(edited by Joiry.2504)
CDI- Character Progression-Horizontal
I think another good method of horizontal progression lies in the combat system itself.
I think that every class should get a Trait Window “B”.
You would not be able to trait in window “A” if you put points in window “B”. You play in one or the other for balancing purposes. I think Window “B” and all of the skills therein should be earned in game. Basically we would have to go out and earn every trait in window “B” by playing the game.
New Weapon, Utility, and Elite skills being added to the game in the future should be earned via game play and not skill points. Skill points would still be viable because we can make weapons at the forge with them. This would create a time sink that could be hidden in the game play itself and in exploration. Earning skills via skill points just feels arbitrary.
Making control and support as viable in PvE as it is in sPvP would go a long way. Telegraphed attacks are great for dodging, but there is no affect that the player has on the enemy itself when defiance is involved. Skills that move bosses are actually frowned upon and for good reason because you are moving the target out of AoE. That makes damage king. Classes that shine in the control dept. get left in the dust in PvE. Skills (or traits that enhance a skill to interrupt) that interrupt but do not move the target should be looked at. Skillful play should be rewarded. That to me is good horizontal progression on the development side of things.
I think a good example of control classes getting a time in the spotlight is during Guild Bounties. My Ranger and Engie shine in the fights where you have to move one of those bounties out of an AoE that they create or they don’t take damage. The problem with those bosses in regular PvE is that they have defiance and you have to time it right. You can make the combat more interesting by revisiting the defiance mechanic.
Just two more points I’d like to add based on the current discussion:
Preventing Homogony: (Aka preventing everyone looking the same.) A major problem in Guildwars 1 (one of few) was that “endgame” wise there was a uniform of sorts that most accomplished players would end up wearing,
Obsidian armor (most expensive, required completing a 3 hour hard map clear in addition making it the most prestigious)
Torment weapon (requires repeated completion of an elite area, expensive)
Chaos gloves: (Really expensive hand item that literally glows)
GWAMM title progress: (shows how many other titles you have total)Looks wise this looked really good but the problem was this was objectively the most prestigious outfit, it requires the most money,skill and well roundedness to get.
So everyone wanted it, and many people got it, there was one point when you couldn’t walk into an outpost without someone having the same outfit as you which shouldn’t happen in a good Horizontal progression, but how do you stop this?
Ehhhh….
I always rolled my eyes when I saw someone with obsidian, chaos gloves, and Tormented weapons, but that’s because, to me, they’re the equivalent of the nouveau riche wearing cloth-of-gold and mink fur and enough jewellery to sink a small boat not because it looks good, but because it serves purely to show off that they can afford to be that ostentatious.
Yes, that may have been the most expensive combination, but if you actually want customisation rather than simply going straight to the most expensive option to show off, there were literally dozens of alternative options out there. I’m sorry, but if you found yourself running into people who looked exactly like you because you chose to adopt the “uniform”, that’s entirely self-inflicted. When you choose to follow the herd, it’s not anyone else’s fault that you end up looking like all the other sheep.
Having said that, there is something we have in common here – in that I fear that we truly will see a uniform developing. As things are at the moment, everyone who isn’t willing to fork out for transmutation crystals is eventually – if they get there and don’t conscientiously object to ascended armour – going to end up with one of a short list of looks – the ascended armour as it is normally, hall of monuments armour, or possibly one or a mix of the above with some Radiant and/or Hellfire pieces mixed in. Not because they chose to adopt the uniform, but because these are the only looks available to ascended armour without resorting to crystals (which costs not only the value of the crystal, but also the value of whatever armour was sacrificed to provide the skin…).
This, I think, is what really needs to be solved. We don’t need some uber-hard-to-get armour that just shifts the goalposts for getting the “look at me and how much virtual money I was able to spend!” ‘uniform’ – what we need is a substantially larger range of appearances that can ascended armour can be found/crafted/otherwise acquired with without transmutation. Otherwise, I’d predict that, given a few years for people to get ascended armour, the ‘uniform’ issue will become many orders of magnitude worse than it ever was in GW1.
People don’t hate Scarlet like Game of Thrones fans hate Joffrey.
They hate her the way Star Wars fans hate Jar Jar Binks.
It would be very nice if we could get unlockable armor stats and unlockable upgrade components as well as unlockable armor skins.
We could have a platform, perhaps the cultural armor, that lets you progress horizontally by unlocking several different stats and upgrade components you could switch between the same way you switch between stats on a legendary.
The same could work for the skins on the platform.
This would also work for vertical progression since you could allow a vertical “upgrade” to the skins that you horizontally unlock.
For example you might be able to horizontally unlock Flamekissed T3, Frostkissed T3, Windkissed T3 and Earthkissed T3 and those could each have a vertical line of progression as well. For example Flamekissed, Firekissed, Infernal and Hellblazed which would be different vertical tiers of skins.
The same could work for the upgrade components.
You first unlock horizontally the fine upgrade components and then you unlock them vertically.
After an unlock you are free to switch between them as you like.
This lets the players be more versatile and useful. You don’t have to go out of a dungeon, go to your bank, switch gear and come back… If you even have several different sets of gear.
You can just get out of combat and switch around the stats and upgrade components and have your build ready in seconds.
What I gathered, ANet has always said they never wanted to lock players into a certain role. But that’s what the current idea of progression does. This idea of horizontal and vertical unlocks lets you choose the role you want and need on the fly.
This also has the bonus that players never lose what they have once gained.
Currently if you want to upgrade to a new armor, horizontally or vertically, you have to transmute and lose the old one if you want the skins on the new one. You can get new skins for the new one, but the old one will still demand storage somewhere and if it’s ascended tier, it will likely be too expensive to make several sets anyways so you’re locked into the armor you once chose.
Instead with this idea, you can switch to what you want, when you want.
The platform also doesn’t need to come with all skins and upgrades at once, it can be updated by ANet as time goes on and they make new skins, stats and upgrade components. So it’s never final but always updateable. And that is fine since players never lose anything in it.
Read more about it in the old CDI progression thread:
Unlock platform
Unlockable upgrades
More arguments
I can’t really think of any systems that I want done or redone, other than dyes account bound, and maybe a way to duplicate Gem Store items. I’d probably buy more armors if you could have as many as you want. Also making Living Story rewards accessible through a similar interface, and give Black Lion Chests better stuff particularly for the weapon tickets (I have literally never seen a single one being used, which is the biggest shame considering how perfect some of them are) but that might be pushing the bounds of the topic.
Really, all I want is more stuff. More armor and more skins which are more practical to use, more heal/utility/elite skills, more weapon:class combinations with skills to go with them. These have gigantic benefits for the health of every aspect of the game.
Actually, now that I think about it, trait templates would be super duper nice.
Switchable stats for Ascended gear
More “chance” at Ascended drops
Allow for selling of Ascended gear
Branch the available classes and create new skills(2-3 branches per class, with ~10 new utilities total per class)
Class/Race swapping (via gem store of course)
-More skills, with interesting ways to unlock them.
-More weapons for each class, with interesting ways to unlock them.
-Mesmer MH pistol. I felt like this deserved its own bullet point.
-More weapon and armor skins tied to in-game content (i.e. not the gem store).
-New runes and sigils with interesting effects.
-New zones with interesting lore, i.e. ring of fire, with rewards in the form of all of the previous bullet points.
-Unlockable emotes.
-More titles.
-Weapon naming (sell a “weapon naming ticket” in the gem store or something).
(edited by Nar.8327)
1. Cosmetics:
Two legendary weapons of each type - one humorous one, like the moot mace, one serious one like twilight.
Weapon dyeing - nuff said
Missing weapon sets - everyone can see that sylvari and asura T1 and T2 cultural weapons are placeholders for “sunnier days”, same with Sorrow’s Embrace Weapons (aren’t the real ones the level 50 craftable rares?).
more themed backpacks – run a sylvari necro. Green one. Guess which backpack fits me? None. Not even the haloween book in green version (to big and it’s not properly dark)
2. Dungeons and combat systems
- balancing professions - everyone knows the “lvl 80 full zerk warrior” story from group finder. If only one to three out of eight professions matter that’s butchering your own content
- balancing dungeon and boss content - stacking in corner is not a good encouragement to try many builds, strategies and professions when facing a hard dungeon boss.
- balancing a dungeon path length and difficulty - take AC as a example of doing it right. All paths are different, but each presenting a similar level of challenge, time consumed and reward if you know what you’re doing.
