Guild Wars 2

Astralporing.1957:

SkiTz.4590:

Theres no exciting “drops” in this game that you go out to a particular location and farm for and pray to RNGesus that it drops (aside from like, fractal skins)…

And that’s a very good thing.

“Theres no exciting “drops” in this game that you go out to a particular location" That is a very bad thing. As that is the fun of chasing rewards, exploring the world and so on.

“pray to RNGesus that it drops " That is a good thing (if it was true) because it means the drop-rate are to low.

“Exclusive” titles don’t have the same value as “exclusive” skins. There is thing thing called path of least resistance.

They don’t, I can totally understand why exclusivity players would prefer to keep as “big” a thing exclusive as possible. But the people who want exclusive things don’t deserve to have exclusive access to things like skins. The other people who wants skins deserve to have them more than the exclusive people deserve to take them away from other players.

Quantity between content types is very hard to balance, there is a reason players do the silverwastes chest farm, it’s the best income for the time/effort needed.

Sure, but “quality” of rewards between content types is even more difficult to balance, to say that one type of reward is “worth” having in one type of content, while another type of reward is “worth” having in another. Balance is hard, nobody is saying otherwise, but you’re saying that the type of balance I’m looking for is so hard that it’s not worth doing, while I note that the balance you’re looking for is considerably harder to achieve.

At least in the balance I’m looking for, the worst case scenario is that some task is viewed as much easier than another, and thus over-played, or another is viewed as much harder than another, and thus underplayed, but conditions being relatively simple to fix by either bumping/lowering the rewards or reducing/bumping the effort needed to earn them. The balance you’re looking for, on the other hand, means that there are no other options, that if you don’t want to do the one thing the reward is attached too, too bad. There is no way in which that is not worse.

But you are saying it shouldn’t reward both exclusive skins and exclusive titles, so how do you say now that it should reward both? How is it both if you only want exclusive titles and not exclusive skins?

I’m saying it would reward skins, not exclusive skins. My point is that you keep saying “they just get the skins,” as if that’s all they walk away with, they would get other stuff too. It’s like, let’s take a modified CoF dungeon, and lets say that your proposal for it is that the only way in the game to get CoF gloves is by beating CoF path 1, you kill the boss, chances are that the gloves would drop, and that’s the one way to get them.

My alternative suggestion would mean that while you could do that, you could kill the CoF boss, and you would get the gloves that way, exactly as often as under your proposal, and you would also get an “Effigy Slayer” title or something, there would be other ways to earn the gloves. You could earn the gloves by collecting tokens, or PvP reward tracks, or various other means.

So basically, if you want to do the intended content, you will get all the same rewards, at all the original rates, you just won’t get exclusive access to them, while you would retain exclusive access to the titles.

What is difficult varies between people. You either put exclusive behind content or you don’t, if you do, all content gets the same types of exclusives. Who sets the “difficulty” barrier? Who says what is difficult and what is not? There is no such thing as “average” especially for un-released and un-tested content.

Yes, but again, there is nothing new or unique about that, it’s a problem when releasing ANY new content, of any type, and with any reward structure. The system I propose is no more (or less) prone to points of failure, but it is fairly easily corrected by tweaking various factors. As I noted, I’m willing for there to be a “cooling period” on the alternate methods, to give players time to test out the raid content and actually see how difficult it is, and only once they’ve got it pretty figured out, determine what amount would be a fair alternative to that.

Again, you keep saying “you can’t make it perfect, so you shouldn’t do it at all,” when “doing it perfect” was never an option, including for the status quo.

Why are world bosses going to have exclusive rewards and not raids?

I don’t think they should either.

I find Liadri easy to fight because it’s a good encounter for me, but I despise the SW chest farm, as extremely grindy/farming content is for me extremely difficult. So by your definition using the “average”, why is the chest getting exclusive rewards and not Liadri?

It shouldn’t.

No, as I explained before.. it makes people enjoy the content longer. People enjoyed the MF every time they did it, that’s why they asked for it to be put back. But when it was back and there was no reward they did not start doing it again.

Like I said.. Reward and Fun of content go’s hand in hand.

I don’t think that’s really true, I think that’s just how you interpret it.

I suggest it, to make the game-play of the hunt for items a more fun interesting item.. I suggest it to make content more fun, I do it to give more value to the items. and yes, drawing people towards different content is a part of that, but not the sole, or even the main reason.

I think that while it’s possible to add value to items, I think that items have enough value within themselves, and do not need value added to them. If you want to add value to things, do it to things with little to no intrinsic value, such as titles.

Funny enough, that is exactly how I feel about your solution, and at least the way Anet implemented your solution has so far proved to work like this.

Just so long as you understand that this is your personal feeling on the matter, and should not dictate how everyone else plays the game.

What you don’t seem to grasp, is that the unique reward are a reason to not be bored with the content so far. Again, MF is a great example of that. It required good content and good specific rewards.

No, content is only fun so long as it is fun. When it stops being fun, then rewards do not keep it fun, they just keep you doing it despite not having fun. There are plenty of elements in this game where I either never had fun with it or lost fun with it well before I stopped doing it, but I kept at it because there was a specific goal I wanted out of it. That is to no one’s benefit, not mine, not ANet’s.

For the person who does just not like that content you mean? Yeah your right.. Like I said, you can’t make everybody always happy. Your solution does not do that, mine does not.. That can’t be done.

My solution makes more people happier though, because they can always do the things they want to get the rewards they want. The worst case is that other methods are slightly more efficient. Your solution means that people either have to do content that they don’t enjoy (worse), or never get the thing they want (worse), so while my solution is by no means perfect, it is at the very least better.

WvW themed armor is something WvW-players will overall likely enjoy more than PvE players..

Not in any way whatsoever. There is no “WvW themed” armor that WvW players are more likely to be interested in than PvPers, dungeon runners, or chest farmers. Players will be attracted to the designs that attract them, it is impossible to design an armor that visually appeals to players who enjoy a specific gameplay type. If you design “WvW armor,” it is fairly inevitable that you will have just as many people who never WvW who want that armor as there are hardcore WvWers who want it, and plenty of WvWers who have no interest in it at all. You CANNOT pair aesthetics with content relaiably.

Now, functional items are an entirely different matter, it’s true that a non-WvWing guild would have no purpose for a high cost WvW-boosting item, so that sort of item could certainly be exclusively a WvW reward, but that has nothing to do with the discussion of armor skins.

Why do you think, multiple people tell you that they don’t like it.. because they get what they want with your solution?.. guess not.

It’s because they get what they deserve, not necessarily what they want. I don’t doubt that you guys would prefer to have exclusive access to things just for doing the content you prefer to do, that’s a perfectly reasonable desire, but you aren’t entitled to actually get it, and can make due with less than what you’d like. Players want to have nice things, I’m fine with that, give them nice things. Players want to be able to keep nice things away from other players? Kitten that, whether it would make them happier or not, they do not deserve to be happy when their happiness can only come at other players’ expense.

So your solution does not give everybody what they want, someting you claimed, not saying mine does.. and indeed..

I meant that you would not actually end up with “less.” You want the armor, you do get the armor, you have exactly as much in your hands as you would have otherwise. All you would not get, is the ability to look over at your fellow player, who did not get that armor because he did not run that content, and smile because he is sad. That is the only difference, that that other player would also be able to get that armor, so you would have less opportunity to be happy at his misfortune. Everything else would be the same.

Grinders will get their rewards, raiders theirs, dungeon-runners theirs and so on, and so on.

Which works fine, so long as you can guarantee that the grinders will never want the rewards made exclusive to the dungeon runners, and vice versa. Can you guarantee that? If not, then not, that is not “fine.”

Well you talked about pretty and non-pretty. With titles you don’t really speak about pretty and non-pretty.

It was in reference to Mad Doc’s comments about players caring how “pretty” a reward looks, and my insistence that players are perfectly valid in valuing how pretty an item looks more than its exclusivity value, and should be able to pick and choose rewards based on prettiness, without exclusivity getting in their way.

As much as I personally dislike RNG when the chances are really low, it is a shot of excitement for the addicted. I personally know reasonable and educated people that can burn through an evening of grinding and go to bed satisfied if they found something only remotely good and thrilled if they found a jackpot item. So I am not really sure if a group reward should be superior to a solo reward, coming from a business position only with the idea that I can fill my servers with solo grinders if nothing else.

One alternative, for RNG junkies, is random boxes. In Marvel Heroes, the big currency is “Splinters,” they drop in slowly, but are the currency you can use to unlock new characters, a little like Gems, but not as versatile. Anyways, a new hero costs 200/400/600 depending on the character’s complexity. You also have the option, however, of a “random hero” box, for only 175 splinters, that is capable of spitting out any hero. The downside, of course, is that you could end up with heroes you don’t want, or with heroes you already have (which is still useful, just considerably less so). So you can choose to gamble, and potentially get three 600 point heroes for less than the cost of one, or you could end up with nothing you wanted, or you could take the sure bet and get exactly what you want at the asking price.

My point is, if they did have a token system, they could incorporate an RNG mechanism as easily as with monster drops. For example a Molten GS costs 390 tokens, a Molten Focus costs 210, they could have a “Molten weapon box” that costs 190 or so that could drop any weapon, but at random, or maybe even a "Molten box for 150 or less that might also just drop runes, potions, or other “junk.” RNG and tokens can coexist, gamblers can have their run at the slots.

The idea that group content should always be better of course also appeals to me for the sake of fairness and for the pain to assemble 5 or 10 people in TS.

I think that the quantity of reward that a group can make in organized play should be more than a disorganized zerg, because it is harder to get that group together, but the quality should not be of a higher tier, it should not be more exclusive. It should take you less hours of play at organized content to accumulate “all the things,” but you should still be able to accumulate “all the things” via other methods if you put the time in.

NO one is asking to take away the rewarding solo open world zerg stuff. Just make group content more rewarding and balanced….which anet has decided they finally will in HoT

And nobody is saying that they shouldn’t make group content more rewarding or balanced, just that they shouldn’t do so using rewards exclusive to that content.

Ohoni.6057:

I don’t think that’s really true, I think that’s just how you interpret it.

You think wrong, for many people it does make it more fun. I gave multiple examples.

Ohoni.6057:

I think that while it’s possible to add value to items, I think that items have enough value within themselves, and do not need value added to them. If you want to add value to things, do it to things with little to no intrinsic value, such as titles.

You think wrong, for many people it does add the value that they are looking for.

Ohoni.6057:

Just so long as you understand that this is your personal feeling on the matter, and should not dictate how everyone else plays the game.

I completely understand that.. the only person who does not seem to understand he talks about his personal feeling is you.. because you keep acting as if your solution is what everybody wants.. while that is clearly false.

Ohoni.6057:

No, content is only fun so long as it is fun. When it stops being fun, then rewards do not keep it fun.

Again your wrong. It keeps it fun for longer for many players and MF was a perfect example. I liked.. had fun doing the content (as many, proven by the people asking for it to return) and consider it a fun dungeon.. But without the reward there is no reason for me to do it again.. part of the fun (chasing that reward) is now gone. The content itself might still be good but now has the state of ‘been there done that’. Something that it would not have had when the rewards where still there.. been there yes, done that no, because I did not get the reward yet.. what is part of the “done that.”

So yeah.. you might think it does not add to the fun.. but your wrong, because for many it does. It might however not do that for you.

Ohoni.6057:

My solution makes more people happier though, because they can always do the things they want to get the rewards they want. The worst case is that other methods are slightly more efficient. Your solution means that people either have to do content that they don’t enjoy (worse), or never get the thing they want (worse), so while my solution is by no means perfect, it is at the very least better.

Your solution where everything is balanced near perfect (what is impossible) you mean?
Ignoring that Anet basically did try that and it resulted in the grind we have now?

Still no, because you keep ignoring the hunt for items as reward.. if that is your preferred game-play it’s reward driven so now you will end up in the grind you don’t like, where the other solution sends you on an adventure all over the world.

Also you keep ignoring the added value to the items because they belong to content. While you keep ignoring this one, it is in fact a huge thing.. Whats the value of an item when you know it might drop from a hard to kill boss, but can also be rewarded by hours of brainless grind? From a reward perspective none.. because you did not have to do anything reward-wordy to get it.

And you keep ignoring the fun such specific items add to the content.

Ignoring all those things.. then on paper your solution is better, and Anet did try to implement it what resulted in a boring grind. Making GW2’s reward-system the biggest negative it has.

Because you should not ignore those things, you can’t balance it out and so it does not work in reality as it does on paper.

Ohoni.6057:

Not in any way whatsoever. There is no “WvW themed” armor that WvW players are more likely to be interested in than PvPers, dungeon runners, or chest farmers.

That is very well possible.. While it’s indeed never a guarantee, but i’m pretty sure the more colorful flashy items will on average be more popular with PvE people, while the more though looking items will on average be more popular with the WvW people.

Ohoni.6057:

It’s because they get what they deserve, not necessarily what they want. I don’t doubt that you guys would prefer to have exclusive access to things just for doing the content you prefer to do, that’s a perfectly reasonable desire, but you aren’t entitled to actually get it

You do understand, the same holds true for you, only where you want non-exclusive items so you can always get them by doing whatever you like and prevent people from getting content exclusive rewards. It’s maybe what you want, but not what you deserve. (to use your words).

Ohoni.6057:

Which works fine, so long as you can guarantee that the grinders will never want the rewards made exclusive to the dungeon runners, and vice versa. Can you guarantee that? If not, then not, that is not “fine.”

It’s also fine without guaranteeing that. Some elements you might like, other you don’t.

It’s also funny how you act as if you try to come with a solution that is social, and works for everybody and you try to put the other options as a selfish one where they try to hold something away from other people..
But in reality your solution is just as (if not more) selfish.. You simply want to be able to get all items without doing raids (and maybe some other content).

It is also shown by the fact that you did not mind if titles where exclusive but with skins it was a problem. Why? some people might add more value to titles then to rewards so then they should also be able to do everything they like to earn those titles.?

But no.. you want to be able to get all the things you like (what happens to be mainly skins) and so people should not be able to get exclusive rewards because it would mean you could not get everything you want in the way you want to get it.

Are people still arguing with Ohoni? I think its writing an article on keeping threads open long past worth.

Again your wrong. It keeps it fun for longer for many players and MF was a perfect example. I liked.. had fun doing the content (as many, proven by the people asking for it to return) and consider it a fun dungeon.. But without the reward there is no reason for me to do it again.. part of the fun (chasing that reward) is now gone.

