Guild Wars 2

Other then to say I have Ascended armor it seem’s pointless. There are those who will need it for fractals but how many people is that really and that’s assuming it has infusion slots.

Then there is the hole time gated part of the equation. That’s why I have only crafted one Ascended weapon.

When push comes to shove it just takes two long to craft that 5-10% damage increase. Plus other then 1 small part of the game there no where that small amount of damage is going to make a difference.

I guess I am just kinda lost on what the carrot is to make Ascended item’s

I play only wvw for fun, no stupid farming or temp events camping (I already have a job in rl thank you). Until now I managed to craft only one weapon for one of my build of one of my 8 characters. When ascended gear will become overwhelming in wvw, since I won’t be able to afford gearing my character as I want and as I did for all of them during the exotic-gear-age, I will quit the game. I lost faith in you anet. Have fun breaking pinhatas

They are never pointless as long as they give an advantage for someone in pvp/pve. Don’t believe those who say otherwise. These are usually the people who are going ascended themselves and just want to gain an advantage over you.

In all fairness, we have known that Ascended Armor was going to be in the game for months now and that it was coming this year. I have been hoarding mats since after getting the ascended weapons I wanted finished. That’s almost 3 months of material hoarding and I not only will have enough mats to make a set for a character, but I will make a ton of money selling the excess at exorbitant prices.

Aten.8046:

I play only wvw for fun, no stupid farming or temp events camping (I already have a job in rl thank you). Until now I managed to craft only one weapon for one of my build of one of my 8 characters. When ascended gear will become overwhelming in wvw, since I won’t be able to afford gearing my character as I want and as I did for all of them during the exotic-gear-age, I will quit the game. I lost faith in you anet. Have fun breaking pinhatas

Ascended gear will never become overwhelming in WvW.

The carrot of ascended is the stats, but it’s designed to only apply to those who like stat progression. If you’re a casual kind of player (not min/maxer), ascended is pointless. WvWers have a little reason to complain about it, but WvW was designed to be unfair and who is really going to come into a situation where random group vs random group, ascended made the difference.

They have plans of adding progression through infusion slots, so although ascended gear might only be x% better now, expect it to be y% better next year and even more the year after that. Ascended runes and sigils will probably come at some point also.

Healix.5819:

They have plans of adding progression through infusion slots, so although ascended gear might only be x% better now, expect it to be y% better next year and even more the year after that. Ascended runes and sigils will probably come at some point also.

There is however nothing that suggest that the infusions will actually increase your stats and that they could simply just be Fractal specific (such as the new “unlimited” Agony Resist Infusion).

Healix.5819:

WvWers have a little reason to complain about it, but WvW was designed to be unfair and who is really going to come into a situation where random group vs random group, ascended made the difference.

I agree that WvW is designed to be unfair, but adding more grind-based elements to widen the disparity further between “those who have more time to grind” vs “those who have more real life responsibilities and lesser time to grind” is still upsetting.

They have plans of adding progression through infusion slots, so although ascended gear might only be x% better now, expect it to be y% better next year and even more the year after that. Ascended runes and sigils will probably come at some point also.

Agreed.

Aten.8046:

I play only wvw for fun, no stupid farming or temp events camping (I already have a job in rl thank you). Until now I managed to craft only one weapon for one of my build of one of my 8 characters. When ascended gear will become overwhelming in wvw, since I won’t be able to afford gearing my character as I want and as I did for all of them during the exotic-gear-age, I will quit the game. I lost faith in you anet. Have fun breaking pinhatas

I know players only playing wvw but have tons of gold. I dont know how you play but if your raging that much cause of ascended/ gear progression then yea the game is not for you…tbh I dont think you can find a mmo that doesn’t have gear progression (excluding Gw1). Gear progression is starting and it will not stop here until they release legendary gear in the future(you should check the test legendary trinket) im sure you’ll rage more. Atm imo Gw2 doesn’t require you heavy grinding unlike ex. Allods, wow, Aion etc. Gl finding an mmo without grinding though. ..

lordkrall.7241:

There is however nothing that suggest that the infusions will actually increase your stats and that they could simply just be Fractal specific (such as the new “unlimited” Agony Resist Infusion).

They’ve said they wanted a slight vertical progression curve. Unless they want that to only apply to fractals, infusions are likely to see a stat increase over time. I imagine it would be fairly negligible compared to the difference between exotics and ascended.

