Guild Wars 2

uknortherner.2670:

What’s even stupider are people who can’t be bothered doing any research before buying a game and then demanding that the game be changed to match their expectations.

I didn’t see any demands, merely a suggestion.

How would this suggestion be detrimental to the game exactly?

ASB.4295:

It’s not about what’s a good idea or what enriches the game in the developers eyes. It’s about what makes the most money, preferably in the short term. Having a stagnating progression curve that fails to pressure or heavily encourage the majority of players to keep playing, increasing the time they’re being exposed to gem store offers, will result in a smaller average gem store revenue, making it harder for them to get permission to create new content, decreasing average player retention, which lowers the number of players exposed to the gem store and consequently the size of the revenue gained from it.

tl;dr if you are against a level cap increase, you are killing the game

What if I told you that there were other methods of progression other than leveling?

marnick.4305:

TheDaiBish.9735:

marnick.4305:

Rejected unanimously by the GW1 veterans.

No level cap increase would be rejected by GW1 vets? o.O

I’d have said they’d approve of it.

They wouldn’t. Most GW1 veterans will claim that GW2 has 60 levels too many already.

I’ve yet to hear any GW1 player with either decent pvp rank or 50/50 and GWAMM to ask for more levels.

There’s no point to levels outside of pen and paper.

Wouldn’t it be a case, then, that they’d reject a level cap increase, as opposed to rejecting 80 being the level cap forever (thus no level cap increase)?

marnick.4305:

Rejected unanimously by the GW1 veterans.

No level cap increase would be rejected by GW1 vets? o.O

I’d have said they’d approve of it.

I personally can’t see the point of a level cap increase. Things like new skills, traits, trait points, trait-line expansion ect could easily be added as a level-cap activity, and the game would benefit more from it (providing it was done well), than some arbitrary 10 levels and gain them every time you level up.

Not only that, providing they don’t add anything above Ascended, they can easily balance content around the level 80, instead of continuously tweaking their scaling every time they add a new level cap so players don’t sneeze and kill everything in lower level zones.

Snarftastic.6709:

I played it during release but never got hooked due to many other distractions at the time. I currently find myself craving some MMO / adventure / exploration / pvp… yada yada. I look to GW2, currently have a level 40… I’ve read and heard a lot of mixed things in-game about the current state of what happens at level 80.

I am most curious about the content, is it … fun at 80? Is it a completely mindless grind just like WoW turned into with absolutely no thought involved in anything? The uttermost important question is the pvp FUN and possibly meaningful?

Thanks for your time guys.

Well, I’d say the only advantage of getting to 80 is access to all content.

Otherwise, WvW and SPvP can be accessed at your level. Most maps in PvE have a number of Jumping Puzzles hidden away if that’s your thing.

As for grind, I’d say that it’s only a grind if you make it a grind.

lordkrall.7241:

^ But the damage would already have been done.
Players might quit because of that and the game itself might take a massive blow because of “idiotic mods”.

True.

Like I said in my first post, the benefit is largely dependent on the character of the people who want to be mods.

uknortherner.2670:

Terrible idea. What if a player moderator is blindly in favour of mounts, raids, holy trinity or open world PvP, or wants the game to be a sub-free version of WoW? You would be giving them the power to delete posts/ban anybody who disagrees with them!

The other side could be the people who are blindly against mounts, raids, holy trinity or open world PvP could easily ban those who are in favour of these additions.

Both of these as an argument makes no sense. If a mod did do that, they could easily be reported for misconduct, and they’d have the right to mod revoked, and potentially banned from the forums.

haviz.1340:

TheDaiBish.9735:

So how does not having an Ascended weapon affect you?

I mean, surely the more AR you get, the easier it’d become at that point? All bosses at that point only do 1% per tick in Agony, apart from the Jade Maw.

What are you talking about? Bosses do 18% per tick while maw ~1000% per tick at that level. But once anet unlocks even levels 50+ you will have to get more AR if you ever want to complete daily which is the only rewarding part of fractals. You can’t avoid maw agony unlike other bosses’.

