Guild Wars 2

If Anet one day put a instant level 80 item on the gem store for 1000 gems. Would you throw your copy of GW2 out of the window or would you go ’that’s cool, saves me a lot of time.’?

I would say that’s cool.

And do nothing. Because 1000 gems would be too expensive for me not to level a character myself.

Also people skipping to 80 would not bother me. Just so long as they don’t join my dungeons in level 0 white items. Oh wait… people do that anyway.

I’d have no problem with it. I wouldn’t buy one unless it also unlocked all the blue and green traits, but whatever.

I don’t see why people can’t create max level PVP characters. Like, ya know, the max level PVP characters we could create in Guild Wars.

I’d buy it 3 times to get the 3 classes I don’t have at level 80 there. Cheaper and less painful than craft leveling, or swapping at the end of a dungeon. Every aspect of the game I actually like to play, level either doesn’t matter at all (sPvP), or you better be level 80 in good gear (Dungeons, Fractals, and WvW roaming); the entire rest of the game is a giant time sink, which was fun the first few times, but isn’t something I ever want to experience yet again because the fun value per time is too low, and there is no more novelty value in it.

Please also sell a personal story skip for another 1000 gems. Pick random options. Don’t even give us any rewards. I don’t care. I’ll buy that too, please. Or just let me get rid of the annoying green text otherwise, and make the ability to enter Arah and other dungeons account based not character based. Thanks.

I don’t care. I have insta-20 scrolls and half a stack of level tomes. Insta-80’s for free.

Brave Mallyki.1563:

I don’t care. I have insta-20 scrolls and half a stack of level tomes. Insta-80’s for free.

My thoughts exactly.

There are already insta level tomes and they are easily obtainable.

I’d be a bit upset for a while, but in the end I wouldn’t really care.

I’d see it as an admission that they’ve taken a great game and messed it up so bad that most people simply don’t want to play most of it. Hardly the “improving as we go” that an MMO is supposed to do.

It’s what I thought when EQ (it was EQ, right?) made servers where you started out at a higher level. It speaks of a gross failure to make the entire game fun.

I’ve wanted this for a long time. I would hope that new players would not bypass the entire playing experience, but really, once you’ve leveled 2, 3, 4, 18 (!!) toons, why can’t we just bypass all that? I would gladly, GLADLY spend some real cash to do so, rather than wasting my precious playing time by crafting (which I hate) for 4 straight hours. This is not a pay to win scenario, since it’s already FREE to fully level to 80 using in-game items such as scrolls and tomes, as others have mentioned.

As long as this item was available only after having maxed out a minimum of say…3 toons to 80, I would be okay with it.

I just don’t want it available for a rookie with a credit card and starts playing this game as a f2p.

I’d rather be able to buy all my traits with a few consumable items….oh wait

I wouldn’t mind, but then again I have all my classes leveled up.
If some rookie with a credit card wants to instant up him/her self it doesn’t bother my solo play.

I have a bunch of Experience scrolls from my 1 and 2 year old characters and half a stack of Tomes of Knowledge from running PvP every day. I know of people using them to get an alt from 1-80 in a blink.

Considering this already is an easy option for “veteran” players, I don’t see any advantage or disadvantage for having them in the Gem Store. However, I would worry about people starting the game and bypassing the whole levelling experience (imo it’s one of the best things about the game and teaches you a lot about your class)… but I guess that would be their choice, their money :P

Xae Isareth.1364:

If Anet one day put a instant level 80 item on the gem store for 1000 gems. Would you throw your copy of GW2 out of the window or would you go ’that’s cool, saves me a lot of time.’?

I’d buy one for each of my non-level 80 characters that day…

…unless an expansion pack had not been released yet.

Palador.2170:

I’d be a bit upset for a while, but in the end I wouldn’t really care.

I’d see it as an admission that they’ve taken a great game and messed it up so bad that most people simply don’t want to play most of it. Hardly the “improving as we go” that an MMO is supposed to do.

It’s what I thought when EQ (it was EQ, right?) made servers where you started out at a higher level. It speaks of a gross failure to make the entire game fun.

