Guild Wars 2

Sylv.5324:

To folks who are frustrated with the OP: Remember that ANet promised us a continuation of GW1. What infos we got over the years (we waited YEARS with very few updates and content) was that it was going to be like GW1 but with the stuff that they couldn’t implement, like jumping, possible mounts (from the concept art coming out), more detailed models, etc.

We liked the game that they stopped making. We didn’t quit it to jump to another game, we moved because they said, basically, ‘the game engine isn’t what we need it to be, so we’re focusing development on the next iteration of this game, please come with us’. Most of us took it at face value.

I LIKE guild wars 2. But I do miss the many creative armors in GW1, I miss heroes and henchmen, I definitely miss Guild Halls (my guild has to go to other servers to have guild meetings just to not get griefed), I miss all my minipets from 1 that never got ported over.

People say, ‘well, go back to GW1!’ That’s not feasible when they stopped updating it. So I wish that they could stop avoiding some of the things that made GW1 good, like guild halls, like the armor styles, like the various cultures, like the guild halls, like those minis, skill capturing, etc. I don’t see why folks would NOT want any of these things.

So, I like Guild Wars 2, it does a lot of things well and it is my main MMO now. But GW1 was the MMO I planned to stick with for longer and that got yanked out from under a lot of players, and the many features which would go a long way toward easing things -aren’t here-. That’s going to bother some people. Dissing us for the quandary we’re finding ourselves in is crappy.

Regarding nostalgia glasses re: grinding: I never had a problem with grinding. Maxing titles and acquiring some armors and weapons required a lot of it, and I was ok with that.

I’m not sure that first point is correct. I remember way back when it was first announced (2007?).

Two things, free to play and a ‘completely different game from/than GW1’.

I’m nigh certain that last one was from an official statement or interview from somewhere, in the early pre-release days.

May someone fill me in how GW2 is grind based?

Tao.5096:

May someone fill me in how GW2 is grind based?

Ascended Gear and its crafting, Yakslapper, “kill 1000 giants” . . . Legendaries . . . these are generally the go-to examples.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Tao.5096:

May someone fill me in how GW2 is grind based?

Ascended Gear and its crafting, Yakslapper, “kill 1000 giants” . . . Legendaries . . . these are generally the go-to examples.

Those come up all the time true, these are aspects of the game they are not what the game is based on. For example you do not need giant kill to do anything else in the game. I personally have 500 in all the weapon crafting and I am not going to make any ascended weapons. I could like anyone else in the game make a legendary, I have absolutely no desire to do so. What parts of the game can’t I participate in?

Tao.5096:

May someone fill me in how GW2 is grind based?

I’ve probably spent 100 hours in ascalon + fz for the sole purpose of grinding for gold and different exo gears for all my chars by completing all 3 paths over and over again. Not going to do whatever is necessary for uprading all that into ascended gear. Speaking of, leveling my 3rd char already felt like a chore, necessary in order to have a valid character.

If I hadn’t done this, what would be left? Grinding archievements? A little PvP (not that much into it)? An open raid once in a while? Totally not worth 100 hours.

The grind doesn’t take as long as compared to other games, but it is still one of the most important game aspects. Trust me, I recognize a grind when I see one – based on the experience of approximately 10000 hours of RO (most of it spent on achieving VP with a single character for everyone who’s unclear on what this means).

It’s true that you can enjoy the world of GW2 ingenuously if you let go of this archievement-mentallity. Unfortunatly this made me lose have the motivation to play the game.

There is difference between optional and trivial. And without a longterm motivation the content becomes trivial. Every other genre goes with improvements in player skill as a long-term motivation. MMORPG apparently go with grinds. GW2 only made their longterm motivation trivial- not optional, because they didn’t implement a real option.

When Diablo 2 was released, it wasn’t as great as it is now. I remember the community saying the game was terrible, that it wasn’t going to be played. But the game got a lot of updates and improved to a point that “Diablo” became a synonym of success

Diablo 3’s release was terrible as well (Blizzard is excellent on that I think), but the community feedback helped the game to take the right direction, and the expansion can prove that is true

GW2 was an outstanding game on the release. I myself played it almost the whole year (bought it on jan/2013 and quit on set-oct/2013).
ArenaNet started updating the game, with good and bad stuff, but the game got more and more like a grind game than something to have fun, and more you were forced to play Guardian or Warrior because they are simply the best classes in the game for PvE.
I hope all that “listen to community” gives us some hope and let us play the game to have fun again

I’ve never played GW1 and from what I’ve seen of it I never want to play GW1.
I love GW2 though!
GW1 is ooold. Get over it guys. If you still like it more. Why not surprise * surprise* PLAY it? GW1 is still playable right?

agree with the op, Alot of content just isn’t there to keep you interested that was in gw1.

You could go hard mode for the challenge , run in uw farms or Doa , if you were into collecting there was chest farming( really miss that), pvpers had there things. there was stuff to collect from bosses ( for those that never played gw1 every boss basically dropped a different rare item)

then there was the events , the last wintersday in gw1 us server had over 100 overflows type maps ,it was a game for the ppl and loved bye the ppl.

And my last thought —--I MISS MY MONK

KarlaGrey.5903:

Please don’t confuse posting on the forums with playing the game. The former is actually rather entertaining.

I was referring to former. Otherwise you’d look like a massive hypocrite. But in any case, here’s to hoping you find something more productive to do with your time.

Just because the majority of my posts are a mixture of sarcasm/criticism/irony/generally on the critical side doesn’t mean I can’t/don’t enjoy myself.
Ty for your hopes and wishes. Worry not, however, for I spend my actual free time elsewhere. You should perhaps be more concerned about the poor souls still lost playing GW2 though!

It is not that hard of a concept, if you don’t enjoy playing a video game quit it. I recently toook a 2 month break from gw2 to play blade and soul, had fun in blade and soul got sick of it and quit.

Unlike a job, you give yourself whatever reason you want to quit. YOu don’t need other players to tell you why you should stay, unless you are for some reason trying to validate your choice, which just makes it sad.

Escadin.9482:

Tao.5096:

May someone fill me in how GW2 is grind based?

I’ve probably spent 100 hours in ascalon + fz for the sole purpose of grinding for gold and different exo gears for all my chars by completing all 3 paths over and over again. Not going to do whatever is necessary for uprading all that into ascended gear. Speaking of, leveling my 3rd char already felt like a chore, necessary in order to have a valid character.

If I hadn’t done this, what would be left? Grinding archievements? A little PvP (not that much into it)? An open raid once in a while? Totally not worth 100 hours.

The grind doesn’t take as long as compared to other games, but it is still one of the most important game aspects. Trust me, I recognize a grind when I see one – based on the experience of approximately 10000 hours of RO (most of it spent on achieving VP with a single character for everyone who’s unclear on what this means).

It’s true that you can enjoy the world of GW2 ingenuously if you let go of this archievement-mentallity. Unfortunatly this made me lose have the motivation to play the game.

There is difference between optional and trivial. And without a longterm motivation the content becomes trivial. Every other genre goes with improvements in player skill as a long-term motivation. MMORPG apparently go with grinds. GW2 only made their longterm motivation trivial- not optional, because they didn’t implement a real option.

no offence, but 100 hours for gathering mats for crafting end game stuff isn’t much which I assume are rare materials. And yet you have a 100% chance for successful output.
And I’m asking what’s grind like in gw2 because I don’t really see anything grindy based here, except achievements which may be done out of boredom.

