Guild Wars 2

In the recent patch to the bag farming in Lake Doric and over the years I’ve noticed an upsetting pattern of decisions made by the development team. You cannot micromanage players to how you want them to play your game. It is in fact really bad PR. It was stated that the area as it was, was not being played to your intentions. To me, this is not an exploit but rather a design flaw. While I am not that upset over this farm being gone, it’s the principal of it. Nor was this farm game breaking or giving anyone an edge as everyone else could do it. My point is that the more you try to force your players to do things the way YOU want the more you’re going to lose customers. And also, why exactly are you so against people farming? It’s a basic core element of MMOs. I don’t see any other MMOs constantly changing things to prevent people from making virtual money. To me this is very odd. Instead I believe the proper action would be to set up spots that are intended for farming. Not discourage players from trying to make gold or get materials. Cause let me tell you, stuff like cloth and leather is a real chore to come by. Unlike wood and ore.

Also I find this extraordinarily hyprocritical because nearly 1 year ago you’ve also said that farming with a Ranger in Silverwastes is completely acceptable. Yet farming with an Engineer is not in Lake Doric? I’m not sure what’s going on over there but I think your teams need to have set rules on stuff, communicate better with both your teams and your playerbase.

It’s their game. They can manage it however they want.

Actually to me, the Lake Doric engie farm was bad PR. It is the kind of thing that turns me off from MMOs in general, and I’m happy that Anet stepped in.

The area was designed so that the point of interest on top would be accessible when groups of people ran up the hill to centaur farm.

You can’t complete the map without that point of interest. The engie farm was making it so people didn’t want to go.

It’s borderline exploit and exploits should be dealt with.

What Anet has done was stop people who wanted to put in the least amount of effort possible to get stuff. Good for them.

Vayne.8563:

It’s borderline exploit and exploits should be dealt with.

Now, I’m fine with arguing it was bad for the game. But “exploit”? Using class skills as intended?

At the end of the day, Anet has a long history of nerfing farming, going all the way back to gw1. I’ve never understood their reasons for it, but after a while you just need to learn to accept it. Moaning about it wont help, it usually just makes the nerf hammer hit harder. My advice is forget about it an move on.
But yeah, I get the point, a game that is advertised as play as you want to play doesn’t stop Anet saying play as they demand from time to time. I’ve never even set foor in Lake Doric, so it doesn’t effect me personally, but the way they have chosen to “fix” the issue doesn’t sit well. Carpet bombing an area isn’t a great way to stop farming, it’s a great way to stop anyone even going there. Seems like they tried to drive a nail in with a wrecking ball. Just my opinion.

Since Anet are going down this route, can we also carpet bomb the afkers at the toxic nodes in Kessex hills and the ones at Bloodfin lake in Iron marches?

circuitnerd.5863:

To me, this is not an exploit but rather a design flaw.

And that is why they made changes to the design of that area. Thank you for the clarification.

Carighan.6758:

Vayne.8563:

It’s borderline exploit and exploits should be dealt with.

Now, I’m fine with arguing it was bad for the game. But “exploit”? Using class skills as intended?

Yeah, I think it’s hard to call it an exploit or even borderline. We (as a community) might not have been “group farming” in the way that ANet intended and it might have been (probably was?) bad for the game. But it’s not like there hasn’t been precedent for people using turrets this way to farm. The escort chain to the pirate ghosts just south of LA (in Bloodtide) was long used as a turret farm — that’s what led to the change in turret durability if the engineer moved out of the area.

Carighan.6758:

Vayne.8563:

It’s borderline exploit and exploits should be dealt with.

Now, I’m fine with arguing it was bad for the game. But “exploit”? Using class skills as intended?

Well, some people used them as intended and some people broke the TOS and did unattended game play which was never intended. The problem is I don’t think it was ever intended for anyone to stay in one place with turrets pretty much forever, farming while watching movies. You may think that was intended, by I don’t.

