Guild Wars 2

When the Ascended gear was introduced, some folks shouted in elation, “Yeah! Item progression.” Then a lot of us reacted instinctive with dismay. A big concern is that casual players who don’t play enough will lag behind in WvW and (high level) PvE, two areas that most considered equally accessible to both casual and hardcore players.

But who is to say that each tier must be earned sequentially? From what I read, the new ring and back will be acquired from the new Fractal of the Mist dungeon; maybe the whole set will follow. Even if ANet introduce a new dungeon + new gear tier on a regular basis, there is nothing to prevent them from making each new dungeon+gear update self containing. If they design it a certain way, a group of players could tackle the 10th tier dungeon+gear (maybe with stats fully twice that of exotics) with all exotic gear instead of 9th tier gear and still be able to work their way toward a full 10th tier set.

That way, anyone who takes a break from playing will not be perpetually lagging behind, they’ll just do the most recently added content to make themselves competitive again. Before they actually acquire the most recent gear (to say nothing of levels), they are at a disadvantage. But you can’t have everything in a compromise.

I am sorry if I’ve duplicated anyone’s suggestion. Maybe ANet intended this all along in which case my apology goes to ANet. It’s the only compromise that occurred to me, and I want to offer at least one suggestion on the current issue before the window of relevance expires.

Cheers.

Thank you for suggestion, i disagree with the compromise, i paid the game and was assured times and times again this wouldnt be gear grinding, just because the system you are suggesting mitigates a bit the grinding, you will still lag behind, you will still be forced to get better gear everytime u just want to login and do high end content with them, for me that idea does not work, but thats just me and my silly ideas from GW1.

What I can see happening is them introducing new dungeons with other types of conditions, for which you will need new infusions on your ascended armor making ascended gear viable w/o adding a power creep / gear grind ladder at all.

So you’re saying I should be happy that I have to buy on the TP or grind in-dungeons for a new type of resistance gear every time I want to do a new dungeon?

Latinkuro.9420:

What I can see happening is them introducing new dungeons with other types of conditions, for which you will need new infusions on your ascended armor making ascended gear viable w/o adding a power creep / gear grind ladder at all.

This would be fine. But if you need previous gear to do the new dungeons (whether armor or Agony resist) then its gear treadmill. Its also gear treadmilll if they add new gear, self containing or not. The only way this avoids being treadmill is if Ascended gear is the last set of gear and new content uses self containing “runes” to make that content easier while not requiring previous “runes”

Edit:

Rojaha.4082:

So you’re saying I should be happy that I have to buy on the TP or grind in-dungeons for a new type of resistance gear every time I want to do a new dungeon?

No, its all about entry level. If Ascended is the last level of gear and you don’t need previous versions of Agony resist to do new content, then its not gated content, nor is gear treadmill. As long as the Agony aspect of the game is used in a way that makes new dungeons easier, and each new content has it own, then its not gear really treadmill in the sense that people hate, which is each new content replaces old content that YOU HAVE TO DO to do the new content. With self contained resistances, old content is replaced may be replaced by new content, but you don’t have to do the old content to even have a chance at the old (assuming Ascended gear can be crafted or it drops in the new content)

Rojaha.4082:

So you’re saying I should be happy that I have to buy on the TP or grind in-dungeons for a new type of resistance gear every time I want to do a new dungeon?

Not the gear mate, only the new infusion slot upgrade specific to the dungeon would be needed the gear would be the same ascended gear.

Why do people hate chasing gear? I like it, you do the new content and get your shinny’s as a reward and as a token that saids hey i did this. Do people just want content that is new and dont like reward i dont get it.

When I hit 80 I actually invested some real money in gems to help speed up some of the acquisition of my exotic gear because I had been told that exotic was it, so it seemed like a fair investment.

Now that additional real money investment appears to have been based on a lie by the company.

I wasted real life money because I was lied to.

Why on earth should I give a kitten about this company or their game when they bare faced me to pick my pocket?

wookie slayer.4259:

Why do people hate chasing gear? I like it, you do the new content and get your shinny’s as a reward and as a token that saids hey i did this. Do people just want content that is new and dont like reward i dont get it.

People obviously like chasing gear or they would have stopped at 80 and bought the cheapest exotics they could find for their class.

