Guild Wars 2

What we know by now:

• HoT will have no level cap increase and no new armour tier, with the reasoning of keeping old content alive.
• HoT will be bringing Masteries to both new maps and old ones (including Fractals).
• You won’t be able to complete certain challenges until you get specific Masteries.
• The new maps will be focusing on smaller areas with deeper, more replayable content, instead of larger but emptier regions.

So how is “gear grind” actually different from the “skill grind” we will be getting?

Gear & Level Grind

• You are not able to complete certain challenges until you get the new levels and the new armour.
• In GW2, you can level by doing (almost) anything you like, when you like, how you like.
• In GW2, you can earn gold for craftable/buyable gear by doing (almost) anything you like, when you like, how you like.
• In GW2, you can still come back and do low-level content thanks to automatic downscaling (which could [or could not] use some tweaking, but that’s another topic).

Skill Grind

• You are not able to complete certain challenges until you get the new skills (“Masteries”).
• In GW2, to unlock character traits, you have to do an enormous list of random tasks, or pay a hefty sum of gold and skillpoints. You have to grind the same tasks over and over again for each character. Until you acquire traits, you cannot start actually playing what you want and instead do what you’re told.
• In GW2, to unlock LS achievements and then get them and the exclusive rewards tied to them, you have to grind specific content over and over again until you succeed. You cannot buy it with gold or other currencies (the official way at least, from the game, not LFG sellers). You are out of luck if you are not there to group up with the people who know what to do in the first days.
• Traits and achievements feel like a “must do” list of chores which nag you until you finish them.

So will the new “revolutionary” progression system be actually better? I’m not sure.

Instead, I’m afraid that with the two camps of “no level cap/gear grind!” and “more character progression!” players we had, we’ve drawn ourselves into a trap which could be worse than the new Trait system and NPE combined.

Disclaimer: I’m not advocating for gear grind or level cap increase; I’m just voicing concern that with the current policy of making people grind more and more for everything, gear grind and level cap might have actually been a more user-friendly solution.

UPDATE:

Lishtenbird.2814:

So, here we go:

When this ability is unlocked, your character’s experience bar will change to become a Mastery training bar while in PvE zones. This bar will track your progress on training the Mastery track you currently have selected, showing both the abilities you are training toward and those already earned from the track. To see all your Mastery tracks, spend Mastery points, and change which Mastery you are currently training, click the Mastery training bar to bring up the Mastery tray. Because the Mastery training bar completely replaces the experience bar, players who’ve reached level 80 will no longer gain levels but will instead train Masteries.

TL;DR: to level Masteries, you play in the new zone.

Now the important part is… How grindy and annoying these levels are? Is it like SW and DT collections, or more like a couple of PvE levels? How much can you actually play what you want now, instead of grinding the allowed content until you’re so bored to death that the new gated content is no longer intriguing?

To train a specific Mastery track, you must first unlock it by spending Mastery points. Mastery points are awarded for completing various pieces of game content. Things like completing a chapter in your personal story, completing certain achievements, reaching hard-to-find locations, overcoming challenging encounters, excelling at adventures found within the Heart of Maguuma, or earning 100% completion for a map will award Mastery points.

TL;DR: to unlock Masteries, you do what we currently do in the LS: grind obligatory achievement tasks until you succeed.

Now the important part is… How grindy and annoying these tasks are? Can you get them naturally, like climbing up a mountain to a vista in the current maps, or they’re similar to the revamped Traits and LS achievements?

Info we know so far -

- Masteries are account wide
- Traits are getting another re-work

Why not wait for some actual information to be released before jumping on the “end of the world so much grind!” train?

Aren’t there already a lot of threads on this in Living Story / Heart of Thorns Discussion?

Here’s a thing about games, especially MMOs:

If you don’t have long-term goals you can advancce towards to, no one will play your game. for long.

AdaephonDelat.3890:

Why not wait for some actual information to be released before jumping on the “end of the world so much grind!” train?

Because:

• Everything that’s being done recently and referenced as a model in HoT reveals is based on (relatively to GW2, not other games) heavy grind.
• ANet is known to misinterpret and overdeliver. Examples: Traits, NPE.
• Action should be taken before stuff which stays for years gets introduced. Examples: Commander tags, 300g for each color.

Lishtenbird.2814:

AdaephonDelat.3890:

Why not wait for some actual information to be released before jumping on the “end of the world so much grind!” train?

Because:

• Everything that’s being done recently and referenced as a model in HoT reveals is based on (relatively to GW2, not other games) heavy grind.
• ANet is known to misinterpret and overdeliver. Examples: Traits, NPE.
• Action should be taken before stuff which stays for years gets introduced. Examples: Commander tags, 300g for each color.

Yes but with regards to that last point they released the information then the community reacted. You’re just randomly guessing about information that’s not released yet! Wait for the information then you can go crazy about how it all sucks or whatever.

Bubi.7942:

If you don’t have long-term goals you can advancce towards to, no one will play your game. for long.

