Guild Wars 2

First things first. This is not about exploration mode or making things trivial. If you were thinking either of those or anything similar, please leave this topic. I couldn’t care less of the difficulty level of exploration dungeons and by all means make them even harder and much more rewarding loot/money/whatever wise.

Second thing the topic. The whole other part of the game is perfectly fine and pretty amazing too for average skilled casuals and maybe even too easy considering how little I needed to pay attention to things to survive while leveling. But when you are having fun in so big part of the game and then make the mistake of stepping into a dungeon thinking you would have a blast there too, it is a pretty bad mood stomper.

This is about difficulty contrast and those who enjoy going to dungeons for fun, but don’t have the skills, time, reaction or money for repairs for current offerings. I have been to almost all story dungeons now and not a single one was enjoyable for me and as they are now and it is a huge shame for me to say I’m not going back since I loved the look and feel and general atmosphere in them. This was because I was practically forced to go ranged at all times, use different skills and weapons that I normally use or want to use, die a dozen times and pay the repairs and hope things wont drag on too long before I need to leave for whatever RL reason.

So far I have been able to complete the story dungeons, probably because of the other party members being better players, but still each time me being really frustrated and that much poorer. I have no issues admitting I’m not very good at this, I do wrong decisions and moves very often and end up suffering or dying because of them, but only because mistakes(and having slow reaction) are so incredibly unforgiving. Dodge too early or late and you get hit, slammed down and beaten to near death, dodge again successfully but then not being able to dodge again the next hit which ends up killing you. There are way too many sudden death mechanics, which you can avoid some if you are above average skilled player, but for me and I’m pretty sure there are lot of others that just get killed over and over due to the previous reasons. It is simply not fun.

I’m not asking for complete dumbing down of the story dungeons and I do like challenges too, but the jump in difficulty and challenge from normal game play to dungeons is just ridiculous at the moment. Story mode was supposed to be the fun, casual and “easy” way to do the dungeons? I’m not sure if the difficulty has anything to do with it but it really surprised me how difficult it is to get a story mode party going too. The first one was fast for obvious reasons, but going from there it took 15-40 minutes to get groups in them. I mean as I don’t really want to go in them again as they are now, surely there are bunch of others too which again contributes to group gathering difficulties?

I would love to do dungeons, but as they are now, they are nothing more than a source of frustration and a money sink. ….Also I would love if they had some random little events in them as well.

Your first time doing anything, you’re prob’ly not very good at it.

Think you’re gonna walk into WvW with a group of newbs and take a keep? Think you’ll stand a chance against a practiced, coordinated team of sPvP?

After you’ve done a couple dungeons, you’ll have learned (hopefully) how to play them. I play 2 diff character types and don’t find myself dead very often, haven’t had total wipe since the 2nd time I tried one.

Comparing my experience with GW2 dungeons versus doing dungeons shortly after Rift launch, the GW2 dungeons aren’t harder and are less plagued with mind-numbing piles of trash mobs.

Q- What server are you on that it takes 15-20 mins to get a group for? (other than crucible and waters?)

I usually say GLF4M and spend the next 3-5 mins saying “sorry full” “filled srry” Just filled"

As for the jump in difficulty I sorta agree but at the same time your arguement can be used for the jump in difficulty from story to explorable

The only thing I can think of is the masses of people who refuse to start a group. 40 people yelling LFG but not one switching to GLF.

I find the difficulty for dungeons as I usually run pugs is from people not knowing what to do and/or not being fully comfortable with their profession and its mechanics.

Figure out what to do. Start leading groups taking the time to explain the mechanics and what to do and hopefully the people in your group will do the same and less posts asking for easier dungeons will appear and more posts for fixing bugs in the dungeons will.

Note these dungeons are nothing & I mean NOTHING compared to entering places like City of Torc’qua with a pug non-sc group. Where you can easily wipe at each and every single mob not to mention spending days in there.

