Thoughts on Ascended Gear? [Merged threads]
thought ArenaNet was diffrent, that they were doing something fresh. turns out we were being lied to. this is not why i bought gw2.
requested a refund. bye bye.
Don’t make me laugh. What have they done listening to us? Nothing. All the changes they have made was their own plan. But I wish, they were listening to players.
I cross my fingers and hope you are right. If you are, this is not such a bad idea.
But we’ll just have to wait for future expansions to tell how it’s going to work out.
http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/21/guild-wars-2-interview-monetization/
“Here’s what we believe: If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game. Otherwise, your MMO becomes all about grinding to get the best gear. We don’t make grindy games — we leave the grind to other MMOs.”
What happened?
Hey, that sounds like a nice game. Where can I get this? At the moment I’m playing a MMO, but they just got changed to a grindy game.
No, I’m not happy with it as detailed in the blog. I hope as we learn more that changes, but I feel like what we know now points to the beginning of the kind of gear grind that I’ve always hated, and thought GW2 wasn’t going to have.
Agreed, people are way in over their heads. Like always, whiny brats. It’s sad, it really is.
In order to be heard, you have to make a noise.
Making noise doesnt mean donning your tinfoil hat, plugging your ears and screaming as loud as you can, which unfortunately is how people seem to think these forums work.
Seems like there has been a good bit of constructive criticism, and not so much of the tinfoil hattery. General consensus is people don’t want the items. The items are essentially unnecessary, and only good to sate progression grinders, otherwise we would just see a new gem type that would fit in current gear.
Complaining about the method of delivery is akin to complaining about the end result.
No, it is not.
Pie is one thing. How you eat it, is another one.
Touche.
I’d challenge you to find a quick fix to stop the bleeding that I assert is going on with the player base besides gear.
What I truly believe is this.
ArenaNet underestimated the speed at which the players would plow through the content. Their solution is Ascended gear and (to placate those wanting progression), Infusions (to gate the content and slow down the players).
Why developers continue to believe they can produce content that will “sufficiently challenge” the players to play at the speed they want them to is beyond me, but that’s another discussion for another time.
It’s all just rumors and whispers and speculations, but there are some key pieces of evidence we can use. I can’t fathom how increased stats on Ascended will incur a GOOD ending, but I’m not saying throw the baby out with the bath water.. We will see.. but as it stands.. I’m hesitant and uninspired. Was quite looking forward to Lost Shores till i read about this new shenanigan
It does beg the question, what happens when we all have ascended gear in our slots and those that want this kind of grind demand yet another carrot to continue playing the game? It’s very disheartening IMHO to see Anet abandon the core principle that grind should be for cosmetics alone, and that skill, not stats should determine the winners.
I’m terribly disappointed by this news, and frustrated by the relative lack of communication and details from Anet in the face of the backlash. Linsey’s blog post was helpful, but seems to confirm the worst of what I feared from this update.
I don’t know exactly how we get the ascended items, and I hope that when the update comes out the system for getting them somehow relieves my concerns. At this point, however; it looks like the beginning of the same power creep and item grind that I found so incredibly distasteful in WoW and other MMOs.
I loved GW1 because I knew when I hit max level and got items with the stats that I wanted I wouldn’t have to grind for something better a year down the road unless I wanted a special skin. That was a huge selling point of GW2 for me, and a large number of my friends. This update seems to throw that away.
We are not sure yet what will happen. Let us, again, wait, and see.
I don’t want to say bad things about ANet yet because I’m not sure how this new mechanic and new items work until I experience them. I don’t want to whine without any valid reason/proof. Don’t judge the book by its cover, they say. :/
Why did the people who are happy for this buy GW2 in the first place? They said themselves it was supposed to have no gear treadmill, what didn’t you understand about that?
Instead you all come in and buy it and then complain that it isn’t exactly like every other MMO and start ruining it for the rest of us who did know what we were buying. There are enough MMOs out there now, why did you have to ruin this one for us?
Don’t make me laugh. What have they done listening to us? Nothing. All the changes they have made was their own plan. But I wish, they were listening to players.
We have no idea how any of the things they have leaked will be implemented. We know almost nothing about the craftables, the Agony mechanic and how it works, the stats AFTER augmenting current gear with new upgrades, whether or not the dungeons drop the armour and a whole bunch more.
