Guild Wars 2

Sleuth.7964:

Vayne.8563:

Sleuth.7964:

DarcShriek.5829:

eisberg.2379:

Guild Wars 2 brought in $25Million in sales in the last 3 months, going by the quarterly, after all expenses and taxes, that is ~$6-7 Million in profits in 3 months.

Financially the game is doing great.

I don’t see as many GW2 is dying posts anymore. They always make me laugh.

if this game is doing so great then where the hell is the content PERMANENT content.

Arguably if you’re doing badly you’d want ALL your content to be permanent, because you don’t want to keep making stuff. Making stuff costs money. Having four teams working on 2 week release schedule costs money. You can’t afford to do that if you’re not doing well.

In fact, many MMOs when they are doing badly, introduce an expansion (which is all permanent content) to get some money back into their coffers. Apparently Guild Wars 2 is doing well without having to have that permanent content.

That said some content is always permanent. For example the current invasions won’t be leaving the game when the event ends (though they will be less frequent).

Sigh there is just no convincing people like you

You’re not even really trying, so I don’t blame him for being unconvinced. For the most part, this game is what the devs are trying to make it. For better or worse, they’ve decided to put their work behind this Living Story. Is it awesome, awe-inspiring, revolutionary?

Heck no. It’s not new but it is the first time I’ve seen a development team focus almost entirely on delivering “episodic content”. (Disclaimer: It may have happened before, but this is the first time in the games I’ve played.) So at least they’re serious about it, rather than half-heartedly throwing it out there.

However, I’m enjoying the content, even if it doesn’t keep me riveted to the game playing it. (Mostly because I run into Diminishing Returns really darn fast doing invasions.) But it’s been fun, entertaining, and better than the stuff in the last MMO I played.

I hope it gets better, because it really does need some better polish before getting sent out to get beaten on by disillusioned fans.

marnick.4305:

Sleuth.7964:

Vayne.8563:

Sleuth.7964:

DarcShriek.5829:

eisberg.2379:

Guild Wars 2 brought in $25Million in sales in the last 3 months, going by the quarterly, after all expenses and taxes, that is ~$6-7 Million in profits in 3 months.

Financially the game is doing great.

I don’t see as many GW2 is dying posts anymore. They always make me laugh.

if this game is doing so great then where the hell is the content PERMANENT content.

Arguably if you’re doing badly you’d want ALL your content to be permanent, because you don’t want to keep making stuff. Making stuff costs money. Having four teams working on 2 week release schedule costs money. You can’t afford to do that if you’re not doing well.

In fact, many MMOs when they are doing badly, introduce an expansion (which is all permanent content) to get some money back into their coffers. Apparently Guild Wars 2 is doing well without having to have that permanent content.

That said some content is always permanent. For example the current invasions won’t be leaving the game when the event ends (though they will be less frequent).

Sigh there is just no convincing people like you

Maybe that’s because Vayne is correct. Expansions are times of huge press, lots of spike income. MMOs time these for a moment when their game does badly or to counter another game (Mists of Pandaria specifically countered GW2). The fact that GW2 doesn’t need an expansion currently proves beyond reasonable doubt it’s doing extremely well.

How about the opposite. There’s no convincing people like you.

If you are trying to convince me to accept the fact the Arenanet wants to focus purely on casual temporary content then I will never in this world agree that is the case

There NEEDS to be a balance between the two if not you bet your kitten this game will go down the drain it will kill itself im just saying just because the numbers are going up doesn’t mean they will stay up

Sleuth.7964:

Okay let me ask you this its a yes or no question

Should Guild Wars 2 introduce more hard content for hardcore players?

Oooh, that’s not fair. Complex issues require complex answers.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Sleuth.7964:

Okay let me ask you this its a yes or no question

Should Guild Wars 2 introduce more hard content for hardcore players?

Oooh, that’s not fair. Complex issues require complex answers.

That is not complex at all

Its a simple yes or no

Sleuth.7964:

marnick.4305:

Diviner.7405:

So I never really understood this logic.

Why cater to casuals?

I have heard claims and claims that there is a larger casual base than a hardcore base…. but is this really true?

Simple mathematics can prove this beyond reasonable doubt.

First, we must acknowledge the playerbase does no longer consist merely of kids and nerds like it did back when I was a nerdy kid. Nowadays, those kids are young adults on the track of making something of their life.

Secondly, it’s important to define what the word Hardcore means. To me, it means playing at least 5 hours a day on a 6 days a week basis minimum. A casual is defined as someone with less than 2 hours to play on any given day. Anyone between is … between.

Third. When we take young adults and assume for sake of argument that everyone, casual or hardcore, has a job to pay for their hobbies, it’s very clear that one group simply can’t exist.

Conclusion #1: from the facts it’s evident that casuals are the largest group by default, because having a job, family, friends or other hobbies directly impacts the ability to be hardcore. At most, those people could be willing to be hardcore, but not really. To me, three hours in a day is a luxury that only happens when my girlfriend is not home.

Conclusion #2: Casuals usually have a job because that’s what forces them to be casual, yet they want to make the most of their hobby. Much like a guy who only bikes twice a year yet has a 2000 euro racebike, a casual will spend a lot of money on his favourite hobby … gaming.

That adds up to the double fact that not only are casuals the largest market by far, but they do have more money to spend on gaming, are willing to spend more money on gaming. Therefor, even with an 80% casual public (low estimate), it’s very likely to have casuals generate 90% of your revenue.

I do want to state that hardcore gamers with jobs and partners exists, but they are a very big exception.

Now I might be wrong here, but I would imagine casuals are the people more likely to move from game to game after 1 month or so then a hardcore player.

