Guild Wars 2

Chameleon Dude.1564:

Now, you should prepare yourself for some flaming…

That’s why when I post on these forums, I usually leave my thoughts and then go back to playing the game, and don’t look at the replies for several weeks. :P

as a player who is, for the most part, quite happy with how the game stands currently.

I have my problems with the core game, some of the stuff that’s been added in the past, and some of the things that have happened in LS2. But for a long time now, I think that everything that has been implemented into the game has been, overall, overwhelmingly positive.

So, I feel the need to state this because the community is going absolutely bonkers right now, and I’m afraid that they’ll cause a kneejerk reaction that I don’t want to see:

• I don’t want expansions
• I want more temporary content mixed with permanent content and the continuation of the living world as the main feature of the game throughout its lifetime
• I want more zones (and dungeons and stuff!) just like what we’ve seen in Dry Top, which has been 100% fantastic. Season 2 in terms of the quality of the content has been stellar.
• I don’t mind if the devs are quiet. When they DO deliver things, they are usually good.
• I still trust in the GW2 and ArenaNet ideal to be innovative and to stick to your guns when it comes to good ideas. The Living World is going to have a huge impact on the MMO industry, but only if it continues for GW2’s entire lifetime.

I wrote this because the people who are losing their minds over an interview are being extremely loud right now, to the point where one might think the entire playerbase thinks that way. This is not true. Those of us who enjoy the game and have been enjoying it for years are still in-game. And we do not want to be forgotten. We want the game to keep improving in the direction it has been going in the past year, not changing course to the old, stale industry standard.

And so I am going to leave this post here and go back to playing the game instead of arguing about it.

xXxOrcaxXx.9328:

Bandido.8719:

We are auto-kicked without this option anyway. Having more options will not hurt us more than we are actually.

SkiTz.4590:

not a chance rangers even get a chance at in elitist parties so this point is moot.

If you want elite, roll warrior or guardian.
It’s anet untouchable classes and they will ALWAYS be kings in PvE group play

Substance E.4852:

And why should they? Pet AI has no place in groups that care about razor edge performance.

The pet won’t get smarter and they won’t increase it’s power as long as PvP and PvE remain joined so the rest of us should have the option to be effective if we choose.

So, what, just toss out our entire profession mechanic in favor of a static buff? No, that’s stupid. I suppose next you’ll suggest that elementalists should get a buff if they don’t switch attunements. Or mesmers should get a buff if they don’t use clones.

Edit: I see earlier in this thread that a dev has stated they will not be doing permastowing, so that’s good.

Allie Murdock.8152:

1. General QoL changes.
   1. When the pet is stowed, the Ranger should gain “aspect of the <pet name>” effect which provides unique buffs based on the pet family and specific pet.

Please don’t do this. When I make my build and play the game, I want to select a pet and work alongside it to succeed. I don’t want to select a static buff that’s just going to sit there.

And no, it will not be “optional”. I foresee a future where rangers who use pets instead of the Aspect Of the _ will get auto-kicked from most elitist parties.

Ayrilana.1396:

Serbaayuu.3051:

Healix.5819:

I just completed both the achievements. They work as you would expect, but you can’t get downed.

I can confirm that in the battle where I should have gotten In Tune, I was not downed at all.

You likely hit something with the wrong attunement of just as it wore off. Conditions could have this unintended effect.

I did not. I stopped attacking when the buff had around 10 seconds left every time, and I don’t use damaging conditions in my build.

Healix.5819:

I just completed both the achievements. They work as you would expect, but you can’t get downed.

I can confirm that in the battle where I should have gotten In Tune, I was not downed at all.

I have seen some non-rangers complaining about not getting the achievement when they should have on my World. I do not think the pet counts for this – it hasn’t for any other similar achievements in the past.

Thanks for this thread.

I am also having trouble with these achievements – I just got through three runs.

In two of those, I am POSITIVE I should have gotten In Tune. Like others, I am being incredibly aware of what I am attacking and when.