I do mean days. As in do not log out, leave your computer on, days.

Quite honestly I dont think people realise how “easier” this is compared to GW1.

mulch.2586:

Your first time doing anything, you’re prob’ly not very good at it.

Think you’re gonna walk into WvW with a group of newbs and take a keep? Think you’ll stand a chance against a practiced, coordinated team of sPvP?

Here’s a keyword: Fun.

I play WWW and little spvp too and while I’m not taking down keeps or whatever, I’m still having tons of fun trying because fighting against other players is much more random, varied and fair. There are huge variety of skill levels against and with you there after all, you’re rarely against best of the best. And on top of that I somehow manage not to lose money doing so. In pvp there are no unfair mechanics, one shot kills or going melee a death sentence, I can play the way I choose and spent the amount time I want or have.

In the dungeons, fun is left at the door step while tedium and frustration is there to meet you.

How are people losing money is another thing I want to know. This game practically throws money at you.

DonQuack.9025:

Q- What server are you on that it takes 15-20 mins to get a group for? (other than crucible and waters?)

I usually say GLF4M and spend the next 3-5 mins saying “sorry full” “filled srry” Just filled"

As for the jump in difficulty I sorta agree but at the same time your arguement can be used for the jump in difficulty from story to explorable

The only thing I can think of is the masses of people who refuse to start a group. 40 people yelling LFG but not one switching to GLF.

I find the difficulty for dungeons as I usually run pugs is from people not knowing what to do and/or not being fully comfortable with their profession and its mechanics.

Figure out what to do. Start leading groups taking the time to explain the mechanics and what to do and hopefully the people in your group will do the same and less posts asking for easier dungeons will appear and more posts for fixing bugs in the dungeons will.

Note these dungeons are nothing & I mean NOTHING compared to entering places like City of Torc’qua with a pug non-sc group. Where you can easily wipe at each and every single mob not to mention spending days in there.

I do mean days. As in do not log out, leave your computer on, days.

Quite honestly I dont think people realise how “easier” this is compared to GW1.

I’m on Argent Glade and during evenings it is high population. But here’s the thing, there’s not even that players or groups looking to go to story dungeons, the most that look for group or more are for exploration mode, not story. I guess I have to consider myself lucky when I was trying to get to Crucible and after long chat “spamming”, because you are allowed to say similar things only couple times before being blocked, a couple who were looking for group for another place decided to join me instead and even they were looking for exploration one in first place.

As for figuring out what to do, leading, explaining to others? I might not have been clear enough but I’ll say again. I’m not very good at this.. or in most games in general. I’m supposed to do all that just in “what was supposed to be easy” story dungeons just to get trough them? That doesn’t sound right at all when there is actually a challenging mode for those who wants and needs it… where’s the manageable and fun and “easy” for those who wants and more importantly needs it. I say “easy” because it is extremely relative term and it is forgotten so easily and often when making these kinds of arguments. For a very skilled and hardcore player something easy might as well be impossible for me, and my easy just a tutorial for a tutorial for those skilled ones.

I don’t know where this City of Torc’qua is, but if you would have understood my post, you would have realized that bringing whatever this is to the discussion is not helping at all. Something more difficult in another game should have made me see things in perspective or something when I was having difficulties in the harder areas in this game which some regard as easy?

I did play Guild Wars 1 too and it was way more difficult. I couldn’t even finish the story line in it because I got stuck for some time several times in the missions until I hit a wall with one before the ascension or something and no one there to help anymore. The few I saw there didn’t even respond when asked for help. I’m actually quite relieved that I haven’t had such difficulties with the personal story in this one.

The thing is, I strongly believe that there is a skill cap for people. There certainly is wide variety skilled players. It might sound and probably is stupid but is it like that if we all just studied and practiced enough, we all could be rocket scientists? Or maybe more relevant example with raid progression in other MMO’s where every guild with enough studying and practicing should be at the same top level with the minority of guilds actually there now now. Or should we just measure skill in how fast you learn and act to things, some manage withing minutes and some days, weeks and so on, and where would be the line for study and practice this “easy” and casual story mode dungeon.

