Guild Wars 2

Very nice. I just hope the odds are better on these. I appreciate the gesture regardless though. Thank you.

To all the people who used real life lottery as an argument:

1. The real life lottery has literally millions of dollars at stake and only so many people can win. People know that going in.

2. Next time you look at a lottery ticket, flip it over and look at the back. Every lottery ticket/scratch off/etc. is required by law to list the odds of winning.

3. These are holiday themed skins that can be infinitely generated.

4. Using “colorful” marketing terms like “stocked” gives the impression that you’re going to be getting holiday themed stuff out of at least 50% of the boxes opened.

Kasen.9032:

As the title says is it worth doing on all my alts?

On one hand I would hate to find out at the end of the event It’s a really nice reward that I could have gotten for all my alts but on the other hand I would hate to spend days doing the whole event on alts only to get some crappy reward

Any devs want to comment either way

Well, you get a nice looking back slot item for each, so far.

I dunno about anyone else, but I really love the idea of constantly using Halloween weapons on Christmas, and Christmas weapons on Easter…

Promega.7628:

You can craft the perm skins when ever you want. Get the halloween related components that you need NOW, and work towards the lodestones or what ever else your are crying about later, and do the combine for the perm skin later. There is no 1% issue here just more crying about not getting everything in the game handed to players instantly for no work what so ever…

Well that’s awesome. I can’t wait to enjoy my Halloween staff, this Christmas.

Halloween costumes shouldn’t be rare on Halloween.

matt.8960:

Reginold.8536:

This is the last straw, Anet and Guild Wars 2 have been a bit disappointing but this definitely takes the cake. Even if these skins are rare, people spending hard earned money shouldn’t have to feel like crap when they see NOTHING Halloween-themed drop.

This is what the trolls seem to forget. Most people here have played a few F2P games and know the normal way they do business but expected ANet to be above those practices. I personally was giving them a chance because GW1 was so great. GW2 is a fun game, but cash shops leave a bad taste in my mouth, I was hoping for something different but now that I see it’s exactly the same and have lost any desire I had to continue fueling this. Getting out before it gets even worse this time.

Yeah, I expect this kind of garbage from some Korean grinder from Nexon, or Perfect World Entertainment. Not Arenanet. So far, the cash shop has been the best I’ve ever seen in a game.

knives.6345:

FiachSidhe.3654:

knives.6345:

Jnaathra.6549:

knives.6345:

mastershke.8145:

knives.6345:

deathTouch.9706:

The Age of Entitlement

Why don’t you try refunding your lottery tickets at the gas station after you scratch it off and see how well that goes.

What you “expect” or think you “deserve” to get out of the chests is irrelevant. At no point did Anet give any expectations as to the drop rate of the items in the chest, nor did they force you to open any chests.

You made a conscious decision to buy keys, based on whatever preconceived notions you had concerning the drop rate of items, which ultimately ended up being far removed from reality.

It’s your own fault for making assumptions and impulsively acting on it, especially if doing so was outside of what you could reasonably afford.

Finally. Someone intelligent.

I really don’t see what the commotion is all about. It’s chance. It’s not like ANet said you will get new skin per 5 chests you opened.

Out of 100 chests…getting nothing is not a “chance”

sigh

“Out of 200 lottery ticket, I did not win the lottery.. This is not a chance.”

Define “chance”. Does it say you will instantly get the item?

Wait, nevermind.. There is no point arguing to someone disappointed. I cannot “un-disappoint” you for expecting too much.

The fact of the matter is guy.. This is a game.. this is entertainment.. There is no logical reason for them to make the drop chance this poor. All they are doing it pushing away people that will give them money.

The game is entertainment – yes. I whole heartedly agree.

The event is a gamble. No one told us that we will all get the skins.

Let me define “Chance”

chance/CHans/
Noun: A possibility of something happening.
Adjective: Fortuitous; accidental.
Verb: Do something by accident or without design: “if they chanced to meet”.

Obviously, we use Noun on our discussion.

“A possibility of something happening” tantamount to “A possibility of something not happening.”

Anyways, I sympathize with the frustrated people. Don’t gamble what you can’t/don’t want to lose (ie: money).

Yeah that’s great. Now explain to me, why, a the designers of a halloween event decided to make us gamble on getting costumes and halloween based items?

