Guild Wars 2

showatt.9413:

chronus.1326:

showatt.9413:

I really don’t see what’s so wrong about dev hyping up their game. I mean it’s not like Anet pulled a Peter Molyneux on us and created a gear that’s grossly overpowered to the previous tier.

It integrated a kind of a community that was outside of the francishe so far, and whose needs are directly opposing the policy of the game and what we were used to and what we liked.

There isn’t a single Guild Wars player who throughout the 7 years of the game wanted vertical progression in an way, shape, or form.

The people who want this thing are the very people whose reinforcements this francise tried to stop by being different and making the difference popular.

Any move backwards, no matter how small, shows the highest ammount of wrong that we canever get in the developement: that this prime directive was thrown out in favor of more cash.

It doesn’t even matter how subtle they want to go with it (they did say that this is just the beginning). The problem is that at this point we should be already heading even farther away from this type of gameplay.

People aren’t raging because of the size of this step.
They do because it is the worst possible direction.

We should be already full-speed into the opposite direction. That was what Guild Wars was about!

Except how will we know it’s the worst possible ‘direction"?
GW1 think gear progression will ruin the game, yet games with hardcore progression like Wow still strives ( and is actually in better shape than Anet atm, I’d say, given how many of my guildies have quitted to play Panda)

It’s only the worst direction if the community doesn’t give Anet a chance to reach out to new audiences. It’s only heading in the worst direction if all the GW1 fan decided gw2 isn’t worth it because it’s not their ’perfect GW1 clone" and quit.

Whether or not this game is heading towards a bad direction or not depends entirely players and not the design itself, as none of the new designs are actually game breaking.

Long story short, have a little faith in the dev who brought you GW1. Give them some time to try new things instead of melting down whenever a change is coming.

Yes, and WoW is also the only gearbased game that lives. Every other geargrind game that was released after it died or was reduced to a skeleton crew to serve a very small playerbase of the last few remaining core players. Fact is that so far every game that tried to take WoW head-on died a painful death.

NoobOnSteroid.7192:

showatt.9413:

Whether or not this game is heading towards a bad direction or not depends entirely players and not the design itself, as none of the new designs are actually game breaking.

If their new choices go directly against everything they’ve said about the game in the years leading up to release, you might say it’s going in a bad direction.

Not so much because it completely ruins the game (I’m pretty sure a lot of people will just keep on playing), but because you’re undermining the trust your own audience has in you. I’m disappointed, and I cannot see any reason for buffed stats on the new items. Ascended could just as well be a copy of exotic/legendary, outfitted for the new dungeon (with the addition of a “harmless” dungeon-only infusion slot).

I for one CAN see the reason for a buffed stat – to accommodate harder dungeons and make existing dungeons SLIGHTLY easier to do.

Naysayer will be the only reason why this game fails – if it ever does.
Not the design.

Because – as much as everyone of you hated what’s coming – you have to admit gw2 is a well designed game, unlike Swtor, where you start lagging when more than 20 people are playing in the same area.

The game works perfectly.
Players who welcome the changes will help the game open to new possibility and venture into the unknown, while the naysayer who keep repeating how they’ve been cheated or how gear progression is bad like a broken record, will lead the game to its downfall.

So?

Are you gonna come on board and enjoy the ride, regardless of the direction that the ship is heading and constructively helping the developers to navigate this ship?

Or are you gonna stand on the shore and screaming and shouting ‘traitors’ and cling onto your belief that Gw2 is better off as just another GW1 clone and that no change is best change?

fourpoundburrito.1698:

I realize the gear can be used in WvWvW, but I what I am hoping is that the infusions have very dungeon specific purposes so that the gear is actually on equal terms with current superior runed / upgraded exotics. If that isn’t the case, IMHO Anet is making a big mistake by adding a new tier.

Well, then for what it’s worth, look at the examples posted in the blogposts. And those carry a hefty increase in magicfind, which, converted to somethiing useful, comes out at at least an 8% upgrade to the stats.

Ignoring infusion.

Whatever infusions might add is not even factored into those 8%. Read up first, please.

yup, +7 crit dmg will faq things up with more 10k dmgs on squishies

It’s power/precision/magic find, I don’t care how hard you hit if you’re rolling with those 3 stats in Wv3 you’re going to get 2 shot by everyone.

