Guild Wars 2

MuxyKillin.7036:

would this be instance-related or open world, because however engaging and challenging it sounds, if it’s open world most players would rather go around this glob of pain than work out tactics and organise to take them down, at least it’s what i think.. now if it were instanced within a larger-than-5-player-party instance… huhuhuh then it’d be quite an interesting change to AI and gameplay.

I am talking about instanced Living Story events. Like inside LA during Escape from LA. Players can get organized in there to fight against organized mobs.

The open world is mostly roaming for most players. So the mobs should be roaming as well (unorganized).

Is my proposal that bad? Or is it too hard to understand?

@ draxynnic.3719

I think the problem is:

The Scarlet story arc was never designed to be a detective story.

A story cannot just becomes a detective story. It have to be built from the ground up to be a detective story. There has to be more than enough clues around for the players/readers to figure out what actually happened in the past.

I don’t think this is the case with the Scarlet story at all. The author of Scarlet wanted the players to guess what will happen in the future, not the past.

The “future” turns out to be an attack on LA, and perhaps the awaking of the Jungle Elder Dragon.

I guess what I am trying to say is, unless the authors had planned for a story to be a detective story right from the start, do not bother hiding anything from the past. About the past, lay absolutely everything out in the open. So there is no guessing needed on the players/readers.

Detective stories are very hard to write well. This is the truth. There are tons more fantasy, sci-fi and other story types out there for good reason.

Any opinions on this? Anyone else want to see an improvement in mob unit AI?

Advanced Tactics:

Now let us move on to advanced tactics. That means the unit working together with other units to fight the players. There are many options. I will provide two options here as examples.

1) Reserves – The mob units form up depths of units, to slowly wear out the players. For example a depth of 3 layers means 3 groups of mob units.

The first unit will engage the players, damaging them and putting the player’s skills on cooldown.

Shortly afterwards to second unit will join the fight. The now weakened players (lost of health, skills on cooldown, etc) will have a harder time fighting this second unit.

Finally the third unit joins the fight. They have a good chance of overwhelming the players, because the players are “exhausted”.

2) Lure – The mobs lure the players into a trap.

To simplify things, let’s say there are only two type of units:

1) Warrior Hammer Unit – This unit are melee fighters.
2) Warrior Rifle Unit – This unit are range fighters.

The mobs will split into two groups, one on the left and one on the right. Each group have a Warrior Rifle Unit in the front and a Warrior Hammer Unit in the back.

The battle starts with the Warrior Rifle Units picking off soft player targets from range. The players have two options:

i) The players charge themselves into one of the two groups of mobs.

Let’s say the players go after the left group of mobs. These Warrior Rifle Unit on the left will roll/dodge back twice, while the Warrior Hammer Unit charge forward to intercept. The Warrior Hammer Unit on the left will take the damage, while the Warrior Rifle Unit (now behind them) can keep firing.

At the same time, the mob group to the right will move in to assist the left side. The players, exhausted from the fight on the left, will have a hard time fighting this right side group off.

ii) The players try to kill these Warrior Rifle Units from range

The players are bound to focus more on one of the sides. This will be obvious since one of the units will be taking more damage. Let’s say the left side of the mobs takes more damage.

The Warrior Hammer Unit on the right will charge in when the players aren’t looking. They will now draw the players’ attention.

The Warrior Hammer Unit on the left will now charge in to assist. Once again, the now exhausted players will have a hard time fighting this group from the left.

For the whole fight, the more glassy Warrior Rifle Unit gets to shoot at the player without much risk.

Watch videos on Rome: Total War for more ideas. For example:

Basic Tactics:

Now we have established what a unit is, we can move on to unit tactics. We will start with basic tactics. That means the unit, by itself, try to survive and deal damage against the players.

Basic:

1) Always on the move – the unit is always on the move. This make it hard for the players’ AoE to deal its full damage.

They may pause for a few seconds when the Champion drops a field, to let the blash finishers take effect.

2) Find large cluster of players (AoE mob unit) – The mob unit will prioritize attacking an area with the highest concentration of players. This will allow the mobs to use their AoE to maximum effect.

3) Pick on the glass cannons (single target mob unit) – The mob unit will prioritize berserker (glass cannon) players to down them first.

4) Dodge together – The mob unit will dodge together with its Champion. When to dodge is up for debate. However when there are 10+ AoE nukes under this unit’s feet, maybe it is a good time to dodge together.

Background:

It is been bothering me for a while, that the game play in GW2 is lacking. In GW1 mobs will fight on a fairly even playing field as the players. Similar skills, stats, etc. But in GW2 they seem to be fighting on a totally different universe. They have health and damages well outside of the players’ reach. At the same time they are dumb as a brick.

Right now we have mobs randomly spawning in the middle of the players. They are not organized at all and do not work as an unit. I think a simple Mob Unit AI will really help in providing the players will a new type of challenge.

Purpose:

Unless the Mob Unit fights in an organized fashion, the players will never be organized. There is no need right now.

The mob units should fight in a similar fashion as a player zerg. It sounds complicated but it doesn’t have to be. Please read on. ^^

Required:

1) No random mob spawns for the unit – There is no mob spawns for a unit of mobs. All the mobs involved in the fight already exists right from the start.

For game play reasons, there may be mobs spawning around this fight. However they are not part of the unit of mobs.

2) Mobs will stack on their Champion as their commander – A unit of mob consist of 1 Champion, 2 elites and 8 Veteran mobs. They will always stack on the Champion as their commander; going exactly wherever he goes.

3) Each champion have a different field+blast – A “Water Champion” will let loose a water field once every 30 seconds at its location. A “Fire Champion” will let loose a fire field once every 30 seconds. etc

A champion will automatically do 5 blast finishers (in a roll) every 10 seconds.

That means a champion will by itself fulfil the function of field+blash finisher for its whole unit.

These field will be bigger than normal (480 in size) to make it easy for the mobs to use.

Some champions have alternating fields. That means water field, then 30 seconds later fire field. Then 30 seconds later static field. etc.

4) Mobs in a unit are downed, and needs to be finished – The mobs in the unit won’t help their downed allies. Instead the downed mobs automatically gains 1% health per second. The players need to go and finish the mobs.

The downed mob have the same health as a regular mob, not their regular health. So you do not need to drain a champion’s health twice. It is champion’s health+ health of a regular mob.

Mobs that requires finishing will give 25% more exp and 25% more chance at dropping loots. This will compensate for the extra time needed to kill them.

5) Focus fire – Mob units will try to hit the same player(s) to down them.

Result:

We now have mob units that are designed to fight together. They will stack together. They will get benefits from fields+blast finishers. They now require players to finish them. And they will focus fire.

A topic that was bought up a few times here is “idiot ball” and “idiot plot”. I will point out when this plot device is acceptable and when it is not.

Acceptable:
1) Only 1, or a few, character(s) are dumb.

Everyone makes mistakes. It happens, and the readers understand this. In fact a character’s mistake can be used to develop that character.

However when everyone inside the plot is an idiot, and this is required for the story to work, the plot becomes an idiot plot.

The size of the idiot population is important in making the plot believable.

2) The character admits afterwards that he is an idiot. People around the character points out that he/she is an idiot.

After the character made a major mistake, it is very important for he/she to owe up to that mistake. He/she may or may not be punished. But the point is that said character cannot act like nothing happened.

The side characters around that character should also point out the mistake to the said character. These side characters cannot act like nothing happened.

[Naruto spoiler]

In Naruto, Kabuto can summon any dead ninja to fight for him. However when he faced Itachi, Kabuto didn’t summon any dead ninja to help himself.

Kabuto was given the idiot ball.

However Kabuto right afterwards said “I never imagine that anyone would find me.”

This implies that Kabuto sent all his undead to the front lines, because he didn’t expect his location to be found. Kabuto was wrong, but he owe up to it.

[/Naruto spoiler]

Non acceptable:
1) Everyone is dumb.
2) No one (or just very few) people point out that dumb character’s mistakes. That character never admitted to being an idiot.

