Grind the Bait and Switch

Grind the Bait and Switch

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Posted by: Ashen.2907

Ashen.2907

Sorry, but you hold GW1 to a standard of, “to be effective,” and GW2 to a standard of, “the best possible.”

That is, by definition, a double standard.

You can be effective in GW2 without the best gear. The amount that the stat gain going from rare to exotic armor/weapons affects your build in GW2 is far less than the difference between an unranked character with nearly half of his entire skill bar comprised of PvE skills and that same build with max rank.

I see your point, but you should also see his. He gives a very reasonable clarification of his position. Would you mind focusing on the actual problems at hand?

What problems at hand ?

The only problem, if you can call it that, presented in this thread is that the OP is comparing the grind inherent in getting the minimum level of performance affecting elements of GW1 with the grind inherent in getting the maximum performance affecting elements of GW2.

As the OP is using GW1 as an example of the ideal approach to avoiding grind while getting the very best performance his entire position is rendered invalid by the fact that the grind for, “the best performance,” was much higher in GW1 than in GW2.

It doesnt get more blatant than stating that you, “can be effective,” without the grind in one game while claiming that merely being effective is insufficient for the other.


Beyond that, OP you can be effective in GW2 without the grind you seem to despise. Problem (?) solved.

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Posted by: Shockwave.1230

Shockwave.1230

Sorry, but you hold GW1 to a standard of, “to be effective,” and GW2 to a standard of, “the best possible.”

That is, by definition, a double standard.

You can be effective in GW2 without the best gear. The amount that the stat gain going from rare to exotic armor/weapons affects your build in GW2 is far less than the difference between an unranked character with nearly half of his entire skill bar comprised of PvE skills and that same build with max rank.

I see your point, but you should also see his. He gives a very reasonable clarification of his position. Would you mind focusing on the actual problems at hand?

What problems at hand ?

The only problem, if you can call it that, presented in this thread is that the OP is comparing the grind inherent in getting the minimum level of performance affecting elements of GW1 with the grind inherent in getting the maximum performance affecting elements of GW2.

As the OP is using GW1 as an example of the ideal approach to avoiding grind while getting the very best performance his entire position is rendered invalid by the fact that the grind for, “the best performance,” was much higher in GW1 than in GW2.

It doesnt get more blatant than stating that you, “can be effective,” without the grind in one game while claiming that merely being effective is insufficient for the other.


Beyond that, OP you can be effective in GW2 without the grind you seem to despise. Problem (?) solved.

You are caught up on one phrase and not focusing on the entire body of my position. You can be effective in combat as a theif at level 30 in combat with 40s by doing some death blossoms throwing on some evading bleeds and shadow refuging to hide and run away until you can do it again. Is your effective contribution as much as those lv 40s? Probably not. It all comes down to your view of the degree of effectiveness whether you agree with me or not about the numbers. I’m saying the disparity holds a lot of weight. You disagree, which is fine.

As for vp in Gw1 if it was so prevelent why in my very first post on this thread am I quoting Mike Obrien saying they never added vp in GW1? In actuality he is wrong, but in his view the amount there is negligible enough to say they never added it.

Sylvari Elementalist – Mystree Duskbloom (Lv 80)
Norn Guardian – Aurora Lustyr (Lv 80)
Mia A Shadows Glow – Human Thief (Lv 80)

(edited by Shockwave.1230)

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

Yes, actually. After the manifesto came out, due to the confusion it caused, Anet posted a clarification of the manifesto. It was widely talked about at the time.

Ree is talking about the personal story. Everything you do in your personal story stays that way. Colin is talking about dynamic events.

Editing for style caused confusion and Anet clarified it. People knew what Ree and Colin were talking about.

Without the clarification it was indeed confusing but you obviously couldn’t have a permanently rescued village in the open world. Which brings me to the next point.

AFTER the manifesto this stuff was discussed and expounded upon and explained ad nauseum. It was done at conventions and the panels are still available to view. It was done in interviews. It was done at AMAs on Reddit. It was done on Guru. There are so many times and ways this was explained.

Sure if you came to the game today, this might be all new to you if you didn’t follow it, but there’s NO excuse for anyone following the game not to understand what was meant in the manifesto. Anyone who says otherwise is being liberal with reality.

You make a solid argument, in this very thread, that the manifesto was an ad for GW2. I agree. It, along with my time spent in GW1, is what encouraged me to buy the game. I don’t know what AMAs is (American Music Awards ?), have never visited Reddit, stopped visiting Guru before the GW2 Manifesto was announced. So the question is, were the clarifications being presented with the ad ? I mean neither of us considers what was done to be really an example of bait and switch, but a published ad whose content is revised at unconnected outside sources is exactly that.

And again, what specific clarification references whether or not a boss stays dead, or a village stays saved, etc. Dynamic Events rotate fairly quickly. The manifesto refers to permanent changes…nothing associated with a character’s interaction with a DE is permanent.

So you watched one video, made two years before the game launched and ignored every single thing shown/mentioned/explained afterwards? Because that’s not the best defense I’ve heard.

Prior to this forum launch, Guru was pretty much the unofficial Guild Wars 2 information site, but even wtihout that, Anet had a blog. Their explanation of many things, including their clarification of the manifesto was explained in their blog on their site.

The videos of panels and information were posted to Anet’s Youtube channel. There are/were countless videos including ANet panels on Youtrube.

The AMAs were advertised, where the community asked questions and Anet answered them. But the bottom line is no one could possibly expect to see one 5 minute video made two years before a game launched, do no further research and expect to have an accurate representation of what was going on with the game.

It’s not reasonable.

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Posted by: VOLKON.1290

VOLKON.1290

No. The fact there are so many of us who believe Anet has backtracked on their Manifesto is solid evidence they are at fault for the miscommunication; it is their responsibility to prevent misunderstandings, and they could have been perfectly clear.

No, it’s solid evidence only of the fact that some people believe ANet backtracked on their Manifesto. What’s lacking is actual evidence that they did.

#TeamJadeQuarry

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Posted by: Shifty.5187

Shifty.5187

No. The fact there are so many of us who believe Anet has backtracked on their Manifesto is solid evidence they are at fault for the miscommunication; it is their responsibility to prevent misunderstandings, and they could have been perfectly clear.

No, it’s solid evidence only of the fact that some people believe ANet backtracked on their Manifesto. What’s lacking is actual evidence that they did.

The burden of clear communication is on their side. If there are many people who end up believing they backtracked on their Manifesto, then that is their fault. It is similar to “The customer is always right.” Clearly that is not always so, but there’s an imbalance in accountability with these things.

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Posted by: Stone.6751

Stone.6751

Interesting. From an outside perspective, as someone who didn’t play GW1 or any MMO for the past 10 years, I don’t really see why people make these types of complaints about the game. The game is very progressive in the world of MMOs, so much that it attracts players like myself who are primarily console gamers.

You should’ve seen Guild Wars 1.

I don’t know what the betrayal, false information, etc. was that people felt sold on, but did you ever think thakittens possible that people took information and created a set of false expectations in their head about what that information meant?

No. The fact there are so many of us who believe Anet has backtracked on their Manifesto is solid evidence they are at fault for the miscommunication; it is their responsibility to prevent misunderstandings, and they could have been perfectly clear.

So fault ANet for the miscommunication, and then let go of it. Move on. They aren’t going to change GW2 back to GW1, so why continue to beat this dead horse?

Penny Royalty – Level 80 Guardian
Raingarde – Level 80 Necromancer

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

No. The fact there are so many of us who believe Anet has backtracked on their Manifesto is solid evidence they are at fault for the miscommunication; it is their responsibility to prevent misunderstandings, and they could have been perfectly clear.

No, it’s solid evidence only of the fact that some people believe ANet backtracked on their Manifesto. What’s lacking is actual evidence that they did.

The burden of clear communication is on their side. If there are many people who end up believing they backtracked on their Manifesto, then that is their fault. It is similar to “The customer is always right.” Clearly that is not always so, but there’s an imbalance in accountability with these things.

Clear communication doesn’t exist. However, that’s WHY Anet published after the manifesto a clarification of certain things. Some people probably remember it. It was probably lost in the shuffle to the new site, but it might be around somewhere.

No one can guarantee 100% clear communication. I’m a professional editor, who works with writers and no matter how clear you think something is, it’s never clear enough.

So Anet made the manifesto, there was confusion, Anet explained the manifesto. Then they proceeded to have two years of pretty crystal clear communication that everyone seems to have completely forgotten while trying to make a point about a two year old video that was clarified at the time.

And the customer isn’t always right. The customer is often wrong. We TELL customers they’re right, because customers like to hear it, but it doesn’t change the fact that customers often have no clue what they’re talking about.

And that’s from someone who spent 19 years in retail. You’re only right to your face. As soon as you turn around, you’re not. It’s pretty entertaining.

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Posted by: Shifty.5187

Shifty.5187

Interesting. From an outside perspective, as someone who didn’t play GW1 or any MMO for the past 10 years, I don’t really see why people make these types of complaints about the game. The game is very progressive in the world of MMOs, so much that it attracts players like myself who are primarily console gamers.

You should’ve seen Guild Wars 1.