Fractals are tuned to the raid-like progression crowd and just increasing agony resists could be enough, but then the only carrot of fractals is the leaderboards. Would that be capable of solely keeping those wanting progression happy? Probably not. Also considering that a level cap increase is something they’re not against, meaning new gear again, I’d wager they’d also be willing to add a minor stat upgrade, just to give the players something to (constantly) work towards. They might not even be stats, but rather content specific stats, such as how the WvW infusions cause you to deal extra damage to guards. That could potentially only make it worse however due to the need of several sets, assuming you cared.

DarkSpirit.7046:

I agree that WvW is designed to be unfair, but adding more grind-based elements to widen the disparity further between “those who have more time to grind” vs “those who have more real life responsibilities and lesser time to grind” is still upsetting

Personally, I don’t see ascended gear as a grind, because rather than obtaining it as quickly as possible, I just build up the materials required. So what if I’m a month or two, or thee late. They are meant to be medium term goals after all. Any materials I don’t naturally obtain, I just buy with the other resources I do.

Healix.5819:

Personally, I don’t see ascended gear as a grind, because rather than obtaining it as quickly as possible, I just build up the materials required. So what if I’m a month or two, or thee late. They are meant to be medium term goals after all. Any materials I don’t naturally obtain, I just buy with the other resources I do.

Unfortunately, you can’t buy vision crystals or its account-bound ingredients. These have to be obtained specifically. If your typical playing routine grants you empyreal, dragonite, and bloodstone then more power to you. Otherwise, you would have to change your routine to grind for them somehow.

Personally I think they’ve gotten the stats on ascended gear exactly right.

For those who like to always be working towards a full set of best-in-slot gear and struggle to find the motivation to play without that goal the small increase in stats is enough to justify working towards ascended gear.

And for those who don’t enjoy vertical progression and just want to gear good enough that they can play most/all the game the difference is small enough that they can ignore it and stick to exotics.

The only point of ascended won’t be they stat increase, but the infusion slots that will allow you to play passed fractals level 50. They will probably raise fractal cap to 80.

Back on topic, there is nothing that requires it no. So it is pointless.

All people that keep complaining bout “catching up” and “grinding” have never played a real catch-up or grind game. Not only that, the stats it offers are minimal. Sure, 5% can make a difference, but in the scenarios they keep bringing it does absolutely no difference………at all. Dungeons? I have been doing them in exotics and ascended with 2 different characters, and must say the damage is very minimal, to the point it matters not, the boss dies .1 seconds faster….. not a life changing event. In WvW no ascended armor/weapon will ever save you, and its very unlikely to give you that extra 14 damage you need to finish up that opponent running away.

The total amount of stats increase is 5%, sure is good, eventually Im getting there, but it isnt something that make or break the game, I guarantee it. This is coming from a guy that has 3 characters fully ascended with MF infusions and weapons(and a legendary too), and still 125 laurels to spare…..

Wanna know true grind? 2Moon. Played the game for over 2 years, took me over a year to reach max level on one character, barely reached 4 on armor…..armor were up to 12. A +1 in an armor was like day and night, no contest who would kill you, only looking at their armor you knew who had the clear upper hand. WoW same, Rohan same, among other MMOs which Im glad I got rid of.

Once again, you do NOT know what true grind/armor difference is, if all you are complaining is about a piece you can literally get in 2 weeks and even without it you are on equal fighting level with your opponents then you are simply; spoiled.

Fortus.6175:

Once again, you do NOT know what true grind/armor difference is, if all you are complaining is about a piece you can literally get in 2 weeks and even without it you are on equal fighting level with your opponents then you are simply; spoiled.

But if that’s the case, then what’s the point of that gear? Oh, actually, I do know: it’s to have more progress bars for the barely sentient to fill.

Progress Quest this way => http://progressquest.com/

Master of Timespace.2548:

Fortus.6175:

Once again, you do NOT know what true grind/armor difference is, if all you are complaining is about a piece you can literally get in 2 weeks and even without it you are on equal fighting level with your opponents then you are simply; spoiled.

But if that’s the case, then what’s the point of that gear? Oh, actually, I do know: it’s to have more progress bars for the barely sentient to fill.

just like you have people who gather every possible AP point, or people that do every possible JP, or people who explores every map on every chaarcter, or the people who have several alts, or people who play only WvW, etc etc etc…..

