Guild Wars 2

Heijincks.9267:

Culling isn’t just a bug, it’s more of a hardware issue plus internet latency.

If culling was simply “fixed”, most people would lag like crazy because their computers will not be strong enough to compensate. Only those with $1500 PCs would be able to run the game at all in large scale battles. This would give something EVERYONE would complain about. In order to not screw people with weaker PCs over, there is “culling”. This is why some people who run GW2 on an SSD with a powerful CPU do not really experience culling.

It’s like trying to run Far Cry 3 on a 2007 PC if culling was simply “switched off”.

Factor in internet latency, and it’ll be a big lagfest like the current world event situation in even smaller battles.

With the March update, I’m pretty sure a lot of people are going to start complaining about lag and low frame rates in even smaller battles. I’m almost sure of it.

But I am running the game at 60fps with a 20mb internet connection and the game is unplayable with culling and lag. How is my hardware killing this game? It is their servers and the script they use to determine what they are willing to show me.

I can stream 1080p content on my TV and play BF3 simultaneously without lag, how come I can’t play this game if this is the only thing I am doing? No, I think there is something wrong with the way ANet have set up their netcode.

If culling is an issue on the mega server then ESOL is doomed before it starts. Can you imagine, GW2 culling kills the game with 10 players on screen, if there are 100s or 1000s on screen how impossible will playing the game be then?

Lexandro.1456:

I read that piece and it actually said that culling would be “player controled” iirc. That means its just a slider or setting in the game now. High end systems can push the slider out and get less noticable culling or possibly eliminate it.

A LOT of people are still going to have culling issues, now though Anet can say its all their fault since they give you the control over it.

If this turns out to be true then I’m done with the game. How can ESOL have a mega server with so much more players and no culling reported? Sadly GW2 is not giving me a reason to stay…

Since the latest patch WvW is unplayable and PvE is only just. I’ve found myself logging on less and less because of this. If the next patch doesn’t fix culling I may stop playing altogether and just wait until a fix is confirmed.

I learnt this issue on day 1 with karma gear (my luck), I feel bad it took so long for you to run into it.

I don’t pay a single copper on travel, I go by foot. :P

I agree with the OP because my typical scene for Orr play is:
- find small mob (e.g. walk 2 feet to find 2-3 risen)
- kill mob
- mob respawns as I kill the last one
- kill mob again
- mob respawns as I kill the last one… and so on.

I am never in danger while killing the mob and I’m now getting some descent drops which is great for farming until DR kicks in, then I’m screwed.

However, believe it or not I actually like this (except DR), so I don’t want the devs to change it because I’m happily farming the 1 mob over and over and I don’t have to move to earn about 1 gold. Heavy mouldy bags anyone…

I have been fighting with myself on this lack of PvE solo-ability problem for 6 months, I think I’m losing the battle though. While you are not forced to group up you do yourself no favours by being a loner. I could suggest join a PvE guild but then you usually have to conform to the group and people who like to solo play don’t wan’t this, hence their ‘solo-play’ preference.

I think it would be nice if they had a single player server but then ANet would have to have 2 versions of the game etc… Sadly I think it is us that have to change to fit the game, not the game change to fit us.

Culling is a big issue which may affect how many people you can see on your map. For example, in Lion’s Arch the map almost always feels like I am the only person there (apart from NPCs) even though it is full all the time . And in world events it only appears like 3-5 other people are playing, but when I show player names I am surrounded, I just can’t see them.

Also, I think the reason the higher level areas seem empty is the re-balancing of enemies has screwed up a lot of farming areas. On my server Orr has become a ghost town since the patch but I have noticed on other servers it isn’t a problem. Maybe everyone is guesting to a few select servers for high level content?

I think the issue here is (because I suffer from it myself) the OP appears to solo the game and roam. After 6 months of trying myself I don’t think the game was designed to be played like this. I bet those who say this game is too easy don’t play solo and/or don’t care if they die here and there (how many of them would have a zero death count?).

Let me clarify my point of view though, I only PvE as a hardcore/permadeath style player, so when I am insta-killed by random mobs it kinda hurts (del toon start again…).

