Guild Wars 2

You are playing a game that is competitively dead, and that has been so for quite awhile. There are, what, 16 people (or rather, accounts) in NA legendary right now? That should tell you all you need to know.

The system and matchmaking aren’t the major problems here. It’s the fact that the game (or at least the mode) has such a dismally low population at this point that it can’t manage to find ten similarly-skilled people to pit against each other in the “higher levels” of play. Because there just aren’t that many reliably available at one time.

It’s simply the sad reality of playing a withered and starved game mode. I’m surprised someone so high on the leaderboard hasn’t already recognized and come to terms with this.

The real way to prevent server hopping: make queues prioritize people who have been on the server for longer.

A 10 supply trick/kit that removes the user’s abilities but gives them a “cloaking field” aura that grants five nearby allies immunity to being tracked on the map.

I miss taking towers with small groups.

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

GreenAlien.5623:

What is the reason for that mechanic?

The purpose of this mechanic has always been to mitigate spawn camping, kill trading, and as an added benefit, it also discourages botting.

The threshold of time before a player is worth WXP (and now also XP/Loot) has not changed, and is low enough that it is almost always the case that a player’s death will award WXP and loot in the time it takes for them to run from a portal keep to a nearby objective.

I’d argue that it’s high enough to notice with surprising frequency in relatively ‘normal’ WvW play now, where it wasn’t before (if only because we were always rewarded with something, at least). Delaying WXP is one thing (and a good thing, I believe), but not being rewarded anything for killing a player does feel a bit disheartening, considering that they’re significantly more difficult to kill than normal PvE mobs.

I can’t help but think, given the timing of this change, that it was done to combat the rampant spawn-camping killfests in Obsidian Sanctum that occurred at the beginning of the previous tournaments. If there’s any truth to this assumption, I’d then argue that it is a welcome change exclusively for Obsidian Sanctum, but not the other WvW maps. I have trouble believing that kill-trading was frequent enough outside of the Sanctum to warrant such a noticeable nerf.

Based on my initial experiences with this, it feels like they added a cooldown to giving experience/loot on death. Something like players needing to be alive for five or ten minutes before granting experience and loot on death. Killing players near their spawns rarely seems to reward anything for me anymore, and I’ve frequently killed someone two or three times in a short span and only received rewards on the initial kill. It probably needs more testing, though.

She’s a member of the race that raises itself to be as hilariously arrogant and overconfident as possible. It would be a “stretch” for her to care about safety at all.

Palador.2170:

Shiren.9532:

Personally I think co-ordination of the dynamic events and the need to time and plan for the whole phase detracts from the open world experience. Dynamic events which occur on a timer and encourage players to “learn the map” and trigger things en mass is such a huge departure from one of the great things about dynamic events – they are dynamic!

It loses the feel of exploring the world and performing random acts of heroism and replaces it with timetables and planning.

While looking around Dry Top, I find myself asking “Wait, will I hurt other players by doing this event?” That’s a question we should NEVER have to ask ourselves. I won’t be surprised if it starts to turn Dry Top as toxic as Queensdale occasionally used to be during the champ train days.

Why would completing an event in Dry Top hurt another player? At the very worst, you’re ‘taking’ the miniscule geode reward for yourself and contributing to the next tier of rewards. Every event that gets completed is beneficial to the entire map, and the faster it gets completed the better. You have no reason whatsoever to feel guilty about doing an event. If you do, that’s not really a fault of the map.

While most people say we didn’t see enough of Belinda to feel sad about her death, that’s actually one of the reasons I found it powerful. I quite liked the glimpses we saw of her character, and her death eliminated any chance of getting to know her even better. It was enough to sadden me, and not just out of empathy for Marjory.

Well, it does at the base of the waterfall.

Nocturnal Lunacy.8563:

Stormleaf.1769:

Nocturnal Lunacy.8563:

Everything you said is 100% exactly how most if not all of us seasoned mmo players feel. It’s those that have never played an mmo before gw2 or are just starting to play mmos that will disagree with you.
Good job and excellent commentary.

It’s beyond absurd to speak for anyone other than yourself on matters like this. Assigning your view to an entire community is nothing more than a blatantly-arrogant attempt at making your opinions seem more legitimate. For instance, I played WoW for four or five years before GW2, and, apart from the “first MMO” wonder and magic of WoW, I feel that GW2 is superior in just about every way. So stop trying to speak for me; it’s disgraceful.

Vorch.2985:

Seasoned MMO player here.

Don’t feel that way.

Do you two even know how to read? I said “MOST” Do you know what that means? It means NOT EVERYONE. I’m sorry the public school system failed you. Move on.

I’ll posit the same question to you. I said that it’s ridiculous to speak for anyone other than yourself, and yourself alone, and your retort is “I only said most people, not all?” That’s not a valid defense to my complaint.

