New player thoughts

New player thoughts

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Posted by: Juanpierre.8913

Juanpierre.8913

I played for 2 months. I’m an avid MMO player (not just wow). Leveled 2 tools to 80. I enjoyed some things about gw2:

- Exploration
- The mixture of traditional quests and dynamic events in the old world. Always something to do at my own pace.
- Gear grind (I appreciate that in a game). Finally got to the point of crafting ascended gear, and I like the work involved.
- Fractals. Dungeons look like they could be fun, but it seems that no one does them.

But I couldn’t get past the following:

- Exclusive focus on dynamic events in newer content. Whenever I go into a newer zone (SW or HoT) I get a serious case of “wtf is going on?” Disconcerting, and less than fun. I guess I could try to figure them out, but there’s nothing about it that makes me want to put that work in. The zones leave me feeling alienated and confused. Not much motivation to play in them.

- Ridiculously difficult open world PvE in HoT. I enjoy difficult content. But I’m used to it being instanced content. Fractals are fun and challenging. I hear the raid is hard as balls, which it should be. But when I die over and over doing the basic expansion content in VB, it’s not so fun anymore. And on top of it they make most of the way points contested so you have to run across the entire map to get back to what you were doing. Yes, I should be better, but I usually expect open world stuff to be more relaxing as opposed to instanced content. Not fun.

- Masteries. I like the concept. But I’m new so I don’t have many achiements. The options for Central Tyra mastery points are all gated behind achieves- and ones that generally require grind. OK, that’s fine. Something to work towards. Problem is my XP bar for masteries is now stuck. That is incredibly unmotivating. Poor design, or a middle finger to new players. Either way, poor. This honestly is my biggest gripe with the game.

- Low rewards for time spent. Fractals drop a bag full of crap. Map completion gives one mastery point. World bosses drop another bag full of crap. Etc…

So I found myself logging in and not caring about doing anything.

So I’m not logging in anymore. Shame they got my money upfront, because I’m a disappointed customer.

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Posted by: Aidenwolf.5964

Aidenwolf.5964

Very close to my thoughts on the game and I’ve been here since before launch.

Buy To Play Guild Wars 2 2012-2015 – RIP
Unlucky since launch, RNG isn’t random
PugLife SoloQ

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Posted by: alwinp.2791

alwinp.2791

HoT maps aren’t really that much harder then SW/DT & SC (southsun cove)

PVE was rediculously easy (google champion train for more info) so anet increased the skillgap a bit by making more CC based mobs and giving them more hp/toughness or whatever mechanic they have now in HoT.

I remember getting rekt pretty much instantly when i entered DT with a full zerk set.
Now I’m playing a zerk ele for almost 3 years and it does affect your survivability by a ton. It’s safe to say that HoT is just a map that requires you to know your class verry well. Wich is something I’d actually encourage to stick with.

Masteries are a good addition to the game. For new players this might seem like a ton of work, but thats what it is supposed to be. These masteries require work even for players who were here during launch.

Gw2 is essentially skinwars 2. Once you reach an 80 character and have it fully pink geared there isent much left as far as progression goes other then doing achievements and collecting skins.

If that isen’t your cup of tea this game will slowly become a boring pain.

Good thing this game doesn’t have subscription and allows you to leave and come back at any time you wish.

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Posted by: Stars.2179

Stars.2179

I played for 2 months. […]
- Gear grind (I appreciate that in a game). Finally got to the point of crafting ascended gear, and I like the work involved.
[…]
- Masteries. I like the concept. But I’m new so I don’t have many achiements. The options for Central Tyra mastery points are all gated behind achieves- and ones that generally require grind. OK, that’s fine. Something to work towards. Problem is my XP bar for masteries is now stuck. That is incredibly unmotivating. Poor design, or a middle finger to new players. Either way, poor. This honestly is my biggest gripe with the game.

Hulloh? Contradiction here. You are a new player. Don’t expect to have the same amount of mastery points as someone who played for three years. Just do the achievements. They are easy. Not even a grind. Yet you call yourself ok with gear grind?

