Guild Wars 2

Here is how I would make the dungeons more fun:

• Make dungeons none-linear. Multiple branching paths, with corridors that are randomly blocked, or locked and require a key (which also spawns in a random location, guarded by a boss).

• Get rid of the 3-paths + story mode idea. It sucks. You just end up with some people only wanting to farm the easiest path, and others being frustrated that path 3 is so hard. Just make it one dungeon, and allow players to pick their own route.

• Add randomized chests that spawn throughout the dungeon in random but predetermined locations. More chances of loot along the way, makes players want to explore the dungeon more, instead of rush through it.

• Add height differences to rooms with enemies in them, and allow players to make use of the height. If an enemy can hit the players, then the players can hit the enemy. None of that stupid “invulnerable” nonsense. I’m looking at you Fractal harpies!

• Add simple puzzles to the dungeons, that require the players to cooperate.

• Add traps that can be disabled, and that do not instantly kill or down a player.

• Add dynamic events to the dungeons.

• Allow every enemy in the dungeon to have a minor chance to drop rare crafting materials, such as ectos (like in GW1). And make sure they have a normal amount of health.

• Add enemy encounters that rely on more than just dodging or hitting the enemies with tons of damage till they die. Add enemies that actually require some form of strategy, like for example: An enemy that can only be hit with healing skills, an enemy that can only be damaged while knocked down or dazed, an enemy that must be crippled, enemies that explode when they get close to you, enemies that chase any player that moves from his/her place.

• Design boss encounters, so they do not require trial and error, and respect every profession. Players should be able to figure out a strategy during the battle, and not through constant respawning.

• Get rid of the reduced movement speed of the players when they are ‘in combat’. Allow players to make jumps regardless if they are under attack.

• Add simple platforming sections to dungeons, and optional paths for those that are bad at platforming.

• Add short underwater sections to land-based dungeons. Variety is the spice of life.

• Add fun obstacles halfway into the dungeon that prevent speed running it. Like for example, mini puzzles.

• Entirely get rid of cut scenes during dungeons, and get rid of Destiny’s Edge. This is about the adventures of the player and his/her party, not about this boring group of flat characters from a book. Make the dungeons focus on the players.

• Add un*que (why is this considered a swear word?) effects during the dungeon that make that dungeon stand out. For example, how about a dungeon where one player is supercharged and does double damage? The dungeon could have wells that provide this buff, allowing the party to boost one of their members to be like a tank. Or a buff that gives the players an aura that deflects projectiles? Or an aura that temporarily makes them immune to fire? Or how about a dungeon with low gravity? Or heavy gravity? Or both, with in each room a different strange effect.

• Allow players to use the traps in the dungeon to kill enemies. Any trap that harms the players, should harm monsters equally… Unless it is a flame trap, and the enemies are fire elementals. You get the idea, it should make sense.

• Rules should be relaxed, not strict and linear. Allow players to cheat a little to pass obstacles. Teleports and such should be allowed. In fact, make them part of the design, but also always make them an optional way to complete certain tasks. Players should not be forced to bring a specific skill.

• No challenges that rely on protecting an npc! Everyone hates babysitting.

• Add siege weaponry in some dungeons, that players can operate to kill foes.

• And last but not least, remove the 5-man cap for this kind of dungeon! Allow the same amount of players to enter the dungeon as you would in any explorable zone, and scale encounters and boss fights according to the amount of players participating. Force players out of the boss rooms when the boss is defeated, so they cannot wait for him to respawn. If you take your loot, you leave the dungeon.

And I know some of you are thinking about that last point, wouldn’t that make the dungeon too easy? Yes and no. Dungeons do not have to be difficult from start to finish. Parts in between should simply be fun, even if they are easy. Working together with other players should be fun, and thus the more the merrier. Boss encounters should be challenging, and thus scale to the number of players in it. Anything in between doesn’t have to be frustratingly difficult, just as long as its fun.

Wow, you guys play this game for a month or less?

Really weird topic..

Shadow.4871:

Wow, you guys play this game for a month or less?

Really weird topic..

Actually, what you talkin’ bout Willis?

Scourn.6498:

Ive loved dungeons in the secret world rift wow even warhammer online and my all time favorite DAOC. I absolutely hate dungeons in guild wars 2 , the devs here seem to think fun is having to dodge around an entire room or get 2 or 3 shotted even in full exotics and max level. Dungeons are made to be challenging yes , puzzles are challenging , mechanics are challeging , GW2 dungeons are not challenging , they are nightmares of dodging around a room and not dying while you dish out as much damage as you can.

I ran the new AC explorable after the patch and do not even want to touch it again . Troll was just annoying and took forever to kill. The stupid grave slinks kept getting to the npc like 10 times before our pug finally got them downed before the npc . This is just not fun at all mechanics , and pugs suffer for it making dungeon runs a chore and longer to complete.

So, what I gather from your post is you would rather get good gear and stand around spamming a hotkey than actively involve yourself in dungeon play.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

snip

So, basically you want dungeons to be open world explorable zones? Because you just described one. There are a whole lot of them already, you don’t need to make dungeons the same too.

I don’t really run dungeons either. I tried FoTM once and got turned off by it; it just isn’t my thing. I don’t touch them anymore, I prefer to do open world events.

It wouldn’t surprise me if there is an even split down the middle for people who either love them or hate them, and arena net could easily tackle this:

People are probably either doing dungeons because they actually like them or enjoy grouping for the challenge; then there are others who just want to get the rewards and get the hell out.

Fine, they could implement a sliding difficult scale; 1 being ridiculously easy and the highest number being harder than what we have now. No new rewards are given for the higher level of play.

What this does:

- Those who like the challenge and want to clear everything, fine you get your wish, don’t concern yourself with the other group that only want’s their rewards
- Those who want to get their gear and get out ASAP, fine you get your wish too, don’t concern yourself with the group that want’s the challenging play

Done, everybody worries about their own game play and only theirs.

A few thoughts…

So I started with an Elementalist. Was running full glass cannon cause “that’s what google told me to do.” Got plowed, furrowed, and planted. I was a frickin’ vegetable garden in dungeons. Switched to a more tanky gearset/build… and it worked fantastic. After a few weeks of really enjoying dungeons, I discovered I really wasn’t taking damage anymore cause I knew all the attacks, had the timing down, etc, so I swapped back to my glass cannon build for optimal face pwnage.

The lesson here is don’t try to play the game like an expert if you aren’t one. There are ways to make things easier on yourself. No one is expecting you to be uberleet in a pug.

Then I got bored with Elementalist and rolled a Warrior…

HOLY PUPPY…

It is incredibly stupid how much easier it is to play a warrior of any spec in a dungeon. This required next to no effort, most times I didn’t even have to bother dodging, and could just “be bad” and stand in the fire.

The lesson here is, seriously… switch to warrior… you will enjoy it a lot more if you have trouble in dungeons, cause you won’t… ever… again. Seriously… this game should be renamed Guild Warriors 2.

Other thoughts…

Learn your weapons, bring extra gear. So many fights can be made a lot easier with a weapon swap. For instance, as an Elementalist, if you only run dagger/dagger you are going to spend a lot of time dead, sometimes staff is best And a set of vitality,toughness,healing power gear can help a lot.