And in one I am pretty certain I didn’t get hit by any lasers.

There are also two other people on my World who are apparently having the same problem.

Hopefully a dev can comment on this because it seems to be affecting many players, and if the achievements are not outright bugged, they are very inconsistent in how they are being awarded.

I don’t have any changes to suggest for this, I just have one thing I want to add my input on:

Please do not make the pet optional in any capacity.

The ranger as a beastmaster is great, and I love having a partner with me no matter what my build is. I have been a ranger in Guild Wars since 2006 but only in around 2010 did I start actively using a pet, something I wish I had done earlier because it was extremely enjoyable. I believe that learning to work alongside the AI is extremely effective and a measure of high skill for this profession, and is something that should be maintained.

If the pet became optional, I assure you that we’d see a massive influx of rangers who decided they wanted to be “medium armor warriors”, completely forgoing the main mechanic and trying to faceroll. Not only that, but if it was optional to have pets, pets would undoubtedly retain their poor reputation, and the players who still used pets would become the primary victims of elitist discrimination, regardless of their actual skill with them.

Make changes, improve the AI, but keep the pets mandatory.

Signed. Ascended gear is kitten, and needs to get fixed, and this is a great way to do it.

It should even be free, but I’d be content with skill points.

All right, finally getting in on this discussion.

My issues are with ascended gear.

Basically: it has turned the game from what was a relatively flat horizontal progression – kitting out multiple characters and/or multiple builds in exotic gear for different situations – to an excess of vertical progression: taking no less than two months to kit out a single character with a single build in full ascended.

I think this is far too restrictive and goes against what I believed to be the core philosophies of this game. It’s massively expensive and time consuming to kit out a character in just one set, let alone a legion of alts with several builds.

Why not just go with exotics? Well, when something better is available, even if it’s only better by a small amount, I think it’s unfair that players who put in the time to grind for their materials and/or cash to make it have higher stats than the players who do not. Everybody should be able to access their best-in-slot stats (and change them when they want) with relative ease – that is one of the biggest core philosophies I believed Guild Wars 2 was going to follow.

After doing some math on the materials needed for a full ascended set, I’ve come to a set of numbers – for most ascended gear, it’s about 100+ world bosses. 100+ dungeons/towers/jumping puzzles. 100+ gold. And at least 1-2 months (laurels).

Doing that once is not fun. Doing that two or more times per character just to have build diversity? That’s a grind – and that’s what this game was supposed to avoid. I want to be having fun. Instead I’m just thinking about my vertical progression whenever I play, and how is what I’m doing right now going to help me progress efficiently?

I have one big suggestion, a sweeping change that would fix ascended gear and turn it into not only a worthwhile grind but a horizontal one too: equalize stats between exotic and ascended gear, and then give ascended gear stat-swapping. (Or allow ascended gear to cannibalize exotic gear in order to swap to those stats – so if a Zojja’s Greatsword ate an exotic Knight’s Greatsword, the Zojja greatsword could swap between Berserker and Knight’s stats freely from then on. This would keep legendaries special and also make exotics worthwhile again, because now exotics are almost totally worthless except for salvaging for Dark Matter.)

With this change, players who grind would not have a numbers advantage over players who don’t. They would have greater utility – easier build variety, less bag space taken up by gear. And we could get back to having fun, instead of working to have fun. Having higher stats behind a time-gated and massively expensive wall is not fun, it’s not fair, and it’s not what Guild Wars 2 or ArenaNet should stand for. At least, that is what I was led to believe in my time playing since 2006.

P.S.: please provide easier access to +5stat (not AR) infusions. The laurel ones are only +4, so any player with common sense is going to ignore the +5 Mystic Forge ones and just go buy them from WvW. Either make the laurel ones +5 or add +5 ones to the Guild Commendation vendor.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Do you have data to suggest that players were not the reason for the progress?

