Guild Wars 2

The community was nothing short of lied to by no less then the company president of AN.

Frankly I am surprised there isn’t MORE of an uproar but I suspect that will come about once the news circulates during the day.

Jrunyon.3012:

Obviously youre not a real fan if youre just going to leave based on rumor and speculation.

it is not a rumour.

it is not speculation.

anet have posted a blog themselves confirming what the 3 idfferent news outlets in 2 different languages reported yesterday.

there is absolutely nothing left to doubt or imagination here.

Like most other players, I first read the ascended armor blog post to be the addition of gear treadmills to GW2. I was outraged. However, after a more careful reading of the blog post, I think that this is NOT what Arenanet has actually said.

I will base everything I state here on the blog post directly from Arenanet:
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/linsey-murdock-unveils-new-high-end-ascended-gear/

I believe their statements boil down as follows:

1. Legendaries are harder obtain than intended, “players … were becoming frustrated with a lack of personal progression”

2. Exotics were perhaps a bit easier to obtain than intended, “our most dedicated players were achieving their set of exotic gear”

3. The next content patch will not add an complete new tier of gear. Rather, it will only add ascended rings and backpacks; “we’re only adding the first level of Infusions and Ascended Rings and Back slots”

4. Future content will NOT add new tiers of gear, but will rather add the missing slots of ascended gear.

From these statements, I think Arenanet is in fact NOT planning on introducing a gear treadmill. Rather, they want to phase in a new tier of gear whose difficulty to obtain is a mid-point between legendary and exotic. They think they made a mistake; the gap between exotic and legendary was too far and needed something inbetween.

Still, there is definitely some treadmill to their current approach. Each new dungeon adds another piece of armor, so you need to upgrade that one piece. However, it’s not quite as awful as other games where you need to replace ALL of your armor with each new dungeon.

Now, I agree with most of the player-base that this could have been done better:

1. Ascended armor should only add the infusions. If the base statistics of ascended armor matched the base statistics of exotic gear, most of the complaints would be gone. Arenanet would still be able to use the infusion mechanic in their bottomless dungeon. The infusion slot would still give an “infinite progression” for players who need a carrot and want to grind that dungeon. If the base statistics (minus infusion) were the same, it would not affect gameplay outside of that particular dungeon.

2. They should have communicated much earlier that exotics would NOT be the max statistic items. Many players invested time and money into items with which they are now very unhappy.

3. The blog post superficially sounds like the beginning of an uncontrolled grind-fest. I believe that is not Arenanet’s intention and they should have clarified this earlier to head off the massive forum unrest.

Unfortunately, we players can complain all we want, but it will change nothing. The new content is out very soon. There is no way they can change it at this point due to the time required for quality assurance before release. Once released, some players will invest time+money in ascended armor and they will be angered if their ascended gear is scaled back to exotic+infusion slot. So, we’re stuck with this change.

However, I think it’s not quite as bad as many (myself included) initially thought.

MrLee.6892:

Levetty.1279:

Absolutely disgusted by this. I bought the game because I was fed up of gear treadmills and after 7 years of GW1 not having one and the developers saying they wouldn’t put in one you would think there wouldn’t be one.

But nope, they didn’t have the balls to stick through with it for longer then 3 months and are having to go the WoW clone way. I don’t know why so many developers decide to do WoW clones when every single one has failed.

Absolutely disgusted by this. What about all the Karma I spent on exotics? What about all the time and money spent maxing crafting disciplines to get other exotics? Worthless now as we have to go into dungeons to get ever increasing stats. I’d care more but it looks like I am stopping playing with the next patch.

GW1 for 7 years, can’t even get GW2 to 7 months.

Combat is different than WoW.
Questing is different than WoW.
Dynamic Events is different than WoW.
WvWvW is different than WoW.
Quickbars are different than WoW.
Being in multiple guilds is different than WoW.
Dungeons are ….becoming the same as WoW…. (Which is not the core issue here)
Crafting ….. will become exactly the same as WoW after this trend starts.
There are no raids in Guild Wars 2

Also there are several WoW Clones that are doing just fine.

