Guild Wars 2

The problem is “shineys” are needed to considerably increase our quality of life. In other words, you survive longer and mobs die faster if you’re in exotic than if you were wearing blues. Some mobs (trash, and even little trash like spider hatchlings take too long to kill) take too long to kill to be cost-effective, so going down to the 45-70 zones is ideal for collecting trash for profit where mobs die reasonably fast.

It’ll be best if they could balance the ones they have now before adding new ones. Remember WoW’s death knight?

Lance Coolee.9480:

Danikat.8537:

Lance Coolee.9480:

Pop quiz:

If “everything is endgame”, then why is there a leveling system at all? Isn’t it contradictory?

At one point they were going to scrap levelling completely. They also considered including it but never having a level cap – only diminishing rewards at each level.

But the way I look at it levelling does 2 things:
1) “unlocks” new areas. In theory you can run straight from the starting point to Orr if you know the way. In practice you’d never get there because the enemies along the way would one-shot you. So you need to level up in order to be able to do everything.
2) It’s an easy way of tracking your progress through the various forms of character progression. You gradually unlock things like traits, new skills, elites etc. as you’re levelling up and when you hit 80 you know you’ve got them all.

So to me it’s just another mechanic that enables and informs your progress, rather than a goal in it’s own right.

I would like to read where they would’ve scrapped leveling. IMO, that would be a fairly innovative direction.

The issue (I see) is that there’s so much that advertises the entire game as being “endgame”; however goals aren’t exactly atomic. IE, everything feels as if it was originally intended to be a vertical progression from content to crafting.

If they had actually came in w/ a no-leveling concept, that would have opened so many doors for the game (granted there would have needed to be some introductory pre-req to get players familiar w/ their character and the game mechanics).

I think maybe replace level with a DBZ like power level, and certain quests cannot be completed unless you have over of a certain stat, like needing to move a certain rock would need over 100 strength, or a certain puzzle 100 intelligence (not for this game obviously but for the genre in general).

Also, The Secret World had a no leveling system and it wasn’t that great, all it did was substitute level with gear. If your gear is strong for you then it doesn’t feel very heroic, as if Superman’s power came from his cape rather than just being a strong dude who wears a symbol of nobility to hide the outline of his… behind. I did like however their segregation between armor graphics and armor pieces (in that game called “talismans”), where you could look how you want and equip the stats you want.

Lance Coolee.9480:

Pop quiz:

If “everything is endgame”, then why is there a leveling system at all? Isn’t it contradictory?

Leveling has been one of my favorite aspects of RPGs because you get to see a character grow and develop. Think of Dragon kitten and Goku during the Raditz saga as being from level 1-5 and is level 80 (exponentially stronger beyond comprehension) when he defeated Omega Shenron. I think games need to make the increased power more obvious plotwise since storywise it seems too… static. Dragon Warrior and older Final Fantasy games did this and I think Phantasy Star 2 when it’s released will too. PS2 will be free to play but probably pay to be a pro too and I’ll play it unless being a “pro” is way too cost-prohibitive.

Depends on what I’m fighting. If it has a pullback sometimes I’ll wait for it to commit (after two swings the risen will throw his pullback pick and if you dodge too late you pull him back lol!), then open with eruption for the bleed, switch to fire, which stacks another 3 bleed, afflict with burning, then lava under it. If it’s the mob with chaos storm I’ll open with magnetic field, and most of “my” damage in those encounters comes from reflecting back to the mob. Anything with heavy armor also calls for an eruption as bleed bypasses defense, get another stack, then go fire.

Underwater, I typically favor earth for tougher mobs and wind for everything else. If against a large group then boiling water as fire and wait for water, and for emergencies or just underwater farming use whirlpool, which is our best ability.

Actually, things in mid-level zones die considerably faster and don’t have the ludicrous mob placement and spawn rates that Orr has, so Bloodtide Coast and the couple of zones after it are great for collecting blue and green vendor trash and salvaging in-demand mid level mats at a faster rate than Orr (unless you’re a warrior, then you get to tap every mob in every wave on Orr’s DE farm).

Ronin.8095:

Gehenna.3625:

Snip

Sure, Gehenna, tell us what we all want. I’ve always wondered what I’ve wanted as a gamer and now I have you to tell me.

Aren’t I the lucky one!

Open your eyes read the forums and see that the game is heading in a really bad direction fast.

Or don’t and continue on this delusional path you seem to want to go down. It’s not going to end well.

