Guild Wars 2

Quite some time ago I suggested having a regional currency for each area, with it being a part of the reward on completing dynamic events. I still think it’s a good idea and would still like to see it implemented.

However, I don’t think it’s a good idea to add in the second part, where the whole zone has to work together to build favor to unlock new things at a merchant. It might be better to have one or two “hidden” merchants that only show up if you complete a long chain of events or meet certain conditions. These merchants can sell a few extra things or have reduced prices, but at least one of them can’t be hidden behind group events. You should never NEED the help of the rest of the zone to get what you want, they just might be able to help you to get it faster.

Grok Krog.9581:

You don’t pick your stats, the level up shows your base stats increase so you have that feeling of getting something. Also it appears you get minor armor/weapon upgrade components for leveling up. Nothing special

So, as far as stats go, it just makes a big show out of giving you what you’re getting right now?

We don’t know enough to say, yet. We don’t know just how this will work, or anything about when it starts.

It sounds to me like they’ve disconnected the stats from the trait system, and put them stats back to the old system. Until they show us more or until it goes live, that’s only a guess.

Does LS eliminate the need for an expansion?

No.

Does it need to add level or gear grind?

No.

This is a game that can appeal to the casual gamers and explorers. Give us that. Give us places where we can just take in the sights and try interesting jumps and get lost in the world. Yes, we’ll eventually explore all of it. But if it’s made well, then we’ll go back to the parts we enjoyed and have fun there.

You can’t match what other games have for treadmill grinding. Don’t try. But the LS isn’t blowing the doors open, either. It may show us a new place every now and then, but it doesn’t expand the horizon.

For all level 80 players who are upset by the idea that lower level characters will be getting rewards that your level 80 can’t: Do you really think ANet is going to be giving them rewards that are better than what you’ve got for your level 80 equipment right now? Of course not!

If you had these rewards, most if not all would be salvaged for scraps of material and some luck. These are easy for us to replace, and not really enough to get upset over.

At best, these rewards will seem good at the level they’re given out at, but to us they’ll be worthless. Heck, knowing ANet, at least half of them will feel like trash even AT the level they’re handed out.

I’m not saying I’m in love with this patch. Not at all. In fact, both this patch and the last “feature pack” seemed to be more about the China client than anything to do with us enjoying the game. THIS, however, isn’t really the part to get upset over.

As far as waypoints reviving you, that’s actually something that’s come up for me back when I was RPing.

The answer we came up with was that the waypoints have systems in them to make sure you don’t arrive with your head where your arm should be, or all your organs on the outside. If you’re in very bad shape, they kick in and “reassemble” you as you teleport, though you’re still suffering a sort of shock from it, thus the lingering penalties.

I then proceeded to make an asura from the crew responsible for testing those systems, but he was too creepy to play for long…

As for teleporting from the middle of nowhere to another waypoint? We wrote that off as everyone that uses the waypoints having an experimental linking device that allows it. Perhaps that’s what inspired you to go out and make your start as a hero, the fact that you had been asked to test the device. The reason all the NPCs don’t use waypoints the way you do is because they don’t have such a device.

Vayne.8563:

Palador.2170:

Vayne.8563:

I’m just saying, all I’m seeing is people say over and over again, this stuff isn’t needed. Obviously someone, somehow thought it was.

Would you consider it a fair concern that, in the process of making the game “easier” to understand, they’re doing damage to it in other ways that they’ve not measured?

Making leveling easier to understand I have no problem with. It’s not going to affect how I play the game either way. That’s what they’re trying to do. Make it so that people who know how to play can jump into PvP at any level, people who don’t won’t unlock it till X level.

That doesn’t really answer my question, though.

I see why they’d want to bring the changes to leveling from China to the Western game. It makes things a lot easier for them if they have only one version of any system to deal with. And yes, some of these improvements may seem good (opinions vary). Given that they won’t undo the mess they made of the trait system, I think that these changes are a good thing.

BUT, I think it’s a fair concern that in making these improvements, they’re costing themselves in other areas that they’ve not noticed yet. Areas that they can’t measure as easily. From what I’ve read, this is basically what a few others are worried about as well.

