Guild Wars 2

How GW2 should have implemented a ‘seamless’ horizontal progression

Yes, I know, it’s too late now, but I had an idea, a brilliant idea, and I had to share it. We all view Horizontal Progression (HP) as not having to chase the ‘next big number’ and if that were true, GW2 failed in the delivering of ‘horizontal’ carrot chasing.

Here is how they "could’ have done so and it would have not only been fun, but epically so.

You right now have crafted sets: Rampager’s, Berserker’s, Valkyrie, Carrion, Travelers…so on and so forth, but that is only 8 sets of armor for quite possibly a wide spread of many ‘stat’ combinations…why not put them all in the game??? Use the ‘crafted set’ as a padding set (unless its the stat combination you truly want) to tide you over as you work for the next sets. The nine different dungeons could have held 9 possible stat combos, while World bosses (such as Jormag and shatterer, Teq) could have held their own unique set (I will elaborate below) while the Temples had their own UNIQUE set that not only had varying stats, but different looks as well.

The way it would work with world bosses is that at the end of the Jormag event (you get a gold medal and a chest, yay!) you have a certain % chance that the armor you are looking for drops. If your lucky number comes up, the game will check the drop (in order) against what you already have. If you don’t have a piece of this armor, then it will give you the set of boots. If you have the boots, it will check if you have the hands, if you do, then it checks for the shoulders…so on and so forth, until you no longer have a piece and it will hand it out to you as a reward.

Also, as a way to reward you busy bodies in game, there would be a unique dungeon crawler set (not just for dungeons), where a fraction of the coins from every dungeon, plus some world drops could be traded for a set of armor that contained + to EVERY stat (much like the Triforged pendant, or divinty runes).

Also, you could have drops (or maybe decon from crafters) shards that could ‘flip’ primary and secondary stats. For example, I get a piece of gear that has power, vitality and Precision, with Vitality being the primary stat and power being my secondary. With this shard, on that piece of armor, now my power is the primary stat on the armor and the vitality is secondary.

This adds a whole level of customization that can really relate to a way a person plays.

Thoughts?

This is exactly what I imagined the game to be before launch. Most of it holds true, some of it completely opposite.

I suppose that’s more or less what most of us who were caught off guard by this “slow statflation” alien invasion were expecting to see in this game. Increased stat flexibility/combinations to help each different build you come up, not increasing stats.

Before people start barfing this is a “manifesto cry baby” thread: no, I don’t think they ‘betrayed’ me. I just think they are throwing away what made them shine.

@Harbard

Yes, this thread is not about stat flation. I was just curious what people thought of this idea.

I had a broader idea of what the game was going to be, but in terms of gear, I was highly disappointed that they only had 8 stat variants. And the armor they had in game…well, they had five years and had some of the….oddest/worst armor skins I’ve ever seen in an MMO.

There just needs to be…more. I like that the starter outfit for casters is, well, on human models, it looks fantastic. Sexy, but not too overboard. And while this somewhat held true for most of teh caster armor (some tiers of crafted aside) it didn’t seem to hold up for leather or heavy.

And the dungeon gear…don’t get me started. I didn’t run dungeons specifically because those armor skins were HORRIBLE (imho only, I know some people do like them). Not only did dungeons feel like a huge piece of junk in their design and mechanics, there was notthing to explore…no bosses to kill for LOOT (yes, there were bosses to kill) and the loot that you did get was just more of the same uselessness you get in the open world. What if the bosses dropped unique skin sets, that was not only tradeable, but good looking as well (everyone will vary on their opinion of what good looks like, but still…unique armor that was mainly for skins you can transmute…unless it has the stats you like, obviously).

The biggest complaint people had in AoC when it first came out is that casters looked like they were all wearing burlap cloth sacks when the game began. They didn’t so much want ‘sexy’ looking armor but nice looking stuff so they weren’t afraid of putting that same burlap cloth over their heads to hide their identity.

That is truly lacking here. When I explored all I could and decided to look for that ‘end game’ set, for both stats and looks, with my build as it was, the Berserker’s set was the best choice of gear for me, as well as the linen crafted set was the look I fell in love with. Nothing else was near good enough, and that…just made me sad.

But one of the things ‘core’ MMO people like is killing a boss and getting loot. I like killing a named over and over again to see it’s loot table and if it has something unique that I want, I don’t mind going after it time and time again until I get it. But the problem was put in that ‘loot’ from mobs was a big chest full of anything from the wrold loot table.

Gee, thanks for that.

Harbard.5738:

I suppose that’s more or less what most of us who were caught off guard by this “slow statflation” alien invasion were expecting to see in this game. Increased stat flexibility/combinations to help each different build you come up, not increasing stats.

Before people start barfing this is a “manifesto cry baby” thread: no, I don’t think they ‘betrayed’ me. I just think they are throwing away what made them shine.

honestly I think that is the overlaying issue. You have people who for either the manifesto or their previous GW1 experience think that Anet had an original awesome idea..and then those like me who never liked or never played GW1 and didnt believe the manifesto in the first place, they just thought this sounded like a good game. I never saw the shine in GW1 in the first place and the first thing my friends said when I told them the end game was cosmetic rewards and no more content was “wtf, is this a japanese flash animation clothing simulator?”