Guild Wars 2

I Really Hate the idea of sub-classes.

I also think that most of their strengths could be harvested to build a better system of tutorials that clarify the concepts of role and ensure players have a good starting point for a variety of gameplay modes.

But.

I’ve often found its a poor process to discard an idea until you’ve really tried to make it work… personally. So here is my stab at Sub-classes that I think would dodge or mitigate most of their worst consequences.

Sub-classes are presented as a new type of Grandmaster Trait. These traits are labeled A, B, C, D, etc. for each profession (as opposed to the Roman numerals used for ‘normal’ Traits). They are unlocked by some mildly time consuming gameplay process that is really the LEAST important thing about deciding to introduce them at all. Trainers, unlocked through achievements, quest line, gem store… finding ways to make players pass the time is a separate concern from the abilities about to be unleashed on the playing field.

Once earned, a Subclass trait can be selected as a grandmaster trait through any of the 5 Trait lines. Even if you have 30 points in two separate lines, you may still only select a lettered Sub-class trait once. This one-&-only-one quality is of critical importance, allowing the traits to have sweeping effects without fear of conflicts between them. By allowing them to be selected from any line you preserve the greatest variety of pathways to this system, and try to give players latitude in their buildcraft.

Assured that a character will only ever have one of these traits at a time, the Developers are freed up to be more daring – not in overall power, but in the reach and breadth of the changes equipping the trait triggers. Complex packages of new effects, substitutions, and the occasional drawback. Vertical creep is one of several insidious and destructive problems looming over the whole concept, so the scrutiny directed at these Traits will have to be extreme. But as a bare minimum we know a person migrating into a sub-class has given up the flexibility and potency of picking a grandmaster trait as a down payment on what the package offers.

Weapon choice as it stands now comes close to creating the distinctiveness often sought for Sub-classes. A mace/shield guardian is a thing quite apart from a greatsword guardian or a scepter/focus guardian. Sub-class Traits could use existing weapon choices for the profession, but replacing some or all of their skill-buttons with new attacks as a powerful tool for creating unique gameplay without blocking a more general plan to increase the range of weapons available to each profession. Working from the model of engineer kits, these new skills could have slightly above-average performance, representing the major part of the contribution to effectiveness you would expect from any grandmaster Trait. Or they could be meticulously held on par with current weapon skills and the advantages delivered through passive effects or modified class mechanics.

I would also consider the option of Sub-Class traits imposing a fixed, locked, and absolute Elite skill while the Trait is equipped. While this could just be a hard association with an existing skill (e.g. a spirit-based Ranger sub-class that locks in Spirit of Nature as your Elite Skill), or it could be a new Elite skill unique to that Sub-class. Either way it uses an existing element of character power as the way to deliver FLAVOR rather than POWER.

Most sub-class concepts simply try to mask vertical progression or excuse it with the time taken to acquire it. When I hear the phrase “real progression” touted as one of their virtues, I shudder. My experiences with how full-on boring some dungeons have become now that my mains are running around with 6/6 ascended trinkets and an ascended weapon (much less armor…) makes me extremely concerned about allowing more power creep into the game in any form. But I think the above could provide a template for tightly-themed horizontal diversification.

I still think that a more daring approach to Trait design in general could net most of those benefits with less peril, but if I HAD TO design “sub-classes” for the game, I’d start with these sorts of trade-offs from within the existing framework.

Watching this video I realized…

Order-specific dances.

Make it so .

Patrikan Habaton.2548:

Hey Chris,

I really hoped I don’t ask this again in the new year but: Any update on Fractals reset?

Reality check: ArenaNet is at home with the families right now.

I’m sympathetic to your concerns, but this is NOT the time to be tapping your foot. It’s another few days till the clocks start up again, and even then I’d allow a few days just to sort out some of the craziness that’s happened in the last week.

Nothing wrong with periodically refreshing the question, but to expect any sort of action to take place right now is simply unreasonable, no matter how righteous the cause.

Stand by. You’re not the only one curious about what can be done on this front .

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Yes I remember this now along with a similar idea by Nike. Very cool ideas.

Global Dominance was spelled out here for those who are curious.

I’d call it more of an extrapolation of how some of the WvW systems for control/claiming and overall scoring/rewards could be earned through normal play across large swaths of the PvE landscape, possibly with “set bonuses” for complete control of the individual maps. It has more sweep and scope than the single-zone conflict I was trying to build around the Tequatl content .

I personally would enjoy Role-diversification more, but I like to tinker and build-craft quite a lot. In the eternal search for “new things to do” and “new ways to do” it, I come down more on the new ways to do it end of the spectrum.

That said, expanding on the Orders as both framework for activities and inspiration for rewards is a Juggernaut-of-Awesome that can reinvigorate huge swaths of the game world and player-base. New skills and traits and weapons cannot be ignored, but I think its the Orders that have the best chance of seizing the imagination of the broader MMO community and keeping GW2 in a strong position through the coming year.

