Guild Wars 2

I’ve posted a few times in this thread, and this will be my last on this particular subject:

I didn’t come to GW2 because I thought there would be no grind. Grind and gear tiers don’t bother me. I’ve done it in WoW, Aion, Rift, any of the dozen or so games I’ve played the last few years. I came for other reasons, and for the most part I’m not disappointed. I’m still having fun.

However, what IS disappointing, is the lack of communication on this subject from Anet. Come to this discussion, Anet. Explain why you changed your gear philosophy. Explain why those who DID buy this game because of no gear treadmill should still play. Don’t send in the folks with their PR talking points. At least if you do PR, have it make sense (ie. we’re introducing a gear tier to address the gear gap that we are also now introducing…..what the?). That was rather insulting to a lot of us. Treat us as your partners, and we will help you grow and expand this wonderful game you’ve created.

Thank you.

John Lucier.5486:

MisterEction.9382:

John Lucier.5486:

One simple thing they could do to please tens of thousands of players(if not hundreds of thousands) about to quit over the ascended gear, like myself. They just make wvwvw seperate from PVE. Have it have the same gear system as sPVP except you can transmute PVE skins onto them, this will make everyone happy, and by everyone I mean the real wvwvw players who care about beating someone with skill and not stat increases, the real players, the one that played this game because progression was supposed to be cosmetic only.

Real players? Good luck geting anything changed if you’re going to start throwing people with other play styles under the bus. I don’t WvWvW. I PVE. I build alts. I explore. This change affects PVE players that aren’t hardcore grinders as much as it does WvWvW players.

Better gear means faster killing, which means more money. In events, that means more money for the people with ascended gear and less for those without it.

Which means prices on the TP go up to match the players with the higher stat gear, so they get more high stat gear, and all the best skins and pretty much everything else. Because not only can the other players not match the higher stat players income, they’ll actually be making less in an event than they did before.

Run events with a character in rares, then the same character in exotics and see the difference in the number of drops you end up with.

And those areas to explore? They’re getting adjusted to compensate for the new gear, so the players that don’t hardcore grind get the fun of those becoming a miserable slog.

A. it wasnt throwing anyone under the bus. It was targeted at alot of us that only do wvwvw that will quit

B. Your events and stuff can be completed in blues, so you have a LOT less to complain about. You fight 1 mob, or run the dungeon, when you fight that mob/run the dungeon again nothing will change, just like WoW.

C. With B in mind, you aren’t going to have to worry about that same mob youve been fighting is now going to be doing 20-50% more damage to you or having 20-50% more tank because of the new gear like a wwvw pvper will, going up against people that are just wow locusts that will dungeon farm and then roll into wvwvw because they can only win with stat increases.

Completing the events in blues generates less money than completing events in better gear. While the players in better gear get more, the players in lesser gear get less. economically, you end up being able to earn less and less over time while the other players have more. The amount of time you have to deal with that with the investment needed to get exotics is manageable. The time needed to get ascended gear isn’t. Those guys you’re fighting that are suddenly tougher and doing more damage are also taking a larger share of the income available from events from PVE players.

And, you’re throwing PVE players under the bus in the same way as if I said, “Hey, just allow the stuff to be usable in WvWvW so the grinders can get their ego fix killing other people and leave the PVE area out of it.”

Logun.2349:

Urxx.6840:

Logun.2349:

Guys we are not going to win this gear fight

Personally I don’t realize myself by fighting imaginary cyberwars on forums.

I’m not here to fight ArenaNet. I’m here because I don’t like where this is going to lead a game I personally loved and spent a lot of time into.

I’d rather be in-game playing than here posting. That was the case before this fiasco.

Well then you’re here protesting changes aren’t you because you want the game not to change …Right!

So if you’re here expressing an opinion then your fighting for what you believe to be the right course for the game is ….Right?

All I’m saying is Arena Net has their reasons they see this change as being needed, and you have your reasons you want it to stay the same as it is ….as I do, but we are not getting anywhere are we?

I’m trying to find a compromise here…. https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/How-to-win-me-back-a-simple-compromise/first#post770150

I’m not opposing game change per se. It’s implicit an MMO is an ever-changing beast, and stagnation would kill it. I merely oppose this specific change.

I also never contested the so-called “Legendary Wall”, which is the problem that lead to the introduction of ascended gear, actually exists and is detrimental to part of the player base.

What I’m saying is that I’m sure there are lots of ways to provide progression to those who hit the legendary wall, without introducing vertical progression and making existing exotics more and more obsolete, wasting the investment the player base has already made in them.

Or in other words, you don’t need to make part of the player base feel betrayed and disappointed to solve a problem another part of the player base is experiencing. All it’s needed is a bit of creativity, and ArenaNet has shown plenty of creativity in GW2, so it’s certainly something that’s in their DNA as a company.

But in handling the legendary wall problem I feel they have settled for the cheapest and most harmful way of providing progression, instead of striving for more. It’s sub-par, compared to what they have achieved in GW2 so far.

I think it’s pretty simple really.

