Guild Wars 2

Now you need strategy and cool down management

So, now they just basically need a game, 4 years into live play?

Uh, good luck with that.

Conquest ia definitely more complex than WoW’s BGs & 2v2/3v3/5v5 arenas. Only reason WoW is showing more PvP action on twitch is because there’s more to do, there’s no standing around (doing nothing for 10m in HotM) and the player pool is insane. If the game was popular with a player base as big as WoW than gw2 would see more views on twitch.
Both games are boring to watch.

I was talking about mechanics. And no, Conquest is not more complex than 3v3 arenas; mentioning 5v5 and 2v2 arenas is fairly ignorant.

WoW is much more mechanically interesting. Not even a little bit so; there’s actual notable skill in the game, and simply using your abilities on cooldown isn’t optimal.

It’s a bad game, though, so I’m not defending it.

Saiyan.1704:

MMO PvP are all boring to watch because of the genre. You would have to simplify it like a Moba, CSGO or Overwatch for it to look entertaining. Heck, I saw Overwatch on Twitch for the first time and even though I haven’t played it, it was entertaining to watch.

It’s not clear what the 12+ skills do on a given class and when they’re used.
It’s not clear how something failed or succeeded because of passive; basically additional abilities people can’t see.

Anet would have to reinvent the genre in GW3 for the game to be anywhere near the top Esports games. But hey, that was never their goal from the get go :P

WoW PvP is substantially more complex than GW2 PvP and people STILL prefer to watch it, even though it’s gone to the kittenter. The problem isn’t complexity.

In all seriousness, though, conditions need to be scaled back to the point of irrelevance. Viewers don’t know/can’t follow what’s happening when instant abilities randomly apply tons of gamebreaking auras that are randomly being stripped and reapplied with impunity by various passive and active abilities. Abilities need to be noticeable, immediate impact/pay off and there needs to be counterplay available. Running around spamming condis with all kinds of passive AIDS and passive counters is terrible.

Basically, the game needs to be redesigned and this is precisely why it failed.

PvP in this game is boring tbh.

I’v been extremely discouraged from playing my ele in WvW ever since Tempest became meta. Running around channeling an AoE spell with all kinds of buffs tacked on is probably the single least skillful design you could promote in the game. It’s a FAR cry from the old playstyle.

I post on the internet and play competitive video games because girls don’t like me.

>for all the attune variety, there seems to be little counter play and strategy mixed in.

That’s why GW2 PvP never took off.

Being invincible isn’t good game design.

Really? I whole-heartedly disagree. I believe this game offers too many comeback mechanics to respond to a thief’s opener, after which they are fairly easy to deal with. In sPvP at least, if a thief opens on my ranger, they either have to kill me instantly or they will lose. They won’t kill me instantly, no build can pull that off.

You have like two abilities in this game. This is a literal case of git gud.

Blooperz.6145:

Larynx.2453:

Blooperz.6145:

Watson.6492:

Dahkeus.8243:

GW2 stil has the best PvP of any MMO out there, unless you just really enjoy winning fights because you grinded longer than your opponent for gear or got really lucky with RNG drops, lol!

Nah, WoW has the best PvP for that. GW2 is just a viable alternative.

GW2 PVP is actually skill based …WoW PVP is grind/which class is more OP based…not comparable at all

WoW PvP is skill based, it’s just not twitch combat like GW2.

I haven’t played wow in the past 3 years, but I heard it was incredibly dumb’ed down to cater to the casuals. As someone that played arena exclusively otherwise I can assure you that Balance and WoW did not belong in the same sentence.

Saying that because GW2 has faster paced combat make it less skillful makes no sense to me, if anything its the otherway around….I guess play WoW if you prefer slower paced combat, but make sure you have a loldruid on your team #balanced

maybe the larger scale rated BG’s are more balanced…but GW2 doesnt have 10v10 so there’s nothing to compare that to.

It’s dumbed down but it’s still far more complex. That’s because GW2 is incredibly dumbed down to cater to casuals. I mean, I’m saying this as a GW2 player. I’m just bored of WoW, so there’s that, but objective enough to make informed claims on the topic.

Blooperz.6145:

Watson.6492:

Dahkeus.8243:

GW2 stil has the best PvP of any MMO out there, unless you just really enjoy winning fights because you grinded longer than your opponent for gear or got really lucky with RNG drops, lol!

