Guild Wars 2

This game isn’t, and has has never really been, about leveling. The only real point of it is so that you can learn your class as you level, but that’s not really all that important in GW2 and 20 levels is more than enough. My suggestion is that the level cap be reduced from 80 to 20. This would reduce the time it takes to level (which lets be honest. After 1 or 2 characters, leveling all the way to 80 gets as boring as watching paint dry, and I’m on number 6 now) while also adding the ability to more easily add new features such as an advanced or second class system. I never played GW1, but the level 20 max level sounds much better then the copy-paste 80 that currently exists.
Right now I feel like the game is trying to focus on 2 end games at the same time those being some gear treadmill(ascended) and some horizontal progression (rare skins/legendaries). Dividing your focus is a sure way to fail. I believe Anet needs to pick one and stick with it, and with this not being a traditional MMO, that focus needs to be the horizontal progression. Reducing the level cap enforces this path.
I know that there would be some hurdles to overcome with this change such as what to do with the personal story, but I feel like the game would be better off if it were done. I’d like to hear what everyone thinks about this. Please be courteous and thoughtful with your response so that we can make this game as good as it can be.

TLDR: Reduce the level cap from 80 to 20 because leveling is boring and that isn’t what this game is about.

No can do. Like any MMO such things are there to waste the time of the players and keep them logging in.

Same reason we are asked grind day after day foe stuff, such as in the Grindwastes.

No.

Taking up time is why an end game exists. Leveling can’t be used as such because there are many players who only have a single character.
As far as the Silverwastes goes, it needs some tweaks, but is a great start towards horizontal progression. You have new skins that you have to work to get. The zone isn’t about leveling up or getting gear with higher stats, it’s about getting those awesome new skins. A new set of weapon skins alike to the way we get armor skins there might round out those long waits between carapace and luminescent, but that is just a random thought.

Azhure.1857:

No.

Please refrain from one word responses as this is a discussion and these kind of replies add nothing to it.

While it’s a nice idea, this would require quite a large overhaul of pretty much the entire game, and the payoff isn’t really big enough to justify it.

There is only around 20 levels in the game. The rest of the numbers are padding.

i.e, level 32 – 1 Unidentified Dye. There is no character improvement at that so called level. It’s a swindle.

Source: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Level_rewards

It’s virtually impossible.
What would all the Heart Vendors sell?
Where would all the gear go that’s currently for sale on the TP?
What would we all craft that uses the materials in-between Green Wood Logs & Ancient Wood Logs (among the rest)?

There’s just too much overhaul, for virtually the same experience of what we already have, in my opinion.

Every dungeon and zone would require an overhaul. The downscaling system doesn’t quite cut it for something of this magnitude.

Lazaar.9123:

While it’s a nice idea, this would require quite a large overhaul of pretty much the entire game, and the payoff isn’t really big enough to justify it.

It would definitely take some work, but I don’t believe it would be as huge of an overhaul as you think.
-Traits would be awarded more frequently as you level but you would receive more earlier and it would be more balanced over the course of leveling then it currently is.
-Some item levels would be removed and then the levels would be scaled down (just the levels. The stats are fine)

There are many things that would need to be looked at, but it is more of a scaling issue than an overhaul.

The payoff here again would be the ability to more easily implement new level related systems into the game. 2nd classes, advanced classes, or even hybrid or multiclass features would be much more easily managed with 20 levels rather than 80. Players would also be much more inclined to create alts as they wouldn’t be thinking of a long wait to be able to do anything relevant. If Anet needs a monetary reason, players wanting more alts = more character slots from the TP = more money for Anet.

Why? All you’ll get with that is merely narrowing the leveling experience. Getting lots of things in less time.

You’ll be basically dividing everything by 4, and making 4 times the same stuff pop on level up.

If you want to level up alts faster, the game gives already plenty of ways to do that.

