Showing Posts For SLOThief.5317:
People are playing a huge game of semantics with ‘casual’ and ‘hardcore’ here, and it all seems to be related to power creep and the new tier of gear. The best comment I’ve seen on the matter was in a PCGamer comment thread and it said, “Umm…I like new gear and content”. I would probably be considered ‘casual by some, and ’hardcore’ by others, depending on the many definitions, labels, and associations you’ve all made.
Attitudes like this though, just make me angry:
I believe players should depend more on skill and less on arbitrary stat advantages. Content should be designed to challenge your abilities rather than to serve as gear checks.
If you can think of a mechanics and game systems that will offer new content and challenges that aren’t gear or stat dependent at all, then by all means, suggest them. I would love to hear new ideas from the community, and I’m sure ANet would too! This isn’t what people are doing though, they’re just bashing the decisions ANet already made and putting words in their mouths. Furthermore, this attitude, is childish:
I very much should be able to jump back into the game and experience the same content as those who play constantly. I think getting things in game should be a matter of skill and not time played, someone shouldn’t have nicer and stronger gear just because they spend more time grinding for it. And I definitely would mind having to play catchup each time a new item tier gets released.
Time spent acquiring gear and moving through content should mean something, and again, if you can think of mechanics they could add to the game that would result in the most ‘skilled’ (let’s not even try to define that) players getting the best gear, let the ideas flow my friend.
People are criticizing ANet endless for the not catering to the right community, or not ‘sticking to their manifesto’. They’re honestly, just trying to do what’s best for the many different groups that make up their player base. Who care exactly how you define casual and hardcore? Why not just suggest what you’d like to see in the game, rather than picking apart the decisions the developer is making and offering no ideas of your own?
Just the other day me and a guardian bumped into each other in a cave network and ended up tackling an elite DE. Then we stuck together for about 8 elite mobs, a vista, a skill point, several mining nodes, and gobs of regular mobs. I never did that in TOR or Rift.
If GW2 wasn’t designed as it was to promote cooperative play, I would never have teamed up with this person.
/slowclap…you get it. I can attest that there are more like you wandering around GW2. The question is how do we get everyone to buy into this mentality, because to me the game clearly already encourages it.
@lorazcyk (didn’t want to quote whole post). Great analogy, (if you’ve seen my posts you know I love analogies) I’m curious what elements in other games you think promote socialization vs. GW2. How specifically does GW2 hinder socialization in your opinion?
The ‘Lol’ was for ‘nasty spastic colon’ wasn’t it? Yup, knew it. Also /agreed on and token grind and DPS. Exactly the point I wanted to make:
This isn’t an issue just with GW2, to be sure
I also think developer efforts to design looser social interaction into the game were (and are) admirable. The works perfectly for some and rubs other the wrong way (as they seem to crave a more structure social experience based purely on the game and progression).
I do think there’s a widespread tendency to confuse ‘socializing’ with ‘guild progression’ or ‘dungeon running’. You can call it hardcore vs. casual, but I think these terms are overly used and way too loaded with preconceptions and entrenched opinions to boot.
GW2 offers a specific brand of social interaction that some like and others don’t, but I don’t think it warrants the label of being a ‘bad community’ compared to others (I’ve played WoW, SWToR, EVE, and LoTRO).
Each had a very specific community. I sat around a campfire all night RPing in LoTRO. I had my ship destroyed (they didn’t pod me) in EVE by pirates and was promptly invited to their corp after the whole affair because I didn’t ‘roll over like a kitten, and actually put up a fight’. Each game has a unique community, and it frustrates me when people can’t enjoy it for what it is and throw absolute labels on it (rage! community is terrible!).
I would think most players would want to get away from their personal lives. I think this is one of the distinctions that is not being made here. Personally I’m not advocating chit chat or personal live reveals, but more of exactly what you don’t like, strategizing about the game itself.
I wasn’t saying that no strategy or game talk would happen, or even that it should. In fact I advocated some game chatter about builds and combo skills! I think that’s the obvious thing to chat about. I’m also not saying you’d immediately delve into your abiding for love obscure Battlestar Galactica trivia or your recent bout with a nasty spastic colon.
Of course you’re going to talk about the game, but the chatter doesn’t need to be about what you’re doing right then. Maybe you talk about what’s going on in WvW and a big siege that just happened, or you talk about trying to gather those last few legendary mats. Maybe you branch into talking about other games (Any SC2 players here?), or you talk about how funny you think Arrested Development is and how glad you are it’s coming back (like me).
The talk doesn’t need to be overly personal, but it doesn’t need to be dry and totally concerned with what’s happening in that moment in the game either. Of course talk over strats and how you want to approach an encounter, by all means. I just think the social experience extends beyond that, and that GW2 is giving me even more opportunity for that type of interaction than MMOs I’ve played in the past.
Let’s not even getting into RPG gaming as an escapist activity or I’ll need to get into some “live reveals” =P.
(edited by SLOThief.5317)
There’s no server community feeling because GW2 is basically a solo game. Sure you see other players in DE but you never talk to them. What would you talk about anyway? They might as well be NPCs spamming their AOE there would be no difference.
