Guild Wars 2

The title pretty much says it all. We’ve got feedback threads and discussions going on for individual elements of the changes, but not one for the thing as a whole.

So, what do you think? Overall bad? Overall good? What parts work together, and what parts don’t? (Trait hunting and Megaserver, I’m looking at you.)

I do kindly request that if you want to go into detail about any specific problems or solutions, that you keep it short and then provide a link to a post in the appropriate thread that goes into full detail. Otherwise, this thread will just become bogged down with the individual issues and lose sight of the overall picture.

Bedtime for me, but I’ll be sure to catch up on this thread after I get off work tomorrow. I’m hoping to see solid feedback in both directions. And thank you all, in advance, for any (on topic) feedback you may give.

Considering that trait hunting is optional and the megaserver isn’t going to change gameplay, I’m not sure what you’re getting at.

Call me ignorant, but what is NGE?

I am looking forward to the patch, if that is what this thread is about. =)

It was an update (sort of a feature patch) for Star Wars Galaxies called “New Game Enhancement”.

The NGE is mostly seen as the reason why SWG failed. So putting it in the title makes the whole discussion sort of biased.

Kaiyanwan.8521:

So putting it in the title makes the whole discussion sort of biased.

It’s also inaccurate… The good thing is it’s basically a flag that says a poster is not believable.

I vant to b a Jedi!

Hmm, I guess if I was going to infer the connection, is this the moment before the moment when the world was prophesized to meet an impending doom and utter destruction to the extent that all or most all inhabitants flee to other realms of reality?

If so, someone called it.

Personally I feel very good about the majority things happening.

Not certain I agree with transmutation crystals converting from 3 to 1 under 79. Say you have 300 cyrstals. You can transmute 300 items, but after patch you will only be able to transmute 100.

Not big on the whole mega server thing. Specifically the world boss aspect of it to include ORR chains. Secondly the contested wp portion of it to include the 3 dungeons COF/COE/Arah.

Equally not big on the town clothes thing either. Pretty much agree with the sentiment of each of the threads up. A lot of good with equal parts bad.

I have say, not seen too many games that blatantly puts things out there that the player base doesn’t want instead of working on making things that they ask for.

I’m starting get to confused on what this game is supposed to be.

You got it backwards… Stones (yellow ones), are 3 of them are one charge.

A crystal (silver blue) is worth 1 charge. Crystals are the lv 80 ones.

Not sure what will happen to splitters though.

I really now believe GW 2 got too big for Anet to handle, so they are shooting themselves in the foot with each new update. They released the game far too early. They made so many logistical and developmental errors, it will take another two years to fix them all.

Stone= 1/3 charge.
Crystal= 1 charge.
Splitter (thanks Garambola) = 5 charges (odd).

Splitter is 5 charges.

FYI – Splitters will be converted into 5 Charges.

And, thanks for the information to those that provided it. If I had known, I would not have posted in such a thread, as it will likely be deleted.

The Guild Wars 2 Neon Genesis Evangelion? It’s the first time I’m hearing of it, but I’m totally onboard.

Personally I think that as the second poster said… trait hunting is optional… and Megaserver actually enchances maps so that there should no longer be empty maps… Overall those aspects are a good thing.

Dyes… a good thing… weapon and armor skins account wide… a good thing…
Traits… free respecc anywhere anytime? awesome…

I think all in all… the entire thing is a great thing. Wish it were the 15th tomorrow. :-)

I feel like all of these changes are great, but also feel a lot of these changes are how things should have been since launch. But better late than never, overall I’m optimistic because Anet is moving in the right direction with this stuff.

You know why maps are empty? Cause there’s nothing to do there. Perhaps that’s the problem anet should’ve fixed, and not how much their servers cost.

I don’t care for the crit dmg nerf or the new traits tbh. Seems like they wanna promote more tanks/healers. Everything else looks great tbh. Granted, most of this stuff should’ve been implemented at the start but better late than never. Overflow gets fixed, wardrobe, partial fix for the ascended grind.

Now they should make some good permanent content and I might start believing this game has a future again.

