Guild Wars 2

“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.”

I like the ideas..except this last last one. This would kill alt playing for me if forced to have anything of the map already uncovered. As I said earlier, the exploration side of things is a great strength of the franchise – anything to lessen that is detrimental in my eyes. The solution to compromise I guess would be an item to unlock 100% map completion on other toons when you hit 100% on one char. That would give the choice and also improve the limited reward from 100% map complete in place.

Apologies, slightly off topic, just needed to comment tho!

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Lets keep coming up with some awesome Horizontal Progression systemic ideas and also reward ideas?

Hmm……how about a Reputation System?

You keep trying to balance drop rates individually, but that results in people farming whatever turns out to be the best possible route to wealth. Meanwhile, adding block buffs doesn’t do anything for the out-of-the-way zones since people congregate in the optimal areas. But you could design a system where rewards were done from a top-down method and scattered across the world to encourage mobility. Like so…

Remove the champion reward boxes (don’t panic!), remove the world boss bonus chests (stay with me!), and remove the PvE Monthly Reward (hold on, don’t go anywhere!). In its place, add Reputation.

Reputation is a series of monthly meta achievements corresponding to the different factions. Each meta achievement has 100 tiers with a chest of goodies per tier, and is fed by a series of different activities for that zone. The individual achievements are logarithmic, becoming less rewarding over time. Reputation resets every month, though there is a permanent achievement reward for maxing it out. For example…

Seraph Reputation
-Slay Bandit champions.
-Slay Centaur champions.
-Slay Ettin champions.
-Slay Underworld and Demon champions.
-Complete unique events in Queensdale, Kessex, Gendarran, and Harathi Hinterlands.
-Complete unique group events in human territory.
-Defeat miscellaneous champion threats (anything not considered a racial foe) in human territory.
-Defeat the Shadow Behemoth.
-Defeat Ulgoth, champion of the Modniir.
-Explore unique jumping puzzles in human territory.

Every time you complete one of the minor achievements, you receive a tic on the Reputation track and a choice between several different bonus chests (for basic crafting components, rare components, ascended components, random valuables, etc). The requirements themselves go up over time. Initially you must defeat one champion for a single tic, but soon it becomes two, then three, etc. Likewise, the same event cannot be farmed over and over again since it demands unique events, and the world bosses stop providing the reward after a few tics.

Other Reputation tracks include the Sentinels, Wolfborn, Peacemakers, Wardens, Lionguard, and the Pact (unlocked through the personal story to make people stop skipping it), thus covering 100% of Tyria and the various Flame Legion/Branded/Inquest/Nightmare Court/Krait/Icebrood/Destroyer/Sons of Svanir/Risen threats encountered across the world.

With this system, the key to getting excellent rewards is to do things you haven’t done yet. It favors diversity rather than repetition, providing benefits for people who go off the beaten path. It also allows people to approach rewards at their own pace. You can spend an afternoon slaughtering champions and be well rewarded for your efforts, but you can’t farm champions for several hours every day the entire month and expect a consistent reward stream. The Wolfborn stop being impressed when you bring in the 274th Icebrood Quaggan head. On the other hand, you can just wander around and explore while still being rewarded for completing the new activities and new events you find through random wandering. Likewise, you can max out different Reputation tracks throughout the month in different ways, so you never feel too burdened by tedium.

Play Your Way suddenly becomes absolutely true and forms the backbone for rewards.

I don’t think that adding gear that scaled only in fractals would be a good idea. Aren’t you making the recent sPvP changes so that players have a more overall sense of progression without dividing the game mods. Making a vertially scaling gear in fractals will only make me wanna do fractals if I invest the time to do it. There would be pve/spvp/wvw/fractals(currently fractals is only a branch in pve).
What I would like to see is making skins work in a similar way to dyes (saw something similar a couple of pages back but I’m paraphrasing at the moment). The transmutation stones are used to make the skin reuseable like the ones from Achv. Points for the given character or account (if account bound keep the level required to use it the same as the original item it came from)

Savoy.6824:

Please can someone tell me if I’m missing something. Do your choices ever show up in the game anywhere?

