Guild Wars 2

DeceiverX.8361:

Static.9841:

This thread seriously confuses me. I don’t understand why anyone on F2P thinks they should have the same benefits as anyone who bought the base game and HoT regardless of what game mode that is and if the game is so “beloved” to you, why can’t you spend money actually buying it? The entitlement here is painful.

To say you can’t get anywhere in PvP without HoT specs is also a complete fallacy, because you absolutely can with core builds, but not if you suck as a player.

Lol, entitlement? Are you kidding me? The game is fundamentally flawed and is clearly restricted B2W in the form of the expansions, and you claim entitlement? The entire F2P concept is arbitrary.

I’ve spent probably close to a thousand bucks on this game, if not more. I built a $3000.00 computer solely to play this game with the highest possible fidelity on top of that. I don’t buy gold or legendaries. What I buy goes straight to ANet. AKA, around 10 years of a WoW sub + expansions at highest price. I had a tremendous amount of respect for ANet before HoT, and as such didn’t care about the money. I gave them what I thought they deserved because I support businesses and games I like.

I prefer playing core specs. I actually hate every single elite by design except the reaper, and the elite specs as a consequence introduced so much arbitrary power for no reason that the game is no longer fun and diverse like it was. The fact I see four builds in a majority of encounters in WvW which before had literally everything is more telling than the meta-crawlers and bad balance in sPvP due to the amulet system. HoT is broken, and it broke GW2.

That’s where the real complaint is. It’s not that F2P players can’t win. It’s that GW2 sPvP and WvW are no longer actually fun because diversity is dead in the water and the elite specs are by far and large conceptual failures that are poorly implemented and in many cases, poorly designed. It’s not about entitlement. Quite honestly, 70% of ANet’s revenue at the time of releasing HoT, both before and after constituted gem purchases. ANet makes more than double its box sales from people who want to fund the game they’re enjoying. And ANet’s sales figures right now are the lowest in company history. I stopped buying gems cold with HoT. And I know many other people, people who spent probably $100 a month on this game who also did.

HoT killed the fun elements of sPvP and WvW. The game is totally broken and anyone who simply doesn’t like their profession’s elite is just in a position where either they deal with it or leave.

Telling passionate players that they’re entitled because they’re complaining because they don’t get the same enjoyment from the game before the expansion is foolish and ridiculous.

Please, before HoT everyone ran the same builds on the same classes. There was no diversity before HoT, there is none after it. There will always be a build that is better than all the others, it is the way trait systems work. There have been many posts from.player through out this year of them getting to legendary on F2P accounts. If you are more skilled you will win the fight/match. I an half my team got mauled by a power core warrior in a match today, who ever the person was, they where something else. How to I know? Did not use berserker once.

There is nothing B2W or P2W about PvP, it’s skill to win, just like every other PvP game out there, the HoT specs just give you more ways to win. So maybe there is a little diversity after all.

DeceiverX.8361:

Static.9841:

This thread seriously confuses me. I don’t understand why anyone on F2P thinks they should have the same benefits as anyone who bought the base game and HoT regardless of what game mode that is and if the game is so “beloved” to you, why can’t you spend money actually buying it? The entitlement here is painful.

To say you can’t get anywhere in PvP without HoT specs is also a complete fallacy, because you absolutely can with core builds, but not if you suck as a player.

Lol, entitlement? Are you kidding me? The game is fundamentally flawed and is clearly restricted B2W in the form of the expansions, and you claim entitlement? The entire F2P concept is arbitrary.

I’ve spent probably close to a thousand bucks on this game, if not more. I built a $3000.00 computer solely to play this game with the highest possible fidelity on top of that. I don’t buy gold or legendaries. What I buy goes straight to ANet. AKA, around 10 years of a WoW sub + expansions at highest price. I had a tremendous amount of respect for ANet before HoT, and as such didn’t care about the money. I gave them what I thought they deserved because I support businesses and games I like.

I prefer playing core specs. I actually hate every single elite by design except the reaper, and the elite specs as a consequence introduced so much arbitrary power for no reason that the game is no longer fun and diverse like it was. The fact I see four builds in a majority of encounters in WvW which before had literally everything is more telling than the meta-crawlers and bad balance in sPvP due to the amulet system. HoT is broken, and it broke GW2.

That’s where the real complaint is. It’s not that F2P players can’t win. It’s that GW2 sPvP and WvW are no longer actually fun because diversity is dead in the water and the elite specs are by far and large conceptual failures that are poorly implemented and in many cases, poorly designed. It’s not about entitlement. Quite honestly, 70% of ANet’s revenue at the time of releasing HoT, both before and after constituted gem purchases. ANet makes more than double its box sales from people who want to fund the game they’re enjoying. And ANet’s sales figures right now are the lowest in company history. I stopped buying gems cold with HoT. And I know many other people, people who spent probably $100 a month on this game who also did.

HoT killed the fun elements of sPvP and WvW. The game is totally broken and anyone who simply doesn’t like their profession’s elite is just in a position where either they deal with it or leave.

Telling passionate players that they’re entitled because they’re complaining because they don’t get the same enjoyment from the game before the expansion is foolish and ridiculous.

There are at least 4 different Guardian builds for WvW in the meta, 2 of which are without Dragonhunter.

And you are a bit silly building a PC solely for GW2, as the most you need is a decent CPU, and even if it isn’t top notch you can make alot of performance with Overclocking.
High-end GPUs are not needed as most performance comes from the CPU. if you wanna make this game look better SweetFx and the likes are alot better solutions, which are free btw.

Also there are players doing just fine with core specs in PvP reaching legend etc, and i bet alot of classes work for the average WvW, PvE anyway.

Also the term B2W (Buy-to-Win) does not exist, it is P2W (Pay-2-Win), and if anything they are exactly the same – Buy=Pay. It was used by some not very inteligent person earlier in the thread who said this game is not p2w but b2w, which is not true as it is B2P (Buy-to-Play).
MMORPGs are all about character progression, some MMOs (most notable WoW) do this with geartreadmills, but as GW2 does not have and does not want a constant gear progression system (gear gets useless in a very short time) they added progression through elite specs.
MMOs usually progress with their expansions – You wanna have access to these changes? You better buy the expansion as else you are playing a outdated version of the game and therefore the game wont be balanced around you.

