24 replies to this topic

[Earendil]

The server that can field more people on a more regular basis will always win.

  We are losing because we have outmanned buff. You have zergs.
  
  Our guilds are leaving WvW/the server. People would rather do dungeons than WvW - that's why we're losing

How many times have you read these ? And you know what - they are usually 100% true. But they are only half of the problem, the start. What follows is "Why is that? why did our people stop WvW ing ? What can I do, as a guild leader/commander/PuG to change it ?"


No simple answer - however, remember that we are not talking about trained and paid soldiers here - we are talking about people trying to enjoy a game.

Basic fact about human behaviour: People will keep doing something that makes them feel good. So, if they prefer PvE to WvW this means that PvE is more fun - at this moment - than WvW.  It is not a fault, not a crime, they are not paid to do it.

It's easy to have fun and feel  good about yourself when you are winning as a server. A lot harder when your server loses - and that's where you need support.

As a guild leader - try to keep WvW fun in your own guild, try to focus on how to make your teams experience enjoyable even when losing. Listen to your people and follow their suggestions. Do not focus on points and score - server victory in WvW is something that's heavily influenced by things you have absolutely no control. Try to set objectives that are in your reach not -"we will take the whole map and turn this thing around".

As an experienced commander, try to make it fun, even when losing. Congratulate your people (who usually respect you) when they do something good - never blame them when they fail. One anger fuelled message in team/map chat from a commander is enough to make people suddenly more interested in PvE.

Case:  yesterday in BG BL, our inner Bay N wall was being trebbed, I finished a mortar with my supply and took the control of the thing (knowing there were others around willing to do it, including Keenat - one of our most respected commanders). After a long duel, I got the treb down - Keenat said "Great job there". "Hardly, I answered,  I missed at least 50% of my shots" (and our shock team was already there anyways   ). "What matters is you got it down" he replied. Had he shown anger in any way (justified, I may add) - I would have probably just left the map like an emo kid.

Also - commanders (and everyone else) - take time to explain some mechanics to people that might not know it. Even the repel  timer for WP is largely unknown by PuGs. Where to place a ram, where to place a treb, why do we do this and not the other. Learning new stuff does give a feeling of accomplishment to casual WvWers even when losing

As a PuG - it's simple - try to have fun and get others to do it. You are being spawn camped in a one color borderland and no commander is on sight ? try to get 4 people with you and go take a camp, kill a Yak or a sentry.  If it works congratulate yourselves, even if you get wiped after. Try to join the effort in one of the maps where there is fighting. Be polite, ask questions and answer them. And so on.

Hope this can help, but I'm sure there are people around who would like to share their experiences.

[Sayura]

Good post. You gotta make wvw fun otherwise people are going to go back to pve. But if you give them a little taste of success and encouragement in wvw and make it fun, they'll want to participate.

When I run with our guild, everyone is on mumble and we're all having a good time laughing and joking about things that happened and being serious when we need to. It's a type of camaraderie that you need to sustain healthy numbers.

[Beastgate]

These are fun suggestions but they will not affect the tide of the battle. Yes it could be fun to take supply camps here and there but eventually the other team will just camp it out, and each of their supply camps and each dolyak will have an escort of more players than the total amount of players on your server. That's when my guild usually called it quits.

Just go back to the last pages of this forum, which are comprised of topics dating before the beta was released. Many people predicted this population problem and gave interesting ideas on how to try and solve it.

[Earendil]

Beastgate, on 07 November 2012 - 06:26 PM, said:

These are fun suggestions but they will not affect the tide of the battle. Yes it could be fun to take supply camps here and there but eventually the other team will just camp it out, and each of their supply camps and each dolyak will have an escort of more players than the total amount of players on your server. That's when my guild usually called it quits.

Just go back to the last pages of this forum, which are comprised of topics dating before the beta was released. Many people predicted this population problem and gave interesting ideas on how to try and solve it.

No individual alone can change the tide of the battle. Not even a guild. Embrace this truth and accept it. Do your grieving over your control of the WvW scores. Maybe then  you will able to have fun in WvW again.

Base on your transfers from BG to JQ and recently to SBI, I can only assume that your purpose in WvW is to be on the winning side. A perfectly valid motivation, I might say, but it ultimately says that you cannot get your fun in WvW if your server is not winning. A pity.

