Guild Wars 2

These are all great suggestions! I’m just getting logged in, but they explained some stuff through the UI. I’m gonna keep an eye on the expansion info, and I noticed the hero point system I need to look into that further as well. Thanks all, so far I am very happy how smooth the game runs, its aging nicely.

Hey guys,

I’ve been absent from the game for almost 2 years and I was just wondering if anyone has recommendations for priorities that I should complete or other tasks that should be done to get ready for the expansion, or any pertinent content that I should check out. Thanks for the help

-Dungin

Is that not a legit way to do it? I thought I’ve heard this being suggested for people that cannot finish it the normal way.

cainejw.7142:

So far, there are eight skins in the vendor:

Wooden Dagger
Bell Focus
Candy-Cane hammer
Pop Gun
Princess Wand
Slingshot
Toy Staff
Toy Sword

There are 10 skins for sale with gems:

Short Bow
Hammer
Axe
Greatsword
Dagger
Long Bow
Shield
Sword
Pistol
Staff

This means that if you want your weapon to be festive as a user of the long bow, axe, great sword, shield, or pistol, you have to go the gem route. For those who use mace, warhorn, torch, harpoons, spears, and tridents…you’re out of luck.

So, why is it that some weapons get vendor skins, some get gem skins, and almost half get jack squat? I would like for a developer to actually answer this inequity in their design.

Stating a lack of resources is not a reason when the developers clearly managed to design two staves, two swords, two bows, and two hammers.

I guess. People complained when they were a very rare drop and 40 gold plus a piece during Halloween. “Why can’t we just buy the for gems” Well now you can. There is no way to please em’ all. I will say though Mace and Pistol could use more skins in general.

Mkalafut.1273:

Up to almost a gold per piece… Really guys?

Can someone enlighten me as to how they are acquired so I can complete my festivities and not pay tribute to the a##hole troll toll players?

I’ve got some stuffing to sell!

I think removing account bound would solve the issue. I’d agree this can’t hurt anyone. I do agree with the monetization of the other 3 pets from the events though, choose 2 from grinding, pay $$ for the rest. I think that’s a good way to do it. No Buy for power, and people can buy the ones that they want.

ObliviousFool.3427:

Actually though I just finally realized why GW2 has turned into a big cash grab for ANET. I did not realize the elder scrolls mmo had a ten minute video on their website and the game is pretty close to release, IE what happened to WoW when GW2 came out is soon to happen to GW2 when elder comes out. Bethesda has never disappointed EVER with elder games and the game looks stunning. And no I don’t work for them but I’d like to cause man its gonna be amazing. So go ahead ANET continue to disappoint the masses. There is not much time left.

It is a theme park Elder Scrolls game. I’m not sure why people are excited about it. Looks pretty, but so does every other themepark. The next big MMO has to mix in the sandbox or it just won’t stand out. Let me rephrase that. It won’t chip away at WoW

ObliviousFool.3427:

Dungin.2983:

Necrid.2705:

What was the point of screwing us on this event, Anet?

The promised Gifts from each location turned out to be a lie.

The possibility of using the leftovers to make tonics will bleed you dry.

The mats required costs a ridiculous amount of gold.

This event proved one thing. Anet cared more about creating a giant Gold Sink and driving up Gems sales, that they care not for the player community and how it affected most of us.

Take a look at the GW2 economy Anet. And the real world economy at that. 90% of the wealth is held by the super rich. Most of us regular players have about 3-10 gold at any given time depending on what we just finished.

1600+ Gems + 23+Gold later and I have absolutely nothing to show for it because of this failure of an event.

Needless to say Anet, you have let us down. All your future events will be weighed out against this one. Seeing as how this was your biggest holiday event of the year, you really blew it Anet. You may not feel it now, but you have set a precedent for what to expect from you in the future.

What a waste. So much for being “for everyone”. You really went back on a lot of promises with this event. Your player community will remember that. You have single-handedly caused players to punch through their monitors at the ridiculous rate you can achieve anything with this Holiday event. With everything being account bound anyways, what a waste.

To the lucky few who was able to afford getting everything they wanted, and had the gold or money to put into gems, honestly, congrats, I envy you highly.

Everyone else, like me, will walk away from this with nothing but disappointment and a severe, deep scar on our hearts for Anet.

You certainly made a statement with this Anet: " The poor (ingame or in real life) are not welcome to enjoy the fruits of your holiday events. "

Is this the message we should expect from Anet for all future events? Should the normal crowd stop participating because we will always have less until we get that 1 lucky precursor drop or spend hours upon hours in your broken dungeons to farm up a few gold. Diminishing Returns makes regular mob-farming impossible after 45-mins to an hour. WTF Anet? Your message is pretty consistant over and over. Bring your wallets or do without.

Take a good hard look at the message you have sent to us Anet. Is this the message you meant to send?

Ultimately, what corrective motions are you going to take in order to correct this mistake and give us an ACTUAL reward for participating in your first ever Wintersday event? Or are you seriously going to sit back and be happy with being the Grinch/Scrooge. So much for Holiday spirit. We’ve all been had. “How Anet stole Christmas”.

I could go on, but there is really no need. Anet, your player community has spoken in many ways about this event. I hope you take the time to seriously reflect on the message you sent to us all. Your community will never forget the Christmas that Anet Scrooged us. You can never redo your first Wintersday event. You dropped the ball Anet. Please pick it up and show some love for those of us in your community who are not in positions to put 200Gold into gems, or buy 2000 gems outright.

Honestly. I would expect this kinda of treatment from the United States Government. I would have never expected it from you Anet.

What specifically did you not get that you wanted? All of the weapon skins were super cheap on the TP, the ones in the gemstore were reasonable.

That just leaves minis, which, they appear to be taking advantage of the completionists a bit with it. I never collected the minis so I don’t really get it

The only way you got ‘nothing’ from this event was if you were chasing minis which you didn’t specify.

