Guild Wars 2

Malkavian.4516:

phys.7689:

Malkavian.4516:

One thing I do not understand about some people who demand this game have endgame is exactly what type of endgame do they want to have and why do they want it to begin with? People may go deaf when I say this but I always make my own endgame in practically any game I play. If I don’t like to do dungeons, I go PvP. If not, then WvW, if not, Legendary crafting.

endgame is something that requires you to use all of what you have/earned built in order to succeed. It generally seeks to let you push or test your limits.

For example, in basketball, you spend a lot of time learning basics, how to shoot, how to dribble, how to pass. Special combinations of this, increasing your accuracy and your speed, and then endgame is playing people of equal or greater difficulty.

programming, you learn a language, learn the rules, figure how to build something complex from a simple set of instructions, and then endgame is putting it all together, devising and figuring out how to build something greater from a simple instruction to the complex.

Art: you study anatomy, perspective, composition, color. Endgame is putting it all together into a peice of art.

Note, not everyone achieves the same levels, not everyone beats the game, but striving to achieve, putting everything you ve built to use. It enhances the experience, knowing there is something to aim for, some use for the skills you build up, some benefit for doing it smartly, or fast. Seeing it come together for a result. Many hobby rock climbers may never attempt to climb everest, but they are glad it exists.

What in this game even tries to come close to this? You may have played for 80 levels, and mastered 65 traits, and 40 skills, what in this game makes you use that to succeed? Even when you take it out of straight up skill, what part of the story is the sum total of everything you have done? Explorer? what in this game has used your knowledge and understanding of the map, in interesting ways to succeed at anything?

PVE wise, what in this game is made to make good use of your skills/abilities/knowlegde?

a good game scales well with its players throughout they various levels, allowing them to find their on comfortable zone for endgame.

Well in my case there is the Fractals and WvW for my endgame really.

yup, those, and a good spvp match is probably it i would say. So for pve you have 1 dungeon. a dungeon thats has the content of about 2 dungeons. Thats not a lot considering it has been out for almost 2 years.

I enjoy fractals, but that cant be it, not to mention there is still some design flaws, like they have too many gradations, you have to beat it like 30 times before you get up to the semi challenging missions.
2) they built content too far behind level gates, now if they add new instabilities or new mechanics, they will only be available to people who have cleared it 50 times.
3) the rewards, in general, not on par with much easier endeavors.

I want expansion!!!!! For realz how many times can i repeat the same things over and over? I have world completion, i have r80 pvp and i played wvw daily for a whole year. Ive done fractals over 100 times, repeated dungeons million of times. We need expansion with new content and with new content i seriously mean new permanent stuff added to the game. Like in gw1, in every expansion they added new types of content. When factions came out we got new type of pvp, new maps, new professions….Now we get…storylines which isnt rly smth that can keep a player to stay. You basically do the story one time and then youre done. Anet please add some more valuable content pls cause i really love the game but i have zero reason to login at this time. <3

My definition of end game is simple: “stuff to do when you reach level cap with your character”.
Is there stuff to do in GW2? Sure, lots of it. But is it satisfying? So-so.

The thing that players truly want is a challenge, simple as that. They want something that cannot be cleared by an average player in 3 hours.

My suggestion would be to simply implement “Challenge Mode” for dungeons, the same challenge mode we’ve seen in the last instance of the latest LS. Same instance, but a bit more difficult, with bosses having new mechanics.
Give us something like “Timed Runs” during those challenge modes. Reward organized groups for clearing the dungeon swiftly. It could work like the Personal Difficulty mechanic in fractals, only it would be named Personal Time Record, and each time you beat your record, you get rewarded.
Reward people who clear the challenge modes with unique skins. One clear gives you a unique 1 armor or weapon part. Collect 10 parts, and you can trade it for a skin of your choice. This could be equivalent of the unique PvP armor for PvErs.
Create new achievements based on the Challenge Modes, and and a meta achievement for clearing all dungeons paths that grants a title “Ascended Dungeon Master”.

For those who prefer the Open World, basically Dry Top is a step in the right direction. Implement a new zone, and give us a reason to be there, to complete the events, and reward us for our activity in that region.

Make the less popular maps more popular by implementing something like a “Bounty” system. Place new, big and hard to kill champs/bosses on different zones (besides Orr of Frostgorge) as a part of a “Daily Bounty Hunt”. Reward players for doing those bounty hunts not only with champ bags, but let’s say a chance to get a new mini, or a booster, or a rare exotic weapon.

New, challenging world boss daily repeatable achievements that give 1AP, and 3 additional champ bags. For example:
-Don’t get knocked back by the Golem Mark II (increase the radius of the knockback to not encourage people to simply range him)
-Partake in destroying at least 6 portals during the Shadow Behemoth fight (would encourage people to actually move their butts, not just stand in the middle)
-Partake in every activity during the Claw of Jormag fight (Kill at least one champ Ice Elemental that spanws near the turrets, help taking down the wall with charzookas, DPS the Claw when the wall is down)
-Etc.

Those are very rough ideas, but you get the picture. Just give us more stuff to do that actually require effort, not just attendance, and reward us for those things.

@Tomas

Don’t expect that to happen. At least on dungeons. They don’t want to split the dungeon community further by creating alternate versions of dungeons available.

I wouldn’t expect the others either, even though I find some of them great ideas.

Story Mode in all Dungeons should be solo-able by Level 80 chars. That’s some endgame content I like to see.

Scipio.3204:

@Vayne,

I do see one big flaw in your argument: “Most people are casuals, they don’t even try out hard stuff”. Let me explain through an example: Lets say anet releases the most hardest thing ever, and they look at the numbers how many people tried out 1 month after release. Let’s say about 15% and they even make this number public to demonstrate why they don’t make hard content, but something is missing.

For this information to even worth something we need to know another thing: The percentage of active players during that time. This is an information that’s never going to be available for us to see. But lets say during that month 30% of the playerbase was active. That would mean about 50% of the active playerbase tried it out.
That would mean the casuals who don’t even try out the hard things are in the other 50% together with PvP/WvW exclusive folks, new players & etc. which would mean they are a minority. But we don’t see that.

Also some other informations would also be useful like, how many people completed it , the percentage of active players before the release (if it’s like 25% that would mean the release drawed back 5% of the players) The next month’s data etc.
My point is, you can’t draw a conclusion like that from a tiny bit of information.

I’m pretty sure that Anet would look at the percent of active players doing it. They’re professional developers, in spite of the fact that some people think they do stuff for no reason. I’m sure Anet has a reason for every change they make even if it might not look like they do.

When they run metrics, they look at the percentage of people playing doing a dungeon, not the percentage of people who have ever played, because that wouldn’t show them any thing.

But I’ve been thinking about it, and I think that it’s not wrong to say people want challenging content. The problem is, challenging means very different things to different people.

Challenging to younger guys who grew up playing this games and play a lot is different than challenge to me.

With the age of the average gamer on the rise, and many people only being able to devote a few hours a week to the game, it’s hard to believe most people want the kinds of ultra hard content other people want to keep them challenged.

I bet if they put in stuff that challenged the hard core guys, a lot of people wouldn’t be able to do it. It wouldn’t be challenging for them anymore, it would become frustrating.

That’s where the problem really starts. The more frustrating stuff, the more people feel they can’t handle the game, the more likely they are to walk.

Vayne.8563:

Shing Jea Monastery had over a hundred districts when I used to play Guild Wars 1. ToA had about 5 max, and most of the time less.

“I’ve never ever seen ToA hav anywhere near the amount of districts you see in Shing Jea.

The only times in the 5+ years I played GW I saw 100 districts in Shing Jea were festivals. The boardwalk was open and hordes of players were AFK with inventories full of tickets on one of the games trying for the Luck title; or when the festival provided a hat to players present during an event. At off times, SJM had a few districts, primarily filled with people who preferred to socialize rather than play the game.

Shing Jea was a social hub. The thing about a social hub is that it will tend to spawn copies because the socializers aren’t leaving. People forming parties in ToA spent as little time there as was needed to get their group together, then left.

Not to say I disagree with the idea that there are more softcore than hardcore players. However, your post gives the impression that 100 districts in Shing Jea was a regular thing. It was not. I know you said, “When I played GW.” However, unless you only played GW during the first week of Factions (maybe) or at Festivals, 100 Shing Jeas was not the norm.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Vayne.8563:

Shing Jea Monastery had over a hundred districts when I used to play Guild Wars 1. ToA had about 5 max, and most of the time less.

“I’ve never ever seen ToA hav anywhere near the amount of districts you see in Shing Jea.

The only times in the 5+ years I played GW I saw 100 districts in Shing Jea were festivals. The boardwalk was open and hordes of players were AFK with inventories full of tickets on one of the games trying for the Luck title; or when the festival provided a hat to players present during an event. At off times, SJM had a few districts, primarily filled with people who preferred to socialize rather than play the game.

Shing Jea was a social hub. The thing about a social hub is that it will tend to spawn copies because the socializers aren’t leaving. People forming parties in ToA spent as little time there as was needed to get their group together, then left.

Not to say I disagree with the idea that there are more softcore than hardcore players. However, your post gives the impression that 100 districts in Shing Jea was a regular thing. It was not. I know you said, “When I played GW.” However, unless you only played GW during the first week of Factions (maybe) or at Festivals, 100 Shing Jeas was not the norm.

