Guild Wars 2

Well, in real life, learning to draw or play an instrument is often frustrating and monotonous, even to get the basics right. I mean yeah, it feels good to hit a milestone and actually not only stay there, but improve upon it, but ultimately…

…If I could become a master artist from jogging and delivering phone books, I would partake in these activities and make art 100% fun, instead of a hit or miss slow as hell process that in the end, I’ll just create something easily eclipsed by someone younger than me anyway.

Basically, to apply to this mentality to the game – I’d rather have a reason to continue running around Tyria and progress than to bottle up in some quiet little corner because it was decided grinding in area X was the only way to earn mastery B.

It’s important to separate the community into facets.

As players the community is generally good, but this is often because of mechanics being set up such that being an kitten is rather difficult. We can’t kill steal, we can’t steal resource nodes, everyone can revive. Though honestly it isn’t so much that the community is good so much as there’s nothing they can really do that’s bad.

When we move into text is where things get iffy. Elitist pricks will be elitist pricks, and 99.% of all differences in opinion will only ever be settled with fisticuffs because its the internet. The other .01% is someone actually asking the armor piercing question that crumbles the other guy’s opinion into idiocy.

Thing is, the more people you gather, the less everyone’s individual reputation will shift, the more likely they are to be rude because being an kitten towards someone without power won’t negatively impact them any. Stick 10 guys in a room, they’ll quickly ostracize the one moron that will always pick a fight. Stick 100,000 guys in a room, one guy always picking fights is nothing, especially when the prior ratio suggests there are 10,000 guys always picking fights. Can’t possibly remember who is who at that point.

This is why communities of sufficient size will always be reduced to trash, even in PvE games. We can just be glad that GW2 goes out of its way to make seeing other players something to enjoy, so when we’re 3-4 strangers all hashing out an event, we exist in our own little bubble where we’ll all be semi-nice to each other, if never speak to one another. It’s ironic that taking out trolling opportunities also diminishes the necessity in socializing.

Tarnished Coast is the unofficial roleplay server of Guild Wars 2, and most RP happens in the tavern in Divinities Reach, and some in the Grove. Otherwise, there are occasional pockets of RP sprouting up, but it isn’t always clear whether or not these people are acting out a story where they’ll welcome strangers. I mean, call me crazy but… what’s the point of acting if you hate having an audience?

Eddie Mo.7169:

No idea why some people are saying MMORPGs have been terrible the last few years solely because they came out with a new way to make money.

Nah, it’s not just about the way they make money. That really is a personal beef from player to player. What’s really telling is how the MMO genre is stagnant in that nearly every single MMO plays virtually the same:

Tab targeting.
Grab quest and do it.
Level up and move from zone to zone until max.
Simply run the “end game” until you get the best gear.

Sure, there are games that try to do different things, but their core boils down to the same formula. TERA, ACTION combat… but still has 2, 3, and 4. Guild Wars 2? 1, technically 2, and 3. 4 is also technical if you consider ascended gear, though that isn’t absolutely necessary to have to do and see everything. Most games do all 4. And that’s a really watered down list, there are also other “side” mechanics, like crafting that is either the method of getting the best gear, or something you likely wasted time and gold on.

Really, the MMO that breaks away from 2, 3, and 4 and delivers an experience LIKE GW2’s living world… only procedurally generated and influenced by player actions as well as NPC faction interactions, will revolutionize the genre (like what Everquest Next promises..) Basically, MMO’s need to be built to be worlds people want to virtually live in and have some influence over, not crappy little themeparks with a thousand goal posts that change nor accomplish nothing upon clearing each and every one.

It’s quite ironic, but single player RPGs, which have zero incentive to keep players playing long term, release with more compelling content and they can keep players playing for hundreds to thousands of hours.

Something about MMO design is so fundamentally broken that it will take throwing caution to the wind and daring to make a huge loss on producing a truly unique MMO experience to break it out of its rut. People want to complain about reused assets in their expansions? The MMO has been essentially a reskinned, lightly modded variant of World of Warcraft/Everquest for a while now. WoW and all the other nomadic player bases are proof people want a good MMO… it’s just too bad developers/publishers can’t seem to think outside of the box and stick to tired old concepts that have long since needed to die. …Like leveling. Seriously, stop developing worlds only for 3% of it to see regular use in the end. And if you’re implementing some deleveling/power balance system for visiting lower level zones, why have leveling at all? It’s a self defeating concept.

Bear, Snow Leopard, Wolf, and Raven are unhappy with you.

