Guild Wars 2

Vayne.8563:

darkace.8925:

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’d take that wager in a heartbeat.

Vayne.8563:

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.

That’s nice. Irrelevant, but nice.

melin skyland.7563:

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.

It’s like saying Maybach is not only for rich people, because you can win the lottery and get it.

I really love this game, I’ve burnt out sometimes and left for a while but always came back. When they first introduced Ascended items I was incredibly disappointed but – obviously – stayed around. However, slowly I’m beginning to realise… what happens after all the hamster’s in their little wheels have gotten all their Ascended weapons? ArenaNet introducing Ascended armor is the likely answer.

Then what? The issue is about trust, and I don’t trust them. I don’t trust that once the grinder’s have eaten the carrot that is Ascended items, that ArenaNet won’t then add in yet another tier in an attempt to keep them around.

Oh, they’ve said they hope that another tier won’t be added but by now I think we all realise they can’t be taken at face-value. Some on these forums would argue that because game design is a re-iterative process that their previous promises don’t matter. I refuse to accept that argument because the nature of promises is that they are supposed to be kept, not disregarded the moment they become inconvenient. But business is business, right? Something I despise but at least can understand, and so to voice my discontent I’m refusing to put money into the store.

They are so far removed from their original philosophy that it’s becoming tragic. It’ll no doubt take me a large number of months if I wanted to gear up any alts with top-end gear because I refuse to join the hamster’s in their wheels in the grind for these ascended items. I could probably go back to WoW and get the Insane title for the same amount of time it will eventually take to obtain a full set of Ascended for one character, and that’s sad.

Freohr.7905:

I really love this game, I’ve burnt out sometimes and left for a while but always came back. When they first introduced Ascended items I was incredibly disappointed but – obviously – stayed around. However, slowly I’m beginning to realise… what happens after all the hamster’s in their little wheels have gotten all their Ascended weapons? ArenaNet introducing Ascended armor is the likely answer.

Then what? The issue is about trust, and I don’t trust them. I don’t trust that once the grinder’s have eaten the carrot that is Ascended items, that ArenaNet won’t then add in yet another tier in an attempt to keep them around.

Oh, they’ve said they hope that another tier won’t be added but by now I think we all realise they can’t be taken at face-value. Some on these forums would argue that because game design is a re-iterative process that their previous promises don’t matter. I refuse to accept that argument because the nature of promises is that they are supposed to be kept, not disregarded the moment they become inconvenient. But business is business, right? Something I despise but at least can understand, and so to voice my discontent I’m refusing to put money into the store.

They are so far removed from their original philosophy that it’s becoming tragic. It’ll no doubt take me a large number of months if I wanted to gear up any alts with top-end gear because I refuse to join the hamster’s in their wheels in the grind for these ascended items. I could probably go back to WoW and get the Insane title for the same amount of time it will eventually take to obtain a full set of Ascended for one character, and that’s sad.

As I’ve said before, when Ascended gear was first introduced, this game had very little “stickiness”. There was no reason for people to play and it was easy to move on to other games. The ascended gear was a stopgap measure (which seems to have worked).

The stickiness now doesn’t actually come from ascended gear. Anet is going to release the rest of it, because it’s in motion, but the stickiness now comes from chasing achievement points.

If people continue to show up to chase achievement points, then there’s not much reason for Anet to introduce another tier.

The tier was introduced for a reason. If that reason ceases to exist, Anet won’t have to resort to that sort of tactic again.

Mind you the achievement point chase, to me, is far worse than gear grind.

Vayne.8563:

As I’ve said before, when Ascended gear was first introduced, this game had very little “stickiness”. There was no reason for people to play and it was easy to move on to other games. The ascended gear was a stopgap measure (which seems to have worked).

The stickiness now doesn’t actually come from ascended gear. Anet is going to release the rest of it, because it’s in motion, but the stickiness now comes from chasing achievement points.

If people continue to show up to chase achievement points, then there’s not much reason for Anet to introduce another tier.

The tier was introduced for a reason. If that reason ceases to exist, Anet won’t have to resort to that sort of tactic again.

Mind you the achievement point chase, to me, is far worse than gear grind.

Possibly. Assuming that the gear grinder’s are content with instead grinding achievement points for the rewards from the AP system. If they aren’t impressed with those rewards they’ll make a whole lot of noise and chances are the dev’s will have to cave in and release a new tier to try and keep those players around. (Edit: In the future, of course)

I agree though that, in a way, AP farming is even worse. Eventually you’d obtain all the Ascended items. Farming achievement points lasts forever.

Vayne.8563:

As I’ve said before, when Ascended gear was first introduced, this game had very little “stickiness”. There was no reason for people to play and it was easy to move on to other games. The ascended gear was a stopgap measure (which seems to have worked).

The stickiness now doesn’t actually come from ascended gear. Anet is going to release the rest of it, because it’s in motion, but the stickiness now comes from chasing achievement points.

Is that a good property? There’s no doubt that ANet is in full swing into metrics driven development. You know what are the most stellar examples of games driven by metrics? Farmville.

The problem of metrics are twofold :
- they cannot innovate. Metrics only look into the past, not the future. They can only work on something that was already done and tends to drive future development into more of the same
- any good scientist should know and have remember what he is measuring. What is ANet measuring? Stickiness? As in the ability of the game to glue people on it and keep playing? Well it’s nice but it doesn’t measure what’s important. It tells them how to make a game people come back, it doesn’t tell them how to make a good game.

This is exactly the problem with Farmville and others. They were completely metrics driven and so worked on anything that would keep their numbers high. The problem is, the human beeing is kind of flawed here. Psycologically there is a LOT of ways to keep people playing by giving them crap. Metrics when they measure the stickiness do not measure how to make a good fun game but also how to best polish that hamster wheel to keep us running.

ANet is certainly making changes that work to keep their numbers high, but they do so by doing the same shady ideas than social gaming and the like did. Which for me leads to a bad game I don’t want to play.

Is it fun? This is the question that metrics should be working on, not stickiness.

Vayne.8563:

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.

You’re wrong Vayne … this was the #1 selling point for the game. You know it so don’t try to deny it. Doublethink is an ugly thing.

That wager … you’re bound to lose it.

That said … ascended does give a good form of progression, but it’s not ascended I’m scared of … it’s what comes next. I’ve got plenty of laurels/pristine relics/commendations currently to deck out any alt in the ascended crap I want, but that’s not the issue I have. It’s that they did a very stupid move with the worst communication possible.

While I support Arena.net in most things they did to the game, ascended is still an icky thing. It was a bludgeoning hit in the face, even though it turned out to be moderately good on the longer term.