That’s what he was talking about in his post. Festivals.

He was saying more people like hard core than casual stuff, because there were as many people in ToA as there were in festival cities.

Vayne.8563:

IndigoSundown.5419:

Vayne.8563:

Shing Jea Monastery had over a hundred districts when I used to play Guild Wars 1. ToA had about 5 max, and most of the time less.

“I’ve never ever seen ToA hav anywhere near the amount of districts you see in Shing Jea.

The only times in the 5+ years I played GW I saw 100 districts in Shing Jea were festivals. The boardwalk was open and hordes of players were AFK with inventories full of tickets on one of the games trying for the Luck title; or when the festival provided a hat to players present during an event. At off times, SJM had a few districts, primarily filled with people who preferred to socialize rather than play the game.

Shing Jea was a social hub. The thing about a social hub is that it will tend to spawn copies because the socializers aren’t leaving. People forming parties in ToA spent as little time there as was needed to get their group together, then left.

Not to say I disagree with the idea that there are more softcore than hardcore players. However, your post gives the impression that 100 districts in Shing Jea was a regular thing. It was not. I know you said, “When I played GW.” However, unless you only played GW during the first week of Factions (maybe) or at Festivals, 100 Shing Jeas was not the norm.

That’s what he was talking about in his post. Festivals.

He was saying more people like hard core than casual stuff, because there were as many people in ToA as there were in festival cities.

My bad, sorry. Festivals, especially the SJ boardwalk, attracted all sorts of players, hardcore and softcore alike. They were more representative of most of the game’s population than any niche.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Vayne.8563:

IndigoSundown.5419:

Vayne.8563:

Shing Jea Monastery had over a hundred districts when I used to play Guild Wars 1. ToA had about 5 max, and most of the time less.

“I’ve never ever seen ToA hav anywhere near the amount of districts you see in Shing Jea.

The only times in the 5+ years I played GW I saw 100 districts in Shing Jea were festivals. The boardwalk was open and hordes of players were AFK with inventories full of tickets on one of the games trying for the Luck title; or when the festival provided a hat to players present during an event. At off times, SJM had a few districts, primarily filled with people who preferred to socialize rather than play the game.

Shing Jea was a social hub. The thing about a social hub is that it will tend to spawn copies because the socializers aren’t leaving. People forming parties in ToA spent as little time there as was needed to get their group together, then left.

Not to say I disagree with the idea that there are more softcore than hardcore players. However, your post gives the impression that 100 districts in Shing Jea was a regular thing. It was not. I know you said, “When I played GW.” However, unless you only played GW during the first week of Factions (maybe) or at Festivals, 100 Shing Jeas was not the norm.

That’s what he was talking about in his post. Festivals.

He was saying more people like hard core than casual stuff, because there were as many people in ToA as there were in festival cities.

My bad, sorry. Festivals, especially the SJ boardwalk, attracted all sorts of players, hardcore and softcore alike. They were more representative of most of the game’s population than any niche.

I agree with that. But I think that in general, people tend to over-estimate the amount of people who do the hardest content.

That’s just my opinion, but there are actual reasons that I hold it.

And again, what’s challenging to one person might very well be easy to another.

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

@Vayne,

I do see one big flaw in your argument: “Most people are casuals, they don’t even try out hard stuff”. Let me explain through an example: Lets say anet releases the most hardest thing ever, and they look at the numbers how many people tried out 1 month after release. Let’s say about 15% and they even make this number public to demonstrate why they don’t make hard content, but something is missing.

For this information to even worth something we need to know another thing: The percentage of active players during that time. This is an information that’s never going to be available for us to see. But lets say during that month 30% of the playerbase was active. That would mean about 50% of the active playerbase tried it out.
That would mean the casuals who don’t even try out the hard things are in the other 50% together with PvP/WvW exclusive folks, new players & etc. which would mean they are a minority. But we don’t see that.

Also some other informations would also be useful like, how many people completed it , the percentage of active players before the release (if it’s like 25% that would mean the release drawed back 5% of the players) The next month’s data etc.
My point is, you can’t draw a conclusion like that from a tiny bit of information.

I’m pretty sure that Anet would look at the percent of active players doing it. They’re professional developers, in spite of the fact that some people think they do stuff for no reason. I’m sure Anet has a reason for every change they make even if it might not look like they do.

When they run metrics, they look at the percentage of people playing doing a dungeon, not the percentage of people who have ever played, because that wouldn’t show them any thing.

But I’ve been thinking about it, and I think that it’s not wrong to say people want challenging content. The problem is, challenging means very different things to different people.

Challenging to younger guys who grew up playing this games and play a lot is different than challenge to me.

With the age of the average gamer on the rise, and many people only being able to devote a few hours a week to the game, it’s hard to believe most people want the kinds of ultra hard content other people want to keep them challenged.

I bet if they put in stuff that challenged the hard core guys, a lot of people wouldn’t be able to do it. It wouldn’t be challenging for them anymore, it would become frustrating.

That’s where the problem really starts. The more frustrating stuff, the more people feel they can’t handle the game, the more likely they are to walk.

I’m sure anet knows what would be best for GW2, but anet also knows what is best for anet. The launch of living story wasn’t based on metrics. The fact is, like you said yourselfs, it’s easier to cater to casuals than to anyone else, and for that the concept of living story is perfect. The last two year was casual priority, and I don’t expect much in the future either, this would explain the company policy too.

And on challenge: it’s optional. Have you ever completed something that was hard and frustrated you for a long time? It’s well worth it.

fireflyry.7023:

It’s Guild Wars.

Are people that seriously kittened enough to complain about lack of “end-game” in this franchise. GW is not an “end-game” MMORPG. There are like a gazzillion other MMORPG’s that do that. Go play one.

Let’s put things in perspective. GW1 end game was about PvP, period. No one did missions repeatedly as end game content. It was all about PvP and get this…..GvG! That’s right they actually had Guild Wars in that Guild Wars game! Amazing?

So now Anet decides they aren’t gonna do that “Guild Wars in this version of their Guild Wars game” so they go out to create an MMO. However, they fail to bring in MMO end-game content AND their PvP blows kitten . On top of that there is NO Guild Wars in this Guild Wars game….erm…MMO.

Yeah.

^ actually the endgame of GW1 was:
UW, FoW, DoA, Urgoz, The Deep, Sorrow Furnace, ToPK, Dungeons(18), Hard Mode missions, Hard Mode maps completion, Challenges Missions, Zaishen bounties, Farming money/rares/titles, chests runs, Jade Quarry, Aspenwood, AvA, HoH, RA, Codex, GvG.

Anet has implemented some quasi endgame raid style content in the form of teq and wurm. If they were behind a portal, you pretty much have an onyxia. Maybe that is the better style for a gw2 raid, rather than the full blown dungeon experience (though that would be cool).

Even dungeon additions could serve as endgame content. I know Anet has zero plans for new dungeons at the moment. But next time you’re in a 5 man, and everyone leaves at the end, take a walk around. There are so many possibilities for different paths, and places to put different bosses.

It just really sucks that we haven’t gotten a lot of challenging small group content. I know molten and aether blade came in. While I appreciate their return as fractured fractals, it would have been nice to just have them as one path dungeons. It’s not like every dungeon needs an awesome story and cutscenes (I love you aetherpath, but you’re a pain the butt sometimes.) It just needs some cool bosses, very limited puzzling (save it for guilds), a moderate amount of trash that is worth engaging, and a fair gold reward, plus standard poo.

The combat system is great. Shadow dragon was fun. I didn’t think it was easy on challenge mode. He would make a lovely encounter scaled accordingly, and perhaps with additional mechanics.

Simzani.4318:

And the worst is that the LS team is really proud to take another 4 month break that will bring us a new mini-map. They rotate on a 1 month work / 3 month break. What is arenanet doing with their 350 workers ? Why we only see a small team work after 2 years ? Where is something that derail in this big company ? Where is the mark at how the work of these 350 workers is never seen ? What is happening in this studio ?

This is what I’m wondering also. It is objectively true that most MMOs release far more content in a given period of time than GW2 has with less incoming revenue and smaller staffs. What gives?

Tomas.5029:

The thing that players truly want is a challenge, simple as that. They want something that cannot be cleared by an average player in 3 hours.

Yea, like 0,5% of the players want that, so technically youre right, practically – no.

Einlanzer.1627:

Simzani.4318:

And the worst is that the LS team is really proud to take another 4 month break that will bring us a new mini-map. They rotate on a 1 month work / 3 month break. What is arenanet doing with their 350 workers ? Why we only see a small team work after 2 years ? Where is something that derail in this big company ? Where is the mark at how the work of these 350 workers is never seen ? What is happening in this studio ?

This is what I’m wondering also. It is objectively true that most MMOs release far more content in a given period of time than GW2 has with less incoming revenue and smaller staffs. What gives?

They are working on another game or an expansion and only have a minimal staff working on the current GW2. It’s the only thing that seems to make sense.

Haishao.6851:

^ actually the endgame of GW1 was:
UW, FoW, DoA, Urgoz, The Deep, Sorrow Furnace, ToPK, Dungeons(18), Hard Mode missions, Hard Mode maps completion, Challenges Missions, Zaishen bounties, Farming money/rares/titles, chests runs, Jade Quarry, Aspenwood, AvA, HoH, RA, Codex, GvG.