Still, game is more player friendly than most of the other MMOs.
And by player friendly I mean that you don’t really need to spend so many hours a week to get the top stuff so it does let you survive.

Here I can point out Lineage 2, which was grindy and there was a chance of destruction of your gear and weapon upon failed enchanting, Aion The Tower of Eternity which had rng in every single pixel of the game(which also should get an award for mass rage, frustration and rageQuit) and since certain patch, forced any player to grind for newest and best gear possible, etc etc.

here is a funny part because devs stay in contact with playerbase and playerbase one way or another has an influence what will be next in game or how the system will change – at least a partial influence.
And that’s what you pretty much can’t see in other games.

Leveling isn’t grindy – you don’t have quests which make you – kill 50 mobs, here, kill 50 mobs there, kill 50 mobs everywhere, and so on till max level.
I solely am leveling thanks to some karma events, gathering and doing vista’s, poi and skill challenges. Even hearts don’t make you grind mobs – plenty of other ways to get influence for that area quest.

Another aspect is that you make whatever kind of build your imagination allow with any class you want.
Doubt any other MMO game allows that, because in most cases, if you’ll try do that, you’re capped in many ways and pretty much useless.

So as summary, I can assume that people believe that spamming some Dunegons and running across all maps for materials for crafting may look grindy, but if we’ll look at other games – it is nowhere near.

Also, have to keep in mind that West MMO games, despite the fact they differ from pure Korean games and their 24/7 in-game mindset, Developer can’t make us get top notch stuff by spending only 50~100 hours in game, because game will get boring soon after we’ll get it or would need to release new content more frequently, which is not easy.
And I know that balancing it is difficult as well.

I was a GW1 maven. I played from shortly after release of Prophecies until GW2.

I choose not to look at GW1 through the proverbial “rose colored glasses.”

Ok, so you could reach level cap in a couple days (less if you pushed hard) and you didn’t have to grind mats for…oh…wait…never mind…how many ectos did I need for that set? and how many speed clear runs in UW did that translate to?

You also didn’t have to grind rep to get the cool EOTN…oh…wait…I neeed how many points to buy Asura armor?

You also didn’t have to grind for the cool skins…wait a minute… how many trips through the bog did I need to make for the froggy scepter?

In truth, the only thing in GW1 PvE that wasn’t a grind was the first 20 levels. After that, you needed points, rep, mats, shineys, and pretty much anything else you wanted.

There was (and still is) a reason they call it Spamadan. It’s because nobody wanted to go grind out the things that supposedly made GW1 so great. They want to buy it. And if you ask, I would bet a large portion of the playerbase that hangs out and purchases goods will tell you…“Because I don’t like the grind involved.”

PvP on the other hand was great. RA (Random Arenas) and TA (Team Arenas) were great, and the GvG put real guild wars in the Guild Wars. I do hope that ANet takes a cue from GW1 and someday implements some other types of PvP. WvZerg is fun, but tiring, and sPvP is not what I had hoped it would be, although it does smack of RA a bit.

TL;DR:
GW2 is really not as grindy as most forumites would have you to believe. Yes, there are aspects that are grinds. I am not disputing that. I just think that the OP has a different view of what is a necessary grind than I do.

@ the OP:
I am sorry that the game is not turning out the way you had hoped. I do think that your views are a bit skewed as to what a grind is, but they are your views, and you are entitled to them.

I wish you well in whatever you do next. If you decide that GW2 isn’t as bad as you had thought, please do come back.

Shiren.9532:

Thobek.1730:

Dark Catalyst.1028:

It’s funny because the gear grind here is worse than it is in WoW.

You’re wrong.

Unlike WoW where you NEED to grind the gear to complete the next tier of content, in GW2 you don’t.

There is gear to get only if you like the look of it. Some of it gives you a very minor boost in stats but doesn’t allow you to see or play any content someone with only rares can experience.

To people who make the choice to play the game, it doesn’t matter whether it’s optional or not. They’ve chosen to partake. Their experience after that is graded on the same level as someone who has to grind to keep up.

I don’t understand why “it’s optional” is the go to defence for grind. Everything in the game is optional – the level cap, playing with other people, WvW, traits and skills (there was a person who used only a warhorn and damage on dodge roll to level to 80 and complete the personal story). Playing the game is optional. Just because something is optional does not mean how it is implemented won’t matter to the players who opt in. To those players, the amount of grind, the kind of grind, the difficulty of grind – all those things are going to matter. If they opt out, why not opt out of the game completely? “It’s optional” is a silly defence to a common criticism.

Just to clarify and go one step further then the poster I quoted above.

Everything is NOT optional in this game.

Ascended is REQUIRED if you choose to do fractals above a certain point.

So all those saying GW2 is that different from all other mmorpgs – Quite frankly it’s not.

You have exactly the same ideals in here as you do in all other games. The difference being the rewards are far inferior here for the time you invest.

Also, This game’s biggest problem is it took far to much effort in trying to be so different from everything else and forgot to that some systems/ideals available in other games are actually good.

I think this whole issue stems from people seeing things a bit too black and white personally.

When I look at Gw2 I personally see a themepark game that has to be played like a sandbox game. Thing is Gw2 unlike traditional themeparks puts the option of how to play entirely to the player and I think a lot of players struggle with this.

Gw2 is not like Gw1 sure but it didnt simply throw the core elements of Gw1 in the bin, it adopted them in a manner that makes them optional. Unfortunately seems to me that in some cases players are not able to recognize them if presented in another form.

Example level cap. sure Gw2 doesnt the small level cap that Gw1 has but going with prophecies I dont think the time to level cap differs much between the two games. In both it will take a week or so to reach max level. Compared to traditional MMOs some of which at high level 1 week will not even be enough to level up a single time.

Another example is gear. In Gw1 gearing up was pretty quick. Gearing up to BiS wasnt quite as quick but it didnt matter cause really you didnt need to get the best runes for each and every build to succeed in fact I am pretty sure few even bothered. In Gw2 the same is still true only its not runes but the gear tier itself. Again BiS is entirely optional here as well just like not having the best runes in gw1 would not stop you from doing any content the same is true here. Before they removed MF I used to run around doing all sort of content in Rares with MF. While I did have an exotic set for WvW and Dungeons I didnt have any ascended piece up until about 2 months ago and didnt get them because they were necessary but because a few guildies needed 1 more for lvl 12 fractal. Compare that with traditional MMOs where sub par gear means certain death in PvP or locked out of certain content like raids and not just because other players will refuse to have you but also because in some games dungeons have gear scores you need to hit in order to enter.

gw1 forced you to give up certain notions of traditional MMOs while traditional MMOs force you in a strict vertical progression game style. Gw2 leaves it up to you.

Galen Grey.4709:

I think this whole issue stems from people seeing things a bit too black and white personally.

When I look at Gw2 I personally see a themepark game that has to be played like a sandbox game. Thing is Gw2 unlike traditional themeparks puts the option of how to play entirely to the player and I think a lot of players struggle with this.