My message was mostly intended for people who want to rebuild a server WvW community that was hit by the loss of morale after defeat.

[Acidbaron]

Numbers do matter, why is this so hard to accept by some is beyond me.

Pugs should be hinted and encouraged, we even refrain from calling them that as it can have a bad meaning for some.


edit: rephrased to avoid confusion.

Edited by Acidbaron, 07 November 2012 - 06:36 PM.

[Beastgate]

Earendil, on 07 November 2012 - 06:33 PM, said:

No individual alone can change the tide of the battle. Not even a guild. Embrace this truth and accept it. Do your grieving over your control of the WvW scores. Maybe then  you will able to have fun in WvW again.

Base on your transfers from BG to JQ and recently to SBI, I can only assume that your purpose in WvW is to be on the winning side. A perfectly valid motivation, I might say, but it ultimately says that you cannot get your fun in WvW if your server is not winning. A pity.

My message was mostly intended for people who want to rebuild a server WvW community that was hit by the loss of morale after defeat.

It was fun until we literally could not do anything because of spawn-camping and everything they have is defended to a point where we cannot match it unless we had more players (the only thing we could do is take quaggans). This was the reason my guild transferred, not simply because of the fact that we were losing.

Quote

Numbers do matter, why is this so hard to accept by some is beyond me.

We want to feel responsible for our server's victory rather than just handing it off to a bunch of Asians.

Edited by Beastgate, 07 November 2012 - 06:44 PM.

[Nalano]

The three-way fight is based on the assumption that all three sides want to be #1, and that as such the two losing sides will naturally team up and overwhelm the winning side.

In this manner is WvW attempting to handle the inevitable problem of population mismatches.

The exceedingly easy manner in which players can jump ship, however, has subverted this system, as has the idea of "playing for second." Everything else - organization, leadership, morale, etc - is of secondary concern.

Edited by Nalano, 07 November 2012 - 06:47 PM.

[lioka qiao]

I'm going to add to this idea an observation.  I've started studying the WvW gameplay and I noticed that real world tactics actually apply to it.  What I know of these tactics comes from the Dynasty Warriors tactics series and Total War but they apply here too.  Here are my observations based on the gameplay:

1.  A zerg group is very poor at actually defending what it takes over on average.  This is similar to how you take a 40 army in Risk and proceed to clear cut Asia.  Eventually you run out of steam but at the same time everything you took is poorly defended and not upgraded.  A smaller army could come in and retake the things you just took.  The same thing happens with zerg groups in WvW and particularly on borderlands.  I was in a zerg in my server and we took over almost all of the red team's battleground.  As we were stuck in a siege on their bastion I noticed that the map slowly turned red again.  First the supply camps went, then the smaller keeps.  The moral of this part is that if you're the leader of a zerg group, assign some people to defend the things you capture.


2.  It is actually very easy to design a defense of a castle.  Arrow carts near the gate, and a ballista or two overlooking the area where the enemy siege would be setup.  Defenses should match or exceed what your enemy might throw at you.  Were you the type of player who stuck 20 siege tanks over a chokepoint near your base and just let them rip enemies to shreds?  It's like that.   At the same time these defenses are useless if noone mans them.  I had designed a defense for bay on the red map.  I knew that enemies would show up at the northeast gate for a siege and with 1 ballista and 2 arrow carts I was able to keep them at bay (no pun intended) for a good 5 minutes on my own.  I called for reinforcements to defend against the siege but noone came.

3.  Intelligence on enemy movements is key to controlling your territory.
-It is okay to have a few players out there as scouts. If you're the player who is doing the scouting, know where you are and observe how the enemy moves.  Is there a path they're taking to reinforce a keep under siege?  Are they zerging and where is that zerg going?  Know the map and use cardinal directions.
- If you're  the commander on a map and you have scouts reporting a zerg on the move you can use the knowledge to anticipate where the zerg will go to.  I had actually done some scouting and tracked a zerg from the middle of astral all the way to bluelake on that red map, reporting the location as I went to the commander on the field.  When they finally started sieging the bluelake tower the commander showed up with his group and the enemy zerg was massacred.

