Guild Wars 2

1. Boxed expansions are able to reach out to gamers who have not yet heard or tried GW2 yet. Living world doesn’t do this.
2. Boxed expansions generally provide more than just a story line that the player completes in a day. It contains enough content to provide players the same amount of excitement as the original release of the game.
3. Boxed expansions generally include content that can be enjoyed throughout the life of the game, even after the initial rush has passed. End game areas that provide unique high end gear or items that can only be achieved in that area, exclusive mini games, etc.
4. Boxed expansions generally include a new set of features not seen in previous versions of the game, such as races, professions, weapons, skills, etc. Living world can do this, but historically has only provided a handful of skills in a lengthy amount of time. A boxed expansion generally provides most if not all of the aforementioned at one time, bringing a new refreshment to the game.
5. In a boxed expansion lore can be expanded and re-focused to areas not yet seen, or bring closure to open-ended questions brought up by the previous versions of the game.
6. In a boxed expansion players can enjoy the story line at any time they purchase the expansion. They don’t have to log in to unlock the content in case they want to enjoy it later. If they don’t do this; currently the content that has passed has to be purchased. With some of the released being no more than 20 minutes worth of content, this is not appealing to new players who have missed the past content. Not to mention the difficulty in following the story line of the living world unless actively keeping up to date with the releases.

In closing, boxed expansions can expand the progression of the world and the game in a much broader sense in a shorter amount of time. It also provides more than one path to take; meaning you can enjoy another area of the game while other players explore another path of story/map/race/etc.

Discredit boxed expansions all you want, but there are many of us who prefer that type of release versus the current living world.

I left the game for over a year. When I came back recently I spend two evenings doing all the new content, that’s just over a years worth of content lasted two evenings.

Seriously disappointed with the volume of content that has been added. The quality of the stories were good as were the maps. Just really disappointing for the amount of time that has passed that nothing substantial has really been added.

I’ll try not to make this a complaint thread/question, but it may be difficult.

I find myself routinely quitting and then coming back, usually when a new LS release comes out to see if the game AS I SEE IT has been “fixed.” And by fixed, I mean something more than a mouse whacking a button to get cheese.

I thought ANet was going to deliver a new MMO experience, with minimal grind, etc., etc. but after two years, I still see the same thing over and over. New titles to grind for, new skins to grind for, new stuff in the gemstore to grind for, a grind that takes uncountable hours to never quite accomplish, and what do we get story/gameplay wise? A couple of cutscenes, bad dialogue, character/skill balance issues, skill bugs, and a LS “release” that can be done in about an hour, even if roleplaying and without skipping anything.

I ask this in all seriousness, will GW2 ever be anything more than a Las Vegas slot machine or mouse-button-cheese psychological conditioning experiment? Silverwastes is a good example of this, with the hordes of players scrambling from Bandit Chest to Bandit Chest desperately hoping for something other than Account bound, un-sellable crafting materials to drop.

I want GW2 to be the be-all, end-all MMO for me. I really do. Frankly I love the way the Elementalist plays, and feels like something straight out of the Last Airbender. But that means nothing if there’s nothing engaging for that character (and me the player) to do or accomplish. Maybe that’s a fault of mine, perhaps its a fault inherent in MMO design and the game just isn’t for me. But I would like to know, before quitting for good, if the game has any intention of ever being something more than loot whack-a-mole, or a system designed to drive players to spend cash in the gem store.

lordkrall.7241:

Nevets Crimsonwing.5271:

Why funny? These people clearly have a passion for the game or they wouldn’t even bother. I think it’s kind of sad… they want the game to go in a good direction and may even want to give anet money, which is why they stick around despite what are arguably terrible changes.

But that is just the thing. They aren’t sticking around. They are coming back as soon as there is a new big thing to hate. When there are no new things to hate on they are very quiet and you more or less never see them post anything at all. But as soon as something controversial turns up they start posting like mad.

