Guild Wars 2

I’m not sure how much development time it would take to do this, but why not have a Town Clothes wardrobe? It could function similarly to the equipment wardrobe, only with a different pool of cosmetic items, and swapping costs 0 charges.

So I guess that would add two tabs to the Hero Panel: Town Wardrobe and Town Dyes. Proof of concept exists already, it’s just a matter of making it work.

Sadly, that’s mostly a benefit to a small and put-upon RP community, but that’s a topic for another thread.

Eric.6109:

So now “plz make VIP” threads are replacing mounts’ threads?

No. No they’re not. Sadly. I still curl into a ball when I remember three mount threads concurrently running on the first page. ;__;

Anyway, the idea of a subscription-like access probably doesn’t fit into their monetization scheme. The reason why games like WoW offer most cosmetics for in-game currency is because they already get the subscription dollars.

And, honestly, most visual changes, especially after max level, taper off once the player is happy with the look. Outfits are kind of a boon in that regard. They cost nothing to change into, set a character look from 1-79, then at 80, you get your max gear and reskin it.

Not to say I’m entirely against the idea of some kind of VIP status, but I don’t think ANet’s gonna go for it.

Two of the issues that come up repeatedly are:

Class imbalance on speed boosts
Walking across the map is boring

And yeah, both of those are right. Someone brought up earlier that, in some cases, it’s a build decision to get swiftness, so it should at least cost something to get that benefit.

So, why not have a general utility ability, like the anti-Toxin healing skill? The particulars can be sorted out by mathematics, but basically, the thought goes as follows:

The utility (maybe even elite?) gives a buff that grants the 25% movement bonus for a set duration, unaffected by boon duration. Say.. 20 seconds. The same skill grants 20 seconds of swiftness, affected by boon duration as normal. The cooldown is, predictably, 20 seconds. So it’s not a “sit on your horse and passively move awesomely faster,” it actually requires the player to stay engaged and actually invest in the usage of it. And probably have the 25% bonus fall off if the character takes damage, maybe.
It would give us something to do with those excess skill points, too.

There’d be things to iron out, of course. PvP, not so much, since they can just lock the skill out of it. WvW might get sticky, but it’s not much different from having a bunch of spec’d warriors running around in the same way. Still, that’s something to plan around and decide if the devs want it to work in WvW. It’s still vaguely balanced by the usage of a utility/elite slot.

It actually wouldn’t be so inappropriate from lore, if pitched the right way. If the Zephyrites can use their sun crystals to dash quickly, why not make it a sun crystal skill? It’d actually be pretty cool to sunbeam across a map!

Behellagh.1468:

Rauderi.8706:

John Smith.4610:

I’m not sure what you mean by growing gulf between the rates, the gulf has always been the same.

The gold/gem rates have very little to do with gold inflation inside the game.

To clarify with some basic (albeit third party) info:
100 gems sells for 9 g .
100 gems costs 12 g 46 s to buy.
Source http://www.gw2spidy.com/gem

Pretty sure the gap wasn’t 3.4 gold at launch. Though that’s in absolute terms. Is there a calculated percentage in the algorithm to handle the difference that makes this difference relative?

Or, parallel to that, is it based on acceleration/deceleration of gem supply, similar to how sometimes buy orders and available sales are sometimes very close together and sometimes much further apart?

The gap is and always been 27.75%. Or another way of putting it the Gem to Gold rate is 72.25% of the Gold to Gem rate. 72.25% is 85% squared. To me that implies that gold is sunk going in and coming out of the exchange.

I suspected something similar. Still seems like a bit of a rip-off, but having the gold sink is a good thing.

For some reason, my mail-full and trebuchet ops hints are present, but not accounted for. Not a huge deal, 5AP ‘n all, but it’s kinda irritating.

proviticus.4183:

Now, if you’re spoiled and want to unlocked them all it will feel like a wasteful grind, which it is. Unlocking all the elites in gw1 would be even worse.

EDIT: i’d like to add that not all the trait quests are well done, I personally think the map completion requirement for some is too much of a time sink. The system isn’t perfect by any means.

Wow, way to slap your audience in the face with “spoiled.” And traits is not the argument to dig your heels into, honestly. Especially when comparing it to GW1 elites.

