With this severe content drought and nothing but very specific content aimed at the more hardcore crowd, I can’t help but to feel a bit forgotten. Sure we have current events, but those are nothing compared to the love that the other parts of the game have seen.
Do you think that the casual base is a minority? I have always felt that the casual gamer base was quite populous in GW2, but maybe I was wrong, maybe its full of hardcore players.
I’m just feeling left out lately, waiting for Living World Season 3 is going to be tough. :-(
I don’t think you’re wrong. But look at it from a different perspective: What if you were the raiding type? How long did you have to wait for the first raid? Four years or so, right? And you know that while raid wings are still being released, LS3 and other more “casual” content is coming, too.
They didn’t forget their base. They adjusted their focus to attract and retain a broader audience. We can debate the wisdom of that choice, but as a new player to GW2 this year I’ve enjoyed the content HoT has to offer more than the core game.
The failure in this reasoning is that raids are intruders to the game, there was no justified waiting for raids. I may not remember every word and sound of it, but I really remember how excited I was when I heard that GW2 will be raid free and totally novel in its art of storytelling, including home invasion. Anet was forced to backpeddle quickly on point 2, but they stayed strong in point 1 until last year. And there was justified waiting for harder content, I agree with that. Anet also delivered said content, but people could not be brought to the idea to abandon their zerker toons and were slaughtered relentlessly by karka dishing out retaliation and ducking out of mega damage attacks. worst of all was though that they were forced to play with Joe Gamer, something no reputable pro gamer can actualyl do without being ashamed as it seems.
If this has brought good or bad things to GW2 is up to Anet, but I think the fact that raids have “intruded” the game can´t be disputed. Sadly the winner is writing history.
Hard, instanced PvE content was always part of the plan for GW2, going back to before launch. Mr. Johanson even called the explorable dungeons, “the raids.”
- Was there originally content called raids? No.
- Was there an intention there be an equivalent? Yes.
- Did that equivalent provide the challenge ANet originally intended? At first, yes, but that evaporated with time, nerfs to mobs, buffs to player capabilities, and the development of ways to minimally engage with the content and still reap the rewards.
- Did that equivalent content suffer from accusations of elitism and exclusion? Oh, yes!
- Did players buy GW2 because the game was promised to have raid-equivalent content? Certainly.
- Have all of them left due to ANet neglect of dungeons? Unequivocally, no.
So, while raids are a change in the way Anet provides harder, instanced content, they are not in any way “intrusions.”. So, yes, your claim can not only be disputed, it’s spurious.
Gosh guys, really… Wait with the disappointment until you see what’s coming.
That’s part of the reason people are complaining. Very close to one full year of absolutely zero real content updates? The only one being raids, where the rest of PvE and PvP get either just balance changes or things so minor that you might not even be bothered to do them?
Hard not to complain. It’s part of a give and take for business and consumers. If a consumer gets so disappointing for so long, it’s very hard for a business to take people out of that mindset even with announcements like this (though it’s not even official, since it’s a leak, it’s safe to assume we wouldn’t even hear anything about this until the end of July).
Let’s not even begin to think how everyone will feel if S3 of LS isn’t even as good kitten or is disappointing in one or more ways.
It also lingers questions like “Well how big will the drought be after this is over? Should I bother buying the next Xpac knowing that this can easily happen again?” and so on.Close to a year? I guess you’re not counting the four zones of HoT, huh?
In October it will be a year with nothing new to PvE out side of what was in HoT. That’s along time to ask any player base in an MMO to wait for new content. Others have new quests, dungeons and raids in-between xpacs. All we’ve had outside of what was supposed to be in HoT is the bandit bounties.
The end of October is more than 4 months away. The current gap is still lower than that between LS2 and HoT. Also, there was a lot more to do put in with HoT than with the final LS2 episode.
Shatterer, making HoT more accessible and revamping how rewards work there, putting gliding into core, the ley-line stuff and bandit bounties are not “nothing new” to PvE.
Compare ANet release cadence with other MMO companies. How often does Blizzard add new open-world PvE outside of XPacs? The other two B2P MMO’s don’t offer new content with no cost at all.
The fact of the matter is that player missing and poaning about “lack of content” is as much of an MMO staple as the content itself. It may be hard to have sense of perspective about the gaps in any MMO. However, look around at the genre.
The one criticism I would have about ANet’s release cadence is that they have spent an awful lot of time and dev effort to revamp systems over and over. Hopefully, we’re nearing an end to months spent doing nothing but reinventing the game. Time will tell.
And no, character progression is nowhere near the same thing as every other reward in the game. Examine the MMO genre, as well as how GW2 worked pre-HoT.
I’m open to this challenge … if you think it’s not, then go ahead and tell us why. I’ve already given several reasons why character progression is very similar to other rewards ingame. I mean, just saying it’s no where near other rewards doesn’t just magically make that true. So go ahead, we are listening.
MMO’s have different types of progression. They offer leveling, achievements, gear chases, tiers of instanced content, PvP ranks, etc. Of those, leveling is always the most accessible, in that different types of activities grant XP, whereas the other forms all require some engagement with specific content, with in some cases the benefits being awarded via a second means (like gear with approximate benefits to raid gear gained in PvP). The only way that GW2 is different in this regard is that XP can be gained by a broader range of activities, making leveling even more accessible than in other MMO’s. This is why I say that leveling is different than other forms of progression.
Expansions in the genre generally have a level cap increase in addition to an infusion of other progressive goals. As with basic leveling, that type of progression is much more accessible than the other forms. Again, there is a difference.
When Anet announced HoT, they established that there would be no level cap raise, and that Masteries would serve as horizontal progression instead. Thus, the Mastery System is intended as a stand-in for XPac leveling. The XP component of Masteries is just like leveling with regard to accessibility. The Mastery Point system is not.
Players who — in other MMO’s — would choose to get to the new level cap by doing specific activities they prefer do not have that choice with regard to the level cap increase stand-in. Gaining XP is worthless without the points.
The benefits of masteries are — with a few exceptions — region specific. Leveling. of course, would not be. Thus, limiting the access to HoT masteries through XP and points gained in HoT seems appropriate. However, exploring and “questing” (events) in Hot requires one gain certain Masteries. There are places one cannot get to without certain mid or high-tier Masteries, and some events that cannot be enjoyed without other mid-high tier ones (try enjoying the Ax-Master boss without Stealth Detection).
