Guild Wars 2

LoneWolfie.1852:

Alberel Leonhart.9640:

Naturally everyone conveniently ignores that the number of tokens rewarded scales up with the difficulty so the numbers being thrown around here are grossly over-exaggerated…

I would think that anet tends to set high difficulty bosses like the one in straits of destruction. Any casual players will find it impossible to farm that fractals, punishing them in wvw for that ‘you don’t need to grind’ mentality.

To add to this. The new zerker ascended ring, for example, has 4+4 = 8% crit damage compared to 3+3 = 6% crit damage. Multiply by 4, add in the necklace which is about a 4-5% total increase, plus backpiece 1-2%, you get 15% more crit damage from just trinkets. Once they add armor, that will sit right around 40-50% more.

150% crit damage and about 5-10% more critrate in ascended zerker compared to exotic zerker. 2-3 shotting anyone without ascended gear with autoattacks? Not an exaggeration anymore – it’s the future.

And let’s not get started on the other stat combinations. It’s a nightmare, perhaps we are all dreaming, maybe it’s really April 1 right now?

Before I ragequit this game’s new gear treadmill, I’d like my pistol to look and fire like the following while I make my last GW2 pvp videos:

http://media.giantbomb.com/uploads/0/24/10909-railgun_super.jpg

If by some divine miracle this happens, I might actually stay longer in Grind Wars 2.

Yep. Well, sorry, no, that’s not true.

It’s actually closer to 2000.

youtube.com/slicgw

I recently played Aion & RIFT. I’m sick of gear treadmills, I thought the GW franchise would be my sanctuary once again, where I could always log in and know that the gear I got initially would stay top tier, stay viable, that I wouldn’t have to worry about tedious/frustrating regrinding of gear.

Look at my Aion/RIFT pvp vids. Do I look like I’m not well-versed in this ‘new idea/concept’ of gear treadmills? I’m more than well versed, I’m SICK of it, and anet’s lie/broken promise is NOT HELPING.

I’m not a ‘fan’ of any company of MMO in particular. I’m a fan of not having to spend frustrating/large amounts of time doing tedious/unskilled/un-fun grinding just so I can then go have real fun (PvP, etc.).

Real Life™ already does this with a lot of things, this is a fantasy game, I don’t want any of RL’s stupid corrupt concepts/rules invading a dream world.

Crater.1625:

Vermillion Hawk.9037:

You guys love stats. Care to provide stats saying you’re the majority?

You see that gigantic monster of a thread nearing 10,000 posts, most of which is overwhelmingly negative toward the idea of introducing a gear treadmill? You see how if you go back through older pages of this forum, there’s nothing even remotely similar to that sort of reaction in favour of a gear grind?

Yeah.

^

Also, Vermillion.. Log into LA on your server and ask, say, 100 randomly picked players “How many friends were active on your friends list 1 week ago? And how many are still active now? And how do you feel about all your lvl80s and their full-exotic sets becoming obsolete starting on the 15th? How do you feel about the legendaries you transmuted exotic stats onto, because they sure as heck will retain the inferior stats?”. Don’t take our word for it. Do your own research, see it with your own eyes.

Their official response has already been repeated by more than 3 anet employees. The response is:

We Don’t Know If This Is The Only Time, But We Won’t Say That It’s Likely Or Unlikely That We Will Add More Treadmills. All We Know Is That We Refuse To Acknowledge This First Time As A Treadmill Or Vertical Progression. And We Refuse To Acknowledge That Spending Days-Weeks To Get One Piece Of Ascended Gear Is A Grind…

Alberel Leonhart.9640:

If ascended gear had been in at release would you all still be complaining? I think most of the complaints are coming from people with full exotic that don’t like the fact they’re not top-tier any more. I understand the frustration there but I still think people need to look at this as a new rarity and not a new tier.

They explained it pretty well in the dev blog: the rarity levels had a gaping hole between exotic and legendary, they needed something to plug the gap. They’ve already said this stuff will be obtainable in WvW as well so the people whining about having to run the fractals for it have nothing to complain about.

Hate to break it to you but.. Do you realize how LONG it will take to get each piece of ascended gear? It takes ~2000 fractal tokens to get the stuff required to craft each piece. 1350 for the exo backpiece then 500 for the asc gift.

Guess the rate at which you get fractal tokens. Give up?

5 tokens every room, with every room taking 15-30mins to complete. PLUS running into an agony-wall gear-check that will force you to spend time looking for someone who can allow you to enter the lower levels again (i.e. a newcomer who hasn’t played the dungeon to death that you have to ‘carry’). We are talking DAYS/WEEKS of grinding for each ascended piece, as opposed to getting exos with the choice of your stats for 1-5g a peice from TP or crafting them (lvl a craft 0-400 in 1-2 hrs, and ur g2g).

I’m sorry, the thought that should be running through your mind is: “ok, the stats would have been acceptable as a top-tier (it is now NOT acceptable period), but the grind/time-sink sure as heck is NOT, considering the game is named GUILD WARS, not Lineage 2, Aion, WoW or Rift”.