Gw2 is not like Gw1 sure but it didnt simply throw the core elements of Gw1 in the bin, it adopted them in a manner that makes them optional. Unfortunately seems to me that in some cases players are not able to recognize them if presented in another form.

Example level cap. sure Gw2 doesnt the small level cap that Gw1 has but going with prophecies I dont think the time to level cap differs much between the two games. In both it will take a week or so to reach max level. Compared to traditional MMOs some of which at high level 1 week will not even be enough to level up a single time.

Another example is gear. In Gw1 gearing up was pretty quick. Gearing up to BiS wasnt quite as quick but it didnt matter cause really you didnt need to get the best runes for each and every build to succeed in fact I am pretty sure few even bothered. In Gw2 the same is still true only its not runes but the gear tier itself. Again BiS is entirely optional here as well just like not having the best runes in gw1 would not stop you from doing any content the same is true here. Before they removed MF I used to run around doing all sort of content in Rares with MF. While I did have an exotic set for WvW and Dungeons I didnt have any ascended piece up until about 2 months ago and didnt get them because they were necessary but because a few guildies needed 1 more for lvl 12 fractal. Compare that with traditional MMOs where sub par gear means certain death in PvP or locked out of certain content like raids and not just because other players will refuse to have you but also because in some games dungeons have gear scores you need to hit in order to enter.

gw1 forced you to give up certain notions of traditional MMOs while traditional MMOs force you in a strict vertical progression game style. Gw2 leaves it up to you.

Leaving it up to you(the playerbase) has not worked very well thus far for GW2.

Just saying…….

Yargesh.4965:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Tao.5096:

May someone fill me in how GW2 is grind based?

Ascended Gear and its crafting, Yakslapper, “kill 1000 giants” . . . Legendaries . . . these are generally the go-to examples.

Those come up all the time true, these are aspects of the game they are not what the game is based on. For example you do not need giant kill to do anything else in the game. I personally have 500 in all the weapon crafting and I am not going to make any ascended weapons. I could like anyone else in the game make a legendary, I have absolutely no desire to do so. What parts of the game can’t I participate in?

Do we have to do this everytime ascended comes up? For some people, having BiS gear is viewed (correctly or incorrectly) as a necessity to participate in the highest level of play (in PvE and WvW).

For example, if you want to get the fastest dungeon speed run you have to have the best gear. If you want to be the most effective (individually) in WvW you have to have the best gear.

As to why the grind for the gear is unbearable…

There are billions of possible combinations of gear in the game. (I know, it’s hard to believe, but do the math, weapons and armor have 19 possible choices each, accessories and back items have 14 each)… even just looking at two handed weapon, head, shoulders, body, legs, amulet, 1 ring, 1 trinket, and a back item I got 95 billion possibilities. Yes, some of them are less intelligent and counter productive, but they are there.

Ascended gear is fine for PvE where only 1 of those combinations matter. But in WvW, it’s irritating and frustrating to be limited to 1 set when there are so many possibilities to explore.

Azreell.1568:

Just to clarify and go one step further then the poster I quoted above.

Everything is NOT optional in this game.

Ascended is REQUIRED if you choose to do fractals above a certain point.

So all those saying GW2 is that different from all other mmorpgs – Quite frankly it’s not.

You have exactly the same ideals in here as you do in all other games. The difference being the rewards are far inferior here for the time you invest.

Also, This game’s biggest problem is it took far to much effort in trying to be so different from everything else and forgot to that some systems/ideals available in other games are actually good.

Yes and No.

Gw2 tries to provide a package that is aimed both to people who want vertical progression and those who do not want it. Fractals is the specific content aimed at those who want vertical progression. Yet the game still doesnt put it out of reach of those players who dont want vertical progression cause well obviously you can do every fractal without a single piece of ascended gear. In other games this is not always the case. Case in point are gear scores.

Thats not all but gw2 differs on a lot of things to your typical MMO. Mob tagging before Gw2 very few if any really rewarded both players killing the same mob without being in a party. No MMO that I am aware of left 2 players tap the same resource within seconds of each other. I’ve been in MMOs where we literally had queues as in straight line long queues to kill bosses in turn. Or camping near dungeons waiting for a tank or a healer and hoping they’d join our group rather then one of the others waiting for the same thing. So yes Gw2 is different in several aspects to a lot of MMOs out there. Of course with everything else it shares similarities too.

Rewards are “inferior” just because it is actually different then other MMOs. Why are reward valuable in other MMOs? because they’re better then what you already have but that means that every single new content raises the bar. Hence if I played an MMO for 10 years someone who can compete with me will require a few years of playing to reach me. In Gw2 in 1 single week a new player can reach a level that can measure up well with a 2 year player. In your traditional MMO they’d be no were close.

Azreell.1568:

Galen Grey.4709:

I think this whole issue stems from people seeing things a bit too black and white personally.

When I look at Gw2 I personally see a themepark game that has to be played like a sandbox game. Thing is Gw2 unlike traditional themeparks puts the option of how to play entirely to the player and I think a lot of players struggle with this.

Gw2 is not like Gw1 sure but it didnt simply throw the core elements of Gw1 in the bin, it adopted them in a manner that makes them optional. Unfortunately seems to me that in some cases players are not able to recognize them if presented in another form.

Example level cap. sure Gw2 doesnt the small level cap that Gw1 has but going with prophecies I dont think the time to level cap differs much between the two games. In both it will take a week or so to reach max level. Compared to traditional MMOs some of which at high level 1 week will not even be enough to level up a single time.

Another example is gear. In Gw1 gearing up was pretty quick. Gearing up to BiS wasnt quite as quick but it didnt matter cause really you didnt need to get the best runes for each and every build to succeed in fact I am pretty sure few even bothered. In Gw2 the same is still true only its not runes but the gear tier itself. Again BiS is entirely optional here as well just like not having the best runes in gw1 would not stop you from doing any content the same is true here. Before they removed MF I used to run around doing all sort of content in Rares with MF. While I did have an exotic set for WvW and Dungeons I didnt have any ascended piece up until about 2 months ago and didnt get them because they were necessary but because a few guildies needed 1 more for lvl 12 fractal. Compare that with traditional MMOs where sub par gear means certain death in PvP or locked out of certain content like raids and not just because other players will refuse to have you but also because in some games dungeons have gear scores you need to hit in order to enter.

gw1 forced you to give up certain notions of traditional MMOs while traditional MMOs force you in a strict vertical progression game style. Gw2 leaves it up to you.

Leaving it up to you(the playerbase) has not worked very well thus far for GW2.

Just saying…….

And I agree with you and its a shame. I just cant understand why players need to be forced to play the way they enjoy rather then choosing it themeselves. Case in point are Zergs so many people have been complaining of Zergs since day 1 yet all they had to do is just no join the zerg.

Oh one addendum. Even if I limit the choices to Berserker, Assassin, Valkyrie, Soldier, Knight and Cavalier for weapons and armor and Berserker, Assassin, Zerk/Valk, Solder, Knight, Cavalier, and Of-the Knight for trinkets, for the same 1 weapon, head, shoulders, body, legs, amulet, 1 ring, 1 trinket, and 1 backpiece there remain over 18 million combinations.

