Guild Wars 2

There really aren’t many “grinds” in Guild Wars 2. There are very few instances where you have to sit on monsters and continually kill them to make progress.

The three biggest grinds are actually Legendary Weapons, Fractal Weapons, and Cultural Sets. The armor just require you to grind for gold, and is not much of a problem. Specific weapons, however, do not drop from specific bosses, making them straight RNG, requiring hours of work with 99% chance of failure when trying to get fractal skins or precursors.

There is also no need/want/pass system with fractals to give your friend the weapon she wants and vice versa.

The weapons are especially a annoying because you waste time and money, and the act is generally regarded as not fun.

Laurels, dungeons skins, etc. are not grinds. Why? Because ArenaNet is trying their hardest to make sure you don’t grind them.

So hard in fact that they have developed another system: Time Gating. This has been more commonly known as Diminishing Returns in many cases, forcing you to stop what you are doing because “time’s up, you’ve farmed too much”, but DR doesn’t really apply to the way the token system works. Instead, the token system (including the newly introduced laurels) has you doing easy tasks, but gate how soon you can achieve your goal. If you want ascended gear, you can only get 1 per 20 days with laurels. This erects a gate that stops the speed at which you progress…

…Which would be fine if not for the other problem currently in place: There is no alternative way to achieve the same goal. The only way to get laurel rewards is with an account bound daily and monthly. This makes it very difficult for the players who want to power towards their goal for the sake of different builds or alts. Instead, they run into an impassable time gate.

ArenaNet said that releasing ascended gear only in fractals was a mistake, and at first only as a frustrating RNG drop before introducing a 10 day time gate per character (still waiting to buy weapon skins with my thousands of tokens). Now they’ve made the same mistake a second time, by only releasing new ascended gear through one avenue.

When players keep hitting this wall without any alternative, they begin to get frustrated. This is what happened shortly after DR was first introduced early in the game’s lifespan, and is happening again with the new gear tiers. Complaints will likely never fully go away, but ArenaNet please consider how future ascended gear is handled, because right now it feels really… grindy and restrictive. Even if it was not meant to be that way.

tl;dr sherlock holmes is coming to tyria with time gates to super-kitten-lazerbeam all of starfleet… wait

BTW on top of all this negativity, Guild Wars 2 is still an amazing and beautiful game. There are just many areas that have been getting on my nerves recently that ruin my experience with the game.

Your post is beautiful. Thank you my good man. Thank you.

I agree in the most part with what you say. Guild Wars 2 was a game with no grind at all, except the cultural armors and the legendary weapons, which were not mandatory and therefore could not really be considered as “heavy grind”, as you say. However, all this changed since the introduction of the ascended tier. There is only ONE way to acquire each piece of ascended gear, thus making the promises of non-grind and liberty to the player simple marketing tricks. I mean that we are FORCED to log in daily in order to acquire the new amulet as well as perform consecutive runs of the Fractals of the Mists dungeon. I once thanked ArenaNet for making a great game for us, casuals, and right now I regret having done so. Let alone the fact that there are not many stat combinations for the ascended gear. For example there is no power, precision, toughness gear and therefore the liberty of making your character exactly as you want also goes away.
There are also those who defend the ascended and say “what difference are 5 points gonna make?”. Well, it is not just 5 points, it is much more, if you consider the fact of a full ascended set coming soon enough.
Generally, speaking, I could HAVE said that GW2 has no grind 2 months ago, but right now, I am very disappointed and I am just watching how things are going to evolve…

Lanser.8520:

tl;dr sherlock holmes is coming to tyria with time gates to super-kitten-lazerbeam all of starfleet… wait

QFT, and those grinds you mentioned are by player’s choice, by the way and not entirely game breaking.

Happyfool.8951:

Lanser.8520:

QFT, and those grinds you mentioned are by player’s choice, by the way and not entirely game breaking.

Well, once you get the full ascended set out and in order to complete the new dungeon, you are going to need the extra ascended stats, we ’ll see what is and what is not game breaking.

Stefanos.1673:

Happyfool.8951:

Lanser.8520:

QFT, and those grinds you mentioned are by player’s choice, by the way and not entirely game breaking.

Well, once you get the full ascended set out and in order to complete the new dungeon, you are going to need the extra ascended stats, we ’ll see what is and what is not game breaking.

