Guild Wars 2

IndigoSundown.5419:

Calae.1738:

Being bad at something doesn’t mean you’ll never be good at it. Go ask how hard professional “anything” has to practice in order to get good.

There’s a big difference between people who don’t want to get better versus people who want to get better.

People who don’t want to get better use the game in the same way they use a radio or a television. It’s a relaxing non stressful environment that they can do while eating and socializing at the same time. Like going to a bar or a restaurant. All you have to do is show up, talk, drink, eat and breathe.

People who want to get better have a desire to learn new skills, develop new strategies and master elegant techniques. Like hockey players, football players, basketball players, tennis players ect…

Using pro athletes as a comparison is not a good one. I’m sure there are people who don’t want to get better. I am also sure that there are people who want to get better, but are not able to spend the time needed to do so. Professional athletes make money playing a sport. How many gamers make money by gaming? You’d be better served referring to amateur sport players competing in city leagues, who actually have limited time, than to pros whose life is about their sport.

I’m not a pro athlete.

I play hockey and tennis in the summer with friends for no money. I play because I love to learn new skills and perfect my techniques. In short; I love to learn.

I don’t turn on a video game for it to tickle me.

Neural.1824:

And if you have the thick enough skin to actually admit it…

Speak up.

I’m not talking about poor social ability, or personality issues. I’m talking about simply being the bottom end of the “gamer” list.

I find this amusing.

I consider myself a gamer. I don’t log in everyday, run dungeon, factals, or PVP. I enjoy the content, exploration, crafting, and alts. I do all of this at my own pace and love the way the game sets this up for me. I play for my personal enjoyment and will continue to play as long as this continues.

I find the playstyle and attitude of many, not all, that want to push through a dungeon, or rant on a pvp battlefield unenjoyable. So I stay away from that activity. I don’t care about acended or legendary items, they have no impact on my playstyle.

This does not make me a bottom dweller of the"gamer" list. I paid the same money for this game as everyone else. We all get to choose how we want to play this game, we are all gamers. Some of us take it more seriously than others, so be it. We can all play how we want to so why throw lables around? Play if you enjoy it, stop if you don’t. Very simple.

I’m talking about simply being a gamer.

Calae.1738:

IndigoSundown.5419:

Calae.1738:

Being bad at something doesn’t mean you’ll never be good at it. Go ask how hard professional “anything” has to practice in order to get good.

There’s a big difference between people who don’t want to get better versus people who want to get better.

People who don’t want to get better use the game in the same way they use a radio or a television. It’s a relaxing non stressful environment that they can do while eating and socializing at the same time. Like going to a bar or a restaurant. All you have to do is show up, talk, drink, eat and breathe.

People who want to get better have a desire to learn new skills, develop new strategies and master elegant techniques. Like hockey players, football players, basketball players, tennis players ect…

Using pro athletes as a comparison is not a good one. I’m sure there are people who don’t want to get better. I am also sure that there are people who want to get better, but are not able to spend the time needed to do so. Professional athletes make money playing a sport. How many gamers make money by gaming? You’d be better served referring to amateur sport players competing in city leagues, who actually have limited time, than to pros whose life is about their sport.

I’m not a pro athlete.

I play hockey and tennis in the summer with friends for no money. I play because I love to learn new skills and perfect my techniques. In short; I love to learn.

I don’t turn on a video game for it to tickle me.

I didn’t say you were.

I didn’t say you don’t.

I have no opinion about why anyone else turns on a video game. That’s their business.

You made an analogy. Your analogy compared game-players to pro athletes; not amateur athletes who practice to improve within the confines of their physical capability and time. All I said was that a comparison to amateurs would have been more apt. I was not disagreeing with your point, only the means by which you made it.

I would consider myself a gamer, not leet or awesome but a gamer. I always enjoy games and usually when I start one I am decent at it but not good. It comes with practice for me. When I started GW2 I died a fair bit and couldn’t solo a vet. Now after months of playing I feel like I am pretty good at it. I didn’t do my first dungeon until February. I died all the time. But I had just joined a really good Guild and they were talking me through how to play in there. Now I feel there are a few dungeons that I am really good at with the right group. I am starting Arah with a group of people from my guild. None of us no what to do in there. But we are all really good players (in my opinion). We are taking our time learning a path to do and it is going good. Ran it three times so far learning different parts of it. We still haven’t finished it. Going slow and learning takes time and we normally run out of time. But we are getting good at doing it.