My suggestion for the OP (and me sadly T.T) is try to stay around other players, they game IS easy when playing in a group of 3+ in my experience (but this is very difficult for anti socials like myself to come to terms with). The only other option is to go back to some other single player game which is designed for this sort of roaming play-style (e.g. Skyrim and the like).

So is this why Cursed Shore is completely devoid of players since patch? I thought I was going mad!

Since patch I’ve been trying to buy a piece of karma gear (my last piece) for my ranger and not one of the event karma merchants has been unlocked in my server the entire time (unless I was just unlucky not to log on if they had been). What I ended up doing last night was guesting to several other servers until I found one that was…

Before the patch I used to do Grenth a few times per day, but since the patch I’ve tried it 3-4 times and everyone got wiped easily, and since those wipes (2-3 days ago) I haven’t seen barely a soul in Cursed Shore let alone doing Grenth.

What’s going on with Cursed Shore???? Even the smaller events are impossible now (I used to do several on my own and now can’t).

Cutting it fine Rev, hope you get your monthly!

blanketfreak.8913:

To all the people that say suck it up its only 40 crafting items. I hope next month daily has 500 WvW kills and 100 spvp kills to complete it and watch who cries…..

hahaha, that’s how I feel :P

kitten, gotta do crafting…

So how is ESOL implementing a mega server if GW2 can’t even handle 10+ characters on screen at a time????

Yeah, I laugh when levelling an alt and I get the letters informing you about the various dungeons you are now at a high enough level to complete… yeah right.

The lag has made the ENTIRE game UNPLAYABLE!!!!

I was trying to do a heart last night on my own (nobody else there) and every key press took 2-3 seconds to register!

Then I went to WvW and it was worse of course. I shall stop calling this game Guild Wars 2, until it is fixed I will call it Lag Wars 2.

I wonder how ESOL will run the mega servers and if they will have any issues like we’re getting in this game? Something I’ll be watching very closely…

Thanks ANet! I loved this part of the update… this part… :P

Well after the new patch I’ve notice the culling issue has multiplied it’s reach to the point where the game is unplayable in WvW.

Does ANet want to force you into PvE only?

I was in WvW last night and I could only see 1-20 players on screen at any given time and the frame rates have been the worst since launch. People were popping in and out of thin air all night long for no apparent reason. Even in the player spawn area we couldn’t even see the commander, and the mini-map was glitching with the commander tag too! There were about 30 of us on top of the commander grouping up and none of us could see more and a few other players let alone when we hit another zerg… the game became a slideshow…

The fights were epic comedy, the only issue was none of us (friend or foe) could see it!!!!

It was hilarious to see the aftermath of 2 massive zergs, dead bodies tags everywhere (couldn’t see the bodies though), nobody knowing whats going on, impossible to have tactics or keep the ball together, plus the frame rate issues… funny to look back at but not fun to play.

Eladriel.7295:

Yes, you are alone in this.. for my part that is. I like the down leveling. I like the fact I can come back to the lower lvls and participate in the events there and get my lvl loot and it still be fun. Your post sounds too much like you are crying cause you can’t come into the lower lvls and one shot everything.. If you like doing that then go to wow or some other game. Power isn’t what gw2 is about.

I don’t think anyone wants to 1 shot everything.

For me, I do vent my frustration at the down levelling from time to time. Its absolutely not because I can’t kill a foe (they die easily enough), I only get frustrated because I am randomly 1-2 shot killed by foes that are well below my level. Please note that this is only a very small percentage as it usually only surfaces when I am level 20-30 in a starting area. I won’t lie, most of the time it IS a cakewalk but I just can’t predict when that difficulty spike will hit. Of course you can say l2p, that is OK because I do suck balls at this game (only just got my 1,000 kills in WvW last night).

I’ve recently made the decision my next permadeath toon in PvE is to steer clear of running in lower level areas, this is because I don’t die when I’m exploring areas at my real level, even Orr (maybe it’s a mental thing, I think I should be safe in lower level areas so I’m not pumped for battle?).

Again, I don’t want more damage in lower level areas, but I would appreciate constructive advice on how not to die in them.

My first time in a dungeon was a solo effort and I couldn’t even scratch the health of the first low level enemy while I got 2 hit…

OMFG! I keep doing the same thing in PvE.