DonQuack.9025:

How are people losing money is another thing I want to know. This game practically throws money at you.

It is in the post. Dying and repairing from it. The thing preventing me going broke is the actual issue I’d like altered slightly. Not wanting to do the dungeons saves me the repairs.

Couldn’t agree with the OP more. I consider myself an above average player; I made my first attempt at AC (level 80 warrior) with 2 friends (level 80 + 30) and 2 other pugs (level 33 + 37) where the health of the mobs was far too high for us. Perhaps the people I was playing with were horrible, but within reason you’d think the two 80’s might balance things out, but no.
I understand if you want to make mobs hit hard or have certain skills to increase the base difficulty, but if I had to compare dungeons to WvW, it’s like beating on a door to a keep with no siege equipment.
Sure you have to roll around a bit etc. but that’s not my complaint; it’s the fact when something becomes monotonous because you’ve done it for the past 1-2 minutes, for every single mob. IMO in it’s current form, it’s just ‘not’ fun.
I enjoy a challenge and I will wholeheartedly admit there are parts about dungeons I love (setting, environmental stuff, etc), however, the mobs are not one of them.

Also, on a side note, I found some of the bosses (i.e. the ranger one) are easier than the stock mobs – less health and dps – which makes no sense to me. Oh yeah I almost forgot to mention, the rewards are horrible.

Story mode is too hard.

Explorable mode doesn’t require enough team coordination. Dungeons aren’t difficult in the way the game should be difficult. Monsters shouldn’t have infinite health and infinite damage, but should require team coordination to take down. Right now everyone just has to dodge insert-telegraphed-skill and unload their skillbar to get through any dungeon.

BlueCheez.4873:

Story mode is too hard.

Explorable mode doesn’t require enough team coordination. Dungeons aren’t difficult in the way the game should be difficult. Monsters shouldn’t have infinite health and infinite damage, but should require team coordination to take down. Right now everyone just has to dodge insert-telegraphed-skill and unload their skillbar to get through any dungeon.

How is that not team coordination?

berries.7016:

DonQuack.9025:

How are people losing money is another thing I want to know. This game practically throws money at you.

It is in the post. Dying and repairing from it. The thing preventing me going broke is the actual issue I’d like altered slightly. Not wanting to do the dungeons saves me the repairs.

Here’s the conflict in this —
There’s a bunch of people doing these dungeons and making huge money, to the point the word “exploit” comes up. With my mid-50s ranger, I’m clearing over a gold per hour, not counting what’s on the trading post. My guild is using the dungeons to buy commander books (100g each).

I fully admit the first couple runs were difficult. I never had one that repairs approached the finishing reward, but they were long and hard and frustrating. When we bring people who’ve not done them before, they prob’ly die a couple of times, even with coaching.

But… I did 4 runs today and didn’t die once, and am not by any means gifted at video games.

There IS a learning curve. It’s best to climb it.

Yes they are for skilled causals…IE they are short in time needed, but high on skill needed. IE skilled causals are perfect for them. They are NOT for unskilled causals.

. I consider myself an above average player

This is the problem. Everyone THINKS they are above average. There’s scientific studies about this: The vast majority of people think they are better than the average.

Which, of course, is impossible: Most of them are not.

You are in this group. I don’t mean this badly or to offend you, and it’s not your fault, but you truly are not “above average”, but “below average”. Your problem is not that the dungeon is hard (the mobs sure are not), the problem is that you think you are good, therefore do not work on improving, and therefore have a harder time.

Hi. I’m a female gamer, I work 40 hours a week, and my GW2 time is pretty limited. I am not that good a gamer, my reflexes are objectively rather slow, and I cannot play FPS games because I get confused. I sometimes click abilities, and I constantly forget to use one of my utilities.

