Guild Wars 2

There seems to be a serious disconnect between the content that Arenanet is releasing and the capabilities of the machines the average player is using to play GuildWars 2.

First of all, Gw2 is already a pretty demanding game. I have upgraded a few times and I still am only getting above average results while playing solo (35-60 fps). During large world events my computer sloooooows waaaaaay dooooown (10-15 fps). So if my computer is struggling I know this must be a pretty big problem for other people.

So this brings me to my big question…why on earth does anet keep releasing content that they know the average computer is going to struggle, sputter, and fumble through? So far there has been the zergs in the queens gauntlet, the zone raids of scarlett, and now the 80 man raid on Tequatl.

Is this supposed to be Anets answer to the raid? Because if it is I am rather uninterested. I may sound like a downer right now, but I am legitimately happy with them reworking this fight. But its not so much THIS fight that I have a problem with as much as the pattern as of late. It seems like Anet is making these zergy laggy world events the main bulk of content to experience and I am not that type of gamer. What do you guys think?

I think you need to give the event a try before you judge it. This may be what they want for “Raid” type content. They will not make “raid” type content instanced at anytime in the near future.

Look for the Red responses on performance issues.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Why-is-Performance-Never-Rarely-Addressed/page/2

Anyone remember Lost Shores? lol.

1) They have done a lot to fix performance issues with changes on graphical effects and culling.

2) Any new content is going to get jumped on by players. Anything short of an instance will cause this.

3) I get 16 fps standing alone in an empty field, on minimum graphics settings, and 3 fps in zerged events. I don’t complain. I still have fun. Try playing on my computer, then go back to yours and see that you are really making this more of an issue than it is. I’d love to have a minimum of 10-15 fps like you do. Quit complaining!

please post you system specs if you’re having issues. I build my PC 4 yeasrs ago and other than upgrading the GPU 2 years ago and dropping in an SSD last year, I haven’t upgraded anything since Ibuilt it. I’m running great except the super zergs where I drop to about 25 fps on high settings. Once we figure out where your system is lacking you’ll know where to spend your money to get it running smoothly. If all else fails drop your graphcs settings for the zerg events and pop ’em back up after.

Curo.2483:

1) They have done a lot to fix performance issues with changes on graphical effects and culling.

3) I get 16 fps standing alone in an empty field, on minimum graphics settings, and 3 fps in zerged events. I don’t complain. I still have fun. Try playing on my computer, then go back to yours and see that you are really making this more of an issue than it is. I’d love to have a minimum of 10-15 fps like you do. Quit complaining!

Lol, you obviously didn’t read all of my post because YOU are exactly who I am talking about. I stated that if my rig is a pretty good setup people who have lesser computers must be having a really hard time. This post isn’t about me. It is about the average gamer and how a focus on large zerg content will effect them.

BlueStoat.9157:

please post you system specs if you’re having issues. I build my PC 4 yeasrs ago and other than upgrading the GPU 2 years ago and dropping in an SSD last year, I haven’t upgraded anything since Ibuilt it. I’m running great except the super zergs where I drop to about 25 fps on high settings. Once we figure out where your system is lacking you’ll know where to spend your money to get it running smoothly. If all else fails drop your graphcs settings for the zerg events and pop ’em back up after.

I would post my specs but this isn’t really supposed to be a “help me improve my performance post”. Sorry sometimes I do write unclear. I appreciate your willingness to help though! What I wanted this thread to be about was a discussion on the-what I believe to be-disconnect between what they are putting out as content (large zerg raids), and the performance of the average gw2 players pc. What are your thoughts? Do you think there is a disconnect? If so do you think it we should just come to expect that as mmorpg players? Do you think that most people can run these events even on low settings and get a decent experience? I want to know what you guys think.

I know what you’re getting at, and I do agree. I normally don’t have a performance issue but in large Zergy events, the disconnect comes from the lack of challenge and accomplishment feel. Regardless if you are running on a low end rig or a high end one, most people could just slam their face into the keyboard and be done with these events. The only thing it adds to the game is a 1-3 hour fight. Adding tedium, not challenge.

One of the interesting things to note is that content seems to pile on in clumps of specific content instead of constant variety. We had the Crown Pavillion zerg farm, Scarlet invasion zerg farms, champion loot bag zerg farms and now Tequatl zerg content. All the large scale open world content is coming out at the same time. Then look at Dragon Bash followed by Aspect Arena, Southsun Survival and Sanctum Sprint. A couple months of heavy mini-games content. Around that time they had two months of Living Story based jumping puzzle achievements.

It’s like they unintentionally give us too much of the same thing at the same time. Too bad they didn’t give us “too much” dungeon content. That would have been nice.

