Guild Wars 2

This is just a post to highlight some of the problems or balance issues that the current game-play results in for the casual gamer. Before anything else I want to state that I do not want to see GW2 turn into WOW, but I might use it as an example or counter point to hopefully make things a bit more clear. WOW does do some things well.

A lot of these things are actually interrelated, so I won’t really push the relationships between the ideas much, but I’ll probably at least make mention of them.

This is all partly personal observation and opinion being a somewhat casual player, but also reflects forum posts and in game conversation and chatter. If you have further or alternate suggestions or new things that might need addressed, feel free to add. I already had to break it up into multiple posts.

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     1     Solo vs. Group
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There is no question about it at all, playing with a group is much easier and vastly more efficient than playing solo. In many games there is a trade off made if you want to group. Faster group kills means sharing loot and maybe experience. In GW2 this is obviously not the case, which is a good thing. I hope it doesn’t change.

The problem is that there is no adjustment or balance involved. A lot of casual players will play solo or be in casual guilds that tend to group a lot less often. The result is that not only do casual players have a more drawn out game experience that feels more grindy, but the more hardcore players can get an experience that feels laughably trivial and easy (just watch some videos to see large groups steam roll areas with 0 challenge or slow down). This is bad in both cases.

One possible solution would be "tag" adjustments. At its simplest this would be adjusting mob stats according the number of players that have it tagged. The result would be solo players capable of a playing at a brisker pace because they are given a bit of a break and don’t need to contend with even trash mobs that can take a not insignificant amount of work to take down. And larger groups would get a more balanced and challenging experience because the mobs get more difficult for each person that tags it.

There could be limits put in place, and exceptions made to keep things from resulting in always feeling exactly the same. For example some mobs might have a limited range of (2-7) tag scaling, so soloing will still feel slightly tougher, but not as bad as now, and large groups can still feel more powerful, but not as overpowered as now. I think the result would be improved game-play overall and a slightly more consistent difficulty for any given mob. Other exception would be things like big event bosses or whatever that either have their own scaling or simply don’t scale at all.

I am not entirely sure how mobs are balanced, but this would be a help even to normal players that are in the "middle zones" (or at odd hours) where players are a lot more scarce and just coming across other players and making ad hoc teams to kill mobs is much much less likely to happen than in the beginning or end zones.

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     2     Level Adjustment
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As a concept, this is a great idea and works pretty well. In practice there are some issues that could be addressed.

The first issue is strongly related to #1. In games like WOW, a casual player that wants a bit of a break from game-play that requires a lot of attention or challenge can simply drop down the zone or mob levels a bit. And in fact if they are less skilled, they may just play in areas below their level to avoid dying so much (even it results in slower leveling or fewer good drops).

In GW2 this is just not possible. While in theory a player is supposed be slightly over the power/level of the mobs when scaled, the actual difference in challenge (especially for less skilled or casual players) is completely unnoticeable and even sometimes HARDER because of how the scaling works. (see posts about low level players doing better in dungeons than scaled down players) In fact a large majority of the people I see running around in areas are scaled down, suggesting that for players who don’t power level or whatever, it is already necessary to play in one of those scaled down areas even if it only helps a tiny amount. Of course a lot of those people may just be farming or completing a zone.

I realize changes in this would probably complicate the feature significantly and require a lot of code, nevertheless it seems that a majority of the vocal players have an issue of some kind with the feature. How exactly that reflects the overall player base is anyone’s guess.

One possible solution would be to make this more variable or optional and have scaled loot/exp/etc reflect that. At it’s most basic this would mean the more scaled to a zone you are, the more scaled the loot/exp is to your actual level. So scaling as it is now would work much as it does now (let’s call it 100% scaled) but you could "turn it down" or even off, and suffer the consequences in return for less challenge. An example (totally made up and inaccurate):
100% (current): 90% exp equivalency for mobs and harvesting, 70% level appropriate loot
50%: 50% exp equivalency mobs, 30% harvest, 40% loot drops
10%: 10% exp mobs, 5% harvest, 3% loot
off: 0 exp scaling, no level scaled loot

The big problem with that would be high levels helping out low levels, but you could do as WOW does then, and just make mobs killed by high level players give no exp to low level players. For events, this might mean that you can’t even damage related mobs unless in the 70-100% scaled range or something. Again, complicated I know, but that is a rough idea and likely can be simplified or explained much more clearly.

