Guild Wars 2

Is like signing up for dance lessons, then complaining that there are no parters, while sitting on the bench not talking to anyone.

None of us have any idea how many players are left playing the game, and so speculating based on personal observation serves no real purpose. Regardless of the actual numbers, what bothers me is that people on this forum to take the time to login, and create posts about the game dying.

How is it that these people can’t put two and two together that perhaps a more productive solution would be to put that energy into finding other players? Why are these people not putting effort into creating social events in game where people can show up and meet other players?

Take a look back and count how many posts are discussing the LFG system. Yes, ANet has admitted they’re looking to improve it, but how is it that these players are sitting around on a forum agreeing with each other, yet not one has the forethought to say, “Hey, why don’t we all meet in the game right now?”

The game may be dying, or it may be slowly growing. Players may all be grouped in level 80 areas, or crowded around crafting tables, I don’t really know. What I do know is that if you find yourself on here, spending your time trying to convince everyone else of something you surely can’t know, instead of trying to find players to make the game more enjoyable…then you, are nothing but a troll.

(if that changes to “kitten” then that will really make my point look stupid.)

It took me less than 10 minutes to find 4 players to run AC story mode yesterday early in the morning when the server is supposed to be low pop.

Seriously, I don’t know what these people are talking about.

I agree. Games got full servers or at least high population. The fact is a lot of people don’t realize that players have dedicated servers to something else. I’ve played on 3 servers. TC, YB, and BG (Tarnished Coast, Yak’s Bend, and now Blackgate). TC was generally role players that are more “casual”. Yak’s Bend was generally focused on just about everything. They weren’t a great WvW squad, but put up a good fight, and generally their zones in PvE had a good population in them to do events. BG has constantly full queue in WvW (and is generally really good at it) but I’ve noticed myself playing solo more in PvE.

Talk to other players on different servers. We’ve had tons of guilds from other servers interested in WvW join our mumble and ask about Blackgate. I’m sure there are servers dedicated to dungeon running, Orr runs, WvW, SPvP, and everything else in the game.

It’s not dying. Tyria is a unique land and GW2 is a unique game. I never see any complaints outside of the rare complaints on these forums. And as you said, they’re nothing but trolls, and that is generally the case.

There were many that doubted Azeroth, and still do.

The majority of those “low player numbers, the game is dying”-posts are created by people who feel disappointed, angry, wronged etc. with or by the game and want to see it fail. A lot of them hate the game, even announce them leaving pompously, yet stick around to fill the forums with their all out-criticism and bile. I have yet to witness not being able to do something at any time of the day because I couldn´t get together a party.

One thing though becomes harder and harder: Dungeons in storymode. As there is no incentive at all in redoing them, it has become rather difficult for people “behind schedule” or just wanting to do them on their alts. Story mode dungeons certainly need some carrot or barely anyone will run them in a few weeks.

While I am not on the forums complaining, I have noticed more and more people leaving spvp and tpvp. Most Mists are deadly quiet and have a lot fewer people than a week ago. Also less and less people seem to be in the hotjoin que which includes all servers. Sure around 30-40 are full but that seems rather low for the population of the game cross server.

I think some people are concerned that areas once full of people now have a much smaller population. This game is still in its honeymoon phase, it feels like the game should have a lot more people in various parts of progression. Several people are leaving the game in pvp because the maps are getting old and there is still no word other than “soon” on when the esport is supposed to start. I imagine some pvers are leaving as well because they have run out of stuff they want to do.

I love this game and want it succeed, it is an innovative and fresh look at the stale MMO genre. However people are leaving; not in droves like the doomsayers are preaching, but it is a steady trickle when the game should be growing as a whole. Repeatedly saying everything is fine does not help. Some people really are worried that this great game won’t be as successful as it should be, I just hope that new additions( at least what was promised for pvp in the beginning) comes soon or people will move on.

Thank you, please dont flame me, I have condition removal ready for any burning effects.

Not going to flame you I didn´t say everyone does and there are clearly shortcomings in the design that will lead to deserted areas and/or parts of the game. The greatest misconception of GW2 is certainly that people will repeat things for the sheer fun of it. That will work two times, three times, but sooner or later it will become stale if you do not have anything “material” to gain from it.