Sdric.8526:

Disable Ascended gear for WvW!

Ascended Gear, as well as the announced item progression, cuts of casual gamers and working/Studying people from competitive WvW.

Unless you don’t/can’t >waste< your time to grind this gear each month, you’re cut of the endgame content.
The kind of endgame content which was announced to be grind-free, standing above all other MMOs.
—————————————————————————————-

If Ascended Gear stays PvE-only most people won’t have a problem with that.
Maybe even accept it as a motivation.

But: As soon as it becomes a must have for WvW, it splitts the playerbase.

Agreed, I could still see myself playing if this didn’t have an effect on WvW, even if it does turn into a grind. But if I have to grind just to reach parity with somebody else in my favored form of PvP, then it’s over.

It’d be just like WAR, or WoW’s asinine resilience stat. An artificial separation between those that have the time to grind and those that don’t, and one that gets constantly worse as the game gets older.

To those saying it’s just a a measly 15 point difference on that one ring, how big will that be if they expand this to a full set of ascended gear? 100-200 over someone with exotics it a significant difference, one that will certainly turn the tide in an otherwise evenly matched battle.

I really hope that when it all comes out the ascended gear balances against exotics with a full superior rune set, or the stat bonus over exotics only applies in the fractal dungeon, or something. Cause as it stands I’d be basically done with this game if it turns into another time wasting grind just to keep pace with opponents in WvW. Hopefully Anet will address those concerns somehow.

Crapgame.6519 yes eventually they will add all the parts…that’s what…24 stats above exotics? I really dont think that will make anyone OP in wvwvw…
Or even better than the avg joe in exotics doing a dungeon. The infusions on the other hand were purposefully put in to gate people in the new dungeon, i would be more worried about that.

Korrigan.4837:

Floryn.6307:

Bottom line: You can’t change human nature, there is a need for a carrot and skins were not it.

People played and still play games like UO or AC1, which are without a gear carrot. It’s WoW (and EQ) and its clones who made people feel they can’t play games for fun anymore, but that they need some kind of virtual purple item at the end of a grind instead.

Generalizations are always bad, even when you are knowing the topic you make the generalization about quite well. They are even worse when you don’t know the topic, aka when the only possible MMO model for you is a gear grind based WoW clone.

Yep, people don’t NEED a statistically superior gear carrot to play a game long term. They just want something to work for, and that is valid.

But that something does NOT have to be statistically superior gear. And like you say Korrigan, UO and other games offered this carrot with things like housing as a long-term goal.

I made a thread (which has no responses lol) to discuss what other ways GW2 could offer gear progression without having statistically superior gear. I’m guessing that people are just generally too upset now to discuss that, but I think it’s an interesting topic.

Peetee.9406:

It’s power/precision/magic find, I don’t care how hard you hit if you’re rolling with those 3 stats in Wv3 you’re going to get 2 shot by everyone.

There is absolutely no reason to believe that the example they posted is the only stat combination.

HTXL.2598:

Why,

why is everyone acting like the world has ended.

Hmm, probably because they just found out that they have been cheated and lied to for years.

I’ve got family in the philippines happy they have a kittening computer.

Algreg.3629:

showatt.9413:

Algreg.3629:

showatt.9413:

7kitten ;Algreg.3629:

showatt.9413:

fixit.7189:

Wow, this thread is a mess. They are cramming anything related to this topic right into this one and making it even more confusing than it already is. What real dev is going to even bother reading it now? lol.

It’s actually best that they don’t.

honestly most people here are all about GW1 and wanting to make the game exclusive to GW1 fans.

They don’t want to game to reach out to a new market – instead they’re happy to close their eye and pretend the game isn’t dying because the lack of progression.

Gw2 is nothing like Gw1, which is why the “diehard” gw1 fans have already gone back to gw1.

Gw2 is a game on its own, and it has attracted not only gw1 fans but also fans of other MMO. to satisfy everyone’s need, compromises have to be made. It’s really sad how most of the community doesn’t seem to understand that.

well, then it would have been rather up front of them to say “we are making a WoW-hybrid with lots of grinding” instead of boasting for years “we will reinvent the genre and there will be no powercreep and gear treadmill”, wouldn´t you agree?