I don’t overly argue with the concept that traits had. If they were simplified like skill point locations were, I’d even be more accepting of them.

But, as they are now, the trait system goes against the design goal of “let players experiment”. Players can’t experiment until level 80. They have to hunt for specific build options, because the others are locked behind inane tasks and bugged events.

The current trait system isn’t a good pastry. It’s walking into the store, getting a wad of cold dough, then being told that the toppings are somewhere on the third floor, and you have to complete a training course to use the oven. Bad.

John Smith.4610:

I’m not sure what you mean by growing gulf between the rates, the gulf has always been the same.

The gold/gem rates have very little to do with gold inflation inside the game.

To clarify with some basic (albeit third party) info:
100 gems sells for 9 g .
100 gems costs 12 g 46 s to buy.
Source http://www.gw2spidy.com/gem

Pretty sure the gap wasn’t 3.4 gold at launch. Though that’s in absolute terms. Is there a calculated percentage in the algorithm to handle the difference that makes this difference relative?

Or, parallel to that, is it based on acceleration/deceleration of gem supply, similar to how sometimes buy orders and available sales are sometimes very close together and sometimes much further apart?

John Smith.4610:

We have a big data solution to help me manage the obscene quantity of data involved. I have a mix of third party and proprietary tools, but one never fully escapes excel. I’m oldschool and have an unhealthy love for excel, though it has many limitations, so if I need to do more advanced statistics I need to use more serious software.

Excel <3

Anyway, so so glad to see engagement with the red-posts. Why’s this popular? Because FEEDBACK.
So, thanks for all the time you take on this, JS, and even going so far as to explain when policy limits your responses.

As for a question, would you be at liberty to discuss the growing gulf between gem-to-gold and gold-to-gem rates? There’s definitely a bit of perception-rancor that I wouldn’t be getting value for my gems relative to those using gold to purchase gems. It’s stopped me in the past from making that conversion.

Was it intended to be an additional gold sink or it is just a proportional effect to gold inflation? Does that gap lower the volatility of gem prices?

Ayrilana.1396:

Making them (the craftable ones) account bound will not mean they won’t affect the existing market.

Which is just fine for me! I just want some agency in getting one.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Perhaps the real problem at the pastry shop is that some customers spend too much of their day at the shop, eating the pastries all day, every day. Sooner or later they get jaded by what the shop has to offer and start asking for sandwiches, and pizza.

“These pastries are too predictable. I already know how to eat around the bottom of the cupcake and use my knife to dig out the creamy filling. Can we make it so the pastries explode in chili sauce, to make them less bland?”

Donari.5237:

Housing, did it exist, should not vanish without monthly payments.

Looking at you, FF14. Grr.

The Kurt.2518:

I hope this will give us some more insight into how the Grove is illuminated eliminated

Fixed.

Vayne.8563:

Those that don’t see what Anet is trying to with the game, suggest things that are incompatible with the game. Things that they might like but aren’t really in the dev’s vision for the game and never were. Reference open world PvP threads as an example.

Then there are people who want more build variety, better enemy AI, a rework of the trait system that just came out. To me, that’s valuable criticism, because those things are within the sphere of what the devs are actually trying to do.

This.

There are so many good things about GW2, and I want it to be better. Not a WoW-clone or whatever one’s game of choice is, just better. And better at what it is rather than what it was distinctly trying to avoid.
It’s already the most convenient MMO I’ve ever played. Some of their UI decisions are a tad wonky (hero panel = wardrobe??), but my quality of life has never been better in an MMO.

Living Story is running (to various levels of quality), and my curiosity is fulfilled enough to follow it in the bi-weekly episodes.
I get the sense that the encounter developers are still learning how to deal with a non-Trinity system, but I’ve seen interesting designs that tell me they’re trying. (And hate melee, but whatev.)

But there are still some critical performance issues brought on by the megaserver (not hating on it, just stating it’s an ongoing challenge), condition caps/Defiance, and an apparent lack of QA/testing. That’s what we want. The rest is just window dressing.

What about the excessively long and convoluted line the chef makes the customers go through to get the best pastries? Or that he only give his good pastries to the customers who waited in line the longest?