I don’t know what the betrayal, false information, etc. was that people felt sold on, but did you ever think thakittens possible that people took information and created a set of false expectations in their head about what that information meant?

No. The fact there are so many of us who believe Anet has backtracked on their Manifesto is solid evidence they are at fault for the miscommunication; it is their responsibility to prevent misunderstandings, and they could have been perfectly clear.

So fault ANet for the miscommunication, and then let go of it. Move on. They aren’t going to change GW2 back to GW1, so why continue to beat this dead horse?

Why don’t you give this a rest? I want to continue voicing my dissatisfaction with some of the elements in the game, with the hope they address them.

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Posted by: Rooks Zaer.5846

Rooks Zaer.5846

So Anet made the manifesto, there was confusion, Anet explained the manifesto. Then they proceeded to have two years of pretty crystal clear communication that everyone seems to have completely forgotten while trying to make a point about a two year old video that was clarified at the time.

See, this is where I’d disagree with you. I dont’ think there was confusion. There’s nothing in the manifesto that is confusing. At all. It’s very simple and straightforward. Now, there -may- be misunderstanding and/or expectations that were not met, but that’s different. No confusion meant that no one had any reason to go out looking for clarifications, because people thought they fully understood the type of game that they were going to get.

As a side note, if I look at the manifesto from the point of Colin talking about combat and Ree talking about personal story…it doesn’t even seem like it would have been worth making the manifesto at all. Permanent choices in areas of the game that are instanced? Is that even worth advertising? Why would anyone make a point of that?The supposed clarifications/backpedaling are waaay more confusing than anything the manifesto or pre-launch inverviews talked about.

Applying Occam’s Razor, I think they made a manifesto video showing what they wanted to do, they were forced to push the game out about a year before it was ready (and had lots of progression options in place for people hitting level cap), people hit level cap and complained they were bored, and ArenaNet took the quick fixes in an attempt to retain players and make their game more sticky….and if the manifesto and “Is it fun?” blog had to be compromised to get something in place quickly, so be it.

(edited by Rooks Zaer.5846)

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Posted by: Shifty.5187

Shifty.5187

Clear communication doesn’t exist. However, that’s WHY Anet published after the manifesto a clarification of certain things. Some people probably remember it. It was probably lost in the shuffle to the new site, but it might be around somewhere.

No one can guarantee 100% clear communication. I’m a professional editor, who works with writers and no matter how clear you think something is, it’s never clear enough.

So Anet made the manifesto, there was confusion, Anet explained the manifesto. Then they proceeded to have two years of pretty crystal clear communication that everyone seems to have completely forgotten while trying to make a point about a two year old video that was clarified at the time.

And the customer isn’t always right. The customer is often wrong. We TELL customers they’re right, because customers like to hear it, but it doesn’t change the fact that customers often have no clue what they’re talking about.

And that’s from someone who spent 19 years in retail. You’re only right to your face. As soon as you turn around, you’re not. It’s pretty entertaining.

Clear communication does exist. Whenever I express my intention and you understand that same intention, there was clear communication. “Please hand me that soda”, I receive the soda, done: clear communication.

Regarding the Manifesto, there clearly is miscommunication, but probably because we also hear what we want to hear. Those coming from Guild Wars 1 understood their message as a continuation of what made Guild Wars 1 so awesome: (almost) no vertical progression.

Here on the forum it is clear by now that there are people who think the Manifesto is not being adhered to. The next step is to address this. Does Anet agree with this? Did they do what they set out to do from the start? Did they have to adjust their planning because of unexpected events (the Exodus hypothesis perhaps)?

What I want personally is for Anet to explicitly address these things. Specifically, do they themselves find it fun to press ‘F’ 50 times for an achievement, do they like to have to log in on a daily basis to get a steady supply of Laurels? Do they like to spend many resources on a +6 stat boost item? If they stand by these things and think they’re perfect examples of where they want to go with this game, then fine. Right now I’m just confused because I did not expect they would.

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

So Anet made the manifesto, there was confusion, Anet explained the manifesto. Then they proceeded to have two years of pretty crystal clear communication that everyone seems to have completely forgotten while trying to make a point about a two year old video that was clarified at the time.

See, this is where I’d disagree with you. I dont’ think there was confusion. There’s nothing in the manifesto that is confusing. At all. It’s very simple and straightforward. Now, there -may- be misunderstanding and/or expectations that were not met, but that’s different. No confusion meant that no one had any reason to go out looking for clarifications, because people thought they fully understood the type of game that they were going to get.

As a side note, if I look at the manifesto from the point of Colin talking about combat and Ree talking about personal story…it doesn’t even seem like it would have been worth making the manifesto at all. Permanent choices in areas of the game that are instanced? Is that even worth advertising? Why would anyone make a point of that?The supposed clarifications/backpedaling are waaay more confusing than anything the manifesto or pre-launch inverviews talked about.

Applying Occam’s Razor, I think they made a manifesto video showing what they wanted to do, they were forced to push the game out about a year before it was ready (and had lots of progression options in place for people hitting level cap), people hit level cap and complained they were bored, and ArenaNet took the quick fixes in an attempt to retain players and make their game more sticky….and if the manifesto and “Is it fun?” blog had to be compromised to get something in place quickly, so be it.

Ah you miss the point. Keep in mind this was before SWToR was released.

NO MMO back then had a personal story of any kind. Like the story or hate the story, it wasn’t done.

A human warrior in WoW had the exact same story as every other human warrior in WoW. WoW didn’t use instances to tell YOUR story. This was talking about stuff that changed for your character, and on one else. So yes, it was new and different. Execution may not have been what people wanted or expected, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t there.

And Colin was talking about dynamic events, when he spoke…obviously dynamic events were meant to be persistent but not permanent (Anet’s words not mine).

The two did their talk seperately…and editors made it look nice. You know, they broke it up so they alternated and yes, it caused confusion. Not everyone was confused, but enough people were where Anet felt a clarifciation was justified.

After that point, they went into detail about personal story, about dynamic events. I mean a lot of detail.

So if there was confusion, and people didn’t get it, it wasn’t like Anet was hiding it from anyone.

And sure some people do buy games because of the pretty white box or some stupid video (like the one that sold Rift to me), but I always acknowledged it was my fault.

I simply didn’t do enough research before I bought the game. I felt let down, but you know, the company was doing what companies do. Promoting their product. As a consumer, my job is to separate sales talk from reality.

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

Clear communication doesn’t exist. However, that’s WHY Anet published after the manifesto a clarification of certain things. Some people probably remember it. It was probably lost in the shuffle to the new site, but it might be around somewhere.

No one can guarantee 100% clear communication. I’m a professional editor, who works with writers and no matter how clear you think something is, it’s never clear enough.

So Anet made the manifesto, there was confusion, Anet explained the manifesto. Then they proceeded to have two years of pretty crystal clear communication that everyone seems to have completely forgotten while trying to make a point about a two year old video that was clarified at the time.

And the customer isn’t always right. The customer is often wrong. We TELL customers they’re right, because customers like to hear it, but it doesn’t change the fact that customers often have no clue what they’re talking about.

And that’s from someone who spent 19 years in retail. You’re only right to your face. As soon as you turn around, you’re not. It’s pretty entertaining.

Clear communication does exist. Whenever I express my intention and you understand that same intention, there was clear communication. “Please hand me that soda”, I receive the soda, done: clear communication.

Regarding the Manifesto, there clearly is miscommunication, but probably because we also hear what we want to hear. Those coming from Guild Wars 1 understood their message as a continuation of what made Guild Wars 1 so awesome: (almost) no vertical progression.

Here on the forum it is clear by now that there are people who think the Manifesto is not being adhered to. The next step is to address this. Does Anet agree with this? Did they do what they set out to do from the start? Did they have to adjust their planning because of unexpected events (the Exodus hypothesis perhaps)?

What I want personally is for Anet to explicitly address these things. Specifically, do they themselves find it fun to press ‘F’ 50 times for an achievement, do they like to have to log in on a daily basis to get a steady supply of Laurels? Do they like to spend many resources on a +6 stat boost item? If they stand by these things and think they’re perfect examples of where they want to go with this game, then fine. Right now I’m just confused because I did not expect they would.

Clear communication doesn’t exist between one person and a million people. One person says something and even if 500,000 people understand what he’s saying, someone WILL be able to misunderstand. It’s called the Army Axiom. Any order than can be misunderstood will be misunderstood.

I’ve watched a team of editors go through a professional writer’s manuscript and someone, somewhere will still find ambiguity that no one else saw.

Communication is flawed. Always has been, always will be.

No matter what anyone says, someone, eventually will misunderstand it.

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Posted by: Shifty.5187

Shifty.5187

Clear communication doesn’t exist between one person and a million people. One person says something and even if 500,000 people understand what he’s saying, someone WILL be able to misunderstand. It’s called the Army Axiom. Any order than can be misunderstood will be misunderstood.

I’ve watched a team of editors go through a professional writer’s manuscript and someone, somewhere will still find ambiguity that no one else saw.

Communication is flawed. Always has been, always will be.

No matter what anyone says, someone, eventually will misunderstand it.