Contrast that with specific progression goals in other MMO’s. Raid gear, for instance, can be used anywhere, but is really only needed in raids. Many other MMO goals offer no benefits other than bragging rights (achievements, titles, skins) or the benefits are specific and can be gained where they are useful (reputation in WoW, crafting increases).
This is why I believe we see complaints specifically about Mastery Points. Players need enough of them to max certain benefits, which are needed in certain content. However, playing that content does not allow enough points to gain these benefits given the facts of tiers within Mastery lines and the fact that different lines hold movement Masteries and things like Stealth Detection/Poison Mastery and Exalted Gathering. Couple that with the expectation that Masteries are the level-cap increase stand-in and leveling in GW2 is the most accessible form of progression in any MMO I’ve seen, and we see the complaints.
If you don’t agree, then fine. However, I believe you’d be ignoring the comparison drawn between Masteries and Leveling and the way leveling works versus more content-specific forms of progression in the genre.
To return — hopefully for good — to the thread topic, I do not accept the OP’s complaint that HP should be more accessible. They are arguably more accessible than they were in core due to the WvW acquisition method put in last winter. I do have concerns about how viable Group Event challenges will be as HoT ages, but so far that has not been as much of an issue as I though it might — at least as far as I’ve seen.
Peace.
Why Kiel? It stands to reason that the terms of others who have been serving longer would be up before hers would be. >.>
While I would not be particularly excited by an election, I can’t help but notice certain parallels between a certain Republican and a certain Charr.
With this severe content drought and nothing but very specific content aimed at the more hardcore crowd, I can’t help but to feel a bit forgotten. Sure we have current events, but those are nothing compared to the love that the other parts of the game have seen.
Do you think that the casual base is a minority? I have always felt that the casual gamer base was quite populous in GW2, but maybe I was wrong, maybe its full of hardcore players.
I’m just feeling left out lately, waiting for Living World Season 3 is going to be tough. :-(
The so-called hardcore I believe to be people who both play the game as a hobby, and who prefer certain aspects of the MMO genre like progression, working at goals and harder, instanced content. I suspect there are gradations of players with regard to these preferences. I think that the truly dedicated players who also embrace all of the MMO genre staples are a minority.
However, that does not necessarily make casuals a majority. There are large numbers of players who play the game as a pastime but who have a bunch of different desires. I don’t think there’s a single casual demographic. I think it’s difficult to nail down just what casuals want because they don’t seem to all want the same things.
FWIW, the current content drought has lasted since HoT release at the end of October. That’s a total of just about eight months. The drought between the last LS S2 update and HoT release was over nine months. I believe Anet was counting on HoT content keeping open world PvE players busy for quite a while.
I also suspect that new content was delayed at least in part due to the effort put into the revamps to HoT to make it more accessible to “casuals.” Those changes represented a lot of dev time and effort, and were aimed at casuals. So, I don’t think it’s either fair or accurate to say that ANet has forgotten casual gamers.
As to the “love” given to raids, well, they’ve finally gotten the entirety of the one raid (9 bosses) promised to be a part of HoT. That’s after over two years neglect of dungeons, and no new fractals for almost that long. WvW? Those players were given something recently, sure, but that game mode is the one ANet has arguably done the least for.
Actually acquiring legendaries and special items are exactly the same thing as character progression in terms of game play satisfaction; both are rewards for doing a set of activities, both give a feeling of achievement, both are something you work towards. The only difference is that you are OK with being told what to do get certain kinds of rewards and with others, you aren’t. I guess that makes it convenient for your side of the discussion to paint them with a different brush though.
General Health has it exactly right; people are just not willing to do what is necessary to get certain rewards. It’s simple as that. We see it for legendaries, precursors, elite specs; name whatever reward you can think of, someone has complained about it; it’s a common theme and it’s called entitlement “I want this now and I want it my way because I’m me”. They invoke silly reasons like ‘play how you want clause’, make it sound like Anet has screwed the game over, insists it needs correction and hope correction has acceptable ways to get the rewards they don’t want to work for.
You might consider that if you have to resort to invoking pejoratives like “silly reasons” or strawmen like “don’t want to work,” then your argument lacks merit in and of itself.
And no, character progression is nowhere near the same thing as every other reward in the game. Examine the MMO genre, as well as how GW2 worked pre-HoT.
Excuse me? Do you even know the mmo genre? Lets go back to everquest 1 and 2 both took ages to fully level including your alternate advancement after you hit max levels, and I mean it took a very long time, look at wow, yea leveling didnt take as long as eq1 or 2 but to get better gear it certainly did, you would be grinding raid after raid after raid, atleast guild wars 2 gives you more options.
What about star wars galaxies where it would take time sinks to gather mats and craft because everything was craft only.
Yeah, all of which is different than playing a min-game that has nothing to do with the actual game I bought to max progression. Thanks for supporting my point.
No it doesn’t support your point at all, getting hero points I’d literally like any other rpg, its not a mini game, its something you do as you play ghe content, you donf need to do anything beyond the path your taking throughout Cote gake and hots content
While the topic is indeed about HP, a tangent developed with regard to MP, which are part of the the HoT progression system. My conversation with Obtena was more about MP, specifically those in adventures, than HP — had you followed it back. HP were obtained in only one way, going back to one to when they were skill points. In fact, acquiring HP now is more accessible than it used to be because they can be gained in WvW. I have no issue with objections to the OP’s complaint about HP. I’m sorry if that was not specified in every post I made.
As a matter of perspective, there are two other Buy to Play MMO’s out there, Secret World and ESO.
- ESO: Drops a DLC about every three months. The first two each consisted of one zone, and their cost combined was in the same ballpark as the basic price for HoT. There are no substantive content releases that are not paid content.
- TSW: Releases “issues” which consist of a story and instances. I believe the current release is issue 15, which costs $25. Again, no substantive content releases without a fee. Issue 1 released in 2012, so that would also be ~4 releases a year.
So, pay ~$100 a year for 4 releases in the competition or pay Anet for HoT and get 3-6 releases in a year at no charge. Whether you will believe the competition provides greater value for money is up to you. but if we assume similar quantity/quality, then the ANet model is more consumer friendly.
Edit: Apparently the TSW Wiki is reporting the collector’s edition price of the Issues. The basic price is about 40% of the CE, so TSW per yer costs are more like $40 v. ESO’s ~$100 and however you want to figure ANet’s.
