Guild Wars 2

Vayne.8563:

Healix.5819:

… about Silverwastes…

Well of course there are less players doing it than there were before HoT. That’s a given with almost all older content. It’s over a year old, people move on.
…

Crap – HoT is 11 months+
Guess I missed the boat if I am not through with that (insert whatever) in 3 weeks

Sorry – Just a bit of banter

(Time to move on…)

darkwombat.3695:

Did anyone else have this experience, and if so, are you looking forward to the volcanic patch coming up? Maybe they will get back to what made GW2 great.

Same. I quit for six-ish months after HoT came out. Came back after the ‘fix’ patch. Grinded out some ascended weapons, now that’s done I won’t be going back. Mainly I just really dislike the impossible to navigate maps.

Wasn’t really HoT that killed my interest, but just all the time gated bullkitten that I started running into when I wanted to advance (and the dungeon gold nerf which they have since reverted). Ascended, legendaries, the HoT maps themselves, just got tired of being told to play when anet wanted me to, and not being allowed to play and advance when I wanted to.

Edit: also hasn’t helped that ever guild I’ve been in has dissolved a couple a weeks of getting a bunch of members. All my friends are gone.

The vertical/canopy zones are kind of uninteresting in my opinion. I know why they did it – get more for less, but I sure hope they don’t continue this approach almost exclusively for new zones. Other than that, HoT reinvigorated my interest in GW2 because it offered something different and fun and continues to do so.

I’ve had a somewhat different experience. HoT didn’t really kill my interest for GW2, it simply killed my interest for the HoT evolution of it. The problem with HoT is that it is not GW2, it’s another genre entirely: the platformer obscura where your first jump is to youtube to learn how to advance the game through platforming. The addition of densely populated ultra-annoying mobs just killed it for me though the platforming would have been sufficient actually.

The problem with playing vanilla is that there is really no horizontal progression in the game for vanilla players. I have the same 9 mastery points I had 4 months ago so not a whole lot is going on. Diablo 3 was brilliant (though vertical) with their paragon system. When confronted with no progression in the endgame they simply added it for playing the game, i.e., by XP. Every time you play, however you decide to play, you progress. Brilliant.

What I would actually like to see is a return to first principles for GW2. That is GW2 before the fateful Lost Souls (sic) release during that grim first November. It had problems, it was new and incomplete, but it was, for all it was, the best game I had ever played.

Hi all,
I too, was turned off my HOT, because of how it was released and unfinished. I refuse to reward poor workmanship. To pay for a product that was not finished at release only invites further deficiencies. I am playing Guildwars2 less because everything new is attached to HOT and I will not purchase HOT. I enjoyed the original GW2 and the updates that were produced in the first two years. After the first two years things got progressively worse for the game, because the work shifted to producing HOT.

WiredHot.7651:

Hi all,
I too, was turned off my HOT, because of how it was released and unfinished. I refuse to reward poor workmanship. To pay for a product that was not finished at release only invites further deficiencies. I am playing Guildwars2 less because everything new is attached to HOT and I will not purchase HOT. I enjoyed the original GW2 and the updates that were produced in the first two years. After the first two years things got progressively worse for the game, because the work shifted to producing HOT.

I suppose it depends upon your definition of “unfinished”, but it strikes me that GW2 is no different from WoW in that sense. An expansion is released. Players buy the expansion. Then they add a bunch of content over time that may only be accessed by purchasing the expansion. Then they do it again.

I don’t see a problem with that. The problem I observe is that it took quite a long time following the expansion release to start actually releasing new content. In WoW there was typically a bit of a lag as well, as I recall. They probably figured the release content would keep players busy for awhile while they continued to work on releasing the next phase of expansion content.

But now? Things seem to be moving along as I would have expected over in WoW. I’m too new to this game to have a frame of reference for how they typically operate, but the way it’s working now is more to my liking. We’re getting regular and significant additions to the game on several fronts (new fractal, new PvP map, new storyline, new PvE maps, new legendary, etc.).

You might want to give it a go, as “unfinished” as it is.

^^ It’s not only not a problem, I think it’s preferred. Assuming this game is targetting casual players, what’s the point of releasing everything at once, bugged and unfinished, then fixing it over the next year as opposed to what we have now? … a stable, constant release of new stuff, relatively well-working?

Can’t tell if people trolling or just ?

I’ve mapped HoT twice in the last month with two characters. One solo, one naturally with events/social/people/mix. Yeah, you can solo the hero point champs. I suggest ranged + pet/minions.

For social – check LFG see what metas are active. Go join that zone. Also very very common to see “HP run” in LFG.

This refutes both points of needing a group and that HoT maps are magically somehow dead.

Obviously you can’t 100% map a HoT zone on first try. Just do a pass and move on. Come back later. They are meant to be zones with DEPTH.

