Guild Wars 2

There’s a lot of “complaints” from people about how GW2 said it was a horizontal progression game instead of a vertical one, and with ascended gear they got verticality.

Myself I think vertical is not bad, while the effort to make a higher-rate gear is proportionally (or even more) higher.

But I wonder… how can a game be horizontal gear-wise? Yea, by the looks. But I think that some time there will be 3 or 4 skins that look really awesome and the others are just “crap”, and it will be so hard to make another skin that’s “prettier” than these other 4s. Then horizontal progression means no progression at all (once you have your set with your skins, you don’t ever have to upgrade it?).

I mean, with vertical progression you can allways add stats into the gear. Theoretically there’s no limit. But I really see a limit if there’s “Max” stats and then everything goes by the look. And I know it really depends (“Every man to his taste”), but there are skins that almost everyone agree that they look awesome.

Personally I think that grinding/looting/crafting (when used in moderation) is one of the things that keep people in MMOs.

Guild Wars 1 didn’t use progression with power/numbers. It used progression with skills that were added to the game. You got more powerful by getting new and different skills, Finding new ways to combine those skills into new builds made you more powerful, without ever increasing the level cap or the damage output or your armor.

It gave you ways to play better, but you didn’t objectively get more powerful. The power was capped by your skill and your ability to create a build (or learn how to use someone else’s build at very least).

yeah exactly skill progression is what we want, and any kind of progression that does not require grind or so much grind as the current ascended gear require`s. And for that let me give a definition to grind, grind is something you do again and again to make some wealth or farm some crafting materials, grinding itself is not bad, the fact that it gets boring is, and thats one reason why theres so much rage about ascended because currently there are not many efficient ways to get ascended except grinding. That been said progresion in this game is its weak point for many reasons and thats what Devs are trying to implement in the game with a more proper and entertaining way and are looking for ideas through CDI

blackoil.2673:

But I wonder… how can a game be horizontal gear-wise? Yea, by the looks. But I think that some time there will be 3 or 4 skins that look really awesome and the others are just “crap”, and it will be so hard to make another skin that’s “prettier” than these other 4s. Then horizontal progression means no progression at all (once you have your set with your skins, you don’t ever have to upgrade it?).

Unlocking things on that set of gear to extend your options:

• Stat combinations – For example, starting with Berserker gear, and being able to unlock Valkyrie on it).
• Runes / Sigils – For example, using Runes of Strength, and unlocking Runes of the Scholar
• Infusions – 1st step; adding the infusion slot. 2nd step, unlocking infusions.

blackoil.2673:

Personally I think that grinding/looting/crafting (when used in moderation) is one of the things that keep people in MMOs.

Well, IMO Grind is a state of mind; it’s how much you can repeat a task before it becomes tedious / feels like a chore.

Presentation is incredibly important, since you want to stave off that feeling of tediousness as long as possible. This could be done by simply providing a variety of ways to get Ascended that appeals to people who enjoy different content.

For example, Fractal runners might have to find hidden bosses within a set of Fractals and kill them for a component which can be fused with the Gift of Ascension to upgrade a piece of Exotic gear to Ascended (these components are then used to unlock stat combos and upgrades).

Fractal runners like running Fractals, and yes, while you’ll still have to collect the numerous Fractal Relics for the Gifts of Ascension, as well as finding the bosses, the feeling of ‘grind’ won’t set in as quick, since they’re doing an activity they enjoy.

Immensus.9732:

yeah exactly skill progression is what we want, and any kind of progression that does not require grind or so much grind as the current ascended gear require`s. And for that let me give a definition to grind, grind is something you do again and again to make some wealth or farm some crafting materials, grinding itself is not bad, the fact that it gets boring is, and thats one reason why theres so much rage about ascended because currently there are not many efficient ways to get ascended except grinding. That been said progresion in this game is its weak point for many reasons and thats what Devs are trying to implement in the game with a more proper and entertaining way and are looking for ideas through CDI

^

I disagree with that.
Except for legendaries maybe, the game doesn’t require you to grind for anything. The reason why people feel the need to grind is because they usually want their ascended gear/weapons asap. That being said, there’s usually only ever one most effective way of accumulating any given material needed for an item. That’s not the devs fault, it just lies in the nature of things. You just can’t balance everything so that it all distributes the same amount of gold, t6 materials, t7 materials and so on. Once people have figured out that fastest way to “grind” for their material, they will do so. Is that the only way to get to your ascended weapon though? Most definitely not. Just take your time. Play the game as you like it, you’ll end up with ascended gear eventually. It’ll just take a while longer.

any form of vertical progression is bad.
horizontal progression is good.

for example,
unlock gear stats skins one by one, swap stats skins.

awesome horizontal progression.

