Guild Wars 2

Wanted to do some indepth thinking on the Waypoint System in GW2 and see what makes sense and what doesn’t. Feel free to add opinions and such (why would I post this on the forums if I didn’t want opinions?)

Waypoints – The Purpose

Waypoints are designed to allow players easy travel across their massive world for a small fee. You can’t use them until you first discover them, so you -will- have to walk the entire world to get 100% map completion eventually.

Waypoints – Why the cost?

This I’m not entirely sure of. I would imagine to stop players from waypointing all the time. However, I think the added effect of having to waypoint upon death AND still pay a repair fee is a bit harsh. Not everyone can stay on top of the economy and struggle for cash. (I’ve seen/heard numerous cases of this in map, in guild, and in local.)

There’s also the idea of a gold sink. Coming from GW1, I was a bit disappointed to see I had to pay for waypoints whereas in GW1 they were completely free and made for great convenience. Right now, the waypoint fees remind me entirely of WoW’s flight master system where you have to pay to fly to a certain place you’ve already been to.

Alternatives to Waypoints

1.) Can transfer to the Mists and then go to Lions Arch, however I’m almost certain ANet did not intend for players to do that.

2.) You could walk, but that’s hardly practical. It could easily take 10-15 min just to get to the place you want to reach. However, there is an added bonus to walking; finding node/slaying mobs along the way for mats. Some players, though, couldn’t care less about nodes/slaying mobs they’ve already fought. (I personally enjoy crafting myself.)

Issues that Arise due to Cost

-In a game that promotes playing with other players, level 80’s will more than most likely think twice about waypointing to a low level/far away zone to go and help a friend because the cost is so high.

-The average rate of which you earn cash in this game is relatively low, and working the auction house can earn you a fair amount, but still not enough to justify such a high cost for waypoints at level 80.

-Can cause players to rethink playing their level 80. See below posts for “proof”.

Conclusion

Waypoints are useful, but sometimes expensive to the point it can cause a player to really not want to use it, but unfortunately the player feels forced to use it because otherwise they’ll have to spend a good chunk of time just running to the point they want to get to.

Thoughts, anyone?

I understand the need for gold sinks.

But right now, I’m discouraged from going out into the world.

My analysis for traveling somewhere is “how much will it cost me” vs. “what do I want to do”. This is just wrong.

I log into my 80 and farm the spots I know will make me gold and am actively discouraged from going to other zones or helping friends with a quick DE.

I’ve stopped using waypoints at all, they’re too expensive for me at this stage. I want to save my gold for other things.

So now if I want to travel somewhere I use the Asura gates and run the rest of the way. If I have difficulty running past mobs (which can be tricky in Orr) I just suck it up and spend an hour getting to the place I want to go, gradually killing mobs and doing events along the way.

I found it inconvenient at first, but now it’s kind of fun, because if i want to go somewhere it feels like a real journey. No more instant gratification!

Edit: in contrast to the previous poster, I’ve seen a lot more areas than I would have otherwise if I was instantly zipping to waypoints all the time.

I’m going to be completely honest here. No hyperbole or exaggeration, and no, I’m not prone to whining about things in MMOs, (or anywhere else, for that matter).

I just surpassed the 200 hour mark of played time since live yesterday. I also playtested 150 hours total during beta. I’ve been playing MMOs for almost 14 years. That’s all just for background and foundation.

Ok, that all said…

I don’t play my level 80 character anymore. It’s not because I’m not willing to break old habits and embrace the paradigm that the game doesn’t stop once you reach the level cap. I very much planned on playing my level 80 until I had explored 100% of the world, earned my epic gear, played a lot of WvW and found ways to have fun at 80!

I don’t play my level 80 anymore because the waypoint costs are insane. It has sucked the fun right out of the game for me.

I gave into the temptation of enjoying a little crafting along the way and with crafting being such a big money sink at the moment, that may be part of the reason I’ve been constantly low on funds, but I’ve tried to go hands off on crafting and I’m still not really getting anywhere. I still can not afford my final trait tome at 2G and the cost for the cultural armor just seems like an extremely cruel joke.

The problem here, in the most general terms, is that the cost of waypoint travel scales up way more steeply than the average income per hour of play scales up as you level through the game. When waypoint travel costs 10x to 40x more at level 80 than at level 8, while your income is lucky to have increased 5X, it should be clear that there are some serious problems in the multiplier being applied to waypoint costs.

To break it down to a finer level, it’s a huge problem that even waypoints in lower level zones and zones close to your location have scaled up such that they are usually at least 70% of the cost of going to the farthest waypoints. You can’t even try to chart a slightly less convenient course to get places to save money. If you can’t afford the full jump, it’s not worth looking for a lower cost waypoint a little closer.

This leaves me to finding the capital city closest to my destination, cutting through the mists to Lion’s Arch and then trudging through multiple zones to get where I’m going. By the time I get there, I usually have little time to spend playing there, as I refuse to trivialize the trek by ignoring everything along the way.