Last time minis were easy weapons were harder, it flip-flopped this time; I don’t really see the problem unless you HAVE to have 100% of all minis. In which case, as many before me have pointed out being a collector IS expensive.

Ok, lets look past the completionist mini thing, you know the shady drug dealer style scam thing……

HTF can you possibly justify urinating away 4 endless tonics that are no small feat to acquire for a small chance at an account bound toy maker tonic? I have not even tried yet for an endless tonic and there is no way I would put them into the forge at this point but I feel so bad for people that decided to invest their frames this way and go robbed during this supposed to be cheerful holiday season.

Then don’t take the gamble. I don’t use the $500 slot machines in Vegas either. Getting greedy is what bites people a lot of the time honestly. You can’t take one or two things that you are happy with you have to get them all. Being a collector is expensive.

ObliviousFool.3427:

Ef anyone who tries to get anet back in this. Shady drug dealer tactics on the mini-pets and mystic forge taking 4 endless and not giving the toymakers is complete BOLLOCKS totally inexcusable and not in the christmas spirit as all. Regardless of any of the other cool stuff they did these two points make x-mas TOTAL FAIL as far as customer relations is concerned.

Dude the mystic forge has been here for months, and has always been a slot machine, why do people expect this to change!?!?

As far as christmas stuff there was the 2 toys that were easy to get that were free not to mention the availability of the christmas skins on the TP were very reasonable or easy to get with socks/sweaters/etc. That part was pretty christmassy if that is a word.

ObliviousFool.3427:

What sticks out in my mind the most about this holiday event are two things:

A: Shady drug dealer tactics – here have 2 free mini pets but if you want them all buy gem beeeotch (extremely unnecessary and not in the christmas spirit at all) YES I know I don’t HAVE to, but there are already minis I HAVE to buy gems for so they should have left it at that and allowed us to grind the rest.

B: putting 4 ENDLESS TONICS into forge for SMALL chance at getting toymaker is such a horridly wrong thing to do to people at christmas and shows HANDS down that anet does not care about us AT ALL.

There is really no rational defense for these two actions and anyone who tries to defend these two actions is either a total fan boy or works for anet. Sorry but FAIL company ethics and morals.

So everyone should have everything then? Then nothing would be special. If arenanet didn’t have RNG people would literally have everything, and we would have 1000’s of people running around with unbrekable choir bells.

Let me state I do not agree with their loot tables in the regular game much, I think they do a pretty poor job on that.

The crux of the argument is: What if you just got in-game mail with every single item you could get in it with no effort. Would anyone actually care about any particular item? Would anything be special?

Also, they have to monitize their game, you don’t pay a monthly fee. None of this is selling power.

Necrid.2705:

What was the point of screwing us on this event, Anet?

The promised Gifts from each location turned out to be a lie.

The possibility of using the leftovers to make tonics will bleed you dry.

The mats required costs a ridiculous amount of gold.

This event proved one thing. Anet cared more about creating a giant Gold Sink and driving up Gems sales, that they care not for the player community and how it affected most of us.

Take a look at the GW2 economy Anet. And the real world economy at that. 90% of the wealth is held by the super rich. Most of us regular players have about 3-10 gold at any given time depending on what we just finished.

1600+ Gems + 23+Gold later and I have absolutely nothing to show for it because of this failure of an event.

Needless to say Anet, you have let us down. All your future events will be weighed out against this one. Seeing as how this was your biggest holiday event of the year, you really blew it Anet. You may not feel it now, but you have set a precedent for what to expect from you in the future.

What a waste. So much for being “for everyone”. You really went back on a lot of promises with this event. Your player community will remember that. You have single-handedly caused players to punch through their monitors at the ridiculous rate you can achieve anything with this Holiday event. With everything being account bound anyways, what a waste.

To the lucky few who was able to afford getting everything they wanted, and had the gold or money to put into gems, honestly, congrats, I envy you highly.

Everyone else, like me, will walk away from this with nothing but disappointment and a severe, deep scar on our hearts for Anet.

You certainly made a statement with this Anet: " The poor (ingame or in real life) are not welcome to enjoy the fruits of your holiday events. "

Is this the message we should expect from Anet for all future events? Should the normal crowd stop participating because we will always have less until we get that 1 lucky precursor drop or spend hours upon hours in your broken dungeons to farm up a few gold. Diminishing Returns makes regular mob-farming impossible after 45-mins to an hour. WTF Anet? Your message is pretty consistant over and over. Bring your wallets or do without.

Take a good hard look at the message you have sent to us Anet. Is this the message you meant to send?

Ultimately, what corrective motions are you going to take in order to correct this mistake and give us an ACTUAL reward for participating in your first ever Wintersday event? Or are you seriously going to sit back and be happy with being the Grinch/Scrooge. So much for Holiday spirit. We’ve all been had. “How Anet stole Christmas”.

I could go on, but there is really no need. Anet, your player community has spoken in many ways about this event. I hope you take the time to seriously reflect on the message you sent to us all. Your community will never forget the Christmas that Anet Scrooged us. You can never redo your first Wintersday event. You dropped the ball Anet. Please pick it up and show some love for those of us in your community who are not in positions to put 200Gold into gems, or buy 2000 gems outright.

Honestly. I would expect this kinda of treatment from the United States Government. I would have never expected it from you Anet.

What specifically did you not get that you wanted? All of the weapon skins were super cheap on the TP, the ones in the gemstore were reasonable.

That just leaves minis, which, they appear to be taking advantage of the completionists a bit with it. I never collected the minis so I don’t really get it

The only way you got ‘nothing’ from this event was if you were chasing minis which you didn’t specify.

Last time minis were easy weapons were harder, it flip-flopped this time; I don’t really see the problem unless you HAVE to have 100% of all minis. In which case, as many before me have pointed out being a collector IS expensive.

arrownin.3128:

Mike.9451:

Word of advice: buy the mats now (if you need them) while they’re still cheap. The prices are going up now.

