Guild Wars 2

I was expecting banner cooldown reduction to be rolled into baseline, but it wasn’t. :\
Pretty sure the banner changes were so we couldn’t have almost 100% uptime on it.

The radius drop seems to be an overall design decision, since most area support got dropped to range 600 or less (banners, soothing mist, etc). Probably more risk-reward and synergy that way, but.. eeeh.

Not about to read 9 pages (sorry!), but can we address that some trait lines didn’t get their unique bonuses “rolled in” as it was said? Boon and Condition Duration didn’t make it into the trait lines as we expected, and the gear hasn’t been updated enough to compensate.

ScribeTheMad.7614:

To some degree hunting for things on the map adds a little bit to the experience, “where is that last stupid POI?”

On the other hand I do agree the skill challenges are just not the right color, the old blue was good, IMO.

I’m not as fond of the Where’s Waldo experience. =P
They do glow if there’s nothing special on your story tracker, so maybe it’s not so bad. And it’s motivation to do Personal Story!

Point taken on the ‘other map items blend in too’ statement.

The map icons should have a backing color that’s easier to see, and that color could denote whether we have the point in question or not. Example: blue background for unfinished POI/Vista/Hero and green background for completed ones.

Thoughts?

Wouldn’t mind seeing it to back to the old skill-challenge blue and make the little person icon (which initially looked like a middle finger to me for some reason) in the middle white so it stands out properly.

After all the rage, all I’m left with is.. relief. And 200 ore’s worth of not-so-bad loot.

It will be worth the new “look it up on Dulfy” troublesome checklist, but from a game design perspective, a good portion of this was a botch.
The three in the only-at-night tavern? For that, when people send cookies as thanks, I’m hoping they’re rye-raisin and burnt on the bottom. -_-#

I get having little secret pockets in the new city. It was fun to run across them while I was dutifully marking off check boxes. There’s a lingering “but…” about it that I can’t quite qualify.

But hey, thanks to the community for finding all those annoying karka!

I’ve been ruminating on this for a bit. It seems an intentional design decision to bring support characters closer to the fight, which increases synergy. I’m not sure how much I agree with it, considering movement and dodging are important, but it does make placement and position more important to a party.

Agreed. Lion’s Arch was more convenient before the new construction. Crafting stations were plentiful and uncrowded, and Postern Ward was the place for me. Having just one crafting area is an obsolete concept.

(Do love the brighter look. Way to use all those exotic pearl weapons we never wanted~)

Ralanost.8913:

I just deleted my little ele and remade her since I knew that would be the outcome. Really stupid decision on Arenanet’s part. Should have just reset everything and let us spent points as we want.

+1, yo.

I saw this coming the moment I saw the statement. There wasn’t going to be any heuristic that would adequately rebuild a mid-tier character. Best I can say is go Hero Challenge hunting and get back into it as soon as possible.

Sad to say, but the Deluxe edition really was the worst value. I tallied an estimate and assumed nothing good about it. :\

So I went Ultimate and will sit on a pile of gems until I feel the need to use them.

A fair chunk of my support warrior got trashed:

• Banner radius and cooldown
• Warhorn no longer converts
• Boon duration dropped to zero

Losing the 20% banner cooldown really, really hurts. 30-second splits between really long cooldowns is punishing, and the old trait bridged that gap significantly. I think most of us assumed the cooldown would be changed to reflect the trait as baseline.
Comparables like Spirits max out at 20 second recovery time, so I could see banners as a fair enough compromise at 100-110 seconds.
Losing the radius is also fairly irritating, but it’s a noticeable trend in making support players ‘bunch in’ (as noted with Soothing Mist as well). A tighter, group-focused play style synergizes better, so I can understand why it was done, and it also supports better banner management. Hurts, but understandable.

Warhorn moving from convert to removal is.. acceptable? We’d obviously rather keep it, but using Warhorn for condi removal is still there, just not with the extra boon attached.

