Guild Wars 2

I’m writing this post as an avid Guid Wars 2 player with around 2,000 hours age. I spend a ton of my time PvX’ing and participate with a high-end min/maxing PvE focused guild and have been enjoying GW2 since launch despite a few hiccups and missing/standard quality of life features. Nonetheless, PvE has been feeling rather dull lately (guild missions on farm, solo’ing lupi becoming stale, and living story quite frankly just does not interest me). With this in mind I wanted to toss out a potential raiding structure and get some community feedback. Ultimately I doubt hardcore PvE’ers will ever get a challenging raid-like structure that provides good experiences for all level of play and that Anet would support (since their main focus is not hardcore no-lifers like myself, although, true story I do have a life!), but maybe this thread will help shed some light on this potential.

As I spent a significant amount of time raiding with us/world progression wow guilds, I have to say I do miss some of this structure. Mainly the sense of accomplishment, the excitement of getting people together to work on a specific goal, etc (I do not, however, miss gear-tier grinding for stat benefits). Ideally I would love to see a raiding structure in place (maybe 10-mans?) that featured challenging encounters with hard and normal modes. The loot would only be cosmetic-based rewards and the only benefit of completing hard modes would simply be access to the cosmetic rewards quicker and/or achievements/titles. Basically, the system could combine wow’s structure with Anet’s mindset on rewarding loot/not discriminating against types of players. On a side note I do believe there should be different cosmetic rewards for different types of play but all stats nonetheless should be made available in any type of PvX play.

Although Guild Missions are basically supposed to be raiding, open-world mechanics are just terrible and allow for easy trolling. We need some type of instance based content here.

So anyways, there’s my simplistic layout of a potential weekly-raid structure that all could enjoy if they like the chase for more cosmetics/achieves but wouldn’t have to participate in if they don’t! Feedback or your own ideas welcome!

I’d brace myself if I were you. A lot of people came to this game to get away from raiding.

I’d love this as well. So many times we do guild dungeon runs and just WISH we could go in with 10 or even 15 people, instead of just that tiny group of 5. And with the “everyone gets their tokens so nobody has to /roll for items etc” system nobody would be forced to do it Just like the dungeons now…you can do it, but you don’t have to.

Guild Puzzles are currently the closest things to raids. That said, I’m somewhat disappointed at their lack of combat.

I never really played WoW (free trial, that’s it), but I spent six years in FFXI. Can anyone explain to me like I’m a six year old what exactly raiding in an MMO is? Is it essentially a dungeon run with more people?

darkace.8925:

I never really played WoW (free trial, that’s it), but I spent six years in FFXI. Can anyone explain to me like I’m a six year old what exactly raiding in an MMO is? Is it essentially a dungeon run with more people?

Yes, that’s pretty much it

darkace.8925:

I never really played WoW (free trial, that’s it), but I spent six years in FFXI. Can anyone explain to me like I’m a six year old what exactly raiding in an MMO is? Is it essentially a dungeon run with more people?

Raiding is exactly that. A dungeon run designed for more people than a standard dungeon group.

Raids are supposed to generally be harder content and in most games they’re more rewarding. This is where it gets tricky.

In almost every game with hard raids, only a small percentage of the gaming population ever finishes those raids. People compete for the honor to be the first guild to get it done. It tends to become very competitive, even within some guilds, to get a spot on the “A” team.

There are several problems I have with raids, having to do with dividing people in the game into haves and have nots. In a game without a trinity, I’m not sure how you’d handle a raid anyway, since the more people you have the easier stuff tends to be to zerg. It would certainly be a challenge to design.

What ends up happening in most guilds is you don’t have enough good people to do raids, and so you have to guilt people into showing up for raids and then carry them through it. Raids are hard…but only for the people running them.

I dislike what raids have done to the MMORPG community. Games that center on raids tend to be more about the MMO part and less about the RPG part. It’s all about boss fights and loot and beating your head against a problem until you solve it. That’s not RPGing to me. There are a million games out there with raids. Guild Wars 2, if it does implement them, should be very careful about how they do it.

darkace.8925:

I never really played WoW (free trial, that’s it), but I spent six years in FFXI. Can anyone explain to me like I’m a six year old what exactly raiding in an MMO is? Is it essentially a dungeon run with more people?

Yep, basically that’s about it. A raid in WoW (this was back in TBC, I didn’t raid heavily after that) was basically an instance that allowed for several groups together, some were 10 people (2 groups), other 25 people (5 groups). They were usually more complex and required more strategy than regular dungeons, but not always the case. They resetted weekly and you were saved on them anytime you killed a boss, so you could come back and continue on another day. Some raids were long enough that it usually took several hours to complete so people did them among several days, others were much shorter and were basically a small corridor leading to a boss fight.

I agree Vayne - I definitely would not want to step into a raid structure mirrored after WoW. It would have to be handled carefully and the encounters I think could also be really fun. A big focus of it would be coordination between groups and the mechanics only limited to developer time/experience. Rolling something out like this would probably be a huge overhaul and time consuming, but nonetheless, I do think in the long-run would be a great investment for the health of the game. The main thing is just to make sure it isn’t required, can be experienced by all, and also provides rewarding/repeatable experiences for both the hardcore and casual gamer (i.e. normal mode vs hard mode, etc). This is all great feedback so far and I welcome more discussion.

I have nothing against larger groups of people playing together in an instance…but having seen what Rift did with raids…they were pretty much the way to advance.

The question I always have is this. If you don’t have the rewards…ie better stat rewards..will most people still raid. I guess if you had cosmetic rewards only available in that raid, some people would…but I’m not sure it would be so easy to get a group for really difficult content without a stat reward included.

And if Anet implemented that, they’d lose a good portion of their player base.

Thanks for the replies. So if it’s just a dungeon with more people, what exactly about raids makes them so popular?

If it’s a difficulty thing, I’ll have to cite my FFXI experience that a six-man dungeon/boss fight can be incredibly challenging, and I see no reason why a five-man can’t be equally difficult. And do keep in mind that content in video games these days tends to be easier so that more can enjoy it.

If it’s something else that makes them appealing, please fill me in.

