Guild Wars 2

Kalendraf.9521:

Right there with Blaeys in hoping we see more guild content in the future. CH and CV do weekly guild missions, but no new puzzles, challenges, races, and not to mention no new rewards for doing them after this many years makes it harder and harder to be motivated to continue doing them.

Definitely.

We just finished our weekly CH guild missions. Had about 25 people – group seems to get a little smaller every month. Group talked pretty much most of the night about whether or not we would ever see new missions. The desire for them is out there. Just wish someone would say something.

Please-please-please, let one tiny corner of that new content be new guild missions.

Fatalyz.7168:

Don’t know if this will help or not, it is more recent than that Youtube video tho:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/57sndn/no_new_guild_missions_are_on_the_horizon_but/d8wlvye/

Basically 10 months ago, he wasn’t sure if they were on the roadmap or not. If there is something newer or not, I am unaware of it.

Speculating, but if they did put them back on their road map after that, it most likely won’t be until the next expansion, that they are seen. While it could be an unpopular opinion, but having guild missions as expansion content, could give it the attention people want it to have.

I definitely remember that conversation.

I agree, the outlook isn’t good. It’s been close to 4.5 years since the last new guild mission. I just wish they would let us know if they are even considered part of the game any more. My guild still does them every Monday night, but part of that persistence is in hope that more are eventually coming. Knowing one way or the other would tell us we need to be looking for new things to do together.

So, with PoF set and ready to launch, I’m going to ask the same question I asked with the last expansion, and several dozen times since:

Any chance we will see new PVE guild missions?

And, as a reminder again, this is something the dev team was supposedly working on and excited to see just after HOT launch: https://youtu.be/W1WBYEfJVb4?t=336

Being good at video games does not equate to being good at life or being qualified for a professional position of any kind.

Video games are pastimes – hobbies that we enjoy in our time off. Playing GW2 (or any other MMO) is not your career nor does it prepare you for anything truly meaningful in life.

That said, it isn’t a bad thing either. It does bring people together – creating new friendships and building new online communities. The problem with raids – the way they are in GW2 – is that they reinforce the idea that those friendships have to be based on how well other people focus on and master a particular aspect of the game. Some of us (not all) find that limiting and obstructive to how we like to bring people together.

But, if that “elite of the elite” group is what you are looking for from the game, that is fine. There really is nothing wrong with that. The issue is, a lot of different kinds of people play the game – and some of us actually see limited scope raid experiences like the ones offered here as antithetical to the community building experience we want from GW2.

But it is a matter of perspective – dependent upon why you enjoy games like this to begin with.

And, to repeat and emphasize – mastering a video game isn’t an indication of how hard you work or how successful you will be in an actual professional career. Trying to make that correlation is a little absurd.

Mirage: 8
At first, I was unsure about this elite, but after spending most of my time on it during the past 2 stress tests, I think it is actually in pretty good shape. The one thing I would say is that one of the new core mechanics , the ambush skills, were not very intuitive. They don’t seem to last long enough before timing out so it took a bit of practice to see what they were going for. Once I figured them out and saw the condi stacking potential of something like the scepter ambush ability paired with the right traits, it was a lot more fun.

Holosmith: 9
By far, the most polished and interesting elite, imo. Not sure it will bring the power the engi desperately needs in PVE right now, but it does look promising.

Scourge: 7
Fun and interesting idea, but will have to wait and see how it stacks up to condition necros/reapers in terms of damage. The static nature of shades may end up being an issue outside of stationary fights.

Firebrand: 3
As many others have said, the design just feels extremely clunky right now. I hate to say it, but it just doesn’t feel ready for release. Tomes are not intuitive at all and the cooldowns make the elite very awkward to play.

I did play all of the others during the pvp/wvw test weekend, but not enough to give even early feedback. Weaver seems complex but fun, Deadeye feels OP (but probably isn’t), Spellbreaker seems like it will extremely situational in PVE (moreso than any other elite to date), Soulbeast is something I wanted to keep playing, but knew I didn’t have time and Renegade wasn’t at all interesting or fun for me. Keep in mind that, again, I didn’t play them enough to really be a good judge, however.

The important take way, to me, is that we are seeing yet another symptom of exclusionary disease that is quickly becoming the status quo for GW2. More and more, players are looking for new ways to split the player base – to find rationale and tools, logical or not, to help them decide who they are willing to be friends with in game and who they never want anything to do with.

