Tower defense in WvW

[Fhi]

Last couple of days I needed a break from world completion, so I hopped into WvW (not Edge) to do world completion (logic!). All I did was run around picking up points and getting ganked left and right.

I always like the concept of WvW and siege warfare. All that running familiarized me with the layout and general locations of everything in the Borderlands, such that I am beginning to understand what people are referring to in chat. However, I despise pvp. When someone kills my character, I can't help but take it personally. Being new to GW2 and new to GW2's pvp, I was nothing more than a free HK to them. I couldn't even run away -- it seems every class has a way to stick to me. lol.

So now I'm wondering if there is a combat engineer role in WvW. They're the ones running around upgrading keeps and towers, laying down defenses, calling out scout movements. Avoiding direct confrontation with enemy players and getting to play with siege weapons seems like something I'd thoroughly enjoy. I know this is mechanically doable, as it is provided within the game itself, but I'm wondering if it just impractical. From what I've seen in WvW, it's mostly a blue-following zerg or havoc squads ninja capping outposts. What about defense?

I know I'm limited to my contribution as a single individual, plus it can get expensive, but I'm hoping to get a couple of friends to do this. Is it even worth it? I play on T1, so we flip outposts all the time. I'd hate to spend all that upgrade only to get run over by a zerg 10 minutes later. Do they keep the upgrades if they cap it? In reality, do people defend what they cap? What kind of force is needed to defend an outpost, or at least slow them until reinforcements arrive? Do reinforcements even arrive? There doesn't seem to be much going on in chat.

What's the WvW culture, so to speak?

[zed zebes]

DO you mean a role for an Engineer or for someone dedicated to siege and scouting?

Because siege maintenance and scouting is very valuable. Your commanders will love you if you do that. The only thing is that you need to know the good places to put siege and how to use them. Each siege piece has a 1 hour timer before it despawns, so people who man the siege to maintain its up-time really help out.

Siege is a lot like billiards. It's a game of angles and holes. You need to know where holes can be made and what angles siege can hit from. An example of this is a trick I try to teach people whenever I can: The Bay in borderlands can be upgraded to have cannons. There's four inner cannons (I believe). Cannons hit hard and can quickly wipe rams, catas and golems. This means that attacking forces often target them first. If you are defending Bay and a force is attacking the North Inner gate, you can actually turn the middle-north cannon backwards to aim at the inside part of the N gate and hit any rams put up at the gate. This is a quick easy counter to attacks at the northern inner gate.

Scouts are normally played by Thieves, but Mesmers, Warriors and maybe Engies can do it as well. A D/D Ele might be able to. You need to be able to move quickly and get away quickly. If you are scouting for your zerg, you'll want to be ahead of the zerg on a high ledge so you can see what's coming. If you see numbers, then report it in map chat. Don't just say "zerg" but try to give a quick count of how many and where they are headed. If you're scouting to defend, then you just need to move around the friendly strctures and call out whenever a size of 10-15+ show up with siege. Scouting is basically being your commander's radar.

[Fhi]

someone dedicated to siege and scouting?

This is what I am referring to -- a combat engineer role to support the frontline zergs and hamper enemy movement.

but yeah, it's a pretty costly job that also removes you from pretty much all of the rewards in WvW.

And this is what I'm afraid of. It doesn't look like there is much incentive to defend. I personally don't mind the lack of rewards, since if I wanted reward, there's Edge. But probably very few people share the same opinion, and this is probably pointless trying to do it alone.

Just like zerker vs defensive builds. *grumbles*

[Karizee]

Here is a really great series on how to siege defend towers & keeps in Borderlands maps.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...2qO00ZguZN4DjX


But my personal all time favorite is in Eternal Battlegrounds. Ogre's Watch, such a sweet little setup. You got Pangloss Mine right there and can feed supply into it for hours if you manage it right, TONS of those great little choke points for supply traps. I don't mind camping that tower at all when I don't feel like running around

It's a long game vs running with a group lootwise, but the payoff is HUGE when the other server rolls a zerg in there and you tag everything. I've held that tower with 2 others against 50 man groups, make massive loot, make them cry


Edit to add: No, they do not keep any upgrades if they take your objective. The structure reverts to "paper" (upgrade status) and they have to start over with reinforcing it if they want to hold it. Here's some info on how the Tier upgrades work.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Structure_upgrade

The only thing they DO get is whatever supply is left inside. So if you know the unstoppable force is coming your way, spend it all so they don't get supplied up!

Note that the score only ticks on objectives you are holding every 15 minutes. THIS IS A CRITICAL POINT. T1 servers are very PPT oriented and will be focusing on that quarter hour tick, trying to claim as many objectives as possible for the score (and in many ways they could care less about holding objectives between ticks). I've fought many battles that came right down to the tick on an objective, someone counting down in TS for when the waypoint unlocks either to port your team in or their server will bust in. Amazing, edge of your seat stuff.

As far as finding the community on your server, join your server's teamspeak and website. So much of the communication that happens during the week happens on TS, it's a great way to connect with the other guilds and players and coordinate your strategies, plus learn the finer points of WvW.

[Fhi]

Looking around the various sites, it seems that some think that individual contributions are much more meaningful (the corollary of which is that contributions are much more critical to the success of the server) at the lower tiers. The trade-off is very low activity at off-peak, and possibly a more stagnant world status -- which is good for the sentry/builder oriented players.