Ditrah.5128:

Gear-check bosses does not exist in the same way in GW2.
The new items are a help it’s not a necessity, make what you want out of it but the only one forcing you are yourself.

actually agony is a gear check, if your taking 5% of your hp per second in unmitigated dmg even with heals your probably only going to live for 120-180 seconds due to heals being on cd and dmg from other attacks the only way to live longer is to get the +5% agony resist infusions that makes them necessary

anyway its page 200 so time for a recap of info from the devs

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/linsey-murdock-unveils-new-high-end-ascended-gear/

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/news/A-message-from-our-Studio-Design-Director-Chris-Whiteside/first#post721451

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/leah-rivera-on-the-new-fractals-of-the-mist-dungeon/

http://kotaku.com/5960951/the-lead-designer-of-guild-wars-2-is-answering-your-questions-right-now

Fractal weapons are obtained by farming and offering sacrifices to the rng gods

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/Fractal-weapons

you also have gear lists on fansites http://www.gw2db.com/items?filter-item-rarity=8

Lunaria, Circle of the Moon
+32 Power
+32 Healing
+32 Precision
+32 Toughness
+4% Critcal Damage
+32 Condition Damage
+32 Vitality
Ring
Required Level: 80

+8 Condition Damage +8 Precision +8 Toughness +8 Power +8 Vitality +8 Healing +1% Critical Damage +1% Magic Find

that seems to be between 200% and 300% better than the 80 ring im wearing atm bear in mind this isnt even infused which is more + stats especially when they release the higher rarity types

http://www.gw2db.com/search?search=infusion#t1:items

also quoting CC Ivonne.6782 from

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Why-shoulkittenep-playing-GW2/first#post768721

“Hello everybody,
thanks for your feedback and please remember there are already 2 threads, one to discuss new content: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Thoughts-on-Ascended-Gear-Merged-threads/page/178#post736894
and one to give feedback: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Patch-Feedback-merged-1/page/13#post755001
Please use those threads for anything related to the new content.”

this apparently isn’t the feedback thread, this is the discuss amongst yourselves thread, looks like we should be making our views known in the actual feedback thread as well as discussing here

This is my first and probable last post. First of all I can’t thank you wonderful, thoughtful, cogent, principled and dignified people for bringing attention to this issue. It’s one I’d not considered and I feel so enlightened from having spent the time reading your thoughts on this duplicitous development. I hadn’t realized the specifics behind a concept like “the treadmill” and all the varying ways it adversely effects players. I had been eagerly awaiting the launch of GW2 for the past two years though not extensively as many of you. It was exhilarating creating my characters at midnight precisely August 25th. I thought of all the fun that was soon to be had. For that first week I found friendly, funny, and above all decent helpful people helping others, a true community. That abruptly changed post launch. First red flag. I began having WoW flashbacks upon reading some of the garden variety cruelty so readily typed in the map channel. So quickly it had changed. Regardless I plunged on steadily leveling 4 “mains”. I tried moving to a different server and luckily found friendly people once again. Then came the bot trains. Second red flag. Seeing the same professions being used to farm seemed to invalidate the notion that all professions were equally footed and skill alone would determine their success. Naked bots for gods sake, extremely insulting to my Mesmer taking far too long to kill the creatures these unarmored things were shredding in seconds. I pondered my build, I tried consulting other peoples builds to no avail. I didn’t mind it, it felt like I was crafting something and just needed the right recipe. It was a fun diversion. However, intrinsically, and I may well be utterly wrong, I felt lied to. As someone hilariously and sadly accurately summed up the situation in another post (I’m paraphrasing) “anyone playing a warrior need only roll their face across the keyboard to outperform my character”. This latest update however has broken whatever trust I had in this company. I’m utterly disgusted. I feel terrible for all the beta testers who gave their time, energy, and enthusiasm to perfect this game. It appears merely from perusing this now merged thread there was a lot of communication going on between the participants and the developers. The contrast to this silence regarding the treadmill is insulting. What has done it for me however was finding a post regarding Magic Find :https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/MF-Gear-in-Dungeons-Contribute-less-get-more in which a Game Designer responded within an hour of its posting. See it for yourself. The OP is questioning the fairness of Magic Find in dungeons, the response he receives is a sales pitch pointing out the wonderful new addition of Magic Find via Ascended gear in the Fractals. My friends they don’t care. They are going ahead with this full press. The jaded side of me feels they used the beta GW1 fans as dupes to saturate the opening of the game. Your usefulness wore off after only 3 months it appears. I say this in full candor and forthrightness regardless of its lack of diplomacy. I hope it doesn’t result in an infraction, however it is my opinion based on what I’ve seen over the last 3 months. I am sorry if this is offensive to anyone but it is my observation and is absolutely fallible, but I now believe it. To end this positively I’d just like to again thank everyone who took the time, energy, and insightfulness to write in this merged thread. You’ve shown me the world isn’t full of selfish, short-sighted, essentially voraciously greedy people. Your dignity and principles are the best examples of what it is to be a human being and I can’t thank you enough for having the courage and resolve to address this betrayal.

DUBkit.8902:

This is my first and probable last post. First of all I can’t thank you wonderful, thoughtful, cogent, principled and dignified people for bringing attention to this issue. It’s one I’d not considered and I feel so enlightened from having spent the time reading your thoughts on this duplicitous development. I hadn’t realized the specifics behind a concept like “the treadmill” and all the varying ways it adversely effects players. I had been eagerly awaiting the launch of GW2 for the past two years though not extensively as many of you. It was exhilarating creating my characters at midnight precisely August 25th. I thought of all the fun that was soon to be had. For that first week I found friendly, funny, and above all decent helpful people helping others, a true community. That abruptly changed post launch. First red flag. I began having WoW flashbacks upon reading some of the garden variety cruelty so readily typed in the map channel. So quickly it had changed. Regardless I plunged on steadily leveling 4 “mains”. I tried moving to a different server and luckily found friendly people once again. Then came the bot trains. Second red flag. Seeing the same professions being used to farm seemed to invalidate the notion that all professions were equally footed and skill alone would determine their success. Naked bots for gods sake, extremely insulting to my Mesmer taking far too long to kill the creatures these unarmored things were shredding in seconds. I pondered my build, I tried consulting other peoples builds to no avail. I didn’t mind it, it felt like I was crafting something and just needed the right recipe. It was a fun diversion. However, intrinsically, and I may well be utterly wrong, I felt lied to. As someone hilariously and sadly accurately summed up the situation in another post (I’m paraphrasing) “anyone playing a warrior need only roll their face across the keyboard to outperform my character”. This latest update however has broken whatever trust I had in this company. I’m utterly disgusted. I feel terrible for all the beta testers who gave their time, energy, and enthusiasm to perfect this game. It appears merely from perusing this now merged thread there was a lot of communication going on between the participants and the developers. The contrast to this silence regarding the treadmill is insulting. What has done it for me however was finding a post regarding Magic Find :https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/MF-Gear-in-Dungeons-Contribute-less-get-more in which a Game Designer responded within an hour of its posting. See it for yourself. The OP is questioning the fairness of Magic Find in dungeons, the response he receives is a sales pitch pointing out the wonderful new addition of Magic Find via Ascended gear in the Fractals. My friends they don’t care. They are going ahead with this full press. The jaded side of me feels they used the beta GW1 fans as dupes to saturate the opening of the game. Your usefulness wore off after only 3 months it appears. I say this in full candor and forthrightness regardless of its lack of diplomacy. I hope it doesn’t result in an infraction, however it is my opinion based on what I’ve seen over the last 3 months. I am sorry if this is offensive to anyone but it is my observation and is absolutely fallible, but I now believe it. To end this positively I’d just like to again thank everyone who took the time, energy, and insightfulness to write in this merged thread. You’ve shown me the world isn’t full of selfish, short-sighted, essentially voraciously greedy people. Your dignity and principles are the best examples of what it is to be a human being and I can’t thank you enough for having the courage and resolve to address this betrayal.

Get ready to be torn apart. As soon as you attack any parts of Anet this is what happens by both mods and the “other side” of the community.
I’m so getting infracted for this comment.
But other than that, I agree with what you’ve said. Well put!

Shadow Blade.1324:

this apparently isn’t the feedback thread, this is the discuss amongst yourselves thread, looks like we should be making our views known in the actual feedback thread as well as discussing here

If the devs ignore the fastest growing thread in GW2’s history just because it’s not officially marked as feedback, then I don’t think what we say in the official thread will make any difference.

I’m pretty sure this isn’t the case.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/13ccl4/mystic_forged_a_quiver/

Just 1 day, someone already has a pink(red) backslot equipment.

Hopefully Anet has good schedule and does not underestimate the ability that how fast players can get upgraded-stat asc gears. ’Cause soon, those who had nothing to do will have 2 asc rings and asc back.

Well, I admit I’m wondering when you will break your promise again — to announce T2 ascended items.

Bardes.1870:

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/13ccl4/mystic_forged_a_quiver/

Just 1 day, someone already has a pink(red) backslot equipment.

Hopefully Anet has good schedule and does not underestimate the ability that how fast players can get upgraded-stat asc gears. ’Cause soon, those who had nothing to do will have 2 asc rings and asc back.

Well, I admit I’m wondering when you will break your promise again — to announce T2 ascended items.

Wow, so the legendary wall is still there. How long before the content locusts will start to feel bored again?

That’s a perfect example of what happens when you cater to those who consume more content than one can produce.

MisterEction.9382:

John Lucier.5486:

MisterEction.9382:

John Lucier.5486:

One simple thing they could do to please tens of thousands of players(if not hundreds of thousands) about to quit over the ascended gear, like myself. They just make wvwvw seperate from PVE. Have it have the same gear system as sPVP except you can transmute PVE skins onto them, this will make everyone happy, and by everyone I mean the real wvwvw players who care about beating someone with skill and not stat increases, the real players, the one that played this game because progression was supposed to be cosmetic only.

Real players? Good luck geting anything changed if you’re going to start throwing people with other play styles under the bus. I don’t WvWvW. I PVE. I build alts. I explore. This change affects PVE players that aren’t hardcore grinders as much as it does WvWvW players.

Better gear means faster killing, which means more money. In events, that means more money for the people with ascended gear and less for those without it.

Which means prices on the TP go up to match the players with the higher stat gear, so they get more high stat gear, and all the best skins and pretty much everything else. Because not only can the other players not match the higher stat players income, they’ll actually be making less in an event than they did before.

Run events with a character in rares, then the same character in exotics and see the difference in the number of drops you end up with.

And those areas to explore? They’re getting adjusted to compensate for the new gear, so the players that don’t hardcore grind get the fun of those becoming a miserable slog.

A. it wasnt throwing anyone under the bus. It was targeted at alot of us that only do wvwvw that will quit

B. Your events and stuff can be completed in blues, so you have a LOT less to complain about. You fight 1 mob, or run the dungeon, when you fight that mob/run the dungeon again nothing will change, just like WoW.

C. With B in mind, you aren’t going to have to worry about that same mob youve been fighting is now going to be doing 20-50% more damage to you or having 20-50% more tank because of the new gear like a wwvw pvper will, going up against people that are just wow locusts that will dungeon farm and then roll into wvwvw because they can only win with stat increases.