You’re wrong. Hardcores were done with GW2 after a few weeks. They had legendaries and practically every achievement. Casuals are still trying to get their stuff. In the end, casuals are the public you can most easily keep because they don’t devour content like that.

So what I see Guild Wars 2 doing is:
Most casuals move on to other games in 1 month or so no matter what you add to the game. It is just their nature.

That’s only the nature of casuals in games that cater to hardcore. For a game like GW2 this definitively doesn’t fly.

So the outcome is that you are losing on both sides. Would it not be better to keep the hardcore fan-base, so you are at least winning on 1 side?

Maybe Im missing something here…. hmmmm

From my perspective, it’s easier to keep casuals. They’re the largest market AND they have more disposable income per capita. As such it’s probably the best to be winning on the casual side.

Feel free to comment, but I’m almost sure this is the correct way to do business in the current time where the average age of gamers is 32(!). Try catering to such an average age with hardcore content ….

Okay let me ask you this its a yes or no question

Should Guild Wars 2 introduce more hard content for hardcore players?

Very vague question that can’t be asked with a simple yes/no.

Hard content, yes. Definitively. But it should be accessible to casuals too. They’re already doing that. Getting every achievement in Queens Gauntlet is really hard. Yet a good casual can theorycraft tactics during lunch break and one shot the boss at 19:05 after coming home from work.

Hardcore content … not sure. I’m not convinced 4 hour raids with 30 people and VP are going to do good for the game. Such content is usually extremely bland and leads to an ugly form of elitism. In the end, it could turn away the casuals which are 80+% of the market and 90+% of revenue. I don’t think it’s worth the risk.

Hard content should not be hard because it’s arbitrarily long but because it is genuinely hard. Doing a solo 5 minute kill on a boss is much harder than spanking a boss with 40 people for 2 hours, yet most people think of the latter when debating “hard” content. It’s not hard. Furthermore, repeating said boss kill a million time is considered hardcore, yet the hard part was killing him the first time.

So please define what you mean with “hard” content for “hardcore” players and I’ll be able to answer your question.

There will always be elitism in every MMO game i’m sorry theres no avoiding it.

And my definition of hardcore content is extremely difficult GROUP content 5+ please that offers rewards worth the effort.

And i’m fine with being able to sell those rewards on the TP to casual players who will want to farm. (This is what they did in GW1) And if your saying a long raid or so would be bland that is arena nets fault because many games with large raids are not bland at all.

I often get the feeling that there are two schools of thought when it comes to defining “casual” and “hardcore”. There are those who think it’s defined by skill (i.e. “casuals are unskilled players”) and those who think it’s defined by time devoted to the hobby (i.e. “anyone who plays more than 20 hours in a week is a hardcore player”).

I don’t think it’s as cut and dry as that. You have skilled players who can only afford to spend perhaps 4 – 6 hours gaming a week, and you have unskilled players who despite spending 20 or 30+ hours gaming each week, are still terrible when it comes to mastering advanced tactics. Yes, as a general rule, the more time you spend at something, the better you’ll be at it, but that’s not always the case. This is especially true when it comes to game modes that involve different skill sets. You may have someone who’s awesome at PvP, but he fails hard at JP’s. Likewise, someone may easily thrash the SAB, but she can’t get past T1 in the Gauntlet. Or someone who’s great at dungeons, but they never manage to win in Crab Toss.

Sleuth.7964:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Sleuth.7964:

Okay let me ask you this its a yes or no question

Should Guild Wars 2 introduce more hard content for hardcore players?

Oooh, that’s not fair. Complex issues require complex answers.

That is not complex at all

Its a simple yes or no

It was a very vague question. That’s why I didn’t answer with a simple yes or no. Not only that but it was actually 2 questions. Should GW2 introduce hard content? Should GW2 introduce hardcore content?

I had to explain the difference between both, before I could answer each question, and they both had a different answer. Furthermore I’m not a black/white type of guy which is why I added nuance.

Sleuth.7964:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Sleuth.7964:

Okay let me ask you this its a yes or no question

Should Guild Wars 2 introduce more hard content for hardcore players?

Oooh, that’s not fair. Complex issues require complex answers.

That is not complex at all

Its a simple yes or no

It is a complex issue, and wanting a simple “Yes/no” answer makes me want to answer “Blue” just to spite you.

ArenaNet needs something for the “hardcore” crowd, but there’s no definition of what you mean by that. It could be the people riding the bleeding 1% of the top tier players. In which case, they really need to work on challenging them somehow.

Do they need something in the open world which only those aforementioned “hardcore” can pass? Well what’s the point of putting it there if everyone can try it but only 1% can pass? What exactly is the challenge, and is it something which is a gear gate, a skill gate, or just a test of how long you can stay in a fight before you die?

ArenaNet also needs everything they put out to be at the very least something every player can (in theory) try. They can’t cater to solely the hardcore (as defined above), because they’re such a minority in the player numbers it’d be a worse outcry than when Guild Missions were introduced (and that even had an “escape clause” for allowing anyone to do them).

If you define “hardcore” as people who play every day, religiously, and collect all the possible stuff they can? I really . . . REALLY . . . don’t think they should be the sole targets anymore than the top 1% “elite”. Mostly for the same reasons as above.

So while there should be something for the “hardcore” to do? I’d much rather not see them catered to exclusively. I watched that with EverQuest, and it was painful.

Sleuth.7964:

There will always be elitism in every MMO game i’m sorry theres no avoiding it.

And my definition of hardcore content is extremely difficult GROUP content 5+ please that offers rewards worth the effort.

And i’m fine with being able to sell those rewards on the TP to casual players who will want to farm. (This is what they did in GW1) And if your saying a long raid or so would be bland that is arena nets fault because many games with large raids are not bland at all.