People obviously like it because they sought out TWO sets of exotics so their stats could also look good.

People obviously like it because they made legendary weapons, despite the fact that they do nothing but look pretty.

Prestige isn’t the problem, mechanical advantage is.

The instant you make people feel like they’re being pressured to spend sheer time in order to stay competitive, everything changes. You cheapen skill as a factor. A LOT of them are going to hate it. Especially when you went to such great lengths to assure them of the exact opposite in the first place.

wookie slayer.4259:

Why do people hate chasing gear? I like it, you do the new content and get your shinny’s as a reward and as a token that saids hey i did this. Do people just want content that is new and dont like reward i dont get it.

Reward doesn’t have to have new stats. I saw someone with a cool sword skin. If I got a choice of a range of cool sword skins upon completing all the dungeons on hardcore mode, I’d set myself the challenge to do it to get it.

I don’t understand why people need bigger on screen numbers to feel rewarded. If your number goes from 500 to 1000, the mob your fighting will have their health pool go from 2000 to 4000. All you gained is a pointless time sink and validation that fun isn’t the driving force for you to play a game, which seems rather counter intuitive to the point of playing games.

Plus there are many other potential rewards. Mystic stones, transmog stones. Chest keys. Boosters. Titles. Rare dyes. Waypoint discounts (cumulative over time). TP access days. Blah blah blah.

Oh, but they are in the gem store!!!!!! How do poor old ANet make money if they give stuff away?

By building up respect in the user base. You give stuff away through prizes for skill and success and your user base thinks kudos, and will actually invest in the game for other things, such as minis or gem store only skins, etc.

Unfortunately the marketing department aren’t very imaginative it seems and are chasing short termism. This WILL all blow up in their face. And when it does, well, I won’t care because I’ll be long gone by then as I’ve already been ripped off by their lies when I spent real money on gems to aid in getting my exotics because they were, allegedly, the ceiling. Unless they are willing to give me back that money now they changed the ceiling, then kitten them.

Hasty or not, the fact is, unless Anet gave us a solution, for now, I will be pulling my credit card away and will not support them any further via the cash shop, and I also will not recommend this game to anyone.

Sure, the money I pull away will not be much, and the couple new potential players that I might give Anet might be insignificant, but it could very well be money that they could have easily gotten, but too bad, right now, they lost that ability

Did Anet, at any point, say that exotics would be the highest tier of gear quality in terms of item stats in the game, or was it just an assumption made by the players?

Seems to me that the ascended (and eventually legendary) quality items are the “plateau” Anet talked about before release.

The infusion slot looks to work like resistance -based items from other games.

An instance causes players to suffer from a certain type of damage, and you mitigate that damage with items you stuff in to the infusion slot. Different types of resistance for different instances. So you keep the gear, you only swap the special infusion slot items.

It creates a sense of progression equipment wise without making other content less challenging I suppose, I fail to see the gear treadmill in it.

This is assuming I understood what Anet is saying correctly, and I guess we won’t know for sure until we see the new system and mechanics in action.

Ensio.8172:

This is assuming I understood what Anet is saying correctly, and I guess we won’t know for sure until we see the new system and mechanics in action.

Which is why we need a direct answer to the question: Is ascended gear the final tier of gear stat wise and will future content rely on rewards from previous content to even hope of completing.

If you get an answer? What have you then? just an other promise they will breake

Haralin.1473:

If you get an answer? What have you then? just an other promise they will breake

They haven’t broken the promise yet. They break it if they use gear as a means of character progression and content delivery MORE.

But the issue isn’t whether or not I will believe them. Its that having a clear answer, not the crap they posted, will save them headache later because people are assuming it going one way or the other. If they stay on that assumption, and their assumption is wrong then ANET will be in bigger trouble. It will be just like what Funcom did.

Don’t pull a Funcom ANET just dont.

Ensio.8172:

Seems to me that the ascended (and eventually legendary) quality items are the “plateau” Anet talked about before release.

Agony bullkitten aside, my last shred of faith is hanging by this thread. This is not an easy job and it never will be, things get over- and under-estimated and things get cut to make deadlines, or the game would never launch. It’s still reasonable to me that this is all an honest attempt to re-fix the plateau at the level they intended in the first place.