I support returning to 20 levels like it was in GW1, or even just get rid of them completely. There are lots of things I like about gaming and GW2 in particular, but watching levels go up ..in fact, needing them to …this is not one of those things I enjoy or ever have.

I don’t need 80 levels to “learn” my character, or even 20. I just need a bit of practice. When I pick up a new skill, I’ll practice with that too. We learn by doing, not by watching an arbitrary number go higher and higher. And the whole “keep us logging in” argument ..how about give us content and activties we can do, you know, actual reasons to want to logon, better reasons than “I have to grind my number up so I can compete / play with the cool kids”.

All that said, leveling is too tied into everything in this game. It’s hardly something they can go back on now even if they wanted to. The best we can hope for is they just don’t add even more of it.

Here’s an idea to throw on top of this. I mentioned advanced/2nd classes and the like. What if once you get to your choice of Vigil/OoW/Priory you unlock an advanced class for whatever one you choose that you advance in as you complete more of their missions? You also unlock the Pact Commander advanced class on joining the Pact. This removes the need to mess with the current story as you would still get your mission rewards as well as something a little more meaningful. Other events in the game could unlock more advanced classes, and you would be able to switch some skills with ones granted by your advanced class(s).

I don’t see this ever happening. If Heart of Thorns is an expansion, perhaps it will offer much faster leveling just like Factions and Nightfall did compared to Prophecies in Guild Wars 1. I can speculate all night, I just can’t wait for Saturday!

Tarrek.7436:

Here’s an idea to throw on top of this. I mentioned advanced/2nd classes and the like. What if once you get to your choice of Vigil/OoW/Priory you unlock an advanced class for whatever one you choose that you advance in as you complete more of their missions? You also unlock the Pact Commander advanced class on joining the Pact. This removes the need to mess with the current story as you would still get your mission rewards as well as something a little more meaningful. Other events in the game could unlock more advanced classes, and you would be able to switch some skills with ones granted by your advanced class(s).

+1
I miss the old multi-classing we had in GW1 and definitely support more options for how to build out our characters. Your idea is pretty cool. It would give more reason to actually play the personal story, and have it matter more which path you choose.

Tarrek.7436:

This game isn’t, and has has never really been, about leveling. The only real point of it is so that you can learn your class as you level, but that’s not really all that important in GW2 and 20 levels is more than enough. My suggestion is that the level cap be reduced from 80 to 20. This would reduce the time it takes to level (which lets be honest. After 1 or 2 characters, leveling all the way to 80 gets as boring as watching paint dry, and I’m on number 6 now) while also adding the ability to more easily add new features such as an advanced or second class system. I never played GW1, but the level 20 max level sounds much better then the copy-paste 80 that currently exists.
Right now I feel like the game is trying to focus on 2 end games at the same time those being some gear treadmill(ascended) and some horizontal progression (rare skins/legendaries). Dividing your focus is a sure way to fail. I believe Anet needs to pick one and stick with it, and with this not being a traditional MMO, that focus needs to be the horizontal progression. Reducing the level cap enforces this path.
I know that there would be some hurdles to overcome with this change such as what to do with the personal story, but I feel like the game would be better off if it were done. I’d like to hear what everyone thinks about this. Please be courteous and thoughtful with your response so that we can make this game as good as it can be.

TLDR: Reduce the level cap from 80 to 20 because leveling is boring and that isn’t what this game is about.

If you never played GW1, then you should. Its a great game. That being said, its in no way balanced at all for PvP – which seems to be one of their current main focus’ with all the tournaments going on. Its easier to balance 8 classes than it is to balance.. what, 72 if you include all class match ups and single classes? The balance would be so much worse. Then there’s how they’d do skills for multi-class characters…

Then the bugs that it would bring.. It would be a whole fiasco of problems.

As for Leveling to 80.. I don’t really see an issue with it. It doesn’t actually take long to do. I personally prefer to level in Edge of the Mists – that way I’m leveling up my character AND my account WvW level. It feels like I accomplish more doing that, and you can have some good and/or funny conversations in chat. It’s a lot better than leveling via crafting or map completing in my opinion.

