Showing Posts For Sanguine.6501:
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Hear hear!
City of Heroes (peace be upon it) had some fairly snazzy PvP going on prior to the introduction of Invention Origins (IOs). IOs were basically super versions of the enhancements (think talents) that already existed in the game, that granted set bonuses that could make a player virtually invincible while still being able to output giant damage. Pretty soon PvP just became a game of who had the best IO sets.
You’re a fantastic PvPer with some great, well-honed tactics for your specific build? Doesn’t matter: I have set bonuses that means that you have a 5% chance to hit me. Sure, I suck beyond suck at PvP, but I have the set bonuses because I farmed for weeks on end. I was willing to put up with the non-game to faceroll people who actually play the game, so I win.
I’d really hate to see that happen to GW2.
There’s also the other lesson to learn from City of Heroes: when you grant stronger and stronger ‘gear’, you need to start catering challenges towards players having that gear. Soon enough, even the PvE becomes punishingly difficult for players who aren’t willing to treat the game like a second job in order to play the game, because all the farmers with their snazzy high-end gear get bored quickly when they realise that they’re now far too overpowered for regular content. When the game reaches this stage, players effectively have to take part in the farming process just to play any new content, because otherwise they’re just too ineffectual.
This is before we even consider the fact that gear-chasing has a limit too; without continuously increasing the game’s difficulty, or nerfing the gear, or releasing lots of expansions that effectively achieve both aims, the developers reach a point where they just can’t make the gear any more powerful than it already is. So now you’ve reached the ‘end’ of the game: your character is fully maxed out. The difference between this end game, and the non-grindy end game is that the non-grindy end game doesn’t force you to treat the game like a second job. When you reach the grindy end game, and your character stagnates, then you’ve basically just lost all time you spent farming and grinding. When you reach the non-grindy end game, and you’ve gotten bored of PvP, then you’ve not lost any time at all, because none of it was spent treating the game like a second job.
Basically, my contention is that all end games are end games, but path to a gear-grind end game is significantly less fun than the path to a non-gear-grind end game. But obviously, some people find farming and grinding fun. It’s all subjective.
Lastly, some people are being a bit harsh on the OP and acting as if he’s trying to proselytize gear-grinding, or trying to state as a fact that gear-grinding is ‘better’ than non-gear-grinding. At no point has he done this. He’s stated his opinions and then had people say ludicrous nonsense to the effect of “UR JUST BEIN 1 SYDED!!!111”; I too don’t want to see grinds introduced, but for the love of all that’s good please try to understand that there’s no such thing as an unbiased opinion.
You lot just inspired me to make my first Engineer since BWE2. It’s level 5 so far, and already a lot of fun! I’m loving the random boons granted by buff powers; it adds unpredictability to a fight.
To be honest, I think a lot of people (maybe most) would hate this profession precisely because of the unpredictability, but it’s exactly what I find fun. I’m really only interested in PvE right now, and this and Necro are a lot of fun in PvE.
Thanks guys!