Or that he hides the toppings for his cupcakes behind pithy clues in corners of his store, hoping that his long-time customers might just stand on their heads for access to his sprinkles or get fed up and pay the extra dollar for the privilege, when before, he added those sprinkles as a part of the cost?

tl;dr
One really can’t “white knight” the abusive trait system and the suddenly 80-heavy focus of traits or the rest of the game.
I love(d) this game, but even I can see that it’s going downhill. I don’t want to leave, but it’s getting to be a waste of time. :\

Ohoni.6057:

Agreed with the OP, you should be able to just drop into whichever story mission you need with any character you have as conveniently as possible.

My one wish regarding story achievements is to be able to play the actual event the achievement takes place. Not sit through the boring story components and inane prattle. That (and a certain anti-Charr jumping puzzle) are my main reasons for not digging into achievements.

And really, what’s wrong with giving us credit for finishing achievements we don’t even see until the story is done if we can do them on the first run?

GW2 has the most liberated naming system I’ve ever seen. If one can’t find a decent name without resorting to umlauts and Alt-0026 characters, then one is not trying hard enough. (Or one is trying to play an Asura or Sylvari canonically. Seriously, what academic in his right might wouldn’t add two or three additional names so his work doesn’t get confused with someone else’s? /rant)

For the past few weeks, I’ve been getting terrible lag spikes. It’s not enough to disconnect me, and they only last for a few seconds, but it’s making the game border on unplayable (given GW2’s unnatural love of one-hit kills…).

Is anyone else having this issue? Anyone got some advice?

Draknar.5748:

Which events? I actually finished the new LS last night and didn’t get hung up anywhere. I assume it is one of the open world events, just curious which one(s) is bugging.

It was the “gather a sample” one, where you head to the event, roll yourself in spores (allegedly) then pick them and give them to the NPC. The spores weren’t appearing.

I logged in yesterday, and apparently I had gotten credit for it, so I continued on and finished. Still, it was really, really irritating not being able to finish the flamethrower mission and then the samples mission in the same week.

It speaks volumes about ANet’s quality control. :\
Especially since that poor dude with the devours is stuck in the middle of the flamethrower event.

Labjax.2465:

Although I understand the limitations of that design choice in an MMO and I think you guys have implemented some cool choices nonetheless, there are occasional moments when I feel like a silly little errand boy. One that comes to mind in the recent story quests was when I had to go gather stuff up for Taimi. I felt like my character should have had a talk with stubborn-asura-guy and just told him to chill the kitten out and/or bugger off until Taimi has finished (which sort of happened, but it felt weak and lacking in personality – like my character is a doormat).

I was hoping /threaten would work coming from a spike-armored Charr warrior with a very large Asura-smooshing hammer, but… Phlunt didn’t seem impressed. :\

The nigh constant CC was irritating, but I got it in the first go. In melee, no less. (Which means I couldn’t hit those stupid fear turrets. =P)

I did end up wasting a lot of time trying to free up NPCs, and I think Rytlock almost died on me.

DigitalKirin.9714:

Mounts? Eh, sure, yah, why not? :p

We could have Dolyak mounts. And then introduce Dolyak breeding so that we could get different colored Dolyaks with different attributes. And have Dolyak digging, where you feed it a gysahl green and then it attempts to dig up stuff for you.

I love this plan. Let’s do it.

Tchshhshhshh! You can’t use the ‘g’ word!
<<
>>
Besides, we can use asparagus for Dolyak Hot & Cold. Or zucchini. No one uses those. =P

Serac.5691:

Mini-pets aren’t needed…

If anything, they need a much better interface… >_>

Bernie.8674:

Many MMO players no longer treat games like games. To them it’s a job that must be performed as efficiently as possible so that they can get to their goal of having the best gear in the game as quickly as possible. Players who fail to conform to that mentality are obstacles who are slowing their progress towards that gear to which they feel they are entitled.

Some of this has spilled into all MMOs, but I still contend that GW2 suffers less from this because there is no DPS addon and no way to inspect gear (that I’m aware of). Unfortunately this still happens (sometimes) in GW2, but that’s just how the kids these days are ™.

