Guild Wars 2

I’m constantly seeing all those angry posts about how AN lied to it’s players. And I’m wondering how is that possible that I heard something totally opposite before release! I was absolutely sure that the game is going to have progression. And it’s going to be different in that regard from guild wars 1. And I was certain of that long before the release! I really was! I remember reading that they decided to strictly separate PvP from PvE so that they could do that. And that WvW was to be the place to use everything you have gained in PvE.

What is the truth?!

Edit: some quotes that people understood as claims of no gear progression.

SpyderArachnid.5619:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Guild_Wars_2_Design_Manifesto

Because, like Guild Wars before it, GW2 doesn’t fall into the traps of traditional MMORPGs. It doesn’t suck your life away and force you onto a grinding treadmill; it doesn’t make you spend hours preparing to have fun rather than just having fun; and of course, it doesn’t have a monthly fee.

It all gets back to our basic design philosophy. Our games aren’t about preparing to have fun, or about grinding for a future fun reward.

SpyderArachnid.5619:

http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/21/guild-wars-2-interview-monetization/#s:guildwars2-16

Here’s what we believe: If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game. Otherwise, your MMO becomes all about grinding to get the best gear. We don’t make grindy games — we leave the grind to other MMOs.

SpyderArachnid.5619:

And here he goes backwards on the previous quote:
http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/13tuac/im_the_studio_design_director_on_guild_wars_2_ama/c77csxm

How is introducing VP[Vertical Progression] respecting the player? Because it’s fun to be challenged and rewarded. Because it’s fun to have the character you play grow and evolve over time. Because ArenaNet (sort of) held a hard line against all VP with GW1 — no VP ever, year after year — and it wasn’t that fun. It was stagnant.
We use purely cosmetic rewards for things that would be outside the reach of typical players. I have an oft-quoted line about that: “If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game.”
Since you’re describing yourself as an average player and asking about average players, it shouldn’t be out-of-bounds for us to give you something new in the game that’s more meaningful to your character than a purely cosmetic change.

Pre-release Q&A with AN. A lot about their design choices.

Fernling.1729:

http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1013691/Designing-Guild-Wars-2-Dynamic

SonicTHI.3217:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/index.php?title=Is_it_fun

The rarest items in the game are not more powerful than other items, so you don’t need them to be the best. The rarest items have unique looks to help your character feel that sense of accomplishment, but it’s not required to play the game. We don’t need to make mandatory gear treadmills, we make all of it optional, so those who find it fun to chase this prestigious gear can do so, but those who don’t are just as powerful and get to have fun too.

SpyderArachnid.5619:

the concept of progression rewards with a shallow curve bridging other rewards was(designed before launch)

They said they wouldn’t add any statistically better gear that takes a long time to acquire. Ascended is what they were saying wouldn’t be added.

Got a quote/link for that? I’d love to read the original verbiage.

They promised no gear treadmill and no grind and that the progression would be cosmetic.

A year after launch and we still have no cosmetic progression, the game instead opting for an uninspired WoW light model to retain interest. The basic systems to facilitate cosmetic progressions aren’t even implemented. Instead all the focus has gone to creating another tier of statistically superior items and we’re stuck with transmutation stones just like in WoW.

I’m going to go get some popcorn.

People seem to be confusing the manifesto as a ‘promise’, rather than a ‘statement of intention’.

In the manifesto (here’s a link), they did mention things like not having a gear treadmill (which there still isn’t in my personal view, since there’s been one tier added, and even then it’s still not all there).

However, since, as far as I’m aware, ANet don’t possess a crystal ball, then common sense dictates that they’d make changes to the game, potentially going against the manifesto.

They didn’t explicitly state “we promise to never add higher tiers of gear” or words to that effect though.

how are ascended items a gear treadmill anyway? after ascended armor comes out there will be nothing else after that.

MMOs can’t make promises.

You want the truth? You can’t handle the truth!

Fungalfoot.7213:

They promised no gear treadmill and no grind and that the progression would be cosmetic.

Where?! When?! You seem to be pretty sure about that so just PLEASE give me a quote that says exactly that!

Barret.4095:

how are ascended items a gear treadmill anyway? after ascended armor comes out there will be nothing else after that.

Sure there won’t. Ascended gear was added solely to placate the players who burned through content and needed something else to work towards. And once they have their ascended gear they’ll be sated, never again demanding higher tiers towards which they can work. Right?

Or perhaps they will demand more an more tiers, but ArenaNet will stand firm. They’ll tell these players, “listen, we’ve already given you one new tier. That’s all you’re going to get; we’re not adding anything else after ascended.” Is that how it’s going to be?