Nocturnal Lunacy.8563:

Everything you said is 100% exactly how most if not all of us seasoned mmo players feel. It’s those that have never played an mmo before gw2 or are just starting to play mmos that will disagree with you.
Good job and excellent commentary.

It’s beyond absurd to speak for anyone other than yourself on matters like this. Assigning your view to an entire community is nothing more than a blatantly-arrogant attempt at making your opinions seem more legitimate. For instance, I played WoW for four or five years before GW2, and, apart from the “first MMO” wonder and magic of WoW, I feel that GW2 is superior in just about every way. So stop trying to speak for me; it’s disgraceful.

Perhaps you, like so many others on this forum, should stop making the mistake of playing a game you dislike simply because of what you want it to be. Play it for what it is, and if you don’t like what it is in the present, stop playing. ArenaNet has no obligation whatsoever to fulfill your personal desires for the game, and it’s ridiculous to say you were ‘tricked’ when GW2 is an entirely different game from GW1 in the first place.

Sekhmet.6153:

Why should he be forgiving to ANET if he doesn’t like the changes they’ve made in the game? They haven’t really tried that hard in fixing all the problems that people have had, since there are still issues that have been going on since launch that are yet to be addressed. They had topics on forums asking for input about sigils and runes and didn’t use a single idea expressed from fans.

Its almost been 2 years since launch, and my main char still has a glitched story event that I stopped trying to get past because it was irritating not being able to progress ( I reported the bug and haven’t heard anything back about it).

I didn’t take the OP’s post as slamming GW2 and calling it the worst game ever. I think hes entitled to be disappointed and he didn’t seem to be over the top with anything.

And people can still play a game despite them being disappointed in it.

It’s an MMO. There are always a huge number of issues… and you know what? MMO players have wildly different viewpoints and desires. No matter how many issues they ‘fix’, just as many will pop up for people who desire the opposite (and sure, this doesn’t really apply to a bugged story mission; I agree that that’s probably lame for everyone, but I’m not saying the game is perfect). They may not have gotten everything right, but they are clearly trying to make the game better for players. If you honestly think the game has barely improved at all since launch, you either haven’t been paying attention, or you’re foolishly assigning your own individual fantasy for a ‘perfect game’ to the entire community and assuming everyone else shares your views. Furthermore, if you do feel that it’s still terrible, why are you still here? After a year and a half of disappointment, why are such people still giving the game a chance? Are they so masochistic that they’ll endure the misery of a bad game just so they can whine to a screen?

Even beside that, the post reeks of contradictions. The poster lists “family friendly” art style as a negative, yet they seem to think highly enough of WoW to ‘threaten’ to return to it? A game with an even more ridiculous and cartoony art style? Story seems to be another complaint, and still, they mention WoW again? A game whose story is so utterly generic that it literally rehashes the same, tired “hero being corrupted into villain” trope over and over? There are numerous other examples, but that should get the point across.

Furthermore, the game doesn’t ‘need’ anything. People who claim that the game needs ‘huge reworkings’ more commonly mean to say: “In order for the game to meet my own personal fantasy, it must do so and so, even at the expense of sacrificing its own vision and integrity. If it doesn’t, it is a terrible game.” And you know, for people like that, the game probably is terrible. But that just brings up my earlier question. If they feel the game is terrible, why do they continue playing? Why do they pour ‘1000+’ hours into a game they view so negatively? Why do they not simply move on? It is beyond foolish to play a game that is currently terrible, simply because you believe it is the duty of the developers to change everything just to fit your individual ideal of a ‘perfect game’. Play the game for what it is, because it’s unfair to demand sweeping overhauls with such absolute and self-righteous language, unfair to speak for anyone other than yourself, simply because you want the game to be something that it currently isn’t.

Of course, I’m drifting into topics that apply to the forum community as a whole, rather than just this individual post… but I think my point still applies in more ways than one.

TheLaughingMan.4320:

Stormleaf.1769:

BloodFallsSilent.1703:

Instead, you’ve never gotten another dime from me, beyond the initial purchases. Every time I have been tempted to buy gems, I think about how greedy it felt during the 2012 halloween event when the BL Chest drop rate for the halloween weapons was stupendously low. I remember all the content that was removed. I think about all the minor (unvoiced by me, but pointed out many times here by others) complaints I’ve had that were never fixed, and the fact that there is not going to be any expansion any time soon, when it should have been here or have been announced, at the least.

Posts like this are always so bizarre and disingenuous, specifically for the argument here (which always seems to come about in some way or another). You’re saying you’ve been tempted to buy gems, but refrained because of a previous complaint, which ArenaNet has massively improved at this point? Gem store weapons like the Halloween set have been made hugely more accessible, yet you still refuse to buy any because they used to be a problem? Why should ArenaNet ever address any of your concerns, if you’re just going to cling to past issues as an excuse to criticize them in the future, even after those issues have been fixed and improved?

