Guild Wars 2

I know, I know, you need them to enter dungeons as a group. And coordinating groups in WvW, guild missions, etc.

But I’m talking about open world pve content.
If a friend makes a new toon, and I decide I want to help him, we make a party and go to the same map.

Now because of the current system, all I can do is watch while he completes each heart on his own, because I can’t share any of the kills with him, or any of the loot I picked up. The only thing I could probably do is help him kill a mob that might be too dificult alone.

All that talk about being able to join my low level friends because of auto scaling seems like a waste. Actually, even if I decided to make a new toon to play together, we would still be each doing our own things.

So I repeat, what’s the point of parties?

Wolfeng.3784:

I know, I know, you need them to enter dungeons as a group. And coordinating groups in WvW, guild missions, etc.

But I’m talking about open world pve content.
If a friend makes a new toon, and I decide I want to help him, we make a party and go to the same map.

Now because of the current system, all I can do is watch while he completes each heart on his own, because I can’t share any of the kills with him, or any of the loot I picked up. The only thing I could probably do is help him kill a mob that might be too dificult alone.

All that talk about being able to join my low level friends because of auto scaling seems like a waste. Actually, even if I decided to make a new toon to play together, we would still be each doing our own things.

So I repeat, what’s the point of parties?

Party chat. Also, nobody owns kills, unless you’re one-shotting things, you can both kill the same things and get experience and loot from them. In any game with parties, you’re both doing your own things, but coordinating things together, so how is this different?

You both should get loot and XP for the kills you both work on in a party.

I’m not sure why you think you don’t.

Were you thinking you could power level someone by them hanging out while you kill everything and they still got XP and loot?

Draknar.5748:

You both should get loot and XP for the kills you both work on in a party.

I’m not sure why you think you don’t.

Were you thinking you could power level someone by them hanging out while you kill everything and they still got XP and loot?

I’m not sure why you think that’s what he said.

He said, quite correctly I might add, that if he goes to help someone low level, he cannot really help kill mobs because scaling was done poorly and you’re still massively overpowered and will likely kill everything in one hit. I’ve had the same problem escorting my wife around. I have to just kinda sit there and wait for her to run to things to hit them and do a bit of damage on them before I can do anything. You don’t get credit for hearts and such if someone else kills something that you haven’t hit, regardless of being in a party.

Wolfeng.3784:

because I can’t share any of the kills with him

This quote is why people think that he’s saying that kills aren’t shared.

For boss events, the type of champ box dropped is dependent on the amount of damage done. With a party that includes a few heavy DPS guys, it means a low DPS player could more easily get the top tier champ box.

The point of parties is to have some place to go to get drunk with out spending a fortune at the bar while having a convenient couch to pass out on.

I stand by what I typed.

Kills aren’t shared. I’m not looking into power leveling someone, I’m trying to discuss completing hearts and events together, I dont care about the exp from kills, those are lousy anyway.

Let’s use as an example the dozens of heart that require you to kill certain mobs. If the heart requires you to kill 100 centaurs, I will have to kill 100, and my friend will also have to kill 100.

We can’t work together towards that goal, at best, we can attack the same exact mob together.

Another example:

If a heart requires you to collect 100 harpies feathers, that drop once you kill them. Again, we have to kill the same mob together. I can’t say kill 50 of those harpies and then give him the loot, or even deliver the feathers in his name.

My point is that there’s no difference between us playing on our own, than with a party.

And most mmo’s I played, we needed parties to help achieve the goal of the quest faster. Because when someone killed a centaur in the party, the kill was added to everyone on it.

There is no mob tagging in this game – everyone who does enough damage will get XP and loot from the mob. (You don’t get loot from every enemy of course, but that’s RNG, not because of someone else getting it.)

There is an issue that even down-scaled level 80 characters in a full set of matching, exotics or ascended gear will be much more powerful than low level characters. But that’s easy to get around – just make sure your friend gets a few hits in first.

For open world PvE parties are more of a social thing, as they don’t really provide much else. As for “escorting” lower level players, the only real rason for being in a party is for the chat, and being able to see where the other person is.

I’ve rolled new characters to help my wife in game. While I wasn’t super overpowered or anything, being in a party helped her to see where to go, made communicating easier then using PMs (which I understand have a spam limit threshold).

In the end, whether its a party with new characters, or a high level helping out a noob, open world parties are more for convience and socializing then anything else.

In the end, whether its a party with new characters, or a high level helping out a noob, open world parties are more for convience and socializing then anything else.

Precisely my point. And that’s why im frustated with the current system, being social is fun and all, but I want to complete events together, and not just watch while my friends do their hearts on their own.