Also Owl, Rabbit, and probably Tuna and Moa, because why not?

It’s hardly the best, more like among the better options out there, but still riddled with too many glaring flaws and dumbfounding decisions that it can still be stomped IF someone makes all the right calls in designing an MMO, but so far, I swear they’re intentionally sabotaging their own work just to keep it mediocre. In the end, GW2 is still an on-rails grinder with the option to repeat content and still progress from it, so an improvement, but further begs the question as to why leveling exists in an MMO in the first place if the goal is always inevitably “get to max, THEN gear out.”

Honestly, out of all the MMO’s I’ve played, GW2 is the most qualified to ditch leveling entirely. It’s got more than enough little check boxes on the to-do list to offer a sense of progression. But I digress – that’s just ONE problem I have with Guild Wars 2’s design direction, but I hate leveling in any MMO because it really does boil down to “get to max, THEN gear out.” Every. Single. Time.

Guild Wars 2 is no exception. Only it swaps out the gear grind at max level (I don’t count ascended here, it’s just ONE step) for grinding out prestigious items to look cool. That’s… and improvement I guess… If you’re okay with the price of on trans-crystal per armor piece.

I think the only MMO I’ve played that actually railed against the norm and is actually still making bank off of it is Mabinogi. Though that one is more setup to be a perpetual grind for new skills and power with a heavy emphasis on selling fashionable outfits. You can literally play that game in it’s entirety with a naked, bare handed character. But likewise, you can make a very powerful character if you don’t mind risking blowing up the best equipment and enchantments you can get your hands on.

I’d love some decent long leaf/“hair” styles on the Sylvari females. Hell, I’ll make it easy and say they can even port over some of the hairstyles from the Sylvari males, more notably the tie backs. I see most Sylvari female player characters running around with the same hair style, and there’s probably a good reason for that. The overwhelming majority aren’t interested in twigs or spikes for their hair style, and I can’t tell if anyone taking the mushroom cap is being serious and picked it for the ronin look or just thought it was so unbelievably silly they had to have it.

I just want free flowing “long/shoulder length hair” for my female Sylvari. Males have better “hairstyles.”

Actually, in many cases, many male hairstyles from every race wouldn’t seem out of place on their female counterparts.

My beefs with GW2 are many, but nit picky in most cases I’ll admit.

Unless you already have a level 80 that has run a few dungeons and don’t mind blowing wads of cash on transmutation stones, low level characters are going to be wearing the same looking garbage for at least 30-40 levels. They could have done with armor what they did with weapons and have had regional themed armors drop instead of the generic looking $#!%, but they didn’t. Most of the aesthetics of the game are locked behind dungeons (so I won’t even be spending gems on transmutation stones until after some effort in something I don’t enjoy anyway…)

This game’s group play is horrendous. I mean, at first I thought the idea of killing the Trinity was a good idea, but then it just turns into a “spam the hell out of it” exercise. Of course, maybe if anything lasted for longer than 2 seconds I could actually combo things together.

Controls themselves feel kitten. This game wants to be an action combat MMO but feels too timid to leave its tab-targetting roots. If they would just put in a little game play option to “always mouselook” so that I don’t have to hold the right mouse button down all the kitten time I could rebind my first skill and second skills to left click and right click respectively and the game would be 1271% more enjoyable for it. I haven’t ONCE needed to left click on anything in game since everything else works just fine. And no, I won’t download and install a mod – this is something Arena.net should do.

Of course, this doesn’t change that the enemies still act like standard fare tab-targetting mooks. But then, TERA and Wildstar’s enemies weren’t exactly raising the bar either. Control scheme takes precedence to enemy interactivity, though I’d still like to see enemies feel like they’re meant for action combat.

Another thing. Moving around and fighting feels like skating on glass. Attacks lack that certain crunch, the impact, like my character is actually hitting something. Instead I see that sword swing and my character might as well be striking air – with yet another generic, steel sword.

There’s also the issue of particle overload. No other game I’ve played seems to lose the enemy behind all of the particles.

The regional flavor weapons need to drop far more often. My Charr is running around in his lands, most of the sword drops better be of the region’s Charr theme, all rusted and put together piecemeal with scraps with serrated edges, not generic, unmemorable steel broadswords.

Still no body sliders, among other things. Selecting templates is a concept from 1999. Please upgrade character customization already.

And oh yeah, I’d REALLY like to skip the tutorial quest newly created characters go through already. It’s a real PITA.

