Guild Wars 2

So here’s the thing, I really enjoy GW2. I’ve come back and forth from it a couple of times since buying it last year, I’ve rerolled characters dozens of time just to get a feel for it, and well, I find myself coming back to it over and over. I’ve played WoW for a long time and still do, but occasionally I need a break from that, and GW2 is so different and inviting that I stay longer each break from WoW I take.

I love the art, I love the DE’s, I love the lore (I’ve read a couple of the books). I love the open and cooperative nature of the game system and combat mechanics. I love the exploration aspect of the game, and the many QoL implementations it provides. BUT, I haven’t even gotten close to the endgame. And as I peruse the forums I keep seeing posts talking about the decline of the game, unfulfilled promises, cash shop dependence, boring-to-nonexistent endgame, bad design concerning the “living story”, two founders leaving ANet, NCSoft calling the shots to attain a lower-quality cash cow grindfest, etc. That makes me a little scared to invest my time into a game that bears the air of possibly not having much of a future.

But before I go further, I need to describe the gameplay I enjoy. And forgive me, but I’m going to use WoW as my reference point. I am a casual player. I am a PVE’er. I like dailies. I like LFR and the Dungeon Finder. I don’t mind running the same thing over and over. I typically get a couple of hours in the morning to play. I am a capable player, and can be very sociable, but unfortunately I just cannot meet the scheduling needs of “organized raiding” outside of LFR. I am a married man in my late 30s with a home to maintain and a job that does not afford me a consistent schedule in regards to gametime. I play to be a character in a fantasy world, not as a competitive sport.

So what am I getting at? I would just like some honest input from people who enjoy/don’t enjoy GW2 on how they think I will fair (given the information above), or if GW2 is a game for me at all. I am not expecting it to be WoW, quite the opposite. I know there is no amount of opinion that will make up for actually playing. I know there are probably many threads in the forums I could go to for this information. But if you will humor me, I’d like to hear what you have to say…

1. I hear the dungeons are hard from some sources, and then I hear from others that they are facerolling zergfests (which I essentially take to mean “easy”). What is your take?

2. I hear that populations are decreasing, making older or lower level content difficult to group up for where grouping is required. Have you found this to be true? (If not, what server are you on?) Does this even matter seeing that an LFG tool is being developed?

3. Is it true that this game does not require gear grind to enjoy the content, or is that a myth and I will most certainly be expected to have a certain level of gear before I can enjoy certain content? (and I mean outside of level-appropriate gear: I read the terms “exotic” and “ascended” alot.)

4. How strong an impact does the cash shop have on gameplay? I read accusations of pay-to-win mechanics sneaking their way in: fact or fiction? Is it really just a collection of RNG vanity items and leveling boosts or is it an absolute necessity that will end up costing me more than a subscription would?

5. Is all the nay-saying just impatience, and GW2 is simply going through its growing pains? Is it a game with great potential that failed to deliver and will ultimately fail? Or is it just a themepark that offers tons to casual players but nothing to hardcore players?

I’m gonna stop here as this post is more than long enough, but I’d appreciate any bits of advice or things I need to be aware of that you care to pass along. Thanks for your time!

EDIT – Thought of another relevant question: In regards to builds, is this a similar system to WoW’s (old) talent system? In other words, is it a cookie cutter system where if I want to compete/complete content then I HAVE to use certain builds/weapons, or is it really up to me and the builds are there for current optimal results but ultimately won’t make a difference in the long run, so long as I play the profession well?

You will fair just fine. This game is WoW with training wheels. The most watered down MMO I’ve ever played actually. Not saying that’s a bad thing, but probably why people like it and find it refreshing. It doesn’t have a dungeon finder though. You will need to rely on a 3rd party site sadly.

1. Dungeons are faceroll zergfests for those who do are pro dungeon runners. Dungeons are really hard for people who don’t do many dungeons. I find some dungeons hard and some dungeons not so far. We did path four of Arah recently and it took four hours. I don’t know how the pro groups go, but that’s about average for group of lesser mortals. I believe more people find the dungeons hard than find them easy.

2. The only lower level content that’s much harder right now, is story mode dungeons. That’s because the reward structure is such that it’s not worth doing them more than once. Join a decent guild and you’ll get people willing to run with you. All the other content is doable.

3. Some people want to have BIS gear. They think they can’t live without it. In other games that may be true, but in Guild Wars 2. it’s not. If you join a speed run group, they may want you to have the BIS gear. If you join a casual dungeon group, they won’t. No one I know requires a gear check. You can run a dungeon in greens. The ONLY grindy bit in this game is Fractals of the Mists and you can still play the content without ever getting TO the grindy bits. Basically if you don’t care about doing the highest difficulty levels of FoTM you won’t care. Everything else you can do with rares, which are easy to acquire.