You can take an interesting rock and polish it to make it more enjoyable. But polish it too much and you can lose the characteristics that made it so interesting to begin with.

oxtred.7658:

While you’re at it there’s also conjures and transforms. That would be a nice QoL changes, but really not necessary.

I think they really ARE necessary. You should never have to buy a skill just to see what it really does. This goes for the Guardian books as well.

These skills should have been in there with the weapon skills from the start.

Vayne.8563:

I’m just saying, all I’m seeing is people say over and over again, this stuff isn’t needed. Obviously someone, somehow thought it was.

Would you consider it a fair concern that, in the process of making the game “easier” to understand, they’re doing damage to it in other ways that they’ve not measured?

Mesket.5728:

Tiger Ashante.1792:

Ultimately, i really don’t see why you had to complain about it.

Nobody is saying that more is less (at least not for this particular case). We are simply implying that while having so much to do on one side, resources were spent on another area. Unless of course, next week’s communications reveals something on the same level of impact for the vast majority of players (those who already bought the game and have being playing for 2 years already waiting for new content ¬¬ )

I want to address this point, if you don’t mind.

A lot of this seems to be from the China release, meaning that most of the work had already been done. The cost to bring it to our side was minimal (in MMO dev terms).

Now, they could have not done this, but then you run into a problem. The more differences there are between the Western and China versions of GW2, the more chances you have for bugs to pop up due to the difference. I’m sure that to make sure the next update didn’t run into any type conflicts is a very small cost, but it’s there.

And it’s there for the next update as well.

And the one after that.

And the one after that.

By making this change NOW, they’re preventing more problems in the future. This is the stitch in time that will save them the effort of 9 such stitches down the road. If you’re hoping to be in this game for the long haul, then this is a good thing.

Basically, bringing the China stuff over is prep-work for making it easier to make updates for the game as a whole.

Given that Monday is a holiday here in the USA, I doubt they’ll be posting anything that day. They’ve not posted anything on Fridays. So, that leaves three days, and three announcements.

I expect one day to include new collectibles. One day that you can now sort by stat in the market (but not armor type). And one day that there is now an ascended rank to Sigils and Runes.

While I too would like to see a whip in this game, I recall that the CoH crew said that creating the DS whip was an exercise in hair-pulling frustration, and making a full powerset for it would take up the same amount of time as making multiple normal sets.

I’d suspect the same is true here. They could do it, but doing so would cost them more time and animation work than a single weapon is worth.

… I would still like it, though.

eekzie.5640:

What I was trying to say that right now I hope GM’s are mostly dealing with serious offenders. And now this would create so many situations where people who got kicked reported someone, felt like they didn’t deserve it and so on and so forth.
I don’t think it’s a healthy situation.

I’ll agree with you there.

That’s part of the reason why I suggest that, if there is a problem, it be brought up in party chat first and the person asked to fix it. It won’t take a GM long to find that in a chat log, read what was said and how it was replied to, and go from there.

Basically, bringing up a problem in party chat and trying to solve it before an honest kick is a CYA precaution that will help the GMs, too.

eekzie.5640:

Palador.2170:

If there’s a problem, I’d say that you should bring it up in party chat first. If it doesn’t get solved, then it’s time to consider kicking.

If it’s just two people talking between themselves (or not at all) that suddenly kick a person, then I’d say there’s a problem. And I’m pretty sure the devs can go back and look at recent chat logs if they know who they’re looking for.

I’m not sure if developers want to play babysitter…

Sadly, this is where we come to dealing with GMs instead of the devs. And yes, the GMs are paid to deal with things like this.

If there’s a problem, I’d say that you should bring it up in party chat first. If it doesn’t get solved, then it’s time to consider kicking.

If it’s just two people talking between themselves (or not at all) that suddenly kick a person, then I’d say there’s a problem. And I’m pretty sure the devs can go back and look at recent chat logs if they know who they’re looking for.

Quickfoot Katana.8642:

And then we take a look at your forum signature.

Look away. Doesn’t say they’re idiots or anything.

I don’t agree with how they view some things. I think they’re honestly messing up. I’ve tried to get through to them, and failed. Done with smashing my face against a brick wall. This issue? It’s not part of that wall.

