Guild Wars 2

Most block skills also have a side effect if they fail to block.
You should only use the block skills when you know the enemy is about to hit.
Many of the block skills allow you to move. In fact I don’t know which block skills root you in place. Can you name the block skills that root you in place?

Kuzzi.2198:

Swoo.5079:

Kuzzi.2198:

Swoo.5079:

Jski.6180:

A good and much needed system in GW2 is a timer on ppl active. So if a person has no rep for x number of day the guild leader can look and see what going on maybe kicking the person to asking the person how they could make a better guild. We could go as far as added in a system of last time logged on.
A guild is only as good as it members so the rewards should be build in now there should be guild aimed events to build up infuses for there guild leading to guild events.

That is exactly the reason they don’t have the system in when they have it in GW1.

Individual power.

As a result, we have people in our guild who haven’t logged in since August.

If that bother you kick them (even invite back in case it might be a mistake).
What is the problem?

There is no last login feature so I don’t know if they logged in yesterday while I was sleeping.

So in fact you don’t know if they have logged in or not since August because you don’t know them – all that a guild is about.

Still, kick the ones you don’t know and invite back. If they are logging in they will accept it back (or not).

Kuzzi.2198:

Swoo.5079:

Jski.6180:

A good and much needed system in GW2 is a timer on ppl active. So if a person has no rep for x number of day the guild leader can look and see what going on maybe kicking the person to asking the person how they could make a better guild. We could go as far as added in a system of last time logged on.
A guild is only as good as it members so the rewards should be build in now there should be guild aimed events to build up infuses for there guild leading to guild events.

That is exactly the reason they don’t have the system in when they have it in GW1.

Individual power.

As a result, we have people in our guild who haven’t logged in since August.

If that bother you kick them (even invite back in case it might be a mistake).
What is the problem?

Jski.6180:

A good and much needed system in GW2 is a timer on ppl active. So if a person has no rep for x number of day the guild leader can look and see what going on maybe kicking the person to asking the person how they could make a better guild. We could go as far as added in a system of last time logged on.
A guild is only as good as it members so the rewards should be build in now there should be guild aimed events to build up infuses for there guild leading to guild events.

That is exactly the reason they don’t have the system in when they have it in GW1.

Individual power.

NerdyMike.2695:

As Arena Net has said in the past – Ascended Gear has meant to be in the game from the get-go, but due to certain constraints they were not able to put it in. From a programmer / developer’s point of view I totally sympathise with them. However, since the Ascended Gear was meant to be in from the start, and it’s slowly been working its way in, let’s go ahead and get the initial gear in first (like Valkyrie) and then work on the newer stat combinations (Example: Power / Toughness / Crit. Damage).

Just my two cents.

I’m sure time constrains play a part.
I’m also sure ascended items weren’t meant to be in the game from the get go. Look how all the ascended items (aside back slot) are items that have no display effect.

That is why they added items with higher stats – it is easier than having to do an awesome looking armor and it is a try to capture the vertical progression crowd (good luck with that) while also “forcing” the horizontal crowd have to grind them (which is unnecessary since we were happy getting legendaries or playing alts).

Ecto is a currency for Arenanet.

Adding more uses for it is Anet way of keep its purchasing power since “coin” keeps losing value due to expansion of supply.

If you want to keep your purchasing power you trade your coin into ectos.

Think of ecto as real life gold – its a natural occurring currency that has other uses. The difference is that ecto has an infinite supply where gold is finite in Earth soil, so Anet needs to add sinks to remove ectos and keep its worth.

What happened to dye drops is that they are random.

Yesterday I got two rare ones with my level 20 Asura Ele.
Today I got 2 uncommon with my level 4 human guardian during the same personal story mission and a common with the said level 20 Asura.

Nerth.3940:

Swoo.5079:

Nerth.3940:

It doesn’t matter, mutiny has never worked in any game apart from EvE Online because of studio-publisher relationship. CCP is the developer and the publisher of the game. They care because their studio existence is directly linked to player subs.

NC Soft makes a killing in Korea and EA is still making a killing despite all the player rage against them. Go figure.

Actually NC Soft shares took a 50% hit in the last 12 months, http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/036570:KS .

Likewise EA stocks dropped 33% in the last 12 months, http://www.google.com/finance?cid=168725 .

So, neither will be happy.

Investors won’t be happy but stock market is a sham anyway. Regardless of their stock price they are still making a killing in profit but we’re derailing the conversation so let’s get back on topic or this thread will be locked in a blink of an eye.

Sure but there profits shrunk quite a bit last few quarters (aside the latest with GW2 and B&S).

Nerth.3940:

It doesn’t matter, mutiny has never worked in any game apart from EvE Online because of studio-publisher relationship. CCP is the developer and the publisher of the game. They care because their studio existence is directly linked to player subs.

NC Soft makes a killing in Korea and EA is still making a killing despite all the player rage against them. Go figure.

Actually NC Soft shares took a 50% hit in the last 12 months, http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/036570:KS .

Likewise EA stocks dropped 33% in the last 12 months, http://www.google.com/finance?cid=168725 .

So, neither will be happy.

If you guys want coverage, what you need to do is a protest in game, that be recorded, streamed, screen shoted.

Avatar.1923:

its like Magic the Gathering.

if you could buy every card you want, it would be cheaper than buying booster packs and hoping to get it.
and it would also make the trading post more dead, as everybody would only have what they really want/need.
smart and fun business move id say.

this aint the problem.

GEAR TREADMILL and ELITISM is the problem.

That is why smart people buy singles.
That is why most smart people won’t touch those RNG chests even if they have a chance for a Legendary weapon.

Sovta.4719:

DegoLocc.5976:

Anishor.6921:

DegoLocc.5976:

Donkey here! HEEEEHAWWWW!

I love the end game gear progression. Hitting a wall and never growing from 80 is a horribad idea in my opinion.

So why aren’t you playing one of the games designed for vertical progression from the get go. That have a lot more content for you to run through?

Rift? TOR? WOW? Aion?

Because all those games suck? And it has nothing to do with their gear progression. LOL.

The only game I can think of that did gear progression, and did it horribly wrong and that’s why it failed, was WARHAMMER online.

