Guild Wars 2

Well, I’ve already expressed a lot of negative opinions about NPE and won’t bother repeating them in this post. But! Having started several new characters since this past weekend, I’ll add this: I feel sorry for the new players. They don’t know what they missed.

Vayne.8563:

I disagree with this. The amount of people who are brand new to the game and who have no idea, would see this locked stuff as normal and not think twice about it.

That’s almost what I meant. What I meant was if people would get frustrated by things being locked they would get frustrated even so, either knowing when it will unlock later or not. And I said that knowing it would unlock at some point later doesn’t make it look like “not-locked”, it will always look “locked”. Just doesn’t make sense to say “the door isn’t locked because it will unlock later”, that was what I meant.

Also yes, there are several things which were locked before and people didn’t complain. In fact, I never did neither do bother about elite, utility and other skills being locked. They DO make sense regarding learning process. But why locking out/hiding things like vistas, story/map progression and others based on level. These don’t make sense and are what made me dislike it.

Warning: incoming long post.

I’ve been ranting about how great Guild Wars 2 is at work for months now, and after the expansion was announced, I managed to convince several of my friends and co-workers to pick up the game.

Playing with new players used to be easy. It was a great way to show them the ropes, explaining things along the way while my character is leveled down to their content. Now, it’s a hassle, because I have no idea what the game has explained, what the game has explained poorly, and what the game hasn’t even tried to explain because it’s level-gated.

I.E. this situation: “What’s this?” “Oh, it’s a skill challenge. If you go up to this thing and complete a challenge, you get a skill point which you can spend to unlock new skills.” Then we go over to it and 3 people all tell me nothing happens when they click on it, because it turns out they haven’t unlocked skill points yet.

This happened over 20 times throughout the course of the night. Skill points. Rallying. Underwater combat. Even salvaging! It was honestly very frustrating for my friends who were told Guild Wars 2 was this rich, immersive experience, and now they feel like the game is treating them like an idiot because the game doesn’t think that they’ll “get it”.

Meanwhile, once they’ve unlocked something by leveling up enough, the game just says, “hey, you’ve unlocked this thing,” and that’s IT. Barely any explanation, and they’re left scratching their heads going “… okay?” When veteran players were traveling around learning new things it was very natural and very immersive. We saw a thing we didn’t understand, we investigated or learned through action. Now the game has a big pop-up that says “Hey, by the way, now all of a sudden when you die there’s this downed state and you can rally. Have fun!” and players are just left confused.

Now there are certain things that I do like about the NPE. I like that they’re getting loot every time they level up. That’s a nice touch that they seemed to appreciate. I like that it’s telling them they’re getting stat increases, or unlocking things like utility skill slots. But when you put huge parts of the game behind a level gate, it creates the illusion that there’s nothing going on in the game. No personal story until level 10 means that for the first few hours of the game players legitimately think the game has no story at all. Things I overheard with my new group: “Is this (renown hearts) all we do?” “What happened with that stuff from my intro?” No major game systems like traits or skill points creates the illusion that players have absolutely no choice over their abilities. “… So I have 3 abilities, is that it?” “When do I get to level up? (said by somebody at level 8)”

Meanwhile, my only response to these kinds of comments is “Keep playing! It gets better.” And it does, truthfully. But you have to hold a new player’s attention all the way until level 31 for them to unlock every major thing the game has to offer, and honestly that’s a long kitten time to try to convince a new player that your game is good. I am prodding my friends to keep playing until the game “gets great”, but I’m left wondering – why did this even need to happen? When I turned on Guild Wars 2 for the first time I thought it was great from moment 1. Now it’s a game that “gets better” after you play it for 10 hours.

Thanks for reading. I hope this feedback from my real-life experiences with new players helps to drive Guild Wars 2 to become an even better game. We’re going to have a LOT of new players with news of an expansion, and if we want to keep them, I think changes need to be made.

TL;DR: Brought some friends into the fold. The NPE doesn’t help to explain anything to them and only serves to frustrate them (and me) by gating major systems – including the kitten plot – behind a level wall, forcing them to play for many hours before the game actually becomes fun. It should just be fun right out of the gate, like it used to be.

Feonix.4790:

[sic]

This.

This is the problem. We didn’t need to be convinced to play. To hold on a bit. We didn’t have to “wait until it gets good”.

Of course there were and always will be things locked by leveling. But we didn’t feel them. Suddenly something on my skill bar changing, I go see what happened: new skill slots. How do I get skill points? Oh, I see I’ve been getting 1 per level; no problemo. My hero icon lights up, I go see what it is: I got trait points to spend. Don’t know what traits are? Google, wiki, ask guild. And so on.

The story got squashed into batches, because everybody has ADD. My skill points and stats got squashed into batches because I, as a new player, need to feel my class is weak as a twig until i figure I’ve been being starved for stats. I unlock untility slots but they’re useless because I am neither given points per level, nor am I allowed to do challenges because I am incompetent.

With the current system even if I was allowed to do challenges, I would fail fighting challenges because my stats don’t grow with my level.

Truth be told, the new information system is downright useless. It says what we can read about just by looking at UI. It does not provide any additional information. And honestly, it’s information we pick up by trying and moving around. We had a bit of freedom. Quite a lot actually. Unlike the current system, where you can’t try almost anything because you didn’t level.

Edit: added “We had a bit of freedom. Quite a lot actually.” for coherency.

Feonix.4790:

..very frustrating for my friends who were told Guild Wars 2 was this rich, immersive experience, and now they feel like the game is treating them like an idiot because the game doesn’t think that they’ll “get it”.

Meanwhile, once they’ve unlocked something by leveling up enough, the game just says, “hey, you’ve unlocked this thing,” and that’s IT. Barely any explanation, and they’re left scratching their heads going “… okay?” When veteran players were traveling around learning new things it was very natural and very immersive. We saw a thing we didn’t understand, we investigated or learned through action. Now the game has a big pop-up that says “Hey, by the way, now all of a sudden when you die there’s this downed state and you can rally. Have fun!” and players are just left confused.
…
TL;DR: Brought some friends into the fold. The NPE doesn’t help to explain anything to them and only serves to frustrate them (and me) by gating major systems – including the kitten plot – behind a level wall, forcing them to play for many hours before the game actually becomes fun. It should just be fun right out of the gate, like it used to be.

