Dungeons: Just not finding them fun at all.
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I love the direction that you took with the overworld areas. It was a little strange to get use to the missions being replaced by the personal/game storyline at first, but doing the hearts (which to me tell mini localized stories) along with the variety of local events had shown that it all really came together and was actually really FUN.
I wish I could say the same for the dungeons, but I cannot lie to myself and pretend its all wonderful and great. Overall. Compared to your past talents. They suck. Maybe not the bits and pieces of them, but the overall design as a whole.
Maybe, you need to rethink your designs to be more like the show of future ideas you had started to implement in GW1 with the EotN dungeons (and GW Beyond content)and actually populate your “Zzzz” dungeons to be something worth going through.
I really want to love all parts of this game, but I just cannot love a dungeon that has some good “Boss Battles” while having otherwise BORING and NON-FUN content being made up of sparse overpowered trash mobs.
Most of us understand Anet that this is your game and your vision, but at the same time your vision also needs to be profitable in order to continue to be a game.
How does a developer keep a MMO profitable and running if they do not learn when and where to meet their playerbase?
Many of us come from a great many MMO’s before yours.
Many of us understand that the first 30-90 days are the “Make it, or Break it” period for an MMO.
Many of us have also been in those MMO’s when that very first “Mass Exodus” happened, and we know very well what follows this event.
So if the game begins to keep out the so called “average joe” that it appeared to be marketed toward then how many players do you think you will lose?
Your true playerbase is not that of which posts on this forum as forum posters overall are a miniority, and not a real view of the feelings of your full playerbase. So players can whine here all they want, or defend it all they want, but in the end neither is really represented fairly.
As it stands right now it just does not seem that you are willing to do anything to really get a fair idea of your playerbase.
So why not turn back on the content rating system (remade of course for the dungeons) now that the game is launched?
Sure people could say thats pointless, blah, blah, blah, but truth be told now that the game is live it really isn’t. Your sample size is at its highest (at least until players start following up on their leaving statements) right now, and a much more reliable look than just what people here on the forums are going to say whether against or in defense of the current dungeons.
Main thing is Anet. Some how you need to find a way to reach out with your playerbase and soon, or your going to be left with the small handful of hardcore elitists and keeping your game on life support (SOE and Vanguard anyone?).
Anyway, heres the part where I put on my “Flame Retardant Suit” and post.
I think a lot of people have their own definition of “fun.” And like you said Michael, you came to GW2 expecting certain things and don’t feel those expectations were met.
I’m not going to tell you to go play with pandas: but perhaps step back and breath a little? I’d suggest writing up some feedback with constructive criticism of the dungeons and what you specifically liked and didn’t like to try to help bring about a change. What specific things within those dungeons need to be tweeked in order for you to have what you feel is fun? I suspect such a post will be much better received over your current post here.
Again though, sorry you’re not enjoying your dungeon experiences and I hope you can find enjoyment in other aspects of the game until other dungeon changes are possibly made.
“The truth of the matter is that you always know the right thing to do.
The hard part is doing it.” -Norman Schwarzkopf **
The hard part is doing it.” -Norman Schwarzkopf **
I agree with Michael Fejervary, when Anet looks back in a few months and see’s all there servers during all times of the day Low. maybe they will look back and wonder what they have done.
Becuase when they send out there please return to tyria emails, granting free gems to players people will already have there opinon about this game.
Just look at FFXIV, because by the time they sent out their return emails it was already to late. Where are they at now? Wasting more time and money to make “A realm reborn” in hopes of what?
Which dungeons have you done?
I agree with Michael Fejervary, when Anet looks back in a few months and see’s all there servers during all times of the day Low. maybe they will look back and wonder what they have done.
Becuase when they send out there please return to tyria emails, granting free gems to players people will already have there opinon about this game.
Just look at FFXIV, because by the time they sent out their return emails it was already to late. Where are they at now? Wasting more time and money to make “A realm reborn” in hopes of what?
The difference is that FFXIV was terrible upon release.
Which dungeons have you done?
I agree with Michael Fejervary, when Anet looks back in a few months and see’s all there servers during all times of the day Low. maybe they will look back and wonder what they have done.
Becuase when they send out there please return to tyria emails, granting free gems to players people will already have there opinon about this game.
Just look at FFXIV, because by the time they sent out their return emails it was already to late. Where are they at now? Wasting more time and money to make “A realm reborn” in hopes of what?
The difference is that FFXIV was terrible upon release.
yes it was horrbile upon release, gw2 is not but when people hit lvl 30 and start running into the same problems that they are already.
then that makes peoples minds up to the point of why am I even playing this game. then you have your mass exdous, after all this game was meant for the casual player.
Which dungeons have you done?
I agree with Michael Fejervary, when Anet looks back in a few months and see’s all there servers during all times of the day Low. maybe they will look back and wonder what they have done.
Becuase when they send out there please return to tyria emails, granting free gems to players people will already have there opinon about this game.
Just look at FFXIV, because by the time they sent out their return emails it was already to late. Where are they at now? Wasting more time and money to make “A realm reborn” in hopes of what?
The difference is that FFXIV was terrible upon release.
yes it was horrbile upon release, gw2 is not but when people hit lvl 30 and start running into the same problems that they are already.
then that makes peoples minds up to the point of why am I even playing this game. then you have your mass exdous, after all this game was meant for the casual player.
I had no problems, my guild had no problems, I am not aware of any problems.
I don’t know how the OP can find EotN dungeons fun but not these. Those had even more trash mobs.
Again it dont really matter when 80% of your player base is having issues with dungeons etc, people will get fed up leave and go to the next best thing. I have seen this many times.
I love gw2 I don’t want dungeons to be completly watered down but I do have a problem when most people don’t want to even do story mode/explorable mode anymore becuase of the diffuculy and being afraid to even go in there.