The well-practiced subpopulation will use gear ping (shift-click on gear to show it in chat, checking for all ’zerk gear) and, of all the stupid things, Achievement Point thresholds to exclude players in a PuG.

I think that’s about the most venom you get from GW2, the omnipresent trolls aside.

FF14 has a terrible dungeon community, from my experience. Don’t you dare be a first-timer to a farm dungeon and want to see the story. (Or if you do, roll tank for it…) Those kittenholes pretty much ruined my end-game experience. :\

I can’t really vouch for PvP community here, but WvW is so blobtastic that all you need to do is follow the group or be a decent scout.

Best advice is to guild up. Check map chat, there’s almost always adverts or put a hook out in the looking for guild/players section of the forums. If that’s not quite your thing, just be very careful with PuGs, read their requirements, or make your own and advertise the kind of run you’re doing (casual, full clear, story, etc).

Ramethzero.3785:

…yiffing domestic housecats.

I went out of my way to distance myself from that image when creating my own characters. I don’t mind so much when lore gets broken, but the hows and why’s really kinda irritate me.

Ouch. Just ouch. And yet, from what I’ve seen, kinda true. ( I have mental scars from the things people /say too close to me. ;_; )
I suppose what upsets me more are the WoW-exiles who equate them with Tauren just because they have horns.

Beldin.5498:

I wish they get rid of them and let us just use our normal headgear instead.

Thiiiis!

Malkavian.4516:

All they would have to do other than work on the next story is to simply beta test (heavily) the episodes and distribute them timely.

After the traits, megaserver woes, and now the broken world LS events…

I don’t think ANet tests anything. I still can’t finish my event string because the events are broken.

runeblade.7514:

Majic.4801:

If Mordremoth wipes out all the waypoints, we’re going to need something.

Maybe that’s what all this is leading up to.

Why can’t WP and mounts co-exist?

Skyrim had both and it worked.

I suppose I could support mounts if they could be killed in open world and has to be repurchased, like in Skyrim. =P

It really is the result of lazy design. They know these skills exist, but the only thing they can do is reinforce the “zerk/PVT” (depending if the boss is a ‘creature’ or ‘object’) metagame. And I’m not even saying that as a criticism of zerk/PVT, just that the devs themselves constantly seem to hedge out condition/control, making things beyond irritating.

Plan around your own mechanics, ANet, and stop bringing Bomb into a game of Rock/Paper/Scissors.

…Epiphany!

If they did plot out some kind of marriage system, they could do an event kickoff with Kas and Marjory’s wedding!

Brother Grimm.5176:

jheryn.8390:

This game was designed with the express intent of NOT having a healer class.

If you ever stood in an outpost in GW1 spamming “LF monk” for 15 minutes, you would get WHY……

A 45 minute queue in any MMO will make you understand why GW2 moved away from tanks and healers…

Not a fan, so far. As stated by someone else above, the click-here-there-andtheretoo thing gets old fast, especially when gunning for achievements. And without a Skip option like the Personal Story dialogues have, it’s even more mind-numbing.

…Huh. That would be nice. If anything, just altering the last hit in the auto-attack string would give a different flavor to the weapon pair being used.

If you pick any class, progress down its support trait line (usually has Vitality and/or Boon Duration), equip Cleric’s gear or something similar, and pick their utility/weapon sets for it, you can be a passable healer.

You’ll also do not-so-great damage.

…And get shunned by every LFG dungeon group.

All I can do is have flashbacks to Sword Art Online.
/shudder

Rym.1469:

Middle Earth.

Where we will have two Asurans trying to destroy the ring and bunch of new DE. And maybe a sylvari woman with a white beard using leyline magic. Because why not? Let’s be revolutionary!

Can it be a Legendary ring?
…that has a .000001% chance of dropping, just to tick off the entire player base? =P

Tommyknocker.6089:

Thank you for making yet another thread to request features that have not only been requested in the past but literally beaten to death by a very vocal minority. I am grateful that you put in the request for these three features within a single thread so it makes it easier to say:

NO

It was WAY tl;dr, but at least I didn’t see the word “mount”. Right?

/ker-flee!

Pretty sure they’d just kitten it up the way they did with Ascended weapons and armor.