And I’m here because unlike you, I’m happy with gw2. “Why are you still here?” would be the better question?

We are here cause forums are now much more fun then game

Yeah, I had never posted in these forums before last week.

GADefence.5634:

“They won’t have a kneejerk decision, I’m sure there’s going to be multiple meetings for this current situation before they address the customers.”

Like the kneejerk reaction they didn’t have to adding an armor tier?

Nexon is on board and so is an ex-veteran of Mapple Story cash shop.

Hardcore grinding or cash is the way Nexon does money with titles like Vindictus.

I’ve spent €0 in titles like that.
My signature says what I’m doing in GW2.

Wintyre Fraust.6534:

http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/11/19/flameseeker-chronicles-guild-wars-2s-lost-shores-recap/

Elisabeth Cardy just put up a “Lost Shores” recap article at massively. She doesn’t even mention the Ascended armor debacle, or this thread.

I mean … really? It’s not even worth mentioning?

Have you seen the last gamebreaker.tv Guild’s Cast?
She thinks it is nothing and she actually was dissing the critics of this as “doom and gloom looneys”, “forums vocal minority”, etc, until the other dudes started talking and none of them were in favour of this, and then she always tried to say this is nothing but none of others actually followed her train of thought.

3-1 in the show that had mildly concerns or worse. The “vocal minority” is everywhere.

ProphetSword.5427:

Okay, I’m confused about these statements, so please clarify. (And no, I’m not trying to be snarky, I really want you to clarify):

Swoo.5079:

These players like their proficiency in the game to be determined only by their own skill.

To achieve that, these players need best in slot items, otherwise they feel kittened.

Why do players who want their proficiency in the game to be determined by their own skill need the best in slot items?

I like to think I’m a skilled player. I’m always figuring out new ways to use skills, actively using my dodging abilities and figuring out the best way to do things with each profession…but I don’t feel I always need the best gear to get along.

Am I different set of player or did I miss something?

Playing in a grass field over a gravel field won’t make you a better footballer, but if you are a better footballer the grass field will help you to show and develop your skill.

So the difference it to being best (and have that seen in the game) instead of going along.

I’ve no problems doing wacky things like naked runs or 2 or 3 mans runs, but that is self imposed challenge instead of a design that either forces me to grind a ton, spend money or have a handicap.

I don’t like handicaps of that nature imposed to me in a game I fully paid for – that is why I don’t play WoW, I don’t play SWTOR or I don’t play Vindictus and another host of games.

Different likes and tastes.

Shootsfoot.9276:

Swoo.5079:

Shootsfoot.9276:

This is exactly what I’ve been wondering about. It seems a vast majority of the complaints come from self-proclaimed “casuals” who say they have very little time for game play due to family, job, what have you…I can understand this. With a wife and two kids, I FULLY understand this, especially when travel baseball season kicks in.

That being said, if they have so little time to play, I’m not understanding how adding a gear level between exotic and legendary levels affects these people in the least.

Let me explain these players to you.

These players like their proficiency in the game to be determined only by their own skill.
These players like to fine tune their characters to be the most efficient possible.

To achieve that, these players need best in slot items, otherwise they feel kittened.
These players either don’t have much time or they like to play different builds and/or characters.

Easy to get bis mean they can achieve all of the above.
Keep increasing the amount of grind required to get bis items and they can’t anymore.

GW1 and GW2 pre ascended allowed for that.
GW2 after lost shores might not allow for that.

You don’t care about this style of play or these players?
It is your right.

It is also the right of these players that have played GW1 for 7 years and have bought GW2 that promised to keep catering for this style of play,to complain and defend the play style they prefer.

shrug

Ok. I just asked. But your response is pretty typical of those aggravated. You automatically dismiss me as “not caring,” which pretty much makes me dismiss your opinion as well.

Just a thought.

It isn’t dismissing.
Loads of people whined about not having anything to do once reaching level 80 and getting exotics.

I had loads of stuff to do in game, so that was a problem not affecting me so I could care less.

And if you dismiss the explanation I give you of course you won’t understand, caring or not.

Shootsfoot.9276:

This is exactly what I’ve been wondering about. It seems a vast majority of the complaints come from self-proclaimed “casuals” who say they have very little time for game play due to family, job, what have you…I can understand this. With a wife and two kids, I FULLY understand this, especially when travel baseball season kicks in.

That being said, if they have so little time to play, I’m not understanding how adding a gear level between exotic and legendary levels affects these people in the least.

Let me explain these players to you.

These players like their proficiency in the game to be determined only by their own skill.
These players like to fine tune their characters to be the most efficient possible.

To achieve that, these players need best in slot items, otherwise they feel kittened.
These players either don’t have much time or they like to play different builds and/or characters.

Easy to get bis mean they can achieve all of the above.
Keep increasing the amount of grind required to get bis items and they can’t anymore.

GW1 and GW2 pre ascended allowed for that.
GW2 after lost shores might not allow for that.

You don’t care about this style of play or these players?
It is your right.

It is also the right of these players that have played GW1 for 7 years and have bought GW2 that promised to keep catering for this style of play,to complain and defend the play style they prefer.

Any smart person will run MF gear.

What is the downside of running MF gear?
Gives the best personal reward.
If others are using MF, well so are you so you aren’t carrying them. If the others aren’t using MF, good for you, your group is stronger and you gaining max rewards at max speed.

This kind of situation is called the Prisioner’s Dilemma http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner%27s_dilemma.

Nayru.4537:

You are 100% right. But you have to face facts. No amount of complaining will change it. It happens with most games. They start off great, and the developers either lose their touch or sell out. It’s happened to great game franchises. Resident Evil, Zelda, Dino Crisis and Pokémon to name a few.

GW1 was a great game. Just be glad you enjoyed it and move on. I, like most people, had high hopes for GW2. But when I completed it and realised it was terrible in every aspect (imo), I quit the game and never went back.

There are other amazing games out there. Stop wasting your time whining. Just some advice.

Didn’t you get the memo?
Whining in forums is called feedback now and they lead to changes.
(at least if those changes reflect what was already decided by someone, I just hope the results expected by the change are the complete opposite – I’m doing my part and stop my €15-20 monthly gem purchases)

Roven Leafsong.8917:

axiology.5807:

Used to be intrinsically motivated to play the game (playing game for the enjoyment of game itself), now extrinsically motivated to play the game (playing game to get loot). Extrinsic motivation doesn’t last, requires continuous supply of carrots.