And I think that you feel that way because you want to feel that way, you want it to be true. I think that if you enjoyed MF before, and do not enjoy it now, there are other factors at work in that, such as time to “cool off” from doing it, the lack of pressure to repeat it as many times as possible before it went away, and perhaps chasing the reward does play a factor too, but I think that even if the original rewards were left intact, most players would have no more fun playing MF than currently do.

Something that it would not have had when the rewards where still there.. been there yes, done that no, because I did not get the reward yet.. what is part of the “done that.”

But what about after you already had the rewards? I mean, if they’d left it alone for 2-3 months, then most players would have ended up earning all the unique rewards, and then what? It would have been a ghost town for the next two years.

Your solution where everything is balanced near perfect (what is impossible) you mean?

Again, no more (or less) impossible than balancing the current system. Any time they make content, they have to make some educated guesses as to how difficult they believe it to be, then judge what rewards would be weorthy of that effort, and how much you’d have to do for them. Should you get the fancy reward after one run? Five? Twenty? A hundred? They have to guess. It’s imperfect. My system is not perfect, but it’s not LESS perfect than the current system, so continuing to point out that my system is not perfect is NOT a case against it. It is not perfect, I never claimed it is perfect, but it is better.

Still no, because you keep ignoring the hunt for items as reward..

You can still hunt for items if you choose, that option is still available to you, it is just not the ONLY item, just as people can choose to throw exotic weapons into the forge to get a Pre, but they have other options available.

Whats the value of an item when you know it might drop from a hard to kill boss, but can also be rewarded by hours of brainless grind? From a reward perspective none.. because you did not have to do anything reward-wordy to get it.

If you got it from that mob, then you got it from that mob. If you got it from a random drop then you got it as a random drop. You will likely not care about it as much in the latter case, but if it’s something you really wanted, then you will still care about it, and having it and caring about it a little is far preferable to caring about it a lot but not having it.

Ignoring all those things.. then on paper your solution is better, and Anet did try to implement it what resulted in a boring grind. Making GW2’s reward-system the biggest negative it has.

. . . to you. You left that part out. It’s the biggest negative to you. And admittedly to at least several other people, but to a lot of other people, GW2’s reward system is a strong positive, and while everyone has their complaints about it, they aren’t the same complaints you have. Everyone would like to see more rewards added to the game, but they don’t have to distribute them worse than they have been.

That is very well possible.. While it’s indeed never a guarantee, but i’m pretty sure the more colorful flashy items will on average be more popular with PvE people, while the more though looking items will on average be more popular with the WvW people.

No, there’s absolutely ZERO basis to make this claim. I’m baffled as to what would even cause you to consider it might be true. Players taste in armor has zero correlation to their preferred activities. At most, it might influence what armor pieces they actually own, because the methods required to earn them were too much out of their way to bother, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t actually want the item. For example, a 100% hardcore PvPer is less likely to have a Legendary Weapon, because the current methods do not provide an easy path via PvP, but that doesn’t mean that PvP players are less likely to want a Legendary weapon.

You do understand, the same holds true for you, only where you want non-exclusive items so you can always get them by doing whatever you like and prevent people from getting content exclusive rewards. It’s maybe what you want, but not what you deserve. (to use your words).

Stop trying to pretend that they are equivalent positions, they are not. I am saying that you can get everything you want, so long as I also get everything I want. You are saying that you want to get everything you want, and the right to prevent me from getting everything I want. You can try as you might to insist that these are two sides of a coin, but they are anything but.

Now, if I were insisting that my favorite activities should give the best rewards while your favorite activities should not, then that would be a position equivalent to your own, but I am not making that case. I am saying that both our favorite activities should reward the things that we want.

It’s also funny how you act as if you try to come with a solution that is social, and works for everybody and you try to put the other options as a selfish one where they try to hold something away from other people..

Imagine that, calling someone “selfish” for trying to hold things away from other people. . .

It is also shown by the fact that you did not mind if titles where exclusive but with skins it was a problem. Why? some people might add more value to titles then to rewards so then they should also be able to do everything they like to earn those titles.?

Look, if someone else wants to make the case that titles are truly essential to them, that they genuinely would mind if raiders wanted exclusive titles? Then I would not argue against them, but that’s their case to make and I would not make it for them because I do not believe it myself. Until such people do appear, I have to consider that a straw man argument, and hold to my belief that the overwhelming majority of players would be content with having access to the skins, and not also demand access to the titles.

Ohoni.6057:

Again, no more (or less) impossible than balancing the current system. Any time they make content, they have to make some educated guesses as to how difficult they believe it to be, then judge what rewards would be weorthy of that effort, and how much you’d have to do for them. Should you get the fancy reward after one run? Five? Twenty? A hundred? They have to guess. It’s imperfect. My system is not perfect, but it’s not LESS perfect than the current system, so continuing to point out that my system is not perfect is NOT a case against it. It is not perfect, I never claimed it is perfect, but it is better.

No, the balancing act of making rewards universal across different activities involving different kinds of gameplay, is something I wouldn’t wish on any game developer, might even be considered a form of torture just attempting to balance A versus B versus C versus D….versus Z. Whereas appending exclusive rewards behind certain kinds of content, regardless of the difficulty of the task, gives the player and any observing individuals nearby an idea of what the person did to get that skin. Your system isn’t less perfect, its a monumental waste of time and resources that offers nothing to retain players.

Ohoni.6057:

You can still hunt for items if you choose, that option is still available to you, it is just not the ONLY item, just as people can choose to throw exotic weapons into the forge to get a Pre, but they have other options available.

You should know the difference between what you propose and the current state of precursors, don’t compare those two items and state that as a reasoning why your system would be better. In fact, the only correlation your solution for reward that even resembles attaining a precursor would be the common method of getting the precursor, by getting gold and buying it. And we all so love the gold system.

Ohoni.6057:

If you got it from that mob, then you got it from that mob. If you got it from a random drop then you got it as a random drop. You will likely not care about it as much in the latter case, but if it’s something you really wanted, then you will still care about it, and having it and caring about it a little is far preferable to caring about it a lot but not having it.

And what happens when you care about an item but don’t have it yet? You make the effort to attain it- wait this is going into a loop again, because you will say as if the task were ripping out your own teeth thus that ruins the fun for me. Yes that’s hyperbole, but its a pattern you have to realize in all of your reasoning, and the reward structure you propose to fix this supposed reward ‘dilemma’ isn’t sustainable.

Ohoni.6057:

. . . to you. You left that part out. It’s the biggest negative to you. And admittedly to at least several other people, but to a lot of other people, GW2’s reward system is a strong positive, and while everyone has their complaints about it, they aren’t the same complaints you have. Everyone would like to see more rewards added to the game, but they don’t have to distribute them worse than they have been.

Wrong. This is why we are getting Legendary Armor behind Raids in the first place, this is why Arenanet explicitly stated that they wished they handled Legendary Weapons better and not made them tradable, the current reward system in this game will not keep veterans around. People that agree with you Ohoni are probably fewer than the players running Fractal 50s every day, you are a minority here. It’s absolutely fine for a great majority of skins to be accessible through most routes but leave the exclusive skins behind exclusive content! Give players a long-term goal.

Ohoni.6057:

Stop trying to pretend that they are equivalent positions, they are not. I am saying that you can get everything you want, so long as I also get everything I want. You are saying that you want to get everything you want, and the right to prevent me from getting everything I want. You can try as you might to insist that these are two sides of a coin, but they are anything but.

Now, if I were insisting that my favorite activities should give the best rewards while your favorite activities should not, then that would be a position equivalent to your own, but I am not making that case. I am saying that both our favorite activities should reward the things that we want.

Sorry.

For the record, I believe Devata doesn’t have the power to stop you from getting the rewards…unless…Devata…Dev….

Oh my god. Devata’s a RED!

Ohoni.6057:

Imagine that, calling someone “selfish” for trying to hold things away from other people. . .

Some would argue it might be more selfish to take away the exclusive rewards from content, and maybe some would suggest making the end-game of GW2 unsustainable just to be able to do what you want for anything would be selfish as well.

…Rather go with the players who don’t want this game to die off.

Ohoni.6057:

It is also shown by the fact that you did not mind if titles where exclusive but with skins it was a problem. Why? some people might add more value to titles then to rewards so then they should also be able to do everything they like to earn those titles.?

Look, if someone else wants to make the case that titles are truly essential to them, that they genuinely would mind if raiders wanted exclusive titles? Then I would not argue against them, but that’s their case to make and I would not make it for them because I do not believe it myself. Until such people do appear, I have to consider that a straw man argument, and hold to my belief that the overwhelming majority of players would be content with having access to the skins, and not also demand access to the titles.

His argument is totally valid tough, skins are that important to you, but maybe some people value titles more, you can’t just pick and choose, if you want to rework the entire reward system (wich is what you are suggesting) and have no more skins exclusive, but keep titles exclusive, then you are just having 2 standards, one for the thing you care about, and one for the thing you don’t care about. Your argument for skins is in my eyes just as ignorant as someone who would want to buy a raid title without ever setting foot into a raid. Just like you see nothing wrong with titles being exclusive (at least i hope), we see nothing wrong with skins being exclusive.

I have to considder your argument just as weak and unfounded in reality, because i hold to my belief that the overwhelming majority of players would be content with not having access to the all the skins in the game. To most people, if exclusivity was something that would really bother them, then they wouldn’t be playing mmo’s in the first place.

No, the balancing act of making rewards universal across different activities involving different kinds of gameplay, is something I wouldn’t wish on any game developer,

Then that’s too bad, because it’s a balancing act that they ARE engaged in, and have been so long as MMOs have included multiple forms of content. ALL Rewards systems have to be in balance with each other, otherwise you get complaints of some being less efficient than others, and these complaints should be resolved. The system I proposed would be no more prone to these considerations, despite constant and loud protests to the contrary.

Whereas appending exclusive rewards behind certain kinds of content, regardless of the difficulty of the task, gives the player and any observing individuals nearby an idea of what the person did to get that skin.

So? You might as well be saying that the other player’s outfit indicates how much he enjoys the color blue, what does it matter?

And what happens when you care about an item but don’t have it yet? You make the effort to attain it- wait this is going into a loop again, because you will say as if the task were ripping out your own teeth thus that ruins the fun for me. Yes that’s hyperbole, but its a pattern you have to realize in all of your reasoning, and the reward structure you propose to fix this supposed reward ‘dilemma’ isn’t sustainable.

I’ll grant that every time you ask me to repeat myself on my basic premise, I. . . repeat myself, I honestly don’t know what the better response would be to that situation, but you’d have to agree that you guys are no better on that score, constantly responding with either “then you have to git gud,” or “then you don’t get the thing you want,” in various wordings.

Wrong. This is why we are getting Legendary Armor behind Raids in the first place, this is why Arenanet explicitly stated that they wished they handled Legendary Weapons better and not made them tradable, the current reward system in this game will not keep veterans around. People that agree with you Ohoni are probably fewer than the players running Fractal 50s every day, you are a minority here. It’s absolutely fine for a great majority of skins to be accessible through most routes but leave the exclusive skins behind exclusive content! Give players a long-term goal.

You have absolutely no basis to this claim, and it runs contrary to everything about GW2 being successful over the past three years.

For the record, I believe Devata doesn’t have the power to stop you from getting the rewards…unless…Devata…Dev….

Oh my god. Devata’s a RED!

We’re discussing this between each other on the forums. I am pushing for an agenda, you guys are pushing for your agendas. Devata is pushing for an agenda that would prevent people from getting what they want. I am not saying that Devata personally has any power to implement that system, any more than I do, but if the Devs were to listen to him, then that would be the result.

I would have thought you capable of understanding that without needing to be explained.

Some would argue it might be more selfish to take away the exclusive rewards from content,

Some might, but let’s not pick on them, they have enough challenges in their lives. Let’s stick to intelligent people like you and me and the other people capable of typing. Let’s not talk in hypotheticals, and just agree on the fact that removing exclusivity from an item is nowhere remotely comparable to actually taking away access to that item.

His argument is totally valid tough, skins are that important to you, but maybe some people value titles more,

It isn’t really though. He’s raising an imaginary person, and asking “well what if this person exists?” Well if he exists, then the outcome would be different, and would need to be accounted. My premise is not “I want it to be this way, I don’t care what anyone else wants, this is how it should be.” It’s “I believe that most GW2 players would prefer it this way, so that’s how it should be.” If I’m wrong that most GW2 players would prefer it this way, then it should not be that way, but nothing you guys have been saying is in any way convincing that they do not.

So if you can provide evidence that there is a massive groundswell of people that would be upset if they could get the armor skins, but not get the titles? Then fine, maybe titles wouldn’t work, maybe there would be nothing exclusive that would work, but I remain convinced that far more players would care about exclusive skins than would care about exclusive armor, and see no point to seriously discussing people that do not exist.

Your argument for skins is in my eyes just as ignorant as someone who would want to buy a raid title without ever setting foot into a raid. Just like you see nothing wrong with titles being exclusive (at least i hope), we see nothing wrong with skins being exclusive.

Ah. Well that’s just known as “being wrong.” Now you know, and can move forward without that misconception. No, lol, there are definitely things wrong with skins being exclusive, whether you personally care that they are wrong or not.

To most people, if exclusivity was something that would really bother them, then they wouldn’t be playing mmo’s in the first place.

Well, at the very least they wouldn’t be playing ones that lock armor skins behind raids, like WoW does. Maybe they would be playing other games, that don’t do that. . . yet.

Astralporing.1957:

SkiTz.4590:

Theres no exciting “drops” in this game that you go out to a particular location and farm for and pray to RNGesus that it drops (aside from like, fractal skins)…

And that’s a very good thing.

No, that’s the worst thing about the game

No, that’s the worst thing about the game

“. . . , to me.”

Seriously, it’s two words, is it really that hard to remember to add them?

Ohoni.6057:

Sure, but “quality” of rewards between content types is even more difficult to balance, to say that one type of reward is “worth” having in one type of content, while another type of reward is “worth” having in another.

Quality doesn’t matter for skin rewards. Skins just have to look appropriate for the content they come from, flame-y armor in CoF, leaf-y armor in TA etc. There is nothing hard to balance there.

You said earlier in the thread that you don’t mind exclusive rewards, but now you change your mind and you don’t want them at all. Make up your mind.