Is it fun?
For me it is when i am “prepared to have fun”…

But the more we go on the bigger the % of time spent is “preparation to have fun” opposed to “having fun”.

Whoever designed GW2 thougt it perfectly…
Whoever is in care of updates, totally destroyed it for me…..

The process of acquiring wealth in order to get equipment was fun at the beginning, in fact you could obtain it from whatever you liked “playing the way you want”.

Few months later you play whatever developers wants….

GW2 may not be for every player and that’s fine. But for those who play it and then later give up on it and bash on it, just leave. Find another game to play. You don’t have to post about how it wasn’t what you were hoping for or that you felt it didn’t go anywhere for you etc. Just don’t complain about it. Just go and don’t waste your breath posting about the “grind” that GW2 “has” that you forced upon yourself. Yes, grinding in GW2 is self-imposed.
…

I think the problem people are having with GW2 is all focused on end game. GW2 did a lot of new innovative things to the normal MMO standards. End Game is not WOWs end game, which a majority of MMOs line up for. In fact many people play WOW JUST FOR end game the climb to max level doesnt matter. I tend to agree end game is the most important thing in a game, what makes an mmo an mmo is the end game. That being said I feel that GW2 is the best End Game of any game. Tons of end game story content it is really like it never ends, they have been pushing a huge overhaul on PVP and PVE in upcoming (spring or summer) patch coming out, and normally content like this would be a paid for expansion we are getting it for free. GW2 gives you much more than you paid for, no you dont hunt gear the same way, no the PVP is not 2v2 3v3 4v4 5v5 like in WOW it is conquest (They said they adding new modes prob in this next patch). If you want gear you gotta work hard for it, if your casual player that wants to still play on a high level you can still join others.

Simply put, the end game does not allow you to grind out GOD gear to crush player of lower gear who may or may not be better skill wise.

Tao.5096:

no offence, but 100 hours for gathering mats for crafting end game stuff isn’t much which I assume are rare materials. And yet you have a 100% chance for successful output.
And I’m asking what’s grind like in gw2 because I don’t really see anything grindy based here, except achievements which may be done out of boredom.

Repeating the same 3hours worth of content for 100 hours is grind and nothing else. It may be less grind than in other MMORPGS but it is still grind and that’s exactly what I said. I also said that this is only for exotic gear because we all know ascended is worse. If you already feel like replying with “ascended is optional” – please reread what you just quoted.

Still, game is more player friendly than most of the other MMOs.
And by player friendly I mean that you don’t really need to spend so many hours a week to get the top stuff so it does let you survive.

You are argueing against a point nobody has made here. Or perhaps, you’re trying to argue that a focus on trivial grind is better than an honest focus on hard/rewarding grinds. That’s not true. Again reread your quote. GW2 requires you to do nothing, no grinds, no specific build or class. That doesn’t mean it offers you a “take a) or b) choice”, because it only offers “take it or leave it”. Lack of longterm motivation is no feature.

here is a funny part because devs stay in contact with playerbase and playerbase one way or another has an influence what will be next in game or how the system will change – at least a partial influence.
And that’s what you pretty much can’t see in other games.

The last 5 games I played for longer periods had better communitcation between devs and playerbase, to be frank. That statement depends on whether you are comparing Anet to EA or some serious developers.
There is big potential for improvement in this game and I’m still sure the devs will try and use this potential based on their communication with us. If only yet unused potential would be the only thing that makes a game interesting.

Leveling isn’t grindy – you don’t have quests which make you – kill 50 mobs, here, kill 50 mobs there, kill 50 mobs everywhere, and so on till max level.
I solely am leveling thanks to some karma events….

Any level up system is by definition grindy.
The system offers you a set of rules on how and at what pace you may progress through the game. The goal is reach max level. The amount of hows (GW2 has plenty of them) doesn’t have any affect on the pace or goal, which means with a set pace you will repeat stuff at a certain point and you will only repeat it in order to reach your goal, even if you progress at such pace that you don’t actually have to be worried.
Each of my characters took me 1 week to level up. Considering I have 4 of them, that makes a month of playtime. Do you really think GW2, even though it offers plenty of “hows” offer enough to make a whole month without repetition possible? How entertaining is it really to farm all vistas for map completion, using waypoints? How entertaining is it after you completed the 10th area?

Another aspect is that you make whatever kind of build your imagination allow with any class you want.
Doubt any other MMO game allows that, because in most cases, if you’ll try do that, you’re capped in many ways and pretty much useless.

Still true in GW2 with the current balance situation. GW2 offers like an average of 40 weapon and utility spells per profession. Almost every possible combination is supposed to accomplish the same things, with compareable effectiveness, while avoiding to become a big pabulum.
Do you really think this will come close to be being balanced at any time soon?

Tao.5096:

So as summary, I can assume that people believe that spamming some Dunegons and running across all maps for materials for crafting may look grindy, but if we’ll look at other games – it is nowhere near.

Also, have to keep in mind that West MMO games, despite the fact they differ from pure Korean games and their 24/7 in-game mindset,….

GW2 was considered a saving grace for many people who grew tired of the way MMORPGs are designed. One argument was that it was supposed to drop the focus on grinds, not to make their rewards trivial – which are 2 different things.
Those people didn’t want a game like other mmos but a bit less bad. It’s also not their fault for thinking black&white if the game still uses black&white motivators, presented in different shades.

@ OP,

I had a similar moment about a year ago, so I decided to take a break. I’m very happy I did. I discovered an unlikely spiritual successor to GW1 in the form of heavily modded ENB Skyrim. Of course the only thing lacking is multiplay. But all the features of GW1 can be modded into Skyrim; and with ENB there are simply no games which currently compare to the hyper-realism, hyper-fantasy visuals achievable. GW2 graphics have improve over the last year, but comparably speaking it causes eyesores. And like GW1 it is pure and unadulterated “sandbox” immersion game-play. No wonky UI; no theme park hand-holding; no gated content, no levels (heroics by number) extremely challenging skill-wise if modded such, (I may do a S.T.E.P. – Pack targeted specifically for GW1 sandbox, skill based gameplay).

But, upon return after a year away, I’ve discovered some very subtle; some promising changes in GW2; it seems the WoWish ‘Lead Design’ philosophy is beginning to show it’s shallow breadth, it’s beginning to fracture. And though subtle some of these changes are, it may be hardbringer of a larger trend for ArenaNet, and a return to Strain-Phinney philosophy so well loved by GW1 fans.

I would suggest coming back in a year. I’ll be back again in a year to test the waters; though not going to hold my breath. Unless there are some big shakeups in design management for GW2.

TooBz.3065:

Do we have to do this everytime ascended comes up? For some people, having BiS gear is viewed (correctly or incorrectly) as a necessity to participate in the highest level of play (in PvE and WvW).

For example, if you want to get the fastest dungeon speed run you have to have the best gear. If you want to be the most effective (individually) in WvW you have to have the best gear.

As to why the grind for the gear is unbearable…

There are billions of possible combinations of gear in the game. (I know, it’s hard to believe, but do the math, weapons and armor have 19 possible choices each, accessories and back items have 14 each)… even just looking at two handed weapon, head, shoulders, body, legs, amulet, 1 ring, 1 trinket, and a back item I got 95 billion possibilities. Yes, some of them are less intelligent and counter productive, but they are there.

