Guild Wars 2

Djinn.9245:

It might have been mentioned that enemies would be more difficult but it certainly wasn’t emphasized. And what people expect from an expansion of a game they like is more of the same thing they already like. I certainly had zero idea that the expansion would be anything like it is. And I would not have purchased it if I did know ahead of time.

What you expect is not some sort of universal truth. I didn’t sign on to GW2 until after HoT released, and I wouldn’t have stuck with the game if all of it mirrored core Tyria. I also played WoW for several years and through different expansions and I can tell you that they made plenty of significant changes along the way. If they hadn’t, they likely wouldn’t be around today.

Nothing is going to bring back that new game smell for you. HoT may not be perfect, but to remain relevant MMOs have to take risks and make drastic changes to their product over time. If they brought you more of the same, it would have alienated more players than HoT did. Trying to recreate that first release again is a path to stagnation, not success.

kdaddy.5431:

Ashen.2907:

Djinn.9245:

Ashen.2907:

Except that, as has been pointed out repeatedly here, the OP’s complaint is about soloing the story, not the zones as a whole. The story is soloable. If one has played a game for only a week or two, and cannot solo content that is designed for solo play, it might be a function of one’s mastery of one’s chosen character.

There are MANY players on the forums that complain about not being able to complete various parts of the story. And as I have said many times – in my opinion the story should be able to be enjoyed by everyone, not just those who have a certain mastery of their character. Challenge should be relegated to separate places in the game where those who prefer a higher challenge can go seek it.

I understand your opinion, but, in my opinion, it is reasonable to expect players to know how to play the game with some degree of understanding in order to complete max level content.

I would expect a new buyer of the game who insta-leveled to 80 immediately after purchase to struggle with max level content in any game.

The only way for max level content to be guaranteed to be fully accessible to anyone, regardless of lack of experience with the game, would be for it to consist entirely of dialogue and cutscenes. To stop being a game. Admittedly interactive storytelling does not need to be a game, but GW2 is one.

Once again i will write that there needs to be a place for this harder content.

Guess what there is alot of PvP players in this game who straight quit because they get handled. I had 2 guild mates who were digging PvP this season. One started 7-3 was put at 1700 rating and then on his 11th game was place against ESL level players and was shut out 500-0. Didnt come back to PvP.

Another guild mate was in silver pushing to gold and he to was nearly in gold, maybe 150 rating away from it. He has played around 60 matches, his next game was 500-0. He was shocked and added 2 players from the enemy team to his friends list and they were in high gold.

There is a time and place, im sorry that i dont agree with some of the logic you guys are using. Im sorry that just because Anet did this style, means i have to agree with it.

No, its a bad set up, a bad design and people should not be told to L2P in starting areas of a map.

You keep talking max- level content, i dont even understand because non of it is actually hard. For me personally i walk threw most of it, ive solo most of the champions and skill points.

But having played with some guild mates who absouletly hate HOT maps, having played with people who struggle with the PvE content, i simply try to understand what is happening and break it down.

You are not, you are trying to say this is high level/difficult content and people should L2P or adjust there style.

Which is fine for you but that would be like me saying if you are not a top 100 player in PvP you can not speak about it because you are not at my level therefore you do not understand the game play as well as i do.

Which is why im pointing out you guys are wrong with the how this thread has gone.

I mean its not like Anet didnt give Mordremoth a challenge mode for you “high level content” players. Seriously, this isnt the first complaint about the story mode or living story coming from players who just want to play the game.

My goodness its story mode, if the OP was struggling with 98-99-100 fractal so be it, tell him to L2P. Raids fine tell him to L2P, hey even the precious meta events go ahead say L2P.

But for the basic story mode and exploring? Come on get that stick out of there.

What do you propose as an alternative? All remotely challenging content must be group-based and instanced? Then why play GW2? WoW does it better. GW2 shines with its open world content and HoT, in my opinion, has by far the best open world maps I’ve seen in any MMO.

I think compromises can and have been made over the issue of HoT difficulty. But really what are you going to do? You can’t make HoT palatable to players who find Queensdale challenging and still attract players like me. I have no interest in playing this game for its mediocre instanced content alone.

AliamRationem.5172:

You can’t make HoT palatable to players who find Queensdale challenging and still attract players like me.

They could, but it’d require splitting the maps. Vertical progression is how other MMOs handle it, where the content is only challenging while you’re progressing through it. Without vertical progression, the alternative would be blanket nerfing the content with the next expansion.

The trick though is that HoT isn’t challenging, it’s simply entirely group content. I doubt anyone would have a problem if the zones were constantly zerged, but that’s not realistic.

The simple solution to the story at least is to remove gear damage and buff the player after every few deaths (as in +3% outgoing damage, -8% incoming damage every 3 deaths, stacks up to 10 times).

Healix.5819:

AliamRationem.5172:

You can’t make HoT palatable to players who find Queensdale challenging and still attract players like me.

They could, but it’d require splitting the maps. Vertical progression is how other MMOs handle it, where the content is only challenging while you’re progressing through it. Without vertical progression, the alternative would be blanket nerfing the content with the next expansion.

The trick though is that HoT isn’t challenging, it’s simply entirely group content. I doubt anyone would have a problem if the zones were constantly zerged, but that’s not realistic.

The simple solution to the story at least is to remove gear damage and buff the player after every few deaths (as in +3% outgoing damage, -8% incoming damage every 3 deaths, stacks up to 10 times).

No, HoT is not entirely group content. Yes it has group content in it, but it is not all group content.

Ashen.2907:

Healix.5819:

AliamRationem.5172:

You can’t make HoT palatable to players who find Queensdale challenging and still attract players like me.

They could, but it’d require splitting the maps. Vertical progression is how other MMOs handle it, where the content is only challenging while you’re progressing through it. Without vertical progression, the alternative would be blanket nerfing the content with the next expansion.

The trick though is that HoT isn’t challenging, it’s simply entirely group content. I doubt anyone would have a problem if the zones were constantly zerged, but that’s not realistic.

The simple solution to the story at least is to remove gear damage and buff the player after every few deaths (as in +3% outgoing damage, -8% incoming damage every 3 deaths, stacks up to 10 times).

No, HoT is not entirely group content. Yes it has group content in it, but it is not all group content.

To add to this, if you take two people with you, a group for three can do virtually all of HOT. I can solo most of it anyway. There are always a couple of hero points in each zone that need a group, but there are only a handlful of really hard ones.

Two in VB, one in AB and two in TD as far as I can tell. Every other hero point can be done with three people quite easily, and many of them if not most, can be soloed.

Every waypoint and POI on the maps I can get solo with the exception of 1 in AB, and some in dragon stand, which require the meta to be completed.

Dragon Stand is the one map where you really do need people, however, it’s done every time it comes on up at least one map and often more than one.

Please don’t give up on HoT and its maps.

• I too found them incredibly frustrating to begin with; hard, dangerous and confusing. My girlfriend found them even more so, and abandoned them in angry frustration for months.

• However, we both persevered at our own individual pace. I still think my girlfriend finds them frustrating, but she has now managed to finish the HoT story and I think has even come to enjoy elements of the HoT maps; I know for a fact that she really likes the AB map.

• I can also tell you for a fact, for us both, that HoT has made us better players.

• For myself, I can tell you that HoT was a big, big wakeup call that I had a lot to learn as a player; that my journey through the core maps had become a lazy-mode, easy-mode faceroll that had actually begun to hurt my progress as a player. Perhaps I was looking for a new challenge.

• I took stock, took a breath, and determined to rise to that challenge. At the same time I also embarked on WvW as a new gamemode to try. The requirements for meaningful participation and enjoyment of both HoT and WvW meant that I had to acknowledge the fact that I really didn’t understand my classes well enough. There were skills and traits that I had never used, and even some I had equipped that I rarely used and didn’t really know what they did, never mind how they synergised.

• It was like finding a whole new gear to the game, and once I embraced the challenge the whole game opened up to me all over again. It was actually a really enjoyable process, and quite thrilling at times. I embraced failure and dying became routine for a while (my WP expenses in HoT maps rose appreciably). But once I accepted that I would die often (in both HoT and WvW), dying became less of an issue in itself, and not particularly demoralising (more of a learning opportunity).

• And I got better. And I stopped dying so much. And I began to really enjoy myself. I’ve spent most of my time so far opening up all the HoT maps on my thief, and it became really fun and satisfying to pick apart groups of mobs that, once upon a time, would have steamrolled me; dancing in and out of them, picking my moments and wrecking them. I’m not good enough to solo most champs/HPs yet on my thief, but I can I’ll have a crack at it; and on some of my other classes now I’ll search out champs to try soloing as I get better (mixed results there). I really feel like HoT has made me pay much more attention to things overall, and that’s satisfying.

