Guild Wars 2

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

hi Chris, can you elaborate on this? Does this mean you are very aware of the fact that the last time Anet talked about “higher percentage chance”, this had little effect for the single person but rather for the whole playerbase?

Have you considered linking droprate to certain achievements? (e.g. if you have achievement xy, your droprate on that single mob increases considerably). What I mean: droprate for single mobs could be tied to achievement progression. The droprate of the Tequatl weapon could be around 10% when you’ve completed the Tequatl-related achievements.

The same way droprates for Lodestones (e.g. Charged Lodestones) and a lot of other items could be tied to these achievements:

• dodge 50 lightning elemental attacks
• defeat a veteran lightning elemental
• Kill a lightning elemental with 100% health left
• find 8 different locations of lightning elementals
• … (non-grindy achievement)…

I’m very much aware that this would make Lodestones much less rare, but imho they are far too rare. I’d turn them into untradeable.

Palador.2170:

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

As for crafting your first set of ascended gear we want this to take a bit of time before you get to our horizontal progression systems.

Stop.

Right there. See that?

That’s making people gear up before they get to the fun stuff. That’s exactly what that is.

Throw that out, it’s terrible. Rethink.

Yes. That’s the whole problem. This is supposed to be a game where max tier gear (ascended) is easily obtainable as soon as you hit 80.

Forcing people into month and year long time sinks just to get their armor is the worst thing you can do imo

And this is from someone who enjoys vertical progression more than most. If it’s too much of a grind for a Vertical Progression centered player, that tells you already that you way overshot your mark.

Aza.2105:

I personally believe that the game needs a healthy dose of vertical and horizontal progression. It should not be so polarized towards either of the two.

It should be polarized towards horizontal. As of now they haven’t done any horizontal progression since launch. I haven’t seen a single new armor set that wasn’t being sold to us for real money. The game was marketed as a horizontal progression game. Then Anet backhanded us and added ascended gear adding vertical progression. It was a wicked blow to the people who bought the game for a game that didn’t force you to run the treadmill. Most of us got over it, a lot of us left. To add even more vertical progression with content that requires the next best thing to do (fractals, now with absurd agony requirements and increasingly expensive agony infusions that require the use of an insane gold sink) would be another injustice. On top of completely ignoring the fact that vertical progression doesn’t belong in the game, even if the player base agrees it should Anet still has yet to do any horizontal progression at all.

Anet’s priorities are in all the wrong places. This is going off topic for a moment but I haven’t even been able to complete my main’s personal story because the path I chose is still bugged over a year after launch. I’ve reported the bug several times since I first tried it.

Well, these are things that would (probably) bring me back to GW2:

- Every ascended piece made has swappable stats (like legendary weapon) without any added “complication” to it, you craft it like now and thats it
- Assurance ascended is the FINAL tier
- Assurance there will be no level cap raise tha will obsolete all the gear ( that took, well the amount of time it takes to get ascended set)
- ALL materials available anywhere in the gameworld and absolutely not how it is at the moment. If today i feel like going to /random 45/50 area doing (mostly) /random stuff (collect mats, doing DEs, exploring) i should be able to get same amount of mats as doing champ train/farming metas/karma train…
- and finally actual introduction of horizontal progression

Aeonblade.8709:

Palador.2170:

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

As for crafting your first set of ascended gear we want this to take a bit of time before you get to our horizontal progression systems.

Stop.

Right there. See that?

That’s making people gear up before they get to the fun stuff. That’s exactly what that is.

Throw that out, it’s terrible. Rethink.

Yes. That’s the whole problem. This is supposed to be a game where max tier gear (ascended) is easily obtainable as soon as you hit 80.

Forcing people into month and year long time sinks just to get their armor is the worst thing you can do imo

And this is from someone who enjoys vertical progression more than most. If it’s too much of a grind for a Vertical Progression centered player, that tells you already that you way overshot your mark.

Well that isn’t exactly true. You don’t need ascended gear to do any of the content barring fractals. You could craft up, or buy an exotic set for cheap. Then you can begin working towards ascended gear slowly as you work your way through dungeons, world events, WvW, fractals, or any other content you see fit. My only problem with the time gate is that the wait is artificial. It only serves to hinder the people with less time. The people with a lot of time on their hands already have full sets of gear because they have the gold to bypass the time gate.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

Yes, please

A review of current RNG metrics.

Agreed.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

I totally want this and the ability to save build templates. Only then will it really matter enough to be truly viable. The current system is such a step back from GW1. Heck, even the archaic LOTRO gives you the ability to save templates now and you don’t have to visit an NPC to respec either. It also doesn’t require a cash shop purchase and that coming from a game that has a terrible cash shop as opposed to the really good one in this game.

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

If this means tokens that we can trade in, then yes please. Emphatically.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

Absolutely.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

If we could know for sure that Ascended was the absolute ceiling for gear in this game going forward, it would make all the difference in being the best decision in my opinion for the game. It would be an actual goal and not a grindy stepping stone to another grindy stepping stone.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

I loved what Izzy said about after making one set, it would be easier to make other sets for alts. I really think it’s a great idea.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

Dang it, I don’t know how to do the answers after your points. Sorry for that.

Asia Skyly.7198:

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

Some other interesting ways we could midigate the pressure on alts is just make all ascended gear account bound it would remove some demand but it’s something we’ve discussed before.

For the love of the Six! Make this happen!!!!

This would totally motivate me to get one of each set (zerker, soldier, cleric, etc.)!!!

What would be the point ? You want to put all your gear in the bank before switching character, switch character, then go to bank get the gear back, equip it, then after finish playing put the gear back in bank ? And this, everytime you switch to an alt ? And then, while you log-in in a hurry, you discover your character naked, because you forgot the stuff on another character…

Account bound stuff would not help at all for alts. It’s so tedious to switch the gear from one character to another that’s it’s a practical impossibility, for anyone who really plays his alts (and therefore can switch between them often).
If it was just for changing your main character to another, it could be useful. For stuffing alt, absolutely not.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

1 RNG increase (I do not care about this, RNG is horrible in every game, tokens are better. Priority = lowest)
2 Ability to change stats (Yes please, but it doesn’t have to be exactly the same as a legendary, I wouldn’t mind unlocking/adding stat combos one at a time to the item. Priority = high)
3 Ability to get w/o rng (Yes. Priority = very high)
4 Mats dropping equally (Sounds good. Priority = medium)
5 No new gear tiers (Absolutely! Priority = highest)
6 Ability for alts to gear up easier (Ok. Priority = high)

I would like to add that I think an upgrade system for gear tier would be a very nice addition, that could greatly supplement #s 2 and 3.

