July 16 Competitive Update Preview

[Oahkahmewolf.6210]

When are we able to make legendary themed WvW weapons, Like the armor

[SerialExperiments.8075]

On 7/11/2024 at 12:00 PM, Chrome.9841 said:

I hope it's like this otherwise will be a pain..

The developers specifically called out on the stream what the differences are for contesting. Nowhere was it mentioned that they changed contesting from a 3-minute long event to an indefinite-long event that relies on the health percentage of a gate/wall.

Only two things have changed:

1. Objectives contest when the lord/supervisor is put into combat, or when a gate/wall is damaged below 98%
2. White Swords, which indicate the objective is contested, appear immediately now, instead of 30 seconds after the contested event.

[TheGrimm.5624]

Thanks for the clarification of activation and link in the WvW subforum!

[The O.2315]

14 hours ago, LichOverlord.6329 said:

The counterplay is you dodge or block it - none of these new abilities are meant to be shut down entirely in all situations

They're incredibly powerful, but can only be used once by one person and require a lengthy channel to obtain - the idea is you actually want to go down in the arena to get it now, instead of just ignoring the djiin

Nothing in the description says the decapture is reliant on hit, which is the part I'm talking about.

[Izzy.2951]

To be honest i feel like theres too many tournament for the population of GW2, it will feel more organic if the 2v2 and 3v3 tournament only happens the week that there is a mini season of those gamemodes so people can practise too.

[MasterJake.9375]

The scoring changes are a good idea but they are way too extreme. The numbers need to flattened out because there are nighttime guilds who are very active during those times in NA. Its extremely demotivating that your hard work is less impactful than during the daytime. 

[Loke.1429]

On 7/12/2024 at 2:20 PM, Thena Thunderhammer.1687 said:

For the proposed changes in the war score, I am not sure what message you are trying to communicate. WvW is a 24hour format, all contribution is valuable, regardless of the time the player plays.  The message you are sending is that prime time players are more valuable than off peak players.  The message Anet is sending is that off peak players might as well not play wvw because they are not going to contribute as much as prime time to the war score. Anet are you trying to lose players? Because that is the end result. Why should I play a game when the company doesn't value my time. Anet please reconsider your war score plans.
 

I view it the other way, this change will make all players time equally valuable. E.g. the score per person per tick is far more balanced this way. Yes you do not get especially rewarded score-wise for playing outside the peak (like you used to), but you dont get punished either.

Of course since it isnt dynamic, it may be uneven if/while playtime patterns are changing.

Edited July 13 by Loke.1429

[Spiral.3724]

Is it just me, or should the scoring change be the opposite of what they've done? 🤔
What is the objective of this scoring change? To encourage giant zergs that only run prime time?
Because it's DISCOURAGING to off-hours guilds, roamers, and havocs who felt like they could help their team to get points.
Guilds have been actively recruiting off-hours people to PPT to catchup the score if they were outmatched in prime time.
It's called teamwork!


 

Edited July 12 by Spiral.3724
teamwork

[Barraind.7324]

There are more people playing on NA at 5am PST than there are in the hours that have the western-most NA timezones AND peak hours for SEA + OCE?

I highly disbelieve this. 

Its kind of bananas that slightly-off-primetime squads will be putting in more effort across any 6 hour time block, to be less valuable for their teams overall success than anyone playing for 2 hours in one of the 2 big primetime blocks.

This change was not even remotely well-thought-out

 

 

But its somehow not as bad as the change to AT's and the timing of them.  Holy crap, "please only play any mode of PvP in prime time, thank you" it is then. 

Edited July 13 by Barraind.7324

[Forgotten Legend.9281]

On 7/10/2024 at 6:12 PM, Forgotten Legend.9281 said:

Otherwise... I'm actually looking forward to seeing the effects of these changes. 

I've got my popcorn ready... The drama is about to unfold... nobody's gonna care about playing off-hours anymore... because only the big prime time zergs matter now... (obvious after the past year of balance changes and WvW changes)... WvW is going to BURN!!! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Oh wait... the changes go into effect NEXT reset... I'm a week early... kitten the bad luck!