Besides, if even I am saying they’re getting this one right, doesn’t that say something?

Mizhas.8536:

You guys must be joking.

Let me check if i’ve understood it right:

You think that the kick system is not ready/optimal for the change you’re about to make but you do it anyway

You are aware of what kind of problems not just some but many players may have and you trust on players kindness to ensure that it will not happen that way

The only tool you give to the players who suffer this actions is a report? Do you know that when you’re kicked you lose any way of knowing who kicked you? Do players now have to take an screen of every dungeon they try to complete in case that they face this kind of behaviour and so they can report them?

Amazing Anet, I knew you didn’t know what were you doing but THIS is the king of the bad ideas.

They’re working on a way to make it so you DO know who kicked you, even after they’ve done so. This will make reporting easier, and should make it easier for them to see it was done in the wrong.

Meanwhile, they seem to feel they have the numbers to suggest that pushing the change forward solves more problems than it causes. They have the numbers on how many complaints they get about instances failing due to a DC or a party leader assuming they’re safe if the rest of the party wants to win, and how often they get reports of griefing by party kick.

I’d trust them on this one.

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

I could answer this! It is true two people could be invited and then boot out everyone else to “take over” the instance where as before two people could only kick the instance owner out closing the instance destroying it for everyone. While this isn’t ideal and something we need to look more into, the goal of this change was to reduce the more common case of the instance owner leaving. For now Ryan is looking into adding some logging (see post here) so people can report people abusing this.

If you guys can get that pushed through, that would be awesome! And thank you all for getting us a quick answer on it.

DDCarvalho.2071:

I hope they don’t dedicate a post next week to announce they will include Backpieces as a searchable TP armor category.

If they make it so you can search the trading post by armor weight, I will GLADLY state it’s worth an entire announcement all on its own.

Power.2957:

Thank you outsourced forum moderator for moving this completely relevant thread to a sub forum with significantly less visibility.

I’ll be blaming you when Anet don’t notice this suggestion and do nothing about the Mystic Forge for another 2 years =/

As they’ve decided that this one is about crafting, I’d suggest making a new one in the main forum that’s limited to the request to change the Mystic Forge UI.

Don’t mention anything about crafting or the crafting UI update. Keep it entirely focused on the MF UI, including in the title.

To be fair, guild halls almost HAD to go on hold once Megaserver went live, until such time as they can get the universal (server independent) guilds going. Anything they made before then might not be compatible with the universal guilds.

I still hope for good news in upcoming information about the incoming patch, but I don’t expect any.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

IvanTheGrey.2941:

Mr. Whiteside, sorry to bring it up again, but can you clarify the changes in instance ownership? I believe that there’s a genuine concern for griefing, and I was hoping that you could put our legitimate worries at ease.

Thanks again for replying!

We have been discussing this for a very long time. Can you PM me so i remember to get back to this point when it is appropriate to do so please?

Chris

How about now? People are worried NOW. People are starting to call doom and gloom NOW. Now is the appropriate time to get someone to deal with this. Not later. Later is now with a bigger mess.

It doesn’t have to be you. Kitten, it shouldn’t be you. There should be someone you can hand this off to and say “Here, explain.” Despite all the posts you’ve made recently, ANet as a whole still doesn’t seem to be communicating. The few of you that ARE talking are just going to get buried by trying to take on the whole load yourselves.

Rayden Kastor.5918:

Rukh.9287:

Yeah it would be hard to do 500 cooking as this would make content easier, the game is already balanced around 400 cooking stats.

Maybe bloodstone dust cookies though…

I get this image of eating one of those and becoming a Mursaat. Or just terrible indigestion. In any case, SOOO not appetizing! :P

Eat 50 of them, and an hour later you “produce” a bloodstone brick?

Rukh.9287:

Yeah it would be hard to do 500 cooking as this would make content easier, the game is already balanced around 400 cooking stats.

Maybe bloodstone dust cookies though…

Actually, that IS an idea…

What if they introduce food that has effects more like what some of the rune sets give you when they’re complete? A chance to proc an effect, for example?