• I also get that many people find the maps themselves incredibly annoying. I shared some of that sentiment for a while but, once I set my mind to it, that too changed and the HoT maps completely rekindled my sense of genuine exploration in the game. Yes, I know that the mini-map isn’t the most helpful tool in such vertical environments, but you know what? To me that just began to create a genuine sense of being lost in wild terrain with only an imperfect map in my belongings to help. And the ever-present danger in these maps really lends exploration a sense of jeopardy. I’ve found enjoyment in that feeling. I know others haven’t, but I’d implore them not to give up on these maps; to play them (perhaps as Anet intended, I don’t know) as if they were a wild frontier – dangerous, confusing… challenging.

• I also recommend checking out the Dulfy guide to the HoT maps. While the meta-gaming aspect of this is perhaps a little at odds with what I’ve just said, those guides really did give me a ‘direction’ at times when I needed it; literally, sometimes, in terms of where to find things, but also in terms of what to ‘pursue’ (masteries, HPs, etc.). In that way, I gradually chipped away at the maps, the content and the story, and I felt a genuine sense of progression doing so. Especially as I could see myself becoming a better player as a result.

• It didn’t really seem to take me that long before I’d completed the story, finished all but the ley-line gliding mastery and got the other really useful masteries, completed VB & AB maps and participated in a ton of events. I managed most of that solo, but people proved really willing to help with most of the HPs which were too hard for me by myself. All in all, good fun stuff (with a modicum of ‘worth it’ frustration).

Anyway, tl:dr…

Please don’t give up on HoT.

I love the new maps (including TD); I’ve loved the challenge and the jeopardy they present; I’ve loved the genuine exploration (getting completely lost in the bargain); I love the gliding mechanic and the verticality of these maps; and I’m becoming a better player as a result of rising to the challenge of HoT.

Maybe you can find enjoyment in the same things if you can approach the journey of HoT in a new way, with an open mind?

Good luck!
~TG

Ashen.2907:

No, HoT is not entirely group content. Yes it has group content in it, but it is not all group content.

I wasn’t saying HoT is group content. From my perspective, a lot of the group content in HoT, VB especially, is actually solo content. They only labeled it as group content because they didn’t want people to feel bad.

From the casual player’s perspective, HoT is essentially entirely group content compared to other MMOs. Mob health may be lower, but their damage is more than what you’d find in dungeons in WoW for example, from a non-tank perspective. Furthermore, you simply need to bring more people to trivialize the content with no punishment for doing so, unlike other MMOs, which only reinforces the idea.

Vayne.8563:

To add to this, if you take two people with you, a group for three can do virtually all of HOT.

I would hope so, considering 3 is the default scale for group events. All you really need is 1 decent zerker and a decoy.

Keep in mind that the average MMO players is simply going to login and play (solo). Most aren’t going to read guides, lookup timers, LFG, etc. Many only play for the casual fun of it and will simply move on if it becomes frustrating. Does ArenaNet care though? They’ve always wanted to be the challenging niche, so we’ll need to wait for the next expansion to find out.

i think the average age of a mmo player is mid 20’s (27 for GW2 i think), and i would expect most older players play casually due to commitments. Older players are typically experienced game players. In other words level of ‘casualness’ has no bearing on skill or perception. I play casually, i’m of average skill, I solo all of HOT easily in a squishy ele. The fact is the majority of players in GW2 are casual, and the majority of players have completed HOT.

lets put it this way, lets say there are 100 player are in a HOT map, 10 are highly skilled, 90 are average and 10 have difficulties both solo and forming groups. 90% have completed HOT, 100% have leveled through all vanilla – At what level should HOT be pitched at exactly ? (and lets consider there are already 30 maps that are trivial)

The biggest problem with HoT was limiting your options for speccing. In the core game, you could build and gear yourself however you wanted. When you enter HoT zones, you have to choose from the tankier side of the spectrum until you learn your class, and the mobs much better. I suggest finding a good defensive build for yourself, and giving it another try. Once you start to fill out you HoT mysteries, get better acquainted with you class, and start to learn the tells from the mobs, you will find yourself able to start speccing a little more the way you like. I run through with GS/LB now, but there are times I switch back to s/sh-sc/f in order to move through certain areas.

I am not a fan of the layout either, and the map doesn’t do much to help with that. You will find areas in all of the zones that seem to be more difficult than others, and learn to navigate around them.

It does get easier after gaining a grasp of how the new zones flow. Push through the tough parts, and maybe just do some grinding to level up your mysteries and Espec. Don’t give up, it does get better.

Also, you have the option to do the new LW stuff, it is much closer to the base game than the hot zones are.

^^ No, I can’t accept that … because if a player refused to change their spec/build, they STILL had other options to proceed and complete HoT content … by teaming. People get carried ALL the time. Some people I know ONLY team. People must stop ignoring player co-operation as a strategy to complete content, especially in an MMO.

I went into HoT on a full glass geared melee build (sword/axe ranger) with mostly exotics (ascended jewelry). Specced for damage. Sure I got downed more than in core Tyria, but the transition was not too difficult. Again, more challenge than in core Tyria, but not unmanageable.

That is from a very casual player who spends much more time on the forums than in game, with the reflexes of a man closer to 50 than 40, who has chosen to live with less than BiS gear rather than do something be doesnt enjoy in game (crafting).

Obtena.7952:

^^ No, I can’t accept that … because if a player refused to change their spec/build, they STILL had other options to proceed and complete HoT content … by teaming. People get carried ALL the time. Some people I know ONLY team. People must stop ignoring player co-operation as a strategy to complete content, especially in an MMO.

First, I think you are taking this too seriously. The OP stated solo play very strongly, and I only wished to convey a glimmer of hope, for again, solo play. I read the OP and wanted to help him out, that is all. No need for you to accept anything, some people don’t have the ability to play in a group,. If you have to walk away randomly and often, grouping with randoms is pretty much out of the question.

To Ashen, I think you underestimate your ability in this game. You sound to be better than I. I had better gear, and did worse starting out in HoT. I have the majority of things down now, but I still die way more than I should running solo.

All I wanted to do was give the OP hope that things get easier, it seems like people are focusing on certain parts of my post, and picking it apart. Everyone has different situations, and skill levels, and groups aren’t an option for everyone, which is why I assume the OP posted solo in all caps twice.

Klowdy.3126:

Obtena.7952:

^^ No, I can’t accept that … because if a player refused to change their spec/build, they STILL had other options to proceed and complete HoT content … by teaming. People get carried ALL the time. Some people I know ONLY team. People must stop ignoring player co-operation as a strategy to complete content, especially in an MMO.

First, I think you are taking this too seriously. The OP stated solo play very strongly, and I only wished to convey a glimmer of hope, for again, solo play. I read the OP and wanted to help him out, that is all. No need for you to accept anything, some people don’t have the ability to play in a group,. If you have to walk away randomly and often, grouping with randoms is pretty much out of the question.

To Ashen, I think you underestimate your ability in this game. You sound to be better than I. I had better gear, and did worse starting out in HoT. I have the majority of things down now, but I still die way more than I should running solo.

All I wanted to do was give the OP hope that things get easier, it seems like people are focusing on certain parts of my post, and picking it apart. Everyone has different situations, and skill levels, and groups aren’t an option for everyone, which is why I assume the OP posted solo in all caps twice.

I have a lot of respect for those who want to help others out, so props for that.

As for running solo if you AFK a lot, I have a lot of people in my guild who have to AFK for one reason or another. That doesn’t mean they can’t run stuff with people it just means they have to find the right people.

I personally help people all the time, some of who are older or have kids or have real life situations and I have no problem hanging out and farming stuff till they get back.

So if you’re in that kind of position and want a tour of any of the HOT zones, feel free to look me up in game.

Vayne.8563:

Klowdy.3126:

Obtena.7952:

^^ No, I can’t accept that … because if a player refused to change their spec/build, they STILL had other options to proceed and complete HoT content … by teaming. People get carried ALL the time. Some people I know ONLY team. People must stop ignoring player co-operation as a strategy to complete content, especially in an MMO.

First, I think you are taking this too seriously. The OP stated solo play very strongly, and I only wished to convey a glimmer of hope, for again, solo play. I read the OP and wanted to help him out, that is all. No need for you to accept anything, some people don’t have the ability to play in a group,. If you have to walk away randomly and often, grouping with randoms is pretty much out of the question.

To Ashen, I think you underestimate your ability in this game. You sound to be better than I. I had better gear, and did worse starting out in HoT. I have the majority of things down now, but I still die way more than I should running solo.

All I wanted to do was give the OP hope that things get easier, it seems like people are focusing on certain parts of my post, and picking it apart. Everyone has different situations, and skill levels, and groups aren’t an option for everyone, which is why I assume the OP posted solo in all caps twice.

I have a lot of respect for those who want to help others out, so props for that.

As for running solo if you AFK a lot, I have a lot of people in my guild who have to AFK for one reason or another. That doesn’t mean they can’t run stuff with people it just means they have to find the right people.

