Guild Wars 2

Victory.2879:

Actually , the only thing wrong with dungeons is the complete lack of solo mode.

I find myself needing 500 of a dungeon token to complete my legendary- but having never done that dungeon before, I don’t want to be dragging the rest of the group down and so I find myself avoiding doing it at all….

• Watch a video guide
• Learn the encounters
• ???
• Profit

Watch a video guide = more experienced than most “experienced” groups.

anabasis.7346:

swiftpaw.6397:

Brutaxia.5098:

Brut
Lvl 80 Ranger – loves whirlwind/rampage as one, hates running from killable mobs, weak players that can’t kill trash mobs, and crybabies

Found your problem.

It gets even scarier if you take a look at his posts.

Brutaxia.5098:

I think ranger gives a lot of solo options if set up properly. I usually use bears for their toughness, and I generally can walk into a situation without worrying about the number of mobs. I do need to move quite a bit to stay alive and thin the numbers, but it still takes less than 1-2 minutes to clear 6 or 7 mobs even if there is a veteran (killing the adds first of course). The other advantage is not having to stress about adds. Plus I have solo’d several champions as a ranger, since my pets are so tough, just takes a bit longer than I have have patience for sometimes Champion rewards should scale if you solo it, yes this is primarily a group game, but I don’t always have time to play when my friends do.

Regardless, the key advantage to a ranger is to be a heartless b**ch and leave your pet to take the heat and aggro the mobs while you save your own kitten and run like hell. Also helps when you have a tough fight to snag a skill point or similar for map completion. Saved me from a few champion encounters where I realized there was no chance with the setup I had at the moment and, in each case, my pet died for me to live on R.I.P Fido!!!

I… I don’t even… Why does… And then he comes here and… He doesn’t even… What is wrong with…

I hate casuals.

Hate’s a pretty strong word :P

being casual doesn’t give you the right to play and behave like an incompetent moron

There are 3 groups of players in any game. Casuals, elitists and morons. Guess which one has the loudest mouth? The morons. And they are here too in all shapes and forms. TBH, I have not seen one in rT (those frequent this forum). Maybe their requirements are too high for ‘wannabe’?

Victory.2879:

Actually , the only thing wrong with dungeons is the complete lack of solo mode.

I find myself needing 500 of a dungeon token to complete my legendary- but having never done that dungeon before, I don’t want to be dragging the rest of the group down and so I find myself avoiding doing it at all….

I am in the same boat. I need Arah tokens, but in contrast to most others, I have never done this dungeon before. I can’t join a group because nobody wants inexperienced me, but I don’t feel comfortable starting one either, for I obviously can’t lead a team there and feel I’d just let the group down if I tried to put one together.
No, I am not a superb player by any stretch of imagination, but I am not totally horrible either, and I can listen. But the issue with GW2 dungeons in the current meta is that unless you perfectly know every single step in there and are bypassing trash mobs like a pro, people are prone to call you every imaginable name. In the end, I guess I just don’t want to take the risk, so I stay away from it.

Kimyrielle.3826:

Victory.2879:

Actually , the only thing wrong with dungeons is the complete lack of solo mode.

I find myself needing 500 of a dungeon token to complete my legendary- but having never done that dungeon before, I don’t want to be dragging the rest of the group down and so I find myself avoiding doing it at all….

I am in the same boat. I need Arah tokens, but in contrast to most others, I have never done this dungeon before. I can’t join a group because nobody wants inexperienced me, but I don’t feel comfortable starting one either, for I obviously can’t lead a team there and feel I’d just let the group down if I tried to put one together.
No, I am not a superb player by any stretch of imagination, but I am not totally horrible either, and I can listen. But the issue with GW2 dungeons in the current meta is that unless you perfectly know every single step in there and are bypassing trash mobs like a pro, people are prone to call you every imaginable name. In the end, I guess I just don’t want to take the risk, so I stay away from it.

My speculation & I think I’m probably correct …

If you connect the dots together, the prolific selling of Arah paths started after the introduction of token gate and likewise, the lack of good players in pug group. Before the introduction of token gate, it’s easy to find players in a guild to run many paths over & over and if it’s necessary, they will pug 1 or 2. Then there are cross servers guilds whose sole purpose is to introduce new players running dungeons together, could muster many runs a day the same path over and over. They also look for pug too if needed. Now a day, these activities are reduced to known players within the same guild, for 1 path or selling the path. Friend list activities are also reduced and with low number of friends on line at the same time, plus the low probability that they have not done the paths yet, dungeon activities are also dropped. The ones that got hurt the most by the token gate are those like you.