That’s quite interesting.

If you didn’t need any reward but the enjoyment of gameplay before, and the gameplay hasn’t changed, why does the extra reward matter now? Is it instead your perceptions of the same gameplay or the game itself that have changed, and if so, did they change before or after the patch was released?

Is it possible you were also extrinsically motivated before, which is why changes to ‘maximum’ stats, gear and power levels matter at all?

The fact is that how a player perceptions a game is important.

Does one stops to resurrect someone just because of the XP reward?
No, but the reward being there certainly helps – the game is acknowledging that you are playing it correctly.

Likewise mobs being shared, loot for everyone, etc, creates an environment of no competition and that pushes it to cooperation.

The game gives bigger rewards to those playing fractals.
What does that tell you?

The Guild Wars franchise has always been about skill over time spent farming items.
Skill is the only factor only when all the rest is equal.
The longer/harder is to reach that max stats plateau the less the game is about skill and the longer it is about items.

Sure you aren’t competing against others in PvE – you still want to show how good you are and not (that guy doesn’t die because he spent hundreds of hours farming those items that give him the edge or spent money to buy the edge).

Way of releasing awesome, beautiful content and ruin my enthusiasm for it in the same day.

Creslin.1758:

Swoo.5079:

Creslin.1758:

Still not seeing it.

If gear progression is the antithesis of GW2, then answer me…why does exotic gear exist? Why does rare gear exist? Gear progression is ALREADY IN GW2. There is really no disputing this.

All their statements mean is that gear that takes an extremely long amount of time to acquire (Legendaries) should not offer a statistical advantage, and that people should play the game for fun and not to chase carrot after carrot…and I agree with them completely. Nowhere in their statements do they say that gear progression will not be part of GW2. And I mean, this should be obvious considering that it IS a part of GW2 already.

Finally, for argument’s sake, I would like to ask…would you have a problem with Ascended items if they are only marginally more difficult to acquire than exotics? And if so, then why don’t you have a problem with exotics, or even rares?

A couple of things.

They are adding this because they say some people hit a wall in character progression.
Q: How is adding a new gear tier will stop them from hitting the “new wall”?
Q: After people hitting a new wall and become bored how are they going to solve the boredom those players feel from having no character progression?
Q: If the above question has an answer other than adding higher stats gear, why not applying it now?

Yes, some people had problems with master work, rares, exotic business.
They ignored it because getting the exotics proved to be not very hard and obtainable by several methods.
Still Anet already increased dungeon rewards and Karma gains via Jugs of Liquid Karma.
Now Anet is adding a new tier that will be harder to obtain – their words.
In fact, they will spread the release of the full item tier to give time for people to obtain them.

The sad part is the players that don’t care about higher stats will be the ones playing GW2, the ones that care about the stats don’t care so much about the stats but the exclusiveness of those items.

Maybe that will be the next change in GW2.

All those questions are speculative and basically a “slippery slope” argument…we’ll just have to see what happens int he future.

Also, I am actually not happy about this change, despite the fact that my more recent posts have been defending it. But I’m not happy about it mainly because it means my exotics are second-rate, which sucks. I’m just arguing against people that are saying that ANet lied or broke their promise, or broke their heart or whatever, because all that melodramatic crap is based on a misinterpretation of Colin’s article.

So while I’m not happy about this change…I don’t think it’s a “betrayal” as some folks are trying to make it out to be.

I’m not being emotive though (some are).
I don’t like this direction and what they wrote points to something worse (speculation or not) – I’m not even bashing Agony and Infusion (they could do Agony and Infusion without touching gear tiers, though).

I expect MTG/LoL/DOTA evolution not Power Creep.

Creslin.1758:

Still not seeing it.

If gear progression is the antithesis of GW2, then answer me…why does exotic gear exist? Why does rare gear exist? Gear progression is ALREADY IN GW2. There is really no disputing this.

All their statements mean is that gear that takes an extremely long amount of time to acquire (Legendaries) should not offer a statistical advantage, and that people should play the game for fun and not to chase carrot after carrot…and I agree with them completely. Nowhere in their statements do they say that gear progression will not be part of GW2. And I mean, this should be obvious considering that it IS a part of GW2 already.

Finally, for argument’s sake, I would like to ask…would you have a problem with Ascended items if they are only marginally more difficult to acquire than exotics? And if so, then why don’t you have a problem with exotics, or even rares?

A couple of things.

They are adding this because they say some people hit a wall in character progression.
Q: How is adding a new gear tier will stop them from hitting the “new wall”?
Q: After people hitting a new wall and become bored how are they going to solve the boredom those players feel from having no character progression?
Q: If the above question has an answer other than adding higher stats gear, why not applying it now?

Yes, some people had problems with master work, rares, exotic business.
They ignored it because getting the exotics proved to be not very hard and obtainable by several methods.
Still Anet already increased dungeon rewards and Karma gains via Jugs of Liquid Karma.
Now Anet is adding a new tier that will be harder to obtain – their words.
In fact, they will spread the release of the full item tier to give time for people to obtain them.

The sad part is the players that don’t care about higher stats will be the ones playing GW2, the ones that care about the stats don’t care so much about the stats but the exclusiveness of those items.

Maybe that will be the next change in GW2.

ArcTheFallen.7682:

Swoo.5079:

Kript.3291:

Swoo.5079:

Kript.3291:

Swoo.5079:

Kana.6793:

My guild has over 400 members. All I’ve seen in game are people excited about the new dungeon and people debating whether or not infusions mean the mursaat are about to make a comeback.

People in LA map chat and dungeon pugs are playing as normal. The only place I’ve seen hysterical rage about the patch is on these forums.

Plus they’ve already said there will not be a new tier of gear every 3 months, there will only be Ascended and Legendaries added. It’s not a gear treadmill.

They have said before that exotics would be the highest stat tier, that the game wasn’t about collecting stronger gear, etc.

They backtracked on that, how do I know they won’t backtrack on this new statement either?

