Guild Wars 2

If you want an example of a dead game that uses heavy RnG; take a look at Archeage. As Gw2 where it stands, the RnG is good as it is.

To get a face-plant bug, all the player has to do is go into casting animation and be knocked down; it’s kinda immersion breaking.

So, although I used to rage about grind gates, the game is overall is enjoyable but I want to put this out there, that there is a bug that makes your character faceplant and stuck in that animation the whole time (I believe it was when you’re using a skill then a knockdown would cause your character to be stuck in the face-plant animation). I also wanted to take this moment to let the developers know that almost every class (Elite Spec; class?) since the expansion are nerf/balanced without a really good reason.

If anything, I would like to ask what are the reasons-direction which Developers are heading towards to for some of these balancing instead of public formal letters.

Thank you!

Texas.9547:

I like, almost love the expansion. Lets see, gliding and jumping mushrooms and updrafts were the three masteries that I felt were really gating me and that took me about 5 hours of casual playing to unlock. I guess my main goal for the game was to play all my elite specs (I have 10 toons by the way, 6 of which i had atleast 170 hero points on before the expansion started.)

So I went about getting mastery experience by trying to get all the hero points in verdant brink. That was what day one was really all about. I can now easily get 10/11 in that zone. My first character took 2 days to unlock his elite spec totally. That was about 10 hours of playing. Again casually playing cause I stopped to play events and glide and explore. My next character only took me 2 hours to go from 170 hero points to 400 cause Im now pro at getting the hero points.

2 hours to unlock an elite spec feels in no way grindy to me even if i need to do it 8 more times cause the events are fun and the classes and builds i play are varied enough to keep me entertained.

One possibly big caveat. I havnt done any of the story. Ive heard that you need itzel poison unlocked to progress the story and I dont have that mastery quite yet. I am close though and I am sure Ill have it by the time I get there because I heard story gets you exp and Im about to start training it after I do the speed mushroom training.

So maybe its a goals problem for some people. People that wanted to finish the story over the weekend. Me I dont care as much about the story, cause thats one and done. I care about the content we will be playing long after the story is over. And holy heck, the events in verdant brink at night, and the big meta in auric basin are both 10/10 for me. They are super fun. Also my elites are super fun. So yeh Id give this game a great review

What level is your gliding Mastery, Nuhoc Mastery, and Itzel mastery? You are obviously lying if you said you have finished all of your Hero points.

Jaken.6801:

SamTheGuardian.2938:

Furajir.3815:

The game has been out for a significant amount of time. Kudos to the Devs first off for making an enjoyable game with tons off added content every few weeks and constant rebalancing to try and get things right.

Now..

IMO this expansion was done half kitten in an attempt to get a quick buck from the consumers. When they first said they would be giving each class and elite spec and “New Weapons” I figured it would be some totally separate entity and NEW weapons, not just unlocking previously existing weapons and giving them to other classes. Like a 2h axe for warrior etc.

Now Elite specs, what a joke, if you REALLY wanted to spice up the game, you should have made it so it was an added FOURTH line to the spec variations to make the other lines stronger, more diversified builds, and more options to the player, not give us a new elite spec that forced us to give up other important lines.

Like Warrior for example, Could be Strength, Arms, Defense, AND BERSERKER. This would have brought the game to a whole new level.

They dropped the ball on this and failed a huge opportunity to really add something different that would have kept people coming back for a long time, not feel like they were lied to for a quick buck on a half kitten expansion.

ArenaNet has some of the very best in the industry. It’s very sad to see them put out a product that was obviously forced to release by a specific date. Without placing blame (because we don’t know who exactly is at fault) it does seem there are huge disconnects between the art, design and writing departments (e.g. Elite Specialization’s cheaply worked into lore but not something core to the story a player experiences… For a reward that is perhaps the most important advertised feature of the game, they make you wait until near end game to achieve you would think they would have at least made it a big event int he game instead of a passive unlock).

What we have in GW2 Heart of Thorns PvE

• Very small amount of new content to explore – even with the vertical aspect the new maps feel small compared to the largest maps of the core game… and there are only three new maps. With HoT we’re only getting about 1/8th or 12% new explorable area compared to the core game See: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Zone

• Grind based progression – To slow down a player from running though the new maps quickly (remember there are only 3 and combined they provide may 12% of the the total explore area of the core game) they have put in place systems that force places to do very repetitive things. This is by definition grind. It may be less grindy than other MMOs, that’s subjective but it is grind and that is new to GW2 and anti GW2 manifesto. This sort of tactic is implemented by a developer to save money. Instead of building out more maps they just make you repeat content before progression over a handful of maps. Is that common with other MMOs maybe, but it hasn’t been with GW2 and there are reasons many of us have chosen not to play other MMOs.