For all your complaints, you sound like the type of person who will never be satisfied, no matter how close ArenaNet manages to bring the game to your ideal fantasy.

Most of his critiques are about the game itself, not the gem store that you used the fanboi generic response on after focusing in on it.

That sole example is enough demonstrate the disingenuous nature of this post. The poster prefaces by claiming to have ‘goodwill’ towards the game and wanting the opportunity to support the game, yet they then refuse to genuinely acknowledge any improvements that have been made to it. The poster clings to past ‘offenses’ while completely disregarding any attempt by ArenaNet to address and correct those issues, simply so he or she can continue to deride and insult the game and its developer for failing to live up to a personal fantasy. Someone who truly had ‘goodwill’ towards the game, someone who truly wanted to support the game and see it improve, would at least be somewhat forgiving, at least acknowledge the efforts to address some of their complaints. But no, what we see instead is petty, unhelpful venting.

You would think someone who claims to have so much experience with past MMOs and other games would possess the discipline to not let themselves get so hyped about their fantasy for a game. So hyped that its inevitable failure to live up to expectations crushes them to the point of such shallow, one-sided whining. You would think that someone with such experience would know to play a game for what it is in the present, not what they want it to be in the future. You would think that someone who had such a bad taste with the gem store methods two months after launch would know to quit back then, rather than stick around for an extra year and a half playing a game that so obviously failed to live up to expectations.

BloodFallsSilent.1703:

Instead, you’ve never gotten another dime from me, beyond the initial purchases. Every time I have been tempted to buy gems, I think about how greedy it felt during the 2012 halloween event when the BL Chest drop rate for the halloween weapons was stupendously low. I remember all the content that was removed. I think about all the minor (unvoiced by me, but pointed out many times here by others) complaints I’ve had that were never fixed, and the fact that there is not going to be any expansion any time soon, when it should have been here or have been announced, at the least.

Posts like this are always so bizarre and disingenuous, specifically for the argument here (which always seems to come about in some way or another). You’re saying you’ve been tempted to buy gems, but refrained because of a previous complaint, which ArenaNet has massively improved at this point? Gem store weapons like the Halloween set have been made hugely more accessible, yet you still refuse to buy any because they used to be a problem? Why should ArenaNet ever address any of your concerns, if you’re just going to cling to past issues as an excuse to criticize them in the future, even after those issues have been fixed and improved?

For all your complaints, you sound like the type of person who will never be satisfied, no matter how close ArenaNet manages to bring the game to your ideal fantasy.

Did she not say something along the lines of “It’s been fun, I’m leaving for awhile”? It sounded to me like we won’t be seeing for the next few months, at least.

Any chance of cleaning up some of the inefficient animations on Sword and Greatsword? Specifically:

• The pitifully short range on the Sword’s second autoattack. I understand it’s meant to be a ‘leap’, but it’s really just an in-place kick. All someone needs to do is dodge it to ruin the entire attack chain. Honestly, it seems like only the third attack in the chain deserves to be a ‘leap’. The first two should be usable while moving.
• The nearly 1s “stand still” on Hornet Sting before the evade/leap actually takes effect. This doesn’t really belong on an evasive skill.
• The root/sluggishness on Greatswords counterattack kick. The animation is literally slow enough for someone to get in a second attack before getting hit by the kick triggered from their first one. It’s wildly ineffective, and at the very least it shouldn’t force you to briefly stop moving upon triggering. You added mobility to the Crippling Throw, so can we get it here too, perhaps?
• The animation on Hilt Bash is too slow/short against moving targets. Can you increase the range a bit, or allow us to use it while moving?

Ensign.2189:

Stormleaf.1769:

The thing is… 150 stat points is, in most cases, insignificant. Assuming you have all the buffs at all times (which has been exceedingly rare so far), you’ll be maybe 5% stronger than your opponent, give or take.

35%. Three orbs is roughly a 35% increase in strength.

Don’t throw around small numbers if you haven’t even tried to do basic math yet.

What? If I have 2,000 power, a 150 point increase is 7.5%. If I have 25,000 health, a 1,500 point increase is 6%. Even if you’re giving every stat the same weight (which is silly), it’s still way less than 35%. For a character with base stats (meaning 3,664 total), the 900 point bonus from the orbs would only come to a 24.5% increase.

Sarrs.4831:

Stormleaf.1769:

I find it amusing that the game is suddenly shattered for so many over something as insignificant as a 0-150 point increase in stats. I simply can’t believe that people who honestly and legitimately enjoyed the game prior to the buff are unable to logically enjoy it now. It seems far more likely that they’re simply being disingenuous, for effect.

