Guild Wars 2

Galen Grey.4709:

I do and actually I think somewhere in the first months when asked about an expansion they did flat out saying they’re not working on one but not 100% sure. That being said I cant exclude they were already working on expansion content with the intention of releasing it in the future through the living story hence the statement not working on an expansion. Of course all of it this is purely speculation on my part for I lack the ownership of a crystal ball

different people value different things. The dungeons were cool and I enjoyed them too, marionette was amazing in itself but I love story more so for me every living story release during season 1 was like a cake with cherries and all. Season 2 is like a buffet of sweets That being said while season 2 has much better story telling it feels like it has less world impact than season 1 did and biggest reason for that I feel is the change from temporary content to permanent.

would go against the idea of the LS? not at all. I think the issue here is you’re threating the LS as all there is. The living story can just easily be the thread that binds stuff together. It doesnt have the be everything just like the personal story wasnt everything at launch. actually no need to look outside of the living story itself. Dry Top wasnt created exclusively to service the Living story, in fact only small parts of it service the living story the majority of it was meant as new content for players to enjoy. Why cant that same thing happen on a larger scale?

Yeah that was about around the same time they started talking about the Living Story (half year after release) and it was also around the same time I got more active here because for a B2P model to work they should have been working on that back then so thats when I did foresee also all the cash-shop approach and everything that comes with it. Exactly what we did see this half year.

But that was then and they said “if we do this (LS) right there will never come an expansion”. Then later explaining content that you expect from an expansion would be released with the LS. Now we can conclude they failed at that so if they made the turn to that LS approach back then maybe it’s now time for them to see they did fail and have to look at other solutions.

Also not sure how you think I see the LS as all there is. I did say we had less as 50% of what we would normally see in an expansion. That means there is stuff added during the LS like some improvements to the world and like Dry Top and a new dungeon path and fractals and a new world boss. There are things added outside of the LS but all that compared is equal to what you would expect from a expansion that you would expect to have been released by now if that would have been the approach.

The LS story itself (the story I mean not the content) does not do anything for me personally, I haven’t even finished the PS yet. So I do not act as if that’s all there is. There is more, just not the same amount as what we would expect from an expansion what should have been the case by now.

Galen Grey.4709:

wasted.6817:

I see this “2 weeks after rushing through content, back to complaining on forums” myth is still popular and goes around. How do people even come up with that kind of crap.

2 weeks is perhaps a little exaggerated although true for some hardcore players. For most people a couple of months is more likely.

there is a website that can help shed some light on this. it allows people to post their average play time:
http://www.howlongtobeat.com/

going for a certain very popular mmo if we take how long people took to finish the main content on average and the fastest times we get:

Expansion 1: 50hrs, 50hrs
Expansion 2: 335hrs, 70hrs
Expansion 3: 176hrs, 11hrs
Expansion 4: 211hrs, 20hrs

The ‘main’ content is not what kept me playing in mmo’s. It was all the side things (that in GW2 are sadly mainly grinding gold) there are in the world.

However if we would to look at that you can also ask yourself how many time people have spend in the LS things. You really think that is a lot. It’s something people do once and take about 2 hours to complete.. Now I am indeed talking about just the LS alone because you are talking about the ‘main’ content in expansions. So that number not going to be any higher.

Galen Grey.4709:

I dont think anyone is saying lets not have a no expansion ever. Its more along the lines of an expansion alone wouldnt solve content problems because it would most likely result in a huge gaps of time with nothing to do but waiting for the expansion to drop.

Now an Expansion and living story together… ahhhh thats beautiful.

If we forget the fact that the LS also means they pay the game with the cash-shop as all those F2P games out there and if we also forget that apparently that then also means expansions take even longer to release. then yes. But taking those things into account then no. Obviously (and let me make this clear) this depends on your preferred game-play.

If you like to do PvP this is not going to hurt you, WvW also less with exception of the lack of new maps and if you like to mindlessly grind a currency all day then you are really in luck. Do not not like to really play but buy a game and then buy items with cash to then show of what you have you are also in luck.

But do you like to go into the world to have fun collecting items, working towards goals and rewards and so on then this is not good.

Another day another expansion thread.
At some point I feel I should voice my own opinion on this.
(Note: I have not played GW1 for reasons I still dont understand, I kind of never had it on my radar. I have no experience with the Expansions of GW1 and what they did to the game)

- I am against any kind of expansion.
- I do Not want to see an expansion in the traditional way where lots of new stuff is being added to the game in one big step.
- I want Anet to continue like they did so far with the occasional living story updates and maybe a little content by the side like we had with fractals.

The reasoning is rather simple:
To this date I’ve seen many MMOs die out in the course of 1 or 2 major expansions or updates. ‘To die out’ does not neccessarily mean that noone like to play the game anymore overnight.

While a big loss of players is of course part of the problem most of the time is that those expansion drive the game away from its original concept, style, visuals, feeling etc. so drastically that all the magic is lost instantly and you feel the game you originally bought is no longer there. Which, in return, leads to loss of player acitivity and many dropping the game.

Of course new players might eventually buy and step into the game, the community changes with this aswell and nothing will be the same anymore.

Now, of course we could assume Anet finds a way to not break the mentioned and keeping the game going like we know it. Its of course possible considering the game is really unique in its core mechanics already and the major cuplrits like ‘Increased level cap’, ‘new gear tiers’ or ‘unfitting new areas’ are not really an issue in GW2 that we probably ever have to deal with.
Increasing the level cap would have absolutely no effect whatsoever, new gear tiers were confirmed to never be implemented after ascended and new areas would be based on the original guild wars so there is no real issue. Thats good

What else could happen? A new class? A new weapon? Well, that does not sound to bad, eh? How could that potentionally ruin the game or drive it away from its original concept? It certainly did for LineageII (Kamael update) and Aion (Aethertech or Gunslinger classes) just to name a few.

Still, are you willing to take that risk? After all, dont we all fear change? Isn’t that what makes us human?
I for sure dont want to take the risk because its to real.

Think about it, I would not be here if the last MMO would have not been patched to death, or the 10 MMOs prior to that.