Since when does anything have to be an exploid or a glitch to be changed or rebalanced. Who says the initial intention might not turn out to be an error of judgement in due time. This happens more often than not.
They are also free to change their opinion and views on any issue or topic in general.
Hell, they need to do so to keep up with a changing game and changing times.

Since you brought up bad PR. Vayne got it right. Farming methods such as this one do make a game look rather boring and stupid to an unknowing crowd.
It is beyond me why people still insist on playing the issue down to farming and ArenaNet only nerfing a farm without any reason. People were doing this while semi-afk, they started to use multiple accounts, bots would have popped up soon enough. They turned a clever usage of game mechanics into something else.
That is the only complaint I ever had against this crap and probably exactly why they ended up taking care of the issue. Nobody would have given a kitten if it had been nothing more than people simply farming their kitten off.

Henry.5713:

Farming methods such as this one do make a game look rather boring and stupid to an unknowing crowd.

Although I agree in general, in this case there is no unknowing crowd because it’s in a map you only reach after having played for a while and have done the whole story and seen almost every other area. Same with BF.

circuitnerd.5863:

Nor was this farm game breaking or giving anyone an edge as everyone else could do it.

As far as im aware only engies could take part in it right? So not everyone could do it. If you didnt have an engineer you lost out which is one of the major issues I had with it.

EDIT: I was wrong you can do it on most classes. My mistake.

On top of that I dont have an issue with farming in general and turret farm was okish to me but I still dont think you should be able to consistently and intentionally be able to get loot while away from the PC screen. (exception is TP flipping i guess since its impossible to stop) Lots of people set down turrets, went away to do IRL stuff and came back once every 5-10 minutes. While it doesnt seem like much, its still 10minutes of AFK looting which shouldnt happen.

circuitnerd.5863:

To me, this is not an exploit but rather a design flaw.

So they’ve fixed a design flaw then, like they often do in patches.

Just because Anet isn’t very consistent with fixing design flaws doesn’t mean they shouldn’t fix them.

Vayne.8563:

Actually to me, the Lake Doric engie farm was bad PR. It is the kind of thing that turns me off from MMOs in general, and I’m happy that Anet stepped in.

For me it wasn’t the engi approach to that farm that turned me off. That was just the natural consequence of the way the farm was designed. And it’s that design that ended up being bad PR.

Vayne.8563:

You can’t complete the map without that point of interest. The engie farm was making it so people didn’t want to go.

No. The path up being a pain and the farm being generally unrewarding made people unwilling to go there.

And as for PoI, no map completion element should assume there will be other players present in the future. It definitely should not assume there will be a lot of players there.

They should not have patched out engies. That was merely trying to shift the attention away from the real problem. What they should have done is to completely redesign the place.

FairyNuff.3452:

So they’ve fixed a design flaw then, like they often do in patches.

They didn’t. They treated the symptoms but left the core flaws untouched.

Henry.5713:

People were doing this while semi-afk, they started to use multiple accounts, bots would have popped up soon enough.

Talk about a logic fallacy. The way you correlate these without the slightest clue is astonishing. And, since you’re clueless, let me tell you I run all the map meta’s, like DS, while multi’ing. There’s no semi-afk while multi’ing.

circuitnerd.5863:

In the recent patch to the bag farming in Lake Doric and over the years I’ve noticed an upsetting pattern of decisions made by the development team. You cannot micromanage players to how you want them to play your game. It is in fact really bad PR.

I find the “Nanny State” Anet has created as bad PR too. Especially when they sold the game as “play Guild Wars 2 the way you want to play”.

zombyturtle.5980:

circuitnerd.5863:

Nor was this farm game breaking or giving anyone an edge as everyone else could do it.

As far as im aware only engies could take part in it right? So not everyone could do it. If you didnt have an engineer you lost out which is one of the major issues I had with it.

On top of that I dont have an issue with farming in general and turret farm was okish to me but I still dont think you should be able to consistently and intentionally be able to get loot while away from the PC screen. (exception is TP flipping i guess since its impossible to stop) Lots of people set down turrets, went away to do IRL stuff and came back once every 5-10 minutes. While it doesnt seem like much, its still 10minutes of AFK looting which shouldnt happen.