Yep, I anticipated that, which is why I bought a ton of them before I made this post

Sooo… How is this post still here then? Isn’t that a violation of code of conduct on forums? I’ve been infracted for 1/10th of what this infers.

arrownin.3128:

Here’s my quick video showing off the Toy Princess tonic, and showing the recipes for all of the tonics, enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZYI1zQRUIE

I’ll add a bit more detail, since some of you seem to be interested

Recipe for each one:

• 50 Wads of Enchanted Stuffing
• 50 Drops of Magic Glue
• One Pile of Glittering Dust
• Lastly, you will need one of the frames. The frame determines which Endless Tonic you will get, so for example if you wanted the Endless Princess Doll Tonic you would need the Princess Doll Frame

Note: There is about a 1/3 chance that you will get the endless tonic, so there’s some luck involved! However don’t worry, if you do not get the endless tonic, your frame will still be there, it will return to you in the Wintersday gift that you get from the Mystic Forge on failed attempts.

Hmmm this seems fishy. Sounds like someone trying to seed the market, call me a pessimist though. I think I’ll pass.

Vanthian.9267:

I See No Tomorrow.7302:

You want to quit the game because you did not receive a permanent choir bell? I mean, I guess the point of the game for you can be choir bells but I was getting along fine before I knew it existed.

I don’t usually post that somebody is doing something they shouldn’t as everyone has a right to their own opinion, but…a bell? That’s probably the least I’ve seen somebody complain about. Now, I do think you’re entitled to care about it as much as you want and complain about it as much as you want but my personal opinion is that this is a little bit ridiculous to write so much over a bell. I would understand if it was something game breaking but I don’t see not having a bell as breaking the game. My two cents. Probably unwelcome but I couldn’t help pointing out what I see as obvious. If you disagree with me, ignore me, as you should fight for what you believe in.

It is not the bell but the method in which to obtain all the rare items. It is the RNG that is making this unbearable. Not only are the mini’s on a RNG but any item worth having is also on the RNG. In a claimed “skill based” game, there is way to much RNG for high end items.

I don’t mind having a RNG for some items, but not for the vast majority. RNG are the quickest way to split a population of players into a have not and haves. The haves will always be the upper class people in the game because they have the time and money to invest in the product. While all casual and semi casual people will have 0 chance at any decent item.

I like this statement much better. Very well said.

Glektor.2934:

I must agree that the RNG system in this game feels WAY worse than any other game I’ve played. It feels like everything has like 0.00000001% chance to appear in this game.

But, at least you can buy it, like others have said. So, at least there’s some kind of alternative to getting shafted by RNG the entire time and never getting it at all.

So while I disagree with the specific argument of the OP. I will say that I agree 100% with you. I have said this in many posts in the past; The worst thing about Guild Wars 2 In my opinion is not Ascended, the fact that it’s not GW1, empty starter zones, ETC. The loot tables, randomization variety and sense of reward are way off kilter.

Stormleaf.1769:

You could have sold that many gifts for almost enough to simply buy the bell with gold off the TP. Maybe do a bit of research before sinking everything into a gamble and then calling the game a failure because you didn’t get what you want (despite the fact that a guaranteed method of obtaining it was right in front of you).

Sorry you didn’t get it, either way =(

This. Pretty much. It does suck not to get something. If you know it’s RNG going in though , I just don’t understand bashing your head against the wall on it.

Vanthian.9267:

I will start with the usual, “I loved guild wars 1. I logged in more than 2k hours, blah blah blah, but…” on to the post.

The amount of gifts required to get that unbreakable bell must be ungodly. On a statistical bell curve I should have had 2 by now if they have a 0.01% chance to drop. The RNG is killing this game and at this point I am surprised anyone is still left. This is absolutely ridiculous. If you are wondering about what did drop…. attached is a screen shot of all that I got excluding the sweaters. Those I used to buy more giant gifts. In total I used around 3k (maybe 3.2k due to sweaters) gifts. I more than likely won’t be able to bring myself to play any more of RNG Wars 2. So much for skill being the number one thing required in this game. It seems the longer the game is out the more and more it will slip away from what was stated this game was about.

Yes, call me a qqer and complainer and whatever else you want. The fact stands: they are adding new gear and more than likely will have to for a expansion since they are increasing the level cap. The RNG is here to stay and will be king of RNG Wars 2.

Side Note: It would have made more sense to have the bell as reward for getting 100% on all parts (upper, middle, & lower) of the mini bell choir game (not just the lower part), but I assume that goes against their new philosophy.

Side Note 2: What seems to drop with 140% magic find:
(60% from armor + 50% booster + 30% food)

2461 Ugly Wool Sweaters
25 Drops of Magic Glue (in drops of 25)
50 Wads of Enchanted Stuffing (in Wads of 25)
476 Flawless Snowflake (either 1 or in groups of 10)
1 Bell Focus Skin
1 Wooden Dagger Skin
3 Pop Gun Skin
5 Toy Sword Skin
4 Toy Staff Skin
2 Slingshot Skin
5 Princess Wand Skin
16 Giver’s Orichalcum Imbued Inscription
12 Giver’s Intricate Glossamer Insignia
33 Choir Bells (in bundles of 3)
AND SUPPOSEDLY Unbreakable Choir Bell

This is a two part question:

1. If you have 33 Choir bells , why do you need the permanent one? Lots of concerts?
2. Secondly, if the answer to question 1 is you’d like to sell the item, then may I humbly suggest a better farm such as FoTM or COF.

Additionally: What annoys me most about RNG complaints is not so much the fact that the 5% of people that actually WANT this item cant have it; it’s the droves that complain they cant make a quick 80G. If everyone could get it so easily, it would be 60 silver just like the skins.

So if you really want it, go farm COF I’d imagine in far less time you could have one off the TP, if you WANT it that is. I feel like people don’t actually want anything but just to play the TP. I could be wrong though.

I will be honest I’d sell the thing in a minute it’s cute but 80G is much more beautiful. But I am not gunning for it. It’s RNG you get it if you get it.

Edit: I’d also like to point out you picked the ONE of TWO things that are extremely hard to get in the event, I don’t really know what you were expecting man.

