Guild Wars 2

Ashen.2907:

But what you describe as failings of champions matches up with my experience of high end mobs in many games to a certain extent. Learn the tells, learn your rotation, play with your eyes closed after a while.

Even my favorite game for “active combat” has . . . shall we say, a potential for such things. (Monster Hunter series) I think my current record so far is Naked Plessy Runs. But it’s amazing what some people can do with proper practice and control. I’ve seen videos of joke weapons being used to devastating effect.

Similarly? “Solo White Mage” FF1 challenges. When you understand the game, you can do ludicrous amounts of cherry tapping.

I think this topic is going to be moved over to a different forum, though it’s an interesting idea. I don’t know if I should . . . yet again . . . dredge up what I have.

Edit: Here you go, I found what I assumed to be unfindable in the bowels of my post history. It’s the short form but here is a small taste.

Honestly, I’m torn but Far Shiverpeaks seems the one which could be executed the best and have the closest feel of nostalgia. Plus, we could have the norn take center stage on the whole thing. About time someone other than the asura and sylvari got a chance to actually do things.

But then I really want to go into the Crystal Desert after Kralkatorrik because that seems like it could be entertaining to watch humanity push that frontier with the intent of reclaiming the path of Ascension. Or maybe just giving Logan a chance to actually do it right this time.

(Plus, if they go to the Desert, that gets closer to the Desolation and Elona . . . which is more my favorite other region than Cantha.)

Far Shiverpeaks.

ipan.4356:

And that’s why the game will die.

I say let it die, then, and move on to something else. I’m sure it’s out there for you.

I can always go back to trying to beat “Terror from the Deep” in less than ten months.

Kurrilino.2706:

So your solution to all this complaining is stopping complaining ??

Nope. My solution to “all this” varies but I think three hurricanes (with a nice rum) and a bowl of breaded and fried shrimp is a good solution. Along with popping in some of my Rooster Teeth DVDs to enjoy utter stupidity in a good way. (Love watching Caboose.)

I got bigger things to worry about than the game.

So far A-Net isn’t fulfilling anything,
-If players want huge game changes they give you a wardrobe
-If players complain about the LS they replace zerking with text box clicking
-If players want new skills they rework existing skills
-If player wants new maps, they create one so simple and so plain that you have no toher chance than asking…. is that it ??? Just delivering a map, to say we did is not the right way…..

I don’t know why you think you need to score points on me. I’m not keeping a scorecard and going “oooh, he got me good”. I couldn’t care less, I just call them as I see them from my own little corner of the game. I find it fun, I am entertained when I log in, and I feel I got my money’s worth out of the initial investment.

And exactly this is the problem. If there is an issue A-Net delivered the least possible amount of everything they could, just to say WE DID IT, we are listening.

Listening to us and following our demands aren’t always the same thing. I really wish that was understood more often.

The only real chance to make this happen is an expansion. But for any reason
A-Net is going into total defense mode when this topic comes up.

Because an expansion isn’t going to fix anything other than add more content people complain about three months later. If they wait that long.

I am happy that this is something you can live with but i am GW veteran and i don’t want this thing going down

I’m also a GW Veteran, from week one of release. Don’t pull that card on me, dear neighbor, because it doesn’t buy you anything more than a pitying glance. GuildWars wasn’t anything special, it was perhaps . . . in many good ways, an iteration of Diablo 2’s design with several balancing decisions attached to make it work for PvP. Much as how League of Legends and DOTA is derived from a Warcraft 3 custom map type, and has evolved into its own thing.

This is what happens when you take Guild Wars and expand it into an MMO. All the cracks in the design become magnified and all the minor issues become unforgivable sins.

ipan.4356:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

That goal creates a more interesting problem, though. If people don’t need to replay it, then there’s no incentive to do so . . . and if there’s no incentive to do so, then you run into two problems:

- A rapid splash of activity close to release time and tapering off to “nobody does it anymore”.
- People who didn’t do it in that time can’t do it because nobody wants to.

Replayability should be based on whether it’s fun or not.

Well designed content is replayed for itself – not for the extrinsic rewards it offers.

