Guild Wars 2

This is written from my personal view on the game and coming from a GW1 veteran. I’ve played both games since release, hence some of my paragraphs might sound nostalgic about the prequel.

Needless to say, there are a lot of things done right in this game, but imo there are also a lot of things that could be done better considering the prequel and other games aswell. If you want, add ‘imo’ to every paragraph, but here is how I feel about this game. For readability I am going to split my points into the categories pve, wvw and pvp.

PvE:
Why does pve lack depth?
-Because with the introduction of another gear tier, any form of progression is forfeit.
-Because you can do nothing but farm to get somewhere in the game. The personal story doesn’t count because a single max level rare item on completion does not prepare you for the endgame.
Why is that?
-Because progression itself means that you achieve something by doing something else. You don’t progress if you actually stand still when both your and the enemy power keeps scaling. See the age old discussion on vertical gear progression.

How do I solve the issue?

I perfectly understand the reason why another tier was added. It is a short-term solution to keep players motivated who actually like getting new gear. However it breaks a lot of moving parts in the game design of GW2 and causes headaches. One problem is, it further segragates pve from pvp (more on this in the pvp section).

Another is the introduction of a gear treadmill by design itself, leading up to the level increase in the future. As soon as people have to grind for the next best-in-slot ascended gear at level x old content gets obsolete. At least that’s how it will be given the current downscaling system, which only downscales character attributes not gear.

Therefore I propose these improvements:
-Improve the scaling system of the game to also include gear stats. Then no content will ever get obsolete.
-Rethink your strategy on how to refresh the hunt for items in GW2. Adding another tier to gear with a stat increase regardless of the amount, is actually a gear treadmill. Instead add long quest chains which reward players with shiny and unique max weapons. These should be doable with more than 1 player and counter the high impact of RNG on players in this game. Also, it would track actual progression of your character.

Hence, add more and more scavenger hunts or challenge quest chains (whatever you want to call them) in the future of GW2 and design the most difficult content for those players. It will then feel like you have achieved something as a player. Farming something and playing RNG should not be the only way to go somewhere in a game. Also, improve reliable rewards from the personal story.

WvW:
WvW is only about swapping strategic points and culmulating points to go up in tiers.

I know this one is a provocative claim, but hear me out. Currently there actually is a lot of strategy and tactics involved in WvW and that’s great, but the way WvW plays is promoting one thing the most, being mobile, exploting bugs (wall climbing), exploiting skills (portal) and capturing strategic points. Hence it plays really fast and you have to be careful all the time to not get stomped by an enemy group.

While this sort of gameplay is fine for the first couple of months, it is getting stale at some point. I blame four things for the state WvW is in.
1. Map design
2. Objective design
3. Lack of options
4. Commander

Add 1: The maps themselves don’t allow for much freedom in how to move your force around. From a distant view they are designed well. The defending server always has the higher position when pushed back, all servers are on equal footing in EB. However there are some glaring issues with the current map design.

-Some strategic positions can be trebbed too easily and these trebs defended too easily. For example the south east tower can be bombarded from the east keep without any hope of retaliation.
-There are way too many chokepoints to exploit the culling issue (including portaling around) and people are forced to stay there. It is way too easy to exclude another server from a map in the borderlands. Breakout events are curing the symptoms, but not the sickness.
-Lack of interesting landmarks to use strategically. Towers and keeps are usually used as base of operation and to siege other points, but there is no way to use some land for that. More on that later.
-There is no way to establish frontiers or borders between opposing factions (also see lack of options).

Add 2: Right now, the best way to cap everything on the map is to be highly mobile in all regards. Quickly run from A to B, use the ideal number of siege weapons to bring down a wall or gate if not fortified, try to fend off opponents who try to retake it and then proceed to the next target. The only thing that slows this whole process down is the fact the fortified structures take a lot of time to break.