Koga.7215:

All i can say is if your guild is not willing to help you do the lower level fractals then you need to find a new better guild filled with people who care for more then just themselves.

while I (and guild) prefer to run 10+ and evens only, we run lower level fractals (maybe with alts) to catch guildies up so we have a larger pool to do our dailies with and not need to run pugs. It is also helpful to get people your regularly running with up to 10+ for better gear to make other runs easier (not that many dung runs are hard)

We also know how bad most pugs are from 1-5 or so as people do not know what they are doing (unless you get someones alt) or have not progressed because they have unstable connections but keep trying to do fractals and thus tend to do them only if we have 3-4 from guild to run them.

I ran my first 10+ pug and it was night and day from anything I ran 1-9. The whole thing with Jade Maw took about 40 minutes V the usual 1:40 it does with Pre-10 groups…. I’m actually really enjoying it now.

Zen.2450:

I refuse to use GW2lfg because my university AV system has declared it a viral infection node.

I’m stuck at level 1/2 because of this crap. Nobody wants to go through them with me. I can’t even do my monthly because of it.

AN, I’m disappoint that you didn’t include a fix this patch.

Do you have a smartphone? (or even a regular phone with a web browser might get it, pretty simple site) Smartphone would be perfect.

Best thing until there is something official. They did a great job on it imo.

SolaceIX.2310:

Now that mostly everyone is in the 10-20+ range, the people who didn’t bum rush the dungeon when it released are basically stranded in the single digit difficulties. There is no reason (that I know of) for anyone to go from level 26 to level 3, and do it all over again.

Now I’m not against having the ascended tier of gear, which is amazing gear, but unfortunately, I’m basically locked from getting it due to my FotM level.

Just wanted to share my thoughts on that.

Also, it doesn’t really seem like anyone wants to do the original dungeons anymore either. Took me a week and a half to find a group to finish my personal story.

As I much as I didn’t really want it, I’d love to have NPC heroes/henchies to help when finding a group can take a whole day or more.

I second GW2lfg.com it is even a sticky in this very thread. Until the team comes up with a true LFG tool this is the next best thing. I haven’t had any issues. You are basically polling all servers and can match-make through any server via overflows.
Have fun!

arjeidi.2690:

This is the single most desired item in all of Wintersday, for me. My entire goal this holiday is to get this weapon skin. As many as possible for my characters.

Pretty cheap on the TP last time I checked. They are definitely more accessible this time!

Malvagite.3254:

i am severely disapointed with this move of making the pets unpurchasable through the trading post as well as unpurchasable outright from the store.

ive spent well over 300 dollars in the shop over 4 months. I dont mind spending money on the game, however, it infuriates me to feel like im being raked over the coals for more and more cash through RNG.

At some point i will just get fed up and quit this kitten.

My 75$ spent on your game a month through non RNG purchases isnt enough for you Anet>????

You really want to treat your cash spending customers like this?

If you think people will continue to put up with these sale practices forever, keep dreaming. I am willing to spend money in your shop…and have. Stop acting like you want to rip me off on top of that~!

It kills me….Why don’t people just wait? The event runs till January 3rd. You can learn from what other people post on the forums. I wait see how it goes buy what I can off the TP and call it a day. You can get what you want with exception of the pet from the TP…..I do feel bad for pet collectors, but thankfully I have zero pets. I like weapon skins

Camulos.7869:

I think the title says it all. I just wish I could buy things in the gem store and gift them to friends who don’t have the luxury. Tis the season after all, plus you make more money!!

I like this idea, would definitely be nice to see this option. Of course you could always buy someone a gem store gift card

HeeHee.5208:

First, Anet stops online sales of GW2 near the start of launch for players.

Second, Anet willing to give a refund on a purchase over 180 days old while Blizzard refuses to give refunds (Diablo 3) to the extent that the South Korean? government intervened and fined it.

Good on Anet!

This. There are two things I respect about Arena Net.

1. They will not be bullied by their player base (unlike WoW) — This was even shown in the beginning when they were dropping the ban hammer like no ones business; and even more recently when they mass banned bots. They take their game seriously.
2. They have shown good business ethics in regards to refund policy. We can all agree that changes made aren’t for everyone and they are allowing people an out.

I personally respect that they do not cow tow or are not bullied by their fans. They listen, but they stick with the plan as they see it.

HeeHee.5208:

First, Anet stops online sales of GW2 near the start of launch for players.

Second, Anet willing to give a refund on a purchase over 180 days old while Blizzard refuses to give refunds (Diablo 3) to the extent that the South Korean? government intervened and fined it.

Good on Anet!

This. There are two things I really respect about Arena Net

Yeap. This is why I play GW2 and will do so for the foreseeable future. That and i run this game at 40 FPS and have no business doing so with my 6 year old computer (although I did upgrade the video card..) They did a great job with engine optimization and casual access. Complaints, aside, this part of the game is top-notch.

nachtnebel.9168:

Show Spoiler

hide spoiler

Storywise it absolutely makes sense that you can’t beat Zhaitan on your own, he’s an Elder Dragon and you really should need an army to defeat him. So I get why they decided to put the final fight in a dungeon.

You can do almost everything (besides dungeons an therefor the final story quest) on your own which makes the game quite solo friendly. Yes, you can’t finish the story line on your own, but then again they just said the game would be solo friendly and not completely doable without others.

The only way around this was hired henchman like in GW1. However, it is my opinion that all dungeon story modes should be re-geared to give out no tokens and should be soloable.

Bvhjdbvkjf.1987:

Apparently Guardians can solo their personal story until the end dungeon…

All I know is that taking my Elementalist down the Vigil path turned out to be quite a poor decision. I was so focused on story I didn’t stop to think that they would make it nigh impossible for scholars to do that quest line.

Would love to see the story get balanced so all professions can solo their story – kinda rediculous that I’ll have to get help to progress without annoying amounts of armor repair costs.