Exotic + required mats, tokens, gold -> Ascended (gains infusion slot + extra stats)
Ascended + additional mats, tokens, and gold per stat unlock * all stat unlocks -> Legendary (gained all stat unlocks one at a time while it was an ascended + appearance modification)

Appearance Modification being:
1 Permanent choice of one particle effect on the item.
2 Weapon dye unlocked (added for all legendary weapons)

Particle effect = fiery (red/yellow), frost (light blue), shadowy smoke (black), until it feels like there are enough choices.

Upgrade Component Acquisition via Merchant:
mats + tokens for the exotic->ascended upgrade component

mats + tokens + gold + karma for additional stat type to be unlocked

mats + laurels + tokens +gold + whatever else for the ascended with fully unlocked stat options -> legendary component with specific particle effect

Upgraded Item Acquisition
Item to be upgraded + Upgrade Component in Mystic Forge -> Upgraded Item

Palador.2170:

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

As for crafting your first set of ascended gear we want this to take a bit of time before you get to our horizontal progression systems.

Stop.

Right there. See that?

That’s making people gear up before they get to the fun stuff. That’s exactly what that is.

Throw that out, it’s terrible. Rethink.

I agree – the proposal is nice, honestly, however.. but that bit of developer mindset right there is just completely counter to what the majority of people are saying they want in this thread.

It’s counter to why I bought the game and counter to what a lot of people believed about this game prior to Nov. 2012.

That one bit, right there, is the idea that has to go. The rest will follow, but that one idea informs everything we’ve seen come out for the game over the last year. And unless this idea goes, the solution offered in the end will be half-kitten and not address the real complaints.

This idea? The drop rates’ll increase by five percent and the mats cost of the items will be dropped by 20%. When what’d make me comfortable is taking that 10,000 silk requirement and slashing it a paradigm-destroying 90%.

Lheimroo.2947:

Palador.2170:

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

As for crafting your first set of ascended gear we want this to take a bit of time before you get to our horizontal progression systems.

Stop.

Right there. See that?

That’s making people gear up before they get to the fun stuff. That’s exactly what that is.

Throw that out, it’s terrible. Rethink.

I agree – the proposal is nice, honestly, however.. but that bit of developer mindset right there is just completely counter to what the majority of people are saying they want in this thread.

It’s counter to why I bought the game and counter to what a lot of people believed about this game prior to Nov. 2012.

That one bit, right there, is the idea that has to go. The rest will follow, but that one idea informs everything we’ve seen come out for the game over the last year. And unless this idea goes, the solution offered in the end will be half-kitten and not address the real complaints.

Adding a giant +1.

In a game that was supposedly about horizontal progression, expecting a massive grind before even attempting any horizontal is insane. At least this shows where the devs minds are: Stuck in traditional MMO land, ignoring the successful features of GW1 that allowed this game to even exist.

Besides some of the other fixes and suggestions for current gear that I have been able to read. I would love to have Profession based gear. With all the different professions wearing the same gear, I don’t feel they are really all that different. I would like to see more armor variation between the professions. I would like my Necromancer to have different gear than my Ele and my Mesmer. GW1 did an AWESOME job of this, and I truly felt a connection to my character.

I would like so see Skulls on my necro, Flames on my Ele, Flashy thing on my mesmer, Glowy light things on my guardian, Spikes all over my Warrior, Knives all over my Thief, Leaves and pelts on my ranger, and Sprockets on my eng. AND ONLY those things on those professions. Give me a reason to make another profession.

Also, legendaries that make sense for those professions, Bifrost on a Necromancer seems silly. But the armor differentiation is more important!

Estriella Faerie.4029:

What would be the point ? You want to put all your gear in the bank before switching character, switch character, then go to bank get the gear back, equip it, then after finish playing put the gear back in bank ? And this, everytime you switch to an alt ? And then, while you log-in in a hurry, you discover your character naked, because you forgot the stuff on another character…

It certainly beats the current system.

I would not mind switching at the bank, I do that for harvesting tools. In my case, the real burden is the soul-binding status of different weapon sets, rings and trinkets, each with different stats. Soul-binding my ascended gear really limits my ability to make different builds with different stats. If all ascended gear was account bound, I could simply try the item on a more suited character.

And… There are other proposals being discussed.

However the fact remains that we are talking about the potential death of soul-binding, and that would be a HUGE, HUGE improvement.

may I suggest a way to equip account-bound items without the need of log in to another character:

…the right-click option on your character-window also shows all accountbound items which are usable in that slot, and you can switch to those without having to switch to another character first.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

some of the things on your list solve the other issues on your list.

For example… by removing the account bound status on crafting materials and crafted pieces, you make the armor more accessible. By allowing players to rechoose stats like legenedary gear, you make it cheaper for players because they need only one piece of gear (and the sunk cost could come from the sigils and runes). This then allows them to gear out alts because they don’t need multiple sets for their mains.

This solves almost the entire ascended problem but does raise the issue of why bother with legendaries at that point so that will need to be looked at as simply making flashy weapons isn’t quite enough to justify the huge investment to obtain them.

Atherakhia.4086:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

some of the things on your list solve the other issues on your list.

For example… by removing the account bound status on crafting materials and crafted pieces, you make the armor more accessible. By allowing players to rechoose stats like legenedary gear, you make it cheaper for players because they need only one piece of gear (and the sunk cost could come from the sigils and runes). This then allows them to gear out alts because they don’t need multiple sets for their mains.

This solves almost the entire ascended problem but does raise the issue of why bother with legendaries at that point so that will need to be looked at as simply making flashy weapons isn’t quite enough to justify the huge investment to obtain them.

Legendaries were originally just a flashy upgrade to show status. It wasn’t until more recently that the ability to swap the stats came into play and plenty of people were crafting them before that happened. The legendary skin itself is the reward. Why do you need something more?

(quick answers to some of the late posts, i’ll likely write some more once i get through the whole thread, which i haven’t managed to do yet due to too much IRL stuff to do :/)

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

In the first point, the rng acquisition (drops) should be a supplement to all others, not being considered a separate method on it’s own, unless the drop chances would be increased enough to make it a reliable source.

About the third point (changeable stats) – that is mostly dependant on how the first point would be implemented. The more accessible ascended gear gets, the less need there is of stat changing. Hopefully the gear would become easy enough to acquite to relegate stat switching to a luxury option.

I think also, that you should add something in the discussion about the effective use of timegates in gear acquisition process as well. While lot of the cases of using them were okay, some of the more highly visible ones i’d consider a complete failure.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Sounds reasonable – it’s rather obvious that you are in no position to commit to anything before any internal decisions are actually made (or no made). On the other hand, if you do happen to come to some conclusions after abovementioned discussion, a feedback from you would be very appreciated.