I don’t think either is very likely to happen. Thinking there won’t be new tiers of gear added after ascended is a bit naive, in my opinion.

Barret.4095:

how are ascended items a gear treadmill anyway? after ascended armor comes out there will be nothing else after that.

You are just guessing that they won’t add anything else.
They say, “we will not add another tier of gear in 2013 after ascended.”, when they should be saying, “we have no plans to ever add another tier of gear after ascended.”
If anything it is more likely that they will add another tier.

Rather than saying this is something in the manifesto that isn’t being upheld, is there ANYTHING in the manifesto that actually manifested in game?

I found it to be mostly an exercise in talking smack to other developers right before they fell on their faces when dealing with the same challenges that every MMO faces.

Or maybe I’m just hung up on the sheer hubris of “I swung my sword, I swung my sword again…” when held up against some of the spam-one-button gameplay a number of GW2 classes devolved into.

Some great goals in there – I hope one day the game hits some of them.

Fernling.1729:

They said they wouldn’t add any statistically better gear that takes a long time to acquire. Ascended is what they were saying wouldn’t be added.

What’s a “long time”?!

Fernling.1729:

Barret.4095:

how are ascended items a gear treadmill anyway? after ascended armor comes out there will be nothing else after that.

You are just guessing that they won’t add anything else.
They say, “we will not add another tier of gear in 2013 after ascended.”, when they should be saying, “we have no plans to ever add another tier of gear after ascended.”
If anything it is more likely that they will add another tier.

They will probably raise level cap before adding new tier, but that will have a side effect of obsoleting ALL your gear (even legendaries) so you can get on gear treadmill all over again!

Remember that infusions are at “fine” quality so lots of room for new tiers there. It will look somewhat:

ascended weapons
masterwork infusions
ascended armor
rare infusions
ascended sigils
exotic infusions
ascended runes
ascended infusions

new level cap rendering all of the above obsolete at new level cap.

Welcome to new Gear Wars 2. Its all about gearflation! And we have grind too!

HiddenNick.7206:

Fernling.1729:

They said they wouldn’t add any statistically better gear that takes a long time to acquire. Ascended is what they were saying wouldn’t be added.

What’s a “long time”?!

Roughly 2 hours.

(joke, calm down!)

HiddenNick.7206:

I’m constantly seeing all those angry posts about how AN lied to it’s players. And I’m wondering how is that possible that I heard something totally opposite before release! I was absolutely sure that the game is going to have progression. And it’s going to be different in that regard from guild wars 1. And I was certain of that long before the release! I really was! I remember reading that they decided to strictly separate PvP from PvE so that they could do that. And that WvW was to be the place to use everything you have gained in PvE.

What is the truth?!

They said repeatedly that better gear would be based on looks not stats. Many have listed quotes in this forum from 2012 so I will not post again.

I started tracking this game in April 2012 after playing in beta. From April to Sept 2012, I read every article and watched every video that they distributed. Based on all of their discussions, it was clear that we would get max stat gear rather easily. After that, the harder gear would be available but would be distinguished based on cosmetics. I never saw one article or video that said after getting max stat they would continue to introduce new tiers.

I did not understand any of this at the time because I was used to gear stat vertical progression. So I did more research and found several articles by Mike O’Brien, the CEO, and the manifesto from several years back. They all explained their view of a new kind of MMO. I then realized that their horizontal progression approach had existed for years and was part of the core design. And again, in the quotes about gear, they kept saying that the distinguishing factor for the best would be looks.

I am sure others read and saw these same things especially the discussions just before and after launch. So for me, introducing a new gear tier 2 months after launch, went against everything they had said as recent as Sept 2012 and negated one of the big reasons that I bought the game.

I would also like to see direct quotes about this.

Here’s your quote (from what I could find at least). The original blog has been removed, so you can find all this information on the wiki.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Guild_Wars_2_Design_Manifesto

Because, like Guild Wars before it, GW2 doesn’t fall into the traps of traditional MMORPGs. It doesn’t suck your life away and force you onto a grinding treadmill; it doesn’t make you spend hours preparing to have fun rather than just having fun; and of course, it doesn’t have a monthly fee.

It all gets back to our basic design philosophy. Our games aren’t about preparing to have fun, or about grinding for a future fun reward.

http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/21/guild-wars-2-interview-monetization/#s:guildwars2-16

Here’s what we believe: If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game. Otherwise, your MMO becomes all about grinding to get the best gear. We don’t make grindy games — we leave the grind to other MMOs.

