Guild Wars 2

Here we’re talking about how to make raids accessible to a larger audience.

The topic isn’t about making Raids accessible to a larger audience (at least not by adding new gameplay mechanics, there are other ways). The OP posted a suggestion (it’s in the thread title and the OP) and the discussion wasn’t about points of the suggestion but if the entire thing is useful or not. Therefore, the topic is whether we need to make Raids accessible to a larger audience, there is no agreement that there is actually a need for it, otherwise this thread would be over by now.

You said

but they want it to be all comfortably within their reach

and I say there is more than enough content comfortably within their reach, so some parts being out of their reach isn’t unreasonable. It doesn’t have to be all within their reach. So there is no need to make the current Raids more accessible, as long as there is more than enough content that is within the comfort zone of every player.

Having the entire current content within reach of some self-claimed casual majority was never healthy for the game.

No it won’t. The majority doesn’t care at all. This has been proven multiple times in other games.

If GW2 followed “what has been proven multiple times in other games” then it would have been Wildstar.

What if I want a hard mode because I find the LS easy? Do I get it?

If enough people want that, then yes, you should. I don’t think the audience is there for it in the same way it exists for an easier raid mode though. We can’t argue over numbers, that’s for ANet to determine, I’m just telling you why I believe it’s not a priority for them. If that audience does exist though, then sure, they should make a harder LS.

The raids don’t support multiple difficulties right now. They would have to rewrite the complete raid structure.

No, they wouldn’t.

The current raids already support being able to select three different wings from a list. All this would need, at most basic implementation, is to add three more wings to that list, “Salvation Pass (easy mode),” for example. No complete engineering needed for that. The infrastructure is already in place, they just need to apply it.

That is not a reasonable effort to delay content for people who are not the target audience.

Again, it depends entirely on how many those people are, verses how many other people they stand to bring in, and depends on how much time it would actually take, and by whom. Most of these values are unknowable to us. Your stance is “any amount of effort is too much,” but that is wrong. There is an appropriate amount of effort that would be worth spending on this, it’s just impossible for us to calculate based on so many unknown variables. The best we could hope for is a loose Fermi calculation.

So you don’t like the only content in the game that offers multiple difficulties and want to change other content to offer multiple difficulties? Yeah that sounds resonable.

It is, because player interest is a very alchemical process. Players like what they like, and dislike what they dislike, even if they are very similar things.

You only complain about things that offer rewards that you like. It is always the same with rampant easy mode raiders. Rewards. Thats why you don’t accept an easy mode without the raid specific rewards.

I’ve said several times in this thread that I would be fine with an easy mode without the raid specific rewards, just that if they went that route, I would continue to push for the raid-specific rewards to be made available in some other content, because I believe that is important two. They are two distinct issues, it just so happens that the simplest solution is to solve both at once, but solving them separately is fine too.

You could play your easy mode to experience the story and the encounters and the normal mode for the rewards.

What part of “the normal mode is not fun for me” are you missing? If easy mode is added without the rewards, and they don’t put the rewards anywhere else, then I would have to run normal mode to get those rewards, and if I were already going to run normal mode, then why would I even need an easy mode? The whole point of easy mode is to avoid normal mode entirely, because plenty of players have no interest in that experience.

As you also complained about the PvP Backpiece (but not about the fractal backpiece, even if you don’t like fractals either, didn’t you like the appeareance?)

Exactly, I’m not a fan of the Fractal backpiece, so that isn’t my issue, but if it’s someone else’s issue, I’m not going to try and shut them up as you try to get me to shut up. If someone else really wants the Fractal backpiece elsewhere, then I fully support them in pursuing that goal, that doesn’t mean that it needs to be my goal.

This is like that old thing where if someone supports a given charity, the petty comeback is "well why don’t you care about [this other charity]? There’s just not enough time in the day to fight for everything at once.

and I say there is more than enough content comfortably within their reach, so some parts being out of their reach isn’t unreasonable.

I would argue the exact opposite. That when you put only some items outside of people’s reach, then if they want those things at all, it will bother them more than if most of the items are out of their reach. I mean, if you’re playing a game and most of the game fails to meet your expectations, like say only a tiny portion of the content is challenging enough for you, then the answer is easy, just find a different game where most of the content is of the sort you enjoy.

But if you enjoy most of the game, and certain portions are out of reach, then that’s much more frustrating, because this is a game that is mostly what you want, and here’s some part that you want but cannot reach. If people come to Dark Souls, they have no right to complain that it’s too hard. If they come to Guild Wars 2, they have no right to complain that it’s too easy, but Dark Souls players should have every right to complain about a certain part that they find lacking in challenge, just as a GW2 player has every right to complain about a certain part that is too inaccessible.

and I say there is more than enough content comfortably within their reach, so some parts being out of their reach isn’t unreasonable.

I would argue the exact opposite.

The basic thing is that you need to provide reasons and incentives to play all types of content and exclusive rewards is the best way, or at the very least adding limited exclusives. I know you disagree with that. There was lots of discussion on the old PVP Ascension thread on the subject and there were pages upon pages there. Obviously none of it changed your mind, but you won’t change the “other side’s” mind either on this subject.

An interesting factor about exclusive rewards is how the PVP Ascension backpiece will be acquired in the future. We still don’t know how, I’d wait and see that first because What they do to the Ascension might also give us hints to future developments on other Legendary pieces like the Armor.

Ohoni.6057:

If GW2 followed “what has been proven multiple times in other games” then it would have been Wildstar.

So Wildstar had the focus on open world and everyone missed the point enterly?
Or GW2 was advertised as a dungeon and raid game?
Or is the focus of both completely different and not comparable outside that they are the same genre?

The raids don’t support multiple difficulties right now. They would have to rewrite the complete raid structure.

No, they wouldn’t.

The current raids already support being able to select three different wings from a list. All this would need, at most basic implementation, is to add three more wings to that list, “Salvation Pass (easy mode),” for example. No complete engineering needed for that. The infrastructure is already in place, they just need to apply it.

And you know exactly how the raid wing selection works and what it could do?
WoW has a standard backback and the ability to change backbacks to ones with a bigger size. So you could think you can make it easy available to change the standard backpack to something bigger.
Wrong, the standard backpack is so deep in the core code, that it actually take years to make this function available.
Only because it exists doesn’t mean you can easily expand it. Don’t make any assumption on ressources needed for changes on software unless you know the code basis. And it looks like you don’t have even basic knowledge about software architecture in general.

Gaile already said it to you 8 months ago and someone posted it in this thread. Stop making assumptions about development ressources.

That is not a reasonable effort to delay content for people who are not the target audience.

Again, it depends entirely on how many those people are, verses how many other people they stand to bring in, and depends on how much time it would actually take, and by whom. Most of these values are unknowable to us. Your stance is “any amount of effort is too much,” but that is wrong. There is an appropriate amount of effort that would be worth spending on this, it’s just impossible for us to calculate based on so many unknown variables. The best we could hope for is a loose Fermi calculation.

Oh we already have a developer comment on this one. Raid participation exceeded the expectations. Thats the only data we have. And it is against an easy mode.