Completing the events in blues generates less money than completing events in better gear. While the players in better gear get more, the players in lesser gear get less. economically, you end up being able to earn less and less over time while the other players have more. The amount of time you have to deal with that with the investment needed to get exotics is manageable. The time needed to get ascended gear isn’t. Those guys you’re fighting that are suddenly tougher and doing more damage are also taking a larger share of the income available from events from PVE players.

And, you’re throwing PVE players under the bus in the same way as if I said, “Hey, just allow the stuff to be usable in WvWvW so the grinders can get their ego fix killing other people and leave the PVE area out of it.”

Yea what I tried to say is I didn’t mean to throw you or anyone under the bus, I was just trying to target a fix for the wvwvw audience. I didn’t want to try and suggest some band-aid for PVE as well when that is not where my experience is.

Bardes.1870:

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/13ccl4/mystic_forged_a_quiver/

Just 1 day, someone already has a pink(red) backslot equipment.

Hopefully Anet has good schedule and does not underestimate the ability that how fast players can get upgraded-stat asc gears. ’Cause soon, those who had nothing to do will have 2 asc rings and asc back.

Well, I admit I’m wondering when you will break your promise again — to announce T2 ascended items.

Once again proving that the “Content Locusts” will devour any content placed in front of them faster than the developers could ever hope to predict.

Mungrul.9358:

Bardes.1870:

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/13ccl4/mystic_forged_a_quiver/

Just 1 day, someone already has a pink(red) backslot equipment.

Hopefully Anet has good schedule and does not underestimate the ability that how fast players can get upgraded-stat asc gears. ’Cause soon, those who had nothing to do will have 2 asc rings and asc back.

Well, I admit I’m wondering when you will break your promise again — to announce T2 ascended items.

Once again proving that the “Content Locusts” will devour any content placed in front of them faster than the developers could ever hope to predict.

So, Chris Whiteside was telling the truth. They have no plans to trot out new treadmill gear every three months, because they don’t know now fast the locusts can consume the content. Every couple of weeks should do it.

Columba.9730:

I just did three of these dungeons. didn’t finish one. I hate this garbage. Hate it with a passion. I can’t believe I am being forced to do this stuff that I loathe just to be competitive in wvwvw.

Please tell us when this will be available in wvwvw? If I have to do another dungeon I will shoot myself, seriously.

Considering that it’s meant to be a grind relevant to the “hardcore” (laugh) raid gear grinders, when it becomes available in w3 it will be like trying to get ap conditioned eternals solely through pvp in Aion. Otherwise everybody would just go to w3 to get it.

Wintyre Fraust.6534:

So, Chris Whiteside was telling the truth. They have no plans to trot out new treadmill gear every three months, because they don’t know now fast the locusts can consume the content. Every couple of weeks should do it.

Me likey!

The gold cost on that guild backpack, as presented in the guildmate already has guild backpack is the nail in the coffin for me.

I’ll still goof around leveling alts (just because there are ants on the dessert bar doesn’t mean the rest of the all you can eat buffet is ruined), but any thoughts on maybe getting this gear through other means in the future are pretty much gone. The cost is ridiculous.

Of course I could just buy the gold with gems, right? Making this pay to win as far as I’m concerned, since the grind is much more severe than the exotic grind.

Wintyre Fraust.6534:

Mungrul.9358:

Bardes.1870:

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/13ccl4/mystic_forged_a_quiver/

Just 1 day, someone already has a pink(red) backslot equipment.

Hopefully Anet has good schedule and does not underestimate the ability that how fast players can get upgraded-stat asc gears. ’Cause soon, those who had nothing to do will have 2 asc rings and asc back.

Well, I admit I’m wondering when you will break your promise again — to announce T2 ascended items.

Once again proving that the “Content Locusts” will devour any content placed in front of them faster than the developers could ever hope to predict.

So, Chris Whiteside was telling the truth. They have no plans to trot out new treadmill gear every three months, because they don’t know now fast the locusts can consume the content. Every couple of weeks should do it.

Ha ….

Maybe we can bet when they will decrease the needs of Fractal Relics or increase the drop amount of Fractal Relics …. when they can no longer carry the pressure from casual players.

Seed.5467:

Well, after have attended the one time event, i have to say i am not so impressed. The one time event should be something that stays in the memory of the players. The only thing that stayed in my memory was Lag,Lag and more Lag. After have participate the event in Lions Arch, i went to see the new dungeon. I must admit the new dungeon is quite interesting but it´s not something for me. I played it 1 or 2 times but that was it. After that went and played WvWvW.

The only thing that i find depressing is the fact that the ascended gear will be available only as a possible reward from Dungeon. So, i am been forced to repeat the dungeon many times in order to enjoy the new gear, since my exotic after introducing this new tier is obsolete.

Please Anet, at least give players like my self, who do not enjoy dungeon grinding other ways to obtain the new tier gear parallel to dungeon, through karma, badges etc.

Regards

Seed

100% agree! I hated the dungeons. Why didn’t they make these items available from WvWvW from day one? Why am I being discriminated against for preferring WvWvW?

Wintyre Fraust.6534:

Mungrul.9358:

Bardes.1870:

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/13ccl4/mystic_forged_a_quiver/

Just 1 day, someone already has a pink(red) backslot equipment.

Hopefully Anet has good schedule and does not underestimate the ability that how fast players can get upgraded-stat asc gears. ’Cause soon, those who had nothing to do will have 2 asc rings and asc back.

Well, I admit I’m wondering when you will break your promise again — to announce T2 ascended items.

