Guild Wars 2

I went from playing 3 hours at least a day(2 weeks ago) to logging on only to say hi to friends. I think it’s mostly due to the fact that spvp is separated from the other form of pvp(wvwvw), I would be happy if you could earn glory from wvw and have much more wvw earned gear to go along with it(one set is not enough). I just never find myself playing spvp often because it ties too little into the rest of the game and offers no xp.

I dont enjoy pve in any mmo, so I’ve just ended up very bored and started playing planetside 2 which I enjoy very much.

Guild fell apart. and honestly it’s harder then it sounds to find a guild again where i actually feel like I’m a member of a community rather then just a number grinding out influence points for the guild.

I have now not played for two days in a row for the first time since early launch. I’m going to move on to other games. I am doing so because I am literally being told by other players and by ArenaNet that I’m not welcome. The direction of this game is ugly elitism, already in action with the gated/leveled dungeons and one-time events. Complain, or even simply point out it’s a betrayal of the game’s own innovation, and you’re a “whiner” told to love it or leave it by half the players and all of the devs. It’s not fun to be around, in-game or on the boards. Meanwhile, I was having plenty of fun with original content except where it is broken, and Anet has made it clear it is not fixing broken original content and instead releasing new broken content. Those are the factor that have me holiday shopping at Steam and finding new things to play with people who won’t insult my dedication and my intelligence.

To answer the question about foruming—yes, I do it more than I play now. Why? To see if ArenaNet is going to show any shred of honesty. I don’t even mean changing its tune and doing something I prefer. I just mean being direct and honest about it. The ludicrous post today about the Lost Shores event, with its PR blather, dodging of the biggest issue and lack of apology to the thousands of people whose fun was ruined convinces me I know all I need to know now. ArenaNet isn’t making mistakes. It knows exactly what it’s doing, knows it’s wrong, and hides its guilt behind puffery and lies. It will continue doing so. So no point in coming back here for more, either.

yes I started playing a lot less about a month ago.

reason: I chose a ranger

I’m definitely playing a LOT less than I used to. It all started like a week before the new patch…

I was the type of player who would do a lot of dungeon runs on my guardian. Also would WvW, but these were my two main activities. As soon as I heard there would be better gear releasing soon, I stopped putting together groups for Arah explorables (keep in mind my guardian is full exotics). I was working on getting Arah armor skins for the prestige. Didn’t help to hear that the ONE TIME EVENT I missed wasn’t just for the experience itself, it was a literal pot of gold and precursors.

Used to log on for 3+ hours a day at least.. Now it’s been over two weeks since I have even logged in at all…

I’m also visiting the forums less. I was really into theorycrafting and posting about builds in the guardian and dungeon forums, but I’ve lost most of my desire to play, so no sense in wasting time

I stopped playing so much since the lost shores came out, and couldn’t download the patches

…I still can’t!

playing significantly less since the ascended gear update causing me to lose most of my faith for these developers,
Fractals as fun as they are, have just caused everyone to overflow LA and spam LFG LVLX, makes this game feel like WoW, everyone just stands in one city waiting

WvW is the only saving grace, heaps of fun on the weekends, but find myself playing less on weekdays

I am but mainly because I have seen all the equipment designs and not really impressed.

The look of my character drives me and honestly nothing about GW2 armor designs grabs my attention.

The new Ascended gear I can ignore for now. It won’t make a huge difference if I don’t run the instances that require it. I’m wonder what impact it will have on WvW.

Honestly, I wish WvW was set up in a manner like PvP. Set equipment, it would allow all players to interact on the same level and minimize the cries to nerf players when some of it is the difference in level and equipment.

The last mmo i played before gw2 was rift. I gave that a go because i like the idea of rifts opening up and players coming from all over to close it. There was no gear requirements just jump in and help.

