Guild Wars 2

Here is my opinion on Character Progression.
Be it Horizontal or Vertical progression, Guild Wars 2 has a fundamental flaw:
The fact that I have to discard almost everything I previously worked hard for.

Here are examples:

1. Ascended Equipment(Horizontal and Vertical Progression)
Ascended gear provides vertical progression in the game. But you are asking me to discard my current Exotic weapon, and also buy Transmutation stones to keep the skin I like, just so I can progress vertically. It feels like a rip off. Once I transmute my Exotic skin on the Ascended item, my Exotic(all my previous hard work) is gone. Poof! Vanished.
Instead, there should be a system of upgrading equipment. For example, if you told me to take my Exotic weapon and add 5 Dragonite Ingots etc to it to upgrade it to Ascended, I would not mind so much. The fact that I am creating a whole new item and discarding my old item just does not feel like progression to me.
I once played a game where you could improve the quality and level of an item by adding materials on it. It was very heavy in vertical progression. However, what I enjoyed about it is that the same level1 sword i started with became the Ultimate Giant Sword of Doom. Then they introduced a new type of tier and i upgraded it using a million mats to the Ultimate Giant Sword of Doom(+1). It was still my sword all along. I did have to farm 1 million mats, but nowhere did I need to discard my current weapon. Ever.

2. Agony Infusions(Vertical Progression)
I have already posted my opinion on this:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/livingworld/fractured/Agony-changes/first#post3228864
If I put a +10 AR infusion in my Ring, it is stuck in that Ring. Then if i want to upgrade to +11AR on that Ring, I have to completely replace my +10AR infusion currently in my Ring. All that hard work to get a +10AR infusion, now you are telling me to farm 2 more to make a +11AR infusion and delete the old one? This is a bad system. It completely overwrites the progression I worked so hard previously, making me re-work twice the amount of my previous progression to progress again. There should be a way to simply keep applying +1AR to a Ring, and the Ring has its own progression bar, and it gains +1AR when the bar fills(EXACTLY like Essence of Luck works right now!).

3. One-time-use Skins(Horizontal Progression)
Similar to the above 2. Once you use a skin, it’s used. Game over. There are expensive little out-of-rule tricks with Transmutation Crystals/Splitters to get back a skin and/or transfer it on another character etc, but if you overwrite a skin like Shattered Dragon Wings with a Quaggan Backpack for example, you are not getting the previous Wings back ever again. It’s gone for good. So if I want to change my looks often, I have to have one ascended backpack for each look I want, or pay a super high price of Crystals and Splitters each time i switch. I am not progressing. I am stuck with one look forever because of the high cost, or renounce to a previous look permanently to get a new look.

I honestly dont mind Vertical Progression in this or any game. What I mind the most is discarding what I worked so hard for, or giving up something forever.
Here is a “how bad it could be” scenario:
You currently have Endure Pain equipped on your Warrior. You can replace Endure Pain by Dolyak Signet on your skill bar, but then you cannot use Endure Pain ever again unless you remake your whole character. Does Permanent choices of skill sound cool to you? No. It’s ridiculous, right?
I feel about the 3 above-mentioned examples are as ridiculous as this one.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi,

To clarify I am looking forward to hearing the communities thoughts on speed of acquisition such as how long crafting time takes? or drop rates in fractals and other areas of the game etc.

I hope this adds some clarity.

Chris

As the only person in GW2 who is actually happy with Ascended crafting, I’m going to mention the one problem I have that is related to it, and it’s the same problem I have regarding Legendary weapons as well.
T6 mats are simply too difficult to come by in PvE. They are a major requirement for attaining level 500 in any crafting profession, and they are part of Ascended crafting as well. Almost every other material required for Ascended crafting can be obtained in general PvE. Things like wood, metal, etc. are obtainable through a process that can be written down like a recipe and is not dependent on RNG or crippled by Diminishing Returns.
I know I’m alone on this one, but I love the way ascended weapons and armor are crafted. It’s what I originally expected to find for legendary crafting, but T6 mats are ridiculously scarce if you choose to hunt/kill for them.
As it is right now, there are 30+ items in game that can be obtained easier by farming gold then buying on the TP.
I gave up on collecting T6 mats for my legendary and bought them off the TP because I had gained nearly 300gold in the time it was taking to try and loot them.
Even with farming punishment it is possible to farm T5 mats if you want to craft some gear, but with T6 or some of the other rarer items (i.e. charged lodestones), you have to be a masochist to farm them yourself.
That simply makes the game un-fun, and takes the accomplishment out of it. In fact I pretty much gave up on my legendary after my T6 purchases. I crafted the components and they sit in my bank now, lacking the precursor (which I won’t go into here).

Anyone remember skill books in GW1?

Great horizontal potential there if they come back.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi,

To clarify I am looking forward to hearing the communities thoughts on speed of acquisition such as how long crafting time takes? or drop rates in fractals and other areas of the game etc.

I hope this adds some clarity.

Chris

Lets put aside if Ascended is good of not. The Acquisition of Ascended gear is really messy right now.
1) Unbalance between different play style. The game is suppose give every people the chance to play as they want. And frankly the game do that better that most other game out there. But for ascended gear, the good part of GW2 is just not present. You want a back item? Play fractal or paid a HUGE amount of money to craft one in the mystic forge. You want amulet? Accumulate laurel and well that it. You want Earings, well to Guild Mission or paid 3 times the cost in ectos and add some more laurel. You want weapons or armor? Well there you need to craft or go home. People need to be able to have access to ascended gear without being push in a specific content. I don’t talk about making ascended more easy to get, just to make more different ways to get it. Exotic armor can be craft, buy from dungeon, buy with karma, buy with money, get from loots, etc.
2) The price seem highly unbalance between pieces. Why an earring cost about 16 Gold and 40 Laurel, while an amulet cost 30 Laurel?? Maybe there is a good reason, but i don’t see it. The same thing go for ascended weapon and armor (and this is kinda link to my first point). To craft an ascended weapon/armor you need to level up crafting to 500 and then craft a piece. Its great if you want to do several character because the initial investment is spread across several piece of gear and weapons set. But the initial investment is really huge for a casual player that only want to gear 1 character over a long period of time. This system make ascended weapon/armor less costly to hardcore and more costly for casual. Crafting should allow those who want to craft several armor/weapon to make an economy of scale, but people that only want to gear 1 character should have an way to get them without a massive initial investment.

Savoy.6824:

@Lheimroo.2947 yes it would feel good if they moved it down to exotic and gave us stat switching. But ill settle for just being able to buy it with all forms of game currency. Right now you can buy accessories with laurels, badges, commendations,and pristine fractal relics. It needs to be this way for weapons and armor too.

Absolutely. I wish all forms of currency were useful towards it, or even interchangeable.

The bloodstone/dragonite/etc is so easy that it isn’t the limiting factor. Instead, the several thousand of every other commodity is – I wish we could purchase the stuff with karma.

Farming all that material is an unbelievably punishing thought, so in effect the choice is to grind gold. And gold for the mats means market flippers and grinders, the drivers of inflation, define how many hours the gear takes to get.

Any non-trade-able currency being the primary block would eliminate that factor.

Buf if we’re keeping the commodities as the limiter.. shoot.

Leatherworking total mats for ascended armor includes 7200 silk scraps. You could drop that requirement by 90% and it would still feel hard. It’s not just out of the ballpark, it’s in orbit.

First of all, it’s worth realizing that we need unfortunately both progression systems. Vertical and horizontal. Just as it is in real-life, we progress both vertically:

1. For example if you do physical exercises, your physical strength is increasing and/or your condition improving. This is an example of vertical progression.

2. But we also expand our set of skills, beyond specializing in just one. You can play music, paint and code. Learning all those different skill is progressing horizontally.

But, this is a game not real life. Vertical >>power<< progression should stay as it is now. And do not expand ever again. Cosmetic vertical progression. Whatever.