EXACTLY! I first noticed that with my friend Bryan (who subsequently went back to WoW instead of staying with GW2 – not because of that per say but just that he didn’t like how things were set up in GW2 and would get frustrated and told me that WoW was easier to get into and he missed raids). But I remember walking with him as he was brand new and I had jumped on one of my lower characters (who were like level 20 but still lower than 80 so I could still do things I hadn’t in his area). I went to a Vista and he kept saying it didn’t do anything. Now I didn’t know about the changes so I kept explaining you just click on it and what not. In fact I think it was one that I had already done so I couldn’t even tell if it was one where you get something in your inventory and have to consume it or what. Why is this locked anyway for low level characters? I don’t get the reasoning here. This just means that later on they have to come back just for these things .. which people end up going back to areas for World Bosses but not every single spot a Vista and SP are. There is a lot of needless waypointing anymore .. And as for Skill Points, not like they were too high level for them to do as they are in areas they are in that are their level already. I don’t understand why these things are locked for them. IS there a reason??

Maybe that is the confusion in us posting here. We are veteran players complaining about how it is for new players. WE know what has changed and when we help out new players we only end up confusing them instead of being “the most friendly and helpful community in an MMO” that we were claimed to be.

I also noticed that there no longer is a “how many vistas, WP’s SP, etc” completed on the world map. When I hit for the map to come up .. that is missing. When I mouse over a name of an area, it no longer has a mouse popup saying how much of the area has been completed. I found this VERY useful. When did this disappear?

NPE is on the white-hot blinding fury territory for me, I can’t really stand thinking about it.
But other than that I seem to think about the game nonstop and if a good number of the feature pack changes hadn’t happened I would’ve gotten four accounts from the sale. All the characters…

I don’t have too much anything coherent to say but there’s one thing I have rambled constantly in the past too: I would not want to see any kind of forced tutorial even with the first character.
Optional is the key word. Completely avoidable.

Maps that count towards World Completion still show. Southsun, Dry Top and Silverwastes don’t show.

Katiekaboom.1980:

I also noticed that there no longer is a “how many vistas, WP’s SP, etc” completed on the world map. When I hit for the map to come up .. that is missing. When I mouse over a name of an area, it no longer has a mouse popup saying how much of the area has been completed. I found this VERY useful. When did this disappear?

It’s one of the “features” related to NPE. You aren’t supposed to see your progress for world completion before you reach certain level. Knowing how many vistas, waypoints, etc you have found, or even wth is a skill point is too overwhelming for new players… [sarcasm self-test completed] :P

Traced.3495:

I would not want to see any kind of forced tutorial even with the first character.
Optional is the key word. Completely avoidable.

Well, with NPE now the whole leveling process feels like a forced tutorial where you can do things only when the game “thinks” you are able to do.

shadow.6174:

Vayne.8563:

I disagree with this. The amount of people who are brand new to the game and who have no idea, would see this locked stuff as normal and not think twice about it.

That’s almost what I meant. What I meant was if people would get frustrated by things being locked they would get frustrated even so, either knowing when it will unlock later or not. And I said that knowing it would unlock at some point later doesn’t make it look like “not-locked”, it will always look “locked”. Just doesn’t make sense to say “the door isn’t locked because it will unlock later”, that was what I meant.

Also yes, there are several things which were locked before and people didn’t complain. In fact, I never did neither do bother about elite, utility and other skills being locked. They DO make sense regarding learning process. But why locking out/hiding things like vistas, story/map progression and others based on level. These don’t make sense and are what made me dislike it.

But they’re not actually locking out vistas, they’re simply not putting icons on the map. If you see a vista, you can get it. So it wouldn’t jar anyone either. Because new players wouldn’t know they should be on the map.

The NPE isn’t perfect., but it’s not as bad as people make out either.

I finally leveled one of my toons from lvl1 to lvl80 with the NPE, so here’s my feedback:

The features that I hated.
- Some features are blocked on low levels, examples is diving goggles and skill points facepalms. I don’t mind if you can’t see them on the mini map when you’re low lvl, but if you find it… at least be accessible to everyone no matter what level.
- I CAN NO LONGER BUY APPLES FROM THE APPLE FARM! :< I can’t buy bread from the baker! RAWR.
-Underwater downed skills are level locked. I avoided going underwater until I had all 4 skills unlocked.
- The personal story is missing a big chunk of information that doesn’t tie much together after you completed it. I personally haven’t finished the personal story but after completing it, it didn’t feel “complete”. Then I realised “My greatest fear plotline was removed”

Some features that I loved.
- The objective compass was quite helpful to me, although it took me to places that I could die in 1 hit. Overall it was helpful although sometimes it didn’t.
- The beautiful pop up window for every level up is oh, so sparkly (and it has information too!). The rewards are quite good especially in when it started giving me exotics.
- Dodging tutorial.
- Lvling was generally very quick for the first 15 levels.
- Heart quests are easy to do now (I did miss the old ways though).

One feedback that some people may find positive or negative would be in regards that skill points are rewarded in “chunks” and primary stats are gained in “batches”. As a veteran player this really irritated me for probably the same reason that many are saying on the forums. However I also see this in another perspective: I get limited skill points and I have to spend it wisely. This convinces me to explore the world more in search for more skill points. Also with the primary stats gain in “batches”, this also somewhat helps me to be more skillful in combat because, well… too squishy.

Overall I find the NPE experience positive and it is definitely a good start to help with new players. However there were a few things that would like to see some changes.

I tried out the NPE when it first rolled out to see how it felt, but this is the first time I’ve made a new character with the intention of leveling it up and playing it.

Not crazy about the NPE, but mostly minor annoyances and some parts I actually like. I can’t put myself in the mindset of an actual new player. What I found the most annoying, however, was weapon swap. Up to level 10 now and it’s still not available (I know now that going into PvP lobby will fix this before it’s unlocked). I accidentally pulled too many scale and managed to get them all down but one. My pet was dead and it was outhealing the damage my bow could put out. I was cursing knowing that the greatsword in my bag would have finished him off but I … just … couldn’t …. reach it. Gah! It was frustrating long before that, but this was the point I got mad about it.

Just before that I had reached a heart that had underwater tasks and I panicked a little before remembering that I had just gotten my underwater equipment. If I had got to this heart any sooner, I wouldn’t have been able to effectively do it.

TLDR: I think some major combat mechanics are gated for too long.

Also, I really miss unlocking weapons by using them instead of by level (except on an ele :p). And bundles. I can’t tell you how much I freaking LOVED that I could carry big ol’ fish around and feed the baby bears on my first toon. Instantly fell in love with the game hard. Oh well, I still have the screen shots I guess.

ugh… not a reflection on this game, but I cringe when I see acronyms like NPE… reminds me of the SWG days when they introduced the NGE ie New Game Experience… that lead to the direct death of the game as a whole… then they introduced a playing card game you could spend real money on….

Gaile Gray.6029:

shadow — You are right, there haven’t been a lot of updates on this topic since the OP. I just wasn’t sure if you’d see the “We’re aware of these things” part. If so, my apologies. And yes, for the most part, changes to NPE are still on the “to do” list. But there’s no lack of understanding by the devs. For instance, our narrative director, Leah, posted about changes that need to be made in relation to the Personal Story.