4.  Small group operations help
If you don't have a commander you can still do small group operations.  A group of 4 can easily take all of the supply points on a borderland and even in the eternal battleground.  If you're observant of enemy reinforcement paths for defense of a siege your commander is doing you can split a group of 4-5 off and ambush the reinforcements that come on that path.  This delays valuable supplies and troops and could mean the difference between a successful siege and getting repelled.   One player can solo the NPC bases to capture them and gain the NPC support.  These NPCs will guard key locations on the map and even take some locations for oyu.

-Real world tactics that exist in WvW:
-  Cutting off supplies:  Armies cannot push forward without supplies.  The longer they have to extend without them the greater a chance of them getting destroyed.  Small teams should assault supply points often.

- Ambushing reinforcements:  This is actually extremely effective.  Lets face it, troops die in armies.  If they go up against a well defended castle there will be casualties.  In Guildwars enemy troops are technically immortal.  Don't let this fool you though.  The enemy gets one respawn point and it is usually in their starting point for the map.  This means that casualties deep in territory are more devastating to an army than casualties at the starting keeps.  This is where ambushing reinforcements can come in handy.  If a siege on your bastion is in effect then you can have ambush teams placed on the roads leading up to the bastion.  These teams should be easily mobile and will be able to overcome reinforcements.  Players don't travel in packs until they get to the zerg at the siege.  Alternatively if you're moving out to reinforce your zerg or siege don't go alone.  Travel with a group, even if they're not partied together.

- Controlling the flow of reinforcements:  While we can't destroy a bridge to create a road-block yet there are few cases where you can control enemy forces and they won't even realize it.  I had such a case where the red team had taken over the dawn keep.  Our bastion was still under control but enemy reinforcements were passing through it.  I took some supplies and gave a few love taps to the southwest gate.  This redirection alone was enough to break the defenses on the keep.

-Pincer attacks, rear attacks, troop lines and maneuvers
I've only personally seen a rear attack work in WvW and we massacred the enemy with it.  Other troop maneuvers should work too given the design of the simulation.  Something that should work but noone does is lines.  Up until WW1 most enemy troops would form ranks with infantry defending artillery.   I have yet to see a battle on open ground here in WvW but in a siege a similar manner should work.  This would be most effective when you're using catapults for the gate.


This is all I have for now.   These strategies may have been posted elsewhere and if they are good.  I'll go looking for them.   The WvW pvp format is actually one of the most interesting ones there is.  It is a simulation of real world medeival combat and while there is an element of fantasy to WvW it strongly parallels its real world counterpart.

Edited by lioka qiao, 07 November 2012 - 06:55 PM.

[Earendil]

Acidbaron, on 07 November 2012 - 06:35 PM, said:

Numbers do matter, why is this so hard to accept by some is beyond me.

Pugs should be hinted and encouraged, we even refrain from calling them that as it can have a bad meaning for some.


edit: rephrased to avoid confusion.

Numbers do matter. That was exactly my point in my OP. A server that can field more people all the tim will usually win. No argument about it.

But try to go further - what makes a server capable of fielding more ?  Usually it's the victory and the free transfers. However, there are cases, like SBI in the previous 2 matches, where we could come back from a large deficit and people would still fight even when outmanned. Just wanted to share with others who might question themselves..."What now ?" instead of "Who's to blame".

I agree with you that SBI is winning right now because of numbers. Which is not great for me - I'm currently leveling my alts. But things will change, and our commanders are still trying to offer us fun experiences when we are on the field.

[RabidusIncendia]

OP it's nice to think a single person or guild can turn around a server but you cannot.  Consider that any given server has a few thousand WvW players, probably 10,000.  It's hard to realise since they all show up at different times.  But given this info, you cannot turn around any server's attitude towards WvW.

Your second part I agree with, though.  There's certainly fun to be had every now and rhen if your server continually tanks or has no opposition.  But it's not very lasting, since the real fun over the years would be if even half of the functions of WvW had any use, but they do not with nightcappers and severe population imbalances.  I've tried to have fun over time in a continually winning/losing server and it just gets boring.  There needs to be some sort of stability for WvW to last.  Any sort of changing your attitude is only going to last you so long.

Edited by RabidusIncendia, 07 November 2012 - 06:54 PM.