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

These choices determine your character’s personality, which serves no purpose other than role-playing and has no effect on gameplay.

There are ten personalities: Scoundrel, Brute, Barbaric, Militant, Honorable, Noble, Diplomatic, Charming, Captivating, and Unpredictable.

The only way I can see this being used for horizontal progression is if they added personality specific helms. In order to do this, your character’s personality would have to be locked while the helm is equipped (because your personality can change, obviously).

About stat progression and fractals.

You already have it, that’s Agony Resistance. More Ar> Easier Fractal.
There are two options and none of them can please everyone:
1) Having those buffed stats will help me cleaning harder content i won’t be able to do otherwise without giving me a better reward. (Unfair to people thinking that playing a game should be like a work: more time spent=better quality/quantity of rewards)

2) i will be able to steamroll lower level fractals, so you’ll have to tone down rewards for them, so the new players will get crap just because i’ll have over 9000 power/critdmg/whatever you want. (Unfair to people new to the game/with less time to play)

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Randulf.7614:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Here is a crazy brainstorm idea, not in anyway indicative of our direction.

What if there was vertical progression in the Fractals with gear that increased in stats but when outside of the fractals defaulted back to BiS numbers?

I am asking this because it is going to generate some left field conversation not because I think it is or isn’t a good idea.

Chris

For what purpose or benefit would said proposition bring? Currently Fractals works very well as it is because of how it is currently set up. How would the idea improve fractals? (ie can you expand a little more on the idea?)

Well let me be devil’s advocate then and give one example. Make it easier to play through earlier fractals when playing with lower level friends.

Chris

I dont see that as attractive to do though. The game has a fantastic feature in its scaling which maintains challenge at lower level content across the entire game, whether it is zones or dungeons.

If higher fractal player was with me, I’d hope for us both to experience challenge. Otherwise the lower fractal player would feel carried (me) and the higher lvl fractal player would feel bored. The sense of achievemnt for us both would be gone. Remember, people are getting to higher fractals because they are skilled not because of their stats.

It would go against a fundamental ideal of the game you implemented.

If vertical progression was to be widened, you already have agony in place. STrategic use in elite instances, bosses or content"could" be a way forward.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Here is a crazy brainstorm idea, not in anyway indicative of our direction.

What if there was vertical progression in the Fractals with gear that increased in stats but when outside of the fractals defaulted back to BiS numbers?

I am asking this because it is going to generate some left field conversation not because I think it is or isn’t a good idea.

Chris

If by ‘defaulting back to BiS numbers’ when outside of fractals, you mean exotic stats…Id be all for that. I had a similar idea, thought it was too off the wall though. Ascended gear only wearable in fractals. Thats it.

But then how do you compensate the people that don’t do fractals that simply wanted BiS gear and spent money crafting ascended?

But I would be in favor of this and for me, it would solve just about every VP problem the game has.

just a quick question on the CDI idea: wouldn’t it be much easier for the devs if this threads would be opened on reddit, like the reddit-faqs Anet made before/shortly after release? Important questions / good ideas would get upvoted so that it’s much more likely to be noticed.

Faowri.4159:

I don’t think it’s a question of casual vs hardcore, although it does somewhat depend on your definition of the terms. Some people define it as easy (casual) vs difficult (hardcore), but the game can have easy content and it can have hard content – that isn’t the problem, or wouldn’t be, if players could easily achieve a statistical level playing field and content difficulty was matched by skill instead of gear level.

It works if you define casual as ‘limited time to play’ vs hardcore as ‘lots of time to play’. The problem is time investment, and gating character progression behind significant time investment and repetitive activity. Hardcore players are willing and able to do it, but casual players won’t, or very often can’t.