Honest to God, there’s no way I can blame them for not listening to most of the posts.
vysaek.8290 – you must have missed where i also said “from what I read on the blog post this is what it looks like”
There is information out there, and the information doesn’t look promising. Hey at the end of the day its a FTP game that I enjoy playing with the family. One of the reasons we decided to play it was no gear progression. if that changes and gear progression becomes the norm, we will just find another game, or something else to do.
No one is “raging” stating an opposing opinion is just that, stating an opposing opinion. Sitting back and not saying anything, considering we enjoy playing, would accomplish nothing.
i know i love being lied to by people i’ve spent hundreds of dollars of investment on based on a particular core selling point!
don’t you love being lied to?
hey guys, don’t we all love being lied to?
maybe we should all shut up and enjoy being lied to here!
hey maybe we should go one step further. and say thank you for lying to us! yes that’s a grand idea
thank you ncsoft for scamming me out of hundreds of dollars based on a single core selling point, then within 3 months doing the opposite of that selling point. you guys are just the best!
I don’t understand why so much rage.
If you see numbers, you’ll see that item progr. is null. I mean:
https://d2vn94glaxzkz3.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Ascended-ES.png
Ascended ring: Base of exotic stats + extra stats from jewel / Infussion slot that would NOT give you extra stats instead of AGONY RESISTANCE.
Exotic ring: Base of exotic stats/ Extra stats from jewelWhat’s the difference between those 2 rings when ascended ring is UNIQUE equipment? +5 power + 5 precission? WOW, I’M INVINCIBLE!
Sorry, but am I’m the only one that sees:
+50, +50, +10%, +18, +18 + Open slot on ascended
+48, +48, +3% + filled slot on the uniquieThat are +136 stats and 10% against 96 stats + 3% making this item around 33% better. I wouldn’t call this a slight increase.
Oh yes, wait, 10 points (5+5) that would increase a… 0,5% the power of your char? So much progression!
And that open slot is for dungeon and useless out of it. Didn’t you read?!
10 more points and 3% better magic find for one ring.
You may be able to have 30 more points and 9 better magic find from 2 rings and back slot.
If you also consider that there are actually 5 jewelry slots, 6 equipment slots and weapon slots ….. you’ll not “just” have 10 more points but 100~ 200 more points. You don’t even need to discuss the “for dungeon only” slot. New gears will just be better than old ones.
As says a friend of mine: OH LÀ LÀ LE GARAGE! 3% magic find! I found lost lands of Atlantis!
Man, I just can say I laughed so much i began to cry. Nope, the item marks clearly “UNIQUE”. This can be readed as two ways:
1.- You can only carry 1 ascended item
2.- You can only carry 1 ascended item with that name.
Can you, please, stop being drama queens and don’t cry me a river?
Bottom line, ArenaNet needs to keep people playing.
Do you honestly think this move, which is clearly pissing off masses of players, is going to keep people playing let alone putting money in to the game…?
I tend to find business practices that are completely the opposite of what your own company president promised are not the most reliable ways of making money.
I’d challenge you to find a quick fix to stop the bleeding that I assert is going on with the player base besides gear.
What “bleed”? Where are you even getting these notions from…?
(edited by Amulrei.4973)
Please …
The game is young, and it is our ideas and voices that make it evolution. This is a well organized and we support new ideas and suggestions to make beautiful addons!
And it is up to us to support their creativity, the developers. Test Tests and they try to make us happy. So certe, you can react. Aggresser but does not serve our Ideos.Stop complaining!
If you had a little more involved proposals bulking pve … If you took the time to read the site to add, again and again, things that are almost all the same …
If you answered a constructive things …The devs would perhaps not look at complaints about the equipment, and the frequency enhance stats.
Have emerged and new skins, new zones, new dungeons strategies.I am very happy with the update. But I am upset that the developers do not go looking the opinions of hardcore gamers!
Of course we are ennuit, but it is not new stats that will change things.
It’s beautiful things as events, entries zones as you put it online! This is the centaurs envahirraient the human capital if not defend the outposts. It’s evolution in cities principals, things that change or add, or have seen the game evolve.
But I request everyone. Calm down, please. This patch still promises great adventures. More’s hoped that I loved they create even more powerful armor. And never put up levels.
Just being happy about the good things, without pointing at the bad things, isn’t helping anyone.
It’s good to be happy, but as feedback you are holding back what matters.