4. Anyone who says this game is pay to win doesn’t know the meaning of the word. You can get some buffs from the cash shop, but no one uses them and no one cares. In other words, I beat the hardest dungeon in the game without anything from the cash shop. And don’t forget, you can use in game gold to get things like repair canisters and stuff like that, which are basically convenience items anyway (since you can repair in every dungeon, without leaving it).

5. Guild Wars 2 IS going through growing pains. I’m not sure why anyone who’s played MMOs in the past would be surprised by that. All MMOs go through growing pains when people have gone through most of the content and more content hasn’t arrived yet. This too will pass.

I can’t think of another MMO that’s done better by month ten than Guild Wars 2. Where as Star Wars ToR laid off half their staff at this point, TSW laid off a third of their staff, Anet is still hiring. Sure it has growing pains. But when you look at the traffic that shows up after every monthly patch, you can’t seriously believe the game is in danger.

Mind you the world is pretty big and sprawling and in a lot of the middle level zones, you’ll have a lower population particularly on lower pop servers. Which is why you can guest over, for free to higher pop servers.

The game is fine. If you’re not a raider, it might well be the game for you.

Araziel.7201:

You will fair just fine. This game is WoW with training wheels. The most watered down MMO I’ve ever played actually. Not saying that’s a bad thing, but probably why people like it and find it refreshing. It doesn’t have a dungeon finder though. You will need to rely on a 3rd party site sadly.

Dungeon finder will be here before the end of the year. Not just a dungeon finder, a group finder for all types of content.

The game core system need to be polished before adding dev ressource on the living story. This is priority.

1) I think the dungeons are difficult for inexperienced players and easy for experienced players. A player coming from WoW has to learn more in this game. It’s not just oh, I’ll just let the tank & heals do their job while I dps, I need to know what the other players spells look like – a shield wall, a veil, is that black/green puddle the necro laying down going to dmg the enemy or heal me?

2) I’m on Sanctum of Rall which is busy around the clock.

3) By the time you level cap you will easily have mostly rare equipment and will be able to do most of the content. It goes Fine>Masterwork>Rare>Exotic>Ascended. The only grind is for Legendary weapons and Ascended gear (jewelry/accessories/back item only). The only reason you would need Ascended is for Fractals and you get enough by doing Fractals to progress to the higher levels. The legendary weapons can be an intensive grind if you focus on it, but the stats are the same as an exotic weapon, it’s for looks/cheeve only.

4) The cash shop has no impact on gameplay or power of characters since it is vanity/convenience items only.

5) Who knows? Some people think that it’s paid game bashers, some people think it’s a few disgruntled GW1 players, the hardcore group cries in every game so take it with a grain of salt

So I did a search on “Sanctum of Rall” and boy, did I get a surprise on the story behind that Server name. It was very touching, shows what MMOs can accomplish, and made me wish I had been a part of it. (http://sanctumofrall.com/about/)

Any other server recommendations? I must say the tone of the responses to my OP is VERY encouraging, please keep the conversation going. Thank you!

Tarnished Coast is the unofficial RP server, which means there’s usually lots of people in lots of zones. RPers, and immersion players tend to have lots of alts, so we’re always leveling some kitten character. lol

We also do quite well in World vs. World as we’ve been Tier 2 for quite a while.

Vayne.8563:

3. Some people want to have BIS gear. They think they can’t live without it. In other games that may be true, but in Guild Wars 2. it’s not. If you join a speed run group, they may want you to have the BIS gear. If you join a casual dungeon group, they won’t. No one I know requires a gear check. You can run a dungeon in greens. The ONLY grindy bit in this game is Fractals of the Mists and you can still play the content without ever getting TO the grindy bits. Basically if you don’t care about doing the highest difficulty levels of FoTM you won’t care. Everything else you can do with rares, which are easy to acquire.

Just for the record though, maximum strength gear is still fairly easy to get. It’s cosmetics you have to grind for.

Navzar.2938:

Vayne.8563:

3. Some people want to have BIS gear. They think they can’t live without it. In other games that may be true, but in Guild Wars 2. it’s not. If you join a speed run group, they may want you to have the BIS gear. If you join a casual dungeon group, they won’t. No one I know requires a gear check. You can run a dungeon in greens. The ONLY grindy bit in this game is Fractals of the Mists and you can still play the content without ever getting TO the grindy bits. Basically if you don’t care about doing the highest difficulty levels of FoTM you won’t care. Everything else you can do with rares, which are easy to acquire.

Just for the record though, maximum strength gear is still fairly easy to get. It’s cosmetics you have to grind for.

Well technically, it’s not fairly easy to get. Ascended gear is maximum strength, not Exotic. And the grind to get Ascended is pretty steep.

Vayne has basically hit the nail right on the head on this one. GW2 is definitely a game for those who can’t get on a set time everyday. A lot of people come from WoW type MMO’s and just expect every MMO to be like that, which is true in most cases because of WoW’s success. A lot of games just copy that model but ANet have taken the chance to make a whole new system and it’s worked, however, a lot of people who prefer the WoW model will come to places like this to complain.