Once again proving that the “Content Locusts” will devour any content placed in front of them faster than the developers could ever hope to predict.

So, Chris Whiteside was telling the truth. They have no plans to trot out new treadmill gear every three months, because they don’t know now fast the locusts can consume the content. Every couple of weeks should do it.

Haha, lol. The thought flickered through my mind when I first read that bit too! Something along the lines of “Hur, once a month works perfectly, every three months and it would be too stale”.

I really don’t think they even know what they’re trying to accomplish anymore. One big pile of contradictions and confusion, no direction and some of the most absurd choices possible.

Gilandred.9870:

I’ve posted a few times in this thread, and this will be my last on this particular subject:

I didn’t come to GW2 because I thought there would be no grind. Grind and gear tiers don’t bother me. I’ve done it in WoW, Aion, Rift, any of the dozen or so games I’ve played the last few years. I came for other reasons, and for the most part I’m not disappointed. I’m still having fun.

However, what IS disappointing, is the lack of communication on this subject from Anet. Come to this discussion, Anet. Explain why you changed your gear philosophy. Explain why those who DID buy this game because of no gear treadmill should still play. Don’t send in the folks with their PR talking points. At least if you do PR, have it make sense (ie. we’re introducing a gear tier to address the gear gap that we are also now introducing…..what the?). That was rather insulting to a lot of us. Treat us as your partners, and we will help you grow and expand this wonderful game you’ve created.

Thank you.

Very good post.
I think most of us will understand if you just are straight with us. You have a business to run, and if you think that this is the way to go than so be it. But when you fail to explain these things in an honest manner the community’s response gets very negative.

Bardes.1870:

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/13ccl4/mystic_forged_a_quiver/

Just 1 day, someone already has a pink(red) backslot equipment.

Hopefully Anet has good schedule and does not underestimate the ability that how fast players can get upgraded-stat asc gears. ’Cause soon, those who had nothing to do will have 2 asc rings and asc back.

Well, I admit I’m wondering when you will break your promise again — to announce T2 ascended items.

And yet it’ll take forever for someone who plays only 2 hours a day to forge it. Or somehow who plays 4 hours a day, but focuses 75% of their effort on WvW.

I would enjoy the Mystic Forge a whole lot more if most recipes didn’t start with “250 T6 crafting materials + a pile of skill points.”

So it seems the community is now split into two groups over the Ascended gear.

1. The group that either does not care or is excited about the new armor and is looking forward to obtaining.

2. The group that believes ANet is going back on their promise about no gear progression and are upset to the point that they will quit the game and possibly attempt to get a refund.

I wonder which group is larger. I am sure though that whichever group affects Anet’s bottom line the most is the one they will cater to. Unfortunately companies exist to make money.

At this point though, if they choose to change the Ascended armor they run the risk of alienating those who are happy about the new changes and don’t want to go back to horizontal progression.

So, this will be the last thing I have to say on this situation. I feel like we are screaming at a brick wall of what apparently was pure greed to begin with.

Listen, I know companies are companies to make money, and nowadays that goal comes at the expense of even the companies own products and even the company itself ( meaning: outsourcing, layoffs, etc… ) .

This move is geared to just make money, maybe it was Anets intention the whole time, maybe it wasn’t. The only way we will find that out is if anyone important at Anet leaves in the next year or two.

What Anet have done with the introduction on Ascended gear and the “new gear progression initiative” is a war of attrition. They hope to retain, but for every one person they retain they are losing one (or more) to the endless grind that we all bought this game to escape. Eventually people that do not frequent the forums will figure it out.

In Anets manifesto they showed us, the players, that they got it. MMOs had become stagnant with the same design decisions being made in every MMO to date. And we were tired, we are getting older, a lot of the core of this game only has so much time to play. Myself, I am 30, I have a full time job that is more important than this game and Mike O’brien showed me that he got it with his comment about GW2 competing with my real life for time. 5 years ago Guild Wars 1 showed me that my real life was more important. They did not insult us with treadmills designed to keep us playing for no reason. And Guild Wars 1 got my time and energy. Anet got it right.

And I thought they got it right this time.

But Ascended tier grind shows that getting it right is not a priority. Just the money.

It is their prerogative, but it is my prerogative to speak out and to leave this game. I feel Anet turned their back on me so I am turning my back on them. Honestly, anyone that had been an Anet customer since GW1 had no inkling that this was coming. That is what has a lot of us upset. We were quite literally blindsided.

Now for my last post here, since posting at a forum for a game I don’t play is entirely pointless and I have no confidence that Anet will fix this I will leave you guys with this quote that you may recognize. haha

“Now before I finish, let me just say
I did not come here to show out, did not come here to impress you
Because to tell you the truth when I leave here I’m GONE!
And I don’t care WHAT you think about me – but just remember,
when it hits the fan brother, whether it’s next year, ten years,
twenty years from now, you’ll never be able to say
that these brothers lied to you JACK!”

In all honesty, I wish everyone good luck and I hope the game is great for everyone that enjoys this type of content and lives up to your expectations. It certainly did not live up to mine.

You are correct in that with the current direction of high end gear creation it is very much treading on the Pay2Win market. Legendary and Ascended are gotten so fast currently because of people paying lots of RL cash for gems converted to gold, guilds funding the person, spectators funding the person, simply buying gold, etc… The current trend of the game is insanely against the original philosophy for the game.

Rpgtabbycat.5869:

So it seems the community is now split into two groups over the Ascended gear.