Nope, your first statement is incorrect. I ran my engi on my alt account in the farm and would simultaneously run my staff ele on my main account. Staff Ele on Air can tag multiple mobs with the auto. Since neither account has auto-loot unlocked, I’d have to switch back and forth periodically to grab loot and replace turrets. Drop rates mostly balanced between the two.

Carighan.6758:

Vayne.8563:

It’s borderline exploit and exploits should be dealt with.

Now, I’m fine with arguing it was bad for the game. But “exploit”? Using class skills as intended?

Dropping a turret and letting it shoot things is about the only way you CAN use a turret. However, I think it’s a stretch to argue that the Lake Doric turret farms were intended use.

Astralporing.1957:

Vayne.8563:

Actually to me, the Lake Doric engie farm was bad PR. It is the kind of thing that turns me off from MMOs in general, and I’m happy that Anet stepped in.

For me it wasn’t the engi approach to that farm that turned me off. That was just the natural consequence of the way the farm was designed. And it’s that design that ended up being bad PR.

Vayne.8563:

You can’t complete the map without that point of interest. The engie farm was making it so people didn’t want to go.

No. The path up being a pain and the farm being generally unrewarding made people unwilling to go there.

And as for PoI, no map completion element should assume there will be other players present in the future. It definitely should not assume there will be a lot of players there.

They should not have patched out engies. That was merely trying to shift the attention away from the real problem. What they should have done is to completely redesign the place.

FairyNuff.3452:

So they’ve fixed a design flaw then, like they often do in patches.

They didn’t. They treated the symptoms but left the core flaws untouched.

Okay I have no idea why you’re saying this. Prior to the engie farm, I completed Lake Doric on about 15 characters. It’s my way of “farming” for keys. I just like doing map completion.

In every single case, every one, I simply joined a farm listed in LFG, and ran to the top. There were only two times when a farm wasn’t listed. The running farm was happening pretty much constantly. The only reason it stopped was because of the engie farm.

People did the farm all the time before the engie farm.

I not only did it for the poi, but i did it to do the Lake Doric Breaking the Siege step of the LS, which I also do on multiple characters. Mind you, even during the engie farm I could do this.

Kaltyn of Torbins Deep.2946:

The entire problem is less the fact that there are AFK farmers than it is this was a bad design and a nonsensical non-response to player concerns. Players complained about the cost of leather, Anet responded with “Here, have a Leather farm!” And the players went, “This is dumb and boring. Here, Anet, we can create an even dumber, and more boring way to do this content than you can.” It was a proverbial middle finger. And the developers decided to respond with their own middle fingers, rather than addressing the 800 lbs gorilla in the room.

Yes, this is it exactly. You get the response you design for. I personally did not do it, as I did not need leather or gold that badly. But I foresaw both the players actions when the farm was created and the designers backlash.

DeWolfe.2174:

circuitnerd.5863:

In the recent patch to the bag farming in Lake Doric and over the years I’ve noticed an upsetting pattern of decisions made by the development team. You cannot micromanage players to how you want them to play your game. It is in fact really bad PR.

I find the “Nanny State” Anet has created as bad PR too. Especially when they sold the game as “play Guild Wars 2 the way you want to play”.

Play the way you want to play has a very specific definition which was repeated over and over again. It meant everything gave you experience. If you wanted to stay in Queensdale to level to 80 you could. That’s all it ever really meant.

People simply use it to try to justify everything else. For example, it didn’t mean you could scam other players. That was not intended, even if that’s the way they wanted to play.

I wish people would stop taking this single line out of context to try to prove their points. Anet was absolutely clear about what that meant.

zombyturtle.5980:

circuitnerd.5863:

Nor was this farm game breaking or giving anyone an edge as everyone else could do it.

As far as im aware only engies could take part in it right? So not everyone could do it. If you didnt have an engineer you lost out which is one of the major issues I had with it.