I would said Anet is the main culprit of this problem.

SkyChef.5432:

My speculation & I think I’m probably correct …

We don’t pay you to think.

I suppose that didn’t help, indeed. I guess if you can do exactly one run a day, people might just do it with other experienced people and then not bother again. I don’t have access to ANet’s metrics, but I’d wager that the overall number of dungeon paths being run by the playerbase went down with the change. I really don’t get why ANet feels a need to time gate anything and everything.

There are a lot of things that makes dungeons unattractive for people like me, though. Or rather, things that makes me unattractive for an experienced player to have in their team. Namely the speed run stuff, which requires some sort of familiarity with the dungeon to pull off. I don’t have that familiarity, making me a double-burden for the team, in addition to me not experienced with the boss mechanics. In games without speed runs, killing trash mobs usually doesn’t take any experience whatsoever. A first timer will usually do it right, too. I could sure kill the trash mobs in this game too, but most teams don’t want me to, but instead expect me to do something that takes prior experience and practice. GW2 is the only MMO I know having this issue, for most others I have played give trash mobs a chance to drop nice stuff too, so people are motivated to kill them.

Last but not least the LFG tool in this game is merely a sort of a first step in an application process like to be followed by questions, gear checks and whatnot. And I am fully aware that most people would rather weed people like me out. That doesn’t really add to my comfort using that tool. I have stared at the LFG tool a lot…but in the end I always closed it again. Being aware that the vast majority of teams don’t want to have me doesn’t exactly add to my self-confidence here.
In games having fully automated dungeon finders, people -expect- to be teamed with beginners, making me a lot more comfortable using these tools.

I guess it’s a little bit of everything. But yes, in the end it always boils down to some design decision on ANet’s side.

spoj.9672:

The problem is people might farm the start of dungeons repeatedly with that kind of incentive.

and what is the problem with that? is still better than farming champions in huge zerg trains… at least they will have to do “something” being only 5 and not 50.

Mesket.5728:

spoj.9672:

The problem is people might farm the start of dungeons repeatedly with that kind of incentive.

and what is the problem with that? is still better than farming champions in huge zerg trains… at least they will have to do “something” being only 5 and not 50.

Do you seriously not see?

Arimahn.3568:

Oxxy.7068:

Arimahn.3568:

zerotwo.4731:

I have to agree with Oxxy, if your a new player as posted then why belittle the play style of the majority of GW 2 players?

Because it runs counter to what you’d expect from a dungeon run in an MMO. Slow and methodical versus ololol zerkr only rush. People actually USED to play it slow but eventually everyone realized how horrible most dungeons were and started skipping, or ignoring everything but CoF1.

I used to play other games as well, what a shocker, anyways, do you know why i never really bothered with pve till gw2? Because every single dungeon had a 40mins~1 hour lenght in general, meanwhile here at gw2 the average dungeon path is something around 15 minutes long. You don’t like fast dungeons? Fine, go and post your own killing everything group, but then you’ll realize you’re only a very vocal minority, and nobody is actually joining your group.

Gee, I wonder why people pick the fast option when given the choice? Maybe because the time/effort/reward balance is out of whack for most paths?!

Skipping hints at bad design. Take away the superficial mobs or make it impossible, but don’t be lazy about it and just tell people that it’s intended.

It was intended. And it is not bad design, they gave us 2 options to progress: killing the mobs or skipping’em. Should killing trash be more rewarding somehow? Sure. Should i ever be tied to killing’em all the time? Nope.
Take kholer and icebrood wolf(from coe) for example, sometimes i feel like killing’em, sometimes i feel like skipping. And i’m sure there are ways to give extra rewards to people that kill other mobs at the end of any path thanks to our achievement system (If you ever played c9, every dungeon had 5 unlockable boxes at the end, 2 for completion, one for time (the faster the better), other for hits taken (the lesser the better, you needed to dodge 90% of everything to get “S” on that one), and other for enemies killed, but to get said extra chests you’d have to get an good overall score, not only a good score at killing trash, for example).
If you think that not skipping is good design, i’d like to remember you how popular the new TA path is (hint: it ins’t).

Kimyrielle.3826:

I suppose that didn’t help, indeed. I guess if you can do exactly one run a day, people might just do it with other experienced people and then not bother again. I don’t have access to ANet’s metrics, but I’d wager that the overall number of dungeon paths being run by the playerbase went down with the change. I really don’t get why ANet feels a need to time gate anything and everything.

