Guild Wars 2

So something I wanted to bring up….

Gw2 was by far the best of these games in my opinion. It was a blast for the average joe player logging in, playing how you wished as long as you wanted and logging out. HoT ruined gw2 in many ways.

One reason many people don’t like eso or ff14 is that dreaded gear treadmill. It kinda stinks, you farm hours and hours for weeks for that new weapon or armor to grow stronger, then the next expansion hits and you do it again. That’s why I left ff14 to come back to this game.

But now gw2 is worse. Why?? Because when you farm and farm for such a long time and get that amazing new armor you feel extremely accomplished in the end. But with gw2 you log in to farm masteries? There is no sense of any accomplishment. Your better off now in the other games doing the same exact farm to actually get something.

I’m sorry anet but you tried to follow other games ways which was wrong, but you also did it wrong. Should of just made made more maps like SW, added the elite specs, made A longer story, made worthwhile rewards, killed the mastery system, and kept up with living world season come February

How is Anet following other game? Is there any other game with similar progression system? Why would you not feel accomplishment with higher mastery? you get new abilities and features, is that not infinitely better than gear treadmill?

Making more SW maps? seems like you enjoy press 1 for hours to farm gold more than actually have to use your skills huh?

Also mastery is not the only thing you work towards, there is new legendary weapon, legendary back piece, legendary armor. And pvp league is coming in a few days so there you go.

I wouldn’t say that masteries have no sense of accomplishment. The difference between having some of them and not can be pretty huge. They affect gameplay in ways that don’t involve hitting a higher number on enemies.

Likewise, I wouldn’t farm masteries, either. I just do other stuff in Maguma Falls and the mastery points come with it. Mostly I’ve been building Viper’s sets, and doing the collections for my spec’s weapons, and in doing that I’m at rank 4+ in everything. Now that elite specs aren’t so gated behind them, masteries are quite the no-pressure system.

I feel more accomplished after level up mastery than acquire higher tier equipment in other MMO..

Sylent.3165:

So something I wanted to bring up….

Gw2 was by far the best of these games in my opinion. It was a blast for the average joe player logging in, playing how you wished as long as you wanted and logging out. HoT ruined gw2 in many ways.

One reason many people don’t like eso or ff14 is that dreaded gear treadmill. It kinda stinks, you farm hours and hours for weeks for that new weapon or armor to grow stronger, then the next expansion hits and you do it again. That’s why I left ff14 to come back to this game.

But now gw2 is worse. Why?? Because when you farm and farm for such a long time and get that amazing new armor you feel extremely accomplished in the end. But with gw2 you log in to farm masteries? There is no sense of any accomplishment. Your better off now in the other games doing the same exact farm to actually get something.

I’m sorry anet but you tried to follow other games ways which was wrong, but you also did it wrong. Should of just made made more maps like SW, added the elite specs, made A longer story, made worthwhile rewards, killed the mastery system, and kept up with living world season come February

I agree.

Besides which, the meta events are just most brain dead trash ive ever seen in a mmorpg.

Huge fail there…

If, as one guy said, one of the ‘great things to do in the game’ is farm legendaries, you are better off putting an axe through your face for fun.

lunaticdawn.1860:

I feel more accomplished after level up mastery than acquire higher tier equipment in other MMO..

Grinding out bran dead exp certainly is a kind of accomplishment.

Exxcalibur.6203:

lunaticdawn.1860:

I feel more accomplished after level up mastery than acquire higher tier equipment in other MMO..

Grinding out bran dead exp certainly is a kind of accomplishment.

I mean, you level up mastery you can travel HoT more easier, etc you will glide faster, access secret passage, its more “meaningful” than grind for armors

lunaticdawn.1860:

Exxcalibur.6203:

lunaticdawn.1860:

I feel more accomplished after level up mastery than acquire higher tier equipment in other MMO..

Grinding out bran dead exp certainly is a kind of accomplishment.

I mean, you level up mastery you can travel HoT more easier, etc you will glide faster, access secret passage, its more “meaningful” than grind for armors

Agree, I think the mastery system is genius. One may dislike the time needed to get them but dont forget these are account bond.

warbignime.4610:

Agree, I think the mastery system is genius. One may dislike the time needed to get them but dont forget these are account bond.

Actually I don’t like getting mastery point, but level them up is fine to me

lunaticdawn.1860:

warbignime.4610:

Agree, I think the mastery system is genius. One may dislike the time needed to get them but dont forget these are account bond.