On top of that I dont have an issue with farming in general and turret farm was okish to me but I still dont think you should be able to consistently and intentionally be able to get loot while away from the PC screen. (exception is TP flipping i guess since its impossible to stop) Lots of people set down turrets, went away to do IRL stuff and came back once every 5-10 minutes. While it doesnt seem like much, its still 10minutes of AFK looting which shouldnt happen.

Yeah, no this is where you are wrong.

Any class with AI could do it and this. Ranger, Guardians, Mesmers, Necro, Ele etc….
Even if your class default does not come with AI you could do it via Racial skills.

Lets not call this thing unique to engineer.

It’s a fundamental design flaw that needed to be addressed and ANet did so in a very poor manner to quickly address a flawed solution to the much bigger issue. They also only managed to shift the goal post here as now all you need to do to “farm” is stealth with thieves and loot the chest.

Vayne.8563:

Actually to me, the Lake Doric engie farm was bad PR. It is the kind of thing that turns me off from MMOs in general, and I’m happy that Anet stepped in.

The area was designed so that the point of interest on top would be accessible when groups of people ran up the hill to centaur farm.

You can’t complete the map without that point of interest. The engie farm was making it so people didn’t want to go.

It’s borderline exploit and exploits should be dealt with.

What Anet has done was stop people who wanted to put in the least amount of effort possible to get stuff. Good for them.

Not quite. Anet is entirely to blame. They set up the area to be a group farm from day 1 that was their intention. They designed the mastery on top of the hill, knowing it was hidden behind a group farm. So, people started farming it, the engineer farm happened and Anet decided that wasn’t what they had in mind so they nerfed it. The design from the beginning to have this area be a intended group farm was a bad decision. I don’t blame engineers for doing the farm their way, Anet encouraged farming and that is what they were doing. I don’t blame Anet for nerfing the engineer farm, as that clearly wasn’t the intended ‘way’ they wanted it to be farmed. I blame Anet for the core design flaw of the entire farm in the first place, and then overloading the area with mastery granting events. (to help with leather prices, which seems to be having no real effect).

circuitnerd.5863:

In the recent patch to the bag farming in Lake Doric and over the years I’ve noticed an upsetting pattern of decisions made by the development team. You cannot micromanage players to how you want them to play your game. It is in fact really bad PR. It was stated that the area as it was, was not being played to your intentions. To me, this is not an exploit but rather a design flaw. While I am not that upset over this farm being gone, it’s the principal of it. Nor was this farm game breaking or giving anyone an edge as everyone else could do it. My point is that the more you try to force your players to do things the way YOU want the more you’re going to lose customers. And also, why exactly are you so against people farming? It’s a basic core element of MMOs. I don’t see any other MMOs constantly changing things to prevent people from making virtual money. To me this is very odd. Instead I believe the proper action would be to set up spots that are intended for farming. Not discourage players from trying to make gold or get materials. Cause let me tell you, stuff like cloth and leather is a real chore to come by. Unlike wood and ore.

Also I find this extraordinarily hyprocritical because nearly 1 year ago you’ve also said that farming with a Ranger in Silverwastes is completely acceptable. Yet farming with an Engineer is not in Lake Doric? I’m not sure what’s going on over there but I think your teams need to have set rules on stuff, communicate better with both your teams and your playerbase.

Unfortunately, despite GW2 being touted at the beginning as “play your way”, Anet does micromanage players and force them to “play THEIR way”. Anet has changed their position on “play your way” at least since the New Player Experience in 2014. Micromanaging players seems to be one of the main themes of development nowdays.

Vayne.8563:

Actually to me, the Lake Doric engie farm was bad PR. It is the kind of thing that turns me off from MMOs in general, and I’m happy that Anet stepped in.

The area was designed so that the point of interest on top would be accessible when groups of people ran up the hill to centaur farm.

You can’t complete the map without that point of interest. The engie farm was making it so people didn’t want to go.

It’s borderline exploit and exploits should be dealt with.

What Anet has done was stop people who wanted to put in the least amount of effort possible to get stuff. Good for them.

Actually that POI can be obtained going up the back way. That’s how I always go I never need a “group” to run up the hill.