Don’t dodge every attack. You really don’t need to. Same for cure conditions. So what if you’re crippled if the boss isn’t AoEing or directly attacking you? Wait until you see a red circle or he turns your direction. For most (all?) classes, you should have a stunbreak/condition cleanse that has no activation timer.

As an aside… people who think WoW is easier than GW2 mystify me… did you not play during Vanilla, BC, or WotLK when many of the fights required absolute perfection for 15 solid minutes or you were going to be restarting? Nothing in GW2 required the kind of effort that WoW raid instances, or heroic dungeons did. I have no idea how it is now, I got tired of playing a game that required 30+ hours a week just to be competitive with other players.

CAVEAT EMPTOR

Lots of stuff in GW2 dungeons has way too much health. These are mobs that are not challenging, or difficult, they are often just very tedious.

Also… Mossman, and the Norn in CoE. They spend way, way, way too much time unattackable. Making me sit around and do nothing, or even just run around dodging forever… is not fun!

Tuomir.1830:

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

snip

So, basically you want dungeons to be open world explorable zones? Because you just described one.

No I didn’t. Did you only read the last part of my post? I listed a ton of things that could be added to make dungeons more fun. What I’m also suggesting, is to make GW2’s dungeon design more coherent with the rest of the game. The entire PVE game revolves around letting players have fun together, and partake in epic dynamic events… so why are the dungeons 5-man linear grind fests with no dynamic events at all? Did they go lazy when designing the dungeons? I really see no reason why a dungeon couldn’t be open to more players, and why it couldn’t have dynamic events.

Dungeons can be more fun. You don’t need to add difficulty sliders, just make them more fun. How hard is that? Difficulty has nothing to do with that. Right now the difficulty argument is nothing but an excuse to defend a lack of fun-factor.

There are dynamic events in some dungeons, you clearly haven’t had much experience in them yet you seem to think yourself an expert when it comes to enjoying dungeons. And yes, I read the whole thing, and mostly everything can be fully experienced in the open world, I don’t see why you want to go to dungeons to find them.

“Constant respawning”, for an example, is nowadays impossible, which you would know if you had done dungeons lately. Waypoints can only be used when the whole party is out of combat.

Now, I’m not saying all of your ideas were bad. In fact, i quite liked a few of them. But, to me it seemed like you weren’t trying to improve on dungeons, you were trying to change dungeons in to what you like. Worlds apart. If you don’t like dungeons at all, then don’t play dungeons, it’d be just silly to turn them into something else altogether than what they fundamentally are, just because you or a few other casual players don’t like it.

I enjoy dungeons. Am I asking for the open world to be changed into instances like was in GW1 and for them to add a hard mode for it? I’m not. Do not ask for the dungeons to be changed into open world PvE.

Tuomir.1830:

There are dynamic events in some dungeons, you clearly haven’t had much experience in them yet you seem to think yourself an expert when it comes to enjoying dungeons.

“Constant respawning”, for an example, is nowadays impossible, which you would know if you had done dungeons lately.

But, to me it seemed like you weren’t trying to improve on dungeons, you were trying to change dungeons in to what you like.

There are an awful lot of assumptions in that post of yours, all of which are wrong. I do dungeons daily, and I’ve almost completed all of them, except Arah (because I refuse to do it). And generally speaking, dungeons do not have dynamic events. That one troll in AC doesn’t count. The dungeons are linear encounters, all of them. A long row of obstacles, with just one path. And I’ve done them all, including one of the paths in Arah.

Constant respawning is in fact possible, because every group that dies has to respawn and try again, until they make it. That is constant respawning. That is how most boss fights work in GW2’s dungeons. You do not learn the pattern of the boss during the fight itself. No, you learn it by dying, fixing your armor, waiting for your whole team to wipe, then respawn and try again… till at long last you grind your way through. My point was, that boss fights do not have to be this way. You can make a challenging boss that doesn’t repeatedly wipe player parties and forces them to respawn and try again. That was my point.

Changing dungeons to what I like, and improving dungeons is the same thing. I’ve played dozens of dungeons in many other games, including GW1. And I had my issues with GW1’s dungeons as well, but they were a heck of a lot more fun than any of GW2’s dungeons. GW1’s dungeons were in fact like giant explorables. Take Underworld for example, or Fissure of Woe. Giant explorable dungeons with multiple quests to do in any order that you like. My fellow guildies used to love doing dungeons. One taste of GW2’s dungeons and they never want to do them again! Something is clearly wrong with the design of these dungeons. They were rushed along with GW2 itself, and did not receive as much design as for example Fractals did. There is plenty to improve.

I do not expect everyone to agree with me, my post was simply a response to this:

Poindexter.8329:

Now that we have a decent list of things wrong with the dungeons how do you think we can fix them.

And that’s what I did, provide a list with ideas on how to fix them. It’s a heck of a lot better than everyone whining that the dungeons are too hard. Simply point out what you dislike, and how you would fix it. We need more constructive threads like that.

Tuomir.1830:

yet you seem to think yourself an expert when it comes to enjoying dungeons

I design levels for a living.

Well I do apologize if I had a wrong impression of you, but I can’t help it if what you write gives out an image that contradicts what you are saying.

A group that respawns after being wiped and just runs back in without thinking is a stupid group. It’s not fun playing in a stupid group, that much I agree on.

Also, while it does hold weight that you design levels for a living, dungeons are a very specific type of levels, catering to a different group of players than most levels, as I’m sure you know better than I do. I’m sure you’re good at what you do for a living, but unless you design hardcore dungeons for multiplayer games, the relevancy of it is not so major as to rise your opinion above that of others on this topic.
If changing the dungeons to what you like changes them to something they never were, that’s not the same thing as improving them. If you like cats more than dogs, and so change your dog to a cat, that doesn’t mean the dog is improved.

Tuomir.1830:

Well I do apologize if I had a wrong impression of you, but I can’t help it if what you write gives out an image that contradicts what you are saying.

I replied to the previous post with a list of ideas. It is up to the reader to see that as a snobby post that implies “I’m know so much better than you how to improve dungeons” when at no point in the entire post is that ever suggested. So why the half apology?

Tuomir.1830:

A group that respawns after being wiped and just runs back in without thinking is a stupid group. It’s not fun playing in a stupid group, that much I agree on.

I didn’t say anything about a stupid group. Most groups are very careful to plan their strategy, and then get wiped again, and have to respawn. That is how a lot of the boss encounters go the first few times. You get punished for trying, and it ends in a wipe… and then you respawn and try again. My point was, boss encounters can be designed in such a way that they do not punish players for trying. Why all the constant wipes? Trial and error is bad design!

Tuomir.1830:

but unless you design hardcore dungeons for multiplayer games, the relevancy of it is not so major as to rise your opinion above that of others on this topic.

You are the only one implying that I’m rising my opinion above others, and attacking me for doing something I’m not doing.

Also, basic design principles still apply regardless what type of level you create. Like the most important question in level design: is this fun? (Also, I have designed levels for multi-player games)

Further more, if there is anything that I have had extensive experience with, its designing traps, obstacles and hazards that are fair, and fun. This is mostly why I see so many flaws with the obstacles in dungeons that annoy so many people. This doesn’t mean my opinion is superior to others (as you seem to imply constantly), but it means I have plenty of ideas, as one might expect. I’m sure I’m not the only one with ideas to improve the dungeons.