I don’t know if it’s a glitch or oversight, but warrior’s support trait line does not include a 10-20% boon duration buff like many other classes have. This goes against the design trend that trait line bonuses were going to be built into the trait line elsewhere. I rank this as possibly more hurtful than the banner nerf, since it affects all my support, including Shouts, which has taken up the support mantle even more.
(And I may be mildly miffed I don’t have 100% Swiftness uptime from warhorn, which is the whole reason I ended up with support warrior in the first place.)

Rich Fuel.7253:

DUEL WIELD TWO HANDED GREATSWORDS!
nuf siad

DIS NOT WOW NO TITAN GRIP!!1!
Signed,
-The Forums

(Nah, I’m just kidding. I’d love to go out there, Greatsword in one hand, Hammer in the other!)

I salute your Mini Rytlock Revenant, oh Maguuma Trailblazer!

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Spot-the-Karka/first

As opposed to on the forums? With a red post?

Lucifers Heaven.2167:

I have also been wondering about this and came here entirely for this reason. It seems like the move was done entirely to allow shout healing warriors to get all their traits plus Inspiring Battle Standard. But it was done without much consideration for those of us who like to run the full sweet of banners. And as OP said, nothing in the Discipline line really fits with banners/support. Some of the traits there are good but other than Burst Mastery they’re not really ones I’d take given the choice.

I was really hoping there being no mention of banner CD or radius just meant it had been rolled into baseline for the skills, but alas…
You asked us to tell you if these things ruin the spirit of our builds. This kind of breaks half of mine somewhat. I mostly play PvE and I designed my character as an attrition support warrior. Extra damage for my team via banners of Strength and Discipline, extra survival via Banner of Tactics, regen and the damage mitigation of dual wielding maces.
It was really nice to be able to pretty much permanently have my banners up and was kind of integral. Now if I drop them all in a fight there’ll be an unforeseeable point 90 seconds later where my character is entirely out of all of her utility abilities for 30 seconds. Oh and now my party members are much less free to move around as they please (and I’m more likely to need to move banners or have to fight outside of them).
I don’t think rolling all the banner traits into one master slot (or rolling radius into base and CD into the trait) is too overpowered for that tier of major trait.

If there really was an intentional design choice behind all this, then I would very much appreciate an explanation, I am willing to be convinced but at the moment it feels more like an oversight.

Thank goodness someone put this topic up here. While I can get healing shouts and banners with the new trait lines, the uptime was really important to my play style. From other threads, I’m also hearing of a loss of healing output as well, which may be from stat changes and losing 300 Healing Power, but the huge time gap may also be an issue.

I’m mad I had to work today. My alts need me! But, alas, I cannot be there at this pivotal time. ;_;

I wonder if this means I’ll get another slot, after buying the Ultimate package.
If not, RIOT Er, uh, I’ll behave.
Thanks so much, Gaile. Glad the team had such a solid response after all the vitriol.

Use the report button [!] looking thing at the bottom of the mail. That will report the spammer. (Best not to use the public forum for stuff like that. It’s a no-no.)

Signal boosting the community announcement about HoT.
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/pre-purchase-community-address/

Gerrand.3085:

Many skins were introduced and canned before the wardrobe system existed. Many of them weren’t even that hard to farm. I’d appreciate every item which could be collected showing up at least one more time for wardrobe unlocking before being banished to the void for good.

Eh, if you botched it the first time they came around. Oh well~

That’s the appropriate response, isn’kitten “Had it, messed it up, lost it” is on the same level of “farmed content, didn’t get RNGsus chest.”

Y’know that beta ball cap that got introduced? Couldn’t find mine after the Wardrobe hit. Support said “oh well, can’t help ya.” I shrugged and moved on. Would I buy it back from the gem store? For 25 gems, maybe, if only to have it back. Would I get upset if a bunch of three-month old players got it? No. There’s no reason to be.