That said, Arena.net has a track record of doing stupid things, both in GW1 and GW2, but also managed to make good on most of them. Just a shortlist: 3 hero teams, loot scaling, smiter’s boon, IWAY, DR … yes that’s GW1’s DR which was HARSH. The GW2 DR is not an issue. It simply doesn’t exist in comparison unless for bots an no-lifers. In the end, most of those turned out okay. That’s gives me a bit of faith concerning ascended.

Freohr.7905:

Vayne.8563:

As I’ve said before, when Ascended gear was first introduced, this game had very little “stickiness”. There was no reason for people to play and it was easy to move on to other games. The ascended gear was a stopgap measure (which seems to have worked).

The stickiness now doesn’t actually come from ascended gear. Anet is going to release the rest of it, because it’s in motion, but the stickiness now comes from chasing achievement points.

If people continue to show up to chase achievement points, then there’s not much reason for Anet to introduce another tier.

The tier was introduced for a reason. If that reason ceases to exist, Anet won’t have to resort to that sort of tactic again.

Mind you the achievement point chase, to me, is far worse than gear grind.

Possibly. Assuming that the gear grinder’s are content with instead grinding achievement points for the rewards from the AP system. If they aren’t impressed with those rewards they’ll make a whole lot of noise and chances are the dev’s will have to cave in and release a new tier to try and keep those players around. (Edit: In the future, of course)

I agree though that, in a way, AP farming is even worse. Eventually you’d obtain all the Ascended items. Farming achievement points lasts forever.

It doesn’t matter if gear grinders are content or not content. This entire situation could be understood best by looking at the context.

Anet saw people leaving the game because they were bored and had nothing to do. Anet gave them something to do. Achievements give them something else to do.

Anet doesn’t care of group A or group B keeps playing as long as one group is large enough to support the game. So if the group of people playing for achievement points is big enough to support the game…ie the game is showing that it’s gaining concurrency, then Anet doesn’t have to worry about the people leaving.

Every MMO has to deal with people leaving. The real question isn’t who’s leaving, but how many are playing and for how long. People are always going to leave.

If enough gear grinders can be converted to achievement point grind (and face it there’s a lot less gear grind than achievement point grind..we don’t get new gear every two weeks), then Anet won’t worry about the few guys who leave because of gear.

The achievement point grind is probably stickier than the gear grind, because so many people with consoles are used to achievements now.

I really do think Anet won’t be doing anything beyond ascended gear, except MAYBE legendary gear that has the same stats, but the ability to change them (like the legendary weapons).

marnick.4305:

Vayne.8563:

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.

You’re wrong Vayne … this was the #1 selling point for the game. You know it so don’t try to deny it. Doublethink is an ugly thing.

That wager … you’re bound to lose it.

That said … ascended does give a good form of progression, but it’s not ascended I’m scared of … it’s what comes next. I’ve got plenty of laurels/pristine relics/commendations currently to deck out any alt in the ascended crap I want, but that’s not the issue I have. It’s that they did a very stupid move with the worst communication possible.

While I support Arena.net in most things they did to the game, ascended is still an icky thing. It was a bludgeoning hit in the face, even though it turned out to be moderately good on the longer term.

That said, Arena.net has a track record of doing stupid things, both in GW1 and GW2, but also managed to make good on most of them. Just a shortlist: 3 hero teams, loot scaling, smiter’s boon, IWAY, DR … yes that’s GW1’s DR which was HARSH. The GW2 DR is not an issue. It simply doesn’t exist in comparison unless for bots an no-lifers. In the end, most of those turned out okay. That’s gives me a bit of faith concerning ascended.

Okay here’s your challenge. Look at EVERY single video and article, every one. Look at everyone that mentions vertical progression. Count the amount of minutes or lines of everything Anet published or said that referenced vertical progression.

From my point of view the living/breathing world got a lot more play than the words vertical progression or no gear grind even.

What Anet spent most of the time talking about (ie most of what it was built on) was dynamic events as compared to quests, a branching personal story line, and a living breathing world.

Look at it all. Everything Anet said. You might have 15 mentions of vertical progression, but I seriously doubt it. Some of those might have been in response to direct questions.

But I don’t think it was the #1 point. I think it was one of many points. I think Anet also made a lot of other points. They made a huge deal about not being able to kill steal, or node steal. That’s still in the game. They made a big deal about the amount of voice acting they used. That’s still in the game.

They did talk about vertical progression, but I’d wager that far more people saw dynamic events, personal story and living breathing world. In fact, I can only remember one single blog post that mentioned vertical progression at all, out of dozens and dozens of blog posts.

In fact, I’ll take it further. How many times was vertical progression or gear grind mentioned on the Guild Wars 2 home page. If it was a central selling point, surely it would be mentioned there.

I dont want a treadmill where every 10 months a new tier of gear comes along.

I do want the last tier of gear to be something of a long term goal that I can be working on while I do all those activities I enjoy in the game.

That means exotic gear being the final tier was something of a failure to me, and ascended so far seems to hit the sweet spot. As long as they dont come out with a new round of +gooder in the future, I believe they made a good choice with releasing ascended gear.

I also believe that Anet vastly underestimated the time it takes to level and max gear at release, as well as how long a legendary takes to get. I think that in their eyes exotic WAS a mid-term goal and you were supposed to use rares for a longer time at cap, as opposed to the reality of people getting full exotic within days.

Bottom line? ANet designed a game to have horizontal, rather than vertical, progression. They were not able to deliver on that goal, so they adapted, and changed their goals. Now we have a game that is full of grindy check-off tasks, vertical progression, and no new permanent content.

Is this good? Bad? That’s up to the players to decide. I decided to bow out, and leave the grindy “content” to other players. I have better things to do with my time than chase shiny things so I can chase more shiny things.

Have I given up on GW2? Not entirely. I’ll be keeping an eye on further developments; it’s conceivable, albeit unlikely, that ANet may steer the game back toward a model I find more to my liking. If that happens, I’ll come back. But in the meantime, every day I’m away I miss the game less and less.

@Mastruq – Look at the statement: Exotic was a mid-term goal. Now look closely at all the ways a player could get exotic weapons & armor. Think about how difficult any of those methods were. (Probably the most difficult was a loot drop since it is pure RNG).
Now base your argument off of how long it took to gather dungeon tokens, karma, gold, etc.

Anet didn’t underestimate the time it took to get exotics, they underestimated the time it took for a part of their playerbase to get bored.