This is also where the map design is at fault, but the overall objective design is the major issue here. WvW lacks some sort of objective progression and ways to defend what is yours. As the defending team you cannot establish a perimiter, which can be hold or breached, you can only reinforce walls. For that you need supply camps that may be taken way too easily.

To add more depth, I would revamp how strategic points interact with each other and how players can shape frontiers on the battlefield (also see lack of options in this regard). As a dev you could get inspired by Battlefield or other games that incorporated a progression system for strategic points. In Battlefield you need to clear to objectives to proceed to the next two. I am not saying you (ANet) should copy the respective gamemode in BF, but that approach achieves two things:

-Always keep players engaged and guide them to where the major battles might unfold.
-Adds progression to a capture-type gamemode. Any side won’t get easily stripped off past achievements, which would promote establishing defences beyond upgrading walls and gates.

Add a way to attack behind the lines and you would enrich WvW tenfold.

Add 3: Currently the is only one way to play WvW effictively:
Run from A to B, nuke all scouts on the way, establish siege weapons according to your plan, wait for the structures to collapse, then take everything inside. While this meta is good for the way WvW is designed and how the leaderboards are setup, it disregards a whole section of WvW, namely PvP.

The only way to proceed in this gamemode is to take and retake fortifications, there is no inbetween and no way to add some sort of player-driven war. To solve this issue, I suggest giving more tools in the players hands. Retain static keeps, tower and supply camps in the world and enrich WvW with dynamic player created content. I am not talking about players building keeps or tower on their own, but about players shaping the battlefield.

For that, I would like to see the following:
-Add more mobile siege weapons, against both man and fortifications. Give us tanks, artillery, jeeps, hovering vehicles (within reason) to make battles last some time and fights to evolve anywhere on the map.
-Add more defensive structures which can be constructed by the players. Give us sandbags or other forms of path blockers to make defending small areas easier, give us anti-tank, anti-vehicle weapons and anti-artillery shields.
-Make all of them destructable and scatter the remains on the field, let us use those remains for cover and sight blockers.

Let us shape the meta on our own and see what we can come up with.

Add 4: Commanders
Give commanders more meaning than being zerg magnets.
-Let them set waypoints for their squad.
-Let all squad members see every other squad member on the map.
-Add a commander interface for different things like waypoints, notes on the map, different groups/strike forces.
-Most of all, let people from a server vote on their commanders. Not everyone is fit for command and a commander should be respected and not something you grind for.

PvP (sPvP and tPvP):
First and foremost, do not segregate pve from pvp further. Instead combine the best of both worlds. How do you do that?

-Let players keep their pve weapon skins. Retain the power level of gear.
-Let players keep their pvp weapons skins. Offer them ways to have similar stats as pvers with the same/similar play time and progress.
-Add leagues to the matchmaking system. See Starcraft 2 for a good implementation.
-Add a ladder system to achieve two things: Make individual and team progression transparent and add goals for pvp enthusiasts.
-Add observer mode to increase pvp awareness and let players learn from other players.
-Add more game modes to pvp. (GvG)
-Change the layout of current maps to make 5vs5 and 8vs8 enjoyable. Afaik only the newest map supports both team sizes.

I know there are more things, but for know these should suffice. Feel free to add to this discussion and keep it going.

Pretty much nailed it , Also there is no end game crafting only grinding for the forge , which is a shame as the crafting system isent bad until endgame ….

p.s sure they will implement a lot of this

One thing i would love to see is allowing builds to swap dodge for a sustained block under certain conditions.

Then you could do things like the roman shield formations where the front row would act as a mobile wall while the back row lobbed javelins at the opposing force.

The closest we have right now is a rotation of people popping their short duration/long cooldown shield skills, or trying to time them to counter a specific attack.

digiowl.9620:

One thing i would love to see is allowing builds to swap dodge for a sustained block under certain conditions.

Then you could do things like the roman shield formations where the front row would act as a mobile wall while the back row lobbed javelins at the opposing force.