I know this is nothing new in MMOs (or even in GW2 to a much lesser degree), but it was (imo) never supposed to be as blatant in this game as it has become in the past year and a half. This was supposed to be the game where we could come home from work, load up our character and just enjoy the game without all the kitten and “are you good enough to play with me” silliness – and, for a long time, it was exactly that.

And, yes, it is driven by player decisions, but I do find it sad that Anet is becoming more and more accepting and even, in some cases, supportive of that kind of behavior. I know I’ve said it a few hundred times at this point, but they really need to stop and think about how this game was supposed to be different than the competition – and get back into that development mindset.

hugo.4705:

I’m so lost with time conversion :o 17:00 Pm GMT so 19:00 Pm for Europe? If it’s that I can definitely join the test.

There are multiple time zones in Europe, so it depends on where you are.

Easiest way – and a friendly tip that a lot of people may not know – if you type a time along with the region code directly into a Google search box, it will give you the conversion to your local time (based on your computer time, I’m guessing) at the top of the results screen -

so, for example, type in “5 pm GMT” and it will immediately give you the answer you are looking for.

I doubt its against the ToS, but I still wouldn’t give it out to anyone.
And no, it has nothing to do with honesty – it is about simply keeping your private information about your account private.

While some will only use it for ridiculous borderline-elitist membership policies, others may be more nefarious. While I doubt anyone can steal your account with the information, communicating the value of your account and exactly what you own can make you a more likely target for gold sellers and others of that ilk.

Best policy is to keep it private.

You can’t say that raids are main content for the game and at the same time use the argument that they were always meant to be designed for a subset of the PVE population. And with that in mind with the way raids are in the game now – they most definitely should take a back seat to the development of other parts of the game.

There is a place for them in the development schedule, but they are by no means meant to be the primary experience of the game.

Murdock.6547:

Blaeys.3102:

snip

I don’t hold grudges against anyone here.

Anyone (but anet it seems) could have seen a bit of a rift would form when Guildwars 2 took its first, and most cautious step away from being fully casual to cater to those who sought challenging content.

And I guess to quote my friend again:

“I worry it won’t ever get better tbh since there’s no… quantifiable standard, I guesd.
In FF or Wow or even wildstar you can tell within like 5 seconds of meeting someone if they’re the real deal or not.
[…] You can tell by the way someone thinks about their class if they are up to standard
There IS no standard in gw2.
It’s made by the community, which is a bunch of [bad players] who don’t know the math behind raids and don’t care to.
They find the broken exploit builds from people who do a little math, say that’s gotta be what’s required because raids are SO HARD, and curse anyone who says otherwise.

As someone who does math every day to raid, I was not amused. So I kittened off because it’s not fun enough to be casual and not interesting enough to justify the elitism.
Like, casually I can do literally 4x the personal check on vg. It’s easy. I can handle that, and you as my friend knew that.
If I wanted to join a chill [not awful] group (if that exists) I’d have to do nearly 10x the check.
I’m not going to spend enough time to SOLO THE DPS CHECK as a one off. I’m just not. I have better kitten to do.
The fact THAT’S the kind of standard people hold is neat, but extremely misguided. And it’s festered into a hell hole."

Thank you for bringing the topic up and continuing to contribute to the conversation. Your original post is spot on and something I very much agree with.

The only thing I would add to your original points is that this isn’t something we can expect the community to remedy – in part for the very reasons this thread derailed so quickly.

I believe that there are fundamental flaws with how they implemented raids into the game that give the worst of our community the excuse – and even encouragement – to behave the ways they do. Until those flaws are addressed (and, at the very least, acknowledged by Anet), the community fracturing you hint at in the original post isn’t going anywhere.

Regardless, thanks for trying to add positively to the conversation. Sorry if I contributed to moving away from that in any way.

zoomborg.9462:

Blaeys.3102:

zoomborg.9462:

It was always about the shinies. Hiding that is the only way to get some “credibility”. Anet could implement a story mode with minimal rewards (basic lootbags) and everyone (the vocal people especially) would still complain despite getting what they wanted. It’s just hypocrisy and vanity.

Here’s the fault with that logic. Raid rewards aren’t that great now. We get a guaranteed exotic, a few magnetite shards, a small chance at an ascended chest (the chance feels higher in fractals and WvW, in fact) and the legendary currency.

None of that is much better than a champ bag. The raid legendaries are considered ugly as sin (and there are multiple paths to the functionality now) and, as I noted, there are way more efficient ways to earn ascended.

