Guild Wars 2

Devata.6589:

timmyf.1490:

You don’t travel to reach the endpoint, you travel. Period. That’s it. The exploration is the gameplay.

You spend your 1 hour exploring. And then you’re done.

I feel like I’m failing at explaining it, sadly.

While I might not have totally agreed on the way you visioned the temporary instanced maps and no mounts I do 100% agree on this.

It’s what I am trying to say when I talk about how ‘exploring’ now is crossing of a list of locations in stead of really exploring.

Well let’s work together, Devata. Mounts are an awfully divisive topic, perhaps we can find common ground.

What ways can we encourage exploration without speed boosts? What gives somebody a reason to travel from point A to point B? What, specifically?

Is it about the journey or about the end-point?

If it’s about the journey, then what should be on the journey? If it’s the end-point, then what should be at the end?

Maybe I can guide discussion by mentioning one of my favorite events in the game: the Penzan pirate treasure hunt. Has everybody here done that one?

DarksunG.9537:

timmyf.1490:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

I hope I’m getting the point across. Waypoints exist for a reason, but their utilization is by people with a variety of reasons for using their convenience factor. Removing them for the sake of exploration (which a lot of players might not even want to have forced on them) seems . . . to be adding some fresh new vibrant color to the Mona Lisa.

I see what you’re saying.

I do not want to REMOVE waypoints.

I want to add new content built without waypoints in mind.

totally agree.. If they add the Crystal desert I think it would be amazing if it were 3 huge zones that only had 1 entrance WP. It would add to the feel of the epic wasteland.

GW1 had the outposts rather than waypoints – that could perhaps be a model for how many waypoints this wilderness region might have.

A personal waypoint consumable may be helpful for exploration of this zone, too. The opportunity to duck out and play something else for a bit before picking up where you left off would be helpful in such a zone – otherwise you have to walk all the way back or use an alt.
So, if it’s possible to have a single-use consumable – kind of like a Twisted Watchwork Portal actually – that takes you back to the place you activated it within a 24-hour period, that may solve some of the problems forseen with this kind of content.

The other thing that I’d recommend to avoid making the zone any more dead than it has to be (being a vast desert, after all) would be providing paths through the desert with a relatively low mob density. If you’re trying to join someone out there you at least want the option of reaching them quickly.

Requiring group play to complete some challenges in such an area is fine, but requiring group play to reach them is going to result in either a dead zone or a zerg (if the rewards are good enough).

Romo.3709:

timmyf.1490:

Morrigan.2809:

What I Absulotely do not want to do, is to spend my 1 hour play time running to where I want to be- I want to get there and play.

thing is I have a choice now you see?

I totally agree. The idea here is that the journey is the gameplay. You don’t travel to reach the endpoint, you travel. Period. That’s it. The exploration is the gameplay.

You spend your 1 hour exploring. And then you’re done.

I feel like I’m failing at explaining it, sadly.

The problem isn’t your idea. The problem is that some people use your idea to push their love for mounts which would in the end completely go against the idea you have in the first place.
They see “exploration” as getting though the map on a shiny mount. I see exploration as going around, jumping on boulders and mountain sides while falling down cracks and holes. Two worlds clash unleashing an argument we’re having right now.

Use the idea to push mounts. How about just many people like mounts and it would be useful to do something with that knowledge. The only thing here is that GW2 is not designed for no way-points while like Chris said they might make exploration feel trivial. So what would then be a good solution.. mounts. Has nothing to do with people using his idea to push mounts.

People are asking for mounts pretty much since the beta of GW2.

It saddens me that the whole conversation turned into another argument about “mounts”. It’s as interesting as player housing. The first game was mostly about lore. Give us some of that. New areas to explore, new enemies to face. If not lets go back to the old unanswered things such as Wizard’s Tower. Make this game great for what it is, not for what other games are.

timmyf.1490:

Well let’s work together, Devata. Mounts are an awfully divisive topic, perhaps we can find common ground.

I just question the steps to get to the decision “we need to take out Waypoints and add mounts”, and if the result will be in any way more useful than what we have now to the general populace.

Lord knows there’s one thing gamers hate and that’s to have something taken away.

Is it about the journey or about the end-point?

It depends on the person. Some players are just exploring to pick up their Gift of Exploration and call it a day, or are on an alt and don’t feel like really exploring stuff they did before. Then there are some who do walk the distance because “heck I’m not in a rush”, or “I want to get materials so I’m going to mine every node from Claypool to Lion’s Arch”.

If it’s about the journey, then what should be on the journey? If it’s the end-point, then what should be at the end?

No matter what you do with this, you need to realize you’re going to annoy people. If you make the journey more useful than just popping from A to B, the people who don’t want to do it are going to accuse you of adding time grind to the game. If you make it about the end point, then you get people zipping around to get the most reward they can from the various end points (for the shortest journeys) and still nobody enjoying the journey.

This line of thought is really addressing a concern I’m not sure is held by many of the players, and dangerously comes close to robbing casual players (or ones with limited time if you prefer that wording) of fun they might otherwise be having for the sake of “enjoying exploration”.

Maybe I can guide discussion by mentioning one of my favorite events in the game: the Penzan pirate treasure hunt. Has everybody here done that one?

It’s normally broken with nobody doing it every time I walk by on SBI.

There’s also a lot of people who don’t want to see mounts since then, for a variety of reasons. My concern is that the waypoint system makes them redundant, and a low-waypoint zone would be there for reasons incompatible with just chucking mounts in to bypass everything in the zone.

VOLKON.1290:

Devata.6589:

skullmount.1758:

VOLKON.1290:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

timmyf.1490:

I’ve felt this for awhile, though I still don’t quite know how to phrase it. Wondering if others might have an opinion.

As convenient as I find the waypoints all over the place, I feel like it trivializes much of the exploration we would be having without them.

I’ve suggested zones without waypoints as a way around this. Does anybody else feel the same way? Or am I romanticizing the runs from towns to far-flung locations in GW1?

Edit: should have said this originally, but all the credit to Sir Arthur for expressing my feelings better than I’ve been able to. This post was meant as a huge +1 to his.

Hi TimmyF,

I agree:

‘As convenient as I find the waypoints all over the place, I feel like it trivializes much of the exploration we would be having without them.’