• Horrible implementation of core features – Core advertised play mechanic of the game most were excited about (Elite Specialization) not made personal to player, implemented as a passive achievement that occurs near the final boss battle so the player doesn’t even get to play the game with the desired play mechanic. .

• Mega-server algorithms preventing progression – Players coming into Verdant Brink for the first time are encountering events and mobs they can’t solo and are finding a good number of them empty. When you encounter this it’s quite horrible. This is turning the new Mastery unlock tredmill into an overwhelming task. Players are feeling defeated and going to off to do something else in game. Not because they aren’t skilled but because the game is broken

• Full game price – Don’t forgot HoT is an expansion and as ported out a very small one at that. Yet they charged full game price for this product

The composite of the above bullet points makes the PvE side of Heart of Thorns an insurmountable failure. Yes, you have hardcore players who’ve teamed up and done and have just finshed all the content together and they are coming in saying “it’s not so bad” or “it’s perfect” but they are not the average player. They are not the type of player ArenaNet wanted as their base when the core game launched (going by the manifesto). Yes, you had players who moved with the heard from launch last Friday morning until completion. Now hopefully they will go the kitten away.

All that said, the PvP side of HoT is nice. I can also say positive things for that team. The Elite Specializations need a bit of balance work but there is nothing I’ve come across that’s game-breaking in PvP with the new specs and that’s impressive.

Hold your horses. Your bulletpoints have some pretty big flaws in it, you know.

Small amount of content
First of there are 4 maps, even your own link titles them as such. Furthermore even if they are not the size of the biggest of the core game, you traverse them in three layers.
While the old ones are usually on a flat surface.
Sure it does not tripple the amount, thanks to obvious gaps, but calling it not enough is just plain wrong.

The fact that these maps all have big overarcing events, that old maps dont or barely have, is another extra that you only get with HoT.

I wont even get into map specific rewards and the design decision of giving the maps replayability and tons of secrets, thanks to (what you see as grind/gating apearently) masteries.

Grind based
I dont think you know what grinding is, do you?
Grind is a repetetative action to archieve a goal.

in HoT you are not bound to one action. You have several actions you can perform to get to your goal. You are not bound to one particular thing (well, aside from the place). You can kill, do a variety of events, do story, gather material, do adventures, be social etc.

Core feature implementation
Ehm, yeah… every game decks you into full epic armor from the start so you have no progression or anything to gun for till you fight the final boss.

You are aware of the fact that the storyline is only part of the whole MMO experience?

That every other game also has you level up or complete quests to attain a similiar feature.

Mega server
Ah yeah. Blaming something that is broken at the moment and will of course never be fixed just to spite you. I mean, its not like it has ever worked before… oh yeah.. it did…

Price
Well, that is something to argue about. I agree I expected more out of the expansion, but calling it small is not the right word.
It is, if anything medium sized and they at least said they will build up upon it, so you can say you bought a 20€ game with a 20€ season pass at least.
I bought it for aprox. 40€ and I so far I got what I expected.

So yeah. I all your points are very short sighted and in my opinion are from someone who wants everything from day one.
However where is the fun in that?
If you are complaining about how small the expension is, at least you got something to do now. You cant tell me you have seen every nook and cranny yet and if you dont care about that, then this is just not your game.

I don’t think you understand what grind is, we are literally doing the same events over and over, that is the equivalent of a grind.

SamTheGuardian.2938:

Furajir.3815:

The game has been out for a significant amount of time. Kudos to the Devs first off for making an enjoyable game with tons off added content every few weeks and constant rebalancing to try and get things right.

Now..

IMO this expansion was done half kitten in an attempt to get a quick buck from the consumers. When they first said they would be giving each class and elite spec and “New Weapons” I figured it would be some totally separate entity and NEW weapons, not just unlocking previously existing weapons and giving them to other classes. Like a 2h axe for warrior etc.

Now Elite specs, what a joke, if you REALLY wanted to spice up the game, you should have made it so it was an added FOURTH line to the spec variations to make the other lines stronger, more diversified builds, and more options to the player, not give us a new elite spec that forced us to give up other important lines.

Like Warrior for example, Could be Strength, Arms, Defense, AND BERSERKER. This would have brought the game to a whole new level.

They dropped the ball on this and failed a huge opportunity to really add something different that would have kept people coming back for a long time, not feel like they were lied to for a quick buck on a half kitten expansion.

