Guild Wars 2

APB: Reloaded takes 220hrs + to reach rank 196, WITH a premium paid for with real money that grants a bonus to progression.

Then there is another 60 levels, each one takes around 1 1/2 to 2 hours to complete.

This game is SO easy to level.

I don’t really agree with the OP.

Yes if 80 is your goal and you set out to achieve it asap, then yes, leveling can be a little slow. But only if you look at it from an absolute perspective.

Unlike most MMOs, leveling in GW2 doesn’t exclude you from most content. Sure, you might not have access to exotic gear but you can still partake in dungeons and most events. Getting there….aka map exploration is really what is holding people back.

Well, compared to other MMOs, GW2’s leveling is formula 1 racing speeds.

As for why its level 80 instead of level 20 now. No idea. Maybe they wanted you to go explore the world. Maybe they wanted level 80 characters to feel like an asset rather than just another random character. It is kind of annoying though.

Conncept.7638:

Really? This is the very first MMO I’ve ever been able to stomach getting a fully leveled character, and now I have two and about to be three.

This is the most insanely easy-to-level MMO I’ve ever played. I actually felt on my first char that it was going too fast, I was getting to 80 before I even really knew my class or explored the entire world.

You can get XP doing everything in GW2. Never seen that in a game before.

Never understand complaints like these. If you actually play, you get XP coming out of your ears.

Impatient people these days….

Clearing the starter zone maps as well as the city maps will easily have you at above lvl for the other maps by about 20 levels.

You want to level faster so you can enjoy these other maps is what it seems to me you are saying. So just enjoy those lower lvl maps so that you can be at the level (plus some) that you need to be to get to those other maps.

I have 9 chars now at lvl 80 and I can tell you getting to max level just from clearing maps only takes 1-2 weeks (depending on how many maps per day you can clear). This is how Anet intended for us to level along with doing the events in these maps while going along. Seriously what is the real rush here? Have fun as you go along. Nothing magical happens at level 80 I can tell you that….

Lastly you can level even quicker just playing events, crafting or just playing wvw (many events there if you go with the zerg or a group). There is also that horrid champ train in Queensdale, it’s good experience and cash.

I accidentally got to level 80. There I was, sitting there, minding my own business and enjoying the game and bam! I’m 80.
The only other game I can think of where this has happened is Guild Wars: Factions.

The game starts at level 1 not at level 80. If you’re someone who can’t find the leveling up process enjoyable – the part where you’re actually playing the game and the content – then please go find some other game and leave the rest of us alone.

Wow, if there was ever a topic for how lazy and spoiled the current generation of gamers is, this is it.
This game hands you exp for doing everything except blowing your nose. Reaching max level is fast and incredibly easy. You can do so with no effort nor coin spent. Why don’t we just make the max level 10?
I leveled a character to 40 buying gear once at level 20 running in a WvW zerg. It was so stressful just running and standing in circles. Seriously….how much easier do we want it to be?

MrRuin.9740:

Wow, if there was ever a topic for how lazy and spoiled the current generation of gamers is, this is it.
This game hands you exp for doing everything except blowing your nose. Reaching max level is fast and incredibly easy. You can do so with no effort nor coin spent. Why don’t we just make the max level 10?

Actually I would love that.
In GW1 the max level was 20 – across 3 campaigns and one expansion the level cap was never raised. Having a low level cap actually worked really well because it meant that all of the content was opened up to you. I think GW2 does a really good job of this with downscaling and like you have said it actually doesn’t take long to hit 80, when I hit 80 I was still in a level 40 zone…

Elmo Benchwarmer.3025:

Putting max level at 80 was in my humble opinion completely unnecessary. Level 40 or 50 would have been more than enough. You would just have earned your trait points in a much faster way, making it less tedious. The added advantage would have been more max level zones. (I didn’t forget downscaling but that is not well done either, since with a fully geared level 80 you can basically just wtfroflstomp through any explorable.)

The game is boring. The skills are boring. The fights are boring. It’s expensive to change builds (armor). Even if you do change your build, it’s still boring. The reason there are 80 levels and ascended gear is because the game has no substance.

