Guild Wars 2

Armor damage is, indeed, a bit redundant without the actual cost to fixing it. It’s a time sink… sort of… if you consider waypointing somewhere to fix it and then rejoining whatever event you were in, but it’s not even really that. I’m not sure what the functionality of armor damage is anymore aside from a relic of the past.

I definitely agree with the QOL improvement of automatic repair when going to an anvil. It’s not a big deal, really, as you said, but it would get rid of one minor annoyance.

I think that some people do not know or maybe forget that human beings have not only different reaction times and frustration threshold but also learn automated instinctual reactions at a different pace, so L2P deficiency is not simply a matter of laziness or spite as the ‘git gud’ bros often present it as.

Danicus.4952:

I am an experienced casual player. 13K APs, 950 WVW rank, Closer to the Stars, done dungeons, raids, crafted ascended gear etc, etc. I’ve read quite a few honest postings about frustrations with HOT, and the trend in responses has been to respond to the OP by saying “learn to play better” or “I did it just fine, there is something the matter with you.”

I personally find HOT uninviting as a solo PVE player. It lacks the difficulty progression structure present in most games. It demands group (zerg) participation for individual rewards. It requires the development of mobility masteries to effectively access map areas efficiently. It loads the player with an ocean of inventory filling currencies or keys. It creates an unprecedented level of grind for goals.

I’ve completed the HOT personal story with a rev, and moved partially through with 4 other characters.

I’ve completed the new specializations with all classes. I find them fun and interesting additions to the game (imo the best part of the expansion) – getting HOT HPs pretty annoying of course. I must admit, I turned in some WVW credits to unlock some HOT HPs.

I was really looking forward to HOT, but am truly ambivalent about the expansion maps at this point – even with the nerfs.

I find myself now checking in, hitting the daily and getting out.

Pretty sure I won’t buy another GW2 expansion – especially if it follows the map design and skill progression structure HOT model. It’s a shame – I am a long time dedicated GW player – sorry to see the franchise pick this path.

My core point is, telling an OP that is frustrated with HOT to “L2P” or “I did it, what is the matter with you?” is missing the mark. There are authentic design departures here, and they are not friendly to the casual player.

HoT is not hard, not at all. If anything core Tyria is too easy. HoT is easy mode if you play a ranged class. My ranger face rolled through HoT in exotic gear with some green trinkets. I only got the HoT pets after I had finished the story. The hero challenges only really need 2 people to do them, I did everyone on AB with 2 others and they where really easy to do with my warrior. Some can be soloed. As long as you have enough room to move and your only fighting the one mob. With my other warrior I soloed the arrow head, king mushroom, chak blitzer. It’s also about what weapons you use also. Alot of fights are easier at range. Like I said if you have space the fights are easy.

Most peoples problems with HoT is they think they can face tank everything like they did in the core game. People are unwilling to change tactics. I used to be quite rigid myself. I wanted to play with the weapons I wanted to play with. Then I realised that they would not always be the best option for some fights. So I changed my ways. I tried different things. And I found things alot easier.

This I feel is the main cause of peoples frustration with HoT. There unwillingness to try a different approach.

I don’t really care bout crafting being account-wide but recipes sure as hell need to be, its a real pain in the kitten when I have to play guessing games as to what character has which recipes.

This has come up a few times before.

I’m happy for crafting to be a per-char thing but I would really like bought recipes to be account-wide unlocks. I only learned that they were not account-wide after I bought and consumed an expensive recipe in Dry Top on my non-Jeweller toon so I ended up doing lots more DT events just to get more of the currency I had just wasted.

I’d also like to be able to buy enough extra crafting licences for one toon to have them all available rather than a maximum of 4. Not sure why that limit is there. Lifting the limit would surely be an easy win for the gem shop.

Honestly the PvP guild missions shouldn’t be tracked by a timer at all.

They should be tracked by number of matches played.

It should have never been “30 minutes to do X” where the possibility of wasting half of that time in a que exists.

“Do this in 2 matches” makes a lot more sense for how the game actually works.

Those aren’t capes. They’re towels. Towels are absolutely necessary if you’re going out adventuring.

Gem store prices are always based on the cost of buying gems with real money. And in that sense the price of a character slot has never changed (except on the rare occasions they’re on sale). It’s been 800 gems or $10 US, £8.50 etc. since launch.

The fact that we can also buy gems with gold is a nice gesture from Anet (and also helps to make buying gold with gems seem more reasonable) but they’re never going to set prices based on the gold to gems exchange rate. It’s a bonus option, not the primary method of getting gem store items.

mia.8209:

Yall have a strange concept of “free”…

People call it free because it doesn’t cost any real money.