Farm Flats and Havoc — Have you posted in the Traits thread? You’re welcome to add your thoughts there, as well, if you care to do so.

Zera — thank you and understood. The mods merged your post into the main thread to keep things tidy, concise, and easily reviewed. Thanks for sharing.

naisonod — If you did that on a phone, I’m impressed! And to your point, I can promise you that we do play our own game, so changes made are made with game experience, not on a whim or without a full view. I take on board you don’t care for the changes, but I did want to clarify that things aren’t switched by people who live in a vacuum.

Thank you Gaile for the update

Enough tomes to get instant 80 with my new toon in home town. So for me anet reduces the whole game experience and the content in their game. Couldnt care less.

Vayne.8563:

The NPE isn’t perfect., but it’s not as bad as people make out either.

Yes, I agree it’s not perfect. But also it’s not so good as you make out either.

shadow.6174:

Vayne.8563:

The NPE isn’t perfect., but it’s not as bad as people make out either.

Yes, I agree it’s not perfect. But also it’s not so good as you make out either.

Considering most of the limitations either kick in about the same amount of time they used to, or they don’t kick in at all after you unlock them once, I’m not sure what you’d base that on.

I thought I would provide some feedback.

Since the introduction of the NPE, I have created and brought to level 80 two characters.
My thoughts are going to revolve around just a couple of changes, the ones that impacted me the most.

Firstly, the fact that skills 2-5 (weapon skills) are now unlocked at a certain level, opposed to just using a particular weapon until all of its skills were unlocked.
I am conflicted in regards to this change. While playing, I found myself enjoying this new method more than the previous one (with my very first character, I remember I didn’t like Mace at the time, and didn’t enjoy using it just for the sake of unlocking its skills): it feels convenient to grab a weapon for the first time and see that some of its skills are already unlocked because your level is high enough. On the other hand, I feel that the previous method gave me a better understanding on what every skill did (since I was forced to spend time using that weapon).
So I think that, while my personal experience was better with the new method, maybe the previous one was better for learning.

The second thing I’d like to address is the level gating in the Personal Story. For me this was a bad, bad change. I mentioned leveling both of my NPE characters to 80, what I didn’t mention was that I did it on EotM, and I did it just so that I would be able to play the Personal Story with my own pace.
After finishing a chapter, having to wait for almost 10 levels doesn’t feel great.

The other changes didn’t really impact me personally, not that I can remember at least.

Feonix.4790:

Warning: incoming long post.

-snip-

TL;DR: Brought some friends into the fold. The NPE doesn’t help to explain anything to them and only serves to frustrate them (and me) by gating major systems – including the kitten plot – behind a level wall, forcing them to play for many hours before the game actually becomes fun. It should just be fun right out of the gate, like it used to be.

I cannot +1 this enough times.

Agree with the above post completely. I used to just make norns for enjoying being thrown into the great hunt immediately after creation, and then just explore/personal story right till lvl 80. It’s much harder now with no ore/lumber/plants in noob area’s (you may not have suspected anet, but these where a good way to earn exp, at low levels, and you removed it). The fun to unlock skills is gone. It’s now behind a huge time wall… Etc. Just wrong.

I bought a new account over the weekend. The silliest NPE for me was having to go back to pick up the skill points. Maybe they should move those to a more logical location.

I ended up reinstalling GW2 after hearing of the expansion pack – started up a new char to get back into the hang of things and ran smack dab into the NPE stuff. Read through the thread here and decided you know what… I’ll give it a try, I probably nead to re-learn some stuff anyway.

I think I can see what they were trying to do…. but they really just dropped the ball with it. Especially when you add in the trait changes, though I’m not going to harp on about them. Most of what I want to say has already been said, and likely ignored by Anet, so I’ll try and keep this brief.

The dodging tutorial was really good – I really think that this NPE would have been fairly good and even great if they had built it into things like that and kept it generally within the starting zones. If they had condensed down this whole NPE system and its gates if that makes sense. I’ve played games like that and haven’t had any problems with those systems, in part because it felt like I was unlocking things at fairly or relatively rapid pace.

Instead it feels like a lot of basic stuff is being given to me by an eye-dropper over far too large a span of “levels.” I’m playing through the starting zones on my new character and I find myself wondering what hooked me on this game back when I first played in the betas. Even with the faster leveling pace rushing me through the starting zones it just feels like there’s no hook in the opening part of the game. It just feels like another generic MMO with “quests” of go kill 20 of this mob using these 2 skills. This is especially true with the personal story starting at ten and other changes – such as those to the hearts.

Honestly if they were going to go this far on changes maybe they should have taken it a step further and made further changes to make it fit in better. Its rather annoying to see those lost trinkets and be unable to do anything with them, to see that skill point and know I’m going to have backtrack to get it when the game finally allows me to do things, etc. Everything used to flow fairly or at least somewhat smoothly and it just doesn’t anymore.

Frankly, I’m looking at the NPE and the changes to the trait system and wondering if I really want to spend my money on this upcoming expansion pack. I’ve heard they are looking at the traits again and I’ll probably stick around to see what they come up with but….

Honestly, the best advice I can give to Anet is to set up some form of a test server. Even if it has to be a closed test server kind of a like closed beta or something along those lines. Maybe even re-introduce those surveys that popped up all the time back in beta. Just get some good solid player feedback before dropping things like this into the live game. There’s a good amount of stuff I like or want to like but its just drowned out by the rest which feels poorly considered and/or poorly handled.

There was a comment somewhere on this forum that NPE was due to some study based on the number of minutes a new player stayed in game prior to logging off. (chuckle)

Tell me one great literature was written with this idea to “keep a reader to read for 2 minutes longer”.

The vision of ANet is gone.

The trait changes aren’t being ignored by Anet. They’ll be changed completely with Heart of Thorns.

I truly wish NCSoft will stop meddling with ANet’s vision. Doing so will only result in NCSoft losing a good product, and it will have nobody to blame but itself.

If GW2 was a Subscription based game, I wonder how many people would have unsubbed when the New trait system hit… I wonder how many more would have unsubbed when the NPE came out… But the game isn’t sub based, so here we are.
I wonder how many pages this thread will reach before they start listening to our feedback.

Vayne.8563:

The trait changes aren’t being ignored by Anet. They’ll be changed completely with Heart of Thorns.

Hmm, if so the question is: will it be changed within the expansion or will be changed when the expansion comes out? If the first, what about those who won’t get the expansion, will they be left out of the changes? If so it won’t sound fair huh. Sorry if I misunderstood something.

The New Player Experience patch was a ruinous pile of level gating and scrambling of the late Personal Story chapters. The compass part is seemingly the only good part — every other part could’ve been removed. Between this and the trait patch that they bungled, early leveling isn’t fun at all now.

shadow.6174:

Vayne.8563:

The trait changes aren’t being ignored by Anet. They’ll be changed completely with Heart of Thorns.