At what point did you accept anet’s lie/broken promise. They specifically and repeatedly told everyone that there would not be ANY vertical progression or treadmill, ever. And now, they’re not even saying there won’t be more tiers between exo/legendary, because there very likely will be. Welcome to Grind Wars 2, would you like a Lineage 2 T-shirt with that?

Namu.5712:

You dont have to grind for pve gear though…. when the new content comes today you can jump right in with your current exotics and complete the content.

They however made it so if you play the content repeatedly the agony mechanic makes you take more dot damage.

So not really seeing why you would have to grind if you are merely doing the content to experience the new update. You would do it, say thats cool was fun. Then go back to WvW right? No gear grind involved…. the gear grind is 100% optional…. assuming they actually listen and normalize WvW so that exotic is the best you can bring into WvW.

You’d THINK they’d do that. But they won’t. I spoke to a couple anet reps idling in LA. They seem to be obsessed with the notion that according to their in-house data, the ‘majority’ want this sort of ‘gear progression’. If this is true, then the content locusts/bandwagoners have won and this game becomes yet another generic MMO.

I am for this kind of down-scaling, but it’d be a nightmare to code. I’d say, the more elegant way to implement it is not allow anything above exotic to be/stay equipped in WvW. And have your equipped gear in WvW differ from the PvE zones/instances, much like heart of the mists swaps to sPvP gear upon entry.

The drawback being those show-offs that want to show off legendary skins in WvW will also have to transmute their legendary to an exotic and lose it for PvE purposes. But I would take that drawback over a treadmill/mudflation-fest any day.

Not allowing higher-than-exotic stats in WvW would go a long way to solving the issue, without making those darn content locusts QQ again…

And to be frank, I’d rather they just didn’t have the stupid stat difference between exo/asc/legendary in the 1st place. They promised us they wouldn’t, and now they break that promise. Too bad it wasn’t a legal agreement, then we could actually sue them and win. :\

mulch.2586:

Aside from the infusions, you have to recognize that the stats increase from tier to tier is very small in GW2.

A naked untraited character has about 2000 attack. With full power gear, you’ll have about 3000 attack. Adding a few points each to 3 slots, you just won’t see any change. Even if eventually we get all 12 gear slots with a few more points each, it doesn’t add up to a noticable change in performance (meaning a mob that takes 10 hits to kill with full exotics will maybe take 9-10 hits after you upgrade every single piece of armor and accessory).

Have you seen a 1v1 fight btwn a full-exotic lvl80 and a lvl20 in greens in WvW? I hate to say it, but the difference is there, and rather noticeable, even if the 80 uses nothing but autoattack…

Try it sometime, if you don’t believe me. Gear matters a lot already, this will further discourage newcomers.

toomuchtatose.6874:

AW Lore.5682:

“And guess what? These ascended items, they’re going to be a 50-100x worse grindfest than the exotics you spent time/patience getting. And the legendaries that will be even higher stats? Well.. Yeah.”

and how do you know they will be 50-100 worse grindfest?

Without a grind-fest, then whats the point of introducing them when players can get them easily?

50x is an exaggeration but they must have thought of minimum exotic dungeon armour level kind of grind to entice stats-seeker to get the equipments, probably grinding enough to get 250 lodestone-rare mats?

Dungeon armour (exotic) grind mostly for vanity then.

There’s no good reason AT ALL to have the stats-seekers be given any advantage, aside from fancy looks and vanity. No reason. At all. And I spend mroe time in this game than 9/10 players. I don’t want this.

Where did their fairness/equality stances go? Where is GW1’s original, carried-over idea of ’a person who started < 1 week ago can gain access to all the tools a 2+yr vet can, the only difference becomes skill)? They blatantly broke their manifesto and promises, this is now just another treadmill MMO in disguise.

During the 1st 2 weeks of launch, I had to 0-400 leatherworker and painfully craft each of my exotic armor pieces, because I was assured that exotic stats would be the highest attainable stat levels. Back when ectos were 20-25s each (if lucky) and when you couldn’t get gossamer in any reliable manner, other than zone lucky zone completion rewards.

All that is going to be nulled, along with all the time I spent outside actual PvP to transmute fancier skins onto them. It’s all going to be gone, nulled, void. All that tedium I did just so I’d never, ever, EVER do it again, it’s invalidated, it’s tossed aside. Most of my friends (who still played up till 2-3 days ago), when they heard this, quit, because they had several 80s kitted out with full exotics. Thanks anet, for making this game the opposite of accessible.

So yes, aside from 1v5+ ing in my videos, I’d say it wasn’t worth it in any other way/shape/form.

Yes, like I said. it’s about 50-100x more grind than getting the exotic counterpart of the same piece. And you HAVE to do this grind in order to experience future content and in order to stay BiS and not have to worry about coming back after a hiatus.

This is just like every other MMO now. Guild Wars 2 is gone. It’s Grind Wars 2 now.

AW Lore.5682:

“And guess what? These ascended items, they’re going to be a 50-100x worse grindfest than the exotics you spent time/patience getting. And the legendaries that will be even higher stats? Well.. Yeah.”

and how do you know they will be 50-100 worse grindfest?

