(can't get paragrafing to work now -will try later)

there is basicly alot less to worry about than in most other games. GW2 is designed around dealing with the problem of a dwindling playerbase making PvE harder to do.

The tools are as mentioned already downscaling and questing.

Beside that i would exspect that some kind of social practise of LFG will develop on every server some times after launch, as well as guilds will begin to announce where they have PvE activities, and then players can join, and the guild can then try to get new members buy show its social side. Also remember that such activities keeps players active on the server and fuels the WvWvW ambitions in the long run. I would expect that any ambitious guild with a PvE side would advertise activities that new players could join, sooner or later. "hang out with Guild X in Zony Y at time Z."

the big differense to WAR is those DEs can still be fun after being outlevelled , that was not the case of PQ at all. Questing simply makes it possible to have 1 server that every one know has the PvE activity, even when the active player base is down to 1/20 of the launch. That is a very nice way to avoid the empty server problem that will happend eventually.

And a big thing , the big Zerg is not the best way to experience the PvE content, it is actual a mostly bad and borring way, as the game mechanics just don't shine that well when players groups get to big against DE's. When that game experience settles more players will scatter out .

Originally posted by Delvie
I think one thing that would help with Group Events is that they auto broadcast with a waypoint when they are triggered maybe in an announcement channel. Same channel could be used to advertise player run events and special holiday events. It then becomes an opt in activity and doesn't affect the folks who want to discover stuff on their own.

I would add something to it though to reward those who discover it on their own.

Scenario:

GEB starts

-It is discovered by a group, Group takes it down and gets bonus reward for the discovery.

-It is discovered by a single player. Single player broadcasts the event. People attend and take it down. Bonus reward for participation and taking it down in a timely manner.

-It is discovered by a single player. Player does or does not broadcast the event. After a set period of time where no progression takes place, the game broadcasts to the zone with a link to the closest waypoint. The event stays broadcasted via world map within the period of time until it is defeated. No bonus, typical reward for participants.

I like it.

Side note: Since Enhanced Editor is not functioning use < p > (no spaces) for paragraphing.

They will be monitoring Success/Failure of all DEs as well as how often they occur and making adjustments accordingly.

I've already seen this even over the course of the BWEs so I'm not too worried.

Originally posted by Naqaj
With everyone making dance videos, I'm not surprised there weren't enough people for the group events...

No kidding. XD

Originally posted by GamerUntouch
I don't think many people were actually playing during the stress tests, just screwing around in PvP mainly.

1000% this, I'm not unlocking weapons skills and hoping to find weapons to unlock weapon skills a few days before launch, when I could go to the mists and try them all there for all classes.

So i can decide which damn class I'm playing. HELP MEEE

Originally posted by GamerUntouch
I don't think many people were actually playing during the stress tests, just screwing around in PvP mainly.

Exactly this. I spent most of the time just running around trying to find some secret places and /dancing around that fun box thing from the cash shop.

I tried to do an event and even started killing the mobs but then I was like "wtf are you doing? there's no point."

Originally posted by deamian

Originally posted by GamerUntouch
I don't think many people were actually playing during the stress tests, just screwing around in PvP mainly.

1000% this, I'm not unlocking weapons skills and hoping to find weapons to unlock weapon skills a few days before launch, when I could go to the mists and try them all there for all classes.

 

So i can decide which damn class I'm playing. HELP MEEE

HELP MEEE understand what you are asking here and how it is pertinent to the threads topic.

I know from what I saw on Maguuma (in last stress test):

1) Alot of people in WvW

2) Alot of people in sPvP

3) Alot of people in cities dancing

4) Usually just 1-5 other people around doing events in most of the starter zones I went to.  We were still able to complete group events (and were getting amazing rewards of 2+ greens each).  I have done numerous events across the stress tests and bwe's with 5 or less people.  It can be done.  It does take longer though... And yes, there are some group events that spawn a boss mob that is too hard for a group to complete, we just moved on.

Cheers!

Originally posted by heartless

Originally posted by GamerUntouch
I don't think many people were actually playing during the stress tests, just screwing around in PvP mainly.

Exactly this. I spent most of the time just running around trying to find some secret places and /dancing around that fun box thing from the cash shop.

I tried to do an event and even started killing the mobs but then I was like "wtf are you doing? there's no point."

Yeah I agree. I was doing some of that too.....well mostly I was shooting my pirate cannon into the crowd of dancers.

However can all of those people who were goofing off represent all of the people playing in higher level zones after several months or years down the line as lower level zones are just not traversed much anymore.

Yes I know you are still rewarded/challenged in the lower level zones but a typical player will just do the higher content because they can.