I’d like to think that their original vision would have worked if they’d implemented a more diverse and complex horizontal progression base. I don’t believe the customization was varied enough, the choices of unique armor/weapons vast enough, hidden challenging quests to find rare gear non-existent, and so on. But that is purely my opinion.

darkace.8925:

Vayne.8563:

darkace.8925:

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’d take that wager in a heartbeat.

Vayne.8563:

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.

That’s nice. Irrelevant, but nice.

Id probably take that wager too. I believe many people bought the game thinking that when they hit 80, it wont be a hefty grind for max stat gear. Once they have their max stat set, they play for fun and for aesthetics. Thats what I was hoping for.

Spiral Architect.6540:

Bottom line? ANet designed a game to have horizontal, rather than vertical, progression. They were not able to deliver on that goal, so they adapted, and changed their goals. Now we have a game that is full of grindy check-off tasks, vertical progression, and no new permanent content.

Is this good? Bad? That’s up to the players to decide. I decided to bow out, and leave the grindy “content” to other players. I have better things to do with my time than chase shiny things so I can chase more shiny things.

Have I given up on GW2? Not entirely. I’ll be keeping an eye on further developments; it’s conceivable, albeit unlikely, that ANet may steer the game back toward a model I find more to my liking. If that happens, I’ll come back. But in the meantime, every day I’m away I miss the game less and less.

I kind of feel the same way. I have logged in two or three times in the last three or so weeks, for a grand total of 10 minutes. Im missing the game less and less. I logged in last night and saw everyone in map chat whining about ascended gear..it was disheartening. I logged off because it reminded me why I have stopped playing.

I will keep an eye on the game, like you, to see if the game is steered back on course for aesthetic progression.

cesmode.4257:

darkace.8925:

Vayne.8563:

darkace.8925:

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’d take that wager in a heartbeat.

Vayne.8563:

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.

That’s nice. Irrelevant, but nice.

Id probably take that wager too. I believe many people bought the game thinking that when they hit 80, it wont be a hefty grind for max stat gear. Once they have their max stat set, they play for fun and for aesthetics. Thats what I was hoping for.

So how many places on the Guild Wars 2 website did it say that would happen? I’m interested, because I’m sure most people who buy a game don’t research it to death. I’m sure many people did research this game a lot, and many more just looked at the webpage. The hard core guys like me, sure, I watched every interview. Out of all my friends who bought it, and there were tons, I was the only one who did it. They played other games, they thought when it comes out, they’ll play it. They watched a couple of trailers.

That’s how most people are. Hard core fans pour over every interview and everything any dev says. Most people just aren’t that hard core.

I think you’ll find a whole lot of people saw the hype, saw the ratings and bought into it, without every delving deeply into it. Can I prove this? Nope.

But I do know that people tend to think everyone is like them, and it’s often not the case.

The OP’s post fully and eloquently expresses a lot of the concerns I’ve had with the game lately. I like a lot of what they’re doing with the living world updates, if not story-wise than certainly in terms of systems improvements such as the wallet and the party finder. Arenanet is currently fixing a lot of the initial holes in the game’s design. However, with ascended weapons they’ve added a far larger one. I just don’t want to play a game with this little flexibility available in playstyle, where it takes this long to bring a new character up to snuff.
Arenanet, how could you, I expected so much better, you’ve lost a loyal player since GW1, etc. etc. I’ve uninstalled the game for now, and it’s the first time in memory I’ve uninstalled GW out of actual distaste for it. There are still a lot of good things about it, not least of which is that it won’t cost me anything to come back if I so please. I’d certainly be much more pleased to if the current tack away from cosmetic goals and towards power grind is reversed. The new MF is a huge improvement that elegantly solves a longstanding problem while providing a harmless yet addictive number to give some sense of progression. Ascended weapons are a problem more virulent yet than MF ever was. I hope that Arenanet can reverse tack on this poor decision, as they did on that one. Until then, the game has broken its promises and its legacy, and I have better things to play.

Its already been announced, its coming.

Ascended will be the only tier added. Its not turning into a gear treadmill.

They said exotic’s were to easy to get they wanted it to take longer and they wanted to satisfy the part of the gaming community that wanted some progression (nothing wrong with that).

Get over it and move on its coming. These VERY same discussions happened with rings, accessories and the amulet. Did they stop there? NO, they will continue forward and introduce the armor.

You can quit if you want it is a game after all. But someone will replace you thats the beauty of mmo’s with no sub people come and go more often than you think.

Freohr.7905:

I really love this game, I’ve burnt out sometimes and left for a while but always came back. When they first introduced Ascended items I was incredibly disappointed but – obviously – stayed around. However, slowly I’m beginning to realise… what happens after all the hamster’s in their little wheels have gotten all their Ascended weapons? ArenaNet introducing Ascended armor is the likely answer.

Then what? The issue is about trust, and I don’t trust them. I don’t trust that once the grinder’s have eaten the carrot that is Ascended items, that ArenaNet won’t then add in yet another tier in an attempt to keep them around.

Oh, they’ve said they hope that another tier won’t be added but by now I think we all realise they can’t be taken at face-value. Some on these forums would argue that because game design is a re-iterative process that their previous promises don’t matter. I refuse to accept that argument because the nature of promises is that they are supposed to be kept, not disregarded the moment they become inconvenient. But business is business, right? Something I despise but at least can understand, and so to voice my discontent I’m refusing to put money into the store.

They are so far removed from their original philosophy that it’s becoming tragic. It’ll no doubt take me a large number of months if I wanted to gear up any alts with top-end gear because I refuse to join the hamster’s in their wheels in the grind for these ascended items. I could probably go back to WoW and get the Insane title for the same amount of time it will eventually take to obtain a full set of Ascended for one character, and that’s sad.

They don’t need to add another “tier” to extend the grind.

All they need to do is raise the level cap (to avoid breaking the promise).

Then you’ll be grinding out level 99 Ascended gear (after the next expansion).

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.

Unfortunately, that means some people agree with it…..

While the entire argument the OP makes brings up valid points and complaints about “the problem”, it must be stated that not everyone agrees there IS “a problem”. Ascended gear is an end game goal that is NOT necessary to play the game. It IS useful to play some aspects (Fractals), but the claim that players are FORCED to grind for this gear or that BiS gear is mandatory is ridiculous. Hailing that idea as absolute truth is the real problem here (just my opinion, but I’m not alone).

I don’t think it can be argued that Exotics are fairly easy to gear up with and I just don’t see the major issue with the highest tier gear being a tier of items that take some time and expense to obtain. I’m still baffled that some seem so surprised that Ascended items are somewhere between Exotic and Legendary Weapons in both time and money to obtain (from what I understood, exactly what we were told they would be).