On top of it each teaches an important aspect of teamplay:
-path one – protecting npc and kiting
-path two – self control when facing boss and strict teamwork
-path three – what is stability;p And quick bursting down of targets.
Crucible of Eternity is another example of things done right (minus stacking ofc).
- Traits that matter. Most traits are doing what they should, but some are still making for running jokes of the year, killing build diveristy (13% power as condition damage might be good necro trait, but certainly not guardian grandmaster one )
- Skills that matter. Signet of Mercy active, Assasin’s signet active, Shield of Avenger command, Bow of Truth normal behaviour to name just a few unattractive, unrewarding skills from top of head. I’m sure there’s more to be cherrypicked for the needs of this conversation.
- 25 damaging condition stack cap per attacker and not per monster attacked. All damage condition builds are useless in pve unless you solo or do in two people tops. Again killing horizontal progression that is already there, just unchain it from the floor.
(edited by ZeftheWicked.3076)
As far as it goes for skins I think the new PvP skin merchant does it right:
-a limited number of currencies/ingredients: in this case gold and glory. Too many currencies are a pain to keep track off, yet alone to gather. Just looking at an asecended recipe makes me walk away in terror.
-no time gating. You can get it as quickly or slowly as you want. if you don’t play a game you don’t feel like you missed out on something.
-the price is a bit over the top for some sets, so that needs adjusting.
Easy to get, not time-gated, straight forward systems is what I want. I’d love to see something like that in PvE. I’d love to walk away from the current dungeon reward system for example, that forces you to grind the same place over and over again insead of letting the player decide how he wants to get his items. Freedom of choice!
There are a lot of excellent suggestions in this thread.
For me, horizontal progression is infinitely more important that vertical. I tend to look at vertical profession as the “job” and the part that you do just so that you can have time, money, etc for your fun things (hobbies = vertical progression).
So what would I love to have for my hobbies?
1. Armor and weapon skin collections. Obviously for this to work, we need an unlock/storage system.
2. Housing and cool stuff to put in it. Quested, crafted, random drops, whatever the source, it makes your house or personal instance more, well, personalized.
3. I’d really like appearance items added to the crafting professions. Armor, weapons, housing items.
4. Titles. More and more titles and a variety of ways to get them (see LoTR for an example of fun ways to get many titles).
All of the hobbies listed above can be incorporated into current zones and activities. I would suggest updating each zone to have a zone specific set of appearance armor, house items, appearance weapons, recipes, and so forth. The karma hearts could be updated to carry these items. The karma merchants all over the land that carry the same few cooking items should be made more region specific with a variety of items.
Some of the most fun I had was locating all the cooking materials my chef needed and locating all the pets for my ranger. I would love more scavenger hunt style things to find.
- As race discrimination is an important issue, consider a proposal to make all racial skills unlocked to all races, but gated by territory-context “quests” (hearts and dynamic events). Yes, this would come at the cost of some distinction between races, but let me ask you: which distinction exists now, when those skills are underwhelming and no one uses them? Let me ask another question: what is better for world immersion, underwhelming skills gated by race, or appealing skills obtained from exploring the world? Under mathematical terms, there would be more potential for world immersion if all races could obtain them (1. Because it would add less restriction for balance, and thus players would actually use and “feel” them, and 2. because they could be tied to territory and thus add personality to each map) than not (because it would remove race distinction, which barely even exists at the current place for the sake of race balance). Two points against one in favor of racial skills be made available to all races. But let me ask a third question: World immersion aside, how fun would it be to all players in GW2, if suddenly they had 24 (!!) new skills to try out, and 30 new skills (by including the racials they already had) buffed to become stronger? I can tell right now that I would personally love it, and make the gameplay a lot more refreshing, while Anet wouldn’t even need to design 24-30 new skills for this single purpose: they are already there. Anet would have to rebalance them and design “quests” for each of them, though.
I like this idea. I’d be fine with all races having racial skills if it means we get racial skills to mean something, and it would allow for some more lore in actually acquiring the skills.
I also second the various comments about how my character’s “personality” should mean something, like having new voice quotes for various things. Maybe a character won’t say “Urge to kill rising!” unless they have a higher Ferocity score.
Quick note to say that I am up to date and that there are some awesome ideas here.
If someone wants to do a macro summary of the main ideas that would be awesome (if they haven’t already. I haven’t seen one). If not I will do one tomorrow morning.
I will then call out some of the suggestions I personally really like. Also as per Colin’s question in the previous thread (one which has been asked again by some posters in this thread) feel free to discuss Horizontal Progression systems you have enjoyed in other games.
Chris
There are a lot of excellent suggestions in this thread.
For me, horizontal progression is infinitely more important that vertical. I tend to look at vertical profession as the “job” and the part that you do just so that you can have time, money, etc for your fun things (hobbies = vertical progression).
So what would I love to have for my hobbies?
1. Armor and weapon skin collections. Obviously for this to work, we need an unlock/storage system.
2. Housing and cool stuff to put in it. Quested, crafted, random drops, whatever the source, it makes your house or personal instance more, well, personalized.
3. I’d really like appearance items added to the crafting professions. Armor, weapons, housing items.
4. Titles. More and more titles and a variety of ways to get them (see LoTR for an example of fun ways to get many titles).
All of the hobbies listed above can be incorporated into current zones and activities. I would suggest updating each zone to have a zone specific set of appearance armor, house items, appearance weapons, recipes, and so forth. The karma hearts could be updated to carry these items. The karma merchants all over the land that carry the same few cooking items should be made more region specific with a variety of items.
Some of the most fun I had was locating all the cooking materials my chef needed and locating all the pets for my ranger. I would love more scavenger hunt style things to find.
Agree on all of those. All are horizontal and could be fun.
Rift also had lots of odd and fun ways to get TONS of cool titles … see http://rift.zam.com/wiki/Title_%28Rift%29
Stormbluff Isle [AoD]
Region Achievement lines
People need a reason to spread out through the world. So give them a reason. Give each of the 5 regions their own long term achievement line. Filling up these lines will be done by doing events in their respective areas. Each finished tier will award the player with some sort of reward.
- Cheaper waypoint costs within the region
- Cheaper merchants
- Region exclusive titles
- Armor sets
- Cheaper waypoints within a zone
- Free waypoints within a zone
- Different dialog from npc’s when reaching certain tiers. ie being addressed with more respect for one.
- Final tier titles something along the line of: conqueror of orr, protector of kryta, sentinel of meguuma.
The achievements should not be cheaped, by being able to farm the same event over and over. So I would propose a limit of only counting unique events per day. On top of that make a high plateau limit on events per day. Making sure hardcore grinders can max it out per day if they so choose, but casuals not feel left behind to much.
New weapons sets.
Adding new weapon sets that are obtained and upgraded by class specific quests. Each class would get say 2 new weapons they can train, but instead of unlocking them one skill at a time by killing them. All skills are unlocked but at say 70% of their final strength. They are then upgraded by completing the class quests, until they reach their max potential.
As a call out to other games:
Horizontal progression systems that I’ve liked in other games:
LoTR:
The titles. The factions. The bits you can turn in to up your factions (gives you something to do besides sell bits to merchants). The emotes. The ability to play musical instruments.
EQ2:
Decorating, housing, carpenter crafting profession, so many house items from holidays and quests. Lore and Legend quests with house item rewards. Heritage quests with house item rewards. Titles. Emotes.
Aion: The useful pets that can follow you around.
I know I’m prob repeating a lot of what has been said, but it’s important to show support for these ideas…
1) weapon/armor skin locker. The current transmog system is terrible and clunky. It should be very easy for me to switch around looks and it just isn’t.
2) more weapon skills, more utility skills, more elites, more weapon types for each class.
3) Customization of our home instance and/or reintroduction of the Hall of Monuments
4) More titles to work toward
5) mini activities (like polymock) and a revamp of the way minis work. They should not be in the bank or in our bags. They should have a tab in our Hero panel where you can summon them.
6) more armor and weapon skins to get in-game. Especially would love more cultural armor.
7) Bring back “vanquishing” somehow and titles appropriate for vanquishing. Perhaps access to special weapon and armor skins when you vanquish areas.
8) New zones. Let us go to the Ring of Fire. Let’s see Elona and Cantha again. Go to the Far Shiverpeaks and take back the Norn’s land. There are plenty of opportunities for great stories here.
9) New races. Would love to see Tengu or Largos as playable races.