1. The group that either does not care or is excited about the new armor and is looking forward to obtaining.

2. The group that believes ANet is going back on their promise about no gear progression and are upset to the point that they will quit the game and possibly attempt to get a refund.

I wonder which group is larger. I am sure though that whichever group affects Anet’s bottom line the most is the one they will cater to. Unfortunately companies exist to make money.

At this point though, if they choose to change the Ascended armor they run the risk of alienating those who are happy about the new changes and don’t want to go back to horizontal progression.

Good. That’s exactly what people who bought GW2 and expected a gear grind forced progression through content gates -should- get… alienated.

replicant.3620:

You are correct in that with the current direction of high end gear creation it is very much treading on the Pay2Win market. Legendary and Ascended are gotten so fast currently because of people paying lots of RL cash for gems converted to gold, guilds funding the person, spectators funding the person, simply buying gold, etc… The current trend of the game is insanely against the original philosophy for the game.

I was told that Exotics were easy to get even without buying gold, and I didn’t care about Legendary weapons that were supposed to be cosmetic only. So I wasn’t worried. Of course maybe I was lied to, but regardless, I know for sure that this backpack isn’t easy to get without opening my wallet.

Rpgtabbycat.5869:

So it seems the community is now split into two groups over the Ascended gear.

1. The group that either does not care or is excited about the new armor and is looking forward to obtaining.

2. The group that believes ANet is going back on their promise about no gear progression and are upset to the point that they will quit the game and possibly attempt to get a refund.

I wonder which group is larger. I am sure though that whichever group affects Anet’s bottom line the most is the one they will cater to. Unfortunately companies exist to make money.

At this point though, if they choose to change the Ascended armor they run the risk of alienating those who are happy about the new changes and don’t want to go back to horizontal progression.

Thats pose a question…

So in the first group, there are the persons that dont care about the change…so obviously, they dont care if Anet delete this patch…
But the second group, why have bouth this game, when in no blog there was advertising of gear progression? Legendary are only for aspect, no gear grind, no treadmill…
These are the type of player that play without take informations before buy, and they are the type of player that leave first when a New MUST HAVE game come to the market.

Now that the betrayal and rage is mostly out of my system, I’m beginning to shift my focus on pity towards the developers that have been there since the start of Anet’s design philosophy. This massive change in vision has made many of them look like hypocrites and traitors. You can’t blame them for not addressing us, because they knew their actions were going to be met with boos and egg tosses before the first word of the blogpost was even written.

Bardes.1870:

“Just 1 day, someone already has a pink(red) backslot equipment.”

Someone has to win the lottery.

Venn.8931:

Now that the betrayal and rage is mostly out of my system, I’m beginning to shift my focus on pity towards the developers that have been there since the start of Anet’s design philosophy. This massive change in vision has made many of them look like hypocrites and traitors. You can’t blame them for not addressing us, because they knew their actions were going to be met with boos and egg tosses before the first word of the blogpost was even written.

I am not so sure on that at least from my experience.

Had they come out and said something like:
That due to a reduction in concurrent players and certain internal goals not being met when have had to re evaluate the situation.
The current trend in GW2 is not what we expected and we need to take some measure to balance this out.
After a vast amount feedback we have concluded that our original hypothesis is unsustainable and that we have need to make a significant change in direction.
We did not expect this however market conditions and player satisfaction deemed it necessary. We are sorry to those who disagree with this but we feel for the better of the game and player base this new direction is warranted.

I might have actually understood and maybe given Anet the benefit of the doubt and would still be playing today.But to slip it in stealth like and not say anything is bad.

Venn.8931:

Now that the betrayal and rage is mostly out of my system, I’m beginning to shift my focus on pity towards the developers that have been there since the start of Anet’s design philosophy. This massive change in vision has made many of them look like hypocrites and traitors. You can’t blame them for not addressing us, because they knew their actions were going to be met with boos and egg tosses before the first word of the blogpost was even written.

Frankly, I wonder how much of this is executive meddling by NCSoft/Nexon. In that vein, I had the sudden realization yesterday that it seems very poignant that the Ascended gear is dropping from the FotM dungeon that’s being obnoxiously hawked to everyone passing through LA by a guy named Blingg. Subtle Take That to whoever decided on this new direction, perhaps?

Hey guys, everyone still pissed about this? Good

Arenanet still not responding to their players? That’s bad.

More and more people still getting refunds for their game? That’s worse.

Arenanet still not refunding the biggest fans who preordered day 1? That’s callous.

Rpgtabbycat.5869:

So it seems the community is now split into two groups over the Ascended gear.

1. The group that either does not care or is excited about the new armor and is looking forward to obtaining.

2. The group that believes ANet is going back on their promise about no gear progression and are upset to the point that they will quit the game and possibly attempt to get a refund.

I wonder which group is larger. I am sure though that whichever group affects Anet’s bottom line the most is the one they will cater to. Unfortunately companies exist to make money.

At this point though, if they choose to change the Ascended armor they run the risk of alienating those who are happy about the new changes and don’t want to go back to horizontal progression.

Changing things now, for sure will have a worse impact than if they did the right thing from the beginning: giving more content to those who hit the legendary wall without introducing vertical progression.

That said. While it’s obvious you can’t please everyone, when in doubt about who to please you should ask yourself who’s your core customer base, the most loyal and dedicated in the long run.

Right now ArenaNet is alienating those who are with them because of their unique values and characteristics and were highly unlikely to find similar core features in other products, and they are doing so to retain those who are easily bored and very high maintenance and will jump on the bandwagon of the next higly hyped mmo as soon as it’s released.