So you don’t like the only content in the game that offers multiple difficulties and want to change other content to offer multiple difficulties? Yeah that sounds resonable.

It is, because player interest is a very alchemical process. Players like what they like, and dislike what they dislike, even if they are very similar things.

So what do you dislike about fractals and what do raids offer that fractals couldn’t?

What part of “the normal mode is not fun for me” are you missing? If easy mode is added without the rewards, and they don’t put the rewards anywhere else, then I would have to run normal mode to get those rewards, and if I were already going to run normal mode, then why would I even need an easy mode? The whole point of easy mode is to avoid normal mode entirely, because plenty of players have no interest in that experience.

Thats the thing. There is no reason for an easy mode unless people want an easy way towards the rewards. So there is no reason at all. We told you this months ago already.
The story is written on paper pieces, that can be read in a cleared instance.

But if you enjoy most of the game, and certain portions are out of reach, then that’s much more frustrating, because this is a game that is mostly what you want, and here’s some part that you want but cannot reach. If people come to Dark Souls, they have no right to complain that it’s too hard. If they come to Guild Wars 2, they have no right to complain that it’s too easy, but Dark Souls players should have every right to complain about a certain part that they find lacking in challenge, just as a GW2 player has every right to complain about a certain part that is too inaccessible.

No he hasn’t. Guild Wars 2 was never advertised as a game where everyone could see everything or can reach everything easily. It was advertised as an casual game, but that doesn’t mean that everything has to be or can be completed by everyone.

The game you are looking for is called World of Warcraft. They follow your dream game since late Cataclysm. At this point they added the ‘Everyone has to see everything’ paradigm, that you want.

Ohoni.6057:

No, they wouldn’t.

The current raids already support being able to select three different wings from a list. All this would need, at most basic implementation, is to add three more wings to that list, “Salvation Pass (easy mode),” for example. No complete engineering needed for that. The infrastructure is already in place, they just need to apply it.

Don’t you think it is quite… presumptuous to keep saying this when even devs said in the past that this as it is simply not true? You keep saying “it’s not much effort”, but you have NO proof whatsoever of backing it up that their code actually allows for simply changing this without having to dig really deep.
Do you code yourself, did you see the code, can you actually back up that it IS easy for them to add multiple difficulties and easily tweak the values to levels they consider up-to-par with what they expect/think should be right without having to take resources from other content? If you can’t, stop saying it despite having been told not to by the very people working on this game.

Jus leave him be.. now he’s a boy who crying wolf when there’s no wolf at all, maybe a small pup or somethin. I dun even agree with his earlier point, also that guy Absurdo ther.. I mite not like him or his attitude, but at least he say one thing that make sense. I.e., escort bores me alrdy so don’t make 2 versions of it pls. Xera is also rly rly easy imo even less time consuming then some of w1 bosses if u have an easy role. Just dps stuff, have masteries trained, avoid red stuff, and boom. No need for easier mode pls

I agree tho make 1 new boss or encounter.. is better then just 2 separate version of same encounter. like idk why even choose that

Arah was (still is) hard for casual player to get into. It dungeon so easier but was it nerfed? No and thank gawd, but the baddies figure out a way to exploit it anyway. Ppl don’t like to expend effort that’s their inherent human flaw but solution is to punish them and expose this weakness so they improve, not dumb everything down to facetank lvl so guy with 0 mastery can complete it

also for u say easier mode will help to train.. no it not. Think abt fractals.. t2 to t4. Huge diff? Yes it hard to get used to t4 then cos ur not expecting dmg spike. U learn nothing, u only keep up skill by repeatedly doing t4. not going back to do t1 when you’ve cleared t4. this is degenerative to u skill.. u unlearn stuff that u shouldn’t need to. PS no one who do daily t4 ever do t1s, cos there no reson for it. What ur think on this?

Ohoni.6057:

The voice of the community is speaking again I see. You do know that there is new content coming for those who want it and get tired of other options.

Sure, and there’s more content coming for those who like hard mode raiding too. That’s a different topic entirely. Here we’re talking about how to make raids accessible to a larger audience.

Quit saying hard mode raiding there is no easy mode raiding so there is no hard mode raiding, it is just Raiding and the Devs said they won’t make easy mode Raids, they will make introductory encounters, get over yourself, quit making baseless claims on how much time/effort/resources it would take for easy modes when the Devs have told you otherwise and have also told you to quit making those claims. move on the Devs have spoken!

I’m still confused what there is even left to discuss or why this thread and quote wars is still on-going to begin with.

BlaqueFyre.5678:

Ohoni.6057:

The voice of the community is speaking again I see. You do know that there is new content coming for those who want it and get tired of other options.

Sure, and there’s more content coming for those who like hard mode raiding too. That’s a different topic entirely. Here we’re talking about how to make raids accessible to a larger audience.

Quit saying hard mode raiding there is no easy mode raiding so there is no hard mode raiding, it is just Raiding and the Devs said they won’t make easy mode Raids, they will make introductory encounters, get over yourself, quit making baseless claims on how much time/effort/resources it would take for easy modes when the Devs have told you otherwise and have also told you to quit making those claims. move on the Devs have spoken!

With enough disatisfaction the devs can change their minds they have before they will again.

BlaqueFyre.5678:

Quit saying hard mode raiding there is no easy mode raiding so there is no hard mode raiding, it is just Raiding and the Devs said they won’t make easy mode Raids, they will make introductory encounters, get over yourself, quit making baseless claims on how much time/effort/resources it would take for easy modes when the Devs have told you otherwise and have also told you to quit making those claims. move on the Devs have spoken!

They never said it tho. They said that there was no plans for it, but plans can change.

TexZero.7910:

I’m still confused what there is even left to discuss or why this thread and quote wars is still on-going to begin with.

People probably find it fun to “discuss” with ohoni, won’t take long and this thread gets closed like many others in the past

Ohoni.6057:

All this would need, at most basic implementation, is to add three more wings to that list, “Salvation Pass (easy mode),” for example. No complete engineering needed for that. The infrastructure is already in place, they just need to apply it.

Wrong. (Link)

Gaile Gray

At this point, I need to interject. I am familiar with the process of changing to a multi-modality system of game presentation, having written about it long ago, when I was a journalist writing about another company and another game. For that game, too, players said “No big deal.” And they were absolutely wrong. They said, “Just tweak a few stats, lower a few spawns, and voila, you’ve got it!” No, that’s not how it worked. And that’s not how I think it would work for Guild Wars 2.

Nokaru.7831:

Ohoni.6057:

All this would need, at most basic implementation, is to add three more wings to that list, “Salvation Pass (easy mode),” for example. No complete engineering needed for that. The infrastructure is already in place, they just need to apply it.

Wrong. (Link)

Gaile Gray

At this point, I need to interject. I am familiar with the process of changing to a multi-modality system of game presentation, having written about it long ago, when I was a journalist writing about another company and another game. For that game, too, players said “No big deal.” And they were absolutely wrong. They said, “Just tweak a few stats, lower a few spawns, and voila, you’ve got it!” No, that’s not how it worked. And that’s not how I think it would work for Guild Wars 2.