• Full ascended for 5-6 alts is a good long-term goal for me.
• Having 20 pretty dress-up alts instead of 10 is a good long-term goal for me.
• Fractals 50 was a good long-term goal for me.
• Dungeon collections and fractals collection are a good long-term goal for me.

All/most of this stuff doesn’t affect how and which content I play. On the other hand:

• Luminescent is borderline since the specific content grind, both LS and SW, is over the top for me.
• All traits for all alts are an awful goal for me.
• Grinding all WvW skills is a bad goal for me – luckily, I do not like WvW.

Once you say that your game is casual and make skins the endgame and attract people that enjoy it that way, switching to gating content behind grind is a bad idea.

AdaephonDelat.3890:

Yes but with regards to that last point they released the information then the community reacted. You’re just randomly guessing about information that’s not released yet! Wait for the information then you can go crazy about how it all sucks or whatever.

In my country, there’s an anecdote about new recent laws:

Guys, stop panicking! It’s just a project, not a law, calm down!
Guys, stop panicking! That’s just the first review, it’s not final yet, calm down!
Guys, calm down, the law is already here and working. If you were going to panic, you should’ve done it earlier!

“For me” being the key words here. You can imagine, not many people enjoy 20 alts dress up party thing, but would like to play for something meaningful to them.

The “casualness” of the game has led to a pretty massive decline… maybe it is time for a change after all.

Lishtenbird.2814:

AdaephonDelat.3890:

Yes but with regards to that last point they released the information then the community reacted. You’re just randomly guessing about information that’s not released yet! Wait for the information then you can go crazy about how it all sucks or whatever.

In my country, there’s an anecdote about new recent laws:

Guys, stop panicking! It’s just a project, not a law, calm down!
Guys, stop panicking! That’s just the first review, it’s not final yet, calm down!
Guys, calm down, the law is already here and working. If you were going to panic, you should’ve done it earlier!

Aye which is fine as when you’re pushing laws through there is information available. The information we currently have is -

Masteries are account wide.
Traits are changing.

So you want to reduce the grind from obtaining the masteries. Brilliant! Love it! Fully on board with that idea. By the way how do you obtain mastery points again? And how do you spend Mastery points again?

Bubi.7942:

“For me” being the key words here. You can imagine, not many people enjoy 20 alts dress up party thing, but would like to play for something meaningful to them.

The “casualness” of the game has led to a pretty massive decline… maybe it is time for a change after all.

You do not have the statistics which says who is the majority. Might very well be that once the casuals which “led to a decline” see how grindy HoT is, they go away and HoT fails because there’s not enough of hardcore players to compensate – since all those are already in WoW and other trinity and gear progression games.

GW2 is not hardcore enough for hardcore, and becoming not casual enough for people who log in on Sunday, see that they have to grind just to get a hang glider they wanted to enjoy, and uninstall.

thank you op for being smart and you did not just jumped on hype train blindly.
the so called Masteries is not something new despite anet trying to tell you otherwise. similar systems already exist in games like rift(pa),,poe and recently ESO added champion system which exactly similar to Masteries in terms of character progression.
that being said.. yes it can be quite grindy for skill you need for certain boss for example and nothing more.
WE HAVE TO WAIT AND SEE..no conclusion it is just to say there is high chance of skill grind which is not fun. JUST HEADS UP.

Bubi.7942:

“For me” being the key words here. You can imagine, not many people enjoy 20 alts dress up party thing, but would like to play for something meaningful to them.

The “casualness” of the game has led to a pretty massive decline… maybe it is time for a change after all.

massive decline?? do you have the official announcement from anet or ncsoft??
if you have please link it..if you do not then do not give your imagination as fact

saye.9304:

Bubi.7942:

“For me” being the key words here. You can imagine, not many people enjoy 20 alts dress up party thing, but would like to play for something meaningful to them.

The “casualness” of the game has led to a pretty massive decline… maybe it is time for a change after all.

massive decline?? do you have the official announcement from anet or ncsoft??
if you have please link it..if you do not then do not give your imagination as fact

Massive decline is pretty much universal speak for “I don’t like whatever.” Not useful or meaningful but keeps some people amused.

Sigh… this has been discussed over and over.

Megaservers.

There, ya’ll happy now?

Bubi.7942:

Sigh… this has been discussed over and over.

Megaservers.

There, ya’ll happy now?

And you are sure of the reason beind that decline how? I’m asking, because in other topics other people claim with as much certainty as you do it was ramping up the overall difficulty that led to decline. Also massive, that part is always constant.

I am quite sure yes, that the casualness of the game led to it, yes. I cannot prove it, but it does seem pretty blatant. We could discuss it all over for the 50th time now (until a mod closes it like most of those threads), but the current thread is about the grind for masteries. A non-existing grind for non-existing masteries. Sheesh.

I’m also kind of fed up people confusing “grind” with “i wanna get prutty skins”.