Majority of the changes I like very much, up until the announcement of Megaserver I was waiting for the update impatiently.

As for Megaserver – I think for the game overall it might be a positive change, it has the potential to hit the community I’m in and server communities in the face like a drunk flying dolyak though.

Since the objections and solutions have all been repeated many times in “Megaserver an RP thread” I’m not going to blabber about details here.

Overall however, I think the patch brings many positive changes to the game from objective standpoint.

My personal wish? If there would be added “lore Vistas” on the maps where one could track down and collect stories concerning local events and history to collect in hero panel.

Perhaps my lengthy thoughts would have been better here.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Feedback-Questions-The-Megaserver-System-World-Bosses-and-Events/page/11#post3855914

Overall opinion: Bad. Very Bad.
Bad enough to seriously consider ending my gameplay now before features important to me drastically change.

Basically i was pretty optimistic about the update, sure it had things that miffed me (town clothes) but all in all i could get over the problems and loved some of the new changes….and then the Megaserver blog post came up, and right now i’m basically trying to figure out what other parts of the game i haven’t tried; to experience before leaving the game. kitten shame, i loved this game but if the developers want to dictate at what time i’m supposed to do events and even on what server i’m supossed to play then it’s better to just call it quits.

The worst part of it is that the backlash over this ridiculously bad idea of a system is quite tame here on the forums giving them the illusion that this is just a vocal minority but the reality is most players don’t frequent the forums and considering some of the disscussions i’ve heard from quite a few big end guilds on my server…well let’s just say the population drop will become quite the problem the next few months.

AlexEBT.7240:

well let’s just say the population drop will become quite the problem the next few months.

People say that almost every patch. lol

World bosses will be better now. Overflow will practically be eliminated and guilds get the option to tackle them as a proper organised group.

cranos.5913:

AlexEBT.7240:

well let’s just say the population drop will become quite the problem the next few months.

People say that almost every patch. lol

World bosses will be better now. Overflow will practically be eliminated and guilds get the option to tackle them as a proper organised group.

People say that EVERY patch, and every week that goes by without a patch and every time a new and shinny different game announces they will kind of sort of release in the next decade.

To be honest, the whole story gone against my will. I wouldn’t say what my character says, and no options at all, not even the on-skill shouts are selectable… :/
+ The charismatic answers are lies and have no effect on the game at all…
NGE isn’t bad, this isn’t what made SWTOR die.

OtakuDFifty.2965:

The Guild Wars 2 Neon Genesis Evangelion?

^ my first thought.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Call me ignorant, but what is NGE?

I am looking forward to the patch, if that is what this thread is about. =)

The NGE (New Game Enhancement) was a patch that was and is universally seen as the nail in SWG’s coffin. It was so drastic that it ended up changing the games genre and is remembered as one of the biggest screwups in MMO history.

I suspect the OP is a little bitter with GW2.

For those questioning my calling the Feature Update the NGE, here’s why I used that term:

The Star Wars Galaxies “New Game Enhancement” (I also heard it called New Game Experience) was a patch that made sweeping changes to SWG. The stated goals of the NGE included improving the leveling experience while making the game easier to understand for first time players. (Sound familiar?)

Part of the hate for the SWG NGE patch came from the fact that they had just released an expansion a couple of weeks before, and the NGE completely destroyed the expansion. SOE was forced to refund the expansion’s cost to a LOT of people. Needless to say, that’s not going to be a problem here.

Is calling the feature patch the GW2 NGE a loaded reference? Well, yes. Not so much of a way of saying I hate the game, as it is a way of saying “tread carefully” to the Devs.

Myself, I’m about 50/50 on the patch. I hate the impact it will have on RP (including town clothes), but I like some of the ideas behind the merging of zones when needed and I love the new world boss schedule. I dislike the delay of traits until later in the game, but find the idea of having to hunt them down to be interesting, at least.

Sweeping changes is a little overblown but stands as a possible way to view these changes.

However you have to understand the NGE had something that this doesnt which is what killed SWG. It changed the CORE of the game.. deleted some entire classes you could play, changed essential parts of the combat mechanics to compensate.