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     3     Crafting
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Put simply, it is nearly impossible to level even a single craft to be level appropriate, it just gets worse the higher your level. It is possible to reduce the gap by spending all of your money, but the fact is, casual players have less money; they die more from being less skilled or in huge groups, and don’t take the time or research ways to game or take advantage of the TP for profit.

One possible way to fix this is to change the crafting table quite a bit. Make simple items craftable at lower levels and with fewer or lower tier crafting materials, while rarer more powerful items need more skill. This is somewhat how it is now, but not quite. As it is, simple and advanced items are still in the same tier, just off by 50. The new way would break out of that and have simple items tier up on their own and advanced on their own.

Example of New tiers:
Simple:
1)0-25 (tier 1 mats)
2)25-50 (tier 2 mats)
3)50-75 (tier 3 mats)
4)75-100 (tier 4 mats)

Master:
1)50-150 (tier 1 mats)
2)150-250 (tier 2 mats)
3)250-350 (tier 3 mats)
4)350+ (tier 4 mats)

Obviously that can be changed or whatever and for simple items you could even require lower tier mats if wanted, but what it means is that you are able to at least craft basic if slightly inferior items for your class without putting a lot of focus on leveling up the craft by either grinding or buying mats.

Special recipes could fall anywhere on the spectrum to reflect their power level. I have noticed that the special recipes can be soul bound, and if that is on acquire, then a lot of the special recipes are simply worthless as is, except maybe on a much later alt that has access to a lot of money and mats to keep up craft level with toon level. Otherwise, by the time someone can craft the soul-bound on acquire item, they are too high a level for it to be of any use.

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     4     Event Notification
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Notification is odd, sometimes showing up farther than expected, often showing only when almost on top of the event. For casual players who don’t look things up online, find nice long chains (or even know an event is part of chain), and figure out which ones are "good" for repeating, events can be a bit of a let down.

There are several things here. First is the notification. It would be very nice for more casual players (and maybe this goes for other people) to have much better notification of events. Make the range they show up in larger so they are easier to find, and maybe even make the more special or bigger events be zone wide notification. A few extra lines of collapsed events in the top right can’t hurt much, and would make finding events and knowing they are happening much easier.

The other thing is event chains. It might be nice to have a clear indication when an event is in an event chain so they know to stick around for what happens next, or if they don’t need to bother following npcs wherever they are running to.

The above would also help with players interested in lore and story; it would make it easier for players to follow npc conversations and know when they need to stick around or follow in order to get the storyline. If there were some way to make it more obvious an event was about to happen, or get the story behind an event chain already in progress that would help story folks as well, though I’m not sure it would be feasible, and having to look up starting actions and story on the net may be inevitable.

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     5     WvW
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This one is just a case of a very poorly introduced feature. Many of the casual players I run across completely ignore this. PvP is somewhat self explanatory, and is basically just running around fighting other people anyways, so dropping people in without a lot of explanation is not as big a deal, even the idea of holding and capturing the little zones is probably easy enough to pick up, but the same is not true of WvW.

A very easy solution to this might be inserting required WvW like events into the story-lines fairly early on. They could happen on completely scripted and separate WvW like instances, but be reflections of actual WvW. There needs to be introductions for pretty much everything. The reason and how to capture each of the different types of locations, escorting, siege building, and all the little stuff involved.

WvW is a great inclusion, but right now it is basically dropping players into a whole other game without any kind of information at all (except what they can nag out of other players already doing things) and in general is just not an easy pick up for the casual players even though they should be able to play WvW just fine without needing to be hardcore.

1) Well my response is that if a group wants to steamroll areas and not have a challenge, let them. They’re ruining their own gameplay experience, not yours. I found the difficulty of soloing in this game to be fine (rather easy actually) for anything other than group events. In fact, this game is really good at weaving you in and out of group and solo play. I enjoy that.

Your idea of tagging mobs would be so easily exploited and a major annoyance. Imagine some jerk just comes by and shoots one arrow at this Veteran you’re fighting and then runs off. Now you have to fight a stronger version of an already strong mob because of that nonsense. Or how about he actually stays and fights but he turns out to be a total scrub and has no idea what he’s doing. He gets killed easily and in the process gets you killed easily. Sorry, but I like the current system as is. Grouping should be strongly encouraged.

