Guild Wars 2

((EDIT: Sorry I hadn’t explained this very well originally. Yes, I know Guild Wars 2 is great for the casual player in a lot of ways. There’s loads of content. My gripe is that ANet isn’t focusing on that casual content (hence being “against” the casual player, even if they aren’t actively doing that), especially considering that said content needs a lot of work still before I’d consider it worthwhile. I suppose some people would consider Living Story “casual”, it doesn’t feel that way in my opinion.))

I’m curious to know what other’s thoughts are on this. I’m a very casual player, I have yet to hit level 80 even though I played the game at release, but for some reason I can’t seem to “click” with Guild Wars 2. I played the original GW1 for hundreds of hours over several years, and I loved it, so I was really looking forward to GW2. But it just hasn’t lived up to my expectations.

I’ve been reading over the whole debate about Living Story content, and I have some major issues with it. First of all, I think it’s a great idea, it keeps the game fresh, and I think ANet can really go somewhere with this. But it just isn’t for me, and here’s why I think that is.

I logged in for the first time in months this past week. I’m an extremely casual player (maybe too extreme?), and I was about to try out the Living Story, but then I thought, “I might not get on for a few more weeks, so what’s the point?”

Like I said, maybe I’m just too casual, but I’m beginning to feel like GW2 is more for the dedicated player, at least in terms of Living Story. I loved GW1 in that I could log in after a few weeks or even months and start right where I left off.

I wouldn’t have any problem at all with Living Story if the rest of PvE was great, but it isn’t. I tried a Sylvari but stopped when the personal story for that bored me to death. I loved the beginning of the Norn with the journeying through the mists, but after level 10 or 15 that story suddenly stopped (why? It was so interesting), and then I grinded for 30 or 40 levels through this boring dredge side story (they aren’t very interesting enough enemies, and with my background in GW1 I’m wondering why ANet would choose to focus so much of the story on them). Things didn’t pick up again until level 50 and I’m suddenly in the middle of a giant zombie fight, but even then there was so much that I felt wasn’t really that worthwhile.

My other problem is that adventuring in general just isn’t that fun either. Monsters aren’t varied enough, dynamic events aren’t cool/varied either (sit here, kill X of invading honey bee/harpee, etc.). Most of it wasn’t challenging enough either to engage me, and the stuff that was were the things like mini-bosses that require a group to beat. There are a few good things out there (like the pirate island in the middle of Gendarren Fields; there needs to be more of that), but I feel like in general the permanent world isn’t polished enough, and so I’m wondering why ANet would choose to focus so much on the Living Story (at least, that’s what it feels like) instead of improving their base world.

That’s what I loved about GW1, I could stop at a random outpost, walk out, and find interesting bosses, monsters, and other things going on that could keep me going for hours.

So sorry if I got a little off-topic, but I’m interested to know how others feel about this.

Your post confuses me.

You say it is too easy, yet you think the game is for hardcore players.

So, to answer the question you asked in the title: No. GWII is not against casual players.

It doesn’t have anything to do with being a casual player, sounds like the game just isn’t right for you.

If you dont enjoy the game you dont enjoy the game. But no this game is not against casual players, it pretty much supports them fully.

But yeah.. if you log once in a month i dont expect how you think you are going to catch everything, unless the game stops being patched.

Maybe GW1 appeals to you more as it doesnt change much at all. The premise of GW2 is that it is constantly evolving, a Living World, and thus you are offered Living Stories that are somewhat transient.

I played GW1 for about 7000 hours and it is true, it’s different than GW2. I enjoy both of them. There are a few things I miss from GW1, but there are many things I would miss from GW2 should I go back. They are kind of like children, very different, but both quite lovable.

The great thing is, just like with GW1, you can leave for awhile and always come back and pick up where you left off. Happy adventuring in Tyria, no matter when. =)

Naus the Gobbo.5172:

Your post confuses me.

You say it is too easy, yet you think the game is for hardcore players.

So, to answer the question you asked in the title: No. GWII is not against casual players.

Sorry, I said dedicated/hardcore, I guess I just meant dedicated (meaning people who play more).

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Maybe GW1 appeals to you more as it doesnt change much at all. The premise of GW2 is that it is constantly evolving, a Living World, and thus you are offered Living Stories that are somewhat transient.

I played GW1 for about 7000 hours and it is true, it’s different than GW2. I enjoy both of them. There are a few things I miss from GW1, but there are many things I would miss from GW2 should I go back. They are kind of like children, very different, but both quite lovable.

The great thing is, just like with GW1, you can leave for awhile and always come back and pick up where you left off. Happy adventuring in Tyria, no matter when. =)

Yeah, I guess I was just expecting another GW1 expansion with GW2. And I don’t hate everything about GW2, there are plenty of things I enjoy like WvW. My second main problem is I can’t get any friends to play, otherwise I’m sure it would be a much better game to me :P

It is not uncommon for GW1 players to feel out of place in GW2. The lack of community, teamwork, interesting combat, meaningful PvP and PvE are pretty much the biggest detractors for GW1 fans. Not to mention the level and gear grind.

Despite the graphics, Neverwinter is probably a better sequel to GW1 than GW2 is as far as game play and mechanics are concerned.

No game is for everyone. Even if a game appeals to someone, playing very sporadically and temporary content do not mesh very well. There is, of course, plenty of permanent content available. If very little of the permanent content appeals, see the first sentence.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Maybe GW1 appeals to you more as it doesnt change much at all. The premise of GW2 is that it is constantly evolving, a Living World, and thus you are offered Living Stories that are somewhat transient.

I played GW1 for about 7000 hours and it is true, it’s different than GW2. I enjoy both of them. There are a few things I miss from GW1, but there are many things I would miss from GW2 should I go back. They are kind of like children, very different, but both quite lovable.