I imagined dynamic events would actually change things in the world. Like failing an event meant the battle lines between forces would actually move. Instead, they’re just public events that happen at intervals and really, nothing happens either way.

The concept of the Living Story feels more like their masochistic attempt to keep to the idea of the world ever changing that they made dynamic events sound like would do.

Finally, WHY LEVELING!? Like… just why? If you’re going to revolutionize anything about MMO’s, get rid of the concept of leveling. It has been and always will be “get to max, THEN play the game” because everyone knows nothing is worth really spending time doing until this stupid little number is no longer growing.

I’m trying to justify purchasing HoT, but I’ve recently seen more design decisions, however minor, that suggest to me that the future only holds more pants-on-head stupidly disappointing decisions that should have been easy, reminding me that it’s best to let someone lead development on an MMO then fire them before they can f*** it up somehow. Every. F***ing. Game.

Just recently came back and kind of enjoying myself, but in the end, I’m just following hearts, doing inconsequential events that don’t really change anything about the world, and watching as my character replaces their $#!%%& looking hatchet and chainmail with the same $#!%%& looking hatchet and chainmail. You know, I’d pay a sub if it meant I could dress up my character any way I wanted without having to invest in stones. That alone would make the experience more enjoyable. I’d rather eat stones to unlock equipment appearances without actually having to obtain said equipment.

Goodness, I hope Everquest Next is everything the developers claim they are making it out to be. It’s [formerly SOE] though… so I’m not holding my breath.

EDIT: Aaaaaand I just found the game does have “action camera.” Only it has to be toggled via setting a keybind. This has to be the least intuitive way of discovering this function, but at least the game play has improved 1271%.

The fact that they went through the trouble of even plopping “invisible shoes” some place instead of making it an equipment menu toggle is both mind boggling and foreboding.

Like… I’m glad I didn’t jump into getting the expansion foreboding if these are the asinine decisions we can expect in the future. Sorry, I have standards – invisible shoes when there is clearly a “hide/show” system in place. Sure, maybe if transmutation stones are only 5 gems a pop.

Better outfit-costume customization. This all-or-nothing deal is BS to me still. I want to mix and match pieces. With other costume pieces and actual armor alike.

Also, NPC town clothes for players: make them available already, and not a castable item with a 15 minute duration. Seriously, WTH. Why was this even decided to work this way?

Oh, and everything in the posts above, because this game can always do with being made better.

My life is pretty much video games and anime. This kind of makes it hard to connect with people on any deeper a level than say, business as usual. I can talk through a mic just fine, say hi to strangers, even join a guild, but I don’t, because I know I won’t really be joining in on any small talk. I’ll always be that quiet, awkward outsider.

I’m 28 now, and have since determined that at best, I find working with people mildly annoying, and at worst downright intolerable. I can follow orders just fine, I have no problem with that, but I don’t like being made to wait, I don’t like feeling like I’m underperforming and have confidence issues as a result, or likewise if I’m doing well I don’t like relying on others that I feel aren’t performing up to what I consider even passable standards.

A large part of the mentality was developed in my WoW years, where I was a teenager in a time when games were for nerdy virgin neckbeards that could never get a girlfriend (still keeping the image true!) Part of it is being “the kid” in a raid guild full of adults talking about adult things and generally having trust issues with one of the few players in game that actually enjoyed tanking. Being on 56k didn’t help. And since then, I don’t think I’ve been in a single guild where I’ve actually felt I belonged, and tended to get the negative attention from someone for reasons I could never really figure out besides clashes of opinion.

In the end, while One with social issues can make the effort to get back into the social game, unlike other mental issues the social anxiety/loner issue isn’t a game that can be fixed playing solo, and it does kind of require some people being ultra forgiving, even a bit pushy and stubborn (smiley’s quoted post of himself is an example of being pushy and stubborn done right because there was an agreeable place to meet half way for both parties) to help them out of it. Coincidentally, loners/introverts tend to have a hard time getting into a co-op game because they’re not a part of the social cliques, and likely, not even a part of the more popular trends, like selfies, facebook, twitter, etc.

As for myself, I’m a whole different kind of anti-social – I’m just used to flying solo, to the point that playing co-op is almost strictly done from a business approach (working retail, being able to do this much is mandatory.) IF I ever hit something off with someone, well, they’ll likely be a very special snowflake themselves. God help whomever teases the idea of becoming my first girlfriend. I know to listen to the people around me for signs of crazy.