But then less people will buy their game.

Have you ever heard of a guy called Peter Molyneux?

haha, while that wasn´t actually any defense of this kind of behaviour AT ALL, it was totally hilarious, thanks for giving me a great laugh Yeah, it is actually pretty Molyneuxesque – well, short of promising world peace and stuff.

lmao there’s no defense for marketing strategy lol it is what it is.

If you ever make a game, you are sure to hype it up as much as possible.

If you don’t, you make less money.

That’s reality.

well, actually I have some background in this, so this is not new to me. But you can also severly burn your brand/name acting like this. Though computer players seem to be rather forgiving when it comes to that.

Aye, they certainly do lmao

Consider Peter Molyneux still managed to coax player into buying Fable 2 AND 3 even after screwing up big time in Fable 1, I’d call that a successful strategy.

Still, the guy is a joke and only 10% of what he says can be taken seriously – not because he did this sort of stunt once, but because he does this with every single game he makes.

As long as Anet doesn’t become like that, I’m pretty sure most ppl will be willing to forgive them.

After all we’re gamers.

Anet makes our game.

Because it’s dropped off the thread:

Yakkington’s ring isn’t 2, or 8, points better than the exotic.

MF costs stat points (compare a MF ring to one with just stats). The extra MF on Yakkington’s Ring is worth 67 stat points, so the ascended item is at least 77 stat points better than the exotic. If infusions offer any benefit outside of the new dungeon, that number just grows.

Floryn.6307:

Hickeroar.9734:

ratatonga.9468:

just because the minority of players wines about getting bored doesnt mean that the vast majority of the community want that too.

contribution to the topic: better skins is nice but not better stats…

You’ve got it COMPLETELY backwards. The Majority of customers wanted it to stay just as it was. The small vocal minority whined so much that ANet has now taken steps that very well may hamper the game for the majority of people who liked it just how it was.

That’s because 90% of the guild mates and friends of that “small vocal minority” simply stopped logging instead of saying anything.

Bottom line: You can’t change human nature, there is a need for a carrot and skins were not it.

Problem?
There is no subscription, you can stop playing whenever you wish. If you’re friends do not find any motivation to play, they stopped playing and didn’t. That’s the right way to go.
If you don’t like it, stop playing it. Why qq about nothing left to do? No one forces you to play.

84 pages in which most of the people are raging about these new items, in a game that was promised to have no gear treadmill, just because people that cannot accept that this game might not be for them qq’ed.

Who are thos people that need to adjust to this kitten now? Those loyal people that didnt qq and got what they paid for.

HTXL.2598:

Why,

why is everyone acting like the world has ended.

First World Problems

First World Problems is the most bullkitten phrase to arise in the last years to dismiss an argument.

jboynton.7894:

Crackbone.5710:

Either you get with the program, that progression is needed and it’s needed now, or you can kiss Guild Wars 2 completely goodbye.

This game needs a carrot that’s not Legendaries. Folks, if you think that this isn’t being done because they are having a retention problem, then you need to look again.

If ArenaNet doesn’t put something in there to keep people playing, and quickly, GW2 is toast. I love the game, but that’s just the truth.

Where are you getting this data from?

Experience.

You don’t change your basic and core philosophy midstream, on a dime, without some external force. If things are humming right along as expected, we wouldn’t be seeing this change now.

Typically it’s money that’s the driving force. They likely have internal data that suggests their retention isn’t where they want it and therefore are introducing this vertical progression mechanic as a way to keep people engaged. Furthermore, the infusion mechanic is a gate to keep folks from burning through the new content at the rate they have been.

Mists of Pandaria is looking pretty good now, I don’t like the subscription fee but the way the GW2 economy is going, it’d probably work out cheaper in the long run. Then there’s the whole thing about WoW being exactly what it says on the box. Always wanted a reason to go resurrect my Worgen Rogue =)

1. Legendaries are exactly equivalent to top tier (currently exotics). If you think anything else, reread the ascended gear devblog post.