Fair enough.

There’s no need for Anet to provide a clear picture of their intentions for every single customer they have, but they should address the issue we’ve been discussing since it pertains to, I believe, a relatively large number of people.

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Posted by: Shifty.5187

Shifty.5187

I simply didn’t do enough research before I bought the game. I felt let down, but you know, the company was doing what companies do. Promoting their product. As a consumer, my job is to separate sales talk from reality.

You seem to accept that companies can be evil. Why this defeatist attitude? Get mad!

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

Clear communication doesn’t exist between one person and a million people. One person says something and even if 500,000 people understand what he’s saying, someone WILL be able to misunderstand. It’s called the Army Axiom. Any order than can be misunderstood will be misunderstood.

I’ve watched a team of editors go through a professional writer’s manuscript and someone, somewhere will still find ambiguity that no one else saw.

Communication is flawed. Always has been, always will be.

No matter what anyone says, someone, eventually will misunderstand it.

Fair enough.

There’s no need for Anet to provide a clear picture of their intentions for every single customer they have, but they should address the issue we’ve been discussing since it pertains to, I believe, a relatively large number of people.

What issue is it, specifically that they’re supposed to address? The issue about the manifesto? It was addressed. You want them to address it again? This has been done to death. I’m sure Anet is tired of addressing it, since it’s already been addressed.

And there’s another issue. For any iterative company, it’s hard to lock in plans. They make a decision and then they go and change it. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing. They try something, it doesn’t work, they try something else. They keep the stuff that works, they discard the stuff that doesn’t.

Over time, the game comes together.

I think people just need to learn to be more patient.

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Posted by: tigirius.9014

tigirius.9014

Be careful, someone might come on here and claim you don’t know what you’re saying, or that you are completely off topic, or some other such nonsensical attack on your personal ethical standards when it comes to business when you point out things like that OP.

Despite the naysayers again coming onto this thread and claiming what is not true about the design of this title and the methods they are still using for the acquisition of both wealth along with the problems they’ve allowed to continue with the loot system and the DR (bugs or not they are still in the game) I can say you are spot on about everything you’ve posted OP.

ie. we were told DR would be ajusted in the open world so that it wouldn’t have and impact on farmers because they love farmers, we were told greens and blue would be made viable for salvaging and that they’d change how salvaging works so that more T6 materials that were previously more rare than clean water in a desert would be collectable, I watched as they made items exclusive and only available in the store while not doing a single thing to help with the acquisition of gold, we were told many things and here it is the anniversary and these things haven’t happened.

It does count when promises are made prior and not just for 1 month before beta but years upon years of promises because that is advertising via word of mouth. So much disappointed came from this game that my friends and I won’t ever be buying anything supported by NCsoft again. When it’s okay to lose customers like that that’s when you know there’s a problem.

It’s coming up on the 1 year anniversary, how much more patient do you want people to be? It’s officially 8 years from the time they started making these claims about how this game would be if you purchased it you should expect to see those things.

Balance Team: Please Fix Mine Toolbelt Positioning!

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

Be careful, someone might come on here and claim you don’t know what you’re saying, or that you are completely off topic, or some other such nonsensical attack on your personal ethical standards when it comes to business when you point out things like that OP.

Despite the naysayers again coming onto this thread and claiming what is not true about the design of this title and the methods they are still using for the acquisition of both wealth along with the problems they’ve allowed to continue with the loot system and the DR (bugs or not they are still in the game) I can say you are spot on about everything you’ve posted OP.

ie. we were told DR would be ajusted in the open world so that it wouldn’t have and impact on farmers because they love farmers, we were told greens and blue would be made viable for salvaging and that they’d change how salvaging works so that more T6 materials that were previously more rare than clean water in a desert would be collectable, I watched as they made items exclusive and only available in the store while not doing a single thing to help with the acquisition of gold, we were told many things and here it is the anniversary and these things haven’t happened.

It does count when promises are made prior and not just for 1 month before beta but years upon years of promises because that is advertising via word of mouth. So much disappointed came from this game that my friends and I won’t ever be buying anything supported by NCsoft again. When it’s okay to lose customers like that that’s when you know there’s a problem.

I’m far more disappointed in the player base than I am in Anet. I think common sense must taken a day off.

Anet has made some design decisions that would upset certain people, but that isn’t a lie…it’s a choice that’s not well received. In any event, isn’t it about time you found a game you like? This probably isn’t doing much for your state of mind.

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Posted by: cesmode.4257

cesmode.4257

Whatever people in either camp will say to sway eachother…here is my personal opinion:

I have always loved a sandbox style of game(even if GW2 isnt exactly sandbox). I’ve always loved exploration, finding hidden things. I enjoy leveling and then gearing up my character. After that I want to just play and enjoy the game, knowing that I have the maximum and optiimum stats my character can have so I can tackle any situation, pve or pvp, and just enjoy the game for what it is and find new things. I saw GW2 as that avenue. I was thrilled, stoked beyond words.

For whatever reason, this is not how I perceive the game today. With all the reward systems and currencies in place, it is VERY difficult to ignore all of the reward and just enjoy the game. Whether you can obtain the reward and enjoy is a circumstanstial statement. It depends on what youre doing. In my eyes, with all of the rewards, currencies, and check boxes…I cannot just head off in one direction and play. It is human nature for me NOT to ignore the carrots.

So, if this thread is self evident along with the dozens upon dozens of threads along with the utter outrage the announcement of ascended gear had..if these responses mean anything, it means that the community is divided pretty evenly on this subject and Arenanet made a decision to go whichever way the wind was blowing.

I hate it, I hate their direction, and I miss the first few months of Guild Wars 2. To illustrate this: This weekend, Friday through Sunday, I logged into the character screen..looked at my characters for 10 seconds shook my head and logged out. WTF is the point? Game isnt fun anymore.

And to re-iterate..this was my opinion. You can disagree with my opinion but if any of you fanboi’s try to reason with me to make me see your side, you are wasting your time (as Im sure you already do). I’ve already limited my visits to this forum in the past week or two.

Karma is as abundant as air, and as useless as the Kardashians.

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Posted by: Shockwave.1230

Shockwave.1230

Be careful, someone might come on here and claim you don’t know what you’re saying, or that you are completely off topic, or some other such nonsensical attack on your personal ethical standards when it comes to business when you point out things like that OP.

Despite the naysayers again coming onto this thread and claiming what is not true about the design of this title and the methods they are still using for the acquisition of both wealth along with the problems they’ve allowed to continue with the loot system and the DR (bugs or not they are still in the game) I can say you are spot on about everything you’ve posted OP.

ie. we were told DR would be ajusted in the open world so that it wouldn’t have and impact on farmers because they love farmers, we were told greens and blue would be made viable for salvaging and that they’d change how salvaging works so that more T6 materials that were previously more rare than clean water in a desert would be collectable, I watched as they made items exclusive and only available in the store while not doing a single thing to help with the acquisition of gold, we were told many things and here it is the anniversary and these things haven’t happened.

It does count when promises are made prior and not just for 1 month before beta but years upon years of promises because that is advertising via word of mouth. So much disappointed came from this game that my friends and I won’t ever be buying anything supported by NCsoft again. When it’s okay to lose customers like that that’s when you know there’s a problem.

I’m far more disappointed in the player base than I am in Anet. I think common sense must taken a day off.

Anet has made some design decisions that would upset certain people, but that isn’t a lie…it’s a choice that’s not well received. In any event, isn’t it about time you found a game you like? This probably isn’t doing much for your state of mind.

If you know of an online rpg without Vertical progression please share. That’s guild wars. Simply put it’s all about horizontal progression and the content and the stories (and PvP too).

Sylvari Elementalist – Mystree Duskbloom (Lv 80)
Norn Guardian – Aurora Lustyr (Lv 80)
Mia A Shadows Glow – Human Thief (Lv 80)

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Posted by: Dante.1508

Dante.1508

I guess the one thing we can take away from all that is what Anet as a company is like, obviously what they say and what they do isn’t accurate, so take what you will from that, i know i have..

With all the false marketing and promises i do not feel bad that i stopped paying my money to them and i urge others to do the same, but ultimately its up to the players..

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

Be careful, someone might come on here and claim you don’t know what you’re saying, or that you are completely off topic, or some other such nonsensical attack on your personal ethical standards when it comes to business when you point out things like that OP.

Despite the naysayers again coming onto this thread and claiming what is not true about the design of this title and the methods they are still using for the acquisition of both wealth along with the problems they’ve allowed to continue with the loot system and the DR (bugs or not they are still in the game) I can say you are spot on about everything you’ve posted OP.

ie. we were told DR would be ajusted in the open world so that it wouldn’t have and impact on farmers because they love farmers, we were told greens and blue would be made viable for salvaging and that they’d change how salvaging works so that more T6 materials that were previously more rare than clean water in a desert would be collectable, I watched as they made items exclusive and only available in the store while not doing a single thing to help with the acquisition of gold, we were told many things and here it is the anniversary and these things haven’t happened.

It does count when promises are made prior and not just for 1 month before beta but years upon years of promises because that is advertising via word of mouth. So much disappointed came from this game that my friends and I won’t ever be buying anything supported by NCsoft again. When it’s okay to lose customers like that that’s when you know there’s a problem.