People bought SWG as a sandbox Star Wars game. the NGE turned it into a theme park SWG game.

Palador.2170:

For those questioning my calling the Feature Update the NGE, here’s why I used that term:

The Star Wars Galaxies “New Game Enhancement” (I also heard it called New Game Experience) was a patch that made sweeping changes to SWG. The stated goals of the NGE included improving the leveling experience while making the game easier to understand for first time players. (Sound familiar?)

Part of the hate for the SWG NGE patch came from the fact that they had just released an expansion a couple of weeks before, and the NGE completely destroyed the expansion. SOE was forced to refund the expansion’s cost to a LOT of people. Needless to say, that’s not going to be a problem here.

Is calling the feature patch the GW2 NGE a loaded reference? Well, yes. Not so much of a way of saying I hate the game, as it is a way of saying “tread carefully” to the Devs.

Myself, I’m about 50/50 on the patch. I hate the impact it will have on RP (including town clothes), but I like some of the ideas behind the merging of zones when needed and I love the new world boss schedule. I dislike the delay of traits until later in the game, but find the idea of having to hunt them down to be interesting, at least.

Why SWG failed so much wasn’t the actual idéa NGE as I know it, it was becouse of bugs they couldn’t fix becouse they where lost in the old coding and the old programmers didn’t work there anymore to fix it. What I mean is that it’s not the actuall fetures that ruined the game but all the millions of bugs and that nothing realy happened to fix it. I Liked SWG as it was but I played SWG:NGE for a few month more before I quit becouse of all the bugs and how bad the new level system worked and with the old fondation.

Anyhow… Call it what you wan’t and IMO this will be quite a little New Game Experience, some have even saved a spot to create a new character to level when the update hits.
- I have to say I am so excited about the new dye and wardrobe system! I have prepared with dyes, gear and I have even spread the word ^^
- The new Trait system isn’t realy a big deal of a change but I love that I don’t have to buy books and that I can do specific stuff to unlock the traits (Sounds so awesome), and last but not least easy re-trait! (Just waiting for templates now)
- MegaServer sounds realy nice but there are som stuff that needs some fixing but I am sure with a good amount of cunstructive feedback they will make it just fine.
- Sigil, runes, crit damage fit and the rest is realy wanted and I can’t wait to see how much PvP will change after this.

I don’t think it will be an NGE misstake.

For my part I view almost all, if not all, changes positive.

Palador.2170:

So, what do you think? Overall bad? Overall good? What parts work together, and what parts don’t? (Trait hunting and Megaserver, I’m looking at you.)

Overall? Bad, with the “mega-overflow-blob” system. ArenaNet can keep their account bound dyes and other little changes, the major impact of the April 15th is the destruction of server communities as they are.

The Good:

• Guilds being able to spawn own Megabosses.
  It’s not an instance that was much asked for, but at least it’s a step in the right direction, and helps Megaboss guilds after they’re making organisation much more tedious with the new all-servers-are-overflows system.
• Guilds able to get influence from all servers and chapter will not exist. That’s been asked for and I’m glad devs addressed it.
• Account bound WXP. Very useful, it will be more interesting to set up alts for WvW now.
• Free re-traiting, anytime outside combat. The cost wasn’t that high so that’s a small change, but it is very useful that to quickly change between dungeon zerk and WvW build without visiting the trainer.
• Wardrobe system. A good feature as it’s not a destructive process like the current transmutation. Nice to see all the unlocked skins in one place.
• Account bound dyes (?). Overall probably good. It’s saves money, a lot. But it makes all the hard work of the people who went for expensive dyes on their alts a waste.
• No more repair costs. Minor change, but a good one. Less dreary.
• Only ok thing about “megaserver” – places like Timberline and Snowden will now have a few more ppl.
  Problem & solution: Mid-lvl maps with low pop are empty because there is no reason to go there once we’ve explored them. With Megaserver, they will still be underpopulated. Solution is to ADD CONTENT, not necessarily merge maps.