[Evenge.4067]

On 7/10/2024 at 9:08 PM, Forgotten Legend.9281 said:

with respect to the dev team, y'all need to spend WAY MORE time playing outside of prime time, and NOT running with huge meta- boonball fight guilds.

THIS! ^THIS! ^THIS!^ 1000%

[Gehenna.3625]

On 7/12/2024 at 6:06 AM, Tavin.7450 said:

Once again about the WvW scoring update:
After talking to more WvW players,  I feel that the curve needs to be flattened further. No further incentives are needed to lure more players into primetime to create higher queues. The total "devaluation" of other game times must not take place either.
(KI-Translater)

Perhaps more like this:

Cest	2:00	4:00	6:00	8:00	10:00	12:00	14:00	16:00	18:00	20:00	22:00	24:00
1st	12	12	12	15	15	15	15	20	20	20	20	20
2nd	10	10	10	12	12	12	12	15	15	15	15	15
3rd	6	6	6	9	9	9	9	12	12	12	12	12

Warscore isn't really an incentive except for guilds/groups who try to manipulate the score; but as it stands the queues will stop people from playing in primetime, so there's only so many people who can play during primetime.

The current problem is that, for example, on my old server we sucked at primetime a lot. But then during the night time there were a few squads that made us win because they went around pretty much unimpeded. And the problem there is that the average is not representative of most of the players. It always irked me because we were T1 a lot but by the grace of those night time squads mostly. So during primetime we were facing enemies that were essentially too strong, which then led to fewer players playing during primetime.

You will still get the rewards for yourself during off-times but I think it makes sense to reduce their impact on the whole server because it makes them far too important for the warscore per person. And this change will fix that; maybe not perfectly but I see it as a good thing that it's based on the amount of people and not about times that you get to destroy things without much competition.

And the warscore will be much more representative for a server's level rather than it being artificially inflated. Besides, I suspect they can adjust the exact numbers regularly when some major changes to the population vs timeslot were to happen. It's a beta after all.

But it's not to lure more players to primetime but it's to counter the overvaluation of off times compared to the total server. Especially in the EU this is an issue.

Edited July 13 by Gehenna.3625

[MorningGlow.5376]

Man, i was looking for this thread in the PvP-subforum. Am i the only one who sometimes fails to find the preview-posts in the forum? I've found this via a link posted in the description of a youtube video^^

Anyhow, the changes you make to PvP seem promising to me. And just the fact that there are changes made to this gamemode, after it basically has been abondoned, makes me very happy. Thank you for giving it a little love.

But while we're at it, could we have an option do something usefull with ascended shards of glory? Right now i have all the ascended/legendary gear i want and am sitting on a pile of 7k ascended shards, with nothing of value to spend it on (since it only can be spended on ascended gear). If i'm not much mistaken, all the WvW currency can be spended for something that translates into gold in one way or another. I would be even happier if the same treatment was given to this PvP-currency. Otherwise my sad pile will only grow bigger.

PS: The same goes for the Emblem of Victory.

Edited July 13 by MorningGlow.5376

[meerfunkuhtron.9725]

I am not sure what to think of these changes on scoring.
I understand the idea of making uncontested capping from nighttime zergs not be as rewarding. However, those aren't the only ones this new system will affect, and I feel like Anet knows that but perhaps you just kind of don't care? There are people with different schedules or who live in different timezones. I guess we'll see how this change will affect these hours. Will it make the battlefields even more dead than it already has been? If so, I'm not sure if that's what we actually want for the game mode, when it's already struggling to keep populations.
But again, we shall see. Only thing I hope for is that the dev team for this to have the better sense of rolling back or adjusting these changes if they do prove to be unsuccessful. Have been losing my faith on that front for a number of years now...

On another note, I DO hope that you're also doing something to incentivize defense. You're increasing benefits for offensive play yet there's no mention of rewarding defense as well. Why? If you want your giant zerg teams to have someone to fight, then make defensive play rewarding as well (and no, stopping the other team from simply getting more points isn't a proper reward. I could care less if Suzi Redname has more points than me, I just want some meaningful points for myself and my team when I'm defending a keep which is also an active part of your gamemode, Anet! ROY!!).