I’m far more disappointed in the player base than I am in Anet. I think common sense must taken a day off.

Anet has made some design decisions that would upset certain people, but that isn’t a lie…it’s a choice that’s not well received. In any event, isn’t it about time you found a game you like? This probably isn’t doing much for your state of mind.

If you know of an online rpg without Vertical progression please share. That’s guild wars. Simply put it’s all about horizontal progression and the content and the stories (and PvP too).

Guild Wars had vertical progression through skill leveling. Stop saying it had no vertical progression. What it had was no gear progression. All the luxon/kurzik/sunspear/lightbringer/norn/asura/ebonvanguard/deldrimor skills had vertical progression and for many of us that was a big part of Guild Wars 1.

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

I guess the one thing we can take away from all that is what Anet as a company is like, obviously what they say and what they do isn’t accurate, so take what you will from that, i know i have..

With all the false marketing and promises i do not feel bad that i stopped paying my money to them and i urge others to do the same, but ultimately its up to the players..

I guess the one thing we can take away from this is that some people don’t know the difference between marketing and promises and some people think that a company that makes an MMO will not try different things or change things around if things aren’t working.

I’d far rather be playing an MMO that takes the necessary steps to fix the game even if it means changing something, than be part of an MMO who says something, finds out it’s not working, and leaves it there just because they said it in the first place.

The dye system is a perfect example. The way it was released sucked badly. Anet fixed it. I feel the same thing about energy and particularly energy potions. They said it would be one way and they fixed it.

Whether people want to acknowledge it or not, too many people got their exotics and left the game. It really is that simple. Anet did what they had to for the good of the game. I highly doubt they expected it to happen but once it did, they had to think on the fly.

If they hadn’t, they could have kept the game the way it was and you’d have six guys playing it by now.

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Posted by: morrolan.9608

morrolan.9608

I guess the one thing we can take away from this is that some people don’t know the difference between marketing and promises

Something can’t be both?

and some people think that a company that makes an MMO will not try different things or change things around if things aren’t working.

A total revision of their vision for the game less than 2 months into it? A vision that was a major selling point for the game. Thats a sign of panic. Not to mention that they refuse to own up to it.

Jade Quarry [SoX]
Miranda Zero – Ele / Twitch Zero – Mes / Chargrin Soulboom – Engi
Aliera Zero – Guardian / Reaver Zero – Necro

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Posted by: Shockwave.1230

Shockwave.1230

Be careful, someone might come on here and claim you don’t know what you’re saying, or that you are completely off topic, or some other such nonsensical attack on your personal ethical standards when it comes to business when you point out things like that OP.

Despite the naysayers again coming onto this thread and claiming what is not true about the design of this title and the methods they are still using for the acquisition of both wealth along with the problems they’ve allowed to continue with the loot system and the DR (bugs or not they are still in the game) I can say you are spot on about everything you’ve posted OP.

ie. we were told DR would be ajusted in the open world so that it wouldn’t have and impact on farmers because they love farmers, we were told greens and blue would be made viable for salvaging and that they’d change how salvaging works so that more T6 materials that were previously more rare than clean water in a desert would be collectable, I watched as they made items exclusive and only available in the store while not doing a single thing to help with the acquisition of gold, we were told many things and here it is the anniversary and these things haven’t happened.

It does count when promises are made prior and not just for 1 month before beta but years upon years of promises because that is advertising via word of mouth. So much disappointed came from this game that my friends and I won’t ever be buying anything supported by NCsoft again. When it’s okay to lose customers like that that’s when you know there’s a problem.

I’m far more disappointed in the player base than I am in Anet. I think common sense must taken a day off.

Anet has made some design decisions that would upset certain people, but that isn’t a lie…it’s a choice that’s not well received. In any event, isn’t it about time you found a game you like? This probably isn’t doing much for your state of mind.

If you know of an online rpg without Vertical progression please share. That’s guild wars. Simply put it’s all about horizontal progression and the content and the stories (and PvP too).

Guild Wars had vertical progression through skill leveling. Stop saying it had no vertical progression. What it had was no gear progression. All the luxon/kurzik/sunspear/lightbringer/norn/asura/ebonvanguard/deldrimor skills had vertical progression and for many of us that was a big part of Guild Wars 1.

Again, if vertical progression was so prevelent in Guild Wars then why am I quoting Mike O’brien at the beggining of this thread saying there was no vp in Guild Wars.

It’s not completely true, as previously explained, as it exists in Guild Wars in the form of leveling up characters and PvE skill progression as well. You level so quickly and grinding out titles only marginally improves PvE skills it’s like vp isn’t there. The vp is so negligible Mike O’brien said there was no vp. So while it’s there, it’s effect goes unnoticed, except in the case of Ursan Blessing, which was a mistake ANet remedied.

Sylvari Elementalist – Mystree Duskbloom (Lv 80)
Norn Guardian – Aurora Lustyr (Lv 80)
Mia A Shadows Glow – Human Thief (Lv 80)

(edited by Shockwave.1230)

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

I guess the one thing we can take away from this is that some people don’t know the difference between marketing and promises

Something can’t be both?

and some people think that a company that makes an MMO will not try different things or change things around if things aren’t working.

A total revision of their vision for the game less than 2 months into it? A vision that was a major selling point for the game. Thats a sign of panic. Not to mention that they refuse to own up to it.

Total revision is more hyperbole. They introduced changes, not major huge changes. They in fact added a tier of gear which they claimed as planned before launch. If you have any evidence to the contrary, by all means, let me hear it.

More to the point, they have always said they wanted to give people options to play their way. Well, those who wanted to grind for some sort of stat (and there were plenty of people) had no way to grind. They tried to sequester these people in their own grind fest but it didn’t work.

This hardly amounts to total revision. The dynamic events were still there and could still be done with exotics. The dungeons were still there and could still be done with exotics. SPvP didn’t change at all. Not one iota.

The only things you needed ascended gear for were higher level fractals (and you could get the gear from doing fractals) and possibly WvW (though that was always meant to be unbalanced and Anet said as much). Basically in WvW for the most part, it’s group vs group, not generally 1v1, so most WvW shouldn’t be several affected. Certainly not by a back piece and a couple of rings, which is all they were, both of which took time to get.

So yeah, I think you’re overstating the changes. I don’t believe most people who stayed believe it’s that big a deal. Of course, some people do. But the core game..that’s still there and relatively unchanged by ascended gear.

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

Be careful, someone might come on here and claim you don’t know what you’re saying, or that you are completely off topic, or some other such nonsensical attack on your personal ethical standards when it comes to business when you point out things like that OP.

Despite the naysayers again coming onto this thread and claiming what is not true about the design of this title and the methods they are still using for the acquisition of both wealth along with the problems they’ve allowed to continue with the loot system and the DR (bugs or not they are still in the game) I can say you are spot on about everything you’ve posted OP.

ie. we were told DR would be ajusted in the open world so that it wouldn’t have and impact on farmers because they love farmers, we were told greens and blue would be made viable for salvaging and that they’d change how salvaging works so that more T6 materials that were previously more rare than clean water in a desert would be collectable, I watched as they made items exclusive and only available in the store while not doing a single thing to help with the acquisition of gold, we were told many things and here it is the anniversary and these things haven’t happened.

It does count when promises are made prior and not just for 1 month before beta but years upon years of promises because that is advertising via word of mouth. So much disappointed came from this game that my friends and I won’t ever be buying anything supported by NCsoft again. When it’s okay to lose customers like that that’s when you know there’s a problem.

I’m far more disappointed in the player base than I am in Anet. I think common sense must taken a day off.

Anet has made some design decisions that would upset certain people, but that isn’t a lie…it’s a choice that’s not well received. In any event, isn’t it about time you found a game you like? This probably isn’t doing much for your state of mind.

If you know of an online rpg without Vertical progression please share. That’s guild wars. Simply put it’s all about horizontal progression and the content and the stories (and PvP too).

Guild Wars had vertical progression through skill leveling. Stop saying it had no vertical progression. What it had was no gear progression. All the luxon/kurzik/sunspear/lightbringer/norn/asura/ebonvanguard/deldrimor skills had vertical progression and for many of us that was a big part of Guild Wars 1.

Again, if vertical progression was so prevelent in Guild Wars then why am I quoting Mike O’brien at the beggining of this thread saying there was no vp in Guild Wars.

It’s not completely true, as previously explained, as it exists in Guild Wars in the form of leveling up characters and PvE skill progression as well. You level so quickly and grinding out titles only marginally improves PvE skills it’s like vp isn’t there. The vp is so negligible Mike O’brien said there was no vp. So while it’s there, it’s effect goes unnoticed, except in the case of Ursan Blessing, which was a mistake ANet remedied.

He said it, but there was vertical progression in Guild Wars 2 from day one since 80th level exotics are better than 80th level rares. More to the point, Anet also said that ascended gear was meant to be in at launch but it didn’t make it on time.

So it would have been just another level of gear that the game launched with. Which presumably wouldnt’ have been a problem.

