Guild Wars 2

I still don’t understand how ANet believes these changes will draw in new players.

A person who’s interested in buying the game will likely “research” it first. Watch some PR videos and advertisements, look towards peoples’ opinions of it on various gaming sites, forums and so on.
When a potential new player watches some of ANet’s older videos and trailers, they’ll take notice of easy leveling system – how skills and weapon combat aren’t gated by level restrictions and so on.

Then they buy the game, realize that all of those initial “promises” about the easy and accessible leveling system aren’t there. They’ll go online and check forums such as this one or reddit to see why this is the case, only to read how the veterans dislike the game now because of the new changes, how it’s no longer catered to the long-term players and going on and on about how much better things were before the patch. This only gives them a negative impression, encouraging them to quit the game in hopes of finding an MMO that manages to stick to their guns. Because there’s no point in continuing to play a game, especially an MMO of all things – if it doesn’t even respect the players who are in it for the long-haul.

The changes drive away the veteran players, who feel they’ve been screwed over. With the loss of vets comes the loss of server populations. With the loss of depleting server populations, new players are left smaller guilds and communities to interact with, essentially lessening the communal experience that the mmo genre is known for.

Not only does it push away the vets, it also drives away the money whales (such as myself,) who’ve poured hundreds into the gemstore in hopes of improving their gaming experience, which they expect(ed?) to last for years to come.

Anet, I don’t know if it’s your higher devs, you or your NCSoft superiors who are making these abysmal decisions, but you are effectively killing off your own game. Continue down this route – with no foreseeable expansion-like content in the future, continuous seasonal breaks, increased grind, more surprise stealth nerfs – and it’s as good as dead. But at this point I can only hope that you don’t add more of the Chinese restrictions such as the VIP membership pass to the NA or EU servers, because it’ll practically become the final nail in the coffin for you. Going against your original manifesto with the NPE is damaging enough.

Kasemdria.7138:

You know, everyone started this game as a new player…..and it really wasn’t that hard to learn. I mean, how hard can it be? You unlock one ability at a time – and that takes a couple of kills to do at a low level. Are you telling me that there are players that can’t read a newly unlocked ability every five kills or so?

And then once you do that intro quest, you are spat out in the real world to do… what exactly? When I was a new player, I had the npc/mail/quest tracker say “talk to that scout” (icon on map) and LOW AND BEHOLD the scout gives a nice summary of what to do in the world. “Go and find challenges” (indicating skill points) “You can travel with these” (indicating waypoints) “go and help people” (Indicating hearts). What was wrong with that system? It was clear and insightful. It made people (or me and my guildies, at any rate) want to go out and GET those waypoints and help those people and do those skill challenges! The story was right there to get stuck into.

I made a new character to see things from a new player….and guess what? As an long time player, I know what the hearts and vistas and skill points mean. As a new player, I imagine a person starting in the world thinking “now what? where are the quests? What do I do?”

And the “Minitures have been hidden due to rising player population.?” I’m watching my wife’s character now. Can’t summon a mini due to the “rising population” but she gets a kitten invite to a denser map because THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH PLAYERS IN HER CURRENT ONE! I had better stop my rant before I find I’ve pulled out all my hair.

^^^ this is… just exactly what i mean. you said it way better than i could. I wish i could give you a hundred +1’s . /cheer

Kamui.4038:

Paradox.1380:

1. They tested it in China. Works great for them.
2. Do NOT place your knowledge base/experience on others in shoddy “Everyone Knows” science.
3. ANet has more metrics and more information than you ever will about the over-all feeling of the start of the early game.
4. I am sorry you don’t like this change/idea but its already coming, adapt or move on is all I can tell ya.

1. I’m not Chinese. I don’t live in China. I don’t have the same personality, ideals, or anything like them.
2. It’s not an ad populum argument like you assume. The average player is not a braindead imbecile. The AVERAGE player knows what they are getting into when they see “MMORPG.” I paid for an MMO, not an iPhone game. Tetris is far more interesting at this point.
3. Assuming that’s true in any way, they sure as hell are doing a great job at alienating everyone they claim to be working for. Your benevolent metrics don’t take players into account because they don’t exist or don’t represent the actual players. It’s like having a politician as a middleman, one we didn’t choose or vote for but one that is there talking for us nonetheless. This is killing the product, plain and simple.
4. This is not an issue of adaptability. Adaptation is what makes things interesting. Adaptation is what we had before this patch: now we are reduced to children sitting on Santa’s lap and asking him ‘how does snow happen.’ The only thing to do at this point is for people to take their business elsewhere. I personally am not going to spend another dime on this game until they do something about what they have done to it.