How is having something that can only be prevented by a stat ‘challenging’?

And I read the table wrong (was looking down instead of across) so my apologies.

haviz.1340:

TheDaiBish.9735:

Then why not continue to do high-level Fractals? Surely the higher level Fractals would be more of a challenge if you haven’t got the AR crutch?

And just out of curiosity, what level Fractals have you got up to?

80.

So how does not having an Ascended weapon affect you?

I mean, surely the more AR you get, the easier it’d become at that point? All bosses at that point only do 1% per tick in Agony, apart from the Jade Maw.

haviz.1340:

High level fractals are the only thing remotely difficult in this game. There’s virtually nothing in pve that is hard to complete. I don’t want vertical progression, I hate it. I want challenging and rewarding content. Instead we have brainless activities that rewards you higher than doing something challenging. And to do something remotely hard you have to participate in those kinds of activities.

Then why not continue to do high-level Fractals? Surely the higher level Fractals would be more of a challenge if you haven’t got the AR crutch?

And just out of curiosity, what level Fractals have you got up to?

First off, you can’t really have a debate about ‘casuals’ since you haven’t actually defined what you’d consider the definition of ‘casual’. Given how everyone seems to have their own opinions on what it means, not everyone is necessarily on the same page.

Now, if we’re talking about ‘casual’ in terms of time one can invest in the game, I’d be under that category (to the point where I can’t log in everyday).

I don’t feel I’m locked out of any content. I do WvW just fine in my Exotics. I run Fractals up to level 10. I do dungeons with level appropriate characters and don’t have much in the way of problems.

I don’t feel anything is particularly ‘hard’ to get either, just time-consuming.

haviz.1340:

TheDaiBish.9735:

Ascended gear is required for higher level Fractals. There’s nothing stopping players who don’t want Ascended from actually experiencing the different Fractals.

Why fractal runners are forced to chop down wood in orr to be able to run higher levels? Does that make any sense to you? If ascended gear is only required for fractals it should be obtainable only in fractals or at least also in fractals. Weapon boxes are not something anyone with more brain cells than amoeba would consider a solution.

Please point out where I said that needing open-world content to do Fractals made sense, or that Ascended gear shouldn’t be available in Fractals.

I was merely replying to your statement that Ascended was a requirement for Fractals, which is false.

In an ideal world, with infinite resources, I’d agree.

However, given that a lot of the players seem to be more into farming champs than actually immersing themselves, it would, unfortunately, be a waste of resources (unless you made these events very rewarding).

However, I do like your idea with the Hearts. Maybe each day there could be different things you can do to complete the Heart. For example, Queensdale farm. One day could be killing Wurms, feeding cows ect, and then the next it could be retrieving crop from a bandits hideout.

I’d say that’d greatly depend on the character of the player.

Not to mention there should be penalties if that player mod abuses the power given to them.

soulkirou.2758:

Yes it can be nice what is more add option to do character on “Only pvp mode” like in Guild Wars 1 have it . But I think this people who will be playing on free wont do daily for laurels, in case of farming them before buy.

You simply give the client limited functionality. So things like:

• No Dailies
• No access to PvE / WvW content
• No TP access

That sort of thing.

haviz.1340:

Ascended gear is required for fractals. Don’t play ignorant card.

Ascended gear is required for higher level Fractals. There’s nothing stopping players who don’t want Ascended from actually experiencing the different Fractals.

• How is SPvP gated in any way? You can still jump in at level 2 and have everything accessible. The only issue there is the player, and it’s common sense that someone who practices 30 hours a week is going to be better than someone who plays 2 hours a week.

• What’s wrong with having some challenging content in the open world that requires people to work together?

• What PvE content is gated at level 80? None (unless you want to go into the higher level Fractals, in which the Fractals are the same anyway.)

Zeldain.5710:

I think if you look at the way Blizzard has handled Legendary items in WoW through the years it’s easy to see how it can be very rooted deep in story and require a real team as well as individual effort.