So my point is, I am a gamer but I am casual also. I log in when I want and play. Some days I do more other days I don’t. I went from not being very good to being better. I don’t mind being with someone in my group that isn’t very good at what were doing because they have the same right to try it out as I do. It also lets them have fun and be with other people and learn from people that has done it before. I used to die all the time but that didn’t stop me from doing it again and learning what my class is good at in this place compared to that place.

I get where you’re coming from. I wouldn’t say I’m BAD at gaming, but i’ve never been “elite”

if it requires studying math, synergies and min maxing I can’t be bothered. That’s not why I game.

This has gated me from a lot of high level pve/pvp content in several games.

I’m absolutely trash in PvP situations. Seriously. I only get any kills when I’m not fighting alone but with a group and even then I think it’s because I tagged something rather than actually killed it. Doesn’t matter if it’s my ranger or my warrior.

This is nothing new for me. I’m “terribad” at Team Fortress 2 as well

Luckily, in PvE I can still be terrible and get things done.

As opposed to games with a ‘holy trinity’, where only the healers need to be situationally aware, this game requires everyone to be situationally aware. Everyone needs to kite, everyone needs to dodge the big attacks, everyone needs to know the mechanics. It takes practice. It’s easy to get into at the beginning, but there is a huge learning curve with lots of room for improvement. This is one of the things I love most about this game.

tcat.6725:

I find the playstyle and attitude of many, not all, that want to push through a dungeon, or rant on a pvp battlefield unenjoyable. So I stay away from that activity. I don’t care about acended or legendary items, they have no impact on my playstyle.

Thats pretty much how I feel. I think that the elitism is even more pervasive in a PvP scenario (including WvW in this game). I still havent found PvE to ever be particularly engaging even if its programmed to be difficult though. I want to be outsmarted by my opponent, and that wont happen until AI in games advances further.

I think this game does relatively well in limiting the avenues of elitism, so I have started to PvP again. Even then though, it obviously happens on the same team, where I have seen commanders tell new players to leave because they were taking up a spot that a “real” player could occupy. The commanders I respect tend to teach new players rather than disparage. After all, that means more people on your server are more capable, making the team stronger.

Most are too enamored with winning right now that they become short sighted. I would even say they do more damage over time (DoT! :P) to the overall strength of the team than that “casual” that was on the map for a couple of fights.

I think one issue is that many have equated being a good player to being a good leader. But, a good player can be terrible at leading. A good leader, even if not particularly skilled at the game, can be one of the largest force multipliers that you can put in your team. The issue is, it does take time to gain that knowledge and elitism prevents many who struggle with the game itself from having any motivation to become a leader.

Its not just in MMOs either, I think its a general social behavior. Some can see past it, but most can not.

I think that those who can actually recognize their weaknesses, instead of thinking they have none, have the potential to not only become better players but actually have the potential of, in time, making the entire team stronger through capable leaders. Not just people who are top dog because they play the best.

This is coming from someone who at one point was extremely competitive in video games. I competed passionately in games like Soul Calibur II (still my favorite fighting game). That was in the “arcade” days, haha. At this point, I am a decent enough player but I am constantly put off by the attitude and behavior of individuals towards others. And not just in video games…

I dont think they realize they do more harm than good. We can become so focused on winning the one battle that we are entirely willing to lose the war, so to speak. In insular groups, like guilds, this doesnt necessarily have an impact other than the number of skilled players they have. In areas like WvW though, it hurts the server (the team) in the long run.

Will it ever change?

Nope!

So, I just bop along doing my thing. A lot of the time, I even look at other players on the field as NPCs :X

edit: If you couldnt guess, I spend 90% of my time in WvW

Neural.1824:

And if you have the thick enough skin to actually admit it…

Speak up.