Edit: I do agree however: A new pvp map, a more difficult dungeon and the like would not hurt. But does this really classify as an ‘expansion’?

Galen Grey.4709:

wasted.6817:

Galen Grey.4709:

I dont think anyone is saying lets not have a no expansion ever. Its more along the lines of an expansion alone wouldnt solve content problems because it would most likely result in a huge gaps of time with nothing to do but waiting for the expansion to drop.

Now an Expansion and living story together… ahhhh thats beautiful.

I think some people are saying exactly this and some saying that it’s no rush, let’s take it slooow, which i would mind that much if it wouldn’t be for that long after release now. Huge gaps of time with nothing to do? Well, people, those who actually play GW2 all this time, they do something , right? You’re still catering to that myth that expansion won’t fix or add anything in the long run, but that’s not true. Expansion will make it so, that for some period of time there will be lots of new things to experience for every kind of player and there will be much more content in the game overall, in the long run.

Why do you think long gaps of time doing nothing will be better appreciated then short gaps?

Lets say it takes you on average a full 6 months to explore an expansion and lets go with the industry average of 2 years per expansion. That will leave 1 year and a half of content void. You feel people will be happy with that? when with the living story you’re getting a void of maybe a week and half generally and a month now and then?

Personally I’d rather have content every 2 weeks and an expansion every 3 years then long stretches of no content and an expansion every 2 years (assuming living story will push content back by a whole year which probably isnt the case considering the LS team is just 20 people out of over 350!)

If they would go for the B2P approach it would be once a year. P2P games that do release an expansion once every 2 years also release stuff in-between and usually one bigger patch half-way. Furthermore while personal a good expansion can easily keep me busy for well over a year.

So if GW2 was to release an expansion once a year and had a bigger patch half way there would be no real waiting gap, I would be able to play all the time.
Obviously also this depends on your personal game-play and the way the game is implemented. For example, if mini’s where put in the game in stead of in the cash-shop it would likely have giving me things to do for easily over a year simply going after all of them. Now I don;t even bother because grinding gold or buying them with cash is not what I consider a fun way of playing a game.

And sadly that is how many of the GW2 ‘veterans’ spend much of there time in GW2. Even a person like Wooden Patatoes said many times he does grind a lot sometimes while watching a movie on a second screen. Sorry thats now what I consider engaging game-play.

maddoctor.2738:

A few things:

Guild Wars 2 launched in China on May 15th, about 6 months ago, it’s a bit too soon to release an expansion yet, because it will affect the China version too.

The November 4th patch should be a massive one, I don’t want to see a F&F Prelude or an Entanglement (first LS2 episode), I want to see something substantial. Once the LS2 kicks off again and players start logging back into the game, then it’s the time to announce the expansion, then release said expansion around April/May of 2015, 1 year after the China release.

Wishful thinking? Maybe. They’ve had a looot of time to prepare this next LS episode, and as the dev already said, Wintersday will be the same as last year, so I expect, the next few LS releases to be rather huge and pave the way for the expansion.

We will see soon enough

Your wishful thinking is not something I would be very surprised to see happening. However if then after that expansion we would go down the same road for the next 3 years as we then did for the last 3 years then it would be very disappointing. And in fact I don’t think they would even be able to because the game would imho then slowly die out.

Personally I always did see the current approach as especially bad in the long-term. Long term being 2 / 3 years. If they would do what you say that might be very smart in expanding that a little but if they keep doing it like this it’s also not more as just expanding on that imho. If there where to change the approach because they did conclude this did not work things might go very different imho.

Devata.6589:

maddoctor.2738:

A few things:

Guild Wars 2 launched in China on May 15th, about 6 months ago, it’s a bit too soon to release an expansion yet, because it will affect the China version too.

The November 4th patch should be a massive one, I don’t want to see a F&F Prelude or an Entanglement (first LS2 episode), I want to see something substantial. Once the LS2 kicks off again and players start logging back into the game, then it’s the time to announce the expansion, then release said expansion around April/May of 2015, 1 year after the China release.

Wishful thinking? Maybe. They’ve had a looot of time to prepare this next LS episode, and as the dev already said, Wintersday will be the same as last year, so I expect, the next few LS releases to be rather huge and pave the way for the expansion.

We will see soon enough

Your wishful thinking is not something I would be very surprised to see happening. However if then after that expansion we would go down the same road for the next 3 years as we then did for the last 3 years then it would be very disappointing. And in fact I don’t think they would even be able to because the game would imho then slowly die out.

Personally I always did see the current approach as especially bad in the long-term. Long term being 2 / 3 years. If they would do what you say that might be very smart in expanding that a little but if they keep doing it like this it’s also not more as just expanding on that imho. If there where to change the approach because they did conclude this did not work things might go very different imho.

The extra parameter I wanted to add to the “Expansion” discussion is the China release, which plays a very important role in when to release an expansion (as I said, 6 months is a bit too early).

Maybe it’s wishful thinking again, but I’m positive we will get larger content updates (expansions) more often than once every 3 years, the first one being an exception due to the China release.

There is a Points of Interest today with Colin Johanson, let’s see what there is in store for us for the November 4th patch, I hope (for the good of the game) it’s something substantial and awesome

Flitzie.6082:

Another day another expansion thread.
At some point I feel I should voice my own opinion on this.
(Note: I have not played GW1 for reasons I still dont understand, I kind of never had it on my radar. I have no experience with the Expansions of GW1 and what they did to the game)

~

Games dying out is not because of expansions. There are enough games with expansions that do or did just fine (including GW1) but also many non MMO games. Look for example at the Tomb Raider genre that is 17 years old and still going strong while using this model. Release an expansion or a new game then have a gap of 1 / 2 years and release a new game. Those things you talk about can be done with expansions but don’t have to be done with expansions and for that matter can just as much be done with LS patches.

What more important is how fun the game is to play. That is why I see the current approach much more as a problem for the long term. The LS made that they had to turn to the cash-shop approach what made that the game has become very grindy. You can wonder how long people keep being interested in that.

So basically you are asking for good content but somehow you seem to believe that expansions will always result in bad content and LS will always result in good content. Just not sure why you think that.

