Guild Wars 2

So I hope that with this post I perhaps cleared up why, in my first few posts, I set these very strict and limited examples for ‘Full balance’ and ‘perfect imbalanced’ games. By going back to the bare minimum and baseline for these two different approaches, there is at least some firm ground to look at GW2 skill-system.

Now where it becomes more difficult, is in the details, incomparables offer a way to give each class a unique feature, or skill-option. Incomparable, by default suggests that you can not compare them. Like ‘apples and oranges’, personally I do not agree with this mind-set. The name may have been better as ‘uniqueness’ instead of incomparable. Because in my view everything can be compared, to anything, sometimes resulting in the conclusion they are entirely different and in no way shape or form ‘the same’, but that just means they are unique when compared to each other, and not ‘incomparable’ (as you just compared them to conclude they were unique)

As far as games go, the ‘uniqueness’ features add in a lot of spice, but as they are unique they are ‘by default’ number-imbalanced, mainly because you can not express them in numbers, and the balance is to be determined by ‘feel’. This by default means that you are speaking of a ‘perfect imbalanced’ game format, and not a ‘symmetric full balanced game’. This then has implications for these unique features as well. Mainly ‘counters’, or ‘equal but equally unique options’, and in some cases limited access to the same feature.

Because without these things you can not achieve the feel of balance for the system as a whole. This is most apparent with the Thief in my views, if there were enough counters to deal with stealth, then even perma stealth wouldn’t be such a big problem. It’s the lack of counters to stealth that makes it such an issue for a lot of players. A similar thing happens with the Ranger and Pets, the pets aren’t really the actual problem, nor will better AI or even full control ever solve the issue entirely, the issue is that you can NOT work around it, the uniqueness is the weakness at the same time, and the ranger is unique in that too. Obviously when comparing the ‘incomparables’ of the professions, the Rangers feel ‘kittened’.

So to conclude, the two things I had been comparing with each other were basically baseline concepts , which (whether you like it or not) have consequences on how you view GW2 and how to judge it’s game mechanics and thus it’s balance. The reason why incomparables were not included at first, was because they are a further details of mainly ‘perfectly imbalanced’ games. As such, I hadn’t come to them yet, because I found it more important to ‘at first’ make it clear what ‘full balance’ means, how it pertains to choice, and what implications it has for uniqueness and profession profiles and roles.

Now that it is pretty much established that GW2 is not a ‘full balance’ game, it means we can look at how ‘perfectly imbalanced’ it is, and or where it is a ‘hybrid’. Although I fear that there is no such thing as a hybrid, even ‘perfect imbalanced’ games have ‘equal and thus ’full balance’ rules sets in which the ‘imbalance’ takes place as a game system. Incomparables are part of the ‘imbalance’ systems, and as such should be accompanied by counters, and/or alternatives.

Hope that makes it more clear

Hiya Vox, let me start off by saying I did not experience your comment as insulting, but the way you put things down without ‘maybes’ felt provocative, which if not cleared up could easily turn into an argument instead of a discussion. I am glad that you are here to discuss and increase the understanding of balance issues, instead of fight over who’s right or wrong … I am also glad you took the time to elaborate your statement, it clears up some things I didn’t quite get early this morning (although that may also have been caused by the state of my brain ).

So yes, I fully agree, there is more to this then merely ‘full balance’ and ‘perfect imbalance’. Especially if you zoom in closer to the professions and their abilities. That is also why I mention that GW2 could/might be somewhat of a hybrid between the two.

Where you get me wrong (or maybe I worded it poorly) is on the point of variety and balance, and consequently I do not agree with you (or maybe I read it wrong) is that they do not go hand in hand.

Example, I played FPS games b4 the whole ‘perk unlock’ state of them, and in that era FPS games were (if not totally, then at least very close) ‘full balance’ games, but with a high variety. See at first everybody had the same character, armour options, and amount of weapon/nade slots; then all the weapons were fully balanced but varied, and I am sure that if you were to look at the numbers, the berretta (a really fast shooting/low calibre/low recoil-pistol), was DPS full balanced, against the Desert eagle (slower shooting/large calibre/med recoil-pistol). And even for most of the automatic rifles the same things applied. This kind of game was a full balance game with a decent amount of variety.

Obviously the same thing could be realised in an RPG, slow hitting weapons vs. fast hitting ones vs conditions over time, all doing the same DPS in different ways. Even though the full balance may not be entirely apparent, the ‘choice’ you have as a player is pretty much non existent, as you would be choosing between equal things. And this is not said to say GW2 is like this, I opt. this more of as baseline for ‘full balance’ RPGs, and to make clear how it is a full balance game without any real choice, for as far as professions go.

The part where there are no calculation in play here either, is because the calculations give the same results. Or rather they should give the same results, because they should result in balance (between the variety).

The other ‘baseline’ is the baseline of the ‘perfect imbalance’ game, games like Magic The Gathering or GW1. Which have a limiting balanced rule-set (f/e deck size, hand size, play stages for magic; or skillbar, runes/insignas, weapon-setup for GW1), but besides that have a ‘perfectly imbalanced’ play system. All the individual cards/skills are ‘perfectly imbalanced’ against each other, and the limiting rule-set then should balance things out, there are also a lot of different skills, set weaknesses and strengths, and counters.

Here also the ‘imbalance’ is based upon the numbers, but instead of balancing each skill against the other, the balance is achieved on a larger scope. For GW1 this was largely based upon the builds running the meta, the combinations on the bar should result in a ‘balanced’ whole. With two professions one could basically have a counter against anything, but, due to the limited bar, if you were to take a counter against everything you would no longer be able to do damage.

more on incomparables in the next post

@Vox it’s 5am now so I need to sleep, but I would appreciate it if you were to add some ‘you may think’, ‘I think you may not’ … as that sounds a lot less offensive then stating you already know what I think … this issue is more fundamental, and quite different than the quarrel about nerfs and buffs. Thus in my views it needs to tackle things one at a time so more people can understand what it is about.

From what I see in your response is that you look at balance in yet another way, this is all good to me, the more input and ways to view things is great, just make sure you don’t assume that the way you view it is the only and thus right way. Incomparables is a part of the whole, and obviously I haven’t gotten to them yet, you are right that I do not entirely understand everything, but you act like incomparables is the end all, and that certainly isn’t. Unless you can explain how GW2 is solely about incomparables and everything I wrote has absolutely no merit.

The thing about balance, as far as I followed discussions about it, has always been nerfs/buffs quarrels; and whining when things didn’t get them. Yet, as this thread clearly shows, there is more to know b4 you can even decide if something needs a nerf/buff explaining that in a way that more people understand, and thus ask Anet for the right things to add to change to the game, ultimately makes a better game…

So please, enlighten me (us), while I go close my eyes and rest for later today…

As a ranger my weakness is my pet, plus low dps on anything but the longbow at long range, mainly due to my pet taking care of part of the damage… and that part of the damage is a liability …

Tnx oZii, especially that last part explains it fairly good, assuming of course ‘one’ wants a ‘perfectly imbalanced’ game. In case you want a balanced game, then denying a certain profession a certain tool creates imbalance and thus…

Now, I do not want to give any preference to any system, or even a hybrid, and I hope ppl in this discussion wont either. Sorry MarzAttackz, but I personally think that saying the dev team failed is a weird statement, as it implies that your preference is the right way… Then again, if you read the statement of Jonathan, then to an extend you can conclude GW2 is not a pure balanced game, which means it is either ‘perfectly imbalanced’ or a hybrid of sorts. For their defence, they don’t always get it right, and if you check the vid on it, it doesn’t sound very easy, so saying they failed is way to strong of a viewpoint, at least in my views.

But the post of Jonathan does make clear that GW2 is not trying to be a balanced game. This in turn makes a lot of ‘nerf this/buff this’ threads pretty useless, now sure, some clearly overly powerful skills/heals still need to be addressed. But in all honesty, for a ‘perfectly imbalanced game’ you are far better off debating the counters to certain skills. and the amount of options available, or for that matter, the amount of options available to place the options you have.

It also gives us a way to be critical towards ArenaNet, f/e, if they release another spirit that does the same thing that a certain well does, or promises to make traps into combo fields. How ever cool that is, it doesn’t give us more options, nor does it provide more or different counters, it just gives us more of what we already have. I sort of pains me to say this, but sometimes honest and true critics hurt.

How ever cool I think it would be to have other traps combo as well, there are other things to be dealt with, f/e the unclarity of thief stealth counters or maybe even the lack of them entirely. As well as the clear incapability of most mid-armours to play WvW due to zerg requirements, not having the right tools or the correct counters to survive.

It doesn’t mean that Anet did a bad job, at least not in my book, it just means their job isn’t entirely finished, and as the theoretical setup of the game is being tested by hours of playtime it shows it’s practical flaws. Yes they are flaws, but not by design, but by practical use, there is nobody to blame for the lack of coherence between theory and practice. The only thing that may be blamed is the lack of actions taken to fix the problems, or, in the case of a ‘perfect imbalanced’ game, the lack of the community finding ways to combat the imbalance.

And seeing, by words of Jonathan, and by getting a better understanding of the issue and how it pertains to GW2 by discussing it, it should be fairly clear that GW2 is somewhat of a hybrid. There is an overlap, but no total balance… still though in the overlap there should be balance where there is not a trade off. This obviously makes things slightly more difficult, we should both see that and respect that. And obviously as former lol players will know, in a perfect imbalanced game there will always be overlaps.

Still though, the realization that GW2 is a hybrid leaning on ‘perfect imbalance’ means that asking for stronger profession roles and profiles is a legit request. I also think (personally) that for being atleast somewhat of a ‘perfect imbalance’ game, GW2 should find ways to put in more skills sooner than later. Mostly pertaining counters or more diverse abilities and counters for those. These should be scattered over profession choice options in such a clever way that one can’t take all kinds of abilities, and also cannot take all counters.