Actually I don’t like getting mastery point, but level them up is fine to me

Umm, I’m quite the opisite actually my problem is how useless some mastery level are for the amount of time needed, Poison lore should be lv1 since they are basically useless.

warbignime.4610:

lunaticdawn.1860:

warbignime.4610:

Agree, I think the mastery system is genius. One may dislike the time needed to get them but dont forget these are account bond.

Actually I don’t like getting mastery point, but level them up is fine to me

Umm, I’m quite the opisite actually my problem is how useless some mastery level are for the amount of time needed, Poison lore should be lv1 since they are basically useless.

Say that on Dragon’s Stand, some of those lores come into play really fast and really hard. You won’t be able to enter quite a few areas in Dragon’s Stand without having that lore active. I do admit however that it never comes up before then.

Don;t even get me started on eso. I came here from 9 mths in ESO.
I had 4 v16 Chars and you think the grind is bad here, the champion point system in ESO has been an absolute disaster. The LAG is horrific, there are more bugs put in to the game in updates than removed on each weekly update and there are very few hot fixes. The landscape and environment is generally worse and there is very little to do once you’ve maxed everything. Coming back to the champion points, I was on about 400 and something. The top players were on 1-1500 or so and there was a hand full who had already gone over 2400.

Now, I wouldn’t say that GW2 is a walk in the park. I have one lvl80 and working on my second now, but I would say that removing the Basic Guild options for smaller guilds was a strange move. And I won’t get in to Crafting yet as it confuses the hell out of me – I just need to spend some time understanding it.

I do however, love TP and the economy – which for me is a big part of the games – personally.

Mosferre.1246:

Don;t even get me started on eso. I came here from 9 mths in ESO.
I had 4 v16 Chars and you think the grind is bad here, the champion point system in ESO has been an absolute disaster. The LAG is horrific, there are more bugs put in to the game in updates than removed on each weekly update and there are very few hot fixes. The landscape and environment is generally worse and there is very little to do once you’ve maxed everything. Coming back to the champion points, I was on about 400 and something. The top players were on 1-1500 or so and there was a hand full who had already gone over 2400.

Now, I wouldn’t say that GW2 is a walk in the park. I have one lvl80 and working on my second now, but I would say that removing the Basic Guild options for smaller guilds was a strange move. And I won’t get in to Crafting yet as it confuses the hell out of me – I just need to spend some time understanding it.

I do however, love TP and the economy – which for me is a big part of the games – personally.

omg Yes ,finally someone played ESO too here. That dat champion system made want to smash my monitor into my toilet. ESO did some thing right like on lore but that dat champoin points and clunky animation are so bad after a month of play I was like , NO I can’t take this nomore.

I think one of the reason I don’t think mastery is grindy is that I played too much actual grindy games. Like ESO, Skyforge,FF14 and most of all I use to play Mayple Story way back. Doesn’t feel like GW2 is anywhere close to actual grinding after my experience with those games.

Mosferre.1246:

Don;t even get me started on eso. I came here from 9 mths in ESO.
I had 4 v16 Chars and you think the grind is bad here, the champion point system in ESO has been an absolute disaster. The LAG is horrific, there are more bugs put in to the game in updates than removed on each weekly update and there are very few hot fixes. The landscape and environment is generally worse and there is very little to do once you’ve maxed everything. Coming back to the champion points, I was on about 400 and something. The top players were on 1-1500 or so and there was a hand full who had already gone over 2400.

Now, I wouldn’t say that GW2 is a walk in the park. I have one lvl80 and working on my second now, but I would say that removing the Basic Guild options for smaller guilds was a strange move. And I won’t get in to Crafting yet as it confuses the hell out of me – I just need to spend some time understanding it.

I do however, love TP and the economy – which for me is a big part of the games – personally.

I too came from ESO :P I quit right before the Champion system as I saw how timeconsuming and requiring it would be.

For those who dont like HoT, dont play HoT and stay in core Tyria? Anet stated that stuff u do in HoT is related to HoT (like masteries), so hopefully they dont go back on this and u can start on an even playing field in the next expansion.

But aside from this, many love this change, because we are all different playertypes. It’s great to see harder mobs in the new zones, if people would only try to better themselves or group up.

As for masteries, I can see the hassle with all the experience needed – but in reality you dont really need all of them, like the raids, you only need the gliding and mushrooms which are easy to get. Masteries is a long time gate, as with legendary armor, we are not meant to have it all NOW, but half a year down the road. But people dont see this because currently theyre given choice but theyre used at being handheld, we have the option to max masteries NOW or wait. The only thing I find a bit unfair is the recent nerf to spider farm, I was there and I finished all my mastery exp in no time, while now others have to spend much more time gaining said exp, replaying events. At least theyll make more map currency, which we all will need at some point for collections etc.