This definition of hardcore and casual can apply to a lot of players, but there are many more such as myself that do not have a lot of time to play, but when we play, we are as capable and as passionate as someone who has tons of time.

With the system as it is right now, I will never have Ascended gear, nor will I have a legendary. I simply don’t want to use my precious time in-game to stand at a crafting station or run endless loops trying to get materials.

Time alone shouldn’t be the determining factor in whether or not I am able to gain the BiS gear.

There are a lot of good options in this thread. I fervently hope that the devs come up with some way that I might have hope to gain Ascended or Legendary gear someday that doesn’t involve endless grind or hours crafting.

In the meantime, i am doing well with my exotics.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Here is a crazy brainstorm idea, not in anyway indicative of our direction.

What if there was vertical progression in the Fractals with gear that increased in stats but when outside of the fractals defaulted back to BiS numbers?

I am asking this because it is going to generate some left field conversation not because I think it is or isn’t a good idea.

Chris

I like the idea, but I think it should work with infusions instead of gear. I wrote a post about how Infusions could work like Materia in FFVII (combining Infusions to create infusions of higher power, or a different type of infusions). I know you read it… or at least will get around to reading it eventually. Ha.

I’ll quote it so others don’t have to hunt for my post.

Agony-Resistance is an arbitrary stat though. It doesn’t make your character more powerful; it simply allows you to play at higher Fractal levels.

It would be interesting if Agony Resistance was replaced with Infusions with unique effects (like sigils) that drop in Fractals and can be combined to create new Infusions of higher power or different types. At higher level Fractals more types of infusions would drop.

I think Infusions that increase your level of power would be more fun than Agony-Resistance, and give you a reason to buy ascended gear besides the minor stat increase.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

DiogoSilva.7089:

• The skill system is generally very restrictive, with few weapons per profession, very few utility slots tied to high cooldowns, and an elite skill system that isn’t acchieving the epic feel it was meant to acchieve.

There are some good ideas here which I would like to see us discussing as a group.

What do you all think about these ideas?

Chris

Short suggestion on this one… been mentioned before but it might help with builds.
Try a selection of different skills/chains for each weapon slot. For example, a torch on any particular class only ever allows two specific skills – if you had 3 to choose from in the 4 slot, and 3 to choose from in the 5 slot, you’d get a lot more versatility in some classes. (Personally I’ve always wished the mesmer had an attack available on the off-hand sword – feels a bit silly to only use it for a block.)

This could make the elementalist a bit of a GW1-style balance nightmare though – based on three selections for each slot you would get 60 different skills/chains for a staff alone. :o

As far as my view of character progression in general – I wouldn’t normally find GW2’s setup too arduous but there’s a few things about the way I play that make it horrendous. Firstly, I’m mainly a WvW player. Switching builds means collecting a new set of gear each time, and working towards ascended is just not feasible – haven’t ever had one drop, and the cost involved in even one set means I probably won’t be done putting it together before I switch builds.

Worse, I have 15 alts.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Thus all progression must be complimentary, enhancing your current roles, perhaps creating new ones rather than just making you more powerful.

Chris

Now that has exciting connotations!

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Brainstorm statement.

I am assuming that you wouldn’t want a progression system in which new skills and traits superseded/replaced existing skills and traits.

Thus all progression must be complimentary, enhancing your current roles, perhaps creating new ones rather than just making you more powerful.

So therefore the idea of statistical power creep is redundant?

Chris

Correct. Id like to discover skills in the open world by doing whatever it is that I want to do whether I am a level 80 running around a mid level zone doing DEs, or doing some DEs in Orr, or running around in WvW, or completing a dungeon.

It has to be everywhere.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Here is a crazy brainstorm idea, not in anyway indicative of our direction.

What if there was vertical progression in the Fractals with gear that increased in stats but when outside of the fractals defaulted back to BiS numbers?

I am asking this because it is going to generate some left field conversation not because I think it is or isn’t a good idea.