There are a lot of people who come on here to complain but that’s the same for every forum. Even WoW has its fair share of complaints on it’s forum, or at least did and from what I’ve heard that game is going anywhere but up at the moment. It’s actually a very biased place because the stereotypical forum user is very committed to the game, so much so that they saturate the content as fast as possible to get their rewards. I’m the same type of player sometimes, but that’s not how GW2 was designed and it’s actually more suited to your play style.

People who say the game is dying have NO idea, honestly, absolutely no idea. They are merely going off observations but in reality the players could have moved to different servers via guesting, gone to other areas for endgame, doing world bosses, dungeons, guild activities etc etc. There is no way of really being able to tell whether this game is dying but I would say it’s incredibly far from it considering that over the past few days Lions Arch has almost always been in overflow on my server. Now that’s possibly due to the update but nonetheless it’s still going into overflow.

Don’t be put off by what people say on the forums. They can seem quite true and some of the complaints are, there is a lack of endgame at the moment but it’s the same with every single mmo in its first year, no matter what anyone says. People tend to have a case of rose tinted glasses and forget what their favourite mmo’s started out like and how bad they actually were in the first year. Growing pains in mmo’s are a natural part of making the game better, so it’s nothing bad and nothing to worry about in terms of this games future. I personally think it will turn out to be one of the best, up there with WoW.

If you just want to level up in the world check out some sights do a few jump puzzles and such then you are fine.

Dungeons are grind to get most nice things and end game is grind to make most nice things, if that suits you, great, if not, not great…

1. Dungeon bosses are easier then wow HC bosses, dungeon trash take twice as long if not longer then in wow, dungeons are about as easy (but more boring) then hc’s dungeons in wow

2. Zones are running empty, and yes it does matter, LFG may be good for dungeons, but pve group events, in the world, are doomed.

3. This is true, however the game doesn’t really create many exciting goals to replace that.

4. There is no pay to win, but skins are the endgame reward you are going for and due to the cash shop already 30% of the skins won’t be available ever again and you missed them.

5. It is a game with great potential that failed to deliver and will ultimately fail imo.

Think of GW2 of a single player game, do everything once and then just leave, the content updates and endgame rewards aren’t worth it.

If you are a casual player (in the best sense, in that you have a full RL and limited gaming time) then GW2 is the ideal game for you.

I suggest that you look out for a guild that is active when you are, doesn’t make demands for attendance for dungeons, gear or build and understands that RL comes first. You won’t look back!

The two co-founders of ArenaNet, Patrick Wyatt and Jeff Strain, that left moved to NCSoft West in 2008 (which they subsequently left, as well). Mike O’Brien is still with us. =) That was long before Guild Wars 2 was released, and has had little impact on the game now, I believe. NCSoft has owned ArenaNet since 2002, and Guild Wars did quite well, considering.

I enjoy the Living Story model. Always something new to explore and experience. It’s a matter of opinion about whether it’s a bad content-delivery model, or not. One thing the devs have expressed repeatedly is that they are trying something new in the Online-World model, and are learning, growing and changing facets of the content as each new set of content is released.

As the servers seem to fill up periodically, and their population cap is increased, it may indicate that the user-population is steady, if not rising. No one can really say until hard numbers are released…if ever. Even on my bottom-of-the-barrel server, I see people around no matter where I go, though there are fewer about the later at night I play. There are even too many people around at the start of new content releases…lol.

As for the Gem Store, I am sure you have seen what’s offered there, whenever you log on. New items have always been either cosmetic or convenience. There haven’t been any new boosters since launch, as far as I can recall.

As for previous skins….they just added a merchant that has all the previous sets of skins. I can’t help but think there must be some way of obtaining them, again, in the future, else why put the merchant there? Still, only time will tell.

I don’t think you have anything to worry about, but I am sure others may have a different opinion of the game than mine. =)

Vayne.8563:

1. Dungeons are faceroll zergfests for those who do are pro dungeon runners. Dungeons are really hard for people who don’t do many dungeons. I find some dungeons hard and some dungeons not so far. We did path four of Arah recently and it took four hours. I don’t know how the pro groups go, but that’s about average for group of lesser mortals. I believe more people find the dungeons hard than find them easy.

4 hours in a dungeon, that sounds like GW2. For me it is just crazy and the reason why I haven’t done dungeons for a long time. However imo it is not hard, it a lengthy drag.

Last dungeon I got myself into was the that super mario dungeon. After 4 hours we still weren’t finished and I just wanted to go, but I didn’t want to dump my group. Assumed it was something small like the halloween dungeon, boy was I in for a surprise…

beren.6048:

Vayne.8563:

1. Dungeons are faceroll zergfests for those who do are pro dungeon runners. Dungeons are really hard for people who don’t do many dungeons. I find some dungeons hard and some dungeons not so far. We did path four of Arah recently and it took four hours. I don’t know how the pro groups go, but that’s about average for group of lesser mortals. I believe more people find the dungeons hard than find them easy.

