Guild Wars 2

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I have been active in these forums for a while helping to give feedback on items that I think are lacking. However after some time you keep repeating yourself in many threads on the symptoms of some underlaying problems.

Anet recently ask for feedback so I will give my feedback in this way and hope they will try to look at this with an open mind.
Even if it turns out they will do nothing with this advise I am happy knowing I did participate in these forums doing my duty reporting what in my eyes where the problems.

So in order to stop (or at least lower) participating in all those threads I decided to make 3 threads that all have one of the underlaying problems I think are the reason for all the problems we see in the game.

These problems result into many things (like gold-grind and so on) but in the end mainly boils down to frustrating (like making people rage) and boring game-play.

For me most problems seem to come from the following 3 underlaying problems:

1. A focus on micro-transaction / cash shop / gem-store to generate the main income in stead of for example focusing on regular expansions as a main source for income.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/A-focus-on-micro-transactions/first#post3316908

2. Wanting to do thinks different as other MMO’s simply for the sake of doing it different and even being stubborn about it, having a sort of tunnel vision towards the current sometimes flawed solution in stead of also looking at proven working solutions.

3. A so called quick-and-dirty (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quick-and-dirty) way of doing (developing) things.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Problem-of-the-so-called-quick-and-dirty-way/first#post3316929

This thread will be about wanting to be different seemingly for the sake of being different.

It seems to be one of those problems that can also result in many of the bad thinks we have seen. For sure it also resulted in some very good new fresh idea’s but there really seems to be a hate against everything that is not different.

Some examples and how it worked out:

Many people would like raids but there are no raids. Why? Because other MMO’s have that option? Or we get the GW2 raid version.. the world bosses. Well thats nice but does not replace what traditional raids gave. A big group really working together

Also have a look at quest. We get these dynamic events that are supposed to to replace traditional quest. Apparently even back in alpha they found out that did not work so they implemented the harts but also that is something people don’t seem to like very much.

Why this hate towards the more traditional quest? Of course those can be mixed with the innovative and nice new type of quest being dynamic events.

The absence of traditional quest and the events have some problems. The events seem useless because they keep repeating. With traditional quest you at least completed it, and they don’t really bind you to the world. With traditional quest you get to learn the npcs, know what they are doing there and so on. It all helped you to bind to the world.

However it seems like they do not want to have those traditional quest simply because they are, well, traditional quest and it need to be different. Even if that does not work out so well.

Another example is the holy trinity. I think there are many ways you can get rid of the holy trinity and have a new way of doing things but many people do think the combat is a little dull in GW2. Reason likely is the fact that you have no real role. You are just a number (in the DPS sum). So holy trinity or not, having a specific role is needed for getting the feeling of importance and getting more interesting combat. However that is to ‘normal’ and it has to be different or they simply stopped at removing the holy trinity not properly replacing it with something else. Resulting in a combat system that many people dislike.

There are a more examples. Mounts versus way-points for example. Mounts would add a whole new addition to the game. Getting them in the game would open a whole new part of end-game (if they are not just getting dropped in the gem-store but that’s more related to the micro-transaction focus https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/A-focus-on-micro-transactions/first#post3316908) and way-points really make the world smaller.

Innovation can also be done by adding in open world housing or things like that but just changing everything for the sake of it might not always result in a better product.

I can go on with a few more examples but I won’t. I guess people get the point and hopefully Anet will as well.

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A big problem related to this however seems to be how stubborn they seem about it. I have seem many threads that talked about the holy trinity being closed with really just an excuse to close them.

Like if you make sure people don’t talk about it it go’s away (NK way of thinking?). Also the whole raid thing, they almost don’t want to seem to be willing to talk about it.. oow yes we will get raids but in a GW2 way. Still not sure if thats still coming or if it was the Tequatl revamp.

No word about how the events really did exactly the contrary of what they in-visioned. Having content that makes no difference at all when you do it. (the manifesto was taking about how traditional quest would do that while the dynamic events would really mean you would make a difference).

And the grind for achievements with the living story also seems to keep on going. Also after many many complains.

There is nothing wrong with trying to innovate, there is nothing wrong with being different. That can all positive. But when you become different just for the sake of it and not willing to see that some things do not work an sometimes the original way did work better then it becomes a problem.

So don’t stop trying to be fresh and innovative but don’t be different just so you can say you are and also have the courage to agree some of those new idea’s might have failed and then change them even if that means changing them back to ‘the traditional way’. There is no shame in failing with a concept, there is in ignoring that fail because of a sort of broken pride.

The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is.

So better embrace it instead of trying to ignore it!

Slightly related links:
(
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/The-Great-MMO-Migration
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/After-more-than-a-year-of-GW2
)

This video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NedWPHZCcik&feature=c4-overview&list=UUJTE1U_RsWh9Nl2hMZxMu5w also tries to make partly the same point.

Might be interesting to watch.

Edit: Another nice little example are names for things. While most RPG games name the game-classes classes GW / GW2 names it profession. Companions are mini’s and a ranger is that an archer? No it’s the class uhhm profession with a pet. In most mmo’s they at least refer to the animal in the name. Hunter, beast-master or something like that. Item colors are mixed up (but there at least it made sense so that might not fit in the ‘for the sake of it’).
Usually there really is no good reason to mix up those names, it only generates confusion so this also really smells like ‘different for the sake of being different’.

Even though ArenaNet has explained why they chose their design decisions, stubbornness can raise its head and prevent listening from happening. This can be unfortunate.

Some people want certain things in-game (such as mounts, dueling, trinity, etc.), some people do not want those things. I am sure design decisions are discussed in-house quite frequently, but with more information than players might have at hand.

I seriously doubt it comes down to something as superficial as stubbornness.

Maybe they know something we don’t…Maybe we’re the ones at fault…?

Maybe some outside force in the world is conspiring against us to ruin our fun in order to harvest the fun particles that fall off our hair when bored, manufacturing them into an evil doomsday device that will end the world as we know it, replacing our current lives with drab, grey replicas of utter boredom and listlessness from which there is no escape.

…no escape.

Maybe it has already happened…

Maybe we just need better shampoo.

lol @ theundersigned

OT

1. I find micro-transactions a legitimate way to finance their game and I’ve never had the feeling they are focusing on the CS more than on the game content itself. And if they are as stubborn as you say, it will likely stay this way. I’ve played f2p and p2p games and this model is by far my favourite.