Oh wait, you want them only in content that you press 1 or F to get, so it’s easy for everyone to get them. Let me tell you something magical then, any content that only requires 1 or F to defeat is impossibly difficult for me to do, because I’m bored of it after 1 minute so I will never have the rewards of it, therefore by your definition of “exclusive rewards” should NOT be behind difficult content, nothing in this game should have exclusive rewards.

Some content won’t have them because it’s difficult for some people who refuse to read guides, refuse to change their builds, refuse to team up and refuse to get good, and rest of the content because it’s so boring and grind-heavy that is impossible for the actually good players to do without falling asleep.

So decide, do you want exclusive rewards or not?

Ohoni.6057:

No, that’s the worst thing about the game

“. . . , to me.”

Seriously, it’s two words, is it really that hard to remember to add them?

Goes both ways.

Torolan.5816:

As much as I personally dislike RNG when the chances are really low, it is a shot of excitement for the addicted.

When the chances are really low then players who hate the grind leave the game for others more rewarding ones. And really aside for the gambling addiction what’s the point of RNG in games anyway? It makes content repeatable, which is important for MMORPGs, and rewards become rare, because not everyone will have them, also a good thing for MMORPGs.

Let’s replace a good portion of RNG, but not all of it, with some challenge:
It makes content repeatable, you will repeat it not only for the mild RNG, but until you are actually competent enough to finish the content. The harder it is, the more repeats will be needed until you get it. It increases the rarity of items, because not everyone will be capable of beating the content, so items will be rare. Helps with the gambling addiction because RNG is still there, it’s not excessive.

The higher the challenge, the less the RNG needed for the same overall results.

Ohoni.6057:

No, that’s the worst thing about the game

“. . . , to me.”

Seriously, it’s two words, is it really that hard to remember to add them?

I would add it if it was true. But anyone who likes to actually feel rewarded in a video game will agree with it so it’s a moot point to add it.

Quality doesn’t matter for skin rewards. Skins just have to look appropriate for the content they come from, flame-y armor in CoF, leaf-y armor in TA etc. There is nothing hard to balance there.

So you would not have any problem if the raid armor was just mildly tweaked versions of the “Worn Mail/Studded/Country” armor sets? You don’t believe that there are certain expectations as to matching certain levels of style and embellishment with certain levels of content? Good to know, and potentially could make this whole “raid armor” situation a lot easier to resolve.

My point though was more that however you judge the value of the loot itself, they do need to come up with an expected balance on loot. They have to say “well, we expect it to take 25-90 minutes for a decent group to get through this, so we can give them 7 gold worth in coin and resellable goods, and we are offering a fancy armor piece, let’s put that at a 3% drop rate.” If they expect it to take shorter time, then they would offer less gold per run, and a lower drop rate on the item. Every content added, they try to determine a fair balance point of how much time and effort the content takes = the total quantity of loot you get, and chance at rarer rewards.

EVERY CONTENT.

But it does raise another interesting point, that if there’s no need to balance the quality of say, raid loot vs. chest farming loot, as you insist, then why would it matter whether the number of tokens the different events give? They give what they give, let the players sort it out. Personally I think they could do better, but if you insist, maybe they shouldn’t bother trying.

You said earlier in the thread that you don’t mind exclusive rewards, but now you change your mind and you don’t want them at all. Make up your mind.

Please stop trying to hold me to things I never actually said, it just makes you seem petty and desperate. I’ll repeat what I said the last time you said this:

“From the start I’ve been fine with “exclusive rewards” in some sense, it’s just that usually when we’ve been using the term we’ve been using it to refer to weapon and armor skins. I’ve always granted that things like titles could be offered as exclusives, anything that has value ONLY as a trophy, and not intrinsic worth.”

Oh wait, you want them only in content that you press 1 or F to get, so it’s easy for everyone to get them. Let me tell you something magical then, any content that only requires 1 or F to defeat is impossibly difficult for me to do, because I’m bored of it after 1 minute so I will never have the rewards of it, therefore by your definition of “exclusive rewards” should NOT be behind difficult content, nothing in this game should have exclusive rewards.

Four points. First, I have specifically said several times that I do not support “1 or F” content, as you put it, and would want the alternative methods to do their best to not include anything that would fall into that category, perhaps to the point of updating some existing content to remove those “playstyles.”

I know that you know better than that.

Second, you know that even if I did consider those activities to be worthy of these rewards (which, I’ll repeat just in case you forgot gain already, I do not), that I also support plenty of other options, such as existing dungeons, PvP, WvW, etc., so whatever activities you enjoy in the game are likely to be part of it too.

Third, you cannot compare not wanting to do content because you find it boring to not being able to do content because it is outside your skill range. I can respect you not wanting to do it, but just don’t try to compare the two as if they are equivalent. The former is an ability to do something and a choice not to, the latter is a lack of ability, it’s like saying that you have it “just as hard” as a paraplegic just because you don’t want to get off the couch. I’m not saying that everyone who doesn’t want to do raids is genuinely unable to do them, but these people do exist, and do not deserve your mockery.

Fourth, I have never suggested reducing your options for acquiring loot, so if you “can’t stand” the idea of farming for loot or whatever, you won’t have to. If you prefer dungeons, you can earn them through dungeons. If you prefer PvP, you can earn them through PvP. If you prefer raiding? Go ahead and raid your heart out, that will work too. I’m all about adding options, not taking them away, so play the one that does appeal to you.

So decide, do you want exclusive rewards or not?

As I’ve said several dozen times over the past few weeks, I believe that exclusive items can serve a roll in attracting people to specific content, but that exclusive items used for this purpose should be very shallowly located, so that players of any skill level can earn them within a few hours of play in that situation, just enough for them to fairly determine whether they enjoy that content or not.

Rewards that require many many hours of concentrated effort and/or high levels of skill, should not be exclusive to specific content, and should allow players to choose for themselves which method of earning them most appeals to them. The game should respect that you’ve given something a try, and made the genuine realization that you do not enjoy it and would rather be doing something else with your time.

Now, while I personally do not favor offering any exclusive rewards for long term content (ala Raid armor for completing difficult and time consuming raids), I am willing to compromise to the point of allowing exclusive Titles, Outfits, Trohpies, etc. as rewards, so long as weapon and armor skins are not exclusive. This is not something I want for myself, but is something that I’d be willing to accept if others want it as a compromise.

I can only speak for myself on this, If there are people out there who would be genuinely upset by the idea of exclusive Titles for raiders, then they are free to speak their mind on the topic, but I have no reason to believe that these people exist in nearly the numbers as those who would be upset by exclusive armors.

The harder it is, the more repeats will be needed until you get it. It increases the rarity of items, because not everyone will be capable of beating the content, so items will be rare.

Would you agree that RNG creates rarity in a way that is egalitarian, whereas challenge creates rarity in a way that is distrbuted very unevenly? I mean, if something has a 1% chance of dropping, then of the 10 people who have one out of every thousand, they would cover a cross section of all player types, while if instead it has a 10% chance of dropping, but from content that only 1/10 people can complete it, then of the 10 people who have one out of a thousand, most of them will be high skilled players, and few, if any of them will be low skill players? Can you see how low skill players might object to such a system?

The higher the challenge, the less the RNG needed for the same overall results.

Not really. The goal of rarity isn’t the rarity itself, it’s player engagement. It’s to get each player to keep playing a given amount of time before they get everything they want. In a system such as you describe, it just creates three strata. You have the top tier players, who might struggle a bit, but eventually get quite easy at the content. If you’ve lowered RNG on it, then this means that these players will earn the thing quite a bit earlier than if it were pure RNG, and as such, would have no more reason to do it. They’re gone. Then you have the lower strata, that attempt it a few times, realize they have absolutely no hope at it, and give up entirely, they’re gone too, and unsatisfied because they don’t have what they wanted. Only the middle strata is as engaged as under a pure RNG system, because it would end up taking about as much time to earn the item either way, but in any case, that’s only one out of three groups that would not end up burning out of the event _faster) than pure RNG would cause.

I don’t see the advantage for anyone other than the high skill strata, who would be able to get the thing they wanted with less work involved.

I would add it if it was true. But anyone who likes to actually feel rewarded in a video game will agree with it so it’s a moot point to add it.

Fair enough, then how about “No, that’s the worst thing about the game. . . for those who do not actually like to play Guild Wars 2?”

Ohoni.6057:

So you would not have any problem if the raid armor was just mildly tweaked versions of the “Worn Mail/Studded/Country” armor sets?

I would because those sets don’t feel “Mordrem” enough. I expect the precursor skins from the raid to say “you got that from the raid”, not only because they are exclusive to it, but also because they fit the theme of the raid. Considering we might not fight Mordrem inside but some other foe, we won’t know the theme of those items until we play the raid. Tweaked versions of current sets do not fit with it at all. Quality doesn’t matter for those skins, it’s only a matter of how they fit the theme.

Please stop trying to hold me to things I never actually said, it just makes you seem petty and desperate.

So you are NOT for the exclusive rewards but actually completely against them. Got it. i thought you changed that stance earlier but I guess I was wrong.

Third, you cannot compare not wanting to do content because you find it boring to not being able to do content because it is outside your skill range.

I can. It’s the EXACT same thing. My “skill range” doesn’t include RNG nor Grind so content that requires those is impossible for me. it’s the exact same thing.

As I’ve said several dozen times over the past few weeks, I believe that exclusive items can serve a roll in attracting people to specific content, but that exclusive items used for this purpose should be very shallowly located, so that players of any skill level can earn them within a few hours of play in that situation, just enough for them to fairly determine whether they enjoy that content or not.

Shallowly located = not located. So once again you want the “spam 1 or F” content. Got it, you are very clear.

Rewards that require many many hours of concentrated effort and/or high levels of skill, should not be exclusive to specific content, and should allow players to choose for themselves which method of earning them most appeals to them.

And clearly Anet doesn’t agree with this, so we can have an actual video game and enjoy it.

Can you see how low skill players might object to such a system?

Not I can’t. I can see though how players who want to be better at the game can object to the opposite.

Not really. The goal of rarity isn’t the rarity itself, it’s player engagement.

Yes really. The goal for rarity is to have rarity, by making content beatable by 10% of the population you succeed in making the rewards rare.

I would add it if it was true. But anyone who likes to actually feel rewarded in a video game will agree with it so it’s a moot point to add it.

Fair enough, then how about “No, that’s the worst thing about the game. . . for those who do not actually like to play Guild Wars 2?”

Guild Wars 2 is a video game. So anyone who wants to be rewarded in Guild Wars 2 agrees with it. You obviously don’t care about rewards in a video game.

Ohoni.6057:

And I think that you feel that way because you want to feel that way, you want it to be true. I think that if you enjoyed MF before, and do not enjoy it now, there are other factors at work in that, such as time to “cool off” from doing it,

I know that is what you think, you said that before. But as I told you, you are wrong.
You simply have a problem understanding (empathy) what other people like.

It is shown in how you ignore so many things because according to you those don’t really matter.

Added value to items is not really important according to you, and the fact that the content somebody wants to do, is content with exclusive rewards, is also a concept you don’t seem to get.

So then in your world, your solution is best for everybody.. but that is simply because you find it hard understanding other people’s world, so according to you they are at least similar.

I understand that’s hard.. I also can’t understand how some people don’t like some drinks, or how they can like a brainless grind.. But you need to just accept that, instead of concluding those people think they like or don’t like something, but they are wrong in that. (what you are saying here).

Ohoni.6057:

But what about after you already had the rewards? I mean, if they’d left it alone for 2-3 months, then most players would have ended up earning all the unique rewards, and then what? It would have been a ghost town for the next two years.

That it’s not completely true, there will always be people who don’t have the item yet and want to get it but also new players and some people who just to do that raid and so keep doing it.

But yes, the rewards have then increased the life-spawn (where many people do it) but does not keep it alive for ever. Something that also happens in your solution. Its’s a fact of life. You could try to add new rewards in an effort to try and squeeze out even some more game-play time, but you can wonder if you really want to do that. Come with an expansion with new content, it is not a problem that part of the game is not being played as active as it was when it was just introduced.

Ohoni.6057:

You can still hunt for items if you choose, that option is still available to you, it is just not the ONLY item, just as people can choose to throw exotic weapons into the forge to get a Pre, but they have other options available.

I guess you miss a part of what hunting items means.. It’s the same as hunting wild. You have to find where the animal is, than see how to best take it.. You are working towards something specific and that sends you all over the world (or forest). That is a completely different experience then “I want to hunt down that item, what are my challenges”.. “uhhm yeah whatever, just do something. And then you will get / be able to buy the meat) that is a completely different experience.

So no, that hunt is not there anymore. You can still try to get those weapons.. but the hunt is gone when items are not exclusive to content.

Ohoni.6057:

If you got it from that mob, then you got it from that mob. If you got it from a random drop then you got it as a random drop. You will likely not care about it as much in the latter case

Again you make an assumption about how somebody else must feel. No, while you don’t understand it, just accept it. Knowing that you can get the same item by doing a brainless grind removes the value from the item.. heck purchasing it might not even be interesting anymore. It does then not matter anymore that you got it from a hard to kill boss.. In fact doing it that way even can feel punishing.

Ohoni.6057:

. . . to you. You left that part out. It’s the biggest negative to you. And admittedly to at least several other people,

No, not “to me” but “according to me”. I think this is the biggest negative for the game. Not for me, but for the game.

Ohoni.6057:

Stop trying to pretend that they are equivalent positions, they are not. I am saying that you can get everything you want, so long as I also get everything I want. You are saying that you want to get everything you want, and the right to prevent me from getting everything I want.

Nonsense.. You can get everything you want in our solution as well. You just have to do some content you might not like, while other items are behind content you will like.

In your example, we can get everything but also by doing content we not want.. because we want to do content that has unique reward.. our content might be the hunt for unique items.

A fair compromise would be to have 50% of the items exclusive items behind specific content, and 50% being distributed in multiple ways.

Imagine that, calling someone “selfish” for trying to hold things away from other people. . .

Like how you are trying to hold the hunt for those unique expansion away from people, or like how you try to hold the feeling of getting that reward that is linked to that content (so has content value), or like you hold the experience from “Will it drop” “yes it dropped” away from people, or like how you try to hold dungeons with unique rewards away from people?

Or you mean how we are not holding anything away from you, only say you will need to do some specific content for it.

Ohoni.6057:

Look, if someone else wants to make the case that titles are truly essential to them, that they genuinely would mind if raiders wanted exclusive titles? Then I would not argue against them, but that’s their case to make and I would not make it for them because I do not believe it myself.