You got me on UW/FOW, I was talking about the 2 year mark, Just before EotN. There was no “mode”, etc., at that time. Yeah they had Sorrow’s Furnace too, but peeps only did that for the greens. There was some other seasonal content as well, but largely at the 2 year stage it was a PvP/GvG end game and had a lot of PvE complaints even though GW1 was explicity designed to NOT be an MMO.

People did farm but I don’t consider farming to be intentional end game content. I farmed greens, had the old 55hp monk build, etc., etc., but I considered this type of thing unintended content and never held Anet responsible to create such content.

MikaHR.1978:

Tomas.5029:

The thing that players truly want is a challenge, simple as that. They want something that cannot be cleared by an average player in 3 hours.

Yea, like 0,5% of the players want that, so technically youre right, practically – no.

Actually, according to my calculations, like 99.5% of players want that, so technically and practically he’s right.

Nevets Crimsonwing.5271:

MikaHR.1978:

Tomas.5029:

The thing that players truly want is a challenge, simple as that. They want something that cannot be cleared by an average player in 3 hours.

Yea, like 0,5% of the players want that, so technically youre right, practically – no.

Actually, according to my calculations, like 99.5% of players want that, so technically and practically he’s right.

It’s pretty simple (Disclaimer: I presume that many people want more challenging content):
This game is supposed to be casual friendly, so the mechanics have to be easy to understand, which they are (and where before the NPE disaster).
Also, casuals have to be able to “complete” the game.
Now we have to determine what completing the game means. In my mind, completing the game means to be able to participate in all aspects of the game.
So “completing” the game means for me to be able to get exotic gear and lvl 80. Both shouldn’t be a problem.
Now the game should allow people who are interested in getting better to progress even further and experience even harder content. The main reward for this should be skins, since they’re the main driving factor for this game but not necessary.
Dungeons and raids, rounded with small, very hard open PvE areas should be fitted for those players.
Open world PvE should be the main go-to content for casuals. They should get nice reward for completing events and such. Players looking for challenge should find them in dungeons and get different loot for completing them.

The current game suffers from open world PvE being almost redundant and dungeons being way too easy.

Palador.2170:

Galen Grey.4709:

well strictly speaking Arenanet’s message was never there i no endgame rather, end game starts at level 1.

I think the NPE safely puts that line to rest.

I dont really like the new changes at least on paper, have yet to try them but I still dont see how NPE means endgame doesnt start at level 1!

I mean what is it you will be doing now between level 1 – 15 that you will not be doing at level 80? its still dynamic events, exploring etc.. NPE didnt change anything … well correction, it did simplify some events no more feeding cows… but not to a degree that it changed gameplay. it just slowed down skill acquisition thats not changing how a game plays.

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

@Vayne,

I do see one big flaw in your argument: “Most people are casuals, they don’t even try out hard stuff”. Let me explain through an example: Lets say anet releases the most hardest thing ever, and they look at the numbers how many people tried out 1 month after release. Let’s say about 15% and they even make this number public to demonstrate why they don’t make hard content, but something is missing.

For this information to even worth something we need to know another thing: The percentage of active players during that time. This is an information that’s never going to be available for us to see. But lets say during that month 30% of the playerbase was active. That would mean about 50% of the active playerbase tried it out.
That would mean the casuals who don’t even try out the hard things are in the other 50% together with PvP/WvW exclusive folks, new players & etc. which would mean they are a minority. But we don’t see that.

Also some other informations would also be useful like, how many people completed it , the percentage of active players before the release (if it’s like 25% that would mean the release drawed back 5% of the players) The next month’s data etc.
My point is, you can’t draw a conclusion like that from a tiny bit of information.

I’m pretty sure that Anet would look at the percent of active players doing it. They’re professional developers, in spite of the fact that some people think they do stuff for no reason. I’m sure Anet has a reason for every change they make even if it might not look like they do.

When they run metrics, they look at the percentage of people playing doing a dungeon, not the percentage of people who have ever played, because that wouldn’t show them any thing.

But I’ve been thinking about it, and I think that it’s not wrong to say people want challenging content. The problem is, challenging means very different things to different people.

Challenging to younger guys who grew up playing this games and play a lot is different than challenge to me.

With the age of the average gamer on the rise, and many people only being able to devote a few hours a week to the game, it’s hard to believe most people want the kinds of ultra hard content other people want to keep them challenged.

I bet if they put in stuff that challenged the hard core guys, a lot of people wouldn’t be able to do it. It wouldn’t be challenging for them anymore, it would become frustrating.

That’s where the problem really starts. The more frustrating stuff, the more people feel they can’t handle the game, the more likely they are to walk.

I’m sure anet knows what would be best for GW2, but anet also knows what is best for anet. The launch of living story wasn’t based on metrics. The fact is, like you said yourselfs, it’s easier to cater to casuals than to anyone else, and for that the concept of living story is perfect. The last two year was casual priority, and I don’t expect much in the future either, this would explain the company policy too.

And on challenge: it’s optional. Have you ever completed something that was hard and frustrated you for a long time? It’s well worth it.

Some things I’ve completed that were hard and felt they were well worth it. Other things that are hard I consider to be not worth it, but frustrating, if I feel the challenge isn’t fair somehow. Or if there’s a lot of wasted time to get to try it. That annoys me. I don’t like to play through an entire living story to try to get one achievement, miss it and have to play through it again. That isn’t fun for me.

But Anet isn’t just making things the way they are to save labor. That’s a misnomer. It would have been far less work for Anet to create a tutorial then do the NPE. They did it because it tested best. Tested is the key word here. Not your opinion. Not my opinion. They ran tests and had a result and based what they did on that result. Like it or not, that’s how it went down…unless Anet is lying.

Nevets Crimsonwing.5271:

MikaHR.1978:

Tomas.5029:

The thing that players truly want is a challenge, simple as that. They want something that cannot be cleared by an average player in 3 hours.

Yea, like 0,5% of the players want that, so technically youre right, practically – no.

Actually, according to my calculations, like 99.5% of players want that, so technically and practically he’s right.

Yeah, tell that to Carbine/WoW vanilla endgame/EQ…..

You can say what youre saying all day long, but it wont become truth.

You want to see how “challenging/old school/walked uphills trough the snow…BOTH WAYS” games fare?

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1045484633/project-gorgon-a-new-approach-to-mmos?ref=nav_search

And thast despite being advertised (by sponsorship/nostalgia i guess) on many gamers sites.

But of course, on forums, you would think there are millions of people just dying for some EQ/AC/UO knock off. Weeeeeeeeeell….yeah.

It’s of course personal. I can tell you what I am missing that you could consider end-game. For that we should look at what I mainly did in other mmo’s.

I went into the world to collect mini’s, to get rare special pets (as ranger), I went on a hunt for cool recipe’s for my crafting to every next level create this nice little item. (Fun crafts) And I did go on the hunt for mounts. Lastly I liked to have some special items that many mmo’s have.

Mainly those thinks but that could as well be skins or looking at GW2 it could be dyes as well.

Now looking at how that works in GW2. We don’t really have fun-crafts and the ‘fun’ items you could possible make with those items are mainly cash-shop items.

Collecting mini’s is for 90% grinding gold and buying them or buying them with cash. Only a few you can get in the world but once you know 90% is nothing more then a boring gold-grind then also those 10% is not interesting anymore. Same for skins and dyes.

We don’t have mounts and also the idea of ‘rare’ ranger pets that require some special tactics / trick to get them is also none-existing.

All that stuff has monetized. The last feature pack did improve that somewhat but it’s not yet at the point where you can go and work towards most of those items in the world… other then grinding gold.

Of course I did find other end-game like WvW and JP’s in GW2. But going into the world to hunt down those mini’s is not here and that is what my end-game was in many mmo’s.

So it’s not always about dungeons.

MikaHR.1978:

Tomas.5029:

The thing that players truly want is a challenge, simple as that. They want something that cannot be cleared by an average player in 3 hours.

Yea, like 0,5% of the players want that, so technically youre right, practically – no.

I think you got it twisted slightly, and did not read my post entirely.
I am not calling for hardcore difficulty content that indeed only 0.9% of the playerbase even gets to see (Oldschool Naxxramas from WoW could be the example).
I am making a suggestion to create content that rewards effort, and not simply attendance.
My suggestions are simple – if you’re a casual, and you don’t want anything changed, and you just want to log in, kill some stuff, get some loot, and just generally relax, you’d still have that.
However, those who want more, and those who like to be awarded for their skillful play, should be. Again, i’d like you to read my post.

Kaz.5430:

IMO, that’s a great example of changing the definition of something just so that it’s existance can be denied, something that is becomeing a plague on these boards. A dungeon is not ‘defined’ by having 4 or 5 long paths, in an MMO a dungeon is simply a bit of instanced content, that is designed for a group, and generally ends with some sort of boss fight and a reward chest.

Fractals of the Mists ‘is’ a dungeon. Every single ‘set’ of Fractals that culminates in a boss fight, a reward and a choice to leave, is a dungeon ‘path’. Every single possible combination of fractals in a set is a ‘different’ dungeon path. It doesn’t matter if some other games do it differently, that doesn’t mean that the definition of a dungeon changes.

Wow, it took me over 2 years and this post to realise that pretty much every single personal story instance is actually a dungeon path.

And home instances are almost dungeon paths too.

Yay.