If I was unemployed and broke and could only afford to buy essentials I would still be able to buy gem store items because I could use gold and gold doesn’t cost me anything except time (which I’d have more than enough of if I was unemployed).

Of course the amount of time it takes varies a lot (right now the exchange rate is high because there’s been a consistent run of new and returning items in the gem store, including some which were very popular, for over 2 months), but it still doesn’t cost real money to buy gems with gold.

If you feel it takes too long to earn the gold then the alternative is to spend real money. If you can’t do that then there are numerous ways to make gold faster. If none of those are an option then you simply need to be patient.

The gem store is one of only 2 ways Anet makes money to keep the company and therefore the game running. The other one is sales of copies of games, which fluctuates a lot. Meaning the gem store is what they rely on for a consistent income. Asking them to reduce the prices, particularly when you’re not actually spending any real money on it in the first place, is asking them to reduce their income and therefore what new content and features they can afford to develop for the game, so that you can spend less time playing before you get your new character. Put in that context does it still sound reasonable?

Substance E.4852:

Harper.4173:

What rubs me the wrong ways is the lack of armor in this game ever since the original release of Core GW2.

Not enough armor in the game, not enough armor in the gem store – what are they even doing?

Making more goofy outfits with giant shoulder pads you can’t toggle off and wings because Wing Wars 2.

I also remember the terrible reason they gave on these very forums for not giving us capes.
Apparently capes obscure too much of our character and ruin our capacity to see our character and immerse ourselves in the world. Or something like that.

Then we get these ridiculous wings, furniture backpieces and so forth.
Such a sham.

EphemeralWallaby.7643

….but…but…but….they’ve got BUILT-IN hankies! After a long day of slaughtering centaurs and mordrem, you can take a break to blow your nose on your preferred guild!

~EW

For once, your signature fits perfectly with your post.

….but…but…but….they’ve got BUILT-IN hankies! After a long day of slaughtering centaurs and mordrem, you can take a break to blow your nose on your preferred guild!

~EW

I hate that ban and suspension has become interchangeable. If you are banned, you are gone. Everything short of that is a suspension.

Seera.5916:

Choppenstein.6720:

I have one of each profession and was trying to use each one to get those trees in Malchor’s. I don’t know what the last poster is talking about but I’m going to have my pets out while I’m anywhere if I’m on my necromancer. I don’t understand how I got a ban for being active with my characters without any assistance from any “Unapproved Third Party Software”.

What troubles me the most is that it could happen again just because I’m playing the game correctly like I was today. I just got a call from a guild mate who says that they’re all terrified of gathering after this. I hope this is all fixed tomorrow.

He’s saying he believes if the minions die or otherwise go away, they have to be brought back with a spell so he’s not sure how that works with regards to afk farming.

I can’t say one way or another as I’ve never played a necro.

Having never seen (that I’m aware of) or done this sort of stuff, I can only guess here, but…

The Reaper skill “Rise” is a shout that hits targets around you, then summons 1 minion plus 1 for every target hit (up to 5). The minions don’t last long, but the shout recharges shortly after they expire. Put that on auto, and I guess that could be what they’re doing to resummon and not use any outside software.

And I REALLY don’t want that skill to be nerfed. I hope they fix the AFK timer instead.

(And is the AFK timer really set to one hour? Is there any chance of getting the option to set it lower if we want? Most of the time, if I’m gone for more than 15 minutes I’d prefer it to kick me to character select.)

AFK farming, even without using 3rd-party software, is still a violation of the ToS, and exploit of the game’s systems.

Cactus Brawler.7415:

penelopehannibal.8947:

Cactus Brawler.7415:

Minion, pet or party member kills a mob while your answering a call of nature? Report and ban.

Heya!

Some of these are AFK for literally 8 hours during the night. That’s a long time to go answer nature’s call!

Even if someone does report someone who has literally just gone AFK for a poo, ArenaNet will know the difference between them and the abusers we’re currently against.

And yet you can’t have a policy of X amount of time because it will become a farce.

“You were banned because you were away X amount of time.”

“Well I have Y disease it takes me more than X amount of time to go to the toilet.”
“My dog got run over and while I was trying to find a vet, Anet banned me.”
“Got up to answer the phone, got knocked out falling down the stairs, and got banned from Guild wars 2 FML”

This entire thing is all Anet’s fault, it is up to them to fix it.