[Beastgate]

Nalano, on 07 November 2012 - 06:46 PM, said:

The three-way fight is based on the assumption that all three sides want to be #1, and that as such the two losing sides will naturally team up and overwhelm the winning side.

In this manner is WvW attempting to handle the inevitable problem of population mismatches.

The exceedingly easy manner in which players can jump ship, however, has subverted this system, as has the idea of "playing for second." Everything else - organization, leadership, morale, etc - is of secondary concern.

Funny, the way I heard it is that the #1 and #2 server will team up on #3 since it's "easy picking." Plus, sometimes it's more important for #2 to stay in tier 1 than to try and overthrow #1.

In response to the huge post, those are good points but in this game at least, it's simply much more population dependent. I've never played Risk or Total War, but I'm assuming each side has relatively the same amount of troops?

[Acidbaron]

Earendil, on 07 November 2012 - 06:52 PM, said:

Numbers do matter. That was exactly my point in my OP. A server that can field more people all the tim will usually win. No argument about it.

But try to go further - what makes a server capable of fielding more ?  Usually it's the victory and the free transfers. However, there are cases, like SBI in the previous 2 matches, where we could come back from a large deficit and people would still fight even when outmanned. Just wanted to share with others who might question themselves..."What now ?" instead of "Who's to blame".

I agree with you that SBI is winning right now because of numbers. Which is not great for me - I'm currently leveling my alts. But things will change, and our commanders are still trying to offer us fun experiences when we are on the field.

Reason i rephrased it to not make it sound as you're are in disagreement with that and more a general stab at those who do still disagree with that

[Nalano]

Beastgate, on 07 November 2012 - 07:01 PM, said:

Funny, the way I heard it is that the #1 and #2 server will team up on #3 since it's "easy picking." Plus, sometimes it's more important for #2 to stay in tier 1 than to try and overthrow #1.

In response to the huge post, those are good points but in this game at least, it's simply much more population dependent. I've never played Risk or Total War, but I'm assuming each side has relatively the same amount of troops?

Hence "playing for second." In no war should you be playing for runner-up.

I suspect that such is yet another form of the ways in which easy server transfers have undermined the system: As there is no "my server or death," there's no particular impetus to give it one's all, as one's back is never to the wall.

But then, I'm of the sort that really enjoyed "Player X has killed you" messages in WAR because it fostered "I must find Player X and kill them over again until they cry like a newborn lamb." This neutered system is comparatively antiseptic.

Edited by Nalano, 07 November 2012 - 07:15 PM.

[Beastgate]

It's sad but so many people play WvW just to win.
Case in point, look at the numbers in tier 1 right now. The order is now guaranteed not to change so Stormbluff isn't even trying anymore, and Blackgate has so much ppt despite being third place.
Another advantage of being in the #1 server, you can take advantage of this time to PvE and farm using the +20% extra gathering chance, etc.

[chuckles79]

lioka qiao, on 07 November 2012 - 06:51 PM, said:

I'm going to add to this idea an observation.  I've started studying the WvW gameplay and I noticed that real world tactics actually apply to it.  What I know of these tactics comes from the Dynasty Warriors tactics series and Total War but they apply here too.  Here are my observations based on the gameplay:

1.  A zerg group is very poor at actually defending what it takes over on average.  This is similar to how you take a 40 army in Risk and proceed to clear cut Asia.  Eventually you run out of steam but at the same time everything you took is poorly defended and not upgraded.  A smaller army could come in and retake the things you just took.  The same thing happens with zerg groups in WvW and particularly on borderlands.  I was in a zerg in my server and we took over almost all of the red team's battleground.  As we were stuck in a siege on their bastion I noticed that the map slowly turned red again.  First the supply camps went, then the smaller keeps.  The moral of this part is that if you're the leader of a zerg group, assign some people to defend the things you capture.


2.  It is actually very easy to design a defense of a castle.  Arrow carts near the gate, and a ballista or two overlooking the area where the enemy siege would be setup.  Defenses should match or exceed what your enemy might throw at you.  Were you the type of player who stuck 20 siege tanks over a chokepoint near your base and just let them rip enemies to shreds?  It's like that.   At the same time these defenses are useless if noone mans them.  I had designed a defense for bay on the red map.  I knew that enemies would show up at the northeast gate for a siege and with 1 ballista and 2 arrow carts I was able to keep them at bay (no pun intended) for a good 5 minutes on my own.  I called for reinforcements to defend against the siege but noone came.