And here he goes backwards on the previous quote:
http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/13tuac/im_the_studio_design_director_on_guild_wars_2_ama/c77csxm

How is introducing VP[Vertical Progression] respecting the player? Because it’s fun to be challenged and rewarded. Because it’s fun to have the character you play grow and evolve over time. Because ArenaNet (sort of) held a hard line against all VP with GW1 — no VP ever, year after year — and it wasn’t that fun. It was stagnant.
We use purely cosmetic rewards for things that would be outside the reach of typical players. I have an oft-quoted line about that: “If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game.”
Since you’re describing yourself as an average player and asking about average players, it shouldn’t be out-of-bounds for us to give you something new in the game that’s more meaningful to your character than a purely cosmetic change.

There is several more in there somewhere as well, those are just some of them. Enjoy.

Barret.4095:

how are ascended items a gear treadmill anyway? after ascended armor comes out there will be nothing else after that.

When you reach max gear in WoW there is nothing after that as well. Until of course they add new gear.

The way Ascended is being introduced is the same as WoW adding new raid gear. In WoW you get the whole tier in one go though, but they space gear out all the same, just like ascended gear is being spaced out now, hence treadmill.

Barret.4095:

how are ascended items a gear treadmill anyway? after ascended armor comes out there will be nothing else after that.

1 character, 6 weapons(including underwater).
According to a dev, it takes 2 WEEKS to make 1 ascended weapon.
That’s 12 weeks(1/4 of a YEAR) for 1 character.
That means, to have BiS gear for all my characters, i will NEED 96 weeks.
I have to login and craft each component EVERYDAY, for almost the next 2 years.
And that’s assuming I ONLY have 6 weapons(2 main, 2 off, 2 underwater).
Then I have to PAY for fine transmutation stones with my $$$ or gold.
5 Transmutation stones = 200 gems. I need 6 PER character.
I already PAID and used Transmutation stones to have cool skin + BiS weapon.
Where is my $10 now? Poofed! Down the toilet because I have to BUY new ones.
PAY $10 to use the SAME skins you are currently using. Fine.
PAY $10 every 2 weeks to use the SAME skin you are currently using. Not Fine.
Do we have a GUARANTEE there wont be new tier gear every 2 weeks? NO!
How MANY $10 do I have to PAY to KEEP the SAME skin that I have?
No compensation, No free transmutation stones. PAY!

Does this sound like FUN to you or to anyone else here?
Then will come ascended armor. Pay pay pay! Just to keep the skin on armor too.
Back then when you bought your Cultural Armor, you bought it Rare, not Exotic.
Why? Because you have to buy transmutation stones with $$$.
Soon: Buy transmutation stones for your own armor after weeks of grind.
And they arent even trying to hide what they are doing.

The person who introduced Ascended gear into GW2 was the same person who ruined GW1 a few years back. If tomorrow I do not like what I see, I am taking my time and my wallet elsewhere. And no, you cannot have my stuff because it is ALL Account Bound, what a convenient system.

Turtle Dragon.9241:

Barret.4095:

how are ascended items a gear treadmill anyway? after ascended armor comes out there will be nothing else after that.

1 character, 6 weapons(including underwater).
According to a dev, it takes 2 WEEKS to make 1 ascended weapon.
That’s 12 weeks(1/4 of a YEAR) for 1 character.
That means, to have BiS gear for all my characters, i will NEED 96 weeks.
I have to login and craft each component EVERYDAY, for almost the next 2 years.
And that’s assuming I ONLY have 6 weapons(2 main, 2 off, 2 underwater).

Don’t forget they’re going to be adding ascended armor. That’s six more slots per character per set of armor (some people want different sets of armor for different situations) you’re going to have to account for.

Barret.4095:

how are ascended items a gear treadmill anyway? after ascended armor comes out there will be nothing else after that.

They already said that they are going to continue item progression, so no, ascended won’t be the last.

I personally don’t see anything in those quotes that would indicated they would not add something like ascended gear. Does not take 1000 hours to get, it is not over-powered compared to top gear now. It is ugly from what I have seen but then so are legendaries.

SpyderArachnid.5619:

Here’s your quote (from what I could find at least). The original blog has been removed, so you can find all this information on the wiki.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Guild_Wars_2_Design_Manifesto

Because, like Guild Wars before it, GW2 doesn’t fall into the traps of traditional MMORPGs. It doesn’t suck your life away and force you onto a grinding treadmill; it doesn’t make you spend hours preparing to have fun rather than just having fun; and of course, it doesn’t have a monthly fee.