(edited by xarallei.4279)
It would be another time consuming difficult PvE activity to do that’s completely different than dungeons, and it lets players enjoy all of the zones in new and exciting instanced ways.
as if the open world zones would be too populated nowadays, we need a new instanced version. No thank you. Better find other ways to add Hard Mode to the game but not instanced
Yeah, that was sort of my biggest concern with it as well, which is why I stated in that same post:
“The biggest problem I see with this though, is that it would prevent players from spending time in the real zones, which is already a goal of Anet.”
:)
It would be really nice for you to have more use in the personal story area of your hero panel. Perhaps a few more tabs? Something adding the stories and whatnot for you to read again later. Bonus points if you could get copies of old meta award skins again here.
Secondly POIs are boring as hell, collecting them is just a chore, but if each one gave you like…a codex entry? That you could collect and read later with a bit of lore or info about the site a lot more people would be interested in exploring and learning about the world for more than just getting their legendary.
One thing about Factions. I did not put it on my list because I am very wary of Factions. The game is kind of grindy enough and adding rep grind to the mix could be disastrous. I just think about other games and having to do rep grind on every single character…..ugh. It’s just really miserable to me. If it was account wide maybe I wouldn’t mind it, but per character? No….just no.
- As race discrimination is an important issue, consider a proposal to make all racial skills unlocked to all races, but gated by territory-context “quests” (hearts and dynamic events). Yes, this would come at the cost of some distinction between races, but let me ask you: which distinction exists now, when those skills are underwhelming and no one uses them? Let me ask another question: what is better for world immersion, underwhelming skills gated by race, or appealing skills obtained from exploring the world? Under mathematical terms, there would be more potential for world immersion if all races could obtain them (1. Because it would add less restriction for balance, and thus players would actually use and “feel” them, and 2. because they could be tied to territory and thus add personality to each map) than not (because it would remove race distinction, which barely even exists at the current place for the sake of race balance). Two points against one in favor of racial skills be made available to all races. But let me ask a third question: World immersion aside, how fun would it be to all players in GW2, if suddenly they had 24 (!!) new skills to try out, and 30 new skills (by including the racials they already had) buffed to become stronger? I can tell right now that I would personally love it, and make the gameplay a lot more refreshing, while Anet wouldn’t even need to design 24-30 new skills for this single purpose: they are already there. Anet would have to rebalance them and design “quests” for each of them, though.
This is a terrible idea.
Racial skills add to uniquness and make my race choice matter. I don’t play a sylvari to watch it summon charr warband or draw hidden pistol. I play a sylvari so even in burned ashford plains i can bring the power of nature into the fight!
Tying it into given map makes me feel like i’m the map’s she-dog and not master of my own fate, walking down my own path.
Not to mention how ridicilous it would look lore-wise:
- charr warshipping human gods (to use human racials)
- sylvari morphing into animals (while they’re plants)
- asura becoming “9 feet tall!” when doing same
- norn who aren’t into science using radiation fields and golems…oh wait they can do that via runes…yikes!
You want to make racials on pair with normal profession skills – i absolutely agree, more power to you if you do. But if you want to make them a communistic “if you have it so should everybody else, only on our terms” then i say “HELL NO!”
Pardon me if this has already been mentioned.
CUSTOMIZABLE WEAPON SKILLS
For a long time I’ve been interested in customizable weapon skills. Not new weapons, not updates to current skills…but alternate skills to the weapons we currently have.
Example
Auto would always be the same, but skills 2-5 would each have 2 skills that I could choose from for that slot (the original skill, and a new unlocked alternate). So I could pick the original skill for slot 2, the alternate skill for slots 3 and 4, and then the original skill for 5…or whatever, mix and match is up to us! An example of an alt skill could be warrior horn skill 4: an aoe torment. So you decide, do you want aoe torment or aoe speed buff???
This would add a lot more customization to our bars, and should be relatively easy to balance as each skill is tied to a slot, and can be adjusted by cool down.
Unlock Methods
These alt skills could be unlocked via skill points (10-25 depending on skill slot), completing meta events for a tome that lets you pick a skill to unlock… or a combo of both: earn up to one tome per day, and requires 25 skill points to use. Heck, an update like this could even be included in the Cantha expansion
Critical Impact [Crit]
(edited by Beorn Saxon.4762)
- As race discrimination is an important issue, consider a proposal to make all racial skills unlocked to all races, but gated by territory-context “quests” (hearts and dynamic events). Yes, this would come at the cost of some distinction between races, but let me ask you: which distinction exists now, when those skills are underwhelming and no one uses them? Let me ask another question: what is better for world immersion, underwhelming skills gated by race, or appealing skills obtained from exploring the world? Under mathematical terms, there would be more potential for world immersion if all races could obtain them (1. Because it would add less restriction for balance, and thus players would actually use and “feel” them, and 2. because they could be tied to territory and thus add personality to each map) than not (because it would remove race distinction, which barely even exists at the current place for the sake of race balance). Two points against one in favor of racial skills be made available to all races. But let me ask a third question: World immersion aside, how fun would it be to all players in GW2, if suddenly they had 24 (!!) new skills to try out, and 30 new skills (by including the racials they already had) buffed to become stronger? I can tell right now that I would personally love it, and make the gameplay a lot more refreshing, while Anet wouldn’t even need to design 24-30 new skills for this single purpose: they are already there. Anet would have to rebalance them and design “quests” for each of them, though.
This is a terrible idea.
Racial skills add to uniquness and make my race choice matter. I don’t play a sylvari to watch it summon charr warband or draw hidden pistol. I play a sylvari so even in burned ashford plains i can bring the power of nature into the fight!
Tying it into given map makes me feel like i’m the map’s she-dog and not master of my own fate, walking down my own path.
Not to mention how ridicilous it would look lore-wise:
- charr warshipping human gods (to use human racials)
- sylvari morphing into animals (while they’re plants)
- asura becoming “9 feet tall!” when doing same
- norn who aren’t into science using radiation fields and golems…oh wait they can do that via runes…yikes!
You want to make racials on pair with normal profession skills – i absolutely agree, more power to you if you do. But if you want to make them a communistic “if you have it so should everybody else, only on our terms” then i say “HELL NO!”
I’ve never liked racial skills because they can create that effect of: I created a human ranger, but a sylvari skill actually works so well with rangers that I have to consider rerolling.
Of course this doesn’t actually happen in GW2, but it could if the racials were buffed to be useful.
Instead I would prefer if they were replaced with profession PvE only skills (that even don’t work in WvW).
[..] feel free to discuss Horizontal Progression systems you have enjoyed in other games.
Chris
An example most of us probably know: POKÉMON!
This game(s) showed probably more than any other game that people can be entertained for a very long time with horizontal progression. There is also vertical progression of course; the pokémons have levels and need to be trained seperatly, but most players have two or three ‘favourited’ pokémons they’ll train and with which they make most fights. The main aspect of the game is what the poké-hymn “gotta catch’em all” says: Collect all pokémons together, no matter how hard some of them are to catch. The player can keep track of the progression easily with the ‘pokédex’ and knows always which are missing and which he already has.
And how to translate that to Guild Wars 2 now? I think the same thing can be done here with skins. Make some kind of ‘Skin-Index’ (skindex? lol, sounds like asura technology) that makes people keep track of their already obtained and still missing skins. There must be some kind of ‘reward’ for collecting skins; e.g., that you can switch to already obtained skins every time you want. Or that there’s some kind of “inspect”-option for other players where they can see the collections of skins another player has etc. Or titles that can be gained by how many skins are already obtained. There are so many options how to expand this (as I already mentioned once, you could give items levels which unlock special shiny armor-parts or additional dye-slots or whatever) that you basically can keep players busy for a very long time (just like Pokémon).
GW1 was already great in focussing skin-acquirement; GW2 could expand that now and put the main focus here. GW2 already did some stuff in the way i mentioned above; the zenith/hellfire/radiant-panel is basically such a “skin-index” as I mentioned above. For some reason, this was never expanded, in my oppinion, it would be awesome to do so.
(edited by Dominus.2360)
If faction could be added without a grind. Make it account wide and natural to obtain. And pure fluff. I get what you are saying. It’s nice if it just adds titles, and items that are not necessary but are fun and if it is account wide and if it is natural to get, not grindy.
For example: Norn faction, you get some by just being norn, get it from mapping the norn area, from events there, from norn dungeon, etc.
(edited by Katz.5143)
THE NEW MASTERS
“I haven’t seen that trick before!” — famous last words
The fighting spirit of Tyria has lead to countless styles and techniques, handed down through the centuries, mixing and flowing across the years like 10,000 streams of courage. Its time for you to drink of these waters. Welcome as Guildwars 2 reveals the next level of horizontal gameplay in this permanent Living World release.