It is an style of play, an style that is not mutually exclusive from the others above mentioned. A person can have different likings. None is right, none is wrong. Nobody can dictate how you want to enjoy the game, just because it isnt fun to you doesnt mean it isnt fun for others. What did Anet do? Give thosepeople who want to feel like they are working for a better gear a mean to keep them busy and working on it, something they ( I also ) enjoy. How did they solve the problem of powercreeping? Simple; minimal stats increase.

People like me need long term goals to work towards too. We arent antisocials, we arent no lifers. I got a work, family, career, studies to take care of, yet I play. It took me a year and 4 months to get a legendary, long term, was fun because I did it with my guild while doing a bunch of activities (like map exploring, dungeons, guild events, crafting, make friends) which I enjoyed. I felt lost at that point, but the end result was fun. Now Im giving myself another oal, another legendary and armor for each character I own.

Is anyone is their right to judge me? Sure, it is up to you, at the end of the day your judgement matters little to nothing to me. It is my way of having fun. Im already playing at max since I’m not grinding for need but instead of giving myself a goal to achieve. It might be hard to comprehend for some people, but the implementation of Ascended by Anet was novel (though they could reduce some of the mats requirements, some of them are beyond crazy, like 250 Strong Blood and such….)

sorry mates, i liked the gw1 because that game was about skills. you needed 10 hours to max a character with full gear. your skins was basics, but maxed stats

Fortus.6175:

Master of Timespace.2548:

Fortus.6175:

Once again, you do NOT know what true grind/armor difference is, if all you are complaining is about a piece you can literally get in 2 weeks and even without it you are on equal fighting level with your opponents then you are simply; spoiled.

But if that’s the case, then what’s the point of that gear? Oh, actually, I do know: it’s to have more progress bars for the barely sentient to fill.

just like you have people who gather every possible AP point, or people that do every possible JP, or people who explores every map on every chaarcter, or the people who have several alts, or people who play only WvW, etc etc etc…..

It is an style of play, an style that is not mutually exclusive from the others above mentioned. A person can have different likings. None is right, none is wrong. Nobody can dictate how you want to enjoy the game, just because it isnt fun to you doesnt mean it isnt fun for others. What did Anet do? Give thosepeople who want to feel like they are working for a better gear a mean to keep them busy and working on it, something they ( I also ) enjoy. How did they solve the problem of powercreeping? Simple; minimal stats increase.

People like me need long term goals to work towards too. We arent antisocials, we arent no lifers. I got a work, family, career, studies to take care of, yet I play. It took me a year and 4 months to get a legendary, long term, was fun because I did it with my guild while doing a bunch of activities (like map exploring, dungeons, guild events, crafting, make friends) which I enjoyed. I felt lost at that point, but the end result was fun. Now Im giving myself another oal, another legendary and armor for each character I own.

Is anyone is their right to judge me? Sure, it is up to you, at the end of the day your judgement matters little to nothing to me. It is my way of having fun. Im already playing at max since I’m not grinding for need but instead of giving myself a goal to achieve. It might be hard to comprehend for some people, but the implementation of Ascended by Anet was novel (though they could reduce some of the mats requirements, some of them are beyond crazy, like 250 Strong Blood and such….)

It is unfortunate though, that only the no-brain grinders and those who enjoy playing the “optimization” minigame called crafting, are rewarded. People like me who enjoy challenges and exploring, but dislike repeatitive and trivial content, are left with very few ways to obtain ascended gear.
Ironically those who’d need the ascended gear the most, that is, WvW players, have next to zero means to obtain them.

The real reason behind this seemingly nonsensical desing is the Item Mall: it is hoped that lots of people buy the gear through gems.

McWolfy.5924:

sorry mates, i liked the gw1 because that game was about skills. you needed 10 hours to max a character with full gear. your skins was basics, but maxed stats

you mean, sPvP, where this is achieved 5 minutes after character creation?

If you go to an MMO and expect it to not have a progression of some kind…then this might not be the genrer for you…. FPS might fit you better

Fortus.6175:

McWolfy.5924:

sorry mates, i liked the gw1 because that game was about skills. you needed 10 hours to max a character with full gear. your skins was basics, but maxed stats

you mean, sPvP, where this is achieved 5 minutes after character creation?

If you go to an MMO and expect it to not have a progression of some kind…then this might not be the genrer for you…. FPS might fit you better

In propechies it took longer to get max gear, but in every other campaing after that you would generally have max gear and level after leaving the noob island. Even in propechies the max gear was cheap in the sense that it was trivial to gear up alts.