Last night I lost my latest Hardcore toon at level 22 (I think I’ve levelled about 40 toons to level 20-30). I was in Divinities Reach and tried to run past 3 level 9 bandits. I got stunned instantly as I missed the dodge. A second later I was in downed state. I couldn’t believe the speed my health went down. Within another second I was dead and I couldn’t get a single hit on them.

I get the down levelling, but seriously, how can 3 level 9 bandits kill a level 22 without the chance of fighting back? I had level 20 equipment and 10 toughness on my traits by the way.

I hear everyone say PvE is sooo easy but I just can’t do it when in lower level areas, when my level 22 was in a level 25 area moments before I didn’t have this trouble… 5 months of this crap is driving me crazy.

Are there any guilds for Hardcore players out there, because I really need some help to l2p… T.T

I hope it’s not all doom and gloom for Arah as I want to start farming it to get some gear for my Necromancer.

Red Falcon.8257:

Procastrinating until it’s too late is built-in the genetics of every dev in the world.

I know this is a joke but I’ll answer as a software developer (its my job). Please keep in mind that this is my experience and isn’t necessarily true for the whole industry.

We do not procrastinate because we never stop working. No matter what I’m doing (also my colleges from what we discuss) I’m always thinking how to solve scripting issues (even at home in bed looking at the clock and it say’s 2:00am).

This isn’t by choice mind you, and it is something I have come to accept as a necessary evil. I have solved so many scripting issues while in the shower, cooking, on the tram, walking the dog, playing Guild Wars 2 and even when overseas on holiday. It’s never done consciously, it just happens.

Trying to explain the complexities of a script to someone who isn’t actively building scripts on a daily basis is like hitting your head against a brick wall, you may as well try and teach evolution to a fundamentalist christian, it can’t be done.

Please NO, I’m sick of levelling to 80 on my alts as it is. Make me level more and it’ll compound the issue for me. In a game that is not meant to be about levelling adding more levels would kill it for me.

In single player games like (Diablo or Elderscrolls) I would say most definitely yes, but not this game, the levelling and down levelling make levelling redundant… so adding more levels wouldn’t make sense. :P

Ethics.4519:

My only grief is the reviving. Everything else happens pretty naturally, but the reviving tends to not happen very naturally. It’s easy to do, because there are certain hearts, like bloodyfield in gendarran area, that have dead bodies around, but the fact is I still have to go out of my way to do it before reset.

Sometimes it will happen naturally in wvw, dungeons, etc. but usually not all 10.

For the record, I love the new system and prefer it to the old dailies, but I am a little sad that there is a lot less experience from completing them now.

What I find (and it might just be my experience since daily heals) is during an event when someone is downed EVERYONE stops attacking the mob/champ etc to revive the downed player. This can be very funny to see but it doesn’t do much for completing the task at hand… :P

Sericenthe.5310:

WvWvW. Always a good time. Have had some epic battles in there that I’ve never experienced in any other game before.

^ This.

I agree with the title of this thread. For me the real game begins at 80 (in WvW) where you have no restrictions and do the most with build variations, weapon/armour equipping etc. I wouldn’t wan’t to change the rate at which we level in PvE (I think it works well), just in WvW, it’s too hard to gain xp as a low level character in WvW so I feel as though we’re forced to PvE so we can play WvW. My level 80 can gain several levels a night but my level 10 can spend a day or two without levelling because the low level player can’t contribute to the fight like the level 80 can.

On a side note, my level 10 warrior finally got it’s first outright kill in WvW last night, imagine the shame if they guy knew… :P

And if anyone says to me l2p please give this crappy player some advice as well.

For me the game becomes playable at 80 because I don’t enjoy the journey to get there at all (but I love being at 80).

The whole game isn’t ‘end game’, level 80 for me is ‘begin game’, there is no end game in WvW (that’s where I mostly play). The lead up is a 79 level grinding waste of time that I did once for the story but cringe the next half dozen times I repeat for alts (especially since nurfed drop rates is getting more common).

Do you know, a common request I hear in my Guild is “can someone who knows how to craft please level up my alt to 80 for me? I’ll pay, here’s 50 something gold!”