ArenaNet has some of the very best in the industry. It’s very sad to see them put out a product that was obviously forced to release by a specific date. Without placing blame (because we don’t know who exactly is at fault) it does seem there are huge disconnects between the art, design and writing departments (e.g. Elite Specialization’s cheaply worked into lore but not something core to the story a player experiences… For a reward that is perhaps the most important advertised feature of the game, they make you wait until near end game to achieve you would think they would have at least made it a big event int he game instead of a passive unlock).

What we have in GW2 Heart of Thorns PvE

• Very small amount of new content to explore – even with the vertical aspect the new maps feel small compared to the largest maps of the core game… and there are only three new maps. With HoT we’re only getting about 1/8th or 12% new explorable area compared to the core game See: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Zone

• Grind based progression – To slow down a player from running though the new maps quickly (remember there are only 3 and combined they provide may 12% of the the total explore area of the core game) they have put in place systems that force places to do very repetitive things. This is by definition grind. It may be less grindy than other MMOs, that’s subjective but it is grind and that is new to GW2 and anti GW2 manifesto. This sort of tactic is implemented by a developer to save money. Instead of building out more maps they just make you repeat content before progression over a handful of maps. Is that common with other MMOs maybe, but it hasn’t been with GW2 and there are reasons many of us have chosen not to play other MMOs.

• Horrible implementation of core features – Core advertised play mechanic of the game most were excited about (Elite Specialization) not made personal to player, implemented as a passive achievement that occurs near the final boss battle so the player doesn’t even get to play the game with the desired play mechanic. .

• Mega-server algorithms preventing progression – Players coming into Verdant Brink for the first time are encountering events and mobs they can’t solo and are finding a good number of them empty. When you encounter this it’s quite horrible. This is turning the new Mastery unlock tredmill into an overwhelming task. Players are feeling defeated and going to off to do something else in game. Not because they aren’t skilled but because the game is broken

• Full game price – Don’t forgot HoT is an expansion and as ported out a very small one at that. Yet they charged full game price for this product

The composite of the above bullet points makes the PvE side of Heart of Thorns an insurmountable failure. Yes, you have hardcore players who’ve teamed up and done and have just finshed all the content together and they are coming in saying “it’s not so bad” or “it’s perfect” but they are not the average player. They are not the type of player ArenaNet wanted as their base when the core game launched (going by the manifesto). Yes, you had players who moved with the heard from launch last Friday morning until completion. Now hopefully they will go the kitten away.

All that said, the PvP side of HoT is nice. I can also say positive things for that team. The Elite Specializations need a bit of balance work but there is nothing I’ve come across that’s game-breaking in PvP with the new specs and that’s impressive.

Here I thought I was alone in my post and rant about their low quality content.

Raziel.4216:

MoonRaiden.7423:

Raziel.4216:

MoonRaiden.7423:

Straylight.7529:

Pixelninja.6971:

I bet half off the 10 stars reviews on Metscritic are written by Anet employees.
Yesterday the score was around 5 with almost 1 to 1 positive and negative reviews.

This tells us that the better, well-thought out reviews from people who took their time to test the game tend towards giving it a better score. Most of the 0-scores HoT received on Metacritic were given within the first 72 hours after launch.

I’ll be honest, your statement makes no sense, and is very bias. Those who took their time to test the game will realized how bad the optimization, experience gain, and how badly gated it is. Hell, I discovered all 4 of the new maps, and is unable to explore the whole area because I am sitting behind mastery walls.

Or they discovered an enjoyable gating system (because they’re not part of the “GIVE ME MY SHINY NOW!!” crowd) and decided to give it a good review.
Could it be that – wait for it ….. – people give it a good review before they like it? Oh god I hope that thought didn’t blow your mind.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrwtWAGGGB4

What part of the manifesto that they posted long ago not cross your mind? It’s my world, my story; not 50 minutes later the whole events restarts.

“play how you want” can mean a lot of different stuff, I play how I want and I enjoy the story and it’s mastery system.
If you don’t enjoy the product you can always get a refund.
I hope they NEVER make an expansion that you can rush and finish on day 1.

Oh yeah, I am definitely close to getting a refund like most people. Half of my friends already quit the game, and that’s a group of 7+ people. I do hope you can pay the bill for Anet by keep paying for gems, because it is people like you who drives people who paid for the game away.

Straylight.7529:

MoonRaiden.7423:

Straylight.7529:

Pixelninja.6971:

I bet half off the 10 stars reviews on Metscritic are written by Anet employees.
Yesterday the score was around 5 with almost 1 to 1 positive and negative reviews.

This tells us that the better, well-thought out reviews from people who took their time to test the game tend towards giving it a better score. Most of the 0-scores HoT received on Metacritic were given within the first 72 hours after launch.