Emiko.3217:

Atlas.9704:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Speaking of which: The Living Story Needs More Side Plots!

I broke the +1 for this part of your post.
We do need side plots, after all it isn’t like Rata Sum is doing nothing or Hoelbrak is sitting on their thumbs while Scarlet goes around.

Side plots would help seed the next villain for the future season.

..and plot twists!!

Yeah, like Demmi Beetlestone is actually a spy for her father. ^^

Sirendor.1394:

hellsmachine.4085:

Traveller.7496:

Give an option to switch stats for ascended gear. Problem solved.

But then people would complain about legendaries being worthless.

Ahahah, but legendaries are just about looks, are they not? /thread

Indeed. Looks by themselves have value. There is no need for stats to be different. ^^

Suddenflame.2601:

I think you guys are missing the point of FTOM.

FTOM 1-9 can be done without any ascended as intended
FOTM 10+ needs ascended as intended.

FTOM 1-9 has identical content as 10+ but with different challenged.

FOTM 10+ was designed for ascended and infusions in mind. No other part of the game requires ascended or infusions.

The content of FOTM 10+ is exactly the same as FOTM 1-9 but with different challenges and rewards. The content is the exact same (the levels are the exact same with the exact same enemies therefore the content is the exact same).

Since all content can be done without ascended than Ascended is a want not a need. You do not need Ascended to complete content X, but you want Ascended to complete content X cooler (horizontal progression) or better (vertical progression).

I wont deny that Ascended is the better stat wise than exotic cause that would be a pointless argument.

Vertical Progression is not dreadful unless its a gear treadmill which by the way this isn’t for they stated it will be the final tier.

As well to the comments about Anet lying. Anet is in a similar situation to when an individual person has to make a hard choice between what they said but have to do. Ascended was added because of the high demand from people complaining about the grind to Legendary from Exotic. Legendary at that time was meant to take years to achieve to get (Long term goal). People were trying to get their legendary in just a few months after release. Ascended was a rushed release at the same time of the failed Karka invasion event (lag fest). So when it first appeared it was in limited locations and the person who did it made an official apology on the forums for it.

They have been working on fixing it ever sense without making it easy to obtain which is against the reason why they designed it. Ascended is a middle-term goal rather than a longer-term goal. It will take you months to get ascended compared to years that Legendary was intended to be. Right now you guys are complaining about the length of time it takes to get Ascended which is its intended length of time.

My long-term goal is to outfit my 10 characters with full ascended gear. Is this goal achievable? Yes it is. Basic calculations say its achievable in less than 5years. It takes only a few months to outfit a single character which to me is not much.

Your 10 character, 5 year plan only works if you plan to never change any of those 10 characters’ build.

What if you get bored with one of your characters and want to change his build? Then you got to grind for ascended gear to fit that new build.

By your estimation, it takes 6 months to fully equip one character with Ascended gear. Let’s go with that.

It takes 6 months for you to re-equip your character to fully Ascended for the new build

You got to admit that this is annoying and it is a waste of time. Having Ascended gears does not benefit you at all. So why are you defending Ascended gear?

Jski.6180:

WvW is made to be the most disadvantages part of the game there soo many means of being lesser then the other 2 side gear just becomes insignificant.

If your dieing in pve you doing something wrong and gear will not save you when ppl can zerk things down in full glass and yet other players cant stay alive in non zerk there a major skill gap going on.

You cant force ppl to inv you to there group the same goes you cant force ppl into showing your gear its your chose and there chose what they do gear has nothing to do with it.

WvW: Sure many of the fights are 20 vs 40, which isn’t even strength. Yet you cannot deny that even strength fights do happen. In fact it happens more often than you think. And hence you cannot deny that this advantage does exist. Whatever that’s significant or not is up to personal opinion and debate.

And what about the increased chance of escaping alive from a 20 vs 40 fight? Is this not an advantage in itself?

PvE survival: You are saying here that “if you died wearing exotic gear, you would have died even with Ascended gear.” Ok sure this may be true 95% of the time. But what about those 5%? If you wear full ascended gear, and you survive with 600 health left, that Ascended gear just saved your life. It does happen. And yes this is an advantage.

Dungeon invite: It is a fact that having full Ascended gear makes it easier to get into dungeon groups. That said player may be a terrible player, but the group won’t know this until they played with that said player. And I consider this an advantage.

I am not saying Exotic gear users cannot find a group right now. I said this may happen in the future when elitists takes over. The potential of gear discrimination is there.

Jski.6180:

CHIPS.6018:

Jski.6180:

CHIPS.6018:

Jski.6180:

CHIPS.6018:

Jski.6180:

Yes you do level from 1 to 80 that is a type of vertical progression any game is like that though i do not see your point.

Yes nearly all games have vertical progression to some degree. But the vertical progression in GW2 is out of control right now in my opinion.

One armor set that not a full upgrade but more on the lines of a +1 is about as far out of control as you can get. I think your making mountains out of ant mounds. Out of control vertical progression is what you have in WoW a full new armor set ever 6 months and about 5 to 10 levels every year. In WoW vertical progression will never end and i have a feeling games say like wildstar or other games with a raid end game you will see the same thing happen. GW2 progression reminds me of FF11 before they added in a higher level cap then 75 only a +1 gear set. My point is that if you call this out of control what is in control vertical progression?

To be honest, it is the slippery slope that I am worried about the most. But even right now, the fact I listed stands.

It takes 3 months to full switch from one build to the next, because switching Ascended gear takes a long time. They take a while to obtain.

People may argue that you do not need Ascended gear. If they only use Exotic (or even masterwork) gear then they can switch very easily. Sure. But then they will be playing at a stat disadvantage, because Ascended stats > Exotic stats > Masterwork stats.

All these a facts.

The next argument is that exotic have very similar stats as Ascended. This is indeed true. However it is still a stat advantage. An unfair advantage is still an unfair advantage, no matter how small. That’s why the Olympics made every effort to make sure the completion is nearly 100% totally fair.

Once again, think of the slippery slope.

Until Anet openly state that “the slippery slope has ended”, we don’t know it will end. WoW is a much older game than GW2, so its slippery slope is more obvious. We cannot say “WoW is worst than GW2” because GW2 hasn’t reached the end of its slippery slope yet.

Hope I am making sense.

Why is it unfair? Your acting like things in pve are so base off of gear that any changes will = a win or a lost and that just not true. In WvW its unfair to be an up level but you can still get into wvw so its unfair to the world to have more up-level its also unfair to use a tp etc.. the list goes on and on for wvw its not made to be fair. There is no slope to slip down because the game still doable in greens at all levels but ONE event fractals and that 10+ fractals only. Its such a small part of the game over all though and you can get the full content of fractals by doing level 1 to 10.

I will repeat what I said:

You may overcome your disadvantages in stats by player ability (e.g. being an awesome player). But you are still at a disadvantage.

You, being an awesome player, does not mean you are not at a disadvantage. Because you are at a disadvantage, literally.

A very bad player (e.g. far worst than you) may be able to do what you do, simply by having higher stats.

And that for the player to do but not the fault of the player who has better gear. At best your trying to tear down ppl who have better gear and who has put more work into the game. By just simply playing it longer as a player they have an advantages over players who have not.

I am not saying it is any players’ fault. I am saying the whole system is flawed. You are, literally, at a disadvantage when you are:

-Engaging in WvW fights
-Surviving in PvE.
-Finding groups in dungeons.

Those are all very important parts of the game.

Overcoming your disadvantages by being an awesome player doesn’t mean you are no longer in a disadvantage.

Jski.6180:

CHIPS.6018:

Jski.6180:

CHIPS.6018:

Jski.6180:

Yes you do level from 1 to 80 that is a type of vertical progression any game is like that though i do not see your point.

Yes nearly all games have vertical progression to some degree. But the vertical progression in GW2 is out of control right now in my opinion.