The Bad

• Trait change. While the system seems ok, why the need to introduce something so drastically different over a year since release?
• Build change after grind to Ascended gear.
• DPS nerf with the zerk nerf. It does NOT change the game nor the meta. Crit damage changes only make the overall best damage output less by 10%. But how will this change current issues? It will just require more time for the same dmg, it will make dungeon runs longer and more tedious, it will make open world events with timers more stressful. Like increased health pools in HotW: still doable, but boring. This will still not teach people to run decent builds, and large-scale open world events will fail due to those poor-build folk who do not care to listen.
  Solution: Different mechanics, and not DPS nerfs, are needed to encourage build versatility. A good step in that direction was the need for Condition Damage parties in the Wurm event. New encounters should give us a reason to run different builds, but current ones, like Knightfall, were pure DPS-meters.
• Acc-bound Dyes (?): One Unindentified Dye does not make up for 2 Abyssesl!
• Megaserver: loosing the ability to see which Waypoints are contested. Paying much higher cost of WPing. Loosing gamig time for tedious nonsense.
• Megaserver: unable to see the status of Orr Temples. Is this the “epic connected storytelling across zones”? Nope.
• Megaserver: Gathering Nodes. Maps are likely to change as we switch between the alts when gathering in Orr/Frostgorge.
• Megaserver: loosing the ability to create a gathering map for fellow players.
• Megaserver: negative impact on ESTABLISHED COMMUNITIES.
• Megaserver: problem with running events with allied guilds – there is no in-game Allaince option. Server that chooses for us will not be able to recognise our connection to players that aren’t on our F-list or guild.
• Megaserver: TAKING THE CHOICE AWAY from players. What if we want to see our server guild tags around instead of complete strangers. Guild and F-list DO NOT make up ALL social connections in this game!
• Megaserver = overflows. Anet please take a look at feedback. Overflows are the most hated thing that came out of GW2 (except maybe Scarlet).
• Megaserver: loss of In-Game Events “meet at X pm at server Y”.
• Megaserver Megaboss TIMERS: restriction in how many times we can set up Megaboss runs. Wurm still needs lots of training and attempts; frequent runs are necessary. Also, not everyone can play all times a day! We need more options, especially for events that require a lot of organised people.

The UGLY:

• Whole Mega-Overflow-Cloud Nonsense. Wrote a lot about it in the MegaServer thread. While this might have worked from the start, it is NOT a good idea to implement such a game breakingchanging feature 1.5 years down the line when we have established communities! This is one NGE that verges on the say-bye-and-uninstall.
  With poorly developed story, and constant nerfs / changes to builds, my server community was the only thing that kept me playing. When they fully take servers away, it’s bye bye GW2.

GW2 are verging on the loss of player base that SWG is known for. Wrecklessly impacting communities, large group meet ups, server events (halloween bashes, machinima meet ups), RP.

I was fine with most of the changes (not how much a transmog crystal is going to cost)
But I feel it’s going to damage most of my reason to log in the game. The RP. The one content that I know a lot of people only play for.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Megaservers-and-RP/first

Risa Aerulight.3914:

Perhaps my lengthy thoughts would have been better here.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Feedback-Questions-The-Megaserver-System-World-Bosses-and-Events/page/11#post3855914

Overall opinion: Bad. Very Bad.
Bad enough to seriously consider ending my gameplay now before features important to me drastically change.

I kind of haphazardly agree. With the megaserver changes introduced I’m not sure I really want to continue with my original gameplan. Really, every update until the megaserver was either good (traits, skills, some generic balancing and polishing, town clothes in combat) or I didn’t really care for it (merging PvP and PvE skins, unified wardrobe, dyes). However megaserver? Seems like it would seriously impact how much I enjoy the game if every conceivable open world event becomes some large megablob of players. With only doing minimal good by fixing some low populated areas to make them look artificially more active.

Terok.7315:

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Call me ignorant, but what is NGE?

I am looking forward to the patch, if that is what this thread is about. =)

The NGE (New Game Enhancement) was a patch that was and is universally seen as the nail in SWG’s coffin. It was so drastic that it ended up changing the games genre and is remembered as one of the biggest screwups in MMO history.

