Guild Wars 2

Do you guys think ArenaNet is even capable of reverting back to the old stuff? Did they store that code somewhere?

I guess it doesn’t really matter, they won’t do it anyway…
The trait aquisition change is much bigger problem imho….

They can’t.

It is their holy grail, a fix to a prolbem that never existed.

People buy games, they don’t like them, they stop playing. I did so too (with a whole lot of games).

For some obscure reason, ANet thought that the gameplay experience was the reason, but honestly, people won’t like it more or less with some minor changes.

On the other hand, ANet made many existing players angry. The two feature patches are a very confusing move.

I doubt that the NPE keeps more players playing GW2 than the game did the old way. The game is still, in its very core, the same game. So people who don’t like the core mechanics of the game will still not stay.

But after putting so many ressources into this stuff, ANet will always argue that it was neccessary. Changing things back is not an option. What a waste though.

The whole reason why I have no desire to make a new character. I want to jump into the game, get all my weapon skills in one go then work on leveling. Not be spoon fed the game slowly and get a slap on the wrist when I try to play the game to fast.

In their defense they did go back and change some of the stuff. Like undoing getting your elite skill slot from lvl 40 to 31 or 30 (I forget).

It really doesn’t have any effect on making a new character, for me at least. Pop a level 20 scroll, eat some skill scrolls, eotm or tome till 80.

I don’t think so. Doing so would be an official act of admitting their screwup, which so far they have only blamed on ‘bugs" and "evil players who spread false information’. I doubt they will do anything that hurts their ego. I think they will just drag it out till everyone either tired of complaining or forget about it, using the ultimate dodge card " We’re aware of the issue and currently working on it"

Typhus.3502:

It really doesn’t have any effect on making a new character, for me at least. Pop a level 20 scroll, eat some skill scrolls, eotm or tome till 80.

you’re forgetting the dungeon runs / crafting…

I made 4 characters after the new changes, And to be honest I couldn’t be bothered by the trait unlocks, I got some from events or maps , for story dungeons, but I refuse to unlock the rest, It seems and/or is unneccessary.. 15 lvl 80’s why would I go do content which is not rewarding, Even when it unlocks a trait point it remains unrewarding. yes kill another (former) champion in …. for another white/blue/green bag….

I bought the core skills I lacked after leveling to 80 with some skillpoints & gold form the story dungeons they did.. They now have a build. Not a flexible adaptable trait set. A build…

And they excel at the things they were build for. and cannot do other content as I refuse to unlock the traits, I couldn’t be bothered by the traits aquisition and will not seek out to get anymore traits, to a point where it no longer matters if I or others find negative consequences spawning from this choice.

The NPE was nice I though t at first, you got usable drops I thought, until I noticed a lot of stuff is unsalvageable, unsellabe , or unusable due to the fact my characters level(ed) so fast, they tend(ed) to run ahead of the story… (mostly due to dungeons/EoTM/ crafting.) This because it’s uttelry boring to not being able to make a build at low level; no longer have the freedom to buy a different weapon at start, have no skills unlcoked for a while, miss the prof. mechanics… all because I’m noob for the 40th-50th time (tend to have run quite some engineers that never made it past lvl 30 or other characters before, that were not the characters of choice at that given moment, and some key warriors)

A good thing to come from the patch was the new backpacks… I like those. not all skins per sé… but moste were gratifying to make.

I just buy the traits I need, the unlocking scavenger hunt is awful and tedious.

Star
Wars
Galaxies

New
Game
Enhancement.

Also on the bright-side of things, you can have a laugh at the thought that someone at some point said “Hey, this is a good idea.” It reminds me of that exploitable comic strip in which the one sensible guy gets thrown out the window for sharing his sensibility to the board.

Judge Banks.9018:

Star
Wars
Galaxies

New
Game
Enhancement.

Also on the bright-side of things, you can have a laugh at the thought that someone at some point said “Hey, this is a good idea.” It reminds me of that exploitable comic strip in which the one sensible guy gets thrown out the window for sharing his sensibility to the board.

WHY did you have to bring up SWG. Now i feel depressed again. Guess i’ll go play SWGEmu for a little bit =P

If only.

(I’m really upset about it)

They had a reason, they had focus groups saying they needed to do this to retain more new players. Sadly there is no way to avoid the majority of it if you are a vet.

If you mean, “Did they save the code?” I’d wager, “Yes.”
If you mean, “Will they reuse the code?” I’d wager, “No.”

