As anyone who participated in the previous beta weekends has probably noticed, there has been a severe nerf to the power of the NPCs in this weekend’s BWE, and the result is absolutely horrible.
While we used to have to actually pay attention to the mobs to stay alive, the content this weekend is the same “turn brain off, apply face directly to keyboard” difficulty level as the vanilla GW2 world that we were promised would not be repeated. I honestly can’t believe this was in the works while ArenaNet was at TwitchCon telling us how game-changingly difficult the Heart of Thorns overworld content would be with a straight face.
Please revert this change. It’s horrible. While it realistically isn’t enough for me to go about cancelling preorders, it’s extremely disappointing and makes me far less excited for Heart of Thorns than I should be. It’s not a game if you can’t lose it, and right now, you can just stand wherever you want, in every single telegraph, for as long as you want, and the game still probably punish you for it.
Please revert combat difficulty to at least where it was in BWE1 or 2. If anything, it should be more difficult than 2, not less.
Colin has confirmed that the change was unintentional. Praise be!
Hey folks,
Coming out of beta weekend two we were really happy with the over all open world difficulty. The only exceptions were that the wyvern was way too easy and didn’t scale well, and mushroom stompers were a little much. Thats all that should have changed for bwe3 – we will have to look into what the issue is here to find out why its being perceived kitten much easier. Simple version: we also liked bwe2 difficulty.
I love how we tried to answer you politely and with logic and you want from being pitiful to just getting kittened and insulting everyone on this thread. Wonderful bedside manner.
On a contributing note, allwing week long beta’s would actually kitten off more people than help them get feedback. Anything you do on any character in the beta after participating isn’t saved. For a week all the loot you would get on any of your mains, pvp ranks, levels, precursors, laurels, etc, will vanish at the end of the week. That’s already annoying enough with a weekend of time being dedicated to it, you’re being restricted to only do beta content so you don’t lose to much. A majority of players would probably be kittened.
It sucks that your wife can’t play, but it is just bad coincidence and I am sorry that the medical field is so demanding. That’s about all you’re going to get though.
Crystal Desert Server, one of each classes at 80
Main Mesmer PVE, Necro and Engineer PVP
Update: Idea #1 has been explained in a NOTE a little more to address a few misconception about the function of ‘Use-all’. Please be sure to read that note.
One of the new things explained in idea #1 is there would not be a “You are Encumbered” Window to prevent item overflow in the event of insufficient Inventory space to which a warning message saying so will come up before players actually use the ‘Use-all’ option.
OR if the “You are Encumbered” Window is to stay, it can be made where not every item in the window is shown, to say that “You are attempting to carry x amount items than will fit in your bags. Clean some space or delete something.” whereupon clicking the ‘Take All’ button reduces the x amount being withheld per click.
1. Give all container-type items and certain consumable items (for example Essences of Luck, Wintersday Gifts, Trick-or-Treat Bags, etc.) a ‘Use all’ option whereupon a ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ Confirmation Window pops up with a warning message saying, “To prevent overflow of items, the “You are Encumbered” Window will not appear in the event of insufficient Inventory space. Are you sure you want to use all at once?” (the sound effects from consumable/bagged items upon using the ‘Use-all’ option would sound off only once to prevent overload of too much of the same sound).
Forcing players to click 500 times to open 250 consumables that contain many items is a lot of wear and tear on our gaming mice after a while. No player should have to go through this much clicking.
NOTE: If players use the ‘Use-all’ option with an already full inventory, the action of ‘Use-all’ will never go through at all until the player makes more room in their inventory.
Furthermore, when players use the ‘Use-all’ option, it is not necessarily the case that all consumable/bagged items will be used due to lack of inventory space to store all those items, and so in the case of insufficient inventory space, no items will be lost, to which a message will still pop up saying to players that they do not have enough inventory space. Nothing changes like if a player clicks a stack of consumable/bagged items one click at a time to which they are eventually met with the same message regarding insufficient inventory space.
Let me explain this mathematically if the above is not clear:
Say you use the ‘Use-all’ option explained in idea #1, and you have room for all items coming from 150 bags out of 250 bags, yet that 151th bag contained 3 items that could not fit in your inventory because you have only 2 empty inventory spaces left. Guess what? When the game code sees 3 items at once cannot fit into only 2 empty inventory spaces left, the use of that 151th bag will never go through, and as a result, NO excess items will be lost because there would be no excess items left over.