Threads like these give players who quit a feeling of solidarity and a platform to voice their concerns which they feel are not being acknowledged.

lordkrall.7241:

Nevets Crimsonwing.5271:

Just because people still post on the forums doesn’t mean they haven’t quit.

Oh, I know. I just find it funny how they always turn up when it comes to controversial changes and threads like these.

Why funny? These people clearly have a passion for the game or they wouldn’t even bother. I think it’s kind of sad… they want the game to go in a good direction and may even want to give anet money, which is why they stick around despite what are arguably terrible changes.

You know, just for once, i’d kinda like you to just be honest and say

“We’ve designed this new system to squeeze and screw the most money out of you that we can but don’t worry we’ll send Gale Gray along to fluster and treat you like carp till the dust settles aaaaaaaaand we’ll put another costume and salvaging tool into the trading house. Go us!!!

ps we will also ignore 99% of the stuff that’s needed fixed for years because we cant find a way to monetise it"

And for Miss sarcastic CS person

Have an option for user defined number of gems/gold so that i can convert any number from 1 to a Anetillion, dependant on what amount i need to buy what item(s) i want. Yes have predefined quantities for speed but not having user input option is just an exceptionally bad design which shows how little thought your devs put into what the game needs and how much you put into what it needs to wring the most cash out of your players

lordkrall.7241:

I keep seeing people shout about how this is milking people out of money and I really don’t see how that really makes any kind of sense.
The prices for gems are still exactly the same as they were back at release.

The fact remains that they don’t even have to have the gold to gem transfer in the first place. If they really wanted to milk the players they would remove it completely, which they quite clearly haven’t done.

I don’t think you understand what’s going on.

phys.7689:

they basically forced a lot of people to buy a ton more gems than they usually would to get the same items, which skews the gem exchange.

the algorithm of the gem exchange has to react to large influx of gold, with predictive values, so they wont take losses on the gold/gem exchange most likely, therefore you will see a large spike in value.
the only thing that can balance this is a large spike on the other side,

but since selling gems gives you better options to sell as much as you want, whereas buying gems is in huge increments, its unlikely that the system will track the real demand that well anymore

That alone can’t explain this spike. The immediate spike caused by the insanely popular Belinda’s Greatsword was about 12.6%. This spike was around 32.2%. Plus you need to factor in the loss of gem conversions from players who don’t have 75 or 150 gold to spend on gems. I can certainly understand some effect from the larger conversion quantities but this is simply unbelievable.

This is absolutely disgusting, I can’t even express how disappointed I am…

The excuse that it was too confusing for new players makes no sense. If it was, you would have added this as an extra and keep the old exchange an “advanced” tab or something, not force this shameless moneygrabbing onto everyone.

It’s really a poorly disguised way of forcing people to buy more gems…

Closes purse, well thank you, but no more real life money from me. I only play casually and therefore only have limited gold, I was putting my surplus gold into a little bit of gems (twenty or so here and there) at a time and saving up for one of the pretty new outfits, now it’s out of my reach via ingame gold and I refuse to let go of anymore real life money to fund such an awful way to fleece your player base.

I did the same with another popular MMORPG, I closed my purse and refused to spend anymore real life money with them, it is now going on two years and they haven’t seen a dime from me. Revert or find something else or you will not see another dime from me either. Thank you.

Considering the only way the game gets new armor or weapon skins is the gem shop, I think I’ll extend my couple weeks off into however long it takes for this to go away.

I have 6 gems that I cannot convert to gold. Thanks for stealing my money anet

I want to buy something for 200 gems but the minimum is 400. Thanks for stealing my money anet

I want to convert 200 gems to gold. I have to do 9 transactions for it. Thanks for wasting my time anet

But I can’t convert the whole thing because i get stuck with 6 gems remaining (at current values) which is less than 1g. Thanks for stealing my money anet

tl;dr: this new gem exchange is borderline criminal, in my opinion

So if i want to buy the Noble Count Outfit that cost 700gems, i have to exchange to 800 and lose money!?