The great thing is, just like with GW1, you can leave for awhile and always come back and pick up where you left off. Happy adventuring in Tyria, no matter when. =)

Think this is the answer you are looking for. Taking a monthly break from gw2 is like going into hibernation for a month and waking up to find that everything has changed. Gw2 caters to casual players unlike any other MMO I have seen but casual does not really mean monthly more like few times a week, an hour a day, few hours a week.

Don’t know what to say I am casual mostly just play weekends.
But when I am on I get stuff done been keeping up to the living story and have got 5 guys to 80 have done most dungeons but no one has 100% map yet still trying.

Maybe you just don’t really care for the game as much as you did GW1, which I never played.

I think this game caters to casuals lots.

GW2 is very good compared to most mmo’s but GW1 was better. GW1 was challenging in the beginning. It took effort and thought to play. They dumbed it down quite a bit the last few years but GW1 still has much better skill mechanics, storyines and PvP.

GW2 right out of the gate had faceroll pve. It was still fun at first when there were lots of other players around triggering massive events. But even that old quickly because there just isn’t any challenge to it. And now with most zones empty the pve is just lame. The WvW has a lot going for it but also doesn’t have any long term appeal.

GW2 is almost a great game. But for whatever reason the devs failed to live up to GW1’s standards. GW2 is better than most but ultimately forgettable.

No actually he’s right on the money of what’s wrong.

We were promised these things, stopping at an outpost finding awesome things to do when we step out from the pitstop, that doing heroic things and failing would make a difference.

We were promised prelaunch that DE’s and metas would be the focus.

We were promised recently, that open world would be the new focus.

They simply haven’t delivered. And no the living story doesn’t come close.

I remember particularly an interview where they told the interviewer that the reason why they weren’t focused on dungeons (prelaunch) was that open world was so much easier, cost effective, and fun to develope and that they would continue after the fact developing the open world “NOT” dungeons so that people wouldn’t run out of things to do.

that has NOT happened. I’m one of the people they attracted with that interview and many others like it, all saying something that in November they threw out the window entirely.

OP is absolutely right. They have not delivered. There was a promise that people would never have to step foot in a dungeon ever to do anything in this game if they didn’t want to. In Nov 2012 they started to go back on that promise overnight.

GW2 is about as casual as it gets. There are certain elements of the game that isn’t casual but on the whole it very much is.

Ya i am not sure how much more casual GW2 can get with out just simply playing the game for you. I guess they could add in bots that players can use when they are not playing kind of a when you log off system but i think that will destroy any type TP we have now. There realty no games out there that are mmorpg this casual what are you coming from that was more casual then GW2?

Hah. It’s not just you that feels this way. For those of you that think the game is FOR casual players, take a look at some of the things that were considered “Casual” in other games, and then compare it to Guild Wars 2. Dungeons, for example, can take forever to complete. FoTM takes forever and what do you get for your trouble? A few worthless fractal relics. (Worthless if you’re a casual player because you need to run FoTM at least a hundred times to get anything worthwhile.) How is that casual? In WoW, the dungeons were almost NEVER longer than an hour. Dungeons and getting gear are the only things I find enjoyable in an mmorpg. So, in essence, that part of Guild Wars 2 is not casual in the least. 1000+ hours spent on my Elementalist and I have yet to get an ascended piece of gear. The story/quests on the other hand, are very casual. If Anet would just shorten the dungeon time and increase the reward, then we could call GW2 casual. But not at the moment.

Galtrix.7369:

Hah. It’s not just you that feels this way. For those of you that think the game is FOR casual players, take a look at some of the things that were considered “Casual” in other games, and then compare it to Guild Wars 2. Dungeons, for example, can take forever to complete. FoTM takes forever and what do you get for your trouble? A few worthless fractal relics. (Worthless if you’re a casual player because you need to run FoTM at least a hundred times to get anything worthwhile.) How is that casual? In WoW, the dungeons were almost NEVER longer than an hour. Dungeons and getting gear are the only things I find enjoyable in an mmorpg. So, in essence, that part of Guild Wars 2 is not casual in the least. 1000+ hours spent on my Elementalist and I have yet to get an ascended piece of gear. The story/quests on the other hand, are very casual. If Anet would just shorten the dungeon time and increase the reward, then we could call GW2 casual. But not at the moment.

Not to mention in WoW one can use a LFG tool and the dungeons can be heroic or normal keeping the class, build, and gear bigotry to a minimum if at all. And in WoW they added solo dungeons in this recent expansion because they too realized that much of their population were casual players.

In GW2 however casual was the thing they advertised for 7 years literally. There’s not a prelaunch interview that didn’t mention it. From the DE and meta focus to getting karma for gear, to having mini games, to being able to reach friends in mobile and internet apps, all these things that were advertised were NOT for the dungeoneer hard core raiders or for those who had enough time to run a 1hr-2hr long dungeon or waste 2.5 hrs waiting on a dragon. In these ways we’ve seen them make this game something other then casual who knows what the real reasons were behind why they spent 7 years advertising for the casual crowd in in just 2-3 months they completely converted this game into something else entirely.

Play for 12 hrs a day, and play for 1hr a day. The difference will be extremely minimal

I think the OP is right but i think hes not saying his point properly, to me its not about casual per say its about GW2 isn’t engaging at all..at least no where near as GW1 was..

The open world is pretty quiet and honestly dead mostly because everything has been nerfed and loot tables ruined to a point its not worth doing anything for no gain.., the AI there is trivial, dungeons AI is the opposite and too hard for most but hardcores, the DE’s have been done to death and still break on a regular basis with nothing new really added, on top of the lot is terrible DR mixed with serious loot table issues and magic find thrown in as icing..