Brother Grimm.5176:

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.

Unfortunately, that means some people agree with it…..

While the entire argument the OP makes brings up valid points and complaints about “the problem”, it must be stated that not everyone agrees there IS “a problem”. Ascended gear is an end game goal that is NOT necessary to play the game. It IS useful to play some aspects (Fractals), but the claim that players are FORCED to grind for this gear or that BiS gear is mandatory is ridiculous. Hailing that idea as absolute truth is the real problem here (just my opinion, but I’m not alone).

I don’t think it can be argued that Exotics are fairly easy to gear up with and I just don’t see the major issue with the highest tier gear being a tier of items that take some time and expense to obtain. I’m still baffled that some seem so surprised that Ascended items are somewhere between Exotic and Legendary Weapons in both time and money to obtain (from what I understood, exactly what we were told they would be).

Pretty much no gear besides basic one was ever required to play any MMO.

Whats exactly your point as i dont see it.

MikaHR.1978:

Brother Grimm.5176:

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.

Unfortunately, that means some people agree with it…..

While the entire argument the OP makes brings up valid points and complaints about “the problem”, it must be stated that not everyone agrees there IS “a problem”. Ascended gear is an end game goal that is NOT necessary to play the game. It IS useful to play some aspects (Fractals), but the claim that players are FORCED to grind for this gear or that BiS gear is mandatory is ridiculous. Hailing that idea as absolute truth is the real problem here (just my opinion, but I’m not alone).

I don’t think it can be argued that Exotics are fairly easy to gear up with and I just don’t see the major issue with the highest tier gear being a tier of items that take some time and expense to obtain. I’m still baffled that some seem so surprised that Ascended items are somewhere between Exotic and Legendary Weapons in both time and money to obtain (from what I understood, exactly what we were told they would be).

Pretty much no gear besides basic one was ever required to play any MMO.

Whats exactly your point as i dont see it.

Umm what? lol

Namu.5712:

Its already been announced, its coming.

Ascended will be the only tier added. Its not turning into a gear treadmill.

They said exotic’s were to easy to get they wanted it to take longer and they wanted to satisfy the part of the gaming community that wanted some progression (nothing wrong with that).

Get over it and move on its coming. These VERY same discussions happened with rings, accessories and the amulet. Did they stop there? NO, they will continue forward and introduce the armor.

You can quit if you want it is a game after all. But someone will replace you thats the beauty of mmo’s with no sub people come and go more often than you think.

By the way game is selling….dont think anyone will replace anyone.

No they didnt stop, and they wont ever stop adding to the gear treadmill.

Enjoy your tredmill, i sure am not feeling like being hamester again.

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Brother Grimm.5176:

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.

Unfortunately, that means some people agree with it…..

While the entire argument the OP makes brings up valid points and complaints about “the problem”, it must be stated that not everyone agrees there IS “a problem”. Ascended gear is an end game goal that is NOT necessary to play the game. It IS useful to play some aspects (Fractals), but the claim that players are FORCED to grind for this gear or that BiS gear is mandatory is ridiculous. Hailing that idea as absolute truth is the real problem here (just my opinion, but I’m not alone).

I don’t think it can be argued that Exotics are fairly easy to gear up with and I just don’t see the major issue with the highest tier gear being a tier of items that take some time and expense to obtain. I’m still baffled that some seem so surprised that Ascended items are somewhere between Exotic and Legendary Weapons in both time and money to obtain (from what I understood, exactly what we were told they would be).

Pretty much no gear besides basic one was ever required to play any MMO.

Whats exactly your point as i dont see it.

Umm what? lol

Yah, ill let you figure that one out, cyas in few days?

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Brother Grimm.5176:

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.

Unfortunately, that means some people agree with it…..

While the entire argument the OP makes brings up valid points and complaints about “the problem”, it must be stated that not everyone agrees there IS “a problem”. Ascended gear is an end game goal that is NOT necessary to play the game. It IS useful to play some aspects (Fractals), but the claim that players are FORCED to grind for this gear or that BiS gear is mandatory is ridiculous. Hailing that idea as absolute truth is the real problem here (just my opinion, but I’m not alone).

I don’t think it can be argued that Exotics are fairly easy to gear up with and I just don’t see the major issue with the highest tier gear being a tier of items that take some time and expense to obtain. I’m still baffled that some seem so surprised that Ascended items are somewhere between Exotic and Legendary Weapons in both time and money to obtain (from what I understood, exactly what we were told they would be).

Pretty much no gear besides basic one was ever required to play any MMO.

Whats exactly your point as i dont see it.

Umm what? lol

Yah, ill let you figure that one out, cyas in few days?

To progress in Rift I had to get higher gear to do pretty much anything when I played. The same was true with AoC when I played that and Lotro.

All the good, cool, interesting stuff was hidden behind gear checks.

Namu.5712:

You can quit if you want it is a game after all. But someone will replace you thats the beauty of mmo’s with no sub people come and go more often than you think.

I see people throw this around a lot. “No sub” is not special anymore, most MMOs have no sub. Also, this game is not selling that well. Did you see the latest NCSoft report? Do you see how it is doing on sales charts like on Amazon?

When people say they don’t like things in the game. The response shouldn’t be “quit”, because eventually a lot of players won’t have anyone to play with. People have different opinions on the direction of the game.

Xcom.1926:

Namu.5712:

You can quit if you want it is a game after all. But someone will replace you thats the beauty of mmo’s with no sub people come and go more often than you think.

I see people throw this around a lot. “No sub” is not special anymore, most MMOs have no sub. Also, this game is not selling that well. Did you see the latest NCSoft report? Do you see how it is doing on sales charts like on Amazon?

When people say they don’t like things in the game. The response shouldn’t be “quit”, because eventually a lot of players won’t have anyone to play with.

How well was Rift selling at the one year mark? How good has any other MMO sold at the one year mark. Here’s a hint….though Rift released before Guild Wars 2, they haven’t sold as may copies total as Guild Wars 2 sold in it’s first year.

In fact, no MMO, no matter how “slow” sales have become, has sold more boxes in a year. Not SWToR with all it’s publicity, not WoW, not Rift.

Sales have to slow down because most people interested in the game get it when it comes out. People don’t say, oh cool new game and wait three months to buy it. So the people who are playing are largely the people who are going to be playing. Some will leave and come back.

If an expansion does come out, they may get some extra sales, but once an MMO is out for a year it’s success is based on the sales made by it’s cash shop, not the number of boxes sold.

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Brother Grimm.5176:

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.