Thanks for digging that post up for me, couldn’t be bothered to search for it.

The basic thing is that you need to provide reasons and incentives to play all types of content and exclusive rewards is the best way, or at the very least adding limited exclusives.

Players should not be encouraged to spend lots of time doing activities that they do not enjoy.

Nobody benefit from that.

You can and should encourage players to try new things, to spend enough time at it to decide whether they enjoy it or not, but after they’ve had time to fairly decide whether they enjoy it or not, you should respect their choices and allow them to leave without penalty if that’s their choice.

Long term goals should be more flexible, so that people that like activity A can do that as much as they want and feel like their time is fairly rewarded, while players who prefer activity B can do that instead.

An interesting factor about exclusive rewards is how the PVP Ascension backpiece will be acquired in the future. We still don’t know how, I’d wait and see that first because What they do to the Ascension might also give us hints to future developments on other Legendary pieces like the Armor.

True, but that doesn’t mean there’s any reason to postpone discussion of it in the present, because the longer we wait to provide feedback, the longer it would take for them to act on that feedback. I don’t want a solution that involves not being able to get the armor until 2-3 years down the road.

So Wildstar had the focus on open world and everyone missed the point enterly?
Or GW2 was advertised as a dungeon and raid game?
Or is the focus of both completely different and not comparable outside that they are the same genre?

I have a feeling you entirely missed my point.

And you know exactly how the raid wing selection works and what it could do?

I know enough to say that they could do what I described. If you can have a selector that can pick between three different maps, it can be used to pick between three other maps. Even on the off chance that their technique only allows for three total choices in a single menu, they’d only need to create a second menu-spawner, like another door or an NPC that opens a second menu.

Gaile already said it to you 8 months ago and someone posted it in this thread. Stop making assumptions about development ressources.

Only when you stop making assumptions that it will take too much work to be worth it. So long as you try to push the narrative that easy mode raids would be an excessive burden on existing plans, I’ll continue to point out how it really shouldn’t be.

So what do you dislike about fractals and what do raids offer that fractals couldn’t?

It’s not really relevant to this discussion so I won’t continue this line of conversation, but the basic bulletpoint is that I don’t like AR gearing, don’t care as much about the plot as it’s disconnected from mainline Tyria, and none of the available rewards particularly interest me. But again, if anyone wants to fight for Fractals, I won’t fight against them.

Thats the thing. There is no reason for an easy mode unless people want an easy way towards the rewards. So there is no reason at all. We told you this months ago already.
The story is written on paper pieces, that can be read in a cleared instance.

I would suggest you read this thread, it may help you to understand why all of that was wrong: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/A-Suggestion-For-Raids/

No he hasn’t. Guild Wars 2 was never advertised as a game where everyone could see everything or can reach everything easily. It was advertised as an casual game, but that doesn’t mean that everything has to be or can be completed by everyone.

Advertising is irrelevant. They established a certain standard of play over the first three years, they own that standard now, and shouldn’t try to deviate from it.

Quit saying hard mode raiding there is no easy mode raiding so there is no hard mode raiding,

It’s a term used to differentiate the two concepts. You can’t say “would you prefer chocolate ice cream or vanilla” if you insist that vanilla ice cream just be called “ice cream.” It’s a pointless semantic argument to make.

NovaanVerdiano.6174:

Thanks for digging that post up for me, couldn’t be bothered to search for it.

This is the best example that he does not participate in “discussions” but rather just tries to exhaust you with his own opinion; it’s very one-sided. It’s pointless to try to disagree with him because you’ll end up hearing the same story over, and over again. He received a direct reply from ANet on this matter but since it was contrary to his own opinion he’s decided to pretend it doesn’t exist.

The sad thing is that we had a developer come to this thread and something of value could have been discussed. It has been derailed once again (for the fifth time?) by the same cast of characters talking about how easy it is to implement easy modes though.

TexZero.7910:

I’m still confused what there is even left to discuss or why this thread and quote wars is still on-going to begin with.

War… War never changes.

There’s really nothing new of merit ever coming up in these threads, it’s pretty boring.

This is the best example that he does not participate in “discussions” but rather just tries to exhaust you with his own opinion; it’s very one-sided. It’s pointless to try to disagree with him because you’ll end up hearing the same story over, and over again.

I don’t like having to repeat myself any more than you enjoy hearing it, but I wouldn’t have to if people wouldn’t keep trotting out arguments that I’d already destroyed. If you read what I say and come up with novel responses, then I can come up with novel responses to them, but if you just keep repeating the same talking points, then there’s no point reinventing the wheel when the classics still work.

Ohoni.6057:

I don’t like having to repeat myself any more than you enjoy hearing it, but I wouldn’t have to if people wouldn’t keep trotting out arguments that I’d already destroyed.

You don’t present arguments. You present preferences.

I present arguments as to why I believe those preferences are both feasible and good for the game and its population. To be fair though, those presenting opposing views are doing no differently.

Ohoni.6057:

I have a feeling you entirely missed my point.

And I have the feeling you don’t know what problems WildStar had at release. Hint: It was not the raid focus as it was advertised in this way.

Gaile already said it to you 8 months ago and someone posted it in this thread. Stop making assumptions about development ressources.

Only when you stop making assumptions that it will take too much work to be worth it. So long as you try to push the narrative that easy mode raids would be an excessive burden on existing plans, I’ll continue to point out how it really shouldn’t be.

We have a developer comment on this one also. Implementing a other difficulty is as much work as implementing a new instance in GW2. No it is not worth.
Instead of you, we have facts. You have nothing more than your own opinion.
And the desire for raid shinies.

So what do you dislike about fractals and what do raids offer that fractals couldn’t?

It’s not really relevant to this discussion so I won’t continue this line of conversation, but the basic bulletpoint is that I don’t like AR gearing, don’t care as much about the plot as it’s disconnected from mainline Tyria, and none of the available rewards particularly interest me. But again, if anyone wants to fight for Fractals, I won’t fight against them.

Yes it is relevant. Fractals offer the gameplay you want.
Nightmare, Mai Trin, Aetherblade retreat, Molten boss/furnace are disconnected from the main story?

So it is not about gameplay, only rewards?
Yeah you are not fighting for easy mode raids. You are fighting for your selfish, greedy desire for rewards, not for experiencing the raid.

I would suggest you read this thread, it may help you to understand why all of that was wrong: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/A-Suggestion-For-Raids/

And it won’t work. It didn’t work in WoW and it won’t work here. Waste of developer ressources unless you want to turn GW2 into a raid focused game. The raid team still consists of 6 people.

No he hasn’t. Guild Wars 2 was never advertised as a game where everyone could see everything or can reach everything easily. It was advertised as an casual game, but that doesn’t mean that everything has to be or can be completed by everyone.

Advertising is irrelevant. They established a certain standard of play over the first three years, they own that standard now, and shouldn’t try to deviate from it.