If anet thing this will work to make me(others) buy gems with real money guess what!? i wont buy the outfit and done!

This is a terrible change. I will no longer buy gems with real money until this change is reverted.

Oh, and I’ve just seen that immediately after this change, gem prices went up nearly 25% – no wonder you removed the conversion history graph.

No, that’s it. I’m done. This is nickel and diming at it’s absolute worst. You’ve made it perfectly clear that you want to treat your player base like crap – well I’ll give my money to a company that doesn’t want to stab us in the back.

Such a potentially brilliant game ruined by outright greed and short-sightedness. Such a shame.

Crovax.7854:

insanemaniac.2456:

Crovax.7854:

I personally feel really let down by the ‘only 4-5 releases left this year’ statement.
Compared to the claim of ‘every two weeks’ this seems like a rather bad joke :/

wat
its october
if they have 5 more releases this year that comes down to about 1 per 2 weeks

What about their ‘break’ that lasted longer than the actual season so far? I was talking about the whole year, not the time between Nov 4th and new year.

There have been 4 releases since S2 start and 4-5 to come; that’s 8-9 releases since March 18th with rehashed festival of four winds but let’s just add that too to a maximum of 10 releases in 33(?) weeks.
That’s hardly ‘every two weeks’ and what’s even worse, is that the only 4 story releases were back to back in 2 months after a 3 1/2 month (!) break. The current break has been 2 1/2 months too. That’s just far too long.

If you don’t feel that way then great, I’m happy you like the game the way it is now but in consideration of all the threads popping up asking for actual content I think I’m hardly alone with my perspective.

I am in agreement here. If there isn’t going to be new content then why not do more polishing? Why not add some skills? Why not do more frequent meta shifts? The gem shop isn’t lacking in the regular updates department. That’s really the kicker for me. If skins and costumes can be added on a regular basis for the gem shop, why can’t things be done on a regular basis for the game?

Absconditus.6804:

Gamers aren’t some unintelligent drivel that are unable to get information about how things are going to turn out later on. They may start to feel a certain way early on, maybe around Lv.15? Where are my rewards? Does my rewards get better later on? How much is a precursor, these legendaries look awesome.

Agree with you. The rewards are terrible. I saved the Summit leaders and all I got was some grey items (goop, broken lockpicks, etc.). Oh, and one green item. Wow.

Killing Zhaitan should net everyone at least an ascended weapon – if not a legendary. Hey, you just helped kill the game’s ultimate threat and you get a hearty handshake and get to watch some credits. Seriously bad rewards.

I wonder if their interviews with players who quit, actually revealed how displeased mostly everyone is with the rewards in this game. Blues and Greens, are not rewarding. On top of that, we are prevented from doing something more than once in a 24-hour period, if we want any type of reward out of anyways, or rather the chance at a decent reward. There’s a distinct lack of rewards for harder encounters as well. Nobody really does Tequatl after it was made more challenging. And don’t get anyone started on the Triple Trouble of wurms, as practically nobody does that anymore at all. It’s encounters designed wrong, encounters who requires way too many players and that takes far too long a time to complete over any other world event that may be up at the time. At least there are a few unique drops in these encounters, but you can’t sell Ascended, nor do they look good, so the interest is dampened. They’re also extremely static. Take Shatterer as an example of how terrible most of these encounters really are; we are all, grouped up on its right hand side, with it pouncing and attacking straight ahead. It pays no attention to the hundred-man army killing it. It’s not dynamic, and it isn’t engaging. It’s ridiculous. Why isn’t it turning around, attacking us at its side? Why doesn’t it fly and land somewhere else nearby? Why is it so blatantly scripted? (That’s not to say you should kill off anyone doing anything by making it too complicated, or too difficult, but at least make it fun, and put some fun rewards in all these encounters who are practically Guild Wars 2’s version of raiding.)

