Guild Wars 2

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Raziel.4216:

fireflyry.7023:

Raziel.4216:

I’ve yet to see a MMO expansion where players log in and have all of their new skills in day 1 and I sure hope this isn’t the first one, don’t let the door hit you on your way out.

Factions.

What? I had to unlock skills in factions.

Yeah…and it took all of 2 hours to unlock all the core class skills.

Amirite?

Raziel.4216:

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

Sorry OP, but this is the point that the “caring” rabid community they brag so much about tells you not to let the door hit you. Or worse.

Feel free to refute the arguments made by people in this topic, instead of ignoring why we’re telling him to not let the door hit him.
Wait, maybe that’s because…. you can’t refute any of it?

did you just skip the post i made 2 posts up doing exactly what youre asking for?

So, after breezing through these posts, it seems that what ppl are most concerned about the most is the gating.
Which I understand within reason, but it’s a stylistic approach for learning how much there is in the maps. Unless there’s something new there that I missed in the hundreds of posts, it’s probably something like “I paid for the game, why can’t I experience everything now?” and the fact of the matter is, if there’s one thing ArenaNet designs around, it’s breaking MMO design conventions.
So instead of ‘rush through 4 zones and get to raids’ it’s ‘rush through some story, explore this playground and that pvp environment, and this event’.
The fact of the matter is, what is the reward? A new spec? Story? Quests? Raids? It’s what you make it out to be, and with the exception of that rank 4 requirement in chapter 14 they plan on changing, it’s reasonable.
Most MMO players are used to breezing through content, so when they come into GW2, they will do something similar out of habit. The Heart of Thorns content is designed to break that habit by doing the zone quests and bosses, and experiencing different ones.
There are at least 5 canopy bosses, each of them are different, and then you have 4 zones. Basin is a giant zone event in and of itself, and I don’t even know about zones 3 and 4.

Pezz.4758:

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

Sorry OP, but this is the point that the “caring” rabid community they brag so much about tells you not to let the door hit you. Or worse.

eh its cool, if it doesnt get fixed no biggy, watching a BDO alpha test on my second screen and its looking like its got options. yes lots of grinding but the combat looks awesome and the immersion with crafting and trading looks intense

I just don’t even know how to respond to this. You say you like this other game, and how it has lots of grinding, but then you do not want to even play to get your elite specs. The amount of kitten out of you is intense.

I think there are two major flaws to most of the arguments that contend that the system is fine as it is.

First, I don’t think you can call new “Elite specs” content. They are an expansion of game mechanics. If the new specs are content, then so is the new class and that should have been gated too. Additionally, I think they are poorly named. Elite specs are not supposed to be more powerful than the existing trait lines, so why are they priced at more than four times the cost of the others?

The second major flaw is calling anything in a video game “work”, unless using that term in the loosest sense. It is time spent, not work that determines how quickly you can progress. There is no skill in zerging events or grinding xp, and sitting in front of a monitor PLAYING a game is not work. If you want to know what work is, my parents still own the farm I grew up on, come on out and I’ll give you a lesson.

Now, if you enjoy spending that amount of time playing and can dedicate the hours required, great! I’m not out to belittle people who can, and in some ways I’m envious. I played SWG like it was my second job for years and had a blast until the NGE. But I think gating mechanics behind any kind of a time sink is the wrong way to go. Most people just don’t have that kind of time to dedicate to a game. Masteries where advertised as progression, but I don’t recall ever seeing that new class mechanics would be gated behind them. I really don’t like that I have less access to what where implied (in my opinion) to be an expansion to mechanics (not a form of progression horizontal or otherwise) than the person with extensive free time. I have responsibilities, if that means that i have to consume content a a slower pace I have no issues with that, but don’t take my money and gate mechanics behind a time sink.

Zypher.7609:

Pezz.4758:

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

Sorry OP, but this is the point that the “caring” rabid community they brag so much about tells you not to let the door hit you. Or worse.

eh its cool, if it doesnt get fixed no biggy, watching a BDO alpha test on my second screen and its looking like its got options. yes lots of grinding but the combat looks awesome and the immersion with crafting and trading looks intense

I just don’t even know how to respond to this. You say you like this other game, and how it has lots of grinding, but then you do not want to even play to get your elite specs. The amount of kitten out of you is intense.

its not insane! i have NO problems with grinding masteries at ALL i just want to do the grind as A SCRAPPER! why is this so hard to understand?!?

why is it SO hard to understand i want to do HoT content WITH HoT content and not 3 years old content.

fireflyry.7023:

Raziel.4216:

I’ve yet to see a MMO expansion where players log in and have all of their new skills in day 1 and I sure hope this isn’t the first one, don’t let the door hit you on your way out.

Factions.

Err, wrong. Yes you could bring your max level down there and levelling a new one was very fast. But you had to unlock the new elite skills via the game. Some were locked in one of the last instances (i. e. story mission in Raisu Palace), so you had to play through the whole story to get it.

My main feedback is just regarding the game modes.

In PvE you can earn hero points, Anet have added a way in WvW to gain hero points. Why has PvP been neglected in this respect when you have worked hard to allow people to develop their characters in PvP in most other aspects.