You don’t even know the exact requirement for Mastery points yet do you?
It doesn’t has to be grind, it can be “completing certain objectives” to unlock Mastery, something like what AP does.
It can also be something like what our current trait does, unlock upon killing certain monsters/ completing certain objectives.

Btw I am pretty sure it has to do with “Adventures” – which they announced yestreday here: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/journey-into-the-heart-of-maguuma-in-guild-wars-2-heart-of-thorns/

This is all I have to offer after reading through this thread.

You don’t know exactly what is coming in the expansion, yet you’re determined to rage against it based on your perception of future grind.

Meh…

OP, you seem to have mixed up two topics to create a one big problem that doesn’t exist. I also think you have confused compulsory grind with optional grind.

Skill Grind
•You are not able to complete certain challenges until you get the new skills (“Masteries”).

This is to be expected as Anet are making the zones and the content within them the progression, instead of it being the capabilities of your character in standard combat. I do not see this as a problem. The masteries may grant you access to new areas and allow you to defeat certain mobs that you couldn’t before, but it will not effect your normal combat ability in new and old zones. As they mentioned recently, it works in a similar way to how progression works in Zelda. You gain a new tool which allows you to reach new areas or defeat bosses you couldn’t before. Personally I think this is a far superior system and much more organic and entertaining than simply gaining more damage or armour (as is the case with new gear tiers)

•In GW2, to unlock character traits, you have to do an enormous list of random tasks, or pay a hefty sum of gold and skillpoints. You have to grind the same tasks over and over again for each character. Until you acquire traits, you cannot start actually playing what you want and instead do what you’re told.

You do not have to repeat the same content to unlock traits, this is a false perception a lot of people seem to have, when in reality they simply do not like the tasks involved in unlocking them. You can gain skill points and gold doing a variety of different content, so you can do whatever takes your fancy and unlock your traits using gold and skill points. Having to repeat content to unlock them is a limit you have placed on yourself, not a limit the game forces on you.

•In GW2, to unlock LS achievements and then get them and the exclusive rewards tied to them, you have to grind specific content over and over again until you succeed. You cannot buy it with gold or other currencies (the official way at least, from the game, not LFG sellers). You are out of luck if you are not there to group up with the people who know what to do in the first days.

You do not need to do the achievements. It will not effect how well you can play the game. All it will offer you is some extra, non-essential, rewards and maybe some skins. They are optional and therefore allowed to be in the grind category, as per Anet’s definition of what should be grindy in their game. The whole point of achievements and their rewards is to give those who like extra challenge or those who are completionists, something to do. You will not be at a performance disadvantage by not doing them, so I do not see this as a problem.

•Traits and achievements feel like a “must do” list of chores which nag you until you finish them.

Traits certainly do give you an advantage, but as I explained above, they can be acquired doing a wide variety of activities. As to achievements, I do not see how these can feel like a ‘must do’ list unless you have completionist tendencies, which is no one else’s problem but your own. As far as I know most achievements do not ‘nag’ you, so I can only assume you mean the dailies, which can be easily ignored. However, I would like to have an option to minimize or hide the dailies by default, just so I have less UI on the screen (which is one of the things Anet said they wanted before GW2 launched, i.e.- taking your eyes off the UI).

So, out of everything you posted, the only thing I can agree with you on is the ability to stop dailies nagging you. Every other concern I disagree with.

You do cite valid points. While I do prefer getting masteries over progressing my character’s level, I am afraid that the game might be noticeably linear past level 80. With that said, it’s wise to wait for more information. I think in a few hours, we will get to know how the Mastery system works here.

Lishtenbird.2814:

Bubi.7942:

If you don’t have long-term goals you can advancce towards to, no one will play your game. for long.

• Full ascended for 5-6 alts is a good long-term goal for me.
• Having 20 pretty dress-up alts instead of 10 is a good long-term goal for me.
• Fractals 50 was a good long-term goal for me.
• Dungeon collections and fractals collection are a good long-term goal for me.

All/most of this stuff doesn’t affect how and which content I play. On the other hand:

• Luminescent is borderline since the specific content grind, both LS and SW, is over the top for me.
• All traits for all alts are an awful goal for me.
• Grinding all WvW skills is a bad goal for me – luckily, I do not like WvW.

Once you say that your game is casual and make skins the endgame and attract people that enjoy it that way, switching to gating content behind grind is a bad idea.

Yes, I have not liked the direction the game has taken since trait change was made. I had decided to check things out again when I heard about the xpac. Not too enthused right now as I expect the changes it brings will just be a variation on the same sort of changes that have been going on since that April patch.

Maybe I will be pleasantly surprised but I have strong doubts.

I play very little since the April patch that gave us the new trait system but if they made the game like it used to be I’d be return. Just have to wait and see, but it seems they have decided to commit to the direction they have been going in recently.

It is not the game I was so attracted to at launch.

Brtiva.9721:

It is not the game I was so attracted to at launch.

Its interesting you should say that. Not that I think your opinion is invalid, its your opinion so its valid to you. But for me, GW2 is moving more and more towards the game I wanted it to be at launch.

