Soto Was a PvE Expansion and We Just Got Scraps. We're Overdue PvP Content.

[Yerlock.4678]

All in title. We need more than balance updates.

New maps, or modes, or reworks to Stronghold, matchmaker improvements for fairer or better games, more pvp tournaments, improvements to spectate, Spirit Watch reworks, even just HotM getting some improvements as a hub world, older maps getting objective reworks or small tweaks to improve the flow of gameplay, etc.

All we got was relics (power creep), and many of the classes don't prosper as much as others when it comes to the new weapon varieties. Still no new weapons either, this could've honestly just been a simple update in terms of pvp.

Don't call it an expansion if two out of the three "pillars" of your game don't get any love whatsoever when it comes to actual new content.

This is literally why the meme of "dead game" won't go away, even after Eod and Soto. Because only 1/3 of the game is getting new content.

Edited August 25, 2023 by gmmg.9210

[atshadow.8695]

you are literally dillusional if you think pvp is 1/3th of gw2, it' s more like 1%, unless you believe only 4000 people play this game.. 

it also wont attract new blood because all mmo motherkitteners only like pve these days just look at ffxiv's popularity, they especially dont like mmo pvp where they cant outgear people by sheer no lifing the game and getting bis gear thru pve and stomping on people in worse gear. i'm afraid that's how most mmo's pvp is and people love that kitten.

Edited August 25, 2023 by atshadow.8695

[Yerlock.4678]

27 minutes ago, atshadow.8695 said:

you are literally dillusional if you think pvp is 1/3th of gw2, it' s more like 1%, unless you believe only 4000 people play this game.. 

 

They called pvp/wvw pillars of their game, it's not my metric.  Also why is there only 4000 people left in this mode? I wonder. Not to dismiss your larger point you're mostly right. But it's easy to punch the kid that's already falling down.

It's just wasted potential on anet's part. sad.

Edited August 25, 2023 by gmmg.9210

[Kuma.1503]

32 minutes ago, atshadow.8695 said:

you are literally dillusional if you think pvp is 1/3th of gw2, it' s more like 1%, unless you believe only 4000 people play this game.. 

it also wont attract new blood because all mmo motherkitteners only like pve these days just look at ffxiv's popularity, they especially dont like mmo pvp where they cant outgear people by sheer no lifing the game and getting bis gear thru pve and stomping on people in worse gear. i'm afraid that's how most mmo's pvp is and people love that kitten.

Sounds like a chicken or the egg scenario. 

What came first. The neglect or the dead gamemode?

[atshadow.8695]

31 minutes ago, gmmg.9210 said:

They called pvp/wvw pillars of their game, it's not my metric.  Also why is there only 4000 people left in this mode? I wonder. Not to dismiss your larger point you're mostly right. But it's easy to punch the kid that's already falling down.

It's just wasted potential on anet's part. sad.

I agree it's wasted potential. it's also a product/victim of the gaming industry tbh.

23 minutes ago, Kuma.1503 said:

Sounds like a chicken or the egg scenario. 

What came first. The neglect or the dead gamemode?

it doesn't really matter tbh, as it stands, as I see it atleast, both anet and the players are contributing to the slow death of this gamemode. a gamemode which I thuroughly enjoy btw, without spvp I probably wouldn't be playing gw2.

[Downstate.4697]

Anet isn’t making enough money to support their own game. They repackaged living world by calling it an expansion and released 1/3 of the content for only 1 game mode.
 

This expansion confirmed for me that anet is all smoke and mirrors
 

 

[Bazsi.2734]

The last "PvP expansion" - and by that I mean an expansion with PvP features in it - was HoT. It came out in 2015, almost 8 years ago. Dunno what you guy were expecting.

[Terrorhuz.4695]

Too much dooming, the relics are funnier than the runes. Plenty of new effects, unique combinations, stuff. Loving it, stop being negative.

[jdawgie.1835]

2 hours ago, atshadow.8695 said:

you are literally dillusional if you think pvp is 1/3th of gw2, it' s more like 1%, unless you believe only 4000 people play this game

Pvp is in fact 1/3 of the game. The other 1/3 is World v World, and the other 1/3 is pve. How many people engage in the game mode has nothing to do with how the games foundational pieces exist. 

Edited August 25, 2023 by jdawgie.1835

[atshadow.8695]

5 minutes ago, jdawgie.1835 said:

Pvp is in fact 1/3 of the game. The other 1/3 is World v World, and the other 1/3 is pve. How many people engage in the game mode has nothing to do with how the games foundational pieces exist. 

tell that to the people who need to make money off this game

[coro.3176]

2 hours ago, Kuma.1503 said:

Sounds like a chicken or the egg scenario. 

What came first. The neglect or the dead gamemode?