I’ll be honest, your statement makes no sense, and is very bias. Those who took their time to test the game will realized how bad the optimization, experience gain, and how badly gated it is. Hell, I discovered all 4 of the new maps, and is unable to explore the whole area because I am sitting behind mastery walls.

Then why is the quantity of positive reviews increasing? If what you say is true, then metacritic should show an increasing number of negative reviews. Yet precisely the opposite is happening.

Have you looked at those reviews? Half of them ARE VAGUE.

Raziel.4216:

MoonRaiden.7423:

Straylight.7529:

Pixelninja.6971:

I bet half off the 10 stars reviews on Metscritic are written by Anet employees.
Yesterday the score was around 5 with almost 1 to 1 positive and negative reviews.

This tells us that the better, well-thought out reviews from people who took their time to test the game tend towards giving it a better score. Most of the 0-scores HoT received on Metacritic were given within the first 72 hours after launch.

I’ll be honest, your statement makes no sense, and is very bias. Those who took their time to test the game will realized how bad the optimization, experience gain, and how badly gated it is. Hell, I discovered all 4 of the new maps, and is unable to explore the whole area because I am sitting behind mastery walls.

Or they discovered an enjoyable gating system (because they’re not part of the “GIVE ME MY SHINY NOW!!” crowd) and decided to give it a good review.
Could it be that – wait for it ….. – people give it a good review before they like it? Oh god I hope that thought didn’t blow your mind.

What part of the manifesto that they posted long ago not cross your mind? It’s my world, my story; not 50 minutes later the whole events restarts.

Yelloweyedemon.2860:

If Legend of Zelda came out tomorrow, the usual forum dwellers would go nuts about how they need to “grind” to get exp, new swords/shields, new potions etc…

If pokemon red&blue came out tomorrow, they would cry about not being given charizard/venusar and blastoise straight away, instead they are stuch with their inferior previous evolutions and they need to “grind” 30something levels to get there…

If super-mario came out tomorrow they would cry about why the princess is ALWAYS in another castle and they need to “grind” 50 different levels to finally meet her for like 5 seconds ’till the credits…

Hooray for this generation…

Straylight.7529:

Pixelninja.6971:

I bet half off the 10 stars reviews on Metscritic are written by Anet employees.
Yesterday the score was around 5 with almost 1 to 1 positive and negative reviews.

This tells us that the better, well-thought out reviews from people who took their time to test the game tend towards giving it a better score. Most of the 0-scores HoT received on Metacritic were given within the first 72 hours after launch.

I’ll be honest, your statement makes no sense, and is very bias. Those who took their time to test the game will realized how bad the optimization, experience gain, and how badly gated it is. Hell, I discovered all 4 of the new maps, and is unable to explore the whole area because I am sitting behind mastery walls.

Dahkeus.8243:

So…what are you getting at? Do you think that people don’t actually enjoy the game in a way that it doesn’t feel like a grind? Cuz I fit in that camp. Yea, I wish I could play with all the elite stuff at the start, but I’m really enjoying the journey to unlocking everything.

And that’s why it doesn’t feel like a grind. I’m not just fixating on what I don’t have. I’m checking out all the new events, exploring all the new content, and just generally paying attention to what’s out there and available right now.

If you think the game is a grind, then either you have the wrong mindset for an MMO or maybe you just really are better off with a different game for some reason, but the GW2 content is really high quality and shouldn’t be a grind for people that like games like this.

What is your take on the events/exp/gated rewards then?
Nobody has ever answer that question, instead they keep on pointing to exploration and some other vague kitten. Please answer my question.

Is it me or has anyone else notice it?

I am serious..
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/guild-wars-2-heart-of-thorns/user-reviews

There’s no actual review, there’s no bug reports, nothing mentioned about the low experience gain, the tedious gates, and this looks just like pure fan servicing or the reviews were bought.

here’s a quote I picked out from one of the user review
"Leveling your mastery does not feel like a grind at all, instead you get immersed by all the events and story going on in the new areas. "

Are you kitten me? What immersion do I gain from grinding 5 million experience points+ just to unlock multiple gates to traverse, explore and enjoy the content?

No, I do not care about Hero points, I am already 73.8% through elite specialization, and is Mastery Rank 10. This post is in fact my actual complaint to the game developers, and I felt like I had to grind a lot of content just to play the content (what?). So the content became nothing more but dust, so I actually do not want to revisit any of the areas that I cleared. For example, Verdant Brink is somewhere I had clear by 84% and I’d rather not step back into it even if someone wants to give me 5 million dollars to go back there to grind; it’s god awful that I’d rather scream than take the 5 million just to enter the zone again to grind.