Nike.2631:

Ok, I’ve read variations on this a bunch of times now but I’ve got to ask it straight out:

Do people feel it’s impossible to test new builds using only Exotic gear?

Irrelevant. I may indeed test new builds with exotics. That doesn’t mean however that i want to be tied to only single final build. I should be able to respec for special situations or different playstyles without fully commiting to only one of those – and such versality should not force me into subpar gear.

I favor horizontal progression a lot more than vertical progression. Horizontal progression opens the way to create more diverse gameplay and mute replayability. All vertical progression does is let you have bigger numbers.

Everyone gets bored of playing the same style eventually, and having vastly more skills, traits and item effects help to stave this. Vertical progression doesn’t do that.

If we must have more vertical progression, I suggest having a item levelling feature. Any experience you gain after you hit 80 goes towards your weapon as well as skill-points. Your weapon will have attributable stat points (up to a cap on each stat) and perhaps effects as well based on it’s level.

Partly going on the idea of opening up more ways to get Ascended gear, after an exotic weapon gains a certain amount of experience, it will evolve into an Ascended weapon. The same for armor, this way you won’t ever lose the progress you made on an item.

Legendary items can’t be evolved into but can absorb a weapon to gain its experience.

I m going to reiterate my point on page 4:

IMO almost everything in the last year that is in any way related to ascended gear has been counter productive. Ascended gear while solving the need for vertical progression of a vocal minority has created numerous problems for everyone else. Not only that but if the time spent on making this gear was spent on actual content and improvements the game would be far better off.

In any case if you really want to “fix” ascended gear you first need to find the problems it creates for the game. Here is my list in order of severity:

1. It is not a definitive end of vertical progression. Pouring all your time and gold only to then see better gear 3 months down the line. You d say that wont happen but it already did: with ascended gear. ANET refuses to give us a definitive answer on this. Why should i waste all my money on it if this is not the end of vertical progression? Even with a given word such as a new manifesto many of us would be slow to trust ANET again on this again.
2. Even if you can get past point 1 ascended gear locks you in a specific stat build. It destroys any and all variety one could have in terms of build and stat combinations. With ascended you will only be playing one build or a small set of very similar builds using the same weapons and armor.
3. Not only that but it is completely alt unfriendly. Making it account bound would only make it tedious to switch between characters.
4. It takes a lot of money and time as well as time gating to acquire. The whole purpose of its existence is based on this. The grinders wanted something to “work for” and they got it but the rest of us never asked for this idea of an endgame hamster stat wheel.
5. There is only one feasible way of acquiring it: putting ridiculous amounts of money into your crafting professions, crafting useless exotics, grinding specific areas of the game.
6. It makes content easier and necessitates the need for harder content across the whole game. So far this hasnt exploded out of proportion with only small things like the cage fights, certain dungeons and one boss event but the power creep is undeniably there.
7. It promotes unneeded elitism across all areas of the game.

Other problems associated with it and gear in general:
Transmutation stones, armor look collections, etc. I m glad ANET is fully acknowledging this but i would say it should be of lower priority than the issues above. Adding the option to acquire and store different looks trough a unified account closet similar to that in sPvP however would be awesome and could be made into a very good horizontal progression system.

So what are the best solutions now that we know what the problems are? Well the suggestions have been around for over a year but first ANET would have to make point 1 crystal clear. If ascended is to be replaced at some point in the future or the gear level cap is raised the whole point of this discussion is moot. Vertical progression always takes precedence over horizontal and this issue must be resolved first.

Besides that here are the solutions that would work:
1: make it on par with exotics with changeable stats and possibly even looks – eliminates all of the above problems except point 4 which is optimal. It is now a hard to acquire gear that gives you a lot of horizontal progression. For vertical progression for the hamsters i again say: take a good look at GW1. Systems like agony that affect only a certain elite area of the game should be the only vertical progression in the game period.

2: make it easier to acquire trough many different avenues of play, maybe also reducing crafting requirements etc. but have it still be top stat with changeable attributes – eliminates most of the problems but also point 4 which as said is the base of its existence. Points 6 and 7 are also still a problem in this solution albeit small ones.

3: completely redesign the gear system akin to the one in sPvP and GW1 where armor and weapons do not carry any additional stats. This would make making and managing builds a lot easier as well as enable simple changing of looks and stats.

PS: Izzy cant balance.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

A review of current RNG metrics.

You have said that you won’t divulge the details of what you’re discussing internally, but I hope you guys will discuss the following thoughts I have on this when you next meet.

I’ll give Anet the benefit of the doubt that you:

A) Watch your drop rates closely and have certain models (even a simple normal distribution) in place which in theory create some sort of output in terms of probability of “success”
B) Equate this to average player effort.

From this assumption, I’d like to suggest examining the following when talking about RNG for any type of progression:

1. Effort Equity – An example of this is Dragonite Ore between WvW and PvE. How many encounters/attempts are needed, in the grand scheme of things, to attain X amount? Time commitment is your variable here. I’d suggest re-examining your metrics from here so people feel some equity between their effort.

If, however, you have numerical proof with decent certainty that the effort is pretty “even”, then there’s something in player perception that you have to overcome to ease the reactions. In either case, you have a productive way to isolate the actual problems on this issue.

2. Commitment of a “Bet” – I’ll use a simplistic example to illustrate what I’m talking about and then relate it back to GW2.

Let’s say we’re just making bets on a coin flip. The game is fair, 50/50 on heads and tails. Two versions of the game exist: one where the minimum entry fee is $1, and one where the minimum entry fee is $20.

Logically speaking, either version of the game has the same Expected Value, but you’ll find that people are more likely to gravitate towards the $1 version. More people can afford to risk that amount, simply put.

This is the same even if you tilt the odds to 51/49 in a person’s favor, or even 66.667/33.333.

It comes down to framing the commitment of the bet. This mental construct comes into play whether someone is gambling in the Mystic Forge, salvaging for Ectoplasm/Dark Matter, or in their perception of putting effort for any end.

When I look around in these forums, I’m willing to wager that a lot of the complaining about unattainability of a ________ comes from this perception. Let me link this to the above idea that I had mentioned so I make this point clear.

Let’s say I have a dungeon that takes 5 hours to do, but at the end, I have a 1/3 chance of getting a Really Freaking Cool Weapon (RFCW). Most people who undertake this should be ready to set 10-20 play hours aside to get RFCW.

I can also create a dungeon that takes 1 hour to do, but at the end, I have a 1/15 chance to get RFCW. Proportionately, we can expect the same range of hours committed in terms of effort to get RFCW (perhaps with a more nuanced range between 10-20, rather than the above 10 OR 20).

