131 replies to this topic

[GammaWolf]

@Aodan

I am Jacobin, and yeah you keep talking about top play even though you are barely bottom of the barrel yourself. Also, the whole point of this thread is that top play is pretty much joke anyways because there is such a small pool of players in spvp, and there is no ladder. I have put hundreds of hours into spvp, but that isn't even relevant.

Just read Jackiepro's post again, he does a great job illustrating the problem with your logic. Also, please keep QQing about guardian symbols in random 8v8 footage because that makes sense.

And for the 100th time the issue is not people willing to take losses, its that a new team can't really learn the game because frees is versus pugs most of the time.

The only way to consistently play non-pug teams is through paids which require money or farming and can have a 20 minute queue times. Because there is rarely more than 1 tournament running, newer teams will often lose on the first map to one of the ~5 hardcore teams in 8 minutes then have to wait even longer for the next paid to start.

Most people who do not have 30-40 hours a week to play with a consistent 5s team do not feel like the competitive side of the is worth playing when they can only get like 3 matches an hour that are 1 sided and only during peak hours. Thus only a few teams are left.

Anets own numbers support this, all the chest thumping in the world won't change them. It simply just isn't healthy for the game to demand that people take up GW2 as a second job in order to play 5v5 matches versus opponents with similar skill levels.

If you really do think 5v5 GW2 should only be for people who have the massive amount of time it takes to "learn from losses", then as I have said have fun in a barely populated pvp mode that is little more than a blip on the competitive gaming scene.

Edited by GammaWolf, 14 November 2012 - 04:02 PM.

[Skyro]

GW1 had far far more competitive (and more casual) teams at this stage in its life compared to GW2, that is without a question. ANet had a more equal emphasis on the PvP side of their game in GW1 compared to GW2, but that's probably because the majority of their playerbase is on the PvE side so that is understandable. The lack of balance changes IMO is also somewhat understandable as right now there are so many bugged traits/skills that you really want to tackle those first (which is far less understandable, these should be tackled ASAP and affects both PvP and PvE).

People have to realize that they have to monetize the PvP side of their game somehow, so paid tournies are fine but their implementation of other PvP systems is lacking. If they simply never had 8v8 hot join, made free tournies solo queues (e.g. no premades), had custom servers for practice/3rd party tournies/goofing off (REALLY important for the casual fanbase since if given enough options in customization they WILL come up with fun formats for casuals to enjoy), and then left paid tournies for all the premades there would have been a LOT more interest from the casual playerbase. No casuals = no eSports. It doesn't matter how many hardcore teams there are (and there aren't many) but if you have no casual playerbase the game will never become an eSport. That's the bottomline.

[Aodan]

GammaWolf, on 14 November 2012 - 02:41 PM, said:

@Aodan

I am Jacobin,

Most people who do not have 30-40 hours a week to play with a consistent 5s team do not feel like the competitive side of the is worth playing when they can only get like 3 matches an hour that are 1 sided and only during peak hours. Thus only a few teams are left.

Anets own numbers support this, all the chest thumping in the world won't change them. It simply just isn't healthy for the game to demand that people take up GW2 as a second job in order to play 5v5 matches versus opponents with similar skill levels.

If you really do think 5v5 GW2 should only be for people who have the massive amount of time it takes to "learn from losses", then as I have said have fun in a barely populated pvp mode that is little more than a blip on the competitive gaming scene.

Explains a lot, way to use a different forum name, so surprised.
(I'm referring your blatant abuse of anything that's broken BWE2, BWE3, Live till TPNA broke up)

As far as time investment, I play a whole ~26 hours a week, with 5-8 hours streaks 4 times a week and score 200-300 on the top 5.

This may be a low blow, but maybe if you were on a competitive team you wouldn't think the game was just a blip. I'm basically the "newer" team your talking about and again, I'm not saying there aren't things wrong with Paid or anything.

But I told everyone on GURU and on other posts, that Paid isn't whats going to start esports or the competitive side of GW2.

Custom Arena and Obs mode will be. Like nurt said, they have plenty of time to still implement it, it's just for now they've lost some steam. But when these features come out, I wouldn't be surprised to see the same top 5 on most ladders and winning most tournaments.

