Guild Wars 2

Actually it is very different from the original game. Yes, you have to do events and map clearing to get to the next story in the original game, but you get to choose which events to do. In HoT because of mastery points, you don’t just level as usual but have to do specific often tedious tasks to get the points. I don’t know why experience wasn’t enough to satisfy the mastery bar demands. The mastery points are a real turnoff and an inhibitor to player freedom.

I totally agree with you about that Vayne, but I would be stunned if nobody else has wondered the same thing since the announcement came out.

Did Colin leave because of HoT???? It’s barely been 4 months since HoT launched and he’s leaving? I just wonder if the mixed reception of HoT had anything to do with his decision. It just seems abrupt and out of the blue.

If you are longbow/greatsword(or power oriented) ranger try running half zerk/half soldiers gear…. use signet of the wild and possibly use peach pies or mango pies as food

At least with the old system buying influence was purely optional. With the new system, gold is the only way to get those upgrades. Mats = gold

I understand where you are coming from Vayne. I just don’t think gold sinks are the way to go with guilds. Let’s say you are a guild member that has donated a lot of mats to the guild that are worth a lot of gold. Then there is a disagreement or some kind of rift in the guild. The guild member gets kicked out of the guild or because the environment is so hostile they choose to leave. Now their massive donations in mats(gold) have been for nothing. With the passive influence system, a player getting kicked is still not great but at least they aren’t robbed of their gold and mats.

There are a lot of competitive people in this game. The urge to have something first drives some players. I just wonder if this was in Anet’s thinking when they changed to the gold sink guild halls. Was there a thought that players might buy gems and convert to gold to have the first fully decked out guild hall?

I just think the new system is cynical. There have been tons of threads about how loot sucks in gw2 and now they implement a system that demands players part with their loot if they want the guild boons they used to get for just playing the game.

It is not just the people with complaints that assume everyone else thinks the same way. I’ve seen plenty of people who like HoT assume the same thing….. for example I see this one a lot “Only people on this forum are players who don’t like HoT while the majority of people are enjoying the expansion and don’t have time to be visiting the forum”

I paraphrased a little but it usually goes something like that

I don’t mind another expansion

Anet please don’t

- rework things the game already has(passive influence guild into gold sink guild for example)
- take away core content and repackage into next expansion to goad people into buying it
- continue with the vertical maps(I even detest them even in the core game…grove…rata sum)
- make platforming requirements in the game
- continue with highly gated content
- make more adventures(Mario crap needs to go)

Anet could have saved some of their development time by keeping the passive influence system for guilds. Unfortunately, they insist on reworking things we already have instead of working on solely new content. I guess the gold sinks were a priority.

Yes, I have seen those who are pro-HoT and anti-HoT claim that they speak for everyone. It is annoying and a weak attempt at strengthening an argument.

I agree that anyone who hates the game should probably find another game that they can enjoy.

I really like gw2 but don’t like the direction they went with HoT. Any criticism I level at the game is not based on hatred of the game. There are aspects of the game that I really don’t like and I want the company to know it. I also enjoy a lively debate.

“that way we can all just find the place that grants the most xp and farm it”

Well at least it would be the players choice to do it. As it stands mastery points force you into certain content. With experience only, the player would get to choose the content they enjoy. I don’t like this growing trend of the devs to mandate certain content. Heck, they even admitted to nerfing dungeon rewards so that players might seek other content.

So nobody would care about their guild hall unless they donated mats and gold? That is the only thing that equals effort?
The passive influence system actually gave points to the guild for player effort. Sure you scored influence for just logging in but beyond that you got points for doing events. With the passive influence system, you could help grow your guild influence while playing the game.
With this new system you either give up your gold and mats or are lucky enough to be online when the guild does its missions. Nothing else helps your guild anymore.

Crafting materials = gold

Passive influence system should have stayed. The new gold sink system is just terrible. Why donate gold to a guild that could later kick you from its roster? It also places unfair burdens on the guild leader in my opinion. Do you continually beg/harass your roster into donating to the guild hall or do you depend on the generosity of your guild and never say anything? In a lot of cases if you depend on the generosity of your guild you might be waiting a looonnnggg time unless it is a megaguild. Players don’t want to part with their loot and I don’t blame them. They shouldn’t have to. That’s why I harken back to the passive influence system.

I agree with you op…… I wish the developers would have stayed with the original gw2 system. Experience was enough to develop your character. Sure there were skill points back at the first but you didn’t have to do them. You could just continue to level past 80 and earn skill points.
The new player experience started the play as you want decline by attatching traits to specific events. The hero point system cemented the decline of play as you want as leveling beyond 80 only gave you currency.
Now with HoT we have mastery points. I guess the developers have certain pet content that they want us to play. No more play your way… Nope… You have to play the way the Anet staff wants you to play or your character doesn’t develop any further.

