Guild Wars 2

Hello GW2 community. Just got back from a hiatus, and I was excited to see they introduced ascended weapons, however, my excitement died quicker than an Azuran escort at a Charr bachelor party once I read up on the process to obtain one. It seems they are removing the sand-box element of what it takes to stay competitive in this game, they are pigeon-holing people into being a slave to a very specific grind (closely linked to market/gem-store at that), and they aren’t giving as many options as most people know they could. This isn’t to complain – this is a discussion, and I would like to hear balanced and mature feed back. I know that is asking a lot of the internet where all the frisky children and inbred cousins like to swarm like any sort of pest or roach, but please let me know what you think. Some of this is opinion and speculation, and some of it you will know to be true. Enjoy!

So not only has guild wars 2 gone against their “not wanting to undo your efforts and hard work of equipping your characters” thing in introducing ascended weapons, but they introduce it in the most boring fashion: you don’t receive the gear from hard-raids and boss fights or something more engaging like that – they come directly from the most boring activities in any MMO game: farming mats and crafting. (And this bodes ill for ascended armor).

Not only is this a time and money sink – the idea of wasting my valuable play-time to level up these professions, but it is also beyond ridiculous because I have four level 80’s who all use multiple weapon and armor sets and builds for multiple situations. (My favorite and primary activity is WvW, fairly hardcore, small skirmishes and havoc, zergs, 1 v 1, you name it, and staying competitive is important). Not only will this remove the wonderful options I have now of having multiple builds, accessories, weapons and armor with different runes, but I also like the aesthetics of multiple armor sets and builds (and what serious MMO-player doesn’t like the shinies?), and now, if I work hard to get time-gated weapons and armor, I will really only have one option: the best set, looks and design be darned! Now what am I gonna do with all these awesome skins I’ve acquired?

This is the biggest problem to me – adding a ludicrous grind for one item that is time-gated favors min/maxing and pushing people into limited play-styles. Instead of working to garner a lot of gear and build knowledge, it would favor minimal expertise and experimentation. Ie., I worked hard for this ascended GS, so why would I use a non-ascended sword and warhorn?

Farming fractals to stay competitive was boring enough as is (seriously, how many times can you run the same few fractals before your heart weeps a little), but now, to try and even stay competitive on multiple toons with multiple weapon sets, I will need more time and money then I will ever have in this game – and instead I will only be focusing on my warrior.

And this is where your standard MMO gear treadmill mechanic sounds wonderful – I’d rather raid multiple bosses a week, be engaged in a game and interesting mechanics with the chance to win something good, rather than waste time farming mats and money and crafting, which is fairly lousy in GW2 anyway, since it isn’t as lucrative as it has been in other MMO’s. I know some people will step in here and talk about market manipulation, speculation, crafting the right items, etc, but again, I am playing a game here – not looking for a second job.

I mean, if the ascended weapons are going to be craft-able, at least let them be put on the market place. I’d personally rather farm gold (equally boring, but more linear, and just as redundant and hard-earned if you think about it) to buy gear, rather than farm mats, to purchase recipes, level up crafting more and etc.

In terms of sandbox, ascended weapons favor people who had the patience or desire to put up with the drollery of crafting. For those of us who are bored to tears with working a 2nd job while we try to play our games (especially if you have been gaming a long time), it totally pushes us into investing time that could be better spent elsewhere. I know some people like crafting (don’t know how or why), and that’s cool. But a lot of people don.t I did it a bit on all my toons for a few easy levels, but gold was often in short supply.

I get it – all in all – ANet is trying to please the hardcore crowd, as well as the casual gamers, but isn’t that what legendary and other grinds are for? I mean, of course, I don’t want them to hand out gear for free, but there should definitely be more options – and pushing people towards limited play-styles through one doorway to acquire gear is just bad design.

-HeavyMetal

With that block of text being said, I would like to hear other people’s opinions, both pro and con for this situation. I mean, I want to believe there is something good about all this, but, after reading much discussion, I have yet to see it, and even then, most of it is biased (just like my opinions), but all in all, I feel I was fair in my assessment. Thank you for your time!