No they just didn’t accomplish their goals. It was always the plan that there is harder content for organised groups.
Explorer mode dungeons and fractals were supposed to fill the niche that raids and the most recent fractals are filling. They didn’t reach the goals until HoT, but that didn’t mean that they weren’t trying and harder content was never planned.

It’s a term used to differentiate the two concepts. You can’t say “would you prefer chocolate ice cream or vanilla” if you insist that vanilla ice cream just be called “ice cream.” It’s a pointless semantic argument to make.

Normal mode and easy mode. It’s that simple. There is no hard mode.

I present arguments as to why I believe those preferences are both feasible and good for the game and its population. To be fair though, those presenting opposing views are doing no differently.

No you present the arguments why you need access to those rewards. You don’t care for the game or the community.

I don’t like having to repeat myself any more than you enjoy hearing it, but I wouldn’t have to if people wouldn’t keep trotting out arguments that I’d already destroyed. If you read what I say and come up with novel responses, then I can come up with novel responses to them, but if you just keep repeating the same talking points, then there’s no point reinventing the wheel when the classics still work.

You didn’t destroy a single argument against easy mode raids in the last 8 months.
Infact you are destroying your own idea for an easy mode raid with the focus on rewards.

I have a feeling you entirely missed my point.

And I have the feeling you don’t know what problems WildStar had at release. Hint: It was not the raid focus as it was advertised in this way.

That would confirm it then.

We have a developer comment on this one also.

Sort of, but not in any way that would be relevant to this particular point. We have the oft-repeated Gaile quote, which is coming not from a systems developer, but from a community relations person. Any knowledge she has of how this process actually works would be second hand, and there’s no indication that she actually discussed this topic with the developers who would be involved in this process to find out specifics. All she was doing was relating her own personal opinion on what she believed to be a similar system in a completely different project, and really I don’t know that what she was thinking of was the same sort of system I was describing or not.

I think that Gaile is great at her job, but we’re discussing a topic that is outside of her job. She did say that she would ask someone who did know how much time and effort this would take and get back to us, but we’re still waiting on that response.

Then we have Crystal’s post, which notes that tiered difficulty was never planned for Raids, but makes no statement as to how much effort it would actually take to produce if they decided to do so.

There are so far no statements out of an ANet gameplay systems developer that convey actual direct responses on how disruptive or difficult implementing easy mode raids as described above would be.

Yes it is relevant. Fractals offer the gameplay you want.

No. they don’t, and that should be obvious. I’d take my word over yours about what I want any day of the week.

Yeah you are not fighting for easy mode raids. You are fighting for your selfish, greedy desire for rewards, not for experiencing the raid.

I’m fighting for both, but you seem to think there would be something wrong about fighting for the rewards. Obviously there is not. Fighting for the rewards would be a perfectly reasonable position to take. The people being selfish and greedy in this discussion are those who already have access to the rewards by playing content they enjoy, and fighting tooth and nail to keep that access exclusive to them. Greed is the dragon sitting on his gold, not the beggar in the street hoping for some food.

And it won’t work. It didn’t work in WoW and it won’t work here. Waste of developer ressources unless you want to turn GW2 into a raid focused game. The raid team still consists of 6 people.

Again, that’s nonsense talk. The core raid team is only 6 people, and can remain at that size, but they have clearly stated on numerous occasions that many other people are involved in the process, building various assets. It’s like saying that a TV show only has the five principle actors involved in its production. And again, we have no evidence to say that the current core raid members could not develop an easy mode version without significant disruption to the existing raid progress, nor do we have any information on how available other members of the staff would be to work on such a project without significantly disrupting other priorities.

Gaile’s advice applies to you as well, don’t speculate that making an easy mode would take too much time and effort to be justified, and I won’t point out how unlikely that is.

No they just didn’t accomplish their goals. It was always the plan that there is harder content for organised groups.

And yet, the game that shipped was the game that shipped, and people liked it, and a massive community built up around that product, whether it was the intended result or not. At a certain point you just have to accept that the product you made may not be what you intended, but turned out better than what you’d intended ever could have been.

Normal mode and easy mode. It’s that simple. There is no hard mode.

“Normal” implies that the difficulty level is consistent with the rest of the game, which is not the case. It’s clearly harder than the baseline of content, hence “hard mode” if we’re going to have multiple modes. If you’re concerned that this would preclude them making even harder modes, they could always have “Nightmare,” “Tribulation,” or “Challenge” modes if they wanted.

No you present the arguments why you need access to those rewards. You don’t care for the game or the community.

Wrong, and rude.

You didn’t destroy a single argument against easy mode raids in the last 8 months.
Infact you are destroying your own idea for an easy mode raid with the focus on rewards.

Also wrong and rude.

Ohoni.6057:

There are so far no statements out of an ANet gameplay systems developer that convey actual direct responses on how disruptive or difficult implementing easy mode raids as described above would be.

There was a comment on reddit, that implementing a different difficulty is the same amount of work as implenenting a new map as the different difficulty is in fact a different map with different mobs. They just look the same.

Yes it is relevant. Fractals offer the gameplay you want.

No. they don’t, and that should be obvious. I’d take my word over yours about what I want any day of the week.

So you don’t want tiered difficulty?

I’m fighting for both, but you seem to think there would be something wrong about fighting for the rewards. Obviously there is not. Fighting for the rewards would be a perfectly reasonable position to take. The people being selfish and greedy in this discussion are those who already have access to the rewards by playing content they enjoy, and fighting tooth and nail to keep that access exclusive to them. Greed is the dragon sitting on his gold, not the beggar in the street hoping for some food.

Wanting a mode where mechanics don’t matter is not fighting for the raid experience.

We are actually fighting for a consistent raid release pace and for the already existing raid community.
People are already complaining that the raid release cycle is too long and you want to make it even longer.
People complained that it took so long for LS3 to start. We are not that far away between Wing 3 and the new raid.

Gaile’s advice applies to you as well, don’t speculate that making an easy mode would take too much time and effort to be justified, and I won’t point out how unlikely that is.

The raid release cycle is already pretty long. People complained about the content drought at the start of HoT and blamed it on the raid. So how is it justified to delay raids to appeal people that are not the target audience?

No they just didn’t accomplish their goals. It was always the plan that there is harder content for organised groups.

And yet, the game that shipped was the game that shipped, and people liked it, and a massive community built up around that product, whether it was the intended result or not. At a certain point you just have to accept that the product you made may not be what you intended, but turned out better than what you’d intended ever could have been.

But a game with only easy content will never be better than a game that features hard and easy content.
And the speedrunning community never left, so that part of the players was also always there.

Normal mode and easy mode. It’s that simple. There is no hard mode.

“Normal” implies that the difficulty level is consistent with the rest of the game, which is not the case. It’s clearly harder than the baseline of content, hence “hard mode” if we’re going to have multiple modes. If you’re concerned that this would preclude them making even harder modes, they could always have “Nightmare,” “Tribulation,” or “Challenge” modes if they wanted.

There is no baseline difficulty in the game. HoT open world is harder than Core Tyria open world and it is still both open world and not ‘hard mode’ open world in HoT.

