Guild Wars 2

Okami.4287:

The fact that i cant play with all the skills of my reaper directly isn’t a problem at all. you were not complaining at launch of gw2 that you couldn’t play with all the spells of your class directly. you had to lvl up to gain stuff, which is normal.

When you first start a character at level one you are playing in an area intended for level one characters against level one foes.

If you switch to an elite spec in HoT zones you are essentially playing a sub 80 character in post 80 content vs post 80 foes.

Quells.2498:

I don’t get the complaints either. In the console world this style of exploring areas to unlock new abilities to access new areas is called “metroidvania” and it’s beloved by all. But then again when it comes to video games every gamer under the sun thinks they’re a design major and that they know better.

GW2 is not a console game.

A lot of inaccuracies and opinions stated as facts in the OP.

Daharahj.1325:

Seera.5916:

On how many characters have you unlocked more than half of your elite spec?

The majority of the players complaining either have a fair number of alts or primarily only play WvW.

One day, no, scratch that, 6 hours, that’s how long it took me to unlock half my elite spec and that’s not knowing the map at all and figuring out how to get to each hero point which took forever.

When even those who support the system describe it in terms such as, it made, “6 hours,” of playing feel like it was taking, “forever,” its not a good sign.

leftyboy.9358:

The dev post came from this original post

DarcShriek.5829:

Bryzy.2719:

Liewec.2896:

what ruins it is that the majority of those hero points are locked behind the mastery system, which is designed to be a long term system.

40 accessible hero challenges would be fine, locking them behind mind-numbing mastery grind walls isn’t fine.

This is the main problem. I started with 100 points, so 300 to go. The mastery system is taking FOREVER and it just feels like a completely boring grind.

The mastery system as only been available for 15 hours. Your complaining about it being forever is just pure over dramatization. Congratulations on being awarded the William Shatner award for dramatic excellence.

The original poster was complaining that the hero points needed to unlock elites took far too long because in its current form it’s tied in with mastery and that you basically need to run around all the new HoT content while still using old specs. The mastery system is just fine and yes you need things to shoot for, but unlocking elites was not discussed in advance as requiring very long times to access and Gaile gray’s post implies people who have a problem with long grind for their basic elite skills and traits are in some way just silly.

Gaile said, essentially, that 16 hours is not forever. Unless you are attempting to claim that there is no number higher than 16 you have no leg to stand on for that point.

The rest of it, though, yeah. Bad form.

Tatikios.1027:

Ashen.2907:

Tatikios.1027:

Mightybird.6034:

Tatikios.1027:

Yes, exactly this i want to say. To get your ELITE specialization you have to complete some challenges with your friends and thats what we want from MMO game.

Pls stop using that word’s implication as an excuse for your own opinion when the devs have already said the elite specs are no stronger (NOT ELITE) than the base class.

It is simply flavor text.

To train this spec you must complete traing in all other specs, it requires 400 points to train the whole spec, its name is ELITE spec and its change your class portrait. So… its 100% ELITE spec and to get it you ,ust complete challenge. Its usual mmo practice and we are playing MMO game, so why it shoud be changed? Cause some of players dont have any friends and have some social problems?

Elite means better.

No, elite means elite.

A word is not defined by itself but rather by the concept to which it refers. The word elite means superior or better in some way.

rsimoes.3851:

Mightybird.6034:

rsimoes.3851:

With this said, to be able to unlock the elite specialization you only need 60 points, which isn’t that much, so you can still experience the new specialization by mixing the olds ones with the new ones.

Err have you played HoT? No one wants to use a kitten 60pt whatever intro spec. Especially in this difficult HoT content. You’d be 2/3rds of a character.

Yes I’m playing HoT and enjoying the new specializations, No one wants to start a game at level 1 either, maybe we should all start at level 80..

When you start a game at level one you are facing level one opponents. Starting an elite spec means being effectively sub level 80 while facing post level 80 content.