Nah, WoW has the best PvP for that. GW2 is just a viable alternative.

GW2 PVP is actually skill based …WoW PVP is grind/which class is more OP based…not comparable at all…not to mention the horrible class balance that has plagued WoW since its release…as much as people like to complain GW2 is much more balanced than WoW ever was

WoW PvP has a much higher skill cap, I’m sorry. It’s simply true.

Dahkeus.8243:

GW2 stil has the best PvP of any MMO out there, unless you just really enjoy winning fights because you grinded longer than your opponent for gear or got really lucky with RNG drops, lol!

Nah, WoW has the best PvP for that. GW2 is just a viable alternative.

WoW has more complex/interesting PvP, but it suffers balance issues as well. No MMO game is immune to this.

Downed state is the oddest thing. It only helps the design of unfun encounters and severely hinders the design of fun encounters. Can’t believe they thought it was ever a good idea.

Faction.4013:

Watson.6492:

The new meta D/D build is going to be D/D in the garbage can where it has been for months upon months.

Whatever you say…You must be a hoot at parties.

The party don’t start til’ I walk in.

The new meta D/D build is going to be D/D in the garbage can where it has been for months upon months.

Crapgame.6519:

Watson.6492:

Jayden Ennok.3687:

People still complaining that wvwers only have no asc? While I agree wvw is way slower in acquiring mats than pve, the loot is still there and unless you are one of the few that upgrade everything all the time. you should be able to craft some asc by now.

This viewpoint is ridiculous. What if I want to get my friend into the game, an avid LoL and DotA player? He’s not going to play WvW if he’s at a disadvantage for a substantial amount of time, plain and simple.

If only people who have grinded on the game for a year are able to compete, it instantly becomes an unplayable disaster.

Maybe not, but your buddy can create a character and play un-ranked sPvP games without being at a disadvantage. He will even learn the class he chose a bit better by facing fewer people with evenly matched teams all things considered. And while doing so earning gear and tombs to reach 80 when he/she wants.

Don’t be so negative – at the end of the day everyone has to get comfortable with the game. That will take a bit of time. Might as well have a bit of fun while doing it and let the lego’s fall into place rather than all over the floor for you to step on later.

Nobody likes stepping on a lego, am I right?

The fact that you think such a significant advantage can be in any way justified as a gameplay mechanic just shows the toxicity of veteran players who think they deserve COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE simply because they’ve played the game longer. You do not. Competitive advantage is the worst reward to give veteran players in any MMORPG.

A competitive LoL or DotA player is going to be really on point in terms of learning curve. It won’t take them long to get good, especially given the relative simplicity of this game’s mechanics. Hamstringing them like this would be really annoying.

It’s not that I want my friends to play the game, it’s that I don’t want to be forced to play with the same insular crowd of veterans. I want new blood to revitalize the scene. Allowing for this change isn’t conducive to that end.

Good post, Zen, but I think it would have benefited from a slightly more moderate approach. In what ways is the choice to keep Ascended as is validated? I really can’t think of many that aren’t cynical cash grabs, but I’m sure it’s possible.

The only regulatory mechanism for business practices that are not outright illegal is the consumer. If the consumer doesn’t react in kind, the market doesn’t regulate. Everything is working as market mechanisms intend.

I don’t think rangers are problematic but to be fair it is really weird that this is a game where a ranger can just press 2 and instantly kill someone with zero setup.

Jayden Ennok.3687:

People still complaining that wvwers only have no asc? While I agree wvw is way slower in acquiring mats than pve, the loot is still there and unless you are one of the few that upgrade everything all the time. you should be able to craft some asc by now.

This viewpoint is ridiculous. What if I want to get my friend into the game, an avid LoL and DotA player? He’s not going to play WvW if he’s at a disadvantage for a substantial amount of time, plain and simple.

If only people who have grinded on the game for a year are able to compete, it instantly becomes an unplayable disaster.

This move is devastating to savvy new players. Let’s say I want to get my friend into the game, who is well versed in competitive gaming. Do I now have to tell him that he’ll be at a 10% handicap for a year of gaming if he wants to WvW? Uh, yeah – no. He just won’t play the kittening game.