If the forums explode on a change, than it means something went wrong.
Do you realise your post is actually insulting the developpers?
You are saying they are incapable of filtering out the usefull feedback from the useless complaints.
YOU are trying to filter for them, by telling people not to complain.
Be happy and content with the game. That is perfectly fine.
But don’t go telling others what they should or should not complain about.
Definitely NO.. I came to this game to escape gated progression and happily played the game while those that want stat progression whined.
I loved the Halloween Event. I loved exploring. I loved working on world completion. I loved going for my legendary (knowing it would be the same stat-wise and only set me apart visually was a HUGE bolt of awesome).. I played the game like many others and loved it.
Then this came and I can’t help but feel the dread of old radiance gear from Lotro.. or fire resist or shadow resist or any other stupid mechanic that substituted for interesting boss encounters. PLEASE don’t ruin this game.
i know i love being lied to by people i’ve spent hundreds of dollars of investment on based on a particular core selling point!
don’t you love being lied to?
hey guys, don’t we all love being lied to?
maybe we should all shut up and enjoy being lied to here!
hey maybe we should go one step further. and say thank you for lying to us! yes that’s a grand idea
thank you ncsoft for scamming me out of hundreds of dollars based on a single core selling point, then within 3 months doing the opposite of that selling point. you guys are just the best!
You are unable to take the time to wait to see if you have been lied to, yet you’re perfectly willing to chastise them for ‘scamming’ you out of hundreds of dollars?
Just relax a bit will you. If you have that sort of disposable income, you could at least use common sense.
I don’t mind the addition of new armor tiers AS LONG AS they’re fun to obtain. Vertical progression is good, as shown by most offline RPGs ever created. Boring and repetitive vertical progression is not, as shown by most MMORPGs out there.
There is a lot of truth to this. The more I calm down and actually think about it the more I feel its going to come down to how well they implement it. If they gear comes faster than the content becomes stale, that could kitten. <- why on earth did it censor ok?(It would also help a hell of a lot if they spread the new gear across existing content so it doesnt become obsolete, this is something they need to do in general, eg high lvl resource nodes spawing for high level players in low level areas)
(edited by Webba.3071)
Nothing new in the world of business, but still extremely disappointing. I suppose at this point I either hope they retract the change due to people’s concerns or that the actual implementation of the system A) isn’t as bad as people think it could be and doesn’t lead them into creating the terrible gear grind treadmill that I and many others find so appallingly bad.
im pretty disappointed Anet feel they need to start going down this road.
They proved with legendaries that people will still grind (and have something to aim towards) without the addition of increased ‘stats’
I just dont understand why they’ve buckled and added this, why not just make them shiny new skins with exotic stats and the added new upgrade slots. As long as they have flashy particle effects people will still do the content for them.
Also, since the new armor will have better stats than exotics does this mean the new weapons will have better stats than legendaries? (if there are new weapons)
We are angry because going forward it is 99% likely that new dungeons will have this stupid agony mechanic and will and thus we will need ascended gear. What if I want to take a break for a month or two and while I am gone everybody does the grind for the dungeon that gives you the ascended chest piece and by the time I come back they have all gone to the next dungeon? I am not behind in gear progression and might not ever catch up, especially if I want to take another break.
Agreed, people are way in over their heads. Like always, whiny brats. It’s sad, it really is.
In order to be heard, you have to make a noise.
So long as you know what you’re really shouting about ^^
So long as you know what you’re really shouting about ^^
And we’ll “exactly” know that in 2 days, so people whining in advance is quite ridiculous. :p
Agreed, people are way in over their heads. Like always, whiny brats. It’s sad, it really is.
In order to be heard, you have to make a noise.
So long as you know what you’re really shouting about ^^
So long as you know what you’re really shouting about ^^
And we’ll “exactly” know that in 2 days, so people whining in advance is quite ridiculous. :p
Amen to that.
But there should be NO DIFFERENCE in the content itself aside from difficulty, sort of like Blizzard is doing with Monster Power in Diablo 3, where you can choose to do the harder version to challenge yourself, but its the same content.
But they are doing this (so far), only in a quite special way.
you can run the instance as many cycles you want, its never-ending, the more cycles you do, the harder it gets so its like infinite harder and harder hardmodes. If you only want to see the dungeon you can do the first couple of cycles that are tuned to exotic gear quality. If you want to progress you can do that too, because it will drop ascended gear that will help you progress. but you wont see new content, only the same as previous cycles but harder.