It all gets back to our basic design philosophy. Our games aren’t about preparing to have fun, or about grinding for a future fun reward.

http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/21/guild-wars-2-interview-monetization/#s:guildwars2-16

Here’s what we believe: If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game. Otherwise, your MMO becomes all about grinding to get the best gear. We don’t make grindy games — we leave the grind to other MMOs.

And here he goes backwards on the previous quote:
http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/13tuac/im_the_studio_design_director_on_guild_wars_2_ama/c77csxm

How is introducing VP[Vertical Progression] respecting the player? Because it’s fun to be challenged and rewarded. Because it’s fun to have the character you play grow and evolve over time. Because ArenaNet (sort of) held a hard line against all VP with GW1 — no VP ever, year after year — and it wasn’t that fun. It was stagnant.
We use purely cosmetic rewards for things that would be outside the reach of typical players. I have an oft-quoted line about that: “If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game.”
Since you’re describing yourself as an average player and asking about average players, it shouldn’t be out-of-bounds for us to give you something new in the game that’s more meaningful to your character than a purely cosmetic change.

There is several more in there somewhere as well, those are just some of them. Enjoy.

At 1:07:50 it is also talked about they don’t want any kind of grind for gear. you will obtain the best stats quickly after hitting 80 and you will only be different by looks alone.
Not exactly what you are looking for, but they specifically state(more than once) that they are bringing over the exact same gear philosophy as they had with GW1, which we now know isn’t true.

http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1013691/Designing-Guild-Wars-2-Dynamic

Astralporing.1957:

Barret.4095:

how are ascended items a gear treadmill anyway? after ascended armor comes out there will be nothing else after that.

They already said that they are going to continue item progression, so no, ascended won’t be the last.

This I hadn’t heard before… do you have a source? For the record: Whether they’ve admitted it or not, I believe that they will continue to add more tiers.

Probably the best idea is to make a Legendary so you don’t have to run the treadmill.

Yargesh.4965:

I personally don’t see anything in those quotes that would indicated they would not add something like ascended gear. Does not take 1000 hours to get, it is not over-powered compared to top gear now. It is ugly from what I have seen but then so are legendaries.

Actually, Ascended gear does take about that to get. It takes a couple months just to gear up one character in Ascended gear, currently. That’s if you only get one weapon and don’t dual wield as well. When they add Ascended armor, expect those couple months to raise to several months. Everything is time gated with Ascended gear, so yes, it will take more than 1000 hours to get a full set (and that is only one one character. Imagine gearing up alts or getting a secondary set).

As for the quotes, yeah I know. I was trying to find the quote where they stated that GW2 will use horizontal progression like GW1, but I’m having difficulty remembering which interview/blog post it was from. Those quotes I posted are just some quotes that reference VP and grind, but I haven’t found the exact quote yet.

Feel free to check for it yourself, cause this is really boring to do lol.

Added some quotes to my OP.

HiddenNick.7206:

Added some quotes to my OP.

Add GDC one also where they specifically state they carry over their GW1 philosphy about that to GW2 and that anyone should have max stats basically when they reach 80 and grind is just for looks.

Turtle Dragon.9241:

Barret.4095:

how are ascended items a gear treadmill anyway? after ascended armor comes out there will be nothing else after that.

1 character, 6 weapons(including underwater).
According to a dev, it takes 2 WEEKS to make 1 ascended weapon.

2 Weeks? I call bull on whoever said that. Unless they plan to loosen the RNG chain, it will take more than 2 weeks. I control how much I play and how I play. I do not control nor can I influence what drops during my play.

After 12 months of playing this game, I managed to obtain 12 powerful bloods. 4 of those I just got within the last month. Does that seem right? If those type of mat drop rates hold for Ascended weapons, I may be able to craft one within the next 8-12 months.

MikaHR.1978:

HiddenNick.7206:

Added some quotes to my OP.

Add GDC one also where they specifically state they carry over their GW1 philosphy about that to GW2 and that anyone should have max stats basically when they reach 80 and grind is just for looks.

Sure. In a sec.

Fernling.1729:

At 1:07:50 it is also talked about they don’t want any kind of grind for gear. you will obtain the best stats quickly after hitting 80 and you will only be different by looks alone.
Not exactly what you are looking for, but they specifically state(more than once) that they are bringing over the exact same gear philosophy as they had with GW1, which we now know isn’t true.

http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1013691/Designing-Guild-Wars-2-Dynamic

Eric Flannum is in that video. Have not heard his name or anything from him since July 2012.