The closest we have right now is a rotation of people popping their short duration/long cooldown shield skills, or trying to time them to counter a specific attack.

This is probably the most innovative idea I’ve heard in a while. I like this idea a lot. As a Guardian I only have my Aegis and maybe one other ability that truly lets me block. I’d actually like to be able to raise my shield up and block instead of rolling.

Downscaling is pointless when the rewards are inferior to the end-game events. This alone is why downscaling has had zero effect on whether or not people revisit old content.

What’s the point in going back to them when you could do any event in Orr and get way better rewards? I don’t see any reason for downscaling it at its current design.

Builds. Where are they?

Skills. Where are they?

GvG. Where is it?

Halls. Where are they?

Trading. Seriously not even going to bother with this.. such a stupid idea to completely remove the trade system. I cannot even fathom the thought, it just baffles me.

Strategy. There is none.

Hey remember that one time when ANet said we could play our way? Yeah, me too. I enjoy being a healer in GW2, said no one ever. I enjoy being forced to range in GW2, said no one ever. I enjoy being instagibbed by buggy dodging mechanics in melee range, said no one ever.

Stat’s on gear. Bad idea. This is not how GW ever worked, other than runes and armor level. Our customization always came from attribute allocation which affected our builds based on what skills we were using. Why are they going from unique and interesting to boring and grindy, needing multiple sets of gear with different stat’s?

Pvp balance. What’s up with all the knee-jerk nerfs that ANet supposedly doesn’t like doing?

Bugs. I’ve ran into the same damn dodge bug for months now, while in melee usually during an autoattack if you press dodge it will hold you in place and not even work right. Also the immobilize bug where your character randomly gets stuck in place and you can’t do anything, that’s a great one too.

Loot nerf/farm nerfs. Lol I don’t even- obviously this is a ploy to get us into the gem store, no more needs to be said.

Lack of Depth doesn’t even begin to touch the surface with what is wrong in this game. It’s the lack of intelligence coming from the dev team imo.

@Rukia

They said there’d be no dedicated healer right from the beginning. Not quite sure why that would be an issue.

The rest I agree on though.

OP:

You say you might sound nolstagic, but most of the stuff you complain about was in GW, and most of your suggestions go against GW design:

• In GW, a lot of the game in PvE was farming, whether it be mats, platinum or rep.

• You say about keeping PvE skins in PvP, but it’s exactly the same as in GW1 where PvP skins were earned in PvP.

• Same with stats. Should be baseline in SPvP to stop it becoming time over skill.

Not saying I disagree with your suggestions. Just confused by your implying that these weren’t in GW1.

Also, some of your wording is confusing i.e when talking about progression, vertical progression doesn’t make other progression forfeit.

TL;DR – While I agree PvE could have more, I’m confused where the ‘nostalgia’ is

Most of what made GW1 great is missing from GW2.

GW2’s storylines are boring, trite and a waste of time (click next as fast as possible). I only do them to get the text off the upper right corner of my screen. GW1 had great stories that were fun to play through and follow.

GW2’s weapons skill system is lame. It is simplistic, without any room for experimentation. GW1’s skills were fun to experiment with and gave you another reason to do content looking for the best skills.

GW2’s WvW has potential but it is sadly lacking in replayabitlity. It gets boring fast.

GW2 does have some cool new features but for the most part it has very little replay value because it just isn’t as fun as GW1 was. And the gear grind they introduced with FOTM is a huge mistake. Grinding dungeons is the lamest gameplay mechanic ever invented.

@ RUKIA spot on ! Gets boring fast with only 5 weapon skills and no choices , ranger is worst traits by miles , theyre just a mess

+1 for Rukia, you summarized exactly what I think about this game.

