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Posted by: Waffler.1257

Waffler.1257

I agree with you OP. Unfortunately it seems like a lot of the people playing GW2 never played GW1 so their view of MMOs is limited to the need for endless progression, constant upgrades, and limitless achievements. They have been trained well by the gaming industry, and will continue to bear fruit for many years to come.

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Posted by: JBleezz.2697

JBleezz.2697

You almost had it, but riddle me this. Why is everyone now forced to work for a “partial legendary” just to keep up in stats? Nobody had to farm for forge exotics just to hit max stats.

What part of “time spent on ascended items is time NOT spent moving towards a legendary” makes the road any easier?

That’s a very good question.

While I am not going to pretend to know what the devs were thinking when they made this change it was probably as simple as incentive.

Due to exotics being easy to attain and legendaries being so hard they needed a partial legendary to give some goal for players on the road to a legendary.

Problem being that looks are so subjective. By adding a small boost to the Ascended they offer incentive for all players to go after them so that the gap between the top tier Ascended and legendaries isn’t as vast as the gap between exotics and legendaries is currently.

In truth while I can see the problem I am along with many uneasy about the solution. I do worry that it could lead to a WoWesque treadmill. Which is why this whole massive forum flaming of ANet has me having mixed feelings.

Happy that ANet will probably see this and be dissuaded from any thoughts of adding a treadmill and at the same time kinda off put by how so many seem to ignore the reason ANet is implementing this in the first place.

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Posted by: Ryan.6951

Ryan.6951

at the same time kinda off put by how so many seem to ignore the reason ANet is implementing this in the first place.

Ok so then lay it on us. What exactly is the reason this is needed? I’m honestly curious.

What is the reason that doing a complete 180 on their manifesto is now required?

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Posted by: Jamais vu.5284

Jamais vu.5284

Well there are already tons of costmetic bridges, so this “gap” is artificial. There is no gap. So they’re not filling a gap, they’re adding tiers of gear, the first of several with lots of room to grow.

No, and I this is where the massive paranoia on this forum stems from. You cannot extrapolate from two data points that this will lead to additional tiers being added, and that this isn’t the final tier forever.

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Posted by: Turkman.1089

Turkman.1089

Arc, if tiers are about attainability then there are already dozens of tier bridging named exotics of varying prices.

Rusttooth all the way up to Foefire. 2g to 200g. That “gap” between exotics and legendaries is already filled with all kinds of attainability options between exotics and legendaries.

I mean I understand what you are saying. But it doesn’t hurt to add more. And they are easier to get than legendaries it seems like. If you disagree with the stats of the new gear, I cannot say anything about that, it’s all about preference.

What is a problem for me, is that this ascended gear, which will have higher stats than the exotic versions, will also be useable in WvW and distort the itemisation there. I mean who wants to grind a dungeon to get best in slot gear for PVP? Nobody wants that.

I bought the game under the assumption that I level my character to lvl 80 (check), get exotic gear of whatever provenance to have “best in slot” gear (check) and will forever be able to compete in WvW without ever setting foot into the pve world aside from logging in (check (well, up to the announcement of this ascended tier)).

I’m not yet entirely sure how WvW will be affected as the new items seem to lack the upgrade slots and seem to have infusion slots instead. So maybe the infusions have no stats other than this pve defense stat that is required for a dungeon. If that’s the case and filling the upgrade slot of any exotic with appropriate runes/sigils will bring the exotics up to par with ascended items for PVP, I couldn’t care less about a PVE dungeon treadmill.

If, however, the game “forces” me to do a dungeon to obtain “best in slot” items for my pvp game, then I’m going to get seriously mad, because I didn’t intend to set foot into a dungeon in this game, ever again. Not because they are particularly horrible in this game. But because they are PVE dungeons. And every PVE dungeon in every game so far has been a more or less horrible experience in comparison to PVP. Fighting NPCs is just not nearly as fun as fighting other people.

In addition I also share a lot of other peoples’ feelings of having been lied to, which doesn’t feel particularly good.

Abaddon’s Mouth
Renth/Eirik
[DP] Diamond Pirates

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Posted by: Jamais vu.5284

Jamais vu.5284

What is the reason that doing a complete 180 on their manifesto is now required?

Before we can resume this discussion, you need to lay out to us how they actually did a “180” on their manifesto, for the sake of both reader clarification as well perhaps to order your own thoughts.

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Posted by: Ryan.6951

Ryan.6951

No, and I this is where the massive paranoia on this forum stems from. You cannot extrapolate from two data points that this will lead to additional tiers being added, and that this isn’t the final tier forever.

I honestly think many people have the same impression you do.

Go re-read linsey and chris’s blog post and forum post. At the end of the blog post linsey states explicitly that this is only the beginning. The first tier. Not the first pieces… the first tier…. and that as they release more content they will release more tierS.

Then go read chris’ forum post. Then tell people they’re just paranoid.

The thing is… even once is bad enough. Even once is against everything they said they were building this game around. This thread isn’t about power creep or gear treadmills being bad, this thread is about the fact that arenanet spent over 5 years carefully designing a game with horizontal scaling instead of vertical, then took it out at the knees less than 3 months after launch.

“We’re a community building company that just happens to do so with games” — why add gear tier separation between your community members then?