You’re falling into the incredibly common trap of equating mechanical ‘difficulty’ with efficacy. These two interact only tangentially. The relevant dichotomy is skill floor versus skill cap. D/P has a higher skill cap than any other thief setup because it features more utility, and combinations. D/P is D/D with usable 3 and 4 and a superior and more flexible 5 providing access to stealth. The design of the set is simply superior, significantly so.

Because D/P is a tier 1 setup it obviously brings a lot of power to the table, and subsequently the skill floor will be allow the setup to be more accessible. This doesn’t necessarily make it ‘easier’, with the implication being that it is easier to master, but it is indeed easier for you to succeed with regardless of your skill level.

As for S/D, it changes the playstyle and brings less utility to the table, but it does shift some of the burden of play on twitch mechanics. I am, however, confident in saying that it is more limited than D/P (though not as limited as D/D) and thus has a lower skill ceiling.

As for shadow arts, I believe this falls into the category of the skill floor/skill ceiling dichotomy. A lot of players use this term ‘passive’ in the GW2 scene where another scene would use the word ‘defensive’, which is far more descriptive of what’s actually happening. The largest concern with SA is simply that stealth is overpowered in this game and poorly handled – and it is, at least compared to a game like WoW, with far better PvP mechanics. That’s true, but it still doesn’t guarantee success in the parts of the game that matter in terms of a competitive structure.

As for overall mechanical simplicity vs. complexity – generally, this game substitutes buttons for mechanics. Less buttons, but slightly more intricate mechanics depending on profession. The game itself is simply more simplistic than a competitive MMO like WoW, but that’s inherent to the design, not traitline.

D/P isn’t ‘easy’ insofar as it is simple, it has more tools than pretty much any other set by far, it’s just the most powerful. D/D and D/P aren’t even comparable. D/D is INCREDIBLY limited compared to D/P in terms of raw tools available for you to play with. S/D dumps finesse positioning elements for raw brawler potential. As for runes, personally, I find traveler or even speed indispensable. Vamp seems redundant in WvW where escape isn’t punished because nothing really matters. You’re more invested in nodes and team fights in sPvP so, tactically, vamp makes more sense.

Also, personally, I don’t really buy into absurd provincial GW2 class culture that labels shadow arts in some way illegitimate, but I don’t think it is as necessary for D/P as it might be for D/D, for example. I just don’t think the points spent there are as useful as they are perceived to be.

EremiteAngel.9765:

Please don’t apologize.
The problem isn’t about how difficult it is to play a thief.

The problem is a Master thief vs a Master [insert any class here] is going to be advantage to the thief, with the exception of a Master Guardian.

Of all the classes, a Master level Thief holds the advantage.
Only a Master level Guardian can proudly say that they have the edge over a Master level thief.

Thieves are OP to every other class except Guardian.

All classes under the control of superb Master level players, Thief comes out on top in every encounter except vs Guardians.

Of the 3 or 4 thieves I defeated in the video below, do you know that I would have died to thieves 30 or 40 times in the same period.

I am not a Master level Necro, but those thieves that killed me were not Master level thieves either. Thieves just hold too many cards against every class except Guardians.

Video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fh2_WxuNUKs

You’re incorrect, but let’s put that aside. No even marginally competitive MMO balances for 1v1 combat. It’s absurd and terribly limiting to game design.

I mean, look at your video. Do you really want to play a game where competitive PvP is just you winning every fight by using all of your abilities on cooldown and backpeddling back and forth?

+1 to everybody saying the problem is essentially that 3 and 4 are poorly designed whether or not you’re some weirdo who personally feels otherwise.

I’ll play some d/d because no PvP in this game really matters, but it feels limited and flawed and I think it would have fallen even further from grace if this game had the ultra-competitive meta meat grinder of a more tactile small scale pvp ladder.

My vote is for a standard S/D build. It’s mobile, it provides extra evade frames and doesn’t really require the same level of awareness as mh dagger builds do imho. You could even use a shadow arts S/D build, but I simply don’t think its necessary.

Locuz.2651:

Watson.6492:

Seems like you’ve been away for awhile from WoW, so there’s no real point to discuss all of the differences in mechanics.

The last time ive played wow was last season so i think i have a pretty kitten good idea about the current mechanics in wow.