Whining about abilities that have no counter, is entirely valid! Whining about not having certain abilities, is not! Which makes it somewhat weird, when looking at those statpages and the trait window! I do hope you can spot the inconsistency there. Or atleast, the room to be ‘perfectly imbalanced’ is made really small if all classes have all stats and should, in some shape or form, perform parts of large clusters of ‘abilities’ (meaning power|dps, conditions|presure or a mix there off). This may need some more in-depth scrutiny though…

Hopefully all this information is enlightening for all those here concerned about the balancing of the game, and hopefully starting to understand why some ‘concerns’ aren’t addressed at all. While at the same time, give those concerned with balance more insight in how to look at balance in GW2 and giving them more ways to address issues that may not simply be solved by a nerf or a buff, because their mechanic needs to be addressed by something like a counter instead.

I know right, I myself am glad I finally got to write this down in a format that seems to do justice to the complications. Even though, tbh, I myself have yet to thoroughly comprehend the implications, in part I wrote this to explain the difficulties ArenaNet faces with balance, aka balance being equality which in turn put a huge burden on diversity and choice.

In the end though, I think I toughed a deeper issue, the implications of either way, or even determining which kind of game GW2 is, has implications on how the professions should work. And what sort of game you envision has huge implications of what you ask for in regards of balance, f/e:

We largely see, ‘buff this’/‘nerf this’ discussions, now if the game would be a perfect balanced game, then these buf/nerf discussions would be over fairly quickly with the right math. Atleast given that the premisis of ‘balance’ is agreed upon. F/e all weapons of all professions need to be balanced around a set of ‘DPS + Counter or Buff or Condition’ set. Meaning, all weapons should be capable of doing say 100 DPs, in 5 skills, Have 1 counter to w/e or a buff’. Given that all weapons meet this requirement, we can say they are balanced. Any weapons that clearly violate this premise should be nerved, or buffed.

On the other hand, if we have an ‘perfectly imbalanced’ game, instead of asking for nerfs, we may well be needing to ask for Counters or buffs instead. The clearest example is Thief/Stealth: in a balanced game we should either be asking for similar skills for all classes, or the removal of stealth as an unbalanced mechanic entirely. In a more ‘perfectly imbalanced game’ we should not ask for nerfs, we should be demanding enough counters! And rightfully so the thief community should be asking for more options besides stealth to survive.

The issue sort of goes down to the core of the game mechanic, and while the preference for the kind of game is purely that ‘preference’, a choice has profound implication for the game as a whole. If GW2 is some sort of hybrid, then we need to figure out where this hybridity is, so that we can more clearly make suggestions about the balance. Or in case it turns out GW2 is one or the other, we can clearly identify the shortcomings to adhering to the system-requirements of that mechanic. (most clearly, I think, that for a ‘perfect imbalanced’ game, GW2 has way to few spells and counters. On the other hand, if it is a balanced game, then clearly it has to many imbalances. Or the premise of balance is far to unclear to the player.

A while back I have commented on this discussion with the promise to come back to it at a later moment. I have read the thread in part and decided to make another kind of post first. This is because the whole deal of balance has me pondering about implications of ‘balance’ and thus what balance should be or could be, and as a consequence what would be good/bad for GW2.

This thread has implications for this topic, but is a more ‘general balance’ discussion or rather, a more profound discussion on ‘what type of balance’ we are after. It also has implications on which kind of balance suggestions we should be asking for, and which kind of suggestions we can expect to be honoured.

Seeing I experienced the ranger community as respectful and thoughtful, I think I should link to this tread, also because it has some implications for the subject.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/balance/Balance-Diversity-vs-Equality-and-Choice/first#post3516297
please take some time to let the OP sink in, this isn’t the kind of ‘nerf this/buf that’ kind of discussion, but more of a ‘what is balance’ or ‘what do we want it to be’ thread. Very basic yet at the same time very deep and profound. Hopefully the thread can contribute to this discussion, and others, and make the result of the effort better, as well as make GW2 better.

Seeing I do not have the answers either, I will wait for the discussion to take off, and perhaps formalize to some conclusion, after which I think it will be easier to analyse the Ranger and make some justified suggestions for change.

Ever since I started to think about balance, I wanted to propose inherent problems with balance. By definition balance means equality, a balance scale (the real life object) is actually set up to achieve equality in weight of an unknown weight of an object to a known weight…

So, when I hear people ask about a better balanced game while at the same time people ask for a stronger profession profile and better roles, I somewhat cringe. Still though, it is also somehow the way I view professions (in roles and profession profile), while at the same time wanting a balanced game so my choice to play X doesn’t mean I will suck or be frowned upon for making the choice to go with profession X.

It’s also a profound dilemma of game designers, how to achieve balance (aka. equality) on the one hand, but also foster diversity, so that I give my players a valid choice on how to play the game. And I think that understanding and discussing these issues should be part of this ‘profession balance forum’.

I am not sure where to take this discussion, but have found a way to clarify some of the issues and hopefully get some meaningful dialogue about this topic, and a place to start. I went to the internet and dug up some ‘extra credit’ video’s, now I was hoping to find a video on this exact topic, but there wasn’t one :P

Now they did make a vid that came close to this issue, and I will start of by linking to that, it has nothing to do with creating balance though, quite the opposite:
Perfect Imbalance: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e31OSVZF77w
The question is now, is GW2 a game that falls into this category (GW1 did) and if it has the tools and elements that make GW2 a perfect imbalanced game.

It also points out some ‘problems’ with balanced games (2:05), the interesting part of this example is the mention of ‘changed to an action one’. And seeing it is mentioned that GW2 should be an action based game, this implies that GW2 should also have a perfect balance in order to make the actions important and not the ‘choices’ (more on those further below)

Closely related to imbalance, is the following topic, and some of you may well spot an ‘imbalance’ in GW2 that has to few ‘counters’ …
Counter play: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BRBcjsOt0_g
Good counter play is obviously a way to both create balance as well as diversity, given of course everybody has access to a counter, but if you come this far you can clearly smell the ‘perfect imbalance’ game design coming from this as well.

Obviously equality can still feel really diverse, as long as the design is done in such a way that it obscures the equality. Slow Hard hits vs Fast low damage, Long lasting low damage conditions vs fast hard hitting conditions. And vice versa for the healing. This (I think) leads to a mild meta game within a balanced game, where healing vs damage type causes a running meta and mild counters. The problem with the design though, is to get the balance right, as the length of the encounter determines how equal the options are and thus how balanced the game is. And another problem with this is then, if the professions are perfectly balanced the fight may last for ever in players of equal skill).

Now why does this all matter, well, it matters a lot because of the choice for your profession and of course the choice of your build.
Choice: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lg8fVtKyYxY

And here also arises somewhat of a ‘contradiction interminous’. In a perfectly balanced game, there is largely equality (at least on the defining game mechanics, average DPS over a set time, healing and condition removal, and choice comes down to your preference in particle effects), now if the options available to you are equal, then do you have a choice? On the other hand, if there is imbalance, then there is no choice by default, as the imbalance causes a calculation problem even if it is a circle kitten calculation with no answer.

These issues are profound in regards to this thread, and for GW2 as a whole. If GW2 is an action game with perfect balance, then clearly there should be more balance, and professions should become more mechanically equal. If on the other hand GW2 is ‘perfectly imbalanced’, then do we have enough tools to counter the imbalances within each profession. And how much choice do we then have, because imbalanced games have a ‘rock/paper/scissors’ setup or reduce choice to a calculation problem, instead of a choice. If GW2 is a hybrid, is that even possible? Is that good for GW2 and what are the implications?

It also matters in regards to this thread, because determining which type of game GW2 is, determines what type of balance suggestions and complaints we should file with ArenaNet, and which ‘issues’ we can expect to be solved.

I am glad they are looking at the sword. I played this skill during the early incarnation @GamesCon and back then the order of actions on the #1 skill was different. It was OP to a point where you would knockdown/lock players and basically gave them no chance. (except with stability of course, but who knew back then :P )

The fix was to reorder the actions, but in doing so the whole flow of the sword went down the drain. Especially so for those people that assume #1 is an auto-attack, which it is not, you can turn it off with left-ctrl + right-click, or even put it on another skill of your choice. But even with full control over the sword, it feels clucky. So my hopes are that they come up with a more natural feeling order of actions, and for that maybe one of the actions just needs to go, and be replaced with something that causes less of a problem.

Idho Ydalis’s Wishlist for Ranger changes in 2014:

Pet
1st Wish = I wish there was an alternative to equipping a pet that did not involve another in game entity. I love pets and will use them, but there are just places in the game where they are a hindrance. Embracing ‘a spirit’ like this: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/ranger/The-ranger-needs-to-Embrace-spirits/first#post3423288 could do the trick
2nd Wish = I wish pets would actually ‘grow up’ as you use them, it doesn’t even have to be a stat increase of any kind, just a base name change after a certain amount of XP or ‘time trained’ would do the trick.
3rd Wish = I wish there was a skill called ‘Beastly Roar’, which would let you call in the aid of a random pet, native to the area, to fight along side you for a short while.
4th Wish = I wish the AI of pets would increase
5th Wish = I wish there were more ‘plant’ pets to charm, there were quite a decent amount of plant creatures in GW1. Hopefully we will see some back as pets.

Weapons
1st Wish = I wish the ranger could use a ‘druidy/beastmastery’-skill-mix staff.
2nd Wish = I wish the Axe would have a bit more ‘base’ damage on its attacks
3rd Wish = I wish the weapons would come with a variety of skill choices, so one can further ‘dial in’ the way one wants to play.
4th Wish = I wish the ranger could also use hammers, and that a tree-stump was one of the hammers available for use.
5th Wish = I wish the bonus wish below.

Trait system
1st Wish = I wish there were more use full traits.
2nd Wish = I wish the traits you choose would also unlock signature defining skills
3rd Wish = I wish the trait system would have cool icon artwork
4th Wish = I wish I could come up with more trait wishes.
5th Wish = I wish I could add these two trait wishes to the skill wishes..

Utility Skills
1st Wish = I wish there was a skill called ‘Beastly Roar’, which would let you call in the aid of a random pet, native to the area, to fight along side you for a short while.
2nd Wish = I wish the spirit skills would actually have cool defining signature model artwork. And that the spirits were linked to actual ‘natural things’ instead of some weird non existent in lore worshipping of sun/storm/water/etc. Mountain spirit, Bog/Marsh Spirit, Woodland Spirit, Desert Spirit, Jungle Spirit. And thus, signature models animation to go with these names.
3rd Wish = I wish the 4 petskills to be more usefull
4th Wish = I wish spike trap had actual woodenspikes as an animation, instead of speartips.
5th Wish = I wish various skills would be removed and replaced with skills that gave the ranger a bit more of a ‘raw’ outdoor feel to them.
6th Wish (see trait wish #5) = f/e I wish that spiketrap would have actual wooden spikes instead of spearheads. Or nice looking snakes moving inwards to the target instead of way from the target.
7th wish (see trait wish #5) = I wish there were more plant related skills, like f/e wall of brambles/thorns, Grasping Roots.