(edited by IndigoSundown.5419)
Actually acquiring legendaries and special items are exactly the same thing as character progression in terms of game play satisfaction; both are rewards for doing a set of activities, both give a feeling of achievement, both are something you work towards. The only difference is that you are OK with being told what to do get certain kinds of rewards and with others, you aren’t. I guess that makes it convenient for your side of the discussion to paint them with a different brush though.
General Health has it exactly right; people are just not willing to do what is necessary to get certain rewards. It’s simple as that. We see it for legendaries, precursors, elite specs; name whatever reward you can think of, someone has complained about it; it’s a common theme and it’s called entitlement “I want this now and I want it my way because I’m me”. They invoke silly reasons like ‘play how you want clause’, make it sound like Anet has screwed the game over, insists it needs correction and hope correction has acceptable ways to get the rewards they don’t want to work for.
You might consider that if you have to resort to invoking pejoratives like “silly reasons” or strawmen like “don’t want to work,” then your argument lacks merit in and of itself.
And no, character progression is nowhere near the same thing as every other reward in the game. Examine the MMO genre, as well as how GW2 worked pre-HoT.
Excuse me? Do you even know the mmo genre? Lets go back to everquest 1 and 2 both took ages to fully level including your alternate advancement after you hit max levels, and I mean it took a very long time, look at wow, yea leveling didnt take as long as eq1 or 2 but to get better gear it certainly did, you would be grinding raid after raid after raid, atleast guild wars 2 gives you more options.
What about star wars galaxies where it would take time sinks to gather mats and craft because everything was craft only.
Yeah, all of which is different than playing a min-game that has nothing to do with the actual game I bought to max progression. Thanks for supporting my point.
Actually acquiring legendaries and special items are exactly the same thing as character progression in terms of game play satisfaction; both are rewards for doing a set of activities, both give a feeling of achievement, both are something you work towards. The only difference is that you are OK with being told what to do get certain kinds of rewards and with others, you aren’t. I guess that makes it convenient for your side of the discussion to paint them with a different brush though.
General Health has it exactly right; people are just not willing to do what is necessary to get certain rewards. It’s simple as that. We see it for legendaries, precursors, elite specs; name whatever reward you can think of, someone has complained about it; it’s a common theme and it’s called entitlement “I want this now and I want it my way because I’m me”. They invoke silly reasons like ‘play how you want clause’, make it sound like Anet has screwed the game over, insists it needs correction and hope correction has acceptable ways to get the rewards they don’t want to work for.
You might consider that if you have to resort to invoking pejoratives like “silly reasons” or strawmen like “don’t want to work,” then your argument lacks merit in and of itself.
And no, character progression is nowhere near the same thing as every other reward in the game. Examine the MMO genre, as well as how GW2 worked pre-HoT.
I would love to give a re-write to this boss, seriously. A full-area KO with exactly one counter isn’t really appropriate for open world (5-man or raids OK, though).
Add on that Stealth Detection is imbedded in a tree that players don’t open until knee deep in story (I rushed to Tangled Depths before the story did so I could open up the vendors), and it’s very inappropriate to have that mastery as a requirement for the fight.
It’s a shame, because I kinda like the overall feel of the fight, but the execution is utterly terrible for players who haven’t farmed a ton of points on an introductory map.
I agree with this. At this point, a lot of players have Stealth Detection, so the boss is doable. What I see, though, is that this boss is not done unless the map is seriously dedicated to getting all five. Since I’ve seen that exactly once since December with intermittent play in VB, I have to wonder whether huge swaths of players find this fight fun.
Perhaps the all-or-nothing counter is not a good idea. Without it, the fight is an exercise in rage-inducement. With stealth detection and CC, the fight becomes trivial. Thus, we have reasons to dislike the encounter at either end of the spectrum.
No problem … many elements of PVE were not play how you want since day 1. How is this for critical thinking … just because you recognized that player progression was play as you want in Core doesn’t mean that Anet consciously intended or designed player progression around that ideology.
You’re ignoring obvious facts. Progression in core was leveling. The game, by design, threw XP at players for doing literally anything. ergo, players could play how they wanted and progress.
I’m saying play how you want is not applicable to earning HP/MP, so suggesting those rewards should be ‘more like’ playing how you want to earn them is utter nonsense.
While you are correct that MP/Hp are not “play how you want” (HC’s never were, just ask any WvW only player), you are incorrect in suggesting that a suggestion is nonsense because it ignores the way things are. Suggestions, by their very nature, are requests for change, are that player’s preference, and thus cannot be nonsense. That you disagree they should be accommodated means you disagree, not that you get to try to belittle the idea by appealing to the status quo.
All that said, the _facts- are that “Play how you want” has a specific meaning to Anet. From the FAQ on the Wiki:
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Frequently_Asked_Questions
“Technically, yes. During development, ArenaNet specifically stated that they were not trying to make another World of Warcraft clone. Their core ideals of accessibility, playing how you want to play, the ability to play with your friends, and not having to wait until maximum level to “begin playing the game” were prominently mentioned in the press for the game."
So, yes, it does seem as if ANet stepped away from that as it relates to progression when deciding to create an incentive for players to play “adventures” by using MP as a carrot. That, unfortunately, has little to do with this thread topic, which is Elite Specs via HC’s. As noted above, HC’s have never been part of the “play how you want” philosophy.
I missed nothing; I recognize all of what you said and I don’t see how it changes my position. These are not suggestions we are talking about; these are claims forming the basis of people’s arguments. Ergo, those arguments are faulty to begin with. If play how you want was an ideology that Anet did not intend for character progression, the idea that HoT MP/HP should return to play how you want ideals because they are character progression elements is nonsense.
It isn’t necessary to have a philosophy statement. One can judge intent by results. Since one can progress in the core game by doing almost anything (other than playing the TP or standing around chatting), it is obvious that Anet’s intent with regard to progression was one which promoted accessibility and choice. It’s also obvious that intent changed when Masteries hit. This is not the only time they’ve changed their tune, and this is not the only time people have complained and made suggestions about returning to prior ways of doing things.
Also, you seem to like to throw the word “nonsense” around. You should then be aware that it does not make sense to insist that a player saying “ANet ought to do this because reasons.” is anything but a suggestion. Justification for a suggestion is still part of the suggestion.
HP’s, of course, were never “play how you want.” so rail about that all you want and you’ll hear nothing from me.
No problem … many elements of PVE were not play how you want since day 1. How is this for critical thinking … just because you recognized that player progression was play as you want in Core doesn’t mean that Anet consciously intended or designed player progression around that ideology.