Chris

This would be quite awful.

As people grow in power within the fractals, they would eventually reach a point where they can clear the lower level fractals easily enough and fast enough that it becomes the new way to farm. At that point, you get to pick one:

• Reduce rewards in the fractals, especially the lower level ones.
• Reduce the power players have earned in the fractals because some are using it in ways you don’t like.
• Make the fractals tougher to compensate.

All three of these will unfair to new players in the fractals, as well as unfair to the people that have earned their way up through honest play.

However…

Let’s add a new item slot to characters. Call it “Luck Charm” or something. We can come up with a few of them, but one version will be specific to the Fractals. It starts at level 0, and can be leveled up like AR. And as the party’s Fractal Luck goes up, there’s an increased chance of a rare fractal showing up. Or a rare variant of a normal fractal. Maybe these fractals will give better rewards than normal? Maybe they’re just fun? Maybe there’s a really REALLY rare one that gives a title if you see it ( and bonus points to ANet if they can disable screenshots in that fractal ).

There’s some horizontal progress for the fractals that I bet people would love.

Favourite vertical progression system:
Guildwars 1 titles and faction skills, time consuming and hard enough for the people who wanted to persue it while still staying completely optional. The logical transfer into GW2 would be racial and order skills or traits along with special weapons and armor skins. While being a vertical progression this system also works horizontally in diversifiying playstyles.
Interim titles like GW1 had them might also add more incentive to pursue achievements. Most tracks we have now only provide a title at the very end.

Favourite horizontal progression system:
Also Guildwars 1. A wide variety of playstyles and options, easy and fast to switch between them. Plain gear with top stats easy to get, presitge gear (with the same stats) that requires more effort.
I also would like to add another horizontal progression to the discussion: player skill.
Harder encounters to overcome, not through increased stats but by adjusting and learning. Demon’s/Dark Souls and Monster Hunter are excellent examples in this providing though but fair challenges (the games do have a vertical progression in them, but even without it, their core priciple would still stay the same).

Stat swapping
I would like to add that upgrades such as sigils and runes are somewhat problematic. The stat swapping system should include separate upgrade slots for each stat option since upgrades often are very specific for a certain setup and do not work for others. Replacing them is not an option due to the often high cost/low availability of sought after upgrades.
I am in favour of a true stats separate from gear system like a number of level based stat points that can be distributed, separate from traits. This would also fix the odd ‘rare stat combo’ issue with insigna costing 20x more than the average.

My opinion on progression
Vertical progression should be in place to pace the play experience of the beginner. More power is added gradually along with new concepts. When all parts of the gameplay are introduced, vertical progression stops and horizontal begins. Playstyles differentiate, alternative options are discovered and the player’s own skill increases.
A game should give incentive to play through good gameplay and not by forcing a checklist of tasks

Im simply amazed at the amount of people that are opposed to vertical progression being confined to FoTM. If you think about it, it is the only place ascended gear is required(currently). So why does a stat increase even need to exist outside of it?

If ascended stats were confined to fractals, then the rest of us who may not want to step foot into fractals would not need to worry about power creep or a treadmill in the open world.

Im very much in favor of this and again, Im amazed that people are against it.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Brainstorm statement.

I am assuming that you wouldn’t want a progression system in which new skills and traits superseded/replaced existing skills and traits.

Thus all progression must be complimentary, enhancing your current roles, perhaps creating new ones rather than just making you more powerful.

So therefore the idea of statistical power creep is redundant?

Chris

Yes. I don’t want the game to change from its core philosophy that content is skill, rather than gear gated. That’s why I’d like to see a progression system that adds depth to existing roles rather than obsoleting them.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Ok another brainstorm idea.

What if certain pieces of ascended gear could be crafted and sold on the TP such as gloves and boots?

Chris

Yes please, or even better:
All pieces could be crafted and sold on the TP.
All pieces could change stats.
All pieces could be obtained outside crafting without relying on RNG.