The problem isn’t that we fail to understand what the word “chance” means. By the way, thanks for linking a dictionary entry for a word. Now look up “irrelevant” and “straw man fallacy”.

Because it’s an event. Where is the thrill when they just give it away? It’s like a souvenir.

And if you do understand “chance”, why all the rage? Maybe you and I have different understanding of “chance”.

Maybe for you, chance is like “I open 200 chest, I will get atleast 1 event item” but mine is “I will open 200 chests and I might get atleast 1 event item”

Isn’t it?

And no, I did not link the dictionary meaning, I copy+pasted it. And you’re welcome.
And no, I don’t need to lookup “irrelevant” and “straw man fallacy” because they are both irrelevant to the point we are discussing.

Cheers!

1. Because it’s an event? WTF? Is that even an argument? No where in your answer did you justify gambling. Give it away? I wasn’t aware that the only alternative to gamble boxes with horrid drop rates would be to give them away. And even still would it really be so back to give something away?
Another strawman fallacy.

2. Because the rage isn’t do to surprise. How hard a concept is this to wrap your head around? It’s that it could have been done far better.

3. No I think of it as might too. It just sucks. It isn’t fun. That’s the point.

4. Congrats, now you can look up semantics. and they are relevant to this conversation, as your sole argument, is nothing more than a logical fallacy.

knives.6345:

Jnaathra.6549:

knives.6345:

mastershke.8145:

knives.6345:

deathTouch.9706:

The Age of Entitlement

Why don’t you try refunding your lottery tickets at the gas station after you scratch it off and see how well that goes.

What you “expect” or think you “deserve” to get out of the chests is irrelevant. At no point did Anet give any expectations as to the drop rate of the items in the chest, nor did they force you to open any chests.

You made a conscious decision to buy keys, based on whatever preconceived notions you had concerning the drop rate of items, which ultimately ended up being far removed from reality.

It’s your own fault for making assumptions and impulsively acting on it, especially if doing so was outside of what you could reasonably afford.

Finally. Someone intelligent.

I really don’t see what the commotion is all about. It’s chance. It’s not like ANet said you will get new skin per 5 chests you opened.

Out of 100 chests…getting nothing is not a “chance”

sigh

“Out of 200 lottery ticket, I did not win the lottery.. This is not a chance.”

Define “chance”. Does it say you will instantly get the item?

Wait, nevermind.. There is no point arguing to someone disappointed. I cannot “un-disappoint” you for expecting too much.

The fact of the matter is guy.. This is a game.. this is entertainment.. There is no logical reason for them to make the drop chance this poor. All they are doing it pushing away people that will give them money.

The game is entertainment – yes. I whole heartedly agree.

The event is a gamble. No one told us that we will all get the skins.

Let me define “Chance”

chance/CHans/
Noun: A possibility of something happening.
Adjective: Fortuitous; accidental.
Verb: Do something by accident or without design: “if they chanced to meet”.

Obviously, we use Noun on our discussion.

“A possibility of something happening” tantamount to “A possibility of something not happening.”

Anyways, I sympathize with the frustrated people. Don’t gamble what you can’t/don’t want to lose (ie: money).

Yeah that’s great. Now explain to me, why, a the designers of a halloween event decided to make us gamble on getting costumes and halloween based items?

The problem isn’t that we fail to understand what the word “chance” means. By the way, thanks for linking a dictionary entry for a word. Now look up “irrelevant” and “straw man fallacy”.

WASTE OF GEMS.

Can’t believe I fell for it. I paid you ten dollars. That’s the first and last payment you’ll ever see from me.

Never buying gems with cash ever again. Never buying keys either. What a joyless feature. You could have sold armor skins in the cash shop, made money, and made everyone happy.

Who creates a Halloween celebration and then becomes a total hardass over costumes?!?!

I went and sold a ton of stuff , to get the gems to buy keys. I may as well, have saved the gold and bought the pieces off the trading post.

I also love how they took the combat skins and put them in the boxes, and only allow you to buy the crappy town clothes stuff directly.

Also thanks for making the candy corn skins last only 4 hours.

Way to be hardasses over holiday vanity items.

I opened about 15 and got one. Some ugly shoulders. Jesus, could they have made the boxes any less fun? Yay! 1 in 1 billion chance of getting the holiday items! Fun!