2. In general you seem to like “traditional” MMOs more. If Anet would change all your suggestions the Game wouldn’t really have any USP anymore. There are things that I don’t like about GW2 but the things you mentioned happen to be parts of the game I actually like or at least don’t mind.

Mounts most likely wouldn’t do any harm. But my gf always says she would like to have mounts rather than waypoints, too. But just as Mini-Pets, I don’t see the point having one unless I could fly and see Tyria from above. After having seen all from above I’d be back to waypoints though as I do prefere them over running (riding) 5 Minutes to place X. Giving the people the option is viable though.

If mounts were to be implemented they shouldn’t be faster than my running pace and should be used as a goldsink through feeding for example.

Discussing the holy trinity is rather pointless as that is one of the major parts of the game, no matter if you like it or don’t. Still IMO why people even think about discussing the topic holy trinity isn’t because they want to play a certain role but because there aren’t enough viable/ comparable builds per class.

If you want to be effective there’s usually one or two main builds to choose from, which you can slightly adjust. If you want to play the build you like you may actually have a hard time.

No matter how quests are implemented most often they’ll be boring if they take too long to accomplish. Mainly also due to lack of variety. I like not having to search for the NPCs though and the various ways of finishing most quests. I never really read the NPC clickthroughs anyway. So for my “playstyle” it’s much nicer.

3. That’s an often discussed point and I agree with you that some parts of the game need a stronger focuse and a slight more developing time. Nowadays everything has to be fast .. games, movies, cars. Seems to be a modern way of life which actually isn’t enjoyable. Just leads to burn-outs.

From a business perspective, you don’t be different for the sake of being different. You be different to carve yourself a section of the industry. After all, it makes no sense to chase after the ones who are into the traditional MMO types (WoW, for example), when these traditional MMO’s have had years to polish their games, build their content and build their player-bases to the point where these players are invested.

Raids

Traditional raids only had people ‘working together’ through a forced grouping mechanic (the Trinity). Given how the Trinity isn’t present in GW2, and without some inspired encounter mechanics to encourage team-play without being able to brute-force them through damage, I’m not sure how raids would be any different than dungeons, except with more people and particle effects.

That being said, I feel Tequatl was a step in the right direction in terms of group play, requiring a modicum of organisation.

Events and quests

Hearts were introduced because the testers didn’t feel like there was enough direction for players. Personally, Hearts with levels should have only been included in the starting areas, with Hearts losing their recommended levels after than, and simply used as a vendor-unlock tool (maybe made a bit less hand-holdy by giving a brief description of the vendor’s troubles, rather than actually telling you what to do to fill the bar up).

Events, IMO, provide a level of immersion that traditional quests can’t with regards to certain quest types (kill X, escort Y). For example, a traditional quest would have you kill 10 of the baddies that are just roaming around doing no harm, while the event actually has them attack a place.

However, it’s sort of catch-22 with them; if they don’t repeat fast enough, thus providing the meaningful consequences and changes, XP gain suffers (which is only a bad thing if you want to level quickly / don’t want to do anything else to level). If they repeat every 2 minutes, then it destroys the immersion.

For me, Events and Quests can co-exist, being used as tools for different purposes:

• Traditional quests for personal progression (learning new skills, traits, crafting recipes, earning shinies ect) (N.B. With these, there shouldn’t be a marker telling you where to go, or at least a toggle, as with the world map).
• Events for the world immersion and group tasks (defend X, assault Y, escort Z).

The Holy Trinity

I personally don’t see the Trinity as true teamwork; you’re only concerned about your role, and you’re unable to flow with the tides of the fight; if someone goes down and you don’t have an in-combat res, then you’re a man down until the end. If the Tank goes down, that’s it, game over, whereas in GW2, if someone goes down, another player can pop some CC while another player helps that guy get back up.

In other words, GW2’s system has infinitely more potential for teamwork than a rigid-role based system.

With the whole roles thing, I think this is more down to encounter design rather than combat mechanics. There are other issues (Defiant + CD in the OW being the main ones), but I think encounter design is the main issue, since combat is only as deep is the encounters.

In other words, roles can be build into encounters to utilise the depth of combat. Not only would this make the fights deeper, but it also allows hybrid builds to be effective and for more variance on roles, rather than simply Tank, DPS and Healer.

Look at the Lover’s fight in AC. Perfect example where the roles would have been built into the fight (2 CCer’s to keep them apart with 3 DPS). However, being able to brute-force through damage, mixed with the boulders lying around making it possible to chain-KD them, kind of circumvents this mechanic.

Another example is the Effigy fight in CoF. Although technically you’re all still damage, 1 – 2 people would have the role of destroying the crystals, allowing the other 3 to DPS the boss. Again, however, this can be brute-forced through poison and high damage.

A little tweaking where the regen is accompanied by damage reduction, and a stacking debuff when destroying the crystals means more teamwork would be required (change from destroying crystals to boss DPS, while someone takes over) and the mechanic couldn’t be ignored.

As a side point perhaps, but still relevant to this discussion I believe, there had been a significant amount of talk about the state of WvW at one point. Why introduce Bloodlust? Why no area for GvG? (ofc this has changed now)
Responses (or lack of) to these points seemed…. interesting.

Long story short, the decisions that were being made simply didn’t make sense. It felt at the time that a lot of it was common sense that would be obvious to the devs.

Then at one point an alpha tester leaked a bunch of information ( I won’t link due to having been banned previously for doing it.)

He highlighted that WvW is supposed to be imbalanced to force players that want balance into PvP. That any ideas for WvW goes through the PvP team first. That the PvP team dislike GvG because they want those players in PvP and concurrently GvG has no place in WvW.

This culminated in a dev trolling a GvG match. The leak stating that the GvG arena only came about to stem the anger from the GvG community over this.

My point is, we don’t know the ‘office politics’ at Anet and while overall most people with perspective will agree that while Mike O’Brien is in charge we won’t lose a healthy perspective of the game overall. However, the same kind of hubris that creeps into any office setting. Where people look out for their own interests is inevitable.

Us as consumers however usually don’t know the details.

Mike.5091:

~

No matter how quests are implemented most often they’ll be boring if they take too long to accomplish. Mainly also due to lack of variety. I like not having to search for the NPCs though and the various ways of finishing most quests. I never really read the NPC clickthroughs anyway. So for my “playstyle” it’s much nicer.

