Guild Wars 2

Greetings!

In every MMO I have played there has been a gear grind and I am so thankful that GW2 is not that way. However, I understand that people love the feeling of advancing their character and that people want to set there toons apart from others. With the game now being over two years old and you hear whispers in the wind regarding possible “expansion” I thought it would be a good opportunity put in my two cents in regarding advancement levels past 80.

One thing that has bothered me regarding MMO’s, even here is how easy it is to get to level cap. XP = level and that is fine up to a point. However, I have always felt that the progression of the character should supersede that of gear progression. I have always felt that reaching level cap should be more complex, more involved, more legendary and require more than just XP. To me level cap should be an epic journey. Why should we expect all players to hit level cap? Do all players get legendries? Do all players get ascended armor? No, but can work for it and achieve it if you want to. Why should not leveling be the same way?

The thought process behind my idea is very similar to the GW1 heritage rewards that some have completed. In order for you to get the title “God Walking Amongst Mere Mortals” you had to very nearly complete every event, almost every single achievement in the game and I feel that if past 80 level advancement was conducted this way that this would be our true end game and our story. The point of this is to take years to complete. Just so we are clear, for this to work all content would still be written for lvl 80 so that old and new content does not become irreverent. Yes, advance levels will make some content easier but it would not be required to play new content and considering how long it would take to get to these levels and that getting to these levels would require completing most of the content anyway this issue should be null. Below is a very ruff example of how I in vision this working.

Please note that events like WvW and SPvP would be still capped at 80 for balance.

[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/dAkuB3W.jpg[/IMG]

As you can see this list is not flushed out it needs A LOT of work and discussion but does give an example of how it could be structured. Also, I see this working in a conjunction with a Personal Story for each of the 5 main level points 81, 85, 90, 95 & 100. I believe that this would be a great way to advance without instituting “gear or Level” grind. FYI, this is meant to be hard, this is meant to be only for those who want this. We all want to be legendary but remember “When everyone is super no one is”

Q: Convert armor from one level to another?
A: This ability would work like the crafting backpacks and would be account bound. At level 95 you would be able to take a masterwork helm + mats to Ascended but you would not be able to sell the item. You could however salvage them for the mats.

Q: Does this progression mean new tiers of armor would be added?
A: No the stat increase would only come from your personal progression.

Q: You mentioned converting Ascended to Legendary does this mean that the only way to get legendary armor is to be level 100?
A: No it is just an alternate path.

Q: What if I do not want to make this journey, will I still be able to play “end game” content?
A: Yes, all content would stay at the current level.

Q: Would being level 100 help me in PvP or WvW?
A: No, for balance the cap for these would still be level 80.

Q: Did you come up with this because you are already mostly there?
A: No. I am at 5500 Ac, Level 20 WvW, ankitten ot dungeon master. I have always felt this way with MMO’s and I think that something like this is truly the way to go.

I look forward to hearing your thoughts.

All players should be able to reach max level.

Due to down scaling leveling past 80 would be pointless under method. You’d just be down scaled back to level 80.

And no easy button for making Ascended or Legendary. It needs to be about the same amount of time, money, and effort for getting either tier as they currently are.

I’m not a fan of the idea.

It’s inevitable that people will grind it out just for the rewards. Carrot on the stick. PvE content is already easy enough as it is in Exotics, players don’t need the stat increase from additional levels. Being able to upgrade gear is also not a great idea, even with severe limitations.

Getting to max level is the journey if players took time with it; it can be as epic as you want it to be. The only benefit of max level is getting the best gear (Exotic, Ascended is situationally better) and being able to do content quicker. That doesn’t mean you can’t do content as a lower level player with lower tier gear.

Seera.5916:

All players should be able to reach max level.

Due to down scaling leveling past 80 would be pointless under method. You’d just be down scaled back to level 80.

And no easy button for making Ascended or Legendary. It needs to be about the same amount of time, money, and effort for getting either tier as they currently are.

I did not think about the down scaling so yes that would be an issue. As far as legendary is concerned this is by far a harder path to it. Please look at the link to see an idea of how long it would take to complete.