- Fractals. Dungeons look like they could be fun, but it seems that no one does them.

Not sure if you know how to use the LFG tools, but there are fractal groups in lfg every moment…

But I couldn’t get past the following:

- Exclusive focus on dynamic events in newer content. Whenever I go into a newer zone (SW or HoT) I get a serious case of “wtf is going on?” Disconcerting, and less than fun. I guess I could try to figure them out, but there’s nothing about it that makes me want to put that work in. The zones leave me feeling alienated and confused. Not much motivation to play in them.

- Ridiculously difficult open world PvE in HoT. I enjoy difficult content. But I’m used to it being instanced content. Fractals are fun and challenging. I hear the raid is hard as balls, which it should be. But when I die over and over doing the basic expansion content in VB, it’s not so fun anymore. And on top of it they make most of the way points contested so you have to run across the entire map to get back to what you were doing. Yes, I should be better, but I usually expect open world stuff to be more relaxing as opposed to instanced content. Not fun.

Um, maybe ask in map chat? Or maybe you’re not ready for the expansion. Look, the expansion isn’t going to be as easy as afk at world bosses and press 1 and grab chest. If you are used to that, then I’m sorry you’ve been taught to play the game the wrong way. Obviously then when you get into HoT zones you will be creamed.

But honestly ALL open world contents can be facerolled now. Even the raids are easy. Vale Guardian is now completed with 5 man instead of 10 on record and is consistently do-able with 8 people with 2 mins on the clock and that’s a bad team. Gorseval the second boss is now beaten with 8 people as well. Same for Sabetha the last boss. Open world in the zones are not even worth mentioning in term of difficulty…

My advise is go back to the core tyria and practice your skills in full berserker and try to learn the mechanic of the class while earning your mastery points. Maybe in 3-4 months you’ll be ready to go on the new zones

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Posted by: Osby.5390

Osby.5390

I enjoy the game but I am finding getting ascended gear and legendary weapons to hard as I am just a casual solo player who has not done dungeons and I really only do PVE. So yeah I’m finding it hard to get that nice stuff.

I agree with OP on most of what you said especially VB and that being ridiculously hard to wander around in even as a level 80 character.

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Posted by: Falanu.4289

Falanu.4289

But I couldn’t get past the following:

- Exclusive focus on dynamic events in newer content. Whenever I go into a newer zone (SW or HoT) I get a serious case of “wtf is going on?” Disconcerting, and less than fun. I guess I could try to figure them out, but there’s nothing about it that makes me want to put that work in. The zones leave me feeling alienated and confused. Not much motivation to play in them.

That’s not supposed to be played that way in SW/TD, as they’re completely interwoven with LS Season 2, story of which explains basically everything you needed to know. It’s the same with the Kraimoss-Spur-Events in Core-Tyria, which I always felt were mis-placed and “funny”, until I learned that they are remains of LS Season 1, which explained that.

The game offers too many short-cuts which leads to many mis-understandings. I wish there was a “guide” on how to optimally get the most out of the “story-content”.

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Posted by: Redfeather.6401

Redfeather.6401

I find myself only logging in to work my way through the login rewards track.
Not feeling very motivated to do anything.
My impression is that some really good stuff is ruined by a lack of innovation, lack of interaction, and too much focus on farming/grind.

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Posted by: Soon.5240

Soon.5240

I played for 2 months. I’m an avid MMO player (not just wow). Leveled 2 tools to 80. I enjoyed some things about gw2:

HoT’s maps represent a significant departure from the core game’s content, and because these departures were so poorly communicated to the community, it caught many who loved the core game off guard.

You aren’t alone.

HoT’s maps should not be seen as a continuation of the core Tyria PvE maps — they are group-forced, single meta-event, end-game maps. The fact that Anet chose to lock core game mechanics (Elite Traits, Gliding, etc.) behind this type of content has turned off many long time players and represents the majority of complaints on this forum.

HoT maps can be better understood as small, repetitive instanced game-play. If you are a new player and like this type of thing, then you’ll probably love HoT. If you don’t, but you loved leveling your toon in central Tyria, then you’ll probably be asking yourself, “Anet, wtf?”