Me I would like BAMF to hit top 5, but if we are in the Top 8, I'm fine with that. I personally don't play the insane amount PZ and a few of the other teams do, but you don't see me calling this game dead or not competitive.

Edited by Aodan, 14 November 2012 - 08:36 PM.

[JPB]

My problems with the PvP side of the game merely echo the OP's sentiments.

- As it stands 8v8 quick join serves the purpose of practising your mechanics (and ofcourse farming glory), it doesn't educate players about how to play the game in a competitive aspect. It's ridiculous to expect any new or inexperienced player to transition from 8v8 to 5v5 with any hope of success. Then, when you do get stomped by a pre-made in a 5v5 tourney you have no real idea what you did wrong. You just went from running with 7 other people from point to point and now you're getting wrecked. There's no way to learn.

- The idea of forcing you to risk a prospective real money asset, or a significant time investment farming frees with tickets for paid tournaments is ridiculous. I myself have about 33 tickets but don't feel it's worth going into a paid tournament unless I am with a very experienced team all on voice chat (which I am currently lacking). This doesn't mean I don't want to play paid tournaments to vs. better opponents (even with a PUG team). It's just not worth the investment to risk getting stomped first round. Playing competitively from a 'solo-queue' standpoint is just non-existent atm. And queuing solo is what most newer players interested in playing more competitively will be doing, so a large percentage of the player base is left out of even trying the competitive side of the game.

- The play right now is pretty boring, I play thief as I played assassin in GW1 (in Hero Battles mostly, was consistently around top 50 on the ladder and played some GvG for a couple of top 100 guilds). It's frustrating to me that so few builds are viable in competitive play. The game quickly becomes repetitive and as the OP says 'stale'.

- Finally, I want to be matched with people of equal skill (or even rank, ofcourse not really indicative of skill but w/e it's an improvement). I'd say when I do play 8v8 (very rare nowadays due to my boredom of the gametype) one in every 3 games I get ressed by players when I am defeated.. It's not their fault, they're new, everyone has to learn. But it's not fun for me to play with them and it's not fun for them to play against me.

It's just disappointing because the game could be so much more than it currently is and what Anet have done so far really isn't enough for the PvP side.

[AestisFF]

Let's be frank.

GW2's competitive community is microscopic.  Defenders can come up with all the reasons in the world for why it's tiny, but that doesn't change the numbers.  Detractors can say it's dying, but they are missing the point, too.  Regardless of which direction the population is trending, it is tiny.

To call it an aspiring eSport is an insult to actual professional gamers.  There is not a single player in GW2 who is in the ballpark of those guys right now, skill-wise.  If they were, they wouldn't be wasting their time in GW2--they'd be making money (see: professional) in a game where you can do so.  But nobody who plays GW2 competitively is capable of competing at the highest level in SC2 or LoL.  And that is totally okay.  I play GW2 because it's fun.  If you play for bragging rights, that's cool, just know you're the big fish in a teeny-tiny pond, enjoy that, and be done with it.  I've been the biggEST fish in a tiny pond before, years ago when competitive gaming was in its infancy, and it was a lot of fun.  But that's all it was:  fun.

GW2 is to esports like me grabbing some of my office coworkers and seeing who's the fastest runner is to the Olympics.  That doesn't mean it's not fun to be the fastest sprinter in your office--just don't confuse yourself for Usain Bolt.

Edited by AestisFF, 14 November 2012 - 09:54 PM.

[Jackiepro]

AestisFF, on 14 November 2012 - 09:52 PM, said:

Let's be frank.

To call it an aspiring eSport is an insult to actual professional gamers.  There is not a single player in GW2 who is in the ballpark of those guys right now, skill-wise.  If they were, they wouldn't be wasting their time in GW2--they'd be making money (see: professional) in a game where you can do so.  But nobody who plays GW2 competitively is capable of competing at the highest level in SC2 or LoL.  