2. The minor stat difference between exotic and ascended is similar to the difference between rare and exotic. I assume, then, most players are content with rares with no desire to upgrade?

3. The ascended devblog post indicates ascended as the next tier of armor. The piece of gear used as an example happened to be explorer gear. If they posted rampage gear, would the argument be: It’s only rampage gear everything else is fine and not changing? Infusion slots are the only thing that is supposed to be specifically for the new dungeon. Let’s hope that doesn’t change. Should ascended upgrades be introduced, then we’ll find exotics possibly match ascended gear. Until then, having an upgrade slot doesn’t matter, when the ascended base stats are better than exotics with an exotic upgrade.

1. Most importantly, already introducing a new tier of gear this early in the game does not bode well for those of us who wished to avoid the gear grind of MMOs past. It’s too early to tell, but I, as with most against this, are fearful of what the future holds. Should this happen again, there will be no doubt as to Arenanet’s intent. Until then, I will revert to a wait and see approach, as apposed to the going all in approach I had adopted.

Has a dev actually commented as to where they’re going with this? Yes, I know they did the blog post but it doesn’t actually answer any of the concerns. The sample in the post doesn’t concern me. I would really rather not see Guildwars 2 become another grind. If I wanted to grind I’d still be playing Aion which is now F2P. Seriously, if endgame grind is what does it for you why play a game that was advertised as grind free and then complain because you have nothing to grind away your time on.

And as far as Guildwars 1 players go, I’m a Guildwars 1 player myself. I will be highly disappointed in the developers if they do introduce a gear treadmill into this game just as much as any other Guildwars 1 player, but I am also willing to wait and see how it goes. The Mursaat were in Tyria from the beginning and required infusion if you didn’t want them 2 shotting you.

I understand that it makes a lot of us who were looking specifically for a non-grind skill based game very uneasy to see any kind of gear progression introduced into a game that was advertised as grind free not even 3 full months after release, but calm down and see how it’s implemented before going off the deep end.

That said, I would also recommend to Anet that in the future they are a little more careful about publicity. All of this forum mess could have been avoided with an official statement from someone. For the most part I don’t pay attention to the media on the game. After the idiotic comment about “being forced to heal” I just decided that it wasn’t worth it if they couldn’t find someone with a little more diplomacy, tact, and common sense to represent them in public relations.

I realise that this isn’t Guildwars 1 but why throw out the good things about the game like actually informing your players what’s going on instead of leaving them in the dark and magnifying things all out of proportion to reality. I really hope someone see this and acts on it.

No, it means you’re ungrateful.

This is taking angry mob proportions. Thinking it is probably just Ninja it and not announce anything. Think it is slight out of control, given the very little information that is given we can’t say much. On exotic armor I am able to put runes, if I cant put runes on these sets then maybe it worse. E.g., the fury and might that rune of pack can give is more important.

I don’t see it as bad because it sounds like it’s only one step in-between.

I’m pretty sure Anet is not only doing things according to feedback on the forums but according to their internal statistics.
At the end of the day the legendaries are still the end of it – so putting some steps in-between, as long as they don’t interfere with that “end-goal” should make no difference, on the contrary it will let us all accomplish something on the way to the legendaries.

To me that makes sense.

pregnable.1954:

FooKFiGhTeR.8153:

Skimmed through this thread as far as I can see this is all speculations.

First and foremost this isn’t a gear treadmill, and GW2 do not require a constant

number in their gamer population. This game is meant to be played by setting goals

and going for it. That is why its not a sub based game in the first place. The devs don’t

even require to bring in a new tier so early on in the game stage but the fact they do

means they got alot more stuffs installed.

If a minority of the population are still in denial and hate the changes or progression

however its called. It might be the time to take a break and maybe come back to Tyria

in a couple of months.

WvW uses pve gear.

Have spent my fair share in WvW and trust me the amount of damage you input isn’t a factor that is just based on a couple of stat points. If your finding yourself in 1v1 situations in your world, your just doing it wrong.

HTXL.2598:

Why,

why is everyone acting like the world has ended.