Again it dont really matter when 80% of your player base is having issues with dungeons etc, people will get fed up leave and go to the next best thing. I have seen this many times.
I love gw2 I don’t want dungeons to be completly watered down but I do have a problem when most people don’t want to even do story mode/explorable mode anymore becuase of the diffuculy and being afraid to even go in there.
where did 80% come from?
Dungeons are designed to bleed money from you. Everything is designed to bleed money from you. Travel, TP % is crazy as a tariff on posting and receiving, Gathering equipment that is perishable.
So how do you offset the costs? Farming? Not with the cleverly implemented “anti botting” code. (pssst Its actually anti farming and it effects everyone) Dungeons? More often than not these will cost you money and as you can see, rarely work correctly.
Look at the dungeons. Most are very long (ensuring deaths and repair bills) or short but have at least one encounter that includes mandatory death (repair bills)
All of this to fool players into thinking “whoa, yeah those items have the same stats as what i already have but..they indicate i’m leet.”
Now that players are doing these dungeons and because these dungeons are really the absolute end of PvE as it currently stands, Anet is forced to drag this experience out as long as possible to cover the hole that there isn’t an endgame. Having everything you want a week after hitting max level is..well, bad for business.
Making these tokens Account bound= “Hey ,we know you’ve gotten all you wanted, now try a new profession and have them in 80 exotics the second they hit 80” Fun eh?
Just another attempt at covering the endgame problem- there really isn’t one.
Fun doesn’t factor in the current profitability factor. It will but likely will only be addressed once its too late and players have migrated elsewhere. It’s not as if this is the only B2P/F2P game. Many are rounding out Betas at the moment and are probably thanking Anet for a lot of lessons learned.
Then again, this is my opinion based on observation and deduction.
A problem for any MMO is having the single-player experience help prepare for the group play. In GW1, you always had a party, even if it was full of AI. So when real players were involved, running a dungeon became even easier. Here, you can easily handle groups of mobs in the regular world, but two or three in a dungeon against your group of five and suddenly folks are corpse-running all over the place.
Granted, you pick yourself up and dust off and give’em Hell and win, but the point I am making is that, in a general sense, there’s a steep learning curve between general PvE and dungeon PvE*.
* I’m willing to bet those with a decent chunk of their time invested in PvP fair much better, on average, their first time in dungeons.
I don’t have all of the solutions or anything, but it’s my guess this contributes to people not having fun.
Me? I view it as a challenge and have enjoyed it, both when I have died a lot and when I have had smooth sailing groups.
EotN dungs were mostly easy and most players did them just once or twice and never returned to them. Dungs that were beloved and had big attention were UW and DoA, now you might want easy dungs now and believe me once anet makes some dungs easy, ull get bored of those dungs very soon. I ran UW over 200 times DoA over 100 times FoW over 50 times. How many times I did EoN dungs? well except 2 or 3 of them I did all just for the title.
When you went to temple of ages it had 4 or more districts, when you went for EoN dung you could hardly find anyone and often had to take henchmen, now dont try to tell me 80% ppl desires easier dungs.
Again it dont really matter when 80% of your player base is having issues with dungeons etc, people will get fed up leave and go to the next best thing. I have seen this many times.
I love gw2 I don’t want dungeons to be completly watered down but I do have a problem when most people don’t want to even do story mode/explorable mode anymore becuase of the diffuculy and being afraid to even go in there.
where did 80% come from?
80% of your player base is going to be casual and not write in the forums, not to mention this game was marketed for the casual player.
So i can almost gaurntee you most people that play this are Casual gamers.
maybe they need to bring back the poll service for awhile in game so people can re-evaluate everything.
EotN dungs were mostly easy and most players did them just once or twice and never returned to them. Dungs that were beloved and had big attention were UW and DoA, now you might want easy dungs now and believe me once anet makes some dungs easy, ull get bored of those dungs very soon. I ran UW over 200 times DoA over 100 times FoW over 50 times. How many times I did EoN dungs? well except 2 or 3 of them I did all just for the title.
When you went to temple of ages it had 4 or more districts, when you went for EoN dung you could hardly find anyone and often had to take henchmen, now dont try to tell me 80% ppl desires easier dungs.
again 80% of the people are casual players based on the way they marketed the game it was made for casual players. when most of the forums have people saying they need changes it sounds 80% to me.
if you don’t like it go make a post asking players who are casual and not casual and do some number crunching then.
I go by what the majority of the players are asking and there asking for change, and anet has no choice but to change the way these are down the line otherwise risk loosing there player base.
thats all im going to write about this atm.
(edited by Zraltik Ravenheart.7219)
Dungeons are designed to bleed money from you. Everything is designed to bleed money from you. Travel, TP % is crazy as a tariff on posting and receiving, Gathering equipment that is perishable.
So how do you offset the costs? Farming? Not with the cleverly implemented “anti botting” code. (pssst Its actually anti farming and it effects everyone) Dungeons? More often than not these will cost you money and as you can see, rarely work correctly.
Bleed money? I repair maybe once per dungeon (all 3 routes) and get about 40 silver every route. In an hour I make about 1g, and about 4-5 gold a day. Sure, once in a while I join a pug group that sucks (Most pug groups are actually quite decent if I lead them) and I don’t exactly break even, but that’s my own fault for joining randoms. How is 1-3s for TP bleeding money? we all TP to new dungeons all the time.. Most people in my guild have over 200g because they can’t get rid of it.
Only done the first 4 dungeons, and they’re all pretty fun, just a shame the non farming mechanics hits so hard against the end xp reward.
I really like playing with other players, loved PuGs in GW1 and did several ZM multiple times even if I didn’t need it on those chars anymore.
Events aren’t the same thing, you don’t get a feel for what other players can do.
Can’t say I find many overpowered trash mobs, it mainly about pulling properly and paying attention.
Even if, it would end up like EoN, nobody would play it after a while bcs it would be too easy, too boring.