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Posted by: Ragnarox.9601

Ragnarox.9601

Yea rewards are crap…..but for those farming 24/7 is good.

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Posted by: Knighthonor.4061

Knighthonor.4061

Problem is my XP bar for masteries is now stuck.

what you mean by this?

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

Problem is my XP bar for masteries is now stuck.

what you mean by this?

He means he’s leveled his XP to max for a mastery point, but he doesn’t have enough points to spend it.

All you can do is switch to leveling other mastery lines until they’re all full. I’m at that point in HoT now.

I have two full mastery bars of experience, but not enough points to spend. It’s the same after you’ve leveled all your masteries too, your XP bar won’t go anywhere.

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Posted by: reapex.8546

reapex.8546

I played for 2 months. I’m an avid MMO player (not just wow). Leveled 2 tools to 80. I enjoyed some things about gw2:

HoT’s maps represent a significant departure from the core game’s content, and because these departures were so poorly communicated to the community, it caught many who loved the core game off guard.

Waiiiiiiiiiiiiit, hold on. Live stream, login articles, gaming websites, map chat, forums, reddit, beta weekends, and more all talked about the radically departure HoT was from Central Tyria BEFORE the game came out and people celebrated the changes o.O. It was communicated extremely well, imo. The only way someone didn’t know about most of the upcoming changes was if they avoided detailed news about HoT.

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Posted by: Inculpatus cedo.9234

Inculpatus cedo.9234

I played for 2 months. I’m an avid MMO player (not just wow). Leveled 2 tools to 80. I enjoyed some things about gw2:

HoT’s maps represent a significant departure from the core game’s content, and because these departures were so poorly communicated to the community, it caught many who loved the core game off guard.

You aren’t alone.

HoT’s maps should not be seen as a continuation of the core Tyria PvE maps — they are group-forced, single meta-event, end-game maps. The fact that Anet chose to lock core game mechanics (Elite Traits, Gliding, etc.) behind this type of content has turned off many long time players and represents the majority of complaints on this forum.

HoT maps can be better understood as small, repetitive instanced game-play. If you are a new player and like this type of thing, then you’ll probably love HoT. If you don’t, but you loved leveling your toon in central Tyria, then you’ll probably be asking yourself, “Anet, wtf?”

How is Gliding core game mechanics? You can only glide in the Heart of Maguuma.

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Posted by: Just a flesh wound.3589

Just a flesh wound.3589

I played for 2 months. I’m an avid MMO player (not just wow). Leveled 2 tools to 80. I enjoyed some things about gw2:

HoT’s maps represent a significant departure from the core game’s content, and because these departures were so poorly communicated to the community, it caught many who loved the core game off guard.

You aren’t alone.

HoT’s maps should not be seen as a continuation of the core Tyria PvE maps — they are group-forced, single meta-event, end-game maps. The fact that Anet chose to lock core game mechanics (Elite Traits, Gliding, etc.) behind this type of content has turned off many long time players and represents the majority of complaints on this forum.

HoT maps can be better understood as small, repetitive instanced game-play. If you are a new player and like this type of thing, then you’ll probably love HoT. If you don’t, but you loved leveling your toon in central Tyria, then you’ll probably be asking yourself, “Anet, wtf?”

Elite traits are not core game mechanics. They were not in game at start with the purchase of the core game. Nor have they been in game for the 3 years before the expansion.

Posts like this make me think people like you haven’t played the games where you buy expansions but only games where the expansions are free. In games where you buy the expansion; races, professions and skills are behind the expansion and must be paid for to get. Just look at WoW or Guild Wars 1 for examples of this.

And as said above, if you missed how the new maps were set up, you must of snoozed through the information given out during the betas.

By the way, since you managed to miss all the information given out during the betas, any further new elite specs and mastery lines will require HoT or purchase of a later expansion.

Be careful what you ask for
ANet may give it to you.