I did with an engineer also till the last one. Arah is even tougher to get a group for though now than it was the month ago I completed mine. Good luck my friend!

jazzllanna.1278:

Dungin.2983:

This brings up a more important question. Precursors come from JP chests?

i think they drop from the wvw jumping chests not sure on others though

Ah. That chest is significantly better than all others so that makes sense.

This brings up a more important question. Precursors come from JP chests?

Mousethecat.1835:

I don’t believe in drop-rate nerfs. Unless the patch notes specifically state so, nothing changes. There is logic and reason behind every price shift…

Dyes
Supply:
-Less bots and overall-players leveling characters. Personally, about 80-90% of the unid dyes I was acquiring was while leveling from 1-80 doing quests in zones. While leveling my 2 80s, I ended with about 60-70 unid dyes per character when I was done leveling (Averaging maybe 1 an hour, and I don’t know of people getting significantly higher rates than that).
-As far as I know, you can’t really farm dyes. It’s hard to maintain a supply on a high demand item if players can’t farm it.
-There was that incident where they unintentionally raised the drop rate of unid dyes. Which caused a temporary surge in supply, dropping the price. This created a bit of a bubble, which popped the moment they announced the accident/fix and people rushed to buy the cheap dyes before they weren’t cheap anymore. A lot of people think they reduced the rate to lower-than-before, I don’t think that’s true.
Demand:
-There are ~400 different colors to unlock.
-Colors are only unlocked on the character that used it.
-Some people are completionists (Apparently, a lot of people who play this game are) and are unlocking every single color on their character.
-You can mystic forge dyes. I could make a whole other list on why this affects an items demand (And supply).

Ectos
Supply:
-As far as I know. The only thing that would have recently affected the supply of ectos, was the karka uber-loot chest. Causing a short burst of increased supply, shortly followed by….
Demand:
-The discovery that ascended items need another truck-load of ectos. That’s really it. The sheer amount of ectos a player needs to forge the items caused enough players to “buy now before it’s too late”, driving the price up steadily since. It’ll normalize once more people get their ascended items, then raise again once more ectos are needed for new ascended items when they’re released.

Chocolate
Supply:
-They made chocolate harder to obtain a while back, so really, chocolate was prepared for a price hike. It just took the anticipation (And a few forum posts here and there) of the holiday season to cause people to speculate enough drive the price up.
Demand:
-Upcoming Holiday season + Trader speculation to the extreme.
-It’s chocolate. Everyone loves chocolate!

Great post. This is pretty much why they can’t increase the drop rates of exotics and rares though. Or add them to all champions as people are suggesting. Champs aren’t that hard to kill and there are a lot of them. If they were guaranteed to drop a rare or exotic or even had a 50% chance the market would tank and inflation would abound.

It does make the game a bit boring though when RnG isnt happening for you.

Vinny.6924:

This is a trend that everyone is going to begin to see with Nnet. And I call them Nnet for Nerf Net. Everything they have done since the game came out is nerf.

The increase in loot did not take right. Vets and champs still drop nothint but blues and sometimes nothing at all. Never an exotic.

Salvage rates in ectos with mystic kits are horrendous. I get 1 or none every time I attempt it. I never end up with more ecto then rares started with. It used to be 2-3 every salvage!

Dye drop rates. O M G. 1 dye a day if youre lucky.

Its bad man, really bad. They have created somewhat of a depression as far as loot goes and its driving costs up across the board. While at the same time pushing people away and making others quit. Which in turn reduces farming and therefore supply.

Hey Nnet. Time to buff something for once.

I cosign this. My biggest problem with this game (is not ascended gear, is not vertical progression, is not that it is not GW1) is Loot tables…The loot tables in this game have just always been very wonky and RnG dependent.

The problem is with rares and exotics is they have tied these to Ecto so if they increase the drop rate the value of said Ecto will fall making legendary and high end exotics easier to get. In turn, it will drive the price down of everything and devalue what’s already there.

So my analysis is they are great at balancing the economy but the itemization of their zones is awful.

Navi.7142:

Yeah, I am not sure what they are thinking. They could make a lot of money, if they offer them in the gem shop.

I can’t help but to think the gambling is projecting them more money since they continue to use this model. It would seem odd to me that they would intentionally not produce themselves revenue.

Maybe they should throw one up and see how the money is before just RNG’ing everything again?

That said, the people handling this are pretty savvy; I doubt they would be doing something that would produce less revenue on purpose. There is a reason for everything , the reason for this is that, in all likelihood RNG projected more profit than direct purchase items.

Food for thought.

penatbater.4710:

I’d rather hope they make it into brackets, say 1-5, then 6-10. Then as long as you’re in a 1-5 bracket, the 1-5 is almost the same, difficulty increases by a bit ofc, (and rewards as well), but generally the same difficulty. Then even if the lowest member of the group is lvl 1, as long as you do a frac run from this dungeon, you get a +1. this way, you won’t have to wait for a group wtih the same level to do, yet you still progress.

Yeah well looks like other posters have already stated what i did below. LOL . but yeah, seems most of us are coming to this conclusion so it would be logical this is what is going to happen.

Knote.2904:

Awesome to hear that they’re working on this.

Does anyone know if there is actually a difference in difficulty from 1-9? I never really noticed any.

Increased mob health pool, increased amount of MOBS. That’s about it.

Mostly same. Each just takes a tad bit longer.

Knote.2904:

I’ve been enjoying the dungeon, and glancing now and then at the massive hatestorm with it, however the only real issue I personally have with the dungeon (besides disconnect issues) is how much it splits players up.

I think Anet went a little bit overboard with the amount of difficulty levels. Not only does it make it much harder to actually find a group for your character’s specific level, it also makes it a big PITA to group (well, “progress”) with guildies unless you all decide to not PUG whatsoever.

I’ve gone back to lower levels to help other guildies try to catch up to my level in hopes that we could be on the same level and progress together, but it just doesn’t end up working out. Most of our guildies are on completely different levels.