I personally help people all the time, some of who are older or have kids or have real life situations and I have no problem hanging out and farming stuff till they get back.

So if you’re in that kind of position and want a tour of any of the HOT zones, feel free to look me up in game.

I may have to take you up on that offer if you were extending that to me as well, lol. I have a new daughter on the way in a week (wife is being induced, so we have a pretty spot on idea when she’ll be here), and I can only imagine the random AFKs in store for me.

Klowdy.3126:

Vayne.8563:

Klowdy.3126:

Obtena.7952:

^^ No, I can’t accept that … because if a player refused to change their spec/build, they STILL had other options to proceed and complete HoT content … by teaming. People get carried ALL the time. Some people I know ONLY team. People must stop ignoring player co-operation as a strategy to complete content, especially in an MMO.

First, I think you are taking this too seriously. The OP stated solo play very strongly, and I only wished to convey a glimmer of hope, for again, solo play. I read the OP and wanted to help him out, that is all. No need for you to accept anything, some people don’t have the ability to play in a group,. If you have to walk away randomly and often, grouping with randoms is pretty much out of the question.

To Ashen, I think you underestimate your ability in this game. You sound to be better than I. I had better gear, and did worse starting out in HoT. I have the majority of things down now, but I still die way more than I should running solo.

All I wanted to do was give the OP hope that things get easier, it seems like people are focusing on certain parts of my post, and picking it apart. Everyone has different situations, and skill levels, and groups aren’t an option for everyone, which is why I assume the OP posted solo in all caps twice.

I have a lot of respect for those who want to help others out, so props for that.

As for running solo if you AFK a lot, I have a lot of people in my guild who have to AFK for one reason or another. That doesn’t mean they can’t run stuff with people it just means they have to find the right people.

I personally help people all the time, some of who are older or have kids or have real life situations and I have no problem hanging out and farming stuff till they get back.

So if you’re in that kind of position and want a tour of any of the HOT zones, feel free to look me up in game.

I may have to take you up on that offer if you were extending that to me as well, lol. I have a new daughter on the way in a week (wife is being induced, so we have a pretty spot on idea when she’ll be here), and I can only imagine the random AFKs in store for me.

Seriously if you’re on a US server, I get great enjoyment out of helping people through the jungle. I’m massively patient with people who have real lives, because I’ve been in that position.

Vayne.8563:

Klowdy.3126:

Vayne.8563:

Klowdy.3126:

Obtena.7952:

^^ No, I can’t accept that … because if a player refused to change their spec/build, they STILL had other options to proceed and complete HoT content … by teaming. People get carried ALL the time. Some people I know ONLY team. People must stop ignoring player co-operation as a strategy to complete content, especially in an MMO.

First, I think you are taking this too seriously. The OP stated solo play very strongly, and I only wished to convey a glimmer of hope, for again, solo play. I read the OP and wanted to help him out, that is all. No need for you to accept anything, some people don’t have the ability to play in a group,. If you have to walk away randomly and often, grouping with randoms is pretty much out of the question.

To Ashen, I think you underestimate your ability in this game. You sound to be better than I. I had better gear, and did worse starting out in HoT. I have the majority of things down now, but I still die way more than I should running solo.

All I wanted to do was give the OP hope that things get easier, it seems like people are focusing on certain parts of my post, and picking it apart. Everyone has different situations, and skill levels, and groups aren’t an option for everyone, which is why I assume the OP posted solo in all caps twice.

I have a lot of respect for those who want to help others out, so props for that.

As for running solo if you AFK a lot, I have a lot of people in my guild who have to AFK for one reason or another. That doesn’t mean they can’t run stuff with people it just means they have to find the right people.

I personally help people all the time, some of who are older or have kids or have real life situations and I have no problem hanging out and farming stuff till they get back.

So if you’re in that kind of position and want a tour of any of the HOT zones, feel free to look me up in game.

I may have to take you up on that offer if you were extending that to me as well, lol. I have a new daughter on the way in a week (wife is being induced, so we have a pretty spot on idea when she’ll be here), and I can only imagine the random AFKs in store for me.

Seriously if you’re on a US server, I get great enjoyment out of helping people through the jungle. I’m massively patient with people who have real lives, because I’ve been in that position.

For sure, next time I’m on, I’ll whisper you, or send some mail to you, I haven’t been on a lot lately, got into a 3 week Rift binge, and recently on ESO for the story, and awesome voice acting, along with the fun action, but I like to pop into the GW2 world every now and then.

I’ve unlocked HoT on 21 of my 22 characters…
On all of those characters I’ve unlocked the elite specs, I did map completion on those maps 10 times for VB, 5 or so for AB, 2 or 3 times for TD and a couple of times for DS…

You will learn to decide to fight or avoid in due time, some HP’s cannot be solo-ed accept it and accept this game to be a Massive MULTIPLAYER Online game and accept you sometimes need some other players. You can domost content pretty easy on glass builds, though some meta parts tend to be just a gamble… in DS having a group of players doesn’t matter If you get shot at by 3 snipers at the same time, you’ll die.. Then again you should be running with 20-30 ppl in the area’s anyways… And wipes of the total group are -very- rare

After the nerf in difficulty the maps became really easily navigated, providing you have 25% speedbuff or on demand swiftness.

I’ve ran all maps as warrior first using S/Wh and LB. this worked out pretty well. Nowadays I just use Condi PS build , but I used a variant using dicipline/tactics and defence and later arms/defence and berseker, before specing arms/tactics/zerk as a total new build…

I do want to add 1 thing: expecting a game to keep it’s level of difficulty will mean all efforts you put in (gear/experience/skills/build) will be mostly useless, they might give a diffeent experience of play but still…

The CC part of the game radiclly changed though, and the amout of people noww uing condi builds for alts… Balance patches had sobered the game to a point where 5 classes could just be removed form the game even…. and for the 4 remaining thier focus has overwritten thier DPS in most cases, Druid doing extremmely low dmg, PS and ps condi being low dmg, necro dead due to no dmg, engineer in a corner cause of no balance, revenant nerfed to EXTINCTION… yes some things have changed not for the better, the content however has improved greatly with HoT now also providing acces to Ember Bay, Bloodstone Fen, Lake Doric, Bitterfrost Frontier and 2 Raid Areas…

Yes…. HoT @launch was bad. But a lot has been improved. I admit not everything promised has been delivered (missing a dozen legendaries and Tier 2,3 and Lgendary armor….) Though the legendaries released have been nice and truly unique… You can at least give the ppl credit for having the legendaries as they are mandatory self crafted.
I think my Nevermore and Ad-Infinitum are worth more then my 2 Bolts, Kudzu and Meteorologicus…

With regard to difficulty.. even with the retention of the gear levels the Specs have bought 5-15% added dmg… Easily. And Masteries improved travleeing a lot… I no longer die from falling dmg anymore (well almost not… just dropped to my death from Griffin Rook due to the no glider area)

Taking in account LS S3 (IMHO a part of HoT expansion) improved my experience a lot…

This game was advertised as one that revolves around one progressing their skill, rather than one progressing their gear. HoT zones are a compliment to this philosophy.

Also, this is an MMO. If you find yourself in a situation that you are having difficulty advancing on your own, there is a legion of allied players willing to help. All you need do is ask.

^^ +1, perfect description.

Razor.9872:

This game was advertised as one that revolves around one progressing their skill, rather than one progressing their gear. HoT zones are a compliment to this philosophy.

Also, this is an MMO. If you find yourself in a situation that you are having difficulty advancing on your own, there is a legion of allied players willing to help. All you need do is ask.

It should be placated as the only true manifesto of GW2 or even Anet licence altogether. Could not agree more. +1 000 000

When I was a new player, I wondered how people survive encounters in dungeons, HoT maps and so on. Now, when I have over 1000 hours of game time on my account I question how people can be this bad and not be able to deal with content. But then I remember my early days and realize that it is the lack of knowledge of your class (usually poor rotation, combo field knowledge) and mechanics.

You need to put in time to become good. There’s no way around it. Embrace it.

the greatest games offer continual challenge, they tend to get dull after that

I agree with OP. It is great difficulty jump from core game to the HoT. Those players who have played this game from start, don’t realise this increased difficulty between core game and HoT.

There is a explanation. Old players played Living Story 1 and Living Story 2. For example Living Story 2 episodes were little bit harder each time when they came out. So new episode were little bit harder than last one. This way old players kind of get used to increased difficulty just playing Living Stories. That means those new players who have not Living Story 2 for example, they don’t have that path for HoT what old players walked. There were 8 Living Story episodes in LS 2 and HoT was 2 step harder than last episode of LS 2. That means if new player is coming straight from core game to HoT, they are experience 10 times harder area, where they left. That’s a quite difficulty jump, is not it?