Yea, I definitely wouldn’t want to step into a system that alienates players or makes them feel like they have to participate in this aspect. Nonetheless, I do think a cosmetic based grind is more than enough to get players interested (think guild mission rewards, but we could even eliminate ascended gear, or just make it another way to get the already available WvW/Fotm/Laurel ascended gear. Basically, what I’m proposing is almost essentially guild missions, but fine tuned mechanics (like guild puzzle + a boss at the same time), set party sizes (eliminates the difficulty with factoring in scaling), instanced (eliminates trolling from open world), and hardmode/normal modes to allow for different skill levels, but over time ultimately providing the same rewards (again, differences would just be more tokens or w/e currency for completing hard mode than normal mode and/or access to certain titles).

Dark, regarding your commens, 5 mans are fun (I don’t think they should be removed of course), but there’s an even better sense of accomplishment when you have a larger group (one of the reasons wildstar is doing 40 man raids). The social atmosphere, in my opinion, is much more fun, the fight mechanics can be expanded more, and the difficulty is often higher. Think of 5 mans more as entry-level type dungeons that can scale up (i.e. exlporable modes). Raiding is, ok, you’re solid at your class now, let’s see yuo take your mechanics and expand leadership across multiple groups at the same time and coordinate multiple groups to meet a certain goal. It’s also something that is more rare to occur (i.e. can only clear once a week typically), so it makes it that more interesting/exciting as it gives a group/guild something to look forward to in general from week to week. I need a psychiatrist to explain this better, but overall it’s just healthier for the lively hood of a game.

docMed.7692:

This is all great feedback so far and I welcome more discussion.

Not to be a party kittener, but there is really nothing left to discuss.
There have already been several very long, very detailed discussions about raids.
I honestly believe there is nothing anyone can say either for or against that has not been said already, at least twice. (yes, the forum search is one of the worst I have ever seen, but the threads are actually there somewhere). Eventually, the mods will simply merge this thread in to one of the already existing threads, and it will also fade away in to the none searchable area they have somewhere.
If you really want raids, your better off posting in the suggestions forum. If enough people suggest it, it’s more likely to happen then being posted here as another in the very long line of soon to disappear threads.

docMed.7692:

allow for easy trolling.

Out of all the post this is what stuck out to me.

For one there is raid content in this game beyond the temples.

As long you people have the attitude that people joining in the “open” world content and consider them to be “trolling” you are in actuality the troll.

It is up to guilds to get a core group together and maintain goals. If you do not allow people that are not in your guild to join in then this is not your game. Since this is an open world game.

Krosslite.1950:

docMed.7692:

allow for easy trolling.

Out of all the post this is what stuck out to me.

For one there is raid content in this game beyond the temples.

As long you people have the attitude that people joining in the “open” world content and consider them to be “trolling” you are in actuality the troll.

It is up to guilds to get a core group together and maintain goals. If you do not allow people that are not in your guild to join in then this is not your game. Since this is an open world game.

Well, there’s plenty of counters to that logic (instanced dungeons, pvp, etc – I’m not asking for open-world things to be eliminated, I like that aspect too; just guild missions are not a suitable replacement for raids in my opinion). Nonetheless, the main issue there in open-world & guild missions is the mechanics in which ArenaNet implements this content. For example, even if a player just stands in the area of a guild mission, the player will scale the mission, same as any event. They will also scale a mission whether they are level cap (80) or if they are just level enough to enter the zone. There are also mechanics, such as guild bounty missions, where if a mob is attacked when it shouldn’t be (Half-baked), it can make him unkillable unless he is zerged down with a 50+ group, which in my opinion also isn’t very fun and again, makes it open to individuals trolling, whether it is intentional or not. Instanced play, available to everyone, allows for more balanced content. Again, I’m not saying open-world/guild-missions should be removed, but there’s also no reason to not exapnd upon instanced play, which already exists in a multitude of ways in GW2.

ShiningSquirrel.3751:

docMed.7692:

This is all great feedback so far and I welcome more discussion.

Not to be a party kittener, but there is really nothing left to discuss.
There have already been several very long, very detailed discussions about raids.
I honestly believe there is nothing anyone can say either for or against that has not been said already, at least twice. (yes, the forum search is one of the worst I have ever seen, but the threads are actually there somewhere). Eventually, the mods will simply merge this thread in to one of the already existing threads, and it will also fade away in to the none searchable area they have somewhere.
If you really want raids, your better off posting in the suggestions forum. If enough people suggest it, it’s more likely to happen then being posted here as another in the very long line of soon to disappear threads.

There’s still plenty to discuss. I’m not even saying this should be implemented, I’m just interested in community feedback (i.e. what’s good/bad about raiding in general) and from there, if I feel warranted, would create an actual suggestion thread to ArenaNet. The same logic you applied (re-cycled discussions) can literally be applied to 99% of the content on these threads.

darkace.8925:

Thanks for the replies. So if it’s just a dungeon with more people, what exactly about raids makes them so popular?

If it’s a difficulty thing, I’ll have to cite my FFXI experience that a six-man dungeon/boss fight can be incredibly challenging, and I see no reason why a five-man can’t be equally difficult. And do keep in mind that content in video games these days tends to be easier so that more can enjoy it.

If it’s something else that makes them appealing, please fill me in.

Basically people liked them because it gave them a sense of progression and something to do for long term goals.

Talking about WoW style raids (at least in the TBC times), the progression was strictly in order. You had to do heroic dungeons (more difficult version of normal dungeons you could do at level cap) until you got gear good enough for the first raid (back then it was 10 people Karazhan), then you did that raid enough times until you had good enough gear to go to the next tier of raids (IIRC it was Gruul’s Lair and Magtheridon’s Lair back then) and so on.

So, the advantage (for some at least) was that the game gave you a specific and defined goal to go trough. You started a raid and do it until you learnt how to kill the bosses, the farmed it for a while until all your team had good enough gear, then moved on to the next tier, started learning that one, and so on. Also gave them something to work for, usually only very few of the top guilds managed to reach the final raid of the time (actually I remember reading that about 10% of the people in WoW evet got into a raid, and most of the highest end content was only seen by less than 1% of the population). Also, to be honest, I think raiding Karazhan was the most fun I’ve ever had in WoW in the years I played, though it’s probably more because of the group I did it with.