It’s a shame that DR was put in place and risen grubs (which I refuse to fight now and no one even bothers with the giant event on my server) don’t drop anything, but Anet will work out a solution since they don’t want GW2 ending up like SWTOR. EA aggressively advertised SWTOR as the WoW killer, but GW2 gained popularity outside of the GW1 crowd because GW1 fans talked up GW2 on 4Chan years ago and how sweet the game was going to be with its features. Word of mouth spread from there to the WoW forums, to other places, and the rest is history. It was mostly level scaling and non-gear grind PvP that made people like this game before it was even released. Yet, DR and other ludicrous mechanics may offset all that.

Dopplegangr.9678:

WoW will die when blizzard makes a better MMO

They are probably working on WoW2 as we speak. They need to add a dodge mechanic, greatly upgrade the graphics, do away with factions, and have it set in a modern or at least Victorian fantasy setting since medieval fantasy has been done to death. It should basically be the WoW world just in the future, but maybe not so far in the future it becomes science fantasy (like Star Wars or Star Ocean) instead of modern fantasy (like Final Fantasy VII or the Mother series).

Diva.4706:

I think some players are mistaken in why we have level scaling. In other level based MMOs, if you are max level and want to play with a friend that is lower level, you have to make an alt to play with them, or wait for them to grind up to your level. In GW2, you can just take your main and play with your friend.

I also see the argument that it isn’t worth playing lower content, because of low rewards. I play with friends and family lower than me all the time, and I am not doing it for rewards. I am doing it to have fun with them.

Some people are having a real hard time getting away from the “I need shinnies to have fun” mentality. For years now people have been playing games that they actually don’t enjoy, simply because it “rewards” them with pixels.

The best reward you will ever have is a great time playing with friends, everything else is fluff. This game is playground, and you never outgrow the toys.

Not necessarily. When I was in the level 60s in WoW a couple of level 85 friends ran me through the Burning Crusade dungeons. It was actually pretty fun.

The game is wildly popular, not dying. It was released near the end of summer vacation, which would explain the decline in average hours played per person. People also tend to play more in the honeymoon phase of the game, but still nevertheless enjoy it afterwards.

I love Halloween events, but I hate bugs (especially invisible walls where they logically wouldn’t be and underwater mobs randomly going “invulnerable”) even more.

ArenaNet, do you really want to know why Guild Wars 2 became popular? Because of /v and /b! That’s right, 4Chan, and then word of mouth spread from there over on to game forums, how PvP wasn’t a gear grind like WoW and for fun, and actually needing skill to do stuff no matter what level you are or where you are. Then, you slap on this DR system and anons everywhere are disappointed.

AlietteFaye.7316:

Can’t help but disagree. First and foremost, they’re supposed to be rare. Having them come out of every Meta-event chest will just start farms and drive the economy down. Don’t know if you know or not, but Ectoplasms are salvaged from rares 70+. Having a person get 1-5 pieces of rare gear, which will equate to a possibility of up to 15 Ectoplasms, from a single event would kill the price and mess with the economy in a negative way.

I understand that it’s boring to get the same gear from chests, but you also get Karma and extra money on the side. Not to mention you definitely have a higher chance of getting rares from a chest than mobs.

Wow, almost enough money to cover a waypoint travel and just as much karma as other events -_- but because world events take considerably longer they’re far less profitable as far as karma is concerned. Better to just walk down bloodcoast on down to Straits of Devastation and just take whatever DE comes in that time.

Soulwatcher.2604:

I don’t know about you but I loved my reward for finishing the personal story 2 pieces of level 40 gear 2 pieces of level 20 gear and 1 piece of junk 80 gear not for my class. Good think it only took me 80 FREAKING levels for such a great reward!

This isn’t about personal story (even the devs said that personal story rewards should be trash) but world events like the Claw of Jourmag.

In the Cursed Shore event and Claw of Jourmag it’s possible to get greens and even blues (not only that, but they’re under level 80 too) in the chests and it’s really disappointing because the results would be the same if you were out farming in the world and sometimes even less so. I got a couple of exotics, but unfortunately they sell for less than 1g on the auction house so I’m saving the level 76 armors I got from the level 80 events for my alts. The gear should at least be rare.

At least it’s not blue or green vendor trash, but same level gear for the event can’t hurt.

Google Onion Head smileys for the best smileys ^_^

Here’s what midnight ice looks like:

Guild Wars 2 was the MMO of choice of both /v and /b (/vg is just a step above 9gag and Reddit as people there prefer to one shot lowbie mobs with their level 90 raid gear), and now many feel betrayed by Anet for their DR decisions.