So far its only speculations that further dungeons will depart from this system
As says a friend of mine: OH LÀ LÀ LE GARAGE! 3% magic find! I found lost lands of Atlantis!
Man, I just can say I laughed so much i began to cry. Nope, the item marks clearly “UNIQUE”. This can be readed as two ways:
1.- You can only carry 1 ascended item
2.- You can only carry 1 ascended item with that name.Can you, please, stop being drama queens and don’t cry me a river?
The blogpost clearly states “Eventually, you’ll be able to kit yourself out with a full set of Ascended gear and high end Infusions to help give you the edge in end game content.”
It also states “This is just the beginning. In November, we’re only adding the first level of Infusions and Ascended Rings and Back slots, so that leaves us a lot of room to build upon these levels of Item progression in future content.” – thereby underlining my argument.
And this is just not what I signed up for…forgive me for being disillusioned and quite frankly, deeply dissappointed in ArenaNet.
Agreed, people are way in over their heads. Like always, whiny brats. It’s sad, it really is.
In order to be heard, you have to make a noise.
So long as you know what you’re really shouting about ^^
So long as you know what you’re really shouting about ^^
And we’ll “exactly” know that in 2 days, so people whining in advance is quite ridiculous. :p
We know now, the blog post has specifically told us what is being added and how to get it.
No point waiting for 2 days to complain after everybody has already got it. The best we can hope for is that the devs grow a brain within the next two days and scrap the whole thing.
No, I hate the new ascended items.
Enjoy the good stuff in the game, complain about the bad stuff on the forums…
That’s what the forums are for, aside players helping each other by info and shared experiences.
That’s how it works.
“Ascended gear works a little bit differently than other gear types. The stats and functionality normally added to gear through upgrade components are actually built into Ascended items. Instead of upgrade slots, Ascended gear has Infusion slots, and rarer versions of the items also come with additional Agony Resistance built into them.”
source: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/linsey-murdock-unveils-new-high-end-ascended-gear/
So will we get:
Rank 3. Exotic
Rank 2. Ascended
Rank 1. Rare Ascended/Legendary
? What do you think about it?
I don’t understand why so much rage.
If you see numbers, you’ll see that item progr. is null. I mean:
https://d2vn94glaxzkz3.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Ascended-ES.png
Ascended ring: Base of exotic stats + extra stats from jewel / Infussion slot that would NOT give you extra stats instead of AGONY RESISTANCE.
Exotic ring: Base of exotic stats/ Extra stats from jewelWhat’s the difference between those 2 rings when ascended ring is UNIQUE equipment? +5 power + 5 precission? WOW, I’M INVINCIBLE!
Sorry, but am I’m the only one that sees:
+50, +50, +10%, +18, +18 + Open slot on ascended
+48, +48, +3% + filled slot on the uniquieThat are +136 stats and 10% against 96 stats + 3% making this item around 33% better. I wouldn’t call this a slight increase.
Oh yes, wait, 10 points (5+5) that would increase a… 0,5% the power of your char? So much progression!
And that open slot is for dungeon and useless out of it. Didn’t you read?!
10 more points and 3% better magic find for one ring.
You may be able to have 30 more points and 9 better magic find from 2 rings and back slot.
If you also consider that there are actually 5 jewelry slots, 6 equipment slots and weapon slots ….. you’ll not “just” have 10 more points but 100~ 200 more points. You don’t even need to discuss the “for dungeon only” slot. New gears will just be better than old ones.
As says a friend of mine: OH LÀ LÀ LE GARAGE! 3% magic find! I found lost lands of Atlantis!
Man, I just can say I laughed so much i began to cry. Nope, the item marks clearly “UNIQUE”. This can be readed as two ways:
1.- You can only carry 1 ascended item
2.- You can only carry 1 ascended item with that name.Can you, please, stop being drama queens and don’t cry me a river?
From official blog
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/linsey-murdock-unveils-new-high-end-ascended-gear/?utm_source=client
“Eventually, you’ll be able to kit yourself out with a full set of Ascended gear and high end Infusions to help give you the edge in end game content.”
Provide your information source, or I’ll believe that Anet clearly said that there will be full set Ascended gears. The backslot and rings are just the beginning.
