Did GW2 lose its identity?
I used to love this game with a passion up until hot release. The game went a completely different direction some loved some hated. Truth is we just need to wait for next expansion and see what we get. I just hope they stop wasting time on raids for such a small player base. Anyone who actually plays this game for raids is simply wrong because if you like raids you should be playing WoW or ff14. We need better content for people who left those games or don’t play those games to not have the companies dedication going three
The game lost is ID?
I didnt know games could have wallets.
O.o
Why simplify things when its so easy to complicate them ?
Gw2 did take a different direction with HoT. Some good, some bad, some disastrous. HoT maps were good, for example. Yeah, they’re tougher than normal level 80 maps, but that’s fine. I don’t mind the extra challenge. Others won’t mind it either. Maps are core to this game. Players will eventually be accustomed to them.
However, I always thought raids were a bad idea. There’s just no way anyone can expect to keep players if you make content for 1% of the playerbase. I’m not against group content, I’m against group content being inaccessible to the majority.
Looking back, I have to ask: Why was the dungeon team disbanded? It saddens me that dungeon content is non-existent. Yes, at least we have fractals, but…why not dungeons too?
I’m curious about the next expansion, but I will tell you I am NOT gung-ho about it like I was with HoT. Thanks to HoT, pvp and wvw have all but been destroyed.
(edited by JTGuevara.9018)
with GW2 now focusing on raids, and the community shifted massively with this change.
Um, no, they have the smallest possible team working on raids. Because it’s content that designed for a more homogeneous minority, they can do more with fewer resources.
The amount of salt, elitism and player base split makes this game no different than any other MMO now, especially with meters being introduced to the game.
There really isn’t much more elitism than there was at launch, or maybe you didn’t try to run dungeons back then, when people kicked you for all the same reasons they kick these days: not enough tokens, too few API, wrong gear pinged, didn’t like your choice of dyes. (Salt… hard to judge I think. Seems about the same to me.)
You also now have mandatory holy trinity as well if you want to succeed in top tier content. Not needed for open world content, but like I said that content it’s either old or not really relevant.
No, there’ is no “holy trinity” — there is a huge diversity of potential builds and team comps. I don’t see it any differently than people insisting on “zerker or bust” for dungeons, when that wasn’t necessary either.
You don’t have any gear treadmill, but you now have the mastery treadmill if you want to succeed in end content, it’s like potayto/potahto, still a treadmill that will get obsolete eventually.
Um, no again. Sure, some of the masteries are busy work, with only a niche value outside of HoT’s story. Some of them are awesome and never obsolete, even in a future expansion, including gliding, autolooting, fractal benefits (for those who fractal).
Plus, you can progress at your own pace (or at least, I did and I rarely felt at a major disadvantage compared to my friends who rushed it).
That’s nothing like traditional gear grind, where you cannot play any content without grinding the gear and it has no relevance in the next expansion.
TLDR; What makes GW2 different than any other generic MMO right now?
- Gliding
- The same max gear it’s had since the first year.
- Cooperative in all forms of PvE.
- No subscription and an F2P option that is very close to the game itself.
- Nearly everything can be PUGged.
- It’s fun for a ton of people.
At the very least, tell people they can try GW2 for free & experience the vast majority of the game without spending a dime, until they are ready to commit.
John Smith: “you should kill monsters, because killing monsters is awesome.”
(edited by Illconceived Was Na.9781)
I have hated in other games to see the divide between raiders (small %) and non-raiders (majority) and so much dev focus on raids that only a small minority of players would ever see at the expense of focus on content for the majority. One of the things that drew me to GW2 way back when was no raids. Sad to see that didn’t last. Just didn’t make sense for this game. Really, what has it added to the game?
TLDR; What makes GW2 different than any other generic MMO right now?
How would you convince a WoW player for example to come and play GW2 today? Because I can’t think of anything else but “well it’s like WoW, but different…it has asuras instead of gnomes, and you don’t need 100 addons to be able to get into a raid…yet”
Lack of gear grind resets. Effective level scaling. More interesting combat. Designed to avoid other players ever being a negative thing to see. Different story. Different aesthetic in-game.
I appreciate that you feel like permitting DPS meters is a bad thing, but (a) they were there before this, and (b) hostility comes from players, not meters, even if they are the current wave of excuses.
Also, ultimately, we really are just another bunch of murder hobos, running about committing mass murder for cash. It’s really not that distinct from other MMOs.
(edited by SlippyCheeze.5483)
I’m a new player, don’t have an 80 yet. Reading the forums and reddit it seems HoT is ‘L2P or GTFO’.
Still enjoying the core game, but not looking forward to HoT.
with GW2 now focusing on raids, and the community shifted massively with this change. That old content is still there ofc, but it’s just that, old content, that…it’s there.
There is no focus on raids. They exist, of course, but as a side endeavor. The focus is on the
In addition to the old content you mention there are several new zones, along with associated story arcs, new weapon skins, new armor skins, new game mechanics, new craftables, new minis, new stats, guild halls, etc, etc.
Dismissing all of this and declaring the game to be focused on raids seems a bit odd to me.
I’m a new player, don’t have an 80 yet. Reading the forums and reddit it seems HoT is ‘L2P or GTFO’.
Still enjoying the core game, but not looking forward to HoT.
Don’t judge the game by all the salt you see on forums and reddit…
HoT has great maps, the elite specs are quite fun, gliding is great.
Raids are actually very accessible in this game as there is no gear treadmill or keys, search for WoodenPotatoes zero-to-hero challenge.
What drives most people away from raids is their own fears.
Of course but it’s not raids
It’s all summed up in a popular Gif I’m to lazy to look up right now. Basically Rhytlock bursts into your room and clears the table of things like balance and happiness and offering up Esports instead.
ESPORTS!!!!