I suspect the OP is a little bitter with GW2.

I’ve been thinking of the NGE all day and I very rarely have anything in common with the OP when it comes to thoughts on this game. It seems a big change for so late in the game’s life.

hedix.1986:

The Bad

• Trait change. While the system seems ok, why the need to introduce something so drastically different over a year since release?
• Build change after grind to Ascended gear.
• DPS nerf with the zerk nerf. It does NOT change the game nor the meta. Crit damage changes only make the overall best damage output less by 10%. But how will this change current issues? It will just require more time for the same dmg, it will make dungeon runs longer and more tedious, it will make open world events with timers more stressful. Like increased health pools in HotW: still doable, but boring. This will still not teach people to run decent builds, and large-scale open world events will fail due to those poor-build folk who do not care to listen.
  Solution: Different mechanics, and not DPS nerfs, are needed to encourage build versatility. A good step in that direction was the need for Condition Damage parties in the Wurm event. New encounters should give us a reason to run different builds, but current ones, like Knightfall, were pure DPS-meters.

Heh, I didn’t think about those. Although a few things: I don’t think the trait change is that bad. I think it’s kind of refreshing. Makes the game feel more integral to doing something other than level up and get to a waypoint close to dungeons.

Build changes won’t be that impacting – zerker will still be best for DPS and such. Gear itself won’t change that much – unless the traits are so schematically different that it would warrant, say, getting Knight’s instead of Berserker’s (which is a fat chance in hell). However, I wholeheartedly agree that nerfing DPS was a bad move. As a ranger main, however, I would say that some of the edits they made to ranger was they should have done.

A trait that makes longbow arrows fly faster, pet skills being instant and fixing sword chain – they fixed some of the core mechanics that made your standard ranger bad and made the elitist community hate “bearbows” – now longbow will contribute more as easily being the highest DPS (it’s already high on that list, with doubled attack speed it would only get better) and pet skills like Shake It Off! will find more use since the bear doesn’t have to take the time to cast it.

Overall, these sort of mechanics should have been considered when visiting other classes and working on “balancing” – fixing some of the core issues of why a class is kicked from parties or looked down on by the general community. Then, fix it. You’ll always have those few elitists who won’t like the classes still because they aren’t the best but their opinions will hold less weight.

hedix.1986:

The Bad

• Trait change. While the system seems ok, why the need to introduce something so drastically different over a year since release?

Because they want to make exploring the world more rewarding and also because they wanted to add more GW1-like features to GW2. Not to mention it’s a feature that has been requested many times AND it was in their original plan but somehow they scrapped it for no reason.

• Build change after grind to Ascended gear.

So because Ascended is a grind they shouldn’t ever make changes to builds and keep the game as it is forever. Really? Same with the trait change, games are changing/evolving, why should the game stay the way it was at release forever?

• DPS nerf with the zerk nerf.

It’s not as much of a nerf as it is a “fix”. Making critical damage work like every other stat in the game. Their ratio might need a bit of adjusting but it’s a change that will make critical damage (Ferocity) scale like the other stats. And. as you said, it won’t affect the meta (because it won’t) so what’s the real problem with it?

• Acc-bound Dyes (?): One Unindentified Dye does not make up for 2 Abyssesl!

And one Abyss bought today is nothing similar to an Abyss bought at release when they were 5g, should they also compensate players that bought items early because they increased in price?

• Megaserver: loosing the ability to see which Waypoints are contested. Paying much higher cost of WPing. Loosing gamig time for tedious nonsense.

This is stupid indeed. But still, “Much higher cost”? The cost of waypointing is so low I’m surprised they didn’t remove that one too with the repair and respec cost.

• Megaserver: unable to see the status of Orr Temples. Is this the “epic connected storytelling across zones”? Nope.

And statues will affect only their current zone. I wonder how the Battle at the gates of Arah will play out now, all the statues disabled? Or enabled based on Melandru/Grenth Temple status?

• Megaserver: Gathering Nodes. Maps are likely to change as we switch between the alts when gathering in Orr/Frostgorge.
• Megaserver: loosing the ability to create a gathering map for fellow players.