Yes, I love core specs and I hate to not be able to play my old favorite build in this meta.
But I really don’t see where the elite specs cutted down all that build diversity.
Before HoT there was a sincle build for class, sometimes two is the class granted two good playstyle chances (es: bunker and dps guardian). Now I see more build diversity than before. I’m a main necromancer and I see 4 different builds while I play. signet, MM, direct damage and a new kind of chillomancer seen in the last tournaments that is really strong, and they all work (some a little better than others, but they work). There’s the guardian trapper and the full-block builds, the mesmer with direct damage, wells supporter and condition damage. The warrior can play with condition, GS and Rifle builds. A Thief can play 3 different builds and all works (don’t know names but they’re the classic stealth, the etenral dodge and the pistol). And like that for all the classes.
Seriously, I don’t see that amount of good and viable builds for every class since…ever?

HoT took a large amount of possible builds in the game, expecially in sPvP. Then, there’s some builds that work a little better than others or are easier to play then more players use them, but there’s a lot of build diversity in more or less every class.

You spent a large amount of money for your pc but no one asked you do to that. That’s not required to play this game. I’m happy for you because you have for shure not a single problem to spend 45€ to buy a single expansion that will last for years without any other payment required.
I’m someone that don’t want to spend moneys on games but I spent 45€ to buy this game (two times because I play from the pre-release) and 90€ in 4 years is not so much for a game like that. Is 1,9€/month. And i will play other two years for free if ANet took the same time they needed to do this first expansion to do another one.

If you like this game Buy it.
If you already have the core game why you are an old player, buy the expansion.
And, more than all, don’t play for free and pretend things from a game you didn’t spend a penny on.

Yasha.5963:

Velimere.7685:

Yasha.5963:

WoW actually was one of the most p2w games in terms of its battlegrounds: that was one of the great things about GW2’s spvp before HoT- absolutely no p2w, unlike every other mmo I can think of.

The fact that you think World of Warcraft is pay-to-win just goes to show that you have absolutely zero understanding of the difference between buy-to-play and pay-to-win and just what exactly constitutes pay-to-win in the first place.

You can (or could when I played) buy gold with cash and spend that on gear and enchants that would make you totally OP. Later you could legally buy tokens with cash and trade that for gold, with which you could buy OP gear.

It is the very definition of p2w, and something completely absent from GW2 until HoT. Luckily even with HoT GW2 is far, far less p2w than WoW etc because USD50 is the greatest advantage you can buy in spvp.

Except you are completely and utterly incorrect. Pay-to-win isn’t being able to spend money to buy gear and gear modifications that other people can grind to obtain. Pay-to-win is being able to buy gear and/or other items that other people cannot otherwise obtain.

runeblade.7514:

Therefore the game is not pay2win.

I’m glad you agree.

Velimere.7685:

runeblade.7514:

Then the opposite is true with your definition.

In F2P mmo, I can buy +1000 power boost in other games in PvP. Therefore the game is not pay2win.

I’m glad you agree.

I’m glad you agree that +1000 power boost into the gemstore is not pay2win. Lets get some more power to the gemstore so I can pay to get an advantage.

runeblade.7514:

I’m glad you agree that +1000 power boost into the gemstore is not pay2win.

I’m glad you agree that this game isn’t pay-to-win.

This horse is almost a puddle by now surely… :/

Famine.7915:

This horse is almost a puddle by now surely… :/

Nope, it keeps flinching!

The dress is gold and white!
just kidding the dress is b2p too.

I’m gonna chime in here with my lame opinion and say that Anet should probably implement two different queues for sPvP. One for core/f2p players and the other for HoT players. They can put two little options for you to tick, so if you wanna queue up on vanilla mode, or if you wanna queue up with the HoT expansion You got your options there.

The way I see it, the game ain’t Pay-2-Win but the expansion has brought in some nasty power creep due to the new skillsets and traits and when new players coming in and having their first go at spvp it’s probably gonna be a pretty sour experience for them. I can’t speak for them, but if I were F2P trying out spvp for the first time only to get destroyed by Trap DH’s or tickled to death by bunker Druids and finding out that they’re behind kitten paywall I’d probably under the impression that it’s P2W because of the power creep that HoT has introduced.

Of course there’s the option of nerfing the elite specs to be more into line with the core classes, but that’s probably gonna tick ALOT of people off. You could buff the core classes to be more in line with the elite specs but that’s just only going to indirectly buff the elite specs as well. I’m under the impression that trying to balance both Vanilla and HoT pvp wise would be some sort of nightmare considering when there’s a few elite spec skills that are just outright superior versions of vanilla skills.

TL:DR, just implement two different queues for spvp. Vanilla and HoT queues for you to choose at your own discretion, that way nobody gets locked into anything. It’ll keep everyone happy and it’ll make balancing alot easier I feel.

I do apologize for the messy post, I’m not the best when it comes to formatting my ideas.

The game is p2w to some extent. It is clearly easier to win on a HoT spec than it is to win on a core spec. I’m willing to bet that’s deliberate.

That being said, I’m successfully running a vanilla PU Mesmer in unranked. I don’t like the melee style of the current meta chrono.

Condi Chronomancers are a tough fight for me, but I win some of them.

I would classify it as Buy to Play. If it bothers you that much either get a job and buy the game or get better. Many people have demonstrated that you can get legendary playing a core class solo queue if it bothers you that much to spend money on a game.

If you go the F2P route, you get quite a lot compared to games like WOW, but you have much more options if you pay for HOT. The price is reasonable for the hours of entertainment you will get out of it.

what a stupid Topic.
You have to understand that nobody wanted you F2P players to begin with.
Even now, you are not desired.

This is a “try to play”. It is clear that all those restrictions are made only for you to try the game. If you like it; You buy.
If you don’t like it; You uninstall. This game is not made to play for free, for a long period of time.

Since you need to buy it to really play, it can not be pay 2 win.

You should remember long time ago, there were things called Demo. The core game now is working like this.

VixusIrine.9013:

I’m gonna chime in here with my lame opinion and say that Anet should probably implement two different queues for sPvP. One for core/f2p players and the other for HoT players. They can put two little options for you to tick, so if you wanna queue up on vanilla mode, or if you wanna queue up with the HoT expansion You got your options there.