The idea of having inter profession specializations is pretty intriguing and could really work. It’s also an excellent way to introduce new weapons and skills. It should require some sort of effort( not too much) to specialize and should happen at level 80.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Ok another brainstorm idea.

What if certain pieces of ascended gear could be crafted and sold on the TP such as gloves and boots?

Chris

I dislike this idea. Its similar to allowing legendaries to be tradeable on the TP. People with thick wallets to turn $$ into gems into gold can purchase their way to BiS…or people with loads of time to farm materials to sell can purchase BiS.

It solves nothing, unfortunately. For me it would be more of salt in an open wound than helping alleviate the problem.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

cesmode.4257:

Im simply amazed at the amount of people that are opposed to vertical progression being confined to FoTM. If you think about it, it is the only place ascended gear is required(currently). So why does a stat increase even need to exist outside of it?

If ascended stats were confined to fractals, then the rest of us who may not want to step foot into fractals would not need to worry about power creep or a treadmill in the open world.

Im very much in favor of this and again, Im amazed that people are against it.

Yep and kudos to you Cesmode for offering the counter argument.

Chris

I am 100% with Cesmode on this one. I believe the original suggestion was meant this way:

Many people are not pleased with your vision of vertical progression. However, if you really want to keep it. If some people really want it that badly, can you at least restrict it to one area of the game so the rest of us do not get punished by the power creep in WvW or elsewhere.

Has the thought of dual profession ala GW1 ever been re-considered for GW2? It is likely to be a real balancing pain and require considerable coding efforts from the team, but the horizontal progression impact could be considerable.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Ok another brainstorm idea.

What if certain pieces of ascended gear could be crafted and sold on the TP such as gloves and boots?

Chris

Why only certain?
The core of the problem still stays the same. accessability. Looking at a heavy vertical progression game e.g. lineage 2, all items can be crafted and sold, there is not even soul or accound binding. However since access to materials is low, supply stays low and prices are high requiring several hundred hours of farming ‘gold’.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Brainstorm statement.

I am assuming that you wouldn’t want a progression system in which new skills and traits superseded/replaced existing skills and traits.

Thus all progression must be complimentary, enhancing your current roles, perhaps creating new ones rather than just making you more powerful.

So therefore the idea of statistical power creep is redundant?

Chris

I have no problem with skills replacing older skills from a style viewpoint, as I suggested in an earlier post. But if it’s an improvement as far as numbers and power goes? Yes, I would have a problem with that.

I find both vertical progression as well as any form of cosmetic progression to be lacking. I can certainly understand the draw towards vertical. I was at cutting edge gear for the majority of my six years in WoW. I’ve been there, done that, and just don’t have enough time or drive for it. That being said I don’t have a problem with it existing as long as the power gap is minimal.

Cosmetic progression just isn’t interesting, but I understand the type of casual player that enjoys this is a large portion of the playerbase. I might be slightly more interested if there were legendaries/ascended items that weren’t so dang shiney. The grim faced Norn Necromancer aesthetic doesn’t quite jive with the items your art team is designing.

When I hear progression I am looking for things such new traits, skills, rune sets, sigils, etc. Anything that moves the game a little closer to GW1 or paper/dice AD&D where players can create a more focused type of character, perhaps very good in one area, but rather poor in others. I don’t expect “Build Wars 2”, but moving just a single step in that direction as a form of progression would be most welcome. Especially new elite skills!

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Here is a crazy brainstorm idea, not in anyway indicative of our direction.

What if there was vertical progression in the Fractals with gear that increased in stats but when outside of the fractals defaulted back to BiS numbers?

I am asking this because it is going to generate some left field conversation not because I think it is or isn’t a good idea.

Chris

That would certainly work for me as it’s basically what fractals have always been. If there is going to be true vertical progression in GW2, it should be limited to something like the Fractals.