I don’t doubt that, you don’t care for titles so it does not matter to you.. But it does show you are also acting from a ‘shellfish’ viewpoint, so drop the attitude as if you solution gives everything to everybody while the other people are selfish.
You are the one who won’t accept a compromise.

I would because those sets don’t feel “Mordrem” enough. I expect the precursor skins from the raid to say “you got that from the raid”, not only because they are exclusive to it, but also because they fit the theme of the raid.

I actually kind of doubt that the Legendary Armor would be super leafy, given that we already have a ton of leafy armors in the game and they’d want something “legendary worthy,” but ok, what if it were “Worn Mail/Studded/Country” armors but made with leaves on them? Let’s say they are thematic, and different enough that they don’t seem like total copies of existing armors, but they are of a similar generic-ness and lacking in “flare,” would that satisfy you as raid armor, if, say, something more like Glorious armor, covered in auras and sparkles, were available as the general PvEing armor?

So you are NOT for the exclusive rewards but actually completely against them. Got it. i thought you changed that stance earlier but I guess I was wrong.

Yup, I’ve been consistent on my stance as to what I was and was not comfortable with.

I can. It’s the EXACT same thing. My “skill range” doesn’t include RNG nor Grind so content that requires those is impossible for me. it’s the exact same thing.

Again, that’s just insulting to intelligent humans everywhere.

Shallowly located = not located. So once again you want the “spam 1 or F” content. Got it, you are very clear.

No, shallowly located means shallowly located, as in “easy to get at.” It means that if you have, say, a PvP system, and you want people to try a PvP system, how do you do that? You offer them a unique reward. So you say “Play some PvP, get a fancy hat!” So it takes about 10-15 minutes to play a round of PvP, you want them to play at least a few rounds, so you say “it takes three PvP rounds to win the hat!” Now you don’t have to be particularly good at the PvP, you don’t have to win, you just have to play three rounds, so you do, it takes a little time, and you get the fancy hat.

Now you have a choice. Did you enjoy the PvP or not? If you did, then you can continue to do it, and as you play you will be consistently rewarded with cool stuff, equivalent to what you would earn elsewhere in the game. If you didn’t, hey, you tried it, it wasn’t for you, that’s cool, go forth and have fun elsewhere in the game, your choice has been respected and we have no reason to keep you here any longer.

If a reward is exclusive, it should be quick and easy to get, so that players do not stick around any longer than they want to. If a reward takes time and effort to earn, and most should, then it should be from a variety of activities that the player can choose freely from, without being punished for his choices.

I’ve explained this many times before, if you’ve been even half paying attention you should know the principle by rote.

Not I can’t. I can see though how players who want to be better at the game can object to the opposite.

Why, nothing is stopping them from getting better at the game, just nothing is punishing them for not getting better if they don’t have that potential.

Yes really. The goal for rarity is to have rarity,

Then that’s a stupid goal. In a world where all rarity is artificial (since everything can theoretically be infinite), the only value rarity has is in encouraging activity and engagement. Rarity for rarity’s sake is pointless.

Yes really. The goal for rarity is to have rarity, by making content beatable by 10% of the population you succeed in making the rewards rare.

Yes, and congratulations, you’ve succeeded at accomplishing nothing. You could have done the same thing by just randomly selecting 10% of the player accounts and sending them the item in the mail, and even that would have been considerably fairer than using a skill wall.

Guild Wars 2 is a video game. So anyone who wants to be rewarded in Guild Wars 2 agrees with it.

Clearly not, or they wouldn’t be playing GW2.

You obviously don’t care about rewards in a video game.

I do, I just don’t like them locked behind specific content.

How is it that by page 38 you seem to know less and less about what I’ve actually been saying? Is this some sort of Benjamin Button situation?

Ohoni.6057:

I actually kind of doubt that the Legendary Armor would be super leafy

There is a chance we won’t fight Mordrem in the Raid but something completely different. Time will tell (or a preview maybe) what kind of foes we will face and what the theme of it will be.

Again, that’s just insulting to intelligent humans everywhere.

Why? Because you say so? I don’t like the grind and it’s beyond my “skill” so content that requires loads of it is off limits for me, it’s the same as if you don’t have the skill to complete the raid. Is that so hard to understand?

Shallowly located = not located. So once again you want the “spam 1 or F” content. Got it, you are very clear.

No, shallowly located means shallowly located, as in “easy to get at.”

So just spam 1 or F. That’s what I said.

Why, nothing is stopping them from getting better at the game, just nothing is punishing them for not getting better if they don’t have that potential.

Exactly the problem. Although you can’t see it, it is still the major problem with your suggestion. “Nothing is stopping them”? The fact that there isn’t anything to go for is enough to stop them.

Yes, and congratulations, you’ve succeeded at accomplishing nothing. You could have done the same thing by just randomly selecting 10% of the player accounts and sending them the item in the mail, and even that would have been considerably fairer than using a skill wall.

That’s not how reward selection works. I guess when they do any kind of sports tournament they should roll randomly who would win and not award the final prize to the best of them.

I do, I just don’t like them locked behind specific content.

So I was correct, you don’t like rewards in video games.

I know that is what you think, you said that before. But as I told you, you are wrong.
You simply have a problem understanding (empathy) what other people like.

It is shown in how you ignore so many things because according to you those don’t really matter.

If that is true, it’s something we all share, because you’ve been at the very least equally dismissive of those that disagree with you. I try to empathize with your position, but since it basically boils down to schadenfreude, I have a hard time doing so.

That it’s not completely true, there will always be people who don’t have the item yet and want to get it but also new players and some people who just to do that raid and so keep doing it.

Sure, a tiny trickle of them, not enough to keep the place active. It would be Aetherpath 3, at best.

But yes, the rewards have then increased the life-spawn (where many people do it) but does not keep it alive for ever. Something that also happens in your solution.

Not really, because in my system, the content is balanced against the generic rewards. In my system, whether you were running MF for the first time or the thousandth time, the rewards you would get would be worthwhile to you, would help you to earn towards some goal you wanted, any goal in the game. So the only point at which you would receive “loot burnout” on any content, is when you have every reward you want in the game (and then you’d be loot-burned out on the entire game anyways).

So under those conditions, you could just keep playing until the actual fun of the mechanics wore off on you, and then move to something else, which is fine, Molten Berserker won’t miss you. Maybe you’ll come back eventually, because you won’t have mined out every possible reward, so it’s always worth running.

I guess you miss a part of what hunting items means.. It’s the same as hunting wild. You have to find where the animal is, than see how to best take it.. You are working towards something specific and that sends you all over the world (or forest). That is a completely different experience then “I want to hunt down that item, what are my challenges”.. “uhhm yeah whatever, just do something. And then you will get / be able to buy the meat) that is a completely different experience.

But just as you can hunt an animal in the wild, you can also hunt the same animal in domesticated conditions (not that I support either, in real life). I don’t think a hunter would tell you that shooting a deer that is semi-domesticated and wandering around in his back yard is as thrilling as stalking one through the woods, but both are options. If you enjoy going to the specific “core” location for an item, and jumping through the specific “core” hoops, then that route is open to you. If you don’t enjoy that, you’ll have other options. If my having other options bothers you, then that’s too bad, really.

Again you make an assumption about how somebody else must feel. No, while you don’t understand it, just accept it. Knowing that you can get the same item by doing a brainless grind removes the value from the item..

Ok, then it removes the value from the item. I’m sorry for you. That does not mean that you are entitled to tell other people how they can earn the item.

It does then not matter anymore that you got it from a hard to kill boss.. In fact doing it that way even can feel punishing.

You mean like it would feel to other players ALL the time if that were the only way to earn it?

No, not “to me” but “according to me”. I think this is the biggest negative for the game. Not for me, but for the game.

And yet plenty of people who are not you love this element. Have some empathy for people who are not you.

Nonsense.. You can get everything you want in our solution as well. You just have to do some content you might not like, while other items are behind content you will like.

Even assuming that it’s possible for me to do all the content, I do not believe that there is anything to be gained from any player running content that they do not like. That is not a positive goal to shoot for.

A fair compromise would be to have 50% of the items exclusive items behind specific content, and 50% being distributed in multiple ways.

We’ve been over that point for me to even indulge you with a response anymore.

Like how you are trying to hold the hunt for those unique expansion away from people, or like how you try to hold the feeling of getting that reward that is linked to that content (so has content value), or like you hold the experience from “Will it drop” “yes it dropped” away from people, or like how you try to hold dungeons with unique rewards away from people?

Or you mean how we are not holding anything away from you, only say you will need to do some specific content for it.

No.

I don’t doubt that, you don’t care for titles so it does not matter to you.. But it does show you are also acting from a ‘shellfish’ viewpoint, so drop the attitude as if you solution gives everything to everybody while the other people are selfish.

I believe that the ideas I argue in favor of would be supported my the majority of the game’s population. If it turns out that the majority do not support them, then they should not be used. I don’t know how I can do better than that.

You are the one who won’t accept a compromise.

I did not accept what you choose to call a compromise, because I do not view it as a compromise. I have offered several compromises as to various items that could be awarded as “exclusive rewards,” that are not weapon or armor skins, but nobody has accepted those either. I think I’ve resigned myself to the fact that compromise might not be possible, and it would all just have to come down to a “vote” among the players, mostly with the time and wallets, as to what they would prefer, and the losing side will just not get what they want. Might be mine, but I doubt it.

Ohoni.6057:

I did not accept what you choose to call a compromise, because I do not view it as a compromise. I have offered several compromises as to various items that could be awarded as “exclusive rewards,” that are not weapon or armor skins, but nobody has accepted those either. I think I’ve resigned myself to the fact that compromise might not be possible, and it would all just have to come down to a “vote” among the players, mostly with the time and wallets, as to what they would prefer, and the losing side will just not get what they want. Might be mine, but I doubt it.

What you suggested is not a compromise. What people have been suggesting to you over the last pages IS the actual compromise. And from what we’ve seen Anet wants that compromise too.

As for your comment about money, putting as many exclusives as possible behind content WILL attract new players, players who never bothered with Guild Wars 2 because it didn’t have many of those, players who didn’t like having everything behind the gem store. The “casual” players that won’t do the raid will continue playing and use the game as they always did, if one skin is enough to make them quit the game then they weren’t having fun to begin with.

Why? Because you say so? I don’t like the grind and it’s beyond my “skill” so content that requires loads of it is off limits for me, it’s the same as if you don’t have the skill to complete the raid. Is that so hard to understand?

Yes, because the words you’ve chosen to string together do not form a rational combination. you are insisting on comparing a lack of capability to a lack of interest.

So just spam 1 or F. That’s what I said.

That is what you said, several times. It just has nothing to do with anything I said, and in fact is directly contradicted by many of the things I said, which is what I find so baffling about you continuing to bring it up.

“Nothing is stopping them”? The fact that there isn’t anything to go for is enough to stop them.

That doesn’t stop people from improving. I’ve improved a ton over the time I’ve been playing the game, but it wasn’t from hitting content I couldn’t do and pounding my head against the wall numerous times until it broke, it came from playing content that I could do, and then doing it again slightly better, and again slightly better, until I could practically do it in my sleep. you don’t need difficulty barriers to encourage growth, you just need to have space for improvement, and nothing I’ve suggested would remove any of that space.

That’s not how reward selection works. I guess when they do any kind of sports tournament they should roll randomly who would win and not award the final prize to the best of them.

Well see now you’re moving from your point. Your point had been that rarity was good for it’s own sake, that items should be rare because they should be rare. Now you’re moving to what I believe is a more honest point, items should be rare so that only “special” people, like yourself presumably, can have them, and nobody else can. That may apply to sporting tournaments, I see no benefit to it here. You are not better than other players just because you are more skilled. You have more skill, which is its own reward, but to the game you’re just another customer, no better or worse, no more deserving than any other. There is no benefit to selecting out the “best” players for superior treatment. The point of the game is for everyone to enjoy themselves, not to determine a pecking order.

I do, I just don’t like them locked behind specific content.

So I was correct, you don’t like rewards in video games.

I do, I just don’t like them locked behind specific content.

What you suggested is not a compromise. What people have been suggesting to you over the last pages IS the actual compromise. And from what we’ve seen Anet wants that compromise too.

Of course it’s a compromise. It is saying “I will not agree to let you have weapon or armor skins as exclusive rewards, but if you must have exclusive rewards, then you can have Titles, Outfits, minis, tonics, trophies, etc. as exclusive rewards.” That is a compromise. It may not be the compromise that you want, just as the one you offer me is not a compromise I want, but it is a compromise, it provides the exclusive goals you ask for, if not the specific rewards that you want in those goals.

As for your comment about money, putting as many exclusives as possible behind content WILL attract new players, players who never bothered with Guild Wars 2 because it didn’t have many of those,

I don’t believe that’s true. I don’t believe those players would come to GW2, they are fictional, like the hardcore Raiders that Wildstar was built for, yet never actually existed.

players who didn’t like having everything behind the gem store.

Well the gemstore is a non-issue here. No matter which of us is right, the gem store IS. It’s not going anywhere or changing in any way. The items that have been going into the gem store will continue to do so whether I’m right or you’re right, all we’re doing is fighting over the scraps. There is no point whatsoever in raising the gem store in the discussion, aside from as a distraction.

The “casual” players that won’t do the raid will continue playing and use the game as they always did, if one skin is enough to make them quit the game then they weren’t having fun to begin with.

As I said, I doubt this one issue will cause anyone to rage quit immediately, but it does cause long term player disengagement, if they start to see items they want more and more ending up locked behind content they don’t. This isn’t the first strike, that was Fractals, then Liadri, Teq2.0, Triple Trouble, Aetherpath, Ambrite weapons, Lumi armor, and now actual raids. It wears on players that enjoyed the way the game originally was, fun and open to all players.

Ohoni.6057:

Yes, because the words you’ve chosen to string together do not form a rational combination. you are insisting on comparing a lack of capability to a lack of interest.

The result is the same, if you can’t see the comparison that’s not my fault.

That is what you said, several times. It just has nothing to do with anything I said, and in fact is directly contradicted by many of the things I said, which is what I find so baffling about you continuing to bring it up.

Getting anything you want by “trying” content is what “press 1 and press F” content is all about. If it requires a tiny bit of more skill some people might find it impossible to do the content (they lack the capability, you said that)

That may apply to sporting tournaments, I see no benefit to it here. You are not better than other players just because you are more skilled.

I don’t see any reason NOT to benefit here. If anything it will lead to some competition by the best teams to not only get good on their own but beat the content before other teams do. It’s the same principle.