Tatikios.1027:

Mightybird.6034:

Tatikios.1027:

Yes, exactly this i want to say. To get your ELITE specialization you have to complete some challenges with your friends and thats what we want from MMO game.

Pls stop using that word’s implication as an excuse for your own opinion when the devs have already said the elite specs are no stronger (NOT ELITE) than the base class.

It is simply flavor text.

To train this spec you must complete traing in all other specs, it requires 400 points to train the whole spec, its name is ELITE spec and its change your class portrait. So… its 100% ELITE spec and to get it you ,ust complete challenge. Its usual mmo practice and we are playing MMO game, so why it shoud be changed? Cause some of players dont have any friends and have some social problems?

Elite means better. We have been told that the, “elite,” specs are not supposed to be better. This means that the word elite is being used as a proper noun, not as an accurate descriptor.

Menzies The Heretic.3415:

If you only play pvp, you don’t need to unlock it.

If you are talking about unlocking it for pve, then why would you? Of you aren’t interested in playing pve anyways?

This.

Cerpin.9152:

Ashen.2907:

Tatikios.1027:

Yes, exactly this i want to say. To get your ELITE specialization you have to complete some challenges with your friends and thats what I want from MMO game.

Fixed that for you.

I too prefer group challenges in an MMO but that does not mean everyone does.

People that don’t have a wide variety of singleplayer games to choose from…

Examine the vast majority of GW2’s content and try to claim that it was not designed for solo play.

Tatikios.1027:

Yes, exactly this i want to say. To get your ELITE specialization you have to complete some challenges with your friends and thats what I want from MMO game.

Fixed that for you.

I too prefer group challenges in an MMO but that does not mean everyone does.

leftyboy.9358:

Also confirming that people who have played for 16 hrs still shouldn’t have their elites unlocked?

That is not what she said. I don’t consider the negative reaction to what was said to be inappropriate but you do not need to misrepresent what she did say in order to make your point.

Devildoc.6721:

Sizer.3987:

I know right? I went to queensdale and killed moas for an hour and i didnt even have every mastery unlocked! Dont these devs know what “play how you want” means!!!

Don’t build strawmen, please.

Sometimes that is all someone has.

Cerpin.9152:

The maps “dieing down” won’t happen soon, so why do you worry about that?

There is already commentary about zones not being populated. Of course this could be just another round of megaserver malfunctions. Then again it doesn’t really matter why if there are not enough people around, just that there aren’t.

Personally I like the idea of more challenges that call for group play to overcome.

Kain Francois.4328:

Uhm… Even in groups, it takes a whole 4 minutes in an event that only gives me 4:30 to complete the event.

How is that not overtuned?

That sounds nearly perfectly tuned actually. The goal would be to have it be doable (complete in under 4:30) without having it be a pushover (complete with minutes to spare).

The announced focus on vertical map design was a major contributor to my decision to not buy the expansion.

Ouch.

Sorry to hear it sir. Hope those tomes come fast for you.

Raziel.4216:

Game has over 7m active accounts according to the infographic they revealed yesterday.

You are misrepresenting the infographic.

7m created accounts does not equate to 7m active accounts. No game has 100% retention.

Pre-purchase = bad.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Guys,

Please read the topic of this thread. The subject is… Not, “Why I didn’t buy” or “What I think about the pricing,”.

Actually the majority of the OP is dedicated to asking why and gives multiple examples of what he theorizes are the reasons, including the specific examples you mention.

Paying for a product that you want….

What an odd concept. Who knows, it may even catch on.

gavyne.6847:

Ashen.2907:

Is it possible that HoT just isn’t seen as very much of a big deal (outside of current GW2 players)?

If these sites don’t operate on advertising revenue, they would’ve posted about it. Because it’s not up to them to decide if it’s seen as a big deal or not. News is news, an expansion for a MMO is news.

But like I said before, these gaming sites operate on advertising revenue. They’ll gladly talk about games & news from gaming companies if they pay for their space & time.

