Guild Wars 2

stof.9341:

Every piece of exotic now is worthless. I wouldn’t pay more than 50s for them now.

/sigh.

So many things wrong with this.

Just for curiosity sake, do you know when an entire set of ascended will be available? Do you know what stat combinations will and wont be available? Do you know what the bonuses for infusion gems are and if they make up for the lack of stack flexibility and effects Ascended inherently has?

I really don’t think you do.

Until we know more about infusions, Exotics have a leg up due to customization. The 5-8% pwr increase a player gets for using an ascended set means jack and squat compared to a set of Rabid exotics with 6/6 runes of undead. Combine that with a sigil or earth in your main hand with a sigil of corruption in your off-hand…and you are bringing pain. You are bringing pain that Ascended sets may never come close to.

Ascended benefits characters that are currently using full set crests and jewels over runes. Which are mostly warriors, guardians, and glass cannon thieves.

I’m just amazed that as deep as the system goes and with all of the moving pieces you can tweak and adjust to fine-tune a character, some players get tunnel vision on a bigger number and never mind that the penalty is holding back other options and potential.

AcidicVision.5498:

Just for curiosity sake, do you know when an entire set of ascended will be available?

Do you know if the next release will add boots, or gloves or earrings? No? Neither do I which is why I don’t want to buy any of those and get shafted after.

AcidicVision.5498:

Do you know what stat combinations will and wont be available?

I didn’t think of that one. Another reason to wait and see.

AcidicVision.5498:

Do you know what the bonuses for infusion gems are and if they make up for the lack of stack flexibility and effects Ascended inherently has?

How do you know that the ascended armors won’t have access to runes or rune like effects? The weapons?

I really don’t think you do.

AcidicVision.5498:

I’m just amazed that as deep as the system goes and with all of the moving pieces you can tweak and adjust to fine-tune a character, some players get tunnel vision on a bigger number and never mind that the penalty is holding back other options and potential.

Uncertainty is the problem. I’m not using more than half my money to buy a new exotic set when I’m not sure what the future will hold at all. If the ascended necklace only comes in 6 months, I might consider paying the full price for them today. But what if they come on the next update in two weeks?

Well, while you may do dungeons in rare level armor, I think at some point you’re gonna need exotics to progress further in the fractals.

stof.9341:

ArcTheFallen.7682:

Aw, what rarity items below exotic look good? :O jw

Considering how ugly the crafted exotic sets are (especially the weapons and medium armor), is it that important?

The best looking medium armor in the game is the rare T3 human cultural weapon btw. Rare quality. Also, if you don’t get level 80 exotics, aim for level 79 or slightly lower rares instead. You can reskin those with the cheaper stones. As for armor sets, the best looking while still incredibly cheap one can get (in my opinion) is the karma bought level 79 medium armor set from that Malchor thing map :p In light armor it’s the crafted winged set and heavy armor is all ugly :o

I like Norn tier 2 more than Human tier 3 for medium female armor. For human cultural, tier 3 light is definitely my favorite for female. What armor set from Malchor are you referring to? This one – http://www.gw2armor.com/norn/female/k5/medium/display_looks.php? Not all heavy armor is ugly. The gladiator’s, barbaric and draconic are decent IMO – again this is for female characters. Most male character armors look decent.

penatbater.4710:

Well, while you may do dungeons in rare level armor, I think at some point you’re gonna need exotics to progress further in the fractals.

The new ring drops from the first level already. Why the need to progress further?

Magiofdeath.2745:

I like Norn tier 2 more than Human tier 3 for medium female armor. For human cultural, tier 3 light is definitely my favorite for female. What armor set from Malchor are you referring to? This one – http://www.gw2armor.com/norn/female/k5/medium/display_looks.php? Not all heavy armor is ugly. The gladiator’s, barbaric and draconic are decent IMO – again this is for female characters. Most male character armors look decent.

Tastes :p Well I’d love to try the norn tier 2 on my human, that naked glitch must have been hilarous but it’s patched now and won’t work ^^

The light human T3 is nice yes but I think it’s not nice enough above winged to justify 120g price point.

The karma armor skin I talked about is exactly that one you linked. You can get it from the Cursed Shores map too but in level 80 so more expensive to transmute if you don’t place it on a level 80 item.

Sure exotic gear was worth it. Still is. I have full exotic on one of my characters and will get the updated armor as I can. It is not like the exotic armor just stops working or anything. It is not like I do not get the benefit from it in the time that I am going to own/keep it.

So new armor is coming out, I’ll get that too and I will be happy to get it. If more new armor or weapons or whatever comes out I will be happy to go get that also as I like new stuff. It is not like the addition of new things to the game forces me to pay a monthly fee or anything to go get it.

Just as the yellow rares were good and useful until you could use the exotics, the exotics are good and useful until you can upgrade to the next. My thoughts would be completely different if I had to pay a monthly fee.

stof.9341:

How do you know that the ascended armors won’t have access to runes or rune like effects? The weapons?

I really don’t think you do.

There is some room for interpretation. But Linsey already wrote that instead of getting traditional bonuses from runes, crests or jewels, that the stats would be “built in” and the upgrade slot would be used for infusions that are a mechanic to use against agony.