With that in mind, I doubt many would care if an easy mode gave a lower reward.

So, yes, it is about getting the experience, not the paltry exotic and small chance at an ascended chest and legendary insight.

I could see an argument for rewarding a tiny amount of magnetite (without unlocking the unique boss skins, of course) – but that would just be as a (really slow) way for people to get toons ready for the real raids – but that one is pretty optional (and it wouldn’t detract from raids – people can farm magnetite on escort and w1 trash anyway if they really care about that).

Lul i get about 20-30g in liquid gold with roughly 200-250 magn shards (depending on minis) for 2hours of play. Add the asc drops which are pretty good on rng and u got pretty decent rewards. I pretty much buy anything i need (asc gear) with magn shards and if i have a surplus i use it to sell ghostly infusions (about 100g per sell). The rewards are fine as they are.

The vast majority of the vocal people when ez raid mode is discussed, withdraw from any kind of discussion when rewards are the subject. They hide behind their little finger and w8 until another thread has opened. And if that thread doesnt go their way they w8 for another and so on….it’s just sad.

So im calling it for those vocal people that observe this thread. If Anet introduced an ez mode without the achievements, currencies, collections, liquid gold for killing the bosses and loot similar to what u get on runs where u already killed the boss b4 in the week WOULD YOU be satisfied? This is where the line is drawn between reason and pure entitlement.
Do u want a mode to take it easy or practice? Or are u simply trying to get rewards for zero effort? I don’t expect a straight answer tbh but w/e, food for thought i guess.

Sorry, but I don’t see a lot of people asking for – or even discussing – the idea of lesser difficulty with the same rewards. People are asking for a way to experience the content (and often bring up the model other games use – which does use a scaling reward to ensure higher difficulties are rewarded properly – it just makes common sense).

It seems like you are assuming a lot – in which case, there is no way to provide an actual counterpoint – because youre fabricating a hypothetical model that many of us don’t believes exists in the first place.

There are some valid discussion points around whether they should or should not implement a story or easy mode, but “the community will just ask for more reward” isn’t one of them. First – almost no one is asking for comparable reward systems and, second, those that do ask for it pretty much do the same with every other part of the game now (you’ll never make that small group happy in any part of the game).

zoomborg.9462:

It was always about the shinies. Hiding that is the only way to get some “credibility”. Anet could implement a story mode with minimal rewards (basic lootbags) and everyone (the vocal people especially) would still complain despite getting what they wanted. It’s just hypocrisy and vanity.

Here’s the fault with that logic. Raid rewards aren’t that great now. We get a guaranteed exotic, a few magnetite shards, a small chance at an ascended chest (the chance feels higher in fractals and WvW, in fact) and the legendary currency.

None of that is much better than a champ bag. The raid legendaries are considered ugly as sin (and there are multiple paths to the functionality now) and, as I noted, there are way more efficient ways to earn ascended.

With that in mind, I doubt many would care if an easy mode gave a lower reward.

So, yes, it is about getting the experience, not the paltry exotic and small chance at an ascended chest and legendary insight.

I could see an argument for rewarding a tiny amount of magnetite (without unlocking the unique boss skins, of course) – but that would just be as a (really slow) way for people to get toons ready for the real raids – but that one is pretty optional (and it wouldn’t detract from raids – people can farm magnetite on escort and w1 trash anyway if they really care about that).

There is no announced public beta related to mounts or story, and we should not expect one.

We will get to learn about mounts this week, apparently, and some story teasers/discussions next week. That likely entails, at most, preview videos or blogs about the Skimmer or a Q&A with the story team.

I play GW2 for one reason – to have fun with my friends in my guild. That is why I chose to create a guild when the game came out and why I almost never pug anything.

Raids have been a two sided blade among my friends and my guild. On the one side, I have a group I raid with every week. While they aren’t the most skilled at the content, we are downing bosses.

On the other side, I have a lot more friends that, while they would like to do the content, they are turned off by the ridiculously lopsided experience based on meta vs non-meta or simply just don’t like how most of the encounters are tuned.

Different people play the game for different reasons. While some find raids a positive addition, I believe many more find them toxic and overly restrictive. A story mote version, using the same tech they use to implement challenge motes, would likely solve this issue – allowing them to develop really difficult raid encounters without boxing the content off from the more casual players – something that Anet obviously cared more about in the early days of the game.

It would give more people more ways to have fun as a team – which should be the whole point.

