One of the reasons for the meta we’re still seeing with Zerker is mentioned in this video, that there’s not enough of a difference between stats to make them useful.
No, no and no. We had a discussion about that already in the dungeon subforum and the problem is not that the different stats are weak, the combat system works fine.
The problem is that the encounters aren’t well designed. There is literally no boss in this game which can’t be killed as zerker because the most bosses aren’t punishing enough.
An example of a failed boss encounter is the first boss of CoF p1, which is meant to apply heavy melee pressure, further intensified by the quickness he gains if his health drops under a certain threshold. 5 zerker players are simply faster killing him than he is in killing them.
An example of a good boss encounter is lupicus, which is extremely hard to beat if you don’t know what to do, thus it might be better for you to run tankier gear. However if you’re familiar with lupicus, you can still use zerker gear.
I think those threads show how the difficulty level harms this game. The people aren’t used to die. In other games it’s normal to die dozen of times before you’re able to beat the content, sometimes you have to even step back from the game for one day to refocus.
In GuildWars2, the mindset is, if I die, the content is too hard.
As for skins = endgame, the difference, is that lower quality gear locks you from doing content (higher tier raids for example), the skins don’t prevent you from doing anything. Also, these skins give prestige for a while, until you get them, there is no IF here, even killing level 1 mobs outside Queensdale will get you any skin you want, the question is only how much time it will take. Putting skins/gear behind content contains the big IF, that is “if you can run that content” to get what you need.
That’s the point, except for high tier fractals, there is no gear equirement in GW2. You can complete any content in this game with blue or green gear just fine.
So you are saying that because you’re not able to beat the challenge, it must be removed?
For the records, I’ve soloed the hardmode in the Grove and I’m going to solo the next hardmodes if I feel like it.
Rework Defiant along with Toughness. Make it so that Toughness has thresholds at which CC skills remove more than 1 stack of Defiant, up to 5 stacks at 2500 Toughness. This will allow CC builds to be a real thing.
Why toughness? Why not boon duration? Or stun duration? Or… anything else? Why should stacking a defensive stat mean you can shave more defiant stacks?
Rework Endurance so that it regenerates about 50% slower by default. Rework Vitality so that it increases endurance regen by 50% at 2500 Vitality. This is aimed to make vitality more attractive in PvE and force pure zerkers to be a lot more careful about wasting a dodge. Even with Vigor, pure zerkers would still have a net gain of 50% faster regen.
The whole point of vitality is that it gives you more of a cushion for error. In essence, you are required to dodge less, or you can miss dodges and still survive. Why should making yourself not need to dodge as much … enable you to dodge more? I don’t get it.
Add more enemies that deal low damage, yet high speed attacks. The point is to counter them through protection and regeneration, not dodging. This will also allow Retaliation and Confusion to be more viable.
So you basically just make a berserker hammer guardian compulsory.
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How long did you actually think these idea through?
It’s a bit indirect but people don’t understand that the way the game works like the level of difficulty, the gemstore, the lack of a trinity, etc… results in a healthy game with plenty of generally satisfied players to do things with. That’s much more important than someone’s personal perceptions and hang ups that shrink to the size of nothing when compared to the importance of the state of the game.
I feel that for what the game tries to do, Anet is rather successful in ‘hiding’ the fact that gems are purchased for gold/money. The only thing they could do better is to remove the money purchase options from the game and make it an internet transaction that is done COMPLETELY outside the game. The only real complaint I can see about ‘intrusion’ is when it starts going through the mechanics of paying for the gems in the game. That is a break in immersion but for me, it’s minor because buying gems isn’t really part of the immersion of the game anyways so if you see it, you’ve already chosen to break out of your immersion.
I don’t exactly know how you come to the perception that this game is in a healthy state. I know this game was designed to also appeal to casual players who don’t want to spend multiple hours a day on this game. However this is just one part of the playerbase. They also wanted to attract the general MMO crowd as well as the GW1 players.