Well you might be right. It might just be the bad experience I have with MMO expansions.
But so far every MMO was ruined for me and my guild or all my mates with game-breaking expansions. It never really was the lack of content.

Of coures at some point you’ll always have seen it all and you only log in occasionally or play a little bit on the weekends but its still better than not playing at all imo.
I play MMOs for escapism. Sometimes casually, sometimes really hardcore or not at all for a few weeks. It depends on how much time I have. But at some point MMOs feel like ‘home’ and so far everytime I really began to grew onto a game that gamebreaking content update was release and it threw me off entirely.
I dont want that to happen again already.

And recent events like NPE (which honestly is not as bad as it sounded when it was introduced) and now the gemstore update are game-changing updates to an extend where the game drifts away from its original concept.
The gemstore update really made me think for the first time to drop the game for a while or even for good. Something like this should not happen. I am glad they’ll reintroduce the custom option. Although they still have to do something against the passive inflation…

It made me realize how things can change in the blink of a moment.
I now have this natural fear again the game might change to much for me to enjoy it anymore.

Actually, considering how Anet’s lately, Flitzie have a point there. In that state they very well could release an expansion which would put this game straight in it’s grave. Anet’s been very consistent lately with all kinds of bad/debatable decisions etc.

wasted.6817:

Galen Grey.4709:

Why do you think long gaps of time doing nothing will be better appreciated then short gaps?

It’s just my experience from other MMO games, including GW1 and it’s common sense for me. When you look back and see what’s actually in the game, it’s crystal clear how little LS managed to deliver so far compared to what a traditional expansion usually delivers. And i believe it’s the same experience for a lot of other people. Expansion supposed to bring substantial, meaningful, replayable content. LS, so far, mostly failed on every account, with few partial exceptions, like Tequatl and Wurm, and Marionette, but that’s gone now.

The problem with replayable content is generally speaking its content designed to keep you busy for months – years and takes the form of dungeons and raids you need to repeat to get the next tier of gear or to unlock whats coming next. I’d personally take LS over that kind of content any day! Repeating the same things for long stretchs of time is just not fun for me.

Galen Grey.4709:

Personally I’d rather have content every 2 weeks and an expansion every 3 years then long stretches of no content and an expansion every 2 years (assuming living story will push content back by a whole year which probably isnt the case considering the LS team is just 20 people out of over 350!)

2014 wasn’t about bi-weekly updates, was it? 2014 was about very moderate amount of content stretched very thin, unless episode 2 proves me wrong. Overall it’s not a bad option of course, what you described, but have we heard any kind of announcement or even some sort of comments from devs? Right now, it’s a general assumption at this point, that it’s probably coming, but for all you know it might as well not be coming at all, like ever xP.

Another thing, let’s just say, that GW1 used to have expansions released in 6 months, others in 1 year. It’s not always 2 years. [/quote]

of course it was bi-weekly, just cause they took 2 small breaks and had a tournament where they didnt release anything while it was running it doesnt mean it stopped being bi-weekly
and thats not even taking into account that they made each season 2 living story release 4 – 5 times larger then what we had in season 1. People seem to ignore season 1 used to have just 1 30 min story instance while season 2 now has 4 – 5.

Provided we dont get any more breaks which well we’re not based on the announced schedule, this year we’ll have had 18 release instead of 21 last year.

Well yes like such for example:
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-01-14-you-thought-that-was-it-for-guild-wars-2

“Actually, it sounds like there is an expansion planned. “We have a couple of really big Guild Wars projects cooking in the background,” Johanson told me."

“The thing that we haven’t decided yet,” he went on, "is what form that type of content will take. Is it right for Guild Wars 2 for that kind of boxed expansion? "

“… but we absolutely are going to do sweeping new features that you would traditionally only get in expansions – large regions, content and progression additions to your characters in the form of growth and professions and races. Those are all things that you will see in the lifespan of Guild Wars 2.”

The 6 month time frame for an expansion was too much for them, something anet stated themselves. As for 1 year period well just go look at lion’s arch in Gw1 and go look at lion’s arch in gw2 and I’d imagine it will be kinda clear why building stuff in Gw2 takes a bit more time then it did in gw1.

Devata.6589:

Galen Grey.4709:

wasted.6817:

I see this “2 weeks after rushing through content, back to complaining on forums” myth is still popular and goes around. How do people even come up with that kind of crap.

2 weeks is perhaps a little exaggerated although true for some hardcore players. For most people a couple of months is more likely.

there is a website that can help shed some light on this. it allows people to post their average play time:
http://www.howlongtobeat.com/

going for a certain very popular mmo if we take how long people took to finish the main content on average and the fastest times we get:

Expansion 1: 50hrs, 50hrs
Expansion 2: 335hrs, 70hrs
Expansion 3: 176hrs, 11hrs
Expansion 4: 211hrs, 20hrs

The ‘main’ content is not what kept me playing in mmo’s. It was all the side things (that in GW2 are sadly mainly grinding gold) there are in the world.

However if we would to look at that you can also ask yourself how many time people have spend in the LS things. You really think that is a lot. It’s something people do once and take about 2 hours to complete.. Now I am indeed talking about just the LS alone because you are talking about the ‘main’ content in expansions. So that number not going to be any higher.

I am sorry but Gw2 has that side stuff too but your reply to that was always along the lines of drop rates are just too low! Anything that can be bought with gold with the exception of gem shop stuff of course can be acquired in game. going for the gold instead of the stuff directly is just a personal choice.

Devata.6589:

Galen Grey.4709:

I dont think anyone is saying lets not have a no expansion ever. Its more along the lines of an expansion alone wouldnt solve content problems because it would most likely result in a huge gaps of time with nothing to do but waiting for the expansion to drop.

Now an Expansion and living story together… ahhhh thats beautiful.

If we forget the fact that the LS also means they pay the game with the cash-shop as all those F2P games out there and if we also forget that apparently that then also means expansions take even longer to release. then yes. But taking those things into account then no. Obviously (and let me make this clear) this depends on your preferred game-play.

If you like to do PvP this is not going to hurt you, WvW also less with exception of the lack of new maps and if you like to mindlessly grind a currency all day then you are really in luck. Do not not like to really play but buy a game and then buy items with cash to then show of what you have you are also in luck.