Another mention is that WvWvW and EoTM has become even bigger now because 90% of the people there does not want to go to Maguuma due to the heavy grind, and low experience points; this is a huge sign that the content is lacking and very low quality (although it has fantastic scenery and good models, without a doubt there’s a lot of glitches which I discovered and will be reporting later), so please developers, please I beg you to not kill off this game with grind gates because not only it goes against your manifesto but it is very disappointing to players who were looking to enjoy this game casually.

Deviant.2304:

Samhayn.2385:

Deviant.2304:

You are all playing an mmo? You realize this right? Just making sure. You can’t have your cake and eat it too.

I got my elite specialization right away, play the game for more then an hour and decide its garbage. If you are skimming. Then that is your perogative. If all your playing for is to get an elite spec that you wont even end up using on PvE, then why are you playing.

MMO, massivly multi-player online. So large game with many people playing online.

Where does that say groupig to do one time character advancement?

O wait and some people want to get a spec line to use in WvW and raids but don’t really like open world pve that much shouldn’t be playing?

The expansions been out 3 days and the OP has nearly put in the hours of a full time job. Yeah that’s not really what this game was sold as but what ever.

You dont need to do open world pve HPs to play your elite spec in WvW? Lol you can get it entirely by just playing wvw.

As far as raids, they are meant to be hardmode with progression, you shouldnt be able to complete them without game
Knowedge and experience

You mean grind WvW?

Deviant.2304:

Im also not putting words in people’s mouths? Read the forums, read all of the user reviews on external sites.. Stop posting nonsensical slander and move on to a game that suits you if you do not enjoy Guild Wars 2. I am merely pointing out and addressing how players “feeling entitled” is making the expansion look like a grind when it really isnt, they just want everything placed at thier feet… Again… Its an MMO…

I am just going to leave this here for you.
https://youtu.be/35BPhT-KI1E?t=1m26s

GW2 received a partial massive increase in player base because he did a 10/10 review on GW2, there was 3 million viewers on that one video alone, and his channel alone has about 2 million + subscribers.

Please click on this link and vote, I will also try to spread this poll to Angry Joe and his army.

http://goo.gl/quepOK

Please ignore all the complaints and just wait for Angry Joe and his 3 million subscribers to watch a review of HoT, its disappointing score, barricading GW2 from any and all future players.

Asudementio.8526:

MoonRaiden.7423:

Asudementio.8526:

MoonRaiden.7423:

Crovean.7891:

10/10
Why?

1. Elite specs take some time to unlock. ( thats why they are called ELITE specs, you must work a bit for them).

2. You cant get all the masteries in 1 day which is awesome ( stop complaining about them, you couldnt level your character fast when Gw2 started also, but some ppl forgot about that).

3. Mobs are much harder all over the place, on all maps. Again great, now im using my brain in combat. ( And yes its SOLOABLE ).

4. Personal story is awesome PERIOD. ( yes it gated so WHAT ?)

5. Just exploring new maps is intresting and rewarding ( You can unlock home instance upgrades just form exploring).

6. Hero challenges give you 10 HP instead of 1. ( and thats why they are maybe 10 times harder —> which is great).

7. Seeing carebears on forums rating HoT with 3 out of 10 just because Itzel poison lore
(which got fixed) adds soo much fun to the game PRICELESS.

You my friends were used to just 1 2 3 every mob of every map for sooo long that you just cant get used to actually doing something which is not braindead content.

You forgot the feeling of finish cof p2 for the first time wiht blue eq back when game started. Some of you never had that feeling, dont know anything about the game other than pressing 1 2 3 on your keyboard and still you gave yourself a RIGHT to trash talk the half of features just because my 2 year old son cant finish it 1 day and max everything…. So0 sad…

2 days of reading this thread made me feel sorry for a lot of you….

Carebear Wars 2

Shut your trap and watch this video.
https://youtu.be/TrwtWAGGGB4?t=1m22s

Unlock home instance? Tell me where? Dam, post a guide.

Work for it? You mean grind the same events or different events over and over even though it is against their manifesto?

Soloable in event? Really? Please record a video of you doing an event by yourself.

Let me answer this question :
4. Personal story is awesome PERIOD. ( yes it gated so WHAT ?)

So what you ask? Why do I have to GRIND A MILLION EXP + just to play a story where I am supposedly to enjoy and where MY CHARACTER was supposed to rush to save people? IT BREAKS IMMERSION.

See bolded.

That is not a hill to die on- trust me.