Instead we should focus on expanding game horizontally. What we need:
1. Alternate Advancement system. It would be system just for PvE and WvW.
First iteration of this system should focus on horizontal trait system.
Horizontal traits would improve weapons, utility abilities and class mechanics and/or completely altering them, to do something different.
Those traits are NEVER acquired by filing some artificial bar. You must get out to world, and find them here. Finding them is not enough. You must perform some task (kill, hard boss, jumping puzzle, other puzzle), in any case it should be task. Not just get here and click on that.
Next step could be adding multi classing. Not like you just go trainer and pick you secondary class. But to create family of characters (yeah it’s idea from SWTOR ;p).
Once your character reach certain level, you can add it family, and other character can use certain abilities from that character. You can use only limited amount of abilities that are not from the character you are currently playing.
Small thing for all alt-lovers.

Another improvement (probably just for PvE and WvW), should be swappable weapon skills.
Create more skills for weapons, and allow people to go into world and hunt for them. I personally don’t really care for new weapons. As when I get new weapon, I still will be limited to the same set of 5 or 3 or 2 skill. At this point I’d rather have current weapon expanded, so each weapon can have 30 skills to choose from.

There are also problems. Some are created by you guys, and your fundamental design choices for itemization.
Here is the issue:, you lads and gals essentialy dumped down itemization to two things:
1. Flat stat increases (+power, +condition damage, +other random stat).
2. And some effects on runes.

It’s wrong. It’s so very, very wrong. How can you possibly can create interesting itemization (and by extension progression), when the only thing you get, is raw numbers increases to some ridiculous values. There is no joy in finding item like that:
+128 vitality
+128 Thoughness
+179 condition damage
+5% damage.

While you could have that item:
For each condition on you, your condition damage is increased by 4% (or any other varation).
If your health is below x% you move X% faster.
You have 25% to i reset cooldown on your last used skill, while using your next ability.
Add some random stats to it (like +power, + life force +increased initiative regeneration + reduce cooldown, + reduce cooldown on attument swap)
and tell which item you would find more.

The list go so on. Every time you can use If, While, For Each in your item description it makes for interesting item.
Yes I know. There are runes. But that is not even tiny part of it. It really should be very item. But that not even nearly the level of customization to what I have proposed.

Add to it, some random stats (random stats, not the same variation of +X +X +Z, when X are the same value and Z is the highest one). Add extremes.
I mentioned stats briefly above. But there is another hugely wasted potential (and some of it actually taken from the game but later on that).

Why there are not items with class specific stats ?
Like for necromancer:
+Increase Life Force pool.
+Passive Life Force Generation.
+increase radius of marks.
+Decrease cool downs of on death shroud abilities.
(and you could combine these with If, While, For Each).
For example:
If you health is below 75% you generate 5% of your maximum life force per 2 seconds.

There are can be class independent stats like:
1. Reduce Cooldown of skills
2. Increase Condition Duration and Boon duration (i know there are items like that currently, but they are just do flawed by the max 3 stat per item idea…).
2a. It could expanded for individual condition and boons. I know there are runes, but it’s limited customization. I’d rather have it per item basis, than 2 or 4 rune set and work with combination of If, While, For Each, rather than passive bonus.

tl;dr version. Increasing item stats in items, while those stats are boring, won’t make for an interesting or exciting progression. It just make for “grind for powah!”. Like the ascended items are right now. Why they heck would I want get ascended items if they:
1. Look ugly.
2. Doesn’t bring anything new, expect for flat stat increase.

tl;dr
Current itemization is boring. It needs some serious overhaul and changes, to make it exciting. It boggles my mind. GW1 have so awesome, exciting and innovative item design and progression. In GW2 all of this was thrown in to thrash and replaced with generic 172378 other games have it, progression.
While all it really needed is expanding it by some lightweight stat system. It’s not to late to fix it though, as all it need is to reintroduce those system (;.

Hi,
To clarify I am looking forward to hearing the communities thoughts on speed of acquisition such as how long crafting time takes? or drop rates in fractals and other areas of the game etc.
I hope this adds some clarity.
Chris

Oh, then it’s not about progression, but how easy or hard is to attain items. Guess i just wasted my 40 mins, on this post ;/

Estriella Faerie.4029:

Before talking about character progression, horizontal or vertical, I think it would be necessary to have a word on Anet view about progression reset.

With the Fractured patch, many players saw their progression (fractal level) resetted to 30, without any kind of compensation for that loss.

Many threads were opened on the forums to talk about it. The first few got deleted, even some pretty big threads, like this one:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/Fractal-personal-level-reset/

Another was locked here (over 850 posts):
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Fractal-levels-above-30-to-be-reset/first

And finally the last one active is this one (over 1000 posts):
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/livingworld/fractured/Merged-Fractal-level-reset-is-equity-wiped-Discuss/first

Over 2000-2500 posts were made, without any concrete answer from Anet. The only answer we got, 3 weeks ago, from a community coordinator, is that “the Developers are reading these posts and we are gathering feedback.” But not a word from those developers since.

Of course, in those 2000 posts, some were quite vindicative, especially after seeing we were completely ignored, but quite a few were also constructive, like this one from Abramelin:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Fractal-levels-above-30-to-be-reset/page/15#post3236535

So, before talking about progression, let’s talk about progression reset. Because if Anet consider it’s okay to reset a player progression without any form of compensation, why talk about progression anyway, it can be reseted at any time…

Since I can’t say it better myself, I’ll just quote it so I don’t mess it up.

I think the game could have a vertical and a horizontal progression. The biggest problem the players with the horizontal progression is the onnipresence. Ascended gear is functional in all sector of the game. All players are effected by it not only players who like the vertical progression. The players I think would not have a problem if the ascended gear would be gated within a certain sector of the game namely the fractals. But this is too late now I fear. I dreamed about a fractal-wardrobe where you have your for running fractals. Before you leave the fractals you pout your gear back in the locker.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi,

To clarify I am looking forward to hearing the communities thoughts on speed of acquisition such as how long crafting time takes? or drop rates in fractals and other areas of the game etc.

I hope this adds some clarity.

Chris

I think the underlying issue is you have two communities you are serving: the hardcore and the casual.

For the hardcore I think the rewards and requirements/time gating on ascended tier items is just right.

The casuals (especially the “altoholics”) however suffer greatly under the current system.

• Fractals take to long for many to complete them daily. If they were an hour I think many more people would be able to run them and more often. There is also a lot of wast with the rewards because you will often times get rings with stats you don’t want. A method of exchange would be great even if it was a 4 : 1 exchange rate.
• Ascended material requisition is also very time consuming or expensive. You either dedicate all of your game time to running world bosses, dungeons, or champs. Bloodstone is fine and drops decently but ore and fragments require much more time from the casual player.
• Dungeons used to be a great alternative for gearing up best in slot items. Players still needed to craft/buy trinkets. Ascended tier has changed this. Dungeons can still be a way to gear out the exotic stage but it would be nice if there was a way they could support the quest for ascended as well. The reasons why dungeons are so nice for casuals is the time commitment can be in small chunks… half and hour here, half and hour there…

I am not sure how you cater to both customer bases, but I would much rather the grind time gated material be cosmetic and best in slot gear be more accessible for the casual player.

Savoy.6824:

Now, jumping right into horizontal progression. Can the ArenaNet designers begin to design a game that incorporates the orders that we joined in our personal story. The designers may already be doing this to some degree, but it is my opinion that it is lightly used.

Personally, I think they missed a trick with the Personal Story, both as a way or making it relative to the open world and extending the pacing of the story, by not including a Order rep requirement.

For example, you start out as a grunt, and you don’t get the next Personal Story mission until you’ve made yourself outstanding among the new recruits (through doing DE’s and Order Missions [Order Missions aren’t something that’s actually in the game. Rather they are tasks doled out at random – say, every 1 – 3 days]). I mean, I found it kind of disjointed that you start in an order, and 5 missions later you’re quite high in the Order in terms of rank.

VOLKON.1290:

Anyone remember skill books in GW1?

Great horizontal potential there if they come back.

Were they the ones you did for rep and gold?

Or am I thinking of something else?

TheDaiBish.9735:

Savoy.6824:

Now, jumping right into horizontal progression. Can the ArenaNet designers begin to design a game that incorporates the orders that we joined in our personal story. The designers may already be doing this to some degree, but it is my opinion that it is lightly used.

Personally, I think they missed a trick with the Personal Story, both as a way or making it relative to the open world and extending the pacing of the story, by not including a Order rep requirement.

