1957]

4 hours ago, Heibi.4251 said:

Exactly the OP's point.  Also seems to be ANET's goal to get things moving.

Actually, the fact that players preferred to just flip the objectives and often not really bother to actively defend them was one of the reasons for the event participation changes. Anet wanted to avoid this very behaviour, so it's quite ironic that it's now encouraged even more than before they started messing with event participation system.

[Xenesis.6389]

Just went to SBI garrison, it was one of the most sieged up keeps I've seen in a while. Also their nec had like 7 golems ready to defend it. Seems to me SBI puts in more effort into defending than other servers. Defending dead? eh don't think so, seems the same as usual.

[Dawdler.8521]

14 hours ago, blp.3489 said:

Would players still fight over SMC if there were no defense rewards there?

Did people ever play on EBG before a month or so ago, when there was no defense rewards there? 

[blackgamma.1809]

why is defence treated as end game content. when zerg vs zerg is the core of the content?

defense needs to be dead. so we can play the best part of wvw. rather than cowards cuddle up inside keep and call it content to the point where it gets stale

keep defence died for a reason. an i hope it stays dead

Edited March 19, 2023 by blackgamma.1809

[enkidu.5937]

43 minutes ago, blackgamma.1809 said:

why is defence treated as end game content. when zerg vs zerg is the core of the content?

defense needs to be dead. so we can play the best part of wvw. rather than cowards cuddle up inside keep and call it content to the point where it gets stale

keep defence died for a reason. an i hope it stays dead

Ya, thats the point. Just because Anet designed this game mode with big maps, castles, towers, PPT, tactics, dolyaks, supplies and an according score system doesnt mean anything.

 

This game mode is clearly only about 15 vs. 15 and 50 vs. 50 with a handfull of meta builds and nothing else.

 

So why should players be rewarded for doing things that Anet designed this game mode around!?! Its obvious that Anet has designed this game mode wrong and 80% of the player base play this game mode wrong for 10 years now and have fun. The wrong fun obviously. 🤡

[Gorani.7205]

Defense still works, if you play towards the form ANet keeps catering (big groups, boon balls, zergs or whatever tag you want to put on that type) . It totally broke down for the small scale. For over ten years, I repair, I fight & delay, I scout and I randomly team up with allies to defend (and attack) things below the "SMC-level". After the last patch dropped a few days ago, I haven't made ANY progression on the Tower Defender weekly. I am stuck at 0/8 defense events. I have played, like I did before, when those events were no problem and I usually got the defense events before I got the attack events. Yes, I could have joined the big groups, but to see the true impact of the patch, I did not.
In my opinion, ANet deliberately fixed the problem of mindless repairs of SMC walls with the easiest solution for them, hurting more players than culling the "afk-mentality" helped. It also shows how neglected the issue of wonky event tracking in WvW is, when the community now needs to speculate on "what actually counts" and perhaps the only reliable answer is "kill an enemy player inside the contested ring".

[Johje Holan.4607]

10 hours ago, Xenesis.6389 said:

Just went to SBI garrison, it was one of the most sieged up keeps I've seen in a while. Also their nec had like 7 golems ready to defend it. Seems to me SBI puts in more effort into defending than other servers. Defending dead? eh don't think so, seems the same as usual.

SBI does have our stalwart defenders. That’s one reason I like being here.  And I like being with Ebay. They’ve got some good players and commanders that will come to the defense when a call is out out.

Yesterday one of you enemy servers were attacking Gari and one Bay. We didn’t have enough to defend both so we had to save Gari first. Then by the time we got to Bay, inner was almost down. So we lost a waypointed Bay.

Was a fun time. But - when we lost Bay, it still had like 600-700 supply in it!  I can’t help but wonder if the wall repair rewards were still in place if some people would have been repairing and we might have been able to save it. Talk about wasted supply - leaving hundreds of supply in a keep when it’s taken is the worst kind of waste!

Edited March 19, 2023 by Johje Holan.4607

[A Hamster.2580]

Don't you get full participation as a defender if you participated in killing at least just one invader? If you are not able to do that, then you were heavily outnumbered (not enough players showed up to help) and should not have wasted your time (and in essence your server's time) there. That is what the system is trying to discourage you from doing. What you should have done was way point out and actually do something useful for your server that will give you participation.

 

It seems to me that you are saying you should get full participation from repairing 1% of the wall/gate despite the enemy zerg running over your objective the next minute.