This conversation has been had many, many times. Be prepared for people to simultaneously say that the stat bonus doesn’t matter but it shouldn’t be removed for reasons.

Yes – I know it has been had – and I still have yet to see any satisfactory answers. I’m hoping someone will make it sound like a justifiable move and good idea on ANet’s behalf, for the good of their customers and community…

Hmm… I don’t think we should beat this particular horse again.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acceptance

Right – because this is what the internet is lacking – sarcastic responses and useless posts to inquiring, intelligent discourse.

HeavyMetal.7814:

Right – because this is what the internet is lacking – sarcastic responses and useless posts to inquiring, intelligent discourse.

I don’t know what you expect from this thread. All the arguments have been had. Threads were locked. Some people quit.

My stance is that ascended items reward power for free time, and I don’t like that. I’d rather success come from skill and talent rather than numbers acquired by grinding/busywork. But other people disagree. Some people disagree so hard they think that MMOs are fundamentally about turning free time into bigger numbers, and nothing else.

I’ll be the first person to explain why the stats don’t really matter and why Ascended weapons are good.

The weapons alone are about 5% damage increase (yes, there’s other stuff but obtaining them is a different matter, we’re just talking about weapons here). This wont make much of a difference in PvE (unless you really care that much about shaving a few mins at best off a dungeon run), and WvW being imbalanced already by design, it won’t matter there too.

What it does however, is revive half the game. If you remember before they got introduced, no one bothered with JPs or world bosses at all. Now people do.

They could have introduced cosmetic rewards for world bosses but the problem is, cosmetic rewards are subjective, not everyone will like the skins and a fair portion of players may not even be interested in skins at all.

HeavyMetal I doubt you’ll get an acceptable answer to why ascended gear exists.

ANet added ascended weapons to generate more gem sales.It’s obvious that was their intent,because they knew leveling crafting to 500 would be extremely expensive.If they wanted gear progression or to get players to do more world bosses they would have just left the cap at 400 and just had material cool-downs to time gate players.

Instead they upped the crafting cap to 500 and made sure you’d be burning like 200 gold leveling crafting.If a player only has time to play for an hour a day, or spend most of their time in pvp/wvw they won’t have the gold to level crafting.So chances are some of those players are going use their credit card to buy the gems, because they don’t have don’t have the time to grind gold or just hate doing things that generate high amounts of gold and would rather pvp/wvw.

Whether you truly like it or not, the short answer is because that’s the route Anet chose to go.

We do have some reassurance that there won’t be any more armor tiers, at least in the near future. Although they have not promised to never add another, and from a strategic business sense, that decision is a sound one that I cannot argue.

We have been told to expect further tiers of infusions, but this was expected (at least by me) and shoudn’t really come as that much of a surprise either.

Still, I do not feel rushed to obtain this tier, if I obtain it at all. For my play, the additional stats are counterproductive. Exotics already make it relatively easy to waltz through the content, I have no desire to make it easier.

I agree with all of it. Not just parts of the OP’s post. No. All of it. And I have leveled up all three weaponcrafts and made several ascended weapons. I’m sick of it. It dumbs down my builds and is in no way “fun”. And don’t tell me I now “only” do 5% more damage. It’s much, much more.

aliksyian.7642:

HeavyMetal.7814:

Right – because this is what the internet is lacking – sarcastic responses and useless posts to inquiring, intelligent discourse.

I don’t know what you expect from this thread. All the arguments have been had. Threads were locked. Some people quit.

My stance is that ascended items reward power for free time, and I don’t like that. I’d rather success come from skill and talent rather than numbers acquired by grinding/busywork. But other people disagree. Some people disagree so hard they think that MMOs are fundamentally about turning free time into bigger numbers, and nothing else.

The biggest thing people want out of MMOs is tangible progress (not my opinion, proven by surveys), that’s what differs a MMO from just a game with a multiplayer function. Power is a very tangible form of progress, but talent and skill isn’t.

aliksyian.7642:

HeavyMetal.7814:

Right – because this is what the internet is lacking – sarcastic responses and useless posts to inquiring, intelligent discourse.

I don’t know what you expect from this thread. All the arguments have been had. Threads were locked. Some people quit.