Just because those other games are doing fine doesn’t mean they wouldn’t have loads more players who pay them money via a different system, store. It also doesn’t mean those players return for the game, most like WoW don’t want to give up the friends they’ve made by moving to a new game.

You and many others like you (who are more dismissive in their posts about this concern we have) are not getting the picture. We were told and shown their game would be different then the other mmo’s. When they add things that other games have and it affects everyone’s progression end game like this will, not only did they go back on their design philosophy but it turns the game into a cheap version of itself.

Here’s the scenario. They keep the broken DR/MF system, more and more people start having issues getting rare drops. They keep adding more and more tiers that only come from dungeons and only from the harder to do content (if you’re undergeared it does become a rez fest). People who are still here and playing down the road complain and they add 1-2 items to crafting that requires a material that is only found in dungeons off of the bosses.

Sound familiar? That’s because this is the system that WoW uses right now!

They stopped the ability to get the same tier gear as in dungeons without running dungeons (actually they required raids for many of the mats) for their poor excuse for a crafting system. They prevented people from getting the higher end mats. They required everyone to run dungeons whether they wanted to do that or not. None of us want to return to that system of gaming, some are more loud about it than others, and we are disappointed in this decision because it’s a slippery slope.

We were promised a different gaming experience. That’s why we are complaining.

I am adamantly opposed to any sort of gear progression scheme other than what was originally in GW2 at launch. If I am forced to grind for gear, I will simply go back to WoW.

Kromica.2831:

Oldgrimm.8521:

the thought of unable to costumize your set makes me worried,

Transmutation stones?

not pertaining to the looks,

what im worried about is, ascended items have fixed stats,

so i cant have Emerald earring + ruby jewels

I don’t understand, in a PVE game, why do people care what stats other people have? These stats aren’t enough to change your effectiveness in any dungeon, you can do current dungeons in greens. And you can do the new dungeon in exotics until you go far enough where you need the condition protection.

And in WvW stats mean very little, you can join in at a low level with low level gear and still play.

There is… delivery of the gear is what will decide its “tredmill” effect and not one single person has even let the content hit the live servers yet. I’m also going to point this out.

LEGAL

The following is an agreement you sign and accept everytime you log on, please note the following paragraphs.

Section 3 paragraph (d): “Refund Request – If You do not accept the provisions of this agreement, You may request a refund for the Software, if you were required to pay for it and if it was purchased from NCsoft, within thirty (30) days of either the date on Your receipt or the date You created a Game Account, whichever is earlier…”

Section 6 paragraph (a): “You acknowledge, and further agree, that You have no IP right related to any Service, Content, Software, or any combination of the foregoing or parts thereof except the limited license provided in Section 2 above.”

Section 10 paragraph (a): “You acknowledge that NCsoft may in its sole and absolute discretion provide subsequent versions, enhancements, modifications, upgrades or patches related to any part of the Service.”

edit

Somebody made a point that made me think. If this progresses to eventual ascended armor and that armor can’t take runes it might not be that big a deal for me. Depending on the boost to stats that armor has over exotics and the function of infusions, the actual stat difference between a player in full exotics with superior runes and sigils and a player in a full ascended set might not be significant. Of course if ascended armor can take runes, or the stats are too much above exotics, then it’s all out the window. I really hope that Anet devs come out and explain this proposal more fully to the community so we can what their ideas are. I want to hold out hope that this isn’t the beginning of the kind of gear grind that I so hated in WoW and other MMOs, but right now there’s not much to hold on to.

After reading the blog post, I have to say I’m terribly disappointed that they’ve chosen to go this direction.

A year from now when people that choose to grind for it are in all ascended gear, what’s the next carrot you offer them? Another tier that’s higher with even better stats? Where does that end?