For example, you start out as a grunt, and you don’t get the next Personal Story mission until you’ve made yourself outstanding among the new recruits (through doing DE’s and Order Missions [Order Missions aren’t something that’s actually in the game. Rather they are tasks doled out at random – say, every 1 – 3 days]). I mean, I found it kind of disjointed that you start in an order, and 5 missions later you’re quite high in the Order in terms of rank.

VOLKON.1290:

Anyone remember skill books in GW1?

Great horizontal potential there if they come back.

Were they the ones you did for rep and gold?

Or am I thinking of something else?

You’re thinking of journals/storybooks. Skill books were the things you got in hard mode that let you learn any skill already unlocked on your account. IDK how this system would be applicable to GW2 though, as all skills in GW2 are considered “unlocked” when you make the character.

BACK TO HORIZONTAL PROGRESSION

Playing with alts
Anet had some sort of strategy about using player’s alts as new sources of money sink, but that has clearly failed, and we’ve been getting changes towards the opposite direction lately. This is great, because the more incentives there are to play with alts, the more incentives there are for a portion of the playerbase to log more often into the game.

• Ascended gear discriminates the players who like to invest on multiple characters, as it demands from them a much higher money sink than from players that stick to a single character.
• Likewise for dyes.
• Likewise for several soul-bound items.
• Exploring the world is very repetitive the second time.

Solutions

• Make ascended gear significantly easier to get after the first copy is crafted/ obtained, similar to the acchievement’s skins. After getting the first copy, the player could get the ability to create as many duplicates as they would wish for their other characters.
• Make dyes account bound.
• Make most non-story soul-bound gear account-bound. If I just replaced my ascended trinkets for new ones, why can’t I equip the old ones to another character I have? The money sink is already done. I have already contributed positively to the game’s economy. :P Let me at the very least use it somewhere else.
• World exploration is very complex, and I won’t dwelve into it for being off-topic. But it would be nice if, at the very least, the WPs were account bound, so we could quickly go to our favourite area or help our friends in a specific dungeon without being restricted only to our main.

In addition to including the orders we joined in the regular game, I would like to see the choices we make represented in game through titles and npc interactions. About 30% of the time weve been given choices in how to proceed with a task and no where have I witnessed an outcome of my choice other than in the immediate path that follows the choice. I think the choices are fist, crown and heart. I dont think we need a system as involved as mass effect or skyrim (though that would be cool) but it would be nice to see your character progress slowly towards the dark side if you will. Please can someone tell me if Im missing something. Do your choices ever show up in the game anywhere?

I think it would be a nice form of horizontal progression.

In general, character progression feels a bit shallow in GW2 for a couple reasons:

Lack of build variety-
One of the developers mentioned early on that GW1’s system of builds failed because it was difficult to balance and that billions of build choices didn’t matter if only 5 were viable. This same statement holds true for GW2. Having a bunch of trait slots with 4 -12 choices per slot is a complete illusion of choice if there are only 5 viable builds per profession. On top of that, the traits that affect utility slots make your choices even lower. The trait system as it currently stands is handicapping your build diversity because of traits that affect only 1 category of utility skills or 1 weapon. While having some options in that regard isn’t horrible, there are far too many. This causes you to pigeonhole builds into categories such as “Power / Well” or “Power / Spectral” (examples for Necro).

Armor Stat Progression

Build diversity would help character progression a lot more if you had more build options, and this includes gear as other people have mentioned in the thread. The real area where vertical progression is hurting the game isn’t the time it takes to get one set. If ascended could switch stats like legendaries can, that would be amazing, because it would mean I could only pay for it once. The real problem with vertical progression is that you have to do it 3 times to have build diversity. Once for a power set, once for a condition set, and once for a support set. When you multiple the time and effort it takes to get 3 full sets, it suddenly becomes a lot more daunting.

Crafting progression -

One area that people don’t like progression wise is crafting. The ascended grind to 500 feels painful in part because the progress to 400 is painful. You’re crafting a ton of junk to get up to 400. You end up forging your junk items or salvaging them back to get your materials. There is almost no purpose to having a 400 craft past cooking because it’s very time consuming to make a profit. While time gating has been added to try and fix that problem, another option is to provide more useful consumables at 400 for each crafting tier. Why do we have party based food (feasts), but no party based sharpening stones? Why could you not craft siege weapons given the proper materials? You could also add an artificial time-gate to crafting by adding crystals and alchemy stones as ingredients for recipes. This is still a time gate since players have to spend the time to get the skill points, but it’s not a forced one. For example, what if lump of mithrillium required 50 alchemy stones (5 skill points) to craft? These things would help make crafting a bit more profitable, which would make their progression feel more meaningful. Crafting also feels shallow because there is only a single skin available for the armor. Why cant we add rare materials to create better skins? We have had a ton of skins come in through the gem store, yet none added to the game normally which really short-circuits the horizontal progression feel. Why cant we craft exalted armor + 10 molten lodestones to get flame kissed exalted armor? exalted + 10 glacial lodestones to get ice kissed? This seems like a great way to add more customization to the base game, and your armor team already has the skins and mesh as a base to start with. I doubt anyone here would complain if they spent some time adding craftable variants to the game instead of a gem store armor. More armors in the base game would greatly help the feel of customization as opposed to more gem store armors, and crafting them would make crafting feel like more progression over grind as well.

DiogoSilva.7089:

• Make ascended gear significantly easier to get after the first copy is crafted/ obtained, similar to the acchievement’s skins. After getting the first copy, the player could get the ability to create as many duplicates as they would wish for their other characters.

This would help immensely. Unlocking the item in an account-bound fashion ala the achievement window would majorly drop the grind requirement. Incidentally I still don’t know why that thing isn’t being used more!

It’s still of my opinion that ONE set of ascended gear is more than needs to be shoved on players as a ‘thou must’. For heaven’s sake, make it stat equivalent and give it some kind of attractive non-stat bonus.

Somebody else mentioned it but I’ll second it: stat bonuses are among the most boring of all possible choices for ‘progression’.

PopeUrban.2578:

You’re thinking of journals/storybooks. Skill books were the things you got in hard mode that let you learn any skill already unlocked on your account. IDK how this system would be applicable to GW2 though, as all skills in GW2 are considered “unlocked” when you make the character.

Ohhhh. Yeah, I remember them now.

Well, you still need the skill points (they just removed the hunting for them part), but since there’s no cross-profession system, and there are more than enough skill points to unlock all of your skills by the time you get to 80, it sorta makes it pointless.

Hi, im semi retired of the game, however i still like it and care about it, so i will post my opinion:

About the vertical progresion:

Is a fact that ascended gear is here now, however the adquisition of it is a litle painfull, i think the drops of ascended gear must to be multiplicated for 5 or such, so that theres more chance to get it without grinding. Aditionally the difference between getting it in WvW and pve is too much, would be better to increment them to be more in line with the temple or the dragons (no teq).

About horizontal progression:

The ability to custumizate their character, the variety of skills and traits, etc, can make the game much more interesting and inmersive, however the first point to take in consideration is if the new in game skills, traits, etc will be used, and in what context, and its contribution to balance.

Putting that aside, it would be a shame to restrict the custumization to just trait and bar skills, you can agreagate more skills like the wvw skills in another game modes, or make the bar skills custumizables with some specific changes to them (probably changges that make a good and bad effect to mantain balance). Als o can make some passive skills to the use of certain consumables.

Going more about the form to implement them, like getting them at completing events or unlock them to buy them via skill points that way, so that they are more interactive to get, i will suggest something like this:

Example 1:
The ash legion want me to pass for its camp without been noticed : success the player get or unlock a 1sec more stealth when using ash legions kits.

Example 2: After defeationg the Karka queen you learned more about the karka anatomy, now you do 1% more damage to such creatures.

Example 3: You completed the griphoin jumping puzle: +1sec all the boons giving from eggs conusmibles.

Example 4: You completed the block practice (queens dale) without been blocking more than 1 sec per each atack (5atacks), your block skills recharge 10% faster when you block in a max interval of 1sec, this isnt acumulative.

And such.