As much as we vets will hate the NPE, it’s targeted for new players – people who never played an MMO before in their life.

It could definitely use improvements. Instead of expressing our hate with biased posts and exaggerated accusations, how about something more constructive?

1. Toggle on/off the NPE tooltips (heal reminder, gameplay notes, explore this area here, etc)

2. Revise the entire trait system

3. Remove silly things, like dancing in front of a cow.

4. Teach necessary game concepts – explain bundles, what is crafting, what are fields/finishers, etc. – the same way they did with dodging.

5. Return golem chess / Edna’s pie

I see this a lot of the forums, and find it perplexing. Often see one of the complaints about the NPE is the changed Trait acquisition. Why do players lump the change Trait acquisition in with the NPE? Weren’t the two about six months apart?

I think they won’t revert most of the old stuff back. It’s no concern to me either way. All I just want is the Personal Story fix because thats the only part of the patch that remains broken.

Behellagh.1468:

Sadly there is no way to avoid the majority of it if you are a vet.

Yes there is, it’s called a level 20 scroll.

Hyper Cutter.9376:

Behellagh.1468:

Sadly there is no way to avoid the majority of it if you are a vet.

Yes there is, it’s called a level 20 scroll.

Which is skipping the game (at least in part). Not all that different from saying that a vet can easily avoid the NPE in GW2…by not playing GW2.

NNYinsanenature.5684:

Judge Banks.9018:

Star
Wars
Galaxies

New
Game
Enhancement.

Also on the bright-side of things, you can have a laugh at the thought that someone at some point said “Hey, this is a good idea.” It reminds me of that exploitable comic strip in which the one sensible guy gets thrown out the window for sharing his sensibility to the board.

WHY did you have to bring up SWG. Now i feel depressed again. Guess i’ll go play SWGEmu for a little bit =P

Hmmm… I don’t know about that. From what I understand, the NGE was a complete overhaul of what SWG making it into a totally different game. GW2’s NPE was like a smaller version of that.

Hyper Cutter.9376:

Behellagh.1468:

Sadly there is no way to avoid the majority of it if you are a vet.

Yes there is, it’s called a level 20 scroll.

The level 20 scroll doesn’t unlock all your traits, which is what most people complain about, and have a good reason to. I won’t make an alt unless I have a lv 20 scroll and like 100 scrolls of knowledge, simply because I can’t be kittened to do all the incessant tasks required to unlock traits.

AlliedKhajiit.2794:

The level 20 scroll doesn’t unlock all your traits, which is what most people complain about, and have a good reason to. I won’t make an alt unless I have a lv 20 scroll and like 100 scrolls of knowledge, simply because I can’t be kittened to do all the incessant tasks required to unlock traits.

The trait unlocks were changed back in april, the NPE has been introduced in september.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Why do players lump the change Trait acquisition in with the NPE? Weren’t the two about six months apart?

Some people probably didn’t bother playing new characters until the NPE. Some classes also don’t really open up in certain ways without traits and people are feeling the difference in the higher level areas. Some people also remember getting trait points more often, compared to the condensed lines they are now, even though it was usually just stats.

In terms of play time however, the time it takes to unlock access to your traits is nearly the same as it was before, assuming normal play.

Kaiyanwan.8521:

a fix to a prolbem that never existed.

Everything that was changed in the NPE had a reason, most of which you can find here from back at launch. The way weapon skills unlocked for example was a common complaint from elementalists.

Jana.6831:

AlliedKhajiit.2794:

The level 20 scroll doesn’t unlock all your traits, which is what most people complain about, and have a good reason to. I won’t make an alt unless I have a lv 20 scroll and like 100 scrolls of knowledge, simply because I can’t be kittened to do all the incessant tasks required to unlock traits.

The trait unlocks were changed back in april, the NPE has been introduced in september.

Well if I remember correctly, the justification they gave for changing the traits was “for the new players”, so to me, that equates to the “new player experience”, because it’s not the same experience I had when I played my first character.

AlliedKhajiit.2794:

Well if I remember correctly, the justification they gave for changing the traits was “for the new players”, so to me, that equates to the “new player experience”, because it’s not the same experience I had when I played my first character.

No:
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/traits-unleashed-forty-new-traits-and-more/

Has got nothing to do with new players.

