Guild Wars 2

Harper.4173:

Except I’ve seen casuals who also want the hardcore gone – completely driven off the game if possible so that they can afk-1-1-1-1-1 it to death.

Name one.

Harper.4173:

If casuals want hardcore rewards they should become hardcore – it’s that simple.

For once you and I agree on something.

The problem is that HoT doesn’t allow me to play through, effectively, without being hardcore.

vesica tempestas.1563:

your analogies are incorrect, your amusement park started off as 98% ‘casual’ rides and perhaps 2% ‘hardcore’ cutting edge in the shape of high end fractals, then Anet added a new rollercoaster in the shape of raids and 99% other stuff.

You’re wrong on your percentages, but I’ll give you a chance to prove them: Name ONE THING that HoT added that is unambiguously casual-friendly.

Daddicus.6128:

vesica tempestas.1563:

your analogies are incorrect, your amusement park started off as 98% ‘casual’ rides and perhaps 2% ‘hardcore’ cutting edge in the shape of high end fractals, then Anet added a new rollercoaster in the shape of raids and 99% other stuff.

You’re wrong on your percentages, but I’ll give you a chance to prove them: Name ONE THING that HoT added that is unambiguously casual-friendly.

Map rewards.

Vayne.8563:

Map rewards.

Predated HoT by nearly 2 months. But, it was related, so I’ll give you that one.

Monstrously valuable, though: on crafting material every 2 events. To make your post make sense, you’re going to need something a bit bigger.

HoT is by no means casual friendly

You may join a map at whatever time you want to, but don’t be surprised if you go into a finished or not started Dragon’s Stand, a Verdant Brink in the nighttime boss phases and see nobody on the map, an Auric Basin with saving Tarir meta only to find that none of the doors are even broken down, or a Tangled Depths that has all of it’s events finished in 20-30 minutes.

Want to unlock your elite specialization? There are some channel HP’s for an easy 10 in a few cases on each map (except for Dragon’s Stand, which is all channeling. Advice is to use teleport to friend to the map or just run there). The rest? Better be prepared to fight a champion and possibly some adds.

I heard you wanted to make one of the new legendaries. Congratulations! These are awesome new weapons. Too bad you’ll have to open (assuming a 1/3 chance, and excluding Dragon’s Stand random crystalline ore amounts [1,3,10]) about 750 of the corresponding “chests” in each zone! Exciting I know! Oh but don’t worry, you can get 15 of each currency by doing the personal story missions in those zones…

You excited for raids! I was too! Took our guild a less than a week to figure out all the mechanics, comps, and finally execution to beat it. That was hard. Now on a good casual run (no wipes, minimal afk time) we finish in 35-40 minutes.

I’m pretty sure I could come up with more instances, but those are some right off the top of my head

maddoctor.2738:

Astralporing.1957:

So, in the end, one or both of those groups will be unhappy and there’s no way around that.

The point still stands. Even if they add something that casuals want behind hardcore content, how is that making the game (as a whole) not casual friendly?

Basically, you are right. If you add something that is more hardcore to something that is basically casual, it does not make the whole product switch from casual to hardcore over night.

But:
*There was very few exclusive gear in GW2 until HoT. I think nobody denies that. The usefulness of legendary armor can be challenged, but the exclusivity can´t. In my opinion, you can´t justify a move like that when you also add the fact that core Tyria was nerfed. The core message to me from Anet was:
Play raids if you want to advance your equipment. You can´t grind or farm it, play it. We don´t care if you don´t like it.
I hope you understand that i don´t like being a second class citizen because I don´t want to play along in the raid experience. You don´t have to support my opinion, I know you don´t, just understand it please.

*I want to improve in a lot of things. I want to be a better human being, a better employee, a better friend etc etc…
I don´t want to improve in games. I see no necessity to improve in games. It´s fun time, not play time. Ask any modern child educator about free play, and they will answer you that free play is the best thing since the invention of the wheel. I already have to function as effective as possible on work, I don´t want to function in my spare time, I want fun and entertainment. I found only a few entertaining and funny things in HoT, although they are also there. As much as a chore the third map is, the first one is actually ok if you get used to it. Tarir map would be nice if it were not for the walls to reach HP everywhere.

So what I am saying is that you can´t expect people like me to weather out HoT and wait for something we lazy types of gamers really enjoy with the argument that core Tyria is still there for us to play. That is like throwing a dog a bone that is already majorily chewed down not only from overuse but also from the owner cutting peces out of it and expect him to chew it until he runs off someday because he is hungry. People will look for alternatives. I have 19610 AP right now, and for the first time in 3+ years, I am really looking for another game I could like as much as GW2 when ls1 was around.

Torolan.5816:

*There was very few exclusive gear in GW2 until HoT. I think nobody denies that.

There was exclusive gear in GW2 pre-HoT. Dungeon armors and Ascended Rings are examples. Over time they made them available through other types of content, but they stayed exclusive as long as the content that awarded them was new.

I don´t want to improve in games. I see no necessity to improve in games. It´s fun time, not play time.

And here is the main problem with gaming in general, not just Guild Wars 2. Players not wanting to use brain power to get better at playing them, leading to more and more dumbed down games. And now the only way to find a worthy game is through a kickstarter campaign, an indie developer or some miracle. Most of them devolve into a bazillion cutscenes with a few interactive moments in-between and QTEs. If I want to watch a movie, I’d watch a movie, there is no necessity to play a video game for a similar experience with far worse graphics.

In GW2 you don’t have cutscenes in most content, but it has the same difficulty as watching a cutscene in other video games. It’s a “watch this bar move until you get your loot” kind of experience. I can understand how for the “newer” generation of gamers who want to watch their game and not play it, HoT would be frustrating because you can’t put it on auto-pilot like in Core Tyria. But is “watching” really “playing”? I’d say not. You’d probably disagree.

maddoctor.2738:

And here is the main problem with gaming in general, not just Guild Wars 2. Players not wanting to use brain power to get better at playing them, leading to more and more dumbed down games. And now the only way to find a worthy game is through a kickstarter campaign, an indie developer or some miracle. Most of them devolve into a bazillion cutscenes with a few interactive moments in-between and QTEs. If I want to watch a movie, I’d watch a movie, there is no necessity to play a video game for a similar experience with far worse graphics.

In GW2 you don’t have cutscenes in most content, but it has the same difficulty as watching a cutscene in other video games. It’s a “watch this bar move until you get your loot” kind of experience. I can understand how for the “newer” generation of gamers who want to watch their game and not play it, HoT would be frustrating because you can’t put it on auto-pilot like in Core Tyria. But is “watching” really “playing”? I’d say not. You’d probably disagree.

Well said.

There are games out there where you have to click on monsters to do damage (Click heroes or something). But you can automate this by buying upgrades, and the game even runs when you are not “online”. So it basically boils down to: Log in → Buy upgrade → Log out. Fun fun fun.

Also, just as a little story, I got a great title from one of my friends for christmas on Steam called: “Shower with your dad simulator 2015: Do you still shower with your dad?” After playing it (yes, I actually played it), and finishing it in one mode, I got the following “you win” screen: http://i67.tinypic.com/jt565e.png

After playing with this game, I think it’s super fitting.

maddoctor.2738:

There was exclusive gear in GW2 pre-HoT. Dungeon armors and Ascended Rings are examples. Over time they made them available through other types of content, but they stayed exclusive as long as the content that awarded them was new.

