Guild Wars 2

Like a lot of GW1 player I am wondering why the change of direction. If more powerful gear and another tier help to bring in more players and more updates, I can live with it.

But I wonder A-net adding yet another tier of gear would really bring in more players. For the following reasons:

1) Will a 8% increase or 26% or what-ever-the-number-is will be enough for your average power hungry (wow) player?

2) If the gears doesn’t provide any benefits (as some have claimed) in WvW or Spvp would you bother with it?

3) If the gears provide some stats increase but with some other draw-back like no runes , will you be happy as it is and have it applied to your legendary since legendary is supposed to be the best whether they are equal to exotic or ascended?

As a former Wow, SWTOR and other wow-clone player, I have to say no to all three. I am used to having super powerful armours and weapons that noobs with their greens can’t even hit me.

So are A-net willing to go that far or will this just be a bad PR exercise just before X’mas sales?

What is your thoughts?

It’s not going to cause me to play more. It’s rather more likely that it will cause me to stop playing entirely. It’s disheartening spending time and resources to outfit three level 80 characters in exotics to then have that gear become obsolete. I played the game the way that I was told to play it, which was the same way you played in Guild Wars 1: focusing on horizontal gear progression rather than vertical gear progression.

And then Anet went back on the statements they made about items to introduce this. I’ve seen people say that it felt like a slap in the face. I’m not sure if that’s apt. I am out on resources for something Anet said would never happen. I don’t feel like I’ve been slapped in the face. I feel like I’ve been mugged.

It’s going to make me not play at all. I’m simply not interested in gearing up again. I’ve been fully geared for some time and was enjoying being done with it and being able to do what I wanted in game.

aliquis.9180:

It’s going to make me not play at all. I’m simply not interested in gearing up again. I’ve been fully geared for some time and was enjoying being done with it and being able to do what I wanted in game.

Same for me. If this turns out how I suspect it will I won’t be playing this game at all.

Horizontal progression through the addition of new weapons and skills would be great. New areas to explore would always be welcome. New races and character classes would be awesome.

Vertical gear based progression was antithetical I had thought to the Guild Wars franchise. Thats why I loved the original Guild Wars and why after reading the manifesto for this game that I decided to by it.

No, after playing WoW, SWTOR and other WoW clones for years. I thought yeah the long awaited gear grind for epics are finally over and yet with this patch its comes back, so its zzz kitten?
Anyways i work in a IT store, If this patch hits and everything slated change, I won’t be recommending it to anyone that ask for a MMO to play.

Edit for grammer

I won’t bother with the new gear. In fact, I wont bother working towards any kind of gear for anything but their unique skin. Before, I would’ve made sure to transmute cultural armor with some exotics, just so I wouldn’t be a drag on my dungeon group due to inferior stats. I was going through the process to not disappoint others by coming unprepared, is what I’m saying. Now, I don’t care. I’ll take whatever drops off of mobs and just transmute greens or golds.

I never enjoyed power progression. It’s a chore in any game I play, but I’ll endure it for the reward of experiencing a rich world full of lore, and beautiful aesthetics both as part of the environment and in item rewards. Same reason I intentionally didn’t set foot in any dungeon until I was 80 and in exotics.

I won’t be taking part in the new dungeon and stay away from the area they will add, not because I’m a Spiteful Spirit (har har), but because this content will remind me how something that I achieved was taken away from me.

Kittens no!!!!!

I play GW2 all the time, new gear more reason to play with main character. So yeah i will!

If this had loot system of Diablo 2 I would be all over it. But it doesn’t. The loot is boring and I don’t want to have to regear every few months to stop falling behind.

If getting Ascended gear requires more time than getting Exotics, then I’m leaving this game for good. I’m willing to give them one last chance. I’ve grinded enough to get my character fully decked out in Exotics, and I’m not doing it again. As someone who has played their games for many years (since 2005), I must say it’s a shame it has to end like this.

I bought this game because I was told by them that there will be no vertical gear progression, that everything else after I’ve obtained the best possible gear in the game is purely for cosmetic purposes only. I was foolish enough to believe that they will stick to their guns and keep only horizontal gear progression in this game, just like they did in GW1. I have little interest in playing games made by developers that turn their backs on their own philosophies and lie to their customers.

Cloudwalkernz.1328:

As a former Wow, SWTOR and other wow-clone player, I have to say no to all three. I am used to having super powerful armours and weapons that noobs with their greens can’t even hit me.

1/ if you want to play a wow-clone, go play a wow-clone. I play GW2 because it’s NOT a wow-clone

2/ big difference between noobs and newbies. By not knowing the difference you just proved to be a noob. If you need better gear to “pwn” someone who may be far better than you skillwise… you are a noob.