• Bonus wish= Don’t make these wishes come true please
  Prysin’s Wishlist for Ranger changes 2014:
  4th Wish = Torch #5, allow it to become a AOE similar to traps when using the trait “Offhand Mastery”. – I really dislike that placement stuff on a ranger, unless you run a longbow there is hardly any time for it. And the ‘offhand training’ also works well on other offhand skills.

JorneMormel’s Wishlist for Ranger changes in 2014:
2nd Wish = Change the mainhand Axe to a melee weapon and replace the ranged skill animations with mainhand Dagger.
- Are you mad! your first wish is a new melee weapon, go make it your mainhand dagger instead ! :p

I play solely axe/warhorn, dual axes. I geared them for crits, mainly because they seemed so otherwise mixed up, and the extra hits, as well as nr5 skill give more dice rolls for crits.

I run my axe with traps, the midrange of the weapon gives a nice ‘in-out’ option, that might well be comparable with the shortbow. Difference with the shortbow is that the axe is a bit more straight forward: no ‘hit from behind or the sides’ … which means you can keep a more of an ‘anchor’ point. Though due to the nature of gameplay you will still want to keep mobile a lot of times, if you value your uptime and reduce repair costs …

Still though, and I think that is the mix you want to get accustom to, the nr.4 skill on the axe ‘pulls’ foes to you, which can work incredible well combined with traps. Just make sure you have enough endurance to get away after doing so.

So main difference between axe and sb, the other midrange weapon, is the need to be moving to get the most out of it, due to the nr1. and nr5 skills with multiple hits, I personally geared it for crit. I myself combine the axe with traps, an in/out roll to place them, or a place/pull/roll out. The nr5 skill also works well in close proximity btw, hitting foes, while it defends from ranged attacks. And with a lot of hits its a crit- generator.

Obviously the axes can also be run with other skills, more passive, or with spirits. Both melee and ranged pets. Versatile and straight forward weapon(s), with a midrange semi-mobile movement need, due to it’s low condition and lowish damage output likely meant to be geared with crits.

Tnx a lot guys as a suggestion freak I will miss the subforum, and looking all over I will likely miss a lot of them, then again the CDI may well give a good suggestionfix as well. The subforums maybe an idea, but then again, it’s not like the forumlisting will get any shorter if each section also gets a suggestion subforum :P

but at least I will know where to go with my ideas now, tnx a lot!

I think they are still looking for a balance for the living story. Both the persistent and the Onetime content expansion in a livingstory fashion can have a place in GW2. And it’s the change of spices that makes people eat (or atleast that is a saying in my country, ‘freely translated into english’). The same goes with the pace of things, for some it is too fast, for others it can’t come fast enough.

Now the pace has been changed just before the wintersday event, so going into the new year we should have a slightly slower pace, with an overlap period, if I am not mistaken. It will be nice to see if I feel less stressed out about skipping a day or two, in regards to being able to finish the actual content.

Another duly noted point is the balance between persistent and ‘one-time’ events on Tyria. Here I will agree that the Scarlet content may have been running to long for being temporary content. On the other hand, some other players complain about empty zones appearing (maybe due to the LS concentrating ppl, or maybe because people scatter all over) meaning that creating more zones will lead to even more empty places (waypoints don’t help there either).

As far as persistence goes, here I see the biggest point, while temporary events can leave persistent marks, they may not leave persistent content. This content though, doesn’t have to be ‘new zones’, it could be new persistent stories, f/e linked to the order of your choice, or linked to events on maps… and largely take place in the existing world/map, some stages perhaps ‘hidden’ in these small instances…

There is a huge potential to do more than temporary stuff, and on that specific part I agree with you (@OP), but I do not agree that the LS is an uninteresting boring grind, the story telling needs some balance as to how long stories last, and in which way they are adding to the game…

Necro elite scar-patern.

Now I find it unlikely that players would design actual playable content, but that doesn’t mean they can not contribute to content in other ways:

- I can see players record a ton of spoken cheers, growls, sentences, or even whole conversations. These could be free reign, aka. the player just does what he wants, or they could be ‘Design Driven’ where the writing/sound team would give clear pointers as to the sort of lines they would want or sounds or w/e. Which they could then use to polish, mix and add to the game, to add a bigger diversity in voices and texts.

- I could also see players design Weapons, and I know for fact that GW1 actually had a weapon design contest at one point, where a winner was picked and put in the game.

Do you think that would work for GW2 ? Should it be something for Anet to look into? or should we just see where CDI takes us first?

I personally think it be a great idea to let players contribute, where they can, to the content of GW2. The CDI is one way to do so, but there are other ways they may be even more valuable to the Player, and perhaps also valuable to ArenaNet. Esp. in the case of a spoken MMO.

I noticed the suggestion forum has been archived … will the CDI threads completely replace the suggestion forum now? Or are we supposed to post suggestions in the general gaming forum? or in case of specific suggestions in more specific forums?

I sort of missed the memo about it being archived and would like to be updated about it’s replacement(s) if any…

Tnx tons in advance, your time and answer is greatly appreciated…

So let me start off by saying I still like the game a lot, and I am happy that I took my time with most of it, I still have no 100% completion, things to discover, places to go, alts to work on. If only the living story would give me some time to actually do them :P … I think the world looks stunning, and in some cases even breath taking. And the hearts and events (to me) feel like a great step forward in MMO game worlds, as opposed to the wood of ! and ? and -> everywhere. So now for some suggestions:

1. I fear this cannot be fixed anymore, mana is gone, and adding it back in may not even be possible. This should be a lesson for a next game though! If you give yourself to little instruments to balance your skills, you end up with a harder time balancing, and with a more shallow skill system.

2. I hope this will be fixed by finding ways to add more skills, and thus more choices to the game. It really needs this! And hopefully with more choices, more players will find the way they want to play.

3. I fear that the only way to improve on the crafting system is to do an overhaul, which I do not see happening. Things may be added to it, but seeing crafting is not a defining system to the game, an overhaul will be unlikely. Hopefully though at some point, it will be the issue of the CDI and I wont hesitate to chip in my ideas. Or Anet can hire me, I’m currently unemployed ‘hint, hint’…

4. I hope they will look into the lighting situation of night mostly, and maybe even the lighting overall. But seeing I do not have a way to mess with the settings myself (apart from on my end), it will be hard to determine what exactly gives this ‘toy-detach’ feel to the world at times.

5. Here I think the Dev’s need to find the right balance between the content they put out, how they put it out, and the pace at which they do so. The idea is good, and both temporary as well as persistent changes have their place. Currently there is a lot of ‘temporary’ content, and there is some just critique to that, just make sure you don’t shift all they way to the other side, and just do persistent content.

Again, this is new to both Anet and the players, and perhaps the dev’s should flat out say that they are still experimenting with it, and ask the players for feedback and patience. I am sure that we will find the balance in both pace, as well as the mix between one time events and persistent additions.

=
Other points that came up while writing the above:

6. There was once the idea to reduce the amount of conditions since there were so many. But now, with the addition of boons, and the addition of some more conditions, the list of boons and conditions double the amount of things in GW1.

To make matter worse, in my views, the higher content is made more ‘difficult’ by using the most annoying conditions (confusion and agony) on all foes.

This, well I can put it like this I think, as its the most clear, makes it feel like ‘political statements’. We all know them, where this party says X to get you excited, and by the time you voted he blatantly does the opposite… I read that more people get this feel at times, and it is bad that this happens (more so in politics then gaming btw, but that is off topic).

So my advice to the dev team would be to go back to what was said to be intended, make a list of things and put it on the wall or a book. And when you have a new idea, check if it’s in line with things you said or promised earlier. If it is not, no matter how good the idea looks on paper, it is just not a good idea by default.

Another would be to not add more boons or conditions anymore, there are more then enough, and to work on AI in general and skills more particular, to make new content harder, instead of plucking confusion and agony on everything.

4. This one is hard to describe and really pinpoint, it may even be due to my computer not being able to run the game at max settings. But, the game looks too polished, to be convincing and believable, there has to be some sort of roughness to it. Part of the game feel almost ‘toy-like’, and here I have a hard time, because parts also look stunningly beautiful, and I have a truly hard time pointing out just what it is. Personally I have a hunch it may be due to the lighting, the world may be over lit, which gives it a somewhat unnatural feel, which in turn combined with the art-direction gives it almost a ‘toy-feel’, which in turn makes me somewhat detached from the game world, or not fully emerged.

Again though, this may also be due to my settings, and seeing I inspected the art work and deemed it good looking, and ‘natural’ looking, and thus not the reason of this ‘feel’, I don’t know what exactly it is. My bet is on the lighting (or my settings), but with no way to compare different lighting scenarios, there is no way to truly point a finger. Although I must add that the bright nights have me somewhat disappointed as well. (I will though, more consciously inspect my own reaction to the game world by day and night, to see if it changes something in my perception).

5. I think the last thing would be the choice to go with a ‘temporary’ living story, instead of building on the existing world. The pace of the story was somewhat high as well, especially for more casual players. The feel to miss something is highly disappointing, which leads to some sort of urge to be there and do things as much you can, which leads to content-stress, which isn’t at all enjoyable for a pastime that should be relaxing and enjoyable.

I do think that both can have a place in GW2, both the added area’s, as well as limited time content taking place in the existing world. It’s just a matter of finding the right pace of things, and the right balance between the too. Preferably they are combined, where a story takes off in the existing world and leads us all to uncharted areas, or adds a dungeon, or adds (and maybe removes) states in the ‘events’.

Actually, the addition to states in the events was how (at first) I personally understood the living story to take place. Anet adding states to certain zones, as such expanding the stories in the world. But even with a huge tree and toxic alliance foes on the doorstep, the Centaur were unmoved and kept going for that bridge…

So, I personally think that if you give negative points, you should at least also give positive ones, or offer solutions to the things you point out. Talking things down is way to easy.