I am not asking for high rewards for defense. Just something to help keep it in line with changes you're bringing to offense, especially since defense is severely lacking in incentives. A lot of people don't even care to keep structures and tier them up, for a variety of reasons (many of which were consequences of your previous changes too, such as the heavy lean towards zergs).

Actually just had a silly thought. What if players decide not to even try to tier up structures since enemies get better scores out of capping higher tiered ones? Better let them paper it, take it back, then let them take it again... It wouldn't be a good response to the system, but this is exactly the kind of thing players have been doing for awhile now. Are there plans on discouraging this kind of play?

[meerfunkuhtron.9725]

On 7/10/2024 at 8:08 PM, Forgotten Legend.9281 said:

with respect to the dev team, y'all need to spend WAY MORE time playing outside of prime time, and NOT running with huge meta- boonball fight guilds.

I would like to put more emphasis on this 'cause I too believe it's important.
If an Anet dev responsible for shaping WvW has been playing the game mode for several years, but has been doing so mainly from a specific experience, then I think it's insanely important that they try to experience the other kinds of gameplay available in WvW as well.
Because otherwise they are very biased form of authority.

WvW is attractive to many people because of its flexibility. It, at least in its inception, catered to a variety of playstyles and types of groups. For example, as I'm speaking to a friend of mine about giving WvW a try, one of the points that's making them actually consider it is that, "it sounds like there's other types of fighting involved outside of groups running towards each other to fight." The variety of engagements and activities in WvW is a good selling point for them, as it has been for many of us. We enjoy it because it's not just zerg vs. zerg, or 1v1, but literally everything else in between.

If you turn WvW into a mode that only caters to a subset of its players, then you're removing a good portion of what made WvW a unique game mode to begin with. One that had other things going for it that literally no other games like it has. There are "similar" ones, but those are already quite rare and aren't as successful in their delivery.

Please, have your WvW devs spend portions of their time with different teams at different times. You can't expect to make things better with such a narrow point of view.

[Quench.7091]

Thanks for trying to improve WvW mechanics!

I'm not sure if making trebuchets cost 50 supplies in the current state of WvW would be a good idea. Could we also get an update on things like not being able to contribute to defense events if ranged siege is used against an objective's walls, since defense events are proximity based? We used to be able to repair walls for credit. It's hard to justify defending against a treb attack in certain locations, as we lose participation. Perhaps something can be done to grant shield generators credit for defense events?

We also got other things that need to be looked at. Armored Dolyaks and Auto Turrets are seen as detrimental to the team. Maybe give Armored Dolyaks a boost to camp defenses as well? Camp lords die really fast, because they don't have Iron Guards as an improvements. For Auto Turrets, perhaps having it increase wall defenses against ranged attacks to funnel enemies into attacking gates with rams would work? That or it might be good to just scrap them for something else. People always yell at their team for using these upgrades.

Edited July 13 by Quench.7091

[Riba.3271]

Positive:

- Siege changes are in good direction. Golem change done perfectly.

- Objective contesting is an improvement. Wish it extended to watchtowers.

- It is fine to put bit more points in primetime. Should put reins in tanking off-prime.

- Regarding sPvP, I like that there are more high level and less daily tournaments since people were just doing it to grind gold.

Negative:

- Superior treb would be better at 80 supply instead of 60. How shield gens work is still a big problem.

- Point difference between skirmishes is too drastic. You're basically saying someones timezone of 8-10 hours is only worth of anothers 2, and thus killing all non-primetime. There are already better suggestions in this thread.

- Matchmaking system: combination of Restructuring & 1-up-1-down is biggest flaw in WvW at the moment. Hopefully the superiority of 4 tier monoservers system or winner-faces-winners matchmaking is acknowledged and implemented soon.

 

Hopefully the point distribution of timezones doesn't go through as it is. Knowing how slow WvW changes are it is unlikely it will be revisited for next 5 years.

Edited July 14 by Riba.3271

[CelestialCat.6240]

Since we are talking about making World vs World changes I'd like to submit a few suggestions.