From this illustration, it’s easy to see that the 1 hour commitment will get more tries than the 5 hours, especially when you have users that can commit a 15 hour spread over a period of time, but never in 5 hour chunks. This is in spite of the fact that both dungeons, from a data perspective, are “fair” in the same way, AND the effort output in terms of time is also identical.

(By the way, MMO’s have one of the most famous examples of proportional framing in World of Warcraft’s experience system. Originally, Blizzard stated that players get 100% of their experience for a period of time, before having that decay to 50%. After the near-revolt of their beta player base, they recanted and “changed” it to a bonus of 200% for a period of time, before reverting to the normal 100%. Hilariously, it’s the same system, framed differently.)

Humbly, I realize that you guys might already be doing all of these things, and you have your reasons for setting the bar for certain reasons, and that things rarely play out how you want it modeled. I’ve been there. But I still submit this to you guys for consideration in case it helps to frame some of the problems you might be grappling with. I think this is a little more productive rather than simply telling you “make this more easy/cheap”… this is an approach of how we can look at benchmarks for easy and hard.

Cheers, and good luck.

Palador.2170:

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

As for crafting your first set of ascended gear we want this to take a bit of time before you get to our horizontal progression systems.

Stop.

Right there. See that?

That’s making people gear up before they get to the fun stuff. That’s exactly what that is.

Throw that out, it’s terrible. Rethink.

Yes.

Can Anet please acknowledge that this type of thinking is the opposite of what was promised at release? If it’s at least formally acknowledged, I can recognise that I’m no longer part of the audience being catered to for GW2, and measure my expectations accordingly.

I’d like to chime in with some thoughts about how GW2’s current progression systems have pushed me away from the game. Before GW2 came out I was super ultra hyped for it, and the first few weeks I played something like 6-8 hours per day. Then I started to realize the implications of some of the mechanics like transmutation, and it dropped to 3-4 hours. Then Ascended gear showed up, and it dropped to 1-2 hours. Now I log in for a couple hours a month (except when Super Adventure Box is around — then it’s back up to 4-8 hours/day).

My core issue with the progression systems in this game is that I don’t like throwing the results of my hard work away. Let’s take an example: suppose I decided to bite the bullet and slog through the 4 months of grind it would probably take me to assemble a full Berserker’s ascended set with a set of skins I liked for my Elementalist.

Now, suppose I wanted a different skin. If I want to keep my stats, my choices are to go through another 4 months of grinding to generate a completely new set, destroy all my old skins that I worked so hard for, or pay nearly $20 in gems to buy transmutation splitters. That’s kind of demoralizing.

Suppose I want different stats (e.g. Soldiers, or some new stat combo)? Same problem, but worse. Another 3 months of grind, followed by the choice of either throwing away the months I spent grinding the Berserkers’ stats, a month grinding out fresh copies of the skins (which isn’t always even possible, since some skins are limited-time-only), or another $20 down the hole.

Suppose I decide my Mesmer is my new main and I don’t want to play Elementalist any more? Everything I strived for on my Elementalist is now meaningless, and it’s yet another four long months before I’ve repaired the damage I’ve done to my progression by daring to play another of the 8 professions.

Just thinking about all the ways my invested time could be so easily be thrown down the drain makes me tired and not want to play the game. I don’t want everything handed to me on a silver platter, but I’d also prefer if my hard work wasn’t invalidated every time I want to change things up and get a little variety in my gameplay. So how could things be better?

My suggestion is to make soulbinding an item unlock its stats and skin for your account. Then repurpose transmutation crystals to be a reagent for reconfiguring the stats/skin on a piece of gear to anything you’ve previously unlocked.

Then I could craft a full set of ascended gear for one character, and a full set for a different character with a different set of stats, and benefit from both. Rather than accelerating the process for alts, this would make repeating the process more meaningful and less of a chore, because you’d be benefitting your existing characters by unlocking a new stat combo, and benefiting each successive alt more by opening them up to a wider and wider pool of choices.

I think this would change the mode of progression for many players from “one and done” or “not even gonna bother” to “gotta catch ’em all”, which is probably healthier for the game long-term.

It would also define a very fun and useful niche for Legendary items. Equipping a Legendary unlocks a unique skin along with all Ascended stat combinations for that slot, and allows you to freely swap skins and stats for that piece on that character forever.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

I have heard Izzy say that he time-gated materials for ascendeds in order to keep the prices high in the TP.

I also worry that if you grant too many ways of gaining ascended gear without a way of choosing the stats on it will end up just like the fractal’s rings problems…where people who ran a ton of fractals literally have a hundred rings sitting in their bank accounts with stats that they do not use…only now we would also have armor and weapons sitting in bank accounts collecting dust. I don’t think we need Ascended to drop frequently as much as we need a way to make ascended more ALT friendly as well as make it more useful when it does drop. Face it, someone with one character has an easy time equipping them with ascended gear no matter how casual a player they are.

I think all of these problems could be solved with some simple but creative solutions. These are my ideas.

1: Ascended drops: Should either allow you to choose their stats when they drop…or have a way of changing their stats (helps build diversity), or have choosable stats similar to legendarys (or even in a more limited capacity limited to the basic craftable stat combos)…if any of those things happened you would have far less useless drops of ascended gear…or gear that cannot be used.

2: TP prices, Build diversity, and ALTS: Once you have successfully crafted one set of armor, you gain the ability in your other crafting disciplines on your account to craft “armor boxes” of any stat…so that subsequent sets of armor whether they be light, medium or heavy are more easily crafted…this will keep the costs of the T7 materials high since it will still be required (especially for your first set), but will still allow people to experiment with builds or ALTS. The downside of crafting as a single set means you might need to make more than one box if you mix and match your stats (which again would be fixed if it had a way to change stats).

3: Non-armor ascendeds: The ideal solution would be a way of tapering off the cost of materials as you create these. SO your first weapon costs a lot, second one costs slightly less, third less again, etc etc….this also would keep TP prices high, but allow players to make a ton of weapons. This seems hard to do though…a second easier solution would be to make them account bound again with a way to change stats…that way weapons can be traded between characters of the same account and select stats based on the new characters needs.

Faowri.4159:

Palador.2170:

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

As for crafting your first set of ascended gear we want this to take a bit of time before you get to our horizontal progression systems.

Stop.

Right there. See that?

That’s making people gear up before they get to the fun stuff. That’s exactly what that is.

Throw that out, it’s terrible. Rethink.

Yes.

Can Anet please acknowledge that this type of thinking is the opposite of what was promised at release? If it’s at least formally acknowledged, I can recognise that I’m no longer part of the audience being catered to for GW2, and measure my expectations accordingly.