After a while the devs seemed to focus more and more on dungeon running and it seemed the rifts got left behind. I remember thinking at the release of one patch where it seemed to cater for more dungeon content, better loot than anything else in the game, more bug fixes ext. That was ok but the open world became more and deserted and id find myself trying to close major rifts with me and one other guy.I would go to the capital and it would be packed with people standing around and chat was full of “lfg,lfm” for the latest dungeon run.

The beginning of this week i have logged on to find the same thing happening in gw2.
I loved doing the events but there was nobody doing them. One hour in Malchor’s Leap farming for mats and nothing in chat and only saw one other person.
So i go to lions arch and end up in overflow and chat is full of lfg fotm lfm fotm.
It seems like rift all over again so ive lost the motivation to log on.

I’m happy for those that like to run dungeons but its just not for me. Maby things will sort themselves out but going around in Malchor’s Leap and cursed shore its just starting to seem like rift all over again.

I have been playing less, yes. But is it because of anything in game? Be it gear, or the new dungeon or the event? No… not at all.

Truth be told, Halo 4 came out, I’ve been beta testing Planetside 2, and I have work obligations that have to be taken care of. I don’t pay a sub for this game, so I can easily not play for a week or two, enjoy another game, and jump back in.

I’m not playing at all. Depending on what they say on Monday, I may be done for good.

I played about 3 hours on weekdays, and 10-12 hours a day on weekends, from head start until last Thursday (I think I may have only missed a couple days that entire time). I absolutely loved the game and planned to play it for years. I had a guild that I wanted to slowly build and make some new friends. I had a tremendous amount I wanted to accomplish in the game, and plenty of fun things pulling for my attention every day. My wife and I played together, and were having a blast.

This patch ruined the game for me. I couldn’t bring myself to log in once it went live, and I haven’t logged in since. I’m still a bit stunned that ArenaNet would do this so casually…just completely contridict their own design philosophy…I just can’t believe it.

When I think about logging in, I can clearly see the huge grind in front of me if I ever want to keep up with the power curve, playing the game in ways I don’t enjoy, and falling farther and farther behind, never to catch up. I can see the community deteriorating and become more and more divided and less social as the various tiers and gear checks make it harder and harder to find groups, and less and less rewarding to meet new people and play together. I can see the top-end content getting more and more out of my reach as they balance it for the max stats and I fall farther behind.

In short, I know exactly what I’m looking at with this new armor and dungeon mechanics, I’ve seen it so many times before. I have no desire at all to keep playing and watch myself slowly fade into obsolescence simply because I choose not to grind. I really dislike these mechanics…which is why I chose GW2 and was so excited about it in the first place (2+years before it launched).

There were many other things wrong with the game, bugs and missing functionality and class issues and story blockages that were quite annoying. I dealt with all of those things and tolerated them because the game and its philosophy were right. The world was a place I wanted to be. Now all those many other issues loom large in my mind, making me wonder why they didn’t bother me more before. The bloom is off the rose.

Also, feeling disappointed and betrayed as I do, I can’t log in. If I play, ArenaNet will count me as approving of the new direction…and I don’t want that. I want them to know, in the clearest possible terms, that I do not approve of this at all. So I just spend time on other hobbies, watch these forums and my guild boards, and continue to hope that ArenaNet wakes up from this weird nightmare and restores the awesome game that I enjoyed so much.

1. Yes. I am finding myself more on the forums and less in game.

2. I started playing less when I reached max level. And almost quit after the Lost Shores event due to the disappointing outcome. But it was mainly from boredom.

3. Lack of things to do. No friends to play with. I don’t know anyone on my server. But the thing that does it the most is that theres no motivation or point to it. When I hit 80, what does that mean? What do I do? Farm gear? For what purpose? This game is lacking community World PvP. We have World Vs. World, but I don’t want to fight random people from other Worlds. I want to build rivalry’s on my own server and say “Oh look! Theres that guy who killed me last week! Lets get him!” I hate fighting strangers but we have no choice because of they way the races were laid out. There are no factions or pride to this either. So its not very fun. But I continue to come back simply because, its free. I login to chat with friends from time to time but thats about it.

