Stonemist's Weekly Achievement and Its Increased Defending Rewards are the Reasons for the Massive EBG Queues during Weekend and they Must Adjusted Asap!
Also, Guild Infuelence without Presentation is Infuelence Abuse & Exploitation and for this reason the whole claiming system in wvw needs adjustment too!
When Stonemist Castle is under the control of a side for 14 hours during Sunday whole day and prime time, it is something that makes the Stonemist Weekly Achievement an impossible achievement and a problem for guild wars 2 players because they want to complete their weekly achievement and for this reason they are creating the big queues during weekend since the weekly ends Monday morning as you can see on the image below!
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| Aurora Glade Queue Numbers. Day and Time of Screenshot.Sunday 19-2-2023 at 20:46. |
Unfortunately, it is more than obvious that these 2 updates created another one problem in WvW with increased queues ( an example is this forum post with name... WvW map ques) by involving Stonemist Castle in weekly achievements. There are total 7 weekly achievements and players need to accomplish 6 of them to earn the golds from the weekly reward.
Imo, there are 2 solutions on the problem with high queues during weekend and prime time after the Update of 14 February 2023.
As it is now with the situation in WvW and its big EBG queues, Anet has 2 options to solve the problem. They can replace the achievement with a achievement that doesn't need the EBG map (where are the defending achievements in Weeklies? Nothing for the ... "individuals" Anet? ;)), or implement a Self Destruction - Corruption map function of Stonemist gates / walls after some hours to make it impossible for defense and make the flipping of Stonemist an inevitable result.
The last option needs coding time and money cost but maybe it is the only way to solve the capture and claiming problem that all guilds & "individual" players aka roamers and scouters have inside all WvW maps since the early days of gw2 (yes this is and was the only problem WvW guilds have, the population problem comes from the fact that WvW designed as a hostile environment for casual players game-mode but this is an another story that nobody is ready for that yet). The picture below from all WvW maps removes any doubt why Stonemist achievement is a problem for all sides including the side that owns the Stonemist when they want to accomplish the Stonemist Weekly achievement and they can't because their side holds it for long time!
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| WvW maps of Aurora Glade + Vizunah Match-up. Day & Time, Sunday 19-2-2023 at 20:46. |
What i just point on the above image is not against the guild that claimed the Stonemist because my post is not against them but i want to reveal what is the situation that the guild wars 2 players are facing when they want to complete their weekly achievement during the last day of the week and maybe they have only 1 day to play a lot inside the week (and this day is most of the times during weekend... big surprise eh?) and Stonemist is under the control of only one Server for the whole day or days as it happened a lot of times in the past!
Stonemist unfortunately during the last 2 days in weekend changed only one time hands (i monitored it with Tsekouri's tv wvw live page) and when the weekly achievement ended both enemies stopped representing on maps (i saw it by my own eyes because i logged Sunday late afternoon in game). This week Aurora Glade is linked with Vizunah ( 2 servers against 2 single servers) and i witnessed this situation in-game because i wanted to see with my own eyes as someone that has only one day of the week to play a lot and if he/she still can complete the weekly achievement during only one day of the weekend.
Before continue about Stonemist Weekly Achievement i want to say now that there is a funny but useful bug on new desert map (red map) on the upper aka north west (left) tower that some times the wall disappeared for no reason and without players actions. i show it by myself in the past twice and i thought it was a hack but a friend confirmed that he saw the same an another day too.
But either it is bug or not... this situation makes the flip of the object easier by roamers and casual players and it gave me this idea to propose it as solution to make strong defending objects like Stonemist Castle changing hands easier and stop remaining under the flag of a guild that maybe is not representing on the map the whole day or... days if the players of the server can successfully defending it for days (it happened many times!!!).
I know that many players will disagree with me but come on, the no change hands after some hours of an object and after players made it T3 is not the guild's achievement that captured and claimed the object anymore but an achievement of the players are playing on the map and defending it and it is not fair for these players if they are too good to defend it, to not earn a better reward than a defending event! Also the no flipping after some hours of the objects are making the no organized wvw players leaving the maps and this is exactly the population problem that Devs noticed as WvW problem.
Think this situation for a moment please. Players from the server that holds Stonemist for 14 hours are playing to hold it for their side a Castle that someone else captured some hours ago and all will loose the weekly because nobody wants to stop defending it for the server pride (can you see now where the server pride lives? :p) and also the queues are affecting anyone who logged or couldn't succed to log during weekend and they can not play on EBG map to complete their weeklies!