Nah thats not fair either, you cant make such statements. I know some players who went on from GW1 to compete at the level of LoL, melissan and jatt are an example of 2 players who actually won LoL dreamhack for 50k$ who also played GW1 competitively. Some of the top players in GW2 are at the same level as some of the top players from GW1. I think it is fair to say that there are people playing GW2 that are actually in the ball park of TSM or CLG, but the numbers are incredibly low, which makes sense because even in LoL the number of players at that skill level even out of 34 million players is low, so surely out of the 2 million in GW2 they are only have a handful, but they do exist. I know quite a few people who play GW1/GW2 who are also at the 2.3-2.4k ELO in LoL and if they wanted and took it seriously they could go on to compete at the top of the food chain.

Edited by Jackiepro, 14 November 2012 - 10:37 PM.

[Skyro]

Jackiepro, on 14 November 2012 - 10:03 PM, said:

Nah thats not fair either, you cant make such statements. I know some players who went on from GW1 to compete at the level of LoL, melissan and jatt are an example of 2 players who actually won LoL dreamhack for 50k$ who also played GW1 competitively. Some of the top players in GW2 are at the same level as some of the top players from GW1. I think it is fair to say that there are people playing GW2 that are actually in the ball park of TSM or CLG, but the numbers are incredibly low, which makes sense because even in LoL the number of players at that skill level even out of 34 million players is low, so surely out of the 2 million in GW2 they are only have a handful, but they do exist. I know quite a few people who play GW1/GW2 who are also at the 2.3-2.4k ELO in LoL and if they wanted and took it seriously they could go on to compete at the top of the food chain.

He has a point though. I don't play LoL so I don't know what the competition is like there at the highest levels but the highest level of SC2 is crazy competitive. Competitive enough where IMO it's not just the time you put in to be good but also you must have a natural talent. The meta has shifted countless times throughout its lifespan, most top players early on in SC2 have mostly fallen by the wayside and replaced by a newer, better crop of players, etc.

Right now in GW2 nobody is good. Period. Pros in other games get good by playing other good teams. That's how the metagame develops. There is no way to consistently do that currently in GW2. GW1 was waaaaaaaaaaaaaay more competitive than GW2 currently is, it's not even close, and I don't think anybody would consider GW1 a legit eSport even though ANet held their own tournies. And I say that not to mean that GW1 was some super high skill cap game because it wasn't, I say that because I was one of those early PvP scene adopters for GW1 and played for top 10 guilds and played in ANet's regional tournies and can directly compare the competitiveness of both scenes at comparable stages of their lifetime. The meta for GW2 hasn't even shifted ONCE.

Talking with some of the people who are trying to go pro in GW2 there are really only 2 schools of thought:
1) They are banking on ANet eventually putting in the right systems in place and praying the PvP community develops from that, so they are putting in the work now to "get in on the ground floor" as a means to be a step ahead of the competition when/if tournaments actually arrive. Being an early adopter is not a bad gamble because you will be far ahead of the competition because you will be one of the few who put in the time beforehand and competing against a player pool that hasn't developed. It is much harder to try to succeed in a game with a developed, matured player pool.

2) They are skeptical so they stopped playing or are playing very casually until they see the scene develop.

Right now, due to the stale meta, lack of balance changes, lack of new maps, game formats, hell, lack of ANYTHING new PvP related, you honestly can't blame people for leaving or not being interested. Depending on when ANet finally gets the correct PvP systems in place, and the timing of when/if the tournies with legit prize pools start to form, I'm pretty sure teams could literally form up overnight and compete with the so-called current "pro" teams very quickly because of how slow the meta is developing. Try doing that in SC2.

[Jackiepro]

Well I agree that GW1 was more competitive as I played it, and I also acknowledge that LoL and SC2 are obviously more competitive. However there are good players in GW2, thats the part I was addressing, its not fair to say that there are absolutely no good players in GW2 who have potential to compete at a world class level of any game, cause those players are indeed there.

[Typhoris]

AestisFF, on 14 November 2012 - 09:52 PM, said:

Let's be frank.

GW2's competitive community is microscopic.  Defenders can come up with all the reasons in the world for why it's tiny, but that doesn't change the numbers.  Detractors can say it's dying, but they are missing the point, too.  Regardless of which direction the population is trending, it is tiny.