You could talk about anything. Chat a bit, ask if they want to go look for more DEs. Group up maybe. Talk about using combo skills people in the group have to take down mobs quicker. Ask about each others builds if you’re playing the same class. Float the idea of doing a dungeon or some WvW together once you’re grouped. Put on town clothes, go to LA, and have a drunken dance part at the Mystic Forge. Really the options are only as limited as what you can come up with.
This game gives you every opportunity to group up and be social. It feels like a large part of the community just chooses not to do this of their own accord and only does so if the game design forces them to.
In my opinion, grouping just to coordinate a kill and having a conversation purely about the game objective with no personality isn’t much of a ‘social’ interaction anyway. I realize this probably isn’t what you’re advocating, but it happens a lot with forced grouping mechanics, and to me it’s a negative.
(edited by SLOThief.5317)
Yeah, I’ll keep using Cleansing Flames through doors and hitting it with staff auto-attack aoe until someone tells me those are exploits. Until then it’s just a deterrent for the enemies standing on the other side =P. (No sarcasm, completely serious).
OP has some good points. Dynamic events don’t force you to party with others and allows you to jump in with randoms any time an event is up. The entire leveling process can be done solo, and quickly at that. The lack of instanced raiding allows you to experience endgame without joining a guild, getting a spot on their raid team, and running on their schedule. In short, grouping and community lacks official structure imposed by game design, and leaves the choice to join a guild, add friends, and party up entirely up to the player.
This is a gray issue. It’s both positive and negative. Personally though, I’m glad I have the choice to do these things. While the game design doesn’t force me to party up or have a stacked friends list, it gives me plenty of opportunity to do so (and encourages it imo).
If you want to build relationships and friendships, jump in and make it happen. Look for a guild (answer one of the recruitment shouts in LA or WvW), and don’t just join one, join a few.
Next time you’re running a dynamic event and see a Guardian in some awesome-looking heavy armor and wrecking shop, say hi, friend him/her, and say ’let’s go look for some more events’ or ‘next time Jormag is up, give me a shout, I’ll do the same’.
If you’re running WvW and you narrowly win a 1v1 only to be downed by the guy’s buddy, and some random from your sever runs up wrecks, the enemy, and revives you, say ‘thanks, want to party up?’. Go kill some dolys together, cap a supply camp. Hell shout that you’re going to go try to take a camp and ask for help, see who shows up, party up with them, and add to friends list if it’s fun and goes well.
In short, take the initiative. There’s plenty of community out there, the game just doesn’t require it or force it down your throat via game design.
Not sure if you think you’ll get flamed for enjoying WvW as a Guardian or for your build. If you think it’s simply because you enjoy WvW as a Guardian, then I’m here to come to your defense.
I switched away from GS early. I’m running with Scepter/Torch and Staff:
http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#mmcmcV0zMMaTGmMaTGmGxG9MMsMkqzo
I still do well enough imo. The staff is great facing large groups of invaders, capping, and general support (empower is nice). The scepter crits like crazy, and chains + retreat + cleansing flame closes the gap and puts major damage on a stray invader. I guess I turned my huge norn in heavy armor into sort of a caster, but I like to think of him as a Heavy Mobile Arms Platform =P.
@Hawks: bought 660ti, sold cell-shaded loot shooter to a friend for $30 =P. Also Boxcarman is Boxcarsmart.
First off I can definitely say you can save on your mobo. That thing is for a serious rig that you’re going to do some serious OCing and customization with. So if you’ll use it for that go for it. If you’re just worried about ‘compatibility’ here is another Asus model that will do you just fine and save you a boatload of cash:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157293
Your CPU is perfect in my opinion. I’m a big advocate of saving money by getting the i5 vs. the i7, unless you’re doing something serious that requires increased cache and core power. It will also fit your mobo (the 1155 is your hint).
8gb of RAM is plenty. Honestly the ‘why not just go for 12 or 16’ argument is a waste of money in my opinion. 8gb will pretty much do whatever you need for ‘gaming’ and you’ll never run out of memory.
I’ll be honest and say that I’m not a huge AMD fan, and while that card is good for the money, I’d recommend:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130810
I’m currently using it, running everything on high (except AA and advanced character textures) and getting 60 frames consistently (low 50s in fairly large WvW battles). That card will save you a little money from the one you listed and will be a beast.
If you want to load your OS on an SSD, get a small one. Crucial is a good brand. In that case you could get:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148441
It’s definitely not essential, but will help load OS and other applications quicker in the background, etc.
That case is a tad overkill in my opinion, but I go pretty spartan with cases, and I’m a big Antec fan in general. I have this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129066
Tons of fans, dust filters, plenty of room, and keeps things very cool (my CPU sticks around 65 C when running on aforementioned settings and my GPU is around 70 C). Plus a little more money saved there too.
For power supply. Get something around 600 watts (whatever you need to run your GPU really) and at least 80+ Bronze certified. Here’s a somewhat budget but reliable model that I recently built with:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817159128
Sorry for wall of text, but I like helping/talking about these things. Overall have fun and enjoy your new rig.
I’m going to agree with Aristar. I just got the GTX 660Ti. Running it on a new 600W 80+ Bronze PSU. Running everything on high (without AA or advance character textures) and getting 60 fps everywhere in PvE. WvW dips into low 50s / high 40s at times, but still smooth.
It all depends on your budget. For the money the 660Ti is a hell of a card.