The negative shift in this game occurred when they devs decided to toss everyone under the bus and shift to esports. The positive word of mouth I used to here took a 180 when they decided to push esports. Class pruning both mechanical and visual while turning their back on things like underwater. People wanted balance with underwater but instead it was removed from pvp and ignored going into the future. Classes are loaded with near useless skills and broken builds as they tried to trim down classes to sect builds. Mesmers and Chrono are eternally handicapped because their balance is based off of pvp and thus OP skills like Moa means that other skills are under balanced they don’t even have a condi based elite.
HoT, Raids, Toxity, whatever the straw was that broke your camels back is only but a straw while the mountain building on it prior originated with the shift to ESPORTS.
I’m a new player, don’t have an 80 yet. Reading the forums and reddit it seems HoT is ‘L2P or GTFO’.
Still enjoying the core game, but not looking forward to HoT.
That may sound harsh at first, but really, isn’t every game “learn how to play or stop playing”?
Ignoring that, in every type of gw2 content there is the third option of “get carried” :p
I’m a new player, don’t have an 80 yet. Reading the forums and reddit it seems HoT is ‘L2P or GTFO’. Still enjoying the core game, but not looking forward to HoT.
I’m sorry that you read the forums and reddit, honestly. HoT is an increase in challenge, but it’s hardly the brick wall of difficulty some posters would have you believe — if you play through to 80, Orr is a nice exposure to harder, smarter enemies.
Expect it to be challenging until you master the various creatures, but it’s hardly that terrible.
How would I convince someone to play gw2 coming from WoW.
To start off with, Guild Wars 2 has an amazing system where you buy the game once, and you forever have the game and unlock the next living world chapter if you log in. You can also unlock it for your account on a free account, but you can’t play it until you buy the game, which makes sense. It’s kind of dangerous since a large amount of people aren’t paying for content, but it is amazing for the players. Also when the next expansion comes out the current one will be free if you buy the new one. Which is also amazing for new players.
However, since there are expansions now so that means you will have to buy the new current game eventually if you want to play the new stuff. Whatever you choose you’ll still get daily rewards for buying the game in the past.
Second point is the art style. The world just feels right to be in. I love how well the maps are laid out. I will say I hate Ascalon, and I think that that’s a good feeling for how horrible a place it’s supposed to be, with so much awful history coupled with the remaining Charr fanatics. So both games are stylized, it’s preference for which one is more appealing.
And on to style! I love the way this game does stylizing your character! Transmutation charges and account wide skins have spoiled me to the core, when I go play anything else. Not to mention the dyes. You get an item and then you decide whether you should use it or account bind it, which means you can’t sell it and you get the skin. Easie peasie lemon squeezie.
Next the gameplay. Oooo how I love limited dodges. There are quite a few games where you can dodge endlessly, but you get punished since they are usually ill timed, but those games end up being rollie pollie away from the enemy until you have an opening. So very minor thing, but dodging in this game is the kitten for me anyway.
Now a short side track over to raids. Dungeons were pretty much supposed to be raids, but they weren’t called raids. They failed because having multiple maps in the same dungeon was hard to do, and quickly gave the player base a feeling of staleness. Also an odd variety of salty sailor was born there. The salty sailor is presumed to live in the current raids now, but the salty sailor don’t effect anyone in any game.
What I mean by that is, if they are being unsportsmanlike or insulting anyone. Immediately block and report in any game you are playing ever. Then you no longer have to hear them and there is the start of a record of their naughtiness or an addition to one. No game can see them. They have to be shown so that their hands can be smacked, and every game will have some.
Also on this note. You can’t expect the world when joining someone else’s group in lfg. Whether it’s running a map, fractals, or any other content. It’s the group they made and have to run. Anyone in the game has the ability to make their own group and run something their own way. That way everyone is getting like minded individuals instead of everyone blaming raiders that just want a quick run before they have to get off. Some of both sides are just not being nice.
Anyway I have to end because I’m going to run out of room and I’m not a two post person. Holy trinity is not mandatory, but everything is what someone else says if you never make your own lfgs. Also I’m not a huge fan of the masteries, but it’s hardly a treadmill. You can get them all done by eventually by doing nothing, excluding the raid masteries which require you to beat one raid boss once. Which won’t get you anything but raid masteries, that help with raids.
It’s funny how everyone says that a very small percentage of the playerbase raids. Just one look at the lfg and you will find that raids are the most popular thing after fractals and i’m not even talking about weekends. Rest is usually map metas, hot/sw/dt etc.
Not to mention the guild runs that dont appear on lfg….
It’s funny how everyone says that a very small percentage of the playerbase raids. Just one look at the lfg and you will find that raids are the most popular thing after fractals and i’m not even talking about weekends. Rest is usually map metas, hot/sw/dt etc.
Not to mention the guild runs that dont appear on lfg….
So let’s say there are 14 LFgs. That’s 140 people raiding. There are a lot more people playing the game.
But to do what I do, you virtually never have to post in LFG. I don’t have to post in LFG to do most dynamic events, or story. So therefore raids look more popular.
Think about this. Let’s pretend there are 2 LFG for the Auric basin meta. That’s more people than all the people waiting to raid. You can only have 10 people in a raid group. you can have well over a hundred on a map.
For raiding to be as popular it would have to have 10 times the number of posts as the auric basin meta. It doesn’t.
It’s funny how everyone says that a very small percentage of the playerbase raids. Just one look at the lfg and you will find that raids are the most popular thing after fractals and i’m not even talking about weekends. Rest is usually map metas, hot/sw/dt etc.
Not to mention the guild runs that dont appear on lfg….
There are several ways in which raids can have more LFGs up than fractals and still be less popular:
- Do you check at least once per hour or are you extrapolating from when you happen to be looking?
- Do the Raid LFGs get filled as quickly? Fractal LFGs drop off because it’s easier to get “any five people” than it is to get “10 people with sufficient experience, gear”
The closest we can get to estimating is using GW2 Efficiency data and compare how many have at least a base amount of LI versus those who don’t. (GW2/E probably overestimates the true number, although that itself is hard to estimate.)
I’m willing to believe that GW2’s raids are relatively more popular than for other games; I haven’t seen evidence that it’s the most popular thing in the game or even close.