Raids are always harder than the rest of the game in every game.
Normal mode, easy mode.

But if you want to be consistent: We can name it story and explorable mode and strip the story mode from rewards that are exclusive to the explorable mode.

No you present the arguments why you need access to those rewards. You don’t care for the game or the community.

Wrong, and rude.

You don’t know the rest of the players so you can’t speak for them and you don’t care for the already existing raid community. And you don’t care for gameplay as a mode with mechanics that don’t matter is not the same experience.

You didn’t destroy a single argument against easy mode raids in the last 8 months.
Infact you are destroying your own idea for an easy mode raid with the focus on rewards.

Also wrong and rude.

What argument did you ‘destroy’?

I don’t like having to repeat myself any more than you enjoy hearing it, but I wouldn’t have to if people wouldn’t keep trotting out arguments that I’d already destroyed. If you read what I say and come up with novel responses, then I can come up with novel responses to them, but if you just keep repeating the same talking points, then there’s no point reinventing the wheel when the classics still work.

It’s the other way around. How many times are you going to repeat the same thing without coming up with something new?

Long term goals should be more flexible, so that people that like activity A can do that as much as they want and feel like their time is fairly rewarded, while players who prefer activity B can do that instead.

I already said that you wouldn’t agree with it but you insist on coming up with excuses. There is already more than enough common reward between activities, there are only a few exclusive rewards around and if you take a hint, most content types already have exclusive rewards and that won’t change, ever. For example:
Can I get the new Glacial Gauntlets without finishing the meta achievement? No.
Can I get Koda’s Warmth Enrichment without doing the Koda’s Blessing achievement? No.

Provide a valid reason why Legendary Armor should be available in multiple types of content, and those above LS rewards should not.

This is going off topic, this is a thread about Raid accessibility (and more specifically tiers in Raids) not long term goal flexibility. If your goal as you state, was to make everything available through any type of content, then you’d go and directly say it, and ask for that, not hide it inside a thread about the accessibility of Raids. Stop hiding.

I’ll post this here as well just because I feel it is somewhat relevant and might help get the OP topic back on target.

LezardValeth.9453:

Current Characters: Viper Horror Necro, Staff Tempest Ele, DPS Support Rev, Condition Engi.

With the nerf of both viper horror and Revs I want another character, preferably one in high demand. Unless its a tank role, I hate tanking. I will do DPS or Conditions.

Herein lies the raiding problem. Not that raids are hard or that we “need” easy mode, but that every class should have a go, period. OP should be able to roll ANY class and be needed in raids. Now, I said class, and as such there are certain requirments you should meet in order to raid of course. As been said, a full celes Guardian in soldier gear just wouldn’t fly. But a Engi, Necro, yes even the poor Revs should still get some love.
If we can fix that, raids will blow up!

Joxer.6024:

I’ll post this here as well just because I feel it is somewhat relevant and might help get the OP topic back on target.

LezardValeth.9453:

Current Characters: Viper Horror Necro, Staff Tempest Ele, DPS Support Rev, Condition Engi.

With the nerf of both viper horror and Revs I want another character, preferably one in high demand. Unless its a tank role, I hate tanking. I will do DPS or Conditions.

Herein lies the raiding problem. Not that raids are hard or that we “need” easy mode, but that every class should have a go, period. OP should be able to roll ANY class and be needed in raids. Now, I said class, and as such there are certain requirments you should meet in order to raid of course. As been said, a full celes Guardian in soldier gear just wouldn’t fly. But a Engi, Necro, yes even the poor Revs should still get some love.
If we can fix that, raids will blow up!

I agree, Raid diversity IS the best way of increasing Raid accessibility. You can see from what you quoted what the REAL problem with diversity in this game. In other MMORPGs you get your tank, your dps and your healer. You don’t care if your healer will be a Druid or a Tempest, you don’t care if your tank is Necromancer or a Mesmer, you don’t care if your DPS is a Thief or a Guardian. You care about their ROLE. In this game that’s unfortunately not the case, and that needs to change.

There is discussion about that there:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/Raid-Diversity-is-now-Dead/first

Although might take a few pages for the actual discussion to start.

maddoctor.2738:

I don’t like having to repeat myself any more than you enjoy hearing it, but I wouldn’t have to if people wouldn’t keep trotting out arguments that I’d already destroyed. If you read what I say and come up with novel responses, then I can come up with novel responses to them, but if you just keep repeating the same talking points, then there’s no point reinventing the wheel when the classics still work.

It’s the other way around. How many times are you going to repeat the same thing without coming up with something new?

Long term goals should be more flexible, so that people that like activity A can do that as much as they want and feel like their time is fairly rewarded, while players who prefer activity B can do that instead.

I already said that you wouldn’t agree with it but you insist on coming up with excuses. There is already more than enough common reward between activities, there are only a few exclusive rewards around and if you take a hint, most content types already have exclusive rewards and that won’t change, ever. For example:
Can I get the new Glacial Gauntlets without finishing the meta achievement? No.
Can I get Koda’s Warmth Enrichment without doing the Koda’s Blessing achievement? No.

Provide a valid reason why Legendary Armor should be available in multiple types of content, and those above LS rewards should not.

This is going off topic, this is a thread about Raid accessibility (and more specifically tiers in Raids) not long term goal flexibility. If your goal as you state, was to make everything available through any type of content, then you’d go and directly say it, and ask for that, not hide it inside a thread about the accessibility of Raids. Stop hiding.

It is not his goal to make everything available everywhere. Only things he likes at areas he wants to play. The rest doesn’t matter.

There was a comment on reddit, that implementing a different difficulty is the same amount of work as implenenting a new map as the different difficulty is in fact a different map with different mobs. They just look the same.

I would be interested in a link for that. I suspect that perhaps their idea of “different difficulty” is more in line with Fractal changes, which can be significant, while what I’m looking for would be much more modest.

So you don’t want tiered difficulty?

I don’t want Fractals, and despite your infinite protestations, Fractals and raids have differences in content. It’s like I tell you I enjoy Community, and you tell me “well you’d like A Different World, it’s basically the same show.” No, there are obviously similarities, but there are also differences, and it’s perfectly reasonable to enjoy one without enjoying the others. Now, can you please stop accusing me of lying to your face and just accept that the things I am telling you about my own opinions are in fact what I believe?

Wanting a mode where mechanics don’t matter is not fighting for the raid experience.

It is fighting for the parts that I appreciate of the raid experience, which I fully acknowledge going in are not what you appreciate about the raid experience. If we both enjoyed the same parts of raiding then there would be no point to asking for alternate variations on the theme.

We are actually fighting for a consistent raid release pace and for the already existing raid community.
People are already complaining that the raid release cycle is too long and you want to make it even longer.
People complained that it took so long for LS3 to start. We are not that far away between Wing 3 and the new raid.

Gaile Gray:
I will ask about this, and if we’re prepared to say something official, one of us will do so. But it’s counterproductive to have a discussion head down the path of misinformation and what seems to be a growing error in assumption. With all due respect, unless you’re a developer for GW2 you are not qualified to make a statement about the time needed, difficulty involved, or feasibility of such a feature.