2. Make the ‘Yes’ or ‘ No’ options Hotkeys that can be used in the Destroy Item Confirmation Window where the Y and N are underlined. I have seen this simple option in other games when destroying items and it would be great to see this in GW 2
Doing this will make it easier for players to Destroy items at a faster pace vs. using the mouse to choose ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ for each undesired item, especially after receiving many useless items that won’t sell on the TP from opening a stack of openable items.
3. Make the ‘Buy more at Trading Post’ option available in all collection windows within the ‘Collection’ achievements section for all collectible items that can be bought and sold at the Trading Post (when players Right-Click on a purchasable collectible item).
4. Without changing the current size of the Trading Post Window (this is not option-related yet should be mentioned), at least 10 items should be displayed (instead of 3) under the ‘Recently Viewed’ and ‘My Latest Trades’ columns where we can use Scroll Bars to view all 10 items under those two columns within the ‘Home’ tab.
5. Under the ‘Miniatures’ section in the Hero Window, add the ‘Find in Trading Post’ option only for Minis that can be bought and sold at the Trading Post (much like you can do within the ‘Dyes’ section).
6. Within the Trading Post, give players the option to ‘Hide all unlocked’ skins and minis like you can in the ‘Dyes’ section of the Hero Window. (This idea brought to you by MashMash.1645 in the comments. This is not really a new idea but a good one).
7. Give players the option to assign a Hotkey for ‘stowing’ and ‘activating’ a Ranger’s Pet.
8. Add a Template Saving System for Builds & Trait Lines so players can switch up their setups on the go during their gameplay to adapt more quickly to different situations.
Note: Idea 8 used to be a ‘View Gear Type’ option, that despite explaining throughout the idea players would only be allowed to view the names of another player’s gear (not Player Stats, Gear Stats and Mods within the View Gear Window), and that there would be a setting within the Settings Window named ‘Allow players to view your Gear Type’ with a Check Box next to it that is not enabled by default… the idea itself (after many conversations I have had about it with players in-game) posed an issue that was argued where elite players doing end-game content would criticize or kick players in parties that did not have the ‘Allow players to view your Gear Type’ option enabled prior to joining the Party, among similar scenarios that were argued.
That is why I no longer stand behind the original 8th idea because I believe all players should be able to go through all their scratches and bruises (as a learning experience) no matter where they are playing in the game, and no matter their game experience.
Just because a great many players have spent countless hours playing through the core content of the game prior to reaching end-game content does not mean they should be expected to fully understand how to play end-game content when they do get to it, because core content gameplay is not the same experience.
9. Create a Toy Tab in the Hero Window where players can store all their Toys bought from the Gem Store to save more Inventory space and to ensure Toys are with players anywhere they travel like players can do with Minis (this idea brought to you by jessym.2109, although I have heard other players in-game say they want this, too).
Note: I have had players tell me in past conversations that one of the reasons they will not buy a lot of Toys from the Gem Store is because they do take up too much Inventory and Bank space, and I can agree because I own many Toys from the Gem Store as well.
The reason why the original idea #9 was removed and replaced with another is explained on Page 2 of this thread between the 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th post down.
10. Implement an in-game World Boss Timer Window that has a timer for each Boss to encourage more players to participate in World Boss Events vs. making players rely on third-party/external sources outside the game to keep track of the World Boss Events. That being said, using external sources to track World Boss Events would still be viable for players not logged into the game, yet an in-game Event Timer would be more accessible.
Furthermore, World Boss Events that are already taking place in the Timer Window would read, “Started” whereas World Boss Events that are over would read, “Pending…”
NOTE: This idea is not option-related, yet it is an idea I believe that will bring more players together on the battlefield during World Boss Events.
(This idea brought to you by the general community)
Honorable Mention 11. Add a ‘Total Gathered’ label below the ‘Vendor Value’ label for all gathered materials within the ‘Buy / Sell’ Windows of the Trading Post.
Mechanic
I am aware that this is a beta, but is the mechanic even finished and will it be ready for launch by October 23rd? The cast times on the pet mechanic are much too long to justify some (most) of the skill effects. Also, the pathing and general responsiveness is horrendous. The mechanic seems almost like starter area AI (in the base game) was tacked on to a class at the last second and then changed to an ally at the very last second.