John Smith: “you should kill monsters, because killing monsters is awesome.”
I’m a soloist. I enjoy GW2 due to it’s PvE lack of required teaming on 95% of it’s content, it’s PvE design philosophy that you should never be afraid to see or help another player, and it’s flash mob world events.
But there is this other community of players who want content that required skill and team coordination. We see this in groups that devote themselves to activities that require formal parties such as dungeons, fractals and now raids. I don’t begrudge them their own content just like I don’t begrudge PvP players from having theirs.
The trick with these party activities is to find a group with similar beliefs to yours and it’s highly unlikely to find them in PUGs. It’s much better to find a like minded guild.
As for HoT, yes, open world PvE was a lot tougher than core Tyria. But then again large portions of core Tyria weren’t level 80 and the game’s downscaling in lower level areas still left level 80 characters as tiny Gods. You get reminded of that everytime you level up a new character through play than shortcuts. It’s unlikely your level 80s were just doing Orr and Cursed Shores exclusively. With HoT everything was level 80. VB was a nightmare to travel, you had mastery gates slowing your progress and it certainly wasn’t as solo friendly when it comes to exploring. So yes, it played very differently to Core Tyria. But last April’s patch fixed a lot of that, at least for me. And the new LWS3 maps are also less … abusive for solo players.
Most of the salt I see are players being upset that the devs devoted any time to an aspect of the game that they don’t care about. How dare they try to make PvP into an e-Sport, unlike how it was in GW was for a couple of years. How dare they add 10 man “raid” content even though it was being asked for. And really how dare they reward those groups with their own exclusive shiny things as rewards. Cosmetic things.
Has GW2 “changed”. Yes and no because a 4+ year old game has to, it’s not populated by a majority of new players with first time lower level characters anymore. It’s full of grizzled vets looking for something interesting to do. But GW2 has always been a game where you set your own end goals, that hasn’t changed. It’s just some of those things require a bit more of an effort than before.
We are heroes. This is what we do!
RIP City of Heroes
RIP City of Heroes
(edited by Behellagh.1468)
Guild Wars 2 hasn’t lost it’s identity. The same game. It has the same sensiblities it’s always had. There have always been a handful of min/maxers in dungeons doing speed runs or in Fractals, and they’ve always been strict about who they allowed in their groups. And it was,. and is, always possible to make your own group or join a casual guild that ignores all that.
I have a guild filled with casual people who go into HoT and get the stuff done they need. A couple of them don’t like it, but most do. And we’re casual as hell. If we were any more casual we’d be dead.
The game hasn’t lost it’s identity. Several of the new meta events build on the old meta events. AB meta, Dragon stand meta, these are both events that build on the old.
People are annoyed they have to use a timer or LFG to get certain things done, but all the other stuff is still there. There are 9 really good event chains in VB that you don’t need to have a zerg for. 3 people can finish almost every chain in VB.
The game hasn’t lost it’s identity, but some people haven’t played the entire game, and so assume what they did was the game’s identity. There have been hard core players here with us from day one.
I’m a new player, don’t have an 80 yet. Reading the forums and reddit it seems HoT is ‘L2P or GTFO’.
Still enjoying the core game, but not looking forward to HoT.
Don’t worry about HOT. I’m a very casual player who I just got HOT a few weeks ago. Yeah, those maps are more challenging but far from impossible. I enjoy the complexity and multi-layer nature of them. But they can sometimes be work and frustrating. All the more fun to succeed.
I know there’s a lot of cool high end stuff I’ll never see but that’s fine. I’m also never doing the grind to craft legendaries; that’s just not my thing. Not raiding either. Still, there’s plenty for me to do and I’m enjoying it so far even though I’ll never have the shiniest of the shinies.
I’m another WoW raider refugee and I sort of get the OP’s point. My draw to GW2 was the ability to play casually, by myself when I wanted to, with others when the opportunity arose and I felt like it. I still think this game has something for everyone.
And, as an added bonus, for the most part this community is one of the most helpful and civil I know of in any game and that means a lot to me. Sure, there are jerks here and there—that happens when you deal with humans—but from my experience, they are few and far between.
I’m a soloist. I enjoy GW2 due to it’s PvE lack of required teaming on 95% of it’s content, it’s PvE design philosophy that you should never be afraid to see or help another player, and it’s flash mob world events.
…Has GW2 “changed”. Yes because a 4+ year old game has to, it’s not majority populated by new players with first time lower level characters anymore. It’s full of grizzled vets looking for something interesting to do. GW2 has always been a game where you set your own end goals, that hasn’t changed. It’s just some of those things require a bit more of an effort than before.
+ to all your post, these bits especially.
I think Gw2 never had a identity to start with or rapidly vanished after launch, theres to much randomness overall, made the game loose alot.
Pve is kinda nice but to much spammy, pvp is poor, and the WvW/EOTM is nothing than redundancy cap empty sdtructures wich cant be even considerated something.
1st April joke, when gw2 receives a “balance” update.
I’d say its lost identity isn’t inherently the type of content they’re releasing but kind of the nature of how they’re releasing it.
GW2 was originally all about fun no matter what you did. Very open and exploratory systems in general.
The case now is just it seems very narrow in its scope and intentions for each piece of content while not considering the greater game, with many of these narrow-scope releases, and many of these new releases just aren’t fun for a large number of players. At least not to the initial mass-appeal crowd the game tried to cater towards at release. This is particularly true for sPvP/WvW and the casual PvE scene.
So while I don’t necessarily think they’ve totally lost their vision, I think ANet has lost control of its game. There are many “un-fun” things still around from multiple years ago. Critical reworks to keep the game fresh and exciting and just generally more fun for everyone have yet to come. The game’s stagnation is very much against ANet’s original philosophy of trying to make the game very lively and ever-changing.
So while LS’s may not be a maintainable content delivery model due to the stress, the issues extend into almost every aspect of the game. ANet’s trying to do too much while pushing out new content, and not fixing what is in some areas a crumbling underlying foundation.