My apologies, I just thought it unlikely that you’d ask how certain control mechanics would work when you should know all of them as a top ranking player. Perhaps I misunderstood the context of your question.

Edit: I play a human mage on KT-US (also every other class in the game at respectable, but not par, level). Honestly, from my way of writing, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone could easily recognize me. It’s quite possible that we’ve played together. I go through cycles of rating-losing interest in the later season and looking for alternatives. SC2 and like aren’t my cup of tea.

Locuz.2651:

As someone who played wow on 7 classes at 2300-2700 rating (during non inflated seasons) i can relate to you in a way. The camera feels a bit slow at first…the combat as a whole doesnt tho.

- Camera responsiveness doesnt say a lot about the combat itself. Its a seperate thing.
- Mind that there is a shortcut to instantly look or aim behind you. Takes a while to get used to having to use a specific key as part of your camera rotation, but once you do it feels really smooth. Imo even smoother than wows camera rotation.
- Correct me if im wrong, but in wow there is no casting while jumping either (besides instants ofc). In GW2 instants AND chains are usable while jumping. To name an example for me my own class: i can use poison dart voley (a 2 second chain that launches 5 poison darts) while midair.

You seem to lack some basic understanding about GW2. If you did understand the game you wouldve mentioned some real issues like the difference in depth and risk/reward between the classes.

I appreciate the perspective.

Seems like you’ve been away for awhile from WoW, so there’s no real point to discuss all of the differences in mechanics. It’d get really pedantic, really quick; most people here don’t really know the specifics of the comparison. Suffice to say, the differences where applicable to the narrow points I’m making are notable.

Obviously, my main concern is with the control mechanics. This vector in PvP should equate to about 40%-50% of the skill difference. We’re talking positioning, character movement and response, etc. It is a substantial indicator of good play. Having impeccable control adds a respectable APM requirement as well.

I could discuss these other topics, but really, who’s going to read my litany? I wanted the parameters of this thread to be within the sphere of what I consider unforgivable errors on the part of the game developers. One comment I’ll make on this, similar to your notations, is that whereas I could easily beat multiple players in PvP at the same time with years of experienced on my hunter in WoW, I would wager that this skill gap simply does not exist in this game for most of the professions. I’m not even convinced there is an excepted profession that takes more than a week to reach 85-90% of potential in the hands of a good player.

In any case, to be quite frank with everybody here, and within the realm of the thread; I have 8+ years of extremely high level MMO PvP experience. We’re talking consistently top .1%, which is magna kitten laude of video games. I haven’t played GW2 for long, but if I was magically put in charge of PvP design and direction for the game, I could make it better than it is now. I know you might view that as a controversial statement, but it shows in my opinion a lack of either drive or mastery on the part of the developers. While some of you folks probably won’t understand this, it’s simply the case that allowing casting while jumping would increase the skill cap of the game. I am nearly 100% sure it would cause physics problems and possibly necessitate a redesign in some areas of the game on the PvE side, though, so it is an unlikely endeavor.

What else is there to say? I am under no illusions that my statements nor claims actually matter or are even remotely productive. Sharing my experience? Thoughts? Complaining? Any of these is applicable. Every MMO ever just needs to understand that you shouldn’t be trying to reinvent the wheel.

Edit: One final esoteric point that people don’t need to read if they haven’t played WoW. WoW was a game that had X number of tools that took years to develop. The meta from BC through wrath developed in a really big way, without a notable design change following suit. That is to say, the mechanics had so much potential that many aspects of play were heavily undeveloped on the player end. Comparing a BC glad to even a late Wrath glad shows a huge gap in play. I remember, notably, trying to pick up my old BC glad partners years after. They were median or below level players, despite having been in the top .1%+ in previous seasons. Comparatively, I doubt such a meta shift from untapped potential could ever exist in this game in a meaningful way. Maybe on the macro scale.

Zirith.6429:

NevirSayDie.6235:

Watson.6492:

No offense, but you’re coming off as irrationally defensive.

None taken. I am often irrationally defensive; it’s my nature. We are all irrational in our own ways. I prefer to err on this side of things.