1/ raiding by default must be bland, because it’s not possible to create hard large group content that can be completed by a 51% majority of the playerbase. If less than half the players can complete it, it’ll negatively affect the game as a whole. Therefor, all raids in all games are bland by necessity, but they use clever tactics to hide that fact, such as trinity.
It’s easier by far to make small group content extremely hard, because you’re limited primarily by your own lack of skill. Clock Tower is a very good example. There’s only one person to rage against when you fail.

2/ The second part of your suggest is nice. All gear from raids should be available on the TP. GW1 did that with Obsidian.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Sleuth.7964:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Sleuth.7964:

Okay let me ask you this its a yes or no question

Should Guild Wars 2 introduce more hard content for hardcore players?

Oooh, that’s not fair. Complex issues require complex answers.

That is not complex at all

Its a simple yes or no

It is a complex issue, and wanting a simple “Yes/no” answer makes me want to answer “Blue” just to spite you.

Not just that, but it was a loaded question, and therefor dishonest.

Sleuth.7964:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Sleuth.7964:

Okay let me ask you this its a yes or no question

Should Guild Wars 2 introduce more hard content for hardcore players?

Oooh, that’s not fair. Complex issues require complex answers.

That is not complex at all

Its a simple yes or no

Let me ask you a very simple yes or no question, to show how wrong you are:

Are you going to continue to play this game you obviously hate?

Just a yes or no. If you feel the need to elaborate, please understand your question wasn’t a simple yes or no question either.

marnick.4305:

Sleuth.7964:

There will always be elitism in every MMO game i’m sorry theres no avoiding it.

And my definition of hardcore content is extremely difficult GROUP content 5+ please that offers rewards worth the effort.

And i’m fine with being able to sell those rewards on the TP to casual players who will want to farm. (This is what they did in GW1) And if your saying a long raid or so would be bland that is arena nets fault because many games with large raids are not bland at all.

1/ raiding by default must be bland, because it’s not possible to create hard large group content that can be completed by a 51% majority of the playerbase. If less than half the players can complete it, it’ll negatively affect the game as a whole. Therefor, all raids in all games are bland by necessity, but they use clever tactics to hide that fact, such as trinity.
It’s easier by far to make small group content extremely hard, because you’re limited primarily by your own lack of skill. Clock Tower is a very good example. There’s only one person to rage against when you fail.

2/ The second part of your suggest is nice. All gear from raids should be available on the TP. GW1 did that with Obsidian.

1. It’s your opinion that raids are bland. Not everyone else many like raids because they are not cluster f*&ks like Guild Wars 2 “dungeons”

2. Don’t compare jumping puzzles to real content for hardcore players

3. Its easier to make 5 man hard but also boring and not as hard as if it was 10 or 20 which is why hardcore players like large scale instances

4. Trinity is not bland trinity gives people roles I love to heal and I heal in every game I play Though I cant do that in GW2 because there is no reason to try to support my team when we can all zerg with zerker gear and kill bosses in less then a minute.

5. In raids like 25 mans or 8 mans in SWTOR or any game with raids 1 person could wipe EVERYONE so it is about YOU even if it is in a large group EVERYONE has to work together.

You cant understand this because I honestly think you’ve never experienced a real raid with a guild and killed a boss to were it was killing you over and over again and learning from your mistakes and finally taking it down feeling awesome.

6. I want that feeling in GW2 and sadly it lacks it as of now. Its not fun shooting fireworks at the elder dragon

Sleuth.7964:

1. It’s your opinion that raids are bland. Not everyone else many like raids because they are not cluster f*&ks like Guild Wars 2 “dungeons”

2. Don’t compare jumping puzzles to real content for hardcore players

3. Its easier to make 5 man hard but also boring and not as hard as if it was 10 or 20 which is why hardcore players like large scale instances

4. Trinity is not bland trinity gives people roles I love to heal and I heal in every game I play Though I cant do that in GW2 because there is no reason to try to support my team when we can all zerg with zerker gear and kill bosses in less then a minute.

5. In raids like 25 mans or 8 mans in SWTOR or any game with raids 1 person could wipe EVERYONE so it is about YOU even if it is in a large group EVERYONE has to work together.

You cant understand this because I honestly think you’ve never experienced a real raid with a guild and killed a boss to were it was killing you over and over again and learning from your mistakes and finally taking it down feeling awesome.

6. I want that feeling in GW2 and sadly it lacks it as of now. Its not fun shooting fireworks at the elder dragon

1/ I like the current clusterfks more than the raids I did back in Vanilla, TBC and WotLK.

2/ Of course not, because jumping puzzles are hard, not hardcore. Repeating a raid isn’t hard content, it’s hardcore. I’m trying to be very clear about that.

3/ Untrue. Onyxia in vanilla was hard. kitten I’ve wiped quite a bit on that little bugger. The thing that made her hard though, was the stupidity of other players, not the boss herself. And that’s why large group content isn’t hard because of the content but merely because it’s a large group. Truly hard content would be nigh impossible with raids.

4/ I do not agree for many reasons. I think WoodenPotatoes explains it fairly well. Find his video on the healers on youtube. Trinity makes for boring content, once you see the matrix

5/ And that’s why raids can’t be too hard. Too many players who are f’k ups. The more people you add, the lower the bar has to be for the content to be accessible. Mad King Clock Tower was extremely hard because it is a single player experience. For one player, Onyxia is rather simple in comparison yet it’s the raid that makes it difficult.

6/ I didn’t like the final boss either, and it should be reworked. But that’s another discussion entirely.

