Guild Wars 2

New to guild wars 2. Been playing the last week leveling up a warrior through the main story line and base game. I was having a blast, great story line and fun interactions. I even enjoyed the new take on some of the quests and how you could do a quest a few different ways. Last night I gave Zhaitan a beat down and was hyped to jump into the next story line and expansion. I had NO problems at all through the main game.

Then today happened. I get into the new heart of thorns zones and right away the first thing that hit me is how GOD AWEFUL and annoying the layout and design of the zone was. this set a horrible tone. I get that it was trying to force the use of the glider and whatever bogus mushroom crap is in the game but it was FAR too forced. Its more annoying than its fun.

I start up my SOLO play story line. Let me say this again.. SOLO PLAY Story line. To find out that not only do the NPCs get absolutely annihilated leaving you alone to fight 15+ mobs, but you yourself get zerg gibbed in 2 seconds. Yes i dodged, Yes i tried to avoid everything. At some point you have to try and hit them and thats when you get gibbed.

After dying and grinding my way through a few solo missions and getting to the point where I had to defend the frog village only to once again have every single npc dead within seconds and dying over and over i gave up.

The SOLO PLAY story line is simply not designed properly. Its garbage. And thats it for me, I was COMPLETELY enjoying the game .. right up until the expansion. Solo play is just not balanced properly.

I always wondered why more people dont play this game. Now i know.

The game is not for everyone sorry to see you go

To be honest, you might want to spend some time learning your preferred profession a bit better before moving on to HoT. The content in the core game doesnt really teach you much about playing well. HoT is supposed to be more challenging for play by those who have a better handle on their characters.

Ashen.2907:

To be honest, you might want to spend some time learning your preferred profession a bit better before moving on to HoT. The content in the core game doesnt really teach you much about playing well. HoT is supposed to be more challenging for play by those who have a better handle on their characters.

True that. It is not that hard as you think it is, do some dungeons or fractals or even taste some PvP to better understand how to work with your class.

To clarify, my post was not meant to be a dismissive L2P jab, I hope it isnt taken that way. But, the reality is that HoT was released to challenge people who had been playing for years. I dont think that it will take very long for even a new player to adapt to the expansion content, but some degree of adaption will be necessary.

Perhaps posting build and gear might allow others to give advice?

I understand what the OP is complaining about.

When the expansion was released, the game was already played for quite some time for old players. Most of the content was trivialized so there was a natural demand for more challenging content. That’s why you see a jump in difficulty.

But I don’t think it is so difficult that you can’t even solo progress your personal story. I suggest you take some time figuring your profession skills/traits/gear. Go to the profession forum. Many of us would be happy to provide some suggestion and help.

The story can be played on any profession solo (though the last fight of the last story will be pretty challenging and may take several tries).

That said, there is no reason why you can’t solo the story. I’m kitten year old guy with arthritis in my shoulder neck and back and I can solo the story on every profession.

What you can’t do is assume that you can solo the story on the first shot without really knowing your profession.

Saying you can’t solo the story is incorrect. You just need to learn your profession better and also figure out how to use things like terrain and positioning to make fights easier.

Hint: If you insist on meleeing and running into the center of everything you’re absolutely going to die some of the time. Make sure one of your weapons as a warrior is a longbow, or rifle, and learn to stand on the outside and pull enemies to you in smaller groups. Be strategic. Learn to move around corners, so archers can’t hit you.

Learn to read tells and dodge.

It’s not hard to do. But you can’t play end game content in most games the way you handle the open world.

Ashen.2907:

To be honest, you might want to spend some time learning your preferred profession a bit better before moving on to HoT. The content in the core game doesnt really teach you much about playing well. HoT is supposed to be more challenging for play by those who have a better handle on their characters.

Leveling a character to 80 and through the entire Personal Story should teach you all you need to know. If it isn’t, that is Anet’s fault.

Also, where did Anet state that HoT was supposed to be for those who were better players? I don’t remember seeing that at all.

Ashen.2907:

To clarify, my post was not meant to be a dismissive L2P jab, I hope it isnt taken that way.

LOL!

Just to offset the kneejerk GW2 defenders, I want to support the OP (if he’s still reading) with the information that I have been playing this game since Beta and I also had a lot of difficulty with the HoT storyline. At the point that I started HoT I had leveled 7 different characters to 80.

OP, keep in mind that those who think there is no problem either think that because they are naturally good at playing / making their characters “meta”, or they have played the game so much that they became good. Not all GW2 players are in that same situation even if the “defenders” would have you believe it.

the solution to your quandary Op is to have the end game quest line solo-able with no effort for players who have been playing a couple of weeks? that’s not going to be fun for very long is it, in fact it sounds like a game for a young child. the final quest line is easily solo able, and once you get a grip of your skills you can annihilate huge swathes of enemies in HOT and solo champs (and its satisfying because you used your skill and knowledge to beat the odds)

May be worth looking at WOW, the model there is setup so the content makes sure it balances itself to be easy with guaranteed daily progress regardless of skill – worth a shout.