I’m surprised that anyone would find the leveling of this game grindy. This is the only MMO that I know of, where you can just play the game, and level with everything you do. For comparison, I’ve played Dungeons and Dragons Online, where you have to strategically select your quests in the right order, to still get experience from them. And a friend of mine plays WOW, and leveling in that takes forever, and involves a lot of repetition.

There are some things in GW2 that clearly are grind (legendary weapons, Halloween weapons, ascended crafting, Fractals AR gear), but leveling isn’t one of them. If you’re not enjoying simply playing the game, and gaining levels with everything you do… then you’re just not enjoying the core game. I don’t know what to tell you.

OP, are you aware of the difference between hearts and DE’s. Dynamic events are one of the best ways to level..hearts are, and were always meant to be, supplementary. The idea of a heart is to keep you in an area where dynamic events occur. When events occur they often chain, so you get more than one. And often they complete hearts for you without doing the hearts.

If you’re just doing zone completion, you’re gimping yourself out of a lot of XP and karma.

cesmode.4257:

endless.1376:

Is that it is a pain in the butt to level. I have to practically do everything I can in a zone in order to progress. This concern is not at all mine alone. I have read many other concerns as such and hate having to chase down events, world bosses, and do all the exploration and story content I can in order to get enough xp just to get to the next zone. I would love it if you guys at Anet instead let people pick and choose their content and give them the xp boost they need to level faster just doing what they like.

Leveling in gw2 was the best leveling experience of any mmo. It is the engame thatis borderline atrocious…i.e. living story

Agreed…why in the world someone would want to rush through the fun part so they can get to the not fun endgame. But maybe this means there is a segment of customers I’m not part of…who have motivated the game developers to wreck games for people like me.

Ten years ago it was not uncommon to take a five hundred hours to get your first character to endgame…or in the case of everquest, leveling was the game and there was no endgame. I preferred that style, hands down, to playing Nintendo — or transient living story content — at endgame.

OP, it sounds like you need to be doing more events. Try this site to locate active events on your map. http://www.gw2state.com/events.html#. You have to select your server and the map of course.

milo.6942:

Elmo Benchwarmer.3025:

Putting max level at 80 was in my humble opinion completely unnecessary. Level 40 or 50 would have been more than enough. You would just have earned your trait points in a much faster way, making it less tedious. The added advantage would have been more max level zones. (I didn’t forget downscaling but that is not well done either, since with a fully geared level 80 you can basically just wtfroflstomp through any explorable.)

The game is boring. The skills are boring. The fights are boring. It’s expensive to change builds (armor). Even if you do change your build, it’s still boring. The reason there are 80 levels and ascended gear is because the game has no substance.

Seems like this is not the game for you, then, and faster leveling won’t solve your problem.

I can see where OP is coming from. Leveling your first character goes smoothly and without grind. But because of the ease to explore/quest around the entire map through the gates everything becomes old very quickly.

I already had cleared nearly everything to do in the charr and sylvari starter areas before i even made one. So when i did start to level a sylvari the area became boring very quickly.

Also leveling after 60 feels pointless because there isnt anything to unlock anymore. You already have all traits, all skill slots, elite skill slot. If they just changed the numbers of all 80 areas /gear to 60 it would make leveling seems more meaningfull.

Leveling a main is no problem its leveling alts which get boring very quickly. (and yes crafting falls under the ‘boring’ category to)

Sylv.5324:

milo.6942:

Elmo Benchwarmer.3025:

Putting max level at 80 was in my humble opinion completely unnecessary. Level 40 or 50 would have been more than enough. You would just have earned your trait points in a much faster way, making it less tedious. The added advantage would have been more max level zones. (I didn’t forget downscaling but that is not well done either, since with a fully geared level 80 you can basically just wtfroflstomp through any explorable.)

The game is boring. The skills are boring. The fights are boring. It’s expensive to change builds (armor). Even if you do change your build, it’s still boring. The reason there are 80 levels and ascended gear is because the game has no substance.

Seems like this is not the game for you, then, and faster leveling won’t solve your problem.