Hopefully though, because this was just a beta, either this is just a temporary mechanic, or there will be a ton of changes and iterations to the AI and skill responsiveness and effects of the mechanic.
Traits:
Quite a few of these traits are served the injustice of being tied to these unfinished feeling utilities (more on that later). Additionally, certain traits, like giving a random chance to destroy projectiles to sword or making axe’s chill AoE, are incredibly basic, beta level traits that need some serious up-tuning in order to ever justify their slots. Also, there seems to be a whole ton of damage modifiers missing, especially when compared to every other class, and the class itself doesn’t exactly stack boons on itself or anything either. That is definitely something that needs to be looked at before the live version of the game.
Utilities:
So, there are Survival utilities, Signets, maybe a spirit or two for exclusively PvE, and then just garbage utilities, pure garbage. Traps will never make ranger compete against something like engineer who just facerolls out the same sort of conditions at a higher rate and intensity than ranger can ever hope to, and Dhuumfire Reaper is a nightmare of a condition spec, along with mesmer and really anything else with heavy condition oriented combat. Spirits are immobile and for some reason have active PBAoE effects which makes them terrible by design, and the passives aren’t worth the slot the skills take up. Shouts…. Just wow.
Good thing all of these utilities are still in beta, because ANet, you definitely need this time to make these utilities worthwhile.
Weapons:
Longbow-Good weapon, ANet, you managed to get one right for this BWE. Don’t change a thing.
Greatsword-The autoattack chain is awful, but the rest of the weapon kit is pretty decent, although hilt bash only reaches about 200 of the 300 range it lists. Fix this bug before Druid goes live.
Axe-What is this weapon trying to be? It has range but can’t do anything at range, it has no conditions on autoattack even though the damage of this weapon is clearly favoring conditions, and the secondary effect on the axe is only as reliable as the mechanic, so aka, not reliable.
Sword-This is a great weapon, outside of the ridiculous autoattack chain animation binding you. Does this weapon even need this sort of treatment? It makes it very clunky and hard to use, even after you get used to it, because you have to use it either situationally or all in.
Shortbow- Horrible weapon. Outside of the autoattack and 5, the rest of the skills are boring, don’t really work well or add much to the ability of the weapon to do anything (shortbow 4 and the bleeds are so weak, this is just a beta issue right?). Good thing this is still beta, because this weapon needs a total overhaul.
Torch – another thing done right. Don’t touch this weapon.
Dagger – the third thing done right so far. Leave it as is.
Warhorn – Warhorn 5 skill is strong, though its effects don’t justify its cooldown. Warhorn 4 is extremely subpar. Single target, long-ish cooldown, poor damage, no additional effects. Since this is beta, the numbers or something on this skill is getting tweaked right? It could at least be AoE (like mad king rune effect 6) and dodgeable to compensate (delayed animation to where the birds meet, dodging the first hit negates the whole attack).
Offhand Axe – Axe 4 is perfectly fine, although it bugs out on terrain WAY too often, halving its potential or worse, since the pull effect is usually the part that fails on the second half of the skill. Axe 5 is one of the longest channels if not the longest channel in the game, and is plagued by rooting you during the whole cast, dealing lackluster damage, and only being functional as a reflect, which compared to all of the commonly used reflect skills, make it a poor choice to ever even activate since you root yourself and lose the ability to do any other action during that time period.
Overall, my beta impressions of the Druid were not pleasant (sorry that I keep using Ranger and Druid interchangeably). Everything was clunky and seemed fairly duct taped together, especially the mechanic, without any sort of design goal or effort to make the skills functional and effective.
Hopefully, these things improve for Druid by the next BWE or by expansion, because they are otherwise pretty awful and should never make it to a live game in their current condition.
I do not understand these threads. “My family and I have played thousands of hours, but we feel ‘cheated’ because the person who is joining now plays the core game for free or pays just the one fee for Heart of Thorns.”
Let’s consider another type of purchase, that of DVDs. FotR was $30 when it came out on DVD. You now can get all three chapters of LotR for less than $20. But the person who buys now lost years of viewing pleasure because he didn’t own the video at release. LotR is shown for free on television, but that doesn’t negate the value of purchasing the DVDs, for those of us who chose to make those purchases. Imagine showing up at a DVD retailer and saying, “This movie is now free. I want money off another title.”