4 hours in a dungeon, that sounds like GW2. For me it is just crazy and the reason why I haven’t done dungeons for a long time. However imo it is not hard, it a lengthy drag.

Last dungeon I got myself into was the that super mario dungeon. After 4 hours we still weren’t finished and I just wanted to go, but I didn’t want to dump my group. Assumed it was something small like the halloween dungeon, boy was I in for a surprise…

Most dungeons are way under an hour, though. That’s the hardest dungeon in the game. Let’s not belabor the point that a group of guildies and I can run CoF path 1 in 10 minutes without even trying hard. Many dungeons take 45 minutes.

1. All dungeons last many hours except for COF, which everyone is farming ofc.

2. Who knows, I haven’t seen statistics. I would join a big guild on the top WvW Server, as much top as you can get. WvW is mostly about numbers, so the strongest server probably has the most active & biggest player base. See lots of players, I think the game is very much alive, but my guild is gone & all my MMO friends play other MMOs. Think player retention probably is not very high.

3. You can do most content with pretty low gear and drops are easy. There is a grind for looks and there is a grind if you want to do fractals at high levels.

4. The cash shop is quiet ok. Most games quickly fall to the darkside of p2w, not GW2. You can also collect gold by playing and exchange it for diamonds and with the diamonds you buy in the cash shop.

5. Imo, they have not delivered things I regard standard for MMOs OR some things I expected to be part of a GW title, e.g., like grouping tools, GvG, Guild Halls, 20 vs 20 arenas, capes or guild icons, multi party epic raid instances. Sometimes it feels to me like doing many things half.

I think you should play it and find out for yourself. I enjoined the game, but it doesn’t keep me. Quickly lost the “must-play” feeling.

with all do respect, dungeons do not last hours… arah does, maybe crucible, but the rest is 30-45 mins, hell AC can even be ran completely (all 3 paths) within the hour. The reason that it’s boring is that out of these 30-45 mins 5mins are bossfights and even the bossfight mechanics suck. Trash just has way to much health and can’t even be pulled together without resetting half the dungeon.

Just the idea that people talk about trash mobs is half the problem. They come from other games, and everything that isn’t a boss is meaningless. Is a trash mob.

Well this isn’t other games. I played Guild Wars 1 for five years and I don’t remember hearing the term trash mob at all. This is something from other games. The bosses don’t give the best loot in the world anyway. People just want fast loot and don’t care about anything else. And if that’s why you’re running dungeons…you’ll never be running dungeons with me.

I’m sure that doesn’t bother you, but get off the trash mob concept. It’s a different game.

Fox.3469:

with all do respect, dungeons do not last hours… arah does, maybe crucible, but the rest is 30-45 mins, hell AC can even be ran completely (all 3 paths) within the hour. The reason that it’s boring is that out of these 30-45 mins 5mins are bossfights and even the bossfight mechanics suck. Trash just has way to much health and can’t even be pulled together without resetting half the dungeon.

Many dungeon I tried took hours to complete (expect COF p1). I ll admit, I haven’t done any of them again, so guess you could do faster. But hey, he should play and see how he experiences it. About the boss fights, I just say agree.

Vayne.8563:

Just the idea that people talk about trash mobs is half the problem. They come from other games, and everything that isn’t a boss is meaningless. Is a trash mob.

Well this isn’t other games. I played Guild Wars 1 for five years and I don’t remember hearing the term trash mob at all. This is something from other games. The bosses don’t give the best loot in the world anyway. People just want fast loot and don’t care about anything else. And if that’s why you’re running dungeons…you’ll never be running dungeons with me.

I’m sure that doesn’t bother you, but get off the trash mob concept. It’s a different game.

I’m a gw1 player, you are talking out of your …
In gw1 mobs were actually exciting and had mechanics behind them, in GW2 they don’t. Don’t disgrace the group experience in GW1 (wich was one of the best in any game so far) with comparing it to grouping in GW2 (wich tried to introduce these bosses/trash mechanics and failed hard)

The difference is that in GW1 everything was made for groups but possible to be done solo with hench and heroes. In gw2 everything is made for soloing and group content is just bad, time-wasting, boring, uninspired content. GW1, altough instanced, was far more of an MMO in the sense of the word then GW2 atm. Cause it actually cared about guilds and groups of people (and alliances, something we need back). GW2 just want you to grind solo content for achievements. Time and money gate all the rewards, skill has nothing to do with it.

beren.6048:

Fox.3469:

with all do respect, dungeons do not last hours… arah does, maybe crucible, but the rest is 30-45 mins, hell AC can even be ran completely (all 3 paths) within the hour. The reason that it’s boring is that out of these 30-45 mins 5mins are bossfights and even the bossfight mechanics suck. Trash just has way to much health and can’t even be pulled together without resetting half the dungeon.