Astral Projections.7320:

While the map edges are ugly I do like the map interiors better than the Guild Wars 1 maps. For whatever reason a fair amount of the Guild Wars 1 maps forced you into corridors with towering hills on both sides of the trail, almost always unclimbable. To me these corridors were far more immersion breaking than the gw2 map borders, which are usually not obvious till you get close.

I’m going to use this post as an example. Even in Guild Wars 1, the maps were still rectangular, but since the space available in these maps wasn’t carved out to make use of most of this space, the player never noticed. See, that’s the thing, pretty much every game uses a rectangular map, it just doesn’t use ALL of that rectangle in an attempt to hide the fact it is a rectangle.

What you see on the map is a very literal and honest representation of the tech. A-net wanted to make the most of the space they had, instead of wasting 40% of it on mountains just to sell the idea that their maps weren’t rectangle cages. Most MMO worlds however do waste a ton of space on impassable mountains and oceans.

How did the people against increasing the level cap cope with leveling and gearing up in the process itself?

With the way “endgame” gear is supposed to work through horizontal progression – thus mostly aesthetics – fearing having to regrind for gear that frankly, isn’t required to be successful in the open world or even dungeons because they’re not expected to be tiered like a standard MMO’s raid sequence, is something gear *****es fret over. The people against a level cap increase making obsolete their current equipment are these very people, and I fear they think this way because they’ve been trained to through other MMO’s, despite how pointless it is to have the bleeding edge stuff when there is nothing that absolutely requires it to progress. It’s like being given the choice to earn one of many sports cars but there are only 50mph roads to drive on.

I figure as long as my equipment is good enough for the open world, I don’t need the bleeding edge stuff. What an increased level crap really brings to the table is potentially extended trait lines and more trait points, further allowing a player to customize their character’s class and how they play. Do you go 0/10/0/30/40? 40/40/0/0/0? 10/10/20/20/20?

I only have one 80, but I’ll only delete her if I replace her with another warrior I like even better. There are a lot of warrior concepts that amuse me, but my alt slots are going to other classes first.

Tarnished Coast is PvE heavy. The bulk of GW2’s NA role-players are here, but since it’s unsupported by Arena.net, it’s not an official RP server. Don’t feel too compelled to play by “role-play” guidelines like you might think you have to in other MMO’s.

I say “think” because developers quickly learn not to give two $#!%s about their RP servers, and for good reason. So many trivial reports over the pettiest crap.

One was “academic and quiet.” The other was also in the same boat, “quiet, but very, very clever” with “remarkable work.” Now… I’m one to get jealous, to be honest. I don’t like trying hard at something only for someone else to do something in the same field only better, making it seem effortless, especially after they go “meh, this is actually pretty bad.”

Not saying Mr. Killer snapped over an IT field dispute because all we got were two descriptive words regarding him. Just saying, some people will snap when they can’t seem to win despite their best efforts.

It shouldn’t come as any surprise that an (unofficial) RP server might see a fair number more PvErs and a stronger social atmosphere. As an RPer (sorta kinda) I feel that PvEing and progressing my character for the sake of progressing will just lead to burn out, isolationism, elitism, etc. RPing introduces another element with no tangible progress: socializing. That aspect kind of breathes life into an MMO more so than simply grouping up for dungeons or mobbing together to kill a swamp ghost ever will.

I want the Rytlock head.

Mystic.5934:

this doesn’t have to be the case. I’ve programmed a game, and while squares are the easiest, they are not the only thing possible. if it can be expressed as a mathematical equation, it can be used as a map perimeter. squares are just one of the easiest to express, and processing power is an issue.
circles are also pretty easy to express. and by extension, ellipses. it’s not even that hard to do interesting circle-type shapes using equations (such as a pear shape). Every zone would need it’s own equation for where the borders are, which can be tricky and much more time consuming than: “how big of a rectangle do you want?”
so that’s the why and a reasonable alternative

personally, I’m not so hung up on each area being rectangular as why there happen to be rectangular-shapped mountain ranges all over the place. most of the boundaries /should/ be open land, but a mountain range always seems to pop out of nowhere. even where it’s open ocean between bloodtide and sparkfly, there happens to be a mountain range at the border. Now, of course mountain ranges are natural borders, but there should be some variability at least. maybe have the border between harrathi and gendarran be an open field with a line that is the portal instead of a giant circle portal.

So it doesn’t necessarily need to be the case, but still in all actuality, one could make a pear shaped landscape in a rectangle, but to reiterate, Anet opted to make the most of the space on each map rather than giving us thin valleys and cliff sides with the occasional big flat area like one might see in Aion.