The hours in Guild Wars 2 that your family has enjoyed—very likely the thousands of accumulated hours—are not without value. They are not, to us, without cost. The 40 major updates we have made to the game that you have been enjoying for three years each add significant value to your purchases: Wintersday festivals that a new player will never be able to attend, major in-game events they’ll never see, drops that were only available to you, as a veteran player, during a limited period.
The position in the first post has been put forth by different people and successfully dispelled time and time again. OP — Please know that we greatly appreciate your support. I encourage you to make whatever purchase decision is best for you and your family. But please never forget that all you have gotten for each of your purchases does have value, in the overall view of things.
You are complaining about something you know nothing about other than vague descriptions. It is possible to make other gear sets slightly more appealing to use to the average player without completely trashing berserker gear.
Worry you should not, at least not without specific details.
I paid $100 to get core game, LS season 1, LS season 2 for free, and HoT
Newbies paid $50 to get core game and HoT, they have to pay for LS season 2 and never able to experience LS season 1
So a single LS being missed is worth a fifty dollar discount for newbies? Doubt it.
Can you count how many free updates and festivals we’ve been through?
All of those updates give me joy, entertainment and experiences that worth every penny to me, if you don’t find that worth the price, exit is that way, please, help yourself.
I ran a small Halloween contest for my guild this month. This morning I judged the entries and set about mailing the prizes to the winners. After sending out TWO main prizes and getting a ‘not found’ message for the third, the mails I try and send out are ‘suppressed due to excessive messaging’. At this rate, getting the four main category prizes and the half-dozen or so participation prizes sent out to my guildmates is going to take forever.
Why is it I can’t send off more than two successful mails without getting hit with suppression while during the trial gold spammers could stand in LA and spam their gold-selling ads for hours under the same name, sometimes several times a minute, without being suppressed?
Velai Visala, Necromancer
TC – When Zergs Collide [CERN]
“Good morning fellow Tyrians! Plyxi here and boy do I have a treat for you! Following his recent reveal as a supporting Legend in the new Guildwars 2: Heart of Thorns expansion, we were able to catch up with Shiro Tagachi to ask him a few questions about his return to the Guildwars universe.”
Plyxi: “Mr. Tagachi, I’d like to thank you for taking the time for this interview. Do you have any opening remarks for your Guildwars: Factions fans?”
At this point Shiro stood up and clenched his fists before taking a villainous pose.
Shiro: “I HAVE RETURNED!”
Plyxi: “Ahhh… ok, we sort of got that with the reveal. Anyway, is there any coffee or water that I can get you before we begin?”
Shiro: “What kind of food buff will this give me?”
Plyxi: “Ahh… healing power I believe.”
Shiro: “Disgusting!” He stands up and kicks over the table with the cups on it. A charr attendant comes over to move the broken table and mess off screen.
Plyxi: “Ok… that was unexpected. Mr. Tagachi. What can you tell us about your powers as a legend and it’s playstyle?”
Shiro:He ponders a moment and puts a hand to his chin “Well. Think of a warrior but with speed, teleports, and an aoe basilisk venom. Oh and you get awesome versions of my Shiro’ken blades made of jade that steal health. They aren’t as good as the real thing though.”
Plyxi: “So are you more or less satisfied with your skillbar loadout?”
Shiro: “I’m just disappointed that they didn’t use any of the original names for my skills. I mean come on! Battle Scars, Meditation of the Reaper, Against Impossible Odds… I put so much time into coming up with those cool names.” He sighs then shrugs “Well it could be worse. I suppose I didn’t get it as bad as those other legends.”
Plyxi: “Speaking of the other legends, what do you think about Jalis and Ventari?”
Shiro:He laughs. “Pathetic! I saw that Ventari guy on the way here in the bathroom. He slipped and slammed his head on one of the sinks. Poor guy couldn’t even heal himself because his tablet was stuck in the hallway. They had to call an ambulance. Jalis? I don’t know about him. I just saw him channeling his elite. I came back after lunch and he was still channeling.”
Plyxi: “Do you think you will have any synergy with the other legends?”
Shiro: “I don’t want to be caught dead paired up with those two. They better pair me up with Mallyx or Glint. Ahhh… Mallyx. I remember the good old days of us stomping newbies in the realm of torment… well until Ursanway came and ruined it all. I remember Mallyx being alot better in his prime though. Old Mallyx would have just facesmashed people instead of trying this condition mess. I keep telling him that power is the way to go. He’s as stubborn as that Lich. If the Lich was DPS specced during our last fight, we would have crushed those flameseeker heroes.”
