Guild Wars 2

As in the topic title, received 3 private messages all from gold sellers, sure you can check that from the backend:(

‘Combat is boring as hell. I have 5 skills I can use frequently’

There are a lot of issues with this game, the above is not one of them – do you realize you can swap weapons in combat? Cos that makes for 10 skils available frequently, not 5

As much as I’d love to see some form of organized 10+ raiding in GW2 I doubt it’s possible without a complete overhaul of all professions. The lack of trinity, or simply a clearly outlined tank/dps/support roles would result in massive chaos. Events are a chaos fest already, so are most 5men pugs. The lack of aggro management options, support specs/abilities, that are actually viable both in dungeons and when soloing or PVPing renders the whole raiding concept rather impossible to implement at the moment. And don’t get me wrong, I like all players being forced to have a certain amount of responsibility – whether it’s self healing, rezzing or buffing, debuffing, I just don’t see it ever being possible to organize 10 or 15 people when there aren’t more clearly defined roles. In theory, the tools are there to a certain extend, in case of most professions, they are just not good enough. One can dream though, it could be sooo awesome:)

I think it’s absolutely awesome:)

I feel the same OP. Only log in to level my alt when I know my friends are online, else the PVE side of things feels deserted. Even in Orr, it’s only somewhat busy at peak time. Mostly, champions roaming around as you said, with noone to team up with. Truth is, the PVE side of the game is a bit of a let down, yes you can farm, if you care about gold or a legendary, if you don’t, exploring is the only thing to do – though frankly, hardly any fun when you’re alone in the zone, not counting an occasional little army of bots here and there, plus, I’d rather not complete the whole map on one character, as that leaves nothing new for an alt. And makes subsequent leveling process a bit dull.

Looking forward to the first proper content patch and hoping some fresh, new ideas will be implemented to counter the many little issues. It’s such a great framework, so much possibilities.

So hyped, such a disapointment – gather a group, each of us gets zoned in seperately, 3 people quit, two of us continue on our own and after few initial deaths on the first trash, soloed the whole thing, which was, to put it lightly, very underwhelming and bugged – MK randomly porting here and there only to return to a previous spot a moment later requiring me to clear all the respawned trash again to get to him at the level he was at 5 minutes earlier. Not to mention server crashes at 19.00 GMT, so did not even get to experience the cut scene, whatever it might have been. Oh, and a 10 slot bag? Really?

Awfully irritating idd, similarly to loging in on the home page, and when swapping to forums, having to log in again :S

My main question was – why do you feel the need to hide? I simply do not understand that, at all.

@Shayne

‘Perhaps you don’t understand why it’s important to some people that they have control over their personal information and activity’

No I don’t, it’s a game? There is no personal sensitive information, of any sort, displayed about you at any time. The only info out there available to the general public is your login length. That alone, doesn’t even tell us whether you actually play the game, or just hang around to keep an eye on a chat with friends. If you are an active player, we see you swapping zones/instances. How is that personal, private, confidential in any way?

You have signed up for an MMO – surely you must’ve considered a certain level of exposure?

‘As it is now by many guilds (that aren’t just a amorphous pool of randomly recruited players) you are nagged at, threatened and even kicked if you stop representing them for a few days or even hours, despite your general commitment to the guild.’

I have addressed exactly that scenario. Why would you want to be in a guild, full of immature management that can’t handle the multi guild system in this game?

Back to the op:

I am in 3 guilds, one is full of family, one is practically my WoW guild, and one is a GW2 PVE. The latter having absolutely no issues, with me switching back and forth. When I am in an instance with guildies, or farming events, I represent the guild from which the majority of players come from. Easy. Before I swap, I always shout in gchat that I’m doing so and so, and either are available if something comes up, or simply want to chill out for now.

Now, if you would like to benefit from a more competitive group environment, it is rather obvious, you may be expected to be loyal to one particular group. Again, it’s your choice if you accept the rules or not, but don’t hide behind privacy when in fact, you appear to have difficulties being honest about what your gaming goals are with the group in question.

If you want benefits and progress that comes from belonging to a hard core community, you need to invest your time in it. By hoping around just because you don’t feel like doing whatever is on schedule, you let down a big number of other people that are serious about said event. Such play isn’t for everyone, it doesn’t make you worse, it doesn’t make them more special. But people have the right to choose how they play, just as you do.