Sorry, but experience and evidence says otherwise. Interesting things do not get as much play as things which are rewarding within the framework of the game.

For example, SAB. People loved to play SAB over and over again, because it was awesome wicked fun.

Even with no rewards whatsoever, people loved to play SAB.

I did not.

Why was it removed? Because Anet saw it as a threat. SAB was intended to be a ‘cutesy’ diversion – a nod and wink to past platformers, and a sly way to include some meta humor into the game.

Oooh, oooh, are we passing out tinfoil hats now? Because I ‘know’ why it was removed much more accurately.

It was not intended to be a permanent fixture, only a development of some developer who thought it’d be fun.

I don’t think it’d be getting the same amount of play as the rest of the game if it was always “on”. And if it did, it’d be because of the stupid Trading Post prices attached to the tradable weapon skins.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

The multi-stage backpack crafting,

I still think that’s a test ground for precursor “crafting/scavenger hunting” because it rather matches what I’d put together if I had the inclination to do so with minimal potential changes to the game itself.

Deathmond.7328:

The biggest problem of CDI – community don`t feel that they works! So many CDI`s and in the end of it we every time see “We know better”© …

Which is why there are things which made it from CDIs into the game?

Lord Kuru.3685:

Vayne and his obsession with the word “promise” again.

Frankly, I’m amazed people even dredge up these old promises as if they weren’t more than hype to keep people strung along. You all show know by now.

Good point.

Frankly, I’m amazed they even consider trying another round of CDIs to give people another shot at using people spending their time trying to talk with people as punching bags for things they don’t have any control over.

Really, that’s what I expect any future CDIs to devolve into unless there’s heavy moderation. And after that, I’d expect tons of “well there goes the idea of collabortion if they’re censoring people they don’t like hearing from”.

There’s no win here. ArenaNet should just shut down the servers at this rate.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Will be posting a list of ten areas that were heavily impacted by CDIs next week.

Thanks for calling out some. Note there are way more than 10 (-:

Chris

This also reminds me, I should start taking notes again with me playing another MMO (a friend bought me some time on it). Mostly about what I like the best about both GW2 and the other one.

. . . and before someone asks, no, I find them both fun and entertaining. But there’s also parts which I seriously find lacking in comparison to the other.

Lheimroo.2947:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

MFoy.3284:

Mr. Whiteside –
I have a simple question for you. Can you (or anyone) point to anything that’s been actually implemented from a CDI?
-M

The wardrobe.

Permanent new content, the story journal, less grindy achievements, account wide dyes, etc, etc.

C’mon. If we’re going to have a chat we have to be more reasonable and less like ravening dogs just trying to score points on each other.

I just picked the most obvious one, as it had cropped up a lot during the “Horizontal Progression” CDI and we got it. Wonder of wonders. It’s also the one which lacks a downside to rant about.

MFoy.3284:

Mr. Whiteside –
I have a simple question for you. Can you (or anyone) point to anything that’s been actually implemented from a CDI?
-M

The wardrobe.

CETheLucid.3964:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

They do not “guarantee” exotic drops.

Right. I meant the bag, but I see what you mean. That processed wrong in my head. lol

On the other hand, I think there are five zones which guarantee exotics as part of the map completion. Fireheart Rise, Frostgorge Sound, Strait of Devastation, Malchor’s Leap, and Cursed Shore.

I got my exotic longbow from Fireheart Rise and a coat out of Frostgorge, which served me well until I said “eh, why do I have all this Karma again?” and did a Temple for those exotics.

. . . which really are guaranteed, mind you, and not all that troublesome to acquire.

CETheLucid.3964:

ipan.4356:

Champs should have guaranteed exotic drops

They do at 80 and depending on the area I believe.

Pre-80 areas might give you a rare or green bag I think; which can end up giving you the lower tier mats like linen. Which is a good thing.

They do not “guarantee” exotic drops.

ipan.4356:

legendary bosses guaranteed legendary drops

That’s just broken, man. You’d kitten off the hundreds of gamers who worked for their legendary.

Legendary’s were always supposed to be an optional grind.