Well, just like any game, it is fun the first time you do it, but doing it for the 10 th time? Not so fun and you just want to get it over with.

It would make no difference to me. I wouldn’t pay that kind of gold or gems to insta-80.

Setting top level to 80 compared to GW1’s 20 was an incredibly bad decision on ArenaNet’s behalf.

Honestly would not matter to me. I play the way that I want and if others want to level their characters a different way, I do not care.

Would instant 80 be any different than instant PvP?

The cap should have been 20 like GW1, the rest is a grind fluff for BIG numbers!

I have levelled 17 characters to 80 via the ol’ grind mill, some with instant 20s though. I wouldn’t have a problem with instant 80s, it does not effect my game.

Xae Isareth.1364:

If Anet one day put a instant level 80 item on the gem store for 1000 gems. Would you throw your copy of GW2 out of the window or would you go ’that’s cool, saves me a lot of time.’?

It’s a deplorable idea and would serve as a death knell for the game.

It’s bad enough we have the level tomes already in the game, but instant 80’s would basically be an admission by ANet that they have screwed up the leveling progression so badly that skipping it entirely is an attractive thing to do even if it costs cash.

It’s crap like this that happens because gamers and developers fail to understand that either you have a common vertical progression MMO or you make a horizontal progression MMO, you do not try to do BOTH…you will fail because they are opposing systems.

Kuldebar.1897:

Xae Isareth.1364:

If Anet one day put a instant level 80 item on the gem store for 1000 gems. Would you throw your copy of GW2 out of the window or would you go ’that’s cool, saves me a lot of time.’?

It’s a deplorable idea and would serve as a death knell for the game.

It’s bad enough we have the level tomes already in the game, but instant 80’s would basically be an admission by ANet that they have screwed up the leveling progression so badly that skipping it entirely is an attractive thing to do even if it costs cash.

It’s crap like this that happens because gamers and developers fail to understand that either you have a common vertical progression MMO or you make a horizontal progression MMO, you do not try to do BOTH…you will fail because they are opposing systems.

Idk, most players will spend most of their time being max leveled. So the leveling process is always just going to be that, a process. A journey with a destination.

No matter how great the scenery on that journey is, the same road gets boring eventually.

Xae Isareth.1364:

Idk, most players will spend most of their time being max leveled. So the leveling process is always just going to be that, a process. A journey with a destination.

No matter how great the scenery on that journey is, the same road gets boring eventually.

Perhaps, I am more inclined to agree with the point thescienceoflaw on /r/GuildWars2 stated:

Maybe the problem isn’t the MMO, maybe the problem is you. Maybe you need to examine the way you approach an MMO – many of you will spend hours playing a FPS with no progression because it is fun – and then you whine because spvp has no progression and say so “what incentive do I have to do spvp if I don’t get better gear?” (Actual statement I have heard).

Many of you will spend hours exploring the world in Skryim, doing tons of side-quests, and yet whine and complain because all there is to do in GW2 is explore the world and run dungeons and do events. That is like rushing to finish the storyline quests in Skyrim and then complaining that the game has almost no content.

Why can’t we as an MMO community take the attitude we bring to FPS games, RPG games, and apply it to an MMO? Too many kitten players feel like the only thing that motivates them in an MMO is the “carrot” of gear always being held out in front of them (and don’t know what to do with themselves without it) – and you are destroying the genre. You need to fix that kitten before you destroy the genre that we love.

We take the attitude of playing games for FUN in almost every other genre, so why can’t we do it for MMOs too?

Wouldn’t bother me a bit

^ Fun is a very ….fickle thing. Often what’s fun is drilled into you. The last decade pretty much associated fun in MMOs with the ‘endgame’. Devs always talk about the endgame, players always worry about the endgame. Everyone focuses on the endgame. We’ve conditioned to try and reach the endgame ASAP, for years, in every MMO. So of course when you play a MMO, you just automatically go for the endgame.

It’s the same with the carrot. The devs design things with the carrot in mind, the players do things for the carrot. For years and years it’s been like this.

The roots are too deep to pull out. When there’s no endgame or no loot, players don’t like it. It;s almost like an addiction to drugs. It hurts to try to pull the roots out. It;s not something you can fix, because it’s become a part of the genre.