What this game rlly needs is more areas like Cursed Shore, Malchors Leap and Frostgorge. Three end-game areas simply aint enough, this game needs at least 3 more, so ppl that dont like dungs or find them too hard, had more options where to go instead of camping at Cursed Shore.
EotN dungs were mostly easy and most players did them just once or twice and never returned to them. Dungs that were beloved and had big attention were UW and DoA, now you might want easy dungs now and believe me once anet makes some dungs easy, ull get bored of those dungs very soon. I ran UW over 200 times DoA over 100 times FoW over 50 times. How many times I did EoN dungs? well except 2 or 3 of them I did all just for the title.
When you went to temple of ages it had 4 or more districts, when you went for EoN dung you could hardly find anyone and often had to take henchmen, now dont try to tell me 80% ppl desires easier dungs.again 80% of the people are casual players based on the way they marketed the game it was made for casual players. when most of the forums have people saying they need changes it sounds 80% to me.
if you don’t like it go make a post asking players who are casual and not casual and do some number crunching then.
I go by what the majority of the players are asking and there asking for change, and anet has no choice but to change the way these are down the line otherwise risk loosing there player base.
thats all im going to write becuase I have seen great games fall becuase of issues like this.
You mean, like WoW had no choice but to make everything easier? Yup, seen a great game fall like that.
My point here is that it is in fact not hard and people have to get used to playing with two hands instead of one. If your definition of casual gamer is one that plays by left and right mouse button only, then yes, this game is not for casual gamers.
It’s people like in this thread that I really want to invite into my dungeon parties, to show them it is very well possible and easy if you get to know the mechanics. I usually actually let pugs or new guildies die once to every new mechanic, or they don’t learn as quickly. If this is a problem for them, I’ll just reimburse their repair costs but up to now they all agree that it’s been helpful in their learning curve, haha.
Well written, was an interesting read, but as Kaae said, a lot of people have different definitions of fun. Also as you yourself have said Michael, the minority are the ones posting on the forums. The majority does not voice their anger or joy on the forums.
From what I see in game, with the random PUGs i join, only a handful have complained about the dungeon difficulty, and it was never the case of the whole group complaining. It was always 1 player who was dying all the time, or failing to complete something blaming it on the Dungeon. Whilst everyone else in the party thought the current task at hand was easy or fun.
Ive never played Gw1, it did no appeal to me then, but so far I am loving Gw2. Its transformed me from a casual player to a hardcore gw2 player. Reason being, I dont feel forced to farm anything, the Dungeons are challenging. Even with a set in stone tactics placed in most dungeons, there is a huge change you can fail. I like this, but I can see some people dont.
Edit:
Regarding the dungeons to be a gold sink, I disagree. I ran a full TA run with some players and I made over 1g. Even with repair costs it was 1g, a fellow party member made around 2g+. Only reason he got more gold was because he was getting 60 Tokens + 25s each run. I was getting 45 tokens 19s due to a bug idk. We all died around 1x each. One person died 2 or 3x I cant remember.
Keep trying, or die trying. Never give up, never forgive. We will Desolate. – Desolation
Not A Message.
Not A Message.
(edited by DKP.4196)
People bickering about how hard it is or isn’t here wasn’t the point of my post.
Just saying.
I am sure that Anet is smart enough to get the feedback I intended out of what I said above about EotN compared to GW2 dungeons, etc.
I came on to leave my opinion of how their dungeon design left me as a customer/player feeling.
Not to get the approval or disapproval of the small amount of the playerbase that will actually ever read and/or post on the forums.
Anet has to see that even in their forum (which is a very small % of players that make up their full playerbase) there is a lot of players torn when it comes to dungeons.
I do not think they live up to the past potential that Anet has shown with GW1 content wise and they could be WAY BETTER, and I just don’t see them as fun.
This wasn’t about things being “to hard” or “to easy”.
This thread was about just not finding dungeons fun. Plain and simple.
Its my view, my opinion, and my feelings about it. Anet can do what they please with it.
(edited by Michael Fejervary.8576)
A problem for any MMO is having the single-player experience help prepare for the group play. In GW1, you always had a party, even if it was full of AI. So when real players were involved, running a dungeon became even easier. Here, you can easily handle groups of mobs in the regular world, but two or three in a dungeon against your group of five and suddenly folks are corpse-running all over the place.
Granted, you pick yourself up and dust off and give’em Hell and win, but the point I am making is that, in a general sense, there’s a steep learning curve between general PvE and dungeon PvE*.
- I’m willing to bet those with a decent chunk of their time invested in PvP fair much better, on average, their first time in dungeons.
I don’t have all of the solutions or anything, but it’s my guess this contributes to people not having fun.
Me? I view it as a challenge and have enjoyed it, both when I have died a lot and when I have had smooth sailing groups.
This is what I was trying to convey in a different post. My only proposal was possibly modifying the paths to have distinguishable differences in difficulty (and rewards) as well as being told what paths are easy and hard…. The idea being to open explorables to more folks by giving more of a gradual learning curve in the explorable dungeon, yet still have the hard challenges available for the “pros”. Imo, I think the difference between a hard path and easy path in the current setup is merely serendipity more than intentional design. I also think the story mode dungeon doesn’t really prep players for the dungeon PvE challenges; at least not in the way other games typically prep you (though they really on something classic like a gear treadmill or holy tinity).
Well written, was an interesting read, but as Kaae said, a lot of people have different definitions of fun. Also as you yourself have said Michael, the minority are the ones posting on the forums. The majority does not voice their anger or joy on the forums.
From what I see in game, with the random PUGs i join, only a handful have complained about the dungeon difficulty, and it was never the case of the whole group complaining. It was always 1 player who was dying all the time, or failing to complete something blaming it on the Dungeon. Whilst everyone else in the party thought the current task at hand was easy or fun.
