Guild Wars 2

I truly tought the medium armor was going to receive the shorter stick in the legendary set.
Amusingly I don’t found it so hideous as I imagined it would be (Light one gets the honor of being the most incredibly ugly one right now). Also, I must say the mere fact that medium boots have toes for asura fills me with a sad joy. We have so few toe-able boots…

I think mix and match will be the great savior for these things. Gloves and boots seems quite decent, maybe some pants are useable too. We’ll see.

I… honestly don’t like them. Maybe the heavy, just a little (But I don’t really play heavy armor professions).

However, I’m at least gladly surprised the medium one has boots WITH TOES for Asura. Boot with toes are SO RARE! I don’t think I would ever use the coat, but I’d like to have the boots, and maybe the gauntlets.

Heavy is very typical but passable for me. Medium is surprisingly less ugly than I expected it to be… although, still a weird trenchcoat. Light has a circus tent on the rear and a muzzle on the face: Astonishingly repulsive for me.

Better add a new emote with the pom-poms included.

Aquiring more emotes would motive me to do treasure hunts WAY MORE than any legendary weapon.

OriOri.8724:

Considering this is the English forum, its fair to say that Americans are a fair number of the people who would be on here, and there would be very few Chinese citizens.

Well, if we struggle to be accurate, most americans aren’t USA citizens either…

Come on. We all know is Tybalt.

Quora Novus?! Niiice.

Mysteries needs to advance and give way to new depths, or they stagnate. IMO theyshould use the Wizards Tower for something, and then tie that something to a new, equally intriguing but fresh mystery.

The problem is not the origin itself, but the effect that origin had in the end, when applied over the “reality”.

An world that lets you put in it centaurs, humans with wings, talking bears and giant ants with tentacles without any reasoning behind except “god made them that way” is fundamentally different from a “big bang” that set a bunch of basic rules that must be fulfilled by every aspect of the universe. Note this big bang CAN be an almighty divinity, whose intervention create rules that then shape the world (See Sanderson’s Mistborn series for an amazing example) and the former loose universe CAN be “sciency” (All cheap scifi is like this: unable to make real sense because lack of basic rules. See most industry superhero stories).

And Greyhawk: yes, I know Tolkien was making an tribute/imitation of nordic and christian mythology. As such tribute and reference, his Silmarillion is amazing. However, mythology reason to be is to explain phenomena and recommend behavior. Strip it from that, and it falls too easily into a mere stylistic exercise. That’s what Tolkien work is for me: an amazing, utterly detailed, really well done stylistic excercise. As wordlbuilding, it lacks good, consistent and relevant rules. As story, it lacks structure and rhythm.
That he was christian explain his choices. It doesn’t make his world structuring any less “easy”.

TBD doesn’t mean “we are taking our time”. TBD means “we don’t know what to do here yet”.

Druid and Scrapper were made by the same developer. While Druid was well discussed with the dev, got a lot of player feedback and saw a bunch of changes before release, Scrapper was shown at the last possible minute, and got NOT even 1 adjustment before the launch of HoT.

The dev promised to see if something could be done to improve the Scrapper spec mechanic in the future. Apparently, nothing, because then the communication ended, to never be reestablished again.

To this day, nothing has been done to improve FGyro value on PvE, gyro’s pathing and IA. Scrapper’s trait line synergy with the rest of the profession is the only thing that has seen some work, always attached to nerfs.

So… yes. I think we do get the shorter stick.

Great advice, Coro!

Lets call it “dumb hope”, then.

It will still be closer to the 3 months than the 2 months, isn’t it?

Communication is key for every project, bussiness and endeavor in our world. In this case, to communicate doesn’t mean to obey or to blindly accept anything the players ask, but simply to let them know what is the plan, and to actually hear what they have to say about it, an then keep the best of the feedback.

IMO the absolute silence strategy Anet is using is very safe for the short term, but is very probably going to explode later: nobody can complain about what they don’t know. Once they know the surprise, even the smallest flaw will be incredibly hard to hide and fix, and the reaction will be absurdly exaggerated.