Rashy.4165:

I’m not a fan of the idea.

It’s inevitable that people will grind it out just for the rewards. Carrot on the stick. PvE content is already easy enough as it is in Exotics, players don’t need the stat increase from additional levels. Being able to upgrade gear is also not a great idea, even with severe limitations.

Getting to max level is the journey if players took time with it; it can be as epic as you want it to be. The only benefit of max level is getting the best gear (Exotic, Ascended is situationally better) and being able to do content quicker. That doesn’t mean you can’t do content as a lower level player with lower tier gear.

You made my point exactly it is too easy to grind to max cap. Please look at the link i provided you will see that in conjuration with xp there is also karma requirements, achievement requirements (both pvp and pve) and skill point requirements

The Last Jagaroth.1652:

Rashy.4165:

I’m not a fan of the idea.

It’s inevitable that people will grind it out just for the rewards. Carrot on the stick. PvE content is already easy enough as it is in Exotics, players don’t need the stat increase from additional levels. Being able to upgrade gear is also not a great idea, even with severe limitations.

Getting to max level is the journey if players took time with it; it can be as epic as you want it to be. The only benefit of max level is getting the best gear (Exotic, Ascended is situationally better) and being able to do content quicker. That doesn’t mean you can’t do content as a lower level player with lower tier gear.

You made my point exactly it is too easy to grind to max cap. Please look at the link i provided you will see that in conjuration with xp there is also karma requirements, achievement requirements (both pvp and pve) and skill point requirements

Oh, I did look at the requirements, and I still don’t think it’s a good idea. Couple of main reasons:
- Skill points are easy to obtain. Champ bags give quite a lot of skill point scrolls, I’ve gotten a 100 in a short time.
- Karma trains give tons of exp per hour.
- WvW ranks are too easy with karma train in EOTM.
- Crafting requires gold, with about 400-500g after sellback, you can level up everything to 400 or 500 depending.

Really the only challenging part in the requirements is the crafted Legendary and Achievement Points.

The rewards will also need to be tuned.

Just as people ground out content to get to level 80 quickly, people WILL grind out these additional levels. The people who do grind them out will get the cool rewards, while the ones who don’t won’t get it. That goes against what ANet intended: for everyone to have a fair opportunity at max level, and to focus more on horizontal progression (this is clearly vertical progression).

Even if you intend for this system to take “years”, people will speed through it and get it in a very short amount of time. The current leveling experience is fantastic – there’s no rush to reach max level, and players have a ton of maps to explore and do their own thing. Does it feel like an epic journey? That’s up to the player.

I don’t think people want vertical progression. What people do want is to be rewarded for their effort in existing content (better loot based on time spent), as well as new, more varied content (as opposed to having essentially the same content for 2 years now) to sink their teeth into. There are obviously some exceptions (Dry Top, Silverwastes).

I don’t see why levelling past 80 shouldn’t be in the game. I kind of wish it was. It gives a bit of purpose to those purposeless exploration sessions on an already levelled character.

I mean just an aesthetic thing, don’t tweak stats. Just something to say how many times past 80 people have levelled just for coolness points

The Last Jagaroth.1652:

Seera.5916:

All players should be able to reach max level.

Due to down scaling leveling past 80 would be pointless under method. You’d just be down scaled back to level 80.

And no easy button for making Ascended or Legendary. It needs to be about the same amount of time, money, and effort for getting either tier as they currently are.

I did not think about the down scaling so yes that would be an issue. As far as legendary is concerned this is by far a harder path to it. Please look at the link to see an idea of how long it would take to complete.

But once you’re at max level, you’re at max level. Which only requires crafting one legendary. By that point you also have crafts maxed so making ascended gear is a LOT cheaper than getting another legendary. Sorry, it’s still an easy button.

Not a fan of raising the level cap. IIRC the level cap was 20 and stayed at 20 in the first Guild Wars. Why do people want to change that here?

I still think the level is too high. 20 worked well in GW1.

LOL WoW

Ok well I guess I just think this would be harder than it may truly be. I still think that level cap what ever that be should include items of completion along with the XP gains. Thank you all for your thoughts