That is the problem of backtracking on fundamental core principles, whatever you say next about philosophies and whatnot is meaningless.

We won’t know if the Ascended gear are going to be stronger until it actually comes out. As far as I’m concerned, it is a set of armor that’s actually worse than exotic because it is incapable of carrying rune set bonus. It is meant to be use as something of a gating gear for the new type of dungeon, which consisted 9 mini dungeon within the dungeon itself.

Do continue to speculate though. I’ve done my part and I’m now going back to the game. Hanging about forum is against my philosophy. Next time my brother wants me to do it I’ll just let him use my account.

We don’t know?

They show a Ascendant counter part to exotics that has higher stats and it has the jewels stats as inherent bonuses, just Higher.

They say legendaries will be upgraded to reflect ascendant stats, since legendary are to remain the bis.

They say ascendant is a new tier to bridge exotic and legendary.

What else do you need?
Do you need to be shot to know a bullet will hurt?

Not even going to bother with this weak post.

The fact that you missed the crucial part of the screenshot – which is lack of rune set bonus on those ascended gears – makes you unworthy of response. No one knows whats gonna go in those infusion slot yet. We only know Ascended gears have better base stats. Does that make them better? who knows? Are you a dev?

I’m done. I’m not gonna sit here and reply to everyone who couldn’t be bothered to double check the screenshot and shot down every whine-bot I ever come across. The forum is filled to the brim with the likes of you.

Go on, spend your day saying the same thing over and over again. Huddle around each other like the worlds ending and your the last of the mankind that’s carrying a dying fire. To an outsider, you are all just whiners anyway.

Rings have no rune slots.

Fact: the ascendant ring in the picture is better than the exotic ring in the picture.

Fact: upgrade components could outweight infusion slot components. It’s a mix between power and usability. I can use sigils to attack flame legion specifically and it’s more powerful for me in CoF. But it would be useless in a place like Queensdale. Just saying there’s ambiguity.

Fact: there is no existing upgrade slot applied to the exotic ring able to out stat the ascendant ring.
Fact: Anet said ascendant items are stronger than exotic counterparts.

Fact: You can’t apply sigils to rings.
Fact: Legendary items are bis and will be updated to match ascendant items. if your case is true then the legendary weapon would be weaker than exotics weapns. that directly contradicts what was said.

Kript.3291:

Swoo.5079:

Kript.3291:

Swoo.5079:

Kana.6793:

My guild has over 400 members. All I’ve seen in game are people excited about the new dungeon and people debating whether or not infusions mean the mursaat are about to make a comeback.

People in LA map chat and dungeon pugs are playing as normal. The only place I’ve seen hysterical rage about the patch is on these forums.

Plus they’ve already said there will not be a new tier of gear every 3 months, there will only be Ascended and Legendaries added. It’s not a gear treadmill.

They have said before that exotics would be the highest stat tier, that the game wasn’t about collecting stronger gear, etc.

They backtracked on that, how do I know they won’t backtrack on this new statement either?

That is the problem of backtracking on fundamental core principles, whatever you say next about philosophies and whatnot is meaningless.

We won’t know if the Ascended gear are going to be stronger until it actually comes out. As far as I’m concerned, it is a set of armor that’s actually worse than exotic because it is incapable of carrying rune set bonus. It is meant to be use as something of a gating gear for the new type of dungeon, which consisted 9 mini dungeon within the dungeon itself.

Do continue to speculate though. I’ve done my part and I’m now going back to the game. Hanging about forum is against my philosophy. Next time my brother wants me to do it I’ll just let him use my account.

We don’t know?

They show a Ascendant counter part to exotics that has higher stats and it has the jewels stats as inherent bonuses, just Higher.

They say legendaries will be upgraded to reflect ascendant stats, since legendary are to remain the bis.

They say ascendant is a new tier to bridge exotic and legendary.

What else do you need?
Do you need to be shot to know a bullet will hurt?

Not even going to bother with this weak post.

The fact that you missed the crucial part of the screenshot – which is lack of rune set bonus on those ascended gears – makes you unworthy of response. No one knows whats gonna go in those infusion slot yet. We only know Ascended gears have better base stats. Does that make them better? who knows? Are you a dev?

I’m done. I’m not gonna sit here and reply to everyone who couldn’t be bothered to double check the screenshot and shot down every whine-bot I ever come across. The forum is filled to the brim with the likes of you.

Go on, spend your day saying the same thing over and over again. Huddle around each other like the worlds ending and your the last of the mankind that’s carrying a dying fire. To an outsider, you are all just whiners anyway.

Rings have no rune slots.

Fact: the ascendant ring in the picture is better than the exotic ring in the picture.

Kript.3291:

Swoo.5079:

Kana.6793:

My guild has over 400 members. All I’ve seen in game are people excited about the new dungeon and people debating whether or not infusions mean the mursaat are about to make a comeback.

People in LA map chat and dungeon pugs are playing as normal. The only place I’ve seen hysterical rage about the patch is on these forums.

Plus they’ve already said there will not be a new tier of gear every 3 months, there will only be Ascended and Legendaries added. It’s not a gear treadmill.

They have said before that exotics would be the highest stat tier, that the game wasn’t about collecting stronger gear, etc.

They backtracked on that, how do I know they won’t backtrack on this new statement either?

That is the problem of backtracking on fundamental core principles, whatever you say next about philosophies and whatnot is meaningless.

We won’t know if the Ascended gear are going to be stronger until it actually comes out. As far as I’m concerned, it is a set of armor that’s actually worse than exotic because it is incapable of carrying rune set bonus. It is meant to be use as something of a gating gear for the new type of dungeon, which consisted 9 mini dungeon within the dungeon itself.

Do continue to speculate though. I’ve done my part and I’m now going back to the game. Hanging about forum is against my philosophy. Next time my brother wants me to do it I’ll just let him use my account.

We don’t know?

They show an Ascendant ring and its current exotic counter part, that has higher stats and it has the jewels stats as inherent bonuses, just Higher.

They say legendaries will be upgraded to reflect ascendant stats, since legendary are to remain the bis.

They say ascendant is a new tier to bridge exotic and legendary.

What else do you need?
Do you need to be shot to know a bullet will hurt?