Also silverwastes guy – what?! That is one of the most active zones in the entire game! Just look at the LFG tool to join the active zone! You can still solo! just leave once you enter it!

WiredHot.7651:

Hi all,
I too, was turned off my HOT, because of how it was released and unfinished. I refuse to reward poor workmanship. To pay for a product that was not finished at release only invites further deficiencies. I am playing Guildwars2 less because everything new is attached to HOT and I will not purchase HOT. I enjoyed the original GW2 and the updates that were produced in the first two years. After the first two years things got progressively worse for the game, because the work shifted to producing HOT.

poor workmanship lol, listen to the developer. Things didn’t get ‘progressively worse’ since Hot additive. You simply didn’t enjoy the new content that was offered and want to blame something other than personal taste. Another ‘I don’t like a thing so it must be rubbish’ post.

I don’t know, but for me, I find it challenging and a lot of it fun. There is always help on the LFG, and people always on the maps. I never found it really that hard, so I like the challenge.

I want to know how there are people on here that say HoT is full of people all the time. Auric Basin, sure. But the other maps are dead 99.9% of the time.

Back when I played this game 8+ hours a day, I spent all of my time in tangled depths and I never saw more than a few people running around…. not even enough people to get a decent group started.

It seems as though there are two types of people here. There are the people that say HoT is full all the time, and the people that say HoT is completely dead all the time. Both are wrong, but the “HoT is dead” argument is becoming increasingly more true.

HoT isn’t amateur. There are people who didn’t like HoT and came back to find after giving it another chance, they did like it.

So knowing that a book isn’t written by a pro on the first page isn’t really the best analogy for the situation. Clearly some people really like HoT. It’s not like Anet is submitting a ms. to a publisher and it got rejected.

HoT isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but then, some people found different ways to approach it and some of those ended up liking it.[/quote]

Sorry to bust your bubble on this guy but many of the people also didn’t like HOT. To be specific we lost a lot of people ad many have not come back yet. We hope but the problems are not corrected to get them to even think about coming back. And many, many still don’t like it – The Dev’s launched it with many people on the forums telling them to wait to hold off until it was fully developed. Many saw problems because of past expansions that Guildwars has released. It was too much too fast for the community and we are still in a mess with several of the issues yet even after all this time of the HOT launch. As a matter of fact some of the review boards went so far as to think this might be a huge blow to the budget of Guildwars 2. I heard and read it all from Reddit to the boards. I still think it can be fixed and will always hope so but its clear that their are somethings that they launched with HOT that was not favored by the community as long as these things stay your loosing gamers. For example this Mastery System, They tried to add new maps for WVW (people stopped playing WVW until it was changed back and it was changed back), so in a nutshell the community warned everyone about these situations before it occurred the company choose to ignore it and as a result they are getting exactly what they wanted. I just can’t help but wonder if the blow was so severe that we are now faced with instead of one dragon on an upcoming expansion we are in fact getting 2. Why the rush now for 2? Folks need to start looking between the lines and look at some of the past to see what is being repeated, none of this is really new happened with Factions, Nightfall redeemed them to the community and they Eyes of the North and the announcement of Guildwars 2. I would just think if we were doing so well we wouldn’t be offering free accounts, rushing product, changing a system that folks are still complaining about and getting extra money out of players for things that would take forever and a day to farm within the game. It still seems that farming looks more like a job to me and a lot less like having fun?

Okay perhaps we can all turn this around and work this out. I mean we all do have one common goal here we all love the game that’s why we are playing it. So lets give the Devs some feedback here maybe it can get them to change their minds or give them feedback for later releases. Okay what was working for everyone and what did they like us – as bullet points and we will go from their:
- I liked the original build program with the lines instead of the circle. I feel that skills should be learned over time as we progress in the game.
-I feel that everyone should at least go through the whole story at least 1 time and map the boards 1 time.
-I liked the horizontal maps (we had some vertical in the Jumping Puzzles and a few dungeons.
-I do not like ranged classes being fighter classes – like a Necromancer with a GS makes no sense whatsoever.
-I like the original character classes (the Special Classes were not looked on favorably such as Dragonhunter, Scrapper etc. – some Guildmasters even rejected people to join guilds that had players playing these classes)
-I liked the difficulty or the zone determined by the character level – this was especially useful when I was a new player. This is why I think level increases should be a norm
-I liked it when the player could choose what part of the game they wanted to do not being forced to do something in the game in order to progress in development – for example I am very against forcing players to get a legendary piece from WVW and from fractals to create a precursor. Not everyone likes or wants to do WVW, PVP and Fractals sorry to be the bearer of bad news.
-I liked it better when the servers were split and think WVW and PVP should be their own servers. IF people want to hack and slash each other or run around and kill each other then by all means go do it, have fun, leave me out of it. No interest if you see me it means I am trying to get something I need for crafting, farming or completing a stupid reward track needed to craft a legendary like Gift of Battle (which by the way use to be FREE)

Galtrix.7369:

I want to know how there are people on here that say HoT is full of people all the time. Auric Basin, sure. But the other maps are dead 99.9% of the time.