They are fixing it, by suspending violators of the ToS. NONE of the situations you mentioned actually happen, because the game has an automatic inactivity kick (Which they really should fix to kick any lack of keyboard input, instead of counting pet/autoattack inputs)

Likewise if we go “Oh despite you not actually doing anything outside of game mechanics, we’ve decided you’re wrong and we are banning you.”.

When do we go after the people who use the best meta-build in PVP or clever mechanics in it?

When do we go after the people who speed run dungeons?

I’d personally say that people who TM mogul are playing against the spirit of the game, when will they get bans?

I’m fairly sure more than few people would say Roleplayers are playing wrong, when is our ban?

None of those are in violation of the “You must be actively playing” clause of the ToS.

Doggie.3184:

It’s a false flag so he wasn’t exploiting or doing anything wrong. The person who reported him was abusing the system.

You’re assuming that someone reported it … sounds to me like Anet has metrics in place that are being measured to flag people as possible bots to me.

penelopehannibal.8947:

Cactus Brawler.7415:

Minion, pet or party member kills a mob while your answering a call of nature? Report and ban.

Heya!

Some of these are AFK for literally 8 hours during the night. That’s a long time to go answer nature’s call!

Even if someone does report someone who has literally just gone AFK for a poo, ArenaNet will know the difference between them and the abusers we’re currently against.

And yet you can’t have a policy of X amount of time because it will become a farce.

“You were banned because you were away X amount of time.”

“Well I have Y disease it takes me more than X amount of time to go to the toilet.”
“My dog got run over and while I was trying to find a vet, Anet banned me.”
“Got up to answer the phone, got knocked out falling down the stairs, and got banned from Guild wars 2 FML”

This entire thing is all Anet’s fault, it is up to them to fix it.

Likewise if we go “Oh despite you not actually doing anything outside of game mechanics, we’ve decided you’re wrong and we are banning you.”.

When do we go after the people who use the best meta-build in PVP or clever mechanics in it?

When do we go after the people who speed run dungeons?

I’d personally say that people who TM mogul are playing against the spirit of the game, when will they get bans?

I’m fairly sure more than few people would say Roleplayers are playing wrong, when is our ban?

*auto loot only activates when moving.

Or

*auto loot is disabled after 5min of not moving, please take a step to reactivate.

Cactus Brawler.7415:

Minion, pet or party member kills a mob while your answering a call of nature? Report and ban.

Heya!

Some of these are AFK for literally 8 hours during the night. That’s a long time to go answer nature’s call!

Even if someone does report someone who has literally just gone AFK for a poo, ArenaNet will know the difference between them and the abusers we’re currently against.

I’ve seen you so called afk reapers. (most?) of you are totally using some kind of script to recast minions. That is botting.

mauried.5608:

The fix to this problem is so obvious, but seems no one wants to talk about it.
No loot if a pet kills a monster.
Only loot if the player kills the monster, as measured by the DPS done to the monster by the player, compared to the dps done by the pets.
I wonder why no one will think this is a good idea?

Because it punishes innocent players too, since getting your pet to kill an enemy whilst not AFK is allowed.

I’m curious about this. I legit want to know why does it matter to you so much?

Xulie.6201:

I was AFK farming with my reaper.

Xulie.6201:

I was AFK farming

Xulie.6201:

AFK farming

You weren’t actually putting any effort into playing the game. The way I see it, being suspended is no different than being AFK, because you aren’t playing the game either way.

Doggie.3184:

Ayrilana.1396:

Doggie.3184:

As long as he’s not using a 3rd party meowgram he’s fine. No one can prove that he’s actually AFK anyways so it’s not possible for it to break any rules. It’ll always be false flag unless 3rd party is detected. Reporting and accidentally suspending people won’t solve the issue, they have to alter the AFK timer and/or loot system.

Refer to the image. See the text “extended unattended play”? There is an idle timer that kicks players the the character screen after an hour or so. If this is circumvented by any means then the player is in the wrong.

And the idle timer doesn’t work correctly at the moment and needs fixed. Proving someone is actually AFK isn’t entirely possible. They could just be semi-idle, distracted, apathetic, extremely lazy, etc but still there in some manner.

They don’t need to prove it. They only need to determine it. ArenaNet’s game, ArenaNet’s decision, whether it’s based off proof or judgement.

Doggie.3184:

Ayrilana.1396:

Doggie.3184:

As long as he’s not using a 3rd party meowgram he’s fine. No one can prove that he’s actually AFK anyways so it’s not possible for it to break any rules. It’ll always be false flag unless 3rd party is detected. Reporting and accidentally suspending people won’t solve the issue, they have to alter the AFK timer and/or loot system.