To call it an aspiring eSport is an insult to actual professional gamers.  There is not a single player in GW2 who is in the ballpark of those guys right now, skill-wise.  If they were, they wouldn't be wasting their time in GW2--they'd be making money (see: professional) in a game where you can do so.  But nobody who plays GW2 competitively is capable of competing at the highest level in SC2 or LoL.  And that is totally okay.  I play GW2 because it's fun.  If you play for bragging rights, that's cool, just know you're the big fish in a teeny-tiny pond, enjoy that, and be done with it.  I've been the biggEST fish in a tiny pond before, years ago when competitive gaming was in its infancy, and it was a lot of fun.  But that's all it was:  fun.

GW2 is to esports like me grabbing some of my office coworkers and seeing who's the fastest runner is to the Olympics.  That doesn't mean it's not fun to be the fastest sprinter in your office--just don't confuse yourself for Usain Bolt.

Did you honestly say LoL takes skill? Oh god my sides

"Professional" eSports is mainly all about the pot money and who can dump the most of it in to attract players. Simply, if you want to see GW2's competitive/eSports community to blossom, there needs to be high profile tourneys with good money incentive, and good custom server support for hosts/spectators like others have said.

Edited by Typhoris, 15 November 2012 - 01:50 AM.

[DWi Gasmask]

who cares, fix bugs please!

[dawdler]

AestisFF, on 14 November 2012 - 09:52 PM, said:

GW2's competitive community is microscopic.  Defenders can come up with all the reasons in the world for why it's tiny, but that doesn't change the numbers.  Detractors can say it's dying, but they are missing the point, too.  Regardless of which direction the population is trending, it is tiny.

Tiny? Last time I checked, the competetive community felt HUGE.

Why?

Because its queues into the Eternal Battleground every day. There you go. sPvP is clearly not the competetive gameplay people are looking for in GW2. They are looking at WvW instead where the large guilds play. Because watching an entire guild portal a dozen golems halfway across the map just to cap a keep is a hell of a lot more impressive on a competetive level than wooing over AwSOMFiddlST1ick McG££ that won 1st place in a 5v5 match.

TBH sPvP and tournements feel like an archaic remnant from WoW type gameplay that few are really interested in (I have no idea what game invented 5v5 or 8v8 style arenas first, just saying what it feel like). Its in the game just because... Well, no apparent reason. There is no point to sPvP so how can it ever be competetive?

[omar316]

dawdler, on 15 November 2012 - 06:22 AM, said:

Tiny? Last time I checked, the competetive community felt HUGE.

Why?

Because its queues into the Eternal Battleground every day. There you go. sPvP is clearly not the competetive gameplay people are looking for in GW2. They are looking at WvW instead where the large guilds play. Because watching an entire guild portal a dozen golems halfway across the map just to cap a keep is a hell of a lot more impressive on a competetive level than wooing over AwSOMFiddlST1ick McG££ that won 1st place in a 5v5 match.

TBH sPvP and tournements feel like an archaic remnant from WoW type gameplay that few are really interested in (I have no idea what game invented 5v5 or 8v8 style arenas first, just saying what it feel like). Its in the game just because... Well, no apparent reason. There is no point to sPvP so how can it ever be competetive?

Lol. This guy thinks WvW is competitive. K. Nuff said. You win!

Edited by omar316, 15 November 2012 - 08:30 AM.

[Diablo85]

dawdler, on 15 November 2012 - 06:22 AM, said:

Tiny? Last time I checked, the competetive community felt HUGE.

Why?

Because its queues into the Eternal Battleground every day. There you go. sPvP is clearly not the competetive gameplay people are looking for in GW2. They are looking at WvW instead where the large guilds play. Because watching an entire guild portal a dozen golems halfway across the map just to cap a keep is a hell of a lot more impressive on a competetive level than wooing over AwSOMFiddlST1ick McG££ that won 1st place in a 5v5 match.

TBH sPvP and tournements feel like an archaic remnant from WoW type gameplay that few are really interested in (I have no idea what game invented 5v5 or 8v8 style arenas first, just saying what it feel like). Its in the game just because... Well, no apparent reason. There is no point to sPvP so how can it ever be competetive?