What a kitteny money grab. On a holiday no less, and after all the waiting.

LobsterJohnson.3054:

FiachSidhe.3654:

LobsterJohnson.3054:

FiachSidhe.3654:

What’s your point? Other than attempting to make me angrier?

I would actually love to see you angrier. Can I?

Why’s that? and probably.

So I can get more faux xenophobic tirades.

Nah I’m tired. Besides I’m sure the Europeans have their hands full with all the blatant “racism” exhibited by Anet for not launching a game holiday on time and not posting the time in a different format.

Lightyears.8624:

I wish Anet would realize that people on the East coast have jobs and can’t be up til 12-1am waiting for an event to start. To us that’s the 23rd not the 22nd.

Clearly if they’re up this late working on the game, I’m pretty sure they figured that out.

LobsterJohnson.3054:

FiachSidhe.3654:

What’s your point? Other than attempting to make me angrier?

I would actually love to see you angrier. Can I?

Why’s that? and probably.

Mimizu.7340:

FiachSidhe.3654:

Dresdoe.7503:

Mathematik.4371:

Dresdoe.7503:

I played Guild Wars for several years. Guild Wars 2 should first and foremost be a sequel to its predecessor. In the original Guild Wars when arenanet said an event would start they gave a very specific time. You could have made a countdown timer if you so chose. Guild Wars 2 on the other hand is showing to arenanets paying customers that their same attention to time is more than lacking. For instance, any typical Guild Wars event started at forgive me if I’m wrong but I think 6 a.m. Pacific Time so.. 8 a.m. or so in Texas where I live and I could count on that…EVERY time. I had planned on buying all of the gemstore halloween items, but now I don’t even know how many gems I will need and I wanted to be one of the first to be sporting one of these items. I have no clue when I will get to purchase them at all, unless you count before tomorrow. I believe “before tomorrow” is the most unsatisfactory timeframe I have ever heard of ever at all. Except perhaps “before I die.” So, arenanet I commend you on the quality of your game. I instead express immense displeasure with your communication and dedication to living up to the expectations of your dedicated gamers and we really deserve better than this next time.

You’re the reason developers believe their player bases are full of immature children with entitlement issues.

and you are the reason that I don’t care about other peoples opinions truth is I’m most likely older than you and 100% more mature I paid for something expecting something and I have been let down. Eat a big one if you don’t like that I’m unhappy.

YOU DIDN’T PAY FOR THIS EVENT
Look Lars, or Helmut, or Pierre, this event is courtesy.
Can you log in, and play the game you payed for?

Yes? you can?

Then SHUT UP.

Go put on some wooden shoes and dance around, or carve a coo coo clock, or whatever the kitten you do, when you’re not pretending to be a victim over a free update to a game you play without a subscription fee.

You paid for the game, you have the game. you can log in now and play the game. No you’re not mature. You’re also not very bright either.

oh do stop flaming, you are coming over as quite xenophobic.

I’d say the same (well the equivalent) if they were from the US.

Dinks.2478:

@FiachSidhe.
On top of what you’re saying. What he said isn’t even true. European emails said the 23rd. Trying to lie to Anet about what they sent you, doesn’t even make sense. This kid is a tool.

Wow. Why am I not surprised.

gadenp.7586:

@ Dlinks

Yes yes, I get it. The world revolves around America. All hail the American Empire and all that … … …

Anyways I am sure, that Anet will actual win alot of people over if they would at least put the top 3 times on their email correspondence.

For example:
So and so patch will be release on 6pm PST (x pm GMT, etc). This that so hard to do?

Or you know, you can stop pretending to be some, put upon, second class citizen and figure it out in like five seconds yourself.
http://www.timezoneconverter.com/cgi-bin/tzc.tzc

This isn’t about America being superior, you clownshoe. I guess they assumed you’re smart enough to tell time on your own.

Thank you for the update. I don’t mind waiting. I’d rather wait a little more if it means the event is the best it can be.

Though I also understand those who planned around this event.

Leiloni.7951:

FiachSidhe.3654:

Denial Of Service.5732:

perhaps because every medium set looks like the same, heavy armor sets are all bulky and when someone says (myself) we could have another couple of skimpy ones i get stoned to death by irrational haters, where only light sets (for females) looks good and i struggled to get one that looked decent and manly (for my mesmer).