Want a sugar cookie that gives you +25% run speed for an hour, along with stats like you’d find in level 80 food?

penelopehannibal.8947:

It’s not fine when names are not censored.

Again, yes it is.

There is no rule against showing names in a screen shot, as long as it’s not being used to “call out” someone.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

cesmode.4257:

Im not sure what 19 pages are about here…All Mr Obrien was stating was their reasoning for being hush hush about certain things. Don’t think we need to discuss it.

The only thing Id like to discuss that abstractly relates to this, is the discussion and/or development effort of things that we do not ask for VS things that we ask for over and over and over again. Id like a little more transparency on that.

No one asked for Ascended gear. We got it.
No one asked for Living Story. We got it.

We did ask for precursor crafting/scav hunts, and still don’t have it.
We still ask for expansions.

Things like that. I know Im over-generalizing here in terms of the scope of my opinion. However, in and out of game these are the things I see most popping up on fansite forums, official forums, in game chat…

Crumbs there are a lot of assumptions here specifically in terms of who wants what to be in GW2 and not.

Chris

There’s always someone asking for something. Name a thing, and I’m sure you can find people that want it in the game.

As for the things we didn’t ask for? Well, yes, we did. Or rather, we asked for things and that’s how ANet answered. Was it quite what we hoped for? ::laughs:: Not for all of us, no, but again you’ll find different opinions on that.

That’s part of the reason why it’s best to talk out ideas and give them a better idea of not what we want, but WHY we want it and what we want from it.

penelopehannibal.8947:

I don’t mean to sound rude or anything, but I think that if you have a complaint about a player’s behaviour, it should have been done privately by submitting a ticket to support – whether they are a dev or not.

Also, to the guy posting a pic: submitting a picture is uncool – again whether it’s a dev or not.

Actually, that pic is fine.

It shows who was there, but there’s no accusations made in that pic or the post that goes with it. It simply confirms that there was a person playing an instrument there, the bears were okay with it, and a person from ANet asked them to move.

That’s all it shows, and it’s quite within forum guidelines.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

" cool new items we’re adding to each crafting discipline"

Could 500 cooking and jewelcrafting finally be here?

What would ascended level cooking even produce?

Dyes that can only be uncommon or rare when identified? Product placement feasts? (Feast of Pizza Hut pizza. Feast of White Castle sliders. Keg of Mt. Dew) Brewing items?

Im Mudbone.1437:

chemie banger.9624:

Interesting.
I didn’t think they’d have that power for a pic O_o
Bad for the Arenanet image.

It’s WORSE for the image of the community when it’s QUITE CLEAR from the screenshot the DEVs were trying to get a screeny without RUDE INTRUSIONS and the community purposely interferes.

Odd, I didn’t see a rude intrusion by the OP there. The bears were fine with having him there. Nor do I see anything to suggest that the ANet person was there first. In fact, there IS a rude intrusion there, but not by the OP.

Planned or not, he had become part of the event. For an outsider to insist that he leave is rude. It would be like a photographer saying “Okay, it’s time for the team photo. But I only want the good players. Mike, you need to step aside for a minute.”

The person was asked (poorly) to move. I will agree that moving would have been the nice thing to do. But he had every right to say “no”, and not be punished for it. He wasn’t griefing anyone or causing any problems. This wasn’t a GM performing company duties for the good of the game, this was an ANet employee trying to get a screenshot.

IF they were DCed for not moving, then the person that did it needs to be dealt with. ANet then also needs to explain why that person had the power to do that, when they’ve said that they don’t carry that power on their normal accounts.

Long overdue and I’m glad they did it.

Now, how about adding some airbreathers to the armor crafts?

Electro.4173:

khani.4786:

So tomorrow we’ll see “cool new items we’re adding to each crafting discipline!”

Wonder if we’ll get these? (Wild speculation)

I still really want these back items and want to have the ultimate bear ranger (just for fun)

That was one of the first things I thought about as well, when I saw the preview titles for the different things. These definitely seem like they’d fit the bill as “craftsmans tools” considering many of them do in fact look like the tools you’d use for each craft. Hope it happens.