But do you like to go into the world to have fun collecting items, working towards goals and rewards and so on then this is not good.

having an mmo essentially means " pay the game with the cash-shop " you can count mmos without a cash shop on one hand regardless if they’re b2p, f2p or p2p

20 people out of 350 = 6%
so if I had to choose between waiting 2 years with barely anything to play but having an expansion 6% before or waiting 6% extra but having something new to play nearly every 2 weeks. is it really a choice?

because an expansion like the main game would have none of these? “But do you like to go into the world to have fun collecting items, working towards goals and rewards and so on then this is not good” ?

Cause I dont know, legendary weapons, named exotics, dungeon skins, Karma skins, heart vendor skins, world bosses skins, crafting recipes, titles, a single piece of town cloths, probably more stuff I forgot were all there with the main game for you to go out and have fun collecting why would it be any different with an expansion just cause there is the living story too?

Devata.6589:

If they would go for the B2P approach it would be once a year. P2P games that do release an expansion once every 2 years also release stuff in-between and usually one bigger patch half-way. Furthermore while personal a good expansion can easily keep me busy for well over a year.

You whole premise hinges on an expansion every year and you think that somehow your choice of business model magically makes things go faster. No CEO goes “hey people, we’re going with the Pay to play model that means you only work 1/2 of the day and do whatever you feel like for the other half because unlike those poor B2P MMOs we dont need to release every 1 year thus we can afford to work 1/2 as much” They release every 2 years cause it takes to years to finish and release. For the milliont time. Living story team is 20 people. Anet has 350 employees. 6% of the work force works on Living story. 6% doesnt cause 1 year delays it causes 1 month delays.. they didnt release an expansion after 1 year 1 month even if they started in the 6th month of Gw2 release. So stop thinking if they drop the whole Living story entirely you’re going to get an expansion every year cause you’re not, modern MMOs just have too much art work to deliver in that time frame not to mention all the work that goes in Dynamic events. At best you can get 1/2 an expansion packaged as an expansion and paid for like a full expansion which would be worst for everyone!

Devata.6589:

For example, if mini’s where put in the game in stead of in the cash-shop it would likely have giving me things to do for easily over a year simply going after all of them. Now I don;t even bother because grinding gold or buying them with cash is not what I consider a fun way of playing a game.

And sadly that is how many of the GW2 ‘veterans’ spend much of there time in GW2. Even a person like Wooden Patatoes said many times he does grind a lot sometimes while watching a movie on a second screen. Sorry thats now what I consider engaging game-play.

Because grinding for the mini is so much more fun then “grinding” for gold. Grinding is grinding its not fun irrespective of what you do it for. I dont think running a dungeon to get a common mini will be any more fun then running a dungeon to earn 1g with which you buy the mini.

I dont think running a dungeon 25 times so that the rare mini drops is any more fun then running a dungeon 25 times to buy the super rare mini.

I dont think running a dungeon 100 times to get the super rare mini to drop is any more fun then running a dungeon 100 times to earn the gold for the super rare mini.

But you know whats fun? Today I dont feel like running dungeons I feel like doing a world bosses, Dynamic Events, Fractals, Jumping Puzzles, WvW, running around the world doing whatever I come across, etc.. instead and I can do that and still work towards my mini.

Gw2 is as grindy as much as you want it to be grindy.

Alerno.1425:

GW2 has tons of content and has had since the day it started. The problem is that after two years most, not all, players have played through them multiple times.

I’d add that another major problem is that a great majority of that content provides almost no worthwhile rewards to a level 80 character. You can run explorable dungeons, Orr temples, world bosses, Champ trains, or level 80 node farm for suitable progression toward “endgame” rewards, whether ascended gear or vanity skins.

Or you can play in most of the rest of the wide world of Tyria and get a trickle of coin, a few karma, and green loot.

Why doesn’t Anet make more use of the single most impressive idea they had for the game, the level scaling downwards. Sure it’s bugged now as it’s effect is too little and level 80 chars are way too powerful in lower areas. hopefully that can and will be fixed at some point.

Agreed. Increase the downscaling so that low level areas are more challenging, and give level 80 rewards for level 80 characters engaging in it.

Galen Grey.4709:

Gw2 is as grindy as much as you want it to be grindy.

Sure, but for some reason ArenaNet likes to put the best rewards in its grindiest parts.

Devata.6589:

Flitzie.6082:

Another day another expansion thread.
At some point I feel I should voice my own opinion on this.
(Note: I have not played GW1 for reasons I still dont understand, I kind of never had it on my radar. I have no experience with the Expansions of GW1 and what they did to the game)

~

Games dying out is not because of expansions.

it is not that simple. Consider Gw2 at launch how many people cried out for vertical progression so much so Anet gave them ascended armor and Fractals. Now Imagine they were going with an expansion model and imagine each expansion takes 1.5 years to develop (1/2 way between our two timelines) Anet hears the need for vertical progression and decides their idea of ditching vertical progression wasnt healty and focus most of the expansion on adding some vertical progression only to have a bigger out cry when the expansion releases. Now its 1.5 more years before they can “fix” it or convince people that well it was just a one off there would not be a new tier with every expansion etc..

you’re essentially both right an expansion doesnt kill an MMO but a miss step in an expansion very well can.

Gibson.4036:

Galen Grey.4709:

Gw2 is as grindy as much as you want it to be grindy.

Sure, but for some reason ArenaNet likes to put the best rewards in its grindiest parts.

its the nature of very best rewards… one thing that makes a reward the best is the value associated with it and what makes something valuable? how hard it is to get!
I’d say the Final Rest is one of the nicest staves in the game for example. Its not grindy to get 6g – 7g easy to make in a couple of days but is it considered one of the best staves? no cause its just too easy to get.

New content is confusing for new players, all these places and items, we should remove them and bring them back “with no timeframe” via an expansion not said to be considered anytime Soon™.

(are you players still here?)

He who is not busy growing is busy dying…

wasted.6817:

Actually, considering how Anet’s lately, Flitzie have a point there. In that state they very well could release an expansion which would put this game straight in it’s grave. Anet’s been very consistent lately with all kinds of bad/debatable decisions etc.