Back when I played this game 8+ hours a day, I spent all of my time in tangled depths and I never saw more than a few people running around…. not even enough people to get a decent group started.

It seems as though there are two types of people here. There are the people that say HoT is full all the time, and the people that say HoT is completely dead all the time. Both are wrong, but the “HoT is dead” argument is becoming increasingly more true.

I don’t know. It’s sort of like the original zones to me. You run around and there’s nothing going on until a world boss shows up and everyone shows up and does it. HoT works the same way.

When the TD meta is on there are people in the zone. When the TD meta is not scheduled to start for a while, there are less people in the zone.

You won’t see people because people are scattered. If two people are doing the ogre chain and two people are doing the scar chain, they’ll simply never run into each other.

I’m on those maps all the time and I don’t see less people on those maps than I do in core Tyria.

But of course, with two new maps out, that’s where the bulk of the people will be. This has always been the case.

macon.4065:

HoT isn’t amateur. There are people who didn’t like HoT and came back to find after giving it another chance, they did like it.

So knowing that a book isn’t written by a pro on the first page isn’t really the best analogy for the situation. Clearly some people really like HoT. It’s not like Anet is submitting a ms. to a publisher and it got rejected.

HoT isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but then, some people found different ways to approach it and some of those ended up liking it.

Sorry to bust your bubble on this guy but many of the people also didn’t like HOT. To be specific we lost a lot of people ad many have not come back yet. We hope but the problems are not corrected to get them to even think about coming back. And many, many still don’t like it – The Dev’s launched it with many people on the forums telling them to wait to hold off until it was fully developed. Many saw problems because of past expansions that Guildwars has released. It was too much too fast for the community and we are still in a mess with several of the issues yet even after all this time of the HOT launch. As a matter of fact some of the review boards went so far as to think this might be a huge blow to the budget of Guildwars 2. I heard and read it all from Reddit to the boards. I still think it can be fixed and will always hope so but its clear that their are somethings that they launched with HOT that was not favored by the community as long as these things stay your loosing gamers. For example this Mastery System, They tried to add new maps for WVW (people stopped playing WVW until it was changed back and it was changed back), so in a nutshell the community warned everyone about these situations before it occurred the company choose to ignore it and as a result they are getting exactly what they wanted. I just can’t help but wonder if the blow was so severe that we are now faced with instead of one dragon on an upcoming expansion we are in fact getting 2. Why the rush now for 2? Folks need to start looking between the lines and look at some of the past to see what is being repeated, none of this is really new happened with Factions, Nightfall redeemed them to the community and they Eyes of the North and the announcement of Guildwars 2. I would just think if we were doing so well we wouldn’t be offering free accounts, rushing product, changing a system that folks are still complaining about and getting extra money out of players for things that would take forever and a day to farm within the game. It still seems that farming looks more like a job to me and a lot less like having fun?

[/quote]

People not liking HoT doesn’t make it amateur. Lots of people don’t like opera, but that doesn’t make a professional opera company amateurs. One thing has nothing at all to do with another. It’s simply a form of hyperbole.

HoT didn’t resonate with everyone that’s 100% true. Doesn’t make it amateur and I can’t see a reason to support that kind of hyperbole whether you like it or you don’t.

Let’s keep in mind some people love HoT, including me and a fair portion of my guild. I don’t mean like it. I mean it revitalized the game for them. Surely that wouldn’t happen if it was amateur.

That’s a description that borders on insult and I don’t see a place for it on these forums.

Not liking HoT is fine. Maligning the work of the company who made it because you don’t like it, in a way that borders on insulting, is what we’re talking about.

macon.4065:

Okay perhaps we can all turn this around and work this out. I mean we all do have one common goal here we all love the game that’s why we are playing it. So lets give the Devs some feedback here maybe it can get them to change their minds or give them feedback for later releases. Okay what was working for everyone and what did they like us – as bullet points and we will go from their:
- I liked the original build program with the lines instead of the circle. I feel that skills should be learned over time as we progress in the game.
-I feel that everyone should at least go through the whole story at least 1 time and map the boards 1 time.
-I liked the horizontal maps (we had some vertical in the Jumping Puzzles and a few dungeons.
-I do not like ranged classes being fighter classes – like a Necromancer with a GS makes no sense whatsoever.
-I like the original character classes (the Special Classes were not looked on favorably such as Dragonhunter, Scrapper etc. – some Guildmasters even rejected people to join guilds that had players playing these classes)
-I liked the difficulty or the zone determined by the character level – this was especially useful when I was a new player. This is why I think level increases should be a norm
-I liked it when the player could choose what part of the game they wanted to do not being forced to do something in the game in order to progress in development – for example I am very against forcing players to get a legendary piece from WVW and from fractals to create a precursor. Not everyone likes or wants to do WVW, PVP and Fractals sorry to be the bearer of bad news.
-I liked it better when the servers were split and think WVW and PVP should be their own servers. IF people want to hack and slash each other or run around and kill each other then by all means go do it, have fun, leave me out of it. No interest if you see me it means I am trying to get something I need for crafting, farming or completing a stupid reward track needed to craft a legendary like Gift of Battle (which by the way use to be FREE)

Unless one uses ToKs, one learns Skills over time.