I do, I just don’t like them locked behind specific content.

So I was correct, you don’t like rewards in video games.

I do, I just don’t like them locked behind specific content.

Which is the same thing. You don’t like rewards in video games, period. If you did, you’d like them behind specific content. To use your own words, because the words you’ve chosen to string together do not form a rational combination. Exclusive = I like the rewards, no exclusive = I don’t like the rewards. Simple

Ohoni.6057:

As I said, I doubt this one issue will cause anyone to rage quit immediately, but it does cause long term player disengagement, if they start to see items they want more and more ending up locked behind content they don’t. This isn’t the first strike, that was Fractals, then Liadri, Teq2.0, Triple Trouble, Aetherpath, Ambrite weapons, Lumi armor, and now actual raids. It wears on players that enjoyed the way the game originally was, fun and open to all players.

Same can be said about everything on the gem store.

Ohoni.6057:

Of course it’s a compromise. It is saying “I will not agree to let you have weapon or armor skins as exclusive rewards, but if you must have exclusive rewards, then you can have Titles, Outfits, minis, tonics, trophies, etc. as exclusive rewards.” That is a compromise. It may not be the compromise that you want, just as the one you offer me is not a compromise I want, but it is a compromise, it provides the exclusive goals you ask for, if not the specific rewards that you want in those goals.

And you still don’t know what a compromise is. Funny.

As for your comment about money, putting as many exclusives as possible behind content WILL attract new players, players who never bothered with Guild Wars 2 because it didn’t have many of those,

I don’t believe that’s true. I don’t believe those players would come to GW2, they are fictional, like the hardcore Raiders that Wildstar was built for, yet never actually existed.

Who said anything about raids?

The result is the same, if you can’t see the comparison that’s not my fault.

The result may be the same, but the reason behind it is entirely different. It’s like you’re saying that a blind person is no worse off, or more deserving of support, than someone who just chooses to keep his eyes closed because he can’t be bothered to open them.

Getting anything you want by “trying” content is what “press 1 and press F” content is all about.

But if you’ll notice, I didn’t say “getting anything you want.” I said that exclusive rewards should be easy to get, because their purpose is to get you in the door, get you to attempt a unique bit of content, not really a reward so much as a door prize. The actual rewards, the things that would take time and effort to earn, would not be unique, you could get them from several different places, but they would take actual work, not “press 1/f”.

If it requires a tiny bit of more skill some people might find it impossible to do the content (they lack the capability, you said that)

I don’t think the rewards should be available to literally every human on the planet, some baseline of skill is reasonable, it’s just a much lower baseline than most raiders would be comfortable with. More like 95% of the server’s population, rather than 10%. Now more skilled players could take shortcuts, take the more challenging, shorter paths to the reward, so they would have their own advantages, but even the fairly low skilled should get there eventually.

I don’t see any reason NOT to benefit here. If anything it will lead to some competition by the best teams to not only get good on their own but beat the content before other teams do. It’s the same principle.

Which is great if you like competition in a cooperative game, worthless if you don’t. I think Leaderboards work just fine for this. Let competitive teams duke it out for the best times, let non-competitive players not have to worry about that mess.

Which is the same thing. You don’t like rewards in video games, period. If you did, you’d like them behind specific content. To use your own words, because the words you’ve chosen to string together do not form a rational combination. Exclusive = I like the rewards, no exclusive = I don’t like the rewards. Simple

Only if you insist on taking two unrelated concepts and treating them as insepperable. It’s like if someone tells you that they like ice cream, but do not like chocolate, and you keep insisting that this means that they must not like ice cream because “ice cream is chocolate.” Rewards do not have to be exclusive, nor do they have to be behind specific content. Silk scraps are a reward (if a very basic one), and yet you can earn them through practically any activity in the game, and via gold if nothing else. I am in favor of rewarding gameplay, I am not in favor of those rewards being overly specific to certain gameplay content. So, to keep this very simple, just accept as fact that:
1. I like rewards.
2. I do not like exclusive rewards.
3. These two points are not in conflict with each other.

Same can be said about everything on the gem store.

Sure, I can agree on that, and feel free to fight for that issue all you like. I don’t think it’s one that is likely to succeed, and whether it does or not has nothing to do with the topic at hand, but go for it.

Who said anything about raids?

^
|
|

(look at the top of the page)

Ohoni.6057:

Wrong. This is why we are getting Legendary Armor behind Raids in the first place, this is why Arenanet explicitly stated that they wished they handled Legendary Weapons better.

You have absolutely no basis to this claim, and it runs contrary to everything about GW2 being successful over the past three years.

GW2 was successful but had troubles holding players (their words) and income did kept dropping (until the announcement of HoT). So it was successful but no perfect, and did not even do what Anet hoped it would do over the longer term, because then we would indeed not make these changes and even would not have had HoT but another LS instead.

Ohoni.6057:

Devata is pushing for an agenda that would prevent people from getting what they want.

What a complete nonsense. What I (some of us) suggest here, does not hold any item away from anybody. Anybody can get those items, they might just have to do some content they don’t like to get some of the items they might like.

Just as your suggestion does exactly the same. Because in your way, if you like that hunt / content for exclusive never have that game-play / content in the game.

Ohoni.6057:

Some would argue it might be more selfish to take away the exclusive rewards from content,

Some might, but let’s not pick on them, they have enough challenges in their lives. Let’s stick to intelligent people like you and me and the other people capable of typing.

So everybody who feels different from you is stupid?
With that statement you basically undermined everything you said here and I am happy you are not on ‘my side’. No user arguing any further with you if this is how you look at thigs.. Besides, everything I have to say I did say anyway. Let the readers decide. Because I think they are not stupid.

Edit:

Ohoni.6057:

Not really, because in my system, the content is balanced against the generic rewards.

People will still get bored by the content. That does not change.

Ohoni.6057:

But just as you can hunt an animal in the wild, you can also hunt the same animal in domesticated conditions…. If my having other options bothers you, then that’s too bad, really.

You can get a boar also in another place yes.. Just as you can get a skin also from other content. But when hunting, you spot one animal and set your sights on it, on that specific one and try to get that one.

Ok so finally we agree in both systems not everybody gets what he wants. So then you would look for a compromise (what you did not want before because your system would give everybody what he wanted.. according to you) that brings us back on the 50/50 deal.

Ohoni.6057:

Ok, then it removes the value from the item. I’m sorry for you. That does not mean that you are entitled to tell other people how they can earn the item.

Just as it does not mean you are entitled to take that value away from other people. need a compromise.. again there is the 50/50

Ohoni.6057:

And yet plenty of people who are not you love this element. Have some empathy for people who are not you.

I have, I would like to have all items exclusive behind content.. but as a compromise.. out of empathy I suggest the 50/50

Ohoni.6057:

I believe that the ideas I argue in favor of would be supported my the majority of the game’s population.

Anet did try to implement it and we don’t know why the people who did leave, leave. But the (bad) reward system is a topic, or subject in many topics, that pops up a lot in these forums. So that says something.

I believe that the ideas I argue in favor of, would be supported by the majority of the game’s population. Especially just after HoT gets released as those who did leave for a big part are back then.

Ohoni.6057:

I have offered several compromises as to various items that could be awarded as “exclusive rewards,” that are not weapon or armor skins

That is not a compromise if it comes to skins right.. That is saying.. I like skins, I don’t care for titles, you can do with the tiles what you like and I say this is a compromise.

Edit: as I said, I won’t argue any further because you simply call people stupid if they feel different about something. There is no arguing with anybody like that. You however answered these last thing before I posted that so to be polite I have answered those and added them here.

Ohoni.6057:

The result may be the same, but the reason behind it is entirely different. It’s like you’re saying that a blind person is no worse off, or more deserving of support, than someone who just chooses to keep his eyes closed because he can’t be bothered to open them.

So you do not accept that excessive grind and excessive rng is a serious turn off for players and something that causes games to fail. OK that’s your problem, but those are far more serious offences than having hardcore content.

But if you’ll notice, I didn’t say “getting anything you want.” I said that exclusive rewards should be easy to get

That’s the same thing. So you want exclusive rewards to be “spam 1” content and non-exclusive to be in other types of content. What’s the point of those exclusives then?

Which is great if you like competition in a cooperative game, worthless if you don’t. I think Leaderboards work just fine for this. Let competitive teams duke it out for the best times, let non-competitive players not have to worry about that mess.

Or have content for both, with its own rewards.

1. I like rewards.
2. I do not like exclusive rewards.
3. These two points are not in conflict with each other.

It depends on how you see the word reward. if you see them just as pretty skins then yes they aren’t in conflict, if you see them as what they stand for then they are directly in conflict with each other.

Who said anything about raids?

(look at the top of the page)

I said that adding more exclusive rewards in the game (everywhere) will bring more players to the game, you said they are fictional and do not exist just like the raiders who were supposed to go to Wildstar. Just having this entire thread proves they are not fictional.

Ohoni.6057:

I know that is what you think, you said that before. But as I told you, you are wrong.
You simply have a problem understanding (empathy) what other people like.

It is shown in how you ignore so many things because according to you those don’t really matter.

If that is true, it’s something we all share, because you’ve been at the very least equally dismissive of those that disagree with you. I try to empathize with your position, but since it basically boils down to schadenfreude, I have a hard time doing so.

By that logic, anyone who accomplished something and then boasts about it is just doing it to be happy about others not being able to do so.

All you’re doing is judging people without understanding or trying to understand why people want exclusive rewards. Trying to demonise their arguments as less intellegent or insinuating that everyone who wants exclusive rewards just wants to be happy about someone elses misery. That’s pretty low, imo.

If you had any empathy you would’ve agreed to disagree. Because all this discussion is about is two “sides” wanting two different games.

Ohoni.6057:

So if you can provide evidence that there is a massive groundswell of people that would be upset if they could get the armor skins, but not get the titles? Then fine, maybe titles wouldn’t work, maybe there would be nothing exclusive that would work, but I remain convinced that far more players would care about exclusive skins than would care about exclusive armor, and see no point to seriously discussing people that do not exist.

Where is your evidence that there is a a massived groundswell of people that is upset that some skins are exclusive? GW2 had exclusive skins locked behind content from day one. You claim that everything that has been succesfull at GW2 supports your argument, but it really doesn’t. Fractals, dungeons, tequatl and the wurm, sPvP and even WvW, and recently silverwastes and drytop, all have exclusive skins in some form, all the living story has had exclusive skins, certain achievements have exclusives behind them. And yet people are playing GW2 and the game is doing just fine. There is nothing with how rewards currently work in GW2 that supports your argument that people would even want this change.
Raids are just another type of content, and they follow the reward structure that gw2 has had since launch.

FrizzFreston.5290:

All you’re doing is judging people without understanding or trying to understand why people want exclusive rewards. Trying to demonise their arguments as less intellegent or insinuating that everyone who wants exclusive rewards just wants to be happy about someone elses misery. That’s pretty low, imo.

If you had any empathy you would’ve agreed to disagree. Because all this discussion is about is two “sides” wanting two different games.

Totally agree with this.
People who do want exclusives have been ridiculed and demonised by him, for really no good reason. Saying others are dumb and stupid is of course an easy way to just bully yourself trough an argument, however i don’t think it’s the right way to bring your point to the attention of the devs. In fact it devalues the entire discussion and if you want to change the current system, that is exactly what you don’t want to do. Anyway if he wants to keep going and respond to every single person that disagrees with him, i’m fine with that. Each reply where he disrespects other people just because they don’t agree with him, makes it more and more likely that his ideas will never find it’s way into our game.

maddoctor.2738:

Ohoni.6057:

No, that’s the worst thing about the game

“. . . , to me.”

Seriously, it’s two words, is it really that hard to remember to add them?

I would add it if it was true. But anyone who likes to actually feel rewarded in a video game will agree with it so it’s a moot point to add it.

Praying to RNGesus is not what most people like. Whether it’s about general or location-specific loot. Just look at the discussion in the RNG thread.

RNG doesn’t make you feel rewarded. At best, it makes you feel lucky.

GW2 was successful but had troubles holding players (their words) and income did kept dropping (until the announcement of HoT).

But they never related their dropping players (which every game has) with any of the things you try to relate it to. You seem to insist on it being related to loot grind burnout, while the only time they referenced not retaining enough players, it was to justify the NPE trait and skill changes, which mainly impacted low-to-mid level players. That indicates that their metrics were showing people leaving well before hitting endgame, which is where the effect you focus on would be taking place.

because then we would indeed not make these changes and even would not have had HoT but another LS instead.

No basis for this either. An expansion was always likely at some point, I don’t know how they would have been able to add new class option or anything like that as part of a LW update, and of course people wanted major additions. I do not see HoT as a “failure” of the LW model, but rather a compliment to it. We have no idea how the performance of the LW might have effected their planned timetable for HoT, but if it were really a disaster, they likely would have launched HoT much sooner than they did.

What a complete nonsense. What I (some of us) suggest here, does not hold any item away from anybody. Anybody can get those items, they might just have to do some content they don’t like to get some of the items they might like.

One, you presume that anyone is capable of completing any content “if they just try,” which is factually incorrect.

Two, you forcing players to do content that they do not like is of no benefit to the game, or those players. It is not something to be encouraged.

Just as your suggestion does exactly the same. Because in your way, if you like that hunt / content for exclusive never have that game-play / content in the game.

You still always have these methods available as an option, they are just not the ONLY option, just as you always have the option of working towards dungeon armor via dungeons, OR via PvP reward tracks. I am not removing any options, I am only adding them. If you insist on seeing choice as somehow reducing your options, I’m afraid I can’t help you.

So everybody who feels different from you is stupid?

No, I do not, but that isn’t to say that all of the people who feel different from me aren’t stupid either. You referenced some of these people, the some who would argue " it might be more selfish to take away the exclusive rewards from content," but I don’t think these people are representative of the whole. I’m not even sure they actually exist.

People will still get bored by the content. That does not change.

Yes, but then they would be able to leave without regret, and play stuff that didn’t bore them. See, that’s the advantage, if you bribe people with loot, then they will get bored just as quickly, but they will feel compelled by the loot to keep playing anyways, hating the game more and more each time, until they get the loot they wanted and finally they can get on with their lives.

If you don’t bribe them with loot, if the loot you get is only comparable to loot elsewhere in the game, then they can play until they get bored with it, and then move on with a clear conscience, doing something else instead. Not only would they be happier with that new content than they would be grinding out the old content, but they would also be less disgruntled with the old content (since they weren’t forced to stick around longer than they wanted), meaning that the chances of them coming back eventually are higher. In the latter example, the player might end up spending well more time in that content over the lifetime of the game than if you forced him to stay there for X weeks straight trying to earn a specific reward.