In addition to that, as a WvW player in a WvW guild, having everyone outfitted with ascended gear could mean the difference between life and death. An extra few damage or defense points goes a long way in a group environment.

Also, fractals has received a hard cap gear check that requires ascended gear, instead of increasing enemy toughness and clever player strategy before the patch. I was happily headed for 50 or 60, learning how to dodge all the agony attacks and keep me and my team alive, and now the game tells me I can’t go past 40 because I don’t have the correct gear?

So for me and many players, it is not optional to get this gear tier.

(As for the first 3 grind, its more about a fun and long journey to a great reward instead of a long and rather boring and frustrating journey to a great reward)
—-

Generally, speaking, I could HAVE said that GW2 has no grind 2 months ago, but right now, I am very disappointed and I am just watching how things are going to evolve…

Again, taking a month to get a piece of gear is just a delay instead of a grind. You don’t sit in once place and kill something over and over, you do varied tasks once, but only once, a day. If you want to reach your goal faster, you can’t, because you can’t grind. You are literally disallowed from grinding.

ArenaNet creates an artificial stop that prevents grinding, and is then met with complaints from those who can’t grind, and instead have to wait 20 days for their shiny. We just don’t have proper terminology to describe why we are feeling this way, so most resort to “it’s a grind!”

You know what’s a grind? Killing hundreds of minotaurs for 100 exp each to try and gain a level.

But I also run 2 fractal runs a day to get nothing from my daily chest when I want specific weapon skins, so I’m not innocent either.

Vertical progression is a non-optional gear grind plain and simple. It is counter to the stated philosophy of Anet for the game and, as such, is inexplicable. I don’t know what they were thinking and I no longer trust what they say. Judging from the recent videos they are just a bunch of kids with little gaming experience making it up as the go. They have shown the propensity to turn on a dime without looking back when it comes to design philosophy. Again, I don’t trust a word they say.

Lanser.8520:

So for me and many players, it is not optional to get this gear tier.

It never was…
As for WvW, I do not really know a lot about that. I am mostly occupied with exploration and playing casually with my guild and friends. The only time I farmed a bit was when I gathered 60 gold by doing events around the world. However, now, I feel that things are just like other MMOs. I believe that this unfortunate change was a result of ArenaNet getting greedier with its plans, as well as because of a number of people whinning about totally irrelevant things in the forums.

Raine.1394:

Vertical progression is a non-optional gear grind plain and simple. It is counter to the stated philosophy of Anet for the game and, as such, is inexplicable. I don’t know what they were thinking and I no longer trust what they say.

Totally agreed.

Raine.1394:

Judging from the videos they are just a bunch of kids with little gaming experience making it up as the go. They have shown the propensity to turn on a dime without looking back when it comes to design philosophy. I don’t trust a word they say.

Totally disagreed. ArenaNet has proved to be a great MMO publisher during the last years [Guild Wars 1, City of Heroes, Aion (at first)] and it seemed like GW2 was going to be THE game.

Raine.1394:

Vertical progression is a non-optional gear grind plain and simple. It is counter to the stated philosophy of Anet for the game and, as such, is inexplicable. I don’t know what they were thinking and I no longer trust what they say. Judging from the videos they are just a bunch of kids with little gaming experience making it up as the go. They have shown the propensity to turn on a dime without looking back when it comes to design philosophy. I don’t trust a word they say.

Bioware this last year made me lose all blind trust in developers. They still need to make money, and this is their job, and this is their game. I take what they say with a grain of salt, but am still pretty heavily biased in favour of Anet.

Stefanos.1673:

I believe that this unfortunate change was a result of ArenaNet getting greedier with its plans, as well as because of a number of people whinning about totally irrelevant things in the forums.

Forums are the pit where rational thinking normally goes to die. Its also the culmination of the majority of the complaints, and very little praise. Why be vocal about something that works? Be vocal about something you think needs fixing.

I think Anet is doing more experimentation than being greedy. We like familiarity, so trying to balance the grind and very time focused content we are familiar with, with content that is suppose to be more fun and varied, is a bit difficult.

Balancing gear is even more difficult, because you don’t want players going through and one-shoting every other part of the game with the new gear. Anet has just stumbled in a few locations.

The thing that gets me is that they stumble on the same bear trap after acknowledging that the trap exists and painting it neon yellow.

Timed Gate and diminishing returns doesn’t remove the grind. It just makes the grind longer. They’re not fun or enjoyable, They’re repetitive.