The way I see it, the game ain’t Pay-2-Win but the expansion has brought in some nasty power creep due to the new skillsets and traits and when new players coming in and having their first go at spvp it’s probably gonna be a pretty sour experience for them. I can’t speak for them, but if I were F2P trying out spvp for the first time only to get destroyed by Trap DH’s or tickled to death by bunker Druids and finding out that they’re behind kitten paywall I’d probably under the impression that it’s P2W because of the power creep that HoT has introduced.

Of course there’s the option of nerfing the elite specs to be more into line with the core classes, but that’s probably gonna tick ALOT of people off. You could buff the core classes to be more in line with the elite specs but that’s just only going to indirectly buff the elite specs as well. I’m under the impression that trying to balance both Vanilla and HoT pvp wise would be some sort of nightmare considering when there’s a few elite spec skills that are just outright superior versions of vanilla skills.

TL:DR, just implement two different queues for spvp. Vanilla and HoT queues for you to choose at your own discretion, that way nobody gets locked into anything. It’ll keep everyone happy and it’ll make balancing alot easier I feel.

I do apologize for the messy post, I’m not the best when it comes to formatting my ideas.

people said we should have diff ques. op didnt like that idea much, for free players “reducing que time so much” he sure as hell didnt want to be left alone.

sophiewhite.3149:

people said we should have diff ques. op didnt like that idea much, for free players “reducing que time so much” he sure as hell didnt want to be left alone.

No! No different queues! Just leave f2p players out of Ranked. Simple. They should still be able to go unranked, so new players could get a taste about PvP, but they couldn’t participate in ranked or do PvP achievements (wings) trial players shouldn’t be able to do all the things that players who bought game can do.

Then Ranked PvP would be B2P game.

Simple solution, and I doubt many f2p players would stop playing the game. Or does that even matter? They don’t use any money to the game, so Anet doesn’t get any profit from them. Why should business company give them all free if they won’t give anything back?

DeceiverX.8361:

Lol, entitlement? Are you kidding me? The game is fundamentally flawed and is clearly restricted B2W in the form of the expansions, and you claim entitlement? The entire F2P concept is arbitrary.

Are you being willfully ignorant when the crying is about how F2P players aren’t getting the HoT sepcialisations or did you just want to add as much filler to your ill-thought out post as possible? There is nothing about “we want build diversity here” and the biggest cheerleader in this thread is continually parroting how they want shorter queue times by giving this to the F2P players.

I’ve spent probably close to a thousand bucks on this game, if not more. I built a $3000.00 computer solely to play this game with the highest possible fidelity on top of that.

Then you’re pretty dumb for thinking you needed to do that when this game in no way requires that and I fail to see how this relates to anything in this topic. Your paying for a PC has absolutley no bearing on F2P or buying the full game. Do you think that paying $3k on a PC of your own volition should allow you to have access to every game ever made? What exactly are you saying here other than trying to throw up a load of chocolate covered strawmen?

The fact I see four builds in a majority of encounters in WvW which before had literally everything is more telling than the meta-crawlers and bad balance in sPvP due to the amulet system. HoT is broken, and it broke GW2.

I feel like you’ve never played PvP prior to HoT. There has ALWAYS been meta builds and a huge lack of variety and diversity in builds and there have always been complaints about this. I don’t think you know anything about what you’re talking about.

HoT killed the fun elements of sPvP and WvW. The game is totally broken and anyone who simply doesn’t like their profession’s elite is just in a position where either they deal with it or leave.

No, they aren’t. But again, if you suck at PvP whether that’s in HotM or Wv3, then you’re not going to get anywhere in general unless you’re carried by others and that will only take you so far. Saying you absolutely have to have profession elites is just ignorant as hell when plenty of F2P and even paid players have risen to legend on core builds alone. Maybe people like you perpetuate this idea because you suck at PvP and look at HoT builds as your only crutch to be competitive.

Telling passionate players that they’re entitled because they’re complaining because they don’t get the same enjoyment from the game before the expansion is foolish and ridiculous.

Can you not read? Saying F2P players should have the same benefits of paying players absolutely IS entitlement, the fact you cannot even follow what’s being said is both foolish and ridiculous.

Razor.9872:

runeblade.7514:

Dominik.5162:

Phaeton.9582:

inb4 endless semantics about if it’s B2P or P2W

Oh wait too late sorry

It’s silly to put spvp behind a paywall. It’s a bad idea commercially and narrows the gameplay.. I’ve written several threads on this and won’t be repeating myself here.

But just leaving something here to register your arguments for a paywall as invalid.

You’re welcome.

Why do PvP players deserve to play this game for free, while PvE and WvW need to pay for it to play it?
That’s absolutely ridiculous, either all pay or none, period.
Players who bought HoT play the most recent version of the game, the game will obviously be balanced around them, and not around the F2P players who think it is in their right to leech of off others who bought the game.

Then the solution is simple, HoT and free players should be split away from each other.

I hope free players don’t experience horrendous queue times and get a bad impression on game population.

One of the many reasons it’s a terrible idea.

as for the whole WvW/PvE jealous sibling spiel from that guy… Lol!

Phaeton.9582:

Razor.9872:

runeblade.7514:

Dominik.5162:

Phaeton.9582:

inb4 endless semantics about if it’s B2P or P2W

Oh wait too late sorry

It’s silly to put spvp behind a paywall. It’s a bad idea commercially and narrows the gameplay.. I’ve written several threads on this and won’t be repeating myself here.

But just leaving something here to register your arguments for a paywall as invalid.

You’re welcome.

Why do PvP players deserve to play this game for free, while PvE and WvW need to pay for it to play it?
That’s absolutely ridiculous, either all pay or none, period.
Players who bought HoT play the most recent version of the game, the game will obviously be balanced around them, and not around the F2P players who think it is in their right to leech of off others who bought the game.

Then the solution is simple, HoT and free players should be split away from each other.

I hope free players don’t experience horrendous queue times and get a bad impression on game population.

One of the many reasons it’s a terrible idea.

as for the whole WvW/PvE jealous sibling spiel from that guy… Lol!