I personally enjoy WvW alot more in this game than the sPvP side, however you can't honestly claim that WvW is more competitive and requires more skill. WvW is a numbers game, sPvP is much more about personal skill and teamwork.

[JPB]

dawdler, on 15 November 2012 - 06:22 AM, said:

Tiny? Last time I checked, the competetive community felt HUGE.

Why?

Because its queues into the Eternal Battleground every day. There you go.

WvWvW is not competitive at all.

[Absolute13]

GammaWolf, on 08 November 2012 - 02:54 PM, said:

Lots of text

Good point, I totally agree. Let's see what happens at 16th update.

[Briar]

Diablo85, on 15 November 2012 - 11:33 AM, said:

I personally enjoy WvW alot more in this game than the sPvP side, however you can't honestly claim that WvW is more competitive and requires more skill. WvW is a numbers game, sPvP is much more about personal skill and teamwork.

JPB, on 15 November 2012 - 12:26 PM, said:

WvWvW is not competitive at all.

What are you talking about WvW is competitive.

com·pe·ti·tion  (kmp-tshn)
n.
1. The act of competing, as for profit or a prize; rivalry.
2. A test of skill or ability; a contest: a skating competition.
3. Rivalry between two or more businesses striving for the same customer or market.
4. A competitor: The competition has cornered the market.
5. Ecology The simultaneous demand by two or more organisms for limited environmental resources, such as nutrients, living space, or light.
http://www.thefreedi...com/competition


Does WvW requre the same amount of skill as sPvP? no it does not. Is WvW balanced? once again no. But don't delude yourselves, it is still competitive

[JPB]

Briar, on 15 November 2012 - 12:46 PM, said:

com·pe·ti·tion  (kmp-tshn)
n.
1. The act of competing, as for profit or a prize; rivalry.
2. A test of skill or ability; a contest: a skating competition.
3. Rivalry between two or more businesses striving for the same customer or market.
4. A competitor: The competition has cornered the market.
5. Ecology The simultaneous demand by two or more organisms for limited environmental resources, such as nutrients, living space, or light.
http://www.thefreedi...com/competition

Thanks for the definition... I am talking ofcourse within the context of high level competative play in GW2, WvWvW is fundementally flawed by not making every player on an equal footing, it is inherently imbalanced. Ofcourse there are strategies to utilise and there are opportunities for skillful play but the vast majority of the time the victory is determined by whoever has the greater number of people playing. It isn't competitive in relation to 5v5 sPvP.

Furthermore the title of the thread clearly states that the discussion is about sPvP, WvWvW isn't a relevant topic.

Thanks for the pointless post.

Edited by JPB, 15 November 2012 - 01:33 PM.

[MarkedOne7]

dawdler, on 15 November 2012 - 06:22 AM, said:

Tiny? Last time I checked, the competetive community felt HUGE.

Why?

Because its queues into the Eternal Battleground every day. There you go. sPvP is clearly not the competetive gameplay people are looking for in GW2. They are looking at WvW instead where the large guilds play. Because watching an entire guild portal a dozen golems halfway across the map just to cap a keep is a hell of a lot more impressive on a competetive level than wooing over AwSOMFiddlST1ick McG££ that won 1st place in a 5v5 match.

TBH sPvP and tournements feel like an archaic remnant from WoW type gameplay that few are really interested in (I have no idea what game invented 5v5 or 8v8 style arenas first, just saying what it feel like). Its in the game just because... Well, no apparent reason. There is no point to sPvP so how can it ever be competetive?

You sir won the 1st place award of title Troll of the year. In WvW is nothing about skill, it is a pve mode with more zerging, rendering issues and gear-dependant state. If you call competetive fighting door then yeah, you are right.

sPvP in this game is only part that requires some skill. Period. This part is the most overlooked by Anet because majority of players are not competetive nor good, so there you go.

PS: I was in a guild that was one of the TOP in WvW on server, when they did tPvP I suddenly realized the truth. It was so sad to see then not being able to kill anyone properly.

Edited by MarkedOne7, 15 November 2012 - 02:00 PM.