I did not mean to be offensive in anyway, but if you are a free spirit by nature, prefer to do your thing, when you feel like it, go for the casual game style, majority of guilds out there are like that.

Simply do not expect any sort of in game mechanism to cover up your lack of respect for other people’s time and effort and facilitate anonymity, so you can act in a way you’d never dare if people knew who you were or simply, in this case, whether or not, you are online;)

Also, out of curiosity, what other games/platforms have all these tools already?

It contributed greatly to even further anonymity in WoW, that led directly to people more and more often acting like twats, as there were no consequences of their actions. When you assemble a group manually, and you get whispered by a player that has quit your previous group mid boss after having a fit, you simply do not invite him. LFG forces whomever upon you.

If you have no time, or can’t be bothered, to waste 5 minutes trying to gather a group together, chances are, you don’t really have time to complete an instance either.

It’s not hard, as you said there is no trinity, it takes literally few minutes at most, you get to at least say hello to people as you invite them, something rather rare in LFG and practically non existent in LFR anymore. The only exchange between pugs in WoW nowadays are insults or loot disputes. So no, there are games out there that offer the tools you are after. Let this game stay clean, as it is. Encouraging people to play together, have fun together, and not just mindlessly press buttons completely disregarding that the other 4 in the group are humans not NPCs.

Just check the fan forums, people are confused, especially in Europe. Anet shouldn’t really expect we know how they work cos we played the original game, many have not. Also, as it was pointed out, 22 is today, from now to 23.59.59 and not a second longer;)

It’s rather natural for people to expect something on the given date. We did not dream it up, it’s blown up on the front page of this site.

Midnight will be the 23rd already It would be lovely if someone from the company cleared this up. There would be no need for anymore threads or posts, atm there are at least 3 in the General Discussion, and this here.

It’s really not so much to ask for good communication. This is the first GW2 content patch, not the best way to land it – in a cloud of confusion, due to something as straight forward as timing.

Don’t even know where to start – are you trying to eliminate the multiplayer aspect of an mmo ? It’s a social game, a whole bunch of us enjoys the very tools you find invading your privacy. Why would you want to hide? Why would you not want people to be able to contact you, why would you not want to see where your friends are? As a guild leader, why would you not want to see which members are representing your guild, which ones you can count on most, which one actually contribute to the community?

Do you have a tendency of making multiple commitments at the same time then randomly choosing what to do based on what will benefit you the most at a particular moment? Can’t really thing of any other reason one would want to constantly hide.

It’s a game. You are free to do what you please, in a company that you find suitable, or even alone. You do not need to hide in order to do that. Those tools are there to help people socialize.

Most guilds out there only care if you represent them when you are actively participating in a guild event, which makes perfect sense – you receive something, you give something in return. Yes, there are some that require you to have all your toons in their establishment, and that is fine as well, you do not need to be a part of a guild, whose rules do not suit you. Some people are happy to form a tight community, if you aren’t, don’t:) People really have better things to do in game then spy on others lol.

The information provided is there for our benefit. As a GM, you glance at the roster and within couple of minutes, you know how many members are online, how many are engaged in activities with another group, how many can be contacted, and how many you can potentially count on for your guild activity. It’s great.

If you are flagged as not representing my guild at a particular time, I assume you are having fun elsewhere and simply take that into consideration when planning. If you are constantly flagged as representing some other group, you’re obviously enjoying whatever they may be doing more, great for you, we move on

You are taking this way to seriously.

Regardless of what time zone is being referred to, in the 24-hour time notation, the day begins at midnight, 00:00, and the last minute of the day begins at 23:59. Whether your country prefers using the 12 or 24 hour clock, this system is the international standard, there is a reason it is used by military worldwide, social preferences aside;) Unless you would like every patch to be a true surprise, without giving any dates at all, using an accurate time format is somewhat necessary – in addition to being a simple courtesy, showing a little respect for people’s time, and considering some may want to make plans to accommodate.

I have no complains about dmg/utility, except the longbow bug with insisting target is obstructed when it’s sitting directly in front of my face…. Pet design on the other hand is absolutely atrocious.