3.  Intelligence on enemy movements is key to controlling your territory.
-It is okay to have a few players out there as scouts. If you're the player who is doing the scouting, know where you are and observe how the enemy moves.  Is there a path they're taking to reinforce a keep under siege?  Are they zerging and where is that zerg going?  Know the map and use cardinal directions.
- If you're  the commander on a map and you have scouts reporting a zerg on the move you can use the knowledge to anticipate where the zerg will go to.  I had actually done some scouting and tracked a zerg from the middle of astral all the way to bluelake on that red map, reporting the location as I went to the commander on the field.  When they finally started sieging the bluelake tower the commander showed up with his group and the enemy zerg was massacred.

4.  Small group operations help
If you don't have a commander you can still do small group operations.  A group of 4 can easily take all of the supply points on a borderland and even in the eternal battleground.  If you're observant of enemy reinforcement paths for defense of a siege your commander is doing you can split a group of 4-5 off and ambush the reinforcements that come on that path.  This delays valuable supplies and troops and could mean the difference between a successful siege and getting repelled.   One player can solo the NPC bases to capture them and gain the NPC support.  These NPCs will guard key locations on the map and even take some locations for oyu.

-Real world tactics that exist in WvW:
-  Cutting off supplies:  Armies cannot push forward without supplies.  The longer they have to extend without them the greater a chance of them getting destroyed.  Small teams should assault supply points often.

- Ambushing reinforcements:  This is actually extremely effective.  Lets face it, troops die in armies.  If they go up against a well defended castle there will be casualties.  In Guildwars enemy troops are technically immortal.  Don't let this fool you though.  The enemy gets one respawn point and it is usually in their starting point for the map.  This means that casualties deep in territory are more devastating to an army than casualties at the starting keeps.  This is where ambushing reinforcements can come in handy.  If a siege on your bastion is in effect then you can have ambush teams placed on the roads leading up to the bastion.  These teams should be easily mobile and will be able to overcome reinforcements.  Players don't travel in packs until they get to the zerg at the siege.  Alternatively if you're moving out to reinforce your zerg or siege don't go alone.  Travel with a group, even if they're not partied together.

- Controlling the flow of reinforcements:  While we can't destroy a bridge to create a road-block yet there are few cases where you can control enemy forces and they won't even realize it.  I had such a case where the red team had taken over the dawn keep.  Our bastion was still under control but enemy reinforcements were passing through it.  I took some supplies and gave a few love taps to the southwest gate.  This redirection alone was enough to break the defenses on the keep.

-Pincer attacks, rear attacks, troop lines and maneuvers
I've only personally seen a rear attack work in WvW and we massacred the enemy with it.  Other troop maneuvers should work too given the design of the simulation.  Something that should work but noone does is lines.  Up until WW1 most enemy troops would form ranks with infantry defending artillery.   I have yet to see a battle on open ground here in WvW but in a siege a similar manner should work.  This would be most effective when you're using catapults for the gate.


This is all I have for now.   These strategies may have been posted elsewhere and if they are good.  I'll go looking for them.   The WvW pvp format is actually one of the most interesting ones there is.  It is a simulation of real world medeival combat and while there is an element of fantasy to WvW it strongly parallels its real world counterpart.

It reads more like a guide, but you have committed the sin of going on a forum with a solution.  People come here to blame the cruel, uncaring hand of fate that hasn't blessed their server with fanatical asian and european guilds that do NOTHING but WvW, 12 hours a day.

1. This is more common in lopsided matches.  In a closely contested 3-way, you have enough cooler heads to realize that a capture of a tower or keep is crucial to keep in your server's hands.  In our match this week, both SoS and SoR really understand how much it takes out of the population to have to retake a keep after losing it.  The cost in siege equipment, time, and effort can drain the group's energy for the day.

