Guild Wars 2

It’s been widely noted that the PvE game is extremely easy to the point of triviality. This is a problem in and of itself, but it becomes a very serious problem when one wants to try to group with friends to do PvE content at low level.

I’ve recently talked a number of my friends into starting GW2. We get together to play and… there’s nothing to do. Collecting rabbit food as a group is not very exciting. Exploring results in us killing solo mobs, which is extremely easy in a group. We have to go to zones 6+ higher to find any sort of challenge and even then it’s iffy.

Our first thought was to go do events. In theory, this would be ideal. The problem is that it seems the vast majority of events are AE-fests for level 80s. Monsters melt in seconds.

As there are no instances for the under-30 set, that’s not an option.

Soo… I’m having a difficult time keeping up my friends’ enthusiasm for the game. We need to find something that would be exciting and challenging to do as a group.

In a perfect world I’d like to see:

a) Lower level instances. Hell, just take the existing dungeon complexes and make a level 5 version of it. You don’t even need to connect any story to it – just give us some content that a group of folks can do that is remotely challenging before they hit level 30. We don’t even care about the loot – just make it accessible and a challenge.

b) Scatter elite/champion non-event mobs around the maps. If they’re events, folks come pouring in from all corners and trivialize the encounter. If they’re just normal mobs, then explorers can find them and get a fun fight out of it.

c) Change the megaserver parameters so that the target population density is a bit lower. This will result in fewer people per event, making the events more challenging.

d) Heck, just take all zones over level 10 and increase all monster hit points and damage by 25%. That would still be pretty trivial, but it would help.

GW2 does not cater well to players seeking skill team play. Overall, it is a casual game. You could try spvp I guess, but last I left it was still in beta. Lots of people that still play may reply with their suggestions, and you guys may want to try them out, but take it from me: save your time and look for another game. Try a little bit of ________ (censored game name) that is in open beta for one week right now, see if you guys like that. It may be more geared towards your group’s “hardcore” playstyle, but that game wasn’t really for me either.

Agreed. They tuned back the creatures to account for trait loss, but now they’re all way too easy. The lack of challenge was partially what bored two of my other friends from the game. (That and a lack of dedicated “healer” roles. >.>;;;)

The game could definitely use some roaming or random-location spawning champions as well. Something not on the train radar. Or something that shows up more rarely than every 5 minutes, like the giant at Nageling. (That was a run 3-man ranger run, by the way. My bear tanked it. :P)

Don’t equip anything better than an a white. There you go hard mode.

I absolutely agree with you Artsy.
Back before megakittened – you could do event chains, champs and WB’s that needed a small unit – great for that little 2-4 man game you might want as RL friends meet up to play.
And you could end up with some great discussions on how to trait to overcome the obstacle.

Now I can only recommend that you express level to get passed the new kittenty system for leveling and get to enter dungeons.

This game is likely not for you:

Open world is either zerg content — particularly with the megaservers, or one-shot kill content.

Dungeons are no longer supported in the game (dungeon team has been disbanded for quite a while now) and the only updates they get are the occasional stealth nerf to combat bots and “JPs” that skip bosses.

You could run a small-man group in WvW, but WvW is only barely in front of dungeons in terms of dev priority.

If you do want to stick with the game (PvE-side), I would recommend: powerlevel to 80 in the EoTM karma train. Then play dungeons with your group. It’ll be the same dungeons over and over for the rest of eternity, so you’ll have to make challenges for yourself such as trying to improve your times.

Are the group events in the formerly out of the way zones now 80-fests along with the events that actually reward anything? Places like Fields of Ruin…

If you’re looking for instanced content, then progress along the personal story. You can bring friends into the instance, and it’s fun. Once you reach 30/35, you can start running dungeons, which are far harder.