Chris

What’s funny is that after playing for years in the original Guild Wars I disagree. I mean, you have to explore as it is to get to the waypoints, but the thought of tedious runs across zones to try and get somewhere you’ve already been… it seems like a step backwards, and if that were to happen in GW2 you’d find the very next hour people demanding mounts or some other means to get around faster. Map travel has always been a part of GW, even included in the lore of the game (there’s a quest you get from a kid who claims his mother invented map travel in Elona if I recall).

I don’t think any exploration is trivialized at all… you still need to walk to where you’ve never been. But the added convenience to get to where you’ve already been… I love that.

My thoughts mirror this as well.
What happens if you are doing the exploring that you want, and a friend wants/needs help doing something. First they’ll have wait till you run there. Then after you finish helping the friend, you’ll need to: 1)remember where you were (granted that already kinda happens even with the waypoints) and 2) run all the way back there. All that time running could mean much more exploring you could get done.

The wilderness zone idea is interesting, but what happens if an actual zone is released that takes up the space next to where those portals into the wilderness zones “lead” to? Are those zones temporary? or do they continue on in that next map released (thus kind always ‘leading’ out to unexplorable portions of the world map?

Maybe a travel to a friend option could help in some situation. At least a travel to guild options (having at least a few guild-members in one spot) would be nice. But overall I never found this getting to a friend a big problem, also not in other mmo’s without way points. Thats where mounts come in.

You seem to have this need to add a buttload of different little systems in order to accommodate the unnecessary and unneeded mounts. We have a system in place that works well with the existing lore of the game, and on top of that you add the nightmares of any other game with mounts relating to the kittening, the trolling (placing mounts on NPCs for example so people can’t access them) etc. Sir Occam is twitching nervously in his grave at the very thought of this.

No I don’t need that to accommodate the need for mounts. Mounts are something many people like. You can leave in all way-points and still add mounts.

However if you talk about reducing way-points (That was, what was being talked about) then the question becomes if you need to replace it with something and then mounts come to tough.

I really don’t need to have way-points to be removed in order to suggest mounts.

And no, it does not fit with the lore. I know you don’t want to see it but mounts fit better with the lore. That does not mean you might not be against mounts. Thats up to you but the lore arguments just does not fit.

I never had any problems in any other mmo’s with mounts and many people liked them. You might have missed the many topics about them.

People can now also block the way of NPC’s. If you want to remove that you need to implement hit-detection on users and NPC’s (but that would create other problems that would require flying mounts to fix.. just saying). Thats totally unrelated to mounts.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

timmyf.1490:

Maybe I can guide discussion by mentioning one of my favorite events in the game: the Penzan pirate treasure hunt. Has everybody here done that one?

It’s normally broken with nobody doing it every time I walk by on SBI.

This makes me really, really sad.

Mounts are definetely something, that should be added later in the game, once we have more explorable maps, once we can explore more continents, like when Elona and Cantha have returned, when we have soe more new huge WvW maps, …

For now, they have low priority, many other things should get handled first, but in some years, they should get definetely implemente, they exist in the lore and anybody who says something else is an ignorant fool – sorry, but its simple so. period.

ANet can also profitate from them as gem shop skins to be sold for special unique looking mount skins that could be sold for short moments, just like eternal harvesting tools.

However, the absolute highest priority that ANet should follow for now is finishing up the vertical progession with all the stuff, that is missing.

- Craftable Precursors and Equipment Refinements to Ascended Quality
- Ascended/Legendary Runes, Sigils, Gemstones (Jewelry 500/ Cooking 500)
- Craftable Back Items/ Aqua Breathers of Exotic/Ascended Quality
- Legendary Armors/ Accessoires
- Accountbound WvW Ranks

After that, Anet should focus on Horizontal Progression, stuff that we have discussed here. Especially many of the things, that are quick and easy implementable first and have at the same time the largest impacts on improvign the game in many different ways.

Mounts and Way Points can perfectly coexist with each other, its just all only a matter of how Anet would implement Mounts in the future and if they made first some important preparations for them first, like adding Cantha/Elona to increase massively the game world that is explorable, reducing the amount of Way Points, so that Way points are more impactful for the regions that you can reach instantly with them and making waypointing to hometowns finally cost free, so that people stop abusing the mists and WvW as a way to avoid the currency loss when quick travelign to a hometown.

I think, its senseless to talk here for the moment about Mounts and I say this as one of their strongest defenders!!!
Postpone this feature for when the right time has come for them!! For now, there are alot more important things to improve, than to add mounts into the game.

Devata.6589:

However if you talk about reducing way-points (That was, what was being talked about) then the question becomes if you need to replace it with something and then mounts come to tough.

I want to be very clear here: you misunderstand. I was not talking about reducing waypoints. I was talking about adding additional zones without waypoints and events/missions/quests that take you from the entrance to somewhere else.

Mounts are not at all a part of this. It would be things like escort quests where you can’t just skip ahead.

If people seem like they’re hostile toward your mounts discussion, it’s because you’ve misunderstood the original suggestion and taken it on a very different path.

timmyf.1490:

I’ve felt this for awhile, though I still don’t quite know how to phrase it. Wondering if others might have an opinion.

As convenient as I find the waypoints all over the place, I feel like it trivializes much of the exploration we would be having without them.

I’ve suggested zones without waypoints as a way around this. Does anybody else feel the same way? Or am I romanticizing the runs from towns to far-flung locations in GW1?

I like waypoints for the current content, but I would like to see more, new level 80 areas which don’t have many waypoints in them. Really big areas, think the size of the current playable world map. There can however be shrines where you can resurrect if you die (closest shrine only), like in GW1, so you don’t have to walk for hours if you die.

I’d really like to see the housing system tie into this. So you build your house in a spot in the actual game world and it really matters where exactly in the wilderness you build your house. Maybe you can even build an upgrade to teleport to your house. So you have a base of operations in the wilderness. Maybe you can even provide services there for other players, so you’re really a settler and can make money by having a house with services in a location that is 4 hours walk from the nearest waypoint.

I think some of the conveniences we have now should be disabled while in the wilderness (such as being able to send crafting materials to bank), so you really need to manage your logistics. Since storage will be an issue, it’d be fun if players can set up their own dolyak caravan to get their loot and resources out of the wilderness. And they have to guard it against NPCs or lose it all.

Devata.6589:

People are asking for mounts pretty much since the beta of GW2.