Also, the game isn’t gonna fail. For that to be so, it would of had to of been shutdown in the year it launched. They’ve been doing this since 2012 – though its been improved over the years – and similarly been focusing on the same aspects of ‘end game’ since GW1. It worked for years in GW1 and its working in GW2, so their focus wont ever change. GW2 isn’t going anywhere any time soon. That’s just a fact. Unless someone goes directly to Anet’s servers and destroy’s them that is.

ArtemusHunter.9521:

Tarrek.7436:

This game isn’t, and has has never really been, about leveling. The only real point of it is so that you can learn your class as you level, but that’s not really all that important in GW2 and 20 levels is more than enough. My suggestion is that the level cap be reduced from 80 to 20. This would reduce the time it takes to level (which lets be honest. After 1 or 2 characters, leveling all the way to 80 gets as boring as watching paint dry, and I’m on number 6 now) while also adding the ability to more easily add new features such as an advanced or second class system. I never played GW1, but the level 20 max level sounds much better then the copy-paste 80 that currently exists.
Right now I feel like the game is trying to focus on 2 end games at the same time those being some gear treadmill(ascended) and some horizontal progression (rare skins/legendaries). Dividing your focus is a sure way to fail. I believe Anet needs to pick one and stick with it, and with this not being a traditional MMO, that focus needs to be the horizontal progression. Reducing the level cap enforces this path.
I know that there would be some hurdles to overcome with this change such as what to do with the personal story, but I feel like the game would be better off if it were done. I’d like to hear what everyone thinks about this. Please be courteous and thoughtful with your response so that we can make this game as good as it can be.

TLDR: Reduce the level cap from 80 to 20 because leveling is boring and that isn’t what this game is about.

If you never played GW1, then you should. Its a great game. That being said, its in no way balanced at all for PvP – which seems to be one of their current main focus’ with all the tournaments going on. Its easier to balance 8 classes than it is to balance.. what, 72 if you include all class match ups and single classes? The balance would be so much worse. Then there’s how they’d do skills for multi-class characters…

Then the bugs that it would bring.. It would be a whole fiasco of problems.

As for Leveling to 80.. I don’t really see an issue with it. It doesn’t actually take long to do. I personally prefer to level in Edge of the Mists – that way I’m leveling up my character AND my account WvW level. It feels like I accomplish more doing that, and you can have some good and/or funny conversations in chat. It’s a lot better than leveling via crafting or map completing in my opinion.

Also, the game isn’t gonna fail. For that to be so, it would of had to of been shutdown in the year it launched. They’ve been doing this since 2012 – though its been improved over the years – and similarly been focusing on the same aspects of ‘end game’ since GW1. It worked for years in GW1 and its working in GW2, so their focus wont ever change. GW2 isn’t going anywhere any time soon. That’s just a fact. Unless someone goes directly to Anet’s servers and destroy’s them that is.

I don’t actually believe that the game will fail. There are too many loyal fans myself included for that. That said, there could be so many more if they stopped trying to play at 2 opposing end goals.

To address your pvp concern, there is a very simple solution. Advanced classes would be limited or restricted altogether in structured pvp. Balance is something that is a tricky topic anyway. If all classes are exactly balanced with each other the game becomes boring. All classes need strengths and weaknesses and pvp needs to be balanced for the teams that should be playing alongside each other. Balancing for 1v1 isn’t the way to go.

EotM is a great place to level, but again, after 5 other characters it gets stale. Not to mention that you miss out on some good loot if you are stuck getting low level drops instead of possible ascended items or precursors or even level 80 crafting mats from those WvW levels.

I see them bringing in advanced classes in one way or another eventually, and working with 80 levels makes it all the more difficult to implement it in a mostly balanced way.

Op, why does the game have to play ONLY the way you want it to? I can take your mentality and go the other way. I would love to see them add levels and abilities.
TL:DR “No thank you. More levels are better than less.”