My stance is that ascended items reward power for free time, and I don’t like that. I’d rather success come from skill and talent rather than numbers acquired by grinding/busywork. But other people disagree. Some people disagree so hard they think that MMOs are fundamentally about turning free time into bigger numbers, and nothing else.

Ok – thank you – That is much better. Between you and Xae, I feel like I am getting a better picture. I mean, like I said, I have been on hiatus, and while I fished through the dev notes and discussion on a lot of this, I feel like very little pro vs. con was laid out. As with most forums, it all seems to devolve into name-calling, whining and flaming fairly quickly. Been reading a few other threads, and I think I have a good idea of what to do:

Grinding (and sometimes playing for fun) for ascended accessories for 4 toons and multiple full exotic sets for all of them has been more than enough to keep me engaged. I’ll probably just never craft one, or if I incidentally wind up with the heaps and heaps of new crafting mats as I sure I eventually will, maybe then I’ll grind out a few hundred levels in crafting… Maybe try for drops, but I’m sure they drop as frequently as precursors do.

The problem is, one or two items isn’t a big deal, but we all know progression and “end-game” in MMO’s equates to gear – so now that we have all the accessories, fine. Now a weapon, but the difference will be very noticable for weapon sets and full armor sets… maybe that would be a good time to take a more permanent break. Guess time will tell.

I dunno – it’s just, the biggest thing that bugs me is with making the next tier such a grind/long-play time to acquire, again, it kills the diversity of having so many good options for builds and equipment sets….

I crafted stuff that will never be used, and sink gold on it, after reach 400 (took me like 30minutes, bought all stuff from the BLT), i was amazed by the price gap of the items needed, i felt forced before to aquire ascended trinkets still, need the backpiece becouse mine is not even exotic.
I will not have full exotics gear and by far of that and the amazing class work we have at the momment, gameplay will require more zerg grouping and be more disgusting.

Imo i dont know if there are any kind of hardcore gammers on gw2 and does not look that Anet wants hardcore players offcially in the game since ascended content is far from being hardcore stuff, its just a pretend to be, and here is a small example why, i used to play games that needed uber rare drops on castle siege chests (guilds had to defend the castle 1 full month for those rewards, chest would drop each 7 days with 3-4 rare items ) to craft just one of the items for the weapon recipe, and that in my opinion is content for more hardcore players, quests that would require time, group work and some dedication.

Xae Isareth.1364:

aliksyian.7642:

HeavyMetal.7814:

Right – because this is what the internet is lacking – sarcastic responses and useless posts to inquiring, intelligent discourse.

I don’t know what you expect from this thread. All the arguments have been had. Threads were locked. Some people quit.

My stance is that ascended items reward power for free time, and I don’t like that. I’d rather success come from skill and talent rather than numbers acquired by grinding/busywork. But other people disagree. Some people disagree so hard they think that MMOs are fundamentally about turning free time into bigger numbers, and nothing else.

The biggest thing people want out of MMOs is tangible progress (not my opinion, proven by surveys), that’s what differs a MMO from just a game with a multiplayer function. Power is a very tangible form of progress, but talent and skill isn’t.

I couldn’t agree more. And yes – when we and they say “progress,” we mean gear. End game in MMO’s is always gear progression. Nothing. Else. Which goes back to my point – please do give me something tangible: boss fights and challenging content – something that pushes my skills, something exciting for me to aquire gear from, not farming and a crafting screen.

This would be fine if this was the system they implemented – and I know ascended gear is something they supposedly were planning to implement from the start – but it seems like they are just hurting their own game design and frustrating their customers in the process.

I wanted to say thank you for your thoughtful responses. Again, I was late to this discussion, and didn’t want to necro an old thread.

TooBz’s smart-alec Aceeptance was a good answer.

Seems I am looking to a non-alcoholic kittentail to get me intoxicated. This frustration is on me, for expecting too much from Guild Wars 2.

Ok. Assuming you aren’t just trying to open up a can of worms again (for the record, I am extremely anti-ascended gear)…

I believe ascended gear is designed to get people out into the world and do things they weren’t doing very much before.

