Guild Wars 2

So I’ve been looking around to see if there’s any information on whether the higher powers at Arenanet are going to make this game modable, and according to this interview with Massively Exclusive, not right now, and never to the point of individuality.

“Q: We’ve seen key-binding customization added in as well as UI improvements — is there hope for UI customization options (beyond overall size and minimap resizing) down the road, or should players try to get used to the idea of not being able to fiddle with the UI?”

“A: While we aren’t going to allow players to mod their UI to extreme levels, we are always going to be looking at adding new options and UI improvements. If a feature is being requested by a large number of fans, we will always evaluate whether or not we can and should add that feature.”

Of course the minimalistic UI they went for is simple and easy to understand to which I give them props, but I can’t help but feel like some things could be slightly clearer, or at least larger- in particular boons/conditions.

Though it’s probably just my own silliness I find it hard to watch the boons/conditions on myself over the top of my skill bar at the bottom of the screen, the enemy’s underneath their health bar towards the top, keeping track of cooldowns and the animation on the screen to dodge and evade. I’m not saying I want a level of mods equal to WoW, where people end up having a UI which looks nothing like the original game and is more convoluted than a government website and is pretty much necessary for you to have or you’re a total noob and can’t raid, but some simple customisation things like displaying the enemy’s health and status lower on the screen could be a great addition.

Hopefully I’m just a scrub and no one else finds it a bit muddled, just thought I’d let people on this forum know in case they were wondering about the future of add-ons in GWII.

If anything, what they’ll do is something similar to Guild Wars ¹ where you can move each UI element independent of each other. Other than that, I doubt they’ll do it unless they see it as useful for most in the long-run.

What’s you’re looking for will fall under that, but I can not remember if that is settable (if there’s such a word) in GW1 either. AFAICR, only the UI itself. But it would be cool to have that.

I have found from the original guild wars was setup to not accept addons though there were addons being created for it. It was something that was not supported and there were security risks in using the addons. (Even WoW goes through that same issue on security with the addons.)

The tool of the addons is to provide the community to to develop the tools needed for the game. It can be fun, required or not thought of before. I do miss the fully customizing that we could do from the original guild wars, but having something like recount will be nice to see what kind of damage you are doing. Something like recount can help even though it isn’t required all the time, it is nice to see that your damage changes when you change your specs.

I hope there are more tools for the GUI in the pipe, or the option to have the addons will be nice. (Why fix a GUI with its already pretty?)

Maybe i just haven’t found the setting yet but, it would like to see numbers as part of the health/status bars of the enemy. TOR has to option to see the bar and the numbers as well. I would even be happy with % left. Like i said maybe there is an option and i just haven’t noticed it yet.

At the very least they should implement the option to move the elements around like in gw1. It’s one of the things they should be doing in in order for multiple-monitor support.

I don’t think ArenaNet should allow addons or mods that changes the UI. Those addons/mods usually add extra functionality that give players an (unfair?) advantage over players that don’t use them.

That said, I also think a little more customizability is desirable, if not needed. Moving and resizing elements alone can make the experience so much better.

An issue I have with the current UI is the way the various windows are styled. The non-straight lines and transparency, especially at the bottom of the windows, make it very unclear what belongs to which window and which window is on top.

I just miss my pretty graphs from HA/GvG!
It is nice to see the teams HP and moral. It gives an advantage to push or pull out of battle.

Polyvinyl.9053:

Though it’s probably just my own silliness I find it hard to watch the boons/conditions on myself over the top of my skill bar at the bottom of the screen, the enemy’s underneath their health bar towards the top, keeping track of cooldowns and the animation on the screen to dodge and evade. I’m not saying I want a level of mods equal to WoW, where people end up having a UI which looks nothing like the original game and is more convoluted than a government website and is pretty much necessary for you to have or you’re a total noob and can’t raid, but some simple customisation things like displaying the enemy’s health and status lower on the screen could be a great addition.

Hopefully I’m just a scrub and no one else finds it a bit muddled, just thought I’d let people on this forum know in case they were wondering about the future of add-ons in GWII.

You are supposed to look at your Character see if he is crippled, etc.
Play the Game not the UI, nuff said. No addons needed.

Not every condition/boon is as obvious as cripple, particularly when there are other players fighting alongside you. The UI is part of the game, otherwise it wouldn’t be there.

well, I think they will probably introduce the same customization options as in GW1 at some point, which I think is enough.

Modding your UI like it is possible in WoW is not a good idea in my opinion, since it can give players advantages simply because they installed a certain mod.

GW1 best addon was texmode for revealing map.

I don’t necessarily feel that addons are necessary, but I do feel some improvements to the UI definitely need to be made. My fiance for example has eyesight issues and is unable to really pay attention to the boons/conditions as well as focus on everything else on screen, including dodging any incoming abilities or such. I’m not really asking for things to be made super easy, but more ‘warnings’ of what will happen could be nice. Ultimately, you still have to be paying attention and such, even if the game does ‘help’ you a tad in that respect. Besides him though, I also have issues seeing such things and have no trouble with my eyes. Also, I can speak for some others as well having the same issues.

