WvW strategy: Things to work on

Simple things to get organized:

Spam this website in /T all night.
Spam ts3 info in /T all night and put a positive spin on it.

Such as:

Hey guys please join us in ts3. I need your help. I can't get you dat loot without you here

Get one of your prominent commanders/ guilds to hold an open WvW night on ts3. Invite everyone. Than train them and have fun.

These are things FA did to get to T2

Okay this may sound like i am trolling, or may seem insane. But as of late i have seen less and less siege on walls. Or that SF will send large contingents (20 or so) to wipe siege off a tower/keep to prepare for the eventual main zerg. However, having seen this tactic several times, I have noticed one thing that they tend to overlook (and us to a degree) that the wipers will tend to forget the flame ram in the front of the door. Now this is where some "creative" thinking comes in. Most of you I am sure noticed that the flame ram has a defense attack (burning and fear) now we can actually utilize this to our advantage once they start attacking/laying down their ram. (unless they were smart and smashed that ram right away).

Have a stealthed character run down (can be a suicide mission if you get CC'd/spiked to death) hit that flame defense on the ram and watch everyone near the ram run away burning/feared. Usually thieves are best for this due to their many many stealths, but as of late i have noticed that a necromancer who has flipped those "fear" traits of theirs they can turn that ram into a large CC defense weapon. Giving those on the ledges ample time to spike down that flame ram/and gives you time if you all have supplies to get siege down to prevent more enemy siege.

I know this all sounds like absolute lunancy, however it does work. You can also put down two rams at a choke point and control through fear/burning to keep the bulk out (it has an aoe limit of 50, so use that to your advantange) if you have ballistas and arrow carts you can than cut down anyone who is in the kill zone.

My observations in WvWvW. ( I remember the time when Ferg was green )

First ... I appreciate every commander online in wvw and I know it's not a very rewarding job with a lot of criticism. Even if they are just there as a gathering point on the map. This blue pin is a magnet.

Here is goes ( kinda random ) There seems to be 3 kind of commanders, some go for points some for karma and some where it's hard to figure out what the goal is. I see commanders which have respect in the community and people follow. Usually those are they ones who communicate as well. Telling what the goal is and what to do. This doesn't mean that they have to write a novel. A few meaningful words will do.

The ones who like to do the karma trains and people follow for obvious reasons, accept that we lose most times reinforced or fortified structures because there is almost nobody there to defend ( not a priority and recapturing is more karma ). A common answer is “We can take it back later”. Now we lost all the upgrades and worse a spawn point. Upgrade loss is supply , time and gold. It irks me a lot to lose anything with an upgrade. Specially if there is no real attempt to defend it. No freebies for the opponent.

Some times a map without commander manages doing a nice defense , then all of a sudden one drops in calls for BG or something else and everything is falling apart and we lose all that what we successfully defended in no time. I like seeing a pin on the map but in this case it's the exception.
If you switch your pin on please be determined to stay on for a certain time and don't disappear when what ever your plan was failed.

Tunnel vision is another thing, not just for the common folks but commanders can have this too at times and I don't blame them ( everybody has those moments )but maybe consider some advise from players once in a while. I see way to many times that we capture a tower or kick around the Supervisor for 4 minutes and lose at the same time an upgraded one or even a keep or garrison. Even worse if there is a call for reinforcements and they come using a detour via capturing a sentry and a camp or two on the way. By the time of arrival they are not needed anymore because we lost the structure.

We are outnumbered so communication and fast reaction is the key.

I can't count the times I see blue pins on the map and absolutely no communication from the leadership in chat at all. If you are not commanding switch the pin off, please. If you do “Say something”. If you are in Teamspeak have somebody relay the commands in chat and somebody relaying the chat to Teamspeak. Not everybody on the map is in Teamspeak and with no chat info people are kinda lost and do their own thing or just stand around. It is very frustrating seeing commanders online and then have no idea what's going on , what the plan is or what's needed.

Some very obvious things needs repeating often like “pick up supplies” when at a camp, ”don't take supply from the tower or keep”, “refresh the siege”. Along those lines. For many it's old news but some people are new and some just forget .