Many dungeon I tried took hours to complete (expect COF p1). I ll admit, I haven’t done any of them again, so guess you could do faster. But hey, he should play and see how he experiences it. About the boss fights, I just say agree.

The big time difference is learning to handle (and avoid) the immortal trash.
Atm the only decent dungeon was molten facility, but hey let’s remove that cause we’re STUPID

Fox.3469:

Vayne.8563:

Just the idea that people talk about trash mobs is half the problem. They come from other games, and everything that isn’t a boss is meaningless. Is a trash mob.

Well this isn’t other games. I played Guild Wars 1 for five years and I don’t remember hearing the term trash mob at all. This is something from other games. The bosses don’t give the best loot in the world anyway. People just want fast loot and don’t care about anything else. And if that’s why you’re running dungeons…you’ll never be running dungeons with me.

I’m sure that doesn’t bother you, but get off the trash mob concept. It’s a different game.

I’m a gw1 player, you are talking out of your …
In gw1 mobs were actually exciting and had mechanics behind them, in GW2 they don’t. Don’t disgrace the group experience in GW1 (wich was one of the best in any game so far) with comparing it to grouping in GW2 (wich tried to introduce these bosses/trash mechanics and failed hard)

The difference is that in GW1 everything was made for groups but possible to be done solo with hench and heroes. In gw2 everything is made for soloing and group content is just bad, time-wasting, boring, uninspired content. GW1, altough instanced, was far more of an MMO in the sense of the word then GW2 atm. Cause it actually cared about guilds and groups of people (and alliances, something we need back). GW2 just want you to grind solo content for achievements. Time and money gate all the rewards, skill has nothing to do with it.

beren.6048:

Fox.3469:

with all do respect, dungeons do not last hours… arah does, maybe crucible, but the rest is 30-45 mins, hell AC can even be ran completely (all 3 paths) within the hour. The reason that it’s boring is that out of these 30-45 mins 5mins are bossfights and even the bossfight mechanics suck. Trash just has way to much health and can’t even be pulled together without resetting half the dungeon.

Many dungeon I tried took hours to complete (expect COF p1). I ll admit, I haven’t done any of them again, so guess you could do faster. But hey, he should play and see how he experiences it. About the boss fights, I just say agree.

The big time difference is learning to handle (and avoid) the immortal trash.
Atm the only decent dungeon was molten facility, but hey let’s remove that cause we’re STUPID

So, because I have a different opinion than you I’m talking out of my ass? LMAO! Okay then. That tells me a lot more about you than it does about me.

I played Guild Wars 1 for five years. I’ve got GWAMM, I’ve got 50/50 in my HoM. So yeah, I have an opinion and it’s shared by some people.

Now the dungeons in Guild Wars 1, some of them anyway, were quite a lot of fun. I particularly liked Bogroots Growths. There were a whole lot of dungeons I didn’t like and didn’t play more than a couple of times because I thought they sucked.

I do agree that the way groups were designed in Guild Wars 1 was better. That doesn’t change the fact that I could roflstomp any Guild Wars 1 dungeon in hard mode with the possible exception of Slaver’s Exile, with heroes and henchmen.

That means I could literally not be there, and my heroes and henchmen could play the whole dungeon almost without me. I could sit on the phone, watch some TV, move around and let my heroes and henchmen do it all. I’m sure that’s fun for some people, but some of us like to actually move around and hit the occasional button.

Guild Wars 1 PvE, particularly after EotN came out, which is where ALL the dungeons were, was easier than Guild Wars 2 is. The dungeons were easier.

Sure you had to know a bit more. You had to know that undead couldn’t bleed, couldn’t be poisoned and couldn’t be diseased. But beyond stuff like that, once you had the right skills, the game was easy as hell, no matter how interesting those mobs were.

1) It’s different from dungeon path to dungeon path but it’s really a matter of perception. People mastering this game’s mechanics and classes will find most of them easy, people less proficient will find them kittene of the hardest bosses in the game, Giganticus Lupicus from Arah, has been soloed with different classes, but I’m certain that 90% of the groups that have tried Arah got stomped by him at least three times.

2) Partially true. It won’t be easy to finda groups for most story mode dungeons because players are expected to play them only once to unlock explorable mode. You might also have to give up on doing some group events in unpopular zones, which is a shame. Anyways, if you are interested in them, just ask for people in map or guild chat, I’ve managed to do one of the less rewarding events in the game (Blood Witch) by simply asking around in /m

3) No grind for content, unless you consider cool looking skins content. Nobody will ever gear check you unless you are doing a speed run, or high level of fractals which require a special resistance. Lower levels of fractals are basically easier versions of higher levels, so the content is the basically the same.

4) Zero. Pay2win fits GW2 as “great game” fits “battleship the videogame”. The only 2 things that come close to being “required” are additional character slots and bank tabs. And did you know that you can buy anything on the cash shop with in-game earned gold?