Jana.6831:

AlliedKhajiit.2794:

Well if I remember correctly, the justification they gave for changing the traits was “for the new players”, so to me, that equates to the “new player experience”, because it’s not the same experience I had when I played my first character.

No:
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/traits-unleashed-forty-new-traits-and-more/

Has got nothing to do with new players.

Then I guess I have zero problems with the NPE and my only problem is the screwed up trait system. That’s subjective, of course.

Let’s put it this way: if it’s bad enough I’m sitting my lvl 5x warrior by a bank, feeding her a leveling tome every now and again from pvp rewards, instead of taking her out into legit leveling and learning the class, then the NPE must be annoying enough I wanna skip over all of it.

I am quite happy that I got most of my alts to 80 before NPE/trait change patches. The trait system doesn’t encourage about learning the class or exploring the open world – it encourages grinding. Either grind for gold, or never appreciate the class to its fullest potential.

The system is great for players who are brand new and still have all of tyria to explore. Not for a vet of ~2 years who’s seen everything at least 3-4 times through.

AlliedKhajiit.2794:

Jana.6831:

AlliedKhajiit.2794:

Well if I remember correctly, the justification they gave for changing the traits was “for the new players”, so to me, that equates to the “new player experience”, because it’s not the same experience I had when I played my first character.

No:
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/traits-unleashed-forty-new-traits-and-more/

Has got nothing to do with new players.

Then I guess I have zero problems with the NPE and my only problem is the screwed up trait system. That’s subjective, of course.

Actually, yeah, we have the same problem. I don’t care about NPE either, maybe except the personal story changes it brought (everybody knows what I mean).
Sometimes, I even laugh about that, like when the game shows me the “tutorial message” about the BLTC when gaining lvl 59, that’s ridiculous

Another thing I hate about the NPE, is what they did to the personal story. Doing the personal story actually gave me incentive to level my alts, so I could see what happened next. And it gave decent EXP reward to boot.

Now the story is missing ugly chunks, and is all over the place. Come on Anet, we know you can do better than that.

of cause they could do that – but never will. If you are any familiar with corporate environments, you know why. Someone with the power of decision making would have to admit having been wrong – that very, very rarely happens in the corporate world.

Traits are the only problem for me .. don’t see any problems with the NPE.

In the end you level faster for the first levels and NOT slower at higher levels
how some people always try to make it look like. And since the first levels
now are much faster it really doesn’t matter that you need to be level 5 to have
alle your weapon skills. Heck .. have you ever tried to unlock all weapons skills
on an Elementalist under the old system ?

The NPE did change my behavior while leveling up. It wasn’t the weapon skills and slot skill unlock changes that did it. It’s the skill points. Before, I would just explore whatever zone I was in. Now, I go from zone to zone, only really pursuing the skill challenges so I can get enough skill points to unlock skills. The way skill points are gated, it feels like I “have to” if I want to have some options to put into the skill slots.

Even though they knew they screw it up, they have too much pride to undo it.

IndigoSundown.5419:

The NPE did change my behavior while leveling up. It wasn’t the weapon skills and slot skill unlock changes that did it. It’s the skill points. Before, I would just explore whatever zone I was in. Now, I go from zone to zone, only really pursuing the skill challenges so I can get enough skill points to unlock skills. The way skill points are gated, it feels like I “have to” if I want to have some options to put into the skill slots.

I always keep a stack of those skillpoint scrolls in my bank. Level 20 scroll and maybe
some of them were enough for me on the last characters i made to get the skills i
need to level to 80.

At least all those veterans that are complaining about it should have some of those scrolls i think.

Kaiyanwan.8521:

They can’t.

It is their holy grail, a fix to a prolbem that never existed.

People buy games, they don’t like them, they stop playing. I did so too (with a whole lot of games).

For some obscure reason, ANet thought that the gameplay experience was the reason, but honestly, people won’t like it more or less with some minor changes.

On the other hand, ANet made many existing players angry. The two feature patches are a very confusing move.

I doubt that the NPE keeps more players playing GW2 than the game did the old way. The game is still, in its very core, the same game. So people who don’t like the core mechanics of the game will still not stay.

But after putting so many ressources into this stuff, ANet will always argue that it was neccessary. Changing things back is not an option. What a waste though.

I fully agree with this. It seems absurdly silly to put so much focus on trying to catch the attention of people who are NOT interested in this niche game genre.

Though maybe it’s easier to get people unfamiliar with MMOs to cough up money for gem store items?