It isn’t, you’re right. My point was if you reduce the level cap, you will only arrive sooner at the “what do I do now” situation. Which I think anet anticipated, which is why there are 80 levels in the first place. There is no horizontal progression (and what little there used to be has been slowly strangled) and the combat for combat’s sake is unsatisfying. That is why they pour rewards into the living story stuff, so you will go there and be distracted by all the minigames and shallow story and not realize the core game is boring and simplistic.

I fell over, dusted myself off and was level 80, seriously it was that easy it even happened to all my alts before I could yell stop wait hold o……
Getting to 80 isn’t the problem, getting to 80 is the problem

The fact is, that this game offers an opportunity of making proximately 1 level per hour at a leisurely pace. I say fact because it has been proven, with the information linked all over these forums at one point. That is a pretty comparative pace to many MMOs but generally better then most.

Given that you can utilize other much faster forms of gaining levels, such as crafting, if you wanted to average things of that nature it, I am sure the average level gain would be much lower then originally exclaimed.

Having leveled six characters in WoW to max level (6 in cata, 2 in MoP), I have to admit that GW2 is much faster and less tedious leveling than WoW . However, personally, I don’t believe there is any need for traditional leveling in games. I would much prefer a tutorial that equipped you gear, gameplay, and lore-wise, and then simply launched you into your further adventures. Leveling itself sets a bad precedent if your intent is to scale a game horizontally, which is what I would prefer.

GW2 has hands-down one of the easiest, fastest leveling of any game. I don’t play a lot of hours and the fact I have 5 level 80s in one year is unheard of for me.

In contrast, I played Aion for one year as well and never hit level max (they kept increasing level max when I was literally 2 levels from max wtf), and I played Aion more per week than I play GW2.

I’m honestly curious what previous MMO experience those that feel leveling in GW2 is long and arduous have had.

I find leveling in GW2 similar to leveling in GW1: Prophecies. Slow, steady, and not capping out until close to the end, if you play linearly.

However, I did prefer the leveling in Factions and Nightfall… where you capped in the starter area and then had the vast majority of the rest of the game to play. The “mainland” areas of these 2 campaigns were designed for max characters, but this was likely because as many players would be making new characters as there would be people bringing over existing characters from the previous campaigns. When we get some more expansion type content, some new permanent zones, we may see more top level areas for us to branch out into.

I don’t really foresee any faster leveling options though. Not with how many levels exist in gw2 as compared to its predecessor.

GW1 and GW2 gets you to max level in couple of hours. Not using crafting or champ trains that is. If we would include the crafting and this only works if you’re not new to the game, since you won’t have the mats or gold to purchase it via tp, you can reach max level under an hour lol.

I’ve played many of games and even tho I’ve reached max level always pretty quick it could never be done under 2 – 5 hours and it defiantly was more effort and grind. GW2 is ridiculously easy when it comes to leveling and all the boosters they throw at you. Not to mention that the zones have no level requirement. You can enter them at any time, with up and down scaling or the help of some friends, even higher level zones without scaling can be done by a lower level. Most of the events have a repeat timer of 5 minutes. You can stay in a specific zone if you wanted and just do that for couple of hours and reach max level lol.

slurpey.6014:

I’ve played many of games and even tho I’ve reached max level always pretty quick it could never be done under 2 – 5 hours and it defiantly was more effort and grind. GW2 is ridiculously easy when it comes to leveling and all the boosters they throw at you. Not to mention that the zones have no level requirement. You can enter them at any time, with up and down scaling or the help of some friends, even higher level zones without scaling can be done by a lower level. Most of the events have a repeat timer of 5 minutes. You can stay in a specific zone if you wanted and just do that for couple of hours and reach max level lol.

FYI: zones do not up-scale. Instances sometimes up-scale, WvW up-scales, but zones definitely do not. At level 5 you cannot enter other zones that aren’t 1-15 without getting absolutely destroyed.

Draknar.5748:

FYI: zones do not up-scale. Instances sometimes up-scale, WvW up-scales, but zones definitely do not. At level 5 you cannot enter other zones that aren’t 1-15 without getting absolutely destroyed.

Yes you can enter those zones. There is not one restriction of entering zones that are not at your level. Other games would not let you enter this zone till you reach that level or finished a specific story to get there. That you getting face rolled is different, but you are not restricted of entering that zone.