Kill 20,000 Elementals to get 250 lodestones and some other materials for this sword. That is repetitive.

Go onto this epic journey that test your skill to receive this reward. That should be ideal gameplay.

Lanser.8520:

I think Anet is doing more experimentation than being greedy.

I had been thinking that the matter could only be resolved by the time an expansion sees an actual release.

There’s no required grind in guild wars 2.

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

There’s no required grind in guild wars 2.

Ascended gear.

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

There’s no required grind in guild wars 2.

You are also not required to play the game at all.

Again, as a WvWer, the difference in the gear grind is life and death for me and my guild.

Also best username.

Stefanos.1673:

Raine.1394:

Vertical progression is a non-optional gear grind plain and simple. It is counter to the stated philosophy of Anet for the game and, as such, is inexplicable. I don’t know what they were thinking and I no longer trust what they say.

Totally agreed.

Raine.1394:

Judging from the videos they are just a bunch of kids with little gaming experience making it up as the go. They have shown the propensity to turn on a dime without looking back when it comes to design philosophy. I don’t trust a word they say.

Totally disagreed. ArenaNet has proved to be a great MMO publisher during the last years [Guild Wars 1, City of Heroes, Aion (at first)] and it seemed like GW2 was going to be THE game.

I agree wholeheartedly that Anet seemed to be a great MMO publisher. After all, the game world and many design choices indicate that. Sadly, where they’ve chosen to take the game is not consistent with their stated philosophy and I believe inexperience in gaming is a factor in the choices they have made.

runeblade.7514:

Kill 20,000 Elementals to get 250 lodestones and some other materials for this sword. That is repetitive.

Go onto this epic journey that test your skill to receive this reward. That should be ideal gameplay.

Exactly! Exactly! That’s what raids/dungeons are supposed to be for but instead, in GW2, you just have a miniscule chance at getting something worth a couple of gold to sell on the TP. It’s so frustrating! Why would I want to play content like that?

Reward vs. time invested is absolutely worthless. You could hit max level and equip max gear a different MMO in the same amount of time it would take you to equip full ascended and a couple of legendaries in GW2. And this is supposed to be the non-grindy MMO? It’s most grindy of them all – except that all that grind happens after you hit max level.

Anet’s logic with this totally blows my mind. Why do they have to have better stats? That’s supposed to be against everything ANet stands for.

RNG force you to stop the grinding, the grinding dont go away (you still need alot of everything to complete anything in this game) but it force you to stop it as a time staller, makes sence right? Funny enough buying gems fix it like a bypass, Anet is happy as ever.

Anet make so called nerf changes several times and confuse players way to much, its like they change their own rules to the game back and forth all the time.

WE are so tired and frustrated of this Anet, please stop it!

Zonzai.2341:

It’s most grindy of them all – except that all that grind happens after you hit max level.

That is actually an interesting comment I’ve never thought about before.

I’ve never personally done a full raid, but I know it can be upwards of twelve hours with very tough bosses and very organized players. I always though you had to grind lower raids to get your gear checked to enter to higher ones?

I’m not sure how much skill is involved in those raids, but I do like it when skill and knowledge of an encounter is the deciding factor on whether or not you make it out of there alive.

Level 28 mobs and 31 bosses against your measly little level 20 player group in GW1 comes to mind. You are fighting something many times more powerful than you. Sure they are tough, but if you learn how to approach them, you can win without any gear check.

Stefanos.1673:

Raine.1394:

Vertical progression is a non-optional gear grind plain and simple. It is counter to the stated philosophy of Anet for the game and, as such, is inexplicable. I don’t know what they were thinking and I no longer trust what they say.

Totally agreed.

Raine.1394:

Judging from the videos they are just a bunch of kids with little gaming experience making it up as the go. They have shown the propensity to turn on a dime without looking back when it comes to design philosophy. I don’t trust a word they say.

Totally disagreed. ArenaNet has proved to be a great MMO publisher during the last years [Guild Wars 1, City of Heroes, Aion (at first)] and it seemed like GW2 was going to be THE game.

Anet didn’t make those two games, But, I too, disagree with him. GW1 was a very well made game.

Stefanos.1673:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

There’s no required grind in guild wars 2.

Ascended gear.

Which you are NOT required to get. The minimal increase does very little to make you stronger, and what little increase it DOES make, accounts for NOTHING if you can’t hit the person that’s killing you.