Are there any future plans to bring hero points to pvp? Or is there some way to get them and I’m missing something?

Pezz.4758:

Raziel.4216:

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

Sorry OP, but this is the point that the “caring” rabid community they brag so much about tells you not to let the door hit you. Or worse.

Feel free to refute the arguments made by people in this topic, instead of ignoring why we’re telling him to not let the door hit him.
Wait, maybe that’s because…. you can’t refute any of it?

did you just skip the post i made 2 posts up doing exactly what youre asking for?

What exactly did you refute there?
You got a short explanation about how progression is important in MMORPGs, then you used your experience in another MMO’s progression (which doesn’t have the same horizontal system btw, so it’d be really hard to extrapolate) to counter his arguments, which, btw, failed miserably.
The MMO you come from had power creep progression, this one doesn’t, it’s far from the same.

BTW still looking foward to how you’ll refute this part

Sorry, but your argumentation could be used by anybody for anything in the game. You are not playing this in a vacuum. What if somebody asked only for having instant access to legendaries. He is not asking for everything, just legendaries. And another player asks for instant masteries. He is not asking for everything, just masteries.
Do you see where this is going?

The game you used had LOTS and LOTS of grinding, at least 50x times more than GW2, so you pretty much killed your own argument.

Once again, don’t let the door hit you on your way out.

Hate to say it, but your best bet is probably to take a break for a couple of weeks and check back for signs of changes every so often. That is, unless there is enough content you are enjoying aside from the elites that will entertain you for a while.

I have more or less boycotted hero points at this point. Every time I get a muse in me to go for one, it seems like 9 out of 10 times, it’s locked behind a mastery that I don’t have yet. So I’m just like… I will enjoy the other stuff for now and bide my time. I see no point in breaking my back over it this soon. If they do change it for the better, I will have wasted time on the old system and if they don’t, I probably won’t be sticking around for the long haul anyway.

Pezz.4758:

EVERY other mmo i have EVER played that introduces new classes (which is essentially what new specs are) starts you at level 1.

and you know what? if i could start a brand new engineer at level 1 with scrapper, i would RATHER do that than the current system. why?

lets use wow. Monk came in MoP, i started one, when i got to 80, i was ON PAR with my players power as the mobs i was fighting in Pandaria.

As it stands now, when i enter HoT maps on a scrapper, i am BEHIND normal level 80 power by a full trait line in a POST level 80 enviroment.

so going back to Mists of pandaria, as i leveled, 80, 81, 82, the world around me got stronger as i did and i PROGRESSED .

as it stands now in HoT im not PROGRESSING im simply catching up to where i SHOULD have been as a level 80.

does it make sense now?

Now you are just shifting your argument, but I will humor you.
Dozens of games don’t let you instantly start any class. Bravely default or some of the final fantasy mmos.
But even then, this is not a new class. This is a specialization. It’s like an advanced class in other games. Where you have to level through the base class to gain access to the advanced class.
And you are honestly telling me that you do not have 60 or close to 60 hero points on your level 80 character? The only way that is true is that you play really really weirdly, or you just boosted him up to 80 which in turn means that you don’t even know how to play the base class yet. So why not start with that?

Labjax.2465:

Hate to say it, but your best bet is probably to take a break for a couple of weeks and check back for signs of changes every so often. That is, unless there is enough content you are enjoying aside from the elites that will entertain you for a while.

I have more or less boycotted hero points at this point. Every time I get a muse in me to go for one, it seems like 9 out of 10 times, it’s locked behind a mastery that I don’t have yet. So I’m just like… I will enjoy the other stuff for now and bide my time. I see no point in breaking my back over it this soon. If they do change it for the better, I will have wasted time on the old system and if they don’t, I probably won’t be sticking around for the long haul anyway.

thanks, honestly at this point with these responses i may take your advice.

EVEN IF i concede that my opinion doesnt matter and and im wrong.

1 thing is undeniable. with this expansion the awesome friendliest MMO community in modern games has been torn apart and destroyed by HoT. People are super defensive on either side of the table, quick to call names or shoo people away.

Whether you like HoTs systems or dont, SOMETHING is wrong when an otherwsie amazing community is torn apart and recesses back to the typical mmo playerbase.

ProtoGunner.4953:

fireflyry.7023:

Raziel.4216:

I’ve yet to see a MMO expansion where players log in and have all of their new skills in day 1 and I sure hope this isn’t the first one, don’t let the door hit you on your way out.

Factions.

Err, wrong. Yes you could bring your max level down there and levelling a new one was very fast. But you had to unlock the new elite skills via the game. Some were locked in one of the last instances (i. e. story mission in Raisu Palace), so you had to play through the whole story to get it.

I said core skills.

Basically you had your build…first day.All core skills and an elite. Within hours.

If you want to now get into semantics and include every skill in the whole game all good. I’ve got work anyway and these things never end with some of you.Ciao

fireflyry.7023:

I said core skills.

Basically you had your build…first day.All core skills and an elite. Within hours.