Actually it is very much up to them to decide. Not every news outlet covers every possible news story in the world. Decisions are made to focus on stories the outlet thinks will appeal to their readers.

These sites may be reliant on advertising revenue but ad revenue is dependent on readership. If the outlet isnt publishing what the readers desire the readers leave and ad revenue dries up. If these sites’ readers cared about GW2 the sites would feature GW2 more.

In the Anet quote they list both core specs AND elite specs. They then go on to estimate how many hero points would be required to unlock EVERYTHING. Not just elite specs, everything.

GragorR.9768:

Ashen.2907:

Claiming some sort of bias against the game on the part of those two sites when they have both reviewed the game in the best possible terms seems odd to me.

You do raise a fine point, they have indeed praised gw2 at launch and given it a pretty good score, which makes me wonder why there isn’t any coverage or ’’hyping’’ being done now that HoT is launching in a few short hours. If you visit the PC part of both websites, in popular games coming soon, or on the entire main page there is not a trace of gw2 launching an expansion, which seems odd to me because there isn’t all that much going on in pc gaming these days.

If there is no bias.

And if there is not much going on in PC gaming.

And if HoT is not getting much attention (outside of current GW2 players).

Is it possible that HoT just isn’t seen as very much of a big deal (outside of current GW2 players)?

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

• If you hate the idea of 100%-rep, don’t join a guild that asks it of you.

This.

GragorR.9768:

What i’m about to say is purely based on my personal opinion and not based on facts, but i have a feeling it probably has to do with shady politics and pressured (bought) boycotts. Considering the extremely biased reviews published there, i wouldn’t be surprised if HoT got a terrible score anyway, if only because Anet refused to buy the reviewers.

I know i might get infracted for saying this, but the truth is that it had to be said, and i find it regrettable that at the end of the day, more people might have decided to try gw2 if they had read coverage on one of those major gaming news websites.

There is no doubting gw2 has had incredible success in the past, and I wish Anet the best for HoT and the coming years. I don’t believe they need coverage from IGN and Gamespot to do so, but you know… It certainly wouldn’t hurt.

I am not sure that one can accurately argue that IGN has not provided coverage for GW2, or that they have a bias against the game, when they did review the game very positively at launch:

“ArenaNet has built one of the most exhaustively detailed and rewarding MMOs in existence, one that never unfairly penalizes and fosters an incredible urge to explore through a generous reward system and achingly pretty environment design. It’s a virtual world that more than anything wants you to work together with others, and provides a huge number of possibilities for cooperation while minimizing restrictions. For those disappointed in the lack of open world PvP, the World versus World alternative is a fascinating, complex system that demands teamwork, and the arena PvP modes should provide an instant-fix for those who thrive on fast, adrenaline-fueled combat. Whether you’re looking for competitive play, want to be told a story or simply want to go for a walk through fantastic countryside, Guild Wars 2 lets you do it all with a minimal amount of arbitrary, irritating limitations, and all without a subscription fee.”

Gamespot said:

“Guild Wars 2 is a paradise for explorers and thrill-seekers alike, and the best online role-playing game in years.”

Claiming some sort of bias against the game on the part of those two sites when they have both reviewed the game in the best possible terms seems odd to me.

Obviously fake.

A true gamer would have Slim Jims listed.

Find your joy wherever you can and devil take anyone who would deny you.

May your recovery be swift and complete.

sephiroth.4217:

I paid for it. I didn’t pay to grind specs, I paid FOR THE SPECS….

Unfortunately this is not the case. You did in fact pay to grind the specs (if you still choose to pursue them).

One of the drawbacks of prepurchasing before all of the details have been released is that you have ceded control over what exactly you are buying to the merchant.

Both sides are on pretty solid ground regarding this topic. The reality is that for some the enjoyment comes from exploring new content on a new profession(ish). Playing through that content on an old profession means less content to explore when they finally do unlock the spec.

For others an elite spec is something to work toward. A goal. A reason to play.