A pet:

1. Never runs by your site out of combat – usually 10-20 yards behind (most of the time, can’t even see it on the screen behind me)
2. Attacks everything in sight, instead, as per ability tooltip, assisting on your target
3. Does not return upon command (huge delay)
4. Some special abilities have some sort of a massive lag ( you press it once, nothing appears to happen, press it again, start spamming, then it finally shows as used?)
5. Completely useless on all undead when on the move (all they do is chase the mobs that are being kited by me, rarely managing to hit anything)
6. Lack the ability to be put away when not needed – it’s most annoying when doing jumping puzzles, every time you fall and die, the pet re spawns with you – while I can, to a degree, understand why you want rangers to have pets active at all times in combat, I can’t see any valid arguments for having them forced on us out of combat. They aren’t even particularly good looking, not by the high standard the game’s art presents in all other aspects.
7. Squishiness – again, to a degree, I like the idea of a tradeoff between dmg and survivability, but as it stands now, with pets not reacting to commands without delay, having anything but a bear/ranged pet is completely pointless in dungeons. You can’t recall one swiftly in and out of mele range/aoe area to make sure it doesn’t get squashed 30 sec into a fight while not even having aggro. Yes, you can swap between the two pets mid fight, and that works flawlessly, however it’s not always beneficial if you’re relying on a special pet ability for something.

As it stands at the moment, they are more of a nuisance then an asset.

Hope at some point, you will find time to address these issues. You’ve created an amazing framework, for what could be an outstanding mmo, sadly, the amount of various bugs or unfinished concepts in game has turned fun into frustration, more often then not.

Yes please, there have been multiple threats on that already, both on this forum as well as fan based. The demand is as big as Norn’s are! Huge in fact, we are craving to give you our monies – seriously, a certain company has us so well trained we are not feeling particularly comfortable not spending money on a game systematically

And seriously, that would be ace, a lot of first toons have been created in a rush :p

I only agree with a part of your post – the hairstyles are lackluster, to put it lightly, across the board. As for faces, you have a limited number of pre-designed templates, but don’t forget you then proceed to adjusting individual details, and it can result in drastic changes to your face It does feel a bit rushed out, or not finished, in a sence that there isn’t a uniform number for all options across all races. However, this is still more then a lot of games out there offer, and there is room for easy improvements, additions, and I’m fairly confident, more will come with time.

To start with, you probably icked the hardest class to play atm, as well as not very rewarding, not initially. You have two choices, keep on playing it or reroll a Warrior :p Should you decide to keep on playing ele: if you die a lot, downzone yourself, don’t go to higher zones, go to parallel ones – you still progress but it is easier. and it lets you practice in a slightly more friendly environment. Trick is, many people come into GW expecting to be able to plow through everything. And that is not the case really. There is nothing wrong with dying, take it step by step:

Try different weapons, make sure you unlock all your weapon abilities for easy switch if neccesary, read the tooltips, try to set up a small ‘rotation’ for yourself for single target mobs, and for aoe situations. See if it works, think of how to improve it.

Check the evasion mechanics available to your prof.

Use signets with CC utilities, they help a lot when playing an ele.

Stick 10 points into Arcana traits for the little life savior bubble – it makes a world of difference, buys you valuable seconds to finish off what’s about to kill you.

Try focusing on one atonement at a time, get a good hang of what abilities it has in different weapon combinations, once you’re familiar with them, start swapping between two, then three, then four.

Make sure you have comfy key-binds – it’s such a dynamic prof, this is, in my opinion, game breaking.

Invest 10 points in Earth atonement – toughness does make a difference.

Highest dmg, from my experience, comes from dual daggers, yes you need to be at close range but mobs do die substantially faster, coupled with some cc utilities you will very soon start seeing dead mobs everywhere.

Swap to staff for DEs, you’ll feel like a god – great for morale :p

Once you get somewhat comfy with swapping stances, at least two, try to create combos .

Be cautious when you pull, take one mob at a time until you are comfy with it, then try more.

When downed, use your escape ability to get away from the mob that’s attacking you – it’s not always possible but quite often is, try to line of sight it to start with, if there are other people around, try heading for where they are.

Make sure to use you elemental asap – the earth one is fairly tough for current level mobs and really makes it easier to go about – don’t use it all the time, keep it for the oh kitten situations, chances are it will take aggro off you, from at least a mob or two, giving you some breathing space.

Conjured weapons are good, well some – buy the skills – I found the axe is pretty good damage, I use it a fair bit, especially when I accidentally pull more then I intended. Blow the cds on it, then drop it and proceed to whatever else.

Go around low level zones grabbing all the skill points you can – you get free xp while at it, karma from events along the way, and of course the ability to unlock as many skills as possible, to give yourself more choices.