This is my first MMO and speaking as someone who has not played any other MMOs to compare GW2 with…

First of all, when you make a design decision, stick with it….Don’t reset progress and rank and leaderboards and etc….people actually put time and effort toward these things…I feel that there are too many wrong decisions made when introducing something and then you try to fix it 3 months down the road???

• Fractals: I was only lvl 3 fractals before Fracture LS and now I am lvl 20 because now I run fractals…but the decision to reset the progress of others was wrong…you made a bad decision to make the fractal level progress soulbound at first and tried to fix it with no sense of sympathy for others….

• PvP glory….so someone wake up someday and said we are going to remove PvP glory, PvP ranks, PvP leaderboards? just like that? here is some armor that you can buy with your hard earned glory+ gold…and now we give you 30 silvers for win,,,,yeah but no thanks….

• WvW ranks and soulbound/accountbound: Same thing…..one day its soulbound and next day its accountbound….accountbound was the right way to go from the beginning…So why make bad decisions when you introduce something in the game that needs to go in a 180 degrees turn after 2 months? You should know your community better by now….

• Ascended Gear: enough has been said that it is waste of time to even mention it….
  https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/wuv/wuv/PvE-ascended-armor-in-WvW/first#post3315817

Chris Whiteside.6102:

TheDaiBish.9735:

Basically:

• How easy it is to attain the Ascended gear?
• Is the balance of acquisition of Ascended out of whack between different game-modes (i.e. Easier in PvE than WvW, easier in the open world than it’s intended game mode [Fractals])?

Couldn’t have said it better myself DaiBish. Thanks.

Chris

OK, then (background: I play almost exclusively PvE).

My gut feel has been that most ascended gear takes somewhat too long to acquire, but I think this is largely related to getting bored repeating the same content in order to earn it, and so it could be mitigated by introducing parallel and synergistic paths to them. For example, being able to earn empyreal fragments from a combination of dungeons, fractals, and the Mad King’s Clock Tower was helpful. On the other hand, being able to buy ascended rings with either laurels or pristine fractal relics doesn’t help much because I can’t do a mixture of both to get a single ring, and the wide variety of dungeon paths helps much less than it should because some are much shorter/easier than others while giving the same amount of empyreal fragments.

I feel that buying rings and accessories with laurels is inefficient compared to pristine fractal relics and guild commendations; I’m not sure I mind in this particular case, though.

I like that my second ascended weapon effectively cost me less than my first, because the investment in crafting was re-usable; my first one felt much more special so I was willing to put more work into it. However, the fact that I need several independent crafting skills to get all weapon types (even for 1 character) does a lot to ruin this feeling. Also, even if there was only one crafting skill, I don’t feel that crafting is a particularly good way of implementing this one-time cost to reach ascended tier, because it feels like make-work to me. I used to look on crafting as a minor optional activity that lets you trade gold for XP; now I feel like it’s been pressed into doing double-duty and doesn’t do it very gracefully.

Simultaneously, I feel a tiny bit sleighted because I happened to pick cooking and jewelry as the crafting skills for my main character. All 6 of the other crafting skills have become vastly more valuable since I made that selection, while jewelry has gotten significantly less valuable because it no longer makes best-in-slot items at all.

Ascended back items seem gratuitously expensive and I don’t have one yet. I dislike almost everything about infusions.

I don’t have opinions on ascended armor yet. (Haven’t even seen the recipes.)

Heres another idea for you. Minipets. Can we get that mini pet fighting game that it appears we have an arena for in lions arch. It would make collecting them so much cooler if we had a use for them. Also if they could stay out permanently till we put them away. That would be nice too.

Ascended gear and agony resist are poor vertical progression systems. Ascended is an unnecceasary stat increase that is earned not for completing challenging content but for time spent in game, which is another knock to the original manifesto. This is disrespectful to many players, myself included, instead of providing a fun and satisfying challenge to keep players playing, all that is being offered is a time-sink for a stat increase. I will not be wasting my time on acquiring ascended armour or weapons, and being forced to play the game a certain way i.e. going around with a list of daily chores, it not what I wanted from the game.

Agony resist should be removed, there is good reason that both Turbine and Blizzard stopped inflicting these types of resist mechanics on their playerbases, well before GW2 was released.

The cosmetic system in this game is woefully lacking. How is the game supposed to be about cosmetic rewards, when the system doesn’t let players change their appearance easily and independent of stats? Adding the new ascended armour and then being stuck with those appearances unless transmutation stones are used was a lazy and cheap decision.

Suggestions:
1) Remove agony, or else rework it to be completely avoidable, make it a hate magnet. Remove agony resist completely.

2) Remove stats from back items so appearance can be changed more easily. Same could be done with aqua breathers.

3) Rework ascended items so they have the same stats as exotic, but act as account-wide unlocks. Once an ascended item is obtained, any number of copies of it can be accessed on one character or on alts. This is an example of horizontal progression, the longer the game is played, the more options accessible to the player and can be changed between at the click of a button.

4) Copy the cosmetic system from Rift. Or Lotro. Or TSW. This should have been priority number one after launch, a year later and still not on the horizon.

5) Add fractal armour with exotic stats, but which can be upgraded in appearance not stats as the player gets higher in fractals. Not just shiny effects, but if the armour appearance started off as basic and that everyone could get at ~level 20, then adding more dye channels, more detail and decoration and layers, more effects as the player progressed that would be horizontal progression.

6) Having the new heal skill costing 25 skillpoints is too much, 8-10 would be more appropriate. If players have too many skillpoints, reduce the drop rate of scrolls or add more consumables that require them.

7) The rank abilities in WvW need to be rebalanced so there is more distinction between characters. The two stacking buffs need to be neutered or else that will be the goal for every WvW player. If everyone aims to have the same setup that is a failure of a progression system.

8) Personal rank in fractals should go, players should get rewards on what they are capable of running instead of having to grind out the levels before hand. That would have solved the need to reset it for players above 30 previously, just remove it.

Plenty of lazy and unimaginative vertical progression was added, but we hardly saw any innovation in horizontal progression.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Felbryn.5462:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

The two main areas for discussion will be Horizontal and Vertical progression, however please understand that the commentary and ideation we are really looking for regarding vertical is around its accessibility in game.

I’m not sure I understand this bit; could you clarify?

Hi,

To clarify I am looking forward to hearing the communities thoughts on speed of acquisition such as how long crafting time takes? or drop rates in fractals and other areas of the game etc.

I hope this adds some clarity.

Chris

you lost me here- I have no interest
whatever in ascended gear- I do not like the fact that I get rewarded with Ascended crafting materials .
Instead of stuff I can actually use.
or like or fluff omg

I hate the fact that I have stacks of stuff I have no use for and can’t trade

I think Ascended gear was the worst addition to the game since launch because it influenced every possible form of game play.

If you are only interested in talking about how it is implemented- I have nothing to say
and why have a discussion?

It needs to be removed and no joke!

Oh oh oh, another idea. If you want to add more skills but dont want to throw off pvp balance. Give us skills that work against npc’s only. You already have sigils why not add some skills that do extra damage against a specific enemy. I think your antitoxin heal kinda worked like that too (it healed a special condition only found in the tower). Keep things like that coming.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Felbryn.5462:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

The two main areas for discussion will be Horizontal and Vertical progression, however please understand that the commentary and ideation we are really looking for regarding vertical is around its accessibility in game.

I’m not sure I understand this bit; could you clarify?

Hi,

To clarify I am looking forward to hearing the communities thoughts on speed of acquisition such as how long crafting time takes? or drop rates in fractals and other areas of the game etc.

I hope this adds some clarity.

Chris

Funny how you bring drop rates into this, because drop rates are TERRIBLE.
-The drops you get from fractals are, lets face it, really bad
-In the time span that you complete the fractals, you could have run CoF p1, SE p1 and p3, and beat up some world bosses (including Tequatl) for much more cash
-Fractal rewards are extremely underwhelming compared to Open world
-Fractal weapon boxes never drop. Ever.
-And much more

Of course, this thread is about progression, so lets shift gears for a moment:
-The whole point of ascended gear, in general, is to let you get farther into the fractals. Why do we have to spend much more time OUTSIDE of fractals to get our gear?
-Why is “Being filthy rich” a close synonym for “progression”? The only way to get things you want is to buy them.
-Why is RNG so closely tied with “progression”? We should be earning the stuff we want, not winning lotteries.