To me, it’s just a coincidence.

http://i.imgur.com/nbqR2HN.png

I do, that is it. I stopped recording around Thanksgiving, but as you will see if you do the math, 25% was at 7 days, 50% at 14 days – and it ended today at 28 days. That’s too convenient to be a coincidence at all.

g e o.2589:

Antitoxin was not at 100% last time I looked, and it was recently it was somwhere around 95% and that 5% is wful ton of players, and why do you even care, do you want to extend that content?

The event is over, where are you seeing the bar at 95%?

I care because if we were misled/lied to about this being player input, it means we can’t trust future Living Story events that claim to require player input. And we can’t trust the Council vote.

It has been removed; check out Kessex for what’s changed.

I think many will agree with me when I say that the release notes for The Nightmares Within implied that it would be player input progressing the antitoxin bar.

Upon each completion, players will be able to inject another dose of antitoxin, weakening the tower that much more.

…

The Tower of Nightmares content will be available until the tower’s heart is destroyed. Watch the progress as more antitoxin is injected!

However, with the bar being exactly 25% on the 7th day, exactly 50% on the 14th day, and 100% on the 28th day – it’s clear that it was on a timer of some sort.

So why was it implied that players would be affecting it when we clearly were not?

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Quiver_of_Swift_Flight

And 3-4 others available.

Minor gripe. And some suggestions on how to fix it.

The current state of infusions is thus:

• Simple Infusions: Just Agony Resist. Super easy to get.

• Laurel Infusions: Just stats, but only +4. Affordable.

• Mystic Forge Infusions: +5 stats and Agony Resist, but INSANELY expensive.

• WvW Infusions: +5 stats and a WvW-unique bonus, and very affordable.

Now assuming that each piece of ascended armor on Tuesday will include an infusion slot, players will have access to a total of 16 – 20 infusion slots. 20 infusion slots at +5 for a stat is +100, which is not insignificant. (Edit: fixed math on number of slots.)

We should have an easier way to obtain +5 infusions for PvE – at the very least, ones without Agony Resist. A PvE player’s best option for those stats currently is to buy the WvW infusions, but that seems like a waste of the bonus effects.

So my suggestion is as follows:

• Change the Laurel Vendor’s infusions to be +5, no need to add any AR to them.

or

• Add +5 stat infusions without AR to the Guild Commendation vendor.

There is absolutely no reason that a single extra stat point should cost upwards of 200g in the Mystic Forge over buying it from the Laurel Vendor.

Doggie.3184:

He was the leader because of his knowledge of Orr and the fact that he was ‘born to help Orr’ for his Wyld Hunt as far as Sylvari culture goes. The fact that he studied Orr his whole life is thrown at you constantly. Being in that dump for so long he probably does deserve the position of leading an Army there. He also had all the connections and knew what NPCs to bring to you for specific needs.

Problem is Anet fails to show an NPC’s true strength in story missions as they keep dying so easily. Considering Trahearne hung out in Orr alone all the time, in reality he should be pretty powerful and able to handle himself.

Yeah. But they can’t very well have NPCs able to solo entire Risen armies like the player can. Otherwise the Personal Story missions wouldn’t be very fun?

Lighthammer.3280:

I won’t say It is not based on players, but if it was solely based on players it would have stopped moving long time ago since people did achievements in few days and stopped doing it.

Apart from occasional forced daily to kill the hybrid/ use antitoxin, players are not doing the content at all.

Its just some “meter” that represents nothing, well nothing more than time until next patch.

Uh, source? Any at all?

Because the Tower still has players in it.

“I stopped playing the Tower” does not mean “Everybody stopped playing the Tower”. Why does everybody in this thread seem to think it does?

Dondarrion.2748:

It would be interesting to see how far that bar has come if you compared a few worlds? I.e. is the tower gonna fall globally, or per server?

I checked when I made this post originally – you will note I found that the bars are identical on Henge of Denravi and Tarnished Coast, so it is almost certainly a global meter.

