Guild Wars 2

.. The fact that ascended armor costs gold (indirectly) to purchase now? How are poor pvp scrubs like me gonna pay up? I play pvp almost exclusively and apart from ranked season when I earn a meagre few hundred gold, I don’t get much income.

So ascended shards were the only way I’m going to be able to gear up for raids, fractals and wvw. I guess now my 1200 shards are going to sit uselessly in my inventory. Thanks anet. What even warranted this change?

(Before anyone points out my seemingly contradictory statements, I do play pvp almost exclusively. I dedicate only at most an hour a day for daily fractals, if I even do them, and only 6 hours a week for raids. The remaining 90% of my time is spent in spvp.)

You get 20 gold every time you complete the Byzantium track during the season. Not to mention the Wintersday Gifts you can sell on the TP. As well as the Unidentified Dyes that are in everything. I made a ridiculous amount of gold this past season without even trying to.

It’s ridiculously easy to earn gold in PvP

Everything you listed is time locked. You can only complete the byzantium chests during a PvP season, and Wintersday reward track is only available for 4-6 weeks a year

If you play pvp exclusively, what is your need for ascended armour, which is mostly useful for fractals?

If you mostly pvp, then it is fair and reasonable to assume you rarely use gold sinks. Again, not earning much or spending much equates that you contribute poorly to the over all economy.

The components you’re talking about in pvp benefit players who play across all platforms. They can acquire materials towards ascended gear from fractals, wvw, open world and pvp.

Gw2 has given player the easiest path to ascended gear they if they wish, or feel they have been excluded.. It is called a credit card.

Credit card farm always works for me, probably needs a nerf tbh

hackks.3687:

You get 20 gold every time you complete the Byzantium track during the season. Not to mention the Wintersday Gifts you can sell on the TP. As well as the Unidentified Dyes that are in everything. I made a ridiculous amount of gold this past season without even trying to.

It’s ridiculously easy to earn gold in PvP

Now compare that to PvE income and it looks truly pitiful xD

In our minds we tend to separate PvE from PvP, because ArenaNet teached us to think this way from the very start of the game, where PvP was separate and did not require level and gear (see: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/competitive-play/)

Meanwhile, things have changed and PvP is now an extension of PvE. Here are a few examples:

PvP gives PvE rewards, PvP rewards gold, PvP + PvE = legendary items, PvP + crafting = ascended gear, PvP provides achievement points and titles, PvP needs to have content unlocked (amulets, runes, champions, reward tracks for PvE, and so on).

Also mechanics have changed: You can play PvE with full premade parties and raids, but ranked PvP is played only in maximum of 2 players premade. Also, nowadays PvP is mostly played and farmed solo, just like PvE most of the times.

We went a long way from earning skins and tournament tickets and PvP boosters, to earning PvE rewards in all it’s forms. All that mentality from the past has changed.

To understand and grasp all this, we need to unteach ourselves on separating those 2 game modes in our minds. PvP and PvE are one. Those are no longer separate, but are not necessarily bound (you can play one without the other, but you can’t enjoy the rewards of PvP without PvE). To start this mentality change, we should think of PvP as PvpE (Player versus Player in Environment). This way is much easier for us to understand patches and modifications for PvP.

OP, there is thread about it in general discussion. I am certainly not seeing myself buying any ascended gear with pvp/fractals tokens any time soon. It is simply not worth it if you calculate costs of mats + time spent to get those tokens, especially when ascended boxes drop from raids/fractals and you can buy gear for magnetite shards which are not time gated to a season and don’t require crafting stuff.

Saying that as pvp’er you don’t need gear is stupid, a lot of players don’t just sit in pvp 24/7 but also participate in other aspects of the game. At least in fractals ascended gear is a must, simply due to infusions. You are not going to get into many raiding groups as well nowadays unless you have proper ascended gear.

I personally have been participating in every game mode (although i quit wvw ages ago, too boring): i raid every week, i do fractals every day and pvp obviously. From my experience gold and mats gains from pvp are absolute joke outside of recent ranked rewards during the season, but it is time gated and not always available unlike fractals or raids. The chances to get ascended from pvp are also absolute joke. I have had more drops from killing 9 bosses in 1 week and some fractal runs than in months of pvp.