I like WvW. Will ascended gear’s better stats count in that? A year from now am I going to find myself at a distinct stat based disadvantage against somebody with all ascended gear in WvW because I don’t want to spend my time grinding for it?

If I’m out farming for crafting material and loot am I going to be at a disadvantage in tagging mobs against somebody that’s doing extra damage from the stats bonuses they get from a full set of ascended gear?

It’d be one thing if these higher stats were limited to just the fractal dungeon. If they are I’ll be hugely relieved and happy. So far based on what information they’ve provided, it appears they will just be a better version of exotics, and there’s nothing to suggest that it won’t lead to the same gear grind that I loathed in so many MMOs.

It’s not what Anet promised during development, it’s not the kind of mechanic that I enjoy, and it’s incredibly saddening to see a game I have so far deeply enjoyed take this kind of turn.

I won’t quit, but if this kind of thing sticks I doubt I’ll be playing for as long as I’d though I would be, and I certainly won’t be devoting the time, money and energy I’d intended to leveling up other characters.

Logun.2349:

People speak out for what they want, everyone has that right.

To each their own, but if you want an endless gear grind end game, that game has been done and copied at least a dozen times. Can’t GW2 be something different instead of pandering to players that just want to graft the mechanics of the last 13 years on to this one.

This will just cements that whole gear progression mentality into the game. How long do you think it’s going to take before you start to here …” no sorry we are only taking players into our “Guild / Group / Party/ Dungeon Run” with full Ascended sets …sorry try a noob Guild.

I think this just goes against the whole design template for this game. GW2 was about taking down the barriers that prevented players from interacting, and tiered gear systems that lock out contents is a 360 to that core philosophy.

That’s what people are upset about because this is exactly what was preached for the last 5 years by the Dev team. No surprise here that this has caused an uproar of epic proportions.

First of all the point in “something diffrent” is to satisfy everyone, no? Explorers, crafters, casuals, hardcores, pvpers etc etc. Its already much diffrent than other MMOs, you can’t say “hey let’s create something diffrent, how do we do it? Oh I know let’s remove one of the main aspects in typical MMOs and call it a new era MMO”.

Secondly, you can’t generalize people like that. People are creating guilds to find people that share their interests/goals in game. Do you think that now every guild is a mass of random players? That there are no PVP/RPG/PVE/WHATEVA specific guilds? If so, than I am sorry to burst your bubble but you are very wrong sir.

About the menality problems… the problem with people’s mentality in general is that they can’t share things. They want to feel special. That’s why people are raging about gear progress they want to be like “LOL YOU NERD PLAYING WOW? I AM PLAYING GW2 THERE IS NO GEAR PROGRESS GET A LIFE”. They want to feel that they are part of something unusual, the problem is – How to tell them, that dividing mmos into pvp/pve/with gear progress/no gear progress/whatever you come up with is not the only way to make MMO special. Why can’t gw2 be good for everyone?

Swoo.5079:

Flynch.6034:

It’s slightly strange that the people who are vehemently against the geargrind are the ones who are so focussed on the stat differences between gear in the first place. Normally people who are all about spreadsheeting item stats are found in games that actively promote geargrind, as opposed to a game where a percentile difference won’t make or break the experience.

If it makes no difference why bother?

The people wanting more power won’t get them and still be bored, the people not wanting a gear grind for stats will be annoyed and disappointed.

Presumably because if it doesn’t affect a majority in any way, but means a minority enjoy the progression, then that’s ok.

Dumb. You people don’t want people to complain before these things happen because “they might turn out different”.

Then you don’t want them to complain when they don’t turn out different because “It was just released and they might change it”.

And then the changes never happen and the people who are still trying to complain about it are told that it’s too late for changes now and maybe it’ll be better in the next expansion.

No. If the players don’t like something then it’s important that they make themselves heard – as soon as possible.

MrLee.6892:

It wasn’t a big deal before but now it is?

I am confused!

No, you’re making stuff up. There’s a difference.