Not just annoying them, but crashing the economy which has the legendary acquisition as a cornerstone of the high-end purchase side of things.

It’d be great if they had “unique” items again.

Jaher Dal.9503:

I wonder who else has maps of Queensdale laying around.

About four dozen people who used to run the champ trains.

Lheimroo.2947:

Yargesh.4965:

A dungeon along the lines of the Aetherblade path that is not done by people because you can do several other dungeons in the same length of time it takes to run this one path?

That’s the thing, though.

They abandoned dungeon development and SAB development after releasing new content that was terrifically different than what the players had previously enjoyed about those activities.

I dunno.. seems to me like they oughta fiddle with the recipe, not toss the cook book.

At this point I wouldn’t blame them if they threw down the apron while they’re at it. There is literally nothing they could develop which would both be good for the game and make the vocal parts of the player base happy.

Not even if they grabbed people to make SAB return on an automated cycle of “one week on, one week off”.

That goal creates a more interesting problem, though. If people don’t need to replay it, then there’s no incentive to do so . . . and if there’s no incentive to do so, then you run into two problems:

- A rapid splash of activity close to release time and tapering off to “nobody does it anymore”.
- People who didn’t do it in that time can’t do it because nobody wants to.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

I’m curious about what has happened at Anet? Has the funding been cut off? Is the money being diverted? was most of the staff laid off?

No, they just listen to complaints.

a new map,

Which people speak of derisively and now is only used for a stop in the World Boss World Tour.

a half dozen PvP maps,

Which nobody seems to care about.

big WvW changes,

Which I keep reading about how these were either pointless or made the game worse.

introduction of fractals,

Which is often held up as the epitome of “grindy farmy” content for less reward in comparison to other things.

a new gear tier,

. . . heh . . .

guild missions,

Which were reviled when released, and currently aren’t held in high esteem.

dungeon revamps,

Which apparently aren’t good.

a new dungeon,

Which is also, apparently, not good but because “the loot is bad”.

updates to 6 of the 8 crafting profession,

Which is touted as being only achievable by the rich, by farming incessantly, or by Gem-to-Gold.

multiple festivals,

Which most people were screaming bloody murder over by the time Halloween came around again.

and a LS.

Which is so very beloved. (/sarcasm)

However since the start of 2014 it seems like nothing is being developed anymore and things are being removed instead.

If you wonder why, start rereading.

So you’d rather go from farming now to farming later?

Chris Whiteside.6102:

You asked me to be honest so I am going to be. I am starting to feel like doing another CDI just isn’t worth the frustration, huge amount of time and heartache.

This is why, actually, I don’t have much faith in any of them working anymore. I like the idea, and I loved some of the discussions. But I think there are several here who want a CDI just to have a developer punching bag.

CETheLucid.3964:

Here in GW2, you have dungeon that offers the same; and yet?

And yet strangely they’re mandatory to do, when the GW1 “not-a-grind-I-swear” wasn’t.

I don’t get it either. Also, any time someone talks about how the armors got uglier I just look at the assassin armor skins, especially their ‘Ancient armor’ set.

It’s not the game which isn’t for me anymore, it’s visiting the forums and reading all this which makes me want to pack up and depart.

Especially since we go from this . . . to this . . . in about 24 hours.

ipan.4356:

If you’re playing, you’re farming, because there isn’t anything else to do in the game, except farm.

So, is this the point where this topic no longer has any constructive or useful discussion since everything comes back to this “complete and unassailable truth”?

Substance E.4852:

I can’t speak from much pve content to be honest. I don’t do fractals or much dungeon stuff, but in zerg vs zerg the pet evaporates like a puddle on the moon.

I don’t really do Fractals or dungeons except with guildmates, really. And you’re right about the pet tending to die rather quickly in Zerg vs Zerg.

It’s worth noting almost any single target can evaporate quicker than a pet if they happen to be taking the hits. Furthermore, in a Zerg vs Zerg there’s less of a focus on one particular character being good/effective and more about “the group”. So long as you can tag or drop some sort of pressure? Doesn’t matter.

Rangers can be turned into a good piece of a Zerg which relies on blast finishers to build stacks or keep healing going through water fields. They get access to both water fields and blast finishers fairly easily.

