Guild Wars 2

Smooth Penguin.5294:

I’m really interested in the reasons why the wedding defectors are so against this idea. There seems to be ulterior motives, since a wedding mechanic wouldn’t affect people who don’t want to use it.

I’m not against it necessarily. Nothing wrong with it. My only concern is that we already have enough drama queens in game, how much worse do we potentially want to make it?

I mean, you know if they get the ability to marry, there are going to be some that start screaming for all the bells and whistles too. Ugh I can just see the new reality show now: Bridezillas of GW2.

cringe

They are allowed to consider something to be ‘extra cool.’ We don’t necessarily have to agree.

Yes, I’m underwhelmed by the info, but I’m also not a WvWer. Some WvWers are ‘meh’ some are like ‘its about kitten time.’ So responses have varied.

Me, personally, I would have liked guild hall info. It didn’t come, so I’ll stay tuned. No big deal.

Wallace MacBix.2089:

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/this-week-on-the-ready-up-livestream-wvw-automatic-upgrades-and-dragonhunter-pvp-demo/

This Week on the Ready Up Livestream: WvW Automatic Upgrades and Dragonhunter PvP demo

demo != beta

To expand upon this:

“Demo” (in this instance) is short for “demonstration.” Not all demonstrations are hands on.

Eponet.4829:

snip

I do believe I said the challenges weren’t necessarily challenging. Of course, neither is beating on a player that’s just standing there so you can kill farm. Neither is champ training. But that’s beside the point and getting off the general topic.

You’re complaint isn’t that you don’t want to do them. Your complaint is that they are boring. That’s entirely different than most of the others’ complaints, which simply boils down to they just don’t want to do them at all….period. I understand the boring part, I don’t particularly find them entertaining either. But, they are the bar by which anet is measuring, because that was their entire purpose / function in the game. While it might be…interesting…to see some of them “upgraded” to actually be more challenging, I don’t consider that to be likely to happen for any in the core game. Maybe for some of the ones in HoT, but we’ll see.

webtoehobbit.4201:

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Either way I don’t see why this announcement displaced a specialization reveal. The WvW team clearly isn’t the same as the class mechanics team, so why didn’t we get a specialization reveal this week?

No, this didn’t “displace” a specialization. If you go back and read the blogs and articles from the chonomancer announcement, they specifically stated three reveals. Which implies they’d have a break for something else before doing more reveals, otherwise there would be no point in calling out that they were doing three.

The imaginary hype train keeps on rollin!

Since when it correcting misinformation “hype train”?

rolls eyes

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Either way I don’t see why this announcement displaced a specialization reveal. The WvW team clearly isn’t the same as the class mechanics team, so why didn’t we get a specialization reveal this week?

No, this didn’t “displace” a specialization. If you go back and read the blogs and articles from the chonomancer announcement, they specifically stated three reveals. Which implies they’d have a break for something else before doing more reveals, otherwise there would be no point in calling out that they were doing three.

Eponet.4829:

Strange. One of my characters will have 190 or so right away, while others will have 30 or less, purely because I played world completion on one of them while the others I used for other playstyles. That hardly seems equal across the board.

Those that have done world completion aren’t affected. The only people complaining are those that won’t have all of their points after the change. However, it is ‘fair’ across the board for those player as they didn’t do all the ‘work’ for the currency. It doesn’t matter if it’s a pve alt, a wvw player, or a pvp player that stepped into pve to dungeon. They will all require the same ~65 challenges.

Eponet.4829:

Additionally, it’s not just the champ trains. From the very beginning, you could still gain skill points from leveling past 80. Sure, it would take you a while to do it if you weren’t playing skill challenges, but you would eventually be able to do it without wasting your time on things you didn’t enjoy.

Yes, you could still get 1 point per level “after 80.” That was one of the things I touched on in my original long drawn out post, but opted to chop. Yes, you’d have eventually have had enough points that way to unlock everything, but it would have been slow and just as tedious as going to do the challenges. I’m guessing after doing the math anet decided there would be too many points floating around still if they kept those additional leveled points and converted them, so they are getting nixed too.

The change is necessary. Skill points are in the same place in GW2 that they were in GW1 – abundant and essentially useless.

