Guild Wars 2

Would be interesting to know and it’s always worth discussing what people think would be the right choice for ArenaNet in this regard.

If you are unsure what progression I am talking about, please read this:

http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/473/feature/7169/Guild-Wars-2-What-Marchs-WvW-Patch-Will-Bring.html

I’ve also been wondering about this. I’m strongly in favor of it being account bound.

However, the commander tag is character bound, which might be the precedent they follow.

Perhaps Habib has an answer for us?

I feel like it should be account bound, like dailies, monthlies and every other achievement.

The only things that should be character-bound should be gear.

Commander status should be account bound as well. It’s not reasonable to expect commanders to put up another 100 gold every time they want to play an alt. That’s a good way to get some of your most visible players to burn out faster and quit.

I want it to be character bound to reward people that stick to their class instead of FotMing around to whatever the current OP class is.

I hope it’s account bound. Gearing different chars with best-in-slot are hard enough. But I think the update is suppose to introduce grind… so it’ll likely be character bound..

Slamz.5376:

Commander status should be account bound as well. It’s not reasonable to expect commanders to put up another 100 gold every time they want to play an alt. That’s a good way to get some of your most visible players to burn out faster and quit.

Completely agree.

On GoM right now, we commanders have been trading off who has run their tag and who gets to play their alts. Its better than nothing, but really tags should be account bound.

Very much want it to be account bound.

I don’t want to feel like I can’t switch characters in the future because of it.

Cosmetics should be account bound, WvW abilities should not.

Slamz.5376:

Usual MMORPG developer thinking:
“Let’s make this character bound so that our players can have fun developing many characters through this system.”

Actual player thinking:
“I’m bored of this class. I think I’ll level up something new. Wait. It’s going to take me 6 months now to get to where my main is and while I’m doing this my main is going to fall behind. That’s not fun and I’m tired of my main. I quit.”

Every.
Game.
Ever.

QFT

Honestly though, I’m sure that the account bound vs character bound decision was already finalized a long time ago (and probably hard-coded into the way the system was built). I’m just really curious which one it is.

Slamz.5376:

Usual MMORPG developer thinking:
“Let’s make this character bound so that our players can have fun developing many characters through this system.”

Actual player thinking:
“I’m bored of this class. I think I’ll level up something new. Wait. It’s going to take me 6 months now to get to where my main is and while I’m doing this my main is going to fall behind. That’s not fun and I’m tired of my main. I quit.”

Every.
Game.
Ever.

I disagree completely with this when a reward system is actually done right. Is this reward system even supposed to introduce a power gap where your statement could even be potentially relevant to begin with?

I am glad commander is character-bound. It is important for servers to be able to recognize their commanders, and for them to be a lasting presence. If you could just switch to an alt and stay as a commander, players would have little vested knowledge into who you are and what your qualifications / style / etc. are.

I also think that this WvW progression will be character bound, but for a different reason. Habib in his recent interview suggested that this would be a way to tailor your character based on how you play your character. This suggests to me that you might be a sieger on one class, and a resupplier on another, and so forth. In this vein, I think it’s important for it to be character bound.

That said, I wish I had a reason to play an alt in WvW outside of them getting portalled in the JPs for siege prints. I think this is something that ANet should work on somehow, though I don’t think account bound progression is the answer.

Rising Dusk.2408:

I am glad commander is character-bound. It is important for servers to be able to recognize their commanders, and for them to be a lasting presence. If you could just switch to an alt and stay as a commander, players would have little vested knowledge into who you are and what your qualifications / style / etc. are.

Let the commanders worry about that.

Making players spend 100g per alt needs to have a better reason than this.

Should probably be character bound, if you level up a new 80 it should not just start with all the bells and whistles.

Nuzt.7894:

Should probably be character bound, if you level up a new 80 it should not just start with all the bells and whistles.

should probably be account bound, if you level up a new 80 you could have all the bells and whistles the whole way.

(but Anet loves the grind, if i had to bet i’d bet on character bound)

Slamz.5376:

Rising Dusk.2408:

I am glad commander is character-bound. It is important for servers to be able to recognize their commanders, and for them to be a lasting presence. If you could just switch to an alt and stay as a commander, players would have little vested knowledge into who you are and what your qualifications / style / etc. are.