Hmm, if so the question is: will it be changed within the expansion or will be changed when the expansion comes out? If the first, what about those who won’t get the expansion, will they be left out of the changes? If so it won’t sound fair huh. Sorry if I misunderstood something.

I’m sure it will be changed for everyone. This is the way it was worded. Anet looked for a way forward that meshed with stated ideals and they’ll modify the rest of the game to match those ideals.

Vayne.8563:

shadow.6174:

Vayne.8563:

The trait changes aren’t being ignored by Anet. They’ll be changed completely with Heart of Thorns.

Hmm, if so the question is: will it be changed within the expansion or will be changed when the expansion comes out? If the first, what about those who won’t get the expansion, will they be left out of the changes? If so it won’t sound fair huh. Sorry if I misunderstood something.

I’m sure it will be changed for everyone. This is the way it was worded. Anet looked for a way forward that meshed with stated ideals and they’ll modify the rest of the game to match those ideals.

That’s what I mean with it being changed when the expansion comes out. In this case, it would be good. Let’s hope that’s how it will be then.

Nilkemia.8507:

The New Player Experience patch was a ruinous pile of level gating and scrambling of the late Personal Story chapters. The compass part is seemingly the only good part — every other part could’ve been removed. Between this and the trait patch that they bungled, early leveling isn’t fun at all now.

“Ruinous pile” is the best phrase I’ve seen on this forum to describe NPE.

Frankly if I were the CEO at NCsoft I’d be getting on the phone to find the person responsible, and canning the person who pulled this stunt

It reduced an elegant game to a genre dime-a-dozen FTP with childish “reward” window that looks cheap. Instead of coming into a game world of faraway fantasy, I’m bombarded with this psudo reward, feeling it’s like a “candy” treat to get me to even respond. Mmm, my goal in an RPG is to learn, to feel I’m challenged, to step into a world of wander. Not to be handed “candies”. In the starting days of GW2, under ANet’s vision, what I saw was a world of beauty and wonder. Now I feel I’m reading a cheap romance, starting on page one with some “enticement”. If I want dime store stuff, I’ll go to 100 other FTP games online.

On top of it, the rewards are full of items that are not salvageable, so players need to drag to destroy. So you give candy to players, then expect them to labor to get rid of it.

Ok… I’d be calling the QA dept. Shouldn’t the disposal of these items be a bit more interesting than that? Make the game a world people can sink into, not one of pop-ups?

Like, players may get a quest to turn in the reward to an army officer at his racial city and learn more about how his turning in his old sword can help younger recruits.

It was ANet’s goal to make this a world of living, breathing fantasy where people will always feel they are in-character. I see this NPE is full of “let’s get the player excited about pop up reward”, “let’s have them drag it to destroy it for our in-game economy.”

Meanwhile, ANet’s vision is utterly being torn apart.

Sigh. If you hope GW2 will become a unforgetable chapter in MMORPG history, as I felt it could be, then don’t do things like this to tear it down, to bring it down to the level of all the cheap FTP games out there.

I’m pretty furious right now. Yes, if I were the CEO I’d be canning people atm.

We bought a new GW2 account over the last weekend and, holy cow! The NPE is just awful for anyone who already knows how the game is played. All this level gating and hand holding is a huge pain.

I really wish there was some way to let me be treated as an experienced player though the account itself is new.

The best thing that can be done for the NPE is to hit a revert button, go back to the pristine version. Although I’m not sure if NCSoft has the balls to do so.

Blockhead Magee.3092:

We bought a new GW2 account over the last weekend and, holy cow! The NPE is just awful for anyone who already knows how the game is played. All this level gating and hand holding is a huge pain.

I really wish there was some way to let me be treated as an experienced player though the account itself is new.

Some of the NPE does disappear on the second character you level. And leveling through levels 1-15 is much faster than it used to be.

Feonix.4790:

Warning: incoming long post.

I’ve been ranting about how great Guild Wars 2 is at work for months now, and after the expansion was announced, I managed to convince several of my friends and co-workers to pick up the game.

Playing with new players used to be easy. It was a great way to show them the ropes, explaining things along the way while my character is leveled down to their content. Now, it’s a hassle, because I have no idea what the game has explained, what the game has explained poorly, and what the game hasn’t even tried to explain because it’s level-gated.

I.E. this situation: “What’s this?” “Oh, it’s a skill challenge. If you go up to this thing and complete a challenge, you get a skill point which you can spend to unlock new skills.” Then we go over to it and 3 people all tell me nothing happens when they click on it, because it turns out they haven’t unlocked skill points yet.

This happened over 20 times throughout the course of the night. Skill points. Rallying. Underwater combat. Even salvaging! It was honestly very frustrating for my friends who were told Guild Wars 2 was this rich, immersive experience, and now they feel like the game is treating them like an idiot because the game doesn’t think that they’ll “get it”.

Meanwhile, once they’ve unlocked something by leveling up enough, the game just says, “hey, you’ve unlocked this thing,” and that’s IT. Barely any explanation, and they’re left scratching their heads going “… okay?” When veteran players were traveling around learning new things it was very natural and very immersive. We saw a thing we didn’t understand, we investigated or learned through action. Now the game has a big pop-up that says “Hey, by the way, now all of a sudden when you die there’s this downed state and you can rally. Have fun!” and players are just left confused.

Now there are certain things that I do like about the NPE. I like that they’re getting loot every time they level up. That’s a nice touch that they seemed to appreciate. I like that it’s telling them they’re getting stat increases, or unlocking things like utility skill slots. But when you put huge parts of the game behind a level gate, it creates the illusion that there’s nothing going on in the game. No personal story until level 10 means that for the first few hours of the game players legitimately think the game has no story at all. Things I overheard with my new group: “Is this (renown hearts) all we do?” “What happened with that stuff from my intro?” No major game systems like traits or skill points creates the illusion that players have absolutely no choice over their abilities. “… So I have 3 abilities, is that it?” “When do I get to level up? (said by somebody at level 8)”

Meanwhile, my only response to these kinds of comments is “Keep playing! It gets better.” And it does, truthfully. But you have to hold a new player’s attention all the way until level 31 for them to unlock every major thing the game has to offer, and honestly that’s a long kitten time to try to convince a new player that your game is good. I am prodding my friends to keep playing until the game “gets great”, but I’m left wondering – why did this even need to happen? When I turned on Guild Wars 2 for the first time I thought it was great from moment 1. Now it’s a game that “gets better” after you play it for 10 hours.

Thanks for reading. I hope this feedback from my real-life experiences with new players helps to drive Guild Wars 2 to become an even better game. We’re going to have a LOT of new players with news of an expansion, and if we want to keep them, I think changes need to be made.