GW2 Storyline is a shambles, jumps from one thing to another, forces players to be an NPC’s sidekick for half the game and has zero in rewards for even doing it, the ending is the worst thing i’ve ever seen from a MMO story..

Skills in GW2 are very generic and builds are almost non existent, nothing to keep the player engaged as they level up or get towards end game..

WvW and sPvP to me are suitable to a certain audience only not everyone enjoys PvP aspects in MMO’s so i’d say they are adequate…at best very few different styles of play though..but i’m not one to judge and very rarely do them..

Guildwars 1 had none of this it had the total opposite and engaged the player right from the start too the finish..Open world (instanced as it was still more fun) PvP (more variation) and Story (amazing stories that integrated into the game advancement) and Skills (so many skills/build variations and kept you going all through the game) GW1 had very little Gear grinding and treadmills the whole game was so much more engaging to do that’s why GW2 isn’t comparable to GW1..

AtoBoss.2906:

Play for 12 hrs a day, and play for 1hr a day. The difference will be extremely minimal

So, what you’re saying is that if I play 12 hours a day, I will get the same amount of experience that I would have gotten if I had played 1 hour? Sorry, makes no sense. I can tell you from experience that I can get 10 level ups in a day, maybe more, but if I play for 1 hour, I get 1 level up. You can’t tell me that a difference of 9 levels is “minimal”. I forgot to mention the gold system as well. Farming loot is terribly boring and also takes forever. Again, farming is another aspect that requires long play time and every once in awhile, you might get a piece of loot that is a little more than lackluster. Farming is pretty much the only way to earn money in this game nowadays.

Galtrix.7369:

Hah. It’s not just you that feels this way. For those of you that think the game is FOR casual players, take a look at some of the things that were considered “Casual” in other games, and then compare it to Guild Wars 2. Dungeons, for example, can take forever to complete. FoTM takes forever and what do you get for your trouble? A few worthless fractal relics. (Worthless if you’re a casual player because you need to run FoTM at least a hundred times to get anything worthwhile.) How is that casual? In WoW, the dungeons were almost NEVER longer than an hour. Dungeons and getting gear are the only things I find enjoyable in an mmorpg. So, in essence, that part of Guild Wars 2 is not casual in the least. 1000+ hours spent on my Elementalist and I have yet to get an ascended piece of gear. The story/quests on the other hand, are very casual. If Anet would just shorten the dungeon time and increase the reward, then we could call GW2 casual. But not at the moment.

Also in WoW what did you have to do to get to every bit on content? You know though the game become your life things during major raids. Most Dungeons in GW2 do not take 1hr there are a few in the high level.

Jski.6180:

Galtrix.7369:

Hah. It’s not just you that feels this way. For those of you that think the game is FOR casual players, take a look at some of the things that were considered “Casual” in other games, and then compare it to Guild Wars 2. Dungeons, for example, can take forever to complete. FoTM takes forever and what do you get for your trouble? A few worthless fractal relics. (Worthless if you’re a casual player because you need to run FoTM at least a hundred times to get anything worthwhile.) How is that casual? In WoW, the dungeons were almost NEVER longer than an hour. Dungeons and getting gear are the only things I find enjoyable in an mmorpg. So, in essence, that part of Guild Wars 2 is not casual in the least. 1000+ hours spent on my Elementalist and I have yet to get an ascended piece of gear. The story/quests on the other hand, are very casual. If Anet would just shorten the dungeon time and increase the reward, then we could call GW2 casual. But not at the moment.

Also in WoW what did you have to do to get to every bit on content? You know though the game become your life things during major raids. Most Dungeons in GW2 do not take 1hr there are a few in the high level.

I’d say 50% of the dungeons last a good hour. Though if you need money, which most people do, you will farm the dungeons repeatedly for the money/gear. And most people don’t farm for just a couple runs and then quit. If you need money, you’re going to farm that dungeon as many as 6 times to get a feeling of actual accomplishment.

Galtrix.7369:

Jski.6180:

Galtrix.7369:

Hah. It’s not just you that feels this way. For those of you that think the game is FOR casual players, take a look at some of the things that were considered “Casual” in other games, and then compare it to Guild Wars 2. Dungeons, for example, can take forever to complete. FoTM takes forever and what do you get for your trouble? A few worthless fractal relics. (Worthless if you’re a casual player because you need to run FoTM at least a hundred times to get anything worthwhile.) How is that casual? In WoW, the dungeons were almost NEVER longer than an hour. Dungeons and getting gear are the only things I find enjoyable in an mmorpg. So, in essence, that part of Guild Wars 2 is not casual in the least. 1000+ hours spent on my Elementalist and I have yet to get an ascended piece of gear. The story/quests on the other hand, are very casual. If Anet would just shorten the dungeon time and increase the reward, then we could call GW2 casual. But not at the moment.

Also in WoW what did you have to do to get to every bit on content? You know though the game become your life things during major raids. Most Dungeons in GW2 do not take 1hr there are a few in the high level.

I’d say 50% of the dungeons last a good hour. Though if you need money, which most people do, you will farm the dungeons repeatedly for the money/gear. And most people don’t farm for just a couple runs and then quit. If you need money, you’re going to farm that dungeon as many as 6 times to get a feeling of actual accomplishment.

I am not sure how many dungeons take that much time but for the accomplishment part if your only looking to get items to feel accomplished then your playing GW2 wrong. The idea is to feel accomplishment from fighting bosses that are more then just dmg and avoid dmg. Not to say there are no fights like this in the current dungeons and anet came out and said the rushed the dungeons and are going back to redo them its more of an issue of time. BUT that what makes GW2 casual you can put the game down for a month + and still not be behind any one who had not stopped. You would call most single player games as casual games but they take 6hr + to complete them and you can sit down and play for 1hr+ with out knowing it.