I’m not talking about poor social ability, or personality issues. I’m talking about simply being the bottom end of the “gamer” list.

For myself, I feel often that I’m the bookend on that list. I don’t solo veterans very well, I have difficulty surviving even in groups, and I find level 1 Fractals to be next to impossible to contribute to (in reality, the four friends I run with can finish them on their own, I’m just cannon fodder).

One of the reasons I came to GW2 was the rumors I heard about it being more casual friendly, and I think that overall it is. I’ve enjoyed it a lot more than I have any other MMO (otherwise I wouldn’t be around, because I believe Anet is obsessed with forcing people to the gem store).
Still, no matter how casual, it still is somewhat depressing when all I hear in regards to dungeons and fractals is how “easy” they are.

Does anyone else look at dungeons/fractals and boggle at how “easy” can be used to define them?

You know, I don’t bother with trying to label myself as a “good” player, an “awesome” player or a “bad” player.

I am a player. Playing against content provided by Anet. Some of it is easy for me. I can do the veteran guarding the cauliflower farm easily on my ranger. Do I care? No, I’m there to gather my cauliflower for the day, I don’t care that I’m “good” at killing that veteran. I can tell you, there is no way I could kill that vet on my elementalist.

What I do know is I hate people who play games who A. try to act superior to other players B. insist they are a better player than you C. try to use a game to make you feel bad about yourself because you’re a “baddie” or a “terribad”, terms I can’t stand.

I find people who say, “oh that level 30 fractal is cake, you’re just a baddie, go away” to either be lying, trying to compensate for something by trying to make someone else feel bad, or just a mean person.

I can’t solo a boss like I see people posting about all the time. The only class so far I can solo vets on is my ranger. The other classes? Not happening (so far). Champs? I can’t solo a single one.

Some of the jumping puzzles I can’t do. The pirate one, nope. The EB one, nope. They are simply too hard for me. And don’t quote me and tell me what easysauce those JP’s are, I don’t care what you think.

But I discovered the raven puzzle on accident, didn’t even know it was a JP and did it to the chest before knowing it was one.

I avoid dungeons like the plague. They take too long, and some aspects of them are too hard. TA blossoms and poison spray, gah! hate that place. Actually I find the last boss to be easier to kill then getting there in the first place. I think there is a lot of content in the game that is hard. Some is too hard. But, others would disagree.

Fractals. Never done one and never will. I don’t like dungeons to begin with. I don’t like being chained to my computer for any length of time where I can’t get up and toss the tennis ball across the kitchen for my dog, or get a cup of coffee or check the laundry.

I’m not good and I’m not bad. I’m just a player. A player who wants to log into the game to have fun. That is why I bought it. That is why I click “log in”.

I’ll let other people tie their identities and lives to their online pixels and puff themselves up with how awesome and wonderful they are in an online game.

Me? I’ll just be logging in and doing what I find fun and avoiding those things I don’t find fun. And not doing the things I can’t do, because for whatever reasons, I just can’t do them.

Does that make me a bad player? Fine.

I AM A BAD PLAYER AND PROUD OF IT.

There.

I have to admit I’m somewhat biased against casual players. I know it’s bad, trying to fix that attitude.

It’s mainly cause I think some players aren’t playing smart and are wasting time (I’m looking at you folks who spend 1 minute beating on a veteran when there are 12 normal mobs behind you). And sometimes the reaction time of casual players is jsut waaay to slow.

But then again, I’m not paying for your game, so I have no right to tell people how to play. And for all I know, you may find it ‘fun’. Nothing wrong with that.

Some bowlers will never have an above 200 average no matter how often they bowl, practice or own better equipment.

Same is true with golfers. Your out on the links every weekend. You take your clubs with you on vacation. You splurged and bought a set of really expensive clubs you’ve seen advertised. Still your handicap has never been south of 30.

But if you enjoy playing socially with others, it doesn’t matter.

Some of us will never have, or have again, the muscle control and eye hand coordination to easily do jumping puzzles. Or to be awesome at dodging during PvP. I enjoy playing this game with my limitations because I have to figure out how to succeed without relying on fast reflexes or overwhelming firepower (but overwhelming firepower is fun too).