3. That’s an often discussed point and I agree with you that some parts of the game need a stronger focuse and a slight more developing time. Nowadays everything has to be fast .. games, movies, cars. Seems to be a modern way of life which actually isn’t enjoyable. Just leads to burn-outs.

1 and 3 I will keep to the other threads about it to keep it on topic here. About one I will say I did not see P2P as the solution. But if you want to talk more about that please see the other topic.

About 2:
It’s not so much that I prefer traditional MMO’s. Maybe I should have given some examples of the thinks I like to much. I did say some worked out very well some did not. but for example the whole movement, dodging, jumping is great. The jumping puzzle are a great addition of colors (maybe not unique for GW but unique compared to other MMO’s) is also great and there are more great thinks that GW2 has because they wanted to innovate.

Even the dynamic events are great. All I am saying about that is that they by them-self can not replace everything a more traditional quest can do (in this example). A quest-line thats sends you all over the world, let you talk with NPC’s, get a bound with them, getting a feeling of completion and a specific reward and so on. That is stuff the dynamic events can’t do.

So then why not implement both? Or improve the traditional quest. It now has the feeling of them implementing something new what is nice (yet does not manage to completely replace the traditional quest) but then just don’t wanting to also have the traditional quest as well (for those thinks that the events can’t give) just because it would be to traditional. That is a bad reason imo.

Mounts is also just an example. They did say they would like mounts but it had to be in a ‘GW2 way.’ Likely combat mounts. But why this must to have it (only) in a ‘GW2 way’. Thats more the problem I am mentioning to. If it has to be differed just to be differed that will not always results in the best solution.

Those thinks have proven themselves for many years.

If it would be. ‘Ok we want mounts / quest / raids (just examples!) and so on, but we want to see if we can innovate it or if we are able to add also a new type of those in’ thats fine. But if you just want it to be different because thats some goal you set then you are sometimes throwing away thinks that work very well.

As long as you don’t force people to do thinks in one way then it’s no shame to have elements in the game that many other games also have. You have enough thinks to set you apart but don’t throw a winning horse.

This video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NedWPHZCcik&feature=c4-overview&list=UUJTE1U_RsWh9Nl2hMZxMu5w also puts it very well but because of it’s title (takes away from the subject) I did not want to add it. Might add it to the OP anyway because I think people focus to much on my examples in stead of what I am trying to say with different for the sake of different.

TheDaiBish.9735:

From a business perspective, you don’t be different for the sake of being different. You be different to carve yourself a section of the industry. After all, it makes no sense to chase after the ones who are into the traditional MMO types (WoW, for example), when these traditional MMO’s have had years to polish their games, build their content and build their player-bases to the point where these players are invested.

~

I don’t want to go to much into the specific examples because thats all I used them for.. examples. My point is the underlaying ‘problem’, I will however try to answer you with the examples hopefully to clear those thinks a little.

“From a business perspective, you don’t be different for the sake of being different. You be different to carve yourself a section of the industry.“ True but a company can still build a very innovative new car while not giving up the four feels and the engine in the frond. If you have a good reason to put the engine in the back then thats fine, if you simply want to put it somewhere else because most cars have it in the frond thats not good. While yes you can say “we are very different, we have the engine on the roof!”.

About the raids. I don’t mind open world combat and Tequatl was indeed a good example how you can make roles (when there is a lack of roles) but one of the problems was then people who did not know what they where doing jumped on a turret. Would it be a real raid (instance) that would have not been a problem. However indeed it’s very nice to also have open world raids. Thats a part of the good innovation but one does not exclude the other and those roles you can give in a raid (by turrets or by giving professions more specific roles) are better for the normal raids (because they can be better organized) then open world raids.

So why exclude the ‘more traditional’ version. To me it looks like the main reason is.. It’s what also other mmo’s have. And that by itself does not seem a good reason for me.

About the quest. I do not dislike the events. Not at all but like you say yourself they do also have there negatives so then why not put in both. What the one misses the other gives and the other way around. You say yourself that would be fine but once again to me it seems like they don’t want to put in traditional quest because they are not different?

Lastly the holy trinity example. I think more specific roles would be great. Getting something new in stead of tank / healer and DPS is fine. No complains there but it seems like they just removed the holy trinity and thats it. Why not put in 2 more roles making it the holy pentagon. Yes if you have very specific roles it means that if somebody dies it’s immediate a problem but is that not also exactly the season why many people find combat a little dull in GW2? Because it does not really matter so much.

Giving everybody the ability to ress people is also not bad but once again to me it seems to me like the motivation was to much “it has to be different”. If they purely looked at how to improve then I think they could make some awesome changes not having the holy trinity but if you just want it do be different then you might not end up with the best result.

Roles being put up on you by a dungeon can indeed help but then you are still easy replaceable (as profession) so a combination of more specific roles and dungeon tactics would work just fine.

I disaggre with some of the things you listed, especially quests and trinity.

To be honest, it surprises me to see someone prefer the old and dated quest system over dynamic events. IMO theres nothing good about the tradicional quest system. And, essencially speaking, we have quests in GW2: hearts. Hearts are essencially quests, with the benefits of not having to talk to the NPC to start it (or the get the reward after having finished it) and offering different ways to complete it. But its essencially the same thing as quests.

But the design choice for dynamic events was not to provide something different just for the sake of being different. As mentioned by the devs on various articles and interviews prior to release, the idea was to provide a more personal gameplay experience. They recongized the tradicional quest system as a very generic experience. I will quote a part of the Dynamic Events Overview (by the way, you should read it all – in case you havent already – since basically everything Im speaking here is there. Here goes the link: http://gw2101.gtm.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/dynamic-events/dynamic-events-overview/)

“There is a second fundamental flaw to traditional quest systems: what the quest text tells you is happening in a quest is not actually what is happening in the world.

For example, in a traditional MMO, the character who gives you a quest will tell you ogres are coming to destroy the character’s home, and you need to kill them. You then get a quest which says, “Kill 0/10 ogres” and you proceed to kill a bunch of ogres standing around in a field picking daisies. Since every player in the game needs to be able to do this quest, the ogres will never actually threaten the character’s home – they will just eternally pick daisies in the field. The ogres aren’t actually doing what the quest says they are – the game is lying to you!"