But that’s just in theory. In reality? I hardly notice. I’m too busy dodging, trying to drop Poison Volleys or Muddy Terrain, and in general not dying to offer up a conclusive investigation. All I have is anecdotal evidence – I have never really found myself terribly off unless I was unlucky enough to be focused on, and choosing a pet which can at least F2 a boon is more useful than sending in the bear/kittykat.

Tyyphoon.5301:

All good, I found it:

“The GIFT) is a postulate which asserts that normal, well-adjusted people may display psychopathic or antisocial behaviors when given both anonymity and a captive audience on the Internet.”

Yes. And I’m still not leaving the link up in the reply or using the full name of it.

And the thing is, it’s not exactly an unfounded thing in psychology. Start digging and you come up with similar . . . examples . . . of experiments. Tell someone they can do whatever they want to someone else, and they will never have it come back on them? I’m more surprised people are surprised by it.

floude.5291:

@Tobias, why bother when they still have the idea of what to do?
@Vayne, these buffes are gonna come with feature patch, please look at the date of ranger CDI. If you think changing these basic things take that much time, ok then.

Also the CDI pet issues really overlooked by devs and they only inreased pets’ reaction times, the mechanic still useless most of the situations.

Floude . . . I don’t see the point in debating this, least of all in this topic. You’re convinced of your conclusion, and I daresay this is one reason . . . and the only reason I wish the CDIs had never been implemented at all.

Because, inevitably, there’s going to be someone who feels their voice wasn’t heard and thus the whole process is invalid because of it.

I almost wish ANet didn’t bother communicating at all except through patch notes and the occasional “that’s working as intended” “we’re looking into fixing that” “that’s part of an upcoming feature we’re looking into”. It worked for Verant/SOE and their game is still running.

Substance E.4852:

Slight LB buff fixed all the pet issues baked into the class design that was the root of the CDI?

That’s not the only thing which came up, and it’s not the root of the problem with ranger.

The class still has an embarrassingly badly designed class mechanic that requires near perfect handling just to make the ranger as good as other classes and is nearly useless in large scale fights in both PvP and many PvE encounters with massive aoes.

I dunno, I’ve had it be . . . not a burden in large-scale fights. I know of at least four instances where “Search and Rescue” was darn near stapled to my hotbar due to how useful it could be. (I wound up doing so for the Dredge fractal boss a couple times, actually.)

Regardless. It’s not just the pet mechanic that’s an issue, it’s an aggregate of a lot of other things which turn into a pile of “nope”.

Zoso.8279:

Look I understand your point of view. I hope we can have a civil conversation about the pro’s and con’s of farming. I love to farm I don’t see it as a grind in other MMO’s for SURE I feel it is a grind but GW2 for me has been able to do something special. Gw2 has been able to make farming a cooperative and fun “event”. Farming scaled event for me is an adventure on its own from the start of rallying people to the event and the cooperation while running the event. Farming champions can be a communal experience where everyone involved gains loot which is one of the main goals to any MMO. Iv’e had many great conversations and made many friends in farm trains. True exploiting events and being rude to others should never be accepted but we can’t let the actions of a few become the general opinion of the farming community. Farming can both hurt and help the economy its all about supply and demand some items will lose value and others will increase in value that is natural to any economic system. To run an event over multiple times is farming, running a champion train is farming, boss trains are farming running dungeons is farming running WvW for lvl/karma/ whatever other loot is farming. What hurts OUR community is when people exploit events and continually fail them and attack others who want to complete the full event. That is making what can be a good experience and turning it into a very unpleasant one for EVERYONE involved.

I think it’s pretty much an agreed thing that farming in and of itself isn’t an issue.

(Except in how it can generate a rather big mess of gold/items into the hands of those farming, versus those playing more simply . . . and thus generate pressure to farm, “requiring” it to get anywhere . . . but that’s a social mess which is quite difficult to spike in the making.)

