Guild Wars 2

Apparently the “big” thread was closed, so newcomers to the forums won’t notice the big bunch of negative responses so easily. It’s still disappointing that the only information we got is a link to the post we all knew, that does deal with the issue by saying “no it’s ok, everything’s gonna be alright” without any substantial point.

But since I decided to not take this game seriously anymore, the bitterness vanished and maybe the following is more rational and way less emotional than my posts before, so I might just leave this community some thoughts:

Vertical progression is not an inherently bad system, it gives people a continuous stream of stuff to do and as you probably noticed a lot of MMORPGs follow that route because many people like that.
After years of these “traditional” MMOs a good portion of the players either got bored with the system or just don’t want to invest a lot of scheduled time anymore, while still wanting to play the “real” content, when they find time to do so. With vertical progression you have to spend a substantial amount of time before you actually get to the “good stuff”, and this barrier, that grows larger over time as additional ascended items are already announced, can’t be overcome with skill (like: “the only thing that should hinder me from completing a dungeon is me being too bad”) but with time investment and stats (namely agony).
All the rage doesn’t happen because these things are inherently bad, but because the game advertised them at not being there. And as multiple threads on these forums tell you, this was a major selling point for quite a lot of people, that specifically looked for a game that was “different” and didn’t have these properties. And I think it’s justified that these people feel cheated:
Additional vertical progression was added with this patch. No matter how you turn it, items, that have more stats than what was available before, were added with this update. This is no matter of how much better these items are – the ascended items are better, so this IS vertical progression. There is NO arguing around that.

What could have been done instead? How to give players something to work for without inflating stats? Many ways of visual effects haven’t been explored at all. Ascended items with the same stats as exotics, but with added visual effects, that add visuals to skills from your profession mechanic, like a Guardian popping his Virtues infuses affected allies in a color corresponding to the Virtue – that would surely be something other players notice and it gives bragging rights to whomever was able to get this amazing piece of equipment without ever overthrowing the fragile stat balance. Ranger Pets transforming into big fiery phoenixes without changing any of the game mechanics, Engineer turrets, that project a unique symbol in the air above them. Completely recoloring all your fancy attack skills in a different color etc. etc.
It’s really not like all cosmetic options have been covered already, so it’d be impossible to come up with anything new except for stats.

All the best GW2 with your new identity you traded your unique one in for with this patch. I’m out of here!

Daizengar.9836:

Why have fine, masterwork, rare, or exotic tiers? It’s too unfair for those who only have lower tier items! We should just eliminate all items for ever so the babies don’t have to collect a single piece of gear forever.

While you meant this as taunting, actually that would be even better than the current system. We just kinda put up with the exotics (which some people already thought are too much because dungeons are still a little bit about gear and you aren’t immediately at the point where only skill matters), because they were there from the beginning, the amount of time to get them was kinda reasonable and most importantly there was an end in sight.

Personally I would be perfectly content when every armor in the game had the same stats as the stuff you can buy from a vendor for a few copper and get started with the interesting dungeons without ever having to worry about stats anymore. – Because the dungeons and the looks are the fun part, not the better stats on the items.
If I’m not good enough to complete a dungeon – so be it, but I don’t want to come back later with better gear and steamroll it just because of stats, there are enough other games that offer that experience, which I consciously don’t choose to play anymore.

This killed PvE. I don’t understand at all why they are doing this. The shady explanation found here: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/news/A-message-from-our-Studio-Design-Director-Chris-Whiteside/first#post721451 doesn’t really change anything.
No matter how your word it – this is not horizontal progression. This is mandatory gear progression.
Why ArenaNet? – Why?

Guys, calm down! How long is it going to take until you adjusted to the new layout? Two hours? A day? It’s really not a big issue.

The main thing about the symbol was the boon anyway, as the damage is not that breathtakingly great. I think they could give the symbol another boon in addition to retaliation now the CD has been increased.

And 5 seconds off of Leap of Faith is a HUGE buff! This ups the combo potential of the Guardian a lot and there should be more changes in this direction, since this is what the guardian desperately lacks when not wielding a hammer. Also the CD on the Symbol+Leap combo is still about the same since now Symbol is on 20s when before leap was (so it’s only the cast time of the symbol longer if you want to do that permanently).

And I don’t think I need to tell you how good a gap closer+blind is in PvP, so having it available even faster is a good thing. Especially since being kited is a real concern for GS+Hammer Guardians if they don’t bring Judge’s Intervention.