One armor set that not a full upgrade but more on the lines of a +1 is about as far out of control as you can get. I think your making mountains out of ant mounds. Out of control vertical progression is what you have in WoW a full new armor set ever 6 months and about 5 to 10 levels every year. In WoW vertical progression will never end and i have a feeling games say like wildstar or other games with a raid end game you will see the same thing happen. GW2 progression reminds me of FF11 before they added in a higher level cap then 75 only a +1 gear set. My point is that if you call this out of control what is in control vertical progression?

To be honest, it is the slippery slope that I am worried about the most. But even right now, the fact I listed stands.

It takes 3 months to full switch from one build to the next, because switching Ascended gear takes a long time. They take a while to obtain.

People may argue that you do not need Ascended gear. If they only use Exotic (or even masterwork) gear then they can switch very easily. Sure. But then they will be playing at a stat disadvantage, because Ascended stats > Exotic stats > Masterwork stats.

All these a facts.

The next argument is that exotic have very similar stats as Ascended. This is indeed true. However it is still a stat advantage. An unfair advantage is still an unfair advantage, no matter how small. That’s why the Olympics made every effort to make sure the completion is nearly 100% totally fair.

Once again, think of the slippery slope.

Until Anet openly state that “the slippery slope has ended”, we don’t know it will end. WoW is a much older game than GW2, so its slippery slope is more obvious. We cannot say “WoW is worst than GW2” because GW2 hasn’t reached the end of its slippery slope yet.

Hope I am making sense.

Why is it unfair? Your acting like things in pve are so base off of gear that any changes will = a win or a lost and that just not true. In WvW its unfair to be an up level but you can still get into wvw so its unfair to the world to have more up-level its also unfair to use a tp etc.. the list goes on and on for wvw its not made to be fair. There is no slope to slip down because the game still doable in greens at all levels but ONE event fractals and that 10+ fractals only. Its such a small part of the game over all though and you can get the full content of fractals by doing level 1 to 10.

I will repeat what I said:

You may overcome your disadvantages in stats by player ability (e.g. being an awesome player). But you are still at a disadvantage.

You, being an awesome player, does not mean you are not at a disadvantage. Because you are at a disadvantage, literally.

A very bad player (e.g. far worst than you) may be able to do what you do, simply by having higher stats.

Zypher.7609:

CHIPS.6018:

You said I should go back to GW1. I could just easily tell you to move to another extremely grindy MMO. That argument will lead nowhere. Instead, look at the two different core design philosophies above. Pick and choose which you your prefer.

I’m not asking the developers to change the game for me. That is what you are trying to do, I enjoy the way the game is. So I made the mention that if you really did enjoy GW1 so much you should just go back. I do not find GW2 grindy at all because I do not support the claim that Ascended armor is needed. I have 5 different sets of exotic in the bank for my character, it takes me 2 minutes to respec. A little be more if I forget what traits I used and need to look at my spreadsheet I have. (Which on this note would love a system to save a trait build.) Back to the point, I am just making the point that there is in no way that “Proof that GW2 is Vertical Progression.” that your post tries to make. I showed that there is vertical progession in every game, by this your first post is invalid.

Sure GW1 and GW2 both have vertical progression. My claim of “GW1 takes 2 minutes” vs “GW2 takes 3 months” stated this very fact.

Why? Because 2 minutes is still vertical progression. This is a fact. No matter how small, like 2 minutes, vertical progression is still vertical progression.

But it is also obvious that GW2’s vertical progression is in a different league than GW1’s. Totally different league.

You said "I do not find GW2 grindy at all because I do not support the claim that Ascended armor is needed. I have 5 different sets of exotic in the bank for my character, it takes me 2 minutes to respec. "

It takes more than 2 minutes to get 5 exotic gear sets. It is true that exotic gear doesn’t take that long to get. But surely more than 2 minutes. And btw 5 sets is incomplete. You do not have all the options available within your fingertip. You have to get more exotic sets if you want all the options.

I understand that having Ascended gear around does not affect you, because you have no plans of getting them. You are perfectly happy with exotic. But then, why are you defending Ascended gear? I have asked people with you point of view many times. But I have still not gotten an answer.

And then you said you got 5 set of exotics. They are great. Except

-In WvW you will be at a disadvantage when you fight against someone with full Ascended gear. You maybe able to overcome this by being the better player. But fact is you are at a disadvantage when you begin.
-In PvE you have a higher chance of dying than someone with full Ascended gear. You also deals less damage, making you less valuable in the party/group. You may very well overcome these by player ability. But fact is you are at a disadvantage when you begin.

The above are facts.

Maybe eventually those dungeon elitists will require full Ascended gear before they take you in. You may try telling them you are an awesome player ability wise. These elitist couldn’t care less.

You see where I am going with this? Ascended gear hurts YOU too! So why are you defending it? That’s what I don’t understand.

Draknar.5748:

Azreell.1568:

Sighs another semantics joker.

Do I really need to explain this?

If you really want to have this argument then here:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mistlock_Instability

Yours definition of content is incorrect.

The fights at higher level fractals due to the mistlock instability list have different mechanics and effects hence different content. I suggestion you review them before attempting any because as per your post I can see you being a liability to a group.

Also, The fractals are listed from 1-50 – there is no difficulty slider.

You may view them as more difficult I simply view them as different because I would not play the exact same way in a level 1 with no instability as I would on a level 43 with Bloodlust.

To clarify – Not being able to do a level 50 by most normal persons would mean by definition you can not do all content.

<boggle>

Sorry, bud, we will have to agree to disagree here, like pretty much everyone on either side of the fence on this.

New attacks/effects does NOT equate to new content. It’s the same content, they added some added mechanics, but in the end it is the same content. You are going through the same level, fighting the same bad guys, killing the same bosses, except now there are different moves the boss uses or different modifiers on damage?

That’s a serious stretch just to make the argument that “lawlz gw2 is totally vertical because you can’t do the hardest version of easily accessible content, which means it is new content, which means Ascended isn’t optional it is REQUIRED huehuehue”.

Someone completely new to GW2 could level up to 80, gear up in yellows, and run FoTM1 of every single fractal and have experienced every bit as much content as the FoTM50 group. Sure the 50 group faces a harder challenge, but in the end, both groups are running the same dungeon, facing the same types of monsters, and killing the same bosses. That is the same content.

I have a feeling that if Anet made a big announcement about a giant update with loads of new content, and then it turned out that all the new “content” was was the same dungeons we have but a special hard-mode that requires Ascended gear, you’d be right with everyone else saying “WTF ANET THAT ISNT NEW CONTENT ITS THE SAME CONTENT WITH MORE CHALLENGE RIPOFF!!”

Look at these 3 dungeons in the same location.

Dungeon 1: You kill mobs. Kill the boss. GG.
Dungeon 2: You are poisoned once every 10 seconds. That makes condition removal very important. You need to carry a condition removal skill. You kill mobs. Kill the boss. GG.
Dungeon 3: You will be hit by a 10,000 damage attack (landslide, etc) every 10 seconds. That makes timely dodging these landslides, while fighting enemies, very important. You kill mobs. Kill the boss. GG.

Are these 3 dungeons, in the same location, the same? Nope!

Dungeon 1, you just kill mobs.
Dungeon 2, you also have to worry about the poison.
Dungeon 3, you also have to dodge landslides while fighting.

These 3 dungeons are not the same at all.

Jski.6180:

CHIPS.6018:

Jski.6180:

Yes you do level from 1 to 80 that is a type of vertical progression any game is like that though i do not see your point.

Yes nearly all games have vertical progression to some degree. But the vertical progression in GW2 is out of control right now in my opinion.

One armor set that not a full upgrade but more on the lines of a +1 is about as far out of control as you can get. I think your making mountains out of ant mounds. Out of control vertical progression is what you have in WoW a full new armor set ever 6 months and about 5 to 10 levels every year. In WoW vertical progression will never end and i have a feeling games say like wildstar or other games with a raid end game you will see the same thing happen. GW2 progression reminds me of FF11 before they added in a higher level cap then 75 only a +1 gear set. My point is that if you call this out of control what is in control vertical progression?