People have also been asking for raids since forever, or hardcore top-level content which requires extreme skill and knowing your class inside and out, aspiring to be top player with a class so you can take a shot at this awesome raid encounter . . . without realizing it’s content which by its own nature excludes the majority of the players.

Sometimes ideas just don’t work out if you’re trying to not drive away players by saying “no, this content is only for the elite”.

Ben K.6238:

GW1 had the outposts rather than waypoints – that could perhaps be a model for how many waypoints this wilderness region might have.

Definitely could be planned a little like the way Orr points are placed – in war camps or at crossroads or such. This way it’s not “every fifty feet” like in some parts of Kryta.

A personal waypoint consumable may be helpful for exploration of this zone, too. The opportunity to duck out and play something else for a bit before picking up where you left off would be helpful in such a zone – otherwise you have to walk all the way back or use an alt.
So, if it’s possible to have a single-use consumable – kind of like a Twisted Watchwork Portal actually – that takes you back to the place you activated it within a 24-hour period, that may solve some of the problems forseen with this kind of content.

Interesting idea.

The other thing that I’d recommend to avoid making the zone any more dead than it has to be (being a vast desert, after all) would be providing paths through the desert with a relatively low mob density. If you’re trying to join someone out there you at least want the option of reaching them quickly.

It’s why I highlighted how the Waypoints are mostly handled in Orr zones. Major points get a Waypoint, often shown as the Pact putting a beacon in place. “Straits of Devastation” style progression of a zone so that the Waypoints need to be routinely activated by DEs or go “dead” except for a few “outpost camps”?

Again, I don’t like the experience of looking to go to Orr and seeing every possible contestable Waypoint contested but . . . if that’s what people want then I’ll adapt to not having easy access Waypoints.

We have a way-point system. Which worked for way over a year now. It is not broken. It works as it was intended. The only thing about that system is making mounts redundant. Upon bringing the idea of taking way-points away, it shined a light on the whole mount thing making sense, therefore sparking the argument. It is completely pointless to take out what is already working just to put in something that is far less convenient for the sake of a small group of players that want a shiny horse. If you want to explore (and I mean explore, not running from point A to B faster than normal) nobody is stopping you. You blame waypoints for taking that away from you? It’s like blaming your TV set for keeping you at home.

Ben K.6238:

The other thing that I’d recommend to avoid making the zone any more dead than it has to be (being a vast desert, after all) would be providing paths through the desert with a relatively low mob density. If you’re trying to join someone out there you at least want the option of reaching them quickly.

Requiring group play to complete some challenges in such an area is fine, but requiring group play to reach them is going to result in either a dead zone or a zerg (if the rewards are good enough).

yeah that may be a possibility.. I think the lack of waypoints can work for or against the zone being dead. It’s all about the strength of the zone & rewards in general.

Shakkara.2641:

timmyf.1490:

I’ve felt this for awhile, though I still don’t quite know how to phrase it. Wondering if others might have an opinion.

As convenient as I find the waypoints all over the place, I feel like it trivializes much of the exploration we would be having without them.

I’ve suggested zones without waypoints as a way around this. Does anybody else feel the same way? Or am I romanticizing the runs from towns to far-flung locations in GW1?

I like waypoints for the current content, but I would like to see more, new level 80 areas which don’t have many waypoints in them. Really big areas, think the size of the current playable world map. There can however be shrines where you can resurrect if you die (closest shrine only), like in GW1, so you don’t have to walk for hours if you die.

This happy medium is mostly an acceptable point. The question does remain, would it be something the players would enjoy or something they’d come here to complain about endlessly until Waypoints were put in instead?

I’d really like to see the housing system tie into this. So you build your house in a spot in the actual game world and it really matters where exactly in the wilderness you build your house. Maybe you can even build an upgrade to teleport to your house. So you have a base of operations in the wilderness. Maybe you can even provide services there for other players, so you’re really a settler and can make money by having a house with services in a location that is 4 hours walk from the nearest waypoint.

Ultima Online again comes to mind with a few houses placed along roads near dungeons and such with vendors there selling your general consumable supplies. Most often at a markup

I think some of the conveniences we have now should be disabled while in the wilderness (such as being able to send crafting materials to bank), so you really need to manage your logistics. Since storage will be an issue, it’d be fun if players can set up their own dolyak caravan to get their loot and resources out of the wilderness. And they have to guard it against NPCs or lose it all.

While I like that concept, I hesitate . . . “or lose it all” is something I really oppose being visited on players. Especially if the events run the risk of being only run with one person there and they can’t defend the dolyak properly. I know I spend time enough alone in some zones the idea of trusting an NPC caravan with my potential loot . . . ugh.

Also, I would like to point out unless you restrict the ability to duck into WvW or Heart of the Mists, Lion’s Arch is always at most two minutes away. Or of you can queue into your borderlands then you can just F12 and come right back in PvE where you left from. (Something I have used.)

And if you do restrict access then it’s gonna really tick off the WvW crowd.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

cesmode.4257:

ColinJohanson.2394:

A lot of the ideas boiled down into variations of one of these two options, and really both have a lot of cool concepts and ideas. Can folks think of anything else that’s a bit more outside the box for something bigger?

I had suggested several times about Global Dominance system. Similar to WvW…we as players and as a server, complete events across the entire map of Tyria and receive passive bonuses based on the % of the map that we control as players. So if we leave entire zones(say the lesser traveled zones) to be completely occupied by centaurs, for example, we won’t be receiving maximum benefits. And you can use most of the existing dynamic events to accomplish this. There are many DEs that take over way points and camps that we as players can complete and push enemy NPCs back…thus acquiring a larger portion of the world.

This encourages players to play in more than one zone, get sthem out in the world, etc.

On top of this, put in a reward system for completing unique(different) dynamic events in a month. I.E. Complete 90 unique dynamic events in January and receive a Cesmode mini(just kidding). But you get the picture.

Is that big enough and outside the box?

Just catching up now. I really do like this idea, always have. I see this as a base system that would be applied to content across the board that would impact many features and mechanics, not just Horizontal Progression. I bet this idea comes up in many more CDIs as it has already done in the past.

Chris

You might like this idea: http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/1lz4yy/what_if_we_got_a_release_revamping_orr_would_you/

Between other things there, I suggest some kind of “World vs Risen” system, where we fight across various zones (The 3 from Ruins of Orr) against the risen, with supply lines and other mechanics to reflect a real conflict, just like WvW but against the AI of Zhaitan’s minions.