I accept your apology regarding me not having done raids. I’ve done quite a few, and I’m done with them. Please don’t be that insulting next time, it’s not fun discussing people who make stupid assumptions like that. I’ve wiped over and over one Onyxia and Ragnaros. It was fun the first time I killed him, not so much the 1000 times I killed them just for loot. Booooring. Why can’t I have all the loot I need on the first kill, the only one that was actually challenging.

marnick.4305:

Sleuth.7964:

1. It’s your opinion that raids are bland. Not everyone else many like raids because they are not cluster f*&ks like Guild Wars 2 “dungeons”

2. Don’t compare jumping puzzles to real content for hardcore players

3. Its easier to make 5 man hard but also boring and not as hard as if it was 10 or 20 which is why hardcore players like large scale instances

4. Trinity is not bland trinity gives people roles I love to heal and I heal in every game I play Though I cant do that in GW2 because there is no reason to try to support my team when we can all zerg with zerker gear and kill bosses in less then a minute.

5. In raids like 25 mans or 8 mans in SWTOR or any game with raids 1 person could wipe EVERYONE so it is about YOU even if it is in a large group EVERYONE has to work together.

You cant understand this because I honestly think you’ve never experienced a real raid with a guild and killed a boss to were it was killing you over and over again and learning from your mistakes and finally taking it down feeling awesome.

6. I want that feeling in GW2 and sadly it lacks it as of now. Its not fun shooting fireworks at the elder dragon

1/ I like the current clusterfks more than the raids I did back in Vanilla, TBC and WotLK.

2/ Of course not, because jumping puzzles are hard, not hardcore. Repeating a raid isn’t hard content, it’s hardcore. I’m trying to be very clear about that.

3/ Untrue. Onyxia in vanilla was hard. kitten I’ve wiped quite a bit on that little bugger. The thing that made her hard though, was the stupidity of other players, not the boss herself. And that’s why large group content isn’t hard because of the content but merely because it’s a large group. Truly hard content would be nigh impossible with raids.

4/ I do not agree for many reasons. I think WoodenPotatoes explains it fairly well. Find his video on the healers on youtube. Trinity makes for boring content, once you see the matrix

5/ And that’s why raids can’t be too hard. Too many players who are f’k ups. The more people you add, the lower the bar has to be for the content to be accessible. Mad King Clock Tower was extremely hard because it is a single player experience. For one player, Onyxia is rather simple in comparison yet it’s the raid that makes it difficult.

6/ I didn’t like the final boss either, and it should be reworked. But that’s another discussion entirely.

I accept your apology regarding me not having done raids. I’ve done quite a few, and I’m done with them. Please don’t be that insulting next time, it’s not fun discussing people who make stupid assumptions like that. I’ve wiped over and over one Onyxia and Ragnaros. It was fun the first time I killed him, not so much the 1000 times I killed them just for loot. Booooring. Why can’t I have all the loot I need on the first kill, the only one that was actually challenging.

you like the dungeons in this game…. your saying that trinity is bland have you played this games content? have you played the invasions? those aren’t bland? dude your head is so far up your kitten .

Sleuth.7964:

2. Don’t compare jumping puzzles to real content for hardcore players

So sorry, what exactly is “real content” then?

5. In raids like 25 mans or 8 mans in SWTOR or any game with raids 1 person could wipe EVERYONE so it is about YOU even if it is in a large group EVERYONE has to work together.

You cant understand this because I honestly think you’ve never experienced a real raid with a guild and killed a boss to were it was killing you over and over again and learning from your mistakes and finally taking it down feeling awesome.

I have had that experience. I’ve had that experience in PvP combat too, where if one person goes down too early then everything else becomes a domino effect until one side is all on the ground dead.

I don’t really miss it, because when you succeed you might feel great . . . unless the reward is nothing. You know, because you didn’t have enough DKP to bid on an item you really needed and some dingbat bid on it for an alt they never play. Or when you wipe another guild in an open-world battle and you know, you just KNOW it’s only a temporary reprieve because their alts are going to come next and you’ve still got “a man down”.

Some people live for that kind of thrill and enjoy it, and I really leave them to it because if I don’t get anything out of it other than four hours of wasted effort or a crosshair on my back in guild politics, I’m really going to have to pass on it.

6. I want that feeling in GW2 and sadly it lacks it as of now. Its not fun shooting fireworks at the elder dragon

Not gonna lie, that part of the fight was underwhelming. Really hope they do better next time.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Sleuth.7964:

2. Don’t compare jumping puzzles to real content for hardcore players

So sorry, what exactly is “real content” then?

5. In raids like 25 mans or 8 mans in SWTOR or any game with raids 1 person could wipe EVERYONE so it is about YOU even if it is in a large group EVERYONE has to work together.

You cant understand this because I honestly think you’ve never experienced a real raid with a guild and killed a boss to were it was killing you over and over again and learning from your mistakes and finally taking it down feeling awesome.

I have had that experience. I’ve had that experience in PvP combat too, where if one person goes down too early then everything else becomes a domino effect until one side is all on the ground dead.

I don’t really miss it, because when you succeed you might feel great . . . unless the reward is nothing. You know, because you didn’t have enough DKP to bid on an item you really needed and some dingbat bid on it for an alt they never play. Or when you wipe another guild in an open-world battle and you know, you just KNOW it’s only a temporary reprieve because their alts are going to come next and you’ve still got “a man down”.

Some people live for that kind of thrill and enjoy it, and I really leave them to it because if I don’t get anything out of it other than four hours of wasted effort or a crosshair on my back in guild politics, I’m really going to have to pass on it.

6. I want that feeling in GW2 and sadly it lacks it as of now. Its not fun shooting fireworks at the elder dragon

Not gonna lie, that part of the fight was underwhelming. Really hope they do better next time.