Mastery system could have been awesome if experience only was enough to achieve the masteries. I don’t need the devs picking and choosing the content for me.

I gather and sell iron, plat(convert to darksteel), seasoned wood, heavy wood and everyday there seems to be a high demand for the materials. If the population was going down, I think that the demand for these things would as well. The market seems to be thriving at a robust level.
I do however think that the great majority of the population resides in the core maps as opposed to the HoT maps. I am not counting low levels. I am talking about lvl 80 characters.

When Anet takes all the champs out of starting zones and replaces them with vets… not elites… vets, I doubt they will want to ramp up the difficulty level of Fire Elemental event.

I am tired of the jungle also. I do think that Dry Top and the Silverwastes are desert maps. I don’t want to look at 4 more maps with that color palette. While I enjoy the events in the Silverwastes I do think it is an ugly map.
Now if large parts of the Crystal Desert are lush as Diovid mentioned that wouldn’t be so bad. I just don’t want to see more barren nothingness with the occasional gathering node.

We already have enough ugly desert maps. I don’t want to see 4 more. How about the shiverpeaks Anet? or maybe that woodlands area….. anything but more desert maps

Yep, there is no guarantee after you donate your time, gold and mats that you won’t be kicked later on from the guild you contributed to. That is why I called this new guild system a monstrosity.
They should never have done away with the passive influence system. They just ripped off the guilds who had built up influence over 3 years. Who cares if they would be able to afford guild upgrades on day one of the expansion? They had earned it after 3 years in my opinion.
Guild halls are just an incredibly cynical gold sink.

Mario style mini-games that are required for mastery points. It sure seems that platforming has become more emphasized in HoT. If there isn’t more platforming there certainly is more Nintendo in this expac.

I agree that the 12 maps like the original would have been better. I spent two weeks in HoT maps and found there was nothing making me come back. They are beautiful but they just don’t have any lasting charm for me. I may be biased as the Sylvari in general and the jungle have never interested me even in the vanilla game. I prefer the flat maps to 3 tiered maps though.

The minimap does indeed interact poorly with the multi layered design. That is why I don’t want anymore maps like Tangled Depths. Open world mazes may be your cup of tea but they aren’t mine. I am not a fan of the mutli layered concept. I much prefer single layer large maps.

A lot of players didn’t like the “New Player Experience” when it was unveiled in 2014. It basically brought gated content ( couldn’t do certain stuff that you could previously do until you reached a certain level) and lessened the “play your way” concept by attatching traits to specific events.

HoT is kind of like the NPE on steroids. Gated content everywhere. Mastery and hero points funnel you to specific content thus forcing you to play Arena Net’s way…. Good old experience just doesn’t cut it anymore….

This along with Anet taking away core content and repackaging it in HoT…. the cynical gold sinks(Guild Halls anyone???), bigger emphasis on platforming gameplay, beautiful but tedious maps, minimal amount of new skins, etc.

These are some things that players don’t like about HoT. I’m sure I missed some things but just wanted to give some examples.

Another thread where a player complains about other people complaining….

I was very disappointed with HoT but it didn’t make me hate the game.

- Changing from guild influence to cynical gold sink system
- taking things out of core game and repackaging in HoT( fractal rewards, guild boons, nerfing dungeons to force players into HoT content, etc.)
- Verticality and platforming… too much Nintendo crap
- Maps are pretty but for me they have no lasting charm
- Mastery points and hero points(this is the new player experience on steroids……. and I destested the original New player experience….. Experience alone should have been enough to get masteries)
- underwhelming amount of armor and weapon skins

I liked the addition of guild halls and elite specs(don’t care for the inflated price of either though)

There were mentions of bestiality, asuran/human relations…… the ever famous fan fiction Logan Rytlock idiocy…… thus the word eccentricities….. I still fail to see how my comment registered as hate speech. I’ve seen much worse said about other things in these forums. Of course, they are not one of the pc prize pig topics.

Human standards……. Actually a very narrow standard of human thought which is political correctness. That seems to be the guiding light of the forum moderators. My comments which were censored by the moderator were not hateful. I understand the rules of the forum but refuse to be cowed by the pc police. If pc becomes what we think of as human standards, then we might as well be a colony of bees instead of humans.

One reason people see “homosexual propaganda” in this game is that if you offer differing views in the forum prohomosexual moderators will infract dissenting views for hate speech. I had a post in this very thread infracted earlier for hate speech(there was nothing hateful about it). I guess it is very easy to win a one sided argument when you stack the deck in your favor. Political correctness for the win!! I thought this was Tyria not Donna Shalala world.