Romo.3709:

If you want to explore (and I mean explore, not running from point A to B faster than normal) nobody is stopping you. You blame waypoints for taking that away from you? It’s like blaming your TV set for keeping you at home.

This is very true! The suggestion for having non-waypointed areas is intended to facilitate a journey. An expedition. Starting from one point and traveling to far-away lands.

The key is to do this in a way that is:
1) Interesting
2) Repeatable
3) Rewarding

For it to be interesting, there has to be a story along the way. You have to experience adversity and overcome it along your path. You have to do it with interesting, well-written characters. You have to use your wits and your skill.

For it to be repeatable, you can’t just waypoint to the end and kill a boss. (Or, to say this another way: this already exists in game. It’s called the champ train. Not trying to repeat that.) Think of it like a dungeon path, but in a larger, open area.

For it to be rewarding, you need it to be structured as some type of event or mission. It can’t just be a zone without waypoints and dynamic events. You could have it be something like Underworld where completing the events spawns a special NPC. You could have a big chest or rares or rare skin drops. It could be tied to an Order progression system where you advance in rank.

Anyway, that was the thinking behind the wilderness zones. I don’t want to change ANYTHING that exists now, simply add on new zones with a slightly different style of play. I feel like I’ve gotten this CDI way off topic by explaining this poorly and apologize to everybody for all the trouble.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Devata.6589:

But then the questions is.. Isn’t it broken?

By adding mounts you are not making it much more inconvenient. If you would just remove all way-points (or don’t add them in a new maps) yes then you are correct but if you replace it by something else it’s not that big of a inconvenient anymore. Of course it would always take longer then a way point but does that mean it’s better?

Assuming you mean “does that mean it’s not better?” otherwise this makes no sense. I outlined a few reasons Waypoints are used, but here’s some reasons more why mounts might not work well:

- Terrain is often variable or uneven. As I said, trying to get a horse or whatever through Caledon Forest in places, or Metrica Province seems like an incredible hassle. Not to mention a very likely trouble with Bloodtide Coast and Sparkfly Fen, or a large part of Mount Maelstrom.

- Invariably, they’re a status symbol. Always. Even in games where mounts were plentiful (Ultima Online) there were, yes, mounts which held higher status than others. Not so much a definite problem so much as something to be aware of . . . they carry rather deep ingrained negative connotations in the genre to so many. Much like the actual, honest profession of “Player Killing in the wild”.

- Travel times become invariably, inescapably inflated to the point it can be exclusive to take part in things simply because “i’ll never get there reasonably fast”.

We could also just give you everything in the game from the start. No need to level or do events or explore or collect or whatever. You have everything from the start. much more convenient but that does not make it more fun.

This is a bit hyperbolic as a counterargument, and weakens your case a bit to resort to it.

By the way, you also just nearly described Ultima Online. And yes, it was fun right up until you were traveling and got “halberd to the face” for whatever you might have on you. Or for the laughs.

And to come back to don’t fix what isn’t broken.
Maybe that is exactly what Anet did here. Many mmo’s have a good solution for it and then Anet did try to fix it while it wasn’t broken. Now some people do think this new system might be a little broken.

No, it was a broken thing. There is long a tradition of travel needing to cost time or else the player isn’t punished enough. The boat rides and massive open areas of Everquest, primarily come to mind. Which only got worse until they chucked it out the window in “Planes of Power” with the travel books.

It was broken, it was patched together with some solder and duct tape. Guild Wars 2 manages to do it better with some superglue and a clamp to get a tight fit.

Let’s not go back to “waiting for the boat to ride it for a half hour”.

- Terrain is often variable or uneven. Chars also walk on 4 feet so don’t see the difference there. Think it should work just fine.

- Invariably, they’re a status symbol. So what? Everything can be a status symbol. Legendaries are status symbols just as some other weapons. Don’t see a problem there. I don’t feel any negative connotations many people don’t. Really don’t see the problem here.

Travel times become invariably
You can easily reduce that by having fast travel locations (like on a air-ship) spread out over the map.

This is a bit hyperbolic as a counterargument, and weakens your case a bit to resort to it.
Not really. What I try to say with this is that with that argument you can dismiss everything that is not as convenient as something else while ignoring everything else. And so it’s an invalid argument imho.

I never played UO so can’t argue on that.

No, it was a broken thing.
That might be how you see it. I never did see having to travel as a broken thing. It makes sense and that is very important element for me in a game.

Or maybe it was broken in your games. Most I ever had to wait in a game after I just mist a boat or something like that was maybe 3 min. Never half an hour.

Not sure how long loading screens can take in GW2 but it’s still a wait. With some smart programming you can already start loading the new area when the game sees you are waiting for a boat reducing the loading time.

Romo.3709:

Devata.6589:

But then the questions is.. Isn’t it broken?

By adding mounts you are not making it much more inconvenient. If you would just remove all way-points (or don’t add them in a new maps) yes then you are correct but if you replace it by something else it’s not that big of a inconvenient anymore. Of course it would always take longer then a way point but does that mean it’s better?

We could also just give you everything in the game from the start. No need to level or do events or explore or collect or whatever. You have everything from the start. much more convenient but that does not make it more fun.

And to come back to don’t fix what isn’t broken.
Maybe that is exactly what Anet did here. Many mmo’s have a good solution for it and then Anet did try to fix it while it wasn’t broken. Now some people do think this new system might be a little broken.

How is it broken? You keep saying that mounts will fix it. But fix what exactly? The need for Role Playing? The need for faster movement so you don’t have to fight anything on your way because you can simply just outrun them? You’re not giving any examples or reasons beyond having a shiny mount.
Exploration is a choice. It is not forced upon you, but waypoints are not taking it away from you either. I don’t understand your definition of exploration since with mounts you’re not exploring, you’re running everywhere at extra speed. And “maybe” something catches your eye as you’re steamrolling through the map. That’s not exploration in any means. It’s like taking a drive through the major city and saying: “Yeah I explored it”.
Mounts are nothing more than unnecessary clutter that would make it like every other MMO out there that had no imagination to create what Guild Wars 2 created. One more extra thing to render as you’re loading the map. If you want mounts ask them to make a town clothes that have mounts attached to them. Don’t tie it to exploration.