Honestly, I’m not against WvW having its own way of obtaining hero points (probably seems that way though). It might make for some painful coding for Anet. I am against them getting a way that is easier than obtaining them through pve play, and let’s face it, just tying them to player kills would be easier. People already farm kills in wvw for the titles…

I’m not even against WvW getting a similar set up to sPvP where it’s simply unlocked and usable in that mode. However, like pvp, once they step a toe into regular pve, it should go back to being locked if they haven’t unlocked it with hero points. The problem with this set up is that WvW isn’t a completely separate mode from straight pve, which is why I think there would be issues doing it this way.

Eponet.4829:

snip

I had a long drawn out post going point by point, but I’m just going to nix that. It boils down to the simple fact that this is exactly what the challenges were designed for. Giving us points to purchase our skills are their function. They serve no other purpose, they give no other reward (world completing not withstanding). Thus it makes sense that they are the bar by which anet is measuring.

Sure, they aren’t any more challenging than running a champ train, but you can see with the addition of the skill scrolls, skill points got out of hand. The addition of skill points to purchase traits, and the insane number needed to do so (not to mention gold) shows us exactly how out of hand skill points have gotten because of scrolls. Anet is simply rolling that system back to how it should have been at the very beginning. A capped currency with a very limited number of acquisition options.

At least the way they are implementing it is “unfair” across the board.

Short answer: Yes OP you can continue to play the base game without buying the expansion.

Expanded Answer: If you want of the masteries, specializations, etc you will need to purchase the expansion. This is no different than other games.

I see a lot of people pointing out that purchasing the base WoW game comes with most all of the older expansions. Prior to MoP, the only expansion bundled with Vanilla WoW was Burning Crusade. I still needed to buy Wrath and Cata in order to play them. Yes they are included (in some) base purchases now. However, the point people were making (and was being ignored) is that even WoW follows the same model. You must buy the expansion in order to play it. GW2 is not old enough (nor does it have enough expansions) to start rolling them into the base purchase as yet.

I tend to hop around a lot on my characters. I tend to favor my light armored characters more than others, but I think they all see some play. Originally I had intended on making multiples of my favorite classes so that I could outfit 1 for pve, 1 for wvw, and 1 I could leave in pvp. It didn’t work out that way….

Wow….what a way to be pessimistic.

• They didn’t remove “a bunch” of abilities. They only actually removed applied fortitude and applied strength

• Yes, upgrades are now automatic; however we still need to coordinate to defend and hold those objectives. It also now cost ZERO gold to do those upgrades, so maybe WvW players wont feel like their game mode is bleeding them dry anymore.

• With the automatic upgrades, supporting supply lines becomes more desirable as dolyaks speed the upgrades along.

I admit the announcement was mildly underwhelming for me, but I think the changes are good overall.

morrolan.9608:

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

I’m sorry, but it’s NOT 11 hours on one character. I have 15 characters currently and I’m working through challenges on them presently. The vast majority of them have very little world completion done, a lot of them have nothing open beyond the first few waypoints in their starter zone. Yet, you don’t see me kittening about this.

Edit: And I only get to play an hour an night if I’m lucky!

Even at 5 mins its around 5 hours for 1 character let alone if you have multiples. It may not bother you personally but how about having some understanding that others may not like having the progress that THEY EARNED reset.

The ones that EARNED it leveled to 80 and did the challenges. They won’t be affected.
I don’t consider champ training and clicking through scrolls EARNING anything. And yeah, I did it too to unlock skills. Ive spent gold to unlock traits with the new system. I’m going to lose all of it too, its not the end of the world though.

People need to take into consideration that 65 points equates to 13 unlocks. Across all of the available skills and traits. A lot of us only have “everything unlocked” because we had nothing better to do, not because we actually use all of it.

People are squealing like it’s the end of the world, like they are being reset back to 1 and being told that they have to do it all again, and that’s not what’s happening. We’re going to be going out to gather challenges to unlock the elite anyway so what the hell is the big deal, that you have to spend a little bit more time for a few more if core completion is really that important. I get that people don’t want to do it. I get that they feel its unfair.

Rin.1046:

People said that about WvW being part of the world complete achievement, but that was changed. I see no reason why unlocking waypoints would be out of the question.

I’m actually surprised that they changed this. However considering some of the changes coming to the game, I can see why they did (and I highly doubt it was specifically because we asked for it)

Unlocking all waypoints will not stop you from getting world complete, nor will it make it that much easier.