The way I see it, dynamic events are the natural evolution of the system in place during GW1. In GW1, the instances could provide this more personal experience by changing the instance acording to the quests the players in the party have. So, lets say a quest tells that theres an ogre invasion (following the previous example); when players entered the explorable they would see dozens of ogres walking towards the home. After they managed to kill the ogres, and get the reward for the quest, they would never see those ogres again.

Since GW2 is open world, they went for dynamic events, which was a pretty good decision imo. Sure it is not a perfect system, though. The events repeat itself (as producers cant create content as fast as people play), and most events provide no consequence in case of failing. But its way better than the tradicional quest system. Some events and chains are really well done.

I can remember one in particular, while I was doing a same old tradicional quest-style heart on a mine in Kessex Hills which consisted – among other stuff – of motivating the miners. Okay, I was just doing it to get the 100% map completion. But then an NPC came running and shouting about a centaur invasion to the village next to the mine. I didnt even see the NPC, I just listened to him, and saw all the miners starting to run towards the village. So I followed them and fought the centaurs. Theres no way not to appreciate all these little details (from the NPC warning about the invasion, to the miners reacting to it). And theres no way I would prefer the “Go to that field and kill 5 centaurs. It may not seem like it, but they are a real threat to our village”. Dynamic events do create a sense of urgency that tradicional quests dont provide. Sure, after having levelled a few chars, you will probably just choose to skip most of them, but the same would apply to quests (theres no fun in reapeting the same quests).

About the trinity, I will just quote another previous post of mine:

First of all, the removal of the dps-tank-healer trinity didnt leave the game with no roles. The devs themselves have always talked about how they focus the game on a new trinity damage-control-support. The only reason why this is just not noticeable (outside of sPvP and, at certain situations, WvW) is because general PvE content in this game is just too easy and dont explore different combat mechanics. “Hard” enemies on GW2 are basically one-hit kill mobs with unlimited HP pool. Thats why most people just go full zerk dps everything, since the only way to survive to those would be to block or dodge the hits anyway.

And the reason they decided to remove the tank-dps-healer trinity was not to do something different just for the sake of being different, but to avoid limitations to playstyle based on the character profession. For example, if we look at GW1, despite their attempt to give each profession at least 2 different possible roles, in the end each one of them was limited to very specific roles and playstyles on PvE end-content. If you were a warrior, you would have to be the tank. Assassin? Perma, right? No? Sorry, bro, no room for you on the party. Basically, each profession ended up having very limited gameplay options despite having all those hundreds of skills available to choose from. If you didnt ping the right build for your profession, you wouldnt even get in a party to do FoW, UW, DoA, or whatever.

If they relied only on box sales and expansions to maintain this game, this would have shut down long time ago, expansions simply do not generate the same money as a purely cosmetic gem store, and each of them have a different impact in the game.

What’s so wrong about developing something different? If you want to play a typical MMO you have plenty of games out there you can try, people are not supposed to enjoy every game style.

i rad your other posts and totaly agree with what you had to say on micro transactions and the quick and dirty way
but im sorry to say i dont agree with most of what you said here the comabat is one of the best things i like in this game quests dont bother me couldent care less about the holy trinty
and as for raid if tequatal is anything to go by the comunity isnt realy willing to work together on that scale very often
the one thing i do agree on tho is Anet is stuborn on some things and refuse to let us talk about them ive had many a post showing Anet flaws in a bad light shut down for minor infactions and see same said offences being commited on less hot topics with no reprisal
like its ok to cyber buly someone who is showing Anet a bad light because it erodes there point
but that same poster stands up for himself and argues with these cyber bullys they use it as a reason to shut down your post coz its not constructive they do not just delete the last post but use it as an excuse to remove the whole conversation thread
its like you say (Like if you make sure people don’t talk about it it go’s away)

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I disaggre with some of the things you listed, especially quests and trinity.
~

Once again I want to appoint that the thread is not about the specific examples. It’s about the ‘problem behind it’.

I also don’t say I prefer the traditional quest over the events. They both have there positives and negatives.
As an example events don’t give you a story behind a NPC and so giving you less binding with a place and NPC. They also don’t send you all over the world in a quest-line and do not really give an option to unlock specific rewards and you can’t really complete (they keep returning) them making them feel less like if you make a change. On the other hands, traditional quest do not show an real event / attack and are very static. So they both have positive and negatives sites.

It’s not true that the hearts are the quest. The hearts where put in to basically to show people where they had to be. When testing in Alpha they had no hearts because quest where supposed to be the new quest. It then turned out that did not work because people had no idea where to go. In stead of then putting ALSO traditional quest in they came up with the hearts. The way the hearts do look like quest is with the very boring gather quest but they don’t look in any way like the more interesting quest lines.

I will read it and comment on it however they are mainly bashing traditional quest so by reacting on it it almost seems like if I am indeed saying traditional quest are better. Thats not what I want to say, I want to say the have there benefits so don’t act like they are totally flowed and events are great so you don’t put them in. They beside to do it different and now they can complain about those other mmo’s while not doing it directly.

>

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Of course they don’t say ‘we did it different because that itself was the goal’. However the first alina starts with pointing out that all those other mmo’s have those ‘flawed’ traditional quest. Showing how GW2 is different. While the events have there own flaws so why not put in both? Because they can then not anymore say they don;t have those old ‘flawed’ quest?

Also the way they describe it you can’t really take serious. “From here, you get a massive wall of text hardly anyone reads.“ only sometimes true.. so then make the text shorter?

“ that describes a horrible or totally mundane thing going on in the world that you need to help with.“. Horrible? Really? All quest? And all mudane? I have seen some very nice quest. Yes these sort of quest exist but but then don’t make those, only make the good ones?

Now if you decide to make you game just different, not implementing quest then you can talk about how bad quest are in those other games. And turning back is also kinda hard after making such a statement. There is you reason to be different for the sake of it and the reason for the stubbornness.

“Traditional quest systems rely on these blocks of quest text to tell you what is happening in the world; this is just an outdated form of storytelling. “ well some thinks you can’t put in an event. An event is something that is happening. A quest can also be “please search my son, he did not come back after going to fish”. Thats something a events can’t really do so those text quest give the option for much more variety.

It’s not for nothing that his example is based on a event where you are being attacked. Something that is the case of maybe 75%? of the events while wit traditional quest it’s maybe 1%. Simply because there are more options.

“A single player decision can cascade across a zone, changing the direction of a chain of events until they dramatically alter the content played by players in a map. “ nice on paper but you never really notice that in the game.