Formal Thief Elite Spec proposal:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/ES-Suggestion-The-Deadeye-FORMAL/
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/ES-Suggestion-The-Deadeye-FORMAL/
Wouldn’t be afraid to say that I believe gw2 have gotten more content these far few months than we got with season 1 and 2. I men, we have already gotten 4 new maps along with associated story, 2 new fractals, the huge rework for pvp, 2 new pvp maps and so on. Raiding is fine, and it was needed. Tbh we should all be thankful for the elitist’s since they are the ones spending all their money on the game. I used to know a guy who bought a huge amount of gems and then converted all the gems he got to around 3k gold, Idk about you but I would never do that. Well my point is, eventhough i dont raid, i think raiding was a very good addition to the game, and until now it doesn’t seem like it hurts any other content in the game.
I really dont understand the logic of , I must be able to do all the content in the game , or the game is no good.
No MMO has content that 100% of the player base will ever do.
I came from WOW as I got burned out by the raids in it , and I dont do the raids in GW2 simply because Im sick of raiding, but the fact that raids exist in the game doesnt fuss me in the slightest.
Ill never do all the JPs either, but the fact that they exist again is of no concern.
You dont have to do everything.
Wouldn’t be afraid to say that I believe gw2 have gotten more content these far few months than we got with season 1 and 2. I men, we have already gotten 4 new maps along with associated story, 2 new fractals, the huge rework for pvp, 2 new pvp maps and so on. Raiding is fine, and it was needed. Tbh we should all be thankful for the elitist’s since they are the ones spending all their money on the game. I used to know a guy who bought a huge amount of gems and then converted all the gems he got to around 3k gold, Idk about you but I would never do that. Well my point is, eventhough i dont raid, i think raiding was a very good addition to the game, and until now it doesn’t seem like it hurts any other content in the game.
Don’t kid yourself. Over all it’s casuals who spend more money. I have a guild full of casuals who buy wings and outfits and toys. Elitists make fun of that stuff. They often want items they can earn in game to show off their prowess. To an elitist, a raid skin you can’t get anywhere else is worth more than something you buy in the cash shop.
I’m what you call a hard core casual. I’ve spent big big money on this game, but I’m not a raider, I don’t PvP, and I’m not competitive.
Nope. The specialization of all classes is what keeps me still playing this game. It is unique. I also like the fact that healing is not exclusive to one class, most classes can heal (ele, druid, guard, rev), I also like that I can res people on my necromancer. This alone makes GW2 more unique than any other games out there where healing is exclusive to healers.
Raid is what keeps me playing, if they erase or stop doing that, I’d probably quit to be honest.
Please nerf bag types instead of class skills!
You also now have mandatory holy trinity as well if you want to succeed in top tier content. Not needed for open world content, but like I said that content it’s either old or not really relevant.
No, there’ is no “holy trinity” — there is a huge diversity of potential builds and team comps. I don’t see it any differently than people insisting on “zerker or bust” for dungeons, when that wasn’t necessary either.
Do you have for raids (and sometimes T4 Fracs):
Tank – Check
DPS – Check
Healer – Check
You have the holy trinity, not much you can do about it as it’s that straight forward and simple. I also wouldn’t go so far as to say there’s “a huge diversity” as people generally still tend to shoehorn into the same sort of builds.
You also now have mandatory holy trinity as well if you want to succeed in top tier content. Not needed for open world content, but like I said that content it’s either old or not really relevant.
No, there’ is no “holy trinity” — there is a huge diversity of potential builds and team comps. I don’t see it any differently than people insisting on “zerker or bust” for dungeons, when that wasn’t necessary either.
Do you have for raids (and sometimes T4 Fracs):
Tank – Check
DPS – Check
Healer – CheckYou have the holy trinity, not much you can do about it as it’s that straight forward and simple. I also wouldn’t go so far as to say there’s “a huge diversity” as people generally still tend to shoehorn into the same sort of builds.
But it’s always been that way for high level fractals and hard dungeons. It used to be zerker or get out. Now there’s more variety, not less.
You also now have mandatory holy trinity as well if you want to succeed in top tier content. Not needed for open world content, but like I said that content it’s either old or not really relevant.
No, there’ is no “holy trinity” — there is a huge diversity of potential builds and team comps. I don’t see it any differently than people insisting on “zerker or bust” for dungeons, when that wasn’t necessary either.
Do you have for raids (and sometimes T4 Fracs):
Tank – Check
DPS – Check
Healer – CheckYou have the holy trinity, not much you can do about it as it’s that straight forward and simple. I also wouldn’t go so far as to say there’s “a huge diversity” as people generally still tend to shoehorn into the same sort of builds.
But it’s always been that way for high level fractals and hard dungeons. It used to be zerker or get out. Now there’s more variety, not less.
Yes but his point was that there isn’t a holy trinity, when there is. I wouldn’t totally agree that it’s always been that way – you could easily do the old dungeons without zerker (it just wasn’t often as fast), it was something around 90-95% wanted zerk or gtfo.
Right now there’s power, condi, for offense (in which the only thing that’s changed is the stats of the gear being used), most likely Minstrel or Magi for healing, and tank depends on what you are really.
Raids are only 1 tiny part of the game. If you’re not interested in raids there’s all of the open-world maps and story in HoT and all of Living Story Season 3 (including 4 new maps and counting) which has come out since. It’s no different to before HoT came out and some people chose not to play Fractals, or PvP or WvW.
If you insist on limiting yourself to only one area of the game then yes you’re going to find there’s not as much to do and a lot of releases will be full of stuff that doesn’t interest you. (And it does happen, I know one person who will only do open-world PvE, not even story instances and hates that she’s “forced” to play the story to unlock new maps.)
But skipping just 1 area isn’t as much of a problem. I’ve never even entered a raid and I don’t do PvP and I feel like I’ve got plenty of stuff to do just with the new maps and achievements and story, and stuff I didn’t finish from HoT.
