Guild Wars 2

Well, Vayne, you managed to respond to my last post without seeming to have read any of the words in it. I would respond, but I am baffled as to how to interpret your post, without any context about what questions and points you’re even answering. I don’t mean to be insulting, I just want to be clear that I would like to respond, but cannot.

All my best!

Ticky.5831:

Ashen.2907:

A drought does not mean a complete absence, but rather an insufficiency. I live in an area that has been in its worst drought in over a thousand years, but we still get rain.

I do not think that the existence of raids means that there is not a content drought.

Well, raids are pretty much the only thing MMOs(in general) are expected to come out with between expansions.

So by the general standards, either it’s not a content drought, or MMOs in general are in a constant state of content drought.

You want to argue with Mike O’Brien, the man who brought “content drought” into this conversation and also started this thread? Okay, yeah, that’s totally reasonable.

This MMO gave the expectation that things other than a couple of raid bosses were going to be released. This is the MMO that claims to do things differently. This MMO was built around the idea of regular content updates and a living, breathing, world. In short, you’re arguing that Mr. O’Brien is wrong about the state of his game and instead chose to literally suggest that players be angry about the content drought.

That response seems uncharacteristic, to say the least.

Well they managed to kill this thread using their typical means. It’s sad that we won’t even get the dignity of a response after almost 3000 posts. This thread was more active than the whole game and yet nothing.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Well they managed to kill this thread using their typical means. It’s sad that we won’t even get the dignity of a response after almost 3000 posts. This thread was more active than the whole game and yet nothing.

It’s not like this is the first time it happens. They don’t like for players to point out that something is wrong, and prefer to just ignore it hoping it will go away on its own. Which may work short term, but just keeps building up dissatisfaction more and more.

In the end, it’s their inability to connect with the community that will kill this game.

Well, I don’t think they are going to respond to this, as they already did so. If they aren’t changing their minds then what can they really say anyway? It would be like, sorry guys, this decision has been made already, once again.

They haven’t been ignoring this, as this thread IS their communication anyway.
If they have more news, then they definitely would say so I wager. But since there is no news on this (meaning no change in the decision) there’s nothing to say about it.

Broken Memory.1436:

I have yet to see anyone with the New Axe or Pistol. Only seen about 10 if lucky Staffs. Sooooo is everyone waiting or no one actually able to make them that quickly or easily due to grind and cost?

Then youre just not paying attention. I see them everywhere, and people are pleased as punch to have something different than Frostfang to work with. Literally every single person I speak to or play with on a regular basis has at least 2 legendaries, so clearly as far as endgame content goes, its a big deal. its not “oh well nobody has legendaries anyway”. EVERYONE has a legendary. its a big beautiful Fashion Wars 2 thing to work towards when you hit 80. removing that, especially when it was sold in HoT as a feature, is an kitten thing to do. wheres your outrage over being lied to? when will you care that youve paid money for something and not gotten it? does it have to be something YOU like for you to care? if so, thats a pretty childish and selfish worldview. so consider if youre just selfish and apathetic, or if there really is a problem going on here.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Well they managed to kill this thread using their typical means. It’s sad that we won’t even get the dignity of a response after almost 3000 posts. This thread was more active than the whole game and yet nothing.

Which response would you like them to dignify you with? Choose from:

1. There will be no u-turn or refunds and we will be pressing ahead with our other priorities.

Make your selection by typing 1, 1 or 1 and then pressing enter.

DoctorDing.5890:

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Well they managed to kill this thread using their typical means. It’s sad that we won’t even get the dignity of a response after almost 3000 posts. This thread was more active than the whole game and yet nothing.

Which response would you like them to dignify you with? Choose from:

1. There will be no u-turn or refunds and we will be pressing ahead with our other priorities.

Make your selection by typing 1, 1 or 1 and then pressing enter.

they could, gee, i dunno, actually offer some player support by addressing concerns that “indefinitely means never” or whatever else has come up that people are worried about, or just BE a sympathetic face that is here to show the company gives a kitten. no, they make an announcement and then ditch the whole ship, showing they care not one kitten about the player base or its feelings on the matter. thats basically the worst PR you can offer, is to drop a bomb and leave, no questions answers, no concerns addressed, no nothing. kitten that.

I’m curious as to why it’s so complicated to make a new collection for a precursor. It seems to only require basic functionalities that should be available in a content editor.

- Create a new item.
- Modify an item.
- Add an item to a merchant.
- Add a conditionally available item to a merchant.
- Create a new recipe.
- Create a new recipe item.
- Create a container item.
- Add an item to a container.
- Add an ‘OnUse’ function on an item to activate a collection.
- Add a conditional item reward for a successful event (collection activated and concerned achievement still not completed).
- Add a conditional item drop from a monster.
- Add a conditional item drop from a chest.
- Add a conditional item drop from a gathering node.
- Add a conditional dialogue to an NPC.
- Add a conditional interactive item/space to a zone.
- Create a new achievement linked to an object.
- Create a new collection object.

Considering the collections were introduced with the “September 2014 Feature Pack”, that they did some rework for Hot and that they knew they would make quite a few collections, one could have expected them to develop the tools to do it efficiently. They had what, 2 years to do it?

tl;dr
My vote – decision sucks. Hope that it is revised someday.

Just another reason I have more fun elsewhere right now.

5 Accounts and I can’t even remember the passwords for 2 of them.

Miss the community though – a lot. Still the best ever.