The NPE changes have shown that they don’t think that their game is easy enough for “new players”. However they’re neglecting the other playertypes. PvE in general is pretty unsatisfying, the player has most of the time no impact on the world whatsoever, the most events just respawn 10 -30 minutes later. Almost no events use interesting mechanics or multiple goals to complete the event. This get intensified by the lack of reward events offer. Noone can claim that 2s for completing an event is worth the time. Dungeons suffer even more, although they should be the core feature for the MMO crowd. ANet has no plans to develop new dungeons, so what is left? The Living Story can’t fill the gap for its very own reasons and in a healthy game it wouldn’t have to. So the only thing that is left for the “hardcore players” is the gemstore, which gets expanded on a regular basis.
However while its something to do, it’s not fun to grind for gold all the time.
At last, great games aren’t considered great because they’re so easy, and that’s what ANet is trying to push their game towards, they’re popular because they’re challenging.
Your performance in other games affects your experience the same way as skins affect your experience in GW2.
Poster is claiming that buying a skin is similar as buying stat-giving items because of how it “messes with game core” I can only assume that he’s talking about performance. Skins do not affect the ingame performance of your avatar.
Even if he is talking about gaming experience, the way skins affect your experience ingame is not the same way that stats do. Stats do not affect your visual pleasure. Skins only affect your visual pleasure. I don’t even see the relevance of the comparison.
Either way, I’m struggling to understand the language being used here; a skin, regardless of how it’s purchased is ‘intrusive’ because no one can tell how it was purchased. Again, we are left guessing what this means. It wrecks immersion?
You’re talking about the core gameplay while he is talking about the core incentive to play this game. You’re right that skins don’t mess with the gameplay but they do mess with the incentive. Other games have the gear-treadmill as incentive to keep playing, while GW2 uses skins as treadmill. This is a sneaky way to devalue shallow Pay-2-Win arguments since you don’t need those skins to “beat the game”. But the difference is that the main driving factor in GW2 are skins. Before acended gear got added you had literally nothing else to go for reward-wise and this is where this arguments turns into P2W again: The challenge in GW2 is not about “beating the game” but about getting all the skins (you want). By putting the majority of new skins into the gemstore they’ve created a pseudo P2W model, which isn’t P2W but feels like it. And in the end it’s about customer satisfaction. And grinding for gold to get the newest skins isn’t satisfactory.
Consider is competition or not, the whole game is build around cosmetics and then selling them or turning them into a gold grind because you want to make money on them is just as intrusive as selling stats in a game where everything is build around fighting each other. Because it messes with the core of the game.
It’s NOT the same as selling stats because stats impact performance. Skins do not. I still don’t understand what makes buying a skin, regardless of the currency source, intrusive. The game is DESIGNED to enable this. It’s not intruding on anyone’s ability to get, use or like the same skin. It’s transparent to other players how the skin was purchased.
Your performance in other games affects your experience the same way as skins affect your experience in GW2.
First, thank you for the quick and precise reply!
I would like to know if you had any plans for the unrevealed areas already while making the unrevealed map. Were there different plans for these areas before the Living Story got launched?
Well I hope that they don’t proceed to do the Living Story after the release of an expansion. The pacing is really annoying in my opinion. I can’t stand pushing the story for one day and doing something else for the next two weeks. It would also prevent some design decisions I can’t agree with, like painting Faolain the way they did this episode. They overdrawed her character way too hard to be convincing.
A good story, even if it doesn’t last very long, would make me more happy than splitting it appart like they do now.
I would like to know if the unrevealed world map resembles the actual map of Tyria.
In the unrevealed version of Dry Top we could see a ring we can’t see in Dry Top by any means. The unrevealed map of the Silverwastes indicates a huge lake we can’t see in the final map. Do the revealed and unrevealed map still fit together or is the unrevealed map outdated?