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Posted by: JBleezz.2697

JBleezz.2697

Ok so then lay it on us. What exactly is the reason this is needed? I’m honestly curious.

What is the reason that doing a complete 180 on their manifesto is now required?

The problem is that there is currently nothing to chase at max level but legendaries which is a HUGE grind. That grind is seriously off putting to a lot of players so rather than decrease the grind they added a tier between Exotic and Legendary to give people something to chase along the way to their legendary.

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Posted by: Jamais vu.5284

Jamais vu.5284

Go re-read linsey and chris’s blog post and forum post. At the end of the blog post linsey states explicitly that this is only the beginning. The first tier. Not the first pieces… the first tier…. and that as they release more content they will release more tierS.

Why did you explicitly specify the term “first tier” when it’s not even used in the blog post, and flat out contradicted by Chris’ post?
Her statements are rather vague marketing speak, but sound much more like that they plan to, parallel to adding a new Ascended gear class (gloves, amulets, etc.) every few months, expand their own diversity (skinwise) within the tier if you ask me.
His statements are that they do not want a gear treadmill, and that they don’t want to add a new tier every three months. Of course you could very cynically interpret that they want to add a new tier only every half year, but really, you are treating this as if it were in a vacuum, that the ArenaNet people are instinctually driven towards a gear treadmill, outside any considerations for their own philosophy, instead of having carefully evaluated it but were only able to release it now, some weeks after launch.

this thread is about the fact that arenanet spent over 5 years carefully designing a game with horizontal scaling instead of vertical, then took it out at the knees less than 3 months after launch.

That GW2 wouldn’t be as horizontal as GW1 was known since their first announcement in 2007. The first ten weeks of GW2 weren’t horizontal by a long shot either. It’s still one of the flattest of any MMO and will remain so.

(edited by Jamais vu.5284)

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Posted by: JBleezz.2697

JBleezz.2697

Go re-read linsey and chris’s blog post and forum post. At the end of the blog post linsey states explicitly that this is only the beginning. The first tier. Not the first pieces… the first tier…. and that as they release more content they will release more tierS.

Then go read chris’ forum post. Then tell people they’re just paranoid.

The thing is… even once is bad enough. Even once is against everything they said they were building this game around. This thread isn’t about power creep or gear treadmills being bad, this thread is about the fact that arenanet spent over 5 years carefully designing a game with horizontal scaling instead of vertical, then took it out at the knees less than 3 months after launch.

“We’re a community building company that just happens to do so with games” — why add gear tier separation between your community members then?

They absolutely did not say that they will be adding more tiers. What you seem to be referring to is the statement that they will be adding new Ascended item types into the game going forward. Which means that they plan on adding new armor and weapons of Ascended type since the November update only adds rings and back pieces.

“The new additions in November are just the start of our item progression initiative. We’re going to add tons of new high-level content to Guild Wars 2 in the future. As we introduce the new high-level content, we’ll also roll out complimentary Ascended and Legendary items (to say nothing of the other rewards you can earn by playing the content).”

The item progression initiative is talking about expanding Ascended gear and Legendaries not adding new tiers above Ascended down the line.

So please get me a quote where they said they will be adding new tiers.

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Posted by: yurtshone.7325

yurtshone.7325

I’m not a fan of melodramatic TV soap operas and I’m not a fan of your post.

Not cool. While I disagree with most of his points, you have to at least lay out your fair share of discussion.

Well done Arc, I love an open and honest discussion when people of opposite view can talk in a constructive way. The apologists on this forum infuriate me with silly comments like Jaimais.

I agree with the OP by the way :-)

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Posted by: Demented Sheep.1642

Demented Sheep.1642

Ok so then lay it on us. What exactly is the reason this is needed? I’m honestly curious.

What is the reason that doing a complete 180 on their manifesto is now required?

The problem is that there is currently nothing to chase at max level but legendaries which is a HUGE grind. That grind is seriously off putting to a lot of players so rather than decrease the grind they added a tier between Exotic and Legendary to give people something to chase along the way to their legendary.

Then they could have added more gear with different skins (since legendary had the same stats as exotic) that are easier then legendary but harder than exotic. If they want something for hardcore gamers to chase why does it even need to be gear? why not a HoM like GW1 had with trophies and titles? It gives you no advantage but shows you were good enough to get it.
By giving these items better stats than exotic they have gone back on everything they said about this post release.

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Posted by: JBleezz.2697

JBleezz.2697

Then they could have added more gear with different skins (since legendary had the same stats as exotic) that are easier then legendary but harder than exotic. If they want something for hardcore gamers to chase why does it even need to be gear? why not a HoM like GW1 had with trophies and titles? It gives you no advantage but shows you were good enough to get it.
By giving these items better stats than exotic they have gone back on everything they said about this post release.

As I have said before looks are subjective. If they did add Ascended gear as gear harder to get than exotics but easier than legendaries with the exact same stats as exotics but different skins you would run into a situation where many might not like the skin of the weapon or would prefer the skin of an exotic. In that case there would be no point in ever acquiring Ascended gear and they would simply skip to the legendary grind resulting in the same problem we already see.