Of course, that would also underline the fact that Fractals are not a proper system for deep lore related content or storyline instances.

As far as horizontal progression goes, a quest chain to unlock access to a “new” weapon (currently unusable by your class) would be nice. Same with new skills. Scarlet ran around the world and learned new things. We should too.

Also, an alternative way to get black lion scraps would be amazing (even if it’s a tough road.)

Stat switching should stay exclusively to legendary items.

No stat changing items in gem shop.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Ok another brainstorm idea.

What if certain pieces of ascended gear could be crafted and sold on the TP such as gloves and boots?

Chris

It doesn’t help the obscene price of time or resources required to simply switch statistics.

It should not cost as much to progress one step Horizontally as it does Vertically. But right now, switching from Berserkers to Carrion will cost just as much as progressing from Exotic to Ascended, regardless of whether ascended items are bought and sold.

You need to make it easier to change builds for ascended gear to stop choking horizontal progression. Either allow ascended items to switch stats (thus making them a huge quality of life increase, not just a stat boost), or allow players to collect stats in some way. Please note, collecting stats should be in game, not in the gem store. An item to unlock ALL the stats could be sold for gems, but you should not cut off decent quality of life improvements while simultaneously making it harder to achieve them in game. It’s rude.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

cesmode.4257:

Im simply amazed at the amount of people that are opposed to vertical progression being confined to FoTM. If you think about it, it is the only place ascended gear is required(currently). So why does a stat increase even need to exist outside of it?

If ascended stats were confined to fractals, then the rest of us who may not want to step foot into fractals would not need to worry about power creep or a treadmill in the open world.

Im very much in favor of this and again, Im amazed that people are against it.

Yep and kudos to you Cesmode for offering the counter argument.

Chris

It would still mean the above mentioned problems for people who do play fractals though. why does a stat increase need to exist outside of fractals – or inside – or at all?

frankly stat progression was a horrible idea to begin with and I would really prefer that there are no further gear tiers and no level cap increase. it wasn’t needed and has only split and polarised the player base.

bring in new skills, new weapons (including underwater weapons), new trait options, these are all great.

but please. no more gear tiers.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Reesha.7901:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Ok another brainstorm idea.

What if certain pieces of ascended gear could be crafted and sold on the TP such as gloves and boots?

Chris

Yes please, or even better:
All pieces could be crafted and sold on the TP.
All pieces could change stats.
All pieces could be obtained outside crafting without relying on RNG.

Personally and note this is not the opinion of Arena but I like the idea of uniquely skinned BiS items dropping in challenging content. My opinion as a player is that the current drop rates could be tweaked.

Chris

That will not remove the RNG factor…. Look at it this way:
Say you increased the drop rate on Tequatl. That means a higher change to get a weapon. But it is still RNG.
Some people will get several drops, others will get nothing, most will get items with the wrong stat combination. Please, please, please: No more RNG!

Reesha.7901:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Ok another brainstorm idea.

What if certain pieces of ascended gear could be crafted and sold on the TP such as gloves and boots?

Chris

Yes please, or even better:
All pieces could be crafted and sold on the TP.
All pieces could change stats.
All pieces could be obtained outside crafting without relying on RNG.

Absolutely. Once again, no reason at all to restrict gathering of high tier gear to any one method of acquisition. Allow all pieces to be bought and sold. Allow all pieces to be traded for using a variety of the in game currencies that are already in place (dungeon tokens, karma, laurels, glory, etc.)

Chris Whiteside.6102:

I think it would be cool if we can get a proposal together for treatment of stat based evolution as it currently stands in the game and then concentrate on Horizontal progression ideation.