To be honest, it is the slippery slope that I am worried about the most. But even right now, the fact I listed stands.

It takes 3 months to full switch from one build to the next, because switching Ascended gear takes a long time. They take a while to obtain.

People may argue that you do not need Ascended gear. If they only use Exotic (or even masterwork) gear then they can switch very easily. Sure. But then they will be playing at a stat disadvantage, because Ascended stats > Exotic stats > Masterwork stats.

All these a facts.

The next argument is that exotic have very similar stats as Ascended. This is indeed true. However it is still a stat advantage. An unfair advantage is still an unfair advantage, no matter how small. That’s why the Olympics made every effort to make sure the completion is nearly 100% totally fair.

I take joy in overcoming a challenge because I became a better player.
I do not take joy in overcoming a challenge because my stats got higher after grinding. This proves nothing.

And once again, think of the slippery slope.

Until Anet openly state that “the slippery slope has ended”, we don’t know it will end. WoW is a much older game than GW2, so its slippery slope is more obvious. We cannot say “WoW is worst than GW2” because GW2 hasn’t reached the end of its slippery slope yet.

Hope I am making sense.

OverlordOutpost.5961:

It seems like everyone here has not played any other MMO out there at the moment; that or has no idea how to actively make gold in the game.

In terms of masterwork, which is all that is required to complete and enjoy 99% of the game, it takes barely any work.

In terms of exotics, which is what everyone minimally wants to complete and enjoy 99% of the game, it takes at most a few days of effort spread out (Dungeons, world bosses, what have you) to get the materials or straight up buy a set.
Generally in the time it takes me to level an alt from 0-80, unless I decided to spend hundreds of gold crafting them to 80 (at which point gold is clearly not an issue), I can straight up buy all the exotic gear I need for my first build.

In terms of ascended, which is what is required to complete and enjoy 1% of the game, it’s 1% of the game. And it is only necessary if you are going to spend hours upon hours grinding through FoTM. At this point in the game, you should have your FoTM build, and only your FoTM build. It should be min/maxed, and there should be no need to ever really change it. You are -already this hardcore-.
FoTM is the oddity in that it exists in a circular loop. You do FoTM so that you can do more FoTM, to further progress in FoTM.

The average player will probably try FoTM for the first 10 levels, and probably peak at the upper teens and 20s. That’s all easily obtainable.

For Exotic vs. Ascended; the stat difference barely has any effect on the overall game outside of FoTM. There is maybe a difference of 15-35 damage a strike for most skills. If you are being horribly outclassed by players wearing ascended, it isn’t the armor’s doing. It’s your build or general skill at the game.

A player must play differently when they are in FoTM level 1 and FoTM level 50. If not that player will not survive.

Same location, yes.
Same challenge, no. Far from it.
Same play style, no. Far from it.

So the only thing that’s the same between FoTM level 1 and FoTM level 50 is the location. So they are different contents.

You will notice that no one complains until Agony starts happening. The other things increase difficulty but does not require any farming. It is when Agony starts happening that players must grind for Asceneded gears. The difference is:

No farm model:
Player finish level 1, move to level 2.
Player finish level 2, move to level 3.
Player finish level 3, move to level 4.

Farm model:
Player finish level 1, now he must grind level 1 for like 10 times to get some items. Then he can move to level 2.
Player finish level 2, now he must grind level 2 for like 20 times to get some items. Then he can move to level 3.
Player finish level 3, now he must grind level 3 for like 50 times to get some items. Then he can move to level 4.

What purpose does that grind server? How much more fun did the player get from that grind? Nothing! It only delayed that player’s enjoyment of level 4 by a week (for example). It is purely there as a time gate. It is a waste of time.

Zypher.7609:

Proof that GW1 has vertical progression:
I log into GW1 and I am level 1.
I do not have the best gear.
I can not complete all content.
So by the logic above, GW1 has vertical progression.

Every single game will have some form of vertical progression, albeit at different difficulties of it. Just because you may not be a fan of the Ascended gear, that does not make it it right to start saying it is bad and the cause of GW2 vertical progression. Some of the posts in here are correct in that you do not need Ascended. You may not be able to do every part of the game without it, but that does not mean that you can not do the majority of the content without it.

By saying that since you can not do all the of content, then we will go back to my original statement. I am level 1 in GW1 with nothing, but I can not do all the content. So I am upset with the design of GW1 since I can not do everything.

If you really dislike Ascended gear then do not create it. If you are so upset with it then just move on from this game. Go back to GW1 if it was such a superior system. I for one spent 8 years playing WoW, you want to see vertical progression/grid go play that for a bit. I very much enjoy the system GW1 has in place, I have been playing all the content, without high level fractals and triple wurm. I am using all exotics besides trinkets and such since since I can get them with laurels. I also have 500 LW so I would be able to make a set of ascended if I really needed it. But as it stands the cost of gold for the minor stat increases are just not worth it. Maybe this summer I will get around to crafting a set, who knows.

The vertical progression in GW1 is bare minimum. Please do not argue that GW1 vertical progression=GW2 vertical progression. Anyone can tell they are vastly different.

The biggest problem is the design philosophy. Once the game devs starts thinking along the lines of "extreme vertical progression (new term ^^), there is no turning back. This “extreme vertical progression” will keep on going until the players cannot do the new contents unless they have the latest tier of gears. I mean yes this is a slippery slope argument and the truth hasn’t happened yet. But we want to make sure this slippery slope ends now.

You said “having ascended gear doesn’t make vertical progression bad.” Well actually “Extreme vertical progression” is bad, very bad. How do we know this? Because no one have any solid reasoning in why they like it. So far we heard reasons such as:

-I just enjoy mindless farming because I have a lot of spare time.
-You don’t really need ascended gear. You just need masterwork.
-Go back to GW1 if you like it so much.

None of the above are solid reasons for why these players even like Ascended gear.

-In the first case, these players seem to forget that there are ton of other fun games out there. “Last of Us”, “Dead Space”, etc. There are so any great games out there. Why would they even want to mindlessly grind?

-In the second case, I don’t understand why gurus/elites/experts like these would even defend the existence of Ascended gear. They clearly have no need for Ascended gear.

And the argument of “Ascended gear is not causing any problems for me because I don’t need it” cannot be used to defend the statement “I like Ascended gear”. “Not causing problems for me” is very different from “I like it”. This isn’t solid reasoning.

-In the third case, these players do not understand the core design philosophies of GW1 vs other MMOs.

GW1:
Player abilities + build design >>>>>>>>>> Time spent grinding.

Other MMOs:
Time spent grinding >>>>>>>>>> Player abilities + build design.

You said I should go back to GW1. I could just easily tell you to move to another extremely grindy MMO. That argument will lead nowhere. Instead, look at the two different core design philosophies above. Pick and choose which you your prefer.

If you prefer the first philosophy, then please help us defend the core values of GW1. As of today, GW2 is the only game where some players would defend this first philosophy.

If you prefer the second philosophy, then please look at all those extremely grindy MMOs out there. There is no need for you to try to change GW2 into these other extremely grindy MMOs. There are so many of them out there, so you are bound to find one that fits you.

Guild Wars is the only game series where players who preferred the first philosophy have gathered. Please do not ruin it for us. Thank you. ^^

KarlaGrey.5903:

CHIPS.6018:

In GW1 it takes me 2 minutes to switch my build.
In GW2 it takes me 3 months to switch my build (from one ascended gear to another set).

The best in-a-nutshell argument to date.
/applauds

Thanks. ^^

Jski.6180:

Yes you do level from 1 to 80 that is a type of vertical progression any game is like that though i do not see your point.

Yes nearly all games have vertical progression to some degree. But the vertical progression in GW2 is out of control right now in my opinion.

Ceridwen.6703:

WARNING! Entering into the place which houses the below links may result in inexplicable loss of time, black holes, and shrivelled eyeballs! WARNING!

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ChekhovsArmy

Please feel free to do as link advises and check out:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheLawOfConservationOfDetail

and

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/EpilepticTrees

I am not saying any of this is YOU. Just maybe some of you. But not you, of course. Or you.