At the same time, multiple of them (not all) including the gem change sames to be related to them earning money with the cash-shop. That is the reason why I so much against that and in favor of expansion. Also the fact that the game has become more and more of a grind (because of that) is not a positive imho.

Galen Grey.4709:

The problem with replayable content is generally speaking its content designed to keep you busy for months – years and takes the form of dungeons and raids you need to repeat to get the next tier of gear or to unlock whats coming next. I’d personally take LS over that kind of content any day! Repeating the same things for long stretchs of time is just not fun for me.

GW2 is also trying to keep you busy with grinding for stuff. What you are talking about is a tier grind what is a another topic all together. Expansion do not automatically have to mean a new tier of armor and weapons. Also they have much more then just raids and dungeons it it comes to collecting stuff. How about mounts, mini’s, recipe’s and so on. That is just as much things used to keep many players playing for a long time. Some as part of a dungeon you would need to repeat other things as a reward for a quest or an achivement.

Galen Grey.4709:

Devata.6589:

Galen Grey.4709:

wasted.6817:

I see this “2 weeks after rushing through content, back to complaining on forums” myth is still popular and goes around. How do people even come up with that kind of crap.

2 weeks is perhaps a little exaggerated although true for some hardcore players. For most people a couple of months is more likely.

there is a website that can help shed some light on this. it allows people to post their average play time:
http://www.howlongtobeat.com/

going for a certain very popular mmo if we take how long people took to finish the main content on average and the fastest times we get:

Expansion 1: 50hrs, 50hrs
Expansion 2: 335hrs, 70hrs
Expansion 3: 176hrs, 11hrs
Expansion 4: 211hrs, 20hrs

The ‘main’ content is not what kept me playing in mmo’s. It was all the side things (that in GW2 are sadly mainly grinding gold) there are in the world.

However if we would to look at that you can also ask yourself how many time people have spend in the LS things. You really think that is a lot. It’s something people do once and take about 2 hours to complete.. Now I am indeed talking about just the LS alone because you are talking about the ‘main’ content in expansions. So that number not going to be any higher.

I am sorry but Gw2 has that side stuff too but your reply to that was always along the lines of drop rates are just too low! Anything that can be bought with gold with the exception of gem shop stuff of course can be acquired in game. going for the gold instead of the stuff directly is just a personal choice.

No it is no choice. Most things you can not work for directly (it’s not a viable option) and you are required to grind a currency. I do not mind low drop rates at all. That makes stuff more rare what is fine. As long as you can work directly towards it and that is also the most viable option to get the rewards. What is not the case in GW2 for most things in there.

i feel like wvw/pvp and classes could have more to them

and i am drowning in story

Galen Grey.4709:

Devata.6589:

Galen Grey.4709:

~

~

having an mmo essentially means " pay the game with the cash-shop " you can count mmos without a cash shop on one hand regardless if they’re b2p, f2p or p2p

20 people out of 350 = 6%
so if I had to choose between waiting 2 years with barely anything to play but having an expansion 6% before or waiting 6% extra but having something new to play nearly every 2 weeks. is it really a choice?

because an expansion like the main game would have none of these? “But do you like to go into the world to have fun collecting items, working towards goals and rewards and so on then this is not good” ?

Cause I dont know, legendary weapons, named exotics, dungeon skins, Karma skins, heart vendor skins, world bosses skins, crafting recipes, titles, a single piece of town cloths, probably more stuff I forgot were all there with the main game for you to go out and have fun collecting why would it be any different with an expansion just cause there is the living story too?

Well we have had this discussion many times and you know what you are doing wrong here I told you that so many times that rather you do it on purpose or you are fooling yourself?

But here is it again. There is a difference between having a cash-shop and focusing on it to generate your income.

WoW has a cash-shop but it does not focus on it to generate it’s income that results in something like 10 mini’s, 5 mounts, 3 skins and the option to change your name. That is about it. (those number are +- didn’t feel like looking it up).
That is a huge difference to a game that focuses on it like GW2 that has much more in the cash-shop and also designs the game to be based on a currency what you can then buy with cash. And that very much effects the game in a negative way. While I agree WoW should not sell mini’s, mounts and skins however at least until now it does not effect the game experience itself. So there is a huge huge difference. But heey, I explained that many times to you already.

Same that you keep talking about the 2 years while you know I talk about 1 year because you are comparing it to P2P and F2P games while I talk about B2P games (like GW1 who released an expansion once every 6 months). And yes I much rather would like to wait a year for good new content if that means I would have a game not influenced in a negative way by the cash-shop focus as that is happening now. And personally I have had more joy playing during the breaks then I had during the LS patches because they did feel to much as a task you had to complete. That did become better with the first half of second season of course (that I still have to complete).

All the stuff you name are usually very rare world drops or at least harder to get then the currency to buy them. If I would want lets say a skin dropped by Teq (while that are the better ways to reward for sure!) I would likely end up earning the gold to buy it before it would drop (reason is because world bosses are one of the things used in this game to grind gold). And if thats the case there is something wrong. Not to mention that overall the better looking stuff does not drop from these things (the Teq mini being the only exception I can come up with). Also a legendary is mainly grinding gold to buy half of what you need. There are a few examples I GW that are implemented correctly but you try to put in more then there really are. Also when 90% is a grind the 10% that is implemented correctly is sadly also not interesting anymore. If I would want to collect mini’s I need to grind gold for over 90% of all mini’s and then can work directly towards another 10% while I would likely earn the money to buy them sooner.

Last time I remember working directly for an item in GW2 directly because it was an item you could really only get that way (gold was possible but even harder because of the price) and where very nice drops where the molten mini and molten backpack. Of course that was back when everything was temporary so that got pulled out and when it was put back in as fractal (what is less fun because if I want to do that dungeon I do want to also do other ones) those rewards where taken out. however that where the type of things I enjoyed doing much more.. or better said, I enjoyed doing that and I do not enjoy grinding gold.