“The bugs could occur with much less frequency than they do. It’s got the most bugs in it of any MMO I’ve played.”

Have you played SWTOR?

I think there are enough pants as it is. Even the pretty light armored tier 1 human armor has pants though it’s a pants skirt hybrid ^_^

They are there, they’re just PvPing and farming very specific Orr events.

Zenith.1234:

Agemnon.4608:

Zenith.1234:

Guild Wars 2 a PvP game? Lmfao. I think people really need to sit back and actually read the details on the game or any MMORPG game. Not one MMORPG is a PvP game. All MMORPG’s are pure PvE with tacked on PvP.

Also this game is amazing and it is unreal of the amount of things to do. If you get bored and can’t find anything and actually bum-rushed the game in 1 week then maybe this game isn’t for you or any game for that matter.

After you’re done all your quests in The Secret World it’s like, “Congratulations!” You’ve completed your storyline! Now go PvP!" They have dungeons but you’re pretty much locked out if you didn’t reach endgame on the first day.

You are talking about The Secret World which I have played and it became another gear treadmill WoW wannabe but it does give interesting quests and such. I really wish MMORPG"s would move away from the gear treadmill crap like GW2 did.

They also had terrible PvP farming where people just traded points. And factions just cause imbalances like in WoW (which is even worse since they have racials exclusive to races, which are in turn exclusive to faction although WoW has Isle of Conquest and Alterac Valley which are fun and SotA is sometimes).

Soulwatcher.2604:

tolunart.2095:

Soulwatcher.2604:

I have one word for you “Gem$” with out the sale of Gem$ Anet will shut this game down faster then you can blink your eye!

But the people I’m talking about refuse to loosen their grip on the credit card to pay a monthly fee. Why would they buy gems when they just want to pass the time until the next MMO release?

You’re talking about the Farmville crowd there, where a single “whale” spends enough to subsidize the game for thousands of free players. Arenanet only needs a small number of these players and they are not among the group I posted about.

I hate to break it to you they need more then a small amount to keep the game going and updated. If enough people don’t buy Gem$ then customer support, game development, and new expansions and your very own player experience will suffer!

I say they just release pay to be a pro gemstore content. I know such isn’t popular in these kinds of games and Anet devs have been on so many other games’ forums and know that pay to be a pro stores push games away… at least the gamers say so, games like Wonderland Online have outrageous pay to be a pro prices in their item mall, yet people spend (literally) hundreds there. Look up the game and its item mall.

tolunart.2095:

They complain there aren’t enough players at max level, and then when the players get there they complain the newer players are noobs.

Well excuse us for not being 14 years old and on summer vacation lol!

Again, I’ve seen some beautiful leather armor on female characters and on males understated. I particularly like the hat with the feather in it ^_^

Chocobo.3950:

The medium armour sets are pretty much all trechcoat with long pants. The only set that actually looks decent imo are the inquest dungeon set but dungeon armour takes forever to grind.

Actually the only armour with decent stats and reasonably achieveable is the human cultural tier 2 and tier 3. They both look quite nice but not brilliant. And Tier 3 costs 120g which is just stupid.

I thought Anet said in a video "[sarcasm] i swung a sword, i swung a sword again, thats great [/sarcasm]. Then off we go to do dungeons that only gives 60 tokens per first run then 35 and then 6 or something. It costs like 1400 tokens for a full set.

Anyway, back to the point. The medium armours are ugly imo. No variety, all long coat and pants. I hope they’re not trying to release good looking armour in the gem store so we have to pay real money or grind more gold for gems to buy.

I noticed plenty of ugly armors, though my noob male armor is understated (though I don’t rally care for the pants).

On females, however, take a look at these!

The last picture is my thief.

Zenith.1234:

Guild Wars 2 a PvP game? Lmfao. I think people really need to sit back and actually read the details on the game or any MMORPG game. Not one MMORPG is a PvP game. All MMORPG’s are pure PvE with tacked on PvP.

Also this game is amazing and it is unreal of the amount of things to do. If you get bored and can’t find anything and actually bum-rushed the game in 1 week then maybe this game isn’t for you or any game for that matter.

After you’re done all your quests in The Secret World it’s like, “Congratulations!” You’ve completed your storyline! Now go PvP!" They have dungeons but you’re pretty much locked out if you didn’t reach endgame on the first day.

Zeph.5740:

I know its a PVP game. I dont have a problem with that at all. I really dont.

