Guild Wars 2

Ayrilana.1396:

If you reduce the number of player models, performance increases pretty significantly. I can run the game on max setting with an average 40 FPS at world bosses with the model limit at medium.

This is because, while GW2 uses three or four cores well, there is a single thread that manages model animation and location, and that turns out to be the place that you hit a wall with first when you have eliminated every other slowdown in the game.

Also notable, changing that is one of the single hardest problems in programming, it has the highest possible risk of introducing bugs, and the nature of the problem means is extremely difficult to test for problems.

Finally, that thread is not limited by any graphics layer locking, meaning that even if you bump to a newer version of DirectX for fun, it wouldn’t change anything meaningful.

All that said … I wish that anet would do this, in the sense of literally just compile the exact same code with DirectX 11. It would make no performance difference at all, but it would get the kittens asking for it because of magical thinking to shush, and that’s getting to be a more and more pleasant idea every week.

I thought HoT was rather pricy for what we got however I was willing to pay it for 4 reasons.
1) they explained it was content light but laid the foundation for the rest of the game onward with its mastery system and elite specs
2) it was needed to continue with the Living Story episodes which would be between expansions 1 and 2.
3) I am expecting the future expansions to be content heavy
4) if I’m going to continue to play the game then I’m going to want to play the expansion. I’m not going to want to sit on the side replaying 4, 5 or 6 year old vanilla content while everyone else is exploring new maps.

That said I’m pleased with the current Living Story setup with new maps and story lines and I’m looking forward to the next expansion. And if I look at the cost of HoT and the time I’ve spent playing since then, it’s quite a reasonable price.

Although I did buy HoT and do not regret it, I can answer from the perspective of when I was still holding out on the purchase for as long as I did.

The short answer is that I used to play another game that deeply and completely betrayed its original premise, and heard from map chat that HoT was doing the same to GW2. However, because what I wanted from core GW2 (dynamic event chains/meta events) was different than what others apparently wanted (a super easy mode casual experience), I convinced myself that buying HoT would be fine. And I was right, in that I love HoT.

The longer answer:

I’ve posted this on occasion in other contexts, but I am a SWToR refugee (the current EA/Bioware Star Wars mmo, for those who don’t know).

SWToR was sold to me, and others, as a game distinct for its strong story writing. Initially this was true: there were 8 completely distinct storylines, complete with unique companions, conversations, and other features. I’d say 2 or 3 of those stories are well-written enough to be their own game, really. Without getting into more detail, suffice it to say that the dev team there has utterly and completely betrayed that original premise; now every single character plays an identical story. You have non-Jedi/Sith running around talking to Force visions, fighting Force battles, and other such nonsense. Even your once-unique companions are basically skins of one another with the same base functionality.

When I first stepped into core Tyria as an f2p, I fell in love immediately with how the world felt alive. No trinity, and a game world that seemed to change and move on with time. I absolutely loved that the tower in Kessex Hills remained toppled, and thought it was quite daring that the devs destroyed the beloved central hub city and remade it as a shadow of its former self. I did feel a bit sad that I missed out on Scarlet and the old LA, but the world felt so much more alive this way. I knew that dynamic event chains would eventually repeat and all would have a chance to do them, but the chains initially seemed long enough (and the new camps/WPs opened stayed long enough) that I felt like my character was making a real difference in that corner of the world. There being pretty much 0 gear grind was a very thick layer of icing on what I found was an already delicious cake.

As I considered buying HoT, I was warned that HoT was quite different from all the things I mentioned above. There was a certain level of power creep involved (although gear grind beyond exotic remained largely optional), and gravitation towards meta builds for higher levels of play was expected.

I wavered for some time, but eventually bought HoT just because I loved the experience of GW2 up to that point. I read as much as I could on reddit, these forums, and elsewhere about what HoT entailed. I concluded that although HoT did betray a bit of that initial feeling of map-aliveness, that shift made sense to me because we’d be fighting in a jungle. Working through wild places that belong to the enemy (not civilization) seemed to fit with the idea that player actions couldn’t ever really tame the zones.

So yeah. I didn’t come to GW2 seeking super casual faceroll, so HoT did not seem like a total betrayal of the core game to me. Since what I wanted was more meta events, HoT was a purchase that made sense. I took the time to confirm this as best as I could before buying, and I’m not disappointed that I did.