Now what I have seen, again Living Story 3 episode is always one step harder than last episode, and first episode was one step harder than HoT. So in that way, when new expansion will come out, I bet it is 10 times harder than HoT. But when we are going thru this path of Living Story 3 players will get used to it. But how about those new players who will come to the game and want to go straight after core game to the last expansion story, they are facing 20 times harder area. That’s a shock.

This topic is funny because this topic ignores reality

HoT has been out for some time now and it has failed they had far too few playable maps and didn’t follow MMO staples like low mob density roads/paths that people of all skill levels can walk to complete story while keeping high density areas off to the side and seperate. The butchered WVW and PvP while offering pure raid related content patches. No player input either just early access disguised as input for things like DBL.

Revenue is down the numbers are down and the people who didn’t like HoT have left and you can’t have a proper discussion if over half the people are gone. It’s like WoW legion expac which had tons of people unsub but if you ask WoW players today how they feel about it you’ll get praise because those that liked it still subbed and frequent forums. There are fan clubs for the Ford Pinto, licorice, and other disliked things the key is to remember that your in a box and progress can only be made from getting more perspective.

HoT is the only open content in the game the demands LFG it’s lfg content. Ls3 and ls2 and prior can be done without lfg as there are many more people playing and enjoying those maps. Ls3 has a road system with more difficult areas to the side like centaurs. People came back for and moved into ls3 you don’t need to use lfg for jades, wurm, or events.

HoT is failed content that demands lfg propped up by AB mm for awhile and quickly abandoned for newer more mainstream content. Defending it this late in the game is pointless as the games veteran base contracted with HoT while any expansion is credited to the f2p core maps. The sheer fact that so many new people got into gw2 due to F2p but revenue declined for three straight quarters speaks volumes. It also says something that an uptick in returning players and new players I’m seeing lately is due to ls3 which abandoned many of the core philosophies of HoT.

I can see the OPs point. I have been playing since beta, have soloed a few champs, etc.
BUT, HOT is not fun. I played through it but there is a lot of content I have not and never will touch. The mordromoth fight? far to frustrating. I gave up after a few tries as there is challenging, then there’s just annoying. Luckely there is nothing I am missing by skipping that fight, but if it had to be completed to continue the game, I would have quit.
There is a fix. Let a player choose easy or hard mode for their personal story. Rewards for “easy” could be much less then for “hard”, which would also give you a reason to play through content again.

HoT was a bit of a mess, rushed, purposely focused on being difficult and not really fun at all so I am not surprised to see the OP go.

Thing is with Guild Wars, no subscription fee means you can drop it and pick it up again later without worry. Come back when they release the next expansion, I am sure it will be much better than HoT.

Doam.8305:

This topic is funny because this topic ignores reality

HoT has been out for some time now and it has failed they had far too few playable maps and didn’t follow MMO staples like low mob density roads/paths that people of all skill levels can walk to complete story while keeping high density areas off to the side and seperate. The butchered WVW and PvP while offering pure raid related content patches. No player input either just early access disguised as input for things like DBL.

Revenue is down the numbers are down and the people who didn’t like HoT have left and you can’t have a proper discussion if over half the people are gone. It’s like WoW legion expac which had tons of people unsub but if you ask WoW players today how they feel about it you’ll get praise because those that liked it still subbed and frequent forums. There are fan clubs for the Ford Pinto, licorice, and other disliked things the key is to remember that your in a box and progress can only be made from getting more perspective.

HoT is the only open content in the game the demands LFG it’s lfg content. Ls3 and ls2 and prior can be done without lfg as there are many more people playing and enjoying those maps. Ls3 has a road system with more difficult areas to the side like centaurs. People came back for and moved into ls3 you don’t need to use lfg for jades, wurm, or events.

HoT is failed content that demands lfg propped up by AB mm for awhile and quickly abandoned for newer more mainstream content. Defending it this late in the game is pointless as the games veteran base contracted with HoT while any expansion is credited to the f2p core maps. The sheer fact that so many new people got into gw2 due to F2p but revenue declined for three straight quarters speaks volumes. It also says something that an uptick in returning players and new players I’m seeing lately is due to ls3 which abandoned many of the core philosophies of HoT.

Clearly, HoT was not universally well-received. But making up nonsense about why doesn’t help. For instance, only the boss events rely on LFG and the exact same process unfolds for every single world boss in core Tyria. There is no shortage of players participating as evidenced by the fact that you can LFG your way into a meta map just as you can with Teq, TT, Shatterer, and so on. Further, the jungle is not clogged with enemies so that players can’t pass without fighting their way through. Not only that, but the vertical layouts make full use of gliding and other skills which allow for more freedom in how one chooses to bypass enemies.

I don’t personally like jump puzzles. That doesn’t make them failed content. Perhaps the failure was simply not enough content for those who didn’t like HoT-style maps? And perhaps if we had received nothing but core Tyria 2.0 it would have been an even bigger failure, as players have apparently been demanding more challenging content for some time.

I suppose your perspective will depend upon your bias.

AliamRationem.5172:

Doam.8305:

This topic is funny because this topic ignores reality

HoT has been out for some time now and it has failed they had far too few playable maps and didn’t follow MMO staples like low mob density roads/paths that people of all skill levels can walk to complete story while keeping high density areas off to the side and seperate. The butchered WVW and PvP while offering pure raid related content patches. No player input either just early access disguised as input for things like DBL.

Revenue is down the numbers are down and the people who didn’t like HoT have left and you can’t have a proper discussion if over half the people are gone. It’s like WoW legion expac which had tons of people unsub but if you ask WoW players today how they feel about it you’ll get praise because those that liked it still subbed and frequent forums. There are fan clubs for the Ford Pinto, licorice, and other disliked things the key is to remember that your in a box and progress can only be made from getting more perspective.

HoT is the only open content in the game the demands LFG it’s lfg content. Ls3 and ls2 and prior can be done without lfg as there are many more people playing and enjoying those maps. Ls3 has a road system with more difficult areas to the side like centaurs. People came back for and moved into ls3 you don’t need to use lfg for jades, wurm, or events.

HoT is failed content that demands lfg propped up by AB mm for awhile and quickly abandoned for newer more mainstream content. Defending it this late in the game is pointless as the games veteran base contracted with HoT while any expansion is credited to the f2p core maps. The sheer fact that so many new people got into gw2 due to F2p but revenue declined for three straight quarters speaks volumes. It also says something that an uptick in returning players and new players I’m seeing lately is due to ls3 which abandoned many of the core philosophies of HoT.

Clearly, HoT was not universally well-received. But making up nonsense about why doesn’t help. For instance, only the boss events rely on LFG and the exact same process unfolds for every single world boss in core Tyria. There is no shortage of players participating as evidenced by the fact that you can LFG your way into a meta map just as you can with Teq, TT, Shatterer, and so on. Further, the jungle is not clogged with enemies so that players can’t pass without fighting their way through. Not only that, but the vertical layouts make full use of gliding and other skills which allow for more freedom in how one chooses to bypass enemies.

I don’t personally like jump puzzles. That doesn’t make them failed content. Perhaps the failure was simply not enough content for those who didn’t like HoT-style maps? And perhaps if we had received nothing but core Tyria 2.0 it would have been an even bigger failure, as players have apparently been demanding more challenging content for some time.

I suppose your perspective will depend upon your bias.

Not to mention Hot revitalized the game for some of us. I was playing less until HOT came out. For me, HoT was a success. I don’t know what I’d be doing now if it weren’t for HoT or something like it.

Vayne.8563:

AliamRationem.5172:

Doam.8305:

This topic is funny because this topic ignores reality

HoT has been out for some time now and it has failed they had far too few playable maps and didn’t follow MMO staples like low mob density roads/paths that people of all skill levels can walk to complete story while keeping high density areas off to the side and seperate. The butchered WVW and PvP while offering pure raid related content patches. No player input either just early access disguised as input for things like DBL.

Revenue is down the numbers are down and the people who didn’t like HoT have left and you can’t have a proper discussion if over half the people are gone. It’s like WoW legion expac which had tons of people unsub but if you ask WoW players today how they feel about it you’ll get praise because those that liked it still subbed and frequent forums. There are fan clubs for the Ford Pinto, licorice, and other disliked things the key is to remember that your in a box and progress can only be made from getting more perspective.

HoT is the only open content in the game the demands LFG it’s lfg content. Ls3 and ls2 and prior can be done without lfg as there are many more people playing and enjoying those maps. Ls3 has a road system with more difficult areas to the side like centaurs. People came back for and moved into ls3 you don’t need to use lfg for jades, wurm, or events.

HoT is failed content that demands lfg propped up by AB mm for awhile and quickly abandoned for newer more mainstream content. Defending it this late in the game is pointless as the games veteran base contracted with HoT while any expansion is credited to the f2p core maps. The sheer fact that so many new people got into gw2 due to F2p but revenue declined for three straight quarters speaks volumes. It also says something that an uptick in returning players and new players I’m seeing lately is due to ls3 which abandoned many of the core philosophies of HoT.