If you want to now get into semantics and include every skill in the whole game all good. I’ve got work anyway and these things never end with some of you.Ciao

Not sure how that refutes anything, we said no other MMO hands out everything on day 1.
You just admitted that factions doesn’t let you buy everything on day 1.
Bye

Here’s an idea. Since all us wvw’ers now have even more wvw rank points that are going to waste, why not lobby Anet to convert them into a currency like a wvw rank token that can either be used to rank up wvw masteries, or buy a hero point.

Elite specs are the consequence of horizontal progression. In any other MMO, you would need to reach the new level cap to gain full access to your new build. ArenaNet tried to simulate that with masteries, but the problem here is that you’re nerfing yourself due to the trait line if you use it while “leveling” through the new content.

Besides nerfing hero challenges to make them actual hero challenges, rather than heroes challenges, it’s unlikely that they will make elite specs easier to acquire. The overall difficulty of HoT will likely be nerfed however, as it’s simply unrealistic to the more casual, the average players. Instead of nerfing hero challenges, they may add more of them to compensate, but other than that, they would have to redesign the system to make it any easier. Alternatively, they could always simply make HoT’s hero challenges account bound.

In short, they will likely get nerfed, but you shouldn’t expect them to be super easy to acquire, although ArenaNet does tend to over nerf.

Pezz.4758:

thanks, honestly at this point with these responses i may take your advice.

EVEN IF i concede that my opinion doesnt matter and and im wrong.

1 thing is undeniable. with this expansion the awesome friendliest MMO community in modern games has been torn apart and destroyed by HoT. People are super defensive on either side of the table, quick to call names or shoo people away.

Whether you like HoTs systems or dont, SOMETHING is wrong when an otherwsie amazing community is torn apart and recesses back to the typical mmo playerbase.

Yeah, the anger at each other is pretty horrific. It makes me think of something said years ago… I think it was said by a lead guy at another MMO company (the details are fuzzy). The gist of what he said was, we’d always prefer that you hate us than hate each other. And right now, a lot of people are directing their ire toward each other, which is always worse than directing it at the company itself. Because the players and the devs don’t have to play together with few exceptions, but the community does have to play together and in this game most of all, where grouping and community is so important, a playerbase at war is a playerbase that can’t enjoy the content together.

I even saw it make its way into a HoT map chat the other day. Two people arguing about the elite specs and the grind aspect and being every bit as close-minded and disparaging of the other side as some of the arguments on the forums.

Healix.5819:

Elite specs are the consequence of horizontal progression. In any other MMO, you would need to reach the new level cap to gain full access to your new build. ArenaNet tried to simulate that with masteries, but the problem here is that you’re nerfing yourself due to the trait line if you use it while “leveling” through the new content.

Besides nerfing hero challenges to make them actual hero challenges, rather than heroes challenges, it’s unlikely that they will make elite specs easier to acquire. The overall difficulty of HoT will likely be nerfed however, as it’s simply unrealistic to the more casual, the average players. Instead of nerfing hero challenges, they may add more of them to compensate, but other than that, they would have to redesign the system to make it any easier. Alternatively, they could always simply make HoT’s hero challenges account bound.

In short, they will likely get nerfed, but you shouldn’t expect them to be super easy to acquire, although ArenaNet does tend to over nerf.

thank you for answering my question respectfully and without inciting an argument or telling me to GTFO, have a happy monday sir/ma’am

^ Your arguments were torn appart, not you.
You were unable to counter anything, don’t play the victim.

Taarak.7562:

I’m very disappointed with the criticism. I’m sorry, but to be brutally honest, it sounds like a bunch of millennial whining. They’re not getting their trophy after playing a whole weekend…

Nah, if anything, we’re Generation X whiners, who are too old and too time-committed to do non-sensical grinds. Yeah this is an MMO, but this is an MMO that promised to remove the grind.

Tell me, what’s the point of locking elite specializations under 400 points? Are they more powerful than other specs? After playing them for three weekends, I can safely say no. Is it to make it a trophy? Perhaps, but why take something many people expected to be more readily available, and at the last minute lock it behind a big grind-wall?

Is it to space content out? You’re never going to stop the devoted from burning through content it took two years to design and make. Even now, there are people who already maxed and elite spec, and there are people who got to Mordremoth. In three days!

The point is, there are people who did it, and they’re the ones who like to talk trash to the other people who help fund the game. However, I guarantee you the people with less time spend just as much money or more on the game, and there’s a lot more of us. I got no problem with a climbing a small mountain, just let me know it before I buy into it.

Like I said, it’s a matter of degree – 400 HP is to keep the relatively small amount of guys who already had 200 HP in the bank, from their 100% map reveals, from being fully loaded before the weekend was out. For the rest of us who play casually, that is a kitten big number, especially when you have an alt for every class.

If HP were like Masteries, I’d have no problem with that. 400×1 is way better than 400×9. I mean what’s the problem? If I played one as as Ele, and got another as a Druid, does it really matter? Far less I think, than running with the Zerg train all weekend long, and then laughing at the people who had real lives.

make the jungle HP unlocks account wide

get rid of any mastery reqs for HPs (lore 4, poison resist, etc)

Zixum.9718:

Why has PvP been neglected in this respect when you have worked hard to allow people to develop their characters in PvP in most other aspects.