What really sets people off is that they open the map and realize the maps are in squares, when from the ground level, no one is the wiser. This is an issue of where ignorance truly is bliss, and those that find themselves no longer ignorant of the map layout getting hung up on the fact they’re running around in a box. Everyone else realizes that’s not what it feels like when moving from heart to heart, or they simply don’t care. After all, if it took the individual opening the map to figure it out, it wasn’t much of a problem to begin with unless they decided to have an issue with it.

Maybe Anet should have just stuck with a “hand drawn” map with squiggly lines and no identifiable features save for some icon for each territory, like with Aion’s world map, instead of laying them out side by side like Anet does here in GW2? Though I personally prefer GW2’s world map. I like to see all the links.

Assuming Palawa Joko is going to resume his role as bad guy overlord of the dead-but-still-moving peoples when we get around to him. 250 years and a bunch of dragon’s can change a lot of $#!%, especially when one of them decides to take a dump in your backyard.

All maps, in ANY game, by sheer restriction of the way coordinates work, are square. Arena.net just saw fit to use 98% of these squares/rectangular maps instead of shaving off a third of them as impassable mountains for the mere illusion of uneven borders. Your PC still has to load that third, there’s just nothing (else but terrain) in it.

Even seamless worlds, Azeroth for example, are built within a square. It’s a bloody huge square per continent, but a square none-the-less. That’s why they have the forced drowning bit when you swim out to sea: they don’t want you hitting the invisible wall.

Sylvari – Female – Warrior
Human – Female – Guardian

And about 6 others I can’t decide on. I think I need more slots.

Voted yes, but only with the caveat there is a new tier of traits for everyone, so it’s not just about more points. Gear itself becoming obsolete is pointless to consider. If we’re looking at an ideal, manifesto following endgame where all the new stuff that comes out is primarily so we can grab it and transmute the appearance onto stuff with the stats we really want, that can be done at level 90 with level 80 gear.

What we’re doing now sans the existence of ascended won’t change in 5, 10, or 100 more levels. It’s about trait points, but simply leveling up for the sake of more points alone is stupid, there needs to be another tier of traits to invest deeper into. I’m not so naïve as to believe the classes are 100% totally balanced around 70 trait points. Even Lyssa can’t hide the fact that particular reality is an impossibility.

Otherwise, along this same line of thought, there is really no need for a higher level cap if the intent is to keep us at 70 trait points. Seriously, that’s the only attribute that really matters on a level up.

I’d really like this feature as well. I don’t see why it doesn’t already. If I pop open a menu, then a mouse cursor is fine. If I’m just running around and fighting in the world, I can’t recall a moment where I haven’t let up on my right mouse button.

Having this functionality would allow me to keybind my cardinal movement directions to each of my mouse buttons, streamlining my key presses, and saving me from twisting my fingers in combat!

Sylvari. There are seldom few non-trench coat medium armors, and I personally think Charr look awful in trench coat armors. Sylvari can at least wear trench coats stylishly.

We’ll likely see new weapons and class/weapon combos before we see new classes.

Cestus (fist weapons)
Great Axe
Halberd/Lance
Crossbow
(Giant) Shuriken (definitely a Cantha thing though.)

And that’s not considering that Anet could very well give classes access to currently existing weapons, like a Thief might get maces, an Elementalist might have access to one handed swords, and Guardians access to one handed axes. Of course, all three of these might just get fist weapons as well (brawler, Earth shaper and monk conceptually respectively.)

I would even say we may be more likely to see a higher level cap and an extra tier of traits. Not even half of Tyria is explorable, and I can’t imagine in today’s market Anet can get away with keeping us at 80 and constantly introducing even higher tiers of gear, or keeping it to as powerful as ascended gear indefinitely. I personally prefer a higher level cap to introducing higher tiers of gear anyway. There’s more customization in extra trait points and tiers.

If we do get a new class… well I wouldn’t be shocked if it was a third heavy armor class. Alternatively they could just have one of the Necromancer’s minor traits unlock heavy armor, if that’s even remotely possible, and rework how armor tiers work in general. Y’know… if I’m wearing heavy and don even a single light piece, I’ll find myself wearing only that light piece of armor. RPers would be very grateful for this functionality.

I’d have to say my only gripes with Guild Wars 2 is the general lack of armor-appearance variety during the low levels, and that hearts have become more of a “okay, what do I need to kill” type system. Sometimes there are other gimmicks, but a lot of times it can or does just boil down to simply killing the creature specified in the blurb. I guess I should mention the newb levels can be pretty harsh without running into a few events between each heart, which is asking a lot actually. Finally, along with armor, climates seem fairly samey across zones. Human lands are mostly grasslands, Norn mostly snowy mountains, Charr mostly wartorn plains, etc.