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Posted by: Tachenon.5270

Tachenon.5270

Yes, actually. After the manifesto came out, due to the confusion it caused, Anet posted a clarification of the manifesto. It was widely talked about at the time.

If the manifesto was so so poorly done, so confoundedly confusing that they needed to clarify matters later, why is it still available for viewing on the Guild Wars 2 site? Why has it not been removed in order to prevent further confusion? Which one of the other videos features this alleged clarification? Where on the Guild Wars 2 website is this clarification? I see you mention it over and over, but I’ve not seen you post a link to it.

Edit: Digging through the News section, found this:

“So if you love MMORPGs, you should check out Guild Wars 2. But if you hate traditional MMORPGs, then you should really check out Guild Wars 2. Because, like Guild Wars before it, GW2 doesn’t fall into the traps of traditional MMORPGs. It doesn’t suck your life away and force you onto a grinding treadmill; it doesn’t make you spend hours preparing to have fun rather than just having fun; and of course, it doesn’t have a monthly fee.” ~ Mike O’Brien, April 27, 2010

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/guild-wars-2-design-manifesto

The table is a fable.

(edited by Tachenon.5270)

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Posted by: Shockwave.1230

Shockwave.1230

He said it, but there was vertical progression in Guild Wars 2 from day one since 80th level exotics are better than 80th level rares. More to the point, Anet also said that ascended gear was meant to be in at launch but it didn’t make it on time.

So it would have been just another level of gear that the game launched with. Which presumably wouldnt’ have been a problem.

There’s nothing that can be done about the past. It’s history, the game launched with substancial vertical progression, even though I didn’t understand it at that time. ANet’s history before that was not vertical progression, because of this it makes sense that people such as myself would impose as much pressure as possible to prevent any further vertical progression and to push for the grind to continually be lessened on that vertical progression.

Even though they’ve stated Ascended gear was meant to be in the game at launch, given the way ANet has done their marketing and communication with the community I don’t feel like it’s as straight forward as that. But it is further evidence to show they released before they were ready, if that is in fact true. I’m more apt to believe that when ANet says ascended gear was supposed to be in the game at launch, they meant that all the tiers of gear should have been introduced at launch to avoid the backlash that they face, but that’s just due to my inability to be as trusting with their words now with Guild Wars 2 as I could in the past while I was playing Guild Wars.

I think that’s probably one of the biggest things actually for people’s expectations, as part of the following in Guild Wars 1 there was communication on the wiki with the devs and release notes and more statements of intent, more detailed transcribed documentation on what they were doing basically. When ANet reps communicated back then, we just knew what they meant. Naturally as the build up occurred towards Guild Wars 2, many people thought they knew what ANet meant as they always had. Obviously things turned out the way they did, and now communication from ANet feels far less genuine and feels like it holds a lot more spin than it used to. This is just me personally speaking of course based on my experiences and from conversation with the people that I played Guild Wars with.

Sylvari Elementalist – Mystree Duskbloom (Lv 80)
Norn Guardian – Aurora Lustyr (Lv 80)
Mia A Shadows Glow – Human Thief (Lv 80)

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

Yes, actually. After the manifesto came out, due to the confusion it caused, Anet posted a clarification of the manifesto. It was widely talked about at the time.

If the manifesto was so so poorly done, so confoundedly confusing that they needed to clarify matters later, why is it still available for viewing on the Guild Wars 2 site? Why has it not been removed in order to prevent further confusion? Which one of the other videos features this alleged clarification? Where on the Guild Wars 2 website is this clarification? I see you mention it over and over, but I’ve not seen you post a link to it.

Edit: Digging through the News section, found this:

“So if you love MMORPGs, you should check out Guild Wars 2. But if you hate traditional MMORPGs, then you should really check out Guild Wars 2. Because, like Guild Wars before it, GW2 doesn’t fall into the traps of traditional MMORPGs. It doesn’t suck your life away and force you onto a grinding treadmill; it doesn’t make you spend hours preparing to have fun rather than just having fun; and of course, it doesn’t have a monthly fee.” ~ Mike O’Brien, April 27, 2010

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/guild-wars-2-design-manifesto

Right, preparing to have fun, instead of having fun is the theme. And it’s true. That is to say in most MMOs your leveling and what you do while leveling is COMPLETELY different from end game…which is why some of us, including me, hate MMOs.

Here what yu’re doing at end game isn’t much different from what yu’re doing during the game. In fact, you can enjoy the living story from almost any level.

So I’d say you’ve proved their point. Thanks for posting that.

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Posted by: morrolan.9608

morrolan.9608

Right, preparing to have fun, instead of having fun is the theme. And it’s true.

Not in the game I’m playing.

Jade Quarry [SoX]
Miranda Zero – Ele / Twitch Zero – Mes / Chargrin Soulboom – Engi
Aliera Zero – Guardian / Reaver Zero – Necro

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Posted by: Tachenon.5270

Tachenon.5270

Yes, actually. After the manifesto came out, due to the confusion it caused, Anet posted a clarification of the manifesto. It was widely talked about at the time.

If the manifesto was so so poorly done, so confoundedly confusing that they needed to clarify matters later, why is it still available for viewing on the Guild Wars 2 site? Why has it not been removed in order to prevent further confusion? Which one of the other videos features this alleged clarification? Where on the Guild Wars 2 website is this clarification? I see you mention it over and over, but I’ve not seen you post a link to it.

Edit: Digging through the News section, found this:

“So if you love MMORPGs, you should check out Guild Wars 2. But if you hate traditional MMORPGs, then you should really check out Guild Wars 2. Because, like Guild Wars before it, GW2 doesn’t fall into the traps of traditional MMORPGs. It doesn’t suck your life away and force you onto a grinding treadmill; it doesn’t make you spend hours preparing to have fun rather than just having fun; and of course, it doesn’t have a monthly fee.” ~ Mike O’Brien, April 27, 2010

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/guild-wars-2-design-manifesto

Right, preparing to have fun, instead of having fun is the theme. And it’s true. That is to say in most MMOs your leveling and what you do while leveling is COMPLETELY different from end game…which is why some of us, including me, hate MMOs.

Here what yu’re doing at end game isn’t much different from what yu’re doing during the game. In fact, you can enjoy the living story from almost any level.

So I’d say you’ve proved their point. Thanks for posting that.

Where’s the clarification, Vayne?

The table is a fable.

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

He said it, but there was vertical progression in Guild Wars 2 from day one since 80th level exotics are better than 80th level rares. More to the point, Anet also said that ascended gear was meant to be in at launch but it didn’t make it on time.

So it would have been just another level of gear that the game launched with. Which presumably wouldnt’ have been a problem.

There’s nothing that can be done about the past. It’s history, the game launched with substancial vertical progression, even though I didn’t understand it at that time. ANet’s history before that was not vertical progression, because of this it makes sense that people such as myself would impose as much pressure as possible to prevent any further vertical progression and to push for the grind to continually be lessened on that vertical progression.

Even though they’ve stated Ascended gear was meant to be in the game at launch, given the way ANet has done their marketing and communication with the community I don’t feel like it’s as straight forward as that. But it is further evidence to show they released before they were ready, if that is in fact true. I’m more apt to believe that when ANet says ascended gear was supposed to be in the game at launch, they meant that all the tiers of gear should have been introduced at launch to avoid the backlash that they face, but that’s just due to my inability to be as trusting with their words now with Guild Wars 2 as I could in the past while I was playing Guild Wars.

I think that’s probably one of the biggest things actually for people’s expectations, as part of the following in Guild Wars 1 there was communication on the wiki with the devs and release notes and more statements of intent, more detailed transcribed documentation on what they were doing basically. When ANet reps communicated back then, we just knew what they meant. Naturally as the build up occurred towards Guild Wars 2, many people thought they knew what ANet meant as they always had. Obviously things turned out the way they did, and now communication from ANet feels far less genuine and feels like it holds a lot more spin than it used to. This is just me personally speaking of course based on my experiences and from conversation with the people that I played Guild Wars with.

I followed this game religiously and very very little surprised me. The addition of ascended gear DID surprise me, and I said at the time, I’ll wait and see how it plays out. To me it’s fine. It doesn’t stop me from doing anything I want to do in the game. I have characters with and without ascended gear and I do most of the same stuff on all of them, the exception being high level fractals.

The problem is, most people see this vertical progression thing as this huge breech of promise, when in fact, vertical progression was in the game from day one. Beyond that, however, most people who play this game, the overwhelming majority, don’t even know what vertical progression is.

I’m willing to wager less than 25% of the game’s population know or understand vertical progression as a concept at all. Of those who do understand it, not everyone is against it.

So the question is, what percentage of the player base is negatively affected by this and what percentage of the player base is positively affected?

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Posted by: Shockwave.1230

Shockwave.1230

He said it, but there was vertical progression in Guild Wars 2 from day one since 80th level exotics are better than 80th level rares. More to the point, Anet also said that ascended gear was meant to be in at launch but it didn’t make it on time.

So it would have been just another level of gear that the game launched with. Which presumably wouldnt’ have been a problem.