Besides, even if it can be fixed, who’s going to take the first step? MMOs take tens of millions, or hundreds of milllions in some cases to make. Who’s going to dump all that money into something that’s most likely to fail? The investors won’t.

Xae Isareth.1364:

Palador.2170:

I’d be a bit upset for a while, but in the end I wouldn’t really care.

I’d see it as an admission that they’ve taken a great game and messed it up so bad that most people simply don’t want to play most of it. Hardly the “improving as we go” that an MMO is supposed to do.

It’s what I thought when EQ (it was EQ, right?) made servers where you started out at a higher level. It speaks of a gross failure to make the entire game fun.

Well, just like any game, it is fun the first time you do it, but doing it for the 10 th time? Not so fun and you just want to get it over with.

That’s the failure though, is it not? It SHOULD be fun, and if it’s not then what do you get from the level 80 character that you can’t get on the way to 80? Take that, and spread it around more.

Take the Living Story, for example. When Flame and Frost started, I was thrilled that they’d avoided the trap of making it high levels only, and put it in lower level areas. This let EVERYONE play it, with any character they wanted to.

Then the added the two instanced missions, Cragstead and the Hatchery. Those were level 80, but at least they up-leveled you if you weren’t 80 already. Running those with a level 15 was painful, but doable.

After that, however, much of it’s been aimed at level 80s and ONLY level 80s. This means that if you want to use a specific character in the LS and they’re not level 80, you have two choices. Just forget it, and use someone else (if you have a level 80, not everyone playing the game does), or rush to level 80 so you can do what you want to do.

I can understand why the second season is level 80, it’s supposed to come after the Personal Story. But that leaves nothing new to do unless you’re level 80. There’s no real change to the game until then, and it gets old. They need a second LS team making other stories (smaller ones, yes) at lower levels.

This is part of the reason why pushing traits back 20 levels was a bad idea. It’s yet another reason to push for level 80 as fast as you can, so you can “finish” the character. I’m sure there’s other reasons to rush to 80, they’ll change from person to person. ANet needs to take those reasons and spread them out throughout the whole game, so there’s more fun to be had before 80, and less reason to rush for levels.

Xae Isareth.1364:

^ Fun is a very ….fickle thing. Often what’s fun is drilled into you. The last decade pretty much associated fun in MMOs with the ‘endgame’.

Meh, so is porn, but supposedly we can all recognize it when we see it. Yes, humans are trained animals and once enveloped in the vast milieu of the echo chamber are very hard to extract.

Xae Isareth.1364:

Devs always talk about the endgame, players always worry about the endgame. Everyone focuses on the endgame. We’ve conditioned to try and reach the endgame ASAP, for years, in every MMO. So of course when you play a MMO, you just automatically go for the endgame.

Well, the ANets actually indicated that the whole game was “end-game”:

“When we looked at the concept of “endgame” for Guild Wars 2, we designed it the same way. We didn’t want the endgame to be something you could only experience after a hundred hours of gameplay or after you reached some arbitrary number. We wanted it to be something that players got to experience every step along the way, spread out across the entire world of Tyria, so we’ve introduced game elements that you’d normally associate with “endgame” at every level and every possible opportunity.”

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/the-endgame-reimagined/

So, my point is that they could have stuck to their plan, but instead went off the reservation and tried to cobble on the standard MMO style progression experience.

Kuldebar.1897:

Xae Isareth.1364:

^ Fun is a very ….fickle thing. Often what’s fun is drilled into you. The last decade pretty much associated fun in MMOs with the ‘endgame’.

Meh, so is porn, but supposedly we can all recognize it when we see it. Yes, humans are trained animals and once enveloped in the vast milieu of the echo chamber are very hard to extract.

Xae Isareth.1364:

Devs always talk about the endgame, players always worry about the endgame. Everyone focuses on the endgame. We’ve conditioned to try and reach the endgame ASAP, for years, in every MMO. So of course when you play a MMO, you just automatically go for the endgame.