When pulling, it’s often good to do so with your ground targeting abilities – simply cos the target will be static until it gets damaged by them, then try to build a slowing/freezing/blinding path between you and the mob(s) – now granted, most will not even live long enough to go half way through, but it’s good practice for tougher creatures. If you have misplaced a ground effect, try to kite mobs back onto it or simply through it. If you get overrun, sometimes it’s just best to pop all the slowing/crippling blinding you can, send in your ele if off cd, and leg it In the direction you came from preferably :p

Make sure to invest in some condition dmg boosting gear. Burning, bleeds, it’s all affected.

I am not the best Elementalist out there, but I find the class really enjoyable and challanging, I go through trial and error and I do see improvement every day I play. Feels very rewarding despite being most definitely the lowest single target dmg dealer out there, something I hope will be rectified along the way.

Hope that helps

Aih.6892:

I’m happy to hear that dedicated and experienced players who have a trained and regular group are finding some challenge and fun in the dungeons.
BUT :
You all must remember that GW2 is supposed to be for every kind of players, not only very good raid specialists. Meaning that everykind of people should be able to get some fun in game.
While the challenging dungeons are great for some, i think that the other ones, the casual players, which represent in fact the major part of the population of a popular game such as GW2, should have access to some adapted content too.
Yes maybe we are dumb, slow, losers or whatever you think, but we are customers as much as you.
So concretly, keep the dungeons as they are for the ones who like it and can dedicate so much time and skill to it, but add an easier mode for casual players, with shorter sessions adapted to family life, with of course less reward etc…
WHY NOT GIVING SOME CONTENT TO EVERY KIND OF PLAYERS ? After all the dungeons are already here, it shouldn’t be that hard to add some easier modes, and yes some harder modes too if there are enough people enjoying it.

There is content for every type of player. That’s the beauty of the game. That said, it does not mean every player needs to do exactly the same thing. If you find dungeons aren’t for you, you can do DE’s, that mostly require no coordination, are easily accessible by anyone, anywhere.

I have a job and a family, and being a girl, loads of housework too, I still manage to find few hours to run a dungeon. I don’t do it everyday, I do it when I can. I’m as casual a player as it gets as I simply prioritize my life over any form of entertainment, still I enjoy a good challenge. And if things aren’t going well, we just call it quits for the day, everyone goes back to look at their build and what can possibly be done to improve the synergy of the group. I do explo mods with my guild, one full of adults with families, and no, we’re not successful all the time, in fact, we wipe over and over again, but we progress, and we find overcoming those difficulties very rewarding and satisfying. I don’t expect to clear the whole explo mode in one go, I’m enjoying the progression and the learning curve. We’ve only attempted a few, but we’re visibly better and better with every try. There is a whole world for you to explore, there is no way you could’ve seen it all just yet, enjoy it. There is content for every type of player!

Story modes are fairly challenging, not hard. Explo modes are hard and I sincerely hope they stay that way. Fine tuning, yes, reducing difficulty across the board, no. I do think the particle effects, while very pretty are somewhat getting in the way. Especially those from an elementalist. Having a fire xplode on the target just as he is about to smash you usually results in a splat. Can’t dodge what you don’t see I’m sure as the game grows older, certain things will be refined.

Thing the main issue we have atm, in pugs, is simply that people do not know how to play the game yet. It’s been out for 10 days only! Even if you played it for 8 hours a day, which many can’t afford to do lol, you still don’t know all there is to it, not in regard to your prof and spec, and most certainly not in regard to other profs/specs you don’ t play. Give it time, enjoy what you can, practice makes perfect. As for loot, yes we’re badly influenced by other mmos up to date- where the primary reason for running an instance is a bag of goodies of some sort, well, looks like it’s time to start doing it for fun! If it’s no fun in a pug, make some friends. So far the community in game is pretty awesome If you don’t like making friends, well, that’s what DE’s are for, mostly a happy, chaotic mash aways:p

I personally would love to see a customizable action bar for anything from food, tonics to weapons or minipets. It’s a pain to have to click on a food from your inventory when it expires, simply cos you it takes a good while to find what you’re looking for in a bag fool of crap. In general I love the UI, and can understand Anet not wanting to allow addons, but little non game breaking improvements like easy access would really be nice. Can only hope, once they sort out their launch stuff and game goes properly steady, they will look into it at some point