You’re ignoring obvious facts. Progression in core was leveling. The game, by design, threw XP at players for doing literally anything. ergo, players could play how they wanted and progress.
I’m saying play how you want is not applicable to earning HP/MP, so suggesting those rewards should be ‘more like’ playing how you want to earn them is utter nonsense.
While you are correct that MP/Hp are not “play how you want” (HC’s never were, just ask any WvW only player), you are incorrect in suggesting that a suggestion is nonsense because it ignores the way things are. Suggestions, by their very nature, are requests for change, are that player’s preference, and thus cannot be nonsense. That you disagree they should be accommodated means you disagree, not that you get to try to belittle the idea by appealing to the status quo.
All that said, the _facts- are that “Play how you want” has a specific meaning to Anet. From the FAQ on the Wiki:
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Frequently_Asked_Questions
“Technically, yes. During development, ArenaNet specifically stated that they were not trying to make another World of Warcraft clone. Their core ideals of accessibility, playing how you want to play, the ability to play with your friends, and not having to wait until maximum level to “begin playing the game” were prominently mentioned in the press for the game."
So, yes, it does seem as if ANet stepped away from that as it relates to progression when deciding to create an incentive for players to play “adventures” by using MP as a carrot. That, unfortunately, has little to do with this thread topic, which is Elite Specs via HC’s. As noted above, HC’s have never been part of the “play how you want” philosophy.
Man guys, I dont know I think the cost is way to high for skills in this rpg im playing right now, is it to much to ask to max my character in 2 hours? I only paid 60 bucks for it plus dlc, geesh its not like ill get bored with it having all my skills nearly instant in an rpg then actually progressing towards it with great pacing through the content itself.
Like seriously rpgs are suppose to only last an hour or two dont you know this?
Some people are interested in playing the new specs, but not in earning them. Others prefer to earn them. Some people can make RPG’s last a long time without the game providing time sinks. Others can’t.
Rather than ANet cutting its own throat by implementing the OP’s suggestion, perhaps the OP might consider a more realistic solution. Stop being part of the cause of the increase in the gold-to-gems conversion ratio by spending real cash to get gems. Of course, he won’t do that. The motivation for such requests is the desire to get what the player wants without having to spend real money and without having to farm as much.
One thing we’ve been told is that it takes a long time to make a set of armor. Maybe it’s just me, but if the male and female versions were substantially alike, we might see more sets. Yes, I know there are issues with identical, but making a male or female version and then adapting it to the opposite sex with minor changes seems like it would take less time/effort than having the male and female versions be so completely different, with only minor stylistic nods.
Try checking LFG. There is usually a full squad of people, or pretty close doing a Hero Point run in one of the HoT maps.
I’ve no idea what region you’re in or what time you play. In NA, when I play, there is rarely an HP run. Sometimes, even in prime time, there is no taxi for meta maps, either.
Do you have a ranged class? Most HC’s can be done solo or duo. Ever one of the first 2 maps can be at any rate. You could always start one your self, tag up and say in map chat you are doing a HC run. Then off you go. I got my Necro max by grabbing all the HC in VB and AB with the rest from the core game.took about 1 and a half hours.
I don’t have a problem with HC’s myself. I was pointing out that claims about there usually being an HC run going just aren’t necessarily so. As to starting one’s own, there are a lot of people who don’t know the maps all that well, and who would thus be reluctant to take on such a responsibility.
Are you serious?
You liked all the superficial event chains in maps but you can’t stand the short and sweet adventures?
I don’t know about anyone else, but for me… at least with event chains I’m playing the character I leveled, geared up and created a build for. This is not true in adventures. I don’t mind timed stuff. I don’t mind hard stuff. I do mind the XPac’s progression system being dependent to some degree on playing a different game than the one I bought and enjoy.
I’m just glad it’s a one time deal with the mini games though after getting gold.
Just to point out to the forum scouts reporting to the dev team:
This is not how valuable content should be viewed by your players.
Especially for something that is used as a progression mechanism.
^This is a very good point.^
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Try checking LFG. There is usually a full squad of people, or pretty close doing a Hero Point run in one of the HoT maps.
I’ve no idea what region you’re in or what time you play. In NA, when I play, there is rarely an HP run. Sometimes, even in prime time, there is no taxi for meta maps, either.
The team working on Raids is pretty small there’s between 5-10 Devs working on it, most others are working on Open world, Next expansion, WvW and Pvp, there are different teams for different content just because 1 team is more efficient doesn’t mean they are the reason the rest of the game feels neglected.
I get what you’re saying, but want to add, “I don’t think the raid team is more efficient!”
Raids were announced in January, 2015. It’s June, 2016. That’s a 17 month period, assuming they started at announcement (and not before). They’ve produced 1 wing, a total of 9 boss encounters and some trash. That’s efficient? All of the rest of HoT was produced by October, 2015.
If we assert that they didn’t start right at the announcement, what evidence is there?
The first wing popped in November, the second in March, third in June. For wings 2 and 3, that’s an average of 3.5 months per wing. Extrapolate that backwards, and the three wings took 9.5 months to produce instead of 17. That’s not all that efficient either.
But are they efficient by comparison with the other teams? I think the question to ask is just how many dev hours were spent revamping HoT? Just how long did that delay Season 3? We may never know. Me, though? I think we have the HoT revamp, not to mention ANet’s history of revamp after revamp, with the company reinventing major aspects of the game to blame for the slower release cadence. Not raids.
That the only “lesson learned” as mentioned in NCSoft quarterly report was that they should not predict so much revenue. My hope is that the lessons learned by ANet are more like:
- Making adventures peripheral content with desirable intrinsic rewards rather than a prominent vessel for horizontal progression.
- Making maps about more than just a few exploration objectives packaged around a map meta.
- Making map navigation more intuitive and accessible while still providing some platforming challenges for those who like such things.
- Maintaining a degree of challenge such as HoT offered in terms of mob ability, while avoiding as much as possible the issues of over-scaled events and packs of mobs just standing around as nothing more than a barrier to run around.
- Providing a currency purse.
- Though I’ve no idea how to do it, I hope that there will come a day when taxiing is not the be-all and end-all solution to mega-server problems, because it is at best a contributing cause to the problems, while only working some of the time and for some of the players.
- That there will be a greater emphasis on smaller scale content, as opposed to the almost ubiquitous emphasis on large-scale content seen in HoT.