Cirran

GW2 is not GW1.

You want only 20 levels, play GW1 instead. For my experiences in this game, good and bad taken into account, I think I’d rather have GW1 but with GW2’s graphics.

leveling from 1-80 should be a little faster, and less restrictive but not reduced to 20, it wouldnt make any sense here. It would require completly reworking everything in the game, stats, mechanics, scaling everything. I think if the leveling were less tedious, a bit more faster and less restrictive more people would enjoy it.

Why stop at 20? Why not eliminate leveling all together?

@OP: Did you ever play GW1. That game was perfect EXCEPT for the level 20 cap. More levels means more room to grow and becomes stronger to overcome challenges. Even if it isn’t the point of the game, having a max level for weeks in GW1 and having an area I can’t beat simply because there’s no way for me to become stronger or better to get past it is poor game design.

No thanks. I have a lvl 80 of every class and it would all have been in vain if going by your suggestion.

Also, “leveling is boring and that’s not what the game is about” are both your opinion, keep that in mind.

This will never happen, ever.

Felkes.2759:

@OP: Did you ever play GW1. That game was perfect EXCEPT for the level 20 cap. More levels means more room to grow and becomes stronger to overcome challenges. Even if it isn’t the point of the game, having a max level for weeks in GW1 and having an area I can’t beat simply because there’s no way for me to become stronger or better to get past it is poor game design.

You beat things in GW1 by being smarter, not stronger. That was the point ..having OPTIONS, and figuring out how best to use them. Not just become “uber” and facerolling. That horizontal format was one of the best things about the franchise that made it different/better than the wow-clones. I’m sorry you couldn’t appreciate it.

I also have yet to see any vertical proponents acknowledge the fact that it’s an ILLUSION of power, because all it does it made everything else go up to compensate so you can still be challenged. So then you’re back to where you started.

Tarrek.7436:

ArtemusHunter.9521:

If you never played GW1, then you should. Its a great game. That being said, its in no way balanced at all for PvP – which seems to be one of their current main focus’ with all the tournaments going on. Its easier to balance 8 classes than it is to balance.. what, 72 if you include all class match ups and single classes? The balance would be so much worse. Then there’s how they’d do skills for multi-class characters…

Then the bugs that it would bring.. It would be a whole fiasco of problems.

As for Leveling to 80.. I don’t really see an issue with it. It doesn’t actually take long to do. I personally prefer to level in Edge of the Mists – that way I’m leveling up my character AND my account WvW level. It feels like I accomplish more doing that, and you can have some good and/or funny conversations in chat. It’s a lot better than leveling via crafting or map completing in my opinion.

Also, the game isn’t gonna fail. For that to be so, it would of had to of been shutdown in the year it launched. They’ve been doing this since 2012 – though its been improved over the years – and similarly been focusing on the same aspects of ‘end game’ since GW1. It worked for years in GW1 and its working in GW2, so their focus wont ever change. GW2 isn’t going anywhere any time soon. That’s just a fact. Unless someone goes directly to Anet’s servers and destroy’s them that is.

I don’t actually believe that the game will fail. There are too many loyal fans myself included for that. That said, there could be so many more if they stopped trying to play at 2 opposing end goals.

To address your pvp concern, there is a very simple solution. Advanced classes would be limited or restricted altogether in structured pvp. Balance is something that is a tricky topic anyway. If all classes are exactly balanced with each other the game becomes boring. All classes need strengths and weaknesses and pvp needs to be balanced for the teams that should be playing alongside each other. Balancing for 1v1 isn’t the way to go.

EotM is a great place to level, but again, after 5 other characters it gets stale. Not to mention that you miss out on some good loot if you are stuck getting low level drops instead of possible ascended items or precursors or even level 80 crafting mats from those WvW levels.

I see them bringing in advanced classes in one way or another eventually, and working with 80 levels makes it all the more difficult to implement it in a mostly balanced way.