Both are right in their approach to enjoying new content and new specs. This is a situation where Anet was going to leave some people dissatisfied no matter what they did and so they erred on the side of addressing along standing complaint…something to earn in game.

Vayne.8563:

But they didn’t nerf the silverwastes, I wonder why.

Because SW is not instanced group content competing against the new direction for such content.

Coulter.2315:

Its your money, just you have a very different way of measuring to me – especially since gemstore items could all have been bought with in game gold and they didn’t improve the game in anyway (besides cosmetics), while the expansion would give you whole new things to do and see (plus new skins if thats what you like).

If the expansion only provided 5% of the enjoyment you got out of your gemstore purchases in the first few months it would still be on par with your purchases and worth it. I think you’re missing out – still time to get that free char slot too

Its pretty straight forward to me. I spend my money on things I want and like. I avoid spending money on things I don’t want, don’t like, or actively dislike.

I find the logic of, “you spent $1000 on things you want and like so you are missing out by not spending $50 on something you do not want or like,” to be odd.

Spending $50 on something that I do not want, that I do not like, that I would not use, would be a very expensive, “free,” character slot. Plus I have not used all of my existing character slots.

I am, however, glad that others find value in the expansion. It increases the likelihood that Anet will develop another, eventually.

Coulter.2315:

Ashen.2907:

The one to Rule.2593:

He did speak for his own circumstances.

She also spoke of other people’s circumstances. If she had spoken only of how it was not expensive for her that would be one thing. Telling others to get a job is something else.

Personally I am willing to spend hundreds of dollars for a game that I feel is worth it. I spent in the neighborhood of a thousand dollars in the months following GW2’s launch.

I would consider HoT to be too expensive if priced at anything above $0. This is not because I am unwilling to spend money. It is purely because what has been announced as included in the price of the expansion is without worth to me.

The one to Rule.2593:

I guess the last 3 years of free play

I paid for every minute of that, “free,” play. Until very recently so did everyone else.

How did you manage to spend $1000 on outfits but think $50 is too much for extra story, pve maps, raids and specs? (plus all the extra bits)

I liked what I bought but do not find the announced HoT elements to be of interest.

I disliked the LS story. As much as I love the core gameplay of GW2 LS2 almost convinced me to uninstall. Who knows perhaps HoT’s story won’t be complete garbage.

Anet have announced that the HoT maps will focus on verticality. Not my cup of tea. Add in commentary about navigation difficulties for the colorblind and my interest in the jungle maps is further reduced. Other elements such as the mushrooms and gliders are also off-putting for me.

Never have raided. Closest I’ve come is things like the Deep or Urgoz in GW1. Most of my friends have quit GW2. Buying an expansion for group content when the people you like playing with won’t be there would be silly IMO.

I tend to focus on a single main character. Play him for thousands of hours. Experiment with builds, kill untold thousands of mobs, generally just have fun with the combat system. Specifically a main Ranger. Druid has no appeal for me. I do have several 80’s but no real interest in developing them into a new spec.

I must admit to being surprised by the quoted question. It is comparable, to me, to asking, “how can you be willing to spend $1000 on your favorite foods but not $50 on foods you actively dislike.”

Paying $50 for something that you find uninteresting or actively distasteful seems more off than anything else IMO.

For what it is worth, I have never bought an outfit.

The one to Rule.2593:

Except that you really didn’t you paid 50-60$ for the base game.

I paid more than $50-60.

I paid to access the game for as long as it existed. Great deal. Phenomenal entertainment value. Every minute paid for. None of it was free.

Now there were no mandatory additional costs beyond that initial purchase. Didn’t stop me from spending a grand in the first few months post launch. But until P4F was launched none of it was free. It was all paid for in advance, at the time of the initial purchase.

A real easy way to tell is a little imagination exercise:

Pretend it is 2012.
Try to imagine what would happen if you tried to play GW2 without paying for it.

Pretend it is 2013.
Try to imagine what would happen if you tried to play GW2 without paying for it.

Pretend it is 2014.
Try to imagine what would happen if you tried to play GW2 without paying for it.