My Guardian is fully support build in Givers gear (Toughness/Healing Power) and I actually thoroughly enjoy being a healer and mainly using my healing abilities/shouts to help my group… :/

So…. " I enjoy being a healer in GW2, said no one ever." should be changed to: “I enjoy being a healer in GW2, said Raebfle” XD

Makes me wonder if givers are ANets attempt at shutting us up. the variant is unlikely to show up in sPVP after all…

Well right now there is no farming because farmers are being wrongly affected by both the intended and unintended affects of DR. Both the bug and the intended programming is preventing farming anywhere else other then dungeons so they definitely need to address that first and foremost. I agree there should be some content or revamping older content (ha, two months and it because old with a single patch, smh) by making these dungeons scale down much like the zones scale the players down. It would make for a better overall experience.

I have been finding that the right out war on Roles that Arenanet is doing has made combat just more and more bland as time goes on.
Boss fights are designed to just want you to burn down bosses as fast as you can and support aspects of classes keep getting nerfed.

Giver armor is ok but does not really fix the core problems that support and healing is just less useful than going pure DPS most the time.
If you are playing with even half skilled people who can dodge/block than going 5 pure DPS specs is the best way to run any group content. This has lead to a vary one sided shallow game.
It almost feels as if their goal was to make something like a 3d version of the old D&D arcade game more then it was to make a MMORPG.

TheDaiBish.9735:

OP:

You say you might sound nolstagic, but most of the stuff you complain about was in GW, and most of your suggestions go against GW design:

• In GW, a lot of the game in PvE was farming, whether it be mats, platinum or rep.

• You say about keeping PvE skins in PvP, but it’s exactly the same as in GW1 where PvP skins were earned in PvP.

• Same with stats. Should be baseline in SPvP to stop it becoming time over skill.

Not saying I disagree with your suggestions. Just confused by your implying that these weren’t in GW1.

Also, some of your wording is confusing i.e when talking about progression, vertical progression doesn’t make other progression forfeit.

TL;DR – While I agree PvE could have more, I’m confused where the ‘nostalgia’ is

Most of them were in GW1 and are nowhere to be found in GW2. I am sorry if I confused you with my wording, but I am proposing these points for further discussion because some were implemented in GW1.

For clarification I am gogin to answer to the three points you raised:

• In GW, a lot of the game in PvE was farming, whether it be mats, platinum or rep.

• You say about keeping PvE skins in PvP, but it’s exactly the same as in GW1 where PvP skins were earned in PvP.

• Same with stats. Should be baseline in SPvP to stop it becoming time over skill.

1. Yeah, GW was a grindy game, but it didn’t take long to get competivite gear. It wasn’t great looking, but solid. You never had to farm, in fact, I never farmed and did well (got 50/50 HoM points).

2. It’s true, you can get pve skins in pvp, but only with tournament points, which takes much more time for the average player to get. The average player could get the same skins in pve much easier and with little effort. Only a handful if any skins were pvp exclusive.

The thing is, in GW1 you could join PVP (any) with your pve gear or choose to go with a pvp template. Therefore it’s the best of both worlds.

3. I am not argueing about keeping a power plateau. I am argueing about bringing pve skins from playing pve to spvp.

“Also, some of your wording is confusing i.e when talking about progression, vertical progression doesn’t make other progression forfeit. "

Yes it does, whether it is based on levels or gear doesn’t make it any different. The new gear makes the old gear obsolete, thus making other forms of gear-related progression useless. Hence I am trying to discuss other forms of progression (gear hunt via challenging quest lines).

Go play another game if you don’t like this on, me and many other’s (game one plenty of awards this year so its doing something right… or at lest better than the other game’s this year))

I dont understand why you people hang around the forums the game’s to big for you to really harm it at this point

UnderdogSMO.9428:

Go play another game if you don’t like this on, me and many other’s (game one plenty of awards this year so its doing something right… or at lest better than the other game’s this year))

Consider it a place between outright hate and drooling unconditional love.

we like the basic ideas, and some of the implementations, but feel the overall end result comes short of the claimed goals.