Which is why I prefaced my comment about stat stacking with “Until we know more about infusions”.

At face value, the comment could very well mean that Ascended armor does not get those effects, and that is the trade of for the stats. The infusions work under specific circumstance. Like the agony condition and creatures that cause it.

That’s how I read it. That’s how I see it implemented. It’s very possible the items have baked in stats + infusion bonuses + traditional rune effects also from infusion. But that would mean the new tier effectively has three upgrade slots. And I don’t see that happening.

I could be wrong. But I don’t think its likely. And if I am right, then exotics are still the way to go for everyone except heavies and some med armor users that are using all jewels and crests instead of runes for pure stat boosting already.

…And even THEY have more options with exotics, since they can have their set boosting five or six individual stats and ascended is limited to what is baked in to it. Koda armor for pwr/tough/vit with a shaman crest for vit/healing power/pwr. Where-as the ascended is like being forced to have koda armor with soldier crest that you cant change.

AcidicVision.5498:

…And even THEY have more options with exotics, since they can have their set boosting five or six individual stats and ascended is limited to what is baked in to it. Koda armor for pwr/tough/vit with a shaman crest for vit/healing power/pwr. Where-as the ascended only is like being forced to have koda armor with soldier crest that you cant change.

Just that one. People say that the ascended ring isn’t as good cause you cannot mix and match jewels into the rings. To that I answer that instead of buying a new jewel and erasing the one built in the crafted ring you bought, you could simply equip all jewelry of one type except necklace and you’d get the same effect for cheaper and easier to fine tune.

Same for armor really. Also it seems that we’ll be getting a lot of ascended items with mismatched “baked in” stats by default.

Draeka.5941:

Steely Phil.3952:

No. Not worth it at all. I ground karma for the Temple set because I wanted the Power/Toughness/Vitality stat spread. This armor is horribly ugly on my female asura so I then used transmutation stones to copy over a low level gladiator style armor I had grown to like while leveling.

If they introduce a new set I would be switching back to my master work magic find gear to grind for it (except I won’t actually do this because I’ll quit instead) and my exotic gear will have been rendered completely worthless.

There are a couple dungeons that reward Pwr/Tough/Vit stats, Honor of the Waves in particular. I don’t understand why people keep talking about the cost of exotic armor when you can work towards a full exotic armor set while earning money via dungeons. If you pay gold for an exotic set, then it’s your tradeoff for not spending time in a dungeon—for stats, of course. If you like the look of a particular set, then that’s based off of your own personal aesthetic.

And then I would have wasted dungeon tokens on armor that is now worthless instead of wasting karma on armor that is now worthless. How would that be an improvement?

Unless they make infusions required for all dungeons, exotics aren’t ‘worthless’, after all, so far the only dungeon you might need Ascended gear for is the new Fractals one.

Meanwhile all the other dungeons and content can still be done in Exotics, which will likely remain a lot easier to get. So until they release more dungeons/content that REQUIRE being Infused to really complete, Ascended armor is an upgrade, but not a necessity.

None of my gear items have their original exotic skins. Every time I discover a skin I like better I transmute it over the exotic stats. Most, if not all, are karma skins. A lot of the armor skins are lower level, my weapons have Asura Tier 3 skins. I think ArenaNet did a great job with the Asura Tier 3 weapon skins.

stof.9341:

Just that one. People say that the ascended ring isn’t as good cause you cannot mix and match jewels into the rings. To that I answer that instead of buying a new jewel and erasing the one built in the crafted ring you bought, you could simply equip all jewelry of one type except necklace and you’d get the same effect for cheaper and easier to fine tune.

Same for armor really. Also it seems that we’ll be getting a lot of ascended items with mismatched “baked in” stats by default.

Im not sure I follow. I think I get where you are going, but another assumption there is that Ascended jewelry, of any particular stat combination, would be cheaper than buying exotic jewelry and the upgrade gem you want for it.

Also, I don’t think you are considering the defensive, offensive and Onmi infusions slots. Without even including Omni (since it will probably be the rarest and last set we get): you are looking at six different pieces of jewelry, of three different stat sets each, and three of each of two different infusions? That’s just not practical man.

BTW, nice to have a conversation about this stuff with someone who can keep a level head and appears to be reasonable.

I got exotic armor to be done with it, because I hate grinding of any kind. Even having to gruel through dungeons for so long to finish a second set was far more than I had wanted. I just wanted to get my characters to 80, outfit them with full exotics so I could concentrate on doing other things. Unfortunately to get to 80 you basically have to do everything in the game anyway. It’s just a bad system for me. I don’t like it at all.

I’d say as long as an updgrade (gem) is made for exotics the base versions (the ones for stats and not looks) would still be worth getting as a go between.

You’d have 2 choices.
1.You could then hit 80 and go strait from say rare to ascended and not bother with exotics stats items at all (and then go for exotic/ascended look items afterwards).

2. You could hit 80 and go from rare to exotic stats items and then put in an upgrade gem to make your exotic stats items have the stats of an ascended item (and then go for exotic/ascended looks items).