ORDERS AND CHAOS
We can work together without surrendering our unique strengths. We can beat this thing without losing who we are. — Almorra Soulkeeper

As Primordius reveals the true extent of its molten grasp, the Three Orders of Tyria rally to strike back against the devastating legacy of ‘Briar’s Folly’. Join us as GuildWars 2 unveils the rise of new heroes as the war against the Elder Dragons enters a new and terrifying phase in this permanent Living World release.

Fulfill Your Oath
Choosing to take your place within one of Tyria’s three Great Orders is one of the most important steps along your heroic journey. Now that decision offers you greater chances for heroism and recognition than ever before. New multi-tiered Renown achievements will record your service, allowing you to advance through the ranks of those to whom you have given your allegiance and with whom you have found common cause in stopping the Elder Dragons. Each Order’s headquarters takes on new importance as the nerve center for dozens of active operations. Visit the Vigils’ War Room, the Priory’s Living Archive, or the Whispers’ Apple Cellar to pick up special weekly and monthly assignments. Or take to the field directly: new and existing Dynamic Events have been flagged as ‘Order Events’. Character’s whose choice of Order matches these events now gain an additional 15% karma reward for advancing the goals of their Order and once per day per character these events contribute to your Renown. Many of the new events can only be initiated by players in that Oder, allowing you to interact with your allies in never before seen ways. Reach out to new operatives, command new subordinates, and correspond with new colleges as you uncover tasks and secrets unique to each Order.

More Than Soldiers
While armed conflict is a part of every Order’s struggle against the Elder Dragons, members must never forget those things that make them unique. Orchestrate a network of spies and wield the hidden blade of diplomacy on behalf of the order of Whispers. Give your service to aid and rescue missions as the Vigil also upholds their commitment to charity and the belief they must protect not only lives but the dignity of the people of Tyria. Partake in secret experiments and unlock ancient puzzles as the Durmond Priory turns forgotten lore into practical solutions. Each path offers an entirely separate viewpoint on the trials of this Age.

Victories Must Be Celebrated
These are grim times but hope still burns brightly. Show off your commitment to the struggle and your chosen path against Evil with new titles, deals on Order-themed dyes and even new dye colors reserved for the upper ranks of each Order. Learn new recipes to create account-bound weapon and armor skins. As your star rises, new areas of each Order headquarters become accessible where the secret lore and history of your Order is preserved. Enjoy access to new vendors who will exchange karma for potent gear. Relax between battles with Order-themed consumables and town-clothes. Redecorate you home instance with subtle hints of your allegiance, earn new harvestable resource nodes, or even install a portal to take you directly to and from your Order’s headquarters. You can even gain new battle cries and dialogue that signal your allegiance!

Now I’m morbidly curious at the opportunity cost I paid to have 113% magic find…

Jaymee.1560:

I am not aware this question as been asked before… Why am I getting responses like I have asked this question 50 million times before?

You haven’t asked it before, but regular forum readers see it asked… often . Probably not more than about 104 times, so our sample size may not be as large as we’ like . Its a common concern, but while the one known exception is ALWAYS held up, it really is just random distribution at work. Some days/weeks/months you just get a disappointing return.

There are stains on the upholstery of that chair I don’t even want to think about. It should be burned before it evolves into a Legendary Ooze…

TheDaiBish.9735:

The Lost Witch.7601:

I bet the ‘limited’ amount of skins isn’t due to a lack of ideas. And coming up with concept design is probably not even a burden! Modeling them for the game, dealing with clipping issues, stuff like that… that’s probably the burdensome part.

I’d say this is all the more reason to allow players to design and submit models, as opposed to concept art, since players aren’t under the same time constraints as the devs.

I can draw at a fair level above stick-figures, but 3D-modeling is right out .

A CDI with the ANet artists is something I would like to see, but I think part of it will be lost to clash over how little diversity there is in Medium armor silhouettes compared to the other two categories. I get it that it ‘exists to provide long-range identification for PvP and WvW’, but the same argument existed in SWtoR and vast majority of players DON’T CARE. The benefits just do not offset the frustration of not being able to express your identity.

Rather than strict silhouette → profession identity, if I should be that worried about being able to identify what is coming at me at a glance, give me an option check-box to append a profession icon to their name-plate. That’s even clearer messaging than “oh, they’re in a trenchcoat, must be an adventurer profession…”

I just saw a post saying Traits couldn’t/shouldn’t unlock new weapons… and I think that allowing them to do so is a fabulous idea.

In the Engineer class we already see the trade-off of give up a utility (or even elite!) skill slot for a new tray of 1-5 buttons. It’s not a big leap to allowing you to access a new left-hand tray with a Trait. And while you could do it as whole new weapon choices with something like an Elementalist’s adept-tier “Battlemage” trait that allows them to use 1h swords in either their main hand, off-hand, or both… it also could open the door to a whole slew of ‘Technique’ traits that substitute new skills for old on existing weapons. Imagine a “Dragonfly Dagger Technique” trait Thieves could take that would replace their Dagger buttons 1 and 2 and give them new skills in those slots that throw their dagger.