I soloed the story on most of the classes already, but I fully see the OPs point. The story mode dungeons and the story mode quests seriously need a bump to your companions. They need to be able to tank hits, dodge, and anihilate enemies just as well as any player playing at PEAK efficiency. IE…if you can solo the content without companions, the companions should be able to solo it without you. This is STORY content, if you want a challenge you don’t look for it int he story…ever. The story should be enjoyed by everyone regardless of skill level. As it is story. If you want a challenge you should be looking for it in non-story areas of any game.

vesica tempestas.1563:

the solution to your quandary Op is to have the end game quest line solo-able with no effort for players who have been playing a couple of weeks? that’s not going to be fun for very long is it, in fact it sounds like a game for a young child. the final quest line is easily solo able, and once you get a grip of your skills you can annihilate huge swathes of enemies in HOT and solo champs (and its satisfying because you used your skill and knowledge to beat the odds)

May be worth looking at WOW, the model there is setup so the content makes sure it balances itself to be easy with guaranteed daily progress regardless of skill – worth a shout.

The vast majority of players cannot solo champions in HoT. I don’t know why you would say that.

Runiir.6425:

I soloed the story on most of the classes already, but I fully see the OPs point. The story mode dungeons and the story mode quests seriously need a bump to your companions. They need to be able to tank hits, dodge, and anihilate enemies just as well as any player playing at PEAK efficiency. IE…if you can solo the content without companions, the companions should be able to solo it without you. This is STORY content, if you want a challenge you don’t look for it int he story…ever. The story should be enjoyed by everyone regardless of skill level. As it is story. If you want a challenge you should be looking for it in non-story areas of any game.

Great points. As it is I have not seen any completed story because I don’t find the difficulty fun.

Djinn.9245:

Ashen.2907:

To be honest, you might want to spend some time learning your preferred profession a bit better before moving on to HoT. The content in the core game doesnt really teach you much about playing well. HoT is supposed to be more challenging for play by those who have a better handle on their characters.

Leveling a character to 80 and through the entire Personal Story should teach you all you need to know. If it isn’t, that is Anet’s fault.

Also, where did Anet state that HoT was supposed to be for those who were better players? I don’t remember seeing that at all.

Anet has stated many times they design their content to be for a continually more skilled playerbase. It’s not just one post it’s one of their design tenets. And it would be a great one, were it not for:

1. They never design content made to improve players. You can’t have better players until you make content that makes better players, and most of GW2s content teaches nothing. And then the developers have the gall to knock the idea of tutorials when they released the NPE.

2. They frequently make content which punishes you for properly executing what little the game does teach. The entirety of HoT is the biggest example, it throws everything the base game taught you about positioning, dodging, scaling, interrupts and a dozen other mechanics back in your face and then calls you an idiot for not knowing what you’re doing.

3. What they define as skilled content, doesn’t even require more skill in the first place! Most of it just ends up being harsher stat/skill/trait requirements, shorter timers, and more people. That’s not a higher skill requirement, that’s escalation and power creep. The only real increase in skill is preservation and proper timing of your dodges, which is a largely binary and uncompelling system that doesn’t feel rewarding to improve in, it just feels like you are being punished slightly less.

Djinn.9245:

vesica tempestas.1563:

the solution to your quandary Op is to have the end game quest line solo-able with no effort for players who have been playing a couple of weeks? that’s not going to be fun for very long is it, in fact it sounds like a game for a young child. the final quest line is easily solo able, and once you get a grip of your skills you can annihilate huge swathes of enemies in HOT and solo champs (and its satisfying because you used your skill and knowledge to beat the odds)

May be worth looking at WOW, the model there is setup so the content makes sure it balances itself to be easy with guaranteed daily progress regardless of skill – worth a shout.

The vast majority of players cannot solo champions in HoT. I don’t know why you would say that.

you don’t need to, its a mmorpg and champs are for groups, but its clearly doable since lots of people do it. The reason i said it is that i’m a casual player playing a squishy ele, probably average skill and i can do it, ergo other people can. Re the final story chain the vast majority have completed it, so you either design for the vast majority or you design for the minority (who will eventually skill up anyway over time).

Djinn.9245:

Just to offset the kneejerk GW2 defenders, I want to support the OP (if he’s still reading) with the information that I have been playing this game since Beta and I also had a lot of difficulty with the HoT storyline. At the point that I started HoT I had leveled 7 different characters to 80.

OP, keep in mind that those who think there is no problem either think that because they are naturally good at playing / making their characters “meta”, or they have played the game so much that they became good. Not all GW2 players are in that same situation even if the “defenders” would have you believe it.

Allow me to counter the kneejerk haters among us…

To give you another perspective, I had a similar experience when I reached HoT. I was brand new to the game and had just leveled up my first 80 with no trouble at all. Those first few days I died A LOT. Looking back on that, I’m amazed at how far I’ve come.

Initially, I said pretty much the same things you’re saying. I complained to my guild that I could dodge just fine, but eventually I had to get in there and deal damage and that’s when I’d get killed. There are too many enemies. They’re too strong. I don’t have the tools, the health, or the armor to handle them. Not with the class I’m using. No way, no how!

I still feel this way to some extent when I level up a new class. However, having done this several times now I know that it takes me a bit to find my comfort zone. Knowing that, I don’t get frustrated. I just keep practicing and making tweaks (weapons, gear stats, traits) until I come up with something that feels right to me. And when I do I can literally do the impossible (or at least, what I remember my new player self claiming with absolute certainty was completely impossible!).

Maybe you’re a hopeless case, but I doubt it.

OP, you might try Dry Top and The Silverwastes (and/or Living World Season 2) before venturing on to the Heart of Thorns maps. That might prepare you a bit more for the increased difficulties.

Good luck.

Djinn.9245:

Ashen.2907:

To be honest, you might want to spend some time learning your preferred profession a bit better before moving on to HoT. The content in the core game doesnt really teach you much about playing well. HoT is supposed to be more challenging for play by those who have a better handle on their characters.