So instead they opted for a small stat boost that would make them objectively valuable to all players and offer incentive to go after to help lessen the grind feeling of the legendarys because you have a median goal to work towards while working on your legendary.

Personally I would have actually preferred something like a HoM or some other achievement based solution since it would have avoided a lot of the concern and controversy caused by the Ascended gear.

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Posted by: Ryan.6951

Ryan.6951

“This is just the beginning. In November, we’re only adding the first level of Infusions and Ascended Rings and Back slots, so that leaves us a lot of room to build upon these levels of Item progression in future content.”

Honestly. To Jamais and JBleezz. That’s verbatim copied and pasted from Linsey’s blog post. First level. Not first pieces. First LEVEL. building upon these LEVELS, not these pieces.

Quit telling me she didn’t say that. She said it.

And to quote Chris verbatim:

“Our goal is not to create a gear treadmill. Our goal is to ensure we have a proper progression for players from exotic up to legendary without a massive jump in reward between the two. We will slowly add the remaining ascended gear items and legendary items in future updates to allow people time to acquire them as we add exciting new content that deserves exciting rewards. We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on.”

So their goal is not to create a gear treadmill, so they’re going to create a slow gear treadmill instead and stretch it out over months. Wat?!

Massive jump in reward? What massive jump? Do legendary weapons come with hidden stats? No, there’s no reward jump. Cosmetics? Oh ok, a 200g foefire isn’t middleground enough between pearl and eternity? sigh.

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Posted by: yurtshone.7325

yurtshone.7325

Demented sheep and JBleez hit on something I feel is a much better solution than adding gear with better stats. The Hall of Monuments. People that play these types of games love to show off. I am one of these types to a mild degree.
Having titles and gear/weapon skins that can display your prowess is a far better solution in my opinion. The “home” instance where you can throw parties for social gatherings with mannequins with your collection on display. Great idea :-)

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Posted by: Snow.5269

Snow.5269

Ryan, thank you for making your post. Moderators, please do not throw this into the other thread as this one carries a very important message & one that needs to be seen/heard by everyone at A-NET.

Ryan put into words what I could not

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Posted by: Encaladus.5291

Encaladus.5291

many people are complaining about how legendaries used to be the same as exotics, and now due to the ascended gear, the legendaries are being bumped up in stats… well here is my opinion on legendaries….

to make a legendary u need 575,000 karma at least (grinding for god knows how long), hundreds of gold (again grinding for a long time) and plenty of other things that are also grindfests…

so in essence what ppl are saying is that ppl who grind for weeks to get a legendary should not have anything else other than a different skin

that dude that just reached 80 should be able to equip the exact same statted (is that even a word) item as that other person who has grinded the required mats for a legendary for the last few weeks….

that begs the question what is the point of a legendary weapon if it is exaclty the same as an exotic…. why bother spending an age to make it look slightly different

but this is just my opinion…

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Posted by: Haette.2701

Haette.2701

Legendaries aren’t getting stat-boosted this weekend. Anyone saying that is just proving that they didn’t read carefully enough. For the record, I do think that legendaries deserve to be equivalent to the best item tier, because all they should be is a really pretty skin. It’s the fact that that tier is now moving that is the problem.

And yes, the pretty skin is the WHOLE POINT of a legendary. Time spent improving your play and personal skill should dictate your improvement in performance, not time spent farming and buying.

(edited by Haette.2701)

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Posted by: JBleezz.2697

JBleezz.2697

“This is just the beginning. In November, we’re only adding the first level of Infusions and Ascended Rings and Back slots, so that leaves us a lot of room to build upon these levels of Item progression in future content.”

Honestly. To Jamais and JBleezz. That’s verbatim copied and pasted from Linsey’s blog post. First level. Not first pieces. First LEVEL. building upon these LEVELS, not these pieces.

Quit telling me she didn’t say that. She said it.

And to quote Chris verbatim:

“Our goal is not to create a gear treadmill. Our goal is to ensure we have a proper progression for players from exotic up to legendary without a massive jump in reward between the two. We will slowly add the remaining ascended gear items and legendary items in future updates to allow people time to acquire them as we add exciting new content that deserves exciting rewards. We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on.”

So their goal is not to create a gear treadmill, so they’re going to create a slow gear treadmill instead and stretch it out over months. Wat?!

Massive jump in reward? What massive jump? Do legendary weapons come with hidden stats? No, there’s no reward jump. Cosmetics? Oh ok, a 200g foefire isn’t middleground enough between pearl and eternity? sigh.

And this is the heart of where I disagree with you.

You read that as Ascended gear is just the first level and the next levels are new tiers of more powerful gear. I read that as the new Back pieces and rings are the first level and that the next level isn’t more powerful gear but other pieces of Ascended gear including armor and weapons.

This is supported by the quote

“Our goal is not to create a gear treadmill. Our goal is to ensure we have a proper progression for players from exotic up to legendary without a massive jump in reward between the two. We will slowly add the remaining ascended gear items and legendary items in future updates to allow people time to acquire them as we add exciting new content that deserves exciting rewards. We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on.”

you seem to read this as oh we won’t have a fast treadmill every three months it will be slow. I read this as a snarky comment on the people who have been extrapolating this into there is going to be a new tier every three months. So he is basically saying that no there is not going to be keep adding new tiers.