While opening up new weapon choices is something I might prefer to see as an unlock or the reward for a task-chain, the idea of managing the “I’d like new skills for existing weapons” that has been brought up might be handled very tidily by the addition of some new ‘technique traits’. And because they pay a trait as a cost, those new buttons could be pretty juicy in what they deliver .

ArtemusHunter.9521:

Would this be a part of Horizontal Progression? :

Various GW1 styled maps(like JQ, FA and Codex) being revamped for GW2.

If there new zones/instances were made available to all they would generally be promoted as “new content”. To make them horizontal progression they would (likely) be released along with an in-game activity as the means of unlocking them, so that your progression was how many new zones you had access to.

If you check back on page one you’ll see my Horizontal Progression test. This passes with flying colors .

So, yes it could be a very desirable reward, depending on presentation.

Marcus Greythorne.6843:

Synergies gave me the following idea:

You can unlock Elite-Skills called Synergy-xy (where xy stands for a profession). Instead of using a standard elite skill you can start the synergy, but only if the chosen synergy-elite profession is in close proximity to you. If not, the skill is greyed out.

Example: A guardian has chosen the elite: “Elementalist Synergy”. He now has access to skill xy / passive xy, but only if an Elementalist is in 600 yards range.

This… is interesting.

I would probably rename them “Partner” or “Partnership” Elites to emphasize that they involve teamwork with another character (rather than some sort of internal synergy).

While graying out would work, you might have them create a combo field that only the other profession can complete. That would create more active gameplay than just becoming available when the other profession is around. A big class logo on the ground hinting ‘Hey, stand here!’

You might also simplify the design workload and increase the utility by having each class get 3 of them keyed to the Soldiers/Adventurers/Scholars categories rather than the 8 individual professions.

So building off your example, a Guardian could select “Scholar Partnership” and it drops a field that your buddy the Elementalist steps into and he can either cause a combo finisher somehow or you could even have a passive benefit while in the field. Coming from a guardian getting Aegis applied every 2 second for 10 seconds while standing in the field seems thematic. And it would make squishy characters BEG their buddy the guardian to carry this skill .

It raises the question of how much to you want to encourage/enforce party diversity. If a profession can’t lead-in for their own profession, mono-profession parties will just have to stick to the elite choices they already have.

Interesting indeed .

Nike.2631:

Maybe a “CDI Contest”, where instead of limiting things to a first, second, and third place winner, every player who suggests a Rune that is adopted into the game would get a set of 6 or 12 of them as the prize. With players sometimes wondering what the benefits of contributing to a CDI are, maybe a little in-game loot would inspire them

TheDaiBish.9735:

Why stop at runes?

• Skills
• Traits
• Armour and Weapon Sets
• DE’s
• Fractals
• World Boss revamps

It’d certainly give me something to do on the quiet days in work :P

Its not really a question of where to stop, but where to start. Runes have a lot of advantages over those other game-aspects.

• They are tightly formatted (easy to lay out correctly)
• Their effects are mostly formulaic (easy to check for correctness)
• They reach across professions unless specifically designed to only key to certain tags.
• There is no presumption of symmetry – introducing new weapons or new skills there’s an expectation you’d do so in sets of 8, but with runes you can add them individually.
• They take the form of loot, making them easy to use as the reward for their own creation .

I’m sure all of the things you’ve listed will be CDI topics over time, but none of them are as simple to implement. Runes are very… compact.

Dark Catalyst.1028:

The only “innovative” thing with the heart system is that it lets you pick your poison. Choices boil down to collect, kill, or some combination of both. And this, at the cost of having any sort of overarching story for a specific zone.

I also play LotRO and while I agree I’ve seen zone story done much more fluidly and compellingly, I would point out there is a little more of it in GW2 than you might think – its just handled by the scouts (the spyglass icons on map) who will tell you about what’s going in in each area. Unfortunately once you complete a heart the scout won’t talk to you anymore, so it’s really easy to miss those introductions.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

— Role Diversification: New skills/traits, new weapons, access to inaccessible existing weapons, infusions and hybrid professions.

I’m a little surprised how little mention we’ve seen of Runes. We already have a couple sets that are essentially the lynchpin of strong, competitive builds (Solider, Perplexity). Also, Runes follow such easily iterative patterns with only small twists in the 4 and 6 set bonuses that I think it would be possible to open it up to the players to suggest really clever and inspiring new Runes. Maybe a “CDI Contest”, where instead of limiting things to a first, second, and third place winner, every player who suggests a Rune that is adopted into the game would get a set of 6 or 12 of them as the prize. With players sometimes wondering what the benefits of contributing to a CDI are, maybe a little in-game loot would inspire them .

As an example, I’d like to see~

Superior Rune of the Trapper
Icon resembles a bear trap

(1/6) +28 Condition Damage
(2/6) +10% Condition Duration
(3/6) +55 Condition Damage
(4/6) When an opponent triggers one of your Traps they are Tormented (2 stacks, 8 seconds duration)
(5/6) +100 Condition Damage
(6/6) When you set a Trap you also remove 1 Condition.