EDIT: Fractals being the exception

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

There’s no required grind in guild wars 2.

Only for those who don’t understand vertical progression. Google it. Educate yourself and then we can talk.

If you don’t WvW, then you have no idea how grindy this game can become. Simply because you “HAVE” to grind on a dungeon every day just to afford to play WvW. As it’s already been mentioned, Ascended gear is a must to your survival. Which in itself is costly. Because armor repairing is darn expensive! If you hard core WvW and not punk out of every fight, you will be spending Gold each day in WvW.

There’s nothing in PvE that compares. And, I’m not even touching siege cost and the cost of upgrading camps/towers/Keeps/ and the Castle.

Grind+Grind+Grind=Grind even more. Even the new laurel’s is a joke what the daily gives you in siege.

With all that said I’m still a sucker for the game and play it every day! I just broke as heck all the time…

Were people doing dailys before? yes. Were there umpteen billion posts saying dailys were a grind before the introduction of laurels? No. But now that you can actually get something for playing exactly like you did before its a grind?

Pustulio.8207:

Stefanos.1673:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

There’s no required grind in guild wars 2.

Ascended gear.

Which you are NOT required to get. The minimal increase does very little to make you stronger, and what little increase it DOES make, accounts for NOTHING if you can’t hit the person that’s killing you.

EDIT: Fractals being the exception

I will just repeat what I said above. Wait until the full ascended set comes out and then we will see if the +120 power, +120 precision and +25% crit damage will make any difference.

killcannon.2576:

Were people doing dailys before? yes. Were there umpteen billion posts saying dailys were a grind before the introduction of laurels? No. But now that you can actually get something for playing exactly like you did before its a grind?

You don’t play exactly as you did before the new dailies. With the new dailies you play for the new dailies. If you don’t you won’t achieve them. That’s pretty straightforward.

Stefanos.1673:

Pustulio.8207:

Stefanos.1673:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

There’s no required grind in guild wars 2.

Ascended gear.

Which you are NOT required to get. The minimal increase does very little to make you stronger, and what little increase it DOES make, accounts for NOTHING if you can’t hit the person that’s killing you.

EDIT: Fractals being the exception

I will just repeat what I said above. Wait until the full ascended set comes out and then we will see if the +120 power, +120 precision and +25% crit damage will make any difference.

And, as I said before, unless you can hit the person that’s killing you, it will amount to NOTHING. You can have +800 to everything, and +100% crit, and it will STILL not matter.

Raine.1394:

killcannon.2576:

Were people doing dailys before? yes. Were there umpteen billion posts saying dailys were a grind before the introduction of laurels? No. But now that you can actually get something for playing exactly like you did before its a grind?

You don’t play exactly as you did before the new dailies. With the new dailies you play for the new dailies. If you don’t you won’t achieve them. That’s pretty straightforward.

I play the game exactly as I did before. I did my dailys before everyday for the karma and 5 silver. They want to give me laurels now? Great. It didn’t make the dailys more of a grind, it’s the exact same process (well different process now, which was sorta stupid) takes 15 minutes to half hour. It added no grind, except in your own mind.

Pustulio.8207:

Stefanos.1673:

Pustulio.8207:

Stefanos.1673:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

There’s no required grind in guild wars 2.

Ascended gear.

Which you are NOT required to get. The minimal increase does very little to make you stronger, and what little increase it DOES make, accounts for NOTHING if you can’t hit the person that’s killing you.

EDIT: Fractals being the exception

I will just repeat what I said above. Wait until the full ascended set comes out and then we will see if the +120 power, +120 precision and +25% crit damage will make any difference.

And, as I said before, unless you can hit the person that’s killing you, it will amount to NOTHING. You can have +800 to everything, and +100% crit, and it will STILL not matter.

You are now obviously reffering to World vs World. I know nothing about WvW, nor am I talking about it. I am only concerned about gaming liberty in PvE.

killcannon.2576:

Raine.1394:

killcannon.2576:

Were people doing dailys before? yes. Were there umpteen billion posts saying dailys were a grind before the introduction of laurels? No. But now that you can actually get something for playing exactly like you did before its a grind?

You don’t play exactly as you did before the new dailies. With the new dailies you play for the new dailies. If you don’t you won’t achieve them. That’s pretty straightforward.

I play the game exactly as I did before. I did my dailys before everyday for the karma and 5 silver. They want to give me laurels now? Great. It didn’t make the dailys more of a grind, it’s the exact same process (well different process now, which was sorta stupid) takes 15 minutes to half hour. It added no grind, except in your own mind.