Only applies if you view big things like “Why did these alliances happen?” and “How is it even possible for these alliances to happen?” and “Why don’t the Krait just kill Scarlet?” and “Why is the Aetherblade willing to die for Scarlet?” as minor details and unimportant to the main plot.

Quote directly from your link:

Say they set a level in a supermarket; a real supermarket stocks thousands of individual products in hundreds of different brands, each and every one with different label designs, and the time it would take to design (or license) all that packaging and trademarks could easily add up to several games’ worth of development cycles. So they use a handful of designs over and over. And it works to their favor: We accept less detail because it is not central to the game.

Thobek.1730:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Angel McCoy.1832:

That’s actually 4 questions. Can’t fool me. Hehe. Konig, we devs walk a fine line between giving too much lore, thus spoiling players’ in-game discovery, and not giving enough. If I’m cagey about something, it’s because I don’t want to give you spoilers, and I’m confident that when you activate your superpowers, you’ll find the right conclusions yourselves—and have a lot more fun than if I had spoon-fed it to you in a forum post.

And when it comes to “spoiling players’ in-game discovery” – to be a bit blunt… avoiding that is pointless when we don’t get the information at a reasonable point in the game’s story. Why the krait, Flame Legion, and dredge (if not NC and Aetherblades too) continue to work for Scarlet is something that should have been explained either with the Marionette or with this update, maybe with Battle for LA. But even then it feels a bit late…

I hate Anet’s mentality of “we don’t want to spoil it” – sounds like a cop out to me for not fully thinking it through. How would knowing these things spoil it? We can’t discover these things for ourselves we can only speculate until its told to us. Unfortunately most of the time it isn’t revealed, or we can’t find the answers in-game, we have to get it from Anet through threads like this.

Give us the answers but allow us to find them in-game some how. That’s called discovery.

I can’t wait to see how many questions get answered by the end of this arc. I have the uncomfortable feeling not many and we will still be asking “why this happened” long after the story has been wrapped up.

Like I said all these mysteries are in the past, and that’s why it is so frustrating for us lore lovers. It is already the present, which means there should be more than enough information available right now for the players to figure out what happened in the past.

Giving information on the past are not spoilers. Spoilers only happens if the leaked events in question are in the future. The only exception to this rule is a detective story like Sherlock Holmes. A detective story is about the main character finding clues to figure out what happened in the past. So in this particular case it is a spoiler to spoil the past.

But detective stories are very very difficult to write well. There is a reason why nearly everyone knows Sherlock Holmes, and yet this same population barely knows any other fictional detectives. I really don’t think the story writers should even attempt to write a detective story for GW2.

And quite frankly, this whole Scarlet story arc is not a detective story. I don’t think anyone will claim that it is. The focus on the story was always what will Scarlet do next.

Hope I am making sense.

@KyleMcLaw.8974

Ok so you said “I don’t want to farm so I don’t.” That means you personally also hates grinding.

Your view on Ascended gear is “If I get it great. If I don’t get it I don’t give a ****.”

At the same time you don’t like people complaining about Ascended gear because it is pointless. You don’t think Anet will fix this.

My view on this:

I agree 100% with you on the first point. I hate grinding.

I agree 100% with you on the second point. I am not wasting 100 gold for 10 extra stat points from Ascended armor.

I disagree with the third point. I still trust in Anet and I think they will fix Ascended gear eventually. :P

KyleMcLaw.8974:

I can say the same for you Az:

In GW1 it takes me 2 minutes to switch my build.
In GW2 it takes me 3 months to switch my build (from one ascended gear to another set).

And this is just one character. We can also talk about alt-characters. They all need one ascended set. And then if we want to try something else and switch its build… >_>

Surely most people sees a huge problem with this design.

OP discuss sets. I said you Don’t need armor (thus denouncing a need for SETS).

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Agony_Infusion
And to fix what I said earlier:
30 with 15 each infused ring, 10 with 5 each earring, 5 with necklace, 15 with infused back and 10 with weapons = 70
FoM 50 doable with NO ascended ARMOR. Don’t want 10 infusions? Go 9s on the back and 2 rings….BOOM……67…… FoM 50 easily doable with NO ascended ARMOR or needing full SETS

I accept your apology

Ascended gear includes all of trinkets armor and weapon. Laurels are time gated. So my point stands: It takes months for my character to fully switch from one build to another

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/List_of_ascended_trinkets

Acquisition

Regular
Purchase from Laurel merchant for 30 Laurel.png
1 The Triforge Pendant can only be obtained by upgrading the exotic version.
Purchase from laurel merchant in WvW for 20 Laurel.png and 250 Badge of Honor.png

So let’s say I am VERY bored with my current build. So I want to switch my build. This is a very simple request. Let’s paraphrase our conversation.

Your reply: Switching your build is a WANT, not a NEED.

I said: It is a NEED for me. I am BORED with my current build.

Your reply: You can switch you build anytime if you just use Masterwork gear. This game is so easy you only need Masterwork. Once again it is WANT not NEED.

I said: But if you are so good of a player that you only NEED Masterwork, why do you even WANT to farm for Ascended gear?

Your reply: Because i have the spare dungeon tokens + mats + coin to make it. I don’t stress over ascended ARMOR on my alts because it’s a WANT and not a NEED

I will say now: You didn’t answer my question. I asked you why you want to farm for ascended gear in the first place. You answered that you already have too much tokens+mats+coin to waste them on. That’s not an answer to my question. You are basically just saying that you got too much spare time on your hands, so you don’t mind wasting time farming for it, when all you NEED is Masterwork gear.

Your turn. :P

KyleMcLaw.8974:

There is not a need for ascended armor. All content can be done with exo armor. If exo armor was a grind, then I’d agree. But since I have 8 80s, 7 full exo, 1 full ascended and do all content, then I can not agree with this. Get your exo and enjoy the game. If you want to change gear, get new exos. There is a huge difference between NEED and WANT; which, OP has a WANT not a NEED.

With all due respect, I find it very ironic that the people who said players can finish the game and Living Story with Masterwork gear are also the most die hard defenders of vertical progression.

If you are such an awesome player with Masterwork gear, what benefits do you get from Ascended gear? If there is no benefit to you personally, why do you want it?

NEED and WANT? It seems people like these are the biggest offender of this exact problem. Look again:

-You only NEED Masterwork gear because you are so awesome.
-You WANT Ascended gear because…..I don’t even know why you want this. If I am that good I will totally run in Masterwork gear all day, WvW, Fractuals 49+, etc, to prove how awesome I am.

PattyCakeChamp.5268:

Ashen.2907:

PattyCakeChamp.5268:

Anet has already begun to address the issue with ascended/ vertical progression directly with a CDI.

Does ascended gear still exist ?

Has there been any indication from Anet ni the CDI thread(s) that ascended gear will be removed from the game ?

The issue still exists.

Look at my post, now look at the op, now back at mine. Now look at yours. I’m saying this specific thread is someone who decided they were angry and posted absolutely nothing of productive conversation about the issue. THAT is why this is a dead horse. If he/she had opened the thread with some meaningful discussion points sure. That is not the case. Threads like this should be dumped. Its the same complaints from a different person

With all due respect, we are free to repeat the same message as many times as we want until its fixed. :P

Well I did made a thread a while back on how to upgrade Ebonhawke, so it can defend itself against all these new technologies and threats. Maybe they can do some of these in the future LA.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/lore/lore/Ebonhawke-needs-Upgrades/

1) 4 layers of trenches, anti tank trenches and pillboxes outside of the wall.
2) 100 meters deep moat just outside of the walls.
3) 100 meters high anti-air and artillery flak towers just behind the walls.

Angel McCoy.1832:

we devs walk a fine line between giving too much lore, thus spoiling players’ in-game discovery, and not giving enough. If I’m cagey about something, it’s because I don’t want to give you spoilers, and I’m confident that when you activate your superpowers, you’ll find the right conclusions yourselves—and have a lot more fun than if I had spoon-fed it to you in a forum post.