You need 500 dragonite ore to craft one weapon, that can be obtained from temples (30 per run), world bosses (3-30 per run), and WvW keep lords (about 10 each).

You need 500 emperyl fragments to craft one, that can be obtained from dungeon runs (20 per run), jumping puzzles (2-4 per puzzle), chests (umm. 4-8?), and towers and camps in WvW (4-8).

You need 500 bloodstone dust, that’s the red stuff you are probably already drowning in. You get it from champs.

The ridiculous ore / wood requirements are to get you to go into zones you otherwise wouldn’t visit. Basically anything from level 15-75.

The Obsidian Shard requirement is to give you a reason to have Karma, and to make it a little longer to get a legendary, especially with the karma nerf.

The need for separate recipes for the inscription and the weapon is to give you something to do with your laurels, because we all only play a single toon and are swimming in the things .. right?

The reason you need soo very much stuff to make one is so it will take you a long long time to get a full set, that way players won’t be qqing for another tier right away.

In response to Xae’s comment, 5% is a superior sigil of force which sells for over 2 gold. 5% is not insignificant.

Upvoted aliksyian because he pretty much said what I was about to. I feel your pain OP, but this is the direction they have taken. Discuss all we want, this direction is not gonna change and Arenanet have been silent or vague about ascended gear for months and months now.

Xae Isareth.1364:

aliksyian.7642:

HeavyMetal.7814:

Right – because this is what the internet is lacking – sarcastic responses and useless posts to inquiring, intelligent discourse.

I don’t know what you expect from this thread. All the arguments have been had. Threads were locked. Some people quit.

My stance is that ascended items reward power for free time, and I don’t like that. I’d rather success come from skill and talent rather than numbers acquired by grinding/busywork. But other people disagree. Some people disagree so hard they think that MMOs are fundamentally about turning free time into bigger numbers, and nothing else.

The biggest thing people want out of MMOs is tangible progress (not my opinion, proven by surveys), that’s what differs a MMO from just a game with a multiplayer function. Power is a very tangible form of progress, but talent and skill isn’t.

You missed the point. The post you quoted was contrasting power gained through talent and skill with power gained through throwing time at the game. Progress would be made under either scenario, hence your point is not applicable.

Also, if you’re claiming objective support for a position, it’s polite to provide links. If you don’t, people will assume you’re pulling facts from the place where most people pull facts on internet forums.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Xae Isareth.1364:

aliksyian.7642:

HeavyMetal.7814:

Right – because this is what the internet is lacking – sarcastic responses and useless posts to inquiring, intelligent discourse.

I don’t know what you expect from this thread. All the arguments have been had. Threads were locked. Some people quit.

My stance is that ascended items reward power for free time, and I don’t like that. I’d rather success come from skill and talent rather than numbers acquired by grinding/busywork. But other people disagree. Some people disagree so hard they think that MMOs are fundamentally about turning free time into bigger numbers, and nothing else.

The biggest thing people want out of MMOs is tangible progress (not my opinion, proven by surveys), that’s what differs a MMO from just a game with a multiplayer function. Power is a very tangible form of progress, but talent and skill isn’t.

You missed the point. The post you quoted was contrasting power gained through talent and skill with power gained through throwing time at the game. Progress would be made under either scenario, hence your point is not applicable.

Also, if you’re claiming objective support for a position, it’s polite to provide links. If you don’t, people will assume you’re pulling facts from the place where most people pull facts on internet forums.

Care to clarify who, what, when, where and why?

HeavyMetal.7814:

Xae Isareth.1364:

aliksyian.7642:

HeavyMetal.7814:

Right – because this is what the internet is lacking – sarcastic responses and useless posts to inquiring, intelligent discourse.

I don’t know what you expect from this thread. All the arguments have been had. Threads were locked. Some people quit.

My stance is that ascended items reward power for free time, and I don’t like that. I’d rather success come from skill and talent rather than numbers acquired by grinding/busywork. But other people disagree. Some people disagree so hard they think that MMOs are fundamentally about turning free time into bigger numbers, and nothing else.