What does your inability to deal with female characters that aren’t half naked, have to do with the topic? They aren’t “irrational haters”, for telling you to stop making gamers look bad.

You my friend are one of his “irrational haters”. People have different preferences in gear and that doesn’t give gamers a bad reputation unless you’re crazy and super uptight. It’s fantasy, a video game! This is not real life, I don’t shoot fire out of a Staff and run super fast in my real life. I do however like getting into the visual aspect of any game I play and as a girl, I prefer characters that look pretty. Head to toe covered up with no style at all is not pretty to me. More fashionable looks with feminine styles like dresses and skirts is what I like and lucky me my main is an Ele who gets to wear that stuff.

Honestly one of the reasons I haven’t leveled my Guardian very far is because the heavy armor for females is the ugliest thing I have ever seen. They need more cute/pretty fashionable and feminine styles. More skin is a good start but it doesn’t need to look like chain/plate armor because in real life chain/plate is ugly as sin. Nothing wrong with making it look different for the sake of style – after all the endgame here is all about looks anyway, right?

and you, my friend, sound like one of those TERA players signing petitions to put the Elin characters back in panties, or posting on GameFAQS about how hot the chicks from Borderlands are.

More skin isn’t a “good start”. You want that lame kitten pandering kitten go play TERA. I’m not irrational, irrational is not playing a character because there isn’t enough of your midriff showing.

The rest of your babbling doesn’t even make sense, chain and plate doesn’t look good on skin?!? What??!?

Someone who calls you on being a stereotypical gamer, nerd boy who needs stereotypical skimpy armor, isn’t irrational.

BobbyStein.2315:

Greyfeld.7104:

Garrus.9803:

Actually I disagree. I admit that some of the dialogue isn’t that great but overall I think it’s pretty good. Tybalt Leftpaw (an Order of Whispers character) had some of the best dialogue I’ve seen in an MMO. If you came into this game expecting Mass Effect quality dialogue you’re going to be disappointed. But if you take it for what it is it’s good.

If by “Mass Effect quality dialogue,” you mean “dialogue that’s natural and believable,” then yeah, I did.

Nobody TALKS like this. That’s my point. It’s stilted and extremely campy and sounds like something you would expect from amateur hour at your local community theater.

For the record, it’s not the fault of the voice-actors, it’s the script that’s the problem.

In what content is the writing/VO problematic for you? The ambient world stuff? The personal story? The dungeons? They were all handled differently. The more specific examples you give, the better we can understand your feedback. I realize that this post is in the personal story section, but I want to know if your criticism is limited to that.

Thanks!

Blueroseknight.7954:

I’m not trying to be unfair, I know the writers tried their best.

After making it to 80, and playing the stories for a few alts up to 30. I think this is more insulting than it is, complimentary. The PS writing is some of the worst I’ve ever seen. It reads and plays out like bad fanfiction.

It’s almost concertedly bad, cringe worthy and painful to listen to.

Personality has no impact on my character’s interactions, and the background you choose at character creation, does virtually nothing, and fails to extend past the first 20 levels or so, but it doesn’t matter because the writing is so flat, that it doesn’t matter.

How Arenanet’s writers managed to make an evil carnival boring, is beyond me.

Trahearn is like “George Lucas prequels writing”. Introduce a character who is important or significant, because you are told he is. Not shown. Then make the character, wooden, bland and uninteresting.

Jeffrey Vaughn.1793:

Also, a point I forgot earlier—a cutscene means that we know that the player sees the important part. We had an issue with some steps where the player would look the wrong way at the wrong time, and have no idea what just happened. Forgetting I have a rifle, or magic powers, or that I’m fast and skilled enough to kill dragons, but not this specific enemy.

It would be great if the “important part” of the cutscene you write, didn’t reduce my character to a stationary, sloth-like idiot, just to push your plot forward, or shoehorn some lazy plot device to evoke emotion. Only the only emotion the player is likely to have, is yelling at their monitor in frustration.

There is a reason Yoda’s death had more impact than Obi Wan’s. Our mentor doesn’t teach us, and we barely know them.

I have yet to see a single scene, in which the player just looks the wrong way. They’re all involving a minute or two of me standing there watching as something stupid happens.