Fumigene.5076:

I’m curious as to why it’s so complicated to make a new collection for a precursor. It seems to only require basic functionalities that should be available in a content editor.

- Create a new item.
- Modify an item.
- Add an item to a merchant.
- Add a conditionally available item to a merchant.
- Create a new recipe.
- Create a new recipe item.
- Create a container item.
- Add an item to a container.
- Add an ‘OnUse’ function on an item to activate a collection.
- Add a conditional item reward for a successful event (collection activated and concerned achievement still not completed).
- Add a conditional item drop from a monster.
- Add a conditional item drop from a chest.
- Add a conditional item drop from a gathering node.
- Add a conditional dialogue to an NPC.
- Add a conditional interactive item/space to a zone.
- Create a new achievement linked to an object.
- Create a new collection object.

Considering the collections were introduced with the “September 2014 Feature Pack”, that they did some rework for Hot and that they knew they would make quite a few collections, one could have expected them to develop the tools to do it efficiently. They had what, 2 years to do it?

Must be a lack of personnel If they had to take the 6 devs off content that was sold but not delivered to work in other segments of the game.

cosmicegg.8502:

Fumigene.5076:

I’m curious as to why it’s so complicated to make a new collection for a precursor. It seems to only require basic functionalities that should be available in a content editor.

- Create a new item.
- Modify an item.
- Add an item to a merchant.
- Add a conditionally available item to a merchant.
- Create a new recipe.
- Create a new recipe item.
- Create a container item.
- Add an item to a container.
- Add an ‘OnUse’ function on an item to activate a collection.
- Add a conditional item reward for a successful event (collection activated and concerned achievement still not completed).
- Add a conditional item drop from a monster.
- Add a conditional item drop from a chest.
- Add a conditional item drop from a gathering node.
- Add a conditional dialogue to an NPC.
- Add a conditional interactive item/space to a zone.
- Create a new achievement linked to an object.
- Create a new collection object.

Considering the collections were introduced with the “September 2014 Feature Pack”, that they did some rework for Hot and that they knew they would make quite a few collections, one could have expected them to develop the tools to do it efficiently. They had what, 2 years to do it?

Must be a lack of personnel If they had to take the 6 devs off content that was sold but not delivered to work in other segments of the game.

Or those 6 are just really incompetent or poorly assigned. We don’t know if this same small team was behind the first 3 weapons or the 20 old precursor collections, but it’s obvious that someone at Anet is capable of making the content. They managed to push out those collections, a bunch of others along with them in HoT, and a crap-ton of them got added to the core game back in 2014. If there was some massive difficulty in creating collections, they must have known it before now. They would have known it before HoT launched, and likely even before they announced it.

It’s like building a subdivision of 20 houses, but not noticing all of your nails are rusted and lumber rotted until you’re laying down the carpets on the 12th house. You can’t work with something for that long, and complete so much, without seeing the problem.

Fumigene.5076:

I’m curious as to why it’s so complicated to make a new collection for a precursor. It seems to only require basic functionalities that should be available in a content editor.

- Create a new item.
- Modify an item.
- Add an item to a merchant.
- Add a conditionally available item to a merchant.
- Create a new recipe.
- Create a new recipe item.
- Create a container item.
- Add an item to a container.
- Add an ‘OnUse’ function on an item to activate a collection.
- Add a conditional item reward for a successful event (collection activated and concerned achievement still not completed).
- Add a conditional item drop from a monster.
- Add a conditional item drop from a chest.
- Add a conditional item drop from a gathering node.
- Add a conditional dialogue to an NPC.
- Add a conditional interactive item/space to a zone.
- Create a new achievement linked to an object.
- Create a new collection object.

Considering the collections were introduced with the “September 2014 Feature Pack”, that they did some rework for Hot and that they knew they would make quite a few collections, one could have expected them to develop the tools to do it efficiently. They had what, 2 years to do it?

How about adding these things:
- design an item
- create a story surounding that item
- scrap the item
- design an item from the ground up
- actually create the system that allows them to impliment that
- work with other members of the big teams, which means you have to coordinate with them, which can be hard. This includes the lore team, the art team, programmer, etc…
- fail at things
- reorganize things
- get better ideas
- get hold up somewhere
- having writers block

And all that for 8+ items all at the same time, while staying up to date with developement in general and trying to fix things that were broken, after release.

If any of you had looked into the collection you see a vast amount of things there. Part old, part new.
Some of them even require new interactions or maybe new coding.

As far as we know the whole system has been build from the ground up, just using the collection system as a base.

mrstealth.6701:

cosmicegg.8502:

Fumigene.5076:

I’m curious as to why it’s so complicated to make a new collection for a precursor. It seems to only require basic functionalities that should be available in a content editor.

- Create a new item.
- Modify an item.
- Add an item to a merchant.
- Add a conditionally available item to a merchant.
- Create a new recipe.
- Create a new recipe item.
- Create a container item.
- Add an item to a container.
- Add an ‘OnUse’ function on an item to activate a collection.
- Add a conditional item reward for a successful event (collection activated and concerned achievement still not completed).
- Add a conditional item drop from a monster.
- Add a conditional item drop from a chest.
- Add a conditional item drop from a gathering node.
- Add a conditional dialogue to an NPC.
- Add a conditional interactive item/space to a zone.
- Create a new achievement linked to an object.
- Create a new collection object.