Anet has already acknowledged this. They have already stated that the manifesto was not a promise and that we shouldn’t take the word of any of the devs as promises. I’m not sure what type of company is so out of the loop that they expect that we shouldn’t expect the words and promises of the company themselves to count as insights into what is to come. But I have basically decided to not believe anything any developer posts or says because it is usually a lie or it is something we won’t see for another 5 years because Anet refuses to share timelines or any reasonable amount of information at all.

Dinks.2478:

Aza.2105:

I personally believe that the game needs a healthy dose of vertical and horizontal progression. It should not be so polarized towards either of the two.

It should be polarized towards horizontal. As of now they haven’t done any horizontal progression since launch. I haven’t seen a single new armor set that wasn’t being sold to us for real money. The game was marketed as a horizontal progression game. Then Anet backhanded us and added ascended gear adding vertical progression. It was a wicked blow to the people who bought the game for a game that didn’t force you to run the treadmill. Most of us got over it, a lot of us left. To add even more vertical progression with content that requires the next best thing to do (fractals, now with absurd agony requirements and increasingly expensive agony infusions that require the use of an insane gold sink) would be another injustice. On top of completely ignoring the fact that vertical progression doesn’t belong in the game, even if the player base agrees it should Anet still has yet to do any horizontal progression at all.

Anet’s priorities are in all the wrong places. This is going off topic for a moment but I haven’t even been able to complete my main’s personal story because the path I chose is still bugged over a year after launch. I’ve reported the bug several times since I first tried it.

They haven’t done none. They’ve added back piece skins, shoulder piece skins, aquabreather skins (I think). They also added two new healing skills. Those are all horizontal progression. It’s all been relatively easy to achieve and not very interesting. But you can’t say there has been none.

TooBz.3065:

They haven’t done none. They’ve added back piece skins, shoulder piece skins, aquabreather skins (I think). They also added two new healing skills. Those are all horizontal progression. It’s all been relatively easy to achieve and not very interesting. But you can’t say there has been none.

Okay, not none. Virtually zip.

Horizontal hasn’t even really been tried in this game. That’s a seriously brain-boggling, utterly baffling pity.

Dinks.2478:

Faowri.4159:

Palador.2170:

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

As for crafting your first set of ascended gear we want this to take a bit of time before you get to our horizontal progression systems.

Stop.

Right there. See that?

That’s making people gear up before they get to the fun stuff. That’s exactly what that is.

Throw that out, it’s terrible. Rethink.

Yes.

Can Anet please acknowledge that this type of thinking is the opposite of what was promised at release? If it’s at least formally acknowledged, I can recognise that I’m no longer part of the audience being catered to for GW2, and measure my expectations accordingly.

Anet has already acknowledged this. They have already stated that the manifesto was not a promise and that we shouldn’t take the word of any of the devs as promises. I’m not sure what type of company is so out of the loop that they expect that we shouldn’t expect the words and promises of the company themselves to count as insights into what is to come. But I have basically decided to not believe anything any developer posts or says because it is usually a lie or it is something we won’t see for another 5 years because Anet refuses to share timelines or any reasonable amount of information at all.

I’m not talking about the manifesto. I’m talking about explicit gear/skill system design philosophies like this one, where “everyone, including casual gamers, by level 80 should have the best statistical loot in the game. We want everyone on an equal power base.”

I respect that agile development means the details often change, but changes to the above would be a core change to game vision. There is still time to rectify this, but not if the devs are still insistent that we need to sink a lot of time before we get to that equal power base. I bought the game based on that premise. I choose not to buy competitor games because they do not have that premise. At this point, I’m a customer wanting to know how viable it is to continue to invest time and money in a game if the core game philosophies are going to be increasingly abandoned and I am not really a part of the intended audience anymore.

Threads like this suggest they are still open to making big changes to correct these problems, but comments like Izzy’s suggest the problematic design tenets are still very much embedded in the studio’s thinking. So I’m one confused customer at this point.

Another thought for dealing with ALTS and ascended items:

What if, after you make an item with a set of stats, those “unlock” for all of your ascended items. So I make an ascended Berzerker Heavy armor and an ascended Carrion greatsword. My armor now gains carrion as an option to change to, and my greatsword gains berserker as an option. Now I make an ascended rampagers scepter, after it is created, it has the options of berserker, carrion and rampagers. Next I make a set of ascended light clerics gear, all your ascendeds now have Clerics, Rampagers, Carrion, and Berzerker that can be chosen from.

This would keep TP prices high, because it requires you to actually make the inscriptions and items for each.

Those that want Legendary capabilities would have to craft a minimum of 17 ascended items (which would actually cost way more than a legendary to craft…so it would keep legendaries “exclusivity”)

This helps people who want to experiment with build diversity, (they could simply make a different weapon instead of a whole new set of armor / weapons), and while it doesn’t really help people who have a lot of ALTS, it gives more meaning to crafting those additional ascended items…so while it doesn’t help the cost of the items, it does make them functionally more useful with each additional one you make.

This could also be account bound, so even drops add / can use the abilities of others (I get a Carrion drop with the above example and it automatically gains Berzerker, clerics, and rampagers, but nothing extra…while if I got an assassins drop, it would then add Assassins to the list of “unlocked” stat combos.)

@anyone from Anet in the discussion right now.

Now that the vertical progression discussion seems like it has come to a near conclusion, is there any chance someone can touch, even slightly, on the topic I raised from page 21.

It concerns both horizontal and vertical and is pretty much the sole purpose I came to this thread. Any acknowledgement of the topic would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Chris

I made a suggestions for ALTS. So I’d like to expand on the idea.

The basic idea is to make “unlocking” ascended armor difficult /time consuming for the first set (as it is now), but reduce the requirements for the next pieces of ascended armor to make it a small percentage more costly than crafting exotics.

Same for time gating, the more pieces we craft, the less time it should take to make the next one.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

Bump. We are close to being able to move onto the ‘focused’ Horizontal Progression part of this conversation.

Does anyone have anymore comments on the proposal above based on our discussions?

Chris

I’ve pretty much summed up my thoughts on this. You have a good list there. Just keep in mind there are a lot of people out there who don’t like crafting, and the talks should be productive.

Thanks again for all the time you are taking to communicate with us Chris.

I may be a bit late to this conversation I haven’t really been following the thread closely, but I have had an idea I’ve been kicking around for a while that in some ways pertains to horizontal character progression.