Clearly, HoT was not universally well-received. But making up nonsense about why doesn’t help. For instance, only the boss events rely on LFG and the exact same process unfolds for every single world boss in core Tyria. There is no shortage of players participating as evidenced by the fact that you can LFG your way into a meta map just as you can with Teq, TT, Shatterer, and so on. Further, the jungle is not clogged with enemies so that players can’t pass without fighting their way through. Not only that, but the vertical layouts make full use of gliding and other skills which allow for more freedom in how one chooses to bypass enemies.

I don’t personally like jump puzzles. That doesn’t make them failed content. Perhaps the failure was simply not enough content for those who didn’t like HoT-style maps? And perhaps if we had received nothing but core Tyria 2.0 it would have been an even bigger failure, as players have apparently been demanding more challenging content for some time.

I suppose your perspective will depend upon your bias.

Not to mention Hot revitalized the game for some of us. I was playing less until HOT came out. For me, HoT was a success. I don’t know what I’d be doing now if it weren’t for HoT or something like it.

HoT maps are all meta event based you can’t compared core world bosses to HoT metas. Saying that only the bosses need lfg doesn’t work for HoT when everything boils down to work torwards those bosses. Gerant, Mord, and so forth have LFG to get the basic ball rolling to get to thos bosses. A world boss is on a timer you know the time and you show up with lfg as a convenience as with it or without it there will be people to attempt it or enough people on the map to get it done. You don’t have people using lfg filling lanes for world bosses. Saying you enjoy HoT is nice but it’s an echo chamber those that dislike it left and pating yourself on the back in an empty stadium is great and all but your ignoring all the empty seats that used to be filled and without people the future is bleak:

Doam.8305:

Vayne.8563:

AliamRationem.5172:

Doam.8305:

This topic is funny because this topic ignores reality

HoT has been out for some time now and it has failed they had far too few playable maps and didn’t follow MMO staples like low mob density roads/paths that people of all skill levels can walk to complete story while keeping high density areas off to the side and seperate. The butchered WVW and PvP while offering pure raid related content patches. No player input either just early access disguised as input for things like DBL.

Revenue is down the numbers are down and the people who didn’t like HoT have left and you can’t have a proper discussion if over half the people are gone. It’s like WoW legion expac which had tons of people unsub but if you ask WoW players today how they feel about it you’ll get praise because those that liked it still subbed and frequent forums. There are fan clubs for the Ford Pinto, licorice, and other disliked things the key is to remember that your in a box and progress can only be made from getting more perspective.

HoT is the only open content in the game the demands LFG it’s lfg content. Ls3 and ls2 and prior can be done without lfg as there are many more people playing and enjoying those maps. Ls3 has a road system with more difficult areas to the side like centaurs. People came back for and moved into ls3 you don’t need to use lfg for jades, wurm, or events.

HoT is failed content that demands lfg propped up by AB mm for awhile and quickly abandoned for newer more mainstream content. Defending it this late in the game is pointless as the games veteran base contracted with HoT while any expansion is credited to the f2p core maps. The sheer fact that so many new people got into gw2 due to F2p but revenue declined for three straight quarters speaks volumes. It also says something that an uptick in returning players and new players I’m seeing lately is due to ls3 which abandoned many of the core philosophies of HoT.

Clearly, HoT was not universally well-received. But making up nonsense about why doesn’t help. For instance, only the boss events rely on LFG and the exact same process unfolds for every single world boss in core Tyria. There is no shortage of players participating as evidenced by the fact that you can LFG your way into a meta map just as you can with Teq, TT, Shatterer, and so on. Further, the jungle is not clogged with enemies so that players can’t pass without fighting their way through. Not only that, but the vertical layouts make full use of gliding and other skills which allow for more freedom in how one chooses to bypass enemies.

I don’t personally like jump puzzles. That doesn’t make them failed content. Perhaps the failure was simply not enough content for those who didn’t like HoT-style maps? And perhaps if we had received nothing but core Tyria 2.0 it would have been an even bigger failure, as players have apparently been demanding more challenging content for some time.

I suppose your perspective will depend upon your bias.

Not to mention Hot revitalized the game for some of us. I was playing less until HOT came out. For me, HoT was a success. I don’t know what I’d be doing now if it weren’t for HoT or something like it.

HoT maps are all meta event based you can’t compared core world bosses to HoT metas. Saying that only the bosses need lfg doesn’t work for HoT when everything boils down to work torwards those bosses. Gerant, Mord, and so forth have LFG to get the basic ball rolling to get to thos bosses. A world boss is on a timer you know the time and you show up with lfg as a convenience as with it or without it there will be people to attempt it or enough people on the map to get it done. You don’t have people using lfg filling lanes for world bosses. Saying you enjoy HoT is nice but it’s an echo chamber those that dislike it left and pating yourself on the back in an empty stadium is great and all but your ignoring all the empty seats that used to be filled and without people the future is bleak:

If what you say is true, then we should definitely not do a complete 180 away from HoT content because apparently the only people remaining are players like myself who signed on to GW2 after HoT released and stuck around because of it.

Doam.8305:

Vayne.8563:

AliamRationem.5172:

Doam.8305:

This topic is funny because this topic ignores reality

HoT has been out for some time now and it has failed they had far too few playable maps and didn’t follow MMO staples like low mob density roads/paths that people of all skill levels can walk to complete story while keeping high density areas off to the side and seperate. The butchered WVW and PvP while offering pure raid related content patches. No player input either just early access disguised as input for things like DBL.

Revenue is down the numbers are down and the people who didn’t like HoT have left and you can’t have a proper discussion if over half the people are gone. It’s like WoW legion expac which had tons of people unsub but if you ask WoW players today how they feel about it you’ll get praise because those that liked it still subbed and frequent forums. There are fan clubs for the Ford Pinto, licorice, and other disliked things the key is to remember that your in a box and progress can only be made from getting more perspective.

HoT is the only open content in the game the demands LFG it’s lfg content. Ls3 and ls2 and prior can be done without lfg as there are many more people playing and enjoying those maps. Ls3 has a road system with more difficult areas to the side like centaurs. People came back for and moved into ls3 you don’t need to use lfg for jades, wurm, or events.

HoT is failed content that demands lfg propped up by AB mm for awhile and quickly abandoned for newer more mainstream content. Defending it this late in the game is pointless as the games veteran base contracted with HoT while any expansion is credited to the f2p core maps. The sheer fact that so many new people got into gw2 due to F2p but revenue declined for three straight quarters speaks volumes. It also says something that an uptick in returning players and new players I’m seeing lately is due to ls3 which abandoned many of the core philosophies of HoT.

Clearly, HoT was not universally well-received. But making up nonsense about why doesn’t help. For instance, only the boss events rely on LFG and the exact same process unfolds for every single world boss in core Tyria. There is no shortage of players participating as evidenced by the fact that you can LFG your way into a meta map just as you can with Teq, TT, Shatterer, and so on. Further, the jungle is not clogged with enemies so that players can’t pass without fighting their way through. Not only that, but the vertical layouts make full use of gliding and other skills which allow for more freedom in how one chooses to bypass enemies.

I don’t personally like jump puzzles. That doesn’t make them failed content. Perhaps the failure was simply not enough content for those who didn’t like HoT-style maps? And perhaps if we had received nothing but core Tyria 2.0 it would have been an even bigger failure, as players have apparently been demanding more challenging content for some time.

I suppose your perspective will depend upon your bias.

Not to mention Hot revitalized the game for some of us. I was playing less until HOT came out. For me, HoT was a success. I don’t know what I’d be doing now if it weren’t for HoT or something like it.

HoT maps are all meta event based you can’t compared core world bosses to HoT metas. Saying that only the bosses need lfg doesn’t work for HoT when everything boils down to work torwards those bosses. Gerant, Mord, and so forth have LFG to get the basic ball rolling to get to thos bosses. A world boss is on a timer you know the time and you show up with lfg as a convenience as with it or without it there will be people to attempt it or enough people on the map to get it done. You don’t have people using lfg filling lanes for world bosses. Saying you enjoy HoT is nice but it’s an echo chamber those that dislike it left and pating yourself on the back in an empty stadium is great and all but your ignoring all the empty seats that used to be filled and without people the future is bleak:

HoT maps are not all meta events. There is a single meta event on each hot map and a bunch of event chains. I don’t just play for metas any more than I play the world for world bosses. Many of the events in the event chains can be soloed. Almost all of them can be done with two or three people.

Saying HOT maps are only metas is simply not the case.

Vayne.8563:

HoT maps are not all meta events. There is a single meta event on each hot map and a bunch of event chains. I don’t just play for metas any more than I play the world for world bosses. Many of the events in the event chains can be soloed. Almost all of them can be done with two or three people.

Saying HOT maps are only metas is simply not the case.