Just Something I Picked Up
‘Class Mentors’ have been added to the world. Each mentor belongs to one of the existing Professions but has their own unique take on what that means. They may be masters of lost arts, privy to secrets from foreign lands, or simply picked up ‘a little something’ along the way. Each mentor offers players a series of tasks in their zone culminating in a new mini-dungeon. Characters of any class can answer the call… But for characters whose class matches the mentor’s, there are even greater benefits.
Completing the instance for your class mentor will immediately unlock a new weapon type for you to use and reveals three new utility skills (listed on a line between the 6-point utilities and the elite skills). These skills typically cost 15 skill points and often share tags with existing skills allowing you to blend them into and enhance existing builds or combine them to unleash entirely new creations!
Now I am the Master…
Once a mentor’s tasks are complete, they will also become a karma vendor offering 3 new weapons skins for the weapon type they teach and specifically themed to go with the skills they reveal. Show off your new moves in style!
Master Kaigen-Li (Elementalist)
While the lands of the Tengu remain shrouded behind secrecy and vast stony walls, there are still those who feel wisdom must be shared or it is not wisdom. Meet Master Kaigen-Li a Tengu elementalist who needs your help finding a scroll lost since the Rise of Orr…
Weapon Granted: Main-hand Sword
Skills Revealed: Conjure Night’s Sword, Riddle of Silence (cantrip), Signet of the Starry Heavens
Centurion Crushstone (Engineer)
Looking for special detached duty, Legionnaire? Word’s come down from HQ that Centurion Crushstone needs support at the Nolan Hatchery. An infestation of spiders threatens to cut off this crucial component of the Black Citadel’s supply chain. If an old hand like Crushstone can’t handle it alone, you know something’s up…
Weapon Granted: Hammer
Skills Revealed: Signet of Progress, Signet of Synchronicity, Signet of the Forge
Roabb the Sunchaser (Guardian)
The ancient Way of the Paragons has not been forgotten! Help this traveler from afar fulfill his ancient oath and bring lasting peace to a tortured spirit from another age…
Weapon Granted: Terrestrial Spear (2-handed)
Skills Revealed: “For Honor, Forever!”, Sunshield Signet, Welcome the Dawn (meditation)
Singing Crystal of Marith (Mesmer)
Come, listen to the mysterious music that pours from this recently uneathed stone. If you listen closely enough, you might even begin to hear words…
Weapon Granted: Main-hand Pistol
Skills Revealed: Double Trouble (phantasm), Rippling Shock (glamour), Who-What-Where? (clone)
Ogenvar Ravensbite (Necromancer)
Come swiftly! Raven has discerned the shape of Jormag’s next scheme to consume the spirit world. Where Bear or Wolf might rush in to face the Serpent of Black Ice head-on, Raven speaks to me of a more… indirect solution. Why just beat a foe when you can play him for a fool? But first, we’ll need some feathers…
Weapon Granted: Greatsword
Skills Revealed: Spectral Voices, Succumb to Despair (corruption), Summon Blood-haze (minion)
Anne Ocke-Linn, 3rd Lionguard Skirmishers (Ranger)
“Bows never worked for me. Too much twanging and thwiping. But rifles? After a few rounds of being shot up by Skritt, I thought ‘hey now’…” Help Anne clear out a little Skritt problem and she’d be happy to show you some durn-fine shootin’!
Weapon Granted: Rifle
Skills Revealed: “Brace for it!”, Deadly Aim (survival), Hunter’s Blind (trap)
Maintainer Tassi (Thief)
It all started out as a little bet to see who could clear more elemental parasites from Rata Sum’s arcane core… And nobody said she couldn’t get help! Meet Tassi, but don’t be fooled. Under her sweet demeanor, this Asuran thief has ruthless moves that more than make up for her… absolutely perfect size.
Weapon Granted: Off-Hand Mace
Skills Revealed: Mirror Trap, Revealing Dust (trick), Two-Man Job (deception)
Sashean the Black Arrow (Warrior)
There is no blade so sharp it couldn’t benefit form a little… natural… augmentation. Sashean is determined to combine Sylvarii arts with martial prowess to bring something new into Tyria. Here’s what he needs from you…
Weapon Granted: Shortbow
Skills Revealed: Banner of Serenity, “I will have Revenge!”, Venomous Pouch (physical)
I wonder what your basis for comparison is…”
- Jareth, King of Goblins.
(edited by Nike.2631)
From other games:
Mabinogi:
The masters titles and robes , once a week you can take part in a test for your class, this is a PVE competitive test so only a few people can advance each week for each class. It gives upgraded titles and robes that change with rank.
ie. Level 1 The Elementalist , and a robe with no trim Level 2 , The master Elementalist and a robe with bronze trim , Level 3 The High Lord Elementalist and silver trim , Level 4 The Legendary Elementalist , and a gold trim robe.
Gives no benefits stat-wise but can be satisfying if you win and gives you something to strive for.
http://wiki.mabinogiworld.com/view/Advancement_Arena
The fashion show, is a minor distraction where players get to show off their clothes, followed by player voting. (it also incorporated a rhythm mini-game), the winner get’s a statue of themselves in the towns and voters + contestants get a bag with a chance to contain unique clothes.
http://wiki.mabinogiworld.com/view/Fashion_Show
Other ideas from there could include , the weekly banquet, “robes” that fit over your existing outfits and the crafting competitions (some changes would be needed for the crafting competitions as gw2 crafting has no minigame.)
Runescape:
I know many people don’t like the game but runescapes housing system is one of the best I’ve seen. The house is completely customizable from 1 room shack to four story mansion. You can visibly store items and clothes (ala Hall of monuments) and mount special trophies on the walls of rooms (i.e meta trophies). The house is also functional in a crafting capacity and there was no limit to the amount of people who could visit at any one time.
http://runescape.wikia.com/wiki/Construction
beginner players could still make a decent house, while those with millions could gold trim and marble up their house. Those who had completed advanced quests could display their trophies and those with many items could show theirs.
Various Customizable Airships, this could be adapted for many roles, it could be the player housing, it could be for a racing minigame, A form of flying combat for future dragons. Plus personally I would love a customizable airship, the kind seen in the .Hack series. (it actually fits with Gw2’s current theme)
11x level 80’s 80+ Titles 2600+ skins , still a long way to go.
(edited by Conski Deshan.2057)
Leveling appearance of items/armor
General idea is that we get items/armor that gain xp and levels wich will influence appearance. We will start with basic look and after every( lets say 10) levels items will get more complex look, that principle will continue to max level( assuming 80).
In Hero Panel next to icons for armor and town cloths would be icon for leveling armor wich will open window in wich we put item to level and track progress. Every unlocked tier will be added as skin same as zenith weapons.
Some of my suggestions from the past:
- Back Item + Mini Carrier Combo
- Miniature Collection Slot
- Miniature Carrier Slot
- Cultural/Class and General Armor Skin Issue Resolutions
Also covers:- Class Trainer utilization
- Class Restricted armor implementation instead of Culturally restricted designs
- Future class skill implementation through trainers
- Gem Store Skin Unlocks/PvE Wardrobe with Gem Store Armor design element toggles and alternate armor appearances
- Class Trainer utilization
Pro Re-skinning
First I would like to state that I am not only completely fine with having alternate versions of cultural armor (or any armor), I actually encourage more alternate variations to be released that have different elements removed or added. Options for appearances are crucial to myself any many other players to fully enjoy this game. Ideally I would prefer the alternate appearances and elements of armors to be able to be toggled off and on to selectively hide certain elements as well as being fully dyeable. I do not see offering alternate forms of existing armors (re-skinning) as being lazy, but as a way to offer us, the players, with many more options to achieve the look we desire within existing armor designs. I fully understand what goes into designing an entirely new armor set in this game and I do not mind the long time it can take when creating them, but take your time and do them right to justify the gem cost (non-human character elements fully considered; charr horns/tail, asura ears/toes). While new designs are being created, offer us more variations of existing designs and a way to customize elements of them so they are not simply cookie-cutter static designs.
Anti-Cultural Armor
I’m actually against the concept of cultural armor as armor designs should have already been culturally designed from the start. An armor worn on a charr should not have the same appearance as that armor on a human only stretched out to fit their non-human body. I’m not saying that every single armor in the game should have a uniquely designed appearance based on the species/gender wearing it, that would take forever to design. However, that human armor could easily have slight tweaks made to it to make it appear more like what a charr would actually wear; remove the sleeves and show off those powerful furry arms, remove the backs of the legs so they’re more like covers/chaps and not form-fitting and fur-constricting pants. Give each piece of an armor design (base human most likely) one hour of attention and it can be made more appropriate for non-human species, thus removing the need for “cultural” armor and allowing all armor for that species to be appropriate for them.