TL;DR: Brought some friends into the fold. The NPE doesn’t help to explain anything to them and only serves to frustrate them (and me) by gating major systems – including the kitten plot – behind a level wall, forcing them to play for many hours before the game actually becomes fun. It should just be fun right out of the gate, like it used to be.

This. So much this.

BlueOcean.5380:

“Ruinous pile” is the best phrase I’ve seen on this forum to describe NPE.

Frankly if I were the CEO at NCsoft I’d be getting on the phone to find the person responsible, and canning the person who pulled this stunt

It reduced an elegant game to a genre dime-a-dozen FTP with childish “reward” window that looks cheap. Instead of coming into a game world of faraway fantasy, I’m bombarded with this psudo reward, feeling it’s like a “candy” treat to get me to even respond. Mmm, my goal in an RPG is to learn, to feel I’m challenged, to step into a world of wander. Not to be handed “candies”. In the starting days of GW2, under ANet’s vision, what I saw was a world of beauty and wonder. Now I feel I’m reading a cheap romance, starting on page one with some “enticement”. If I want dime store stuff, I’ll go to 100 other FTP games online.

On top of it, the rewards are full of items that are not salvageable, so players need to drag to destroy. So you give candy to players, then expect them to labor to get rid of it.

Ok… I’d be calling the QA dept. Shouldn’t the disposal of these items be a bit more interesting than that? Make the game a world people can sink into, not one of pop-ups?

Like, players may get a quest to turn in the reward to an army officer at his racial city and learn more about how his turning in his old sword can help younger recruits.

It was ANet’s goal to make this a world of living, breathing fantasy where people will always feel they are in-character. I see this NPE is full of “let’s get the player excited about pop up reward”, “let’s have them drag it to destroy it for our in-game economy.”

Meanwhile, ANet’s vision is utterly being torn apart.

Sigh. If you hope GW2 will become a unforgetable chapter in MMORPG history, as I felt it could be, then don’t do things like this to tear it down, to bring it down to the level of all the cheap FTP games out there.

I’m pretty furious right now. Yes, if I were the CEO I’d be canning people atm.

Whoever was in charge should’ve been told to go right back to the drawing board or just get fired for sheer stupidity. But of course, someone’s going to whine at me for that sentiment. Anyways, +50 for your post….if I could do that.

Nilkemia.8507:

BlueOcean.5380:

“Ruinous pile” is the best phrase I’ve seen on this forum to describe NPE.

Frankly if I were the CEO at NCsoft I’d be getting on the phone to find the person responsible, and canning the person who pulled this stunt

It reduced an elegant game to a genre dime-a-dozen FTP with childish “reward” window that looks cheap. Instead of coming into a game world of faraway fantasy, I’m bombarded with this psudo reward, feeling it’s like a “candy” treat to get me to even respond. Mmm, my goal in an RPG is to learn, to feel I’m challenged, to step into a world of wander. Not to be handed “candies”. In the starting days of GW2, under ANet’s vision, what I saw was a world of beauty and wonder. Now I feel I’m reading a cheap romance, starting on page one with some “enticement”. If I want dime store stuff, I’ll go to 100 other FTP games online.

On top of it, the rewards are full of items that are not salvageable, so players need to drag to destroy. So you give candy to players, then expect them to labor to get rid of it.

Ok… I’d be calling the QA dept. Shouldn’t the disposal of these items be a bit more interesting than that? Make the game a world people can sink into, not one of pop-ups?

Like, players may get a quest to turn in the reward to an army officer at his racial city and learn more about how his turning in his old sword can help younger recruits.

It was ANet’s goal to make this a world of living, breathing fantasy where people will always feel they are in-character. I see this NPE is full of “let’s get the player excited about pop up reward”, “let’s have them drag it to destroy it for our in-game economy.”

Meanwhile, ANet’s vision is utterly being torn apart.

Sigh. If you hope GW2 will become a unforgetable chapter in MMORPG history, as I felt it could be, then don’t do things like this to tear it down, to bring it down to the level of all the cheap FTP games out there.

I’m pretty furious right now. Yes, if I were the CEO I’d be canning people atm.

Whoever was in charge should’ve been told to go right back to the drawing board or just get fired for sheer stupidity. But of course, someone’s going to whine at me for that sentiment. Anyways, +50 for your post….if I could do that.

Because that wouldn’t cause your gaming company to go out of business. Some people have not a clue how businesses work. Not a clue.

Once, when I was running a fairly large store as part of a chain, a guy made a mistake that cost the company a couple of thousand dollars. It was an honest mistake, but yeah, it cost us. The district manager told me to fire him. A couple of weeks later, the DM sees him working and says to me, I told you to fire that guy. I told him, fire him? I just spent $2000 TRAINING him.

It’s not like he was ever going to make the same mistake again, so firing him would have been counter productive. By keeping the guy, he became not only a loyal employee but one of my key salespeople. That guy ended up being very loyal, because he knew I didn’t fire him when I could have.

Firing people who do something that doesn’t work out, particularly something like this which was undoubtedly the work and decision of more than one person, most of these things are doing collaboratively, means firing more than one person. Who replaces those people? Who trains the people that replaces them? What makes you think the next people can do better? Do you know how long this would set back development?

Calling for people to be fired when you don’t know anything about the internal workings of a company isn’t just irresponsible. It’s unwise.

The reason I’d be firing that individual is A) He(she) has to be in a managerial position to approve this change. Not just a newly trained employee. I have no place in my company for myopic mangers. I don’t want to spend my time looking after their mistakes.

BlueOcean.5380:

The reason I’d be firing that individual is A) He(she) has to be in a managerial position to approve this change. Not just a newly trained employee. I have no place in my company for myopic mangers. I don’t want to spend my time looking after their mistakes.

Yes, I think the word myopic applies here. How ironic.

Vayne.8563:

Yes, I think the word myopic applies here. How ironic.

You are entitled to your opinion, sir.

Vayne.8563:

Nilkemia.8507:

BlueOcean.5380:

“Ruinous pile” is the best phrase I’ve seen on this forum to describe NPE.

Frankly if I were the CEO at NCsoft I’d be getting on the phone to find the person responsible, and canning the person who pulled this stunt

It reduced an elegant game to a genre dime-a-dozen FTP with childish “reward” window that looks cheap. Instead of coming into a game world of faraway fantasy, I’m bombarded with this psudo reward, feeling it’s like a “candy” treat to get me to even respond. Mmm, my goal in an RPG is to learn, to feel I’m challenged, to step into a world of wander. Not to be handed “candies”. In the starting days of GW2, under ANet’s vision, what I saw was a world of beauty and wonder. Now I feel I’m reading a cheap romance, starting on page one with some “enticement”. If I want dime store stuff, I’ll go to 100 other FTP games online.