That, IMO, is a very poor business decision. Sure in the short period their logs could show that there isn’t a critical problem in the concurrent access, and their monthly events are well received, but when their current mistake will show its true, ugly face, it will be too late to intervene.

When your loyal fans are gone, and so is your credibility, those fans won’t come back. And when the content locusts are gone as well, you are left with empty servers and an MMO that was once great and then got ruined by a single, miopic decision.

Anet seem to think that keeping their heads down is helping. While they sit there and feel hard done to by their ungrateful customers they might like a little light weekend reading
http://www.forbes.com/sites/rogerdooley/2012/09/18/complaints/

That’s if they can tear themselves away from AC3

@Urxx I agree with what you said but your statement “don’t want to go back to horizontal progression” is troubling.

There are many examples of corporations that made drastic changes to their vision/product and had to revert or retcon them. Why? Because their core, paying customers hated the changes and stopped buying their product. The same is going to happen to Arenanet/GW2. People bought GW2 because for years, Arenanet has stated/shown that horizontal progression would be a core, foundational feature of its product.

Many people got a taste for non-gear based progression in GW1 and loved it. Those same people bought GW2 because it had it. Read the posts against this. Many of these people who love horizontal progression got their friends to buy or bought stuff in the shop just because they wanted to show support to Arenanet. All of this translated into increased revenue from customers who dig Arenanet’s original vision.

Now, after only 3 months, Arenanet eliminates its core, foundational feature in its new product offering. Another famous company did the same thing. After decades, Coca-cola changed its syrup formula so it could “appeal to people that liked the taste of Pepsi.” Within months it changed it back. Why? Because their core customers hated the new taste. Sales dropped off sharply. Coca-cola lost money. They lost brand loyalty. That happened over 20 years ago. Coke has never changed its syrup formula again. Coke learned a valuable lesson. Unfortunately, it appears that today’s corporate executives fail to read or understand product/brand history.

Arenanet could have continued its horizontal progression but given people more to work for by simply introducing new content – new areas, new skills, new cosmetics, new dynamic events, etc.

Ryan.6951:

Hey guys, everyone still pissed about this? Good

Arenanet still not responding to their players? That’s bad.

More and more people still getting refunds for their game? That’s worse.

Arenanet still not refunding the biggest fans who preordered day 1? That’s callous.

My ticket was escalated to a Senior Customer Support Representative on Friday so I’m not expecting an answer before Monday, however as far as I’m concerned, all return policies in EU count from the day of delivery, not sale.

dalendria.3762:

@Urxx I agree with what you said but your statement “don’t want to go back to horizontal progression” is troubling.

Rpgtabbycat actually wrote that, I was only quoting him/her

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

-Mike Obrien, President of Arenanet

“This is just the beginning. In November, we’re only adding the first level of Infusions and Ascended Rings and Back slots, so that leaves us a lot of room to build upon these levels of Item progression in future content. As we release more new end game content in the future, you’ll see more Infusions and Ascended item types being added to the game. Eventually, you’ll be able to kit yourself out with a full set of Ascended gear and high end Infusions to help give you the edge in end game content.”

- Lindsey Murdock, Game Designer

What happened?

Wait Arenanet gives infractions for calling them out for being liars? How about for poor customer service? Don’t they think we deserve to know the reason for NGE2.0? Is NCsoft pushing them? Did they get new people that don’t know what they are doing? Something’s gotta give.

Might I direct you to the lyrics of a composition by one William Joel: “Honesty is such a lonely word; everyone is so untrue.”

Or maybe the paraphrased words of Obi kittenenobi in the only well-acted scene in Revenge of the Sith: “You were the chosen one! You were supposed to bring [newness to MMOs, not chicken out and follow the same old gear-chase model]!”

Edit: This game delivers: http://new.livestream.com/accounts/398160/events/1594566/player_pop_up

I will eat the infraction for this “meaningless and non-contributory post”
But you are right.

If you saying anything bad about how things are being handled then you get your post deleted.

for me, I refuse to post on the official forums because of this.
YOU CAN make your voice heard though by posting in reddit.

THIS is why I bought GW2:
“Here’s what we believe: If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game. Otherwise, your MMO becomes all about grinding to get the best gear. We don’t make grindy games — we leave the grind to other MMOs.”

-Mike Obrien, President of Arenanet

My thoughts on ascendend gear huh?

I will leave this game, like many others. I have already read incredibly well written explanations of my point of view.. broken promises, literal allergy to “the grind”, and an absolute refusal to bow to it.

Im a WvWorlder. Came here for it, like many others. I wont become a PvE player even if you force me. If this refrains me from beign competitive then i guess its all over. Its really that simple.

WvW lakes are dying. WvW guilds are dying. Hell, im pretty sure that if I leave its gonna be the nail in the coffin for 50 or 60 ppl (my guild) whose sole drive is the Realm Wars. Beign probably the most active and effective WvW guild in my server, thats going to have a butterfly effect. An ugly one.

You spit us in the face with no WvW updates and lazy fixes like the orb one. But changing the whole SPIRIT of the game midfly is a literal knife in the back.

You kinda killed it for us. Heed my words: Rollback or perish ala SWTOR. You have been warned.

This thread has lost a lot of steam. Now it isn’t because people stopped caring or that they have come to terms with it. No, it’s because these people simply stopped playing as they do not feel like Anet gives a kitten This all due to complete and utter lack of respect towards their playerbase.