I like the Greatsword Necromancer. I think every Profession has and has had ranged and melee options.

I think players should choose whether they are interested in completing any of the Stories, and/or any of the maps.

With Gliding, I enjoy verticality much more than without Gliding.

The only Elite Specialization I’m not overly fond of is Druid, but that’s probably because I enjoy my Ranger so much.

I see no need to keep increasing the max character level. We didn’t need it in GW, and it doesn’t seem needed here. All it would do is render all previous acquisitions obsolete.

No one is forced into PvP for a Legendary weapon. One can even, with enough time, acquire the WvW components needed without ever setting foot in a WvW map. I’m not sure what is needed, if anything, from Fractals (barring the 4 original HoT Legendary weapons). One does, however, need to either participate in Dungeons, or acquire the necessary components, either from WvW (again, no need to set foot in WvW, given enough time), or PvP.

The Gift of Battle was no more ‘free’ previously, than it is now. Again, with enough time, one can acquire the GoB without ever setting foot in WvW, just as one could acquire Badges of Honor without setting foot in WvW. One did, and does, however, need to set foot in a WvW map to purchase said Gift of Battle. Rest assured, though, no combat will ensue at the Vendor. I’m not sure where you are crafting in a WvW map, and whatever mats you are farming there are no doubt easier to farm in a PvE map.

Perhaps, a perusal of the Wiki would be enlightening (link above).

Good luck.

Galtrix.7369:

I want to know how there are people on here that say HoT is full of people all the time. Auric Basin, sure. But the other maps are dead 99.9% of the time.

Back when I played this game 8+ hours a day, I spent all of my time in tangled depths and I never saw more than a few people running around…. not even enough people to get a decent group started.

It seems as though there are two types of people here. There are the people that say HoT is full all the time, and the people that say HoT is completely dead all the time. Both are wrong, but the “HoT is dead” argument is becoming increasingly more true.

I’ve never been on an empty HOT map in months, in fact I don’t think I’ve ever been on an empty map in HOT except for when I went on weird hours. Maybe it’s because I use the LFG often but even when I don’t use it I always find people around to play with. I’ve been doing the TD often lately, because I needed those crystals, and never had a problem finding enough people to do it.

Well I just tried to do the Mordren attack on Tarir event and there wernt even enuf people to attack the gates, let alone kill the Octovine.
This event needs some kind of auto scaling because its starting to fail due to lack of people.
Most have moved on to the new Ember bay zone or are in Bloodstone Fen.

mauried.5608:

Well I just tried to do the Mordren attack on Tarir event and there wernt even enuf people to attack the gates, let alone kill the Octovine.
This event needs some kind of auto scaling because its starting to fail due to lack of people.
Most have moved on to the new Ember bay zone or are in Bloodstone Fen.

Did you use looking for group? Because I’ve done this event at least once a day, off hours, every single day this week. Just open LFG, get yourself to an active map doing the meta. Profit.

Edit: To be clear, every single time I’ve done it there are at last four other maps that have done it, since I’m in a multimap group.

My Interest in GW2…….HoT
the game is so inflated with enemies. that it is almost impossible to play a game relaxes. sometimes y just stressed out from too many enemies and . nearly unbeatable.. I think GW 2 Hard Of Thorns they are a bit crazy

snikisnipe.9106:

My Interest in GW2…….HoT
the game is so inflated with enemies. that it is almost impossible to play a game relaxes. sometimes y just stressed out from too many enemies and . nearly unbeatable.. I think GW 2 Hard Of Thorns they are a bit crazy

Still the mobs were much better at the beginning….

EVERY mastery int he gliding line should have been granted immediately. Mechanics that are…quite frankly, needed to just get around everywhere should never be hidden behind a grind.

Runiir.6425:

EVERY mastery int he gliding line should have been granted immediately. Mechanics that are…quite frankly, needed to just get around everywhere should never be hidden behind a grind.

It’s not a grind. I was able to get the entire line just by wondering around and goofing off.
I had half of them done within an hour, just from doing random things…

Runiir.6425:

EVERY mastery int he gliding line should have been granted immediately. Mechanics that are…quite frankly, needed to just get around everywhere should never be hidden behind a grind.

It is not a grind because you only need to complete the mastery line once. And now you have two more maps to complete it.