If, and its a big if, they added advanced classes, which I’m assuming are similar to the secondary classes in gw1(IE: I mained a necro in GW1 and could secondary any other class in, like warrior or mesmer to make a Necro/Mesmer or w.e), then it would probably be implemented in a similar fashion as it was in GW1.

In GW1, you needed to choose your secondary profession and you were locked into that second profession. You could go to a guy, and have him change you to another profession, but it wasn’t until you were able to Ascend that you would freely be allowed to change professions. When you started a new character, you were eventually presented with the choice between various secondary professions; based on your starting location(vanilla or various expansion startings). Problems would be we can’t Ascend without communing with the Old Gods – who are completely silent. It’s possible that could change one day, but it won’t – for sure – be happening any time soon.

The thing is, there was no additional level for the secondary profession. That being said, there wouldn’t be an issue with them working with 80 levels. You would probably get to choose early on, a secondary, then work with that as you level – changing it if need be by visiting someone. The problems with sub classes isn’t the levels but rather the idea of them in general for GW2. Imagine people running around with +600 power instead of +300 via traits. Secondary classes means that. It would work the way GW1 worked, and people would have access to most of the secondary professions trait lines – which would mean the stat increases. Then there’s the issue of skills and unique class f1-4 skills being altered(because if they’re not, that’s a missed opportunity), then they would have to balance those 72 class combo’s and all the skills.

There would be no time left for content to be made lol. Its trouble enough already; I highly doubt they’d add secondary classes.

Oh and I’m in the same books as you, 5 80’s, halfway to my 6th, but you don’t miss out on much loot wise. Yeah you don’t get the higher tiers but the mid tiers tend to sell for a lot more. After leveling two outside of and before edge, I still find it preferable over PvE map completing. If you’re doing edge for levels, then your goal isn’t really mats or drops anyways. :P

Hi there,

In response to your idea I must start off by saying this. I am a player who’s had the luxury of playing the first Guild Wars, so I am talking from experience. Now I would rather keep the level 80 cap for Guild Wars 2, as opposed to decreasing it to level 20. The main reason why is because once you hit the max level in the original, there was nothing really to do after that, at least level wise. I’ve played most of the content in the original and it was good for what it is, but it essentially offered nothing for those players that liked grinding levels, hence they introduced a higher level cap in Guild Wars 2. Now another reason I also say this, with Guild Wars because the level cap is so low, you can very easily, without even pushing yourself real hard, obtain the max level within 1 day. If you go all out crazy though and push hard, you can get it within a few hours and I do mean literally a few hours. If you were to reduce the level cap in Guild Wars 2, it would essentially become another Guild Wars when it comes to leveling and I’d be pretty certain that they would lose a portion of their player base because of this (I would likely play far less if the cap was reduced). I will admit it does get a bit tedious after you’ve leveled your 4th character (I believe I am on to leveling my 11th character right now, with 10 level 80s at present. Also got to note that I don’t level hard out either, I level characters when I feel like it and at my own pace, so if I really wanted to level hard out, I would likely have somewhere in the vicinity of 15-20 level 80s), but I would rather have the level cap at 80, as this does provide me with something to do when I am in the mood for leveling up one of my characters. Of course for those that don’t like grinding levels in Guild Wars 2, there are some ways around this. One example is crafting. If you level all of your crafts to 400 you can obtain most of your levels from that and you can level them all to 400 within a day if you really try (1 hr to level each craft to 400 is pretty easy to do these days). Of course before they increased the crafting level cap to 500 on the majority of crafts, it was possible to level to 80 alone simply by maxing all of the crafts to 400, so that would’ve been a total of 8hrs spent to reach level 80.

Why do GW1 players think 20 is some kind of magic number? Frankly it does not matter at all. They picked 80, it could have been zero, 5, or 500.