I enjoy posting on the forums but generally spend too much time doing it, so I won’t address most of your points. I hope you find what you’re looking for. GW2 has pretty active combat so I think you could enjoy it, but it’s not perfect like WoW

(Sorry, couldn’t resist. I’m also irrationally sometimes a jerk.)

Watson is dumb, you are too nice!

Now, there’s no need for that…

No offense, but you’re coming off as irrationally defensive. It is no secret that GW2 is laden with uber-casual gameplay elements for an MMO. There’s no indication on any level that the developers have attempted to adapt the game to high level play.

It really can’t be an ‘oversight’ unless the developers are grossly incompetent, which I doubt. It’s obvious that they’re never going to budge on this, years later, despite the obvious fact that excellent and experienced MMO PvPers have made similar notations to them in order to help them improve their flawed mechanics.

The default claim for PvE is also implausible, given the fact that my initial post was dealing specifically with the fact that the game doesn’t allow you to adjust upwards to your level of skill. It places a distinct and limited cap. The only legitimate reason for this is to not give players who are good a notable mechanical advantage.

Let’s talk about your claim that ‘good players win no matter what the mechanics are like’.

The problem is that mechanics are the only element that create good gameplay. GW2 is more about memorizing a bunch of things versus having good mechanics. The key element in a competitive game is that knowledge should not equal efficacy. You need the mechanical variable as well, or you have a failed game. This holds true for all legitimate competitive games.

Basically, either these issues need to be fixed (which is utter hilarity to note, years into the development cycle) or you’re going to have a competitive system that continues to be highly flawed, which is a marked departure from slightly flawed.

My mouse sensitivity is quite high. There are two problems with the movement system that make it inferior to WoW, which I’m now going to comment on if anybody is interested in the opinions of a consistently top .1% WoW PvP player.

1. The camera action feels like it’s going through molasses, even at high sensitivity and after adjusting the rotational slider. The rotational slider should adjust upwards towards the needs of an experienced player. I believe Arenanet made it so that it doesn’t get too fast in order to equalize the inexperienced player with bad character control to the experienced player.

2. No casting while jumping. This is a subtle point that less experienced players might not understand. A jump is like a kinetic energy chain. You store your movement/velocity in the jump for a brief period. This enables you to systematically put up ‘auto-run’ in the direction of your choice while also changing your camera angle and using abilities. Jumping allows for superior character control and movement. No jumping while casting destroys this, and I can only imagine it is a deliberate design choice to hamstring good players and appeal to casual PvP play.

That’s all. The game is different, which is nice, but inferior.

Fix the camera turning speed or am I just going to have to accept that character control is inferior to WoW? I have the slider set to max and its still unacceptable. It levels the playing field in terms of movement for bad and good, which is not acceptable for a ‘competitive’ game.

I think it’s fair to speculate that the game mechanics can’t support competitive arenas in an engaging way.

MakeYouMad.5301:

Watson.6492:

MakeYouMad.5301:

Watson.6492:

Updated my post with some information relating to the VPN solution. Long story short, it works, and you don’t need to stay connected to it.

Without the VPN my connection returns to insufferable 0-50KB/s speeds.

What type of ISP provider do you have and where are you located?

Thanks!

Yidrizon Wireless, Northeast. Sorry to hear that. Hopefully it works for other people.

I’m on Verizon Fios @ NorthEast.

You should really switch to Yidrizon. It comes with free bagels and a crash course in how to run international criminal banking enterprises and how to crash entire economies for fun and profit.

MakeYouMad.5301:

Watson.6492:

Updated my post with some information relating to the VPN solution. Long story short, it works, and you don’t need to stay connected to it.

Without the VPN my connection returns to insufferable 0-50KB/s speeds.

What type of ISP provider do you have and where are you located?

Thanks!

Yidrizon Wireless, Northeast. Sorry to hear that. Hopefully it works for other people.

Updated my post with some information relating to the VPN solution. Long story short, it works, and you don’t need to stay connected to it.

Same problem. Mangled my file systems trying to find a solution. Not much else to say about it.

Edit: The VPN solution works, although I dislike connecting to a shady link/botnet.

Edit 2: Using the VPN/botnet/honeypot provided to simply bypass the initial sticking screen and waiting till you get to this portion of the download (https://i.imgur.com/rtXBKyW.png) works. At this point, I disabled the VPN, and my connection kicked in. No need to stay connected to it.