Guild wars 2 will come out when its ready

Guild wars 2 will come out when its ready

when its ready

Sleuth.7964:

Vayne.8563:

Sleuth.7964:

DarcShriek.5829:

eisberg.2379:

Guild Wars 2 brought in $25Million in sales in the last 3 months, going by the quarterly, after all expenses and taxes, that is ~$6-7 Million in profits in 3 months.

Financially the game is doing great.

I don’t see as many GW2 is dying posts anymore. They always make me laugh.

if this game is doing so great then where the hell is the content PERMANENT content.

Arguably if you’re doing badly you’d want ALL your content to be permanent, because you don’t want to keep making stuff. Making stuff costs money. Having four teams working on 2 week release schedule costs money. You can’t afford to do that if you’re not doing well.

In fact, many MMOs when they are doing badly, introduce an expansion (which is all permanent content) to get some money back into their coffers. Apparently Guild Wars 2 is doing well without having to have that permanent content.

That said some content is always permanent. For example the current invasions won’t be leaving the game when the event ends (though they will be less frequent).

Sigh there is just no convincing people like you

People like me? Logical people?

What are you trying to convince me of? That temporary content is a sign of a game doing badly? That makes no objective sense whatsoever.

Can you explain to me, in basic logical terms, why a company that’s not doing well would keep making more and more content, and then take it out of the game after a month?

I’m not arguing temporary content is better or worse than permanent content. I’m arguing temporary content isn’t a sign of a game doing badly financially.

Sleuth.7964:

Guild wars 2 will come out when its ready

Guild wars 2 will come out when its ready

when its ready

So, feeling like answering any questions or addressing anything in my reply other than leaving a sniping, snide little comment? Please? I did you the courtesy of treating you like an intelligent counterpart, please do the same.

Vayne.8563:

Sleuth.7964:

Vayne.8563:

Sleuth.7964:

DarcShriek.5829:

eisberg.2379:

Guild Wars 2 brought in $25Million in sales in the last 3 months, going by the quarterly, after all expenses and taxes, that is ~$6-7 Million in profits in 3 months.

Financially the game is doing great.

I don’t see as many GW2 is dying posts anymore. They always make me laugh.

if this game is doing so great then where the hell is the content PERMANENT content.

Arguably if you’re doing badly you’d want ALL your content to be permanent, because you don’t want to keep making stuff. Making stuff costs money. Having four teams working on 2 week release schedule costs money. You can’t afford to do that if you’re not doing well.

In fact, many MMOs when they are doing badly, introduce an expansion (which is all permanent content) to get some money back into their coffers. Apparently Guild Wars 2 is doing well without having to have that permanent content.

That said some content is always permanent. For example the current invasions won’t be leaving the game when the event ends (though they will be less frequent).

Sigh there is just no convincing people like you

People like me? Logical people?

What are you trying to convince me of? That temporary content is a sign of a game doing badly? That makes no objective sense whatsoever.

Can you explain to me, in basic logical terms, why a company that’s not doing well would keep making more and more content, and then take it out of the game after a month?

I’m not arguing temporary content is better or worse than permanent content. I’m arguing temporary content isn’t a sign of a game doing badly financially.

I’m trying to convincing you that if the game just focuses on temporary then that is bad

There has to be a balance that so far we have not seen at all. Until I see an actual update that gave something to really do since fractals ill continue to voice my opinion on the fact that this game needs a real challenging content for players who want a challenge and reward with a real risk vs reward.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Sleuth.7964:

Guild wars 2 will come out when its ready

Guild wars 2 will come out when its ready

when its ready

So, feeling like answering any questions or addressing anything in my reply other than leaving a sniping, snide little comment? Please? I did you the courtesy of treating you like an intelligent counterpart, please do the same.

I’m basically saying in short we got bait and switched.

Sleuth.7964:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Sleuth.7964:

Guild wars 2 will come out when its ready

Guild wars 2 will come out when its ready

when its ready

So, feeling like answering any questions or addressing anything in my reply other than leaving a sniping, snide little comment? Please? I did you the courtesy of treating you like an intelligent counterpart, please do the same.

I’m basically saying in short we got bait and switched.

Yeah, but you’re still not talking to me. You’re making a case for everyone else to listen to you, but you’re not addressing anything I had to say in response.

Well Anet said that temporary content is working for them, keeping people logging in.

I don’t like it so it doesn’t work for me, but apparently it does work well enough to stabilise the game. Anet also said they are going towards adding more permanent content. Now I am not a big fan of this game, but could that indicate that they are at least sort of listening to their fans?

I don’t see why there can even be a discussion about this. The whole gaming industry is almost completely dedicated to casuals (even more so the f2p games), because those people pay the bills.
Convincing the hardcore, highly invested and knowledgeable (in the game’s terms) is a very challenging and expensive endeavour, selling eternal pickaxes for $10 and a collection of plushy backpacks takes basically no effort at all and thus generates that much more income.

The true hardcore scene is always an afterthought; developers tend to think that it is good to have people who consider themselves hardcore around, because it gives the game a better image in press and forums, but it is very clear that they are not the real target audience for the majority of content.

I have heard claims and claims that there is a larger casual base than a hardcore base…. but is this really true?

Yes, by a far and large margin. I mean like 10 casuals for every 1 hardcore player. It’s in the companies best interest to market towards people who are either just picking up the game for the first time, or who own it and log in every now and then to have a gaming session.

Sleuth.7964:

Vayne.8563:

Sleuth.7964:

Vayne.8563:

Sleuth.7964:

DarcShriek.5829:

eisberg.2379:

Guild Wars 2 brought in $25Million in sales in the last 3 months, going by the quarterly, after all expenses and taxes, that is ~$6-7 Million in profits in 3 months.

Financially the game is doing great.