Leveling a character to 80 and through the entire Personal Story should teach you all you need to know. If it isn’t, that is Anet’s fault.

Also, where did Anet state that HoT was supposed to be for those who were better players? I don’t remember seeing that at all.

They stated repeatedly that HoT would be more challenging than much core content. It is. Its not a matter of the expansion being meant for, “better players,” as you suggest (not what I said) but rather that it is likely to be more manageable for players who have a better handle on their character than someone who just started the game a week or two ago.

That said, I agree that the core game does not do a particularly good job preparing players for increased difficulty.

Djinn.9245:

Just to offset the kneejerk GW2 defenders, I want to support the OP (if he’s still reading) with the information that I have been playing this game since Beta and I also had a lot of difficulty with the HoT storyline. At the point that I started HoT I had leveled 7 different characters to 80.

OP, keep in mind that those who think there is no problem either think that because they are naturally good at playing / making their characters “meta”, or they have played the game so much that they became good. Not all GW2 players are in that same situation even if the “defenders” would have you believe it.

I cleared everything in HoT on a Valkyrie GS/staff necro, marauder PP/SB theif, and zerk Flamethrower(not even juggernaut traited) engi. Solo. I died thousands of times. And never once did i think it was because the game was ‘too hard’. I always knew where i could have done something better.

The problem isn’t being ‘meta’. The problem is people choosing things they like, with no idea how they operate or synergize with the class. Then run in expecting to excel because they have a few exotics. I’m sorry but this is not that game.

There is no reason why I should be able to fight a bloodstone ele, without getting hit by a single exploding mini elemental, while a Daredevil is lying on the floor beside me, and I’m RESSING him, and still not getting hit by the explosions.

How many players pay enough attention to dodge two attacks at once with one dodge in pve? Not many. But those are the kinds of tricks that let you live longer.

Most of this game is ‘game knowledge’. It has nothing to do with being meta. Not a single stat type I listed is or ever has been meta for the corresponding classes. Not a single one of those has ever seen ESl or Raid play even. Some players are just naturally good at learning. You have effectively stated that the problem is people not learning. Which is the problem of those players.

How on earth can you blame Anet for their short comings?

Here is my rice grain on this topic. Back when HoT came around i was a fresh 80 on my guardian, and yes, i did feel the difficulty increase. If you don’t know what you’re doing it can feel like switching from skyrim to dark souls.
The story is soloable, and traversing through the areas shouldnt be that bad
(except tangled depths, that place is like navigating through spaghetti)

These are my tips if you’re having a hard time:

1. Get more people to run with you.
   I know you were talking about the content needing to be soloable, it is. But you can always ask for help. Find someone to run around with you or stick to groups, they make life much easier.
2. Get exotic or ascended gear.
   Gear isnt everything, but it helps.
3. Learn that running is not always an option
   Things will chase you and shoot you down, you cannot always run. If youre going to attempt running, make sure you can outrun your enemies
4. Avoid unnecesary combat
   Don’t jump in the middle of a hoard of enemies and try to kill them all at the same time. Take it slow. Sometimes staying on the sidelines without calling the enemy’s attention is a better strategy
5. Be ready to get lost
   Yes, the maps are complex, you will get lost at first, but once you unlock the masteries that allow you to move around, you’ll notice how much easier it becomes.
6. Bring cc skills
   Lots of the enemies in HoT have breakbars, cc them to break those and they will get stunned for a while and take more damage.
7. Dont get frustrated
   Since youre not used to these different maps its normal to die. The HoT areas have quite a few unexpected dangers, but again, running with someone will improve your success rate a lot, and at least they can ress you in case of need. Its ok to die.
8. If you really hate it..
   Finally if you really reaaaaaalllly hate it, just dont do it. There’s no point on bashing your head against your desk. Dont do it if you really believe you cant play it without suffering. Its a game, and its meant to be played for fun

TLDR? its all about adapting. In the end, you wont find it hard anymore. But, as usual, having someone by your side will help ease the transition. Dont get frustrated about the maps, the different masteries you can learn will make it so much easier to move around. (Except Tangled Depths… that evil, treachrous land! ..i mean seriously.. those chak.. who’s idea was it to make the karkas into mesmers?? and why?? its still fun tho)

Ps, I wont be available this weekend, but if you need help with the story, id be happy to assist. That is, if you still have any interest in finishing it.

Gw2 never had a good system for teaching players and theres a big gap between vainilla and hot, as Djinn said in one of his posts, thats anet fault (ls2 its a difficulty progression, perhaps not so soft for some, but its not free or included with HoT). Wildstar even explain what cc its at the intro tutorial xd. I have explained that in raids here xd.

Ashen said a good solution, practice some of the dungeons and fractals, your skill level will go up and hot will be less traumatic xd.

Also, hot story its really good and the actual LS3 has been even better. So it really its worth the training xd

Btw, did you tried ls2?, its the more close “next chapter” from the vainilla game and will be an intermediate difficulty step before hot.

Djinn.9245:

Leveling a character to 80 and through the entire Personal Story should teach you all you need to know. If it isn’t, that is Anet’s fault.

Also, where did Anet state that HoT was supposed to be for those who were better players? I don’t remember seeing that at all.

That is a terrible attitude to have. Like everything else in the world, it takes will and practice to get better at anything and that includes learning how to use your classes in depth. It doesn’t come handed to you on a silver platter. If it was that easy to be mechanically perfect, there ‘d be no reason to play the game. You’d be better off watching a movie or reading a book.