This time around they did it a bit differently in that everyone was basically capable of earning one through an expansion-long quest line and there really wasn’t anything “grindy” that, if you were playing the game anyway, didn’t sort of just come to you. Most importantly though, they didn’t have a cash shop to lean on that can make the process more convenient by spending money.

The world of Tyria has some pretty awesome lore, but the storytelling in GW2 has been abysmal, and this would be one place they could work on improving it.

In WoW though, aren’t there only one or two Legendary items per expac? I know vanilla had Hand of Ragnaros and Thunderfury, as well as a number of Legendaries being encounter-specific (Sunwell Raid comes to mind).

It’s a bit different to having to craft specific content for each weapon (so a total of 14 weapons) to have an individual story, rather than one item. Thus, some form of grind would have to be used to lengthen the process, or overlapping content.

I’m not arguing that Legendaries shouldn’t have a process that is based on their lore and challenges. I just don’t see it being feasible to do if each weapon is going to have a Legendary.

Zeldain.5710:

If they want to change it so that there’s an epic story involved with unmatched player skill to achieve it over time… then fine. But no more grind. Simply won’t do it.

I agree with the story and challenging content part, but there’s no way to do it without adding a grind of some sort.

The amount of content they’d have to produce per weapon wouldn’t be justifiable for a single weapon. Thus, they’d have to use some form of ‘grind’.

That’s the sad truth; ideal game design isn’t real world game design.

xephire.8324:

Aberrant.6749:

And makes for an extremely boring game.

Hey it is already one lol.

I have to wonder about your logic of:

• playing a game you find boring
• not wanting Anet to improve these fights so they aren’t snoozefests

If anything, all world bosses in the higher level areas should get a revamp, and just boost the rewards for them, leaving all other Champion fights (like in Queensdale) with smaller rewards.

Dragonar.1342:

Ofc there are different ways that they can implement it.
But how big is the chance? Ascended weapons? goldgoldgold. Ascended armor? Even more gold. Legendaries on the tp? 2000 gold.

You’re right. They may not change it.

But if we look at Ascended, there are mats that you can’t buy, that you have to obtain yourself. The Vision Crystal, for one. This is an example of how a creation process has changed.

Until they actually implement it, we won’t know.

Dragonar.1342:

Gear-Progression:
1: Stronger statts
2: Better looks

As far as I know, gear progression has never been attributed with ‘better looks’, since ‘better’ is subjective. Hell, I’m still using Flame weapons on my Charr.

Dragonar.1342:

TheDaiBish.9735:

Dragonar.1342:

Edit so there is no confusion anymore.
Return to the discussion.

It really doesn’t change the fact that you want them to not add something that a large group of people may want to pursue that will have no affect on you, simply because you don’t like the idea of other Legendary gear.

Please explain how this makes any sense.

Because legendaries dont show how good or experienced you are in the game.
It’s shows how much you have been farming, or how much of trading post playing you have done, or how much luck you had once.

And who’s to say that the process will stay the same?

Example: Ascended Ring acquisition changed from Fractals only, to Fractals and Laurels, to Fractals, Laurels and Guild Commendations.

Dragonar.1342:

Edit so there is no confusion anymore.
Return to the discussion.

It really doesn’t change the fact that you want them to not add something that a large group of people may want to pursue that will have no affect on you, simply because you don’t like the idea of other Legendary gear.

Please explain how this makes any sense.

Razor.9872:

xephire.8324:

Zplus.4217:

Buttercup.5871:

OP, before you shout murder, check your sources. What you are stating is incorrect information.

Look at the Pax interview with Colin. It wil either be a legendary backpack or one legendary trinket. Cut it out with the pitchfork attitude and don’t believe everything you read.

Funny that’s exactly what people said when the ascended trinkets came out.

Funny that after ascended and legendary there will be an OMG tier weapon coming out.

Do you have proof of this?