Considering the collections were introduced with the “September 2014 Feature Pack”, that they did some rework for Hot and that they knew they would make quite a few collections, one could have expected them to develop the tools to do it efficiently. They had what, 2 years to do it?

Must be a lack of personnel If they had to take the 6 devs off content that was sold but not delivered to work in other segments of the game.

Or those 6 are just really incompetent or poorly assigned. We don’t know if this same small team was behind the first 3 weapons or the 20 old precursor collections, but it’s obvious that someone at Anet is capable of making the content. They managed to push out those collections, a bunch of others along with them in HoT, and a crap-ton of them got added to the core game back in 2014. If there was some massive difficulty in creating collections, they must have known it before now. They would have known it before HoT launched, and likely even before they announced it.

It’s like building a subdivision of 20 houses, but not noticing all of your nails are rusted and lumber rotted until you’re laying down the carpets on the 12th house. You can’t work with something for that long, and complete so much, without seeing the problem.

Unfortunately for the customers it looks like the “legendary collection stories” were too much to complete (i.e. over-scope). I would much rather the weapons to be added without the collection story elements if meant we would actually get the weapons.

Spira.4578:

Obtena.7952:

Spira.4578:

Which is none of your business. Everyone sets their own goals and everyone has different likes and dislikes.

Actually, it’s very much our business since you’re willingly and openly discussing in on a public forum. … so no, if people aren’t ready to talk about the goals they set for the endgame and how it relates to Legendary development, they shouldn’t use that as point for discussion and probably exclude themselves from the whole discussion in the first place.

I’m willing to mention it as part of the argument, but the only thing we actually need to know are the answer to 2 questions
Did we pay full price for the expansion? Yes
Did ANET provided with EVERYTHING they were promoting as part of HoT? No

Obtena.7952:

Probably exclude themselves from the whole discussion in the first place.

Lol!
The main issue here is the fact that the customer didn’t get what they paid for.

This is the way I see it. It’s not true that we didn’t pay for features. Of course, we did. The whole reason they list features of an expansion is so we’ll know what we’re paying for. If features were so unimportant and arbitrary, they wouldn’t bother listing them and we wouldn’t know what we’re spending our money on. It’s the standard by which we make our decision to spend our money. What they cut is irrelevant. The fact that features listed as an expansion, that were used to make the decision to spend the money, were cut after the fact is the problem. I think it’s sloppy and unprofessional. Until they actually add everything they listed as being the HoT expansion, I’ll consider it a partially finished product.

Sorry Jaken, I slightly changed the order of your items, to make a shorter post. I hope you don’t mind.

How about adding these things:
- design an item
- design an item from the ground up

Yes, there is an icon to draw. Those are often close to an existing one. A name. <Part of monster>. A description? “An item that was taken from <monster> hint: you can find it at <location>”.
What is the difference between “designing” and “designing from the ground”?

Jaken.6801:

- create a story surrounding that item

If they want to make a collection for a precursor without having already figured the thematic of the legendary, well… Besides, “story” is really a big word. For that shiny great-sword of light, we say you are a hero and must save some villagers. <includes list of events where you save villagers>. For that fishy weapon, you have to kill fishes <includes list of fishes to kill>.

Jaken.6801:

- work with other members of the big teams, which means you have to coordinate with them, which can be hard. This includes the lore team, the art team, programmer, etc…

The art team? Well, if they make the icons, just put a place-holder meanwhile. Not blocking.
The lore team? Considering how the precursors collections seem to have been done, intensive interaction does not seem required. And the main lore aspects should already be known.
The programmers? Well, yes, if they have been waiting for two years for the tools to make collections, that can definitely be a problem. My list is mainly referring to that aspect.
The economist? Sure, the price-tag comes from John Smith.

Jaken.6801:

- fail at things
- scrap the item

You aren’t supposed to chain-fail for 6 months. Especially if it’s not the first time you’re doing something.
If you scrap an item, then the item goes under the “failed at thing” aspect?

Jaken.6801:

- reorganize things

Like? A collection seems like something that is already structured.

Jaken.6801:

- get better ideas

Sure, they will be able to use them for the next 13 precursors. Oh wait, they wont.

Jaken.6801:

- get hold up somewhere

Sure, it happens. Not for months, though.

Jaken.6801:

- having writers block

What is there to block on? They aren’t writing a book. The dialogues I’ve read from the precursors hunts were not particularly complex. “You after <shiny>? Me give <shiny> if you give <insert item>”. I’d say that the heart quests from the core game were (far) more developed.

Jaken.6801:

And all that for 8+ items all at the same time

We’re not talking “balancing 8 classes at the same time” complexity here.
The technical part, which my list does refer to, should be trivial. For the design part, considering it’s a set of items with the same thematic and following the same logic, it should not be a problem. (Item1:killfish1, Item2:killfish2,…)

Jaken.6801:

while staying up to date with development in general

Irrelevant. If someone works 40h per week, it does certainly not mean he works 40h per week on his project. At least not in any medium/big software related company. But that should have been taken into consideration from the start.

Jaken.6801:

- actually create the system that allows them to implement that
- and trying to fix things that were broken, after release.
If any of you had looked into the collection you see a vast amount of things there. Part old, part new.
Some of them even require new interactions or maybe new coding.
As far as we know the whole system has been build from the ground up, just using the collection system as a base.