1. Arrow carts get fire arrows added to their skill set which do extra damage against siege.

2. Spawn zones no longer reward the enemy for player kills, no loot, no points, nothing.

3. If a side has lost their keep and towers rewards for killing players of a side that owns no keeps or towers is removed. I recently had to deal with being on the team that was being spawn camped and we kept loosing people as they would give up after each failed assault to reclaim even a tower let alone the keep in EBG.

4. All waypoints but the emergency and spawn waypoints are removed. With the addition of warclaws having been added when a side out numbers both of the other two sides 5+ to 1 it makes it very hard for break outs when foes you defeat can rush back within seconds of their death to spawn camp your side.

5. Additional entrances are added to EBG keeps for defenders to be able to safely enter their own keeps. Such as adding side entrances.

6. All finishers on downed players are easily interruptible. If you dodge, move, teleport, stealth, etc your finisher move should cancel. I'm sick of running into people who have macro'ed their finishers with a dodge, teleport or some other action and I know their using macros as I have interrupted their finisher before they could use a dodge or teleport or whatever and watched them complete their macro and be forced to restart their macro or do the finisher normally.

7. Catapults can damage themselves if their splash damage is to close to themselves. I submit this suggestion as I know of multiple exploit spots (that I have reported to the devs about) that use the splash damage of the catapult to damage a tower or keep's wall without directly hitting the wall and often being obstructed.

8. All siege can be seen from range. This would make it easier for people on trebs to aim their shots a shield generators, catapults, and rams.

9. Defense participation is reworked to allow more ways to count with defending a camp, tower, or keep that isn't centered around killing at least one player. When you are a lone defender or greatly outnumbered getting a player kill can be difficult to impossible when any downed players are quickly revived. I miss the days repairing would count but teleport hackers ruined that.

10. Emergency waypoints (EWP) last three times longer. When you are on another map and someone shares the link to a EWP often by the time my client loads the map I'm being redirected to the spawn waypoint and having to go through another loading screen and I have a i9 14th gen with a latest gen SSD. For the few times I do load in I'm welcomed to a you died and the EWP has ended...

11. All Range attacks fire a little higher. This would not only make it easier for defenders to fire from walls in towers and keeps so that the sides of the walls don't block their shots including balli shots but also not having your arrows or bullets being blocked by the camp mark which has often frustrated me when a shot looks clear at the camp but I'd get a "obstructed" message because of the big mark in the center of the camp's ground.

12. We get more event days or weekends for WvW like no downed state, but maybe some new ones like 'you break it you fix it' where you would not get auto full repair on gates and walls when a tower or keep changes ownership.

I think I had some other ideas for WvW that wasn't suggestions like nerf Willbenders as their too op but I cannot think of them right now.

[nthmetal.9652]

On 7/10/2024 at 10:32 PM, Rubi Bayer.8493 said:

•Victory Points are now going to be weighted based on player population per skirmish, per region:

Like quite some people have said here, I would agree that the current suggestion for score adjustment based on player active is not ideal. Taking into account that it takes time for objectives being flipped back, the emphasis on primetime is so strong, that it seems like it's now only or mostly necessary to only win primetime. Activity during certrain times is alsod evalued so much, that plyers could as well just leave it be during these times, as their actions hardly have any impact.

IF such a system is placed there should at least be some kind fo countering mechanism to make it still worthwhile being active during off-times. There is a danger of driving a certain set of players away (which I don't understand why you would want that? Don't we all want a game that is worth being pllayed at all times? Maybe some of those players also spend some money, why would you want to completely devalue their contribution without giving anything back?), while at the same time concentrating activity where it is already being concentrated and hardware / virtual servers struggle to handle the activity (ping, skill-lag, even disconnects) not even to speak of queues during the primetime.

I can understand the idea that off-primetime activity should not control and dominate the score totally, when only some groups are able to provide such activity (e.g. only one team in a matchup having a night cap group or early morning group), but instead of blanket-punishing everyone for playing during such times, wouldn't a dynamic system reacting to the amount of players AND opposition more sense?
And if that is somehow not possible, or there is fear of this being gamed too much, could we at least have some other kind of compensation of the off groups, so that them playing during off-times is still somehow worthwhile?