As for the FoeFire weapons being a middle ground I believe that was their original intent however for those like me who don’t particularly enjoy those skins we are left with no middle and instead face a massive grind for a legendary with no middle goals along the way.

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Posted by: Amra.6028

Amra.6028

I agree 100%. Gear Grind is not what I signed up for.

Moderator Notes:
Please refrain from making posts of this nature. Thread bumps/posts that lack content such as this are against our code of conduct and do not provide meaningful contribution to the topic at hand.

Funny to see moderation is equally trisomic as development.

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Posted by: Ryan.6951

Ryan.6951

that begs the question what is the point of a legendary weapon if it is exaclty the same as an exotic…. why bother spending an age to make it look slightly different

but this is just my opinion…

Why don’t we let Colin and Eric the project leads answer that for you?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=Yjxvj2I_CCA#t=468s

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Posted by: Snow.5269

Snow.5269

“This is just the beginning. In November, we’re only adding the first level of Infusions and Ascended Rings and Back slots, so that leaves us a lot of room to build upon these levels of Item progression in future content.”

Honestly. To Jamais and JBleezz. That’s verbatim copied and pasted from Linsey’s blog post. First level. Not first pieces. First LEVEL. building upon these LEVELS, not these pieces.

Quit telling me she didn’t say that. She said it.

And to quote Chris verbatim:

“Our goal is not to create a gear treadmill. Our goal is to ensure we have a proper progression for players from exotic up to legendary without a massive jump in reward between the two. We will slowly add the remaining ascended gear items and legendary items in future updates to allow people time to acquire them as we add exciting new content that deserves exciting rewards. We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on.”

So their goal is not to create a gear treadmill, so they’re going to create a slow gear treadmill instead and stretch it out over months. Wat?!

Massive jump in reward? What massive jump? Do legendary weapons come with hidden stats? No, there’s no reward jump. Cosmetics? Oh ok, a 200g foefire isn’t middleground enough between pearl and eternity? sigh.

And this is the heart of where I disagree with you.

You read that as Ascended gear is just the first level and the next levels are new tiers of more powerful gear. I read that as the new Back pieces and rings are the first level and that the next level isn’t more powerful gear but other pieces of Ascended gear including armor and weapons.

This is supported by the quote

“Our goal is not to create a gear treadmill. Our goal is to ensure we have a proper progression for players from exotic up to legendary without a massive jump in reward between the two. We will slowly add the remaining ascended gear items and legendary items in future updates to allow people time to acquire them as we add exciting new content that deserves exciting rewards. We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on.”

you seem to read this as oh we won’t have a fast treadmill every three months it will be slow. I read this as a snarky comment on the people who have been extrapolating this into there is going to be a new tier every three months. So he is basically saying that no there is not going to be keep adding new tiers.

As for the FoeFire weapons being a middle ground I believe that was their original intent however for those like me who don’t particularly enjoy those skins we are left with no middle and instead face a massive grind for a legendary with no middle goals along the way.

After this change, anything stated is subject to change. When a playerbase is specifically told “Here is our mission statement” and then it changes to the exact opposite how can the playerbase continue to trust?

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Posted by: Encaladus.5291

Encaladus.5291

Legendaries aren’t getting stat-boosted this weekend. Anyone saying that is just proving that they didn’t read carefully enough.

quoted from http://www.pcgamer.com/2012/11/13/arenanet-guild-wars-2-ascended/

Murdock also stated current Legendary items will receive stat bumps to Ascendancy’s level to maintain the appeal of undertaking the enormous resource and time efforts to get them

so after reading that do u agree legendaries are not being stat-boosted?

and as for the ‘the skins are the reason to grind’ why would u grind for weeks on end just to have something that looks different, but has the EXACT SAME STATS…. seems a waste of time (in MY OPINION)

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Posted by: JBleezz.2697

JBleezz.2697

After this change, anything stated is subject to change. When a playerbase is specifically told “Here is our mission statement” and then it changes to the exact opposite how can the playerbase continue to trust?

Ok I’ll bite please quote the statement in the mission statement where they promised they would never add a tier of gear.

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Posted by: Amra.6028

Amra.6028

and as for the ‘the skins are the reason to grind’ why would u grind for weeks on end just to have something that looks different, but has the EXACT SAME STATS…. seems a waste of time (in MY OPINION)

Because I play a character that excels in what he does by mine and his abilities, not by his clothing. Armor is mainly for the looks, that’s why it does not progress.

Why they don’t boost legendaries to superior levels is beyond my understanding. The veil is gone, we all see it’s WoW 2.0 here, why not make them worth my while now?

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Posted by: Haette.2701

Haette.2701

Legendaries aren’t getting stat-boosted this weekend. Anyone saying that is just proving that they didn’t read carefully enough.

quoted from http://www.pcgamer.com/2012/11/13/arenanet-guild-wars-2-ascended/

Murdock also stated current Legendary items will receive stat bumps to Ascendancy’s level to maintain the appeal of undertaking the enormous resource and time efforts to get them

so after reading that do u agree legendaries are not being stat-boosted?

“Legendary items were always intended to be on par with other “best-in-slot” items. So fear not, all existing Legendary weapons, which are currently on par with Exotics, will be upgraded to be on par with Ascended weapons at the same time that we add Ascended weapons to the game.