Clearly the direction was changed post-launch.

GwGuru archivist/veteran here…. /w +6 to-all reading-between the-fine-lines

Anet never said they wouldn’t have more Powercreep in the Game.
Nightfall & Eye of the North after all, was almost entirely straight up powercreep.
And even Factions before that eventually became massive powercreep over Prophecies.

The only promise they made here, is that you wouldn’t have the typical super expensive / grindy Treadmill you have in most MMO’s for the next level of powercreep where you’re effectively only doing the same sets of “Raids” over and over and over again for them… a lot like Fractals actually which is why I BOYCOTT FotM still.

.

In GW1, with Eye of the North, they initially kittened up really bad on this mantra when that expansion first shipped because the racial abilities (Ursan especially) were not only disgustingly Overpowered (other examples: Pain Inverter, By Ural’s Hammer, Technobabble, Echoed Ebon Assassins, I am the Strongest, etc…), they +they also had a very linear vertical progression in their strength as you progressed the Title Rank. But then Linsey… (also the designer of these Ascended Crafting recipes), upon promotion, took it upon herself to smooth out that “powercreep curve” on those titles which brought people with low ranks a lot closer together with the super grinders who had the highest ranks.

Now normally, I’d be raising the red flags harder than anyone else if this whole Ascended business was actualy worse than anything they’ve done in Gw1 that went back on most of Mike O’Brien’s whole Manifesto thing… Bu let’s look at this logically for a second with the info we already have: The biggest single Hurdle here for most people is going to be that Vision Crystal. … which for some reason, #1: you don’t even have to grind for apparently …. no you can just buy it off the TP if someone’s actually willing to sell the ones they’ve made. and #2: The components don’t only just drop from Temple Priests & Dungeons, you can also get those same mats just Pee-Vee-Dooring in WubWub and even the worst players in the game already do that night after night anyway simply by being up earlier/later than anyone else.

.

So to wrap this up: It doesn’t have to be a massive grind. If you could get 5 Ectos and 40 Ori ingots several times over to to make a full set of Exotics… then you should in theory be able to get 15 refined ectos per weapon to “vertically progress” your 2 or 3 main DPS weapons… which if you're smart, and not a bad player, will be 66% melee weapons and not 100% ranged weapons

.
.

PS: They also never said they wouldn’t “sell power” …. incase you’re one of those people who considers buying gold with Gems and then buying Vision Crystals to be “buying power”. …in Gw1 they also sold power, especially MARKET power by selling additional bank tabs and super customizable Mercenary heroes for Discord Farming. (and yes I still have a wiki journal of an actual Developer admitting exactly that)

The manifesto was just the tip of the iceberg. There were over 200 blog posts detailing almost every aspect of the games philosophy and design with just as many interviews given to various websites.

Unfortunately ANET took down their blog so i cant serve you the armor specific quotes but here s the one i did save:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/index.php?title=Is_it_fun
It does far more than just address gear. Time gating, dailies, content… it is all in there and almost all wrong a year down the line.

Here s a quote specifically on items:

The rarest items in the game are not more powerful than other items, so you don’t need them to be the best. The rarest items have unique looks to help your character feel that sense of accomplishment, but it’s not required to play the game. We don’t need to make mandatory gear treadmills, we make all of it optional, so those who find it fun to chase this prestigious gear can do so, but those who don’t are just as powerful and get to have fun too.

And then there s this:
http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/21/guild-wars-2-interview-monetization/

Before even answering this question, I want to point out that in Guild Wars 2, being competitive isn’t all about having the best gear. It’s not like you’re going to go into world-versus-world and get smoked because someone else has a godly weapon that you can’t hope to acquire. We’ve always been against that kind of thing.

Here’s what we believe: If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game. Otherwise, your MMO becomes all about grinding to get the best gear. We don’t make grindy games — we leave the grind to other MMOs.

Going back to armor specific quotes. IIRC there was one that went something like this: max stat gear should be acquirable trough many different means in the game: karma, crafting, wvw and loot.

Ascended gear breaks all those design choices so the truth is:
ANET lied.

While we r discussing quotes:
A personal favourite rebuttal from fanboys is them quoting ANET: Ascended gear is meant to bridge the gap between exotic and legendary items.

Yet no such gap ever existed. Exotic gear cost anywhere from 1g to 500g and stat wise there were no differences.

This whole system was pulled out of nowhere to please a subset of hardcore progressionist players. Most of those players left the game already chasing their next carrot while the rest of us now have to suffer with bad game design and decisions.