In long term, having a strong brand is what matters. Not delivering on your brand promise —> worse brand image.
Conventional business men tend to be short sighted…
I dont understand this statement. So your saying the ONLY reason to play GW2 is the no gear progression? What if someone loves the combat of gw2 over WoW but also wants gear progression? For the record I am not infavor of one way or the other I just dont care for this statement.
He should buy a different game. We did buy the game, because we want a game without grindfest. If we would like grind, than we could buy one of the other thousends MMOs.
already hate the new patch an everything related to it….
It’s a bit vague, I’ll have to wait and see.
No higher stats. Bad kitty! Bad!
oh I didn’t get that explanantion from reading the blog, when it’s explained in that way. I don’t think there should be a problem at all then, why are people complaining? If they can run the all of content with their current gear?
Just run it a few times and be done with it. Sounds like theyre doing there best to appease both fans of non- gear progression and gear progression. I fail to see the problem if what you say is true.
The stats increase is not as much a problem as that if you don’t have infusion sufficiently then you won’t be able to get far enough in the dungeon. The danger is that if you lack behind and future parties will demand specific gear which you can’t achieve because there are no parties to go with, a circle. We will see if this happens with this system.
Agreed, people are way in over their heads. Like always, whiny brats. It’s sad, it really is.
In order to be heard, you have to make a noise.
So long as you know what you’re really shouting about ^^
So long as you know what you’re really shouting about ^^
And we’ll “exactly” know that in 2 days, so people whining in advance is quite ridiculous. :p
We know now, the blog post has specifically told us what is being added and how to get it.
No point waiting for 2 days to complain after everybody has already got it. The best we can hope for is that the devs grow a brain within the next two days and scrap the whole thing.
We know nothing apart from a few things that are coming, in a MASSIVE update. We have no idea what will affect the stats on current gear. We have no clue how the dungeons will operate until we’re actually trying them out.
Until we have the whole story, everyone is shooting at shadows.
This only strengthens the point that they adding a gear treat mill. Just sad.
vysaek.8290 – you must have missed where i also said “from what I read on the blog post this is what it looks like”
There is information out there, and the information doesn’t look promising. Hey at the end of the day its a FTP game that I enjoy playing with the family. One of the reasons we decided to play it was no gear progression. if that changes and gear progression becomes the norm, we will just find another game, or something else to do.
No one is “raging” stating an opposing opinion is just that, stating an opposing opinion. Sitting back and not saying anything, considering we enjoy playing, would accomplish nothing.
There is information, ok. But the WHOLE information or only a tiny bit?
And what does acomplish stating an oposition in something you dont fully dont know? they only added a preview of what it is going to come and you are all jugding it event without knowing the whole thing! Even without testing it! Its like a baby cry for eating something you dont like, and you event had a taste yet.
I just think we need to be more constructive, and enforce our rights. But do not aggresser either.
To this end, we have put in place tools. Forums discussing, the reddits, the suggestion went …
Complaining is certe, justify, we pay for a game full of promise. But is shaped according to people who speak regularly and claiming a WoW ²
Sorry if I speak bad English I learned some time ago. but I make an effort to explain my opignon this wave of rage.
(edited by Louveepine.7630)
Bottom line, ArenaNet needs to keep people playing.
Do you honestly think this move, which is clearly pissing off masses of players, is going to keep people playing let alone putting money in to the game…?
I tend to find business practices that are completely the opposite of what your own company president promised are not the most reliable ways of making money.
I’d challenge you to find a quick fix to stop the bleeding that I assert is going on with the player base besides gear.
What “bleed”? Where are you even getting these notions from…?
Experience.
When something that’s a core philosophy changes so very quickly there’s typically something behind the scenes that is forcing that change.
Typically it has to do with money. Sure, it’s a guess, but an educated and experienced one. Things don’t just “change” because things are working. Something in their model clearly isn’t working, and they’ve decided on this course of action to right whatever is wrong.
What happened was that Arena Net created this game thinking it would take far more time for the majority of their population to get to end-game – whereas in reality it took only a fraction of that time. I think they underestimated their player base and are scrambling now to add additional carrots to keep people playing.
Which is sad really, because THE ONE AND ONLY selling factor for me in this game was the hard-stop of gear progression once you hit the cap. I know a HUGE majority of people feel the same way. This was their manifesto, this is how they sold their game & this is how they misled their player base. If this was a subscription game, I would have already cancelled just based on this fact alone. Since it’s not, I’ll hurt them the only way I can.
