Guild Wars 2

I just came back to GW2 after 4+ years. I barely scratched it after the launch despite enjoying the game quite a bit.

From I have seen so far the game hasn’t changed much. One thing is still annoys me is the inconsistency in difficulty of the pve content.

Killing mobs barely takes any effort, to the point you can easily kill them by using the auto attack abilities alone. No need for dodging, smart positioning, using specific skills. You usually have to put some effort only if you gather a bigger group of normal mobs or have a veteran in the mix. On other hand champions which are admittedly group content can kill you in few hits. I really wish normal mobs and events actually took some effort.

I know rebalancing so far in the game release probably isn’t going to happen, but maybe ArenaNet could introduce “Veteran Instances” of the game world?

You could basically tick a box during the login process and you would enter a map instances where mobs are more dangerous, have more health/dps, higher number of mobs in groups or far more veteran mobs on the map. You could reward players with a higher chance for a better loot from the the veterans etc.

This way people who want a relaxed default experience wouldn’t complain while people who want more on the edge experience would join the veteran instances.

Since you just came back, if you do not have HoT or have not tried it yet give it a go. The mobs there and the mob density are probably what you are looking for. There are loads of veteran mobs, mobs all over the place in groups, and more mobs with different dynamics like break bars. What you suggested for more difficulty pretty much describes one of the big things some people have been critical of when it comes to HoT maps.

Or even, with Living World Season Two, Dry Top and The Silverwastes. A bit less of an investment.

Welcome return, and good luck.

If you’re leveling, you should be in +5 level areas, +10 if you’re playing an easier profession like necro.

If you’re 80 downscaled, remove your gear and equip the next weapon that drops.

Veteran instances would split the playerbase too much i fear and things would never get done. It would mean players would likely see less other players on the map due to such a split and that’s very much the opposite of what Anet want their game to be like.

Silverwastes, HoT maps and more recent living story maps are a world apart from the core difficulty, so should meet your expectations.

Healix.5819:

If you’re leveling, you should be in +5 level areas, +10 if you’re playing an easier profession like necro.

If you’re 80 downscaled, remove your gear and equip the next weapon that drops.

Does training in higher leveled maps actually make your character gain exp faster or is this just to make it more challenging? It takes longer to kill higher leveled mobs, so I’m just don’t know if its actually quicker to level up that way or not

^I don’t think leveling in higher-than-current character level maps is for increased XP gain, but for more of a challenge that the OP desired.

Unfortunately, the removal of LS1 means you can’t see how great the updated zones and the new mobs were. Lots of great new types of mobs on old maps, basically LS1 was like having these veteran maps you are talking about. Too bad it was temporary content

Fortunately LS2 is permanent content and you can visit Dry Top and Silverwastes for some more challenge. Probably best to go check there, although the rest of the game is rather easy. That’s to be expected though, when we first started playing this game nobody knew how to play because the combat was rather unique, and that includes the devs. It’s no secret that every single patch added more challenging mobs than originally available in the game.

I doubt they will ever add extra versions of the old maps because it will split the community. But once you get into Heart of Thorns and the LS3 zones you will find that the difficulty has increased somewhat making the open world more fun to play and not dying from boredom.

They’d basically need twice the amount of servers they currently own or rent for this, for probably half as many people in each one.

Try Silver Wastes, Dry Top, then upgrade to Heart of Thorns, try Verdant Brink, especially during the night time meta event, Auric Basin, Tangled Depths, Dragon Stand and the three new-ish Living Story 3 zones.

THEN comeback and say nothing has changed…

OriOri.8724:

Healix.5819:

If you’re leveling, you should be in +5 level areas, +10 if you’re playing an easier profession like necro.

If you’re 80 downscaled, remove your gear and equip the next weapon that drops.

Does training in higher leveled maps actually make your character gain exp faster or is this just to make it more challenging? It takes longer to kill higher leveled mobs, so I’m just don’t know if its actually quicker to level up that way or not

Yes you get more exp.
When guild wars launched I was killing mobs 5+ lvls higher than me because of that and with an exp booster it was pretty nice. Toss in some yellow mobs and your exp bar chunks up fast. To do this you want a good power build though like warrior axe to chop through mobs easy.

Justine.6351:

OriOri.8724:

Healix.5819:

If you’re leveling, you should be in +5 level areas, +10 if you’re playing an easier profession like necro.

If you’re 80 downscaled, remove your gear and equip the next weapon that drops.

Does training in higher leveled maps actually make your character gain exp faster or is this just to make it more challenging? It takes longer to kill higher leveled mobs, so I’m just don’t know if its actually quicker to level up that way or not

Yes you get more exp.
When guild wars launched I was killing mobs 5+ lvls higher than me because of that and with an exp booster it was pretty nice. Toss in some yellow mobs and your exp bar chunks up fast. To do this you want a good power build though like warrior axe to chop through mobs easy.

Yea I know the higher exp per mob, I wasn’t sure if the additional time to kill mobs balanced that out and evened out the exp gain or not though.