Edited July 14 by nthmetal.9652

[Nero.7369]

On 7/10/2024 at 10:32 PM, Rubi Bayer.8493 said:

• EWP:
  • Now spawns 3 Emergency Waypoints for the duration of the tactic – only being updated for Keeps/Castles
  • All 3 Waypoints will be relatively near the Lord’s room of the Keep/Castle
  • Allow for defending groups to respond to objectives with EWP safer

 

WHY?!!!

Just fix the invul, so we wont die during loading screen. And maybe extent it until we use movement or a skill. If you dont do anything it would expire a few seconds after the emergency way point disappear. 

[Napster.8290]

Idk guys, those warscore changes in wvw seem irrelevant? Who cares who wins, if we don't get any noticeable rewards off of it. They should focus on making the game mode fun and attractive again. They should re-think their score changes...

 

- Give us different gold rewards for 1st, 2nd and 3rd placement, so it actually matters who wins. Link it to the skirmish reward track and give the reward to ppl who at least completed the gold chest, to not inflate economics, but rewards players for actually trying to play the game mode as intended and care for def/atk of objectives. Or even let it scale within finished chests.

 

- Remove those annoying celestial stats in wvw or heavily reduce the amount of stats they give. It is destroying roaming, smallscale and build diversity in general. And it just simply doesn't make any sense that these stats give so much more raw attribute points than 3 or 4 stat piece like berserker or minstrel.

 

- Keep on working on the MU algorhythm to guarantee fair fights and alliances.

 

About the contesting objective changes I'm open minded and interested to see how these play out.

[Poliator.7021]

First of all, I want to say thank you for the stream, it was a lot of fun and I'm looking forward to more streams like that. It always gets me more hyped for the changes to come!

I saw Trig mentioning that the PvP tournament changes are focused more on veteran players than in attracting newer players to organized play. I think the next step should be to incentivize participation in tournaments (we'll have many of them! 1 weekly, 2 monthlies, ToL twice a year...):

• Why? Because it'll be more fun, more teams might appear (thus more competitive matches at high level) and the experience of organized play helps to greatly improve skill even in Solo Queue from my experience.
• How? I'd think either with an LFG rework (unlikely) or by creating a PUG queue, which could be divided taking into account population by rating or such. I don't have a clear idea on how or if it would work.

As a more direct feedback, I like the addition of a monthly 2vs2 / 3vs3 tournament, but it will feel weird practising for those, since the only time they are enabled in any Queue is during off-season, which the last two seasons have been reduced from 2-week duration to 1-week duration. I don't know if creating a 2vs2/3vs3 Unranked Queue, as there is with Stronghold, is a viable option taking into account the population issue (the plus side is it takes less people for a match, and they are usually shorter).

 

I like the changes and they make me feel encouraged to play more sPvP again. I hope there are more things in store (and streams to go along with them)!

[kiranslee.4829]

While changes look good and positive, i have few questions regarding existing issues in pvp and wvw:

1. Will Anet finally address match manipulation/selling monthly AT tournaments ?

2. Are we finally gonna get option for reporting hackers/glitch abusers ?

 

 

 

[Anthonev.6452]

On 7/11/2024 at 6:02 AM, Rubi Bayer.8493 said:

NA: 21:00, 0:00, 3:00, 9:00 UTC (2:00 PM, 5:00 PM, 8:00 PM, 2:00 AM PDT)

So basically you just killed Aussie play time, I won't be able to do another tournament ever again.

Those times are basically 5:30am, start of the working day, middle of lunch or middle of dinner.

But wait I hear you say, there's a new weekly.....

Yeah, at around the same useless and fixed time as the monthly, which is around 4-5am on a Sunday or Monday morning.

So, yup, epic. All this will do is let the rich PvP elitists get more rewards and win-trade/sell weeklies along with monthly.

[PulsarianDevil.8125]

So...no fix to the perma shields and ranged immunity of "boon blobs" in WvW?