And I think you turned it on it’s head. Rewards in of themselves shouldn’t define if content is fun to do or not. It’s like asking to be paid to go play ring toss at an amusement park. Can’t players simply take on the challenge and enjoy beating it unless they dangle something in front of them?
Which challenge, exactly? Which one you haven’t done already atleast dozen of times?
The whole game is on halt while the LS gets pushed. Only the gemstore is recieving updates steadily. So forgive me that if they aren’t able to implement new things to do more than once that I want atleast new rewards for doing the same things over and over.
Mounts can be lent at stables. Lending a mount will cost gold based on how fancy the mount is. The mount gives a 50% (or100%) speedboostcan and can be ridden until you descent from it . There are restrictions however. Mounts can’t be ridden in towns and their speedboost will only be active on roads. Off the roads, the speedboost will decrease to 25%. You also can’t jump while riding mounts and you only have a limited and weaker set of skills to attack. Mounts have to be activated per account/town/character, which costs one Gift of Exploration.
You don’t need to spend a lot of money. Spend $10 on a new character slot and make a mesmer. Mesmers are also good for teleporting ridiculously huge WvW blobs into the middle of other ridiculously huge enemy blobs. It’s a part of the No Blob Left Behind campaign that’s headed up by a dedicated team of staff guardians.
The way I see it this item will either be useless or overpowered. Either way, it’s something this game doesn’t need and ANet could’ve used the resources otherwise but they didn’t. They chose to go for that extra money this item will grant them.
“Creating” this item most likely didn’t eat up that many resources or time even, there is really no way this could be “overpowered” that I can think of, I just see it as completely useless.
Given that they can’t even fix the Kudzu bowstring, it must have taken a hell lot of time.
The way I see it this item will either be useless or overpowered. Either way, it’s something this game doesn’t need and ANet could’ve used the resources otherwise but they didn’t. They chose to go for that extra money this item will grant them.
A mesmer helping you is a nice person who’s ok with you having no interest in beating the challenge he just did.
You teleporting to a random is like someone using cheats in games to skip the hardest part. And instead of creating this either useless or overpowered crap, ANet could’ve used the resources to improve some other systems.
And all the people who have used mesmer portals to finish JPs, get to difficult-to-reach locations, take a shortcut?
The mesmer is the one who opens the portal, he is helping others.
The one using the teleportation consumable isn’t helping others, he is just helping himself. Furthermore, Portals are limited by range and by playercount. I assume there will be no range limitation for the consumable.
The person taking the portal is just helping himself, as well. The consumable is limited by player count (one player can teleport to one friend). Plus, the consumables are a one-time-use item, unlike the portals which can be cast every minute or whatever. I see no difference between someone asking for and taking a mesmer portal and using the teleport consumable. Both are just fine; if they want to be lazy, then they can go right ahead.
Simple: The mesmer can choose to not open a portal.
And all the people who have used mesmer portals to finish JPs, get to difficult-to-reach locations, take a shortcut?
The mesmer is the one who opens the portal, he is helping others.
The one using the teleportation consumable isn’t helping others, he is just helping himself. Furthermore, Portals are limited by range and by playercount. I assume there will be no range limitation for the consumable.
A statement that says “If we get money for it, we’ll implement it!”.
“Did you ever face a challenge in PvE (oh the jokes…) you can’t beat?
Worry not! You can just spend enormeous amounts of money on BLC keys to get one of those consumables and you’ll never have to face a challenge again! You just need someone else to do it for you!
Getting better yourself is outdated, let someone else do the hard work!”
I am inclined to agree. It has been far too reliably observable by too many players to not warrant suspicion.
Seriously, again, this isn’t a thing.
But your customers (See how I use the term customers instaed of players? That’s how far we’ve come, ANet! That far!) feel like it, therefore it’s your problem. RNG is bad because it’s highly subjective. It’s a two-edged sword and you’re now experiencing the reverse side. Now you can deal with it or, even better, do something about it.