I’m with Arioso and a few others on this one. Purely time-locked RNG is pretty lame. But I could see some situations where “exclusive” is actually acceptable:

Annual events.
If they’re actually annual or regularly occurring. Looking at you SAB, Dragon Bash, etc.
No RNG on time-limited items.
Exception: the regularly-occurring clause above, as long as they are tradeable.
Time-limited but skill-based attainment.
Cool. I will never have Mini Liadri. I don’t particularly care, but I still smile a bit when I see someone showing her off, because that person’s proud of their achievement.
Collection.
This sort of always-on, winding-road method is most appropriate for exclusive rewards. One item with a 0.1% drop chance is crap for rewarding players. 100 items with a 10% drop chance is at least progress all players can see.

There’s plenty of ways to limit collection of an item without being a kittenhead about it.

Guhracie.3419:

Rauderi.8706:

Taxidriver.2043:

give extra scrolls to under level 80 alts and make sure they have 65 skill points.

That wouldn’t work, unfortunately. Skill points existing on a character get converted to Spirit Shards.

The Hero Points accrued tomorrow will come from Level and Hero Challenges (skill challenges) completed.

Per this post they’ll all be obtained from getting to level 80. The rest will go toward elite specializations and mastery, in heart of thorns.

Holy kitten, thanks for the update, Guhracie! That’s fantastic news, especially for the WvW community.

Taxidriver.2043:

give extra scrolls to under level 80 alts and make sure they have 65 skill points.

That wouldn’t work, unfortunately. Skill points existing on a character get converted to Spirit Shards.

The Hero Points accrued tomorrow will come from Level and Hero Challenges (skill challenges) completed.

I already got an item: Mini Revenant Rytlock~

Conversion will happen either way, so likely save yourself the clicking and leave them as is. If they turn into a spirit-skitten-click item, then it’s the same amount of clicking anyway.

Don’t spend skill points, however you’re earning them.

vincecontix.1264:

Huh what? can you link the source that says our scrolls with become useless? Also is there info about what will happen to tombs of knowledge?

Scrolls will be converted into spirit shards.
Excess skill points will be converted into spirit shards.

I don’t think I can make it clearer than that.

Yes to pants.
And yes to vests for medium chest slot.

I asked for it before, and I’ll highfive Guzzi for bringing up again.
Tonics to Outfits!

A: Nope!

evadrepus.1280:

Rauderi.8706:

…Can ANet hire you? Seriously, that is the most balanced, mature response I think I’ll ever see to this incident.

I’m enjoying the game currently, I’ll work cheap! I’d love some mini llamas…

In seriousness, I think this is a decent game, and that the price point was driven by what I always call the suits. When they see a dip, a good suit will then come in allow the folks we talk to make the change. Based on the majority of dev posts I’ve seen, they care pretty heavily for the user base.

A marketing agent that works for minis. If I were running an MMO, you’d be hired. =P

Meanwhile, sigh. I wish I could have more faith in ANet’s top-end decisions (see other post about changeable Ascended gear, much excite), but a lot of us are weary. After Traits 2.0, NPE, Trading Post gold buying (still not 100% fixed), and now this, we see a lot of mis-steps that should have been thought out more.

But I also believe they’re trying. They have to reconcile “heart in the right place” with “keep the lights on.” (Because heart in the right place says BL Keys should not be $1.50 for digital gambling.) And I get that, so I’ll remain cautiously optimistic.

Dante.1763:

Rauderi.8706:

Does this mean we’ll be able to get gear loads for types that aren’t a part of the standard Ascended set? Sinister and Giver’s are two I was looking at but didn’t see options for.

Though, there’s still a few gear nomenclatures without a standard process to obtain (Rabid, etc). Find gear/Salvage gear for a chance as inscriptions is not an acceptable practice.

Sinisters can be gotten out in Silverwastes! Ascended and exotic both, the insignia i mean! The other recipes you can actually buy from the TP! crafted myself an entire Sinister set for my ranger not to long ago! No clue about givers though, sorry!

Ah, my mistake! I don’t cruise Silverwastes that much. Thanks for the correction.
Rabid and a few others of its cohort (Soldier’s, Sentinel’s) have highly irregular ways of acquisition. Soldier and Rabid require a lot of luck and salvage, and Sentinel is locked behind guild commendations. That really needs to change.