To make this clear, I said zones would upscale you because specific living stories as the tower of nightmare for example, is not declared as a so called instance. And we have had plenty of those temporary stories implemented to the game.

slurpey.6014:

Draknar.5748:

FYI: zones do not up-scale. Instances sometimes up-scale, WvW up-scales, but zones definitely do not. At level 5 you cannot enter other zones that aren’t 1-15 without getting absolutely destroyed.

Yes you can enter those zones. There is not one restriction of entering zones that are not at your level. Other games would not let you enter this zone till you reach that level or finished a specific story to get there. That you getting face rolled is different, but you are not restricted of entering that zone.

To make this clear, I said zones would upscale you because specific living stories as the tower of nightmare for example, is not declared as a so called instance. And we have had plenty of those temporary stories implemented to the game.

EDIT: I am not addressing anything else you’ve brought up because I think the way scaling works is excellent.

The tower of nightmare is an instance. It is its own map, and you pass through a zone break to get into it.

A continuing issue with this game is that leveling is dependent on dynamic events, and said events are not easily discoverable unless you pretty much walk into them.

ANet pretty much designed GW2 leveling around GW1 community behavior, where after having done all the story lines and such your only real thing to do in PVE was to explore the instances. It appears that ANet designers thought this drive to explore would be the norm in GW2, and designed the game around it.

But this didn’t take into account how the community was self selecting. Those that didn’t enjoy exploring would have left the game once they were done with the stories, or were busy chain farming end game instances.

Exploring on your first toon is ok. But once you hit your second or third L80, you want to get it over and done with. And not being able to locate and complete events quickly makes the whole process tediously boring.

One would have thought GW2 would have finished what GW1 started and had no levels at all. A game totally based on build depth, skill hunting, and wanderlust exploration…

Instead they went the exact opposite and increased the grind fourfold. /facepalm

Jaed.9823:

Name one other game where the AVERAGE rate of reaching max level is 5 days

I would love to see the data (and source) demonstrating that the average time to reach max level in GW2 is five days.

You should try getting 99 in every skill in RuneScape. Then come back and say this takes forever.

I will just copy/paste my older post here, so some of the post may be confusing (hard to edit using tablet). Here it is:

I believe I responded to one of the thread the OP made, and like I said, I support the Insta-80 only if Anet can do some sort of time gating or fix requirement.

One example I provided was, the player wishing to be insta 80, must have leveled a character to 80 the traditional way. This ensure that the player have basic understanding of the game: crafting, teleporting, where’s L.A., what is a dungeon, wvwv, etc. All the basics, from doing DEs, to completing hearts, to salvaging to forging.

Also, a totally NEW player, aside from having a Lv80, must have played his character for at least 240hrs (4hrs for 60days) to be eligible to purchase that Insta-80.
In HoM, players are all Lv80 anyway. So for those saying everyone doing an alt MUST be hand leveling it “the newbie” way to learn the class is missing the point because anyone and everyone can learn their class in HoM because they have full access to utilities and skills. Note: I said learning, not mastering. And even if a player has hand-leveld his character to 80, I have seen a lot of them not knowing how to cast their skills for the right situation. However, they do learn it, in time.

As for those saying exploration? Well, you can still do that, no one prevents anyone from visiting a new place unexplored on the new character. And because a new Lv80 is a new character, EXPLORATION is bound to happen coz all of the maps is not explored! The scroll is not about insta “world map completion”.

As for baddies: you can’t remove this. There will always be bad players, period. Will they improve? Of course, but they aren’t baddies because they’re insta 80.
So the point is:
1. Insta 80, only for those who qualify (i.e. hand lvled an 80 and/or met the minimum play time, and/or did a full dungeon, and/or did a 100% map completion)
2. Insta 80, isnt insta 100 map completion
3. Insta 80, will make vet players go right to the action: learn the new class (if they haven’t yet) thru maximizing traits and weapons
4. Insta 80, is an option, and Anet must make it an expensive option (3000gems-4000 gems) so players can’t spam alts or abuse this system.. There must also a time-gate, i.e. limit 1 insta 80 per month.
5. Insta 80 doesn’t make you a bad player, the players play their characters badly. And with teh time gate and requirement, the only thing making the player play the character bad, is themselves. I mean, if you have 240hrs (2mos or 60 days, assuming 4hrs game play everyday), players should at least grasp the basics of the game.