This is where ArenaNet needs to work on things. Rewards. Not trying to make leveling into a reward by slowly unlocking things. Pretty much nobody has ever enjoyed leveling in a game because it unlocked more and more skills, or the ability to dye something… They endure it because they want to reach the highest level and expect the fun to be there, the end-game. I will give ArenaNet the compliment again of saying this was the first MMO game in which I found leveling to not be a drag, I actually really enjoyed it. But I never felt rewarded and I still don’t to this day. I got blues and greens, and this is what I mostly get to this day. Fun.. There’s also an excessive amount of Account Bound things that are either worth a few silver to a vendor and/or that I can’t even salvage. They take up space, so you’re given the choice of deleting your reward or simply having it take up space. I’ll ask as I have before, who wants to delete their reward, for nothing. Drag it out of their inventory, click confirm and poof, it’s gone. That is not rewarding, that’s discouraging. And who wants to sell their top tier items for a silver.. a silver! If it was because players deemed their value to be a silver, that’s different, over the game saying you can’t even try sell them to other players and the vendors are willing to grant you a measly silver for it, that’s just.. annoying. It doesn’t feel rewarding.

Again, Karma. Used to feel rewarding, you could buy Exotics, armor as you leveled up, you could salvage and vendor these things. Then we have one incident, of some group of lame players exploiting one little mistake you make with the cost of some Karma reward. And you go bonkers and make it impossible to sell and salvage them. Why is it that you have kept it like this for nearly two years now. Why is this not “fixed” yet? I have not purchased Karma gear as I leveled up since that day. I don’t like destroying my rewards with nothing in return.

Also, why do we have a single sPvP map with a new game mode added? One TDM map. One! Why is the Borderlands of World vs. World still a copy-paste. We have two maps, Eternal Battlegrounds and Borderlands. Edge of the Mist was and is a great map, but it’s not included in the matchup, so that hardly counts. It’s not like players PvP there anyways.. they run in circles avoiding each other to farm it like a PvE map. Why do we have only two new PvE maps (three if you count EotM), which aren’t even the size of the original maps, combined, added over the course of two years. You have a massive world to take from. It exists in Guild Wars: Prophecies, Factions, Nightfall and Eye of the North. We get one map that’s barely used, Southsun Cove, and one that is, well actually quite awesome, Dry Top, but that’s it though.

Over the course of two years, you have given us content, I’m not saying you haven’t. But where is all the content from the Living Story, Season 1. It’s gone, poof, it’s nowhere. You haven’t expanded your game. There’s hardly more content for a new player today, than there was a year ago. There is the problem. The game is stalling, it’s not rewarding, and you can only have fun for so long with the same toys provided to you. Player retention comes with rewards and new things to do. Players play for rewards. “Fun” is only rewarding for so long.

Everything they say about this being bugs and minconceptions is the same, as the guy you cought in the middle of crowd with his hand in your pocket – claiming he needed support due to muscle exhaustion …

Now how likely would be such man to continue stealing from you if you actually belived that explanation? (allowing him to continue his attempts until he obtain everything you own)

For me this is not a game anymore – it is a money scheme. And they dont want even to delete my account (I do not even mention lack of refund/resale possibility).

Vayne.8563:

Chrispy.5641:

Vayne.8563:

Paul.4081:

It strikes me as that place where your dad knows he’s lost but keeps driving ahead. This is Anet.

I recently re-installed and the TP was removed from Queensdale, uhm, why? Probably because the new TP layout is rubbish. Why is selling to bids the auto choice? This will lose new players money because they’ll assume that the game has their interests at heart.

Eg. New player get’s an exotic, bid of 1 copper is there…gratz new player you just lost a ton of gold.

Maybe I’m wrong but if I am it means the new TP is more confusing than the old one. You see my point? Lose lose, WD Anet, WD. Slow clap.

