Is the game any challenging again?

Is the game any challenging again?

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Kethian.4259

Kethian.4259

I’ve fallen in love with Guild Wars 2 since beta.
I played it like hell when it was released.

Unfortunately, most of my friends quit, as they didn’t find end game content interesting for them. So I quit as well after some point. I wasn’t happy with playing alone.

I did a second shot later on. But than, I was struck with how casual the game became. First thing I’ve done after return, was the last instance to kill Zhaitan.

I was in shock with how boring and unsatisfying it became…
I uninstalled it again. Wasn’t interested in the game aimed for difficulty and complexity od 12 year old kids.

Few months passed… Yesterday I was in the cinema to see WarCraft movie. With the ticket, I got a coupon for WoW. I reactivated my account, and played it today for one hour. It was such a disgrace, that I uninstalling it right now. They made it Diablo-style when You can randomly press any buttons, and You will still finish the instance without a problem…

So I made another look on Heart of Thorns.

Is it worth to buy it for me, if I look for some challenging experience like original instances of Guild Wars 2 or it’s going the same direction like all the other titles…?

Thanks for replies!

Is the game any challenging again?

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Randulf.7614

Randulf.7614

Heart of Thorns brought the difficulty level up with both open world and the introduction of raids.

I haven;t raided, but my understanding is the raid community appear to be happy with the difficulty level and where it is at.

Open World will garner mixed responses. Many will say it’s unplayable, many will say it’s much improved.

The truth is, you can’t simply run through, spamming 1 anymore. There is a learning curve from the core content and it has caught some players out. Mobs have a greater range of attacks and maneuvers and can hit a lot harder, so knowing your skills and the various ways to mitigate damage are what make the maps playable.

The story instances aren’t quite as tough as open World but since the start of Season 2, they are (in my opinion) vastly improved in terms of gameplay, mechanics and balance of difficulty compared to a hugely lacklustre personal story, which never made any attempt to challenge the player.

tdlr the difficulty bar has been raised, but opnion varies as to by how much

Is the game any challenging again?

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Sir Alric.5078

Sir Alric.5078

Well, even though it has been nerfed (it was harder at launch) HoT is still a lot more difficult than Core Tyria, that’s for sure. Almost all mobs in the jungle can easily kill you if you don’t know how to counter them.

Is the game any challenging again?

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Healix.5819

Healix.5819

The difficulty of HoT can vary greatly depending on how you play. If you play one of the easier professions, like necromancer or ranger, you’re going to find it fairly easy. If you play something like a zerker dagger elementalist or thief however, you’re going to find HoT rather deadly. HoT features a lot of anti-melee enemies, and with only ~11k health, you can easily be killed within seconds by a lot of things. Most enemies are basically zerkers; dealing much higher damage at the cost of health. A lot of enemies for example deal 2-4k damage every second or two, while some deal 10k+ with slower attacks, but they only have maybe 10-50k health. Most of the challenge can however be skipped as you’re not actually required to face any of it and the stronger enemies are already nerfed during the story, plus you have an NPC team to help you.

If you want it to be however, HoT can still be a 1 button spammer if you only zerg around and group for solo content like a lot of people. At the very least however, HoT was definitely not balanced for the casual majority like almost every other MMO is. HoT’s map design is also fairly complex, so if you don’t like legitimately exploring, you’ll likely find navigating HoT very annoying.

GW2 has a 30-day refund policy if you buy it from their own store, and HoT comes with a level 80 booster, so you could just try it for yourself. Make a new account though.

Is the game any challenging again?

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Enko.6123

Enko.6123

The Zhaitan fight at the end of your personal story is not end game so that’s not a something to use as an indicator. Try raids out or if you don’t have HoT, fractals and dungeons.

Is the game any challenging again?

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: ImTasty.2163

ImTasty.2163

I’ve fallen in love with Guild Wars 2 since beta.
I played it like hell when it was released.

Unfortunately, most of my friends quit, as they didn’t find end game content interesting for them. So I quit as well after some point. I wasn’t happy with playing alone.

I did a second shot later on. But than, I was struck with how casual the game became. First thing I’ve done after return, was the last instance to kill Zhaitan.

I was in shock with how boring and unsatisfying it became…
I uninstalled it again. Wasn’t interested in the game aimed for difficulty and complexity od 12 year old kids.

Few months passed… Yesterday I was in the cinema to see WarCraft movie. With the ticket, I got a coupon for WoW. I reactivated my account, and played it today for one hour. It was such a disgrace, that I uninstalling it right now. They made it Diablo-style when You can randomly press any buttons, and You will still finish the instance without a problem…

So I made another look on Heart of Thorns.

Is it worth to buy it for me, if I look for some challenging experience like original instances of Guild Wars 2 or it’s going the same direction like all the other titles…?

Thanks for replies!

Some of the challenge has returned. It’s not back to the “dodge-or-die” style it was during the original gw2 beta but it’s not a “stand in one spot and AA everything to death” style either.

I know some people say that certain classes are easier to take through the jungle but I don’t see. I’ve ran through the jungle with all professions and if you know what you’re doing it’s not too bad. The biggest thing you have to keep an eye out for is the white text beneath the mobs health. That text will tell you everything you need to know about the fight. For example, there is this one frog enemy(I think called shadowleapers). The text will tell you the evade range attacks so if you are going full range and no melee you will have a hard time with them.

Another thing is be ready with some CC. With breakbars introduced there are quite a few bosses/strong enemies that can either be a walk in the park or a hellish nightmare if you don’t break them. A good example of this are the legendary wyvern fights scattered throughout the jungle. If you don’t break them before they fly off the fight becomes longer and a lot harder because they will spew out these trails of fire that last for a long time and makes it harder to move around/dodge other attacks.

Is the game any challenging again?

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: dekou.6012

dekou.6012

The Zhaitan fight has always been awful, so nothing’s changed there. The only difference is that it’s soloable now.

Is the game any challenging again?

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: domness.6719

domness.6719

The HoT expansion brings Raids to the table, and to be honest, they are some of the best “challenging” content. They may not be the hardest/most challenging, but they are pretty fun and well made. If that’s the kind of thing you’re into, then I’d heavily suggest getting HoT just for that. This Tuesday ANet is releasing the 3rd and final wing to the 1st Raid, and I hope many more will come in the future.

[OP] Optimise

Is the game any challenging again?

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Kethian.4259

Kethian.4259

I think I will give it a shot!
Thanks for replies!