On top of it, the rewards are full of items that are not salvageable, so players need to drag to destroy. So you give candy to players, then expect them to labor to get rid of it.

Ok… I’d be calling the QA dept. Shouldn’t the disposal of these items be a bit more interesting than that? Make the game a world people can sink into, not one of pop-ups?

Like, players may get a quest to turn in the reward to an army officer at his racial city and learn more about how his turning in his old sword can help younger recruits.

It was ANet’s goal to make this a world of living, breathing fantasy where people will always feel they are in-character. I see this NPE is full of “let’s get the player excited about pop up reward”, “let’s have them drag it to destroy it for our in-game economy.”

Meanwhile, ANet’s vision is utterly being torn apart.

Sigh. If you hope GW2 will become a unforgetable chapter in MMORPG history, as I felt it could be, then don’t do things like this to tear it down, to bring it down to the level of all the cheap FTP games out there.

I’m pretty furious right now. Yes, if I were the CEO I’d be canning people atm.

Whoever was in charge should’ve been told to go right back to the drawing board or just get fired for sheer stupidity. But of course, someone’s going to whine at me for that sentiment. Anyways, +50 for your post….if I could do that.

Because that wouldn’t cause your gaming company to go out of business. Some people have not a clue how businesses work. Not a clue.

Once, when I was running a fairly large store as part of a chain, a guy made a mistake that cost the company a couple of thousand dollars. It was an honest mistake, but yeah, it cost us. The district manager told me to fire him. A couple of weeks later, the DM sees him working and says to me, I told you to fire that guy. I told him, fire him? I just spent $2000 TRAINING him.

It’s not like he was ever going to make the same mistake again, so firing him would have been counter productive. By keeping the guy, he became not only a loyal employee but one of my key salespeople. That guy ended up being very loyal, because he knew I didn’t fire him when I could have.

Firing people who do something that doesn’t work out, particularly something like this which was undoubtedly the work and decision of more than one person, most of these things are doing collaboratively, means firing more than one person. Who replaces those people? Who trains the people that replaces them? What makes you think the next people can do better? Do you know how long this would set back development?

Calling for people to be fired when you don’t know anything about the internal workings of a company isn’t just irresponsible. It’s unwise.

You must have had a very forgiving DM. Most likely mine would have fired both of you.

So I also am playing one of those ten dollar accounts. Some of the stuff is a little strange, but I don’t think that it’s terribad.

I ran a ranger up to around lvl 15, and have banked around 6 gold so far, and a few goodies from 2 BL chests {had a key drop, and the PS key}.

I have not used my chest yet, as I am undecided between the heavy and medium armor set. I’m going to delete the ranger at around lvl 20, and start the main.

Bellizare.5816:

Vayne.8563:

Nilkemia.8507:

BlueOcean.5380:

“Ruinous pile” is the best phrase I’ve seen on this forum to describe NPE.

Frankly if I were the CEO at NCsoft I’d be getting on the phone to find the person responsible, and canning the person who pulled this stunt

It reduced an elegant game to a genre dime-a-dozen FTP with childish “reward” window that looks cheap. Instead of coming into a game world of faraway fantasy, I’m bombarded with this psudo reward, feeling it’s like a “candy” treat to get me to even respond. Mmm, my goal in an RPG is to learn, to feel I’m challenged, to step into a world of wander. Not to be handed “candies”. In the starting days of GW2, under ANet’s vision, what I saw was a world of beauty and wonder. Now I feel I’m reading a cheap romance, starting on page one with some “enticement”. If I want dime store stuff, I’ll go to 100 other FTP games online.

On top of it, the rewards are full of items that are not salvageable, so players need to drag to destroy. So you give candy to players, then expect them to labor to get rid of it.

Ok… I’d be calling the QA dept. Shouldn’t the disposal of these items be a bit more interesting than that? Make the game a world people can sink into, not one of pop-ups?

Like, players may get a quest to turn in the reward to an army officer at his racial city and learn more about how his turning in his old sword can help younger recruits.

It was ANet’s goal to make this a world of living, breathing fantasy where people will always feel they are in-character. I see this NPE is full of “let’s get the player excited about pop up reward”, “let’s have them drag it to destroy it for our in-game economy.”

Meanwhile, ANet’s vision is utterly being torn apart.

Sigh. If you hope GW2 will become a unforgetable chapter in MMORPG history, as I felt it could be, then don’t do things like this to tear it down, to bring it down to the level of all the cheap FTP games out there.

I’m pretty furious right now. Yes, if I were the CEO I’d be canning people atm.

Whoever was in charge should’ve been told to go right back to the drawing board or just get fired for sheer stupidity. But of course, someone’s going to whine at me for that sentiment. Anyways, +50 for your post….if I could do that.

Because that wouldn’t cause your gaming company to go out of business. Some people have not a clue how businesses work. Not a clue.

Once, when I was running a fairly large store as part of a chain, a guy made a mistake that cost the company a couple of thousand dollars. It was an honest mistake, but yeah, it cost us. The district manager told me to fire him. A couple of weeks later, the DM sees him working and says to me, I told you to fire that guy. I told him, fire him? I just spent $2000 TRAINING him.

It’s not like he was ever going to make the same mistake again, so firing him would have been counter productive. By keeping the guy, he became not only a loyal employee but one of my key salespeople. That guy ended up being very loyal, because he knew I didn’t fire him when I could have.

Firing people who do something that doesn’t work out, particularly something like this which was undoubtedly the work and decision of more than one person, most of these things are doing collaboratively, means firing more than one person. Who replaces those people? Who trains the people that replaces them? What makes you think the next people can do better? Do you know how long this would set back development?

Calling for people to be fired when you don’t know anything about the internal workings of a company isn’t just irresponsible. It’s unwise.

You must have had a very forgiving DM. Most likely mine would have fired both of you.

You don’t fire your #1 earner, I don’t care how annoyed you are. I made more money for that company than any other manager in the district.

He did try to fire me once. Man, he got in trouble with the office.

Blockhead Magee.3092:

I really wish there was some way to let me be treated as an experienced player though the account itself is new.

THIS is the point. Teaching new players is always good and a needed thing, but with NPE all players are treated equal, not taking in account how smart and/or experienced the players can be.

Vayne.8563:

Some of the NPE does disappear on the second character you level. And leveling through levels 1-15 is much faster than it used to be.

Yes but, from viewpoint of a really new but experienced player… if someone already feel frustrated due being treated like a child just at the first character, do you think they would be patient and persistent at the point of creating a second one just to see if things would change, or would they give it up before that? I believe the last…

Another thing… what’s the point of it being faster? Leveling wasn’t supposed to be an enjoyable experience instead a boring tutorial that you feel wanting to rush in order to finish it asap? Again, that’s it, leveling has became more like a boring chore than a enjoyable playtime.. I never bothered about hitting lvl 30 in the fastest time possible, I liked exploring things and mechanics at my own pace.