Go to the Lost Shores forum section, look at the ‘quiet about rewards’ thread (too lazy to link, go look). You get 5 tokens for completing 1 fractal area. Now look at how many you need for just 1 exotic-leve backpiece. Yeah. Now look at the ascended gift that you will probably forge ascended versions of backpiece/etc with. 500 tokens. Yeah. And now look at 15 tokens per obsidian shard, which I can guarantee you will be used in ascended recipe as much as in legendaries. Yeah. Are you getting all this? Read up, it’s all there.

50-100x more grind than buying an exotic for 1-3g off the TP, or crafting it yourself after leveling crafting for a day. Grind Wars 2 for life, right??

Logun.2349:

I don’t know …. isn’t +3% magic find going to help out in the open world?

3% Magic Find won’t. But 3% more crit damage, or 30-40 more condition damage, or 30-40 more (insert another primary stat) will, especially when multiplied by 10-12x (all gear slots will become ascended eventually). You could be looking at 150% crit damage, vs 90-100% (current exotic zerker sets). And other primary stats will also display this huge disparity the more asc/leg anet releases. All because they’re stupid/sadistic enough to go back on their word and make ascended/legendary gear have higher stats than exotics…

A player coming back 3-6months from now will be noticeably weaker in WvW and in dungeons/zone events, and the promise of accessibility will evaporate for good.

And guess what? These ascended items, they’re going to be a 50-100x worse grindfest than the exotics you spent time/patience getting. And the legendaries that will be even higher stats? Well.. Yeah.

Point is, unlike GW1, you won’t be able to attain max statted gear and relax/do stuff without being forced/gate into content. The fact that WvW allows use of PvE/dungeon gear further exasperates this.

coleman.2095:

I’m down with this…. I really just want to know that I’m not going to be upgrading from Ascended gear again in 6m – 12m…

Yeah, again, that’s the other problem. They did not say anything about not introducing more tiers btwn ascendedand legendary. It’s obvious they want to continue with this treadmill approach.

Then, you can come back to the game 3-6+ months later, everyone will faceroll you in WvW, you won’t be invited to any of the new dungeons and the old dungeons will be empty (useless, since exotics are no longer BiS), forcing you to just quit again because you actually cannot be viable or enjoy WvW, let alone the existing content.

Great customer model, right? Oh and, you won’t even want to use cash shop, because you won’t want to play. I know that if this patch’s ascended gear isn’t acquirable in 2-3 days that I’m not going to bother trying to keep up with the gear curve. There’s plenty of other MMOs that are built for this kind of thing.

^ Yes, this is a great middle ground between the ‘content locusts’ (that want to feel like their time/grind spent should automatically make them superior) and the players that just want max statted gear forever (and not have to worry about re-grinding everything, like in EVERY. OTHER. MMO.).

Have ascended/legendary have the same stats as exotics, the same upgrade slots, PLUS the additional infuse slot for the new content. And have these infuse slots never, EVER, EVER have general stat bonuses like power, precision, crit damage, etc. Only agony resistance/duration reduction/etc. And boom, all of a sudden the progression locusts can have their progression, and it will not affect the rest of the game, such as WvW.

Wreckdum.8367:

Columba.9730:

Hexgame.4802:

I’m not agreeing or disagreeing with you. But basically what you’re saying is that these “locusts” don’t have a right to express how they want their game play to be? What makes them wrong and you right on determining the betterment of this game?

They are the 1%. They don’t have right to ruin the game for the 99%!

Did you ever stop to think that maybe just maybe this is going to be the only rarity change? They haven’t compromised on their consistent power levels for each rarity of gear. They are just adding an additional level of rarity to support infusions…

For all these die hard fans that are saying agony is going to ruin the game experience because it is a gear wall… It was in GW1! So were infusions. Oh no! Arena Net actually made the game a proper sequel. Let’s all go delete our accounts now and form a picket line.

It’s not a gear treadmill until it becomes a regular thing. I’m pretty sure Arena Net knows what they promised. They spent 5+ years of their lives making this game and you think they forgot their vision? Are you being serious. The attitudes of whiners on this forum kills me sometimes. One second you love them the next second you’re screaming for their blood. I would venture to say a large portion of these forums users are bi polar.

You realize that legendaries, at the end, will have the highest stats, higher than ascended? Now, step back for a moment. The legendary weapons you’re grinding right now, that is the kind of grind you will endure for EVERY legendary piece down the road.

In GW1, how long did it take to get max armor/weapons? The answer is: about 100-500 times shorter and less frustrating than what the legendary grind is today.

In order to make this new system, where exotics are 3rd tier, work, they’d have to completely redo legendaries, they’d have to allow them to all be acquired about as easily as the current exotics.

Still trust them to do that? Because I don’t.

Haishao.6851:

If the game was about progressing and building a character, like in Ragnarok Online for example, then progression would be great.
But now it’s about endgame and progression is only a waste of time that everyone want to go through as quick as possible to go reach end game.

Level and armor tier are completely useless in game like GW2. They should concentrate into making the game fun and more challenging instead of adding meaningless progression that everyone want to skip.