Which could open up new build possibilities for Rangers and Thieves, but at the cost of carrying some of the currently popular choices (Lyssa, Divinity).

— Sociopolitical Diversification: Player housing, Guild Halls, and Faction Alliances leading to new game play opportunities, rewards and content.

— Hero Recognition: Unique Skins, Titles, Rewards, followers and NPC reactions/opportunities based on the players individual feats in the world of Tyria regardless of how he/she chooses to play the game.

Sounds great. So we should be looking for all that around January 14th, right?

Ok, the idea that dailies should be the primary source of karma is the problem, and frankly I’m glad they stamped it out.

The very notion that you get “karma” from killing 30 ambient creatures and taking an axe to a bunch of saplings is dumb. Go out and smite some evil. Stop bandits from poisoning an entire town. Save that kid that keeps getting lost in the Destroyer crevice. Do something heroic!

I try to keep around 20-50g on hand. But I also just ran a leather worker from 400 to 500 in forty minutes using nothing but mats already in my bank, so a fair amount of my wealth is not held as coin.

I also rarely buy anything that costs more than 3g by choice, so it’s not like I need a lot of cash to address my whims. Once when I decided to drop 25g or so on mats to make an ascended back item, I forked over 20$ of real money and called it good. (good timing too: the recipe went away shortly thereafter)

I don’t buy-sell stuff on the Trade Post, but I certainly harvest and sell from time to time. I’ve probably scratched about 45 silver doubloons out of chests with my lower level characters and sold them off for about 1.7g each over the last two months.

Necessary ingredient in certain infusions?

I figured the price would spike considerably with weapons, but maybe its the ascended armor that’s driving it finally.

A quick visit to the PvP locker will answer all these questions .

You can preview pretty much all armor there (but not all weapons)

Sidebar:

A possible improvement to Unshakeable and Defiance

Each control ability, successful or not removes one stack and at 0 stacks you are allowed a single unimpeded control before the NPCs refills their Defiance – this remains unchanged. The change is rather than having stacks of Defiance completely negate Control Effects and rendering the entire role nearly meaningless in crucial PvE encounters, each stack of Defiance provides minus-15% control effect duration reduction. This would mean characters with extremely developed control abilities would begin being able to momentarily stun/interrupt the NPC at 13 stacks (195% duration reduction). Normal stuns would start to have some impact at 6 stacks (90% duration reduction) and that impact would increase over the next few CC abilities until the NPC is reduced to 0 stacks of defiance, is struck one more time for the full effect and then returns to its most resistant state.

The gradual decline in resistance (rather than the current binary state) not only makes control more meaningful in general, it also specifically acknowledges the focus and opportunity costs paid to deliver higher duration CC effects. “Control builds” become tangibly better because they can make their effects work several stacks earlier than less focused characters for whom Control is a more tertiary ability. Retaining the count-down aspect allows all characters with control effects to contribute to ‘chipping away’ the target’s defenses.

End Sidebar.

Funny how a tankish/bunker build with lots of active condition cleanse doesn’t even notice its princesses rather than say plushie griffons or skrit.

Nice to know something out there eats Berserkers alive .

Beorn Saxon.4762:

I’m a mini collector and last year I was only able to get 3 of 5 wintersday minis, so I was happy to see we would get another shot at them.

And this morning when I finished the meta, I was very cautious to check my bank to know which 2 I still needed: Ventari and the Doll…and the Doll still scares me, so I opted for Ventari.

However, upon accepting my gift, the Toy Solider popped into my inventory…which I already have one of! Now I’m set back another year to wait again

I don’t think this is a bug, I must have miss clicked, but I’m not sure how because I was being so cautious and careful.

Has anyone else run into this, or is there a mystic forge recipe that allows us to turn one mini into another?

Support ticket. Definitely contact support. They’ll be able to see that you have the achievement and thus should have had the mini you wanted most.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Lots of ideas and discussion. I think it would be useful now to list your top three favorite ideas with either a link to your favorite description of that idea in the thread or a single sentence description of your own.

I feel a number of the ideas that have caught my eye and imagination spring from one underlying concept~

Make the world more aware of my choices.

1. More respect for Race. Its the very first thing you choose coming into the game. Add goals that are race specific, but also NPC dialogue that notices and responds to one of the essential facets of the character you have created. Small flourishes like the Hearts in each of the 5 starter zones sending out one letter if you are a native to that zone, and a different letter if you are one of the other four races passing through.

2. More respect for Personality. We have dialogue choices and the game tracks the last 100 of them. USE that information. Weave it into anything and everything it could influence. When we tell the game-world who we are, it should listen!

3. More Respect for Order. This is probably the single biggest decision in the game, with 15 different personal story missions dedicated to making sure we make an informed decision. Choosing your Order can and should be opening a doorway to a long and fascinating journey.

My AP is almost to 10,000… and it certainly doesn’t warn people that I’m old, slow and have a super power that allows me to fall off of anything…

Earendil Starsailor.4675:

- Heh, some niche gear is more niche than others; Settlers is one that is not in any kind of demand. It’s not enough to be unique; it has to also be desirable.