The next 5 points i considder to be the main design mistakes of gw2:

1. The most ‘frustrating’ one, and the one hardest to deal with personally, is the choice to have no other skill balancing method than recharge time. Or put otherwise, the removal of mana from the game. Why is this so hard to deal with? Because i still hear Collin speak about ‘swinging your sword, and swinging it again’, well lo and behold, due to the removal of mana, the whack-a-mole skill system feels just like that.

Now i met Collin at GamesCon, and he is a really nice guy, and there is no way i would accuse him of lying, really! there would be no way he would lie about his! Yet, in the end, the skill system does feel a lot like ‘hey i swung my sword, now i swung it again’. I fear unintentionally and disappointing. The removal of mana; which, next to recharge time, cast time and impact was good to use as a skill balancing tool, and as such remove the ‘whack a mole’/‘swing your sword’ feel. Though I feel that nr.2 also has a part in this.

2. The second thing that i have a hard time dealing with, is the lack of choice skills. Now having played GW1 since beta (on and off I will add.) and I fully supported the notion of some severe weeding amongst the skills. Each profession had around 150 and with 2 professions that meant 300+ skills to pick from. It was just to much to handle, both as a player (esp. new ones) and i would reckon also for skill balancing.

Looking at the result though, I fear the weeding has gone too far, with the 2nd profession gone the amount of skills already got cut in halve. Then with the weapon skills partially fixed and partially choice (by choice of weapon), there were basically 3 locations left to choose, from a total of 20 skills. Which, in most cases, were basically 5 builds of 4 skill types thrown in a pool of 20.

There is hardly any buildmaking any more, just ‘pick from the 5 builds’. And the traits while promising further diversification at first, turn out to contain a bunch of useless traits, and a couple of cough choices that strengthen the 5 builds you can pick from.

Yes the amount of true builds was limited in GW1 too, but each balancing act shuck up the cards and it was off to making the best combo again. which mostly took some time. Yet, with the large amount of skills it felt you did have a true personal choice, and some of my builds were (be it 2 or 3 skills) different from the standard build(s), but in GW1 that was about 1/3 of your build, so still quite different I would say.

So yes, the skills needed tuning down, I still support that decision, but then its a matter of by ‘how far’, and that is where I feel they went too far. It feels there is hardly any free choice now, and the traits just complement the builds you can choose from, so no real choices there either. This then enhances the feel of ‘having a sword, and having to swing it, again, and again’.

3. The linear crafting system, or more accurate would be the tiered resource system, well it is both really…

Let me start off by saying I support the way the crafting system is divided up, aka. the various part crafted form an actual item. This could have made a really interesting and diverse crafting system. But: By making the items solely tiered, it remains a simple linear crafting system, disguised by a discovery window. Well just look at your crafting list and you know what I mean. To that is added the tiered resource system, which enhances the linear feel of the whole.

How I could have been a lot more interesting if different resources would have had different properties, and if perhaps even different trophies could have made different looks. I would love to get my hands on that system and amp it up…

I feel being burned out mainly …

As an older gamer with RL things and limited amounts of time, I feel like the Living story takes up all my time, I have hardly set foot in other places (but some nights of WvD) even though I would like to. Most of my time is eaten up by grinding out the LS b4 the main blob has passed through and stopped caring, so its actually possible to complete all the checklist items. Which in a sense feels more like a chore list, instead of an ‘achievement’ list.

I also feel somewhat stalled on my current main, as a sylvari there is a rather limited amount of plant armors to choose from, and the ones I would like to match have huge clipping issues (mainly the lowest tier cultural chest piece, totally removes the dungeon gloves from view). Then I also have not yet found a higher than exotic axe that I truly like … so basically the visual progress of my main has halted. This in part is due to the distinct nature of Sylvari, but on the other hand, it’s also due to this clipping and no new sylvari armors being released.

As a last thing I tend to feel a times that I am somewhat being mocked as a gamer by GW2, this has largely to do with the very childish approach to a lot of game elements. In some sense the game even mocks itself at times. While humour is nice to enjoy yourself, when its overdone and put to extremes it becomes a parody of itself, and not really something to laugh about.

Lastly I feel somewhat sad, sad in a sense that all effort seems to be spend to create temporary content, leading to a game that has but grown an inch in over a year. While temporary content can surely break the mould, and shake up things, if everything is just temporary, it will have nothing to show for itself in the end… it also gives this ‘burn out’ feel, with urgent wild goose chase ‘to-do list’ … I dunno, a living story that would actually expand the game, instead of giving the illusion of shaking things up (as its only for a 2w period), sounds like something that would make me happier in the ‘end’.

In the ‘mechanics mistakes gw2 made’ thread, I just read I came across a suggestion I really like, and it pertains very much to horizontal progression. So even though it is not mine, and I read it on my way through the thread (so sorry I can not give credit, right away). Here it goes:

- Add extra utility skills into the trait lines, so besides the traits, spending points in a trait line unlocks extra defining skills, pertaining to that trait line.
the example was given that an engineer traiting into alchemy would unlock an extra potion, similar to f/e a necro that specs into minions unlocks an extra minion.

Not saying that this would have to be the way to increase the skill amount in order to foster horizontal progression, but it was certainly ‘a’ way to introduce extra skills into GW2 and do it in a way that makes the trait system a more distinguishable choice, and thus a ‘deeper’ investment.

@Devata, in my suggestions I try and leave the dev team some room for choice and creativity. My main concern with the request is, ‘well’, the lack of quests, not in the sense of how quests are done in games, but the quest as a way to convey a story. Now the PS was the main quest, but after that there is none. Only vigilant responses to acute issues… you may want to read the actual thread I linked to get the idea, as repeating everything here seems a bit over the top…

So let me agree then to what was likely said, and say that what I was hoping to get out of it is a number of chained quests leading the player through Tyria, with behind it either lore (for the durmand priory), intrigue (for the order of whispers), or brute force (for the vigilant).

I will ponder some more about other horizontal progression additions in my dream.. gn

Not sure if this thread has been referred too already (65 pages is a lot to read ) … so i will just refer to it in this post: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/archive/suggestions/Reinvent-The-Quest/first#post3423683

This suggestion made by me roughly 2 weeks ago, suggests ‘reinventing the quest’. You can read the details of the suggestion by following the link … so, while this suggestion isn’t really a way to have horizontal progression for a character, it is a format this progression (or at least part of it) can be achieved.

Tnx OP for the respectful way to address these issues, I think you are completely right about ‘why’ sometimes the discussion goes down the drain faster than a Skrit in LA.

I mainly post this little post here so that I can find it in my history tomorrow, and won’t forget about it. It’s just to late for me now to read the whole thread and reply. So that will have to wait…

What I can say is the build I like running:
- dual axes / axe warhorn
- healing well, spike trap, frost trap, lighting reflexes and (as a sylvari) take root.
- pets: Hyena + (still undecided, currently imob.spider)
- traits: 10/0/30/20/10 (from memory), traps, offhand, axe.
- berzerkers, and lyssa runes (4x), other two unsure from memory.
- axes & warhorn, have +5% crit chance, +7? per kill precision

I run mostly PvE with this build, living story, and I think I do okish with it. I have some support, move around a lot to trap/midrange. Main problem I have in PvE is my pet dieing on Champs. Other than that I like the healing I can do (incl. self combo), and warhorn buffs, also the take root and hyena are nice to suddenly provide a lot of targets for enemies, which can be very helpful in a dire situation.

I haven’t run many dungeons yet, but I did do the sylvari one multiple times as I wanted my armor. With this exact same build. Here also the warhorn is helpful, as is the healing and extra bodies.
Here again, my pet dieing is just to dang annoying, and seeing there isn’t a huge group to do damage on champs, both my pets tend to die on me, giving me both on a cooldown.

I tried WvW once or twice I think, in a zerk, just wanted to see if this build was usefull, but also to try out the armour setup, as I was looking for armour to put on my WvW thief. Yeah, well, I guess the warhorn was useful to get ppl around, the traps were somewhat useful in sieges, for keeping ppl out of keeps. And if I wouldn’t die so easily the well was somewhat useful for it’s water field also.
Biggest problem, for me, here was my pet dieing even faster, the only way to keep it alive was basically to put it on ‘do not attack’ and stay far away from anything doing any damage. ohw except for sentries and the spider, or unguarded yak… obviously…
Can’t really judge the survivability of myself, I mean berzerkers, I didn’t realy expect to live long, and my expectations were met…

I haven’t played PvP yet, so I cannot comment on it…

Overall my main annoyance is the pets survivability, and the fact that I can not work around it. It is there whether I want it to be or not. And sometimes that is soooo annoying I wish I could shoot it myself and it would stay down… As somebody that likes pets in gameplay, I wish I could have more, I am of the opinion that rangers should get a non-pet alternative. For which I wrote the ‘pets should embrace spirits’ suggestion in this forum-section. People are free to disagree with me based upon arguments, and positive or negative constructive/respectful feedback is always welcome with me, heck if you can prove me wrong in a respectful way based upon solid arguments I will even yield and tell you I was wrong and you were right. That’s just the way I roll

Anyways, besides this, now already long, post, I will leave any other comments till another time, after I had the chance to read all the comments and thus do justice and respect to the time put into them, and this discussion.

It may not be the best advice I have ever given, but I will still give it, as It will take more time than reading a book. But if you truly want to get to know this world, you should realy get GW1 (prophecies and eye of the north), which will cover the entire map. And even then you will miss some things.

Hmm perhaps it’s easier to try and find the gw1 wiki on the internet and browse through it. http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Main_Page it will at least give you a source to get some idea of how the world looked, and some of it’s lore, and how it changed. As playing GW1 doesn’t really do much in regards to learning to play GW2, they are completely different in that sense. Yeah, the wiki is likely easier

The books are nice too, but do be advised that they deal with events more recent, still a good read though, I read them all … but as far as knowing a big of history of sites in GW2 you are bound to run into, the wiki is better. Things like ‘The bloodstones’, ‘The underworld’, ‘The Seering’, and loads more are things that will give present day surroundings more substance So have a look around on the wiki’s …

Well that depends on what one would expect of ‘The expansion’. From GW1 an expansion has always been a whole new area, with a whole new main story…

With ‘the quest’ I mean more story driven content, that doesn’t even have to be the main story. ‘A quest’ can also take place current world (be it maybe with some instances), and doesn’t have to be taking place in an expansion kind of fashion. It could be… But then I would expect a kittinton of questlines in one go. Where I mean more off ‘additions to the current content’ (and/or within an expansion, which is surely another option), with the air of ‘a quest for’ type of storylines, quite possibly solo content or small teams, perhaps even guild versions.