It’s the attitude leveled at people who don’t conform to the farming status quo, either innocently and unintentionally . . . intentionally but not maliciously . . . or just plain “trolololol!” . . . more than a few times, farming trains/clusters don’t bother differentiating. They just pop off, either as a few rowdy and angry voices or as one. And . . . thus, it starts to build up and snowball into greater problems when people not farming go “you know what? screw these guys, let’s just mess it up until they go away”.

And that’s where “both sides in the wrong” comes in.

Frankly, so long as farming is well-behaved and not disruptive to a zone (all-consuming and all-important to the point where nothing else can take place)? I . . . personally, couldn’t care less. And to a lesser extent, I care little if someone wants to fling toxicity in my way for something – it’s only a game and there’s a block function for the truly vile.

What I really care about? Having waypoints contested because people in the map are too busy farming events to actually take care of waypoints, because if they let that waypoint go active then their farm collapses.

Tyyphoon.5301:

For those uninformed: Wheaton’s Law

I’m not familiar with the acronym “GIFT”. Care to elucidate?

It’s from Penny Arcade, so . . . no, I’m not linking it here.

Astraea.6075:

Thankfully, that’s all in the past for me, but I would advise anyone in the OP’s position to try to balance the amount of time they spend in game with staying connected with the real world.

Need to echo this . . . it does no lasting good to be stagnant and stationary in a situation where you can only maintain the status quo or degrade – inevitably, in such cases, entropy wins out. The result is not pretty . . .

I’d say you need to really stop and look about what makes the game give you so much relief, try to pinpoint it down to something and then work on finding that outside of the game. It can exist in the real world too, but you have to work for it.

For me, it’s a yearly trip to a particular renaissance festival I enjoy making with family, and walking around seeing a bunch of people dressed up and having a good time. Sharing slightly risque jokes and one-liners traded almost in an almost memetic fashion, and watching entertainers who have put effort into a craft which ordinarily wouldn’t be worth the time . . . except there, it is. There is something about it which just . . . resonates, I suppose.

And so . . . You need to find something outside the game which resonates just as much as the game does, and try to pull yourself forward one inch at a time. It’s not going to be easy, and there will probably be more failures than success . . . but if you’re not trying, you’re not living.

Vayne.8563:

I don’t know, I remember people talking about buffing the damage of long bow and that was done. And the signet change is very good, I think.

Not quite sure what you’re on about.

This particular line:

- “Fix pets.” “To do that we’d have to completely redo code and it’s not a quick endeavor, can we come up with anything else?”

- “Can’t fix? Fine. Get rid of pets.” “We don’t really want to do that. We really wanted rangers to have pets, and that’s how we ran the design.”

- “Well let us perma-stow them.” “We don’t want to do that, as then it’s not giving you any benefit to being out.”

- “Give us a buff then when permastow’d.” “Then, why would rangers run with pets at all?”

- “You’re getting the idea now!”

That was the biggest slice of stink I recall from that CDI. That, and they didn’t want to basically buff the ranger too much out of fear of “power creep” settling in if they did. “Well now the ranger got buffed, we need to buff X class just to keep up now.”

The ranger CDI was, for the largest part of it, some players trying to dictate to the devs and getting huffy when the devs didn’t seem to be taking it seriously.

Tyyphoon.5301:

If that was the case, we would have seen “known” grievous players banned already from game. Unfortunately, that is not the case, so it must be allowed — logically speaking. And I will not divulge how I will take action. I am awaiting to see if ANet addresses this concern of myself and many fellow players who have experienced similiar foul behavior(s) in PvE/WvW worlds both. Please dont take me as foolish as you may perceive me to be.

Oh I don’t perceive you as foolish, otherwise I’d not have spoken up to you and just grabbed popcorn. I may do that anyway, as “counter-trolling” may be a very fun spectator sport.

Though I sneakily suspect ANet may see “counter-trolling” as “trolling” all the same and treat it as harshly if they do have a position against it.

Once more . . . try to adhere to “Wheaton’s Law”, people. Not GIFT.

Tyyphoon.5301:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Please note, “taking matters into your own hands” may result in you being the one reported and acted against.

Not if its within ToS. No? That is what I understand from the recent threads going on in these forums.