Tuomir.1830:

If changing the dungeons to what you like changes them to something they never were, that’s not the same thing as improving them. If you like cats more than dogs, and so change your dog to a cat, that doesn’t mean the dog is improved.

That’s a bit of a strawman argument. Because re-visioning what a dungeon in GW2 could be, can be the same as improving them. For example FRACTALS is an example of completely changing how dungeons work. And considering the popularity, I think we can pretty much all agree that most people find Fractals more fun to do than the original dungeons. So I couldn’t disagree with you more.

Fractals are not dungeons. They are similar to dungeons in how they work, but they have their key differences, and they weren’t a replacement for dungeons. So, they’re a different thing, that’s more popular than dungeons. That doesn’t make them an improvement of dungeons.

If you read attacks and implications from my posts, rest assured, no such thing is written, though such could be read. However, if you write down something into your post that includes an argument, I hold the right as a reader to evaluate it’s relevancy. Perhaps my way of pointing it out irks you?

Again, I do not know of your work experience. Do not expect me to know it after reading that you design levels for a living.

And about finding a strategy against a boss through trial and error. There I am going to have to say that we simply have different tastes. For me, it’s immensely gratifying to finally crack open a boss fight that has stopped my party for a long time. I understand that not everyone might like it, but to me, it’s a vital part of experiencing hard content.

Half apology? I apologized for misjudging you. However, I felt that my actions needed no such apology, as I could only accordingly to what I knew at the time.

Tuomir.1830:

Fractals are not dungeons. They are similar to dungeons in how they work, but they have their key differences, and they weren’t a replacement for dungeons. So, they’re a different thing, that’s more popular than dungeons. That doesn’t make them an improvement of dungeons.

Yes they are.

• You team up for them with a group of 5.
• There are some sections you need to navigate, including hazards and enemies.
• There’s a boss at the end that drops rare loot.

That’s a dungeon. Fractals are dungeons by every definition! Now I can speculate why Fractals were released so shortly after the game’s release. The fact that they are now addressing dungeons such as AC one by one tells us one very important thing: Anet is aware many people have issues with the quality of the dungeons, and they are working to make them all better, starting with AC. That is as close to a redesign of the dungeons as is reasonably possible.

It would not surprise me if Anet was aware of the poor reception of the dungeons, and released Fractals to show us that dungeons in GW2 can be fun. They are clearly an improvement. Several of the most annoying aspects of the original dungeons are addressed in Fractals, such as:

• Hazards don’t instantly kill you, but teleport you back to the start of the challenge, and down you (so you can be revived). An improvement over the constant armor repairs that people suffered from in the original dungeons.
• Bosses all feature some interesting mechanics, rather than being big damage sponges.
• Every Fractal has unique features, such as the cold mechanic in the Snowblind Fractal, or the hammer of corruption in the Cliffside Fractal.
• Fractals feature jumping puzzles! Something the original dungeons hardly do at all.
• Fractals feature a central hub that has a merchant for easy access right where you enter the dungeon.
• Fractals has an entrance in a town, rather than an explorable, and does not require any events to be opened.
• Fractals adds a form of progression in the form of ascended gear.

This is sliding into an argument on semantics, but I’ll have still one more swing…

Let’s define [dungeons] as the 8 dungeons at launch, as they are so in every sense, and at the time of launch there were no other areas that could have been included.

Now, let’s see if we can fit [fractals] into [dungeons]. They work similarly, they share many mechanisms, but they aren’t quite the same. Here are some of the key differences (while they may seem irrelevant, bear with me) -

Fractal tokens belong in a different rarity group than dungeon tokens

Fractals of the Mists consists of multiple small zones separated by loading screen, unlike dungeons

They hold no dungeon rank enemies

Now, we have established loosely that FotM is not like the rest of the dungeons. It does not belong into the group [dungeons], though it belongs to the group [[dungeons][FotM]], where dungeons also belong.

A little breather.

Now, I’m not denying what you are saying about FotM being an example of how the dungeons could be. I’m also not denying that the dungeons currently have problems, they do. And I am not saying that making the original dungeons more like FotM in some ways would not be good.

Onwards.

Now, to my key argument. If one were to take [dungeons], and give them properties from [FotM], while still retaining they key features from [dungeons], they would still be dungeons, but they might be improved. However, if one were to take all the properties from [FotM] or [open world PvE] or whatever one might, put them into [dungeons], and take out what was originally there or cover it up, that group would no longer be [dungeons], it would be [FotM] or [open world PvE]. And that would in no way be improving, it would be replacing.

And that’s the point of this whole essay.

Tuomir.1830:

Now, to my key argument. If one were to take [dungeons], and give them properties from [FotM], while still retaining they key features from [dungeons], they would still be dungeons, but they might be improved. However, if one were to take all the properties from [FotM] or [open world PvE] or whatever one might, put them into [dungeons], and take out what was originally there or cover it up, that group would no longer be [dungeons], it would be [FotM] or [open world PvE]. And that would in no way be improving, it would be replacing.

And that’s the point of this whole essay.

That’s not an argument at all. You are basically saying that if you put all the properties of Fractals, or of a PVE explorable, into a dungeon, that it wouldn’t be a dungeon any more. Who is arguing that? No one! It is not even an argument at all, and it has no relevance to any of the ideas I posted for improving dungeons.

Also, you are arguing semantics about the category dungeons, which is just stupid. Fractals are qualified as being dungeons. They were added later, and they don’t have separate story/explorable modes, but they ARE dungeons. End of story, no more semantics please. http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Dungeon (<—Fractals are listed in there)

This however, IS an argument: Incoherent design

WvW is coherently designed when compared to PVE

WvW and PVE are different from each other, but not that different. That we all realize. They are basically still the same game; allowing you to fight hostile creatures, harvest resources, and even do jumping puzzles. They are like a giant PVE zone with pvp in it.

Dungeons are incoherently designed when compared to PVE

Dungeons on the other hand are very different. They break away from the design philosophy that is present throughout the game, and introduce what feel like outdated MMO rules about what a dungeon should be like. It is as if Anet reinvented the genre, but then neglected to expand this same philosophy to the dungeons. There is a matter of incoherent design going on there, and I think that is part of the reason why many of the dungeons are considered “not fun”, where as many of the explorables ARE considered fun. Everything fun about PVE gameplay seems to have been stripped away for the dungeons, where this isn’t the case for WvW. My question is, why?

Because you do not need to strip any of those fun elements away. You could keep all of that fun stuff still in there, but within the environment of a dungeon. The best example of this is Flame Temple Tombs, which shows that it can be done perfectly, and with tons of players! This already exists in the game!

Now keep in mind, I never suggested how these ideas would be implemented. Nor did I suggest that ALL of them should be implemented. It was merely a list of ideas of how dungeons IN GENERAL could be better. I didn’t say anything about implementing these changes in existing dungeons. Frankly, I really hope some of these ideas would be used for any future dungeon content (I also think the existing dungeons might be beyond salvaging).