You’re welcome to discuss the situation, and we appreciate that you want to do that. We welcome the conversation! But please participate by sharing what you’d like to see, and why, and don’t be misled by individual, external assumptions about the feasibility or practicality of such a request.

But a game with only easy content will never be better than a game that features hard and easy content.

Totally false. You’re saying that variety in content is always preferable, but there is a value in consistency too. If you have a core audience and you make sure that no part of the game feels “off limits” to them, then that can be superior to having a divided community in which some of the players seem to be offered things that the rest cannot reach.

And the speedrunning community never left, so that part of the players was also always there.

And they can continue to speedrun all they like. They do not need challenging content to do that. You always have the option of setting your own challenges.

You don’t know the rest of the players so you can’t speak for them and you don’t care for the already existing raid community. And you don’t care for gameplay as a mode with mechanics that don’t matter is not the same experience.

Those are not arguments on the merits of the discussion, they are just ad hominem attacks.

It’s the other way around. How many times are you going to repeat the same thing without coming up with something new?

Until it’s implemented, or something of equal value.

There is already more than enough common reward between activities, there are only a few exclusive rewards around and if you take a hint, most content types already have exclusive rewards and that won’t change, ever. For example:

Quantity is entirely irrelevant. Rewards are not fungible. If there are ten possible wings, and one of them you love, and the other nine you mostly hate, then it does not matter if they make the other nine super easy to get, if the one that you actually want is locked behind an unreasonable barrier, then that is an issue. If all uniques were visually identical, if the only difference between Envoy Armor and stock Ascended armor was that the Envoy armor had slightly higher stats, then I could understand if they said that Envoy armor was restricted to only certain players. Who cares? Or if the raids were identical to other content in form and function, but just with tuned up difficulty, that would be fine.

But that’s not how they designed it. It is perfectly reasonable, in the current system, for players to want things that are locked behind systems that they cannot enjoy, and in such circumstances, it’s perfectly reasonable for them to fight for access to those things.

Can I get the new Glacial Gauntlets without finishing the meta achievement? No.
Can I get Koda’s Warmth Enrichment without doing the Koda’s Blessing achievement? No.

And two wrongs do not make a right.

Provide a valid reason why Legendary Armor should be available in multiple types of content, and those above LS rewards should not.

I would never. There’s absolutely no reason why those LS rewards should not be available elsewhere. Obviously they are thematically tied to the LS, so that should be the first and most straightforward way of earning them, but if those methods are found to be onerous by portions of the community then obviously they should provide alternate methods of earning them.

Of course from a practical standpoint, Any player who would be capable of earning Envoy armor would also be capable of earning both of those items in about 1% of the time and effort, while the opposite is certainly not the case, so in terms of balance, it just doesn’t add up.

This is going off topic, this is a thread about Raid accessibility (and more specifically tiers in Raids) not long term goal flexibility. If your goal as you state, was to make everything available through any type of content, then you’d go and directly say it, and ask for that, not hide it inside a thread about the accessibility of Raids. Stop hiding.

I’m not “hiding,” I’m always straight forward in what I believ,e but you are the one seeking to wander off the path towards other rewards, while I’ve at least tried to stay on the topic of raids unless directly asked to do otherwise. When have I ever brought up non-raid rewards except in direct response to a “but what about X reward on Y mode?” request? Ask me a question and I’ll give you an honest answer, but don’t then turn around and accuse me of wandering.

It is not his goal to make everything available everywhere. Only things he likes at areas he wants to play. The rest doesn’t matter.

Factually inaccurate.

Until it’s implemented, or something of equal value.

So you will repeat the same thing even when someone gives you new arguments until it is implemented? Just wow.

And two wrongs do not make a right.

I would never.

Then why care only about the Raid rewards?

I’m not “hiding,” I’m always straight forward in what I believ,e but you are the one seeking to wander off the path towards other rewards, while I’ve at least tried to stay on the topic of raids unless directly asked to do otherwise.

You ARE hiding. You are not staying on the topic when you are talking about long term goal accessibility. I’m saying that the same principles apply to all other types of content, you want to apply the different “idea” only in Raids.

Quantity is entirely irrelevant.

So your problem is with long term goal accessibility and it’s irrelevant to the Raid discussion. If you want to make a topic about that go ahead at least we can discuss your actual problem with Raids and not an imaginary one.

maddoctor.2738

You care about their ROLE. In this game that’s unfortunately not the case, and that needs to change.

Yea, lets work on fixing that and then maybe Ohoni will get his loots as he may actually raid as well?
But on a serious note the above issue is one that the community can fix now, without ANET…..only how?

Joxer.6024:

But on a serious note the above issue is one that the community can fix now, without ANET…..only how?

I don’t think it’s possible to fix that without Anet. My “idea” would be to give to more builds damage buffs that do not stack with current ones and more builds than can output Might/Fury/Quickness. This is buff/boon meta and the selfish professions are excluded while those with party buffs are invaluable.

maddoctor.2738:

Joxer.6024:

But on a serious note the above issue is one that the community can fix now, without ANET…..only how?

I don’t think it’s possible to fix that without Anet. My “idea” would be to give to more builds damage buffs that do not stack with current ones and more builds than can output Might/Fury/Quickness. This is buff/boon meta and the selfish professions are excluded while those with party buffs are invaluable.

Makes sense and sounds like a great fix, or a great start! See, this is the kind of discussions we need on here…constructive!!

maddoctor.2738:

Joxer.6024:

But on a serious note the above issue is one that the community can fix now, without ANET…..only how?

I don’t think it’s possible to fix that without Anet. My “idea” would be to give to more builds damage buffs that do not stack with current ones and more builds than can output Might/Fury/Quickness. This is buff/boon meta and the selfish professions are excluded while those with party buffs are invaluable.

If you include those buffs into an elite specialization, the specialization becomes mandatory, like druid or herald.
If you include too many of those buffs you get a massive power creep. You need to either rebalance most of the game or older content becomes completely trivial.

I don’t say it is a bad idea, but you need to be extremly careful with the execution.

Miellyn.6847:

maddoctor.2738:

Joxer.6024:

But on a serious note the above issue is one that the community can fix now, without ANET…..only how?

I don’t think it’s possible to fix that without Anet. My “idea” would be to give to more builds damage buffs that do not stack with current ones and more builds than can output Might/Fury/Quickness. This is buff/boon meta and the selfish professions are excluded while those with party buffs are invaluable.

If you include those buffs into an elite specialization, the specialization becomes mandatory, like druid or herald.
If you include too many of those buffs you get a massive power creep. You need to either rebalance most of the game or older content becomes completely trivial.

I don’t say it is a bad idea, but you need to be extremly careful with the execution.

That’s why I said: “that do not stack with current ones” to avoid power creep. If they add something that reduces cooldown like Alacrity, it won’t stack with Alacrity. If they add something that buffs power like Warrior Banners, it won’t stack with Banners, if they add something similar to Frost spirit, it won’t stack with Frost Spirit. Otherwise yes you run the risk of massive power creep.