That’s my point. All this should be available in the content editor. If those adding the precursor collections had to manually dig in everything to do their job, I can only pity them. And to have so many bugs at release, I can only imagine the “Add conditional thing to” from my list were not available. Poor souls.

I’m not saying there is no work involved in the process. Just that the collection part does not seem to justify insurmountable time/manpower problems. Especially since they should have some experience with it now.

On a side note, I may sound critical concerning the depth of the precursor hunt, I just call it as I see it. And since 95% (random guess) of the players only see it as a check-list, I wouldn’t have expected them to make it more developed.

The good news is, it seems they’ve finally updated the HoT page to include the fact that we won’t be getting all the weapons most of us were sold when we bought the expansion.

Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns will let you begin your journey toward the first new set of legendary weapons to be added to the game since its original set of 20 that were included in the launch of Guild Wars 2. The first three to be released will be the celestial axe named Astralaria, an experimental energy pistol called H.O.P.E., and the raven spirit staff named Nevermore. Additional legendary weapons will be released in small groups at regular intervals until the full set of 16 has been added to this game.

Update, March 2016: Please see this post from game director Mike O’Brien about legendary weapons & upcoming content in Guild Wars 2.

Siobhan.5273:

The good news is, it seems they’ve finally updated the HoT page to include the fact that we won’t be getting all the weapons most of us were sold when we bought the expansion.

Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns will let you begin your journey toward the first new set of legendary weapons to be added to the game since its original set of 20 that were included in the launch of Guild Wars 2. The first three to be released will be the celestial axe named Astralaria, an experimental energy pistol called H.O.P.E., and the raven spirit staff named Nevermore. Additional legendary weapons will be released in small groups at regular intervals until the full set of 16 has been added to this game.

Update, March 2016: Please see this post from game director Mike O’Brien about legendary weapons & upcoming content in Guild Wars 2.

I think Anet is trying to have their cake and eat it, too. You ate most of the cake, now it’s time to take down the sign that says you’re selling a whole cake. Not scribbling “sorry, we ate half the cake” “turn over sign for details on what we did with the cake” on the sign.

They leave up the false info, and put an unclear “something has changed” subtext to it, with nothing but a forum post link to clarify. They could have at least taken out the last line that specifically states 16 weapons would be added, and perhaps reworded the first line a bit. That would get rid of the blatantly false info and leave the rest being somewhat vague, but still true. Of course, the update should still remain to further clarify the situation.

They do get points for adding the updated info, but it definitely could have been done much better without any additional effort.

mrstealth.6701:

Siobhan.5273:

The good news is, it seems they’ve finally updated the HoT page to include the fact that we won’t be getting all the weapons most of us were sold when we bought the expansion.

Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns will let you begin your journey toward the first new set of legendary weapons to be added to the game since its original set of 20 that were included in the launch of Guild Wars 2. The first three to be released will be the celestial axe named Astralaria, an experimental energy pistol called H.O.P.E., and the raven spirit staff named Nevermore. Additional legendary weapons will be released in small groups at regular intervals until the full set of 16 has been added to this game.

Update, March 2016: Please see this post from game director Mike O’Brien about legendary weapons & upcoming content in Guild Wars 2.

I think Anet is trying to have their cake and eat it, too. You ate most of the cake, now it’s time to take down the sign that says you’re selling a whole cake. Not scribbling “sorry, we ate half the cake” on the sign. Not scribbling “turn over sign for details on what we did with the cake” on the sign.

They leave up the false info, and put an unclear “something has changed” subtext to it, with nothing but a forum post link to clarify. They could have at least taken out the last line that specifically states 16 weapons would be added, and perhaps reworded the first line a bit. That would get rid of the blatantly false info and leave the rest being somewhat vague, but still true. Of course, the update should still remain to further clarify the situation.

You could look at it that way, or you could look at it as they want to keep the old post as it is to show what it said originally while also informing people of the changes. The last time they outright changed an advertisement on their site to better represent the current product (something about needing core GW2 to play HoT before they decided Central Tyria would come with HoT) there were a lot of accusations that they were manipulating and trying to hide the error from us. I see this new method as an attempt at transparency. Though I think simply crossing out the changed info and an asterisk with a note would’ve been better but w/e.

DaikonSamurai.6714:

mrstealth.6701:

Siobhan.5273:

The good news is, it seems they’ve finally updated the HoT page to include the fact that we won’t be getting all the weapons most of us were sold when we bought the expansion.

Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns will let you begin your journey toward the first new set of legendary weapons to be added to the game since its original set of 20 that were included in the launch of Guild Wars 2. The first three to be released will be the celestial axe named Astralaria, an experimental energy pistol called H.O.P.E., and the raven spirit staff named Nevermore. Additional legendary weapons will be released in small groups at regular intervals until the full set of 16 has been added to this game.

Update, March 2016: Please see this post from game director Mike O’Brien about legendary weapons & upcoming content in Guild Wars 2.

I think Anet is trying to have their cake and eat it, too. You ate most of the cake, now it’s time to take down the sign that says you’re selling a whole cake. Not scribbling “sorry, we ate half the cake” on the sign. Not scribbling “turn over sign for details on what we did with the cake” on the sign.

They leave up the false info, and put an unclear “something has changed” subtext to it, with nothing but a forum post link to clarify. They could have at least taken out the last line that specifically states 16 weapons would be added, and perhaps reworded the first line a bit. That would get rid of the blatantly false info and leave the rest being somewhat vague, but still true. Of course, the update should still remain to further clarify the situation.

