Guild Wars 2

Irrodesia.3907:

alcopaul.2156:

Leveling a profession to 400-500 is about ~200 gold. When ascended armor comes that will be ~800 gold!

WTF!

Yeah, the estimated cost buy the mats to level it up is 200g, for one weapon crafting profession and there is three:

• Weaponsmith
• Huntsman
• Artificer

So around 600g in total if you buy it out of pocket. But it’s just an estimate, you have to take in to consideration the inflation of the GW2 economy as well.

As far as Ascended armor goes, no one knows what they are going to do. But I fear the worst for what they have planned.

Definitely especially now since the prices will be and have been increasing since the essence of luck is a factor now as well.

darkace.8925:

I believe the length of time and amount of effort required to obtain exotic gear is exactly what they expected it to be. It’s the rate at which players left after getting exotic gear they didn’t expect.

I would concur with this as well as the points made by the OP (with amendments of course).

Simply put changes have been and are in progress of being changed of what was originally set forth prior to release (and even at release). We can kitten with words, euphemisms and back-and-forth banter all we want, it doesn’t change what was said. It was said in easy to understand language, in plain black and white, no strings attached. It is what it is, and most people understood that the game was going to “be this way” upon launch.

Some of you may remember the posts about 2 months after release of people leaving because there wasn’t some sort of “progression” aside from skins. I bet if you check the archives, there’s a good number of them.

It really comes down to two schools of thought"
1>An MMO by definition can never be defined as it constantly changes, for good or ill. GW2 is no exception.
2> Once the Dev’s have spoken that’s how it should always be, and if it is changed, it means they have lied.

Generally the former will trump the latter, even in early games such as EQ this became apparent (Verant Interactive lost to SOE). With those two schools of thought, there really isn’t any gray area. People are going to think one or the other, or simply not care.

I’m personally a bit disappointed, especially since the time sink(s) and massive restrictions have been put in place. But that’s just my 2 copper on the subject.

Irrodesia.3907:

…..

So…. What ARE you going to do now?

They will do what they did so far: stay silent.
It took them one year to even give us the real explanation why ascended gear was introduced to the game. Not to even mention all the issues and problems that were introduced with it or have existed in the game since launch that haven ever been addressed or even acknowledged.

One year down the line GW2 is without a doubt yet another MMO that buckled to the MMO locusts in their search for the next WoW.
Fitting clip posted by some back in november:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QiZNSzWIaLo

darkace.8925:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

“Vegan meal” with “a bit of meat” in it is not vegan meal any more.

Your spin aint working.

Ascended gear probably did more damage than good, and in the long run it will deal even more damage.

When you’re done with your crystal ball, you must lend it to me. Because I think you’re wrong. I think ascended gear will be a storm in a tea cup.

A year ago people on these forums said the game is dying. That’s less true now than it is then. Maybe Anet knows something you don’t. Maybe what they’re doing is actually working for them.

It may not be working for you, which is another issue altogether.

In the meantime, I think this game is gaining popularity, not losing it.

We don’t need a crystal ball, we have reason and logic. At some point the people who demanded “something to do” grew bored after attaining what was then the BiS gear (exotics). ArenaNet, fearing these players would stop playing the game, added a new tier of BiS gear (ascended) for these players to work towards.

They’re now saying this is the final tier of gear they wish to add. But what happens when that same group of people has attained the new BiS gear for all of their characters? Are they going to be content upon reaching that plateau where before they screamed they were bored? Or are they again going to demand “something to do”? And if they demand more “somethings to do”, is ArenaNet going to stand firm and say “this far, no further”? Or will they cave as they did last time?

Forget crystal balls…what does your gut tell you will happen?

It’s pretty simple, they can add better infusions to grind for. It’s much easier for them to continue down their stat progression without having to increase tiers this way. I don’t agree with the inevitable direction Anet will now be forced to take if they wish to cater to the VP masses, but they have given themselves a fairly elegant solution to a long term problem.

