Alliances will not bring players and guilds back to WvW

[Knighthonor.4061]

@Warlord.9074 said:

@steki.1478 said:Pretty sure that guilds who leave don't leave because of population reasons. If guilds have problem with that, they transfer somewhere with healthier population and stay there until it gets too overstacked then move again.

The reason they did that was becasue of population reasons. That was sort of the last breath for them and that ship has already sailed.They transferred and transferred and stacked, and stacked and quit. All of this already happened. The game was/is to the point that no amount of transferring or stacking by guilds can give them content. Obviously there are still people playing this game I am not arguing over that, but it is a minuscule fraction of what there was that's just a fact. And yes any game loses players after 7 years, but wvw is not like every other game and what has happened here is no less than a tragedy and its not normal, considering everything this game had going for it.

So what do you all suggest? again you WvW dont want any PvPvE improvements, and you want something that will never happen in any class based MMO, aka Balance. So what do you all want exactly?

[Knighthonor.4061]

@steki.1478 said:

@Cambeleg.7632 said:

@"Sovereign.1093" said:how would you attract players to try and stay in wvw?

1. Worth rewards for incentivizing new players to join. Yes, it's a "poor" reason, but let face it: many players want their spent time rewarded fairly.

2. Real balance between teams. Call 'em servers, alliances, gangs... whatever... but change the game mode for incentivizing the balance and avoid third teams to be stomped without mercy 'cos lack of interest or feeling of helplessness 'cos not having enough coverage/population.

3. Make structures really valuable, that people really learn it's important to attack/defend/capture.

4. Balance the value of PPK (Points per kills) and PPT (Points per tick). WvW is a massive fight and siege activity field; both scoring systems should be fairly balanced, avoiding the manipulation of matchups going up and down in the leaderboard. Every server should play both systems in a healthy way, and be rewarded 'cos this reason.

5. Give a purpose to the game mode, not only the "just for the love of big battles". Give it something deeper, that offers a real motivation and repercussion.

6. Offer places for GvGs and duels where a) deaths don't cause drops in the score and b) they can happen without bothering and being bothered. If so, give them an own game mode where they can enjoy this.

7. Make roaming valuable again. This includes making guilds really a thing for the game mode, not only a nice tag and lot of buffs.

8. STOP promoting the bandwagoning, this been one of the biggest cancers in the game mode.

9. Rework the structure upgrades. Some of them killed good part of the strategy (spy globes, for example).

10. Fix the [censored] lag that is caused in Stonemist, for the sake of...

And one of the most important ones: have meaningful and regular balance patches instead of adding fluff and more powercreep to classes/builds that dont need it.

more balance patch talk. WvW and any PvP in this game will never be balanced because classes are so radically different.

[Tinnel.4369]

On the subject of rewards and winning mattering.......

I, personally, play to compete and play with friends and anything beyond that is kind of a bonus/quality of life improvement. If there's progression available within the mode I expect it to be attainable at a reasonable rate and I'm quite happy with the rate and available strategy with which I'm accumulating legendary armor. However, what's next? Not having to do map comp for stat changeable weapons would be nice. I don't really care how shiny they are, the game is flooded with shiny options.

Drops beyond the loads of crap could be better, but meh. I'd rather see just less crap overall, rather then more.

I don't understand winning needing to matter more. I agree with the sentiment that winning mattering in the WvW setting encourages undesirable behavior. If I grab a pickup ball game with my friends I don't need a reward outside of the spirit of competition and fun. I'm comfortable with the combination of PPK and PPT controlling the outcomes week to week and moving up and down the tiers accordingly. It's the population system/balance that has this all screwed up. However, a way to mark and acknowledge organized comps abilities and accomplishments is important.........GvG.

On the subject of our future.......

The sad truth is the state of the ears our voices are falling on and have been falling on for months/years. I believe the evidence is abundant and solid and they won't even speak to these questions/concerns The current anniversary sales while the game exists in apparent limbo is just another sign. There's a lot of things going on sale I'd like to snatch up to grow my account, but the question is, for what? You want my money? Earn it.

One way or another, writing will be on the wall Friday.

[Knighthonor.4061]

Problem with WvW isnt the balance so much. It needs a flat damage reduction across the board from players.

Need more mini objectives.

Need more better and threatening PvPvE NPCs that arent easy pushovers.

Need Better rewards and skins on rotation.

Need Factions instead of this Server nonsense. Hopefully Alliances are Factions by a different name. I hope, because WvW need Factions.

Boarderlands are too many for a small population. Merge the Boarderlands into a single map of some kind. Dont need 3 of them.

Need more Mobile Sieges, Not just Guild Specific ones.

Need some player Building features even if minor such as building selection and auto build.

Need a New Rez system than just the Waypoints.

[XenesisII.1540]

We couldn't even talk about the balance patch in this section of the forum.... so what's the point anyways.