Bolded the important parts so you don’t have to read carefully.

And if you don’t think legendaries are worth it for the skin alone, that’s totally cool. Legendaries aren’t for you. This game wasn’t for you until now.

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Posted by: Encaladus.5291

Encaladus.5291

and as for the ‘the skins are the reason to grind’ why would u grind for weeks on end just to have something that looks different, but has the EXACT SAME STATS…. seems a waste of time (in MY OPINION)

Because I play a character that excels in what he does by mine and his abilities, not by his clothing. Armor is mainly for the looks, that’s why it does not progress.

Why they don’t boost legendaries to superior levels is beyond my understanding. The veil is gone, we all see it’s WoW 2.0 here, why not make them worth my while now?

i think what u are trying to say is skill>gear, which i completely agree with….. but that begs the question how is an extra (from the screenshot posted) 5 power 5 precision and 3% magic find going to make an unskilled player better than a skilled player….

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Posted by: Snow.5269

Snow.5269

After this change, anything stated is subject to change. When a playerbase is specifically told “Here is our mission statement” and then it changes to the exact opposite how can the playerbase continue to trust?

Ok I’ll bite please quote the statement in the mission statement where they promised they would never add a tier of gear.

“Here’s what we believe: If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game. Otherwise, your MMO becomes all about grinding to get the best gear. We don’t make grindy games — we leave the grind to other MMOs.”

http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/21/guild-wars-2-interview-monetization/#s:guildwars2-16

(edited by Snow.5269)

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Posted by: Ryan.6951

Ryan.6951

After this change, anything stated is subject to change. When a playerbase is specifically told “Here is our mission statement” and then it changes to the exact opposite how can the playerbase continue to trust?

Ok I’ll bite please quote the statement in the mission statement where they promised they would never add a tier of gear.

Ok I’ll bite, please point out where everything needs to be pinky sworn and promised on hallmark cards to be common sense.

Keep narrowing down the list of acceptable answers until none are left to satisfy you then claim victory…. it’s a weak tactic for when you’ve already lost an argument but are too stubborn to give up.

How about this though:

“Finally, since combat is such a core part of the gameplay of any MMO, we’ve put a lot of emphasis into rethinking combat. So much of traditional MMO combat is rote and repetitive. You execute the same strategy over and over again, just augmented over time with better and better gear. After a while it starts to feel like you’re playing a spreadsheet.”

You can find that tidbit at http://www.arena.net/blog/guild-wars-2-design-manifesto

But I guess it doesn’t apply because they didn’t end every sentence with “we promise!!!”, right? Ad besides, grinding 9 rooms for gear tiers couldn’t possibly get “rote and repetitive”

The thing is…. all over the site are all of these quotes and articles and interviews and videos all explaining how they feel that level gear playing fields make the best games….. then this.

WE’re not making things up or misquoting arenanet on this issue.

They came out and said “we’re making an mmo with purely optional grind and no treadmill” and then they introduce the first steps of a treadmill less than 3 months after launch.

It shows that they don’t have faith in their own product or idea.

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Posted by: Encaladus.5291

Encaladus.5291

Murdock also stated current Legendary items will receive stat bumps to Ascendancy’s level to maintain the appeal of undertaking the enormous resource and time efforts to get them.

bolded the part of the statement that I read so it shouldnt be too difficult to read

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Posted by: Starhawk.2958

Starhawk.2958

Ok so I have been seeing posts on this for a while now and I have to ask.

How is this added tier to bridge the time acquisition gap between exotics and legendaries a gear grind or a treadmill?

its only a gear grind if it takes an insane amount of time to get and is required for content. From whats been shown Fractals will only require the gear to survive staying in a really long time not required to enter or even to see and experience the content inside.

And its only a treadmill if they continue to add tiers which they have made it clear they have no intention of doing. So why then is there such a fuss.

P.S. Before anyone tells me I don’t understand GW I was a GW player since launch and I hate gear grind but I don’t see this being a gear grind.

Honestly, you bring up a good question here about what all the fuss is about. I can’t speak for everyone but I’ve read a bunch of the posts from players about this issue. I honestly believe that the undercurrent in a lot of this ire about what Anet is doing boils down to players not trusting them when they say they won’t do it in the future. From my personal stand point, I see after the Halloween event and some of the sleazy way in which that was marketed on this website and then backpedaled later on that something is rotten in Denmark. I think it’s possible a lot of former GW1 players want to trust Anet, but something in the back of their minds says not to.

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Posted by: Ryan.6951

Ryan.6951

i think what u are trying to say is skill>gear, which i completely agree with….. but that begs the question how is an extra (from the screenshot posted) 5 power 5 precision and 3% magic find going to make an unskilled player better than a skilled player….

That is not the topic of this thread, though to be accurate, the 7% MF on exotics is worth 92 stat points per piece of exotic jewelry. If it increases the same as the MF does (let’s say 7.9% rounded down7% and 9.1% rounded up to 10% to be as generous as possible… still a 15% gain) Then that major stat becomes 105 each, or going from 552 to 630 in just that primary stat, on just jewelry alone. Secondary stats see the same % increases, though obviously of lesser values.