The disadvantage was that it also created an elitist mindset that was light years ahead of what we’ve seen so far in GW2. If you wanted to raid, you better join a good guild, and hope you get a spot in the raiding team. I saw more guilds that I care to count disband because of drama over who goes to which raid, and how fast/slow they were progressing, and if you wanted to join one of the top guilds, you’d better be prepared to go trough a job interview that makes getting to work for google look like joining a public library. Even if pug raids were being formed, basically joining one meant proving you had done the raid over and over and knew all the fights (imagine like a Warrior Zerker only CoF run, but with the caveat that if you join, even if just place one step inside, and the group leader doesn’t think you’re up to it, you’re booted and locked out of it for a week).

That’s basically the mindset people wanted to get away from in GW2. Of course, raids were optional, but really in most raid centric games, endgame becomes “raid or do nothing”, and which is why lots of people are so much against regular raids in GW2 in the first place.

Players want to be the best and play with the best in any aspect of any game; especially in GW2. Look at WvW and PvP - two very competitive aspects of any game. I don’t see any reason why groups of players that want to accomplish something at a high-level of play are frowned upon just because they are typically the minority (i.e. more casual players than hardcore players). Nonetheless, there are other players on the exact opposite spectrum that play simply to enjoy the game, which this system would not obstruct them from doing so. For hardcore gamers like myself, there really isn’t much that the PvE world currently offers on a large scale for our guild. We get together for guild missions, destroy them in a hour, and then that’s it, PvE-wise, we have no other reasons on a large scale to get together and do any other content. 5 man’s just feel unrewarding on a guild level and I think on the PvE side of things we could really use some more incentives to get a larger part of the guild together working on difficult PvE content.

I don’t have a problem with raids. I do have a problem with WoW s instance version of raids that they brought to popularity, I’m not sayin they are all bad, they did have huge benefits, like no more camping bosses, no more fighting over mobs, etc.

What I didn’t like about them(instances) is they are kind of exclusive, in open world/open dungeon raids you can pretty much invite everyone to come, and using daoc as a reference, no they weren’t easy. You did need some people with certain kills, but these people were easy to find in raids of 50-100 people, but the most important thing was teamwork. (aside from having enough max lvl people, which was hardly ever an issue)

With instances it’s kind of like “okay, we need you, you, and you, sorry, not enough room for the rest of you.”

This post is probably late because I had to leave to go do something in the middle of it, lol.

As an ex-hardcore raider from WoW I do not think WoW-type raids would work in GW2 and here’s why.

A raid (in WoW terms) is a tightly controlled instance that limits the number of players that can enter and is designed to allow players to progress through the instance by getting better gear with each boss kill. There’s no mystery, magic, difficulty or complexity beyond that.

It’s seen over and over, a guild gets finally gets down a boss and then they have it on farm thereafter. Why? Did they suddenly “get better” or unlock the secrets of the universe? No, they have better gear, that’s it. The whole thing can be worked out on a spreadsheet – the boss isn’t killed when the killing blow is dealt, that fight was decided with the previous boss kill when the tank got a shield so he would take less damage or the healer got a trinket so he could heal more or the dps got a set piece so that he could deal more damage.

It’s all about the gear and that’s why they won’t work in GW2.

docMed.7692:

Krosslite.1950:

docMed.7692:

allow for easy trolling.

Out of all the post this is what stuck out to me.

For one there is raid content in this game beyond the temples.

As long you people have the attitude that people joining in the “open” world content and consider them to be “trolling” you are in actuality the troll.

It is up to guilds to get a core group together and maintain goals. If you do not allow people that are not in your guild to join in then this is not your game. Since this is an open world game.

Well, there’s plenty of counters to that logic (instanced dungeons, pvp, etc – I’m not asking for open-world things to be eliminated, I like that aspect too; just guild missions are not a suitable replacement for raids in my opinion). Nonetheless, the main issue there in open-world & guild missions is the mechanics in which ArenaNet implements this content. For example, even if a player just stands in the area of a guild mission, the player will scale the mission, same as any event. They will also scale a mission whether they are level cap (80) or if they are just level enough to enter the zone. There are also mechanics, such as guild bounty missions, where if a mob is attacked when it shouldn’t be (Half-baked), it can make him unkillable unless he is zerged down with a 50+ group, which in my opinion also isn’t very fun and again, makes it open to individuals trolling, whether it is intentional or not. Instanced play, available to everyone, allows for more balanced content. Again, I’m not saying open-world/guild-missions should be removed, but there’s also no reason to not exapnd upon instanced play, which already exists in a multitude of ways in GW2.

As it is due to this type of thinking the open world raiding that is already in the game is not being taken advantage of.
The last thing this game needs is more instanced gaming. This promotes elitism and segregates most of those that play the game.

This game was sold as a community focused game and instancing removes this.

It is nice you want to do raiding. Why don’t you try and see how it works beyond the temples. Anet has stated most of the DE webs are beyond the temples and that it would require a community guided effort to figure them out and to get the reward that lie there.

This game was sold as being not like the other games out there that require instanced encounters. You need to start thinking community and not the guild. In the long run the guild will end up the winner if you do

Already I have seen some people spamming PING your gear or don’t bother messaging, so no I don’t want to go back those so called good old days.

I think it’s kind of strange that these last few posts are focused around concerns pertaining to segregating players. There is always going to be different skill levels, involvement, interest, goals, etc. These will innately segregate players. I’ve also indicated the structure would need to work for all levels, hardcore and casual, which normal/hard modes could provide. Just as if a casual player wants to play with relaxed/casual players so should a hardcore min/mazer be given the right to group with like minded players. There are jerks both amongst casual/hardcore, to give the impression that challenging content would only bring hate on casuals is unfounded. I’ve known plenty of nice elite or casual players just as I’ve known as many jerks who are elite or casual. The fact of the matter is, this current PvE content holds no weight and is crushed through by min/maxers in literally minutes. I’m not saying we should only make content for these types of players, but it would be nice if this game provided some type of content that allowed this type of play to actually exist (ie provide challenge). In my opinion, farming broken mechanic open world PvE events is simply put - boring. Progression in challenge and cosmetic-only rewards would be a welcome change.