I am an ex Lotro raider, who raided before radiance, during radiance and post radiance (quit playing in March this year) and I don’t think this is like radiance at all. Lotro’s stats and combat mechanics work differently. Stats provide resistance to certain “conditions”, you have ways to mitigate certain damage types and raid sets have mitigation as a set bonus. They are not required to do a raid but make it easier, especially hard modes.
I don’t see the difference to having mitigation as a stat on jewellery or as a set bonus to having it as an infusion. Radiance did gate raids in that if you didn’t have it you couldn’t even do your skills as you were constantly cowering, mitigations just make it easier.
I think comparing radiance to this us comparing apples and oranges.
Now saying all this I am playing GW2 because I wanted something different. I have hardly done any dungeons here. I am feeling very uncomfortable about this more because it possibly could be a gear grind I was hoping never to do again. I was happy to have farmed for my exotics in a way I found fun and was getting on with my still long to do list of things I find fun in the game. I left lotro after limelight gorge introduced a new grind of must have, better than the raid items and I just didn’t have the heart to do more grinding. And now I feel I may be in the same situation again. I will wait and see how it works before deciding whether I like it or hate it.
Same here, also a Lotro player (still) and raided pre-, during- and a bit post-radiance and left raiding/getting ‘great’ gear with Orthanc/Limlight Gorge.
But I do think that radiance is can be very well compared to this new Agony condition. This guy below hammers the nail on it’s head:
First time I’ve felt the need to make a post on these forums but this really is a sad development for this game and is a huge mistake. Want evidence Arenanet?
Speak to LOTRO developers/players about the grind that was Radiance.High end content inflicted Dread on you and the only way to counter it was Radiance on your gear. How did you get it? A long slow grind over months or forget ever seeing high end content.
LOTRO Dread = AGONY, LOTRO Radiance = INFUSIONS.
A huge grind to allow gated access to high end content which is exactly what this and was WITHDRAWN due to the huge exodus of people who were sick of not being able to do high end content without a huge amount of radiance that took months to grind.
Eventually, but for many players way too late, they recognised the joke this was and removed it.Why on earth have you gone down any route like this when this game was supposed not pander to the 24/7 hardcore types and now does so in the worst possible way and a proven total FAILURE.
If you keep the bold bit within the quote above in mind, reading the article linked in the OP would make an awful lot of sense, so people who didn’t play Lotro, but do play GW2 can see what’s coming.
In my opinion the Acsended gear and even the infusion slots could be interesting, BUT the Agony condition is a very very bad idea as it’s the same gating mechanism as Radiance was in Lotro, locking out players from experiencing ‘new’ content!
Imo, it would be best to revert this mechanic asap, before it’s too late.
(edited by Smartbean.5960)
Complaining about the method of delivery is akin to complaining about the end result.
No, it is not.
Pie is one thing. How you eat it, is another one.Touche.
I’d challenge you to find a quick fix to stop the bleeding that I assert is going on with the player base besides gear.
What I truly believe is this.
ArenaNet underestimated the speed at which the players would plow through the content. Their solution is Ascended gear and (to placate those wanting progression), Infusions (to gate the content and slow down the players).
Why developers continue to believe they can produce content that will “sufficiently challenge” the players to play at the speed they want them to is beyond me, but that’s another discussion for another time.
the worst part is that I fully agree with you.
But that doesn’t change the fact this game can not simply come back on the core principle they sold their game on.
Not after a mere few months.
There could be created different incentives to keep players playing, but the first one they picked is the one they should have resorted to last…
Might as well a dev pop In here and say the following:
“Nope, you don’t need to repeat content to obtain Ascended gear.”
Then, everything will be fine and life will move on.
For me, at least.
People who think this new mechanic will only apply to one dungeon are being naive. They aren’t going to add a gating / treadmill mechanic and then only use it for one dungeon. Based on that blog post, it looks like all future max-level content (or at the very least, the dungeons) is going to require more and more of these gated items. So, you either jump on the treadmill now with this first dungeon and first few items, or watch the gap grow bigger and bigger and the amount of content to which you have access grow smaller and smaller.
From now on, there will be the haves and the have-nots in this game, and guess which one is going to get most dev time?