“Where previous systems reset and start again and really don’t change the world, dynamic events chain and cascade across a zone and leave persistent effects in the game world after the event has ended.“ for a few minutes and then it starts all over again making you feel like you did it for nothing. With traditional quest you at least complete it. However here he seems to be pointing towards rifts in Rift and yeah compared to that these events are an improvement.

“In traditional MMOs, when a quest is completed it has no real effect on the game world.“ true but it has a effect on your character. He completed that quest, you know a little more about the place and the NPC and the NPC will now also know you and react different on you.

“You receive your reward and then move on“ And that reward can be a very specific and unique reward based on that quest.

“ The world appears no better or worse for your actions. In GW2, the outcome of every event will directly affect the game world around you. “ it will a little bid for a while. This indeed a positive about events.

I can go on for a while but what it comes down to is that it’s not so black and white. Traditional quest have there advantages and events have.

Then put them in both.

But now they really just want to be able to tell how different (and better) they are then other games. So it has to be different for the sake of it being different. At least now they can flame about how bad traditional quest are.

So I am not saying traditional quest are better. I am also not saying events are better. I say they both have there pro’s but seemingly because GW2 wants to do thinks different they only put in the events. And so losing the good stuff from the quest. But at least hey can now say they do it different.

caiomacos.1694:

About the trinity, I will just quote another previous post of mine:

First of all, the removal of the dps-tank-healer trinity didnt leave the game with no roles. The devs themselves have always talked about how they focus the game on a new trinity damage-control-support. The only reason why this is just not noticeable (outside of sPvP and, at certain situations, WvW) is because general PvE content in this game is just too easy and dont explore different combat mechanics. “Hard” enemies on GW2 are basically one-hit kill mobs with unlimited HP pool. Thats why most people just go full zerk dps everything, since the only way to survive to those would be to block or dodge the hits anyway.

And the reason they decided to remove the tank-dps-healer trinity was not to do something different just for the sake of being different, but to avoid limitations to playstyle based on the character profession. For example, if we look at GW1, despite their attempt to give each profession at least 2 different possible roles, in the end each one of them was limited to very specific roles and playstyles on PvE end-content. If you were a warrior, you would have to be the tank. Assassin? Perma, right? No? Sorry, bro, no room for you on the party. Basically, each profession ended up having very limited gameplay options despite having all those hundreds of skills available to choose from. If you didnt ping the right build for your profession, you wouldnt even get in a party to do FoW, UW, DoA, or whatever.

Maybe they did try to make new roles but in reality you don’t feel much of it and to me also this seems like they just wanted to do it different.

Alukah.2063:

If they relied only on box sales and expansions to maintain this game, this would have shut down long time ago, expansions simply do not generate the same money as a purely cosmetic gem store, and each of them have a different impact in the game.

What’s so wrong about developing something different? If you want to play a typical MMO you have plenty of games out there you can try, people are not supposed to enjoy every game style.

gem-store focus is another thread but GW1 did generate the money that way and many games generate the money like that. Battlefield also needs to have servers running for many many players. They generate there money mainly with the game sale. The idea that it would not be possible is simply not true.

“What’s so wrong about developing something different?” Nothing as long as you don’t do thinks different just because it is different because that does not always make it better. I can make a car with no wheels. Thats different but it’s not better (if it’s not a flying car)

Trying to do things different is not the problem but it becomes the problem when you don’t just try to innovate anymore but you are simply wanting to change tings for the sake of being different and I think thats what we see with many thinks in GW2.

Read all your posts, was a nice read and can only agree on every point you made.

Devata.6589:

About the raids. I don’t mind open world combat and Tequatl was indeed a good example how you can make roles (when there is a lack of roles) but one of the problems was then people who did not know what they where doing jumped on a turret.

Would it be a real raid (instance) that would have not been a problem. However indeed it’s very nice to also have open world raids. That’s a part of the good innovation but one does not exclude the other and those roles you can give in a raid (by turrets or by giving professions more specific roles) are better for the normal raids (because they can be better organized) then open world raids.

I’d actually say this is more of an issue with the player base, rather than with ANet.

I fully believe that ANet could make open-world bosses require a high level of organisation; multiple groups working in tandem in order to achieve the goal of beating the big baddie (one thing could be having mechanics scale [Shatterer’s healing crystals, for example], as opposed to just damage and health).

However, the majority of the player-base doesn’t want that type of content in the open world. They want to be able to just run around and not require communication for these encounters, at the detriment of the how the encounters are designed.

Devata.6589:

To me it looks like the main reason is.. It’s also what other mmo’s have.

By that logic, ANet wouldn’t have included dungeons / crafting / levels ect either, since they’re also in other MMO’s.

Devata.6589:

About the quest. I do not dislike the events. Not at all but like you say yourself they do also have there negatives so then why not put in both. What the one misses the other gives and the other way around. You say yourself that would be fine but once again to me it seems like they don’t want to put in traditional quest because they are not different?

In a sense, we do have traditional quests:

• Personal Story
• Hearts

Maybe not in the way they’re usually done, but they have the hallmarks of a traditional quest: both aren’t repeatable; they tell a story; they offer rewards and; you need to go to a certain point to do them.

Devata.6589:

• No complains there but it seems like they just removed the Holy Trinity and that’s it.
• Yes if you have very specific roles it means that if somebody dies it’s immediate a problem but is that not also exactly the reason why many people find combat a little dull in GW2?

Except they didn’t. They removed the Holy Trinity and added:

• Combo’s
• The ability to ress
• The ability to intercept skills

As I said above, more often than not the reason these aren’t used is because they aren’t needed in encounters.

As for the lack of roles making it dull, roles within the encounters would solve this, since you’d still need people to fill them roles.

Having rigid, static roles is counter-productive to true teamwork, IMO, since you’ve got to focus on what you’re doing, rather than being able to help your team when the tides of battle don’t go your way.

Between these two examples, what do you think is a better example of teamwork?

• All fighting, teammate A goes down, teammate B switches weapon and uses a KB and Immobilise, while Team C and D rally teammate A.

OR

• All fighting, Healer / Tank goes down, fight automatically fails.

The problem with specific roles is exactly that; you require that person to always man that role. They leave that role, and you don’t have that role being fulfilled anymore. They don’t offer flexibility that the current combat system does.