Somebody stated that way-points do trivialized exploring. Chris agreed and I did as well. In that way you can say there mechanic is broken. So thats what I was referring to.

Romo.3709:

Devata.6589:

Like I said before, running to a list of locations (poi, vista’s and so on) crossing them all of like you do now and not going somewhere else because it takes so dam long kills exploration more for me.

So mounts would fix that how? Make that “cross-off” of yours a lot faster? True meaning of exploration… You’re not exploring, you’re taking a taxi. You have an option to use waypoints, if you take that option, don’t complain that it kills “your” exploration.
Mounts is not a fix. It never was. In any game. Trying to push the subject on something that actually made quite a lot of sense once it has been cleared up of the whole mounts idea by original poster, is quite selfish. They don’t bring anything new to the game. At all. All they’d do is make it look like one of tens of other MMOs out there. It’s practically asking Anet: “Make GW2 like WoW!!”.

That was more related to quest then mounts.
About you saying “It’s practically asking Anet: “Make GW2 like WoW!!”.
Funny, I feel like what you are saying is “No, because WoW”

Here a nice video about that: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NedWPHZCcik&feature=c4-overview&list=UUJTE1U_RsWh9Nl2hMZxMu5w

timmyf.1490:

Devata.6589:

timmyf.1490:

You don’t travel to reach the endpoint, you travel. Period. That’s it. The exploration is the gameplay.

You spend your 1 hour exploring. And then you’re done.

I feel like I’m failing at explaining it, sadly.

While I might not have totally agreed on the way you visioned the temporary instanced maps and no mounts I do 100% agree on this.

It’s what I am trying to say when I talk about how ‘exploring’ now is crossing of a list of locations in stead of really exploring.

Well let’s work together, Devata. Mounts are an awfully divisive topic, perhaps we can find common ground.

What ways can we encourage exploration without speed boosts? What gives somebody a reason to travel from point A to point B? What, specifically?

Is it about the journey or about the end-point?

If it’s about the journey, then what should be on the journey? If it’s the end-point, then what should be at the end?

Maybe I can guide discussion by mentioning one of my favorite events in the game: the Penzan pirate treasure hunt. Has everybody here done that one?

I think exploration-like quest. Does not have to be exactly like traditional quest if thats not oke because WoW. But something like that.

You get a task, talk to an NPC, he ask your for a favor for that you need to go to his brother how lives on the other side of the map. That NPC then ask you to please go find his son who went into the swamp to catch frogs. So then you are exploring the swamp. Once you found him the son says his grandma can make potions from frogs so you take the frogs and go to his grandmother who happens to live in another maps.. and so on.

About the mounts.

I think it would be better to spend a other CDI on that as it might not fit into the Horizontal Progression CDI. Just a little bid. In another CDI people you might also have a better discussion between people who want them and who don’t. I think I did say everything about them that there is to say.

timmyf.1490:

darkace.8925:

I don’t explore Southsun because there’s nothing to see or do. There are no Vistas, there are too few Points of Interest, there are far too few Dynamic Events, and I personally wouldn’t have balked at some Renown Hearts either. Outside of harvesting runs or Queen kills, there’s really no reason at all to spend any time in Southsun.

Would you go to Southsun if there were events that you could warp in, spawn immediately, and complete for a chest with a guaranteed rare or two? And when you finished, you could start another chain? Up to maybe three or four paths?

That’s basically what I’m suggesting.

That sounds like a dungeon. Arah even comes with the ‘badly placed waypoints’ thing already!

timmyf.1490:

Devata.6589:

However if you talk about reducing way-points (That was, what was being talked about) then the question becomes if you need to replace it with something and then mounts come to tough.

I want to be very clear here: you misunderstand. I was not talking about reducing waypoints. I was talking about adding additional zones without waypoints and events/missions/quests that take you from the entrance to somewhere else.

Mounts are not at all a part of this. It would be things like escort quests where you can’t just skip ahead.

If people seem like they’re hostile toward your mounts discussion, it’s because you’ve misunderstood the original suggestion and taken it on a very different path.

Well I reacted on Chris and he quoted that one sentence.

I also don’t mind people being hostile. In the many mount threads you see that the people who are against them tent to be sort of hostile about it.

Difference is that this topic does not attract the people who so like them so it’s like I alone need to defend them. Thats why I also have suggested to have that discussion for another CDI where you also do get the people against and in favor so it can be more of a discussion.

Devata.6589:

- Terrain is often variable or uneven. Chars also walk on 4 feet so don’t see the difference there. Think it should work just fine.

Charr “run” on four feet. They walk on two, and they fight on two. Charr also are better at cornering and turning than horses, being . . . well, inspired by big cats who are intended to be quick and agile.

It might work fine. I’m skeptical of that.

- Invariably, they’re a status symbol. So what? Everything can be a status symbol. Legendaries are status symbols just as some other weapons. Don’t see a problem there. I don’t feel any negative connotations many people don’t. Really don’t see the problem here.

Personally speaking – I don’t either. However, it is something to keep in mind. Especially considering how other games treat mounts as status symbols, people have a reaction based on that.

Travel times become invariably
You can easily reduce that by having fast travel locations (like on a air-ship) spread out over the map.

That might as well be Waypoints set at outposts or camps with less in the wilderness, which pretty much is what I’ve been suggesting in lieu of mounts.

Not really. What I try to say with this is that with that argument you can dismiss everything that is not as convenient as something else while ignoring everything else. And so it’s an invalid argument imho.

No, it’s still valid, some people do desperately need the convenience factor due to lack of time. Fast food or TV dinners are invariably and inescapably proven to be not as good as fresh-cooked home meals. But they continue to exist because some people simply don’t have the time to devote to cooking anymore. Audiobooks exist because people need their time to do other things than reading. Vehicles, themselves, exist primarily because people need to get from one place to another without spending hours on hours to get there (or they simply are physically unable to walk the distance).

Convenience is not always born of laziness, sometimes it is born out of necessity.

Or maybe it was broken in your games. Most I ever had to wait in a game after I just mist a boat or something like that was maybe 3 min. Never half an hour.

Someone who played Everquest can attest to the trouble of the boat from Butcherblock Port to Freeport. This is the longest of boat rides, crossing an entire ocean zone with a stop inside the zone for people on the island to get on or people on the boat to disembark.

