2 posts up, looks like I can google better than you. Jon Peters says its not going to be in game, but might be added if there is enough demand, I guess there is not enough demand.
What the hell, here’s the link again http://www.pcgamesn.com/guildwars/arenanet-reddit-all-your-guild-wars-2-beta-questions-answered
Enjoy.
Funny…
When I look at your link and search for duel, all I find is…
“PvP
The automatic tournaments are GW2’s “first step towards e-sport” – Jon Peters. Dueling will be added post-launch; the exact date depends on demand."
…and, to be fair, it has been added, just not in the persistent world of Tyria.
After a long look through a google search on Duels, I found a post saying that Dueling was never going to ne a part of Guild Wars 2, but if there was enough interest they would look into it, this was apparently said by Jon Peters. Though the post failed to link said video, and I don’t care enough to look for it
Since you brought it up, and in the interest of accuracy… when I google No dueling in GW2 Jon Peters, the closest thing I see is this link. You’ll note the link to a Jon Peters document that does not work, so I’d guess this is what is being referred to.
http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/23193-1v1-pvp/
“• MyGw2: We will be able to fight in duels?
• Eric: Dueling is not a core system for us, given that we balance all of our PvP combat around groups of players fighting and not one-on-one engagements. Because of this, dueling is on our wish list of things to add, but is unlikely to make it into the game on release."
(edited by IndigoSundown.5419)
More slots in the skills bar? Next expa?
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: IndigoSundown.5419
Opportunity costs are important to games. Allowing players to select all the skills they want would remove opportunity cost and make PvE even easier.
No thanks.
What would the point be of the ability to dodge, have stability, stealth, and stun breaks if there were no attacks worth countering or avoiding?
This, very much this. Killing mobs with the same rotation all the time while their abilities don’t actually require one to do anything is kind of boring.
That’s a lot of opinion and no facts. That’s all we both have, and I’m just as likely to be right as you are. You’ve certainly haven’t given more than your opinions here that (small) PvP in PvE is somehow different than (large) PvP in PvE or your opinions as to the why, “because lore.” (Like they couldn’t whip up new lore in a New York minute if they wanted to).
So my opinion still stands. They were referring to the underlying structure of PvE and this underlying structure is why they can have dueling in guild halls, which is a “privately” owned type of map with a different underlying structure but not have PvP in in regular PvE maps, without first doing the “prohibitive amount of work”
Facts:
- Rewriting the game’s backstory, lore, personal story and living story to account for faction play is not going to happen in a “New York minute.”
- There is nothing about the statement, “The overall design for Guild Wars 2 does not support fully open world PvP and it would take a prohibitive amount of work to even make it possible.” which must mean the statement refers to mechanics and not fitting such into the entirety of the game design, which would include factors beyond mechanics.
- The mechanic for players to fight players in PvE maps has already been created. Not only is there Costume Brawl, there was a PvP event at the end of BWE 2 in one of the early Ascalon Zones.
The assumptions behind my opinions are factual. What facts do you have behind yours? Do you dislike the idea of dueling? If so, might there not be some confirmation bias occurring? Since I don’t care one way or the other, I doubt there’s any on my part.
Open world PvP in PvE: is PvP in PvE maps
Dueling in PvE: is PvP in PvE mapsThe difference, group size. One is large groups the other is one vs one but they are both PvP on PvE maps. Unless you’re saying that the “prohibitive amount of work to even make it possible” is related to group size and that the problems disappear or significantly reduce with one vs one then that quote describes the problems of putting PvP in PvE maps.
The difference goes way beyond group size. ANet thinks of GW2 as a AAA MMO. They put a AAA price on the game and the XPac. No AAA MMO offers open world PvP in PvE maps without a backstory and rationale. Putting in that rationale would be a monumental task. As far as rationale goes, dueling could be warriors sparring.
The former requires a complete rewrite of the game. The latter requires using a mechanic that allows two players to fight in PvE maps. That mechanic already exists. Unless divorcing that mechanic from Costume Brawl is immensely complicated, the prohibitive amount of work in all likelihood refers to fitting open PvP into the game’s lore and overall coop mechanics, not allowing two players to fight without any effect on others.
So, if it’s not hard, why hasn’t ANet done it? My guesses: dueling fuels sales of custom arenas or serve as incentive to be in a guild with a hall; and there are players who abhor the very idea of dueling. Keeping it in arenas and guild halls serves as, “Out of sight, out of mind.”
For “Amount of Work to Implement” to be the reason why there’s no persistent world PvE dueling would require me to believe that ANet programmers could not easily adapt the mechanic allowing two players to Costume Brawl to two players fighting with their builds. I choose not to believe that they are that incompetent. It seems much more likely to me that other reasons account for both the “prohibitive amounts of work” and “Why hasn’t it been implemented” issues.
Dueling=player vs player equals pvp=player vs player
flesh’s post proves this cant be done in pve.
Why should we have to prove it to you again?
Because his post is a quote about open PvP in the persistent world. In MMO’s, this usually involves either factions or free-for-alls. The amount of work to introduce factions into GW2 would involve a complete rewrite of the back-story and massive changes to NPC’s. That would truly be a prohibitive amount of work. So would revamping all of the cooperative play elements in GW2 to allow players to be able to FFA PvP at will.
Duels are a different animal. All they require is two players being able to fight without affecting other players. That functionality already exists in Costume Brawl. There’s no need to revise the game’s background or revamp its cooperative style.
ANet stated hey wouldn’t be putting open PvP into the PvE world. They did state back in 2013 that they were looking into dueling.
We can’t prove you wrong (obviously). However if they’ve said that PvP in open world PvE would take a lot of work to put in and if they said they were looking in to adding dueling (PvP in the open world) but they didn’t do so then a distinct possibility is that it was too much work to put PvP in open world PvE.