They could make the nodes spawn at the same place and reset daily/weekly/monthly, that would fix this issue.

• Megaserver: negative impact on ESTABLISHED COMMUNITIES.
• Megaserver: problem with running events with allied guilds – there is no in-game Allaince option. Server that chooses for us will not be able to recognise our connection to players that aren’t on our F-list or guild.

According to the blogpost, that’s false, the server recognises Guild, Home server, Friends and even people you play with. It’s a question though if it also recognises Squads too, this could help solve lots of problems easily.

Next Gen Edition? Don’t think that’s coming out any time soon but I’d love to play on my Ps4. So yes, love it.

maddoctor.2738:

So because Ascended is a grind they shouldn’t ever make changes to builds and keep the game as it is forever. Really? Same with the trait change, games are changing/evolving, why should the game stay the way it was at release forever?

No one said that. It’s just ridiculous that it’s so soon after adding the major grind that is ascended armor. That wasn’t really a smart move on their part. They could’ve easily announced the changes earlier.

maddoctor.2738:

It’s not as much of a nerf as it is a “fix”. Making critical damage work like every other stat in the game. Their ratio might need a bit of adjusting but it’s a change that will make critical damage (Ferocity) scale like the other stats. And. as you said, it won’t affect the meta (because it won’t) so what’s the real problem with it?

Boredom obviously. I already don’t run dungeons like HOTW because of the kittenedly big HP pools, now I definitely won’t.

I like all changes, except the upcoming nonsense around the Server Status Changes that are tied together with the games’ Travel System.

These changes just scream out loud Mounts as a solution and reducing the amount of Waypoints completely.

Seriously, whats the sense of having tons of waypoints, when you can’t freely travel anymore whenever you want to whereever you wan,t without being forced to travel first to a border of a map to become able to see, when you are in the map, if the WP where you originally wanted to travel to, is even useable…

Anet has to get rid finally with that nonsensical braindead mechanic of contested/uncontested waypoints, reduce the amount of waypoits per Map to 5 Waypoints, that are always useable and as a compensation for loss of travel speed within a map, introduce finally mounts for PvE only

This way we all get a Win/Win.
This together with removing the nonsense around Dungeon Waypoints becoming contested and blocking of the entrance to dungeons andpeople would have no problems anymore with the game losing its ability to show the Server Status individually, because with these changes would be ZERO NEED anymore for these obsolete Server Status information.

Because when you always have 100& guaranteed access to Dungeons, theres no need anymore for any infos about if a Dungeon WP is contested or not.

And if the 5 Waypoints that each map has can be used always, regardless if your are in a map, or of you change from one map to an other map, then theres also no need anymore to show players,if these WP are contested or not, because those 5 Wp per map, that would be guaranteeed useable, would be so designed, that they simply NEVER are contested at all ….

And gettign mounts as a compensation for travel speed is just the plus, that would many people happy in GW2, and anet would receive somethi9ng with that they could make profit, so its a win for them too.
And with the feature being PvE only, there will have the permanent No Mount QQers also no problem with that, because their fears are mostly related only on WvW/Game Balance there.
Add to that also the restrictino, that Mounts can not be used in towns and everything would be fine for all.

Becka Williams.4978:

You know why maps are empty? Cause there’s nothing to do there. Perhaps that’s the problem anet should’ve fixed, and not how much their servers cost.

+1.. empty because no point going there,, None.. Totally Agree,!

The feature update is bringing features that for a large part should have arrived in the beta, but better late then never? The worse part is its mostly trade-offs.

Dye system is good, but adding it this late so all the people who wanted the most expensive dyes on multiple characters, some dyes being temporary gem store gambling even, have progression lost is bad.

Account wardrobe is good, costume, tonic, etc mess is bad. I foresee many refunds for these items in the future as will as steadily increased mistrust in the gem store =P

Megaserver feels as if they took the suggestions from the forums, made it happen without actually considering the effect it will have beyond filling shards. And why in cities, where at least some server identity, important for wvw and some forms of organized play (we still have no alliances to affiliate guilds together), could have been preserved?