Plyxi: “Are you looking forward to anything in the new Guildwars 2 expansion personally?”
Shiro: “Well I have replicas of my blades and armor lined up for sale in the Black Lion Gemstore. I’m sure I’ll have more gems than I know what to do with.”
Plyxi: “Any plans for those gems?”
Shiro: “I think I might use them to kickstart Shiroken University. It’s an online college with courses designed to teach young Quaggans how to properly spec into dps builds. My philosophy is that if you teach the younger generation the value of mass murder and damage early, you can make the world a better place.”
Plyxi: “I notice that you keep staring out the window, is there something wrong Mr. Tagachi?”
Shiro: “That idiot Revenant over there is heading into that fractal gate with cleric armor and a staff. I think we might need to cut this interview short. Someone needs to stop him. What is he trying to do? Trap his team in there for 5 hours?”
Shiro suddenly teleports to the revenant and bursts him into down state in 2 seconds. Some shouting can be heard.
“AND STAY DOWN THERE UNTIL YOU LEARN HOW TO REV!”
Plyxi: “Well there you go Tyrians! Shiro Tagachi, coming to a Revenant near you! Be sure to Preorder! I’ll see you next time, on Eye on Tyria!”
More screaming can be heard as Shiro begins to terrorize other staff Revenants.
January 21 Content Release Notes LIVING WORLD The Origins of Madness
For weeks, mysterious probes have been thrumming ominously all across Tyria. Now, the Vigil has ordered a trio of crusaders to investigate three mysterious new probes that have been sighted in Bloodtide Coast. Meanwhile, the Priory in Lornar’s Pass has observed Scarlet Briar’s watchwork minions streaming into their region. What’s the connection between these events, and what exactly is Scarlet up to? Twisted Marionette Weapon Test
New world event: Twisted Marionette world boss
Scarlet is recalling her twisted watchwork troops from all over Tyria to power her aethercannon weapon test. The results could be deadly if Scarlet is allowed to carry out her test.
Players must unite with fellow adventurers and allies to stop the attack!
Twisted Marionette Rewards
Completing The Origins of Madness meta-achievement will reward players with a Gift of Sprockets, which will create a new sprocket generator in their home instance.
Participating in the fight against the Twisted Marionette in Lornar’s Pass and investigating the energy probes throughout Tyria will grant players access to a hitherto secret location—with additional rewards inside.
Additional exclusive rewards include:
New power, precision, and healing power stat combinations. Includes both exotic (Zealot’s) and ascended (Keeper’s) items.
New Mini Twisted Watchwork Moa
Code Fragments
Gather code fragments from the battle at the Twisted Marionette weapon test.
After completing the story components of the weapon test and the great jungle wurm investigation, players can discover how to use the code fragments.
Triple Trouble
There’s a rumble in the jungle, and the Vigil needs help! Assist Crusaders Xutt, Yipp, and Zepp as they investigate three new probes in Bloodtide Coast.
After forging new allegiances to take down Tequatl the Sunless, it’s now time for players to rally their forces together in an all-new epic encounter!
Triple Trouble Rewards
Completing the new permanent meta-achievement, Triple Trouble, grants players the title of Great Jungle Wurm Slayer.
Assisting in the investigation of wurm activity in Bloodtide Coast will give players a chance at new exclusive rewards:
New wurm-themed ascended armor pieces
New wurm-themed rifle skins
New great jungle wurm minis
New exotic wurm minis
Additional note: Players can no longer sell sprockets to vendors, but they are still tradable at the trading post.
Achievements
The Origins of Madness meta-achievement will task players with engaging in the fight against Scarlet’s Twisted Marionette weapon test in Lornar’s Pass.
Completing The Origins of Madness daily achievements will also contribute to the meta-achievement. These are earned by participating in either the Twisted Marionette weapon test in Lornar’s Pass or the Triple Trouble investigations in Bloodtide Coast.
The permanent Triple Trouble boss meta-achievement will task players with successfully defeating the great jungle wurms in Bloodtide Coast while also performing various feats to help out in the fight.
BALANCE, BUG-FIXING, POLISH General
Fixed a bug that caused cooldowns to be reset while using the jump pads near the Tequatl encounter.
Fixed a bug that prevented players from receiving credit for completing fractal level 50.