I should also add, I have done a ton of open world PvE farming; the main issue here is given a large enough group they are all crushed through easily. Additionally, hunting them down with a small group yields 0 cosmetic reward short of a potential drop and karma. If they want us to hunt these types of events down, they need to make the benefits far more rewarding.

GW2 sold itself as a skill based game, where does this actually apply in PvE?

docMed.7692:

I think it’s kind of strange that these last few posts are focused around concerns pertaining to segregating players. * There is always going to be different skill levels, involvement, interest, goals, etc. These will innately segregate players.* I’ve also indicated the structure would need to work for all levels, hardcore and casual, which normal/hard modes could provide. Just as if a casual player wants to play with relaxed/casual players so should a hardcore min/mazer be given the right to group with like minded players. There are jerks both amongst casual/hardcore, to give the impression that challenging content would only bring hate on casuals is unfounded. I’ve known plenty of nice elite or casual players just as I’ve known as many jerks who are elite or casual. The fact of the matter is, this current PvE content holds no weight and is crushed through by min/maxers in literally minutes. I’m not saying we should only make content for these types of players, but it would be nice if this game provided some type of content that allowed this type of play to actually exist (ie provide challenge). In my opinion, farming broken mechanic open world PvE events is simply put – boring. Progression in challenge and cosmetic-only rewards would be a welcome change.

I think the point I was trying to make in my post was that the way the open world/dungeon raids were designed in these old MMO’s, there was very little segregation, and the community was a lot stronger than these current mmo’s imo. Although, I don’t know if that’s because of the game design, or the amount of players mmo’s now attract these days, probably a little of both.

Yes, there were more skilled players than others, but the solution wasn’t to split them up into different kinds of instance content, instead they generally had more important roles to play in these non instanced raids. (raid leader, group leader, puller, maintaining crowd control, main assist tank, etc) Some of the raids were “hard” (there were a lot of wipes), but for less skilled players, as long as they followed instructions, and didn’t run around like a chicken with no head, they were fine.

Yes, there was flaws in these type of raids in daoc, but they can easily be addressed. Actually, one has already been addressed, everyone has personal loot in Gw2 rather than sharing.

I’m not saying they shouldn’t implement raid like content aside from DE’s (whether if it’s in a new open world dungeon, or some boss out in open world), I just disagree with them being instances. (aside from the already standard 5 man instances)

Well, I suppose to wouldn’t care all that much either way, but it’s become a recent pet peeve of mine when I get the “What do you mean you don’t run dungeons, you know you’re playing an mmorpg right?” No, I have no problems with grouping, I just don’t particularly like instances.

^ That last bit is not directed at you, just me rambling, lol.

Krosslite.1950:

docMed.7692:

Krosslite.1950:

docMed.7692:

allow for easy trolling.

Out of all the post this is what stuck out to me.

For one there is raid content in this game beyond the temples.

As long you people have the attitude that people joining in the “open” world content and consider them to be “trolling” you are in actuality the troll.

It is up to guilds to get a core group together and maintain goals. If you do not allow people that are not in your guild to join in then this is not your game. Since this is an open world game.

Well, there’s plenty of counters to that logic (instanced dungeons, pvp, etc – I’m not asking for open-world things to be eliminated, I like that aspect too; just guild missions are not a suitable replacement for raids in my opinion). Nonetheless, the main issue there in open-world & guild missions is the mechanics in which ArenaNet implements this content. For example, even if a player just stands in the area of a guild mission, the player will scale the mission, same as any event. They will also scale a mission whether they are level cap (80) or if they are just level enough to enter the zone. There are also mechanics, such as guild bounty missions, where if a mob is attacked when it shouldn’t be (Half-baked), it can make him unkillable unless he is zerged down with a 50+ group, which in my opinion also isn’t very fun and again, makes it open to individuals trolling, whether it is intentional or not. Instanced play, available to everyone, allows for more balanced content. Again, I’m not saying open-world/guild-missions should be removed, but there’s also no reason to not exapnd upon instanced play, which already exists in a multitude of ways in GW2.

As it is due to this type of thinking the open world raiding that is already in the game is not being taken advantage of.
The last thing this game needs is more instanced gaming. This promotes elitism and segregates most of those that play the game.

This game was sold as a community focused game and instancing removes this.

It is nice you want to do raiding. Why don’t you try and see how it works beyond the temples. Anet has stated most of the DE webs are beyond the temples and that it would require a community guided effort to figure them out and to get the reward that lie there.

This game was sold as being not like the other games out there that require instanced encounters. You need to start thinking community and not the guild. In the long run the guild will end up the winner if you do

Most people consider their guilds their community, i know i do. The problem with putting many things in the open world is it sets a limit on difficulty because everyone needs to participate. Also personally in terms of community in wow my closest community was my raid team, why? Because raids are prime team building exercise . By opening things to everyone you simply cant have things to difficult or you present a whole slew of other issues especially where people can inadvertently scale things up which can make it harder for you and they arnt pulling their weight.

Instances dont remove the community, they build smaller tighter ones. Its much like how you have circles of friends. You have people you just know, friends, Close Friends / family etc you get the point. GW2 currently lacks in the close friend department because there isnt content to build those ties which is challenging content. Im not sure what everyones experience was in BC but i made lots of friends in BC, Why? Because you had to, the content was challenging enough you built a list of friends that you work well with and got along with and thus a friends list was born.

I really miss raiding with my guild in LOTRO. A raid is not necessarily tied to a gear treadmill, nor it needs to be near-impossible to beat. I was in a small guild and raiding is by far the most enjoyable thing the game had to offer, even if we were never that great or able to beat the hardest challenges, it was still fun and playing together shaped us into a small community.
I’d like to see THAT here as well. Something to do with your guildmates that is fun, somehow challenging and worth your time.

And no, guild missions are not comparable. Don’t even get me started on the mess they are when you’re not all on the same home server. Yuck.

Here is the thing. I have been pushing for guild to form raiding groups. Why? because Anet has stated that beyond the temples you will need:

1) organization
2) large number of player.