The closest thing he’d have is the interview with MattVisual, where CJ said they’d like Ascended to be the last tier, but they can’t make any promises.

Dragonar.1342:

“None is waiting for it” is a statement, you’re not supposed to read it literally. If you dont understand that you really should go back to school.. :/

No, it’s an ‘fact’ that you made up to support your argument to not add other Legendary gear.

If people will go for it, why not add it? Other people having Legendary gear won’t affect you if you don’t want to go for it, surely?

Xcom.1926:

And this is why they need a user friendly queue system that does all the work for us. The current implementation is pretty bad and will suck for both elite level players and new players.

Elite players will find it frustrating. And new players will be scared to use it.

Surely it will result in the same thing? Newbs and ‘non-desirable’ builds and professions getting kicked, while waiting for someone else to join that has the desired setup?

Possibly the same reason they didn’t mention:

• WvW Masteries
• Fractals
• Open-World Boss and Dungeon Revamps

before the game started; it’s an addition that was designed after launch.

Lord Kuru.3685:

Oh but they are difficult to create. Each mastery takes the WvW dev team quite a while to implement (17 over the past six months). They no doubt put a lot of thought, balancing, and testing time into each one. That’s why the WvW dev team should be moved in its entirety to this new project. They no doubt synergize very well thus breaking them up may hurt the project.

On the flip side, they may very well stagger the release of the Masteries as to not overwhelm the player.

Without actually knowing the design process, how many people work on this and whatnot, we have no idea how difficult they are to create, how big the team is or how much goes into testing it (I’d wager that testing is actually the majority of the work; testing skills work and tweaking numbers).

For all we know, each individual could have responsibility over improving 2 – 3 lines and conceptualising / creating a new line. It’d certainly be more efficient that having individuals responsible for different things (one for conceptualising, one for creating, one for balancing ect), thus, only taking one or two away wouldn’t affect much other than production time on WvW mastery lines.

Lord Kuru.3685:

Also, since we want this done right, please move the WvW team to this new DXP project. It should be the entire WvW team because these masteries are very difficult to create and balance properly so it needs to be done carefully by a team with experience in managing such content.

I can’t imagine them being difficult to create. I’d wager they’ve actually got a tool for creating the Masteries. As for balancing, you can always use the WvW ones as a template; small gains that make it a little easier, but nothing that would allow 80 people to be able to steamroll the content.

How many times has this topic been brought up now?

Different people have different specialties.

Game designers (the ones who create the content) aren’t necessarily programmers. In fact, if you look at the job description for ANet’s game designers, they don’t need to know programming, just how to use world-building tools.

The people who deal with class balance don’t necessarily know how to create content.

Add to this that it’s easier to create content than to fix content (anyone with a little programming knowledge knows that bug-fixing just isn’t that simple).

What you’re asking is that the content developers stop what they’re doing while the people who fix bugs fix the bugs.

fellyn.5083:

Seems like all the OPs problems would be solved by joining a guild of like minded individuals.

In the interests of objectivity, the same could be said for those who don’t want to / can’t adhere to some strict level / gear / build requirement.

However, the only people I can see the OP’s suggestion hurting is the new players who use it and haven’t found a guild yet for whatever reason.

Why not work on the other parts first?

We’re supposed to be getting precursor crafting at some point before the end of the year.

xephire.8324:

I guess the majority of gw2 players are bored out of nothing better else to do to organize these kind of stuff.

I’m failing to see how one person is a ‘majority’.

OP, just out of curiosity, how would you judge the winner when players only have access to a few dances?

Bismuth.3165:

Is the RNG for these chests permanent, so we’ll always have a chance to get those weapons as long as we do tequatl?

As far as I know, everything to do with Tequatl is permanent.

Bismuth.3165:

They look awesome, good job anet, and bad job anet for making it RNG based….

At least it isn’t cash-shop RNG.