I can’t agree it is a terrible idea. What is a terrible idea is that F2P players gets roflstomped because they don’t have the elite specs. They’re better off leaving sPvP with a bad impression from queue times than from pay2win.

runeblade.7514:

Phaeton.9582:

Razor.9872:

runeblade.7514:

Dominik.5162:

Phaeton.9582:

inb4 endless semantics about if it’s B2P or P2W

Oh wait too late sorry

It’s silly to put spvp behind a paywall. It’s a bad idea commercially and narrows the gameplay.. I’ve written several threads on this and won’t be repeating myself here.

But just leaving something here to register your arguments for a paywall as invalid.

You’re welcome.

Why do PvP players deserve to play this game for free, while PvE and WvW need to pay for it to play it?
That’s absolutely ridiculous, either all pay or none, period.
Players who bought HoT play the most recent version of the game, the game will obviously be balanced around them, and not around the F2P players who think it is in their right to leech of off others who bought the game.

Then the solution is simple, HoT and free players should be split away from each other.

I hope free players don’t experience horrendous queue times and get a bad impression on game population.

One of the many reasons it’s a terrible idea.

as for the whole WvW/PvE jealous sibling spiel from that guy… Lol!

I can’t agree it is a terrible idea. What is a terrible idea is that F2P players gets roflstomped because they don’t have the elite specs. They’re better off leaving sPvP with a bad impression from queue times than from pay2win.

sucks to suck doesnt it? if your bad at pvp with core specs youll be bad with elite specs. simple as that. elite specs dont give you more power just a new way to play.

runeblade.7514:

Phaeton.9582:

Razor.9872:

runeblade.7514:

Dominik.5162:

Phaeton.9582:

inb4 endless semantics about if it’s B2P or P2W

Oh wait too late sorry

It’s silly to put spvp behind a paywall. It’s a bad idea commercially and narrows the gameplay.. I’ve written several threads on this and won’t be repeating myself here.

But just leaving something here to register your arguments for a paywall as invalid.

You’re welcome.

Why do PvP players deserve to play this game for free, while PvE and WvW need to pay for it to play it?
That’s absolutely ridiculous, either all pay or none, period.
Players who bought HoT play the most recent version of the game, the game will obviously be balanced around them, and not around the F2P players who think it is in their right to leech of off others who bought the game.

Then the solution is simple, HoT and free players should be split away from each other.

I hope free players don’t experience horrendous queue times and get a bad impression on game population.

One of the many reasons it’s a terrible idea.

as for the whole WvW/PvE jealous sibling spiel from that guy… Lol!

I can’t agree it is a terrible idea. What is a terrible idea is that F2P players gets roflstomped because they don’t have the elite specs. They’re better off leaving sPvP with a bad impression from queue times than from pay2win.

The pay wall means losing out on the F2P crowd

F2P = higher population = shorter queue times

sophiewhite.3149:

runeblade.7514:

Phaeton.9582:

Razor.9872:

runeblade.7514:

Dominik.5162:

Phaeton.9582:

inb4 endless semantics about if it’s B2P or P2W

Oh wait too late sorry

It’s silly to put spvp behind a paywall. It’s a bad idea commercially and narrows the gameplay.. I’ve written several threads on this and won’t be repeating myself here.

But just leaving something here to register your arguments for a paywall as invalid.

You’re welcome.

Why do PvP players deserve to play this game for free, while PvE and WvW need to pay for it to play it?
That’s absolutely ridiculous, either all pay or none, period.
Players who bought HoT play the most recent version of the game, the game will obviously be balanced around them, and not around the F2P players who think it is in their right to leech of off others who bought the game.

Then the solution is simple, HoT and free players should be split away from each other.

I hope free players don’t experience horrendous queue times and get a bad impression on game population.

One of the many reasons it’s a terrible idea.

as for the whole WvW/PvE jealous sibling spiel from that guy… Lol!

I can’t agree it is a terrible idea. What is a terrible idea is that F2P players gets roflstomped because they don’t have the elite specs. They’re better off leaving sPvP with a bad impression from queue times than from pay2win.

sucks to suck doesnt it? if your bad at pvp with core specs youll be bad with elite specs. simple as that. elite specs dont give you more power just a new way to play.

Until core specs wins tournaments, then your statement is false.

Phaeton.9582:

runeblade.7514:

Phaeton.9582:

Razor.9872:

runeblade.7514:

Dominik.5162:

Phaeton.9582:

inb4 endless semantics about if it’s B2P or P2W

Oh wait too late sorry

It’s silly to put spvp behind a paywall. It’s a bad idea commercially and narrows the gameplay.. I’ve written several threads on this and won’t be repeating myself here.

But just leaving something here to register your arguments for a paywall as invalid.

You’re welcome.

Why do PvP players deserve to play this game for free, while PvE and WvW need to pay for it to play it?
That’s absolutely ridiculous, either all pay or none, period.
Players who bought HoT play the most recent version of the game, the game will obviously be balanced around them, and not around the F2P players who think it is in their right to leech of off others who bought the game.

Then the solution is simple, HoT and free players should be split away from each other.

I hope free players don’t experience horrendous queue times and get a bad impression on game population.

One of the many reasons it’s a terrible idea.

as for the whole WvW/PvE jealous sibling spiel from that guy… Lol!

I can’t agree it is a terrible idea. What is a terrible idea is that F2P players gets roflstomped because they don’t have the elite specs. They’re better off leaving sPvP with a bad impression from queue times than from pay2win.

The pay wall means losing out on the F2P crowd

F2P = higher population = shorter queue times

F2P = higher population = shorter queue times = roflstomped = frustration = leave spvp = lower long term population = longer long term queue times.

Pay wall = fairer games = Longer stay = higher long term population =shorter queue times in the long lerm

Razor.9872:

runeblade.7514:

Dominik.5162:

Phaeton.9582:

inb4 endless semantics about if it’s B2P or P2W

Oh wait too late sorry

It’s silly to put spvp behind a paywall. It’s a bad idea commercially and narrows the gameplay.. I’ve written several threads on this and won’t be repeating myself here.

But just leaving something here to register your arguments for a paywall as invalid.

You’re welcome.

Why do PvP players deserve to play this game for free, while PvE and WvW need to pay for it to play it?
That’s absolutely ridiculous, either all pay or none, period.
Players who bought HoT play the most recent version of the game, the game will obviously be balanced around them, and not around the F2P players who think it is in their right to leech of off others who bought the game.

Then the solution is simple, HoT and free players should be split away from each other.