5) I really don’t know, all I can say I’m personally satisfied although things could be better.

If you take an hour or more to run a dungeon other than Arah or Fractals you had a pretty bad group.
Not saying I’m some speedrunner who rages when a dungeon isn’t cleared within 20 minutes, but yeah dungeons generally don’t take an hour.

Aside from the achievements Super Adventure box can be cleared insanely fast if you are good at it.
This is namely because you can run past every mob except for the bosses.

Everyone else has spoken up on the big points, so I won’t repeat that. It’s a good game and from what you say about yourself it sounds like it’s the right game for you. Exploration is wonderful – there are more things to find on a map than just the “map completion” requirements. (such as mini-dungeons, jumping puzzles, hidden chests protected by monsters, beautiful locations you only find by exploring, etc.)

I don’t play PvP, but PvE is better than most MMOs I’ve played in; there’s a bit of a learning curve, though, so don’t get discouraged if you die alot in the beginning. (especially if you’re playing a Thief) Don’t tackle large groups of creatures – meaning anything more than 2-3 – until you’ve got a strong grasp of combat and what your character can do. Always be aware of your facing; and Dodge!

Don’t be in a rush to get to end game, the lower level zones all scale you down so you’ll almost always be challenged wherever you go, (Though realistically if you’re in a zone below 8th level and you’re 50+, you’ll stomp through it because you’ve more skills than the other people. But around 8th level or so it levels out and is as challenging as your level appropriate zones – sometimes even more so if you get kocky.) That said, I personally love the 80th level areas of Orr – they are breathtaking, just make sure you’re on the lookout for monsters while you’re sight seeing.

And don’t worry about gear. Even if you decide you want all Exotic gear at lvl 80 you can go to the Black Lion Trading Company (where players buy and sell their junk – hitting “O” brings it up on your screen, you you have to pick up anything you buy in person from an NPC) and totally kit yourself up for about 7 gold. (which isn’t as bad as it seems at lower levels)

You might not ever even do Fractals of the Mist – though I hear it’s worth doing once at least – but if ya get into that you can worry about Ascended gear then.

Hi, Goodcannedsam.

Let me first say, how you described yourself as a gamer, your likes and dislikes of MMOs, your time constraints, etc…thats me. 100%. I have a couple of hours to play each day(night). I enjoy PVE, although WvW is fun. I don’t mind doing the same thing over and over. I love the openness of the game, DEs, the MMO aspect of it, the story, graphics, sounds, environment..love it all. I am with you 100%.

As someone who seems to have similar wants, hopes, dislikes/likes of the MMO, let me answer your numbered questions:

1. Dungeons were supposed to be hard. They were touted as borderline not completable without a competant party. Whether through nerfs, or the developers just didn’t have a clue as to how skilled we truely are, they are not difficult. You have Story and explorable mode. Story is one path, story driven, easy. Explorable you have multiple paths per dungeon to choose. People very rarely venture off the normally run paths to try the harder/longer paths. 9/10 groups will run the same paths for these explorables. The easiest, quickest, most efficient routes possible. Citadel of Flame has four paths. 1 and 2 are the most run paths. However, path 1 is run 99% of the time because its a cake walk and you can complete it in under 12 minutes sometimes. Just to give you an idea….

2. Depends on your server. I’ve played on Stormbluff Isle for 5 months, IoJ(which is declining) and now Dragonbrand. I never have problems with empty zones. There are, for example, 15 zones…probably half of them have people of all levels running around at any given time. Thats not bad compared to a game like WoW where all but the max level zones are empty.

3. Debatable. We were promised no gear grind, yet ascended gear is a gear grind. I compare the rate at which ascended gear is released, and the stat difference of ascended vs exotic to WoW and raiding tiers. Every few months we get a new ascended slot/piece to grind for. In WoW, every few months theres a new raid and tier of gear. To me, there is a gear grind there, its just different. However, to experience all of the dungeons and content in the game, no you don’t need ascended gear(unless you want BiS stuff). Ascended gear is mostly for fractals, another form of dungeon, and you need it for agony resist(a lazy mechanic).

4. For the first 5-6 months, I thought this cash shop was a gem(no pun). No impact on game play. Now, more and more discussions are popping up since people can buy their way to the skins they want, or buy gems to convert to gold to buy the mats necessary for legendaries. Pay to win? Eh, not really. But theres no denying that every move in the last 3 or 4 months has been driven from making money off the cash shop, rather than sticking to their guns and providing exceptional content.

5. Growing pains, yes. There is truth behind the naysaying. There are certain people, even in this very thread, that only have positive things to say about the game and defend it at every turn even when he’s being short sighted( ). I tend to lean toward the more critical side of opinion, but I do have positive things to say and I do voice them. Did the game deliver? Yes and no. I think arenanet created a shade of grey when promoting the game so they can bend one way or the other depending on the direction of the wind. Does our community want gear progression or aesthetic/skin progression? Do they want harder content or easy content for newbies? Things like that. And the game is definately revolving more around RNG and the cash shop than ever before. Its leaving an awful bitter taste in my mouth.