I think it goes like:

1. devs make something nice for the game mode
2. community hates it, doesn't touch it
3. devs try to fix it
4. community still hates it
5. devs give up and never touch the game mode again

Happened in WvW with Desert Borderlands. Happened in PvP after Stronghold (remember stronghold?)

Edit: I mean, I'll grant that they did actually add some more maps & the tournament stuff. It's not *completely* neglected

Edited August 25, 2023 by coro.3176

[Gotejjeken.1267]

Just look at first page of the forums-we have:

Topics complaining about stealth

Topics complaining about thief damage

Topics complaining about soulbeast damage

Topic complaining about ground effects being too stronk

Topic complaining about Willbender damage

Why, would anet ever put effort into a mode that has nothing but complaints on the forums and degenerates in the lobby? The PvP content stopped when the skill level did, many years ago.

Now, much better to focus on PvE where just have the elitist instance groups to worry about that can be avoided by finding a different group / friends / guild.  

[Hightop.8294]

EOD was also only PvE.  In PoF we at least got some specs not totally unhealthy or totally unusable in PvP, also PvP was not mentioned in any expansion trailer or roadmap. Only HoT had new stuff like new WvW map and a new PvP gamemode. Both not that successful sadly.

[Avatar.3568]

1 hour ago, Bazsi.2734 said:

The last "PvP expansion" - and by that I mean an expansion with PvP features in it - was HoT. It came out in 2015, almost 8 years ago. Dunno what you guy were expecting.

well pof gave gizmos and reworked the ranked system and AT's

[Bazsi.2734]

1 hour ago, Terrorhuz.4695 said:

Too much dooming, the relics are funnier than the runes. Plenty of new effects, unique combinations, stuff. Loving it, stop being negative.

My positivity batteries ran out during the last 4-5-6-ish years. Ever since living world season 4 ended, they are in a state of constant restructuring, redirecting, rebranding, and after 6 years and basicly changing their entire management twice, they seemingly managed to fix their PvE content release schedule. How cool... I'm off to stare at a blank wall or something. Maybe I can scrape at it and eat whatever comes off.

Anyway kids, remeber it's only downhill from here! Be grateful for what you've got, because this will only get worse.

[Bunbury.8472]

1 hour ago, coro.3176 said:

I think it goes like:

1. devs make something nice for the game mode
2. community hates it, doesn't touch it
3. devs try to fix it
4. community still hates it
5. devs give up and never touch the game mode again

Happened in WvW with Desert Borderlands. Happened in PvP after Stronghold (remember stronghold?)

Edit: I mean, I'll grant that they did actually add some more maps & the tournament stuff. It's not *completely* neglected

no single WvW player wanted a dinosaur npc megalazer PvE event map, let alone one that also killed the servers.

no single pvp player wanted a badly designed moba clone that you can speedrun in minutes.

the addition to these modes were badly designed & not what any of the existing players wanted. you can't blame the players. we all played the modes at launch, streamers even casted games for stronghold- but guess what the mode isn't very good & the devs didn't want to iterate, & the players don't want to play it. same with DBL, they removed the Pve lazer to try & fix the lag, but now the entire middle of the map is empty & pointless & all the objectives have terrible flow for no reason at all. oh, & obviously DBL is dead, yeah because the community hates it, but if the entire audience hates something I think that's an indication it might be bad.

blaming the players is wild, it's like inviting someone over for dinner, burning all the food & then blaming them for not liking it.

[jdawgie.1835]

2 hours ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

Just look at first page of the forums-we have:

Topics complaining about stealth

Topics complaining about thief damage

Topics complaining about soulbeast damage

Topic complaining about ground effects being too stronk

Topic complaining about Willbender damage

Why, would anet ever put effort into a mode that has nothing but complaints on the forums and degenerates in the lobby? The PvP content stopped when the skill level did, many years ago.

Now, much better to focus on PvE where just have the elitist instance groups to worry about that can be avoided by finding a different group / friends / guild.  

"This forum isnt interested in discussing the game. Just hearing other people echo their frustration so they can all nod around at each other and not feel like they are the problem, but the game. But you see the delusion here is that - thats all the forum has ever done and its never stopped. Not once has anyone looked around and gone "huh, weve asked for nerfs so often for so many different things we've bled the game mode we claim to love completely dry. Maybe its us."  - JDawgie.1835 on  08/24/23.

[Arheundel.6451]

10 hours ago, gmmg.9210 said:

They called pvp/wvw pillars of their game, it's not my metric.  Also why is there only 4000 people left in this mode? I wonder. Not to dismiss your larger point you're mostly right. But it's easy to punch the kid that's already falling down.

It's just wasted potential on anet's part. sad.