The thing is though, why should the players trust arenanet’s game direction when they do not trust it themselves? They can’t stick to their guns for 3 months without capitulating on a core design choice…. who’s to say that once people quit whining now that they have a boring gear grind that they won’t whine about mounts next…. then what……… ?

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Posted by: JBleezz.2697

JBleezz.2697

Ok I’ll bite, please point out where everything needs to be pinky sworn and promised on hallmark cards to be common sense.

Keep narrowing down the list of acceptable answers until none are left to satisfy you then claim victory…. it’s a weak tactic for when you’ve already lost an argument but are too stubborn to give up.

How about this though:

“Finally, since combat is such a core part of the gameplay of any MMO, we’ve put a lot of emphasis into rethinking combat. So much of traditional MMO combat is rote and repetitive. You execute the same strategy over and over again, just augmented over time with better and better gear. After a while it starts to feel like you’re playing a spreadsheet.”

You can find that tidbit at http://www.arena.net/blog/guild-wars-2-design-manifesto

But I guess it doesn’t apply because they didn’t end every sentence with “we promise!!!”, right? Ad besides, grinding 9 rooms for gear tiers couldn’t possibly get “rote and repetitive”

The thing is…. all over the site are all of these quotes and articles and interviews and videos all explaining how they feel that level gear playing fields make the best games….. then this.

WE’re not making things up or misquoting arenanet on this issue.

They came out and said “we’re making an mmo with purely optional grind and no treadmill” and then they introduce the first steps of a treadmill less than 3 months after launch.

It shows that they don’t have faith in their own product or idea.

And again we both read into this different.

I’m not saying they never promised to introduce a gear grind or gear treadmill. They made that clear they were against gear treadmills and calling just adding new gear over and over expanding content. But the difference is I don’t see this as the start of a treadmill.

You see this as a the first step on a gear treadmill. While I see this closer to the introduction of green uniques to the original Guild Wars. A type of gear added to the game post launch that was originally very limited in its acquisition but was later sprinkled through out the later campaigns and served as cool gear to chase for those who wanted them.

Now before you go off saying that the Greens of GW weren’t a stat increase this is very true. However they were in essence “perfect” gear because they were req 9 and those found at lvl 20 were always max damage and whatever stats they came with were max power.

However since in GW2 there is no such thing as “imperfect” gear, the unique class would have to be special in its own way so they gave it a stat boost and added the infusion slot.

You may not agree with implementation of this gear and believe the stat boost shouldn’t exist and I can very much understand this. But can you at least humor the possibility that this isn’t the start of a bunch of new gear tiers but rather just an added tier that they felt was missing between Exotics and Legendaries and that they have no intention of adding any tiers above Ascended.

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Posted by: Haette.2701

Haette.2701

Murdock also stated current Legendary items will receive stat bumps to Ascendancy’s level to maintain the appeal of undertaking the enormous resource and time efforts to get them.

bolded the part of the statement that I read so it shouldnt be too difficult to read

“Legendaries aren’t getting stat-boosted this weekend.”
this weekend
this weekend
this weekend

(edited by Haette.2701)

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Posted by: Ebon.7641

Ebon.7641

Here I’ll say it for you then:

IT WILL BE FINE

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Posted by: Latinkuro.9420

Latinkuro.9420

You talk about skillful players being removed because of the new gear, well I hate to break it to you but skillful players are the 1st bunch of players that don’t give it a 2nd thought and are happy for the new gear, almost all skillful players have a closet full of exotic gear and weapons covering all possible builds for their profession to choose from already.

Did they break their word?
imo NO they didn’t, nothing stronger or shinier than legendary quality was introduced.

Did they work around their word ?
Yes they did, and it’s fine because most players were bored and had nothing to do except for legendary hunting which does take ages to get by yourself.
I welcome this new step in-between exotics and legendary.

You forget, they did clarify that legendary is and always will be the highest most powerful item class in the game, if you have a legendary and ascended weapons are introduced your legendary takes on the max stats of an ascended weapon till they finalize legendary stats for good.

I use powerful here conservatively though because let’s face it legendaries are all about the shiny

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Posted by: XodoK.8734

XodoK.8734

Looks fine to me. I guess it is just very subjective.

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Posted by: Ryan.6951

Ryan.6951

@latinkuro They did actually, the videos and quotes are all from Colin and Eric and all are exactly the opposite of power creep or gear treadmill. There’s no weaseling out of it. They didn’t ‘work around’ what they said, they went back on it.

Skillful players I know prefer not to grind. They know that stats are meaningless. They know that after X hours, they’ll have the ‘best’ stats. They would prefer not to waste their time getting to the end.

There is no step in between exotic and legendary. They have identical stats. People who keep saying this I gotta wonder if they don’t understand, never seen a legendary, can’t differentiate the way something looks from how powerful it is or what. It really seems to be a concept that is way above and beyond the grasp of a few people.

@tjockis wat? lol.

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Posted by: Ryan.6951

Ryan.6951

Looks fine to me. I guess it is just very subjective.

So, you prefer a gear treadmill, or you think this won’t be one?

Genuinely curious.