Perhaps they should allow the choice for people to pick debuffs like in fractals (say, reduced stats for more magic find)

OriOri.8724:

Justine.6351:

OriOri.8724:

Healix.5819:

If you’re leveling, you should be in +5 level areas, +10 if you’re playing an easier profession like necro.

If you’re 80 downscaled, remove your gear and equip the next weapon that drops.

Does training in higher leveled maps actually make your character gain exp faster or is this just to make it more challenging? It takes longer to kill higher leveled mobs, so I’m just don’t know if its actually quicker to level up that way or not

Yes you get more exp.
When guild wars launched I was killing mobs 5+ lvls higher than me because of that and with an exp booster it was pretty nice. Toss in some yellow mobs and your exp bar chunks up fast. To do this you want a good power build though like warrior axe to chop through mobs easy.

Yea I know the higher exp per mob, I wasn’t sure if the additional time to kill mobs balanced that out and evened out the exp gain or not though.

If your build kills stuff fast regardless then yes. Axe warrior is one example where it’s power of killing trivializes higher level mobs. It is worth noting that past ~10 levels higher and foes are also giving a larger glancing blows chance which is bad for kill speed ya. The best mobs for exp gain are ~+5 lvls and neutral. They typically are easy kills regardless of lvl.

You could always downgrade your gear if things seem too easy for ya. Swap out all your gear for rare equivalent or maybe even masterwork.

Necrotic.7820:

You could always downgrade your gear if things seem too easy for ya. Swap out all your gear for rare equivalent or maybe even masterwork.

All my characters are 30+, the highest just hit 40. Most of my gear is self-crafted, dropped by mobs or bought with karma.

I don’t believe veteran instances would split the community, I have no idea about numbers of instances per specific zone, but I’m sure one or two veteran ones wouldn’t change anything for players in the default instances.

BlindChance.3678:

Necrotic.7820:

You could always downgrade your gear if things seem too easy for ya. Swap out all your gear for rare equivalent or maybe even masterwork.

All my characters are 30+, the highest just hit 40. Most of my gear is self-crafted, dropped by mobs or bought with karma.

I don’t believe veteran instances would split the community, I have no idea about numbers of instances per specific zone, but I’m sure one or two veteran ones wouldn’t change anything for players in the default instances.

How could it not split the community. If half the people play in veteran instances and half the people play in normal ones, the community would be split. There’s no other way to do that.

For popular maps, this wouldn’t represent a problem. For less popular maps, at off hours, it might.

The other problem with veteran instances (after the community split) is the rewards. The game is notoriously bad at balancing effort/reward, which means these higher difficulty instances won’t have any kind of worthy reward. Same as how so many posters said to run content with lower quality gear to make it more “challenging” as if that’s a valid solution.

It sounds like you want HoT. Higher mob density, more dangerous monsters with abilities you actually need to learn to counter, more veterans/champions.

BlindChance.3678:

All my characters are 30+, the highest just hit 40. Most of my gear is self-crafted, dropped by mobs or bought with karma.

If veteran instances existed, they would be for level 80s and the rewards would be no different from playing in level 80 areas. If there was something even higher, it would just be zerg content. That’s the problem, where most people play the game on easy mode and even believe that’s normal, as in zerging content scaled for 3+ or grouping for solo content, except there’s no downside for doing that and it can actually be more rewarding.

Hard modes have been suggested for years, as it was a feature in GW1, but ArenaNet has already said they wouldn’t do it. It’s not a smart idea to split the population because it’s very important to keep old areas active, otherwise the game appears dead to new players.

When leveling, there’s no need to keep your gear up to date. I’m usually 10-30 levels behind in gear with no accessories, rings, backpack or specific runes/sigils, as I only equip what the personal story or leveling rewards provides. On a weaker class like elementalist, you should encounter “deadly” pirates around level 30-50 that can kill you in maybe 5-10 seconds. This pales in comparison to HoT however, where regular enemies can hit for upwards of 15k vs your 12k health. This is where your choice of class can make a huge difference. For comparison, both being glass builds, necro is at the opposite end with an effective health of ~50k, which can basically faceroll in comparison.

When I recommend playing the game at +5 to +10, that’s actually how the game used to be balanced, before the massive nerfs in the original beta, except for the glancing blows. If you’ve ever been hit by an ettin’s club smash (the knockdown) or a moa’s flurry of pecks for example, that would have simply killed you. The best part, it was still considered too challenging for the WoW-type players, so levels 1-20 were further nerfed with the NPE ~2 years later.

I don’t think this game needs any more content that would split the audience.

So what is it you want? A more difficult fight or a different reward? I see no problem with PvE veteran instances as long as the reward is set to half the normal reward. You get the reward of harder content, others get the reward of better drops.

All in all, I’d prefer trait, skill and weapons balance as a way for players to understand the impact of added skill. Then players might learn to play better, bearing in mind that some players will never leave PvE, and many are looking for the easiest way.