It was, if I recall correctly, ten minutes from the departure of one boat, and arrival of the next. But then it was also at least a ten minute trip across the ocean zone. Half an hour was a rounding of the time required but even if the difference is 20 minutes instead of 30 minutes, the point remains: it was a pain in the centaur’s backside and did nothing but prolong playtime . . . a fact admitted to back then.

Then there was the Luclin portal, the Velious Icebreaker ship . . .

These are travel times most people circumvented by saying “let’s get a port from a druid/wizard” because they were just so . . . inconvenient. Let’s put it mildly, to get from one side of the world (elven lands) to the nice humans of Qeynos, it could take you at least two hours with run speed buffs and fortunate timing. It could take upwards of an entire afternoon if you were unlucky, not including corpse runs. Even with a portal, you’re looking at a half hour trip.

On Mounts:

Keep in mind we do have speed buffs now… and they have opportunity costs.

My warrior runs Sword + Warhorn. With Warhorn traited for cooldown and wearing runes with +20% Swiftness duration, I have personal and group-wide perma-swiftness. Its very useful in WvW, but I pay a price for it.

Mounts (typically) by-pass all of those costs, sharply devaluing those character options. Introducing them has more impact on gameplay than just faster exploration…

(Two hours of reading later to catch up from where I left off last night……this thread is starting to get MASSIVE!!!!!)

As far as Mounts go, what if they were Cosmetic? Like the Enchaned Broom or the Sonic Tunneling Tool you bought in the Gem Store,. Like what was said before, the ability we already have to travel around the game world quickly, just completely trivializes Mounts. (And if your riding on a War steed, don’t kick us into town clothes, but keep us in our armor.)

Also, GW1 had parts of the game where you had to ride a Mount, in this case, a Junundu Wurm so you could get past parts of the map. What if we had areas of Tyria in Guild Wars 2 that were like that?

Lonami.2987:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

cesmode.4257:

ColinJohanson.2394:

A lot of the ideas boiled down into variations of one of these two options, and really both have a lot of cool concepts and ideas. Can folks think of anything else that’s a bit more outside the box for something bigger?

I had suggested several times about Global Dominance system. Similar to WvW…we as players and as a server, complete events across the entire map of Tyria and receive passive bonuses based on the % of the map that we control as players. So if we leave entire zones(say the lesser traveled zones) to be completely occupied by centaurs, for example, we won’t be receiving maximum benefits. And you can use most of the existing dynamic events to accomplish this. There are many DEs that take over way points and camps that we as players can complete and push enemy NPCs back…thus acquiring a larger portion of the world…

Just catching up now. I really do like this idea, always have. I see this as a base system that would be applied to content across the board that would impact many features and mechanics, not just Horizontal Progression. I bet this idea comes up in many more CDIs as it has already done in the past.

Chris

You might like this idea: http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/1lz4yy/what_if_we_got_a_release_revamping_orr_would_you/

Between other things there, I suggest some kind of “World vs Risen” system, where we fight across various zones (The 3 from Ruins of Orr) against the risen, with supply lines and other mechanics to reflect a real conflict, just like WvW but against the AI of Zhaitan’s minions.

My biggest problem with systems like this is that if you provide bonus’s for servers that keep the most area’s clear, you are now incentivising people to play on the most populous servers (more people means they can keep more area’s clear)…which only exasporates the problems seen on popular servers already (over-flows, waiting to do things, etc). Look at WvW.

So before implementing something like this….think about how it would affect a less-populated server, and how it would affect a more-populated server….and think about what you are trying to accomplish…if you are trying to fill servers, this would get people to jump to more-populated servers until they are full…leaving less populated as ghost towns…if you are trying to even out the servers, you need to do something completely different than this. Perhaps scaling the “invasions” to the population of the server….so they are easier to clear on low-pop servers than they are on high-pops, requiring about the same percentage of players to keep clear regardless of server population.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Again, I don’t like the experience of looking to go to Orr and seeing every possible contestable Waypoint contested but . . . if that’s what people want then I’ll adapt to not having easy access Waypoints.

honestly I think that’s more about how the zone is designed. first: you react differently to a waypoint being contested then not being there. Second, if the zone is set up more like a WvW map, with push/pull/moving armies you’re more likely to accept always starting from the beginning. third: if the zone is packed with things to do, hidden secrets, lots of DEs with interesting unique mobs (there should be 100s of events with many branches in 1 zone), events & lots of unique rewards & achievements it will be more fun to hang out in a section of a zone for weeks. I think the idea of wanting to stay in 1 section of a zone for a while is so cool. Rather than having only LA. Why not have 3 towns in 3 zones that you hang out at because you have tons of stuff to do in that 1 area. (a good farming spot for certain mats, a wealth of achievements you are doing, a dungeon you are farming, a set of armor you are going for as a meta, capping skills from rare mobs, collecting items for a legendary quest & unlocking unique vendors by completing events/Hearts, finding JPs or doing good Guild Missions )

DarksunG.9537:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Again, I don’t like the experience of looking to go to Orr and seeing every possible contestable Waypoint contested but . . . if that’s what people want then I’ll adapt to not having easy access Waypoints.

honestly I think that’s more about how the zone is designed. first: you react differently to a waypoint being contested then not being there. Second, if the zone is set up more like a WvW map, with push/pull/moving armies you’re more likely to accept always starting from the beginning. third: if the zone is packed with things to do, hidden secrets, lots of DEs with interesting unique mobs (there should be 100s of events with many branches in 1 zone), events & lots of unique rewards & achievements it will be more fun to hang out in a section of a zone for weeks. I think the idea of wanting to stay in 1 section of a zone for a while is so cool. Rather than having only LA. Why not have 3 towns in 3 zones that you hang out at because you have tons of stuff to do in that 1 area. (a good farming spot for certain mats, a wealth of achievements you are doing, a dungeon you are farming, a set of armor you are going for as a meta, capping skills from rare mobs, collecting items for a legendary quest & unlocking unique vendors by completing events/Hearts, finding JPs or doing good Guild Missions )

It sounds good, but you’re mostly talking about stuff people either don’t want to do . . .
or would quickly tire of doing in a couple months and we’re kind of back at the “step one” again: need more content. I mean, it’s good and all that but we have some truly voracious content-munching people around here

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

It sounds good, but you’re mostly talking about stuff people either don’t want to do . . .
or would quickly tire of doing in a couple months and we’re kind of back at the “step one” again: need more content. I mean, it’s good and all that but we have some truly voracious content-munching people around here

Yes & no. Everything can be done “quickly”. It’s a non-issue using that standard in game design. You could make any suggestion conceivable & I can retort with: “you’re talking about stuff people don’t want to do, or would quickly tire of doing” . It’s more of a balance of is the grind/activity balanced enough for the bulk of players for an acceptable amount of time. Although I don’t understand why you would say “you’re talking about stuff people don’t want to do” I basically listed everything there is to do in the game besides pvp.