I really enjoyed the openness and freedom of the “quests” and events while leveling up and how it promoted exploration of the entire map. however I found when I reached max level and got map completion I lost some direction. daily tasks are great, and its good that they are more generalized, but I also find myself just going to the same areas I know will work well for said task to get it done easily and I don’t explore as much. the Same goes for Metas. sure you’re traveling the world, but really you’re porting to the closest wp completing the event and then porting to the next.

Another disappointment I have is the lack of interaction with my chosen faction. I was very immersed reading up on the backgrounds of each faction when I first created my character and visited there offices in divinity’s reach. I decided to go with the priory and there part of my personal story was probably my favorite part. The few quests I had exploring ruins were exactly what I had imagined. however I am now max level and no longer have any interaction with them.

My idea is to basically add regular (daily) faction missions to the game. Some missions could be more generic and shared across all of the factions but the bulk would be specific and themed depending on who you chose to align with IE the priory missions could involve exploring/revisiting dungeons, jumping puzzles and other various ruins collection objects, solving riddles etc. Vigil missions would be a bit more combat oriented, completing an assault or defense of a keep somewhere in the world, escorting a vip etc. and the order of whispers missions would be more espionage/stealth oriented. spying on an npc, sneaking into a base for a rescue etc.

but I think its important that there would be a fair variety of missions that you could get, and that they could take place in any zone in the world that you’re level appropriate for and take a bit of trekking. Some would be open world, collection/delivery events and others would be instanced single player dungeon type events. (the last few living world events I’ve really enjoyed having the option to solo and it felt like just the right amount of challenge. I really want to see more of that. Hell I’d even love to see some take place in the wvw maps. perhaps some artifact important to the war effort has been dropped off somewhere in the borderlands and you’ve gotta make your way through to pick it up.

These missions could be used towards completing your daily events, and could also be used to acquire some sort of faction currency and access to new faction unique items/ skins. (the armor is cool,but I’d like a lot more)

Chris Whiteside.6102:

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

An idea for this: create a Stat Swap consumable that takes a piece of gear and an insignia. The insignia goes into the gear and the player get the gear’s stats back as an insignia. NOTHING gets lost except the Stat Swap consumable.

This way, you can decide what it should cost to change stats on gears and sell the consumable for that price. Ideally, players should be able to use karma, coin, or badges to get it.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:
…
Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

I can’t help but see a pattern here. I see a number of solutions designed to alleviate the downsides of the vertical progression system. I want to add the structure and fill in a few pieces that I think are missing. (Additions in italics).

• Different players need a different number of sets. (Alts and multiple builds require you to get more of them).
  • The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not).
  • Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.
  • Time gating exacerbates this issue. Consider alleviating it by dropping the gate after the initial completion, by moving to a character gate, etc.

• Ease and method of acquisition.
  • Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it. Crafting shouldn’t be the only reliable source. And in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.
  • A review of current RNG metrics.
  • The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.
  • Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

• Degradation of progress.
  • No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

• Skin degradation.
  • Help alleviate the cost of transmutation. Players are stuck with a splitter and crystal or making an entirely new set in order to transmute. Consider a skin locker system so that we can use the skins the artists of this game have designed without losing massive investments to do it.

I’m in favor of all the items listed. Alleviating the downsides to vertical progression is a good thing.

Faowri.4159:

Dinks.2478:

Faowri.4159:

Palador.2170:

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

As for crafting your first set of ascended gear we want this to take a bit of time before you get to our horizontal progression systems.

Stop.

Right there. See that?

That’s making people gear up before they get to the fun stuff. That’s exactly what that is.

Throw that out, it’s terrible. Rethink.

Yes.

Can Anet please acknowledge that this type of thinking is the opposite of what was promised at release? If it’s at least formally acknowledged, I can recognise that I’m no longer part of the audience being catered to for GW2, and measure my expectations accordingly.

Anet has already acknowledged this. They have already stated that the manifesto was not a promise and that we shouldn’t take the word of any of the devs as promises. I’m not sure what type of company is so out of the loop that they expect that we shouldn’t expect the words and promises of the company themselves to count as insights into what is to come. But I have basically decided to not believe anything any developer posts or says because it is usually a lie or it is something we won’t see for another 5 years because Anet refuses to share timelines or any reasonable amount of information at all.

I’m not talking about the manifesto. I’m talking about explicit gear/skill system design philosophies like this one, where “everyone, including casual gamers, by level 80 should have the best statistical loot in the game. We want everyone on an equal power base.”

I respect that agile development means the details often change, but changes to the above would be a core change to game vision. There is still time to rectify this, but not if the devs are still insistent that we need to sink a lot of time before we get to that equal power base. I bought the game based on that premise. I choose not to buy competitor games because they do not have that premise. At this point, I’m a customer wanting to know how viable it is to continue to invest time and money in a game if the core game philosophies are going to be increasingly abandoned and I am not really a part of the intended audience anymore.

Threads like this suggest they are still open to making big changes to correct these problems, but comments like Izzy’s suggest the problematic design tenets are still very much embedded in the studio’s thinking. So I’m one confused customer at this point.

Every previous CDI has failed to result in any changes that the majority have discussed. Hell the entire WvW CDI was one big circlejerk of devs telling the players that they are wrong.

They abandoned the idea of the premise that you are waiting for the moment they added ascended gear and refused to even attempt horizontal progression. It is more profitable for them to make one new set that takes a month to craft because of artificial time gating and is ugly so it requires you to buy transmutation crystals than it is to make engaging content and build diversity. 90% of the players are still running berserker because

A) It is the best gear in the game, things like healing power and such are virtually useless.
B) Now more than ever we are being forced to choose the most viable gear with the longest shelf life because ascended armor takes a whole month and a kitten ton of materials to make with the time gate.

This means that gear variety is mostly null. Then we have the fact that elite skills are mostly useless and most classes only have one elite skill that doesn’t suck. My guardian for example only has one useful elite skill, renew focus. The others have massive cool downs and what is essentially no payoff. Anets idea of new build variety is a new healing skill?

What Anet needs to do is reduce the cost of Ascended gear and remove the time gate then focus on horizontal progression that is alt friendly and encourages variety.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

Bump. We are close to being able to move onto the ‘focused’ Horizontal Progression part of this conversation.

Does anyone have anymore comments on the proposal above based on our discussions?

Chris

Regarding the ability to change gear stats I have the impression it is more a debate about “how” than about “whether”. Some people prefer a more temporary one some prefer a more permanent one.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

Bump. We are close to being able to move onto the ‘focused’ Horizontal Progression part of this conversation.

Does anyone have anymore comments on the proposal above based on our discussions?

Chris

Please consider/reconsider doing away with soul-binding in favor of account-binding. Soul-binding makes a bad vertical progression into an absolutely punishing progression for those of us who have many characters.