To you, it is not grind, since you are doing the same thing. On the other hand though, there are also casuals, like myself, that choose to play 4 days a week due our work or education. With the new laurel system, casual people just can’t keep up with the rewards. Being forced to play each day definitely IS grind.

killcannon.2576:

Raine.1394:

killcannon.2576:

Were people doing dailys before? yes. Were there umpteen billion posts saying dailys were a grind before the introduction of laurels? No. But now that you can actually get something for playing exactly like you did before its a grind?

You don’t play exactly as you did before the new dailies. With the new dailies you play for the new dailies. If you don’t you won’t achieve them. That’s pretty straightforward.

I don’t. I play the new dailies so as to get the new dailies. The old dailies were largely a product of of just playing the game…as it should be.
I play the game exactly as I did before. I did my dailys before everyday for the karma and 5 silver. They want to give me laurels now? Great. It didn’t make the dailys more of a grind, it’s the exact same process (well different process now, which was sorta stupid) takes 15 minutes to half hour. It added no grind, except in your own mind.

yes, you are playing the new dailies for the new dailies not as a byproduct of simply playing the game. That is actually a statement of the problem with the new dailies, but you would have to understand gaming and reward to know the difference.

You know in WoW people grind the raids to get better items. GW2 players are often keen to point out that those items have stats that improve the character and therefore in WoW grinding is a must and in GW2 it is player choice.

But if you look at it, in WoW that raid grinding is ALL those players do. They never really see any advantage from those new items. Blizzard put in an update and they are obsolete and they grind for the next ones.

That’s completely different to GW2 right? Not from where I am sitting. In GW2 people are grinding towards legendary weapons, etc. My mate has been doing it for months. All he does is run the same dungeons over and over for cash. You can kid yourself that it is player choice, but to my mind Anet have created the mode of play, and people are playing it. Anet have incentivised the grind with legendary weapons instead of the item treadmill Blizzard use, but it is still very, very clearly a pellet for the rats to nibble on.

Raine.1394:

killcannon.2576:

Were people doing dailys before? yes. Were there umpteen billion posts saying dailys were a grind before the introduction of laurels? No. But now that you can actually get something for playing exactly like you did before its a grind?

You don’t play exactly as you did before the new dailies. With the new dailies you play for the new dailies. If you don’t you won’t achieve them. That’s pretty straightforward.

Basically, Anet made dailies give too much good stuff, so that it’s worth a lot more than the past dailies. So when people see it now, their mentality changes from “Oh, it’s just a daily for karma and stuff… no big deal to miss…” to “Oh! It gives Laurels!? I must not miss it! Dang! I don’t want to grind this for those things!”.

I blame Anet for making dailies worth more than the past versions. Obviously people were going to say it’s now a grind :P. (I’m being sarcastic).

But, if you look at dailies from a more nit-picky point of view, dailies actually got less grindy. They gave us more choices and variety for the daily. Of course, not everyone looks at the small details. Just the general picture, and that’s dailies now reward laurels, which can be used for Ascended gear.

Stefanos.1673:

Pustulio.8207:

Stefanos.1673:

Pustulio.8207:

Stefanos.1673:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

There’s no required grind in guild wars 2.

Ascended gear.

Which you are NOT required to get. The minimal increase does very little to make you stronger, and what little increase it DOES make, accounts for NOTHING if you can’t hit the person that’s killing you.

EDIT: Fractals being the exception

I will just repeat what I said above. Wait until the full ascended set comes out and then we will see if the +120 power, +120 precision and +25% crit damage will make any difference.

And, as I said before, unless you can hit the person that’s killing you, it will amount to NOTHING. You can have +800 to everything, and +100% crit, and it will STILL not matter.

You are now obviously reffering to World vs World. I know nothing about WvW, nor am I talking about it. I am only concerned about gaming liberty in PvE.

it doesn’t matter ANYWHERE. Change “person”,"to “mob”…the end

Pustulio.8207:

Which you are NOT required to get. The minimal increase does very little to make you stronger, and what little increase it DOES make, accounts for NOTHING if you can’t hit the person that’s killing you.

And If I can hit the person? Vertical progression is not optional.

There’s a small difference between ascended and exotic.
A small difference between exotic and rare.
A small difference between rare and masterwork.
A small difference between level 80 gear and 79.
A small difference between level 78 gear and 79.
And this goes on.