“Insignificant” is not what I would call 4 ascended trinkets’ worth of stats.

Take the inverse of Bloodlust; if the other realms could get a bonus which, upon getting it, would let them go “nope, you’re not allowed to equip any accessories”, would that shed any light on it for you then? Can you understand why they might think that completely invalidates WvW? Because that is 2/3rds of what this system does. It’s even worse than everything else that imbalances WvW because you can’t both have those orb bonuses at the same time; if someone else is eating, you can eat too. If someone else has stacked Guard Killer, you can stack Guard Killer. If you’re outmanned and you want to roam for some fun fights? Enjoy your (even more) uphill battle.

There is a significant difference between a minor, blanket increase in stats and forbidding an enemy from equipping accessories altogether. I understand the spirit of what you meant, but that is a ridiculously silly comparison to make.

The thing is… 150 stat points is, in most cases, insignificant. Assuming you have all the buffs at all times (which has been exceedingly rare so far), you’ll be maybe 5% stronger than your opponent, give or take. If you die to a thief in two backstabs without the buff, you’ll still die in two backstabs. If you kill someone in ten hits without the buff, you might kill them in nine with the buff. In the vast majority of cases, people aren’t winning or losing fights by the margin provided with bloodlust, and that is why it’s insignificant. People just want an excuse for losing.

Regardless of that… So many people in WvW don’t use food or other such bonuses, despite the fact that they can. Plenty still run around in rares or exotics, when others are using ascended. When you encountered such a person prior to this week’s patch, did it completely ruin the game for you? Did you avoid the fight? Did you think “this game sucks, I should quit”? If people never reacted with outrage to those situations, I can’t exactly take it seriously when they scream about this one, considering it’s virtually the same issue.

Sarrs.4831:

Stormleaf.1769:

If you find WvW so incredibly unacceptable in its current state that you’re willing to quit en masse, then maybe GW2 just isn’t the game for you? Play the game for what it is right now, not for what you fantasize about it being in the future.

It was the game for them two days ago, and apparently it was the game for 99% of this forum two days ago. It was the game for a not insignificant portion of the WvW-playing playerbase two days ago, as well. If GW2 was never a game that they enjoyed, then maybe I’d agree with you, but that’s not the case.

I find it amusing that the game is suddenly shattered for so many over something as insignificant as a 0-150 point increase in stats. I simply can’t believe that people who honestly and legitimately enjoyed the game prior to the buff are unable to logically enjoy it now. It seems far more likely that they’re simply being disingenuous, for effect.

If you find WvW so incredibly unacceptable in its current state that you’re willing to quit en masse, then maybe GW2 just isn’t the game for you? Play the game for what it is right now, not for what you fantasize about it being in the future.

Here’s a random, bizarre little bug from today’s patch. Whenever I link an item in guild chat, it cuts off part of my name. I assumed it was because I have a long name, but as you can see in the screenshot, someone with an even longer one can still link without issue. Happens in every channel other than /say, /team, and /map, from what I can tell. So weird!

Jinks.2057:

Vena.8436:

Jinks.2057:

Nope it’s about them letting us, the players, decide how we WANT to play the game.

That’s the point.

But its never that clear cut, now is it? Certainly isn’t for you because you don’t want to let anyone play the game in the way they want to unless its the way you want them to play the game.

Here, let me quote you:
“We don’t want siegewars.” ~ Some people do.
“We don’t want orb bonuses.” ~ Some people do.
“Please give us the dev time and let sPvP get life support dev focus for once…” ~ Some people like sPvP and would rather you not abuse it anymore than it already has been.

Ho boy. Would you look at that? Its not about we, its about me.

Interesting view you have.

1. Siege Wars refers to Open field Siege creep.
2. No one has stated they want the bonuses..stop lying
3. sPvP is dead. They are not the majority. WvW far outnumbers sPvP and infact i’m willing to bet that 1 week of WvW players far outnumbers months of sPvP players. You give dev time to what the majority of your players play not cling to some dead game mode literally the tiniest fraction of your player base plays.

The majority has spoken and you really need to realize it.

I want the orb buffs. There, your argument is shattered.

Jinks.2057:

Stormleaf.1769:

You know… People who think 150 extra attribute points are enough to eliminate skill as a factor, or even dilute it more than slightly, are completely blowing this out of proportion. It amounts to a 15% increase for a character that wears nothing, and far less for someone who’s actually equipped. It’s on the verge of completely negligible.

Seriously, if GvGers can’t figure out a way to adapt to something so miniscule on their own, then… well, I’ve severely overestimated them, to say the least.