Are there any future plans to bring hero points to pvp? Or is there some way to get them and I’m missing something?

Why do you need hero points in spvp? All the elite specs are already unlocked. There are new runes and trinkets that you have to buy with gold, but that is an insignificant annoyance in comparison.

Dei Gracia.6859:

Love most aspects of the expansion, however all I do in this game is pvp and wvw, they are what I enjoy most about this game. The PvP is done great, I’m sure the skill balancing could be better, but I digress. I almost exclusively bought this expansion because I was under the impression I would be getting my elite specializations on day 1, and be able to enjoy my game. This isn’t the case, as many others have already stated better than I ever could.

I am not a big fan of playing the story or anything, while I personally feel it’s done well, it’s just not what I come onto Guild Wars 2 to do. I love the PvP aspects of this game, everything about it, countless hours of enjoyment. This expansion bothers me because it’s forcing me to do things I DO NOT want to do, I would much rather enjoy this game and some compromise be made between people in my situation and people on the other end telling me I need to enjoy the game their way. It’s a serious limitation for me, I do not like it. Please figure out a way to appease your customers.

I’m glad I’m not alone, the story just doesn’t interest me, map completion doesn’t interest me, I like the competitive environment of PVP and WVW and will occasionally step into fractals because they get progressively more challenging and have some good rewards along the line of skins….

Most of the people arguing to keep the system the way it is likely never step into WvW, and probably have very few characters, and actually did map completion, which isn’t the case for folks that just do not enjoy that content.

OP, let them be Anet white knights all they want to. It’s still early into the xpac. They don’t have the foresight any intelligent person would have to know how horrible it’s going to be when you’re on you 5th toon trying to unlock your elite spec. Once they finally get around to that point, they’ll see the light. The grind will finally have worn away their fanboy attitude and they’ll understand what we, and the THREE THOUSAND other angry posters are talking about (reference; see the mega thread). Each elite spec takes an average of 20-25 hours to unlock. I have 11 toons. So kindly, go kitten yourself if you think it’s entitled or whining for wanting elite specs at a lower rate.

I took a look at Metacritic a few moments ago and the expansion is only scoring at 6.9 right now. That’s pretty darn sad as GW2 was the best MMO on the market for years. I hate seeing the HP issue tearing down such a good game.

I wish Anet would fix this and turn the expansion back to the core game of no grinding/casual friendly.

^ That’s an example of attacking people.
Yup, the people who quoted each one of the OP’s post and refuted’em are all white knights. Let’s completely ignore the fact that the OP has been unable to refute anything that’s been used to counter his arguments.

BTW my elite spec (on rev) didn’t take even 15% of the time you said it’d take, can I pull a number out of the same place you pulled yours to support my argument?
If so, elite specs take 2 hours.

Turin.6921:

I guess I am one of the few that actually likes the time that I need to spend to earn the points. The HP hunting and difficulty was the most fun I had in game in a long time.
And I have many alts and still look forward to fight through for them also. With the masteries unlocked its actually much easier even if you do not have map completion.

Definitely not the only one, but one of the few. I too like the challenge. Yes, that means I like it for every one of my alts. We didn’t hop into this game expecting an 80 off the bat, why should we expect the same for an ELITE spec. It should show that you took the time and challenge to get that spec completed. The name is ELITE for a reason.

These aren’t just new builds to try out. They are completely different play styles added onto your class…practically a new class! There are new icons to represent this for Pete’s sake!

I think if people would slow down and think about it this way they would realize how much it makes sense that you shouldn’t expect instant gratification for something coming out of an expansion designed purely for lvl 80s. It is going to be challenging and it is going to require time.

TY Anet for giving me something to do other than logging on, doing my dailies and dungeon run or two with my guildies then signing off. This brought back tons of goals and challenges for me to aim for and it brought back a huge social experience for me and many of my guildies! The fact that a lot of the maps are aimed for group experiences has been enjoyable. Its so fun to see/meet others that are willing to lend a helping hand.

The thing is, he doesn’t HAVE to refute anything you say. That’s the wonderful thing about opinions, everyone is entitled to theirs and you don’t get to say otherwise. As for unlocking your herald spec, completely, all 400 points, in 2 hours? You’re wrong. Plain and simple.

FinalPatriot.8034:

I took a look at Metacritic a few moments ago and the expansion is only scoring at 6.9 right now. That’s pretty darn sad as GW2 was the best MMO on the market for years. I hate seeing the HP issue tearing down such a good game.

I wish Anet would fix this and turn the expansion back to the core game of no grinding/casual friendly.

It is pretty silly because the HP issue is probably the only thing holding back that rating from being through the roof right now.

FinalPatriot.8034:

I took a look at Metacritic a few moments ago and the expansion is only scoring at 6.9 right now. That’s pretty darn sad as GW2 was the best MMO on the market for years. I hate seeing the HP issue tearing down such a good game.

I wish Anet would fix this and turn the expansion back to the core game of no grinding/casual friendly.

Well, the HoT expansion is scoring 6.9 because a lot of shills have been giving 10 to it for the last hours…go read the reviews and you will undertsand what I am talking about.