I really can’t get over that teleportation consumable. Many players will not take further notice but for me it’s a clear sign that ANet wants to make money above all, and not a good game. The gemstore is atleast as bad as those “DLCs” all the new “blockbuster games” have.
It shows that they’re willing to implement anything that will give them money, no matter if it renders parts of the game utterly useless.
Right now they’re definitely catering to the Vaynes of the playerbase. I wonder if they’ll ever change that.
And I’m a little bit puzzled by your last sentence. I’m not a native english speaker and the meaning is beyond my grasp.
this program is only going to work if you do the following…
1. start being transparent.
2. open a public testing realm.
3. actually start pumping out aaa quality content, updates, fixes, changes… on a regular basis.
anything short of the above three will be seen as another stalling tactic (cdi) while the game remains substantial development starved and we are constantly given the “umm, we can’t talk about it again”.
1. Up to personal interpretation.
2. Highly debatable benefit, keeping the costs in mind.
3. Up to personal interpretation.
What you’re asking for sounds good on paper but is not achievable.
1 – Achievable by having a roadmap like many, many other game devs working on MMOs.
2 – Agreed on this.
3 – Fixing stuff that’s forever broken is probably something they should have fixed a long while ago – and even looking at the traits thread, it’s only getting bigger, with lots of good suggestions but with little response from devs on if or when it will be fixed. Also this links back to number 1.
It’s not as farfetched as you think.
Fixing stuff is something different than creating an AAA game. I agree with you on fixing flaws, even if “flaws” are occasionally debatable. However creating an AAA game everyone will be happy about is impossible.
this program is only going to work if you do the following…
1. start being transparent.
2. open a public testing realm.
3. actually start pumping out aaa quality content, updates, fixes, changes… on a regular basis.
anything short of the above three will be seen as another stalling tactic (cdi) while the game remains substantial development starved and we are constantly given the “umm, we can’t talk about it again”.
1. Up to personal interpretation.
2. Highly debatable benefit, keeping the costs in mind.
3. Up to personal interpretation.
What you’re asking for sounds good on paper but is not achievable.
Should posts about general profession balance, that are not tied to one specific profession only, go into General Discussion?
Guild Wars 2 Discussion, yes.
So you’re saying that the Profession Balance Subforum is a failure? Not that I would say otherwise but it’s interesting to see this decision being made, keeping in mind that the subforum got created 10 months ago. The issues this subforum has will stay and get carried onto other subforums.
If there is yet another thread about 100b/backstab/rapid fire being over powered, an official response is needed, just scraping the subforum wont help.
Malicious tongues may say that this is yet another step to fob forumeers but I for one am happy to see this implemented. Can’t wait to spam the new Ranger Specialist. *evil grin *
The Sylvari don’t have a second map like the other races have. Kessex Hills transitions nicely from Queensdale and the Brisbane Wildlands transition from Metrica Province. As a Sylvari you could use the portal in the west (not north west) of Caledon Forest to get to the Metrica Province.
Thats why i said niche situations. No need to take offense and go on the defensive.
So suddenly 80% of the content is niche? Interesting.
So it’s more important to tag all mobs and let them get killed by someone else instead of killing them by yourself?
Yeah…
The only argument for Mesmer GS is laziness. For everything else there are other weapon choices which are more effective, even at tagging.
Well, I’m pugging almost the whole time and it worked best for me to set up groups reading “zerker only, gearcheck”. The well known path will be usually done by 10-20 minutes. However, you’ll almost never find true berzerker’s gear, most people are using something non-optimal, like hoelbrak runes and such, but it’s better than to play with the “I play how I want” crowd. I’m on EU servers, so I don’t know if this applies to the NA servers as well.
I for one think that this is not a very good comprehension of the discussions that have been going on. I would much more appreciate links to the last threads of each topics, since the search function isn’t working.
So it occured rather often to me that my swoop will stop right in front of the enemy without hitting him, however the hit animation gets played.
Would be cool if this vug could get fixed fast, I don’t want to play lottery every time I use that skill.