Lot’s of people complained about the monthly adding dungeons. People have also complained about the personal story forcing us into a dungeon, in its final act. Not everyone likes dungeons and that shouldn’t be news if you read these forums at all.

Somehow Anet misinterpreted that we want more endgame content into that we want the gear treadmill.

It’s against everything Anet has stated about it’s design philosophy and what we expected when we bought this game.

Please just give us challenging content with new and interesting mechanics and playmodes – new conditions and work arounds are fine but NOT by putting in a new gear tier.

Get those artists working on new skins and digital shinies as rewards. There must be limitless possibilities there. We don’t want the stat treadmill.

is the opposite of what they advertise before the launch of the game.
they have not kept their promises.

Bye Bye GW2, it’s time to left.

I’m done with ArenaNet. not buy a game made by them never!

P.S.
sorry for my bad english

Could be worse…….they could start charging us for these updates.
Wait scratch that, I don’t want to jinx it or give them ideas!

My question now is if Lindesy Murdock will face the community here after the mess that she is planning or she will hide behind her desk.

Im still try to understand how someone who work in arena.net since GW1 dont check with the community the idea of put item progresion in a GW game before mess it.

Worst idea ever, and if Linsey , a developer or a CM behind these idea you are reading these you should feel proud, this is the worst worst worst idea behind the GW saga after 8 years.

Be proud

Levetty.1279:

prenavo.3926:

I am very excited for this. I think it is a step in the right direction. No matter how pretty the game is or how cool some of the armor looks, there will always be some form of progression in an mmo. It is the nature of the beast. I think they are taking great strides in trying to make this game appeal to a wide range of tastes as to make the game have a better player retention rate. More people playing is a good thing.
I look at it like this.
1. If you like open world pve…you’ve got it.
2. If you like regular dungeon running…you’ve got it.
3. If you like spvp… you’ve got it.
4. If you like wvw…you’ve got it.
5. And now, if your into getting new things for more power, you’ve got that too.
None of it is required, yet all paths are available for every play style.
In the end in almost every mmo, the acquisition of new stuff is the driving force behind it all. If some people need a carrot on a stick to keep them going, so be it. Eventually, (I’m crossing my fingers here) They may introduce raids!!! GASP!!! Oh the horror! People just need to relax and see where this new stuff takes us. I seriously doubt it’ll be as bad as people think. Besides, even if it did become a wow clone in the future, I’d rather play this than have to pay a monthly sub to do the same thing. People just need to chill out.

Seriously why did you buy GW2 in the first place? Aren’t the millions of other MMOs enough for you? Why does GW2 have to be exactly the same?

The same question can be said for those who believes endgame gear progression is bad thing and believe Gw2 should not include it. Why should GW2 be exactly like GW1?
Now I’m not saying needing to get a certain stat to be able to do dungeon isn’t ridiculous – that’s completely dumb.

But if its just a better tier of gear with non of the infusion stuff I’m all for it. Guild Wars 2 is not meant to be guild war 1 as it is nothing like guild wars 1 from the get go. If I want a game where I’m only ever gonna grind for skin I’ll go play GW1.

Logun.2349:

How long do you think it’s going to take before you start to here …” no sorry we are only taking players into our “Guild / Group / Party/ Dungeon Run” with full Ascended sets …sorry try a noob Guild.

People are already doing this with exotics.

People also did this on GW1. I saw it loads of times. They were asked to ping their build and if they didn’t have the build the group leader wanted them to have because they hadn’t unlocked the right skills yet they were told to go away. People were often looking for “experienced players only” for FoW etc.

So when will I just be able to buy this ascended gear from the cash shop already?

Can’t be arsed to grind all this stuff over and over.

sonicsix.5713:

I am adamantly opposed to any sort of gear progression scheme other than what was originally in GW2 at launch. If I am forced to grind for gear, I will simply go back to WoW.

Let’s not talk about other games and get this thread closed… discussion of what’s been presented is best.