The only online RPG I played longer than 2 months was Guild Wars 1 because it didn’t have gear increments and as such, I could show my skill without being called “noob” by noobs.

To tell the truth, i expect more lv80 dungeon which require more tactics and creativity to beat rather than new tier of gear every once a while. But who knows the ascended gear is already planned by Anet or it is a temporary solution to some “elite” players who claims the end game is nothing….

I personally hope the ascended gear is the top tier item as intended from the sketches of GW2, and stop right there. Anyway i will gladly accept this new contents and see what it will bring.

The fun of GW is always how you plan and build your character, the TEAM tactics in nasty situations, the creativity in bring most out of your skill bar…… gear is the least concern. But I will keep playing as long as the gear grind is in acceptable level…

Nah, actually after i read the blog n many comments here, it totally made me lost interest in the game. I was in the middle of farming CoE, to get the light armor set for my future alt necro. Everything become moot point, i stopped after I read this ascended crap. Only log in to do dungeon here and there, nothing specific.
Funny thing is my friend lists seems to be thinning on peak hours last two days, probably heavily coincide with this announcement and ppl reaction towards it.
And I started to notice lots of ppl acting differently in general in couple of dungeon groups that i was in. Those elitist kitten attitudes are starting to show lots, i’m not going into details of what happened. I guess it’s perfectly normal since the game is starting to cater for them, eventually the true nature of their color are showing. Met at least 5 kittens in at least 6 of dungeon i was in. Horrible. I probably will have look a bit @ the content n leave the game for good.
If i wanted a gear gate, treadmill gearing game i would have either play rift or wow.
GW2 is just subpar compare to them if aanet decided to head into that direction.
Knowing that this will be my last mmorpg … so, the end. I’m tired and to old for this.

I will actually play less or not at all.

I will not be a part of a gear grind.

More powerfull gear will discourage me from playing

No I will not play more, in fact I will play less.
It makes me sad and I love this game but if they add a gear treadmill, I know I will lose interest and eventually quit.
I was under the impression that I would be playing this game for years and up until this announcement I was really enjoying myself.
oK off to cry now

I’m not going to change the way or amount I play because of the patch. I like GW2 as it is, and I imagine I’ll still like it when ascended gear gets added in. Yes, I will get the gear, because it will be available, the best, and something to do.

That being said, I don’t think a new stat tier was needed. But no, I won’t lose any sleep over it. I just don’t really have any strong feelings either way. To me it’s just an update like any other and I’ll wait and see how it plays out.

Unless I can faceroll nubs no. rofl stomp badies not a chance. It has a greater chance of me being turned off and logging in less and putting the game on the shelf.

For those who think Ascended gear is going to make you more powerful in relevant content, you clearly ain’t played enough gear treadmill MMOs to realize that isn’t true in the long run.

Ascended Gear will make me play less, since I can trashcan my exotic gear now which I grinded in order to also play WvW rather than just sPvP.
This patch disables competitive WvW for me.

So I’ll only play sPvP now, resulting in overall less time spent on GW2.

Certainly won’t make me play more. All I can see it doing is cutting me out of certain content.

Yesterday I was raging at this but I’ve calmed down, I’ll see how Anet have made it before I make anymore judgements.

Phoenix.6735:

For those who think Ascended gear is going to make you more powerful in relevant content, you clearly ain’t played enough gear treadmill MMOs to realize that isn’t true in the long run.

It isn’t true in the long run if every1 keep playing n participate in the new content.
If one decided not to, they’ll get stomped n left behind. Most of us play gw2 because it isn’t a treadmill gear mmorpg.

Please keep in mind that a large majority of people unhappy with the patch are more likely to post here then those who dont mind/support it. Therefore all forum threads will be skewed in the direction of the people unhappy.

In response to the question, i am half and half on the idea, however i am willing to try it before making any judgements. Just like when i tried mushrooms after hating them for years and i suddenly liked them when cooked a certain way, i feel it is always worth trying before raging or refusing to experience something.

With that said, i don’t believe ascended gear will be a game changer and make gw2 like WoW. I would prefer that no ascended stats be used in WvW, but i doubt Anet will take the WoW approach and make each new level of gear make all others completely worthless. What i expect is that there will be many types of new gear that come out with equal stats to ascended, just infused with different things, and ascended gear is just the lore step to gaining the knowledge of infusion. Then all new sets will not be a gear-treadmill but equal to ascended with a different skin/different monster fighting specialty.