And I must disagree, though I wasn’t a Engineer farmer I have no issue with those who enjoy and prefer to do this. ArenaNet keeps listening to the complainers who want everyone to play like they play and they will see other issues.

I can’t understand why folks want to complain about the farmers, if you want to do the event use one of your famous quotes, “use LFG or create you own on a map not farming”. If it works for Dragon Stand it will work for Lake Doric.

Djinn.9245:

Unfortunately, despite GW2 being touted at the beginning as “play your way”, Anet does micromanage players and force them to “play THEIR way”. Anet has changed their position on “play your way” at least since the New Player Experience in 2014. Micromanaging players seems to be one of the main themes of development nowdays.

You can’t make a game without somehow controlling/allowing players to play a certain way.
Ofcourse, most of that is done before the release of the content…

zombyturtle.5980:

circuitnerd.5863:

Nor was this farm game breaking or giving anyone an edge as everyone else could do it.

As far as im aware only engies could take part in it right? So not everyone could do it. If you didnt have an engineer you lost out which is one of the major issues I had with it.

On top of that I dont have an issue with farming in general and turret farm was okish to me but I still dont think you should be able to consistently and intentionally be able to get loot while away from the PC screen. (exception is TP flipping i guess since its impossible to stop) Lots of people set down turrets, went away to do IRL stuff and came back once every 5-10 minutes. While it doesnt seem like much, its still 10minutes of AFK looting which shouldnt happen.

It actually could be joined by any class, for example while doing events, farming wood and metal I have stopped in with my Ranger, Necro, and Elementalist and looted for 5 minutes or so then went on my way. No one ever said anything about be joining.

I’m like you I never sat there and farmed but I still hate the fact that this area was created as a farming area, it was even advertised by ArenaNet as such before the release then when others started complaining because others were “farming” they get their panties in a wad.

If they paid as much attention to little things like economy, prices, and the number of mats needed to craft items this would never have become an issue.

It may do no good to complain because they will, as you say do what they want but at least we can at least stand up for each other. The knee jerk response to everything has got to go.

ArenaNet try listening to everyone not just a select few. I will step down from my soap box now…..

Carighan.6758:

Vayne.8563:

It’s borderline exploit and exploits should be dealt with.

Now, I’m fine with arguing it was bad for the game. But “exploit”? Using class skills as intended?

They obviously had not intended for the turrets to be used in that manner, or they would not have made the change.

FrizzFreston.5290:

Djinn.9245:

Unfortunately, despite GW2 being touted at the beginning as “play your way”, Anet does micromanage players and force them to “play THEIR way”. Anet has changed their position on “play your way” at least since the New Player Experience in 2014. Micromanaging players seems to be one of the main themes of development nowdays.

You can’t make a game without somehow controlling/allowing players to play a certain way.

According to what?

In the beginning, GW2 had WvW, PvP, Open World PvE, Dungeons, Crafting, TP, JP, mini-games, etc. There are people who played GW2 by doing only 1 of these and people who liked to do several or all. But there were very few ways that Anet attempted to force players to do any of these game modes. WvW was initially part of Map Completion and they removed it, taking one of those very few away.

At least since the New Player Experience, there has been an increasing ramp up to coerce players, and in some situations force them, to play other game modes. I don’t know of any reason this is “necessary”. If you do, please share.

kurfu.5623:

Carighan.6758:

Vayne.8563:

It’s borderline exploit and exploits should be dealt with.

Now, I’m fine with arguing it was bad for the game. But “exploit”? Using class skills as intended?

They obviously had not intended for the turrets to be used in that manner, or they would not have made the change.

We don’t actually know that. What we do know is that Anet didn’t want players “AFKing in the centaur stronghold”. The problem is: how do you distinguish between players who were afking and players who were using turrets but were actively playing the entire time? Anet ended up punishing both.

Anything that permits or rewards unattended or “basically unattended” gameplay is bad game design and should be corrected.

What they should have done was put an event chain on the hill that causes the Centaurs to spawn. You have to then clear the whole chain before any new Centaurs spawn back in.