Strongly agree.
Not even sure that moving to a gear-progression will win back any of the “hardcore” demographic; they’ve already made up their minds. All this will do is drive away people who were otherwise extremely happy.

i’m seriously excited about this, new content is good and new stuff to do is always better, i was bored to death already just leveling alts and doing some pvp once in a while since dungeon gear isnt that appealing to me( not that much improvement in stats imo).
I do wish they fixed alot of stuff though, but i’m excited to hear i’ll get new things to do.

They’re releasing new recipes, all but certain we will be able to craft the new armor when it’s released. The exotic market will go the same way as the masterwork market market.

Thank you OP for this post – it sums up most of my thoughts and arguments quite nicely
(You might want to add a TL;DR section for the lazy)

That legal stuff is gibberish – it has nothing to do with the philosophy we were promised, of max-stat gear not becoming obsolete.

And yes, I’d be fine if it was in from the start. Because then we wouldn’t suddenly have set the precedent that it’s OKAY to add more tiers. Now it’s okay to add more tiers! What happens three years from now? Six more tiers of gear?

And yes, I’d be okay with a new dungeon without items in it. Most of the dungeon gear is ugly, anyway.

When I created this, it was not to prohibit or kittening!

It was to ask people to respond constructively! To show that the community can be mature and rich in ideas, and listen will make a great game Gw2

If a child plaind all the time, the parent will say “no” to everything, exasperated by his behavior.

That’s why I asked was that people are calm and react wisely!
Community and not go to a spoiled child …

Sorry if I’m having a hard to explain my point of view … = (

Yes to new skin; no to better stats on the new items. Don`t promise something and throw it overboard three months later >.>

i dont mind new items, but im not infavor of fixed stats,

i want a combination stats, like emerald earring + ruby jewels

Can sum my reaction up in one word – betrayal.

I don’t want to be content gated by treadmills. Been there, done that in other games and got the t-shirt. Had enough of it. GW2 sold itself as being different, the devs made very loud noises at launch about how there were no treadmills and how progression was horizontal. This felt like a breath of fresh air, it meant I could work towards the gear I wanted at my own pace and not need to worry about feeling left behind or things I have achieved being rapidly outmoded. And yet we’re barely 3 months in and the goalposts have already moved.

If this was just a dungeon thing I wouldn’t care so much. But it is going to have an impact on WvW and soon as you mix a gear treadmill with WvW, well it should be obvious where that leads and the devs should be ashamed to have let it happen.

Well I won’t be joining all the hamsters on the treadmill, good luck to those who think this will be fun, you’re going to need it.

While I agree with you that in reality it wouldn’t be a big deal considering extra gems and runes would be unusable. If it was truly meant to only defend against that one condition then why upgrade the base stats at all? Leave them at exotic stats and use them for resistance reasons, perfectly logical to me. Upgrading the stats just makes it more confusing.

That said, I am more concerned about the fact that “rarer versions of the items also come with additional Agony Resistance built into them,” so there is a chance that the item they showed us in the blog is a low end item. So the stats could be bigger, or not. This is all assumption from what I read in the blog.

Also, yay for obtaining infusions in the mystic forge. /sarcasm

It’s all up in the air at the moment anyways. We shall see.

One of the promisies made to US , was that no matter how we play, but we can have the better stats item with various methods and without grind for months:

Crafting, Dungeon tokens, Auction house, Drop, Karma, WvW badges… and this methods is wonderful for me, i can focus on what i like to play, without being oppressed by the NEED to have the better gear.

If these ascended item are necessary to improve the game,(and i really doubt it) at least, give to us the same choices as before, maybe with higher prices, but dont make ascended item only for dungeons or mystic forge! its not fair!
Make us craft em, make us use our karma to buy em…

steelwolf.9864:

It’s deceptive of them for using a MF item, if you calculate the MF increase for stats the ascended ring has +49.4 total item stats than the exotic, meaning non-MF rings would have about this much of an increase.