You’d have a choice of sticking with lower tier gear (rare etc) longer until you get your ascended pieces, or you can have an exotic set inbetween until you can upgrade them.
—-
If it’s not like this i’ll be annoyed, i have a full exotic set of everything (armor & items) and 7 exotic knights weapons all skinned with Tier 3 cultural looks.

Plague.5329:

I got exotic armor to be done with it, because I hate grinding of any kind. Even having to gruel through dungeons for so long to finish a second set was far more than I had wanted. I just wanted to get my characters to 80, outfit them with full exotics so I could concentrate on doing other things. Unfortunately to get to 80 you basically have to do everything in the game anyway. It’s just a bad system for me. I don’t like it at all.

I don’t know where you were leveling, but I was at less then 50% world completion when I hit 80, and hadn’t even set foot in the Grove or Rata Sum, and had only passed through Black Citadel briefly.

Everyone keeps referring to crafted exotics. Did you know there are at least 100 unique exotic weapon models in this game at level 80 that are not crafted? (Well technically they are but in the Mystic Forge.) Go browse the TP. There are some exotics that actually rival some legendary weapons in their appearance.

They won’t lose any value. And crafted exotics will always cost exactly the same price as the mats to make them. Which is the way it is now. Nothing will change.

It remains to be seen how easy Ascended gear will be to obtain with just Rare equipment and not lvl 80.

Ykfox.3825:

Plague.5329:

I got exotic armor to be done with it, because I hate grinding of any kind. Even having to gruel through dungeons for so long to finish a second set was far more than I had wanted. I just wanted to get my characters to 80, outfit them with full exotics so I could concentrate on doing other things. Unfortunately to get to 80 you basically have to do everything in the game anyway. It’s just a bad system for me. I don’t like it at all.

I don’t know where you were leveling, but I was at less then 50% world completion when I hit 80, and hadn’t even set foot in the Grove or Rata Sum, and had only passed through Black Citadel briefly.

There’s a few limiting factors now. If you try to level in PvE without resorting to crafting or zerg farming in WvW, it’s going to take a very long time. A month or two ago you had the benefit of a lot of players being in zones, setting off lots of DEs and communicating where those were. Leveling was easier, as a result. Now, it’s usually just you in a nearly empty zone, with relatively few DEs. I no longer had the money to craft alts up, and WvW wasn’t an option anymore for me.

The game is designed to try to get you to explore as much of the world and content as possible. Unlike GW1, you won’t get be forced to max level 3/4ths of the way through the storyline. Rather, you can actually do a couple missions and then find yourself having to grind for several hours, perhaps a couple days, to get back to what you were doing.

It would be nice if there was an alt character system that gave your new characters buffs to xp gain and reduced time requirements for hearts, and similar. I’d have liked to have had a level 80 of every class in the game, all outfitted with max armor/exotics, just like I did in GW1. That’s definitely not feasible anymore. Either way, I don’t plan on playing the game any longer, unless they abandon this progressive nonsense.

I have not read through the entire thread so I apologize if this is a re-post.

I’d say one set of exotic gear was not a waste. In my case though, I have two full sets (completely runed, jewelry included) and I’m very close to completing a third. I got these sets in the event that I wanted to try another build with my character.

I would have never spent the time and resources on the other two sets if I knew they would have introduced another tier that would make exotics inferior (seemingly, waiting until I see the details before I make my final judgment).

So yes, I do feel somewhat cheated and I’d like to be able to sell my soulbound exotics for the gold I spent on them if they are going to be inferior. That’s an if right now. We will see.

Wreckdum.8367:

They won’t lose any value. And crafted exotics will always cost exactly the same price as the mats to make them. Which is the way it is now. Nothing will change.

They won’t lose value. In all likelihood they will get more expensive. And that goes back to the question of whether or not they are worth it.

If Ascended items require Ecto and Orichalcum to make, then those materials are going to be more expensive. Making it more expensive to craft Exotics and a lot of people might not think they are worth crafting or buying at the new cost. Especially for a go between armor set.

Dungeon exotics will still be completely desirable since they don’t take anything to get but a little time and you make money while you are at it.

Didn’t think of that. It’s likely that the perceived value of exotics will go down quickly. If the production value of those also goes up at the same time, we are going for a complete exotic crafts market crash :p

Exotics includes a very wide range of item. If you are talking about exotics that are sold for 1.5g or rewarded from a few 10-mins-long dungeon runs, then YES. Even if there is a better tier of items, they are still an efficient way to increase your stat. They will serve the role which rare items are serving now; If you are talking some exotics that cost tens to hundreds of golds, then well, at least you already got your time to show off your “mini legendary”.

BTW, those exotics should never be at same tier at the first place.

Hadn’t realized til this thread how many people spent gold for their exotics.

/shrug

So what do you do with your karma, dungeon tokens, badges, and materials?

mulch.2586:

Hadn’t realized til this thread how many people spent gold for their exotics.

/shrug

So what do you do with your karma, dungeon tokens, badges, and materials?

What if you don’t want the WvWvW jewelry? How do you get your rings and earrings?