^ This. Add more bosses in PvE, more challenging areas, or add difficulty levels (hard mode in gw1). Add more ways to kill and be killed in WvW/sPvP, add more maps. And add more stat prefixes to WvW badge gear?

But no, you have to add a gear treadmill instead. Such lazy designers, what happened to the GW1 designers and their no-vertical-progression philosophy? That was 1 of a kind in the world of MMOs, and sadly still is.

You don’t need to force a REASON for players to experience new content or come back to the old. If they don’t want to experience content because they’re already ‘maxed out’, then maybe they’re just doomed not to ever have fun anyway.

Why this boring/lame gear grind forced upon everyone else, just because those other sad/doomed players are hopelessly trying to find a REASON to have fun instead of HAVING fun?

I don’t want to be forced to do a PvE dungeon just to remain competitive/viable in WvW. So many players that have several 80 toons all with exos gear have quit because of this patch’s ascended BS.

Aevic.9675:

I prefer gear progression because once you hit max level that’s all there is. I don’t really progress my character anymore once I hit max level, I sit at the same strength I am regardless of what I do. I’d like to see my character become more powerful, it’s satisfying knowing that. However, I am not against my character being acknowledged for accomplishments at max level and doing things in the world.. I just feel the latter is more satisfying to me.

Devil’s advocate time…

Why do you need your character to become more powerful? Maybe you should work on the player behind the controls becoming more powerful? Maybe you should devote all that time and energy to growing some skill instead? To reacting faster, to reacting correctly, to being a better PLAYER, not to having a better character. Why do you want this inequality, where a new person gets roflstomped by a 2+yr vet, with no chance, and no tools offered to stand a chance?

I’ll tell you why people want progression. Because they want to enforce their pretend-superiority over other players. Because instead of doing stuff like the following:

They are the ones that are getting killed like scrubs. And they want to compensate/feel better by destroying what this game stands for (NO VERTICAL PROGRESSION).

They want to have the better stats and an advantage (aside from natural talent and knowledge/intelligence), just because they devote more time and are more srs-bsns to a GAME. A SILLY GAME.

I have seen this mentality time and again, these bandwagoners that go to every MMO expecting this, expecting their time to magically raise them above someone who spent less time/effort. It’s a crappy mentality IMO, it ruins every game it touches, and it needs to die off – anet needs to stop listening to these kinds of players.

Gliss.9713:

Einlanzer.1627:

there is a fairly steep gap between exotic and legendary and it’s going in to support some new content.

Where is this gap? Legendary weapons have the same stats as exotics.

People are freaking out because ascended items are creating the gap, not filling it.

They will have noticeably better stats then exotics starting this patch… GG NO RE

Hunterdan.4921:

Worry not good sir. People are just over reacting.

No, most my friends that h\got 5+ 80 alts kitted in 80 exos have quit for good (or until exos are highest stat again, if anet wakes the f up), after hearing this patch. Pretty much 99%+ of the pvp-ers have quit beforehand, too. This is a bad day to be a pvp-er, or to be someone who doesn’t want gear grind/treadmill. And let’s face it, almost all the refugees from gear grind MMOs came here, and now they’re being thrown out? This won’t go well.

Delolith.9645:

Slic.2406:

Delolith.9645:

Slic.2406:

Yeah, umm. Did you get the memo where the primary stat diff btwn an exo and a corresponding ascended piece is about 40%? 2ndary stats 8-10%+?

Those state aren’t for that dungeon only, those stats will be used EVERYWHERE, including WvW (pvp). This is a big problem, especialy to wvw-ers that take a break and then come back to see that their max gear is no longer ‘max’.

It’s also a matter of trust. Anet has repeatedly assured us in the past that there would be NO VERTICAL PROGRESSION. Where is that promise now? Maybe that former Nexon manager in charge of most financial things in anet is the backdoor for Nexon (who has 15%+ shares in NCSoft, btw)?

Stop taking drugs seriously. The difference is beteen 4-7% total.

Yakkington’s ring – 10% MF. Magic find ring with MF crystal in it – 7% MF. 42% increase (3/7). This will probably be the same for berserker gear (150% crit dmg in WvW? LOL???) and for carrion/rabid/etc gear, once all the ascended peices are released. And we aren’t even talking about the next tier (legendaries) yet!

40% increase of primary stats is ridiculous, and even 4-7% is already a noticeable edge. Say hello to Gearscore and gated content. And to WvW-ers such as myself being forced to grind PvE for things other than looks. Sorry, this is the WRONG direction for anet to take. And if you don’t believe me about Nexon (the one responsible for Maple Story’s fate, among other things), go ahead and do your own research. They’re insinuated into anet’s decision making processes, probably as much as NCSoft itself is.

If you consider MF as the primary stat then yes. I seriously doubt this will happen to berseker gear though. I expect a 1% increase in Crit damage…not a 4% from a single piece. And you know what….numbers have the flexibility to be able to get rebalanced if they are off.

You don’t get it. With all the people against this in-game and on forums, they’d have already reverted ascended stats back to exotic. They’re not. This is intentional. Do you really trust them so much, that you’re going to think ‘oh, they increased the stats, but the increase must be a bug’? Please, wake up and read up on Nexon and NCSoft and what’s been happening on their wall street doings.