Rather, things like Support (buffing, healing ect), Control (both ‘hard’ [stun] and ‘soft’ [cripple]) and Damage should be thought of a aspects of combat, rather than specific roles.

As previously mentioned sort of, roles within the encounters circumvents this, since these roles would be needed to progress the fight, as opposed to requiring specific roles before you even start. This offers a lot more build freedom as well for everyone involved.

While someone might want to go pure DPS, another DPS focused player might also have a control utility and weapon to bring Control if things go pear-shaped, while another might sacrifice some DPS to enhance their ability to buff and res; not required, but it’s there just in case.

As mentioned before, I honestly feel it’s the encounters that make the combat suffer the most, since it doesn’t utilise the full depth the combat has to offer (possibly missing stuff off of the pic).

The thing about mmo’s is that they have very long lifespans. If you aren’t trying to make your game different from the established games then you’re just trying to get people to pay again for the same game they already have. To use your car analogy it’s as though we have 2 cars with the same wheels, the same engine, the same number of doors and seats, the same cargo space and the same fuel tank. If one of those cars comes out a year before the other the second car will not have any success. It would be technically just as good as the first car but everyone that wants a car with those specifications has already bought the first one. Car 2 could even have slight improvements in performance over car 1 but it wouldn’t make a difference, there’s no point trying to steal an existing customer base from a competitor. If instead car 2 has a different engine, fuel tank, cargo space, etc to car 1 it would be able to claim it’s own segment of the market instead by targeting different people to those that already have car 1.

To be more specific to GW2 it’s clear that what Anet is targeting are those people that like the base mmorpg playstyle, but don’t like the specifics of existing games in the genre. As one of those people I can tell you my opinion of raids is that you may as well be playing DDR on your keyboard, that the only difference in holy trinity roles is what bar you’re looking at while playing DDR and that standard quests could be replaced with greater exp gains from kills and I wouldn’t notice the difference. These opinions are obviously not the only reasons anyone that plays GW2 over other mmos would state but I can also say that it’s almost certain that if I didn’t hold those opinions I would be playing a different game.

TL;DR if it wasn’t different to the games we already have we would just keep playing those.

Devata.6589:

True but a company can still build a very innovative new car while not giving up the four wheels and the engine in the front. If you have a good reason to put the engine in the back then that’s fine, if you simply want to put it somewhere else because most cars have it in the front that’s not good. While yes you can say “we are very different, we have the engine on the roof!”.

I meant to address this one first, but run out of words.

You have the pre-conception that they did this simply to be different, thus anything they try to do differently, in your eyes, will be done for this sole reason, despite there potentially being other reasons for it.

For example, getting rid of the Trinity.

They got rid of dedicated healers, according to them, to help take the fun aspects of a support character while ditching the unfun bits. Obviously, this is subjective, but since this was done during the design stage, they probably looked at what they found to be fun and unfun.

We examined what it was about the healer archetypes that people really enjoyed, and we took a look at what it was about those archetypes that made the game less enjoyable. Then we created professions to appeal to those types of players.

Support players want to be able to say, “Remember that one time when I saved you from certain death?” They want to stand in the line of fire and block attacks. They want to surround their allies with a swirling dome of air that keeps enemy projectiles from passing through it. It’s not about clicking on a health bar and watching it go up, it’s about being there for your friends when they need you.

Source

I also heard something about not requiring a dedicated healer was something people in GW1 brought up. However, whether this is true or not, I don’t know.

All in all, I don’t think that every design choice is made simply to be different. There’s underlying reasons as to why them choices are made as well, and why they may not be as polished as some of the mechanics in other games, them mechanics have been polished over time. Given time, polish and the most important, love, who knows? The current combat system might be just as well received as the Trinity.

TheDaiBish.9735:

~

“However, the majority of the player-base doesn’t want that type of content in the open world.”
Isen’t that always the problem. And even if it isn’t the majority, even if it is 10%. If you make hard content that required teamwork of 100% of the people and 10% does not to what they should you fail.

Put it in a raid and only the player-base that is interested will go in (as part of a guild) and so needs to work together.

Open world raids are nice but they don’t work if you want hard content that requires perfect teamwork. Maybe thats because of the player-base but that does not make it less true.

“By that logic, ANet wouldn’t have included dungeons / crafting / levels ect either, since they’re also in other MMO’s.”
Maybe they where not able to come up with a other system for dungeons?
They did try to create a whole new crafting system and they planned on not having levels but eventually where forced to do so because it totally did not work.

That gives a little hope that they are sometimes willing to change a decision.

“In a sense, we do have traditional quests:
Personal Story
Hearts
“
They can’t really be compared to the traditional quest (where also not designed to do so) and have also none of the positives of the traditional quest with the exception that the PS indeed sends you all over the world. But thats really it.

“Except they didn’t. They removed the Holy Trinity and added: “
Well to me it looks a lot like they did. Yeah they did talk about the ‘new’ trinity but I don’t see it and I don’t think just changing the dungeons will change that.

“Between these two examples, what do you think is a better example of teamwork?
All fighting, teammate A goes down, teammate B switches weapon and uses a KB and Immobilise, while Team C and D rally teammate A.
OR
All fighting, Healer / Tank goes down, fight automatically fails.`
I do indeed think that giving everybody the ability to ress was a good idea. It´s not that I dislike everything that is new.

Coldtart.4785:

The thing about mmo’s is that they have very long lifespans. If you aren’t trying to make your game different from the established games then you’re just trying to get people to pay again for the same game they already have. To use your car analogy it’s as though we have 2 cars with the same wheels, the same engine, the same number of doors and seats, the same cargo space and the same fuel tank. If one of those cars comes out a year before the other the second car will not have any success. It would be technically just as good as the first car but everyone that wants a car with those specifications has already bought the first one. Car 2 could even have slight improvements in performance over car 1 but it wouldn’t make a difference, there’s no point trying to steal an existing customer base from a competitor. If instead car 2 has a different engine, fuel tank, cargo space, etc to car 1 it would be able to claim it’s own segment of the market instead by targeting different people to those that already have car 1.

To be more specific to GW2 it’s clear that what Anet is targeting are those people that like the base mmorpg playstyle, but don’t like the specifics of existing games in the genre. As one of those people I can tell you my opinion of raids is that you may as well be playing DDR on your keyboard, that the only difference in holy trinity roles is what bar you’re looking at while playing DDR and that standard quests could be replaced with greater exp gains from kills and I wouldn’t notice the difference. These opinions are obviously not the only reasons anyone that plays GW2 over other mmos would state but I can also say that it’s almost certain that if I didn’t hold those opinions I would be playing a different game.