I would really prefer they solve these basic bunch of bugs and QOL gaps before they even announce the next Expac.
IMO Keyring and more intelligent Wallet are bigger priorities than Build Saving. And I’m assuming the second Expac WILL have the option to save Builds…

SlippyCheeze.5483:

Ardid.7203:

I usually let them accumulate in the right bottom, bouncing and all, so I can look at them later, without worrying about getting my inventory full in the middle of a long mission. A “consume all” option in that zone would be great for me.

They actually auto-accept already after four chests build up, as far as I can tell. FWIW, in case you wonder why it’s not quite doing what you would expect.

I haven’t revised lately, but I know I have had as many as 8 bouncy chests there. You’ll never see more than 3, but if you open one of them, the 4th will appear in its place (and so on).

SAB is totally different from Raids. SAB can be soloed, doesn’t require coordination between a bunch of people, doesn’t gate any relevant lore, is only temporary content, don’t require specific builds or professions, and do not have a dedicated grup of devs investing time and resources in it.

If Raids were like SAB, people would probably still complain, but not as seriously as now.

If Raids were just a seasonal joke, maybe it would be a bit more acceptable for they to be accesable only to a group.

I usually let them accumulate in the right bottom, bouncing and all, so I can look at them later, without worrying about getting my inventory full in the middle of a long mission.
A “consume all” option in that zone would be great for me.

Vanilla GW2 needs a better (higher) intermediate difficulty to get people into HoT difficulty.
Raids needs a better (lower) intermediate difficulty to get people into Raiding.

Is not that hard to understand: the jumps in difficulty are too sharp, dividing the community intead of unifying it.

Is GW2 better with raids? is it worse? It is hard to know without real numbers. But the community has suffered a lot because of them, and that is undenyable.

It bothers me too. I think they just clasiffy the maps according to the seasons/expacs, and not geographically. It make sense from a money point of view, although for a player point of view is rather weird.

The work of worldbuilding Tolkien did was really amazing, specially when we took in account his time. I don’t think LOTR or the silmarillion are cheap as fiction works (I’ll always consider LOTR an example of a fine story horribly told, but that is another topic). Quenya alone is an incredibly, awe inspiring creation.

However, the choice to justify everything through an all knowing, all powerful, subjective yet unarguable being, allowing he world to not respond to any economic, biologic or simply “logic” rule, is, by definition, convenient, and therefore, cheap.

I do think I could create something at least close if I had the resources. I don’t know if I could do really better… but I’m sure I’ll work my back until breaking it just to make sure it is not “convenient”.

Maybe horses were too sensitive to magic fluctuation and died when the first dragon began to move again. From the population point of view, horses suffered from a sudden and mortal desease. And… thats all I can think right now.

CaptainVanguard.4925:

Is Accessiblity.

Getting into raiding once your in it isnt hard, once you’ve found a good static, or people good enough to get you into a decent training guild/training run regieme you can genuinely get through raiding fine, the difficulty isnt as hard as some might be afraid to think it is.

Id say the challenge of most raids is on par with normal mode world of warcraft for those familiar with the concept, as a comparison for refference, its accessably dooable and hell some of it can even be done with mostly exotics though id still recommend having at least ascended armor/weapons before investing into raiding, maybe a backpack too.

I would however admit, that it took me a while, like, a whole year and then some to finally “find” someone willing to take me on, Im not a confident person, the group im with though, they’re awesome, some of the best, genuinley.

And as times gone on, we went from clearing maybe 3 bosses a week, to literally clearing the entire raid, a week.

We’ve even recently done CM Cairne, I got the eternal title, working on slip-slub, is it achievable? Yes, is it hard, quite probably yes.

Now I will say again, the accessiblity can be demanding, I find alot of pug raids demand a rediculas number of LI’s even if you clearly have done some of the harder achievements in the game which honestly makes it obnoxious.