I was a bit curious as to their choosing a Magic Find stat ring to show off on that blog. I do think it was at least partly to hide the larger stat difference that the major stat has. It also shows of MF, which is a pretty popular stat among the farmers/grinders(their target audience for this new content/gear), but at the same time is a stat that others (especially those concerned about WvW imbalance) will shrug off as a “pve stat that doesn’t matter.”

“The new additions in November are just the start of our item progression initiative.”

This is the scariest and most un-GW thing I have ever read. There has always been a policy of not having a gear treadmill, and I was excited to start working on my exotic set because I knew that once I was done, I would never have to worry about armor again.

In GW1 they released 3 expansions, and the max armor and damage was never changed. 3 months into GW2. and those principles of design that separated them from the rest have gone out the window. Sad day.

Make it unusable in Wv3 or down grade all Ascended/Legendaries to exotic stats while in Wv3. I would be fine with that.

PvEers get their ‘gear progression’ and Wv3 fans won’t suffer from gear imbalances when level capped.

But no, you will need legendary/ascended gears or be inferior to people who do have them; this is not good. Gear Wars 2?

Some scoff at a plus 5 stats but add all those pluses together then times it by a full set then tell me with straight face that doing 100+ dmg more per attack will not throw Wv3 out of whack.

That ring they previewed is a perfect example: it’s way better than an exotic. They also say legendaries will do more dmg and be BiS. Not a good sign, man. This is a pre-cursor to a treadmill that will never end and only a small percentage of the pop gets to be in the ‘cool club’ while the rest are left in the dust. I went through this for 7 years in that other game and is the reason why I came here; I had it with gear grinds….now they come back to haunt me in a game I once thought would never have it.

We shall see man, but this gets worse and worse the more I hear about it.

You had to work for gear in the beginning……what is the difference after 80? you think there just gonna beable to throw more skins at us? LOL, no that wont keep the players happy, i want my character to feel like he is getting stronger…..that is what an mmo is about right? or just grinding all day to play dress up is for you?

Errant Venture.9371:

https://d2vn94glaxzkz3.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Ascended-EN.png

Ascended:
+50 power
+50Precision
+10% Magic Find
+18 Power
+18 Precision

Unused Infusion slot which ONLY gives you a defensive stat which is ONLY useful against the agony condition which ONLY appears in the high-end levels of the enw dungeon

Exotic:
+48 power
+48 Precision
+7% Magic Find
+15 Power
+15 Precision

That’s a TOTAL increase of +5 power, + 5 precision, and +3% magic find. And it’s only available on two pieces. And they’re only going to be made available one slot at a time.

Take a deep breath, calm down. Your exotics are not worthless. Your exotics did not take all that much effort to get in the first place, and it won’t take much effort at all to get this new piece. And this new piece ONLY provides a meaningful upgrade if you plan on playing the HIGHEST END content of ONE dungeon.

I love you guys but you need to chill the kitten out.

If you read the Dev Blog they you also know its just the start to item progression initiative

“The new additions in November are just the start of our item progression initiative. "

The reason we are seeing so many knee-jerk reactions is that this is GOING LIVE IN 2 DAYS! If we can’t get ANET to make a change or delay the ascended items release, the ENTIRE game is going to change (and IMO for the worse based on the information they’ve provided thus far).

Antiriad.7160:

1) I wonder about the situation of people who have spent substantial amounts of real money in in-game armour/weapons that are now devalued, because wrong “assuring” information was given to them by Arenanet in advance. Isn’t that actually something similar to fraud?

A good luck finding an attorney to pick that up. Unless you plan to sue and fund it yourself this is an empty threat.

Besides that no you can’t. You paid for an in game currency. Just like in the real markets changes happen and can cause currency to be higher or lower valued. You can’t sue over decisions you made in the past like that. Could you imagine the stock market? I lost money because your stock value went down I’m going to sue you to get my money back!!!! Ummm no sorry. Also look at the real estate market. You buy a house and it devalues. You don’t get to sue the previous owner for fraud.