Ok so finally we agree in both systems not everybody gets what he wants. So then you would look for a compromise (what you did not want before because your system would give everybody what he wanted.. according to you) that brings us back on the 50/50 deal.

I think you misunderstand how compromise works. Compromise doesn’t mean that each side gets half of what they want. Compromise means that maybe each side has to give up some portion to reach a solution that is best for everyone. Not always. If there are more of one group than the other, for example, the larger group gets more of what they want, and the smaller group gets less. If what one group wants is ultimately bad for everyone, then maybe they get none of that.

I’ve laid out the compromise I would be satisfied with. Having any exclusive weapons or armor would not be part of that compromise. If that’s the only sort of compromise you would be willing to accept, then I’m prepared to “take it to the jury,” and let the game’s population sort out who gets what, rather than “settling out” for something that would not at all work for me. We can’t “split the baby” on this one.

Anet did try to implement it and we don’t know why the people who did leave, leave. But the (bad) reward system is a topic, or subject in many topics, that pops up a lot in these forums. So that says something.

Yes, it says that forums are terrible scientific samples of mass opinion. There are numerous topics that pop up on the forums of this and other games that offer a vastly distorted perception of the game. Someone mentioned earlier how the LotRO forums were awash in discussions of raids and raid balance, and yet only 10% of the population turned out to be serious raiders. I don’t doubt that there are some people who are bothered by GW2’s reward structure, I just have serious doubts that these people make up a serious portion of the game’s population. If they can be made happy without reducing the QoL for everyone else then I’m fine with that, but I don’t see grounds to make them happy at everyone else’s expense, without evidence that there actually are a lot of them, rather than just a few noisy people.

That is not a compromise if it comes to skins right.. That is saying.. I like skins, I don’t care for titles, you can do with the tiles what you like and I say this is a compromise.

It is offering something to those that claim that they like “exclusivity,” that they like earning something that is specific to an area and can only be earned one way. If titles are that thing, I am fine with that. If skins are that thing, I am not.

So you do not accept that excessive grind and excessive rng is a serious turn off for players and something that causes games to fail. OK that’s your problem, but those are far more serious offences than having hardcore content.

That is a very different thing than what I said, or what you said that I was responding to. I do think that excessive grind and excessive RNG are bad things, and should be avoided as best they can be, and the system I propose would do just that.

I do not, however, think that they are worse than hardcore content, because ultimately they are just as bad, with the added problem that while everyone CAN grind, whether they like to or not, not everyone can do hardcore content, whether they want to or not, so it’s all the negatives, plus more negatives.

That’s the same thing. So you want exclusive rewards to be “spam 1” content and non-exclusive to be in other types of content. What’s the point of those exclusives then?

They entice people to try out the content, to give them a fair chance of seeing if they like it. If they do like it, then they can continue to play that style and earn the other rewards in the game, if they don’t like it then they can move on with a clear conscience. It’s just like how stores will have a “doorbuster” sale where they have something that is a really nice deal that you get for just showing up, on the premise that maybe you’ll see other stuff you want to buy while you’re there.

Or have content for both, with its own rewards.

which does not work, since if the player who enjoys one type likes the rewards that the other type offers, he’s stuck doing that other content to earn those rewards. How about this instead, have content for both, each with its own rewards, and also able to earn the rewards from the other one?

It depends on how you see the word reward. if you see them just as pretty skins then yes they aren’t in conflict, if you see them as what they stand for then they are directly in conflict with each other.

So basically, “if you use an incorrect definition of the term, then you will reach an incorrect conclusion?” Well yeah, that’s to be expected. A “reward” is an item that you receive for accomplishing a task. There is no burden on that reward that it only be given out for accomplishing a single task, the same reward can potentially be earned any number of ways, and it is still a reward. What you insist on calling “a reward,” is actually “an exclusive reward,” a reward given out for only a single possible task. If you continue to misuse the term, you will continue to get inaccurate results.

I said that adding more exclusive rewards in the game (everywhere) will bring more players to the game, you said they are fictional and do not exist just like the raiders who were supposed to go to Wildstar. Just having this entire thread proves they are not fictional.

You said that adding more exclusive rewards would bring in more players, those who don’t play GW2 now, but would at the promise of more exclusive rewards. I pointed out Wildstar, a game that made similar claims, that if they made a “hardcore, raid focused game” in 2015, that people would pour in to play it. I believe you have no basis for your claims that these people exist in sizable numbers. You assume that because you want something, there must be a lot of other people that want it, and that would come into the game if that thing were offered. I do not believe this is true. All you can fairly say is that if they made this change, you would be happier, several people in this thread would be happier, and that’s about it. You can continue to believe that a larger population would also prefer this change, but I do not share that belief, and would not act on it without more evidence.

By that logic, anyone who accomplished something and then boasts about it is just doing it to be happy about others not being able to do so.

That is generally the nature of boastfulness, yes. Has anyone ever boasted about something when they were the last person to do it?

Where is your evidence that there is a a massived groundswell of people that is upset that some skins are exclusive? GW2 had exclusive skins locked behind content from day one.

Because there have constantly been complaints about the more difficult to acquire exclusive skins. They tend to ebb and flow, no point belaboring an issue that isn’t changing, but it always comes up. I expect the topic of raid rewards to die down eventually as well, but that doesn’t mean that people stop being bothered by it, just that they don’t see the point in continuing to talk about it if nothing it changing.

They have made some changes on the matter of exclusivity, such as tokenizing Fractal weapons, adding PvP reward tracks, adding Precursor crafting, but they could always do more. The addition of raids takes this a step beyond anything they’ve done before, as everyone, on both sides of this discussion, is assuming that they will be more difficult and time consuming than previous content, and therefore an exceptional burden on those who want to earn those rewards, and therefore adding raids, with exclusive rewards, cannot be viewed as merely a continuation of previous trends.

Ohoni.6057:

Then that’s too bad, because it’s a balancing act that they ARE engaged in, and have been so long as MMOs have included multiple forms of content. ALL Rewards systems have to be in balance with each other, otherwise you get complaints of some being less efficient than others, and these complaints should be resolved. The system I proposed would be no more prone to these considerations, despite constant and loud protests to the contrary.

They are not, no one has attempted to universalize rewards, that hasn’t happened ever. Give me an instance of a successful MMO where every single reward in the game could be earned through every single kind of game style in the game. Where there is no exclusivity.

Ohoni.6057:

So? You might as well be saying that the other player’s outfit indicates how much he enjoys the color blue, what does it matter?

No, because last I checked dye colors themselves aren’t exclusive behind anything except a gold sink. Try again. This time attempt to understand how exclusive rewards behind exclusive content shows a merit however small or large of what the person did. It’s literally ‘cause and effect’ here.

Ohoni.6057:

I’ll grant that every time you ask me to repeat myself on my basic premise, I. . . repeat myself, I honestly don’t know what the better response would be to that situation, but you’d have to agree that you guys are no better on that score, constantly responding with either “then you have to git gud,” or “then you don’t get the thing you want,” in various wordings.

Not really, we have been attempting over and over again, providing videos, links, actual examples of why exclusive rewards behind exclusive content is necessary. You simply don’t believe in it. It’s really coming down to the point where you won’t ever concede anything, which is making this entire conversation and debate fruitless.

Ohoni.6057:

You have absolutely no basis to this claim, and it runs contrary to everything about GW2 being successful over the past three years.

There are a lot of factors that cater to why GW2 has been successful. Personally, the core game had an impressive amount of polish across even the smallest details, and the utter design of the ‘trinity of gameplay’ from PvE, SPvP and WvW was a breath of fresh air in the monotone that was the MMO Market.

…Oh, and the B2P model for such quality is still kitten amazing to this day. However what we are discussing here is how to prevent such successes from failing, to not make this another ‘WoW contender that failed’. TBF though, FF14 is doing a pretty decent job at smashing WoW at this time.

Ohoni.6057:

We’re discussing this between each other on the forums. I am pushing for an agenda, you guys are pushing for your agendas. Devata is pushing for an agenda that would prevent people from getting what they want. I am not saying that Devata personally has any power to implement that system, any more than I do, but if the Devs were to listen to him, then that would be the result.

I would have thought you capable of understanding that without needing to be explained.

Admittedly got a little bit out of line there, but can you at least see the opposition to your idea? Those who take your side are not going as far as what you have suggested, rather they have other motivations (such as not wanting to see the elitist and stereotypical raider mentality split the community for instance).

Ohoni.6057:

Some might, but let’s not pick on them, they have enough challenges in their lives. Let’s stick to intelligent people like you and me and the other people capable of typing. Let’s not talk in hypotheticals, and just agree on the fact that removing exclusivity from an item is nowhere remotely comparable to actually taking away access to that item.

Nothing in this game is inaccessible except for skins ripped from the game, some of those early-on SPvP skins for instance have never seen a return for instance.

Lastly, for the record Compromise actually means to make concessions for a deal, both sides make their own concessions, there’s no maybe about it. I may not support the whole 50/50, that’s a little extreme I rather see exclusive rewards be the ‘end-game of a game-type’ but if you want exclusivity to exist even though you despise the method, then the best course at this time would be providing exclusive legendary armor rewards across various gametypes, the skin unique to that mode. Given that they made that model behind the Legendary Backpieces (that we know of right now), its likely that raiding won’t be the only method to earn Legendary Armor.

They are not, no one has attempted to universalize rewards, that hasn’t happened ever. Give me an instance of a successful MMO where every single reward in the game could be earned through every single kind of game style in the game. Where there is no exclusivity.

That wasn’t the point I was making so I have no obligation to defend it. The point that I was making is that ALL MMOs with multiple gameplay systems that share the same space have to balance out the rewards between those systems, including GW2 in its current state. Universalizing rewards places no additional burden for balance on the developers, they already have that burden (whether they fully live up to it or not).

No, because last I checked dye colors themselves aren’t exclusive behind anything except a gold sink. Try again. This time attempt to understand how exclusive rewards behind exclusive content shows a merit however small or large of what the person did. It’s literally ‘cause and effect’ here.

But the vast majority of rewards in the game take very little effort. Need I repeat that one of my mains wears a PvP helm, while being very mediocre at PvP and spending as little time in there as possible. My other main is wearing an outfit consisting of the starter helm, level 30 crafted shoulders, guild armor chest, and PvP gloves. If you gather from any of this that this character is only level 30, loves Guild stuff, or loves PvP, you would be grossly misinformed.

Not really, we have been attempting over and over again, providing videos, links, actual examples of why exclusive rewards behind exclusive content is necessary. You simply don’t believe in it. It’s really coming down to the point where you won’t ever concede anything, which is making this entire conversation and debate fruitless.

Only if you believe that the point of this conversation is to get me to concede something, in which case, I would totally agree with you. Oh, wait, I just conceded something. Logic fault detected, error, error, rebooting. . . now what we we talking about again?

TBF though, FF14 is doing a pretty decent job at smashing WoW at this time.

Well, not “smashing,” but it is doing well, which shouldn’t be surprising given that it’s an MMO with a strong console version, giving it a wider potential market, and a VERY strong IP. It would have to be an awful game to not be very successful.

Admittedly got a little bit out of line there, but can you at least see the opposition to your idea?

I understand the opposition, I do not agree with the opposition, or agree that if they got their way it would be the best for the game. I understand that they are upset with what I propose, I do not see a way to make them not upset while still succeeding in the strengths of my proposal, and I’ve offered any suggestions for compromise that I can think of, and have been rebuffed at every time. This seems to be a situation in which the two positions are simply irreconcilable, and the jury would need to decide on one or the other winning out entirely, rather than both sides meeting in the middle. I’m fine with that.

Nothing in this game is inaccessible except for skins ripped from the game, some of those early-on SPvP skins for instance have never seen a return for instance.

In the current game, very little is completely inaccessible. There are a few things, mostly along the fringes. And btw, for the purposes of this discussion, I mean “completely inaccessible within ones own power,” as in not counting cases where it’s possible for a group to completely carry you 100% on their backs and you still get credit. So there are a few items, the Liadri mini, the rewards that require you to be a peak level PvPer, but admittedly not many.

HoT is adding more of these though, some known, some potential. The PvP tiering system, for example, clearly excludes many people entirely out of the top prize categories. The raids, everyone, on both sides, will exclude at least some players. The opposition falls back on the idea that “in theory” anyone can do it, but in practice we all understand that this will not come to pass if they are sufficiently difficult to please anyone.

So GW2 is not doing a terrible job right now, but they’ve hinted that they intend to get worse, and that is what I am opposing.

Lastly, for the record Compromise actually means to make concessions for a deal, both sides make their own concessions, there’s no maybe about it.

The “maybe” is in whether a compromise is necessary at all, or in whether that compromise needs to be 50/50 between two parties. It is not reasonable to assume that any disagreement between parties must, or even should result in each getting half of what they want.

then the best course at this time would be providing exclusive legendary armor rewards across various gametypes, the skin unique to that mode. Given that they made that model behind the Legendary Backpieces (that we know of right now), its likely that raiding won’t be the only method to earn Legendary Armor.

Which is fine, if the thing you want is to “have Legendary Armor,” but is meaningless if the thing you want is to "have the appearance that they are giving to the raid Legendary Armor. "

Ohoni.6057:

That is a very different thing than what I said, or what you said that I was responding to. I do think that excessive grind and excessive RNG are bad things, and should be avoided as best they can be, and the system I propose would do just that.

No it’s not, it’s the same thing you just missed it (again) or you are doing it on purpose. This is the original argument:

As for your comment about money, putting as many exclusives as possible behind content WILL attract new players, players who never bothered with Guild Wars 2 because it didn’t have many of those, players who didn’t like having everything behind the gem store.

Putting exclusives behind content will bring a lot new players in, and this thread is proof that a lot of players WANT them, you can’t ignore that.

I do not, however, think that they are worse than hardcore content, because ultimately they are just as bad, with the added problem that while everyone CAN grind, whether they like to or not, not everyone can do hardcore content, whether they want to or not, so it’s all the negatives, plus more negatives.

That’s not true. If everything is a grind you can’t get anything if you hate the grind, like most of the game is now and will be with your “proposal”. With the hardcore content you won’t get what is behind hardcore content only, the rest will be more easily available, it’s rather simple. So you either miss a few rewards (hardcore) or you miss everything (grind), how can you tell that hardcore content is worse than grind only your twisted logic knows.