[GammaWolf]

Aodan, on 14 November 2012 - 08:35 PM, said:

Explains a lot, way to use a different forum name, so surprised.
(I'm referring your blatant abuse of anything that's broken BWE2, BWE3, Live till TPNA broke up)

As far as time investment, I play a whole ~26 hours a week, with 5-8 hours streaks 4 times a week and score 200-300 on the top 5.

This may be a low blow, but maybe if you were on a competitive team you wouldn't think the game was just a blip. I'm basically the "newer" team your talking about and again, I'm not saying there aren't things wrong with Paid or anything.

But I told everyone on GURU and on other posts, that Paid isn't whats going to start esports or the competitive side of GW2.

Custom Arena and Obs mode will be. Like nurt said, they have plenty of time to still implement it, it's just for now they've lost some steam. But when these features come out, I wouldn't be surprised to see the same top 5 on most ladders and winning most tournaments.

Me I would like BAMF to hit top 5, but if we are in the Top 8, I'm fine with that. I personally don't play the insane amount PZ and a few of the other teams do, but you don't see me calling this game dead or not competitive.

No idea what you are talking about in line 1-2. Also, I didn't realize there was a requirement to have the same name as in game. I said who I was in the first 15 seconds of the video I made and I signed up for this forum before GW2 was released.

Once again for the 100th time, the thread is about the dwindling interest in sPvP overall. If you must know I was largely in the same position as yourself, playing the current few hardcore teams over and over, until about 2 weeks ago when my team stopped playing for the reasons I have been posting about for a while now.

If you are comfortable waiting in long queues, feeding the same few teams over and over and farming or buying tickets for the privilege of doing so then congrats, you are one of the few people foolish enough to engage in this ridiculous cycle. At this stage there is really little point in starting a new team unless you just want to play against pugs in frees all day --- thus competition is in a death spiral.

A person's place on the ladder is irrelevant to this conversation because I am not talking about the ~10 or less teams that play. I am talking about the potential hundreds that have left or are simply not bothering with spvp. Competition amongst such a small pool of players is not what Anet advertised when they were selling people on the idea of an Esport.

Do please keep up the petty attempts at character assassination in order to avoid the issue.

Edited by GammaWolf, 15 November 2012 - 06:54 PM.

[dawdler]

MarkedOne7, on 15 November 2012 - 01:58 PM, said:

You sir won the 1st place award of title Troll of the year.

A prize is a prize and I'll quote you on that!

Anyway, I have no idea why people seem to confuse individual skill for competetive gameplay. Its not like you go to a soccer match, see 11+11 people duke it out and go "wtf we just care about those two because the others arent as skilled, remove the rest of the teams!!!". WvW is competetive gameplay on a grander scale than sPvP. Say what you want about it or my take on it, but its fact - have you ever seen players move between servers because they want to find better sPvP guilds/partners? No. They move between servers because they want to win at WvW.

The reason GW2 sPvP is in a death spiral is because its being pushed aside by GW2 WvW.

But I shall end my discussion, obviously talking about the impact of WvW on sPvP in this thread is a big no no, its all about the glorious skilled sPvP!

[JPB]

dawdler, on 15 November 2012 - 04:51 PM, said:

Say what you want about it or my take on it, but its fact - have you ever seen players move between servers because they want to find better sPvP guilds/partners? No. They move between servers because they want to win at WvW.

Yes, I have seen people change servers to get into a more active PvP server for easier ways to find PUG's in HoM. However the action is ultimately redundant seeing as sPvP is cross server. You don't need to change server to play PvP with your guild members. You're ignorant and your points are invalid.

dawdler, on 15 November 2012 - 04:51 PM, said:

Anyway, I have no idea why people seem to confuse individual skill for competetive gameplay.

Who said that at all? The point of WvW being a numbers game (rather than sPvP) is not about one person's skill determining a match but because the server who wins will be the one with the most people consistently online. The fact you can win by capturing points against a server with no people online shows this. The gametypes can't be compared, in a tPvP match you have 2 teams of 5, in a WvWvW match you have 3 teams of constantly fluctuating numbers, it's not competitive.

dawdler, on 15 November 2012 - 04:51 PM, said:

The reason GW2 sPvP is in a death spiral is because its being pushed aside by GW2 WvW.