You have to understand that the vast majority of folks are there for only FOUR hours and as such they are not gonna be doing alot of PvE.  The vast majority are going to do some other things like sPvP and explore or craft or other things to nail down their release schedule.

I wouldnt worry to much about not having enough players to run DEs i na 4 hour stress test but if it really does bother you I highly suggest checking out either the Human or Charr areas.  DE'ing in a high population racial area might be key for some lower population realms.  As a reference Asura are the lowest population race across several different polls conducted on other forums.

Originally posted by vmoped

I know from what I saw on Maguuma (in last stress test):

1) Alot of people in WvW

2) Alot of people in sPvP

3) Alot of people in cities dancing

4) Usually just 1-5 other people around doing events in most of the starter zones I went to.  We were still able to complete group events (and were getting amazing rewards of 2+ greens each).  I have done numerous events across the stress tests and bwe's with 5 or less people.  It can be done.  It does take longer though... And yes, there are some group events that spawn a boss mob that is too hard for a group to complete, we just moved on.

Cheers!

That's a problem.  I can see people eventually skipping the really challenging/nearly impossble stuff (Fire Elemental Boss in Metrica Province) and those who are interested in completing such events dwindling.  Those few who are left that want to do the events might be left sitting on their hands.

Originally posted by deamian
Oh and one big thing, if your guild isn't enough to do a starting area, since everyone gets level adjusted accordingly, you can guest to another server right? Still reading up on that.

Guesting wont be at launch but will come shortly thereafter.

Launch time will be your best bet to get around this problem, before they scale/adjust the starting areas once the population outgrows that portion of the game's content. It won't be an obvious problem in the beginning, but majority of the population will go through content quickly which will make this a problem later on.

In most cases you probably won't see any adjustments through the early months in the game, just because there's a population to support it. People like me might run into the same situation because of the time they play, I always play really early in the morning so it is off peak times and I might not run into many people.

Originally posted by Lucrecia

Originally posted by heartless

Originally posted by GamerUntouch
I don't think many people were actually playing during the stress tests, just screwing around in PvP mainly.

Exactly this. I spent most of the time just running around trying to find some secret places and /dancing around that fun box thing from the cash shop.

I tried to do an event and even started killing the mobs but then I was like "wtf are you doing? there's no point."

Yeah I agree. I was doing some of that too.....well mostly I was shooting my pirate cannon into the crowd of dancers.

 

However can all of those people who were goofing off represent all of the people playing in higher level zones after several months or years down the line as lower level zones are just not traversed much anymore.

Yes I know you are still rewarded/challenged in the lower level zones but a typical player will just do the higher content because they can.

Most MMOs become a bit top heavy as they get older. It's just the nature of the beast. The newbie 1-16 areas will probably be barren in about a year, unless there is a steady influx of new players. I think that some higher level players will go back to lower level zones just to do stuff they missed and explore. The various achievements will help with that as well and of course alts.

Basically, for the first year or so, I think that the game will be fine as far as player distribution goes. After that ArenaNet may have to do something to entice higher levels players to revisit lower level zones.

ArenaNet did say that they will be changing events and adding new ones across the zones, so maybe that will be one way to keep players exploring everywhere and not just Orr and a handful of 70-80 zones.

Originally posted by Lucrecia

Anyways, I thought all events scaled down to solo-ability, even the GEBs.  But they do not...at least for a p/p d/d s/d rogue. I tried every trick I had to take down a GEB.  It just didn't happen.

 Group events scale down to 5 people (Though two determined people can usually beat it if they're good, at least in all the zones I've seen so far)

The big bosses like the fire elemental are supposed to scale down to =10= people, I believe.  Though again, a much smaller group (Say 5 people) can complete it if they're on the ball.  Or even less people if they're patient and willing to die.

Yes, I can totally picture later in the game's life, some zones having those huge bosses wandering around for hours at a time until a group is put together to put them down.  This is where guilds come in handy. :)

Originally posted by DrDwarf

For me, dynamic events are just pve zerg.   

People dont need to group, socialise, play skillfully etc when you are just spamming spells.    It is all a piece of piece for casters and a tougher job for melee.

I found this initially as well, and it was a worry.

Then I took myself out of the zerg, let the levelling wave pass me by, and played them through again in a small group of my friends.

The difference was night and day and all of a sudden the events made sense. They became really fun.

It seems having less people around is better for this game's PvE. Saying that though, I struggle to remember ANY PvE experience that has been made better for me at launch in ANY game by having an incredibly crowded zone.

It is a shame that GW2 will be judged by many on that initial zerg experience... it will only be like that really for the first few days while the crowds naturally spreads out after all. It really is the poorest way of playing the PvE game though, but still one completely controllable by the player. Most though will just choose to jump into the zerg, suffer the consequences, and declare it 'fail'.