Guild Wars 2

Warning: melodrama ahead.

John Smith.4610:

Q: Is the intention to deincentivize dungeons
A: Yes

HALLELUJAH.

I love dungeons. They have always been my favorite part of Guild Wars 2. Don’t ask me why; I realize it’s completely irrational. But it’s the only content that I can manage to do over and over and still have fun with. I remember back before dungeons didn’t have any incentive at all, and I remember those days fondly.

This will make people baww, but if you think back to the fabled days of launch, it used to be that all dungeons gave were loot and tokens. That’s it. There was no guaranteed 1G+ reward at the end.

I am still a little angry. But what I’m angry about is that, for some reason, it was decided that that the system needed to be changed, and guaranteed gold rewards needed to be added to the dungeons to provide income for players to compensate for the nerfing of boss-kill gold-rewards in one dungeon: Citadel of Flame Path 1.

If you remember back to that time, you will remember that this is what killed the dungeon community. A pretty tiny minority of people did dungeons, merely to have fun (except for COF1 gold farmers). After the change, COF1’s protoculture spread throughout all dungeon paths in an angry diaspora, bombarding the community with an onslaught of impatient, inexperienced players looking to make quick gold.

This shift completely changed the culture of dungeon running and made it patently Not Fun. I quit for a while, and so did many of my friends. I eventually came back, but none of them did.

I began running dungeons again, honestly, mostly for the easy gold. But the whole affair became an aggravating hit-and-miss of “will we or won’t we be able to finish this without someone complaining like an kitten.” Long patches of attempting to have fun looking for PUGs to run with would be separated by long dry spells where I wondered if it would be worth the effort at all.

And now it’s been announced, after… what, a year of this? Two? That they’ve changed their minds and are switching it back. It’s bittersweet. Yes, IMO, it’s better this way. But by the same token, this change is a correction for damage which cannot really be undone.

Additionally, there is a clear and deliberate effort to shift emphasis away from dungeons. Waxing nostalgic again, it bears pointing out that dungeons were the real, sole, end-game PvE content. It’s unlikely romps in CoE will draw many new players hitting Lv80 in the age of raids.

It can only be hoped that after this change goes through, the gold farmers will abate and the community might recover its glory, if only in a small measure.

I will never understand the mindset of “I don’t want anyone playing this content who doesn’t play it for the reasons I do”

You apparently don’t get it. They are trying to kill dungeons off completely.
(and this is also fairly telling about how rewarding HoT is going to be, if they have to nerf other content to be less rewarding to make HoT look favorable in comparison)

I think you are going to be rather disappointed if you think this is going to restore any sort of dungeoning community.

ScribeTheMad.7614:

You apparently don’t get it.

As I said, the damage has already been done. I’m just trying to look on the bright side.

However, dungeons have been “dead” since that patch two years ago, with the exception of Aetherpath. They have gotten little to no support, no updates, no buffs, only the occasional exploit fix/nerf.

If you’re suggesting that they’re paving the way for dungeons to be removed, then I would say that’s highly doubtful. Dungeons are apart of the original campaign story (if anyone even remembers that), and ANET has been loathe to excise even bloated fat like that, which new content has entirely superseded.

They already built and programmed all the content, why delete it? Might as well keep it up for a sad, tiny, and dwindling community of people who still get enjoyment out of it. It’s not like we expect them to support it anymore.

As for people needing to “play my way,” you’re putting words in my mouth. What I take issue with are the negative consequences when people who play a very specific way, i.e. gold farmers, belligerently mandate their singular standards to the degree that they set the tone for an entire area of content, excluding the original community, which is exactly what happened.

If that’s the case, the what’s the case for even stepping into a dungeon after Oct 23rd? Lore? Gold? As I see it now Anet can just remove those dungeons and push more into raids and fractals.

CodeHavoc.7926:

If that’s the case, the what’s the case for even stepping into a dungeon after Oct 23rd? Lore? Gold? As I see it now Anet can just remove those dungeons and push more into raids and fractals.

Well there is still the dungeon armor/weapons. but aside from that, fun?

But yea it’s very clear they want it to be dead content.

ScribeTheMad.7614:

I will never understand the mindset of “I don’t want anyone playing this content who doesn’t play it for the reasons I do”

You apparently don’t get it. They are trying to kill dungeons off completely.
(and this is also fairly telling about how rewarding HoT is going to be, if they have to nerf other content to be less rewarding to make HoT look favorable in comparison)

I think you are going to be rather disappointed if you think this is going to restore any sort of dungeoning community.

If they want to kill those dungeons completely the special skins better start dropping in open world, or ways to earn the coinage be in the open world. Returning after a long hiatus and I still am after many of those skins.

ScribeTheMad.7614:

I will never understand the mindset of “I don’t want anyone playing this content who doesn’t play it for the reasons I do”

You apparently don’t get it. They are trying to kill dungeons off completely.
(and this is also fairly telling about how rewarding HoT is going to be, if they have to nerf other content to be less rewarding to make HoT look favorable in comparison)

I think you are going to be rather disappointed if you think this is going to restore any sort of dungeoning community.

That’s a bit of a reach. All that I have seen them doing is removing some of the gold reward to redistribute to the rewards in other areas of the game. They’re not trying to kill off dungeons.

There will still be dungeon tokens, and the personal story as well. So there will be reasons to do dungeons, and particularly for new players who have never experienced them they will probably want to do each Explorer path at least once. However that being the case, about the only reason to repeat dungeons is going to be for the tokens at this point. Or for the fun if you are one of those people that enjoys the dungeons enough.

ScribeTheMad.7614:

I will never understand the mindset of “I don’t want anyone playing this content who doesn’t play it for the reasons I do”

Because everyone has to be exactly like you? Because you’re the most wonderful person in the multiverse?

