Guild Wars 2

As a Guildwars 1 veteran I am becoming increasingly more disappointed and discouraged. In the past 6 months almost all of my Guildwars 1 friends quit Guildwars 2 and are moving onto other games. But this doesn’t have to be this way. We can bring these players back if we just make some changes. I will now bring up what I think needs some work in this game and suggest changes. I would love to see what other people say about these issues:

1) Lack of farming ~ When Guildwars 2 was introduced they claimed it would not be a “high grind” game. However the more expensive “nicer” weapons and armor in the game require HIGH grind, without means of farming. The introduction of champions and champion farming is fantastic. I would like to see more of this as well as more ways you could get t6 mats. Maybe have an option at the end of dungeons to get daily t6 mats and/or gold for various paths. Or maybe do a tiered daily where if you completed all daily tasks you could get t6 mats.

2) Lack of end game content. ~I don’t know about anyone else but after I hit 80, geared up my character, and completed my story (which had an ending that made me say “lol this is?”) I had nothing left to do. It would be nice if we could have some raids or maybe some repeatable quest lines that would give t6 mats or maybe even a precursor. I know that WoW had quest lines that led to legendary weapons of sorts and it was a great idea. This is a great implementation of time-gating.

3) RNG System ~ Everything nice in this game is pretty much dependent on RNG. Why is it that some people have gotten 8 precursors from the forge within 3 months of playing and others who have played since beta haven’t gotten any? I don’t mind some RNG but when everything is RNG its not fun. I don’t know how to fix this at this point but if anyone else has any ideas id love to hear them!

4) Lack of a community ~THIS Is by far the BIGGEST let down. I was so excited when Guildwars 2 was announced because it seemed like it would foster a great community. But not players are being banned for “selling gold” when they give guildies and loved ones expensive items or t6 crafting mats. I think that the system needs to be worked on so that these gifts aren’t flagged and maybe bring back a trading screen like there was in guildwars 1. I also think it’d be great if Anet would hire a community manager person who would hold events on various servers ever month or once a year. There is so much potential for community events with the way cities and maps in general are set up!

5) The gem store PROMOTES Gold sellers. Where to start with this….Well I will start from the beginning. In the beginning A-net said that the Gem store would not put players who didnt spend rl money on the gem store at a disadvantage. But thats whats happening. Because Anet is selling gold to their players in a game where this is the only means to get gold fast for these really expensive weapons, players who spend rl money on the gem store have a leg up in getting these really nice weapons. Now to the part where this promotes gold sellers; this is a game and people are competing for the best price and they don’t really have means to “farm” money so they buy money from other players. Ordinarily I would say, yes this is a horrible thing, but I am feeling as though they aren’t doing anything wrong when they could be buying gold from the game makers themselves. I think Anet should make a constant gold to gem and gem to gold rate or remove it entirely. There could be better ways to make it so people didn’t feel the need to buy money or that they were at a disadvantage for not doing so but I am not quite sure how else one would fix that.

6) I don’t feel as though gw1 vets are cared about or even matter ~ I was a bit hurt by the fact they made the process of getting zodiac weapons involve the gem store. It would be nice if we could get crafting recipes for these by doing quests or missions. Maybe not of the weapons but at least some of them. I really hope that anet doesn’t throw tormented weapons into the gem store.

7) HoM~ The HoM is a big disappointment. I would like Anet to start to introduce some of the items gw1 veterans spent so much time getting, such as the tormented weapons, into the hall of monuments. If the HoM was made cooler and more rewarding it would even be beneficial to arenanet because non gw1 vets would want to buy the game and fill their HoM.

8) Guilds~Making it so players have to be on the same server to even contribute the guild is not fair. This ruins the community aspect of guilds. Please let the Europeans and North Americans play together. Please bring back Guild Halls. Please bring back guild tournaments and snowball tournaments or something like it. I would also like the WvW map to be rotated but I understand that that would take a lot of work to do.

9) Time-gating ~ Weapons, Dungeons, Armor. If this was implemented in a different way it would work. Such as putting in a quest line or mission line that you could do solo, with guildies, and/or with other players. But that’s just my two cents. Maybe others like the time-gating?

10) Censoring players ~ Players need to feel as though they are heard and it would be nice if Anet could take some of the criticisms and address them in a post and acknowledge that the players aren’t happy with it.