If it goes any further than this, it’s also gone beyond my comprehension.

Just be HONEST about this for godssake, and even if you decide to move the target again down the road, you’ll keep me around right up until that point.

Haralin.1473:

If you get an answer? What have you then? just an other promise they will breake

They haven’t broken their promise, not yet at least.

While I can understand why they would hesitate to make any clear cut statements given how the forums have reacted to the patch teasers they posted, they really need to explain the system so people will stop jumping to conclusions.

Ensio.8172:

Haralin.1473:

If you get an answer? What have you then? just an other promise they will breake

They haven’t broken their promise, not yet at least.

While I can understand why they would hesitate to make any clear cut statements given how the forums have reacted to the patch teasers they posted, they really need to explain the system so people will stop jumping to conclusions.

My thought exactly.

Not only what OP said but everyone is ignoring one crucial statement Linsey made:
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/linsey-murdock-unveils-new-high-end-ascended-gear/

As we introduce the new high-level content, we’ll also roll out complimentary Ascended and Legendary items (to say nothing of the other rewards you can earn by playing the content).

So far we don’t know what this means obviously so it could be nothing but it could also be there will be single events that give away a basic version of ascended armor as it is introduced much like the back item given away at halloween!

What if people are worried this is going to create a threadmill for them when in fact it will make getting a basic version (basic as in skin wise) of an ascended item much easier then getting an exotic simply to solve the issue so many people are worried about?

I personally think there are way to many unknowns to judge the situation objectively as is. Is it such a problem to just wait 3 days to see how the whole events play out, see first hand what infusions are all about (something we know nothing about as of now) and then react objectively when we have all the facts in our hands rather then being absolutely sure based on nothing more then guesses and gutfeelings that they decided to throw in the bin all the core design phylosofies for the game? which personally I find very hard to believe!

I could understand the OP’s point if AN had been man enough to present this plan when they were first intent on putting it in the game. They could of treated us like adults, sat down months ago and said “Ok we think end-game activities need a bit more incentive. We are planning something like this, this or this etc.”

Instead they spring a massive 180 degree about face less then three days before the patch and broker no discussion on it. And people wonder why hell broke loose.

I have no doubt a lot of the harsher responses could be overreaction or over-emotional but again, I put the blame squarely on AN. They had the chance to do the right thing and instead act without transparency or integrity. Their actions fly in the face of many claims of the development team (especially the “Respecting the player” tenant.) and in light of this, the whole thing looks nothing short of dishonest and underhanded.

So yeah, frankly I think they deserve whatever they get. You reap what you sow as the old saying goes.

Xpiher.5209:

Which is why we need a direct answer to the question: Is ascended gear the final tier of gear stat wise

They can’t answer questions like this because of people like this:

If you get an answer? What have you then? just an other promise they will breake

If ascended gear doesn’t end up serving its purpose or lasting long enough, then they will end up adding another tier.

This is why they answered your question with

“Adding item progression is a delicate process normally undertaken in an expansion, but we feel it’s important to strive to satisfy the basic needs of our players sooner rather than later”

and

“We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on”

Ensio.8172:

Haralin.1473:

If you get an answer? What have you then? just an other promise they will breake

They haven’t broken their promise, not yet at least.

They so have… play the game your way…. not any more… multiple paths to the same (stats) goal – crafting, pvp/wvw, dungeons… not any more… no exclusion from content based on gear… not any more. Communication is diabolical – obviously the only way to get a response from ANet is to QQ “I have nothing I can be bothered to do so this game sucks” Considering the number of in-game bugs like Arah being bugged shut more than it’s working as intended lets just ignore all of that and introduce a gear grind man that’s so brilliant why haven’t other MMO’s thought of it…. oh wait…. they did!

Galen Grey.4709:

As we introduce the new high-level content, we’ll also roll out complimentary Ascended and Legendary items (to say nothing of the other rewards you can earn by playing the content).

So far we don’t know what this means obviously so it could be nothing but it could also be there will be single events that give away a basic version of ascended armor as it is introduced much like the back item given away at halloween!

Misprint. She meant complementary. Items that go with the new content. Do you really think they’ll be giving away free legendaries