Dungeons have been under fire for more than a year as being faceroll. Hardly exclusive. Ascended rings became available through laurels in January, 2013 — after being made available via FotM in mid-November of 2012. So, an exclusivity period of around two months, and it has been three years since. Legendary armor may in fact become available via other means over time. If it does, I hope the exclusive skins stay exclusive. However, appealing to those two examples does not help much. It’s already been ~2 months since raids popped — and we don’t even know what L. Armor looks like yet, never mind if it will be accessible elsewhere.

IndigoSundown.5419:

maddoctor.2738:

There was exclusive gear in GW2 pre-HoT. Dungeon armors and Ascended Rings are examples. Over time they made them available through other types of content, but they stayed exclusive as long as the content that awarded them was new.

Dungeons have been under fire for more than a year as being faceroll. Hardly exclusive. Ascended rings became available through laurels in January, 2013 — after being made available via FotM in mid-November of 2012. So, an exclusivity period of around two months, and it has been three years since. Legendary armor may in fact become available via other means over time. If it does, I hope the exclusive skins stay exclusive. However, appealing to those two examples does not help much. It’s already been ~2 months since raids popped — and we don’t even know what L. Armor looks like yet, never mind if it will be accessible elsewhere.

Dungeons were a faceroll IF you took the time to learn how they work and use the builds that actually make them faceroll. Go in Arah P4 and try it with a group of total randoms using random gear and builds, it won’t be a very good experience.

I think we’ll know how legendary armor looks, and if it will be available from other content, after they release the third Raid wing. It’s premature to talk about alternative paths to the legendary armor without first knowing the “first” path.

Bubi.7942:

Also, just as a little story, I got a great title from one of my friends for christmas on Steam called: “Shower with your dad simulator 2015: Do you still shower with your dad?” After playing it (yes, I actually played it), and finishing it in one mode, I got the following “you win” screen: http://i67.tinypic.com/jt565e.png

That image is perfect indeed. RIP video gaming.

Astralporing.1957:

Harper.4173:

Except I’ve seen casuals who also want the hardcore gone – completely driven off the game if possible so that they can afk-1-1-1-1-1 it to death.

What did you expect? Casuals do see that hardcores are trying to steer the game in directions they wouldn’t enjoy. They do not like it, and are trying to counter it. And if the only way to do it is by chasing hardcores away, then so be it. After all, while hardcores need casuals they can lord over to be happy (because when everyone’s special, noone is), casuals can do well on their own, with no hardcores around.
(and no, i’m not going to address your afk-1-1-1 strawman)

Get the profession with the lowest amount of armor/health, namely the Elementalist. Get a melee weapon (or close range) so you can’t range and kite the mobs, in this case the dagger. Use full offensive gear like Berserker and a full offensive build, no defensive traits or skills at all. Also, un-bind your dodge key, you don’t need any dodges at all for this.

Now find me a single mob (normal one) in Core Tyria that you can’t faceroll and auto-attack to death. This excludes Silverwastes and/or areas were LS mobs spawn, just Core Tyria mobs. To make it easier to illustrate the point, use only Fire skills because the Water auto heals you, making you really immortal in the eyes of such core mobs. And please don’t use the signet healing skill because it also make you immortal and defeat the point.

I doubt you will ever find such a mob. That’s how easy core tyria actually was. Even the “dreaded” Orr at release wasn’t hard at all, it was annoying to move around with all the CC abilities, but there was hardly any chance of you actually getting killed by the Risen. There is a reason all new mobs added with the Living Story had a much higher difficulty level, things like the Molten Alliance mobs, Toxic Alliance, Aetherblades, Watchknights and of course the Mordrem of DT/SW. Even their normal versions use more complicated skills and are more of a threat to players.

And the reason is, the devs realised the game was way too easy and tried to add more challenging mobs, and they continued that pattern with HoT. I don’t remember the new Molten mobs being such a threat to “casuals”

So anything that is not faceroll is “not casual” and will lead players away? Want to make HoT mobs a faceroll like the rest of Tyria?

When a 9 foot tall dragon-slaying epic hero gets knocked on his backside by a 3 foot tall bloke dressed as a mushroom you’ve got to question the thought process that went into HoT design.

I agree with Vayne by all means. Nobody could expect that HoT will be what it is, if we compared it to the gameplay from the base game. The advertisement was better AI of mobs, and challenging 10-man content and legendary armor. The reality is is few gimmicky mob mechanics with insta-kill damage, unbalanced 10-man fractals favouring only 50% of the classes and excluding the rest + favouring only highly organised groups of people pre-HoT. There is no friendly way to find people for raiding, as this game is so casual, the guilds don’t mean almost anything. And legendary armor, even though I didn’t even kill VG yet (because I’m guardian and nobody wants me + finding 9 more people is next to impossible), won’t be accessible until maybe the end of the year. And I’m not really going into all that map-meta events that are….. no, I’m not saying anything.

Astralporing.1957:

What did you expect? Casuals do see that hardcores are trying to steer the game in directions they wouldn’t enjoy. They do not like it, and are trying to counter it. And if the only way to do it is by chasing hardcores away, then so be it. After all, while hardcores need casuals they can lord over to be happy (because when everyone’s special, noone is), casuals can do well on their own, with no hardcores around.
(and no, i’m not going to address your afk-1-1-1 strawman)

Except this was going on waaaay before we even had hardcore content and even before hardcore content was even asked for. This was going on when hardcore players were simply trying to play the game their way and forming speed clear groups for dungeons ( during those early days of speed clearing when it was just starting to be a thing).
At that time GW2 was incredibly casual – and there was no sign of hardcore content ever coming.
And as a hardcore – I don’t really need casuals to “lord over” – unless by that you mean that I want people to work for their things and not get them as hand-outs.

Astralporing.1957:

Yeah, exactly what i said – “Join the club or be a second class citizen”. Thank you for illustrating my point so well.

You might call it a second class citizen but that’s not really it – is it?
Is not getting things you have not worked for considered second class now?

Astralporing.1957:

Some people do like to suck the joy out of life by turning rest and entertainment into a second job. I’m not one of them.

Cool – that’s fine – but understand that this game has specific rewards for people who go that extra mile and take the game much more seriously.
Also – joy is relative – so your lack of joy might be where I find joy and vice versa. Don’t present things in absolutes. Just because I play differently doesn’t mean I’m not resting or being entertained while playing GW2.

Astralporing.1957:

They did kill dungeons in order to make raids popular, did they not?

They killed dungeons? You mean they nerfed the rewards – but the general consensus is that casuals play “to have fun” and “to enjoy the experience” and don’t generally farm for rewards – if anything it’s the hardcore for whom the dungeons were killed since you can’t farm gold there anymore.

But the casuals aren’t so casual are they?
That aside – dungeons were nerfed because all over the game GOLD income has been nerfed and more and more gold sinks have been added.

Your overall point is null though – dungeons are still in the game – you can do them any time you want.