PVP in this game is boring….do you not think so? Like I said, WvW is something I had high hopes for but really its nothing more than multiple packs of zergs running from point to point. You cant do anything on your own which makes it feel like you dont have a choice.

Its not a matter of PVE vs PVP because I have played League of Legends for years, so I do enjoy PVP. Its just that something is missing in GW2 and I cant quite put my finger on what it is.

Are you seriously telling me that you enjoy endgame in GW2 to the point where you log in and still play it for hours?

Have you actually tried PvP or are you just chicken?

I got a celestial dye from the forge and used it on my elementalist. But yeah most of the green dyes I put in there just return other greens mostly.

I remember entire teams fighting the shark in Bloodtide coast. I also soloed the hunter skillpoint veteran as Earth (DoT kiting to avoid their poison and after using whirlpool twice), which was tough as my usual wind.

The only issue I have with underwater is whirlpool’s really long CD and mob density.

I actually find elementalist strong underwater. Whirlpool is an “I win” button against packs of mobs so enjoy it while you can before they nerf it. Also, wind is really strong for single target damage if you’re willing to stand toe to toe in melee range so all three bolts hit the target, but if you need to kite then earth is great since it has a skill where you could stack up to 9 bleeds so they get damaged while you stall them. It’s great vs. veterans because they have higher HP or anything with a high armor rating.

Dopplegangr.9678:

tolunart.2095:

“I don’t play X any more” does not mean death. It means you choose to spend your money elsewhere. How many MMOs have actually shut down all their servers and closed up within six months of release? A year?

I’d say pretty much every MMO besides WoW is dead. I don’t know anyone that still plays AoC, Rift, Aion, Tera, SWTOR, etc. I’m guessing the same will be true for GW2 soon.

Keep dreaming, Blizzard spy. Some games just get old and die, some just atrociously manage and design their levels (in addition to SWTOR’s bug and homogenization problems) while not being graphically spectacular but still feeling like the latest Crysis on max settings and taking forever to load screens even with the latest SSD. However, GW2 is much better than that. The hype for GW2 comes from the grassroots whereas SWTOR paid for its own hype and ratings. Sure GW2 has problems (paying to rez and common world mobs with bleed, pull, slowdown, and knockback while others transfer conditions while having a too potent for a lifesteal lifesteal, WTH?) but those will be worked out. This isn’t an EA game.

There are times to kite, kite stalling to wait for heal to get off CD, and times to stand there while the mob hits you in your own area damage fire =) Mob placement means that sometimes kiting just isn’t viable. Some mobs’ ranged abilities such as chaos storm are a godsend since you could magnetic shield it back to them (sadly, most of your damage vs. those particular risen will come from the risen itself).

In some places autorunning with the camera zoomed behind you is viable (so you could dodge pullbacks from behind), but mobs are so dense in Orr it’s not typically viable there. Sometimes you have to kite and CC champions so your friends could get a skillpoint while they take turns so you could get one.

TL;DR: kiting has many uses, yet kiting isn’t always viable or optimal. This of course written from an elementalist’s perspective.

brickforlife.1364:

I will definitely wear pink, If I can get my hands on some of that dye, if I can’t I’ll spend up to 1 gold buying it.
Got humiliation, hotpink and pink ice and rocking it.

Try cotton candy. It’s one of my favorite dyes. I like it to replace ancient silver (my serious color) to make my character more whimsical on occasion (though keeping the celestial dye on usually):

I agree, we should fight cancer, since cancer is bad and effects people of all races, ages, and genders. (Yes the lack of a specific body part before “cancer” is intentional).

Can Asura segways be added if mounts are ever implemented?

Algreg.3629:

the system really needs some adjustment, I find myself using skills I usually don´t like much exclusively to loottag in zerg events (flamethrower in my case, which lets me AOE-tag continously), I bet it is the same for many players. When people have to switch to skills that are neither effective nor fun for them just to have a chance for loot, it seems wrong.

Yes! Exactly! Other people and I have been saying this right along. I remember being in the Bloodtide Coast event with the frog guy gathering eggs and dedicating myself to heals and slowdowns (because the ice field slowdown is useful for these mobs who love to run around and scatter), and only got bronze for it (and only got a medal at all by using icicle of armor reduction) -_-

Maybe not a guardian, but I saw one swing a sword and abunch of mobs being blown back. Maybe it was someone behind him.

ErzaScarlet.2386:

to put it simply
eles are glass cannon without the cannon

Usually, but we completely wreck underwater with cyclone. We basically pull mobs around us into a vacuum of high AoE damage, like over 1000 damage per tick, and that’s not even a critical! It is on a very long CD though -_-

So yeah other than our elites we’re pretty weak.