You could look at it that way, or you could look at it as they want to keep the old post as it is to show what it said originally while also informing people of the changes. The last time they outright changed an advertisement on their site to better represent the current product (something about needing core GW2 to play HoT before they decided Central Tyria would come with HoT) there were a lot of accusations that they were manipulating and trying to hide the error from us. I see this new method as an attempt at transparency. Though I think simply crossing out the changed info and an asterisk with a note would’ve been better but w/e.

That’s a good point. Even if the change is less drastic, it could be seen as trying to sweep it under the rug. Crossing it out would be the most clear way to handle it.

Though Anet might not want to put a big “we cancelled this after selling it” message on their marketing page, it’s still the most accurate and honest way of doing it. Which I think is something they do need to focus on right now. Anet has a lot of trust to re-earn if they want to sell another expansion later on.

It’s frankly sad that a game that was/is so stable (compared to some others) can’t manage to deliver on key features that were promised to people who paid for the xpac. Simply put, Anet had been accused by many of us with using bait and not give tactics in the past and we were shouted down by many true believers. Now they’ve done it again on a bigger (IMO) scale and they will simply try to move on as if it never happened. Ridiculous. But hey, I’m sure tomorrow’s patch is going to be AWESONE, right? I mean, they have such a great track record with big game changing updates they release in April.

mrstealth.6701:

DaikonSamurai.6714:

mrstealth.6701:

Siobhan.5273:

The good news is, it seems they’ve finally updated the HoT page to include the fact that we won’t be getting all the weapons most of us were sold when we bought the expansion.

Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns will let you begin your journey toward the first new set of legendary weapons to be added to the game since its original set of 20 that were included in the launch of Guild Wars 2. The first three to be released will be the celestial axe named Astralaria, an experimental energy pistol called H.O.P.E., and the raven spirit staff named Nevermore. Additional legendary weapons will be released in small groups at regular intervals until the full set of 16 has been added to this game.

Update, March 2016: Please see this post from game director Mike O’Brien about legendary weapons & upcoming content in Guild Wars 2.

I think Anet is trying to have their cake and eat it, too. You ate most of the cake, now it’s time to take down the sign that says you’re selling a whole cake. Not scribbling “sorry, we ate half the cake” on the sign. Not scribbling “turn over sign for details on what we did with the cake” on the sign.

They leave up the false info, and put an unclear “something has changed” subtext to it, with nothing but a forum post link to clarify. They could have at least taken out the last line that specifically states 16 weapons would be added, and perhaps reworded the first line a bit. That would get rid of the blatantly false info and leave the rest being somewhat vague, but still true. Of course, the update should still remain to further clarify the situation.

You could look at it that way, or you could look at it as they want to keep the old post as it is to show what it said originally while also informing people of the changes. The last time they outright changed an advertisement on their site to better represent the current product (something about needing core GW2 to play HoT before they decided Central Tyria would come with HoT) there were a lot of accusations that they were manipulating and trying to hide the error from us. I see this new method as an attempt at transparency. Though I think simply crossing out the changed info and an asterisk with a note would’ve been better but w/e.

That’s a good point. Even if the change is less drastic, it could be seen as trying to sweep it under the rug. Crossing it out would be the most clear way to handle it.

Though Anet might not want to put a big “we cancelled this after selling it” message on their marketing page, it’s still the most accurate and honest way of doing it. Which I think is something they do need to focus on right now. Anet has a lot of trust to re-earn if they want to sell another expansion later on.

You guys nailed it on both issues.

Celtic Lady.3729:

What they cut is irrelevant. The fact that features listed as an expansion, that were used to make the decision to spend the money, were cut after the fact is the problem. I think it’s sloppy and unprofessional. Until they actually add everything they listed as being the HoT expansion, I’ll consider it a partially finished product.

Postponed indefinitely does not mean cut. Be upset all you want about the indefinite postponement, but at least be aware what you are upset about.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Celtic Lady.3729:

What they cut is irrelevant. The fact that features listed as an expansion, that were used to make the decision to spend the money, were cut after the fact is the problem. I think it’s sloppy and unprofessional. Until they actually add everything they listed as being the HoT expansion, I’ll consider it a partially finished product.

Postponed indefinitely does not mean cut. Be upset all you want about the indefinite postponement, but at least be aware what you are upset about.

Time will tell if “postponed indefinitely” really means “cut.” I believe there’s a good chance that’s exactly what it’ll end up meaning, but yes, we’ll all wait and see.

OH this is rich: People were upset that Anet was advertising a feature they didn’t fully deliver one so when they fix that advertising, people accuse them of sweeping it under the rug.

This is really part of the reason Anet shouldn’t take the calls in this thread of compensation, reimbursement and appeasement all that seriously; it wouldn’t change the fact that people act in this manner.

Obtena.7952:

OH this is rich: People were upset that Anet was advertising a feature they didn’t fully deliver one so when they fix that advertising, people accuse them of sweeping it under the rug.

This is really part of the reason Anet shouldn’t take the calls in this thread of compensation, reimbursement and appeasement all that seriously; it wouldn’t change the fact that people act in this manner.

Did you read the whole thing? It said IF they removed the original advertising, it could be conceived as them sweeping it under the rug, not that they did.

Sorry I don’t buy it. If someone says it MIGHT be conceived as something and they were against it in the first place, they are thinking it as well. There is an agenda there; they want something.