I think it’s a bit insulting to say that Anet obviously don’t care or are incapable of making days in-game and days in lore match up when people have given clear, game design related reasons for them to be difference.

To me it seems more likely that if they had never thought about it or didn’t care about an accurate timeline they’d either make days in-game match days in real life (presumably on Pacific time since that’s their time zone), or they just wouldn’t give dates for the different events and wouldn’t have gone to the trouble of making up a calendar in the first place.

Yes it is weird that a day is only 2 hours long. It’s also weird that in certain maps it’s permanently night time or permanently day time and in some no one’s even heard of Mordremoth and they’re desperately fighting Zhaitan and in others both Zhaitan and Mordremoth are dead. But that’s how things work in games.

I think it comes down to different teams having different priorities. For the lore and story guys the important thing is that the dates seem logical to us and we don’t need to read a mass of notes on how Tyria’s solar system works to understand their months and years – so they tied it to the real-world calendar (right down to the year starting on Wintersday which is New Years Day in real life).

For the people designing the maps the important thing is that players get to see both the day and the night version and that, because some events only happen during the day or during the night, we never have to wait too long to see it. Plus apparently most people prefer day time in-game to night. So they made the full cycle 2 hours and most of that day time.

Besides unless you pay for hours every day it probably evens out. I suspect the average player is only on for 2 hours a day, at most, so with a 2 hour day/night cycle their character experiences 1 day of game time for every real world day.

Orpheal.8263:

What do you guys think of GW2s outdated Health System?

While it may be outdated, it certainly sucks a lot less than your idea.

atheria.2837:

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

You may benefit from a -repair of the client, due to corrupted file(s).

Instructions to repair the client can be found in the Knowledge Base accessed via the ‘Support’ link above/below and ‘Search – Repair’.

Another command line argument that may work would be -prefreset.

If you continue to have issue, you can contact the CS Team via the same ‘Support’ link and ‘Submit a Ticket’ for assistance.

Good luck.

GW2 repair doesn’t work for many, I being one of them.

There are glaring errors and not one Dev has gotten back to us about most of them.

The repair option being the most egregious of all.

I’m really not sure what you imagine “-repair” is supposed to do, but it does exactly what it is intended to: checks the integrity of the content of the gw2.dat file, and ensures that anything broken will be redownloaded.

This may or may not solve the problem, but if you really believe that it isn’t working, you can simply delete gw2.dat entirely, wait for all content to redownload, and end up in the same position.

To your other complaints, the reasons that the “devs” have not gotten back to you is because it is absolutely, without question, not their job to spend time responding to your individual complaints on the forums.

If you want individual attention, submit a support ticket via the link available here.

Of course, that likely leads to your final point, that there are “glaring errors”, which are most likely some sort of hardware, software, or network problem at your end. (Why? Well, because if they really were as common as you say, reproducing and fixing them would be easy for the developers, and there would be a lot more people experiencing them, observably neither of which is true.)

Too Lazy, Didn’t Read version: your problem is almost certainly something broken about your computer and/or network. Don’t whine about devs not fixing your pc.

atheria.2837:

SlippyCheeze.5483:

atheria.2837:

SlippyCheeze.5483:

Have you tried the `-repair` option to GW2, or deleting and redownloading the gw2.dat file? Perhaps some of the issues, especially vanishing models, are related to local corruption?

Repair has NEVER worked on my system – Anet knows it and won’t help. I have the emails. The fact that it doesn’t work for many should tell Anet something but they, to date, will not listen to any of us.

Secondly, I have already uninstalled and REINSTALLED in a DIFFERENT drive and a DIFFERENT file so it’s not my issue, it’s Anet’s ‘issue’.

I’m not sure if you are trying to say that “running repair did not fix [your] problems”, or “running repair didn’t work correctly”. It might be beneficial for this discussion to clarify that?

Being able to reproduce this with a clean install certainly suggests that it’s not tied to the content of the file. That does not rule out local hardware or software issues, though. In either case, best of luck!

I have tried many times since the release of the game to do a “repair”.

Go look it up, “repair” works for very, very few.

The game bugged to death, quest chains on many maps are bugged so it’s not just WvW, but when one can’t even see a property’s color or ANY of the above listed bugs that still to this day are not fixed, something is wrong, not with the computer, but with the information exchanged between server AND the client.

WvW is in dire shape, but don’t bother caring, you’re probably not even in there a tenth of the time most of us are who DO care about it and see the glaring inaccuracies and blatant neglect.