Let the commanders worry about that.

Making players spend 100g per alt needs to have a better reason than this.

I agree with slamz here. If you are a recognized commander, in a recognized guild, then all you have to do is remind people who your main is. Your guild tag will be the same, your guild will back it, and everything will be good. Also the account name stays the same, just in case someone challenges it.

If people read chat then you don’t have a problem. If people don’t read chat, then they are probably mindlessly following tags around the map anyways.

Ascended gear and now this. I guess we are really being pigeonholed into playing one character.

Boring, Arena Net.

Thanks for the reply, Habib! I really appreciate how open you guys have been about the March update.

titanlectro.5029:

I agree with slamz here. If you are a recognized commander, in a recognized guild, then all you have to do is remind people who your main is. Your guild tag will be the same, your guild will back it, and everything will be good. Also the account name stays the same, just in case someone challenges it.

If people read chat then you don’t have a problem. If people don’t read chat, then they are probably mindlessly following tags around the map anyways.

I understand the counter-argument, and it’s indeed valid. Still, I think that having to be backed up, or having to be supported or verified makes it difficult for newer players. I know on my server, lots of players recognize a CDR by their character name because that’s what it shows when you type in /m or /t or /squad. It’s also what shows on the map, over your head, and everything. People who aren’t the best-of-the-best recognize that character name and that character name earns reputation and then players know what to expect from that character name. I think this is the thought process ANet followed when deciding to make it character bound, and to me it makes sense.

I do think it’d be sweet if I could CDR on some of my other characters without shelling out another 100g, but I think that it benefits the server and the players more if I continue to use my one Commander and they continue to learn my style and so on. It’s a tough argument for sure, and I’m really not sure if there is a “correct answer” to the discussion.

Habib Loew.6239:

WvW ranks & abilities are character based. The best way to think of this system is as alternative/extended character progression.

I had the feeling it’d be this way. I just hope it doesn’t take months/years to level up and earn useful abilities. If I can level up very quickly, much like how I can going from level 1 to level 80, then it won’t be such a burden and will still be rather alt-friendly.

I also think it’d be nice to have different abilities on different characters based on their roles and class specifications and builds, so to me this seems reasonable.

Realy screws over people with more lvl 80’s
I have 5 80’s, all geared up for WvW…now I have to choose who to lvl. Was alrdy hard enough to choose what 80 was gonna get commander.
Also sucks to know that my 26K WvW kills are gonna be worth nothing, better just stop playing until patch…

why would it be account bound? are skill points? are skills? are traits? are experience points?

They should be account bound they are all passive traits to show how much you WvW now people will be punished for wanting to play a different characters in WvW.

Hmm that’s a shame… I really like swapping between my characters depending on what’s needed at the time, and this is going to force me to play one…

It’s a shame too, because my Mesmer is my commander character but I still love all my others (except the ranger lol) and my staff ele and hammer warrior are my current fav’s so it seems I will either have to give up commanding or play with a character I already have 900hrs on and have grown a little bored of…

Stupid and bad decision.

The idea of passive traits for WvW had me considering spending far more time in the battlegrounds than I currently do. Finding out that they are character bound undoes all of that.

Atleast give my guardian Out of Combat movement speed :>

I could not waaaait to bring my engi into world v world and this completely shot that down and now he will gather dust like all my other alts will starting with this March update. I hope they take notice and really consider changing this.

Great, another way to disregard benefiting WvW progression.

Just like how the commander title is broken in so many aspects.

covenn.7165:

I want it to be character bound to reward people that stick to their class instead of FotMing around to whatever the current OP class is.

Really? Because which class is more OP than the other classes has changed so strikingly or so often??

why doesnt Anet like me liking to play different classes?

Habib Loew.6239:

The best way to think of this system is as additional grind.

There … I fixed that for you.

They should be profession-based.

Or at least profession-race pair based.

One who is good with a sylvari ranger would be good with any silvary ranger. Why limiting them to that rather than letting them make as many rangers as they want?

The less reasons people have not to buy another character slot, the more they’ll buy.

This is horrible news. First ascended and now this?