I could write pages about this issue, but all that really needs to be said is that it has sucked the fun completely out of playing my level 80. The entire design philosophy behind waypoints, eliminating time sinks and barriers to playing together seems to have flown completely out the window now that the game is live! What the heck are you guys doing Arenanet?

Waypoint travel should never, ever be a major money sink. It’s a money sink that punishes players for using a system that was meant to remove barriers to having fun!

Continued…

What would I suggest?

Overall costs at the upper levels need to be lowered, one way or another. The band-aid fix would be to cut the current scaling in half.

A proper fix would be to cap the cost of each waypoint to what it would currently cost for a character of the level the area around the waypoint scales characters down to. I’d be fine with it being the current cost to go right to the level 70-80 areas, if the cost to go to the lower level areas was much, much lower.

Another proper fix would be to rework the scaling based on distance. At lower levels, cost/distance seems to scale well. At the higher levels, there seems to be an additive modifier on top of a multiplicative one. There should be no additive modifiers! Waypoint travel closest to your location should be maybe 20% to 25% of the cost of going to the farthest locations, not 80% of the cost of going some where all the way across the map!

I understand how this may have happened. The economy is pretty broken atm and it’s hard to know how much of that’s because it’s still early and how much is because it’s really broken. Level 80 blues and greens are often only worth 3X the value of level 20 blues and greens, which just amplifies the cost of cash sinks that seem to be based on players making a lot more money at higher levels. However, even then, the cost for higher level characters to travel to low level and near by waypoints is just silly. There probably should be a cap for a waypoints cost based on the level of the area it’s located in and there most certainly should be better scaling based on distance, with the nearest waypoints costing only 25% of the current costs and proper scaling from there based on distance.

Once again, not hyperbole. This issue alone has sucked the fun out of the game for me with my level 80. I like the idea of the earning curve being more shallow, in order to slow down inflation, but money sinks need to be toned down to match that reality. When earning power increases 4X, but money sinks increase 10X to 40X, there are serious problems that need to be addressed.

Failure to address this would point toward the possibility that the game has actually been designed to require people to convert cash to gems to gold, just in order to be able to afford to play at the higher levels. I refuse to believe that’s the case, as it would be the kiss of death for an absolutely amazing MMO. This game is perhaps the best MMO every produced, but there some issues hobbling it and this is one of them.

Fiontar.4695:

What would I suggest?

Overall costs at the upper levels need to be lowered, one way or another. The band-aid fix would be to cut the current scaling in half.

A proper fix would be to cap the cost of each waypoint to what it would currently cost for a character of the level the area around the waypoint scales characters down to. I’d be fine with it being the current cost to go right to the level 70-80 areas, if the cost to go to the lower level areas was much, much lower.

Another proper fix would be to rework the scaling based on distance. At lower levels, cost/distance seems to scale well. At the higher levels, there seems to be an additive modifier on top of a multiplicative one. There should be no additive modifiers! Waypoint travel closest to your location should be maybe 20% to 25% of the cost of going to the farthest locations, not 80% of the cost of going some where all the way across the map!

I understand how this may have happened. The economy is pretty broken atm and it’s hard to know how much of that’s because it’s still early and how much is because it’s really broken. Level 80 blues and greens are often only worth 3X the value of level 20 blues and greens, which just amplifies the cost of cash sinks that seem to be based on players making a lot more money at higher levels. However, even then, the cost for higher level characters to travel to low level and near by waypoints is just silly. There probably should be a cap for a waypoints cost based on the level of the area it’s located in and there most certainly should be better scaling based on distance, with the nearest waypoints costing only 25% of the current costs and proper scaling from there based on distance.

Once again, not hyperbole. This issue alone has sucked the fun out of the game for me with my level 80. I like the idea of the earning curve being more shallow, in order to slow down inflation, but money sinks need to be toned down to match that reality. When earning power increases 4X, but money sinks increase 10X to 40X, there are serious problems that need to be addressed.

Failure to address this would point toward the possibility that the game has actually been designed to require people to convert cash to gems to gold, just in order to be able to afford to play at the higher levels. I refuse to believe that’s the case, as it would be the kiss of death for an absolutely amazing MMO. This game is perhaps the best MMO every produced, but there some issues hobbling it and this is one of them.

This about sums up my issues with waypoint cost. I will also state that your fixes seem legitimate as well. Five or more silver for one waypoint travel is a really huge turn-off to playing my level 80. In fact, it depressed me to the point I didn’t -want- to play my level 80. I feel two silver at the maximum should be the cost. It will still make you think twice about waypointing all the time, but at the same time allow for much more breathing room. You can easily make a travel to LA to work on crafting then move back to whatever zone your at with that cost and re-earn the money in a matter of 5 -10 minutes of slaying mobs.

Your suggestion of half price as it is now sounds good as well, or also the zone level based one would be interesting to see. I still don’t like the idea of paying 5 silver just to get to Orr.

But the main problem here is not the fix, but the actual situation that waypoints are causing players to truly ponder “what’s the purpose of this unfun mechanic in a fun game?”