Astralporing.1957:

They naively thought that dungeons would remain hard, and so when they did remain hard for a large part of community, they nerfed them significantly so the wider populace could enjoy them? Somehow this doesn’t add up.

Dungeons got nerfed? I don’t exactly recall – unless you mean the scaling issues -which weren’t exactly nerfs – but a reworking of the scaling system.

Either way – to say dungeons remained hard for the “general populace” is absurd – they remained hard for new players who kept coming in – but even the worst of the original players had the capacity to complete most dungeons or could find people to carry him through it.

Daddicus.6128:

Astralporing.1957:

Not possible. As the last few months of back and forth on the forums proved, hardcore players aren’t satisfied with just content meant for them. They also need rewards hidden behind that content – rewards that are both inaccessible by casuals, and yet at the same time desired by them. Elitists want casuals to be unhappy (unhappy that they aren’t as good as them, of course). Hardcore content whose existence casuals can simply ignore just won’t cut it. …

Completely correct.

If all HoT had done was add hard content, the casuals would have been happy just leaving the rest alone and letting us know in advance that we shouldn’t buy it.

But, they didn’t. They tried to satisfy both camps, but did an abysmal job of it by gating everything. The hardcores got their raiding (but for some strange reason they’re not content with it), and the casuals got less than nothing. Not only was HoT designed almost 100% for hardcore types, they made it unappealing to their more numerous counterparts, the casuals.

And, for the icing on the cake, they nerfed rewards for those left behind.

Lol – who exactly isn’t happy with Raiding? Raids have gotten almost universal praise since release.
The only malcontent threads I see are “omg i can’t kill VG pl0x help” and I assure you no hardcore player is posting that.

HoT was bad because it was bad – for a multitude of reasons – gating, poor story, poor execution of certain aspects – but neither hardcore nor casual players are to blame for this.
Yes HoT was aimed more at hardcore than at casual players when compared to core GW2 but to say HoT ended up being what it was BECAUSE it was aimed more at hardcore players is absurd.
There are a lot of things wrong with HoT and most of them have nothing to do with casual or hardcore.

Daddicus.6128:

Harper.4173:

If casuals want hardcore rewards they should become hardcore – it’s that simple.

For once you and I agree on something.

The problem is that HoT doesn’t allow me to play through, effectively, without being hardcore.

HoT doesn’t require you to be hardcore to play it – it does require you to sink time into it.
Like Vayne – you can be casual but sink a lot of time – HoT doesn’t really need you to improve that much but it gates things to artificially increase the length of the expansion.

Harper you are so wrong it hurts. Casuals play to have fun and not for rewards? Oh, reeeaaaally? I thought casuals just don’t have time or will to play 8-16 hours a day, unlike stinky elitists.

Harper.4173:

Daddicus.6128:

Harper.4173:

If casuals want hardcore rewards they should become hardcore – it’s that simple.

For once you and I agree on something.

The problem is that HoT doesn’t allow me to play through, effectively, without being hardcore.

HoT doesn’t require you to be hardcore to play it – it does require you to sink time into it.
Like Vayne – you can be casual but sink a lot of time – HoT doesn’t really need you to improve that much but it gates things to artificially increase the length of the expansion.

Wrong again. Calling Vayne a casual is showing you don’t know him much. People who know him from the forum know he is far from being a causal player.

maddoctor.2738:

Torolan.5816:

*There was very few exclusive gear in GW2 until HoT. I think nobody denies that.

There was exclusive gear in GW2 pre-HoT. Dungeon armors and Ascended Rings are examples. Over time they made them available through other types of content, but they stayed exclusive as long as the content that awarded them was new.

I don´t want to improve in games. I see no necessity to improve in games. It´s fun time, not play time.

And here is the main problem with gaming in general, not just Guild Wars 2. Players not wanting to use brain power to get better at playing them, leading to more and more dumbed down games. And now the only way to find a worthy game is through a kickstarter campaign, an indie developer or some miracle. Most of them devolve into a bazillion cutscenes with a few interactive moments in-between and QTEs. If I want to watch a movie, I’d watch a movie, there is no necessity to play a video game for a similar experience with far worse graphics.

In GW2 you don’t have cutscenes in most content, but it has the same difficulty as watching a cutscene in other video games. It’s a “watch this bar move until you get your loot” kind of experience. I can understand how for the “newer” generation of gamers who want to watch their game and not play it, HoT would be frustrating because you can’t put it on auto-pilot like in Core Tyria. But is “watching” really “playing”? I’d say not. You’d probably disagree.

The problem is playing is subjective – and while this “watching” might seem like brainless to you to others it might feel very intense and challenging.
It’s the unfortunate side effect of more people getting into video games – back in the day games were hard because they were made especially aimed at people who cared about games and improving and being a better player and whatnot.

Those who didn’t want to improve “in a game” generally didn’t play games – but sadly all that’s changed now and everyone is now a gamer in some way shape or form.
This means games have to be easy now – so everyone in spite of their lack of experience, time, skill or capacity can now play and get “rewarded” and told “they did good” so they can spend their money on more games.

Harper.4173:

The problem is playing is subjective – and while this “watching” might seem like brainless to you to others it might feel very intense and challenging.
It’s the unfortunate side effect of more people getting into video games – back in the day games were hard because they were made especially aimed at people who cared about games and improving and being a better player and whatnot.

Those who didn’t want to improve “in a game” generally didn’t play games – but sadly all that’s changed now and everyone is now a gamer in some way shape or form.
This means games have to be easy now – so everyone in spite of their lack of experience, time, skill or capacity can now play and get “rewarded” and told “they did good” so they can spend their money on more games.

Yes indeed. Video Games becoming mainstream is the number one reason for the overall quality drop we experience in more recent years. The sad part is, although the quality is dropping and actual good games are rare and few, companies make more money because of the expanded audience, so this quality drop is unlikely to change.

Mortifer.2946:

Casuals play to have fun and not for rewards? Oh, reeeaaaally?

So you are saying that Casuals don’t play to have fun but to get the rewards? Then why is it that so many posters say that Hardcore players should play for fun and not for the rewards? Casuals can play for rewards but hardcore players can’t?

Harper.4173:

Daddicus.6128:

Harper.4173:

If casuals want hardcore rewards they should become hardcore – it’s that simple.

For once you and I agree on something.

The problem is that HoT doesn’t allow me to play through, effectively, without being hardcore.

HoT doesn’t require you to be hardcore to play it – it does require you to sink time into it.
Like Vayne – you can be casual but sink a lot of time – HoT doesn’t really need you to improve that much but it gates things to artificially increase the length of the expansion.

Okay there’s a definite learning curve in HoT and a lot depends also on things like whether you’re used to meleeing or ranging.

For example, I can melee all over the world, but I have a lot more trouble meleeing in HoT. I can do it, but I don’t always survive the experience.

On my ranger it hasn’t changed that much. On my warrior, I tend to use my bow a lot more in HoT.

I know a guy who likes to melee. It’s what he enjoys. He’s in my guild. He doesn’t like HoT because he feels it forces him to range. It doesn’t really but it’s certainly easier for some of the encounters.