They entice people to try out the content, to give them a fair chance of seeing if they like it.

That’s not what rewards exist in a game. Let’s entice people by giving them free legendary items? Then IF they like it, they can get blues and greens? Does that make any sense to you?

which does not work, since if the player who enjoys one type likes the rewards that the other type offers, he’s stuck doing that other content to earn those rewards. How about this instead, have content for both, each with its own rewards, and also able to earn the rewards from the other one?

It’s something you say but it is irrelevant, the individual player wants don’t matter at all, we’ve been through this many times. You care about the chance someone might like rewards behind content he might not like in a game about cosmetics. Let me ask you, even if you get that shinny raid legendary armor, how long will you keep it? Looks in this game are mostly in flux and you will change them often, if you “miss” one skin it won’t be the end of the world. Individual player wants are irrelevant when designing rewards, once you get this you won’t sound like a selfish spoiled brat who wants everything handed to them.

So basically, “if you use an incorrect definition of the term, then you will reach an incorrect conclusion?” Well yeah, that’s to be expected. A “reward” is an item that you receive for accomplishing a task. There is no burden on that reward that it only be given out for accomplishing a single task, the same reward can potentially be earned any number of ways, and it is still a reward. What you insist on calling “a reward,” is actually “an exclusive reward,” a reward given out for only a single possible task. If you continue to misuse the term, you will continue to get inaccurate results.

I call a reward what it is, a reward. A reward is something given or received in return for a service or deed rendered, it can be both exclusive and non-exclusive. There are many “rewards” out there that are exclusive, just take a look at a any sports event. If you continue to misuse the term, you will continue to get inaccurate results.

You said that adding more exclusive rewards would bring in more players, those who don’t play GW2 now, but would at the promise of more exclusive rewards. I pointed out Wildstar, a game that made similar claims, that if they made a “hardcore, raid focused game” in 2015, that people would pour in to play it. I believe you have no basis for your claims that these people exist in sizable numbers. You assume that because you want something, there must be a lot of other people that want it, and that would come into the game if that thing were offered. I do not believe this is true. All you can fairly say is that if they made this change, you would be happier, several people in this thread would be happier, and that’s about it. You can continue to believe that a larger population would also prefer this change, but I do not share that belief, and would not act on it without more evidence.

And Wildstar and raids are still irrelevant, that’s why I asked “who said about raids”. You have no basis that these people do not exist in sizable numbers and you do not know if more people would come if they made that change, where is your evidence? I have this thread and MANY others about the failed reward system of this game, where it doesn’t feel at all rewarding. I have the DEVS themselves saying they want to improve how rewarding their game feels, I have the DEVS themselves saying the game is hard to keep players playing long term because there is a limited amount of things to go for. Where is your evidence on the contrary? Just because YOU say it won’t make a difference, doesn’t mean it won’t, because the evidence show the exact opposite.

Where is your evidence that there is a a massived groundswell of people that is upset that some skins are exclusive? GW2 had exclusive skins locked behind content from day one.

Because there have constantly been complaints about the more difficult to acquire exclusive skins. They tend to ebb and flow, no point belaboring an issue that isn’t changing, but it always comes up. I expect the topic of raid rewards to die down eventually as well, but that doesn’t mean that people stop being bothered by it, just that they don’t see the point in continuing to talk about it if nothing it changing.

There have been constantly complaints about the game not being rewarding too. Exclusive rewards = a rewarding game, non-exclusive rewards = a massive grind.

Ohoni.6057:

then the best course at this time would be providing exclusive legendary armor rewards across various gametypes, the skin unique to that mode. Given that they made that model behind the Legendary Backpieces (that we know of right now), its likely that raiding won’t be the only method to earn Legendary Armor.

Which is fine, if the thing you want is to “have Legendary Armor,” but is meaningless if the thing you want is to "have the appearance that they are giving to the raid Legendary Armor. "

That’s irrelevant, it was, it is, and will always be. This argument of yours is the most illogical and flawed of them all. When you stop using it, you might become a better person.

Putting exclusives behind content will bring a lot new players in, and this thread is proof that a lot of players WANT them, you can’t ignore that.

This thread is “proof” of nothing. There have mostly been less than a dozen people responding to the topic, myself being one of them, and while more of them have stood in opposition to me than have supported me, even in total it’s a VERY tiny number of people, and not at all a representative body of people. If ANet could get everybody in this thread 100% on board with what they were doing, it might pay for their coffee budget for a month.

It’s a fact that “some” players want what you want. At least enough to count off on the fingers of one hand, possibly even two. Are there more than that? Likely, sure, but how many more? Impossible to day. I know that there are people out there who prefer exclusives behind content, but how many of those people actually care enough about the rest of GW2 that it would draw them in, rather than they seek it out in some other game product? I think it’s a bad idea to speculate about “drawing players in” because there’s almost never any evidence to support these groups existing in reliable numbers, while the players actually playing the game are actually playing the game.

That’s not true. If everything is a grind you can’t get anything if you hate the grind, like most of the game is now and will be with your “proposal”.

That’s a facetious argument though, you’re just trying to demand a false equivalency that you cannot earn. Not being able to do something because you don’t want to do something is not the same thing as not being able to do something because you can’t do something. You’re abusing a play on words, at best. Now ideally you wouldn’t be expected to do anything that you don’t want to do either, and my proposal is the best possible compromise for that, because if you prefer to grind, you can grind, but if you don’t want to grind, you never have to grind, and you can just do the specific content and get the specific rewards as you like.

That’s not what rewards exist in a game. Let’s entice people by giving them free legendary items? Then IF they like it, they can get blues and greens? Does that make any sense to you?

You don’t typically need a Legendary item to act as enticement. No. If we’re using generic terms here, the idea would be that you would use, say, a unique exotic as an enticement. Run Shadow Behemoth a few times, get a Final Rest. It would be something interesting enough that you would go out of your way to get it, but not so fancy that it blows all other rewards out of the water.

Then after that, you would just earn progress towards other rewards. If you enjoyed that encounter, you could do it again, if you don’t, then you don’t have to do it again. It wouldn’t be blues and greens alone, it would be progress towards things like Legendaries, which would take many months if all you were doing was farming Shadow Behemoth, but it would be possible.

Do you understand?

For the record, I am NOT saying that Legendary Armor should just be a freebie casual reward for Raids, I’m just saying that either Legendary Armor should not be exclusive to raids at all, in that you’d never even have to set foot in one to earn it through hard work in an other area (although you could raid for them if that’s your choice), OR they make it so that you do have to dabble in raiding, just for a little bit, to unlock “something,” and that something would then allow you to either keep raiding for the armor, or go elsewhere to finish it up. The “something” would just be a seed, but you’d have to work to grow it into the final version, you wouldn’t just be handed the final version after minimal effort.

Again, any time you think to yourself “He’s trying to get the rewards with less effort, I’m going to straighten him out!” Stop, go back, you’ve made a mistake somewhere, figure out where and then post.

Let me ask you, even if you get that shinny raid legendary armor, how long will you keep it? Looks in this game are mostly in flux and you will change them often, if you “miss” one skin it won’t be the end of the world.

If that’s true, then why do you care so much about maintaining exclusive access? If you can demand a right to care, then obviously I can demand an equal right to care. And for the record, while I update my characters from time to time, some of them are still wearing pieces that they’ve had since their first day, and most are still wearing at least mostly stuff that they’ve had for a couple years now.

That’s why I think exclusive Outfits would be much more palatable than exclusive armor, because while I agree with you that if I got the Exclusive Armor handed to me tomorrow, likely none of my characters would be wearing the entire thing within six months, and honestly I doubt that any of them would ever wear the entire thing at once, but depending on how they look, I fully expect that several of them would be wearing at least 1-2 pieces of it for years to come. It’s like the Lumi set, where between ten characters, I’m wearing like ten pieces of it in total, spread between three of them. That doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t be upset at not having it at all.

Individual player wants are irrelevant when designing rewards, once you get this you won’t sound like a selfish spoiled brat who wants everything handed to them.

True, and the same applies to you, but what does matter is individual player wants in aggregate, what large groups of people agree they want, and while neither of us has direct evidence to support a mandate, I still fully believe that my side has more, and would pressure ANet to determine that using the tools only they have.

I call a reward what it is, a reward. A reward is something given or received in return for a service or deed rendered, it can be both exclusive and non-exclusive.

Right, and yet every time I refer to a non-exclusive reward system, you insist on “that’s not a reward.” I’m not saying that the definition of “rewards” can’t include exclusive ones, obviously they can. I’m saying that specific to this game of GW2, the best rewards shouldn’t be exclusive, and I personally don’t support them being so. I’m saying “exclusive rewards are a thing, but GW2 should avoid them.”

I have this thread and MANY others about the failed reward system of this game, where it doesn’t feel at all rewarding.

Which at most represent dozens, perhaps hundred of people in a game population in the hundreds of thousands. It doesn’t matter what the consensus of thread are, the numbers involved are still tiny and not representative. I don’t doubt your anecdotal evidence, I just doubt it’s relevance.

I have the DEVS themselves saying the game is hard to keep players playing long term because there is a limited amount of things to go for.

Actually, I’ll need you to cite that one, because the only time I heard devs talking about player retention, it was in regards to the mechanics being too confusing for new players at low levels so they had to dumb them down a bit.

Just because YOU say it won’t make a difference, doesn’t mean it won’t, because the evidence show the exact opposite.

“The evidence,” at the moment, shows absolutely nothing. There is no actual evidence, and won’t be until well after HoT comes out, and even then only if ANet releases any of the relevant numbers.

That’s irrelevant, it was, it is, and will always be. This argument of yours is the most illogical and flawed of them all. When you stop using it, you might become a better person.

And until you understand and accept as fact the point I am making there, you have no hope of understanding the conversation at hand.

Ohoni.6057:

This thread is “proof” of nothing.

Yes, so your entire crusade to change the game is meaningless if the thread isn’t “proof” of anything. There are fewer people that post here that agree with you than disagree with you so if you can prove nothing why are you still posting?

That’s a facetious argument though, you’re just trying to demand a false equivalency that you cannot earn. Not being able to do something because you don’t want to do something is not the same thing as not being able to do something because you can’t do something. You’re abusing a play on words, at best.

If I hate the grind then it means I can’t do it as much as if you are unskilled you can’t do hard content, EXACT SAME THING. If allI can is grind for the rewards then I will leave the game, if you have at least a little bit of experience on MMORPGs you’d know the phrase “korean grinder”. It’s not false equivalency, it’s the EXACT SAME THING.

You don’t typically need a Legendary item to act as enticement.

So anything “good” will be behind a massive grind, and some little skins will be exclusives, still I don’t agree with this, it doesn’t make any sense. If you get Final Rest from Shadow Behemoth easily, you remove a huge incentive to continue doing it.

Again, any time you think to yourself “He’s trying to get the rewards with less effort, I’m going to straighten him out!” Stop, go back, you’ve made a mistake somewhere, figure out where and then post.

Funny. When the subject of non-exclusives came up you said specifically that the “non-hard” method shouldn’t require much more time to achieve the same results as the “hard” method, which is exactly the same as “I want rewards with less effort”. Or you forgot already your own posts? Look in your history, in your mess of multi quotes and you will find them.

If that’s true, then why do you care so much about maintaining exclusive access?

If that’s true, then why not?

True, and the same applies to you, but what does matter is individual player wants in aggregate, what large groups of people agree they want, and while neither of us has direct evidence to support a mandate, I still fully believe that my side has more, and would pressure ANet to determine that using the tools only they have.

No it doesn’t apply to me, you are the only selfish spoiled brat here. Individual player wants don’t matter at all when designing video game rewards. Simple as that no matter what you say. Even if your side has “more” it still doesn’t make it right, you are discriminating against a way of thinking and a way of dealing with rewards while not accepting the simple compromise presented to you.

I’m saying “exclusive rewards are a thing, but GW2 should avoid them.”

No, it’s the opposite, exclusive rewards are a thing, and GW2 should embrace them and add even more of those.

Which at most represent dozens, perhaps hundred of people in a game population in the hundreds of thousands. It doesn’t matter what the consensus of thread are, the numbers involved are still tiny and not representative. I don’t doubt your anecdotal evidence, I just doubt it’s relevance.

Then your “my side is larger” is also irrelevant so your entire crusade in this thread is meaningless. So why are you still posting?

Actually, I’ll need you to cite that one, because the only time I heard devs talking about player retention, it was in regards to the mechanics being too confusing for new players at low levels so they had to dumb them down a bit.

No. It was about not having anything cool to go for, that’s why they introduced the Ascended tier.

Just because YOU say it won’t make a difference, doesn’t mean it won’t, because the evidence show the exact opposite.

“The evidence,” at the moment, shows absolutely nothing. There is no actual evidence, and won’t be until well after HoT comes out, and even then only if ANet releases any of the relevant numbers.

Dev quotes are enough evidence.

That’s irrelevant, it was, it is, and will always be. This argument of yours is the most illogical and flawed of them all. When you stop using it, you might become a better person.

And until you understand and accept as fact the point I am making there, you have no hope of understanding the conversation at hand.

It’s not a fact so there is nothing for me to understand. if you finally get that your entire argument is flawed and illogical you will finally begin understanding the conversation at hand and accept the compromise presented to you. Until then you can live in your high fantasy.

Yes, so your entire crusade to change the game is meaningless if the thread isn’t “proof” of anything. There are fewer people that post here that agree with you than disagree with you so if you can prove nothing why are you still posting?

Nike asked that like five pages ago. The answer remains true.

If I hate the grind then it means I can’t do it as much as if you are unskilled you can’t do hard content, EXACT SAME THING

No, it is not remotely the same thing. Not looking at something because you choose not to look at it is NOT the same thing as not looking at it because you’re actually blind. I don’t even understand why you are persisting on this nonsense non-point.

If allI can is grind for the rewards then I will leave the game, if you have at least a little bit of experience on MMORPGs you’d know the phrase “korean grinder”.

And that’s your choice, I’m in no way defending or supporting grind, but if it’s there then you have the choice to either engage it or not, and no matter how you feel compelled on the matter it still is your choice how to react, and a completely different thing than if you have no choice at all. I am not saying that you aren’t entitled to not enjoy grind, and to seek alternatives to it. I totally support you on that, I’m just saying, it is a different thing than content that you would actually be physically incapable of passing, however much you attempt to hyperbolize the issue.