Like the sacrifice on Claw Island? Seriously? I love how that many people just couldn't close the doors, or fight their way back to the ship. We killed a dragon, but the left over zombies are a problem....right

So much of GW2’s story is so painfully bad, it comes off like a 15 year old’s fanfiction.

Denial Of Service.5732:

perhaps because every medium set looks like the same, heavy armor sets are all bulky and when someone says (myself) we could have another couple of skimpy ones i get stoned to death by irrational haters, where only light sets (for females) looks good and i struggled to get one that looked decent and manly (for my mesmer).

What does your inability to deal with female characters that aren’t half naked, have to do with the topic? They aren’t “irrational haters”, for telling you to stop making gamers look bad.

Andele.1306:

FiachSidhe.3654 – Divination and Necromancy are polar opposites… one is helping the dead to be actually dead and talking to them/helping them reach their gods, other is getting the dead back to life (in one form or another)and enslaving/chaining their spirits to a mortal form to control em (also you couldnt chose both unless you were true neutral and even then you were unable to use raise and command undead spells. Thats like saying that arcane manipulation has anything to do with elemental control except the fact that they both use the same power source.

Anything ending in -mancy is a form of divination. Necromancy was the supposed act of communing with the spirits of the dead, to obtain usually hidden information/insight.

Divination as a word, has nothing to do with the dead. Divination is gleaning information from esoteric means. It could be anything from candles, to tea leaves, tarot cards, to crystals.

Divination is a blanket term.
Necromancy, is a specific form of divination, dealing with the dead.

Fantasy Necromancers, do things like animate the dead.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CutsceneIncompetence

I absolutely loathe this trope. This game seems to force you to do really stupid things, and stand idly by and watch easily preventable events from going down. It’s bad enough I have to suspend my disbelief over the notion that I can return from the dead a billion and one times, but my mentor cannot after claw island.

stormwaltz.5368:

Hey all. First post and likely last post. I just uninstalled the game over the difficulty of a personal story mission.

I first tried the level 10 “human street rat” personal story mission “Breaking the Blade” as a level 12 Thief. I had relatively little difficulty with the previous missions, but on this one I died six times in a row. Doc Howler crushed me every time – I killed everyone else, but couldn’t get her below ~25% health. I tried different weapons and different utility skills – nothing got me any farther. So I abandoned the personal story and played the rest of the game.

This morning I returned to “Breaking the Blade” as a fully-equipped level 27 Thief. Green weapons, blue armor, all on-level. I expected to do somewhat better, but… no. Again I was killed over and over by Doc Howler, never getting her below ~25% health.

So I give up. I’ve got less frustrating games I could be playing.

I know. Whine-whine, call the waaaambulance. Normally I’d leave without saying anything, but they asked which personal story missions were unbalanced. It’s only my opinion.

As bad as the story missions can be, you’re missing out. The story mission are literally once every 2 levels and the gameplay between them (read 80% of the game) is fantastic.
I’m not going to sit there and tell you, you need to like the game or play it, but thankfully, the personal story is a very small part of it. Outlevel each by even one level and they shouldn’t be too bad. The game is a lot of fun though.

My advice is to stick with it. But it’s your time, play what you enjoy.

Focksbot.6798:

Why did you make NPC allies so terrible? Why do the enemies get a mob of super deadly assassins but you programmed our NPC allies to do jack damage and drop in three hits? What is the point? I’ve watched them a few times and they often just stand perfectly still! It’s ridiculous.

NPCs are terrible because if they weren’t, there’s a chance they could win without your intervention. The player has to be the one to swing the battle, or else what’s the point? And since the player can usually take out an entire army, as long as they come one by one, that means the NPCs have to be significantly weaker.

That said, I only got through Claw Island by abusing Entangle as a ranger. It held the mobs in place long enough for me to revive what’s-her-name, and helped slow mobs down just enough in the final encounter for me to survive by constantly running around on the battlements.

I have to agree that the way in which ANet make a mission ‘hard’ is extremely limited and balanced on a knife-edge between challenging and absurdly maddening. I rarely feel: “Right, if I knuckle down and think clever, I can do this”. Instead, it swings violently between me being more or less on autopilot and a sense of total despair as dozens of mobs close in.