Fixed a bug that caused the Endless Toy Golem Tonic to produce the wrong item.
Fixed a potential client crash in the Cliffside fractal.
Improved some of the creature descriptions.
User Interface: Various updates have been made to the right-hand side of the HUD to improve its appearance and functionality.
User Interface: Hints have a new arrow that is more visible and animated.
To mitigate performance issues, items that summon pets now have a 30-minute cooldown.
Profession Skills General
Leave Transform: This skill can no longer be set on auto-attack.
Elementalist
Arcane Wave: This skill is no longer ground-targeted while underwater and will now activate the area effect on the targeted enemy.
Earth’s Embrace: Fixed this trait to properly have reduced recharge when traited with Cantrip Mastery.
Engineer
Rocket Turret—Rocket: This skill is no longer ground-targeted while underwater and will now fire at a targeted enemy.
Mesmer
Chaos Storm: Fixed a bug that caused this skill to stun enemies whether or not it dazed them when traited with Confounding Suggestions.
Necromancer
Putrid Mark: This skill will now blast an area only once when the trap executes.
Structured Player vs. Player
Battle of Khylo: Any destroyed trebuchets, clocktower windows, and clocktower walls will now reappear when the match begins.
Legacy of the Foefire: Any destroyed gates will now reappear when the match begins.
World vs. World
The Guard Leech boon has been renamed to Applied Strength.
BLACK LION TRADING COMPANY GEM STORE New Items and Promotions
A new 3-pack of masterwork great jungle wurm minis is now available for a limited time in the Minis category of the Gem Store for 300 gems.
A new Great Jungle Wurm Finisher is now available to surprise enemies from below in PvP and WvW. Available in the Upgrades category for 800 gems.
Instant Trait Reset will be removed from the store at the end of January 27. It will still have a rare chance to be in Black Lion Chests.
Improvements
Deposit All Collectibles no longer deposits miniatures. However, they can still be individually deposited by right-clicking on them.
Double-clicking a Black Lion Chest when players do not have any keys will now open the store and show players the keys.
The Black Lion Weapons Specialist conversation has been tweaked for clarity.
The Black Lion Chest rewards have been entirely overhauled, affecting all drop rates. Significant changes are below:
Tonics are no longer a dedicated slot in the drop. Instead, tonics will now occasionally drop like all other rewards.
Players will now get two rewards plus a booster from each chest. This means they can potentially get two of anything from a single chest.
Rare minis are now much rarer from Black Lion Chests.
New drops of Endless Mystery Tonics can be traded until they are used once.
The following items have been removed from Black Lion Chests:
Karma Booster
Glory Booster
Heavy Bag of Coins
Name Change Contract
Small Guild Discovery
Medium Guild Discovery
1 Copper
The following items have been added to Black Lion Chests:
They’ve worked kitten this expansion. It’s their life. What they put their hard work and passion into. Some of you think they’re just greedy dirtbags that want to screw you over…why? Have you ever created a work of art? A painting? A musical piece? A game? A story?
How would you feel if when you announced that it was ready for purchase, people spat on it. People lashed out at you on not only your official accounts, but your personal ones to.
How would you feel if your hard work and what you’ve dedicated a year or two to, was ridiculed and hated before it was even released?
You don’t want to pay the full price for the pre-order?
Don’t. That is your choice. But they owe you NOTHING.
But being complete jerks about all of this is revolting and reflects poorly on us as a community. And think of the devs. They have feelings too. And I’m sure many are upset right now. This may just be an expansion to you, but it’s much more than that to them.
Arenanet, thank you for all you have done. For putting the time and effort into giving us an amazing series of games that only get better as time goes on. I’ve been looking forward to HoT since it was announced and cannot wait.
Keep the amazing work
I didn’t know where to post such a request so I’m hoping that if this is not the appropriate place then you can forward it to where it needs to go.
I’ve been playing guild wars with the same group of people since around Factions from the original Guild Wars. We’re all 30 – 50 years old, most of us married and all of us, spouses included, have played Guild Wars together for around 10 years. We’ve become good friends over the years, some visiting others IRL, and a couple even moving to be closer to another couple just because they became such good friends. The consistent enjoyment through the years has been Guild Wars, people have come and gone from the guild but there was a core that always stayed together.