They could have. There are any number of other possibilities for why they haven’t, starting with the fact that they put it into custom arenas and guild halls.
Edit: or do you think that the “prohibitive amount of work to even make it possible” would disappear or become negligible when it’s only some PvP in PvE? Why would the amount of work become less or unimportant when it’s still PvP in PvE?
See response to Linken, above. The amount of work to put dueling in would be trivial compared to putting in either faction or FFA PvP.
And I’ll bring out this quote as I wish. It refers to problems in adding PvP to PvE maps and thus is relevant.
Do as you like, but that does not change the fact that open PvP in a PvE environment and dueling are two very different animals.
ANet have said no to this, simply because it can’t be done.
Citation needed.
The game can not make you hostile to just one person.
Costume Brawl says hi.
The Devs have said PvE duels where never intend, there for the game is not made in a way to allow it. It would brake alot of the game.
Citation needed — again.
Here’s what they had to say about open world PvP. They talk about how the game isn’t designed for PvP on PvE maps.
http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/TemperHoof/072012/23486_Guild-Wars-2-Redefines-Open-World-PVP
“The overall design for Guild Wars 2 does not support fully open world PvP and it would take a prohibitive amount of work to even make it possible. World versus world is our version of open world PvP, and while it isn’t ‘true’ open world PvP for more PvP purists, it does contain many of the elements that make world PvP so exciting. Hopefully it will mostly satisfy people that want open world PvP.” — Mike FergusonIn future, save this quote for threads asking for open world PvP in PvE zones. That feature has nothing to do with dueling.
I’ve followed this game for a long time. I’ve seen devs say they wanted to add dueling. I’ve never seen them say it can’t — or won’t — be done. Prove me wrong — if you can. Flesh’s quote absolutely does not do so.
The other problem with the targeting system is that targets dont stay targeted while you are fighting them, and you are forever having to retarget them to continue doing any damage.
Seems to happen most when you are fighting a mob in a group of mobs.
Hmmm. I don’t seem to have this problem. I use Nearest Enemy or Next Enemy, and have Auto Targeting Off. I believe Auto Targeting is the culprit causing your issue.
Though I would use such a feature rarely, if ever, I can see PvE dueling being a good thing for the game — with certain caveats:
- Allowed in persistent explorable zones.
- Starting a duel within the area where the game awards credit for an active event is blocked. If an event starts while a duel is in progress, the duel continues.
- Disallowed in cities except for certain designated arenas (e.g., Black Citadel arena)
- Default option for “See Duel Requests” is Off. Those who want duels can choose to switch it On.
- ANet makes a policy statement that they will NOT make balance changes based on dueling.
- Those who fear persistent, “Duel me!” whispers can use the existing report and block features.
That said, I don’t think this feature is going to be happening. ANet stated three years ago they wanted to. They haven’t. Whether that’s as a nod to those in opposition, or they think the existing options are “good enough,” or some other reason, I’ve no idea.
LS3 is tied to Hot because accessing the zone requires HoT purchase. It would not make sense to assign the new zone to core for that reason. The problem is not that the new zone is lumped with HoT, it’s that raid Masteries ought to have been a separate category independent of HoT.
I’m almost 100% certain Guild Wars 1 had a rapid fall of as well four years after lauch, because, get this, it was a four year old game.
Four years after GW launch? Yeah, in all likelihood the game made very little, but not just because it was old. At that point, ANet was 1.5 years past the release of Eye of the North, which was 1.5 years after they stopped development on the game. GW was on life support.
Food for thought:
- Aging games tend to make less money, with few exceptions.
- In-game stores are a staple of the industry, and can be either a part of the way the game is monetized, or the whole thing. Even P2P games have them, so they’re likely here to stay.
- XPacs can and often do generate large infusions of cash. HoT did so also.
- HoT failed to attract a large percentage of active players, and conversions from free accounts were, according to the report, disappointing. Attributing that to the store rather than the reasons expressed on forums and fan sites is a stretch. In fact, some time ago, ANet switched over to a system where new cosmetic armor skins were obtained via play rather than gems. The beef about such skins in Hot was there were not enough of them, not that they were in the store.
- If a poster has consistently expressed an antipathy to the gem store throughout his posting history, that same poster interpreting falling revenue numbers as caused because large swaths of players share his views is both expected and questionable.
Personally, I’d rather see a suggestion made by, iirc, Just a Flesh Wound, that ANet implement a one-click “Vendor Runes/Sigils” feature.
The fashion in Tyria seems to be large clothing.
What, exactly, does this have to do with the topic of skirts/long coats? There are plenty of examples of “not-large” skirts/robes/long coats as well as “large” ones.
It’s meant to look epic.
Epic is very much in the eye of the beholder. Large and epic are not the same.
Like, imagine Gandalf or Darth Vader in skin-tight gear, they’d look ridiculous.
No, they’d look different. Gandalf wears a classic wizard’s robe. Lots of robes/skirts/long coats in GW2 fell very far from that tree. Vader wears bulky gear because his body is deformed from his injuries. Conan is often pictured in just a loin cloth, or sometimes a tight chain shirt and tight leather pants. Even in LotR, Legolas and the hobbits did not wear bulky clothes. Then there’s Red Sonja…
Epic fantasy characters have “large” clothes, it’s just the way it is.
Nope, bulky =/= epic in any objective sense. You’re free to think so for yourself, but the game ought to cater to more tastes than just yours. You’ve got plenty of skirts/capes/long coats. It’s time to balance the playing field.
If you want modern clothing you should be playing GTA Online or something.
I’m not asking for modern. The styles from the original GW game offered a more balanced variety of looks. Those didn’t look modern, and there was more variety.