Vol.5241:

I have to admit I’m somewhat biased against casual players. I know it’s bad, trying to fix that attitude.

It’s mainly cause I think some players aren’t playing smart and are wasting time (I’m looking at you folks who spend 1 minute beating on a veteran when there are 12 normal mobs behind you). And sometimes the reaction time of casual players is jsut waaay to slow.

But then again, I’m not paying for your game, so I have no right to tell people how to play. And for all I know, you may find it ‘fun’. Nothing wrong with that.

You have hit the nail on the head in your last paragraph. I understand it can be tough for gamers that really put all of themselves into the game to try and understand why it might seem like some of us are wasting time.

In my mind I am having fun and I don’t care if it isn’t smart. I see that Vet and I see a challenge that differs from banging on normal mobs. I see something different to do, otherwise it might start to feel like a grind.

To me playing smart may not be fun at all, but to you that is the only way that makes the game fun. To you I may be slow, but to me I am just right.

Good to know you are working on that bias of different playstyles.

Tbh, GW2 is more based on your setup rather than actual “skill”. If I can play the game without a mouse (on my laptop), then the skill cap is pretty low. If you’re having troubles, I advise you to look at your traits/skills/weapons you are using for that situation.

Halanna.3927:

You know, I don’t bother with trying to label myself as a “good” player, an “awesome” player or a “bad” player.

— snipped for brevity —

Me? I’ll just be logging in and doing what I find fun and avoiding those things I don’t find fun. And not doing the things I can’t do, because for whatever reasons, I just can’t do them.

Does that make me a bad player? Fine.

I AM A BAD PLAYER AND PROUD OF IT.

There.

I can’t say whether the behavior you described makes you “bad” in someone else’s eyes. From my point of view, it makes you someone who knows what they like to do and what they don’t, and that’s far more important than pixel skillz.

I confess …

My character is level 56 but I’m still in Queensdale almost all the time. I’ve never been to any of the PVP places and I don’t know how to get there. Not long ago I learned that you can pick new keys for the extra skills so you don’t have to click on the icons …

Hi, my name is roach and I’m bad at jump puzzles.

*pull up chair

it’s been 2 weeks since my last puzzle attempt, and I am recovering well. it’s tough!

i am bad with everything in this game but i like this game :/ so .. as long as i did not make people around me angry because of my nuubish style, and i am having fun, then i don’t think it’s a problem :p

Pirlipat.2479:

thisolderhead.5127

Reread what I said – you state you try to think and learn and master it, I like you.

There is an example further up of someone who is willfully (I would hope) unwilling to learn auto-attack, traits and spending the point, etc. closer to what I was referring to.

Also – reread the part where I was highlighed there is a difference between casual and poor as an adjective for a player (and a game incidentally), and also said that terms like “casual” and “hardcore” are poorly defined.

It never was about uberleetpronesscopters – though to clarify – it was about engagement with the game via its mechanics and the willful belligerent being a waste of time.

I appologise, I missinterpreted your post then.

What I’m up to is that there are limits how good someone can become. I can play kinda decent but I will never become an keyboard-artist, doing every jumping puzzle like nothing for example. And I would wish that people come to accept that some might try and indeed improve but still are not comparable to some who a) play alot and got more practise and b) are more skilled when it comes to reaction and whatelse, instead of beeing told they do just not try hard enough.

The fact you are trying to improve your gameplay makes the “real-pro” players love you, the kiddie “leetpro” players can join the willfully unimproving and logout too. The key is to find a niche within the game that suits your playstyle and skill level – back in the day I’d have told you to roll a pally (he he he).

I notice a few people who have replied either without reading properly (yes it is a higher register language I use, vocab up) or have missed my point, but I’ll throw in this as a response to one – having fun is the idea and the fundamental reason to play – being crap at something doesn’t preclude that.

Oh Roach! That made me lol!