If Elder Scrolls Online ( /ducks banhammer) isn’t good, I’m quitting MMO’s for life.

1. Was more or less only in game except when I had specific questions to search for answers on, now I take frequent breaks in game to view the forums and also follow them more outside of game time.

2. Playing in game about the same amount of time as before, but with less enthusiasm since the Lost Shores patch.

3. Disappointed in the future plans. Not seeing a long time ahead in game for me, no desire to enter the fractals. Once my chars are all 80, that’s probably my exit from MMO’s for good.

I am not logging at all since I knew about the patch. I hope against hope that ArenaNet will come back to reason, and save the game before its too late. People are leaving in droves — THIS is not the game we purchased, no one wants to purchase something with a very concrete characteristics, and get delivered something instead that is very much the complete opposite of it.

For one it has nothing to do with pvp being balanced, its balanced allright just as long as everyone is playing for conditions or damage, the blandness of the specs and lack of diversity makes it boring not a numbers balance game.

Also Ascended gear is more than just an extra tier of better gear.
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/linsey-murdock-unveils-new-high-end-ascended-gear/
You HAVE to have this stuff for Fractals so its not just a stat bump, which is bad enough as it is. Its windowed very specifically on purpose. And you can bet every locust raider calling for groups is gonna want you maxed out in Ascended Infusion sets which means windowed content, which means exclusion which means FU Arenanet.

Not less, just as much actually and I’m more than happy with what we have been offered for free. If ANet has made any mistakes it is in the fact that they decided to cater to the hardcore player and less so the casuals. I don’t much care if they added a new tier so long as they don’t keep the power creep on the front burner. I however will quit if I EVER see a gear check addition added to the game as this to me just spells elitist garbage and we don’t need that here.

I haven’t played for a few days, tried the Lost Shore event and quit immediately. It wasn’t fun in the slightest because fighting enemies who soak up 2 minutes worth of damage dealing and can kill you with three hits is never fun.

gadenp.7586:

1. Who here, still come to forums but play the game much less?
2. When did you start playing less?
3. Why / What caused the decline in time spent?

1. Yes to playing less.
2. After I experienced in full the kittenfest that is Orr.
3. While I am not particularly pleased with the you know what stuff, I must say that the primary cause of the decline in my desire to play is <…drumroll…> Orr. Orr has just about ruined the entire game for me. I hate Orr. In all the online games I’ve played since I first logged in to the original Guild Wars in 2005, I have never experienced a zone I hate more than Orr. Not Taris. Not Blue Mountain. Not the Hollows. Orr tops them all. Orr has all but destroyed my tolerance for the various and sundry minor annoyances one may encounter here and there in other parts of the game. How to fix it? I don’t know. Some folks seem to like it as it is, but I would probably not hate it quite as much if every other mob was removed, some of the more annoying environmental effects were toned down, the respawn rates were rendered less than (incoming hyperbole!) instantaneous, and there were Risen Dancers running around saying “I’ve Risen, and I can’t get down!”

Anyway, I’m not leaving the game over it. I still have quite a few things I want to do. Get 100% exploration on my Thief. Roll an Engineer (I have a character for every other profession). Like many others here, I am a little concerned for the future of the game. I was really hoping to see Cantha in GW2, and sooner rather than later. So here’s hoping the sun won’t be setting for Tyria anytime soon.

1. Who here, still come to forums but play the game much less?
Me

2. When did you start playing less?
Monday, the 19th

3. Why / What caused the decline in time spent?
For me it was a culminations of a series of events since patch 15/11
A: The great disappointment in the “significant quality of life” ranger patch notes.
B: A boring and broken event.
C: The welfare precursor fiasco.
D: Arenanets move away from open world pve towards a more contained single point of entry dungeon. The fractals dungeon by itself is not a bad idea, but making it the only viable way to progress is what ultimately broke the camels back for me.
E: Ascended gear and a “design-lazy” new mechanic called “Agony”

Not one of the mentioned points by itself would have bothered me much, except “D” maybe, but all of them combined was the deal-breaker for me.