Xovian.8572:

It really comes down to two schools of thought"
1>An MMO by definition can never be defined as it constantly changes, for good or ill. GW2 is no exception.
2> Once the Dev’s have spoken that’s how it should always be, and if it is changed, it means they have lied.

Only when they try and bull us with “We always meant it to be this way” when they go against their previous public statements.

200 gold to level a profession to 500 from 400. if i wish to pop my debit card out, that would be around 8000 gems or 100 dollars which could be happily spent on a half month supply of McDonalds and Hot Pockets for a kittening pink weapon.

Pray For Kosmos.5849:

maddoctor.2738:

Part 1: Is Ascended Gear Required?

First of all, there are people doing naked runs of dungeons (absolutely no armor, only weapons), there are people soloing AC/CM/TA at their intended levels, without access to Ascended or even Exotic items. I’ve seen a level 24 Necromancer doing 30+ fotm, it was fun and “unique”. Overall, Ascended gear, and really ANY type of gear isn’t required at all, provided you have enough skill to compensate for the lack of it. I doubt Ascended gear can make much of a difference in large scale WvW battles or sieges either, there are siege weapons to be used, and I’d take a properly built (skill-wise) team mate using greens (for example a support Guardian with a Staff) over a bs Thief in a large scale battle.

As I’ve said in multiple posts, if you are doing a variety things (like, everything in the game) you can get an Ascended Weapon without ever doing the same thing twice.

ascended gear kittens up wvw. it’s not debatable. if it was pve only, i wouldn’t probably care as much—i would simply not get the gear.

such stupidity. no, you’ll have to do the same thing twice, three times, or 10 times, or 500 times. think about all the combinations of stats. dumb. (and amount of weapons)

This is my issue with it. I wouldn’t care if it just affected PVE, which I solo and run around in doing whatever for my daily anyway, plus sloooowly level alts. But WvW, that was something I was thinking of getting back to doing. I see no point if there is stat advantage for grinder hamsters, though. No point at all.

Ashen.2907:

jayb.1329:

so….you want the strongest gear possible and you want it to be easy to get.

sounds like the typical complainer on these forums

Actually sounds like what Anet said they wanted. Kind of why some people bought the game in the first place.

^ This exactly, i just wish i’d known then when i bought this game what i know now.

alcopaul.2156:

200 gold to level a profession to 500 from 400. if i wish to pop my debit card out, that would be around 8000 gems or 100 dollars which could be happily spent on a half month supply of McDonalds and Hot Pockets for a kittening pink weapon.

Or its almost 8 months complete access to FF14 and many other Subscription games..or one pink weapon…

Or a fortnights worth of food too if you want to get technical.

Dante.1508:

Ashen.2907:

jayb.1329:

so….you want the strongest gear possible and you want it to be easy to get.

sounds like the typical complainer on these forums

Actually sounds like what Anet said they wanted. Kind of why some people bought the game in the first place.

^ This exactly, i just wish i’d known then when i bought this game what i know now.

^ Him and you and me and many, many others. Guess we are the ‘typical complainers’.

alcopaul.2156:

200 gold to level a profession to 500 from 400. if i wish to pop my debit card out, that would be around 8000 gems or 100 dollars which could be happily spent on a half month supply of McDonalds and Hot Pockets for a kittening pink weapon.

I played heavily for the first month of the game, then maybe an 5-7 hours/week up until the champion patch (then I farmed them like mad..) I had a decent amount of materials saved up because most of that time I spent doing a quick Orr run or two. I am 500 in WS and Huntsman and I can tell you I personally spent no where near even 100g total, inc three weapon designs (obviously there is opportunity cost there, but I still had ~ 7 stacks of ancient wood to sell @ the high)…if you don’t have mats, then stop complaining and start gathering – or if you are the type to gather and sell immediately then you should have the gold, no?

Tbh, the biggest problem for me with ascended is not being able to distribute it .-.