[Stand The Wall.6987]

@Cambeleg.7632 said:but it's true that rewards need to be enough good for making worth this invested time.

no.

[Blackarps.1974]

It'll be a short addition to player count at most. The alliance update will give us more consistent fights but its not going "fix" WvW. The last time I wrote out a wall of text for Anet on glaring WvW issues, it was about 3 pages of text. No reason to win, poor balance patches (ones that aren't centered around WvW but instead PvP and raids), bad rewards, lack of GvG support, bad terrain issues on every map, bugs in the game since launch, etc. The list is huge.

This "alliance update" as people call it won't solve those issues. It will solve coverage issues. WvW will need a solid half a year or more of development from a good majority of Anet to fix which is something nobody should expect from them 7 years into the game. WvW, to me, is in a take it or leave it state from here on out. You stick around and play because you're still having fun or you move on. Expecting things to turn around and get much better is irrational thinking.

[Offair.2563]

@Ysmir.4986 said:People thinking that alliances are actually going to come out any day is kind of hilarious.

If it does come out it would create more problems then solving them. Players already gaming the system by tanking and bandwagoning. Give them more tools and voila..

[steki.1478]

@Knighthonor.4061 said:

@steki.1478 said:

@Cambeleg.7632 said:

@"Sovereign.1093" said:how would you attract players to try and stay in wvw?

1. Worth rewards for incentivizing new players to join. Yes, it's a "poor" reason, but let face it: many players want their spent time rewarded fairly.

2. Real balance between teams. Call 'em servers, alliances, gangs... whatever... but change the game mode for incentivizing the balance and avoid third teams to be stomped without mercy 'cos lack of interest or feeling of helplessness 'cos not having enough coverage/population.

3. Make structures really valuable, that people really learn it's important to attack/defend/capture.

4. Balance the value of PPK (Points per kills) and PPT (Points per tick). WvW is a massive fight and siege activity field; both scoring systems should be fairly balanced, avoiding the manipulation of matchups going up and down in the leaderboard. Every server should play both systems in a healthy way, and be rewarded 'cos this reason.

5. Give a purpose to the game mode, not only the "just for the love of big battles". Give it something deeper, that offers a real motivation and repercussion.

6. Offer places for GvGs and duels where a) deaths don't cause drops in the score and b) they can happen without bothering and being bothered. If so, give them an own game mode where they can enjoy this.

7. Make roaming valuable again. This includes making guilds really a thing for the game mode, not only a nice tag and lot of buffs.

8. STOP promoting the bandwagoning, this been one of the biggest cancers in the game mode.

9. Rework the structure upgrades. Some of them killed good part of the strategy (spy globes, for example).

10. Fix the [censored] lag that is caused in Stonemist, for the sake of...

And one of the most important ones: have meaningful and regular balance patches instead of adding fluff and more powercreep to classes/builds that dont need it.

more balance patch talk. WvW and any PvP in this game will never be balanced because classes are so radically different.

That's why you do the patches regularly. Keeps the meta fresh and same builds not broken for years.

[Jugglemonkey.8741]

@steki.1478 said:

@Knighthonor.4061 said:

@steki.1478 said:

@Cambeleg.7632 said:

@"Sovereign.1093" said:how would you attract players to try and stay in wvw?

1. Worth rewards for incentivizing new players to join. Yes, it's a "poor" reason, but let face it: many players want their spent time rewarded fairly.

2. Real balance between teams. Call 'em servers, alliances, gangs... whatever... but change the game mode for incentivizing the balance and avoid third teams to be stomped without mercy 'cos lack of interest or feeling of helplessness 'cos not having enough coverage/population.

3. Make structures really valuable, that people really learn it's important to attack/defend/capture.

4. Balance the value of PPK (Points per kills) and PPT (Points per tick). WvW is a massive fight and siege activity field; both scoring systems should be fairly balanced, avoiding the manipulation of matchups going up and down in the leaderboard. Every server should play both systems in a healthy way, and be rewarded 'cos this reason.

5. Give a purpose to the game mode, not only the "just for the love of big battles". Give it something deeper, that offers a real motivation and repercussion.

6. Offer places for GvGs and duels where a) deaths don't cause drops in the score and b) they can happen without bothering and being bothered. If so, give them an own game mode where they can enjoy this.

7. Make roaming valuable again. This includes making guilds really a thing for the game mode, not only a nice tag and lot of buffs.

8. STOP promoting the bandwagoning, this been one of the biggest cancers in the game mode.

9. Rework the structure upgrades. Some of them killed good part of the strategy (spy globes, for example).

10. Fix the [censored] lag that is caused in Stonemist, for the sake of...

And one of the most important ones: have meaningful and regular balance patches instead of adding fluff and more powercreep to classes/builds that dont need it.

more balance patch talk. WvW and any PvP in this game will never be balanced because classes are so radically different.