Thanks!

my additions in bold

Dosvidaniya.3260:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:
…
Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

• Degradation of progress.
  • No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.
    I would add that this also applies to progress such as fractal levels, things like that

• Skin degradation.
  • Help alleviate the cost of transmutation. Players are stuck with a splitter and crystal or making an entirely new set in order to transmute. Consider a skin locker system so that we can use the skins the artists of this game have designed without losing massive investments to do it.
    I think this definitely needs to be addressed, particularly for skins achieved or gotten from living story / gem store…many of these can never be gotten again and I shouldn’t have to create a whole new ascended backpiece / whatever just to use a different skin so that I don’t lose the original one

I’m in favor of all the items listed. Alleviating the downsides to vertical progression is a good thing.

Belenwyn.8674:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

Bump. We are close to being able to move onto the ‘focused’ Horizontal Progression part of this conversation.

Does anyone have anymore comments on the proposal above based on our discussions?

Chris

Regarding the ability to change gear stats I have the impression it is more a debate about “how” than about “whether”. Some people prefer a more temporary one some prefer a more permanent one.

Another variation of opinion is that some people think it should be a standard function, and others think it should be restricted to prestige gear like ascended and legendary.

Personally, I’m in the former camp. But yeah, it’s less that people don’t want to see this implemented, and more a matter of how.

Vertical Progression (general)

I am not a fan of extensive vertical progression, honestly. While it is true that all games have it, each game is a little different in its application. I find it is the ones where it never seems to end that I hate the most. I do not want to see GW2 become another of these never ending gear slog games. As a GW1 vet, I honestly miss the cap to stats and the ability to simply play without worrying about that next ‘better tier.’ I dislike the ‘prepare to play’ mentality.

Vertical progression, in its purest form, is simply power creep. This does not; in itself, offer us any interesting play. Bigger numbers, sure, but nothing truly interesting. This boils down to ‘I swung a sword, I swung a sword again.’ Sound familiar? We don’t want this. To me, there is more to a character’s “growth” than just bigger numbers, and typical VP trivializes this. There are better ways to more ‘organically’ grow your character. To make their existence meaningful, enjoyable, and feel like they are going somewhere. Without simply making them hit harder and have bigger health pools…

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

As for crafting your first set of ascended gear we want this to take a bit of time before you get to our horizontal progression systems.

I do not get a good feeling from this statement, because it is precisely part of the issue that tends to occur with vertical progression – locking people out of content. What happened to letting us play, rather than making us spend time preparing to play?

With the introduction of ascended gear, this type of scenario was a fear many people expressed, since content locking is common and is typically done via gear gating. In this instance you are gear gating the horizontal progression we so desire behind the vertical progression that is ascended gear. What happens to those that have no desire to and / or never obtain ascended gear? Do they then never get access to the horizontal progression content? These are things that Anet has said they would not do, had no desire to do, from the beginning, and now seems to be doing a drastic about face on. This is not ok.

While some VP is going to happen, that is expected and even acceptable; however the concern is that GW2 is turning into every other VP type game out there. We don’t want to ‘prepare to play.’ We do not want to ‘swing a sword, swing a sword again’ meaninglessly. That is not what we came to this game for.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

This is my main gripe with ascended gear. Its OK the highest tier of armor would take me a long time to work for. But it upsets me what making it I will lock myself to one build/playstyle.
If i could change stats on ascended gear, ascended gear would be best thing that happened to gear progression in a long time. More build experimenting, less confusion when changing gear to mach up builds and less clutter in inventory.

I would literally make one for every alt.

I’ve pretty much summed up my thoughts on this. You have a good list there. Just keep in mind there are a lot of people out there who don’t like crafting, and the talks should be productive.

Thanks again for all the time you are taking to communicate with us Chris.

I have two more questions, if that’s ok.

1. Given the lack of support for the current crafting time gates, would you guys consider changing the gate to two items per day or even once per profession per day?

2. Will you explain exactly where the Ascended Tier fits into the hierarchy? I know you’ve said it was supposed to exist in-between Exotic and Legendary, but Ascended weapons seem to have equal stats to Legendary. Is this an error? I ask because I’m genuinely confused.

I would really like to see ascended weapons and armor with the stat changing ability (or at least allow us to unlock each stat set so we can swap to those stats) because it creates build diversity (need to change stats quick when out of combat? no problem) and you don’t have to go out and buy umpteen different weapons and armor – THAT to me, is what ascended should be.

Edit: and for legendary armor in the future, all I expect from that is the same stats as ascended, the stat-changing ability, but most of all, each piece would have amazing particle effects/animations – because that’s what you’re really buying it for.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

Bump. We are close to being able to move onto the ‘focused’ Horizontal Progression part of this conversation.

Does anyone have anymore comments on the proposal above based on our discussions?

Chris

Please take another look at time gates. I know Izzy touched on the subject with pros and cons, but I’m still just not buying it. I think the idea that casual players somehow feel more rewarded or acknowledged by being equalized with more dedicated players is completely nonsensical.

To be perfectly honest, I see only two real benefits to timegating, neither of which are justifiable. They prevent market flooding, somewhat, and they force log-ins. While preventing market flooding does have some merit, forcing log-ins is a completely arbitrary and artificial way to force gameplay that reeks of bad design. Time gates for the purpose of forcing log-ins say, to me, that there’s some design paradigm of Anet or NCsoft’s doing to get people to log on no matter what for business purposes, like how temporary living story content forces players to get on and (hopefully) spend gem store money while they’re there.

The whole idea of getting players to play concurrently is something that should be looked at from a player-interest perspective. The way to get people to log in and play your game is not to artificially limit their abilities so that they absolutely have to log in, it’s to create exciting, engaging content that makes people come home and say “I want to play Guild Wars 2 because it’s fun.” Things like time gates take your absolute most important player-base (long-term, dedicated fans) and makes them feel alienated because this isn’t what they want. Time gates themselves make players feel like their decisions and fun are being limited, and saying things like “we wants to equalize our players” makes hardcore players feel like Anet doesn’t care about them.

Guild Wars 1 got along just fine without time gates. Guild Wars 2 doesn’t need them either. If time gates exist for some other, unmentioned reason, like extending the life of the game by making it take longer to craft armor, then that’s a completely different issue that needs to be addressed by adding more permanent, engaging content, and not by artificially forcing people to play. The necessary time gates are already there; it takes time, money, and dedication to make ascended armor. The limiting factor should never be an artificial barrier. If it’s true that you believe that everyone should play on the same field (like how all of GW1’s armor had the same stats regardless of cost) then a casual player acquiring max gear and a dedicated playing acquiring max gear should only be differentiated by cosmetics. Time gating to equalize players only suggests that you’ve created an actual disparity between maximum stat values, because if that weren’t the case, then casual players could get their maximum armor cheap and easy, while the “time gate” of investing money to buy more expensive, cosmetic gear, would be limiting enough.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

Bump. We are close to being able to move onto the ‘focused’ Horizontal Progression part of this conversation.