One thing I was really satisfied with in the main world, which I’m surprised you didn’t utilise in the story, was making use of neutral NPCs. I enjoy provoking enemies to accidentally attack a veteran oakheart while trying to get to me, and then I sit back and watch the show. Please, please, please plan more missions around these sorts of ideas.

You’re right of course, and I understand their intent. Like you said, the execution is awful though. Considering the strength of the opposition in many of these missions.

Isn’t there a way to make these quests challenging, without being completely insulting to our intelligence? If they suck, to prevent us from having them fight for us, why bother? What’s the point in having them, if all they are, is window dressing.

Technically a person who animates the dead shouldn’t be called a necromancer, either. As Necromancy is a form of divination. Communing with the dead to glean wisdom or information. (as is any magic ending in -mancy)

I agree. and considering how absolutely cheap they made the mobs, whether it be spawning asinine numbers at you, with little regard for fun or playability, they all spam knockdowns and have ridiculous HP, I find it even more insulting, that they purposefully kittened our only aid.

Along with the lazy writing, poor continuity, and kitten poor voice acting, it’s like they did everything they could, to make story mode as joyless, and frustrating as possible.

I disagree, five people isn’t epic.
An entire army comprised of every nation, would have been epic. A giant, world wide battle spanning continents would have been epic. Legions of troops, the pact, countless forces, those Charr tanks that never seem to be used.

All of these are worthy of a world wrecking dragon god, but no, we get what every, derivative, uncreative mmorpg developer does. Typical lame kitten boss fight at the end of a dungeon/raid.

Thanks Greyfield, glad you got a kick out of it.

I chose Norn for my guardian, because I wanted an elegant/graceful Valkyrie-type. Influenced partially by the character Lenneth, from Valkyrie Profile.

WARNING SPOILERS REGARDING HUMAN -LOST SISTER and CIRCUS- PS’s

I’ll preface this, by saying I adore this game. I love so much about it. I love the GM’s taking charge and laying down the ground rules and gasp actually enforcing them! I like so many quality of life features that I actually get angry, that it took this long for a game to include them all in one place. I love how PVE is stripped of senseless, drama generating competition for things like gathering/local quests.

But the writing is unacceptable.
Regardless of gender. I’m Kristen Stewart.
Every character I play, apparently has ONE emotion/line delivery.
In this case, that being “dinner theater actor, rehearsing lines with family member/or friend”.

It’s bad enough that you guys took the lazy route, and went for two, idle, expression-frozen people, oddly swaying their arms like a happy five year old girl, regardless of the tone, for virtually every scene. With almost no background audio, as well. Making the whole thing even more artificial.

No matter who dies around me, whether it be the absolutely pointless, and forced sacrifice at Claw Island, or the death of a friend, or enemy. My character sounds exactly the same.

Look, I don’t expect Citizen Kane, when I log onto an mmorpg. But could you at least try to aim higher than White Chicks*?

I just finished the ‘lost sister arc’.
Boy does it take the cake, for anti-climactic, masturbatory storytelling.

So it turns out my sis is alive, which I’m sure everyone knew before finishing character creation.
I finally track her down.
Find the guy responsible for her plight. He then waddles off to jail, and is never heard from (unless I go full barbaric).
Then I find her. My long lost sister! The only family I seem to have…. at all!

The one I sat up nights thinking about, imagining her death over and over, and how I wasn’t there to protect her when she needed me most. Pondering her last thoughts, and imagining her body rotting, forgotten in some dingy hole somewhere.
“The pain!”
“The torment!!!”
“The GUILT!!!”
“The- Oh! Hello there, I see you’re still breathing. Well I suppose you’ll be needing a ride somewhere… QUEST COMPLETE HAVE SOME MAGIC PANTS.

Seriously?!? My god, did the writers even TRY? My character reacted to a sister he thought was dead, with the same enthusiasm he has, when he gets a free second candy bar, out of a vending machine.

This is disgraceful storytelling. The personal story doesn’t even have the burden of permeating through the whole game. It’s literally 20 levels of game time, at maybe a 20 minutes of dialogue, and the writers couldn’t muster any more effort than “Good to see you’re not worm food. Goodbye.”

It’s like the PS’s were just pointless busywork, until they could get to what really mattered. Namely Trahearne, who is more important than me, apparently.