New TP isn’t more confusing than the old one and the overwhelming response to it has been positive. Even with all the people who enjoy pointing out flaws in the game,. the response has been overwhelmingly positive.

Admittedly it’s hard to change from one system to another but that’s something that new players won’t have to worry about.

I’m relatively certain this is better for new players than the last one.

You should define overwhelmingly positive response. 1 person typing overwhelmingly positive posts on every thread does not mean that the response to the change was overwhelmingly positive. That doesn’t mean the response to the change was particularly negative either, but just because the response wasn’t negative doesn’t automatically make the change an 11/10.

When I say overwhelmingly positive, in every single thread that people posted negative stuff in,. more than 80% of the posts on those threads were positive. You can go back to any thread complaining about it and check that if you want.

Do you even read the forums?

Let’s also be fair here. Your comments are usually “positive reactions” and in many threads comprise roughly 50% of the posts. Skews the data a bit, eh?

I’m glad more people are coming to realize how stale GW2 has become. ANet seriously needs to reconsider the Living Story idea because it’s not panning out. Now if that means hiring more people (yes we know your resources ate strained) then do it. NCSoft is posting huge profits so ask daddy for a loan if you need it.

Thuggernaut.1250:

(4) I don’t think I even need to mention how superior the writing and content in GW1 was compared to GW2. it simply goes without saying. in order to make another “me too” MMO, they had to throw in additional races, and instead of making one race with one solid, compelling story (GW1), they made five races with mediocre, forgettable stories.

The Nightfall campaign inspired me to become a writer. One published book and two more manuscripts in the works I’d say it’s been a very positive change. GW2’s writing is anything but. It feels commercial, overly simplified and not well thought out. Story drove the missions in GW1. You were immersed in the world, and you cared about your character. In GW2 you run kitten-boy errands for Trahearne. Your character means nothing in the personal story nor the Living Story. Now if you can’t connect with your character are you going to care about the world?

GW1 was a successful experiment that should have been continued, GW2 was a promising experiment at first that had great potential, but failed and ended up like every other generic mmo.

(1) GW1 combat played out much more tactically because of the dual-profession balancing act and the wide variety of skills to mix and match. GW1 put the emphasis on careful skill choice and thoughtful building. GW2 is a button-mashing, cooldown spamming, dodge-rolling, bump-and-grind that plays about as deep as a pizza pan.

(2) Anet wasn’t afraid of split balancing in GW1. fun, unbalanced skills for pve and more carefully refined skills for pvp. the “one size fits all” balancing philosophy of GW2 ends up butchering both pvp and pve and forces everyone into meta builds.

(3) GW1 eliminated the concept of “gear” by capping stats and item upgrades and strictly defining the roles of each profession. GW2’s poorly delineated profession roles allow every class to have a good heal and support role, which forces everyone into a zerker gear set to compete on DPS. in GW2, DPS is king, bottom line. they eliminated the “trinity” of mmos, and replaced it with a unity: all DPS, all the time.

(4) I don’t think I even need to mention how superior the writing and content in GW1 was compared to GW2. it simply goes without saying. in order to make another “me too” MMO, they had to throw in additional races, and instead of making one race with one solid, compelling story (GW1), they made five races with mediocre, forgettable stories.

(5) Cash shop business model. ’Nuff said. Quantity over quality (of cash shop items), and as long as that brings in the dough, real content (continents, professions, storylines) can go to hell. China is the perfect market for this type of business, and we can see that philosophy infecting the original (American/European) version of the game. NCsoft is just following the money here, and Anet pretty much has to oblige.

GW1 stands tall as a memorable game that did something different from the stagnant mmo market and succeeded. GW2 might make more money, but it will not be remembered because it succumbed to the same dumbed-down trends as every other modern mmo.