And my email has nothing to do with “not” getting answers from a ticket – I get emails from GW2 just fine… no issues on my side, but they don’t have ‘email’, they have a ticketing system that uses a form, not an email account that could possibly at the very least be trackable and provable. If we can’t track what we send, it’s our word against theirs… and we all lose.

I have to say here, your attitude really, really isn’t going to motivate anyone to want to help you out. You are that customer standing in line, screaming at the top of your lungs because you didn’t want bacon in a bacon cheeseburger, and you don’t know why they didn’t read your mind to put it in there.

In what might help, the email being referred to was the one generated after you submit a ticket via the form. The ANet support system send you an automatic email to confirm that, hey, your ticket was received.

That is, the tool to allow you to track that your ticket was sent, and received by ANet.

It is probably also worth remembering that the problems you describe are gross, obvious, constant problems. If the game was so broken that they happened all the time, for all the players, they would be solved.

Since they don’t, in the experience of others, exists to that degree, we suggest things that might help you out. Not will, but might. Because we would prefer you not to suffer like this.

All that said, I think you would probably be better served playing something else. It’s clear that both GW2 does not work for you correctly, and that the support you receive is not to your satisfaction.

Given that neither of those is highly likely to change, I’d strongly encourage you to consider other games, where you might have a much less aggravating experience.

mathion.8549:

Last time I looked, TP prices put the sections at about 24 silver. It appears that the USE of hardened leather was increased, but the drop rate wasn’t.

Last time I looked it was below 20s already.

How does it feel complaining about something they just announced to change with the next update?

I think I’ve figured out the central argument against the event completer dailies, at least from those who have posted here in this thread:

“Events dailies take too long to do, and I have to run around the game looking for events to get credit. It needs to be removed from the game because myself and a handful of other players don’t want to do them. This isn’t about rewards, this is about my personal opinion on game design.”

Myself and a few others have given equally opinionated versions of why we are in favor of the event completer daily. But those players who dislike doing these achievements (or dislike the fact that the achievements even exist in the first place) don’t want to hear about positive opinions supporting their existence. They want their opinions, and only their opinions validated. Remove this thing from the game that I don’t like, I don’t care if others do like it and I don’t care what their reasons are. I will not back down, for my opinion is the one that’s important.

The players here who support this achievement’s removal will continue to say that their voices and opinions aren’t being heard because there is content in the game that they don’t want to do and even after posting that they don’t want to do it, it’s still here. How dare anyone else have an opinion different from theirs? Bear in mind that they’ve similarly dismissed all positive opinions in favor of these achievements, effectively trying to silence the discussion by pointing out how opinions of others are either less thought out or less important.

Just get on with your life and do a different daily. Seriously, what is the problem with that mentality?

How about this instead:
Tequatl takes too long to complete. I can’t get it done every single day. It needs to be made easier or faster in some way, or maybe players should be able to loot the boss chest and get full event cycle rewards at the start of the event instead of the end, so that way people just there for the rewards can get the stuff and people who just want to kill the dragon can stick around and do that too. But I shouldn’t have to do it if I don’t want to. This isn’t fair, it takes too long, and sometimes it fails! So I’ve spent all the time doing the event and I get nothing for it?! How is that fair?!

Do you see how ridiculous that sounds? How entitled I come across?

If I enjoy doing something in a game, I do it. If don’t enjoy doing something, I don’t go to the forums and immediately demand its removal—instead, I go do something else and get on with my life.

Because it’s true? I mean, they have demonstrated their ability to create, develop and run a game better than any single player in this forum … so why shouldn’t I believe they don’t know better than you or anyone else posting here? If Anet isn’t doing it right, that’s not any indication that players would do it better, so that asusmption is just crap right from the outset.

Now maybe if you claimed that another game dev could do better, you would have a point … but players? That’s a ridiculous claim. You are being very audacious.

You haven’t shown your understanding in almost any post you make that this is a for-profit business and the restrictions that imposes on the concept, design and delivery of the game. Just based on that fundamental lack of understanding, I will put my money on Anet doing better than you or any other player any day.

Devata.6589:

Behellagh.1468:

Vayne.8563:

You say having a less intrusive cash shop is the answer, so if expansions cant’ be made as quickly, how are you planning on paying rent, insurance, electricity and 300 plus employees?

That’s because @Devata believes at the core of his being that ANet “could” do it.