Also, an update for everybody: at 162 hours, the bar is at 22%. The rate of the bar has once again changed. In fact, the rate of the bar now matches the original rate (3% for 22 hours).

This coincides with the weekend being over. Perhaps fewer players playing?

Who ever said we had to do it before next week’s update?

The whole point of the antitoxin injections being player-based is that it’s up to us to destroy it. If we don’t, it sticks around, and all the Toxic Alliance stick around with it. Once we clear it, those kittens will leave (presumably).

Consider “not destroyed yet” the event’s failstate. Maybe in future Living Stories they’ll have a player input meter that also has a timer on it so it can actually fail, that would be neat.

Healix.5819:

It could also be designed to fail or simply last forever until destroyed.

No failing yet – the Tower will simply last forever if the players take too long. It’s obviously a trial of this sort of counter-bar so that they can use it in subsequent story events which will contain fail states or possibly multiple choices for the players to make & progress.

Cyvil.1605:

Is the timer the same across the servers? That should give a decent idea as to which path Anet chose.

It’s the same across all servers

This does not prove anything either way, of course, because it could be a UNIVERSAL counter. Or a universal timer.

Agreed with this. I really hope they expand on this kind of content.

Heck, they could even have a huge dungeon like the Tower that includes a world boss-level boss somewhere.

VitisVinifera.2834:

Wondering what this Antitoxin Injected meter was about. So noone really knows but maybe it’s server-specific?

I’ve checked, Henge of Denravi and Tarnished Coast had identical bars down to the pixel. I seriously doubt those two worlds are at the exact same point, so it’s a global bar.

Valandil Dragonhart.2371:

It is pre-determined. The disintegration of the Lion’s Arch statue last year before Mad King Thorn blasted through it was based on a timer as well, but it required no input from anyone playing the game.

That said, however, this has the hallmarks of doing the same thing, ie. increasing incrementally based on little to no user input at all. It wouldn’t surprise me if they copy-pasted the timer/meter from one event to another, and just had it renamed.

Shadow of the Mad King occurred before the Living Story was properly fleshed out. As it stands, the Living Story has a timer built in. So, unlike the SotMK, there’s absolutely no reason to pretend it’s player input (which the SotMK didn’t do, mind you, it was just a timer).

Astral Projections.7320:

They have to consider the possibility that people might stop doing the antitoxin pumping or not do it enough so the timer maxes before the next patch.

Morsus.5106:

It’ll probably be player input for awhile, but as time goes on the amount of bar per injection will change. (For example, if one injection is 0.01% now, it could be 0.02% later, or 0.005% depending on how fast we fill it up. I think they want to release the next patch on schedule.)

The next patch is due to be Fractals. I think ArenaNet has prepared for The Nightmare Within taking a long time to be removed. Why is everybody under the impression that there is some guarantee on the time limit of Living Story events?

Plus, Scarlet is done with the Nightmare Tower, so whatever she does next doesn’t even need to revolve around it being fully destroyed yet. She can pop up somewhere else in the world with her progress from experimenting on the krait and the Tower can still not be destroyed at the same time.

Protoavis.9107:

It’s a timer of some sort, realistically if it were player input it would have exploded after it went live and then slowed down after couple days.

I think you underestimate the number of players who show up exclusively on the weekends.

Dash.7108:

In my opinion its player input as of right now, but I’m sure anet has a date they want it gone by and will probably fudge it a bit towards the end if everyone stops doing it.

Agreed, they definitely wouldn’t leave it 100% up to player input but that’s just naturally expected.

Meglobob.8620:

I don’t think its player input at all…

Its just probably a timer, far, far simpler to do and how can anyone other than this particular story team developers know?

A timer that changes its rate based on player activity in the game is simpler than a counter that increments by 1 every time someone completes the instance?

I’ve attached two screenshots. The second one was taken a few minutes ago, and the first approximately 22 hours after the patch went live. At the time of this post it’s been about 102 hours since the patch went live. [Also, a note: I guested to another World to check on the bar there and it was identical, so I am fairly certain it’s a universal meter.]