The idea is to give some diversity to PS Warrior/Chrono/Druid as buffers. Instead of having all these 3 to every Raid team, because they triple the DPS of the team when used together, you’d have a lot more professions to choose from. An Engineer in place of a Druid, a Guardian in place of a Warrior and a Necromancer in place of a Chrono (I use them as examples, not as what should happen) but you get the idea.

I don’t know if it’s possible to make buffs non-stacking like that. But it’s something that can open up loads of builds and boost diversity.

maddoctor.2738:

Can I get the new Glacial Gauntlets without finishing the meta achievement? No.

Actually you can. As far as I know the only exlusive skins introduced through LS are the 3 new backpacks for each new zone.

Scipio.3204:

maddoctor.2738:

Can I get the new Glacial Gauntlets without finishing the meta achievement? No.

Actually you can. As far as I know the only exlusive skins introduced through LS are the 3 new backpacks for each new zone.

What about Koda’s Warmth Enrichment?

Ohoni.6057:

There are so far no statements out of an ANet gameplay systems developer that convey actual direct responses on how disruptive or difficult implementing easy mode raids as described above would be.

They’ve also not said how easy it would be to impliment either. That’s the whole point of the response by Gaile: You do not know, so stop pretending that you do. Even her opinion, which is far more informed than yours, is being dismissed off-hand by you.

The burden is proof is on the one making an assertion. If you say “It’s easy to do!” then where is your evidence to support this from the ANet gameplay systems developer? (Your own words) If you cannot provide it, then you simply do not know and you’re guessing at best.

Hello, my name is Fox, and I’m the OP of this thread.

After reading the first comments I received on my initial post I felt quite ashamed of bringing up a topic that has been discussed many times before and thereby being an overall annoyance for the community that are heavily into Raids. As a result I stopped looking at what was going on here, only to come back and see that it has received over 25.000 views and over 400 comments including some Dev involvment aswell.

Last night I read through 80% of the comments and I’m happy to see that the discussion has gone so far in this thread. That’s why I came here to share my final thoughts and opinions and make clear what my original intention was with this post.

The developer, as mentioned above, Crystal Reid stated: ‘’They are, and should remain, the most difficult content in the game.’’

And this is something I fully agree with. Raids in itself do not need to be watered down and thus serve only as a training-mode for brand new players. The difficulty of raids and the rewards acquired from it should always stay the same. However, what does need to change is the accessibility for brand new people who are looking to play the Raids and get better at it slowly, because right now alot of new-to-raids people feel like they will never be welcomed into the Raiding community. Can you imagine what a new player must feel like when he goes in LFG and sees the +100 Li requirements to join a group?

I’m not saying that it is the fault of the group that demand too much, I completely understand that experienced people seek experienced people to play together with and clear the instance as efficiently as possible. And doing this is simply not possible with a player that is entirely new to the encounter.

I also think that if Raids would be put in a tier-system that the lower tiers should absolutely not give the same or similar rewards as doing the original difficulty level would give. If you want the best rewards in a game then you’ll have to go through all the difficulty to get it and dedicate your time to master it. Only recently I decided to start on the Envoy Armor collection and I am very happy that it requires me to only Raid alot and complete difficult encounters rather than having to pay 2000 gold which I could farm in the Silverwastes in a month while being half awake.

So the question still remains.. how do we make Raids more accessible for all? Since that is the topic that should be discussed about here, and I’m sure the Raid team is discussing this aswell as we’re speaking.

Should we make even higher, difficult and more rewarding tiers so that new people will be more welcomed into the low original tier?

Should we add a level-system to Raids that functions as the Li check and then lock the LFG in categories according to your Raid Level?

Should the Developers add true encounter mechanics from each boss into the Special Forces Training Area so people can practice their minds for the real deal later on?

I am sure there’s many ways to solve this problem that clearly shows in the voices of many people that commented on this thread and other threads so far.

I would like to thank everyone for participating in a thread of which I thought would be beaten to death, and if people still wish to continue commenting then let’s stay on topic here, shall we?

Now, I hope next thread about capes will be as succesful as this one was!

o/

Goldfox.5729:

I also think that if Raids would be put in a tier-system that the lower tiers should absolutely not give the same or similar rewards as doing the original difficulty level would give.

First, thank you for this one since you are the OP and it’s your thread and your topic.

So the question still remains.. how do we make Raids more accessible for all?

And that’s the BIG question. Devs said they are talking about it internally a lot.

A few ways that Raids can become accessible:

a) Build diversity, if an entire profession is locked out of Raiding because it’s considered bad, then those running that profession are excluded from raiding before even trying. The problem with this is that the Raid team has little say, it’s the balance team that balances the entire game that needs to solve this. As I said before, we need to move away of specific builds and ask for roles instead.

b) Adding encounters of varied difficulty in a Raid helps with accessibility. Wings 1 and 3 were good on this part, having progressive difficulty settings for their bosses. But Wing 2 wasn’t good at all, Bandit Trio needed to be the first encounter somehow. Hopes for Wing 4 and future raids to be better on this part.

c) The idea of the training area to show people some of the boss mechanics is excellent. That way, you can practice the important mechanics without having to face them in a group.

d) More Vale Guardians and less Slothazors at least for first Wing bosses. What’s the big difference between the two:
VG has clear phases, which means even if you fail to kill it and wipe, you progress if you phase him. Working slowly from phase to phase, learning increasingly more difficult mechanics. Slothazor stays the same, he gets one extra attack at 50% and that’s it.
Second, VG has trash mobs that teach you the most important mechanics, green circles, blue aoes, seekers and the defensive abilities of all the mini guardians during a split. On the other hand there is nothing that tells you what to do at Slothazor.

I like the bosses with clear phases. It makes fighting them a progression.

You can not add an introduction encounter to every wing. We already have 2 in 3 wings. It gets boring to veteran raiders and has no purpose as you have to start somewhere anyway.
Raids won’t get anymore accessible as the main problem is the community wanting experienced players (happens in all games, nothing special here) and not the raid system itself.
ArenaNet could increase the rewards for multiple runs to help forming training runs or add the bosses to the special training area.
If you increase the difficulty only inside the wings and not over all wings combined it will hurt the raiding scene in the long run.
The thing that would help the most is to create rewards for training people.

Miellyn.6847:

You can not add an introduction encounter to every wing.

Not every encounter in the future Raids needs to be Mathias difficulty/complexity.

Goldfox.5729:

So the question still remains.. how do we make Raids more accessible for all? Since that is the topic that should be discussed about here, and I’m sure the Raid team is discussing this aswell as we’re speaking.

I’ll do my best to cook a few of these points for you.

Goldfox.5729:

Should we make even higher, difficult and more rewarding tiers so that new people will be more welcomed into the low original tier?

This isn’t really a tenable solution because, while this may be the initial effect, it won’t last. Eventually, everyone will drift up from the bottom tier and there will be nobody left to participate in that lower level & to help people rise from that point.