(edited by IndigoSundown.5419)
When I see the plethora of trench coats in GW2, I find myself wishing that Peter Jackson put Vigo Mortenson into a short jacket rather than a duster. Maybe then we could have greater variety. As it is, Anet would have to produce dozens, if not over a hundred, looks just to catch up. It’s so 2001.
Is there:
A: Progression or story attached to the area?
or
B Is it more like Noble’s Folly?
If A, not cool. If B, no biggus dealus.
Actually this statment is false. Saying my statement is false dosen’t make is so.
Anet may know of five reasons why people don’t buy the upgrade (and it’s probably more but lets pretend it’s only 5).
If 1 million people don’t buy the upgrade, Anet really has no idea of what percentage didn’t buy it for which reason. They don’t know. They can guess, but it’s only guessing, It’s not a metric.
If 1 million people didn’t like the direction of the game because it got harder, it’s very different than if one million people didn’t buy it due to grind or perceived grind, which is very different if 1 million people didn’t buy it due to power inflation in builds due to elite specialzations.
Anet just has no idea. They know all the complaints. It’s absolutely not a metric they can use.
So let’s pretend that 1 million people feel the expansion is probably too hard for them. Too much work. Even that’s two different things but let’s roll with it. Those people never buy the expansion. The people that do tend to like the idea of harder content and they do that harder content.
This gives Anet the idea that players playing their game like harder content, rather than the idea that these people didn’t buy the game because of it. Because they don’t know.
They can’t know what percentage of people didn’t buy the game because they started playing something else for completely unrelated reasons. Or which people didn’t buy the game just due to bad publicity without any idea of whether it would be good for them.
So they can’t base decisions on who didn’t buy the game. If they made the next expansion easier based on the theory that the new stuff is not working, they can only get that knowledge from people actually playing.
- Collect data on percentage of active accounts that did not buy HoT.
- Have a low level staffer or intern tally the various forum reasons given to not buy HoT.
- Apply statistical methods similar to those used by opinion polls.
- Tally the complaints about HoT by adopters.
- Look at #’s of players who bought HoT but spent most or all of their time playing core.
- Apply statistical methods.
With both, you’ll have a decent idea within margin of error on what people did not like.
Both metrics are within reach. Both are extrapolations (educated guesses). The reasons given may be different (some may be the same), but both methods can provide valuable insights into GW2 consumer trends.
If a million people don’t buy the expansion it tells Anet zero about what those people don’t want. Nothing at all. NoT one thing. Anet can’t possibly know why those people didn’t buy the expansion.
1. Unless people tell them on this board or Reddit, which happened a lot with HoT.
People who buy the expansion and only play certain content at trackable entities. Anet knows exactly how many people have bought the expansion and what percentage of them raid. If you’re not counted in that, if you didn’t buy the expansion because you don’t like the addition of raids, a bigger percentage of people will be raiding. You can call it shameless but I call it logic.
2. Failure to purchase is also a demographic. In fact it can be subdivided into didn’t buy/doesn’t play core and didn’t buy/still plays core. I doubt ANet would ignore all of the info available to them.
How exactly does not buying the game tell anything anything? DId you not buy it because it was two expensive? Did you not buy it because of bad reviews? Did you not buy it because it didn’t include enough new armor skins? Did you not buy it because you didn’t like the difficulty of the HoT zones? Did you not buy it because you don’t like vertical maps. They’re all different reasons. People who bought it can be tracked.
3. Businesses speculate about why consumers don’t buy their products all the time. They gather evidence about it any way they can. Given forum feedback, all of the reasons you cited above appeared in sufficient frequency to be areas of concern.
It’s like saying Disneyworld knows why people don’t come to their park if they don’t come to their park. It’s factually false. They can guess but they don’t know. But if you go to their park and you don’t ride certain rides and enough other people don’t ride those rides they’ll replace them.
4. It’s not the same at all. People who bought core already went to Disneyland. The fact that they’re choosing not to ride the 2-3 new rides recently put in should be plenty of info for a discerning business.
You absolutely won’t be counted if you’re not actually there.
False. I am certain ANet knows how many active accounts that own core didn’t buy HoT, and that they can look at the body of complaints, discern frequencies and extrapolate probabilities.
Consumers who purchase products they find lacking are in fact doing a disservice to the consumer base. One stat companies will certainly track is sales. A sale indicates that the consumer valued at least some aspect of the product enough to spend the money. If the consumer is spending the money regardless, that’s disinformation. That may serve the company. After all, they collected. It does not serve the consumer because it sends the message, “Keep doing this.”
The only scenario I can envision where a company might choose to disregard existing customers who did not purchase a recent product is one in which the company no longer cares whether those older customers might become ongoing customers again. If that’s the picture you’re painting, then OK, but I doubt that’s where ANet is — or ought to be.
Content with no loot or junk loot does not get repeated. See story mode dungeons. MMO’s rely on players repeating content. Sounds like a waste of dev time.
There is nothing sleazy about nor is it gambling. Is there chance involved, sure. But there is nothing important to the game that comes from the box. It is all cosmetic that has no affect on a person’s ability to play the game compared to someone who doesn’t open a single one.
For a game that does not have a monthly fee, there is nothing wrong for Anet to offer for sale cosmetic items in the manner they do.
Whether “nothing important to the game … comes from the box” or not has no bearing on whether chests are a gamble or not. The three elements required for gambling are consideration, chance and prize. All three are present. Players pay for keys, the boxes use RNG and users get virtual stuff.
Ask yourself why ANet uses keys instead of just producing and selling the items straight up. They do so because human weaknesses are such that people will spend more on keys than they would be willing to spend on a given item. There’s certainly nothing noble in pandering to compulsive gambling and the gambler’s fallacy.
Did keys drop more often in the early days?