Tl,dr. As far as extensive addons, don’t think they’re really necessary in this game it seems. UI needs some adjustments though, resizing, keybindings, etc.

I have done some investigations on how to perhaps make the UI more customizeable and it looks very hard to do on our own without help from arenanet.

It appears that the GW2 UI is done in HTML and then uses the something called Awesomium (awesomium(dot)com) to interface that with the native code running GW2.

That means 2 things, 1, the UI may not be rendered by open GL, meaning texmod modding might not be possible. It may be possible to use the Awesomium API directly to inject your own UI elements into GW2…. but that sounds like something that would get you the ban hammer.

Mark Love.6274:

I don’t think ArenaNet should allow addons or mods that changes the UI. Those addons/mods usually add extra functionality that give players an (unfair?) advantage over players that don’t use them.

That said, I also think a little more customizability is desirable, if not needed. Moving and resizing elements alone can make the experience so much better.

An issue I have with the current UI is the way the various windows are styled. The non-straight lines and transparency, especially at the bottom of the windows, make it very unclear what belongs to which window and which window is on top.

While I agree that I don’t want to see addons/mods, there is nothing unfair about mods when you have the same capability to use them as everyone else and simply choose not to. That’s like walking to work and saying it’s unfair that other people drive to work, even though you have a working vehicle in the driveway.

The real problem I see with mods is that, as evidenced by Warcraft, they change how the game is played. Blizzard cannot add any new content without tailoring it to account for players having 8 million mods playing the game for them.

I personally would like addon’s, because i love customizing the UI to my preferences. However i cannot ignore the fact it can give players a unfair advantage. I used to play GW1, and the UI customization would be loved by many players. However they are simply things that it wont do that some players would like.
SO my final opinion is: No Anet will most likely add they own UI customization.
With a little part of me asking them to.

The UI needs improving and basic customization, regardless of whether player-created addons become available.

You should be able to resize/hide all the windows independently. Everyone has different things they want to see more or less prominently, this is really just a basic preference that I’m pretty sure every other game typically has some HUD control.

The addition of some % and # markers (target at 58% health, ally at 13k health, boon/condition at 5 seconds, etc) for information you could already derive from the game (like hovering over) should probably be added.

Ultimately if I can control how the game looks on my end, allowing me to highlight and resize the bits I care about, I’ll be all set.

Also, is there any existing or talk about a parser for this game? Would love to see some non-anecdotal logs for damage.

Honestly, you need to look at how WOW originally implemented macros and mods. I believe it was one of the unsung reasons for the success of wow.

I love being to take advantage of game mechanics and customize it to suite my goals and needs. There was a sub community within WOW that took on macros and wow and really did improve the game in the early days.

ANet obviously would need to be cautious about what they released, and for the most part they have learned the lessons of the past and implemented very good features of the game. There is nothing in the UI that I can think of that truly needs change, sure maybe person A would like the map here or there, but in reality its simplicity and usefulness is amazing.

The standard UI that blizzard released would have never come close to the customization and usefulness of their current one if not for modders thinking beyond blizzard.

I wish I could put my bars on the side and mini map in the middle… so much easier looking down and instead to a corner.

If there were no add on support than that is ok with me, however I could think of a couple that would be useful. For one, the auction house filtering is severely limited. I would like to extend my search to number of stats, what kind, how many, etc and a stat rating add on to compare gear so you can quickly see dps, and changes to hero stats based on item stats + upgrades. I don’t mind doing the figuring but sometimes it’s cool to just look at it. Guess I’m spoiled with the StatRating add on for

…another game. LOL

I was in a dungeon the other day and a member of the party asked “Are there damage counters for this game yet?” It made me cringe. I have bad memories of other games where it was a game of watching counters, instead of playing and enjoying the game. From personal experience, I hope that Anet doesn’t allow this type of modding to happen.

Yeah, customizable UI is definitely good. Perhaps an extra Quickbar/Skill Slot for the Razer Naga as an example or SWTOR’s UI Customizations. It makes a character effective on what their roles should be.

I would love if ANet allowed, at least, something similar to LotRO’s “skins” (cosmetic only mods that can move, reskin, or remove the existing UI elements, but without allowing behavior changes or any kind of scripting).

While the UI, as a whole, is nice, there are a few things that really irk me (such as the too small out of range indication).

I used to raid in WOW and honestly, I’m relieved NOT to have to deal with add ons any more. The ability to move the current UI’s components around would be welcome, however.

Keep it the game the same for every body, no to add-ons. No matter how insignificant you think they may be you’re basically just cheating, you are going out of your way to dl an add-on to let you do more, or skip a step in the game.

The only thing I would like to see is the option to key bind to gaming mice. But even if they decide to not go that route its not game breaking. More of a quality of life change for me but something I can live without.

Putting add-ons is a big no-no to me. Customizing the Basic User Interface, resizing and placing them to where I am comfortable is acceptable.

The only change I wouldn’t mind is to resize/move around the UI. I do not want addons added that pretty much do the thinking for us. Play the game. None of those addons are needed…

UI resizing/moving, sure, sounds great. Anything else, no thank you. Especially no parsers/dps meters/etc. Ugh. Game isn’t always about raw damage output. Control and support are valuable as well. Don’t need that “zomg your dps sucks get out” mentality here.