Shiren.9532:

One of the interesting things to note is that content seems to pile on in clumps of specific content instead of constant variety. We had the Crown Pavillion zerg farm, Scarlet invasion zerg farms, champion loot bag zerg farms and now Tequatl zerg content. All the large scale open world content is coming out at the same time. Then look at Dragon Bash followed by Aspect Arena, Southsun Survival and Sanctum Sprint. A couple months of heavy mini-games content. Around that time they had two months of Living Story based jumping puzzle achievements.

It’s like they unintentionally give us too much of the same thing at the same time. Too bad they didn’t give us “too much” dungeon content. That would have been nice.

I’d kill for “to much Elder Dragon content” right now. I mean seriously. Over a year later and still kittening nothing for the primary purpose and lore of the game? Enough with this meaningless side story bullkitten Anet. Give me Elder Dragon content or GTFO!

And no, the new Teq is not new Elder Dragon content. For one, he’s been there since launch, just has different mechanics now. And two, we’ve already killed Zhaitan, so anything pertaining to him now is just stupid. We have several other dragons to deal with now, so let’s get cracking on that!

I have a lower-end computer, and my fps drops to around 2-5 (5 if I’m lucky) in heavily-populated content. It’s an MMO, so I can only expect there to be lots of people partaking in popular (at the time) content. It would be great if my fps was better, but I don’t have the kind of rig that can handle that. It is what it is. It usually doesn’t last too long, and even if I can’t see too well, I seem to get an acceptable amount of credit. It doesn’t especially bother me, because there is nothing I can do about it. This is all I can afford at this time. Just making lemonade from lemons. =)

jweez.7214:

BlueStoat.9157:

please post you system specs if you’re having issues. I build my PC 4 yeasrs ago and other than upgrading the GPU 2 years ago and dropping in an SSD last year, I haven’t upgraded anything since Ibuilt it. I’m running great except the super zergs where I drop to about 25 fps on high settings. Once we figure out where your system is lacking you’ll know where to spend your money to get it running smoothly. If all else fails drop your graphcs settings for the zerg events and pop ’em back up after.

I would post my specs but this isn’t really supposed to be a “help me improve my performance post”. Sorry sometimes I do write unclear. I appreciate your willingness to help though! What I wanted this thread to be about was a discussion on the-what I believe to be-disconnect between what they are putting out as content (large zerg raids), and the performance of the average gw2 players pc. What are your thoughts? Do you think there is a disconnect? If so do you think it we should just come to expect that as mmorpg players? Do you think that most people can run these events even on low settings and get a decent experience? I want to know what you guys think.

What do you have to hide by not wanting to tell us your specs though?
You say average like YOUR computer is average while for all we know you could be playing on a toaster and clearly not enjoying the content anet is pushing out for you because it can’t handle that content.

I have a feeling your idea of average is pretty low as far as standards go.
I mean, gw2 on lowest settings looks worse than minecraft for god’s sake.
( exageration yes but still )

panzer.6034:

Anyone remember Lost Shores? lol.

I remember Lost Shores, and it’s the first and only time I experienced lag like that in GW2. Even with the removal of culling and the massive zerg fest that was Scarlet I haven’t experienced it.

As much as people have troubles, ANet has consistently and continually improved the capability and reliability of their servers for massive numbers of players existing together.

jweez.7214:

BlueStoat.9157:

please post you system specs if you’re having issues. I build my PC 4 yeasrs ago and other than upgrading the GPU 2 years ago and dropping in an SSD last year, I haven’t upgraded anything since Ibuilt it. I’m running great except the super zergs where I drop to about 25 fps on high settings. Once we figure out where your system is lacking you’ll know where to spend your money to get it running smoothly. If all else fails drop your graphcs settings for the zerg events and pop ’em back up after.

I would post my specs but this isn’t really supposed to be a “help me improve my performance post”. Sorry sometimes I do write unclear. I appreciate your willingness to help though! What I wanted this thread to be about was a discussion on the-what I believe to be-disconnect between what they are putting out as content (large zerg raids), and the performance of the average gw2 players pc. What are your thoughts? Do you think there is a disconnect? If so do you think it we should just come to expect that as mmorpg players? Do you think that most people can run these events even on low settings and get a decent experience? I want to know what you guys think.

There is no disconnect. i have a mid-range rig and run perfectly. Games progress and so does technology. Upgrade a part once a year and you are fine. you can’t expect to enjoy everything to the fullest with an 8 year old rig, THAT is the disconnect to reality people have.

I am expecting out of memory crashes, fatal error on disc read and BSODs that take several restarts to fix. I know my rig is out of date by a year or so… but I also know people with high end rigs having these same issues due to the game engine itself. Even with character models and all settings on low – I still get slow down to 3-5 FPS and, best of all, INVISIBLE ENEMIES! The game engine can sure load all those vanity backpacks on every generic model it displays but sometimes, it’s 2 minutes before I see the actual monsters.