Mortifer.2946:

Harper.4173:

Daddicus.6128:

Harper.4173:

If casuals want hardcore rewards they should become hardcore – it’s that simple.

For once you and I agree on something.

The problem is that HoT doesn’t allow me to play through, effectively, without being hardcore.

HoT doesn’t require you to be hardcore to play it – it does require you to sink time into it.
Like Vayne – you can be casual but sink a lot of time – HoT doesn’t really need you to improve that much but it gates things to artificially increase the length of the expansion.

Wrong again. Calling Vayne a casual is showing you don’t know him much. People who know him from the forum know he is far from being a causal player.

I’m casual in my approach to the game. That doesn’t mean I"m not skilled. As an example, I’ve only recently gone over Fractal level 40. And while I have finished every dungeon in the game, mainly I prefer just banging around the world and exploring, doing events gathering.

I don’t really love challenge in my games, at least not often. I play to relax. So in that way I am pretty casual.

I think it’s pretty clear what’s wanted here:

A declarative statement of what the philosophies of what the game will be. It’s clear the manifesto is old news, that was clear a long time ago. We as players need to know where the game is going in order to invest our time into it. A philosophy for Guild Wars 2 would go a looooooooooooooong way to helping us out in determining if this is the game for us or not.

Wow this thread took off. Just want to echo something I said earlier. The analogy about amusement parks is exactly how I feel 100%. I almost applauded it out loud.

I am casual. I earlier in this thread described casual not only as lack of time but wanting less stress. So with this in mind, I want rewards, but I don’t want the toxicity of dungeons/fractals, I quite like PvP but it stresses me out. WvW interests me more, but I mostly like to follow a train, do events (silverwastes for example) but feel free to hop off when I feel like or when I feel I have done enough.

I have a legendary, sure maybe it took me longer to grind out but I don’t mind because I am casual, I expect that in an MMO.

When HoT came out and I first experienced the first map, I was in love, random events, a meta. But soon I realised the rewards weren’t that great compared to time spent, and time spent was a lot. If I managed to not crash in DS then it was fun, but again, all that time spent, you are locked in until the end or you get nothing, this is rather stressful.

Then came raids, legendary armour. When ascended came out, it was the same thing. It was hidden behind gates so we could be bottlenecked into playing to see new content, as opposed to how we want.

Honestly, ascended armour should be outright on the TP. Legendary also should be purchasable with gold but at a massive rate. 2k per piece even. But far cheaper to get in raids. This evens out the playing field so players can shortcut in new and more challenging content. But those of us who would rather take our time with less stress can get there too in time.

Bish.8627:

Wow this thread took off. Just want to echo something I said earlier. The analogy about amusement parks is exactly how I feel 100%. I almost applauded it out loud.

I am casual. I earlier in this thread described casual not only as lack of time but wanting less stress. So with this in mind, I want rewards, but I don’t want the toxicity of dungeons/fractals, I quite like PvP but it stresses me out. WvW interests me more, but I mostly like to follow a train, do events (silverwastes for example) but feel free to hop off when I feel like or when I feel I have done enough.

I have a legendary, sure maybe it took me longer to grind out but I don’t mind because I am casual, I expect that in an MMO.

When HoT came out and I first experienced the first map, I was in love, random events, a meta. But soon I realised the rewards weren’t that great compared to time spent, and time spent was a lot. If I managed to not crash in DS then it was fun, but again, all that time spent, you are locked in until the end or you get nothing, this is rather stressful.

Then came raids, legendary armour. When ascended came out, it was the same thing. It was hidden behind gates so we could be bottlenecked into playing to see new content, as opposed to how we want.

Honestly, ascended armour should be outright on the TP. Legendary also should be purchasable with gold but at a massive rate. 2k per piece even. But far cheaper to get in raids. This evens out the playing field so players can shortcut in new and more challenging content. But those of us who would rather take our time with less stress can get there too in time.

A lot of people play games to cut down on stress. I know I do. The last thing I need during my day is more stress. So relaxing is good.

The argument that people that play harder deserve better rewards is really the question. If you and I buy tickets to the same movie, and you’re a hard core fan and I’m a casual viewer, we get the same experience. Games aren’t like that, but I’m not sure they shouldn’t be. Or rather, competitive games aren’t like that. I didn’t buy this game to be competitive. I bought this for the cooperative PvE experience.

The angst and anger over getting harder content done, and people blaming other people is the reason I didn’t raid in other games. It just seemed like something I’d rather not be involved with. If I wanted arguments I’d remarry my ex-wife.

No, I much prefer to relax and enjoy myself while playing. This game gave me that more in the past than it does now.

I’m an occasional/casual player. I’ve only had about 3 longish sessions in the last month. Saw the dragon’s stand meta-event sequence for the first time the other day.

I don’t consider HoT too difficult.

I don’t use “meta” builds, came up with my own. I had to redo my warrior’s build quite a bit to be able to survive HoT at all (and the upcoming balance patch apparently will increase warrior survivability, thanks). The other classes were not so much of a problem. I would probably agree that it is less melee and more ranged work — this could be balanced out better.

My characters die, not too often. The elementalist dies more often than other classes.

I can almost solo the ‘hearts and minds’ story line — if I could see the vents and updrafts better, I think I’ll be able to finish it.

Some of the expectations of players here I find odd. There are hundreds of hero points available in PvE. I only had to get 3-4 hero points in HoT to achieve the elite specialization. The rest I’ll get over time for map completion. I guess I don’t understand some player’s purpose/style in playing.

I think that for any RPG if you have a ranger with pet (or any other character) and stand in the middle of a PvE mob and don’t die, then the PvE game is not balanced right.

The biggest problem with casual no party, no guild play is I get stuck in depopulated megaserver maps a lot.

I may be too much of an "hardcore’ish’ " achiever but I find this game really casual. I am a PvX player and I can step in any given time in any content of the game. Okay more and more events are behind a timer now but now you know for sure when you can step in.

• You want to do Auric Basin? Okay come xx:30 to do events (or xx:45 if you only want the meta)
• Want to do fractals? Up to fractals 20 you dont need any special gear and can even do dailies.
• Want to do raid? Sure, especially the first boss, you only need exotic gear to kill it.
• World vs World, can join in any time you like, maybe there is even an open raid to join.
• Spvp, got leagues and there is a big achieve list you could work on, why not starting with thief?
• Oh legendaries, lets start with the collection list and open up wiki, or locate the items yourself with the hints.
• and on and on, Achievement list is big enough. For me at least.

And come on.. a reward could be fun, but there is so much out there you can enjoy. And it’s not about what another player has. It is about what you got yourself. Especially as a casual player you should not fall in a trap about any rewards other players achieved.

“But it’s grindy, it takes so long” So what? You can achieve it. Isn’t it meant to take long? (end-game content), or should Anet give everyone who logs in with the new patch the new legendary skins? If you get bored choose something different from the “TO DO” list there’s plenty on it and come back later.

And to specify “grinding”: Killing the same kind of mobs like thousands of times on a single spot for at least several hours to get 1 or 2 items. (I dont see this in GW2)

Sometimes it may look grindy because people want to compleet a longterm achievement too fast. And what will you do when you compleeted everything, when it only takes a few hours to compleet everything? People will find it boring and asks for more.