Tuomir.1830:

Let’s define [dungeons] as the 8 dungeons at launch, as they are so in every sense, and at the time of launch there were no other areas that could have been included.

…

Now, we have established loosely that FotM is not like the rest of the dungeons. It does not belong into the group [dungeons], though it belongs to the group [[dungeons][FotM]], where dungeons also belong.

ANet defines fractals as a dungeon. The title of the blog which introduced FotM was, “The Fractals of the Mist Dungeon.” The first sentence was, “A mission to bring all of you an awesome, high-end dungeon experience that will be challenging, rewarding, and a ton of fun!” Apparently, being unlike the other dungeons in some ways did not impact the developer’s classification of the content.

Mad King and Tixx were also classified as dungeons. Perhaps you should revisit your assumptions.

Ah, I’m sorry if I didn’t make myself clear, I often think things in abstract concepts, so it’s sometimes difficult for me to explain what I mean to others. My argument was consistent with the previous posts, referring to the question about improving. This was relevant to whether or not applying chances that would replace some of the key elements of dungeons be improving dungeons, even if some or even majority would find the result better.

I don’t really see the incoherent design you are talking about, as dungeons are inherently a different kind of experience compared to the rest of PvE. Sure, there could be more to it, but I can honestly say that I enjoy them, and so do many others. And I can say that I would enjoy them far less if they were open to groups of any size and so on, as the instanced nature and party limitation presents the opportunity for the designers to fine tune the difficulty (though I admit, it’s not always a success) higher than in a similar setup but with a varying amount of players. The challenge added by this fine tuning is the major draw-in to dungeons for me.

And as a side note, Fractals do not count as dungeons for achievements, so technically, they aren’t grouped as dungeons ingame. As for my argument, I separated them to be able to use it as a valid example.

After learning the dungeon mechanics, wiping should be very, very rare. I finish almost every dungeon run without a single damaged piece of armor.

Thanks for the post, I agree dungeons like AC just aren’t fun. I used to do AC before the patch a lot, now I’m just avoiding it at all costs and focusing more on WvW. Even though we’re always greatly outnumbered in the latter (from as low as 3:1 to as high as 5:1) and I’ve accumulated thrice as many deaths as in the entire PvE experience combined, I’m still having a lot of fun doing it and still keep on joining the fight. AC is too hard & costly, too repetitive, no fun, and the bosses and mobs are just ridiculous. I can understand people having to group on bosses, but adds…???

I’m not gonna argue to nerf AC anymore and they can even go and quadruple the difficulty on other dungeons as well, I really couldn’t give less of a fridge. However, their mindless actions are slowly but surely going to take the M out of MMO.

My personal experience with dungeons is still fairly limited, but if there’s one thing I can surely agree with, it’s the “trash is too tough” sentiment.

Bosses? I think most of them are OK as they are, or close. I have no problem with the need to learn their mechanics, but sheer number of high HP silver mobs with plethora of disabling skills tends to raise tedium/annoyance bar above acceptable levels. Funny thing is, with PUG’s I play typically more wipes are caused by “trash” mobs then boss fights. Even a new group will typically grasp boss mechanics at some point and push through, but give them a bad enough trash group, and there’ll be problems. Lots. Something seems off here.

Current changes (AC only, but let’s assume it’s the new trend) are sort of a mixed bag for me. I agree with some parts (OHKO scavengers, good riddance; new spider is hard, used to be nearly harmless… need to adapt), disagree with some (making “defend NPC” quests more challenging just adds frustration and makes certain class combinations higher priority… bad bad bad), and I just can’t believe a few (so, they took time to “improve” entire dungeon and I still see “obstructed” burrows and people falling through wall in Hodgins room? Wow, just wow).

Other than that, I rather like dungeon design. At my skill level I find them difficult, but fun nonetheless, getting through new one gives me a – kind of funny – sense of achievement and I can get the skins I want if I put enough effort into it. Seems more or less fine IMO.

I think dungeons in GW2 are absolutely miserable, and there are several factors why, many of which have been touched on in this thread. Honestly, many of the players on both sides of this argument (meaning these dungeons are awful vs. dungeons are great l2p) have actually mentioned some of the same things;

Challenge is good. Tedium is dreadful. Rewards are good. Lack of reward for effort is dreadful. Fun is good. Boredom is dreadful.

People just disagree over the best way to implement changes to take advantage of what we all want to love about dungeoning. Our level designer poster is correct; there IS such a thing as poor level design and design decisions that punish the player. Many of the players who think the dungeons are fine are doing things like skipping content, exploiting weaknesses, and making use of one known method of beating a dungeon to repeatedly run it for reward. This is not wrong. It means those players are extremely clever at working the current system to their advantage. And that is a skill, and that takes a build, and that means they are very good at their workarounds. Great.

That does not mean the dungeons are well-designed, though, and that is not a knock on the people who think they are fine. People who prefer beating clever level design are disappointed by things like a dungeon being hard because every trash mob has 1,000,000 HP. Not because we are n00bs or are too dumb to figure out that we should skip that room, but because we wanted a cleverly designed room we wanted to stay in and beat, not a room or a path or a set of mobs that ‘everyone knows you should skip.’ Advice like ‘omg just roll a ______ class, lol’ misses the point. Some of us aren’t in dungeons because it is the fastest way to shinies. We are there because we enjoy the game and enjoy the character we leveled for 80 levels, and like teamwork (and shinies).

The argument that ‘well dungeons are for tricking yourself out to manage the one way to get around that particular instance of crappy design…why don’t you know that yet??’ well… I have to ask; why are you okay with the design as is? Don’t you want a living game like this be be improved? Not made easier; improved.

I want this game to encourage teamwork and a varied party; I liked the posted idea of having some bosses vulnerable to healing spells, for example. Can you imagine what kind of cooldown management that would take? If we were all dodging and freaking out trying to time our heal cooldowns, instead of standing barely in range and ranging off the Nine Billion boss hitpoints, I think that would be way more fun.

Anyway; I loved Heroics in SWTOR, there were some WoW dungeons I liked a lot. I think GW2’s dungeons need some love.

I have seldom enjoyed dungeons/dungeon-type areas in an MMO more than I enjoy GW2 dungeons.

Dungeons are fine. Though some 999999999health bosses just make you fall asleep

DeathPanel.8362:

Nilkemia.8507:

Not for me anyway.

Fighting regular enemies with near champion level HP requiring all 5 players to focus fire for 3 to 5 minutes isn’t fun.

Getting killed in 5 hits at best and 2 at worst isn’t fun.

Having to sit there dead because I can’t just waypoint and run back until everyone’s dead or the others retreat isn’t fun.

Getting rewards that aren’t worth the time isn’t fun.

I just don’t get this. I’ve tried the story mode of every dungeon except Citadel of Flame, and it’s more or less the above happening all the time. So far, I’ve only ever beaten Twilight Arbor story and Arah story. All the other times, it just got so frustrating that we’d just give up.

So, what do any of you see in these dungeons that I’m not seeing? Because right now I can’t imagine anyone wanting to do these the 50 or so times each it takes to get the gear from those vendors.

Welcome to every single mmorpg game.