Account bound would be way better, just like the PvP title.

People shouldn’t get punished by playing different characters compared to those that only focus on 1…

Should be account bound. Entirely discourages playing alts. Can’t fathom why it wouldn’t be account bound. Perhaps it’s another excuse to not make these things retroactive because of more statistics that they “can’t calculate”…

Courageous Mithos.8745:

Account bound would be way better, just like the PvP title.

People shouldn’t get punished by playing different characters compared to those that only focus on 1…

Unfortunately, Anet’s (new, post-manifesto) philosophy is that if you want to play at maximum power you need to pick one main character and grind like mad.

I like playing alts. The idea that all my alts could be at max power without sucking my life away was a major reason I bought this game. I would have bought 3 more slots so I could have one of each type, but ascended gear/laurels/guild commendations means my alts will never be max-geared.

Another character bound grind is another reason not to roll alts. And in my case, another reason to play less overall, since I know I can’t keep up with the power curve anyway, due to my life often requiring days/weeks away from the game.

You’re not even supposed to grind for “max power”, this is meant to happen over a long time and it doesn’t make you more competitive against other players, only in siege battles. The mostly random WvW zerg still dictates the winner.

I see this as a good thing.

Why? Well, consider the following. You level up multiple alts to level 80. Why is it that when you level up one character to level 80 (and specialize it), it doesn’t level up all of your characters to level 80? The reason is to let you progress and grow each character on your own, and then specialize your character as it grows. I think that this situation is analogous to WvW progression. You play a character in WvW, and it gets better in WvW. You can then progress your character and specialize it however you best think you’d like to.

The stipulations for my liking it come as the following, though:

You need to be able to change your WvW abilities after you’ve chosen them.
Just like traits on a class that you level up, you need to be able to change these WvW abilities you get for WvW. If you can’t, then we’ve devolved back to the days of D2 where “Oh I misplaced a skill point, TIME TO REMAKE MY CHARACTER”. That is horrible, and should absolutely be avoided. Make it cost like 3.5s to retrait your WvW abilities or something if you have to, but absolutely make it possible to retrait them or this will end horribly.

You need to be able to make significant progress in a small amount of time.
Just like leveling up, you need to be able to make significant progress on this progression in a relatively short time span. This is different from sPvP, where your progress is account bound and can thus take longer. It must not take weeks upon weeks to ‘max’ a character for WvW. I emphasize that particularly because this is so critical. If it takes 4 months of dedicated playing to max one character, then I agree that this is alt-unfriendly and is a bad implementation for the game. However, if it takes about the same time to max a character in WvW as it does to max a character to level 80, then that’s totally acceptable.

You need to be able to make progress by helping the team, not just killing/capping.
People who scout are important, and so are people who refresh siege, or who upgrade bases, or who escort dolyaks. These roles are critical to WvW, and with progression being added, these roles must be rewarded with progression experience. If not, then people will forgo these critical roles in favor of things that earn them progression, and we will lose out on important parts of our strategy and the game will devolve further into zerg-smash-wall mentality.

If these three factors are appropriately handled in the March release, then I am confident that this release will be a good one. If not, then this will probably be one of the worst things to happen to WvW ever. Please, ANet, I don’t mind character-based progression so long as you get it right.

I’ve accepted that grinding laurels for the ascended gear is useless, since they are adding another tier of gear above that (and I’m guessing a new currency then too). But yeah, this makes it kind of pointless to have multiple toons and playing anything but one of them FOREVER. I have 6 80’s, a 40 and my ele hit 20 last night. Granted, I mainly play my necro for everything (dungeons, etc.), but I have leveled all of my toons in what I consider a balanced fashion. Some crafting, zone completions, story line and WvW. I spent last night improving my ele play, enjoying some awesome time on a cannon and blocking treb shots in WvW, but once this patch hits (although LONG overdue) there will be no reason to take any character but your main into warfronts (which has already happened to dungeons and fractals).

I may be mistaken, but didn’t A-net say that they were going to give us credit for the things we had already done in WvW (I’m thinking kills, etc) towards this new system or were they just saying they weren’t taking out the old title lines? Maybe I misread….?