Another quote that people keep misusing is:
There will not be another tier of gear… this year.
And as pointed out above they can always up the infusion tiers.

Found another quote, but it’s probably something you don’t want to hear. It talks about not having another tier, but instead, have enhancements to make your gear slightly more powerful over time. A “shallow power curve” as they so put it. Which is basically a gear treadmill, but with enhancements instead.

So expect further vertical progression in the future folks.

http://gw2.junkiesnation.com/2012/11/27/chris-whiteside-talks-ascended-gear-on-reddit/

That is why there is no plan for new Rarity Tiers of loot but there are plans to enhance or gain items within the existing rarity design whose properties continue on a shallow power curve.

And Mike O’Brien went on to say:

Some progression is OK, but pushing players onto a gear treadmill isn’t OK and isn’t what the game is about. I don’t think [ascended gear] invalidates the fundamental concept that GW2 can have gradual stat progression without being a gear treadmill game.

Unless I’m mistaken, gradual stat progression is a gear treadmill. Thus why it is called a gear treadmill, cause you are constantly chasing the highest stats and it never ends.

EDIT: Forgot to add this as well for those who say Ascended gear was supposed to be in at launch, but never made it in time. This proves you wrong.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-11-27-arenanet-holds-frank-reddit-debate-on-guild-wars-2-loot-grind

The first revelation was that “in retrospect it would have been better to have included Ascended gear at launch”, wrote Whiteside. As we know, Ascended gear was designed to sit between Exotic and Legendary items. “It was not specifically designed before launch,” Whiteside added. “However, the concept of progression rewards with a shallow curve bridging other rewards was.” The whole debate about a new tier of armour being added post-launch to placate goalless hardcore players would have been avoided, too.

dalendria.3762:

Fernling.1729:

At 1:07:50 it is also talked about they don’t want any kind of grind for gear. you will obtain the best stats quickly after hitting 80 and you will only be different by looks alone.
Not exactly what you are looking for, but they specifically state(more than once) that they are bringing over the exact same gear philosophy as they had with GW1, which we now know isn’t true.

http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1013691/Designing-Guild-Wars-2-Dynamic

Eric Flannum is in that video. Have not heard his name or anything from him since July 2012.

Clearly the direction was changed post-launch.

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/eric-flannum/12/194/663

He is still a Game Director in Arena Net.

Personally I’d rather play a game where the developers see a lot of players asking for something and, even if they personally don’t see the appeal and thought people would prefer the game without it, they choose to try and compromise and give those players what they asked for (whilst sticking as close to their original ideal as they can).

In this case adding vertical progression in the form of a single tier (so far) that takes a lot of time and effort to acquire so those who need vertical progression to enjoy a game have something to work towards, but which has a minimal advantage over existing gear so those who aren’t interested can get by without it.

What’s the alternative? A game where the developers ignore what players ask for and tell us we should be happy with what we’ve got? That they know better than we do what we want to play?

I have no interest in vertical progression. I’ll get ascended gear as and when it’s convenient (aka when I’ve got all the minis I’m currently saving my laurels/commendations for) but I’d be very happy without it.

But I am happy that it’s in the game. A lot of players asked for exactly this and the fact that they’ve got it – in spite of it clashing with the manifesto – gives me hope that Anet will carry the same attitude to other aspects of the game and if I (and many other players) ask for changes we could get them instead of being ignored.

Anet has been jerking us around with half -/ assed temporary content for a year now and you are all complaining that something PERMANENT to work for is being added to the game. I don’t think this community has it’s priorities straight.

TheDraco.3965:

Anet has been jerking us around with half -/ assed temporary content for a year now and you are all complaining that something PERMANENT to work for is being added to the game. I don’t think this community has it’s priorities straight.

Its not permanent. Its trmporary just like that content.

SpyderArachnid.5619:

Found another quote, but it’s probably something you don’t want to hear. It talks about not having another tier, but instead, have enhancements to make your gear slightly more powerful over time. A “shallow power curve” as they so put it. Which is basically a gear treadmill, but with enhancements instead.

So expect further vertical progression in the future folks.

http://gw2.junkiesnation.com/2012/11/27/chris-whiteside-talks-ascended-gear-on-reddit/

That is why there is no plan for new Rarity Tiers of loot but there are plans to enhance or gain items within the existing rarity design whose properties continue on a shallow power curve.

And Mike O’Brien went on to say:

Some progression is OK, but pushing players onto a gear treadmill isn’t OK and isn’t what the game is about. I don’t think [ascended gear] invalidates the fundamental concept that GW2 can have gradual stat progression without being a gear treadmill game.