Cynz.9437:

OP, there is thread about it in general discussion. I am certainly not seeing myself buying any ascended gear with pvp/fractals tokens any time soon. It is simply not worth it if you calculate costs of mats + time spent to get those tokens, especially when ascended boxes drop from raids/fractals and you can buy gear for magnetite shards which are not time gated to a season and don’t require crafting stuff.

Saying that as pvp’er you don’t need gear is stupid, a lot of players don’t just sit in pvp 24/7 but also participate in other aspects of the game. At least in fractals ascended gear is a must, simply due to infusions. You are not going to get into many raiding groups as well nowadays unless you have proper ascended gear.

I personally have been participating in every game mode (although i quit wvw ages ago, too boring): i raid every week, i do fractals every day and pvp obviously. From my experience gold and mats gains from pvp are absolute joke outside of recent ranked rewards during the season, but it is time gated and not always available unlike fractals or raids. The chances to get ascended from pvp are also absolute joke. I have had more drops from killing 9 bosses in 1 week and some fractal runs than in months of pvp.

You just invalidated your own point. If you are playing other game modes, then you are earning gold from said game modes, which means you can pay for it like everyone else.

Also the statement about raids is an outright lie. At most groups require asc trinkets and weapons, not ascended armor. And even then most groups only require exotic. And with the new patch giving you easy access to an ascended weapon, and berry farming literally giving you trinkets up the kitten , no one should be complaining about this AT ALL.

FrostDraco.8306:

Cynz.9437:

OP, there is thread about it in general discussion. I am certainly not seeing myself buying any ascended gear with pvp/fractals tokens any time soon. It is simply not worth it if you calculate costs of mats + time spent to get those tokens, especially when ascended boxes drop from raids/fractals and you can buy gear for magnetite shards which are not time gated to a season and don’t require crafting stuff.

Saying that as pvp’er you don’t need gear is stupid, a lot of players don’t just sit in pvp 24/7 but also participate in other aspects of the game. At least in fractals ascended gear is a must, simply due to infusions. You are not going to get into many raiding groups as well nowadays unless you have proper ascended gear.

I personally have been participating in every game mode (although i quit wvw ages ago, too boring): i raid every week, i do fractals every day and pvp obviously. From my experience gold and mats gains from pvp are absolute joke outside of recent ranked rewards during the season, but it is time gated and not always available unlike fractals or raids. The chances to get ascended from pvp are also absolute joke. I have had more drops from killing 9 bosses in 1 week and some fractal runs than in months of pvp.

You just invalidated your own point. If you are playing other game modes, then you are earning gold from said game modes, which means you can pay for it like everyone else.

Also the statement about raids is an outright lie. At most groups require asc trinkets and weapons, not ascended armor. And even then most groups only require exotic. And with the new patch giving you easy access to an ascended weapon, and berry farming literally giving you trinkets up the kitten , no one should be complaining about this AT ALL.

This wouldn’t be a guild wars 2 forum without someone crying about something and intentionally ignoring facts.

Like you said, PvPers exclusive players do not need ascended gear for anything. If you are not a PvP exclusive player then you can make money from the other modes of play.

Why should crafters be punish for crafting when you can just lose your way into a full set of ascended gear?

FrostDraco.8306:

Cynz.9437:

OP, there is thread about it in general discussion. I am certainly not seeing myself buying any ascended gear with pvp/fractals tokens any time soon. It is simply not worth it if you calculate costs of mats + time spent to get those tokens, especially when ascended boxes drop from raids/fractals and you can buy gear for magnetite shards which are not time gated to a season and don’t require crafting stuff.

Saying that as pvp’er you don’t need gear is stupid, a lot of players don’t just sit in pvp 24/7 but also participate in other aspects of the game. At least in fractals ascended gear is a must, simply due to infusions. You are not going to get into many raiding groups as well nowadays unless you have proper ascended gear.

I personally have been participating in every game mode (although i quit wvw ages ago, too boring): i raid every week, i do fractals every day and pvp obviously. From my experience gold and mats gains from pvp are absolute joke outside of recent ranked rewards during the season, but it is time gated and not always available unlike fractals or raids. The chances to get ascended from pvp are also absolute joke. I have had more drops from killing 9 bosses in 1 week and some fractal runs than in months of pvp.

You just invalidated your own point. If you are playing other game modes, then you are earning gold from said game modes, which means you can pay for it like everyone else.