The content is already here. I support you in your wish to have organization, but you wish to remove, segregate, the large number required.

When you are willing to do organized open world raiding. again, which is already in the game. then I feel you will more community centered

In GW1, Fissure of Woe, The Deep, Urgoz Warren, the Underworld, Domain of Anguish and to some extent Sorrow’s Furnace and the Temple of the Primeval Kings took the “place” of raids. Being the game it was, these instances were often completed due to party build plus knowing mechanics as opposed to pure player skill, just as standard MMO raids succeeded due to knowing the mechanics and gear.

I imagine that truly hard larger group content in GW2 would have to be based on twitch-skills + knowing the mechanics. If true, this means there would be a smaller audience than either GW1 or the standard MMO. Expanding the potential audience would essentially mean reducing the twitch skill requirement, making the content easier.

Another issue is rewards. Raids serve two purposes in a standard MMO. They provide something for players to do, and they buy time (with their gear progression grind and weekly lockouts) for the devs to make the next step of the ladder. Some players will play content into the ground to get what they want. Make the rewards too accessible and they’re done with it too soon. Make them too hard to get and people complain.

Many of the GW1 instances referred to above featured a very small chance for unique drops. This gave them longevity, because they took time to run and people who ran them really wanted that drop. Of course, speed runs were developed, but that only solved one of the problems, it had no effect on the RNG.

I’d like to see what GW2 ANet would do with instanced content like UW and FoW. Unfortunately, they are being pulled in many different directions by their player-base, and they doubtless have a long-term plan which probably does not include this type of content. Still, I think it would be worthwhile to modify their plans to include it. FoW, UW, etc. contributed to keeping GW alive a long time and provided a lot of fun for its players.

Honestly I don’t think it would be difficult top implement raids that work in GW2. A lot of development work of course, but all new content is. Just keep the system, that is currently used with dungeons.

Don’t add gear grind to the mix. Just keep it the way it is right now. No items drop, instead token rewards. Everybody gets their tokens, everybody can purchase their reward with it. Which would be a new exotic armor set. Just like the other dungeon rewards. We need more armor sets in game anyway.

People who want to do raids for gear progression didn’t buy the right game when they bought GW2. People who want to do raids to test their skill, progress through hard content as a team, play challengeing stuff with their guildies and the like – thos will be happy with not getting Legendary rewards for 1 person of the party with each boss kill

I would be perfectly fine with raids as long as:

1- They do not award any items- cosmetic or spec-wise- that cannot be acquired via 5-man means.

2- They do not offer a faster way to accrue Karma, Laurels, Badges of Honor, Top-Tier crafting materials, or Fractal Relics.

3- They do not have their own tokens/currency.

4- They do not provide any extra boost to Guild Influence.

Not giving raids their own reward tokens wouldn’t make sense – if you want dungeon armor now, you have to do dungeons. If you want raid armor then you have to do raids. Same stats, different aesthetics, but yeah. SOMETHING has to be given as reward

darkace.8925:

Thanks for the replies. So if it’s just a dungeon with more people, what exactly about raids makes them so popular?

If it’s a difficulty thing, I’ll have to cite my FFXI experience that a six-man dungeon/boss fight can be incredibly challenging, and I see no reason why a five-man can’t be equally difficult. And do keep in mind that content in video games these days tends to be easier so that more can enjoy it.

If it’s something else that makes them appealing, please fill me in.

If you’d like to see an example of raids, try going to tankspot.com and watch some of their raiding videos located on the “Movies” tab.

Personally I loved raiding with my WoW guild, but that was because we weren’t all that concerned about progression and were more concerned with just having fun and ribbing each other when we “stood in the fire” and died.

I tried a couple “heroic” raids with another guild and…yeah…no thanks….

Yea, again - the general idea would be content that actually gives your tight-knit group of guildies (beyond 5 people, this is just too small!) to get together more and accomplish the tasks at hand. Rewards would be ultimately available to everyone and based on whether you do hard mode or normal mode, would reward a slight boost in more tokens for hard and/or achievements - but ultimately, over time, everyone would get the same rewards.

People have a negative view on raiding simply because of what WoW has done to it. Guild missions are a good start and I can see the general ideas ArenaNet is laying out there, but there are just too many difficulties that lend itself to open world (scaling, difficult content for all levels of play at once, mechanics that lend itself to be trollable even when unintentional, etc).

Firefly.5982:

Honestly I don’t think it would be difficult top implement raids that work in GW2. A lot of development work of course, but all new content is. Just keep the system, that is currently used with dungeons.

Don’t add gear grind to the mix. Just keep it the way it is right now. No items drop, instead token rewards. Everybody gets their tokens, everybody can purchase their reward with it. Which would be a new exotic armor set. Just like the other dungeon rewards. We need more armor sets in game anyway.

People who want to do raids for gear progression didn’t buy the right game when they bought GW2. People who want to do raids to test their skill, progress through hard content as a team, play challengeing stuff with their guildies and the like – thos will be happy with not getting Legendary rewards for 1 person of the party with each boss kill

This is definitely the idea I was getting at. I would just open it a bit more to a skill tuning ability for groups that want more or less of a challenge (and ideally more or less tokens and/or achieves per week).

zuraith.6104:

I would be perfectly fine with raids as long as:

1- They do not award any items- cosmetic or spec-wise- that cannot be acquired via 5-man means.

2- They do not offer a faster way to accrue Karma, Laurels, Badges of Honor, Top-Tier crafting materials, or Fractal Relics.

3- They do not have their own tokens/currency.

4- They do not provide any extra boost to Guild Influence.

1. and #3 is awfully restrictive , Cosmetic rewards are the life blood of the game. Those need to be a reward and having a currency of which to give said reward is also needed.

Warruz.8096:

zuraith.6104:

I would be perfectly fine with raids as long as:

1- They do not award any items- cosmetic or spec-wise- that cannot be acquired via 5-man means.

2- They do not offer a faster way to accrue Karma, Laurels, Badges of Honor, Top-Tier crafting materials, or Fractal Relics.

3- They do not have their own tokens/currency.

4- They do not provide any extra boost to Guild Influence.