Well he did say meta event “based”. :p Which was sort of true until they decoupled them, and now it is at least storywise connected to the meta. But yeah. It’s not like everything is necessary to be LFGed.

Either way, regardless of whether people moved away from the game for whatever reason, there’s always the option to come back. The LW3 New maps are already not in HoT style, which just tells me that ArenaNet at least sees that, while some people don’t see any problem with HoT, a considerable amount does. And they are definitely listening to the people who say that HoT was not liked.

Really, you can argue all you like why HoT is easily soloable, and everyone you know feels the same, and it’s not true that this and that is a problem in HoT, and people are just giving up too early, or the ever popular “This game is not for you” (OP liked the core game at least, so uhh what??)
But in the end, no amount of arguing is going to help convince the people who simply disagree. And ArenaNet at least understands that in order to get players returning to the game is to steer the direction towards those opinions at least enough for them to reconsider.

It mostly boils down to: possible doesn’t mean enjoyable.

FrizzFreston.5290:

Vayne.8563:

HoT maps are not all meta events. There is a single meta event on each hot map and a bunch of event chains. I don’t just play for metas any more than I play the world for world bosses. Many of the events in the event chains can be soloed. Almost all of them can be done with two or three people.

Saying HOT maps are only metas is simply not the case.

Well he did say meta event “based”. :p Which was sort of true until they decoupled them, and now it is at least storywise connected to the meta. But yeah. It’s not like everything is necessary to be LFGed.

Either way, regardless of whether people moved away from the game for whatever reason, there’s always the option to come back. The LW3 New maps are already not in HoT style, which just tells me that ArenaNet at least sees that, while some people don’t see any problem with HoT, a considerable amount does. And they are definitely listening to the people who say that HoT was not liked.

Really, you can argue all you like why HoT is easily soloable, and everyone you know feels the same, and it’s not true that this and that is a problem in HoT, and people are just giving up too early, or the ever popular “This game is not for you” (OP liked the core game at least, so uhh what??)
But in the end, no amount of arguing is going to help convince the people who simply disagree. And ArenaNet at least understands that in order to get players returning to the game is to steer the direction towards those opinions at least enough for them to reconsider.

It mostly boils down to: possible doesn’t mean enjoyable.

The problem is a lot of people also left the game because it was too easy and those four maps gave some people impetus to come back. This isn’t an all or nothing proposition.

The game needed maps like this. It needed some challenging, some complex open world maps. Now it has some. It gives more options and variety. I will always spend more of my time on these maps now than the original.

If it continued the way it was, there’s no guarantee that more people wouldn’t have walked.

As I’ve said many times, I don’t think any demographic has a clear majority. What we have here, in my opinion, is a bunch of largish minorities. Cater to one and another gets kittened off. That’s what happened to HOT.

Vayne.8563:

FrizzFreston.5290:

Vayne.8563:

HoT maps are not all meta events. There is a single meta event on each hot map and a bunch of event chains. I don’t just play for metas any more than I play the world for world bosses. Many of the events in the event chains can be soloed. Almost all of them can be done with two or three people.

Saying HOT maps are only metas is simply not the case.

Well he did say meta event “based”. :p Which was sort of true until they decoupled them, and now it is at least storywise connected to the meta. But yeah. It’s not like everything is necessary to be LFGed.

Either way, regardless of whether people moved away from the game for whatever reason, there’s always the option to come back. The LW3 New maps are already not in HoT style, which just tells me that ArenaNet at least sees that, while some people don’t see any problem with HoT, a considerable amount does. And they are definitely listening to the people who say that HoT was not liked.

Really, you can argue all you like why HoT is easily soloable, and everyone you know feels the same, and it’s not true that this and that is a problem in HoT, and people are just giving up too early, or the ever popular “This game is not for you” (OP liked the core game at least, so uhh what??)
But in the end, no amount of arguing is going to help convince the people who simply disagree. And ArenaNet at least understands that in order to get players returning to the game is to steer the direction towards those opinions at least enough for them to reconsider.

It mostly boils down to: possible doesn’t mean enjoyable.

The problem is a lot of people also left the game because it was too easy and those four maps gave some people impetus to come back. This isn’t an all or nothing proposition.

The game needed maps like this. It needed some challenging, some complex open world maps. Now it has some. It gives more options and variety. I will always spend more of my time on these maps now than the original.

If it continued the way it was, there’s no guarantee that more people wouldn’t have walked.

As I’ve said many times, I don’t think any demographic has a clear majority. What we have here, in my opinion, is a bunch of largish minorities. Cater to one and another gets kittened off. That’s what happened to HOT.

How can you even make that argument when the sharp decline in revenue as well as a complete change in a number of regards happened only after HoT launched. The game existed for years prior to HoT so making the argument of people leaving due to the game being easy doesn’t hold any water at all. The game grew under those easy circumstances you say people were leaving and contracted when they decided to go the HoT map. From launch till HoTs launch the game has never been about hardcore content in PVE as people who sought difficulty went in PVP or skirmished in WVW.

Anet gave people who wanted harder PVE content there first bone ever with HoT outside of aetherblade and just like aetherblade it played to a minority. All the reports and all of Anets actions after completely clash with your argument that the game needed harder maps. Raids sure you don’t see raiders going on about PVE maps.

Current game shown by ls3 is comprised of casual maps with pvp, raids, and fractals for those looking for harder content. With WVW still awaiting the promised changes and dungeons dead. Easier more open HoT maps with harder mobs off the story path and to the side like lake Doric centaurs. In addition if the really wanted harder PVE maps they could have pulled a GW1 and used side maps. Guild halls could have been chucked into the mists and the existed Guild hall maps could have been flooded with higher level mobs for farming or a vanquish system.

I completely disagree to in that casual play is clearly the majority demographic as stated it’s basically been the game from launch up till HoT. They designed the game in numerous ways to clash with others with more hardcore elements since launch. No trinity, shared events, and so forth and there is even something that’s harder to argue against.

Anet devs use Reddit for all sorts of feedback they used these boards more often in the earlier days. But with Reddit you can see likes and dislike and thus a basic representation of numbers. From posts to highly upboted questions asked in their AMA you have a force that has successfully let the devs know their opinions on HoT and lead to the designs we see today in ls3. Casuals are the majority and these forums are for players helping players with the devs making there presence known with the community on Reddit.

Doam.8305:

Vayne.8563:

FrizzFreston.5290:

Vayne.8563:

snip

Well he did say meta event “based”. :p Which was sort of true until they decoupled them, and now it is at least storywise connected to the meta. But yeah. It’s not like everything is necessary to be LFGed.

snip

It mostly boils down to: possible doesn’t mean enjoyable.

The problem is a lot of people also left the game because it was too easy and those four maps gave some people impetus to come back. This isn’t an all or nothing proposition.

The game needed maps like this. It needed some challenging, some complex open world maps. Now it has some. It gives more options and variety. I will always spend more of my time on these maps now than the original.

If it continued the way it was, there’s no guarantee that more people wouldn’t have walked.

As I’ve said many times, I don’t think any demographic has a clear majority. What we have here, in my opinion, is a bunch of largish minorities. Cater to one and another gets kittened off. That’s what happened to HOT.

How can you even make that argument when the sharp decline in revenue as well as a complete change in a number of regards happened only after HoT launched. The game existed for years prior to HoT so making the argument of people leaving due to the game being easy doesn’t hold any water at all. The game grew under those easy circumstances you say people were leaving and contracted when they decided to go the HoT map. From launch till HoTs launch the game has never been about hardcore content in PVE as people who sought difficulty went in PVP or skirmished in WVW.

Anet gave people who wanted harder PVE content there first bone ever with HoT outside of aetherblade and just like aetherblade it played to a minority. All the reports and all of Anets actions after completely clash with your argument that the game needed harder maps. Raids sure you don’t see raiders going on about PVE maps.

Current game shown by ls3 is comprised of casual maps with pvp, raids, and fractals for those looking for harder content. With WVW still awaiting the promised changes and dungeons dead. Easier more open HoT maps with harder mobs off the story path and to the side like lake Doric centaurs. In addition if the really wanted harder PVE maps they could have pulled a GW1 and used side maps. Guild halls could have been chucked into the mists and the existed Guild hall maps could have been flooded with higher level mobs for farming or a vanquish system.

I completely disagree to in that casual play is clearly the majority demographic as stated it’s basically been the game from launch up till HoT. They designed the game in numerous ways to clash with others with more hardcore elements since launch. No trinity, shared events, and so forth and there is even something that’s harder to argue against.

Anet devs use Reddit for all sorts of feedback they used these boards more often in the earlier days. But with Reddit you can see likes and dislike and thus a basic representation of numbers. From posts to highly upboted questions asked in their AMA you have a force that has successfully let the devs know their opinions on HoT and lead to the designs we see today in ls3. Casuals are the majority and these forums are for players helping players with the devs making there presence known with the community on Reddit.

