Guild Wars 2

Let me begin by saying this is not a complaint or gripe post. It is meant to offer some constructive criticism and suggestions for simple fixes to issues that I have found with various aspects of the game. I would prefer that responses and discussion remain focused on evaluating and attempting to solve these issues rather than a descent into bickering and name-calling.

That having been said, let’s begin:

Issue 1: The open world and the lack of PvE participation

The world of Tyria is beautifully crafted and the designers have worked hard to create numerous areas, characters, and events….that are virtually abandoned. The concept of dynamic scaling is great and in theory it allows a zone, any zone… to be both level appropriate for new players, and end-game content for those at 80. Unfortunately, there seems to be little reason for most players to explore the world. How can Arenanet get players back into Tyria?

Some suggestions: rework daily achievement to be more zone specific and offer better rewards to entice players to complete this daily. Rather than a generic “kill 15 enemy types” or “gather 20 of anything”, make the daily more specifc i.e: “gather 20 copper ore” or “kill 1 Risen, 1 Moa, 1 Cat, etc” forcing players to spend some time traveling the world and really getting to know Tyria better. To promote this objective, offer reward options like "pick one: 1 mystic coin + karma, 1 random elemental shard (the tier below cores) + karma, or 1 bag of coins (random amount between 10-30silver) + karma.

This would create an objective that tempts players back into the world and helps alleviate that constant complaint about lodestone prices. (2 birds, 1 stone)

Issue 2: Dynamic events are not being utilized to their full extent and players only do certain events (read: dragons and some orr temples)

Suggestion: create a system that scales event rewards for completion of chains and meta events. For example: event 1 – xp, karma, coin. event 2 in chain – xp+,karma+,coin+ (same reward but maybe a bit more), event 3 in chain – xp+,karma+,item(low%blue,green,low%yellow). A chance at a better reward would motivate players to stick around for an event. Meta completion: xp, karma, chest. Which brings us to the sub issue of chests.

If the reward is so good it’s worth keeping in an enormous chest, then why is it always so crummy? Let’s have a chest give a better chance at some decent loot. In addition have the chance at loot scale in relation to the number of preevents completed. Nobody wants to help with steps 1-4 of a meta but they all sure want that final part when the chest pops up…. let’s make it worthwhile to participate.

Issue 3: Dungeons are a mess and skipping/shortcutting is a bad system. Mobs in dungeons are above veterans but below champions in difficulty but they seldom drop any loot. As a result, most groups feel that the risk is not worth the reward of fighting them and parties devise ways to skip or evade enemies. Why bother having them in the dungeon at all if they are to be ignored and run past?

Suggestion: Either A) tone down the trash to make clearing it easier and faster, improve the loot from trash to make it worthwhile to kill them, or C) remove the majority of the trash mobs and let players just fight bosses as they are now. Of these solutions, I prefer B. I think making enemies easier just turns dungeons into more of a zergfest than they already are and thats no fun in the long run nor does it challenge and excite players. Removing enemies would also make dungeons silly, essentially creating instanced boss encounters. However, improving the quality of loot from dungeon enemies (better chance at tier6 or rare quality mats maybe) would make killing trash mobs more appealing. Sure, groups focused on expediency might still want to skip the trash, but I believe that more groups would consider fighting some of the enemies Arenanet has worked to design and place in dungeons if it was worth their time.

These are just a few suggestions for issues that I feel are hurting the long-term playability of the game. I will likely address some of my concerns about WvW in another post (maybe in that forum) as WvW is a whole other mess and I believe Arenanet is already working quite hard to improve it.

Thanks for reading my wall of text and I would appreciate any feedback that furthers the discussion.

I’m not going to comment on Issues 1 and 2 yet. I’m going to wait to see what the blog post later this week says.

However:

Issue 3 – Skipping

Tone Trash Down to make clearing easier and faster – I’m not a big fan of nerfing content, to be honest. If anything, Bosses need to be made more ‘boss-like’ so they differentiate from trash. Toning them down would just mean that it’ll be an AoE fest.

Improve Loot – Depending on how it’s balanced with open-world loot. If it’s better, then you’re still stuck with issue 1.