Does this mean we’ll be able to get gear loads for types that aren’t a part of the standard Ascended set? Sinister and Giver’s are two I was looking at but didn’t see options for.

Though, there’s still a few gear nomenclatures without a standard process to obtain (Rabid, etc). Find gear/Salvage gear for a chance as inscriptions is not an acceptable practice.

Yamsandjams.3267:

Did they confirm is was 300? There was conflicting information in the stream and patch notes that stated it might be 600 instead of 300.

I think the Grandmaster trait raises it to 600 and adds the 200% bonus.

Still a nerf, but I suppose it encourages staff or scepter eles to close in. It’s not a change that will effect Dagger/Dagger by much.

evadrepus.1280:

The silence is taking a long time. I think there’s only one way to go. I would expect to see a message like this very soon:

“Greetings fellow inhabitants of Tyria,

Earlier this week we opened pre-orders for our exciting new expansion, Heart of Thorns. We are really excited about this expansion – not only does it have the new Elite classes, only a few of which have been fully revealed so far, but it also introduces a whole new world for you to explore. We have many more teasers and spoilers planned over the next few weeks that will let you share our excitement about the expansion.

That said, we here at Anet have been aware of the voice of the community on the pricing or content of the expansion packs we’ve offered. We feel that the prices we listed are appropriate for the content we are releasing, and certainly comparable to the other releases we and other gaming companies are producing these days. We have a fantastic user base, and many of you have been as hyped as us for the expansion. Some of you have been with us from the original Guild Wars, including even some of our beta testers of that game. You veterans form the core of our userbase, and are are often the most vocal supporters for us. Or, in this case, vocal in your discontent. We do want to have you continue your journey with us through Tyria, after all, we have dragons and lore you haven’t even seen yet (are you there, “Bubbles”?).

After a great deal of internal conversation, we’re making the following change to all expansion packs: All packs will now include 800 gems, which is the current cost of a character slot in the game. Are you one of our players who has a maxed character in every slot? You can use these gems to buy yourself a new spot to roll that exciting new Revenant. Are you a newer player and still have open slots? Use these in our Gem Store to buy many quality of life and appearance items – we’re sure you’ll find something you’ll like! For our user base who want to buy the Ultimate Edition, you’ll now get these gems in addition to the ones you already are receiving as part of the package. We expect you to be the snappiest dressed Revenants in Maguuma!

Once again, thank you for your passion around our world. We are on a shared journey and look forward to you joining us in the newest chapter, Heart of Thorns!"

…Can ANet hire you? Seriously, that is the most balanced, mature response I think I’ll ever see to this incident.

nicknamenick.2437:

Wow! i am often a kittenhead also on this forum, mostly about balancing.
I often feel that i get less on my main warrior.. and dont give much about other classes..
I know .. i know it shouldnt be like that..

I the end i have a great time in this game! my greatest + point with gw2 is the fighting mechanic! its so kitten nice! there is no other game that gives me this much combat feeling like gw2 does.

But reading this http://www.killtenrats.com/2015/06/18/gw2-lash-and-love/
And the amout of negative feedback on this forum, is even making me sad.. even i feel kinda responsible for this.

Sorry Anet, ignore me or anyone like me if it does hurst.

Keep up the good work, we will buy HOT because the game is great!

I tip my hat to you for owning up to this.

GW2 really is the best community I’ve encountered, even after all the gripes and vitriol over the latest marketing move (which, I’ll be honest, is understandable).

Sure, ANet make mistakes (a lot of them, apparently), but gkitten it, they’re trying to do something new and different, so I applaud the effort.
Even if their vigor for these changes leaves them shortsighted to the implications that players can spot a mile away. >_>

But, I assume any MMO is going to have a rocky start in its first two years. I’m sure WoW wasn’t any different. ESO certainly didn’t change that thread. Neither did Star Wars or Warhammer. And FF14 really didn’t buck the trend, until it completely changed the entire game.