I have never had this issue until GW2 dungeons. Though to be accurate and state I am not exaggerating, in some other mmo’s there are sometimes a few dungeons out of the entire list of dungeons that are too difficult for me. In this game it’s every one of them. This is very different then all the other mmo’s, this is not common.

FWIW I’m over in Neverwinter’s forums trying to get them to make their content have a hint of challenge. Stupid easy.

I like the dungeons. I find them challenging. I also find that, like most challenges, they are hard at first yet easy once you figure them out. Just like jumping puzzles.

I know they are doable b/c my gf (who played the SIMS prior to this) can handle them with instruction from me.

If you don’t like them, that’s fine. However, there are very few encounters that I would deem “unfair” after seeing them 2 or 3 times. If they are not worth your time, then don’t do them. I sure as hell enjoy them and hope they add more now that they have a handle on encounter creation.

diamondgirl.6315:

Advice like ‘omg just roll a ______ class, lol’ misses the point. Some of us aren’t in dungeons because it is the fastest way to shinies. We are there because we enjoy the game and enjoy the character we leveled for 80 levels, and like teamwork (and shinies).
…
I want this game to encourage teamwork and a varied party; I liked the posted idea of having some bosses vulnerable to healing spells, for example. Can you imagine what kind of cooldown management that would take? If we were all dodging and freaking out trying to time our heal cooldowns, instead of standing barely in range and ranging off the Nine Billion boss hitpoints, I think that would be way more fun.

Nothing against improvement to dungeons but that specific idea is terrible. We already have an indirect version of that in the new AC. With Grast being an idiot you basically have to heal him to keep him alive so you can actually fight the boss. More of that would not make dungeons better.

I’ll admit that particular point is a bit of a stretch but even if you ignore that, healing skills simply do not work that way for at least half of the classes. That is going directly back to “LF healer”. The dredge mining suit/ice elemental/jellyfish in fractals is a better implementation of a similar idea.

Khisanth.2948:

Nothing against improvement to dungeons but that specific idea is terrible. We already have an indirect version of that in the new AC. With Grast being an idiot you basically have to heal him to keep him alive so you can actually fight the boss. More of that would not make dungeons better.

We’re not talking about healing npc’s and keeping them alive. In fact, in my list of ideas to improve dungeons, I specifically stated that babysit quests should be avoided at all costs, since everyone hates to babysit an npc. No, what I was talking about, is using certain skills in unconventional ways. Most bosses are simply a matter of hammering them with skills till they run out of health. I thought it would be interesting to have opponents that respond differently to skills than what you are used to. A boss that is vulnerable to healing skills was but a random idea, but this point was mostly about the concept of giving bosses unique traits that make that boss fight more interesting.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Khisanth.2948:

Nothing against improvement to dungeons but that specific idea is terrible. We already have an indirect version of that in the new AC. With Grast being an idiot you basically have to heal him to keep him alive so you can actually fight the boss. More of that would not make dungeons better.

We’re not talking about healing npc’s and keeping them alive. In fact, in my list of ideas to improve dungeons, I specifically stated that babysit quests should be avoided at all costs, since everyone hates to babysit an npc. No, what I was talking about, is using certain skills in unconventional ways. Most bosses are simply a matter of hammering them with skills till they run out of health. I thought it would be interesting to have opponents that respond differently to skills than what you are used to. A boss that is vulnerable to healing skills was but a random idea, but this point was mostly about the concept of giving bosses unique traits that make that boss fight more interesting.

Yes. That. ^ Babysitting is awful, and no one likes it.

Some people like the dungeons, and that’s fine; I am not saying anyone who likes them is wrong. But I am curious; most players have done the dungeons a million times anyway … even if you like them, wouldn’t you like more challenging content?

Another poster above mentioned that for him, at first dungeons were hard, but now they are easy. Well… wouldn’t you like them to be a challenge again, at least the first few times? Updating them with content designed to appeal to more people (and I am not saying nerfing, or making it easier – hell, I want it more complicated for the most part) would be like getting a whole new set of dungeons!

Turgut.4397:

Dungeons are not fun. Plain and simple. I 100% agree with the OP. Now there’s all the elitist GW2 fan boys defending it, as their own ‘challenge’ and that it’s fine as it is.

Far from it.

There’s challenge. And then there’s completely, and utterly stupid. Dungeon’s are simply not fun, because you’re bombarded with knockdowns, stuns, conditions, launches, knockbacks, etc. More than you can handle with the endurance recharge rate, all the stability/cc removal skills. That’s the problem. There is simply NO balance in dungeons.

Now some are saying, players enjoy different parts of the game, while the others enjoy this and that. Why can’t all aspects of the game be fun for everyone? Or at least do-able?

I’ve been playing since pre-launch, and I’ve probably only done half the dungeons. I regret to say each one was a frustrating experience. But why wouldn’t it be, when I’m being cut down in seconds, even in my tank gear/build, from constant AoE and CC?

I can dodge attacks, sure. I can block for a few seconds, ok. Knocked down? I’ll just pop that stability. Conditions on me, heal/remove them. Oh wait. The mobs seem to have no cooldown on any of these abilities, nor a cast bar of some sort (major flaw in the game’s design, KEY aspect of GW1) so I’m unable to react in time. All my major CC removal skills are on minute long cooldowns, while I’m being tossed around like a ball and unable to do anything while everyone’s dying and desperately hoping they can get a revive or two in, before the mobs go on another multi-CC frenzy every second.

The MAIN issue with dungeons is BALANCE. To be fair, ANet hasn’t disappointed me with balance (give or take a few cough OP classes/builds on new expansions cough) and have fixed the problems regarding them (eventually).

Well, inb4 the ‘go l2p nub’ crowd show up, and blindly defend the most terribly flawed area of the game.

Tbh with you I don’t have any issue with playing the dungeons and I’m no fan girl, they’re not bad in my books. The learning curve can be a steep one for the casual player, everyone remembers their first AC at lvl 35, it was a travesty! As a hardcore myself I would say that after a week or so you start to understand mechanics and when to dodge, what builds to run and what traits, it all starts to become entrenched in your mind, reactions come naturally, and within months you find yourself running ‘just another boring dungeon’ in a full zerker set, trying to get the run done ASAP so you can move onto the next one.

What irks me is the awful rewards. They just aren’t worth doing once you have your gear set (very quick and easy to get once you’ve got into the groove) and have run them enough to grind out a legendary. You have no real reason to return after that.. After explorable dungeons, you find yourself grinding away at FOTM for skins you know may never drop… And none of your friends want to join you because they know how pointless fotm is.

This is not so much a learn to play issue as it is a practice makes perfect thing. You know how to play, I’m sure, but when it comes to a dungeon you may just need more time and (perhaps) a better team.

Ps- I certainly agree that dungeons are far from perfect, there are some things that defiantly need to be looked at. One of those being trash mob hitpoints which discourage a great deal of people from killing them and another being NPC reliance resulting in bugs/glitches that stop the dungeon from being able to be finished.

Dungeons are meant to be the most challenging part of the game, so if you don’t like being challenged then yeah you won’t like it.

I just obtained my dungeon master title a few days ago and I have to say I love most of the dungeons in this game. I have familiarized myself with every dungeon in this game and am currently helping the rest of my guild through them. I am a firm believer that if you learn the mechanics, listen to instructions and work with your party you start to find dungeons to be fun.