It’s not pointless. I bust out my laptop at the club and show the ladies my ascended armor and they’ll all be like :O

It’s a few extra stats here and there which could be the diff between life and death in WvW… but probably not.

Master of Timespace.2548:

The real reason behind this nonsenscial desing is the Item Mall: it is hoped that lots of people buy the gear through gems.

You cant buy laurels with gems. You cant buy dragonite/emperyal/blooddust with gems. You cant buy 1 per day accountbound materials such as charged quarts or the 450 wood thingy.

Im sorry but your logic is flawed. You want rewards? Play the game!

And please, people, stop it with the “WvW players” or “sPvP players” or “explorer players” excuses! This is one game. I do WvW, among all my characters I have a total of around 190 ranks. I plya sPvP, nearly rank30. I have completed 100% map on two toons and working on 3rd one. I have dungeon master. All crafting professions but the one with leather. A legendary. 4 characters lvl 80, 3 of them fully ascended and 125 laurels to spare, working on the 4th. Fractal lvl 30. Never played TP, never farmed CoF, only farmed FGC for a week and got utterly bored. Nearly 9k AP. Had around 5 million karma but spent 4 million in obsidian shards. Halfway through my second legendary. Yet I have 1860 hours of gameplay.

You people are doing something wrong, very wrong. Like I said, in this game things are very achievable without any grind, you just gotta focus and gotta stop thinking that you are an “x field player” and instead realize that all of this are different aspects of the game.

I know Im not the only one on this view;

I would play WvW even if there was no profit on it, just for fun. (like it currently is)

In PvE my fun is tied to how my character looks, so looks > stats.

In Dungeons all I care is about making the runs faster; aka beating the challenge.

In sPvP my fun is tied to playing on equal grounds, a show of skills.

Would I want rewards for playing one field exclusively? Sure. Would that be unfair? Very!

Legendaries are working as intended (except for 250 t6 stacks and precursor), you have to spread out in almost ever aspect of the game. Ascended is kind of the same, except to a lesser extend. Do you need them? No, absolutely not, I run dungeons in exotics mostly and there is no difference, same for WvW. You want them; work for them!!

Players who don’t have all the time in the world not having a gear disadvantage in wvw is a real concern for them. You can say it’s not required all you want but in the end when one player has a handicap over another in direct competition it has imbalanced consequences.

WvW may not be intended to be balanced in the first place and currently it isn’t. There’s no reason to make that imbalance grow even quicker.

I do think ascended is a logical step to make gear progression very slow through small baby steps with the infusions, but the initial step from exotic to ascended isn’t is in no way a small step. It will have a significant impact for many months to come. It may get better after that, but the future is still cloudy.

I’m seeing two schools of thought behind the arguments on each side. There’s a discrepancy between those who want wvw to represent the legacy of their server’s hard work, strength, and experience versus those who just want a fair, perpetual pvp experience on a grand scale. Anet’s current design greatly favors the first. Over time, many months when ascended has settled in place, the two philosophies might see a little more eye to eye, but right now they are in contention.

Of course, this could all be made less dramatic if Anet would lighten up the godawful grind to ascended. Arguably, most of Anet’s demographic probably came to GW2 with WoW as their big mmo experience. WoW has level and gear progression to grind with every expansion… but by the time you hit max level for each expansion you can afford at least on of their max level pvp sets from battlegrounds and not be far from getting the premium set from arena points. in WPvP, the closest experience it had to WvW, this is a very competitive set with exception to maybe one or two pve cooldown pieces. Anet lead people in to believing GW2 would eliminate the grind, and all they did what make it worse with ascended gear. A lot worse. Unbelievably worse. Holy hell is it worse. BLTC inflation, terrible rewards with ridiculously unfavorable probability for anything useful making it even more dauntingly worse. My point is, there’s a lot of core issues making Ascended gear unrealistic for some people more than others.

… Well enough rambling. I’ve been watching a movie while typing so idk where this is going. xD

Act with wisdom, but act.

I always wonder why people that use WvW as a reason to dislike Ascended gear always seems to be under the impression that only one side will get the Ascended gear.
That is of course not the case. About the same amount of people on all servers will have gotten Ascended gear in about the same time, thus it balances itself out.

WvW is not a 1v1 battleground after all.