Galen Grey.4709:

its the nature of very best rewards… one thing that makes a reward the best is the value associated with it and what makes something valuable? how hard it is to get!
I’d say the Final Rest is one of the nicest staves in the game for example. Its not grindy to get 6g – 7g easy to make in a couple of days but is it considered one of the best staves? no cause its just too easy to get.

I was thinking of straight up income (gold), Ascended mats, or even top tier crafting mats.

These things are limited to a very small portion of the game’s content.

Galen Grey.4709:

Devata.6589:

If they would go for the B2P approach it would be once a year. P2P games that do release an expansion once every 2 years also release stuff in-between and usually one bigger patch half-way. Furthermore while personal a good expansion can easily keep me busy for well over a year.

You whole premise hinges on an expansion every year and you think that somehow your choice of business model magically makes things go faster. No CEO goes “hey people, we’re going with the Pay to play model that means you only work 1/2 of the day and do whatever you feel like for the other half because unlike those poor B2P MMOs we dont need to release every 1 year thus we can afford to work 1/2 as much” They release every 2 years cause it takes to years to finish and release. For the milliont time. Living story team is 20 people. Anet has 350 employees. 6% of the work force works on Living story. 6% doesnt cause 1 year delays it causes 1 month delays.. they didnt release an expansion after 1 year 1 month even if they started in the 6th month of Gw2 release. So stop thinking if they drop the whole Living story entirely you’re going to get an expansion every year cause you’re not, modern MMOs just have too much art work to deliver in that time frame not to mention all the work that goes in Dynamic events. At best you can get 1/2 an expansion packaged as an expansion and paid for like a full expansion which would be worst for everyone!

Devata.6589:

For example, if mini’s where put in the game in stead of in the cash-shop it would likely have giving me things to do for easily over a year simply going after all of them. Now I don;t even bother because grinding gold or buying them with cash is not what I consider a fun way of playing a game.

And sadly that is how many of the GW2 ‘veterans’ spend much of there time in GW2. Even a person like Wooden Patatoes said many times he does grind a lot sometimes while watching a movie on a second screen. Sorry thats now what I consider engaging game-play.

Because grinding for the mini is so much more fun then “grinding” for gold. Grinding is grinding its not fun irrespective of what you do it for. I dont think running a dungeon to get a common mini will be any more fun then running a dungeon to earn 1g with which you buy the mini.

I dont think running a dungeon 25 times so that the rare mini drops is any more fun then running a dungeon 25 times to buy the super rare mini.

I dont think running a dungeon 100 times to get the super rare mini to drop is any more fun then running a dungeon 100 times to earn the gold for the super rare mini.

But you know whats fun? Today I dont feel like running dungeons I feel like doing a world bosses, Dynamic Events, Fractals, Jumping Puzzles, WvW, running around the world doing whatever I come across, etc.. instead and I can do that and still work towards my mini.

Gw2 is as grindy as much as you want it to be grindy.

No P2P and F2P models put also a lot more content out during those 2 years (thats something you seem to forget) and I would also not expect every year an expansion the size of the expansions you would see with the expansions released every two years. That are the big differences. I would expect less content in between and smaller expansions then the 2 years expansions. And that is why it can go faster (an expansion per year) when they focus on that.

An while for you that might not be more fun, for many including for me it is. Also is gives the item itself more value. Like I said before. I had fun doing the MA dungeon and farming for that dungeon. I don’t have fun grinding gold to buy items. While that might not be true for you it’s very true for me and many other people.

Every time that rush of will it drop or not.. Yes that makes doing the dungeon 25 times much more fun ten doing it 25 times seeing your gold slowly go up and it also makes the reward feel much more rewarding. (that is what I said about it giving more value to the item)

And you know whats fun? I would likely want more things then that one item. And some might be in dungeons other can be in world bosses, Dynamic Events, Fractals, Jumping Puzzles and so on. Making all that content more fun to do becuase of that rush.

Galen Grey.4709:

Devata.6589:

Flitzie.6082:

Another day another expansion thread.
At some point I feel I should voice my own opinion on this.
(Note: I have not played GW1 for reasons I still dont understand, I kind of never had it on my radar. I have no experience with the Expansions of GW1 and what they did to the game)

~

Games dying out is not because of expansions.

it is not that simple. Consider Gw2 at launch how many people cried out for vertical progression so much so Anet gave them ascended armor and Fractals. Now Imagine they were going with an expansion model and imagine each expansion takes 1.5 years to develop (1/2 way between our two timelines) Anet hears the need for vertical progression and decides their idea of ditching vertical progression wasnt healty and focus most of the expansion on adding some vertical progression only to have a bigger out cry when the expansion releases. Now its 1.5 more years before they can “fix” it or convince people that well it was just a one off there would not be a new tier with every expansion etc..

you’re essentially both right an expansion doesnt kill an MMO but a miss step in an expansion very well can.

I did not see anybody ask for that. But then again I did not become really active here until about 6 months after release when I did see the game starting (or planning) to go in the wrong direction.

Sure missteps can end bad for a game but thats not different from the way they do it now. How long did it take them to take out scarlet because many people disliked it? And after the complains about the ascended tier they did keep adding more. Likely because that was already worked on, so the LS does not also mean they can simply turn back on a bed decision. If you make a bad decision in one expansion you fix it in the next one. There is a higher risk with the expansion model I do agree with that. Not as much higher as you seem to think because we did see it happen with the LS as well without it being taken out within a small amount of time but yeah expansions have a higher risk. With GW1 however Anet did show they could provide what people wanted.

With GW2 that seems to have been ore of a problem. There content seems more about selling gems and proving a point.. Lets destroy LA to show what we can do with the LS. Both do not really help the game imo.

Devata.6589:

~

That’s the whole point, because other games have released expansions in x time your now frustrated and running around stomping your feet because there hasn’t been an expansion for this game, like a kid who was told no. Once they convince you to buy and play the game they don’t have to do anything further.