I don’t see as many GW2 is dying posts anymore. They always make me laugh.

if this game is doing so great then where the hell is the content PERMANENT content.

Arguably if you’re doing badly you’d want ALL your content to be permanent, because you don’t want to keep making stuff. Making stuff costs money. Having four teams working on 2 week release schedule costs money. You can’t afford to do that if you’re not doing well.

In fact, many MMOs when they are doing badly, introduce an expansion (which is all permanent content) to get some money back into their coffers. Apparently Guild Wars 2 is doing well without having to have that permanent content.

That said some content is always permanent. For example the current invasions won’t be leaving the game when the event ends (though they will be less frequent).

Sigh there is just no convincing people like you

People like me? Logical people?

What are you trying to convince me of? That temporary content is a sign of a game doing badly? That makes no objective sense whatsoever.

Can you explain to me, in basic logical terms, why a company that’s not doing well would keep making more and more content, and then take it out of the game after a month?

I’m not arguing temporary content is better or worse than permanent content. I’m arguing temporary content isn’t a sign of a game doing badly financially.

I’m trying to convincing you that if the game just focuses on temporary then that is bad

There has to be a balance that so far we have not seen at all. Until I see an actual update that gave something to really do since fractals ill continue to voice my opinion on the fact that this game needs a real challenging content for players who want a challenge and reward with a real risk vs reward.

Maybe, just maybe, arena.net understood the huge outcry that happened after FotM and ascended gear was released. Maybe the understand that one update alienated a very large part of the playerbase. Maybe they’re listening and trying to not make that same mistake.

I’m very sorry you’re caught in the aftermath, but I was actually hit in the first blast. I invite you to see it from the perspective of a skilled player with limited time.

Sleuth.7964:

DarcShriek.5829:

eisberg.2379:

Guild Wars 2 brought in $25Million in sales in the last 3 months, going by the quarterly, after all expenses and taxes, that is ~$6-7 Million in profits in 3 months.

Financially the game is doing great.

I don’t see as many GW2 is dying posts anymore. They always make me laugh.

if this game is doing so great then where the hell is the content PERMANENT content.

Are actually forwarding the argument that because there hasn’t been enough permanent content to satisfy you , that this game is dying. I’ve seen people leap to conclusions, but this is in a class by itself.

I’m not sure what server your on, but I’m on Sanctum of Rall. SoR traffic has been steady all year. Right now, it’s feels as busy as it did on opening weekend. The corporate financial reports also support that position that this game is growing and not dying. I’m not sure why you choose to ignore facts and push hyperbole, but it’s not working very well for you. You should pay attention more and shout less.

Firstly, casual does not equal bad necessarily. I have raided in hardcore teams in a variety of MMO’s over the years but simply dont have the time nowadays. Does that mean I am a bad player because I don’t have time to raid and grind and farm for 7 days a week?

What GW2 tried to do was offer an MMO whereby people could play for as long or as short as they wanted to without feeling they were at a massive disadvantage over people who could spend more time online. For example, in WoW I didn’t PvP a whole lot, which meant I could never compete because I struggled to gear my toon up to the correct levels and always ad a disadvantage. In GW2 however, I can hop on, grab which ever toon I want to PvP with, and go do it on a level playing field relying on skill rather than pure time-sink gear farming.

I don’t think GW2 caters specifically for casual gamers, but they are sympathetic to their needs as well. I think this is the problem, in that those who have no life and spend all day in game seem to think that naturally should give them an advantage over everyone else, which is right in terms of cash to spend on gems etc, BUT I don’t think gameplay should be affected by time spent, which is where I feel WoW went wrong by catering only to the top tier raiding and trying to casual friendly that bit up rather than stick to giving casual players other stuff to do when raiding wasn’t an option. Rift has probably got the best balance out of most MMO’s, their F2P gem system is much fairer priced than GW2 is, you don’t NEED to buy gems to enjoy the game, you can mentor level down to do older content that you are more comfortable with and there is still top tier raiding and hardcore event farming for those with more time to get more rewards…the only thing it falls down in is PvP where it still follows the old grind of gear levels to be competitive. GW2 isn’t a million miles off a good all round game but just needs tweaking of content a little to cover everyones needs.

Sleuth.7964:

Vayne.8563:

Sleuth.7964:

Vayne.8563:

Sleuth.7964:

DarcShriek.5829:

eisberg.2379:

Guild Wars 2 brought in $25Million in sales in the last 3 months, going by the quarterly, after all expenses and taxes, that is ~$6-7 Million in profits in 3 months.

Financially the game is doing great.

I don’t see as many GW2 is dying posts anymore. They always make me laugh.

if this game is doing so great then where the hell is the content PERMANENT content.

Arguably if you’re doing badly you’d want ALL your content to be permanent, because you don’t want to keep making stuff. Making stuff costs money. Having four teams working on 2 week release schedule costs money. You can’t afford to do that if you’re not doing well.

In fact, many MMOs when they are doing badly, introduce an expansion (which is all permanent content) to get some money back into their coffers. Apparently Guild Wars 2 is doing well without having to have that permanent content.

That said some content is always permanent. For example the current invasions won’t be leaving the game when the event ends (though they will be less frequent).

Sigh there is just no convincing people like you

People like me? Logical people?

What are you trying to convince me of? That temporary content is a sign of a game doing badly? That makes no objective sense whatsoever.

Can you explain to me, in basic logical terms, why a company that’s not doing well would keep making more and more content, and then take it out of the game after a month?

I’m not arguing temporary content is better or worse than permanent content. I’m arguing temporary content isn’t a sign of a game doing badly financially.