There are simply so many things Anet could be doing BESIDES a gear treadmill that i will not make assumptions yet, and neither should anyone else.

Edit: Its amusing everyone is saying that gw2 is BECOMING a gear treadmill because technically since you have blues, greens, yellows and oranges it always was to begin with lol

Since the announcement of ascended gear, I logged on once, for about half a minute. I deleted my credit card information and logged off again.

Problem is, I don’t even want to get exotics for my alt anymore. Why should I? They’ll be made obsolete by some future dungeon anyway.

I wanted to get a third exotic set for my main, a glass-cannon set, all max damage just to see how big the numbers would get. Seems senseless now. I’d not use it a lot so it would probably be obsoleted after having been used three or four times. I’m not doing that.

I have been saving gold and karma for my alt. However, since I don’t know if I might need it for the next tier of equipment for my main, I’m not going to spend anything on exotic-level items anymore.

I still have some fine transmutation stones. I was also thinking about getting nicer looking equipment and transmuting it to the stats I want. No, not doing that. I’ll need those once ascended level gear is out.

Basically, just the announcement of more powerful gear took all incentive to log on from me.

Couldn’t hurt.

The chances of a player playing more.

Better then crappy gear, making people wanting to play more, I guess.

Yes it will. I’ll be holding a 72 hour GW2 marathon this weekend, I can’t wait to try all the new content =)

This gives me the excuse I need to shelve Guild Wars 2 and get on with playing other games.
I’ve played GW2 every day since early access. I was fully intending to continue to play it as much as I could, but now the devs have successfully driven a wedge between me and the game. It’s becoming something I didn’t want. I’m logging in to my dailies still, but even that is tinged with contempt. It won’t be long until I stop playing completely if they continue with this behaviour.
And it’s not just the introduction of gear progression; something about the Halloween event left a nasty taste in my mouth too. Too much profiteering and forceful pushing of monetised features.
I notice that the Black Lion Chests are once again to feature special items for the new event.
Heh, let’s see how many people buy keys after they got burned last time.

No. A new and interesting content would make me play more. Gear progression is the exact opposite to that – especially if the new content from now on will be designed with the assumption that everyone has ascended(/better) gear.

It’ll probably make me play less. I’m a huge WvW player and don’t really care much for PvE or even sPvP. I would rather not be taken out of what I enjoy the most for the sake of increasing my stats by 8% (which is rather massive) to stay competitive. Ascended gear better be cheap…. no more expensive than exotics.

I won’t be playing more, I’ll probably be totally ignoring them. I’ll do some of the new dungeon to see what it’s like, but I play for appearance, not stats; the ring can’t be seen and the back piece is ugly, so no thanks.
I’m still working on dungeon sets for various alts; I really don’t care if there’s anything more powerful. One of my chars had a rare/masterwork mix at level 80 till I got dungeon pieces to replace them.

If the time comes when I need Ascended for new content, I’ll play much less. Till then, I’m just going to despise Ascended items and anything associated with them.

I will continue to play this game. I plan to eventually do the Lost Shores content. The Ascended gear is not that much more powerful than exotic. It’s not as if they are introducing Tier Armor WoW style. Infusion and Agony were in GW1.

People will not leave over this. Why? Because this is still the best non-subscription game currently on the market.

Yes.

Shoot me.

No powerful gear will not make me play more. So far the mere thought of it made me play less.

If I wanted to play for constantly increasing numbers, then I would have played any one of the hundreds of other MMORPGs out there. So no, this won’t make me play more than I already do.

And if anyone honestly thinks one new tier will be enough for that type of player, then they haven’t played any of those other games. Whether Anet intended this to be the start of a treadmill or not, now that they have given in, they have no choice but to make it one. The second Anet releases the full Ascended set, someone will have it and start whining that they have finished the game and have nothing else to do.

I’ll keep playing (no sub, why not), but like others I’ll no longer purchase anything from the store.

Am I the only one who doesn’t care for new gear at all? :S I’ll play it as much as I’ve been playing so far, doing what I enjoy. No one is forcing anyone to grind for new gear :S

They are not adding WOW like gear tiers that make old gear useless.

This is quote from News and Announcements:

Our Studio Design Director Chris Whiteside just posted this:
“I’d like to respond to concerns players have raised about ascended items. Please keep in mind that we’re releasing this as one portion of a massive November update that introduces and improves many aspects of challenge, progression, and rewards. With this and upcoming updates, we view ourselves as introducing large amounts of content with supporting systems and features, akin to an expansion pack, building on Guild Wars 2 through a series of live releases. So it’s important for us to be able to add an expansion pack’s worth of progression and rewards to support that content.