The biggest thing people want out of MMOs is tangible progress (not my opinion, proven by surveys), that’s what differs a MMO from just a game with a multiplayer function. Power is a very tangible form of progress, but talent and skill isn’t.

I couldn’t agree more. And yes – when we and they say “progress,” we mean gear. End game in MMO’s is always gear progression. Nothing. Else. Which goes back to my point – please do give me something tangible: boss fights and challenging content – something that pushes my skills, something exciting for me to aquire gear from, not farming and a crafting screen.

This would be fine if this was the system they implemented – and I know ascended gear is something they supposedly were planning to implement from the start – but it seems like they are just hurting their own game design and frustrating their customers in the process.

It doesn’t have to be gear. For example in TSW it was in a large part getting all the abilities, but it has to be a visible progression which the player can notice. So they can feel they got something out of their time, if you will.

Hardcore encounters like in TBC WoW is a good way of progress, but Anet seems to be very much against doing content which 5% of the playerbase ends up doing. Not sure if that’s a good or a bad thing, because frankly speaking, if I was a casual who isn’t good at games, I won’t be seeing any progress at all if it was all based on hardcore boss encounters, and I would end up quitting.

That’s why WoW stopped being hardcore.

Having said that, I do want to see hardcore raids in the game, and battle trophies (aka cosmetic loot) from doing them.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Xae Isareth.1364:

aliksyian.7642:

HeavyMetal.7814:

Right – because this is what the internet is lacking – sarcastic responses and useless posts to inquiring, intelligent discourse.

I don’t know what you expect from this thread. All the arguments have been had. Threads were locked. Some people quit.

My stance is that ascended items reward power for free time, and I don’t like that. I’d rather success come from skill and talent rather than numbers acquired by grinding/busywork. But other people disagree. Some people disagree so hard they think that MMOs are fundamentally about turning free time into bigger numbers, and nothing else.

The biggest thing people want out of MMOs is tangible progress (not my opinion, proven by surveys), that’s what differs a MMO from just a game with a multiplayer function. Power is a very tangible form of progress, but talent and skill isn’t.

You missed the point. The post you quoted was contrasting power gained through talent and skill with power gained through throwing time at the game. Progress would be made under either scenario, hence your point is not applicable.

Also, if you’re claiming objective support for a position, it’s polite to provide links. If you don’t, people will assume you’re pulling facts from the place where most people pull facts on internet forums.

I’m typing from my iPhone. It’s a nightmare to copy and paste from places.

I misunderstood him. I thought he meant the L2P kind of power.

I can clarify: for most people in MMO’s, even casual, progress means higher levels, which in terms means more and better loot, which is then usually used to progress through more difficult content. In GW2 the abilities are unlocked easily, but everything else is (was) loot and cosmetics. I mean, MMO’s are infamous for gripping people due to “progression ,” which separates MMO’s from other games and RPG’s, hence people play out of compulsion long after the fun is gone. (And if they are honest, every MMO player knows exactly what I am talking about here****)

GW2 billed itself as ‘play how you want,’ ‘horizontal progress not vertical, similar to GW1,’ doing away with the compulsion because it was more equalized, leaving more variables and fun-factors to be had with builds, weapon usage and individual player skill, even though it doesn’t encourage playing skilled/dedicated roles like other MMO’s (ie, tank, cleric, etc). Now they infused their ascended equipment with what I see as nothing but compulsion. Bill it how you will, but it seems to boil down to that.

The main problem with this is – yes, they are increasing the loot progression – but for what? What new content? Just for the heck of it? Is the Lich King stopping by after Mad King Thorn crawls back into his hole?

The other motivations mentioned seem like a decent idea (encouraging more diverse activities and exploration), but at the end of the day, it all seems like limiting factors, and right back to doing what any MMO does best – encouraging compulsion, which all of us have to greater or lesser degrees to even swallow these crazy games like we tend do to.

Ok – maybe this is more than just ascended gear.

I think it has more to do with the fundamental problem with MMO’s in general: Addiction based game design. And without enough unique and quality content, it feels that much more hollow

Until a game comes along to shake up the formula enough, I guess this is what we’re looking at. Long hallways of trash mobs and pointless upgrades.