Remove Trash Mobs – Eh, that would make the dungeons seem too empty. Ascalon Catacombs? Isn’t that where the Foefire happened? So where’s all of these vengeful spirits?

Additional Suggestions:

• Vanquishing – Vanquishing a dungeon means killing every single mob in there, and would grant loot at the end (such as additional Tokens, gold, Karma ect), possibly an additional dungeon title track "Vanquisher of (insert dungeon here).

• Mechanic: Call for Help – Skipping the trash in the surrounding area would result in the boss calling for help. All the trash you’ve missed would then swarm, making the fight a lot harder for an unorganised group.

This may not be an idea for the game but a valued bit of info that I think should be taken into consideration:

Dev’s should stop putting emphasis on the ideas stage and put more focus into the execution.

Absolutely I’m on board for the full loot issues being addressed, reward for time spent is very important for PVE in any game. There are always goals to be met even in RNG and if RNG isn’t working they need a new system, utilize that Karma more effectively for everything including the end game gear like crafted exotics and asended. Make T6 mats available via karma so that crafters don’t rely on the RNG to make their gear, we spent the time getting to 400 let us have the ability to craft the gear on par with everyone who runs dungeons to get their gear. It’s only right we simply used a different means to an end a different niche on the cogwheel.

Make all level zones have meta events that drop rares and exotics for completion for level 80 and above not just level 55+. Fix the vet/champ problem. Make the rewards worth the effort.

I’d love to see also new metas instead of expansions onto dungeons (unless of course they plan on doing both) but I think the metas are the best start since they did receive while bugged a new dungeon for the dungeoneer crowd.

This is a post that actually addresses the real issue with the game. If you don’t mind I will summaries:

The player base is refusing to use the game mechanics as they now stand.

Don’t change the whole game just the dailies as too encourage the player base to utilize the game as it is designed to be played.

My response is I support this thread

Thanks for the positive comments. @TheDaiBish – love your ideas for dungeons. Certainly connecting trash mobs to either boss difficulty or bonus rewards helps encourage the content be played as intended while preventing dungeon loot from overshadowing the open world.

Another thought to improve the open world is to have the bonus XP effect removed at level 80 and replaced by a bonus magic find effect. For those who don’t know, killing a mob who hasn’t been killed in a while results in standard xp + a bonus amount. As gaining levels for skill points is the least challenging portion of the legendary grind, I suggest that instead of a mob awarding bonus xp to a level 80 character, it should have an improved chance to drop better loot. This would reward players who seek out those hard to reach areas of Tyria and kill that troll way deep in the caves. Thoughts?

While I don’t necessarily agree with the OP’s rationale, I think the suggestions themselves are pretty awesome. I’d be all for them. Though instead of replacing the daily, it might be cool to have a daily ‘scavenger hunt’ to complete.

TheDaiBish.9735:

I’m not going to comment on Issues 1 and 2 yet. I’m going to wait to see what the blog post later this week says.

However:

Issue 3 – Skipping

Tone Trash Down to make clearing easier and faster – I’m not a big fan of nerfing content, to be honest. If anything, Bosses need to be made more ‘boss-like’ so they differentiate from trash. Toning them down would just mean that it’ll be an AoE fest.

Improve Loot – Depending on how it’s balanced with open-world loot. If it’s better, then you’re still stuck with issue 1.

Remove Trash Mobs – Eh, that would make the dungeons seem too empty. Ascalon Catacombs? Isn’t that where the Foefire happened? So where’s all of these vengeful spirits?

Additional Suggestions:

• Vanquishing – Vanquishing a dungeon means killing every single mob in there, and would grant loot at the end (such as additional Tokens, gold, Karma ect), possibly an additional dungeon title track "Vanquisher of (insert dungeon here).*

Mechanic: Call for Help* – Skipping the trash in the surrounding area would result in the boss calling for help. All the trash you’ve missed would then swarm, making the fight a lot harder for an unorganised group.

The improved loot in dungeon trash mobs is a big no no in most cases since people will also eventually find a way to farm/rerun initial mobs in the first area of a dungeon if these loots are better than the open world loot.

I like the Vanquishing suggestion. Clearing a dungeon will be a lot more exciting/challenging than skipping the entire dungeon and just killing the final boss.