This would have made it so camping the bottom level would result in no gain outside of killing the initial wave of Centaurs.

Djinn.9245:

FrizzFreston.5290:

Djinn.9245:

Unfortunately, despite GW2 being touted at the beginning as “play your way”, Anet does micromanage players and force them to “play THEIR way”. Anet has changed their position on “play your way” at least since the New Player Experience in 2014. Micromanaging players seems to be one of the main themes of development nowdays.

You can’t make a game without somehow controlling/allowing players to play a certain way.

According to what?

In the beginning, GW2 had WvW, PvP, Open World PvE, Dungeons, Crafting, TP, JP, mini-games, etc. There are people who played GW2 by doing only 1 of these and people who liked to do several or all. But there were very few ways that Anet attempted to force players to do any of these game modes. WvW was initially part of Map Completion and they removed it, taking one of those very few away.

At least since the New Player Experience, there has been an increasing ramp up to coerce players, and in some situations force them, to play other game modes. I don’t know of any reason this is “necessary”. If you do, please share.

According to, Pass Challenge→ Get Reward.
As ArenaNet sets the challenges, and tie rewards to them, they force players through those specific challenges. Regardless of whether players like that challenge. They can offer a few alternative routes, but making too many routes will simply lead to one route being the most optimal while the others are rather pointless. Regardless, PvP and WvW also get some rewards with each living story update.

TexZero.7910:

zombyturtle.5980:

circuitnerd.5863:

Nor was this farm game breaking or giving anyone an edge as everyone else could do it.

As far as im aware only engies could take part in it right? So not everyone could do it. If you didnt have an engineer you lost out which is one of the major issues I had with it.

On top of that I dont have an issue with farming in general and turret farm was okish to me but I still dont think you should be able to consistently and intentionally be able to get loot while away from the PC screen. (exception is TP flipping i guess since its impossible to stop) Lots of people set down turrets, went away to do IRL stuff and came back once every 5-10 minutes. While it doesnt seem like much, its still 10minutes of AFK looting which shouldnt happen.

Yeah, no this is where you are wrong.

Any class with AI could do it and this. Ranger, Guardians, Mesmers, Necro, Ele etc….
Even if your class default does not come with AI you could do it via Racial skills.

Lets not call this thing unique to engineer.

It’s a fundamental design flaw that needed to be addressed and ANet did so in a very poor manner to quickly address a flawed solution to the much bigger issue. They also only managed to shift the goal post here as now all you need to do to “farm” is stealth with thieves and loot the chest.

Mesmer is a huge stretch on your list since they have to constantly use skills to generate an clone that dies if the target dies…. they don’t persist in the slightest

Sly.9518:

TexZero.7910:

zombyturtle.5980:

circuitnerd.5863:

Nor was this farm game breaking or giving anyone an edge as everyone else could do it.

As far as im aware only engies could take part in it right? So not everyone could do it. If you didnt have an engineer you lost out which is one of the major issues I had with it.

On top of that I dont have an issue with farming in general and turret farm was okish to me but I still dont think you should be able to consistently and intentionally be able to get loot while away from the PC screen. (exception is TP flipping i guess since its impossible to stop) Lots of people set down turrets, went away to do IRL stuff and came back once every 5-10 minutes. While it doesnt seem like much, its still 10minutes of AFK looting which shouldnt happen.

Yeah, no this is where you are wrong.

Any class with AI could do it and this. Ranger, Guardians, Mesmers, Necro, Ele etc….
Even if your class default does not come with AI you could do it via Racial skills.

Lets not call this thing unique to engineer.

It’s a fundamental design flaw that needed to be addressed and ANet did so in a very poor manner to quickly address a flawed solution to the much bigger issue. They also only managed to shift the goal post here as now all you need to do to “farm” is stealth with thieves and loot the chest.

Mesmer is a huge stretch on your list since they have to constantly use skills to generate an clone that dies if the target dies…. they don’t persist in the slightest

They can still do it. Point is it’s not an engie exclusive.