2. Again, a symptom of low participation and sloppy defenses.  In larger matchups, keeps tend to fall to large, coordinated efforts.  People are learning to not rush in when the wall goes down, that maybe lobbying a few more cata shots will make the difference between a successful rush and some stealthed thief throwing 4 supply on the wall to put it back up.  Cautious invaders will setup ballista as soon as they get inside and clear the walls and do mesmer checks.

3.  There are a lot of thieves who get tired of zerg rushing.  Most at risk points on the map usually have one casual observer if not more.  The lesson to be learned is to not chat more than necessary.  Often you get some bored chatty Cathy and you start ignoring him, until you happen to see that he said the water gate is at 50%...3 min. ago.

4.  Agreed.  What's more epic, taking a keep with 50 people or taking 3 camps with 2 people?

5. Tactics fit the weapons and abilities.  Pincer attacks fail in GW because of AoE support.  Napoleonic tactics are the key here, strong interior lines of communication supply and reinforcements.  That's the key to tactics in this game, is making sure that your teammates can get back to the fight as soon as possible, while minimizing the chances for ambush.

Too many armchair generals talk about going behind enemy lines.  The only time you should take a tower or keep when the enemy holds real estate between you, is if you are 95% sure or better you can ninja it with a single ram.

[BloodSF]

Keenat is awesome. Saved my ass once last night as well. We wiped BG from south tower and then got c*cky. spawn camped and built arrow carts. meanwhile a few of them came thru the supply camp and put catas on the back wall without getting swords up.

We kept spawn camping... then ran up to take the camp for the tick. We come out... tower got FLIPPED!

My IG char's face must've been beet red. We were about to leave the map and go elsewhere and fell asleep at the wheel after the first wipe. Anyway... the crew would've gotten the tower back within 30-45 mins. But Keenat just roles down with Mayoken and we have it back in 10

All I could say was... nj CaLM... and thanks for covering our asses while SF crew was busy badge farming and looking the other way lol.

Edited by BloodSF, 07 November 2012 - 09:25 PM.

[Switchback]

lioka qiao, on 07 November 2012 - 06:51 PM, said:

2.  It is actually very easy to design a defense of a castle.  Arrow carts near the gate, and a ballista or two overlooking the area where the enemy siege would be setup.  Defenses should match or exceed what your enemy might throw at you.  Were you the type of player who stuck 20 siege tanks over a chokepoint near your base and just let them rip enemies to shreds?  It's like that.   At the same time these defenses are useless if noone mans them.  I had designed a defense for bay on the red map.  I knew that enemies would show up at the northeast gate for a siege and with 1 ballista and 2 arrow carts I was able to keep them at bay (no pun intended) for a good 5 minutes on my own.  I called for reinforcements to defend against the siege but noone came.

Problem with this as it relates to the numbers game (being outmanned), is the trebuchet is the great equalizer to your castle defenses. The outmanned side usually does not have a treb if they just took something through surprise or good tactics, and often little supply to get their own up. Thus the zerg throws up a treb outside your defending siege range, or worse at another stronger fort or keep they own, and you are defenseless (to a slow supply drain) unless you can either take down their structure, or rush the field against their superior numbers.  Thus once again, boiling it down to a numbers game.

Even beside the trebs, its not enough to defend a gate. Most towers and keeps can be brought down very quickly with simply two catapults on a wall. Unless the undermanned defending side has enough supply and money to siege up every single direction that is vulnerable, guarding the front will turn out irrelevant.

Biggest point though, is as you said, no amount of defenses is worth much if no one is there to use it. And in most cases this is where the majority of WvW points are being accumulated, with gains that happen via player vs door, and then those obj's just sit and accumulate points for long periods in the dead times for various servers.

Edited by Switchback, 07 November 2012 - 09:48 PM.

[lioka qiao]

Interesting point Chuckles about the pincer attacks.   Some characters are in a sense walking artillery in that they can take out large groups of enemies.  And yes i know it's a sin to put useful information on a forum.  I've posted in the world of warcraft forums.

As for the trebuchet being the great equalizer, I agree Switchback.  I actually go back to Age of Empires for this.  The most effective way to destroy an enemy base was to build 6 trebuchets and park them at maximum range from the castle and go to town.  That while surrounding them with infantry to ward off cavalry attacks.