Are you willing to gamble on it with your account? Because I’m not sure premeditated disruption, intentionally premeditated disruption mind you, is within the ToS.

floude.5291:

Please answer this Chris. You made a ranger CDI and what we got? All the answers you gave was the same ‘Not in design, you say x but we’ll do y’. Man you pick the most useless point from the cdi (OH THE MIGHTY GREAT POISON MASTER) and added it to the game.
As long as you use CDIs as tools to persuade your changes to people and shelters to say “But we asked for this and you wanted it!!11!”, thanks but no need for CDIs.

You heard it here, folks. No need for CDIs anymore.

Please note, “taking matters into your own hands” may result in you being the one reported and acted against.

Nicholas S Lin.6187:

Really now? I’ll wager 100 Dolyaks that it is actually proof of future invasion plans.

Do you have 100 Dolyaks to wager? I’ll only take one, mind you, but the one I want is unfortunately long dead.

-holds up a Red Iris-

They’re . . . more than likely not soulbound.

Dreadful.2860:

Astral Projections.7320:

They would have to be breaking TOS. If they are annoying you but not doing anything against the rules, then I don’t think so.

That’s what I figured, maybe one day they’ll give us invite only maps or change future world bosses. Because right now single person being able to mess up a fight on purpose that takes 120 people working together. With no chance of punishment seems really strange to me.

They won’t do invite-only maps unless they decide to scrap servers altogether and go back to “district X” or instanced world zones like with GW1.

. . . one of those is not going to happen.

Labjax.2465:

True, there is only so much you can do about it. I guess my point was more that the general population is not going to go around trying to justify these peoples’ behavior just because they can get away with it.

Exactly, and that is why there are people defending both the people doing the event fail loop and those who closed the loop as doing the right thing.

. . . wait . . .

Labjax.2465:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Welcome to life. This is how it goes, honestly.

But people do get called out in life… or other people stop hanging out with them and ostracize them. Or they get the kitten kicked out of them silently.

Everything up to “kicking the crap out of them” is also legal, and might actually work unless they don’t care. Trolls exist in RL too, and the only thing keeping them in check is the threat of impending physical violence . . . unless they know the law won’t protect the person who threw the first punch.

Of course, the problem arises same as it does in the game – there is very little to really stop someone from being a pest if they stay entirely within the rule of law. In the game, really toxic people can have the final trump card played and have ANet just terminate their service. This is not something which can be done to some jerk who pays only in pennies for purchases over ten dollars and insists on counting it out one at a time . . .

Ashen.2907:

Perhaps, but acting in that manner is in violation of the, “law,” of the land here.

Entirely noted. I wish more people subscribed to “Wheaton’s Law” instead of Tycho’s GIFT. Unfortunately . . . -shrugs-

Palador.2170:

Arikyali.5804:

Oh sweet, thank you. At least it won’t feel like a total waste of deleting them.

But let me clarify – that vine backpiece is alive?

Yep!

Not after I poison that bloodstone dust it eats.

Labjax.2465:

So it sounds like you’re saying that as long as you’re not breaking the law, you can be the worst person possible to others and no one should dare call you out on it.

Welcome to life. This is how it goes, honestly.

Lostwingman.5034:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Strange. That map doesn’t look like Queensdale.

It does, the bigger island in the middle is Shaemoor Garrison. The smaller island South of it is the Altar Brook Trading Post. Scaver plateau is another mark and I guess the map might not be updated for the centaur attack but there are buildings where the marker is on that map. Then to the northeast of that is the skritt cave.

Nope, all I see is Cantha.

The charr are going to Cantha.

Palador.2170:

Vayne.8563:

Other things have happened in WvW, including account bound WxP, but the thing is, I keep hearing WvW people saying nothing has been doing and listing stuff and ignoring EotM.

You mean they didn’t spend a year working on that?

Disclaimer: I don’t play PvP or WvW.

I think the problem with EotM is that it doesn’t matter what you do there. There’s an actual contest to WvW, and actions taken in EotM simply don’t count for it. It’s WvW based, though, so it leaves it in an odd grey area.