I’ve been playing since day 1 of the headstart weekend and I didn’t get a key as a drop at all for about the first 2 years. Then I got 1 from a champion in Orr. Since then I’ve had another 2, one from a random level 9 bandit when I was playing a level 12 character, and one I’m not actually sure where it came from, I just found it in my bag and I certainly didn’t complete a map, do a story chapter that awards one or buy it so it must have been a drop.
1 account is obviously an absurdly small sample size, but my understanding is the rate of keys dropping has always been the same and always been incredibly low.
IIRC, the key drop rate was lower earlier on. When they nerfed key farming to 1/week per story step, they also _said_they increased key drops slightly. Since the rate was always extremely low, a small percentage rate increase would likely only be noticeable with extreme numbers of drops.
The thing about game development is that someone has to pay for the development of a new game. As it is, NCSoft no longer publishes GW2 — ANet assumed that responsibility some time ago. Now, if NCSoft were interested in supporting ANet in setting up a PvP only game, well, they’re free to work that out with ANet management. Given that they still wholly own ANet, I doubt they’d be interested in a third party assuming that role. As of this date, there is no word that NCSoft is interested in ANet doing anything but producing the next expansion.
If NCSoft isn’t going to front the cash, that would leave ANet needing to find the resources to do so. As it is, ANet is apparently funding continued development for GW2 out of the game’s revenue. Unfortunately, their efforts don’t seem to be enough — either in quantity/frequency or quality — for a lot of GW2 players, to the point where gem store revenue has dropped off. Taking devs off GW2 development cannot make that better and in all likelihood will make it worse.
I doubt this idea would happen.
When stat swap utility on non raid armor?
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: IndigoSundown.5419
ANet made a mistake. What that mistake is, though, remains to be seen. Atm, my candidates are either: placing too much emphasis on Legendary items as the ultimate endgame pursuit; or moving with glacial slowness in producing alternative L. Armor, so that it appears that this armor tier is locked behind fringe content.
The other aspect of the situation is this: raiders believe that because they raid, they are entitled to better loot than non-raiders. It’s ingrained into their psyches from other games where they are allowed to have better stats than anyone else. The unfortunate part of this situation for GW2 is that a great many people bought GW2 to get away from typical MMO mindsets. What remains to be seen is whether catering to such a mindset will help ANet more than it hurts them.
I say this as a disinterested observer. I stopped throwing rl cash at ANet a long time ago, and that’s a card that can only be played once.
Buying keys, with gold or RL cash, has never been “worth it.” Keys are a monetizing scheme deigned to take advantage of psychological weakness. It’s sleazy.
Carrying everything is a choice. You don’t need to carry anything, you choose to.
That said, GW2 “rewards” way too much crap. Even those who choose not to carry it all at least need to dispose of it. Imo we don’t need 40 junk items for every item that might be wanted.
He said that his guild broke down. He cited his source. You claimed a numerical statistic, that for every guild that broke down, another was created or strengthened by the raids, -1 +1. I’d just like to know where you got that information.
Pot, meet kettle. You claim numerical statistics all the time. You claim that large numbers of players would benefit from your proposals. Yet, you offer nothing to support that position. Why should he?
So what rewarrd TYPES are only locked behind one type of content.
Put it another way. I’ve done everything in the game. I’ve been able to achieve it. I wasn’t able to do the legendary backpack in PVP but I am able to get a legendary back pack through Fractals.
I may not like crafting ascended armor, but it does drop (if rarely in game) and you can farm high level fractals for it. In fact, now you can buy it.
I may not be able to get the mini from SPvP but I can get minis elsewhere.
There is one place to get legendary armor from. Period. And it requires more of an investment that almost anything else in the game, including legendary weapons.
More to the point, the hardest part about getting a legendary weapon is world complete, which I can do in 5 minute intervals solo if I like. This is a departure from the rest of the game, as the commitment is much higher.
I can get a gift of battle if I want, but doing WvW or EotM in half an hour intervals with a commander, without thinking about it.
This ups the ante to what I perceive to be an unacceptable level. This is going to make me feel like a second class citizen, because that armor is flash as hell and it’ll be around me, but I won’t have access to it without destroying the game for myself.
Seeing a mini, when I can get other minis isn’t such a big deal. Seeing a skin when I can get other skins, isn’t a big deal.
But this skin that animates only when you’re in battle, that has swappable stats.
Sorry, it’s a prize that’s being withheld from me that I’ll not be able to get without destroying the game for me. Which makes me wonder if the game is really for me anymore.
I’ve played too many hours and worked too hard to get the rewards I have to become a second class citizen now and I’m not the only person who feels this way.
It’s a massively visual indication that the game is moving away from my comfort zone. That implication has already cost this game players and sales. If you think that’s going to stop, you’re probably wrong.
I expect ANet will eventually offer L. Armor outside of raids. It’s probably years away. It might or might not be transformer style. It will probably be too late to retain some players.
The thing is, I’ve felt disenfranchised by ANet decisions as to game direction going all the way back to the inclusion of Ascended gear in late 2012. I know exactly what you’re talking about. The thing is, where can we go? Where is there an MMO which offers the things you like about GW2? I haven’t found one which even comes close, and I like a whole lot less about GW2 than you seem to.
And no, I don’t expect people in general to suddenly become willing to accept that there are going to be aspects of any game that aren’t for them. I offer the idea because maybe there will be some who get it.
I’ve tried raids, didn’t enjoy myself and stopped trying. It’s not that I didn’t try. It’s not even that I didn’t put many hours into it. It’s that during those many hours I didn’t have fun.
See, this is a game. A game I purchased. A game I purchased that had no raids in the beginning. A game in which I could pick up and play pretty much any content in the game, without worrying about who was in the group (as in what professions) or whether we had a dedicated healer (something they advertised the game as not having), or any of the other dozens of intangibles that make raids annoying to me.