Ascended gear is fine for PvE where only 1 of those combinations matter. But in WvW, it’s irritating and frustrating to be limited to 1 set when there are so many possibilities to explore.

doesnt the choice of I have to be the very best justify the high cost in itself though? There is a saying really in business you generally can provide 90% of a product at 10% of the cost. Of course its just an euphemism but the concept behind it is true and that is if you want the very best it will cost a lot more then the 2nd best. Thats the whole point of cost to benefit analysis after all.

If it will take you say 100hrs to fully gear up in ascended gear will that be worth the 10 mins you’re going to shave off a dungeon run?

If you do a lot of runs than probably yes, if you do 2 to 5 runs a week it will take you 2 – 5 years before even break even so probably not.

Thing is players really need to understand that they dont have to be the very very best in everything. In fact I am curious to see how that will effect Wildstar since the game is specifically designed to make it practically impossible to have all pieces of gear BiS by design.

Galen Grey.4709:

Azreell.1568:

Just to clarify and go one step further then the poster I quoted above.

Everything is NOT optional in this game.

Ascended is REQUIRED if you choose to do fractals above a certain point.

So all those saying GW2 is that different from all other mmorpgs – Quite frankly it’s not.

You have exactly the same ideals in here as you do in all other games. The difference being the rewards are far inferior here for the time you invest.

Also, This game’s biggest problem is it took far to much effort in trying to be so different from everything else and forgot to that some systems/ideals available in other games are actually good.

Yes and No.

Gw2 tries to provide a package that is aimed both to people who want vertical progression and those who do not want it. Fractals is the specific content aimed at those who want vertical progression. Yet the game still doesnt put it out of reach of those players who dont want vertical progression cause well obviously you can do every fractal without a single piece of ascended gear. In other games this is not always the case. Case in point are gear scores.

Thats not all but gw2 differs on a lot of things to your typical MMO. Mob tagging before Gw2 very few if any really rewarded both players killing the same mob without being in a party. No MMO that I am aware of left 2 players tap the same resource within seconds of each other. I’ve been in MMOs where we literally had queues as in straight line long queues to kill bosses in turn. Or camping near dungeons waiting for a tank or a healer and hoping they’d join our group rather then one of the others waiting for the same thing. So yes Gw2 is different in several aspects to a lot of MMOs out there. Of course with everything else it shares similarities too.

Rewards are “inferior” just because it is actually different then other MMOs. Why are reward valuable in other MMOs? because they’re better then what you already have but that means that every single new content raises the bar. Hence if I played an MMO for 10 years someone who can compete with me will require a few years of playing to reach me. In Gw2 in 1 single week a new player can reach a level that can measure up well with a 2 year player. In your traditional MMO they’d be no were close.

Just to clarify – You can not do every single factal without a piece of ascended gear. The highest level of fractal is 50. Generally speaking due to the instability list the most commonly done fractal is 49. Level 49 requires 55 Agony resist. Level 50 requires 70.
Both would require ascended gear unless you have more money then most players in this game and have the ability to craft some pretty hefty infusions.

The interesting part about your post is the equality issue. This is where we differ greatly in our mentality. Why do you think it’s proper for a player who played 10 yrs to be on par with a player who played for 2 weeks and was able to catch up in literally less then a day? If that was the case then what incentive would any player have for every continually playing GW2? Human nature generally desires if you work harder you should reap rewards greater then someone who works less. That is a reasonable assumption and part of the issue with GW2 also.

The point being though other games have systems to allow player’s to catch up gear wise but not in such a ridiculously short time as GW2.

But, quite frankly – I have always had an issue with the fact that I can take 4 hrs to craft a character from 1-80 and he is just as powerful as a character I have played for over a year and have 100’s if not more hrs invested in.

“Idle mind is the devils playground” An interesting quote which would explain a lot of the current forum activity and tone.

People are simply bored of GW2 and it’s systems and are desiring for it to improve to renew interest.

Eventually if things don’t change the forum activity will subside again and that will be due to more player’s leaving.

Quiet forums are never a good thing though.

A lot of people are giving up on this game.

Transient PvE zerg content and gem store updates are not what I signed up for when I pre-ordered this game.

The thing I enjoy most out of an MMO is not it’s story or it’s gear grind or it’s lore (although its fun to speculate on that). I enjoy the development of my personal playstyle and the ability to show off how skilled I am at it, be it in PVE or PVP. I don’t want to show off a legendary with too much pixeleffects, or an xpensive piece of armor. No, i want to show off how skillfull i can approach different kind of game mechanics (boss fights, dungeons, pvp, ..)

To be able to do this there are 2 requirements:
1) An AWESOME combat system with a high skill cap
2) A lot of diversity in possible playstyles (yes, BUILD DIVERSITY)

Let me get my nostalgia on and tell you why i was drawn to the Guild Wars series all those years ago. Exactly, those two reasons. GW1 combat system was dynamic (not as much as gw2’s but it got the job done) and it took many many hours to master. Here I’d like to give the example of the Famous Spike builds (Rift spike, blood spike, ranger spike) that were run in Heroes Ascent that took hours and hours of team practice to get exactly right. I would also like to remind you off the elaborate weapon swapping builds (backbreaker assassins, or even the warrior “4 WEAPON DOMINATOR” (thumbs up if you ever played this build)). One last example, the art of INFUSION, people that took years to master this one specific skill and to be able to safe someone by their developed microsecond reaction speed.
Second, GW1 had THE MOST DIVERSE SKILL SYSTEM EVER and that is what kept me clustered to this game hour after hour , day after day, year after year. There were never-ending lists of skills from all professions too choose from to fill up those 8 precious slots and thus endless combinations of potential builds. Back then, it meant something when you invented a new build. If it was good it would get picked up by many until something better was invented, or until a strong counter build was created (in pvp). This allowed for an ever changing “meta-game” and challenged players to try and break the meta by originality in their builds.

Now, back to GW2 and the point of this post. What GW2 does really well is the Combat system. It is all I could ask for, it’s dynamic, fast paced and difficult to master the timing of key skills (stunbreaks, heals, cc, teleports). However GW2 lacks BUILD DIVERSITY. We are 18 months into the game and by know all professions have about 2, maximum 4 different build (traits and skills) setups that are viable. That’s it! And after playing through most of them I have gotten bored with the skill system. When I play a pvp match i just have to see what profession with what weapon i am up against and i know immediately what build they run. There is no more room for creativity. This happened as well after a while GW1 Prophecies. However not much later there was an expansion with a SH*TLOAD of new skills, and even new professions, allowing me to further define my playstyle and try different ones. GW2 however doesn’t do expansions, they focus on living world. OK, i am totally fine with that so far as story and lore content. However, these living world updates don’t seem to change a lot about the skills and trait systems. Very scarcely there is a BALANCE UPDATE and it is meant for exactly and only that, to BALANCE. These mostly revolved around toning down overused and overpowered traits a little with the small exceptions of sometime completely changing the functionality. But that is all that happens and it is not enough. In my eyes, to make this game compelling again, we don’t need new areas, or new living story quest lines. What we need is:

1)A thorough rework of many traits and skills that have never been used because they are not viable
2)Addition of traits and skills with completely new functionality, opening up different build options and re-sparking the creativity involved in build-crafting. And i want to say that the adding of a new healing skills is a good start but it is NOT ENOUGH. I want to ask for a living world release which adds at least 10 utility skills to each profession,

I wish people would stop using the defence “But you don’t NEED to do it!” I didn’t need to pay for this game either but here we are.