Ive never played Gw1, it did no appeal to me then, but so far I am loving Gw2. Its transformed me from a casual player to a hardcore gw2 player. Reason being, I dont feel forced to farm anything, the Dungeons are challenging. Even with a set in stone tactics placed in most dungeons, there is a huge change you can fail. I like this, but I can see some people dont.
Edit:
Regarding the dungeons to be a gold sink, I disagree. I ran a full TA run with some players and I made over 1g. Even with repair costs it was 1g, a fellow party member made around 2g+. Only reason he got more gold was because he was getting 60 Tokens + 25s each run. I was getting 45 tokens 19s due to a bug idk. We all died around 1x each. One person died 2 or 3x I cant remember.
That is why I suggested they turn on an in-game poll for dungeons (rework them for post launch, etc) to get a better idea of what players really think. As trying to piece together how players may really feel about something based on forum or world chat alone is still not a big enough pool to really represent the feelings of the total playerbase.
Again, though this was not left to be about “to easy” or “to hard” I could care less about that at this point, and while I am glad that you and others may be enjoying the way the dungeons are and its linear approach with sparse mobs I just do not.
The difference I see in other MMO dungeons, you feel powerful. In GW2 after the patch, you feel weak, regardless of level, armor or skill.
The difference I see in other MMO dungeons, you feel powerful. In GW2 after the patch, you feel weak, regardless of level, armor or skill.
Feels like you actually have to utilize all your power(abilities + brains) to beat dungeons. Isn’t that the way you SHOULD be running dungeons? It’s extremely fun and rewarding imo.
The difference I see in other MMO dungeons, you feel powerful. In GW2 after the patch, you feel weak, regardless of level, armor or skill.
Feels like you actually have to utilize all your power(abilities + brains) to beat dungeons. Isn’t that the way you SHOULD be running dungeons? It’s extremely fun and rewarding imo.
I take it you haven’t run a dungeon since the last patch? You could have the best skills, gear, and be level 80. 20+ mobs Vs 5 real players… you cant even kite that many without dying loads of times. Have you not seen all the posts about this??!
I have to say, I agree with the sentiment of the OP. As someone who has come from multiple other MMO’s, the feeling the game generates for normal PvE, and then stepping into a dungeon, the difficulty comparison is absurd. There’s no preparation for it, there’s no indication.
The only reason I knew to spec and gear for more survivability and to be prepared for hell was because I’d been paying attention to what other people said, reading the forums, and I’m a bit of a minmaxer for these sort of things anyways.
I also don’t expect to walk in a roflstomp dungeons either. I know bad coordination and bad players can ruin an experience, but dear god. I just ran the first part of AC Story mode on my 30 Guardian, and it was the most frustrating and un-fun thing I’ve done in this game.
It’s more fun trying to fight 5v1 in PvP than do Dungeons. It was an effort in run the kitten away until I can hit two or three times, then do it again.
Granted, if the REWARDS for such difficulty were there, I’d shut up and take it to task, but it cost more money to get through the first leg before I was so frustrated I quit, than I made back in any sort of joy, loot or experience in actually going through the dungeon.
Now, I may hear the response ‘Oh, well you’re level 30, you should wait to go do AC til insert level’. To that I say: Then why the hell is the Dungeon available at level 30?
I just… I understand dungeons are difficult. That they push player tactics and capabilities to the max and are supposed to make you operate at peak efficiency, but most people DON’T do that. Most people are casual. Even further when your typical PvE grind difficulty comparison is just nothing near dungeon difficulty. I find it almost upsetting that there is such a stark difference in PvE, and PvE Dungeons, that I can’t fathom how this was let to pass, not even including how pitiful the rewards were.
Yeah, dungeons aren’t hard (except for the parts where you have to defend people). But they just aren’t fun.
i never played GW1 so i cant comment on that but its honestly refreshing for me to play the explorable mode dungeons in this game as they are actually challenging. I played WoW for many years and always found their dungeons to be a joke. Id rather play through a shorter dungeon with much harder pulls than play through an easy trash fest waste of time instance like every single WoW dungeon was. Including that bad joke of a mode they called “heroic” which was anything but heroic. With a lack of raiding in this game compared to other MMO’s high end content i dont mind these dungeons one bit as they take the challenge of raiding and just scale it down to dungeon form. Im enjoying myself anyways. bugs and balancing issues aside as well. they will get dealt with in time
I have to agree with much of what is said by the OP, I’ve tried quite a few dungeons now and I’m finding them more frustrating than anything else. Don’t get me wrong I love a challenging dungeon that requires a fair bit of execution and finesse to pull off but much of what I’m seeing in GW2 dungeons is just poorly balanced encounters and/or mechanics that have far too few ways of dealing with them. Oh, and before anyone goes on and on about looking for telegraphed moves and L2P (I’ve played quite a few MMORPG’s and experienced the “hardcore” end game content associated with them) and everything else I can assure you I’m not running a glass cannon build, I’m very closely watching what’s going on and trying to support my part (as is everyone usually in my runs) and we are still seem to encounter many instances where none of that matters, bosses/trash will one shot us or use abilities so overpowered that we have no choice but to die.
So in taking a step back and looking at things I really do think that the reason these dungeons are so terribly tuned is because many of the mobs abilities have been “ramped up” in explorable mode by just having had their abilities/health pools increased by a certain percentage. This leads to disproportionate damage, fights that take far too long, far too much damage scaling by bosses ect ect… it’s just bad news all the way around and frankly I would don’t really understand why ArenaNet doesn’t understand this. They have to play test these dungeons and they have to receive feedback on how unbalanced and often enough frustrating they are so I have no idea why they’re never given the fine touch needed to make them engaging and interesting without being ‘pull-your-hair-out’ aggravating.
maybe they should make easy mode dungeons with terrible rewards as a way for lower skilled players to practice the mechanics?
there should be explorable mode for the skilled players who enjoy a challenge and a World of Warcraft mode for everyone else crying that its way too hard
Here’s a quick way to find out if it’s player skill or the player’s choices. How many of you that find dungeons fun are playing ranged builds and how many play melee builds?