(edited by Just a flesh wound.3589)

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Posted by: Yargesh.4965

Yargesh.4965

There is a huge amount of content to go through in this game. People who don’t plan at all and want everything have a problem. The op being a new pleayer could have done old map complete, story and several side achievements to get the point needed in the base zone to fill out things like Pact commander so they get auto loot. Then move on to the new maps and be on the same footing as everyone else when they enter the HoT maps and just go around collecting HP and exp.
TLDR: take your time and it is amazing how the exp adds up and the mastery points as well..

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Posted by: jarieleledan.8249

jarieleledan.8249

Chiming in just to say Anet already disclosed that the future expansions will include the previous expansions. So for example, if you don’t have the game/you don’t buy HoT, when DSD (I still hope that’s gonna be the thing) comes out, buying DSD exp will automatically get you core Tyria and HoT.

Or at least, I think I remember that being said.

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Posted by: luzt.7692

luzt.7692

I played for 2 months. I’m an avid MMO player (not just wow). Leveled 2 tools to 80. I enjoyed some things about gw2:

HoT’s maps represent a significant departure from the core game’s content, and because these departures were so poorly communicated to the community, it caught many who loved the core game off guard.

Waiiiiiiiiiiiiit, hold on. Live stream, login articles, gaming websites, map chat, forums, reddit, beta weekends, and more all talked about the radically departure HoT was from Central Tyria BEFORE the game came out and people celebrated the changes o.O. It was communicated extremely well, imo. The only way someone didn’t know about most of the upcoming changes was if they avoided detailed news about HoT.

So they had all that info and communicated extremely well and still delivered some sub-par expac that a big part of the community doesn’t like. Many already took a break.

That makes me worried, since apparently no amount of extremely well communication is enough.

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Posted by: Torolan.5816

Torolan.5816

OP, i agree with you on many points, but SW is really easy to understand. You have to be just there and wait for a commander or mentor lamp to go on. If the orange bar reaches the end, you jump into the closest hole in a fortress and battle the boss there to get a key. Then you rush along with everyone, beat 3 champs, get a key. Collect chest, rush along with anyone else, kill 4 champs, teleport to the waypoint in the south, transform yourself and rush to the middle where your keys opens the chest twice. SW in a nutshell.

What any HoT map differentiates from SW is that it is Drytop on speed, utterly despicable jumping and riddle stuff. If you like that, HoT, is the map for you. If not, you´re screwed and have to weather it out until you got all you HP and recipes you need to never go to any of the maps ever again.

Nobody knew about how to get mastery points either, and I remember the outrage when you had to get 400 points for the elite spec, most people did not even expect that you had to free play them if I remember well. So much for communication.

So yes, HoT is a massive upgrade to SW and Southsun in terms of jumping, not so much in the quality of mobs. I remember people getting rolled over in the first days of Southsun in droves or killed by their mighty combo of doom because of retalitation, that was poetry in motion for me. too bad that the map itself has not much to offer beside Karka Shells.

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

I played for 2 months. I’m an avid MMO player (not just wow). Leveled 2 tools to 80. I enjoyed some things about gw2:

HoT’s maps represent a significant departure from the core game’s content, and because these departures were so poorly communicated to the community, it caught many who loved the core game off guard.

Waiiiiiiiiiiiiit, hold on. Live stream, login articles, gaming websites, map chat, forums, reddit, beta weekends, and more all talked about the radically departure HoT was from Central Tyria BEFORE the game came out and people celebrated the changes o.O. It was communicated extremely well, imo. The only way someone didn’t know about most of the upcoming changes was if they avoided detailed news about HoT.

So they had all that info and communicated extremely well and still delivered some sub-par expac that a big part of the community doesn’t like. Many already took a break.

That makes me worried, since apparently no amount of extremely well communication is enough.

No amount of communication is every really enough. A lot of things that surprised people, I knew from paying attention.

Like the new zones would be hard, or the guild halls would be long term goals.

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Posted by: Blood Red Arachnid.2493

Blood Red Arachnid.2493

It is a good thing that HoT maps are harder than core Tyria. Right now, core Tyria is way too easy. There’s a good chance I could beat most enemies using my nose to play the game. Excuse me while I whip out my old fogy and talk about the past.