Some areas are pretty empty. First week (really obvious as to why – but will type it anyway) had people ALL over the place. Two weeks later as I’m moving an alt up the lack of people (compared to First Week and first time through this zone) was starting to show.
Now, moving a character through some of these lesser zones (the ones without a timed dragon or “efficient karma run/farm”) are nearly empty. Had a pickle of a time getting a few of the events completed in Dredgehaunt a few days ago. The southern area where the dredge take over the outposts… yeah, that was interesting trying to solo. O.o

Now, to me, that doesn’t mean the game is dieing; only that players are sticking with certain zones that have 1) higher pay outs 2) that they enjoy more.

In fact, I think that Anet should adopt a dynamic rewards boon to zones that have fewer players in them… think I may go hit that up in the Suggestions forum in a bit.

because theres broken things in the game which prevents them from having fun therefore venting here and making themselves heard hopefully get their issues rectified.

And before anyone says “Blah blah blah less complaining, not the game for you, should have done your research” 1) these people paid for their games 2) they have the right to give feedback 3) its not your call if you dont agree with the feedback, its the developers call.

People complain because it gives results….they complain complain complain until they change the game.
Ask Bioware on ME3…

Whenever I see someone saying “This game is perfect! Stop playing! Stop ruining it for me! Go back to WoW” I imagine a spoiled birthday kid whose guests somehow offended him. Now he’s stomping his feet and yelling for everyone to get out of his house and never come back.

aleiro:

People complain because it gives results….they complain complain complain until they change the game.
Ask Bioware on ME3…

People didn’t just complain about ME3. They started things borderline harassing developers and writers even on private level. Recently both of Bioware’s founders left. Insider informations say that they were both pretty exhausted especially over the ME3 issue and it’s insane backlash reflecting on everyone in the company.

Persistence is one thing but gamers usually do not know these days where to draw a line. Repeating the same complaint over and over does nothing but constructive criticism does.

That’s why I actually admire people like Ghostcrawler at Blizzard. He is tough as nails and doesn’t care about what people are calling him nor does he care much about the most of the inane complaints. I may not necessarily agree on every of his policies and the desaster that was Cata but he manned up to it and said it sucked.

“Hey, blood witch spawned, can someone help me kill her?”
“Circle straf, u nub. do it yorself”

What I’m complaining about.

The game is losing players. At least temporarily. Theres really no denying that. It’s only a little over a month in, so some fall-off is to be expected. Especially from people that burnt themselves out.

But look at the facts:
- World of Pandas, Borderlands 2, Torchlight, and a few other big name games all dropped within the last few weeks. And as we get closer to the holidays, more are going to be coming out.

- People burnt themselves out and got bored with the endgame (wrongfully yes, but it happened).

- GW2 has no sub so people aren’t “guilted” in to playing it.

The player population for GW2 over the long term will look something like a sine wave. When new games come out people are excited about, a fraction of players are going to spend some time on those until they beat or get bored with them. When Anet releases content patches, expansions, has holiday events, or blockbuster season for games passes then players will come back.

Half my guild right now is playing Borderlands 2. We are all still on Mumble daily. They love GW and are going to be playing it again soon. But they also like Borderlands. That doesn’t mean GW2 is “dying” or “failing”. Just means no sub gives people freedom to come and go and play what they want when they want to, without throwing out $15/mo.

People need to realize that unlike WoW, GW2 is great because you can come and go when you please…without feeling like you HAVE to log in to play.

Trust me…people are playing…they just aren’t ‘addicted/programmed’ anymore which is a good thing.

hm, even though I don’t pay I still feel like I have to log in and play. Those darm daily achievements heh (also, I want to get the montly and see what the chest awards!)

lacrimstein.5603:

Whenever I see someone saying “This game is perfect! Stop playing! Stop ruining it for me! Go back to WoW” I imagine a spoiled birthday kid whose guests somehow offended him. Now he’s stomping his feet and yelling for everyone to get out of his house and never come back.