Refer to the image. See the text “extended unattended play”? There is an idle timer that kicks players the the character screen after an hour or so. If this is circumvented by any means then the player is in the wrong.

And the idle timer doesn’t work correctly at the moment and needs fixed.

And yet people are taking advantage of that.

Doggie.3184:

It’s a false flag so he wasn’t exploiting or doing anything wrong. The person who reported him was abusing the system.

You’re basing this off one player’s side of the story. You don’t know the facts of the suspension at all, so best not to jump to conclusions. The OP could be 100% innocent, 100% guilty. Not for us to judge.

Just like it’s not up to the person who reported him to judge whether he is guilty or innocent, but if they see suspect behaviour, always best to report.

Howsabout you don’t try to exploit the game?

Sorry I can’t be more sympathetic, you guys knew the risks.

People, you need to understand … if you’re playing in a ‘grey area’ of the game, you’re risking your access to the account. I can’t tell you how many times a GM (in many other games) has come by and banned someone I know or me for something that we were told DIRECTLY on the forums was OK to do and not a bannable offense. Their Modus operandi is: Ban first, investigate later. WITHOUT fail.

mia.8209:

Just a flesh wound.3589:

mia.8209:

Just a flesh wound.3589:

Who sets Gem prices? source

John Smith
There seems to be some confusion:

The currency exchange has a supply of Gems and Gold.

If players are converting Gold to Gems, then the Amount of Gold player will receive for their gems goes up.

If players are converting Gems to Gold, then the amount of Gems players receive for Gold goes up.

The exchange rate changes based on the scarcity of each supply. You cannot inflate it, it’s an exchange rate. As players purchase in one direction, it entices purchases in the other direction.

So, what exactly do you want ANet to do?

Lower cost of character slots (or remove cost all together), I suppose. I can wait for the rates to adjust for buying vanity items, but no character slots = fewer things for me to do in game = higher risk of me burning out on the game entirely.

So, you’re asking for the gemstore, ANet’s source of money to pay the monthly bills since people don’t pay a subscription in this game, to give everyone free character slots when ever they want, up to the max number of slots. Why should ANet, which is a business trying to make money, do this?

How about if you find $5 and buy 400 gems with gold and let that be your discount.

mia.8209:

character slots are kind of a fundamental game thing – altoholics are a core group of MMO player types, it’s something that actually keeps people playing and encourages more spending in the gemstore (once you have those alts, that’s when it’s time for the pretty outfits!) so it seems like an odd decision by Anet to have them priced so high anyway. Especially since owning alts doesn’t really give you any perks in game (like in WoW where timegated cooldowns often aren’t account-wide, despite you having 50ish character slots for free there) – it’s just something for people who enjoy variety or leveling or dressing up different characters.

One character slot is $10. If you’re having trouble getting hold of $10 for a character slot the game gives you the option to get a slot completely free, not having to pay a penny, just by playing the game and earning gold to buy them. So since the game already give you a way to get slots for free, I don’t see a reason for ANet to cut the gem price to zero.

After all, unlike WoW this game does not charge you a monthly subscription. With WoW, you pay $15/month or $180/year for those 50 “free” slots. You can play this game after purchase and not pay real money at all for gem store items.

Maybe you could buy $15 or $20 in gems each month as your subscription and use the gems from that to buy char slots.

Chris Cleary.8017:

Right now there is a consistent supply of mystic coins entering the game (way more than are being consumed) and churning through the trading post at a very slow rate. Most of the coins on the market are ones that have been flipped.

Because at current prices it’s frankly too expensive to consume! So people hoard it for that one item they might make in the future when they finally get enough of them.

The problem is not a “consistent supply” that’s being stretched out throughout the players, but rather the inconsistency of available sources to get these. At the moment we have 3 sources:

- Trading Post

- Sometimes daily (“Mystic Forger”)

- And daily logins

From daily login u can “amass” 20 Mystic Coins in a month. While Daily Mystic Forger is somewhat semi-common, you get 1 coin per.

So basically when u need a stack of those, you either have to cash out on TP or wait a really long time. And it’s just another unneeded time gate for many people that want to craft things.

It’s just those time gates are getting a little annoying whenever you want to make anything these days.

Chris Cleary.8017:

If players are willing to pay more…

They’re not willing. They’re forced to as there is no other alternative to get them!

I’d be using a whole lot more mystic coins if they weren’t so expensive….

There’s a reason more people are flipping them to raise prices rather than buying to use them.