FinalPatriot.8034:

I took a look at Metacritic a few moments ago and the expansion is only scoring at 6.9 right now. That’s pretty darn sad as GW2 was the best MMO on the market for years. I hate seeing the HP issue tearing down such a good game.

I wish Anet would fix this and turn the expansion back to the core game of no grinding/casual friendly.

It was much lower last night because some people have been asking others to leave bad reviews to force Anet to answer this thread.

To make a point, if people want to leave bad reviews it’s their right, but make sure they’re well written and you try to justify the score. Also, counter to that, if you leave a good review, mention what you liked and justify your score.

“1/10, grindy as hell” and “10/10 because people are whiny” don’t help anyone decide if a game/expansion is any good by looking at the reviews and it makes it harder for Anet to look for feedback.

My current suggested fix after a weekend of playing.

Elite specialization should cost nothing, they should simply be granted by having bought HoT and being level eighty.

Instead change the Hero points into once per character EXP bursts, giving more EXP the less solo friendly and more mastery locked the hero point is.

This means people can enjoy HoT with the new class functionality, and keeps hero points as something to do, while also lessening the grindy nature of masteries

atlrising.5134:

Dear Devs,

I am enjoy the story and the content so far in Heart of Thorns, I have been in the jungle since it launched and really have not left. So bravo on that part since normally PvE is not my thing at all but I must complain a bit so you understand I am not completely happy however. My biggest complaint is I can not play my mesmer as a chronomancer, the character I have spent the most time on, built ascended armor for and took the time to craft legendary weapons for. So for now she sits and I play my ranger who I really only ever used to long into for guild recruiting purposes because she had map completion which made it easier to unlock over half of the ranger elite. One last thing before I go, did I mention the nine other level 80 characters I cant try the elite for due to the hero point requirement?

Sincerely,
An upset player

P.S I don’t want a refund, I just want to play my elite specialization

You can try them out in the Mists.

You unlock everything by playing the game. Also you don’t need to have unlocked everything from the beginning. I play my reaper (2 months old, no map completion) from day 1 on with the elite spec.

I’m glad there is acknowledgement that there is quite a deep split in the feedback they are seeing. For the first time ever I feel somewhat slighted, I will use that lightly because in part a little bit of research on my part could have saved me money, and ANET a player who would ultimately lead to negative feedback. All this expansion has done for me is make it ever more apparent that this game is not going to cater to my play style, which is very much a casual one. I have 2 80s one that’s cleared maybe 60% of the world, and another that’s done even less. I enjoy doing world bosses, dungeons, and the occasional fractal. I do not have either character in full ascended gear, not even close. The thing I first enjoyed about this game was that there was never really any gated content, fractals being the first, but that was a separate part of the game almost entirely so I never felt the push.

I left the game with my guild because they wanted no part in the fractal, gated content progression they were seeing. I heard about the expansion and remembered all the freedom of specs, content and progression and decided to come back. I was a bit surprised how much had changed, so much so that even the guides were confusing because a lot of the UI had changed. I was having a great time up until the expansion, doing my typical casual things, a few world bosses, knock out some dailies, and maybe a dungeon or fractals. All this time still trying to learn the meta, find what my focus needs to be to get to ascended etc etc. I’m only casual in a since of the time I can put in game. I can spend quite a bit outside learning what I need to do to be competitive if need be. I consider myself a skillful player, just don’t have much time.

Now that you have a jumbled rundown of where I am here’s my first few hours in the expansion. Keep in mind, I’m going in completely blind, no betas, no review, I wanted a true first time experience . “I expected the core principles to stay the same after all.” Hop through the first bit of the story, journey to a few waypoints. Wow this zone is a giant maze, that’s ok I can get used to that. Wow, all these mobs require a group, no problem I have a guild, and there are plenty of players about. I see some nodes that give Heroes/masteries forgive me if I butcher this part, as I didn’t quite memorize all the new terms. It spawned a hero mob and just destroyed me, and there was nobody around to even do it for quite some time. As Sunday rolled around there was even less around me in the beginning instances, and a lot of stuff required masteries that I did not have. I can’t even try out the new elite builds until I finish. So now I’m stuck.. I ended up spending the rest of the evening playing a new revenant until about level 30, completing all the map mind you.. Because that seems to be almost a requirement now for the 200 extra hero points..

What the heck ANET, has all the founding principles been abandoned at this point? Can some veterans that stuck around fill me in? I feel completely lost as a returning player. There is so many different types of currency now, so many skills/masteries buried underneath gated content. Now there is ascended gear, weapons, and even the crafting us bumped up 100 more points.. There is literally so much added grind now I could literally never experience the new content I have payed for up until this point..

Taarak.7562:

Everything about this expansion has been done very well. Every difficulty and gate seems tastefully done in good context.

I’m very disappointed with the criticism. I’m sorry, but to be brutally honest, it sounds like a bunch of millennial whining. They’re not getting their trophy after playing a whole weekend…

I’ve mostly played map events and the story. I’ve really enjoyed the story, except for the final which I haven’t completed. I don’t know whether it’s buggy or I’m just not understanding mechanics.

The density of explorable space is fantastic. I’ve never seen anything like it.