Jski.6180:

Galtrix.7369:

Jski.6180:

Galtrix.7369:

Hah. It’s not just you that feels this way. For those of you that think the game is FOR casual players, take a look at some of the things that were considered “Casual” in other games, and then compare it to Guild Wars 2. Dungeons, for example, can take forever to complete. FoTM takes forever and what do you get for your trouble? A few worthless fractal relics. (Worthless if you’re a casual player because you need to run FoTM at least a hundred times to get anything worthwhile.) How is that casual? In WoW, the dungeons were almost NEVER longer than an hour. Dungeons and getting gear are the only things I find enjoyable in an mmorpg. So, in essence, that part of Guild Wars 2 is not casual in the least. 1000+ hours spent on my Elementalist and I have yet to get an ascended piece of gear. The story/quests on the other hand, are very casual. If Anet would just shorten the dungeon time and increase the reward, then we could call GW2 casual. But not at the moment.

Also in WoW what did you have to do to get to every bit on content? You know though the game become your life things during major raids. Most Dungeons in GW2 do not take 1hr there are a few in the high level.

I’d say 50% of the dungeons last a good hour. Though if you need money, which most people do, you will farm the dungeons repeatedly for the money/gear. And most people don’t farm for just a couple runs and then quit. If you need money, you’re going to farm that dungeon as many as 6 times to get a feeling of actual accomplishment.

I am not sure how many dungeons take that much time but for the accomplishment part if your only looking to get items to feel accomplished then your playing GW2 wrong. The idea is to feel accomplishment from fighting bosses that are more then just dmg and avoid dmg. Not to say there are no fights like this in the current dungeons and anet came out and said the rushed the dungeons and are going back to redo them its more of an issue of time. BUT that what makes GW2 casual you can put the game down for a month + and still not be behind any one who had not stopped. You would call most single player games as casual games but they take 6hr + to complete them and you can sit down and play for 1hr+ with out knowing it.

Sorry, but what you said in that paragraph makes anything else you say void. You definitely cannot put the game down for even a week without getting nerfed at least a couple times. The D/D ele is an example. I was destroying everyone in PvP one day, stopped playing for a week, and then came back to find that my entire build was nerfed to the ground. Everyone who had not stopped playing had already developed alternate builds and were destroying. I, on the other hand, sucked for another week while developing a build. You misunderstood me in the first part of your paragraph, by the way. The “accomplishment” I mentioned was the money and items you got through dungeon running. I’ll put this in short terms. You need money. You run dungeons for hours to get that money. That’s basically the only way to get money is to run dungeons for hours. As for the “Boss Fights” you mentioned, I do not feel accomplished in the least when I kill the boss and get a rare worth 20 silver. I feel like the chance of getting an exotic from a boss is 1%, probably less than that. It takes way too long to get exotics in this game as well. I’m level 80, I’ve been 80 for about 3 months now, and I haven’t gotten a single exotic from a dungeon or from a boss. Yet another way to punish casual players.

Casual players can’t tell apart an MMO from a single player campaign.

MMOs over pandering to casuals = failing MMO = WoW.

flame away.

Galtrix.7369:

Jski.6180:

Galtrix.7369:

Jski.6180:

Galtrix.7369:

Hah. It’s not just you that feels this way. For those of you that think the game is FOR casual players, take a look at some of the things that were considered “Casual” in other games, and then compare it to Guild Wars 2. Dungeons, for example, can take forever to complete. FoTM takes forever and what do you get for your trouble? A few worthless fractal relics. (Worthless if you’re a casual player because you need to run FoTM at least a hundred times to get anything worthwhile.) How is that casual? In WoW, the dungeons were almost NEVER longer than an hour. Dungeons and getting gear are the only things I find enjoyable in an mmorpg. So, in essence, that part of Guild Wars 2 is not casual in the least. 1000+ hours spent on my Elementalist and I have yet to get an ascended piece of gear. The story/quests on the other hand, are very casual. If Anet would just shorten the dungeon time and increase the reward, then we could call GW2 casual. But not at the moment.

Also in WoW what did you have to do to get to every bit on content? You know though the game become your life things during major raids. Most Dungeons in GW2 do not take 1hr there are a few in the high level.

I’d say 50% of the dungeons last a good hour. Though if you need money, which most people do, you will farm the dungeons repeatedly for the money/gear. And most people don’t farm for just a couple runs and then quit. If you need money, you’re going to farm that dungeon as many as 6 times to get a feeling of actual accomplishment.

I am not sure how many dungeons take that much time but for the accomplishment part if your only looking to get items to feel accomplished then your playing GW2 wrong. The idea is to feel accomplishment from fighting bosses that are more then just dmg and avoid dmg. Not to say there are no fights like this in the current dungeons and anet came out and said the rushed the dungeons and are going back to redo them its more of an issue of time. BUT that what makes GW2 casual you can put the game down for a month + and still not be behind any one who had not stopped. You would call most single player games as casual games but they take 6hr + to complete them and you can sit down and play for 1hr+ with out knowing it.

Sorry, but what you said in that paragraph makes anything else you say void. You definitely cannot put the game down for even a week without getting nerfed at least a couple times. The D/D ele is an example. I was destroying everyone in PvP one day, stopped playing for a week, and then came back to find that my entire build was nerfed to the ground. Everyone who had not stopped playing had already developed alternate builds and were destroying. I, on the other hand, sucked for another week while developing a build. You misunderstood me in the first part of your paragraph, by the way. The “accomplishment” I mentioned was the money and items you got through dungeon running. I’ll put this in short terms. You need money. You run dungeons for hours to get that money. That’s basically the only way to get money is to run dungeons for hours. As for the “Boss Fights” you mentioned, I do not feel accomplished in the least when I kill the boss and get a rare worth 20 silver. I feel like the chance of getting an exotic from a boss is 1%, probably less than that. It takes way too long to get exotics in this game as well. I’m level 80, I’ve been 80 for about 3 months now, and I haven’t gotten a single exotic from a dungeon or from a boss. Yet another way to punish casual players.