I have ALOT of mats, but I don’t enjoy crafting very much. So now I have to stockpile stupid amounts of things I don’t even want to use because Anet thinks the world will end of they didn’t just make them sellable.

azurrei.5691:

alcopaul.2156:

200 gold to level a profession to 500 from 400. if i wish to pop my debit card out, that would be around 8000 gems or 100 dollars which could be happily spent on a half month supply of McDonalds and Hot Pockets for a kittening pink weapon.

I played heavily for the first month of the game, then maybe an 5-7 hours/week up until the champion patch (then I farmed them like mad..) I had a decent amount of materials saved up because most of that time I spent doing a quick Orr run or two. I am 500 in WS and Huntsman and I can tell you I personally spent no where near even 100g total, inc three weapon designs (obviously there is opportunity cost there, but I still had ~ 7 stacks of ancient wood to sell @ the high)…if you don’t have mats, then stop complaining and start gathering – or if you are the type to gather and sell immediately then you should have the gold, no?

I have both, it still wont get me to create these things i deem unneeded and destructive to this game, the whole Ascended tier is useless anyway as there is zero new content to use it in..

Vayne.8563:

That’s the problem. They probably had more than one camp. One group saying, look, we said this, and another group saying, okay what can we do that would help that we can do in a timely manner and is guaranteed to work.

That still doesn’t address the problem of them insisting that they haven’t changed their course when everyone can see that they did.

SonicTHI.3217:

Irrodesia.3907:

…..

So…. What ARE you going to do now?

They will do what they did so far: stay silent.
It took them one year to even give us the real explanation why ascended gear was introduced to the game. Not to even mention all the issues and problems that were introduced with it or have existed in the game since launch that haven ever been addressed or even acknowledged.

One year down the line GW2 is without a doubt yet another MMO that buckled to the MMO locusts in their search for the next WoW.
Fitting clip posted by some back in november:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QiZNSzWIaLo

That clip is so extremely fitting. It’s so painfully fitting to this entire thing and basically reflects what most people here are saying…

“You were the chosen one! It was said that you would be innovative and different from every other MMO, not join them! Bring joy and fun to the players, not leave them in mind-numbing misery!”

To touch on another note, I’ve been browsing around and I’ve seen a handful of things that have been thrown around about what ArenaNet has said in the past on Ascended and I’ll post them here.

This is pulled from a Reddit AMA: (Bare with me as I gather)

Continued from post above, quotes pulled from a Reddit AMA:

Allowing players to continue doing the things they love without focusing player migration to a specific part of the world. The introduction of the Ascended reward in one part of the game was a mistake and one that i don’t want to make again.

So having to do dumb zerguing content like world bosses and temples doesn’t count as “focusing player migration to a specific part of the world”? Another lie from a dev. Everything they said about ascended gear and the way they’d handle progression in this game is a lie.

The funny thing is that they can’t fix the harm they’ve done to the game even if they wanted to now. Because there would be a huge, incredible whining fest if they changed the weapon acquisition from all the players who already grinded theirs and would be kitten ed if other players could get it without that grind or gold sink. It’s a change they’ve made that they can never fix.

I agree, I think the damage has been done for many. Question is, what will that ‘many’ do? I havent played since the recent SAB patch..2+ weeks. Seeing that the game is headed in this direction, I dont have plans on playing again. I don’t think this is the game for me anymore. It was, for a solid three months. And I tried to make it work up until Living Story came out. Arenanet, in my eyes, went against their core principles and continue to play word games with us. It is no unique snowflake in the MMO community. Other than pushing out poor content every two weeks, it is the same as every other MMO. Every piece of ascended gear that is released can be compared to the time it takes to acquire most of a raid tier in wow. I’ll play other games that do gear treadmills better.

I’ll keep an eye on the game to see if it improves, and frequent these forums until Arenanet decides they have had enough of my blabbering. But I don’t think they can climb out of this hole. Regardless of their playerbase…visit any fan site or MMO site and people bash GW2 and arenanet for being dull, and abandoning their core. Im starting to agree, sadly.

Oh, my adventuring thief could have been awsome!