In short, I can see myself enjoying this content for a long time. Please, please, please don’t make drastic changes to the gates or difficulty. I can see that you’re already adapting some parts of the game to accommodate short-term, almost arcade style MOBA play. I don’t want instant gratification.

If the short attention span crowd kicks and whines and gets their way with GW2, I’ll need to find a different game. And I want to stick with GW2 for a long time.

Thank you for all you do. Your work is greatly appreciated.

I’m trying not to take sides, here, as I don’t really care about the elite specs, personally.

However, GW2 is supposed to be a casual MMO.

It’s not supposed to be grindy, or feel like a second job.

Also, accusing other people of being “whining”, “millennial” and of having a “short attention span”, just because they don’t happen to think like you, about a game, is very prejudiced and rude.

It serves no real purpose, here, apart from allowing you to vent, at the cost of upsetting everyone else further.

i dont see how people are calling me “wrong”

there is no right or wrong, i personally dont find the current set up of elite unlocks acceptable. i wont play the game or invest money into unless its changed. if its not ill move on.

where is the argument in this? are you going to make purchases in my name? log into my account from my ip and play? no? then i guess im not wrong about anything.

having said that i will monitor and hope for the best until something comes along to fill the void left by losing GW2 as a main source of entertainment.

I’m just as entitled to my opinion that unlocking herald is just 2 hours, I don’t have to refute anything you say

This is a forum, people have discussions, when people discuss stuff they make their points, others refute’em, if you’re completely unable to counter what other people say then your opinion is crealy missplaced.

So sure, he doesn’t have to refute anything and I just want to play HoT content with a HoT legendary, I paid for HoT so I deserve it. I’m entitled to my opinion, keep reason and logic out of here!

Raziel.4216:

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

Sorry OP, but this is the point that the “caring” rabid community they brag so much about tells you not to let the door hit you. Or worse.

Feel free to refute the arguments made by people in this topic, instead of ignoring why we’re telling him to not let the door hit him.
Wait, maybe that’s because…. you can’t refute any of it?

Missing the point much? You can disagree without becoming hostile. The comment was on hostility, nothing else. Feel free to invent other motives and then apply a snarky comment.. oh wait.

psizone.8437:

FinalPatriot.8034:

I took a look at Metacritic a few moments ago and the expansion is only scoring at 6.9 right now. That’s pretty darn sad as GW2 was the best MMO on the market for years. I hate seeing the HP issue tearing down such a good game.

I wish Anet would fix this and turn the expansion back to the core game of no grinding/casual friendly.

“1/10, grindy as hell” and “10/10 because people are whiny” don’t help anyone decide if a game/expansion is any good by looking at the reviews and it makes it harder for Anet to look for feedback.

Yeah, that’s a good point. I’ve not purchased the expansion yet mainly due to this issue as when I read it right before release, the “red flags” started waving. It’s sad too because I LOVE the personal story and wanted to see what happens next.

Since GW2 was released, I’ve pretty much soloed everything. It’s how I like to play the game. I now have 6 alts, all level 80. With the current format, I should almost delete them as I’ll never get around to doing such a grind on them.

Perhaps they can just make it account wide?

I foresee the return of skill trainers and books. For lots and lots of gold and spirit shards of course

Pezz.4758:

where is the argument in this? are you going to make purchases in my name? log into my account from my ip and play? no? then i guess im not wrong about anything.

The changes you want would affect everyone, not just you.
There’s the reason to argue, the arguments have been already made.

An easy example: I could be just as entitled to my opinion that there’re fairies on my garden and we should all honor them, that doesn’t stop others from tearing appart whatever crazy thing I say in favor of fairies in my garden.
Why argue? What I propose would affect others.

But… It’s not grindy!
You have to do hero challenge once per character.
Many can be done without fighting.

In grindy MMO, unlocking a point would be like “kill 10 000 kittenty weak foes”.

While I’m one that doesn’t mind a grind (as long as I can earn it with effort rather than the stupid old RNG of Legendaries), there is the question if it should be applied to specializations. Historically character development was not part of the grind. You got your character capped with everything and at that point it was playing what content you wanted and grinding achievements/Fashion Wars. This is a bit of a two-edge sword as it allows people to play at the full potential they want the character which many can find more fun, but it also takes out the most obvious reason to grind: character progression. For those that played for that reason saw the game as having very short legs and would get bored fast – people can play through content much more quickly than it can be created. Personally, I think they should keep to their roots of the game. There are plenty of treadmill games out there already, so they don’t need to make this game one. With Masteries and tons of new collections and Legendary paths, there are grinds to be done, and I would like to do them on my full characters. This means I think the 400 cost is too much as it means that I have to grind out Masteries on my
‘incomplete’ character.

So then comes the question of the line between “just given to you” and “earn it” it should be. This will vary greatly on people’s opinions. Ranging from the same baseline (80 points – 40 traits, 40 skills) as the other lines, to the full 400. My personal opinion is in either one of two camps:

1) 200 points. This allows the specialization to be completed either through standard world completion or through the Heart of Maguuma and it’s current Mastery gates.