(from the post above me) I emphasize that particularly because this is so critical. If it takes 4 months of dedicated playing to max one character, then I agree that this is alt-unfriendly and is a bad implementation for the game. However, if it takes about the same time to max a character in WvW as it does to max a character to level 80, then that’s totally acceptable.

I really hope this isn’t the case. It only takes me 50 hours of actual game time (/age in game) to get a toon to 80, run them to Cursed and get my karma gear. I’m hoping it will be something like RR in Dark Age, but I’m not holding my breath.

Rising Dusk, good points. The only way that they can justify this system being A. Not Retroactive and B. Character Bound, is if maxing is possible in a short time similar to leveling. However, if sPvP and GW1 PvP ranks are any indication of how long it takes to get a rank, then we are in big trouble with this change. WvW players will lose months upon months of stats that they’ve compiled and people will be pigeonholed into playing one main or stuck without any recognition or progression to speak of because they like alts. There is a guy in my guild with 10 fully geared and max leveled characters. He will now be forced to choose one, and if it is a grind, he won’t get recognized with the nice shiny titles he should be getting for his WvW play. Titles mean less as well. It’s “oh you just play one character” instead of “hot kitten that guy is a kitten”

Guess its time to gear up a thief

I really agree with this decision. You start making so many things account bound and you start running into the realm of “Now that I’ve done everything on one character I can do it on all the characters.” As it is, you can hop in to sPvP and play any class as if it were maxed out. I want to be able to build up my alts just like I did a main.

Good Decision.

Really want to avoid playing with my kitten asura necro for leveling my acc rank.

Ubi.4136:

I’ve accepted that grinding laurels for the ascended gear is useless, since they are adding another tier of gear above that (and I’m guessing a new currency then too).

Funny how these things work. ANet says they’re not adding another tier in 2013, people hear they’re adding another tier in 2014.

Esoteric.5490:

WvW players will lose months upon months of stats that they’ve compiled and people will be pigeonholed into playing one main or stuck without any recognition or progression to speak of because they like alts. There is a guy in my guild with 10 fully geared and max leveled characters. He will now be forced to choose one, and if it is a grind, he won’t get recognized with the nice shiny titles he should be getting for his WvW play.

Most people just come to WvW with badly equipped, upscaled chars and are more or less useless though. So it’s good they’re discouraging twinking in WvW.

I’ve been completely happy with all aspects of the game so far, but this is one thing that really annoys me.

I want to help my team. I have an Ele, Thief, Mesmer and Guardian and play the ‘night shift’ due to my Australian-ness, so switching to specific characters depending on group size and make-up can be very handy. Under this system I’d be spreading my effort around multiple characters and delaying my personal progresss to enhanced abilities.

When I walk a Dolyak, that takes up 10 minutes of my time to help my team, that’s my time, the guy behind the keybord.
If I do that on my main or an alt what does it matter? Why should I have to grind 500 Dolyak escorts per character (made up number) to get a bonus when I may have already done that combined?

It means I have to sacrifice something to play my way rather than encouraging people to try lots of different classes, that, I find very disappointing.

Edit – Oh! Is this why we can’t use our existing stats, because you have the number of escorts and kills for my account, but not for each character?

Please make it account bound! What are the reasons to make it character bound?

Commander title should also be account bound.

Once again Anet decision to limit variety in game. It seems the Anet developers are doing their best to have as little variety in the game.

Developers should understand this:
Limiting player player options kills fun.
Less variety = less fun

Yeah, I’m done.

I get the abilities being char based, but ranks should definitely be account bound. It’s like you are forcing us to stick to one character, which gets old for most people.

If you compare WvW in GW2 to Alliance Battles (FA/JQ) ranking in GW1, the latter was account based and allowed me to cycle through various characters keeping the game fresh for me.

Obviously you aren’t forced to progress on one character, but that’s what people will stray towards to get the next rank or ability.

You are essentially steering WvW into stagnation.

Split the ability and rank progression, please.

Habib Loew.6239:

The best way to think of this system is as alternative/extended character progression.

Using your words, what we are saying:

The best way to think of this system players’ characters is as alternative/ an extended extension of one character progression.

WvW’ers already have nigh unreachable titles, why add to it?