Some of it might not be intuitive and anet doesn’t do too good of a job at explaining it, but nothing stops you from doing a bit of personal research on the wiki , watching some videos, or doing experiments yourself etc.

HoT was specifically designed to be challenging and it says right there on the sales page.

“The jungle represents a challenge for you to overcome. Creatures within it use our new advanced AI, making the fights you encounter harder, giving you the opportunity to work with your friends and put your abilities to the test in battling Mordremoth’s forces and the deadly inhabitants of the jungle.”

Like other people have suggested, I recommend you practice in PvP and dungeons until you have a better handle on game mechanics before attempting to tackle HoT content. You won’t be able to just stroll in and faceroll over the keyboard to get through the content. PvP is an excellent training ground even just to get an idea of how high up the skill ceiling for any class can be when played by a skilled player.

You were having fun because you found it easy to do from what I see in your explanation. Then things changed that you were not used too them. The foes are harder, the terrain is not what you are used too, and you die faster than before. Its very frustrating. That is just the beginning in places like bloodstone fen and beyond you can get shot out of the sky. On the other hand you can earn and purchase with the currency there abilities to attack foes from the air as you are gliding. Outside the area you cannot use those skills at least for now. You can however in the HoT maps get shot down but no where as often.

The point I am trying to make is GW2 is not a typical MMO this does two things it either upsets people, or excites them. You saw that GW2 was different you learned It and then had fun with it. Now all you have to do is continue that with HoT its even different from the core game. and even new areas are different from HoT itself. They all have the similarities to each other also, just like GW2 is different from other MMO’s in how its played. Open your mind and explore learn and have fun with those differences in this game. Or you can play the same old way in another MMO there are quite a few out there for you.

However you look at it the fact is that many players will buy the expansion expecting “more of the same” and that’s not what they get. Not everyone wants an ever increasing challenge.

When my feet first touched HoT ground, I felt like I was in the wrong movie. All the time, I trashed everything in my path with my almighty warrior with mix-and-match stat armor (at least it was all exo). Then, after getting my butt slightly kicked by “Terrorgrifs”, I got rekt reaaaally good by even the lousiest trashmob (I’m looking at you, red frogs), because they actually posed a challenge. Instead of just standing still and soaking up all my damage, they just vanished, reappeared and shot me with arrows. Their yellow brethren did their three-hit-combo, stunning me and almost rekking me in one go. Oh, was I furious. I thought I had got it all wrong, that I did not even know how to play my warrior, which indeed happened to be my first char.

That was the critical point. Either I would keep on trying or go on and do something more fun. I suppose it is the point you are in right now, OP. Maybe it helps you if I tell you that it is do-able. The frustration can be overcome. But it takes patience and the willingness to adapt. Forget what you learned so far by yourself, as the core game is very very forgiving and looks away when you miss that dodge or are running with max healing power while trying to do damage. In HoT, however, you first of all need to know what you want to do and then do it 100%. Check all your traits. Look for synergies between specializations. Streamline your gear. For me, it made quite some difference whether I played rare mix’n’match or matched exotics.

Also, don’t expect yourself to become dodge-god overnight. I did it in two steps. I first went the safe route and chose a defensive traitline for my warrior, namely defense (heh) which gave me quite some nice regen after each adrenal burst, which from that point I did much more often than before (ofc using berserker traitline). At some point where I managed to survive quite decently, even against higher odds, I realized that it took me quite some time to kill mobs. Also, every player and their mother taunted me for using defense, as it is basically training wheels (which in my case, was just the thing I needed). So, after some time running around in all HoT maps, surviving, but doing minuscule damage, I decided to switch to all attack mode. This in return ofc led to me dying more often, because I still sucked at dodging. At the same time, it would take 20-30% less hits to kill mobs. So, after all, the saying “kill it before it kills you” is absolutely true.

Right now, I got somewhat better at dodging and it really is the best defense there is. I even discarded my last pieces of non-berzerker gear for a mix of assassins and berzerkers, to increase my damage. As an afterthought, I wish I would have noticed marauders earlier, as it would have been exactly what I had needed. Berzerker plus some hp. Then again, to get marauder’s armor, you actually have to play HoT… or have some gold. A vicious circle.

TL;DR: If you want to enjoy HoT, you actually need to get good at the game. Understand me right, I am still not “good”, but at least I enjoy playing HoT, which was all I wanted to achieve. The major problem is, that the core game does not teach you how to get good and most advises pro-uber-power-gamers give you are seldomly brought to you in a respectful and understandable manner. So, what you need to do:

1. Streamline your gear – exotics with 1 or 2 stat-combos (berzerker + vakyrie or pure berzerker (not advised in the beginning) for example)
2. Streamline your build: Are you really using that trait? Is that one trait really worth it to pick that entire traitline or should you chose another one that has more uses for you?
3. Learn your dodges and blocks/invulns. This is most important. If the enemy hits hard, you have to make sure you won’t stand in that hit.
4. If your tactic doesn’t work out, adapt to the situation. Be always ready to adapt. It will make your time on HoT much more enjoyable and hone your skills in the game as well as increase your understanding.
5. Ask someone, maybe a guildie, for help. They walked the way that lies ahead of you before and know what they are talking about. Don’t be ashamed of being tutored.

This is just my personal experience and is meant to help the OP. Don’t tear it apart because you don’t agree. It has worked for me.

DoctorDing.5890:

However you look at it the fact is that many players will buy the expansion expecting “more of the same” and that’s not what they get. Not everyone wants an ever increasing challenge.