We need to make progression more meaningful; what we earn shouldn’t be bought anymore. Some suggestions here:
-Make open world bosses much more rewarding (ATM the Karka Queen is the “best” world boss in terms of rewards)
-Introduce unique, account-bound or soul-bound drops that can only be obtained by world bosses (Tequatl’s hoard is a step in that direction). The dragonite ore and the special exotic drops don’t count here. They can be crafting materials; however,
-if it is a “buyable” crafting material, then it needs to drop in large numbers (example: 2-10 Vicious Fangs from the Jungle Wurm)
-if it is a “non-buyable” material, then it needs to be craft able into something useful and valuable, to an extent. IT BETTER NOT BE MORE BLOODSTONE DUST.
-Make home instances more like GW1’s HoM; we want to be able to reflect on our achievements.
-Put in guild houses; a lot of us would kill for those
-Most important of all: either make better loot actually drop more often at higher fractal levels (and increase fractal weapon drop frequency too while your at it), or allow us to use Pristine Relics to buy things besides rings (Fractal Greatsword for 100 Pristine Relics, anyone?).

I really like the idea of Changing current ascended /exotic to what some people have suggested with ascended having same stats as exotics but being changeable like Legendaries, however….this would cause a complete hell-storm for the people that made ascendeds to be on the same page as the legendaries.

As someone who has 2-3 sets of armor on each of my characters for different circumstances (one of these circumstance…tequatl…was actually created by ANET)…we need a way to get ascended armor and weapons easier than now. I guarantee with the current system I will be making a single set of armor…which completely negates any build diversity / changes for different content…not to mention my ALTS becoming moved to second-class citizens…since they probably wont have ascended at all. Ascended armor should not be a grind to get…leave Legendary armor and weapons be the grind. It should be easy to get Ascended items for all characters so that we can enjoy the CONTENT of the game, and not have to grind Mat’s every day just to get the decent gear.

ANET needs to decide which type of game they will be. And then we as players will decide if that type of game appeals to us. If they continue vertical progression, okay…those who don’t like that will move on. If it is horizontal…those who don’t like it will move on. You really cannot be both.

I still believe, Horizontal can be made compelling for the hardcore. I saw many a hardcore player attempt Tequatl again and again simply for the title. I saw many a hardcore doing Arah again and again, for the exclusive Arah armor….you CAN appease hardcore players without vertical progression…while still appeasing the rest of the players.

TheDaiBish.9735:

Felbryn.5462:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

The two main areas for discussion will be Horizontal and Vertical progression, however please understand that the commentary and ideation we are really looking for regarding vertical is around its accessibility in game.

I’m not sure I understand this bit; could you clarify?

Basically:

• How easy it is to attain the Ascended gear?
• Is the balance of acquisition of Ascended out of whack between different game-modes (i.e. Easier in PvE than WvW, easier in the open world than it’s intended game mode [Fractals])?

Ascended gear is “easy” to attain (skill-wise) but not (in my opinion) quick enough to attain. I believe this is largely due to it’s methods of acquisition, with the exception of Rings and Amulets and Accessories (though with the probable increase to 500 Jewelry it will be significantly easier).

You have three options for ultimately obtaining an Ascended Weapons/Armor (not the components).

1) Crafting. Is the definitive method of acquisition. This way first takes money or a lot of rng luck and time to get to lvl 500. I commend that it can be synergistic to do world events/dungeons to acquire money/mats to fuel this progression.

What could be improved is the puzzling need to Refine T6 ->425-> Make Exotics ->450-> Refine Tier 7 ->475-> Make more of the same Exotics from 425-450. I would value something like being able to make Deldrimor Ingots and Spiritwood Planks and possibly Globs of Dark Matter from 475 -> 500. It’s a little odd that items with recipes that unlock at 450 eventually stop gaining me experience before a recipe I unlock at lvl 400

What hurts perhaps the most is that without significant time investment Crafting an Ascended Weapon is a giant money sink and it competes with other parts of the game (aka cosmetics, gem shop, and mini pets) where Exotic quality items had a non-competing and synergistic option in Dungeons.

2) RNG Drop of Ascended Weapon and Armor chests anywhere Ascended materials can drop (Champion Bags, Guild Mission Rewards, World Events, Dungeon Rewards, FoTM)

This is not a good or reliable acquisition method for attaining an Ascended Weapon. I’m sure this fits into the Anet loot philosophy of the “epic” drop. But honestly even with 5 alts and a desire to gear them all differently, if I got a box drop in a stat I didn’t need it would only be “epicly disappointing”

3) Tequatl Weapons

Special skin and specific stats. Good idea but would be better if there were more examples in the game.

Like I’ve talked a little bit about in the Crafting section, I think it would be nice to have a token option for Ascended Weapons just like Exotic tier weapons. Pristine Fractal Relics, Dungeon Tokens, or Laurels (I wouldn’t be opposed to some kind of token for Tequatl either) that an further provide options for players seeking an Ascended weapon.

Final)
I understand theoretically Dragonite/Empyereal/Bloodstone act in a similar fashion to tokens (guaranteeing an Ascended Weapon for X amount of effort) but it is also tied to the problem of Ascended Weapons being only a money sink instead of the optional timesink/moneysink/rng that exotics enjoyed. Making people choose between spending gold on armor or on other aspects of the game was a relatively foreign concept until ascended weapon/armor crafting

Because the most reliable method of acquiring ascended weapons is a money sink, whichever activity is the most gold profitable is the most favored activity. (which again competes with the cosmetic side of the game)

Vertical and Horizontal Progression.

*Vertical Progression:

-Vertical progression via increasing armor stats is a complete waste of time for a very simple reason, future monsters also have to receive stat increases, effectively cancelling out any progress you thought you had made. This is why making ascended gear was pointless.

-If the level cap had been raised by say 10-20 levels, that would have been a slightly different because more trait points would have led to new builds. The problem with increasing the level cap would be rebalancing, and higher level armor would make the old selection armor obsolete.

-Infusion and agony resistance IS acceptable vertical progression, and I have no problems with more like that, even open world. Since ascended has an infusion slot, atleast we wouldn’t feel like the armor we already made was now completely useless if infusions with more resistance come out. In addition agony resistance doesn’t affect WvW.

*Horizontal Progression:

-Is what was primarily used in GW1 so ANET has experience using it.

-In GW1, even if you left for a year and returned, your power compared to everyone else stayed the same. This made returning much easier.

-Horizontal progression leads to a more complex game. This can be viewed as both a good or a bad thing by different people. I personally find GW2 to be WAY to simplified. Some complexity and more meaningful choices to change and individualize gameplay would be a very good thing, because it allows the game to feel new and fresh when you try out new combinations that lead to vastly different ways of playing.

-Horizontal progression can come through different stat combos for armors, new skills (the new healing skills were a first step but nowhere near enough), and new traits.

More elites. There are not nearly enough of them, and the super long cooldowns prevent them from greatly affecting gameplay.

More weapon skills. This is the thing that I want from horizontal progression the most. New weapons would be amazing horizontal progression. In addition, new swappable skills that could replace some of out current weapons skills on each skill bar would make old weapons feel new and exciting again.

Giving us a larger pool of trait choices could also be nice horizontal progression.

Giving us some choice with our 5,15, and 25 point traits would be amazing. Even 1 other option that we could swap for the 5, 15, or 25 trait per trait line would be very nice.

*Vertizontal Progression – taking the best from both worlds.

-Agony resistance is the primary form of stat progression, and starts being used in future maps, helping ANET gate the content a little bit.

-New weapons, skills, and traits are now acquired by completing achievements in the open world. By releasing them this way instead of the way you have been doing it, the new skills and traits themselves would feel like a part of progression. However they should also be make available to buy in WvW for badges.

New skills should come from achievements gain by killing a certain boss (Who better be using said new skill in a very flashy way to show it off! ./remembers signet of capture).

-This is what I believe would be the ideal progression for everyone. A stat increase without impacting WvW or making old gear obsolete. A little bit more customization over how your character plays. Increasing customization and a feeling of change making you feel that your character has “grown.”