Phy.2913:

It’s a very literal question “why do you need 80?” You, as a supporter of this thread, need to make arguments to support the idea. Complaining that you feel leveling is boring and/or tedious isn’t a good argument when the goal of this game is to keep you around for as long as possible.

But what if your business model isn’t one based on a subscription, and your content-design motivations aren’t driven by creating mechanics to keep people playing as long as possible? When looking at content design for Guild Wars 2, we’ve tried to ask the question: What if the development of the game was based on…wait for it…fun?

Hayashi.3416:

You should try getting 99 in every skill in RuneScape. Then come back and say this takes forever.

They have no idea the difference between these games with regards to this. I played that game on and off since 2001 and I had all but a few at 99 and I got a lot of those close to 99 even way back on classic. These people would cry if they knew how painful classic grinding was. Even RS2 was a heck of a lot easier and came no where near close, so people playing that game now have no idea and have it a lot easier. :P

Should play a game like Lineage 2 if you think the leveling is slow here

and what’s the rush to getting to max level anyway?

I can’t understand why people want it to be hard to get to 80, mmos have been out for a long time and alot of us are sick of the process, it’s nothing new, I crafted my 2 alts to 80 and as much as I want another 80 it’s not worth taking time away from what I actually play the game for, WvW and fractals, as an experienced mmo player the whole levelling part of the game might as well be a whole other game entirely.

I’ve had several friends choose to not get into gw2 because of the levelling, they just wanted to WvW and it doesn’t work out as a lowbie the way we play.

At least those of us who have got to 80 ‘the right way’ whatever thats really worth should have a much easier path to get alts up. I understand the arguement that new players should learn their class before jumping in lev 80 content and agree to a certain extent.

To people saying how super easy it is to level up also may want to realize some people only get a couple of hours to play every few nights and they have other games they enjoy.. it’s not just that it takes time but that for alot of mmo players levelling up in pve is extremely boring, I LOVE this game but I can’t stomach the thought of having to level up in the game world again.

There should have never been levels in the first place.

Crysto.7089:

There should have never been levels in the first place.

What should they have done?

If you can’t play that often an MMO is not for you. People need to realize that. These kinds of games are social games that become a time investment.

Solution:

Wait for a nightcapping session in WvW. Everybody’s gone to sleep mostly except for the hardcore WvW imsomniacs, so you get easily about 7 levels per night just by constantly capping all of EB.

During the day do the dungeons you normally do, except switch in your alt at the end for 1.5 levels.

slurpey.6014:

Draknar.5748:

FYI: zones do not up-scale. Instances sometimes up-scale, WvW up-scales, but zones definitely do not. At level 5 you cannot enter other zones that aren’t 1-15 without getting absolutely destroyed.

Yes you can enter those zones. There is not one restriction of entering zones that are not at your level. Other games would not let you enter this zone till you reach that level or finished a specific story to get there. That you getting face rolled is different, but you are not restricted of entering that zone.

To make this clear, I said zones would upscale you because specific living stories as the tower of nightmare for example, is not declared as a so called instance. And we have had plenty of those temporary stories implemented to the game.

I didn’t say you couldn’t enter the zone, I said you would be absolutely destroyed if you did. GW2 is pretty unforgiving when the level disparity is above 3-4.

Also, Kessex Hills does not upscale you at all, entering the Tower of Nightmare instance upscales you. It is an instance and is declared as such. It just has other instances inside of it.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the scaling in this game, but some of what you said was just incorrect.

I don’t believe I ever said it was hard to get to level 80, nor was it grindy. Maybe something I said was misconstrued somehow yet again.

zenleto.6179:

Crysto.7089:

There should have never been levels in the first place.

What should they have done?

You simply gain skill points as you fill the bar with your traits already unlocked and all areas are of the same “level.”

Crysto.7089:

zenleto.6179:

Crysto.7089:

There should have never been levels in the first place.