There’s a massive difference in PvE difficulty between the two in GW2 and its worth getting specific feedback based on the way you’ve chosen to play. Adjustments may need to be made, but nothing can be done if things aren’t put into context.
there should be explorable mode for the skilled players who enjoy a challenge and a World of Warcraft mode for everyone else crying that its way too hard
Thanks for not really reading any of the posts “crying” about dungeons at all and providing the typical uninformed belligerent answer for the “World of Warcraft” players crying about dungeons being too hard. However if you had read much of what players are actually commenting on you’d realize it’s not that they’re “too hard” it’s that they’re unbalanced. In fact I believe you’re familiar with this concept yourself, let me quote one of your own earlier posts:
i really enjoyed path 1 as well. its a good change from doing 2 over and over. the boss though…. yeah…. needs some tweaking. 45 min worth of wipes and resets and we gave up. unbalanced for sure compared to anything else in that place
So you might want to take a second to check out what people are actually saying before you jump to the conclusion that people are just being crybabies about nothing, maybe just maybe there are legit concerns being brought up that many players (like yourself apparently) share that don’t need to be shot down by thoughtless chest thumping like your own.
(edited by Atticus.7194)
I’m trying to adapt to dungeons. I’m 80 and going back to do them since I didn’t play through them originally. I play a thief, so I’m already aware I’m going to be ‘squishy’, but I’m getting the “make one mistake and insta-fail” vibe and I dislike that greatly.
This is with switching from PvE farming DPS & MF gear to more rounded equipment too, BTW.
I get 1 shot by big attacks. Not “oh no I’m downed” 1-shot, like .. from full health to completely dead & running back from a waypoint 1-shot.
Trash mobs can down me with their standard attacks pretty quick. Usually so many are unleashed on the group that I’m destined to be mauled. All I can do is run and kite and pray the rest of the group can complete the encounter without me. I feel like I’m not only offering little to the group, but I’m a liability unless they just consider me bait to keep half the trash mobs busy.
I haven’t really seriously played MMO’s in a long while. I don’t have “WoW mentality” or a holy-trinity focus (I actually hate the trinity system, total snoozefest). I did most recently play some Secret World for a little bit. They did the whole “danger circles on the ground” mechanic. I see circles in GW2. I can avoid world PvE “big hits”. Dungeons though? By the time I see the circle under me here though, I have no time to react, it feels like. I miss dodging once, I die. Maybe I’m just getting old and too slow :p
I also don’t understand how Aggro works in GW2. The other day I saw a nearby event in Orr, and headed over. Champ mob, at 75% health and dropping, big group of people mobbing it, lots of ranged folks. I hop in next to them, fire up ranged DPS and literally just take a couple plinks at the mob with my shortbow (standard auto-attack) … and it b-lines RIGHT for me. I spent the next 5 straight minutes running in circles around the event-zerg while they laughed at me, because the mob would not come off. I stopped fighting back and just ran, figuring someone would aggro it off me. Nope, it was fully and wholly focused on my destruction over anything else, for what looked like zero reason.
I even dropped ALL my stealth skills. The mob would turn away, take 5-6 steps to go after someone else, my stealth would drop and it’d instantly 180 and rush right back at me. There was zero chance I could survive that fight if I didn’t just run 100% of the time.
Frankly, that is what I’m getting out of the dungeon experience too. Get hit = I die. More than 1 mob = % chance I get hit skyrockets = 1 die, guaranteed. AoE? I die. Someone comes to revive me? They get AoE’d and I die.
If I’m lucky they’ll be straight melee mobs and I can kite them. If there is a ranged mob and it is after me I’m lucky if I don’t get 2-shotted, even after burning my heal.
Maybe I picked a crappy profession for survival, or am “playing it wrong”. Thing is, I can sleep through most world PvE. On the odd chance things go badly, I never have an issue fleeing if and coming back to reengage and try again. Dungeons though? Just feels like a meat grinder.
I’ve dropped dead in CoE fractions of a second after the group engaged mobs, when I hadn’t even done damage to anything tokitten it off, had zero idea where the mob was that was attacking me, and had no way to counter it. Just “ok, next group” – “sounds goo-” and I’m dead. Again, not “downed” but dead. Combat log checks after were just “____ hits you for 1000-2500 with _” about 6-10 times in a row. I got hit so many times in rapid succession in a blink of an eye that I felt I had zero recourse.
I dunno, like I said, just having a bad experience with dungeons.
I’m trying to adapt to dungeons. I’m 80 and going back to do them since I didn’t play through them originally. I play a thief, so I’m already aware I’m going to be ‘squishy’, but I’m getting the “make one mistake and insta-fail” vibe and I dislike that greatly.
This is with switching from PvE farming DPS & MF gear to more rounded equipment too, BTW.
I get 1 shot by big attacks. Not “oh no I’m downed” 1-shot, like .. from full health to completely dead & running back from a waypoint 1-shot.
How many points have you put into your toughness trait? thieves have medium armor so staying ranged should be fine for you.
and there it is.
Gee, here I thought that part of what Anet was going for in this game was not creating a game where players had to rely on the “end all be all” and/or “cookie cutter” builds.
I’m not saying your wrong, but if Anet succeeded in that regard then that question wouldn’t have to be asked in the first place.