Unfortunately, that means some people agree with it…..

While the entire argument the OP makes brings up valid points and complaints about “the problem”, it must be stated that not everyone agrees there IS “a problem”. Ascended gear is an end game goal that is NOT necessary to play the game. It IS useful to play some aspects (Fractals), but the claim that players are FORCED to grind for this gear or that BiS gear is mandatory is ridiculous. Hailing that idea as absolute truth is the real problem here (just my opinion, but I’m not alone).

I don’t think it can be argued that Exotics are fairly easy to gear up with and I just don’t see the major issue with the highest tier gear being a tier of items that take some time and expense to obtain. I’m still baffled that some seem so surprised that Ascended items are somewhere between Exotic and Legendary Weapons in both time and money to obtain (from what I understood, exactly what we were told they would be).

Pretty much no gear besides basic one was ever required to play any MMO.

Whats exactly your point as i dont see it.

Umm what? lol

Yah, ill let you figure that one out, cyas in few days?

To progress in Rift I had to get higher gear to do pretty much anything when I played. The same was true with AoC when I played that and Lotro.

All the good, cool, interesting stuff was hidden behind gear checks.

You obviously dont read what is responded to. Suggest you do.

You were NOT forced to get BiS gear in Rift or AoC or LOTRO to “play teh game”.

Lazy people, why do they respond like they wanted to quote someone else?

And not to mention that all those games had abysmal retention rate and gone F2P because they couldnt sustain any decent playerbase.

GW2 became “fastest selling MMO” * (in first 9 months) BECAUSE of their pre launch selling points. Keep THAT in mind next time you respond.

Vayne.8563:

How well was Rift selling at the one year mark? How good has any other MMO sold at the one year mark. Here’s a hint….though Rift released before Guild Wars 2, they haven’t sold as may copies total as Guild Wars 2 sold in it’s first year.

In fact, no MMO, no matter how “slow” sales have become, has sold more boxes in a year. Not SWToR with all it’s publicity, not WoW, not Rift.

Sales have to slow down because most people interested in the game get it when it comes out. People don’t say, oh cool new game and wait three months to buy it. So the people who are playing are largely the people who are going to be playing. Some will leave and come back.

If an expansion does come out, they may get some extra sales, but once an MMO is out for a year it’s success is based on the sales made by it’s cash shop, not the number of boxes sold.

Rift didn’t sell much, which is why they merged their servers and laid of a lot of their staff. I do know most MMOs don’t grow after release, most do decline except WoW and Eve I believe.

But they need to gain as many players as they are losing to stay stable. If they don’t they are declining, that is the case for any MMO including WoW. A decline in players is a decline in potential gem revenue.

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Brother Grimm.5176:

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.

Unfortunately, that means some people agree with it…..

While the entire argument the OP makes brings up valid points and complaints about “the problem”, it must be stated that not everyone agrees there IS “a problem”. Ascended gear is an end game goal that is NOT necessary to play the game. It IS useful to play some aspects (Fractals), but the claim that players are FORCED to grind for this gear or that BiS gear is mandatory is ridiculous. Hailing that idea as absolute truth is the real problem here (just my opinion, but I’m not alone).

I don’t think it can be argued that Exotics are fairly easy to gear up with and I just don’t see the major issue with the highest tier gear being a tier of items that take some time and expense to obtain. I’m still baffled that some seem so surprised that Ascended items are somewhere between Exotic and Legendary Weapons in both time and money to obtain (from what I understood, exactly what we were told they would be).

Pretty much no gear besides basic one was ever required to play any MMO.

Whats exactly your point as i dont see it.

Umm what? lol

Yah, ill let you figure that one out, cyas in few days?

To progress in Rift I had to get higher gear to do pretty much anything when I played. The same was true with AoC when I played that and Lotro.

All the good, cool, interesting stuff was hidden behind gear checks.

You obviously dont read what is responded to. Suggest you do.

You were NOT forced to get BiS gear in Rift or AoC or LOTRO to “play teh game”.

Lazy people, why do they respond like they wanted to quote someone else?

And not to mention that all those games had abysmal retention rate and gone F2P because they couldnt sustain any decent playerbase.

GW2 became “fastest selling MMO” * (in first 9 months) BECAUSE of their pre launch selling points. Keep THAT in mind next time you respond.

I’m not lazy. I can to ALL the content except for the highest level in fractals in Guild Wars 2. And I can see everything in the fractals without doing the highest levels, without getting anything above rares.

This is different from other games where such things aren’t true. I’m sure most people knew what I was talking about.

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Brother Grimm.5176:

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.

Unfortunately, that means some people agree with it…..

While the entire argument the OP makes brings up valid points and complaints about “the problem”, it must be stated that not everyone agrees there IS “a problem”. Ascended gear is an end game goal that is NOT necessary to play the game. It IS useful to play some aspects (Fractals), but the claim that players are FORCED to grind for this gear or that BiS gear is mandatory is ridiculous. Hailing that idea as absolute truth is the real problem here (just my opinion, but I’m not alone).

I don’t think it can be argued that Exotics are fairly easy to gear up with and I just don’t see the major issue with the highest tier gear being a tier of items that take some time and expense to obtain. I’m still baffled that some seem so surprised that Ascended items are somewhere between Exotic and Legendary Weapons in both time and money to obtain (from what I understood, exactly what we were told they would be).

Pretty much no gear besides basic one was ever required to play any MMO.

Whats exactly your point as i dont see it.

Umm what? lol

Yah, ill let you figure that one out, cyas in few days?

To progress in Rift I had to get higher gear to do pretty much anything when I played. The same was true with AoC when I played that and Lotro.

All the good, cool, interesting stuff was hidden behind gear checks.

You obviously dont read what is responded to. Suggest you do.

You were NOT forced to get BiS gear in Rift or AoC or LOTRO to “play teh game”.

Lazy people, why do they respond like they wanted to quote someone else?

And not to mention that all those games had abysmal retention rate and gone F2P because they couldnt sustain any decent playerbase.

GW2 became “fastest selling MMO” * (in first 9 months) BECAUSE of their pre launch selling points. Keep THAT in mind next time you respond.

I’m not lazy. I can to ALL the content except for the highest level in fractals in Guild Wars 2. And I can see everything in the fractals without doing the highest levels, without getting anything above rares.

This is different from other games where such things aren’t true. I’m sure most people knew what I was talking about.

I pretty sure they dont since pretty much all other MMOs are same crap.

AGAIN, NOBODY CARES WHAT WAS 5-10 YEARS AGO.

hope it sticks this time. though i doubt it.

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Brother Grimm.5176:

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.