I hope free players don’t experience horrendous queue times and get a bad impression on game population.

It would be the other way around, many spvp vets would pay 100$ to go back vanilla pre-june 2015 patch.

So, serious spvp players would go F2P and play vanilla.

It’s like Stronhold. People would go where fun matters. HoT OP bunker skills/traits are bad for spvp design. Removing amulet, didn’t solved the problem.

DeceiverX.8361:

Static.9841:

This thread seriously confuses me. I don’t understand why anyone on F2P thinks they should have the same benefits as anyone who bought the base game and HoT regardless of what game mode that is and if the game is so “beloved” to you, why can’t you spend money actually buying it? The entitlement here is painful.

To say you can’t get anywhere in PvP without HoT specs is also a complete fallacy, because you absolutely can with core builds, but not if you suck as a player.

Lol, entitlement? Are you kidding me? The game is fundamentally flawed and is clearly restricted B2W in the form of the expansions, and you claim entitlement? The entire F2P concept is arbitrary.

I’ve spent probably close to a thousand bucks on this game, if not more. I built a $3000.00 computer solely to play this game with the highest possible fidelity on top of that. I don’t buy gold or legendaries. What I buy goes straight to ANet. AKA, around 10 years of a WoW sub + expansions at highest price. I had a tremendous amount of respect for ANet before HoT, and as such didn’t care about the money. I gave them what I thought they deserved because I support businesses and games I like.

I prefer playing core specs. I actually hate every single elite by design except the reaper, and the elite specs as a consequence introduced so much arbitrary power for no reason that the game is no longer fun and diverse like it was. The fact I see four builds in a majority of encounters in WvW which before had literally everything is more telling than the meta-crawlers and bad balance in sPvP due to the amulet system. HoT is broken, and it broke GW2.

That’s where the real complaint is. It’s not that F2P players can’t win. It’s that GW2 sPvP and WvW are no longer actually fun because diversity is dead in the water and the elite specs are by far and large conceptual failures that are poorly implemented and in many cases, poorly designed. It’s not about entitlement. Quite honestly, 70% of ANet’s revenue at the time of releasing HoT, both before and after constituted gem purchases. ANet makes more than double its box sales from people who want to fund the game they’re enjoying. And ANet’s sales figures right now are the lowest in company history. I stopped buying gems cold with HoT. And I know many other people, people who spent probably $100 a month on this game who also did.

HoT killed the fun elements of sPvP and WvW. The game is totally broken and anyone who simply doesn’t like their profession’s elite is just in a position where either they deal with it or leave.

Telling passionate players that they’re entitled because they’re complaining because they don’t get the same enjoyment from the game before the expansion is foolish and ridiculous.

F2P claims for balance have validity as well from a marketing perspective. Nobody cares about PvP in P2W games because it’s not competitive and something other spectators might get interested in getting involved in. GW2 right now isn’t worth it, both before and after paying for the game. It freezes trial players and makes them run for the hills by being horrible and standing so little chance, and keeps those who may have been interested dissuaded from playing because they’re forced into a specific build in most cases.

Great write-up.

Another thing to consider, is F2P players with vanilla spec are less viable than HoT spec. So, all Buy to Win players face a disadvantage to get a F2P in their team.

So, it’s even less fun for the B2W players to get paired with F2P one, in a model where all chances/options to be good should be open. Skill based games are not behind paywall.

Jourdelune.7456:

So, it’s even less fun for the B2W players to get paired with F2P one, in a model where all chances/options to be good should be open. Skill based games are not behind paywall.

First of all, Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns is buy-to-play.

Secondly, most skill-based games are buy-to-play.

runeblade.7514:

Phaeton.9582:

runeblade.7514:

Phaeton.9582:

Razor.9872:

runeblade.7514:

Dominik.5162:

Phaeton.9582:

inb4 endless semantics about if it’s B2P or P2W

Oh wait too late sorry

It’s silly to put spvp behind a paywall. It’s a bad idea commercially and narrows the gameplay.. I’ve written several threads on this and won’t be repeating myself here.

But just leaving something here to register your arguments for a paywall as invalid.

You’re welcome.

Why do PvP players deserve to play this game for free, while PvE and WvW need to pay for it to play it?
That’s absolutely ridiculous, either all pay or none, period.
Players who bought HoT play the most recent version of the game, the game will obviously be balanced around them, and not around the F2P players who think it is in their right to leech of off others who bought the game.

Then the solution is simple, HoT and free players should be split away from each other.

I hope free players don’t experience horrendous queue times and get a bad impression on game population.

One of the many reasons it’s a terrible idea.

as for the whole WvW/PvE jealous sibling spiel from that guy… Lol!

I can’t agree it is a terrible idea. What is a terrible idea is that F2P players gets roflstomped because they don’t have the elite specs. They’re better off leaving sPvP with a bad impression from queue times than from pay2win.

The pay wall means losing out on the F2P crowd

F2P = higher population = shorter queue times

F2P = higher population = shorter queue times = roflstomped = frustration = leave spvp = lower long term population = longer long term queue times.

Pay wall = fairer games = Longer stay = higher long term population =shorter queue times in the long lerm

How does shorter queue times due to high population = roflstomped?

If you wanted you could keep queue times at the same level and just improve the quality of the matchups.

Either way quality wouldn’t be aversly affected.

Velimere.7685:

Secondly, most skill-based games are buy-to-play.

If by ‘skill-based’ you mean ‘competitive’, you must be talking to us from the 90s.

In which case, why is HoT even relevant to you? Go play some Ultima or something.

Phaeton.9582:

Velimere.7685:

Secondly, most skill-based games are buy-to-play.

If by ‘skill-based’ you mean ‘competitive’, you must be talking to us from the 90s.

In which case, why is HoT even relevant to you? Go play some Ultima or something.

You must know absolutely nothing about skill-based or competitive games if you think my factual statement only holds relevance to the 90s. Sorry, but the majority of registered ESL games require you to buy them. People foolishly think that free-to-play MOBAs are the majority of such when there’s actually only a handful of popular ones.

Kappa

Velimere.7685:

Phaeton.9582:

Velimere.7685:

Secondly, most skill-based games are buy-to-play.

If by ‘skill-based’ you mean ‘competitive’, you must be talking to us from the 90s.

In which case, why is HoT even relevant to you? Go play some Ultima or something.