Funny, I imagine the same thing when I see people complaining about the game, but all I see is a spoiled brat stomping his feet because his guests didn’t bring the presents that he wanted.

I think a lot of the complainers are comparing their experience to launch day, when all the starter zones were mobbed with players rolling fresh toons.

I was telling my one friend who keeps going back and forth about the game that he needs to unlearn what he has learned from WoW because he’s basically stuck in that ‘WoW’ mentality.

He keeps saying he needs a reason to log in…I’m like…um…FUN?

He’s stuck in that hamster wheel treadmill of WoW where they make you grind gear and pvp stuff over and over.

Ravenblade.7685:

aleiro:

People complain because it gives results….they complain complain complain until they change the game.
Ask Bioware on ME3…

People didn’t just complain about ME3. They started things borderline harassing developers and writers even on private level. Recently both of Bioware’s founders left. Insider informations say that they were both pretty exhausted especially over the ME3 issue and it’s insane backlash reflecting on everyone in the company.

Persistence is one thing but gamers usually do not know these days where to draw a line. Repeating the same complaint over and over does nothing but constructive criticism does.

That’s why I actually admire people like Ghostcrawler at Blizzard. He is tough as nails and doesn’t care about what people are calling him nor does he care much about the most of the inane complaints. I may not necessarily agree on every of his policies and the desaster that was Cata but he manned up to it and said it sucked.

This a hundred times over. I think the entitlement mentality, lack of basic human decency and viciousness on the internet have reached a point where companies and creators are advised not to enable public discussion of their creations and certainly not partake. Can you imagine what the Sistine Chapel would look like if there had been a Michelangelo-forum in these days? Or Shakespeare´s plays? The ME3 desaster really demonstrates how ridiculous the “democratiziation of the arts” has become allready. The endings where complete and reasonable within the context of the universe, if you liked them was really a matter of taste. Instead of accepting the creation for what it was they demanded a piece of art being changed. I cannot say I have ever seen the audience storm the stage because they thought Prospero´s decision was really “lame”. Probably it would be best if all game creators just closed their forums.

Aramanth.1546:

“Hey, blood witch spawned, can someone help me kill her?”
“Circle straf, u nub. do it yorself”

What I’m complaining about.

I think that may be less an issue of not having people around than one of no one wanting to fight that boss…I don’t know why, but I have never seen anyone in the area going for her.

As for people complaining about the game dying, they’re just trying to bring everyone down, so it’s best to just ignore them (though I know it’s hard when the majority of topics on the first page are of this type). They don’t like the game, so apparently no one else is allowed to actually enjoy it either.

It’s not about level spread. It’s about not being launch anymore. I don’t play as often as I did at launch because it didn’t just launch. People will be playing a few hours every day or every several days, not 4-12 hours every day.

Sincerely, GW2 doesn’t do much to help with finding other players:

- It’s LFG tool is a bad joke. It’s so useless most players seem to have given up on using it.

- There’s no centralized way to find groups for a specific dungeon; you might find players looking for a group in the dungeon’s map, players trying to use the game’s LFD, players in different cities, etc. The closest thing to a de-facto system is the chat spam in LG – which is something I, personally, won’t use, because I flat out refuse to just sit in a city instead of actually, you know, playing.

Also, players have been trained by most games nowadays, including most recent MMOs, to just queue for group content. WoW, LotRO, DCUO, TOR, Rift, STO, and so on allow the player to just enter a queue and be mostly guaranteed a group. Lots of MMO players never had to manually assemble (or look for) a group before, and even if they are willing to do so, they might not be used to it.

BTW, my preference lies heavily with an automated grouping system. Even though I actually like doing group content, I’m too shy in chat to ask for a spot in a dungeon run or to assemble my own run. As a result, I tend to do dozens of times more group content in games where I don’t have to ask for a group – and I’m not actually exaggerating; I went from roughly one dungeon run per month in WoW, before it implemented an automated queue, to over a dozen weekly dungeon runs after the automated dungeon queue.

Please refrain from making threads to complain about people who complain. Thank you.