It’s because a sub 80 character is weaker and less fun in WvW than an 80, it’s that simple. It would be nice to be able to level your low level toon effectively in WvW (it can be done I know, but not easily, the amount of xp my 80 gets is amazing, I’ve go an endless pool of spare skill points that I can’t use), but my low level alts in WvW can’t get kills so they level painfully slow.

Until WvW gets some love I’m stuck doing dailies with alts and WvWing with my only level 80 toon. If I could level at the same rate as in PvE I’d never be in the PvE area except to run the odd dungeon for monthlies.

Vayne.8563:

Finally what do people really need so much gold for? The only thing I can really think of is a legendary. And legendaries are supposed to take a while to get. I mean, you can’t buy 500 badges of honor, yiou can’t buy 500 dungeon tokens. If you see legendaries as a long term project, there’s no need to spend money.

OK, so I personally want Kudzu for my ranger. At the current price of 1,750 gold and at my current rate of saving (600+ hours for 30 gold in my bank atm) it would take me… 35,000 hours of play to get the gold needed, but then again the item might cost 100,000 gold (I have no idea of course) by the time I save so there is no possible way I could save the money to buy one.

Sure I have wasted some of my gold over the 4 months but I don’t think I would have earned much over 50 gold in total as I have been saving everything since XMas.

The only real way for me to get a legendary is to craft and I don’t like crafting so I won’t be getting one. T.T

maddoctor.2738:

only 5g as a level 80? That’s how much you get from a 10 minute CoF path 1 run.

Right… Did 5 CoF runs in 2 days and got 1 rare and the rest blues and whites and got less than a gold for my effort. Got 50 silver 10 karma bottles for the monthly so it wasn’t all bad.

thisolderhead.5127:

I’ve played 600+ hours and my highest priced item sold was 35 silver… O_O

I get all my gold (just 50 in total) from selling low level mats, not the worthless drops. But I don’t do FOTM so I guess it’s my fault for not doing what Anet want’s me to do.

600+ hours, and how much did you pay (excepting the original disc/box investment) in that time?

How many people out there have the 600, 700, 900+ hours of game time, cry about the game not being customised to their imagining, and have paid NOTHING for the experience?

Was it something I said? o.O

I’ve read my post many times and I don’t see any crying about the ‘game not being customised to my imagining’. All I’ve said is I should have gone and played FOTM to get better drops which is exactly what it is for.

If you can’t get over someone not enjoying the game as much as yourself then perhaps you should keep away from the forums because this is the only avenue a person who isn’t 100% happy with the game can let Anet know this. So far this thread isn’t a kitten thread, it is just highlighting something that is less than ideal for a number of players. Of course we all have different opinions on what is a good/bad in anything, why can’t we voice it? Or do you think anyone who has anything negative to say about this game should go and kitten off and play another game? I’m sure Anet want this right?!

harbinger.2698:

Raine.1394:

Overall, the game is not rewarding, beyond the awesome gameplay of course, in my experience.

This has been my experience as well. I’ve run for ~300 hours on just my warrior and have farmed Lvl 80 dungeons in EXP mode and FOTM all the time and I’ve never once found an item worth more than 50 silver. I get that it’s random and that it’s all about farming and patience and I don’t expect an exotic or even rare every run, but quite frankly the absence of finding a single item worth even 1 gold ever in 300 hours is pretty mind boggling and very frustrating.

I’ve played 600+ hours and my highest priced item sold was 35 silver… O_O

I get all my gold (just 50 in total) from selling low level mats, not the worthless drops. But I don’t do FOTM so I guess it’s my fault for not doing what Anet want’s me to do.

panikos.8309:

that patch that made veterans and champions drop something 100% of the times

Hahahahahaha… Wait, they can drop stuff now??? I did my daily last night which included kill 5 veterans, not a single drop. T.T

Guess that patch worked right?!

Doomguard.5094:

StormageddonBK.9842:

Kal Spiro.9745:

The ONLY reason to want it to be turned off, the ONLY reason, is to show off how much rediculous damage you can do to level 2 mobs.

No, this isn’t why I don’t like it. I don’t like the leveling system in GW2 for 1 reason, it makes leveling worthless.

They should have stayed with their original premise of no leveling at all, e.g. make the game all about skill, not gear or level stats.