Trait system gives the earning of traits, which would have been amazing for release, but now feels empty and desperate. If they released a new race with it, however, it would have more meaning. And the number changes are just filler, to bloat the update, which is pretty empty actually.

Balancing – very little happening here (I don’t believe they have anything big hidden at this point, but we can always hope), even though we had to wait for this update? Why, because we have to wait to see how the meta settle with the new GM traits and runes?

GM traits – cool at first, when you start playing around with them, it gets a lot less cool. Many are awkward, some are good. I like that they are adding more, but I hope they fix the trait lines.

Runes, sigils and the like – Good update, I personally don’t like that they are making the full set weigh even more than it did before, as it reduces choices and the viability of mixing and matching, but this is an overall good change in my opinion.

Crit damage changes – more transparency is good, nerfing things without fully realizing the effect on other aspects is bad. Their ability to do math isn’t great, nor is their understanding of the value of different stats. (looking at celestial here in particular)

Removing money sinks is probably not a great idea, not that I don’t appreciate it. I’m talking about all of them, account bound instead of soulbound, free traits (they mentioned it twice btw, see what I mean with filler), free armor repairs. I want it all, but I know I shouldn’t =P

Social update is too vague, but it sounds like they’re pretending they have more than what they actually have. We’ll see

PvP unification would be good, but it smells of resetting progression for no particular reason. Before you get mad at me for this one, let me pose two scenarios. If you achieved a title with 1000 hours of gameplay, then suddenly everyone can achieve the same in 500hours, this is a reduced value, and lost progress in the sense that your progress is worth less. If you earned, found or made a awesome gear skin that is cool and hard to get in pvp, but normally easier to get in pve, it loses its rarity and thus value, especially in a game that claimed to be horizontal based.
I do like the new gear system it proposes, however the skin change is just a money grab, unless there is a steady reward rate of transmutation charges in pvp. As before, we’ll just have to see.

No one likes server mergers, but when the games population is plummeting they need to do something. Anet decided to take the hard a spin as possible approach to the mergers, but obviously not everyone is going to fall for the spin.

Fortunately usually after mergers are complete games populations usually stabilize and sometimes even rebound slightly.

The NGE in SWG killed off about 25% of the population and essentially ended the game. It took 4 more years after that but near the end the game was actually one of the better games on the market… Lucas killed it for SWTOR which ended up being another mistake.

So much drama.

GW2 will be unplayable.

The end of the world.

On the whole: negative.

Most of the positives have little impact on gameplay (dyes, clothes and frippery)

-10% DPS nerf.

We’re getting money nerfs to events and boss loot bags. It will be a net money drain because there is no way that “free” trait changes+armor repair will even came close to the amount of money taken from those sources of income.

Clunky megaserver rollout that is incompatible with their event system. Highly unprofessional and makes the world more static and boss hunting like a job. Not to mention destroying server communities and their homebrew events.

It’s a big step backward for Anet, and I’ll just spend more time on my oft neglected Steam Library than dealing with GW2.

Same threads opened again and again, forums are getting boring. GW2 will die is a subject I have experienced with WoW for 10 years, come up with new storise, like Anet is being taken over by Microsoft or something. At least something fresh to discuss.

A-Net is in a difficult position…

They want to keep all them kids but they got no candies.
Other old men do have plenty of candy and so A-Net had to make this step but my problem with this … it was no step in some sort of a right direction.. more like a step off the edge to finally lose the race for dem kids.

If they pull off the megaserver and the algorithm placing people together.. wouldn’t it be a good change then?

I think many people are just afraid that it won’t work the way Anet describes it. And I believe it’ll be messy in the beginning, but the goal they’re trying to achieve is a solid one.

At the end of the day, I’m sure everything will be fine, and there are many things that will make the game better.

I’m just really sad about how the clothing was handled, especially the demise of mix-n-match as well as certain types of clothing (following in the wake of the human female running animation change) not having any sort of effort put into changing it (and yanked from the store 4 months ago) to work with the new system, finished off with words like appropriate and healthier, it leaves a sour taste.