(edited by Michael Fejervary.8576)
I do agree ANet seems to like our faces on the ground way too much when it comes to dungeons. I can’t possibly believe they think this is ‘fun’, so there’s only 2 other logical reasons:
1) they’re terrified as hell that people who ‘figure out’ an instance will farm it to death, thus ‘ruining the economy’ or promoting botting by other people, or
2) they don’t have any new content due for release any time soon and need us to ‘slow down’ with our ‘progression’ lest we all end up with legendaries before they have a content patch
Now I know this sounds somewhat snide, but those aren’t technically bad reasons. They’re definitely not good reasons to keep players miserable, so I’m going to make the following suggestions:
1) Either tone down the trash difficulty (because let’s face it, fighting 5+ of juggling elites when you can easily oneshot the boss after is just… demoralizing) or make their special attacks and cc on MUCH longer cds with OBVIOUS telegraphing. Because 10s of instant fear does not make for a challenging mechanic. It’s kitten annoying
2) Reduce the SM difficulty and XP/cash rewards (so it’s not being ‘farmed’, but at least people can ‘practice’ there without running out of money) while make a gradual difficulty ‘scale’ for different EM paths and dungeons (and possibly scale the rewards in a similar manner; as long as it says somewhere in the descriptions what is what).
3) Make ‘challenge’ type DEs, either in SM, EM, OW pve, or all of the above, where people can ‘test their mettle’ for some modest rewards and to maybe practice specific combat mechanics. Or something.
4) (this is a bit off topic) Make more environment-oriented battles, such as specific objects to use during combat, or ‘run this guy through water to make him slow/vulnerable’ or even ‘kite this mob into this other mob’s fire/poison’ type fights where it’s not all about ‘dodge, heal and pew pew’ like the current system.
oh and… SIEGE BATTLES PLZ
I like challenge, but there is too much frustration with the current level of challenge (which is mostly artificial ‘overwhelming trash mob oneshots challenge’) and lack of actually interesting fight mechanics, with some very few notable exceptions.
ANet said multiple times, before the game was release, just what they thought about dungeons. They want them to be challenging content for a group of players that is willing to communicate among themselves. That does not mean using vent as it can easily be accomplished with the in game chat.
If you don’t want to communicate and expect everything to go smoothly, then that’s your fault. Try actually getting better at the game instead of QQing on the forums. A full Arah clear nets me 1.5s in repairs because I communicate with my group, mark targets to be focused down, and I don’t just go in with the highest DPS spec/gear makeup.
The majority of the pugs I’ve joined go like this: Group of 5 mobs agros > Everyone picks random mob to solo because they’re bamf’s > Group proceeds to wipe > After rezzing I start marking targets to be focused down > Mobs die, players live, dungeon complete.
ANet said multiple times, before the game was release, just what they thought about dungeons. They want them to be challenging content for a group of players that is willing to communicate among themselves. That does not mean using vent as it can easily be accomplished with the in game chat.
If you don’t want to communicate and expect everything to go smoothly, then that’s your fault. Try actually getting better at the game instead of QQing on the forums. A full Arah clear nets me 1.5s in repairs because I communicate with my group, mark targets to be focused down, and I don’t just go in with the highest DPS spec/gear makeup.
The majority of the pugs I’ve joined go like this: Group of 5 mobs agros > Everyone picks random mob to solo because they’re bamf’s > Group proceeds to wipe > After rezzing I start marking targets to be focused down > Mobs die, players live, dungeon complete.
I like how you assume that this is what this entire thread is about. Or that everyone plays like this pug you describe.
Gratz on your arah farming, thanks for lack of any constructive input, bye
ANet said multiple times, before the game was release, just what they thought about dungeons. They want them to be challenging content for a group of players that is willing to communicate among themselves. That does not mean using vent as it can easily be accomplished with the in game chat.
If you don’t want to communicate and expect everything to go smoothly, then that’s your fault. Try actually getting better at the game instead of QQing on the forums. A full Arah clear nets me 1.5s in repairs because I communicate with my group, mark targets to be focused down, and I don’t just go in with the highest DPS spec/gear makeup.
The majority of the pugs I’ve joined go like this: Group of 5 mobs agros > Everyone picks random mob to solo because they’re bamf’s > Group proceeds to wipe > After rezzing I start marking targets to be focused down > Mobs die, players live, dungeon complete.
I like how you assume that this is what this entire thread is about. Or that everyone plays like this pug you describe.
Gratz on your arah farming, thanks for lack of any constructive input, bye
No, he knew what the thread was about: Players who cant handle a little challenge
Sorry to sound rude but I find the OP’s post to be mostly useless rambling. You should’ve explained in more detail why you found dungeons to be unfun, that way it would lead to a more constructive discussion. Personally I don’t think there are enough interesting enemy mechanics.
I’ve run explorable paths in different dungeons mostly with PUGs, and as long as:
a) at least one person has had experience beating the dungeon
b) everybody reads the party chat
c) everybody has half a brain
then you should be fine.
Also, about the “overpowered trash mobs”. Maybe you should change your mentality. Maybe the ENTIRE dungeon is meant to be difficult, nothing is meant to be taken lightly.
Really the only thing frustrating about dungeons is when there’s a mob that has way too much HP, especially if it doesn’t do a ton of damage. Other than that, I find explorable dungeons to be very rewarding (not talking about in-game rewards), moreso if my party members didn’t do anything I found exploitative.
I do have to say that Story Mode dungeons should be a little easier, albeit with less reward if done more than once. Then there’s the problem with explorable mode rewards, but I won’t get into that.
ANet said multiple times, before the game was release, just what they thought about dungeons. They want them to be challenging content for a group of players that is willing to communicate among themselves. That does not mean using vent as it can easily be accomplished with the in game chat.
If you don’t want to communicate and expect everything to go smoothly, then that’s your fault. Try actually getting better at the game instead of QQing on the forums. A full Arah clear nets me 1.5s in repairs because I communicate with my group, mark targets to be focused down, and I don’t just go in with the highest DPS spec/gear makeup.
The majority of the pugs I’ve joined go like this: Group of 5 mobs agros > Everyone picks random mob to solo because they’re bamf’s > Group proceeds to wipe > After rezzing I start marking targets to be focused down > Mobs die, players live, dungeon complete.