Well, the ANets actually indicated that the whole game was “end-game”:

“When we looked at the concept of “endgame” for Guild Wars 2, we designed it the same way. We didn’t want the endgame to be something you could only experience after a hundred hours of gameplay or after you reached some arbitrary number. We wanted it to be something that players got to experience every step along the way, spread out across the entire world of Tyria, so we’ve introduced game elements that you’d normally associate with “endgame” at every level and every possible opportunity.”

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/the-endgame-reimagined/

---

So, my point is that they could have stuck to their plan, but instead went off the reservation and tried to cobble on the standard MMO style progression experience.

Because their vision just didn’t work out. You got a vision, but you also have 300 people and their families’ mouths to feed, with a few million dollars stuck in the project.

At that point you have to make a rational decision.

Palador.2170:

Xae Isareth.1364:

Palador.2170:

I’d be a bit upset for a while, but in the end I wouldn’t really care.

I’d see it as an admission that they’ve taken a great game and messed it up so bad that most people simply don’t want to play most of it. Hardly the “improving as we go” that an MMO is supposed to do.

It’s what I thought when EQ (it was EQ, right?) made servers where you started out at a higher level. It speaks of a gross failure to make the entire game fun.

Well, just like any game, it is fun the first time you do it, but doing it for the 10 th time? Not so fun and you just want to get it over with.

That’s the failure though, is it not? It SHOULD be fun, and if it’s not then what do you get from the level 80 character that you can’t get on the way to 80? Take that, and spread it around more.

Take the Living Story, for example. When Flame and Frost started, I was thrilled that they’d avoided the trap of making it high levels only, and put it in lower level areas. This let EVERYONE play it, with any character they wanted to.

Then the added the two instanced missions, Cragstead and the Hatchery. Those were level 80, but at least they up-leveled you if you weren’t 80 already. Running those with a level 15 was painful, but doable.

After that, however, much of it’s been aimed at level 80s and ONLY level 80s. This means that if you want to use a specific character in the LS and they’re not level 80, you have two choices. Just forget it, and use someone else (if you have a level 80, not everyone playing the game does), or rush to level 80 so you can do what you want to do.

I can understand why the second season is level 80, it’s supposed to come after the Personal Story. But that leaves nothing new to do unless you’re level 80. There’s no real change to the game until then, and it gets old. They need a second LS team making other stories (smaller ones, yes) at lower levels.

This is part of the reason why pushing traits back 20 levels was a bad idea. It’s yet another reason to push for level 80 as fast as you can, so you can “finish” the character. I’m sure there’s other reasons to rush to 80, they’ll change from person to person. ANet needs to take those reasons and spread them out throughout the whole game, so there’s more fun to be had before 80, and less reason to rush for levels.

If you add everything people want from a 80 to a level 1, then there’s no point having levels at all.

As someone who enjoys leveling characters from 1 (now 20) to 80 through mapping I’d probably still take occasional advantage of something like this. 1000 gems is pretty cheap though, in my opinion.

Xae Isareth.1364:

Because their vision just didn’t work out. You got a vision, but you also have 300 people and their families’ mouths to feed, with a few million dollars stuck in the project.

At that point you have to make a rational decision.

Two months after game release was hardly a time of malnutrition and economic hardship for ANet. They had just sold record breaking numbers of “boxes” (read money in the bank) -hardly a time to switch off in another direction when the numbers weren’t even in yet.

Nope, someone panicked, decided to go the “safe” (read what every other MMO has done) route.

Perseverance is what makes original thinking matter.

Kuldebar.1897:

It’s a deplorable idea and would serve as a death knell for the game.

It’s bad enough we have the level tomes already in the game, but instant 80’s would basically be an admission by ANet that they have screwed up the leveling progression so badly that skipping it entirely is an attractive thing to do even if it costs cash.

It’s crap like this that happens because gamers and developers fail to understand that either you have a common vertical progression MMO or you make a horizontal progression MMO, you do not try to do BOTH…you will fail because they are opposing systems.

So is buying gems to exchange them for gold a death knell then because it’s an admission that paying RL money is more attractive than spending hours farming to get the gold you need for an item?

Honestly I wouldn’t mind as long as the player already have a level 80 for the same profession they are trying to insta level 80.