Take the arah explorable dungeon for example. People say that it’s the hardest dungeon in the game and going through it the first time, I agree. After spending an hour on lupi my first group gave up and it was no fun. And I understand that’s where a lot of people who don’t like dungeons are. Hell, I avoided arah like the plague for months. But I found myself people who knew how to run the dungeon, learned the mechanics and listened to the strategies, and I beat the dungeon. And then I convinced some guild mates to come with me next time and I taught them everything I learned and now they love it and we have arah on farm mode.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that everybody gets frustrated at these dungeons at first, but if you find fun people to play with, strategize with them, and learn the fights, learn your class and most importantly, remember that you work for the benefit of your team, not just yourself, you will breeze through these dungeons and most likely enjoy them much more. Also it is important that you try different strategies when you are having trouble. What didn’t work before most likely will not work again, and it is amazing how a change in weapon/utility or even positioning can turn a fight in your favour.

Note: I do agree that many trash mobs hit too hard/too often and have too much health and anet will have to rebalance that. And I know sometimes its frustrating dealing with l33t players who have no patience in helping others, but there are people who will help you. You just have to play the game and seek them out.

Irena.1062:

Dungeons are meant to be the most challenging part of the game, so if you don’t like being challenged then yeah you won’t like it.

You are not really addressing the issue. The issue is that the dungeons aren’t fun at all. It has nothing to do with difficulty or being challenged.

There’s challenging and fun, and then there’s challenging and not fun. The dungeons are not fun, and that’s a big problem. Lots of players are avoiding the dungeons, not because they don’t want to be challenged, but because they find them a pain to sit through. There’s hardly any enjoyment to be had from them. And of course every player has a different definition of fun, and there are of course players that do enjoy them as they currently are. But is there anyone against making them “more fun”? Not easier, but more entertainment value in them?

Its staggering the kind of reactions I’ve heard from players that used to love doing dungeons in other MMO’s (Including GW1). Just recently after completing CoF P3 our leader said “Now I know what it’s like giving birth”. And shortly after release a guildy doing TA storymode said “I’m never doing dungeons again, this was a nightmare”.

I doubt this is the response anet was hoping for.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Irena.1062:

Dungeons are meant to be the most challenging part of the game, so if you don’t like being challenged then yeah you won’t like it.

You are not really addressing the issue. The issue is that the dungeons aren’t fun at all. It has nothing to do with difficulty or being challenged.

There’s challenging and fun, and then there’s challenging and not fun. The dungeons are not fun, and that’s a big problem. Lots of players are avoiding the dungeons, not because they don’t want to be challenged, but because they find them a pain to sit through. There’s hardly any enjoyment to be had from them. And of course every player has a different definition of fun, and there are of course players that do enjoy them as they currently are. But is there anyone against making them “more fun”? Not easier, but more entertainment value in them?

Its staggering the kind of reactions I’ve heard from players that used to love doing dungeons in other MMO’s (Including GW1). Just recently after completing CoF P3 our leader said “Now I know what it’s like giving birth”. And shortly after release a guildy doing TA storymode said “I’m never doing dungeons again, this was a nightmare”.

I doubt this is the response anet was hoping for.

You already gave the only reasonable response to this thread in your own post. Everyone has a different take on what is fun, and many people find it fun already. Unless you are saying there is nothing else you find fun in GW2, then you should allow those people the content they find entertaining and do what YOU find entertaining.

Oolune.4357:

You already gave the only reasonable response to this thread in your own post. Everyone has a different take on what is fun, and many people find it fun already. Unless you are saying there is nothing else you find fun in GW2, then you should allow those people the content they find entertaining and do what YOU find entertaining.

At what point did I suggest not allowing people that like dungeons to enjoy their content?

I think I said exactly the opposite. I suggested making the dungeons more fun than they currently are. Not easier. More fun. More being the operative word here.

Some players (I don’t know if they are many) find dungeons fun the way they are. But how can anyone be against making them more fun? It is okay to have higher standards, and expect more from an MMO. We know Anet can deliver much better dungeons content, and these dungeons were just made rather sloppy. It is okay to ask them to make them better. That is not going to ruin dungeons, or make them easier. It is not going to take away anyone’s fun.

I’m actually curious now about how you’d go about making them more fun without making them easier – I’m sure there are ways, I’m just interested to hear if you have specific ideas.

Tuomir.1830:

I’m actually curious now about how you’d go about making them more fun without making them easier – I’m sure there are ways, I’m just interested to hear if you have specific ideas.

Well, I think you’d have to either tackle the enemies, or the environment. Part of the work is already been done by giving the bosses an overhaul. But you could also give trash mobs interesting mechanics, rather than just the classic wack ’m till they drop.

Environments can be made more interesting by for example spawning random content throughout the dungeons. You can add extra treasure chests that appear in different spots every time you run the dungeon, and which appear in different quantities every time you run the dungeon. If it isn’t just the typical linear affair, but also a bit of exploration and treasure hunting, dungeons could be a lot more fun.

Dungeons can be given special effects and features, like they’ve done in the Fractals. Like the hammer of corruption, or the cold effect in the snowblind fractal.

They could add additional goals to the dungeon. Right now it’s simply a matter of walking from A to B and killing the boss. But why not walk from A to C, back to A, then to B? Why not give more optional goals that can deliver additional loot?

They could add resource nodes to the dungeon, like in explorables. This would give players additional things to do in the dungeons.

They could make traps work both ways. Allow players to lure enemies into traps, instead of them always been immune to traps (Yes, I know there is one pre-designed part in AC that forces you to use traps, but only those traps and nowhere else). The moment you allow additional strategies, is when the game becomes more than tank ’n spank.

Allow players to make use of height differences. None of that invulnerable nonsense. What is the point of having a ranged weapon, if you can’t position yourself on a vantage point? So what if an enemy can’t reach you, that’s the point of higher ground. If this makes enemies too easy, add flying enemies and enemies with ranged weapons.

Add puzzles with levers and gates. Doesn’t have to be complicated, but give us something to do apart from clearing mobs of canon fodder.

Just a few ideas.

Yes, those indeed would be welcome improvements. While some of those things are already in some dungeons, at least partially (blossoms in TA, for example, I’d count as dungeon specific feature), there’s a plenty of space for more.

I don’t mind dungeons but I don’t really like them either. I’ve crafted all my exotic sets so Dungeon tokens aren’t really a necessity for me but I will farm a dungeon if I like the look of an armor set.

I have played a lot of MMO’s and through the journey I’ve played the role of a Tank, Healer and DPS. My impressions of Dungeons in Guild Wars 2 are basically a 5man zerg fest, with cheap enemy tactics/skills and annoying boss fights witch require exact timing and execution.

But the most frustrating thing for me is the constant dodging required to stay alive. Not everyone lives and plays in the US and not everyone has good latency. I am in Australia and because of my latency I need to be 2 seconds ahead of the game. It gets extremely frustrating when you think you have dodged an enemy attack only to see your character rubber band to his/hers previous position and get one shotted by an enemies attack because of the 1 – 2 second delay.

The entire premise, “dungeons aren’t fun at all” is subjective opinion. There can be no winner in this argument.