First World Problems

well, that is a silly comment when it comes to computer games – yes, there are way more important and more pressing things even in my first world life than GW2, and? We are discussing a game and hence the problems are petty compared to real life. You want the international Medal of Wisdom now or something? Probably the one on the other end of the spectrum seems more becoming.

ratatonga.9468:

just because the minority of players wines about getting bored doesnt mean that the vast majority of the community want that too.

contribution to the topic: better skins is nice but not better stats…

better skins = subjective.

Better stat = universal.

I really don’t see what’s so bad about being able to grind for better gears considering the only place you can use it is during wvw and lets face it WVW is never about skills – whoever’s got more coverage or bigger zerg pretty much wins.

Feel like saying “BUT THEY PROMISED!!!”?

well too bad. It was a marketing strat.
People say whatever they want to sell their product.

People also find out that their original philosophy isn’t working out as well as they had thought it would.

Long story short – People change.

So does Game.

I want GvG
I want PvP and Wv3 ladders/elo system
I want “cool” skins
I want more skills like gw1 was
I want bug fixes

I DON’T want more %stat…

When I read about the “Ascended” gear all I could think about was “Gear Grind”. No Thanks.

What I like about the game at this point is that I can gear all my characters in basic exotics and then enjoy the game on each of them. I can add legendary weapon skins for eye-candy and that’s a nice enough carrot.

This was supposed to be a game for the masses that didn’t have a grind, you enjoy it from day one. Like in every other game, the “hardcore” players are the minority. They’ll flee to the next game, don’t disrupt the game for the rest of us to cater to them.

MrLee.6892:

I get it, you’re always right nobody else is.
Not to mention people have been asking for a type of gear progression from the start.

Nonono, people have been asking to keep it out from the start. And Anet, for years, assured those people that it would never add gear treadmills to its game.

I’d be angry to if I just found out I have been cheated and lied to for years. In fact I am.

They lied to us for years.

/Thread

@Waar Kijk Je Naar. nobody asked for? So you speak for the entire GW2 community? I want it, so apparently you don’t speak for me.

phooka.4295:

fourpoundburrito.1698:

I realize the gear can be used in WvWvW, but I what I am hoping is that the infusions have very dungeon specific purposes so that the gear is actually on equal terms with current superior runed / upgraded exotics. If that isn’t the case, IMHO Anet is making a big mistake by adding a new tier.

Well, then for what it’s worth, look at the examples posted in the blogposts. And those carry a hefty increase in magicfind, which, converted to somethiing useful, comes out at at least an 8% upgrade to the stats.

Ignoring infusion.

Whatever infusions might add is not even factored into those 8%. Read up first, please.

I think it is good that everyone is alarmed but the content hasn’t been released yet, so no one exactly what the final stats on the items will be. Again, it’s good to be alarmed so in case Anet was about to walk off this cliff they will hopefully realize their mistake before the content goes live.

I’ve never understood people whose initial reaction to news has been “If you do this developer, I’m quitting your game”; and perhaps I’ve never cared enough about a game to sympathize.

BUT, when I read this news, that is exactly how I felt inside.

One of the biggest reasons I chose to invest into GW2 was because I could play when I wanted, without the feeling of falling behind the player population who seem to have more time to invest in progression wheels. While I still intend on playing GW2 for the time being, this change has definitely left me with one foot out the door, just in case future changes to GW2 follow this pattern.

to ANET, I understand that future problems may endanger your original vision; I just hope that in finding solutions you don’t compromise that vision until it becomes blurred.

Devildoc.6721:

Teva.2807:

alanis.6094:

Most of what you have written here is incorrect.

Please do list what is incorrect.

Legendaries are currently the same stats as exotics.

There will also be ascended gear that has other stat combinations other than magic find. I have a hunch they showed the magic find because the power/prec differences will be LOWER than if you showed berserker or rampager or any other stat combo. Each piece of gear level 65+ has 3 stats, 1 major stat, and 2 lesser stats.

I didnt say same stat. I said legendaries are better. That means appearance and that extra 80 attack.

Memento Mori.5217:

I want GvG
I want PvP and Wv3 ladders/elo system
I want “cool” skins
I want more skills like gw1 was
I want bug fixes

I DON’T want more %stat…

This! They couldve added so much more to the game before ever introducing this outdated gear system that has already failed in other games.