Builds changes and the game is still very new when it comes to balancing you being gone for a week has nothing to do with buffs and nerfs. You can be gone 1 min and need to change your build the next because of an update or a fix.

You only need money for the cosmetic items just to get the min items for level 80 even the near top end you do not need that much gold and most of the gold you get for these items are though leveling up or you can get karma items. You can start working on your level 80 items if you want at level 2 though daily and monthly you can also work on other level 80 items at 35. Your going to get a level and the ability to get level 80 items during the low end dungeons.
So do not get your items from RNG get them from tokens krama laurels. Would you realty feel accomplished if you just got all item from one event?

You only need money for the cosmetic items just to get the min items for level 80 even the near top end you do not need that much gold and most of the gold you get for these items are though leveling up or you can get karma items. You can start working on your level 80 items if you want at level 2 though daily and monthly you can also work on other level 80 items at 35. Your going to get a level and the ability to get level 80 items during the low end dungeons.
So do not get your items from RNG get them from tokens krama laurels. Would you realty feel accomplished if you just got all item from one event?[/quote]

Money for the commander title. Money for food. Money for a guild. Money for creating a legendary. Money to repair broken armor. I could go on and on, but I think you get the point. Also, I’m not stating that I would like to get all of my armor from a single event. In WoW, if I wanted a piece of armor, I would run the dungeon in a few minutes, boom done. Another piece of armor from a different dungeon? Boom, done. Plus, people want their characters to look cool. And the cool stuff takes an eternity to gain. The Fractals ascended backpiece, I guarantee, will cost you more than a month of your life, for a SINGLE piece of armor. Most legendaries take at least 3 months to create and they don’t just cost time. I’ve never seen a more subtle hint that Anet wants you to play the game 24/7.

@ Galtrix.7369
Quoting messed up i guess it happens.
So every one needs commander title?! Food not needed oddly. What are you spending money on for your guild because it should be if ppl are doing things with your guild rep. then your guild will get better. Legendary is pure cosmetic. You should be making enofe money to repair your gear what at worst if every thing is broken its 12 s if you cant make that before you have broken every thing i am not sure what your doing.
And i say your too WoW mind sated because you do not need EVERYTHING in the game you do not need any ascended item you do not need looks. I ask you why are you not playing WoW? You seem to enjoy it more then this game.

Jski.6180:

@ Galtrix.7369
Quoting messed up i guess it happens.
So every one needs commander title?! Food not needed oddly. What are you spending money on for your guild because it should be if ppl are doing things with your guild rep. then your guild will get better. Legendary is pure cosmetic. You should be making enofe money to repair your gear what at worst if every thing is broken its 12 s if you cant make that before you have broken every thing i am not sure what your doing.
And i say your too WoW mind sated because you do not need EVERYTHING in the game you do not need any ascended item you do not need looks. I ask you why are you not playing WoW? You seem to enjoy it more then this game.

I enjoy WoW’s dungeons, but I enjoy Guild Wars 2’s quests. Keep in mind that I’m still only talking about how the dungeons are hardcore, not casual. The only reason I referenced WoW was because it has the perfect dungeons with just the right amount of reward for the time spent there. Anything else in WoW, I couldn’t care less about. This may only be my final goal for the eventual “end” of an mmorpg, but when I picture the end, I see my character with a decent amount of gold, awesome armor, and amazing stats. Apparently, that’s the only goal Guild Wars 2 has to keep people going. To get those things, in PvE at least, you must spend massive amounts of time in dungeons, or gathering the gold to buy it off the tp. Anet confirmed this by adding Ascended gear. You may not need ascended gear, but Anet knows you want it and they don’t hesitate to implement new armor that you want so you will play more. The rewards for completing the dungeons just aren’t cutting it (I’m mostly talking about FoTM here.) FoTM is the big reason for my argument about dungeons not being casual.

Galtrix.7369:

Jski.6180:

@ Galtrix.7369
Quoting messed up i guess it happens.
So every one needs commander title?! Food not needed oddly. What are you spending money on for your guild because it should be if ppl are doing things with your guild rep. then your guild will get better. Legendary is pure cosmetic. You should be making enofe money to repair your gear what at worst if every thing is broken its 12 s if you cant make that before you have broken every thing i am not sure what your doing.
And i say your too WoW mind sated because you do not need EVERYTHING in the game you do not need any ascended item you do not need looks. I ask you why are you not playing WoW? You seem to enjoy it more then this game.

I enjoy WoW’s dungeons, but I enjoy Guild Wars 2’s quests. Keep in mind that I’m still only talking about how the dungeons are hardcore, not casual. The only reason I referenced WoW was because it has the perfect dungeons with just the right amount of reward for the time spent there. Anything else in WoW, I couldn’t care less about. This may only be my final goal for the eventual “end” of an mmorpg, but when I picture the end, I see my character with a decent amount of gold, awesome armor, and amazing stats. Apparently, that’s the only goal Guild Wars 2 has to keep people going. To get those things, in PvE at least, you must spend massive amounts of time in dungeons, or gathering the gold to buy it off the tp. Anet confirmed this by adding Ascended gear. You may not need ascended gear, but Anet knows you want it and they don’t hesitate to implement new armor that you want so you will play more. The rewards for completing the dungeons just aren’t cutting it (I’m mostly talking about FoTM here.) FoTM is the big reason for my argument about dungeons not being casual.