No, it's due to the reasons stated in OP's post and video. Of course WvW has an impact on the total player base of sPvP, if people are spending time in WvW they aren't spending it in sPvP. However, it's not as if the sPvP player base was playing sPvP then all went to WvW... They left the game completely or at least now play it at a casual level until the sPvP game type improves through changes implemented by Anet. The people playing sPvP are interested in different aspects of the game to those who play WvW and this post is about those sPvP players who have stopped playing because of the poor state of the game.

Edited by JPB, 15 November 2012 - 05:24 PM.

[dawdler]

JPB, on 15 November 2012 - 05:23 PM, said:

Who said that at all?

sPvP in this game is only part that requires some skill. Period.

At the end of the day, nothing change the shortcomings of sPvP as seen by the average peep - small and boring maps, simplistic goals, completely cut off from the rest of the game, repetetive and it has complicated mechanics like tournament tickets. Ignoring the so called "skilled" gameplay, its not particularly fun to watch or even comment about.

[JPB]

dawdler, on 15 November 2012 - 06:18 PM, said:

sPvP in this game is only part that requires some skill. Period.

At the end of the day, nothing change the shortcomings of sPvP as seen by the average peep - small and boring maps, simplistic goals, completely cut off from the rest of the game, repetetive and it has complicated mechanics like tournament tickets. Ignoring the so called "skilled" gameplay, its not particularly fun to watch or even comment about.

Fair enough, I agree with a lot of that, it's certainly not an attractive gametype for the average player. But the thread is about the players who got the game for sPvP. I myself spent 95% of my playtime in PvP in Guild Wars 1 and was anticipating doing the same for GW2. However, with the current system even the people who want to play sPvP can't enjoy it because of the shortcomings by ANet. In short, if the people who enjoy PvP primarily don't see the point to stick with it then there's very little hope of a new player picking it up.

[Dahk]

Agreed with the OP.

Here's the main reason I haven't invested much time into sPvP:

If I just want to jump into some PvP and choose non-tourney sPvP, then I'm thrown into a game that's not nearly filled up and constantly "rebalanced" unless I choose a specific game.

If I choose a specific game (something that's 15/16 members), then it's still possible I'll get "rebalanced" and I'll end up going against most of the same people on the preceeding games unless I drop out and re-queue.

It gets even worse if I want to play with a teammate.  Since my fiance and I play together regularly, this is particularly frustrating:

If we just want to play a casual game, we have 2 options:
1) Join a regular sPvP game.
- To do this, we have to choose a specific game and hit join at the same time or else we can't get in the same game.
- If we get put on opposite teams, we have to drop out and retry.
- Once we finally get into the same game and on the same team, we then have to hope that we don't get rebalanced against eachother again.

2) Join a free tournament.
- To just get in a game, there is a lot of wait time to get paired up with other players and after that there's still the planning phase before the game starts that is pretty useless since no one else that gets auto-pugged into our group ever wants to talk strategy.
- Once the game starts, we almost always get pitted against serious, competitive PvPers that are on a full team to farm glory.

In other words, I have mostly given up on sPvP not because I don't like the mechanics or the class balance (even though it sucks that thiefs and mesmers are so OP), but rather because the actual structure to actually get and stay in a good game is miserable.

[DWi Gasmask]

GammaWolf, on 15 November 2012 - 03:17 PM, said:

If you are comfortable waiting in long queues, feeding the same few teams over and over and farming or buying tickets for the privilege of doing so then congrats, you are one of the few people foolish enough to engage in this ridiculous cycle.

We do it cause we want to, there is a flaw in the system, but i don't think calling people foolish for queuing is right. It's his choice to voice an opinion as you did yourself in the video. Some people choose not to queue in these times of bugs and shit, and some do, who cares.
You guys have conflicting opinions whatever, let's just hope these things get fixed! <3 1luv

[JPB]

Dahk, on 15 November 2012 - 07:18 PM, said:

If we just want to play a casual game, we have 2 options:
1) Join a regular sPvP game.
- To do this, we have to choose a specific game and hit join at the same time or else we can't get in the same game.
- If we get put on opposite teams, we have to drop out and retry.
- Once we finally get into the same game and on the same team, we then have to hope that we don't get rebalanced against eachother again.