I was thinking that too. But if they don’t actually DO anything (as has been stated here), then there needs to be more to the update than just this.

Ice of Dragons.1637:

Where did u read that they will delete stuff ? They stated that they do not know what will they do whit the sky hamere. But they will not delete it.

They deleted one of the maps rather than balancing the underwater combat.

Ayrilana.1396:

@ Ice of Dragons:

How does the WvW tournament fit within the living story? What good can fighting in the mists do to help with the fight against the dragons?

Remember when elements of the LS started to show up in WvW? Remember Edge of the Mists?

Now, want to guess where one of the Elder Dragons will run to before our final fight against it? There’s nothing keeping it from fleeing to the Eternal Battlegrounds, and doing so will tie WvW in with the LS even more. You know they’re at least considering it…

Leo Paul.1659:

If it was any other dev I would most certainly give him/her the benefit of the doubt. But I’ve been around for a while enough to have read the other threads regarding issues of abuse of power about this person both on this forum and on gw2 reddit to feel it isn’t so farfetched that he’d do something like this (again).

Agreed. If it was any other ANet person, I’d tend towards giving them the benefit of the doubt.

cesmode.4257:

Apparently, the dancing bears(sounds so silly to say) didn’t mind him being there. He was playing an instrument. The only sour grape was the dev. Why should he have to move? …Again if all of what the OP said is true. There are always two sides to a story.

If you look at the one screenshot that was posted by someone else, you can notice that the screenshot was taken from a transformed character. A quick look shows that one of the Kodan isn’t showing a name above their head, meaning that’s who took the screenshot.

So, we have the word of one of the Kodan players that the character playing an instrument wasn’t causing a problem and was welcome there by all but the ANet person. The poster simply can’t confirm or deny any other parts of the story. However, there have been reports of problems with this particular ANet person before.

Yes, I believe someone abused their powers. And I think they’ll get away with it, just like they always have.

Bear/bow ranger needs to move less. Just get used to sending your bear in first. And have a second bear ready in case the first one falls.

Seven Star Stalker.1740:

ArchonWing.9480:

Speak for yourself.

I only have 5 characters after two years , and would eventually like one of each class, so I could use another scroll or two. I have one in my bank currently. Yes, once my later characters get a birthday, they’ll have useless scrolls. Big deal. It’s not my first day playing an RPG. 90% of loot is crap.

Just because it’s useless for you doesn’t mean it’s useless for other people. Just delete it if you think it’s useless.

They should probably turn it into just skill point scrolls on further birthdays, but that’s just me.

Even then, they should remove the upto twenty level limit.

It’s useless for anyone who’s gotten their character past level 20 and that’s not hard at all for somone who’s played for more than a year I’d say.

You’re not looking at it right, and you don’t understand why they send it to you.

The scroll is an advertisement. “Buy a new character slot now, and we’ll auto-level you to level 20 to help you get started!” If they used the in-game email to send you messages saying that, most people would be kittened by the blatant money grab and disrespect. But by calling it a birthday present, they can mail it out and people actually THANK THEM for the advertisement.

Is it useful? It can be, yes. But more and more people are finding them useless, and their true nature is starting to show.

Hunter.4783:

Any average player who read the interviews last weekend when asked what they think Anet is working on will give the following 2 answers:

- I have no idea
- They are working on nothing

Now you tell me Colin, how does this whole mess look like in the eyes of the player base?

Answer three: “Another game.”

At NO point have they said that this “big stuff” they’re working on has anything to do with GW2.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

This doesn’t mean that I am against the idea of having a CDI forum though if for example we consolidated the vast number of our other forums.

I strongly believe that this would be a bad idea, and I’m somewhat shocked that you would actually consider it a step forward in communications. Consider my suggestion withdrawn.

I was thinking about them the other day.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but don’t they arrive BEFORE everything goes to kitten? They arrive, and within a day there’s a pile of bodies and a town in ruin.

Maybe those two aren’t as innocent as they act.

Would it help if, between LS2 and LS3, we had a series of small story arcs that focused on each of the biconics so we could get to see them as their own, separate characters better?