So we hang around trying to point out potential flaws and improvements to ANet.

Whilst some of these suggestions might be helpful, personally those things don’t bother me at all.

The real place GW2 needs more depth, is in its action-combat mechanics. ANet can look at other games like Dark Souls, Dragons Nest, Devil May Cry, God of War, etc for tips. But generally we need shorter cooldowns, defensive abilities like evade and block need to be much more available, but attacks should also be stronger.

Good combat improves the entire game (well, except for crafting, I guess.) If the basic combat mechanics are skillful and deep, then nothing else matters – two signet warriors hitting each other with white-rarity axes would still be interesting and competitive.

If ANet wants to truly stand out from the crowd, combat mechanics are the way to go. There are very few MMOs (except Dragons Nest, possibly Vindictus although I havent played it) with good action combat.

Rukia.4802:

Downscaling is pointless when the rewards are inferior to the end-game events. This alone is why downscaling has had zero effect on whether or not people revisit old content.

What’s the point in going back to them when you could do any event in Orr and get way better rewards? I don’t see any reason for downscaling it at its current design.

Builds. Where are they?

Skills. Where are they?

GvG. Where is it?

Halls. Where are they?

Trading. Seriously not even going to bother with this.. such a stupid idea to completely remove the trade system. I cannot even fathom the thought, it just baffles me.

Strategy. There is none.

Hey remember that one time when ANet said we could play our way? Yeah, me too. I enjoy being a healer in GW2, said no one ever. I enjoy being forced to range in GW2, said no one ever. I enjoy being instagibbed by buggy dodging mechanics in melee range, said no one ever.

Stat’s on gear. Bad idea. This is not how GW ever worked, other than runes and armor level. Our customization always came from attribute allocation which affected our builds based on what skills we were using. Why are they going from unique and interesting to boring and grindy, needing multiple sets of gear with different stat’s?

Pvp balance. What’s up with all the knee-jerk nerfs that ANet supposedly doesn’t like doing?

Bugs. I’ve ran into the same kitten dodge bug for months now, while in melee usually during an autoattack if you press dodge it will hold you in place and not even work right. Also the immobilize bug where your character randomly gets stuck in place and you can’t do anything, that’s a great one too.

Loot nerf/farm nerfs. Lol I don’t even- obviously this is a ploy to get us into the gem store, no more needs to be said.

Lack of Depth doesn’t even begin to touch the surface with what is wrong in this game. It’s the lack of intelligence coming from the dev team imo.

this post may not be all that constructive, but so true

Let me add and/ or rephrase what some people have said:

- Want to enjoy the story, the characters and the world of GW2?

• The story is poor at developing characters and at developing the world, and is further crippled by a barebones narrative structure from the game.
• GW1 offered you story quests inbetween missions to keep the narrative flow, GW2 not only lacks that, but you are gated by level and must pay to teleport every time the story demands you to backtrack. GW1 allowed you to interact with the characters of the story through the henchmen/ hero systems, GW2 does not. GW1’s story opened new areas of the map, which gave a sense of progression that did not rely on grinding, GW2’s story is tacked on the maps while the developers focus their efforts of progression on ascended gear. GW1’s story structure/ story progression is FAR.MORE.SOPHISTICATED and ahead of its time than GW2’s vague, generic MMO-ish, bare-bones story progression.

- Want to explore the world of Tyria?

• The best thing that general PvE is good at. But, after some time, the very uninspired heart tasks and the very uninspired monster AI start becoming repetitive and grindy, and you find out that exploring new areas in Tyria feels exactly the same as exploring the previous areas.

- Want to have the option between doing everything solo or playing in a party?

• You don’t. In general PvE (and thus I’m not talking about dungeons) you are almost always forced to go solo.
• The devs have focused so much on giving us the “freedom” to be able to do things alone, that they have completely forgotten about adding gameplay mechancis to incentivate party playing.
• GW2’s general PvE is anti-party: the story structure is solo and very player-dependent, map exploration is a list of non-linear repetitive simple tasks, pve combat is shallow, events are easily completed with mindless zergs and party searching is a barebones mechanic.