I played Guild Wars for 7 years, I have all their games and expansions and several collector editions including Guild Wars 2. I’ve never been disappointed with any of their games till now, truth is that GW2 is not the game Guild Wars fans hope, but nevertheless had a common philosophy of play, if that philosophy of play that now you are betraying . That feedback and kittens, Did pissed’re aware of that have caused more faithful to your community, the Guild Wars 1? only ye heard a group of whiners kitten gear mostly from the Word of Warcraft, ArenaNet well I see that kind of public elected as betraying your most faithful follower who made ??it possible to arrive where you are, keep it up and we definitely lose at least to me, but the “feedback” is that I am not alone in thinking so.

Kindeller.3072:

I feel like screaming at you people but instead im going to stick to my guns and just quote you the legal stuff.

LEGAL

The following is an agreement you sign and accept everytime you log on, please note the following paragraphs.

Section 3 paragraph (d): “Refund Request – If You do not accept the provisions of this agreement, You may request a refund for the Software, if you were required to pay for it and if it was purchased from NCsoft, within thirty (30) days of either the date on Your receipt or the date You created a Game Account, whichever is earlier…”

Section 6 paragraph (a): “You acknowledge, and further agree, that You have no IP right related to any Service, Content, Software, or any combination of the foregoing or parts thereof except the limited license provided in Section 2 above.”

Section 10 paragraph (a): “You acknowledge that NCsoft may in its sole and absolute discretion provide subsequent versions, enhancements, modifications, upgrades or patches related to any part of the Service.”

As a more specific answer, we already have fine master-work and exotic, would you be complaining if this had been in from the start? The point is its combined with new content, would you also be as content if they give you new dungeons to do with no new shiny gear rewards?

TOS have no legal value in most parts of the world

Hello all! I’m not a frequenter of the forums and mainly skim them when I have a chance. Yesterday I bought the helm for my exotic set and am 2 pieces away from the full thing. Today I had urge to check out if there was any new info on the upcoming updates for the Lost Shores only to see that the forum has exploded over these new Ascended gears. Not only am I thoroughly confused, but I’m also concerned that I just wasted 42k karma on something that I may not even need in a few days times.

Between reading the released article and the forum posters’ assumptions… I’d like to seriously ask. Is it worth me even trying for the last 2 pieces of Exotic armor? I didn’t buy them with their ‘good’ looks in mind (I already have the look I want just waiting to transmute) so I don’t want to keep pouring time into karma farming if it’s going to be… well unnecessary. I also want to know if I should hurry up and complete the Orr zones before no one wants to do the temples anymore.

For the record I do consider myself a casual player. I’ve been lvl 80 for about a month now and as you can see I’m not done with my Exotics. I’m not even done with my personal story or have 100% map completion. I don’t even have any craft to lvl 400 yet (close at 318 but not there). I play almost every day for at least 2 to 4 hours between PvE and W3.

While I realize that the content hasn’t come out yet, with all the speculation going around for the armor as much as against the armor, I want to know from both sides a few things:

1. Would Exotics even be worth it with the prospect of Ascended gear being better stats (even if slight it does make a difference i.e. a penny more is still an increase and more than nothing at all)? In other words why would Ascended gear not phase out Exotics like exotics phased out rares?

2. How would this effect map completions? Right now it’s very hard to complete some zones due to bugs (Temple of Balthazer I’m looking at you) but I’m finding at lvl 80 it’s hard to complete because there’s never enough people running around in Orr. If temples require a sheer amount of people to complete them and if the above question holds, what is going to stop people from running temples if exotics are no longer worth it?

3. How will this effect my W3 experience and effectiveness? There’s already a current disparity with gear scaling in W3 (which is why I’m even after the exotics) if Ascended gear is better than Exotics will this continue to prevail?

Remember that currently this is all speculation but since the Pro and Anti camps are speculating I’d thought I’d too speculate what this means for me and others like me that have roughly the same questions that does effect our current time spent.