I solo’d plenty of the hero points and events in both verdant and auric basin. Haven’t done much of tangled so can’t speak to that map. The content in this expansion is harder, but it quite legitimately reminds me of BWE2 for the original launch- which is the level of difficulty i wanted so dearly for GW2. It’s all doable but punishes sloppy play; you can make mistakes but the worse you are the more help you need to recruit. And frankly that’s how it should be. I have seen plenty of players rise to the challenges presented with this new content and i think that this is really a non issue long term.

People need to get over the fact that they will have to do more than stand still, not dodge, and ping their auto attack to flail down mobs now.

Please post a video of you doing a Maguuma hero challenge.

If i have time i will, i am not sure i can redo some of the more doable ones i am aware of though? Like can i redo hero challenges that i have completed, because i focus on a single toon.

But if you are seriously this kitten about this you are really showing the quality of player you are. There is no serious discussion to be had about the soloability of the content in maguuma, unless you are focusing on that ALL maguuma content is not soloable.

I am sorry, I asked for evidence, I am a skeptic yes, and my quality is how you based me so base what you want; I am just realistically pointing out the flaws that this expansion presents itself with, and even against its own manifesto which actually what got players into GW2 in the first place. Oh, and all Hero point events in Maguuma are repeatable, I will be waiting for a video from you.

Asudementio.8526:

MoonRaiden.7423:

Crovean.7891:

10/10
Why?

1. Elite specs take some time to unlock. ( thats why they are called ELITE specs, you must work a bit for them).

2. You cant get all the masteries in 1 day which is awesome ( stop complaining about them, you couldnt level your character fast when Gw2 started also, but some ppl forgot about that).

3. Mobs are much harder all over the place, on all maps. Again great, now im using my brain in combat. ( And yes its SOLOABLE ).

4. Personal story is awesome PERIOD. ( yes it gated so WHAT ?)

5. Just exploring new maps is intresting and rewarding ( You can unlock home instance upgrades just form exploring).

6. Hero challenges give you 10 HP instead of 1. ( and thats why they are maybe 10 times harder —> which is great).

7. Seeing carebears on forums rating HoT with 3 out of 10 just because Itzel poison lore
(which got fixed) adds soo much fun to the game PRICELESS.

You my friends were used to just 1 2 3 every mob of every map for sooo long that you just cant get used to actually doing something which is not braindead content.

You forgot the feeling of finish cof p2 for the first time wiht blue eq back when game started. Some of you never had that feeling, dont know anything about the game other than pressing 1 2 3 on your keyboard and still you gave yourself a RIGHT to trash talk the half of features just because my 2 year old son cant finish it 1 day and max everything…. So0 sad…

2 days of reading this thread made me feel sorry for a lot of you….

Carebear Wars 2

Shut your trap and watch this video.
https://youtu.be/TrwtWAGGGB4?t=1m22s

Unlock home instance? Tell me where? Dam, post a guide.

Work for it? You mean grind the same events or different events over and over even though it is against their manifesto?

Soloable in event? Really? Please record a video of you doing an event by yourself.

Let me answer this question :
4. Personal story is awesome PERIOD. ( yes it gated so WHAT ?)

So what you ask? Why do I have to GRIND A MILLION EXP + just to play a story where I am supposedly to enjoy and where MY CHARACTER was supposed to rush to save people? IT BREAKS IMMERSION.

See bolded.

That is not a hill to die on- trust me.

I solo’d plenty of the hero points and events in both verdant and auric basin. Haven’t done much of tangled so can’t speak to that map. The content in this expansion is harder, but it quite legitimately reminds me of BWE2 for the original launch- which is the level of difficulty i wanted so dearly for GW2. It’s all doable but punishes sloppy play; you can make mistakes but the worse you are the more help you need to recruit. And frankly that’s how it should be. I have seen plenty of players rise to the challenges presented with this new content and i think that this is really a non issue long term.

People need to get over the fact that they will have to do more than stand still, not dodge, and ping their auto attack to flail down mobs now.

Please post a video of you doing a Maguuma hero challenge.

SamTheGuardian.2938:

Koolaid.9152:

The Elite specialization system and mastery system will be fixed, Give it this week! Trust me. It is difficult for them to get it right on the first go. We will hear responses tomorrow.

I believe Elite Specializations unlock will change in some way. How they implement that change is anyone’s guess. The most straight-forward way would be to simply offer the same hero point scrolls awarded in WvW for a fee in the gem store. Make each 10 point hero challenge scroll 100-gems and you have a system where players must pay 4000 gems to get the 400 hero points. As chance would have it 4000 gems is what a player receives with the Ultimate Edition of Heart of Thorns. So make it so players can upgrade their basic Heart of Thorns account to the Ultimate. Casual players who love them will clearly understand how ArenaNet’s business model and either opt in or leave but at least an option will exit for causal players.