Evidently I’m destined to be ‘that guy’…

I have 2 full sets of Settlers armor. One that I bought for an alt coming up because never in my life would I have expected something paid for with common currency would be soulbound on purchase. Yes, that set is still sitting in my vault as I mull over what to do with it. I’m a tiny bit miffed about that.

The other I brought the mid-level alt out there and parked them at a vendor after dodging an all you could eat buffet of doom serving karka, skelks, and hungry windriders. That set is still on my Super Unicorn Thief now that it’s reached level 80 and it is the best thing since sliced bread for that type of build . That character is a perfect storm out in WvW for my playstyle.

There’s a lot of things the game needs to do to move away from DPS>ALL. Hopefully those things will make some of the options already in play more appealing.

Ronah.2869:

But hey, this is not Nike’s idea or other dev favorites, so people don’t think of them as valid and worth a brainstorming discussion.

I really don’t know what’s given you the impression my ideas in this thread have been all that well received .

I’m actually quite interested in the potential of a ‘hardmode’ be it one zone at a time or some sort of extended (re)play through… I just would like to see the idea talked through and refined so that it won’t be trivially easy to break it.

As a matter of individual fights its at first glance far too easy to hit something enough to tag it an then let your normal-difficulty buddies finish the heavy lifting. You can’t punish people passing by for helping and you don’t want the hard mode-person screaming curses at them because his progress shut down when they took a swing at a monster he was fighting. I don’t immediately see a way to isolate the challenge-seeker from aid accidental or deliberate… which was why I suggested a whole zone set aside for this and that went over like a lead balloon . Hopefully a more robust version will come out of these discussions because I’d like to see a solution that still works when the slightest bit of weaseling is applied to it. We’re not there yet.

It just concludes to “no this is not good” or “no this is worse idea ever” like some other guy Kulvar said.

If you believe in it, I wouldn’t be distracted by such vague challenges. But some of the points more clearly formulated do need to be considered and resolved. Find the people who are offering good critiques and interact with them instead of getting bogged down in unanswerable statements.

None of these ideas are valid in an Open World because they affect others
non HM people don\t want to be left alone in the map because all others are in HM maps.

I’m sorry but the wants of non-hardmode people don’t have any more sway over my play decision than people who think I should be playing at their precise levels of fractals or going and doing the Dungeon they’re most interested in at this moment. It’s like saying keg brawl is a bad thing because it takes people out of Lion’s Arch. Find the people who like doing what you like doing, don’t block your fellow players from doing something they’d enjoy just because you’re lonely.

timmyf.1490:

I am BEYOND in love with this idea and it could be extended to more than just pedestals: why not allow people to claim ownership of town POIs like bars, etc?

I have to say the roleplaying possibilities of being able to buy a non-instanced bar for a year wherein the staff dialogue acknowledges you’re the owner is kinda sweet. Especially if its uniquely owned for that year. The competition for top bid on that could get amazingly fierce.

The absolute king of all: allow a player to buy their way onto the Captain’s Council. This would be a truly unique way to allow a single player to show off in the hugest way possible.

Yeah, I could get behind that.

A thought for letting our heavy-hitters of gold collecting slug it out for our amusement and for theirs.

Patrons of the City
Add 12 pedestals to Lions Arch, scattered around in somewhat out of the way palaces. At the start of each month a pedestal becomes “Up for grabs”. You can place a blind bid by interacting with the pedestal, which takes your coin into holding as the bid is placed. You can always increase your bid by throwing additional coin in. At the end of the month the highest bidder is revealed and used to model a statue that will stand on that pedestal for one year, they receive a ‘Patron of the City’ title, and their name & winning bid is permanently engraved into the interactive plaque at its base. Failed bids are then returned, another pedestal goes up for grabs, and the cycle repeats. After all 12 pedestals are filled, the first pedestal goes up for grabs and so on, recording ‘patrons of the city’ for all time. Pedestals, statues, and plaques would be unique to each server (no bidding while in overflow!).

That ought to pull a few tens of thousands of Gold out of the system from the very wealthiest and provide a title the puts ‘Golden’ to shame for sheer exuberant wealth .

Chrispy.5641:

And how are you going to show off your Bragging rights? If its a Title or Unique skin, guess what buddy? Its still a greater reward than Normal Mode.

I don’t disagree. My point is more that the rewards should not in turn reduce the difficulty of that or future challenges. Hard mode should not invalidate its own hardness through vertical reward schemes .

Fighting Liadri did it, and doing Tribulation mode did it as well. However, those only get you so far.

I think for people who wanted to show their prowess was above the norm those two things worked quite well and that vein isn’t nearly played out yet. I’m entirely serious when I say bragging rights are the highest reward, and the game could do more to verify our accomplishments in ways others can see.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Romo.3709:

Chris, is there any update regarding fractals in general? Maybe suggestions that we can tune in on or possible balancing of dredge fractal? In general, anything at all?

