Guild Wars 2

I’m just confused.

If they were concerned about a large gap between exotics and legendary items – (which I personally thought the dungeon and cultural armor sets filled nicely) – Why oh why didn’t they just give us more skins?. Same stats, new shiny sexy armory goodness to hunt. I cannot for a second fathom why they thought raising the stat ceiling was in any way a good idea.

Someone earlier made the comparison – it’s like releasing a sword in Guild Wars 1 that does ‘16-24’ damage. It’s an alien concept for a lot of us who have followed Anet from GW1’s early days. I’ve spent a decent amount of time telling people how awesome the Guild Wars franchise is based primarily on the concept of ‘skills, not gear’.

Don’t I feel stupid now.

The only things I desperately miss from GW1 are larger numbers of elite skills, and the elementalist class. I still think GW1’s elementalist is one of the best realised classes of any game, ever. The ability to spec into the elements essentially turned one class into four. I miss it and haven’t enjoyed the messy chaos of the GW2 version.

As for skills – I do miss the customisation from GW1, though I only really notice it with elite skills. GW1 had bundles of elites, with maybe 4-5 really useful ones. Now we have 3 or so class specific elites and only 1 useful one. Some classes have none. I would much rather have an extra utility skill slot on my elementalist than have to take on of their so called elites.

Since playing GW2 I’ve experienced 3 ocular migraines. I’ve never had them before, so I must assume that GW2’s FoV has at least something to do with it. Certainly I’ve pumped more hours-per-session into other games without incident.

Oddly enough I don’t especially notice the restricted FoV as I’m playing. The problem only shows itsself an hour or two in when I start feeling nauseous or I literally lose half my vision to swirling, shimmering lights. The screen shaking explosions in CoE combined with the narrow FoV also tend to make me feel sick. Indeed, on the first few trash fights in there I usually have to auto-attack and look away.

It’s not laziness that puts me off swapping, it’s lack of cohesion/theme.

I’m a sucker for a theme, my norn elementalist is called ‘Ursula Stonetongue’, not ‘Swappy McSwitcheroo’. I guess I’d like them to make it a little more optional, like I said above – some way to trait for either a swapping build OR a pure 1 element build.

The biggest strength of the GW1 elementalist for me was that each seperate element played so differently. It kind of turned one profession into 4 possible professions. It was fun for me and I miss it. The jack of all trades theme on the elementalist – to me – leaves the class feeling messy and unfocused.

I’m not against attunement swapping per se, I think it should be a viable option/build path, but not the only viable path. I don’t enjoy when I’m blinkered into playing a profession one way and one way only.

I’ve thought attunement swapping wa a problem for quite a while now. It feels to me like someone early on in development had a crush on attunement swapping and just refused to let it go, even as the class moved in a different direction.

To me it feels shoe-horned in and kinda gimmiky, and the class as a whole suffers as a result.

At the very least I feel like attunement swapping should be something you can choose to actively trait for if you want, and ignore altogether if like me, you’re not a fan of it. I’d like to see elementalist given incentives to trait for swapping, or indeed incentive to focus purely in one element. Choice is the name of the game here, and currently, elementalist has very little to work with.

Time Warp is the one and only elite I bother to use – on any profession – any more.

I heard the argument early on that they didn’t want the old GW1 issue of having 50 elite skills, but only 3 or 4 viable choices.

Now we have 2 or 3 choices and ZERO viable choices – mesmers excluded. I really feel the lack on my elementalist, I really want an elite for each element. A raging maelstrom, A massive lightning bolt of doom, anything really.

As others have said, I would take an extra utility skill over one of these “elite” skills in a heartbeat if I could. They’re just disappointing in almost every way.

Sharpe.1485:

I have to say, I understand this whole safety feature of not allowing more purchases after a certain ammount, but only if customer support wouldn’t take so long to again “re-authorize” the user to make a purchase.

As it is now, there are alot of people wanting to put money into this game, but unable to due to the time it takes the support to solve each individual request.

It is becoming somewhat annoying.

3 days now – and waiting.