There is benefit of doubt and there is refusal of reality.

Kana.6793:

My guild has over 400 members. All I’ve seen in game are people excited about the new dungeon and people debating whether or not infusions mean the mursaat are about to make a comeback.

People in LA map chat and dungeon pugs are playing as normal. The only place I’ve seen hysterical rage about the patch is on these forums.

Plus they’ve already said there will not be a new tier of gear every 3 months, there will only be Ascended and Legendaries added. It’s not a gear treadmill.

They have said before that exotics would be the highest stat tier, that the game wasn’t about collecting stronger gear, etc.

They backtracked on that, how do I know they won’t backtrack on this new statement either?

That is the problem of backtracking on fundamental core principles, whatever you say next about philosophies and whatnot is meaningless.

Exactly Vengus.

Lets use something in game.

Imagine the adept manual is exotic and the grandmaster manual is legendary.
I need to buy them in order, so I spend 10s and then 2g. Total 2g10s.

Now I add master manual (ascendant) to bridge the huge disparity in price between exotic and legendary.

Now I have to buy adept, master and grandmaster manuals for a total of 3g10s.

Wow much easier to get legendaries by adding something else to spend additional resources in.

How many of us would buy the master manual if the grandmaster manual didn’t require it?

How many of us will spend time/resources in exotics knowing ascendant are out?

And of course the same crowd that complained that legendaries are a waste of time because they are the same stats will say the same about them since they have the same stats as ascendant.

I thought the reward jump from exotic to legendary was nil.
Apparently it was massive.

If a 0 stats jump is massive, how do we classify a +10% stat jump?

exphryl.3857:

So there is fancy new armor with “better” stats where I can’t use my Runes that I typically used over stats anyway?

I have to grind this armor in the dungeon where the armor is needed and will be there anyway?

I’m failing to see what all the fuss is about.

You are missing the little fact that the items without any upgrades are better than the items with upgrades.

Basically the Ascendant tier WITHOUT UPGRADES is HIGHER STATS than the Exotic tier WITH UPGRADES

MrLee.6892:

Swoo.5079:

MrLee.6892:

veritech.1048:

MrLee.6892:

Rhyaehar.9504:

MrLee.6892:

Conner.4702:

FACT: It’s a gear treadmill as it requires new gear with new upgrades
FACT: They stated they will add new infusions, which will require a new grind
FACT: Gear treadmill = Gear treadmill. Doesn’t matter if it is vertical or horizontal.
FACT: They said they would not put in a gear treadmill
FACT: They stated they wanted everyone to be able to do all content, which is impossible when you add gated content

FACT: If you don’t like it you can go play Guild Wars 1

How about..
FACT: If you don’t like games without vertical gear progression, you shouldn’t have bought game clearly advertised as not having one and yourself go play something else?
You’d have much more to choose from anyway, since every MMO out there has it.

Instead, everyone who dislikes gear treadmill now ends up in a game with one anyway.

To have a gear treadmill there must be several sets of gear every few months.. There is ONLY going to be ascended rank gear, not multiple sets.! If you would have read what Chris Whiteside said you woudn’t be over-reacting like you are now.

Just stop and learn the facts first before you start typing.

Also if you don’t want to play a game that never changes and always stays the same, then go back to Guild Wars 1.
And wither you like it or not, people have asked for this change. So there are quite a few people happy for it. It’s coming and there isn’t anything you can do about it.

Chris Whiteside.6102:
I’d like to respond to concerns players have raised about ascended items. Please keep in mind that we’re releasing this as one portion of a massive November update that introduces and improves many aspects of challenge, progression, and rewards. With this and upcoming updates, we view ourselves as introducing large amounts of content with supporting systems and features, akin to an expansion pack, building on Guild Wars 2 through a series of live releases. So it’s important for us to be able to add an expansion pack’s worth of progression and rewards to support that content.
Our goal is not to create a gear treadmill. Our goal is to ensure we have a proper progression for players from exotic up to legendary without a massive jump in reward between the two. We will slowly add the remaining ascended gear items and legendary items in future updates to allow people time to acquire them as we add exciting new content that deserves exciting rewards. We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on.
Ascended and infusion rewards will be available in both PvE and WvW over time, and be made available through all sorts of content around the world including existing content. PvP will remain unaffected to ensure our intended PvP balance going forward. We are also working on other reward and progression systems for the game that tie into current and new content and features. As you know we care very much about your support and opinion and are listening intently to what you say.
Finally we look forward to hearing your thoughts on the upcoming content, and we will ensure we share our thoughts with you on the experiences we share in the Lost Shores.
Chris Whiteside – Studio Design Director

And tell me why should we believe them after they already lied to us?

And there is no way of spinning this to be anything than what it is, an outright lie to the playerbase.

You didn’t get lied too just stop it.

ArenaNet is a business, then made a decision that they think bests suits them for the game. company and the players.
Ya we get it, you don’t agree with their decision so your going to shout, yell, stomp your feet until you get “heard”.
Pretty much the same thing as my 10 year old daughter would do.

No, we also have wallets.
And them can remain closed.

And word of mouth can be negative instead of positive

NO BS, but I know of 10 people who quit GW2 because of being bored at 80 in the last 2-3 weeks. They have been watching info about The Lost Island patch and when they found out that there was going to be some kind of gear progression and a new dungeon, they will be coming back to check it out on the 15th.

So their wallets are going to open back up, just because of gear progression. And if they like it more will come.

So actually you are saying shouting does work.

So it is a question of seeing or hearing who shouts louder.

Pissing off players that are currently playing vs catering to player that leave once they reach max stats and which return isn’t guaranteed at all.

Hmm, how many tiers will Anet have to add to keep that kind of people playing?
Seems wise.

MrLee.6892:

veritech.1048:

MrLee.6892:

Rhyaehar.9504:

MrLee.6892:

Conner.4702:

FACT: It’s a gear treadmill as it requires new gear with new upgrades
FACT: They stated they will add new infusions, which will require a new grind
FACT: Gear treadmill = Gear treadmill. Doesn’t matter if it is vertical or horizontal.
FACT: They said they would not put in a gear treadmill
FACT: They stated they wanted everyone to be able to do all content, which is impossible when you add gated content

FACT: If you don’t like it you can go play Guild Wars 1

How about..
FACT: If you don’t like games without vertical gear progression, you shouldn’t have bought game clearly advertised as not having one and yourself go play something else?
You’d have much more to choose from anyway, since every MMO out there has it.