The game that you know as core Tyria today is not how it has always been. There was a time when it was much harder (at launch) than it is now, and a time where it was harder than that (beta). Old Cursed Shore was nightmare, with Risen Krait chain-ulling you half way down the map, aggroing the zerg rush of enemis that occupied that space. Everything in general was all around tougher.

Now, this is where you’ll learn partly of my treachery, but partly of the dark truth that is user metrics. I suggest a long time ago that the game was too hard in a specific way, in that the absolute lack of tutorials for things meant that most players had to fight with wikis and numbers in order to actually be good. Apparently this reflected… some kind of survey Anet did. Might’ve been focus groups, or user metrics. But regardless, they ascertained that there was, indeed, a pretty big drop off at the beginning of the game, that people couldn’t build themselves properly, and that the opening to the game wasn’t “user friendly”.

Now, while my idea is to have more tutorials in the game to demonstrate things, as to eventually make the game harder, Anet took it a different way. Combining the “we want to find our skills like in GW1” suggestion and the idea to increase player retention, they decided to make it so instead of getting most stuff by level 30, all of your utilities and traits were going to be spread out along a much larger area, and that everything would be given to you painfully slow. The game was simplified greatly, and likewise enemy encounters were designed assuming you had little more than auto attacks and under-level gear.

With repeated changes to the trait system, leveling, and stat distributions, the game kept getting easier and easier. Add in a bit of power creep and theorycrafters “breaking” the system to come up with optimal builds, and suddenly you melt face by just auto attacking. This has left core Tyria in a neutered state, where dungeons barely pose a challenge and the overworld is surmountable by all but the most incompetent of individuals.

The thing with HoT maps is that, they take advantage of much more of the combat system than core Tyria does. I imagine that it must be quite the shock moving from faceroll to facemelting content, but it is better this way. These are enemies you have to actually play against. Enemies you have to chase, to disengage, to disable, enemies who aren’t completely destroyed by a blind field. The dodge key is suddenly important. These enemies actually encourage you to take advantage of the intricacies of the GW2 combat system. Enemies in HoT are how GW2 enemies should’ve been designed, and not the “smoke field to win” enemies we get in the rest of the game.

I don’t have opinions. I only have facts I can’t adequately prove.

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Posted by: slamfunction.7462

slamfunction.7462

Please note that the rewards system is based on your wallet only. In game rewards are an F2P illusion. Thanks for playing! Please come again!

Arena Nets are used to catch Gladiator Fish.

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Posted by: Just a flesh wound.3589

Just a flesh wound.3589

Please note that the rewards system is based on your wallet only. In game rewards are an F2P illusion. Thanks for playing! Please come again!

Oh? Is that why I had 3500 gold at one time, just from playing the game and the skins I wanted, none from buying gold. Good to know.

Be careful what you ask for
ANet may give it to you.

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Posted by: Soon.5240

Soon.5240

I played for 2 months. I’m an avid MMO player (not just wow). Leveled 2 tools to 80. I enjoyed some things about gw2:

HoT’s maps represent a significant departure from the core game’s content, and because these departures were so poorly communicated to the community, it caught many who loved the core game off guard.

Waiiiiiiiiiiiiit, hold on. Live stream, login articles, gaming websites, map chat, forums, reddit, beta weekends, and more all talked about the radically departure HoT was from Central Tyria BEFORE the game came out and people celebrated the changes o.O. It was communicated extremely well, imo. The only way someone didn’t know about most of the upcoming changes was if they avoided detailed news about HoT.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/heads-up-iteration-incoming/

Some excerpts:

“When we ran our beta events for Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns, we allowed everyone to instantly access fully unlocked elite specializations with all their skills and abilities so we could get balance and gameplay feedback on them. We’d also always said you’d need to unlock your elite specialization, but we were never explicit on the details of how characters do this and the hero-point costs associated. We always viewed the elite specialization as one of the major rewards in expansion—but between the betas and lack of unlock info, we didn’t do a great job properly aligning expectations on how your elite specialization is earned.”