There’s nothing that can be done about the past. It’s history, the game launched with substancial vertical progression, even though I didn’t understand it at that time. ANet’s history before that was not vertical progression, because of this it makes sense that people such as myself would impose as much pressure as possible to prevent any further vertical progression and to push for the grind to continually be lessened on that vertical progression.

Even though they’ve stated Ascended gear was meant to be in the game at launch, given the way ANet has done their marketing and communication with the community I don’t feel like it’s as straight forward as that. But it is further evidence to show they released before they were ready, if that is in fact true. I’m more apt to believe that when ANet says ascended gear was supposed to be in the game at launch, they meant that all the tiers of gear should have been introduced at launch to avoid the backlash that they face, but that’s just due to my inability to be as trusting with their words now with Guild Wars 2 as I could in the past while I was playing Guild Wars.

I think that’s probably one of the biggest things actually for people’s expectations, as part of the following in Guild Wars 1 there was communication on the wiki with the devs and release notes and more statements of intent, more detailed transcribed documentation on what they were doing basically. When ANet reps communicated back then, we just knew what they meant. Naturally as the build up occurred towards Guild Wars 2, many people thought they knew what ANet meant as they always had. Obviously things turned out the way they did, and now communication from ANet feels far less genuine and feels like it holds a lot more spin than it used to. This is just me personally speaking of course based on my experiences and from conversation with the people that I played Guild Wars with.

I followed this game religiously and very very little surprised me. The addition of ascended gear DID surprise me, and I said at the time, I’ll wait and see how it plays out. To me it’s fine. It doesn’t stop me from doing anything I want to do in the game. I have characters with and without ascended gear and I do most of the same stuff on all of them, the exception being high level fractals.

The problem is, most people see this vertical progression thing as this huge breech of promise, when in fact, vertical progression was in the game from day one. Beyond that, however, most people who play this game, the overwhelming majority, don’t even know what vertical progression is.

I’m willing to wager less than 25% of the game’s population know or understand vertical progression as a concept at all. Of those who do understand it, not everyone is against it.

So the question is, what percentage of the player base is negatively affected by this and what percentage of the player base is positively affected?

That sounds like the ends justify the means, which in this scenario show’s a company is more concerned about the bottom line than it’s existing playerbase. I already feel like ANet is less of a players’ company than they were, which may not make sense to some due to them likely having increased their audience. But every other MMO already had vertical progression. ANet was the company who’s online rpg didn’t have it. Their grind was purely cosmetic and for title. Their grind didn’t impact gameplay and it didn’t impact combat, save the first 30 or so hours to level and the minor impact to PvE skills. That’s what their playerbase liked, and now they’re doing the same things every other company else does to pull a larger share of the overall market instead of catering towards the market they did have. So to me they feel like less of a players’ company because they don’t cater towards what their existing playerbase wants, they make decisions to gain a larger share of the overall market. Which is good for business, but bad for the needs of playerbase that they had. They pretty much abondoned the don’t do vertical progression, don’t let grind impact combat gameplay philosophy and thereby alienated that whole part of the community.

Sylvari Elementalist – Mystree Duskbloom (Lv 80)
Norn Guardian – Aurora Lustyr (Lv 80)
Mia A Shadows Glow – Human Thief (Lv 80)

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

He said it, but there was vertical progression in Guild Wars 2 from day one since 80th level exotics are better than 80th level rares. More to the point, Anet also said that ascended gear was meant to be in at launch but it didn’t make it on time.

So it would have been just another level of gear that the game launched with. Which presumably wouldnt’ have been a problem.

There’s nothing that can be done about the past. It’s history, the game launched with substancial vertical progression, even though I didn’t understand it at that time. ANet’s history before that was not vertical progression, because of this it makes sense that people such as myself would impose as much pressure as possible to prevent any further vertical progression and to push for the grind to continually be lessened on that vertical progression.

snip

I followed this game religiously and very very little surprised me. The addition of ascended gear DID surprise me, and I said at the time, I’ll wait and see how it plays out. To me it’s fine. It doesn’t stop me from doing anything I want to do in the game. I have characters with and without ascended gear and I do most of the same stuff on all of them, the exception being high level fractals.

The problem is, most people see this vertical progression thing as this huge breech of promise, when in fact, vertical progression was in the game from day one. Beyond that, however, most people who play this game, the overwhelming majority, don’t even know what vertical progression is.

I’m willing to wager less than 25% of the game’s population know or understand vertical progression as a concept at all. Of those who do understand it, not everyone is against it.

So the question is, what percentage of the player base is negatively affected by this and what percentage of the player base is positively affected?

That sounds like the ends justify the means, which in this scenario show’s a company is more concerned about the bottom line than it’s existing playerbase. I already feel like ANet is less of a players’ company than they were, which may not make sense to some due to them likely having increased their audience. But every other MMO already had vertical progression. ANet was the company who’s online rpg didn’t have it. Their grind was purely cosmetic and for title. Their grind didn’t impact gameplay and it didn’t impact combat, save the first 30 or so hours to level and the minor impact to PvE skills. That’s what their playerbase liked, and now they’re doing the same things every other company else does to pull a larger share of the overall market instead of catering towards the market they did have. So to me they feel like less of a players’ company because they don’t cater towards what their existing playerbase wants, they make decisions to gain a larger share of the overall market. Which is good for business, but bad for the needs of playerbase that they had. They pretty much abondoned the don’t do vertical progression, don’t let grind impact combat gameplay philosophy and thereby alienated that whole part of the community.

So you think the Guild Wars community would have been better served letting the game settle into oblivion? Because that’s what would have happened.

This game has much higher operating budget that Guild Wars 1 did, with five times the number of employees, bigger headquarters, etc. This game would have languished and died without players. There aren’t enough players like you and even me. Sad to say, but true.

So yeah I like the idea of no real vertical progression but Anet has to worry about feeding families of the people that work for them, in addition to being loyal. But even then you’re missing the point.

Because I’m no less a loyal Guild Wars fan than you are, and I LIKE the changes. So do others I know. So only SOME of the Guild Wars fans felt betrayed not all of them. There are an awful lot of guys running around with GWAMM titles who seem to like this game.

So in your mind betraying you (while not betraying me) is a betrayal of Guild Wars 1 players. Well, sorry to tell you, not all of us feel betrayed. So what did Anet really do?

They made a decision for the benefit of their game…which some of us don’t mind and some actively like.

They betrayed, your words, a portion of their playerbase. In my mind, letting the game languish would have betrayed a bigger portion.

Things aren’t so black and white as you’re painting them.

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Posted by: Shifty.5187

Shifty.5187

So you think the Guild Wars community would have been better served letting the game settle into oblivion? Because that’s what would have happened.

This game has much higher operating budget that Guild Wars 1 did, with five times the number of employees, bigger headquarters, etc. This game would have languished and died without players. There aren’t enough players like you and even me. Sad to say, but true.

What would be the reason they can’t just say that this is the case?

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Posted by: morrolan.9608

morrolan.9608

The problem is, most people see this vertical progression thing as this huge breech of promise, when in fact, vertical progression was in the game from day one.

It was and I for one said as much even before ascended items were introduced. However if anything it makes it worse given that wasn’t a panicked reaction to players reaching endgame and leaving. It was in the game from day 1 when they promised it wouldn’t be. The ascended items just brought the issue into focus.

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Posted by: marnick.4305

marnick.4305

The grind is what really gets my gears though. How can a company go from 0 power progression to over over 10% disparities on weapons and armor and ridiculous disparities on runes and sigils. That in combination with the trading post being the only viable way of obtaining the items… just look at the prices of the best stat items. How can you expect someone to get a full set of max gear and mods in a day or two like it was so easy to do in Guild Wars? You can’t because the current systems don’t allow it.

Let’s, for sake of argument, assume you’re serious.

A brand new account didn’t get max gear in GW1 and wouldn’t in GW2 either. So let’s assume alts because that’s the only way you could donate max gear.

1/ you’ll have a ton of leftover laurels > rings and amu
2/ depending on activity you’ll have commendations > earrings
3/ back piece depends on your financial situation but southsun backs will do in a pinch
4/ exotic armor costs less than 10 gold in total.

Bam. Fully geared minutes after dinging 80. What are you complaining about?

If you don’t want to spend money on armor, you could run a few dungeons or use karma jugs to get max armor for free.

If I can’t play Guild Wars 2 at work, I won’t work in Guild Wars 2 either.
Delayed content is eventually good. Rushed content is eternally bad. ~ Shigeru Miyamoto

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

So you think the Guild Wars community would have been better served letting the game settle into oblivion? Because that’s what would have happened.

This game has much higher operating budget that Guild Wars 1 did, with five times the number of employees, bigger headquarters, etc. This game would have languished and died without players. There aren’t enough players like you and even me. Sad to say, but true.

What would be the reason they can’t just say that this is the case?

No business ever says they’re in danger of failing unless they have no choice. The negative publicity hurts sales. You never give the enemy ammuntion to use against you. People would then go and say it’s a failed game.

Have you seen what this community does if Anet says ANYTHING. Do you know the kind of trollign that would go on here?

Anet is not responsible to say everything to the fans, because a portion of the fanbase isn’t trustworthy. It’s why Rift didn’t call server closes server closes. It would have been horribly stupid of them to say this.