It’s really just a retaliation nerf – all the good things about the GS are still intact.

I agree that the visual tells are often hard to see with all the particle effects flying around. Some animations could use work, but most of the time it’s just a matter of getting used to it.

World Events are perfection? 40 people spamming all their skills for on some champion mob that doesn’t do anything dangerous other than two-shotting one of the forty players every 30 seconds that will be ressed in under 2 seconds by all those people standing around are supposed to be great?
Fun? Yes! – If you do it occasionally.
Challenging? No.

Acutally I’d enjoy giving all those world bosses some one-shot AoE ability with a clear red circle on the ground and a long cast-time if many players join in. That way it’s still not too difficult, but you can’t go brain-afk anymore.

Sahfur.5612:

Yeah, a boss that seems to spam an attack that is able to pull me out of maximum long bow range to melee and whipe the entire group in a one hit ko… that attack needs like a 30 second tell and maybe a reduction in how often he does it. Seriously, we were all doing fine and at full health then he hits that attack once and everyone dies no matter how far they were, and if we somehow res, he kills us while trying to pull the other players up.

It seems you’re talking about Lieutenant Kholer in AC explo. Actually said attack has a tell, but you have to watch very carefully (which I agree is not easy with all the particle effects flying around). The pull-in attack is signified by him raising his sword and a “charging up”-animation on his sword while he makes all his other attacks with his dagger. Still it takes some time to figure out the exact time when to dodge and can be nearly impossible if he spawns with two Warriors, but there is a tell. If you have a Guardian and you stay reasonably close together a well-timed “Stand Your Ground!” can save the whole group.

The more I play the more I discover these very subtle tells from bosses – most of the time it isn’t even necessary to react, since switching to range when you’re hit suffices – but some bosses have these evil abilities. I think we’re just spoiled by DBM and the like that tell you every boss move with big red letters and loud alarms and countdowns and it takes a while to adjust. I’ll probably need a lot more time to stop getting hit by all those knockdown abilities mobs throw around and free up my utility-stun-breaker for something more useful.

Burning as well as poison stack in duration not in intensity. That means if you apply two 3s burns you will get a 6s burn instead of a 3s burn with double the damage.

Apraxas.3685:

SunRain.8972:

Signet of Mercy – does not revive a dead ally only downed ones, has preference to NPC’s more on Party members.

Pretty sure it should only revive them if they are downed, not defeated, just like the warriors banner elite.

I couldn’t get it to work at all – neither on downed allies nor defeated allies. The only thing I managed to revive so far were defeated NPCs that accompany you in the dungeons.

I like the difficulty of AC, but comparing it to the other story mode dungeons I really wonder why AC was used as an introduction for new players to the dungeon system.

Don’t get me wrong here – I really like the challenge the dungeons currently provide.
The only issue I currently have with them is that the difficulty is very INCONSISTENT.

AC Story’s Ralena and Vassar are far harder than the other bosses in that mode and contrary to other story mode dungeons the trash mobs hit like a truck.
AC explo’s Lieutenant Kholer’s difficulty being mainly based on which adds he is accompanied by and being far more punishing for mistakes than the Skelk endbosses of the different paths.

Then with lvl 40 you walk into CM and just march through it without any problems at all and wonder why this instance is so much easier than AC and why AC was thought to be a good fit for introducing players to the dungeon system.

The list with inconsistent boss difficulties goes on.
Twilight Arbor: The second champion with all that ghost spiders – very hard until you figure out how to handle it properly and a mistake still costs you a good chunk of your health.
Then the third champion isn’t even able to damage you seriously even if you choose to ignore all the confusion stacks on you.

Sorrow’s Embrace:
Kudu’s Golems need a good specialization on removing conditions and punish you abruptly if you use your cooldowns on the wrong things and can nuke you promptly if you fail to watch their animations closely.
The endboss can’t even touch you if you keep dancing behind the shields and 2 steps out of it and his animations are very easily recognizable and even if you fail to react in time you usually come out of it alive.
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Yet still I’m itching to see how the other dungeons and explorable modes are designed and looking forward to discover all that the PvE side of this game has to offer.

Those complaining about explorable modes being hard – think again, did you clear all the raid content in other MMOs on the first evening?

Could it be, that you used the “deposit all collectibles” function? Since minipets count as collectible you would find it in the collectibles tab of your bank.