./shrugs

Nymphetamine.2103:

1. Who here, still come to forums but play the game much less?
Me

2. When did you start playing less?
Monday, the 19th

3. Why / What caused the decline in time spent?
For me it was a culminations of a series of events since patch 15/11
A: Ascended gear and a “design-lazy” new mechanic called “Agony”
A: The great disappointment in the “significant quality of life” ranger patch notes.
B: A boring and broken event.
C: The welfare precursor fiasco.
D: Arenanets move away from open world pve towards a more contained single point of entry dungeon. The fractals dungeon by itself is not a bad idea, but making it the only viable way to progress is what ultimately broke the camels back for me.

Not one of the mentioned points by itself would have bothered me much, except “D” maybe, but all of them combined was the deal-breaker for me.

./shrugs

I do feel a bit of bait and switch. One of the things I hated in WoW was constantly reaching max level, spending months obtaining and buffing the best gear, then a new patch comes along and starts that whole treadmill over. I did this until mid BC and quit, grinding is a lazy, uncreative way of creating “content”.

I haven’t played in maybe a month, I put in like 130 hours during release month and burnt myself out. The one time events aren’t enough to pull me back since they’re on at obscene hours. Not disappointed with the game or anything, I just can’t be bothered.
None of my friends play anymore either, which can make the game a little bland.

1.) I come to the forums and spend way less time (none, actually) in-game.
2.) It started sometime around the halloween patch.
3.) Because the Legendary grind sucks. The skyrocketed economy in combination with the consistent nerfs to Mesmer and lack of bugfixes and nerfing of farming areas made me lose interest. I logged in one time when the 3 day event started planning to get whatever item they might hand out for collections sake, but when I logged in for event one it lagged so horrendously bad that it left an extremely sour taste in my mouth and I decided to call it quits.

I mean minutes worth of lag at a time on an overflow server followed by an eventual disocnnect followed by a different overflow server with zero progress on the event you just wasted your time on trying to complete amidst the worst lag I’ve had in a game since years.

1. Who here, still come to forums but play the game much less?
2. When did you start playing less?
3. Why / What caused the decline in time spent?

1. i do because i always hope ill find something that will make me play this awesome game once again.
2. early october.
3. i dont know, i really like the game but i just dont want to start the game.

I experienced the 3rd event for the Lost Shores. I was kicked off and missed my reward. I read up on the fractals and how pvp/wvw playere were not going to be offered the same rewards yet.

The original appeal with this game was the ability to be on equal footing. I could acquire my gear several ways. Now, I have to farm dungeons. I am not going to do that.

Steam sales kicked in today, lots of other stuff to play. Dabbling in a couple other F2P games.

Oh, I still play. But not fractals. And after doing one, I avoided the karka events like the plague. I still play, but I play the personal story, do hearts and events, maybe some WvW.

I still play. But I think that the lost shores was a mistake. A BIG mistake.

My main issue is, as a lore buff, not just where the heck that island came from—but the fact that it almost completely blocks the exit from the Sea of Sorrows. How are ships supposed to get out of there? Will we never get to sea travel to distant lands? Or do ships just magically slide through the karka infested waters?

C’mon Anet. You’re better than this.

1. Who here, still come to forums but play the game much less?
I do, when I hear about the game being broken even more on other places like reddit, then I come here and see, there’s nothing about it.

2. When did you start playing less?
Right after the event

3. Why / What caused the decline in time spent?
Other than the broken events and lag we had to deal with for this “event” and the stupid DC issues with FotM? A new wave of hacks (people have strong passes that are not their email passes, don’t buy gold, no keyloggers ect ect but still get “You’re email address has been changed” alerts) that ANet doesn’t seem to know how to fix and the fact that they won’t even help the people that got hacked through their security hole

Combat is boring…weapon skills are static…the feeling of a role-less party might as well not be a party at all. The combat and class structure is not solid, engaging, and fun in my opinion. The customization is segmented into traits and even then a lot of the systems feel homogenized, weak, and hyper balanced, taking out a lot of the fun. It makes me miss GW1, that and everything seems like an arbitrary gear grind when the fundamental game play, combat and grouping, is like a laborious, shallow chore.