I like how you assume that this is what this entire thread is about. Or that everyone plays like this pug you describe.
Gratz on your arah farming, thanks for lack of any constructive input, bye
If people weren’t playing in PuG’s, or at least communicated and tried to improve, then the forums wouldn’t have nearly as much QQ about difficulty. Every dungeon path has been cleared so that is proof they are all possible. If you can’t do it then that’s not ANet’s fault. Improve yourself and try again. Eventually you’re going to clear your way through it and each run after that is going to get quicker and quicker as you grow accustomed to the difficulty. If you want easy modes then go play a Single Player RPG, or WoW as both are extremely simple.
Sorry to sound rude but I find the OP’s post to be mostly useless rambling. You should’ve explained in more detail why you found dungeons to be unfun, that way it would lead to a more constructive discussion. Personally I don’t think there are enough interesting enemy mechanics.
I’ve run explorable paths in different dungeons mostly with PUGs, and as long as:
a) at least one person has had experience beating the dungeon
b) everybody reads the party chat
c) everybody has half a brain
then you should be fine.Also, about the “overpowered trash mobs”. Maybe you should change your mentality. Maybe the ENTIRE dungeon is meant to be difficult, nothing is meant to be taken lightly.
Really the only thing frustrating about dungeons is when there’s a mob that has way too much HP, especially if it doesn’t do a ton of damage. Other than that, I find explorable dungeons to be very rewarding (not talking about in-game rewards), moreso if my party members didn’t do anything I found exploitative.
I do have to say that Story Mode dungeons should be a little easier, albeit with less reward if done more than once. Then there’s the problem with explorable mode rewards, but I won’t get into that.
Exactly. There are things that do needed to be better balanced, but even with how they are now everything can be completed if you’re willing to improve and play better. Sadly most people don’t want to improve they just want it brought down to their level.
ANet said multiple times, before the game was release, just what they thought about dungeons. They want them to be challenging content for a group of players that is willing to communicate among themselves. That does not mean using vent as it can easily be accomplished with the in game chat.
If you don’t want to communicate and expect everything to go smoothly, then that’s your fault. Try actually getting better at the game instead of QQing on the forums. A full Arah clear nets me 1.5s in repairs because I communicate with my group, mark targets to be focused down, and I don’t just go in with the highest DPS spec/gear makeup.
The majority of the pugs I’ve joined go like this: Group of 5 mobs agros > Everyone picks random mob to solo because they’re bamf’s > Group proceeds to wipe > After rezzing I start marking targets to be focused down > Mobs die, players live, dungeon complete.
I like how you assume that this is what this entire thread is about. Or that everyone plays like this pug you describe.
Gratz on your arah farming, thanks for lack of any constructive input, bye
No, he knew what the thread was about: Crybabies who cant handle a little challenge
Because fun can only be had when the instance is easy??? where are you reading this
The OP is saying that most of the fights ARE NOT FUN (which I agree with).
The concept does not have to do exclusively with the difficulty level. It is true that a lot of instances have an unnecessary high volume of unnecessarily dangerous trash (which if you find fun… kudos to you, but I don’t), in ADDITION to boring boss fights, crap mechanics, and crap rewards.
Please re-read the thread title if still in doubt. Maybe wiki the definition of fun, and forward it to ANet while you’re at it.
I don’t find any SM particularly ‘hard’. CM WAS too easy, and not fun, but now it’s just frustrating due to the 10x trash increase, and STILL not fun.
If anything, I like the cat boss in TA (he’s definitely too easy) and twins in AC because they’re not your standard ‘dodge/heal/run’ crap of every other boss. Again, nothing to do with ‘difficulty’
There would be less frustration with trash fights if they had original mechanics. But they’re all essentially the same, more or less, repeated over and over, sometimes in exorbitant amounts, which makes them boring, and therefore even more annoying to fight when they have almost as high or higher chance to kill you than the boss itself.
(edited by Disconnected.9253)
ANet said multiple times, before the game was release, just what they thought about dungeons. They want them to be challenging content for a group of players that is willing to communicate among themselves. That does not mean using vent as it can easily be accomplished with the in game chat.
If you don’t want to communicate and expect everything to go smoothly, then that’s your fault. Try actually getting better at the game instead of QQing on the forums. A full Arah clear nets me 1.5s in repairs because I communicate with my group, mark targets to be focused down, and I don’t just go in with the highest DPS spec/gear makeup.
The majority of the pugs I’ve joined go like this: Group of 5 mobs agros > Everyone picks random mob to solo because they’re bamf’s > Group proceeds to wipe > After rezzing I start marking targets to be focused down > Mobs die, players live, dungeon complete.
Why don’t you start at the top post that the OP wrote, and then try again. K?
Thanks!
If people weren’t playing in PuG’s, or at least communicated and tried to improve, then the forums wouldn’t have nearly as much QQ about difficulty. Every dungeon path has been cleared so that is proof they are all possible. If you can’t do it then that’s not ANet’s fault. Improve yourself and try again. Eventually you’re going to clear your way through it and each run after that is going to get quicker and quicker as you grow accustomed to the difficulty. If you want easy modes then go play a Single Player RPG, or WoW as both are extremely simple.
nah, actually, if people would be properly thought about dungeons in the game and there would be alternatives, THEN there would be much less QQ. and just because it’s possible doesn’t mean it’s perfect. there are plenty of issues in dungeons that need improvement.
also pulling the “want ez-mode go wow LOLOL” card is getting boring.
EDIT: you’re right that some are lazy and just want easy access (and then stop playing because they have no carrot to chase anymore), but saying everyone who criticizes or just isn’t entertained by the current dungeons belongs to that group is a gross generalization.
(edited by Gray.9650)
ANet said multiple times, before the game was release, just what they thought about dungeons. They want them to be challenging content for a group of players that is willing to communicate among themselves. That does not mean using vent as it can easily be accomplished with the in game chat.