• Rox gets word that the cave-in that killed her warband may not have been the accident it seemed. A gladium may not be able to get all the answers, but if she has us beside her she might get the answers she needs.

• Stories of Taimi’s adventures have spread, and some young asura have decided that “If Taimi the sickly can do it, so can we!” Now they’re in over their heads, and Taimi feels it’s her fault. With our help, she sets out to rescue them.

• Word reaches us that Brahm may have bitten off more than he can chew, and we charge in to save him. When we do, he turns on us, furious. We find out that for him, we’re the ones playing the part of Trahearne and stealing his story. Can he prove to himself and the spirits that he’s worthy while we’re there, or will his legend disappear into our shadow?

• When Kas’s family fell from nobility, many of her “friends” suddenly decided they didn’t know her. Now, one of them has contacted her, begging for help. Can she set aside the past to help? Should she? And why is the Countess lingering nearby?

• One of the few good people Marjory knew in the Ministry Guard is dead. They’re saying it was a random street thug that did it, but she doesn’t believe it. What’s really going on here, and can you help her to survive long enough to find out?

saventis.1485:

iv never done that nor expected it
where im from were greatful to recieve things
and dont complain because its not exactly what we wanted
free gifts are free gifts take it or leave it
i mean really…
ungreatful

If this was a personal gift, given from person to person, I would agree with you.

It’s not. It’s handed out by an automated script that cares nothing about you or your character. Telling the devs “this item would be a lot more awesome if you adjust this one field in the datafile” is hardly being ungrateful.

If the new level 20 scrolls don’t stack with the old ones, that does suggest there’s something different about them. Has anyone checked to see if they can go into the MF?

biofrog.1568:

That makes no sense.. the Birthday Present is for the CHARACTER that reaches 2 years old, not the account. If you made it account bound, then you’re alts are effectively having their birthday present before your birthday.

Besides there will be an abundance of birthday cakes everywhere anyway. There is a problem in that people can troll with them though, which needs to be addressed. Use some expensive food, then have someone birthday-cake you and there goes your expensive food buff.

It seems the cake doesn’t overwrite other food buffs. In fact, if you have another food buff, you can’t get the cake buff.

ipan.4356:

New damage types would increase diversity in a game where only DPS matters.

Damage already comes from a couple different sources – although to be honest, there is really only front loaded/direct and over time damage.

Just diversify how damage is dealt, by dividing, or creating, more damage types that function in new, interesting ways, and you have build diversity in a game where aggro and healing aren’t important.

Armor Piercing. (Example: “This attack ignores up to 100 Defense, based on level”)

And yes, we could use some new character building stuff (skills, traits, weapons) to play with.

I’d say to try it for a bit and see how it goes.

If it proves to be counterproductive, then just tell us “Sorry all, it wasn’t doing what we intended for it to do. We’ll try something else.”

Suggestion: When you do the next CDI, don’t make it a thread.

Make it a sub-forum.

Part of the problem in the old CDI threads was how much of a mess they became. But if it’s a sub-forum with one main CDI thread, then when something interesting comes up you can say “That might be worth a more in-depth discussion in its own thread, go ahead and start one.” They can then make the new thread in the sub-forum, and that topic can get talked over in more detail without derailing the main thread.

Of course, any devs in the CDI could start new threads there as well. Such as “You say you want better rewards. What does ‘better rewards’ mean to you?” Getting details talked out and making sure everyone is on the same page without cluttering up the main topic.

When it’s over, lock the sub-forum and have someone work up a “final results” post. Keep that somewhere, and wipe the sub-forum when the next CDI starts.

Basic vote: ANet chooses.

Advanced vote: ANet chooses three to five topics, then the players decide which of those we go with.

If the players pick from any and all topics, there’s a very real chance that the topic picked will be something that can’t be worked with very well right now. The CDI won’t generate any real results, and it will seem like a big waste of time all around.

SKATE.1394:

Unless it’s my imagination, I’m pretty sure the consortium harvesting sickle has a slightly faster gathering rate than the other sickles due to a shorter animation?

You are correct.

ElusiveOne.7352:

Why haven’t players spoken out against this?

Oh, we have. The only reply we ever got was the standard Arena Net silence.