Ascended = death of alts.

Astralporing.1957:

Vayne.8563:

That’s the problem. They probably had more than one camp. One group saying, look, we said this, and another group saying, okay what can we do that would help that we can do in a timely manner and is guaranteed to work.

That still doesn’t address the problem of them insisting that they haven’t changed their course when everyone can see that they did.

Okay, so a publisher says thousands of things and five of them change. I see you hold people to this high standard of behavior that probably isn’t attainable within a corporation.

I suspect you’ll end up frustrated with much of your business dealings. People are people, not machines. In companies you sometimes have to two the party line. That’s life in big business…and that’s pretty much all big business.

You may not like it. Hell, I don’t like it, but I should as hell have learned that that’s how things are.

Is it right? Not at all. It is what people really should be expecting from businesses. Pretty much.

Vayne.8563:

Okay, so a publisher says thousands of things and five of them change. I see you hold people to this high standard of behavior that probably isn’t attainable within a corporation.

That’s not just some 5-6 random points among thousands XD For me, the notion of Horizontal Progression was the core of the game, plain and simple. Changing that isn’t as if the decided to remove some minigame before (or after) the release.

Continued. Grabbed from Reddit AMA

Nikaido.3457:

The funny thing is that they can’t fix the harm they’ve done to the game even if they wanted to now. Because there would be a huge, incredible whining fest if they changed the weapon acquisition from all the players who already grinded theirs and would be kitten ed if other players could get it without that grind or gold sink. It’s a change they’ve made that they can never fix.

That’s the entire point: Shove out the change you want that you know will be unpopular, then say “Sorry, too late, we can’t change back without hurting people”, then ignore any further complaints or criticism on the subject from then on. It’s a very common tactic.

Augh, a fourth post. Sorry guys! Just wanted to try to grab everything that covers the core concerns here. I know you all are already discussing! This is it! If you find anything else there that you feel relates, feel free to post! Again, sorry this was dragged out! Everything here was grabbed from Reddit AMA!

Yah, i alwyas dreamed of having alts parked at JPs just to farm gear.

I always dreamed of champion trains and temple zerging for months just to grind some gear.

As i said before, they want to sell vegan meal with meat in it.

But anyways, these changes are not for west market, focus is east now.

stof.9341:

Vayne.8563:

Okay, so a publisher says thousands of things and five of them change. I see you hold people to this high standard of behavior that probably isn’t attainable within a corporation.

That’s not just some 5-6 random points among thousands XD For me, the notion of Horizontal Progression was the core of the game, plain and simple. Changing that isn’t as if the decided to remove some minigame before (or after) the release.

It’s the core of the game TO YOU. It’s not the core of the game to me. It’s not the core of the game to lots and lots of other people.

If you had to take a guess, what percentage of the players even know what vertical progression means?

Vayne.8563:

stof.9341:

Vayne.8563:

Okay, so a publisher says thousands of things and five of them change. I see you hold people to this high standard of behavior that probably isn’t attainable within a corporation.

That’s not just some 5-6 random points among thousands XD For me, the notion of Horizontal Progression was the core of the game, plain and simple. Changing that isn’t as if the decided to remove some minigame before (or after) the release.

It’s the core of the game TO YOU. It’s not the core of the game to me. It’s not the core of the game to lots and lots of other people.

If you had to take a guess, what percentage of the players even know what vertical progression means?

Well… instead of taking a guess at what percentage of the players know what it is I’ll just clear things up right now:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Zn81sY7pqI#t=332

In my personal opinion, Taugrim explains very well what Vertical Progression is and talks about the issues in the video. We are hardly at the peak or even in the middle of Vertical Progression; Guild Wars 2 has simply nudged in to it. Now if we keep moving forward is a different thing completely. He also covers Horizontal Progression in the video.

http://taugrim.com/2012/04/19/why-games-should-scale-horizontally-instead-of-vertically/

The link above is the little mini-article that goes with it, for those who would like to read it. :)

Boy, remembering those answers makes my blood boil.