Pro-Class Armor
I am, however, completely for armor designs that are restricted to only being available to each class through their class trainers. In their current form, having an individual trainer for each class serves absolutely no purpose. Players do not learn new skills from these trainers and the trait manuals are completely generic in that any class can use each manual tier regardless of where it was acquired (TP/a manual my thief got from their trainer can be used by my mesmer). Class trainers also do not even offer a unique service of resetting traits. There are ‘Trait Reset’ NPCs whose only purpose is to reset traits regardless of your class. And with the new single-use trait reset items, one does not have to even visit an NPC to reset their traits.
[Continued…]
| [Free Ports For All “Not So Secret” JP Needs (and 1st Try Dive Tips)] |
| [Classic Thread: “all is vain”] |
[…Continued]
In my cultural situation resolution proposal I outlined making the cultural armors available on the Gem Store and switching to Class Armor. It would also implement the ability for past and future Gem Store armors to be infinite use for a fee of unlocking the Base Skin (Cultural 1.0) so players that want the 1.0 pay what the players paid for their Cultural 1.0 skins and they would also already have it unlocked as they already bought it. My proposal offered a way to make everyone happy without trivializing the time or money earned and spent on Cultural 1.0 armors, as well as retaining armor sets that are restricted, but to class instead of species. The Class Armors could even be GW1 class armors ported or re-envisioned for GW2, which would also make even more players happy that some GW1 skins would finally return.
Nobody gets slighted, nothing is removed from being attainable, restricted armor ‘mechanic’ remains, desired features get implemented, more appearance options available for every player, Anet sees increased Gem Store revenue, stagnant/half-implemented game aspects receive purpose.
Regarding the horizontal aspects of skills and traits I offer my thoughts on:
- Necromancer – Minion Acquisition and Management
- Ranger Changes
- Pet Dismissal Replaces Pet Stow
- A Non-Pet/Beastmaster Class Option
- Further distancing from trinity-influenced aspects of RPGs
- Armor weight class restriction removal
- Character Level Irrelevant; remove levels and switch entirely to stat-based down/upscaling
- Base stats same across the board regardless of class; remove stats from armor; players increase stats based on character creation choices and frequency of skill usage (actual experience with skills increases that skill’s stats and its effectiveness instead of relying on an outmoded form of character progression to increase stats and dictate survivability, effectiveness, and appearance options: leveling)
| [Free Ports For All “Not So Secret” JP Needs (and 1st Try Dive Tips)] |
| [Classic Thread: “all is vain”] |
Another Idea I would like to work on is the following:
- You can SAVE A CLASS: sort of like a template item you can save being a level 80 class in for example, guardian.
- Once achieving level 80 on a class, the game keeps track of it, and you are able to “activate” any class you leveled to 80 on any character you wish.
- The template system keeps track of the skills you have unlocked on your account (not the cultural ones). Cultural skills can be purchased per race for the whole account.
- Armour can be stored in an unlimited STAT DATABASE, where you can withdraw any amount of for example “Berserker_L80_HeavyHelm”. The armour will soulbound and not salvageable upon withdrawing.
- Skins can be stored in an unlimited SKIN DATABASE, where you can withdraw any skin you want for example “Vigil_Helm”. As with stats these are soulbound and not salvageable upon withdrawing.
See here: the most alt-friendly and least grindy game ever seen (yes it’s basically the SPvP system we have in GW2 and the PvP system we had in GW1).
Discuss away!
Oh I totally forgot to put guild things in and that’s super important too.
GvG needs to be added, Guild Halls, more Guild missions and guild rewards. You need to add more things for guilds to do together.
Oh along with the return of Vanquishing it would be nice to have an Underworld type zone. That would be nice to do with the guild too actually…
Quick note to say that I am up to date and that there are some awesome ideas here.
If someone wants to do a macro summary of the main ideas that would be awesome (if they haven’t already. I haven’t seen one). If not I will do one tomorrow morning.
I will then call out some of the suggestions I personally really like. Also as per Colin’s question in the previous thread (one which has been asked again by some posters in this thread) feel free to discuss Horizontal Progression systems you have enjoyed in other games.
Chris
I enjoyed Guild Wars’ horizontal progression systems.
I liked how you had to work towards the title progression of different groups/races in order to unlock weapon skins. I also thought it was neat to have what became a fairly shallow vertical progression blended title related skills (Ursan Blessing problem, but after all the fixes and changes it wasn’t grindy to max power).
I liked how there were some serious rewards for characters via story books in Guild Wars. This heavily promoted lore and playing of the story multiple times, which is sadly something that appears improbably at best for Guild Wars 2. I’m not sure why it feels like there is such a lack of storytelling in Guild Wars 2, but for me it does (maybe there’s just not enough voice over story telling and cutscenes for my liking).
I liked the hard content and the titles that came with it, Hard Mode with Vanquisher and Guardian titles (though vanquishing felt pretty grindy sometimes, less of that please). Something Guild Wars 2 could use is more challenging content outside of PvP and WvW. Having that challenging content be rewarding would be also be nice, but please be careful with gating challenging content. I like how it was done in Guild Wars, it was gated behind ascension, story progression in factions, and completing the story in nightfall, while EotN had it littered everywhere.
Another thing I liked about Guild Wars is that I could reasonably do character progression on all my characters. Check out my account I have elite armor skins on 8 of my characters (includy Vabbian and Obsidian) and multiple on some of them (4500 hours over the life of the game). In order to make that happen in Guild Wars 2 it feels like I’d have play twice as much, another thing is I felt way better about spending money in Guild Wars’ cash shop, that’s FAR less true in Guild Wars 2 (I feel like numerous things in the gem shop are a scam that you either already had accessible for way less time in game or would have had accessible for way less time if it was in the first Guild Wars).
Besides Guild Wars, the only other games I really play for progression are FPS games that have ranks. But y’all already have that, so kudos.
Norn Guardian – Aurora Lustyr (Lv 80)
Mia A Shadows Glow – Human Thief (Lv 80)
(edited by Shockwave.1230)
Region Achievement lines
I love these ideas. Personally, I’m a huge fan of the Shiverpeaks areas in the game and would spend pretty much all of my in game time there if I could, and it would be great if there was some sort of associated rewards for that. Maybe it could even be an acceptable way to open up the cultural armour of one race (or a slight variant) to the other races, assuming you achieved maximum reputation with that race.
Also, as far as titles are concerned, I would like to see monster and area specific titles put in place. Along with the cosmetic appearance system, this is one thing that Lord of the Rings Online does extremely well. If you kill X number of creature Y in area Z you get a unique title that is different from killing that same creature in a different area. Having that sort of achievement in place instead of just having a blanket one for killing X number of creature Y anywhere in the world gives completionists more to work on as well as offering much more character customization in a very simple way. Sure it could be seen as grind, but that’s really what much horizontal progression boils down to. Keeping the players busy by giving them goals they want to achieve, where the goals aren’t an increase in power.
so for horizontal progresion i would like to see the following
Guild Halls and player Housing
-unlockable furniture and trophies from achievements or feat done while playing
-custumizable furniture and themed aswell (norn,asura,etc)
Followers
-the followers couldnt fight,merely grant % bonuses to crafting and minor ones like magic find and so on
-would be costumizable in appearance,like 3 pieces of armor,new armor and hair bought on TP
-could be sent in missions with a set day of duration for better loot at the end,being out of action for the duration and if defeated,also the mission would be statistical,we would se only the result,would not interfere or help out
-also followers could be unlocked through quests,achievements or bought at TP (famous one i guess)
-would have an affection meter,we could fill it throw time spent played,key achievements done or itens bought as gifts,when 100% full we unlocked a follower related questwhich revealed a bit of their past
Side quests
-even the traditional model,or Anets take on it would be fine,like Order missions,Racial missions or Pact missions,for a lore and stroy driven guys like myself there not enough of it as it is,wheres the human sister at lvl 80?the player home instance is a ghost zone with zero utility,what of the order?and the Pact?some of our initial choices in character creation still havent matered or didnt have consequences,those first 10 lvls were the best,give us more of it,if not in a expansion or more lvls or dragon related stuff,perhaps side stuff like racial,order and pact could be done
Guild management tools and Guild vs Guild
-the simply ability to see who logged on last or when is lacking
-seperate map or set of maps similar to wvw but pitting a guild versus another
-also the ability to duel would be cool
also beter narrative and more gritty consequences and grey areas and choices in general,otherwise keep uo the good work guys
I’d like to jump in to the discussion as well please. A few thoughts I’ve had. Might get rambly.