More freedom, more alt friendly and a more organic and fun progression system. It’s still got some things to improve, but the basic core systems of the game are improving.

AdaephonDelat.3890:

The information we currently have is -

Masteries are account wide.
Traits are changing.

We have way more information, as stated in the OP. The PAX presentation is not the only source of official information – various interview articles have appeared in gaming websites, and we had a blog post yesterday.

AdaephonDelat.3890:

So you want to reduce the grind from obtaining the masteries. Brilliant! Love it! Fully on board with that idea. By the way how do you obtain mastery points again? And how do you spend Mastery points again?

Since ANet has stated that things are not set in stone and they’re willing to make changes based on player feedback, I want to raise the problem now, preemptively, to make sure no more “misunderstandings” like the Trait revamp make it into the game and stay for year(s) until they reinvent the wheel once again.

Lishtenbird.2814:

AdaephonDelat.3890:

The information we currently have is -

Masteries are account wide.
Traits are changing.

We have way more information, as stated in the OP. The PAX presentation is not the only source of official information – various interview articles have appeared in gaming websites, and we had a blog post yesterday.

We really don’t. We have vague outlines of ideas. Adventures are tied to masteries. When they do the blog post about the mastery system as I said then feel free to say the sky is falling, it’s the end of the world, cats and dogs will be living together. Chaos as we know it.

Lishtenbird.2814:

AdaephonDelat.3890:

So you want to reduce the grind from obtaining the masteries. Brilliant! Love it! Fully on board with that idea. By the way how do you obtain mastery points again? And how do you spend Mastery points again?

Since ANet has stated that things are not set in stone and they’re willing to make changes based on player feedback, I want to raise the problem now, preemptively, to make sure no more “misunderstandings” like the Trait revamp make it into the game and stay for year(s) until they reinvent the wheel once again.

And if I was Anet I’d want that to be informed feedback based on the full amount of information given i.e. Not yet!

We also have a saying in my country shutting the door after the horse has bolted. You sir are trying to shut the door before you’ve even purchased the farm.

The OP is wrong and the OP is right. Skill grind COULD be worse than gear grind, but that’s really just an opinion anyway. So…

Objectively one is not likely worse than another, it’s subjectively that the question needs to be stated. Those who played Guild Wars 1 and enjoyed it probably prefer skill grind to gear grind. Those who played other MMOs if they enjoyed gear grind and seeing their numbers get higher might enjoy that.

Either way, we have no way to know if the skill grind in hot is worse than gear grind since we don’t have enough details to judge it (and I suspect we won’t until we play it).

Speculation is fun, but that’s all it really is. Speculation.

AdaephonDelat.3890:

We also have a saying in my country shutting the door after the horse has bolted. You sir are trying to shut the door before you’ve even purchased the farm.

I’ve experienced the results of poor misinformed decisions in RL far too often to act upon such sayings. Big old corporations are slow and rigid and suffer from stuff like this, and when they do announce stuff, they’ve already decided everything behind closed doors based on what they’d seen. And then the consumers which say “Okay, I’ll eat it anyway…” make it worse.

We’ve also experienced more than enough dubious changes in the game because of ANet’s “never talk about anything until we release it” policy, which has led to megathreads and uproars. The game is changing. When you’re concerned, why wait? When you see a problem, tell about it, or you’ll have to deal with consequences and waste time on something which could’ve been avoided.

Lishtenbird.2814:

AdaephonDelat.3890:

We also have a saying in my country shutting the door after the horse has bolted. You sir are trying to shut the door before you’ve even purchased the farm.

I’ve experienced the results of poor misinformed decisions in RL far too often to act upon such sayings. Big old corporations are slow and rigid and suffer from stuff like this, and when they do announce stuff, they’ve already decided everything behind closed doors based on what they’d seen. And then the consumers which say “Okay, I’ll eat it anyway…” make it worse.

We’ve also experienced more than enough dubious changes in the game because of ANet’s “never talk about anything until we release it” policy, which has led to megathreads and uproars. The game is changing. When you’re concerned, why wait? When you see a problem, tell about it, or you’ll have to deal with consequences and waste time on something which could’ve been avoided.

The saying means you’re acting too late. I’m pointing out that you’re acting far too early. If you’d made this post tomorrow after they’d released the blog post about the mastery system then it would have been a different matter.

So if you really want to act on these things like you say you do I asked two questions earlier you’ve not answered. How do you earn mastery points and how do you spend them? If you can answer those and provide good suggestions for correcting the grind they represent then I’m all ears. Otherwise wait until you have the information then crack on with your “sky is falling” posts.

AdaephonDelat.3890:

If you’d made this post tomorrow after they’d released the blog post about the mastery system then it would have been a different matter.