Unfortunately, that means some people agree with it…..

While the entire argument the OP makes brings up valid points and complaints about “the problem”, it must be stated that not everyone agrees there IS “a problem”. Ascended gear is an end game goal that is NOT necessary to play the game. It IS useful to play some aspects (Fractals), but the claim that players are FORCED to grind for this gear or that BiS gear is mandatory is ridiculous. Hailing that idea as absolute truth is the real problem here (just my opinion, but I’m not alone).

I don’t think it can be argued that Exotics are fairly easy to gear up with and I just don’t see the major issue with the highest tier gear being a tier of items that take some time and expense to obtain. I’m still baffled that some seem so surprised that Ascended items are somewhere between Exotic and Legendary Weapons in both time and money to obtain (from what I understood, exactly what we were told they would be).

Pretty much no gear besides basic one was ever required to play any MMO.

Whats exactly your point as i dont see it.

Umm what? lol

Yah, ill let you figure that one out, cyas in few days?

To progress in Rift I had to get higher gear to do pretty much anything when I played. The same was true with AoC when I played that and Lotro.

All the good, cool, interesting stuff was hidden behind gear checks.

You obviously dont read what is responded to. Suggest you do.

You were NOT forced to get BiS gear in Rift or AoC or LOTRO to “play teh game”.

Lazy people, why do they respond like they wanted to quote someone else?

And not to mention that all those games had abysmal retention rate and gone F2P because they couldnt sustain any decent playerbase.

GW2 became “fastest selling MMO” * (in first 9 months) BECAUSE of their pre launch selling points. Keep THAT in mind next time you respond.

I’m not lazy. I can to ALL the content except for the highest level in fractals in Guild Wars 2. And I can see everything in the fractals without doing the highest levels, without getting anything above rares.

This is different from other games where such things aren’t true. I’m sure most people knew what I was talking about.

I pretty sure they dont since pretty much all other MMOs are same crap.

AGAIN, NOBODY CARES WHAT WAS 5-10 YEARS AGO.

hope it sticks this time. though i doubt it.

Except that my experienced with Rift were two years ago, not five to ten. And you can’t discuss a genre without going back at least a couple of years.

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Brother Grimm.5176:

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.

Unfortunately, that means some people agree with it…..

While the entire argument the OP makes brings up valid points and complaints about “the problem”, it must be stated that not everyone agrees there IS “a problem”. Ascended gear is an end game goal that is NOT necessary to play the game. It IS useful to play some aspects (Fractals), but the claim that players are FORCED to grind for this gear or that BiS gear is mandatory is ridiculous. Hailing that idea as absolute truth is the real problem here (just my opinion, but I’m not alone).

I don’t think it can be argued that Exotics are fairly easy to gear up with and I just don’t see the major issue with the highest tier gear being a tier of items that take some time and expense to obtain. I’m still baffled that some seem so surprised that Ascended items are somewhere between Exotic and Legendary Weapons in both time and money to obtain (from what I understood, exactly what we were told they would be).

Pretty much no gear besides basic one was ever required to play any MMO.

Whats exactly your point as i dont see it.

Umm what? lol

Yah, ill let you figure that one out, cyas in few days?

To progress in Rift I had to get higher gear to do pretty much anything when I played. The same was true with AoC when I played that and Lotro.

All the good, cool, interesting stuff was hidden behind gear checks.

You obviously dont read what is responded to. Suggest you do.

You were NOT forced to get BiS gear in Rift or AoC or LOTRO to “play teh game”.

Lazy people, why do they respond like they wanted to quote someone else?

And not to mention that all those games had abysmal retention rate and gone F2P because they couldnt sustain any decent playerbase.

GW2 became “fastest selling MMO” * (in first 9 months) BECAUSE of their pre launch selling points. Keep THAT in mind next time you respond.

I’m not lazy. I can to ALL the content except for the highest level in fractals in Guild Wars 2. And I can see everything in the fractals without doing the highest levels, without getting anything above rares.

This is different from other games where such things aren’t true. I’m sure most people knew what I was talking about.

I pretty sure they dont since pretty much all other MMOs are same crap.

AGAIN, NOBODY CARES WHAT WAS 5-10 YEARS AGO.

hope it sticks this time. though i doubt it.

Except that my experienced with Rift were two years ago, not five to ten. And you can’t discuss a genre without going back at least a couple of years.

And? You have “experience” with 1 other game. That also had to go F2P to stay afloat.

Do you know how many are out there?

Ignorance is bliss.

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Brother Grimm.5176:

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.

Unfortunately, that means some people agree with it…..

While the entire argument the OP makes brings up valid points and complaints about “the problem”, it must be stated that not everyone agrees there IS “a problem”. Ascended gear is an end game goal that is NOT necessary to play the game. It IS useful to play some aspects (Fractals), but the claim that players are FORCED to grind for this gear or that BiS gear is mandatory is ridiculous. Hailing that idea as absolute truth is the real problem here (just my opinion, but I’m not alone).

I don’t think it can be argued that Exotics are fairly easy to gear up with and I just don’t see the major issue with the highest tier gear being a tier of items that take some time and expense to obtain. I’m still baffled that some seem so surprised that Ascended items are somewhere between Exotic and Legendary Weapons in both time and money to obtain (from what I understood, exactly what we were told they would be).

Pretty much no gear besides basic one was ever required to play any MMO.

Whats exactly your point as i dont see it.

Umm what? lol

Yah, ill let you figure that one out, cyas in few days?

To progress in Rift I had to get higher gear to do pretty much anything when I played. The same was true with AoC when I played that and Lotro.

All the good, cool, interesting stuff was hidden behind gear checks.

You obviously dont read what is responded to. Suggest you do.

You were NOT forced to get BiS gear in Rift or AoC or LOTRO to “play teh game”.

Lazy people, why do they respond like they wanted to quote someone else?

And not to mention that all those games had abysmal retention rate and gone F2P because they couldnt sustain any decent playerbase.

GW2 became “fastest selling MMO” * (in first 9 months) BECAUSE of their pre launch selling points. Keep THAT in mind next time you respond.

I’m not lazy. I can to ALL the content except for the highest level in fractals in Guild Wars 2. And I can see everything in the fractals without doing the highest levels, without getting anything above rares.

This is different from other games where such things aren’t true. I’m sure most people knew what I was talking about.

I pretty sure they dont since pretty much all other MMOs are same crap.

AGAIN, NOBODY CARES WHAT WAS 5-10 YEARS AGO.

hope it sticks this time. though i doubt it.