If they allowed this, then it SHOULD bar you from gaining world completion (on that specific character) because you didn’t bother actually doing it. It was the same when wvw was part of the completion requirements. You couldn’t just ‘skip it’ (which is exactly what people are asking for regarding waypoints). If you didn’t do it, you didn’t get it.

And yes, having waypoints open does tend to make mapping easier, since you can jump around a heck of a lot faster.

ozmaniandevil.6805:

snip

Not calling anyone entitled. I get that you guys don’t enjoy mapping after ‘x’ many characters. There are times where I get bored of it or don’t enjoy doing it too, and I’m on characters 14 (lvl 55 ele) and 15 (lvl 11 ranger). I agree shortcuts are nice, I could benefit from this too. However, there are trade offs with all things. One of the trade offs of making a new character is needing to open up the world with it.

The skin is ok…not my cup of tea personally. Doesn’t fit either of my necro’s color themes. One is deep green and pale orange accents. The other is deep green/black and bright electric green accents (her glow even matches )

Yes the arches give a bit of an Orrian vibe. I can also see the Elonian influence in it as well (all that white sand and bright blue pools in the concept art).

I like the general concept thus far, but we’ll see what the final product looks like.

Rin.1046:

snip

No I haven’t forgotten this is just a game. Nor have I forgetting that it’s supposed to be fun and something people enjoy, not a job. Although, I do sometimes wonder why people bother playing when they obviously don’t like the game, but that’s not exactly the topic of this conversation.

All games have a mix of things we like and don’t like, and a required amount of both that we “have” to do. To me, simply allowing people to just open up all the waypoints for their account because one character has done it is on par with opening up all of the cities in a GW1 campaign for all characters after your first one has beaten it.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Donari.5237:

lordkrall.7241:

Valento.9852:

Looks like “Nothing, but will roll some content to the live game” was the most correct answer (although new map changes isn’t content at all). ~whee

The week is far from over.

Quite so! If you’ve been watching the last few weeks’ reveals you’ll note that the big blogs came on Thursdays. Sometimes 3rd party sites managed to release articles on Wednesday that mostly said the same things as the blogs. Saying we’re not getting a reveal this week just because Tuesday had a significant change to a map is rather premature.

Actually if you had REALLY been watching then you’d know that the past few weeks of revelas have had the theme of the reveal given on Monday or Tuesday via a post/image from Anet. This Monday/Tuesday has the reveal of LA being rebuilt, so based on the last 4 weeks this means the blog on Thursday will be related to the rebuilding of LA.

So maybe the rebuilding of LA has something to do with how we acquire guild halls. A services hub where we can go to preview and select which one we want, or to enlist npcs for features or buildings. After all, in GW1, we had to go to an NPC who then took us on a tour of available halls when we wanted to select one. So it’s not completely out there to think they have some type of services hub for the new halls

Or it could be some other aspect of something we’re getting in HoT. We don’t know as yet, but it’s highly unlikely that ‘LA is being rebuilt’ is all we’re getting as a reveal this week. I would like to believe they wouldn’t devote a whole twitch to just that.

Clearly you don’t remember the week of the “frogs”… I think Anet is very capable of making a whole twitch dedicated to just that.

I found the Hylek twitch to be quite entertaining and informative. This isn’t quite on the same level though. The new Hylek are both friend and foe. They covered lore, attack animations, etc. LA is simply being rebuilt…there isn’t new lore, or new battles, and they sure as heck aren’t going to show us images of the finished product.

Jahroots.6791:

I don’t understand these counter-arguments to the OP.

Do you guys feel like it diminishes your achievements? Like it is going to give players some sort of advantage?

Nothing wrong with people wanting some of the stuff the game has to offer, but not everything.

Honestly, it doesn’t impact me particularly at all.

Does it give advantage? Depends on how you look at it. Some will say yes, some will say no. It’s a very perspective based question.

No, there is nothing wrong with wanting some the of the stuff the game has to offer, but take a step back and consider how people work. Take a look at how even basic request and suggestions spiral out of control. People requesting things like instant level 80 scrolls. It may start with a ‘simple’ thing like unlocking waypoints across and account, but then when people start pushing for other such things, where do we draw the line? How much is ‘convenience’ and where does it end. At what point does it become "Whats the point in having the game if you aren’t going to bother playing it? "

I’m with Rose, I just temporarily trait speedy kits and then swap back and forth between grenade and bomb kits….. constant speed boost. No issues there.