Total deaths in dungeons: Less than 10, including me rolling off cliffs in Flame citadel twice by accident.. Story mode dungeons are easy. Their difficulty is in line with what an average skilled casual gamer can handle.

The problem is that below-average skilled people cannot handle it, and since they assume they are above average, they assume the design itself is bad. People usually do not like that the problem is on their end, after all.

I hope Arenanet does not make them easier, because that would make them boring for average skilled casual players like myself. Having a challenge is GOOD.

mulch.2586:

berries.7016:

DonQuack.9025:

How are people losing money is another thing I want to know. This game practically throws money at you.

It is in the post. Dying and repairing from it. The thing preventing me going broke is the actual issue I’d like altered slightly. Not wanting to do the dungeons saves me the repairs.

Here’s the conflict in this —
There’s a bunch of people doing these dungeons and making huge money, to the point the word “exploit” comes up. With my mid-50s ranger, I’m clearing over a gold per hour, not counting what’s on the trading post. My guild is using the dungeons to buy commander books (100g each).

I fully admit the first couple runs were difficult. I never had one that repairs approached the finishing reward, but they were long and hard and frustrating. When we bring people who’ve not done them before, they prob’ly die a couple of times, even with coaching.

But… I did 4 runs today and didn’t die once, and am not by any means gifted at video games.

There IS a learning curve. It’s best to climb it.

There’s a conflict in this one too.
I get the impression you go to the dungeons solely with guildies or maybe with 1 random, 2 at most. Having a set group of people, most likely prepared at least a little for the coming fights and knowing the capabilities of your party members does make a big difference.

I’m not in a guild, and that’s by choice for various reasons, but that leaves me just one option and it’s pugs. Now if I’m in each dungeon with different people, totally strangers, am I required to learn their skill sets and abilities and explain myself every time just to have a fighting change in story mode? I think not. I do think everyone still should need do their best to help themselves and others when possible. I don’t want to do dungeons one handed while reading a book, like I could have while leveling with normal stuff, but I shouldn’t need to be all aware of my party and the dungeon itself to go trough it comfortably and actually have fun. That’s what the exploration mode is for, right? And if your guild is actually farming story dungeons for money, then I would gladly have big cut in the rewards in order make it more reasonable with cheap mechanics and increase the rewards in exploration mode to make it more appealing to those who breeze trough story.

When you go trough 4 dungeons and not die a single time, that’s way beyond average gamer. There is a learning curve in everything, some things just can’t be solved only by studying and and knowing everything about encounters. Being able to act accordingly at every situation is the key part where the average gamer like me is not at it’s best. Like I said earlier, I do wrong moves and decisions often, not by choice or wanting to, but it just happens, and it should be pretty clear by now that mistakes are costly in the dungeons.

Zefiris.8297:

. I consider myself an above average player

This is the problem. Everyone THINKS they are above average. There’s scientific studies about this: The vast majority of people think they are better than the average.

Which, of course, is impossible: Most of them are not.

You are in this group. I don’t mean this badly or to offend you, and it’s not your fault, but you truly are not “above average”, but “below average”. Your problem is not that the dungeon is hard (the mobs sure are not), the problem is that you think you are good, therefore do not work on improving, and therefore have a harder time.

Hi. I’m a female gamer, I work 40 hours a week, and my GW2 time is pretty limited. I am not that good a gamer, my reflexes are objectively rather slow, and I cannot play FPS games because I get confused. I sometimes click abilities, and I constantly forget to use one of my utilities.

Total deaths in dungeons: Less than 10, including me rolling off cliffs in Flame citadel twice by accident.. Story mode dungeons are easy. Their difficulty is in line with what an average skilled casual gamer can handle.

The problem is that below-average skilled people cannot handle it, and since they assume they are above average, they assume the design itself is bad. People usually do not like that the problem is on their end, after all.