And since the difficulty doesn’t really change at all (not that I noticed) besides going into a new +10 tier it just seems sort of pointless. I think it would’ve been alot better had they cut down on the levels a bit perhaps making it either 1 tier every 5 levels and just require 2 runs to upgrade a level?

Or perhaps just have a progress bar to upgrade to the next tier so the 1-10 tier simply becomes an Exp bar of sorts that you fill up doing 1-10 runs. And if the difficulty from 1-10 actually does change (again not very noticable really) then just take the average progress level of each party member and set the difficulty for that tier (with anyone 11+ counting as lvl 10).

Ex : 5 people group up with levels : “24, 20, 6, 9, and 1” (first 2 count as lvl 10) group can only do Tier 1 Difficulty at difficulty level : 7.2

Atleast this way the difficulty levels wouldn’t fragment the playerbase/guild members so much. (LFG Tier 1, LFG Tier 2, etc).

Yeah, I guess they are working on it. I play mostly at night and it has been a problem. To be honest, it’s not so bad during peak play hours. No rush really anyway for me, I’m on 6 and will get to 10 at some point. You can also run lower levels for tokens if you are willing to take the hit. you still get 15 tokens plus some nice loot every run so … eh. I’d say it’s not as big of a deal as people are making it, but I would like to see level brackets.

I.E, 1-9 (all players gain one level no matter their dungeon level)
10-19
20-25
25-30

This way you would not be at a disadvantage for experienced players for the difficulty , in addition to that, infused gear etc would not effect anything because you’d still have to be within a reasonable level range to join and benefit the party.

So, I will try to keep this short and to the point:

As a preface, I like the fractals and I believe it was a great addition to the game. I think its necessary. What we can mostly agree on, is that the gear tier was not necessary.

I’m somewhere in the middle on this topic, but I dislike how it is separating and dividing the community. I for one don’t have a huge problem with the ascended gear other than it’s effect on the overall mood of folks. (I also don’t think Volcanus should cost 650 gold…but hey..)

How do we fix it? What is to be done?

Folks have suggested that we remove Ascended gear from the game. I would say that the answer is going to be a negative. So what do we do? Some quick ideas:

I am not a coder or a programmer, so some of this may be difficult but I think would be great:

1. Scaling. Why not scale all Ascended gear to exotic stats in the open world? You could take this even further and make Ascended Gear < Exotic gear in open-world situations. Conversely, you could make the Ascended gear > Exotic gear in dungeon/raid gear treadmill situations only.;Thus making this gear ONLY necessary or beneficial during these (what I believe to be necessary) endgame areas. There is a scaling system in place, it can’t be that hard to apply this to gear (or can it?).

2. Immediately render Ascended items useless in WvW — Soon please (I’d hope this happens anyway) Personal note: I don’t even play WvW, but a new tier has no place there.

3. To coincide with a re-working of the statistical advantages of Ascended, develop a system of progression within the current parameters (including legendary) that makes sense for both casual, hardocre, and cashicore.

4. Guild Wars 2 Hardcore server: The entire thing plays like SPVP; with progression being limited to cosmetic items only.

5. Guild Wars 2 Classic Server: Entire progression mimics GW1; great for those with nostalgia.

Let’s make it happen folks

Ohoni.6057:

And they never have been. The stuff that you can get out of a Black Lion chest are mostly junk, and yet I have about 80 of them with not nearly enough keys to open them. Currently, Black Lion Keys are on “sale” for 80 cents each, or 5 gold each if you convert gold to gems. I have never received either 80 cents worth or 5 gold worth out of a Black Lion chest, even when that chest contains a new key (which hasn’t happened to me since beta). Even at the sale price it would cost me $64 to clear my inventory of chests, or 427 gold, which is the cost of almost any two precursors, and about 15 times more gold than I’ve ever accumulated between all my characters.

ANet needs to drastically and permanently alter the cost/value balance of black lion keys, so that a player can reasonably afford to open all the chests he receives. Here are some suggestions:
A: make gold far more common, deflating the economy, such that spending 5 gold on a key is as casual as deciding to take a waypoint someplace, mere pocket change.
B: make gems far cheaper to buy with gold, so that would take perhaps only around 10s to purchase the 60 gems needed to buy one key on “sale”.
C: make keys cost way fewer gems, so that you could spend around 10s on enough gems to buy a key.
D: Make the contents of the chest guaranteed to be worth far more than they currently are, like at least one non-consumable goodie. There is not one item I’ve found in a Black Lion chest that I would pay even 1g for on the TP, so asking 1.25g per item is a bit silly.
F: Make chests drop far less common, so that you rarely find more chest than you do keys. Based on current rates that would have to be around 1/50th as common. Of course, you’d also need a temporary method to let players clear their existing inventory.
G: Make a permanent recipe similar to the Mad King’s Chest that allows you to combine four chests into one “super chest” that has a much higher rate of quality drops and a much lower rate of consumables, so that the total contents of the “super chest” would be well worth the 20g it would cost. Maybe a precursor or several exotics.

I like C and D the best, but any of them would do. Does anyone else have better ideas?

The information is out there on keys. IF you don’t want to buy them …don’t buy them? I stopped after the Halloween fiasco and vetted the consortium chests to figure out they were no go. Now, BLC do have nice boosters in them that are not available individually, so if you desire those they aren’t so bad.

For people looking for a quick buck it is a no-go though. Consortium chests are worse IMO.

Swamp is not that hard. It’s annoying, but as people are learning things I find a mixture of guildies and PuG’s to be fine. Nothing is insurmountable, and I do enjoy how Arena Net like to make hard things.

Magnetron.5823:

For me its like this;

Sparks for charged lodestones: 1x in 2 hours ( if i keep it up )
Champions: blues or nothing
Orr chests: blue and greens
Fractals lvl 1 – 4: yellows!
Fractals lvl 4 – 9: greens and blues

My only way to make money is to work with the trading post. I hope Anet does realise that you need tons of gold in this game to get a legendary.. the Lodestones cost lots of money! (150g for 100 atm) The pre-c is still the same price (200 for sunrise).