That's why you do the patches regularly. Keeps the meta fresh and same builds not broken for years.

I'm fine with having some fights I can't win personally. A scourge has no chance against a rifle DE on average so I don't see why I should have an easier time vs a good mirage. Got to be within reason tho, all specs should have a matchup (or three, counting elite specs) that is nigh hopeless, some that are in your favour, and the rest down to who plays better.

[baguette.3248]

Anet needs alliance exclusive skins, that will make wvw great again!

[Lanthun.7251]

@Vayne.8563 said:I don't think people will come back largely either but...the large reason I don't bring my PvE guild into more WvW events is because too many people in my guild aren't on my server which was closed for a long time. This is just bad businesss. You mean I can't play with my friends? Alliances will fix that or rather, not having servers at all.

My guild is very much my in game community. I'm not going to run content I can't run with everybody because I don't like excluding people. I mean now, the server I'm on is open, but for ages it hasn't been. It's a very frustrating situation for a guild leader.

I definitely feel the exact same way; a game mode I loved bringing guild members, new and old, into was not possible due to the locked doors. It was heartbreaking to tell members they couldn't join me in WvW because the server is full, and I was not about to tell them (a guild that is super casual at the end of the day, and does not specialize in WvW) to hop every 8 weeks to the linked servers. It just was not ideal, and I did not even encourage that to members; it was a sad day, for me, when I had to tell them I would no longer be hosting an official WvW event for the guild anymore. We may just be a big bunch of knuckleheads that don't know how to WvW effectively, and wanted to have fun as a collective.

[steki.1478]

@Jugglemonkey.8741 said:

@steki.1478 said:

@Knighthonor.4061 said:

@steki.1478 said:

@Cambeleg.7632 said:

@"Sovereign.1093" said:how would you attract players to try and stay in wvw?

1. Worth rewards for incentivizing new players to join. Yes, it's a "poor" reason, but let face it: many players want their spent time rewarded fairly.

2. Real balance between teams. Call 'em servers, alliances, gangs... whatever... but change the game mode for incentivizing the balance and avoid third teams to be stomped without mercy 'cos lack of interest or feeling of helplessness 'cos not having enough coverage/population.

3. Make structures really valuable, that people really learn it's important to attack/defend/capture.

4. Balance the value of PPK (Points per kills) and PPT (Points per tick). WvW is a massive fight and siege activity field; both scoring systems should be fairly balanced, avoiding the manipulation of matchups going up and down in the leaderboard. Every server should play both systems in a healthy way, and be rewarded 'cos this reason.

5. Give a purpose to the game mode, not only the "just for the love of big battles". Give it something deeper, that offers a real motivation and repercussion.

6. Offer places for GvGs and duels where a) deaths don't cause drops in the score and b) they can happen without bothering and being bothered. If so, give them an own game mode where they can enjoy this.

7. Make roaming valuable again. This includes making guilds really a thing for the game mode, not only a nice tag and lot of buffs.

8. STOP promoting the bandwagoning, this been one of the biggest cancers in the game mode.

9. Rework the structure upgrades. Some of them killed good part of the strategy (spy globes, for example).

10. Fix the [censored] lag that is caused in Stonemist, for the sake of...

And one of the most important ones: have meaningful and regular balance patches instead of adding fluff and more powercreep to classes/builds that dont need it.

more balance patch talk. WvW and any PvP in this game will never be balanced because classes are so radically different.

That's why you do the patches regularly. Keeps the meta fresh and same builds not broken for years.

I'm fine with having some fights I can't win personally. A scourge has no chance against a rifle DE on average so I don't see why I should have an easier time vs a good mirage. Got to be within reason tho, all specs should have a matchup (or three, counting elite specs) that is nigh hopeless, some that are in your favour, and the rest down to who plays better.

I wasn't talking about 1v1 scenarios that have almost no impact on the game mode (but even then you don't want overly strong builds). I was talking about large scale fights which only get affected by new specs from expansions. The only thing that changed since start of PoF was introduction of scrappers into meta everything else is practically the same with a little more fluff.

[Acheron.4731]

@Knighthonor.4061 said:

@Warlord.9074 said:

@steki.1478 said:Pretty sure that guilds who leave don't leave because of population reasons. If guilds have problem with that, they transfer somewhere with healthier population and stay there until it gets too overstacked then move again.

The reason they did that was becasue of population reasons. That was sort of the last breath for them and that ship has already sailed.They transferred and transferred and stacked, and stacked and quit. All of this already happened. The game was/is to the point that no amount of transferring or stacking by guilds can give them content. Obviously there are still people playing this game I am not arguing over that, but it is a minuscule fraction of what there was that's just a fact. And yes any game loses players after 7 years, but wvw is not like every other game and what has happened here is no less than a tragedy and its not normal, considering everything this game had going for it.