Instead, everyone who dislikes gear treadmill now ends up in a game with one anyway.

To have a gear treadmill there must be several sets of gear every few months.. There is ONLY going to be ascended rank gear, not multiple sets.! If you would have read what Chris Whiteside said you woudn’t be over-reacting like you are now.

Just stop and learn the facts first before you start typing.

Also if you don’t want to play a game that never changes and always stays the same, then go back to Guild Wars 1.
And wither you like it or not, people have asked for this change. So there are quite a few people happy for it. It’s coming and there isn’t anything you can do about it.

Chris Whiteside.6102:
I’d like to respond to concerns players have raised about ascended items. Please keep in mind that we’re releasing this as one portion of a massive November update that introduces and improves many aspects of challenge, progression, and rewards. With this and upcoming updates, we view ourselves as introducing large amounts of content with supporting systems and features, akin to an expansion pack, building on Guild Wars 2 through a series of live releases. So it’s important for us to be able to add an expansion pack’s worth of progression and rewards to support that content.
Our goal is not to create a gear treadmill. Our goal is to ensure we have a proper progression for players from exotic up to legendary without a massive jump in reward between the two. We will slowly add the remaining ascended gear items and legendary items in future updates to allow people time to acquire them as we add exciting new content that deserves exciting rewards. We will not be adding a new tier of gear every 3 months that we expect everyone to chase after and then get the next set and so on.
Ascended and infusion rewards will be available in both PvE and WvW over time, and be made available through all sorts of content around the world including existing content. PvP will remain unaffected to ensure our intended PvP balance going forward. We are also working on other reward and progression systems for the game that tie into current and new content and features. As you know we care very much about your support and opinion and are listening intently to what you say.
Finally we look forward to hearing your thoughts on the upcoming content, and we will ensure we share our thoughts with you on the experiences we share in the Lost Shores.
Chris Whiteside – Studio Design Director

And tell me why should we believe them after they already lied to us?

And there is no way of spinning this to be anything than what it is, an outright lie to the playerbase.

You didn’t get lied too just stop it.

ArenaNet is a business, then made a decision that they think bests suits them for the game. company and the players.
Ya we get it, you don’t agree with their decision so your going to shout, yell, stomp your feet until you get “heard”.
Pretty much the same thing as my 10 year old daughter would do.

No, we also have wallets.
And them can remain closed.

And word of mouth can be negative instead of positive

Sam.4728:

Has anyone considered how best to stage a protest? We can’t picket their offices like with politics, since we’re a global group. They are pretty much ignoring player feedback on the forums (the PR-spin answers that try to dodge the issue do not count as honest consideration). So what to do?

I have a proposal: during the release of the new content, we all go back to playing GW1.

Just leaving the game is a statistic they can’t distinguish from the locusts moving on.
Playing GW1 makes it clear that their core player base isn’t happy with the new GW2 direction and wants the GW1 system back.

Probably it would be too hard to organize enough people to do this, though.

Well I’m stopping buying gems with money.
Other option for protests could be:
- Not giving the RAF codes;
- Mass logging at pre-determined hours in a major town (like Divinity’s Reach) shouting something like “new gear tiers? no thank you!”.

Adding content is great.
Adding the new gear tier is a good way to ruin a good thing.

If something is not max stats, it is junk, merchant fodder.

When I get a non level 80 exotic or a level 74+ rare I go “Yay. ectos”.
Whenever I get an upgrade while levelling I don’t feel any special happiness.

When ascendant items are available for all the slots level 80 exotics will be just another temporary item.

ArcTheFallen.7682:

No, you guys have no loyalty. Whether someone betrays you are not, you should still be loyal if you are say you are loyal. Whether the people who left were loyal to begin with, they’ll continue to play if it’s a good game and that’s what Anet is working on. They are going to give it a chance at every corner and come back at new releases. But for you “loyal” fans who are leaving after this one release. Overtime, the people who leave and comeback will overrule how much you’ve put into the game.

I’m not leaving the game.

There is a lot of stuff I want to do in it still.

I’m not spending more money in the cash shop, though. (€50 so far, which is 3 months worth of subs in a game that isn’t 3 months old and they generally come with 1 month).

Buying the expansion will be dependent of what path Anet will take.

piitb.7635:

If Arenanet released legendary armor tomorrow, players would complain ascended gear isn’t strong enough.

You know there are expectations.

I didn’t blow my karma in certain items because I knew there were certain other items I wanted.

i didn’t spend gold on exotic level 74 weapons because I shot for level 80 exotics.

A core of expectations about GW2 is that gear wont become obsolete with a patch, it was that grind would be cosmetic.

ArcTheFallen.7682:

So basically, the majority of this game does not want us to be able to get better things to kill the same things they are killing.

WvW does not count, it’s about tactics and zerging. And we do not have PvP let alone 1v1 PvP. Come on guys, we all have that opportunity to get better to fight off the risen or whatnot, I feel like there’s a Zhaitan conspiracy amongst players. They do not want us to be able to fight new enemies.

You can fight new enemies.
Hopefully new enemies just fight better.

Apparently they are as smart or dumb as current enemies just have higher stats.

Apparently it requires infusion to fight them – that is ok.

Just make quests/rewards that allow players to add an infusion slot to current items or upgrade current items.

What would this do?
This would allow a progression (you even have infusion defence 1, defence 2, defence 3) but this would mean the items weren’t more POWERFUL VS THE OLD ENEMIES.

Adding extra stats is trivializing old enemies – there is a reason a down levelling exists after all.

Flynch.6034:

Swoo.5079:

Flynch.6034:

It’s slightly strange that the people who are vehemently against the geargrind are the ones who are so focussed on the stat differences between gear in the first place. Normally people who are all about spreadsheeting item stats are found in games that actively promote geargrind, as opposed to a game where a percentile difference won’t make or break the experience.

If it makes no difference why bother?

The people wanting more power won’t get them and still be bored, the people not wanting a gear grind for stats will be annoyed and disappointed.