Look. I will be trying this patch, and I will see the stats difference in-game. But most players, who have spent everything on getting exotics for like 5-8 alts are now slapped in the face. A lot of players don’t want to keep spending time/effort on better stats/gear, they don’t want it to be mandatory, if they want to have maximum effectiveness. I can tell you right now the agony mechanic for Mursaat and lightbringer titles for DOA weren’t something people enjoyed in GW1.

My friends list is now empty half the time I’m online, this is absurd.

Delolith.9645:

Slic.2406:

Yeah, umm. Did you get the memo where the primary stat diff btwn an exo and a corresponding ascended piece is about 40%? 2ndary stats 8-10%+?

Those state aren’t for that dungeon only, those stats will be used EVERYWHERE, including WvW (pvp). This is a big problem, especialy to wvw-ers that take a break and then come back to see that their max gear is no longer ‘max’.

It’s also a matter of trust. Anet has repeatedly assured us in the past that there would be NO VERTICAL PROGRESSION. Where is that promise now? Maybe that former Nexon manager in charge of most financial things in anet is the backdoor for Nexon (who has 15%+ shares in NCSoft, btw)?

Stop taking drugs seriously. The difference is beteen 4-7% total.

Yakkington’s ring – 10% MF. Magic find ring with MF crystal in it – 7% MF. 42% increase (3/7). This will probably be the same for berserker gear (+150% crit dmg in WvW? LOL???) and for carrion/rabid/etc gear, once all the ascended peices are released. And we aren’t even talking about the next tier (legendaries) yet!

40% increase of primary stats is ridiculous, and even 4-7% is already a noticeable edge. Say hello to Gearscore and gated content. And to WvW-ers such as myself being forced to grind PvE for things other than looks. Sorry, this is the WRONG direction for anet to take. And if you don’t believe me about Nexon (the one responsible for Maple Story’s fate, among other things), go ahead and do your own research. They’re insinuated into anet’s decision making processes, probably as much as NCSoft itself is.

Yeah, umm. Did you get the memo where the primary stat diff btwn an exo and a corresponding ascended piece is about 40%? 2ndary stats 8-10%+?

Those state aren’t for that dungeon only, those stats will be used EVERYWHERE, including WvW (pvp). This is a big problem, especialy to wvw-ers that take a break and then come back to see that their max gear is no longer ‘max’.

It’s also a matter of trust. Anet has repeatedly assured us in the past that there would be NO VERTICAL PROGRESSION. Where is that promise now? Maybe that former Nexon manager in charge of most financial things in anet is the backdoor for Nexon (who has 15%+ shares in NCSoft, btw)?

Replace the D3 stuff of the following link with the appropriate GW2 references, and make a GW2 version of this article on this thread. Let’s see who can make the best GW2 rendition of:

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/5889888966

That pretty much sums up the direction GW2 is heading, especially with the introduction of Ascended gear, which has better stats than slotted/jeweled exotics, PLUS an infusion slot on top of it.

Delolith.9645:

ChairGraveyard.2967:

The bads here are crying for legendaries to be based entirely on mindless Korean-MMO-style grinding because otherwise it might be a real achievement instead of a complete joke, and they won’t be able to just buy themselves one from gold sellers. Boo hoo.

No…the bads here are arguing about legendaries been kept down to 5% of the population like ANet promised no matter what. If they want to introduce an insanely difficult dungeon to get a precursor and that being the “measure” of player skill…I am all for all legendaries to be taken back, return Gift of Mastery/Fortune/Legendary name….and force everyone to make that hard dungeon for the skill check in order to get the precursor.

Also make the dungeon solo so that several of the actual bads here won’t be able to get it just because they bring their adequate friends with them….althoug adequate should cut it for 5% population dungeon.

That’d be totally cool by me. That’s actually the ideal way for this game IMO. Something like a very tough (but not too time-consuming!) solo dungeon with no checkpoints and all enemies respawning/resetting if you die.

Something like THIS, even.

Yep, like I alluded to. In the past, I have sat down for 1-2hr Nightmare Quake 1 speedrun sessions, just for kicks. And I’ve actually gone 5+ maps without dying in 1 go that way. And yet, that kind of ability doesn’t help me at all in getting something that’s supposed to be ‘legendary’. GW2 is basically permanent slow-motion to me. And yet…

I mean, how much more legendary (PvE-wise) does it get, to play a game like Q1 on nightmare and survive consistently while being in ultra-crazy-rushdown mode? Isn’t that kind of inherent ability supposed to count for something? That’s >>>>> than any stupid trading post abuse or endless zerg-grinding. Where’s MY precursor? And really, where’s the precursor+legendary for those who are ‘gosu’, those who truly do deserve it in the eyes of many?

There’s SO MANY players out there 1000x better than me at gaming in general. And I bet most of them would be unable to get a legendary in this game, and that’s just WRONG.

Olba.5376:

Slic.2406:

John. Whatever you guys decide to do. Please. PLEASE make sure that whoever can do something like THIS is guaranteed to get at least the precursor (or, the whole legendary IMO).