(Good old times in old games like Maple Story, “Kill thousand mushrooms to get a small reward and come back tomorrow to do the same again, yay!” )

Vayne.8563:

A lot of people play games to cut down on stress. I know I do. The last thing I need during my day is more stress. So relaxing is good.

The argument that people that play harder deserve better rewards is really the question. If you and I buy tickets to the same movie, and you’re a hard core fan and I’m a casual viewer, we get the same experience. Games aren’t like that, but I’m not sure they shouldn’t be. Or rather, competitive games aren’t like that. I didn’t buy this game to be competitive. I bought this for the cooperative PvE experience.

The angst and anger over getting harder content done, and people blaming other people is the reason I didn’t raid in other games. It just seemed like something I’d rather not be involved with. If I wanted arguments I’d remarry my ex-wife.

No, I much prefer to relax and enjoy myself while playing. This game gave me that more in the past than it does now.

I completely agree, and if you read C.J. state of the game up date one particular section of his comments captures this in a nutshell;
"2016 is the year where we’ll be focusing on the parts of Guild Wars 2 that have been most successful and giving our full attention to those areas by adding depth to them. This means a focus on new content and polish for our existing, successful parts of the game. "

To me this should have continued to be their main focus all along, sure some things like Elite specs and better AI were a must but at the end of it all I think continuing to strive to create content that made them initially successful is the best route forward. In the end I believe they recognized that as well and it will be their primary focus going forward. Many have said it in many ways, this isn’t and should never become another WoW the gaming world doesn’t need that and as far as hardcore content being the most important to focus on, well that’s just rubbish and a lesson they learned firsthand with Wildstar.

This game was made for causal gamers for the most part and in the end it’s what set them apart of the rest of the MMO world, I think they just got caught up in the frenzy of trying to capture it all, well even WoW hasn’t done that and never could that’s why GW2 caught on in the 1st place. I encourage Anet to go back to their roots in many areas and if they do it will only continue to grow, if not they will see a dwindling population because like it or not hardcore gamers and elitists are the real dyeing breed of the gaming world and even Blizzard has recognized that fact.

Anet stick to what got you there, you and the original visionaries had the right formula and you need to dust off the cobwebs of your manifesto and refocus going forward. I look forward to the next expansion and the quarterly content updates.

The problem I have with raiding is that the difficulty comes from arbitrary restrictions implemented – seemingly – for the sole purpose of exclusion. This is bad design and it leads to this general feeling that GW2 is moving away from its base.

Anet wanted to be able to tell potential new players – specifically raiders from other games – that they had this extra hard content that only a few people could see. The problem is they only created the illusion of difficulty by enforcing extremely restrictive set numbers, very specific builds and simplistic pass/fail enrage timers.

In other words, the fights themselves aren’t difficult, but the hoops you have to jump through to organize the fights are. This gives them the numbers and semi-exclusion they need to tout the “difficult raids for hardcore raiders” in a news release to potentially entice new players from other games.

The reality is they could open up the raiding experience to everyone without impacting the hardcore experience – by simply tier-ing the rewards through either scaling or time it takes to kill. In other words, reward performance but don’t effectively close off the content to those who don’t enjoy specific builds or those who simply play for the experience/camaraderie through arbitrary mechanics.

I can say with 100% confidence that this single aspect of the game, while it isn’t mandatory, is changing the feel and atmosphere of GW2 in a negative way – and, more importantly, is driving away many of the more casual players (something that should worry everyone – they are the core customers keeping the game alive).

I have 0 problem with raiding in GW2, I just don’t like it. I understand i won’t get legendary armor, and I’m fine with that.

My only issue with HoT is things feel like a chore. To get those masteries I have to do the same events over and over and over and over, even the legendary crafting system is just time gated crap behind other time gated crap. Make content fun, I don’t want to feel like I left work to just go do more work.

maddoctor.2738:

Torolan.5816:

*There was very few exclusive gear in GW2 until HoT. I think nobody denies that.

There was exclusive gear in GW2 pre-HoT. Dungeon armors and Ascended Rings are examples. Over time they made them available through other types of content, but they stayed exclusive as long as the content that awarded them was new.

I don´t want to improve in games. I see no necessity to improve in games. It´s fun time, not play time.

And here is the main problem with gaming in general, not just Guild Wars 2. Players not wanting to use brain power to get better at playing them, leading to more and more dumbed down games. And now the only way to find a worthy game is through a kickstarter campaign, an indie developer or some miracle. Most of them devolve into a bazillion cutscenes with a few interactive moments in-between and QTEs. If I want to watch a movie, I’d watch a movie, there is no necessity to play a video game for a similar experience with far worse graphics.

In GW2 you don’t have cutscenes in most content, but it has the same difficulty as watching a cutscene in other video games. It’s a “watch this bar move until you get your loot” kind of experience. I can understand how for the “newer” generation of gamers who want to watch their game and not play it, HoT would be frustrating because you can’t put it on auto-pilot like in Core Tyria. But is “watching” really “playing”? I’d say not. You’d probably disagree.

I sometimes wonder if my point of view makes sense myself, but it is the way I feel.

I thought for example that the new player experience was stupid and pointless. Anyone with half a brain will see people dodge and attempt to duplicate it at some point.
I also agree when someone says that Karka Queen is facepalm easy.
I liked how Tequatl was when it first came out. It was a fifteen minutes attempt. You got it, great. You did not make it, ok, forget it.
I regularly ran lvl 40+ fractals before HoT.
Drytop was just stupid and RNG is king there, but it is not overly challenging.
I never made one way of Arah, keeping my away from the dungeon master title. I did not want to buy it, and nobody wanted to make it. There is nothing substantial behind Arah, so I basically ignore it.
I won´t make ls2 completely because it is just a lesson in coordination and anger management for me, despite the collector in my head who is heavily protesting because victory is near there.^^
My gripe with HoT is not that mobs are hard. My gripe is that I have to constantly do things I loathe, like jumping or waiting in front of and behind walls to find a HP of all things.

In the past, I did not play casually. But I think I am a casual by hearth.

I think I just hit my personal firewall with raids where I feel there is too much effort required for the reward involved. Maybe when there are more ways to get legendary, I will look at my opinion and laugh for being a defeatist and grumpy, but right now, probably not.

Difficulty is ok, but i hate the timer on each map

It would be great if HoT maps have the same mechanic like silverwaste progression system

Vayne.8563:

Harper.4173:

Daddicus.6128:

Harper.4173:

If casuals want hardcore rewards they should become hardcore – it’s that simple.

For once you and I agree on something.

The problem is that HoT doesn’t allow me to play through, effectively, without being hardcore.

HoT doesn’t require you to be hardcore to play it – it does require you to sink time into it.
Like Vayne – you can be casual but sink a lot of time – HoT doesn’t really need you to improve that much but it gates things to artificially increase the length of the expansion.

Okay there’s a definite learning curve in HoT and a lot depends also on things like whether you’re used to meleeing or ranging.

For example, I can melee all over the world, but I have a lot more trouble meleeing in HoT. I can do it, but I don’t always survive the experience.