I don’t think I’m acting too early. When people read the mastery post tomorrow, I’d prefer them to ask “That’s good, but can I log in, play a bit and unlock it, or do I farm weeks like a zombie just to jump on a mushroom?” instead of “OMG MUSHROOM JUMPING, TAKE MY MONEY!!!” and “OMG HANG GLIDERS, PREORDER NOW!!!” Since that’s usually how marketing fluff works on most players.

Even if we don’t know the details today, it shouldn’t stop us from thinking about how we would like to see the changes and how we won’t. Probably it’s even better to think about it before they announce their version, since after it you’ll be funneled into discussing that one option only – which might not be the best one for players.

AdaephonDelat.3890:

The saying means you’re acting too late. I’m pointing out that you’re acting far too early.

I meant your version of it, but whatever.

Rin.1046:

Brtiva.9721:

It is not the game I was so attracted to at launch.

Its interesting you should say that. Not that I think your opinion is invalid, its your opinion so its valid to you. But for me, GW2 is moving more and more towards the game I wanted it to be at launch.

More freedom, more alt friendly and a more organic and fun progression system. It’s still got some things to improve, but the basic core systems of the game are improving.

A mater of taste, I would say. I do not say the game is becoming “bad”, as if it were so according to some objective measure.

But for me, my taste, the game is going in a direction I dislike. It feels less free to me and more regimented, do as you’re told etc.

So, the game is just going for a different audience now I suppose.

This is not some sort of rant, I don’t want it come off that way. It just feels like the things I liked about the game are diminishing/have diminished and I have grown less and less interested in it.

I do not feel that one needs to defend or justify either a preference for the new way the game is going, or a dislike for it.

Maybe with HoT, things will seem better to me again. I do not know, I just feel doubtful that this will be so.

AdaephonDelat.3890:

Lishtenbird.2814:

AdaephonDelat.3890:

The information we currently have is -

Masteries are account wide.
Traits are changing.

We have way more information, as stated in the OP. The PAX presentation is not the only source of official information – various interview articles have appeared in gaming websites, and we had a blog post yesterday.

We really don’t. We have vague outlines of ideas. Adventures are tied to masteries. When they do the blog post about the mastery system as I said then feel free to say the sky is falling, it’s the end of the world, cats and dogs will be living together. Chaos as we know it.

Lishtenbird.2814:

AdaephonDelat.3890:

So you want to reduce the grind from obtaining the masteries. Brilliant! Love it! Fully on board with that idea. By the way how do you obtain mastery points again? And how do you spend Mastery points again?

Since ANet has stated that things are not set in stone and they’re willing to make changes based on player feedback, I want to raise the problem now, preemptively, to make sure no more “misunderstandings” like the Trait revamp make it into the game and stay for year(s) until they reinvent the wheel once again.

And if I was Anet I’d want that to be informed feedback based on the full amount of information given i.e. Not yet!

We also have a saying in my country shutting the door after the horse has bolted. You sir are trying to shut the door before you’ve even purchased the farm.

actually the OP is right and you are wrong about the timing.
In fact he may be too late, The Devs are making descions NOW about the topic he is bringing up.
If he waits till its in game? it will take more than a year at best to change, and will be a waste of resources.

Now you are right, that he doesnt have all the information, but thats why this is a hypothetical discussion, based on past trends, and what they have announced. Now, theoretically, the devs could look at this and be like hmm, thats not exactly what we are doing, but maybe we have to consider X, Y or Z more.

now the best solution? the devs should give more information, before they are at the point where no qualitative changes can be made. However that is unlikely, so the best thing even though it isnt great, that can be done is discuss hypotheticals to give the devs a better idea what players thought processes are.

So the question, assuming what he said is true, how would it make you feel
What are the better ways of going about handling it so his fears are never realized
Even assuming what he says is true, is that a negative thing?

Lishtenbird.2814:

AdaephonDelat.3890:

If you’d made this post tomorrow after they’d released the blog post about the mastery system then it would have been a different matter.

I don’t think I’m acting too early. When people read the mastery post tomorrow, I’d prefer them to ask “That’s good, but can I log in, play a bit and unlock it, or do I farm weeks like a zombie just to jump on a mushroom?” instead of “OMG MUSHROOM JUMPING, TAKE MY MONEY!!!” and “OMG HANG GLIDERS, PREORDER NOW!!!” Since that’s usually how marketing fluff works on most players.

And if that information is not revealed in the blog post then like I said by all means crack on and ask those questions. The post will be going ahead with – or without your post. Now whether you can affect the final outcome (like the commander tags you mentioned earlier) will be a different matter after we have the information.

Lishtenbird.2814:

Even if we don’t know the details today, it shouldn’t stop us from thinking about how we would like to see the changes and how we won’t. Probably it’s even better to think about it before they announce their version, since after it you’ll be funneled into discussing that one option only – which might not be the best one for players.

See above comment about commander tags. Yes that was a bad idea on their part and kudos to the 2 Devs who gave up their weekend to fix it. But when their plan became apparent it did get changed due to community input. Same as the gem conversion change. Honestly from reading your post all I got was – “OMG there’s going to be massive skill grind and I don’t know anything about this system but I don’t like it!”

phys.7689:

actually the OP is right and you are wrong about the timing.
In fact he may be too late, The Devs are making descions NOW about the topic he is bringing up.
If he waits till its in game? it will take more than a year at best to change, and will be a waste of resources.