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

I’m pretty sure that Anet would look at the percent of active players doing it. They’re professional developers, in spite of the fact that some people think they do stuff for no reason. I’m sure Anet has a reason for every change they make even if it might not look like they do.

When they run metrics, they look at the percentage of people playing doing a dungeon, not the percentage of people who have ever played, because that wouldn’t show them any thing.

But I’ve been thinking about it, and I think that it’s not wrong to say people want challenging content. The problem is, challenging means very different things to different people.

Challenging to younger guys who grew up playing this games and play a lot is different than challenge to me.

With the age of the average gamer on the rise, and many people only being able to devote a few hours a week to the game, it’s hard to believe most people want the kinds of ultra hard content other people want to keep them challenged.

I bet if they put in stuff that challenged the hard core guys, a lot of people wouldn’t be able to do it. It wouldn’t be challenging for them anymore, it would become frustrating.

That’s where the problem really starts. The more frustrating stuff, the more people feel they can’t handle the game, the more likely they are to walk.

I’m sure anet knows what would be best for GW2, but anet also knows what is best for anet. The launch of living story wasn’t based on metrics. The fact is, like you said yourselfs, it’s easier to cater to casuals than to anyone else, and for that the concept of living story is perfect. The last two year was casual priority, and I don’t expect much in the future either, this would explain the company policy too.

And on challenge: it’s optional. Have you ever completed something that was hard and frustrated you for a long time? It’s well worth it.

Some things I’ve completed that were hard and felt they were well worth it. Other things that are hard I consider to be not worth it, but frustrating, if I feel the challenge isn’t fair somehow. Or if there’s a lot of wasted time to get to try it. That annoys me. I don’t like to play through an entire living story to try to get one achievement, miss it and have to play through it again. That isn’t fun for me.

But Anet isn’t just making things the way they are to save labor. That’s a misnomer. It would have been far less work for Anet to create a tutorial then do the NPE. They did it because it tested best. Tested is the key word here. Not your opinion. Not my opinion. They ran tests and had a result and based what they did on that result. Like it or not, that’s how it went down…unless Anet is lying.

Agreed, Challenge/reward factor could be improved in this game, but liadri is a great example for a challenge that frustates you for some time , but killing her after numerous trying , that feeling makes it worth it.
And actually I disagree with your second pharagraph’s first sentence. The last two year have been lacking, no matter how I look it. Anet proved they can do faster, and I’m not talking about the first game’s expansion frequency. I’m talking about the 5 year they made GW2. I’m just gonna say a number, but I could say a lot: Explorable areas, GW2 launched with 26 in PvE, that means during the 5 year development they created 5 every year on average. This number is also sad on a lot of things (Professions, Races, events, skills you name it.)

And on those tests… I don’t believe anet is lying…but I also don’t believe they told us everything. They said they made tests , did they say where? Probably not on the west, if they did recruit 10k tester in the west that would leave some kind of mark. I do believe those tests took place on the east. There were tests before launch with a loads of people, yet anet didn’t make these changes back then. And its slightly suspicius that china launched with these changes.

Liadri was annoying because of the way the encounter was designed. The whole wait after each round, was bleh. It was cool to be able to watch others do it, but they could have gone with an observer mode in an instance fight for the same affect.

munkiman.3068:

Liadri was annoying because of the way the encounter was designed. The whole wait after each round, was bleh. It was cool to be able to watch others do it, but they could have gone with an observer mode in an instance fight for the same affect.

I actually liked what they did there. It was unique and creative , the way they did , it made it possible to learn through other’s faults, give them feedback what they did wrong or congratulate them if they were successful. Or just stand near an arena and do an evil laugh when a competitor has only a few seconds left, then watch them fall to death.

Tomas.5029:

MikaHR.1978:

Tomas.5029:

The thing that players truly want is a challenge, simple as that. They want something that cannot be cleared by an average player in 3 hours.

Yea, like 0,5% of the players want that, so technically youre right, practically – no.

I think you got it twisted slightly, and did not read my post entirely.
I am not calling for hardcore difficulty content that indeed only 0.9% of the playerbase even gets to see (Oldschool Naxxramas from WoW could be the example).
I am making a suggestion to create content that rewards effort, and not simply attendance.
My suggestions are simple – if you’re a casual, and you don’t want anything changed, and you just want to log in, kill some stuff, get some loot, and just generally relax, you’d still have that.
However, those who want more, and those who like to be awarded for their skillful play, should be. Again, i’d like you to read my post.

Its direct answer to your post.

Pavillion was a big mistake on ANets part

Dry Top should be exception, not the rule, it goes under same hat as pavillion.

You agai and again metion these rewards (bribes), BUT content should first stand on its own, then and ONLY then it can be measured how many people want it. So no, no special rewards or anything such, if its extremely popular → make more.

Otherwise youre just making a point most people that do this content are interested in the rewards anyway, they dont give a kitten if its challenging or not. So making “easy” content with nice rewards is actually way to go. Yeah, that 0,0001% that actually want challenging content because its challenging content get screwed, but thats how it is.

MikaHR.1978:

Tomas.5029:

MikaHR.1978:

Tomas.5029:

The thing that players truly want is a challenge, simple as that. They want something that cannot be cleared by an average player in 3 hours.

Yea, like 0,5% of the players want that, so technically youre right, practically – no.

I think you got it twisted slightly, and did not read my post entirely.
I am not calling for hardcore difficulty content that indeed only 0.9% of the playerbase even gets to see (Oldschool Naxxramas from WoW could be the example).
I am making a suggestion to create content that rewards effort, and not simply attendance.
My suggestions are simple – if you’re a casual, and you don’t want anything changed, and you just want to log in, kill some stuff, get some loot, and just generally relax, you’d still have that.
However, those who want more, and those who like to be awarded for their skillful play, should be. Again, i’d like you to read my post.

Its direct answer to your post.

Pavillion was a big mistake on ANets part

Dry Top should be exception, not the rule, it goes under same hat as pavillion.

You agai and again metion these rewards (bribes), BUT content should first stand on its own, then and ONLY then it can be measured how many people want it. So no, no special rewards or anything such, if its extremely popular -> make more.

Otherwise youre just making a point most people that do this content are interested in the rewards anyway, they dont give a kitten if its challenging or not. So making “easy” content with nice rewards is actually way to go. Yeah, that 0,0001% that actually want challenging content because its challenging content get screwed, but thats how it is.

Well, the rewards (or “bribes” as you so elegantly put it) are an integral part of RPGs, whether you like it or not. New, shining loot that requires patience and dedication attracts players. If this wasn’t the case, no one would go for that Legendary or Ascended armor.

If we go by what you say, that players actually want more stuff for less effort (which i kind of doubt, after observing LA’s chat for a year), then ANET should at least make it more enjoyable to repeat it. Like i mentioned in my previous post, the last instance of the latest Living Story patch was really good in this regard, because it introduced Challenge Mode, which made the encounter feel more exciting and dangerous the second time you play it. Even the Mordrem mobs are a step in the right direction, because they hit hard, and you actually need to watch yourself when fighting them, especially when you wear Berserker’s/Assassin’s gear.

Tomas.5029:

MikaHR.1978:

Tomas.5029:

MikaHR.1978:

Tomas.5029:

The thing that players truly want is a challenge, simple as that. They want something that cannot be cleared by an average player in 3 hours.

Yea, like 0,5% of the players want that, so technically youre right, practically – no.

I think you got it twisted slightly, and did not read my post entirely.
I am not calling for hardcore difficulty content that indeed only 0.9% of the playerbase even gets to see (Oldschool Naxxramas from WoW could be the example).
I am making a suggestion to create content that rewards effort, and not simply attendance.
My suggestions are simple – if you’re a casual, and you don’t want anything changed, and you just want to log in, kill some stuff, get some loot, and just generally relax, you’d still have that.
However, those who want more, and those who like to be awarded for their skillful play, should be. Again, i’d like you to read my post.

Its direct answer to your post.

Pavillion was a big mistake on ANets part

Dry Top should be exception, not the rule, it goes under same hat as pavillion.

You agai and again metion these rewards (bribes), BUT content should first stand on its own, then and ONLY then it can be measured how many people want it. So no, no special rewards or anything such, if its extremely popular -> make more.

Otherwise youre just making a point most people that do this content are interested in the rewards anyway, they dont give a kitten if its challenging or not. So making “easy” content with nice rewards is actually way to go. Yeah, that 0,0001% that actually want challenging content because its challenging content get screwed, but thats how it is.

Well, the rewards (or “bribes” as you so elegantly put it) are an integral part of RPGs, whether you like it or not. New, shining loot that requires patience and dedication attracts players. If this wasn’t the case, no one would go for that Legendary or Ascended armor.

If we go by what you say, that players actually want more stuff for less effort (which i kind of doubt, after observing LA’s chat for a year), then ANET should at least make it more enjoyable to repeat it. Like i mentioned in my previous post, the last instance of the latest Living Story patch was really good in this regard, because it introduced Challenge Mode, which made the encounter feel more exciting and dangerous the second time you play it. Even the Mordrem mobs are a step in the right direction, because they hit hard, and you actually need to watch yourself when fighting them, especially when you wear Berserker’s/Assassin’s gear.

And thats where youre wrong again. Loot is defnitely not integral part of RPG. It certainly devolved to that in certain games.

To give you nice RL analogy: crapzillion people play soccer daily without expecting any reward at all. Soccer doesnt change, it has no new conent. And people STILL do it.