Playing less, feeling less motivated to play.

Reasons

Ascended Gear: So this just did what every other MMO has done, invalidated all the time I have spent in gearing my character so I can do it again and again in a pointless cycle. No thanks, I have better things to do. I am a completionist, I like have the best gear I can but I don’t like shifting goal posts in a game that promised none. Agony is a thoughtless mechanic and subpar game design. I thought Anet was better than this.

Fractal: I love and hate this. I like the design, I hate it added a better way to get everything including better drops. I hate the fractal level system. This dungeon has single handedly made it harder to get groups. Now no one runs the old dungeons. Groups for fractals are bracketed by level. I play on Ferg Crossing during Oceanic peak. Good luck to me to find a group.

Empty world: Seriously its like the world builders started with a beautiful rich vision and then the content team left it empty. So many interesting maps and places that are now pointless. I have 100% world completion, but it felt hollow. Where are the stories, where are the unique interesting things on some of the non starter maps? I find caves with nothing in them, whole areas of Divinity’s Reach have nothing to do in them. They are beautiful but other than eye candy there is nothing going on. For example, Divinity’s Reach has officers for each of the three orders and no reason to go there, no special stuff, no special missions, no reason at all other than POI’s to get. I was hoping for more. Field’s of Ruin is another such map. So much potential wasted. More stuff to do in cities, more reason to seek things out rather than spawning an unrewarding dynamic event. DE’s were a good start place but have become progressively bland and add no impact my character or the world really. Anet, you promised more!

Basically, I think my biggest frustration with the game is they had such a good vision of what they wanted to create and then someone came along and decided their vision wasn’t good enough or wasn’t going to satisfy bulk shareholders. It stopped being a great game for the players and became about ‘how little can we give for a dollar to make more money,’ rather than sticking with ‘how can we make this the best game with our design philosophy.’ Make a great game and people will come, make a clone and it will die like all the others.

I started playing less ever since ive been falsely banned for botting. I got my account back but ever since then i never had the feeling of wanting to play the game like i did before my ban

I just started watching the forum…. I come in hope to see they will be adding new content for me an average player that doesnt have any desire to lock myself away in a dungeon and doesnt have a desire for the best gear in the game at that expense. i will be reinstalling a new game this weekend to see the new content they have added so i will be playing less and yes i did see the new zone that was added which is void of content and looks like the possibly put a day’s worth of interest in its purpose after the event was over

I’ve been playing less for a month or so now
Outside the holiday/one time events my routine:
1) Log into 80 #1, pick high level 24 hour spawn gatherables, do an event if I see one (get annoyed at Orr mobs)
2) Log into 80 #2, pick high level 24 hour spawn gatherables, do an event if I see one (get even more annoyed at Orr mobs)
3) Log into my 6 low level / bank alts, gather low level rare spawn gatherables
4) Finish daily on low level thief alt (kills, variety, events, etc)
5) Check TP, maybe sell or buy something

Log back to another game that is currently more entertaining…

We need more OPEN WORLD, LESS ANNOYING, MORE REWARDING/MEANINGFUL (karma is not used for anything exciting…) content. Solo dungeons would be nice too…

5-man dungeons are fine for those that like them
sPvP and WvW are fine for those that like them
Jumping puzzles do not belong in an MMO – leave that to single player console games – fine for those that like them I guess

Seriously…please revamp the high level open world content – I want to love GW2 but it’s becoming increasing difficult to do so.

I started playing less when there was some bug that kept the loading screen frozen when you died in sPvP, I tried to come back during Lost Shores and Halloween events but meh.