And depending on how long those systems have been in development means they could already be finished.
Also I’m not saying wait until it’s in game. I’m saying wait until he has more information and a better idea (so according to yesterdays (04/02/15) blog post then that would be the blog released today during a PST work day) of what those systems are and how they work.

Is it something about these forums that people can’t make informed decisions using complete information and instead rely only speculation and snippets of info?

Anyway I’ll throw out my two questions to you now phys. Before the blog is released can you tell me how you earn mastery points and how you spend then? Also you need to come up with a viable solution for the “grind” that this system will introduce. Now if this blog post doesn’t include this information then we can start to get a bit more suspicious/nervous but until then just wait for the info!

The difference? Gear grind requires replacement. You grind out the gear you need, then the level cap changes/new gear tiers are added, and your gear becomes obsolete. You have to grind for gear again. Once new BiS gear is there, your old BiS gear is no longer BiS… so you just throw it away.

Adding skills, traits or masteries, at least in GW2, is just that. Adding. You never have to replace anything. All your skills remain just as relevant, and keep the same functionality, as long as you keep playing the game.

Lishtenbird.2814:

• In GW2, to unlock LS achievements and then get them and the exclusive rewards tied to them, you have to grind specific content over and over again until you succeed. You cannot buy it with gold or other currencies (the official way at least, from the game, not LFG sellers). You are out of luck if you are not there to group up with the people who know what to do in the first days.

Do I have to explain ‘optional’ to you again? Achievements are just that, and the LS ones are among the least grindy. Not an example of skills, grind, or anything even remotely relevant to your topic.

Lishtenbird.2814:

• Having 20 pretty dress-up alts instead of 10 is a good long-term goal for me.

All/most of this stuff doesn’t affect how and which content I play. On the other hand:

• Luminescent is borderline since the specific content grind, both LS and SW, is over the top for me.
• All traits for all alts are an awful goal for me.
• Grinding all WvW skills is a bad goal for me – luckily, I do not like WvW.

Once you say that your game is casual and make skins the endgame and attract people that enjoy it that way, switching to gating content behind grind is a bad idea.

God thanks i don’t really like the Luminescent armor, since i really hate all those
instanced stuff, and i can’t bring myself to play through it more than once, so
i will maybe never get any of those needed achievements.

Having something like that as skill-grind is my greatest fear since i prefer simply
open world .. and play also a lot solo and only now and then in big zergs.

Olvendred.3027:

The difference? Gear grind requires replacement. You grind out the gear you need, then the level cap changes/new gear tiers are added, and your gear becomes obsolete. You have to grind for gear again. Once new BiS gear is there, your old BiS gear is no longer BiS… so you just throw it away.

This might or might not be relevant in GW2 where you can salvage, buy and sell stuff. GW2 is different from other games in many aspects.

Olvendred.3027:

Adding skills, traits or masteries, at least in GW2, is just that. Adding. You never have to replace anything. All your skills remain just as relevant, and keep the same functionality, as long as you keep playing the game.

You never know until you see them. For one, specialisations will replace some of your mechanics.

Olvendred.3027:

Do I have to explain ‘optional’ to you again? Achievements are just that, and the LS ones are among the least grindy. Not an example of skills, grind, or anything even remotely relevant to your topic.

That was an example of the direction the game is heading, especially since they’re referencing DT and SW stuff as the most similar existing models.

As for validity of “optional” in a game where cosmetics are the endgame, see many other posts throughout the forum.

Bird, while I get the general point of what you’re driving at here, I think you’re jumping the gun just a bit.

There is far too much that we don’t know yet to be able effectively judge how much “grind” will actually be involved with the mastery system. I can see them giving enough points through ‘casual’ play to be adequate for most people, and then having additional ‘grind’ for those hard core people that need that type of play. We’ll just have to wait and see.

The other question is .. do the masterys make you really better against all content,
or are they really only needed at the new content.

If its the first i see already the crys that all other content is too easy and must made
harder .. and since ANet seems to listen to those it seems, we will maybe end at
where the old zones can’t be played anymore without those skills.

I just shudder if all starter zones are suddenly infected with something like those
toxic events.

Lishtenbird.2814:

Olvendred.3027:

The difference? Gear grind requires replacement. You grind out the gear you need, then the level cap changes/new gear tiers are added, and your gear becomes obsolete. You have to grind for gear again. Once new BiS gear is there, your old BiS gear is no longer BiS… so you just throw it away.

This might or might not be relevant in GW2 where you can salvage, buy and sell stuff. GW2 is different from other games in many aspects.

Lishtenbird.2814:

Adding skills, traits or masteries, at least in GW2, is just that. Adding. You never have to replace anything. All your skills remain just as relevant, and keep the same functionality, as long as you keep playing the game.