Ikittenar.6457:

i am bad with everything in this game but i like this game :/ so .. as long as i did not make people around me angry because of my nuubish style, and i am having fun, then i don’t think it’s a problem :p

But again it shows an awareness and (though not stated) a desire to improve or learn. We were all “that guy” once, in some game somewhere – and I love bringing you guys through runs… not least of all because of the tears it will bring the proleet kitten who is raging over nobody else bringing their exploit consumables to the dungeon :-D

Rehashed Jibe Tube.7102:

I get where you’re coming from. I wouldn’t say I’m BAD at gaming, but i’ve never been “elite”

if it requires studying math, synergies and min maxing I can’t be bothered. That’s not why I game.

This has gated me from a lot of high level pve/pvp content in several games.

If it requires understanding the underlying mechanics and gameplay intent, doing a little bit of thinking to bring out the best possible outcome, and having half of an eye towards the “cog in the machine” than a character is when operating in a group – I can’t be bothered, that why FPS zerg Halo FFA maps exist.

This whole topic confuses me. Seriously. I can promise you
that first person shooters, and other games like SC2 and Rift
require MUCH more understanding of the game to play at a
good level.’

Why would you lead a crusade to dummy games down?! WOW did
that and caused me to quit after 6 yrs of playing. There are much
easier and simpler games out their, that dont require skill levels
if you are looking for a timesink to relax.

@Thunderbrew, I don’t know who you are directing this toward but nearly all of the GW2 hype I heard leading up to it was pushing how it was going to be a more player friendly MMO than ones that came before. That to me sounds more like it’s targeting casual players than hardcore ones.

I’m terrible at WvW, when I treb, escort yaks, or build siege I get bored and have to leave.

I though I was SOOOO good at PvP…until I realized I was watching a youtube video

Thunderbrew.7034:

This whole topic confuses me. Seriously. I can promise you
that first person shooters, and other games like SC2 and Rift
require MUCH more understanding of the game to play at a
good level.’

Why would you lead a crusade to dummy games down?! WOW did
that and caused me to quit after 6 yrs of playing. There are much
easier and simpler games out their, that dont require skill levels
if you are looking for a timesink to relax.

Your post confuses me, tbh. I can only speak for myself but I don’t want content to be made easier. Where did someone in this post ask that the content should be made easier anyway? But I don’t want content to become much more difficult either.

Behellagh.1468:

@Thunderbrew, I don’t know who you are directing this toward but nearly all of the GW2 hype I heard leading up to it was pushing how it was going to be a more player friendly MMO than ones that came before. That to me sounds more like it’s targeting casual players than hardcore ones.

Read the OP. It clearly is someone saying that the content is too hard for them. After reading your reply and once again the OP, I realize where the problem is: How you are
defining “casual gaming.”

Casual gaming has nothing to do with the difficulty of the game itself, but the time
required by the game to experience everything it has to offer. I good example would
be in WOW, where you had to be in an end game raiding guild and playing 5 nights
a week (due to mandatory attendance) in order to get “the best gear.”

Research all of the “casual vs hardcore” debates and you will see this has nothing
to do with how easy a game is. I cannot devote 40 hours a week to this game either,
but when I do play, I would like to see SOME kind of challenge for my time to be
worth it.

The only hard part of this game are some of the jumping puzzles (especially the
clock tower one for halloween). If you run fractals with people using TS or Ventrilo,
they are not hard. WvW I dont even need to comment on, and the end zones
are solable by any class.

As someone that finds most games easy mode, I am kinda jelly. I miss the times where I didn’t understand much and every day was full of discovery and improvement.

Thunderbrew.7034:

Behellagh.1468:

@Thunderbrew, I don’t know who you are directing this toward but nearly all of the GW2 hype I heard leading up to it was pushing how it was going to be a more player friendly MMO than ones that came before. That to me sounds more like it’s targeting casual players than hardcore ones.

Read the OP. It clearly is someone saying that the content is too hard for them. After reading your reply and once again the OP, I realize where the problem is: How you are
defining “casual gaming.”

Casual gaming has nothing to do with the difficulty of the game itself, but the time
required by the game to experience everything it has to offer. I good example would
be in WOW, where you had to be in an end game raiding guild and playing 5 nights
a week (due to mandatory attendance) in order to get “the best gear.”