The thought of having to grind all that ascended gear again on multiple 80s just reminds me too much of other games I’ve played. After I just finished getting them all in exotics :/

@Heehee, I can’t speak for other WoW players but I do cause well the time I’ve invested into my characters is hard to throw away, But I also play quite a few other games which generally recycle the same crap again anyway. I know some do cause well their friends are there. So I assume others social reasons from the ones that I use to play with.

1. Who here, still come to forums but play the game much less? I do find that I check the forums a lot more as I play less.

2. When did you start playing less? I started playing less after I almost completed the world on my thief. (I’m at 95% and am slowly getting the rest in wvw.)

3. Why / What caused the decline in time spent? I find I play less because I don’t have anything to do. I have spent most of my game time guildless because I join a guild then no one ever says anything, or does anything as a group. I blame that on the way the guild system is set up and found I was the only one representing half the time, thus the ghost town feel. I hate the dungeons. I have always loved dungeons in other games, and would spend a lot of time running them, but the dungeons here are so difficult that it takes away any chance of having fun. I just don’t think it’s a good time when you are dying to the first trash mobs repeatedly in the level 30 instance. It really turns me off to even try another dungeon. I do enjoy wvw but I don’t want to spend my entire game time doing that. So I need a reason to keep playing my character after I hit 80, and I’m not finding it.

I have noticed a lot..ok…most of the people on my friendlist in-game are hardly on anymore. I rarely see them log in… makes since from reading this thread I suppose.

Playing less here.

the reasons why:

1 – I play mesmer — I didn’t care much about any other nerfs to the class, but when they put into place the last major update to mesmer, the “blind, block, dodge, invulnerability prevents illusion summons” pretty much stabbed at the very heart of the way the class functioned. It turned blind into an extra, mesmer-only blanket-silence on pet summons, utilities, and defensive cooldowns. It allowed a single dodge to negate not just one attack, but the group utility the phantasms brought AND the next shatter. No other class has to deal with that injustice. It became a huge “no confidence” flag in the devs.

2 – The introduction of this new tier of gear when people are still getting used to this game’s most basic mechanics questions whether there will ever be a true, cohesive community in this game. This is how you produce elitists centralized in certain guilds telling anyone who doesn’t have their gear level to DIAF. This elitism is how communities rot from the inside out.

FOR THE RECORD:

I happen to LOVE the dungeons in this game. They reward skill and are challenging. You have to adapt to them. FotM should be scrapped, however.

Not playing at because they lied about not adding vertical progression which will have a negative impact on ppl who do not acquire that gear for WVW.
Fractals is a gating system.
pvp is still bad.
poorly implemented events.

Waiting for Monday to see if they make a statement regarding this. If I find it inadequate or if not presented, will complete my request for a refund.

I play less partially because of work, but mainly because of 80 levels. I realize it doesn’t take long if you just grind away however I do and always have HATED PvE its boring, mind numbing, and lets face it GW1 had how many abilities to unlock ? By lvl 30 you have everything you really need. I prefer WvW … not for the zerg/keep taking aspect but more for the roaming aspect. So yes I have gotten multiple toons to 50-60 via WvW but around 60 I lose interest because of the grind.

I think they had it right in GW1 with 20 levels 80 is to many regardless of how easy some feel it is to level. Sure I can jump into WvW and play at any level but to actually compete against most you need to be 80 with half decent gear.

Also class balance is such a complete joke in this game its not even funny, certain classes dps is far beyond others, crits are to high, no true support class. These are all personal prefrences and opinions but hard to ignore and very hard to believe that Anet doesn’t have favorite classes.

I really wish they had gone the route of GW1 with levels and skills, more skills to unlock at least gave me a reason to go out and PvE.

Spending much time on online commerce sites such as Amazon.com. I encourage anyone who is unhappy with these changes to post reviews early and often. Target.com, walmart.com, newegg.com, gamestop.com.

Columba.9730:

Spending much time on online commerce sites such as Amazon.com. I encourage anyone who is unhappy with these changes to post reviews early and often. Target.com, walmart.com, newegg.com, gamestop.com.