Unless I’m mistaken, gradual stat progression is a gear treadmill. Thus why it is called a gear treadmill, cause you are constantly chasing the highest stats and it never ends.

EDIT: Forgot to add this as well for those who say Ascended gear was supposed to be in at launch, but never made it in time. This proves you wrong.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-11-27-arenanet-holds-frank-reddit-debate-on-guild-wars-2-loot-grind

The first revelation was that “in retrospect it would have been better to have included Ascended gear at launch”, wrote Whiteside. As we know, Ascended gear was designed to sit between Exotic and Legendary items. “It was not specifically designed before launch,” Whiteside added. “However, the concept of progression rewards with a shallow curve bridging other rewards was.” The whole debate about a new tier of armour being added post-launch to placate goalless hardcore players would have been avoided, too.

It’s all rather post release. So it’s not about the subject.

SonicTHI.3217:

The manifesto was just the tip of the iceberg. There were over 200 blog posts detailing almost every aspect of the games philosophy and design with just as many interviews given to various websites.

Unfortunately ANET took down their blog so i cant serve you the armor specific quotes but here s the one i did save:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/index.php?title=Is_it_fun
It does far more than just address gear. Time gating, dailies, content… it is all in there and almost all wrong a year down the line.

Here s a quote specifically on items:

The rarest items in the game are not more powerful than other items, so you don’t need them to be the best. The rarest items have unique looks to help your character feel that sense of accomplishment, but it’s not required to play the game. We don’t need to make mandatory gear treadmills, we make all of it optional, so those who find it fun to chase this prestigious gear can do so, but those who don’t are just as powerful and get to have fun too.

And then there s this:
http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/21/guild-wars-2-interview-monetization/

Before even answering this question, I want to point out that in Guild Wars 2, being competitive isn’t all about having the best gear. It’s not like you’re going to go into world-versus-world and get smoked because someone else has a godly weapon that you can’t hope to acquire. We’ve always been against that kind of thing.

Here’s what we believe: If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game. Otherwise, your MMO becomes all about grinding to get the best gear. We don’t make grindy games — we leave the grind to other MMOs.

Going back to armor specific quotes. IIRC there was one that went something like this: max stat gear should be acquirable trough many different means in the game: karma, crafting, wvw and loot.

Ascended gear breaks all those design choices so the truth is:
ANET lied.

While we r discussing quotes:
A personal favourite rebuttal from fanboys is them quoting ANET: Ascended gear is meant to bridge the gap between exotic and legendary items.

Yet no such gap ever existed. Exotic gear cost anywhere from 1g to 500g and stat wise there were no differences.

This whole system was pulled out of nowhere to please a subset of hardcore progressionist players. Most of those players left the game already chasing their next carrot while the rest of us now have to suffer with bad game design and decisions.

Another quote that people keep misusing is:
There will not be another tier of gear… this year.
And as pointed out above they can always up the infusion tiers.

Added the first quote to the opening post. The other was already quoted.

Fernling.1729:

They said they wouldn’t add any statistically better gear that takes a long time to acquire. Ascended is what they were saying wouldn’t be added.

Yep, and we railed against it in November when they proposed it. Just because it took almost half a year to get it out doesn’t make it any less against their original proposed game nor does it change the fact that most people who bought their game did so under the pretense that it was to be unlike all of the other mmos out there in these aspects. (including having no gear progressions whatsoever).

That’s what I’m seeing OP.

TheDraco.3965:

Anet has been jerking us around with half -/ assed temporary content for a year now and you are all complaining that something PERMANENT to work for is being added to the game. I don’t think this community has it’s priorities straight.

Gear treadmill isn’t content. LS and the treadmill are two separate concerns entirely but both were items of contention.

LS was never meant to be temporary, they did say they’d add new story content however it was never meant to last 1 month or be completed in 1 day per update, we were to see new permanent additions to DE’s and metas, not what LS has been thus far.

And gear whether it’s permanently added or not, shouldn’t be a new tier. It should be the same tier as Exotic if they were to stay true to their prelaunch interviews.

SpyderArachnid.5619:

Found another quote, but it’s probably something you don’t want to hear. It talks about not having another tier, but instead, have enhancements to make your gear slightly more powerful over time. A “shallow power curve” as they so put it. Which is basically a gear treadmill, but with enhancements instead.