1. and #3 is awfully restrictive , Cosmetic rewards are the life blood of the game. Those need to be a reward and having a currency of which to give said reward is also needed.

Then Raiding is no longer an option, but a requirement. Right now, Fractals (which I personally love) are not an option if you want top-tier gear or Fractal skins. And you’re right, cosmetic rewards are the life blood of the game. That’s why Raids cannot reward them exclusively.

World bosses are awesome because you can have a hundred people together doing the same thing, but it took no organization. If an exclusive skin drops from The Shatterer, you go kill the Shatterer. Others will be there. It’s way different when you have to get 25 folks together.

It’s difficult for MANY of us to know enough people for raids. PUGs are not okay for raids, unless GW2 makes them the same difficulty as dungeons (which would raise the question of having them at all). Personally, I like small groups, especially in GW2 when we can all play DPS. So here’s why Raids need to either have NOTHING exclusive and therefore be 100% optional, or not exist:

- Difficult to form a worthy group.
- Potentially forces guildless players to be involved in guilds.
- Discourages small/social guilds
- Introduces a new style of PvE that many PvE players may not want to be part of.
- Goes against the ability to “play what/how you want”, the way Fractals currently does
- Encourages the unholy trinity
- Restricts class builds to specific class-based assumed roles
- Potentially introduces lore and characters that will be otherwise inaccessible
- Essentially requires voice chat

Krosslite.1950:

docMed.7692:

Krosslite.1950:

docMed.7692:

allow for easy trolling.

Out of all the post this is what stuck out to me.

For one there is raid content in this game beyond the temples.

As long you people have the attitude that people joining in the “open” world content and consider them to be “trolling” you are in actuality the troll.

It is up to guilds to get a core group together and maintain goals. If you do not allow people that are not in your guild to join in then this is not your game. Since this is an open world game.

Well, there’s plenty of counters to that logic (instanced dungeons, pvp, etc – I’m not asking for open-world things to be eliminated, I like that aspect too; just guild missions are not a suitable replacement for raids in my opinion). Nonetheless, the main issue there in open-world & guild missions is the mechanics in which ArenaNet implements this content. For example, even if a player just stands in the area of a guild mission, the player will scale the mission, same as any event. They will also scale a mission whether they are level cap (80) or if they are just level enough to enter the zone. There are also mechanics, such as guild bounty missions, where if a mob is attacked when it shouldn’t be (Half-baked), it can make him unkillable unless he is zerged down with a 50+ group, which in my opinion also isn’t very fun and again, makes it open to individuals trolling, whether it is intentional or not. Instanced play, available to everyone, allows for more balanced content. Again, I’m not saying open-world/guild-missions should be removed, but there’s also no reason to not exapnd upon instanced play, which already exists in a multitude of ways in GW2.

As it is due to this type of thinking the open world raiding that is already in the game is not being taken advantage of.
The last thing this game needs is more instanced gaming. This promotes elitism and segregates most of those that play the game.

This game was sold as a community focused game and instancing removes this.

It is nice you want to do raiding. Why don’t you try and see how it works beyond the temples. Anet has stated most of the DE webs are beyond the temples and that it would require a community guided effort to figure them out and to get the reward that lie there.

This game was sold as being not like the other games out there that require instanced encounters. You need to start thinking community and not the guild. In the long run the guild will end up the winner if you do

At what point did Arenanet make the statement that this game would solely be introducing open world content? You mention open world “Raiding” as if it fixes our current problem in a lack of endgame. It simply doesn’t, since their is no limit factor in these events/“Raids” people can simply zerg them. It’s counterintuitive to have both a “Difficult” battle and “Zerg”, If they were to introduce Raid’s in the same way they introduced it in Guildwars 1 it would in my opinion provide the endgame this game has been eluding.

Arenanet stated in the manifesto that they would bring back things players loved in GW1, and one of those thing’s were Elite instanced content.

zuraith.6104:

Warruz.8096:

zuraith.6104:

I would be perfectly fine with raids as long as:

1- They do not award any items- cosmetic or spec-wise- that cannot be acquired via 5-man means.

2- They do not offer a faster way to accrue Karma, Laurels, Badges of Honor, Top-Tier crafting materials, or Fractal Relics.

3- They do not have their own tokens/currency.

4- They do not provide any extra boost to Guild Influence.

1. and #3 is awfully restrictive , Cosmetic rewards are the life blood of the game. Those need to be a reward and having a currency of which to give said reward is also needed.

Then Raiding is no longer an option, but a requirement. Right now, Fractals (which I personally love) are not an option if you want top-tier gear or Fractal skins. And you’re right, cosmetic rewards are the life blood of the game. That’s why Raids cannot reward them exclusively.

World bosses are awesome because you can have a hundred people together doing the same thing, but it took no organization. If an exclusive skin drops from The Shatterer, you go kill the Shatterer. Others will be there. It’s way different when you have to get 25 folks together.

It’s difficult for MANY of us to know enough people for raids. PUGs are not okay for raids, unless GW2 makes them the same difficulty as dungeons (which would raise the question of having them at all). Personally, I like small groups, especially in GW2 when we can all play DPS. So here’s why Raids need to either have NOTHING exclusive and therefore be 100% optional, or not exist:

- Difficult to form a worthy group.
- Potentially forces guildless players to be involved in guilds.
- Discourages small/social guilds
- Introduces a new style of PvE that many PvE players may not want to be part of.
- Goes against the ability to “play what/how you want”, the way Fractals currently does
- Encourages the unholy trinity
- Restricts class builds to specific class-based assumed roles
- Potentially introduces lore and characters that will be otherwise inaccessible
- Essentially requires voice chat

1. LFG (10-Man)
2. Guildless can “PUG” on LFG.
3. How? What will be the size of a “Raid” party?
4. How is this a reason to not “Raid”, based on this why should anyone do any new content at all?
5. Guildwars 2 was built around (Support,Control and Damage) so this wouldn’t be a problem.
6. How?
7. So? People who didn’t do F&F didn’t see Braham or Rox does that mean that the update shouldn’t have went live? (People could atleast attempt to “Raid”)
8. I did all the “Raid” in Guildwars 1 without voice chat.

im beginning to think raid along the style like they did in gw1 would be nice endgame. they had expert group who did them well and fast and guild group who usually took more time but could do them with experience. i preferred the 12 man dungeon they had in gw1 but the 8 man ones were fun also. ivwe never done any wow raiding per say but i think raiding might be a great idea just call them 10 to 15 man dungeons instead

zuraith.6104:

I would be perfectly fine with raids as long as:

1- They do not award any items- cosmetic or spec-wise- that cannot be acquired via 5-man means.