Vayne.8563:

Guild Wars 1 didn’t use progression with power/numbers. It used progression with skills that were added to the game. You got more powerful by getting new and different skills, Finding new ways to combine those skills into new builds made you more powerful, without ever increasing the level cap or the damage output or your armor.

It gave you ways to play better, but you didn’t objectively get more powerful. The power was capped by your skill and your ability to create a build (or learn how to use someone else’s build at very least).

What he said.

Horizontal progression usually gives you a very basic build to start with. You progress horizontally by unlocking parts to create new builds. So you become more diverse and can more and more customize your character to play the way you want it to play. You can also adapt to more diverse situations and run more optimized builds in each.

Horizontal progression allows you to be a generalist. Because you’re often limited in some way (the amount of skills on your bar, the amount of runes you can put in your armor), you can’t use everything you unlocked at once and have to think creatively how you’re going to use the unlocks you have at your disposal to overcome specific challenges.

And there are many more ways to progress horizontally or cosmetically. How about player housing? It’s mostly vanity, but it’s still a giant carrot on a stick to keep people busy.

Deimos Tel Arin.7391:

any form of vertical progression is bad.

I wouldn’t say that. I’d say any form of VP that completely negates previous progress is bad.

I’d say WvW ranks are a good example of VP done well, mainly a) you keep any progress in the lines and b) the focus isn’t on it; it’s merely another system that people can use to enhance and specialise their character in that game-mode.

I quite don’t understand progression

Don’t worry, neither do the devs!

You could always try to l2p. That is vertical progression for you. If you are PvE player try solo some easy dungeon first and then arah. In www make 5 man team and try to kill 20 players blob first, then 30, 40, 50 and so on. sPvP you could try to get in top 10 on solo queue or something.

Gw2 progression = crafting.

This is not remotely enjoyable.

Well to me horizontal progression mean player skill progression over character power level progression . So as an example most FPS use horizontal progression: it’s not about getting a bigger gun but about learning how to use the gun you have.

That kind of progression require 3 things:

-a high (player) skill cap : On skills and build level GW2 is actually quite good. But there are problems with the trait system (that has been changed from a personalisation system to a specialisation system in early stages of the game), combo (such potential for “end game” progression in this system finally limited to a fire+blast mechanic…What a waste…) and of course balance (no balance at all for the combo, class and skills totally broken…)

-a challenge hard enough to encourage player progression: I’m totally for a story doable by anybody…But there must also be challenging contents that require you to use the high skill cap…There is none. Explorable dungeons (initially presented as “elite zones”) are even easier than there story path, fractals are just grind for AR and, here again balance is a problem (since you have skills and build that totally breaks challenge…“need more hundred blade for this event”). I would also add on the challenging thing that devs are obviously afraid about OS (a karka rolled on you…you are dead…that’s all…but not in anetland), afraid about dangerous foes and gives us health bags instead of medium health, high damage bosses…Oh and bosses also lack mechanics…

-rewards for effort : in horizontal progression games you are rewarded when you play better. Those reward are usually skins, titles, ranks,… In Gw2 you are not rewarded for anything else then grinding. There is no challenging(I mean player challenge…not grind X things ones) achievement rewarding the player (except maybe for liandry but that challenge was more a “avoid the bug” challenge then a proper fight…). Dungeons (even if they were challenging) rewards are totally broken.
Initial system : a weapon for finishing a story path, an armor piece for finishing an explorable (suposed hard) path.
Actual system : grind your tokens in explorable mode! As for story mode you only get a gold headpiece..;What a joke when you know that some story paths are actually more challenging then the explorable ones…

And that’s all they needed to make a great horizontal progression game…But instead of that we’ve got more stats, more grind your AR, more grind your “living” story (a story should be enjoyed, not farmed…), more kill X rats achievement, more guides on how to do things (seriously they give solutions even before releasing the content), …

Hoping you now better understand what people mean by horizontal progression…