Regard Mastery’s grind and empty events on the HoT maps. I don’t see a change coming. Keep in mind there are only three maps. People have said “they are huge maps” but the first two (haven’t made it to the last yet) really are quite average compared to the core game maps. Even accounting for the vertical/layers. Point is HoT doesn’t really seem to have a lot of new content for PvE. Just three new maps, a dozen or so story instances and about 6-10 dynamic events per map. It’s not a big expansion so they have to compensate for that and make it feel longer than it is. Grinding for mastery’s is the tool they are using to accomplish that. Not sure how they would change this aspect of the game without allowing players to fly though it, but I could be wrong.

That would actually make the game officially P2W.

SamTheGuardian.2938:

gee.9263:

…The expasion is fun and brilliant at the same time, its just a different way of leveling, if the people who are moaning on here, actually spent more time playing instead of qqing, you might suprise yourselves and realise that you are missing out on a great game.

If you want to grind In a different way to gain more levels which then make the work of the past few years useless then I suggest you play something else, where your loyalty to your character only goes as far as the next expansion.

As grandma use to say, “the squeaky wheel gets the grease”.
A few facts about the expansion which explains most of the complaining

• A character going into HoT without map competition will not be able to unlock enough the Elite Specialization trait line to play with the Elite Specialization until near the end of HoT. Most of of us were hoping to play most of HoT with our Elite specialization not earn them an end-game reward. We don’t want full unlock immediately but a much faster pace where we could have them playable for most of the HoT content. As designed we can’t. That is worth complaining about. Unrelentingly if need be.

• People were complaining about gated content and ArenaNet listens, which proves in spite of your thinking that continuing to talk about this issues and complain about problem with the game is bad thing, it’s actually a positive thing for the game. It also proves the game needs some work and ArenaNet is listening trying to rationalize when appropriate to take action. Those who choose not to speak their minds have no voice.

• The new map events are not solo-able forcing. Many events take a mid-size group to complete and often times no players are around for those events. There are a lot of people who play with friends often and have rushed though the content together and they are wondering what all the complaining is about, essentially clueless and unempathtic to those who play the game differently than they do.

• The Mastery system requires players to repeat events to gain XP to level them. As designed it is the first time in GW2 grind has been a requirement of progression. The game was launched with an anti-grind, casual friendly manifesto which this design is counter to. This is why the complaints are valid. If you’ve come recently to GW2 from [name any other MMO here] then you may not get why people are so upset. It’s because we’ve held GW2 to a higher standard than your normal grind everything MMOs. Sadly no it’s just another one of them. If you disagree about the Mastery’s being grind, then you need research what grind is, they absolutely are country to one of the tenants GW2 who created to counter.

• The mega-server balancing algorithm needs to be tweaked to take into account players coming for hero points and the position of they groups on the map. The server population is holding together in small packet to take on events and they are leaving many events void of players.

The solution isn’t to demand that everyone play like you do or stop complaining. Don’t be so narrow minded. GW2 has been home to many casual players and those players are struggling to understand the new PvE content was not created for us.

OH MY GOD, THIS, FINALLY SOMEONE WHO HAS A SENSE.

I’ll say this again, playing the game while doing the same hard events over and over for 20-30 mins for very low experience points IS NOT FUN.

Malkavian.4516:

@MoonRaiden If a treasure is handed over to you without any effort done on your part, would it be considered treasure at all?

If not everyone can afford 2 hours a day worth of playtime, then why would they be playing games in the first place. While I do admit Anet does need to flesh out some issues the expansion has, I don’t think adjusting to someone’s schedule is the right way to do it.

Please watch the video, PLEASE.
Most of the player base are people who has a family, who wanted to hop on to enjoy, who bought the expansion to enjoy, and not grind through walls.

If a treasure is handed to me, it is still a treasure BECAUSE THAT IS HOW I PERCEIVE it. I am not some animal trained to think something is valuable or not, it is not a dam treasure if I perceive it as not, ever heard of a “priceless” treasure? it can be anything, and please don’t use psychology question on me because I am majoring in B.S Psychology.

Xiahou Mao.9701:

I’m not sure I can think of a single 20-30 minute event that I’ve seen in the new zones… there are meta event chains that can last an hour, but those are made up of series of smaller events, which each award close to 20k experience. Over a 6 event chain, that’s 120k experience, a 9 event chain is 180k experience. Suddenly that’s not quite so bad.