You must know absolutely nothing about skill-based or competitive games if you think my factual statement only holds relevance to the 90s. Sorry, but the majority of registered ESL games require you to buy them. People foolishly think that free-to-play MOBAs are the majority of such when there’s actually only a handful of popular ones.

ook friend let me put it another way

How many of these ‘skill based or competitive’ games sit behind paywall that crops up biennially and bears little to no relevance to the competitive game itself?

Why do I get the feeling you’ll tell me why this is a widely adopted business model.

Possibly because you’ve posted the same opinion 50 times in this thread.

Let’s not fight; she’ll make you to stay with your aunty and uncle in bel air. Trust me on this one.

Phaeton.9582:

ook friend

I’m not your friend, Bro.

Phaeton.9582:

How many of these ‘skill based or competitive’ games sit behind paywall that crops up biennially and bears little to no relevance to the competitive game itself?

I fail to see the relevance of this question. Guild Wars 2 was released in 2012 whereas Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns was released in 2015, and Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns bears much relevance to the competitive game itself. I’m assuming here your goal was to seek a comparison, but quite frankly your query is as to which of these games are absolutely not like Guild Wars 2, which doesn’t really serve any purpose, Bro.

Phaeton.9582:

Why do I get the feeling you’ll tell me why this is a widely adopted business model.

I won’t tell you that, but I will tell you that most of the games in this universe are released as buy-to-play and most of their expansions are also released as buy-to-play. Change “widely” to “widest” and you have a factual statement, Bro.

Phaeton.9582:

Possibly because you’ve posted the same opinion 50 times in this thread.

It’s a matter of fact.

If you want to see a matter of opinion, you need only read your own writing, Bro.

Phaeton.9582:

Let’s not fight; she’ll make you to stay with your aunty and uncle in bel air. Trust me on this one.

You’re welcome to stop embarrassing yourself at any time, Bro.

Oh sorry, I didn’t realise all your statements were entirely factual in this context.

You must be better informed than all of us, thanks for clearing that up (bro?).

There’s a second expansion on the way that is most likely to make this a biennial occurrence, unless you’ve got more ‘facts’ to the contrary of course!

And besides the discussion is ultimately irrelevant – you can’t honestly believe that the majority of popular ‘esport’ games have a business model like GW2 spvp – where you are asked to periodically re-purchase a game with 95% of its new content not used competitively.

Also I’m not your bro, pal.

Phaeton.9582:

Also I’m not your bro, pal.

I’m not your pal, Guy.

Phaeton.9582:

Oh sorry, I didn’t realise all your statements were entirely factual in this context.

No you do, Guy.

Phaeton.9582:

You must be better informed than all of us, thanks for clearing that up

If actually paying attention to reality and not forming and then communicating false assumptions makes me better informed, then yeah. It’s amazing how useful actual observation can be, Guy.

Phaeton.9582:

There’s a second expansion on the way that is most likely to make this a biennial occurrence, unless you’ve got more ‘facts’ to the contrary of course!

Given the duration of time between Guild Wars 2 and Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns being more accurately described as 3 years than 2 years, any reference to any subsequent expansion being termed “biennial” would require explicit exclusion of that discrepancy or would otherwise be nonfactual, Guy.

Phaeton.9582:

And besides the discussion is ultimately irrelevant – you can’t honestly believe that the majority of popular ‘esport’ games have a business model like GW2 spvp – where you are asked to periodically re-purchase a game with 95% of its new content not used competitively.

That entire argument point is a misconstruction. First and foremost, of course PvE and WvW content do not see use in PvP as these game modes are separate. That said, the misconstruction of your argument is that it ignores the simple fact which easily defeats it: Every current PvP meta build uses Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns content.

Quite frankly, Guild Wars 2 is the intellectual property of ArenaNet, and if they only want to sell the complete expansion as the complete expansion, then that’s their prerogative. If you can’t come to terms with that, then you can simply not buy it and move on, Guy.

It’s nothing short of seemingly millennial entitlement for someone to cry on a forum about how he or she doesn’t like what some other people are doing with their own property or selling their own product the way they choose to. It’s like throwing a hissy fit because General Mills won’t sell you Lucky Charms with only the marshmallows.

hm, what? People need the specializations to win you say? Well, I guess i should go delete all my Base Necro gameplay videos then….

It’s nice to see that the clickbait threads full of aggrandized ignorance are the ones that get to stay on page 1 for days on end while the useful and productive threads don’t last half a day on page 1.

Velimere.7685:

It’s nothing short of seemingly millennial entitlement for someone to cry on a forum about how he or she…

ok buddy, I don’t feel as bad about this now I realise I’m not arguing with a fifteen year old. (Gen X guy quoting south park and arguing with people on a game forum?)

The only valid point you’ve put forward however is that it is entirely arenanets prerogative. My hope is that they see sense, as right now it will only take one decent hack n slash multiplayer (for honour being a likely contender) to decimate the exclusive pvp population that are still here. I want this game to do well, that’s why I take this stance – not because it is my right or because I feel anything is owed.

I don’t think your point that we are using elite specs means my argument was misconstructed. I don’t think the elite trait lines are a significant amount of the overall content in HoT, as I put forwards. I also don’t think the described skills and traits were designed with PvP in mind, a separate discussion but none the less relevant to how this pay wall is justified to a ‘competitive’ population.

Now I’m not going to enter into a long debate about who is misconstructing arguments or propagating logical fallacy. You may well be a very intelligent and successful human (albeit snubbing people on a gaming forum), but it is ultimately pointless as little can be justified.

All I will say, more as a helpful pointer than anything else.. as someone who apparently reserves the right to judge ‘millennials’ on their misconception of the world; people that raise opinions as facts often come across like idiots, regardless of their generation.

Or you may of course be trolling me, in which case GGWP.

Phaeton.9582:

ok buddy, I don’t feel as bad about this now I realise I’m not arguing with a fifteen year old. (Gen X guy quoting south park and arguing with people on a game forum?)

I’m not your buddy, Dude, and I never claimed to be fifteen. Also, please keep your American television references to yourself as I won’t get them and they’d be off-topic.

Phaeton.9582:

The only valid point you’ve put forward however is that it is entirely arenanets prerogative.

That’s a complete and utter falsification. Everything I’ve stated is 100% factual.