And many bought the expansion expecting more challenging content and that’s what they got. I’m not so sure either side has a clear majority.

I can deal with the increased challenge, the increased damage, the increased spawns, the increased need to understand your build and all that. I get the fervent git gud crowd. What I absolutely, uncompromisingly cannot deal with, is the constant sense of being lost.

And if being lost in a strange and dangerous place gets you excited, you can stop reading now.

Even in the real world, there are landmarks, maps, GPS, locals, something to help you along the way. In HoT the map is always above or below you and there is no friggin way to tell. Landmarks are covered by acres of forest. Locals try to kill you. You can spend half an hour walking to a spot on the map you need to be at, only to find that you’re in the wrong spot. And there’s no apparent way to fix your mistake. Some places just seem inaccessible no matter what route you take.

Infuriating level design is one thing, not equipping the player with information to make smarter choices is just poor game design dressed up as a “challenge”. I’m sorry, I just don’t buy it. Being constantly lost is about as much fun as having your knackers waxed.

Those that have conquered Hot, to you I say “well done,” some of us are beating our heads on our keyboards wondering why we spent $50 to be constantly frustrated by poor design.

DuncanSteele.4801:

I can deal with the increased challenge, the increased damage, the increased spawns, the increased need to understand your build and all that. I get the fervent git gud crowd. What I absolutely, uncompromisingly cannot deal with, is the constant sense of being lost.

And if being lost in a strange and dangerous place gets you excited, you can stop reading now.

Even in the real world, there are landmarks, maps, GPS, locals, something to help you along the way. In HoT the map is always above or below you and there is no friggin way to tell. Landmarks are covered by acres of forest. Locals try to kill you. You can spend half an hour walking to a spot on the map you need to be at, only to find that you’re in the wrong spot. And there’s no apparent way to fix your mistake. Some places just seem inaccessible no matter what route you take.

Infuriating level design is one thing, not equipping the player with information to make smarter choices is just poor game design dressed up as a “challenge”. I’m sorry, I just don’t buy it. Being constantly lost is about as much fun as having your knackers waxed.

Those that have conquered Hot, to you I say “well done,” some of us are beating our heads on our keyboards wondering why we spent $50 to be constantly frustrated by poor design.

I don’t see how something I can find my way around quite easily is poor design,. just because you can’t. There ARE landmarks. There ARE ways to find your way around.

It’s not always easy, but puzzle solving has been part of RPGs for ages, and those are puzzles. That’s what some of us like about HoT.

In the old days of computer gaming, we had puzzles that were far worse than anything in HOT. You play a game like Ultima IV and you had to find a cave with a hermit in it, in a mountain range, and maybe you find out he’s in the north of the range. No arrows, no hints, no directions, no stars, no mark on the map at all.

Saying it’s badly designed is an opinion, but I don’t agree with it. I think the HOT maps are probably the best designed maps in the entire game.

DuncanSteele.4801:

Even in the real world, there are landmarks, maps, GPS, locals, something to help you along the way. In HoT the map is always above or below you and there is no friggin way to tell. Landmarks are covered by acres of forest.

Navigation is easy in the real world because humans have spent centuries building infrastructure to make it easy.

In the real world if you leave civilization and go out into a deep forest you will find that navigation becomes much more difficult than HoT is. Maguuma is a untamed jungle. There are no roads, there are no signposts.

While intuitiveness of level design is a interesting discussion, bringing realism arguments into it is not a productive argument.

Vayne.8563:

DoctorDing.5890:

However you look at it the fact is that many players will buy the expansion expecting “more of the same” and that’s not what they get. Not everyone wants an ever increasing challenge.

And many bought the expansion expecting more challenging content and that’s what they got. I’m not so sure either side has a clear majority.

I agree, and it’s mostly unknowable because most players won’t be using the forums or responding to surveys. However, the solution is kitten obvious. Hard Mode. Not just for the new stuff but for all the existing stuff too. Players can find their own challenge and the game gets a broader appeal. You can still share the same open world. HM players hit softer and get hit harder.

Mass appeal games have to set at a fairly easy difficulty level otherwise they risk becoming niche.

DoctorDing.5890:

However you look at it the fact is that many players will buy the expansion expecting “more of the same” and that’s not what they get. Not everyone wants an ever increasing challenge.

This pretty much sums up the feelings of everyone I have talked to that hasn’t liked HoT.

Yes, I’ve enjoyed the increased difficulty…but I have also noticed the maps lacking in population because of it. You should ‘never’ have to rely on shuttling people into a map in order to complete it. That is HORRIBLE game design. If that means you need to lower the difficulty, then you do so. People begging for more difficult things…you give them areas for it. They do not need unique rewards (if all they want is a challenge then the challenge itself is the carrot, otherwise they are lying and simply want more exclusivity).

Runiir.6425:

DoctorDing.5890:

However you look at it the fact is that many players will buy the expansion expecting “more of the same” and that’s not what they get. Not everyone wants an ever increasing challenge.

This pretty much sums up the feelings of everyone I have talked to that hasn’t liked HoT.

Yes, I’ve enjoyed the increased difficulty…but I have also noticed the maps lacking in population because of it. You should ‘never’ have to rely on shuttling people into a map in order to complete it. That is HORRIBLE game design. If that means you need to lower the difficulty, then you do so. People begging for more difficult things…you give them areas for it. They do not need unique rewards (if all they want is a challenge then the challenge itself is the carrot, otherwise they are lying and simply want more exclusivity).