What I have been wishing for is a better skill bar with more attacks. The same 5 attacks all the time. Sword+Shield Warriors and Guardians have such little attack power and their shields do barely anything constructive when faced with multiple enemies. It also appears that wearing leather armor as opposed to full plate-style armor makes absolutely no difference. For example, I have a level 80 Warrior with a Sword and Shield. I am dead in five hìts from an enemy. And I can barely do any form of damage back. The damage is so ridiculously low, it’s like the game is FORCING you to use only 2H weapons. And the same 5 skills over and over and over again… This is getting really old. Increase the skill bar to four sets of 5 (Total of 10 skills, 10 abilities), and finally give me some options so I can actually come up with a ‘skill rotation’. Oh, and up the armor defense so I’m not taking 10,000 damage a hit even with a Shield + Armor. Maybe then I’ll do more PVE in your world. I can’t survive worth jack in your world because of the damage output of enemies, even when I’m fully decked out in the strongest armor I can get at my level and strongest shield.

PyroPrincess.3287:

What I have been wishing for is a better skill bar with more attacks. The same 5 attacks all the time. Sword+Shield Warriors and Guardians have such little attack power and their shields do barely anything constructive when faced with multiple enemies. It also appears that wearing leather armor as opposed to full plate-style armor makes absolutely no difference. For example, I have a level 80 Warrior with a Sword and Shield. I am dead in five hìts from an enemy. And I can barely do any form of damage back. The damage is so ridiculously low, it’s like the game is FORCING you to use only 2H weapons. And the same 5 skills over and over and over again… This is getting really old. Increase the skill bar to four sets of 5 (Total of 10 skills, 10 abilities), and finally give me some options so I can actually come up with a ‘skill rotation’. Oh, and up the armor defense so I’m not taking 10,000 damage a hit even with a Shield + Armor. Maybe then I’ll do more PVE in your world. I can’t survive worth jack in your world because of the damage output of enemies, even when I’m fully decked out in the strongest armor I can get at my level and strongest shield.

Using your Warrior example, you just have to know what weapons are best at what. GS is the Warrior’s Cleave/Melee weapon. Axe/Axe works too, but that is mainly for single-target dps.

Sword on Warrior is mainly a condition-weapon. Are you geared for conditions? If not, then there is not much reason to use a sword. As for shield, if you are geared for conditions, it would be best to go Berzerker and use a torch.

It’s important to have a build that synergizes with itself.

PyroPrincess.3287:

What I have been wishing for is a better skill bar with more attacks. The same 5 attacks all the time. Sword+Shield Warriors and Guardians have such little attack power and their shields do barely anything constructive when faced with multiple enemies. It also appears that wearing leather armor as opposed to full plate-style armor makes absolutely no difference. For example, I have a level 80 Warrior with a Sword and Shield. I am dead in five hìts from an enemy. And I can barely do any form of damage back. The damage is so ridiculously low, it’s like the game is FORCING you to use only 2H weapons. And the same 5 skills over and over and over again… This is getting really old. Increase the skill bar to four sets of 5 (Total of 10 skills, 10 abilities), and finally give me some options so I can actually come up with a ‘skill rotation’. Oh, and up the armor defense so I’m not taking 10,000 damage a hit even with a Shield + Armor. Maybe then I’ll do more PVE in your world. I can’t survive worth jack in your world because of the damage output of enemies, even when I’m fully decked out in the strongest armor I can get at my level and strongest shield.

Generally speaking, no weapon is good for all game modes or even within a game mode. We have weapon swap in combat for a reason. In my opinion, it is a good idea to have a ranged backup to your primary melee weapon of choice. For an open world power build I like something like this…

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vJAQJARUjMdQdHW2BudAnIGICKs1fhRwCgIYA0vY63CA-ThSBwAdeAAAOCAFV+Rb/hIKBRpL4xhAAh5PKXAgbq/QKgIWGB-e

The build focuses on strategic weapon swapping and bursting to produce various effects. It is also heavy on might and fury. This should solve any issues you’ve had with weak damage.

If you find it isn’t quite resilient enough for your tastes, then add soldier’s (power/vitality/toughness) gear until you feel comfortable. Your damage will suffer somewhat, but the might stacking compensates you quite a bit if you care to look at it that way.

Don’t like greatsword? That’s fine. There are other ways you can go. Just keep in mind that your weapon choices really matter and not all weapons or weapon pairings are equal in all situations.

Back to the OPs issue with HoT’s unexpected early difficulty… I agree it was a step up (especially for a new player like me), but I really, really liked it. Sure, it was initially a bit frustrating to be facerolling core Tyria maps but then getting killed rapidly in VB. However, I quickly came to appreciate the difficulty of navigation and survival. It really did feel like my characters stepped into something over their heads, which is exactly what happened to the entire Pact.