Tarrek.7436:

This would reduce the time it takes to level

No it wouldn’t because everything involving experience would simply be divided by 4. GW2 went with many quick levels instead of long levels. Would you rather have it be level 20 @ 4 hours per level, or level 80 @ 1 hour per level? In the end, it’s only cosmetic. If they were to simply cut the cap to level 20 without any other changes, it would only take 2-3 hours to reach due to the NPE, people would complain about the lack of content and quit, even though they only played through Queensdale.

I liked the lvl mechanism of gw1 and the low max lvl.
Btw in that game mobs was interesting.

People already complain that there is nothing to do and you want to reduce levelling and this small gear progression we have? What else to do? Sorry, but some people just like to improve their characters over a long period of time. If you want instant-win characters go play Guild Wars 1 or some casual stuff.

A certain level of progression is necessary, otherwise people leave it and go to the next. No MMO can dish out constantly new story and content to please the crowd, they crave for more.

In gw1 it worked becouse U had only few tier weapon and armor. Starting, basic, best and exlusive (which has same stats as best, u can just give it to hom) In gw1 also more pressure was put in skills than in atribute points. (gw2 traits) And to be good player u needed specified build (temcomp) and what appear. Build needs skill that are only selled in location positioned in the middle of campaign. (and mostly u couldn’t run to that location without pulling campaign) And capturing elite skills.
And now imagine on gw2 where I can lvl to 20 just crafting or simple using scroll from birthsday. Now i have all traits and it’s just a matter of gold and vanqishing 2 first location (for skillpoint’s) to have 1 day character which can slay zythan. I maxed 3 characters and i have 2 another on half lvling. And the most. U can upgrade new character to 20 using scrolls and to 40 maxing one crafting way and even to 50something maxing next crafting way (using boost of coarse) Rest u’ll gain just pushing campaign.
Summarizing i think it takes to much effort to rescall everything to 20lvl and I think that a-net changed their mind about such low max lvl for some reasons.

This will never happen.
Please go back to Guild Wars 1, as this here seems not to be the right game for you, if you dislike traditional MMORPGs

Anet would have to redesign and rebalance for this crappy idea the complete game in absolutely every section.
This change would stand absolutely in no good cost/profit relationship at all.

I think Tarrek has some legit points in his suggestion although I would put it in a different format:
First of all, leveling in GW2 feels like a minor accomplishment, because you do it so often. Therefore a quick fix could be to just rename the “80” max-level to “20” max-level, and make each level require 4 times the amount of xp (and basically give 4x rewards etc.).
That way nothing in the core game would change, but each level would feel more like an accomplishment.

I like levels best when I don’t even notice them or have much reason to care what level I am. The more benign / non-existent, the better. It’s when they get in the way that they irk me.

When I used to play GW1, levels were never a concern. Often I didn’t even notice I’d leveled because I was having so much fun and that was such a minor detail. And it got maxed out so early while I still had SO much more game left to play. It felt good to not have that weighing on me and feeling like I was being held back from anything because of this arbitrary number. It was nice. The levels were there, but it wasn’t very many, and the gameplay did not revolve around them.

It’s the opposite in GW2 though. Everything is so tied to your level. You have to pay attention to the level range of zones to figure if you “should” go there. Your own personal story is level gated. And remember when they said in GW2 “the whole game is endgame”? Well as long as there are levels and all the “endgame” content is lvl 80, then no, that statement just isn’t true at all. Everything I “should” or even can do is limited by my level, and there are so kitten many of them to burn though.

I miss being able to just play and be immersed in the world and not be focused on my level number and what it says I can do. Can’t say it enough: levels don’t add to gameplay, they hinder it. I wish GW2 could recapture that essence of being able to just play and not even care to notice your exp bar and how many more levels there are to go.

Lazaar.9123:

Every dungeon and zone would require an overhaul. The downscaling system doesn’t quite cut it for something of this magnitude.

I’d have been just ducky with the idea if it’d been what the game was built around, though changing it to that now? Yep. It would impact so much so vastly that they’d have to remake a great deal of content from the ground up.