Actually, there’s no evidence that making it easier will bring more people into those maps. There are plenty maps in core that don’t have a lot of people on them most of the time, because there’s no reason to be there.

The reason HoT maps are empty is because metas come and go on schedules and people follow that tide.

So if you have a bunch of people doing the meta and they all leave on say three maps, that means you have two maps closing.

But all three maps get empty at once so everyone ends up transfering and ends up on a map that everyone has transfered off of.

The problem isn’t necessarily that people aren’t doing it. The problem is that some people don’t really know how to get around. I don’t think the design is horrible, because I haven’t seen too many games that have solved the problem. That is, every game suffers from empty zones, even WoW.

At least Guild Wars 2 provides some kind of mechanism to get where the action is.

If it were easy to solve, everyone would have done it already.

But saying that making it easy will increase the population might not be correct. You might lose as many people as you gain at that point. There’s no way to know.

As a long time gamer I liked the HoT content. But compared to Central Tyria it is indeed less forgiving. But in the end you will adapt. I run a full ascended Viper’s Condi Ranger and I can solo 3-4 veteran frogs and a champ boss all by myself. You have actually to do something to survive.

In my opinion the original content in Central Tyria was extremely shallow and far too easy. But that’s me. The vast part just want to play shallow stuff for relaxation – I don’t blame that. But at least try to adapt. It’s fun if you get the hang of it.

There was a glorious time during the beta, and even shortly after release, where the mobs were actually fun to fight. After that, the difficulty got dropped and places like Oor became the cakewalk that you waltzed through OP, without a care in the world. The sudden hike in difficulty in Heart of Throns is the game returning to its roots (hahah), and you are going to need to play more defensively until you have your elite stance sorted out. The Warrior is particularly good at surviving when it honestly does not deserve to, so take a look at some tougher, more defensive builds. Once you learn the mechanics of the new mobs, you can go right back to the meta glass cannon go zerk or go home spec. Try the zones a bit more; once you get better at not being murdered, navigating them and actually taking in their brilliant design becomes quite fun.

Most of core Tyria is set a “grandma difficulty” of a solo shooter. A few times it goes up to “normal” difficulty, and the champion events aren’t meant to be solo’ed at all. But those situations are avoidable.

HoT raises the difficulty to XCOM level, normal difficulty. If you aren’t careful you’ll get waxed in the encounters. You do have to pay attention, use all your tools including CC, and tinker with your builds. HoT is more of a place where you may have to do encounters multiple times, possibly trying different strategies.

Additionally, there are some character upgrades to think about. Get all exotics, either from the Trading Post or the Karma vendors in Orr. Get Superior Runes (at least five of set) and Sigils that fit your build. Many are available for a few silver on the Trading Post. The laurel vendors have ascended trinkets and the proper amulet is usually a good purchase, ie will be useful for quite some time.

PS I couldn’t defend the frog camp either. Pick the other option to attack the mordrem.

Runiir.6425:

DoctorDing.5890:

However you look at it the fact is that many players will buy the expansion expecting “more of the same” and that’s not what they get. Not everyone wants an ever increasing challenge.

This pretty much sums up the feelings of everyone I have talked to that hasn’t liked HoT.

Yes, I’ve enjoyed the increased difficulty…but I have also noticed the maps lacking in population because of it. You should ‘never’ have to rely on shuttling people into a map in order to complete it. That is HORRIBLE game design. If that means you need to lower the difficulty, then you do so. People begging for more difficult things…you give them areas for it. They do not need unique rewards (if all they want is a challenge then the challenge itself is the carrot, otherwise they are lying and simply want more exclusivity).

Traditionally in MMOs areas increase in difficulty as they increase in level. But that is just to keep pace with the increased power of your character as it gained levels. People who enjoyed more of a challenge would take a character into a higher level zone. At cap, people who enjoyed more challenge would go to End Game / Raids. The developers don’t put the higher challenge in the open world where all of their players would have to deal with it whether they wanted to or not.

But if Anet wants to chase away the more casual players, I guess that’s up to them.

Sorry OP – You will be (and have already been) told that:
1. HoT was what most (well, out of the remaining) players wanted in difficulty.
2. Two weeks in this game is not even remotely enough to actually enjoy it or have fun.
3. While you may have enjoyed the core levelling experience: Sorry, so much is wrong with that and you should just accept that you need to:
a) Study and look up everything in various online guides.
b) Watch youtube videos on the subjects you researched.
c) Invest ungodly hours into grinding enough gold to buy a viable metabuild/gearset

GW2 was both casual, open and VERY different on release. Pre-release (beta) was as difficult/punishing and (regarded by some, if not most) as unfun as HoT and Anet did a lot of adjusting (nerfing) to be able to release a game most would find enjoyable.

Bottom line… You already said it: “I always wondered why more people dont play this game. Now i know.”

Things/direction changed. It is probably close to perfect for players that loyally stick around (at least they will tell you it is).
GW2 was never anything like Guild Wars, HoT is very different from the values that initially brought a lot of new players to GW2.
Today Anet have painted themselves into a corner with their new “direction”. People like me judge them on action beyond everything else and… They have been clear about very few things.
Evaluating what they DO churn out, the immediate future looks like:
- (yet more) Challenging groupbased content. :-s
- A lot of PR focus on PvP without actually making it enjoyable to watch.
- No REAL love for WvWvW. (I don’t play it, never enjoyed it, but a lot of people do/did: At least show them the same amount of content as… sigh… “raiders”/challenging group content.)
- Direction? Where is this game headed?