Phaeton.9582:

My hope is that they see sense, as right now it will only take one decent hack n slash multiplayer (for honour being a likely contender) to decimate the exclusive pvp population that are still here.

The PvP population is fine, and your fear-mongering propaganda is entirely unappreciated.

Phaeton.9582:

I want this game to do well, that’s why I take this stance – not because it is my right or because I feel anything is owed.

I want this game to do well, and that’s why I wholeheartedly disagree with you and your presented pejorative falsifications and misconstructions towards ArenaNet and Guild Wars 2.

Phaeton.9582:

I don’t think your point that we are using elite specs means my argument was misconstructed.

It does, and I stated exactly how and why.

Phaeton.9582:

I don’t think the elite trait lines are a significant amount of the overall content in HoT, as I put forwards.

That’s nice, however the fact still remains that every meta PvP build uses Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns content and absolutely zero meta PvP builds don’t.

Phaeton.9582:

I also don’t think the described skills and traits were designed with PvP in mind, a separate discussion but none the less relevant to how this pay wall is justified to a ‘competitive’ population.

Regardless as to this tangent point and whether or not that discussion which already came up here and was shot down rather quickly was started by you or not, the fact remains that they are used in PvP, and your attempted obfuscation does nothing to detract from that.

Phaeton.9582:

Now I’m not going to enter into a long debate about who is misconstructing arguments or propagating logical fallacy.

Good because you’d lose as you are in the wrong.

Phaeton.9582:

You may well be a very intelligent and successful human (albeit snubbing people on a gaming forum), but it is ultimately pointless as little can be justified.

While certainly very little can be justified on your end, I won’t meet your ad hominem in like and make direct inferences as to your intelligence and success as a human being nor project any of my negativity onto you like how you do with your snubbing people on a gaming forum.

Phaeton.9582:

All I will say, more as a helpful pointer than anything else.. as someone who apparently reserves the right to judge ‘millennials’ on their misconception of the world; people that raise opinions as facts often come across like idiots, regardless of their generation.

While you may reserve the right to judge millennials on their misconception of the world as per whatever feelings of entitlement you may have, facts remain facts regardless as to idiots writing them off as other people’s opinions.

Phaeton.9582:

Or you may of course be trolling me, in which case GGWP.

Rather, the format dictates that if anyone is trolling, it’s definitely you.

Short Version :
Its better to use the mechanics/engine of GW2 into a different F2P game . Now that they have implanted a ’’crosshair’’ , they can go too into a hybrid moba .

Long Version :
1) Other games have simpler mechanics (Aim or dont feed/hug the towers for 15 min) with limited bottuns to use . If the released a F2P model and the majority of the population cannot cope with the 20+ bottuns that once more , then the game will be played by a smaller amount of ppl
+ they will make a small amount of money , that cannot be used in advertisement or 100k dollars tournamenst anymore (if f2p is released it means that the PvE side should stop founding money in the PvP side and via versa)
+without income +population the engine will go in waste…..
+they wont be able to ’’delete’’ or ’’stop’’ the F2P model , because that might give the company a ‘’bad name’’

Either way they will meet the fate of other amazing games , such as :
Savage 2 Torture Soul
Natural Selection 2 (B2P)
Titanfall (B2P)

2) They cannot make drasticly changes to each class , to alienate them between PvE and PvP , because that will upset ppl to love their avatar from the PvE or get bombared with informations and are forced to ’’relearn’’ their beloved character from the start .

So either take a gamble to focus on the newer F2P players , making the PvE angrier once more ?
What if something goes bad like launch ?
They will loose both ?

Edit: theres some ’’anoying’’ spike lag in pvp -_-

agreed. elite spec should be free in instanced pvp like arenas.. ( not so much with wvw as gear matters there )

i bought gw2 before hot, so spending another $50 just for elite spec dont seem worth it tbh..

Jay.3409:

agreed. elite spec should be free in instanced pvp like arenas.. ( not so much with wvw as gear matters there )

i bought gw2 before hot, so spending another $50 just for elite spec dont seem worth it tbh..

100% disagreed.

..?

Ok I’ll bite

Allow me to reassemble the central point
you decided to decontextualise then fail to dispute.

Phaeton.9582:

..you can’t honestly believe that the majority of popular ‘esport’ games have a business model like GW2 spvp – where you are asked to periodically re-purchase a game with 95% of its new content not used competitively.

Velimere.7685:

That entire argument point is a misconstruction. First and foremost, of course PvE and WvW content do not see use in PvP as these game modes are separate. That said, the misconstruction of your argument is that it ignores the simple fact which easily defeats it: Every current PvP meta build uses Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns content.

Phaeton.9582:

I don’t think your point that we are using elite specs means my argument was misconstructed. I don’t think the elite trait lines are a significant amount of the overall content in HoT, as I put forwards. I also don’t think the described skills and traits were designed with PvP in mind, a separate discussion but none the less relevant to how this pay wall is justified to a ‘competitive’ population.

Velimere.7685:

It does, and I stated exactly how and why.

That’s nice, however the fact still remains that every meta PvP build uses Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns content and absolutely zero meta PvP builds don’t.

Regardless as this to this tangent point and whether or not that discussion which already came up here and was shot down rather quickly was started by you or not, the fact remains that they are used in PvP, and your attempted obfuscation does nothing to detract from that.

I didn’t deny these builds were in use, what I put forwards was that they do little to substantiate a feature-product paywall to an exclusively competitive player base. Despite this very intellectual manner of yours, you’ve failed to even argue this point – let alone debunk it with un-referenced ‘facts’!

:)

grabs popcorn

Jay.3409:

agreed. elite spec should be free in instanced pvp like arenas.. ( not so much with wvw as gear matters there )

i bought gw2 before hot, so spending another $50 just for elite spec dont seem worth it tbh..

Then don’t buy it.

Everyone if failing to note one important thing, ANet needs to keep the lights on.

Giving P4F players the Elite specs takes away a reason to buy the game. You know, the thing that funds ANet, you know money, cold hard cash. Now currently P4F players are leaching(for lack of a better word) of others who have stomped up the money to support the game. So the should have every advantage available to them over a P4F player.