Why? Because the leveling can help you get a rope of the profession. Some might question and say can do that as a level 80, however I’ve seen my share of those players that tries to play and understand their classes inside dungeons. I wouldn’t mind if was told before hand but as time pass and you see that player dying non stop inside the dungeon and notice they have no clue of how to play with the profession, nor at least the basic to stay alive.

Xae Isareth.1364:

If you add everything people want from a 80 to a level 1, then there’s no point having levels at all.

Doing without levels isn’t always a bad thing, but there are other uses for levels.

In another game, you went up in levels like you do in GW2, and you also moved to new zones as you went. The difference was that the story progressed as you went from level to level. Sometimes a villain group would fade away only to be replaced by the people behind them (you stop fighting the street gang selling the street drugs, and start fighting the Mafia types making it for them), other times you’d find out more about a group and get deeper and deeper into things with them (that strange cult kidnapping people off the streets turns out to be undead mages trying to settle a demonic pact made ages ago). They used levels and zones to advance the whole world’s storyline as you played.

In GW2, that really doesn’t happen outside of Orr, and even there it’s not really well done. The personal story, however, uses levels that way. (Or does, until you reach the current hatchet job done on the Orr chapters.) If they added in lower level missions/arcs, they could use level to indicate WHEN they happened in the overall GW2 timeline. I think most players would be okay with that.

azyume.6321:

Honestly I wouldn’t mind as long as the player already have a level 80 for the same profession they are trying to insta level 80.

Why? Because the leveling can help you get a rope of the profession. Some might question and say can do that as a level 80, however I’ve seen my share of those players that tries to play and understand their classes inside dungeons. I wouldn’t mind if was told before hand but as time pass and you see that player dying non stop inside the dungeon and notice they have no clue of how to play with the profession, nor at least the basic to stay alive.

Personally, I think it’s more important that a player would need to have leveled at least one character of any profession to level 80, to even have the option to buy or use such an item (in whatever hypothetical way it might be implemented). That way, they are forced to go steadily through much of the tips for game systems.

I don’t think the particular profession itself is necessary. I can already go faceroll in EotM and learn virtually nothing about a given profession in the process, if I’ve a mind for it. Or heck, just questing, I can stick to one weapon type and mash buttons without looking.

Systems that encourage class exploration are a boon – in that regard, I would agree. But I don’t think the leveling process itself is any guarantee of understanding how your class works. Even more so right now, with traits being so locked.

Labjax.2465:

So is buying gems to exchange them for gold a death knell then because it’s an admission that paying RL money is more attractive than spending hours farming to get the gold you need for an item?

By an order of magnitude or so lower, but yes, to a certain degree.

The variables will always have some people seek to skip a perceived “labor” activity for the end result if they perceive that to be more desirable, which they invariably do. But this is a type of poison, not fatal in small doses, but a poison nevertheless.

^ it’s like the experiment with the money bowl…it short circuits things and the game ends early.

Kuldebar.1897:

By an order of magnitude or so lower, but yes, to a certain degree.

The variables will always have some people seek to skip a perceived “labor” activity for the end result if they perceive that to be more desirable, which they invariably do. But this is a type of poison, not fatal in small doses, but a poison nevertheless.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0VHiONkot8#t=331

^ it’s like the experiment with the money bowl…it short circuits things.

And yet we have that system in this game (the gem-gold exchange) and it’s perfectly healthy as far as I can tell. GW2 isn’t the first game to use a system like it either, with plenty of success.

The so-called “poison” is only present, imo, when it feels like the “easy path” is an obligation, rather than an option. At that point, people tend to start minding a lot.

But there is nothing wrong with options in principle. It’s all in how they are delivered.

On one hand, this sounds awesome. I’m not much of a leveler person but I love alts. On the other this seems opposite of their intentions, they’d rather people play PvE content (NPE) to level rather than pay gems. If it were to ever happen, it needs restrictions on new accounts. I see it happening though.

I’ve been asking for this since I leveled my first 80. Now that I have moved to PvP every other toon I make will be insta level with tomes. Leveling in this game is nothing but boring grind. Even more so since they revamped the trait acquisition. I would gladly pay up to 1800 gems for an insta lvl 80 kit.