Makai.3429:

I just want to go back to late 2012 when dungeons were en vogue; where I could play the game to the best of my abilities without being judged or lambasted, and earn some nice rewards for it. I miss pick up and play group content that lets me unwind after work and allows a mistake or two. I want the game to be the MMO I bought; not the MOBA APM OHKO retina burning festival it has become.

+1 x10,000 if I could

The devs seem to have changed course as it pertains to base game goals and philosophy somewhere in the past few years and it wasn’t a change for the better. GW2 was building a strong reputation for accessibility and community focus in a field of MMOs that seemed to be going the opposite direction. If they want to know why the game has fallen out of favor a little – and why there is less excitement about PoF than there was for past game updates – it is because of their change in direction.

Adding in single mode raids for an exclusive audience may seem like a little thing, but it is a major leap to making GW2 just a me-too clone of what everyone else is doing. It is helping deprive GW2 of what made it unique – a game where content (and definitely all PVE content) was designed for the community rather than for niche groups.

I want that community focus and accessibility back in the game.

It’s still early, but from what I saw, the big issue will continue to be alacrity + quickness. I didn’t see anything this past weekend that will supplant the chronomancer’s role in raids – meaning, most of the time, at least two raid spots will still be reserved for that profession.

Outside of that, Gotl alongside healing and strong ccs keeps at least one spot reserved for the druid.

For might stacking, there are a few potential contenders, but I doubt they will have the warrior’s efficacy – meaning 5 raid slots (2 chronos, 2 warriors/zerkers, at least one druid) will likely remain hard meta.

Looking at dps, we have to wait and see what the final balance numbers look like before we can start talking about potential replacements in the other 5 slots.

Likely means – at least in raids – if you play one of those core professions, you are probably stuck with the same skills and rotations for the foreseeable future – at least in meta groups.

I still contend that moving to a 10 player boon cap (at least in raids) would help alleviate some of this.

The key phrase here is “one keystroke per action.”

That directly answers the OPs question about macroing a dps rotation – it would definitely violate the game’s TOS.

What you’re asking for isn’t true loyalty – its the ability to force people to be exclusive to your guild.

Loyalty to a guild is shown through active support of that guild – helping with upgrades, placing hall decorations, participating in guild activities, etc.

Requiring 100% representation is completely at the discretion of the guild leader, but – if you are going to take that drastic measure, it falls to you to establish a monitoring system and punishments for players that break your rules and rewards for those that are completely loyal.

I’ve been leading a fairly large and very active guild for years. They best way to build loyalty among members is to earn it. In my guild, what we did was create a small council of leaders who are responsible for coming up with and leading fun activities throughout the week -spanning across open world, raids, wvw, pvp and others. By giving the members a reason to be online and doing things with the guild, they are more apt to support the guild when needed – as they did last week when we asked for gold to purchase a custom pvp arena specifically for testing beta elite specs this past weekend.

So to repeat and summarize – a 100% rep button isn’t needed and wouldn’t be an indicator of guild loyalty anyway. If you earn member loyalty, they will be there when the guild needs them.

This thread is a testament to why a single raid mode/difficulty is bad design in GW2.

The issue most struggle with is “XYZ person is holding back our group,” balanced against “But I just want to have fun in the raid.”

The ideal answer to this question is the same one that (I believe) works in fractals – those players who want to just have fun and play their way in raids need a place they can do so that does not hinder or aggravate the more serious raiders. And, before people say it, it does work in fractals – I see it in my guild every week.

A tiered raiding model – based off a simple inverse of the currently implemented challenge mote system – would fix it.

TexZero.7910:

Blaeys.3102:

Sooloo.1364:

I never understood why developers create content just for small segments of the community instead of everyone. This always leads to elitism and exclusion.

It has had a fairly negative impact on the game’s community.

And, even more unfortunate, if you try to bring it up on these forums, all you tend to get is “you’re imagining it – get over it and stop talking” style responses, which only further alienates people from the game mode.

The current implementation of raiding in GW2 needs to change in some pretty basic ways, imo.

Proof and citation of negative impact needed!

As is if you currently refuse to raid, that’s on you as raiding isn’t as gated as the very vocal minority here is making it out to be.

The proof and citation is found here in this subforum, on reddit and in the other subforums – with all of the posts and stories about people running into the uglier side of GW2 when they try to raid for the first time – and further supported by the response they get – mostly hateful and accusatory – when they do get up the courage to post. Beyond this, you only have to look at the LFG throughout a week to see how raids are more and more becoming an exclusive club based around gear, meter and LI/kill proof checks.