I disagree with some of the assertions made here.

I vastly prefer the systems in place in GW2 for gear advancement to the traditional environments. One reason I stopped playing other MMOs is that my responsibilities prevent me from being able to make regular runs or raids. Games that require such in order to advance create a big, impassable wall for me.

GW2 allows me to slowly plug away at crafting, and even work towards a legendary. I will be mechanically on par with other players. I can’t say the same for other MMOs- I can get in a distant proximity to heroic raiders in WoW, for example, but when push comes to shove the difference is incredibly stark.

In the long run, that state eventually makes me disillusioned with that sort of set up. I have not experienced that in GW2 in the last almost year and a half. This, along with always being able to find a way to have fun when I log in, keeps me coming back.

Prince.7198:

The thing I enjoy most out of an MMO is not it’s story or it’s gear grind or it’s lore (although its fun to speculate on that). I enjoy the development of my personal playstyle and the ability to show off how skilled I am at it, be it in PVE or PVP. I don’t want to show off a legendary with too much pixeleffects, or an xpensive piece of armor. No, i want to show off how skillfull i can approach different kind of game mechanics (boss fights, dungeons, pvp, ..)

To be able to do this there are 2 requirements:
1) An AWESOME combat system with a high skill cap
2) A lot of diversity in possible playstyles (yes, BUILD DIVERSITY)

You’re on the right track! Let me point out a few things that you do not need in order to accomplish this:
-level system
-attributes and stats
-gear

Proven by any racing game, FPS, RTS, TBS and figher game there is.

remnant.2485:

I disagree with some of the assertions made here.

I vastly prefer the systems in place in GW2 for gear advancement to the traditional environments. One reason I stopped playing other MMOs is that my responsibilities prevent me from being able to make regular runs or raids. Games that require such in order to advance create a big, impassable wall for me.

GW2 allows me to slowly plug away at crafting, and even work towards a legendary. I will be mechanically on par with other players. I can’t say the same for other MMOs- I can get in a distant proximity to heroic raiders in WoW, for example, but when push comes to shove the difference is incredibly stark.

In the long run, that state eventually makes me disillusioned with that sort of set up. I have not experienced that in GW2 in the last almost year and a half. This, along with always being able to find a way to have fun when I log in, keeps me coming back.

Just an FYI – It would take me less time in Wow to get a full set of current tier raid gear then it would for me to craft 1 set of ascended in GW2.

This is also assuming I would be playing wow VERY VERY casually and at my own time schedule and pace.

Wow is the most casual game on the market atm – so using that as an example is a very poor choice.

“We don’t make grindy games”.

Azreell.1568:

Just to clarify – You can not do every single factal without a piece of ascended gear. The highest level of fractal is 50. Generally speaking due to the instability list the most commonly done fractal is 49. Level 49 requires 55 Agony resist. Level 50 requires 70.
Both would require ascended gear unless you have more money then most players in this game and have the ability to craft some pretty hefty infusions.

The interesting part about your post is the equality issue. This is where we differ greatly in our mentality. Why do you think it’s proper for a player who played 10 yrs to be on par with a player who played for 2 weeks and was able to catch up in literally less then a day? If that was the case then what incentive would any player have for every continually playing GW2? Human nature generally desires if you work harder you should reap rewards greater then someone who works less. That is a reasonable assumption and part of the issue with GW2 also.

The point being though other games have systems to allow player’s to catch up gear wise but not in such a ridiculously short time as GW2.

But, quite frankly – I have always had an issue with the fact that I can take 4 hrs to craft a character from 1-80 and he is just as powerful as a character I have played for over a year and have 100’s if not more hrs invested in.

“Idle mind is the devils playground” An interesting quote which would explain a lot of the current forum activity and tone.

People are simply bored of GW2 and it’s systems and are desiring for it to improve to renew interest.

Eventually if things don’t change the forum activity will subside again and that will be due to more player’s leaving.

Quiet forums are never a good thing though.

And tell me how is a lvl 49/50 Cliffside Fractal different then a level 1 Cliffside Fractal content wise? Simply speaking if I am interested in the content I can have all of that at level 1. If I am interested in the challenge I can get that by playing as far as my gear allows (granted the AR check has effected this to a degree to be fair). If I want to conquer fractal levels then sure I need Ascended gear but thats the point. I cannot expect to get into a driving competition without having to drive a car can I ?

Well isnt that technically the core of the argument? All you’re going to get by removing vertical progression is everyone at the same level quicker. You can both remove grind / vertical progression and have a distinct advantage worth years between you a new player. Its either one or the other.

Yes people want to be rewarded for their effort but who says only power can be a reward? Every LW release had a unique item that required effort to achieve. I who played from day 1 have characters customized with items I acquired while playing (effort). Someone who joins today will not have the same stuff I have next week but can quite possibly kill me if we fight each other in WvW. And thats important not so much as for the equality itself but for the longevity of the game. I think 1 problem most MMOs face is that a year or so in their lifetime new players have to segregated to a mostly solo game until they reach the level of players who started on day one which can actually take years for games who have been out for quite some time.

The mistake you’re making here is you assume all there is to the game is leveling. Personally I have something over 1200 hrs in the game. Most of my time was spent exploring, seeking out dynamic events and trying to discover every secret behind the living story. I could start at max level it wouldnt make the game any more boring because leveling is nothing more then a small pacing tool. In fact I think its quite liberating then the alternative. Some MMOs I played have such steep leveling curves that either it took 100s of quests to gain a single level with the unfortunate result that each quest because a joke story wise. Something like ohh winter is coming we need 10 world pelts. oh you’re back thanks but we also need to defend ourselves wolf fangs make excellent arrow heads go get 10 of them. Thanks for the fangs but we also need candles can you go get 10 fatty tissue for you guessed it the same wolves I just been killing all day for different reasons because the poor npc doesnt have the mental capacity to reason all the stuff he needs at one go! Or even worst not even bother to hide the grind and have you do the same 5 repeatable quests 20 times each. Or even worst not bother with quests at all and leave to mindlessly kill mobs all day. As if thats not torture enough then why not enjoy a 10% XP loss on death cause you know its not boring enough as is. Ehh nope reach max level too quickly isnt what makes a game boring in my opinion.

Yargesh.4965:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Tao.5096:

May someone fill me in how GW2 is grind based?

Ascended Gear and its crafting, Yakslapper, “kill 1000 giants” . . . Legendaries . . . these are generally the go-to examples.

Those come up all the time true, these are aspects of the game they are not what the game is based on. For example you do not need giant kill to do anything else in the game. I personally have 500 in all the weapon crafting and I am not going to make any ascended weapons. I could like anyone else in the game make a legendary, I have absolutely no desire to do so. What parts of the game can’t I participate in?

The game (at launch) was based on a combination of dynamic events and event chains in the games’ disparate areas coupled with a down-leveling system that was supposed to ensure that max level characters did not trivialize events. The idea was that players would then participate in these events for fun.