Why should items be the “end” though i hope your in this game more then just these items. Its more then like going to take me a year + to get a legendary even though i have a good bit of gold saved up and a Precursor but i am in no rush to make any thing i am simply enjoying the game. To effect of WoW dungeons they have trued into nearly a single player game where you happen to have other ppl in there with you. Yes it is super casual to jump into a group that a program made for you but there is no soul behind it no reason other then just a mad item grab. Look at it this way in GW2 you need to talk to your pt or you will fail a lot at non speed runs (i hate speed runs) that why most ppl play online game to talk with other ppl to get something done and your not doing it for items mostly your doing it for the dungeon in it self. This is how and why things should be done not for some pix reward that amounts to nothing but for the event it self.

I’ll admit I was TLDR as it’s early, but I’ll assume you’re complaining of 1 of 2 things:

1. Optimisation of professions vs"I want to play my style". If this is the case, all professions can experience all content regardless of their build. The limiting factor is perhaps high level Fractals being fairly restrictive, but it’s not new content, you can just run level 10 a bunch of times to experience all Fractals has to offer.
2. Content updates. If this is the case, I really disagree with you. While I don’t fit the casual category, I usually complete everything new the month has to offer in a day. Really, the amount of new content is pathetic.

The only benefit the “hardcore” have is access to the more expensive weapon skins and difficulty level.

Ive read a bit in this topic but not all. I myself am a casual player i have a job so i cant play all day

So i can whole heartily say if you truly are a “casual” player then there is no way youll get bored. There is so much content it can take you days and weeks to do. Not if your think your a casual player but just saying that to hide the fact you maybe an addict then sure you may get bored.

Just my 2cents

I’m noticing everyone has different definitions of the word “casual”…

Yes, I know Guild Wars 2 is great for the casual player in a lot of ways. My gripe is that ANet isn’t focusing on that casual content (hence being “against” the casual player, even if they aren’t actively doing that), especially considering that said content needs a lot of work still before I’d consider it worthwhile. I suppose some people would consider Living Story “casual”, it doesn’t feel that way in my opinion.

I’ve had a horrible experience with DE’s as well. Every once in awhile the enjoyable one comes along, but most times I find either they’re broken, too difficult for a solo player like myself to play in an unpopulated world, or too boring to be worth my time. I tend to backtrack a lot as well because I missed something or I need to talk to a vendor, and there were so many times where the exact same DE was running again. It was so bad in some cases that I would literally have to rush and finish up with the vendor or risk being caught in the same DE running just a few minutes later (which is exactly like a resetting mob; didn’t ANet promise that this wouldn’t happen?). I hated the main crafting area in the Sylvari starting area because even though it was the most convenient, I couldn’t talk to any of the vendors half the time because of some lame DE that kept repeating that required 15 minutes to complete, and that was with at least five people nearby.

With Guild Wars 1, there were so many places I could farm that didn’t feel like work at all because there were so many different ways I could play them. And if I got bored of one area, I had a billion other awesome ones to choose from.

Also, I haven’t gotten to this point, but I don’t feel like it’s worth my time getting to 80 and beating all the endgame content, because it sounds like there isn’t much to do after that.

Personally, with the way most things run I feel like GW2 should still be in development. Maybe it will finally catch on for me in two years when they’ve got all the problems and weak content figured out, but there really isn’t much holding me here at the moment.

this is the most casual game in the history of casuals games, console mmos casual solo players already stated that (and left already?)

What? It was made FOR the casual players.

Personally I think GW2 is the perfect MMORPG. It’s just lacking one thing that I really miss from EQ2, player housing and a carpenter tradeskill that can make player furniture to decorate the house.

Other than that, I think ArenaNet have made an outstanding game and I’m really grateful for the amount of detail they’ve put into it.

Nuka Cola.8520:

What? It was made FOR the casual players.

Originally, yes. Lot of changes/new content since then is aimed however at everyone but the casuals.

I sort of agree with the OP. The game was always touted as "leave when you want, come back and you aren’t “behind”."

Well, I left in early march, I am patching as we speak and thinking..I missed most of the living story. I didnt experience it. What happened to not falling behind?

Same thing with all of the new currencies in the game…laurels, commendations, etc. Falling behind because I stopped playing for 2 months.

Same thing with gear. I have 5 max level toons, 3 decked in exotics(what one would have thought to be the top tier gear). I thought I could take breaks from the game come back and pick it up again. Well, now I’ll have to farm ascended gear if I want BiS gear. I know I can do all content in exotics. Thats not the point. I wanted BiS gear, and then work on aesthetics/legendary.

I really thought this game was more about aesthetics, builds, WvW, exploration and just flat out playing the game and enjoying it. Not about keeping up with the latest content(living story, guild missions, etc), keeping up with the latest currencies(laurels, fractal relics, commendations), and gear(ascended gear).

I hyped this game so much and it was my last saving grace for an MMO. I just dont know if I have the desire to come back and invest time into it when clearly the developer walks a fine line between cosmetic progression and stat progression, and it kitten es me off.

MMO’s are always going to include elements that take time and commitment to achieve/accomplish/obtain/complete. Why? Because many players insist that the game hold their attention through months or years during which they play for many hours a day and complain constantly about nothing to do. No other game genre faces this issue.

cesmode.4257:

I sort of agree with the OP. The game was always touted as "leave when you want, come back and you aren’t “behind”."

Well, I left in early march, I am patching as we speak and thinking..I missed most of the living story. I didnt experience it. What happened to not falling behind?

Same thing with all of the new currencies in the game…laurels, commendations, etc. Falling behind because I stopped playing for 2 months.

Same thing with gear. I have 5 max level toons, 3 decked in exotics(what one would have thought to be the top tier gear). I thought I could take breaks from the game come back and pick it up again. Well, now I’ll have to farm ascended gear if I want BiS gear. I know I can do all content in exotics. Thats not the point. I wanted BiS gear, and then work on aesthetics/legendary.