Contradictions everywhere and in hindsight what they said does not reflect reality.

It’s also fitting how it’s our fault too.

“Misinterpretations”. Rofl. Typical PR spin. “Uh guys I swear we didn’t say that, you just heard wrong”.

“Available through multiple activities”. Yes – that’s why to get As(s) weapons I’d have to park my character for who knows how long in front of a crafting station all the way from 0-500, instead of going out into WvW and killing people. Thanks, A(asscended)net.

“We didn’t intend for As(s) gear to impact WvW”. Oh, really? Is that why it has better stats? What do you call that then? See, a rational human being, when confronted with the problem of As(s) gear and WvW and how to minimize the impact of gear in WvW, would reason that As(s) gears should not have higher stats. Anet decides that the best way to minimize the impact is to encourage WvW players to go farm. Genius!

What a train wreck. And SPvP is so bad I can’t even look to it for shelter.

TainoFuerte.8136:

What a train wreck. And SPvP is so bad I can’t even look to it for shelter.

Dont worry, they are making it more “accessible” for PvEers, so if you cant get PvPers to play, populate it with PvEers! lol

there will surely be a content gate some day in hte future so ascended weapon can have some meaning outside the fractals… you just wait and see.
since this game stripped me from the freedom to:
- not playing it everyday
- changing build at will (i expected this was a major feat since it was in gw1, i was just disappointed)
- not to play content i don’t like
- not having deadline on my farming (when i felt i need to do it)
- having some free time between “festivals” (i hate festivals in games because no dev can come up with something different than farm this a lot to get that).

for all this reasons i’m not playing it for the moment.

p.s. and i’m really tired if i want to do an instance to spam map chat or use an outside source to find party… i should just click and go like in pvp (and i don’t care they are doing it now… it’s too late to recover from the endless waiting everytime i want to run something not popular)

MikaHR.1978:

Yah, i alwyas dreamed of having alts parked at JPs just to farm gear.

I always dreamed of champion trains and temple zerging for months just to grind some gear.

As i said before, they want to sell vegan meal with meat in it.

But anyways, these changes are not for west market, focus is east now.

/15charr

^^^^^^^^

kitten, I laughed way harder than I should have.

Erick Alastor.3917:

MikaHR.1978:

Yah, i alwyas dreamed of having alts parked at JPs just to farm gear.

I always dreamed of champion trains and temple zerging for months just to grind some gear.

As i said before, they want to sell vegan meal with meat in it.

But anyways, these changes are not for west market, focus is east now.

/15charr

kittenManchu stereotypes are pretty offensive. Especially when its difficult to grow a mustache of that length.

Ascended weapons are cheap. Try making some legendaries and talk with me then.

The point is that – it – is – a goal to make over time. To hear 5 pages of people fearing the challenge only makes me cringe to think that ArenaNET may backtrack on the ascended level or make it easier.

..and no, it’s not Elitist Allisa. The challenge is like that of anything else in the game: those who want to put in the insane efforts deserve to have something to show for it. If you don’t want to put in the time, you are like the other 99% … Which means that a few ascendeds in a Zerg of 100 people will add .13% each.

The game hasn’t been made harder. Exotics work as well as they ever have.

Dashes exist above to overcome kitten insertion system

Allisa Wonderland.8192:

Ascended weapons are cheap. Try making some legendaries and talk with me then.

The point is thakitten- is – a goal to make over time. To hear 5 pages of people fearing the challenge only makes me cringe to think that ArenaNET may backtrack on the ascended level or make it easier.

..and no, it’s not Elitist Allisa. The challenge is like that of anything else in the game: those who want to put in the insane efforts deserve to have something to show for it. If you don’t want to put in the time, you are like the other 99% … Which means that a few ascendeds in a Zerg of 100 people will add .13% each.

The game hasn’t been made harder. Exotics work as well as they ever have.