So expect further vertical progression in the future folks.

http://gw2.junkiesnation.com/2012/11/27/chris-whiteside-talks-ascended-gear-on-reddit/

That is why there is no plan for new Rarity Tiers of loot but there are plans to enhance or gain items within the existing rarity design whose properties continue on a shallow power curve.

And Mike O’Brien went on to say:

Some progression is OK, but pushing players onto a gear treadmill isn’t OK and isn’t what the game is about. I don’t think [ascended gear] invalidates the fundamental concept that GW2 can have gradual stat progression without being a gear treadmill game.

Unless I’m mistaken, gradual stat progression is a gear treadmill. Thus why it is called a gear treadmill, cause you are constantly chasing the highest stats and it never ends.

EDIT: Forgot to add this as well for those who say Ascended gear was supposed to be in at launch, but never made it in time. This proves you wrong.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-11-27-arenanet-holds-frank-reddit-debate-on-guild-wars-2-loot-grind

The first revelation was that “in retrospect it would have been better to have included Ascended gear at launch”, wrote Whiteside. As we know, Ascended gear was designed to sit between Exotic and Legendary items. “It was not specifically designed before launch,” Whiteside added. “However, the concept of progression rewards with a shallow curve bridging other rewards was.” The whole debate about a new tier of armour being added post-launch to placate goalless hardcore players would have been avoided, too.

Yes, we know about these. They made these statements in November 2012 after launch. After many of us bought the game based on different statements that they made.

This was from their AMA to try and calm down all of the people who stated they would stop financially supporting this game because of the introduction of a new gear tier.

We are talking about the statements made pre-launch and their statements made in September 2012.

Danikat.8537:

Personally I’d rather play a game where the developers see a lot of players asking for something and, even if they personally don’t see the appeal and thought people would prefer the game without it, they choose to try and compromise and give those players what they asked for (whilst sticking as close to their original ideal as they can).

Have no problem with this.

Can anyone post the surveys that say that those who bought GW2 want new gear tiers with better stats? Anyone?

No, no one can because there are none. In November 2012, one of my biggest complaints is that they made a huge change without doing any market research. No online surveys, no in-game surveys, no forum polls. Nothing.

So how do they or you know that the majority of GW2 customers want this stuff? More importantly, how do they or you know that GW2 players who support the cash shop want this stuff?

Oh yes, there are people out there that like gear stat progression. We know this because they populate other MMOs. But how do we know that even if GW2 has that those people will enjoy this game?

It has no raids. It has no holy trinity. It has no mounts. It has no arenas. It has no way of feeling uber powerful when playing in lower levels. It has no competition in open world pve. It has no bragging rights (no one really cares what you are doing or have done as an individual in this game). It has no griefing.

dalendria.3762:

So how do they or you know that the majority of GW2 customers want this stuff?

They don’t, because it’s not true. Even for the strongest ascended defendants here the best they can claim is that the majority doesn’t care either way.

HiddenNick.7206:

It’s all rather post release. So it’s not about the subject.

dalendria.3762:

Yes, we know about these. They made these statements in November 2012 after launch. After many of us bought the game based on different statements that they made.

This was from their AMA to try and calm down all of the people who stated they would stop financially supporting this game because of the introduction of a new gear tier.

We are talking about the statements made pre-launch and their statements made in September 2012.

Ah, you guys are right. My mistake. Didn’t check the dates on those and wasn’t paying attention. I’ll keep looking for the stuff pre-launch and see what I can find.

Did AN promised to never add new gear tiers?

In 2013.

The thing is that it’s hard for vertical progression to go along with the concept that one shouldn’t spend excessive time preparing to have fun to have fun. This doesn’t mean it’s impossible, but it’s very easy to do it wrong.

It’s not a clear yes or no. The goal should be to discuss whether or not vertical progression adds to the game and be consistent with said philosophy.

ArchonWing.9480:

It’s not a clear yes or no. The goal should be to discuss whether or not vertical progression adds to the game and be consistent with said philosophy.

Absolutely.

TheDaiBish.9735:

People seem to be confusing the manifesto as a ‘promise’, rather than a ‘statement of intention’.

It doesn’t matter what you call it. Whatever it is, it was the reason a lot of online RPG players, who have become jaded by developer greed, short sightedness, community disconnectedness, and attempts to appeal to the lowest common denominator, decided to give Arenanet the benefit of their much abused doubt and trust.

There’s times when developers are overly ambitious, yes. The beta of Ultima Online attempted to be a fully realized artificial life simulator, until players were introduced and it led to mass extinction. When you release a “statement of intent” (as you put it) and then do the opposite thing, however, that’s just being a bad faith actor.