I really thought this game was more about aesthetics, builds, WvW, exploration and just flat out playing the game and enjoying it. Not about keeping up with the latest content(living story, guild missions, etc), keeping up with the latest currencies(laurels, fractal relics, commendations), and gear(ascended gear).

I hyped this game so much and it was my last saving grace for an MMO. I just dont know if I have the desire to come back and invest time into it when clearly the developer walks a fine line between cosmetic progression and stat progression, and it kitten es me off.

I agree with this, even though I still like playing the game. When I logged back in, I found some of my ex guildmates online and I asked them what they were doing. They said they were doing FoTM 30+ (38 I think it was), and I said, “I need Agony Resist for that, huh?” They told me they’d help me farm for the gear, but I just said ‘nevermind, I’ll WvW’. I just didn’t expect the game to really have come to this.

The open world is too easy and not rewarding enough, leaving most of options of acquiring stuff to instances and laurel grinding, stuff that isn’t very casual friendly. The main source of challenge is the champion which has a terrible reward vs time spent ratio. So it can feel tedious.

The other problem is that dynamic events do not fire fast enough in most zones; they also do not get marked well on the map (only gets marked if you are closed). There needs to be an option to mark all events on your current map lest there be a lot of boring downtime.

ArchonWing.9480:

The open world is too easy and not rewarding enough, leaving most of options of acquiring stuff to instances and laurel grinding, stuff that isn’t very casual friendly. The main source of challenge is the champion which has a terrible reward vs time spent ratio. So it can feel tedious.

The other problem is that dynamic events do not fire fast enough in most zones; they also do not get marked well on the map (only gets marked if you are closed). There needs to be an option to mark all events on your current map lest there be a lot of boring downtime.

IMO, the open world is the absolute, hands down, best part of this game. Unfortunately (at least on the server I played on) it is under-populated and poorly rewarded.

If ANet could find a way to get more people in the open world, even if it meant somehow consolidating all servers, it would be a HUGE step in the right direction.

clay.7849:

It is not uncommon for GW1 players to feel out of place in GW2. The lack of community, teamwork, interesting combat, meaningful PvP and PvE are pretty much the biggest detractors for GW1 fans.

I’ve got great community in GW2, but after about 2006 GW1 was a solo game with NO community at all for me.

I think it comes down to picking the right guild and realm. My guild has gotten a few recent members commenting that GW2 had no community and no group stuff for them, so they joined us. My guild is not the most active or social on my realm – but we have -enough-.

My GW1 guild, that I joined in 2005 – was a place of strangers to me. Especially after heroes came in, there was no reason to group, so no one did. Other guilds did not have this problem, but I never shopped around to find them…

But I recognize that this burden was on me, and wasn’t the game itself.

cesmode.4257:

I sort of agree with the OP. The game was always touted as "leave when you want, come back and you aren’t “behind”."

Well, I left in early march, I am patching as we speak and thinking..I missed most of the living story. I didnt experience it. What happened to not falling behind?

Missing an event does not leave you behind.

RL kept me out of the game from Sept to Feb. I missed a few events. I am not at all behind.

The big loot drop for doing the entire Living Story? A pair of exotic gloves with a unique skin.

No one who misses that is left behind. They will just not get a neat cosmetic (for those who like its style).

Here’s the thing; if you don’t show up at the table, you will miss out on what happens there. But in this game, they still won’t leave you behind.

And that no one gets left behind note? That’s a fan comment anyway – not a dev one. Its great that the devs have held to it, but its not the promise -they- made to us. Just our interpretation of their actual promotions.

Kichwas.7152:

clay.7849:

It is not uncommon for GW1 players to feel out of place in GW2. The lack of community, teamwork, interesting combat, meaningful PvP and PvE are pretty much the biggest detractors for GW1 fans.

I’ve got great community in GW2, but after about 2006 GW1 was a solo game with NO community at all for me.

I think it comes down to picking the right guild and realm. My guild has gotten a few recent members commenting that GW2 had no community and no group stuff for them, so they joined us. My guild is not the most active or social on my realm – but we have -enough-.

My GW1 guild, that I joined in 2005 – was a place of strangers to me. Especially after heroes came in, there was no reason to group, so no one did. Other guilds did not have this problem, but I never shopped around to find them…

But I recognize that this burden was on me, and wasn’t the game itself.

I agree completely. I left shortly after Nightfall because ANet slowly destroyed that game. When I refer to GW1 I should refer to it as pre-Nightfall GW1 so there is no confusion.

Perhaps there might be a good community in GW2 I missed, but I find there to be little teamwork in this game – rather teams are more of 5 solo players in the same spot, but rarely do they actually help each other like In GW1. Personally, it was that teamwork aspect that made the community in pre-Nightfall GW1 so good.

clay.7849:

Kichwas.7152:

clay.7849:

It is not uncommon for GW1 players to feel out of place in GW2. The lack of community, teamwork, interesting combat, meaningful PvP and PvE are pretty much the biggest detractors for GW1 fans.

I’ve got great community in GW2, but after about 2006 GW1 was a solo game with NO community at all for me.

I think it comes down to picking the right guild and realm. My guild has gotten a few recent members commenting that GW2 had no community and no group stuff for them, so they joined us. My guild is not the most active or social on my realm – but we have -enough-.

My GW1 guild, that I joined in 2005 – was a place of strangers to me. Especially after heroes came in, there was no reason to group, so no one did. Other guilds did not have this problem, but I never shopped around to find them…

But I recognize that this burden was on me, and wasn’t the game itself.