Obtena.7952:

Sorry I don’t buy it. If someone says it MIGHT be conceived as something and they were against it in the first place, they are thinking it as well. There is an agenda there; they want something.

I’m not looking to sell you anything, so it doesn’t matter to me if you buy it or not. It’s right there. No need for me to tap dance, I’ve got nothing to gain.

Obtena.7952:

Sorry I don’t buy it. If someone says it MIGHT be conceived as something and they were against it in the first place, they are thinking it as well. There is an agenda there; they want something.

Yes your right I want my money back for hot without losing the core game.

Obtena.7952:

Sorry I don’t buy it. If someone says it MIGHT be conceived as something and they were against it in the first place, they are thinking it as well. There is an agenda there; they want something.

It might be seen that way, if they had actually done it. It’s not related at all to anything Anet has done. In fact, it was something I had originally suggested that they do, then later acknowledged that it might be perceived in an unfavorable way and agreed that another more transparent option would be better. An idea based on the negative reaction to Anet’s FAQ editing the day HoT was put up for pre-order.

So yeah, I guess I have the evil agenda of wanting to see Anet present information in a manner that is least likely to be construed as misleading, false, or attempting to hide something.

The fake promises Anet makes are greater than the fake promises our government in Greece makes.

I have been waiting for new legendary weapons since they were announced in an article in 2013! For 3 Years! Three f…. full years! And finally when expansion came and I thought that the miracle had happened, they released an announcement of terminating their progress. I mean… would the devil himself do something like this? I wonder.

To sum up, thanks for not keeping me in game Mike O’ Brien! I have been playing console games this season and that announcement reassured me that I have been spending fewer hours in console gaming than I was supposed to.

Sadly… Guild Wars 2 is dead.

Thanks for new blc weapon skins and an outfit. You have outdone yourself on them. They are also far more important than legendary junk weapons. Keep the good job up

Mike O Brien.4613:

I strongly believe that we will in fact entertain you. We’re a team of people who love the game that you love, and are working on things we’re confident you’ll love. But I’m not here to convince you of that, and I wouldn’t expect you to take my word for it. You can make that judgment in April, and each subsequent time we ship. I will work to make you happy, and I’ll do it by making you happy with what we ship, not with what we promise to ship.

Mo

So, no legendary longbow to work towards, and now you nerfed my reaper.
It is now april, and I have made my judgement.
I am neither entertained nor happy. Since you’re confident I’ll love what you do, I’m forced to utter those dreaded words: “we need to talk”.

Fumigene.5076:

- snip -

Okay, let me just throw these things out here:

Story and Theme
First you have to come up with a theme and design (what is first, doesn’t matter now), which might have a story or not, but having one is better.
You create the thing, do research and build something around it.

Then you have to see how it fits in the world you create it for. If it doesn’t you have to see how to make it fit.

Example: Creating a cool sword for a shooter. Doesn’t fit at first, till you can incorporate it somehow.

So the recent shortbow for example, based on an real life myth. Nice idea. From that the weapon has to be created. Then it has to be trasnfered into the world of Tyria.

This is not just a collection, as they have to know the world and (even loosely at the moment) have them fit thematicaly. It means they have to know where and what is.

Which means another round of research, to find as many cross over situations to make it happen.
If they don’t get this right, people will feel like they didn’t put effort in.

Example: New legendary sowrd excalibur themed. If they just have you find a sword in a stone to start things, it just isn’t interesting, more so as there is no sword in the stone story in GW2 right now (we got fiery ones, though). If the collection however is using the athurian legend as a background, like having you do task worthy of a king for example, which measn you have to talk to the races leaders and do what they seem worthy of a leader/king, then it is something different. However all that has to be worked out.

Basicaly saying. There is more than just “kill X”, as they have shown with H.O.P.E. in which you have to be a bit more clever (on GW2 terms, but you have to puzzle some things together and it was still a checklist, but we are getting there)

Interacting with others
Art Team : And things get never redesigned, changed or scrapped. Knowing someone in the industry and how she is annoyed by these things, it isn’t that easy.

Lore : Look at the example above. You can just cram it in somehow, or you di it with care. Feedback from the loreteam, based on your legendary idea should be a given and can create a greater workload, depending on the scope.

Programmer : If it was just collections, then sure. You would be right. However if you had looked at the tasks required for some of the legendaries then you would see that it is more then check if item X is in possession . Because item X can be an item, something you did in the world or something you have to create. So these things need all be implemented in various parts of the games. maybe in parts that weren’t supposed to do that.

Failure
Yes, you shouldn’t fail so much. We have seen where they ended up. Scrapped. We still don’t know why and them being cut, might just be economic.
However they were working at several at once. Even if they switched around, depending on where they can work at the moment, problems accumulate and stop progress. That’s just how it is. Maybe a problem or idea can also result in them reworking other. The whole development process is not a straight line.

brainstorm
Yes, getting better ideas happen and no that doesn’t mean they have to put them on the backburner because another came first. If the new idea just fits better than the first idea, then use that.

Example: I bet you woudn’t like if the first idea was punch you in the face and the second was talking about who has taken your pudding out of the refrigerator.