But I will give you another example of a difference in approach, to what I mean:

not : you convert 3 months of allowance into gems to buy the precursor of your dreams, and a bunch of materials (for as far as your allowance takes you) to then go farm the kitten out of any content that will give you the drops you will need, to dump all of it into a mystic fountain, with a hoarder fairy in it that happen to have piles of this legendary you want, and is more than happy to take more stuff out of your hands…

but : after fighting for x hours and doing y damage with the weapon (design) of your choice, this weapon starts to glow ever so slightly, and it’s text colour changes to ‘legendary pre-curser’, take this weapon to any master crafter for inspection. Now you may not know where to find one, so you travel to LA and ask for directions.

Obviously this master of crafts lives secluded, and in high hopes you Waypoint to the closest one. From there you start you travel (up the mountain, into the cave, through the secured lab, through the magic forest, or down the tomb), after a long and and hard fighting challenge you meet the master crafter. (S)he inspects the weapon and (with a cool cut scene) informs you that the weapon has seen so many blood that the souls of those that were slain with it started to cling to the weapon itself, as if, in a grasp of the dead they tried to cling on to the last physical thing they toughed before they left the physical world, desperate to stay here instead of wondering off into the mists. (s)he informs you that this weapon now has the potential to become legendary, ‘but’, to invoke such a status onto this weapon he will need: The blood of a giant, the essence of a spirit, the resin of a living tree, an un-dead bone, a charged soul crystal, and proof of your heroic status. Then he sends you off your merry way, with an empty soul crystal (noted. this crystal reaps the souls of foes you slain).

Then obviously you will go and slay things, to charge your crystal, seek out giants to gather blood, somehow gather the essence of a spirit, the resin of a living tree, and an un dead bone. Upon collecting these things (which may still take you a long time) and figuring out the proof of your heroic status comes from venturing to a ‘soul stone’ somewhere far away and costs 250skillpoints (or so). You go back to the master crafter, (s)he messes around somewhat, then tells you he forgot something, and ask you if you prefer some sort of ‘look’ to your weapon to display its legendary status, then he would have a pop-up where certain ‘visual effects’ are linked to certain items. And maybe directly (if you knew up-ahead) you hand him a stack of w/e material to get the look you want (else you will have to go back and get these items).

Having done so, he hands back your weapon, now there is just one thing to do, dip this weapon in the maguma spring, to imbue the weapon with the force of life. Obviously, you will now travel to the maguma, and start your journey through the jungle to find the Spring of life… Here you will imbue the weapon with it’s live essence qualities ‘et voila’ cheers all round, tears rolling from eyes, ‘gratz’ all over. You did it, you completed your quest, you have made legends come alive and have the proof to show for it…

‘A quest’ not ‘a chore’

I too want to say ‘aye’ here. Not only for aesthetics, but also to add more living world to the living world. I know the main purpose for a game is to hack and slice, and get them drops and gold. But there is still (at least one) a populous that also likes to ‘live’ on a fantasy world, and in a sense sees the game world as a ‘simulation’ of a living world, in which to hack and slice…

Currently that simulation part of the living world could be strengthened a lot, and a barber shop (amongst others) would be a welcome addition to the gaming world. In a sense the Hairstyle-kit, is just a lazy way around a needed feature. A feature non the less that could make the actual gaming world much stronger, if it were actually part of the gaming world.

It’s like having a mini-map, or an actual ‘in-game map’, it’s like having a ‘preview’ button on every item. Or a true armour-shop, weapon-shop etc. with ‘fitting’ rooms. And while I know it’s easy to call something lazily done, esp. when there is effort put into it, I personally still think it’s not just lazy, but it’s somewhat of the wrong choice. Especially when/if you see the effort put in to make the gaming world look more alive…

With waypoints, there can hardly be an argument about: “Well I have to travel, all the way to X, to do Y”, and it’s not that there isn’t enough space to carve out a few shops and offer players more interaction, in different ways, with the gaming world.

! And lastly, the barber shop (and others) can actually be a good ‘driver’ for things like the complete make over kits, gemshop weapons and armors, and even stimulating the trade on the BLTH (f/e an armour-shop, where also all armour colours can be previewed, will stimulate the sale of dyes in the BLTH, mainly because knowing what it can look like may convince players to actually go ahead with the specific purchase.

Could this be done in another UI element, sure, but why clutter it more, if you can also realize it within the game, and make it part of the interaction with the actual gaming world?

• finally, ‘its all permanent content’ supplying all players with more services and in doing so improving the actual game and the world of Tyria.

Hello Devs,

Just now, while giving a new player on Tyria some pointers, I realize that there is a certain content missing from GW2. One I am somewhat glad to see gone, but on the other hand I am also missing. It is ‘The Quest’ …

Now true, the personal story is the main ‘Quest’ in GW2, and the living world is awesome. The living story is fairly cool as well, and as I am adjusting to the new pace, may become just right (change to it has been recent, and the holyday event season somewhat messed up the pace of things, to see how the new pace will come to be experienced), still though, the living story will always take place as a pressing issue… Unlike ‘the Quest’. And it is somewhat ‘missing’ in GW2

And with Quest I obviously don’t mean a pointer to follow, or people with ! above their heads. No, with a quest I mean a certain storyline where a hero is asked to undertake some daunting task that takes them on a long and epic journey. Or in a more personal sense, the search for a lost treasure, weapon, item, knowledge, lore, etc and so on. Which ‘in a sense’ gives purpose to the story that is experienced…

Now obviously quest pointers and ! are out of the question, and certainly the issues brought up can’t be to urgent, but should most certainly be ‘pressing’ enough. And obviously there will be guides on them sooner than later. But still, I somewhat miss them … let me explain:

When I joined the Durmund Priory, I had hopes of being send out to search for ancient books, vaguely described artefacts, in hidden and buried tombs, and on dusty bookshelves in secret libraries, and run into all sorts of foes that are ‘after the same things’.

When I joined the order of whispers, I had the hopes of meetings in the dark, visits to hideous pirate bars, and keeping an ear out for ‘whispers’, both during the day and during the night.

When I joined the Vigil, I had hopes of frequently being called upon to apply brute force. To keep people ‘in check’, to be pointed somewhere for a mission and just solve it ‘Hollywood style’ (aka. lots of bullets and explosions, possibly even high speed chases).

Now true, the personal story delivered these things, one way or the other, but once ‘in the open world’, only the Vigil approach is called upon. Aka respond to urgent and pressing business and/or be pointed in the right direction. Sure, in parts of these urgent situations other skills are called upon. But in the Living Story, it will always be ‘The vigil’ approach that has the upper hand…

Hence my ‘request’ to ‘re-quest’ Tyria ;D , but doing it in a fashion that is fitting for the current gaming world. I thought about it somewhat during writing this, and I fear ‘the old style quests’ may well be the way to go. It’s the only way I currently see that does justice to a world without pointers and ! or ? above heads. But perhaps it can be done in other ways, hence ‘the suggestion to reinvent ’the quest’’. And offer players optional story lines within the world of Tyria that are somewhat hidden from the surface of present day events. That have players roam and search the land for … and bring them places and situations along the way. I used the orders in my example, because these are both easy and suited anchors for any quest.

_ps. I been away for a week and only just caught up with the LS, then obviously the holydays were upon us, but I did notice some vague pointers for continued research, I am hoping to pursue within the coming weeks. Aka. I may have already gotten what I am asking for, if not, the background search for Scarlet may well be a good example for what I mean here, even though it’s still a ‘vigil quest’ as far as ‘the angle’ goes.

But anyways, this suggestion/challenge stands, reinvent the quest please_

@TheLyraki, as with any fantasy world it will take some time (and perhaps even study) to get into the Lore of the World (and possibly fall in love with it). Now as people have said, there are actually a races and creatures that are still very ‘classical’, if not in design then by carrying a certain classical trait (in a new coat).

So my advice would be, give it some time, forget your prior notion, forget why you left WoW and went to GW2, now that you made the choice you have closed the book of WoW. And before you is a new book, one you are unfamiliar with, and which is taking place in a whole different world… Pick it up and start to read (play), give yourself a chance to be amazed about all the familiar faces, and all the new ones. And if the world grasps your interest, then there is a deep history waiting to be discovered. Over 7y of GW1 for one, from which much remains scatter Tyria’s landscape.

In that regard, I personally fear the worst, as currently somebody has set up protected probes all over Tyria, and by the looks of these probes they are either trying to annoy something from the depths, or they are making a archaeological/geological survey to find certain locations. Seeing we know most of what can be annoyed in the depths, my fear is for that which is currently buried, and that includes a whole lot of stuff that even the old players may not have realized. (aka. various races came from the depths as the dragons awoke and drove them to the surface) We have no clue what may be hidden there besides the few things that we know ‘are’ buried…
That all to appeal to your fantasy mind and interest for lore

Now in regard to the story(s) and how it (they) are told. With any new book come other authors, which tell stories in different ways. I will somewhat agree that ‘the storyline’ (which is the personal story, and is pretty much the only ‘quest pointed’ story you will find in this game) could have had more depth to it in some places, and perhaps have more content. But, most (in not all, depending on how you look at all the areas) of the story actually takes place in the gaming world and ‘the present’, and it’s not the quest pointer and text that tells the story, but it’s the whole area that draws a picture of a scene. The only way I can describe this is how I view it myself. An area is basically like a chapter, with all sorts of stories big and small, and by playing and acting you will both experience and ‘read’ this chapter.