I agree completely. I left shortly after Nightfall because ANet slowly destroyed that game. When I refer to GW1 I should refer to it as pre-Nightfall GW1 so there is no confusion.

Perhaps there might be a good community in GW2 I missed, but I find there to be little teamwork in this game – rather teams are more of 5 solo players in the same spot, but rarely do they actually help each other like In GW1. Personally, it was that teamwork aspect that made the community in pre-Nightfall GW1 so good.

No see there a problem with your logic then you have been saying GW1 was more about team work and far deeper then GW2 but then you your self talks about how GW1 was more of a solo game after Nightfall the bulk of the games life.

I am also a casual player however, I love GW2 because I enjoy the game itself.
Maybe this game isn’t for you?

I play this game on/off because I have other games as well as I go to school and work. Time is very limited at my end but when I play, I play! =) Perhaps another game might suite you better?

gw2 is one of the most casual-friendly mmos ever, there isn’t any content aimed at “hardcore” players at all

there is no gated content
there are no raids
exotic gear can be obtained through a currency that is gained naturally through leveling up
ascended gear is obtained through a currency gained from doing daily and monthly achievements

as for the living story (which you mentioned extensively), during each phase of the living story there were about 1-2 things to do…. for a month, all of it was soloable except for the dungeon released with this patch, none of the enemies are/were deadly, you get up-leveled for the content so anyone can participate

I can’t defend people who go away from online games for a period of time then return and expect to be at the same level as everyone else. The game moves forward as there are more players who want to experience something new than there are those who never want the game to change.

I think you’d have to be very naive to believe that a game company would provide an online experience and not release new content that might entice their players to spend more money.

I have to ask though, do the same players who expect to be able to keep up with everyone else without putting in any effort actually think anything in life works that way? Do you think you can bum around in school, under achieve your way through life and still expect to earn as much as someone who puts in the effort to have more than you? Where does this self entitlement come from?

Jski.6180:

clay.7849:

I agree completely. I left shortly after Nightfall because ANet slowly destroyed that game. When I refer to GW1 I should refer to it as pre-Nightfall GW1 so there is no confusion.

Perhaps there might be a good community in GW2 I missed, but I find there to be little teamwork in this game – rather teams are more of 5 solo players in the same spot, but rarely do they actually help each other like In GW1. Personally, it was that teamwork aspect that made the community in pre-Nightfall GW1 so good.

No see there a problem with your logic then you have been saying GW1 was more about team work and far deeper then GW2 but then you your self talks about how GW1 was more of a solo game after Nightfall the bulk of the games life.

I’m not sure if you’re aware of exactly what Clay’s talking about here. With Nightfall, GW1 introduced heroes which were fully customizable NPCs and were available to you wherever you went. This destroyed the need to find real people to join you’re party, and you could journey solo with a bunch of NPCs to help you out instead. GW1 was more about teamwork pre-Nightfall because of this. Hopefully that helps.

Personally, I have to disagree with Clay here, and this is just my opinion of course. AI’s will never be as good as real players, and there was plenty of difficult content that required the help of other players to get through (especially once you got to the content after the endgame). There were a lot of missions in the Nightfall campaign that made even a solo, independent person like me team up with other players to beat.

I agree with what Clay says about GW2 though. There were so many occasions in the open world where I happened upon groups of players tackling an event, I never once worried about what their classes were, what builds they were running, etc. because it really didn’t affect how I would act when contributing to the event. There’s no synergy between players because of the way skills and combat are structured. Sure, you can give your allies boons and remove conditions and throw the occasional heal at them (usually once every minute or so), but that really doesn’t affect tactics between players at all.

hamsteak.1368:

as for the living story (which you mentioned extensively), during each phase of the living story there were about 1-2 things to do…. for a month, all of it was soloable except for the dungeon released with this patch, none of the enemies are/were deadly, you get up-leveled for the content so anyone can participate

To be honest, I never tried any of the Living Story content, so I guess my argument is a little weak. The idea behind it however, that certain content is only available for a certain amount of time, is what frustrates me. It’s not “casual” in the sense that it forces you to play the game once a month or every two weeks or whatever in order to experience it; otherwise you miss it. Like I said, I wouldn’t have any problem with this if there was other interesting content available for me to do… which there isn’t (refer back to my original post and the examples I give). And there is stuff out there, but I feel like I have to hunt too hard for it. I’m like any normal person, I want to play an interesting game, and finding that the short-term, Living Story seems to be the only interesting content is bothering me.

When I got on last week, I wanted to jump right to the new content that had just been released in the Living Story (because that sounded interesting and the other stuff didn’t), but I quickly found out there were other things I had to do first, and it was all this open world stuff that I’ve had such bad experiences with and which most people had already moved on from.

Plus, I didn’t know how long it would take me, and the way my life runs I didn’t know if I would be getting on again within the next few weeks, so I didn’t want to start something only to come back later and find out I could never finish it, with all my spent time gone to waste.

Torpian, I’m not completely sure if your comment was directed at me, but I agree with you completely. Living Story is a great idea, especially for people more dedicated to spending time logged in. I also believe that it’s reasonable for ANet to want to make profit by providing new content.

I’m complaining that most of the other PvE content outside of the Living Story is terrible. The story is choppy and full of boring content, DE’s all tend to be pretty similar and get stale pretty quickly, most of it is too easy and unvaried, and I wish ANet would spend some time fixing up the rest of their world and make it as interesting as this Living Story stuff (which of course I’m assuming it is :P).

@Lightcringe

If your builds were good, you could do 90% plus of the PVe content solo. My wife and I did DOA just the two of us with 6 heroes. It’s all down to their builds.

People soloed the game with the 3 necro sabway builds and later the discord necro builds. And when spirit spammer rits came out…all challenge was all over.

I can run every mission in Nightfall hard mode solo.