That’s a very bad example of “skill”.

Firstly, it’s not even an MMORPG. It’s an FPS, which is inherently more skill-oriented. Well, if you consider aiming and reflexes, which is mostly something you learned through practice, to be skill.

Secondly, speedruns require that you’re extremely familiar with everything involved. In this case, the level design, the seckitteneas, the monster locations, the requirements for 100% completion. That’s more knowledge and experience than skill.

Thirdly, record times are never gotten on the first try, you always repeat it tons of times to get it. And that’s what you call grinding.

Finally, if you read the description of the video, you would know that the video is a composite of a team of players, each doing a few levels. So the video is not the display of skill by a single player, but by a team of players.

Willingness to grind and/or spend time playing a stock market simulator shouldn’t be the only thing a player gets rewarded for, if you want to successfully retain the label of “Guild Wars”.

That’s true. However, you also shouldn’t make it impossible to get by those means. That’s a bit like asking them to remove events, drops, experience, gear and skill points from WvWvW.

So what you’re saying is: you don’t feel comfortable or able to do something like in that video link, and therefore are trying to rationalize how someone who CAN do that shouldn’t get rewarded? Come on. It’s obvious that that kind of playing ability is superior in terms of EVERYTHING (quick thinking, practice, reaction/twitch, knowledge, experience, etc, etc.) to something like making gold and grinding CS for 1mil karma.

That is why I linked that particular example, because it shows every single aspect of ‘skill’ that’s worth noting to John:

1) way more exciting/interesting to watch and DO
2) way more demanding of a person
3) doesn’t always take a long time (takes a while only if you’re bad and can’t get it right – can’t learn/adapt fast).

P. S. Yes, 1 person can’t be expected to 1st-try what those dozen people did only through multiple tries, but it’s an example of the kind of gaming ability that should ALWAYS be at the top of the please-reward list.

Going to repeat this for emphasis.

John. Whatever you guys decide to do. Please. PLEASE make sure that whoever can do something like THIS is guaranteed to get at least the precursor (or, the whole legendary IMO).

Willingness to grind and/or spend time playing a stock market simulator shouldn’t be the only thing a player gets rewarded for, if you want to successfully retain the label of “Guild Wars”.

Saturn L O L.1406:

Congratulations Anet,

I say this with all of the respect I have because GW II is so far the best game I have ever played, after 600 hours I didn’t get bored a single minute… But this?

Now Legendaries become WAY more accessible – as you read on the forums => precursor was usually the limiting factor in the creation of a legendary…

The way I interpret this post is that you’ll make it easier to acquire the precursor and thus also ease the process of making a legendary…

This is what ruined WoW imo – and every other MMORPG. The legendary was something to work for. People will cry, they will cry every single time. Be sure that after you “fix” the precursors you’ll be flamed and yelled at for other things that are too hard for most of the casual players.

There is NO CHALLENGE in a time-consuming and tedious task. All the current legendary process does ATM is exercise a person’s patience and willingness to SPEND TIME. That is not a challenge, and that is not even brag-worthy.

Here’s to hoping they do address it. Maybe come up with dungeons/quests that are ridiculously hard (but doable!), without being a huge time/gold sink.

John, I hope that’s what you’re aiming for – Castlevania/Contra style difficulty that allows a person to get legendary mats/precursors quickly, IF that person is genuinely a good player (not good at knowledge of gw2, or gw2, just a ‘good gamer’ period).

Examples of what a ‘good gamer’ can do and what you should promote and reward the most:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhzXKMqZBBc

Torvarren.6295:

There are no lodestones required to get the best gear in the game though. It’s all personal preference.

I keep seeing this ‘personal preference, aesthetic, not necessary for BiS’ argument. Why should something as important as ‘personal preference’, as the very image a person wants their character to be, be something that is hidden behind weeks of frustrating/unfun grind and RNG?

To many, many players looks are just as important as utility/effectiveness. While I am not one of them, I can see how looks can be rather important to a FANTASY MMO experience. So why is it that something so basic is given such frustrating (not even hard, or skill-based, or brag-worthy) barriers that need to be overcome? Yes, I’m talking about the 100+ lodestone recipes and the legendaries specifically.

arabeth.2361:

Slic: Legit gold buying will never be able to compete with black market prices. If they drop their prices in half, the black market will as well. Black market gold has no cost.

Black market gold does have a cost. Gold farmers/botters/etc have to spend time and effort to get in-game gold. They have to risk going to jail for stolen credit cards, etc. They get paid like regular employees of any business. A lot of the ppl that actually sit at a computer and gold farm are college kids, etc. trying to make a quick buck to help w/their tuition fees.

Again, there is a cost and a risk to producing black market gold, and if anet finds a more reasonable price range for gems then said black markets will be hard pressed to compete, even if they do undercut the official rate. Because black market is a risk to player accounts. The reason most players are currently attracted to the black market is that risk doesn’t outweigh the large difference between cost effectiveness.