11) A LFG system. ~ In gw1 this was great because you could just press (p?) and a in game browser of sorts would pop up and you could see people looking for a group for whatever.

12) The TP~ Put a time limit on buy orders and sell orders in the TP. This would keep inflation down and keep certain people from dominating the market.

What do other people think? Do you guys think that these need to be fixed and if so do you have any ideas of how to make things better?

Hey Caroline!
I definitely agree that some areas of the game could be made better!

I agreed especially with your second point concerning the lack of end game content.

• The living story content has been a great door to giving me things to do at 80, but I also wouldn’t mind seeing more activities that I can aim for (a goal or achievement) that isn’t tied to something such as a legendary.
• Seeing more large scale events like the current invasions would be pretty awesome, especially if it really affected the zones they were occurring in.

Down in your 6th point, you brought up the zodiac weapons being in the gemstore.

• While I personally am not as bothered by this, I did like your suggestion about having quests/missions/alternate ways of achieving unique skins.
  • Earning nice skins, rather than purchasing them allows me to feel as if I have gained a trophy and make them feel more valuable.

Guilds!
I’m totally with you on players from both sides of the pond being able to play with one another again. This was definitely a feature I loved about Guild Wars, and having it in Guild Wars 2 was a drawing feature for myself and many of my friends (I play in the US, but I have several friends in EU that I cannot play with in GW2). Once the technology is available, I feel this change would make many of us (the players) incredibly happy!

Yeah I LOVE the living story. I think its been a fantastic addition to the game and I am glad that they are keeping up with it. But I wish it wasn’t the ONLY thing to do as a level 80 you know?

I think that down the line Anet will probably allow EU and NA to play together again because in GW1 the same thing happened. In the beginning they couldn’t play together. -crosses fingers-

1. I don’t like the idea of making farming even more mandatory. I agree though that quest chains leading to legendaries would rock, but these should be altered by your personal story.

2. I personally like how people can get lucky. I agree though that we need a trade screen, and community events with gamemasters stepping in to lead.

3. Originally, ANet had lower prices than the gold sellers. They should have kept this practice as it’s the best way to encourage honesty – Make it more worthwhile.

4. Do you really care so much about skins? Rewards should be USEFUL, not FLASHY.

i personally don’t think skins as a reward is that great even the skins in hom i don’t use apart from the fiery dragon sword, proper weapons and armor would of been better

Oxstar.7643:

1. I don’t like the idea of making farming even more mandatory. I agree though that quest chains leading to legendaries would rock, but these should be altered by your personal story.

2. I personally like how people can get lucky. I agree though that we need a trade screen, and community events with gamemasters stepping in to lead.

3. Originally, ANet had lower prices than the gold sellers. They should have kept this practice as it’s the best way to encourage honesty – Make it more worthwhile.

4. Do you really care so much about skins? Rewards should be USEFUL, not FLASHY.

1) Farming wouldn’t be mandatory, it would be an optional method of gaining materials added to the list of current ways. If farming isn’t for you, you could stick to what you’re doing now for your materials and items.

2) I like how people can get lucky too but there’s a problem with the same people being the lucky ones.

3) I completely agree with that.

4) I care about skins because its what sets apart players from one another. Since it is a game, aesthetics are everything.

Caroline.9068:

Oxstar.7643:

1. I don’t like the idea of making farming even more mandatory. I agree though that quest chains leading to legendaries would rock, but these should be altered by your personal story.

2. I personally like how people can get lucky. I agree though that we need a trade screen, and community events with gamemasters stepping in to lead.

3. Originally, ANet had lower prices than the gold sellers. They should have kept this practice as it’s the best way to encourage honesty – Make it more worthwhile.

4. Do you really care so much about skins? Rewards should be USEFUL, not FLASHY.

1) Farming wouldn’t be mandatory, it would be an optional method of gaining materials added to the list of current ways. If farming isn’t for you, you could stick to what you’re doing now for your materials and items.

2) I like how people can get lucky too but there’s a problem with the same people being the lucky ones.

3) I completely agree with that.

4) I care about skins because its what sets apart players from one another. Since it is a game, aesthetics are everything.

There’s TONS of gear and color combinations, you don’t need legendaries to stand out. Your armor is more visable than your weapon anyways.