Arguements seem to lead back towards “GW2 dungeons aren’t like WoW so they aren’t as fun” kind of message. But if they were like WoW then the arguement would be “whats so great about GW2 dungeons? WoW already has done this only they have much more content”. Or at least that seems to be the message I got out of reading the posts.

GW2 is different. Some people embrace that and others dont. In GW2 you run dungeons for tokens and the extremely low chance of getting an exotic along the way. In a lot of the cases they made trash skippable, your choice. Bosses can be rather unforgiving in cases where you are underexperienced or mess up. But as with all PvE content the bosses are predictable. After you’ve experienced you almost never die on that boss again.

Things I dont miss are:

-groups having to wait around 45 minutes to find a tank and healer to meet the holy trinity design
-finally finding a holy trinity group only to find that your tank can’t tank and/or your healer can’t heal so your group falls apart half way thru a dungeon. Then your stuck looking for replacements.
-having to clear trash like in other mmo’s but those dungeons taking 90-120 min to clear.
-having to run a dungeon 15 times waiting for your piece of armor to finally drop and having someone who ran it once outroll you on it.

I’ve played nearly every mmo and had some degree of fun in all of them. There are upsides and downsides to them all. I never played GW1 but in GW2 its more of a think outside of the box kind of mmo. Only there is no monthly fee!

The problem here is that one guys idea of greatness is another guys idea of pointless suffering.

I agree with the OP, dungoneering is “not” fun, and the real issue is that some guys who complained it was too easy have no consideration for those who didnt get the chance to “enjoy” the easy mode, so those guys who now have the best gear already, and thus have no real reason to return to dungoneering ANYWAY now have the best gear while others have to work EVEN harder to attain it than they did.

This, pointless, backwards, elite-based logic needs to die in a fire somewhere and never return, preferably in an inferno.

The fact is, the difficulty of dungeons should scale based upon the personal choice of the player, if the player doesnt WANT to try hard why should they be MADE to? Sure, im prepaired to take longer than the other guy to get my epics but that does NOT mean I should have no right to get them.

Heres how I see the system working:

1. Its clear that dungoeons are flat out ignored in favour of fractals anyway for the hardcore farmer, rarley are they used anymore because people have no reason to go back to them in favour of fractal gaming, and im looking at you, hardcores.
(solution:) Make dungoneering easier while upping the anti on fractals, make fractals the end game focus for hardcores and dungeons, including explorable mode, more casual and easy to do, because they are purley there for vanity and story anyway.

2. Give hardcores a more focused gaming style, give them something to truley enjoy that is hardcore focused, like more fractals, possibly even a super fractal that is unlocked after a certain number of fractal accomplishments, giving end game gear that is specificly vanity gear for hardcores only. This allows casuals, who could do explorable at “any” time, to simply enjoy that gameplay at their own pace.

Long story short, let the hardcores have the fractals, let the casuals have the dungeons,b ecause the hardcores dont even bother going back to them once they have their dungeoneering gear ANYWAY so whats the point in arguing about this?

Yes, that means making dungeons easier, and thats because dungeons are for the guys who want to know the lore, the world and the setting more, not the guy who wants the best loot, he doesnt even CARE for the story.

So focus fractals on “that” guy, so that they have less reletivity to the lore (but still have some, interesting lore tidbits) while giving them harder, more interesting challanges, while future dungeons and current ones could be revamped to be more accessable to everyone.

Its a fair trade hardcores, think about it, you get what you want, the casual base gets what “it” wants, nobody looses, everybody wins.

Food, for thought.

CaptainVanguard.4925:

The problem here is that one guys idea of greatness is another guys idea of pointless suffering.

I agree with the OP, dungoneering is “not” fun, and the real issue is that some guys who complained it was too easy have no consideration for those who didnt get the chance to “enjoy” the easy mode, so those guys who now have the best gear already, and thus have no real reason to return to dungoneering ANYWAY now have the best gear while others have to work EVEN harder to attain it than they did.

This, pointless, backwards, elite-based logic needs to die in a fire somewhere and never return, preferably in an inferno.

The fact is, the difficulty of dungeons should scale based upon the personal choice of the player, if the player doesnt WANT to try hard why should they be MADE to? Sure, im prepaired to take longer than the other guy to get my epics but that does NOT mean I should have no right to get them.

Dungeons have been advertised to reward coordinated players who were willing to face the “challenge” given by the dungeon, so I don’t know why people are asking for them to completely turn around on that. The stats you get in dungeon gear can be acquired outside the dungeon as well, through the TP or karma vendors, so the gear access is irrelevant. The only clear main reasons I see for running an explorable dungeon mode is to earn income and/or collect skins/collectibles unique to that dungeon.

No one is forced to do any explorable dungeon mode for ANY statistical advantage as far as gear goes, so I don’t understand why there is any complaint in that regard. I can understand the curiosity of lore as I care both about the lore and the challenge when I do dungeons, but really, the lore in explorable is really not that substantial, anyways. The lore in the explorable paths can easily be summed up in a few sentences, so you’re not missing much.

If the player doesn’t want to try hard, then why is the player insisting on doing dungeons, given the advertisement of it being for coordinated players who want challenges? Dungeons were designed to be mechanically different than the open world PvE. A player in a focused party of five has a lot more impact than a player ikittenerg in open world PvE. An open world PvE player wishing dungeons to be like open world PvE is like the stepping into sPvP and asking for opposing players to be easy AI NPCs.

We all have our own “sandboxes” of comfort: open world PvE, dungeons, PvP, and WvW. You won’t see me asking for open world PvE to have hardcore bosses because I understand that there needs to be a place like open world PvE for players to get started and play casually. There’s even casual mini dungeons out there if you want the experience (Vexa’s Lab and Forsaken Halls).

Dungeons are a place for players to feel a sense of PvE endgame “challenges”, which can start as early as level 35. Dungeons are one of the general areas of PvE where you can actually enjoy the proper coordination of a focused team. If you want good stat gear and/or a way to generate income, you can do that in the open world PvE content already, so that shouldn’t be a sole reason to do a dungeon. If your complaint is about obtaining the skins, then that’s a problem that occurs with many other modes. WvW, for example, has exclusive skins that you can only get with badges, so non-WvW players would have to work hard to get those by playing WvW just as those who want dungeon skins should learn and do dungeons to collect tokens for skins.

The topic of this thread was whether or not dungeons are fun. As others have said, fun in dungeons is subjective, and there’s no way to satisfy everyone. However, please understand that dungeons are a game mode that is targeting a specific group: those that want coordinated 5-person team grouping content in PvE. Trying hard IS part of this, and by removing effort, then there is no point of this intended game mode. If you don’t want to put effort into working with a team, you have open world PvE, which is intended to target a broader audience.

I’m not going to throw the casual/hardcore label around to make these points. The real label is the sandbox(es) you enjoy. The only real things that I think are restricted are skins and play style.

Dungeons in GW2: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/dungeons/

I find that not all the dungeon aren’t fun.Some are good enough to do multiple run.But sometime you get bad luck with PuGs.Especailly if you happen to get a narrow minded players in a group who didn’t have much experience with multiple run of the dungeon.