And I do believe that we would hear about this a lot more if not for the venom spewed at people every time they try to bring it up – which is, of course, just further anecdotal proof of the point I am trying to make.

Designing game content that is first and foremost fun for as many players as possible – that sounds like something we should be saying to devs a lot more often.

Tell that to a Scourge using the Dhuumfire trait.

They are most definitely – in most cases Ive seen – useful with the new elite specs.

Sooloo.1364:

I never understood why developers create content just for small segments of the community instead of everyone. This always leads to elitism and exclusion.

It has had a fairly negative impact on the game’s community.

And, even more unfortunate, if you try to bring it up on these forums, all you tend to get is “you’re imagining it – get over it and stop talking” style responses, which only further alienates people from the game mode.

The current implementation of raiding in GW2 needs to change in some pretty basic ways, imo.

InsaneQR.7412:

Blaeys.3102:

There is a lot of control built in as well – with the toolbelt collapsing ring and the knockback from laser being the strongest (but not only ones).

Additionally, strong boon stacking with the arena and a few other skills – and probably some of the best mobility/stunbreaks we’ve seen.

I would love to use the stunbreak but the toolbet skill is just aweful with a blind, a light aura for 4s and a CD of 40s. I rather use an elixer stunbreak instead.

Overall its a fun class for boon stacking and a “into the fray” gamestyle. But the exceed skills need tweaking on the toolbelt counterparts, all of them.

I think you hit on an important point that many are forgetting across all of the new specs. While pure holosmith builds may be what we want to test now – to get a feel for every utility, in realistic gameplay, we need to look at how it mixes with the preexisting utilities/weapons/etc. So, if the elixir stunbreak works, that is a viable addition to a holosmith build.

One of the things I look forward to is mix and match character building. A holosmith that relies on a couple of elixirs sounds fun to me (and potentially pretty strong).

The other thing to remember – numbers can always be tweaked – so, yes, provide feedback on balance, but the most important thing to critique this weekend, imo, is the feel of the spec. Is it fun to play? I think the holosmith is definitely that and look forward to playing it in game.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Considering summoning Shades takes no life force, I have no idea why you think “overspamming” runs you out faster. Sand Savant doesn’t affect it either.

You are correct. My bad.

Still think that as people become more practiced with resource management (the abilities, not the actual summons), they will find the Scourge to be in a pretty good spot.

There is a lot of control built in as well – with the toolbelt collapsing ring and the knockback from laser being the strongest (but not only ones).

Additionally, strong boon stacking with the arena and a few other skills – and probably some of the best mobility/stunbreaks we’ve seen.

Tora.7214:

by the way, am i the only one who noticed the Holosmith elite; Prime Light Beam, is a perfect replica of Scarlet´s Briar Prime Hologram own main attack? Animation, effect, and even name wise

Good catch – and thanks for sharing.

Loving the holosmith. One of my favorites today. Can’t wait to see it in action in pve.

After playing through all of the new elites today, I think that the Scourge is in the best spot design wise of them all. It is definitely a condi-focused class. Running scepter/torch + staff with the lifeforce regeneration traits, dhuumfire and a few corruption skills thrown in, it really felt strong without feeling overpowered. I see it particularly useful against large semi-stationary targets in PVE. Add in the barrier mechanic and it is pretty tanky as well.

As far as lifeforce being hard to generate, once I adapted to the new method of play, I found it wasn’t that hard, especially if you use the trait where you spawn one stronger shade rather than three. It is overspamming shades that runs lifeforce out prematurely, imo. A little resource management and it becomes a non issue.

TheRandomGuy.7246:

Blaeys.3102:

Developers waste too much time policing these things and chasing after violators. A zero tolerance policy for violators is the only way to ensure future tools can be created without pulling away valuable developer resources.

Chriss Cleary is a security lead. Chasing after violators and policing things is what he does.

He could still be spending time on more important matters. He was WAY to lenient with this guy. The ban should have happened months ago.

Historically, the reason these kinds of things were frowned upon is because Anet didn’t want to have to spend unnecessary developer resources and time on them – and that is exactly what has happened.

When they continue to develop these kinds of things – even after they have been told they violate the TOS – then they put all addons – even widely praised ones like TaCO – at risk, and no one wants that.

Implement a zero tolerance policy – ban the violators – praise the people adhering to policy – and move on with business.