But it would be a fine way to raise the value of silver and gold… >_>

Brother Grimm.5176:

You guys do realize this is the EXACT opposite of another way to GET a bug, right? RE-READ the update notes.

(Gentt will give you 3 Sandy Gear Bags for 1 Fossil Bug, not the other way around).

Ah. Oops. I suppose I was letting “hopeful good-game design” brain translate that into a good thing, instead of “sigh, ANet doesn’t know WTK they’re doing” brain get to it first.

July.5361:

So I was away for 2 months, I log in and I see the same kitten as before! Seriously? I am sure I have asked it before, but are you blind Anet? Do any of you play the game?

Considering traits, jump puzzle inequity, PvP, WvW, traits, trait tasks, bugged content…

I’ll go with “No.”

zoejo.2317:

Not before the Moderately Humid Middle.

Muggy Middle?

And Wet Bottom?

tofumon.5924:

Vayne.8563:

Bottom line is you can level to 80 with minimal traits and still do just fine.

Except it’s boring as hell. Point of leveling up is to get cool stuff like skills/traits and you got that feeling with the old trait system starting from level 11. Now you don’t even start getting traits until 30 and you have to level up 6 times before another trait point comes your way. Feels way too slow.

I mentioned it before, and other people recognize it, too. Between 20 and 60, half the game, progression feels dead. Sure, you get elite skills and a single trait point at 30, but they’re meaningless in most cases. A minor trait and a long-cooldown, short effect ability? Pft. And then it’s nothing but a long weight. By 30, you have all the utility skills you actually want, so each level after 30 just feels painful.

Not that I’m a big proponent of the 1-point-every-level thing (that is so old-school WoW), but as it is, after the 20-30 stretch, this is what we have to look forward to:

Trait point (which may not even have an actual trait) every 6 levels.
Gear upgrade (catch as catch can) every 5 to 10 levels.
A dungeon unlock every 10 levels.
. . .And that’s about it.

And to top it off, I hit 48 last night in my ranger experiment. I didn’t have a Power trait opened, but that’s where I’m headed with the build. It was really …disappointing. The thing I was supposed to get anticipation out of was completely useless. And I’m still not done with Lornar’s Pass, which is what my friend needs for his trait.

It made me actually sit down and think “Is this game even fun anymore?”

Farzo.8410:

Looks like people think I am the one what wants mounts in the game.

No offense, but what most of ‘em don’t want is not just mounts, but mount threads.
I don’t care one way or another. I realize it’s totally optional, and even after having 25% speed boost with swiftness, I found myself wishing I could just have a mount to make the slough that is travel/leveling go by a little faster.

I’ve done a few, passed on others. Some I don’t have the patience to futz with, like the jumping puzzles or the more obnoxious combat ones. So I don’t do those.
If I care later, I’ll try again.
I really can’t say they’re too hard, so much as I don’t care enough. =P

Vayne.8563:

What, only the big people get merchants? lol

To make up for jumping puzzle inequity? :\

Staaaaaaaahp!
No more mount threads. ;__;

RyuDragnier.9476:

I don’t even notice the animation doing them. Then again, I’ve done every JP in the game as a Charr, so I’m just used to their movement and timing.

I /salute you, sir. You are a soldier of incredible skill and patience.

I think I’m more ticked off at this point that the devs continue to design their jumping puzzles for smallest-possible-height Asura, with absolutely no account for max-size large races like Norn and Charr.

Dog.1472:

Subligar

(Can I have it?)

I didn’t even know that was a word until FF14.
And then, leather panties, everywhere.

If you hate their running animation, wait until you try jumping puzzles with them.

Styxx.1564:

Killing or not, he just needs to man up a bit and maybe Anet should hire someone else who didn’t just wake up from a nap to do his voice.
He’s seriously THE MOST anti-charismatic hero I’ve ever had to listen to. Like.. really.

When he gives a speech to “motivate” troops, I just want to throw down my weapon and go join the enemy’s forces.

I’ve heard better, more rousing, and more convincing arguments from the Risen:

“Death good!”

I mean, dang, I’m sold.

I had a friend who was on the fence about buying it, and I couldn’t recommend GW2 to him.

Primarily because of the trait system.
Dungeon QQmunity came in as a close second. (But still isn’t as bad at FF14’s :P)