I think unlimited levels would be awesome and content scales dynamically like Dragon kitten’s villain progression. Like they fight Raditz first, but he’s terribly weak compared to much later villains. Our character, like Goku, Vegita, etc., should increase in power. No, I don’t just mean wear stronger weapons, I mean get stronger.

bojangles.6912:

If Vanilla WoW was out this year I will bet anyone $89753977 it would win GOTY over GW2 or any mmo.

When Sylvanas looked like a goofy night elf… are you kdding me?! And vanilla WoW and even current WoW have no active dodge or level content scaling.

"

It’s all subjective but my pick is human males for heavy armor.
For me Norn look comically large, almost like a parody of masculinity, like a teenage boy would choose or someone overcompensating for other “shortcomings”.
Charr look like big kittens.
Just my 2 copper."

My next character will definitely either be a Norn guardian or Charr engineer. I remember playing a Charr in beta, it was fun although moving felt a tad slow -_- Besides, I like the big kitten look! :D While we all love humanish looking cat people like that race in Final Fantasy MMOs I’ll still give GW2 bonus points for making Charr truly cat people.

Today I used flaming greatsword and aimed the number 3 in the right direction at the right moment then proceeded to spam 1. I got so much loot from that and I thought, “Geez! This is probably what the big sword guys get every wave!” Since the elite skill is on a short CD it’s try to predict where the mobs will be next, use meteor shower or lava ground, and hope for the best -_- Oh, and guardians who use that obnoxious spread them out skill are especially bad, hard to tap many mobs when they’re blown out of your AoE circle so I have to quickly switch over to air for the bouncing lightning to even stand a chance.

Some unspoken etiquette of these events should be:

1. Only let mesmers pick up a flaming greatsword (the caster gets one automatically so two people can have them if one person casts it)

2. No using skills that blow out of AoEs and try fighting in the player fire.
It’s really sad and I even did a post here on it the other day.

Yes, but there are ways to deal such as laying down an AoE field when he commits to his knockdown animation. For risen downward swing means knockdown.

ostracize.8316:

I want to make a warrior for random smashy feelings. I already have a Charr Necromancer (male) and a human Engineer (female). Which race and sex do you think looks the best in heavy armor?

I’m hoping to avoid doubling up on race. I have tried to like Norn but their story makes me angry (I hate alcohol). Asura seems to small and hard to look “cool”, and Sylvari are weird, which could be cool, or could be uncool.. So, those of you who use heavy armor, who looks the coolest? (Race and Gender)

Oh yeah? I know it’s light armor, but I still look kewl ^_^

Yes, and 3.5-4 seconds of knockdown is excessive. Pullbacks are what’s especially bad, though those can be dodged but the game needs further camera zooming so we can see what’s coming from behind.

Legendaries would like a word with you.

Note, this isn’t a "mounts please! :D "thread, but what I’d like to see if they’re implemented:

Mounts could be obtained in many ways:

-Rare spawn (yes expect camping lol!)

-gold, and

-achievements (retroactively given if you already obtain the achievement before the mount too just to be fair)

-Dungeon drops

-PvP token reward

Now on to the cosmetic part:

Mounts would be dolyeks, unicorns, drake-like creatures that scale with character’s size, and of course, winged unicorns ^_^ But, those would be rare. Mounts could also be recolored using dyes (rare only and having at least one would be a prerequisite to having one), so a unicorn’s horn may be one color, mane another, and body fur another color while simpler mounts may have fewer coloring spots while more complex will have more spots to be dyed.

Mounts would also activate unique skills and have unique mechanics, and not be usable underwater. Underwater weapons would be mount weapons but have different skills. Warriors and guardians also get lances. An elementalist riding one would have their mount go faster if attuned to wind (and also have an active boon that makes everyone around them move faster, in and out of combat) while attuned to earth be much harder to knock off and have higher defense.

This, all the way through.

“You can’t kite some of them with speed either as they will just run right up to your face and force you into melee.”

I have many strategies as an elementalist, and can kite many of the melee mobs fine enough despite their speed. I’ll stand next to a ranged, earth shield the chaos storm thrower mobs, and as fire stand in my AoE lava field since you can’t kite that which has the same range as you. Problem with Orr though is some mobs run away and back, and a mob in combat getting near a mob not in combat will pull that mob into combat with them =( It’s what I really hated about bandits and krayt too.