So yeah, if GW2 can survive this latest debacle, perhaps we’ll be laughing about this in a few years, when another expansion is on the way (and hopefully marketed better).

Thanks for the positive note, OP.

Behellagh.1468:

From ANet’s presentation at a game developer con back in 2012 they have active metrics on just about everything in real time, from seeing what players are doing to how much memory the game is using in player’s systems. They have more than enough metrics.

What they don’t have is “assets on the ground” to borrow an intelligence term. They frequently misstep thinking that players actions mean one thing and not realize it actually means another.

Correct. Metrics tell you “what” but not “why.”

@OP: As for why we can’t have nice things like calm, logical discourse, blame.. um.. the rise of 1980s narcissism? I dunno, but the research is out there. =P

I wouldn’t mind having a second account to laurel farm and have gag characters on. :P

ScribeTheMad.7614:

Which meant having to buy a 7th rune, which was stupid (imo)

I like the waterbreathers, they were a nice touch.

I would suggest simply making the waterbreather a simple cosmetic that visually replaces the helmet underwater (maybe by choice?)
Can have it if you want, but don’t have to and don’t have to buy that 7th rune.

Exactly this. Time to de-commit to water combat, since that’s what’s been going on the last 3 years anyway. :\

Staple.6237:

I happily bought the Ultimate edition since there is no Collectors Edition.

My only complaint is no Boxed Collectors Edition. Got the Collectors Edition for base GW2 and the Rytlock on my desk needs a buddy!

I know, right?!

I’ll hold out a liiiittle bit, but I’m definitely going Ultimate, if there’s no sign of a collector’s box.

And why wouldn’t I? I’m going to, over time, pay the $50 in gems anyway, I’m going to buy the $10 character slot, so I’m already only paying $40 for the expansion. And I get a cyute mini Rytlock for doing so!

I took a look at the packages again. Ultimate is very worth it. Net result is you pay about $30 for the game, and the rest is a huge benefits package (of stuff I would likely have paid for anyway). Even if the mini, skin, etc weren’t there, it’s $40 for the expansion at that point with $50 in gems I would have purchased anyway.

It’s the standard and deluxe packages that are very lackluster. $50 for the expansion, no character slot or other benefit for the veterans, while the core game is “sold for free” with it. I’m “eh” on it, because that assumes HoT is going to deliver that much value.
The $80 package is $50 for the game $10 for the single character slot, and $20 for.. some cosmetics that are barely worth it.

I can afford Ultimate, so I’m going to get it. But I’m worried for a lot of other players that can’t buy in and enjoy it. Or maybe they can, but the $50 doesn’t have the same value to them.

So glad to see someone positive in the wake of all the fuss.
It does sound like a good idea. (Though, I’ve already given gifts to the few people I wanted to bring in :P)

I think a lot of the veterans would be appeased if a new character slot came standard with the expansion. Yeah, that means ANet loses a bit of extra cash on slot sales, but the goodwill would keep people in game and buying the expansion.

Very right, OP.
If nothing else, a free character slot would simply be good will to everyone. It’s a better marketing strategy than stiffing veterans. It’s fairly common sense to add a character slot when adding a new character option like a class (or race).

I suspect there’s a coding reason behind it somewhere, as to why the expansion and core game are bundled the way they are, instead of 50$ for the expansion with a “great deal” of getting core for only $10 more. Perhaps a $60 price point was too high? Can’t be too sure, but the math reeks of cash-grab, and that’s sad.

I can’t say I mind too much, since I have the luxury of saving up for the Ultimate package. 4000 gems is $50 I was going to end up investing over time anyway, the character slot is $10, and there’s other expansion goodies in there too. So I estimate the expansion to value around $30 in that package.

But the point stands, the base $50 price point isn’t kind to long-time supporters without at least giving a character slot.

Tag this post with [Suggestion]
Because I very much like this idea.

I do hope they stick around somehow. For my thief, Shrapnel Mine is a fantastic keep-away tool, much better than the other legit thief traps.