2) Split up the Specialization into trait and skill lines for the standard 80 points, and have it available without having all other trees completed. Are specializations a different track of a class, or class +? Being that you have to give up a trait line and skill slots for those of the specialization, I’d say it’s just a different track to bring your character. Doing this would allow new players to play as the specialization as they level.

Unfortunately it’s too late to have Specializations unlocked the way I wanted them to be – a story mission that would create a fun and logical transition to your new specialization. If it were somehow able to be implemented, I’d much prefer that to be the way to unlock vs the current bland grind gate of spending all your HP to complete the standard lines first.

Of course, any “nerf” to the grind for the specialization comes the question of what about the unspent Hero Points that are now useless? Having them as prep for future specializations would make the most sense, and would prevent the requirement of needing enough HP on new maps to support the new specializations… though we’d be sitting on a lot of them. The amount of HP available on the new maps can be shaved – 10 per point is a lot. Or we could just not care – people can simply go for the extra HP for map completion, or cut out once they have enough to unlock everything and do other things. Their choice on how to play.

I guess since this is a Feedback thread and I don’t really have much time to write an extensive review of the expansion I’ll leave my overall feedback here.

First off I’d like to say the expansion did surpass my expectatives however I still think it is not enough content to justify the price tag.

The good:
• Maps are great, a ton of stuff can be done I like the way they’re set up, and some WP’s near big events are sorely needed, still I think that 2 or 3 extra WPS per map wouldn’t hurt
• Gliding is quite responsive, so far gliding and bouncing mushrooms have been really helpful
• Mobs have slightly better UI
• Bosses are not as easy as they were before
• Meta events are everywhere in the open world PvE
• Borderlands seem interesting
• Stronghold is something I really liked because it reminds me of GW GvG/FA/JQ maps
• While I really don’t enjoy scavenger hunt the collections seem nice
• Changes to Fractals were nice
• Personal Story Missions are neat
The bad:
• Masteries take longer than I expected to unlock, especially because you’re depend and on meta events (to unlock adventures, challenges)
• The 400 Hero points on Elite Specialization IMO is an overkill, especially for Revenant since Glint is the most useful out of all the trait lines, and let’s not go into the alts.
• The Dungeon reward nerf IMO was unnecessary
• Anet says they don’t want deserted maps: so far the better source for meta events and adventures seems to be Auric Basin.
• New stats are rather unnecessary, we already had 26 different stat combinations in armor, at most 6 of those are actually viable and 2 are extensively used (Sinister and Zerker), why add more when there’s room to change existing ones?
• Meta event activation time is slow, experience is kind of low and maps seem empty.
• The PvP Hero unlocks and amulets are quite expensive, especially for people who just do PvP
• The mobs in the jungle DO NOT need nerfs, people need to get better in personal skill and coordination, however after even 3 years the playerbase hasn’t got the idea that the game is action based, not passive stat based and that’s why the predominant meta is in damage gear with the current changes to conditions… you have enough defenses with coordination, animation tellatels, boss effects/phases AND boons – conditions – control YOU REALLY NEED TO MAKE THIS SHOW AND LEARNT IN BATTLES IN A MUCH CLEARER WAY. And a dev’sclaim on gutting the berserker meta didn’t help a tiny bit on this, the proof is that fractals 100 was cleared with DPS gear, the Vale Guardian was cleared with 8/10 full DPS gear 1 Support role with support stat gear and 1 dps with defense combos.
• Fractal instabilities from 60-100 feel rather disappointing and annoying and unnecesary, you have like 20 leves with removing boons on dodge and everything blowing up.
• Ascended armor crafting got harder because of materials needed, and it’s price has risen between 60-100g.
• The Legendary precursor crafting still is a raw total of 600-800 gold per precursor so it’s not changed that much really excepting that you now don’t rely on RNG
• The 2 blues 1 green is still annoying, Magic find still feels like a god kitten ed placebo and RNG is still bad. The rewards vs. time spent on activities still feels absurdly low (see dungeon reward nerf and Maguuma metaevent rewards).
The personal opinions
• I find map completion, scavenger hunts and exploring rather boring and I know people that share this thought will do so too, which will broaden the number of people that support this kind of format
• I find the whole do whatever you want philosophy stronger here and it reminds me of GW and was a huge aspect I liked about the game, props for keeping it this way it at least makes people think for themselves
• I find the utterly large number of stat variations unnecessary, I’d rather have the Anet team work in 12 solid stat combos varying into the 3 roles (4 solid stat choices per role) quality>quantity
• People do not want a trinity yet they ask for roles, make encounters show said roles in a decent way. The kitten started by someone against the current/previous? Meta is actually just not helping, I’ve seen people say that the content is hard and that they need defensive gear, while I using a balls out DPS build still can farer more than well in the jungle, excepting in some big meta events.
• The whole e-spec thing is the thing that bothers me most, if I want to play in say 3-4 alts I NEED to complete the whole mag map and Dragon’s stand isn’t that easy with pugs, LFG and map zergs, it seems like an unnecessary chore and I’d rather sit on a main than spend ridiculous ammounts of time trying to grind just for an e-spec, more so when gold will be more scarce and its overall value will rise.
• A ton of players like the difficulty of the content, however they do not like the time investment vs. reward and that’s been a problem from Anets side, since GW-
• Anet constantly tries to be innovative and that’s good, however you try too hard to innovate that it forces things that will eventually get dropped out because of your decisions: think of the next expansions, will this masteries be useful? Can this masteries be trained in the new maps? What will happen if they’re not? Will the new players be able to complete HoT content if the maps do not have some parties running around? It’s not that you’re not in touch with the player base I think that you try to overdo stuff without thinking on the long term impact for the playerbase, you follow the gut instinct that “oh this is cool and awesome” and then boom 6 months later that’s just not working.
• Raids still missing and some stuff still missing but I really feel the expansion is solid as is, great work with the content so far
Suggestions for changes:
• Make e-specs account wide unlocks, so that if someone wants a new alt with the same profession it’s not investing all that time for just those traits once again. Or just Cut the E-spec cost from 400 to 200, or just make the core tyria HP give 3 points instead of 1, what will we do when the maps get emptier (they will) and there’s not enough people so we can unlock all that with alts?.
• Remove all the unused gear stats by using some of your metrics ® I’d rather have more focused roles than stats all over the place, the only armors I ever used were the ones I could chose stats from IMO, all the other stuff I used to lv I had to buy since most drops weren’t even stats I was using and that dates back to 2 years ago.
• Either make masteries take 3/4ths time to lv per mastery or make the rewards give more xp per tier
• Meta events need to trigger faster and end faster, the difficulty is GREAT as it is, please do not change this, I hate the mindless run and bash 1 and F while following a tag and that’s one of the reasons I do not like open world PvE
• Make rewards feel rewarding, it really bothers me how I can drop my time in a game that even after 2-3 hours of grinding will give me 99% trash, and that’s a common complaint for everyone that doesn’t spend 6-8 hours on SW or that could (RIP) at least 6-8 dungeon paths per day plus some random stuff.
• Try to keep Maguuma live for the players that join later, maps currently are full due to people wanting to unlock the masteries, but what will happen to the players that join let’s say in 1 year from now?
• PvP needs still more gold and rewards than it has available now, it’s around 100g to unlock the new amulets, runes, sigils, etc.