As for the run speed signet ruining your ability to play with out a speed boost……we have a phrase for that….

ozmaniandevil.6805:

Behellagh.1468:

Sorry, you have to get off your butt and do something when creating a new alt.

When you’ve done the SAME something for 2,500-5,000 hours, yeah, it gets a bit tedious and boring. I find it laughable that you’re telling a person sitting at a computer to “work harder” in the game they paid for. Do you even understand what you’re saying? Not just you, but many others here. This is not a job, nor should it be viewed as such. This is a bunch of people sitting around playing video games. Uh… yeah.

Then. Don’t. Do. It.

Yeah, its a bunch of people sitting on their kitten, playing a video game. If they don’t like playing that part of it more than once, then they shouldn’t bother making more than one character. That’s pretty much standard fare across most games.

Rin.1046:

I understand what you’re saying, but when you have to unlock most waypoints (not just the dungeons), on many characters, those minutes can quickly turn into hours.

Sure it can, but again that’s the nature of the beast. There is only so much ‘convenience’ a developer can actually give you in a game considering their goal is to keep you in game, keep you busy. Having to run from waypoint to waypoint does exactly this. Will it kitten off some people and discourage them from playing alts? Yes, it will, but they can’t please everyone. (We’ll address the convenience factor and opting in or out further down)

Rin.1046:

As to the XP from waypoints helping with masteries, that is a valid point. However, there are still many other ways to acquire XP, so I do not think it would be a big issue if you unlocked all waypoints without earning the XP.

Yes, there are many other ways. I wasn’t discounting them; however a lot of people do forget that unlocking these do earn them xp (because at this point, for them, xp is meaningless).

Rin.1046:

I would rather have the convenience of unlocked waypoints than getting bonus XP towards the masteries.

Again, its a choice thing.

Yes, it’s a choice thing, but how would you have them implement this? How to give people the option to opt in or out without introducing a potential influx of bugs?

Say they offer waypoint unlocks for free:
Do you need to have world completion on just one character first, or is the pre-req simply making it to 80?
Do people only have a 1 time (per character) chance to ‘opt in’ once they hit 80, or can they decide they want to opt in at any point after 80?
How difficult would it be to add this check (and other checks as needed) to the code and make it character specific?

If they offer it as a gemstore item:
Again, world completion on the account or just level 80?
Do you have to buy one per character? Or is it an account unlock that you can opt in or out per character?
Again, how much would it impact the code to make all these checks?
Does this border on ‘pay to win’? (This one would be a big concern)

Rin.1046:

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

“I don’t want to actually play the game, so give me the option to just buy everything”

That’s all I’m seeing here.

“But I did play the game! I just don’t want to do it all again!”

Then don’t make another character.

You’re obviously not reading everything. I do want to play the game, just not every aspect of it. If you enjoy every little aspect of the game, then I am happy for you, but not everyone does.

I love doing events, dungeons, and helping friends with their personal story. I have done the personal story one with my main, I get no enjoyment out of repeating it with another. I know there are some different choices and paths, but the majority of it is the same, especially later on. Besides, I have never really been into the idea of experiencing different paths of the same story. I like to run through it once and that is my story. I am the same with exploring, once I have explored all areas I do not enjoy doing it again.

There some parts of the game I do enjoy repeating, and I would like to be able to quickly jump to those parts with different characters, without doing stuff I don’t enjoy so much, because I like to experience things with differrent professions.

I don’t know about anyone else, but I am not asking for the game to be completed on my alts. I merely want to be able to take an alt, leveling it quickly to max and be allowed to take it where ever I feel the fun is, without some time gated progression holding me back. You can do that with PvP and to some extent in WvW, but not in PvE, and to me that is not fun.

Some players play PvE for the story and the exploration, which I do at least once. But that aspect of the game is not something I enjoy doing more than once, so it would be nice to have the convenience of skipping it. I am not asking for them to make you skip it.

Sorry, it was more aimed at the OP than anyone else.