Now that I agree with….. If players want homosexual charrs roleplay them yourselves. The game doesn’t need anymore token npcs.

every niche of sexual preference or “sexual identity”….. does that clear it up for you

What is ridiculous is trying to cover every sexual niche with token representation. Please don’t make this game a fan fiction abomination. There is enough of the sexual stuff already. I am trying to play a game not take a sensitivity training course.

They need to separate pve from pvp once and for all….. I am so tired of my characters traits and skills being rebalanced to fit pvp needs.

Every choice the devs have made in this game has been perfect. They never make a mistake. Any rational person would never make a complaint on this forum. This isn’t a business these are people. How dare anyone voice any criticism. Why would a rational person expect feedback from devs as they have already made the perfect decisions for the game?

Why would the devs create a forum since the game is made up of nothing but perfect decisions? They understood that irrational people need something to express their nonsensical rage. The adults have given the children a playroom to take out their angst.

Remember, devs always make perfect decisions…. Rational…… People who say there is any problem with the game….. Irrational….

lol

Exactly…. I earned plenty of skins and items before HoT. I don’t remember any of those requiring jumping puzzles.

This is an rpg not a platformer. I think.

Platforming was peripheral in vanilla gw2. The change to make it integral to the game is why you are getting complaints. People bought an rpg not a platformer.

Yeah, in vanilla gw2 jumping puzzles were an optional thing. Ever since HoT platforming has become necessary. It is an odious trend that I hope they stop soon.

Prior to HoT the game had a lot more inclusion as jumping puzzles were peripheral content that were never attached to skins or items.

I admit I don’t want skins or development points in the game linked with platforming.

This isn’t about downgrading content. This is about the shift of gw2 philosophy on platforming. In vanilla gw2 platforming was peripheral to the game. Since HoT platforming has become a requirement for things in the game.

I bought the game advertised as a rpg not a platformer.

I went to play a rpg… and a platformer broke out! What the hell????

Anet needs to go back to the beginning philosophy of gw2 that made platforming available but always as a sideshow attraction.

Sigh… Another thread where a player whines about people whining.

I believe this thread is appropriate for the HoT section of the forum. The ridiculous requirements for this skin are right in line with the whole HoT theme. Festivals before HoT never had stuff that that had these ricidulous requirements.

His argument about content had nothing to do with my previous comments. It isn’t that I missed what he was saying.

Whether a skin is content doesn’t matter. What matters is the change in philosophy that gw2 has made on platforming.

Where did I say it was content?

One of the most enjoyable things in GW2 in my opinion is the customization to characters appearance. While I don’t expect to have every legendary in the game. I do like to collect the “special event or festival items and skins”. This would be a nice skin to put on one of my characters. Previous to HoT and its Mario Wars 2 approach I probably would have been able to achieve it. I know the world doesn’t end because I don’t get it. I just want Anet to understand that customers aren’t happy with some of their changes

If players keep having to “skip” the cool stuff. More players might skip throwing money at the screen.

I’ve put forth this suggestion in another thread. Award tokens after completing each event(bell choir, jumping puzzle, snowball fight, and infinitarium). Have each of the collectibles have a token cost. Since the snowglobe took 3 successful jumping puzzle completions charge 3 tokens for it….. etc. etc. This I think would be a reasonable way to go about earning the skin. That way you could do the events you want and still earn the skin. After all isn’t the game about entertainment?

To get Winter’s Presence you are required to finish the winter jumping puzzle 3 times. I believe that would be a platforming requirement.

Well Anet has certainly cut down my tree by changing their philosophy on platforming. I actually enjoyed earning skins previous to HoT. Now that platforming is involved not so much.

It is not “entitlement” to ask that a game stick to its original philosophy. In vanilla gw2 platforming was sideshow attraction. There was maybe a title and achievement points attached to them. Gaining skins or items was never attached to jumping puzzles.

With the introduction of HoT, the emphasis on platforming has skyrocketed. Skins, mastery points, and even the nature of the new maps require platforming. I bought an rpg not a platform game!!

I didn’t sign up for Mario Wars 2.

Never have asked that the skins are given to me. I already said I have earned other items and skins in game. I am asking for the process of acquisition to be akin to some of the great events in the past.

Oh boy, here we go again with the “entitlement complex” accusations. No one is asking for free skins. I earned a bunch of skins and items in the game before the release of HoT. For example, I worked for the selfless potion which was part of the Lion’s arch events. It wasn’t given to me but it had a reasonable way to achieve it.

Nightfury and Winter’s Presence requirements are just ridiculous.