I agree with TooBz’ analysis of the intent, but getting people into other parts of the game only partly works, and things like Dragonite bear to be questioned.

There are probably some people who are making their way through mid-level zones to get the hundreds of iron and platinum ore and mid-level woods required to make one ascended weapon. The numbers are astonishing, however, and for most it just makes more sense to farm the gold required to get those mats on the TP.

I suppose you could argue that if those burdensome mat requirements aren’t getting people into mid-level zones, at least they made it worthwhile to sell them on the TP, so it was good for the economy, but I’m starting to question whether a realistically functioning economy should even be a goal for a heroic fantasy game.

As for Dragonite, if they were going to draw people into disused parts of the game, why choose world bosses, which were being done for their guaranteed rare drops already? Why not create a mat that got people out doing all of those DEs that are only ever seen by players doing world completion or who still level without doing one of the XP farms?

Ascended gear feels like such a departure from so much of the rest of the game. ArenaNet touted their flat leveling progression before and shortly after launch. The idea is that you weren’t going to see some exponential requirement to continue your character’s progression. That’s true of the trip from 1 to 80, gearing from Fine to Exotic, and leveling crafting from 1 to 400.

Suddenly, when you reach Ascended weapons, the progression line drastically steepens. Crafting from 400 to 500 takes mats worth ten times what it takes to get from 1 to 400. Ascended weapons themselves require hundreds and hundreds of mats and time-gates to pass through.

In the end, though, it does come right back to the players. There’s no way for any developer to create content to satisfy people who play hours and hours a day. So, in order to keep that portion of the playerbase in game, the only real option is to create addictive game design because a portion of the playerbase wants to be addicted.

I can’t see ArenaNet’s and NcSofts balance sheets or log-in metrics. Perhaps they could have taken those players box price and then waved at them as they swarmed off to the next game so that GW2 could have stayed closer to what they said it was going to be. Then again, maybe the ship looked like it was sinking, and the only way to keep it afloat was to get the locusts to stay on board and hope most of the rest of us choose not to abandon ship.

To the OP. I normally am very critical tward AN however in this regard I think this is something that they have done actually quite well now a year after release. I left when they announced Ascended items because while I do 90% PvP it was kitten that I’d have to spend my time grinding PvE fractals to get the best gear in game for PvP.

Now however you can get ascended trinkets and such from PvP laural vendors that you can get in WvW. Also the materials that you use to make the Ascended weapons are all farmable while farming other players in WvW. So the current Ascended gear with the exception of I think the back piece can all be acquired through PvE and PvP.

It is far closer now to the play how you want as it was the last year. Yes the items cost a lot but considering how much I’ve been farming lately you have to make a lot of exotics to skill up to make the gear, and if you salvage what you make then you’ll get the Dark Matter while your leveling. While it’s not the fastest thing I have leveled up in the last two weeks and plan to be 500 in weapon smithing within the next two weeks. Hopefully will have at least one ascended weapon by end of the year.

The Legendary are very dated looking now. The graphics definitely in my opinion are not worth the time vs the graphic of the Ascended. The being able to swap stats how often do your really do that? But for a fraction of the cost you can have a few different ascended weapons for different builds or best yet multiples on multiple characters for still less then a Legendary.

Honestly this is the best thing AN has done in the past year. With the amount of time the Legendaries take vs the meh graphic and swapping options I couldn’t really care less if they ever come out with a scavenger or crafting of precursor. Price vs Utility Ascended are a way better option.

HeavyMetal.7814:

…I would like to hear balanced and mature feed back.

HeavyMetal.7814:

…the internet where all the frisky children and inbred cousins like to swarm like any sort of pest or roach…

Uh huh.

Pros:
-Ascended gear gives the hardcore players something to do, so both casuals and hardcore players have something to do.

-Ascended gear means new armor added to the game. Anet hasn’t added a single armor set to the game yet.

Cons:
-Casuals truly believe that ascended gear will unbalance WvW and PvE and will favor the hardcore players.

-Ascended gear looks like butt.

-Ascended gear uses the same general armor concept as every. single. piece. of. armor. in. the. game. Therefore, it is butt ugly x2.