When someone like the developer of BGDM continues to push the boundaries, even after multiple warnings, then they put all future add ons in jeopardy.

If meters comply with the TOS, then there should be no problem. However, if a DPS meter violates the terms of service, however, it should be banned on the spot with minimal warning. Either get it right or don’t do it.

Developers waste too much time policing these things and chasing after violators. A zero tolerance policy for violators is the only way to ensure future tools can be created without pulling away valuable developer resources.

Donari.5237:

This is also just the start of Elite Week, so it’s an overview. The first video is also a behind-the-scenes look at some of the design decisions behind the new elites which I had not seen before. That includes some of the dev excitement, Blaeys, albeit in truncated form.

I definitely hope so – and that they build on it. I love this game and everything I’ve seen about PoF seems to be going in a direction I think people will enjoy.

I worry that they have grown too gun shy when it comes to praising their own product – that they are too concerned that someone will misinterpret something or that they will have to back away from something they say and be criticized for it.

of course people will misinterpret – and, of course plans change. Just don’t let a fear of these things get in the way of communicating with customers or promoting to potential customers. Anet is still one of the best game developers around, imo. They just need to start showing how much they care about the product they are making a little more.

My biggest issue is that we are almost a month from the actual expansion and we have yet to see any real excitement from the developers about the content they have created.

I want developers telling us about why they love what is coming – what excites them with POF. I want to see that the devs are actually excited and care about what they are working on – the way they did at launch and with HOT. Why should players and potential customers care about the xpac and what it brings if the developers cannot be bothered to show some real excitement themselves.

Every announcement we have seen so far feels sterilized and whitewashed before it is shown to us.

Loved the feel and look of mounts. Bounties were a home run (wish there were guild bounties/missions though ).

Only negative was that the raptor race and coin collection event would cancel each other out if they triggered around the same time – happened to our group a few times. Probably need to look at timing and how they trigger.

Gliding, with the parameters they have set, do not unbalance WvW in any way – while adding a little more strategic/tactical choice and fun.

Still too early to tell 100%, but I think today WvW was more fun than it’s been in a while. Hope they look at more ways to add to the game mode like this in the future (looking at you, mounts).

To everyone yelling about P2W – gliding in no way guarantees a win or gives a player a faster way to earn personal rewards on the map, and even if it did, that would be okay (just as limiting things like the Herald or chronomancer, both of which offer strategic advantage similar to gliding, is okay). GW2 is not a free to play game. It is a pay-to-play game with the most amazing demo area ever (core open world, PvP and WvW).

The game must be allowed to grow – and that takes money. Limiting gliding to paying customers still gives the f2p customers a way to try out WvW and the core game to decide if they want to invest in ways that further their in game experience.

Because the design and implementation of raiding that Anet chose in antithetical to pretty much every part of the GW2 PVE experience. For the average player moving from the open and flexible systems in something like fractals or the open world to the walled off and shortsighted experience that is GW2 raiding is jarring and encourages elitism. And anyone that claims otherwise is immediately belittled, called lazy, ignorant, greedy or other such nonsense in the raiding subforum.

The reason behind the introduction is crystal clear – marketing to an audience from other MMOs – hardcore raiders – that they were not addressing before. Unfortunately, in doing so, they had to, imo, compromise on core tenants of what GW2 was. That decision has been harmful to the game and has created an unfriendlier environment in the community – even though there are alternatives (multiple tiers, as an example) that would have made much more sense.

It’s also interesting to see how much differently this kind of discussion progresses outside of the raiding subforum. Hopefully Anet doesn’t move this thread.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Blaeys.3102:

Raids address the needs of a particular audience well – and that may have been the audience they were originally targeted to at first. But, with the inclusion of interesting storylines (Saul most notably) and unique mechanics and bosses, they moved from just being challenging into something that would have more mass appeal across the PVE population in the game.

Right now there are multiple game modes, and multiple content types. Each serves different demographics, and only players who find a place in multiple demographics cross over into different content. You’re saying that different content that serves different types of players is only OK if it is not interesting to you, specifically.

That’s a slippery slope argument. There are a lot of players. Many of them will find different things interesting. If the game needs to cater to you specifically, why does it not need to cater to all those other people? Why are you, and however many or few others who want easy tier raids more important than anyone else?

The facts are that ANet has limited resources. Every demographic wants more from ANet. They cannot accommodate everyone’s desires. Why should they give you what you want and not me, raiders, PvPers, WvWers and however many other players?