I also disagree that masteries are the equivalent of a gear treadmill. I still don’t have most of my masteries finished (because I haven’t bothered to get the mastery points) and it doesn’t prevent me from doing anything. Sure it’d be more convenient if all my drops collected themselves and I might like whatever those Fractal Instability things are, but it’s not like I can’t do new content until I have the right masteries. In that sense it’s less exclusionary than the previous system of Agony Resistance in Fractals.
As for the trinity I have mixed feelings on that. My understanding was that when Anet said there isn’t a trinity in this game they meant that any character can fufil any role and you can switch your build to suit whichever you need. In some games if you make a particular class you are then locked into a role – a monk is always a healer, a knight is always a tank, a thief is always a damage dealer and so on (or you might have a choice of 2 roles but you have to pick 1). If you want to play a different role you have to make a new character. If your friends are doing a dungeon and need a tank but your main character is a healer and your tank alt doesn’t have the right gear then, oh well, too bad, you can’t go and your friends will have to try and find someone else.
Whereas in GW2 you can build a support warrior or a tank warrior or a DPS warrior, if you have the equipment you can switch your build in about a minute and any group composition can complete any content. Of course in practice that meant almost everyone tended to focus on damage with just enough healing/defense to keep themselves alive (which if you’re good enough at active defense could be nothing).
My understanding is that’s a bit different in raids – if you go in with a full group of warriors, or different professions but everyone using glass cannon DPS builds you’re going to have a much, much harder time than a more balanced group with people fulfilling different roles. But I know some people complete raids with smaller groups, so presumably they could fill the remaining spots with anyone and still complete it.
But it still only applies to raids. If you want to go and play on the new maps, or do the story you can do it solo using whatever build you want (even I can do it with my terrible novelty builds) and it’s still very easy to find a group for Fractals or Dungeons who will take anyone because they haven’t changed, so it doesn’t matter what you use.
(As for how I’d convince WoW players to play GW2 my main argument would be based on the time required – you can get to level 80 and get a full set of exotics very quickly in this game, without using the booster – and then you’re good to go for anything you might want to do. If you take a break for weeks or months or years the only catching up needed is familiarising yourself with the game again, you’re not going to have to grind out new levels and equipment. That’s the main criticism I hear about WoW – that it’s a huge time commitment, especially if you want to get into the end-game.)
Danielle Aurorel, Dear Dragon We Got Your Cookies [Nom], Desolation (EU).
“Life’s a journey, not a destination.”
“Life’s a journey, not a destination.”
It’s funny how everyone says that a very small percentage of the playerbase raids. Just one look at the lfg and you will find that raids are the most popular thing after fractals and i’m not even talking about weekends. Rest is usually map metas, hot/sw/dt etc.
Not to mention the guild runs that dont appear on lfg….
First of why would guild runs not showing up even matter because guild runs for other game modes won’t show up either in other category it’s not a valid point of defense at all because it’s universal to lfg.
Second they said that a higher percentage of players raid in this game than other MMO’s around HoT launch. Which was probably true though the issue is why is it true. Anet focuses on one thing at a time be it raids or esports other parts of the game are completely ignored or strait up abandoned. Today’s lfg for raids is laughable compared to dungeons in their hay day.
Of course raid lfg would be active when WVW is a bleeding mess, dungeons, have been completely ignored for years aside reward nerfs, HoT maps are still a blight to many whose lfg lasts but a second for meta if they even bother doing the meta, and the list can go one. Raids are a small player base just like Esport playerbase they just focus and balance the game to those modes while ignoring the rest. Balancing to raids isn’t bad but some classes are so kitten after years of pvp focused patches many mechanics and traits need to be overhauled.
As for Fractals they have nightmare raid, dailies, legendary backpack, and while nothing new since raiders are getting the new rewards fractals have a difficulty slider of sorts and are much more accessible than raids. In fact comparing all game modes raids require the most work to get into and there isn’t really any changes in difficulty at all.
People get bored and leave when there mode is neglected look at WVW no legendaries, tournaments went belly up with esport shift, smaller servers bounced around, dbl is still there which is the least used of the four maps, reward tracks tick on a timer, and basically people leave lowering the overall population but the areas they focus on like raids get a higher percentage of those that remain.
(edited by Doam.8305)
I really dont understand the logic of , I must be able to do all the content in the game , or the game is no good.
No MMO has content that 100% of the player base will ever do.
It’s not about the “content for 100% of the playerbase”. It’s about the content in the spotlight.
GW2 has moved from “whole game is the endgame” to “raids are the endgame, and fractals are a stepping stone to raids”. It’s a completely different design approach. It’s a completely different marketing approach as well. Image does matter a lot – and the current image of the game, that can be derived from most of dev statements we see around here is that raids are the endgame, and every other content is only important as a pathway to them. Basically almost every dev action, no matter how seemingly unrelated, underscores that raids are special (see changes to ascended vendors, and how the raid one got exempted). If you add to it the apparent abandonment of WvW and sPvP…
In that regard, gw2 now is really a different game than when it launched. And it’s now very much more similar to other games on the market. Especially since all the other games look closely at GW2, deciding which of its better elements can be easily incorporated into them. If this direction continues, then who knows? GW2 may end not being the game for its initial target group.
We’re not there yet, but so far devs seem to put a lot of effort for this to happen as soon as possible.
Actions, not words.
Remember, remember, 15th of November
Remember, remember, 15th of November
(edited by Astralporing.1957)
I will bite on this topic because as someone that hated raiding and recently tried GW2’s version of it I have my own view on the matter.
The biggest issue right now is that raiding is harder than ever to reach because of certain difficulties with getting the materials to earn ascended gear. While ascended gear has become significantly more easy to earn in season 3, this is still a huge problem with not enough gear dropping to help people catch up and start their experience in raiding.
I was fortunate, I had just enough gear to make a viable and very well geared PS warrior which has managed to down Vale Guardian and do the Escort encounter yesterday.
But I can understand the frustration and difficulty of ALOT of people trying to get into raiding, including me, I took -ages- to finally try, and it was only through a friend I got in.