For most the issue has zero to do with effort in obtaining the items, it’s about broken design implementation and a 180 from a original philosophy of horizontal progression. Obviously games will always have busy work to keep people playing since no developer can crank out high quality content fast enough to keep things interesting indefinitely. The problem here is that it was not supposed to be busy work for BiS gear, but rather for hard to obtain prestige items such as a legendary or other rare cosmetics. Thank you for agreeing though that since the game has not been made harder to keep up with a new tier of gear that it serves no purpose other than a carrot to keep the VP sheeple masses satiated because they can’t see anything but needing more stats to stroke their kitten.

Allisa Wonderland.8192:

Ascended weapons are cheap. Try making some legendaries and talk with me then.

The point is thakitten- is – a goal to make over time. To hear 5 pages of people fearing the challenge only makes me cringe to think that ArenaNET may backtrack on the ascended level or make it easier.

..and no, it’s not Elitist Allisa. The challenge is like that of anything else in the game: those who want to put in the insane efforts deserve to have something to show for it. If you don’t want to put in the time, you are like the other 99% … Which means that a few ascendeds in a Zerg of 100 people will add .13% each.

The game hasn’t been made harder. Exotics work as well as they ever have.

Ascended gear is already in the game, that much is already said and done. They added the extra stats to close the gap between Exotic and Legendary ‘time-wise’ as far as obtaining it.

Anet will clearly never backtrack on Ascended gear.

The way things are, as far as the limited way to obtain said gear is one of the issues that they say they are working on but I don’t see any of it.

Ascended weapons are obtained through drop or crafting. While it is two options, it’s limited. I’m not a fan of crafting, at all. Nor am I a fan of swarming to a Megaboss/Temple. I got my Exotics through doing dungeons/WvW and turning in the tokens. That’s my playstyle and how I liked to obtain my gear. What money I earned I used to finish off rings, amulets or trinkets. Or I used what materials I had and sent them to a friend who could do Jewelcrafting.

Ascended gear stats are planned to increase on big content drop or when an expansion drops. Level cap is intended to be increased passed 80. Which means higher stats. Which means upgrading gear to be more powerful.

If Ascended gear stats stayed the same they are now and level cap stayed 80, then fine. I would simply just wait until more options were made available and I could obtain it through a means I would enjoy. But that isn’t the case.

The only stat progression that should be increased over time is Agony Resist in order to go further in FotM and whatever Agony Resist content they may release.

I never asked for Ascended gear to be thrown in my lap. Everyone worked towards their Exotics through some means that suited their playstyle, even if they bought Exotic gear off the Trading Post they had to earn the money to do so somehow.

You’re right, those who put in an insane amount of effort SHOULD have something to show off because of it. They earned that right. And they have this sort of content already: Legendary gear, achievements for titles, mini-pets and whatever.

They only have ONE batch of legendary weapons out. They plan to change how someone can get a precursor for a legendary by making it a scavenger hunt at some point to make it have more of a progressive-feeling. They haven’t even got to Legendary armor yet which people will be able to work towards to show off for an insane amount of effort put in to the game.

To assume that leveling passed 80 and increasing gear stats to be more powerful is the only way there can be ‘progression’ is lazy.

:/ So unless I’m reading it wrong, they DON’T want max stats to be easily accessible at 80. We can play with our builds w/o max stats, cool, awesome!

Anyone know any good games coming out?

And by easily accessible, I don’t mean “please hand me the gear when I log in”… I mean not jumping through time gated loops trying to acquire a ton of material that potentially makes a small planet…. Exotics are “easily” acquired, there wasn’t a need to change that.

The time gap between Legendaries and Exotics, is not primary based on material, the main (unsolved) issue is RNG. RNG is what makes the gaint time gap between Exotics and legendaries. The fact that precursors are not really progressed towards, rather waited to one day be dropped/come out of the toilet/finally saved up 600-800 gold.

Allisa Wonderland.8192:

Ascended weapons are cheap. Try making some legendaries and talk with me then.