Summary: I left the game in March for two months. Came back in May. Lots of RNG, lots of farming nerfs(silently pushing us to cash shop to buy gems, convert to gold), lots of negative things in my opinion. Living story is neat, but lackluster. The game was the best MMO Ive played up until November. Now, its no unique snowflake, no gem, no innovating game. Its a free to play game, and for no subscription, its a great free to play game. But has its pitfalls, which push me into the arms of other games.

@OP,

I am also like you, in my 30s, house, wife and kids. I found a great guild of over 30 gamers that all have priorities away from the game. We do dungeon runs, group up to level low toons, just hang out and chat sometimes. This game has everything I need. It is a game I can play when I have time and take a break when I don’t. I took 3 months off back in October because of family problems and came back and didn’t feel behind, yes I missed some content but that didn’t effect how I played the game.

The server I play on (Yak’s Bend) always seems to have people playing everywhere. I hardly go into a zone an not see a few other players there.

Vayne.8563:

…

Please if you have any respect as GW1 player you admit that EotN sucked.

I’m talking about UW, FoW, DoA, SF, Urgoz, The Deep, several missions on hard mode. Those were harder then the Eotn jokes called dungeons. Not saying that it wasn’t doable with heroes and henchies, but at least it was beneficial to do together. In GW2 atm, almost nothing is.

Fox.3469:

Vayne.8563:

…

Please if you have any respect as GW1 player you admit that EotN sucked.

I’m talking about UW, FoW, DoA, SF, Urgoz, The Deep, several missions on hard mode. Those were harder then the Eotn jokes called dungeons. Not saying that it wasn’t doable with heroes and henchies, but at least it was beneficial to do together. In GW2 atm, almost nothing is.

My wife and I beat DOA with six heroes. That’s the hardest of all the stuff. FoW wasn’t hard at all.

But here you go talking about Guild Wars 1 and than taking a percentage of it and calling it a joke. See, that’s now how it works. Guild Wars 1 is Guild Wars 1…all of it. Permasins had nothing to do with EotN either.

Anyway, though I beat all those areas, I didn’t love most of them. They were okay. And that’s really the point.

You’re interested in different things than I am. However, if you polled Guild Wars 1 players, I think you’d find overwhelmingly that only a very small percentage of the player base ever beat DOA and probably almost as big a percentage never even tried it.

Anet has those numbers, I don’t, but it’s been shown in game after game throughout the years that the hardest content is only visited by a small percentage of the playerbase.

I dunno what game you were playing, but GWEN was awesome! It introduced some very nifty new skills, some great new races, dungeons – which were hard when I was playing them – new enemies, expanded the story; most everything about GWEN was awesome. Eye of the North is neck and neck with Factions as best expansion, in my opinion.

Jack of Tears.9458:

I dunno what game you were playing, but GWEN was awesome! It introduced some very nifty new skills, some great new races, dungeons – which were hard when I was playing them – new enemies, expanded the story; most everything about GWEN was awesome. Eye of the North is neck and neck with Factions as best expansion, in my opinion.

EotN was my favorite Anet product as well, followed closely by Factions. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. lol

1. I hear the dungeons are hard from some sources, and then I hear from others that they are facerolling zergfests (which I essentially take to mean “easy”). What is your take?

- I don’t run dungeons so I can’t comment here

2. I hear that populations are decreasing, making older or lower level content difficult to group up for where grouping is required. Have you found this to be true? (If not, what server are you on?) Does this even matter seeing that an LFG tool is being developed?

- I can only comment on my server, Blackgate, which is very busy. everytime new content comes out I will end up in overflow at some point. When I roam on my low level alts many of the zones will have other players running around. WvWvW is always busy with a wait. I can truly say I have not seen a drop off since I have been playing, only periods of increased activity when new content is introduced.

3. Is it true that this game does not require gear grind to enjoy the content, or is that a myth and I will most certainly be expected to have a certain level of gear before I can enjoy certain content? (and I mean outside of level-appropriate gear: I read the terms “exotic” and “ascended” alot.)

- I am a casual player and solo alot, saying that I can also confirm that there is no gear grind. I completed most content in blue and green gear, only when I hit 80 did I even consider rares and exotics. That level gear only makes the game a little easier for me, but I did not see it as necessary to play the game.

4. How strong an impact does the cash shop have on gameplay? I read accusations of pay-to-win mechanics sneaking their way in: fact or fiction? Is it really just a collection of RNG vanity items and leveling boosts or is it an absolute necessity that will end up costing me more than a subscription would?

- The Cash shop has no impact on the game for me, it is full of vanity items i really don’t need. Nothing in there that makes the game pay to win.