You never know until you see them. For one, specialisations will replace some of your mechanics.

We do need to wait for details. But certainly I can’t envision a scenario where salvaging something would give you anything more than a single component of a higher tier of gear… and even if you did salvage, what are you going to wear while you get the other components? As for buying/selling… in most games, the moment new gear comes out, the old gear becomes much less valuable.

Specialisations will replace some mechanics, but you can always swap back. The current assumption is that different specialisations (including the “base class” specialisation) will be relatively balanced against each other, though with different focuses. So, while there are some situations where it might be better to be a Druid, there are others where it would still be better to be a Ranger. Just like swapping weapons removes some skills and replaces them with others… it doesn’t mean the first weapon’s skills have become obsolete.

Lishtenbird.2814:

Do I have to explain ‘optional’ to you again? Achievements are just that, and the LS ones are among the least grindy. Not an example of skills, grind, or anything even remotely relevant to your topic.

That was an example of the direction the game is heading, especially since they’re referencing DT and SW stuff as the most similar existing models.

As for validity of “optional” in a game where cosmetics are the endgame, see many other posts throughout the forum.

I think you know I’m going to disagree with those posts. There’s a wide variety of different skins, attainable by a wide variety of different means. I’d accept that players should get some skins, but not that they are driven to get all of them or any specific ones.

The name of the game is progression. There are more than a few people who feel the need to progress somehow.

With vertical progression numbers get bigger. With horizontal progression, the skill pool gets bigger.

Whether you prefer one or the other, I believe most people want to see their characters progress. They want to see them get new skills. Getting a skill point every time you ding 80 again isn’t enough for a lot of people…maybe even most.

There’s an excitement for people in working toward new things. Right now, we can work toward new skins, and we can work towards achievements, but none of those really make our characters more powerful.

Yes, there are upsides and downsides to being more powerful. But I believe most people want their characters to be more powerful.

It’s a mixed bag, no matter how you slice it.

As for the topic of grind, if it sets up so each unlock is a different thing you’re doing, I don’t know that I’d classify it as grind…but some people will.

Brtiva.9721:

A mater of taste, I would say. I do not say the game is becoming “bad”, as if it were so according to some objective measure.

But for me, my taste, the game is going in a direction I dislike. It feels less free to me and more regimented, do as you’re told etc.

So, the game is just going for a different audience now I suppose.

This is not some sort of rant, I don’t want it come off that way. It just feels like the things I liked about the game are diminishing/have diminished and I have grown less and less interested in it.

I do not feel that one needs to defend or justify either a preference for the new way the game is going, or a dislike for it.

Maybe with HoT, things will seem better to me again. I do not know, I just feel doubtful that this will be so.

I totally agree, it is indeed a matter of taste. I did not want you to think I thought your opinion was wrong. I merely wanted to compare your view to mine, and to highlight to others as well, that these things are indeed a matter of taste.

As Vayne adequately put it, we each have different likes and dislikes, so the progression systems Anet adds will not appeal to everyone. It is a shame, but unfortunately a fact of life. Hopefully though, Anet can add content in HoT that will appeal to a large majority of its player base.

I am sorry but I don’t think you know more about what the game needs to success than Anet themselves. Some of the most devestating changes during the past 2 years were suggested by players INCLUDING the addition of ascended gear. People cried here since release to add more gear because they needed progression and Anet responded to that.

Honestly speaking, I would prefer Anet going with their own vision than listening to the playerbase. GW2 was much better when Anet developed the game by themselves compared to what started to happen when players started to affect the development with their suggestions.

I think it’s a little premature to decide whether the mastery or specialization system will actually be a grind. need more info!

There will be a kittenload of rage because GW2 tries to cater to everyone. Any form of progression gets raged upon by the community.

I’m looking forward to this system. I’m not looking forward to the community rage.

I think I’ll riff on the term “precog” and call this “preQQ.”

I can’t imagine a grind they could put in place that would be worse than needing to level my 10 toons from 80 to 90 and replacing two full sets of Ascended armor as well as dozens of Ascended weapons.

Increasing the level cap as a form of progression is a terrible idea. But we do still need progression. Masteries seem like a very good solution to that problem.

Its called pve end game if you do not like it odds are you may of not wanted a pve end game in the first places.

Look at it this way for real pve end game you need to have a goal gear and leveling up is not a chose once you hit the max in gw2. So though this mastery system you have soothing to work on to unlock more things though out pve maps. Its like unlocking the gravity suit in metroid once done you can go back though water as if there was no water and go places that you saw locked off before. I am thinking fractals maybe a lot like this. Imagen going over the jade wall with the maw in it and find something even more crazy and bigger on the other side to fight maybe the maw’s full body or a maw that is not trapped at all.

If there was no time investment required to get these mastery leveled up then it would not be an end game chose for pve it would just be something else to do for a time and simply give up not real end game content.