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Posted by: Shockwave.1230

Shockwave.1230

So you think the Guild Wars community would have been better served letting the game settle into oblivion? Because that’s what would have happened.

This game has much higher operating budget that Guild Wars 1 did, with five times the number of employees, bigger headquarters, etc. This game would have languished and died without players. There aren’t enough players like you and even me. Sad to say, but true.

So yeah I like the idea of no real vertical progression but Anet has to worry about feeding families of the people that work for them, in addition to being loyal. But even then you’re missing the point.

Because I’m no less a loyal Guild Wars fan than you are, and I LIKE the changes. So do others I know. So only SOME of the Guild Wars fans felt betrayed not all of them. There are an awful lot of guys running around with GWAMM titles who seem to like this game.

So in your mind betraying you (while not betraying me) is a betrayal of Guild Wars 1 players. Well, sorry to tell you, not all of us feel betrayed. So what did Anet really do?

They made a decision for the benefit of their game…which some of us don’t mind and some actively like.

They betrayed, your words, a portion of their playerbase. In my mind, letting the game languish would have betrayed a bigger portion.

Things aren’t so black and white as you’re painting them.

No one is saying they were unjustified to lookout for themselves. Companies do it all the time. NC Soft and ArenaNet are bringing in far more revenue now, great for them. The market that likes vertical power progression has another system in another game they can play, wonderful.

What I’m saying is that they abondend their philosophy of not doing vertical progression that impacts gameplay. They didn’t have to abondon that philosophy, but they did.

They could have chose to stick with that philosophy and things would have played out differently. Would it have been better or worse? No one really knows for sure, but they probably would have had more players than Guild Wars but less than they have now, because it seems like the larger portion of the gaming community does want power progression, which they already have an abundance from every MMO. Would they have done their hirings and budget differently too? Probably. Would the game be different? Definitely. A lot different? It would be fairly different. Is that good or bad? It’s just different. Would they be hearing about how people are upset about grind for vertical progression? Not if they had stuck with their original philosophy, and maybe had a sprinkle of it like they had previously done.

They had however many millions of copies of Guild Wars sold, and it was sold on the idea of quality buy to play CONTENT. It wasn’t about vertical progression to suck you in and make your character more powerful or about a monthly fee to suck you into playing. Just pick it up, put it down as much as you want. Enjoy the content, enjoy the stories, repeat content and dive into the lore, progress your title’s for bragging rights if you want, and progress your character’s look if you want. There’s still more to it than just these things obviously.

Still millions of copies sold without power progression being a theme of the game, which allows players to focus on so much more than their character’s power. It was obviously a different concept, but still successful and enjoyed.

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Posted by: maddoctor.2738

maddoctor.2738

What I’m saying is that they abondend their philosophy of not doing vertical progression that impacts gameplay. They didn’t have to abondon that philosophy, but they did.

Ascended is the last gear tier and it was needed to introduce new ways of getting it without requiring the over-farmed ways to get the other gear types. Gold/karma/crafting were flawed and imbalanced designs in the first place, relying only on your luck to get what you need or excessive hours farming at certain places. They didn’t abandon their philosophy, yet, I haven’t seen a constant tier increase with Ascended gear, yet, so until that time comes, the amount of vertical progression in the game is at the bare minimum.

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Posted by: marnick.4305

marnick.4305

What I’m saying is that they abondend their philosophy of not doing vertical progression that impacts gameplay. They didn’t have to abondon that philosophy, but they did.

Ascended is the last gear tier and it was needed to introduce new ways of getting it without requiring the over-farmed ways to get the other gear types. Gold/karma/crafting were flawed and imbalanced designs in the first place, relying only on your luck to get what you need or excessive hours farming at certain places. They didn’t abandon their philosophy, yet, I haven’t seen a constant tier increase with Ascended gear, yet, so until that time comes, the amount of vertical progression in the game is at the bare minimum.

Indeed. He wants to see extreme VP so takes the extremely shallow and optional VP currently in the game and expands that into a flawed argument.

Not even half the gear slots are currently of ascended quality, whereas in other games at the 1 year mark, about 2 full tiers had been released. Furthermore exotic is viable everywhere except fractals.

While there’s a little bit of VP in this game, it is well implemented and I hope it remains at this level for a very long time. After ascended armor comes legendary armor and then nothing.

If I can’t play Guild Wars 2 at work, I won’t work in Guild Wars 2 either.
Delayed content is eventually good. Rushed content is eternally bad. ~ Shigeru Miyamoto

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

So you think the Guild Wars community would have been better served letting the game settle into oblivion? Because that’s what would have happened.

Snip

So in your mind betraying you (while not betraying me) is a betrayal of Guild Wars 1 players. Well, sorry to tell you, not all of us feel betrayed. So what did Anet really do?

They made a decision for the benefit of their game…which some of us don’t mind and some actively like.

They betrayed, your words, a portion of their playerbase. In my mind, letting the game languish would have betrayed a bigger portion.

Things aren’t so black and white as you’re painting them.

No one is saying they were unjustified to lookout for themselves. Companies do it all the time. NC Soft and ArenaNet are bringing in far more revenue now, great for them. The market that likes vertical power progression has another system in another game they can play, wonderful.

What I’m saying is that they abondend their philosophy of not doing vertical progression that impacts gameplay. They didn’t have to abondon that philosophy, but they did.

They could have chose to stick with that philosophy and things would have played out differently. Would it have been better or worse? No one really knows for sure, but they probably would have had more players than Guild Wars but less than they have now, because it seems like the larger portion of the gaming community does want power progression, which they already have an abundance from every MMO. Would they have done their hirings and budget differently too? Probably. Would the game be different? Definitely. A lot different? It would be fairly different. Is that good or bad? It’s just different. Would they be hearing about how people are upset about grind for vertical progression? Not if they had stuck with their original philosophy, and maybe had a sprinkle of it like they had previously done.

They had however many millions of copies of Guild Wars sold, and it was sold on the idea of quality buy to play CONTENT. It wasn’t about vertical progression to suck you in and make your character more powerful or about a monthly fee to suck you into playing. Just pick it up, put it down as much as you want. Enjoy the content, enjoy the stories, repeat content and dive into the lore, progress your title’s for bragging rights if you want, and progress your character’s look if you want. There’s still more to it than just these things obviously.

Still millions of copies sold without power progression being a theme of the game, which allows players to focus on so much more than their character’s power. It was obviously a different concept, but still successful and enjoyed.

They abandoned? Really?

You’re trying to say this game has full on vertical progression. So far, it has ONE TIER OF GEAR. That’s it. Actually sorry I’m wrong.

It was one tier of ACCESSORIES.

I think abandoning their vision, all things considering is a little strong.

What Anet did was compromise. Reasonable people are usually for compromise. If you have to have it all your own way, then in my opinion you’re not being reasonable.

It’s not reasonable to say I want this and Anet didn’t do this so I’ve been betrayed. Particularly when so many Guild Wars 1 players ARE playing and enjoying this game.

And if you continue to compare this to Guild Wars 1, which remained a niche game and was always a niche game, I’ll remind you, again, that the staff is five times the size and a niche game won’t pay their salaries.

From what I see, a bunch of Guild Wars 1 people got it in their head that ALL vertical progression is a gear grind and thus a bad thing. I don’t ever feel like I’m grinding in this game. Because I choose not to grind. We don’t have a gear treadmill. And since vertical progression was in the game AT LAUNCH, Anet abandoned nothing.

I think some people are way to attached to vertical progression being negative automatically. It can BECOME negative, if not watched, but Anet hasn’t flooded the market with gear tier after gear tier.

Sorry but the response of a small portion of the fan base doesn’t indicate Anet abandoned anything.

In fact, this game is the true spiritual successor to Guild Wars 1. Want to know why? Because Anet is innovating and trying different things, and that’s precisely what Anet did with Guild Wars 1.

Guild Wars 1 players wanted Guild Wars 1.5…but then that wouldn’t be a true successor to Guild Wars 1. Because it wouldn’t have been as innovative.

Guild Wars 1 was hailed as a landmark game because it innovated. Now Anet is experimenting and innovating again. So Guild Wars 2 is the true spiritual successor to Guild Wars 1.

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Posted by: cesmode.4257

cesmode.4257

You do know that while ascended gear is currently limited to accessories, amulets, rings…they plan on releasing a full gear set of ascended? They said by the years end we will be able to fit out an entire gear set of ascended gear.

So no, it isnt limited to just accessories. We will have our ascended gear set. And if the level cap ever raises, that gear becomes obsolete(unless they allow ascended gear to scale with your level). And if they allow ascended gear to scale with your level, that pressures other people to grind for ascended gear so they can have their scalable gear.

Woa speculation I know.

And response from a small % of the playerbase? Try a thread containing 40,000+ posts in November, largely kitten ed off about ascended gear. And if ascended gear was always planned, as they claim, how come they didnt let us know about it for three months, or even in beta? They KNEW releasing ascended gear was going to annoy a lot of people, and they said they knew this. So why not avoid all trouble, release the game, and say “hey we do have more gear coming down in a few months., a higher tier. A one time treadmill only”. No, they didnt do that, instead they just annoyed a ton of people when they could have avoided a lot of it. So no, I really dont think it was planned.