So still waiting on that solution you keep going on about…

I already posted a solution. The side with the buff unequipping a few accessories to balance the difference. You could also only let the weaker side use food, or add an extra player to their force if you think the stat disparity is that significant, or disallow traits that increase that attributes of nearby allies. Nothing is going to be perfect, but there are plenty of workable possibilities.

Heck, you could even just go ahead and fight regardless of the buff, accepting that when you lose, it most likely wasn’t because of a paltry few bonus attributes.

You know… People who think 150 extra attribute points are enough to eliminate skill as a factor, or even dilute it more than slightly, are completely blowing this out of proportion. It amounts to a 15% increase for a character that wears nothing, and far less for someone who’s actually equipped. It’s on the verge of completely negligible.

Seriously, if GvGers can’t figure out a way to adapt to something so miniscule on their own, then… well, I’ve severely overestimated them, to say the least.

Jinks.2057:

Stormleaf.1769:

Zenguy.6421:

Stormleaf.1769:

Obviously it’s not ideal, but nothing is going to be. Peoples’ effort would be better spent on coming up with solutions and work-arounds on their own.

Solution: swap the Bloodlust and Outmanned buffs.
This will improve the balance between servers (and in doing so make WvW more interesting) as well as allow GvG to continue.

(I don’t know who first came up with this idea but it’s an excellent one, which is why it keeps getting raised. IIRC, the basic idea was around before ANet announced the Bloodlust buff and it keeps being repeated because it’s such a good idea. It’s possible Anet have missed this one, but I’d be surprised given how often it keeps appearing.)

This “solution” has been available for the past year. The developers clearly don’t want to do it. Again, find your own solutions, with the tools you currently have in the game, rather than calling for the developers to “fix” it for you.

We did that…this can’t be fixed by players

If you can’t figure out how to balance a scant 150 point stat disparity amongst yourselves, then you’re not thinking nearly hard enough.

Zenguy.6421:

Stormleaf.1769:

Obviously it’s not ideal, but nothing is going to be. Peoples’ effort would be better spent on coming up with solutions and work-arounds on their own.

Solution: swap the Bloodlust and Outmanned buffs.
This will improve the balance between servers (and in doing so make WvW more interesting) as well as allow GvG to continue.

(I don’t know who first came up with this idea but it’s an excellent one, which is why it keeps getting raised. IIRC, the basic idea was around before ANet announced the Bloodlust buff and it keeps being repeated because it’s such a good idea. It’s possible Anet have missed this one, but I’d be surprised given how often it keeps appearing.)

This “solution” has been available for the past year. The developers clearly don’t want to do it. Again, find your own solutions, with the tools you currently have in the game, rather than calling for the developers to “fix” it for you.

Menaka.5092:

Stormleaf.1769:

Can’t the side with the buff just take off a few accessories to even out the stat disparity, for GvG?

or switch from ascended to exotic jewels, if the same stat distribution exists in exotic.

but this solution has quite a few problems:

• doesn’t adapt to the changing buff status (you can have from 0 to 3 stacks)
• hard to find a balanced combo of which jewel to remove
• can’t be verified by the other party: I’m sure no guild would ever want to lose the respect of the community by cheating, but… it is a possibility.

Obviously it’s not ideal, but nothing is going to be. Peoples’ effort would be better spent on coming up with solutions and work-arounds on their own, though, rather than on calling for Devon to be fired. GvG doesn’t need to die over something as miniscule as 150 extra stat points.

Can’t the side with the buff just take off a few accessories to even out the stat disparity, for GvG?

AppleHack.7340:

Stormleaf.1769:

AppleHack.7340:

Both sides could be happy if there just was an original version of TM, and the “new” Normal mode.

That still wouldn’t make every side happy, though. There are people who liked the old difficulty for normal mode, as well. Understand that TM and normal mode are inherently different in terms of playstyle and difficulty. Some people enjoy the ‘traditional’ difficulty presented by normal mode more than what TM offers. Now they’re sad because normal mode is easier, regardless of how TM was changed.

And that’s my point. Everyone is always going to have something they want changed so that SAB better fits their personal fantasy… but instead of demanding such changes, can’t we just accept that SAB is never going to be a perfect representation of every individual player’s unique desires? There’s still plenty about it that people can and do enjoy… so just cherish the positive aspects! Focus on the ways in which it does live up to and satisfy your personal desires, rather than the ways in which it doesn’t.

If people did that all the time and never complained about anything the world would be a horrible place. Sometimes you just need to complain to make things better, it’s sad but true. Making TM be as it was before and Normal mode as it is now wouldn’t make every single player happy but it would surely make a lot more people happy compared to leaving it as it is now and we should express that feeling so that the developers can know it. Granted we are being annoying, childish and whatnot about it but sometimes you just have to.

This is absolutely not one of those times you have to be annoying and childish. Not even close.

