Curse

Higo · Jun 08, 2007, 09:09 PM // 21:09

Just wanted to post some thoughts about the PvP community attitudes towards GvG, guild transience, and how these may relate to a lack of reward if a team loses a match.

The assumption of this post is that there is a problem in the current PvP culture with transience that relates specificially to in-game reward systems. A secondary assumption is that these systems may be modified in order to make GvG guilds less transient.

I've been in a few guilds over my in-game lifetime, and have been very interested to observe some marked differences between PvP (namely GvG guilds) and PvE guilds. At first, I attributed the differences to "stress-level" of gameplay. I figured that because GvG's required more intense coordination between players, and that required more social interaction which can lead to more conflict... i.e. greater chance of guild implosion. However, under closer inspection I decided this was most likely not the strongest factor as HA requires similar levels of coordination... and through my experience has led to a much less stressful environment. I have not yet been in an all HA guild, however my experiences with HA have been less stressful, drama-inducing, and generally more rewarding per match than GvG.

I may be going out on a limb here, but I decided that the marked difference between HA and GvG is the ratio between risk and reward (more later). I think this is why there is such a large turnover in GvG guilds.

RISK

Rank -
Ranking was meant to give players an idea of how they fared or "ranked" in relation to other guilds. It orders guilds in terms of team rating. However, those of us who have struggled with rank know that around the 2k mark one single match can markedly increase your rank. I have gone up 2k rank in a single match! This number range isn't the important point... the most interesting point is that wherever MOST of the guilds are, that's where teams suffer the greatest loss when they fail to win and conversely the greatest gain when they win. In other words, the modal area is also the area where rank changes are most pronounced.

Getting rid of the visible ranking system would make GvG less visibly risky for the majority of teams, and reduce the system to rating in a simplistic form. This would also reduce the visible rewards as well as losses when GvGing and make the overall gameplay experience less exciting... and perhaps more boring. Sadly, I do not think that this should be modified (with the well-being of the guildwars community in mind). Secondly, you can't make a culture forget and the impact of the ranking system would never be forgotten. However, it is interesting to ponder a PvP community that is not so rank-hungry... hmmm. Maybe they should be hungry for something else.

INVESTMENT

GvG is perhaps one of the most investment intensive areas of gameplay, arguably the most intensive as you cannot plan every detail of a match somewhat unlike elite missions. However, the benefits of GvG are unproportional to this investment in my opinion. HvH requires little investment, players can start a game with little preparation, and they receive faction, tournamet rewards, and points towards commander titles. GvG in comparison requires the concerted effort and scheduling of eight players, four of which must be of the same guild, possibly the use of Vent if you really want to win and a preconceived build that has been tested or investigated by many members of the party. Although you can obtain faction very quickly through GvG and participate in tournaments, the rewards pale in comparison to HvH when you take into account INVESTMENT. Secondly, faction (although fun and important to the development of primarily pvp accounts) is not special. It, as a reinforcer, is weaker than other more rare or coveted forms of reward. Faction = white, titles + rewards = green.

Champion titles would be a shining light in the storm, however guilds with ratings of 1200+ are hard to find, and harder to join. Many non-hardcore gvg'ers and players without impecable skill will most likely never get one point, no matter how many matches they play.

Automated tournaments have done much to increase visible rewards to PARTICIPANTS of gvgs, not only winners. However, I don't think that they do enough to quell the rank-hunger that is in my opinion making teams more transient and less skillful.

Recommendations: Add a title for GvG victories for lower teir ranks (or just victories in general). In addition, attempt to increase participation in guild v guild automated tourneys (special weekend, anyone?). Overall, try to make GvG more enjoyable and less about rank farming.

Oh yea, thanks for the awesome game ANET!! gg

Kool Pajamas · Jun 08, 2007, 09:33 PM // 21:33

More individual gvg rewards would be a good idea to get more people into gvg. Some people I know that dont like gvg dont like to play because they dont get any type of individual rewards (like fame or items). And like said above to get champ points you have to be in a top guild not achievable for a large part of the community.

Div · Jun 09, 2007, 08:45 AM // 08:45

Individual gvg rewards = large amounts of balthazar's faction when you win.

Believe it or not, but that's one of the better indicators on how familiar you are with PvP in general. If you're a rank 2 hero, rank 1 gladiator, and say you have lots of GvG experience and back it up with your 2 mil balth faction, they're more likely to accept you than if you had something like rank 4 hero, rank 1 gladiator, but only 400k balth faction.

With that said, I'd like to see a slight increase in the balth faction earned in lower ranked GvG battle, and also a title for balth faction (maybe similar to luxon/kurzick title). That way, balth faction wouldn't just be seen as something useless.

I would like to see Anet get rid of ranking the guilds outside of the top 1000, as it has spurred many arguments on how they're a rank 8000 guild fighting rank 3000, even though the actual rating difference may be less than 10.

william1975 · Jun 09, 2007, 12:54 PM // 12:54

GvG is something i have been interested in, but none of the guilds i have been in participated, I'm not a top player, I like to chase titles, and to be hoset i see what Higo is saying to me the GvG title is impossibel to get, so my PvP is limited to all the other areas,
I do like the idea of a title for winning it, and holymasamune's idea of a balth faction title too, I'm still using the balth i get, to unlock skills and items, but soon i will be finished, so what do I do with it then?

do these things and maybe i would be interested in joining a pvp guild

/signed

Higo · Jun 09, 2007, 06:31 PM // 18:31

it think that is a really good point.

TONS of people are title chasing, especially after the announcement of the halls of monuments to be revealed in EotN. This would be a great way to add some much needed reward to GvG.

Faction is very easy to come by with a string of wins, however faction isn't unique to gvg... i just dont think I WANNA GVG SO I CAN GET FACTION WOOOO. I dunno, its just not something i really consider when i go against a team.

a lot of people ive met say the same thing: what do i do with all this faction now that i've unlocked all skills?

The awnser right now really is nothing...

I was taken aback by the suggestion to make a title similar to the AB faction donation, however I think its a good idea given the previous point.

Thanks for the comments, good dialogue.