A week ago today, June 4th, a member of our tight knit group was killed in a car accident. He was cut off by a semi trailer, he was able to swerve just enough to ensure that the full impact of the crash happened on his side of the vehicle, sparing the life of his son who was in the passenger seat. This was an incredibly shocking tragedy and has shook his family and our “gaming family” to its core. His wife, who also plays, has been battling cancer for some time now and to watch something so horrible happen to such an amazing couple has been heart breaking.
I’m emailing to request a small gesture that would mean the world to our gaming family. Is it possible to place a monument or grave marker of some sort in our upcoming guild hall? Somewhere prominent, somewhere that we can all gather in game to pay our respects, tell stories, or just be there to feel like there is still a part of him playing with us.
I’ll be happy to privately provide his account info and anything else you might need if you could make this happen.
You really don’t know how much something like this would mean to us all. Thanks for your time and all of the memories, regardless of the answer.
Has ANet said or hinted at whether or not we’re going to have to unlock all our skills again in the new system? I know we’re going to get 400 points flat from leveling, but they also said that unlocking everything costs 465, and I don’t even think that number includes the Elite Spec line.
I’ve spent tons of skill points and gold to unlock all my skills and traits on the majority of my characters, but I only have a big chunk of world completion on 1 out of all 9 of them. If I log in on patch day and suddenly I’ve got to go out and grind Hero Challenges just to make sure I can have everything again… I’m probably going to leave the game, because you’ll have robbed me of skills and traits I’ve had for literal years in this game and given me only one very slow, very boring way to get it back. I’m not doing 65 (or more) challenges each across 8 characters simply to get stuff back that I’ve earned previously.
I shouldn’t be stuck doing PvE so I can have 100% of the options available to me in WvW, which is the only gamemode I play aside from SPvP. Either preserve the skills of legacy characters, or introduce another way to get Hero Points that isn’t so lopsided. ANet has seriously overestimated how engaging skill challenges are for players; it’s like their heads are in the sand with regards to the quality (or lack thereof) of their PvE content. And please: do not even try to pass it off like Skill Challenges in WvW are “WvW content”. Right now I can buy every skill and trait in the game with the XP and loot I get from kills and captures in WvW. After this patch, I won’t be able to. That’s broken.
I’m okay with using the new system on the Revenant, obviously, and any characters I might make after the patch, and for the Elite Specialization track, but I would sincerely hope that ANet will take the same route as they did last time and allow legacy characters to keep what they have. And if not, at least compensate us for the money we’ve spent buying skill books from trainers. I know I personally have dropped upwards of 30 gold buying Master and Grandmaster traits since the last change. To have that large amount of gold be gone forever simply because your first redesign of the trait system was a failure would be massively insulting.
And honestly, how long do you think it’s going to be before ANet is going to be designing yet another system for trait/skill unlocks because this one winds up being just as off-putting as the last time? This one will probably have an even shorter lifespan, as there’s not even a way to bypass the PvE nonsense this time, since Hero Points are earned “strictly” through leveling and Hero Challenges. You’re removing the ability to earn Skill/Hero Points when you level past 80, you’re removing the ability to buy traits with gold… this game is becoming so narrow and it’s making me sad.
Why is 14% (65/465) of a character’s functionality walled off behind Hero Challenges, when doing Skill Challenges now is basically grunt work you do for map completion, and doesn’t require any skill at all? A third of these challenges are just standing in one place with your arm outstretched, “communing”… how is that “heroic” at all? You must’ve seriously drank the PvE Kool-Aid if you think that something so trivial should be so strongly tied to a character’s functionality.
For what it’s worth, I do like the trait changes that are being made… but you’re killing experimentation by walling everything off into reward tracks, and forcing Skills and Traits to compete for the same limited currency, where there was no limit to said currency before.
Honestly, I’m probably so pathetic that I wouldn’t stop playing even if I log in and I’ve got to spend a week grinding out enough Hero Points to get back to where I was… but this all just reeks of a bad idea that hasn’t had nearly enough thought put into it.
What was so wrong with getting skill currency every time you re-leveled to 80? What was so wrong with just buying traits from the trainers, or, if you go way back, not having to unlock traits at all? You’re undermining player progression, and the game itself, by layering on new forms of artificial progression where they don’t need to be.
These are just my two cents, take them or leave them. If legacy characters get to keep their skills, or if a new, non-PvE-exclusive way to get Hero Points is introduced, then there’s much less of an issue I think. I obviously don’t think the HP system is particularly good, but I’d be happy simply not to have my previous progress erased by 14%. Definitely want to hear back on that point especially.