Some people dont even have friends to -get- into raiding, and that can be the biggest problem. There is a very toxic attitude pug raiders have towards new people and thus they wont help people grow and develop unless you find guilds specifically devoted to training runs, who tend to be quite friendly and relaxed.
Raiding is a two sided blade, it is something that has become moderatley more accessable, considering wings 3 and 4 are alot easier than wings 1 and 2 by comparison for certain bosses and encounters. But theres many issues with it, many issues that are downright silly.
Story Gating is a bad idea, we need a story mode
Story Gating content behind raiding is -bad- end of story, it is just a terrible method of forced grouping that means those that dont get involved feel left out and its not encouraging for them, its off putting.
A-net needs to recognise this, and add a story mode to raiding, something that can be done entirley solo, but removes all the game based rewards. Also, something that DOES unlock the raid mastery (while not rewarding mastery points for downing bosses) as it allows people to actually start investing into it in pre-prepairation.
Secondly, We need better ways to get Ascended gear
The grind to get a vision crystal is hard enough without the thousands of other materials you need to even craft “one” item these days of ascended quality. Unless your lucky and have money for the gemstore, you’re pretty much doomed to spend Months, farming.
This just isnt healthy for GW2, at all. Id say we need a significant reduction on the cost of ascended quality materials, and previous quality materials considering that its expensive to even get to max crafting as it is.
Alternativley, redesign the system, so that crafting becomes account wide, and you can in essence, learn every crafting skill.
Astralporing 0,1957
Is True
Basically almost every dev action, no matter how seemingly unrelated, underscores that raids are special (see changes to ascended vendors, and how the raid one got exempted). If you add to it the apparent abandonment of WvW and sPvP…
In that regard, gw2 now is really a different game than when it launched. And it’s now very much more similar to other games on the market. Especially since all the other games look closely at GW2, deciding which of its better elements can be easily incorporated into them. If this direction continues, then who knows? GW2 may end not being the game for its initial target group.
The “holy trinity” is only there at a few raid bosses, not even all and is non-existent in fractals and HoT open world metas which would be the other relevant new content endgame.
The playerbase split has existed for far longer than raids. Does no one remember the zerk meta hate? Casual vs tryhard pug “elitist”? “Only 7k+ ap allowed”?
The rose tinted glasses are so real here… Every gamemode has a toxic side in GW2 and had that well before HoT, which includes open world. The flame and hate for commanders I’ve seen after a failed teq attempt far outweigh what I’ve witnessed in raids for example.
But the raid is still much less demanding than WoW raid.
There is still no gear treadmill. You don’t have to grind forever just to join raid. Most encounter difficulties are well tuned that you don’t need to play super hardcore to beat them.
Last but not least, there is so much more content in this game than just raid. Raid is fun for me in this game. If not for you, there is still tons of other stuff you can do.
I do agree with you on the mastery system though. It gets pretty grindy and gates out content. Especially at the launch of the expansion, mastery system is absolutely something I hate.
However, they did realize the problem and reduced the grinding and made it less mandatory for most content.
cranos 0,5913
OFF TOPIC
a bit off
The “holy trinity” is only there at a few raid bosses, not even all and is non-existent in fractals and HoT open world metas which would be the other relevant new content endgame.
The playerbase split has existed for far longer than raids. Does no one remember the zerk meta hate? Casual vs tryhard pug “elitist”? “Only 7k+ ap allowed”?
The rose tinted glasses are so real here… Every gamemode has a toxic side in GW2 and had that well before HoT, which includes open world. The flame and hate for commanders I’ve seen after a failed teq attempt far outweigh what I’ve witnessed in raids for example.
Did GW2 lose its identity?
FOR ME Y
You also now have mandatory holy trinity as well if you want to succeed in top tier content. Not needed for open world content, but like I said that content it’s either old or not really relevant.
No, there’ is no “holy trinity” — there is a huge diversity of potential builds and team comps. I don’t see it any differently than people insisting on “zerker or bust” for dungeons, when that wasn’t necessary either.
Do you have for raids (and sometimes T4 Fracs):
Tank – Check
DPS – Check
Healer – CheckYou have the holy trinity, not much you can do about it as it’s that straight forward and simple. I also wouldn’t go so far as to say there’s “a huge diversity” as people generally still tend to shoehorn into the same sort of builds.
But it’s always been that way for high level fractals and hard dungeons. It used to be zerker or get out. Now there’s more variety, not less.
Yes but his point was that there isn’t a holy trinity, when there is. I wouldn’t totally agree that it’s always been that way – you could easily do the old dungeons without zerker (it just wasn’t often as fast), it was something around 90-95% wanted zerk or gtfo.
Right now there’s power, condi, for offense (in which the only thing that’s changed is the stats of the gear being used), most likely Minstrel or Magi for healing, and tank depends on what you are really.
There’s a trinity in raids. I run fractals without a tank. Even T4 fractals.
cranos 0,5913
OFF TOPIC
a bit offThe “holy trinity” is only there at a few raid bosses, not even all and is non-existent in fractals and HoT open world metas which would be the other relevant new content endgame.
The playerbase split has existed for far longer than raids. Does no one remember the zerk meta hate? Casual vs tryhard pug “elitist”? “Only 7k+ ap allowed”?
The rose tinted glasses are so real here… Every gamemode has a toxic side in GW2 and had that well before HoT, which includes open world. The flame and hate for commanders I’ve seen after a failed teq attempt far outweigh what I’ve witnessed in raids for example.Did GW2 lose its identity?
FOR ME Y
That’s a great argument. Putting it in caps really made the message extra clear as well.
There’s nothing off topic about it. Playerbase split existed pre-HoT, toxicity existed pre-HoT and is def not a raid phenomena, holy trinity is still not a thing. Half the things listed are just plain wrong.
You also now have mandatory holy trinity as well if you want to succeed in top tier content. Not needed for open world content, but like I said that content it’s either old or not really relevant.
No, there’ is no “holy trinity” — there is a huge diversity of potential builds and team comps. I don’t see it any differently than people insisting on “zerker or bust” for dungeons, when that wasn’t necessary either.