Hi Romo,

As soon as there any updates we can discuss we will let the community know.

Maybe we could do a CDI on the Fractals next year?

Chris

Discussion is good, but I think it might be more amusing to have some contests where players design something and a couple of offerings get added to the game.

Chrispy.5641:

Let me Emphasize this a little….

THERE CAN BE NO HARD MODE WITHOUT APPROPRIATE REWARDS

Is there any reward greater than bragging rights?

Conner.4702:

I’m fully against all forms of hardmode, not because I dislike challenging content (when done well), but because it will take away people from an already desolate area.

Um, if you’re saying all future content has to take place within the maps we have now for fear of spreading things out… that’s pretty much the definition of Dead Game to me. And there were no more worlds to conquer – just maps to endlessly rehash.

While I have lobbied extensively for more Dynamic Events layering, refreshing and expanding the stories of the zones we have now, it was NEVER with the belief that what we have now should be the full measure of real estate the game shall ever present.

If the Living Story has taught us anything, it’s that the Devs can focus population where they want it for as long as they want it. Often to the detriment of any hint of challenge as the zerg consumes all.

I’m largely convinced a couple of zones designed for the hard core aren’t going to meaningfully deplete the population of open world zones… since there’s almost no one in them anyway except for the two champ trains. And if the rewards are chiefly the pleasure of exploration and the bragging rights of surviving in a harsh land rather than the never-ending search for the next most abusable farming loop, then I just don’t see it pulling a huge amount of population or of keeping them out of other area all that long.

If anything that’s the strongest argument against it: that it would be a lot of work for a very flashy, nicely promotable but ultimately not grindy enough piece of content .

Just out of curiosity, are people really committed to a hard mode existing as an overlay in already present zones?

Would a new set of 5 “Perilous Lands” (1-15, 15-30, 30-50, 50-70, & 70-80) covering the full leveling path where you are always 2-6 levels lower than the mobs scratch this itch? No mix-and-match modes, no cheap work-arounds… You set foot in here, you expect to get your hind-parts severed, cooked, and plated on fine silver unless you bring your best game. Let the map devs have fun and be deliberately MEAN in laying out spawn sites and vistas.

The new zones could have all the features that we see now, but since the Personal Story doesn’t go through them they would be completely optional. The hearts, places of interest, vistas, and way points could all contribute to a second separate world accomplishment track both to create a new meta-goal and to keep this frankly brutal new real estate outside of the current Legendary acquisition path.

And on the subject of risk and reward, I’d rather the reward for playing in perilous lands be more bragging rights than farming bait.

Swagger.1459:

devs,

this thread seems all over the place. there are a bunch of suggestions about content and qol features that don’t have anything to do with progressing our characters, so could you please clarify what you mean by “horizontal progression”?

thanks!

To me, the big difference between Quality of Life changes and Horizontal Progression is QoLs are given out immediately and freely to all who are affected, while Horizontal Progression requires you do something to earn it.

For example, if characters who have bought a Commander Tome were given the ability to change the color of their tag to any of 6 colors, that would be a QoL patchnote. If they were instead given a method to earn up to 6 different colors that would be a Horizontal Progression patchnote. The reward is exactly the same, but the means of accessing it makes all the difference.

I’m thinking we’ve given them enough to keep them busy most of 2014 at this point .

Yoh.8469:

So out of 9 attributes, 4 are for DPS, 1 for control, 4 defense, 2 support.
That’s kinda skewed don’t ya think?

I thought that was an interesting observation, don’t you?

Precision can be a support stat in some builds, if they work through proc-on-crit effects/traits.

Redenaz.8631:

A celebrity volunteer has confirmed that it doesn’t only work on attractive young women.

Aaaaand there goes another perfectly good holiday.

The Goggles! They do TOO MUCH!

What has been seen cannot be un-seen! ((bursts into tears))

draxynnic.3719:

It’s a nitpick, but this isn’t entirely true – a sword offhand can give you a second clone generator, and a scepter gives you clones on the autoattack chain as well as through skill #2. These are probably exceptions to the rule, though, particularly since neither of the blocking skills can be used to reliably generate a clone on demand

Fair point. 1 phantasm / 1-2 clones – and clearly the meta-rules have to be looked at very closely to be maintained .

Kain Francois.4328:

4 great lulz…

Hobo-Sacks
Because they ARE relevant to Horizontal Progression!

I cannot progress my back horizontally on my engineer. PLEEEEAAAAASE REMOVE THEM!

Quote for great justice, because it is kinda frustrating.

HiddenNick.7206:

Am I the only one a bit disappointed… All that this community could think off is generally: “more of the same”. Where are the crazy ideas of some new progression systems? Or suggestions about something that could be copied from other games?

That’s maybe a little unfair. As exciting as “revolutionary” changes are, a lot of work gets done through more “evolutionary” outgrowth, building on existing systems or experiences (when sifting through what other games have done very right).

Just pointing at one of my off-hand thoughts, being able to buy specific shades of dye with karma is actually a bit ‘crazy’… its just not dangerous .