No one says this is an astronomical impact, but it’s a fact that a difference exists and is there.
Stop using this ‘argument’ to try and debunk a fact. You are not required to get gear, no one is.

kenshinakh.3672:

Raine.1394:

killcannon.2576:

Were people doing dailys before? yes. Were there umpteen billion posts saying dailys were a grind before the introduction of laurels? No. But now that you can actually get something for playing exactly like you did before its a grind?

You don’t play exactly as you did before the new dailies. With the new dailies you play for the new dailies. If you don’t you won’t achieve them. That’s pretty straightforward.

Basically, Anet made dailies give too much good stuff, so that it’s worth a lot more than the past dailies. So when people see it now, their mentality changes from “Oh, it’s just a daily for karma and stuff… no big deal to miss…” to “Oh! It gives Laurels!? I must not miss it! Dang! I don’t want to grind this for those things!”.

I blame Anet for making dailies worth more than the past versions. Obviously people were going to say it’s now a grind :P. (I’m being sarcastic).

But, if you look at dailies from a more nit-picky point of view, dailies actually got less grindy. They gave us more choices and variety for the daily. Of course, not everyone looks at the small details. Just the general picture, and that’s dailies now reward laurels, which can be used for Ascended gear.

New dailies without rewarding laurels. Duh…

Pustulio.8207:

Stefanos.1673:

Pustulio.8207:

Stefanos.1673:

Pustulio.8207:

Stefanos.1673:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

There’s no required grind in guild wars 2.

Ascended gear.

Which you are NOT required to get. The minimal increase does very little to make you stronger, and what little increase it DOES make, accounts for NOTHING if you can’t hit the person that’s killing you.

EDIT: Fractals being the exception

I will just repeat what I said above. Wait until the full ascended set comes out and then we will see if the +120 power, +120 precision and +25% crit damage will make any difference.

And, as I said before, unless you can hit the person that’s killing you, it will amount to NOTHING. You can have +800 to everything, and +100% crit, and it will STILL not matter.

You are now obviously reffering to World vs World. I know nothing about WvW, nor am I talking about it. I am only concerned about gaming liberty in PvE.

it doesn’t matter ANYWHERE. Change “person”,"to “mob”…the end

Why wouldn’t I be able to hit a mob that’s killing me? Am I a kitten or something? Your argument makes no sense.

AwwGee.5628:

Pustulio.8207:

Which you are NOT required to get. The minimal increase does very little to make you stronger, and what little increase it DOES make, accounts for NOTHING if you can’t hit the person that’s killing you.

And If I can hit the person? Vertical progression is not optional.

There’s a small difference between ascended and exotic.
A small difference between exotic and rare.
A small difference between rare and masterwork.
A small difference between level 80 gear and 79.
A small difference between level 78 gear and 79.
And this goes on.

No one says this is an astronomical impact, but it’s a fact that a difference exists and is there.
Stop using this ‘argument’ to try and debunk a fact. You are not required to get gear, no one is.

The difference doesn’t matter. You can beat this game in “greens” with little to NO problem. That ALONE, makes it optional.

Pustulio.8207:

AwwGee.5628:

Pustulio.8207:

Which you are NOT required to get. The minimal increase does very little to make you stronger, and what little increase it DOES make, accounts for NOTHING if you can’t hit the person that’s killing you.

And If I can hit the person? Vertical progression is not optional.

There’s a small difference between ascended and exotic.
A small difference between exotic and rare.
A small difference between rare and masterwork.
A small difference between level 80 gear and 79.
A small difference between level 78 gear and 79.
And this goes on.

No one says this is an astronomical impact, but it’s a fact that a difference exists and is there.
Stop using this ‘argument’ to try and debunk a fact. You are not required to get gear, no one is.

The difference doesn’t matter. You can beat this game in “greens” with little to NO problem. That ALONE, makes it optional.

Arah path 3 in Greens is not little to NO problem.

Stefanos.1673:

Pustulio.8207:

AwwGee.5628:

Pustulio.8207:

Which you are NOT required to get. The minimal increase does very little to make you stronger, and what little increase it DOES make, accounts for NOTHING if you can’t hit the person that’s killing you.

And If I can hit the person? Vertical progression is not optional.