I’m trying to convincing you that if the game just focuses on temporary then that is bad

There has to be a balance that so far we have not seen at all. Until I see an actual update that gave something to really do since fractals ill continue to voice my opinion on the fact that this game needs a real challenging content for players who want a challenge and reward with a real risk vs reward.

Okay, I have no real opinion on this. But that’s not what I was talking about at all. I wasn’t talking about whether it was bad or good, because what I was replying do wasn’t talking about bad or good.

The post I replied to, seemed to say that Anet doesn’t do well because they resorted to temporary content. That’s ALL I was commenting on.

I wonder what type of players WoW was targeting when they made a commercial with Chuck Norris.

marnick.4305:

It’s easier by far to make small group content extremely hard, because you’re limited primarily by your own lack of skill. Clock Tower is a very good example. There’s only one person to rage against when you fail.

Oh ho ho ho. I just had to comment on this while I was reading through.
There were and still are plenty of people to rage at in jumping puzzles, the larger the character the better.

You can’t believe the abuse I got for doing it on my Charr.
Luckily, time heals all wounds.

Evans.6347:

marnick.4305:

It’s easier by far to make small group content extremely hard, because you’re limited primarily by your own lack of skill. Clock Tower is a very good example. There’s only one person to rage against when you fail.

Oh ho ho ho. I just had to comment on this while I was reading through.
There were and still are plenty of people to rage at in jumping puzzles, the larger the character the better.

You can’t believe the abuse I got for doing it on my Charr.
Luckily, time heals all wounds.

People giving you abuse doesn’t mean you are the source of their failure They are the ones to make a false jump.

I suppose I was just making a point that there will always be plenty of people around who will always put the blame on something or someone else, even if they have to get creative to do so.

And if all else fails, there’s always ‘lag’.

Nuka Cola.8520:

Because hardcore isn’t dumb enough to spend $10 for a flute or $5 for a minipet. <—- of course this will be deleted because stating the obvious isn’t allowed on this forum

Making obviously dumb comments is always welcome in any forum. Keep up the good work!

Lookers – temporary players who are looking but don’t know if they will stay.

Casuals – players with less time but do play.

Hardcore – play a lot

Lechers – People who play for free and never buy anything with real money. Box cost does not pay for the servers or new content.

Diviner.7405:

So I never really understood this logic.

Why cater to casuals?

I have heard claims and claims that there is a larger casual base than a hardcore base…. but is this really true?

Now I might be wrong here, but I would imagine casuals are the people more likely to move from game to game after 1 month or so then a hardcore player.

So what I see Guild Wars 2 doing is:
Most casuals move on to other games in 1 month or so no matter what you add to the game. It is just their nature.

At the same time, hardcore players are alienated and leave.

So the outcome is that you are losing on both sides. Would it not be better to keep the hardcore fan-base, so you are at least winning on 1 side?

Maybe Im missing something here…. hmmmm

You’re missing everything.

1) You’re making too many sweeping generalizations for things you “imagine” (something you said yourself).

2) ‘Hardcores’ are the most likely to jump from game to game to game. This is based on them eating through content really, really fast and trying to jump to the “next big thing” just to eat through that content. *This is my perspective only, as I’ve seen through many of games.

3) ‘Casuals’ take longer to experience content, thus tend to stay within a game a bit longer. They also create an enjoyable, friendly community that helps expand the population. *This again is personal perspective only, as seen in many games.

4) If you’ve read recent information about the game’s 1st Year mark, you’d know that the population has not shrank. Instead the population has actually grown in terms of concurrent players and boxes sold. That right there says that the direction the game is taking works for the developers the best. There is no “losing from both sides”, as you put it.

Onshidesigns.1069:

Lookers – temporary players who are looking but don’t know if they will stay.

Casuals – players with less time but do play.

Hardcore – play a lot

Lechers – People who play for free and never buy anything with real money. Box cost does not pay for the servers or new content.

You forget a category – Obnoxious Jerk. These are people that label people that buy the game but make no additional purchases leeches.

DarcShriek.5829:

Onshidesigns.1069:

Lookers – temporary players who are looking but don’t know if they will stay.

Casuals – players with less time but do play.

Hardcore – play a lot

Lechers – People who play for free and never buy anything with real money. Box cost does not pay for the servers or new content.

You forget a category – Obnoxious Jerk. These are people that label people that buy the game but make no additional purchases leeches.

Well you forget, there are two kinds of people in this world. The ones who categorize people into groups, and the ones who don’t . . .

Catering to casuals?

In order to complete the new content, you must complete it within 2 weeks before it’s gone forever (or a month in half of the cases).

Casuals wouldn’t be able to keep up. The Living Story is catering to hardcore players for sure. So are legendaries. So are Ascended gear. So is anything taking time and gold in the game. You cannot even find a good amount of lore without going in depth of the content.

How exactly is GW2 catering to casuals?

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Catering to casuals?

In order to complete the new content, you must complete it within 2 weeks before it’s gone forever (or a month in half of the cases).

Casuals wouldn’t be able to keep up. The Living Story is catering to hardcore players for sure. So are legendaries. So are Ascended gear. So is anything taking time and gold in the game. You cannot even find a good amount of lore without going in depth of the content.

How exactly is GW2 catering to casuals?

Apparently 2 weeks is too much for the self proclaimed hardcore, especially since the content usually doesn’t involve absurd day-long grinds.

Somehow it seems former meaning of hardcore/casual has shifted. It’s not only about playtime and “dedication”. To my understanding, there are several things to think about:

1. Time is money. If you want to achieve something, you can use your time to work towards it or, long story short, pay others to do it – or some kind of combination of this. You can say “pay to win”, however you can say as well – “nobles have servants”

2. Attitude. I consider myself casual because of attitude (and play with others with similar attitude), like not adjusting real life plans because of the game (no commitments), not focusing on achieving but rather on enjoying etc.