The extent of the Mastery XP system gating was not communicated.

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Posted by: NecroN.8306

NecroN.8306

Get yourself a refund.

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Posted by: Celtic Lady.3729

Celtic Lady.3729

- Masteries. I like the concept. But I’m new so I don’t have many achiements. The options for Central Tyra mastery points are all gated behind achieves- and ones that generally require grind. OK, that’s fine. Something to work towards. Problem is my XP bar for masteries is now stuck. That is incredibly unmotivating. Poor design, or a middle finger to new players. Either way, poor. This honestly is my biggest gripe with the game.

I’ve been playing this game for 3 years and have quite a few achievements done, so I had a decent leg up on the masteries. But what I have left to do feels like a grind. lol I can’t really imagine having to start as a new player with nothing. Especially when it comes to the Maguuma Masteries.

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Posted by: Vayne.8563

Vayne.8563

- Masteries. I like the concept. But I’m new so I don’t have many achiements. The options for Central Tyra mastery points are all gated behind achieves- and ones that generally require grind. OK, that’s fine. Something to work towards. Problem is my XP bar for masteries is now stuck. That is incredibly unmotivating. Poor design, or a middle finger to new players. Either way, poor. This honestly is my biggest gripe with the game.

I’ve been playing this game for 3 years and have quite a few achievements done, so I had a decent leg up on the masteries. But what I have left to do feels like a grind. lol I can’t really imagine having to start as a new player with nothing. Especially when it comes to the Maguuma Masteries.

Why especially when it comes to Maguuma Masteries. We were all on basically even footing there, since no one started with mastery points.

I’m at Mastery Level 141. I have all core Tyria masteries finished and I think two left in Maguuma, that I don’t care much about, but I’ll eventually get. I haven’t touched the raid masteries and may never, which is fine.

I never farmed spiders or CoF either.

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Posted by: Healix.5819

Healix.5819

So I’m not logging in anymore. Shame they got my money upfront, because I’m a disappointed customer.

If you liked gear grinds, quests, fractals/dungeons/raids and easy open world content, it sounds like you were wanting a WoW-clone.

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Posted by: Soon.5240

Soon.5240

Why especially when it comes to Maguuma Masteries. We were all on basically even footing there, since no one started with mastery points.

All they’re saying is that they just don’t like the HoT content. Liking or not liking the HoT content has nothing to do with being “on basically even footing” or comparing yourself to how others might be enjoying the game.

It is possible to enjoy the core Tyria PvE maps while not liking the HoT maps. They are apples and oranges.

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Posted by: Razor.9872

Razor.9872

It is a good thing that HoT maps are harder than core Tyria. Right now, core Tyria is way too easy. There’s a good chance I could beat most enemies using my nose to play the game. Excuse me while I whip out my old fogy and talk about the past.

The game that you know as core Tyria today is not how it has always been. There was a time when it was much harder (at launch) than it is now, and a time where it was harder than that (beta). Old Cursed Shore was nightmare, with Risen Krait chain-ulling you half way down the map, aggroing the zerg rush of enemis that occupied that space. Everything in general was all around tougher.

Now, this is where you’ll learn partly of my treachery, but partly of the dark truth that is user metrics. I suggest a long time ago that the game was too hard in a specific way, in that the absolute lack of tutorials for things meant that most players had to fight with wikis and numbers in order to actually be good. Apparently this reflected… some kind of survey Anet did. Might’ve been focus groups, or user metrics. But regardless, they ascertained that there was, indeed, a pretty big drop off at the beginning of the game, that people couldn’t build themselves properly, and that the opening to the game wasn’t “user friendly”.

Now, while my idea is to have more tutorials in the game to demonstrate things, as to eventually make the game harder, Anet took it a different way. Combining the “we want to find our skills like in GW1” suggestion and the idea to increase player retention, they decided to make it so instead of getting most stuff by level 30, all of your utilities and traits were going to be spread out along a much larger area, and that everything would be given to you painfully slow. The game was simplified greatly, and likewise enemy encounters were designed assuming you had little more than auto attacks and under-level gear.