Our goal is not to create a gear treadmill. Our goal is to ensure we have a proper progression for players from exotic up to legendary without a massive jump in reward between the two. We will slowly add the remaining ascended gear items and legendary items in future updates to allow people time to acquire them as we add exciting new content that deserves exciting rewards. We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on.

Ascended and infusion rewards will be available in both PvE and WvW over time, and be made available through all sorts of content around the world including existing content. PvP will remain unaffected to ensure our intended PvP balance going forward. We are also working on other reward and progression systems for the game that tie into current and new content and features. As you know we care very much about your support and opinion and are listening intently to what you say.

Finally we look forward to hearing your thoughts on the upcoming content, and we will ensure we share our thoughts with you on the experiences we share in the Lost Shores."

Chris Whiteside – Studio Design Director

Source: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/news/A-message-from-our-Studio-Design-Director-Chris-Whiteside

If you read it, it clearly says: We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on.
It is just one level of gear. If they had that since release no-one would have been worried.

Just like legendary items (which will gain Ascended-level stats when they release Ascended weapons), Ascended items are items of prestige. They are meant to give the most hardcore players a good and challenging goal to work towards, while not breaking the game or seriously gating content in any way.

People say that this is a step towards WoW in progression. This is ArenaNet introducing a perfect solution to catering to casual and hardcore players, without creating any sort of rift between those two player types.

Also note that Ascended gear lacks slots for players to choose runes, gems, and sigils (when weapons come out). This means that despite Ascended gear having slightly higher stats, they’re less open to customization and are likely to not even replace exotics in many scenarios. I imagine this is why they are introducing the rings and back slot first, because it will not take away runes/sigils from people.

TLDR: I’m happy with new free content that we will get. I will not start running one instance over and over to get Ascended gear as fast as possible. I’m still exploring the world with friends who are slowly moving to GW2.

Koolthulu.9682:

If I wanted to play for constantly increasing numbers, then I would have played any one of the hundreds of other MMORPGs out there. So no, this won’t make me play more than I already do.

And if anyone honestly thinks one new tier will be enough for that type of player, then they haven’t played any of those other games. Whether Anet intended this to be the start of a treadmill or not, now that they have given in, they have no choice but to make it one. The second Anet releases the full Ascended set, someone will have it and start whining that they have finished the game and have nothing else to do.

I’ll keep playing (no sub, why not), but like others I’ll no longer purchase anything from the store.

Don’t worry. I got your share covered.
The second they release the new gear I’ll purchase a megaton of gems to show my support.

I was planning on getting my necro to 80 tonight and making exotic gear for it. Then I read the filth they plan on implementing and thought “Why the kitten bother?”

Just the other night I was saying making a full set of gear 80 exotic gear, and knowing that it’ll last was one of the selling points of the game.

So less, if at all for me.

Gold and Power! NO. Have fun playing the game, make it optional otherwise.

Defora.3694:

They are not adding WOW like gear tiers that make old gear useless.

This is quote from News and Announcements:

Our Studio Design Director Chris Whiteside just posted this:
“I’d like to respond to concerns players have raised about ascended items. Please keep in mind that we’re releasing this as one portion of a massive November update that introduces and improves many aspects of challenge, progression, and rewards. With this and upcoming updates, we view ourselves as introducing large amounts of content with supporting systems and features, akin to an expansion pack, building on Guild Wars 2 through a series of live releases. So it’s important for us to be able to add an expansion pack’s worth of progression and rewards to support that content.

Our goal is not to create a gear treadmill. Our goal is to ensure we have a proper progression for players from exotic up to legendary without a massive jump in reward between the two. We will slowly add the remaining ascended gear items and legendary items in future updates to allow people time to acquire them as we add exciting new content that deserves exciting rewards. We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on.

Ascended and infusion rewards will be available in both PvE and WvW over time, and be made available through all sorts of content around the world including existing content. PvP will remain unaffected to ensure our intended PvP balance going forward. We are also working on other reward and progression systems for the game that tie into current and new content and features. As you know we care very much about your support and opinion and are listening intently to what you say.

Finally we look forward to hearing your thoughts on the upcoming content, and we will ensure we share our thoughts with you on the experiences we share in the Lost Shores."

Chris Whiteside – Studio Design Director

Source: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/news/A-message-from-our-Studio-Design-Director-Chris-Whiteside

If you read it, it clearly says: We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on.
It is just one level of gear. If they had that since release no-one would have been worried.