So anything “good” will be behind a massive grind, and some little skins will be exclusives, still I don’t agree with this, it doesn’t make any sense. If you get Final Rest from Shadow Behemoth easily, you remove a huge incentive to continue doing it.

The incentive to keep doing it is to earn better rewards, things like other fancy skins, Legendary Armors, all the other stuff that’s in the game, the same rewards you’re currently chasing. If Shadow Behemoth is how you choose to pursue those, or a part of it at least, then that can be your path. If you’d prefer some other path, that’s fine too.

Funny. When the subject of non-exclusives came up you said specifically that the “non-hard” method shouldn’t require much more time to achieve the same results as the “hard” method, which is exactly the same as “I want rewards with less effort”. Or you forgot already your own posts? Look in your history, in your mess of multi quotes and you will find them.

I said it should take equivalent effort. That doesn’t mean it would take way longer. If you have fun running a raid for two hours that doesn’t make you superior to someone who fights world bosses for two hours, it just means you like different stuff. The more complex content can offer a slightly higher rate of reward, to balance out that it takes more organizational hassles around the edges, but overall they should be closer than they are far apart. You would still have to put in your time and effort though, whichever activities you choose.

No it doesn’t apply to me, you are the only selfish spoiled brat here.

No, you’re being no less selfish, just applied in the opposite direction. You are fighting to defend the things you personally care about no less vigorously than I fight to defend what I care about, and you’re right, our personal feelings on the matter are largely irrelevant. What does matter is the aggregate opinions of the overall playerbase.

Individual player wants don’t matter at all when designing video game rewards.

Individual player wants are the ONLY thing that matters when designing game rewards. If you design rewards that nobody actually wants then they have no value to them and do not serve any purpose.

[quote][quote][quote][quote][quote][quote][quote][quote]

maddoctor.2738:

There have been constantly complaints about the game not being rewarding too. Exclusive rewards = a rewarding game, non-exclusive rewards = a massive grind.

Heh, you make here a nice leap between the first and second sentence.

Yes, there have been constantly complains about the game not being rewarding enough, but if you look closer, you will see that mostly those are complains about the quantity, not exclusivity, and complains about exclusivity are for both sides. With most of those being about not getting something because it is locked beyond content player do not play, not the other way around.

How from this you got to your second part, i have no idea.

maddoctor.2738:

That’s irrelevant, it was, it is, and will always be. This argument of yours is the most illogical and flawed of them all.

It’s irrelevant to you, because you, personally, do not understand that logic. That doesn’t mean it’s illogical in general or irrelevant to others.

Ohoni.6057:

Because there have constantly been complaints about the more difficult to acquire exclusive skins.

By a vocal minority on the forums, you said to me a few pages ago i can’t prove that many people want raids of a vocal minority asking them on the forums, so only you can use the forums in your advantage right? You are using 2 standards to justify your claims and devalue mine.

Ohoni.6057

By that logic, anyone who accomplished something and then boasts about it is just doing it to be happy about others not being able to do so.

That is generally the nature of boastfulness, yes. Has anyone ever boasted about something when they were the last person to do it?

You’re confusing boasting with gloating. And yes people definitely boast about their own accomplishments with pride even if they are the last person. Taking pride in ones own accomplishments is nothing wrong with and proudly representing that accomplishment in the shape of an armor skin is definitely something that people like to do.
I understand that not being able to get that skin and or being confronted with that CAN be frustrating but there’s also people who can accept that and actually be happy for other people when they make something. Even if you already have that reward you can help someone else with it and be proud about the shared accomplishment.

Ohoni.6057:

If I hate the grind then it means I can’t do it as much as if you are unskilled you can’t do hard content, EXACT SAME THING

No, it is not remotely the same thing. Not looking at something because you choose not to look at it is NOT the same thing as not looking at it because you’re actually blind. I don’t even understand why you are persisting on this nonsense non-point.

I persist because it’s the exact same thing, I don’t understand why you still don’t get it. Not able to do something because it’s against my belief is even worse than not doing it because I resigned and think I’m unskilled to do it.

Your blindness example is bad, someone who is unskilled now, might become skilled later, there is nothing actually impossible (vs seeing again after being blind), you can train to get better, you can improve yourself, you can actually finish that hard content if you put some more effort into it. Being “unskilled” enough is your own perception and your own fault. If others can do it, so can you.

That’s why there are ways to make a Raid more accessible for different skill levels:
*Put the exclusive rewards behind specific bosses, and not only the last one, so you don’t have to do the whole thing (helps with the time problem)
*Make all Wings accessible in any order, so you can go for the Wing/boss you want and once again, don’t have to do the entire thing. (what’s the point of Wings otherwise?)
*Make the raid require different roles to succeed, in the example of the encounter with the platform and the gliders, if you aren’t good at reflexes to stay afloat, you will go with the bunker role that will tank the boss, if you aren’t good at cd management, you will try the glider. If all encounters require a good amount of roles they can appeal to lots of different play styles and even skill levels. The devs specified the need for some form of tanking in the raid, so that’s a unique role not available anywhere but sPVP atm.

That’s for the skill part. On the other hand, no amount of training or getting better will help if you fundamentally oppose something as a principle. You will just don’t do it and if the game is full of it, it’s time to look for a new game. If it’s only grind or luck and you hate those, you will never in your entire life do it. It’s the same thing if you are completely against challenging content, you won’t do it because you don’t like the idea of having to put effort in a video game, not because you aren’t skilled enough. Those two are separate.

Funny. When the subject of non-exclusives came up you said specifically that the “non-hard” method shouldn’t require much more time to achieve the same results as the “hard” method, which is exactly the same as “I want rewards with less effort”. Or you forgot already your own posts? Look in your history, in your mess of multi quotes and you will find them.

I said it should take equivalent effort.

So you DO want rewards with less effort. Got it.

“Equivalent effort” is just an impossibility because effort means different things for different players. A player with skill100 will put 100points of effort to get what he wants, a player with skill50 will need to put 200 points of effort to get the same thing. So how exactly do you count effort (and skill for that matter)? And please don’t say “time”.

Individual player wants don’t matter at all when designing video game rewards.

Individual player wants are the ONLY thing that matters when designing game rewards. If you design rewards that nobody actually wants then they have no value to them and do not serve any purpose.

We’ve already been through this and going in a circle. Individual player wants do not matter as far as exclusives are concerned. It’s the entire playerbase that matters and if you can get the vast majority of what you want by doing any type of content. Then you put a select few behind exclusive content to cater to the other side, having a small amount of items that way is in no way invalidating the fact that the majority is not exclusive. Therefore, by using let’s say 90/10 percentage you appeal to both, which is the compromise. Individual players that might want that 10% is irrelevant, unless you can prove that the entire playerbase wants that 10%

Then your “my side is larger” is also irrelevant so your entire crusade in this thread is meaningless. So why are you still posting?

Presumably the same reason you are.

I post because you do.

Fox.3469:

Ohoni.6057:

Because there have constantly been complaints about the more difficult to acquire exclusive skins.

By a vocal minority on the forums, you said to me a few pages ago i can’t prove that many people want raids of a vocal minority asking them on the forums, so only you can use the forums in your advantage right? You are using 2 standards to justify your claims and devalue mine.

If it supports his argument then the vocal forum minority exists and has merit, if it’s against his argument then the vocal forum minority doesn’t exist and holds no merit.

Astralporing.1957:

maddoctor.2738:

There have been constantly complaints about the game not being rewarding too. Exclusive rewards = a rewarding game, non-exclusive rewards = a massive grind.

Heh, you make here a nice leap between the first and second sentence.

Yes, there have been constantly complains about the game not being rewarding enough, but if you look closer, you will see that mostly those are complains about the quantity, not exclusivity, and complains about exclusivity are for both sides. With most of those being about not getting something because it is locked beyond content player do not play, not the other way around.

How from this you got to your second part, i have no idea.

Well, the complains usually did not really specify it and mainly said the game did feel unrewarded but yeah, in also many just asked for more or better rewards, and I dear to say people making those complains where just wrong.. they did feel unrewarded so asked for more or better rewards..

Anet give them exactly that! People still did feel unrewarded so Anet added even more.

These days you get rewards for logging in (I remember threads where people talked about rewards where this option was brought up as a joke.. an honestly, a reward for logging in is a joke), and when doing any content, you bags are getting filled up with bags full of stuff.

I have never ever played any game that did gave you so many ‘rewards’. It’s come to a point, that collecting all the rewards is giving you carpal tunnel syndrome.

Yet it dome not feel rewarding.. Why.. Let me show you why:
Rewarding: http://cdn3.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/jaT4eqKJWbfQYwxWtaaxnumwuW4=/0x250:5274x3217/1600x900/cdn0.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/46680134/usa-today-8682481.0.jpg

Not rewarding: http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02396/VietnameseDong_2396164k.jpg

Rewarding: http://snd1.splashpress1.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/germany_lucky_number_7.jpg

Not rewarding: http://famouswonders.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/cambodian-riel.jpg

Quantity does not mean a d@mm thing. The more you give of something, the leas it’s value per piece. Exclusivity does mean something.

And again, if you lock specific rewards behind specific content all over the place. Most items will be available for people, but for those who like / are good in JP’s the exclusive JP rewards would be the wants they would / could go for while the raid-players have they rewards.

Fox.3469:

Ohoni.6057:

Because there have constantly been complaints about the more difficult to acquire exclusive skins.

By a vocal minority on the forums, you said to me a few pages ago i can’t prove that many people want raids of a vocal minority asking them on the forums, so only you can use the forums in your advantage right? You are using 2 standards to justify your claims and devalue mine.

Not to mention that I have not seen many of those complains.. heck the content with those rewards, Liadri, SAB, MF have mainly been applauded and has been use as examples we should get more of, or that should come back.

So the contrary seems to be true.

maddoctor.2738:

We’ve already been through this and going in a circle. Individual player wants do not matter as far as exclusives are concerned. It’s the entire playerbase that matters and if you can get the vast majority of what you want by doing any type of content. Then you put a select few behind exclusive content to cater to the other side, having a small amount of items that way is in no way invalidating the fact that the majority is not exclusive. Therefore, by using let’s say 90/10 percentage you appeal to both, which is the compromise. Individual players that might want that 10% is irrelevant, unless you can prove that the entire playerbase wants that 10%

Just for the record.. I find 90 / 10 unacceptably low. 50/50 is the least we need. The reason why 90/10 does not work is also simple.. If you like to hunt and collect items.. with 90/10 is means (let’s take mini’s as example) you would be able to collect 10% by doing the hunt you like.. but to get even close to getting the full collection you would still have to grind, grind, grind for 90%.. What really means you lose interest in the collection as total.

So for people who like to hunt and collect some rewards this is unacceptable low.

Devata.6589:

maddoctor.2738:

We’ve already been through this and going in a circle. Individual player wants do not matter as far as exclusives are concerned. It’s the entire playerbase that matters and if you can get the vast majority of what you want by doing any type of content. Then you put a select few behind exclusive content to cater to the other side, having a small amount of items that way is in no way invalidating the fact that the majority is not exclusive. Therefore, by using let’s say 90/10 percentage you appeal to both, which is the compromise. Individual players that might want that 10% is irrelevant, unless you can prove that the entire playerbase wants that 10%

Just for the record.. I find 90 / 10 unacceptably low. 50/50 is the least we need. The reason why 90/10 does not work is also simple.. If you like to hunt and collect items.. with 90/10 is means (let’s take mini’s as example) you would be able to collect 10% by doing the hunt you like.. but to get even close to getting the full collection you would still have to grind, grind, grind for 90%.. What really means you lose interest in the collection as total.

So for people who like to hunt and collect some rewards this is unacceptable low.

50/50 is impossible thanks to the gem store, gem store rewards require only gold so it’s a non-exclusive reward. I think it’s a bit unreasonable to have exclusive rewards equal to the amount of gem store items. If you don’t count the gem store then 50/50 is doable

maddoctor.2738:

Devata.6589:

maddoctor.2738:

We’ve already been through this and going in a circle. Individual player wants do not matter as far as exclusives are concerned. It’s the entire playerbase that matters and if you can get the vast majority of what you want by doing any type of content. Then you put a select few behind exclusive content to cater to the other side, having a small amount of items that way is in no way invalidating the fact that the majority is not exclusive. Therefore, by using let’s say 90/10 percentage you appeal to both, which is the compromise. Individual players that might want that 10% is irrelevant, unless you can prove that the entire playerbase wants that 10%

Just for the record.. I find 90 / 10 unacceptably low. 50/50 is the least we need. The reason why 90/10 does not work is also simple.. If you like to hunt and collect items.. with 90/10 is means (let’s take mini’s as example) you would be able to collect 10% by doing the hunt you like.. but to get even close to getting the full collection you would still have to grind, grind, grind for 90%.. What really means you lose interest in the collection as total.

So for people who like to hunt and collect some rewards this is unacceptable low.

50/50 is impossible thanks to the gem store, gem store rewards require only gold so it’s a non-exclusive reward. I think it’s a bit unreasonable to have exclusive rewards equal to the amount of gem store items. If you don’t count the gem store then 50/50 is doable

“I think it’s a bit unreasonable to have exclusive rewards equal to the amount of gem store items.” I think it’s unreasonable to have 50% of the items in the gem-store.. especially for a B2P game.. Don’t forget, this is a B2P game, not a F2P game something Mike mentioned multiple times in the last Pax reveal.. He said they try to sell the games, or expansion in this case.

That means there is less need to selling stuff in the gem-store.

The reason the reward system in GW2 is as it is, is imho for a big part because of to much focus on the cash-shop the last 2,5 years. (What was the result of the LS approach vs expansion approach as they did in GW1).

So if this is the underlaying problem.. not wanting to touch that means you will not be able to get a good system. 50/50 is imho simply the least you need to get a interesting, fun and rewarding game. And not only that, it also means the hardest content should reward you better skins.. Not having the best skins being sold / grinded and having some lesser looking ones behind challenging content.. that does not feels rewarding, that feels unfair tbo.

I know the cash/shop is the biggest problem to get this solved (get to at least 50/50) but that does not mean it should then be ignored. Anet did try to solve the problem they had with rewarding and it failed because they try to work around this. And I don’t think it’s an unreasonable thing to ask because again.. I say it again: this is supposed to be a B2P game, something Anet’s president talked about during the last major presentation (so while it looks they stepped away from that, they are back on that idea now). If this was a real F2P game (what it’s not) then you had a point and asking this would be unreasonable. But now it’s not.