The sharp decline in revenue has a lot of possible explanations. I don’t believe enough copies of the expansion sold, which means that people who play core get tired of the content faster and leave. There’s just not that much core content. But WHY didn’t people buy the expansion, that’s the question.

SOME may not have bought it because it’s too hard. That’s true. And some found it too hard and left. But other people stopped playing and buying for other reasons too.

Some people for example, thought the expansion was too expensive for the number of zones it offered, they didn’t see it as a season pass (which I said it was even back then) and those people didn’t buy the expansion. Some were angry that it didn’t come with a character slot. Some were WvW who didn’t like the new zone at all. This isn’t just a case of one reason is the reason this happened. That’s how I can say this.

You’re saying sales declined because of X. I’m saying sales declined for a ranger of reasons, X probably among them, but NO ONE can say what percentage of that X represents.

I’ve said this many times in many different threads. It’s more likely that there’s a number of factors that affected sales, including a 9 month content drought for everything but raids and PvP, and you don’t get all those people back.

How can you possibly know that the content drought didn’t affect more people than the difficulty of the expansion?

Doam.8305:

How can you even make that argument when the sharp decline in revenue as well as a complete change in a number of regards happened only after HoT launched. The game existed for years prior to HoT so making the argument of people leaving due to the game being easy doesn’t hold any water at all. The game grew under those easy circumstances you say people were leaving and contracted when they decided to go the HoT map. From launch till HoTs launch the game has never been about hardcore content in PVE as people who sought difficulty went in PVP or skirmished in WVW.

Anet gave people who wanted harder PVE content there first bone ever with HoT outside of aetherblade and just like aetherblade it played to a minority. All the reports and all of Anets actions after completely clash with your argument that the game needed harder maps. Raids sure you don’t see raiders going on about PVE maps.

Current game shown by ls3 is comprised of casual maps with pvp, raids, and fractals for those looking for harder content. With WVW still awaiting the promised changes and dungeons dead. Easier more open HoT maps with harder mobs off the story path and to the side like lake Doric centaurs. In addition if the really wanted harder PVE maps they could have pulled a GW1 and used side maps. Guild halls could have been chucked into the mists and the existed Guild hall maps could have been flooded with higher level mobs for farming or a vanquish system.

I completely disagree to in that casual play is clearly the majority demographic as stated it’s basically been the game from launch up till HoT. They designed the game in numerous ways to clash with others with more hardcore elements since launch. No trinity, shared events, and so forth and there is even something that’s harder to argue against.

Anet devs use Reddit for all sorts of feedback they used these boards more often in the earlier days. But with Reddit you can see likes and dislike and thus a basic representation of numbers. From posts to highly upboted questions asked in their AMA you have a force that has successfully let the devs know their opinions on HoT and lead to the designs we see today in ls3. Casuals are the majority and these forums are for players helping players with the devs making there presence known with the community on Reddit.

For me it’s pretty simple: I like HoT style maps and want to see more of them. Everything you say could be 100% true and it would still be a mistake to design only flat maps with easy combat moving forward. In my opinion, there is room for both.

Having said that, I still think you’re placing too much of the blame on players hating HoT open world. The fact is that’s what matters to you, but if you listen to the complaints you refer to a lot of them focus on other factors such as guild halls and PvP/WvW balance. I don’t doubt that HoT-style vertical maps were a factor and it was certainly a mistake to design only 4 maps and make them all of this style.

That’s why I advocate a mix of map types moving forward. You can argue all you want that that’s a waste of time, but the evidence is right in front of you. Plenty of players love these maps and consider them far superior to core maps and LS3 (perhaps minus bloodstone fen). Also, you said it yourself that the players who dislike such maps already left and many of them may not come back. Do you want ANet to double down on the strategy of alienating their player base by going back to an exclusively “flat and easy” design?

All stuff started with ppl being mad due to the expansion containing the base game and the complete riot on fora (forums), media, vloggers, Gamereview sites and so on…

If everybbody says it is unfair, not cool and dishonest, ppl will go and will not try.

The Hypetrain derailed catastrophically and sales were BAD. You cannot expect this to recover… Not easily at least. GW2 sold 5 Million copies and maybe 500k HoT I guess…
So for most ppl I see there are at least 9 ppl who chose not to buy the expansion….

The fact the game is not bad and the QoL updates were good, the story was well… mediocre at launch but is still continuing every 2-3 months… and is now 26+ steps instead of the 16. The introduction of RAIDS, well there has been a lot of stuff….

Just no(t enough) players… because they made a really bad marketting choice ad they kittened ppl off… a loss of 90% of your playerbase is a really really bad thing. small remark, most ppl playing high end have 2(+) accounts…..taking THIS in consideration the actual number of acounts could have been 90% but the player nuber could have dropped 92-93% even… Even if a quarter of those ppl wold come back we would have tripled the amount of players overall…

Imagine if 50% of all players HAD purchased HoT, with 2.5M accounts most stuff would have been significantly easier, everything could have had 6 times more instances… and I doubt gw2 would have been F2P…

The Flat and easy is to allow new ppl to fastgear their characters…. Or for the Old Guard to fastgear thier Alts…

I expect the new expansion to be reliant on ppl having ascnededs, not having a base level of exotic anymore… This would be very very likely. I do not expect further gear progression, I expect ascnededs take the place of the rare madatory for vanilla(exotic for instanced), exotic for HoT(ascneded for instanced) to ascneded for EXP pack 2, with legendaries (need to swap stats often???) being normal for the instanced content at that time…. but we’ll see. I do know acces to legendary character will mean instant changes to meta / gameplay will no longer cost cast/ecto’s/shards and so on…

Ya’ll do realize that HoT had a prepurchase option available months before HoT launched and the sales from those prepurchases would have been on the pre-HoT quarter.

If they were going to make ascended the new required standard, it would only need alongside making ascended as easy to acquire as exotic is now. Right now you can do the dailies for a week or two and kit out the average character in full exotic – that’s a grand total of maybe 4 hours. A full set of ascended is more like 2 weeks of 4 hours per day, if you’re being really efficient about it. For the average player, it’s much longer. Hell, I’ve been playing for years and I have one ring, an amulet, one accessory, and my specialization weapon, though that’s mostly due to indifference.

Crinn.7864:

Ya’ll do realize that HoT had a prepurchase option available months before HoT launched and the sales from those prepurchases would have been on the pre-HoT quarter.

Profits from pre-purchases are held back to make the launch quarter look better. If that’s not the case, pre-purchasing was a failure (2014 vs 2015).

Healix.5819:

Crinn.7864:

Ya’ll do realize that HoT had a prepurchase option available months before HoT launched and the sales from those prepurchases would have been on the pre-HoT quarter.

Profits from pre-purchases are held back to make the launch quarter look better. If that’s not the case, pre-purchasing was a failure (2014 vs 2015).

Pretty much this. Given the volume of posts from players who claimed to have pre-purchased and the numbers in the beta tests, there had to be substantial sales revenue from pre-purchases. So, either pre-purchases counted in Q4 2015 or gem store sales in Q2 and Q3 15 tanked.

I feel the same way about HoT maps.

Crinn.7864:

Ya’ll do realize that HoT had a prepurchase option available months before HoT launched and the sales from those prepurchases would have been on the pre-HoT quarter.

Nope that is not true. GAAP rules don’t allow companies to recognize revenue at PoS unless it’s also the same date a delivery or the date a customer actually takes possession of the goods.

Healix.5819:

Crinn.7864:

Ya’ll do realize that HoT had a prepurchase option available months before HoT launched and the sales from those prepurchases would have been on the pre-HoT quarter.

Profits from pre-purchases are held back to make the launch quarter look better. If that’s not the case, pre-purchasing was a failure (2014 vs 2015).

I just find it interesting how gw2 numbers are slightly better before the expansion and 25% down after the expansion. ~20k vs ~15k It doesn’t seem the expansion had a positive effect on the game. Though not sure about what negative effects, either could be age. Or just the fact people paid for the expansion makes them less likely to pay for gemstore stuff. Since numbers are fairly the same if normalized over the time the expansion was out. (really just how you want to explain it probably both factors play a role)

The quarter numbers btw: 24k 21k 19k 20k 22k 21k 37k 30k 16k 15k 15k

PaxTheGreatOne.9472:

All stuff started with ppl being mad due to the expansion containing the base game and the complete riot on fora (forums), media, vloggers, Gamereview sites and so on…

If everybbody says it is unfair, not cool and dishonest, ppl will go and will not try.

The Hypetrain derailed catastrophically and sales were BAD. You cannot expect this to recover… Not easily at least. GW2 sold 5 Million copies and maybe 500k HoT I guess…
So for most ppl I see there are at least 9 ppl who chose not to buy the expansion….

The fact the game is not bad and the QoL updates were good, the story was well… mediocre at launch but is still continuing every 2-3 months… and is now 26+ steps instead of the 16. The introduction of RAIDS, well there has been a lot of stuff….