PvP was never called a pillar of the game, WvW was and for good reasons...the current PvP mode is unmanageable mostly due to the PvP playerbase:

1. You ask for diversity....then you call it powercreep even for minor changes
2. You ask for better matchmaking...then you complain when you don't win as many times as you deluded yourself into believing you should
3. You constantly non stop ask for nerfs on everything you don't play...everytime you lose a duel

The PvP forum it's nothing but complaint threads, toxic elitism and not once...not even once, somebody comes and says :"oh kk I got outplayed"...no...it's always because the enemy plays an OP spec

[Arheundel.6451]

6 hours ago, Bunbury.8472 said:

no single WvW player wanted a dinosaur npc megalazer PvE event map, let alone one that also killed the servers.

no single pvp player wanted a badly designed moba clone that you can speedrun in minutes.

the addition to these modes were badly designed & not what any of the existing players wanted. you can't blame the players. we all played the modes at launch, streamers even casted games for stronghold- but guess what the mode isn't very good & the devs didn't want to iterate, & the players don't want to play it. same with DBL, they removed the Pve lazer to try & fix the lag, but now the entire middle of the map is empty & pointless & all the objectives have terrible flow for no reason at all. oh, & obviously DBL is dead, yeah because the community hates it, but if the entire audience hates something I think that's an indication it might be bad.

blaming the players is wild, it's like inviting someone over for dinner, burning all the food & then blaming them for not liking it.

Seriously?

Just open the PvP forum and have a read.....newb with less than 100 hrs gameplay, come here to create nerf threads as soon as they lose...it's sad. These days, players with less than a couple of months worth of PvP, expect to be top tier and will complain their eyes out unless that is accomplished. It's still fresh in my mind when people were complaining about being stuck in bronze after 100 of games....instead of reflecting on themselves they came here to whine and ask for the matchmaking to be changed to what it is today...but no..the problem is not the playerbase....wild

[Marckan.9526]

10 hours ago, coro.3176 said:

I think it goes like:

1. devs make something nice for the game mode
2. community hates it, doesn't touch it
3. devs try to fix it
4. community still hates it
5. devs give up and never touch the game mode again

Happened in WvW with Desert Borderlands. Happened in PvP after Stronghold (remember stronghold?)

Edit: I mean, I'll grant that they did actually add some more maps & the tournament stuff. It's not *completely* neglected

I do agree with this, but the same thing has also happened to PvE/Story/LW and they still continue to develop those areas.

Just think back on the outrage after IBS story ended, that didn't stop them from making more.

On Topic:

PvP has been the major reason why I've played this game since launch, subconsciously every hiatus I have had from the game has coincided with me not playing PvP, or WvW.

But after all these years without content I have just accepted the fact that we aren't getting any updates and have started to see things for what they are and not what they could be.

Nowadays, I play my 3 dailies at the start of every morning before studying which really helps my brain wake up nicely before moving on to heavy math etc.

The new content I find through making alt builds and basically just switching things up from time to time. Given that the game has 36 e-specs you'd be surprised at how much joy this can bring, plus it makes you better at PvP since every time you learn to play a new spec you also learn how to counter it.

Plus, it's not like we havent received ANY updates throughout the years - back when I played the most we didn't have tournaments or fancy ascended/legendary armies as rewards for playing - so I mean we have actually come a long way!

Anyway, I have made peace with it and I suggest anyone remotely invested in PvP should do the same.

[Bunbury.8472]

16 hours ago, Arheundel.6451 said:

Seriously?

Just open the PvP forum and have a read.....newb with less than 100 hrs gameplay, come here to create nerf threads as soon as they lose...it's sad. These days, players with less than a couple of months worth of PvP, expect to be top tier and will complain their eyes out unless that is accomplished. It's still fresh in my mind when people were complaining about being stuck in bronze after 100 of games....instead of reflecting on themselves they came here to whine and ask for the matchmaking to be changed to what it is today...but no..the problem is not the playerbase....wild

dont think your point is even related to how badly designed stronghold and DBL are honestly.

as a mainly WvW player, I feel like your assessment of the population in the gamemode is very accurate- full of low skill dunning kruger nerf takes. however that doesn't mean stronghold wasn't a badly designed mode that anet gave up on instantly instead of trying to make it more fun and competitive to play. as a WvW player DBL was even worse, the PvE event they designed the map around was too hardcore for their servers and they couldn't run it without extreme performance issues- plus is was terrible and no WvW player wanted to be doing a PvE lazer event with dinosaurs. So anet made WvW players a map based around a PvE event, that the game couldn't even handle and then players have the gall to say anet won't make more WvW maps because people didn't like DBL....

it's like, my brother in christ DBL was a PvE event map too buggy to even be played how could anyone like it?

it's like, sure the avg pvp forum goer is a complaining scrub- but stronghold is still a bad mode, and anet still gave up on it instantly instead of trying to salvage it at all. it's been a joint effort to kill pvp, from both the community and anet- that's why no one calls it a cornerstone mode, even if that is a meme unto itself. pvp probably has similar population than the raid scene. deleting amulets never did make anyone want to play in the end lol.