It does not make the leveling worthless, instead of simply adding you power by default, leveling up opens you up more options and possibilities to customize your play style by unlocking more traits and more skills, it’s simple as that. The level is just an indicator how many traits you have at your disposal, demanding you must be stronger by default because you simply have a higher number is incredibly selfish and ignorant of how good and fair games actually work. I’m aware you got used to how things work in other MMOs, but that doesn’t mean that THAT is the right way to make it so. They did stay with their original concept that its all about skill, how can you be so blind to not see that? That’s why you downscale, because levels DON’T MATTER at all, you should ignore them, it’s all about skill. The point of the game isn’t to level up, it’s to play the game, why are you so stuck on thinking that everything revolves around this one silly number?

Then why do you get more health and armour when you level? If it was just about skills and traits then these two attributes should stay put. I just don’t understand the point you’re trying to make, maybe I’m stupid, done too many years playing old fashioned rpg’s in the 80’s and 90’s. I don’t want to 1 hit things in a low level area, never have, what I’m against is me, as a level 30+ toon being 1 hit in a level 5 area to a Champ i didn’t even aggro (happens to me all the time, and yes I have the appropriate gear etc, not that it matters because it’s down levelled…).

Nerf the weapons by all means so we can’t ruin it for you by killing things fast because I don’t want to, but why nerf my armour and my health by so much so I feel as though I can’t survive when I explore? Of course this is all self imposed because when I PvE I delete dead toons immediately and many have said I’m silly for doing so but its the way I play all my rpg’s. I can now see why Anet don’t have hardcore servers, it is impossible to do unless you craft to 80 or avoid boss/champion events etc. The developers even said ‘we wan’t death to be an experience’, maybe they wan’t you to die often?

I’ve said all I can on this subject and we’re getting nowhere, time for WvW where the down levelling is absent.

I’ll stick to Path of Exile for my hardcore rpg gaming for the time being, sigh…

Kal Spiro.9745:

The ONLY reason to want it to be turned off, the ONLY reason, is to show off how much rediculous damage you can do to level 2 mobs.

No, this isn’t why I don’t like it. I don’t like the leveling system in GW2 for 1 reason, it makes leveling worthless.

They should have stayed with their original premise of no leveling at all, e.g. make the game all about skill, not gear or level stats.

pluzoid.2597:

you just stuck in your old ways as a soloist.

I know I am stuck as a soloist in PvE and I also only play a self imposed hard core death on myself for my PvE characters, it’s just what I like to do. I cry when my 2-3 week old toon gets 1 hit by a lower level enemy, so for me the leveling system sucks balls. In WvW I don’t mind dying or playing with others because it is expected as it is a pseudo PvP environment. But in PvE I am a loner, and always will be, I don’t want the hassle of finding a group of others I don’t know. This is why I spend 95% of my time in WvW with my Guild because I don’t have to worry about being down leveled or talking to stranges etc, I only have to worry about my toon’s gear.

I love how the level 5 bandit champ can 2 hit kill my level 80 full exotic character… I know its a group event but…

Runiir.6425:

MANY new players to dungeouns are being kicked simply because people “can’t bother to explain a fight” and it takes too bloody long to get a downed person on their feet. If they wanted to stop the glass cannon builds than they could have made toughness have a marked improvement in damage reduction. When is the last time anyone has seen a full toughness build (every peice of gear had toughness as the top stat)?

^ This.

A group of 5 in CoF/3 last night for 3 hours and we all quit because we couldn’t kill the second boss after the torches… There was possibly 2 fairly green players (me and another) but 3 were CoF veterans. Man I wasted the whole night for nothing…

Lag was the biggest factor in not beating but I run a toughness build and I was getting cleaned up in a couple of hits.

If we weren’t down leveled I might enjoy the climb to level 80. That way I could best judge what area I want to play in, but with down leveling Arena net makes that decision for you by pigeon-holing you into a whatever zone your in (I like being a few levels stronger than my computer enemies like you can in single player games).

As it is the whole game feels like there is no point to get stronger. Having said this I only like WvWing at level 80 in this game because the up leveling is also crap so I have to PvE with down leveling for my Alts. kitten its a circular problem… grrrrrr.