 

As a defender, this is how the system wants you to play

 

1.) invaders show up at objectives

 

2.) you call it out in team chat for reinforcements

 

3a.) if a friendly zerg group responds saying they are coming, you can try to stall them without dying

3aa.) when friendly zerg group shows up, you can fight with them and should easily be able to get participation

 

3b.) if no one responds or not enough players will be showing up as reinforcement, you should way point out and do something else for participation. That should be more useful for your server than just ending up as a bag for that enemy zerg

 

From the defender's perspective, the system encourages more even fights. No more semi afking at an objective to repair 1% of the wall/gate for full participation. This is a good thing.

 

You mention that you are thinking about quitting, that is also intended by the system. Semi afkers should be discouraged from playing to free up space on their server for those that will actively play to help their server.

Edited March 19, 2023 by A Hamster.2580

[Xenesis.6389]

2 hours ago, Johje Holan.4607 said:

SBI does have our stalwart defenders. That’s one reason I like being here.  And I like being with Ebay. They’ve got some good players and commanders that will come to the defense when a call is out out.

Yesterday one of you enemy servers were attacking Gari and one Bay. We didn’t have enough to defend both so we had to save Gari first. Then by the time we got to Bay, inner was almost down. So we lost a waypointed Bay.

Was a fun time. But - when we lost Bay, it still had like 600-700 supply in it!  I can’t help but wonder if the wall repair rewards were still in place if some people would have been repairing and we might have been able to save it. Talk about wasted supply - leaving hundreds of supply in a keep when it’s taken is the worst kind of waste!

That isn't a matter of rewards, that's a matter of your entire side was busy trying to save your main keep while being double teamed.

As for wall repairs, which only buys you a couple seconds while actively being damaged by multiple catas and would require a small group of repairing together to have any effect, invul walls, disables, counter siege really make the difference on time, that other team was going to make it in, and really was dependent on how fast you all cleared garrison first. 

The other part of the equation, did bay have half broken walls before they broke in? There could be another problem of, do you all even bother to call out what needs to be repaired after the last battle? Like did you personally know bay had walls that needed to be repaired, had 600-700 supply, and didn't tell/remind your team?

Doesn't really make sense that your server has stalwart defenders that likes to heavily defend with siege(something you also take time to build but get no immediate rewards on), yet ignores basic repairs? While other servers use all their supply out on repairs regardless of rewards? I stick supply into walls regardless of rewards, because I want to keep the objective, I want to make it harder for the enemy to take time to get siege up, make them waste more time to get in, regardless of if reinforcements come or not to eventually save it.

Problem isn't the lack of rewards for repairs, it's the reward me first mentality of players.

Edited March 19, 2023 by Xenesis.6389

[Timelord.8190]

Imagine crying for not getting WXP for repairing walls and building siege. Must be a useless player. You get WXP and loot for killing, not for reparing walls. That's the way it should be.

[Johje Holan.4607]

39 minutes ago, Xenesis.6389 said:

That isn't a matter of rewards, that's a matter of your entire side was busy trying to save your main keep while being double teamed.

As for wall repairs, which only buys you a couple seconds while actively being damaged by multiple catas and would require a small group of repairing together to have any effect, invul walls, disables, counter siege really make the difference on time, that other team was going to make it in, and really was dependent on how fast you all cleared garrison first. 

This is true.  However, getting rewarded does seem to affect players by encouraging them to participate.  And perhaps we would have had more people participating,  but perhaps not, its hard to know.

41 minutes ago, Xenesis.6389 said:

The other part of the equation, did bay have half broken walls before they broke in? There could be another problem of, do you all even bother to call out what needs to be repaired after the last battle? Like did you personally know bay had walls that needed to be repaired, had 600-700 supply, and didn't tell/remind your team?

Doesn't really make sense that your server has stalwart defenders that likes to heavily defend with siege, yet ignores basic repairs? While other servers use all their supply out on repairs regardless of rewards? 

These are all good questions that I don't know the answer to;  I was on another BL when all this started.  There did seem to be some people in Bay when I got there, what they had been doing I don't know.  We do seem to do a fairly good job of repairing after a battle; but of course how good depends on who is on.  And  HBL Defenders do the best they can with what they got.  In the chaos of WvW some things are going to get missed sometimes.  And that contributes to the fun of it actually.

48 minutes ago, Xenesis.6389 said:

I stick supply into walls regardless of rewards, because I want to keep the objective, I want to make it harder for the enemy to take time to get siege up, make them waste more time to get in, regardless of if reinforcements come or not to eventually save it.

Problem isn't the lack of rewards for repairs, it's the reward me first mentality of players.