Chris

Haha sounds good. However, we don’t know your technical limitations, resources, or abilities so I don’t think we could provide an adequate rehab plan

But if you’re looking for some ideas…and if you simply cannot figure out a way to remove ascended gear from the open world…

-Have ascended armor(which was just released) be the end of anything ascended. No runes, or sigils. By introducing runes and sigils, it widens the gap between exotic and ascended even more and now people who opted not to go for ascended armor feel that much more behind in stats and now compelled to craft ascended armor, reluctantly. This will have a negative impact, more so than already exists. And it would be difficult to calculate the stat differential on things like bloodlust sigils being ascended.

-Allow people to ascend exotic gear instead of crafting whole new sets.

*And then we move toward horizontal progression which is far more fruitful… *

-Horizontal ability progression(not better just different and complimentary like you said and discovered/unlocked doing ANYTHING in game).

-More dyes

-Skin locker / wardrobe(I asked for this probably 3 months into launch!!)

-Skins be account bound and used as many times as you want

-Thoughts on changing the color of some abilities? Like Null field from purple to blue? Might not work, but a thought.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Ok another brainstorm idea.

What if certain pieces of ascended gear could be crafted and sold on the TP such as gloves and boots?

Chris

No. GW2 has a distinct lack of rewards that are earned only through playing the game, and far too many rewards that can be bought with gold. This is is why I want some kind of BiS/BiA character progression in Fractals.

Reesha.7901:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

cesmode.4257:

Im simply amazed at the amount of people that are opposed to vertical progression being confined to FoTM. If you think about it, it is the only place ascended gear is required(currently). So why does a stat increase even need to exist outside of it?

If ascended stats were confined to fractals, then the rest of us who may not want to step foot into fractals would not need to worry about power creep or a treadmill in the open world.

Im very much in favor of this and again, Im amazed that people are against it.

Yep and kudos to you Cesmode for offering the counter argument.

Chris

I am 100% with Cesmode on this one. I believe the original suggestion was meant this way:

Many people are not pleased with your vision of vertical progression. However, if you really want to keep it. If some people really want it that badly, can you at least restrict it to one area of the game so the rest of us do not get punished by the power creep in WvW or elsewhere.

The counter argument is that it would be adding additional vertical progression for the sake of adding it rather than it being added to enhance fractals. AR works perfectly whilst stat creeps would in no way improve it that I can see.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Brainstorm statement.

I am assuming that you wouldn’t want a progression system in which new skills and traits superseded/replaced existing skills and traits.

Thus all progression must be complimentary, enhancing your current roles, perhaps creating new ones rather than just making you more powerful.

So therefore the idea of statistical power creep is redundant?

Chris

I am trying to see if we can just remove conversation around any form of statistical evolution in the CDI?

Chris

If it seems necessary to have any kind of Vertical progression do what y’all did with PvE skills in Gw1 and make it feel less grindy than that. Make such skills have a normalized power in WvW.

Many would be fine without stat power creep. A lot of people see it as artificial content or a treadmill, but as a compromise the shallow skill progression offered by EotN wasn’t too grindy towards the beginning of the Gw2 release. As long as we don’t have a hot situation like Ursan Blessing it’s a solid system that can be improved upon.

I personally would have preferred just hunting the skills offered in EotN, but the skill progression being so shallow wasn’t a deal breaker and it had a power cap, plus those were PvE only skills so it didn’t break pvp.

cesmode.4257:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Ok another brainstorm idea.

What if certain pieces of ascended gear could be crafted and sold on the TP such as gloves and boots?

Chris

I dislike this idea. Its similar to allowing legendaries to be tradeable on the TP. People with thick wallets to turn $$ into gems into gold can purchase their way to BiS…or people with loads of time to farm materials to sell can purchase BiS.

It solves nothing, unfortunately. For me it would be more of salt in an open wound than helping alleviate the problem.

It’d be better that way though.

One debate I’ve seen a lot over ascended armor and weapons is the restricted availability. Keep in mind, that if an individual gets ascended armor, and gear, and trinkets, and maxes their entire inventory, you run the problem of having useless drops because you’ve already fully geared up.

This is a good alleviative to that.