At this, you might be thinking “well surely guilds will need to go down and bring people up!” and that’s true but they can already do that with the standing difficulties so there’s no reason to implement tiers in the first place.

Goldfox.5729:

Should we add a level-system to Raids that functions as the Li check and then lock the LFG in categories according to your Raid Level?

This is a hard mechanical fix when the problem should ultimately be solved by the community.

Goldfox.5729:

Should the Developers add true encounter mechanics from each boss into the Special Forces Training Area so people can practice their minds for the real deal later on?

This is an interesting idea though I think there’s a better spin on it; instead of adding them into the SFTA, add them into new open world bosses or fractals. It won’t work with a lot of high-communication mechanics but the core of most mechanics can be taught in those places.

Goldfox.5729:

I am sure there’s many ways to solve this problem that clearly shows in the voices of many people that commented on this thread and other threads so far.

I would like to thank everyone for participating in a thread of which I thought would be beaten to death, and if people still wish to continue commenting then let’s stay on topic here, shall we?

Unfortunately all of these threads boil down into slogs. A handful of people elongate these threads, and the rest who are interesting to talk to tend to leave from boredom.

maddoctor.2738:

Miellyn.6847:

maddoctor.2738:

Joxer.6024:

But on a serious note the above issue is one that the community can fix now, without ANET…..only how?

I don’t think it’s possible to fix that without Anet. My “idea” would be to give to more builds damage buffs that do not stack with current ones and more builds than can output Might/Fury/Quickness. This is buff/boon meta and the selfish professions are excluded while those with party buffs are invaluable.

If you include those buffs into an elite specialization, the specialization becomes mandatory, like druid or herald.
If you include too many of those buffs you get a massive power creep. You need to either rebalance most of the game or older content becomes completely trivial.

I don’t say it is a bad idea, but you need to be extremly careful with the execution.

That’s why I said: “that do not stack with current ones” to avoid power creep. If they add something that reduces cooldown like Alacrity, it won’t stack with Alacrity. If they add something that buffs power like Warrior Banners, it won’t stack with Banners, if they add something similar to Frost spirit, it won’t stack with Frost Spirit. Otherwise yes you run the risk of massive power creep.

The idea is to give some diversity to PS Warrior/Chrono/Druid as buffers. Instead of having all these 3 to every Raid team, because they triple the DPS of the team when used together, you’d have a lot more professions to choose from. An Engineer in place of a Druid, a Guardian in place of a Warrior and a Necromancer in place of a Chrono (I use them as examples, not as what should happen) but you get the idea.

I don’t know if it’s possible to make buffs non-stacking like that. But it’s something that can open up loads of builds and boost diversity.

Well it sure is possible you just give the same kind of buff to another class, frozen gyro=frost spirit for example.

But then we would have people complain that their class arent unique anymore.

Miellyn.6847:

You can not add an introduction encounter to every wing. We already have 2 in 3 wings. It gets boring to veteran raiders and has no purpose as you have to start somewhere anyway.
Raids won’t get anymore accessible as the main problem is the community wanting experienced players (happens in all games, nothing special here) and not the raid system itself.
ArenaNet could increase the rewards for multiple runs to help forming training runs or add the bosses to the special training area.
If you increase the difficulty only inside the wings and not over all wings combined it will hurt the raiding scene in the long run.
The thing that would help the most is to create rewards for training people.

And here we have why a easy mode raid is needed.

You think its boring with easy encounter as opener but can still complete it all, the one loving that opening encounter think its boring since they can only do 1/3 of the raid.

Linken.6345:

But then we would have people complain that their class arent unique anymore.

This reminds me of the normal Engie Reaction when People give Suggestions on how to make Engie less reliant on Kits and a bit easier to play. ( without the Need to swap Kits like crazy )

Linken.6345:

But then we would have people complain that their class arent unique anymore.

If you go to the special forces training area and select “buffs” you will see that all professions are there on the list, but not all of them offer any kind of group buff.
Giving a non-selfish build option for all professions won’t make the others less unique, but care must be taken so the new buffs do not stack with the old ones, or we are back to square one. The easiest way that I can think of is making them boons.

maddoctor.2738:

Miellyn.6847:

You can not add an introduction encounter to every wing.

Not every encounter in the future Raids needs to be Mathias difficulty/complexity.

But we also don’t need in every wing an introduction encounter. Occasionally it’s fine, but not in every wing.

Linken.6345:

And here we have why a easy mode raid is needed.

You think its boring with easy encounter as opener but can still complete it all, the one loving that opening encounter think its boring since they can only do 1/3 of the raid.

So people can’t be bothered to start with the wings that actually have introduction encounters, get better and play the other ones after?
And not every wing having an introduction encouter is why we need an easy mode? That doesn’t even makes sense anymore.
Are introduction encounter good or bad?

Miellyn.6847:

maddoctor.2738:

Miellyn.6847:

You can not add an introduction encounter to every wing.

Not every encounter in the future Raids needs to be Mathias difficulty/complexity.

But we also don’t need in every wing a introduction encounter. Occasionally it’s fine, but not in every wing.

Linken.6345:

And here we have why a easy mode raid is needed.

You think its boring with easy encounter as opener but can still complete it all, the one loving that opening encounter think its boring since they can only do 1/3 of the raid.

So people can’t be bothered to start with the wings that actually have introduction encounters, get better and play the other ones after?
And not every wing having an introduction encouter is why we need an easy mode? That doesn’t even makes sense anymore.
Are introduction encounter good or bad?

Well the ones defending raids say you have these 2 fights to train on… you cant train on them for other bosses so when more raids come out there should be more easy fights for the masses.

You as a raider dont like the easy starter encounters you said so its boring.
So to you that is bad hence it would be better if all were around the same challenge to you.

But the ones who can only do easy one would like them all the be around the same challenge so they can see the whole raid like you get to do.

You get a full 3 coarse meal others get the appetizers then the waiter say sorry but you cant have the other 2 coarses becouse you cant dance around the table on 1 foot with 1 hand behind your back balanceing an egg on your nose.

Do you see the differance?

Edit

its kinda funny you skip over the very first sentence in the post you reply to.

Go back and 2 my sentences again please

maddoctor.2738:

Until it’s implemented, or something of equal value.

So you will repeat the same thing even when someone gives you new arguments until it is implemented? Just wow.

i don’t understand why you’re surprised. That’s exactly the approach raiders had up till raids got implemented.

maddoctor.2738:

Then why care only about the Raid rewards?

He doesn’t. For example, he was active in PvP threads too, if i remember correctly. And he is always first to admit that people eplaying types of content he doesn’t like have equal rights to ask for items to be made available for them as well.

maddoctor.2738:

I’m saying that the same principles apply to all other types of content, you want to apply the different “idea” only in Raids.

Really? You missed all those cases where Me, Ohoni and few other posters fully agreed with people that other content should also get the same treatment?

maddoctor.2738:

So your problem is with long term goal accessibility and it’s irrelevant to the Raid discussion.

It’s not. Reward accessibility is something that lies at the core of most raid discussions.