Several things happened.

1. Down-leveled characters do not have the same experience as an on-level character.
2. Some players refused to participate in the same events over and over without a carrot to pursue. This phenomenon is not new, and is why MMO’s without grind either do not exist or do not have staying power.
3. Some of the rewards needed to fuel a typical MMO endgame rewards chase were in the game at launch. There were nowhere near enough. More have been added, and ANet made these either time-gated or materials intensive to make them take longer to achieve.
4. Some of the new rewards have been concentrated in specific areas of the game, while a significant percentage of “what the game was based on” has been left unrewarding.

Azreell.1568:

remnant.2485:

I disagree with some of the assertions made here.

I vastly prefer the systems in place in GW2 for gear advancement to the traditional environments. One reason I stopped playing other MMOs is that my responsibilities prevent me from being able to make regular runs or raids. Games that require such in order to advance create a big, impassable wall for me.

GW2 allows me to slowly plug away at crafting, and even work towards a legendary. I will be mechanically on par with other players. I can’t say the same for other MMOs- I can get in a distant proximity to heroic raiders in WoW, for example, but when push comes to shove the difference is incredibly stark.

In the long run, that state eventually makes me disillusioned with that sort of set up. I have not experienced that in GW2 in the last almost year and a half. This, along with always being able to find a way to have fun when I log in, keeps me coming back.

Just an FYI – It would take me less time in Wow to get a full set of current tier raid gear then it would for me to craft 1 set of ascended in GW2.

This is also assuming I would be playing wow VERY VERY casually and at my own time schedule and pace.

Wow is the most casual game on the market atm – so using that as an example is a very poor choice.

havent played WoW since launch so I make no assertions about it but 1 question does this statement refers to starting a new character getting to max level and gearing it up to tier 15 or whatever max tier in wow is right now in a month or so (without buying yourself to max level of course)
Did WoW really change that much?

Galen Grey.4709:

Azreell.1568:

remnant.2485:

I disagree with some of the assertions made here.

I vastly prefer the systems in place in GW2 for gear advancement to the traditional environments. One reason I stopped playing other MMOs is that my responsibilities prevent me from being able to make regular runs or raids. Games that require such in order to advance create a big, impassable wall for me.

GW2 allows me to slowly plug away at crafting, and even work towards a legendary. I will be mechanically on par with other players. I can’t say the same for other MMOs- I can get in a distant proximity to heroic raiders in WoW, for example, but when push comes to shove the difference is incredibly stark.

In the long run, that state eventually makes me disillusioned with that sort of set up. I have not experienced that in GW2 in the last almost year and a half. This, along with always being able to find a way to have fun when I log in, keeps me coming back.

Just an FYI – It would take me less time in Wow to get a full set of current tier raid gear then it would for me to craft 1 set of ascended in GW2.

This is also assuming I would be playing wow VERY VERY casually and at my own time schedule and pace.

Wow is the most casual game on the market atm – so using that as an example is a very poor choice.

havent played WoW since launch so I make no assertions about it but 1 question does this statement refers to starting a new character getting to max level and gearing it up to tier 15 or whatever max tier in wow is right now in a month or so (without buying yourself to max level of course)
Did WoW really change that much?

Yes.

Wow is now as casual or hardcore as you make it.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Yargesh.4965:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Tao.5096:

May someone fill me in how GW2 is grind based?

Ascended Gear and its crafting, Yakslapper, “kill 1000 giants” . . . Legendaries . . . these are generally the go-to examples.

Those come up all the time true, these are aspects of the game they are not what the game is based on. For example you do not need giant kill to do anything else in the game. I personally have 500 in all the weapon crafting and I am not going to make any ascended weapons. I could like anyone else in the game make a legendary, I have absolutely no desire to do so. What parts of the game can’t I participate in?

The game (at launch) was based on a combination of dynamic events and event chains in the games’ disparate areas coupled with a down-leveling system that was supposed to ensure that max level characters did not trivialize events. The idea was that players would then participate in these events for fun.

Several things happened.

1. Down-leveled characters do have have the same experience as an on-level character.
2. Some players refused to participate in the same events over and over without a carrot to pursue. This phenomenon is not new, and is why MMO’s without grind either do not exist or do not have staying power.
3. Some of the rewards needed to fuel a typical MMO endgame rewards chase were in the game at launch. There were nowhere near enough. More have been added, and ANet made these either time-gated or materials intensive to make them take longer to achieve.
4. Some of the new rewards have been concentrated in specific areas of the game, while a significant percentage of “what the game was based on” has been left unrewarding.

Let me broaden your horizon: I know an mmo, that includes infinite VP, mostly timegated and alot of grind as well.

The most common and very successful strategy is to ignore the VP for anything that isn’t automatically fed to you with no effort on your side and pillage anything else you might need.

The most important ressources in that game are in descending order: Prestige and political power, Skill, knowledge of the exact game mechanics (they are a secret even to guides or the wiki), teamplay, VP.
The gap between these ressources is very small though and btw this game has a heavy focus on pvp.

Average hours spent playing this game for anyone I met was 1000+.

Conclusion: If your MMO offers grind as a feature – not a must have you will be just fine, even if hardly anyone important to the pvp scene takes part in it (in a MMO that heavily focuses on pvp).Guess what GW2 apparently does not.

Flytrap.8075:

A lot of people are giving up on this game.

Transient PvE zerg content and gem store updates are not what I signed up for when I pre-ordered this game.

A lot of people? you mean the less than 5% that visit the game forums.

I mean that most be weird considering the game made 100 million dollar last year which is not bad considering it they did not rely on 60 dollar box and 1-2 million people to buy the game.

Dead on OP.

Unfortunately, this is the game we got and there is very little “Guild Wars” to it. Fortunately, what we got isn’t a bad game.

I will argue ’till the days the servers shut down that any grind people feel the need to do is 100% self imposed. Just to give a general example, in game X you may need to have Y stat/item before anyone will group with you for content Z. That is the basic design of vertical progression driven treadmills that lock content behind gear requirements, which ends up forcing you to grind for that gear as a way to artificially extend play time in order to generate more subscription revenue.

After playing GW2 for an extended period of time, its easy to forget how restricting other games are and how transparent the time syncs are. In GW2 you can effectively do everything (except higher level fractals, i’ll get to that) in the game with exotic gear. How do you get exotics? Well, if you like crafting then you can craft them; like open world PvP, then buy them with badges in WvW; like doing dungeons, then buy a set with tokens; like exploring and doing open world events, then buy them with karma; enjoy farming or trading, just buy them from TP.

Back to Fractals, that is the only content that would require ascended gear, but it provides what you need. If you enjoy, and want to do high level fractals, the dungeon either drops the rings you will need or gives you relics to buy the ones you want. It throws AR materials at you to either make AR infusions or ascended back pieces. Ascended amulets you can buy with Laurels that you can get from dailies, or monthlies, PvE or PvP; the activities are pretty generic and can easily be worked into doing something you enjoy. Trinkets can be bought with guild commendations and those are easy to come by.