When that perfect revolutionary idea does hit, I’m sure it’ll stir things up quite nicely . But even then we’re looking at a live game, not a blank whiteboard. The best idea since sliced bread will still have to refined (and I really mean “hammered” when I say that) to fit into the environment already in place.

Cliff.8679:

These posts about wanting some kind of Faction reputation worry me. It’s one of the easiest things to turn into a grind, and it just doesn’t seem that interesting. There are far more substantial things the devs can implement for horizontal progression than faction rep.

In many ways Horizontal Progression is fundamentally about “Adding things to do… and incentivizing them in a way that doesn’t blow up your game…”

That they drink player time like sweet spring rain is sorta the point .

That said, the specifics of implementation are key. Assume you need “100 ticks” to get something you want. For me at least the difference between there being 25 activities that can generate a tick giving an average of 4 times each to get the shiny, and there being only 5 tick activities giving me an average repeat rate of 20 times ((grrr)) is the difference between fun and OMGWTBBQ grinding .

On the idea of Daily Order ‘quests’ possibly something like we see now with the Living World meta-achievement where they have an identifying icon and count towards the larger meta and the daily quota.

Each day there would be three daily tasks in the list of 10-12, one for each Order with it’s own identifying icon that also counts towards the usual 5-per-day goal. That would reduce the cut into limited time as its working towards both goals simultaneously.

Actually that might work better as a standardized MONTHLY activity, but again advancing both your status with the Order and counting towards fulfilling the 4 Monthly Achievements.

While this is all tracked at an account level, you could keep the focus on individual characters by only being able to advance the daily/monthly achievement while on a character of the appropriate affiliation.

The question then become more do you want each character to be completely separate in their progress, or can an account with for example three Orders of Whispers-aligned characters ‘pool their pull’ with all three contributing to a single masters tracker for rank/standing?

Given my usual frustrations with alt-friendliness, I think I’d like all my Vigil characters to rise together, all my Priory nerds to contribute to a shared academic standing, and all my Whispers sneaky-sneaks to climb the ladder together. My experiences with WvW xp make truly individual tracking sound rather… dreadful.

I’d also mention increasing your Order rank/standing could include fancier banners on the character select screen . I loved getting those silly things, and would put is some serious time to have more elaborate versions displayed there.

Chrispy.5641:

Horizontal Progression for Existing Weapon Skills

I am cautiously interested in this, as it certainly sounds entertaining.

I’ll point out 2 downsides to work out (I think both are solvable, I just want them included in consideration) and an observation.

First, you’re going to need a fair bit of UI work both to manage your collection of alternate modes and for picking them. You’ll probably also need a fair bit of new icons so that you can look at your toolbar and at-a-glance identify “Oh yeah, I’m in Torment-mode. I forgot…” Something you can take in instantly without dragging you cursor over the skill (which would also reveal what mode you are in, naturally).

Second it will require a very deft hand managing trait interactions with multiple skill modes. While reducing cooldown 20% or + 5% damage is pretty uniform, some of the more complex modifying traits might crash and burn combining with certain new skills in the broader array. Not unsolvable, but a definite ongoing cost.

…We see the problem now – your weapon modes are quite similar to the flexibility offered by swapping out pets and for the life of me I still don’t know what Beastmaster IX: Intimidation Training (Activated (F2) abilities for canines and spiders cause cripple) does when my Mossdog howls to grant Regeneration.

Lastly, I wanted to mention some classes have fairly exacting meta-rules in how their weapon skills work and all variant modes would have to conform to those rules. For example Mesmers always have one clone and one phantasm in each possible #1 to #5 skill array. Exactly one. Introducing new variants to Mesmer weapons would have to always deliver a clone ability in an existing clone ability slot, and likewise with phantasms.

Kain Francois.4328:

New Dailies: Zaishen Quests
I know most players will cringe when I say dailies… But Zaishen Quests from GW1 were an exception. Each day there would be a bounty to slay a particular boss, or clear a particular mission/dungeon, and we would be rewarded with Zaishen coins.

Zaishen Coins were great because they allowed us to purchase ultra-rare item skins, toys, and larger equipment bags.

Unlike GW2, we could repeat them on each character we had; a character time-gate as opposed to an account time-gate. Kinda like the way GW2 use to be.

I don’t see why such a system can’t work for Gw2 either, in order to get players back into more obscure zones.

One refinement I would offer would be to make them weekly.

One of the best things GW2 does in my opinion is it puts everyone sharing a server on the same side. The most obvious manifestation is shared harvesting nodes, but there are a lot of other flourishes supporting that concept.

Bosses are something of a finite resource. Putting players in direct competition to be there and get kill credit over a narrow window just creates animosity. Allowing a longer cycle wouldn’t stop flaring tempers for first-day completionists, but it would leave a lot more space for casual players to have a go after the initial rush at the start of each cycle.

I wonder if it couldn’t just offer a modest sum of gems? Weekly bounty for say 10 or 20 gems? (probably 10 considering exchange rates, but still that’s a pretty sweet payout)

((shrug)) I’d suggest this thread is the best place for the issue it addresses rather than the Support System .