So what do you all suggest? again you WvW dont want any PvPvE improvements, and you want something that will never happen in any class based MMO, aka Balance. So what do you all want exactly?

More frequent attempts at balanceMore frequent looks at overall populationMore frequent change-ups in loot availability perhaps?More frequent wvw announcements and dev communicationsJust more of a feeling of being a priority

[Slick.7164]

Guilds die because peeps leave the game and no one will pick up after the tag getting bored. WvW will never recover. Anet allowed a group of people to destroy it. Go watch it live right now. Anet could stop that this coming Friday but wont. I say give a certain server 5 links and get it done. I am personally just about done with this game too. The Koreans didn't clean house fast or hard enough.

[JusticeRetroHunter.7684]

@Lanthun.7251 said:

@Vayne.8563 said:I don't think people will come back largely either but...the large reason I don't bring my PvE guild into more WvW events is because too many people in my guild aren't on my server which was closed for a long time. This is just bad businesss. You mean I can't play with my friends? Alliances will fix that or rather, not having servers at all.

My guild is very much my in game community. I'm not going to run content I can't run with everybody because I don't like excluding people. I mean now, the server I'm on is open, but for ages it hasn't been. It's a very frustrating situation for a guild leader.

I definitely feel the exact same way; a game mode I loved bringing guild members, new and old, into was not possible due to the locked doors. It was heartbreaking to tell members they couldn't join me in WvW because the server is full, and I was not about to tell them (a guild that is super casual at the end of the day, and does not specialize in WvW) to hop every 8 weeks to the linked servers. It just was not ideal, and I did not even encourage that to members; it was a sad day, for me, when I had to tell them I would no longer be hosting an official WvW event for the guild anymore. We may just be a big bunch of knuckleheads that don't know how to WvW effectively, and wanted to have fun as a collective.

I think vayne's comment is very underrated. This to me seems like the biggest reason why more people from pve or spvp don't come to wvw. I'm a veteran WvWer, and the only reason i transferred from FA to HOD at one point was because i had friends i knew that were on Hod (If you look at world selection, you can see how many friends are on specific worlds, for HoD it was abouit 5... and i have hundreds of friends on my FL). It was a completely random decision, and then from there i met other friends and joined an awesome GvG guild. I think that WvW itself is too much of a game mode that rewards playing it internally. You go to wvw, play with strangers and over time you get to know these strangers and that's what creates server pride...then when you want to introduce your non wvw friends to wvw...well they can't and so your kinda stuck with your own server. When your world link changes every few months its a new way to meet more strangers and make new friends...so that actually solved some issues...but it's still interanlly kept in WvW rather than fixing the problem with pve or spvp recruitment.

[Cambeleg.7632]

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@Cambeleg.7632 said:

but

it's true that rewards need to be enough good for making worth this invested time.

no.

Explain why not.

[Naxos.2503]

I dont think the Alliance system is meant to "retain" current WvWers, so much as get more people in. If someone has a level 2000, most likely, those folks already have their fill, and play by habit, or because of the people. There is not much to be done to retain those types of players, other that fixing inherent flaws in the system, which is easier said than done.

On the other hand, I know that quite a few of my guildies would indulge in the mode more seriously if they could play on the same side, which is currently not the case. I even saw more than once people from the same guild fighting on opposite sides of the same conflict, and that must happen rather frequently. It's not necessarily what people want, and it really doesn't make much sense (especially from a point capture point of view).

[Stand The Wall.6987]

@Cambeleg.7632 said:

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@Cambeleg.7632 said:

but

it's true that rewards need to be enough good for making worth this invested time.

no.

Explain why not.

cuz the best way to make the time invested worth it is to make the battles better. rewards might add a bit of incentive, but they will not be the main reason or even close to it for why people stay in wvw. you could add unique rewards like the legendary backpack, but once pve'rs get that they will leave. which means you have to produce continual content just to keep those numbers up. that is a waste of time compared to people wanting to play the mode.

[Cambeleg.7632]

@"Stand The Wall.6987" said:

cuz the best way to make the time invested worth it is to make the battles better. rewards might add a bit of incentive, but they will not be the main reason or even close to it for why people stay in wvw. you could add unique rewards like the legendary backpack, but once pve'rs get that they will leave. which means you have to produce continual content just to keep those numbers up. that is a waste of time compared to people wanting to play the mode.

Good, your point is valid, but... did you read the rest of suggestions I made? This should give you the hint that rewards aren't the focus in my request list, but another point that Arenanet needs to care of. Obviously, the game mode itself needs to offer more than mere rewards, but even with this "more", rewards need to be balanced in quality.

[enkidu.5937]

regarding the title . . .what about . . .lag-free alliances :p

[juno.1840]

We can predict the future now?