I think masteries are a great premise, but they could have been executed a lot better. Making any of them zone/area specific was a mistake, imo, because it detracts from the sense of having mastered something.

The Pact Commander ones are pretty good, I think, in terms of being universalized. Things like vacuum loot, better revive when rezzing lower level players, mentor tag, swiftness in cities… all very cool to have and also not vital enough to count as anything more than horizontal progression.

Then you have maguuma masteries, which feel rushed and hapdash. Lots of abilities that are hardly horizontal at all – instead, they are all but required to navigate the areas that they are useable in. Some even that are required for collections (I’m looking at you, Exalted 6) and serve no other purpose.

I’m not saying none of the maguuma masteries are interesting or fun to use, but the point is that the design of them is less optional utility and more “you’re going to feel it if you don’t get these pretty soon.” That’s not horizontal progression, imo. That’s vertical dressed up to look like horizontal.

Even the legendary ones are kind of silly and feel like someone stuffing one system into another. You’ve already layered precursors into collections and then you want to layer them into masteries as well? It’s unnecessary layering that serves no purpose other than to make the average player scratch their head and go read a wiki for an hour. Or play something more simple.

Both masteries and collections have examples of use that feel like “we wanted to make sure these systems weren’t going to waste, so we shoved [other system] inside them.” It’s the opposite of future-proofing. It’s laying down the need for mass system overhauls down the road.

I really feel like they’ve gotta make a choice about what these systems are supposed to be for and stick to that one main designation. What invariably keeps happening is that a new system works great for a few months and is enjoyed by a lot of people, but falls to the wayside and gets neglected, or gets used for whatever random purpose comes to mind next, instead of consistently having its own niche usage as part of the overall design whole.

It gives the impression of a stream of new devs coming in with no familiarity with the game and slapping together whatever they can into the existing systems..

lunaticdawn.1860:

I feel more accomplished after level up mastery than acquire higher tier equipment in other MMO..

Funny that because I don’t.

I just look at the number of mastery points I need for the next mastery. (Like I need 10, I have 1).

And then I think that’s a long hard grind to get those points.

Yes it’s the dreaded grind, nobody can deny it.

But at least with going out and getting the mastery points, it is a mini adventure in it’s own right. It’s something you can do on your own. I’m presently stuck on a single Hero point to gain map completion on VB – it’s the Golom mk1 in the Canapees. Can never get together with friends due to working and hours in general – but hopefully this weekend I will

Solid Gold.9310:

lunaticdawn.1860:

I feel more accomplished after level up mastery than acquire higher tier equipment in other MMO..

Funny that because I don’t.

I just look at the number of mastery points I need for the next mastery. (Like I need 10, I have 1).

And then I think that’s a long hard grind to get those points.

Yes it’s the dreaded grind, nobody can deny it.

Well you could only get same mastery point once so exactly how is it a grind when It’s your first time play through the content? Do you know what grind is?

“Metroidvania” style progression does not seem to working that well in this game for me at least.

Maybe it is just the way it has been delivered here. Exp grind and all that. Maybe it’s that there are not many interesting ones.

You know I think it’d have been better if we had unlocked them overcoming great challenges like boss fights and crazy jump puzzles or something, like how we get that mastery track for beating the Vale Guardian for the first time.

Mixed feelings about that one though. It’s cool that we get another line but uncool that we need to complete it in order to beat the raid. Prolonging the time it takes to beat the kitten thing. Gating, gating everywhere.

I don’t really care for masteries honestly, only at mastery 14.

I’d rather we had just gained in power instead. It’d make sense seeing as the things we fight are getting stronger also. I mean if we never gain strength how the heck will we beat the next dragon? Didn’t they wake up in order of power or something?

Sure keep the armor/weapons/gear as is with it only reaching ascended but let my body and mind grow stronger at least. Working out always but I’m destined to forever be at this plateau.

Yeah we gained elite specializations but these gave us more utility instead of strength really. This is how It has felt so far anyway.

And kitten Anet give my Human male thicker legs. Even at the tankiest body size my characters legs are still skinny asf. Maybe this is why he did not gain power. Kept missing leg day so his foundation is weak. Bet he’d shatter his ankle walking over a curb.

More body types kitten!

Off topic but w/e.

Sylent.3165:

So something I wanted to bring up….