For the majority of times ( and no supply is needed ) I think commanders with a large zerg should just bypass any sentry and camp. There is no need to take a camp with 25 people (5 are plenty). It just slows everything down and gives a vigilant opponent time to prepare , telegraphing our position of the main force. Besides a not upgraded camp has just 100 supply anyway. Leave the sentries for the roamers or scouts.

The last time I seen a commander utilize actively Squad was around 5 month a go ( he was from down under I think and is not around anymore ).
It is a great tool for communication also for supply checks and marking objectives on the map. Specially when more commanders are on one map.
/squadinfo will show the names of players in the squad and the amount of supply they are carrying. This command only takes squad members into account.
/supplyinfo will show the names of adjacent allies and the amount of supply they are carrying. This command is not limited to squad members, but its radius is very small.
ALT+Mouse1 on the map opens a context menu for adding special order way points, to mark locations for attacks, defense, and rally points. These special way points are visible to squad members

Talking about map. Check it often and report !!!

Don't build 4 siege blueprints at once. Finish one or two and then do one more.
I seen so many times a bunch of blue prints dropped at once and at the end there is one finished and the rest started because there is not enough supply. It's a waste of supply and blueprints. Better have 2 finished and usable than four halfway build.
Don't fight at the citadel exits if outnumbered. It's pointless you get farmed and it's often used as a distraction to capture other objectives. Use another exit and capture camps where they are not. I bet they are not everywhere.

Here are 5 points from a forum post which are nice guidelines :

1. Call incoming: Report in /Team the amount of incoming enemies and your location, as precise as you can. Watch for disappearing Sentries or Caravans to predict where an enemy force will strike.

2. Call ‘location clear’ when attackers have been dealt with so people know no further reinforcements are needed.

3. Respond to ‘incoming reports’ even if you cant send reinforcements at least acknowledge that the message is received. There are few things as disheartening as calling out in a void.

4. Try to get in touch with the organization on a map, even if you are a veteran or a commander, if you just arrived on a map there will be people there who know more about the current situation then you do.

5. Use the servers communication channels, either go there yourself or if you need to stay on guild comms send a representative to relay information.


I probably forgot a bunch of things and others posted good points here already.

Again like I said at the start. I appreciate any commander online and know it's not this easy. I seen improvement , that's sure a good thing but we need more.
Please talk , check the map frequently and report ! Knowledge is golden.

Now that I made so many friends here I might expect to get uninvited.


Here is a quote which applies to WvW as well

Albert Einstein once said “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results"

Let's turn this boat around and communicate

Cosmic

ur shit is organized. i enjoyed running with your group tonight and getting all those badges. definatly gonna be there tomorrow. this is why im always telling ppl to use aoe but your really pushing these to the full potential and its kicking ass. no wonder Yak's got wiped when you guys came through. i can still feel the pain from december. glad you guys showed up =)

One thing I have noticed while playing a few times, mind you I do not play during our prime time. I usually get on at around 10pm pst but what I noticed with the night crew is they do not stack might as often as they can. Might is often looked past and not given much thought from what I have seen. It would be nice to teach some of the puggies how to properly stack might with their toons to give the mini zerg we have at night a chance at fighting groups that are a bit bigger then us. Also stacking might when autoattacking a gate helps out quite a bit. those 25 stacks of might could almost double the amount of damage you do to the gate so it would be very useful when we only have a ram or 2 down and have about 10-15 people autoattacking the gate.

^ thank you. Didint know the exact stats, I just knew it made a difference lol.

What we did on Maguuma is we take a day out of the week to have a sort of boot camp and we teach players how to use proper combo fields and other tactics that would benefit the zerg or small groups as well as siege placement and basic combat tactics. It is one thing to watch a video but it is another to actually try it out in wvw. I know fc doesnt have the coverage that maguuma has but if this week is lost already it would not be too bad of an idea to have a bit of a boot camp eiher today or tomorrow before reset against some invading et or sf players on our borderlands.