It was supposed to be something for people who wanted to get into WvW and had to queue up for servers which weren’t low-tier to get some play in rather than waiting X hours.

Honestly I’m surprised it turned out so well.

Angel McCoy.1832:

We are always discussing ways to get more player agency into the game. It’s not as easy or as simple as any of us would like, however.

Free advice on that? Since the Living Story has become divorced from the open world and thus doesn’t need to follow a perfectly synonymous path for everyone due to that?

Cheat.

Have there be choices which affects what happens. Have there be consequences for choices later on. You don’t need to unify it so the whole of the world is on the same page, because they’re all living their own instances . . . for the most part.

Even if it’s minor things like which allies you keep and which you tell off, or who you choose to save who otherwise would be inconsequential if they died . . . but since they lived, you can get something out of it later.

I play DM for a D&D game and my biggest tool is knowing the flow of the story and having the chance to change it on the fly if the players . . . those wacky, lovable rapscallions . . . decide to stab the guard captain giving them a hard time and dispose of his body in the moat rather than try to win his respect or apply diplomacy. (Including shouting out “dibs on his armor” as they do it.) I can invent something later on which makes them regret doing that hasty act born of boredom.

You don’t have the option to do it quite as well . . . but you can still cheat just as effectively and create the illusion of player agency in minor ways which goes a good distance to creating the feel of “this is my story”. Even if it’s not.

And besides, once you can get it working for minor things . . . then you can get it working for bigger things.

NewTrain.7549:

Apparently it’s impossible to create repeatable content that’s actually fun each time you play.

I’m still waiting on Nethack to be fun any time I play. Or Gnomoria.

On the other hand . . . UFO: Enemy Unknown by Microprose? Still fun every time.

ipan, how is it you have three times as many posts as anyone else in this thread and have half as much to say? Without actually listening to the points from the more reasonable people who I know hate the grindy bits . . .

I’ll try to break it down from what I understand. This may run long.

First, your point. Farming is a fundamental flaw in MMO design. I agree, this is indeed something which exists as a flaw, which begins when we attach “monsters drop loot which can then be transformed into something more useful, such as liquid cash” to “monsters are infinitely respawning”. What we get is “monsters are an infinite source of loot which can be sold”.

This moves into another issue which is usually tangential but it impacts the “farming” issue right here: inflation.

When money is, in effect, only bounded by the time which is spent on getting it, then there is a real danger of those who have more time to produce more money or more goods to turn into money on a player market.

What this means is people, like me, who have been playing since the first day a character could be created and not wiped . . . could conceivably have more money than anyone else on the server if they did nothing but farm infinitely repeating monsters all the time. And you’re not going to stop that because it is the laziest effective way to make money. (Effective, not efficient. Most efficient would be flipping specific goods on the player market.)

This is something not restricted just to MMOs, mind you. It’s just mostly called “grinding” on single player games. And it’s existed in the RPG/Adventure genre for a long time now. So far back we can point to Roguelikes which had farms in them. Here have proof that I’m not joking.

My point, to break it down: There is always going to be a ‘farm’ so long as infinitely respawning enemies drop an infinitely possible loot table, except if Diminishing Returns or “anti-farm-code” exists. We all hate DR, especially because it bites at the worst times and takes forever to stop. But that’s supposed to be there to prevent farming from being infinitely lucrative by introducing a boundary near which the loot chance approaches (but never reaches) 0.

So, you want the developers to stop farming from existing? Fantastic. Let’s hear how we’re supposed to do that without messing up the systems which make an MMO actually function. Such as respawning enemies, and loot drops. Or you can find the magic bullet somewhere in the deep forgotten recesses of time which has always been present since the dawn of RPGs which makes farming obsolete enough to be unsatisfactory.

Mental Paradox.3845:

I’ve been depressed and completely alone for years. Games offer an escape, but it doesn’t stop me from feeling empty inside.

It only magnifies it for me, during those periods where I am sitting up after my night shift and go: “what the heck am I doing with my life”. It just hits harder, even though I am very . . . very . . . motivated and working hard to try to get promotions and career advancement through what my job offers.

It’s just . . . I dunno, it’s hard to fight.