I hope Arenanet does not make them easier, because that would make them boring for average skilled casual players like myself. Having a challenge is GOOD.

Below average, above average. That is just making very subjective matter even more intangible. There are as many opinions as there are people. For one, below average is good or bad for another.

Female gamer, male gamer, full time job, kids, second job, age (to a certain extent), ability in other genres and all those things, they all are meaningless. It doesn’t matter if you have 45 hour week, kids, spouse and other hobbies to take your time, when you can grasp certain things better and faster, and more importantly have ability to use the knowledge right, than some other. Sure all those may slow you down, but at some point you do experience the moment when things start working out, but that’s not the case with everyone and it’s not because they don’t want to.

It’s never been about “not being able to do”. At least I hope I have given that message myself. But it is about being there in the edge where achieving that goal is frustrating and not really fun and then not wanting to do it more because of that even though the desire to do them is there. I know the problem is mostly on my end, but it’s something I can’t change no matter how many times I read about encounters, skills and things and try overcoming them. Anet however has the ability to give the chance for everyone to enjoy that aspect of the game. There are 2 difficulty modes, why they are hard and harder, when they could be normal and harder?

To me you way underestimate yourself and would find your challenge in exploration mode. Seems like you aren’t actually challenging yourself by going to story dungeons, please correct me if I’m wrong.

I hope this didn’t come out too confusing, It’s so late and I’m starting to see things in two already.

It took me 3 days to get a group for the level 60 Dungeon story mode (1 week looking, 3 days actively searching for one, Server Status “Full”), and after i did it, i know why nobody wants to do it.

We needed nearly 3 hours to complete the story mode, and i lost about 10-20 silver doing so.

And i don’t even consider myself a bad player.
Sure, we weren’t all that coordinated as a random group, and we had some people playing/dodging… not so well, but it’s the Story Mode!
I went in there just to get the story, the lore of the game, not for a hardcore vent supported dungeon master run with a group of people i play together since years.

Besides that, i also like the skin of the level 78 dungeon armor for example. Do i now have to get TS, a headset and a pro dungeon team to get that armor skin, because i happen to like it?
Seems kind of over the top, i think a group of organized strangers using chat should be enough to beat a dungeon, for everything else, make a hardmode with higher rewards.

/E:

I tried the explo mode for the dungeon with the armor i desire, but my whole group was naked before we saw even one chest, and we really tried and were excited about it, and overcoming the challenge.
But it was just to much.

@Zefiris "You are in this group. I don’t mean this badly or to offend you, and it’s not your fault, but you truly are not “above average”, but “below average”. "

I don’t mean to offend you but the amount I care about your opinion is “below average”.
Whether ‘you’ think I am a below average gamer or not is irrelevant, ‘I’ am the one stating my situation and ‘I’ am the one telling you my parameters for that situation; other people (including yourself) are not allowed to say that is false unless you have actual evidence (speculation does not count) to back up your statement – in this case you do not; therefore, my point still stands.

I don’t mean to offend you but the amount I care about your opinion is “below average”.

It has nothing to do with anyone’s opinion.

If you are dying an obscene amount of times in dungeons, then you are simply bad and should put even half of the effort you put towards whining on the forum towards learning how to play.

berries.7016:

… I’m not in a guild, and that’s by choice for various reasons, but that leaves me just one option and it’s pugs. Now if I’m in each dungeon with different people, totally strangers, am I required to learn their skill sets and abilities and explain myself every time just to have a fighting change in story mode? I think not.

a couple things there:
1. yeah, i’m a pugger who avoids guilds and in doing so, have to accept that this is going to limit what i can do.
2. it’s good to learn what other classes do. part of my schtick when i’m on my ranger is dropping the healing spring and knowing that the melees can leap into it for a group heal. those things are important to me in taking my gameplay to the “next level”.
3. i don’t know how to approach, ‘story mode is too hard.’ even playing a lb ranger, i tried to challenge myself (switching melee and attacking things that my pet wasn’t) and dodging damage that my guardian could safely eat. as a pretty mediocre to bad player, i haven’t found the story modes to be that hard. you don’t really need to coordinate the support in story as long as there’s some. maybe your problem has been that your pugs all went full dps.

as robert downey jr. says, never go full dps.