With repeated changes to the trait system, leveling, and stat distributions, the game kept getting easier and easier. Add in a bit of power creep and theorycrafters “breaking” the system to come up with optimal builds, and suddenly you melt face by just auto attacking. This has left core Tyria in a neutered state, where dungeons barely pose a challenge and the overworld is surmountable by all but the most incompetent of individuals.

The thing with HoT maps is that, they take advantage of much more of the combat system than core Tyria does. I imagine that it must be quite the shock moving from faceroll to facemelting content, but it is better this way. These are enemies you have to actually play against. Enemies you have to chase, to disengage, to disable, enemies who aren’t completely destroyed by a blind field. The dodge key is suddenly important. These enemies actually encourage you to take advantage of the intricacies of the GW2 combat system. Enemies in HoT are how GW2 enemies should’ve been designed, and not the “smoke field to win” enemies we get in the rest of the game.

^ This is pretty much my view in a nutshell.

For those who still can’t handle what HoT demands, you can make use of the MMO system; too hard? Bring a friend. Still too hard? Bring a friend’s friend.

HoT is encouraging grouping and socialization, but people seem to be hating it. This must be the irony of an MMO.

NSPride <3

(edited by Razor.9872)

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Posted by: Soon.5240

Soon.5240

It is a good thing that HoT maps are harder than core Tyria.

I hate the direction that Anet has taken PvE gameplay with the HoT maps but, while they are “harder”, I didn’t find them that much harder.

I changed my Engi main from an Ascended Celestial build to a Dire Condi build and have solo’d much of the content – including many Champs.

Liking or not liking the direction Anet is taking PvE (single, instanced meta-event maps) has little or nothing to do with the perceived “hardness” of the new maps.

As a longtime WvW’er, I learned years ago (unlike you?) how to counter hard enemies.

The HoT NPC are just dancing to different algorithms. Learn to zig when they zag, and you’ll win.

New player thoughts

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Posted by: Razor.9872

Razor.9872

It is a good thing that HoT maps are harder than core Tyria.

I hate the direction that Anet has taken PvE gameplay with the HoT maps but, while they are “harder”, I didn’t find them that much harder.

I changed my Engi main from an Ascended Celestial build to a Dire Condi build and have solo’d much of the content – including many Champs.

Liking or not liking the direction Anet is taking PvE (single, instanced meta-event maps) has little or nothing to do with the perceived “hardness” of the new maps.

As a longtime WvW’er, I learned years ago (unlike you?) how to counter hard enemies.

The HoT NPC are just dancing to different algorithms. Learn to zig when they zag, and you’ll win.

So I can get a better sense of what some are disliking about HoT, could you define exactly what is putting you off?

NSPride <3

New player thoughts

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Posted by: Illurim.6059

Illurim.6059

I think the new maps in HoT are terrible. I’ve always found the minimap to be difficult to read with the way Anet styled it. But the new maps are so much worse. I don’t like mazes and I don’t like jumping puzzles, but that’s really all the new maps are. Oh, and they’re coupled with map-metas that gate everything and if you’re behind the progression curve (like a new player) they are ridiculously difficult to do. Oh, and then there’s the story progression locking behind masteries required to access particular content. Needless to say, I spend 99% of my time in central Tyria, because the expansion is terribly implemented and completely uninteresting.

Dungeons and fractals are pitifully easy, yet open world story-based content is gated behind ridiculous hyper-difficulty and event-gating.

So Anet basically wrote a huge “kitten you” sign on the expansion to anyone who likes the story component of their game and enjoys soloing through it. They took away choice and options. They limited their game and broke it up in such a way that now it’s pretty terrible in a lot of ways.

Needless to say, I won’t be buying another expansion from this company ever. I won’t buy another game from them. They lured me with a promise of being able to horizontally progress and enjoy my story…then kicked me in the teeth once they had my money.