Does anyone have anymore comments on the proposal above based on our discussions?

Chris

I’m 100% in favor of being able to change the stats on existing gear for a cost drastically less than crafting a whole new set.

Strongly agreed on no new gear tiers. I think that point is pretty much unanimous.

I’m not in favor of making Ascended gear faster for alts as a sole solution. I think this is a bandaid rather than a fix of the core problem (e.g. throwing away/wasting effort). I think account-wide stat unlocks are a much better way to incentivize crafting Ascended for alts, and that the current crafting balance (where leveling crafting from 400-500 costs about 5-10x as much as crafting a single gear piece) provides sufficient acceleration if unlocks are added. That said, I wouldn’t be opposed to some additional acceleration if it was offered alongside unlocks.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

Bump. We are close to being able to move onto the ‘focused’ Horizontal Progression part of this conversation.

Does anyone have anymore comments on the proposal above based on our discussions?

Chris

Could a review of timegated crafting get added to that?

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Hi All,

Here is the next evolution of the original Vertical Progression proposal based on a summary of our discussions:

Regarding Ascended Gear we would like to see more ways to earn it and in terms of drop rates, a higher percentage chance of acquiring them through this method.

A review of current RNG metrics.

The ability to change gear stats (Note there is still a lot of discussion about whether people want this or not)

The ability to build up to Ascended Gear through drops rather than just relying on RNG.

Ascended Gear mats dropping more equally across the game, for example WvW.

No more new Gear tiers that make the existing tiers obsolete.

Additional ways to earn Ascended Gear at accelerated for Alts.

Note this is the formulation of a proposal for discussion. Once the proposal is finalized it will be discussed internally. However there will be no promise of actions or schedule.

Chris

Bump. We are close to being able to move onto the ‘focused’ Horizontal Progression part of this conversation.

Does anyone have anymore comments on the proposal above based on our discussions?

Chris

Would you add the tier upgrading idea? Like being able to upgrade rare into exotics into ascended into legendary… at reduced costs? How about level upgrading? Like upgrading a level 70 exotic piece to level 80 for instance? Maybe via crafting, to give it more purpose. Maybe it could be a way to keep the tiers equidistant as you want, forming one single upgrade line that involves no replacements, but upgrades. Otherwise people are always going to go masterwork all the way up to lvl 80 then leap to ascended or just stay at exotics.

At any rate, thanks a lot for the space, I think we’re ready for horizontal

The Lost Witch.7601:

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

The Lost Witch.7601

These two have their own con’s:
- If I can only play an hour a day, I don’t want to spend any of that time loading into Lions Arch to do my crafting and do my daily. Yet that is what I often find myself doing, and it freaks me out.
- I don’t want to log in every day, I need to spend some time on something else. I want to put GW2 away for a few weeks and invest in other parts of life. (Be it other forms of play/studying/traveling/social calls/an intense working period or who knows what.) But I will be ‘behind’ on progress if I don’t log in. And it is so ‘easy’ to just log in and get those time gated things done… but they make it really hard to take a break!
You make a fair point, but these should really be a part of the con’s in your list!

Well this comes down to your play style it’s not like there is anything forcing you to log in every day just slows you down if you don’t and as for being behind I think when the new thing comes out there is a stronger pressure around “being behind” but as time goes on that pressure goes away. Sense we are normally planning on how something will work in the long term we are ok with there being a bit more pressure when something first goes out but someone who starts one month from now will have a very different feeling.

While it does come down to my playstyle (which I don’t think is limited to just me) it is the game that encourages this. (Partly by tagging timegating on to stat-progression, which feels much less optional than other forms of progression.) A playstyle is not just made by choice, also by the design of the game.

There is nothing ‘forcing’ me to log on every day. But there are systems in place that make not logging on feel like a wasted opportunity, that make reaching ‘completion’ a matter of logging on every day. Without these systems I would have a different playstyle. So while I am not ‘forced’ to do timegated content every day, I feel bad about missing out on the opportunities when I don’t. (Moreso because not doing it today means I will have to do it some time in the future. We can’t just get it out of the way.)

I’ve have yet to miss a single daily/time gated whatever but it has never been about catching up/keeping up/getting ahead. I do it for the reason you mentioned, so I can throw these annoying pest aside ASAP. These time gates add nothing to the game play, they are just an annoyance, a hindrance, that mosquito during summer that keeps buzzing next to your ear as you are trying to play. They are obstacles to overcome so you can get back to playing the game. They are the equivalent of “go do your homework before you can play any games”.

The Lost Witch.7601:

Khisanth.2948:

How much time was this supposed to buy? It has taken over a year for ascended gear to roll out and and there are still problems aplenty. How much time would this better expansion system need? Before or after this decade?

Before, certainly.

GW2 had a lot of things that needed to get going in it’s first year. From seasonal events to building up the living story, to tweaking systems like magic find and guild progress + so much more. I’d say they are already making use of the time they bought with it. But yeah, more good horizontal progression systems do need to be invented so that they can get rid of this temporary solution. And I really think that this thread can inspire them to come up with a great horizontal replacements.

I guess this is all a matter of opinion but I do not feel that the living story brought much to the table for me as a player. Maybe it got ANet more sales so it did its thing. Story? “meh!” Adventure? “WHERE?!” Replay value? “…”
I am glad you are still confident about that, I have been disappointed all too many times already.

At least the core of the game is still decent despite all the broken systems/events/dungeons/etc. That and friends are the only reasons I am still here.

My biggest concern with the ascended tier is the recipes. If you want to make different statted items, you have to buy a new ascended inscription/insignia (not too bad, same as other exotics/rares), but you have to buy new recipes for each weapon/armor piece. I think this was an unnecessary step in the ascended item process.

Further, this punishes those with alts for having diverse builds, as someone with a zerker armored Mesmer need only reproduce armor for a zerker Necromancer and or Elementalist, where someone with diverse builds has to re-purchase every recipe.

It’s my opinion that crafting the final weapon/armor should be the same as exotics, through discovery, not recipes.

@Harbard.5738, upgrading ascended armor to legendary armor sounds awesome.

Also yes please on looking into the time-gated stuff. I hate only being able to make 1 bolt of damask per day. At this rate it’ll take me at least 15 days to make one of those epic looking light of dwayna/shadow of grenth backpieces, and in all honesty, I won’t be bothered in making it if it takes me 2 weeks to craft that.