Not a bad idea.

I don’t play at all anymore. I was very disappointed in ANet when things changed with Lost Shores. I stopped playing probably a day or two after it came out. I come here to the forums in hopes that it will change but at this point with what has been said by ANet, I view this game as a lost cause.

I loved the game when it first came out. I played most of the beta weekends and stress tests if I wasn’t working. Loved it. I had been waiting for this game for well over a year, messing around in like 3 or 4 other games if not more. Didn’t keep track.

I actually went back to an old game because of ANet changing things up like this. I don’t want the gear grind that Ascended is requiring. I don’t really have the time or patience for it.

And I do agree with Nutz. The class balance sucks. ANet claims they are going to fix certain things with the dmg done by certain skills but I didn’t see no chances. Still was getting 2 shot by a thief and he was using only one skill.

I still average 5.5hrs / day

Read this it will illuminate what is going on with gw2 after the patch http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Meleagar/112012/24237_NCSoft-Sold-Arenanet-and-GW2-Out-For-Nexon-Investment this person was hired to adjust game to push people to buy from cash shop and transform game to the standard f2p pay to win model nexon is known for.

diablo.8679:

Read this it will illuminate what is going on with gw2 after the patch http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Meleagar/112012/24237_NCSoft-Sold-Arenanet-and-GW2-Out-For-Nexon-Investment this person was hired to adjust game to push people to buy from cash shop and transform game to the standard f2p pay to win model nexon is known for.

Pathetic. I hope it’s just rumor-mongering, but it fits perfectly with what i’ve seen everywhere else.

I have to disagree with alot of these posts simply because you people have never played other mmos other then gws1. let me tell you i played and still play wow for 8 years and since wows release in 2004 its hard for other mmos to get noticed or attract gamers i mean you either get one niche of players who like pvp,raids or regular pve. Also if you want true gear grind go play wow and come back and tell me whats worse gws2 or wow’s furthermore most mmos now a days have to compete with blizzard’s success and im happy to see anet try to do that with rng gear. i mean sure its not for everyones taste and if you dont like go back to playing gws1 or cyrptic studios new mmo coming out neverwinter. i hate when others disown a game just because there trying to compete in this world of gaming wow has molded with there whole concept of end game gear most mmo’s don’t live long because wow crushes them or people are disappointed with how it turned out. I love gws2 because its a different take on the genre and i love its a new take on the whole gear grind without competing with others of your class in a 25 man raid for a single piece of loot ive been there in wow when it was 40 man raids as a mage. I would also like to point out anet has plans to revamp and rebalance the dungeons to make them more fun and to drop more tokens in the future. so just hang in there remember good things come to those who are patient=) also if you dont like gws2 go play console games instead =)

Stopped for 2 weeks to finish my degree so I didn’t experience the event nor did I do any fractals yet (so yeah I’m, lv1 or whatever noone wants in a group judging by the forums).
Anyway, past few days I can’t even find the motivation to log in (sadly in this time I was reading the forums and got infected by gloom :P ). Yay, massive grind for gear. Yay for a dungeon the excludes ppl via some stupid levels. Yay for my idea I’ll have all toons lvl80 and geared. Yay for crappy class fixes, nerfs and stuff still broken from beta. Yay for stupid RNG and DR.

Sadly, if this game does turn into gear grinding, I will not play.

I play very little, not even every day at this point sometimes not even once a week.

Why: Because every content option for my lvl 80s aside from map completions involve serious grind if Im to actually have a purpose to it. – I dont mind grind if it has an intrinsic reward such as; Fun?! – but I do not have fun grinding t6mats while battling the anti farm code, and I dont have fun in Orr because frankly, the events scale horribly – lastly I refuse to get in the fractal or token gear mill because they are also mindless grinds. Doing a dungeon 10 times is ok, if its fun – but grinding them, taking the fastest routes possible because of mindnumblingly boring trash encounters; something a large majority of dungeon runners ended up doing. Im not going to do something I actually would classify as boring and no carrot is going to make me do that.