Except that my experienced with Rift were two years ago, not five to ten. And you can’t discuss a genre without going back at least a couple of years.

And? You have “experience” with 1 other game. That also had to go F2P to stay afloat.

Do you know how many are out there?

Ignorance is bliss.

I’ve played Aion, Rift, Lotro, WoW, Guild Wars 1, Perfect World, DDO, TSW and a few others. But since this is a Guild Wars 2 forum, I seldom refer to them here. Not talking about other games on another game’s forum is a type of etiquette that’s apparently not everyone follows.

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Vayne.8563:

MikaHR.1978:

Brother Grimm.5176:

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.

Unfortunately, that means some people agree with it…..

While the entire argument the OP makes brings up valid points and complaints about “the problem”, it must be stated that not everyone agrees there IS “a problem”. Ascended gear is an end game goal that is NOT necessary to play the game. It IS useful to play some aspects (Fractals), but the claim that players are FORCED to grind for this gear or that BiS gear is mandatory is ridiculous. Hailing that idea as absolute truth is the real problem here (just my opinion, but I’m not alone).

I don’t think it can be argued that Exotics are fairly easy to gear up with and I just don’t see the major issue with the highest tier gear being a tier of items that take some time and expense to obtain. I’m still baffled that some seem so surprised that Ascended items are somewhere between Exotic and Legendary Weapons in both time and money to obtain (from what I understood, exactly what we were told they would be).

Pretty much no gear besides basic one was ever required to play any MMO.

Whats exactly your point as i dont see it.

Umm what? lol

Yah, ill let you figure that one out, cyas in few days?

To progress in Rift I had to get higher gear to do pretty much anything when I played. The same was true with AoC when I played that and Lotro.

All the good, cool, interesting stuff was hidden behind gear checks.

You obviously dont read what is responded to. Suggest you do.

You were NOT forced to get BiS gear in Rift or AoC or LOTRO to “play teh game”.

Lazy people, why do they respond like they wanted to quote someone else?

And not to mention that all those games had abysmal retention rate and gone F2P because they couldnt sustain any decent playerbase.

GW2 became “fastest selling MMO” * (in first 9 months) BECAUSE of their pre launch selling points. Keep THAT in mind next time you respond.

I’m not lazy. I can to ALL the content except for the highest level in fractals in Guild Wars 2. And I can see everything in the fractals without doing the highest levels, without getting anything above rares.

This is different from other games where such things aren’t true. I’m sure most people knew what I was talking about.

I pretty sure they dont since pretty much all other MMOs are same crap.

AGAIN, NOBODY CARES WHAT WAS 5-10 YEARS AGO.

hope it sticks this time. though i doubt it.

Except that my experienced with Rift were two years ago, not five to ten. And you can’t discuss a genre without going back at least a couple of years.

And? You have “experience” with 1 other game. That also had to go F2P to stay afloat.

Do you know how many are out there?

Ignorance is bliss.

I’ve played Aion, Rift, Lotro, WoW, Guild Wars 1, Perfect World, DDO, TSW and a few others. But since this is a Guild Wars 2 forum, I seldom refer to them here. Not talking about other games on another game’s forum is a type of etiquette that’s apparently not everyone follows.

And when you do its all missinformation. Good point.

I told you at least DOZEN of times to inform yourself about it, and as usual, you just IGNORE everything and continue to post missinformation.

Vayne.8563:

Okay here’s your challenge. Look at EVERY single video and article, every one. Look at everyone that mentions vertical progression. Count the amount of minutes or lines of everything Anet published or said that referenced vertical progression.

From my point of view the living/breathing world got a lot more play than the words vertical progression or no gear grind even.

What Anet spent most of the time talking about (ie most of what it was built on) was dynamic events as compared to quests, a branching personal story line, and a living breathing world.

Look at it all. Everything Anet said. You might have 15 mentions of vertical progression, but I seriously doubt it. Some of those might have been in response to direct questions.

But I don’t think it was the #1 point. I think it was one of many points. I think Anet also made a lot of other points. They made a huge deal about not being able to kill steal, or node steal. That’s still in the game. They made a big deal about the amount of voice acting they used. That’s still in the game.

They did talk about vertical progression, but I’d wager that far more people saw dynamic events, personal story and living breathing world. In fact, I can only remember one single blog post that mentioned vertical progression at all, out of dozens and dozens of blog posts.

In fact, I’ll take it further. How many times was vertical progression or gear grind mentioned on the Guild Wars 2 home page. If it was a central selling point, surely it would be mentioned there.

All that is not relevant. The no grind and no progression thing wasn’t hyped up, because it was evident, common sense. No one expected differently.
It wasn’t necessary to talk about, just like it’s not necessary to talk about whether or not it’s acceptable to murder your kids. People don’t explicitly write that into a marriage contract.

Arena.net also didn’t communicate much about Mesmers, simply because they were to be expected. Mesmers were not a big reveal and neither was the lack of gear progression. Neither was lack of sub fees much discussed. One line in the FAQ was all because that’s simply evident with a Guild Wars game.

As for a living, breathing world … ye that’s a hefty achievement. It should be hyped, and rightfully so. But lack of vertical progression is a cornerstone for the Guild Wars franchise just as much as the lack of sub fees.

When I first purchased GW2, I thought I would be playing it for the next 5 years based primarily on the zero gear grind philosophy. With Ascended gear this has all changed. There is no reason for me to spend six months fully gearing out an alt in GW2 when I could spend the same amount of time gearing out a main in an entirely new game.

Even if Ascended gear is the final tier, what happens when they introduce the 12 stat Infusions, or the +24 Infusions 6-months later, or the +20/15/+15 multi-stat Infusions a year from now?

I was going to spend 10$ a month on this game, and had spent $60 on the box and $50 dollars on gems so far. But I’ve stopped buying gems and will only resume when my main has converted all weapon sets and one set of armor to Ascended with max level infusions. Playing with max level gear is the game I bought, and that is the game for which I’ll continue to pay.

marnick.4305:

Vayne.8563:

Okay here’s your challenge. Look at EVERY single video and article, every one. Look at everyone that mentions vertical progression. Count the amount of minutes or lines of everything Anet published or said that referenced vertical progression.

From my point of view the living/breathing world got a lot more play than the words vertical progression or no gear grind even.

What Anet spent most of the time talking about (ie most of what it was built on) was dynamic events as compared to quests, a branching personal story line, and a living breathing world.

Look at it all. Everything Anet said. You might have 15 mentions of vertical progression, but I seriously doubt it. Some of those might have been in response to direct questions.