Furthermore, I’m not saying never offer criticism, but at the very least do it in a fair and respectful way. So many people on the forum are saying that SAB needs to change to fit their desires, among other unfair absolutes, though, and that’s what I think is harsh/unnecessary.

AppleHack.7340:

Both sides could be happy if there just was an original version of TM, and the “new” Normal mode.

That still wouldn’t make every side happy, though. There are people who liked the old difficulty for normal mode, as well. Understand that TM and normal mode are inherently different in terms of playstyle and difficulty. Some people enjoy the ‘traditional’ difficulty presented by normal mode more than what TM offers. Now they’re sad because normal mode is easier, regardless of how TM was changed.

And that’s my point. Everyone is always going to have something they want changed so that SAB better fits their personal fantasy… but instead of demanding such changes, can’t we just accept that SAB is never going to be a perfect representation of every individual player’s unique desires? There’s still plenty about it that people can and do enjoy… so just cherish the positive aspects! Focus on the ways in which it does live up to and satisfy your personal desires, rather than the ways in which it doesn’t.

We all take our sides, and we all want things to go our way, but even so… all these complaints are just completely unfair to Josh.

He’s extremely passionate about his creation, and the incessant whining from both camps (“Too hard!” vs. “Too easy!”) has to be beyond draining for him. Surely people must know what it’s like to create something you think is really neat and awesome, only to have it be met with waves of dissatisfaction and demands for change. He has demonstrated a profound ability to take it all in stride, thus far, but even so, it has to be tough for him.

While much of the criticism may be useful, the attitude a lot of people have with their complaints is just frustrating. Josh has his own vision here, and I think it’s both absurdly selfish and completely unfair for people to say “it has to be easier,” or “this is such a failure compared to original SAB,” or “what a blatant cash-grab,” or “stop ruining the integrity of SAB by catering to casuals,” or whatever other judgmental absolutes they’re coming up with.

It’s obvious that most of the people here love the concept of SAB, so why do we constantly have to complain about its flaws instead of cherishing the positive? All of us are going to have different problems with it, but if we all like the idea of it as a whole, can’t we just be a little nicer and more accepting of what it is? Take the good with the bad? I mean, I’d love to see the difficulty (even in normal mode) maintained and ramped up even further, but I understand that’s a minority viewpoint and unfair for the people who can’t handle said difficulty. I still love SAB and what it represents, so why do I need to rudely make demands for something better?

It’s a passionate project from an amazing developer. Don’t blunt that passion by complaining every time Josh makes a change that you are not happy with or does something that fails to appeal to your specific fantasy and desire.

Sera.6539:

TenkenSan.3482:

Everytime there’s “hard” / challenging content, they just go and nerf it because of all the people who keep complaining they can’t do it… .

Hard content is not meant to be done by everyone, especially not within the first week of release.

After trying many times yoruselves and eventually managing to do hard content, they nerf it because of all the complaining…it’s almsot as if they’re just laughing at you and say: “well.. nice you’ve tried and got everything through skill/perseverance, now we’ll give everyone else the achievements for free.”

It’s really saddening this happens everytime.
I’m glad they didn’t nerf Liadri.

Many of the issues weren’t hard due to skill barrier or concept, they were hard because of the game engine. Things like knockback into rapids as the geysers lowered – despite you being in the clear, getting knocked into rapids on random objects despite you being in clear. Not to mention people don’t really enjoy being flung halfway across the level for one mistake. Other things were simply not ideal in player minds like long stretches of content with lack of checkpoints where one mistake in the room killed you (and this is normal, not Tribulation). I don’t believe that’s the type of difficulty Josh Foreman was going for.

Difficulty due to the game engine, even if unintended by the developer, is still a skill barrier. Yes, the geysers were buggy, but with practice, skill, observation, and timing, even that bugginess could be mastered.

Normal shovel has a 10% chance to dig baubles, can only find blue baubles, and has a 5 second cooldown.

Steel shovel has a 15% chance to dig baubles, can find both blue and green baubles, and has a 3 second cooldown.

Sparrowsong.4238:

My take on this is there is a bunch of owls in a very dark basement under the item shop that is at the cave entrance where you find this emote. use your candle and walk to the creepy owls and …they are not what they seem..they are instead wooden dolls you can hit for baubles…quite a few actually.

So the owls are created by the shopkeeper to steal your baubles. Gasp!

Shopkeeper is Lord Vanquish.

Varonth.5830:

CeNedro.7560:

It seems too hard when you do it the first time, but once you did it, it’s quite easy. Although the levels are too long for my taste(half the lenght would be nice).

Wouldn’t be a big deal, if the rewards would be better.