We get to a fundamental problem with world vs world in that regard.  The problem is that a trebuchet should be a difficult siege weapon to support.  It is technically, using 100 supplies.  The problem is that the keeps and towers are close enough together that a treb can reach from one keep to another.  It becomes trivial to support a siege weapon that would otherwise be vulnerable to attack.

On the point of the catapults of course they will tear down a gate if you let them.  Get your defensive siege prepared and man it.  You should be able to take out that siege.  If you can't get siege shots on them then send a few ppl out to take out the siege.  Against a really coordinated siege you'll need backup.  It is the biggest problem though that frequently you have 5 defenders against a 20+ army.

[Fannwong]

Hello Earendil,

I might have to disagree with you on your point.

Having a very strong wvw guild (big or small) might help inspire more pve oriented players to come out of the woodwork and play wvw. Most (if not all) players want to win and hate to lose or get wiped.

The key issue in WvW (or any large warfare pvp) is morale. In short, good morale attracts more people and rolls into more wins (generally) increasing morale, it's a rapid spiral up or down.

Understanding and handling short and long term morale is imperative for any commander. As some posters have mentioned, what commanders say and how they say it contributes to morale. Short term morale in winning keeps and maps inevitably leads to long term morale giving people hope to win a match.

FW

Earendil, on 07 November 2012 - 06:33 PM, said:

No individual alone can change the tide of the battle. Not even a guild. Embrace this truth and accept it. Do your grieving over your control of the WvW scores. Maybe then  you will able to have fun in WvW again.

Base on your transfers from BG to JQ and recently to SBI, I can only assume that your purpose in WvW is to be on the winning side. A perfectly valid motivation, I might say, but it ultimately says that you cannot get your fun in WvW if your server is not winning. A pity.

My message was mostly intended for people who want to rebuild a server WvW community that was hit by the loss of morale after defeat.

Edited by Fannwong, 08 November 2012 - 12:37 AM.

[chuckles79]

lioka qiao, on 07 November 2012 - 11:34 PM, said:

Interesting point Chuckles about the pincer attacks.   Some characters are in a sense walking artillery in that they can take out large groups of enemies.  And yes i know it's a sin to put useful information on a forum.  I've posted in the world of warcraft forums.

As for the trebuchet being the great equalizer, I agree Switchback.  I actually go back to Age of Empires for this.  The most effective way to destroy an enemy base was to build 6 trebuchets and park them at maximum range from the castle and go to town.  That while surrounding them with infantry to ward off cavalry attacks.

We get to a fundamental problem with world vs world in that regard.  The problem is that a trebuchet should be a difficult siege weapon to support.  It is technically, using 100 supplies.  The problem is that the keeps and towers are close enough together that a treb can reach from one keep to another.  It becomes trivial to support a siege weapon that would otherwise be vulnerable to attack.

On the point of the catapults of course they will tear down a gate if you let them.  Get your defensive siege prepared and man it.  You should be able to take out that siege.  If you can't get siege shots on them then send a few ppl out to take out the siege.  Against a really coordinated siege you'll need backup.  It is the biggest problem though that frequently you have 5 defenders against a 20+ army.

The fundamental problem with your defensive siege strategy is that the terrain is designed to give advantages to offensive siege.

The home team has advantages in that they can always siege with near impunity, the next large targets.  Towers from just beneath the citadel, garrison with trebuchet(s) in the towers, Bay from Garrison.

Hills is always a bit tougher, but also vulnerable from the Western flank.  You look at any BL Friday or Saturday night in a close match, you'll see the two invaders will either be attacking or will have gained the flanking keeps but usually get no further.  The job of the defending team is to bristle the towers and especially the garrison with so many ballista, arrow carts, and cannon that any attack is suicide.  Hence why most of the play action is over the camps during primetime, with occasional feints and presses on fortified positions.

This is why the bulk of keep flips happen in off hours.

[zj12345]

During off-peak periods where there is a smaller base of WvW players, the role greater numbers play become more significant. The most important (although not only) advantage the old HoD had over any other server was the advantage they had in those periods. It could turn a 10k lead into a 30k lead, and a match that would have been close throughout the week to one whose result was already decided by Wednesday.