[Multicolorhipster.9751]

On 8/25/2023 at 6:33 PM, Bunbury.8472 said:

blaming the players is wild, it's like inviting someone over for dinner, burning all the food & then blaming them for not liking it.

1 hour ago, Bunbury.8472 said:

deleting amulets never did make anyone want to play in the end lol.

I rebuke that metaphor with every fiber of my being. Who asked for amulets to be deleted? That's right, the players. There were people unironically praising CmC as PvP's savior back in 2020 because he was just removing the content the playerbase asked to be deleted. They wielded balance and an incompetent and understaffed PvP team selfishly to get their in-game counters either nerfed or deleted outright.

And that's not even mentioning the dev discord where top players; cheats and wintraders, players that should have been banned 10x over were invited in to have a direct say in how competitive modes were balanced. And all done by other players that outright hate and resent the rest of us. By their own admission, they were actively trying to annoy us.

And I quote:

ANet_Solar — 06/19/2022
A very high level overview will be happening next week. It won't have details- it's just a section of a larger blog, so space was limited. It mentions a few general changes and has one line for the area of focus on each profession- that leaves out a lot by necessity.

As is customary for large profession updates, full release notes will be available over the weekend before it goes live.
Nikephoros — 06/19/2022
ill be making popcorn
hopefully some salty tears to season it
ANet_Solar — 06/19/2022
Oh, there'll be some amazing salt. I can't wait.
 

And this toxic playerbase would probably label me a conspiracy theorist for posting that. They have the good sense to get mad and complain, but never about the right things. The truth of the matter is we and Arenanet are both equally guilty. We are not always right. I am not always right. We are humans; flawed and imperfect, and our only way to salvation relies on us overcoming our lower-selves. That inner, base desire to seek immediate gratification. Having what we play buffed and what we don't like removed or nerfed, and dismissing any opposition as pointless because pvp is doomed anyway.

We don't get anywhere by constantly playing the victim and begging for more of the same balance patches that have done nothing, absolutely 0, nada to pull us out of this hole and stop pvp's rapid decline. We need to take some responsibility and start looking at the bigger picture fr. We owe it to ourselves even if the doomers are right.

[Kozumi.5816]

PvP is no longer a supported game mode.

PvE is barely supported, their main focus is some genshin clone mobile game or something, idk.

[Yerlock.4678]

On 8/26/2023 at 12:56 AM, Arheundel.6451 said:

PvP was never called a pillar of the game, WvW was and for good reasons...the current PvP mode is unmanageable mostly due to the PvP playerbase:

1. You ask for diversity....then you call it powercreep even for minor changes
2. You ask for better matchmaking...then you complain when you don't win as many times as you deluded yourself into believing you should

 

You can walk and chew bubble gum at the same time.

1. Have more class competitive diversity and balance against the inevitable power creep. (Which btw CmC has been doing a good job of considering the previous state of things, but obviously that needs more attention).

2. Better matchmaking is a multifaceted issue. The lower population doesn't help (in part due to pvp neglect), but in general it's a very basic system (like the LoL type matchmaker from 2011) that could get more attention.

On 8/26/2023 at 12:56 AM, Arheundel.6451 said:

 

3. You constantly non stop ask for nerfs on everything you don't play...everytime you lose a duel

The PvP forum it's nothing but complaint threads, toxic elitism and not once...not even once, somebody comes and says :"oh kk I got outplayed"...no...it's always because the enemy plays an OP spec

3. I guess you're saying "you" like the general "you", as in the pvp player-base? If I get wrecked 1v1 I'll admit it. Currently some 1 shot out of stealth rangers have been winning duels against me. While it's super annoying for me, a loss is a loss.

 

In any case, and to state the obvious, everything on the forums must be taken with a huge pinch of salt. Who would've thought?

So to say that for all of these reasons pvp should just be left to rot or not be treated on the same level as WvW I think is misleading at best, and unfair at worst. The one thing that baffles me more than anet's neglect for this game mode is the battered housewives and apologists who defend their inaction by pointing to trolls on these forums. Like what kind of argument is that? Are you expecting people on here to all be super dandy and have no complaints for a game mode that was fully or partly abandoned for so many years? Other fully maintained and updated pvp games that are much larger and much more healthy in terms of population still have people wailing on the forums about imbalance, lack of features, etc. So to expect anything less from these pvp forums is completely unrealistic.