Hi Angel thanks a lot for your reply. That did clear up somethings.

So it is now established that the likes of Molten Alliance and Toxic Alliance is just a small faction of the population. It is much more believable that Scarlet convinced a small group of them to join her, instead of everyone. The main population (Dredges, Flame Legion, Kraits, etc) probably didn’t even know about these alliances until very recently.

It is also established now that it is over-generalization to say none of the Kraits will bother talking with other races. It is perhaps true that a good 90% of the Kraits will never bother talking with strangers. But there are always the minority who will. Scarlet found those 10% and made full use of them.

As for giving enough lore or not, the problem isn’t with the hints for “predicting” the future. Those are fine. The problem is with the events (already happening) creating a conflict with the past lore.

I believe the story on Minister Caudecus is a good example. For anyone paying attention, it will be obvious that Caudecus is planning something against Queen Jennah. There are plenty of hints. But we don’t know exactly what he will do.

This is how I think hints should work. There should be more than enough hints for the players to to get a general idea of what will happen. Only things missing should be the details.

Let’s say if in the future Demmi Beetlestone turns out to be evil too and betray the players, did this break the lore? Nope! She had been working for her father all along. She was the perfect double agent; pretending to be a victim only to infiltrate the Order of Whispers for its secrets. The lore flows perfectly.

On the other hand let’s say Caudecus’ wife was seen walking around. The villagers who met her act as nothing special happened. Did this break the lore? Yes! It was stated that Caudecus’ wife died a few years back. So the players will have to guess on why she was alive again and why no villager see anything wrong with this picture. They will spent more time wondering about the past than with the future.

I think this sums up the problem of delivery the the Scarlet story: Players spending more time wondering about the past than with the future.

This mix with a year long delay of the Living Story’s releases didn’t help. In a TV series, the viewers can find out these secrets in a week or two. In the Living story, the players need to wait 6 months or longer to find out anything. 6 months of speculation about the past is very bad.

I think for the Living Story to work well, players must spent more time wondering about what will happen next, instead of what happened in the past. So the past should be clearly defined and very few secrets are there.

In my evil Demmi Beetlestone example, the past was clearly defined. The story flows. So the players are free to speculate the future; exactly where their full attention should be.

Healix.5819:

Mindless zerging is inclusive, whereas organization is exclusive. The easiest path will always be taken and when none exists, participation will drop. You can’t teach nor is every player willing to put in the effort to be organized. Some players are simply not capable of playing that way.

If content becomes too difficult for the average player, it will simply die out. Look at the Marionette for example. After 4 weeks, people still failed to grasp the basics.

I have seen this conflict of interest in WvW. On one hand we have professional WvW guilds who are organized, and want all militias around them to also be organized. On the other hand we have militias who just want to mindlessly zerg and get loot.

Now everyone paid for this game, so they can play however they want. But there is obviously a serious conflict of interest. One side want to prove that they are the best and win the match. The other side just want to casually play and get loots.

I wonder if we can find a medium to appease both player bases.

DeWolfe.2174:

The main argument against Zerg’s isn’t about being organized, the argument is about large scale vs small scale. There are players whom simply do not like playing with others and they’ll complain on the forums when events attract a large number of players.

One of the reason is the Personal Story and Dungeons. The players had been doing smalls scale things from level 1 to level 80. So most players are not used to large scale events when the players were introduced to them in the Living Story . And since they are not familiar with large scale events rejection is the outcome.

If the game provided training in large scale battles, it would change the players’ attitude.

Do we even want to rebuild LA?

It is obvious that LA is a very poor area to defend. It can be attacked by land, sea and air. It have zero natural protection. It is an excellent location for trade. But with Kaineng and Elona out of contact, it is pointless to have such a city in the location of LA.

I believe the future city should be build around/outside a mountain and cave system, which offers much more protection. In case of emergency the citizens can quickly find shelter. This would also give the future council some time to hold out and plan their next move, instead of losing the whole LA in less than an hour.

For example the Glisteriece Caves.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Glisterice_Caves

Kalavier.1097:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Angel McCoy.1832:

-snip-

You said a lot of things without saying much at all. Or at least, little to nothing new or important.

Just like when there were issues over your espirits interview.

You’d make a great politician!

The important matter that you’ve yet to answer is simply this question – all other questions don’t really matter, as they’re just flavor context that only help deepen the lore rather than solve the conflicts that are making people scratch their heads and go “wtf?” – the question is:

Why did the krait agree to work with Scarlet? Why did they not just take the obelisk shards, perhaps enslave some of her minions, with the ruthlessness that they are known for? More so after their “prophet” died? Why do her alliances (krait, dredge, and Flame Legion particularly) continue working for her?

This is perhaps one of the biggest unsolved conundrums of Scarlet – other issues of her got lessened from when their roots were first presented, but this one has not.

On an aside, I would really, really love for those old racial lore blog posts to return – in an updated post-release form.

In the Escape from LA questions I saw before the release, Anet said the different forces were working with Scarlet for the endgame rewards. Each group probably has a ‘different’ reward in mind, but whatever was promised to them at the end is enough for those left to stick around.

Why didn’t they take the shards? Maybe they didn’t know where it was. Maybe they did try torturing Aetherblades only to find out Scarlet had hid them, and (probably) like her lairs, only SHE knew the locations. For all we know, this ‘splinter’ group of Krait could’ve tried their normal ways for a while until finally just throwing their arms in the air and going “FINE, we accept. You better deliver those shards!” (Which probably were the ones we looked at during that update). Heck, afterwards it’s noted that the shards all disappeared through portals, but I forget if it’s just said “They disappeared” or if the krait guarding them took them through.

I mean, when we talk about super zealous Religious extremists, we can’t expect predictable, rational thoughts. It’s happened before where they accept help/items, then later turn against the gift-giver. Example, if somebody today convinced the super zealous religious groups that he is the second coming of Jesus, and somebody gunned him down, would you expect those groups to just go “Oh, probably wasn’t true them. Move on.” Nah, they’d go crazy. Like the ones declaring days to be “The end day” when life continues they still don’t just admit they are wrong, they cling to it.

These Krait may very well be the group that takes the normal Krait religion to the extreme, and are now in it not for the obelisk/obelisk shards, but also for vengeance on their slaughtered prophet.

Without knowing what happened, I can still say with near 100% certainty that the Kraits never attacked Aetherblades and Molten Alliance. They never tortured them for information.

Why?

Because right now in LA, the Kraits are fighting side by side with the Aetherblades and Molten Alliance. If the Krait did indeed enslaved and tortured them before, there is no chance they can work together right now.

The Charr and Human situation is extremely rare. Only once in a blue moon do factions, who had been killing each other for years, to suddenly ally with each other. Anymore of these things happening will simply be plot convenience.

Even today many humans (Separatists) and Charrs (Renegade) still hold onto the old grudge. My 300 years old necromancer from Ascalon still hates the Charrs today, for example. It is just that the Elder Dragons are bigger threats right now. Once the Elder Dragons are dead, you Charrs better watch out.

We have to remember the core problem here: Believability

To sell a story, the story writers have to make it believable. Else you will have a situation where 90% of the readers don’t believe in the story.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Angel McCoy.1832:

-snip-

You said a lot of things without saying much at all. Or at least, little to nothing new or important.

Just like when there were issues over your espirits interview.

You’d make a great politician!

The important matter that you’ve yet to answer is simply this question – all other questions don’t really matter, as they’re just flavor context that only help deepen the lore rather than solve the conflicts that are making people scratch their heads and go “wtf?” – the question is:

Why did the krait agree to work with Scarlet? Why did they not just take the obelisk shards, perhaps enslave some of her minions, with the ruthlessness that they are known for? More so after their “prophet” died? Why do her alliances (krait, dredge, and Flame Legion particularly) continue working for her?

This is perhaps one of the biggest unsolved conundrums of Scarlet – other issues of her got lessened from when their roots were first presented, but this one has not.