Writers block or blocked thoughts
You work on something and get blocked. Nothing works, you have no idea. blocked.
You don’t have to write a book, but you are trying to come up with soemthing and you can’t.
Even the easiest things can be blocked, for various reasons. You think it is simple, then go ahead and try doing complex that looks easy from the outside. Like swordfighting. I mean, it is just swinging a sword at the enemy, right? You know the theory, but then reality hits you over the head, leaving you unconcious for three days.

Content editor
Yes, it should be versitile enough to make some quick changes.
However these changes need to be implimented once, to be effective. If these conditions are not present, then they have to be created. Like making a background object, being able to interact with. I don’t think it is just click on object and connect it with collection.
So everything that was present before has to be implemented somehow.

Scope
Yes, many see it as a simple checklist and that’s what it is. However only because it should be accesable. The playerbase got lazy. They don’t want to think too much.
They could have gone oldschool with the legendaries. No collections, just following the clues by NPCs or random items.
However that is like saying: StarWars is about some guy in the desert who goes out saving a princess and the universe with a thief and an old guy. . It just isn’t doing it justice.

I just want to say thank you for not adding more legendary weapons to the game I’m sure I’m in the minority but hey – our voices exist, too and you should hear them. Thank you.

Firefly.5982:

I just want to say thank you for not adding more legendary weapons to the game I’m sure I’m in the minority but hey – our voices exist, too and you should hear them. Thank you.

Still very much confused by these posts. You’re literally thanking them for not adding content somebody else paid for simply because you don’t necessarily plan to play that content. Pure selfishness.

Dinks.2478:

Firefly.5982:

I just want to say thank you for not adding more legendary weapons to the game I’m sure I’m in the minority but hey – our voices exist, too and you should hear them. Thank you.

Still very much confused by these posts. You’re literally thanking them for not adding content somebody else paid for simply because you don’t necessarily plan to play that content. Pure selfishness.

It is that kind of persons you want to…. opppsss!

Rising Blade.9206:

Jaken.6801:

Rising Blade.9206:

well it’s quite a shame that nobody even bothered asking them in their AMA about this thread. then again, it’s full of Anet sockpuppets and white knights hence why they ignore forums completely and run there.

So why didn’t you?
Did you go through the whole thread?
Did you look at the other threads at the same time, where devs were active?

different timezone, checked other threads during that time, nothing of the sorts. second, checked the thread, no questions or either way down the rabbit-hole of “answerable” questions and praises and probably downvoted. i would’ve posted a question IF i had a reddit account.

People asked questions about the visual issues, and were totally ignored, yet Colin dank meme got quite the bit of attention, as did the discussion on the care of sponges. Reddit is laughable for those looking for answers to questions. Heck, people were offering to send the team beer they “clearly are owed”. Yes, these are the people who bought them cupcakes. Yes, for them doing what we already pay them to do… /boggled. No wonder we go through “content droughts”. We forget to get them nummies.

Ashandar.2570:

So, no legendary longbow to work towards, and now you nerfed my reaper.
It is now april, and I have made my judgement.
I am neither entertained nor happy. Since you’re confident I’ll love what you do, I’m forced to utter those dreaded words: “we need to talk”.

The fact they added a _short_bow indicates that “no new legendaries ever” (something that was never claimed, only read into statements by pessimists) isn’t true. And if they added one, they can add others. Although, hopefully not one per quarter – I’m kind of hoping one per month? Pretty please?

P.S. If they do add another, your signature will be invalidated.

P.P.S. Unless you’re Count Rugen, I suppose.

Duke Darkwood.4237:

Ashandar.2570:

So, no legendary longbow to work towards, and now you nerfed my reaper.
It is now april, and I have made my judgement.
I am neither entertained nor happy. Since you’re confident I’ll love what you do, I’m forced to utter those dreaded words: “we need to talk”.

The fact they added a _short_bow indicates that “no new legendaries ever” (something that was never claimed, only read into statements by pessimists) isn’t true. And if they added one, they can add others. Although, hopefully not one per quarter – I’m kind of hoping one per month? Pretty please?

P.S. If they do add another, your signature will be invalidated.

P.P.S. Unless you’re Count Rugen, I suppose.

They took the team that was doing Legendaries off that and onto other things. Until they reassemble that group it’s no new Legendaries, not once a month and or once a quarter, but none at all.

Duke Darkwood.4237:

Ashandar.2570:

So, no legendary longbow to work towards, and now you nerfed my reaper.
It is now april, and I have made my judgement.
I am neither entertained nor happy. Since you’re confident I’ll love what you do, I’m forced to utter those dreaded words: “we need to talk”.

The fact they added a _short_bow indicates that “no new legendaries ever” (something that was never claimed, only read into statements by pessimists) isn’t true. And if they added one, they can add others. Although, hopefully not one per quarter – I’m kind of hoping one per month? Pretty please?

P.S. If they do add another, your signature will be invalidated.

P.P.S. Unless you’re Count Rugen, I suppose.

Did you read the first post of this thread? They disbanded the legendary team. As in there is nobody working on legendaries. Don’t expect something in a monthly, quarterly, or even yearly release cycle there is nobody making it.

Mike O’Brien:

Looking at the size of this thread, it would have probably been easier if you kept quiet about this and just have people ‘wait’ for quite a while, then there wouldn’t be this huge uproar about it. Just people constantly asking when next one is, similar to the SAB situation we had.

But it was morally the right thing to do, no matter how difficult it was to announce, so Kudos for that. tips hat

penelopehannibal.8947:

Mike O’Brien:

Looking at the size of this thread, it would have probably been easier if you kept quiet about this and just have people ‘wait’ for quite a while, then there wouldn’t be this huge uproar about it. Just people constantly asking when next one is, similar to the SAB situation we had.