Unfortunately after TA disbanded, this oceanic advantage is still present. Ideally there should be at least 3 servers with roughly the same numbers so that they can be put in the same tier, but at the moment, it seems there are only 2 (if JQ recovers theirs). Thus the other servers will need enough people that can accept that they would not win (in the sense of the overall score) but still do not mind entering the WvW maps. Unfortunately the numbers of solo players and PUGs would still drop drastically then, leaving only the dedicated WvW guilds (of which there aren't many).

[Xai]

Morale via positive and encouraging communication is a good factor to bring up. It might not win every battle, but it will keep a lot of players interested in continuing to play, which in turn helps with keeping numbers up. If it's not fun or the atmosphere turns negative, people will go elsewhere.

[Jackiepro]

Yea but morale isnt so easy to maintain. If a server has several small guilds and pugs then its very hard to maintain morale because its hard to reach out to all these people. They are more likely to complain in their smaller communities which are fragmented and cause the server as a collective to fall.

SBI stayed consistent because it has a consistent large force; WM. Even in the downs of the server WM came out, fought and did their best, and that motivated others. But thats the power of a large guild, 1 single tag that encompasses such a large mass of players has more direct control over the morale of a server. If WM was instead just 20 different 10-15 man guilds on SBI then the server would have crumbled a while back, possibly when they dropped to t2. Now sure, there are others who do their part, but WM motivates the entire server to chip in and do their part, therein lies the difference. It is easy to say well "why dont you do it too" and thats a valid argument. But part of the answer in that lies in the fact that other servers dont have 500+ members willing to go out and fight at the command of 1 or 2 individuals.

Edited by Jackiepro, 08 November 2012 - 02:00 AM.

[geala]

Very good posts by the OP and some other people. However I am slowly disappointed/eroded by WvW mainly through some poor design choices. I don't want to talk about server transfer in a server-oriented combat system at all, otherwise... Other: it is too easy to take advantage of some daytimes. It is too easy to get an advantage too soon. A structure like Stonemist Castle is bad, much too important. It is bad that some fortresses can be hit from nearly inaccessible positions.

Ok, small concerns perhaps, but it works in addition. Then some situations form your attitude more than others despite the minor importance. Like yesterday. The pro-Server who rules our match actually after absorbing many join-the-winner-guilds sent a (small) zerg (one of his many) in our camp behind the home fortress (borderlands) and built siege equipment near the gate between camp and fortress. It was impossible to deal with it even with some superior numbers because you cannot reach people and material in front of the gate, you have to go through it into the heavy aoe and the siege machines fire. Only way to cope would have been to send a zerg in from the outside. What person on earth would build such a gate in an important place? I logged off after some trials.

Edited by geala, 08 November 2012 - 07:49 AM.

[lioka qiao]

Stonemist castle is a very interesting topic actually.  It is technically the most vulnerable spot in all of WvW and an army IRL would be able to siege it and overwhelm it easily given castle existed in real life as it is.  There is no terrain adavantage around it at all.  One could and actually should argue that the ridgeline on the north makes the northern side of the castle most vulnerable.  It is an excellent place to deploy siege weapons and is easily defended with 2 roads leading up to the ridge on the west side.

This highlights the two problems with the WvW design.  The first is trebuchets.  Their range is so long that they can bombard this ridge and make it useless.  For real life equivalency I go to wikipedia's page on trebuchets http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trebuchet.  The type of treb represented in guildwars is a counterweight trebuchet.  In the medieval period this treb was mentioned having a range of 300 meters (about 330 yards).  The best range is the Yankee Siege treb from pumpkin chucking with 600 yards.  I don't have exact distances but I feel that the range from the north keep to the north wall of stonemist is at least 700 yards.  The closest tower to stonemist seems to be about 200 yards.  I'll have to re-estimate the distances later.  These distances are the second problem with WvW.  In real life a castle would have an easy time controlling a tower 200 yards away from it and that shows the case in Guildwars.  This highlights that the maps are just too small for the area that the castle is able to control.  The owner of Stonemist should have a very easy time controlling the nearest towers to it at all times.  They just have to bomb the tower into submission from the center keep walls.  It would take a very coordinated effort to take down the castle.  This is an effort that the lower population servers just can't support.


Trebs aside the WvW format is still the best pvp format i've seen in most any game.