Do you have for raids (and sometimes T4 Fracs):
Tank – Check
DPS – Check
Healer – CheckYou have the holy trinity, not much you can do about it as it’s that straight forward and simple. I also wouldn’t go so far as to say there’s “a huge diversity” as people generally still tend to shoehorn into the same sort of builds.
But it’s always been that way for high level fractals and hard dungeons. It used to be zerker or get out. Now there’s more variety, not less.
Yes but his point was that there isn’t a holy trinity, when there is. I wouldn’t totally agree that it’s always been that way – you could easily do the old dungeons without zerker (it just wasn’t often as fast), it was something around 90-95% wanted zerk or gtfo.
Right now there’s power, condi, for offense (in which the only thing that’s changed is the stats of the gear being used), most likely Minstrel or Magi for healing, and tank depends on what you are really.
There’s a trinity in raids. I run fractals without a tank. Even T4 fractals.
Is why I said sometimes in T4 ;P I’ve never seen it myself but a friend has said he joined a group and they were expecting raid-like efficiency.
You also now have mandatory holy trinity as well if you want to succeed in top tier content. Not needed for open world content, but like I said that content it’s either old or not really relevant.
No, there’ is no “holy trinity” — there is a huge diversity of potential builds and team comps. I don’t see it any differently than people insisting on “zerker or bust” for dungeons, when that wasn’t necessary either.
Do you have for raids (and sometimes T4 Fracs):
Tank – Check
DPS – Check
Healer – CheckYou have the holy trinity, not much you can do about it as it’s that straight forward and simple. I also wouldn’t go so far as to say there’s “a huge diversity” as people generally still tend to shoehorn into the same sort of builds.
But it’s always been that way for high level fractals and hard dungeons. It used to be zerker or get out. Now there’s more variety, not less.
Yes but his point was that there isn’t a holy trinity, when there is. I wouldn’t totally agree that it’s always been that way – you could easily do the old dungeons without zerker (it just wasn’t often as fast), it was something around 90-95% wanted zerk or gtfo.
Right now there’s power, condi, for offense (in which the only thing that’s changed is the stats of the gear being used), most likely Minstrel or Magi for healing, and tank depends on what you are really.
There’s a trinity in raids. I run fractals without a tank. Even T4 fractals.
Is why I said sometimes in T4 ;P I’ve never seen it myself but a friend has said he joined a group and they were expecting raid-like efficiency.
There’s no consistent aggro mechanic in fractals and anyone in a group with raid-like efficiency will blast through t4 bosses so fast tanking isn’t even an option.
You also now have mandatory holy trinity as well if you want to succeed in top tier content. Not needed for open world content, but like I said that content it’s either old or not really relevant.
No, there’ is no “holy trinity” — there is a huge diversity of potential builds and team comps. I don’t see it any differently than people insisting on “zerker or bust” for dungeons, when that wasn’t necessary either.
Do you have for raids (and sometimes T4 Fracs):
Tank – Check
DPS – Check
Healer – CheckYou have the holy trinity, not much you can do about it as it’s that straight forward and simple. I also wouldn’t go so far as to say there’s “a huge diversity” as people generally still tend to shoehorn into the same sort of builds.
But it’s always been that way for high level fractals and hard dungeons. It used to be zerker or get out. Now there’s more variety, not less.
Yes but his point was that there isn’t a holy trinity, when there is. I wouldn’t totally agree that it’s always been that way – you could easily do the old dungeons without zerker (it just wasn’t often as fast), it was something around 90-95% wanted zerk or gtfo.
Right now there’s power, condi, for offense (in which the only thing that’s changed is the stats of the gear being used), most likely Minstrel or Magi for healing, and tank depends on what you are really.
There’s a trinity in raids. I run fractals without a tank. Even T4 fractals.
Is why I said sometimes in T4 ;P I’ve never seen it myself but a friend has said he joined a group and they were expecting raid-like efficiency.
There’s no consistent aggro mechanic in fractals and anyone in a group with raid-like efficiency will blast through t4 bosses so fast tanking isn’t even an option.
This is my experience too. There are some bosses in Raids that require a tank. But saying that you have a trinity without encounters requiring it is a fallacy.
In games with a trinity you can’t even queue for content without a tank and a healer. No such restriction exists here.
The roles do exist, but there is not a Holy Trinity, because each profession simply have to do much more than that. Even if you were able to truly capture each role exclusively into specific builds, you’ll still will be lacking a 4th role, and even a 5th…
Tank means sustain, keeping aggro, defending and kiting. You can have those through different means, but doing only that is a lose for the team. Most tanks in GW2 are also clear healers or DPS, breaking the trinity just by mixing roles.
Healers also mix a lot with offense and tanking. A pure healer will hardly find a spot in a common raid comp.
DPS in GW2 is not just DPS. You need Power and Condi alternatively, or in combination, and the builds don’t let you be good at both at the same time. So you have 2 roles instead of one.
Then you have mobs that must be pushed around or keep in place, and that pesky CC bar… Control is a real role to cover in GW2, a role that you can take as your speciality, but is normally divided between some members of the team… like most of the other roles.
Then you have the support, with every single one of the players piling different boons, cleans and boosts over the squad.
So even if you try hard to see figures and convince yourself that there is a Holy Trinity in GW2, the truth is the lot is very mixed, and tend to resemble a pentagon more than a triangle.
“Only problem with the Engineer is
that it makes every other class in the game boring to play.”
Hawks
that it makes every other class in the game boring to play.”
Hawks
The playerbase split has existed for far longer than raids. Does no one remember the zerk meta hate? Casual vs tryhard pug “elitist”? “Only 7k+ ap allowed”?
I do. I also remember, that the groups without those restrictions filled up faster, and yet had the same chance of finishing the content. Elitist atitudes were more damaging to elitists themselves than to other players or the game as a whole.
The rose tinted glasses are so real here… Every gamemode has a toxic side in GW2 and had that well before HoT, which includes open world. The flame and hate for commanders I’ve seen after a failed teq attempt far outweigh what I’ve witnessed in raids for example.