But it was morally the right thing to do, no matter how difficult it was to announce, so Kudos for that. tips hat

I love the irony in giving somebody the moral highground for telling people all about how he took their money and isn’t giving the service paid for.

I disagree on the effect of waiting. Eventually it would have to be disclosed, or people would just notice as time went by without any being released, and the longer he took to tell us, the more people would have sunk mats into account bound Gifts in preparation.

This uproar is a pond ripple compared to the tempest that would come if they canceled (sorry, “suspended”) legendaries without notifying players for months. Right now it’s just a hard business decision they made (and a very disappointing one and the “correction” to the HoT site they belatedly put in still isn’t enough to offset the paragraph promising 16 legendaries). Concealing it would move them outright into the sleaze side.

Congratulations anet it was a decent patch on an expansion that needed a lot of work but you still took our money for Content that you are no longer providing the weapons are a lot more then just the weapon skins at the end it was the whole quest for each individual weapon that won’t be part of the game that’s a lot of content that was sold and won’t be delivered. What you did it is just a start a good start in the size and scope of it just shows how much needed to be done there’s still a lot more that needs to be done though

What I really don’t understand is this: If it’s too difficult to work within the framework of the legendary journey, is it really a worse option to add the actual legendary/precursor weapons than it is to renege on features of an expansion you outright promised wouldn’t ship until it was ready?

If you can’t deliver the crafting bit- if that’s the bottleneck in this process- then why not at least deliver the bare bones of what was advertised?

Guhracie.3419:

Well, Vayne, you managed to respond to my last post without seeming to have read any of the words in it. I would respond, but I am baffled as to how to interpret your post, without any context about what questions and points you’re even answering. I don’t mean to be insulting, I just want to be clear that I would like to respond, but cannot.

All my best!

Ticky.5831:

Ashen.2907:

A drought does not mean a complete absence, but rather an insufficiency. I live in an area that has been in its worst drought in over a thousand years, but we still get rain.

I do not think that the existence of raids means that there is not a content drought.

Well, raids are pretty much the only thing MMOs(in general) are expected to come out with between expansions.

So by the general standards, either it’s not a content drought, or MMOs in general are in a constant state of content drought.

You want to argue with Mike O’Brien, the man who brought “content drought” into this conversation and also started this thread? Okay, yeah, that’s totally reasonable.

This MMO gave the expectation that things other than a couple of raid bosses were going to be released. This is the MMO that claims to do things differently. This MMO was built around the idea of regular content updates and a living, breathing, world. In short, you’re arguing that Mr. O’Brien is wrong about the state of his game and instead chose to literally suggest that players be angry about the content drought.

That response seems uncharacteristic, to say the least.

My line of thought is; “There is no content drought, so I don’t see the point in suspending Legendarys to address a content drought”.

Fancypants.9705:

- We are releasing a journey to make legendaries easier and cheaper to create…

You have 6 developers working on legendaries?? FIRE them all, its takes them 2-3 years or however long the game has been out for and they come up with 4?? 1 of which (the shortbow) I am sure has been copied from Aion.

1) Actually, the intention was never to make them cheaper, just to make them non-RNG

2) Apparently, for what it’s worth, I don’t think the Legendary team is to blame for this. Apparently they weren’t solely working on the Legendarys and were also tasked with working on other things. It sounds like they were just grossly mismanaged to me.

Dinks.2478:

penelopehannibal.8947:

Mike O’Brien:

Looking at the size of this thread, it would have probably been easier if you kept quiet about this and just have people ‘wait’ for quite a while, then there wouldn’t be this huge uproar about it. Just people constantly asking when next one is, similar to the SAB situation we had.

But it was morally the right thing to do, no matter how difficult it was to announce, so Kudos for that. tips hat

I love the irony in giving somebody the moral highground for telling people all about how he took their money and isn’t giving the service paid for.

The service was postponed not cancelled. Now if they announce the next expansion without any new legendaries being released before then I will gladly grab a pitchfork even though I could care less about them. In fact until the game has stabilized and delivered on promises like legendaries there is no way I could give them money for an expansion.

bloodletting wolf.2837:

Dinks.2478:

penelopehannibal.8947:

Mike O’Brien:

Looking at the size of this thread, it would have probably been easier if you kept quiet about this and just have people ‘wait’ for quite a while, then there wouldn’t be this huge uproar about it. Just people constantly asking when next one is, similar to the SAB situation we had.

But it was morally the right thing to do, no matter how difficult it was to announce, so Kudos for that. tips hat

I love the irony in giving somebody the moral highground for telling people all about how he took their money and isn’t giving the service paid for.

The service was postponed not cancelled. Now if they announce the next expansion without any new legendaries being released before then I will gladly grab a pitchfork even though I could care less about them. In fact until the game has stabilized and delivered on promises like legendaries there is no way I could give them money for an expansion.

By that time though, no Legendaries will be old news. Your pitchfork will less pointed than our current pitchforks and completely ignored. Any post or thread with pitchfork waving in a year or so will be greeted with a collective yawn from the forum followed by a query of “Where have you been all this time? That was ages ago.”

After reading some of the comments legendary weapons would be core and legendary weapons were promised too be a feature is the new heart of the thrones expansion.