(Just saw the ascended gear request…spent an hour writing this. I’ll detail my thoughts on Ascended Gear later)

Horizontal Progression Goal – New skills or skill mechanics

Long Term Vision

• The introduction of the new healing skills are a decent start towards improving flexibility, which is one of my biggest proponents and measurements of Horizontal Progression. The long-term vision of mine has been the addition of say 1-3 new weapons, where each class would at least be able to wield one of the three. Of course with new weapons comes new 1-5 skills, each of which would have their own flavor of design dependent both on the weapon and the class that uses it. I’m aware it would require tons of new items, animations, art, everything and the kitchen sink to implement, but I do hope once the game is 2, 3, even 4 years old, we would be playing with some brand new skillsets to introduce new styles of play and new skill mechanics.

Middle Vision

• With healing skills now available, I’m sure a decent amount of the community is hopeful for the addition of new utility or elite skills. Most utility skills across the classes – save for the extra unique ones like Engi Weapon Kits, Mesmer Portal, or Shadowsteps and Blinks – most of the skills can decently fit into only one of the following expectations: Power Builds, Condi Builds, Support Builds, Stunbreakers, and Staple Skills.
• The existence of skills for hybrid purposes is very few, with boons and boon stacking comprising a majority of the selection. In the future, I would like more skills that can potentially meet two expectations, to further allow compression of the skill bar, and prevent the need of “staple skills” across each profession. I’m sure the various posters here could identify which utility skills they seem to bring for every build they use on a given profession, just because other skills are too one-dimensional.

Short Term Vision

• That brings me to my short-term vision, and that’s additional ways to make our current skills not necessarily more impactful, but more engaging, active, or fun. The animation and art team has done a phenomenal job with making combat exciting, and kudos to the combat designers for making the best combat system in an MMO I’ve ever played. There is still room for growth, though.

• During pre-release, the idea of “charge” skills, abilities that increased in intensity the longer a key was pressed, was originally in the design. At some point, it was removed (likely for time or tech constraints, but that’s none of my business and that’s in the past). With a solid game now, and the LW teams parsed out to create new environments and content, I’d like a revisit to the concept of charge skills.

• Forgive me for using an outside reference, but just on a whim, I picked up the new Neverwinter MMO on Steam recently. The Ranger Class within the game had a Split Shot skill that began with something like a 90 degree cone on activation, and could be fired straight like that. The skill fired 5 projectiles in this cone, and like a Shortbow Ranger’s Poison Volley, each projectile could hit multiple targets (Piercing and unique recognition of each projectile). Covering such a wide arc, the strength of the AoE was actually quite weak, because the projectiles would fan out and hit multiple foes unless in point-blank range of the target.

• The true power and flexibility of the skill came when the skill was held down and channeled, the arc narrowed all the way to 0 degrees to hit a single target! A player could choose the width of the arc based on how long the key was pressed and release the key to shoot the 5 arrows in a 60 degree, 50 degree, etc…all the way down to 0 degrees for a straight line shot, which was incredibly powerful! Decreasing one’s firing arc to only cover the effective range necessary, meant the player could maximize damage potential through careful planning, position, and field awareness, and even adapt his/her approach for multiple enemies, all within one encounter! One skill served as a multi-functional tool for the player to recognize the situation at hand and rewarded smart play and positioning! (Did I mention the Ranger learns this skill at level 2? )

• It’s the flawless design of that Spread Shot skill I experienced in Neverwinter that opened me back up to the sheer possibility of effects that could be utilized with giving improved “charged skill” functionality to already existing skills in the game across each profession.

• In closing, I’ll offer this. A player who can be flexible, adapt, play multiple builds and professions, is a player that is constantly being challenged by the game to become a more skillful player. That’s how I see it. Thanks everyone for your time, and I hope we continue to produce more ideas for Horizontal Progression.

Sincerely,
Malchior Devenholm

@VOLKON mentions the statues from the hall of monuments. That was more of a personal memorial.

How about utilizing the changing world abilities of gw2 and have player-built and maintained statues/monuments in the various cities. These would be limited to a selection of pre-defined statues, plinths, plaques and cosmetic skins. The player would have to get a title which the statue represents, then the resources to build the statue in the first place (using a combination of three of PvE, WvW, crafting, PvP, dungeon). And perform a dynamic event to get it accepted by the city founders. And the statue has to be maintained, otherwise it falls into disrepair and gets replaced by another player’s statue.

Guild halls could be done in a similar fashion, but I don’t know how to prevent the biggest guild getting the best spots. The guild hall should reflect ability rather than sheer size. Guild titles perhaps: highest average crafting score, highest average achievement score, average WvW rank, etc.

Progressive titles as were mentioned in a prior post. WvW has ranks, let them have the associated progressive titles also: WvW rabbit, WvW assaulter, etc.

Vertical progression. I keep gaining XP, but I don’t know what level I’m at. Why not put the character at its real level. Outside of a city, the character level would always be down-levelled to level 80. Might have to upgrade the database to handle more than 255 levels (not my character, but others) :-). Progressive titles could be added for this also.

Competitive titles that you have to work at to keep. e.g. Biggest gain in WvW XP in a month. Each month the title is reassigned. Keep track how many times in a row it is earned. If the player keeps it 10 times in row, they get a permanent title. (I suspect the competitive people will love this).

I think I personally like horizontal progression better, but there should be a balance between the two, and horizontal progressors can also progress vertically through progressive titles (I did manage ‘Legendary Skill Collector’ in gw1).

Morrigan.2809:

If you are only interested in talking about how it is implemented- I have nothing to say
and why have a discussion?

It needs to be removed and no joke!

We all know how well received removing progress is from the Fractal levels.

The issue with this would be that if it is removed, people would expect (and quite rightly) recompense for the gold and time spent. Now, given how the economy is game-wide, what do you think would happen if that amount of gold and mats (which I can imagine some people spent real money on) was suddenly re-introduced into the game, and with no immediate use for the new materials that were introduced?

Thus, the next best thing is to polish how it’s acquired. That’s the reason for the discussion. Just because it’s not a discussion as to whether or not Ascended should be removed, doesn’t mean it has no worth.

Suggestion for easier ascended acquiring:
Make them trading postable, I know ANet is scared it’ll devalue them as quickly as it did Exotics, but something needs to be done.

Alternatively: 3 exotics and some item that costs some gold in the mystic forge has a chance to spit back an ascended item(a decent chance, like 4 rares does for making an exotic), this also has the benefit of making some of the cheaper exotics more desirable and valuable).

Moshari.8570:

I really like the idea of Changing current ascended /exotic to what some people have suggested with ascended having same stats as exotics but being changeable like Legendaries, however….this would cause a complete hell-storm for the people that made ascendeds to be on the same page as the legendaries.

People went for legendaries for the cosmetic aspect long before they had better stats or stat-switching capabilities, so I’m not sure I buy that argument.

Yes, it would cause some upset. Of course. But would you rather prolong a rather horridly conceived vertical progression scheme than fix it? Rip the bandaid off quick before the issue has time to get more people.

The biggest issue I have with the implementation of ascended gear, the primary thing personally blocking my progression, is the artificial time-gating through Laurals. Time-gated content is not fun at all and this really needs to be resolved as it is killing my enjoyment of the game. Having made 8 ascended weapons and 1 peice of armor so far (will be making a 2nd after reset later after doing the daily) I find the use of Laurals to buy a single armor stat slot recipe (and only for that armor class) to be absurd and sickening.

As someone with 8 level 80s the design of this is just pure frustration for those of us who have alts and play them regularly. And what about those with alts who like to run different stat sets depending on what they are doing (dungeons, WvW, soloing) to play different roles? The time-gated requirements of Laurals are pure insanity when you consider such things. Using Laurals would be fine if everyone was restricted to playing only a single class, however that is not the reality of the situation for myself and many, many others. I realistically should not have to wait for almost a full YEAR just to do every daily and monthly only so I can get all recipes needed to get all my characters geared up in top tier armor and weapons, that is absurd and goes against the core features discussed in interviews prior to launch and me purchasing the game. The original statements made about the lack of gear grind and the manifesto were the primary reasons I ever considered buying GW2 and recommending it to friends.