On an aside, I would really, really love for those old racial lore blog posts to return – in an updated post-release form.

What I got from Angel is, those background on the Kraits on the GW2 wiki are “outdated”. They were from Anet’s envision of the Kraits back in the year 2011. Currently this is no longer their vision.

Those background is also from before the Kraits were forced out of their ocean homes by the Elder Sea Dragon. So they were enslaving people from before too.

Since in GW2 the players first meet the Krait after they were forced out of the ocean, all that background on the wiki pretty much does not apply.

It does bring another huge question:

Which other lore/background written on the wiki no longer applies? Which parts can we lore lovers view as the truth?

And this question is perhaps even worst than the Krait question.

>_>

I also believe that before the players will get organized, the mobs have to get organized. And once the mob beat the players by organization, instead of a million health and damage, then the players will have to follow suit.

Perhaps something like the warriors in the frontline charge to knock all the players down, and then the mobs behind them follow with a AoE barrage to wipe everyone.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

This already exists. Anet programmed some events to actually punish zerging. Take the LA rescue event that happens hourly. If you zergball that, you’ll never get to the top tier 1200 citizens rewards. Players must split up to tackle multiple events in different places.

Also, with Guild Missions, we were introduced to some Bounties that can’t be simply run over, and challenges that also require people to split up.

Yes splitting the players up is an option. This suggestion was bought up multiple times. I support this idea.

But I do wonder if it is possible to train/teach a group of 40+ players into a professional fighting army though in game content and game mechanics.

Like, if I am a warrior, I know exactly what I have to do in my 40+ player army to help my group.

If I am a necro, I know exactly what I have to do in my 40+ player army to help my group.

etc

I read a lot of complains against mindless zerging. I think it is a fair point. However this isn’t easy to fix. Is there any ways to design future contents, where an organized army will be more popular than mindless zerg?

The way I see it, most players just want to hop onto a zerg-wagon and farm mobs for loot. They don’t want to get organized.

The game also never “trained” the players in how to fight in a large army of 40+ players. All the Personal Story missions were very small scale.

The only place to get “trained” in fighting with a large army is WvW. And even that you have to get involved (joining or allying) with a professional guild to get training. Many players in WvW just hop onto EB and zerg-wagon away.

And is the WvW army organization the “correct” organization for PvE? Maybe the devs envision a totally different approach to army organization in PvE. How did the devs hoped the players will do these world event contents?

And then let’s talk about you. How do you feel about the current style of mindless zerg-wagoning in PvE right now? How do you envision it to be? How do you want to fix it?

Discuss.

As the first poster I do have a suggestion:

Bring back body blocking!

This will allow line battles, where tanks can stay in front to absorb the damage. The players can then organize themselves into elite fighting units, similar to the Roman legions.

Angel McCoy.1832:

1) Does this mean the Kraits were driven out of the ocean homes by the elder sea dragon 250 years ago, so they were forced to live on land?

2) If the Kraits were xenophobic 250 years ago, and as of today they are no longer xenophobic, does that mean they are no longer the force of pure evil that we thought they are?

The answer to your first question is in this wiki page: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Unending_Ocean

Keep in mind the “about”. There’s a wiggle factor of 10-15 years either before or after that number that you should keep in mind. In other words, that number isn’t exactly correct.

As to your second question—the krait are evil. I don’t see them joining the Pact any time soon.

The krait are still xenophobic. But, xenophobia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenophobia) is a fear of or hatred for any person or group that is not like the accepted group. It’s racism. In the same way white-supremicists are xenophobic.

They’re not so xenophobic that they won’t even consider taking slaves. They do take slaves. A lot. So they do deal with other races on a regular basis. No, this isn’t an alliance with them, but it is using them. They have proven they’re willing to use other races, if it suits their purposes.

With regard to the article by Ree Soesbee, that particular article was written on May 4, 2011, while we were still developing the game (launched over a year later).

The article provides a general description of krait based on their personality profile and history. You might call it a preview. We (Ree, Jeff, and the entire team) did more development of the krait after that article went live.

Ree even says in the article, “The krait were featured in the original Guild Wars game, and we very much wanted to continue their story in Guild Wars 2. We knew so little about their culture and society; as we were expanding the game into new underwater regions, it was exciting to add new depth (pun intended) to an existing race.” Though she speaks in the past tense in this article, the adding new depth didn’t stop there.

You’ll find references in-game to how quaggans were driven from their homes by krait that had been driven from theirs.

Hi Angel. Thanks a lot for answering. ^^

1) So about 50 years ago the Kraits were driven from their ocean homes by the sea elder dragon. That means the kraits we saw 250 years ago in GW1 weren’t living there. They were on land looking for new slaves. Is this correct?

2) From what you said, it indicate to me that the lore as written on the wiki about Kraits is no longer valid. Those were based on the 2011 envision of them. I am talking about the descriptions such as:

“These intelligent creatures are vicious and xenophobic, attacking and enslaving all other species on sight.”

“They believe other, lesser races have nothing to offer them, so the krait never bother to communicate with them. Never beaten, they are convinced that they are blessed and elevated: the superior species in the world. The krait will seize whatever they want for themselves — slaves in particular — with a ruthless efficiency.”

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Krait

So here is what I think happened, based on your reply:

After being driving from the ocean 50 years ago, and then suffering defeat in the hands of Zhaitan’s Risen and the Pact, many Kraits are getting desperate.

They no longer view themselves as superior to other races. The reality have set in. The Kraits are, in fact, in very serious trouble. They are trapped between the Elder Sea Dragon, Zhaitan’s Risen and the Pact. Their years of isolation and hostility against everyone has made it impossible to find allies.

A small group of Kraits were especially desperate. Scarlet had been scouting this group for a long time. When the moment was right, she defeated and captured this group of Krait.

Instead of killing them, she sweet talked them into joining her. She promised them the Obelisk and their prophet. They in return have to assist Scarlet in taking LA. The group of Krait then spread the message to gather even more followers.

These Kraits do not like Scarlet. They are still extremely xenophobic and racist. However in these desperate times, a group of them are willing to try anything, even an alliance with a stranger.

The Nightmare Court want to spread pain and suffering throughout the world. They see the Kraits as an excellent tool to use for this. Though their plant poison and magic, they created the Krait Hybrid Oratuss. Scarlet has very little to do with the hybrid, since she doesn’t know biology that well.

DarcShriek.5829:

CHIPS.6018:

The Living Story for the Crystal Desert may not arrive for a while. But to me this is one of the most exciting battle ground available.

Why is that? Tanks!!!

In Orr, the Charr tanks were often stuck in the mud.

In the Crystal Desert, the Charr tanks won’t be stuck. Crystal Desert is mostly open field. This terrain is ideal for armour warfare. The Charr tanks will be deployed here with maximum efficiency.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXsg_5RxdeQ

To me, the Battle of the Crystal Desert will settle the age old question once and for all: How to build the strongest army in the world?

Is it Kralkatorrik, who rely on ancient magic from a millennia ago to corrupt the living?

Is it Palawa Joko, who relies on an army of resurrected ancients with years of battle experience?

Is it the Pact, who relies on new technology to overcome their weaknesses?

Who is stronger? Raw power and obedience? Battle experience and tactics? Or technology and innovation?

If you think the desert is ideal for tank battle, perhaps you should study desert storm. The tanks weren’t even a factor once the air cover finished with them.

To kill tanks from the air the enemy needs precise air bombing. There is no such as thing in GW2. Airships may be able to carpet bomb cities, like they did in LA. Trying to hit a fast moving tank with those bombs is another story.

The dragon champions may be able to hit the tanks fairly accurately. But from what we have seen they cannot “snipe” the tanks from afar. They have to get very close to the tanks to hit them. They puts them within range of the tanks’ guns. So it is pretty much going to be 50:50 kill/loss ratio.

And the Pact got airships to protect their tanks anyways. So there will be another battle raging in the sky, while the land battle was going on.