2) Well you are usually just a tad stronger than the mobs when you scale down (assuming gear is up to date, and casual or not, the TP is so cheap you can easily buy a full upgrade for a few silver). Also you seem to be intertwining the terms casual and skill-less noob. My gameplay is casual, but I don’t need the game to be easy-mode to play it. The term casual refers more to time investments and “barrier-to-entry” that alot of other games have. The game allows you to easily jump into most activities at any level and allows you to progress rapidly, even when playing very little.

Also a big part of the reason for down-scaling is to prevent higher-level players from griefing content for lower level players. This game is heavily designed around anti-griefing, so don’t expect a dramatic change to the downscaling…. ever.

3) While crafting could be tweaked a bit (mostly that professions that use cloth or leather materials easily fall behind those that use metal and wood), I think it is quite well done. And while the discovery system initially would come off as intimidating for a casual, it’s actually quite easy and intuitive when you try it since you’re not allowed to make failures. I’ve also, personally, been able to craft level appropriate gear for myself from Jewelcrafting quite easily.

4) I agree that Event Notification is a little wonky at times and you make some excellent suggestions in this regard. I feel like there is a bit too much hand-holding with event revelation, but considering that the crux of top-level gameplay only utilizes events, it is important to be able to track them (rather than shouting out in map chat, though this does give an additional outlet for social interaction in this game).

5) I definitely agree that WvWvW has many nuances and tasks that need to be strategically understood. There should be a thorough, in-game manual or document that explains WvWvW in extensive detail. To be fair though, a casual player as you seem to be describing them would just follow the zerg wherever they are and proceed rushing around in that manner.

I think defensive stats should be more mildly scale down in side-kicking. It makes a lot of difference for a heavy armor class and a light armor class. A level 80 light armor class needs a level 10 heavy armor class help in a low level zone is sort of humiliating, because you can get killed easily if you get hits from a few mobs. After your effort to get to level 80, this is really a shame.

Regarding the Event notification, frequently I get a pop-up telling me some events are nearby, but if you look at the map, there is no circle anywhere. You have no idea where the DE is and moving around won’t help. You will need to make your guess on which direction to head. If you move in the wrong direction, you have a very good chance to be late for it, and event ends at the moment you arrive, wasting all your time finding its location. If the popup shows up, you should be able to see that on the map already.

<—This casual player is completely happy with the solo play and level adjustment. I rather like playing solo and do not want it to be any easier or faster than it already is. As far as why you see alot of downleveled people running around? Consider that they are just exploring the content, and want to see everything. That is exactly what I’m doing.

Hologramx.6402:

I think defensive stats should be more mildly scale down in side-kicking. It makes a lot of difference for a heavy armor class and a light armor class. A level 80 light armor class needs a level 10 heavy armor class help in a low level zone is sort of humiliating, because you can get killed easily if you get hits from a few mobs. After your effort to get to level 80, this is really a shame.

Uh well as a Level 80 Elementalist, I haven’t had that issue where I need a heavy armor class. It’s not like they can tank anyways… so I don’t know that I see your point.

I agree with your Notification issues, I don’t know anything about WvW, but i disagree with points 1-3. I think solo’ing is fine and I have no problems at all and I’m a thief! We get 2-shot by critters!

Yes, I do intertwine casual and less-skilled, but in most cases they are intertwined. You don’t have to be casual to be low-skill, and you aren’t necessarily lower skill if you only play casual, but they are usually somewhat connected. MMOs HAVE to take lower skill players into account, other wise there would be no MASSIVE about it. (I consider myself slightly above average skill and have done exploreables)

And I may not have represented the solo vs group quite as well as intended and I’ve seen talked about or been in discussions with. Most people I’ve talked to on the issue seem to think that mobs in general were balanced for perhaps 3 players as far as time needed to kill vs loot/exp gained.

So, if something was scaled with tagging, even if you got a few extra tags from run-by jerks, they would still be killable. Solo would not necessarily be all that much easier if mobs were in fact balanced for only 3 or so players – 1 tag would not mean 1/3 current h/p as in 1:1 scaling, just some scale, and with a limit or similar scaling 8 tags wouldn’t mean 8 times harder, just some more challenge. Huge groups would still be able to steam roll, just not as ridiculously fast.