And if you don’t like doing the events, just pop some of the myriad XP boosters you’ve undoubtedly been sticking in the bank and run off to kill random critters. Just turning on a Birthday Booster on my character is making normal enemies give me 2500 XP each if they’ve been sitting alive long enough to earn their bonus XP. If I actually went out and stacked the other XP boosters I have (hello, Killstreak booster!), that would go even higher. 5000 XP a kill equals an event completion after only four kills. All you have to do is find a quiet spot in the jungle (or Orr, for Tyria Masteries) and just run roughshod over things.

I hope you will understand what you suggest is exactly the definition of a grind.

Which is the opposite of what the manifesto states by our Game Designer, letme repost the link again in case you didn’t watch it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrwtWAGGGB4#t=1m24

sean.6058:

How ironic OP, because Since the launch on Friday, all I have seen on the forums is people moaning and the expansion and the so called endless grind and to be honest ots starting to get rather annoying.
When I log into the game its self, I dont see people moaning, I see people having a good time and commenting on how fun it is and how refreshing it is to have an expansion that is different from the Base game yet still has the Gw feel. The only digference in the expansion is there are no heart quests to gain xp, they have been replaced with events, which happen all the time. To expect to be able to buy the expansion and clear all the content in a daymor two, just because you are level 80 is quite frankly ridiculous, tjis is an expansion, but a dlc for season 3, although, aome will arhue that is exactly what it is im sure. The, astry system has replaced the leveling and as you did in the core game, you have to earn the levels to get to higher places, in this case, to get to higher ground.
I admit, it does seem slightly grindy, but only if you want it to be, I have quite happily gained enough mastery in a few days to get to the third map without really thinking abut it. Plus keep in mind that the mastery is account bound, when I wanted to prgress the story and id had enough of events for the time beaing, I simply logged an alt and redid the first part of the story and would you belive it, I had enough, mastery for my updraftmand the language.
The expasion is fun and brilliant at the same time, its just a different way of leveling, if the people who are moaning on here, actually spent more time playing instead of qqing, you might suprise yourselves and realise that you are missing out on a great game.
If you want to grind In a different way to gain more levels which then make the work of the past few years useless then I suggest you play something else, where your loyalty to your character only goes as far as the next expansion.

Okay, honestly not everyone have 2 hours a day to spend because of work, and for the most part; we don’t feel rewarded because of the ludicrous exp gain. We have to work for it? Really? Was this REALLY part of the manifesto?

please read this topic.

WereDragon.6083:

MoonRaiden.7423:

What…? What planet are you guys on, is there free healthcare there? Much of the content is locked behind mastery walls, and you need to grind to access those tiny little quirks TO EXPLORE.

I was getting around the maps just fine with barely anything unlocked and it’s only gotten easier with each new unlock. What planet are you from? Is it a distopian future that skews your view on everything?

God forbid we can’t get everything in kitten expansion in the first day like some games such as WoW. Me and my buddies hit 100 in WoD in 2 days, and by day three we where geared in full dungeon gear ((Not heroic.))

What…? What planet are you guys on, is there free healthcare there? Much of the content is locked behind mastery walls, and you need to grind to access those tiny little quirks TO EXPLORE.

BUMP AGAIN.

I need a developer to reply to this.

RyuDragnier.9476:

Not 20%, that’s too fast unless we’re talking the Legendary Mordrem Wyvern (which really should be that much, boy is a pain to kill). Everything else, 10%.

I believe 20% isn’t fast, it is at the right pace, considering that each events last for 10-20 minutes. And that each level only count towards 1 mastery.

SHAMELESS BUMP

Please do fire control.

How about this, we all know that one event will land you 16k-25k EXP in Maguuma (20-30 mins at best), and that we have to complete a 1 MILLION EXPERIENCE requirement to level 1 LEVEL.

So, why not have a solution that each events would be 20% of your experience bar, regardless of level similar to WvWvW experience gains. Not only this would ACTUALLY motivate players to play the content and group up, it won’t feel like a kitten-kitten-kitten-y—chore, playing the same kitten events over and over.

This is my two cents, and I already have sent an email-via Youtube to ask Angry Joe for a review on Hearts of Thorn; if things doesn’t change, expect his 100% honest review; which will probably go from 10/10 to something less.

oh, and I’ll leave this here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrwtWAGGGB4#t=1m24

I am going to have to add on to this post. This is actually ridiculous, the time it takes to grind is absolutely horrendous, 16k exp for 1 event that takes 20-30 MINUTES AT BEST; to beat a 1 MILLION EXP level requirement. And this is me talking with 52.5% of the Elite Spec unlocked, and level 6 Mastery level (Maguuma only, none of that CoF farming kitten).

If anything, they should’ve make the reward experience points by PERCENTAGE (20%/each) instead of this 16k experience bull-kitten.

Here is my Elementalist.