On skills.
New weapon types/utilities/traits are a given. Not a matter of if, but when will they be implemented and how?
- Nike’s idea of going to class specific Masters and completing related quests to unlock new abilities just sounds awesome. This type of content certainly seems to lend itself well to expanding on the personal story and lore surrounding each class.
- Content like this would however end up competing with the current skill acquisition system we have in place. Gain skill pts, spend them on skills. I think that completely negating the legitimacy of the current system once you reach a certain point could be confusing to new players as well as a point of contention amongst old. Good or bad, I’m not sure.
- Perhaps the trainer rather than being tied to a class would be tied to a weapon type or utility type, one’s that are shared across multiple classes. Upon completing the content rather than being rewarded with the specific skill, you are rewarded with a second type of skill point (think red rather than blue).
The Soft Trinity
I think currently when you look at pvp and wvw content, this actually works fairly well already. Most classes have at least a couple roles they can play. This is debatable to be sure, and most often the debate centers on the situation involved. Zerg v Zerg. Guild Group v Zerg. Solo roaming. Bunkering a pt. 1v1. Team fights at mid. etc…..
- Currently PVE content places very limited demands on players. You’re welcome to play how you want, but you’ll never achieve the efficiency offered by zerker stats.
- What if mobs had a wider range of skills? What if some mobs were smart enough to kite away and heal when they were taken down to 50% hp. What if some mobs had more complex combinations to set up spikes (think eles precasting churning earth and lightning flashing in to connect)
- Use current builds and playstyles that players use in pvp/wvw as inspiration for differentiating the mobs and bosses we face. We’ll have to change the way we build to succeed in those encounters.
Guilds
Who doesn’t like hanging out with friends, growing together, and achieving common goals? Guilds do this well already, but the actual progression they offer seems limited.
- Moar missions! Why are guild missions limited to open world PVE? What would Guild Missions look like in PVP? Or WVW? Or even if you placed Guild Missions inside of Dungeons?
- Moar to spend commendations on. Progressing with your guild should open more options in terms of prestige for you and your alts. If we had Guild Missions across more game types maybe we could also have unlockable guild vendors for those game types, with specific skins, dyes, minis etc….
- Tie Guilds in with the Orders. Aligning yourself with and completing content related to an order would unlock exclusive guild upgrades or vendors related to that order. Again more skins, dyes, minis etc…… MOAR Prestige!!!! And lore.
I like the system to use Skill points for Horizontal Progress.
The currency builds up as a reward for progressing past 80 so it feels natural to use as progression.
I thought the new healing skill was a good start to using this.
Even if the skills are only sightly different i.e. mixing up two signet active and passive’s
The Power and Precision ones for Warrior for example.
Unlocking other races elites would also be cool.
Small things that motivate us to spend more time in game doing whatever is fun to grow our characters.
-Mike Obrien, President of Arenanet
You know… Polymock would be lovely…
Skill points — a big “yes” to using them as a currency for horizontal progression. They are earned at a steady rate through playing most aspects of the game.
My 2 cents.
1) The Locker
We all want the dyes/multiple looks locker. Everyone. Nobody, doesn’t want it. Trans Crystals are still profitable.
Now that that’s out of the way.
2) Legendaries
With all this talk about making Ascended stats liquid, and making Legendary dyes, and skins, and what not, I hope Anet is remembering to preserve Legendaries as they are, Legendary. Please, be careful not to water down the benefits of having farmed a Legendary. I want the orange-texted wonder I’m working towards/have (in my case, Bolt) to be THE coolest, most awesome-sauce looking sword, gun, etc. around. The knowledge that at any given moment, you have that Twilight on your back and you know, people are constantly thinking ‘Man, that looks awesome. He put some darn dedicated work into that thing.’ is a huge reward that I don’t think ever goes away. (I say this not having a Legendary yet) Preserve that appeal. Yes it’s elitist to say, but if you are an average player, who doesn’t play/enjoy most/all aspects of the game, a Legendary isn’t something you should strive for. It’s not as simple as ‘The tier above Ascended’. Especially when there is 1 legendary per weapon type, that legendary is meant to be THE big-bad weapon of that type. Legendary means legendary, and that shouldn’t change. Increasing the frequency of legendary-esque skins makes players who farmed like mad for that appeal feel shorted. They’re fine, hell they’re awesome, the way they are. Be wary of anything that effects the near-prefect spot legendary weapons have in thee game.
3) Open World
Another important element is the massive world, that might not be being used to its full potential. I haven’t gotten to see the intimidation of Vigil Keep or the wonder of the Durmand Priory in a while, simply because I have no reason to go there. (Now I’m going to, this game is gorgeous.) I would suggest either more world events, or more value to lower-level zones. One of my favorite aspects of GW2 is that world bosses matter. They’re not just there to be forgotten about. I realize it would be counter-productive to release more world boss-like things, because that would water down world boss-like things and defeat the purpose. But the revamp of Tequatl is a prime example. More of that. It’s fun, challenging, and the rewards are there enough to be lucrative. First contender, Shatterer. But that’s a whole other thing.
4) Character-expansion
I agree that the personality system should be more influential, in one way or several that have already been mentioned. I want to build a character, someone cool, with depth. Right now, and in many other examples in games, the player character is more of a vessel to view cool things (the game itself) through. Creating multiple different windows to view the game through, I feel, would massively increase interest and playability, and would cause burnout to be less of an issue.
5)Mini-dungeons
A really cool idea that have sort of gone by the wayside in favor of big-ticket appeal. An increase in quantity and/or quality of these types of events would increase player enjoyment, and I for one, wouldn’t be forgetting them after a few weeks, provided they are special.
5.1)
Sub-category: jumping puzzles. (Something I applaud Anet for even doing, the fine line between fun and frustration is consistently held just on the side of fun by Anet, and players appreciate it.) More of them. Enough said.
6) Living Story.
We’ve all heard the “TOO MUCH SCARLET”. I don’t want to get into that. I find it important to note that new players coming into this game find out quick who these big-bad Elder Dragons are. I’m sure Anet has plans for this kind of thing, and zones that haven’t been added on the map yet. However, as a new player, and as someone bringing a new player into the game, it seems a bit off-putting that these big-bad dragons are out there, they have stories of their own yet to be told, and yet we’ve only ever even seen/fought one of them. Progression of the central story is due for more attention.
7.) Weapon customization
I really like the idea of a proposed weapon dye/customization option. Seeing a bright purple Mjolnir on an enemy in WvW would make me smile, then the seriousness would come back as I’m knocked into downed state. It would be a good balance between cool and fun.
Turned out to be more of a shotgun of issues than a fixed discussion. Sorry :/ hopefully I foster some fixed discussion with my post.
…feel free to discuss Horizontal Progression systems you have enjoyed in other games.
Chris
As you wish
EVE Online and spaceships. There are a MASSIVE number of ships you can fly in that game. For some of them, it can take an equally MASSIVE amount of investment to access them (almost 2 years for a Titan). And yet CCP has managed to make their system almost perfectly horizontal. After the first 6 months or so that is. Ahem. Anyway.
There are two simple reasons for this. The first is that every ship has it’s own unique purpose. You have general purpose ships, like Cruisers. Then you have highly specialized ships of the same class, like Heavy Assault Cruisers (DPS), Interdiction Cruisers (Control), Logistics Cruisers (Support). The key is that the initial, general-purpose ships remain viable throughout the game. Specialization is mostly horizontal- yes, a Logistics cruiser is orders of magnitude better at armor repair then the standard cruiser. But it sacrifices in absolutely every other area to get this. It’s sort of diagonal progression- yes, you are going up in power, but in such a way that what you left behind will still be desirable some of the time. Which, in the end, is truly what ‘horizontal’ progression is all about.
(Thats the idea anyway- it may succeed more or less at any given time as the game and metagame shift, but thanks to the rolling balance adjustments, it tends to work pretty well overall).