I might be wrong. We do however know that their current approach was good for the first 1,5 year or so and then started to drop off more thenthey had hoped.

Didn’t want to resort to this. Air the dark dirty secrets of ArenaNet but if this doesn’t change your mind I don’t know what will. All you have to do is examine the audited annual reports from NCSOFT which breaks out the income and profit of their subsidiaries including ArenaNet.

Looking at the audited annual reports reveals an ugly truth. ArenaNet as an entity never made a profit from Guild Wars.

In 2005 GW sold 41,308 million KrW. ArenaNet only saw 10,608 million KrW of that and almost made a profit, their loss was only 168 million KrW.

In 2006 GW sold 52,560 million KrW. ArenaNet only saw 13,400 million KrW of that and their loss was 2,022 million KrW.

In 2007 GW sold 42,058 million KrW. ArenaNet only saw 12,020 million KrW of that and their loss was 2,975 million KrW.

In 2008 GW sold 26,228 million KrW. ArenaNet only saw 8,131 million KrW of that and their loss was 10,148 million KrW.

In 2009 GW sold 17,127 million KrW. ArenaNet only saw 5,254 million KrW of that and their loss was 21,658 million KrW.

ArenaNet had to pay off the development cost of GW just like an author or a band paying off their advance. And in 2009 they announced work on GW2. [sarcasm]It sure looks like that box expansion plan for GW really worked out for them.[/sarcasm] By the end of 2012, the last time ANet was broken out as it was “absorbed” into NC West Holdings along with NC Interactive and Carbine, ANet had liabilities, aka debt, of 128,000 million KrW. That’s the year GW2 sold 164,854 million KrW and ANet saw 68,000 million of that and actually had a profit of 28,000 million KrW.

This is part of the reason they decided that to maintain their B2P/no subscription approach, went with the cash shop.

Edit: This also makes the taking over of distribution by ANet for HoT a lot of sense so they could book more of that income without letting NC Interactive suck up a sizable cut.

Some things have to be rarer and more expensive than others, otherwise we’d all have everything and then we’d be bored.

I don’t think anyone is “flipping” them on the TP, simply because the buy-sell spread is not that favourable and anticipating the short term fluctuations is risky. Most likely players get them for logging in, deposit them with everything else and then forget about them. That’s what I used to do until folk started making threads like this one and I realised their value. Now I sell a few here and there when I need the gold.

Randulf.7614:

The devs will have better metrics about who is playing the content Vs the target audience of 4 years ago, but I do wonder how many of the casual playerbase the game was very much aimed at, has been lost with the advent of improved difficulty in Open World. I prefer the harder mobs and think it validates the game’s progression more, but I can sympathise with those increasingly turning away because of it.

Part of the problem with questions like this is that first you need to define ‘casual players’.

In many ways I could be considered a casual player. I’m only online evenings and weekends (and not every evening, certainly not every weekend). I genuinely have no idea about the meta-game other than being aware it exists and I have always mained a ranger in rabid (now rabid/sinister) gear, regardless of what I’m told I “should” be playing. One of my main priorities is cosmetics, mini-pets in particular but I’m very slow to get them (or anything else) because I rarely farm for anything and have never done anything like AB multi-loot. I haven’t even done all of the dungeon paths yet and haven’t ever entered a raid except to take screenshots to prove it’s possible to enter the instance solo.

But on the other hand I’ve not had a problem completing HoT content. I think partially because of the aforementioned ranger in rabid gear (pocket raptors take 2 skills – spike trap with a bonfire on top. Maybe some sword auto-attacks to finish them off) and partially because dying doesn’t bother me that much. I wasn’t going to complete things efficiently anyway, probably wasn’t going to complete it that night because I tend to get distracted, so having to start over doesn’t bother me much. But then I do tend to play other RPGs on at least normal difficulty, sometimes harder.

I agree that the game is aimed at a more casual audience than most MMOs, but I always thought of that as having less to do with the difficulty and more to do with other aspects of the design. Most content can be completed solo, with anyone who happens to be around or with a group formed on the spur of the moment so you don’t have to commit to playing at a fixed time with a regular group of people. There’s no gear grind so if you take a break or simply can’t play a lot you won’t fall behind. It’s relatively easy to get to the maximum level and to get good quality equipment when you do. And the game is fairly open-ended so you don’t have to do things you don’t want to do. You can skip dungeons or WvW or PvP or raids or jumping puzzles or most other content types (even open-world PvE to some extent) without it affecting the content you do want to do.