So ye, anyone know where we can make some gold while we play the game instead of the TP? :P

This pretty much. The RnG gods were nice to me on Halloween, but in my humble opinion this game’s loot system is the worst thing about it.

Second straight event where its been terrible RnG, I’m pretty sure this is how they plan on doing it. That said, I’d recommend using the TP to buy things like this. It is a little more expensive but assures no needless gambling.

xxxzavulonxxx.8413:

With Lodestones appearing in chests, prices have bottomed out on them. It makes the game way too easy for people. I have seen a lot of whining on forums about rising prices. But there needs to be incentives for people to farm.

Lodestones used to be nice to farm. Now they’re not even going to be worth the effort to open up the temple.

It seems like people whined their way into making endgame content ultra easy to obtain which leaves people who like to have stuff to do like farming with dwindling options other than killing trash mobs in hopes of T6 mats.

Devs should strongly consider removing Lodestones and valuable items out of chests, and let people who want to farm for profit farm for profit. There’s no reason to screw up a decent part of the economy because of whiners.

It is clear that they want no specific group of people to have control over the economy , which is good. I do not , however, agree with the RNG nature of things as alluded to by the person a few posts above me (in reference to the event)

You, my friend, must be absolutely loaded in-game

That is a lot of analysis to give out for free, I can only imagine the fortune amassed thus far before giving this out.

TheMagickDoll.7594:

Sorry A-Net. This whole gambling chest thing is a fail. Better off just selling the items themselves. Its not fun. It only makes people angry. The only entitlement here is people wanting a better game and better shopping experience. Stop this non-sense already.

A side note, excellent and amazing new dungeons, have been a blast to play. Reminds me of old school D&D modules.

The problem is:

No one would give a crap ( and I am reffering to the crowd that buys these chests for a quick buck) about the items if you could buy them. Would the greatsword skin even be on anyone’s wish list if it was 2000 gems (halloween) Ok , there it is, but much like the wow pony of doom, you had to do nothing to get it so no one will care about your super easy to obtain kitten. Wow I got this skin with gems so did everone else. even if they made common weapon skins for sale individually and rare ones in chests peoPle will cry. Hell. People cried about only getting a 20 slot bag and nice trinket (30g in items) for doing a non mandatory event. People here just cry.

That said they do need to retool this gem shop a bit.

While I found these chesta a huge disappointment, I waited till others tried. There is no excuse to not wait and see what people get. Shoot all you have to do is stand in lion’s arch and watch the linking. You can get the thing you want (surprise just like Hallowen) by waiting and using the TP VS RnG….This is why they are tradeable. It really is the ‘fooled me twice shame on me’ situation. If you don’t like this stop supporting the chests. Truth is, much like Haloween people couldnt make a quick buck so they are kitten-hurt.

Anet is leaving this thread open and even responding. So make an informed decision on things you buy. Check the forums, check the trading posts, etc.

I was dissapointed once again with these chests and kept my powder dry. Here’s to hoping the winterfest chest is less of a snoozer.

Sytherek.7689:

Dungin.2983:

Sytherek.7689:

Mr. Whiteside…

Your message does little to allay my concerns about upcoming changes in GW2.

As the game stands now, I have no interest in grinding for a legendary. I dislike most of the skins pertinent to my character, and given my commitments in Real Life, I see no point in the grind. And that’s a GOOD THING — other people can grind, if it makes them happy. But their desire to grind in NOW WAY makes their character “better” than mine, as it stands now.

You’ve wrecked that with the new gear.

My main character has a set of equipment she likes; I play the game for pure enjoyment at this point, and am pleased that I don’t need to grind gear as I did in WoW. I like my Mystic Longbow.

You have just undone my happiness. Now, if I want to do the latest content, I must get a legendary (the bows are just plain ugly or stupid, BTW), because you’ll be making legendaries/ascendeds BETTER than exotics. I’ll need to replace my current weapons and armor with new ones if I expect anyone to bring me along on new content.

Even worse, you’ve gated access to ascended items via multiplayer content. I play at odd hours and when I have a few minutes, or with family. I’m not anti-social, but I don’t like having my character’s viability locked to multiplayer content. It’s no different than forcing PvP players to do PvE for something necessary in WvW — a terrible idea that ruins one of the foundations of GW2, in that I should be able to play how I want.

I do nor want gear progression. You have JUST added gear progression. Why should I trust you to not inflate stats further in future content, and REQUIRE those stats to play new content?

The problem is:

Many people that play the game 3-5 times per week for more than a few hours of time are ready for something new (hence why I’m not in the game and find the forums more entertaining.)

My translation of this post is as follows:

I would like the gear that I have to be the best of the best 1 year from now, so I can log on 3-5 hours per week and run the latest content. I’d like to take breaks for months at a time in a ‘persistent and changing world’ and be able to be on equal ground with all when I return on my whim.

While this is a nice idea it sounds a lot like a single player game. The people that are here the most will dictate the content. I am not saying I am an elite gamer by any stretch, the legendaries are way out of my league. You can’t develop content for people that pop in in a fairweather fashion to play.

As it was all this game had was an altoholic appeal (aka SW:TOR — we know how that worked out..) I hate alts. I don’t want to level my character to 80 to start another. In fact, I did start another, and didn’t even make it to level 10. Why?! Because zones are dead there is nothing to do at endgame except for jumping puzzles with greens that await and pats on the back in the form of achievements.

This isn’t Guild wars 1, in fact, Guild wars 1 was a glorified lobby game (aka single player — yes a game where you could form your own entire groups and never interact with a soul.) So sure, in GW1 you could come back months later and it would be like nothing changed. I bet I could log in now and fire up a group and my armor wouldn’t matter. I also would be playing completely alone. This is not to say GW1 wasn’t an amazing game, but it was not an MMO …BY definition.

I fire up an alt in GW2 and I am playing absolutely alone.

This patch doesn’t fix that, but it gets people playing together again, and in a new shiny area.