Give us a way to earn Laurals and stop with this time-gated nonsense. Why not allow us to convert karma or dungeon tokens into Laurals? Why weren’t like a dozen Laurals given as a reward from the WvW season 1 chests? Why not make Laurals a reward for some Living Story meta completions?

I’m not asking for Laurals to be removed or anything so dramatic, I just want to see other means of earning them that aren’t purely time-restricted through such things as dailys, monthlies, or achievement milestones.

As for the topic of ascended box drops. Out of doing countless world bosses, temple clears, hours upon hours of WvW, various fractals, and easily thousands of champion boxes opened since the introduction of ascended weapons, I have yet to have a single ascended weapon box drop and I have talked to countless others who are in the same situation. The droprate is far, far too low to be meaningful. Should one actually get lucky enough to have an ascended weapon box drop, the chances are it will be a stat set that won’t be desirable for them. I would strongly prefer we get a weapon box and pick the stats instead of getting a box of a certain stat and then choosing the weapon. Same could be said for ascended armor boxes assuming they function in the same manner.

A couple quick comments about gear progression, from the point of view of someone who plays regularly but is overall pretty casual (no farming, no Fractal running, etc.):

• Exotic Gear: Getting Exotic gear right now is easy. By the time you get to max level, you probably have enough gold to simply go onto the TP and buy whatever gear you want. On the one hand, this is nice, because it means that you can get on with the game. On the other hand, its lame, because it’s boring. There is nothing exciting about selling generic drops, making cash, and then buying good gear. Even if you are looking for cosmetics, a lot of those are on the TP as well, for cash. Get a few lucky drops, get rich, buy stuff. It’s accessible, but not fun. While I like (most of the time) the fact that GW2 doesn’t use quests, I find that I actually miss quest rewards—the feeling that I’ve earned a new piece of cool gear for my character. We really only get that in dungeons and Fractals here.

• Ascended Gear: As a casual player, I find Ascended gear to be so absurd in terms of material costs that it doesn’t even seem to be relevant to my gameplay. I collect my Bloodstone Dust, Dragonite, etc when I come across it and bank it, but Heaven knows if I’ll ever do anything with it. I liked the look of the new backpieces, but I looked up the materials on Dulfy and it was ridiculous. Which really is fine, because I don’t need Ascended gear for anything. I don’t do Fractals and I only dabble in WvW. But once I’ve bought all my exotics, which are easy to get, there’s still nothing else to do. I could work on buying some of the cooler skins off the TP, but that is again just accumulating money and forking it over for goods. So, again, boring. Too much of the gear progression in this game seems to go through the TP.

• Crafting: Finally, crafting is just not fun. Tying the best gear currently in the game to it, with no good alternatives (miniscule drop chance notwithstanding), is not cool. Crafting is expensive, time consuming, and most of all tedious, for little reward compared to simply buying crafted goods off the TP. Then in order to make crafting more desirable, we get Ascended gear that you must make for yourself. But this doesn’t fix the underlying problem that getting through levels 1-400 is a painful, unfun and unsatisfying slog.

Basically, I want to earn more of my gear, even at lower levels (before max levels, dungeons and Fractals) so that gearing myself up is interesting and satisfying. Right now, it feels like everything I’m wearing was mass produced in a sweatshop and bought off the shelf at Walmart. And Ascended gear doesn’t even enter the picture.

Also, I am a big fan of cosmetic rewards, both in appearances/skins and in titles. However, cosmetic rewards are always going to be handicapped in this game until we get a better appearance system than currently exists. I have tons of LS rewards skins sitting in my bank doing nothing because they are one time use items. The Zenith/Radiant/Hellfire skins were a baby step in the right direction, but the whole system needs to get fixed to really make cosmetic progression its own thing.

ETA: As far as obtainign gear goes, the new weapons skins introduced in the Champion bags were, I think, a step in the right direction—I thought they were a really cool addition when they first came out. But just like exotics, you either monotonously ride the champ training hoping to get one to drop, or you just farm up the gold through whatever means and buy it off the TP. Cool weapons? Yes. Satisfying experience? Not so much. Being able to complete a discrete piece of content and be given a Bonetti’s Rapier—or have the skin unlocked in my account-wide skin wardrobe—would be a big improvement. Even if it was simply completing one or more achievements, or something similar (since achievements are the closest thing to quests we have in this game). Something more engaging than what we have now.

There’s been a lot of talk about having a skin locker for PvE, and that’s definitely something I’d like to see. Collecting is a form of horizontal progression that I think a lot of people can get behind.

I’d like to take it a step further though and have a stat locker as well. My biggest concern with ascended gear is that if I ever want to change my gear to different stats, the prospect of losing the equipment I had before (either through transmutation or through having to discard the item I had before) is discouraging and will often mean I just don’t bother.

Basically, it discourages experimentation and skill progression (ie. “I’ve been using this pretty tanky gear for a while and have learned to survive well, so I’d like to switch some pieces to zerker stats, but if it doesn’t work out I’ll have wasted time and money and be stuck with this piece of gear.”

Alternatively, a way to change stats on items would also be fantastic. It doesn’t have to be the same as a legendary. Having to drop some mats to unlock or change to a stat would be perfectly sufficient.

Thighum.7295:

*Vertizontal Progression – taking the best from both worlds.

-Agony resistance is the primary form of stat progression, and starts being used in future maps, helping ANET gate the content a little bit.

…

New skills should come from achievements gain by killing a certain boss (Who better be using said new skill in a very flashy way to show it off! ./remembers signet of capture).

No agony outside fractals, mobs such as karka and reef drakes are challenging enough without having to cause agony too. No gated content in the open world.

They could have given the anti-toxin spray to everyone who completed the ‘nightmare within’ meta, and for players who didn’t, allow for it to be bought as it is now.

I’ll try to make this short as you will have enough to work through anyway.

Vertical vs. horizontal progression:
Well, in short i am here because i got burned out of hunting the dragon. Aka get BIS gear, new tier released, enemy buffed according, rinse and repeat.
So i got hooked up to the idea of “easy to reach gear ceiling” originally displayed during the development of GW2.
I spent some hundreds of hours in GW1 before the release of GW2 hunting skins and more (Obsidian armor, elite charr hide, vanquisher titles, explorer, etc.). That is what i seek(ed) in this game. The ability to drop out and come back to the game without any disadvantage be it a month or a year.

Accessibility:
That’s your own decision. Cater to the players that have few time to spare or those that have 8 hours+ a day.
Just as input: would you rather grind skillpoints (for example, don’t get hooked up on it) to get that healing skill or do something you feel more like? Be it gathering, chatting with friends in LA, or some high lvl fractals?

Personal Notes:
To me progression has become a synonym for a flawed system, let me explain. It’s as if the game is not enough to keep you going so we slap at you stuff to grind out.
You know as they say, it’s not about the goal but about the journey.
If you want to take the route of carrot on a stick “that blizzard gameand it’s clones” is over yonder.
vague gesture (emotes, a kingdom for emotes..)

Yours sincerely,
Thyrm

The point is it was never allowed for horizontal progression.
the game shipped without the magic ingredient of horizontal progression

Where are the new skills you can hunt in the world to make your character cool?

where are new armor skins in game?

where are new weapons to unlock for your character?

where are new sub-classes for existing professions.

Where is player housing and guild housing?

So before you tell us this game needs vertical progression- actually add some horizontal progression first.

Yes. There was no progression system in place at launch, either horizontal or vertical.

I sometimes feel like Arenanet went for vertical as a stopgap measure simply because it would be easy to implement short-term.. but that’s.. I can’t even say how disappointed and betrayed I felt.

And to top it all off, they went with ‘vertical progression’ that was grindingly long and hard, with no ‘catch up’ mechanism. Gear treadmill MMOs are at least honest and give the more casual player a realistic possibility of reaching a good gear level.

Here’s what I don’t understand about gear progression: It’s so weird. It’s totally unfinished; there’s no method of acquisition for higher end underwater gear, for example. Then there’s this whole system of insertables, which is really not intuitive. Runes, sigils, marks, gems, 2 infusion types, doubloons…. It feels messy. I also have no idea why some items have a collectible spot and others do not. There are plenty of cooking items that only work as ingredients, but they don’t deposit, for example. It is punitive to switch to new gear and costly in terms of gold and space to keep gear for different builds/situations.