And now with the option of playing for free and then just buying HoT to unlock everything (except Living Story seasons) it also suits people who are wary of tying themselves to a game with a large, early financial commitment.

But to my mind none of that says it can’t get harder as you progress through it.

Doam.8305:

OriOri.8724:

DeceiverX.8361:

I don’t think the intention was to have tons of them. It’d just make balancing even more difficult for a team which already has major issues in this department.

Based on HoT, I’d say some devs are already low on creative juices, anyways.

HoT was an expansion that focused primarily on introducing new tools, engine revamps, and features over content. Its no surprise that it was content light, that doesn’t mean that the devs are struggling for creativity though.

The constant creation and destruction of so called systems is something this game is known for actually. I’d say yes it does mean there is a lack of creativity they strip something down and try to revamp it then strip and revamp over and over with very little content shown given the amount of work put into it.

To push what you have to bring about unique experiences is a sign of creativity to scrap the entire thing and start a new each and every turn is a sign they didn’t have the creative insight to push anything with what they have to they try to create again and again. Dungeons and underwater lost and forgotten, characters killed off, and so forth. Season 1 in terms of achievements and presentation is as different to season 2 as season 2 is to season 3 while HoT is different from all the seasons and the core.

Work with what you have and use creativity to do something inspired which is something people don’t typically associate with Anet who much prefers to wipe the board clean and try something else which leads to alot of work and very little content.

So, to clarify, you are saying that constantly working to create new things is a sign of a lack of creativity while working to not create new, but instead tweaking that which already exists is a sign of creativity?

I always assumed the armors released early in the gem shop had been created during the game’s development, then set aside so they could sell them. Rather than assuming they had been created after the game launched.

Move the achievement chests to a repeatable ladder mastery track ( regular → large → heavy → massive → regular → etc. Or, however you’d prefer it to ladder) and you can do whatever the heck you want with APs and AP caps for all I’d care.

~EW

I’d say: first, do a poll to know if we should have a poll about daily AP cap.

I vote no.

I suggest that when a player makes a purchase from this cash-only shop they are awarded a “Please validate me!” title which can’t be changed or turned off.

I think a game is more fun and interesting when a few things in it are exclusive and there are several types of exclusivity:

• By cost: fun for the rich, something for the less-rich to covet, and a gold sink for the economy.
• By game mode: rewards for those who like PvP vs WvW vs PvE vs Raids vs Fractals
• By skill: skins tied to JPs or raids.
• By longevity: birthday rewards require you to have played for long enough.
• By perseverance, aka Strong Bladder rewards: virtually everything tied to meta rewards in HoT is like this. You have to play a lot.
• By RNG: not that many people are fans of this, but it does encourage people to open various bags, so the rest of us can get the rest of the contents more cheaply.
• By right time + right place: Mad Memoires is one of the few remaining such items. It was nearly free if you were around for the first Halloween and otherwise unavailable.

In short, the game is full of exclusive items already. It makes the rewards more interesting. I am okay with the idea that there will be some things I never get because something in RL was more important than some reward in a game I really like. Especially since the vast, vast majority of rewards in the game are available to any of us.

HoT has been out for a year. You’re late to the party with your post and observations.

As long as I don’t have to regear with each expansion I’m fine with elite specs that allow me to handle harder content and Masteries that give me new abilities.

They pretty much did the same thing in gw1 with the skills that became better the higher faction you got.

Custer.6217:

Thanks, I wasn’t aware of that. Looks as if I won’t be bothering with dailies any longer, then. It makes me wonder how people get to the 25,000 total for the “Illustrious Achiever” title – let alone 60,000 for “Uncontrollable Achiever”…

It makes me wonder how you only received ~4k AP in the time it took to max your dailies when AP is so easy to get at that level.

More importantly, can we have descriptive thread titles?

nerovergil.5408:

ElectricGoat.8253:

~snip~

~snip~

Mount is not basic human need, most people at that time walked, just like you should in-game. Horses were and continue to be expensive. Right now Horses are only for rich horse-girls. Back then In Medieval times Horses were for Knights and those would can afford them. I’m not even sure why you’re mentioning this since GW2 is a fictional game where magic exists. I sure would love some magic in this real world.

You didn’t say to get rid of some waypoints, but someone was going to regardless and I cut them off preemptively.