I like to purchase gems every few days, once or twice a week. So now I have to send in 1-2 support tickets per week to have my purchase restriction lifted for 24 hours.

What an absolutely, astoundingly stupid state of affairs. Turn around on support tickets is already glacial without adding to it with this. Something really needs to be done, once you’re on the ‘risk’ list, apparently they are completely unable to remove you from it. EVER. So we’ll all be sending in tickets every time we want to buy gems. Then waiting a few days to a week for a response.

This is bushleague business right here. I want to give GW2 money, I like the game, I’m happy to support. Why in the holy heck are they making so difficult for me to do so?.

I’ve somehow ended up on the ‘restricted purchase’ list. It is beyond frustrating and only made worse by a total and complete lack of clarity on Anet’s part. I didn’t even know these security measures existed until I contacted support and then had to Google to find more info.

My partner and I have plenty of expendable income, we enjoy supporting games we like. But until something is changed here I’ll be giving my money to Riot – they have no problems accepting my cash XD

Seriously though, there has to be a better way than emailing support every time I want to buy gems so they can give me a 24 hour window in which to purchase. It’s awfully irritating for me and has to be a drain on the already over-worked support guys.

To top it off, the lack of clarity is just plain unprofessional. Not what I’ve come to expect from 6 years plus of happy gaming with Anet.

DarqueDiva.8032:

TwilightStorm.7159:

Well, finally. I’m able to buy gems, without a time frame. Somehow the issue is fixed!

Perhaps but perhaps not…. consider the following:

Customer XX via CSS Web 09/15/2012 12:47 AM
Hello I tried to purchase using same info for paypal – same email address – same way – same everything! Funds are in paypal so no cc was involved. I was declined AGAIN!

Reply: Thanks for contacting us!

I apologize for the delay in our response; we have an unusually high ticket volume which we are working through as quickly as possible.

In reviewing your account, I can see that I am able to override your purchase restrictions for 48 hours. Please make your purchase within this time frame. If you are unable to make the purchase within that time, you may need to contact us again.

If you still experience issues, please let me know.

Thanks,
Erik
NCsoft Account Support

Customer: (ME)
I appreciate the “window” but I do not appreciate why it is necessary. What exactly is going on that I have to have a window opened to me to hurry, rush, or quickly buy virtual currency from you? I dont understand and would really like to be relieved of this hassle.

Reply: Response Allen via Email 09/18/2012 03:02 PM
Hello Diva,

We have implemented new purchase limits to help prevent fraudulent credit card use. These limits restrict the number of codes which can be purchased for each product per household and/or credit card used within a certain timeframe. For our purposes Gems are considered to be serial codes.

This is a system-wide security measure. Trying to purchase past the limit on a different or new account will result in the same error.

Often, these issues are temporary and you will not have the problem in the future. Unfortunately, we cannot disclose the exact limits of these restrictions because that would defeat the purpose of trying to preventing fraud.

We apologize for whatever inconvenience this may create.

Regards,
Allen
NCsoft Billing Team

Customer reply: Thank you for this explanation. I appreciate the preventative measures in place “in case of” issues that can and do arise with the publishing of MMOs. There has to be something in foundated though that allows “active purchasers” to increase their limit or lessen their security measure in some way. Being able to buy one day for say $30 and then two days later going back to purchase $50 and find that you are flagged is unnerving.

As a consumer we are being forced to “wonder.” Wonder if there is an issue with our personal credit accounts or paypal or did someone hack us or something! That seems to be cruel and unusual punishment to an innocent person whose only intent is to spend money with your company.

As for my issue – is my account free to purchases again? And, if it is and becomes flagged for whatever reason how long of a wait must I endure (again) til it is free?

The end…

I hope this information helps “some” because I feel it will stop a lot of the speculative comments in this thread (including mine) and perhaps offer more resolution type of suggestions. Given the issues presented in my correspondence what can be done to appease both sides here?

I have just received an identical reply in regards to the same issue. I understand vaguely what they are trying to do here – but the problem remains for me – without any idea as to when this restriction ‘rolls over’ and what sort of purchases result in my account being flagged I have no way of planning out future purchases.