I am not saying this battle will be easy. No far from it. The Brands and Ancients are very strong foes; capable of destroying Charr tanks from the ground. That’s why the players will be there to cover the tanks as they advance.

This will probably be the largest battle we have ever witnessed. And hence I am excited to take part in it.

The Living Story for the Crystal Desert may not arrive for a while. But to me this is one of the most exciting battle ground available.

Why is that? Tanks!!!

In Orr, the Charr tanks were often stuck in the mud.

In the Crystal Desert, the Charr tanks won’t be stuck. Crystal Desert is mostly open field. This terrain is ideal for armour warfare. The Charr tanks will be deployed here with maximum efficiency.

To me, the Battle of the Crystal Desert will settle the age old question once and for all: How to build the strongest army in the world?

Is it Kralkatorrik, who rely on ancient magic from a millennia ago to corrupt the living?

Is it Palawa Joko, who relies on an army of resurrected ancients with years of battle experience?

Is it the Pact, who relies on new technology to overcome their weaknesses?

Who is stronger? Raw power and obedience? Battle experience and tactics? Or technology and innovation?

FlamingFoxx.1305:

CHIPS.6018:

CC Danicia.1394:

Hello all,

We absolutely do not allow posts with rumors of unreleased/unannounced game content and it is a very serious violation of our forum Code of Conduct. Posts as such tend to cause overly strong inflammatory and emotional responses, and derail easily.

Please report any violations of our Code of Conduct so we can take appropriate action.

Clearly, you are all allowed and encouraged to speculate and discuss your thoughts, so please continue! Thanks for your understanding.

Hi Danicia. Sorry but I am a bit confused about your post.

You said we can’t talk about rumours of unreleased content.
Then you said we are free to speculate about future content.

Isn’t them essentially the same thing?

There’s a difference between speculating using facts that are presented in game, or simply what people want to see – and speculating on content that has been gained from suspicious sources and then claimed to be “official”. I imagine there was a post that was deleted that fit such a category and Danica was simply warning anyone else against doing the same.

So will the following sentence be against the forum rules?

“I believe that Charr tanks will be a great weapon when fighting in the Crystal Desert. The open and flat desert terrain is ideal for tank warfare.”

CC Danicia.1394:

Hello all,

We absolutely do not allow posts with rumors of unreleased/unannounced game content and it is a very serious violation of our forum Code of Conduct. Posts as such tend to cause overly strong inflammatory and emotional responses, and derail easily.

Please report any violations of our Code of Conduct so we can take appropriate action.

Clearly, you are all allowed and encouraged to speculate and discuss your thoughts, so please continue! Thanks for your understanding.

Hi Danicia. Sorry but I am a bit confused about your post.

You said we can’t talk about rumours of unreleased content.
Then you said we are free to speculate about future content.

Isn’t them essentially the same thing?

Aaron Ansari.1604:

Maybe it’s just me, but it doesn’t really sound like Scarlet’s threatening them. Leveraging the service that only she can provide, sure, and if you want to toss a term with negative connotations in you could call that blackmail. But the implied “or else” is “or else I won’t help you”, not “or else I will harm you”.

I will tell you what the Krait should have done, after finding out Scarlet have the Obelisk.

-Kill and enslave Aetherblades that they can find. Torture them until they give up Scarlet’s location. Everyone have a breaking point and one of them will crack eventually.
-Kill and enslave Molten Alliance that they can find. Torture them until they give up Scarlet’s location. Everyone have a breaking point and one of them will crack eventually.
-Locate Scarlet and kill Scarlet.
-Take the Obelisk and continue worshipping.

This is the Krait’s way of dealing with problems. They don’t communicate or play nice with anyone. They just kill and enslave you. Any questions? :P

That is, until the old lore got changed to make room for Mary Scarlet Sue.

By the way nevemind the Krait. Even the Pact should have done this. If I am truly the commander of the Pact, I would have tortured the Aetherblades and Molten Alliances members for information long time ago. Cut off a finger here. Cut off a feet there. Someone must know where Scarlet is.

It would have prevented the deaths of thousands of lives in LA. When you play nice with your enemy, the people you love and care about suffers. It is purely due to the “play nice” attitude of the Pact, that thousands are now dead in LA.

It was the same reason Ascalon lost the war against the Charr. Talented people like Verata should be used to their maximum effect. Instead they were outlawed and banished by the Order of Necromancers. What foolishness!

I am a 300 years old necromancer and I approve this message.

Taimi is the Grand Master of the Order, Alvin Jacques de Aldersberg. :P

http://witcher.wikia.com/wiki/Alvin#Speculation_about_Alvin

@ Qawsada.4251

The Pact and Lionsguard wasn’t defeated in open combat. It was the miasma gas that’s forcing the Pact and Lionsguard into retreat. Scarlet’s forces could never defeat the Pact in a head on fight.

The priority right now is the get the civilians out of LA, away from the miasma gas. It was correct to try to saves lives first.

LA never had air defences because the LA council had the idiot ball.

Lionsguard only have a few airships. The Pact airships are not in LA, yet.

Kalavier.1097:

Actually, the game didn’t. There were a lot of Krait that were normal and not “toxic” glowing.

Also, As Angle explicitly said for the Krait, the wiki clearly stated the Nightmare court with Scarlet is a splinter faction.

Growing a giant tree to poison massive amounts of land? That’s pretty horrible and would affect the dream.

Also, the Krait willing enough to following Scarlet for the Obelisk shards, would also be the ones who would follow her still. Why? Vengeance. A bunch of adventurers just murdered their prophet after it emerged. A super “religion is everything” group would basically follow Scarlet simply to get the heads of those who did it.

No one will avenge false prophets, who lied to their own people.

The prophet(s) were supposed to lead the Kraits to conquer all the land dwellers. That’s the prophecy. If someone claimed to be a prophet, yet failed to fulfill the prophecy and died, that person is a false prophet.

Angel McCoy.1832:

I’ll tell you a little secret about the krait, that’s perhaps not so secret, but that may help you understand how and why they’ve changed since GW1. The krait once believed themselves to be the top of the food chain.

But, in these intervening years, they’ve been attacked, driven from their deeps, scattered into smaller groups, and forced to move into more shallow waters. The rise of the dragons gave them a little taste of humble pie. (http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Unending_Ocean)

This group of krait are hungry to regain their previous level of power and confidence, and they believe that the one way they can do it is via their prophets. And Scarlet offered them a chance to take back what they’ve lost.

As the wiki says, “Krait doctrine fortells the return of the obelisks’ prophets, bringing with them massive armies to flood the surface of the world and destroy other species.” (http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Krait)

They may have wished they could do it a different way, but this particular group of krait agreed to Scarlet’s offer of obelisk shards and the chance to “grow” a prophet.

Thanks for your reply. I do have two questions:

1) Does this mean the Kraits were driven out of the ocean homes by the elder sea dragon 250 years ago, so they were forced to live on land?

That also means the elder sea dragon was awoken at about the same time as Primordus.

Primordus’ awakening was slowed down by the players destroying the Great Destroyer.
Nothing slowed down the elder sea dragon, so it was already awoke 250 years ago?

The time of awakening for the elder sea dragon is a very important part of the lore. So please clarify. ^^

2) If the Kraits were xenophobic 250 years ago, and as of today they are no longer xenophobic, does that mean they are no longer the force of pure evil that we thought they are?

All races were xenophobic once upon a time. Humans were xenophobic. Charrs were xenophobic. etc. Does that mean the Kraits will also be “redeemed” to become a good race in the future?

And it sounds like some of the Kraits are willing to talk with other races now. Does this mean that in the future, it is possible for some of the kraits to ally themselves with the Pact?

Arthos Ravron.3796:

I just play PvP when I feel I need some horizontal progression.

Imagine that tomorrow PvP becomes vertical progression, where you have to grind hard to each item you use. How angry will you get?

That’s the problem we PvE and WvW people face everyday.

If Primordius kills Scarlet, I vote him into power. This deed was a big favour for the players.

All hail Primordius! Primordius for president!