3. Group content and raiding. Gear progression and defined roles in raids… Well, for me it seems boring and something sooooo 20th century Thinking philosophically, it encourages social behaviour, where people always have clearly defined roles, and if they perform what expected they get an award (which really means nothing). It’s an illusion, form of control, as it is very easy to predict and control such society. It’s completely uncreative though. Thinking from this perspective, GW2 made some steps away from it, which is actually great and healthy.

Let’s see what happens next.

marnick.4305:

1/ raiding by default must be bland, because it’s not possible to create hard large group content that can be completed by a 51% majority of the playerbase. If less than half the players can complete it, it’ll negatively affect the game as a whole. Therefor, all raids in all games are bland by necessity, but they use clever tactics to hide that fact, such as trinity.
It’s easier by far to make small group content extremely hard, because you’re limited primarily by your own lack of skill. Clock Tower is a very good example. There’s only one person to rage against when you fail.

Not really… I think that if you got the numbers of how big of a percentage of the GW1 playerbase completed DoA, UW, FoW, Urgoz and/or Deep, you’d be surprised how small it would be. Especially if you take into account that a bunch of people (although not such a significant amount) used running services to get their DoA, UW, FoW, Deep and Urgoz achievements.

GW1 end game was still amazing, even though a lot of people weren’t able to do it. You might argue that it’s still bland because it used the trinity, but I’d like to see you 4 lord Shadow Walk trench tank DoA. It took a lot of skill and knowledge of an area to be a prominent tank for example. Yes, spikers could be just about anyone, and could be carried by the rest, but it took at least a couple of skilled players to be able to complete the areas.

JustTrogdor.7892:

I wonder what type of players WoW was targeting when they made a commercial with Chuck Norris.

Internet nerds, as those were the people making all the bad chuck norris jokes.

Bright.9160:

marnick.4305:

1/ raiding by default must be bland, because it’s not possible to create hard large group content that can be completed by a 51% majority of the playerbase. If less than half the players can complete it, it’ll negatively affect the game as a whole. Therefor, all raids in all games are bland by necessity, but they use clever tactics to hide that fact, such as trinity.
It’s easier by far to make small group content extremely hard, because you’re limited primarily by your own lack of skill. Clock Tower is a very good example. There’s only one person to rage against when you fail.

Not really… I think that if you got the numbers of how big of a percentage of the GW1 playerbase completed DoA, UW, FoW, Urgoz and/or Deep, you’d be surprised how small it would be. Especially if you take into account that a bunch of people (although not such a significant amount) used running services to get their DoA, UW, FoW, Deep and Urgoz achievements.

GW1 end game was still amazing, even though a lot of people weren’t able to do it. You might argue that it’s still bland because it used the trinity, but I’d like to see you 4 lord Shadow Walk trench tank DoA. It took a lot of skill and knowledge of an area to be a prominent tank for example. Yes, spikers could be just about anyone, and could be carried by the rest, but it took at least a couple of skilled players to be able to complete the areas.

Except you are not differentiating between unskilled, lazy or simply non interested people. Can also throw in people with lack of time. Most of those took a long time to complete and not all had that time readily available. I never did Mallyx simply because I couldn’t be bothered to do him. FoW I only completed for HoM and that was with Heroes in an unoptimized set up. Just because something is hard does not make it fun to do or interesting.

On raids

The hardest thing about raiding is getting all the people to stay focused to A learn the content, B execute the content. Raid content is not difficult at all in itself once you know what to do. I say this as having been a raidleader for a progressive hardcore raid guild with server and world firsts under my belt.

Bright.9160:

Not really… I think that if you got the numbers of how big of a percentage of the GW1 playerbase completed DoA, UW, FoW, Urgoz and/or Deep, you’d be surprised how small it would be. Especially if you take into account that a bunch of people (although not such a significant amount) used running services to get their DoA, UW, FoW, Deep and Urgoz achievements.

GW1 end game was still amazing, even though a lot of people weren’t able to do it. You might argue that it’s still bland because it used the trinity, but I’d like to see you 4 lord Shadow Walk trench tank DoA. It took a lot of skill and knowledge of an area to be a prominent tank for example. Yes, spikers could be just about anyone, and could be carried by the rest, but it took at least a couple of skilled players to be able to complete the areas.

That’s true, but GW1 end game was also distinct by not having any soulbound rewards. Everything was up for trade. Raiding almost never has that in western MMOs. In GW1 the most casual player could eventually save up the 2 million needed for obsidian, without ever setting foot in UW. That’s what defines good content imho, most other MMOs don’t have that at all.

Apart from (maybe) Urguz’ and the Deep, there wasn’t any proper raiding, the endgame were just very very hard areas, but regular areas non the less. The endgame didn’t play by vastly different rules than the rest of the game.

To end this argument … nothing in GW1 gave you a stat advantage, merely because you beat something. That’s the cornerstone of the entire GW1 model.

It’s not that I’m against raiding per sé, but I’m against all the bad that usually comes with it namely
- 3 hour long, extremely boring dungeons with 30 idiots who can’t play despite their epix
- having to repeat that dungeon ad nauseam because it drops a weapon of awesomenss +0.01
- to need that weapon for the next coolness tier +0.02
- the requirement to have whack-a-mole roles like tank or healer because properly hard content would wipe said group of 30 elitists.

That’s inherently not fun. I pass for such content. So while large group content can be fun to a degree, it’s the repetition required for the VP that’s the deal breaker to me. I don’t think people would set foot twice in a place like Naxx if it weren’t for the epix. But I agree, killing the end boss in any dungeon the first time really is a nice achievement. The 50 times after that … not so much.