Since I don’t play games to be annoyed, I now have a content type I don’t enjoy, behind which rewards I want are being locked. I’m not incapable of raiding. Bur I am reluctant to spend hours of time doing something I don’t enjoy in a game that I paid for.
Now, if I were a tiny minority it wouldn’t matter what I think but I think most people don’t want to raid and that’s a problem for the game.
You may think it’s not a problem but the perception of a casual game that changed it’s stripes has hurt this game a lot more than raids have helped it.
The thing is, there are a lot of rewards locked behind specific content. It’s not just raids. You may very well be in a tiny minority that does not enjoy raids but does enjoy everything else the game throws at players. From the reactions on these boards, there are a lot of players who dislike a lot of content types, and sometimes there are things locked behind such content. I tend to take the view that it is impossible to cater to players who believe that everything in the game ought to be aimed at them when they don’t want to play everything that the game could throw at them.
The thing is, the MMO fan base is diverse, but the business model is dependent on keeping many demographics interested over time. A game developer that ignores enough demographics is cutting its own throat. That said, there is a balancing act inherent in adding content designed for one group because players do take the unrealistic view that everything the company puts into the game ought to be their cup of tea.
Take your point about designated roles. You don’t like that aspect of raids. However, there was a sizable demographic whose beef about dungeons was the lack of such roles. Now that raids are in, I’m not seeing those complaints. A game developer cannot cater to both points of view. All they can hope is that when they cater to A, B recognizes, “Oh, this isn’t for me, I’ll just focus on the parts of the game that are for me.”
I think, in the long run, ANet is too smart to lock L. Armor as a tier behind one type of content. The drawbacks there are:
- Seemingly, L. Armor takes a long time to produce, and if there is one thing an overwhelming majority of posters have in common it’s lack of patience.
- ANet has locked skins behind specific content, so there’s every likelihood the raid skin will be exclusive even if they add a different L. Armor elsewhere.
This is not to say you are wrong to beef, it’s just offering a rationale for why the issues are less cut and dried than many posters seem to believe. Finally, it seems somewhat ironic that I, a non-raider, am defending the inclusion of raids, and defending ANet actions from you when it’s often been the other way around.
Karka in particular are enemies that are designed for group engagements; a single person cannot in general reasonably engage a full-size Karka in a reasonable amount of time…
I was watching a friend on the Karka beach in Ember Bay fight a Vet Karka solo. Two other Vet Karka also aggroed, as well as one or two regular ones. My friend took them all down. As “reasonable” is a subjective term, I’m not sure if the time it took would be reasonable to you, nor did I time the fight.
As to the topic, while SSC is not as utilized as other zones might be, it does see some use. Also, redirecting the few things that players might go there for to other zones would require dev time whereas leaving things as is would not. It sounds to me as if the OP’s proposal is more about the good of players who don’t want to go to SSC for collections, etc., than it is about the good of the game.
Core Tyria was once harder. During BWE 1 it was very hard. Of course,
- People had blue gear, green if lucky.
- There were few if any down-leveled 80’s.
- (other than earlier testers) No one knew mob tells, and we were just learning to play.
- Several mob nerfs had not happened.
- The NPE was as yet undreamed of.
- Traits were in their original form.
So, yes, core Tyria could be harder. However, lets say ANet decided to buff core mobs to the point that they were at in BWE 1 in relation to a geared, down-leveled 80. What happens then to the play experience for anyone actually leveling a character from scratch.
Then, there’s the issue of whether it would be better for ANet to spend a lot of dev time making core harder versus making new stuff.
@IndigoSundown.5419
Yes, I’m aware that the post is about open world PvP (as I stated in my comment to you above). My guess is the problem is that the underlying structure of PvE maps are set up to be cooperative (players give boons to each other). If the underlying structure of PvE is cooperative then it may be unable to have PvP without it conflicting with the way PvE maps ‘sees’ players as cooperative. It may be difficult to set up PvP and also stop people from buffing each other while dueling.
If you notice, the PvP arenas in PvE are on guild hall maps which are not the same as regular PvE maps. (They are more like instances that you can waypoint to) and being not the same as regular PvE maps means that the underlying rules can be different to allow PvP.
Yet, in 2013, ANet thought it was possible to add duels. Then again, Colin also talked about adding capes in the same interview.
@ Inculpatus/Fleshie
That MMORPG article is about open-world PvP, not dueling. These are two distinct features that are very different. It’s very possible to design a game that supports duels while avoiding full open PvP (see Champions Online as an example).
The last time I remember anyone from ANet mentioning dueling at all was this:
See around 14:10.
^^ Sounds to me like anyone that focuses on the reward vs. the play wouldn’t really have a much of a care in how Daily rewards work in the first place. If rewards is what you are about … Daily is a pretty strange and pathetic place to seek them.
There are more rewards available in general play from before than there is now because before, we didn’t have LS and HoT and Raids, and … well it should be obvious why. The game evolves with endgame content … and the balance of rewards towards that. That’s not a pity that the game evolved that way, it’s a natural evolution. If you seek the balance of rewards from general play, then I’m afraid the MMO genre isn’t for you to begin with.
Yep, that’s how GW2 has changed. Or did you forgot that GW2 was supposed to appeal to both MMO lovers and haters? And what’s with everyone attributing things to me I did not say. The “balance of rewards from general play?” Not even close when all I’m doing is talking about one reward track that used to be more accessible and is now less.
~ Legendary Effects Mastery ~
- T1 – Legendary footfalls now last 2 minutes.
- T2 – Legendary auras are now 3x the size of your character. Also effects infusions and other visual enhancements.