At the 22-hour mark, the bar was at 3%. You can calculate this yourself via pixels. At a constant rate the bar would be filled in about 733 hours.

At the 102-hour mark, the bar is at about 16%. 102 hours is 14% of 733.

Somewhat surprisingly, the bar has sped up slightly. If the players are indeed having an impact on the injections, this can be explained by the fact that it’s Saturday and there is higher weekend activity.

Thus evidence currently suggests that the bar is actually taking player input. It would be a good idea to keep an eye on it over the coming weeks to see how it progresses.

Ghosn.3219:

This buildup is as exciting as hitting signs for a month.

And this is why ArenaNet stopped giving us longer story arcs.

Yeah, and everybody whined about Flame & Frost and said it was boring as kitten until the Molten Facilities arrived. So ANet backtracked.

Also I am a bit confused as to what you are zerging in this update? There’s not any need to run around Kessex grinding the offshoots.

Shanaeri Rynale.6897:

Imho the order was the wrong way around, probably driven by the 2 week cadence thing.

What we should have got was all the build up stuff for this 2 weeks while halloween was on. Then this content and the one after combined in 2 weeks time. This patch feels like it’s only half done, which while ok from an LS story does leave a meh taste in the players mouth which is something you really don’t want to do.

There was a buildup during Halloween, it was just smaller.

The tower was masked behind a veil and Kessex was missing half of its trees. Kasmeer and Marjory were investigating it.

That is what you call a “teaser”. The Tower of Nightmares update is a “beginning”. The next patch will have the “middle” and maybe also include the “end”.

Plus I don’t think distracting your players with two totally separate Living Story events at the same time is a good thing.

This is not the main update for the Nightmare Tower. This is a preliminary one. If you are expecting another Aetherpath… Just wait for the next couple of updates, I’m sure they will be more involved and instanced.

How to give feedback for the Living Story:

Copy-paste meaningless complaints from the past year.

It’s clear that this is a preliminary update – I imagine the one on the 12th, or even the one two weeks after that, will be the main update revolving around the Nightmare Tower.

So I am loving the buildup we’re getting for this. Compared to most other Living Story events which have been START – GO – COMPLETE – STORY OVER GO TO THE NEXT ONE!, this seems like it is going to have a beginning and middle before the climax.

Plus all the NPCs around Marjory’s camp – some Vigil, some Priory, some Whispers, and several members of the lesser races, even – make the situation seem really ominous. Like, even Flame & Frost didn’t have this kind of gathering force of heroes coming to find the solutions, at least not until the Vigil found the Molten Facilities.

So, good job on that! Hopefully we can see more story arcs that are longer than just two weeks, because those have been lacking since all the players complained about F&F being too long.

Hi devs,

I’d like to start by saying that I have generally enjoyed the Living World so far. Everything from the Shadow of the Mad King onward has been basically good, but of course there are lots of improvements to be had. So I think I will begin by listing the things that have happened that I really enjoyed, followed by things I didn’t like and ways I think they can be improved.

What I’ve Liked:

• Lost Shores. Everything about it. I would love to see another attempt at a one-time event & boss, maybe with less loot to soothe the pain of missing it, and with more permanent changes as a result (possibly different changes for success/failure?).
• The length of Flame & Frost. Though many will say the first three months were boring, I think a slower story arc adds anticipation and investment when done properly.
• Both of the temporary dungeons as well as Super Adventure Box. All of them have been some of the best content in the game.
• Cutthroat Politics: the very first player-determined permanent change! More, please.

Complaints:

• Some of the stories have felt short and disjointed. We hop from plot to plot, and haven’t had a months-long one for a while. The only one that came close to a fully coherent plot was Dragon Bash → Bazaar (and that was good).
• Scarlet is not reaching her full potential. I do not hate her, but I can see why many players do. She needs to hurry up and unveil her master plan or purpose or whatever she has up her sleeve. The “mystery” isn’t interesting enough for most players when they simply dislike her. If she can become truly threatening, I think the attitude about her will improve.
• The rewards are piling up. I am running out of bank space for all the unique stuff you keep giving us!