But, I figure they’re going to disappear because of Revenants. That makes me sad.

RoRo.8270:

DirtyDan.4759:

I think people shouldn’t post their own character names.

I agree. They are usually the most bland names too

I’m glad someone else said it. =P

But I did see a charr named Murrcenary. Maybe not the “best” name, but I chortled a little.

My guild is actually pretty welcoming. We ignore the trolls, but if someone approaches curiously and respectfully, we let them know what’s going on.

Of course, we also try to do it in not-as-public areas. From personal experience, I find I’m more interested in groups that are out and about than the ones who sit languishing in a bar having “CW romance dramas.”

And, I’ll be honest, I’ve seen some bad RP out there. >_>" Usually in Rata Sum, Black Citadel, or the Grove. Rata Sum and Grove are especially bad, because the emote radius is huge, so then you start listening in on cringe-worthy dialogue.
There’s no way to avoid it. So I wonder if that might be one of the reasons people get trolled, sometimes.

Y’know what would be awesome? RP chat in the same vein as map chat. Or more functionally like /say and /emote for range, but limited to that specific channel.

As a note, you can trade random boosters in to the armor rep near the Black Lion Trading Post. It’s a little obscure, but he sells dust and has menu options to convert boosters of one type into:
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Enchanted_Reward_Boost
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Enchanted_Combat_Boost

So you can turn ones you don’t use into ones that you can use.

Ralanost.8913:

Turamarth.3248:

Regarding warning the description states that the item is unique .

Anything with this descriptor needs to be more obvious about it. I don’t care if it’s in a larger font with animated rainbow letters. It’s needs a bigger warning than what the game offers currently as I also got burned by this when getting a second trinket.

People who are newer to MMOs might not know that “Unique” means “can only equip one per character”. Seems common sense, but it’s such a small part of the gear text that people might not see it. (Same goes for precursor flavor text. …looking at you Storm.)

The good news is, OP can still give that ring to another character, since Ascended gear isn’t soulbound.

Zaklex.6308:

How odd, I don’t find it hard to do the daily zone event completions on any map with my main, but perhaps that’s because I always turn my Content Guide on when doing this particular daily(Disable Personal Story), and then I just go to what ever event happens to be nearby. If it finishes before I reach it, just go to the next one, as well as hop around to those select areas that I know have repeatable events. It’s not that annoying, I just use the time running around to gather materials along the way.

A very positive way to look at it.

Doesn’t mean it’s not indicative of poor design, but you’re making the best of it.

Chuck.8196:

Make an effort.

That’s a bit lacking in game theory, to be honest. “Make an effort” does nothing to address years of research on motivation, gamification, or even public relations and human factors. Quite frankly, the ‘argument’ is just lazy and equates to mouthing off for no reason.

Specific zone event completion is bad design. It funnels players into content that wasn’t designed for such large groups, so it leads players to exploit the system, get frustrated, or ignore it. And to be honest, the reward for that level of frustration and exploitation isn’t even worth it. Timed bosses give rare gear, harvesting gives materials worth several silver.
Events..? Writ of XP and a drop of karma. Woo. There is nothing good about the current zone event design.

Gerrand.3085:

Gentlemen, I see it now.

In the center of our guild hall, upon a raised wooden platform, being guarded by two nervous looking ogres, a small old woman, working a strange wooden thing.

A “loom” she will call it, but you know those magic types just tend to be polite to the ignorant. Loom it does though, OVER YOU, as wooden frames and strings swing left and right. You don’t know how it works, neither do the ogres, but none of you like it – or like being near it.

Every day the old woman gives you two pieces of cloth. You not sure where cloth comes from, or why she doesn’t give you three pieces like all the other harvest nodes. But you do not ask, because frankly you find the entire operation a bit scary. (Poor ogres)

It’s not too much different from the people I steal clothes from every day.

…I can only imagine that’s what the cloth rack is for. I bought it not realizing the “basic” part of name, but hey, free cotton, jute, and wool. /shrug