- T3 – Legendary sounds are now 5x louder. All legendaries which have no sounds now do.
- T4 – All legendary effects now stack with one another, including the second weapon set. All combat-related visual effects are now on 100% of the time.
- T5 – Equipping a legendary now places a giant “NOTICE ME” sign above the player. All weapon trails and footfalls become arrows pointing back to the player using the weapon. Auras become a cloud of arrows pointing to the player. All of these are exactly the same to ensure that no legendary is considered “better” any longer.
- T6 – Any player attempting to rotate their camera away from a player using a legendary will have their screen automatically pointed at that character and locked in place for 5 seconds. Using a positive emote (like /cheer, /bow, or the new /worship emote) will break this effect.
Which leads to the “Ignore Effects Mastery Line.” 5 Tiers lower the intensity of things like legendary footfalls, player music, costume brawl, etc. by 15%. The 6th tier lowers their effects to nothing, and offers an option to remove the annoying “Revive others” prompts that get in the way. Players could of course still click on the downed/defeated player and F to revive. As a final bonus (T6 is loaded), T6 grants access to a special effects slider.
Yes, but if the player truly wanted to do those things, then the AP earned from the dailies would just be icing on the cake. The AP earned wouldn’t matter if that’s what the player truly wanted.
I like to kill two birds with one stone, as do many others.
My question is why is earning 10 AP for doing those things so important? Important enough that players will stop playing the game if they don’t get it. If it’s not because the person is truly bored with the game and the loss in AP is making them realize that, then what is it?
For me, I get tired of ANet saying, “You can play 90% of the game’s content if you like, but if you want rewards, you need to concentrate on the other 10%.” I’m not leaving due to the cap, but it’s one more straw added to the many others, and the camel’s back isn’t going to last forever.
Your post doesn’t answer any of my questions. None of them. I want answers from players who do feel this way and I want why THEY feel that way. Not generalized “people have different goals and expectations”. I get that. I want to hear specific individualized responses.
My answers in italics, above. I’d also guess others feel the same.
Because if it’s wanting quicker progression toward AP chests, then they need to be asking for more AP to be added to the game with one possibility being removing/increasing the cap on dailies. And another being increasing the amount of AP earned by the achievements they do add. Not progressing fast enough there is a valid reason for not playing even if you aren’t bored with a game: most players like progression and a lack of it can make a fun game, not worth playing. But just the lack of earning AP from dailies tells me that the player was bored with the game but wasn’t able to be true to themselves until they reached it or realized what will happen when they do reach it.
Speaking only for me, I’m pretty fed up with the way rewards have come to work in GW2. All the responses to complaints about the game being unrewarding have made no difference in my sense of reward for playing. However, were I to change my play style preferences to do crap I don’t like, I get deluged with loot. I view the AP cap as a measure to remove the responsibility for people who are obsessive compulsive about AP to police their own behavior by taking away rewards that were once available to my play preferences.
As to adding more AP, fine. ANet should. However, given current trends it’s going to be behind crap content I have little interest in.
However, it’s a pity that the game has evolved away from the way it was at launch.
Could I get dungeon armor skins without playing dungeons at release? No. I CAN NOW. PvP/WvW TRACKS ARE ONE OF THE FEW POSITIVE CHANGES TO REWARDS.
Could I get PVP skins anywhere outside PVP? No.
Could I get the Temple of Orr skins without playing the actual content of the Temples? YES. THOSE ARE PURCHASED WITH KARMA AND ONE JUST HAS TO GO TO THE ZONE WHILE A TEMPLE IS OPEN.
Could I get any PS specific skins outside of the PS? WELL MAYBE, SOME WERE AVAILABLE FROM RACIAL VENDORS IIRC.
Could I get any of the LS1 specific skins outside of playing the LS1 content? Outside really rare exceptions, No.When was this magical time in the game’s history we could get all the rewards by playing any kind of content we wanted?
Never said anything about all rewards, just that there were more rewards available in general play _proportionally than there are now._
To me, those of you who say you aren’t bored with the game yet lose motivation to play after hitting a cap for the daily aren’t really bored because of that. Because how can one not be bored with a game that the only motivation you have to play is playing for 5-15 minutes to get 10 AP?
Why is getting that 10 AP so critical to your desire to play? There are other AP in the game. If ANet added more AP to the game more regularly, would the cap be a problem? Is it the progression towards the AP chest that you want and the lack of decent progress is what kills the motivation to play?
Most of the daily AP involve doing stuff that feeds into other aspects of the game that a player might want. For instance, if one does three dailies in WvW, s/he also advances a reward track, and maybe gains a WvW rank. While some of the non-daily AP added to the game work similarly, some do not. Also, a lot of the AP added post launch involve silly-kittened tasks, like repeating story steps while doing X, or massive grind. Some AP was always this way, but it seems like more of the new AP is, and less accrues during normal play like the explorer, (most of the) slayer AP, and (most of the) weapon master AP did.
Some people play GW2 to kick back, relax and chill. At the game’s launch, game rewards for such players seemed fairly balanced compared to rewards for exclusive content aficionados. Over time, though, more and more rewards have been added to exclusive content, at least some of which does not appeal to everyone. Some rewards have been taken away from casual play and hidden behind specific content or grind. AP chests (since the institution of the daily cap) is an example of the former, guild rewards of the latter.
This shift in game rewards happened largely for three reasons:
- Some players like the idea of getting stuff others don’t have. This group also tends to be more vocal. If ANet doesn’t scratch that itch, the no-endgame complaints proliferate. This group also tends to devour content faster, and can appear voracious as a result.
- A large segment of the player base taught ANet that repeating content because it was fun was not going to be a thing for them. So, ANet has resorted more and more to the use of reward carrots to keep players playing and to get them to play specific content. The net result is a game about which there are increasing complaints concerning “shoving things down peoples’ throats” and “too much grind.”