Also the statement about raids is an outright lie. At most groups require asc trinkets and weapons, not ascended armor. And even then most groups only require exotic. And with the new patch giving you easy access to an ascended weapon, and berry farming literally giving you trinkets up the kitten , no one should be complaining about this AT ALL.

The problem is, if i spent 90% of time in pvp and only did say fractals once in a while, it would take me probably a year to get enough mats for a set.
I have few characters geared by now i couldn’t care anymore but i remember when i had to craft the pieces i had to simply give up on pvp and i have issue with it.
Most raid groups require only asc trinkets and weps? Is this a joke? When have you raided last time lol? For VG and escort maybe ppl won’t care, but gl getting in Xera or Matt groups.
Also, i am not complaining (as said, i have few characters geared by now and sitting on thousands of magnetite shards and bunch asc boxes, so it doesn’t affect me much), i just think the way the change is implemented is unreasonable.

@PlatinumMember.5274: yeah you can make gold/farm mats from other modes but it would require you to basically completely drop pvp, coming from personal experience. Usually “farms” require you to sit in good maps or in instance even and in a squad -> no pvp queues for you.
Crafters are not punished, crafting gives you guaranteed way to get piece you want. I mean you can also say, why should crafters be punished when you can get ascended drop from boxes.
Getting ascended for losing matches is different discussion. I don’t think any half decent pvp’er actually welcomed such implementation.

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

If you play pvp exclusively, what is your need for ascended armour, which is mostly useful for fractals?

If all I do is PvP, what need do I have for crafting?

Yet I have to do crafting in order to get my PvP rewards.

Dear OP,

I am sorry that you and the rest of us have to give up the thought of actual good rewards in PvP.

Let me tell you what caused this to happen. At the beginning of the season five, a few people here on the boards lost their minds because PVE players were coming to PvP. This crime against nature caused much hatred towards the new Potential PvPers (as in they had potential but I am sure many of them were run off).

The threads of vile disgust at PvP offering ascended armor, and drawing in new players to the game mode was pretty rampant on these boards.

I myself saw it as a great idea that had the potential of reinvigorating interest in PvP and thought that things had finally gone in the right direction. As I have always touted, new blood is the life blood to each game mode and without it well, long queue times ect..

You see I started this game in PVE myself, and now I mostly play PVP, the thing is that I had sorta wanted to build some suits for my characters and maybe play some other game modes again. I was planning on using this ascended armor to do so as hey I was working pretty hard for it, seasons arent a walk in the park really, I spend as much time in PvP each night as people do in raids and wvw so why not?

Sadly and for an unexplained reason, (trust me I ussually agree with the devs, but I just can’t on this one.)They actually listened to the infuriated comments that went on here and , so they while they didnt take the ascended away completely they just gave us a crafting ingredient that bypassed some of the work.

sigh I doubt myself or many other PvPers will put that time in to building ascended suits as you can see many have just gone back to, well I mostly PvP why would I need it, as the work is just not worth our efforts.

At this point we want to jump into things with suits ready not go out and farm them up, as we already invest a significant amount of time into the game.

My solution and or suggestion would of been to just slow down the number of pieces of Ascended armor you could get per season to maybe one or two, thusly making it a long term operation. At least you are still working towards a piece and you don’t have to buy or hunt down the materials on top of your efforts in PvP.

One really has to ask Oneself, why would you ever complain about good rewards and yet… that is exactly what lead to this.

Signed,
Bewildered and Bothered

Crinn.7864:

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

If you play pvp exclusively, what is your need for ascended armour, which is mostly useful for fractals?

If all I do is PvP, what need do I have for crafting?

Yet I have to do crafting in order to get my PvP rewards.

legendaries have always been advertised as luxury and requiring effort in all parts of the game.

at least you dont have to wvw.

hackks.3687:

You get 20 gold every time you complete the Byzantium track during the season. Not to mention the Wintersday Gifts you can sell on the TP. As well as the Unidentified Dyes that are in everything. I made a ridiculous amount of gold this past season without even trying to.

It’s ridiculously easy to earn gold in PvP

it costs like 600g to get an entire set of ardent glorious armor, don’t you think that’s a bit ridiculous? especially when it was originally like 14g + ascended shards of glory.

Crinn.7864:

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

If you play pvp exclusively, what is your need for ascended armour, which is mostly useful for fractals?

