Guild Wars 2

For a while now I’ve had this idea about node harvesting/gathering, and how visibility of each icon could be improved.

My main character does a lot of gathering for itself and my alts, and most of the time when I’m on a given map I am flying blind to the rest of the map and where potential nodes could be. My only point of reference is the minimap, and before anyone says ‘expand it more’, there’s only so much screen area you want it to cover before it becomes intrusive.

So, with this in mind, the suggestion I have is to make node icons more visible when the Map key is pressed. To my mind, the way it would best be seen is to have the nodes of the entire map that you’re on being visible at the closest or even 2nd-closest zoom view where the map detail is the same. When you would zoom out past the 2nd-closest level, the icons would disappear.

I have used websites that detail the node locations of tier 6 materials, but since ascended crafting has become more demanding on almost ALL tiers of materials, and even more people are farming them daily to craft ascended items, I think this would be a nice idea to implement so as to help virtually everyone who harvests/gathers materials.

Yeah but that really just takes away the fun of discovery in my opinion. Sometimes it’s fun to be running around the map when you come across a node you didn’t notice in the mini-map. It also somewhat defeats the purpose of having them randomly spawn in different locations. I feel that it is fine the way it is since it makes you have to look for them if that’s your objective for the day, rather than just waypoint hopping to get the ones you want. If that is your only goal, then just look up the daily node maps that players post of the current locations. I personally feel that node harvesting should only be a side-goal for players as they are doing something else, rather than a primary goal. Adding the nodes to the main map in game just makes it seem like now I MUST farm all the nodes.

I’m torn on this one, but I’m leaning toward “no” for nodes on the world map.

I’m all for ease of access, but at the same time, I would prefer that the gathering “sweet spots” remain as a slight reward for people who expend the effort to explore on a regular basis.

This is one of the few things that actually rewards exploration at the moment.

Salvaging drops is a decent way of getting materials too. Do a few dungeon runs and get your bags full then salvage it all. You`ll get a decent amount of mats and luck essences.

I’m going to have to say I can’t support this. I’m sure there are YouTube videos and web guides out there for most of the better spawning areas, you may just have to dig a little to find them. I honestly don’t see this being a benefit as much as it would be a huge crutch.

Leeroy – I’d like to know how it would not be a benefit? You provide no reasoning in your argument. The videos and guides are for the tier 6 materials and not for the lesser ones.

Bane – I’m used to salvaging every blue and green item I get, and I can’t agree with your approach here. I’m getting maybe 10% at best of the materials I’m looking to harvest from nodes, from actual salvage drops. Inefficiency at it’s best.

Vick – This IS one of the few things that actually rewards exploration, and for gatherers it’s a major setback because when the server resets (and that seems more often these days), so do the nodes. Granted some of the food nodes don’t reset over time but most of the utility nodes will, and that makes it difficult to track down if your sole purpose is to go out and harvest materials. And let’s be frank here, since the introduction of ascended crafting, there’s a lot of people who will go out of their way to harvest nodes off their own back instead of paying through-the-nose to get them on the TP.

Cattivo – I’ll agree that 6 months ago this wouldn’t have been such an issue for tier 2-tier 4 nodes as tier 6 was the only one that actually mattered (as well as tier 5’s that could be harvested on the same maps as the tier 6’s), and as I stated above there are websites that will give you node locations for those already.

As for the exploration and “woo I found another one!” thrill-of-the-chase type of approach, I see this approach as being more of a want than a need. Ascended crafting has created the demand here. More players are getting out into zones, as Anet wanted, with the sole purpose of gathering, if nothing else. My proposal simply makes that gathering a little easier for people who want to streamline their efforts and not waste time wandering around on a map tracking down nodes only visible on a minimap for hours on end.

If the node spawns didn’t change over time I could see a reason not to do this as it would become easier for people to find nodes simply by memory. As it is, this doesn’t happen and I’m trying to explore other more efficient ways of doing this.

Valandil Dragonhart.2371:

Leeroy – I’d like to know how it would not be a benefit? You provide no reasoning in your argument. The videos and guides are for the tier 6 materials and not for the lesser ones.

Well, I didn’t quote reasons for it not being a benefit because I made note of its alternative. I called it a crutch, and all the benefits people would see from this are exactly what I see as a crutch in this suggestion. So whatever pros you see in this I’m not saying I see as a con, just as something that is less than needed and will not encourage the player-behavior I think AreaNet is trying to push for.

I would be in favor of anything that shows on the minimap can show on the regular map. So if you are to make your minimap window bigger to see further around you should be no different then having them show on the regular mail within a certain radius of you.

Same info just two ways to see it. And really shouldn’t the mini map just be a version of the regular map capable of all the same info showing?

I’m colorblind and pretty much can’t see any of the plant nodes on the mini map. It’s a bummer because I really dig the new harvesting sickle and would like to use it more than when I just happen to stumble across a plant which is not very often.

I think that there should be toggable map nodes on the regular map ….so people that like discovery can discover nodes while people that like the convenience can use them.