However, a thing I tend to agree with…

Vayne.8563:

Calling for people to be fired when you don’t know anything about the internal workings of a company isn’t just irresponsible. It’s unwise.

Mistakes happens at times and firing may not the best solution yes. Sometimes replacing the one or those who did the mistake can cost more than the damage caused by the mistake.

shadow.6174:

Blockhead Magee.3092:

I really wish there was some way to let me be treated as an experienced player though the account itself is new.

THIS is the point. Teaching new players is always good and a needed thing, but with NPE all players are treated equal, not taking in account how smart and/or experienced the players can be.

Vayne.8563:

Some of the NPE does disappear on the second character you level. And leveling through levels 1-15 is much faster than it used to be.

Yes but, from viewpoint of a really new but experienced player… if someone already feel frustrated due being treated like a child just at the first character, do you think they would be patient and persistent at the point of creating a second one just to see if things would change, or would they give it up before that? I believe the last…

Another thing… what’s the point of it being faster? Leveling wasn’t supposed to be an enjoyable experience instead a boring tutorial that you feel wanting to rush in order to finish it asap? Again, that’s it, leveling has became more like a boring chore than a enjoyable playtime.. I never bothered about hitting lvl 30 in the fastest time possible, I liked exploring things and mechanics at my own pace.

However, a thing I tend to agree with…

Vayne.8563:

Calling for people to be fired when you don’t know anything about the internal workings of a company isn’t just irresponsible. It’s unwise.

Mistakes happens at times and firing may not the best solution yes. Sometimes replacing the one or those who did the mistake can cost more than the damage caused by the mistake.

See I just don’t get this comment. I’ve played lots of other MMOs, most recently FFXIV. I’m an experienced player. FFXIV was much much slower in getting abilities than Guild Wars 2 is. An experienced player will fly through the first 15 levels, which are introductory anyway, and have most of the important stuff unlocked.

I’m not even sure why this is a discussion.

Vayne.8563:

Bellizare.5816:

Vayne.8563:

Nilkemia.8507:

BlueOcean.5380:

“Ruinous pile” is the best phrase I’ve seen on this forum to describe NPE.

Frankly if I were the CEO at NCsoft I’d be getting on the phone to find the person responsible, and canning the person who pulled this stunt

It reduced an elegant game to a genre dime-a-dozen FTP with childish “reward” window that looks cheap. Instead of coming into a game world of faraway fantasy, I’m bombarded with this psudo reward, feeling it’s like a “candy” treat to get me to even respond. Mmm, my goal in an RPG is to learn, to feel I’m challenged, to step into a world of wander. Not to be handed “candies”. In the starting days of GW2, under ANet’s vision, what I saw was a world of beauty and wonder. Now I feel I’m reading a cheap romance, starting on page one with some “enticement”. If I want dime store stuff, I’ll go to 100 other FTP games online.

On top of it, the rewards are full of items that are not salvageable, so players need to drag to destroy. So you give candy to players, then expect them to labor to get rid of it.

Ok… I’d be calling the QA dept. Shouldn’t the disposal of these items be a bit more interesting than that? Make the game a world people can sink into, not one of pop-ups?

Like, players may get a quest to turn in the reward to an army officer at his racial city and learn more about how his turning in his old sword can help younger recruits.

It was ANet’s goal to make this a world of living, breathing fantasy where people will always feel they are in-character. I see this NPE is full of “let’s get the player excited about pop up reward”, “let’s have them drag it to destroy it for our in-game economy.”

Meanwhile, ANet’s vision is utterly being torn apart.

Sigh. If you hope GW2 will become a unforgetable chapter in MMORPG history, as I felt it could be, then don’t do things like this to tear it down, to bring it down to the level of all the cheap FTP games out there.

I’m pretty furious right now. Yes, if I were the CEO I’d be canning people atm.

Whoever was in charge should’ve been told to go right back to the drawing board or just get fired for sheer stupidity. But of course, someone’s going to whine at me for that sentiment. Anyways, +50 for your post….if I could do that.

Because that wouldn’t cause your gaming company to go out of business. Some people have not a clue how businesses work. Not a clue.

Once, when I was running a fairly large store as part of a chain, a guy made a mistake that cost the company a couple of thousand dollars. It was an honest mistake, but yeah, it cost us. The district manager told me to fire him. A couple of weeks later, the DM sees him working and says to me, I told you to fire that guy. I told him, fire him? I just spent $2000 TRAINING him.

It’s not like he was ever going to make the same mistake again, so firing him would have been counter productive. By keeping the guy, he became not only a loyal employee but one of my key salespeople. That guy ended up being very loyal, because he knew I didn’t fire him when I could have.

Firing people who do something that doesn’t work out, particularly something like this which was undoubtedly the work and decision of more than one person, most of these things are doing collaboratively, means firing more than one person. Who replaces those people? Who trains the people that replaces them? What makes you think the next people can do better? Do you know how long this would set back development?

Calling for people to be fired when you don’t know anything about the internal workings of a company isn’t just irresponsible. It’s unwise.

You must have had a very forgiving DM. Most likely mine would have fired both of you.

You don’t fire your #1 earner, I don’t care how annoyed you are. I made more money for that company than any other manager in the district.

He did try to fire me once. Man, he got in trouble with the office.

What can I say? I’ve been employed by some very vain bosses. One time I was actually fired, and they ended up rehiring me with a raise and promotion.

Vayne.8563:

shadow.6174:

Blockhead Magee.3092:

I really wish there was some way to let me be treated as an experienced player though the account itself is new.

THIS is the point. Teaching new players is always good and a needed thing, but with NPE all players are treated equal, not taking in account how smart and/or experienced the players can be.

Vayne.8563:

Some of the NPE does disappear on the second character you level. And leveling through levels 1-15 is much faster than it used to be.

Yes but, from viewpoint of a really new but experienced player… if someone already feel frustrated due being treated like a child just at the first character, do you think they would be patient and persistent at the point of creating a second one just to see if things would change, or would they give it up before that? I believe the last…

Another thing… what’s the point of it being faster? Leveling wasn’t supposed to be an enjoyable experience instead a boring tutorial that you feel wanting to rush in order to finish it asap? Again, that’s it, leveling has became more like a boring chore than a enjoyable playtime.. I never bothered about hitting lvl 30 in the fastest time possible, I liked exploring things and mechanics at my own pace.

However, a thing I tend to agree with…

Vayne.8563:

Calling for people to be fired when you don’t know anything about the internal workings of a company isn’t just irresponsible. It’s unwise.

Mistakes happens at times and firing may not the best solution yes. Sometimes replacing the one or those who did the mistake can cost more than the damage caused by the mistake.