Running W1Z1 gets you 2 bauble bubbles and a continue coin.
Defeating Storm Wizard gets you 2 bauble bubbles and a continue coin…

The reward is the experience.

All the complaints about length really make me sad. I think the new vastness of the levels is awesome; don’t be discouraged, Josh!

I don’t know if it’s been suggested already, but could you use the flute (which I absolutely love) to help alleviate length issues, without having to scrunch every zone down to World One size? You could give larger zones some sort of halfway, ‘checkpoint’ statue that teaches you a zone-specific song the first time you reach it. You could then use that song to teleport to the halfway statue from the beginning of the zone, in the future. That way, people wouldn’t have to do massive zones all in one sitting (which is, I think, the main issue people have with the length. Really, who doesn’t like more content, so long as they can do it at their convenience?).

Kind of inelegant, I suppose, but I think something along those lines could help! I just love the lengthy, complex journeys offered by World Two, and I’ll definitely miss it if that feeling is cut back in the future. But alas, I am the minority! =(

You can get enough coins for 200+ lives just by running World One daily, which takes 12-15 minutes if you know what you’re doing.

I find it amusing that people think they’re worthy of Tribulation Mode, when they’re both unwilling to do something as simple as this, and too cheap to pay a scant 30 gold for the infinite coin.

The third song doesn’t seem to affect that stone “fist” wall, either. It’s called “Shatter Serenade”, so it sounded like the perfect thing to weaken the wall so the power fist could destroy it… but alas, no =P

Perhaps there’s some hidden upgrade we’re still missing that opens it.

It is absolutely not needed. You can get enough baubles for over 150 lives per day just by running world one, which takes almost no effort or time. If you think either mode requires the infinite coin, you are delusional.

matthewr.3980:

Pretty much they removed all the baubles scattered across the world and stashed them in random nooks where most people won’t find them.

FUN! jk :/

Er, there were never that many “scattered across the world” in the first place. Most of them were always hidden.

Bragdras.9572:

Meh, I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself, but as soon as I jumped over floorspikes and giant clouds started popping, and then more spikes popped when I passed the clouds, I figured it would be pointless to have any sort of enthusiasm about this fake difficulty

Why? Because the “feeling of being too frightened to move, for fear of uncovering another trap” as you say, is shattered once you realise the only way to uncover them is to throw yourself everywhere until you don’t just die, there’s no hint, no nothing, all you know is that you’ll die if you take the route you’d take on normal, but since there’s only one way to go, you just minesweep around.

That’s a shallow argument. There are plenty of hints, and there’s plenty of lessons throughout even the earliest levels. It’s the player’s job to actually think about each experience, about each trap they fall victim to, and apply that to their future advancement through the level.

Every trap should teach you about what to expect. Every trap is a hint, a glimpse into the developer’s mindset. Almost immediately, you learn that miniscule little flowers are deadly. That rocks are often less than inanimate. That helpful hands don’t really like you anymore. These should all teach you about the rest of the level.

What you’re suggesting is that, despite the fact that the first flower you step on kills you, you should continue mindlessly stepping on every single flower you come across, just to see if they, too, kill you. That’s just silly. You learn to avoid the things that killed you in the past, and thus they are no longer much of a surprise when they do in the future. You learn what you should be cautious of over time, and everything you go through in the level builds that understanding.

I think the ice in Kegbrawl should be made slippery like this.

Slippery ice during Wintersday in WvW would be awesome, as well. Imagine the hilarity.

Moss.5371:

Josh Foreman.8250:

If I cared about cash grabs I’d be working at Zynga where they design based on MTX. We don’t do that here. I’m trying to make SAB (And I mean SAB, not the GW2 rewards, achievements, titles, MTX, etc) a good, solid, fun game. That’s my focus.

Woah I don’t know where to start. 1. You don’t do that here? Infinite coin anyone? 2. Here’s a free idea for you. I’m sure there’s a group of playes that enjoy Zynga games so why not bring them in GW2 too? Let players in WvW after taking a keep open a restaurant in it and customize their menu and stuff. That would be like, so innovative and rule-breaking!

You’re really calling the infinite coin a “cash grab”? It’s a minor convenience feature for people who either want to support the game and Josh’s wonderful creation, or simply feel they need access to that many lives. You can still get plenty of normal coins with very minimal effort, if you don’t want to pay for the infinite one. It takes something like twelve minutes to speed-run World One, and that nets you enough baubles for at least 150 lives. If they were only out for money, they wouldn’t make free lives that accessible.

Personally, I love the feeling of being too frightened to move, for fear of uncovering another trap. I love learning to adapt to prior experiences in the level, when trying to guess what might be deadly and what is safe moving forward. Sure, those feelings begin to fade after you’ve completed a level and know all the safe routes, but still. That initial delight, when everything is an unknown, is just so utterly perfect and satisfying.