An expansion isn’t a fix all solution as you guys seem to think. A new expansion would keep you busy for a few months at best then the current underlying problems leading you back to wanting new content. Loot being one of them. Yes you don’t need to have the most rare items, but 95% of the items in game are 6g or less, not even remotely a struggle to get. Once you do get these cheaper items then what do you do? Do a dungeon that doesn’t have unique reward or endlessly farm for gold for no reason since you already have the item you like best.

you act like there’s something wrong with them wanting to have a cash shop on the side. Have you seen the amount of outside sites that sell game items and currency for real money. If you were the developer youd be crazy not to go in cash shop when those sites are selling your items for $$$. Micro transactions are the future

Lastly I don’t just accept the way things are if i don’t enjoy them. Action speaks louder than words – I haven’t logged in since the week prior to last tourny, and even up to that point it was maybe 1-2 times every 2-3 weeks at best. This isn’t going to be the last mmo ever…..

Wanze.8410:

Why should Anet cater towards veteran players? I would say that new players spend more money in the gem store. I played since head start and I have all character slots, bank and bag expansions and other gem store items i need. Even if I would be willing to pay as much for an expansion as a new player is for the box game, the potential of me dropping additional money on the gem store is far less than than the one of new players.

Which is why there are regular additions to the gem store.

wasted.6817:

I see this “2 weeks after rushing through content, back to complaining on forums” myth is still popular and goes around. How do people even come up with that kind of crap.

It might not be the norm, but it can happen. People do rush through content and people do complain when there’s “nothing new to do.”

GW2 launched (headstart) on 25 Aug, 2012; by late September, early October the QQ about “nothing to do” had started. It took about a month, but I won’t swear that the complaints didn’t actually start trickling in sooner. I found this post on page 1328 of 1330 on the General Discussion Forums.

asmariya.1096:

It makes me so sad to see the amount of people complaining that there is no end game but farming, what mmo is there that does not have anything but grinding/ farming in their end game? People rush to level 80 in less than a month that the game has been out and say they are going to quit because of issues like this…

Interestingly enough, I don’t start seeing “No Endgame” posts and “Nothing to do” posts that far back, but a lot of threads got deleted once they got heated, so who knows.

Also, one member of my GW alliance beat the Factions campaign in under a week. That same individual beat Eye of the North in three days.

Devata.6589:

Aeolus.3615:

Game do not need an expansion IMO, what they need is to tune LS to bring the same as expansions over time, some TP souvenirs would cover the price.

Well I think they should simply because the LS approach means they need to focus on the cash-shop what is not good for the game. However that was not the point of this thread.

The point was that they did have had the time to do exactly what you say and that time it now over. By now we should then have had that content. The excuse you give here is what we get from people for over 1,5 year now. And usually that did come with the notion that other games also did take about 2 years to release the expansions.

Anet did got the time to do this and that time is over now. We should have gotten that content by now. In an expansion (as I prefer) or in the LS. The time to tune has long passed.

We (the complainers) can not be accuses anymore of not waiting long enough and Anet can not be excused anymore for needing more time to release or tune. Waiting is over. ‘We’ did what we have been asked (waiting) it’s Anet who failed to deliver. And ‘we’ did warn for that early enough.

Players need to wai,t see if Anet has learned what went wrong(blob disaster effect >:] ) in LS1, and that only time will tell over the LS2 season.

echo.2053:

Devata.6589:

~

That’s the whole point, because other games have released expansions in x time your now frustrated and running around stomping your feet because there hasn’t been an expansion for this game, like a kid who was told no. Once they convince you to buy and play the game they don’t have to do anything further.

An expansion isn’t a fix all solution as you guys seem to think. A new expansion would keep you busy for a few months at best then the current underlying problems leading you back to wanting new content. Loot being one of them. Yes you don’t need to have the most rare items, but 95% of the items in game are 6g or less, not even remotely a struggle to get. Once you do get these cheaper items then what do you do? Do a dungeon that doesn’t have unique reward or endlessly farm for gold for no reason since you already have the item you like best.

you act like there’s something wrong with them wanting to have a cash shop on the side. Have you seen the amount of outside sites that sell game items and currency for real money. If you were the developer youd be crazy not to go in cash shop when those sites are selling your items for $$$. Micro transactions are the future

Lastly I don’t just accept the way things are if i don’t enjoy them. Action speaks louder than words – I haven’t logged in since the week prior to last tourny, and even up to that point it was maybe 1-2 times every 2-3 weeks at best. This isn’t going to be the last mmo ever…..

Thats one way to put it. Another way is that ‘We’ have been asked to give Anet this time and ‘we’ did.

Also another way of putting it is that Anet is underperforming to what the market does while they said they could do this using the LS. So I then now conclude they can’t.

But if I am to listen to you I (and all those people asking us) should not use other games as reference. What is very convenient now Anet has undelivered if we where to do that. They do not have to do anything thats true, if they want to destroy there own game they may also very well do that. Still I may say something about it.

If I would purely look at it from a cash-crap way in there perspective I would agree with you. It;s a nice cash-crap at least for the shorter term and NCsoft simply moves on to the next game after that. But I am looking it from both perspectives, not only from the cash-gapping perspective.

Well my action where speaking up here and not buying any gems while spending addition money on the game itself buying a CE. So yeah I did all I could from an ‘action’ perspective.

I’m happy to have anything new (whenever it comes out), I’ve already gotten my value for money out of GW2 100 times over and if there’s a gap between content I can just play something else til it comes out

i think we all are happy what anet does for free . i can say i have got more than my moneys worth in play time

but it would be nice to see a expansion if they cant grow wvw/pvp/and classes faster
they are growing to slow

if u are a pve player … there is loads of junk for u to do.

It’s too late for an expansion, anyways. Anet has outsourced too many jobs, and allowed too much talent to walk. They now have a reputation of low-balling developers and mis-management which leads to consistent sources of frustration and delays in code releases. Seattle is flourishing is game development. Many an opportunity to be found.

So where does that leave GW2? The same state it is now for the foreseeable future.

Expansion, what I hope is better open world PvE content, where my Necromancer (Which runs Condition/Corrupter build, to use against high armor and boons) doesn’t sit out for 2 years, only to be played occasionally in complete solo or to cook for food buffs…
Even more, it’s possibility to play Open world PvE with Support or Control builds, while not rendered useless…

(I played general PvE in GW1, never ventured into hard content there, or played PvP, so I’m pretty much Open World PvE in GW2)

Well, that’s my opinion. I have no certain opinion for other type of content…

“ZZZZZ u put me to sleep” …. i cant deal with any more PVE content. unless they bring pvp/wvw in to the open world pve maps …. dreams

any recommendations for a hard core wvw/pvp game.
with a name like guild wars 2 .. i did not think there would be so much pve

IndigoSundown.5419:

Also, one member of my GW alliance beat the Factions campaign in under a week. That same individual beat Eye of the North in three days.