So in that sense, the gaming world is entirely different from the way you may be used to experience content. Aka. by being guided through the story, from quest to quest telling you (if you bother to read the quest texts) the story. GW2 does it differently, you basically ‘are’ the content driver, any content in the area’s suited for your level are content that you can experience, and with that, some content may not be happening as you yourself pass through. This will likely become more clear to you as you come nearer to the completion of your personal story line, and decide that it’s time to explore the regions that the story didn’t bring you too… This different way to bringing content (to me at least) is quite refreshing, but it takes some getting used to and in a sense asks of you to throw some of your old conceptions of fantasy games out of the window.

Hope you will come to enjoy Tyria and the stories you will take part in, there is a large pile of history waiting for you (and us) waiting there to be discovered, not only for as far as GW1 goes (for you, and likely others), but also 250y we didn’t get to see, and all that that transpired during GW1 that we had no notion of…

I wouldn’t mind at all if these were all in separated ‘areas’ above the current map. And by separated I mean that it is impossible to land a flying mount on the ground, it would be battle in a separated area basically. And besides mounts and flying creatures, airships may be just as interesting. (there is a whole new dare concept to entering an airship, that just isn’t there on a normal boat, mainly the 1000s of meters below you and certain death after the way down)

Obviously you could still ‘land’ by using the waypoints, anywhere there are waypoints. And it might not even be a bad thing if you could ‘land’/‘air dock’ at major cities. As long as you can’t swoop down on the landmap anywhere, i’dd be all for giving people air-combat.

Not sure if I would frequent it, but I would surely take a look, if only for the stunning overview of Tyria.

First off, don’t you just love it when you made a 45m/1h post detailing what you intend where you use all sorts of decent argumentation to make your point, to then be ignored and get somebody SHOUTING (as if I can’t read normal case), L2PET …

The only time a pet is going to cripple you is WHEN YOU USE THE WRONG ONE IN THE WRONG PLACE.
L2PET, it is NOT rocketscience.

Having said that, and not wanting to go into forum etiquettes as surely just after Christmas everybody has their belly filled with etiquettes…

Let’s respond to the argument instead:

Devourers/Spiders for dungeons
Bears/Drakes/Devourers for open world content
Cats/Birds for burst situations
Dogs/Spiders for CC
Moas for open world melee
Bears/Spiders/Drakes/Dogs for WvW
Any pet you think works for PvP

choosing the right pet, is as important (fixed that for you) as choosing the right traits.

‘Play how you want to play!’

That is what should be enough to pull this argument on it’s back. But I’ll even make it more specific. Half the pets don’t really appeal to me, and from those that do appeal to me, there are a couple that don’t fit my Ranger and how/what I want my character to ‘be’ on Tyria. You may consider a pet as just another tool that everybody needs to just ‘learn2play’ with, but for me (i’ll leave others out of it) personally, a pet choice is about as personal as any RL pet you choose.

And that is just the thing in this whole discussion, isn’kitten The pet (like any mechanic) needs to fulfil a multitude of uses as well as needs. And while you take the stance ‘L2Pet’ you can not deny that there are numerous other players that clearly see a faulty (sometimes even annoying) system, that can’t be worked around… which in all honesty is my biggest frustration about it, in some sense there are numerous situations where i’dd prefer to just not have a pet at all, and just do less damage.

But as you feel strong enough about this whole ‘L2pet’ thing that you need capitals to stress your point. Let me ask you another thing, I hope you will take the time to answer…
What is it to you? What is your personal problem with me being able to not use the pet? Really? If you know how to pet like a pro, then surely you won’t be using this suggestion (if ever they were to add this), so why does it bother you that I could?!?

Hopefully you can answer that to me, because I don’t get it? (not that I want to suggest you are like this) Just like I don’t get why people could be against something like gay marriage, as if somebody else being gay has some implication for them not being gay, and if this gay couple getting married has any implications for their marriage :/ … now obviously the scope is entirely different, but to me at least the issue is the same, why be against something that has absolutely no implications for yourself. I just… I don’t understand it

… and maybe if I could, I would be able to make better suggestions, or at least understand why you are against adding something that would solve a lot of issues, a lot of people have with something, while not effecting anybody else that can still do their own thing. Like f/e marry in a church, next to marrying for the state, an option that most gay couples wouldn’t even like to persue (in the case of gay marriages, which is not the point here btw, but I see similarities; which yes may say more about my brain then both the issues) but anyways, I just don’t understand, I again, would love to hear: ‘Why, you feel so strongly against this suggestion that will more then likely not even effect your own options and choices?’

add. I would like to add again, just in case I did not make this clear enough yet, or my English (non native) wasn’t good enough to stress this enough: that I do not imply that you would or could be against gay marriage just because you are also against this idea. This post just draws comparisons between these issues because ‘I’ see similarities, in how I view thing where people are against something that doesn’t really effect somebodies own choices and options, hope I made this clear enough not to offend anybody and in specific Prysin

geesh what a hate …

First of all, to me this isn’t a QQ pets suggestion, I am personally quite happy with my pets. And in about 80% of the game they are (to me) a welcome companion. Thing remains though that in 20% of the game, mainly boss fights (thus in PvE and Dungeons, and against a zerg) they are a true liability. And having 2 doesn’t even help, because they both die so soon that you just end up with the swap on full cool down.

So second, this isn’t to replace, it’s to add to the ranger. Nowhere did I mention that this should replace the current pets. Nopes, it should be an addition to the pet group, giving the ranger more options. And in such a way that the added options give the ranger more viability in area’s where it currently lacks.

Third, the suggestion is made in such a way that it adds to the ranger theme. Which (as once stated) was that they were more attuned to nature, and as such didn’t have a rifle/pistols to fight with. But in all honesty, the ranger has not become more attuned to nature, nor has it changed in 250y. It’s basically a limited rehash of the ranger from GW1 with an obligated pet instead of a choice…

Last, and in regards to that choice, there is no choice not to use the pet. This is something that more then anything bugs me the most. Almost all the classes I am somewhat familiar with (all but the Mesmer, which I am not to sure off), the player can pretty much ignore their class mechanic if they want to:

- An elementalist can stay in one attunement.
- A necro doesn’t have to go in deathshroud
- A warrior doesn’t have to use his agro attack
- A guardian can just put some passives up and forget about it
- A thief doesn’t have to rob ppl.
- An engineer can pretty much choose whether or not to use the extras.
- A Mesmer (not entirely sure) can play without illusions

A ranger though, is stuck to his pet, and has no options other then to deal with it. And for a large part of the gameplay it is penalized for having the pet die on him. And seeing the amount of boss fights being the actual fights in GW2. The ranger is thus penalized for the biggest part of the gameplay…

And all of that, why?! … this to me is a decent solution, that would fit the ranger theme, and I for one would still run a pet. A though, being 1, because for the 20% of the game where the pet is a liability, I would embrace a spirit instead…

Would be nice if people were less stubborn and cut the other guy some slack, or at least give them a choice, a choice for somebody else does not effect you and the choice you make, so why be so uptight about it? sigh (and yes in a sense that is also pointed at the Dev’s, who refuse to change a broken mechanic, or at least give player a way to work around it, if they choose to do so. I love you guys to bits, but really, on this issue I’m entirely baffled by the reluctance to add a minor thing that would solve an issue for a populous that run into area’s where this is an issue.)

Anyways, Merry Christmas, as far as Christmas wishes go: hope next year people will be more open to the options for others, for as far as they do not effect themselves.

@FootDive, I totally disagree with you on the way to implement such a system. The 1 auto attack and 2-5 choices does one thing, it adds to the nightmare of balance, and with 1h and 2h weapons also becomes a nightmare to implement.

With linking the choices to the weapon slots, the choice skills can be balanced for said slot, and as such balanced to the other choices in other slots. When you add the choices on one pile, all the skills need to be balanced against all the other skills.

f/e the 5 skill on almost all weapons is a bigger impact skill than all the others. This skill would then become one of the choices. Now ‘we’ add in another intended nr5 bigger impact skill. In the ‘bound to slots’ choice options, there is no balance problem, a player can NOT take both high impact skills and has to choose one or the other. And obviously the same goes for the lighter impact skills. A player would not be able to weaken himself un-intended by putting a small impact skill on the nr5slot. In the case where all these skills are put on one big pile, this is no longer the case. players can take both high impact skills, or weaken themselves.

Same with balancing, in the case of slot bound choices, the balance only has to be taken into account for the possible combination. As opposed to the free choice, where balance can become a nightmare, because it has to take into account ALL the combinations. Or to put this into math:

Choices linked to slots:
slot 1 has auto, slot 2 has 3 choices, slot3 has 1, slot4 has 3 and slot5 has 2, slot 3 has 1 because of the Thief mechanic, this amounts to a total of 5 skills added per weapon for a total of 10 weapon skills

1 * 3!/(3-1)! * 1 *3!/(3-1)! *2! = 18 combinations

Choices on one pile:
same amount of skills, but only nr1 skill is bound to nr1

1 * 9! / (9-4)! )= 3024 combinations

dang I reserve the right to totally mess up the math here :P … been to dang long since I been playing with this, and I may have got the amounts not entirely right Thing remains though, that the amount of combinations linked to one big pile, tends to be bigger than the amount of combinations possible where these choices are linked to certain locations.

*in regards to the math, the amount 3024 is to high, as this still counts the builds that are practically ‘the same’. Unfortunatly my statistics book is somewhere packed away, and while searching the internet Is a breeze, actually finding something is a hairball in the kitten. … principle remains though…

@Vick I fully understand the reasoning behind the idea, and in a sense I am all for it

Thing is though, is it to be expected? There is always a balance between resources put in, and amount of impact or (how to say this correctly) the amount of people that these resources are spend on.

And that is mainly what I try to bring across in my posts, so again, I am all for it but the chances to see this suggestion to take off are highly unlikely. Mainly due to the reasons I put forth, one of which, beyond a shadow of a doubt is the ‘skip-game-till-here-points’ that make a large part of the content to be skipped by a large percentage of the gaming populous, and thus the chances for them to see these new content to be relatively slim (as opposed to big changes like in the Living Story). Hence it is not to be expected that they will add in new things in remote corners of Tyria

Unless maybe they are part of a bigger thing … f/e lets say they add in ‘master crafters’ at some point, that have their working stations all around Tyria, and where you can do certain quests to obtain crafting recipes. Now all of a sudden there is a large ‘system’ that needs to find its place in Tyria, and as such warrants new additions to remote area’s. As part of such an update it may be deemed necessary to ‘fluff’ up these area’s a bit, if there is no other content in that area yet (f/e the very north/easy of gendaran fields, in that snowy area behind the animal fighting pits).