Ascended gear isn’t pointless by any stretch of the imagination. It IS an improvement, it WILL increase your raw numbers.

However, it’s not this huge cavernous gulf that can’t be overcome if you don’t have it either.

Fortus.6175:

, the stats it offers are minimal.

Sure it is….lol

Anyone who has payed attention to the average zerker build realizes that damage increases multiply in this game.

In other words: +5% and +5% is better than a single +10%. The second 5% is multiplied on TOP of the first 5%.

Break that down to ascended gear and what do you get? Higher stats that reverberate heavier down a line of +% boosts. The more +%s you equip, the more ascended gear is going to matter.

Ascended gear is sort of like locking a build down. You don’t invest that much time and money unless you’re sure the parts fit the finished product. Once you’re set on a build and you’re maxed on exotics, what do you have left to work for? Either vanity or stats.

Have gone through several of these. I feel I should just express my exhaustion at hearing the “MMO must have (vertical) grind” thing as much as having to do grind itself. Likewise I think the grinders have won this time, and they have… conquered GW2. But i still hold out hope for a massive multiplayer environment that can do without statistical grind. One can still hope i believe?

lordkrall.7241:

I always wonder why people that use WvW as a reason to dislike Ascended gear always seems to be under the impression that only one side will get the Ascended gear.
That is of course not the case. About the same amount of people on all servers will have gotten Ascended gear in about the same time, thus it balances itself out.

WvW is not a 1v1 battleground after all.

Solo roamers do get 1v1 battles every once in a while. Not every one is a zergling. That said every one has known about this for months so there is no excuse for not having most of what is needed already stored up.

Even if they increase your personal stats, the overall balance will be the same in WvW where odds of having equal amount of players with ascended is the same of both side. If you are roaming alone then sure ascended might make a difference, but only in equally skill matchs, and even then it is possible to beat someone with exotics.

You people are overexaggerating, and at this point Im starting to think you are the kind of spoiled and annoying brats that want it all, want it now and want it free in the candy aisle. There is a fine line between working for something and grinding for it, of course it is very subjective and varies from person to person. There are grindy things in the game for sure, such as those that take 250 t6 mats, or getting raw gold in general, but for everything else, a pretty good balance has been achieved IMHO.

Once again, dont expect to get things based solely on playing absolutely one aspect of the game. Spread out, try different things, find the options that arent too grindy for you and fit your style better. I can guarantee you that you will find a lot of aspects of the game which you didnt even know about.

Ascended have only 1 “point” → Fractals.

It will not be pointless.
A lot of people ( myself included ) will be motivated by the fact that it is the BIS gear and final gear ( at least for a long time). I min/max my stuff. So I will max my armor.

In order to keep you playing a gear tread mill was added to the game shortly after release. In order to make this treadmill a requirement, to keep you playing, past and current content will be buffed over time. Enjoy.

It’s an advantage over your opponents – most especially if you roll straight damage.

That said, to me, ascended IS pointless, since it’s a gear treadmill for the simple sake of having one – there is NO justification for it at all.

Aten.8046:

I play only wvw for fun, no stupid farming or temp events camping (I already have a job in rl thank you). Until now I managed to craft only one weapon for one of my build of one of my 8 characters. When ascended gear will become overwhelming in wvw, since I won’t be able to afford gearing my character as I want and as I did for all of them during the exotic-gear-age, I will quit the game. I lost faith in you anet. Have fun breaking pinhatas

Same is for me if armor > skill wvw is broken

Ascended item complete set is a boost of over 10%

Fortus.6175:

You people are overexaggerating,

In every pvp match, in order to be enjoyable, it has to be fair. How would you like it if both you and your opponent know that the match is skewed before it even started? This is especially more so in 1:1 situations.

Even if you have full ascended and your opponent doesn’t, if you win, he would say that it is because of your gear advantage, not skill that won it for you. On the other hand, if you lose because of a gear disadvantage, you won’t feel good either. Even if the guy who beats you really have more skills than you, you would wonder how much of it is due to gear and how much is due to the player’s skills that have beaten you.

The guy who lost with the inferior gear may even say that you won because you have fewer real life responsibilities than he has, therefore you have more time to grind in this game, not because your skills are superior to his.

I know I won’t have the time to grind for ascended armor any time soon because of my busy life and I roam in WvW. If someone in WvW beats me with the obvious ascended armor skin, I would be tempted to think that way.