On my ranger it hasn’t changed that much. On my warrior, I tend to use my bow a lot more in HoT.

I know a guy who likes to melee. It’s what he enjoys. He’s in my guild. He doesn’t like HoT because he feels it forces him to range. It doesn’t really but it’s certainly easier for some of the encounters.

But as a casual player open world HoT is still very accessible if you’re slightly interested in figuring out how to make things work for you.
Yes – like you said – melee vs range – there are very few ( possibly none) mobs in HoT that you can’t kite to death by running in a circle and ranged dpsing them.
You can do that solo.

And a lot of the difficulty added wasn’t added to appeal to “hardcore” but also to make you more dependent on other players. That’s why we have events that require more people – why we have huge metas on every map.
Because one of the core complaints with core GW2 maps was that everyone was doing their own thing and there was no sense of togetherness or aiding others in a huge fight – HoT sought to address this by “forcing” the community to band together.

Regarding your friend – we were all “forced” to range at some point – I was forced in core GW2 at release. It’s just how it is. At some point people will have to simply improve at the game.

Vayne.8563:

Mortifer.2946:

Harper.4173:

Daddicus.6128:

Harper.4173:

If casuals want hardcore rewards they should become hardcore – it’s that simple.

For once you and I agree on something.

The problem is that HoT doesn’t allow me to play through, effectively, without being hardcore.

HoT doesn’t require you to be hardcore to play it – it does require you to sink time into it.
Like Vayne – you can be casual but sink a lot of time – HoT doesn’t really need you to improve that much but it gates things to artificially increase the length of the expansion.

Wrong again. Calling Vayne a casual is showing you don’t know him much. People who know him from the forum know he is far from being a causal player.

I’m casual in my approach to the game. That doesn’t mean I"m not skilled. As an example, I’ve only recently gone over Fractal level 40. And while I have finished every dungeon in the game, mainly I prefer just banging around the world and exploring, doing events gathering.

I don’t really love challenge in my games, at least not often. I play to relax. So in that way I am pretty casual.

I call Vayne casual in the sense that he does play a lot but doesn’t take the game as seriously as a hardcore.
Yes he spends a lot of time in this game – I know that.
He doesn’t ( as far as i can tell) treat it the same way I do – I spend far less time in game but I go in with a check-list and go about it as effectively as possible. I don’t doodle in-game – I do it fast and clean and efficiently – like it was a “job” for other people.

Vayne as far as I can tell doesn’t – he does what he likes, what he feels like, etc.
I on the other hand do those things as well – but if there’s a PvP bonus buff I’ll go pvp because it’s more effective.
Or if it’s the time of day some activity is easier or faster to do – I’ll do that.

He might not be casual by your standards – but he’s not hardcore either.

Maximillian Greil.1965:

I think it’s pretty clear what’s wanted here:

A declarative statement of what the philosophies of what the game will be. It’s clear the manifesto is old news, that was clear a long time ago. We as players need to know where the game is going in order to invest our time into it. A philosophy for Guild Wars 2 would go a looooooooooooooong way to helping us out in determining if this is the game for us or not.

Yes but that would also mean the people who get told the game isn’t going to cater to them more might quit.
So Anet makes a smart play and says mostly nothing – doesn’t promise much and just keeps people waiting.

They’re not going to favor one side over the other – they will simply deliver content to both sides with a bit more thrown to the side that received less attention and content in the past and seems more disgruntled( which in the case of HoT were the hardcore).

Bish.8627:

Wow this thread took off. Just want to echo something I said earlier. The analogy about amusement parks is exactly how I feel 100%. I almost applauded it out loud.

I am casual. I earlier in this thread described casual not only as lack of time but wanting less stress. So with this in mind, I want rewards, but I don’t want the toxicity of dungeons/fractals, I quite like PvP but it stresses me out. WvW interests me more, but I mostly like to follow a train, do events (silverwastes for example) but feel free to hop off when I feel like or when I feel I have done enough.

I have a legendary, sure maybe it took me longer to grind out but I don’t mind because I am casual, I expect that in an MMO.

When HoT came out and I first experienced the first map, I was in love, random events, a meta. But soon I realised the rewards weren’t that great compared to time spent, and time spent was a lot. If I managed to not crash in DS then it was fun, but again, all that time spent, you are locked in until the end or you get nothing, this is rather stressful.

Then came raids, legendary armour. When ascended came out, it was the same thing. It was hidden behind gates so we could be bottlenecked into playing to see new content, as opposed to how we want.

Honestly, ascended armour should be outright on the TP. Legendary also should be purchasable with gold but at a massive rate. 2k per piece even. But far cheaper to get in raids. This evens out the playing field so players can shortcut in new and more challenging content. But those of us who would rather take our time with less stress can get there too in time.

No – legendary and ascended should not be on the TP – that would arguably make the game P2W.
The biggest complaint people had about generation 1 legendary weapons was that you could get them off the TP.
It devalues them immensely when someone can just credit-card his way to something you spent a lot of time and effort to get.

Vayne.8563:

Bish.8627:

Wow this thread took off. Just want to echo something I said earlier. The analogy about amusement parks is exactly how I feel 100%. I almost applauded it out loud.

I am casual. I earlier in this thread described casual not only as lack of time but wanting less stress. So with this in mind, I want rewards, but I don’t want the toxicity of dungeons/fractals, I quite like PvP but it stresses me out. WvW interests me more, but I mostly like to follow a train, do events (silverwastes for example) but feel free to hop off when I feel like or when I feel I have done enough.

I have a legendary, sure maybe it took me longer to grind out but I don’t mind because I am casual, I expect that in an MMO.

When HoT came out and I first experienced the first map, I was in love, random events, a meta. But soon I realised the rewards weren’t that great compared to time spent, and time spent was a lot. If I managed to not crash in DS then it was fun, but again, all that time spent, you are locked in until the end or you get nothing, this is rather stressful.

Then came raids, legendary armour. When ascended came out, it was the same thing. It was hidden behind gates so we could be bottlenecked into playing to see new content, as opposed to how we want.

Honestly, ascended armour should be outright on the TP. Legendary also should be purchasable with gold but at a massive rate. 2k per piece even. But far cheaper to get in raids. This evens out the playing field so players can shortcut in new and more challenging content. But those of us who would rather take our time with less stress can get there too in time.

A lot of people play games to cut down on stress. I know I do. The last thing I need during my day is more stress. So relaxing is good.

The argument that people that play harder deserve better rewards is really the question. If you and I buy tickets to the same movie, and you’re a hard core fan and I’m a casual viewer, we get the same experience. Games aren’t like that, but I’m not sure they shouldn’t be. Or rather, competitive games aren’t like that. I didn’t buy this game to be competitive. I bought this for the cooperative PvE experience.

The angst and anger over getting harder content done, and people blaming other people is the reason I didn’t raid in other games. It just seemed like something I’d rather not be involved with. If I wanted arguments I’d remarry my ex-wife.

No, I much prefer to relax and enjoy myself while playing. This game gave me that more in the past than it does now.

Yes Vayne – because a movie is a passive experience – it’s not interactive.
It doesn’t give you more or less – but even in your example if you didn’t pay for the ticket you wouldn’t have seen the movie.
So still -in a sense those who put in work get rewarded( having money – buying ticket- seeing movie) vs not working (no money, no ticket, no movie).