Storytelling seems like something they consider a nescessary evil and, since they don’t enjoy spending ressources on it: They make it punishing/unfun. Maybe the lesson they try to teach is a new level of loyally accepting anything – Great, just a single storymission in the next expansion: Thanks Anet, I really hated those!!!

As for “Direction”: I no longer play GW2 (since it has none).
I log in once in a while and I look for some kind of hope/real direction/dev pipeline on the forums, but I am at the point where I only log in once or twice a month for 5 mins. and prefer to (once a week or so) spend 5-10 mins. on the forums looking for that single straw that might bring me back to this game that I still hope will do well for years to come.

Alas… It’s been 12+ months without a straw! Ask here: Everything is GREAT, L2P, GG etc… Now look at financials: Would you bet your pension on the direction of this game?

I was on the same page as you when I first ventured into HoT. I almost gave up when I tried to defend the frog village. I had to look up tips to kill that boss, which required me to use my range, dodge every single one of his ranged attacks. It took me like 20 minutes to get that done. Things start to get easier from there though. I don’t think the content gets easier, but you become a better player as you survive through HoT.

Now a days, I actually prefer travelling around HoT than core Tyria. It’s nice to see how much you’ve improved when you can deal with mobs you couldn’t handle before! It’s true that I still get scared when I see rolling devils around the corner, but that’s why makes HoT fun. It’s challenging enough to push you to be better.

If it’s too much, then you can always go back to core Tyria and do stuff there for a while! There are tons of stuff to do and things to explore in core Tyria.

Good luck!

It’s a well known issue that the difficulty jump from core to LS1 to LS2 to HoT is a bit skewed because it’s both disconnected as well as a huge difficulty increase.

LS1 already increased difficulty and LS2 was similar in difficulty. HoT is a step above that. But for many new players, they both miss the experience of LS1 which only came around once AND LS2 because it’s strangely hidden in the story menu. (Very bad PR really)

As well as years of playing in between. Im not at all surprised that newer players can’t adjust very well to the new content.

But I never really had any problem since I pretty much played everything easily.

scrumsome.7198:

GW2 was both casual, open and VERY different on release. Pre-release (beta) was as difficult/punishing and (regarded by some, if not most) as unfun as HoT and Anet did a lot of adjusting (nerfing) to be able to release a game most would find enjoyable.

The core game was nerfed during beta basically because of WoW players standing still and getting destroyed because of it (enemies had dodge or die attacks). They nerfed it with the intention to ramp up the difficulty over time to allow for people to get accustomed to mobile combat.

ArenaNet has always wanted to be more challenging, as they’re for the gamers, rather than the majority like other MMOs. Obviously that’s not a great idea from a business perspective, but maybe ArenaNet’s fine with that as they’d rather be a niche like Dark Souls. Normally, vertical progression would be the compensation, which really opens up everything for everyone, such as soloing older raids. Without it however, ArenaNet’s only choice is to blanket nerf it, otherwise they’re essentially telling people to leave once they hit that wall.

Healix.5819:

The core game was nerfed during beta basically because of WoW players standing still and getting destroyed because of it (enemies had dodge or die attacks). They nerfed it with the intention to ramp up the difficulty over time to allow for people to get accustomed to mobile combat.

Can you back up your extrapolations somehow? My beta experience was definately different: Most people I saw/chatted with ingame were mostly seasoned Guild Wars veterans.
While anecdotal I doubt that other timezones was so different that a massive influx of static still-standing WoW players managed to change Anet’s idea’s of fun/inclusion and everything in GW2.
And: Your extrapolation on Anet’s intent to retroactively ramping up difficulty later… WHEN did they ever make that intent public? (Back when… Before HoT – You know, before they ever talked about an expansion…)

Yeah…in Beta and at release…most everyone were GW1 vets or people who had played GW1 a little.
You didn’t see the huge group from other games show up till a month later.

Also the whiners about difficulty in the beginning? Mostly GW1 vets.

Remember when you had to use a weapon repeatedly to learn the skills on it?
If your weapon skill wasn’t maxed out you couldn’t use your full power for damage either.
How about the way skills worked and the fact you essentially had to level to 160 in order to buy every skill? For those who don’t know you used to continue to re-ding lvl 80 and get a skill point every level.
How about when vets were known more for being able to 1 shot squishies and 2 shot everyone else (3 shot necros, even back then they were health sponges)?
The elites (silvers) just had more hp, they didn’t hit any harder and dungeons were filled with elites and vets mixed together, vets had the same hp as a normal mob and just hit harder.
Armor weight also used to matter a lot more, with the exact same stats an elementalist would take 3k damage while a war or guard would only take 1.5k. Remember this is with the exact same stats.

All things the GW1 crowd got changed from beta to live, or shortly after live. Because all of those changes happened long before the influx of other gamers. Ironically enough those other gamers seemed to stick around more too, I haven’t ran into many who have played GW1 in a long while. A LOT this was their first MMO and they just return to it ocassionally or never left it entirely.

what on earth are you talking about, GW1 is of a magnitude harder than GW2. I’m guessing you didn’t play the hard mode maps in GW1. In fact GW1 maps were harder than any other maps in a mmorpg/coorpg. The real issue was that Anet wanted to broaden the appeal to players from other games – they reduced difficulty by a huge amount.

scrumsome.7198:

Can you back up your extrapolations somehow? My beta experience was definately different: Most people I saw/chatted with ingame were mostly seasoned Guild Wars veterans.
While anecdotal I doubt that other timezones was so different that a massive influx of static still-standing WoW players managed to change Anet’s idea’s of fun/inclusion and everything in GW2.
And: Your extrapolation on Anet’s intent to retroactively ramping up difficulty later… WHEN did they ever make that intent public? (Back when… Before HoT – You know, before they ever talked about an expansion…)

Keep in mind that what actually matters is the feedback, not what you personally encounter. Why do you think core was basically nerfed by 50%, then further nerfed with the new player experience? The average MMO player is not very good, as most people simply play casually for the fun of it. Surely there’s a reason why almost every MMO makes a joke of their solo content.