May I just add 1 important thing here, hopefully John reads it. The very thing anet is trying to prevent the most in the economy (inflation/gold devaluation) is actually the very thing that has been accelerated, because the mass bot banning was not counteracted with increases in drop rates and decreases in loot DR.

The players still have the same amount of gold as 3 days ago, but now the prices for everything worth buying are 2-3x higher on average. So, we have only 33-50% of the buying power we had 3 days ago.

Needless to say, this is NOT GOOD for players who were saving money to buy stuff, this will set off a lot of alarms and cause a lot more players to give up trying to play the game because of your draconic, grind-oriented standards.

If everyone knew how to play the TP, then nobody would be able to play the TP. So you’re not going to get much out of asking.

…

If anet’s own dollar → gem → gold ratio wasn’t so unreasonable, I’d imagine black market wouldn’t be an issue in the 1st place. They need to realize that offering good deals to customers is a good idea…

Or, they could have the crafted items actually have high npc-sale values. For instance, 20-slot bags should at least be able to be npc-ed for slightly more than 10g. That would at least prevent crafted items from being sold for too low, and would give crafters a way to make (a little) money, without needing a buyer.

But I doubt anet wants that. They don’t want players to have a freedom of choice, they want players to log in, zerg+multi-task specific things (tyvm xp/loot/karma/dungeon DR -_-) and log out.

Theplayboy.6417:

It has to do with the outcome of the recent election. The dollar is now weaker because more money is expected to created out of thin air, the stock market will continue to fall as confidence in consumer spending decreases and as people are move their money into foreign exchanges. Small business and big business will start taking hits on their bottom line and people will lose their jobs. Taxes will sky rocket for everyone except the lazy non-working folk who rely on government hand outs, their lives will remain unchanged and they can continue to spend the money they earn off the books on clothes, jewelry, and gadgets. The employed and self employed will now have to deal with higher insurance premiums, higher mortgage costs, higher gas prices, and higher taxes on top of many other things.

Paraphrase:

The average player will suffer MORE instead of LESS, as has been the pattern as time after release went by. I personally will not be affected by this much. However, I’m sure there will be less and less players logging in and doing stuff (which does, actually indirectly affect me). All because of this kind of ridiculous scarcity/RNG in end game items. In fact, if ectos/t6 mats weren’t so scarce, bots wouldn’t even be bothering with them and anet wouldn’t be fighting as heavy a war.

But go figure, anet wants you to grind for hours and get only 1-2 ectos/t6 mats, because they think the avg player will be ok with it, when you require about 2000+ of these for 1 effin skin, and it’s the only endgame…..

Yeah, I’m 99.99% certain you get loot if they’re tagged and die to fall damage. Good example of it here (doubles as an example of weird warping due to server lag!):

www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnqE7xnqsyI&hd=1&t=7m10s

They don’t get a repair bill when they do it though, but IMO it’s very convenient to me as well (intentionally or not), since it saves the killer time – you don’t have to stomp them.

Probably, in part, because of videos like mine. Just cowards/bads trying to save face. Move along, nothing new to see here.

This can easily be solved by the devs changing a few lines of code to leave the character in-game until combat expires, regardless of whether the client was closed.

Nimraphel.7819:

Zaxares.5419:

I actually see things differently. I expect that ANet intended Legendaries to be items that players could obtain over the course of SEVERAL years. Guild Wars 1 had a lifetime for over 7 years; I fully expect GW2 to last for the same amount of time, if not more. In that timeline, Legendaries are probably items that your average player, playing 1 – 2 hours a day for 3 – 4 years, could definitely afford if they saved up with a mind to working towards a specific Legendary. ANet probably didn’t expect people to have Legendaries within 2 months of the game’s release. (Perhaps it was poor design, perhaps it was people exploiting the market, or perhaps it was people buying gold from gold sellers, but I’ll refrain from going too much into it since that’s not really what this thread is about.)

Let’s not compare GW1 and GW2 please; one was and is a niché mmo/CORPG, the other one is a triple A title with a persistent world and massive growth over its predecessor. Dangling carrots in front of a small, die-hard playerbase might have worked, but in a triple A title with massive populations it’s not a viable or sustainable strategy, unless they’re happy about the massive outrage legendaries are right now causing on the forums. I think it speaks volumes that pretty much every serious legendary guide comes with the caveat “don’t do this. Wait and see. It must get better.”.

Regarding people getting early legendaries, some exploited the initial precursor bug where level 65+ rares could yield precursors, making them a somewhat reliable source of massive income.

Anyway, do you honestly believe that ‘the average player’ will ‘put his mind to saving up for a legendary’ for 3-4 years? Of which the majority of the time will be spent repeating the same Cursed Shore events over and over and over? Instead of going to another games that, y’know, actually have a better measurement of effort/reward.

Did we just take a time machine back to EQ1?

Yes, as sad as it is, anet seems to have taken the time machine back to EQ1. They don’t realize the average player will not stay and support their (currently draconic) business model.

I mean, I’m one of the few that can afford the time for a legendary, but seeing its requirements and lack of any other endgame confirms my fear that pretty soon I will not have many players to kill in PvP, or have a good/large community to do the occasional PvE with.