But I don’t think it was the #1 point. I think it was one of many points. I think Anet also made a lot of other points. They made a huge deal about not being able to kill steal, or node steal. That’s still in the game. They made a big deal about the amount of voice acting they used. That’s still in the game.

They did talk about vertical progression, but I’d wager that far more people saw dynamic events, personal story and living breathing world. In fact, I can only remember one single blog post that mentioned vertical progression at all, out of dozens and dozens of blog posts.

In fact, I’ll take it further. How many times was vertical progression or gear grind mentioned on the Guild Wars 2 home page. If it was a central selling point, surely it would be mentioned there.

All that is not relevant. The no grind and no progression thing wasn’t hyped up, because it was evident, common sense. No one expected differently.
It wasn’t necessary to talk about, just like it’s not necessary to talk about whether or not it’s acceptable to murder your kids. People don’t explicitly write that into a marriage contract.

Arena.net also didn’t communicate much about Mesmers, simply because they were to be expected. Mesmers were not a big reveal and neither was the lack of gear progression. Neither was lack of sub fees much discussed. One line in the FAQ was all because that’s simply evident with a Guild Wars game.

As for a living, breathing world … ye that’s a hefty achievement. It should be hyped, and rightfully so. But lack of vertical progression is a cornerstone for the Guild Wars franchise just as much as the lack of sub fees.

Mesmers were a big reveal. People speculated about it. Guild Wars 2 Guru had a zillion pages of threads discussing the mesmer reveal. There were probably more posts about the mesmer reveal than there were about vertical progression.

So what you’re saying here is that it was assumed, so it didn’t have to be talked about. Except for one problem. Anet wasn’t only talking to people who knew Guild Wars 1, or played Guild Wars, so what is the evidence that it was assumed. Assumed by who? Of course it would be assumed by Guild Wars 1 players. That’s another story. But Anet is selling a game. Presumably they want to sell a game to more than just you and people like you. They want to tell people and explain to them what the game would be about.

And if that was really one of their core selling points, don’t you think they’d have made it clear for the WoW players and the Rift players who may never have encountered that?

No, I don’t think it was assumed by everyone, though I agree it was probably assumed by most Guild Wars 1 players that thought about such things. But many people who played Guild Wars 1 also played other MMOs as well, and not all of them would have necessarily assumed that.

Yes, if Anet was building their game around it, they’d have had to have said so and made that clear.

Mind you, I agree it was there original intention. I just think other selling points were far more prominent and thus the major selling points of the game to most people.

Totally agree with the OP. The thing is they did promise something and delivered something else. I do think they did it to please the masses, however, doing so will alienate their core fans. And the gear progression is no where done, it is coming more often.

Xcom.1926:

Totally agree with the OP. The thing is they did promise something and delivered something else. I do think they did it to please the masses, however, doing so will alienate their core fans. And the gear progression is no where done, it is coming more often.

They need epic grind (Korean grinder) for eastern market, theyre pretty much done with west, GW2 will get treatment like Aion/Lineage 2.

Thats pretty much everything someone who decide to continue playing needs to know. I advise them to try those games to see what is it all about.

Vayne.8563:

marnick

snip

Mesmers were a big reveal. People speculated about it. Guild Wars 2 Guru had a zillion pages of threads discussing the mesmer reveal. There were probably more posts about the mesmer reveal than there were about vertical progression.

But arena.net only mentioned mesmers on two occasions:
- Was Logan mesmerized by the Queen?
- The release itself

Personally I never joined those mesmer discussions because it was a moot discussion. One might just as well discuss whether the sun would shine tomorrow.

And if that was really one of their core selling points, don’t you think they’d have made it clear for the WoW players and the Rift players who may never have encountered that?

No, I don’t think it was assumed by everyone, though I agree it was probably assumed by most Guild Wars 1 players that thought about such things. But many people who played Guild Wars 1 also played other MMOs as well, and not all of them would have necessarily assumed that.

Lets compromise and agree that a vast majority of players bought GW2 on the pretext that it would have no gear progression. A small minority might have had other ideas but it’s evident from all discussions about Ascended nonsense that people did not expect that to happen.

Yes, if Anet was building their game around it, they’d have had to have said so and made that clear.

Mind you, I agree it was there original intention. I just think other selling points were far more prominent and thus the major selling points of the game to most people.

I do think Exotic happened to be far too easy to get and had to add Ascended gear as a short term solution. However, it was clearly not intended, the entire implementation reeked of a desperate rush to get something, anything into the game resembling character progression. Mike O"Brien himself admitted that during the AMA. Fractals was a mess at launch, the communication was horrible and insulting. If Ascended was planned, the launch wouldn’t have been such a disaster.

Now Arena.net has to make this into a long term good system, which is rather difficult with a botched and desperate launch. They’re doing a good job, the current implementation is pretty OK by my standards. But at no point should you argue that this was the plan all along, the facts clearly show it wasn’t.

I wouldn’t mind ascended weapons so much if they didn’t keep changing the meta around. The last thing I want to do is create a weapon that becomes obsolete.

With exotics changing builds/gear in PVE was doable. This won’t be so with ascended.

I bought the game under the impression that it will share the same horizontal progression that GW1 was popular of. Why wouldn’t anyone think the same, when it’s marketed as having all the things we love about GW1?

Well, ascended gear made the game sour to me.
I’m no longer logging in thinking “hey I can do some awesome WvW battles” but “hey I can do wvw and it’ll be unfair cause I don’t do ascended”. Also, I can’t really play a game where the devs lied into your face this blatantly, just impossible.
So I’ll be switching to Camelot Unchained as soon as it’s out, cause this fun here is half-baken. Or Wildstar before that, although just for interim, I want the RvR of Camelot really.

Leo Paul.1659:

I bought the game under the impression that it will share the same horizontal progression that GW1 was popular of. Why wouldn’t anyone think the same, when it’s marketed as having all the things we love about GW1?

It is definitely a shame that the devs seem to hate GW1 and so took out pretty much every mechanic or method in the game and then discarded it to do something different and inferior.

The implementation of Ascended gear has irritated me to no end since its launch, and if it weren’t for the fact that this game is subscription-free, I would have cancelled by now.

I’m not alone in this. Out of those I talk to in real life and online, a good 90% of them have quit – not for good, but simply because the concept of a gear treadmill does not appeal to them.

I’ll still play, and probably even enjoy playing, but it’s saddening to see how far the game has swerved from its original philosophy. So much of what Colin Johanson’s infamous blog post spoke about is so two-faced and duplicitous if looked at through the lens of what’s currently happening ingame.

ArenaNet’s silence on this topic speaks volumes more than any discussion ever could, I think.