To answer the question of how will the skill grind we will be getting be any better than the gear grind we have:

Because we (perhaps) will be choosing, knowingly, to buy the skill grind. The gear grind was added to a game that was sold to us advertised as not having such.

I just hope that the acquisition of the new progression does not involve the Mystic Forge and/or the need for a spreadsheet to keep track of excessively long lists of the stuff needed to “make” them. There are already too many incremental rewards that require too many different types of increments in the game for my taste. There is also too much collect-virtual-things to eventually get reward in the game for my tastes.

One of the worst parts of the trait system (for me) is the level-gating of the content needed to unlock traits. The slot opens at level 36 but the event needed to unlock trait Y is a L60 champion, for instance. That should not be a problem with HoT masteries. I’m expecting the new content to be L80, and many players already have L80’s. Of course, the Revenant that everyone is likely to make will need to reach L80, but unless HoT features level-up areas, that will be taking place via the normal leveling means. I’m expecting at least some people will save up Tomes and Writs and have an 80 Revenant as soon as HoT launches, anyway.

They’re not all that different. The only difference is that the new vertical grind will not invalidate previous progress.

Lishtenbird.2814:

What we know by now:

• HoT will have no level cap increase and no new armour tier, with the reasoning of keeping old content alive.
• HoT will be bringing Masteries to both new maps and old ones (including Fractals).
• You won’t be able to complete certain challenges until you get specific Masteries.
• The new maps will be focusing on smaller areas with deeper, more replayable content, instead of larger but emptier regions.

So how is “gear grind” actually different from the “skill grind” we will be getting?

Gear & Level Grind

• You are not able to complete certain challenges until you get the new levels and the new armour.
• In GW2, you can level by doing (almost) anything you like, when you like, how you like.
• In GW2, you can earn gold for craftable/buyable gear by doing (almost) anything you like, when you like, how you like.
• In GW2, you can still come back and do low-level content thanks to automatic downscaling (which could [or could not] use some tweaking, but that’s another topic).

Skill Grind

• You are not able to complete certain challenges until you get the new skills (“Masteries”).
• In GW2, to unlock character traits, you have to do an enormous list of random tasks, or pay a hefty sum of gold and skillpoints. You have to grind the same tasks over and over again for each character. Until you acquire traits, you cannot start actually playing what you want and instead do what you’re told.
• In GW2, to unlock LS achievements and then get them and the exclusive rewards tied to them, you have to grind specific content over and over again until you succeed. You cannot buy it with gold or other currencies (the official way at least, from the game, not LFG sellers). You are out of luck if you are not there to group up with the people who know what to do in the first days.
• Traits and achievements feel like a “must do” list of chores which nag you until you finish them.

So will the new “revolutionary” progression system be actually better? I’m not sure.

Instead, I’m afraid that with the two camps of “no level cap/gear grind!” and “more character progression!” players we had, we’ve drawn ourselves into a trap which could be worse than the new Trait system and NPE combined.

Disclaimer: I’m not advocating for gear grind or level cap increase; I’m just voicing concern that with the current policy of making people grind more and more for everything, gear grind and level cap might have actually been a more user-friendly solution.

Masteries change the way you play the game and open up new options of things to do and places you can go.

Gear just adds numbers, it doesn’t change gameplay that much aside from change how easy or hard it is.

So yes, it’s better and more interesting.

I’ve always wanted an MMO with Zelda/Metroid like upgrades that allow you to go new places.

I was excited when in SWTOR you can get a magnetic hookshot, but it’s used in only 2 places in the entire game, so it’s kind of lame.

Besides the main problem of getting a new level cap with higher level gear is that it’s a RESET, like, you go from level 80 with ascended/legendary gear, and go to level 81 or at the very latest level 85 (at least in other games you were replacing end game raid gear within 5 levels of the new expansion) greens (maybe even blues), go up to 90 or 100 in greens and blues and then get yellows, then golds, and then start the ascended grind all over again….. just to get back to where you used to be.

Doesn’t feel like progression it feels like you got demoted and had to catch back up.

It’s kind of insulting and feels like we wasted all of our time getting the good gear we had at the previous cap when it is outpaced so early on and people who barely got to the cap before and didn’t even bother gearing up are on the same foot as us who put in considerable time and money investment into improving our characters beyond hitting the level cap.

World of Warcraft, characters who hit 60 and then just did nothing until TBC were on the same foot as full Tier 3 Raid geared characters who’d spent the last 2 years progressing through Molten Core, Blackwing Lair, Ahn Qiraj, and Naxxramas, with hours and hours of wiping and repair bills that forced them to spend their off days doing nothing but grinding gold and consumables for their next raid night, all that effort is wasted as they went to vendor/shard their tier 3 epics to put on their new quest green they got at level 62.. standing next to them is some dude who got to level 60 just yesterday, and has never been in a dungeon much less a raid.

All that effort just evaporated into nothing.

Don’t defend that.

Masteries sound a lot more interesting than bland stat increases anyway.

This does feel a bit silly now, doesn’kitten