Horizontal progression is just so difficult to even manage. Even on the same class of armor, dyes vary wildly in coloration. There’s not enough space to hold all the gear/skins we have been getting, and the cost of switching looks is prohibitive. There has been a distinct lack of full armor sets being added to the game- I don’t think it needs to be an equal ratio with the gemstore sets, but maybe 3:1 isn’t a terrible idea? Of course, I’m all for postponing if it means less clipping issues with non-human races.

Implementing the zenith/radiant/hellfire pieces the way you did shows that you have the capability to unlock and store skins in a much more permanent and efficient way, and I think people are really wondering when you are going to utilize that to its full potential.

Also, I don’t think it’s off-topic to discuss progression resets. There’s precedent for it, now, with the fractal level resets.

Will there be another stat increase in gear? Will cooking get bumped up to 500? Will crafting be expanded again?

I’ll let others talk about ascended, but I want to talk about progression of appearance.

I want to collect skins, I really do. I want to buy skins from the gem store for 800 gems whenever they are released, but I never do. Why? Because I have T3 armor and if I want to keep it, I have to constantly buy transmute stones whenever I want to change my looks. As a result, I am buying neither stones nor the skins.

Please release a skin locker like the achievement skins that can be used over and over again. Make us unlock slots with gems if needed, but I guarantee more people will care about armor skins if we had a better system in place.

The progression is fine for one character, but it really kills the game for alt-o-holics. Not that I should care, but every character I got except my main PvE and my main WvW are nothing more than retainers, which I am sure was not the purpose of extra characters.

The other issue is time-gates. Laurels, low mat. drop rates, for example, makes it very hard for a new or returning player to catch up to friends, so they figure they might as well wait for another game. The worst part is that we can’t even help out, we can only wait it out. Waiting is boring. Changes to skills make it necessary to re-gear a character sometimes, and the time consumption of that isn’t very appealing so there is no effort going into the gear, we just play the time-gate because there is no other way.

With crafting, I’m up to being able to make 3 ascended but I find it pointless to make them now as I can’t help but think the next update will ruin it. You got a lot of suckers with the warrior hammers last patch, while I laugh because I saw it coming, I also hold back on a lot of things because they change without refunds.

Now I dont know if you classify timegates as horizontal or vertical progression, but I think it’s the worst thing about GW2. At least I don’t pay to wait, so it’s not as bad as competitors, but I do admit that I am looking around just to get away from those.

I don’t want to get dragged into this conversation at all, because this game was sold to me on the basis of horizontal progression. Everybody remembers the manifesto? Vertical progression really should not even be a question at this time.

However, we’ve been handed gaming material such as Ascended gear, Fractals, and much of it is gated content. Time gates weren’t mentioned in that original manifesto either, and I think most players find them reprehensible.

The point I want to make is, if new material or “vertical progression” is to be brought to the game, and you Anet feel the need to time gate it, perhaps it shouldn’t be brought to the game in the first place.

I’m so excited for this topic! I really care a lot about rewards, and specifically the horizontal/vertical split, so bear with my enthusiasm.

Horizontal Rewards: Don’t cheapen them!
I think the missing element in horizontal rewards right now comes because too many of them are “cheap”

• Cheap to get: designed to be acquired in 2 weeks, mostly by just participating in LS content
• Cheap for ANet to make: backpieces, shoulders, minis, etc.; not skills or armor sets

There’s a limit to how much of this cheap stuff we can take before it stops feeling like a reward. Of course there’s a place for it: you can’t produce new skills every two weeks, and it’s nice to have some short-term goals. But right now, I feel like it’s too much.

There are some good examples in the game of horizontal rewards that don’t feel cheap:

• Mini-legendaries, like Infinite Light or Volcanus
• T3 Cultural Armor
• Fractal weapons
  The big problem with these examples is none of them have a very nuanced acquisition method. Gold, gold, and grinding fractals—you can do better.

Some more examples:

• The Radiant/Hellfire gear has a good acquisition method, but it’s more helmets/shoulders/gloves.
• The Zenith weapons look great, but are given away for so few points that they feel cheap because everyone has them, often without trying.

So, as a suggestion: instead of having a new cheap-to-design reward come out every two weeks with the LS meta, let our work on the LS and other parts of the game help us build up for bigger rewards. An armor set earned for participating in 16 weeks of LS is a lot more exciting to me right now than 8 backpacks in that same time—and 2 new skills would be even more exciting.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Felbryn.5462:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

The two main areas for discussion will be Horizontal and Vertical progression, however please understand that the commentary and ideation we are really looking for regarding vertical is around its accessibility in game.

I’m not sure I understand this bit; could you clarify?

Hi,

To clarify I am looking forward to hearing the communities thoughts on speed of acquisition such as how long crafting time takes? or drop rates in fractals and other areas of the game etc.

I hope this adds some clarity.

Chris

Does Anet Really thinks drop from fractal is a practical way to get ascended weapon/ armor?

Because right now, on top of the very low drop rate, the way it drop makes it impossible for someone get a full set of ascended gear the stats they want by playing fractal.

This problem isn’t new to you, it happened before with the ascended rings, that’s why you put Pristine Fractal Relic in the game, why would you make the same mistake again.

And it is not only about how long the time it takes, its how much it takes. Right now it cost around 240g to craft a set of ascended armor by crafting the time gated mats yourself, You are limiting people to play alts and different builds, I don’t know about others, but I sure as hell cant craft 2 set of different stats for 1 job because of how much and how long it takes when I have 8 job waiting for me.

I think the fractal progression reset issue is a bit of a red herring, honestly.

Of course you changed the difficulty of things. Asking to keep your fractal level in that case would be like asking to keep your ‘world leader!’ reward for biking the tour de france if it was changed from France → Africa to France → Australia.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Felbryn.5462:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

…

…

Hi,

To clarify I am looking forward to hearing the communities thoughts on speed of acquisition such as how long crafting time takes? or drop rates in fractals and other areas of the game etc.

I hope this adds some clarity.

Chris

Okay, I’ll state it clearly:
Ascended takes way too long and way too much money.
If the droprates are as “good” as the asc. weapon droprates (or precursors for that matter), I’ll have mine in about 10 years.
Too slow, statprogression really bad, cut it out.

Guhracie.3419:

Here’s what I don’t understand about gear progression: It’s so weird. It’s totally unfinished; there’s no method of acquisition for higher end underwater gear, for example. Then there’s this whole system of insertables, which is really not intuitive. Runes, sigils, marks, gems, 2 infusion types, doubloons…. It feels messy. I also have no idea why some items have a collectible spot and others do not. There are plenty of cooking items that only work as ingredients, but they don’t deposit, for example. It is punitive to switch to new gear and costly in terms of gold and space to keep gear for different builds/situations.

Horizontal progression is just so difficult to even manage. Even on the same class of armor, dyes vary wildly in coloration. There’s not enough space to hold all the gear/skins we have been getting, and the cost of switching looks is prohibitive. There has been a distinct lack of full armor sets being added to the game- I don’t think it needs to be an equal ratio with the gemstore sets, but maybe 3:1 isn’t a terrible idea? Of course, I’m all for postponing if it means less clipping issues with non-human races.

Implementing the zenith/radiant/hellfire pieces the way you did shows that you have the capability to unlock and store skins in a much more permanent and efficient way, and I think people are really wondering when you are going to utilize that to its full potential.

Also, I don’t think it’s off-topic to discuss progression resets. There’s precedent for it, now, with the fractal level resets.

Will there be another stat increase in gear? Will cooking get bumped up to 500? Will crafting be expanded again?

Mmmmm…..Ascended doughnuts.

In all seriousness, I wouldn’t consider skins and how you dye something as ‘progression’, or at the very least, the progression is very personal to the individual. Who’s to say someone who likes the Karma weapons in a level 2 area hasn’t progressed?

Rather, it’s more along the lines of cosmetic customization, much like the character creator, unless the look of the gear was tied to challenges you went through to get it (Fractal Capacitor comes to mind).

As for storage, yes, they could do with a wardrobe. Even if they gave you 3 slots which you could store a set, as well as the template for that build, and you could buy additional slots at your pleasure.