I also am one of those that repair and do other things regardless of rewards.  Heck, I could personally care less about rewards or achievements.  That's not why I play a game.  I'll never have a Legendary or the fancy weapons or armor; and I don't care.  But obviously some people do care about those things.  And if it encourages them to participate in WvW to make it a thriving game mode then it doesn't matter to me if they get rewarded.  (I do think, and I'm glad that Anet seems to understand, that WvW should never ever give as much in rewards as PvE.  Too many rewards would be bad for the game mode.  Striking a balance can be tough though).

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

@coures.1065 you don't understand. People were getting actual rewards for things not zerging, and we obviously cannot have that now can we? Because after all zerging is the only way we're allowed to play WvW didn't you know.

[Xenesis.6389]

22 minutes ago, Johje Holan.4607 said:

And if it encourages them to participate in WvW to make it a thriving game mode then it doesn't matter to me if they get rewarded.  (I do think, and I'm glad that Anet seems to understand, that WvW should never ever give as much in rewards as PvE.  Too many rewards would be bad for the game mode.  Striking a balance can be tough though).

Can't really complain about lack of repairs if all you're attracting to the game mode now is casual pve reward hunters...

[JTGuevara.9018]

On 3/18/2023 at 3:39 AM, coures.1065 said:

I've been a WvW scout/defender for 4 years and the recent updates have been terrible. I get that WvW is clearly in dire need of something new to attract more people, but they've missed the mark so badly that I'm planning on quitting.

 

For the yak supply increase and objective supply decrease, from my speculation, they did this so that certain servers can't monopolize objectives for too long. It'd be easier for attackers to invade, but what about the people who actually have fun defending then? We have less supply to work with and distribute people to flips camps if need be instead of focusing on the invasion. Seems like a con for us.

 

I thought the reward system change would've fixed that. For a brief moment, I thought 'Hey! We're finally getting more out of defending our Borderlands which not many players go to. Building siege I paid with my low WvW earned gold and purchasing tricks and traps for stopping enemy siege is finally paying off. More people are repairing walls and gates that nobody ever cared about before instead of leaving it all to me!'

 

That is until several folks complained about how SMC 'oh woe is me' is always out of supplies because players abused it. And for some strange miraculous reason, Anet listened and then completely messed it up by not even getting a reward. Oh, how I wish they'd listen to me when I report thieves being able to teleport in a tower without using siege. Would've been the light of my life, but nooo they listened to SMC huggers instead.

 

Now despite how hard I participate in events I don't get rewards. 

 

Retaking objectives doesn't even give gold. I build up the siege, I kill the lord with people I called for and what do I get? Bronze.

 

A tower has an enemy trebbing Bay. I build counter siege and destroy the treb. I fix two walls that have massive HP by myself. What do I get? Nothing.

 

Enemy zerg comes in on Garrison. I call for help. I disable the siege and stall. I patch the walls so nobody else gets in. I destroy the siege. Our people wipe the enemy. What do I get? NOTHING.

 

Why? Because I have to kill a person to be considered as participating? How unfair is this? I helped too! I don't understand how I'm worthless after doing all of these things. It feels as if it's better to just let the enemy flip our objective. That way I would at least get bronze for the retake event, right?

 

Defending is dead. Whoever's a defender out there, just PPT and get your pity bronze.

It's because Anet answers to the mega-guilds and their zerglings who plop down their monies for server transfers. (Said the quiet part out loud didn't I...?) Who cares about some pidly little defender or roamer having fun? (/s)

The way I see it, there was no problem with defenders' rewards, it's just that some people found it "unfair" that somebody could just sit in a tower and rack up rewards at a faster rate than those following a tag. Despite the fact that this was not a problem before. But...now all of a sudden it is...

But YES. This is why I don't play wvw anymore! Primadonnas all across the board. Typical of mmos.

[Whirlygig.9685]

I was confused about defence reward nerfs to until i found out Anet has bought Paul The Octopus Oracle from the UK; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_the_Octopus

 

He now decides if a defence will count or not, this is why despite doing exactly the same thing from one defence event to another it can result in some/no/full rewards. ( but usually none because Paul is bad tempered)

Did around 8 defence events on Friday, got rewarded for 1.

Edited March 19, 2023 by Whirlygig.9685

[coures.1065]

I've decided to just quit for a while and thought I'd check this post one last time.

 

While some of you agree with my problem, others gave counter points too and I'd like to address them. 

 

So far, what I took from some of your responses are:

 

"WvW = PvP" 

"Defending objectives doesn't matter, only zergs" 

"The only way to play WvW is to kill people" 

"PvE players shouldn't play WvW"

 

First of all, how dare you people even insult WvW by saying it's as simple as just a major duke out with 50 people vs. 50 people. Just plain old player vs player except with more people by your side! Wow, how fun! It's no wonder Edge of the Mists is so popular right? Heck, why not even Obsidian Sanctum. Best place in my opinion, the spawn is close to the enemy spawn. They don't even need to walk all that far to reach the enemy and brawl it out. 