Pretend it is 2015 (pre P4F launch).
Try to imagine what would happen if you tried to play GW2 without paying for it.

Sykper.6583:

In the raid instance you are put into combat, so Legendary Armor can’t flip stats anyways.

Perhaps, but it might make it easier to alter your spec from your norm to meet the needs of a group before entering the raid.

Still face the cost of changing runes though.

The one to Rule.2593:

He did speak for his own circumstances.

She also spoke of other people’s circumstances. If she had spoken only of how it was not expensive for her that would be one thing. Telling others to get a job is something else.

Personally I am willing to spend hundreds of dollars for a game that I feel is worth it. I spent in the neighborhood of a thousand dollars in the months following GW2’s launch.

I would consider HoT to be too expensive if priced at anything above $0. This is not because I am unwilling to spend money. It is purely because what has been announced as included in the price of the expansion is without worth to me.

The one to Rule.2593:

I guess the last 3 years of free play

I paid for every minute of that, “free,” play. Until very recently so did everyone else.

Conncept.7638:

Ashen.2907:

Conncept.7638:

Nexons majority acquisition of NCSoft stock.

When did Nexon increase their holdings of NCSoft from their purchase of 15% to the 51% you claim?

Picked up that huge wealth of finance knowledge from 1990s business dramas did you?

Nope, from the dictionary.

To be the majority shareholder one must own greater than half of the stock in a publicly traded company.

Maybe people should speak for their own financial circumstances rather than attempting to comment, in ignorance of relevant facts, on others’?

Conncept.7638:

Nexons majority acquisition of NCSoft stock.

When did Nexon increase their holdings of NCSoft from their purchase of 15% to the 51% you claim?

zaced.7948:

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Crystin Cox.

^

i did a quick google search and it seems cox is still doing work for anet (at least she appears in recent gw2 videos like from gamescom 2015). i don’t know the terms of her involvement as this was nowhere to be found in a quick search. as far as i know nexon hasn’t sold their shares yet as such things usually happen over time.

According to linkedIn Crystin Cox worked for Nexon from 2010 to 2012 before leaving to work for Anet from 2012 to present. She has now been with Anet for longer than her employment with Nexon.

Ohoni.6057:

I don’t think anyone’s suggested removing ascended armor from the game.

I have.

Kayberz.5346:

Except legendary really isnt a different tier. It is the exact same as ascended. All the stats that can be choosen on a legendary can also be choosen for an ascended item and they are completely identical in stats. Changing the stats on legendarys is both unnecessary and impractical because it doesnt change runes/sigils. Locking unneeded luxory conveniences behind specific content is definitely accaptable because not having it in no way prevents you from experiencing anything in the game

This is why, though I think that a skin would have been a better option, gating legendaries doesn’t bother me all that much.

The one benefit of a legendary over an ascended piece would be too expensive to use. Just imagining the cost to replace my runes with any degree of frequency is enough to make me flinch.

zaced.7948:

Ashen.2907:

zaced.7948:

at some point anet had someone from nexon come in and look at the gemshop stuff. that’s fact.

Isn’t the someone from nexon you refer to someone who worked at Anet before working at Nexon. Were they not also someone who left Nexon’s employ, taking a new job at Anet?

as far as i know it was a nexon employee consulting regarding ingame shop and microtransactions. if it had any concrete effect on anything i don’t know.

Who was it?

Coulter.2315:

Ashen.2907:

Coulter.2315:

Do you really believe it would be reasonable to just remove all Ascended equipment from the game tomorrow given the hours that hundreds of thousands of people put into getting them?

I do.

But I also understand that not everyone will agree with me.

Which means it shouldn’t and couldn’t be implemented – glad we got that sorted.

It could be.

Should or should not is subjective.

Note that all Ascended was added after hundreds of thousands of people invested hours in a game that had been advertised as not having a post max level gear progression/grind.

Works both ways.