You did buy the game for one aspect of it but this game doesn’t only aim to deliver that – it also wants to be an eSport – it also wants to deliver hardcore content.

Regardless of why you bought the game – the game is trying to be more than what it is delivering to you as an experience – and part of that is having other areas of the game being more demanding and more rewarding.

I understand the game gave you “more” content for you in the past and that the current shift is upsetting – but look at it from the other guy’s perspective? Try MY perspective?

3 years – no hard content – no acknowledgement of hardcore players. We’ve finally been given something now – the game is also marketed to us – if you dislike that – take it up with Anet – not us.

I’m pretty sure you can see what I’m trying to point out – it’s all about perspectives.
Anet want to sell this game to all types of players – and will most likely stick a band-aid (more content) where the game is struggling the most – which in this case was the lack of hardcore content.

I’m pretty sure WvW would have gotten a LOT more love sooner if more people had been playing WvW – it would have made it matter more for them.

Torolan.5816:

*There was very few exclusive gear in GW2 until HoT. I think nobody denies that.

I deny it A LOT, want Heroic Weapons go WvW, want Dungeon Armour go PvP or Dungeon, want Tequatl weapons do Tequatl, want Crafted Armour do Crafting, want Fractal Weapons do Fractals, want Living Story items do Living Story..

I hope thats enough to prove you’re wrong beyond belief..

Hi guys, sorry I’m a bit late to this conversation! I’ve been a faithful supporter of Guild Wars 2 since years before its release and I’ve poured hundreds and hundreds of hours into it. I pre-ordered Heart of Thorns and feel that I’ve committed more than enough time, money and love into this game to feel that my voice should be heard and understood as coming from a place of insight and not ignorance(along with everyone else in this thread).

I love this world. I loved the original Guild Wars lore and have loved being immersed in Guild Wars 2 despite it having its rocky patches in the personal story (which the living world seasons really learnt from! Good work Anet!) and the fact that it has yet to really honour or expand on Tyria’s history and unanswered questions (please hire WoodenPotatoes as a lore master Anet!).

I’m glad that I purchased Heart of Thorns and completed the personal story, but I have to be honest I have felt neglected and excluded in my experience of participating in the expansion.

Here are my demographics:
- None of my friends play mmo’s or this game bar 1 who only tunes in on the release of expansions or living word seasons for about 2 weeks before disappearing into the ether. I am alone amongst my peers in my love for Guild Wars 2.
- I am not a hardcore player, never have been never will be. Doesn’t mean that I’m not good at GW2 (or other games), I just don’t find fulfilment in grinding for money, experience, achievement points or top tier gear (only one of my chars have all ascended gear and one legendary – the rest will have to settle for exotic).
- I have probably made something close to 20 chars and spend an immense amount of time creating the look and feel of my character and enjoying the role playing elements of this game. Settling on a build can be infuriating for me as I care more about what weapons I imagine my character to have then what weapons are actually viable (desperately wanted my main Guardian to role sword/shield, but have finally settled with the fact that the mace/shield & hammer is the better option).

So with this in mind, what I loved about the core game of GW2 was the fact that I could immerse myself in exploring the world, being the hero that aided those heart quest people, participating in the local wars and struggles of different map militias and feeling that it was significant to my character’s experience (I.e. fighting in the harathi hinterlands with my human seraph guardian) and being able to do all this at my own pace, being able to observe and speak to characters, inspect and discover lore, enjoy vistas and landcscapes and feeling enjoying my well earned title of THE commander of the pact (now I bear in mind that the Heart of Thorns personal story did a great job okittennowledging this and honouring it!).

My problem with Heart of Thorns is that the excitement of engaging in the content I purchased including: 4 new maps, exploration, map completion and thus masteries as well as the lore, motivations and characteristics of the local inhabitants and new races, has been robbed of me by the fact that the difficulty has been escalated to the extent that it is necessary to engage with other players who all want to engage in different content at different paces, just to explore a beautiful golden city or luscious jungle treetops. Anet: It feels like you have been pressured by the minority of hardcore players to shape the game to fit their opinion of what the content should looks like.

There is no reason why hardcore content can’t be delivered in formats like raids, fractals/dungeons and word boss events without having to compromise the accessibility of the rest of the PVE environment. Please change this! Please utilise champion/elite mobs properly based on the number of players present rather than having areas that are flat out inaccessible to solo players. Please change hero points in the expansion to be completable by solo players instead of having to recruit a bunch of players to complete ridiculously long jungle climbs to tackle a boss that offers a reward that appears pretty insignificant in context of the effort required to put in.

Please just open the world up for me to be able to enjoy its gorgeous detail and design without the fear of being absolutely trashed because I’m on my own.

Thanks for hearing my thoughts.

Coulter.2315:

Torolan.5816:

*There was very few exclusive gear in GW2 until HoT. I think nobody denies that.

I deny it A LOT, want Heroic Weapons go WvW, want Dungeon Armour go PvP or Dungeon, want Tequatl weapons do Tequatl, want Crafted Armour do Crafting, want Fractal Weapons do Fractals, want Living Story items do Living Story..

I hope thats enough to prove you’re wrong beyond belief..

+1

And then there is festival events
And then there is early access rewards
And lets not forget our roots, hall of monuments, a deserved exclusive reward to those dedicated to GW1.

I don’t mind specific content giving specific skin.
I do mind gated content giving better stats.

Current legendary can be done at a slow pace. I play, I get stuff, nothing more, nothing less. If legendary armor is acessible game-wide, but that raids give a specific legendary skin, that’s ok for me. It is not OK if raids are the only way to get legendary armor.

I like to explore at my own pace. For me, this is casual play. Having to join a HP train to get HP is not the gameplay I like. I like to walk a map and just do the HP’s I come by. I don’t mind map events needing more people, I like it actually. I meet people, and do events, as I freely roam the land.

So, for me, the rewards gated behind ONE content and the necessity to group for HP, while HP are a personnal advancement are what I’m having the most problem with.

I also remember a time where we would get an event item just for playing as we wished. We could do the dailies or do specific activities achievements to get the events reward. I’th not much, but it’s a kind of “I was here”.
For example, there have always been haloween crafts that would need a somewhat more “advanced” play to craft.
But, If I did the daily, it would give me one “haloween events” point. I did the nex day’s daily, another point in. I kill a monster in the lab (which was an achievement), another point.
I was rewarded for my casual play.
People doing the clock tower or who farmed the Lab were able to get more, but I had basic reward for basic play. I would not complain for not doing the shield, people worked for it…
This year, there was no reward for casual (haloween and wintersday). One had to do specific events for the collection things, specific events that not everyone could do. Lots of resources were needed in a short timeframe, far from what a casual like me could or want to put in.

I feel cheated. Yes, for an ugly skin I would never wear, or a miniature that I would never show.
I should get a little something to show I did take part in whatever event, as it used to be.

But yes, there was a time GW2 was casual friendly.
For me, casual-friendly is not about giving casuals the same as hard core, but about giving casuals the possibility to get something for their involvement.
I do not feel I can get much HoT stuff with my current involvement.
I feel sad to have nothing to show for wintesday and haloween participation.