There are a lot of things that makes dungeons unattractive for people like me, though. Or rather, things that makes me unattractive for an experienced player to have in their team. Namely the speed run stuff, which requires some sort of familiarity with the dungeon to pull off. I don’t have that familiarity, making me a double-burden for the team, in addition to me not experienced with the boss mechanics. In games without speed runs, killing trash mobs usually doesn’t take any experience whatsoever. A first timer will usually do it right, too. I could sure kill the trash mobs in this game too, but most teams don’t want me to, but instead expect me to do something that takes prior experience and practice. GW2 is the only MMO I know having this issue, for most others I have played give trash mobs a chance to drop nice stuff too, so people are motivated to kill them.

Last but not least the LFG tool in this game is merely a sort of a first step in an application process like to be followed by questions, gear checks and whatnot. And I am fully aware that most people would rather weed people like me out. That doesn’t really add to my comfort using that tool. I have stared at the LFG tool a lot…but in the end I always closed it again. Being aware that the vast majority of teams don’t want to have me doesn’t exactly add to my self-confidence here.
In games having fully automated dungeon finders, people -expect- to be teamed with beginners, making me a lot more comfortable using these tools.

I guess it’s a little bit of everything. But yes, in the end it always boils down to some design decision on ANet’s side.

You should just join some pug groups and tell them that you are new to arah but that you are willing to listen and learn and will do whatever needs to be done the best you can. That road would be less problematic than you’d think. Everyone started somewhere.

If you’re on NA, you can ask me out for a few dates in arah if you’re not too shy. I help out pugs a lot on good days and occasionally even do path 4 with them for their title ’n stuff.

All i ask of people is to use full Berserker’s or Assassin’s armor/trinkets/weapons and listen to orders. If you’re a ranger, make sure to bring a sword, an axe, a warhorn and maybe a red moa pet.

Glad that Emanuel can help you because I just got acceptance to a new feature introduced by Anet for some special players. The way it works right now based from the 1st report, I would be in solitaire for a long time.

If you want to skip, make/join an lfg that states you want to skip. If you don’t want to skip, make/join an lfg that states you don’t want to skip. It’s as easy as that.

You’ll always be able to find groups that go either way, so what’s the problem? Having a choice is better than having no choice.

TKiller.6829:

Mesket.5728:

spoj.9672:

The problem is people might farm the start of dungeons repeatedly with that kind of incentive.

and what is the problem with that? is still better than farming champions in huge zerg trains… at least they will have to do “something” being only 5 and not 50.

Do you seriously not see?

I don’t like it either, but I prefer to have those kind of players inside an instance than lagging a whole map with their stupid cho cho zerg-train way of playing.

For players like me far from the servers some maps are impossible to play because of the zergs.

i’m with op. (most “experienced vets” will flame at me by just reading this.)

sometimes, skipping makes sense. (optional random champs, for example)
sometimes, it does not. (3 low def mobs, that ohk you, unless you melee)
most of the time, killing most mobs in your way makes a dungeon run more fun, faster , more profitable (high-lv dungeons only) and easier (or more challenging).

just recently, at arah p3, some “vet” stated, that we should stack at the first boss in a corner. (this seems to be a theme going on)
i said we should take that 1 minute to kill the mobs nearby, so we have plenty of room to fight/dodge/actually see the enemy. (which worked fine for me the previous runs)
nope…everyone listened to him/her instead and died.
he/she left, everyone got kicked out of the dungeon.
well, it was the first boss, not a big deal tbh.
but i also got kicked or the leader left too many times later in dungeons or even during the endboss.

on the other hand, one could say, it’s my fault for playing with those heartwarming and friendly players, but even if my LFG states “be patient, expect wipe, first timers welcome, no rush/skip”, elitists flame the crap out of the group and then leave. (i’ve waited 2H+ for this?)

and don’t get me started on that “4k AP+”, “EXP ONLY”, “SELL ARAH P2 @ENDBOSS 1%” and, of course, the good ol’ “ZERK OR KICK” madness.

elitists seem to forget the point of games: FUN.
don’t tell me, that it’s fun, challenging and tactical to skip every single mob, except the mandatory bosses.

oh and i also consider it “exploiting flawed dungeon design”.

please go easy on your bash on me, elitists, i’m a glass-zerk-ranger (with bear*), so i can’t take much hits.

*when @lupi…dat bear just never dies at phase 3.

tl;dr
1: i don’t like elitism.
2: i’m not casual.
3: elitists are ruining my gameplay experience.
4: item 3 is my own fault.
5. elitists can’t read.
6. LF social players.
7. bears are OP, nerf ’em.

wauwi.9162:

elitists seem to forget the point of games: FUN.
don’t tell me, that it’s fun, challenging and tactical to skip every single mob, except the mandatory bosses.

oh and i also consider it “exploiting flawed dungeon design”.