I don’t have time to post much into this, about to walk out the door, hubby just informed me off the new Gw2 gear treadmill.

Absolutely disgusted.

The whole reason we play Gw2 over WoW is so we don’t have to grind for gear stats. I love the flexibility of playing an alt, heck I still haven’t even completed my mains set from TA, seeing as how it was optional and NO TREADMILL, I thought I had all the time in the world..LOL I suppose it’s a good thing I didn’t grind all those hours out Because NOW it’s a WASTE!!!!

SO Disappointed ANET, way to cave to all the wrath babies.

More explorables, more dungeons, more DEs, more global events (not just one time events, eg. 1pm every day a quest chain starts at Lion’s Arch that goes round several explorables and ends in a dragon champion fight)

More armour skins, more rewards from jumping puzzles, more jumping puzzles. More sophisticated party system (for dungeons and group events).

More skill oriented ways to grind for legendaries (a dungeon a day instead of a DE farm for example) <- note I still say grind for legendaries, they are designed to be a time sink → why not make it an interesting time sink, perhaps with daily missions that specifically encourage you to do a random dungeon (like gw1 has).

More things to craft minipets, armour skins, new runes, new sigils →more choice over which stats you can have on your armour/weapons etc.

Wow I spent a whole 5 minutes coming up with much better ideas than a new armour tier, and NONE of it goes against the gw manifesto (the reason most of us bought this game!)

Oh wait I forgot, spending 5 minutes adding higher stats and a tiny drop rate to new items is much easier! Doh, my mistake.

I like the idea of the new dungeon and the new condition that can only be mitigated by having ascended armor. What I don’t agree with is the way it seems to be implemented. Putting in extra tiers of gear is the first step towards the much dreaded “gear threadmill”. A better idea is to drive the player to progressively improve on his existing items to overcome greater challenges without them giving any advantage against other players.

Case in point, instead of just throwing a new tier of items in, what I’d like to see is the ability to “infuse” my armor with the required protection – but only with that needed protection. No need to boost the stats on it. In the new dungeon, you could put an extra turn on the first level – that instead of bringing us to the portal to the next level, will lead us into a room where a rather difficult boss await, and behind it, an NPC that will add an infusion slot to an item of our choice – for a price, of course. The price could simply be a token dropping from the afforementioned boss. Maybe even have several ways to “buy” the infusion slot: A significant amount of gold, a token dropping from a boss, or a few Badges of Honor. (Make sure you cater to all play styles)

Don’t make the gear better. We don’t need better gear, looks is enough. Proof: how many people put countless hours grinding and farming for a legendary when it is not one bit better then basic exotic weapons? On top of that, you’re telling me that I just gathered and wasted 1400 token from Twilight Arbor for a totally awesome set of armor that I won’t be able to use anymore? All tha crafting I’ve spent gold and time on, what am I gonna do with that now?

I find that this way you’re not flipping off all the more casual players that worked hard for their few exotics only to be told that they’ll need to start the grind again. You’re giving the hardcore players complaining of not enough do to something else to rush to finish and start complaining again. You’re not preventing players from playing with whoever they wish – ascended or not, as getting someone the required upgrades is just a fun detour on the path you’re going to take anyways.

And you know what, in 3 years, after the Xth patch and Yth expansion, I’ll be able to show my gear with N different infusion slots on it and say: “Been there, done that. Newb”.

Very dissapointing, feels like a bait and switch to me. Surely there are other ways to expand and improve the PvE endgame then to simply add a power creep?

Anet should know that the so called hardcore raiding crowd will never be pleased. Even in WoW wich is supposed to be all about the gear “progression” you will have many people who burn trough content as fast as they can just to sit around in Orgrimmar and spam trade chat with “I’m boooooored”.

Supposedly Anet thinks this change to the core game will make people more active, how ironic then that this is the first day since launch were I have abosoluteley no desire to log in.

It’s a very, very slippery slope. Also, talisman/rune upgrades have been grouped together with the base stats of the item. If Ascended items were just slightly stronger but lost their upgrade slots / stats and got Infusions instead, I’d be comepletely fine with it, because that would mean Ascended items aren’t always better.