This. +50 if I could…but I have to stick with just 1.

Personally, I don’t mind the new changes that much. But I do think some of the philosophy behind the changes is a little weird. These are meant to primarily address the concerns of people who have previously tried and left the game, if I understand correctly…but its changing things significantly for the people who currently play and enjoy and support the game as it is.

You would think they would have research a path that would build value both for the departed players they want to get back AND the existing customer base. And I don’t really think these changes do that. For an existing player who has played through with the existing system, these changes can add frustration, confusion, and even anger… the very feelings that these changes are supposed to PREVENT for new players.

A veteran player should feel as heard and valued as a departed player does at the very least.

Asmodeus.5782:

Dance for the cows! Rub corn! Press F ’til you decide to find another game! Do ncsoft and anet want to kill this product this badly?

Yes. I don’t understand why, but the bulk of both feature patches lean toward “we hate our own playerbase.”

On the plus side:

-The balance changes were cool.
-The wardrobe is excellent.

Cons:

-Megaserver still won’t group me with either friends or guildies.
-As of yesterday, I can no longer choose to join the map a group-mate is on.
-The mini-pet bug wherein bound minipets do not show on explorable maps.
-Every last part of the new levelling process sucks diseased moose wang. Until this gets fixed, I’m not touching my newest alt, and even our guild’s White Knight™ is blunt that nobody can, in good faith, recommend this game to friends with the “new character system”.
-The new TP UI is just bad, and they should feel bad.
-Ditto the Hero Panel UI.
-Still can’t turn OFF the bloody story notifications.
-Patch completely broke the “Target Nearest” option. Quick fix would be naming it “Target Random”.
-Dancing at cows – need I say more?

Judging by the amount of people that are crossed by this, and how vocal they are, I guess the real reason for this discontent is the black lion key farm.

Lets face it, how many people posting in the forums about this are actual new players like the op claims to be?
How many are rolling out a new char to get to 80 and play the game?

Paradox.1380:

1. They tested it in China. Works great for them.
2. Do NOT place your knowledge base/experience on others in shoddy “Everyone Knows” science.
3. ANet has more metrics and more information than you ever will about the over-all feeling of the start of the early game.
4. I am sorry you don’t like this change/idea but its already coming, adapt or move on is all I can tell ya.

1. According to what I’ve heard (from people who’ve actually talked to players from the China servers), the forums over there were in an uproar too. They don’t like it either.
2. You do the same by coming out with a statement like your first point, without actually knowing all the facts.
3. Any statistician can tell you metrics can be deceiving, and are extremely open to interpretation that fits someone’s hobby horse. As to the large focus groups…. hum. It had been shown in the past that information from large focus groups consisting of people who do not actually play the game (either because they quit before max level or never played at all), does not necessarily reflect the wishes of the people who are actually playing. Messing around with the wishes and expectations of your existing customer base carries huge risks, as Sony Online Entertainment have proven with Star Wars Galaxies (“Combat Upgrade” and “New Game Enhancements”). They too had large focus groups, they said. It is estimated those changes, that the focus groups loved, lost them 160,000 of their 200,000 subscriptions, and didn’t bring any significant new players. It’s known as the biggest failure in MMO history.
4. Move on, most likely. And at some point, the player base WILL be driven too far, and do exactly that, and they will be not be coming back, especially if the players feel they are being treated like little children. Which, in case you hadn’t noticed, most of us are not.

Is this as bad as the CU/NGE? Not yet, not. But the element of spoon-feeding players the game in little baby-sized mouthfuls is turning me, for one, off in a big way. And I’m completely baffled as to why they level-gated things I have always considered easy, and removed things I found enjoyable, in stead of just adding some solid OPTIONAL tutorials players can go through at their leisure.

From my personal first-time leveling experience, I can remember that where to go after my first starter zone was a bit puzzling. A tutorial giving a brief outline of the history and maps of Tyria would have helped there. And I was 80 before I figured out what the combo fields were and did. Definitely a tutorial there. But changes like level gating pet control on a Ranger? Seriously? If that had happened to me, I’d deleted my ranger long before she reached 22, out of sheer frustration with the uncontrollable nuisance pet.