TL;DR if it wasn’t different to the games we already have we would just keep playing those.

No because I don’t say they should not do thinks different or innovate, they simply should not do thinks different for the sake of doing it different because then you also do it different when you do not have a good solution to replace whatever you remove.

Yes include events. Thats great but if they can´t fully replace traditional quest don´t remove traditional quest so you can see “see we are different”.

TheDaiBish.9735:

Devata.6589:

True but a company can still build a very innovative new car while not giving up the four wheels and the engine in the front. If you have a good reason to put the engine in the back then that’s fine, if you simply want to put it somewhere else because most cars have it in the front that’s not good. While yes you can say “we are very different, we have the engine on the roof!”.

I meant to address this one first, but run out of words.

You have the pre-conception that they did this simply to be different, thus anything they try to do differently, in your eyes, will be done for this sole reason, despite there potentially being other reasons for it.

For example, getting rid of the Trinity.

They got rid of dedicated healers, according to them, to help take the fun aspects of a support character while ditching the unfun bits. Obviously, this is subjective, but since this was done during the design stage, they probably looked at what they found to be fun and unfun.

We examined what it was about the healer archetypes that people really enjoyed, and we took a look at what it was about those archetypes that made the game less enjoyable. Then we created professions to appeal to those types of players.

Support players want to be able to say, “Remember that one time when I saved you from certain death?” They want to stand in the line of fire and block attacks. They want to surround their allies with a swirling dome of air that keeps enemy projectiles from passing through it. It’s not about clicking on a health bar and watching it go up, it’s about being there for your friends when they need you.

Source

I also heard something about not requiring a dedicated healer was something people in GW1 brought up. However, whether this is true or not, I don’t know.

All in all, I don’t think that every design choice is made simply to be different. There’s underlying reasons as to why them choices are made as well, and why they may not be as polished as some of the mechanics in other games, them mechanics have been polished over time. Given time, polish and the most important, love, who knows? The current combat system might be just as well received as the Trinity.

For some thinks there surely have multiple reasons but for many I really have the idea they simply want to do it different. And because of that will they sometimes don’t see (or want to see) that there solution is not better or is at least not able to fully replace what it’s suppose to replace.

If you watch interviews they also always mention how if they introduce something it needs to be not like other MMO’s but in a ‘GW2 way’. Sadly that statement brings more fear to many then joy. Fear of it not giving everything it should give or it does give in other MMO’s.

That fear simply comes from thinks people have seen already in the game. As an example I remember the interview with Collin that was streamed where they were talking about raids (thats why it’s one of my examples) and that he said they were working on them but it had to be in a GW2 way. The reactions on that statement where less of joy and more of fear for getting a lesser system.

Devata.6589:

“However, the majority of the player-base doesn’t want that type of content in the open world.”

Isn’t that always the problem. And even if it isn’t the majority, even if it is 10%. If you make hard content that required teamwork of 100% of the people and 10% does not to what they should you fail.

Put it in a raid and only the player-base that is interested will go in (as part of a guild) and so needs to work together.

Open world raids are nice but they don’t work if you want hard content that requires perfect teamwork. Maybe thats because of the player-base but that does not make it less true.

So what’s the difference between a guild doing an open-world raid and an instanced one?

If 2 or 3 guilds (each with 10 or 25 members, since that seems to be the general numbers needed for a raid), what’s to stop them 3 guilds working together?

Perfect teamwork isn’t needed. As long as the majority of players know what they’re doing, then it’d be doable. There’s a thing called a margin of error. Traditional raids don’t require perfect teamwork either (unless mechanics dictate knowing teammates positions).

I personally think that these bosses should be that type of content. After all, it’s an MMO. The genre’s unique selling point is the ability to play with lots of other players, and it should be used.

Again, the reason they gave for not have instanced raids was splitting the player base any further than it already has.

Devata.6589:

“By that logic, ANet wouldn’t have included dungeons / crafting / levels ect either, since they’re also in other MMO’s.”
Maybe they where not able to come up with a other system for dungeons?

They did try to create a whole new crafting system and they planned on not having levels but eventually where forced to do so because it totally did not work.

That gives a little hope that they are sometimes willing to change a decision.

But you theorised that they left instanced raids out to be different. If that was the case, wouldn’t the same hold true for dungeons and crafting?

And crafting isn’t all that much different from other MMO’s, aside from the Discovery mechanic.

Devata.6589:

“In a sense, we do have traditional quests:
Personal Story
Hearts
“
They can’t really be compared to the traditional quest (where also not designed to do so) and have also none of the positives of the traditional quest with the exception that the PS indeed sends you all over the world. But thats really it.

Quests are also commonly used to give direction through a zone. Just like Hearts.

As for the positives of traditional quests, what are they?

Devata.6589:

“Except they didn’t. They removed the Holy Trinity and added: “

Well to me it looks a lot like they did. Yeah they did talk about the ‘new’ trinity but I don’t see it and I don’t think just changing the dungeons will change that.

And why’s that?

The ability to make a full support, a full control and full damage specs are there.

The encounters, though, don’t require them; in fact, damage is the optimal way. Humans and the path of least resistance, and all that.

TheDaiBish.9735:

~

I want to keep it short because it’s to much focused on the examples. Remember the topic is about being different for the sake of it. Not ‘there should be raids’ or something.

However you take the time to comment so I also want to give you an answer.

Difference with open world raid is that those 10% can mess thinks up for the rest if they do not fulfill there role properly.

If perfect teamwork isn’t needed or strict roles are not needed thats indeed not true but thats then maybe also the difference of what you can put in an instance and what you can put in the open world. In an instance you can put extremely hard stuff that does require perfect teamwork and roles.

So it’s in fact different content and because of that the one can not simply replace the other in every perspective.

Having those open world raids is indeed great but because it can’t replace the instanced one in all perspectives you might want to put in both. Even if you then have an ‘older’ mechanic in your game.

Splitting the player-base is also done with overflows. So I don’t see that as a very good argument.

They did change the instance raids to open world raids. They did not take the raid idea out. Same for crafting and with dungeons they might simply had no idea how to make that really different.