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Posted by: Demented Sheep.1642

Demented Sheep.1642

Demented sheep and JBleez hit on something I feel is a much better solution than adding gear with better stats. The Hall of Monuments. People that play these types of games love to show off. I am one of these types to a mild degree.
Having titles and gear/weapon skins that can display your prowess is a far better solution in my opinion. The “home” instance where you can throw parties for social gatherings with mannequins with your collection on display. Great idea :-)

Regardless of this update goes I do actually hope they add something akin to the HoM at some point. They already have a home instance but it feels empty at the moment.

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Posted by: Amra.6028

Amra.6028

and as for the ‘the skins are the reason to grind’ why would u grind for weeks on end just to have something that looks different, but has the EXACT SAME STATS…. seems a waste of time (in MY OPINION)

Because I play a character that excels in what he does by mine and his abilities, not by his clothing. Armor is mainly for the looks, that’s why it does not progress.

Why they don’t boost legendaries to superior levels is beyond my understanding. The veil is gone, we all see it’s WoW 2.0 here, why not make them worth my while now?

i think what u are trying to say is skill>gear, which i completely agree with….. but that begs the question how is an extra (from the screenshot posted) 5 power 5 precision and 3% magic find going to make an unskilled player better than a skilled player….

Combined with “you need infusions or you’re too weak”, I’d say I’d be nothing more than a mule for my items to do my fights.

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Posted by: SneakyErvin.3056

SneakyErvin.3056

I just thought of a thing regarding Ascendant gear, itemization, PvE and WvW.

Maybe, just maybe it will just be like this. Ok here goes.

The ring we have seen is stacked with MF along with power and presicion, and an infusion slot but no gem slot (since its already calculated into the ring. Perhaps there will only be a select few types of rings, that all have MF as the major stat.

Con, pres, MF
Vit, pow, MF
Pow, pres, MF
Vit, con, MF

Then the infusion (offensive, defensive, omni) will decide the rest for the instance.

Offensive = +damage dealt to karka
Defensive = Reduced agony damage taken

Maybe thats close to how it will work. This way no one would freely use ascendant gear in WvW and those that do are far behind in useful stats (MF = Bad) and infusions wont have any impact on non karka.

We just cant know for sure until the patch is out.

And regarding Legendaries. It’s not a big issue if they are of ascendant level if they keep the stat combos they currently have (pow, tough, vit), because the choices are very limited. Reskinning an exotic would probably still be better to fit your spec.

Let Valkyries guide me to my destiny.

(edited by SneakyErvin.3056)

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Posted by: Kirani.2690

Kirani.2690

So you know yet-to-be-implemented update is bad? Can I borrow your time machine?

You don’t need the time machine to know that you have been lied to. Many of us bought this game because we were suckered into the bill of goods presented in their manifesto. I played GW1 for five years and enjoyed all of it because there was no gear treadmill. Given that experience I accepted all the hype about not being a WOW clone. Now just three months after buying 3 copies of the game (for me and my two sons) they are adding gear progression to end game. How can anyone think that the Manifesto is anything other than a big lie now. ANET has lost my trust and it will be very difficult to get it back. To the fanboys who cannot see a lie when it is staring them in the face I have two famous quotes for you “Thank you sir may I have another” and “There is a sucker born every minute.”

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Posted by: elsbeth.3567

elsbeth.3567

And this to the vital question.
Can we believe what they say?
They say there will never be pay to win ever – but they just scrapped one of the founding principles.
So even if I was ok with this do I trust them not do it – to resist the temptation of the killer weapon for $10.
That is the profound question I am asking myself.
PS why do you think it was only 60, many purchased gems.

This really is a vital question. I mean not only in the purely idealistic sense that lying is bad, etc. I mean practically in how it affects my personal enthusiasm for playing the game, and thus the likelihood that I will help it continue via money or being a warm body on the server. My enthusiasm for “Lost Shores” is quite low because I feel braced for running into something that makes me feel like a sucker.

I already had growing mistrust of Anet, especially after Halloween. The Black Lion chest scam was just outright criminal (even though it didn’t affect me personally). Then they told everyone to make sure they were in Lion’s Arch at X time for a big surprise. I actually rushed to finish work and then rushed home to make it, missed it by a few minutes, only to learn that all I missed was a cutscene that I could YouTube, and all the content was there at my leisure. And now this whole debacle.

They’ve got a great game that I love in many ways and that has points of real genius. I love it enough I made a website about my adventures in it. Almost three months in, I am not feeling bored by it and I play it every day. But over and over, Anet’s communication is awful and loaded with obvious PR hype and outright lies and deceptions. Whatever the merits or problems of the new gear and gated dungeons might be, it is impossible for Anet not to have known they would be intensely controversial, yet they did not explain until pushed, and then not fully or forthrightly; indeed, it just raised more significant doubts. Again, leaving aside moral judgments, in a practical sense, that just makes me not want to be around them and their product. Who wants to hang out with an untrustworthy friend, just waiting for the next ripoff or embarrassment or lie? Trust is good business, and trust is fading fast.

I tackled Halloween with gusto, wanting to try everything out. Never mind if I liked it or not, I did it, for hours every single day. But now I feel burned, and I am not going to be rushing to play “Lost Shores.” I’ll probably peek in and mess around briefly. I’m not setting time aside and I’m frankly looking at my library of Steam games. These are not decisions I’ve planned out; just stuff I realize I’m doing (or not doing) as I sit here thinking about it. And that’s bad, because MMOs need every player they can get.