Kromica.2831:

Levetty.1279:

Kromica.2831:

Levetty.1279:

Remember that one that started collapsing because of that easily farmed event in the Mad Kings Zone? The even that resulted in an emergency fix where they nerfed the chest to the point it was no longer worth doing the event?

Wonder how everybody is going to feel when they can’t sell their exotics because of all the new ascended armour coming in over the next few content updates. To forget peoples reaction to it that easily you would think it hadn’t happened only last month.

There are 2 pieces coming out a ring and a back , and they are only useful in the new dungeon that will probably give exos for the higher rewards so its really no big deal.

Please read the blog post.

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

They will have higher stats then Exotics, eventually you will be able to wear full Ascended.

This will kill the exotic market and probably take the high tier crafting material with it.

They have higher stats because you can not add runes or gems to them , without this they would be worse than exotics.

No, please read the blog post like I asked you too. It specifically states that Ascended has higher stats.

If you look at the picture and add the numbers of the exotic together with the gem slotted into it it still has lower stats then the Ascended one shown.

Infusion might make that stat difference even more but even if it doesn’t then Ascended is still better and nobody will want exotics anymore.

This really ruins WvW for the majority of folks that flocked to it in the first place.

It would have been wiser to post this thread tomorrow though – any kind of positivity, especially if it is as zealous as the negativity in some threads, will be torn asunder today.

Kindeller.3072:

I feel like screaming at you people…

Why, exactly? Others opinions aren’t going to hurt you. I don’t really feel like screaming at you even though you completely fail to understand my point of view too, because it wouldn’t help us understand each other at all.

We have all had some excellent tantrums and counter tantrums about everything and everyone has got nice and uptight so it might be a good time to chill out a bit around here.

Jrunyon.3012:

Kimbald.2697:

Corvindi.5734:

I’m all for Arenanet doing things to make people happy, I like a populated game. But not when making some people happy messes with my style of game play, which is WvW. If they change WvW to the sPvP system of gear equalization I’ll shut up and go away happy.

would be soooo freaking simple:

WvW is pvp, so just apply the same rules as for spvp.
Equal gear, equal traits… and no pve gear progression could ever cause imbalance in this game’s pvp.

Let me go ahead and guess that on many occasions you have bursted down an undergeared lvl 10 in a few seconds in WvW. I bet you even had fun doing it, but god forbid someone have an extra 5 precision and 5 power than you right?

but where does it end? How long before they trickle in enough extra stat points to where it does make a difference? You think people are lamenting a couple extra stat points, when what they are really worried about is where will it stop.

Please if your against the current form of change, please post in here

This IMO would please all, as the dungeon grinders would still have a grind to play with and the rest would be on a level playing field. A change like this would be simple, quick and help all IMO.

Please don’t turn it into an anti Ascended thread, it’s a valid suggeston to keep the items BUT make it so it’s not an actual gear grind outside of the dungeon.

karma.8763:

You had to work for gear in the beginning……what is the difference after 80? you think there just gonna beable to throw more skins at us? LOL, no that wont keep the players happy, i want my character to feel like he is getting stronger…..that is what an mmo is about right? or just grinding all day to play dress up is for you?

There are plenty of other MMOs that cater directly to people like you, who want more and more and more stats.

This game was not meant for you. It was meant for us, who want a stat ceiling, followed by skill and looks.

I played Guild Wars for 7 years, I have all their games and expansions and several collector editions including Guild Wars 2. I’ve never been disappointed with any of their games till now, truth is that GW2 is not the game Guild Wars fans hope, but nevertheless had a common philosophy of play, if that philosophy of play that now you are betraying . That feedback and kittens, Did pissed’re aware of that have caused more faithful to your community, the Guild Wars 1? only ye heard a group of whiners kitten gear mostly from the Word of Warcraft, ArenaNet well I see that kind of public elected as betraying your most faithful follower who made ??it possible to arrive where you are, keep it up and we definitely lose at least to me, but the “feedback” is that I am not alone in thinking so.