Saying herald takes 2 hours to unlock is stating a fact, not an opinion. Learn the difference. Let’s make this fun, here’s a challenge for you. Level a brand new revenant to 80 without gaining any map hero points. Recording a video of you, at level 80, with 0 hero points, and go unlock your entire herald spec in 120 minutes or less. If you do this, I will buy you a legendary of your choice (besides eternity). Let me break this down a bit for you, wouldn’t want you to strain yourself.

This means that you will need 40 hero points in the jungle. Each point can take you no less than 3 minutes. This includes travel time. Some of those hero points are a simple “channel to acquire”. The vast majority are champion monsters that require 5+ people. Come prepared.

Each map only has 3-5 points that can be achieved without mysteries. Lucky for you, I am SO confident that you can’t do this, I’ll let you do this with what you have unlocked already. Since you’ve already done a full 400 hero points on one revenant, I will assume this means you have ALL mastery tracks unlocked. Yay!

Go ahead and do this today or tomorrow. Since it’s only 2 hours, it shouldn’t be a problem to have done in the next 48 hours. I only challenge you with all of this since you are SO KEEN at proving people wrong.

I was thinking about it and can’t remember if I posted my suggestion or not. I’m sure someone has posted the same idea.

Currently it can take 200 WvW ranks to unlock the elite specialisation, that seems like a bit much for 1 spec.

Maybe just adjust the amount you can earn per rank up to a similar amount you can earn through PvE HP challenges.

Kulvar.1239:

But… It’s not grindy!
You have to do hero challenge once per character.
Many can be done without fighting.

In grindy MMO, unlocking a point would be like “kill 10 000 kittenty weak foes”.

It’s grindy for a casual MMO, though.

I don’t know which godforsaken, hellhole of an MMO would require you to kill 10,000 weak foes, for 1 point; but, thankfully, it isn’t (or wasn’t) anything like this one.

You have to compare like with like.

Raziel.4216:

Pezz.4758:

where is the argument in this? are you going to make purchases in my name? log into my account from my ip and play? no? then i guess im not wrong about anything.

The changes you want would affect everyone, not just you.
There’s the reason to argue, the arguments have been already made.

An easy example: I could be just as entitled to my opinion that there’re fairies on my garden and we should all honor them, that doesn’t stop others from tearing appart whatever crazy thing I say in favor of fairies in my garden.
Why argue? What I propose would affect others.

heres the difference, i pay for the fairies in guild wars 2, and no bodies argument no matter HOW good it is can make me keep giving them money. ive made up my mind, i left feedback so my opinion could be heard by those who make decisions.

here ill make it simple for you

im wrong, im entitled, im bad, i need to l2p, i suck, i dont know what an mmo is, i need to play single player games

and guess what? im still not giving anet another dime.

I don’t want rush new maps for HP to be able to be able play how I want , I want to slowly explore new maps and story, fractals , mastery, www with new specs, but with needed numbers of HP, elite specs (that were the first “point of interest” in addon) is become closed for me for veeery long time with my play style, and I’m not even talk about that I have 9 tunes, so it become even more pain…