The positives I did mention before. Just a small list of pro’s here.
Quest lines that send you all over the world.
You get to know the many NPC’s in the world and there story.
You get more of a bound with an area because you learn the NPC’s.
There can be specific unique rewards for specific quest / quest lines.
You really complete it (for you character) in stead of having something (events) that keeps repeating. So it creates more of a feeling of accomplishment.

Well maybe it’s because of the encounters. I don’t think thats the reason or maybe it’s partly the reason. Maybe the support / control and DPS are not enough of a difference to always be felt. So that you really need the encounters to be based on it.

I just wanted to add that funny enough Wooden Potatoes hit this subject in one of his latest video’s. He did not say that “it has to be difference” was bad but he did say it might be the reason mounts are not in yet. (I did see an interview where Colin said they would like mounts but then with combat skills or something).

BTW I do not agree with Wooden Potatoes that it’s to late for GW2 to add those changes in the existing world and I do think thats those places would still be very accessible (thats there the mounts come into place and maybe flypoints like many mmo’s have) but I would like to add the video to this thread: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXgBAWOGvw4&t=10m46s

The Holy Trinity is great and all, but closing it just for the sake of closing it is in my opinion better than having it around.

Inherently, due to the way its designed, you have a lot less people playing tanks and healers, so as a DD, you spend most of your time waiting in a queue. That’s not fun.

I had to wait for up to 4 hours in a queue for FF14. 4 HOURS.

Also, is it so bad with everyone being DPS with some team support? I really don’t see whats so bad about not having a dedicated tank or healer.

Xae Isareth.1364:

The Holy Trinity is great and all, but closing it just for the sake of closing it is in my opinion better than having it around.

Inherently, due to the way its designed, you have a lot less people playing tanks and healers, so as a DD, you spend most of your time waiting in a queue. That’s not fun.

I had to wait for up to 4 hours in a queue for FF14. 4 HOURS.

Also, is it so bad with everyone being DPS with some team support? I really don’t see whats so bad about not having a dedicated tank or healer.

closing it just for the sake of closing it is never a good reason for anything. There are always more ways to solve a problem. Maybe they could make tank and healer classes more fun. Or even have an equal amount of healer / dps / tank classes because in most games (with the queue problem) there are more DPS classes then tank or heal classes.

So if the queue is a problem there are many ways to do something about that. If another reason is the problem you can always redesign the content / combat in a way to counter those problems.

But doing it different really just for the sake of doing it different. Because you want to be this game that is ‘new’ so everything has to be different is a bad reason. Then it’s not quality driven.

I took the trinity as one of the examples because many people complain about the combat being boring, having no roles, feeling to solo, having no real impact and being to much just smashing a button (to take the complains you can find on the forum together).

So you might not think it’s a problem but many people seem to think it is.

I just know at this point regardless of what anyone else says Guild Wars 2 is not a healthy product. Anet does not do something before other MMO’s release there going to be in trouble. Because most of there current lv 80 player base will most likely ditch out since there is no end game, no raiding, and they just keep adding time gated crafting as a way to keep people around.

The trinity system vs. the system in gw2 is a perception thing. In both formats you push a button and something happens. Just because the trinity system offers a way to get an enemy to attack you if you are a tank or to make someone’s life bar go back to full is just a control thing.

I like that GW2 puts the onus on each player to make sure they are taking care of their end of the game play. I have seen far too many videos where a good tank or a good healer carry a group of mediocre players through content in trinity based games. This game allows me to see who is carrying their weight and I can play with people that are willing to play. Sure, you can carry a bad player or two in this game as well, but to me their flaws are more easily discernible.

TL;DR This game is doing it the way I like to do it.

Yeah, i miss mounts too. For exploration game, this game really suffer from lack of exploration abilities. Even existing one like mesmer’s blink is useless for exploration. Such bad design.

I just read an article about Wildstar. A game I am not interested in (just for the record). However I really had the feeling that the guy who was being interviewed referred to GW2 when promoting his game.

“According to Donatelli, that familiarity is intentional. “I hate reinventing the wheel for the sake of saying we did something different,” he says. He used the auction house as an example, emphasizing his desire to tweak familiar models. “We say, ‘This is how auction houses function in many other games, now let’s see how we can add searchability to it and ease of use.’” “

Have to agree on this and adding new stuff as well is not bad bad doing it different just for the sake of it is.

http://www.pcgamer.com/2013/12/18/wildstar-hands-on-is-innovation-overrated/

Just wanted to mention the following about hearts (that I posted into various threads already).

These heart events should reset every month and be part of the monthly completion. The hearts were meant to get people into places where events happened, while the events would then lead you to other event-locations. And as such they would guide you through the game. ‘But’ because hearts are a onetime deal, people do not frequent these locations, do not encounter the ‘lead in’ events that sprout from these locations and are thus left to roam the area looking for any event that is taking place, more then often being ‘the same’ as always. As opposed to events that only start at heart locations and never fire off, which in turn mean their follow ups never fire off, which in turn means that there is a whole lot of content that a whole lot of people never saw!

A monthly heart reset, and making them part of the monthly completion list, would get more people into these locations and as such bring them into contact with more events.

That said though, I did a thread recently with the request to ‘reinvent the quest’, and with that I did mean the more traditional quest, where you go on a certain mission that takes you places and has certain NPC involved in clear roles. And I repeated this suggestion in the vertical progression thread.

I think there is space for these in the GW2 world, and the quests would fit in really well with the 3 orders. Or even other organisations and or ‘things’, they could be a great addition to add more to the background story of the world, or serve as specific goals (f/e the quest for a legendary).

While I do not expect the traditional ‘quest’ to return, as a bunch of characters linked together with a ! or ? above their heads. The ‘quest’ as a storytelling facet (mainly the Personal story is ‘the main quest’ in gw2), may well return.

Lastly I do agree that sometimes ANet is a tad to stubborn in regards to being different for the sake of being different. And yes, this lead to great things and not so great things (based a lot on personal preference), in the end though I think we should embrace this more then shun from it. As shunning from it would mean we would not be playing GW2, but instead we would be playing WoW2 backed by GW2 lore…

In this regard it is also worth it to find the right angle to address issues, I wouldn’t like the holy trinity to return, but I do somewhat agree that the current roles aren’t at all that clear. Which can be fine in a sense, as long as each profession can fullfill this roll in an equal manner. I think the horizontal and vertical progression CDI’s gave them enough feedback to find their own way in this.