What did he do afterwards? Complained?

just being honest here. the end game is wvw.

after i got my first character to lvl 80. i was done with pve.

may go back to a dungeon to painfully grind for armor for a new character :S

Aeolus.3615:

Devata.6589:

Aeolus.3615:

Game do not need an expansion IMO, what they need is to tune LS to bring the same as expansions over time, some TP souvenirs would cover the price.

Well I think they should simply because the LS approach means they need to focus on the cash-shop what is not good for the game. However that was not the point of this thread.

The point was that they did have had the time to do exactly what you say and that time it now over. By now we should then have had that content. The excuse you give here is what we get from people for over 1,5 year now. And usually that did come with the notion that other games also did take about 2 years to release the expansions.

Anet did got the time to do this and that time is over now. We should have gotten that content by now. In an expansion (as I prefer) or in the LS. The time to tune has long passed.

We (the complainers) can not be accuses anymore of not waiting long enough and Anet can not be excused anymore for needing more time to release or tune. Waiting is over. ‘We’ did what we have been asked (waiting) it’s Anet who failed to deliver. And ‘we’ did warn for that early enough.

Players need to wai,t see if Anet has learned what went wrong(blob disaster effect >:] ) in LS1, and that only time will tell over the LS2 season.

Anet said multiple times they where improving it and people where told to wait all the time. moral of the thread is that the waiting time is over.

Rangelost.4857:

People pay $40 for a console game, then consider it descent if they get 40 hours of gameplay out of it.

People pay $40 for Guild Wars 2, and after spending thousands of hours in the game, they complain about lack of content.

I don’t even.

Yes, more content would be nice. Yes, not removing content would be nice. Yes, other MMOs love to recolor older content, change some numbers and pretend it’s new content. No, Guild Wars 2 doesn’t need any of that.

Players ask for a new continent, players get a new continent, players complain about having to explore a new continent. Let’s take this moderately, shall we?

That’s not actually the point. Guild Wars 2 is a persistent world MMO, which means that Arenanet has to maintain steady streams of revenue to keep it running and growing. The only way to keep people coming back is by frequently adding new content.

It’s not so much that people feel like they haven’t gotten their money’s worth out of the game from the initial purchase, it’s more that a.) it isn’t meeting their expectations as an MMO, and b.) they feel like they aren’t getting out of it what they’re putting into it, often in terms of both time and money.

I think some major improvements in WvW. If it’s more pve stuff, it makes no difference to buy stuff from gem stores.

The only ‘people’ who said to wait were the players themselves. ArenaNet has never given a timeline for when an ‘expansion’ would arrive. I fail to see where this “didn’t meet the expected timeline” comes from other than the people posting on the forums…especially the OP.

If there is evidence of ArenaNet stating there would be an ‘expansion’ within a certain time period (such as 2 years 25 days x amount of hours, or whatever), please do provide the link.

Maybe the end of LS2 will lead into an expansion?

lol when will living story end? what about cantha ?

IndigoSundown.5419:

Also, one member of my GW alliance beat the Factions campaign in under a week. That same individual beat Eye of the North in three days.

Well I beat Factions campaign in ~22 hours with a fresh character, Factions was by far the shortest GW1 campaign, you could get to max level in less than 5 hours. That’s even less story/content than single player games.

Prophecies was equally fast if you used the shortcuts (running) but it was the longest GW1 campaign if you did it “properly”.

Nightfall was in-between the two, maybe it took longer than the other two because it was (to me at least) significantly harder, especially the final part (DOA)

The “Story” part of GW1 wasn’t something that took any serious amount of time to finish.

I won’t say if there were complaints about length in GW1, at least I didn’t notice any but I wasn’t a pver. I didn’t finish the Factions story until almost 1 year after release (finished Factions just days before Nightfall was released) because I was busy GvGing all day before that.

wasted.6817:

IndigoSundown.5419:

Also, one member of my GW alliance beat the Factions campaign in under a week. That same individual beat Eye of the North in three days.

What did he do afterwards? Complained?

Complained pretty hard, yep. At least he played GW occasionally, though — mostly solo farming and the occasional FoW/UW/DoA. GW2, he was gone by Christmas, 2012. The rest of the alliance is pretty much gone, though the reason was mostly not lack of content, it was that other games did PvP way better.

ya i wont leave this game because of lack of story.

it will be because someone has better pvp/wvw to offer

i am all ready looking at (black desert on line) but that wont be out in the U.S.A for at least one more year :S

would have moved on to arche age .. but Gw2 has way better combat

Rangelost.4857:

People pay $40 for a console game, then consider it descent if they get 40 hours of gameplay out of it.

People pay $40 for Guild Wars 2, and after spending thousands of hours in the game, they complain about lack of content.

I don’t even.

Yes, more content would be nice. Yes, not removing content would be nice. Yes, other MMOs love to recolor older content, change some numbers and pretend it’s new content. No, Guild Wars 2 doesn’t need any of that.

Players ask for a new continent, players get a new continent, players complain about having to explore a new continent. Let’s take this moderately, shall we?

Oh geeze….

I’d gladly pay $60 for more content out of GW2. What people complain about is having to “experience” the same old content over and over and over and over again. People asking for an expansion do so because they want the game to grow (races, weapons, new content, new maps, etc) and are more than happy to pay for it.

Take it moderately? No. I don’t know about you but I’ve enjoyed this game enough to know I want a LOT more content.

I’m not gonna buy the same game I already bought once before. Just because they add 2 classes and 2 races, make a few new areas, quests and dungeons does not make it a new game worth re-buying again. It’s still Guild Wars 2. It’s basically a bigger update that you pay for as if it was a new game. No thank you. Maybe I’d pay for it with gems if that was an option.