Just get rid of all level scaling up and down please so I can play the game instead of the game playing me.

Absolutely not, my wife would kill me… :P

Seriously though, if it were made p2p I’d go to another f2p game immediately or go back to single player rpg games and be done with MMO’s.

Budg.3064:

Theres already a system in place that rewards players for everything they do, its called karma. I dont understand why laurels were intoduced in the first place rather than offering us the same rewards but for a karma price. New karma rewards every so often is all the incentive people need to go out into the world and gather karma.

And before anyone brings up the point that people just farm the same events for karma until specific events were nerfed, the same thing is happening with laurels. People go to areas they know are likely to be populated with dead NPC’s just to get the daily healer done, or fling themselves from tall places for their friends.

Exactly, I farm 2 level 1-15 areas for all my laurels. I never move because it’s too hard to find the ‘job’ needed in unfamiliar areas.

I still think dailies/monthlies should be xp based not task based.

I doubt he has anything left…

“laurels as rewards for events”

This would fix the thread I just opened earlier where I said the new system doesn’t promote exploration, nice.

Immortality.5093:

For months now i have been trying to get my dusk, i have thrown over 2000 Greatswords down the mystic toilet

So we’re progressing the same in terms of getting a legendary, the difference is I’ve put 0 effort into it… I hope you get it eventually.

Before I start I would like to say this is not a complaint, just an observation.

I assume the changes to the dailies were intended to promote exploration of the game and get people out of LA, and it did for me, briefly.

I won’t lie, I don’t like doing the dailies at all, but I do want the laurels for ascended gear. I spend most of my time in WvW so the sooner I can get these things out of the way the better. So what did I do? I positioned a couple of my Alts in 2 areas in the world so each day I spend about 10 minutes in total to complete the dailies.

For example, I put 1 in Metrica Province where the golems need healing, its also next to the water for underwater kills and a couple of events. I also have 1 in Divinity’s Reach for the events with the water pipes which happens very often. I’ve found that I can camp these 2 areas to get all my dailies. I know I could get some of the things done in WvW (like the heals) but when you’re following the commander’s orders you can’t always get heals, gatherings, kill variety etc. This way I can concentrate on my WvW without being sidetracked. Personally I would rather the daily achievement be a xp achievement so you could do it in any part of the game doing whatever you chose.

I have a different view on monthlies as I’m slowly appreciating Dungeons more and more. I joined some pugs in CoF today which was loads more fun than the others I’ve tried and I’m sure as I get more confident in them I may enjoy them even more. Who knows I might get some dungeon exotics to replace my ugly WvW exotics one day. :P

Just wanted to share my thoughts on the new system and how I complete them.

Sartori.1960:

lol, you can get to lvl 80 in less then a day if you wanted. All you have to do is buy crafting mats, some xp boost’s, and sit and craft all the way to 80

I wish I knew how to do this but I can’t work out how to efficiently craft, it always bleeds me dry of all my gold and I end up only level 15-20ish…

I think to fix the issue dailies/monthlies and their rewards could be soulbound. If you want your Warrior decked out with ascended gear then it is the Warrior that does the daily. Then on the same day if your Ranger wants ascended gear this toon can do the daily and get their own reward and so on.

This is still taking the same time to get ascended gear for 1 toon and still takes 6 time the work to get said gear, however, you can get the gear for all toons in 1 month instead of 6.

Would this work?

DarthBenedict.3410:

StormageddonBK.9842:

DarthBenedict.3410:

It’s frustration that we’re still getting matchups decided by coverage this far into the games lifetime. WvW is a lot more fun when the battles mean something, and the keeps you take aren’t guaranteed to be lost every night through no fault of any of your players. Some players blame that on the server with more coverage because they are not very intelligent people.

Please explain… o.O

I’m saying that trashing a server for having timezone coverage is stupid, not that having timezone coverage is stupid.

OK, thanks.

DarthBenedict.3410:

It’s frustration that we’re still getting matchups decided by coverage this far into the games lifetime. WvW is a lot more fun when the battles mean something, and the keeps you take aren’t guaranteed to be lost every night through no fault of any of your players. Some players blame that on the server with more coverage because they are not very intelligent people.

Please explain… o.O