Don’t hope for something like this, OP. Anet’s never going to pull a remake on the order of what Squeenix did with FF14, I do not suspect.

There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to drop the level cap to 20. Why 20? Why not 40? Or 17? Or 4?

No, there’s no reason to drop the level cap to 20, though they could certainly make it easier to max out alts.

Marvel Heroes actually has an elegant solution to this. Each time a character reaches a certain milestone, it increments a stat that raises the amount of XP gained on any character, similar to Magic Find in this game. Each time you get any character to 1/2 cap, you get a global +1% XP gained. Each time you get one to ~70, you get another 3%. When you get any one character to cap, you get a full +30% buff, then another +20% for your second, 15% for the third, 10% for the forth, and 5% for every subsequent character.

If that same buff existed in GW2, then by this point everything in the game would be rewarding me 131% XP bonus on all activities, stacking with any other bonuses I might have. And on top of that, you can shut that feature off if you like, so if you do enjoy leveling a character casually, you can do so at the normal pace. I think it’d be a nice fit, perhaps an even higher buff, given how there are more levels to earn in GW2.

Oh, and as for “progression is needed to keep people in the game,” that isn’t really that true here. I’ve had a max-level character for over two years now, and a full eight for a year and a half, and I still play nightly. The fun in this game is in the various activities, and they are just as fun at level 80 as when leveling. The miracle is auto-downscaling, which allows a level 80 to play much lower level content without it being entirely trivial. I still think there’s value in the leveling process, since even experienced players should gradually get a feel for their character, but I don’t think it’s a vital element for locking players into the game like it might be on some other ones.

It’s not going to happen. They would have to redesign things and code it, from scaling to quests and events, dungeons, gear, stats, etc. It would be a arduous task to do, simply for changing numbers.

Kartel.2561:

Felkes.2759:

@OP: Did you ever play GW1. That game was perfect EXCEPT for the level 20 cap. More levels means more room to grow and becomes stronger to overcome challenges. Even if it isn’t the point of the game, having a max level for weeks in GW1 and having an area I can’t beat simply because there’s no way for me to become stronger or better to get past it is poor game design.

You beat things in GW1 by being smarter, not stronger. That was the point ..having OPTIONS, and figuring out how best to use them. Not just become “uber” and facerolling. That horizontal format was one of the best things about the franchise that made it different/better than the wow-clones. I’m sorry you couldn’t appreciate it.

I also have yet to see any vertical proponents acknowledge the fact that it’s an ILLUSION of power, because all it does it made everything else go up to compensate so you can still be challenged. So then you’re back to where you started.

LOL, well I have played GW1 and hit level 20 pretty quick. As for part of your statement “You beat things in GW1 by being smarter, not stronger.” UUhhhmmm no, you beat things in GW1 with cookie cutter builds. As for your intolerance for folks that like to level, with the way you insist on phrasing and boxing your argument, you make it impossible for anyone to “debate” you. You have the classic “I want what I want the way I want it and what you want is stupid.” You don’t want to discuss this you just want to say, “My way is best and the rest of you are wrong.”

Cirran

Great idea, since levelling doesn’t matter anyway, let’s just change the max level to 20 and introduce a concept i’d like to call quarter levels. It basically means you get the same level up rewards the scaling would stay the same. The only thing that would be changed is the numbers. level 1 will be 0.25 lvl 2 will be 0.50 etc.!

Seriously though, what does it really accomplish? You say levelling is boring, but I wager that levelling in prophecies from 1 to 20 takes the same amount of time as it will from 0 to 80 in GW2.

The level simply indicates the progression of your character through the world. What you’re basically asking for is already in the game for every other character. With level scrolls, skill point scrolls experience scrolls booster and all that stuff you can zoom to 80 pretty quickly.

The only argument why levelling is potentially bad is that it limits the player from going anywhere in the world while not needing to care about armor weapons and such. Which means that it makes the player conform to a progression speed that goes with the levelling speed.