Besides, I’d say this is similar in GW in the way of having a specific skin tied to a boss.

http://dulfy.net/2013/09/17/gw2-sunless-weapon-skins/#more-56275

Amun Ra.6435:

The hate OP is getting is from the baddies who could never hold down the role of tank or healer in traditional MMO’s…

False. I Tanked, Healed and DPS’d from TBC to the beginning of Cata, back when I had no life. I’ve also done some Healing/DPS hybrid in TSW and Tanking / Healing various other games.

When it come down to it, the mechanics are samey with regards to mechanics that focused on the Trinity, that is, positioning of the boss and your positioning in relation. Not to mention the mechanic of Aggro Management it really dumbs down the AI:

Mobs – Boss, shouldn’t we attack them over there?
Boss – Why?
Mobs – Well, they’re all raining down arrows and fireballs and wiping us out, and that guy is keeping this guy alive so we can’t kill him.
Boss – Yeah, but this guy said stuff about your mothers. Especially yours, Minion #243. She’s always been nice to me. That’s why we’re attacking him.

That’s not saying what we currently have is any better or worse, for the record.

I’ve said this many a time, but I don’t feel that you need a hard requirement of Tank/DPS/Healer or Control/Damage/Support to have roles. Roles can simply be worked into the encounter mechanics by having:

• Roles built into the encounter mechanics themselves.
• Mechanics being tantamount to success and made in such a way they can’t be brute-forced through sheer damage.
• More than one mechanic happening at a time.

This way:

• Strict roles aren’t forced upon one player for the entirety of the battle
• Roles can be taken up by any player (providing they come equipped for it).

For example, if we reworked the Lovers so:

• There were no boulders in the room.
• When they were within a certain radius (say, melee) to each other, they would become Invulnerable (while still being susceptible to CC), gain 2 stacks of Defiant, regenerate health and start to stack Might and Fury.
• They would try to move closer to each other at certain points (x stack of condition / health% / time).

Then CC cycling and positioning would be a requirement as well as damage. Maybe players could approach it so 2 CC-focus builds would concentrate on keeping them both locked down while others would take their health down. Maybe more organised groups would bring some form of CC and time it in order to bring more damage. If they get close, players will need to use Pull / Push skills smartly and not waste them on removing Defiant.

Of course, things like Defiant would need to be reworked in such a way to allow CC builds to do their job.

How would a Thief do that, out of curiosity?

The only way I know of a Thief applying Confusion is through Runes of Perplexity, and they require Interrupts (5 stacks) and chance (3 stacks, 15 sec cooldown), and Pain Inverter if it was an Asuran.

Well, they don’t allow things to be posted on the official forums.

However, as long as the files aren’t actually altered, I don’t think they ban you for it.

Tachenon.5270:

Wolfheart.1938:

2 playable builds on engi really?

Yet another missed opportunity: Engis should have been the one profession capable of gathering up some rocks and vines and bamboo and using it all to craft a weapon on the spot capable of one-shotting a kitten krait witch. But no. They’re alchemists with guns.

So basically the McGuyvers’ of Tyria?

Konrad Curze.5130:

living story development team – 100 programmers
bug fixing development team – 1 intern

Have you thought that maybe it’s harder to fix bus when you actually have to go into the code itself, as opposed to creating content using tools, where little to no programming is needed?

Zacchary.6183:

Chuck Norris – Bruce Lee

That’s not a rivalry. That’s a one-sided, systematic beating in which Norris is on the receiving end of.

The only reason Lee he hasn’t been seen lately is because the Thor needed his help with something.

Herr der Friedhoefe.2490:

Fanboys, vs everyone else.

Personally I’d have said Fanboys vs Disgruntled Forum Wanderers, with a few ‘objective’ posters in between.

Norns vs Carlton Banks

Theplayboy.6417:

TheDaiBish.9735:

Theplayboy.6417:

And you don’t have to be a brainiac to understand the difference between 3.5 Million copies sold and an Active Player base of less than 400,000…. Things will get very very interesting and show abysmal numbers for GW2 in the Q3 Reports if they don’t manage to turn on the GW2 China Pre-Purchase.