Difficulty of navigation only adds to the immersion, I say. I’m no RPer, but I do appreciate a certain amount of logic to my MMOs. It makes perfect sense that it’s hard to get around the jungle. Hell, compared to our Earth jungles, VB is a paradise – clearly visible updrafts and clearly marked paths all over the place. As someone who doesn’t want everything just handed to me, HoT was a huge improvement over core Tyria.

you are not the only one. i havent played the game in over 6 months. i just got so frustrated with it because my character keeps dying from just a single enemy. killing one of them has become a nightmare. i had none of these issues in GW2 it self. hell, i could even fight off enemies who were 4 levels higher than me and i still managed well. but with this addition; not possible.
it has some things i like like the gliding and new areas but playwise, it was a huge step backwards that just prevents me from exploring without stepping on enemies every 20m.
i came here to see if things may have changed. looks like it hasnt.

HoT difficult is comparable to old Orrs difficult. If anyone remembers old Orr, you would get mobbed downed by risen and everything crippled. Players adapted to that place but it was nerfed and changed later on. They were no new zones as difficult as old Orr until HoT. Some players asked for hard content and elite spec make the HoT zones very easy. The only issue I had with HoT is that it was to short. The depth of HoT is enormous so A-net expected players to replay the zones a lot. Still maps like AB are the ones that every player likes, instead of maps like TD that are extremely hard to navigate without WP.

I despise Heart Of Thorns with all of my being. I detest the jungle maps and being lost most of the time. I don’t find being tricked by a developer that can drop caves, vines, interactions in the most random places to be anything close to fun.

The story is cool, but the instances are horrid at best. I get disconnected quite often and then i have to start from scratch all over again. I find myself starting new toons and goofing off vs. hanging out in the jungle trying to complete the insipid and inane design of the instances.

you only joined the game a month ago, theres 30 odd zones, pick another until you can deal with maps that go up and down?

I am sorry to burst your bubbles guys, but in this community there is a lot of people that wanted challenging content and they have been neglected heavily so far, before HoT came out, because lets admit it. Central Tyria open world is a walk in the park. Its so casually easy, where you can faceroll everything in your path that its borderline redicilous. HoT maps are 4, oppose to all the maps in Central Tyria and they are meant to be high end maps. If you find such difficulty in them, then brace for a rude awakening – you are NOT ready to play in them. Yes, that means you need to step up your game and get better. That does not mean you need to spend countless hours grinding profitable maps to get the best gear possible, no. HoT maps are easily doable with exotics. You just need to know your class, your skills, you need to put some effort into learning the design of the maps and the mechanics of the enemies. To get this masteries and make your life that much easier and above all start using that mystical LFG tool that everyone points you towards, but you obviously never heard of. Seriously… oppose to appreciating all the hard work and ingenious design and concept that went into HoT you complain and complaing, for what? Because you can’t be bothered to -think- while you play a video game? Since when a video games were meant to be played without putting any effort or thought in the way you play them? When/if such day comes I think I will be done playing video games myself.

No hard feelings, mates. Just facts.

No hard feelings at all.

I play video games to have fun. HoT is not fun for me at all. I’ll restate that “for me” part. As such, I am empathizing with the OP and all the others who have such disdain for HoT. I simply hope the next version is better, in that it appeals to my customer segment. Glad you OP types got what you wanted.

The rest of the game I love very much.

6AB542C9-4925-485E-B5C2-15BA7972AF72:

No hard feelings at all.

I play video games to have fun. HoT is not fun for me at all. I’ll restate that “for me” part. As such, I am empathizing with the OP and all the others who have such disdain for HoT. I simply hope the next version is better, in that it appeals to my customer segment. Glad you OP types got what you wanted.

The rest of the game I love very much.

Empathize if you like, but it’s not as hard as you make it out to be. I’ve taught more than a few people how to navigate and get around in HoT, and just about all those people go from having negative feelings to really enjoying the zone.

Saying this zone is hard for me, because I’m not good enough, is a personal choice. Getting better at the game can be fun too, though. It’s your choice whether you want to get better or not.

Here’s the issue. In a game without raising the level cap, the only way you really progress is by getting better, or doing things that are harder. And since for many people, probably most, MMOs are about progression, getting better is part of the progression.

I’ll extend you the same offer I’ve made to many people. If you’re on a US server I’ll be happy to teach you how to deal with the HoT zones. It’s probably not nearly as bad as you think it is.

Blipp.5206:

I am sorry to burst your bubbles guys, but in this community there is a lot of people that wanted challenging content and they have been neglected heavily so far, before HoT came out, because lets admit it. Central Tyria open world is a walk in the park. Its so casually easy, where you can faceroll everything in your path that its borderline redicilous. HoT maps are 4, oppose to all the maps in Central Tyria and they are meant to be high end maps. If you find such difficulty in them, then brace for a rude awakening – you are NOT ready to play in them. Yes, that means you need to step up your game and get better. That does not mean you need to spend countless hours grinding profitable maps to get the best gear possible, no. HoT maps are easily doable with exotics. You just need to know your class, your skills, you need to put some effort into learning the design of the maps and the mechanics of the enemies. To get this masteries and make your life that much easier and above all start using that mystical LFG tool that everyone points you towards, but you obviously never heard of. Seriously… oppose to appreciating all the hard work and ingenious design and concept that went into HoT you complain and complaing, for what? Because you can’t be bothered to -think- while you play a video game? Since when a video games were meant to be played without putting any effort or thought in the way you play them? When/if such day comes I think I will be done playing video games myself.