Some Suggestions/Hope for the Future:

• More player choice. This needs to happen. I’ve never seen the community more invested in the game than during Cutthroat Politics, and most of the time it was in a very good way. We need more votes, Living Story events that can succeed or fail based on player participation, plotlines that change and branch depending on what we do. (Example: Scarlet becomes a world boss on par with Ancient Karka, except it’s actually possible to lose. Players can beat her or fail, and depending on what happens, her plot will change.)
• Let’s see some new zones! I realize you said we wouldn’t be getting new zones in 2013, and I fully accept this. But I am very much hoping we will see one or two new zones unveiled in early 2014, because we all want new stuff.
• Please get us out of Kryta for once. Going to the Foothills for F&F was great, and getting to Caledon last month was good too. But 80% of the Living Story has revolved entirely around Kryta, and it’s getting dull! There are so many other cool places the story could go, and I feel like Ascalon in particular is super neglected.
• This is the most important: progress a story. Right now, to many players, it feels like we are in a Saturday morning cartoon chasing around the villain who is concocting plan after plan that we regularly foil. I realize that this is not entirely true – Scarlet has only appeared in person one time. But we have “foiled” her (or her minions) five times in 1 year, and gone that entire year without a whole lot of progress. The story needs to move a little bit faster, and it should be more focused.

That’s about all I can think of right now without blathering on for hours. I still hold quite a lot of trust in the Living Story. I think it has IMMENSE potential, and I’m really looking forward to where it goes. Do not abandon it, no matter what some players might suggest; the Living Story is unique and it’s going to help propel the MMO genre into a new age of living virtual worlds.

MithranArkanere.8957:

I always though that ascended items should be able to ‘consume’ other ascended or exotic to unlock the respective stats.

You make a legendary, you get all the stats from the start. You make an ascended, you’ll have to ‘feed’ it to unlock the other combinations.

That way legendaries keep their specialty of starting with all stats, while those who do not have the time for a legendary can at least go for a few stats combinations in legendaries.

That is a GREAT addition to this idea! Thank you.

You make your ascended the normal way, and then if you want more stats you make some exotics for it. Sounds awesome. Keeps some goldsinks & crafting active, too.

Talyn.3295:

With the exception of a small percentage of people who come here to complain about ascended weapons most of the population is over whatever issue they had with them. We do not need crazy pointless changes to tje system yet again. If you do not want to work for the stat bonus that is fine. But we do not need this change. If you want to swap stats get a legendary like the rest of us. But I already jnow what the response to that will be.

Who is this “we”? Are they the same people who forced ArenaNet to cave and add ascended gear in the first place because they couldn’t stand not having a grind-for-stats in their MMO?

Or does “we” mean “me”, in this case? (Answer: yes.)

Good point on the various vendors, Nay. But Lion’s Arch is supposed to be the hub of the world, and it should be packed. It’s just something to consider, but like you said the various vendors would likely keep the city full anyway.

Ludo.3618:

Be aware of the fact that I am not asking you to make it easier, I am merely suggesting an alternative.

Except you are.

Be patient; I was in a similar position once, and eventually my World rallied together and smashed that Lowlands Keep for two weeks until we finally got inside (I’m pretty sure like half of our World gained their Completion on that day).

It’s far easier nowadays that the colors are somewhat randomized, too. Eventually you will get the chance to have each color as your home Borderland, and once the season is over you can easily run around during off-hours and get what you need.

Rangers, guardians, and elementalists have easy access to stability. Thieves can blind, mesmers can reflect. Necromancers even have stability in plague form. I’m pretty sure warriors have stability too. How about engineers?