Presumably because if it doesn’t affect a majority in any way, but means a minority enjoy the progression, then that’s ok.

Apparently it does affect.

When you shift power plateau, the skill differences get washed by the gear.

Considering Ascended items are supposed to be harder to get than exotic (read grindier) it means you have to spend more time grinding items rather then acquiring secondary sets to try out different builds, rather than playing different professions to learn them.

Instead of one developing themselves as player they need to spend more time developing their characters.

Developing yourself as a player is an endless task. Developing your character is a question of spending time.

When I get the max stats I don’t find it rewarding. I’m just happy that phase of the game is done and I can focus on trying different builds, strategies and professions.

For me stats isn’t a reward – it is a requirement to have a shot at being the best player possible.

So no, Dear Linsey Murdock, I’m excited about the new content, I’m excited about the new items artwork. I’m not excited about a new item tier.

Przemek.6835:

Quick and short : when I started playing I had a feeling that people are so nice and you know … “well brained”. Now when ANet tries to do something for A LOT OF PEOPLE that were just getting bored everyone else is crying about it. What I thought is the best, turned out to be the worst, people have a mindset that if there is any gear progression they have to participate in it else they feel inferior to others that have 5% stats more. If you don’t like gear progression, even as little as ANet wants to introduce, either stay away from the new dungeon and help gear up people that want to try it out (because you will need exotics before stepping there) or go craft, farm events or do whatever you want. The game is ment to be fun, and your “fun” doesn’t have to collide with others.

“Fun” being connected to “better stats in items” is a silly notion for many of us tha picked this game (and GW1) in the first place.

I’ll link a post from a dangerous revolutionary that doesn’t want to help the people getting bored:

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/is-it-fun-colin-johanson-on-how-arenanet-measures-success/

“Fun impacts loot collection. The rarest items in the game are not more powerful than other items, so you don’t need them to be the best. The rarest items have unique looks to help your character feel that sense of accomplishment, but it’s not required to play the game. We don’t need to make mandatory gear treadmills, we make all of it optional, so those who find it fun to chase this prestigious gear can do so, but those who don’t are just as powerful and get to have fun too.” ~Colin Johanson

This guy created a game I wanted to play and I bought it.

“As we watch Guild Wars 2 mature in its Live environment, we have found that our most dedicated players were achieving their set of Exotic gear and hitting “the Legendary wall.” We designed the process of getting Legendary gear to be a long term goal, but players were ready to start on that path much sooner than we expected and were becoming frustrated with a lack of personal progression. Our desire is to create a game that is more inclusive for hardcore and casual players alike, but we don’t want to overlook the basic need for players to feel like they are progressing and growing even after hitting max level.
(…)
We have always worked hard to create a sense of satisfying progression rather than gear grind and this new item progression initiative is no exception. By adding challenging new combat mechanics to end-game content and ways to mitigate those mechanics through gear progression for high-end players, we can add personal progression without making the game feel like an endless treadmill of gear that is just out of your reach” ~Linsey Murdock

This girl isn’t.
(not trying to make a girl vs guy thread, and I know this was approved by more than just these individuals)

Flynch.6034:

It’s slightly strange that the people who are vehemently against the geargrind are the ones who are so focussed on the stat differences between gear in the first place. Normally people who are all about spreadsheeting item stats are found in games that actively promote geargrind, as opposed to a game where a percentile difference won’t make or break the experience.

If it makes no difference why bother?

The people wanting more power won’t get them and still be bored, the people not wanting a gear grind for stats will be annoyed and disappointed.

loaded.1938:

forum users are about 5% of gw2 community and the other 95% are probably looking forward to the new patch as i am just saying

It probably is, but apparently they did this change based on feedback gathered.

Since they haven’t asked me anything in game since BWE surveys I gather they did so based on forum posts.

Were you asked if you wanted a new item tier?
I wasn’t.

I didn’t post in this forum until this development – my first post was giving Anet the benefit of doubt. (Check my posting history)

I’m looking forward for new content. I’m not looking forward for new item tiers.

I bought this game knowing that:
“There will be no mandatory grind”;
“End game is all the game”.

So I was perfectly happy grinding stuff for better looking items at my own pace while I explored all the professions and several builds for each.

I also bought the game knowing “that fun is how we measure success, not some items with +1”.

Apparently they decided to change that based on player feedback.

So if screaming in a forum brings changes, I’m screaming my feedback.

And my feedback is:

“Leave the continuous gear upgrades outside. It is not fun!”

I’ll be playing, but my gem store purchases (which have been at least the cost of the game box, digital deluxe) will be halted while this change is in effect as a protest.

I was planning on buying the new miniatures for the “Lost Shore” event like I did for the Halloween event, but not anymore.

HawkMeister.4758:

Problem:
Fractal Dungeon is endless.

Agony gear is only needed in its lower levels.

Agony gear is nerfed as it can only slot infusion thingies, therefore has slightly higher stats to compensate.

Solution:
Ignore the frikken Dungeon and do what you´ve done till now.

The problem is that Ascendant gear isn’t nerfed – it is auto upgraded and then has a buff on top of that.

Additionally outside of the dungeon that player with ascendant items/legendary items (that will be equivalent to ascendant) will be more efficient than one with full exotics.

One could say that a player with full exotic is already stronger than one without.

True.

But apparently Anet is adding ascendant because exotics is too easy to get and so ascendant will be harder to get than exotic.

For casual players not interested in grinding, exotics were relatively easy to get. Ascendant will be harder to get (and don’t be mistaken, harder is grinding not higher difficulty challenge, especially because there will be crafted ascendant).

Ah, lets not ignore Ascendant with no infusion slot and Ascendant with infusion slot – how does one justify Ascendant with no infusion slot?

Fact – it is easier to do a dungeon run with full exotics with proper runes and glyphs than with white, blues, greens or yellows.

One could complain about that blue/green/yellow/orange disparity but it is silly because exotics are fairly easy/fast to get (not all exotics, but stats don’t care about appearance.

So a casual player would still be in a state of stats parity with someone with harder to get exotics and legendaries.