Just consider where flood control is concerned sometimes you guys resort to a mallet when maybe a… uh, a spatula?… no no, Salad Tongs would be a more appropriate tool .

(incidentally I had to wait/re-submit on this one too since I just made a joke somewhere else )

Ya know…

Final Rest was really expensive that first month too…

And Bonneti’s Rapier…

And Exodus…

If you gotta have it right this second you’re gonna get (rightly) reamed.

CC Danicia.1394:

As your active infraction points expire, you will start to regain more forum privileges. As example, if you currently have 900 second flood control, as your points start expiring, the flood control numbers will go down.

It’s the same with other forum privileges.

Could you possibly set the ‘Support’ forums to neither be limited by nor trigger flood control? Its excruciatingly annoying to have flood control block you from trying to get help with a support issue. Or to have dealing with a support issue cripple your ability to interact in the more general topics areas.

Yup… That causes Burning.

Embracing the Strengths of Sub-Classes

While I actively oppose the introduction of sub-classes, I think it’s important to recognize some of their strengths, and look at benefiting from that without the worrisome downsides.

While we have a rich language of Build-crafting here on the boards, the casual player in-game may not ever come into contact with that. Further, the sheer immensity of choices can be daunting. While I think the distribution of character options over the 1-80 level progression does a pretty decent job of introducing concepts and considerations at a measured pace, the game could still do a better job of teaching about professions from within the game.

One of the great strengths of sub-classes is the power of an evocative NAME. There’s a reason why when people share builds on the boards they often name them – its equal parts short-hand and trigger for the imagination. ((mind you, I still giggle every time I go into the Thief boards and mention I’m running a very satisfying and successful “Super Unicorn”… And people there actually know what I’m talking about…))

Further, I find it sort of telling that most Sub-class schemes offer 3 choices (at least for an initial implementation). The number 3 has a very important place in game design: its the highest number of options you can introduce without players having a previous deep understanding and not trigger massive ‘Option Paralysis’. I previously argued that there were around 2,000 plausible builds per class – not competitive, plausible. Set-ups that wouldn’t make you look like a complete dufus while wandering around Orr or Frostgorge shooting up the locals and taking their stuff. Level 31-80 are entirely dedicated to easing players into that massive array of choice, but its still a deep sea to be thrown into. Slowly unlocking more trait slots and gradually unveiling the higher trait tiers helps. It can still be completely overwhelming, and I think ‘sub-classes’ are one way to try and address that.

But here’s another:

What if the Trainers for each profession had a conversational branch that offered to explain some common, reliable, and even highly competitive archetypes. Three of them per profession, in fact .

Then you could ask the Warrior Trainer to tell you more about the Berserker, Duelist, or Legionnaire builds. Maybe the Mesmer trainer could show you the existence of the Mantra-Healer along with two other potent builds.

Through dialogue it walks you through weapon choice, skills array, and major Trait choices. In addition to telling you what the key synergies are, what stat points will help you most, and how all that serves the theme you can have a conversational button at the bottom that says~

“Yes, that sounds great, make me one of those!”

That button then spends all your trait points and sets the Trait choices for you with a single click (well, a click and confirm choice panel, but you get the idea ). Then you can go out and explore being a Berserker for a few hours before making informed choices about how you’d like to fine tune it for your own playstyle preferences.

Lets make these great sub-class names powerful tutorials and training tools without binding players to them once they understand the merits of playing their profession that way.

cesmode.4257:

In Gw2…we work on cooldowns. And then we have traits to passively reduce the cooldowns vs the arcane mage where you actively manage your resource.

The resource is time. Ironically thieves are also the only class I can immediately think of that has active time management – the trait that allows steal to reset all the cooldowns on a cluster of skills sharing a tag.

Maybe we should be looking at cooldown resets for other classes… ((ponder))

Wait! I did just think of another – the new Mesmer Signet in the heal slot resets cooldowns for phantasm skills.

I think this mechanic shows great potential to make for more active gameplay…

And resource != charges aka mesmer clones for shattering or Warrior adrenaline.

Oh, I think any Mesmer who ever slotted Mirror Images would disagree with that statement. Mirror images is entirely a resource management skill. And the ways Warriors can manage their adrenaline is as diverse and rich as many “power/mana/whathaveyou” schemes in other MMOs.

Serious Thought.5394:

Thoughts though?

First I encourage you to do a quick read on this the post about numerically symmetrical exchanges.

Now, that said, where I think your idea shows promise is if the point swaps are limited to back and for the between the secondary bonuses.

With an exotic Rampager coat giving you primary Precision and some Power & Condition damage, you could potentially shift a limited number of points from Power to Condition Damage or from Condition Damage to Power without radically altering the overall value of the item. Stat combos that include crit damage as a % are a lot more granular (you have to go up or down a full percentage point in either direction) but equivalencies almost certainly already exist under the hood.

But pushing more points into its primary stat is pretty much right out .