I basically agree with everything, but I would like to see more about guilds. The Guild Halls would be awesome (maybe an instance like the characters home instances?) and also playing international servers too (EU+NA and what not ASIA). I would like to see the weapons my character got in the first game. But not only skins, maybe real weapons with lvl 80 stats (or ascended weapons?) will be a good addition for a different improvement here? And you could have a place like the hall of monuments to get this real weapons (free, of course). One more think that they are adding this last updates and I am enjoying is the cut scenes to the living story. I know it is just the icing in the cake, but it brings more RPG to the MMO, if you get what I mean. I want to see more storytelling to this game, because the Mai Trin end on that cell was kinda: “eh?” I thought I lost something to that story…

fabiane.6027:

I basically agree with everything, but I would like to see more about guilds. The Guild Halls would be awesome (maybe an instance like the characters home instances?) and also playing international servers too (EU+NA and what not ASIA). I would like to see the weapons my character got in the first game. But not only skins, maybe real weapons with lvl 80 stats (or ascended weapons?) will be a good addition for a different improvement here? And you could have a place like the hall of monuments to get this real weapons (free, of course). One more think that they are adding this last updates and I am enjoying is the cut scenes to the living story. I know it is just the icing in the cake, but it brings more RPG to the MMO, if you get what I mean. I want to see more storytelling to this game, because the Mai Trin end on that cell was kinda: “eh?” I thought I lost something to that story…

It would be cool if theyd take the skins and allow players to choose stats for them. I agree with your other points ^^

Caroline.9068:

5) The gem store PROMOTES Gold sellers. Where to start with this….Well I will start from the beginning. In the beginning A-net said that the Gem store would not put players who didnt spend rl money on the gem store at a disadvantage. But thats whats happening. Because Anet is selling gold to their players in a game where this is the only means to get gold fast for these really expensive weapons, players who spend rl money on the gem store have a leg up in getting these really nice weapons. Now to the part where this promotes gold sellers; this is a game and people are competing for the best price and they don’t really have means to “farm” money so they buy money from other players. Ordinarily I would say, yes this is a horrible thing, but I am feeling as though they aren’t doing anything wrong when they could be buying gold from the game makers themselves. I think Anet should make a constant gold to gem and gem to gold rate or remove it entirely. There could be better ways to make it so people didn’t feel the need to buy money or that they were at a disadvantage for not doing so but I am not quite sure how else one would fix that.

Cant agree enough with this point.

Yeah, i love thiese ideas, but you may have forgot a few pretty important once.
PvP improvements/new game designs
Guild vs Guild
and the changing builds

Caroline.9068:

3) RNG System ~ Everything nice in this game is pretty much dependent on RNG. Why is it that some people have gotten 8 precursors from the forge within 3 months of playing and others who have played since beta haven’t gotten any? I don’t mind some RNG but when everything is RNG its not fun. I don’t know how to fix this at this point but if anyone else has any ideas id love to hear them!

I’ve proposed a type of solution to the RNG system in a similar post. RNG is bad, because it’s like a lottery. That is, each ‘draw’ of the RNG lottery has no memory of the last draw. If you have 1 in 1,000,000 chance of receiving an exotic from putting 4 rares in the Mystic Forge, the next time you put 4 rares into the Mystic Forge it is still a 1 in 1,000,000 chance of getting the item.

Instead of RNG, we need an exponential curve system. Increasing the odds each time you do something does mean you will eventually get your desired outcome because it ‘remembers’ what you just did. Say putting your first 4 rares into the MF has a 0.01% chance of an exotic. That instance should increase your odds next time by 1%.
ie: 0.01 * 1.01 = 0.0101
0.0101 * 1.01 = 0.010201
0.010201 * 1.01 = 0.01030301
and so on. By my calculations then, if you were massively unlucky the entire time it would take 464 attempts (464 * 4 rares) for a 100% guarantee you will get an exotic.
Put it in a spreadsheet as well if you like:
- first cell = 0.01 then each next cell = last cell * 1.01
You’ll get a standard exponential curve.

As soon as you DO get that exotic (or drop, or whatever you might be trying to achieve) the co-efficient should be reset back to 0.01%.

This should be something like a ‘luck’ factor for each character, so it’s not just when you put 4 rares into the MF, but includes drops and the rest. I also feel this should be presented to us in the Hero screen ( maybe instead of Magic Find ). So if we are unlucky enough, we can see “Hey I’ve got a 25% chance of getting something good at the moment.. I’m going to put rares in MF until I get something exotic!”