You might want to think about that and why you have to bribe people to play something. As i said, content needs to stand on its own legs first.

munkiman.3068:

Liadri was annoying because of the way the encounter was designed. The whole wait after each round, was bleh. It was cool to be able to watch others do it, but they could have gone with an observer mode in an instance fight for the same affect.

Also the fight was made needlessly harder for certain classes (shadowfall insta-killing pets and summons, for example.).

MikaHR.1978:

Tomas.5029:

MikaHR.1978:

Tomas.5029:

MikaHR.1978:

Tomas.5029:

The thing that players truly want is a challenge, simple as that. They want something that cannot be cleared by an average player in 3 hours.

Yea, like 0,5% of the players want that, so technically youre right, practically – no.

I think you got it twisted slightly, and did not read my post entirely.
I am not calling for hardcore difficulty content that indeed only 0.9% of the playerbase even gets to see (Oldschool Naxxramas from WoW could be the example).
I am making a suggestion to create content that rewards effort, and not simply attendance.
My suggestions are simple – if you’re a casual, and you don’t want anything changed, and you just want to log in, kill some stuff, get some loot, and just generally relax, you’d still have that.
However, those who want more, and those who like to be awarded for their skillful play, should be. Again, i’d like you to read my post.

Its direct answer to your post.

Pavillion was a big mistake on ANets part

Dry Top should be exception, not the rule, it goes under same hat as pavillion.

You agai and again metion these rewards (bribes), BUT content should first stand on its own, then and ONLY then it can be measured how many people want it. So no, no special rewards or anything such, if its extremely popular -> make more.

Otherwise youre just making a point most people that do this content are interested in the rewards anyway, they dont give a kitten if its challenging or not. So making “easy” content with nice rewards is actually way to go. Yeah, that 0,0001% that actually want challenging content because its challenging content get screwed, but thats how it is.

Well, the rewards (or “bribes” as you so elegantly put it) are an integral part of RPGs, whether you like it or not. New, shining loot that requires patience and dedication attracts players. If this wasn’t the case, no one would go for that Legendary or Ascended armor.

If we go by what you say, that players actually want more stuff for less effort (which i kind of doubt, after observing LA’s chat for a year), then ANET should at least make it more enjoyable to repeat it. Like i mentioned in my previous post, the last instance of the latest Living Story patch was really good in this regard, because it introduced Challenge Mode, which made the encounter feel more exciting and dangerous the second time you play it. Even the Mordrem mobs are a step in the right direction, because they hit hard, and you actually need to watch yourself when fighting them, especially when you wear Berserker’s/Assassin’s gear.

And thats where youre wrong again. Loot is defnitely not integral part of RPG. It certainly devolved to that in certain games.

To give you nice RL analogy: crapzillion people play soccer daily without expecting any reward at all. Soccer doesnt change, it has no new conent. And people STILL do it.

You might want to think about that and why you have to bribe people to play something. As i said, content needs to stand on its own legs first.

because within the soccer world, the only way to show achievement in soccer, or improve yourself in soccer is to play it. You do what you enjoy, and you get better at it, along with a fairly good challenging game design.

See soccer doesnt make you choose between doing hard things that will barely improve your soccer abilities/ or achievement within the soccer world and easy things that will vastly improve your skill/achievement.

This is reward design, and its a key aspect of game design. They must reward you for playing the game well. In other games its more direct, but in an RPG you have a game within a game within a game.

So not only do they need to consider the reward for certain actions within the minigame of combat.
They also have to consider the reward for combat itself.

It would be like if the fastest way to an NBA championship was to become a celebrity.
Or the best way to become a chess master was move 1000 pawns a day.

They need to consider what type of gameplay they most reward, because this changes the complexion of the game. People will always go where the rewards are most appealing, and even if they love something, they will probably abandon it if its unrewarding.

Sir Egil The Bull.7869:

Story Mode in all Dungeons should be solo-able by Level 80 chars. That’s some endgame content I like to see.

As someone coming up on my Zaitan personal story ending I’d have to agree. It’s crazy not to have a soloable content like a personal story, why do people have to gather into a 5 man just to complete something like this.

The other thing that bothered me was the early LS systems, somehow they thought that 5 mans for LS were what casual open world consumers wanted when what we really wanted was them to keep their promise that we’d never have to step into another dungeon ever again for anything if we didn’t want to.

I like their recent interview talking about how dungeons aren’t the focus of the future I’m anxious to see what’s coming in it’s place!

tigirius.9014:

Sir Egil The Bull.7869:

Story Mode in all Dungeons should be solo-able by Level 80 chars. That’s some endgame content I like to see.

As someone coming up on my Zaitan personal story ending I’d have to agree. It’s crazy not to have a soloable content like a personal story, why do people have to gather into a 5 man just to complete something like this.

The other thing that bothered me was the early LS systems, somehow they thought that 5 mans for LS were what casual open world consumers wanted when what we really wanted was them to keep their promise that we’d never have to step into another dungeon ever again for anything if we didn’t want to.

I like their recent interview talking about how dungeons aren’t the focus of the future I’m anxious to see what’s coming in it’s place!

I agree with you. I think it was a questionable design decision to have the personal story end in a five man instance. It reminded me of how I felt when the one main quest line in Rift ended in a raid. Really kittened me off.

Galen Grey.4709:

Palador.2170:

Galen Grey.4709:

well strictly speaking Arenanet’s message was never there i no endgame rather, end game starts at level 1.

I think the NPE safely puts that line to rest.

I dont really like the new changes at least on paper, have yet to try them but I still dont see how NPE means endgame doesnt start at level 1!

I mean what is it you will be doing now between level 1 – 15 that you will not be doing at level 80? its still dynamic events, exploring etc.. NPE didnt change anything … well correction, it did simplify some events no more feeding cows… but not to a degree that it changed gameplay. it just slowed down skill acquisition thats not changing how a game plays.

Really? That’s really how you see it?

So, you don’t see builds as part of endgame, then? Waiting until level 11 to start on that wasn’t so bad, but now you can’t even LOOK at the traits screen until you’re level 30. Are you telling me that you don’t see traits as an important part of the endgame?

There’s this class I like. Rangers. I have a few of them. You know what I spend a lot of my time on them doing? Keeping an eye out for any pets I may come across that I’ve not gotten with them yet. Guess what they removed from the low level areas. Yep, new pets. I guess Rangers having the right pets isn’t part of their endgame?

New players can’t even face skill challenges and start building up (very useful) skill points until.. level 12, right? I kind of thought end game called for skills, and maybe even some of the things you need skill points to buy or unlock.

You know what you have at level 1? An auto attack, and a heal. TWO skills. Do you know what you don’t have? The ability to improve yourself in any way, save by clearing the instance. You can’t gain more skills, or better loot, or anything until you level. And they reinforced that by pushing everything else further away from level 1. This is the very opposite of “Endgame starts at level 1”. This is “Gaining levels is the most important thing you can do”. All the new unlocks and rewards on level-up just reinforce that.

I kind of feel bad for the new players that will rush up in levels, thinking that there’s some awesome unlock awaiting them at the end. I guess Grand Master traits and Living Story are going to have to make do.

Palador.2170:

Galen Grey.4709:

Palador.2170:

Galen Grey.4709:

well strictly speaking Arenanet’s message was never there i no endgame rather, end game starts at level 1.

I think the NPE safely puts that line to rest.

I dont really like the new changes at least on paper, have yet to try them but I still dont see how NPE means endgame doesnt start at level 1!

I mean what is it you will be doing now between level 1 – 15 that you will not be doing at level 80? its still dynamic events, exploring etc.. NPE didnt change anything … well correction, it did simplify some events no more feeding cows… but not to a degree that it changed gameplay. it just slowed down skill acquisition thats not changing how a game plays.

Really? That’s really how you see it?

So, you don’t see builds as part of endgame, then? Waiting until level 11 to start on that wasn’t so bad, but now you can’t even LOOK at the traits screen until you’re level 30. Are you telling me that you don’t see traits as an important part of the endgame?

There’s this class I like. Rangers. I have a few of them. You know what I spend a lot of my time on them doing? Keeping an eye out for any pets I may come across that I’ve not gotten with them yet. Guess what they removed from the low level areas. Yep, new pets. I guess Rangers having the right pets isn’t part of their endgame?

New players can’t even face skill challenges and start building up (very useful) skill points until.. level 12, right? I kind of thought end game called for skills, and maybe even some of the things you need skill points to buy or unlock.

You know what you have at level 1? An auto attack, and a heal. TWO skills. Do you know what you don’t have? The ability to improve yourself in any way, save by clearing the instance. You can’t gain more skills, or better loot, or anything until you level. And they reinforced that by pushing everything else further away from level 1. This is the very opposite of “Endgame starts at level 1”. This is “Gaining levels is the most important thing you can do”. All the new unlocks and rewards on level-up just reinforce that.

I kind of feel bad for the new players that will rush up in levels, thinking that there’s some awesome unlock awaiting them at the end. I guess Grand Master traits and Living Story are going to have to make do.

See, I’m not sure what the huge rush is here. Pets were removed from the starting area, pre level 10. Skill points unlock I think at 13 now.

It takes an hour to get to level 10 now. An hour. Is this really what we’re complaining about? That in the first hour of play on a new character, you can’t tame animals that will take you ten minutes to go back and tame later? Because by level 10 you need a selection of 87 pets?