Just finished AC story with arguably the worst group ever. Only one full wipe.

-Nobody besides me had been there
- We had a level 25 (lol) mesmer that died instantly and did no damage.
- We had 3 level 30 warriors that were all in melee at all times.
- Only one of those 4 rezzed with any kind of consistency, I’m fairly sure the only time the others did was on accident.
- Nobody besides me used anything even remotely resembling a support ability

Yet we still finished it. And I died once.

QUITE THE GRAVEYARD ZERGFEST HERE GUYS

@Apathy “If you are dying an obscene amount of times in dungeons”

Which I never stated, point invalid.

I finally got to do story Arah I didn’t think I would say this but… I liked it. It was by far the most enjoyable dungeon and to me one single reason makes it so. No pointless cheap mechanics. I did die there couple times, but what’s different is this time is that I could tell the reason what it was, not just by standing in wrong place and somehow lose all my health or someone charging at me then beating to death or whatever. The progression was fairly swift and it generally felt how it should be for a more like starting difficulty.

If only the rest were like this, then we wouldn’t have this issue as how many has the concern that something is bit off in story dungeons.

Rather then dumbing down storymode (my god, its so easy), I’d rather leveling be made more difficult. I can solo 5 mobs comfortably; way too easy.

As a warrior I have completed all the dungeons on story once except COE and Arahs as I havent gotten around to them yet. I had a tough time in all of them. Now after 250 hours and a decent amount of WvW and learning of my class I know why I was so screwed.,

Spec and gearing decisions are extremely important in this game. It isnt so much the level and quality of your gear as much as understanding what stats you want to maximize to be able to survive a heavy melee. You need at least one of high toughness and/or vitality and at least one trait line into those to be effective.

A pure glass cannon in full berserker’s is gonna get rocked in just about anything and doing 17k crits is not gonna help your group if your dead.

I am going to go out on a limb here and say dungeons seem alot harder than they actually are because people in general are not playing there characters as effectively as they can be.

The one exception is the one ridiculous possible buggy golem boss in sorrows embrace. That some crazy shiot man!

Dont feed the trolls

I don’t get the gripes with the dungeons. All I see are complaints that the overworld stuff is too easy, and that dungeons are too hard. Which is it?

Also here is my FIRST real time in Ascalonian Catacombs (We tried it with 4 in BETA and made it just past the first trap room)

http://youtu.be/Gihg4ciH3og

It took less then an hour with around 5 deaths.

For some reason the reply button has gone missing now so please excuse me for doing this the really bad way.

Kaaboose,
“I don’t get the gripes with the dungeons. All I see are complaints that the overworld stuff is too easy, and that dungeons are too hard. Which is it?
Also here is my FIRST real time in Ascalonian Catacombs (We tried it with 4 in BETA and made it just past the first trap room)
http://youtu.be/Gihg4ciH3og
It took less then an hour with around 5 deaths.”

What do you mean which is it? It is both. Out in the world I can start auto attacking something, go get cup of coffee and still be alive when I come back, but when I go to a dungeon then I suddenly need to be aware of everything including what my other party members can or can’t do and act accordingly, have the reflexes I don’t posses and I’m supposed to trait and equip myself in certain way in order not to die.

Congratulations on your party, but doesn’t show anything else than you are better than most. Or maybe the party setup just worked so much better than the random things you might have with you in any dungeon. There seems to be quite a bit of chat of how having this and that class there with a specific skill making things so much easier. And here I thought the class, and how you choose to play it wouldn’t matter as much as it seems to now.

Ty for posting that vid. It looks like my group was ‘very’ bad on DPS, problem solved :P