Now, they are adding a tier (I know it is only rings and backpacks for now, but Anet stresses exactly that it will add more in the future) that apparently exists to bridge how easy is to acquire exotics and how hard is to acquire legendaries.

So ascended will be harder to acquire than exotics and have better stats…

Additionally if the dungeons aren’t rewarding enough, what will happen to the existing dungeons?

Will they be patched to give ascended items as well?

If not, who is running the old dungeons?
Let me guess, the same that already were because they wanted the skins.

Well, if player feedback about dungeons lack of rewards and farming for skins is meaningless makes Anet to change their phylosofy so much, lets see if even more feedback against these changes make them revert it/change it.

The sad part is that the majority of players clamouring for more powerful gear wont be returning because of this.

It will be the players that were mostly satisfied that will keep playing because they enjoy several aspects of the game (like no hassle associated to big raids or no holy trinity) that will have to live with a change that they didn’t asked and that it actually kills some of the game fun and unique flavour.

Arnath.2319:

Swoo.5079:

Arnath.2319:

This Guild Wars 2 community makes me sick. Look at how you are all acting! Your behaving like pathetic spoilt children.

They have NOT broken any promises introducing Ascended gear, this is not a “gear treadmill” and it is not even a grind!

They are introducing TWO new items with this patch, a ring and a backpiece, the majority of you complainers will easily get those items within hours of the dungeon opening and you can all go back to your simple boring lifes until they introduce two more Ascended items a few months from now.

Its TWO items, only two, there is no grind there, stop pretending there is.

Ascended items are here to create the illusion of charector progression, it is gated on purpose so the very large amount of players who do enjoy a more stat increases progression with there hero will be encouraged to keep playing for a longer period of time.

Also, this is where the stat increase ends, if you payed attention to the blog you would noticed that this increase is a once off, yes they did say they would add more Ascended items but there stats what get any bigger than that.

I honestly hope all you complainers stop, take a deep breath, and think for a second instead of raging on the forums.

These changes are now inevitable, it is only TWO items to start with, that wont kill anyone, this wont be the end of the game. Life will continue i promise.

Did you miss the part where they said they will continue to expand it and eventually you will able to have a full kit of Ascended items?

And of course the same folks that had full exotics a few days after the game went live will have them in a few days (unless they make them achievable only to a minority, which is probably worse).

No i did not miss that part but clearly you missed that part where i mentioned that in my post!

Yes they will add more Ascended gear, i said that allready, but the stats wont increase, this is NOT a gear treadmill, this is not like WoW, this is not the end of the world.

This is a once off thing to keep a overwhelming majority of players happy.

The question is why even bother adding a new tier of items?

If there is need for infusion (which is a silly mechanic designed to make you needed items) why not making current items infusable (you need to do quests to make the items infusable) couple with whatever process you acquire the actual infuses?

This just adds more grinding.

A once off thing until they get full ascended items and start asking for more powerful items.

Meanwhile casual players went from having max stats items in a few months to not having max stats.

Arnath.2319:

This Guild Wars 2 community makes me sick. Look at how you are all acting! Your behaving like pathetic spoilt children.

They have NOT broken any promises introducing Ascended gear, this is not a “gear treadmill” and it is not even a grind!

They are introducing TWO new items with this patch, a ring and a backpiece, the majority of you complainers will easily get those items within hours of the dungeon opening and you can all go back to your simple boring lifes until they introduce two more Ascended items a few months from now.

Its TWO items, only two, there is no grind there, stop pretending there is.

Ascended items are here to create the illusion of charector progression, it is gated on purpose so the very large amount of players who do enjoy a more stat increases progression with there hero will be encouraged to keep playing for a longer period of time.

Also, this is where the stat increase ends, if you payed attention to the blog you would noticed that this increase is a once off, yes they did say they would add more Ascended items but there stats what get any bigger than that.

I honestly hope all you complainers stop, take a deep breath, and think for a second instead of raging on the forums.

These changes are now inevitable, it is only TWO items to start with, that wont kill anyone, this wont be the end of the game. Life will continue i promise.

Did you miss the part where they said they will continue to expand it and eventually you will able to have a full kit of Ascended items?

And of course the same folks that had full exotics a few days after the game went live will have them in a few days (unless they make them achievable only to a minority, which is probably worse).

Naoko.7096:

If you look back in this forum history this 2 months, almost half of the topics were touching this. If you go to forum like ign and others talking about gw2, you see as much feedbacks about this too.

Many dedicated players leave the game because of the anti-progression and punishing dedicated players. I’m sure they have their database records of players and know when and how they quit. It’s kinda obvious that there’s no goals for exotic players left. The ascended gears is a good addition.

Read this, it said the truth.

“As we watch Guild Wars 2 mature in its Live environment, we have found that our most dedicated players were achieving their set of Exotic gear and hitting “the Legendary wall.” We designed the process of getting Legendary gear to be a long term goal, but players were ready to start on that path much sooner than we expected and were becoming frustrated with a lack of personal progression.”

Source – https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/linsey-murdock-unveils-new-high-end-ascended-gear/

And now they will get feedback of the people losing interest and leaving because they were interested in a game where there was no rush to get exotics or legendary items since they would remain the same for lots of time and personal progression was obtained by a better knowledge of the game, including by playing different builds (that require different armor/weapon sets) and different professions.

Now personal progression is having a main and grinding the new item tier. And then the next item tier.

Haishao.6851:

there
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Dear-Anet-Disregard-Rabid-Vocal-Minority

So there was a silent majority being silent that wanted item progression?

I remember a vocal minority saying that doing dungeons for skins is useless since they don’t increase the power.

It is the same vocal minority that say dungeons aren’t fun since they are a graveyard zerg because there are no way to control mobs aggro.

Lets hope that vocal minority doesn’t morph into a silent majority giving loads of silent feedback.

In the new blogpost about the Lost Shores patch it is mentioned that due to player feedback it was deemed as a good move to introduce new item tiers to increase sense of progression.

The last time I was asked about my feeling/thoughts about the game was during the BWEs and aside from that the other feedback asked was limited to bugs/exploits/gold sellers, etc.

So where was this massive (I suppose it has to have been quite big to induce change) feedback demanding/asking/suggesting a new tier of items collected and/or can be seen?

Thanks.