Just FYI one of you can join a server which is say 14/16 players, and when you're in the game the other can go to their friends list. RIght click your name and select Join in sPvP.

I didn't know about this until I was around rank 20 so it's easy to miss.

[Dahk]

JPB, on 15 November 2012 - 08:32 PM, said:

Just FYI one of you can join a server which is say 14/16 players, and when you're in the game the other can go to their friends list. RIght click your name and select Join in sPvP.

I didn't know about this until I was around rank 20 so it's easy to miss.

And then get rebalanced mid game onto different teams, but yea, I forgot about that, which is much better than getting on different teams from the start.

Edited by Dahk, 15 November 2012 - 08:43 PM.

[GammaWolf]

DWi Gasmask, on 15 November 2012 - 08:26 PM, said:

We do it cause we want to, there is a flaw in the system, but i don't think calling people foolish for queuing is right. It's his choice to voice an opinion as you did yourself in the video. Some people choose not to queue in these times of bugs and shit, and some do, who cares.
You guys have conflicting opinions whatever, let's just hope these things get fixed! <3 1luv

Fine my wording isn't great, regardless its a waste of time for most people to bother queuing as is shown by the lack of players in spvp and the countless people who all agree the system is broken.

Aodan is welcome to post whatever he wants, but when his point is basically:

'I get farmed by a few hardcore teams and I am fine with the fact that it costs me time/money to get tickets. The long queue times and lack of interest in spvp are because players who don't like the present system need to LTP BRUH! BTW I posts pics of myself holding guns on a gaming forum and a vid of myself beating a dev team months ago as proof of my argument.'

He needs a reality check as myself and numerous others here have pointed out.

Edited by GammaWolf, 15 November 2012 - 11:52 PM.

[FoxBat]

Quote

Jon Peters: There are >500 skills in this game, 480 traits, and 2 designers working on this

Now we know why this game will never be an e-sport.

Edited by FoxBat, 16 November 2012 - 01:51 AM.

[Feanor]

nurt, on 14 November 2012 - 11:04 AM, said:

Starcraft II is a game that was built to be an E-sport.  At release there was a polished observer mode, skill based ladder, replays, custom matches, and the announcement of a Blizzard sponsored tournament.  The bottom line is that Anet made the claim that they were striving to accomplish the same thing and so far they haven't delivered any of the basic features needed to build a thriving E-sport.

It's not too late, they can still add all that stuff, but they've definitely lost their momentum for now.  At 11PM PST tonight there weren't enough teams queuing to pop a single paid tournament.

I made a thread saying basically this exact same thing and it got deleted...  GW2 was not actually intended to be a esport or ANET would have took MEASURES to make it so.  

This Aodan is seriously drinking the kool-aid and gamma wolf was making me laugh so hard by picking aodan apart throughout this entire thread.

Hey aodan, I have played GW1 since beta, climbed from top 500 to top 200 to top 100 to top 20 calibur as a player.  I started GW2 up at launch with my connections from GW1, and some new people.  We immediately began destroying everyone in GW2 including the "BETA HOTSHOTS", winning 90% of tournaments in first place.  Unfortunately, as the "new game effect" wore off, it became increasingly clear that this game lacks depth and does not foster a competitive environment due to the lack of the much needed structures required to develop a pvp scene.  

Diversity in play style
Observer mode
Guild Ladder
Rated Tournaments
Real prizes (or prospect of real prizes)

Guild wars 1 had all of these except observer mode right off the bat, which puts GW2 distinctly behind GW1, a game that was released 7 years ago.

Guild wars 2 screwed themselves over with this conquest format, because even if it is BALANCED (what GW1 struggled with), it lacks VARIETY & INTERESTING PLAYSTYLES.

In SC2 you can do a cheese, do a macro play, or do a mid game timing attack

In GW1 you can do a pressure, a split, or a spike build.

In GW2 every team plays the game the exact same way, and the ones that don't LOSE. What's more is that this game mode is BORING.  It doesn't have any crescendo or climax, there is just "gain points more efficiently and win".

Edited by Feanor, 16 November 2012 - 04:53 AM.