Gaile,
Nice to see you back in the saddle again!
The main problem with feedback on the forums is a very inconsistent mod team.
I have seen some very well written posts with valid points deleted for no apparent reason. For a very long time, it seemed like ANY post that had anything negative to say was deleted and the poster infracted. I and many others simply gave up even trying to say anything as it felt like no one wanted to hear anything except how great a job everyone was doing. Rude, nasty, demanding or insulting post where and SHOULD be deleted but when a player has a valid issue and posts it, to have it deleted and a warning issued just stops people from posting at all.
Feedback on the forums is a great idea, but only if someone wants to listen and honestly from what I have seen, no one at Anet seems to care.
I gave up on the game and uninstalled it months ago. I still watch the forums to see if it improves, and I even reinstalled it and tried it after a death in the family had me very depressed, but it never really seems to change.

Feedback is great, but first the mods need to learn to take the bad with the good and stop using such a heavy hand or there will be no feedback at all.
Second, it would REALLY be helpful if someone simply replied to threads with hundreds of posts complaining about game breaking issues with a simple “We are aware of the issue and looking in to it”. I work in support. I copy and paste that canned response all the time. Users are happy just to know someone has actually seen their message and they are not being ignored. Many times here, we feel ignored.

As to the suggestion of rating features on a scale, that sounds like a great idea.

What I would do:

- Levels have been removed.
- No trait or skill hunting
- All items have normalized stats.
- The only thing that changes as you approach “endgame” zones is that enemy AI changes to be more difficult and more complex.

I would love it. But I know it would fail miserably as an MMO.

Vayne.8563:

Do you know the one about glass houses and stones.

Ooh, I know!

Mick Jagger walked into a glass house. The owner of the glass house threw him out. Mick called Keith Richards, who came and punched the owner of the glass house in the nose. The moral of the story: watch out for Keith Richards, he’s got a wicked right cross.

Just wait. Watch the predicable unfold.

Anet: “We’ve made leveling easier for new players!”
Forums: “You mean more tedious…”
Anet: “Well if you think that way we are sorry, but you are welcome to buy the instant leveling scrolls that grant you 40 or 60 levels in the gem store.”

This is what cash shop games do. Create artificial roadblocks / barriers for the ‘good of the game’, wait a bit, and then sell the bypass to said roadblock / barrier. It is a pattern that has often repeated itself since the creation of the micro transaction model. Quite frankly, a buy 2 play game should be above this.

People were excited by the datamined 40/60 scrolls because leveling was already tedious past the first few alts….

Shanaeri Rynale.6897:

Wethospu.6437:

Could you explain how skipping leads to DPS centric play? How damage helps with skipping?

In GW2 the trash mobs are just that, trash. They don’t offer any variation in the required tactics or builds within the dungeon. In other MMO’s I’ve played trash mobs are a real threat and often require specialist tactics to kill.

Now, since the mobs don’t offer (reward, build or challenge) anything different people skip them and so by skipping them, it only adds to the DPS centric nature of PvE as there is nothing in the encounter to dilute the DPS centric nature

It’s like putting milk in coffee, you can put milk in or not(skip trash of not) but it’s still coffee.

Think that makes sense and I did say it was off the top of my head

that pretty much sums it up. Not to mention the aggro mechanic means that it’s easy to break combat. Anyone who has played GW1 will remember the aggro circle and how important it was to pull carefully in dungeons because the trash mobs will completely destroy you if you over aggro. Slaver’s Exile is a prime example of required careful pulling and aggro control. Apart from the fact that the mobs also came with resurrection skills it meant that selective targeting of mobs was even more critical. Slaver’s Exile is a more extreme example. The regular dungeons were still challenging especially on hard mode.

GW2 has nothing like that. Trash mobs will do just that, mob you and burn you down through attrition not through any sort of slick skill usage that has to be prepared for. Hard mode is non existent except if you aggro everything in sight. Mob AI is deficient. The list of everything wrong with dungeons is huge

There were way more builds in GW1. Just looking at my folder of saved build templates, it is gigantic. And most of those are necromancer builds for different parts of the game. I wish GW2 had that much build diversity.