So again, I would be all for adding more persistent content to Tyria, but just adding a few titbits here and there is, in my opinion not the way to go, and also not to be expected to ever happen…

I had this idea a while back and it popped back in my mind just now, so I will post it … the idea consists of a couple of improvements to make traders (not the BLTH) more dynamic and add some more content to the living world.

1. First off all, it would be nice if some Anet person could look at all the traders in the game, and make sure they have different goods on them where applicable. I don’t think I ever found a (non-heart) karma trader that traded anything different from any other.

2. There a large number of ‘guard this yak’ events in the game, that have no impact on the game, other then provide a basic item to the people tagging along. These existing yaks could be tied into the availability of goods in cities and towns.

3. As long as a yak does not reach its end destination, the goods they were shipping do not make it into the city or town, and as such these goods would not be available at their designated vendors.

These designated vendors would then let it be known that their shipment is delayed, and how are they going to feed their kids now, and ohw the horror. Go check why their shipment is not showing up…

4. Players have an added reason to guard Yaks, as they supply their cities with the goods they need…

5. These ‘yaks’ should leave periodically from important production sites in the Tyrian landscape, and effect the goods and traders that rely on these products directly or indirectly.

This whole system is set up to make Tyria more dynamic and feel more ‘alive’ as well as give players incentive to go out and take control of the world.

You do realize that there is a large amount of these ‘empty places’ in the game right? And that once you add an activity to the most starved places, the next in line become the most starved places… etc and so on…

I would be all for more content, for one I suggested (2x in different threads) to reset the heart events every month to add more replay value to area’s and thus give people more incentive to go back to certain areas, which in turn would give Anet a reason to put more content (events) in these area’s, because the events in there would become stale at some point…

I mean, I see your point, but after everybody has gotten their mini, the place is a ghost town again …

There is another reason for this as well, dare I say it, yes I dare… the waypoint system … the ‘skip the game until here’ points that let people totally miss entire parts of the actual game because once they gone through there is no incentive to go back…

Would travel have been mount based, there would have been a lot more players en-route to places. Actually stumbling on states of the game they haven’t encountered b4. And thus there would have been a reason for Anet to put new stuff in (events mainly) because there would actually be a reasonable chance that players would actually stumble upon this content… other then, here is an email go there, there is a big obvious plant tower there, go deal with it for loots!

While I personally have no intention to turn this into a mount thread, I hope people can see that the ‘skip-game-point system’ is turning out to be much worse in this regard.

Anyways, I can’t see Anet add these kinds of things (anymore) seeing that nobody would find these events, and for people to actually do them the reward should be ridiculously high in comparison to other content, and receive an email to be notified about them… Sadly enough games are turning into instant gratification systems with ‘congratulations! you found the 1-button on you keyboard’ rewards… Sadly enough the big market is where the big masses reside, and that is not en-route pondering about 2 elementals, they are running the ‘said’ highest-copper per press 1 dungeon they can. So they have a slight chance to keep up with the ‘inflation per press 1’-rate they cause themselves…

Anyways, I hope you actually stuck around to see if the Elemental you would have placed a bet on actually won …

The animations should be the actual ‘pointers’ instead of the cast bar (as there was one in GW1) … thing it though, due to the mass of particle effects sometimes reducing a foe to a blob of effects, there is hardly an opportunity to actually see the animation and thus react to it … iow I’m with scrambles on this one…

4. More options, more customization, and thus more ‘play like you want to play’. And increasing the amount of builds could be as easy as adding say 2 skills to 2 choice slots. Increasing the amount of permutations significantly with just a minor addition.

5. Last but not least, to this then would be added the trait system. (which at one point was communicated to work like Diablo3, but then Diablo3 had that system and for lack of the actual reason we ended up with what we have, the idea of having a system like diablo3 got tossed out, likely because GW2 didn’t want to be associated with having the same system.) Which I think is too bad, because it could have been the same but entirely different at the same time, but w/e…

Traits could function as they do now, though I would personally have preferred it if they would actually mean something, because right now a lot of traits just seem like needed things for certain pre-intended builds that got tossed in some other part of the game.

• in short, to me the current skill system feels like a couple of build puzzles thrown into 3 piles (weapon, utility, traits) and the choice is to go and make the puzzle (build) that’s the most powerful or mess around in the side lines. While both GW1 and GW2 both had a certain amount of ‘illusion of choice’ in them, GW2 enlarged the illusion, by taking away the fluff that hid the illusion. (Or to put it more directly, where GW1 actually had the illusion of choice, the lack of choices in GW2 makes it blatently obvious that you have none).

Adding some skills to the weapons, as suggested years back, would at least add a little bit more choice to the professions, and as such add back a bit of the charm that GW1 had. I for one am all for this !! (if fact the system as described above is in my ’if I ever get the opportunity to build a game, this would be it.doc)

This idea is about as old as the announcement of the skill system for GW2, ‘unfortunately’ … back when all those that commented on anything related to GW2 were merely the players that were still active in GW1, it was mentioned in multiple threads, that choosing such a narrow skill choice would be like ‘throwing away the baby with the bathwater’ (if you happen to be familiar with this saying, if not: like taking one of the best and most defining things of GW1 and throwing it out).

Next to this suggestion, there were also suggestions along the line of giving weapons themselves different skills. So that one would choose the weapon to go with the build…

I still think the lack of skill choices (as currently there are just a few build per profession that have been ‘cut up’ and hidden as the illusion of a choice, is somewhat sad. Especially if you see what GW1 came from… And sure, from those roughly 150 or so skill per profession (so 300 for a character), you could use only 8 and the amount of options in a synergetic build were few and far between. Still though, you could at least personalize your build if you wanted to, atleast for a few skills, and as such play as you want to play. (instead of merely choosing a way to play from a set of given builds, that once chosen need to be followed through. It’s not ‘how you want to play’ its choose from how we want you to play).

Anyways, to get back to this suggestion, I (amongst other ppl) suggested the same thing. But besides adding a couple of skill choices for weapons, I personally think Anet should take it one step further…

1. Each weapon should come with a basic set of skills on them, that are equal to all professions. This way, any class can pick up any weapon, which obviously makes a lot of sense… And while we are at this, also add skills for bare handed combat…

2. Then a class would get their ‘profession skills’, these would be choice skills that can be chosen for each weapon. Here in comes the difference in professions, as some weapons are NOT bound to a profession, these weapons would keep their basic skills for this profession.

As you unlock (via skill points) a certain weapon skill, it becomes an option in the pull down menu for that specific weapon, for the specific slot the skill is intended. Because lets face it, some skills are balanced through the location they have on the weapon, the cool down associated with them and the traits that influence those slots.

3. Now it becomes much easier to add weapon skills to the bunch, some skills may even warrant themselves to be in on different weapons as different combo’s. Heck, a ‘weave hand’ skill could even be a choice on the bare handed combat.

It also becomes easier to add a certain weapon (or merely part of it) to a profession, by adding one or more profession skills to the specific weapon. This could be as much as 1 skill even.

f/e: The warrior could still be the master of weapons, for having warrior specific skills for the most amount of weapons. But a ranger could still equip a staff, and fight with the basic skills on it. As could the warrior with a short bow, with ‘its’ basic skills…

Thinking about this I realize there are things I want personally, and things I would like for the game in general. So I guess I’ll go and make 2 lists ^^

Game:
1. More weapon and profession skills, to allow for more customization and more play styles.

2. More area’s to explore (including underground) continuation of the (personal) actual story. We have slain one dragon, ‘whos next’ ?

3. Monthly resets of Heart events, not interfering with map completion, aka. the heart would get a ‘golden’ rim around it (or green or w/e color), to signify the heart has been done, then the inside would reset every month, in essence adding it to the persistent content pile and giving more options for the monthly reward system.

4. Total revamp of the crafting system, including the interface.
In regard to the system: there should be a part that is linked to stats (lining), and a part that is linked to looks (outside). These should be combinable in any fashion, so that I can craft a wool lining and a damask outside, to get a damask armour with wool stats.
in regard to recipes (another system part): there should be crafting masters all over Tyria, that reward players with armor and weapon ‘skins’ to craft. Combined with quests. F/e a scavenge hunt for certain drops that this crafter needs to make a certain piece of armor, as a reward he teaches you to craft a certain design.
in regard to the interface: almost anything would be better then the current endless list of “I hope I just clicked the right thing”, and “where the heck is that”

5. More weapon and armour skins to allow for more customization options. More legendary weapons, or ways to add (f/e craft) effects onto weapons, or add legendary status to weapons and or armour with effects. Again to allow for more customization options.

Personal: excluding those mentioned above to make more room for other personal preferences
1. Actual day and night cycle, where ‘night’ actually means something in regards to the lighting, instead of it only being noticeable by Sylvari or weapon effects. Some actual dark content that needs torches be nice as well.

2. More Sylvari style armors, aka. plant armor, it is so specifically different from all other races armor that the choice of 4 armors (3 cultural, 1 dungeon) is just to dang little to make a personal set. Come to that, some pieces can’t even be combined because they overlap (f/e dungeon gloves and T2 chest piece).

3. Option to ‘quest’ to make your weapon a soul bound legendary weapon. Realy, legendary weapons should be named after and become such due to the legends that it created, not the toilet they came flushing out of … quite possibly this could be combined with a bunch of the title’s you can get, adding to them a personal ‘quest’ to turn your weapon into a legendary weapon. Each legend-quest would come with a specific fluff effect added to the weapon of your choice, and a set title for the weapon linked to your name.

EXAMPLE !!! So, when I slay 1000 ghosts, I get an email from some Charr saying he noticed my continued effort to clear the charr lands of the dreaded human ghosts, and points me to a specific location where I would find something related to ghosts or a special ghost of a certain significance, f/e the ghosts of Gwen. Upon finishing the quest, the Charr offers to create a weapon to commemorate the event, by making ’Arghore’s Axe of Ghostslaying’ and my Axe of choice would get a ghostly effect, where the axe itself stays the same in design.
Other legendary achievements should give other quests and related legendary effects.