What should they have done?

You simply gain skill points as you fill the bar with your traits already unlocked and all areas are of the same “level.”

They tried it early beta testing, it was changed to levels because people did not like it.

Yargesh.4965:

Crysto.7089:

zenleto.6179:

Crysto.7089:

There should have never been levels in the first place.

What should they have done?

You simply gain skill points as you fill the bar with your traits already unlocked and all areas are of the same “level.”

They tried it early beta testing, it was changed to levels because people did not like it.

Those people were wrong, as evidenced by the game’s mostly empty maps outside orr and metaboss spawning grounds.

This is what you get when you introduce levels: wasted assets.

Zenith.7301:

Yargesh.4965:

Crysto.7089:

zenleto.6179:

Crysto.7089:

There should have never been levels in the first place.

What should they have done?

You simply gain skill points as you fill the bar with your traits already unlocked and all areas are of the same “level.”

They tried it early beta testing, it was changed to levels because people did not like it.

Those people were wrong, as evidenced by the game’s mostly empty maps outside orr and metaboss spawning grounds.

This is what you get when you introduce levels: wasted assets.

Ah well, good thing you will change all that when your game comes out.

Draknar.5748:

I’m honestly curious what previous MMO experience those that feel leveling in GW2 is long and arduous have had.

GW1, Runescape and cabal online. The last two becoming so tedious for that i never reached max level. The first being so +varied gameplay because i had many alts that i played for years.

You could reach max level in a few hours.

Only way i see that happening in gw2 is crafting…alot.

To add to my previous post i just want to try out and experiment (with all tools) with all the professions (and that one of the few things i would spend real money on: character slots) without going through the same starter that ive already seen plenty of times.

endless.1376:

Is that it is a pain in the butt to level. I have to practically do everything I can in a zone in order to progress. This concern is not at all mine alone. I have read many other concerns as such and hate having to chase down events, world bosses, and do all the exploration and story content I can in order to get enough xp just to get to the next zone. I would love it if you guys at Anet instead let people pick and choose their content and give them the xp boost they need to level faster just doing what they like.

My main is lvl 80 and has 280 spare skill points. I am currently up to lvl 20 in the story mode. I have a character in queens dale that is lvl 65 and never left queensdale. I am not sure where your complaint is coming from?

Yargesh.4965:

Crysto.7089:

You simply gain skill points as you fill the bar with your traits already unlocked and all areas are of the same “level.”

They tried it early beta testing, it was changed to levels because people did not like it.

Of course people didn’t like it: they’d be taking out any meaningful progression out of the game.

It was a wrong solution to the wrong problem.

What they needed to do was implement a system of progression that is not tied to math behind each encounter. In fact, that’s what they needed to do even if they did – the game still lacks progression and direction in most respects.

Even WoW with its huge array of dumb fetch quests knows better. Quests give the player direction and incentive, and they enable progression. It’s not the best of solutions, but it’s better than nothing.

endless.1376:

Is that it is a pain in the butt to level. I have to practically do everything I can in a zone in order to progress. This concern is not at all mine alone. I have read many other concerns as such and hate having to chase down events, world bosses, and do all the exploration and story content I can in order to get enough xp just to get to the next zone. I would love it if you guys at Anet instead let people pick and choose their content and give them the xp boost they need to level faster just doing what they like.

See this is the problem with MMOs today. Players want everything NOW and not have to work for it. Something that everyone needs to remember too is even with the new LS content you only really need to be lvl30 to participate. I reached lvl 80 on all 3 of my toons before I finished Mount Maelstrom zone. That still left me 20-25% of the story to do and ALL the dungeons.

I remember when Anet released Factions and you could get to 20 in about 3hrs. People complained it was too quick. So when the release Nightfall they made it take about 8hrs to level. You still had to work for it tho, clear each zone, do the missions, etc.

Guhracie.3419:

Are people really trying to say that it’s easier to level in WoW than it is in GW2?

Uhhh no. I play WoW alot. and GW2 is definitely faster to max level. Even with the new fast tracks. Now when you buy the next expansion you’ll get a free level any one character to 90 instantly. But yeah GW2s leveling is way faster.