I think maybe a better system would be if the hearts worked just like events.
You know those events where we have a bar decreasing with the ammount of mobs killed? Or where everyone needs to go hunt for a certain item and once we reach a certain number the event is over?

If hearts worked the same way, I could still be actively helping a friend while he completes stuff. I know some hearts have events that happen from time to time, but not all of them, and some just take longer to start.

I guess I’m looking for more group content where parties have a meaning beyond being social.

Technically speaking hearts weren’t meant to be done in groups, those were designed as solo objectives, which is the reason you don’t see them in places like Orr where everything is an event or group event…most people don’t understand that.

It sort of does work that way, just in a teamwork sort of sense. Your friend can’t go afk while you do the kills for the heart quest, but a group of five people will kill something 5 times as fast as a solo player.

I guess I just don’t agree that your contribution should directly influence their heart bar.

I party with low level guildies all the time. I take a couple of hits on stuff and get loot. We don’t worry too much about hearts, we do events instead, which fill hearts. If the guy is doing hearts, I still gather. Particularly in 15-25 zones, there’s iron and soft wood both of which sell pretty well.

But in the party we can see each other’s dots, which allows us to know where there other is.

So if someone does get in trouble, you don’t have to run back.

If you find yourself killing too fast, change weapons or remove some of your accessories.

My bf and I party up all the time when we’re on GW2 together.

The blue dot on the map is a pretty useful indicator on where the other person/people in the party is/are. I picked up Aion the other day where there is no such minimap indicator (or if there is, it is much much smaller) and I found it very difficult to keep tabs on where he was- even with our screens next to each other it was painful unless I was directly following him step-for-step.

We also use the personal waypoint indicator often to mark bosses/harvesting nodes/covered up POIs etc. (alt + click on the map). The ping and drawing on the map abilities are also pretty useful.

With your “kill 100 centaurs” analogy, although both players would have to kill 100 centaurs to complete the task, two players killing one centaur is much faster than two players killing two separate centaurs. I definitely find duoing exploration with my bf is much faster than soloing, purely because you have some extra dps and a second set of eyes to help out.

Also, I believe that partying up is more beneficial when it comes to loot (or at least I have been told that in EotM, champ trains etc). To be eligible for a loot drop from a foe, you have to inflict a certain amount of damage to the foe. Whilst in a party, providing the rest of the party have inflicted enough damage, you just need to hit the foe in order to be eligible for the reward.

There is also a superstition that players have regarding loot and kill credit.

It has been debunked a hundred times over and yet people still do it as some sort of good-luck juju to ensure they get guaranteed drops like champ bags or world boss chests.

Personally, I think its funny that the players who defend the party-up for loot thing have never once brought forth a shred of proof that it actually changes anything (lack of credit and rewards is almost always attributed to lack of participation/dps)…. but its harmless enough.

All I am reminded of is how people swear holding down some arbitrary button when catching a pokemon actually helps.

It is easier to share boons when you are in a full party during events.

Killing stuff before your lowbie party member can tag it? Blank all your traits and use a piece of loot gear as a weapon.

There are a million ways to lower your damage.

Lévis.5489:

It is easier to share boons when you are in a full party during events.

…but if nobody was in a party, all boons would be divided equally.

It is actually much more efficient to not be partied up (if everyone drops party), and it is the meta for World Boss events like Tequatl and Wurm to have everyone going in solo, so any might over 25 stacks gets distributed to nearby players instead, rather than getting capped off and wasted.

All I have is circumstantial. If I’m soloing doing Maw and it takes more the 3 1/2 minutes to defeat him, I am more likely to get an orange champ box; if he’s defeated in 2 minutes I get either a blue or white champ box. But if I’m in a full party with heavy hitters and he’s defeated in 2 minutes, I get an orange box frequently.

So I read this as if the Shaman is taking a lot of damage quickly, my little old thief can’t do enough damage in 2 minutes to qualify for an orange box on her own. If it takes an extra minute or two, I can do enough damage to qualify.

But if I’m on a team with a few high DPS players, the average per player on the team is high enough to frequently qualify for an orange box even if the Shaman is defeated quickly.

So to me it looks as if there’s a total damage threshold to meet to get better tier chests and if I’m partying with players who can do a lot of damage quickly, my party’s average damage is often high enough so we all get orange chests. It’s as good as a working theory as any.

And if you are playing a high DPS character, you probably wouldn’t see a difference as you can do enough damage all the time on your own to qualify for the top tier reward.

From what I understand, one of the main bonuses that I don’t see really expanded upon up top is that your party members get boon and field priorities instead of just having them randomly assigned, in addition to all the other positives mentioned. This should mean blasting a water field assigns those boons to party members in a more organized manner.

I could be totally incorrect though.

@OP, the point of parties is: we can’t stop. LOL