My proposal to A-net is something akin to a soft LFR like wow. My suggestion essentially is this, a tutorial mode much like how everyone keeps asking for story mode.

Tutorial mode would essentially be the beginners guide to raiding, much like how we have CM and current normal, tutorial mode would be designed for people more interested in the story, but also be designed to give you a much “much” easier time getting “into” raids for the first time.

My idea for this works as follows:

Tutorial motes are similar to challenge motes, but instead of blue glowing motes, you get a green glowing one.

When tutorial mode is activated, the damage the boss deals is significantly nerfed, and the boss enrage timer is made alot longer.

However, in this mode it is literally impossible to get raid rewards from the bosses, but you can however get mastery contribution, aswell as a very MINOR amount of mag shards, were talking maybe…, 2-3 per boss.

Some might say this would make raiding completley Irelevent but I disagree, this is “the” compramise raiding needs, because now, you have no excuse. Accessability via tutorial mode would give people the means to get into raiding, much like infantile mode to SAB. It would be designed to help you START the experience, and help unfamilair players do the bosses for the first time.

Tutorial mode would also extend to the training ground, which could be accessed now een without a squad, tutorial mode basically allows you to familiarize yourself with your class, and the general role your speicalizatoin favors such as Chronomancer Tanks, Druid Healers, etc etc.

By training people with an automated system we can essentially remove the need for trianing groups and eventially have everyone more or less ready for raiding in no time. I say keep the current difficulty, and CM, but add a training mode, to help new players who want to get into raiding for the first time.

I would definitely try this mode to enter into Raids. No rewards is fine by me, the problem has always been pure accesibility.

Absolutely subjective, anecdotically devised, “simple” solutions I would like to see:

- Rifle is strongly and smartly buffed. (For example, when Overcharged Shot is reflected it reflects the damage, but not the knockback effect.)
- Shield is strongly and smartly buffed. (CDs are reduced.)
- A new, decent and versatile mainhand weapon is added. (Ok, not simple, but not that horrible either)
- Gadgets are polished for “purity of purpose”, balanced and buffed. (For example, Rocket Boots become a pure movement skill: stop doing damage, but evade and move a farther).
- Kits aren’t utility skills anymore. Instead, you select a toolbelt slot and allocate the kit there, replacing the former toolbelt skill you had previously. (The kit “cost” you a toolbelt skill, and don’t give you a toolbelt skill either. You win a space in the utilities for a gadget, giro or elixir).

AI behavior should be more varied and more natural. For some mobs, it should mean to fly or hide after the first attack, and you should chase them (And they probably should be faster than you). For other mobs, it should mean they become extremely agressive, like it is now for almost all creatures. For others it should mean they try to get help or make a last run, or even that they try to make a final, kamikaze attack that really hurt.

The point is: Variety is good.

Xillllix.3485:

Ardid.7203:

The new system is good enough, IMO. The older system wasn’t bad either, but it was a nightmare to balance.

THE PROBLEM IS THEY STILL CAN’T BALANCE THE CURRENT ONE.

The old trait system balanced itself much better because the stats were attached to the trait lines.

You couldn’t for example put all your stats in healing and then use offensive trait lines. If you used all the traits from an offensive trait lines then you needed to take 300 away from 2 different defensive stats.

That’s not what we usually call balance. I was not talking about keeping all stats of a char in a similar value, but in the very real necesity of avoiding both OP and useless builds, in the strategy to make all professions similarly capable of fighting against environment foes and between themselves.

The stats fixed to traits lines were IMO one of the worst qualities of the old system, precisely because that LOWERED build diversity.

You need to also consider that Tyria IS NOT MODERN, FIRST WORLD EARTH.

During most of humanity’s history, and in fact, in many places all over the world even today, young people do need, want and have to take responsibility over their lives and the lives of others, often puting themselves at risk. 17 years old people go to work, take care of their families, go to war, have children. Many of them do a terrific job we should be grateful for. It is not good by our standards, it can be extremely cruel and heartbreaking, but it is real.

