In one embodiment, a supervisory device in a network receives from a plurality of access points (APs) in the network data regarding a network availability request broadcast by a node seeking to access the network and received by the APs in the plurality. The supervisory device uniquely associates the node with a virtual access point (VAP) for the node and forms a VAP mapping between the VAP for the node and a set of the APs in the plurality selected based on the received data regarding the network availability request. One of the APs in the mapping is designated as a primary access point for the node. The supervisory device instructs the primary AP to send a network availability response to the node that includes information for the VAP. The node uses the information for the VAP to access the network via the set of APs in the VAP mapping.