However I get your general point. There are aspects of the game that I don’t necessarily enjoy repeating either, but that’s just the nature of the beast. I have a lot of alts too, many of which leveled to 80 and don’t have anything beyond their starter zones. Can it be tedious to run to wherever it is you want to go because you don’t have the waypoint readily accessible? Sure, I’ve been there too, but I still don’t feel that justifies this “short cut” that is being asked for. Its not like it takes hours do get from point A to point B, even if point B is on the opposite side of the continent. If it did, then sure, I could see the complaint, but it doesn’t.

Also, keep in mind that once HoT releases we’ll have masteries for the core game. Unlocking those waypoints on an 80 gives a pretty decent experience pop for very little effort. I know, that’s pretty meaningless now, but it might be sort of handy once we start building those mastery tracks.

skullmount.1758:

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Donari.5237:

lordkrall.7241:

Valento.9852:

Looks like “Nothing, but will roll some content to the live game” was the most correct answer (although new map changes isn’t content at all). ~whee

The week is far from over.

Quite so! If you’ve been watching the last few weeks’ reveals you’ll note that the big blogs came on Thursdays. Sometimes 3rd party sites managed to release articles on Wednesday that mostly said the same things as the blogs. Saying we’re not getting a reveal this week just because Tuesday had a significant change to a map is rather premature.

Actually if you had REALLY been watching then you’d know that the past few weeks of revelas have had the theme of the reveal given on Monday or Tuesday via a post/image from Anet. This Monday/Tuesday has the reveal of LA being rebuilt, so based on the last 4 weeks this means the blog on Thursday will be related to the rebuilding of LA.

So maybe the rebuilding of LA has something to do with how we acquire guild halls. A services hub where we can go to preview and select which one we want, or to enlist npcs for features or buildings. After all, in GW1, we had to go to an NPC who then took us on a tour of available halls when we wanted to select one. So it’s not completely out there to think they have some type of services hub for the new halls

Or it could be some other aspect of something we’re getting in HoT. We don’t know as yet, but it’s highly unlikely that ‘LA is being rebuilt’ is all we’re getting as a reveal this week. I would like to believe they wouldn’t devote a whole twitch to just that.

I thought it was stated somewhere (an interview iirc) that GH would be based/founded/discovered/whatever in the jungle? So preview/etc wouldn’t be possible in LA.

I think it was said that it would be available to those that bought the expansion. I don’t recall if they specifically said we’d discover them and such that way. Hell, even if they did, is it really that unbelievable that they changed up some of the ‘how’ and ‘why’ between then and now?

“I don’t want to actually play the game, so give me the option to just buy everything”

That’s all I’m seeing here.

“But I did play the game! I just don’t want to do it all again!”

Then don’t make another character.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Donari.5237:

lordkrall.7241:

Valento.9852:

Looks like “Nothing, but will roll some content to the live game” was the most correct answer (although new map changes isn’t content at all). ~whee

The week is far from over.

Quite so! If you’ve been watching the last few weeks’ reveals you’ll note that the big blogs came on Thursdays. Sometimes 3rd party sites managed to release articles on Wednesday that mostly said the same things as the blogs. Saying we’re not getting a reveal this week just because Tuesday had a significant change to a map is rather premature.

Actually if you had REALLY been watching then you’d know that the past few weeks of revelas have had the theme of the reveal given on Monday or Tuesday via a post/image from Anet. This Monday/Tuesday has the reveal of LA being rebuilt, so based on the last 4 weeks this means the blog on Thursday will be related to the rebuilding of LA.

So maybe the rebuilding of LA has something to do with how we acquire guild halls. A services hub where we can go to preview and select which one we want, or to enlist npcs for features or buildings. After all, in GW1, we had to go to an NPC who then took us on a tour of available halls when we wanted to select one. So it’s not completely out there to think they have some type of services hub for the new halls

Or it could be some other aspect of something we’re getting in HoT. We don’t know as yet, but it’s highly unlikely that ‘LA is being rebuilt’ is all we’re getting as a reveal this week. I would like to believe they wouldn’t devote a whole twitch to just that.

morrolan.9608:

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

I don’t particularly consider 65 skill challenges to be “a lot,” but that’s just difference of opinion.

65 skills challenges is probably around 11 hours to complete for 1 toon. Add in multiple toons and it is a lot of time to regain what we already have..

I’m sorry, but it’s NOT 11 hours on one character. I have 15 characters currently and I’m working through challenges on them presently. The vast majority of them have very little world completion done, a lot of them have nothing open beyond the first few waypoints in their starter zone. Yet, you don’t see me kittening about this.