With 17 years on her life, if Taimi were a real human she will not be even close to an infant. She’s on the fringe of adulthood in a lot of modern societies, and well over the age of motherhood in most historic societies.

So, yes, she’s quite young, by our modern, first world standards. But I don’t think Tyria can be considered that similar to our own place. Please remember the most ancient of the oldest Sylvari today has only 26 years… Tyrians can’t be judged by the same rules as us.

Gorani.7205:

It is just natural that you would tend to agree with Woodenpotatoes on some parts and to some extend and disagree with him on other parts.
Therefore I just want to address only two of his statements

1. Raids being awesome

As a casual player with a full time job (unlike Woodenpotaoes, who’s full time job is to dedicate his time to Youtube/Twitch and GW2 content, IIRC), Raids have been nothing I was looking forward to and would rate significant for the vast majority of players. It is a niche aspect of the game, that is bound to specific times to play (organization of the team, fairly long game time to finish without a pause etc.) , very specific build & group composition and a very complex game play.
For such a small part of the game, the actual (and perceived) Dev time devoted to it was huge and general PvE and QoL updates + balancing seem to have been set to a lower priority. This has contributed to the “content drought”.

2. Character bound masteries

I agree that masteries should matter more and the acquisition was gated behind some strange walls and concepts, but character bound masteries would be a nightmare for me. The fun of the unlocking process will never outweigh the repetitiveness of getting MPs on each character and gaining XP for levelling up that mastery.

Couldn’t agree more, Gorani. +1.

Short bow for engie: think on Hawkeye trick arrows , with explosives, electricity, sonic effect and the like, but every one has a different timed effect. If you get to make the timed effects happen at the same time, you get another, extra effect, which varies depending on how you combine them.

The new system is good enough, IMO. The older system wasn’t bad either, but it was a nightmare to balance.

THE PROBLEM IS THEY STILL CAN’T BALANCE THE CURRENT ONE.

My commander is not military. She worked with the pact and took some responsabilities related to combat and soldiers, and she also knows how to kill all kind of creatures. But she was not trained as a militar, doesn’t truly care about militar structure, and doesn’t have any moral limitation asociated to such organization (or any other moral limitation, to be honest)

She’s an explorer and a mercenary, totally ruthless and without time to spare.

SoTaimi has a physical problem and is regarder as a youngling by her people? But she is also a readily available genius interested in killing dragons that seems able to defend herself as long as she is not in the middle of a battle?

WHATEVER WORKS.

Why would Kormir disguise herself as Lazarus? So GW1 fans don’t try to kill her?

I confess I still can’t understand how people can value quantity over quality so much.

All the 4 initial HoT maps are incredibly beautiful, the only one I feel was lacking in content is Dragon Stand. The other three are just amazingly complex, full of tasks to do, lore-bits, npcs, stories and dialogues, challenging enemies, exploration puzzles, easter eggs, coordinated metas, etc. They are simply superior to any other “map” in the MMORPG market afaik.

In other thread someone used the correct word: Some people seems to be interested, not in all the fun things you can do in a map, but in mere “Landmass”. I can’t understand it.

The only thing the Papaya Report says about Engineer is “NO INFO”
Sadly, I think this make it a very fiable resource… :_(

Amaimon.7823:

Ardid.7203:

Amaimon.7823:

Ardid.7203:

More fractals, less raids. It doesn’t matter wich one is easier. It matter which one is more accesible.

I just don’t feel a 5 man instance can do justice to the Prime Hologram

I agree, however, in that case I prefer it to be plainly zerg-able, not tightly coordinated 10 people challenge, simply because coordinating 10 players is a giant pain.

If its going to be hard, please make it for no more than 5 people.

Because coordinating 10 people is hard? then how have hundreds and thousands of 10 man groups been doing fine in raids so far? I’m not saying the instance needs to be as hard as the current raids, just do the boss some justice

That many people has the fortune to have the time, ping and proper contacts to coordinate 10 man raids effectively doesn’t mean everyone have it. (Also there is an opinion trend that claims raiders are a small minority in the game, but since we don’t have real numbers, its better to not go there at all: we just don’t know if raids are popular or not, and if you know for sure how many people are raiding, it would be great if you share your source). Your experience is not the same as other people.