A company doesn’t have to do everything I want, or make a perfect product every single time, to keep my business. But when it’s dishonest or disrespectful, it will lose me quickly—not just because of my head, but because of my heart. My heart is increasingly not in this game.

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Posted by: Celesica.5790

Celesica.5790

It’s fine! You’ll see
So far ANet hasn’t let me down. It’s still 3 months, so I can understand why some of the bugs aren’t yet fully fixed. But overall, it has been really awesome, for me. And about the new gears and stuff, I can’t say they’ve let me down just because of pure assumptions bases on words posted in a single blog post. I’ll have to see and experience it myself first starting on the 16th, before I judge. I’m so excited!

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Posted by: elsbeth.3567

elsbeth.3567

It’s fine! You’ll see
So far ANet hasn’t let me down. It’s still 3 months, so I can understand why some of the bugs aren’t yet fully fixed. But overall, it has been really awesome, for me. And about the new gears and stuff, I can’t say they’ve let me down just because of pure assumptions bases on words posted in a single blog post. I’ll have to see and experience it myself first starting on the 16th, before I judge. I’m so excited!

Judgments based on words from the people directly involved are by definition not pure assumptions. Likewise, the debate ultimately involves comparisons to similar systems in other games—comparisons that Anet itself made when it said it would never do this. So by all means, be excited and see for yourself, but understand that you don’t understand what you’re talking about.

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Posted by: elsbeth.3567

elsbeth.3567

Here I’ll say it for you then:

IT WILL BE FINE

If the cap lock key was the CEO of Anet, that would mean something.

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Posted by: Celesica.5790

Celesica.5790

It’s fine! You’ll see
So far ANet hasn’t let me down. It’s still 3 months, so I can understand why some of the bugs aren’t yet fully fixed. But overall, it has been really awesome, for me. And about the new gears and stuff, I can’t say they’ve let me down just because of pure assumptions bases on words posted in a single blog post. I’ll have to see and experience it myself first starting on the 16th, before I judge. I’m so excited!

Judgments based on words from the people directly involved are by definition not pure assumptions. Likewise, the debate ultimately involves comparisons to similar systems in other games—comparisons that Anet itself made when it said it would never do this. So by all means, be excited and see for yourself, but understand that you don’t understand what you’re talking about.

I understand, that’s why I said it’s fine. And yep, I’m really REALLY excited
How people react to a thing that is not even there yet, is.. oh nvm, it’s obvious. xD

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Posted by: Ryan.6951

Ryan.6951

It’s fine! You’ll see
So far ANet hasn’t let me down. It’s still 3 months, so I can understand why some of the bugs aren’t yet fully fixed. But overall, it has been really awesome, for me. And about the new gears and stuff, I can’t say they’ve let me down just because of pure assumptions bases on words posted in a single blog post. I’ll have to see and experience it myself first starting on the 16th, before I judge. I’m so excited!

I appreciate the sentiment that things have been fun. Lots of games do fun gear grinds.

Arenanet has been 5 years browbeating everyone about why their no gear grind philosophy is superior. From the ground up and as far back as gw1 prophecies they’ve advocated horizontal content scaling. I’ve offered plenty of video clips of Colin and Eric stating this as well as quotes from many on the design team.

So regardless of whether you found the game fun….

Do you think arenanet is executing their vision on the game? Why the sudden change of heart if not? Why hide it from us during presales if so?

Answer those if you want to contribute anything to this thread.

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Posted by: Celesica.5790

Celesica.5790

It’s fine! You’ll see
So far ANet hasn’t let me down. It’s still 3 months, so I can understand why some of the bugs aren’t yet fully fixed. But overall, it has been really awesome, for me. And about the new gears and stuff, I can’t say they’ve let me down just because of pure assumptions bases on words posted in a single blog post. I’ll have to see and experience it myself first starting on the 16th, before I judge. I’m so excited!

I appreciate the sentiment that things have been fun. Lots of games do fun gear grinds.

Arenanet has been 5 years browbeating everyone about why their no gear grind philosophy is superior. From the ground up and as far back as gw1 prophecies they’ve advocated horizontal content scaling. I’ve offered plenty of video clips of Colin and Eric stating this as well as quotes from many on the design team.

So regardless of whether you found the game fun….

Do you think arenanet is executing their vision on the game? Why the sudden change of heart if not? Why hide it from us during presales if so?

Answer those if you want to contribute anything to this thread.

" Our goal is not to create a gear treadmill. Our goal is to ensure we have a proper progression for players from exotic up to legendary without a massive jump in reward between the two. We will slowly add the remaining ascended gear items and legendary items in future updates to allow people time to acquire them as we add exciting new content that deserves exciting rewards. We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on.

Ascended and infusion rewards will be available in both PvE and WvW over time, and be made available through all sorts of content around the world including existing content. PvP will remain unaffected to ensure our intended PvP balance going forward. We are also working on other reward and progression systems for the game that tie into current and new content and features. As you know we care very much about your support and opinion and are listening intently to what you say."

- Chris Whiteside

(edited by Celesica.5790)