Otherwise, GW2 > others. Aion has pretty armors, weapons, housing, and I actually find the skill system fun, but it’s forced PvP. Blegh.

WoW, I like the class variety, but those first ten levels, like here, are brutal, but the boring, mundane “spam a single button” brutal, and despite having 400 spells, I only really need 3 or 4 by level cap on trash.

TERA, once you’ve killed your first Ghilledieu, you’ve experienced every single PvE trash mob fight in the game, they just get hardier as you level up. Also, it has been SO streamlined, so simplified, gear is literally a matter of just finding bigger numbers and using the right crystal setup. One can’t even really tell what half the stats provide, because no explanation is given as to how much of Y stat = X chance. Min-maxing is virtually impossible. Some people might view that as a good thing, I view GW2’s build possibilities as a min-maxing paradise in comparison, and that’s a fun prospect to look forward to.

Dwarves.

At a stretch: Risen from Elona. However, they’d be designed with visual differences akin to how the Forsaken differ from Humans in WoW.

Kodan as a distant third.

I honestly don’t expect any of the currently existing non-player races to become playable.

I saw one addition of “power creep” and people are already losing hope in the game not going the vertical progression route? I question whether or not the progession minded players are the real audience to cater to here. They didn’t just give up because the game didn’t play their way, they kittened and moaned to no end and still kept playing. Who’s displaying more loyalty?

As for the OP, aside from skill collection, it’s going to be very hard to not have some form of character progression that isn’t vertical. Frankly speaking, I think the concept of resists is an interesting way to go regarding progression, the more powerful over all gear wasn’t necessary however.

If one needed decay resistance to survive in Orr, and this was a character bound stat, not something worn, that would present a sort of progression without power creep. Couple the decay resistance with passive skill acquirement proper for each weapon that could replace weapon skills, and we’d have a mechanic/“experience bar” that says “yeah, I killed a few hundred Risen, and I learned how to do it efficiently too.”

Though this is all easier said than done, especially where developing new skills is concerned.

Because the only people that ever really leave are those that no longer care enough about the game to say anything at all.

… Well most of them. Some leave because they can’t spare any time, or they found a game they prefer (like a certain MMOFPS in my case,) but those reasons don’t make for very constructive farewell posts either.

I’m thinking incorporating a brand new weapon type like brass knuckles or cestus’ and including those within the currently existing classes selection of equipment would be a more likely scenario. A brand new class isn’t exactly necessary when the weapons + the class determine the skills used. I’m thinking warrior, guardian, thief, and maybe the elementalist or mesmer would get the fist weaponry.

So wait… not being able to warp around willy nilly to play with your guildies/friends is killing the social aspects of the game, but skipping over meeting everyone one would come across in the field and participating in the dynamic events filled with even more people and meant to be filled with people (like those that can’t manage their cash flow and so must run) isn’t killing the social aspect either?

Pretty sure this is just another veiled “I warp too much and I’m broke!” thread.

As I see this games fighting mechanics more in line with that of your typical fighting game (like mortal kombat, only without the 23 sequence moves) I feel some method of ending a knock down early would be very much appreciated.

Bluestone.7106:

The people who think teleport costs are expensive must be spending their money on silly things and/or not actually playing the game enough (read as: doing anything other than standing still) to earn the tiny amount of money that is required to travel via waypoints.

I don’t farm at all, I just play and I have never thought twice about the negligible amounts required to waypoint travel.

I think part of the problem isn’t that they’re spending their money willy nilly, so much as they’re abusing the WP system too much, even over the shortest of distances. It’s meant as a means of conveniently getting around quickly, not the primary means of getting around, period. There are world events going off at ALL times and they require people to complete them. I firmly believe Anet’s idea was to deter WP usage with the costs (more so than making them a money sink) so that people would be traveling on foot from place to place and getting involved with the dynamic events they come across.

It’s unfortunate that people can’t figure this out. They’re too used to being coddled and expecting everything to be easy and convenient. “Time” is something of an issue for many, true, but if one is playing an MMO, the first thing one needs to realize is that time (as well as money) is precisely what the developer intends to get out of a player. In P2P’s, making things take time is one way to get them to pay the monthly fee. In F2P’s, money typically amounts to removing or reducing the time requirements for convenience. Cosmetics are a different issue both types practice regularly.