Karma is as abundant as air, and as useless as the Kardashians.

(edited by cesmode.4257)

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Posted by: cesmode.4257

cesmode.4257

What I’m saying is that they abondend their philosophy of not doing vertical progression that impacts gameplay. They didn’t have to abondon that philosophy, but they did.

Ascended is the last gear tier and it was needed to introduce new ways of getting it without requiring the over-farmed ways to get the other gear types. Gold/karma/crafting were flawed and imbalanced designs in the first place, relying only on your luck to get what you need or excessive hours farming at certain places. They didn’t abandon their philosophy, yet, I haven’t seen a constant tier increase with Ascended gear, yet, so until that time comes, the amount of vertical progression in the game is at the bare minimum.

Indeed. He wants to see extreme VP so takes the extremely shallow and optional VP currently in the game and expands that into a flawed argument.

Not even half the gear slots are currently of ascended quality, whereas in other games at the 1 year mark, about 2 full tiers had been released. Furthermore exotic is viable everywhere except fractals.

While there’s a little bit of VP in this game, it is well implemented and I hope it remains at this level for a very long time. After ascended armor comes legendary armor and then nothing.

Yes, in one year you get one, two or even three tiers of gear. Takes about a month or so of grinding raids and rep to gain a near full set of the new tier gear. True.

Takes about a month or so to grind the laurels + ecto to gain an ascended..amulet? Whichever one requires the ecto. Takes about as long to gain that back piece, if you’re not playing 10 hours per day. See where Im going?

Takes as long to gain one slot of ascended gear than it does to gain a full set of max tier gear in a game like WoW. So tell me, what not grindy and not pure example of verticle progression?

Karma is as abundant as air, and as useless as the Kardashians.

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Posted by: LordByron.8369

LordByron.8369

Guild Wars 1 was hailed as a landmark game because it innovated. Now Anet is experimenting and innovating again. So Guild Wars 2 is the true spiritual successor to Guild Wars 1.

Do you think that using a concept like vertical progression that is the KEY of OLD SCHOOL mmorg is innovation?

Its actually the opposite i’d say.

GW2 balance:
A PvE player is supposed to avoid a 1-2 second 1 shotting aoe.
A WWW player is considered uncapable of avoiding a 5,75 second aoe for half his health.

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

You do know that while ascended gear is currently limited to accessories, amulets, rings…they plan on releasing a full gear set of ascended? They said by the years end we will be able to fit out an entire gear set of ascended gear.

So no, it isnt limited to just accessories. We will have our ascended gear set. And if the level cap ever raises, that gear becomes obsolete(unless they allow ascended gear to scale with your level). And if they allow ascended gear to scale with your level, that pressures other people to grind for ascended gear so they can have their scalable gear.

Woa speculation I know.

And response from a small % of the playerbase? Try a thread containing 40,000+ posts in November, largely kitten ed off about ascended gear. And if ascended gear was always planned, as they claim, how come they didnt let us know about it for three months, or even in beta? They KNEW releasing ascended gear was going to annoy a lot of people, and they said they knew this. So why not avoid all trouble, release the game, and say “hey we do have more gear coming down in a few months., a higher tier. A one time treadmill only”. No, they didnt do that, instead they just annoyed a ton of people when they could have avoided a lot of it. So no, I really dont think it was planned.

I’ll believe it when I see it. And when I see it it still might not be a problem for me. Again, Guild Wars 1 had, through skills, vertical progression.

What I don’t want, and what I’ve never wanted, is a full on gear treadmill. Adding the a tier of gear over an entire year slowly, particularly if there’s many and easy ways to get it does not a treadmill make.

More importantly, I don’t want to see content gated by gear, with the exception of the Fractals what was put there for that reason.

So even if ascended armor and weapons do get into the game, we don’t know how much of an affect it will have. For example the ascended stuff that’s in the game now doesn’t affect me at all. I can easily ignore it, or get it when I happen to have enough laurels.

Adding ascended gear doesn’t make a treadmill. And again, they still said it was supposed to be in the game at launch. Why do people keep ignoring that?

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

Guild Wars 1 was hailed as a landmark game because it innovated. Now Anet is experimenting and innovating again. So Guild Wars 2 is the true spiritual successor to Guild Wars 1.

Do you think that using a concept like vertical progression that is the KEY of OLD SCHOOL mmorg is innovation?

Its actually the opposite i’d say.

You say that as if vertical progression is the only thing in the entire game. As if vertical progression is so important and such an issue that nothing else Anet is doing matters. And as long as you’re blinded by vertical progression, then there’s nothing to say on the matter.

Anet has brought together a whole lot of different things to make this game different from other MMOs in spite of the TINY BIT of vertical progression in the game. And that’s all it is….a tiny bit.

It’s like saying Guild Wars 1 wasn’t ground breaking because they had an energy bar, and so did other games. What makes a game innovative isn’t the one thing that a company does that others do, but how they changed the genre and moved it forward.

Anet is TRYING different things. Rift and Warhammer both had forms of dynamic events, but neither had the bottle to remove the traditional quest hub system. The removal of the energy bar is another thing Anet did. Not competing for nodes or kills, the downed state in an MMO, taking away the trinity, jumping puzzles, and now the living story are all ways that Anet is innovating.

That makes it the true spiritual successor to Guild Wars 1 (particularly since Guild Wars 1 had vertical progression as well).

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Posted by: Wolfheart.1938

Wolfheart.1938

He’s not referring to vertical progression as something innovative I believe. He’s saying that GW2 is innovative as a whole and that it is because Arenanet keeps experimenting just as they did with GW1. Take an old element and see how it can work in a different environment under different philosophies. That is innovation.

Sorry if I got that wrong, my english isn’t that great.

(I didn’t like the introduction of Ascended items, putting this out to prevent flaming)

“We have no first-person view because stupid people would lock into it”
“You can’t have more than 10 HS decks because that would confuse people”
“30 fps is more cinematic”

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

What I’m saying is that they abondend their philosophy of not doing vertical progression that impacts gameplay. They didn’t have to abondon that philosophy, but they did.

Ascended is the last gear tier and it was needed to introduce new ways of getting it without requiring the over-farmed ways to get the other gear types. Gold/karma/crafting were flawed and imbalanced designs in the first place, relying only on your luck to get what you need or excessive hours farming at certain places. They didn’t abandon their philosophy, yet, I haven’t seen a constant tier increase with Ascended gear, yet, so until that time comes, the amount of vertical progression in the game is at the bare minimum.

Indeed. He wants to see extreme VP so takes the extremely shallow and optional VP currently in the game and expands that into a flawed argument.

Not even half the gear slots are currently of ascended quality, whereas in other games at the 1 year mark, about 2 full tiers had been released. Furthermore exotic is viable everywhere except fractals.

While there’s a little bit of VP in this game, it is well implemented and I hope it remains at this level for a very long time. After ascended armor comes legendary armor and then nothing.

Yes, in one year you get one, two or even three tiers of gear. Takes about a month or so of grinding raids and rep to gain a near full set of the new tier gear. True.

Takes about a month or so to grind the laurels + ecto to gain an ascended..amulet? Whichever one requires the ecto. Takes about as long to gain that back piece, if you’re not playing 10 hours per day. See where Im going?

Takes as long to gain one slot of ascended gear than it does to gain a full set of max tier gear in a game like WoW. So tell me, what not grindy and not pure example of verticle progression?

Umm no. It doesn’t take a month to grind laurels. It takes a month to GET laurels. You’re not grinding them, unless you’re just a terribad player. There are numerous ways to get laurels. You can SPvP to get them. You can WvW to get them. You can PvE to get them. Hell half the stuff you can do in dungeons.

With the badges you get from WvW, you can spend even less laurels to get ascended gear.

In other games you get this next tier of gear here, here and here, specifically. This is NOT a gear treadmill. It works differently. It follows different rules. And there’s not a whole lot in this game that’s denied to you if you don’t have that gear. High level fractals and nothing else. Meaning someone with NO ascended gear and still see every fractal.

What other MMO can make a claim like that?

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Posted by: cesmode.4257

cesmode.4257

-Grind was bad choice of words. Get laurels yes. Still takes a month to get them. Time vs reward.

-https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/linsey-murdock-unveils-new-high-end-ascended-gear/

“As we release more new end game content in the future, you’ll see more Infusions and Ascended item types being added to the game. Eventually, you’ll be able to kit yourself out with a full set of Ascended gear and high end Infusions to help give you the edge in end game content.”

True, she doesn’t say armor or weapons, but she sais a full set of ascended gear. I take that as a full set of ascended gear. A full set is not limited to accessories. A full set is a full set..armor…weapons. They are coming. A very very high probability.

-I can still see every raid in WoW. If I enter with my guild, the game doesn;t stop me from entering. It prevents me from queuing if I use LFR, but I can zone in normally if I wanted to with my guild. I can be in pure blues and crap lvl 90 gear and see all raids if I wanted. (at least this was the case when I played up until this expansion).

Karma is as abundant as air, and as useless as the Kardashians.

(edited by cesmode.4257)