If you weren’t there for the start of BWE1, right out of the gate in Queensdale, a level 2 Moa could kill you as quick as a veteran shadowscale’s assault if you took its full channeled peck to the face. I remember seeing people die all over, and the rally tutorial was hilariously filled with bodies.

Unfortunately, I didn’t cache the BWE1 or 2 forums, so I don’t have the exact quote. They said something along the lines of those not accustomed to action combat as the reason for the nerfs, which I took as an obvious jab at WoW. I have the BWE3 forums though, which hinted at fishing and 2h axes.

As for ramping up the difficulty over time, they’ve been experimenting with the difficulty from the very start with every major content release (ie, karka, aetherblade, toxic, watchwork). The difficulty has always been complained about, the first major one after launch being Orr, which is now actually harder than it was (they culled mobs, removed CC – year later – added CC, buffed temples, added stronger attacks).

Djinn.9245:

Ashen.2907:

To be honest, you might want to spend some time learning your preferred profession a bit better before moving on to HoT. The content in the core game doesnt really teach you much about playing well. HoT is supposed to be more challenging for play by those who have a better handle on their characters.

Leveling a character to 80 and through the entire Personal Story should teach you all you need to know. If it isn’t, that is Anet’s fault.

Also, where did Anet state that HoT was supposed to be for those who were better players? I don’t remember seeing that at all.

They didn’t say that, but you certainly need to know at least one class very well to do the personal story in HoT. While I think the OP’s complaint is valid (core GW2 in no way prepares a person for what HoT throws at them), nothing stops this person from doing better and completing the personal story in HoT except themselves. Frankly, I think it’s a VERY small thing to ask players to know their class and the game mechanics well enough to be able to do most of the content in HoT by themselves.

Obtena.7952:

Djinn.9245:

Ashen.2907:

To be honest, you might want to spend some time learning your preferred profession a bit better before moving on to HoT. The content in the core game doesnt really teach you much about playing well. HoT is supposed to be more challenging for play by those who have a better handle on their characters.

Leveling a character to 80 and through the entire Personal Story should teach you all you need to know. If it isn’t, that is Anet’s fault.

Also, where did Anet state that HoT was supposed to be for those who were better players? I don’t remember seeing that at all.

They didn’t say that, but you certainly need to know at least one class very well to do the personal story in HoT. While I think the OP’s complaint is valid (core GW2 in no way prepares a person for what HoT throws at them), nothing stops this person from doing better and completing the personal story in HoT except themselves. Frankly, I think it’s a VERY small thing to ask players to know their class and the game mechanics well enough to be able to do most of the content in HoT by themselves.

I disagree that ALL you need is to know your class and the game mechanics. The people who are able to put together a more powerful character not only have knowledge but a deeper understanding of how to put what they know together into a character and how to play that character to best effect. Obviously not everyone can do that or everyone would have the type of character you find on Metabattle and everyone would be able to play at Raid level.

If Anet wants to cater to the type of player that dedicates a lot of his time researching, practicing, and experimenting, they will ultimately lose players who simply want (or only have time) to log into a game and play. And I’m pretty sure that the latter compose the vast majority of game players.

And consider this: the more hardcore gamer might welcome losing more casual players who keep content less challenging. But less players also means a game dies more quickly.

I don’t think the argument is worth rehashing the same … but just to say that Anet provided people with warning that HoT will challenge players. Anet knew their market so if people can’t do HoT, then clearly this isn’t an expansion they should have purchased, especially if they aren’t willing to make up for their shortcomings by teaming and improving themselves. I know your stance; you think the game is doom to failure because of these things. It’s doomed regardless; MMO’s have a lifetime and unless Anet are complete noobs, they’ve planned for that. Threatening that the game will die quickly because of these things is based on a poor assumption that Anet hasn’t thought of these things.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/the-first-beta-weekend-event-begins-august-7/

“We’ve done a lot of work to balance creature difficulty, and we’ll be looking for your thoughts on the overall experience. Do you feel the need to use your entire skill bar in battles? Does teaming up with other players feel more rewarding? Do you find yourself wanting to change your skills and traits to overcome encounters? Warning—creatures will be more challenging than in the existing Guild Wars 2 world.”

As you can see, the intent in HoT was to present more challenging creature which are designed to encourage players to make greater use of their character’s builds than core mobs do, and/or to encourage playing with others. While I doubt that HoT forced the best players to do more than learn new mob moves, I believe it did raise the bar with regard to the minimum engagement with one’s character capabilities needed to successfully deal with HoT creatures. I’d call the XPac a qualified success in that regard.

Whether that is what the design intent ought to have been is another matter. However, the lesson for those who bought without learning what the XPac was intended to be is to exercise due diligence before buying. The information was — and is — out there.

I completely agree with OP. I frequently come back to play GW2, but HoT is so NOT fun to me that I can hardly stomach playing it and I end up quitting again.