Here’s the thing…

I don’t want to do this dungeon, period.

Got to 80, MADE my own gear with materials I gained while in the open world, and I was perfectly happy. I could Wv3 to my hearts content and not worry about if the other players out gearing me, no they were the same as me.

Now I have to do this stupid dungeon and worst thing: I have to be in a group to do it. Suddenly a game that can be played solo requires me to have to join a guild too. Seriously? This game turned into that other game over night.

That is total kitten. That is lying to me for FIVE YEARS.

Well after 7+ years of raiding 4+ hours a night, I came here expecting I would not have to go through that again to get gear to compete. I came here to escape this stuff and for a while it was heaven. Now it’s same old group based hampster wheel.

That is kitten. Total kitten.

Well I guess it’s their way or the highway, right? Wait, where have I heard that term before….ah yes, a game where I quit after 7 years of dedication after they too decided to spit in my face.

Oh btw, I had a guild. Guess where they all went back to? It rhymes with cow. And you know why? That game does hampster wheels 10000x better and is that how the game is advertised/designed from the ground up; you know exactly what you are getting into the moment you sign up.

The people you are tryin to please will also eventually follow my guild back to that other game cus they will demolish your content in records time and get bored again. That is not me just sayin that, that is me stating a FACT.

p.s. I severly doubt anyone important is reading this thread. Merged threads = throw any complaints into one spot so it can be ignored. The only people in power that are reading this are the ones who hand out infractions/delete posts/move them into the ‘trashbin’ cunningly named ‘merged threads’. I think I am just about at my limit. Enough is enough. They lied outright; the end.

What’s amazing is that even WoW didn’t raise the power cap that quickly after release. I have no interest in the gear refreshing zero-sum game anymore… that’s why I waited for and came to GW2. I thought people that made and played this game were on the same page. Very sad news… I guess the only bright side is that we find out so soon after release and not after investing a lot of time.

For reference to anybody looking to get refunds for this issue, I just got my ticket responded to. I asked for a refund for the gems that I used to buy exotics, based on the fact that we were promised the power level would never increase and I assumed the money would be an investment in the future of the game. I was told that gem purchases are non-refundable and that if I wanted a one-time courtesy refund I could get one, but they would permanently close my account if I did so.

I declined the refund on the grounds that I still have hope for the company, but I assume many of you will be making a different choice.

Kolache.3964:

What’s amazing is that even WoW didn’t raise the power cap that quickly after release. I have no interest in the gear refreshing zero-sum game anymore… that’s why I waited for and came to GW2. I thought people that made and played this game were on the same page. Very sad news… I guess the only bright side is that we find out so soon after release and not after investing a lot of time.

As disappointing as it is, have to agree with this.
Far, far better this happening now rather than later after invested even more time and money into the game.

This Ascended gear treadmill follows from the gems to gold revenue stream.

I was in the vast minority when I posted my displeasure over the gems for gold announcement on Guru.

Other players tried to downplay the pay to win aspect by pointing out that the top tier level 80 gear was so easy to get it would never matter.

Other players said we were foolish and worried for no reason when we said they would find ways to get people to buy gold by making the game grindy for those who didn’t.

Other players said botters and gold farmers wouldn’t be an issue because of gems for gold.

Other players said a lot of not so nice things about us over this issue.

Now I have one thing to say to all of them:

We told you so.

Corvindi.5734:

This Ascended gear treadmill follows from the gems to gold revenue stream.

I was in the vast minority when I posted my displeasure over the gems for gold announcement on Guru.

Other players tried to downplay the pay to win aspect by pointing out that the top tier level 80 gear was so easy to get it would never matter.

Other players said we were foolish and worried for no reason when we said they would find ways to get people to buy gold by making the game grindy for those who didn’t.

Other players said botters and gold farmers wouldn’t be an issue because of gems for gold.

Other players said a lot of not so nice things about us over this issue.

Now I have one thing to say to all of them:

We told you so.

Sorry but you are connecting 2 separate things. Sure some bought their way to the top, but most didn’t. The more hardcore players simply don’t have to pay their way to the top.
On the contrary if what you are saying is true they would have taken longer to do this as it is still very early in the games life and profits no doubt have been good from gems.

We seriusly should do a Quote thread of Developers… It would be a good way to tell them “hey guys, accept it, you just screw things up… bad.”

Conner.4702:

Corvindi.5734:

This Ascended gear treadmill follows from the gems to gold revenue stream.

I was in the vast minority when I posted my displeasure over the gems for gold announcement on Guru.

Other players tried to downplay the pay to win aspect by pointing out that the top tier level 80 gear was so easy to get it would never matter.

Other players said we were foolish and worried for no reason when we said they would find ways to get people to buy gold by making the game grindy for those who didn’t.

Other players said botters and gold farmers wouldn’t be an issue because of gems for gold.

Other players said a lot of not so nice things about us over this issue.

Now I have one thing to say to all of them:

We told you so.

Sorry but you are connecting 2 separate things. Sure some bought their way to the top, but most didn’t. The more hardcore players simply don’t have to pay their way to the top.
On the contrary if what you are saying is true they would have taken longer to do this as it is still very early in the games life and profits no doubt have been good from gems.

Explain to me how grinding 60-100 hours at 1 gold per hour for one back slot item versus buying the mats with gems exchanged for gold isn’t pay to win? That’s standard pay to win. Either unreasonable grind or open your wallet.

Is it possible to get my money back, as this is not the game I pre-ordered?