4. Dare I say it, yes I dare. Mounts!

I have taken the personal liberty to ‘walk’ everywhere instead of skipping content by way-pointing. And I must say that it has drastically improved my immersion in the game, I actually run into events now ! Only thing though, even with a ranger with warhorn and the ‘swiftfeet’ passive (or w/e its called) it takes a long time to actually get somewhere, mounts could improve this significantly. As an option they would offer those that do not like to skip optional content to still get around fairly quickly, where those that are only in it for the quick reward and don’t care about the content in between can just waypoint and skip the game

5. A button to remove snarky comments about mounts, as though having a different opinion is something that should not be allowed. This isn’t China! :P

I think they had such a filter in GW1 … realy, while I just showed 2 possibilities on how to write www. just think of howmany more there would be for the actual url. including spaces, 2 spaces, points in it, etc and so on…

It’s not that I think your line of thinking is wrong btw. the idea is good, it’s just, an uphill battle that would not end. And a new ‘url’ costs about 2$ if not less, so while its a good idea, there would be no actual results … banning their accounts is a lot more expensive, and we don’t cost any extra resources. Anet gave us the weapon, we should pick it up and fight

Hmm nobody actually interested in saying anything about this ? … I had imagined people to be more vocal about this. :/

Well then I just hope I got a lot of [+] to hopefully make this happen…

The ranger needs to grow in the intended direction of being more ‘nature magically’ inclined. and adopt some ‘druid/shaman’ like qualities, while not mimicking the Norn racial abilities, BUT at the same time enhance the Norn Rangers ‘attunement to nature’

As long as the Ranger keeps focussed on having a pet ‘persee’ the ranger class will stay a handicapped class outside of PvE.

So I would like to opt for having ‘nature spirits’ or ‘spiritual pets’, to negate the need to actually have a pet. And making these part of the ‘pet equip’ is ‘I think’ a fair way to deal with the situation, and give players a choice… And these ‘spirits’ can be set up in a variety of ways.

- Using atunement to the ‘spirits’ already assigned to the ranger, sun, frost, stone, storm.
- Using other’s: earth, water, air, wood
- Using animal ‘groups’: fish, bird, mamal, reptilian.
- Using more specific: Moa, Yak, Drake, Spider.
- Or any other setup that floats ‘Anets’ boat and is deemed suited for the ranger profession.

What would these ‘spiritual’ pets do? Well they would function just like the current pets, only they would not show as a pet. Aka. They would ‘randomly’ add damage and/or effects to ranger attacks, and offer an F2 skill that could be pressed for a controlled effect.

In order to illustrate the following setup, with the actual spirits that the ranger already has assigned to it. Meaning a ranger could ‘equip’ or ‘attune’ to this spirit of nature, in exchange for having a pet. The ‘effects’ would trigger to the same algorithms that currently control the pets output…

Frost:
1. Your next attack will cause chill to the target
2. Your next attack scatters on impact causing bleed to your target and foes near to it.
3. The next incoming attack glances on your cold icy body
[F2] Embrace the Frost, your body cools the area around you chilling all foes near.

Stone:
1. Your next attack hits like a brick and does extra damage
2. Your next attack hits like a ton of bricks, knocking your target down.
3. The next incoming attack that hits you, gives you a short duration of protection
[F2] Embrace the Stone (‘earth’) gain stability for a short duration.

Storm:
1. Your next attack hits like lighting, it cannot be blocked and negates armor
2. Your next attack that hits, releases a flash of lighting hitting foes near to your target
3. The next incoming attack that hits you, ‘backfires’ as retaliation.
[F2] Embrace the storm, grants nearby allies swiftness.

Sun:
1. Your next attack sets your foe on fire.
2. WHen your next attack hits, it hits so bright it blinds foes near to it.
3. The next incoming attack, when it hits, sets the foes hitting you on fire.
[F2] Embrace the sun, you shine so bright it blinds foes near to you.

These are obviously examples, and a ton of varieties could be made up. I personally think this would be a great addition to the ranger, as it would allow it to be a more viable profession for more people, and it would make the ranger more viable in GW2 formats where the pet is currently more a liability than an asset (surely WvW, likely PvP).

While I fully understand that PvP (structured) is the place where balance takes place, I would like to point out a few things that I feel lacking about the thief. And in a sense may be lacking for more professions.

1. A good profile for each play format (pvp, wvw, pve; in order of importance…) and diversities of roles for these formats.
2. A reasonable trade off, so that using one negates the other.

This mainly has to do with me ‘trying’ to play a thief in WvW, and in a sense be part of all it has to offer. Currently though I feel that the only ‘use’ for a thief is to slaughter yak, and ‘maybe’ play a role in a havoc team, given the havoc team is big enough for the thief to not be noticed (or have 2 mesmers along). Otherwise one is fairly useless…

And with that I mean the main play in WvW is to zerg fight. And in that part of gameplay the thief is weaker than a caster, without any way to put some hurt back. And the only way to possibly contribute is to ‘stealth’ people with regeneration, which only helps a tad for the regeneration, because being stealthed doesn’t mean not being hit…

Now obviously I suck at thief play still, but that is not what I am trying to point at. It’s the very strict use of a thief, the one dimensionality that disappoints me. Not enough armor or health to stand against melee, not enough hurt (beside some gank builds) to stand against casters. And not enough utility to contribute on any other front, aka. useless unless you like ganking yak all day… or carry supply…

Now I somewhat like the buff on initiative to 1/s, but I have to follow this with some ‘true’ sarcasm, as I can now shoot 5 instead of 4 poisonous clouds in a zerg fight, while I pray nothing hits me…

And I do realize that the zerg fighting was hoped not to occur, I can see that the intention was to have large scale ‘hall’ fights. Where frontline, midline & backline where distinct roles to fulfil. And that the thief, in those roles did come with some needed support (I see the traps, the smoke screen and stealths, to guard that backline, and the ‘gank’ to take out those ‘monks’). The reality is different though, there is no midline in WvW, there are just fairly useless medium-class armour professions.

And in a sense that is sad, but more important I think is to accept it as a given, as I doubt there be anything that can be done about it. Just look at it this way, Astrix & Obelix and their village would not stand a chance against the mighty rome, if the zerg wasn’t more effective than organized play, in large scale battle… Moving with Chaos, in a chaotic situation simply works better than trying forcefully to apply organization to the chaos in order to beat it and win the fight at the same time…

So to cut to the chase, and come to my point, the thief (and the other midrange classes) need a whole bunch of ‘new’ skills, or have their current skills adapted, to deal with the reality of the game, it’s formats, and the roles in it suited for each individual class. And by using the power of forced choice, limit a role to its intended purpose, while at the same time making it possible to be useful in every format of the game.

And I would like to stress that this is meant as constructive criticism, I fully see how the medium armor classes were supposed to play their part, and in that have their diversity of roles, and contribute to the whole. And as someone that has found they love midrange play I applaud the setup (a dual axed, trapper ranger is very useful in PvE). It’s just that in the reality of WvW, they currently have no real contribution to make apart from some minor niche functions…

I have to agree with this, esp. after seeing that Pheonix armor :/ … well one of them and one strangely named the same …

likely because the first time such a filter is introduced they will work around it. The sheer amount of ways to write an URL make it nearly impossible to make the list. and surely, once you finally managed to get ALL these ways into the filter… they will change their name :P

vvvvvv.guildwars2.com
vvwvv.guildwars2.com
and this list goes on and on … and then when you finally got them all…

www.guild-wars2.com you can start all over…

====

So best thing to do, when you see one of these buggers, right click their name and report them for goldselling !

While I realize most just reply to the TS instead of reading the whole conversation. I would like to mention to these people just above here that there is more than just a ‘yes/no’ answer to this issue … there are always alternatives that may actually have aspects of most the pro’s and take the con’s into consideration..

Guess somewhere along the line I ended up on the wrong server then, as a SoR player that only recently felt the need to try out WvW … Needed to work on my PvE character first … I hardly recognise the SoR that is being described by many players here, I been on TS almost every day during the last 3 weeks or so and most the atmosphere is fine, with mostly nice people trying to do their best.

Sure we got our share of whiners and loudmouths, I doubt any server is filled with just popes and nuns. But I am guessing a fair share of those also flocked in while SOR was doing really good, meaning, as we drop in effectiveness these people will not stick around. They are the people without any backbone or character, only in it to win, and when there is a loss it’s always the other players that sucked, and not them … they will run to the next best server as soon as this league is over and we didn’t make 1st…

Now I joined only just after that whole IRON/ZD stuff, so I missed all that (tnx Dwayna) … but in defence of the nice people I met, that worked very hard to keep things going even during down hours, I do not recognize the reasons that people here write down to give SoR slack.

But if these reasons are true, then slipping back into T2 will be the best that has happened to my server for a long time. It will mean we will loose the ‘loosers’ that only care about winning as they will flock to another T1 server, and we will be left with a core of loyal friendly people … this loss will give us character, as it is the hardship you endure that builds your character, not the wind in your back.

And from the experiences I had over the last few weeks, I have confidence that we will manage to retake our momentum. But I sincerely hope that with that momentum, we will not retake the attitude that made our reputation precede us in a manner that I read it now. One, and I will mention this again, is not the attitude that I recognise in the large majority of our player base (in EU & NA timezones)

And if/when night do actually get darker, it be nice if there be ‘fire bundles’ that can be crafted in the mystic forge (f/e wood, iron, flint, cloth), that would let players set up some sort of ‘camp’ for roleplaying purposes, and the fire could also function as a ‘torch’ dispenser.

Plain and simple, the ambient light on Tyria should be tuned down by at least 20% if not more…

Currently I have absolutely NO clue when it is night or day, other then perhaps some effects on my Sylvari, if I pay attention to them… When it was said that Tyria would have day and night cycles, I actually had ‘visions’ of scary gameplay moments, when sounds in the distance at night would alert my senses of great fights to come.

When an account wide ‘torch’ was handed out as some sort of bundle item, I expected to see a darker Tyria at night, one where this torch would come in quite handy, especially in caves and dense woods or other dark places… None of that (well except for maybe that one place in the WvW dungeon).

So I really hope a lot of people agree with this statement (and give it a plus), so that sooner than later we can expect Tyria to offer more truly ‘night’ gameplay. Instead of just daytime gameplay with periodic extra light effects from races and or weapons…