There’s a small difference between ascended and exotic.
A small difference between exotic and rare.
A small difference between rare and masterwork.
A small difference between level 80 gear and 79.
A small difference between level 78 gear and 79.
And this goes on.

No one says this is an astronomical impact, but it’s a fact that a difference exists and is there.
Stop using this ‘argument’ to try and debunk a fact. You are not required to get gear, no one is.

The difference doesn’t matter. You can beat this game in “greens” with little to NO problem. That ALONE, makes it optional.

Arah path 3 in Greens is not little to NO problem.

for YOU

Lanser.8520:

Laurels, dungeons skins, etc. are not grinds. Why? Because ArenaNet is trying their hardest to make sure you don’t grind them.

Just because someone tries to accomplish something does not mean it happens. Gearing up is a grind. Also, I can only think that the people who “grind” dungeons for skins only are the ones who have played for 700+ hours. Most people are grinding the dungeons for gear because crafting the set they want is not possible.

Vanthian.9267:

Just because someone tries to accomplish something does not mean it happens. Gearing up is a grind. Also, I can only think that the people who “grind” dungeons for skins only are the ones who have played for 700+ hours. Most people are grinding the dungeons for gear because crafting the set they want is not possible.

That’s not exactly right. If you are of the first Guild Wars’ generation, then collecting skins is something we normally do.

killcannon.2576:

Were people doing dailys before? yes. Were there umpteen billion posts saying dailys were a grind before the introduction of laurels? No. But now that you can actually get something for playing exactly like you did before its a grind?

The grind mentality comes up when you have to do something to stay within the top reigns of the game. You could stay “at the top” of this game and not do dailies before. In a sense they forced the people who were not doing dailies to do them for the new and BETTER amulet.

Weather you will accept it or not, there is a small step up from exotic items to ascended items. This will make a difference in overall defense and dps. The amount of increase is not the issue; it is the increase itself that is the issue.

I don’t see anything wrong with time gating. In GW1 it took me almost a year to get my 20 slot equipment bag.

I’m skipping some dailies and some monthlies. No big deal. As long as ascended remains the top tier, I can just slowly gain whatever I want. I’ve got all the time in the world

Stefanos.1673:

Vanthian.9267:

Just because someone tries to accomplish something does not mean it happens. Gearing up is a grind. Also, I can only think that the people who “grind” dungeons for skins only are the ones who have played for 700+ hours. Most people are grinding the dungeons for gear because crafting the set they want is not possible.

That’s not exactly right. If you are of the first Guild Wars’ generation, then collecting skins is something we normally do.

Yes, but this is not Guild Wars 1 this is Guild Wars 2. Gearing up is very different and dungeons are mainly used for this fact. In Guild Wars 1 it took a lot less time to get max gear. In actuality you had very little trouble getting the BEST gear in game.

In Guild Wars 2 you are forced to either grind out Money to buy the exotics, becase there is no way someone who just “plays the game” is going to have 50g + by 80. They could max the craft that their armor is in but then they would lack the trinkets. Last but not least, they could run dungeons to gear up then by the trinkets with the money form the dungeon. The last option is the most widely used.

edit: Forgot to mention this, since you brought up Guild Wars 1. The difficulty in repecing in Guild Wars 2 is astronomically higher than Guild Wars 1. All in all, I could repec my character in Guild Wars 1 in a round about 5 minutes if I new what I want. In Guild Wars 2, it would take me weeks to respec my character. Weeks of what? Grinding for new gear. End of Story.

Pustulio.8207:

Stefanos.1673:

Pustulio.8207:

Stefanos.1673:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

There’s no required grind in guild wars 2.

Ascended gear.

Which you are NOT required to get. The minimal increase does very little to make you stronger, and what little increase it DOES make, accounts for NOTHING if you can’t hit the person that’s killing you.

EDIT: Fractals being the exception

I will just repeat what I said above. Wait until the full ascended set comes out and then we will see if the +120 power, +120 precision and +25% crit damage will make any difference.

And, as I said before, unless you can hit the person that’s killing you, it will amount to NOTHING. You can have +800 to everything, and +100% crit, and it will STILL not matter.

What a poor argument, you act like every fight in this game is each person/enemy gets 1 attack and if you miss you die. Sorry, but you can’t dodge every attack. So yes that +800 stats and +100% crit is going to matter because when you don’t 1 hit your opponent and you have to take a hit you’re going to die. The less stats you have the longer a fight takes and the greater your chance of dying. Sure you can run around in whites and complete some content, but that doesn’t mean you aren’t making it the most miserable experience for everyone else that has to make up for your lack of stats.