The point is thakitten- is – a goal to make over time. To hear 5 pages of people fearing the challenge only makes me cringe to think that ArenaNET may backtrack on the ascended level or make it easier.

..and no, it’s not Elitist Allisa. The challenge is like that of anything else in the game: those who want to put in the insane efforts deserve to have something to show for it. If you don’t want to put in the time, you are like the other 99% … Which means that a few ascendeds in a Zerg of 100 people will add .13% each.

The game hasn’t been made harder. Exotics work as well as they ever have.

Ascended weapons are redundant compared to legendaries. Why would you take something stagnant and time consuming when you can use the same time for something that is infinitely scaling, interchangeable stats and at least looks nice? I would never build ascended over a legendary, because its a guaranteed solution. Once you have a legendary, that weapon slot is immune to level caps, new tiers, and anything between.

You talk of a goal to make over time? Riddle me this. There are many, many, many reasons for why people can’t get one. Some people don’t have the gold. Some people don’t like crafting. Some people don’t like wasting Obby shards on something that may or may not be the top tier. Some people can’t make it to the champs and bosses in time to get a few hits. Some people don’t like spending hours on end running from champ to champ to Lyssa to Dwayna to champ to champ. And guess what. These are all legitimate, acceptable, enjoyable playstyles. In WvW, if you trebbed a wall, you can’t get any loot unless some idiot manages to get himself killed by your treb’s boulders. And realistically, a small drop rate is not a reliable method to get any item. Should all these play styles be cast aside because Anet thinks they’ve done the right thing? Should I trade off fun for good gear? Punishing people for their playstyle is anything but a good way to get customers, if anything it’s brilliant for chasing me away.

You’re right. If you put effort, you deserve rewards. That’s why we have legendaries. But anything lower than that should have No say in the way I want to play my game. I bought GW2 to play happily without being forced to raids to keep up with the game or be forced to do anything else to have equal oppurtunity with other players. Ascended basically says “CRAFTING OR GTFO”. Prove me wrong.

Perhaps I should be more clear. More than Ascended, the issue for me is the manner of implementation. There’s only one way to get ascended and if you don’t take that way, it’s tough luck. That’s a bullkitten policy and makes it that much harder to enjoy this game.

The challenge is like that of anything else in the game: those who want to put in the insane efforts deserve to have something to show for it.

Please, crafting ascended weapons ranks extremely low on challenge and very high in mind-numbingly dull farming of materials and gold.

Allisa Wonderland.8192:

The point is thakitten- is – a goal to make over time. To hear 5 pages of people fearing the challenge only makes me cringe to think that ArenaNET may backtrack on the ascended level or make it easier.

That’s exactly the point – it’s not a challenge. It’s just a tedious and boring grind that brings nothing to the game.

Allisa Wonderland.8192:

those who want to put in the insane efforts deserve to have something to show for it.

That “something” being a stat advantage goes against one of the core principles of this game – one they claim they still follow. It could have been something else. Legendaries being able to swap stats on the fly is a good “something”. They offer a valuable convenience, but not an advantage. Unique prestige skins and titles are also an option – again, because they offer no advantage.
New tier of gear, offering significant advantage that isn’t available to 99% of players (to use the value you yourself supplied) is something completely different, something at whose existence i will continue to protest as long as i still play this game.
And something that devs originally promised will never exist in GW2

Seven Star Stalker.1740:

Ascended weapons are redundant compared to legendaries. Why would you take something stagnant and time consuming when you can use the same time for something that is infinitely scaling, interchangeable stats and at least looks nice? I would never build ascended over a legendary, because its a guaranteed solution. Once you have a legendary, that weapon slot is immune to level caps, new tiers, and anything between.