Edit: And I only get to play an hour an night if I’m lucky!

DeWolfe.2174:

You people need to be “Gibb Smacked” repeatedly. Of all things to complain about, geez….

I need the ability to +1 this a lot more than once.

“A chapel is a religious place of fellowship, prayer and worship”

Could be NPC weddings.
Could be funerals.
Could just be an all purpose place to commune with the assorted gods / spirits in the game that is intended to be non-race specific (an ‘all are welcome’ sort of thing).

But I don’t think we’re looking at possible player char weddings. Could be wrong, but I sure hope not. I actually would prefer to not have that drama in this game.

Orangensaft.7139:

pdavis.8031:

Wut?

I’m confused.

You are upset they increased the rate of salavaging upgrades per tier of salvage kit, and this is a nerf because now your inventory fills up faster?

Really!?

Getting more stuff is now bad and can be classified as a nerf?
Yeah no. Not at all.

By definition a “Nerf”: is a change to a game that makes something less effective or desirable.
One can argue that a greater chance to get an upgrade is undesirable, however it’s a very weak argument, unless getting a few extra coin from salvaging is undesirable to you. Then yes, it can be classified as a “nerf”.

But I would imagine that a vast majority of players getting an upgrade worth a few extra silver, or more MF fodder would consider this change positive and a buff. (At least anyone who is halfway reasonable….)

getting more stuff is good if the stuff is useful in any way

getting more crap is bad

Not everyone considers it to be ‘crap.’

You don’t like it, that’s fine. That doesn’t make it a “nerf.”

Wow….just wow.

I didn’t realize it was such an arduous task to take an extra 5 seconds at the merchant.

Killface.1896:

SHOUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!!!!!

i second this!

take it!

Guilty Cross.2706:

I’ve played a lot of MMOs and gw2 has the worst leveling grind of them all imo.

I have 3 lvl 80s and that last 80 was such a kitten drag I almost gave up on it.
It’s so kitten boring. I would literally pay for instant 80, and I hated that feature in WoW.

Uhm…I have to disagree with you on leveling. It’s far from a grind…ok maybe it’s a “grind” if you only do one thing across all your characters, but that’s on you. This game gives you experience for practically everything, so it’s very easy to change up and get some variety in leveling. I’m presently working on leveling my 14th and 15th character to 80. (I’ll even give ya screenies of my character select screen if you so desire)

Yes, it can be boring, especially if you only play alone. I will agree there. However, as I said originally, that’s partially on you considering there are a multitude of ways to level. You aren’t limited to “just” creature killing or just doing quests or whatever. You can play your 80 through a dungeon and swap your lowbie in at the end for a quick experience burst. You can craft. You can get tomes and experience scrolls from pvp and/or dailies. Simple exploration gives nice chunks of xp. You can go run around eotm or wvw (depending on how you’re server is doing). Lot of options out there to switch it up, including not even having to play the character.

But grandfathering is not a simple solution. Unlike skill points, hero points are intended to be ‘limited’ resource. They have a cap, which is something that has to be taken into consideration as part of the programming of the system.

Grandfathering people in essentially puts them in debt, which they would need to work off, since they now have credit for content they didn’t actually do. This would require them to ‘work it off’ before they could start earning points to put towards the new elite.

Or do you suggest that Anet simply gives all those people 65 free skill challenges that they now no longer need to complete? They just select a random 65 across the map and mark them as done? Giving credit for content that wasn’t actually done…I can just hear that uproar now.

Or, just ignoring all of that and just grandfathering them in, if they still complete all of the skill challenges per normal, they will eventually hit the point cap before all of the challenges are done. Then what? Do these players then get nothing for completing those? Wouldn’t be all that dissimilar from working off the debt, only you’d be doing it at the end of the run instead of the beginning.

Its not a ‘simple’ problem, thus there is no ‘simple’ or right solution. Since we have to do skill challenges anyway to get the points to open up the elite spec, it shouldn’t be that big a deal.

Guhracie.3419:

I’m with Lanfear above, except I’d be shocked to see the new trait system in the game any sooner than two to three months..

I was trying to be optimistic

I don’t expect it anytime soon either (thus the “at least” chunk of the statement). But we can dream…

Either #2 or #3 are your best options right now. However it’ll probably be a while still before the new changes come into the game. (I’m thinking at least another month, but I could very well be wrong).