- That maybe, just maybe, Anet will realize that FotM needs more than just reward and instability changes, it needs actual new encounters.
If the raid team is like 6 people, (plus some support), the average Dev makes around 50K a year, Raids have been in the works for a little over a year, so, given some lesser paid positions, that would around 300K invested into raids, just from the 6 core dev’s assuming they were only making that much.
I wonder how raids will generate the ROI of that monetary investment.
The same way that all content produced by any of the 220 devs (with your salary guess, about 11M/year) does, keeping players interested in the game.
Since HoT is B2P and Core is F2P now, that is simply not a sufficient answer. There needs to be something about raids that will generate an ROI from them directly, since they have a designated team just doing that at the expense of contributing to any other content.
Why do you get to decide what’s sufficient? Cash shop revenue generation game revenue models are based on statistics. There’s a percentage of players who play regularly who will spend money in the store. Some of them will spend a lot. The rest will spend nothing. Any content that adds to the player-base is increasing the likelihood that revenue will increase. As to the raid team not contributing to other content, you could say that about any of the designated teams.
So I am wondering, what direct ROI do raids have, I mean, I know I won’t ever see the numbers, but I would love to see if the metrics draw a linkage between the people that love raids to death and an increase in their real money spending on the game since raids got introduced.
I’m sure Anet can compile those statistics if they want to. They should have the information.
If they haven’t, then raids have zero ROI in and of themselves, and they are just being funded by the other content.
Again, this is possibly true about any content. Arguably, PvP subtracts money because of the prize funds.
Anyway, since you answered, have you been spending more on the game since raids got put in? I know I haven’t, been spending a lot less to tell the truth. As a Filthy Casual, I’m not gonna pay into a game that makes an ‘end game’ not designed for me.
Me? The base GW2 game was arguably the best game product in terms of value for money for me. It even beat the original GW. However, I’ve not liked the direction Anet has taken the game after launch. So, I vowed a long time ago not to throw money at Anet unless they produced something I valued. I bought HoT, but only because it was on sale on Amazon when I did. Raids are not my cup of tea, either. However, I think of raids as a small portion of the game that I can easily avoid. I view them as only a tiny portion of GW2 endgame, and despise a lot of it, whereas I’m kind of indifferent about raids.
I’d prefer more diversity, as in more options that are comparable in different circumstances. That’s why I don’t agree that there used to be a lot more diversity in the game before. Most of the options that have since disappeared either didn’t play differently or were so inferior as to not warrant consideration.
HoT is Not Enticing to Returning Players
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: IndigoSundown.5419
I wonder how long it’ll take people to stop spreading misinformation and conspiracy theories on the forum.
Easy question, with several possible answers.
- When this forum comes down.
- When the internet crashes for good.
- When the human race expires.
- there would be enough hero points in central Tyria to complete the elite specialization for a character
Before HoT dropped, I’d had three characters with map completion in the launch maps. Once the number of points needed dropped from 400 to 250, they needed either 4 or 5 challenges in Heart of Maguma (1 had done more challenges in Dry Top and Silverwastes than the other two. There are 11 in Verdant Brink alone, 8 of which can be gotten solo, with only basic gliding.
I’m not trying to tell you HoT was worth the money you spent. That’s your decision. However, if you were willing to get 80% of the points from core, then getting 5 challenges in VB is not much at all. I can do it in about 15 minutes.
I really don’t understand all this talk of minorities.
Being capable of raiding isn’t some minority you’re born into like race/ethnicity, it’s simply researching and participating in something. The only ones stopping you from becoming part of this “minority” are yourselves.
Demographics in gaming communities — at least the ones being talked about in discussions like this one — are based around preferences. For instance, I’m in a demographic that prefers not to raid but doesn’t worry about exclusive rewards being in that content. Yes, that group exists. It might well be the real “majority” regarding this issue. My reason to not raid is that I promised myself back during WoW I would not get sucked into the raiding time sink again. While it looks like the time commitment for GW2 raids is lower, it’s still higher than I care to commit to.
How far do we stretch this logic?
I’m no good at PvP, you have to let me get the PvP legendary backpiece by participating in hot-join.
I’m no good at high level fractals, you have to let me get the legendary backpiece by participating in fractals 1-10.
Back when the game launched, there was some thought that most rewards would be obtained via Karma as a sort of universal currency. Even then, though, making L. weapons required doing at least one dungeon and real WvW (pre EotM or achievement chests with Badges). Also, dungeon skins were only available for use in PvE by doing that dungeon. So, there were unique rewards tied to specific content even then.
A funny thing’s happened since. ANet learned that: (a) a lot of players would not repeat content without reward; and (b) that players would seek the path of least resistance to obtain the universal currency, ignoring any other content. This led to the idea that players could be enticed to do specific content by including rewards they can’t get elsewhere — whether this is a matter of degree (rares via world bosses) or exclusivity (Glorious Armor). Karma was incorporated as a component into a few collection rewards, but was otherwise largely abandoned.
Now, virtually every new thing the devs throw out for players to do has an exclusive reward attached to it. What we’re seeing in threads like this one is the reaction from players who still have attachments to the idea behind that universal currency and what it meant to them — even though ANet pretty much abandoned universal access regardless of preference long ago.
If the raid team is like 6 people, (plus some support), the average Dev makes around 50K a year, Raids have been in the works for a little over a year, so, given some lesser paid positions, that would around 300K invested into raids, just from the 6 core dev’s assuming they were only making that much.
I wonder how raids will generate the ROI of that monetary investment.
The same way that all content produced by any of the 220 devs (with your salary guess, ~ $11M/year) does, keeping players interested in the game.
(edited by IndigoSundown.5419)
I thought Anet had a staff of around 300?
Last time I saw an estimate anywhere it was closer to 350. Back in March we heard…
“120 devs working on live game, 70 devs on expansion 2, 30 devs on core teams that support both.”
From:
http://dulfy.net/2016/03/05/gw2-reddit-developer-ama-summary/
That adds up to 220. The rest are going to be clerical, CS, forum mods, other support staff, etc.
You are forgetting QA, which can make up a sizable portion of a Game’s staff.
I did not forget them. Perhaps you should look up what “etc.” means.
I thought Anet had a staff of around 300?
Last time I saw an estimate anywhere it was closer to 350. Back in March we heard…
“120 devs working on live game, 70 devs on expansion 2, 30 devs on core teams that support both.”