There were ways to handle all of those things to keep what some of us enjoyed (the old animation, the old clothes) in place, and possibly introduce a new system and way to make money (customizable running/walking animations), but they don’t seem interested, which still makes me think this is about an agenda of values (in some, not all, cases) rather than strictly about bottom lines.

I suppose if I were them, I’d not want to Mozilla, Barrila or Hobby Lobby myself into a position where I made any sort of specific statement which might be harmful, rather taking a more passive aggressive approach to change directions, but as a customer, it’s frustrating not given the courtesy of that picture to make informed decisions about what I do with my discretionary income.

But, as I said, at the end of the day, they are only a few things that happen to hit me like a punch in the face (especially after trying to ask as nicely as possible over the course of a few months through the support system if I could be provided with an explanation as to ‘why’…not ‘how’ or ‘what’, we get plenty of that), but I’m one person and don’t particularly matter, and I’m sure most people don’t feel that way anyways.

Overall, the new things will be fine. We’ll figure it out, and move forward. Some of us with avatars we don’t like as much as we used to (which subconsciously will make us not want to play them as much, like ESO characters with giant feet and … well, those were just generally kinda ugly, maybe not enough style and too much uncanny valley), but we’ll soldier on.

Since the new boss schedule means most players won’t be able to do most bosses, I doubt this will be a good thing.

Yumiko Ishida.3769:

You got it backwards… Stones (yellow ones), are 3 of them are one charge.

A crystal (silver blue) is worth 1 charge. Crystals are the lv 80 ones.

Not sure what will happen to splitters though.

I really now believe GW 2 got too big for Anet to handle, so they are shooting themselves in the foot with each new update. They released the game far too early. They made so many logistical and developmental errors, it will take another two years to fix them all.

Stone= 1/3 charge.
Crystal= 1 charge.
Splitter (thanks Garambola) = 5 charges (odd).

obviously I meant to say stones when referring to items under level 80.

Celtic Lady.3729:

Since the new boss schedule means most players won’t be able to do most bosses, I doubt this will be a good thing.

If anything, this means most players will be able to do most bosses when they show up.

A day late to reply to my own thread. Heh. Sorry about that.

Okay, here’s what I think of the whole patch. “Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it.”

We wanted a wardrobe? Fine, but it’s going to be painfully expensive to use.

We wanted Underflows? Fine, but they’re non-optional and will screw up waypoints and dungeon access.

We wanted to wear town clothes in combat? Fine, but only some, and at the cost of no more mixing and matching to make our own outfits.

We wanted to stop getting overflowed out of events? Fine, but now they’re on a daily timer that may put some constantly out of your reach. You can trigger the big ones, if your guild is big enough and advanced enough and willing to pay the price.

We wanted two Sigils in two-handed weapons? Fine, but it comes with a rebalance of Runes to deter mix-and-matching for builds, and mix-and-match with them is totally gone in PvP.

We wanted something done about the poor balance of underwater PvP? Fine, the only map that even had water in it is gone. Problem solved.

I see merit to a lot of what they’re doing here, but… I’m not sure if the costs are worth it.

Megaservers will work fine: people have been telling Anet since beta that splitting the PvE population up would result in 95+% of maps being totally deserted. They finally listened – better late than never.

The trait hunting is just dumb. It was a pain in the neck in GW1, so much so that they abolished it for Factions. Why they’ve seen fit to bring it back escapes me I’m afraid.

I think overall, this feature patch is moving the game towards the right direction.

We already have a good amount of players, but hopefully this will draw many others to hop into GW2 (especially with the game on sale for $25!). It’s exciting, imo.

Carzor Stelatis.9435:

Megaservers will work fine: people have been telling Anet since beta that splitting the PvE population up would result in 95+% of maps being totally deserted. They finally listened – better late than never.

The trait hunting is just dumb. It was a pain in the neck in GW1, so much so that they abolished it for Factions. Why they’ve seen fit to bring it back escapes me I’m afraid.

You can also buy these traits with gold if you choose to. Honestly, I like this, as it gives me a reason to actually go out into the world and kills these bosses. Another goal to meet, and possibly more achievements.