I doubt we’ll see any kind of reimbursement for gold spent, so I highly advise against doing that.

As for relearning traits…. traits and skills will all unlock via hero points if I understand the new system correctly.

Daddar.5971:

The basic problem is that PvE players who are obsessive about map completion can have everything unlocked right away on all their toons, while hard-core WvW players who only do PvE when absolutely necessary will have to do a lot of PvE just to get back to the traits they already legitimately unlocked before. It’s patently unfair, since it lavishly rewards one playstyle while severely disadvantaging another, all for the sake of ‘ease of coding’.

I don’t particularly consider 65 skill challenges to be “a lot,” but that’s just difference of opinion.

Hard core pvp players that decide they want to dungeon or do anything in pve or wvw will be in the exact same place as you. Sure, they can level to 80 through their chosen mode (via tomes), but once they step a toe outside that mode, they run into the same issue as a hard core wvw player. They have to go do pve content to obtain those last 65 points for the core specs, and ‘x’ number for the elite spec. Additionally, there will be quite a few pve only players that will be in similar shoes. People who leveled alts through tomes, or eotm, or just skill scrolled their way through the necessary points for skill unlocks. So I wouldn’t say its “patently unfair,” but it is disadvantageous.

There is probably more to it than just ‘ease of coding’ as you call out. However, it’s hard to tell given that we can’t see the underlying code. You do have to step back and look at it from the perspective of all the modes though, not just wvw or just pve. How they can set up and balance the new hero points so that its not easier to go to one mode over another. How to implement limitations so people don’t double up because they play more than one mode. Etc Etc. Its not a “simple” problem.

Hmmm… so this will obviously change as more of the specializations are revealed. However, for me, most to least liked:

1. Chronomancer
2. Reaper
3. Dragonhunter
4. ?
5. ?
6. ?
7. ?
8. ?
9. ?

I can’t gauge Druid or Tempest yet, since we don’t know anything about them other than their names. I can get into specific likes/dislikes about the individual specs later, just don’t feel like going into it presently.

Valento.9852:

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

Valento.9852:

Check attachment. “Inner Fire” effect depends on number of burning stacks, so I guess burning is changing aswell.

It does sound like that’s what they’ve settled on. Now it’s just a matter of balancing numbers. However, it is still possible that they completely scrap the fire stacking between now and implementation.

That would be a shame… making burning stack intensity could allow for great condi builds, specially for elementalists.

Agreed, it would a be a shame. Imo, from the way they talk about it in the streams, it doesn’t seem likely that it will go back to how it was originally, but I’m trying not to count the chickens before they hatch. Pray for the best, expect the worst is how the saying goes I believe.

Valento.9852:

Check attachment. “Inner Fire” effect depends on number of burning stacks, so I guess burning is changing aswell.

It does sound like that’s what they’ve settled on. Now it’s just a matter of balancing numbers. However, it is still possible that they completely scrap the fire stacking between now and implementation.

Daddar.5971:

I think they should tie trait unlocks to WvW player kills. I mean, why not? If you have no player kills, it should just be a simple matter of catching up a bit, right? When you look at it that way, you may actually see the absurdity of the anticipated unlock system. You don’t want to have to kill X number of opposing players? Too bad, ‘cause that whole ’play the way you want’ thing was just another bit of marketing spin.

Too easily farmed, I would think. Especially in in the larger zerg on zerg fights. We’ve already seen players farming each other for loot in an agreed upon manner. I think it would just be a bit messy.

The problem we run into is that WvW, unlike spvp, is not a completely separate mode from pve. Thus there is a lot more to take into consideration regarding the ‘how’ behind hero points.

Recluce.3709:

I suppose we can speculate on names too, based on the secondary profession:
1. Mesmer: Chronomancer
2. Guardian: Dragonhunter
3. Necromancer: Reaper
4. Ranger: Spiritualist SPECULATION
5. Engineer: Sapper SPECULATION
6. Elementalist: Tempest (SPECULATION but commonly accepted)
7. Thief: Commando SPECULATION
8. Warrior: Samurai SPECULATION

Tempest is no longer speculation. It was confirmed on the 4hr trait stream that it is the ele spec name.

The sticky addresses bleed and confusion, both having their cap removed.