No hard feelings, mates. Just facts.

I have to disagree,

HOT maps didnt bring harder content. It just brought forced map content.

I love Verdint Brink, i can solo a few of the champions and i can do all the events by myself. It may take longer alone but its playable. Literally there are times were it feels its just me and 2 other people on the map. Yet 2 days ago I and 3 other people killed the legendary matriarch dragon. It was still fun.

AB,TD,DS all require the meta event and large coordinated groups to get done. Its like Triple Double except a majority of the players are walking in it for the first time. All you here on these 3 maps are the lanes that need more people.

My biggest problem with these 3 maps are quests to do when the meta event sint going on. I was doing Ogre events in TD and after 1 event i realized that its basically all done. Everyone had done the events to keep teh NPC happy and then most of the people left until the meta event was coming. The commander actually said 55 min till meta event.

This isnt quality content, it isnt challenging content. Raids challenge your mechanical skills and gear, PvP challenges your ability to multitask and theory craft, WvW challenges your ability to understand different levels on defensive and offensive strategy.

HOT maps (besides verdint brink) challenges player to grind away at meta events. Anet has a AP/title for doing the AB meta event 100 times.

I agree people wanted challenging events but since sivlerwastes, shatterer rework, Triple Trouble, Tequatl, everything Anet has put forward is really zerg minded events focus on lane control.

My major gripe with HoT is DS. I’m not a fan of open world in general, especially not since it’s all on timers and you have to plan your day around it to actually be able to participate, but DS is just cancer. It just takes way too long. I don’t rly mind doing all those terrible bs collection steps when it comes to a legendary, but for DS I practically have to take a day off from work to actually do it.

I think the maps are rather amazing — the amount of design work put into each map is simply amazing. Sometimes I just stand in-game in awe looking around.

I really appreciate the complexity. The maps are like a fine wine — you don’t sit there and chug the whole bottle as fast as you can. You take it in slowly and enjoy.

The Mastery Points on the other hand — I’m disappointed so many are behind the mini-game challenges. I find most of those a pill. Just goes to show that HoT offers a lot, and you aren’t likely to enjoy 100% of it, but you probably will enjoy 80% of it!

juno.1840:

I think the maps are rather amazing — the amount of design work put into each map is simply amazing. Sometimes I just stand in-game in awe looking around.

I really appreciate the complexity. The maps are like a fine wine — you don’t sit there and chug the whole bottle as fast as you can. You take it in slowly and enjoy.

The Mastery Points on the other hand — I’m disappointed so many are behind the mini-game challenges. I find most of those a pill. Just goes to show that HoT offers a lot, and you aren’t likely to enjoy 100% of it, but you probably will enjoy 80% of it!

I’m the exact same way. Love the complexity, hate the adventures.

Vayne.8563:

6AB542C9-4925-485E-B5C2-15BA7972AF72:

No hard feelings at all.

I play video games to have fun. HoT is not fun for me at all. I’ll restate that “for me” part. As such, I am empathizing with the OP and all the others who have such disdain for HoT. I simply hope the next version is better, in that it appeals to my customer segment. Glad you OP types got what you wanted.

The rest of the game I love very much.

Empathize if you like, but it’s not as hard as you make it out to be. I’ve taught more than a few people how to navigate and get around in HoT, and just about all those people go from having negative feelings to really enjoying the zone.

Saying this zone is hard for me, because I’m not good enough, is a personal choice. Getting better at the game can be fun too, though. It’s your choice whether you want to get better or not.

Here’s the issue. In a game without raising the level cap, the only way you really progress is by getting better, or doing things that are harder. And since for many people, probably most, MMOs are about progression, getting better is part of the progression.

I’ll extend you the same offer I’ve made to many people. If you’re on a US server I’ll be happy to teach you how to deal with the HoT zones. It’s probably not nearly as bad as you think it is.

This. It’s really not that hard. I do not mean to sound dismissive, and if you take offense, my apologies.

I always run my own builds (many of which admittedly align fairly well with meta as it turns out), and most of my characters wear only exotic gear at the moment. I’m not a min/maxer or OP by any stretch, but just a few small adjustments (we’re talking 1-2 utilities, no build changes or weapon changes) were all I needed to do much better in HoT. In fact, for some of my characters, I changed nothing other than learning that some moves I should do off cooldown, and others I should wait to pop at the right moment.