From:
http://dulfy.net/2016/03/05/gw2-reddit-developer-ama-summary/
That adds up to 220. The rest are going to be clerical, CS, forum mods, other support staff, etc.
When there’s lot’s of comments saying this is natural, I like to ask questions.
How long before it becomes natural for a lot of players to no longer look at the Gem market?
How many players have already stopped even looking or considering gem purchases of any kind?
Sure there’s more readily available gold but that doesn’t mean it’s going towards gems, or will in the future, for many players. How many players have said to themselves “I simply can’t spend more than one gold for 4 gems”?
Doesn’t this make the division between the haves and the have nots, so much more obvious to players?
It’s not buy to win but can’t it look a whole lot like it?
I just don’t like the questions this all brings.
Stop pretending that the rate increase is affecting players who purchase gems with RL cash in any way, shape or form. The RL price of gems has been the same since the game released. The exchange rate means nothing to those players unless they’re buying those gems to exchange for gold. In that case, the higher the rate, the better for them.
So, this discussion is only about players who exchange gold to get gems. If a lot of players stop doing so because they don’t like the rate, then that means less gold in the exchange. Assuming a similar supply of gems, then the rate goes back down.
Your questions are based on the idea that gems ought to be attainable not only without spending RL money, but also without spending more time farming than you think is warranted. If a virtual item in the store isn’t worth the time to you, or to someone else, it isn’t worth the time. That’s what gold is, time spent playing a game.
Haves and have nots? No. We’re not talking basic human necessities or even quality of life. We’re talking about virtual fluff in a video game where all it takes is enough time spent playing the game to get as much of it as you want.
Uh-huh, yeah except its not a “day” its like, 6 months, and ignoring that fact, nobody that is sane is saying that “arena-net should abandon raiding completely” what people are, justifiably, asking is, "wait a minute, so this “tiny” raid team can crank out this complex well designed content at a consistent rate, but the “bigger” Living World and general PvE team is having its segments abandoned and cancelled (Hello Dungeons and Legendary Weapons) and we still have no news regarding LS3" Yeah seeing the problem yet?
Fun with numbers:
120 devs on the live team. 6 of those work on raids full-time. 30 devs on a support team, so maybe some of them help with raids some of the time. Maybe not. Presumably those people have been working on raids since the raid announcement in January, 2015, which is almost 17 months ago. In that time, they’ve produced 9 boss encounters and some trash. So, that “consistent rate” turns out to be about 5.5 months per three boss encounters.
So, if the other 114 devs cannot produce anything other than the Shatterer, a (minor from player perspective ) rework of the HoT maps, and the events that have been featured lately in the 8 months since HoT dropped, just what do you think 6 more whose production rate is 3 bosses in just under a half year are going to do?
Some people, however, just like to play their game rather than work it through researching how to get to every location (e.g., hero points). Watching videos to play a video game?
I equate it to old-school reading the user’s manual for a game, or more currently to reading the PHB for D&D (or any table-top RPG). My current 5e campaign has been going on for almost a year, and we all still reference/read the PHB before/after/during play to figure out better ways to accomplish our goals.
It might not be for everyone, but the tools for researching how to be better at games have existed in one form or another for a very long time, and for every game format. If you find the subject interesting enough, research won’t feel like work and it can be a lot less frustrating than perpetual trial-and-error.
~EW
I’m not sure if the comparison to a rule book holds up. That would be more like looking up stuff like algorithms and math as used in game design. The PHB is about the mechanics behind the PNP game. You aren’t likely to see a walk-through about how to navigate your group DM’s dungeon, or how to win over the city watch captain who is on your case.
Also, online resources like videos of video game content are definitely not for those whose enjoyment comes from the process of discovery. I can see why using them is so common, though. There seems to be a lot of emphasis on finishing goals, as opposed to accomplishing them.
Actually are there any non-mordrem enemies in VB? Not sure how bandits would end up in the jungle if the only way in is via pact-controlled airships but I do like the idea.
Tigers, boars, moas, raptors, raptor hatchlings, pocket raptors, and even the Coztic and Shrooms are not part of the Mordrem army. We also see Mordrem versions of Coztics and Shrooms (e.g., Coztic Shadowleaper v. Mordrem Shadowleaper), but I don’t believe that happens before AB. I could be wrong about the where, but there are definitely Mordrem versions (probably corrupted, like the dragons seem to do in general) and non-Mordrem versions.
I’m also not sure about bandits due to the difficulty in getting there, but there could be Pact deserters out to do the same things suggested.
2. Major events not contesting waypoints. Main one I’ve noticed so far is the legendary wyvern where if you die you just respawn at the center wp, glide down to the chopper and re-enter the fight. Its been done before, contest nearby waypoints to prevent this but also tie in to #1 to make the fight evolve more so players are encouraged more to rally allies.
I’m gonna have to say, “No, thanks!” to this suggestion. While I revive where I can in that event, the Wyvern lays down huge fire patches. There are people who just aren’t going to get revived in those. Since I see large numbers down in those patches every time I do the event, I have to believe that absent the ability to return we’d see all the defeated folks lying there the whole event. This is not fun for them, and can lead to chat fights. If they have an option to take a couple of minutes and return, at least there’s no excuse for just laying there.
While I am greatly in favor of events like these that require movement, thought and skill use (as compared, say, to the old Shatnerer, who never looked to his right), I think it would be a mistake to expect a high level of play in persistent world events. That sort of thing is fine in instanced content.
For what it’s worth (i.e., not much), I saw a post in one of the raid threads earlier which cited a dev comment in a Reddit thread saying that about 30% had tried GW2 raids. That would of course have to be 30% of those who bought HoT, which is (by my reckoning) somewhere around 20-35% of the 1.5M monthly active accounts cited in the Fortune article about ESports.
If true (No, I’m not looking it up. I might if search actually worked), that doesn’t seem like a bad stat for content that is produced by a small percentage of the devs.
I’d guess the reason is “technical limitations,” as in, the maker of the board’s software designed it that way. While you ponder that, ponder also that that third party designer designed the forum search function, which doesn’t.
Would the ones complaining about “only” getting raids have wanted that HoT content delivered over time instead of all at once?
Personally, I would have rather had HoT release 1 zone every ~3 months with double the story so it could run bi-weekly, then transition directly into season 3 shortly after. It would have lasted a lot longer for me, compared to burning through it within a month, which is also about how long just the Silverwastes lasted me. On the bright side however, with nothing new, I’ve had the chance to burn through several other games.