Buttercup.5871:

I agree with all of it. Not just parts of the OP’s post. No. All of it. And I have leveled up all three weaponcrafts and made several ascended weapons. I’m sick of it. It dumbs down my builds and is in no way “fun”. And don’t tell me I now “only” do 5% more damage. It’s much, much more.

I cannot believe this. After posting the above, a user named Sinoran.9140 messages me the following in game:

Buttercup.5871:

Buttercup.5871:

I agree with all of it. Not just parts of the OP’s post. No. All of it. And I have leveled up all three weaponcrafts and made several ascended weapons. I’m sick of it. It dumbs down my builds and is in no way “fun”. And don’t tell me I now “only” do 5% more damage. It’s much, much more.

I cannot believe this. After posting the above, a user named Sinoran.9140 messages me the following in game:

Actually he would be the idiot but that’s okay. See in WoW there is only a 5% difference between non 2200 and 2200 rated weapons. It makes a HUGE difference. Apparently that player hasn’t done much competitive PvP in MMOs. Let them think what they want. We can’t all be at the top of the game.

Edit: Ask a eSports player if 5% is a big difference or not. The answer is a pretty unanimous Yes.

Ascended is ok.
Skill > Gear.
You can play all part of the game with exotic.

“ascended gear is to be a bridge between exotic and Legendary”

The difference between medicine and poison is in the dose. Gw2 need a Small dose of vertical progression.

Buttercup.5871:

Buttercup.5871:

I agree with all of it. Not just parts of the OP’s post. No. All of it. And I have leveled up all three weaponcrafts and made several ascended weapons. I’m sick of it. It dumbs down my builds and is in no way “fun”. And don’t tell me I now “only” do 5% more damage. It’s much, much more.

I cannot believe this. After posting the above, a user named Sinoran.9140 messages me the following in game:

Report him.

my ability to be flexible feels wasteful ever since ascended items

I 110% agree with everything the OP say’s and is for the most part one of the main reason’s why I stopped playing month’s ago, well that and horrible RnG and always getting 4v5 Spvp matches. The gear grind in this game is not fun what so ever for me and I feel other game’s do it in a far better, less grindy and more meaningful way. So now I play those other games, I get my BiS gear in a reasonable amount of time and am able to sit back and enjoy the content and play the way I want to play. I check in here every week or so to see the changes hoping Anet decides to go back to making the game they originally advertised.

I was fine (even though I disagreed with it)with ascended trinkets, there are plenty of ways to get them that don’t require me to craft up to 500 (which is a grind in itself) and then farm meta events and dungeons which I have no interest in doing. Ascended weapons came out, and I made 1. After that I quit, or should I say, I am taking a break from the game until I start agreeing with Anets direction. Ascended discourages alts and build variety and is a pain in the kitten to make. They could have at least made the weapons sellable on the TP so that people who do craft them can make some money off of them and those that don’t want to craft can just buy the kitten things.

Julie Yann.5379:

I was fine (even though I disagreed with it)with ascended trinkets, there are plenty of ways to get them that don’t require me to craft up to 500 (which is a grind in itself) and then farm meta events and dungeons which I have no interest in doing. Ascended weapons came out, and I made 1. After that I quit, or should I say, I am taking a break from the game until I start agreeing with Anets direction. Ascended discourages alts and build variety and is a pain in the kitten to make. They could have at least made the weapons sellable on the TP so that people who do craft them can make some money off of them and those that don’t want to craft can just buy the kitten things.

Can you explain to me how ascended discourages alts? Laurels are account bound, weapons are account bound until you equip them (and I can only assume armor will be too).

Ahlen.7591:

Julie Yann.5379:

I was fine (even though I disagreed with it)with ascended trinkets, there are plenty of ways to get them that don’t require me to craft up to 500 (which is a grind in itself) and then farm meta events and dungeons which I have no interest in doing. Ascended weapons came out, and I made 1. After that I quit, or should I say, I am taking a break from the game until I start agreeing with Anets direction. Ascended discourages alts and build variety and is a pain in the kitten to make. They could have at least made the weapons sellable on the TP so that people who do craft them can make some money off of them and those that don’t want to craft can just buy the kitten things.