Gw2 was by far the best of these games in my opinion. It was a blast for the average joe player logging in, playing how you wished as long as you wanted and logging out. HoT ruined gw2 in many ways.

One reason many people don’t like eso or ff14 is that dreaded gear treadmill. It kinda stinks, you farm hours and hours for weeks for that new weapon or armor to grow stronger, then the next expansion hits and you do it again. That’s why I left ff14 to come back to this game.

But now gw2 is worse. Why?? Because when you farm and farm for such a long time and get that amazing new armor you feel extremely accomplished in the end. But with gw2 you log in to farm masteries? There is no sense of any accomplishment. Your better off now in the other games doing the same exact farm to actually get something.

In other MMOs you farm for “level ups” for the new, raised max-level and new gear that has the new max level because the stats of your existing gear became useless with the expansion.

In GW2 you only farm for “level ups” for the masteries and you can still use your existing gear. I think that is better, because I really hated it in other MMOs when my gear, that took a long time to get, became useless from one day to the other.

Maybe you should farm for new gear (legendaries etc…) in GW2 if that makes you feel to have accomplished something.

If you don’t like this kind of progression system (aka gating) than better not play MMOs.

warbignime.4610:

lunaticdawn.1860:

warbignime.4610:

Agree, I think the mastery system is genius. One may dislike the time needed to get them but dont forget these are account bond.

Actually I don’t like getting mastery point, but level them up is fine to me

Umm, I’m quite the opisite actually my problem is how useless some mastery level are for the amount of time needed, Poison lore should be lv1 since they are basically useless.

I think you missed the point. The idea is to make the lower level ones more useful so grinding it truly optional.

I feel a sense of accomplishment if I leveled up a mastery. Don’t deduce from your own impressions only.

Mastery’s feel like Nothing more than achievement points basically useless in the long run and one of the worse grinds i ever had to do in 15 years of playing mmorpgs

If you want to see how it is done go look at Eq2 AA system
same with raids if i wanted to raid i would go back to eq2 or even wow

Oh and by the time you farmed the mats for ascended -daily mat craft-
and the time it took you to get all them laurels .. In most games you could of 100% geared you toon out as well for raiding

warbignime.4610:

How is Anet following other game? Is there any other game with similar progression system?.

Yes, if you look beyond the details of the mechanic and look at the effect .. masteries unlock content based on doing stuff which gives you points towards unlocking new skills, this is by no means a new and novel concept, no matter how much you want to argue Anet innovated something never seen before.

I cite FFXI’s Merit system as one very clear analogy, kill stuff, earn Merit Points, unlock new skills: replace Merit Points by Mastery Points and that’s the definition of Masteries, most MPs are earned by killing stuff and of course you need XP to unlock access to the lock in the first place!

Q.E.D.

Valky.2574:

Mastery’s feel like Nothing more than achievement points basically useless in the long run and one of the worse grinds i ever had to do in 15 years of playing mmorpgs

If you want to see how it is done go look at Eq2 AA system
same with raids if i wanted to raid i would go back to eq2 or even wow

Oh and by the time you farmed the mats for ascended -daily mat craft-
and the time it took you to get all them laurels .. In most games you could of 100% geared you toon out as well for raiding

In this game every level 80 is likely geared for raiding the moment they hit 80, since Anet intend the raids to be doable with Exotic only .. by definition every raid must be doable in the previous BiS gear since you don’t get the new tier gear until you manage to kill some stuff, and in GW2 the ‘best’ gear in only 5% better then the next one and 5% isn’t the difference between winning and losing anything.

In my experience Masteries allow me to interact with the world in a more meaningful and fun way than before. I do not get the same feeling when grinding for armor in other MMO’s like WoW. If WoW’s armor actually made me more powerful by giving me new abilities or techniques to dispatch enemies in a smarter way then I would feel a sense of accomplishment. However all it does is preventing me from falling behind the gear treadmill.

I like how the mastery system of GW2 focuses mainly on improving/modifying the way you interact with the world instead of just putting you in an endless loop of “you get stronger-enemy gets stronger-you get stronger-enemy gets stronger” etc..

The accomplishment you get from collecting stronger armor in games like WoW or FFXIV is nothing more but an illusion. Better gliding techniques and modifying your character temporarily with mushrooms is not an illusion.

Also keep in mind with masteries they have way more freedom to implement new exciting ways to improve your character in the future. With gear grind all you get is more attributes like endurance, strenght, mana etc.. and the only thing it allows you to do is fighting enemies that also have more stats.

People liked more GW2 and not other games because there were no raids and Anet focused on PvP/WvW/Story.