Well, Teq revamp was part of the same wave that created HoT and brought us raids. You know, the mistaken assumption that people asking for the game to be made more difficult are speaking for the community, or even for the large part of it.
Yes, the split did exist before, but the game made a lot of effort to minimize its importance. Now it directly feeds it. That is the difference.
Actions, not words.
Remember, remember, 15th of November
Remember, remember, 15th of November
The playerbase split has existed for far longer than raids. Does no one remember the zerk meta hate? Casual vs tryhard pug “elitist”? “Only 7k+ ap allowed”?
I do. I also remember, that the groups without those restrictions filled up faster, and yet had the same chance of finishing the content. Elitist atitudes were more damaging to elitists themselves than to other players or the game as a whole.
The rose tinted glasses are so real here… Every gamemode has a toxic side in GW2 and had that well before HoT, which includes open world. The flame and hate for commanders I’ve seen after a failed teq attempt far outweigh what I’ve witnessed in raids for example.
Well, Teq revamp was part of the same wave that created HoT and brought us raids. You know, the mistaken assumption that people asking for the game to be made more difficult are speaking for the community, or even for the large part of it.
Yes, the split did exist before, but the game made a lot of effort to minimize its importance. Now it directly feeds it. That is the difference.
So the difference is that it no longer blatantly ignores a group of players in GW2 and more varied content is created? Sounds terrible.
You know, I play this game no differently now than I did 3 years ago.
What was I doing three years ago? Whatever I wanted to do. Now there are just more options.
I play HOT pretty much the same way I played the open world. I go to a map and start doing events. If I want the meta, I will look at LFG, but it takes a few seconds to get over to another map and then I’m playing the same way again.
HoT feels a lot like Orr did to me, and I welcome that kind of thing. There were places in Orr I had trouble doing stuff by myself too, but they got done. Temples, some events. that were group events. This was fun for me. And the same situation exists in HoT.
I don’t have to min/max (and I don’t). I don’t need to run a specific build (and I don’t). I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to do.
Do you know how I leveled by masteries in HoT? By doing events in the zones. The only thing I did differently was I used boosters and food. Beyond that, I played the same way.
- Gliding
- The same max gear it’s had since the first year.
- Cooperative in all forms of PvE.
- No subscription and an F2P option that is very close to the game itself.
- Nearly everything can be PUGged.
- It’s fun for a ton of people.
I have been gone for a few years. I thought I would find what I was looking for elsewhere. I was wrong.
The reasons listed above are exactly the reasons I came back. They stand out in a world where literally every other MMO I played relied on numbers and how much one could screw their fellow player.
Don’t get me wrong, there are elitists and evil kittens in every game. This game is no different, but the number of them is hugely reduced from other games.
GW2 hasn’t lost its identity. Like all games, it has made a few changes that some will like and some will not. The solution is simple. If you don’t like a particular aspect of the game, then don’t participate. It sounds cliche and trite, but it’s absolutely true.
Level 80 Elementalist
I used to love this game with a passion up until hot release. The game went a completely different direction some loved some hated. Truth is we just need to wait for next expansion and see what we get. I just hope they stop wasting time on raids for such a small player base. Anyone who actually plays this game for raids is simply wrong because if you like raids you should be playing WoW or ff14. We need better content for people who left those games or don’t play those games to not have the companies dedication going three
Totally agree, GW2 wasn’t WOW and the like BECAUSE it didn’t have a ‘raid community’ to which the devs had to pander, sadly HoT changed that for the worse.
For me, GW2 HAS lost it’s identity. This used to be a game to play when you wanted to, and put down when you wanted to, with no real consequences to your characters. If you wanted to take a month off, you could still go back and do all the stuff that you missed later. You didn’t need a certain gear. You didn’t need a certain weapon. If other people played longer, they’d just have more gold to play with.
NOW, you NEED ascended to do fractals. You cannot do upper level fractals without agony resistance, and that goes in ascended gear. In order to get ascended gear, you have to have a maxed out crafting on one or more category. You also need a ton of materials to make this gear, and some of the things you are crafting is time-gated to one a day, which will take a while, or is expensive to buy. Now there will be Legendary armor coming out, with better stats than ascended.
That doesn’t sound like the start of a gear treadmill to anyone else? Because it does to me. What happens when we’ve had Legendary out for a while and they require it somehow for some other game mode? And then once “everyone” has that, will they put something else out, that’s got more stats than Legendary armor, so the players have something else to reach for? I’m thinking they will. It hasn’t started with weapons yet, but it is a matter of time.
I am not saying that we shouldn’t have anything to work for ever, or that there shouldn’t be more challenging content! Far from it! When they first revamped Teq, it was simply to increase hitpoints so it was almost unkillable and then dusted off their hands like “Our job here is done!!” Teq is one of the most popular world bosses there is, along with Karka Queen. Player dissatisfaction was LOUD and CLEAR that just upping the hitpoints was not the way to go. The new Shatterer design is a lot better, and more in line with the “improvements” that should be made. Before the revamp, we stood on a hill in a group and just fired stuff at it. That was all.
HoT was a dramatic increase in skill needed. I still haven’t completed it all, because you need masteries and you have to kill things for masteries. Story is gated behind these masteries and if you don’t have them, you can’t do the story! I HATE STORY GATING!! I hate it with a passion! Story is what I enjoy most about this game, and they gated story behind not only masteries, but they did the lead-in to Living Story Season 3 behind raids! How many people knew what was going on in the story, without looking at you-tube? Be honest with yourselves. The majority of players did not know, because the lead-in story was gated behind raiding, which the majority of players do not do!
I am not saying to not have raids. I am not saying to not have challenging content. I am saying that this started as a more casual and relaxed atmosphere, and now it is turning into a grindfest, either for masteries, or for gear. Leveling is easy, thank goodness. The real grind begins at level 80 for most people!
TLDR: Yeah, GW2 has definitely lost it’s vision.