The only possible rationale you can offer is the one you and a few others frequently make, the appeal to representing a “majority” that you have not proven. I could as easily contend that the majority of non-raiders don’t give a kitten about raids at all.
I could say that while they may not be happy that raids are in the game, they would certainly prefer that no more resources be allocated to raid development at the expense of stuff they like.

You make some good points here, but I contend that the segmentation approach (PVE area 1 is for Type A players while PVE area 2 is for Type B players) isn’t a sustainable model for the game. It create have and have not mentalities (talking in terms of experience, not rewards) and encourages elitism (not calling anyone elitist) – and, just as importantly, it waters down game populations for particular areas.

Let’s look at fractals as a good example. I lead a guild of about 200 active members. Of those members, about 10-12 love the T4 fractals and run them every day. But, at the same time, I see dozens of members in T1 and T2 fractals every week just because they want to do something other than open world. It’s something else they can enjoy with their friends. The tiered model works – while still giving players some very real challenges to overcome and unique rewards to earn. Simply put, they do it because it is fun for them.

Raids are the only part of the game the more casual players feel like they are locked out of (whether they are or not is moot – it is the perception that matters). And, raids are something they would (I believe based on what I see in my guild) enjoy if they could at a more casual pace.

I don’t want to take anything away from anyone. I don’t really care about the reward issue. I think the idea of prestige or entitlement in a video game is silly. I want people to just enjoy themselves playing a fun game. My goal in speaking out on the forums is – and has always been – advocating for something I think my guildees and friends would find enjoyable and fun. That is all there is to it.

Imo, this whole argument is moot. I’ve said it before – tying legendary armor to any single game mode (including raids) was a mistake. Legendary should denote mastery of EVERY part of the game, with activities required in WvW, PvP, open world PVE and instanced PVE (dungeons, fractals and raids).

What we have now isn’t legendary – neither the weapons nor the armor. It is something players can grind or buy their way to achieving (even the raid stuff). It isn’t seen as an indicator of skill by most in the game (like it should be).

To add to that – stat and rune swapping are quality of life features – not legendary rewards. They are not indicators of skill and should not be held as a reward.

In GW2, the look of the gear (the skins) is what is supposed to set it apart and let other players know (alongside titles) which part of the game they have mastered. With HOT and raids, Anet pretty much decided to ignore this key legacy selling point of the game – and the animosity and drama we are seeing now is a direct result of that decision.

This sounds awesome. Can’t wait to see it in action.

And I like that they are taking a cautionary approach with an in game trial as well. It may end up being disastrous (even though I don’t think it will), but I hope people give it a legitimate change before writing it off.

Expressing any opinion other than raids are great as is will get you attacked on these forums. It’s pretty much an uphill battle to get any other opinion heard on these forums any longer.

Rest assured, however, that as new raids or other raid related news come out, new people will continually bring this up (as your post continues to prove – unfortunately usually to cave under the hate of the forums after a week or two. It has been the case for the past two years.

Hopefully Anet understands that just because people don’t want to subject themselves to the forums doesn’t mean this isn’t something they still care about.

They never made us buy a glider. That was given to us with the completion of the mastery.

They sold us skins to change the look of the functional device – and I fully expect them to do the same thing with mounts (actually look forward to it).

We were told from day one that part of the game’s monetary system would be cosmetic items on the gem store (which can still be bought with gold, btw). There is nothing nefarious or surprising about it.

Just a few points:

• Four years and almost three months since the last new one.

• Just prior to the launch of HOT, the game lead talked about how excited they were to see what kind of missions the guild team would create in the new zones (https://youtu.be/W1WBYEfJVb4?t=339).

• Guild hall progression and features are still directly tied to currency obtained from guild missions.

• Personal rewards for missions haven’t been updated to include new stat sets.

• In the PoF promotions, they tout bounties as a “new” feature and seem to have forgotten it was something they should have been updating for the past 4.5 years.

I know they want to focus on the new shiny stuff they can put in a press release, but missions were something that excited a lot of players/guilds – and many guilds (like mine) still use them as a way to bring everyone together in PVE once a week.

I really wish someone at Anet would just let us know how (or even if) the further development of missions fits into the development schedule. Some of us have been waiting a VERY long time for any kind of new information on the topic.

I think people are overreacting a bit. I look at mounts as just this map’s masteries – special abilities similar to gliding/mushrooms/etc that add a little fun to moving around the map.

Overall, the expansion looks good. Should be a good addition to the game.