I like many others have paid for the game, and HoT, bought gems, can someone tell me why P4F players should get the same things? And no because they are at a disadvantage is not a good reason, If they enjoy the game that much, that they feel they are missing out, buy the game. It’s not a lot of money. it’s £30 on amazon in the UK. That’s a take away, a trip to the movies or a meal in a restaurant.

People who play the game for free don’t deserve anything. They should be grateful they get to demo the game, then buy it later and not have to start over.

Look at it this way, If you are a 100% PvP player, and when the next Xpac came out if ANet said everyone gets the elite specs for free, then anyone who is a 100% PvP player would not buy the next Xpac, I mean why would you? ANet needs a hook for all game modes to get you to buy the next Xpac. They need the money, with out it the game shuts down.

It isn’t P2W because the reality is GW2 is not really a F2P game, it is much more like a very extended demo where you are expected to actually buy the game if you like the game enough to keep on playing.

buy pvp carry man, even with HoT you still meet a lot of unforgivable kittened ingame

zinkz.7045:

It isn’t P2W because the reality is GW2 is not really a F2P game, it is much more like a very extended demo where you are expected to actually buy the game if you like the game enough to keep on playing.

So are the people who bought the base game playing a “very extended demo”?

Yasha.5963:

zinkz.7045:

It isn’t P2W because the reality is GW2 is not really a F2P game, it is much more like a very extended demo where you are expected to actually buy the game if you like the game enough to keep on playing.

So are the people who bought the base game playing a “very extended demo”?

The people that bought the base game, bought it at time when it was not marketed as “play for free”, it was strictly buy to play, if a buy to play game releases an expansion then I think the expectation is you pay for it and it is unlikely you will get it for free.

Velimere.7685:

Phaeton.9582:

Velimere.7685:

Secondly, most skill-based games are buy-to-play.

If by ‘skill-based’ you mean ‘competitive’, you must be talking to us from the 90s.

In which case, why is HoT even relevant to you? Go play some Ultima or something.

You must know absolutely nothing about skill-based or competitive games if you think my factual statement only holds relevance to the 90s. Sorry, but the majority of registered ESL games require you to buy them. People foolishly think that free-to-play MOBAs are the majority of such when there’s actually only a handful of popular ones.

Sorry, but actually DOTA 2 and LOL are greater than all others games put together in term of sheer numbers of players.

I’ve shown you that LOL money is greater than all Blizard + Activisions money in their respective 2015 reports.

Perhaps you are blind… the best (Blizzard) pc game maker, lag behind LoL.

Crinn.7864:

It’s nice to see that the clickbait threads full of aggrandized ignorance are the ones that get to stay on page 1 for days on end while the useful and productive threads don’t last half a day on page 1.

Yeah, its what happen when people lie to others. It bring controversial posts.

But anyone know that you need to buy HoT to get competitive. So Gw2 is B2W. It’s simple, it’s the truth… just some people don’t seem to realize this, yet.

Phaeton.9582:

I didn’t deny these builds were in use, what I put forwards was that they do little to substantiate a feature-product paywall to an exclusively competitive player base.

PvE, PvP, and WvW are all parts of a whole game of which PvP itself does not substantiate anywhere near the majority of. That goes for Guild Wars 2 as well as Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns. You can apply your negative buzzwords such as “paywall” as much as you’d like in your attempt to avoid and misconstrue against this fact of the matter, but it’ll do little to serve your purpose as long as people are actually aware of it: PvP is only one part of the game, and a smaller part content-wise as is the case with most MMORPGs. A smaller part of the game receiving less relevance from the expansion is nothing short of common sense given that said expansion isn’t dedicated nor exclusive to PvP. That said, being the successfully fleshed out and integrated expansion that Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns is, it also plays a substantial role in the PvP experience with its Elite Specializations.

Phaeton.9582:

Despite this very intellectual manner of yours, you’ve failed to even argue this point – let alone debunk it with un-referenced ‘facts’!

See above for some more facts which deconstruct your argument in its entirety, though that’s not difficult when you’re attempting to detract from big picture facts while arguing big picture references. It’s also cute to see you go back on your word and throw your ethos through the ringer even further, but who needs popcorn when you have self-defamation as treat?

Jourdelune.7456:

Sorry, but actually DOTA 2 and LOL are greater than all others games put together in term of sheer numbers of players.

Sorry, but that point was never disputed by me at any given point in time. It boggles my mind how you can read something someone else stated and then quote them in responding to something they didn’t state.

Jourdelune.7456:

Perhaps you are blind… the best (Blizzard) pc game maker, lag behind LoL.

Regardless as to whether or not your are blind and projecting such, you certainly seem to love your tangents. Either that or you’re making poor attempts at a straw man, moving the goalposts, or both.

BrotherBelial.3094:

Jay.3409:

agreed. elite spec should be free in instanced pvp like arenas.. ( not so much with wvw as gear matters there )

i bought gw2 before hot, so spending another $50 just for elite spec dont seem worth it tbh..

Then don’t buy it.

Everyone if failing to note one important thing, ANet needs to keep the lights on.

Giving P4F players the Elite specs takes away a reason to buy the game. You know, the thing that funds ANet, you know money, cold hard cash. Now currently P4F players are leaching(for lack of a better word) of others who have stomped up the money to support the game. So the should have every advantage available to them over a P4F player.

I like many others have paid for the game, and HoT, bought gems, can someone tell me why P4F players should get the same things? And no because they are at a disadvantage is not a good reason, If they enjoy the game that much, that they feel they are missing out, buy the game. It’s not a lot of money. it’s £30 on amazon in the UK. That’s a take away, a trip to the movies or a meal in a restaurant.

People who play the game for free don’t deserve anything. They should be grateful they get to demo the game, then buy it later and not have to start over.

Look at it this way, If you are a 100% PvP player, and when the next Xpac came out if ANet said everyone gets the elite specs for free, then anyone who is a 100% PvP player would not buy the next Xpac, I mean why would you? ANet needs a hook for all game modes to get you to buy the next Xpac. They need the money, with out it the game shuts down.

Look for bold.

There is less than 2000 spvp only players. They still pay for GEM with Money.

The suggestion made, still ask spvp players to pay GEM to unlock specialization.

If that would been the case, the 50 000 new pvp players that left on HoT, would paid GEM / Money to unlock that…

So, spvp players would bring more money than Buy to Play one (90$ to unlock all, versus 50$ to buy to play).