Additionally, the twitch streams since that stress test have touched on condi changes and recently it’s been implied that burning and poison may be changing to stack intensity instead of duration and would also not have caps (as far as my understanding goes). It’s still a work in progress regarding final numbers though, so we’ll just have to wait a little longer til we know for certain how everything will function.

I don’t care one way or the other on housing, I guess. I don’t personally think the ‘traditional’ set up that other games follow really fits with GW2. However, as other’s have pointed out, they could do something similar with building one’s home instance. Some of us enjoyed building our HoM, which is similar though not the exact same thing as a ‘house.’ I think many of us would enjoy doing something similar again, and the home instance offers a relatively convenient built in locale for doing exactly that.

Regarding mounts, I really don’t want to see traditional style mounts in this game. “This is not WoW” is a common argument against these, but it goes further than this. Mounts are not something the lore of the existing game supports, they’d have to retcon it in, which would kitten off a lot of lore hounds. With the waypoint system and the assorted speed boost options of most classes (can we say “sprint spoiled”?), again, mounts serve no functional purpose. Yes, we could add them as purely cosmetic collectible items; however, we’ve already seen in previous mount threads that some people wouldn’t be happy with that. We’ve already seen calls for reducing or even completely removing waypoints so mounts could have speed boosts, for combat capable mounts, etc (for even just the few gemstore mountlike toys we currently have). So, I think this is simply something Anet should just stay away from. They have given in inch and players are demanding a mile, and we won’t even get into potential issues that mounts cause (things we’ve seen in other games).

People, please for the love of every deity I can name, look up wtf “viable” means.

Condi builds are viable. Even in group content. They are far from optimal. They are extremely slow when you are competing with other condi users. However they are still “capable of working successfully.”

As for supporting documentation…there is a sticky over in the HoT forum where they have screenies of bleed stacking greater than 25 during the stress test, and a red post confirming they are indeed playing with removing the stack cap for bleed and confusion. Additionally if you’ve watched the assorted twitch streams since then, it has been discussed a few times. We have since been told that they are looking at making burning and poison stack intensity as opposed to duration as they currently stand. .

Sola.7250:

Ascended gear is something you earn, you can’t just buy it

You can’t just buy it….except you really just can. With the exception of 2 components.

You can buy everything you need to level to 500 in the crafting. In a matter of hours.
You can buy all of the materials for the final armor. Hell you don’t even have to craft the components if you don’t want.

The only things you can’t buy are laurels for the patterns and vision crystals for the final crafting stage. Laurels only require you to log in, and the materials for vision crystals drop like rain (now). Not really any “earning” going on there.

Dromar.1027:

I’m not against working towards a goal but ascended weapons and armor were implemented in the wrong way. They should have been introduced in brand new elite content like raids or elite dungeons along with the time gated crafting for those that didn’t want to or couldn’t complete high level content. I guess for Anet fractals fit the bill but the RNG is brutal and not to mention it still is time gated with the daily.

Except this is exactly what the game was not supposed to be.

GW2 wasn’t about locking gear behind high level content, per se. It wasn’t about “getting ready to play” which is exactly what you’re talking about.

I played GW1, to me legendaries are like FoW armor. Something to work towards. A flashy skin to sink time into, nothing more, nothing less.

Honestly, it’s no more ‘unhealthy’ to grind out a legendary than it was to gring out all the ecto and shards for the armor. Its the exact same concept. If you don’t want to do it, then don’t.

I wouldn’t mind taking a week for them to give us details on Guild Halls, then do another 3 specializations, then a week for to cover ‘challenging group content,’ and then cover the last 3 specializations.

Not sure if they’d go that route though.

lordkrall.7241:

The point in maintaining it is that it makes crafting relevant to the market.
Why would people bother buying the materials on the TP if they could just make all of them by themselves in a day?

I’m not saying to completely remove the daily gate; however, they could increase the limit from 1 to 3 and it would still maintain their secondary ‘reason’ for the gating, which was to give crafters a consistent high value item to make and sell. However, even that has failed for all of the ascended materials except damask, and damask is only as expensive as it is because its set up is broken.

However, given that their supposed primary reason for implementing ascended was because they wanted BiS armor to take a ‘certain amount of time’ and people can almost completely bypass that, it does tend to make the gating of the materials themselves pretty much pointless.