Can you explain to me how ascended discourages alts? Laurels are account bound, weapons are account bound until you equip them (and I can only assume armor will be too).

Playing a few hours a week will take months to equip 1 toon in full ascended versus the 1 week or less for full exotics. Multiply that by the number of alts and it could take you over a year. Ascended gear discourages Alts cause the whole process of creating it sucks and is time consuming and expensive in mats.. It’s not hard to understand.

Ahlen.7591:

Can you explain to me how ascended discourages alts? Laurels are account bound, weapons are account bound until you equip them (and I can only assume armor will be too).

Sure. It’s not about whether an obtained BiS piece can be given to any character on one’s account, it’s about looking at the totality of time, gold and whatever else needed to completely equip multiple characters and thinking it isn’t worth it.

The idea that Asc is alt-unfriendly stems from an assumption about the availability of BiS gear in GW2. If you played GW, followed the pre-launch GW2 advertising and played GW2 at launch, there was every indication that equipping alts in BiS was achievable through a variety of means (you could play any aspect of the game you wanted to), and could be done with relative ease. That is no longer the case and some people are not willing to accept the new paradigm.

We could argue the virtues of either view til the cows came home, but that isn’t my intent. I took your question as an honest one, looking for information and attempted to explain how I see the psychology of those who think that way about Asc and alts.

Pros
-It has higher stats.
-It makes one of your characters feel like they are a hero when you are playing them.
-They have animated uv coordinates so they look “ascended”. So they have that going for them. Which is nice.

Cons
-Most of them are fugly. (See gemstore for how to change the appearance).

-Time and materials mean you will likely only ever gear one profession. Killed my alts.
(One of every weapon you use, enough armor and trinkets to support the different builds you play. Unless you like being married to one set of gear and one build, this will take a very long time.)

-No room for error in deciding what to craft. You can’t salvage it, you can’t sell it, and
the cost of the recipe for the weapon and inscription mean you better be pretty darn sure about what builds and weapons you intend to use. You can’t switch the stats or use an existing ascended weapon to craft a different set of stats on to it.

-It is a contrived game mechanic and a hamster wheel. It isn’t fun. I’ve crafted three and wasn’t the least excited. It was more like chewing tinfoil. I was happy when it was done so I could put the spread sheet away.

-More chores of things you have to do when you log in. Nope, can’t go down to Cursed Shore and finally do that jumping puzzle. I need to do my daily. I need to get my quartz. I need to charge my quartz. I need to farm my candy corn. I need to craft my daily ascended materials. I feel like my dad is over here telling me to take the garbage out and make my bed. The Hero of Shaemoor has chores now! No more adventuring for you!

McSlappy.1372:

Buttercup.5871:

Buttercup.5871:

I agree with all of it. Not just parts of the OP’s post. No. All of it. And I have leveled up all three weaponcrafts and made several ascended weapons. I’m sick of it. It dumbs down my builds and is in no way “fun”. And don’t tell me I now “only” do 5% more damage. It’s much, much more.

I cannot believe this. After posting the above, a user named Sinoran.9140 messages me the following in game:

Actually he would be the idiot but that’s okay. See in WoW there is only a 5% difference between non 2200 and 2200 rated weapons. It makes a HUGE difference. Apparently that player hasn’t done much competitive PvP in MMOs. Let them think what they want. We can’t all be at the top of the game.

Edit: Ask a eSports player if 5% is a big difference or not. The answer is a pretty unanimous Yes.

I’ve got Ascended gear both in my Guardian and my Mesmer and frankly, I don’t notice a difference in PvE. My numbers are 5% higher but it doesn’t exactly let me ball wreck enemies compared to exotics and I don’t feel myself getting much more powerful at all like in other MMOs.

The hint is, WvW is not an eSport. There’s so many imbalanced that it throws that caused by Ascended gear out of the window. For a start, the number of people on each side is going to never equate.

Last time I checked the consensus on potential damage increase compared to exotics appeared to be roughly 10 to 16 percent. See:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Ascended-vs-Exotic-Math