Coulter.2315:

Do you really believe it would be reasonable to just remove all Ascended equipment from the game tomorrow given the hours that hundreds of thousands of people put into getting them?

I do.

But I also understand that not everyone will agree with me.

Sidenti.6035:

I have a hard time feeling sorry for people who just don’t pay attention. “Unique” means “one of a kind”.

If it was one of a kind it would not be possible to buy it twice. By the definition you list it is not unique.

The mistake here was not made by the OP, it was made by Anet who inaccurately labeled the item.

Iason Evan.3806:

Astralporing.1957:

maddoctor.2738:

For the record, I was never against alternatives. I’m against having alternatives in every piece of content possible. And also, I never understand why everyone is only talking about raids in discussions like this, as if Raids is the only content that has unique rewards. As if the rest of the game doesn’t have any kind of unique reward but somehow it is bad only for Raids to have them.

No, it’s not bad only for raids to have such rewards. How bad it is depends on how difficult the content behind the rewards are locked is, and what rewards are locked this way.
Thus, so far, only 4 cases really stand out. One is legendary armor, one is tournament armor, one is liadri mini, and one is a llama mini.

Of those, i consider a mini to be a more reasonable reward (though i understand that there might be people that will disagree) for this type of content. That leaves a tournament armor (against which i did protest), and a whole category of items locked beyond raids.

If it was just a case of a mini, or some singular unique skins, i might perhaps stomach it. In this case i just can’t stay silent.

So, Raids get picked out, because in their case the problem is the biggest and most visible.

I agree with Astral here. I think skins are an appropriate thing to lock behind specific content because it signifies the content you completed. A tier of armor(legendary)being locked behind a specific type of content isn’t the best in my opinion. I think you should be able to get Legendary armor in a number of ways and maybe lock some armor skins behind raids. Visually that signifies you’ve completed the raids. Fractal Weapon skins were handled like this. You want the fractal weapon skins? Do Fractals. You want dungeon armor skins? Do dungeons. Locking Legendary Armor exclusively behind a raid gate is a little counter-intuitive to what GW2 stood for when a bunch of us started playing. Let players get legendary armor from doing raids. Let the craft it. Let them do a quest for it. Look at the metrics after that and see where most people get there armor from.

It’s my opinion that ArenaNet is using Legendary armor in raids to drive players to actually do the raiding content. That shouldn’t be the reason. The reason should be because those players actually want a skillful challenge. I think they know that the number of people that want an actual challenge in this game isn’t that high so they are using the armor to get people to play the content. It’s a mistake.

Yeah,

With Astral and Iason here.

Although having Legendary armor locked behind raids doesn’t really bother me all that much I do think that a specific skin rather than a category of armor would have been a better option.

Ultimately I think that this indicates a great deal of doubt, on Anet’s part, in the merit of the content in question. If they feel the need to go further than skins to push the content they can’t have much confidence in the fun factor of the content IMO.

Not buying HoT but still playing the game.

No outrage just a sense that what has been presented about HoT is not worth my money.

What will I do? Probably play a bit less. Some WvW. I love the Orr maps. Probably spend some time there.

Neox.3497:

Ashen.2907:

Astralporing.1957:

Still, he’s wrong. A good puzzle is one that remains hard even after it has been done few times already.

What puzzle retains its difficulty after you not only know the solution, but have practiced its implementation?

One that doesn’t have a “cheap solution”. Or simply one that is a little bit different everytime.

Cheap or not if the solution is known and practiced the difficulty goes down.

A puzzle that changes each time is a new puzzle each time and so its solution is not known and cannot be practiced. Personally I love the idea of a certain degree of randomness to slow down (it wouldn’t stop it) the rate of difficulty loss for a given encounter.

Obtena.7952:

For instance, people complained about Ascended being introduced being a ‘grind’ and ‘breaking promises’. Does that really affect a person’s ability to be successful in the game?

Is there any success, in a game, that matters more than playing and having fun?

If the quality of one’s play is lessened and the fun to be derived is lessened then yes the ability to be successful may have been impacted.