So intead of comparing subjective experiences, let’s keep it simple: Coordinating 10 people is harder than coordinate 5, which is also harder than not coordinating at all. Raid difficulty is clearly higher than map bosses, and is clear some people can’t raid.

So it doesn’t matter if someone think raids are easy. They are still harder than 5 man basic content, and harder than open world bosses, and less accesible. If you want to make something accesible by most people, you can’t propose raids as the model to follow.

IMO the “LA guild mission” is a good idea, as also is the “LA fractal”. I don’t think we need more raids that seems to divide people instead of include everyone.

PS: Also a question out of pure curiosity: do you use any voice communication system to coordinate raids?

The problem is no matter how old and wise your hair looks, your voice will always be an unsuitable sweet and pure greenhorn’s one.

In other words: it is NOT an outfit. Its mix and match armor.

All I can say is the Scrapper was beta-tested only 2 days, and only at the end, just before the release of the Expac, when any change to the elite spec was already impossible to do. The feedback about the new mechanics, the AI, pathing and trait synergy for the elite spec was overwhelming, very clear, smart and loving, but it was completely “scrapped” due to lack of time (or interest from Anet?).

I love HoT, but the way they treated Engie still hurts my feelings and my reason. It was wrong and insulting.

So Hype is not as relevant to me as timely comunication and proper participation of the community. Please don’t make hype without participation again.

Amaimon.7823:

Ardid.7203:

More fractals, less raids. It doesn’t matter wich one is easier. It matter which one is more accesible.

I just don’t feel a 5 man instance can do justice to the Prime Hologram

I agree, however, in that case I prefer it to be plainly zerg-able, not tightly coordinated 10 people challenge, simply because coordinating 10 players is a giant pain.

If its going to be hard, please make it for no more than 5 people.

More armor skins are always good.

Male Sylvari also got the shoulder elephantiasis syndrome.

The problem with HoT is people alerted about a lot of problems BEFORE Anet even publish the expac. They hyped, they showed, they received feedback, they barely took that feedback into account, then the failures were just what the feedback screamed about.

This is what made the most damage: to not complete the product, to not hear the critics on time, and to get out in the proper date, without the proper quality.

Amaimon.7823:

…
But I can understand a loathe for a specific race, even if it is without a clear reason. I absolutely DESPISE the quaggans and as soon as one is involved in the story, I no longer feel it’s a serious or real part of the story. Like you can just skip it and the story wouldn’t change. There were a few in the WinterFrontier, but luckily I only had to talk to 1 and could then ignore them for the rest of my life.
It’s like someone threw away an old design that didn’t make sense, and a dev walked past the bin and thought “hey, who threw a perfectly fine and usable race away” as he took his fifth bottle of rum and swiggled into his office

I tend to feel that about humans. Its a real pain.

Please remeber me when you are directed to Bennet, I’m interested in play that part again.

More fractals, less raids. It doesn’t matter wich one is easier. It matter which one is more accesible.

Hype is only good when accompanied with real, permanent and active communication with the player base. Creating hype over something people will not be able to properly test, help to develop and actually change if needed is just a straight path to frustration.

I would love if they begin sharing the development of the new expansion early, but only if I can support the proccess closely, actually influencing it in some way.

IMO true, active, well planned participation is the only way to avoid some mistakes, like those HoT suffered the most (Power creep, incomplete ideas, non-popular systems, badly balanced difficulty, etc). However, if they aren’t going to go all the way with this, I prefer them to anounce any change as close as possible to the actual release.

As long as they add more content to guild missions, I’ll support.

Best way to tackle this problem is to travel to Orr or Fireheart by just walking. I did something like this for my 2 last characters, and it was much more rewarding, fun and challenging to level them.

Something like this?
Man-at-arms’s minecraft sword