Most of the people I see in this thread just can’t be bothered to hoof it. Yes, I understand if your time is limited… but you’re not going to be reset back to the nearest city if you log out in the field and continue your trek again the next time. I’m pretty sure everyone can afford to TP to their destination zone once per sitting and easily make a profit. Plan your teleports carefully, instead of treating them as the only means of travel, and you won’t go broke unless are truly horrible with your money. I promise.

As a warrior, I think there’s only been one occurance where I’ve legitimately been overwhelmed and killed. Otherwise, I essentially put myself in front of death’s door willingly (typically when engaging champs.)

I’ve considered doing this very act with another warrior but only if there’s an achievement as a result. Otherwise, it’s this stressful experience with nothing to show for it and only fear of dying when I hit the cap. What do I do if I do die at 80? Delete the toon?

Well… as an RPer that might draw some real emotion from others, even if it’s just over a bunch of pixels >.>

Grab the cook wear. It’s racial specific in aesthetic, and for a Sylvari that amounts to big leaves. Looks like a leafy dress on my Sylvari female.

Have yet to find a jumping puzzle in the Harathi Hinterlands to find out if anything I actually might deem valuable comes out of the chest.

But then… I usually just considered the reward as as a sign I completed the puzzle, so I’m not aimlessly looking for the correct path when the correct path is the exit.

I play games knowing all progress, no matter how big or small, is near completely rendered moot* once I move on to the next game that interests me. …Am I the only one that does anything in this game without feeling like I need some tangible reward for it? What ever happened to beating a game just to see the credits roll or the score screen?

• Because having the original Quel’serrar on my Warrior or the haunted momento** on my Palidan totally doesn’t entice me back to WoW every once in a while.

• 2. Something from pre-Naxxramas events in vanilla WoW that has a shade follow you everywhere, watching you. Trek across the continent, it WILL slowly travel towards you until it finds you. It’s pretty sick. I want a haunted momento in Guild Wars 2

3b. It’d be nice if at least light armors fit into our town clothes tab too – without the stats of course. Y’know… while there’s still so few town outfits that it won’t be a development nightmare to make them play nice with the light armors.

(This is all I got for this bump.)

Some people are just no good in social situations. I swear I’m from a different planet, personally. Most of my social interaction comes from forums and /map chat. Meeting new people and speaking on a more personal level about things outside of gaming or my other interests? Forget about it.

Then you have to also consider many people only communicate with their clique, which in turn discourages others not in a clique from ever really trying to communicate with strangers, and it just snow balls.

If nothing else, I have just been conditioned not to bother through a variety of unsuccessful attempts and interaction with other people. Even being in a guild doesn’t guarantee one will make friends. The game play is fun, and I’d like to communicate, but it can be a stressful and awkward experience because I’m not a very good real time conversationalist. I know I’m not the only person with socialization issues either.

It isn’t always about playing efficiently, sometimes it’s just uncomfortable to interact with others with anything more than convenience in mind.

There is a plethora of MMO’s on the market with a grind treadmill for any player wanting that sort of thing. Anet isn’t stupid enough to compete with these MMO’s. especially the elephant in the room, which is undeniably the best at doing it.

Instead, Anet has opted for a more “game” approach, where 100% balance in PvP is the greater concern, and “grinding” is rewarded with trophies such as unique looking armors and weapons, and little icons next to your name. There is more to do than simply reading the quest requirements and killing monsters to reach the cap. There is exploration and jumping puzzles.

We should all expect this game to update with as great a focus on fluff as there is actual progressive content. New armors and weapons simply for looks, new town clothes, housing, emotes, mini games, even jumping puzzle mechanics like ledge grabbing (why not?) etc. If you picked up Guild Wars 2 expecting the same progression you’d find in most other major MMO titles, you’re playing the wrong game.

MMO’s aren’t defined solely by their grind mechanic. That’s just what the sheep conditioned to think in terms of endless grind are intended to think.

Lotus Lightblossom, Sylvari Warrior – Cycle of Noon.

I dreamed about two great armies clashing in a barren valley nurturing naught but a single flower under the setting sun. When the dust settled around me, two blades, one black as midnight, the other shining like the sun itself pierced the ground before me. Bore into the base of each blade was an inscription, but I could not make out the words.

There were only the bodies of the fallen to witness the last shimmers of sunlight disappearing from beyond the horizon, and a wounded flower, shedding its final remaining petal as the dream faded and my life began in the world of Tyria. It was there that I finally understood the inscriptions on those two swords:

“All things have a right to grow.”