Xae Isareth.1364:

Kuldebar.1897:

Xae Isareth.1364:

If Anet one day put a instant level 80 item on the gem store for 1000 gems. Would you throw your copy of GW2 out of the window or would you go ’that’s cool, saves me a lot of time.’?

It’s a deplorable idea and would serve as a death knell for the game.

It’s bad enough we have the level tomes already in the game, but instant 80’s would basically be an admission by ANet that they have screwed up the leveling progression so badly that skipping it entirely is an attractive thing to do even if it costs cash.

It’s crap like this that happens because gamers and developers fail to understand that either you have a common vertical progression MMO or you make a horizontal progression MMO, you do not try to do BOTH…you will fail because they are opposing systems.

Idk, most players will spend most of their time being max leveled. So the leveling process is always just going to be that, a process. A journey with a destination.

No matter how great the scenery on that journey is, the same road gets boring eventually.

But no matter how great the scenery the same destination gets boring eventually too. If you are spending more time being max leveled than in the leveling process it stands to reason that being max level would get boring even before the leveling process for alts does.

It doesnt really matter much what players think. If this item was available on the gem store, Anet might make a little more bucks but also unpopulate lower level zones, devaluating their product for newer players.

Wouldn’t bother me.
Can have an instant 80 and 50+ right now. Would be grand if the birthday 1 and 2 scrolls stacked. Or even forge them to higher level scrolls since getting to 20 now is quick.

Unfortunately some people would use it and have no idea how to play their class.

Aro.8275:

Wouldn’t bother me.
Can have an instant 80 and 50+ right now. Would be grand if the birthday 1 and 2 scrolls stacked. Or even forge them to higher level scrolls since getting to 20 now is quick.

Unfortunately some people would use it and have no idea how to play their class.

True, but some manage that trick while leveling the old way.

I think having the ability to buy them unlock after your first level 80 is a good middle ground.

Wanze.8410:

It doesnt really matter much what players think. If this item was available on the gem store, Anet might make a little more bucks but also unpopulate lower level zones, devaluating their product for newer players.

This is, without a doubt, the best counter argument I have read.

Wanze.8410:

It doesnt really matter much what players think. If this item was available on the gem store, Anet might make a little more bucks but also unpopulate lower level zones, devaluating their product for newer players.

Objection, your honor. Speculation.

Labjax.2465:

Wanze.8410:

It doesnt really matter much what players think. If this item was available on the gem store, Anet might make a little more bucks but also unpopulate lower level zones, devaluating their product for newer players.

Objection, your honor. Speculation.

No, he’s right. The effect has been seen in other games before this one, if there’s not a good stream of lower level characters coming in, then the newbie zones become largely empty.

We’ve also seen complaints about level 80s just rushing through lower level zones, destroying everything in their path before lower level characters can get a good hit in. We don’t really want to add to that problem, either.

Labjax.2465:

Wanze.8410:

It doesnt really matter much what players think. If this item was available on the gem store, Anet might make a little more bucks but also unpopulate lower level zones, devaluating their product for newer players.

Objection, your honor. Speculation.

Speculation made me rich, so I will stick with it.

I would not care but I do think that 1000 gems would be too cheap though.

Palador.2170:

No, he’s right. The effect has been seen in other games before this one, if there’s not a good stream of lower level characters coming in, then the newbie zones become largely empty.

We’ve also seen complaints about level 80s just rushing through lower level zones, destroying everything in their path before lower level characters can get a good hit in. We don’t really want to add to that problem, either.

I’m not debating that less leveling characters means emptier zones. That’s kind of self-evident. The speculation is that having such an item on the gem store would significantly impact the number of players who use the leveling process.

I would expect them to roll back the entire NPE system if this was offered to new players. They’re polar opposite ideas.

No objections from me, but like some of the others here, I have no reason to buy it. Barring a new race being released, I won’t be creating any more new characters, and I have 10+ Experience Scrolls and almost 100 Tomes of Experience so I could level that new character instantly to level 80 anyway.

I wouldn’t have a problem with it and might actually use it. They’d have to introduce a new race or class before as well though.