Don’t tell me it’s fun to take 3 times longer to complete a dungeon and be rewarded only marginally better.

To some people speed and efficiency is fun. To some killing everything in a dungeon is fun.

Right now, both of those demographics have to option to enjoy the game their way. Were you to make it so skipping is no longer possible, you effectively take away the fun of a whole demographic.

I heard people like the new TA, you know, the dungeon where you can’t skip stuff.

Bright.9160:

I heard people like the new TA, you know, the dungeon where you can’t skip stuff.

Now Bright, where did you hear such a bold faced lie?

Nike Porphyrogenita.8137:

Bright.9160:

I heard people like the new TA, you know, the dungeon where you can’t skip stuff.

Now Bright, where did you hear such a bold faced lie?

Bahahahhahahaaha oh god.

I skimmed this thread. People put the P on a pedestal too kitten much. Just watch strife’s video right before you start. Crack open a beer. And do the kitten thing. Dungeons aren’t some mystical thing.

What to pay most attention to in videos:
1.) Mob Skips
2.) Special Boss Mechanics.

Everything else just stack where the experienced players stack and profit.(Oh and don’t bring a stupid build)

It appears the OP is new and without delving into the details of his post, he makes a reasonable point. Their isn’t alot of ‘training’ that you get in the open world game that will prepare you for dungeons. The dungeons punish you pretty heavily if you don’t know what to do when.

Some people might direct the OP to the many videos on the dungeons but for me the problem is that the majority of these aren’t made with helping the new guy prior to their first run. Their really isn’t anything that prepares you for what you will encounter their WITHOUT dragging on 4 other people to do it. That missing smooth transition makes it very unappealing for a player who has to think about what content they will do with the little time they have.

wauwi.9162:

snip

SkyChef.5432:

Glad that Emanuel can help you because I just got acceptance to a new feature introduced by Anet for some special players. The way it works right now based from the 1st report, I would be in solitaire for a long time.

He took me for a ride already! I was an…eye-opening experience. I hope he didn’t have to bite into his keyboard too often because of me…

And I hope they will solve your chat issue soon!

The famous Emanuel rides….. Was it arah P1 by any chance?

Nike Porphyrogenita.8137:

Bright.9160:

I heard people like the new TA, you know, the dungeon where you can’t skip stuff.

Now Bright, where did you hear such a bold faced lie?

I think he’s basing his facts on the overwhelming amount of TA aether posts in the lfg tool.

I mean, look at all of them.

durend.6237:

Nike Porphyrogenita.8137:

Bright.9160:

I heard people like the new TA, you know, the dungeon where you can’t skip stuff.

Now Bright, where did you hear such a bold faced lie?

I think he’s basing his facts on the overwhelming amount of TA aether posts in the lfg tool.

I mean, look at all of them.

I’m basing my facts on the fact that I’ve asked on countless occasions to do the new TA path in both [LOD] and [DnT] and every single time I suggest it every goes ‘nah, it was fun for once, but never again’. And as such, I still haven’t been able to do the new TA path.

I just want F/U back

wauwi, that’s the most kittened post I’ve seen in a good while.

1. your bear is literally doing negative damage by feeding lupicus HP.
2. maybe you’re not casual, but you ARE a trash player.
3. it is not fun to play like an idiot and spend ages in dungeons

guanlongwucaii.3162:

wauwi, that’s the most kittened post I’ve seen in a good while.

1. your bear is literally doing negative damage by feeding lupicus HP.
2. maybe you’re not casual, but you ARE a trash player.
3. it is not fun to play like an idiot and spend ages in dungeons

It wasn’t until the second half of his post that I realized it was a clear troll.

haha, I thought your post got quick-reported and deleted or something

I do alot of quick deletes lol

Delay.6908:

I just want F/U back

I miss the Vevina fight… That fight is definitely in my top 5 of fun GW2 bosses…

I can replicate Vevina, come into PvP!

Your chaos storm has a 5 second cooldown?

No, but you’ll probably be dead after the first chaos storm + the prestige :dddddddddd

You can skip stuff in TA/TA?

Can someone link a vid? We do full clears, and it’s fun, but time consuming.

You fight the incredibly hard hitting mobs with crazy high health that give you perma fear and knockdown in a field of constantly respawning Volatile Blossoms? Was it worth the globs of globby goo?