You know, that would have been a good idea, to have released only 1 HoT map, to see player reactions to it and make some minor adjustments, and then release the second map a month later, and make adjustments to that one, then release the 3rd map, and span out the whole HoT release over a few months.
I think that would have been a great idea, that way players could get used to VB, for a while, before moving on other maps.
Thanks for the responses. So, it seems that some players, at least, prefer a more regular, smaller release cadence for PvE. What I wonder is whether, if Anet had gone that route, we’d still be seeing complaints about, “Not enough content.” Probably, I guess, but I do wonder.
Well the main thing with HoT was how drastically different it was from the Core game. The way the maps work, with their many levels, I think would have been much better to introduce in smaller doses so that it would have been much easier for the masses to swallow as well as given Anet time to respond to feedback, it’s lot easier for them to respond to the critique of one map then 4 of them.
Personally, I think slow continual growth of a game is a good way to make things happen. That way Anet can work it out, and adjust, and make it fit right, before moving on with their next addition.
I can see the value of that approach. As it is, ANet seems to have taken the XPac approach to sellable content, rather than a DLC model with smaller packages and smaller price tags. Since a lot of people complained about HoT’s content amount for its price, I can only assume that there would be backlash at smaller packages unless they were priced really low.
“Gear drops” are an artifact of MMO genre expectations which began with stats on gear. The idea of "magic gear’ is permanently ingrained in the minds and psyches of RPG players (paper or video) and is likely to remain there. Anet has incorporated the idea of magic gear into the economy, by making it a source of crafting mats via salvaging. Salvaging also creates a coin sink, albeit a small one, and selling those mats on the TP creates the largest coin sink in the game.
The phenomenon is not going anywhere. Removing it would require a massive rework of game systems which imo the game cannot afford.
Would the ones complaining about “only” getting raids have wanted that HoT content delivered over time instead of all at once?
Personally, I would have rather had HoT release 1 zone every ~3 months with double the story so it could run bi-weekly, then transition directly into season 3 shortly after. It would have lasted a lot longer for me, compared to burning through it within a month, which is also about how long just the Silverwastes lasted me. On the bright side however, with nothing new, I’ve had the chance to burn through several other games.
You know, that would have been a good idea, to have released only 1 HoT map, to see player reactions to it and make some minor adjustments, and then release the second map a month later, and make adjustments to that one, then release the 3rd map, and span out the whole HoT release over a few months.
I think that would have been a great idea, that way players could get used to VB, for a while, before moving on other maps.
Thanks for the responses. So, it seems that some players, at least, prefer a more regular, smaller release cadence for PvE. What I wonder is whether, if Anet had gone that route, we’d still be seeing complaints about, “Not enough content.” Probably, I guess, but I do wonder.
I don’t know if it’s so much that people care about the pacing of general pve releases as it is the seeming lack of new pve content in general. Not to say anything against raids because I love them but I understand why people see the pace of raid content release and are salty that the rest of the game seems to be neglected. I have to admit it’s baffling that the relatively small raid team can release quality content generally on schedule, but we haven’t seen a new fractal scale in years and have no indication that there will be one any time soon. There are other aspects of the game that seem to have been neglected, but fractals are particularly puzzling from a player’s perspective because on the surface at least they are quite similar to raids yet there is a huge disparity in production with no obvious explanation why.
I and presumably others don’t mind if content gets released in big bunches or in small parcels, but I can definitely see the perspective that the content that gets released in “big bunches” doesn’t do justice to the time spent producing it (especially considering some content has been scrapped altogether). The “small parcels” approach at the very least has the advantage that it demonstrates to players that cool new stuff really is getting made and it’s worth it to stick around for more.
Well, I’ll agree that Anet has spent way too much dev time working on systems and features and not enough on content. Too many times re-inventing the way aspects of the game works may be “necessary,” or it may not, but it surely detracts from producing things to do.
As to fractals, I suspect the idea behind FotM from the get-go was that players would repeat the same stuff ad infinitum without a lot more work from ANet. I still hold that the raid (there’s only one, with 3 wings) was dribbled out over time. If all three wings had hit at once, then there would be no new raid content and thus no complaints about it.
Finally, who knows why it takes Anet so long to produce new “other” PvE content?
The way healing works in this game is by design. Characters are supposed to take care of their own health bars, with maybe just a wee bit of help from their allies. Someone who specs into Healing Power is providing that wee bit of help in conjunction with the use of skills that provide AoE healing.
In order to make Healing Power more effective, the game would have to be completely redesigned. Base heals would have to be reduced in effectiveness. Most characters would end up being more dependent on dedicated healers because their own heals would be weaker. In order to “take care of your own health bar,” you’d have to have Healing Power just to get the same results you get now.
The alternative to this scenario would be to leave base heals as is and still boost H. Power. I hope I don’t have to tell you how many complaints there would be in PvP/WvW, where bunker builds are already reviled. I also hope I don’t have to tell you that having that “wee bit of help” be stronger would make PvE even easier.
So, I would not be in favor of the OP’s suggestion. I prefer the game as is. I also believe that ANet spending a huge amount of time reworking the game’s mechanics would detract from ANet moving forward with sustainable, more frequent content releases.
Also, what’s up with using the question format for this thread? That’s supposed to be for questions other posters can actually answer, not theoretical discussions about game mechanics where there is no “correct” answer. What’s the OP going to do, choose the post that most agrees with his position as the “answer?”
Would the ones complaining about “only” getting raids have wanted that HoT content delivered over time instead of all at once?
Personally, I would have rather had HoT release 1 zone every ~3 months with double the story so it could run bi-weekly, then transition directly into season 3 shortly after. It would have lasted a lot longer for me, compared to burning through it within a month, which is also about how long just the Silverwastes lasted me. On the bright side however, with nothing new, I’ve had the chance to burn through several other games.
You know, that would have been a good idea, to have released only 1 HoT map, to see player reactions to it and make some minor adjustments, and then release the second map a month later, and make adjustments to that one, then release the 3rd map, and span out the whole HoT release over a few months.
I think that would have been a great idea, that way players could get used to VB, for a while, before moving on other maps.
Thanks for the responses. So, it seems that some players, at least, prefer a more regular, smaller release cadence for PvE. What I wonder is whether, if Anet had gone that route, we’d still be seeing complaints about, “Not enough content.” Probably, I guess, but I do wonder.
