Guild Wars 2

I’ve gone in the way of building up my alts. With a bunch of 80’s and a few more I’m chipping away at that I intend to get to 80 as well.

I enjoy developing my alts and getting good gear on them, exotics all round and rares for weapons that I don’t use often.
My higher alts have been great for farming chests and getting better drops as a result. However with the ‘Ascended’ update I’m now starting to wonder the practical aspects of my decision.

With this trend I’ve decided to focus on getting one toon all max gear (at least at this time) but ignore my alts.

I came from GW1 and I’m curious about other people’s takes on alts from other MMO’s. At least in terms of GW1 alts were invaluable, different professions could do different things and you knew that when you got max gear for them it wasn’t going to get surpassed somewhere in the future.

With that in mind what is everyone’s take on making alts. I did it for fun and don’t regret but am curious about any practical uses they will have from you experience?

I’m less that a week from having my fourth 80 (mesmer at 71). The 3 I have all have exotics except for one earring on one of them. I still want Superior Rune sets for 2 of them also. I farm, I play alts, I run around doing dailies.

I am waiting on Ascended to see if/when/how they implement making those pieces available in more places (and at what cost). If I decide not to get Ascended, then I’ll live with Exotic as long as I can still play what I want to play. I have tailor, weaponsmith, armorsmith and jeweler at 400.

I feel that as long as I am not in a hurry, I can count on getting all 8 characters to 80 and geared in exotics/runes eventually. It does take some effort to gain gold, though, even if you craft your own, as ectos are not cheap.

I don’t believe so, all games with vertical progression eventually offer an ezmode for gearing up toons in order to catch up the casual players.

They aren’t going to let the working people with the money to spend get left behind.

As an altaholic myself i’m fine going without Ascended for now and waiting until they make gearing alts a possiblility.

Yes and no. If you’re just playing for the sake of playing this awesome game, then no. If you’re really focused on getting a legendary and a full set of (infused) ascended gear then kind of, but not really; considering the cost of said gear, gearing an alt with exotics is a drop in the pond.

Well, most people play games in order to have fun. If you have fun making alts, then I don’t think you’re wasting your time. As long as you aren’t hurting anyone else you should feel free to play the game however the heck you want to.

I like alts. Sometimes the journey is more fun than the destination—and when you get everything up to par, it’s very nice to have lots of options.

I’m an altoholic and sadly at the moment I think yes I’ve wasted my time. A spin off of the Fractals/Ascended update is that it has turned this into a very alt unfriendly game. Not only alt unfriendly but new player unfriendly too. There are fewer and fewer people outside of LA, more and more contested waypoints and zone events large and small left undone and difficulty getting dungeon groups for story modes.

So much QQ here.

Ascended gear is needed only for High level fractals. Other than that, all content is fine with Exotics.

I currently have zero interest in making an alt.
My Necro keeps me content so until I get bored I see no need for alts.

BaconCatTheGreasy.9542:

So much QQ here.

Ascended gear is needed only for High level fractals. Other than that, all content is fine with Exotics.

With that kind of attitude. Why bother with exotics? Master work is fine too!

Also @ OP:

I have two 80s with a third on the way. I only bothered to gear my main. I was thinking of making exotics for my alts, but for the price it costs and with a new tier on its way to replace it. I don’t see the point.

Pretty much all leveling an alt to 80 is…
Do you like playing this class?
If yes -> Make this your new main.
If no -> Either it collects dust or you use it for gathering/crafting/chest collecting.

The effort put in for alts in gw2 is less rewarding than gw1 for the reason you mentoned, OP. In gw1 different proffessions had very different roles and as such only certain proffessions were useful depending on the pve metagame.

In gw2, proffessions merge into “glass cannon” “support/tank” “support/dps” “tank dps”, therefore I would suggest having an alt scholar and an alt warrior/guardian, and focusing on those – if you dont have the time to constantly keep 4/5 alts up to date. That should cover all the generic roles pretty well.