Secondly is that progress in EVE is never obsoleted. So you spent 3 months training up to use that HA Cruiser like a master? You NEVER lose that training. The HAC, and the skills to use it, will still be there no matter how many other things you get into. A 5-year EVE veteran with 80 million skillpoints will be just as competitive in that HAC as a 6-month player with 5 million SP that specialized. Move out of that niche, and the old vet gets the advantage again. Progress, but without leaving anything behind. This is because specializing brings power, but also limitations. New(ish) players and ancient vets are on the same footing- within a given specialization. Progression means more options to choose from, not a simple advancement on a ladder. As a result, even the earliest option (in EVE terms, the Frigate) is highly attractive in it’s given role.
To adapt the concept to GW2 it will require adding new customization mechanics, and refocusing the current ones. My previous post in this thread discussed a few ideas for new ones, like customizing utility skills (augmenting DD over conditions with ranger traps for example). In addition, the current mechanics (traits) need to be tuned down into a more generalized function. Mostly they already do this; some focus far too much and should be phased out as new mechanics are added (weapon cooldown traits for example). As a character levels to 80, they unlock their traits and spec in the general direction they want- support, DPS, control. After 80, they gain access to the high specialization areas of progression, like modifying skills.
Which bumps us up against the elephant in the room, gameplay depth. The game is too simple- there’s not enough room for specialization to matter. Defiant, boons and conditions are the biggest offenders- too simple, too limited. One mechanic (condi removal) counters every debuff in the entire game. You will have no choice but to separate PVE and PVP skills- the needs of both arenas are too dissimilar. Right now this means PVE is pathetic. Control abilities are like eunuchs trying to repopulate the world in a post-apocalyptic Vault- or Lobotomites in a Science! fair. Until the gameplay supports it, true horizontal progression will be impossible.
provide a service that I’m willing to purchase.” – Fortuna.7259
(edited by Rhyse.8179)
Quick note to say that I am up to date and that there are some awesome ideas here.
If someone wants to do a macro summary of the main ideas that would be awesome (if they haven’t already. I haven’t seen one). If not I will do one tomorrow morning.
I will then call out some of the suggestions I personally really like. Also as per Colin’s question in the previous thread (one which has been asked again by some posters in this thread) feel free to discuss Horizontal Progression systems you have enjoyed in other games.
Chris
GW1 had amazing horizontal progression. Every expansion had new skills for more build variety, new maps w/ new stories to enjoy, and new armor sets w/ elite armor that had superior looks but the same stats!
Talking about other games with horizontal progression, I think skyrim is the best example. Skyrim basically scales the game to your level, so no matter what happens its pretty much level with your character. I think we should look at the very popular mods and take those an example for horizontal progression.
1. Player Housing- Some of the most popular mods were houses, player castles, things like that.
2. Armors/Weapons- these are very popular mods too, ones that add on custom housing.
3. Skills- Midas Magic has always been a very popular mod since oblivion because of the variety and “cool” factor of the skills and abilities it adds
4. Campaign/Story Missions- the living story is kind of taking up the reigns of this. Its slowly being improved over time and it has so much more room to expand and get “better”.
Those are the type of mods I think people really enjoy. Now some of the default aspects of skyrim that lead to its success
1. Great replay value. There is so much of a difference in playstyles in the classes that it allows players to replay things and play them very differently.
2. Skills matter. The skills you level up drastically change how you can use those skills. In gw2 most of the traits don’t really do this. They may increase somethings duration or add an effect, but they don’t really change it in a sense. This is also something that a certain TES game that involves a massive amount of players has. You can evolve skills and it changes to a great degree on how you use those skill.
Sorry I made another gigantic post here for the dev’s and players, it’s just I have a lot of passion on the subject of improving GW2 to make it the best it can be. Anywho…
Just a couple ideas that came to me.
Gathering Elite Skills like in GW1
I remember how awesome it was collecting elite skills from GW1 – going out and exploring, getting to some remote location and slaying a particular boss to unlock an elite for that character. I think it would be awesome to bring that mechanic back as well as perhaps some animations from GW1 elite skills (or even skills based off of GW1 elite skills!), like the ray of judgement animation, for some elite Guardian skill
For those who haven’t seen how epic RoJ was…
And how much fun capping elite skills were:
I also think Guild Halls would be a neat idea – to show off all the mini’s and ranger pets you’ve got. To show all the unique weapons or armors you’ve obtained, and so on. It could work sort of like how Runescape’s player housing system works. It’s an instanced area and the higher your construction level, the more areas you unlock, and the better items you can unlock.
For GW2, it could work like the account wide magic find system where you get items that increase your guild hall level. You could unlock bankers, traders, merchants, crafting stations, all sorts of vendors, and the higher your level, the more unique rewards you could unlock (like GW1 skins and different environments? I don’t know). You could invite your friends over and enjoy the perks of things like bankers and traders being right next to each other for quick trading etc.
Edit: Completely forgot. I think it would be good to bring back the Hero system too, where we can party with NPC’s rather than having to deal with random players who expect so much from you and ragequit at the drop of a hat, or simply for those (like me) who aren’t a people person and/or do badly in team situations.
Like GW1, you could customise and improve your heroes weapons, armor and give them specific skills to use (override and manage when they use them too – if need be), unlock other heroes (maybe in your personal story? Or perhaps when you get to a specific location you find that NPC and unlock that Hero). The possibilities here are endless.
There were so many amazing mechanics in Guild Wars 1 – from going out and capturing elite skills (making you really feel like you earnt that skill), dyeable weapons and armor, no travel costs, grouping up NPC Heroes, and if you weren’t particularly good at dungeons, you could pay the runner and tag along (CoF runs in GW1 was soooo awesome because you pretty much always profited and usually got an elite skill tome every now and then), and we got to fill in those dungeon books that gave titles or skill rewards that were well worth the time invested.
These sort of things I NEVER experienced from another game whatsoever, and it’s things like these that made GW1 so amazing and memorable, and I feel that GW2 is missing some of those vital mechanics that make it so different from other games and so much fun. I think bringing a few of these mechanics back would really do GW2 justice.
Edit 2: Just had another thought. I remember when Guild Wars 2 came out and there was a video or webpage by one of the dev’s talking about being able to fully customise your armor. Being able to take a spikey part of, say, your chest armor, and apply it to another piece of chest armor (Perhaps they were talking about the transmutation feature). At least, I interpreted this COMPLETELY different :-/ and was extremely let down when I didn’t see this feature in game. I wanted to be able to move spikes on my armor to different areas, or be able to add a bit of fluffy armor from one piece of chest armor to another piece of chest armor for example, in turn, combining the two to make a truly unique piece of armor.
I believe if we were able to do this (whether through a ‘customisation’ leveling system or through an ‘upgrade’ or ‘crafting’ system), it would definitely take customising your gear to the ultimate level, and this would be something that not many games do (if at all).
For example, you could take 2 shoulder pieces and combine them so it isn’t just on 1 side, but both sides (as I photoshopped an example for your viewing pleasure below), or even take the fluffy trim of Braham’s chest armor and apply it to a different heavy armored chest piece. The potential of customisation epicness here is HUGE.
(edited by Zaoda.1653)
Another suggestion is in regards to the current weapon skins in the game (as well as minis, tonics, armor skins, etc) – have the tokens to obtain them drop at a low rate throughout the game so that over time you can accumulate the skins.
Also, please put all tokens in the shared wallet or consolidate the tokens in some way. Too many tokens, tickets, and so forth gets messy over time.
THE NEW MASTERS
“I haven’t seen that trick before!” — famous last wordsThe fighting spirit of Tyria has lead to countless styles and techniques, handed down through the centuries, mixing and flowing across the years like 10,000 streams of courage. Its time for you to drink of these waters. Welcome as Guildwars 2 reveals the next level of horizontal gameplay in this permanent Living World release.
Just Something I Picked Up
‘Class Mentors’ have been added to the world.
I can’t say how much I love this suggestion, lore relations is something I really miss in GW2. It’s not perfect (because skills still rely on skillpoints instead of exploration) but kitten close. I hope they do something like this when implementing new weapons.
Let writers do the writing, personally I don’t care if there are no voice-overs when you have a lore-rich environment instead.
Creation
The ultimate customization: being able to create your own things.
Now of course a map-editor of some sort is completely out of the picture, since it would require an immense simplification for players and it could take up way too much server space. Not to mention the amount of bugs it would deliver!
But what might be a realistic option:
- Pattern design. For example on armor pieces/tapestries/banners/guild emblems/other flat surfaces. But perhaps also tattoos and limited patterns on weapons. (The blade of a sword perhaps)
To prevent an invasion of terrible design, perhaps we could have a button that says: disable playermade patterns.
Of course we should be able to trade our designs in the game as well.