Smartbean.5960:

I see what you mean. However, the dread (caused by lack of amount of radiance) also influenced your incoming and outgoing damage by percentage (excluding mitigations). Dread could only be countered by a combination of Hope tokens and Raidance gear. Later that got split up and Hope tokens countered Dread and Radiance countered gloom (not sure of the term now).

But unfortunately in GW2 we don’t have mitigations to counter effects, we only have boons and conditions, and with this Agony condition being ‘forced’ upon you and you only have 1 way to counter it (i.e. acquiring and slotting a specific infusion into your gear) there’s this gating mechanism created for which you need to get an item in order to experience the rest of the content. And in that light I think it has the same effect like Radiance had in LotRO; it prevented people from progressing and/or experiencing (new) content.

I am not disputing that it in a way gates the harder levels in that it was required, I just don’t see as the same beast as radiance, which totally prevented some players experiencing content. Hence my reason for saying I don’t think it can be compared to radiance and gloom (as you rightly pointed out the new name ) It is probably the lack of mitigations that they needed to find an interesting way to mitigate new damage types they introduce. Could there be better ways to do this – maybe, I don’t have the answer.

And again because this comes from a merged post I will say again for anyone who does read this that I am feeling uncomfortable about this as I came to GW2 to get away from gear grind/ hamster wheel/treadmill. I am going to wait and see if I like it or not and how much of a grind was involved. If it is a fun grind that happens with me not noticing much while I still do things I enjoy in this game, then I probably won’t have a problem with it and if this is the last time they add a new quality that could make other qualities obsolete aka the slippery slope others have mentioned. I play both PvE and WvW and hope they allow those that only do WvW some way to have the improved stats too without forcing a play style on them they don’t like.

Lordrosicky.5813:

They lied to us for years.

/Thread

Or, they fully intended to go the route they had “promised” only to find out it wasn’t going to meet the needs financially.

What would you have them do? Just allow the game to crash and burn?

Reality has a way of being a kitten when it comes to lofty ideals meeting a market driven economy.

pregnable.1954:

Hickeroar.9734:

Naoko.7096:

Surprisingly, in-game majority accept the ascended gears.
I’ve not heard a single player complaint about it in map chat the whole day today. I see many great anticipation in Lion Arch and Cursed Shore of players talking good about it.

I haven’t seen a single POSITIVE comment about it in map chat. Everyone I see seems to be supremely ticked off by this reversal of promises.

Ditto. Pretty sure he was going for some kinda troll irony.

Troll? Who?

@Hickeroar,
Which server you’re from?
Crystal Desert here seems very positive on this update.

Ever since that update was announced, I never seen so many players in cursed shore doing DE to farm gold. There was usually 5~10 in weekend. I saw like over 30 in the same map, and it’s a weekday. I guess they have a reason to play now ever since that update. The anticipation was great. It gives them more things to achieve for.

fourpoundburrito.1698:

phooka.4295:

fourpoundburrito.1698:

I realize the gear can be used in WvWvW, but I what I am hoping is that the infusions have very dungeon specific purposes so that the gear is actually on equal terms with current superior runed / upgraded exotics. If that isn’t the case, IMHO Anet is making a big mistake by adding a new tier.

Well, then for what it’s worth, look at the examples posted in the blogposts. And those carry a hefty increase in magicfind, which, converted to somethiing useful, comes out at at least an 8% upgrade to the stats.

Ignoring infusion.

Whatever infusions might add is not even factored into those 8%. Read up first, please.

I think it is good that everyone is alarmed but the content hasn’t been released yet, so no one exactly what the final stats on the items will be. Again, it’s good to be alarmed so in case Anet was about to walk off this cliff they will hopefully realize their mistake before the content goes live.

To be fair, they did include a screenshot in the blog with a side-by-side of an exotic ring stats and an ascended ring stats. And the ascended ring had significantly better stats. I mean, it may not seem like much on one piece of equip…but if you get an entire set, it becomes a big deal.

fourpoundburrito.1698:

I think it is good that everyone is alarmed but the content hasn’t been released yet, so no one exactly what the final stats on the items will be. Again, it’s good to be alarmed so in case Anet was about to walk off this cliff they will hopefully realize their mistake before the content goes live.