Research all of the “casual vs hardcore” debates and you will see this has nothing
to do with how easy a game is. I cannot devote 40 hours a week to this game either,
but when I do play, I would like to see SOME kind of challenge for my time to be
worth it.

The only hard part of this game are some of the jumping puzzles (especially the
clock tower one for halloween). If you run fractals with people using TS or Ventrilo,
they are not hard. WvW I dont even need to comment on, and the end zones
are solable by any class.

I’m not talking Casual gaming. Casual gaming is Plants Vs Zombies or Angry Birds. I’m talking about a casual gamer. Someone who don’t have oodles of free time to spend on a game. For MMOs, back in the subscription days, they didn’t hang around long simply because at some point they couldn’t rationalize paying $15 a month for a game they might be about to put 30-50 hours a month in. Due to the slow leveling process of those MMOs they would never have a chance to see the world, play the higher level content, explore the various classes or races. They would join a guild, start a new character with a bunch of guildies and the next time they log in everyone has outleveled him by 5 or 10 levels and he can’t play with them anymore.

A lot of those problems aren’t found in GW2. No subscription. Auto level adjustment. Fast leveling since everything gives you XP. No PvP required unless you want to. No triad. Easily soloable. No tagging. No loot rolls. It’s these features that makes the game attractive to “casual” players.

Now if I was still in HS or college and spent an inordinate amount of time playing, that is what I define as a hardcore player. They’ve been playing videos at home their entire lives. The only tricky part of jumping puzzles for them is the puzzle part, not the jumping part. I’m just to uncoordinated to jump reliably. No amount of practice, assuming I had the time, is going to make me significantly better at it. I just have no rhythm.

I’m probably semi-casual. I can play a bit more than friends who have families and have more things consuming their free time. I might be able to do 20 hours a week. Gaming, in total, not just this game. Before GW2 I was playing XCOM, Civ4, and Torchlight I. I haven’t touch them since I installed GW2. Before them it was City of Heroes and nothing else. I have Steam running in the background and I see one of my buddies literally play 6 games in one day and buys twice that number monthly on Steam. He has nearly 600 games on Steam. I have maybe 10 “modern” games in my house. I’m digressing here.

Circling back, yea I’m not “good” at MMOs. I might be better if I have the time to get “serious” but I don’t. And it’s that, not having time, which dictates my skill in the game. My “casual” devotion to it.

MMOs seem to take a different kind of gamer. If you’re more used to action oriented games, where real life physics seem to apply at least to a semi-realistic extent, then MMOs tend not to make any sense.

I have tried to get into several MMOs in my time as a gamer, starting back in the days of Legend ofMir and other such rubbish. However it’s not until GW2 came along that I found myself able to actually get into the mechanics enough to develop any form of “skill”.

I would say I’m probably still terrible, I don’t get time to play nearly as much as I would like to, and as a result my mind still boggles when I look through my traits, skills, and try to piece together a “build” where all the percentages and buffs and bonuses etc. compliment one another. This game does a great job of bridging the gap somewhat to make it more action-oriented, where individual player skills like reaction times and accuracy make a difference; but at the end of the day there is still that element of playing a spreadsheet that you either understand, or you don’t.

I think I’m just too stupid for MMOs to be honest. I play games to let my brain relax, not to do math.

…clap your hands!! If you’re terrible at MMO’s clap your hands!! If you’re terrible and you know it and your face is going to show it. If you’re terrible and you know it…….clap your hands!

Certain dungeons I avoid because I get low FPS in them (CoE, SE) and so I die a LOT, but in the other dungeons I do pretty well, so I guess it’s my comp that sucks and not me. (I am not sure why my game runs flawlessly everywhere except CoE and SE, but that’s a matter for another thread.)

I avoid fractals because I am TERRIBLE at jumping puzzles and there is no way to avoid getting Uncatagorized. I don’t like holding groups back with my clumsyness.

I like solo-play jump puzzles because I can go at my own pace, and if I fall, I don’t feel bad because I’m only holding back myself. The WvW puzzle is pretty cool.