The sad fact is that once you cut out the content that doesnt give any intrinsic rewards in and of itself after the first 2-3 times let alone the first 50 times, this game has nothing to offer but grinds. Artifically slowed down by either anti farm codes, or by repetitive use of same mats in many recipes to hike up prices (encourage gem purchases I suppose) – Its just such a hollow game when you get disenchanted enough by these facts. – Killed it for me.

I spent hours and hours and days and weeks and months in EQ1. I grinded AA’s – and I had fun. The game was social, it had gear grinds it was grindy. But it had intrinsic value even as content was repeated. GW2 does not to the majority. – Only the ones who have found golden guilds with enough outofgame social banter to carry them through in game activities can enjoy the game longterm, considering the direction it is heading.

I have absolutely no doubt that GW2 is in trouble, unless it gets out of this grind hell its sunken into. And that goes from material grinds to stat grinds. It cheapened the game from the very first mystic forge discoveries.

I went from about 5-6h/day to about 1-2h. The fact that every single piece of new content they put in it’s insanely buggy and frustrating, the gem store is such a big money scam it’s not even funny (yeah I’ll just go buy the 25 BL keys for the modest price of 1500+ gems to drop more mystery tonics). I’ve finished my storyline, map completion, I got my gear, I’ve pretty much done every dungeon in the game, WvW, PvP and in 3 months I feel like I saw everything worth seeing in this game. Will I grind for a legendary or full ascended gear, probably not. And aside from that everything becomes kinda boring and repetitive.

Fobik.5908:

I have to disagree with alot of these posts simply because you people have never played other mmos other then gws1. let me tell you i played and still play wow for 8 years and since wows release in 2004 its hard for other mmos to get noticed or attract gamers i mean you either get one niche of players who like pvp,raids or regular pve. Also if you want true gear grind go play wow and come back and tell me whats worse gws2 or wow’s furthermore most mmos now a days have to compete with blizzard’s success and im happy to see anet try to do that with rng gear. i mean sure its not for everyones taste and if you dont like go back to playing gws1 or cyrptic studios new mmo coming out neverwinter. i hate when others disown a game just because there trying to compete in this world of gaming wow has molded with there whole concept of end game gear most mmo’s don’t live long because wow crushes them or people are disappointed with how it turned out. I love gws2 because its a different take on the genre and i love its a new take on the whole gear grind without competing with others of your class in a 25 man raid for a single piece of loot ive been there in wow when it was 40 man raids as a mage. I would also like to point out anet has plans to revamp and rebalance the dungeons to make them more fun and to drop more tokens in the future. so just hang in there remember good things come to those who are patient=) also if you dont like gws2 go play console games instead =)

Although your entitled to your opinion, don’t presume because many of us have mentioned GW1 being a great game that we have never played anything else. Some of us have been around since the days of UO, and have played many, many games. I will agree WoW was and still is a great game even if its not everyones cup of tea.

With that out of the way I don’t completely disagree with what you posted, however, one of the main selling points was no gear grind (it doesn’t matter how big or small the grind is) and now they are introducing a gear grind. (one could argue your console comment by saying if you like gear grinds of any sort go play WoW)

Perhaps the problem with MMO’s nowadays is the fact that they are trying to compete with WoW’s success instead of worrying about their own.

The mold your talking about was created long before WoW was a twinkle in the MMO eye. I won’t argue that they kitten near perfected it but I can assure you the mold was there long before. In the end your not all wrong and I’m not all right but everyone has an opinion and we are all entitled to it, but implying most of us have only played GW1 or should go to consoles is just ignorant at best.

At the end of the day, this specific design, which is a much more unimaginative verison of WoW normal vs hard mode raids, specifically rewards people with advantages for excluding others.

This is directly counter to the stated manifesto in designing this game.

It’s demoralizing and definitely makes me worry about logging on.