HoT was advertised to provide what Anet thought was a lot of content for persistent world PvE, plus a story. It also promised 3 raid wings, which equal 1 complete raid, delivered over several months. Would the ones complaining about “only” getting raids have wanted that HoT content delivered over time instead of all at once? That’s what happened with raids. Raiders are just now getting the rest of the raid while persistent PvE players got their content all at once.
Complain all you want about the ANet release cadence. That’s a beef I can understand. However, when you complain about raids getting a fraction of a raid over time, you should also be asking for paid persistent PvE expansion content to be parceled out in dribs and drabs rather than all at once.
#what’sgoodforthegoose
Since this is some sort of straw poll… no, I did not, I will not buy any such, I have no interest in such.
Unless the underlying numbers say that a PvE battle cannot be won, PvE “difficulty” is largely a matter of learning what to do to bring “your” numbers to bear on the fight while limiting the mob’s ability to bring its numbers to bear. Since mobs almost always do the same things, once you’ve figured out what to do you can do it every time. PvE difficulty melts away once you’ve passed the learning curve.
With core GW2, it’s rare that mobs demand you to do anything other than (maybe) a basic rotation and a dodge, if anything. Some mobs can be beaten with the #1 attack and face-tanking. Players don’t really learn how to overcome challenge because the game demands it only in certain situations, which are usually chaotic and filled with overdone effects that make it hard to pick up on what’s going on.
With HoT, there are some mobs and some groups of mobs that can kill a character. The learning curve on some HoT mobs is definitely steeper than on most core mobs. Just as in core, there are definitely boss mechanics that can kill one. The same problems in large-scale core events (particle effects, tons of AoE circles, add mobs coming from everywhere) exist in large-scale HoT events. The large-scale HoT events are harder than core ones only insofar as the adds may hit harder because they’re regular HoT mobs, at least as far as I can tell.
Stop gating map completion with events
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: IndigoSundown.5419
Gating is just another way to get people to do stuff they might otherwise avoid doing. It is indeed a way to slow people down, but I don’t think that is its purpose, which I believe instead to be to provide more bodies, over time, to do the gating event/whatever.
- Because scammers make for significant complaints, which means time spent by GM’s/CS Reps, which costs money.
- Because it inconveniences gold sellers who are competing with ANet for player dollars.
- Because providing an alternative to the TP would allow cheap players (gasp) to avoid the only significant gold sink in the game.
- All of the above.
We know there are frequent complaints from players regarding their FPS and DC’s in crowded maps. What we don’t know is just how many cosmetic mounts players are buying. Were I to judge by what I see, I’d be saying that few buy them, or and no one uses them anywhere other than cities. I am of the opinion that the market for cosmetic-only mounts is small. Thus, we see one once in a while, and that’s it.
I’m also of the opinion that if cosmetic riding animal mounts were to start appearing, it would not be long before the complaints about, “No speed boost!” would start coming in. I’m not sure that’s a can of worms ANet would want to open.
Taxiing does indeed contribute to map emptiness. The mega server is designed to open new shards before the first shard has filled. When people congregate to one partially-filled shard, they are leaving another partially-filled shard to do so.
Taxiing only works for a certain percentage of players at any given time. Generally, there will be more emptying shards than filling ones. This will be especially true if there are enough players to fill multiple maps at any given time. The fact that someone can be merged to multiple seemingly empty maps in a row is evidence of this.
There is a significant number of players who do not care to “pop a tag” and thus take responsibility for a map. Similarly, there are a lot of players who don’t care to start dungeon/raid LFG’s for similar reasons. I would not be surprised if the number of players who prefer to be followers as opposed to leaders mirrors similar numbers in the rest of life. For another thing, starting a taxi is not a guarantee “your” map will fill. This is especially so if the player popping the tag does not know the event well enough to “lead.” Players will be quick to leave if there doesn’t seem to be both knowledge and progress being demonstrated. Just think about any Teq map where no one is forming shore/hills teams.
Unfortunately, I’m not sure there is a fix for this situation. ANet cannot/will not get rid of the “Join In” feature which enables taxiing. If they did, they would be removing players’ ability to join their guild members/friends at the same time. This is not going to happen.
People seem to think there is some magic fix that will make mega-server better by eliminating emptier maps. I doubt this, very much. At best, there can be some tweaking of numbers with regard to when new shards form or to when shards close. Such fixes might mean fewer emptier shards, but will certainly not eliminate the problem.
Taxiing is a form of “following the path of least resistance.” That tendency is part of the human psyche, and is not going away, period. The only way to make players choose a harder path would be to eliminate the easier path. That’s not going to happen.
God I hate Plinx. So boring. There’s no waypoint for a start so you have to run across half the map to get there.
The R&D Waypoint is close to the Plinx start point — less than half the distance from Caer Shadowfain — and is only contested during that one tar elemental event. Even running from the Caer WP — which is never contested — is nowhere near half the map. That’s nothing compared to getting to certain places in HoT maps, especially when WP’s are contested there.
LOL…. Just realised they realeased all these new legendaries… none of which I’ll be able to get.
I was looking at making Nevermore, then I saw the achievement collections, in addition to the maximum mastery (Nuhoch/Exalted etc) to get the gifts.Is this for real? I’m now expected to do all the achievements for mastery points just to craft a single of the legendary weapons?
………………. Wow.
Guess I won’t be getting any. I’d rather not play than even continue to read through the contents of the huge collection lists.
It’s a long term goal and it’s supposed to push limits. That’s what legendary means. They’re doable. They’re not doable fast. You just have to take your time.
What’s the difference if you chip away at something for a year while doing other stuff?
No, I’m afraid that is not what “legendary” means. Well, maybe, if you’re taking the position that L. Items being related to actual legends is " a popular myth of recent origin."
It’s what legendary means in games. Within context, it’s what legendary means. It’s supposed to stretch you, push you, and yes, make you jump through hoops. That’s what legendaries are in most games I’ve played.
Obviously we’re talking about legendary items, not legendary in the dictionary definition just like a mob isn’t one guy outside MMOs. Sometimes context is everything.
Could have fooled me. I thought that in MMO’s it meant this takes a long bloody time and you aren’t going to enjoy the process. Jump through hoops, I’ll buy, but not stretch you and push you. The use of the term “legendary” is an attempt to give some sort of mystique to items that are really nothing more than a lot of busy work. However, that’s what MMO’s are, anyway, so I guess I’ll cede the point.