Every skill point you can’t acquire, you can get immediately at level 13, if you really want to, which is fine, because it’s around the time you really need to start spending skill points.

You want to have them up front? Build up a stash? What’s the difference if you have them at level 8 where you can’t use them, or you take ten minutes to get them at level 13?

Is it more convenient. Yeah, a bit. Good thing waypoints at that level are cheap as dirt.

For a first time player it won’t matter. For an experienced player it shouldn’t be that much of an inconvenience.

Vayne.8563:

See, I’m not sure what the huge rush is here. Pets were removed from the starting area, pre level 10. Skill points unlock I think at 13 now.

It takes an hour to get to level 10 now. An hour. Is this really what we’re complaining about? That in the first hour of play on a new character, you can’t tame animals that will take you ten minutes to go back and tame later? Because by level 10 you need a selection of 87 pets?

Every skill point you can’t acquire, you can get immediately at level 13, if you really want to, which is fine, because it’s around the time you really need to start spending skill points.

You want to have them up front? Build up a stash? What’s the difference if you have them at level 8 where you can’t use them, or you take ten minutes to get them at level 13?

Is it more convenient. Yeah, a bit. Good thing waypoints at that level are cheap as dirt.

For a first time player it won’t matter. For an experienced player it shouldn’t be that much of an inconvenience.

My point is that the game you have at low levels is NOTHING like the game you have when you’re at “endgame”. So, no, endgame does NOT start at level 1. Endgame now starts at level 30 or so, at best. The NPE changes (and I count the trait changes as part of that) actually go against ANet’s idea of having the whole game be endgame.

Can I deal with it? Yes. Do I want to? Not really. Do I think it’s teaching new players the wrong idea about this game? Very much so, yes. Your answer to part of this is to rush to level 10. Just stop and think about what you’re saying there. This is what the NPE is teaching people, to rush for levels to make the game more fun. That’s horrible.

Palador.2170:

Vayne.8563:

See, I’m not sure what the huge rush is here. Pets were removed from the starting area, pre level 10. Skill points unlock I think at 13 now.

It takes an hour to get to level 10 now. An hour. Is this really what we’re complaining about? That in the first hour of play on a new character, you can’t tame animals that will take you ten minutes to go back and tame later? Because by level 10 you need a selection of 87 pets?

Every skill point you can’t acquire, you can get immediately at level 13, if you really want to, which is fine, because it’s around the time you really need to start spending skill points.

You want to have them up front? Build up a stash? What’s the difference if you have them at level 8 where you can’t use them, or you take ten minutes to get them at level 13?

Is it more convenient. Yeah, a bit. Good thing waypoints at that level are cheap as dirt.

For a first time player it won’t matter. For an experienced player it shouldn’t be that much of an inconvenience.

My point is that the game you have at low levels is NOTHING like the game you have when you’re at “endgame”. So, no, endgame does NOT start at level 1. Endgame now starts at level 30 or so, at best. The NPE changes (and I count the trait changes as part of that) actually go against ANet’s idea of having the whole game be endgame.

Can I deal with it? Yes. Do I want to? Not really. Do I think it’s teaching new players the wrong idea about this game? Very much so, yes. Your answer to part of this is to rush to level 10. Just stop and think about what you’re saying there. This is what the NPE is teaching people, to rush for levels to make the game more fun. That’s horrible.

Okay, so the end game begins at level 10, or an hour into the game. Some group gets a slight disadvantage, another group is helped by it.

It’s not teaching people the wrong idea about the game, because it’s past so quickly. It’s doing what should have been done in the first place.

And you know, if we started with this, no one would have said a word. It would have been fine. There’d have been no complaints.

Just like everyone says level gating is bad, but skills and weapon swap were already level gated and no one complained.

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

I’m pretty sure that Anet would look at the percent of active players doing it. They’re professional developers, in spite of the fact that some people think they do stuff for no reason. I’m sure Anet has a reason for every change they make even if it might not look like they do.

When they run metrics, they look at the percentage of people playing doing a dungeon, not the percentage of people who have ever played, because that wouldn’t show them any thing.

But I’ve been thinking about it, and I think that it’s not wrong to say people want challenging content. The problem is, challenging means very different things to different people.

Challenging to younger guys who grew up playing this games and play a lot is different than challenge to me.

With the age of the average gamer on the rise, and many people only being able to devote a few hours a week to the game, it’s hard to believe most people want the kinds of ultra hard content other people want to keep them challenged.

I bet if they put in stuff that challenged the hard core guys, a lot of people wouldn’t be able to do it. It wouldn’t be challenging for them anymore, it would become frustrating.

That’s where the problem really starts. The more frustrating stuff, the more people feel they can’t handle the game, the more likely they are to walk.

I’m sure anet knows what would be best for GW2, but anet also knows what is best for anet. The launch of living story wasn’t based on metrics. The fact is, like you said yourselfs, it’s easier to cater to casuals than to anyone else, and for that the concept of living story is perfect. The last two year was casual priority, and I don’t expect much in the future either, this would explain the company policy too.

And on challenge: it’s optional. Have you ever completed something that was hard and frustrated you for a long time? It’s well worth it.

Some things I’ve completed that were hard and felt they were well worth it. Other things that are hard I consider to be not worth it, but frustrating, if I feel the challenge isn’t fair somehow. Or if there’s a lot of wasted time to get to try it. That annoys me. I don’t like to play through an entire living story to try to get one achievement, miss it and have to play through it again. That isn’t fun for me.

But Anet isn’t just making things the way they are to save labor. That’s a misnomer. It would have been far less work for Anet to create a tutorial then do the NPE. They did it because it tested best. Tested is the key word here. Not your opinion. Not my opinion. They ran tests and had a result and based what they did on that result. Like it or not, that’s how it went down…unless Anet is lying.

Agreed, Challenge/reward factor could be improved in this game, but liadri is a great example for a challenge that frustates you for some time , but killing her after numerous trying , that feeling makes it worth it.
And actually I disagree with your second pharagraph’s first sentence. The last two year have been lacking, no matter how I look it. Anet proved they can do faster, and I’m not talking about the first game’s expansion frequency. I’m talking about the 5 year they made GW2. I’m just gonna say a number, but I could say a lot: Explorable areas, GW2 launched with 26 in PvE, that means during the 5 year development they created 5 every year on average. This number is also sad on a lot of things (Professions, Races, events, skills you name it.)

And on those tests… I don’t believe anet is lying…but I also don’t believe they told us everything. They said they made tests , did they say where? Probably not on the west, if they did recruit 10k tester in the west that would leave some kind of mark. I do believe those tests took place on the east. There were tests before launch with a loads of people, yet anet didn’t make these changes back then. And its slightly suspicius that china launched with these changes.

Still no answer? But I enjoyed our discussion

Scipio.3204:

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

snip

With the age of the average gamer on the rise, and many people only being able to devote a few hours a week to the game, it’s hard to believe most people want the kinds of ultra hard content other people want to keep them challenged.

I bet if they put in stuff that challenged the hard core guys, a lot of people wouldn’t be able to do it. It wouldn’t be challenging for them anymore, it would become frustrating.

That’s where the problem really starts. The more frustrating stuff, the more people feel they can’t handle the game, the more likely they are to walk.

I’m sure anet knows what would be best for GW2, but anet also knows what is best for anet. The launch of living story wasn’t based on metrics. The fact is, like you said yourselfs, it’s easier to cater to casuals than to anyone else, and for that the concept of living story is perfect. The last two year was casual priority, and I don’t expect much in the future either, this would explain the company policy too.

And on challenge: it’s optional. Have you ever completed something that was hard and frustrated you for a long time? It’s well worth it.

Some things I’ve completed that were hard and felt they were well worth it. Other things that are hard I consider to be not worth it, but frustrating, if I feel the challenge isn’t fair somehow. Or if there’s a lot of wasted time to get to try it. That annoys me. I don’t like to play through an entire living story to try to get one achievement, miss it and have to play through it again. That isn’t fun for me.

But Anet isn’t just making things the way they are to save labor. That’s a misnomer. It would have been far less work for Anet to create a tutorial then do the NPE. They did it because it tested best. Tested is the key word here. Not your opinion. Not my opinion. They ran tests and had a result and based what they did on that result. Like it or not, that’s how it went down…unless Anet is lying.

Agreed, Challenge/reward factor could be improved in this game, but liadri is a great example for a challenge that frustates you for some time , but killing her after numerous trying , that feeling makes it worth it.
And actually I disagree with your second pharagraph’s first sentence. The last two year have been lacking, no matter how I look it. Anet proved they can do faster, and I’m not talking about the first game’s expansion frequency. I’m talking about the 5 year they made GW2. I’m just gonna say a number, but I could say a lot: Explorable areas, GW2 launched with 26 in PvE, that means during the 5 year development they created 5 every year on average. This number is also sad on a lot of things (Professions, Races, events, skills you name it.)

And on those tests… I don’t believe anet is lying…but I also don’t believe they told us everything. They said they made tests , did they say where? Probably not on the west, if they did recruit 10k tester in the west that would leave some kind of mark. I do believe those tests took place on the east. There were tests before launch with a loads of people, yet anet didn’t make these changes back then. And its slightly suspicius that china launched with these changes.