Well, they said the stats would be slightly better and they posted an example that turns out lightly better (8% is about half the difference between rare and exotic).

No reason to assume the example is anything like the stuff that’s going life 3 days from now, right? I think that’s called denial. I think it’s save to assume that the examples posted are in fact accurate.

There’s no subscription, you’re not paying a dime, and you’re complaining?

But you got your $60 worth, right?

Crackbone.5710:

jboynton.7894:

Crackbone.5710:

Either you get with the program, that progression is needed and it’s needed now, or you can kiss Guild Wars 2 completely goodbye.

This game needs a carrot that’s not Legendaries. Folks, if you think that this isn’t being done because they are having a retention problem, then you need to look again.

If ArenaNet doesn’t put something in there to keep people playing, and quickly, GW2 is toast. I love the game, but that’s just the truth.

Where are you getting this data from?

Experience.

You don’t change your basic and core philosophy midstream, on a dime, without some external force. If things are humming right along as expected, we wouldn’t be seeing this change now.

Typically it’s money that’s the driving force. They likely have internal data that suggests their retention isn’t where they want it and therefore are introducing this vertical progression mechanic as a way to keep people engaged. Furthermore, the infusion mechanic is a gate to keep folks from burning through the new content at the rate they have been.

So, you have no proof what-so-ever to back up your claim that this game is dying.

My experience is that people will also do things to increase their revenue, despite already making a profit. This is especially so in the MMO market when people see Blizzard’s subscription numbers and profit margin as a result of WoW; which is quite frankly and unrealistic goal to strive for.

Every game that attempted to mimic WoW has crashed and burned. Look at all the money and hype poored into SWtOR…which inevitably became known as the TORtanic. This MMO is doing fine, look at the server populations. Anet will continue to make a profit by catering to a different crowd.

This game is not dying and it does not need to change in an attempt to grab people who are already happy in a game that’s been out since 2004 and in which they are established.

showatt.9413:

NoobOnSteroid.7192:

I’m disappointed, and I cannot see any reason for buffed stats on the new items. Ascended could just as well be a copy of exotic/legendary, outfitted for the new dungeon (with the addition of a “harmless” dungeon-only infusion slot).

I for one CAN see the reason for a buffed stat – to accommodate harder dungeons and make existing dungeons SLIGHTLY easier to do.

If you “need” better stats to do a dungeon, the dungeon is poorly balanced and should be redesigned. There is no need to buff players to do a new dungeon, just debuff the dungeon if it’s really too hard to complete.

HTXL.2598:

There’s no subscription, you’re not paying a dime, and you’re complaining?

Many of us have already paid out more money per month on gems than we would have on a subscription fee in other games.

Naoko.7096:

pregnable.1954:

Hickeroar.9734:

Naoko.7096:

Surprisingly, in-game majority accept the ascended gears.
I’ve not heard a single player complaint about it in map chat the whole day today. I see many great anticipation in Lion Arch and Cursed Shore of players talking good about it.

I haven’t seen a single POSITIVE comment about it in map chat. Everyone I see seems to be supremely ticked off by this reversal of promises.

Ditto. Pretty sure he was going for some kinda troll irony.

Troll? Who?

@Hickeroar,
Which server you’re from?
Crystal Desert here seems very positive on this update.

Ever since that update was announced, I never seen so many players in cursed shore doing DE to farm gold. There was usually 5~10 in weekend. I saw like over 30 in the same map, and it’s a weekday. I guess they have a reason to play now ever since that update. The anticipation was great. It gives them more things to achieve for.

The cursed shore of JQ was negative on ascended gear the last time I was on.

Again, it is only a couple points today. Who knows what it will be tomorrow.

To the point of it not being a issue in WvWvW we’ll see. However, history has a way of repeating and my vote is that it will. Not right away, no. But over time I think it will. Today the gear is set and you can use anything between lvl 78 exotics to level 80 rares and hold your own. You have time to equip a exotic set.

People don’t want to keep buying more gear is all. We would rather it stop and be static for a while because that is how the game was originally sold. Plain and simple.