Ascended armor and weapons and legendaries are virtually the only grindy aspect of the game, and they are also 100% optional and not required to do or complete a single piece of playable content. Again, this is where GW2 differs from other games. Its there to chase if you want to chase it. If you don’t, then exotics are plenty good enough. Just play the things you want to, do the content you enjoy, occasionally check your material storage and one day you will say “hey, look at that, I have enough stuff lying around to make ascended weapons”.

This game, and most other games made in the history of video games are as grindy as you make them, a few others are grindy by design and business model.

silvermember.8941:

Flytrap.8075:

A lot of people are giving up on this game.

Transient PvE zerg content and gem store updates are not what I signed up for when I pre-ordered this game.

A lot of people? you mean the less than 5% that visit the game forums.

I mean that most be weird considering the game made 100 million dollar last year which is not bad considering it they did not rely on 60 dollar box and 1-2 million people to buy the game.

I suggest you actually read NCSofts Financial statements before pulling numbers out of thin air.

silvermember.8941:

Flytrap.8075:

A lot of people are giving up on this game.

Transient PvE zerg content and gem store updates are not what I signed up for when I pre-ordered this game.

A lot of people? you mean the less than 5% that visit the game forums.

I mean that most be weird considering the game made 100 million dollar last year which is not bad considering it they did not rely on 60 dollar box and 1-2 million people to buy the game.

That’s cool. I’m glad some people still enjoy this game.

Still doesn’t change the fact that a lot of people are leaving this game because they’re tired of the same old stuff from ANet. I know a lot of WvW guilds that are leaving for ESO because of how stale everything is currently.

Yea I miss gw1 so much. I miss having to have a permasin to do end game content. I miss the freaking grind that was legendary vanquisher. I miss the cheese that was LDOA and the dlvl concept to get a title. I miss smiteball (the original stacking technique). Or even necro spike, or any of the cheesy spike teams in HOH. I miss having to clear 3/4 of the game to get A skill for an alt (thats the only downside I really had with that system tbh). GYou see, gw2 is the rightful predecessor, and I’m glad we have it now. There are many aspects of the game that are so much better than what it was. Yes, there is much room for improvement, but I’m happy being HERE till we get there.

Edit: what guilds have you heard are leaving for ESO?? I haven’t heard any myself and think the idea is laughable. ESO is the next swtor.

timmyf.1490:

I think I’ve felt both frustration and optimism about this game. The way I think about it is this….

Playing Guild Wars 2 is like taking your second-choice date to prom.

You’re happy. You will have a good time. There’s nothing wrong with your date. But it wasn’t the date you really wanted. And the more you think about wanting that other person, the less happy you’ll be.

I think most of us wanted more from GW2.

This post has haunted me and I just have to say that yes, this reflects how I feel as much as any other statement I have ever seen on these forums.

It may have been unrealistic to expect Guild Wars 2 to have been a true successor to the first Guild Wars. But they made so many promises and then there was the manifesto. It was such a harsh, brutal letdown when we finally experienced the game for ourselves.

Like you said, it’s not so much that the game is bad, it’s that the game could have been so much better.

LordByron.8369:

Is it fun?
For me it is when i am “prepared to have fun”…

But the more we go on the bigger the % of time spent is “preparation to have fun” opposed to “having fun”.

Whoever designed GW2 thougt it perfectly…
Whoever is in care of updates, totally destroyed it for me…..

The process of acquiring wealth in order to get equipment was fun at the beginning, in fact you could obtain it from whatever you liked “playing the way you want”.

Few months later you play whatever developers wants….

I’ll agree with this aswell.

A couple examples:

• Map completion > preparation for legendary
• Leveling > preparation for joining in on dungeons or wvw (only end-game we have)
• Repeating dungeons > preparation for being able to look cool/be strong enough

First time, exploring the world is “okay”, because even if you do see varying landscapes and opponents, the world has been subdivided into areas that take away every feel of an immersive world. On top, the heart quests are a poorly masked repetition and involve barely any or absolutely no personal story advancement.

Leveling was kinda annoying for me the first time already. Took me several months of casual play to actually get to 80 on my first character, only to find that I needed to farm gear from that point in order to actually get into the most exciting part of the game: dungeons and world vs. world.

All the characters I leveled after my first 80 have been leveled using crafting, personal story, experience scrolls and switching at dungeons, in order to avoid as much repetition as possible.

There’s plenty more of this kind of content, barring your way to actually having fun.

The most ‘intrinsically fun’ experiences in the game for me were jumping puzzles and pvp with friends, not needing the do them for whatever reason, but only because they were a challenge. Sadly, even that gets boring if there are no patches making either aspect better.

silvermember.8941:

Flytrap.8075:

A lot of people are giving up on this game.

Transient PvE zerg content and gem store updates are not what I signed up for when I pre-ordered this game.

A lot of people? you mean the less than 5% that visit the game forums.

I mean that most be weird considering the game made 100 million dollar last year which is not bad considering it they did not rely on 60 dollar box and 1-2 million people to buy the game.

The fact that there even is a visible current of players leaving the game, tells a story.
I never saw any game before with daily “I’ve had enough” messages. I would think that there’s a very good ground for them, namely that the game isn’t as good as the creators said it would be.

What I don’t understand is how the PVE in this game is more profitable for ArenaNet than the WvW or the PvP?

The PVE in this game is not good. Open world content is nothing more than a massive zerg-fest. Orr has too much trash and not enough waypoints. The Zhaitan was a massive disappointment. Optimally running dungeons means you focus on maximizing dps, stacking and leashing. The Living World, with the shining exceptions of SAB, Halloween and Marionette, have all been zergy disappointments.

I can easily find many MMO’s that have better PVE content: Wow, LOTRO, Rift, etc.

However, the WvW and PvP in GW2 are different. WvWvW content – large maps to explore, huge fights, small skirmishes, etc. It’s better than any of its current competition. PvP has fluid combat and good balance.

But, ArenaNet has let WvW and PvP flounder. If they invested the time and energy into WvW and PvP instead of PVE and LW, they’d have the best world and team-based PvP in any MMO, ever. It had so much potential – and it’s simply being squandered.

Instead of having lousy PVE and outstanding WvW and PvP, we have a game with mediocre PVE, WvW and PvP.

Thedenofsin.7340:

What I don’t understand is how the PVE in this game is more profitable for ArenaNet than the WvW or the PvP?

The PVE in this game is not good. Open world content is nothing more than a massive zerg-fest.

Marionette was not zergy. Great Jungle Wurm is not zergy. Tequatl is not zergy. Tower of Nightmares was not zergy. 1200 Citizen runs in LA content are not zergy (in fact, being zergy ruins the 1200 run for your entire server). Very few dungeon encounters are tank and spank group zergs. Queens gauntlet was not zergy. Aetherblade retreat was not Zergy. New TA path was not zergy. And that is only combat. There is a ton out there to do exploration wise or solo, and there is a healthy portion of the playerbase that enjoys that style of content.

At the same time, Queensdale and Frostgorge champ trains, Scarlet invasions and Queens Jubilee creature areas were allowed to exist because some people like that style of content.

If you want the slight to highly coordinated group play where composition, strategy, placement and skills matter, then that is there. If you want the mindless farming, that content is there.

If all you are doing in PvE is running with a herd to spam on whatever gets in their way, I’m sorry, but you are most definitely doing it wrong.