You talk of a goal to make over time? Riddle me this. There are many, many, many reasons for why people can’t get one. Some people don’t have the gold. Some people don’t like crafting. Some people don’t like wasting Obby shards on something that may or may not be the top tier. Some people can’t make it to the champs and bosses in time to get a few hits. Some people don’t like spending hours on end running from champ to champ to Lyssa to Dwayna to champ to champ. And guess what. These are all legitimate, acceptable, enjoyable playstyles. In WvW, if you trebbed a wall, you can’t get any loot unless some idiot manages to get himself killed by your treb’s boulders. And realistically, a small drop rate is not a reliable method to get any item. Should all these play styles be cast aside because Anet thinks they’ve done the right thing? Should I trade off fun for good gear? Punishing people for their playstyle is anything but a good way to get customers, if anything it’s brilliant for chasing me away.

You’re right. If you put effort, you deserve rewards. That’s why we have legendaries. But anything lower than that should have No say in the way I want to play my game. I bought GW2 to play happily without being forced to raids to keep up with the game or be forced to do anything else to have equal oppurtunity with other players. Ascended basically says “CRAFTING OR GTFO”. Prove me wrong.

Perhaps I should be more clear. More than Ascended, the issue for me is the manner of implementation. There’s only one way to get ascended and if you don’t take that way, it’s tough luck. That’s a bullkitten policy and makes it that much harder to enjoy this game.

+1
This exactly

To Vayne and Inferna

Really, as a forefather player to this venue, mmorpgs, there have been many times in this industry were gaming developers and investors set a carrot on a string and kept baiting and baiting, eventually keeping their proposed upcomings and eventually delivering, but by that time, patience was lost and many folks bailed never to be heard from again. Granted, so far Anet is delivering on their current hitlist geared for “By the end of the year”. As a hardcore casual gamer, I am good with that. As I am sure you both are, the real idea that I truly hope Anet realizes and understands, is not to try to burn the candle at both ends. Aim for your statistical demographic, based on how short or long you want your financial return.
Angering all sectors of your playerbase would be disasterous for any development.

I could name several developers that went out of their market (demograph) and found themselves selling their companies (I cant cite examples for TOS reasons). Anet cant and will never please all demographs, the real issue is they still havent drawn a line in the sand, or maybe they have and we players just havent taken to it wholeheartedly.

As a customer and a client, I would say I am 75% satisfied with the service. So game on!

Vayne.8563:

If you had to take a guess, what percentage of the players even know what vertical progression means?

What percentage of people who bought the game did so because of ideas like “everyone should have best in stat gear by the time they hit the level cap” or “we don’t make grindy games” or “our measure of success is ‘is it fun’”?

HiddenNick.7206:

Another ‘AC gear is bad’ thread… It’s getting old. It differs from ‘mounts’ threads only by that you get a lot of +1 for making one.

Now there’s an innovative idea: Ascended Mounts!

Vayne.8563:

If you had to take a guess, what percentage of the players even know what vertical progression means?

Isaac Newton: Aw, man, these kitten apples – why do they keep falling on my head? Someday, I’ll figure it out. In the meantime, ow. Kitten apples.

The moral of the story: what you don’t know can still put bumps on your head.

why you keep crying about mats price ? it is you who buy it >>

i dont realy get it, people say fractal is only for “rich” players who can affort the new ascended weapons but that is total nonsense, my frend has 4 ascended weapons and did not craft a single one of them, he got all 4 of them from maw end chest.

i admit you have to be lucky to get them but now the fractal lvls are still capped at max 48 maw there is no need for agony resistance above 40/45, sure you wont die/get downed at maw 40+ but there are plenty of ways you can do maw 40+ with only 35 agony resistance.
so plz stop “crying” about fractals would be only for “rich” players, go do a lower level fractals and wait for a ascended weapon drop…..

darkace.8925:

Vayne.8563:

If you had to take a guess, what percentage of the players even know what vertical progression means?

What percentage of people who bought the game did so because of ideas like “everyone should have best in stat gear by the time they hit the level cap” or “we don’t make grindy games” or “our measure of success is ‘is it fun’”?

I’d wager it’s a far lower percentage than you think. FAR lower.

I mean I heard those same words, and though it was nice, it wasn’t the reason I bought the game. It may have added to the list of reasons, but other reasons were far far more important to me.