- Want to pick the builds you enjoy the most?

• You can´t.
• Seriously, what are you going to pick? Condition builds? Why, if you can kill monsters faster by going glass cannon? Party-support builds? Why, if there’s no party for you to support, and you don’t even get credit in events by spamming your support abilities on the mindless zerg? CC-driven builds to indirectly support your party? Why snare your foe or interrupt whatever to help anyone, if there isn’t anyone to help? You’ll use CC for your own survival, and that’s it. Magic Find builds to grind, grind, grind? Oh yeah, GW2 is actually good here, and anyone knows I’m NOT beign sarcastic.
• Finally, build making is clumsy because devs decided to throw a money sink in there. GW1’s build making felt simpler but more sophisticated, and it also had the party support to give a lot of build diversity. GW2’s build making, outside of already being crippled by how you are forced to go solo most of the time, requires you to get specific pieces of equipment for EACH build, AND you still need to pay to respec your traits. There’s not even a proper system for cheap maxed armor versus costly cosmetic armor: You MUST get an entire exotic set, and in the future an entire ascended gear set, for EACH build.

UnderdogSMO.9428:

Go play another game if you don’t like this on, me and many other’s (game one plenty of awards this year so its doing something right… or at lest better than the other game’s this year))

I dont understand why you people hang around the forums the game’s to big for you to really harm it at this point

Since this is directed at me, though already answered, I am going to reply anyway.

I truly love the game for a lot of components, the world, the lore, the combat system (though shallow), the pvp and wvw and for what it tries to be. I’ve spend hundreds of hours already and I want to continue having fun. That’s why I am still posting, suggesting things that might improve the game and things that would definately improve the game overall.

If you think this way of telling the devs where their game is in disarray or needs help is wrong, then maybe try to look at this way from a different perspective. You are in love with a pretty woman/handsome guy, who is nice, has a lot of respect for you, you can talk to her/him about anything really etc. but there is one thing that’s not cool: Her/his breath smells really bad. Are you going to tell her/him?

I would and I also do.

Pawlegance.7012:

Since this is directed at me, though already answered, I am going to reply anyway.

I truly love the game for a lot of components, the world, the lore, the combat system (though shallow), the pvp and wvw and for what it tries to be. I’ve spend hundreds of hours already and I want to continue having fun. That’s why I am still posting, suggesting things that might improve the game and things that would definately improve the game overall.

If you think this way of telling the devs where their game is in disarray or needs help is wrong, then maybe try to look at this way from a different perspective. You are in love with a pretty woman/handsome guy, who is nice, has a lot of respect for you, you can talk to her/him about anything really etc. but there is one thing that’s not cool: Her/his breath smells really bad. Are you going to tell her/him?

I would and I also do.

The problem is that some of the “issues” people are complaining about are not akin to bad breath. They’re more akin to “likes trashy television”. Some people don’t find anything wrong with that and actually some people like that.

People are complaining all over these forums about the “shallowness” of the combat and the “lack of roles”. Not only do I completely disagree with the basis of those complaints, I vehemently fear the developers listening to those people because the current complexity (which is quite deep, just vastly different from what everyone is used to) and forced generalization are ideal in my opinion.

Bad breath would be more like having a really buggy game, nobody likes that. But the things you’re complaining about are a matter of taste. For all of the good you like in this game, changing the combat to make it more interdependent, allowing for greater specialization or hard coded roles would just flip the coin for me and put me in your shoes. I’d love so much of the game, but there would be that light of glaring hatred for certain aspects and my hatred would be more than yours because I would have had what I liked taken away.

Rukia.4802:

Lack of Depth doesn’t even begin to touch the surface with what is wrong in this game. It’s the lack of intelligence coming from the dev team imo.