If you don’t want to communicate and expect everything to go smoothly, then that’s your fault. Try actually getting better at the game instead of QQing on the forums. A full Arah clear nets me 1.5s in repairs because I communicate with my group, mark targets to be focused down, and I don’t just go in with the highest DPS spec/gear makeup.
The majority of the pugs I’ve joined go like this: Group of 5 mobs agros > Everyone picks random mob to solo because they’re bamf’s > Group proceeds to wipe > After rezzing I start marking targets to be focused down > Mobs die, players live, dungeon complete.
Why don’t you start at the top post that the OP wrote, and then try again. K?
Thanks!
I knew that this would happen. OP read my earlier post. You never really mentioned why you thought that dungeons weren’t fun other than “overpowered trash mobs”. That makes it look like you don’t find them fun because they’re too difficult. As a result, the point of your post becomes convoluted.
Trash mobs are not just overpowered, they’re boring, and pointless. If they at least had some unique mechanics, or decent loot drops, this might be different, but no one comes to dungeons to kill trash mobs right now, and if you are… go play D3 maybe.
Unfortunately, the majority of actual boss fights are boring as kitten too.
When I first looked into getting GW2 (never played GW1, but I played WoW, Rift, D3) I was promised dynamic battles involving the environment, complex skill layering (this at least is still somewhat doable), use of lots of external objects (yay for boulders in AC?) and other epic amazingness. Which there is still lots of in the GW2 open world, WvW, and even spvp. Which is why I still love the game, even if dungeons suck
In dungeons, most of what I’m seeing is ‘dodge this barely visible red circle RIGHT NOW or you die. Oh, and here’s a chain knockdown cc-immune ranged mob too, enjoy’
ANet said multiple times, before the game was release, just what they thought about dungeons. They want them to be challenging content for a group of players that is willing to communicate among themselves. That does not mean using vent as it can easily be accomplished with the in game chat.
If you don’t want to communicate and expect everything to go smoothly, then that’s your fault. Try actually getting better at the game instead of QQing on the forums. A full Arah clear nets me 1.5s in repairs because I communicate with my group, mark targets to be focused down, and I don’t just go in with the highest DPS spec/gear makeup.
The majority of the pugs I’ve joined go like this: Group of 5 mobs agros > Everyone picks random mob to solo because they’re bamf’s > Group proceeds to wipe > After rezzing I start marking targets to be focused down > Mobs die, players live, dungeon complete.
I like how you assume that this is what this entire thread is about. Or that everyone plays like this pug you describe.
Gratz on your arah farming, thanks for lack of any constructive input, bye
No, he knew what the thread was about: Crybabies who cant handle a little challenge
Because fun can only be had when the instance is easy??? where are you reading this
The OP is saying that most of the fights ARE NOT FUN (which I agree with).
The concept does not have to do exclusively with the difficulty level. It is true that a lot of instances have an unnecessary high volume of unnecessarily dangerous trash (which if you find fun… kudos to you, but I don’t), in ADDITION to boring boss fights, crap mechanics, and crap rewards.Please re-read the thread title if still in doubt. Maybe wiki the definition of fun, and forward it to ANet while you’re at it.
I don’t find any SM particularly ‘hard’. CM WAS too easy, and not fun, but now it’s just frustrating due to the 10x trash increase, and STILL not fun.
If anything, I like the cat boss in TA (he’s definitely too easy) and twins in AC because they’re not your standard ‘dodge/heal/run’ crap of every other boss. Again, nothing to do with ‘difficulty’There would be less frustration with trash fights if they had original mechanics. But they’re all essentially the same, more or less, repeated over and over, sometimes in exorbitant amounts, which makes them boring, and therefore even more annoying to fight when they have almost as high or higher chance to kill you than the boss itself.
This guy is right!
ANet said multiple times, before the game was release, just what they thought about dungeons. They want them to be challenging content for a group of players that is willing to communicate among themselves. That does not mean using vent as it can easily be accomplished with the in game chat.
If you don’t want to communicate and expect everything to go smoothly, then that’s your fault. Try actually getting better at the game instead of QQing on the forums. A full Arah clear nets me 1.5s in repairs because I communicate with my group, mark targets to be focused down, and I don’t just go in with the highest DPS spec/gear makeup.
The majority of the pugs I’ve joined go like this: Group of 5 mobs agros > Everyone picks random mob to solo because they’re bamf’s > Group proceeds to wipe > After rezzing I start marking targets to be focused down > Mobs die, players live, dungeon complete.
I like how you assume that this is what this entire thread is about. Or that everyone plays like this pug you describe.
Gratz on your arah farming, thanks for lack of any constructive input, bye
No, he knew what the thread was about: Crybabies who cant handle a little challenge
Because fun can only be had when the instance is easy??? where are you reading this
The OP is saying that most of the fights ARE NOT FUN (which I agree with).
The concept does not have to do exclusively with the difficulty level. It is true that a lot of instances have an unnecessary high volume of unnecessarily dangerous trash (which if you find fun… kudos to you, but I don’t), in ADDITION to boring boss fights, crap mechanics, and crap rewards.Please re-read the thread title if still in doubt. Maybe wiki the definition of fun, and forward it to ANet while you’re at it.
I don’t find any SM particularly ‘hard’. CM WAS too easy, and not fun, but now it’s just frustrating due to the 10x trash increase, and STILL not fun.
If anything, I like the cat boss in TA (he’s definitely too easy) and twins in AC because they’re not your standard ‘dodge/heal/run’ crap of every other boss. Again, nothing to do with ‘difficulty’There would be less frustration with trash fights if they had original mechanics. But they’re all essentially the same, more or less, repeated over and over, sometimes in exorbitant amounts, which makes them boring, and therefore even more annoying to fight when they have almost as high or higher chance to kill you than the boss itself.
This guy is right!
P.S. I’m a chick
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