Everybody has a way to either become stable, block, blind, or reflect the harpies. The harpies are pretty bullkitten, but it’s the kind of bullkitten that forces you to become a better and more aware player.

Everything up to Bank in your post: yes, absolutely.

Also, I think it would be interesting to give players a free waypoint to their home instance. This would make them mildly useful for traveling around as well as giving everybody an easily-accessed base of operations, and might even help to populate the other cities.

The only problem is it might drag too many players out of LA, but there are still enough important things there that I doubt this would occur.

This reward is a slap in the face on two counts, to both sects of players.

Players who desire horizontal progression find themselves with their best-in-slot gear locked behind a grind. They cannot be best-in-slot without grinding (unless they get it as a “side effect” of playing over months or years, depending on how many builds and characters they use). This goes against the philosophy developed in Guild Wars, a philosophy many players had come to expect from Guild Wars 2.

But also, players who desire vertical progression are hardly getting any reward at all! All this grinding, and all they get is a measly 5%? It’s not even the same jump from exotic to ascended as it is from rare to exotic.

My suggestion aims to improve ascended gear for both parties. Give purer horizontal progression back to those who desire it, without any “optional” stats locked behind a grind. And give those who want vertical progression some vertical utility to work toward.

Revert ascended gear back to exotic stats, and give it stat swapping – just like legendaries.

There are many benefits to this:

• This will revert power creep. The game is designed around exotic gear, but ascended gear is tipping the balance in the wrong way.
• Following on the previous point: new content might be designed & tested with ascended gear in mind, making it more and more “required” for the average player to have ascendeds over exotics. This change would prevent that.
• Horizontal progression returns to the exotic level, satisfying players who hate grind-for-stats.
• Vertical progression is relegated to utility and Fractals of the Mists. Players can grind for the utility of having more bag space, not needing to swap around their gear, and not having to obtain an entirely new set of extremely expensive gear whenever they make a new build.
• Following on the previous point: at the same time, different infusions being useful in different areas of the game (WvW vs. Agony Resist) means that having more than one set of ascended gear would still be desirable in some cases.

As I said earlier, I despise ascended gear’s current implementation. I have grinded for 1 weapon over the course of a month, and intend to continue as long as it takes for me to become best-in-slot once more, because I believe a player is entitled to their best (statwise) gear. But I hate doing it.

However, if this change was implemented, I would LOVE ascended gear. Grinding for cosmetics and utility as a goal is an ideal I support. Just as long as it doesn’t include stats.

Allow me to end this post with an excerpt from an interview with the hype machine himself describing the design philosophy of Guild Wars 2’s best-in-slot gear:

Guild Wars 2 Preview; September 2011

Eurogamer: How are you handling endgame loot – will we be farming bosses?

Colin Johanson: Everyone, including casual gamers, by level 80 should have the best statistical loot in the game. We want everyone on an equal power base. The rare stuff becomes the really awesome looking armours. It’s all about collecting the unique looking stuff and collecting all the other rare collectable items in the game

Thank you for reading. To the devs – thank you for your consideration. And to the forum denizens – thank you for keeping this discussion productive.

Let me open with this: This will not be a debate on whether the 5% stat increase on ascended is worthwhile or how “required” it is. This is a suggestion to improve ascended gear and the game, all on its own. If you are going to reply simply by saying “If you don’t like it, don’t get it”, no progress can be made and you should refrain from doing so.

So, to properly begin this post: I hate ascended gear in its current implementation. It is a grind through and through, and the reward for that grind is stats.

In my time playing Guild Wars, I learned philosophies and ideals of game design that have stuck with me. Notably in this case is the philosophy that every player, no matter how hardcore or how casual, is entitled to the best possible stats in the game as well as every skill and ability with minor effort. Through this philosophy it is possible to create a community that values fun, skill, and quality content over grind and rewards for those grinds.