 

Second, zergs aren't the only thing in WvW. There's roamers, there's scouts, there's defenders, and ppters. If it's all about zergs, then you wouldn't mind having no scout to call the invading enemy blob at your door, right? Don't want roamers to flip camps and get more supplies for you either? Ah that's too bad. I guess you wouldn't mind defenders not stalling the enemy either by disabling siege or building counter siege or pull the ewp for you, just let the enemy have it while you're in another map, right? Oh wow, not even ppters? I see you just want that tower to stay within the enemy's grasp, let them make a trebuchet on it, and use it to tap your keep thereby making you walk sooooooo much more because your keep waypoint is endlessly contested. TSK. Zerging. 👏 Is. 👏The. 👏Only. 👏Way! 

 

Third, WvW isn't just about killing people. Here's a not-so-secret, I hated WvW at first because I also thought at one point that WvW = PvP. I didn't like conflict. I liked building things. I liked helping people. PvP wasn't something for me, but WvW I found out, was different. I realized that I could do all the things I like and be relevant. I could escort yaks, tier up objectives to make them stronger, build defensive siege, stall or annoy enemies with traps, help with calling out, etc. The only way I knew I was relevant was because I was getting participation. But now I'm not, that could only mean that I'm irrelevant to this game mode now, right? That's my problem. 

 

Finally, you might want to be educated by the fact Guild Wars 2 players don't always start as WvW players. They barely advertise important PvE things in their email subscription, I'd cry if they say something for WvW. Did you think Guild Wars 2 promotes WvW as their main game mode. Wrong. Every player in this game starts out as a PvE player. While more competitive players do go on to play PvP and WvW eventually, you can't say that players who majorly focus on PvE shouldn't even try and join it. What if those PvE'rs actually end up liking the game mode, and after playing for a while, invite more and more people to play. I spent 3 years in PvE until WvW took over my life and, despite being bad at killing players, have been advocating the game mode to my friends. To say you want to exclude people for the sake of your elitism and prevent the player base from growing or maintaining a healthy population is just wrong.

 

Anyway, that's all I can say. If you don't agree with me, I don't really care any more. I'm off to play something else until next update.

[Gendalfs.7521]

I feel like WvW should be the End game content for GW2 where you can show off your shiny grinded armor and leaned skills.

I know some people like doing same bosses over and over and over and set goals to do such bosses faster and faster.

But main thing of MMO after all is engaging with or against other players.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

WvW is a war mode. Yep, that includes PvP, but as with real war the actual combat is only part of it. There are also logistics, maintenance, supply lines to secure and protect, and objectives to take and maintain.

OP hit the nail on the head though. The zergs should take it to EOTM or OS if all they care about is the fighting part.

[Mabi black.1824]

6 hours ago, coures.1065 said:

The only way I knew I was relevant was because I was getting participation. But now I'm not, that could only mean that I'm irrelevant to this game mode now, right?

I like the way you interpret this game mode, and I like your considerations. in fact I put you a beautiful little heart. The only thing I would like to tell you is that you really do everything you have so well described just for a little more participation? Or just for a little more gold? I don't think so. 

You are an active gamer and you put your content in this mode in the way that rewards and that you enjoy the most. You do it for yourself, for your server mates, and for your server. Participation and gold count for nothing in this mode. Someone used the term ''magic'' which you can find in WVW. You will find that magic in the competition, in teaming up with other players, in the common action of your server, in the spirit of belonging to your server.

You will overcome every difficulty every defeat and whatever the enemy teams will force you to face, because you know you are a small part of your server. and you will spill all the blood needed for your server. In this sense of participation and belonging lies the ''magic'' of this modality. Certainly not in the gold you can earn.

Edited March 20, 2023 by Mabi black.1824

[misterman.1530]

On 3/18/2023 at 1:03 PM, blp.3489 said:

I think you nailed it.  It seems like an easy first step toward fixing it would be that any enemy inside your objective is an attacker.  I have no idea if that is easy to code.

Edit: maybe an easy second step is that anyone who builds siege within range of your objective is also an attacker.

I agree with this. I was on early this morning (couldn't sleep). Defended SW Tower (Bluebriar) from some red enemies. It was only T0, but I thought it would be fun.

I repaired walls, built counter siege to take out their siege, fought them as they tried to build more siege...

...all of that, and I  got NO defense credit whatsoever.

So, yeah, I stopped defending and went to EB to help attack objectives instead.