If all I do is PvP, what need do I have for crafting?

Yet I have to do crafting in order to get my PvP rewards.

Nope. You need to craft to get ascend gear, which is utterly useless in pvp.
You can sell the materials gathered for crafting, without actually crafting anything. This is your reward.

Your reward is the effort you took to gain materials to craft a armour that provides you with no advantage in the mode you play, yet provides you the opportunity to convert to gold which allows you to purchase amulets etc that you can use in the mode you play.

The original logic still applies. It benefits cross platform players, yet leaves single mode players with something to show and/or benefit from.

You don’t need to craft ascended gear if you only play pvp, therefore any more discussion on it after the fact is mute.

No one has done the math of the ridiculous amount of wins needed to get the gear?

You need to repeat the last chest 19 times to get the shards needed to craft ascended items. You get 27g for each of the chests completed.

So you earn roughly 500+g for getting 1200 shards, which is more than enough for ascended items.

The big issue is the fact you need to win 18 times to complete the last chest, so in order to get a full set of ascended you need to win roughly 342 matches in order to get a full set of ascended.

Assuming your win rate is 50/50, you would need to play roughly 684+ matches just to get full ascended and it is by far the slowest method to obtain ascended items.

You’re better off taking the gold from the wins and using it to craft ascended the normal way at the higher price.

So you need 180 pips to complete the Byzantium chest. You get 10 for winning and 4 for losing (but based on some comments that may end up being buffed for super close games in the next season?), and lets assume you get a top stat 50% of the time.

Worst case, with 0% win rate, this averages out to 9 pips every 2 games, which means you would need 40 games to complete the Byzantium track, at 19 completions needed (according to you, I have yet to check how many ascended shards it gives now), this would mean you would need to play 760 matches worst case to get the ascended armor, not counting the games required to get to Byzantium.

Assuming 50% win rate, this would average out to 7.5 pips per match, or 15 for every 2 matches. That would require 24 games to complete a byzantium track. At 19 completions needed, you would only need to play 456 games, not counting the games required to get to Byzantium.

So substantially better assuming 50% win rate than what you estimated. I do think its steep, but it could be worse.

If they left everything as is from Season 5 and made only a small change, we’d see an overnight change in match quality.

Put the rewards in Unranked.

Remove all rewards from Ranked—the only thing you’re playing for is a spot on the leaderboard.

Then, you let the carebears follow the incentive into their “farm”

And the players that actually want to be competitive don’t have to deal with that nonsense.

Kreweless.2196:

If they left everything as is from Season 5 and made only a small change, we’d see an overnight change in match quality.

Put the rewards in Unranked.

Remove all rewards from Ranked—the only thing you’re playing for is a spot on the leaderboard.

Then, you let the carebears follow the incentive into their “farm”

And the players that actually want to be competitive don’t have to deal with that nonsense.

Absolutely correct… only 1 problem: queue times for ranked will be insane. People will complain again for 30 minutes waiting in queue, so everything will be back to square one. We sometimes tend to forget they added ascended as rewards to lure PvE players into PvP and solve the long-queue problems.

Acrisor.8097:

Kreweless.2196:

If they left everything as is from Season 5 and made only a small change, we’d see an overnight change in match quality.

Put the rewards in Unranked.

Remove all rewards from Ranked—the only thing you’re playing for is a spot on the leaderboard.

Then, you let the carebears follow the incentive into their “farm”

And the players that actually want to be competitive don’t have to deal with that nonsense.

Absolutely correct… only 1 problem: queue times for ranked will be insane. People will complain again for 30 minutes waiting in queue, so everything will be back to square one. We sometimes tend to forget they added ascended as rewards to lure PvE players into PvP and solve the long-queue problems.

We also tend to forget. Why the population crisis happened in the first place. Because ANet just couldn’t be asked to give players fun and entertaining matches. Instead just set players up, mainly solo queuer’s up to lose before the match even started.

The smoking gun here is the match maker. Which has just started to get worked on. However it’s just too little too late to make a difference. Since it no longer has the amount of players needed. In order to make it meaningful for 5v5 conquest matches. Matches are more non competitive now then ever before in the past. teams of 1800 being allowed to face teams of 1350 or lower. You might as well be cannon fodder for those players who are top tier’ed. Players to included the Pro League players hated such a system. So in the end everyone lost, except for ANet.