But, as it stands in Guild Wars 2, that philosophy is shaky. Upon reaching level 80, a player has quite an ordeal ahead of them to get their best-in-slot stats, something they truly should be entitled to with minimal effort. To reach best-in-slot, they must:

1. Obtain laurels over 20-30 days for an amulet.
2. Run Fractals of the Mists at least 20 times OR obtain 70 more laurels, for rings.
3. Spend 1 month minimum doing guild missions once per week OR spend a hefty sum of ectoplasm and laurels for the accessories.
4. Grind materials, gold, or fractal relics for a back piece (and then ascend it).
5. Grind at least one, but more likely two or even three, crafting disciplines to level 500, either through daily gathering runs or grinding the gold for it.
6. Run 25 dungeons (enough for an entire set of dungeon armor, which was originally one of the game’s biggest grinds!) OR ~100 supply camps OR ~40 towers in WvW. Do that repeatedly for as many weapons as you need – for a single build, that can be as many as six weapons.
7. Grind world bosses daily for several days/weeks, depending on how many weapons you need.
8. Grind champions (this is admittedly the easiest by far, and out of all of them is almost guaranteed to be obtained as a side-effect of normal play).
9. Grind more high-level materials for crafting (over 2 stacks of elder wood and/or mithril and/or thick leather per item), or grind the coin to buy them.
10. Oh, and if you REALLY want to min-max, grind 1000g or so for those +5stat infusions for all of your gear.

And let’s not forget that very soon when ascended armor arrives, this list will include:

1. Grind one more discipline up to level 500 and get the stacks and stacks of silk, leather, and mithril needed to craft each piece, plus whatever ascended mats are necessary.

What is the reward for all of this? Stats. A 5% increase over exotic gear.

(Continued in next post…)

1. Living World – specifically, how ArenaNet is going to provide players with more ways to have permanent impact, with the Captain’s Council vote as a starting point.

2. Ascended gear – is there any way to satisfy the players who expected less vertical progression/stat grinding? (Spoken as someone who hates the ascended grind, but does it anyway because he does not want less-than-best-in-slot.)

3. Quality of Life – there are a lot of these that some would consider “necessary”, and it may be a big morale boost for the playerbase to get some of the things they have been asking for since launch.

I’m looking forward to getting something productive out of this. Hopefully the environment remains civil and constructive.

For those wondering how to get it to work: the bug seems to trigger if you hit Edrick with the candy corn before he and Tassi finish talking. Wait for their dialogue to end and then do it, the mission prompt should update to “Continue pelting him with candy corn” and then it will work.

notebene.3190:

So I have to do all those things this year that I avoided last year farming doors to get candy corn?

If by “all those things you avoided” means “playing most of the content”, then yes, it seems you will have to do that.

Or if you prefer grinding and not actually playing the new stuff, you can just buy it.

Really nice voice acting both from the Prince and Tassi, and the in-engine cutscenes are looking better with every patch. Good stuff so far even if the instance is bugged.

Malkesh.5841:

I’m stuck too. Did it solo. He enters the box and nothing happens.

Ah darn, I guess I won’t bother trying that then.

(Minor spoilers obviously.)

The instance gets stuck on “Throw everything available at Bloody Prince Thorn.” The fight ends and he reenters his box, but nothing else continues afterward.

Gotten stuck here twice, with two players in the instance. Will try it solo and report back.

Edit: Just completed it on my third try, worked fine – did it solo this time. I think Peetee.9406 is correct; you have to wait for Edrick to finish talking before you hit him with the candy corn. If it works, the “Throw everything available” prompt should change to “Continue pelting him with candy corn”.

As it stands right now, there are 3 pieces of ascended gear that can be inherently infused: the back items and rings.

I would like to buy infusions for my new ascended weapons as well as the rest of my trinkets, and armor when it arrives. But I’m terrified of wasting laurels and expensive crafting materials on them, because if later we are able to inherently infuse these items, those expensive infusions will disappear (as they currently do if you infuse rings or a back item).

So I am hoping to get some confirmation one way or the other on whether we will be able to infuse the rest of the gear at some point.