- “Path of least resistance” means that locking rewards behind specific, perhaps less-desirable content, forces players to engage with that content. Rewards available via general play mean players can play as they like while feeling reasonably rewarded for doing so. They also mean that those in it “just” for the rewards will do the easiest content as fast as possible, then demand more shinies.
Given human nature, and the nature of the MMO business model, it’s likely that the change was inevitable. However, GW2 was advertised to be for those who hated MMO’s as well as those who loved them. While it still is in some respects, its approach to rewards has gotten a lot closer to that of older MMO’s and further away from the way it was at launch.
This is not to say I believe that every reward should be openly available. I don’t. However, it’s a pity that the game has evolved away from the way it was at launch.
I rather make the assumption that the number of incoming raiders is smaller than the number of casual players who left because they did not like the new direction of GW2. Anet already heavily backpeddaled with Hot and both of the new maps.
Disliking raids and disliking HoT/WvW/PvP are not the same thing. You link them, apparently, because you dislike both.
My Silver Knight and Tiger ranks disagree with your assumption that I dislike wvw and don´t play pvp. i would be superhappy if Wvw was the endgame of GW2 for example, it very much reminds me of RvRvR from DAOc, but it has some visible flaws and has always been the stepchild.
I also have to agree with Ohoni that raiding is not fun for everyone who tried it. I tried both VG and Escort to see how it is and I find both of these events already tiresome and boring for multiple reasons. I would probably ragequit if I had to face the tougher mobs and wipe even more often for nothing.
I misspoke. I meant to say that you link raids and HoT and (apparently) dislike both, perhaps including the DBL.
@ Skyper
I get what you’re saying. The new ANet seems to be going with the idea that content gets one reward pass. The old ANet’s life-support team for the original GW game got a lot of mileage out of old content with https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Zaishen_Challenge_Quest
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GW2 would be doing better if it had a better, or fresher, gemstore offering.
That’s really the thing, what about another Outfit is going to entice me?
When there were 5 or 6 outfits, getting another one as an option was interesting. Now, there are so many outfits and so many minis and so many gliders, and they come out so quickly, nothing individually registers any more.
I usually don’t even check dulfy’s posts about the new stuff any more >.<
Tigaseye’s post called for both “more” and “different.” While I’ve no idea what would interest you, I do know what would interest me. Both armor and outfits without butt capes, skirts, robe tails and with greater simplicity in design would do so. I ignore most of the cosmetic stuff too, not because there’s too much of it, but because there’s not enough that passes the “elegant simplicity in design” test.
Yes, some people would grind XP in the fastest-to-get content in order to get the rewards faster.
So wait, you want to tie a reward of 400 gems to just grinding random xp anywhere you want? Am I missing something or you want to make the game “work” and not “play”? Or by removing the reward chests you meant only the armor skins?
That’s a fair point. Perhaps just the skins and frills, not the gold/gems.
@IndigoSundown.5419
Interesting suggestion. However does this mean that new players and people who have alts below level 80 won’t make progress on this while leveling? (Tomes and writs might be an issue also if they do progress below 80).
Yes, it does. As an alter, I’d be happy to make that sacrifice, though I can see why some others might not. However, it’s not that it takes a long time to level to 80, even for a new player. As far as Writs go, make them usable post-80. Post-80 tomes could still give shards, or a level’s worth of XP. I’d favor the former since the game shoves Tomes down our throats.
Also, it would be more of a problem for a new player. For vets, most of the AP available in leveling content were gained long ago.
I like your ideas. For this point, did you mean experience points, or did you have some other points system in mind? The previous comments re: concern about playing sub-80’s may go away if it isn’t strictly XP being used.
I meant Mastery points as they exist now, but with perhaps more options to gain them. This is because Post-80 XP is currently tied to the Mastery system and I was trying to avoid the whole, “You must complete Masteries to access post 80 level tick rewards thing.” If it is possible to set it up to choose whether XP goes to masteries or a reward track, I’d be OK with that.
Not sure why the mastery system needs to be dragged into this. Plus it heavily favours grinding for XP, rather than avoiding it. Instead of grinding xp for masteries, you’re grinding xp for rewards. Meaning it would affect how people play the game on a fundamental level. Going for the XP grinds of certain dungeon paths and mob grinders just to get the most XP in the shortest time. That doesn’t seem that good at all. Dailies put everyone on an equal level.
Plus it would implicate WvW and PvP, as gaining XP there is very limited. Unless you drag in XP tomes, which just would break the whole system apart as people have loads stacked up making the rewards basically worthless.
I think that XP grind can be pretty bad if you’re focussed on the XP but, since the launch of gw2, gaining xp never was too big of a problem. I think the incremental XP grind of masteries however, is a bigger issue. Since you spend a very long time not really feeling like you’re progressing. (it’s basically one bar for 16 levels at once or so, which just breaks rewarding feeling of the system apart, and make it feel like a longwinded grind).
I “dragged Masteries into it” for several reasons: some people are unhappy with the mastery system’s XP requirements; ANet tied post-80 XP to Masteries and chose not to allow people to choose to allocate it to a post-80 level tick reward instead of Masteries; and ANet loves addressing multiple issues with one change. I’d be fine with the rewards being available without changing the Mastery System — as long as people don’t have to complete Masteries to use it.
Yes, some people would grind XP in the fastest-to-get content in order to get the rewards faster. This is why we see more and more rewards tied to specific content rather than generally available. The losers with the current trend, though, are players who want a reward available via playing what they want, rather than having to dance the specific content tango. Perhaps it’s time for the pendulum to swing in their direction for once, and ANet can live with the idea that some players will path-of-least-resistance the rewards. As to grind in general, I don’t find grinding AP to be any better than grinding XP.