Used to do a casual AC run every other day or so with my guild. Then it got changed, and now we just about never do them anymore. Yes, awesome change.

I would argue that dungeons aernt the real end game, since they made it clear that fractals are technically the end game of the game itself. Look at the difference between the format, dungeons have a stagnant progression, you cant change what is there because its literally what it is, occasionally there might be a few secret extra events but thats all down to chance.

Fractals were intended for hardcores, people who “want” the challange to have a sense of progression and intended primarily for them to do something “end game” that they can continue doing indefinatley.

Now granted, players have a choice, a choice of what challange they want to do, but when it comes down to it, why should the choice be forced?

Honestly, the hardcores have no second reason to go back to a dungeon because end game gear for a hardcore is in the ascended items from fractals. Statistically, they gain more from doing fractal runs while dungeon runs are not casual friendly, especially after the people who already “have” dungeon gear are effectivly making it harder for those that want it.

This is a matter of privlaging and an attempt to subvert others right to that privlage, is it wrong? Yes, it is wrong to deny others the full content of the game because a few wanted it exclusivly to themselves. Thats why dungeons “should” be easier, more accessable, more casual friendly, more simplistic, because they are intended to be fixed, stale, one way.

As I said, this is why you should let the people “looking” for a challange stick to fractals, they were “made” to be the end game for dungoneering hardcores, so that by definition means they should be hard enough to be entertaining for a hardcore player.

Why should a casual be denied their entertainment in turn? Does that mean a casual should spend the entirety of his carrear doing wvw, open world pve and pvp if he can be bothered? No, it means he should be allowed to do the same content at his own choosing.

It doesnt mean you have to stop the content being challanging, theres always a way to compramise this through long sessions of programming and tuning, but it should not be designed purley to deny the casual gamer his chance at the trophie just cause the hardcore wants a challange that only he can overcome.

Again, Dungeons as an example here, dungeons arent going to be anymore hardcore than they are and they have no reason to change.

Fractals could literally be “the” best way forward for dungeoneering for hardcores, because its a puzzle, challange, and intended to make the player feel a sense of teamwork, accomplishment, and wisdom thinking.

Dungeoneering doesnt need to be that complicated, its there for the lore, for the story mode (which even now is harder than it looks barring maxed out gearsometimes). The biggest issue isnt just in teamwork, its in the fact people that are working as a team already “have” the end game gear, and thus dont have to “work” for it.

I agree with the OP, and maybe I’m not a dungeon person in this game. (I enjoyed dungeons in WoW and SWTOR.)

But since you HAVE TO do dungeons in order get cool armor/ money/ rare crafting materials, it’s annoying that they aren’t fun.

If I could just do my WvW and get the same rewards as everybody else, I would stay there.

Some are fun, like CoF, CM, and COE. I enjoy the strategy, the teamwork, and the story presented. However, there are that are downright painful. Personally, I find ArenaNet’s liberal use of snares to be extremely annoying. That frustration is exasperated by PuGs insistence on running through those mobs without fighting. Here are somethings that they could do to prevent annoyance (if players are mad, they won’t play the game):

1. Don’t give mobs insane amounts of health with no strategy. It’s not fun standing there, pressing 1-5 for 15 minutes on some poor troll.

2. Enough with the snares. It’s bad enough our run speed diminishes in combat, we don’t need every mob in Orr to cripple, freeze, daze, confuse, and other ensnare us.

3. Reduce knockdown time. I should never be down for more than 5 seconds.

4. If I can’t knock a mob off a ledge, they shouldn’t be able to do the same.

5. Reduce the use of invulnerability.

6. Reduce one shot kill bosses.

CaptainVanguard.4925:

Honestly, the hardcores have no second reason to go back to a dungeon because end game gear for a hardcore is in the ascended items from fractals. Statistically, they gain more from doing fractal runs while dungeon runs are not casual friendly, especially after the people who already “have” dungeon gear are effectivly making it harder for those that want it.

Why should a casual be denied their entertainment in turn? Does that mean a casual should spend the entirety of his carrear doing wvw, open world pve and pvp if he can be bothered? No, it means he should be allowed to do the same content at his own choosing.

I’m not casual, nor am I hardcore, but I believe dungeons set the stage for something like fractals. If it weren’t for the things that I learned through trial and error in dungeons, I think fractals would have been more difficult for me. When it comes to dungeon rewards, I believe only people that want to put effort into it deserve those rewards. Again, the stat acquisition is not limited to dungeons.

I, for one, do dungeons to acquire skins and to make coin (not CoF p1 spam) in a manner that helps me develop focused team play, which I enjoy. I can’t efficiently get this kind of reward anywhere else except dungeons. Fractal income gain is poor in comparison, and I find it less fulfilling in comparison to dungeons, especially because it’s mostly based on an RNG system compared to a dungeon’s token reward system.

How are casuals being prevented from doing dungeon content and why does it seem like you speak for all of them? This is why there are angry assumptions thrown at both casuals and hardcores. Define casual. I have many friends who can only play like 2 hours a day, and they do dungeon content with me just fine. It’s because they put enough effort to learn the content. There’s a difference between something you can learn and something that is impossible. It’s the person that denies themselves the content by not putting in any effort.

Like you said, people should be able to choose the content that they want to do. Mastering it is another thing. They’re not being denied content if they’re simply choosing not to learn and complete the content. “Casuals” are allowed to get their feet wet in dungeons. It’s up to them whether or not they want to put in effort.

Story mode can be for the lore and a casual walk-through, but explorable mode needs to be challenging as advertised. The only real reward that’s out of your reach as someone that doesn’t want to endure the explorable difficulty is skins. I’m certain plenty of “casuals” have learned to work with and without experienced players to obtain these rewards, and they did well to deserve them. There’s some WvW skins that I like, but I don’t like WvW, so I don’t deserve it’s rewards if I don’t want to meet the challenge to earn it. I’m not being denied because I chose not to collect badges for them just as one can choose not to do dungeons for the token rewards.

Enjoyment of dungeon content is subjective. I’ve stated my reasons above, and your suggestion sounds like you want to get rid of the content that only people like me can enjoy. “Casuals” and “hardcores” aren’t the only ones who play this game. I guess, since we’re using a labeling system here, I’ll call my group “competitive casuals”. We enjoy playing with other people, working on a deeper level to achieve a daily income and aesthetic rewards. I will not cross over to open world PvE content and say it’s too easy, demanding that bosses need to be super hard and beat new players down to the ground. I will not fail at jumping puzzles and ask for walking platforms to be added. Again, these game modes have specific groups in mind, so that there’s coverage for as many player types as possible.

Here’s how I understand some of the game modes:

• Open world PvE is for large-scale cooperative casual play and learning the game.
• Dungeons and fractals are for players that want focused small-scale teams to tackle challenging PvE content.
• WvW is generally for players that love large-scale cooperative competitive combat.
• PvP is for players that want small-scale cooperative competitive combat.

Let “casuals” have open world PvE and story mode dungeons. It is up to them if they want to move on to a higher level of play in explorable dungeons. All they are really missing is the aesthetic rewards which have a similar kind of prerequisite as other content such as WvW.

Same no fun in Dungeon the scale of the final bosses is often absurd