I think most end-game zones just don’t have enough to do & don’t have enough unique enemies & rewards. GW2 has fallen into all the new rewards essentially being numbers. Whether it’s stats or mats. That goes into Anet’s abandonment of the DE system development & shift from putting rewards into the Gem Store rather than the game.

This is why many people like housing. The rewards are cool things you can build with. I think this is also why mounts are so fun. People yap on about speed buffs & travel & such but I’m sorry, it’s just cool & fun to have your guy riding on a sweet looking monster. & It’s a great goal to collect pets & mounts because it’s another visual customization of your character. There are only so many things you can change on your guy so people feel mounts & pets are a logical extension.

How about new profession mechanics?

Ranger

• Guard pet - you take the hits your pet would normally take yourself. This would be a command skill without any cooldowns, set on/off by pressing the F3 key.

Idea here is that if you take those hits on yourself, then you can evade/block/reflect them – something your pet can’t. And you have full control over when you’re being protective of your pet, or it’s gotta take it’s own damage.

That way if there’s powerful attack coming your way you won’t have to feel like semi-winner and half the success, cause when others including yourself dodged, your pet didn’t and you lost your companion..
Necromancer:

• F2 class mechanic – “Realm of the mists”.
  Enter into the realm of the dead, gaining damage protection and new skill set, but staying too long in it will kill you.

Unlike death shroud your hp would not be shielded by secondary hp pool, instead you would gain an exclusive damage reducing buff that grows over time to a breaking point of absorption of enemy attacks. However as it grows, so does the death corruption count, where max stacks = deafeated state. Corruption stacks would wear off as you’re not in “Realm of the Mists state”.

This state would also provide it’s own 5 skills just like death shroud, though much less control and survival oriented, and much more damage and negative status oriented.

“Kill them before it kills you” is the message of the day for this mechanic.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

‘The more GW2 can do to make itself utilize that world and expand the content in there, the more people are going to be happy with horizontal progression and new experiences, rather than chasing higher stat gear.’

hi Chris.

i really don’t know what you equipe has in mind for the future of this game, but please, think also about that huge part of players who, as stated from many of us and in many threads, do like horizontal progression as it was intended in the very beginning, and not what the game has recently become.
i’m sure that almost ANY horizontal progression (nearly everything is suggested here) would be well accepted. yes, bugged or not innovative features could cause the usual whine threads…but it would be more “fix-it!”posts than “i’m-ragequitting” posts.
because this kind of BiS gear is really really like a betrayal for some customers.
i really don’t know if arenanet and devs already “recognized” this gamers’ feelings, so i dared to post here it directly, as you’re actively posting on this thread.

DarksunG.9537:

Yes & no. Everything can be done “quickly”. It’s a non-issue using that standard in game design. You could make any suggestion conceivable & I can retort with: “you’re talking about stuff people don’t want to do, or would quickly tire of doing” . It’s more of a balance of is the grind/activity balanced enough for the bulk of players for an acceptable amount of time. Although I don’t understand why you would say “you’re talking about stuff people don’t want to do” I basically listed everything there is to do in the game besides pvp.

Yup, and there are some people who really don’t want to do any of it except get out of WvW to refresh themselves and dive back in again. Really, one charm of GW2 is we have all kinds of players. One problem with GW2 is we have all kinds of players. Someone’s going to be upset, but the trick is trying to mitigate it by trying to make as many people happy as you can.

But more to the second part. “It’ll be chewed through quickly” . . . which is more my concern. They could run themselves ragged designing this region to “go nuts in” as you put it and it would still be almost completely done with in less than a week by a not-insignificant portion of players.

Big catch-22 with game design. Years to build it, months for your players to play it, break it, mod it, and send you photos of things you never thought you could do in the engine. Like with movies, you’re spending a lot of time and effort on something which will be over much sooner than you took to make it.

I think most end-game zones just don’t have enough to do & don’t have enough unique enemies & rewards.

No matter how much they add, it will never be enough content. Again, that’s just how it goes

. . . .although the “unique rewards and enemies” comment is interesting, would like to see some work on that front. Good for the collector types.

GW2 has fallen into all the new rewards essentially being numbers. Whether it’s stats or mats. That goes into Anet’s abandonment of the DE system development & shift from putting rewards into the Gem Store rather than the game.

Eh? Tixx’s Toybox wasn’t in the Gem Store, neither was my Injector skin. And my reward for doing WvW Season 1 was rediscovering I really enjoyed getting myself beaten bloody in there and occasionally getting someone else or helping win something.

Sometimes those rewards aren’t tangible.

This is why many people like housing. The rewards are cool things you can build with. I think this is also why mounts are so fun. People yap on about speed buffs & travel & such but I’m sorry, it’s just cool & fun to have your guy riding on a sweet looking monster. & It’s a great goal to collect pets & mounts because it’s another visual customization of your character. There are only so many things you can change on your guy so people feel mounts & pets are a logical extension.

You’re right about mounts in that respect. But I don’t think it meshes well here as a mount system. As a cosmetic system like the riding broom or the drill machine? Sure, but as a travel system maybe it’s best left alone like that and instead we need to look at why we feel the exploration is lacking.

No I don’t need that to accommodate the need for mounts. Mounts are something many people like. You can leave in all way-points and still add mounts.

However if you talk about reducing way-points (That was, what was being talked about) then the question becomes if you need to replace it with something and then mounts come to tough.

I really don’t need to have way-points to be removed in order to suggest mounts.

And no, it does not fit with the lore. I know you don’t want to see it but mounts fit better with the lore. That does not mean you might not be against mounts. Thats up to you but the lore arguments just does not fit.

I never had any problems in any other mmo’s with mounts and many people liked them. You might have missed the many topics about them.