So saying that levelling is boring, really doesn’t count as a good argument per say. It just means you’re too focussed on levelling to level 80. I’ve been there, and yes it’s really boring. But once I dropped that and invested time in progressing my character as a character through the world the levelling really stopped mattering all that much. But I must say it’s not that easy to do when you’re already thinking about that max armor and that lvl 80 build you want for your character.

In the end it’s just a matter of mindset I think.

As much as I can see a couple of benefits to the idea:

• Would fix many of the down-leveling issues, as mobs in all but the first and second tier zones could be adjusted to L80 mobs.
• The leveling benefits could be compressed into 20 levels rather than spread out over 80; the truly awful trait acquisition could then be done away with.

…it’s never a good idea to take something away from a gamer population.

40 would have been about right. 80 is too many.

DarcShriek.5829:

Why stop at 20? Why not eliminate leveling all together?

As this person says. What else is leveling than an illusion?
Think about it: what actually changes when you “level up”?

• The number on your experience bar.
  → What a change! The 9 changes into 10, the 10 changes into 11… ?
• You can play in other maps.
  → But you could already do that before you were level 80 right? And people who like exploring still do it past level 80 right?
• You can play dungeons.
  → Sadly, most people only play dungeons at level 80 anyways, and people who don’t match gear check level 80 full zerk 5-8-10k+ AP get kicked.
• The name colour of your gear goes from blue to green to yellow to orange to purple.
  → Oh wait, they could just scrap gear tiers too, because they don’t particularly mean anything for anyone not playing Fractals.
• You gain trait and skill points
  → Can easily be awarded through gameplay and in a large part already are obtainable either through a merchant or through completing challenges.

Levels mean nothing in themselves, they only serve as limiters for content. There are plenty of ways to do that without levels however.

This is a concept that needs to be floated about 3 years ago, when the game was still being developed.

You don’t just open a file and change a number from 80 to 20 and magically everything falls into place when you recompile the game.

What you want would require a massive amount of time and effort in both development and implementation, none of which would do anything but satisfy you and a few other customers.

The ROI would be the polar opposite of “income generation”.

Neural.1824:

This is a concept that needs to be floated about 3 years ago, when the game was still being developed.

You don’t just open a file and change a number from 80 to 20 and magically everything falls into place when you recompile the game.

What you want would require a massive amount of time and effort in both development and implementation, none of which would do anything but satisfy you and a few other customers.

The ROI would be the polar opposite of “income generation”.

Pretty much this. Yup.
And honestly, remember the last time they “took something from GW” and how that turned out. Leave the levels as they are.

Leveling as an arbitrary sense of progress has outlived its purpose. I’d agree that they should do away with levels altogether.

Traveller.7496:

Leveling as an arbitrary sense of progress has outlived its purpose. I’d agree that they should do away with levels altogether.

That would require even more work than just decreasing levels.

OP

When I first started playing GW2 I loved the high max level. After going through several characters and helping friends level I agree with you. Reducing it to 20 would allow me to play and enjoy the game more than grinding levels.

And I know “levels aren’t important in this game, blah blah blah” But the amount of gold wasted buying crap gear and missing key game features is a bit annoying.

One thing I will say about a high level cap is I do get a strong feeling of accomplishment when I hit 80.

Too late now grinding is excuse for lack of content and reason some want expansions. If a game focuses on “the real thing start at max level” will succeed over the one who divides content in levels which people skip… One that would have no levels and just pure exploration/content based on lore would reign supreme and can provide challenging pve everywhere with better pvp gear balance why has no one though of that? New mmos need to get rid of levels just like generic questing,gender lock… End the thread this would never happen that’s a rework on all the game while the class balance is ticking me off.

Edit: I’m biased on tab target.. BnS (and BDO) has soft lock but has great combat something like DN is too much compared to C9 … maybe GW3??

Honestly, leveling is easy and quick enough as it is. Making it take even less time takes away from the journey, which is the focus of GW2.