If at least they made legendaries easier to obtain overall, I’m sure players would stick around and wait even if there is a lack of other content. AS it is, there’s way too many disillusioned/untrusting/angry players thanks to the korean RNG fest that are the precursors and the ridiculous t6/ecto reqs for legendary gifts.

John Smith.4610:

The price spike doesn’t represent a shortage, it represents prices returning to where they should be without bots. This change creates more opportunity for players playing the game to earn money. The oversupply the bots created hurt the legitimate producers of items. As the prices go up, more real players will enter the market.

Before these players (that are all trying to craft a legendary BTW) ever enter the market, they will ragequit the game’s ridiculous grind requirement for an aesthetic skin.

You’re not understanding just how ridiculously unskilled and time consuming the legendary crafting process is.

I thank you for banning bots, but please make t6 mats and ectos drop more frequently from level80+ mob. Otherwise, there will be nobody left to pay for your game.

John Smith.4610:

I don’t want to get into an argument, so this is the last statement I will make here:
Of the data that I have seen. Which is significant. It is reasonable to say
1) Goldsellers are a criminal group
2) Goldsellers damage games
3) Goldsellers cannot be classified as competition because they are not in the same industry

These are not statements of belief. They are statements of statistics.

I understand they are almost always criminal in some way. But you seem to not understand how CRIMINAL your own gem prices are. The amount of gems you get a dollar is simply that – CRIMINAL. It is an abysmal deal, most players will not ever use credit cards in your gem store, because you seem to not understand how to offer attractive deals to your clients. This is also a fact statement, none of the 80+ players I have talked to about the gem prices have been even remotely happy with the dollar → gem conversion.

This is what my analogy was alluding to. That the legitimate patent holder/inventor of the Koenigsegg are also, in a way, criminal, because they are abusing their power, be it backed by law or not. Hence, also my choice of the word totalitarian.

While you are not going to reply in this thread anymore, I hope you do read what I have typed to you carefully, because I have personally been witness to a lot of software company follies of this kind.

John Smith.4610:

I really want a new Koenigsegg. At the moment I cannot get one. I am an upstanding citizen and will not steal a Koenigsegg. I will hire someone to steal one from someone else and give it to me. If they weren’t so hard to get I wouldn’t NEED to have someone steal one. Oh, but would I want one if they were easy to get?

I’m sorry Mr. Smith, but that’s a rather gaping fault in analogy, shame on you. It’s:

I really want a new Koenigsegg. At the moment I cannot get one by buying it from the official manufacturer, because it’s tyranically expensive. I am an upstanding citizen and will not steal a Koenigsegg. I will have someone else manufacture it for a fraction of the price and sell it to me. If they weren’t so hard to get I wouldn’t NEED to have someone else manufacture it, taking profit away from the rightful inventor/patent holder. Oh, and I would STILL want one if they were easy to get, because that wouldn’t detract from how AWESOME it looks.

Kindly consider being less of a totalitarian towards your playerbase, and maybe your customers will actually use credit cards in your gem store more often. Thank you.

It’s actually been interesting to watch all 3 vids – neat to see the gradual improvement in positioning & camera/skill usage over the 3 videos you posted so far. Like, for instance, the change in what directions you dodge, relative to the enemy.

It mimicks the beginnings of my own ‘fighting style’ changes over the last month more than I thought. Finally, my yippie kye yay vids aren’t the only GW2 vids of it’s kind!

Yeah, they need to reveal names, at least on death. I get that they don’t want to hurt players’ tender feelings, or want to cut down on hate tells from enemy players, but that IMO is what makes PvP communities last longer – that sense that you can actually communicate with the opposing side, be it friendly or unfriendly.

And maybe have downed state do 0 damage to enemy players (it can stay in PvE, but in PvP it’s just downright counter-competitive at this point)… :\

Before I log on to PvP in GW2, I-

-click this link, to get me in the mood:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T70ecorspEg

MasterDeere.3417:

… Thieves…. lets buff them more so they can 1 shot entire mob and destroy ennemy castle with HS. I bet thieves players will keep saying its a L2P issue.

http://img266.imageshack.us/img266/1271/umadbro.png

FannonCodder.1286:

@Slic

Love the vids, between you and Daphoenix (D/D tank ele build) I am torn between which prof I want to focus with. Speaking of ele’s that go D/D, do you have a lot of trouble with them (good ones mind you)

I notice in #6 you use p/d and then d/d, and #skill 2 to the wall… do you find that better then using the SB?

One last thing – the change in your build from 30 in deadly Arts to 20 and then increasing Shadow Arts to 30. Was the loss of the 10% damage from 25 in deadly Arts worth the extra regen in stealth? is the might from stealth making up for it or might a combo of 25 in each be better?

The 10% damage doesn’t affect condition damage, so it isn’t that useful. The 5-10% condition duration is though, but I sit right at 7s at 20 (7.3 at 30), so I don’t notice the loss very often. However, fractions in duration do add to bleed dps so I’m sure I’m losing something. There’s threads out there about it with rather weird results.

Emerge.9640:

Was that the song from Chrono Trigger at the end?

Yeah, Spekkio’s theme.