As to PvP/WvW, there’s always reward tracks.
(edited by IndigoSundown.5419)
Builds, diversity, and balance are all combat-related topics. Movement speed while out of combat is NOT a combat-related topic. When you stop conflating two unrelated issues you will reach the same conclusion I have.
So, people switch from an OOC to a combat build all the time? I somehow doubt that happens. OOC speed matters most in persistent zones. What’s actually happening is that people spec for speed and ignore mobs. I see no problem with that.
Why do developers slow player travel in the first place? Why not let players go as fast as they want, whenever they want? Since they do in every MMO I’ve seen, there must be some reason.
I rather make the assumption that the number of incoming raiders is smaller than the number of casual players who left because they did not like the new direction of GW2. Anet already heavily backpeddaled with Hot and both of the new maps.
Disliking raids and disliking HoT/WvW/PvP are not the same thing. You link them, apparently, because you dislike both.
All they had to do is just not pushing raids at expense of everyone else.
As a disinterested observer, I’d have to say that this seems way off base. One raid was promised with HoT. It was delivered in 3 pieces, with several months in between, precisely because a very small number of devs worked on the wings That’s not pushing raids at the expense of everything else, it’s delivering expansion content across nine months when the open PvE content was delivered all at once — then revamped at considerable expense in resources because people complained about it.
If you want a scapegoat for lack of attention to general PvE, you need look no further than ANet decisions that led to story episodes taking a tremendous amount of time/effort to produce. Why were those decisions made? Because PvE players complained about the quality of PvE delivery that took less time.
Please stop blaming raids for ANet revising their approach due to complaints that had nothing to do with raids.
Removing opportunity costs does not increase build diversity.
Here’s an idea.
- Remove all daily/monthly AP, retroactively.
- Remove reward chests from the accumulation of AP (not retroactively). Achievement hunters instead gain position on the leaderboard. Add titles to various points on the board which someone can display if they want to display their achievement level.
- Remove the XP requirement from Masteries and convert to a points-only system, then make sure there are more than enough points to give people options.
- Take the former AP rewards and use them to provide a benefit for the gain of XP post-80.
Who wins:
- Players who hunt AP seriously. No more concerns about AP being devalued by easy dailies. Since AP hunting is play-intensive by nature, these players will still gain the rewards formerly associated with AP because they will gain XP while AP hunting. In addition, they’d gain exclusive titles to show off their accomplishments.
- Players who just want the reward chests. If someone wants a reason to play regularly and was using those chests as the incentive, they can now log in regularly and play whatever they like, including dailies, and progress.
- Players who dislike the XP grind for Masteries.
- Players who dislike the (currently trivial) post-80 level tick reward being gated behind completionism.
- Anyone who wants post-80 XP to be meaningful.
Who loses:
- Players who want the AP skins behind an achievement barrier.
What does ANet gain?
- Additional reward goals for general play.
- No more concerns about the daily AP cap.
- They would have addressed the concerns of several demographics unhappy about one thing or another.
I don’t know, I don’t think it’s unusual for the game to settle a bit after HoT, but seeing as how the biggest drop-offs came when raids were added, and this drop-off leveled out a bit after LSs3 was added, I think that at the very least the claims that the raids were good for the game are well exaggerated.
Not correct. The drop happened in Q2 2016. This was after the initial two quarters of increased revenue likely due to sales of HoT. Some of those HoT sales were to players who wanted to raid. In fact, anyone who wanted to raid had to buy HoT.
The fact is that HoT in general did not appeal to as broad a group of players as ANet might have liked. The expressed reasons included: linked core/no discount for vets; timers on meta events; HoT mob difficulty; verticality/difficult-to-navigate maps; perceived grind; no free character slot; and not enough content for the price. In all of that dissatisfaction, there were few if any statements that someone wasn’t buying HoT because it introduced a raid.
Then there was the lengthy content drought. Some people want to blame that on raids, but that’s ludicrous. A small fraction of the live team worked on the raid full time. A similar number of devs were moved to LS production from LW 2.0 production in March, and their inclusion did not advance the timetable for LS3 at all. Much more likely was that the effort needed to revamp HoT to address some of the complaints was to blame for the drought.
Your confirmation bias is showing again.
Why can’t we all have easy access to how and what we want to play and then once we’ve customized our character in terms of stats we can actually do the “content” of the game and play “Map X, Map Y. event X, event Y or do whatever X, Y instance”?
Because:
- MMO’s survive on players being willing to repeat content.
- Many MMO players won’t repeat content unless “rewards.”
- ANet has been listening to those players since shortly after launch, and has learned from them that they can make players play specific content by placing desirable stuff behind it.
The simplest solution, I think, is to make the traits relatively the same for every weapon per class. If done properly, whichever trait the player picks for their weapon sets would boost a certain build trait they find desirable. This would emphasize multiple builds, rather than one. I think this could make more builds more viable options as they are instead of making more builds do the same things as meta builds.
Viable in what way? Viable to succeed in some game-play circumstances? Viable in every possible game-play circumstance? Viable in a content meta? Then there’s viable versus optimal. Meta builds are chosen because they are believed to be optimal. Making more options will not impact that because there is only one optimal choice, by definition.
Builds are mostly about combat. Combat means damage along with other factors like sustainability, control and support. Most build options are already viable in many combat situations. If you think they need work to be “viable,” then you’re in all likelihood wanting more build choices that compete with the perceived top builds on one or more of those factors. That can’t happen without those builds doing similar things to the top builds in similar circumstances.
(edited by IndigoSundown.5419)
The drop-off coincided with the release of the raids. I don’t think it could be much clearer than that.
Confirmation bias at work.