This is going to be a nightmare and I still have six months to go before I can afford a new computer.

I have played with the same PC from Lost Shores to the current scarlet and all I can say is they have done a lot of work improving the performance. In lost shore I had to make my window mode like a 1/4 of the screen and had like 3 fps while now in Scarlet I play full screen with 9 fps, without changing anything in the graphics.
I am playing a custom medium graphics.

I have played through all the living story since launch on a laptop which is a couple of years old (and while bought with gaming in mind, it is by no means an expensive gaming laptop, I just wanted it to run stuff) – and I haven’t found anything ‘unplayable’ since Lost Shores. Yeah my graphics aren’t the best, nor is my FPS at an ideal rate all the time, but I have definitely still been able to participate in and enjoy world bosses and things like Scarlet’s invasions. I don’t know if you’re just not as lucky – that would suck – but I would have thought my computer was fairly average.

Besides, GW2 is a game that is more in favour of server-wide, spontaneous large group events than instances; just the way it is. They like getting us all together and always have. As others have said here, they are always tweaking the system and event design to make it easier to run and more enjoyable, but I think the philosophy’s here to stay.

I have FPS waaay lower than yours, and I don’t mind. Standing alone in a field I get maybe 30 FPS, and I still jump at the chance to do a big even though I’ll drop down to 12 fps. It’s better than the 0.5 FPS I got with the first lost shores event.

My computer has been laggy a bit especially on loading Waypoints. Which can be a problem in the Scarlet Invasions because you need to get around the area better. Some times by the time I load in the fight is almost over. Now some of that may be slow callers and me just not seeing the call right away. But some of it is my load time.

I’m not really seeing the disconnect. I play on a laptop that’s a couple of years old, and the game’s performance is a lot better than I would have expected given my machine. The only times I’ve had significant lag were during Lost Shores (which I think was a learning experience for ANet,) the double boss fight at the end of the Molten Facility, and when local internet conditions cause it rather than the game itself.

Keiel.7489:

I know what you’re getting at, and I do agree. I normally don’t have a performance issue but in large Zergy events, the disconnect comes from the lack of challenge and accomplishment feel. Regardless if you are running on a low end rig or a high end one, most people could just slam their face into the keyboard and be done with these events. The only thing it adds to the game is a 1-3 hour fight. Adding tedium, not challenge.

Imagine if you had to do anything else than press 1 in zerg events. If you actually had to time your dodges and skills and act fast. Impossible, it would be unplayable. Im willing to bet that well over 50% of game’s population wouldnt be able to play that content.

Morsus.5106:

I have FPS waaay lower than yours, and I don’t mind. Standing alone in a field I get maybe 30 FPS, and I still jump at the chance to do a big even though I’ll drop down to 12 fps. It’s better than the 0.5 FPS I got with the first lost shores event.

That is egzactly problem with gw2 optimization and performance. If i can reach 60 fps when alone or in small crowds and in zerg i cant get above 8-9 fps then there is something wrong. And there is no difference if i lower my setting to lowest, or play at higher settings its always 8-9 fps in zergs.

I only have issues with very large groups. If I had to guess, it would be 100+ players plus lots of mobs (Usually, Aetherblades). Nevertheless, these events are not a lot of fun for me. If I do get low framerate, it’s annoying. If I don’t, I still get massive spell effects everywhere — which turns the game’s very appealing art into a technicolor mess.

ANet seems intent on moving the game towards these massive events designed to entice as much of a server’s population as possible into one area. While the idea is epic, I just don’t find the execution to be fun. If it were my choice, I’d be looking at ways to spread people out, to utilize more of the game world — rather than leaving 95% of the world empty to cram everyone into one area.

This is a PC game.

I’d love to see them update the graphics from DX9 to 11. As any PC powerful enough to run a big zerg, isn’t using a DX9 vid card. (I’d love to see if they could make it more pretty too, oh yes!)

I also think, they do pretty kitten nicely. There players allowed before going overflow, seems to let most people ‘play’. It’s soo better than say Rift/SWTOR.

Anyway, I’m all for epic scale stuff, that you can’t say do on a toy like a console, and well the PS4/XBone is def more powerful than what you need to efficiently play here.

My box is old, i3 4cores 3ghz, 16gig ram, 1gig Dx11 vidcard that cost me like $75 years ago. It’s shameful, but it works fine. It’s GW2 & Star Citizen that’s making me inspired to get a new one! And I like that.

Tho, can we get a PS Vita client, so I can play in bed? ;-P

I can’t say that I really have these problems. The only times my fps gets below 30 are when hundreds (literally, world events on my server lately are crazy) of people are on screen, or (for some reason) when Fire Elemental spawns. That’s it. I’m on max settings.

Specs are in my signature.