The incredibly large drawback to this idea would be the enormous amount of dev time it would take to develop a feature that makes it possible for us to design our patterns inside the game. (New UI and system design)
But I would absolutely love to have this feature!
After doing some research about “dual-profession” in GW2 I found out that this concept was already tried by Anet and shut down before the game release (I didn’t find any concrete proof of it, just rumors in the forum), so I don’t have hopes to see it in game. However, after thinking about a suggestion for the progression issue I came up whit an idea that involves “dual-profession” and “sub-classes”.
How it would work:
-You would create your character the same way it is done today, choosing your first profession as your main profession.
- After you reach L15 you would be able to get your second profession, choosing between professions that can equip the same type of armor (light, medium or heavy). So, the first profession you pick at character creation phase will determine which one could be yours second.
- The two profession wouldn’t “work together”, you wouldn’t be able to mix the skills of them in you action bar as we did in GW1. Only one profession would be active at time, but when out of combat, you can quickly switch between them just pressing a hot key (the character should perform a very cool animation during the transition). When you switch profession, your weapons, armor, skills and traits would change as well.
- At this point you have two characters merged into one, but this isn’t the main purpose of this system. After you reach L80 and spent a minimal amount of skill points in both professions you could unlock the “profession specialization” its kind of a “sub-class”. This sub-class is the result of the combination of the first and second profession.
- The sub-class will work simultaneously with the other two you already have. Now you would be able to mix skills and create a more unique character.
- Each profession would have two possible choices as “sub-class”, for example, a Mesmer after reaching lvl 15 should choose between a Elementalist or a Necromancer as second profession and each choice would culminate in one sub-class. One point I want to highlight is that this “sub-classes” wouldn’t be affect by the order you get yours preofessions, if the Mesmer opts to get necromancer as the second profession he would unlock the very same “sub-class” if a Necromancer opts to get Mesmer as the second profession.
- The heavy armor class is in a huge disadvantage here, following this concept there would be only possible combination (guardian/warrior) and only one “sub-class” for this guys =/. This could be solved including another heavy class (just kiddin) or just invent one more sub-class for them, not just based on the combination of the professions.
What would come with this “sub-profession / sub-class”:
1) A new bundle of weapon skills that would work along with the current skills. The possibility to customize your weapon action bar.
2) New utility, healing and elite skills.
3) A new trait line with active skills to be unlocked.
I know this system would bring problems, like the necessity to work twice as hard (go through the entire grind two times) to properly equip your character. But this could be solved if we could change the stats our gear. Another issue is the pain it should be for those players who already have lots of 80s in every possible profession; I would suggest a way to let them transfers the equipment from one character to another, if they want to merge them into one.
Another issue is the finite number of SK points, and they are needed to craft legendary weapons, but this could be solved with the addition of more ways to acquire then (I know Anet is already working on this).
With this system the combat in game would became much less repetitive, as you could swap to another profession when you get bored with one. There would be a much higher demand for SK points, making people explore more the maps searching for them (this could possibly become grind, but if worked properly can be something really nice!). This would also implement a much more customization system and a higher goal to complete, talking about progression in professions.
This is just an idea, in a very “immature” way, possibly full of errors and holes. I don’t even know if is possible to implement a sub-class in the game the way it was developed, but this is what I could suggest to improve the experience under character creation and customization. Feel free to flame this or implements new ideas to this =]
By the way, here is topic about skills that I found really interesting:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/suggestions/Skill-Alteration-1-5/first#post3100373
I’m loving what Diablo III is doing with their transmigration system in their expansion. There’s a basic set of skins, then you unlock extra skins from legendary items you find from drops.7
Once unlocked, there’s a fee for applying the skin to any compatible item.
There’s already a quite decent number of exotics with unique skins, and a lot of armors, and of course legendary weapons.
But with the current system, most people make the one thing they were aiming for, maybe an alternate set, and that’s it. One will not spend in a lot of transmutation stones to keep switching constantly, that would be insanely expensive.
But if transmutation was converted from an unitary system you pay per use to an unlock system, once you’ve got a item you liked, knowing you can go back any time to previously unlocked stuff, there’s no reason to stop there. There will be always a reason to make a different legendary, or craft a new exotic from mystic forge, or aim towards another nice rare exotic that may drop.
Unlocks are always better
I also think there should be a bit more reasons to travel all over the world and do different things. Currently one can get a steady amount of coin just by sitting in 3 spots.
Why would anyone go to the Demagogue, then go kill the Troll Champion in Snowden Drifts then go all the way to Fields of Ruin when they’ll get more or less the same if they just sit on Queensdale?
Maybe there could be a system that automatically generates random “quests”. You talk with a herald, they tell you to speak with a random NPC.
NPC gives you a few tasks, like:
1. “Go get me item X from this champion.”
2. “Go ask this NPC for item Y”. When you find the NPC, they asks for help, and send you to one of the nearby events currently active, and then gives you the item after you complete it.
3. “Go ask this another NPC about a third item”. Third NPC tells you it has been stolen. Go beat these enemies until you find the one that got it".
Ding. You get a reward for getting him those items, and the NPC makes you another offer.
Bring X, Y and Z to a dungeon explorable, and the NPC will join the dungeon and wait at the entrance, telling you to watch out for a certain spot. When you find and clear the spot from enemies, the NPC comes and tells you to wait while he does his thing, and at the end of the bonus event, you get an additional reward, which could be anything, from a stack of a certain consumable cooked in Caudecus Manor with ingredients you obtained to an exotic forged in Sorrow’s Embrace with materials you gathered.
The whole thing seems like a single thing, but it’s actually a composite from a series of small and simple events added all over the game, many of them reusing already existing content.
I also think traveling the world should be linked to obtaining skills.
There should be 3 ways:
- Just with skill points in the hero panel. The fastest when one already has the skill points.
- Using skill tomes. Each time a character learns a skill, it becomes ‘unlocked’ account wide. In PvP no other character would need to unlock it again they’ll get it after one character unlock it. In PvE, it would be cheaper for the rest of the characters. Tomes would allow learning any unlocked skill without having to spend skill points. Tomes would be available from champion bags, boss chests, laurels and PvP chests. And they would be tradeable, and they would be the fastest way to build up a new character of a profession you have already mastered.
- Finding a trainer. Each skill that gets added to the game would be assigned to a trainer, including the existing trainers. Talking with the trainer will send you and the trainer to an instance in the Heart of the Mists, where you are given a temporary build, both skills and gear, and you are given an event that requires understanding the skill to complete it (For example, with arcane brilliance you are given a water field, 5 low HP enemies spawn around you and you get burning on you. To survive, you need to put down the water fiend and use arcane brilliance at the right time so kill the enemies with it, and you heal enough to survive the burning). Some skills would be a bit harder to get, from trainers in higher level areas, or that become available only after an event is completed. This third method would be the slowest way to get more skills, but it would be the cheapest, and the one that better teaches players about the skills.
It would be another time consuming difficult PvE activity to do that’s completely different than dungeons, and it lets players enjoy all of the zones in new and exciting instanced ways.
as if the open world zones would be too populated nowadays, we need a new instanced version. No thank you. Better find other ways to add Hard Mode to the game but not instanced
Yeah, that was sort of my biggest concern with it as well, which is why I stated in that same post:
“The biggest problem I see with this though, is that it would prevent players from spending time in the real zones, which is already a goal of Anet.”
:)
What could be done, since theres level scaling already, is to scale you to a lower level than normal, and/or add the new mistlock instabilities to normal mobs. In this way, you can have a greater open world challenge, while preserving the “Natural” world. The only issue I see with this is using groups of people to roll over events while you personally have “Hard mode enabled”. Maybe the gambit system would work better, with things like less damage, always burning, no dodging etc.
Quick note to say that I am up to date and that there are some awesome ideas here.
If someone wants to do a macro summary of the main ideas that would be awesome (if they haven’t already. I haven’t seen one). If not I will do one tomorrow morning.
I will then call out some of the suggestions I personally really like. Also as per Colin’s question in the previous thread (one which has been asked again by some posters in this thread) feel free to discuss Horizontal Progression systems you have enjoyed in other games.
Chris
The best one was Bases in City of Heroes.
Building something that was your own from the parts you had and later from parts you could merge together. An entire sub-culture within the game; it was something that kept me going in times when I was bored of the content or waiting for the next installment or Issue to drop.
Seeing all those creations, sharing ideas and tips, being brought in to help new starters and even being “hired” to build places for others; it was the sandbox of the metaphorical park where the rest of the game was the otherwise functional grass verges, carousels and swingsets.