I don’t mind them being in the same section but I’d advocate putting the log in grid at the bottom. It’s large enough to be easy to scroll to, and not in need of constant checking; really more of a daily viewing. I’m used to checking my MF quickly, having the number below a scroll bar is annoying.
I’m a Senior UX UI designer and I’ve been playing GW2 since the betas, with long breaks in-between and since I’ve spent quite a lot of hours with this game, I’ve noticed some flaws in the games UX (user experience) and thus I decided to tackle it in order to diversify my portfolio. This lead me to redesigning some of the in-game UI’s & the official website.
About the project
The project started last summer, as I was redesigning my portfolio website, I wanted to take a break from my regular website design so I started redesigning the GW2 official website, since I missed working on a more creative & artsy website. This last holiday season I had a few days free so I decided to continue this project and tackle the in-game UI’s since I wasn’t really a fan of how some things were currently done.
What I’ve redesigned
Looking for Group Panel & the related tabs
Character Panel
Guild Tab
The Story Journal & the related tabs
Created a Lore Journal & related tabs
The Entire Design in PDF format – Horizontal layout
Note
There are a lot of explanations that point out to different things & the reason behind my design decisions. The entire project took roughly 2-3 weeks, so It could be better, but unfortunately I don’t have access to actual game or player data and I kinda ran out of free time.
In case some of you are interested in seeing the behind the scenes process like the research, sketches, what I learned and so on, feel free to check out the link from my portfolio. http://builtbyg.com/portfolio/guild-wars-2-redesign
(Before I get started, let me ask that this thread be left as is. I refer to the change to the Gem Conversion process only as an illustration on communication. Please do NOT merge it with the other thread on the Gem Conversion discussion.)
The following is a case study on ANet communication and transparency. I will walk anyone who has ears to hear through the way that ANet handled the change to Gem Conversion appeared to the playerbase, and why it’s indicative of typical ANet communications.
Please hear me: I’m not suggesting that any of these steps is an actual reflection of ANet’s thinking or process, or a reflection of the entire playerbase’s attitude. I am, however, presenting how the whole debacle appeared to the players.
Afterward, I will walk through the same four steps and offer a possible alternative where, if ANet had used good communication, the whole thing could have been avoided.
What Actually Happened
Step One
What ANet Did: Decides behind closed doors to streamline the Gem Conversion process. The proposed modifications would severely limit the useability of the conversion feature.
What Players Heard: Nothing. No communication happened prior to this change. Silence prompts the playerbase to assume one of two things. Either 1) ANet is greatly out of touch with its playerbase’s desires, or 2) ANet doesn’t care. ANet goes where does what ANet pleases.
Step Two
What ANet Did: Moves ahead with the change despite obvious negative consequences: a Gem Conversion system that forces players to purchase more or waste more Gems/Gold than they want.
What Players Heard: Nothing. No communication happened prior to or at release regarding ANet’s awareness (or lack thereof) of negative consequences. Silence once again prompts one of two conclusions: Either 1) ANet makes changes recklessly without giving thought to the ramifications (like bolstering its growing image as a cash-hungry company with little regard to actual content), or 2) ANet genuinely is an unabashed, cash-grabbing company.
Step Three
What ANet Did: Ships the change. Patch notes communicate only what happened without the tiniest hint of why.
What Players Heard: Patch notes. Notes that in no way justify the change. The glaring lack of information leaves players to assume: Either 1) ANet makes reckless changes without thinking through the consequences, or 2) ANet is a cash-grabbing company.
Step Four
What ANet Did: Chastises the playerbase and demands suggestions for possible changes. Despite the near-universal outrage across all forums of communication (FB, Twitter, in game, Forums here, etc.), the only response from ANet was, “We may consider changing it, but only if you stop ranting and start suggesting changes.”
What Players Heard: Excuses and criticism. Rather than an apology for a huge misstep, the playerbase received a slap on the wrist for expressing frustration, and the promise that things might change. But only if the playerbase was good. And stopped whining. This leads the players to conclude: Either 1) ANet has an ego that refuses to admit it has done wrong, or 2) ANet doesn’t actually care what the playerbase truly thinks.
Once again: I’m not saying that any of the impressions that the playerbase had are completely and unequivocally accurate. However, the above describes how ANet’s actions and words communicated.