Big irony and also a super boring and toxic situation because the objects should change hands after some hours to make WvW an interesting and not a boring place like it is the home borderland when nobody attacks it because enemies have no change to flip anything on this map!
LOOK THE AURORA GLADE MAP AGAIN NOW ( taken on 10 hours of Stonemist ownership) AND TELL ME THAT THIS MAP IS NOT A F@CKING BORING MAP TO PLAY AS DEFENDER, PLEASE!
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| WvW maps of Aurora Glade + Vizunah Match-up. Day & Time, Sunday 19-2-2023 at 17:08. |
The situation with big queues can change if Devs replace the Stonemist Weekly Achievement or they create a game-mode MAP function that decays the walls or gates after some hours of claiming (something like diplomacy conflicts other games have) and makes them more difficult for defending them and easier for new players to earn easy wxp by repairing them if no enemies attack them, but this change needs development time and cost and for me better is to replace it with an other logical, not dedicated to EBG map and doable for a casual player weekly achievement because casuals (members or not in wvw guilds) are your best customers Anet and you know it!
Also, the increased rewards of Stonemist defending is another one reason for the queues and this can change easily if DEVs do Stonemist defending rewards equal with the Home Keeps/Garison defending rewards and i don't want to say anything more because it's obvious that the mind behind the extra rewards of Stonemist Defending is the same that added the Stonemist weekly achievement.
Since i said in the subtitle that the claim procedure is infuence without represantation, exactly like the taxation is thievery :p, i want to say now that it is unjustice for the players of the server that defending a strange'S guild claimed object without having a chance to earn a good achievement too while they are playing and for this reason i proposed the idea with decay as a solution.
Devs, if you want to give some lore behind this gate self destruction, bring Scarlet Briar who is responsible for the Destruction of Lion's Arch. she knows well how to destroy cities, i am sure Castles gates will be no problem for this boss and also, nobody will blame you if it will be just a gate/wall disappearance as the bug of the nw tower on red map :).
Bugs happen all the time in WvW! ;)Closing and personal thoughts. If you are sensitive to criticism avoid to continue reading please.
For the history i played again yesterday* after long time (my last article on this site was 6 months ago too!) since friends told me that the WvW has fresh air now after the 8 gold (8 AGAIN ANET? a big |_ ([]) |_ @the symbolism behind the 8 number) reward of the weekly and i should come back.
I started playing Sunday afternoon and i failed to complete the weekly even i had completed 5 achievements in 5 hours of playing in WvW because of Stonemist Weekly Achievement and the lack of battles because i couldn't find a single one enemy Sunday late night - Monday early morning to complete these 50 kills too ( i stuck at 30+ enemies ). Every single one weekly achievement is doable for an experienced player to be accomplished even alone in less than 6 hours of gaming but when Stonemist is on your side and enemies have gave up trying to capture it or there are not playing wvw because there is not any interest for them, you can't do anything to accomplish the 6 weeklies because 2 of these achievements are impossible to accomplished.
And for these reasons i will say, sorry friends but i couldn't see this fresh air in WvW. I admit that the WvW Weekly Achievements is a good aid and overall to the right direction but WvW remained unchanged. Nothing changed inside WvW and nobody is attacking Stonemist or home Garrison because of the supremacy of the 1st server as it always was!
* I wrote this article Monday 20-2-2023, one day after my last login but i published it later because i wanted to see how many times StoneMist Castle will change hands during the match-up and i saw that i was right to wait. StoneMist Castle finally changed less than 30 times during the match-up (while towers/camps are changing hundreds of times during a day, not in a week) and i am sure a lot of casual players couldn't complete this StoneMist weekly achievement because of the big EBG queues and they couldn't accomplish the 50 kills too because the casual player is a player that can't spend a lot of time playing the game but most of the times and in all video games not only in gw2 the casual players spend instead of time more... $$$ to remain competitive in-game!
So, no extra gold from the weeklies for the casual WvW players, that bring the real life gold to Anet!
Anet do you understand what are you doing here? You are pushing the casual players out of WvW or maybe you are pushing them out of Guild Wars 2 too since you are disappointing them too for another one reason! I really don't think that this is really what you want but this is exactly what is going to happen if Stonemist Weekly Achievement remains in WvW Weekly Achievements!