2- They do not offer a faster way to accrue Karma, Laurels, Badges of Honor, Top-Tier crafting materials, or Fractal Relics.

3- They do not have their own tokens/currency.

4- They do not provide any extra boost to Guild Influence.

I assume you didn’t want too see Guild missions either? As most of what you have stated here is exactly what is related to Guild Missions currently.

Martin The Brave.8731:

zuraith.6104:

I would be perfectly fine with raids as long as:

1- They do not award any items- cosmetic or spec-wise- that cannot be acquired via 5-man means.

2- They do not offer a faster way to accrue Karma, Laurels, Badges of Honor, Top-Tier crafting materials, or Fractal Relics.

3- They do not have their own tokens/currency.

4- They do not provide any extra boost to Guild Influence.

I assume you didn’t want too see Guild missions either? As most of what you have stated here is exactly what is related to Guild Missions currently.

I was excited for them! But Guild Missions are terrible the way they are. Fortunately, they are completely optional and therefore can be completely ignored.

zuraith.6104:

Martin The Brave.8731:

zuraith.6104:

I would be perfectly fine with raids as long as:

1- They do not award any items- cosmetic or spec-wise- that cannot be acquired via 5-man means.

2- They do not offer a faster way to accrue Karma, Laurels, Badges of Honor, Top-Tier crafting materials, or Fractal Relics.

3- They do not have their own tokens/currency.

4- They do not provide any extra boost to Guild Influence.

I assume you didn’t want too see Guild missions either? As most of what you have stated here is exactly what is related to Guild Missions currently.

I was excited for them! But Guild Missions are terrible the way they are. Fortunately, they are completely optional and therefore can be completely ignored.

Well doesn’t my comment make you reconsider the reason you may not want “Raids”? Considering that these features are currently in game and have no impact on you whatsoever and as you say can be completely ignored?

Martin The Brave.8731:

zuraith.6104:

Warruz.8096:

zuraith.6104:

I would be perfectly fine with raids as long as:

1- They do not award any items- cosmetic or spec-wise- that cannot be acquired via 5-man means.

2- They do not offer a faster way to accrue Karma, Laurels, Badges of Honor, Top-Tier crafting materials, or Fractal Relics.

3- They do not have their own tokens/currency.

4- They do not provide any extra boost to Guild Influence.

1. and #3 is awfully restrictive , Cosmetic rewards are the life blood of the game. Those need to be a reward and having a currency of which to give said reward is also needed.

Then Raiding is no longer an option, but a requirement. Right now, Fractals (which I personally love) are not an option if you want top-tier gear or Fractal skins. And you’re right, cosmetic rewards are the life blood of the game. That’s why Raids cannot reward them exclusively.

World bosses are awesome because you can have a hundred people together doing the same thing, but it took no organization. If an exclusive skin drops from The Shatterer, you go kill the Shatterer. Others will be there. It’s way different when you have to get 25 folks together.

It’s difficult for MANY of us to know enough people for raids. PUGs are not okay for raids, unless GW2 makes them the same difficulty as dungeons (which would raise the question of having them at all). Personally, I like small groups, especially in GW2 when we can all play DPS. So here’s why Raids need to either have NOTHING exclusive and therefore be 100% optional, or not exist:

- Difficult to form a worthy group.
- Potentially forces guildless players to be involved in guilds.
- Discourages small/social guilds
- Introduces a new style of PvE that many PvE players may not want to be part of.
- Goes against the ability to “play what/how you want”, the way Fractals currently does
- Encourages the unholy trinity
- Restricts class builds to specific class-based assumed roles
- Potentially introduces lore and characters that will be otherwise inaccessible
- Essentially requires voice chat

1. LFG (10-Man)
2. Guildless can “PUG” on LFG.
3. How? What will be the size of a “Raid” party?
4. How is this a reason to not “Raid”, based on this why should anyone do any new content at all?
5. Guildwars 2 was built around (Support,Control and Damage) so this wouldn’t be a problem.
6. How?
7. So? People who didn’t do F&F didn’t see Braham or Rox does that mean that the update shouldn’t have went live? (People could atleast attempt to “Raid”)
8. I did all the “Raid” in Guildwars 1 without voice chat.

Sorry for the quote tree.

1- What I meant by “worthy” group was a group that isn’t going to wipe at the first encounter. Unless raids are completely different elsewhere, I’m coming from WoW and Aion, and raids were HARD. An LFG tool works for small groups, not large groups. Generally larger required groups = higher difficulty. Bigger groups = more people “applying” for groups. The ways around it are gear checks, DPS checks, prerequisite achievements… all horrible things.
2- See above /\
3- In Aion they were 12-man. In WoW they were 40-man. Later they dwindled to 10 and 25-man. I’m in a guild of 35 people, usually 6-8 online at once. No way we’d be able to have a guild raid, unless we find a big guild.
4- It’s not a reason to not raid, I was saying that it’s a reason to not give raids exclusive rewards that cannot be obtained by other means.
5- This WOULD be a problem. With 5 people in GW2, you still have the freedom to play your build (assuming you aren’t with a bunch of elitists). When you’re with 24 other folks, all heavies are now tanks. All lights are now ranged dps, and keep your pets away. With larger groups, your class becomes a generalized role.
6- Well, when your class becomes a generalized role, you’re less useful and undesirable if you aren’t capping that role. You can’t play with utilities anymore, you have to go full cannon!
7- People who didn’t do the F&F events probably don’t care about the lore or characters.
8- I’m unfamiliar with Guild Wars 1 raids. In Aion it was possible with a 12-man group, but in WoW I was kicked numerous times for not using some random Vent server to listen to the fat 14-year-olds’ cracking voices. When I left WoW (Lich King update) Vent was a staple.