That I would even have to plan out purchases in order to avoid an automated restriction system in the first place is pretty gosh darn annoying. To make matters worse, Anet are unable/unwilling to let us know what the parameters of this secret restriction system actually are, meaning we’re as much in the dark as a Chinese gold seller.

All of this I could have stomached without too much complaint if I had been freakin’ well told about it in the first place. That I had to spend a week back-and-forthing with support and googling obscure, (to me), terms to find this thread is simply not good enough. A simple email explaining the whole shindig would have saved me a fair bit of irritation and the support guys would have had at least 1 less ticket to deal with.

I’m one of those bemused customers who suddenly couldn’t purchase gems, put in a ticket and finally got a response about lifting a restriction for 24 hours.

If my account, or indeed anyone’s account is flagged as ‘high risk’ and then prohibited from purchasing gems – perhaps it would be a capital idea to let them know somehow. Oh, I don’t know, maybe through this wacky new thing called e-mail?. I didn’t even know this ‘risk’ system existed ’till I googled the jargon in my support ticket and found this thread.

What use a 24 hour window is to me I don’t know. Does this daft, secret restriction status rollover at any point?, or can I just not buy gems ever again unless I contact support and wait a flipping week for a new 24 hour window?.

The lack of clarity on this has been frustrating and unprofessional. Not what I expected after 6 years or so of happy gaming with Guild Wars. I think I’ll save my money for other games in future.

I think the problem the OP has is that the entire class is built around attunement swapping. Hence under any sort of pressure at all, attunement swapping is out and out required to survive.

I’m not really a fan of the mechanic if I’m honest. For me it’s kinda a flavour thing. I just can’t seem to get into a solid pattern, I don’t ‘feel’ my character much because my role is constantly shifting. I miss the GW1 elementalist, where my fire elementalist was a FIRE elementalist.
It doesn’t help that the trait system as it exists now practically begs you to specialise in 1 or 2 elements, whilst combat demands you stance-dance all fight long. It creates a disconnect and leaves the class feeling messy and underdeveloped. I’d like to see attunement swapping changed to non-combat only and weapon swapping brought in. Then have the ele’s numbers pulled up finally to be on par with everyone else.

I can’t help but feel attunement swapping is kinda the problem here.

It feels to me a bit shoe-horned in, and the class suffers somewhat as a result. If they left the trait lines more or less as they are, removed combat attunement swapping and added weapon swapping I might be more interested.

I like the feel of being an ‘earth’ mage, or indeed fire, water or air. Flicking in and out between them is gimmicky and has little-to-no synergy with the traits as they currently exist.

Either the trait line, which desperately wants you to specialise in one or two elements, needs a complete rework – or – remove attunement swapping and bring in weapon swapping, allowing people to create more dedicated elemental builds.

It’s a little like someone early on thought attunement swapping was just the bees knees, and then refused to let go of it, even as the class grew in a different direction.

I’ve found it to be consistently laggy and unresponsive. Half the time the tornado animation never loads, so I’m just twirling about invisibly for a while. The damage seems hit and miss.

To top it off the casting animation is messy as all heck.

Instead of the borderline useless ‘skills’ given to you in tornado form, I’d rather have an element specific effect depending on what attunement you’re in when casting it. EG: Dust devil/blind for earth, waterspout/chill for water, firestorm/burn for fire etc.

I’ve been pretty let down by the ele elites too. The tornado, even if not especially useful, at least feels great on an air set. The theme is there. I’d really like an elite tailored for each element. An awesome earthquake, a maelstrom, some searing flames. Anything other than a few summons, weapons which I just can’t bring myself to use and a whirlwind.

There’s a real sense of disconnect when your favourite element is water, but your elite skill is a flaming greatsword. Ruins immersion.

Yeah I gotta admit the CC was a pretty massive let down for me.

I know it’s a new game and they have their hands full at the moment, but this is the sort of stuff that should have been implemented before thekittenbetas even started.

There are games half a decade old that wipe the floor with GW2 when it comes to character creation, and that makes me decidedly sad.