Just no(t enough) players… because they made a really bad marketting choice ad they kittened ppl off… a loss of 90% of your playerbase is a really really bad thing. small remark, most ppl playing high end have 2(+) accounts…..taking THIS in consideration the actual number of acounts could have been 90% but the player nuber could have dropped 92-93% even… Even if a quarter of those ppl wold come back we would have tripled the amount of players overall…

Imagine if 50% of all players HAD purchased HoT, with 2.5M accounts most stuff would have been significantly easier, everything could have had 6 times more instances… and I doubt gw2 would have been F2P…

The Flat and easy is to allow new ppl to fastgear their characters…. Or for the Old Guard to fastgear thier Alts…

I expect the new expansion to be reliant on ppl having ascnededs, not having a base level of exotic anymore… This would be very very likely. I do not expect further gear progression, I expect ascnededs take the place of the rare madatory for vanilla(exotic for instanced), exotic for HoT(ascneded for instanced) to ascneded for EXP pack 2, with legendaries (need to swap stats often???) being normal for the instanced content at that time…. but we’ll see. I do know acces to legendary character will mean instant changes to meta / gameplay will no longer cost cast/ecto’s/shards and so on…

I’m not sure I can believe there were 5 million players left 3 years after Core launch. That assumes absolutely no one left the game since launch. o.0

lukejoe.1592:

Crinn.7864:

Ya’ll do realize that HoT had a prepurchase option available months before HoT launched and the sales from those prepurchases would have been on the pre-HoT quarter.

Nope that is not true. GAAP rules don’t allow companies to recognize revenue at PoS unless it’s also the same date a delivery or the date a customer actually takes possession of the goods.

But the customer did take possession of the goods the day they prepurchased HoT.

Remember that GW2 went f2p before Heart of Thorns, and when it did so, purchasing HoT was how you upgraded from f2p to full account. The day a f2p account purchased HoT they take possession of more character slots, unrestricted trading post, and beta weekend access.

For example I came to this game in august of 2015 as f2p, I bought HoT in September of 2015 in order to gain a full account. I took possession of the full account on that same day. HoT launched in late October of 2015.

Even people that had bought the original game before f2p where still possessing their HoT purchase before HoT launch in the form of incentive items.
From the HoT pre-purchase announcement page: “All virtual items will be delivered to your account immediately for instant enjoyment” https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/guild-wars-2-heart-of-thorns-is-available-for-pre-purchase/

Crinn.7864:

lukejoe.1592:

Crinn.7864:

Ya’ll do realize that HoT had a prepurchase option available months before HoT launched and the sales from those prepurchases would have been on the pre-HoT quarter.

Nope that is not true. GAAP rules don’t allow companies to recognize revenue at PoS unless it’s also the same date a delivery or the date a customer actually takes possession of the goods.

But the customer did take possession of the goods the day they prepurchased HoT.

Remember that GW2 went f2p before Heart of Thorns, and when it did so, purchasing HoT was how you upgraded from f2p to full account. The day a f2p account purchased HoT they take possession of more character slots, unrestricted trading post, and beta weekend access.

For example I came to this game in august of 2015 as f2p, I bought HoT in September of 2015 in order to gain a full account. I took possession of the full account on that same day. HoT launched in late October of 2015.

Even people that had bought the original game before f2p where still possessing their HoT purchase before HoT launch in the form of incentive items.
From the HoT pre-purchase announcement page: “All virtual items will be delivered to your account immediately for instant enjoyment” https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/guild-wars-2-heart-of-thorns-is-available-for-pre-purchase/

Did the customer take possession of the HoT expansion at the time of prepurchase?

Ashen.2907:

Crinn.7864:

lukejoe.1592:

Crinn.7864:

Ya’ll do realize that HoT had a prepurchase option available months before HoT launched and the sales from those prepurchases would have been on the pre-HoT quarter.

Nope that is not true. GAAP rules don’t allow companies to recognize revenue at PoS unless it’s also the same date a delivery or the date a customer actually takes possession of the goods.

But the customer did take possession of the goods the day they prepurchased HoT.

Remember that GW2 went f2p before Heart of Thorns, and when it did so, purchasing HoT was how you upgraded from f2p to full account. The day a f2p account purchased HoT they take possession of more character slots, unrestricted trading post, and beta weekend access.

For example I came to this game in august of 2015 as f2p, I bought HoT in September of 2015 in order to gain a full account. I took possession of the full account on that same day. HoT launched in late October of 2015.

Even people that had bought the original game before f2p where still possessing their HoT purchase before HoT launch in the form of incentive items.
From the HoT pre-purchase announcement page: “All virtual items will be delivered to your account immediately for instant enjoyment” https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/guild-wars-2-heart-of-thorns-is-available-for-pre-purchase/

Did the customer take possession of the HoT expansion at the time of prepurchase?

The took possession of Guild Wars 2. All versions of HoT included vanilla GW2 as part of the purchase.

See the link in previous post. And really HoT pre purchases have to be under the previous quarter since it doesn’t make any sense for the game to have a large revenue spike during a content drought.

Crinn.7864:

Ashen.2907:

Crinn.7864:

lukejoe.1592:

Crinn.7864:

Ya’ll do realize that HoT had a prepurchase option available months before HoT launched and the sales from those prepurchases would have been on the pre-HoT quarter.

Nope that is not true. GAAP rules don’t allow companies to recognize revenue at PoS unless it’s also the same date a delivery or the date a customer actually takes possession of the goods.

But the customer did take possession of the goods the day they prepurchased HoT.

Remember that GW2 went f2p before Heart of Thorns, and when it did so, purchasing HoT was how you upgraded from f2p to full account. The day a f2p account purchased HoT they take possession of more character slots, unrestricted trading post, and beta weekend access.

For example I came to this game in august of 2015 as f2p, I bought HoT in September of 2015 in order to gain a full account. I took possession of the full account on that same day. HoT launched in late October of 2015.

Even people that had bought the original game before f2p where still possessing their HoT purchase before HoT launch in the form of incentive items.
From the HoT pre-purchase announcement page: “All virtual items will be delivered to your account immediately for instant enjoyment” https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/guild-wars-2-heart-of-thorns-is-available-for-pre-purchase/

Did the customer take possession of the HoT expansion at the time of prepurchase?

The took possession of Guild Wars 2. All versions of HoT included vanilla GW2 as part of the purchase.

See the link in previous post. And really HoT pre purchases have to be under the previous quarter since it doesn’t make any sense for the game to have a large revenue spike during a content drought.

But they did not take possession of the highly advertised HoT expansion to GW2. Taking possession of the incentives for prepurchasing HoT is not taking possession of HoT.

Ashen.2907:

Crinn.7864:

Ashen.2907:

Crinn.7864:

lukejoe.1592:

Crinn.7864:

Ya’ll do realize that HoT had a prepurchase option available months before HoT launched and the sales from those prepurchases would have been on the pre-HoT quarter.

Nope that is not true. GAAP rules don’t allow companies to recognize revenue at PoS unless it’s also the same date a delivery or the date a customer actually takes possession of the goods.

But the customer did take possession of the goods the day they prepurchased HoT.

Remember that GW2 went f2p before Heart of Thorns, and when it did so, purchasing HoT was how you upgraded from f2p to full account. The day a f2p account purchased HoT they take possession of more character slots, unrestricted trading post, and beta weekend access.

For example I came to this game in august of 2015 as f2p, I bought HoT in September of 2015 in order to gain a full account. I took possession of the full account on that same day. HoT launched in late October of 2015.

Even people that had bought the original game before f2p where still possessing their HoT purchase before HoT launch in the form of incentive items.
From the HoT pre-purchase announcement page: “All virtual items will be delivered to your account immediately for instant enjoyment” https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/guild-wars-2-heart-of-thorns-is-available-for-pre-purchase/

Did the customer take possession of the HoT expansion at the time of prepurchase?

The took possession of Guild Wars 2. All versions of HoT included vanilla GW2 as part of the purchase.

See the link in previous post. And really HoT pre purchases have to be under the previous quarter since it doesn’t make any sense for the game to have a large revenue spike during a content drought.

But they did not take possession of the highly advertised HoT expansion to GW2. Taking possession of the incentives for prepurchasing HoT is not taking possession of HoT.

They took possession of (most of) the goods because they took possession of a full account.

Please remember that legally and technically Guild Wars 2 is a separate item than Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns However all packages that include Heart of Thorns include Guilds Wars 2.

Besides there is literally no way to make any sense of the quarterly reports if we assume that all HoT purchases including pre purchases where listed in HoT’s release quarter. It would require assuming that players randomly increased their gem purchase by a large amount during the drought, and assuming that of the existing players only a minority bought into HoT, and assuming that the game received little if any new players post HoT, and that gem store purchases dropped to nothing after HoT.