I’d like for our personalities (charm, dignity, ferocious) to have some affect on our non-combat stance.

But generally, more emotes are good. I like how City of Heroes handled their sitting emotes in particular – the model lowers towards the ground and assumes a sitting position either appropriate for a chair, a ledge, or even just on the ground. The former two typically sank the legs into the ground if initiated on solid ground, sure, but their effect in their proper usage was ingenious.

Vees.7816:

If I’m pulling a bunch of mobs to my party in a dungeon, I’d like to shoot my bow while I’m leading them without being bent over.

Is running backwards a bad thing in general?

Apply this strategy to an encounter of the player versus player variety.

Hint: It’d get annoying for melee really quick.

T1 heavy and medium made deciding on my Sylvari’s class extra hard. T1 medium was sexy as all get out, but T1 heavy wasn’t too far behind either. It came down to character concept eventually, and the warrior fit (better armor selections too in my opinion.)

Fortunately, the cook uniform is, in fact, race specific in appearance, and I got it for my Sylvari. She’s sporting a nice, big leafy torso and pants that look natural as a dress more so than a chef’s uniform. I stuck her in the pirate boots though, just because I felt they looked better than the chef boots.

The glove is a huge, single oven mitt though. Shipped that piece off to my Charr, whom sports the piece as two elbow long gloves.

Seras.5702:

you have a favorite word? i’m not being mean but…really? Do I? I don’t think……

My favorite word is “effulgence.” It means “radiance” or “brilliance,” like what you’d see in standard issue scenery p**n.

…Or whenever you’re working with HDR lighting, lightrays, and staring at the sun through a tree’s branches. Never stops being ****ing beautiful. Thus, Guild Wars is beautiful.

Super hard bosses have their limits. Or rather, AI has it’s limits. Someone will learn the encounter, bring it down, then post the method all over the internet. So much for something being legendary.

Here’s the thing everyone needs to understand: legendaries are intended to be rare. They’re prestigious, and they don’t grant anyone any more power over someone that has their exotics. The RNG is a sure fire hard stop in ensuring they’re kept rare, in a very fair way, believe it or not, but an aggravating one.

Getting my Foror’s Compendium of Dragon Slaying felt ****ing awesome, precisely because it was a drop.

But fine, suppose the RNG aspect is removed, whom here as actually thought about HOW to make the legendaries hard to acquire? A simple answer would be “hard boss” but I just explained how that doesn’t stay hard for long, unless you’re a dimwit or working with dimwits.

Rather, I think the requirements should be exporing the whole world, completing every jump puzzle, and getting a gold medal in every single event in the game, maybe even every single long term achievement such as killing quotas, and just for $#!%s and grins, every single dye too, all without dying ONCE. Am I missing anything?

Great, so now legendaries could be reserved for players playing the game like it’s on hardcore mode, whom will probably play it ultra safe whenever and wherever possible.

And you know what? They could have that ^^^ AND the RNG method, just to keep the hope alive for those that didn’t survive the journey but don’t want to restart. Thing is, I’m fairly certain a good number of the people in this thread wouldn’t go through with that kind of grind either.

Some things are intended to be rare. I smell jealousy.

I think the biggest issue is that during the design process, the art team members responsible for drafting up the designs may have boxed themselves in too tightly. I don’t see why light and medium armor can’t have SOME metal incorporated into their designs. I really like how some of the light armors look, especially “Seer’s” as it’s called in the Mist PvP Locker, and Dredge definitely breaks the norm, though I find the Dredge sets far too bulky personally. However, there are many more light and heavy armors that I enjoy than I do medium armors. A lot of them really are samey.

I get that part of the purpose is to make the sets “at a glance” easy to identify and keep them near strictly cloth/leather/metal, but seriously ArenaNet, for the sake of offering a variety of styles, let go of that mindset.

Also, design contests. Because I personally would love to see something I design end up in game, even if I’m mediocre in designing anything!

I too found it jarring and never expected to walk into a winter wonderland. It’s like I transitioned into the Shiverpeaks without a loading screen.

I’ve been toying around with my gamma and found setting it to 70 or 75 makes the game look a lot better. Things seem less washed out, and the contrast between light and dark areas is even greater. Also, Sylvari glows become much more obvious to see.

It still doesn’t bring about a true night however. Anet would have to forcefully bring in the fog and turn it black to achieve an affect akin to true night without a moonlight. Note that clear nights under the full moon are practically bright as day. So the conditions would have to be done on a zone by zone basis to make it work believably.