You’re going to take damage.
You’re going to do damage.
You’re going to heal.

Therefor the extra stats are never worthless because you WILL use them.

As for them being “required”, technically they aren’t required. However with that same technicality neither is leveling up or playing the game. This is a MMORPG and progression is something that is considered required. That means that pretty much anything that makes a character better is considered to be required, be it 1 stat, 50, or a super rare armor/weapon skin. That is why people level up, that is why people get gear, that is why people run consumables, and that is why they farm tons of mats for rare skins. They want to be the best they can be(max progression). So yes, ascended gear is just as required as leveling up.

Raine.1394:

killcannon.2576:

Raine.1394:

killcannon.2576:

Were people doing dailys before? yes. Were there umpteen billion posts saying dailys were a grind before the introduction of laurels? No. But now that you can actually get something for playing exactly like you did before its a grind?

You don’t play exactly as you did before the new dailies. With the new dailies you play for the new dailies. If you don’t you won’t achieve them. That’s pretty straightforward.

I don’t. I play the new dailies so as to get the new dailies. The old dailies were largely a product of of just playing the game…as it should be.
I play the game exactly as I did before. I did my dailys before everyday for the karma and 5 silver. They want to give me laurels now? Great. It didn’t make the dailys more of a grind, it’s the exact same process (well different process now, which was sorta stupid) takes 15 minutes to half hour. It added no grind, except in your own mind.

yes, you are playing the new dailies for the new dailies not as a byproduct of simply playing the game. That is actually a statement of the problem with the new dailies, but you would have to understand gaming and reward to know the difference.

I find it amusing that you know why I do something better than I do. Game theory and skinner boxes are also pretty easy to understand, even for laymen, which you assume me to be. Perhaps you should enlighten the rest of the class with your wondrous knowledge of why we are all now doing something for a totally different reason than we were before. Hint…we have always done it for reward.

and what is up with the misquotes, I never even said half the stuff that is in those quotes

Stefanos.1673:

killcannon.2576:

Raine.1394:

killcannon.2576:

Were people doing dailys before? yes. Were there umpteen billion posts saying dailys were a grind before the introduction of laurels? No. But now that you can actually get something for playing exactly like you did before its a grind?

You don’t play exactly as you did before the new dailies. With the new dailies you play for the new dailies. If you don’t you won’t achieve them. That’s pretty straightforward.

I play the game exactly as I did before. I did my dailys before everyday for the karma and 5 silver. They want to give me laurels now? Great. It didn’t make the dailys more of a grind, it’s the exact same process (well different process now, which was sorta stupid) takes 15 minutes to half hour. It added no grind, except in your own mind.

To you, it is not grind, since you are doing the same thing. On the other hand though, there are also casuals, like myself, that choose to play 4 days a week due our work or education. With the new laurel system, casual people just can’t keep up with the rewards. Being forced to play each day definitely IS grind.

Were you forced to complete the dailies before? no. Why do you feel you are now? Because they decided to give you more rewards for the same thing, you now feel like you have to do it? That’s not a design problem, that’s some kind of personal thing.

Also, I’m “casual” whatever that even means anymore in GW2, at least in WoW i knew what a casual was. You didn’t belong in the “ZOMG!!! you have to be on every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday from 2 pm till 10 pm to raid or we’re going to come for ya!!!”, you were a casual. What does that mean here? The same? A time investment? I’ve seen wildly varying definitions for casual in this game, ranging from If you only pve, If you only wvw, If you don’t do dungeons, If you do do dungeons, If you’re not worried about your legendaries, If you like jumping puzzles, If you play solo, If you named your toon Kittenchops. I have no idea. I play a couple hours a day, some more on weekends. To me, that’s having an enjoyable time.

OP you’re completely leaving out the early levels of the game where quests turn into “Kill x amount of X” or “Kill the x boss”.

Pustulio.8207:

The difference doesn’t matter. You can beat this game in “greens” with little to NO problem. That ALONE, makes it optional.

It does. This is not subjective and based on opinion, it is objective and fact. with 1 more power I will deal 1 more damage than the guy next to me if he were doing everything the same. Simple as that.

By your reasoning everything is optional. You can enter dungeons at level 2 no problem, go ahead. You don’t even need to wear armor for anything. Troll away