People can now also block the way of NPC’s. If you want to remove that you need to implement hit-detection on users and NPC’s (but that would create other problems that would require flying mounts to fix.. just saying). Thats totally unrelated to mounts.

How can you possibly continue with the absurd claim that mounts are part of the lore when the lore from both games clearly shows that to be false? No, sorry, concept art doesn’t count, nice try. What’s in both games counts… and it’s not mounts.

Reducing waypoints is also unnecessary. The system works fine as it is and encourages a more ‘take your time’ approach to exploring without the inconvenience of excessive travel times when you’re in a hurry, plus we avoid the plague of mounts and the pox of elitism that is inevitable if anything remotely prestigious is introduced.

I haven’t missed mounts one bit, and I bought a Sparkle Pony back in the day. So much wasted time, so many people cluttering towns trying to show who has the bigger dragon, the griefers blocking access to mailboxes and bankers etc… what a mess that was. Nothing good came of mounts, they were only a faux convenience for a deliberately added travel time sink. We don’t need those time sinks… there’s no need to make us stretch out our playtime to give the illusion of getting our money’s worth for our subscription.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Signet of Forums.4397:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Zaoda.1653:

@ColinJohanson,

In regards to new weapon skills/unlocks, I think the way it worked in GW1 in terms of obtaining both normal and elite skills using the Signet of Capture was so unique and amazing. It was something I had never seen done before in any other game I had played, whereby you go around the world looking for specific bosses that have the elite that you want, and that boss had a particular glow depending on what profession it was – gold/yellow for warrior, cyan for ritualist, green for necromancer etc. you slayed that boss, and captured its elite when standing near its corpse. I felt like I had truly earnt that skill, and that to me is what it’s all about – true progression.

So something like a Signet of Capture concept where you can purchase, or get via a reward, and go around and collect weapon skills from bosses would be ideal – and would make you feel as though you truly earnt it.

You could even swap in, say, 10-20 skill points for a capture skill (as many have been wanting more ways to use excess skill points, this could be another way to use them up?)

Edit: another idea could be bringing back elite tomes? Just a thought anyway.

Hi Zaoda,

Absolutely, this is a simple and excellent system. Very elegant, and rewarding with a great sense of discovery.

Chris

Well, I didn’t think the part where you had to have the Signet of Capture already taking up the slot of one of your skills on your skill bar in advance was what I would call “elegant,” but it was interesting aside from that.

Hi,

I am referring to the system at it’s core level. If we were going to reintroduce the system we would evolve and polish it.

I hope this makes more sense.

Chris

Remember tinkering from page three? We could craft Signets of Capture through that.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Recently however we have been working kitten balance and situational role parity and bit by bit in game you can see player’s experimenting much more. This is a very good sign and will afford us a stronger foundation to build our content on moving forward.
Chris

Okay, what was it that got censored there?

VOLKON.1290:

Remember tinkering from page three? We could craft Signets of Capture through that.

Why go that far? Make it a purchase from your class trainers rather than force another crafting discipline. You get an “Orrian Capture Device” (remember! the Signet was originally supposed to be Orrian in origin) which can be used on a valid target as a “Use Device” prompt.

Now the question comes what would this thing actually do and how would it interplay? Personally, I suppose it could be useful as a side-road to a horizontal progression of subclass or masteries or whatever. Instead of questing, get the device and charge it with each target it’s used on. Redeem it at a trainer as currency for the unlock.

Let it charge in sPvP after every match, or even better have the stuff unlocked as default so you can test drive them in sPvP . . . but it charges in WvW also so they can just grab the device, and get to work.

Nobody gets left out, and you got an alternate road to your horizontal progression than “go do the PvE content”.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

VOLKON.1290:

Remember tinkering from page three? We could craft Signets of Capture through that.

Why go that far? Make it a purchase from your class trainers rather than force another crafting discipline. You get an “Orrian Capture Device” (remember! the Signet was originally supposed to be Orrian in origin) which can be used on a valid target as a “Use Device” prompt.

Now the question comes what would this thing actually do and how would it interplay? Personally, I suppose it could be useful as a side-road to a horizontal progression of subclass or masteries or whatever. Instead of questing, get the device and charge it with each target it’s used on. Redeem it at a trainer as currency for the unlock.

Let it charge in sPvP after every match, or even better have the stuff unlocked as default so you can test drive them in sPvP . . . but it charges in WvW also so they can just grab the device, and get to work.

Nobody gets left out, and you got an alternate road to your horizontal progression than “go do the PvE content”.

Why? Because we can, of course, and it could flesh out tinkering a bit more, that’s all.

VOLKON.1290:

Why? Because we can, of course, and it could flesh out tinkering a bit more, that’s all.

We . . . are fleshing out . . . Tinkering, something which doesn’t exist yet, with more things which also don’t exist yet, and we don’t even know if Tinkering is something we should be looking at?

Sure why not?

:)

Though it bears to question just what exactly is “Tinkering” supposed to do which “Artificer” can’t as a flavor thing?

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Recently however we have been working kitten balance and situational role parity and bit by bit in game you can see player’s experimenting much more. This is a very good sign and will afford us a stronger foundation to build our content on moving forward.
Chris

Okay, what was it that got censored there?

What do you mean? They really are working on the balance of kittens throughout the game. Personally, I think more kittens in all areas of the world would certainly make for a solid horizontal progression system I could enjoy.

Actually Runescape had an excellent Kitten progression system, if you did a certain quest you could even unlock hell kittens.
I support this kitten system 100% , Kittens for all :P
although I will say Chauncey von Snuffles III is overpowered and needs to be nerfed.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

VOLKON.1290:

Why? Because we can, of course, and it could flesh out tinkering a bit more, that’s all.

We . . . are fleshing out . . . Tinkering, something which doesn’t exist yet, with more things which also don’t exist yet, and we don’t even know if Tinkering is something we should be looking at?

Sure why not?

:)

Though it bears to question just what exactly is “Tinkering” supposed to do which “Artificer” can’t as a flavor thing?

The thought was to have a crafting profession for “fluff” items, such as furnishings for halls or homes, town clothing, etc. The posts go into ideas, such as drops off boss mobs being used to make items (dragon scale table for ex.). Tied into housing and all that it builds on the overall concept and helps players have more of a hand in progressing their place plus pulls the world into it by using items found on certain mobs, etc.

Artificing is tied to combat, as are all the professions. This would be ‘out of combat’ fluff.