5. Is all the nay-saying just impatience, and GW2 is simply going through its growing pains? Is it a game with great potential that failed to deliver and will ultimately fail? Or is it just a themepark that offers tons to casual players but nothing to hardcore players?

- The game is going throug hsome growing pains, but they are minor and have no impact for my style of play. I find much of the complaining comes from the impatience of players that consume content way too fast. I consider myself casual and this game is perfect for me.

Thanks to everyone so much for their responses! I am so surprised and encouraged at how on-topic this thread has remained. There have only been a few GW1 vs. GW2/Easy vs. Hard scuffles! If this were the WoW forums this would have derailed into a 25 page sniping match without any regard for the original intent by now. I truly appreciate all of your time and advice. Obviously there is overwhelming support and I believe this game is one I need to invest some time in, but I’d still like to hear from anyone who is willing and I do have another question to add.

In regards to builds, is this a similar system to WoW’s (old) talent system? In other words, is it a cookie cutter system where if I want to complete content then I HAVE to use certain builds/weapons, or is it really up to me and the builds are there for current optimal results but ultimately won’t make a difference in the long run, so long as I play the profession well?

Thanks again!

goodcannedsam.9841:

Thanks to everyone so much for their responses! I am so surprised and encouraged at how on-topic this thread has remained. There have only been a few GW1 vs. GW2/Easy vs. Hard scuffles! If this were the WoW forums this would have derailed into a 25 page sniping match without any regard for the original intent by now. I truly appreciate all of your time and advice. Obviously there is overwhelming support and I believe this game is one I need to invest some time in, but I’d still like to hear from anyone who is willing and I do have another question to add.

In regards to builds, is this a similar system to WoW’s (old) talent system? In other words, is it a cookie cutter system where if I want to complete content then I HAVE to use certain builds/weapons, or is it really up to me and the builds are there for current optimal results but ultimately won’t make a difference in the long run, so long as I play the profession well?

Thanks again!

Yes and No. Also depends on what you play.

Playing the profession well means understanding builds and what goes good with that profession and your playstyle. However in the long run does it matter too much. No not to an extreme degree. I played without the highest rank of trait points for quite a while.

That said tPVP and sPvP do require builds to complement other builds on the team.

It depends on how you play and who you play with. Casual SPvP for example, doesn’t require specific builds because who you’re teamed with is relatively random. Obviously tournament play would require builds.

In PvE, if you want to speed run with the pro guys, you’ll need a specific build…but the game doesn’t require that build.

In a casual guild, like mine, no one cares what build you bring, and somehow we clear content…but it takes us longer. On the other hand, we’re having fun, so we don’t care.

You need to identify what kind of player you are and who you want to play with. That will determine if specific builds are required or not.

goodcannedsam.9841:

Thanks to everyone so much for their responses! I am so surprised and encouraged at how on-topic this thread has remained. There have only been a few GW1 vs. GW2/Easy vs. Hard scuffles! If this were the WoW forums this would have derailed into a 25 page sniping match without any regard for the original intent by now. I truly appreciate all of your time and advice. Obviously there is overwhelming support and I believe this game is one I need to invest some time in, but I’d still like to hear from anyone who is willing and I do have another question to add.

In regards to builds, is this a similar system to WoW’s (old) talent system? In other words, is it a cookie cutter system where if I want to complete content then I HAVE to use certain builds/weapons, or is it really up to me and the builds are there for current optimal results but ultimately won’t make a difference in the long run, so long as I play the profession well?

Thanks again!

Some builds are better than others, but you don’t need specific builds to do content. A guardian you can setup as a healer build or more like a warrior. Spend some time searching good builds. Even if you make a mistake you can change your build for little silver.

Yeah builds don’t matter that much, it comes down to more of understand your build, what you can do and how well you play the class. Dodging is big on any build you do and throughout the game you may see many different builds.

I have a ranger that I found a play style that I liked. It is traited as a beast master but I use all Rabid armor and accessories to give me good condition damage and crit. I really have fun playing him that way and it does require a little bit of micro managing but it is fun. So far no one in my guild plays the same way. We all have our rangers set up a little different depending on our play style. Same goes for other classes also but the ranger was easier to explain since I just finished setting him up last week.

Structured PvP , especially tournaments, has two or three builds per class that are definitely better then the rest and, bar minor personal adjustements, you will be expected to play those if you mean to play seriously. For example, 95% of the Guardians in tournaments play as bunkers (tanks). Now when you form a team with people you know, you’ll get a lot more variety being able to change from “cookie-cutter” builds to buids that complement your party.

For PvE, personal skill matters a lot more than equip, class or build. Nobody will ever question your build as long as you are not speedrunning, or always dead. There are of course right choices, and wrong choices, so don’t fool yourself into thinking every build is good because certain traits and weapons/utilities flat out suck (I’m looking at you Guardian’s spirit weapons ).