Phage.4263:

The UI needs improving and basic customization, regardless of whether player-created addons become available.

You should be able to resize/hide all the windows independently. Everyone has different things they want to see more or less prominently, this is really just a basic preference that I’m pretty sure every other game typically has some HUD control.

The addition of some % and # markers (target at 58% health, ally at 13k health, boon/condition at 5 seconds, etc) for information you could already derive from the game (like hovering over) should probably be added.

Ultimately if I can control how the game looks on my end, allowing me to highlight and resize the bits I care about, I’ll be all set.

Also, is there any existing or talk about a parser for this game? Would love to see some non-anecdotal logs for damage.

What you’re talking about is all I need, just some options that aren’t game changing but highlight the information that I want in a clearer manner. A UI is like an old sofa, it’s hard and uncomfortable until you shape it with your butt.

The ideas for changing the UI by moving the components around for those who want to sounds great (tho I’ve never felt the need to move anything) and the no-no’s against bigger moding or combat improving addons seems perfectly logical to me.

Even tho I would like to have something like keybindeble macros for emotes or even an extra actionbar (hideble if you don’t want it) for emote-macros or items from your inventory that won’t inpact combat, making things unfair. The extra actionbar would be able to be keybinded and to contain the macros or basic items like Salvage Kits, mostly so you don’t have to scroll around in your inventory when it runs out or you missclick, and other consumables. As for the macros, I don’t think it would be a great idea to be able to use the chat function with them due to the huge risk for spamming.

The “problem” regarding damage-trackers that might ruin som of the feeling of the game or making people focus too much about it could be fixed. One way I can think of is that ArenaNet created some places with traning dummies and NPC’s with whom you’ll be able to talk to and start a “personal event” that will keep track of your total damage and damge per second while you’re inside the area. This would be great for those who are curious about their damage and compare it with other builds or weapon combinations. I can admit that it might not eliminate all the nagative sides but it will certainly decrease them.

I’m certain that some people will disagre with some (or all) of it, but this is just my thoughts and I just wanted to share them.

The main things I want right now are multiple chat windows (not just tabs) so I don’t miss whispers and guild chat, and notes for each player in the guild window. And alerts when friends or guild members log on or off.

I wouldn’t mind an addon that lets me control my media player so I don’t have to alt-tab out just to skip or pause a song. Anything else I can live without (though maybe a macro system to let me shout when I charge into the fray would be fun).

Firestryke.2130:

I wouldn’t mind an addon that lets me control my media player so I don’t have to alt-tab out just to skip or pause a song.

You could just use a program that sends certain inputs to specific windows, that way even if GW2 has focus, pressing a set key combination will control another window. Hotkeynet can do that (along with a whole load of other useful things).

Something I’d like to see is a display for the number of uses left on my gathering tools, besides the one in the character pane.

Also, if I’ve brought along different grades of tools in my pack, it would be nice to automatically switch to the lowest effective version for the thing I’m trying to gather, so I don’t have to keep opening the character pane to switch the most economical one to use.

If it couldn’t be done automatically, then at least a ‘tool uses remaining’ display could double as buttons to cycle between whatever tools you have on you, to save having to mess around in the character pane. Also the mouse tooltip for resources could show whether or not your equipped tool will give something useful, or just junk.

For the crafting window I’d like a way to collapse all the categories by default, or set filters for the list. I’m only part way through levelling my trades, but the list is already getting huge.

Also what I find really annoying is how the ability bars are fixed at the bottom of the screen. They display lots of useful information, but you have to stare at the bottom of the screen to see it.

In WoW I had my UI customised so that my range indicators and cooldowns were shown right beneath my character (icons were hidden until something was actually on cooldown, to keep that area of the screen uncluttered).

All GW2 really needs right now is the moveable UI components (like in GW), better weapon swapping ( and more of em ) like the weapon sets thing from the first GW. Also I would see the incorporation of armor swapping, so many different builds to go with for different stuff. All in all the game is great though, just needs a little tweaking….also the text in the trading post should be a little clearer.

GW1 style moveable interface components would definitely nice and i think it’s only a matter of time before we see that.
As far as WoW style Add-ons go … Well i don’t even want to talk about it.

More customizability of the existing UI would be nice – and as deep as possible (e.g. down to little things like having vertical or horizontal positioning of boons/conditions).

But I’d be against totally customizable UIs until the game is much, much older, if at all.

Yeah, a moveable UI would be great for a start, but none of you mentioned nameplates.
There is little to no visibility with the current enemy nameplates, and even worse, no friendly nameplates (unless you mouseover them, which is no solution to be honest).
Player nameplates could also be class colored.
These improvements are particularly needed in PvP, i won’t argue on PvE, where the moveable UI/boons/conditions would be far enough to play comfortably. I guess.

Anyway, if the devs really made this game with eSport in mind, these changes would be a least.
I would ask for macros and a focus frame, but something tells me I’ m gonna get boo’ d for it, and, well, in his current state the game feels like a moba, so i guess we could live without those last two.