The thing is, the majority of players will go where the incentives are best, meaning they could have accomplished the same thing simply by providing better rewards for fractals and raids, but they chose not to.

The question is why? The logical answer that comes to mind is that they feel dungeons are too profitable for people that stealth past most of the content. The problem with that (if, in fact, it is the reason) is that the change punishes those players that want to tackle it more legitimately.

There will still be a point to run dungeons: tokens. It’s just no longer a mean to get easy gold. And I’m ok with that.

Am I annoyed? Yes, because though not giving much golds, dungeons are the best option for me to farm gold because pve contents are boring as hell. Now I’m just gonna have to go through endless cycle of boring, mindless contents to get golds to buy anything.

Remember he is meaning from the ECONOMIC perspective, they are reducing the money earned at the end, this is because you would feel obligated to run as many dungeon paths as you could every day and demand the most efficient setup because you were doing so many paths. If you enjoy dungeon content its not being harmed, just the ECONOMIC incentive is being reduced.

I found myself burning out on dungeons quite a few times. I hope they reduce the SW chest farm too though.

Coulter.2315:

Remember he is meaning from the ECONOMIC perspective, they are reducing the money earned at the end, this is because you would feel obligated to run as many dungeon paths as you could every day and demand the most efficient setup because you were doing so many paths. If you enjoy dungeon content its not being harmed, just the ECONOMIC incentive is being reduced.

I found myself burning out on dungeons quite a few times. I hope they reduce the SW chest farm too though.

If anything it sounds like a reason o stop stealthing past and to start clearing trash. Seen more than one person net a precursor from trash, and the bags alone will give lots of sellable mats.

Soa Cirri.6012:

ScribeTheMad.7614:

You apparently don’t get it.

As I said, the damage has already been done. I’m just trying to look on the bright side.

I’m not seeing the bright side of killing off dungeons.

I can see the bright side of not supporting them, however. And the two are vastly different.

I don’t think dungeons have enough worthwhile unique rewards to allow reducing liquid gold gains.

Maybe if they upped the unique masterwork/rare trinkets/backpiece drops to exotics, gave every dungeon path a unique drop set like Aetherpath has, and made the recipes for exotic trinkets into ascended trinket recipes then it would be. But as is? No.

Soa Cirri.6012:

However, dungeons have been “dead” since that patch two years ago, with the exception of Aetherpath. They have gotten little to no support, no updates, no buffs, only the occasional exploit fix/nerf.

“Dead” !- “No support”

“Dead content” means that no one plays that content. That’s what ArenaNet’s goal apparently is by deincentivizing the content.

Soa Cirri.6012:

If you’re suggesting that they’re paving the way for dungeons to be removed, then I would say that’s highly doubtful. Dungeons are apart of the original campaign story (if anyone even remembers that), and ANET has been loathe to excise even bloated fat like that, which new content has entirely superseded.

Personality system was part of the original system. They removed it.

Underwater combat was part of the original system. They reduced it greatly – removing it fully from PvP and low level areas, while almost removing it completely from WvW (once the new borderlands go live, underwater content will be removed completely from WvW).

I don’t think “being part of the original campaign story” will hinder them. They’ll just do to the story modes what they did to Arah, then they can feasibly remove the explorables at the wrath of many players. Not like anything of import comes from just the dungeons anymore.

Soa Cirri.6012:

They already built and programmed all the content, why delete it?

Indeed. They already built and programmed all the content around the personality system. Why did they remove it?

They already built and programmed the PvP and WvW underwater combat. Why did they remove it?

This is NOT a good thing. It could be if and only if they were doing other things to dungeons – particularly to improve balance and increase unique rewards – but they’re not. So it’s not a good thing.

dsslive.8473:

CodeHavoc.7926:

If that’s the case, the what’s the case for even stepping into a dungeon after Oct 23rd? Lore? Gold? As I see it now Anet can just remove those dungeons and push more into raids and fractals.

Well there is still the dungeon armor/weapons. but aside from that, fun?

DavyMcB.1603:

There will still be a point to run dungeons: tokens.

Which you can get from PvP. And honestly? That’s the more reliable way to do it anyways.

remove the money in dungeon will actually INCREASE the money in dungeon, selling path will get even more hardcore. what is that 1-3g means compare to the 6-20g people are selling dungeon for? did they really think it over? did they really understand how people really “farm” dungeon? they don’t do it for the loot, they do it to SELL it.

it would only make legit run less favorable to selling them.

Misguided.5139:

The thing is, the majority of players will go where the incentives are best, meaning they could have accomplished the same thing simply by providing better rewards for fractals and raids, but they chose not to.

The question is why? The logical answer that comes to mind is that they feel dungeons are too profitable for people that stealth past most of the content. The problem with that (if, in fact, it is the reason) is that the change punishes those players that want to tackle it more legitimately.

As a player who is averse to grinding, has no legendaries, and tries to play for fun… I can totally back this statement.

lagrangewei.8516:

remove the money in dungeon will actually INCREASE the money in dungeon, selling path will get even more hardcore. what is that 1-3g means compare to the 6-20g people are selling dungeon for? did they really think it over? did they really understand how people really “farm” dungeon? they don’t do it for the loot, they do it to SELL it.

it would only make legit run less favorable to selling them.

Maybe, but buying dungeon paths becomes less attractive as the gold isn’t there to offset the cost, which will force path sellers to lower their prices, or better yet eff off entirely.

people are paying way MORE than what the dungeon are worth, thus the value of it is not in the gold or loot they get at all, they are paying to complete the dungeon and for getting the ascended stat which you need to unlock by buying every item in the dungeon, they don’t even get much loot since they skip the chest. :\