Still no answer? But I enjoyed our discussion

There’s not much to say. I didn’t end up killing Liadri, because I didn’t really like the setup. I don’t play MMOs to solo mostly anyway, and sitting there, waiting my turn to get to Liadri was not all that interesting to me. I’d love to have the minipet. I’m sure I could have beaten her if I banged away at it, but the reward wasn’t worth me doing something annoying. Particularly because latency where I am is such that it would make it harder for me than someone who actually saw where they were.

Anet didn’t tell us much, so I don’t think they’re hiding stuff. If they didn’t have reason to change the early game, they wouldn’t have changed it. I mean it’s a lot of work. Obviously they thought it was necessary. I feel I have to give them the benefit of the doubt, because I don’t really expect them to consult me on major decisions….or at all for that matter.

I believe the test was done in the west, because I help people in starter zones quite frequently and I see the questions people ask and how confused they are. This isn’t some random thing that happens to a couple of people. People really don’t have a clue what’s going on, and I’ve seen several people ready to give up because of it. I don’t see why anyone would think otherwise.

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

~

I’m sure anet knows what would be best for GW2, but anet also knows what is best for anet. The launch of living story wasn’t based on metrics. The fact is, like you said yourselfs, it’s easier to cater to casuals than to anyone else, and for that the concept of living story is perfect. The last two year was casual priority, and I don’t expect much in the future either, this would explain the company policy too.

And on challenge: it’s optional. Have you ever completed something that was hard and frustrated you for a long time? It’s well worth it.

Some things I’ve completed that were hard and felt they were well worth it. Other things that are hard I consider to be not worth it, but frustrating, if I feel the challenge isn’t fair somehow. Or if there’s a lot of wasted time to get to try it. That annoys me. I don’t like to play through an entire living story to try to get one achievement, miss it and have to play through it again. That isn’t fun for me.

But Anet isn’t just making things the way they are to save labor. That’s a misnomer. It would have been far less work for Anet to create a tutorial then do the NPE. They did it because it tested best. Tested is the key word here. Not your opinion. Not my opinion. They ran tests and had a result and based what they did on that result. Like it or not, that’s how it went down…unless Anet is lying.

Agreed, Challenge/reward factor could be improved in this game, but liadri is a great example for a challenge that frustates you for some time , but killing her after numerous trying , that feeling makes it worth it.
And actually I disagree with your second pharagraph’s first sentence. The last two year have been lacking, no matter how I look it. Anet proved they can do faster, and I’m not talking about the first game’s expansion frequency. I’m talking about the 5 year they made GW2. I’m just gonna say a number, but I could say a lot: Explorable areas, GW2 launched with 26 in PvE, that means during the 5 year development they created 5 every year on average. This number is also sad on a lot of things (Professions, Races, events, skills you name it.)

And on those tests… I don’t believe anet is lying…but I also don’t believe they told us everything. They said they made tests , did they say where? Probably not on the west, if they did recruit 10k tester in the west that would leave some kind of mark. I do believe those tests took place on the east. There were tests before launch with a loads of people, yet anet didn’t make these changes back then. And its slightly suspicius that china launched with these changes.

Still no answer? But I enjoyed our discussion

There’s not much to say. I didn’t end up killing Liadri, because I didn’t really like the setup. I don’t play MMOs to solo mostly anyway, and sitting there, waiting my turn to get to Liadri was not all that interesting to me. I’d love to have the minipet. I’m sure I could have beaten her if I banged away at it, but the reward wasn’t worth me doing something annoying. Particularly because latency where I am is such that it would make it harder for me than someone who actually saw where they were.

Anet didn’t tell us much, so I don’t think they’re hiding stuff. If they didn’t have reason to change the early game, they wouldn’t have changed it. I mean it’s a lot of work. Obviously they thought it was necessary. I feel I have to give them the benefit of the doubt, because I don’t really expect them to consult me on major decisions….or at all for that matter.

I believe the test was done in the west, because I help people in starter zones quite frequently and I see the questions people ask and how confused they are. This isn’t some random thing that happens to a couple of people. People really don’t have a clue what’s going on, and I’ve seen several people ready to give up because of it. I don’t see why anyone would think otherwise.

If anything makes things confusing for people I don’t think it’s having trouble throwing a bucket with water on plants or the 5 skills you can unlock for the weapon you use.

It’s more likely the lack of traditional quests that normally also guide you through the world. This already proved to be a problem in alpha and thats why hearths came in..

Maybe that also did not do the trick. I am all in favor for also including traditional quest (more because I find them amusing and they give me a better bound with the world and the NPC’s) and that might help new players much more.

Devata.6589:

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

~

snip

Some things I’ve completed that were hard and felt they were well worth it. Other things that are hard I consider to be not worth it, but frustrating, if I feel the challenge isn’t fair somehow. Or if there’s a lot of wasted time to get to try it. That annoys me. I don’t like to play through an entire living story to try to get one achievement, miss it and have to play through it again. That isn’t fun for me.

But Anet isn’t just making things the way they are to save labor. That’s a misnomer. It would have been far less work for Anet to create a tutorial then do the NPE. They did it because it tested best. Tested is the key word here. Not your opinion. Not my opinion. They ran tests and had a result and based what they did on that result. Like it or not, that’s how it went down…unless Anet is lying.

Agreed, Challenge/reward factor could be improved in this game, but liadri is a great example for a challenge that frustates you for some time , but killing her after numerous trying , that feeling makes it worth it.
And actually I disagree with your second pharagraph’s first sentence. The last two year have been lacking, no matter how I look it. Anet proved they can do faster, and I’m not talking about the first game’s expansion frequency. I’m talking about the 5 year they made GW2. I’m just gonna say a number, but I could say a lot: Explorable areas, GW2 launched with 26 in PvE, that means during the 5 year development they created 5 every year on average. This number is also sad on a lot of things (Professions, Races, events, skills you name it.)

And on those tests… I don’t believe anet is lying…but I also don’t believe they told us everything. They said they made tests , did they say where? Probably not on the west, if they did recruit 10k tester in the west that would leave some kind of mark. I do believe those tests took place on the east. There were tests before launch with a loads of people, yet anet didn’t make these changes back then. And its slightly suspicius that china launched with these changes.

Still no answer? But I enjoyed our discussion

There’s not much to say. I didn’t end up killing Liadri, because I didn’t really like the setup. I don’t play MMOs to solo mostly anyway, and sitting there, waiting my turn to get to Liadri was not all that interesting to me. I’d love to have the minipet. I’m sure I could have beaten her if I banged away at it, but the reward wasn’t worth me doing something annoying. Particularly because latency where I am is such that it would make it harder for me than someone who actually saw where they were.

Anet didn’t tell us much, so I don’t think they’re hiding stuff. If they didn’t have reason to change the early game, they wouldn’t have changed it. I mean it’s a lot of work. Obviously they thought it was necessary. I feel I have to give them the benefit of the doubt, because I don’t really expect them to consult me on major decisions….or at all for that matter.

I believe the test was done in the west, because I help people in starter zones quite frequently and I see the questions people ask and how confused they are. This isn’t some random thing that happens to a couple of people. People really don’t have a clue what’s going on, and I’ve seen several people ready to give up because of it. I don’t see why anyone would think otherwise.

If anything makes things confusing for people I don’t think it’s having trouble throwing a bucket with water on plants or the 5 skills you can unlock for the weapon you use.

It’s more likely the lack of traditional quests that normally also guide you through the world. This already proved to be a problem in alpha and thats why hearths came in..

Maybe that also did not do the trick. I am all in favor for also including traditional quest (more because I find them amusing and they give me a better bound with the world and the NPC’s) and that might help new players much more.

I agree with you about the bucket of water, but taking individual changes out of a whole packet of changes is just pointless. Yes,s we could always edit change A, B or C, but over all the NPE, in my opinion was well done.

Anet was never going to get it so everyone agreed with it. They made decisions, they made changes, feeding the cows and watering the plants is something I’ve done for maybe a some total of 5 minutes of my Guild Wars 2 experience, in thousands of hours.

Was it a bad change? Yeah probably. But over all, it’s so insignificant..most of these changes are, that it won’t affect my enjoyment of the game. People are focusing on details. Overall, for me, the experience of leveling has improved, though it still needs some adjustments.

Vayne.8563:

Okay, so the end game begins at level 10, or an hour into the game.

First of all, thank you. If I can get even you to agree with it, then I’m pretty sure that means I’ve won at least my original point. We may not agree on when the end game starts, but we do agree it’s not at level 1.

Vayne.8563:

It’s not teaching people the wrong idea about the game, because it’s past so quickly. It’s doing what should have been done in the first place.

And you know, if we started with this, no one would have said a word. It would have been fine. There’d have been no complaints.

Just like everyone says level gating is bad, but skills and weapon swap were already level gated and no one complained.

Of course there were complaints, you know that. There’s always someone complaining. The question is, how many of those complaints had merit?

Look at Elementalists, for example. They used to start with fire and water elements unlocked. In other words, they had weapon swapping (ele style) at level 1. Looked at like that, it raises the question of why everyone else had to wait until level 7. Part of the reason for the outcry now is because ANet’s answer to that question was to push it back further for ALL classes, including Elementalist, the opposite direction from what most players would have considered an ease of play improvement.

Some level gating is good, I’ll grant you. But it’s something to be used sparingly. It makes gaining levels the goal, when that’s really something that should fade into the background of the rest of the game.