Maximillian Greil.1965:

It’s clear the manifesto is old news, that was clear a long time ago.

I agree with your post, but I would say we’ve only really known for 3 months. Before that there was lots of posturing, but no substance. They spoke out of both sides of their mouths.

But, when HoT was released we realized we had been misled. This wasn’t GW2 plus some more challenging content, as advertised. This was a substantial rework of GW2, making further progression much more difficult. It wasn’t harder so much as it was blocked (gated by time, XP, extreme encounters, etc.)

As I played through further and further, it became obvious that I wasn’t having fun. I was just grinding through various gates.

But, I’m casual. I like to play almost all of my characters every day. I progress their mapping title, run events, gather, do storylines, and generally just have fun. The dailies help, as I use those as roadmaps off of which I’ll choose WHERE I’m going that day. But otherwise, I’m more or less just following whatever winds are blowing that day.

With HoT, I don’t have that option. I have to force myself to play just to attain the next milestone. And, the milestones were getting further and further apart. When I got to DS, I basically stopped. I couldn’t even tell where I was supposed to go, and yet I was still gated.

THAT is what I mean by anti-casual. I survive the encounters just fine, but I don’t have fun doing it. In core Tyria, I could wander about to my heart’s content, but not in HoT. Everything is gated by something (including an impossible-to-follow map), and when you finally get through the gate, you discover there’s an even worse grind to get through the next one. For all I know, I could be near the end, but I have no way to know that.

I’m as loyal as they come to this game series, but I feel betrayed by ANet. I just feel deflated whenever I try to accomplish anything in HoT. When I was still trying, I would go and commit to a couple hours, but in the end I had accomplished almost nothing perceptible. It just kept dragging me down. So, the time periods between attempts got further and further apart. Until I stopped trying altogether.

Grinding with a purpose can sometimes be OK. For example, I’m a Champion of the Gods (I earned all 50 points in GW1’s Hall of Monuments). There was some grinding there. But, I could step out of the grind and do something else, even a different grind. Kept it from becoming boring at least.

But, in HoT I don’t have that choice. I must finish one grind before I can start the next.

I’ve always been “proud to be casual”, but I must confess, Heart of Thorns has been… changing how I play.

Soloist and casual here. I definitely sympathize with the sentiments expressed throughout. I do want to add my feeling that I don’t think necessarily all the content can or should be available to me. To me, there is some excitement about having content that requires more effort and coordination than I’m willing to put forth to get. Something I’ll never quite be able to attain, not unless I get more serious about the game. That, to me, is not a bad thing. Just the promise of content I could eventually experience can be enticing. I feel HoT’s mastery system did an awesome job of building that sense of anticipation as well. I wasn’t bothered by the grind, either, because I wasn’t usually focused on doing the same maps on repeat. I think it’s a valid criticism of HoT’s maps (as well as Dry Top + Silverwaste) that they effectively encourage playing them well past the point the novelty and energy has well worn off.

I do want to say I love core Tyria and I loved exploring the many maps it offered. For me GW2 was the first MMO I ever found genuinely welcoming to play and I do have some faith that they’re not going back on their mission statement. But I won’t lie, when I first heard raids being announced, I was a bit concerned too. In the end, I’m okay with stuff being there for the hardcores too. I’m very glad to play alongside them and I hope they’ll accept my company as well.

To me the biggest sign that GW2 is on its way to being more welcoming to players like me rather than less is when they made Zhaitan killable w/o needing a party. You guys don’t want to know how long I had the “Victory or Death” green star on my HUD.

One thing I hope ANet does is make mobs a little bit more melee friendly.

I don’t mind having to dodge one-shot skills, but the stoneheart keeps charging away and it gets very annoying.

Coulter.2315:

Torolan.5816:

*There was very few exclusive gear in GW2 until HoT. I think nobody denies that.

I deny it A LOT, want Heroic Weapons go WvW, want Dungeon Armour go PvP or Dungeon, want Tequatl weapons do Tequatl, want Crafted Armour do Crafting, want Fractal Weapons do Fractals, want Living Story items do Living Story..

I hope thats enough to prove you’re wrong beyond belief..

I guess it depends if you played Fashion Wars 2 or not up until HoT. I am a collector until the game does not offer me APs for it anymore, therefore my interest in skins sank rapidly when I reached the AP barrier for them. I guess I am a pretty bad Pawlow dog.^^
Heroic Weapons: Just a skin, irrelevant for the playing experience itself and an exotic item that is easily replaceable. It´s not even convenience. There is no substance hidden beneath it.
Dungeon Armor: Irrelavent too because 1.
Festival item: Probably the worst offender of irrelevancy. Speaking of server population as a whole, nobody cares if you have the ghastly grininng shield or not. If you buy it for 1000+ gold on the TP, you reap what you sow in my opinion.
Tequatl weapons: Can be built statwise, irrelevant in my opinion. I have about 3 of them, all they spared me was time and effort to build them, the skin is ok but I could live very well without it. The same goes for triple headed worm.
Crafted Armor: Ok, here is a barrier you have to break since ascended armor appeared. Still open world offers you multiple chances to aquire them, or at least it did offer them until patches. Many people I know equipped thier alts with ascended armor from fractal drops, some had even chests left.
Living story items: Here I fully agree. Things started to go down rapidly with the living story items, and that is something I always critizise in posts when the topic is around. This is just as wrong as hiding the ascended backpack behind fractals was wrong when it was new, or the hiding the legendary backpack behind PvP. From all people that play PvP I personally know, casuals hate it because it is not something they want to play excesively, more hardcore hate it because they have to share the game with PvE newbies they don´t want in their teams. It´s an epic lose-lose situation everyone is facing here.

Of course there is also the factor that my perception of relevancy probably vastly differs from yours, so I should have worded this probably more carefully.^^

midnight tea.3681:

To me the biggest sign that GW2 is on its way to being more welcoming to players like me rather than less is when they made Zhaitan killable w/o needing a party. You guys don’t want to know how long I had the “Victory or Death” green star on my HUD.

For whatever it’s worth, I’ve been playing since beta and still haven’t finished the personal story on any of my characters because it galled me so much to have to beg up a party to finish my personal story.

And I have 35 characters. All level 80. I consider that a failure on ArenaNet’s part, not mine, and am glad they finally fixed it.

It’s not that I mind grouping: easy grouping was one of the main things that attracted me to GW2 in the first place. It’s that I do mind forced grouping, and its relative absence is also one of the main things that attracted me to GW2 in the first place.

Oh the irony.

Hmm. Now that you’ve reminded me, I guess maybe I should finally finish up the personal story on at least one of my characters.

Meh, eventually.

Did I mention I’m proud to be casual?

…

P.S. I have never, ever set foot in a single dungeon in GW2, probably never will, have the same plans for raiding, and have no regrets.

Great point. I feel like I wasted $50. Even trying to do the story (solo or with a group) in HoT became tiresome. Everyone kept wiping and no one was having fun. Couldn’t get past the part where you can’t heal during some challenge. I moved onto Old Republic as a subscriber.