New player thoughts

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Posted by: Soon.5240

Soon.5240

[quote=5894164;Razor.9872:
So I can get a better sense of what some are disliking about HoT, could you define exactly what is putting you off?[/quote]

If Anet had spread the same Mastery/XP gating system over 12 or more new maps – based on the core Tyria maps – I’d have loved the expansion. I like exploration and RPG’ing

In my opinion the new HoT maps are non-RPG, lather-rinse-repeat, platform, single-meta-based-event maps that were gated to give the illusion of content. The Adventures have zero rpg content. And while I’m not a hard-core RPG’er, I like to think that the PvE maps are part of a Living World. Doing the same event over and over, weeks on end to unlock vendors and skins bore me. It bored me so much that I deleted my Alts and sold all the Ascended materials that I’d gathered over the summer in anticipation of the expansion. (On the plus side, I’ve netted almost 2,000 gold on TP!)

This direction started with Living Season 1 and has not varied since. But I didn’t care because of my 5,000 hours, almost 3/4 of that has been in WvW. Now that WvW is crippled, I don’t have much to do but Lumberjack Wars2.

(edited by Soon.5240)

New player thoughts

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Posted by: Illurim.6059

Illurim.6059

If Anet had spread the same Mastery/XP gating system over 12 or more new maps – based on the core Tyria maps – I’d have loved the expansion. I like exploration and RPG’ing

In my opinion the new HoT maps are non-RPG, rinse-wash-repeat, platform, single-meta-based-event maps that were gated to give the illusion of content. The Adventures have zero rpg content. And while I’m not a hard-core RPG’er, I like to think that the PvE maps are part of a Living World. Doing the same event over and over, weeks on end to unlock vendors and skins bore me. It bored me so much that I deleted my Alts and sold all the Ascended materials that I’d gathered over the summer in anticipation of the expansion. (On the plus side, I’ve netted almost 2,000 gold on TP!)

This direction started with Living Season 1 and has not varied since. But I didn’t care because of my 5,000 hours, almost 3/4 of that has been in WvW. Now that WvW is crippled, I don’t have much to do but Lumberjack Wars2.

[/quote]

Pretty much how I feel. Anet polished a kitten and sold it to players at an inflated value relative to the work they bothered to put in, which is very little. Their skills at sleight-of-hand and illusion are great, though. I mean, they should be politicians.

New player thoughts

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Posted by: Razor.9872

Razor.9872

If Anet had spread the same Mastery/XP gating system over 12 or more new maps – based on the core Tyria maps – I’d have loved the expansion. I like exploration and RPG’ing

In my opinion the new HoT maps are non-RPG, lather-rinse-repeat, platform, single-meta-based-event maps that were gated to give the illusion of content. The Adventures have zero rpg content. And while I’m not a hard-core RPG’er, I like to think that the PvE maps are part of a Living World. Doing the same event over and over, weeks on end to unlock vendors and skins bore me. It bored me so much that I deleted my Alts and sold all the Ascended materials that I’d gathered over the summer in anticipation of the expansion. (On the plus side, I’ve netted almost 2,000 gold on TP!)

This direction started with Living Season 1 and has not varied since. But I didn’t care because of my 5,000 hours, almost 3/4 of that has been in WvW. Now that WvW is crippled, I don’t have much to do but Lumberjack Wars2.

[/quote]

Interesting. In many respects, I feel the exact opposite. To me, the core-Tyria maps feel…for the lack of a better word — pointless. While the new HoT maps give me a sense of “purpose.” Since the maps have players working toward a single, ultimate goal, I feel like I am accomplishing something and contributing.

On the topic of how many maps were released, I’m not sure how this can be elevated. Sure, having more maps is fun and awesome, but what would that do to player concentration? More than likely, it would spread the playerbase far too thin. Having just 4 — but very large — maps all but ensures that each one stays full even at odd hours.

As for WvW, I can’t make any comments. I’m a casual WvW’er at best. I can only hope that future updates bring the structure that you wish for.

If you’ve completely given up on the game, though, would it be too much to ask for you to send me that gold? :P

My character name is Lance Bowson, and I’m always broke.

Cheers <3

NSPride <3