You didn’t hear of it cause the pay to win killed the game. It killed the game, and the publisher was punished for P2W. I don’t think you are understanding just how bad western players hate P2W. They hate it with a such passion that they will voice negatively how much they dislike it to anyone that also plays games. They hate it so much they will spend large amounts of time saying how much they hate it than play a different game. Game “Journalists” will also promote how bad the P2W is and further create bad press. For a market that hates P2W with a fury of 1000 suns, that spells trouble. Maybe it doesn’t in eastern markets, but for the west that’s the way it is. That game I referenced was supposed to sell tons and tons and was supposed to be a money printer. However, once word got out that it was P2W, the game went to the discount rack because nobody wanted to touch it. I returned my copy for full refund. That is how badly the western market reacts to P2W. Players will get tired of not being able to compete against P2W and leave. Eventually enough bad reputation will be generated due to P2W status that everyone knows not to play that game and the game closes. Unsurprisingly such games that have P2W come from eastern markets? Hmmm…

P2W is not fine, it might be fine in eastern markets, but in western markets they spell doom for games. Players in the west, just. will. not. submit. to. P2W. In eastern markets maybe it’s not death, but this is a different market and here people want fairness and for rewards to be earned. I hear the Chinese GW2 has all the pay to win your heart desires. Oh look it also is in an eastern market. (I’m putting smileys up so you don’t think im being hostile. Tone is very important these days.)

People in the west are not brainwashed, they understand pay to win is terrible. There’s even a term for P2W games, “Cash Grab”. P2W is only good for bad, and unskilled players who want to wallet to the top, but here, you have to earn your way up. Western markets value earning your way up over buying your way up. I say this as someone who has walleted their way to the top only to leave a few months later, and yes, very unskilled. Sub games like Wow are actually on their way out, I played WoW for a while and I cancelled my sub for this game. I’ll let that speak for itself as to which game is better. I even played some P2W games, I’m here which means those games did not captivate my attention after they were revealed to be a money grab hidden under a blanket of fake-fun. Old WoW was good, but they don’t understand the market the way Anet does. Which is why Anet holds strong and firm, while WoW wanes and depletes.

Actually free players provide a very valuable service to the game by being content in and of themselves. While this seems counter-intuitive let me explain, players like me who spend money for cosmetics want to play with other players. We want to show off our cool things, and want to show what we have earned. We also need to sell things to other players. So yes, a player influx is very good for the game as it leads to full game purchases, gem purchases, and more money for Anet. Otherwise those trials would just sit on the sidelines and not purchase anything, and it’s only buy game or no buy. For some players that’s a hard choice, for others it’s a simple option.

If something is free, maybe you are the product. For facebook the users are the product, and advertisers purchase access to the product. It just also accidentally happens to also be a social media site where literally everyone is, and provides a neat feature that lets you network with your friends. Google has a similar approach, provide people a place to view videos and let advertisers pay to advertise to the viewers.

So in sum Mounts bad, P2W bad. I seriously can’t wait for you to try your hand at an MMO. I’ll be here waiting for news of your grand success. Here’s to a new millionaire!

Ohoni.6057:

Grind =/ bad game design.

By definition, yes it does. If you’re grinding, it’s because someone has seriously kittened up. Now “repetition” is not always “grind,” it’s only grind if you aren’t enjoying it. But yes, if you’re doing something repeatedly beyond the point that you’re having fun, then it is bad design and they should fix it.

By your definition. Grind is very much a part of every MMO. If you have an issue with grind then you’re seriously playing the wrong genre. Not everyone will find everything enjoyable. People also happen to have vastly different thresholds.

Ohoni.6057:

Not everything in this game do all players enjoy. There are some things that certain players enjoy and other things that another group of players enjoy.

And again, that is fine, so long as the players who do enjoy it can do it, and the players who don’t can do something else instead, and NOT have to give up on specific rewards. If there are specific rewards that a player would miss by giving up on the activity, then “to each their own” no longer applies. And no, the game is by no means perfect on this, but that is reason to fix the other parts that are broken, not to excuse adding new broken elements.

Not everyone will find everything in the game enjoyable. There will be some things that players do not like. Some people do not like jumping puzzles. Should those then be removed because they’re “bad design”? After all, someone doesn’t like them and according to you that makes it bad design.

There are specific rewards with raids, WvW, PvP, and so on. Not everyone will enjoy all of them. Does that mean those are bad design too? No.