Just like legendary items (which will gain Ascended-level stats when they release Ascended weapons), Ascended items are items of prestige. They are meant to give the most hardcore players a good and challenging goal to work towards, while not breaking the game or seriously gating content in any way.

People say that this is a step towards WoW in progression. This is ArenaNet introducing a perfect solution to catering to casual and hardcore players, without creating any sort of rift between those two player types.

Also note that Ascended gear lacks slots for players to choose runes, gems, and sigils (when weapons come out). This means that despite Ascended gear having slightly higher stats, they’re less open to customization and are likely to not even replace exotics in many scenarios. I imagine this is why they are introducing the rings and back slot first, because it will not take away runes/sigils from people.

TLDR: I’m happy with new free content that we will get. I will not start running one instance over and over to get Ascended gear as fast as possible. I’m still exploring the world with friends who are slowly moving to GW2.

Yours is just fallacious reasoning, this game should not cater to WoW treadmill fans simply because this isn’t WoW and it was PROMISED to be NOT a gear treadmill. And being F2P doesn’t excuse the devs to steer the game away from that.

I just realized why Anet is doing this from another poster, a veiled attempt of a money grab by pressurizing players to spend their gold/$ on transmute stones. Can’t milk the cow when it doesn’t want to change it’s skin.

It won’t make me play more or less. It’s entirely optional. If I want to work towards better gear, I can. If I don’t want to, there’s plenty of other stuff to do and other characters to make.

hmm if anything it might make me play less. I didn’t want a gear treadmill mmo like wow, swtor and other grinding mmos. I wanted something different. So for now i’ll still play but if sometime else comes along that is better, i’ll probably move. Heck i might end up going back to gw1.

On a side note, i did spent like $100 on the cash shop on bank slots and stuff but now i have no incentive to spend anymore because of this new gear grind stuff. oh well.

The news about needing to go through the gearing process again has really discouraged me. I don’t want to think about gear. I want to enjoy WvW with a max-geared toon.

The news that my BIS gear will soon need to be improved has left me wondering if I can still get my money back for this game.

To reply to OP.
i dont now, until the last week, i had my 40 euros ready for a next GW2 expansion…
Now, i think ill continue playing because i already payed the game, but i really dont think a will buy from cash shop or take a future expasion.
I dont like wasting money on broken facts.

Like a number of people I do question the shift in direction. I may not be an GW1 player, but it is a shift in direction for ArenaNet. Even so though I have to say I’m looking a bit forward to it. I have almost Full Exotics on my character. I just got done with Map Completion and Story Completion last night. I started asking myself what is there for me to do? Legendaries are great and all, but they are a long term goal. Not something I am expecting get done in a short time frame. So, I need something in between to keep my interest. That is where the new gear and dungeon come in. Something to work for in the middle while working on a Legendary.

It will make me play less, I spend most of my time roleplaying with friends on Tarnished Coast, and it was already a pain to get them to do anything because of exotics, now with ascended I’ll be lucky to get the chance to roleplay every three days.

It might get me to play more if it makes it feel like my Ranger actually does some damage !

“Time to do some REAL damage” I don’t think so.

It really depends, I can’t, (don’t want to) grind for weeks or months to get kit that “Might be” half decsent !

Depends on how it’s implemented.

If I have to use Fine T-Stones to transmute the looks of the armor I already used those stone on; then I’ll be kinda miffed off. Culture Armor wasn’t cheap, required a hella grind to get; then to get the Exotics I wanted plus upgrades to tweak out the stats.
Now the Ascended gear is supposed to be better than Upgraded Exotics… ok, but with what stats? Who picked them and do they mesh with my character or will the stats result in a mild nerf for my character(s)?

Will the new gear be more grind? I already grinded more than I wanted; I don’t want to grind more. I ran screaming from WoW for that reason. Ugh…

If the Ascended items can be chosen from a list of “rewards” at various tiers within the dungeon and can be transmuted onto the look I already worked for (without the need for Fine T-stones), then I’ll be “OK” with it. Wont be pleased if it nerfs my chosen stats, but “OK”.
If the Ascended items are just more grind, token farming or RNG kitten… then kitten no. I will likely walk away and not look back.

Yes, i dont really mind needing to work to get some better gear as long as its no terrible grind, if it stays the gw2 way i will happily do it ;D

No.

In fact I havn’t even logged in since I read the announcement. The thought that everything I worked for, the world I explored, the skills I learned might all be obsoleted and replaced has stolen all enjoyment I get from playing. I’ve been there and played that game before, I don’t want it again.

Granted it might not happen that way, but the wording of the blog and Chris’s response both strongly suggest that it is. If that door is opened, my wallet is shut.