I would agree.

To me there’s such a radical shift in how this game was described and developed and how it’s being executed post launch, that it’s like night and day or like 2 different design/development teams.

It’s like the WoW live team took over and is saying, now, how can we flush THIS game down the toilet too…

digiowl.9620:

UnderdogSMO.9428:

Go play another game if you don’t like this on, me and many other’s (game one plenty of awards this year so its doing something right… or at lest better than the other game’s this year))

Consider it a place between outright hate and drooling unconditional love.

we like the basic ideas, and some of the implementations, but feel the overall end result comes short of the claimed goals.

So we hang around trying to point out potential flaws and improvements to ANet.

What you see as a potential flaw may not be for some one else. A lot of you are spouting your opinion as fact and its getting a bit ridiculous.

Scourge.4317:

digiowl.9620:

UnderdogSMO.9428:

Go play another game if you don’t like this on, me and many other’s (game one plenty of awards this year so its doing something right… or at lest better than the other game’s this year))

Consider it a place between outright hate and drooling unconditional love.

we like the basic ideas, and some of the implementations, but feel the overall end result comes short of the claimed goals.

So we hang around trying to point out potential flaws and improvements to ANet.

What you see as a potential flaw may not be for some one else. A lot of you are spouting your opinion as fact and its getting a bit ridiculous.

That blade swings both ways.

digiowl.9620:

That blade swings both ways.

The difference is that you’re trying to change something already implemented. The status quo should always take precedence over outcries for change when the two have equally valid points and their total satisfaction is mutually exclusive.

We like the combat dynamic as it is. You don’t. Therefore if all other things are equal, you should find another game instead of changing ours.

Omega.1473:

The problem is that some of the “issues” people are complaining about are not akin to bad breath. They’re more akin to “likes trashy television”. Some people don’t find anything wrong with that and actually some people like that.

People are complaining all over these forums about the “shallowness” of the combat and the “lack of roles”. Not only do I completely disagree with the basis of those complaints, I vehemently fear the developers listening to those people because the current complexity (which is quite deep, just vastly different from what everyone is used to) and forced generalization are ideal in my opinion.

Bad breath would be more like having a really buggy game, nobody likes that. But the things you’re complaining about are a matter of taste. For all of the good you like in this game, changing the combat to make it more interdependent, allowing for greater specialization or hard coded roles would just flip the coin for me and put me in your shoes. I’d love so much of the game, but there would be that light of glaring hatred for certain aspects and my hatred would be more than yours because I would have had what I liked taken away.

The whole point of the role-discussion is that you are actually not rewarded by the game for choosing a different role. There actually is only one role that is rewarded design-wise. That is dealing damage. You don’t get any rewards for cc’ing or supporting your group. Most bosses and all major ones are immune to knock-back and know-down among other effects.

GW2 is supposed to be played chaoticly, but tactically. There are a lot of things that don’t allow people to fill actual roles in combat whether pve or pvp. You have to be highly mobile, have good timing on your dodges and a high dps to destroy everything. Mobs are badly designed and most of the monsters cannot attack you while you move. This is a design flaw among others. There are so many things that don’t work together and put the game’s combat in a shallow light.

I am moving away from the original topic at hand. In this thread I want to concentrate on the game’s design and what is actually missing for a number of players and why. I mentioned all the above for specific reasons that would cater to my playstyle. I don’t want the enjoyment in a game to become routine, like running a dungeon 10 times to get x tokens or to collect 500 gold to craft a legendary item. I want a repetive game that makes each minute unique for various reasons. I already listed what is missing, imo, in this game (e.g. challenges and rewards that challenge in pve, not mindless grind that gw2 actually is known for.)

I don’t want to change the game for everyone. I want to improve upon what is already there and add things for players that don’t want to do the same thing everytime they log on.

Edit: Clarified and removed some typos.