Martin The Brave.8731:

zuraith.6104:

Martin The Brave.8731:

zuraith.6104:

I would be perfectly fine with raids as long as:

1- They do not award any items- cosmetic or spec-wise- that cannot be acquired via 5-man means.

2- They do not offer a faster way to accrue Karma, Laurels, Badges of Honor, Top-Tier crafting materials, or Fractal Relics.

3- They do not have their own tokens/currency.

4- They do not provide any extra boost to Guild Influence.

I assume you didn’t want too see Guild missions either? As most of what you have stated here is exactly what is related to Guild Missions currently.

I was excited for them! But Guild Missions are terrible the way they are. Fortunately, they are completely optional and therefore can be completely ignored.

Well doesn’t my comment make you reconsider the reason you may not want “Raids”? Considering that these features are currently in game and have no impact on you whatsoever and as you say can be completely ignored?

Please read my original comment. I’d be fine with raids. As long as they don’t offer exclusive rewards that we cannot obtain elsewhere.

zuraith.6104:

Martin The Brave.8731:

I assume you didn’t want too see Guild missions either? As most of what you have stated here is exactly what is related to Guild Missions currently.

I was excited for them! But Guild Missions are terrible the way they are. Fortunately, they are completely optional and therefore can be completely ignored.

But how are raids any different? Guild commendations can get you gear that you can’t get anywhere else. So if you want some of that, missions are no longer optional. And that’s perfectly fine. Pretty much every type of activity in the game has it’s own specific set of rewards. These rewards are all mathematically the same, but they look different. All the OP is asking is to introduce new content that would be instanced, balanced around larger groups and more challenging than what we’ve seen so far. Because, let’s face it, everything this game has to offer in PvE is about as difficult as pushing ‘1’ on your keyboard. I fully support that.

Why would you be against this? I would like to get a legendary weapon. However, this requires me to do map completion, which I detest. I don’t like running around maps hunting for vistas and PoIs. My solution? I gave up on legendaries and simply ignore that aspect of the game. Or I could be like you and ask for that content to be removed from the game because other people get stuff that I don’t. C’mon, that’s not cool.

Some of us would like to raid in this game. This thread is for us. Those that don’t like it really have no business here. Content would not be removed from the game to make room for raids. Literally everything else would remain the same, just as you like it now. You do your thing, we’ll do ours.

1. Well “Raid’s” would fall under the category of “Elite” content thereby making it difficult to find competent members. These problems will occur, they even happen with higher level fractals. So that’s granted.
2. Depending on the size of “Raid’s”, which I would assume to be the same as Guildwars 1. Which was aprox. double the “Normal” party size. So a “Guildless” player can still PuG, I did it in Guildwars 1 I admit I failed alot but so what? I still got some rewards.
3. Granted.
4. “to either have NOTHING exclusive and therefore be 100% optional, or not exist” I was harping on the comment in particular, if there is nothing that can be gain from this content “Exclusively” then why make any content? The reward’s can be aesthetics just like Guildwars 1. (And also be sellable so the casuals can buy it *Example – Dhuums scythe.)
5. We can’t truly say what party size will be, it kind of makes this point superfluous.
6. That’s not how it worked in Guildwars 1, each person played a vital role in the content. I don’t see why it can’t be done here in Guildwars 2.
7. Which makes the your point mute?
8. Well you should read up on Guildwars 1 Elite missions, It will probably give a better understand of what “Raiding” would be like in Guildwars 2. Everyone has a biased opinion of raiding because of WoW which is simply not needed in discussions about raids.

zuraith.6104:

Martin The Brave.8731:

zuraith.6104:

Martin The Brave.8731:

zuraith.6104:

I would be perfectly fine with raids as long as:

1- They do not award any items- cosmetic or spec-wise- that cannot be acquired via 5-man means.

2- They do not offer a faster way to accrue Karma, Laurels, Badges of Honor, Top-Tier crafting materials, or Fractal Relics.

3- They do not have their own tokens/currency.

4- They do not provide any extra boost to Guild Influence.

I assume you didn’t want too see Guild missions either? As most of what you have stated here is exactly what is related to Guild Missions currently.

I was excited for them! But Guild Missions are terrible the way they are. Fortunately, they are completely optional and therefore can be completely ignored.

Well doesn’t my comment make you reconsider the reason you may not want “Raids”? Considering that these features are currently in game and have no impact on you whatsoever and as you say can be completely ignored?

Please read my original comment. I’d be fine with raids. As long as they don’t offer exclusive rewards that we cannot obtain elsewhere.

What if those rewards were aesthetic and overglorified like Legendaries? And were sellable? This is the model Guildwars 1 ran with, and it worked great. It allowed people who enjoyed “Elite” content to have fun and hopefully get their hands on some neat items. and at the same time allow “Casual” players to buy that item from the “Raider”.

And when Anet add raids you will finish them, get bored, demand new ones, finish them, get bored, demand new ones, etc, etkittenil you found a new game without raids and move there to ask for raids leaving us, players who bought GW2 to get away from kittenty-raids-games or loyal GW players looking for a quality game like the original, with a lot of unwanted content nobody will do ever, and with a poorly developed game because Anet was to busy creating raids for you to pay attention to the rest of the game.

The thing is: If you love WoW Raids (or from any other of the bazillions of clones out there), WHY THAT HELL ARE YOU HERE ASKING FOR RAIDS? WoW is still online (same with most of their clones) as far as I’m aware.
If raids are truly that awesome, why don’t go and keep playing there?

And no, I’m not asking you to leave GW if you don’t like it or those kitten fanboys always said, I’m legitimately asking why, if raids are so great and there is already hundred of games with that system, why come to GW and ask for raids instead of keep playing in WoW?

Also, this is a F2P game, shinies and aesthetics items belong to the Gem Store. If we we could get shiny weapons by finishing a 10-15 men dungeon then, what would be Anet profit?

darkace.8925:

I never really played WoW (free trial, that’s it), but I spent six years in FFXI. Can anyone explain to me like I’m a six year old what exactly raiding in an MMO is? Is it essentially a dungeon run with more people?

Raids are essentially what Sea, Sky, and Salvage were to us in FFXI. Nice to meet another player.