You’re quite wrong in your “interpretations.”

To begin with, I’m quite social in-game. Chatting in Guild Chat, helping people with various things; often, I play with family.

Nor am I super-casual. My “/age” is 411 hours on my main, 466 hours total across all characters. That much time should not be considered trivial or super-casual.

As you can see from those numbers, I, too, am a one-character kinda guy. Alts don’t interest me (much).

I was promised no gear progression after 80; many people have quoted ANet’s people saying exactly that. Many people have also done the math, and show that the ascended gear is definitely “better” (stat-wise) than current exotics. Thus gear progression has been added.

Now, if ANet were to commit, promise, that Ascendeds are the final tier of gear, and if they make Ascendeds available thru normal PvE and crafting and WvW, then I’ll have less to complain about.

I can agree with your last paragraph, and I respect your playstyle but I think they handled Halloween well and will respond well here. The live team is all that really gives me hope for this game — I feel the initial concept failed.

Ace.5196:

Tbh, I’m not against this per se. Because I was starting to get a little tired of the game. New fresh content is always nice.

However, as I see it A LOT of people are against it, some even going as far as uninstalling the game. I made the mistake to use ferguson’s crossing as my server and for several personal reasons I can’t switch server. This means that there will be even less people on the servers.
People have really valid points and if you don’t start listen to things that really matter I can’t see guild wars lasting long unfortunately, it’ll be one of those deserted mmo’s where you’ll be lucky to see another player (not bot. Player) outside of a city.

I don’t really see how that differs from right now. This is exactly how it already is outside of Orr and Lion’s Arch. There is a reason behind this. Game is already what you are describing, and has been since the buzz wore off of Halloween.

FaultWeeyam.4302:

If this goes through, I’ve had it. I was betrayed by Blizzard the same way when Crapaclysm came out. Not doing again.

You all get betrayed by games a lot, wow.

Such a strong word for a piece of entertainment. It must be stressful working at arena net and reading these sort of things. Reminds me of the developer in ‘the game’ in The Guild obsessing over the various criticisms he received on message boards and through emails.

Really a betrayal? The drama. Not only is this game free that are TONS of other choices.

Enikuo.9205:

Wintyre Fraust.6534:

Mr. Whiteside confirmed that the manifesto is out the door. The design philosophy has changed. Rare gear is no longer about a sense of achievement, but rather must now feed a sense of progression. Linsey directly implicated that the_ “whole game is the end game” philosophy is dead, as they are concentrating on creating “end game content” and new “end game mechanics” for “high-end players” to serve a sense of progression that is, in her mind, a “basic need for players to feel like they are progressing and growing even after hitting max level.”.

This is one thing that confuses me. Down-leveling, loot scaling, and travel costs all work against that idea of the “whole game is the end game” – it funnels everyone into the Orr “endgame.” Did they intend the game to be so linear?

This. Exactly This.

People love to throw things back in game company’s face it is the new cool thing to do. So , people are dragging out Anet quotes, etc.

You could do that for any game. They are making adjustments based on stats and figures that you or I do not possess.

This short but sweet depiction above is why.

Sytherek.7689:

Mr. Whiteside…

Your message does little to allay my concerns about upcoming changes in GW2.

As the game stands now, I have no interest in grinding for a legendary. I dislike most of the skins pertinent to my character, and given my commitments in Real Life, I see no point in the grind. And that’s a GOOD THING — other people can grind, if it makes them happy. But their desire to grind in NOW WAY makes their character “better” than mine, as it stands now.

You’ve wrecked that with the new gear.

My main character has a set of equipment she likes; I play the game for pure enjoyment at this point, and am pleased that I don’t need to grind gear as I did in WoW. I like my Mystic Longbow.

You have just undone my happiness. Now, if I want to do the latest content, I must get a legendary (the bows are just plain ugly or stupid, BTW), because you’ll be making legendaries/ascendeds BETTER than exotics. I’ll need to replace my current weapons and armor with new ones if I expect anyone to bring me along on new content.

Even worse, you’ve gated access to ascended items via multiplayer content. I play at odd hours and when I have a few minutes, or with family. I’m not anti-social, but I don’t like having my character’s viability locked to multiplayer content. It’s no different than forcing PvP players to do PvE for something necessary in WvW — a terrible idea that ruins one of the foundations of GW2, in that I should be able to play how I want.

I do nor want gear progression. You have JUST added gear progression. Why should I trust you to not inflate stats further in future content, and REQUIRE those stats to play new content?

The problem is:

Many people that play the game 3-5 times per week for more than a few hours of time are ready for something new (hence why I’m not in the game and find the forums more entertaining.)

My translation of this post is as follows:

I would like the gear that I have to be the best of the best 1 year from now, so I can log on 3-5 hours per week and run the latest content. I’d like to take breaks for months at a time in a ‘persistent and changing world’ and be able to be on equal ground with all when I return on my whim.

While this is a nice idea it sounds a lot like a single player game. The people that are here the most will dictate the content. I am not saying I am an elite gamer by any stretch, the legendaries are way out of my league. You can’t develop content for people that pop in in a fairweather fashion to play.

As it was all this game had was an altoholic appeal (aka SW:TOR — we know how that worked out..) I hate alts. I don’t want to level my character to 80 to start another. In fact, I did start another, and didn’t even make it to level 10. Why?! Because zones are dead there is nothing to do at endgame except for jumping puzzles with greens that await and pats on the back in the form of achievements.

This isn’t Guild wars 1, in fact, Guild wars 1 was a glorified lobby game (aka single player — yes a game where you could form your own entire groups and never interact with a soul.) So sure, in GW1 you could come back months later and it would be like nothing changed. I bet I could log in now and fire up a group and my armor wouldn’t matter. I also would be playing completely alone. This is not to say GW1 wasn’t an amazing game, but it was not an MMO …BY definition.

I fire up an alt in GW2 and I am playing absolutely alone.

This patch doesn’t fix that, but it gets people playing together again, and in a new shiny area.