They didnt mention guild halls, guild missions, fractals, pvp, jumping puzzles or wvw either – but I’m confident they are coming. I wouldn’t read too much into what they did or didn’t talk about in the early announcement.

Mike O’Brien, in the “Message from the Game Director” shows that how much he and his team understand the importance of customer feedback and iterative design when it comes to shiny new content. I am encouraged by the statements he makes and can see the vision he outlines clearly manifest in each new update.

But it still falls a little short in an important area for me. New content and game systems are important. They keep the game fresh and alive. But they are only half of the GW2 equation.

Where the Anet team fails to deliver, imo, is in support of existing, successful game content. While the newest zone/fractal/etc feels exciting, things like guild halls, holiday events, guild missions, etc feel more and more outdated and, often abandoned.

And it is the existing elements – especially those that were obvious successes (eg, guild missions) – that keep communities engaged in the game in between the big new shiny drops.

So if Anet is listening – kudos to a job well done on things like Siren’s Call or the new fractal – but please don’t let the shiny new thing overshadow the need to continually updated and support older systems.

As a few glaring examples -

• when HOT launched, the last game director talked about how he really looked forward to what the guild team could do in the HOT zones as it pertained to guild missions (https://youtu.be/W1WBYEfJVb4?t=337). That was the last time it was even mentioned by Anet. Now, even the existing missions (races and prisoner 1141 bounty particularly) are bugged (and have been for more than a year now).

• shortly after HOT, in response to criticism of the small PVP area in guild halls, the guild team said they were working on an instanced areas for the guild halls that would be bigger and more accommodating to guild groups looking to have fun in a dedicated pvp arena

• holidays (wintersday, halloween, SAB, etc) are now on a copy/paste loop from year to year, even though the community has responded well to pretty much everything new added to them – and some (like queens gauntlet and the sanctum) seem to have been forgotten completely.

TL;DR:

The point here is – yes, the new stuff is important, but so is the old stuff. Please dedicate some resources to updating and keeping things like guild missions, guild halls, holidays, etc fresh and fun. It really would go a long way to addressing complacency and attrition between major updates.

Update itself was enjoyable, but kinda frustrated we just went an entire expansion without a single new guild mission.

I agree in spirit, but Im not sure the proposed solution would fix the underlying issue.

Groups will still look for builds that can maximize uptime of particular boons, most notably might, quickness and alacrity, even if they aren’t 100%. In fact, it is more likely to exacerbate the issue, encouraging groups to bring 3 chronos or might sharing warriors.

It isn’t an easy issue to solve and i don’t pretend to know the math. My first reaction is the one Ive seen many share – boons need to cap at 10 people. That alone would lessen the demand for particular professions in more difficult content. Beyond that, mesmers need a high dps build for PVE that is separate from the boon sharing build.

Again, I agree that something needs to be done to change the current boon sharing meta and encourage more profession/build diversity, but im not sure eliminating 100% uptime is the answer.

Guild missions were my favorite part of the game – cool rewarding activities to do with my guildmates and friends.

It has now been 4 years and 2 months since they added the last guild mission to the game. When HOT launched, they even said they “looked forward to what the team was doing” in the new zones.

I really hope they haven’t let this important part of the game slip away .

And, as a reminder AGAIN -

https://youtu.be/W1WBYEfJVb4?t=336

As a reminder – Liadri had variable levels of difficulty through the use of gambits, and, at the base level, wasn’t overly difficult for most professions regardless of gear. It was when you cranked up the gambits that the fight became a real challenge. Even more importantly, the fight, since it was solo, didn’t have the social component raids do – or any lore/story tie ins. As a result, it didn’t have the same potential social impact raids have on guilds or groups of friends.

It was a good example of how to implement challenging content. Too bad they haven’t revisited the gauntlet in a really long time.

My suggestion – spend some time with the LFG tool, even at lower levels, to get involved with some world boss kills. Not the most challenging content, but it will give you a small taste of what makes this game special to people like me.

Specifically, that is the vibrant open world playground for the community as a whole. Compared to games like WoW, you will likely find the instanced stuff in GW2 lacking. GW2 will never do that kind of content as well as games that focus more on it.

Where this game really shines is in open world – playing alongside dozens, or potentially 100+, other players as you explore the world and kill enemies. It will never be overly challenging, but it is engaging and fun for many of us.

Also – the game is a lot more fun with a good guild. I would make that step one.

Addition – and definitely give WvW a try.