Where did you get the ‘less than 400,000 active players’ figure from? You aren’t getting it mixed up with ‘concurrent’ are you?

The concurrent is over 460,000. They didn’t put a time stamp on it and one can only assume that number was generated in the games earlier days when the servers were all much more populated. I heard it on a podcast or sotg or interview. I’ll try to find it.

Well, the concurrent was 400,000 in the headstart. That much I know.

http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/08/28/guild-wars-2-hits-400k-concurrent-users-before-launch/

Theplayboy.6417:

And you don’t have to be a brainiac to understand the difference between 3.5 Million copies sold and an Active Player base of less than 400,000…. Things will get very very interesting and show abysmal numbers for GW2 in the Q3 Reports if they don’t manage to turn on the GW2 China Pre-Purchase.

Where did you get the ‘less than 400,000 active players’ figure from? You aren’t getting it mixed up with ‘concurrent’ are you?

Questions

• with the progression system, would certain traits be locked to certain attribute lines? For example, a trait that gives Might on crit is locked to the precision line?

Progression

I like this.

The only thing I’d change is the acquisition of skills. Rather than just spending points, have the player complete tasks / have to find and talk to someone ect in order to unlock said skill.

Loot and Currency

I can’t say I agree with the idea of no loot or currency whatsoever. No loot or currency > no economy. Hardly gives the impression of an actual world. Also, how would crafting work?

Instead, I’d have gone for more ‘realistic’ loot drops:

• Animals wouldn’t drop armour and such. They’d only drop base crafting materials (leather, hide, bone ect) that would need to be refined.
• Bosses would have a chance to drop a ‘broken weapon / armour’ piece that players could use to craft a replica of the skin. These would be sellable.
• I’d keep currency in the game for the purposes of having an economy.

All in all, I wouldn’t say there’s a problem with having a loot system. It’s when the loot puts players at odds with each other and loot is used as a primary driving force to complete content is when it becomes an issue.

Dynamic Events

I agree on the ‘more story’. I’d also add that events should ideally:

• evolve. The enemy tries one approach, fails, so they try another.
• the big events have scaling tied specifically to the mechanics of the event.

Dungeons

I agree that Story Mode should be soloable.

I also feel dungeons should be more about exploring and less about reaching an end boss. Maybe have some dungeons where it’s less about the enemies and more about the looking in nooks and crannies for different things. Have traps and such; not the ones that trigger on a timer, but ones where you need to pay attention to siurroundings. Add some puzzles in some of them. Or maybe have it so it’s a mix, and the whole exploration thing is a bonus.

I’d also:

• Improve mob AI – give mobs all of the tools players have (traits, weapon-swap, ability to use combos ect)
• Have a more open layout – instead of linear paths, make them more like mini maps with a more open layout.
• Have mobs and bosses patrolling – instead of having the boss stay in one place awaiting his doom, have him wandering around. Given sufficient difficulty, players would have to wait for the opportune moment to strike. This would open up a lot of options for achievements; Vanquishing, Straight to the point (only kills bosses) ect
• Have random objectives – maybe one day you’ll go in and there’s a Whispers agent that’ll ask you to search for some battle-plans of theirs.

Combat and Skills

First, I’d scrap all of the passive traits (+damage, -cooldown ect) and work them into skills to encourage smart usage of skills. For example, Fire Grab. In addition, I’d allow players the ability to customise there skills in 2 ways:

• First, the additional clause. “If this skill interrupts”, “If you hit someone that is bleeding”, “If this skill is blocked”.
• Second, the effect “You deal 2x damage”, “You inflict Confusion” ect.
• Achieving the clause a certain number of times would unlock a new skill that is slightly more effective. For example, having a Hammer skill that Knockdown (4 seconds) on hitting a moving target would unlock Backbreaker, which can Knockdown at any time, but for a reduced amount of time.

I’ll add to this at a later time.

runeblade.7514:

http://assets0.ordienetworks.com/images/GifGuide/michael_scott/The-Office-gifs-the-office-14948948-240-196.gif

This is the worst suggestion ever.