Playing through Tribulation Mode has provided some of the most delightfully hilarious moments I’ve ever experienced in my time with GW2. Playing with friends makes it even better. Watching someone just randomly die because they stepped on a flower? Or seeing them fall through the floor two steps in front of you and driving you to a laughter-induced halt? It’s awesome, and all in good fun.

fugazi.5139:

butch.8136:

ColinJohanson.2394:

We still have a long ways to go to get to where we’re going, but considering where we stood when we launched with almost no features in PvP I think we’ve come a long ways.

And yet, this game was hyped to be the MMO esport…

More popular than gw1 ever was on it’s height? You’re counting the hotjoin players too, I guess. I remember the time getting top 1000 in gw1 (Guild leaderboard) was ‘hard’.

Exactly. They can try defend Gw2 and try and make it seem like it is better than Gw1 but the truth is…It never will be.

If you think the game is so incapable of improving, why are you here? Why are you so pathetically attached to spreading misery? Why do you demand more developer communication, only to then take out one miniscule line or comment from everything they say when they do communicate, and hammer it with utterly illogical insults? Do you literally only want them to post more so you can continue directly insulting them?

People with this attitude are nothing but a drain on the community, the developers, and the game. If you actually wanted to help improve the developer-player relationship or the game, you wouldn’t be so obsessed with spreading negativity in every single circumstance. As it is, you offer nothing constructive to the game, and with that attitude, it’s difficult (and arguably undeserved) to take any of your suggestions or demands seriously.

If people are so concerned about balanced servers, why don’t they just make a conscious effort to transfer in a way that promotes such balance, rather than going straight for the ‘top’ server? Guilds coordinating with each other to spread out evenly so as many servers as possible can stand a chance? Sure, you could argue that such a thing shouldn’t be necessary, but when it’s your best option, why not just do it instead of whining about what you can’t have? It might make things more interesting!

Of course, that will just make the real issue more obvious: While everyone may be screaming that they want balanced servers more than anything else, they’ll still just do whatever is necessary to get the rewards. Alas!

Uh. You don’t need to finish the repair animation for Supply Mastery to trigger.

Ragnar.4257:

Stormleaf.1769:

Ragnar.4257:

Stormleaf.1769:

Ragnar.4257:

To be honest, 9 times out of 10 it won’t be a spy, it’ll just be some newbie who thinks they’re helping out by dropping 50 silver for the team. The problem is that one person can burn the supply of the entire server, troll or not.

You can never conclusively prove that someone is griefing in order to ban them, they might just not know any better. But you can limit the ability of trolls to cause damage.

Just split supply into two types: Seige Supplies and Building Materials. Dolyaks, instead of bringing 60 supply to a tower, instead bring 30 Seige Supply and 30 Building Materials. BM can only be used for upgrades and repairs, SS can only be used to build seige. That way if someone starts an upgrade when you really need supply for building defensive seige, you aren’t completely screwed.

And suddenly it takes twice as long to upgrade the defenses of a keep or tower (while also providing half as much supply for siege and repairs when being attacked), just for the sake of making things slightly more difficult for griefers. And this when the forum whiners are constantly complaining about defense being hard enough, already.

Make it 60 SS and 60 BM then. The numbers are irrelevant, thanks for missing the point ^^

The numbers are entirely the point. If you skew things too much in either direction, you harm the balance of the game for all players, simply in an effort to deter griefers (a group of people that can never truly be deterred).

I just dont’ understand why you’re so hostile to an idea that would both help:

1. People wanting to build seige by stopping their supply being eaten by trolls/newbies starting ugprades.

2. People trying to upgrade and having their supply stolen by others.

Other than demanding some developer time, there is no downside.

Criticizing it and suggesting that you consider the wider consequences of such a change qualifies as ‘hostile’? If that’s the case, think about how much hostility ArenaNet has to go through every day because of the utter brats on this forum. If you can’t handle that, then maybe you shouldn’t be making suggestions in the first place. I’m not trying to be rude to you, it’s simply exhausting to see so many people on this forum who believe they can do an infinitely better job than ArenaNet, when they don’t fully examine the implications of their own ideas.

Regardless, suddenly having twice as much supply available can be just as damaging. On top of that, what will your suggestion truly change? There’s still the issue of upgrade supply being burned on “useless” upgrades like merchants and guards to prevent people from repairing or activating more useful upgrades. Meanwhile, griefers can also still go about draining the siege supply by dropping useless rams or whatever else (and guess what: suddenly they have even more supply than before to build siege in inconvenient and obtrusive places!). You’re not going to stop griefers; at best, you’re only going to push them in other directions, while simultaneously skewing the balance of the game.

That you think your idea is infallible suggests that you haven’t fully thought it through.