And actually, you could even put a timer or interval check on a tag, so it goes away if the mob wasn’t attacked by that player in x time which would get rid of run-bys but add probably significant overhead.

I feel like they have taken “lower-skill” into account. I come from many pause-and-play games, yet the “active” combat in GW2 is easy enough that even I, someone who hates FPS games (except DOOM), can pick it up with ease.

I haven’t had an issue playing solo. I’ve been in places 4 levels under-level as an engineer and still gotten Gold in events and been able to solo mobs without that much of a problem. I think part of the problem people may be having right now is that the game is very new – so people are clustered in the zones – you have the people slowing moving upward, and those that powered to 80, so the mid-levels aren’t getting much love. This “problem” (of not having others around to help you) should fix itself when things spread out a bit more.

There are all kinds of players, and no one game is going to appeal to all of them.

I think most things are fine with the game so far. In relation to your specific comments.

Solo vs Group: I think the respawn rates in some areas are too fast. If you find yourself in some areas alone you can very quickly become overwhelmed by the respawned mobs you just killed on your way into the zone. While I appreciate that the high respawns are necessary due to the number of players in some areas I feel the game would be better if player density in a zone was monitored and the respawn rates tweaked accordingly.

I can handle a veteran mob and maybe one or two adds at the same time. What I can’t handle is a couple of axes slamming into the back of my head from the two mobs I just killed to get to the veteran mob while I’m doing it.

It’s not always appropriate to get a group for every situation “Looking for group to get that point of interest in the cave with the centaurs”, probably wouldn’t work too well.

On groups in general, I do think the game would benefit from a better LFG mechanic. Maybe along the lines of the one in City of Heroes where you can just queue for an instance and once there are enough people it starts. After all the holy trinity is no longer needed apparently so a mixed group should work, shouldn’t it?

At the moment there are people looking for dungeons using the Map channel in ( for example ) Queensdale, Lions Arch and Divinity’s Reach for Cadeceus’s Manor and never the twain shall meet.

Level Adjustment: I’m fine with it. got my backside kicked by the troll in Queensdale last night when I’m level 41 and actually found it refreshing. Made me realise I’d been fighting lazily. That won’t happen again.

Crafting: I struggled at first as I didn’t realise that discoveries pay all the experience. Since I realised that I’m motoring and I’m tailoring/artificing. So not the easiest in terms of drops. My biggest annoyance at the moment is that it seems pointless at lower levels to make any money from crafting, the trading post prices seem all messed up with people selling stuff for little more than they can get at a vendor.

Event Notification: Should be better. Basically if you’re the right level ( maybe 1/2 your level and it’s on your map, you should know about it ). The rest, chains etc. is down to experience. Always talk to the event starter after an event, simple.

WvW: Haven’t tried it yet, tried queuing last night as I need to get a few levels before hitting my next area but didn’t get in. There are plenty of resources on the internet that explain it. Yes, it would be nice to be lead through it in game but it is possible to learn it elsewhere, so there is no excuse not to really.

Other than that, I think the game wins big. It’s beautiful, fun and I see very little trouble being caused out there. A big A+ from me.

LucidCrux wrote : “MMOs HAVE to take lower skill players into account, other wise there would be no MASSIVE about it”.

I totally agree with that, and the “hardcore” players who spend their time on this forum to tell to stop to whine and to learn to play should remember that very basic truth.
We too are customers, and we don’t want to waste the content of the hardcore players, we just want to have some content too.
In what does it annoy you if the devs add some easier modes, with of course less reward ? They won’t remove your hard mode, so where is your problem ?
Why do you always look down at us and repeat this stupid “L2P” ? There are tons of things i know better than other people, but i don’t feel the need to throw that in their face at the first occasion, for they certainly know better or do better than me tons of other things too. And even if not, in what is it a crime to be less talented ?
Why do you fear that your game experience will be destroyed if they add some adapted content for people who have not had the luck to be wonderfully gifted by the nature like you (me, ironic ?).
Yes we are less skilled, yes you can think that we are stupid or whatever you want. You can despite us as much as you want, but in the meantime, if you want GW2 to be populated only with hardcore players, then i don’t know how the devs will get their next pay.