How so?

I personally think these points have some merit:

• requiring the use of various environmental weapons gives the whole organizational aspect to a fight. As well as this, it adds a layer to the fight; needing to protect the environmental weapons.
• Having the boss focus fire on large clumps of enemies eliminates safe zones where people stand and just auto-attack.

However, without improving the targeting system first, number 2 would just be frustrating.

Adding to this:

• Any mechanics the boss has should scale according to the number of players participating, to encourage all players to take not of the mechanics. For example: The Shatterer’s healing crystals; Shadow Behemoth’s portals

• Megaboss fights should have multiple ways you can fail it so that not all players are focused on one thing. For example, with The Shatterer, if: all of the siege are destroyed; all of the players are dead.

Kyrel.8942:

Time to define endgame again.

I wish you well on your quest :P

For me, ‘end-game’ is the game when your character stops leveling.

As well as this, ‘end-game’ is going to change from person to person. There isn’t one type of content that is ‘end-game’, rather it’s going to change depending on the content you do.

I mean, if I don’t do WvW, WvW isn’t going to be end-game for me.

JemL.3501:

Kuzzi.2198:

I know people will say “You don’t HAVE to do all the dailies”. .

anyone who say that is delusional, because dailies are the only way to obtain laurels

But you only have to do 5 out of the selection.

OP is talking about people who try to do every single one, even after obtaining the Laurel.

Kuzzi.2198:

I think a possible solution for this is to cap the PvE dailies at 10AP/day. This would let the game have more of the advertised “play how you want” feel.

As opposed to now, where you can ‘play how you want’ anyway?

Your friends wanted to do every daily. They weren’t forced at gunpoint, or hypnotized into doing it. It was a conscious decision on their behalf to attempt to get all Dailies done.

I’m not seeing how something like this is the games fault.

You’re going to hear people say that you absolutely need Ascended in WvW.
You’re going to hear people say that you don’t need Ascended in WvW.
You’re going to hear people say the game isn’t worth returning to.
You’re going to hear people say the game is worth returning to.

Ultimately, it’s up to you to decide. Here’s the main additions to PvE and WvW though:

• Fractals – Dungeons that increase in difficulty the higher their level goes. Has the unique condition Agony with is what Ascended is primarily used for; giving your character Agony Resistance.
• Guild Missions – Missions your guild can activate. These include things like Bounties and Challenges
• Changed how dungeon rewards work.
• Added 100 levels to crafting to be able to craft Ascended Weapons. These weapons also have a chance to drop where you get the materials.

In PvE, most of the content has been temporary

• WvW now has ranks, where you can level up to gain points to spend in WvW specific abilities.

I could be missing a few things though.

MikaHR.1978:

Who was expecting it?

Few days ago nobody gave a kitten about ascended weapons (or any other ascended addition)

Everyone who had read that blog post.

We didn’t know specifically when it was coming, but people who read the post knew it was coming.

MikaHR.1978:

Dondarrion.2748:

MikaHR.1978:

And someone honestly think that there would be some kind of massive exodus if they didnt implement ascended weapons? Hell, just few days ago noone even knew about ascended weapons and game was going good.

They didn’t?
They were announced November 2012…

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

I see nothing about “ascended weapons will be released on 3rd September” You? No? rofl

You’ll also see more Legendary items in the future and an update to our existing Legendary weapons. Legendary items were always intended to be on par with other “best-in-slot” items. So fear not, all existing Legendary weapons, which are currently on par with Exotics, will be upgraded to be on par with Ascended weapons at the same time that we add Ascended weapons to the game. Thus Legendaries will remain “best-in-slot” items. All Legendary items going forward will be of Ascended power.

It may not give a specific date, but it does say in there that Ascended weapons will be added. You can argue all you want about how they didn’t give a specific date, but to say that you weren’t expecting them either means you’ve never read this blog post, or your reading comprehension is lacking.