To anyone feeling burned by HoT, I highly recommend revisiting the area with a bit more patience and the willingness to make minor changes to how you respond to mobs.

TLDR: HoT is a tad harder, but not that hard. A pretty casual player like me could do it with minimal adjustment, I suggest revisiting HoT and seeing if a couple tweaks can do it for you.

I love the “L2play” responses. People are expressing their opinion that they don’t like something and others are responding “learn to like it”. LOL

Same issue.

I pre-bought the expansion. I played it a week. I saw the gated story ouside dungeons, had some rage in verdant brink. I quit.

Returned two weeks ago, it feels better now.

Djinn.9245:

I love the “L2play” responses. People are expressing their opinion that they don’t like something and others are responding “learn to like it”. LOL

We’re not saying learn to like it. If the complaint is that it’s too hard for me to do and I keep dying then the reason why people don’t like it is they keep dying. Literally, the easiest solution is not to die as much. That’s why people say L2P.

No one is saying learn to like it. We’re saying if you don’t die so much you might end up liking it naturally.

I feel as if you’re trying to twist what people are saying to try to prove some point. You may not like HoT for a lot of reasons, but if dying too much is one of them, there are ways to play better.

I’m not sure why anyone would argue for their right to be worse at the game.

Vayne.8563:

I feel as if you’re trying to twist what people are saying to try to prove some point.

That’s funny. I always felt this way about you.

Djinn.9245:

I love the “L2play” responses. People are expressing their opinion that they don’t like something and others are responding “learn to like it”. LOL

Right on.

And just so we are clear, Heart of Thorns killed my interest in Guild Wars 2. The game has had big problems since the release of this so-called “expansion”. Deleting or downplaying our opinions won’t fix those.

LoL NooBs.5076:

Vayne.8563:

I feel as if you’re trying to twist what people are saying to try to prove some point.

That’s funny. I always felt this way about you.

Djinn.9245:

I love the “L2play” responses. People are expressing their opinion that they don’t like something and others are responding “learn to like it”. LOL

Right on.

And just so we are clear, Heart of Thorns killed my interest in Guild Wars 2. The game has had big problems since the release of this so-called “expansion”. Deleting or downplaying our opinions won’t fix those.

There were negative opinions before the expansion and people who don’t like the difficulty of the expansion are downplaying the opinion of people who like that harder content.

I love the more challenging content. The sense that actually paying attention to the game I am playing is necessary for success is a massive improvement over the core game in my opinion.

Unfortunately the map design makes playing in HoT unpalatable for me.

Pretty much what Ashen said. If you are neither into jumping puzzles or exploration in general, every map of HoT is a pain with tangled depths being the worst offender. I don´t know how many times I ran around looking for this or that hero point or mastery point despite standing only a few inches besides them. Plain disgusting. Using a guide helps, but i don´t think it is a good design of a map if you have to seek outside help to actually complete it.

Torolan.5816:

Pretty much what Ashen said. If you are neither into jumping puzzles or exploration in general, every map of HoT is a pain with tangled depths being the worst offender. I don´t know how many times I ran around looking for this or that hero point or mastery point despite standing only a few inches besides them. Plain disgusting. Using a guide helps, but i don´t think it is a good design of a map if you have to seek outside help to actually complete it.

I remember people saying the same thing about Kaineng Center in Guild Wars 1. There are now 2 maps in the game that are particularly mazy….hint, AB really isn’t, nor is DS.

Every map in the beginning of the game had some hard to get points. How soon we forget that.

So out of some 30 maps, 2 are mazes?

I’m not so sure that should be a major issue. Particularly because I’ve taught thiose maps to lots of people who ceased to have a problem after. Oh, and I’ve never used Dulfy or a video.

Like Kaineng Center, I just learned where to go by playing.

Torolan.5816:

Pretty much what Ashen said. If you are neither into jumping puzzles or exploration in general, every map of HoT is a pain with tangled depths being the worst offender. I don´t know how many times I ran around looking for this or that hero point or mastery point despite standing only a few inches besides them. Plain disgusting. Using a guide helps, but i don´t think it is a good design of a map if you have to seek outside help to actually complete it.

I always thought that Tangled Depths was hard to navigate, but now I find it really easy. It’s a matter of practice and actually playing in the zone instead of rushing to get everything then not go back. There is no need to look for a guide to complete the zone, the easiest way to navigate is to use your eyes instead of relying only on the map, the map can be confusing and misleading. I wish we had a 3D map instead

What I read all over this thread, and to address the OP, is that some players dislike having to figure out things and want everything handed to them. Others just want a relaxing easy time, pressing 1 and occasionally 2 on their keyboard, “playing” the game while watching a movie, or “playing” the game while semi-afk. If anything requires some thought process, or some gasp skill to play then it kills their interest.

It’s really sad that some of that might’ve lead to Ember Bay being so pathetic easy, I hope it’s not an indication of what’s to come.