See I just don’t get this comment. I’ve played lots of other MMOs, most recently FFXIV. I’m an experienced player. FFXIV was much much slower in getting abilities than Guild Wars 2 is. An experienced player will fly through the first 15 levels, which are introductory anyway, and have most of the important stuff unlocked.

I’m not even sure why this is a discussion.

Absolutely. I am getting ready to tackle SB for the first time on my $10 account. My only nit to pick so far is that it’s kind of silly to pass a commune with this place for a skill point, and being told I’m not experienced enough to commune lol.

Bellizare.5816:

Vayne.8563:

shadow.6174:

Blockhead Magee.3092:

I really wish there was some way to let me be treated as an experienced player though the account itself is new.

THIS is the point. Teaching new players is always good and a needed thing, but with NPE all players are treated equal, not taking in account how smart and/or experienced the players can be.

Vayne.8563:

Some of the NPE does disappear on the second character you level. And leveling through levels 1-15 is much faster than it used to be.

Yes but, from viewpoint of a really new but experienced player… if someone already feel frustrated due being treated like a child just at the first character, do you think they would be patient and persistent at the point of creating a second one just to see if things would change, or would they give it up before that? I believe the last…

Another thing… what’s the point of it being faster? Leveling wasn’t supposed to be an enjoyable experience instead a boring tutorial that you feel wanting to rush in order to finish it asap? Again, that’s it, leveling has became more like a boring chore than a enjoyable playtime.. I never bothered about hitting lvl 30 in the fastest time possible, I liked exploring things and mechanics at my own pace.

However, a thing I tend to agree with…

Vayne.8563:

Calling for people to be fired when you don’t know anything about the internal workings of a company isn’t just irresponsible. It’s unwise.

Mistakes happens at times and firing may not the best solution yes. Sometimes replacing the one or those who did the mistake can cost more than the damage caused by the mistake.

See I just don’t get this comment. I’ve played lots of other MMOs, most recently FFXIV. I’m an experienced player. FFXIV was much much slower in getting abilities than Guild Wars 2 is. An experienced player will fly through the first 15 levels, which are introductory anyway, and have most of the important stuff unlocked.

I’m not even sure why this is a discussion.

Absolutely. I am getting ready to tackle SB for the first time on my $10 account. My only nit to pick so far is that it’s kind of silly to pass a commune with this place for a skill point, and being told I’m not experienced enough to commune lol.

Sure about the skill point but it only happens your first time through. If you make a second character, you can get skill points from level 2.

Suggestion to improve immersion in NPE:

Instead of the current pop-up window which knocks out immersion—

have a quaggan materialize next to the player with a gift box in hand in a magical light.

Quaggan introduces himself as a peaceful race from the sea that has been attacked often by Kraits, and is happy to see player advancing in skills. He indicates the gift box is from the quaggans for friends.

The Quaggan hopes to one day see the player again in the ocean.

At the same time, an in-game mail appears. Player can click on it and see the gift content. For e.g., a potion, or quaggan-tradtiional food, that will grant skill points, traits, in addition to weapons, armor, etc.

This way when the player finally sees quaggans at their homes, it will bring an arc to a completion. At that time the player may hand in old weapons, armors to any quaggan NPC.

The quaggan will reply: “Thank you for bringing this back. Perhaps we can help a bit more”. The reward for tuning in this armor/weapon can be an exp booster.

The thing is, we are talking about New Players Experience… first character, first impression, very first moments in the game, first experience in the game… second, third or whatever character shouldn’t matter. You don’t start a game already planning what to do with your Nth character. Stop using second char gets better as argument.

Also, it’s called New Players Experience, again, New Players… Veteran players shouldn’t be forced to go through a tutorial whenever a new character is created. Alts shouldn’t matter for this subject. People doesn’t go through a whole learning process again every time they have to drive a new car, they learn the basics just once and then just get adapted to any difference or new info along the way.

Yes, it’s frustrating to see my main getting a “you haven’t enough experience” from a NPC after been playing it for more than 2 years and no, I wouldn’t waste my time through the whole leveling process again just to get rid of that. Stop using alts as argument. Alts are the end of leveling process, an additional. NPE should be only about the very first character.

Vayne.8563:

Because that wouldn’t cause your gaming company to go out of business. Some people have not a clue how businesses work. Not a clue.

You are seriously going to try defending the NPE garbage patch and whatever fool(s) implemented it? Stupidity has no limits, it seems…

Once, when I was running a fairly large store as part of a chain, a guy made a mistake that cost the company a couple of thousand dollars. It was an honest mistake, but yeah, it cost us. The district manager told me to fire him. A couple of weeks later, the DM sees him working and says to me, I told you to fire that guy. I told him, fire him? I just spent $2000 TRAINING him.

Nice story. But what does it have to do with the garbage NPE patch we’re discussing?

It’s not like he was ever going to make the same mistake again, so firing him would have been counter productive. By keeping the guy, he became not only a loyal employee but one of my key salespeople. That guy ended up being very loyal, because he knew I didn’t fire him when I could have.

Well, that scenario doesn’t seem to relate to this one at all. We know the NPE wasn’t an accident on their part, it was deliberate. And despite all the ways we’ve pointed out how it’s trash, all they seemed content to do was tweak a few things to try appeasing us, but left most of the new rubbish level-gating in effect.

This was clearly done by someone with influence in the company too, not some low level employee. Yet they seem to have not played their own game, otherwise they’d realize that there was no need for the NPE whatsoever. If people are being overwhelmed by the mechanics, you try to inform them better, not screw over parts of the game that were just fine and then top it with a compass and a dodging tutorial.

(Seriously, they think we don’t know how to use dodge?)

So, not only have they done something that hurts the game, they are continuing to do so despite how we’ve all pointed out how bad it is. Not an “honest mistake” at all. And I’ve yet to see anything good come out of it. People still ask the same questions they always do , and then some.

Firing people who do something that doesn’t work out, particularly something like this which was undoubtedly the work and decision of more than one person, most of these things are doing collaboratively, means firing more than one person. Who replaces those people? Who trains the people that replaces them? What makes you think the next people can do better? Do you know how long this would set back development?

You know what also doesn’t work? Keeping ruinous changes like the NPE in the game and thinking it’ll make things better somehow.

Calling for people to be fired when you don’t know anything about the internal workings of a company isn’t just irresponsible. It’s unwise.

Sitting idly by and letting them drive this game into the ground is even worse. So, is that all you’ve got? I doubt you know anything of ArenaNet’s inner workings either.

You cannot defend the New Player Experience, because almost nothing about it was a good change. It gave us barely anything and took away things that made leveling early on so fun, as well as mucking up the late game Personal Story. If it had been like this when I first started, I most likely wouldn’t have stuck around for as long as I have, nor would I have supported them as much as I had in the past.