I wonder if people transfer off T1. Surely I can't be the only one who doesn't enjoy zerging and the politics/trashtalking of T1.

[Karizee]

Fhi, after spending a year on a T1 server I will never go back to that meatgrinder again. I've only been on 2 servers but since launch I've played in every tier NA and I'm convinced Silver league offers the best experience - in terms of great community and more variety in matches. You're absolutely correct that traffic is lower during off-peak hours, but we still queue maps on reset and sporadically during the week at prime time. It's much more fun.

[Fhi]

So much love... reminds me so much of my old server Wintergrasp trashtalk.

[Karizee]

If you weren't the one dropping cherry pies to troll your own server I'd say you have nothing to worry about ;-)

As for the person who did drop them, it's not like "Ruh roh, I'se jes walkin' along and dese cheerie pies fell out of my pocketz and I totally didn't mean to troll mah my own server yo. Why you guys yell at me, make me sad, such love". They knew exactly what they were doing, if you've been playing more than a minute you'd know too.

[Fhi]

If you weren't the one dropping cherry pies to troll your own server I'd say you have nothing to worry about ;-)

As for the person who did drop them, it's not like "Ruh roh, I'se jes walkin' along and dese cheerie pies fell out of my pocketz and I totally didn't mean to troll mah my own server yo. Why you guys yell at me, make me sad, such love". They knew exactly what they were doing, if you've been playing more than a minute you'd know too.

I guess I'm a real dimwit then, because I had to ask my guild what's wrong with cherry pies. Does make me wonder what else will get me cussed out for.

[Karizee]

I guess I'm a real dimwit then, because I had to ask my guild what's wrong with cherry pies. Does make me wonder what else will get me cussed out for.

Bookah please. If you're trying to pull a "Guise I don't know no better than to go out and find a ridiculously expensive to craft but sells for nothing useless TRAY of crap buff food and drop into the middle of a raid repeatedly to steal their buffs and GW2 players yell at me cuz they so meeeeean!" nonsense, that shit just don't fly.

No wonder no one comes to your aid when you call out in mapchat. Wouldn't surprise me if 95% of your server already has you blocked, word travels fast in WvW.

[Karizee]

I think communities that shun and ostracize trolling are pretty fabulous. It's kinda like how WoW use to be in the old days before it got corrupted

[Fhi]

Bookah please. If you're trying to pull a "Guise I don't know no better than to go out and find a ridiculously expensive to craft but sells for nothing useless TRAY of crap buff food and drop into the middle of a raid repeatedly to steal their buffs and GW2 players yell at me cuz they so meeeeean!" nonsense, that shit just don't fly.

No wonder no one comes to your aid when you call out in mapchat. Wouldn't surprise me if 95% of your server already has you blocked, word travels fast in WvW.

If that was meant for me, I think you meant to direct that.... anger at the guy who put down the tray of food. I get it now why people are mad, though.

(For the record, I'd never seen this "Cherry Pie trolling" thing, either. Seems like a poor troll, can't people just...not click them?)

Probably instinctive clicking. I clicked it, but I didn't have an optimum food buff made from expensive mats already on me that then got overwritten. Those who did would have lost their buffs. I'd be mad too.

[lawow74]

So much love... reminds me so much of my old server Wintergrasp trashtalk.

My rule of thumb with MMOs has been, for many years: Cut off all the public chat channels. You'll be much happier.

[Fhi]

Seriously never gave it a second thought though. Simply thought people were just goofing off, and I certainly never clicked one. It never once occurred to me to think, "Wow, this is such a good troll."

That was what I meant earlier. There are things that are considered trolling, that I would likely not realize immediately. I could be doing something I thought is "normal" that could, rightfully, be considered trolling. Honestly? The cherry pie could have been me. Granted, if I did put a tray down I would use something that's level 80, but it might not be the kind of food people want. Will that be trolling? I don't know, and it's better for me to keep things to myself, at least until I have been "playing more than a minute in WvW".

My friend's son, who is a minor, was in EoTM once. He got cussed out because he was separated from the zerg and on his way back to rejoin the zerg, he ran into an opposing zerg -- who then chased him and ended up clashing with the friendly zerg. People started calling him a spy, and throughout the whole game, they were verbally abusing him for being a spy and a troll. My friend explained to her son why he got cussed out, and that if he wants to do EoTM, he needs to grow a thick skin and understand that what is allowed within the game isn't necessarily what everyone else's goals are.

That is what I find disheartening. Relating to the thread topic, I won't be surprised if I, say, place a trebuchet to bombard the walls during an attack, and I get cussed out because some servers dislike "open sieges", a term I discovered while researching this topic. Siege warfare map, use siege to attack a fortification, makes perfect sense, right? I might get cussed out for placing an arrow cart in the "wrong" place, because I am expected to know where to place them. I don't, unless someone teaches me or I watch a bunch of youtube videos, read guides, etc. Over time, these things may become standard knowledge to me -- such as not taking supplies from keeps so that they can upgrade faster -- but to a new player who may not have the inclination to watch videos, read guides, ask in forums, etc, they get driven out of that game mode because they didn't know better.