Palador.2170:

Vayne.8563:

Okay, so the end game begins at level 10, or an hour into the game.

First of all, thank you. If I can get even you to agree with it, then I’m pretty sure that means I’ve won at least my original point. We may not agree on when the end game starts, but we do agree it’s not at level 1.

Vayne.8563:

It’s not teaching people the wrong idea about the game, because it’s past so quickly. It’s doing what should have been done in the first place.

And you know, if we started with this, no one would have said a word. It would have been fine. There’d have been no complaints.

Just like everyone says level gating is bad, but skills and weapon swap were already level gated and no one complained.

Of course there were complaints, you know that. There’s always someone complaining. The question is, how many of those complaints had merit?

Look at Elementalists, for example. They used to start with fire and water elements unlocked. In other words, they had weapon swapping (ele style) at level 1. Looked at like that, it raises the question of why everyone else had to wait until level 7. Part of the reason for the outcry now is because ANet’s answer to that question was to push it back further for ALL classes, including Elementalist, the opposite direction from what most players would have considered an ease of play improvement.

Some level gating is good, I’ll grant you. But it’s something to be used sparingly. It makes gaining levels the goal, when that’s really something that should fade into the background of the rest of the game.

See but then we get into all sorts of arguments. Some guy wants it to unlock at 7, someone at 5, someone else might think it would be better at 9 and it doesn’t really matter, because it has to be done to help the maximum amount of new people.

Clearly Anet will soon have more regular free weekends, or a refer a friend thing and they want people to stay with the game. They tested this and this is what works.

Since more people in the game is better for me, the fiddling details about what level something unlocks is not all that important. The changes were made to get more people staying with the game, based on testing.

I can argue anything would be better changed, but we’re still arguing about minor details in a very big patch.

Focusing on those details make people more unsatisfied than they need to be.

Vayne.8563:

Focusing on those details make people more unsatisfied than they need to be.

You may be right there. I think I can agree to disagree on the details, and get back to running around in PvP and making my team lose because I suck.

(Sorry to all I team with, but I want that CoF armor and I can’t buy dungeon tokens with laurels, so you’re stuck with me.)

Vayne.8563:

Devata.6589:

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

~

snip

~

Agreed, Challenge/reward factor could be improved in this game, but liadri is a great example for a challenge that frustates you for some time , but killing her after numerous trying , that feeling makes it worth it.
And actually I disagree with your second pharagraph’s first sentence. The last two year have been lacking, no matter how I look it. Anet proved they can do faster, and I’m not talking about the first game’s expansion frequency. I’m talking about the 5 year they made GW2. I’m just gonna say a number, but I could say a lot: Explorable areas, GW2 launched with 26 in PvE, that means during the 5 year development they created 5 every year on average. This number is also sad on a lot of things (Professions, Races, events, skills you name it.)

And on those tests… I don’t believe anet is lying…but I also don’t believe they told us everything. They said they made tests , did they say where? Probably not on the west, if they did recruit 10k tester in the west that would leave some kind of mark. I do believe those tests took place on the east. There were tests before launch with a loads of people, yet anet didn’t make these changes back then. And its slightly suspicius that china launched with these changes.

Still no answer? But I enjoyed our discussion

There’s not much to say. I didn’t end up killing Liadri, because I didn’t really like the setup. I don’t play MMOs to solo mostly anyway, and sitting there, waiting my turn to get to Liadri was not all that interesting to me. I’d love to have the minipet. I’m sure I could have beaten her if I banged away at it, but the reward wasn’t worth me doing something annoying. Particularly because latency where I am is such that it would make it harder for me than someone who actually saw where they were.

Anet didn’t tell us much, so I don’t think they’re hiding stuff. If they didn’t have reason to change the early game, they wouldn’t have changed it. I mean it’s a lot of work. Obviously they thought it was necessary. I feel I have to give them the benefit of the doubt, because I don’t really expect them to consult me on major decisions….or at all for that matter.

I believe the test was done in the west, because I help people in starter zones quite frequently and I see the questions people ask and how confused they are. This isn’t some random thing that happens to a couple of people. People really don’t have a clue what’s going on, and I’ve seen several people ready to give up because of it. I don’t see why anyone would think otherwise.

If anything makes things confusing for people I don’t think it’s having trouble throwing a bucket with water on plants or the 5 skills you can unlock for the weapon you use.

It’s more likely the lack of traditional quests that normally also guide you through the world. This already proved to be a problem in alpha and thats why hearths came in..

Maybe that also did not do the trick. I am all in favor for also including traditional quest (more because I find them amusing and they give me a better bound with the world and the NPC’s) and that might help new players much more.

I agree with you about the bucket of water, but taking individual changes out of a whole packet of changes is just pointless. Yes,s we could always edit change A, B or C, but over all the NPE, in my opinion was well done.

Anet was never going to get it so everyone agreed with it. They made decisions, they made changes, feeding the cows and watering the plants is something I’ve done for maybe a some total of 5 minutes of my Guild Wars 2 experience, in thousands of hours.

Was it a bad change? Yeah probably. But over all, it’s so insignificant..most of these changes are, that it won’t affect my enjoyment of the game. People are focusing on details. Overall, for me, the experience of leveling has improved, though it still needs some adjustments.

No, we should talk about individual changes. Because there are likely also things you agree with so you don’t say “I like it or I don’t like it”. It’s much better to say what you like and dislike.

And about that hearth. For some reason if I think about GW2 hearths thats the hearth I always think about.

Palador.2170:

Vayne.8563:

Focusing on those details make people more unsatisfied than they need to be.

You may be right there. I think I can agree to disagree on the details, and get back to running around in PvP and making my team lose because I suck.

(Sorry to all I team with, but I want that CoF armor and I can’t buy dungeon tokens with laurels, so you’re stuck with me.)

I hate to ask but why not just run CoF?

Devata.6589:

Vayne.8563:

Devata.6589:

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

Scipio.3204:

Vayne.8563:

~

snip

~

Agreed, Challenge/reward factor could be improved in this game, but liadri is a great example for a challenge that frustates you for some time , but killing her after numerous trying , that feeling makes it worth it.
And actually I disagree with your second pharagraph’s first sentence. The last two year have been lacking, no matter how I look it. Anet proved they can do faster, and I’m not talking about the first game’s expansion frequency. I’m talking about the 5 year they made GW2. I’m just gonna say a number, but I could say a lot: Explorable areas, GW2 launched with 26 in PvE, that means during the 5 year development they created 5 every year on average. This number is also sad on a lot of things (Professions, Races, events, skills you name it.)

And on those tests… I don’t believe anet is lying…but I also don’t believe they told us everything. They said they made tests , did they say where? Probably not on the west, if they did recruit 10k tester in the west that would leave some kind of mark. I do believe those tests took place on the east. There were tests before launch with a loads of people, yet anet didn’t make these changes back then. And its slightly suspicius that china launched with these changes.

Still no answer? But I enjoyed our discussion

There’s not much to say. I didn’t end up killing Liadri, because I didn’t really like the setup. I don’t play MMOs to solo mostly anyway, and sitting there, waiting my turn to get to Liadri was not all that interesting to me. I’d love to have the minipet. I’m sure I could have beaten her if I banged away at it, but the reward wasn’t worth me doing something annoying. Particularly because latency where I am is such that it would make it harder for me than someone who actually saw where they were.

Anet didn’t tell us much, so I don’t think they’re hiding stuff. If they didn’t have reason to change the early game, they wouldn’t have changed it. I mean it’s a lot of work. Obviously they thought it was necessary. I feel I have to give them the benefit of the doubt, because I don’t really expect them to consult me on major decisions….or at all for that matter.

I believe the test was done in the west, because I help people in starter zones quite frequently and I see the questions people ask and how confused they are. This isn’t some random thing that happens to a couple of people. People really don’t have a clue what’s going on, and I’ve seen several people ready to give up because of it. I don’t see why anyone would think otherwise.

If anything makes things confusing for people I don’t think it’s having trouble throwing a bucket with water on plants or the 5 skills you can unlock for the weapon you use.

It’s more likely the lack of traditional quests that normally also guide you through the world. This already proved to be a problem in alpha and thats why hearths came in..

Maybe that also did not do the trick. I am all in favor for also including traditional quest (more because I find them amusing and they give me a better bound with the world and the NPC’s) and that might help new players much more.

I agree with you about the bucket of water, but taking individual changes out of a whole packet of changes is just pointless. Yes,s we could always edit change A, B or C, but over all the NPE, in my opinion was well done.

Anet was never going to get it so everyone agreed with it. They made decisions, they made changes, feeding the cows and watering the plants is something I’ve done for maybe a some total of 5 minutes of my Guild Wars 2 experience, in thousands of hours.

Was it a bad change? Yeah probably. But over all, it’s so insignificant..most of these changes are, that it won’t affect my enjoyment of the game. People are focusing on details. Overall, for me, the experience of leveling has improved, though it still needs some adjustments.

No, we should talk about individual changes. Because there are likely also things you agree with so you don’t say “I like it or I don’t like it”. It’s much better to say what you like and dislike.

And about that hearth. For some reason if I think about GW2 hearths thats the hearth I always think about.

You missed my point.

Adjusting something like whether it should unlock at level X or level Y is not likely to get a majority agreement anyway, but even if it did, it’s still completely irrelevant if Anet has tests that show that those ways don’t work.

But talk about it if you like.